A Wrinkle in Time

"T-this...This is n-not g-g-good," he stuttered, rubbing his head roughly and setting a few pieces of hair and dandruff flying. He paced across his workroom, knocking over several mannequins and concept prints. Scrunched-up pieces of paper overflowed his trash bin and he couldn't help but feel quite a bit of panic. His work for the bride's wedding dress was due today—well, the prototype of it, anyway—and he wasn't anywhere near completion of the basic rough sketch, much less the actual proto-dress!

He took deep breaths in-and-out before forcing himself to still and calm. It would do no use for him to ruin even more of his hard work and push himself even further into the ditch he worked himself into. He had already hired several contractors to help him with his work and, if they come, then he might be able to finish the project. He sat in his rolling chair, slumped, and used his feet to propel himself back, feeling the rush and whiz of the air pass him. "It's okay Lachlan, you can do this," he reassured himself, hand ruffling his hair back once again.

@Ortix Farlin @Eridan Kalorann @Sera Phim

 

Sera found herself wandering the town, cursing to herself under her breath. Time to go over things, from the start - she'd logged into this game, made her way to this town, almost immediately found a help wanted posting about helping a man design a wedding dress, that prompted a quest start thing, which she accepted, and then realized that it was supposed to be started soon. After a few moment, she found the place she was pretty sure was the right place.

When she looked in, however, she saw a man rolling around on a rolling chair, which seemed very unlike anything that would normally be involved in the creation of a wedding dress, but then again Sera had never made a wedding dress herself before, so what did she know?

"Hello?" She half asked, half said to the man, unsure if he wanted to be distracted. "Uh, my name is Sera Phim... I'm here about helping out with the creation of a wedding dress?" She stepped inside the room. It was rather messy, which seemed fitting of a creative type. There were a few mannequins, but none of them were donned with anything that could really be a wedding dress that would be finished any time soon, if at all. "I'm not entirely sure if this is the right place. If it's not, could you be so kind as to point me where I actually need to be?"

 

Ortix wandered the streets Pormont with the taste of regret in his mouth.

"Why did I accept this nonsensical quest, I mean what was I thinking? Tailoring and Leatherworking are two entirely different skills." He let out heavy sigh, placed his hands in his pockets, and continued to stroll. The speed of his stroll was so drastically slow it appeared almost as if he wanted to be late, but his punctual nature would hardly allow it. Looking at his feet now, he began to study the cobbled road. Ortix admired the patience the developers must have put in to design the texture of the whole road differently so that every square foot had no equal.

Right when he had finally relaxed, he heard a slight commotion ahead. His glance toward it was only met by a piece of paper which had flown directly into his face as if it was magnetized. A short struggle later, he was free from the paper's grasp. He held in his hands a crudely drawn wedding dress. Now remembering the objective of his quest, Ortix looked around until he spotted a rather small shop, crowded with mannequins instead of people. A woman stood in the door way and a short white haired boy in the center of the mannequins with a concerned look on his face.

"Oh boy... This must be the place."

@Lachlan @Sera Phim @Eridan Kalorann

 

He had been walking through the streets of the city, marvelling at the details that he could gleam. It was still amazing to him how realistic Virtual Reality was - and that he was in it.

Eridan had spent his first few hours in game making his way to and through the city, familiarizing himself with it. And one point, he'd found a notice board with a request for help from a tailor. Even though he did not have that skill, it would benefit him as a magic user so he accepted the quest.

As he approached the place, he noticed two other people along with the very worried-looking tailor, surrounded by mannequins and drawings of dresses. "Hello." He greeted, smiling affably. "I'm here to help with a wedding dress."

@Lachlan @Sera Phim @Ortix Farlin

 

Lachlan turned quickly, falling out of his chair and landing on his bottom to the ground, his mouth slack with shock and surprise. The sudden greeting and the door openings had startled him. "I-If this is a-about the debt then y-you've messed with t-the wrong p-person!" he shouted, closing his eyes and picking up the closest thing next to him. He waved it as a weapon and, incidentally, it was a writing utensil commonly called a pencil. Thus, as the three people entered and greeted, they were greeted to the sight of this glorified mess.

