Day 3: Shine/Shadow (Attzi)
Warnings: none/ maybe light stalker vibes?
Summary: Attzi gets a package (and I make canon something that keeps happening to her repeatedly in-game.)
Attzi was on Ripple, her favorite water bug in the whole wide world, running through Silvermoon and trying to find a mailbox. She was pretty sure a city this big and open shouldn’t be this hard to navigate, but finding where the gates were in the walls after having been here three times in ten years was proving difficult. Ripple’s feet clicked along the stones, and she kept an eye peeled for her goal, though she was becoming increasingly convinced that she’d be better off just delivering the letter personally.
She turned a corner, and a large building came into sight. Oh good, it was a bank, which meant there’d be mail. All she needed to do was find it….
“Excuse me,” asked a very tall, red-headed Blood Elf, who had one arm casually draped across a–
“Mailbox!” she yelled, pulling Ripple to a halt.
“...Excuse me?” the Blood Elf asked, in a very different tone this time.
Attzi hopped down from Ripple and started walking for the box. “Sorry. You’re kinda blockin’ what I’m after.” She pointed at the mailbox.
The Blood Elf pondered this for a moment, and then recovered, smiling brightly and shifting slightly to one side. “Well, I’m not one to often lose to a mailbox, but if it got you to stop, I have no complaints, miss…?”
“Attzi,” she said absently, closing the distance between them before stretching up and dropping her letter through the slot of the mailbox.
He said something indistinct. Crap. He was standing on her deaf side. She cocked her head, but only caught the last bit: “--ovely to meet you.”
“Yeah, likewise!” She tilted her head up, trying to remember if she had ever seen this guy before. “Sorry, uh, didja need somethin’?”
His bright grin showed again. “Well, yes, now that you mention it. I’m a tailor, and I was wondering if you might allow me to make you something as practice? I don’t typically work with the smaller races, you see….” He trailed off, green eyes clearly watching her for a reaction.
“Oh man, you’d need to measure me an’ stuff, right? I don’t got that kinda time today.” Attzi took a step back towards Ripple.
Those green eyes were clearly taking her measure. “Pity. Are you quite sure I can’t convince you otherwise? I have cloth that would suit your coloration quite well. It doesn’t sell as well here, as you might imagine.”
“Eh, you know how it is with Goblins an’ business, yeah?” She hopped back onto her bug friend and offered a bright smile, because after years of having manners for work, old habits were hard to quit.
…Was he pouting? She brought a hand to her mouth and coughed to stifle a giggle. “Whew. Ah. Was nice meetin’ ya all the same. May another short woman come through Silvermoon soon, buddy.”
Attzi rode off at that, but she could still feel him watching her until she managed to find the next gate and get closer to the woods outside Silvermoon.
She didn’t take the time to pause and write down the encounter, however, so by the next morning, she’d forgotten all about it. It happened. How could she tell whether or not every tiny encounter she had would be important later?
Attzi woke with a groan, from a nightmare of something large and green and dripping acid. She’d had just enough time to register the smell of chemical burning before jolting upright in her bed and looking around.
“...What the–?” She reached for her glasses and her notebook, which were neatly stacked atop one another on the table beside the bed, and let her notes fill her in on the bits her brain had sent to the Void. Solving the mystery of the day before was the typical start to her mornings these days.
As her eyes flicked back and forth across the page, she sighed and shook her head. What a fuckin’ embarassing initiation into the fighting side of the Frostbite Contingent. If they didn’t think she was deadweight after that, it’d be a miracle. So’s there’d need to be some damage control there.
“I need a lotta coffee,” she muttered, swinging off the side of her bed and kicking into her slippers, before grabbing her comfiest robe from where she’d left it on the floor the night before.
While the coffee brewed, she checked her mailbox, and was surprised to discover a sizeable wrapped parcel, sent from Silvermoon. She brought it into the kitchen and made her breakfast before giving in to curiosity and opening it.
Pulling back the parcel paper revealed some black and red cloth, as well as a small card. She picked that up first and read it over as she sipped her coffee.
Attzi,
I do so hope I got your sizes right. If not, you may find me at my shop in Silvermoon for a complementary fitting. I also accept compliments and accolades for a job well done, of course.
She stared at the note in confusion for a moment, and then set it aside. “What in the–?”
Attzi pulled out the first article of clothing, which turned out to be a stocking. “...Well, D definitely don’t stand for ‘Dave’, here,” she muttered, setting it aside and digging into the rest of the package. It contained another stocking, a set of strappy underwear, and a bit of cloth that could, potentially, be called a ‘top’.
She had a sip of coffee and moved for her notebook, flipping through the last five pages before giving up with a sigh. No clues or warnings about this had been written down.
…But at the same time, free clothes! She scooped them up and headed to her bedroom to try them on, because that’s where her biggest mirror was. On the one hand, it was a little scary that a blank spot in her memory knew her measurements, but on the other… Hey, they were kinda pretty, in a gaudy way. Not something she’d wear outside of Winter’s Veil, though. The red clashed real bad with her skin and hair. Attzi struck a few poses, laughing despite herself, before peeling off her new clothes and opening her closet to put them away.
The fabric that came to light as the door came open shimmered and shone in the light, largely in colors of teal and golden thread. She ran a thumb along the hanging shirts and dresses, remembering that all of them had been gifts, but not necessarily remembering who had given them to her. Attzi hadn’t had to buy any of her own clothes since she started doing trade deals for the Steamwheedle Cartel. Over the past few years, her wardrobe had become what other people sent her, and honestly, it was pretty convenient.
Usually, though, she knew who was sending her stuff. She settled her newest additions down into various drawers, close to the bottom because the colors really didn’t match her skin. There was a place for all things, sure, even the stuff that clashed. And whoever sent it had clearly tried, so who was she to turn up her nose?
Attzi shut the drawer, closed up her closet, and then returned to looking at the card that had come with the clothes, trying very hard to spark a memory.
Nothing came. The only thing in her memories were her coworkers, and a great creature that had melted everything that it touched. Anything else in her head that could help her had been melted away, as though the one memory she’d kept from last night had done the same damage in her mind as it had threatened to in real life.
Ah, well. Maybe the tailor'd left an address she could send a thanks to.
