All for One and One for a Book (Solo, Job)

Job:

Spoiler:

"Ugh.. Another boring job." Cirven spoke out as he walked around the area of Peace Village. He had just arrived and was looking for the house where his client was waiting for him. After finding the house he examined it slightly while getting closer to its door. The house didn't have anything that made it stand out too much but that seemed like a common thing in the area. He knocked on the door but no one answered. The blue-haired sixteen year old grew somewhat annoyed and knocked again to receive no response.

"Hello? Anybody there?" He spoke out as he knocked a third time. Again there was no answer so instead of waiting any longer Cirven decided to just walk inside possibly thinking that the client didn't hear him or at least that is what he told himself to hide the fact that it was really his want to just get the job over with.

The house was decorated with picture frames of people and trinkets that were set up on shelves. He moved through the house cautiously so that he didn't damage anything. He found his way into the kitchen of the home but after all his looking still didn't find anyone. He heard something behind him and turned around to see the bottom of a frying pan.

Cirven jumped back and grasped at his aching skull which started to form a lump. He looked at the elderly woman who had just hit him with the frying pan and spoke while still in pain. "What the hell!! I came here for a job to find some book!!" He then placed both hands over the lump as if that would help with the swelling.

The elderly woman laughed at the boy. "Why didn't you just say so?" She spoke after her short laugh. He stared at her sternly before speaking. "You didn't answer the door or give me any sort of time to do so, grandma!" She laughed again. "Oh, oh! This is pretty true. I was into one of my shows and didn't want to get up from it until now." Cirven mumbled curses in his head while trying to calm himself.

"Do you have a bag of ice or anything? I need to stop this from swelling up so much even though I think the damage has been done." The old woman smiled at Cirven and pointed to the pan. "Maybe I can slam that lump down..?" Cirven put out his hands to stop her before she could try anything. "No, no! Just nevermind the lump. I'll deal with it later. Could you tell me about the job though? I am Cirven Mizune by the way and I'd like to get this job over with."

She put the pan down on a near by counter and nodded to Cirven. "Thats fine. I wanted to get back to my shows soon anyways." She then dug into a drawer near her and pulled out a picture. She smiled at it before showing Cirven. She gave it to him to look at himself. It was a picture of a dark haired boy holding a book and a woman hugging him from behind, both with big smiles on their faces.

"That is a picture of my son and I from a long time ago." Cirven raised an eyebrow and switched from looking at the elderly woman and the woman in the picture a few times. "The years look like they caught up to you.. Errmm.. I mean.." The elderly woman reached for the pan again. "Caught up to you in a great way! The wrinkles really compliment your face!" Cirven tried to cover up his previous comment but feared he was pretty bad at complimenting under pressure.

"You really think so?!" She seemed to kind of glow as she spoke. "Yeah. Completely..."

Cirven didn't know how she fell for that but figured maybe she had lived alone for so long that any type of compliment would do. "But yea, what does this picture have to do with anything? Am I after that book in the picture?"

She nodded. "Yes. Its a book that I used to read to him when he was younger and is one of my favorite. I used to read many books to him back then but nothing affected him more than that book. He used to try and be the characters from it while playing and always asked for me to be one of the villains." Cirven thought to himself of how fitting that actually could have been with her personality. "I wanted to read through the story again when my son comes to visit in a couple days but this same book has been out of print for many years. I wanted to rent this book from the village library but I would have too many problems with going myself and searching for it. That is why I hired you. I want you to go and find this book at the library for me and rent it."

"If it is so old are you sure they have it there? Would rather avoid going on a sort of wild goose chase." Cirven cut in as she stopped for a breath before continuing. "Yes, I am sure they do. It is a classic after all so they would have to have it." Cirven sighed and thought of how annoying this job could get on top of how it already was. "This book have a name?"

The woman pointed at the picture still in Cirven's hand and rolled her finger in a circle-like motion. Cirven looked at the picture and then flipped it over to see some words written down on the back. "The Three Duck Swordsmen. Why does this sound like a children's fairy tale book?"

"Maybe because it is one. I'll let you use that picture to help you remember it." In the background some voices could be heard talking. "Oh, oh! Its back on! You can see yourself out, right?" Before Cirven could respond the woman walked away from him and into another room.

He had to restrain himself from just crumbling up the picture and just leaving the woman to find another, more willing worker for the job but then he thought of how she looked when she first pulled out the picture. He had a soft spot for helping people anyways even though he would sometimes get annoyed doing it.

With a moan and some steps he found himself back outside the home but remembered he didn't exactly know where the town library was. He thought about bothering the old lady again but quickly decided against it with how the lump on his head started to pulse at just the thought of crossing through the doorway.

He managed to find upon the library after asking people where it was along the way which wasn't too bad for him but he had a feeling that things were about to change soon. The library was fairly small which was expected from such a village but it was a different story once inside. Shelves seemed to be lined up for miles to him which was probably to blame for his not want to not really do the job.