Then, he opened his eyes slowly to look around carefully, wary of the strangers. He was still and stiff for a few seconds until he their words finally went through his ears and his eyes recognized his guests. "Oh," he slumped, dropping the pencil to the floor with a quiet clack.

"You're here for the dress thing I put up, right?" he sighed, scratching his head. "Well you can go home now. It's hopeless."

@Sera Phim @Ortix Farlin @Eridan Kalorann

 

Sera frowned at the terrible and pathetic sight that she was greeted with when she looked into the door. She sighed heavily. "You're threatening me with a pencil. Are you aware of the fact that such an item is not usually feared? Sure, it can hurt, but so can a lot of other things, quite a few of which I can do myself."

When the man told her to give up on the dress thing and to go home because it was hopeless, Sera froze for the briefest of seconds. Was he serious? This asshole had asked people to come help him, and immediately upon their arrival, he was going to turn them away? No. She was not going to fail her first question just because the person she was supposed to be helping had decided now was a good time to have some existential crisis over their lack of creative skills, and how they should have listened to their parents and gone into college for a real major, or whatever this world's equivalent of that shit was.

"No," she said flatly. She was dimly aware of the other two players who had come to also assist. Whether they stayed or left, she didn't care. She was going to see this mission through to the end, no matter what it took, even if she had to drag this poor creature to the end of his own mission behind her. She walked toward the man and put her hands on his shoulders. Because of her height, this might not have been the most intimidating thing in the world, but she put on something that was a cross between a scowl of disapproval and a glare of angry. "You are not giving up on this," she told him. "Because if you give up once, you've told yourself it's okay to give up. So then you'll give up the next time, and the time after that. Sure, early on, you might only give up when it seems so hopeless you can't move on. But by the end of things, you'll give up at the first chance there's even a sign that there might be trouble! You'll grow old, having never achieved your dreams. Everyone will remember you and know you as 'that one person who gave up before he ever could accomplish anything, in whatever he tried to put his poor little mind to.' You'll die, alone, unhappy, bitter at the world, but more importantly bitter at yourself because you'll know. You'll know that your entire life from this point on was ruined because you gave up once. You mentioned debt? Well guess what, if you give up now, you'll never be able to pay that debt off. You know who'll have to? Anyone who might love you - though why they would love someone who gives up all the time would be a mystery to themselves as much as it is to me, and you'd always wonder too. Because you'd be a burden to them. So no, you are not giving up."

"And you know what else? This is some girl's wedding dress you're supposed to be making. How the fuck do you think she'll feel, knowing that her 'perfect day' was ruined because you decided it was just too hard? Because you decided you couldn't at least give it one more damn try? What was supposed to be the happiest day of her life, and now she doesn't even have a wedding dress? No. You're not doing that to whoever that girl is. I am not going to allow you to, do you understand? I don't care if we have to start over, with nothing but a tree to cut down and some rocks to shift through, we will make a piece of paper, we will fashion a pencil, we will draw until we find the perfect design that will make the perfect dress to make that girl's perfect day. We are going to do it, and we will have it done in time for that girl to be able to try it on, and tell us every little thing we got wrong, and then we will fix it. And then if we have to, we'll fix it again. And again. And again. Because people just don't make things perfectly the first time around. They try. They fuck it up. So they try again. And they fuck it up, but this time a bit less. So they try a third time, and they keep on trying until finally, they can't tell that they're fucked it up anymore. So then they send it to someone with fresh eyes, and that person tells them how they fucked it up. And then, and only then, is something truly beautiful made. The journey and the process is hard, but beautiful to see the results. So stand up, get your balls back out of whatever part of this messy studio you've kept them in up until this point, and clear a space to start doing some drawing. You are going to make the dress that will be worn on the day that every dream of a beautiful girl finally comes true."

 

Ortix, still across the street, began his approach. The woman that was in the door was now inside clutching the white haired kid by the shoulders with a very angered expression on her face.

"Oh boy, this is gonna be good!" He said to the other man standing in front of the shop, while pressing his own face up against the shops glass window. The woman made a long and meaningful speech, Ortix didn't really care about that though. He was simply there to make a dress and collect his rightful reward. He then moved over to the doorway and waited for the woman to finish yelling before introducing himself.

