Oh...how pleasant... || Passport job, solo

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The white snow is falling from the starlit skies...

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Words: 1,007 words

Formal procedures for travel were nothing but a nusiance for many, but for a particular snow mage they were boring, tedious, and otherwise unproductive in anything other than dissuading the masses from leaving their home countries and traveling abroad. She could have easily forged some papers or gotten a temporary permit to enter a country at the border, she supposed, but, given that she had previously acquired a passport to travel with in her explorations of years past, it was more than likely easier to get it renewed than it was to go through the trouble and money to purchase fake documents.  So, Ms. Evolan was stuck in line at the notary’s office in Rose Garden waiting for her turn to talk to a person at the desk to get her travel documents renewed. It was an easy task to sit there and wait, but trying to keep occupied while doing so was frustrating, and many of the people she had the privileage of sitting next to in the waiting area were unpleasant and nusiances, to say the least. One of them was an overweight woman, munching loudly on some potato chips and regularly spilling crumbs or licking the salt off her fingers; the other was a man jabbering constantly on his iLac about something or another to a friend or his wife or whoever happened to be on the other end. Grace couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to have to talk to him: his hair was greasy, his face unshaven, and his suit wrinkled and bearing faint coffee stains on the edges of his coat and pants.

The now guildless mage had brought a book with her in case that the wait started to drag on, but she found it impossible to concentrate on anything in her current situation. Between having to regularly wipe crumbs off her coat and skirt from the woman on her left, and constantly wanting to throw the man’s device at the wall to get him to shut up, it most certainly was not an environment conducive to reading or pursuing any sort of enjoyment out of introverted activities. She patiently tapped her fingers on the cover of the book—a compendium of information about phenomena in cold weather—but was increasingly becoming impatient with the two people sitting next to her. Minutes ticked on, and on, but eventually she heard the sound of a clerk in a nearby cubicle saying ‘next!’ Taking that as her cue, she got up and held her book at her waist, wiping any crumbs that happened to drift on to her garments; as she walked past the overweight woman, she discreetly froze her fat lips shut as repayment.

Not waiting to get any satisfaction out of the confusion that would most definitely be caused by her little act of revenge, the mage rounded the corner to the cubicle and nodded a greeting to the receptionist. The girl sitting on the otherside of the desk looked to be a year or two younger than Grace, with straight auburn hair and a pair of gleaming green eyes.

“What can I do for you today Miss...”

“Evolan,” Grace said. Reaching into her inner coat pocket, she pulled out her old passport and opened it up to the page with all of the identification information. “I was planning to take a trip out of Fiore in the next couple of months,” she explained, “But, I realized that my passport has been expired for almost six months. I was looking to see if I could get it renewed and have some information updated.”

The woman on the other side of the desk moved the passport over to get a closer look, her curiosity evident as she thumbed through it a bit; the pages of the booklet were covered in stamps and ink from Grace’s travels. After a moment, she pulled out a clipboard with some paperwork on it and a pen.

“Well, Ms. Evolan,” she said, “I can certainly take care of that for you. I do have a few questions to ask though, for the new one.”

“Of course,” Grace replied, shifting in her chair a bit to get more comfortable.

“Have you had any residency changes or changes in guild membership during the past six months?” she asked, “You’re currently listed as being a member of Lamia Scale and living in Hargeon.”

“I’m no longer a member,” she explained, “Currently I’m living on my own in Oak Town.”

After jotting her response down, the receptionist looked over the old one again and filled in the personal information. “Would you mind looking over the personal information and filling in some missing details for me?” she asked.

“Not at all,” she replied, taking the clipboard and the pen as she was handed them. Much of the missing information had to do with her medical history and contact information, which she filled out in short order before signing at the bottom. After a moment, she handed the clipboard back to the receptionist, who doubled checked to make sure everything was filled out.

“If you would, please stand by the wall in front of the camera,” she said, “After we get your picture, we’ll be done~”

Doing as she was told, the snow mage got up and stood at the wall facing the camera, placing her feet behind the line as she did. After a moment, the flash went off, and the receptionist said, “Alright, turn to the left.” She did, and the flash went off again. “And now the right.” Once more, and the flash went off.

After the pictures were taken, Grace walked back to the chair and sat down as the receptionist explained that it would take about a week for the new passport to be processed, and about another for it to be mailed out to Oak Town. A few minutes of conversation afterwards, mostly about the book the snow mage had brought with her, and she was out the door and walking towards the train station to head back home...