He was happy to see that they at least had the shelves lettered with signs hanging above each of them which started to make him feel as if this job was going to be easier than his gut feeling was telling him. He found the T-section and noticed that there was a female librarian in the section shelving books. He then started to look at the books in the section but was confused by what he saw. The books in the section were not all starting with the letter T and actually were every other letter thrown in there.

"Excuse me, miss." Cirven spoke out and turned to the woman. "You know that this section is completely unorganized. It has books from other sections everywhere here."

"Oh, yes. I'm sorry. There are these children who come in here and ruin everything by moving the books around. If you can find what you are looking for I'd be happy to let you rent it but otherwise I'm too busy to help you find your book."

Cirven's left eye gave off a twitch to her comment but he held his anger in. "So a wild goose chase just about.. Peachy.." He then went back to looking through the section. [color:c106=#v]"Thank you for your help, every last good piece of it." The librarian smiled and gave a nod then went back to fixing the shelves.

Time flew by and Cirven was still in the library looking for the book. He had gone through multiple sections but still didn't find it. He couldn't believe that some kids had nothing better to do than ruin some library sections. After all, there was so much to do outside that didn't get you in trouble or bother anyone and was still fun.

He heard some kids laughing near him and decided to go and try to find the source. There were two boys and a girl grabbing books from the shelf on the other side of the section he was looking. He made his way in front of them where he attempted to confront them. "Hey! What are you kids doing?! Do you know how much work it takes to fix this?!"

The kids stopped in their tracks and stared at Cirven. "Run before he gets us!" One of the boys said and threw a book at Cirven which he easily dodged but the kids ran off each holding a book.

As the kids attempted to run off Cirven saw that one of them was holding the book that he was looking for all this time. His eyes widened at the sight and he started to run after the kids. "Hey! Stop! I just want that book with the ducks with swords on it!"

The kids didn't listen and kept running each going a different direction but Cirven followed after the boy who held the book he was after. Hey kid! come on! I just want that book! The boy was surprisingly fast for his age but Cirven was still faster. He got close enough to the boy where he could grab him but before he could the boy turned around a corner into another section of books.

"UGH! Damn it! I said stop!" Cirven had to come to a complete stop in order to follow the boy so that left him losing how close he had just gotten but he then ran as fast as he could towards the boy again.

The boy looked back to see how close Cirven had gotten as he turned around another corner. When he turned his head back to where he was going he went face first into a book shelf at the end of a path, falling over after hitting it. The shelf moved from the child hitting it and dropped books off from it. The books started to fall towards the fallen child.

Cirven saw as the boy hit the shelf and ran faster to catch up with him. The frightened boy saw as the blue-haired mage came after him and cringed in fear while covering his face with the book he held. Once close enough, Cirven wrapped his arms around the boy and protected him from being hit by the books by using his own body.

"You OK, kid?" Cirven let go of the boy and stood up. "You are kind of lucky I was chasing you there." Cirven tried his hardest to not show the pain on his face from being hit on the head by one of the falling books.

"Ben!?" A woman ran up to the boy and hugged him. "Are you OK?" The boy hugged his mother back and used one hand to point at Cirven. "I'm fine, mama. That guy saved me." The woman let go of her son and looked at Cirven. "I saw what you did for my son. Thank you. If there is anything I can do just ask."

Cirven leaned down to the boy and grabbed the book from out of his hands. "All I want is this book but make sure you teach him to not mess around with this library anymore." He gave a wink to the boy as a way of telling him what he really meant before raising back up to his feet. "Take care, ma'am."

By the time Cirven had finally gotten out of the library the sun had started to go down. He couldn't believe it took him so long to find the book but he had to blame some of it on the librarian too because it took him some extra time to find her again in that maze of books.

He figured he had some time on his hands with the walk he was taking so he started to skim through the book out of boredom. The story was about three ducks that are turned into human-like versions of themselves through a spell and start a swordsmen group to fight against evil. Cirven didn't read everything but he managed to get the gist of it.

He thought the book was childish and too cliche but he knew that it meant a lot more to the old woman. To her it probably resembled a time when she had her son around and wasn't as lonely or he thought it was something like that.

He arrived at the old woman's home and knocked on the door. This time she answered but she still held the frying pan from earlier up above her. "Bothering me during my shows..!!" She stopped herself. "Oh its you! How'd the book hunt go?" Cirven presented the book to her. "Don't worry about that. Just take it, OK?"

She smiled warmly at the book and then at him as she took it. She put the book down on a counter inside and came back out with jewels for Cirven. Cirven tried to push it away and shake his head but the woman raised the frying pan from earlier with her other hand. Cirven smiled and took the jewels as well as the hug that followed it from the old woman then left her.

He was happy about how it all ended but after a few weeks would receive a letter for a late fee for the book he checked out for the old woman.