"Hello, my names Ortix and I'm also here for the quest." He said to the woman. Then pointing to the young man,

"Also, what she said" with a stern look on his face. "So get up off the floor, we got a dress to make." Ortix said while cracking his knuckles and lifting Lachlan up to his feet by his armpits. He proceeded to pat the dust off Lachlan's shoulders and back and to fix his hat. There was a short pause.

"So uh... what do we do first?

@Lachlan @Sera Phim @Eridan Kalorann

 

His walking in seemed to have triggered some sort of panic attack on the diminutive tailor. Before he could do anything to try and calm him down, the woman started giving a rather rousing speech that Eridan received with warm applause.

"Like she said, you have no excuse now. Let's do this!" He approached a table filled with sketches and peered over them carefully as he waited for further instruction.

@Lachlan @Sera Phim @Ortix Farlin

 

Lachlan had never felt his heart beat so fast in his life. He had never felt so close to death before, either. Was this is reward for leaving the village to go off and explore? If so, then go ahead and give him a one-way ticket back because he's not standing for this lack of respect for his own character! ...Well, that was what he told himself but he was a bit too busy trying not to piss his pants. But he still swore, to hell and back, that he would definitely give the three a piece of his mind! But, of course, a true warrior and hero knows how to set their priorities in order and, currently, he supposed the best course of action would be to rush to the bathroom and loosen his bladder there before he makes (another) mess out of his work area.

So, without another word, Lachlan vanished from Ortix's grip and into the bathroom where, after relieving himself, flashed back in with a calm, collected face. Or, at least with what he thought was a calm, collected face. In fact, he was just a shivering wreck who couldn't help but have little body spasms at the sight of these three rambling, monstrous, uncivilized beasts! How could they lay a hand on him? He still had dust all over his perfectly tailored outfit, for god's sake! He snarled a bit to maintain his image and showcase his wrath perfectly.

"Y-you think t-that you can b-bully me into making that d-dress?!" he spoke albeit with a voice that hindered on a whisper. "I-I w-won't, who cares about s-some stupid w-woman!" he cried.

Then he seemed to realize what he said and flinched, looking back at the three. "I-I mean," he stuttered, continuing and trying to remedy his mistake. He'd rather not get held up again and, perhaps, get beaten up by this pack of brutes. "J-just get me some i-ideas idiots! Like a m-magazine or something!" he shouted, hoping they'd just go away. It was hopeless anyway and the sooner he got rid of these guys, the better.

@Sera Phim @Ortix Farlin @Eridan Kalorann

 

Sera sighed heavily at the man's antics and raised a hand to her forehead, slowly, in a sign of exasperation. She rubbed her temples with her middle finger and thumb. Okay, tough love wasn't going to work. "Look, you asked for help," she pointed out to him. "We're not going to hurt you, we just want you to succeed. Or something like that," she said. "And I care. I care about stupid women. I care a lot about women in general."

Sera turned to the two men who'd come to help as well. "You two heard the man. Either of you know where we could get a magazine from? I assume he doesn't mean playboy... I'll stay here with him, make sure he doesn't try anything stupid. I'm Sera Phim, by the way," she said. "Well, I guess the other option is we design the wedding dress for him..." she sighed and turned back to Lachlan. "If we just designed the dress for you, would you be able to make it?"

 

Ortix let the woman take charge, as if she wouldn't have anyways. He then took a task and ran with it, literally.

"Okay... I guess I'll be on magazine duty. I saw a shop with some a little ways back on my way here. It won't even take me 10 minutes. You guys get to work and keep this little clown in check. I'll be back soon. Good luck." Without waiting for a response, Ortix walked out the door to begin his small trek. He lied. He hadn't seen any magazines, let alone magazine shops in the entire town. He didn't even know if magazines existed in this game until the wedding dress kid, what's-his-face, said something about them.

"Thank god I'm outta there... This whole quest is starting to look like a pain in the ass. In the off chance that I do find a magazine AND it's about wedding dresses I guess I'll have actually helped out by the time this ends..." Slowly, Ortix made his way to the outskirts of the town. His plan was to make and entire lap around before coming back. At least that way he could enjoy the view.

@Sera Phim @Eridan Kalorann @Lachlan