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 Posted: Tue Feb 24, 2009 8:55 pm
It was as if the place had just sprung up overnight. This particular shopping square out of many in Erasmus hadn't seen much change in many years. The same restaurants and inns and butcher shops had always created its borders, the same stalls selling flowers and fish and fruit were set up every morning, and the same cries of hagglers and playful screams of children weaving their way between legs and under tables robbed the air of its silence throughout all hours of each day. Like every other part of the city devoted to the exchange of money-- and it seemed some days that the place had more businesses than houses-- it had its own special routine, with specific stores opening up at specific times and certain customers being friendly with certain shopowners. So it was, or at least that's how it had always been until a new store had forcefully wedged itself between the Warm Sunrise Inn and the little repair shop with no real name. And whatever it possessed that was trying to pass itself off as 'architecture' came very close to clashing with its neighbors, but barely avoided it in favor of sticking out so much and so strangely that only the blind would fail to notice its presence. Its colors were bright and cheerful, the front feeling humble and inviting once one got past the strangeness, and a sign over the door was more than pleased to give you the place's name. The Happy Mask Shop.
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Posted: Sat Feb 28, 2009 9:18 am
Strange things were ordinary in Link's life; since the acquisition of Midna into Link's home, unusual circumstances were... usual, really. Strange deliveries, odd rescue requests... all completely ordinary and regular for Link, at this point.
He'd quickly adjusted to unusual hours; going to bed around midnight, then waking up at five or so. It wasn't terrible, really. All it took was the willingness to get out of bed, and the knowing that he'd spend all of Saturday and Sunday catching up on sleep. (Unless, of course, some strange and unusual favor called him out of rest. Or Midna. It tended to switch between the two.) So, really, he wasn't terribly surprised when he'd been called out on favors this morning.
It'd started with a cat in a tree. Nothing too horribly unusual about that, so Link hadn't put much thought into the job. He'd hurried out quickly, and scrambled up the tree to the feline... only for it to jump down and scurry to the sewers when he'd been within reach. And, as usual, the owner was fully expecting him to get the thing from there, too. Friendly as ever, he'd held his nose, and plunged into the horrible world below the city. It wasn't horrible, really. Once you adjusted to the smell.
Three hours later, Link would say he was fairly well adjusted. Having finally secured the cat- (much to the creature's protests-) it was another hour before he'd made it to the surface, gotten rid of the cat, and made his way onto the rest of the day. There were plenty more deliveries to make, after all!
...Which had lead him here. The.. Happy Mask shop? Frowning slightly, Link scrunched his nose, double-checking to make sure he'd gotten the right address. It.. seemed to be the right place, anyway. Sighing lightly, he pulled the parcel out from his knapsack and headed inside the shop's entryway.
"Uhm... hello! My name's Link, and... delivery for you!"
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Posted: Sat Feb 28, 2009 10:42 am
If strange things were that commonplace in for the young Kanus, then opening the door to the new shop meant he was about to encounter an extravagant amount of normal. Not that the interior of the place seemed overly bizarre... it was furnished and trimmed with dark, well-polished wood, and the light earth tones spanning the walls were a strange but pleasing compliment to the bright colors it sported on the outside.
There were several displays visible from the doorway - most of them looked only partially finished, but the place still lived up to the expectations of its name. A variety of masks were peering down from the walls or out of display cases, some a bit odd, others outright disturbing, and more that were actually quite beautiful. In the space that could be afforded without disturbing customers too much were neat rows of careful stacks of boxes, each having its own color and design, that looked about the right size to hold one more mask in each. If one bothered to try and count them... well... there were dozens of them, if not a couple hundred.
Link would enter the room to see a rust-haired man, presumably the shopowner, bent down over a display case, carefully adjusting the merchandise inside. He took great care to ensure that everything was properly arranged. It just wouldn't do if one mask was tilted over by an unnoticeable millimeter or if a feather was weighed down by a speck of dust, oh no! And then there was the matter of choosing what item to put where, and how vital it was to ensure that all of the colors and shapes in the entire store would compliment each other just right....
...Oh. Someone was inside.
The vendor made one more tiny adjustment and rose to greet whoever this new arrival was, clasping his hands together and giving a small, cordial bow.
"Hello, and welcome! Please pardon the mess, if you could. I moved to this city just recently, you see, and am still in the process of setting up my little shop, here..."
His smile would have been right at home on one of those shelves.
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