World of Warcraft®

It was amazing how much dust had already accumulated in the AAMS warehouse. Or maybe it had been shipped to Booty Bay with everything else, who knew? Kezrin sneezed for the third time, which had nothing to do with cold she didn't actually have.

She'd left Sidonwy's note on Derscha's desk, which said that she should take another week off from regular courier duties. For some reason the bossgnome's desk was a disaster zone, but Kezrin dutifully put the note in her in-box then ran away as fast as she could before Derscha could question her on it. Looking through shipment records was an easy enough task and would keep her out of the bossgnome's field of vision.

She had already gone through the most recent delivery receipts and hadn't found a match to Abominus's strange crate. "Three four four point four something something five," she murmured under her breath; he hadn't been able to give her the whole number on the crate, but it didn't sound quite like one of their filing systems.

(Granted, it seemed like the AAMS filing system changed as often as management. Meaning: fairly regularly.)

The number was likely from whoever packaged the crate originally; if she could find a record or crate with a similarly formatted number, she'd at least know who sent the crate.

So she was looking through the AAMS warehouse for clues. The dusty room was stacked high with crates and file folders in stacks towering above Kezrin's head, in blatant disregard to goblin accessibility. Possibly Vutago from the general way things were simply tossed together. She forced herself to breath slowly and push away the tendrils of claustrophobia.

"Ah-ha!"

Her eyes were drawn to a particularly messy corner, where one of the stacks had fallen over. One of the overturned crates bore the same markings as Abominus's creepy, stalkerish crate. She examined it for any other signs.

Larsim Laboratories
Hold for pickup.
Crate 1 of 2.

One of two?

She looked back at the fallen stack. . . or perhaps tipped over would be a better description? And now that she looked closely, was that a trail in the dust?

That settled it. She was not opening that crate unless she had a haz-mat team ready and full MLA procedures in place.

((On an OOC note, I will not be available for the next few days and apologize for not getting on this sooner.))

It became fairly obvious why Arrayah had hired a dedicated researcher to shift through the older records. Gerthi had been warned that the AAMS' record keeping had been somewhat… shaken up… when they had moved offices, and that even before that particular event, there had been inconsistencies.

No matter. Her job was not to organize, merely locate. She had a time limit to adhere to. After the first couple of days in the archives, she had most of the files separated into "likely," "not likely," and "incomprehensible." If there were any documentation of the original agreement with Abominus, she'd find it.

Assuming said documentation hadn't been lost, eaten by various animals, destroyed by spirit-possessed priestesses, burned in a fire, tossed info Lake Darrowmere, handled by Spriggel, or affected by one of the other numerous disasters that had visited the AAMS. . .

It was tedious work, and every few hours she'd get up and take a short walk to relieve stiff muscles. It was during one of those walks she heard the first whispers.

"It's not safe anymore. You couldn't pay me to go in there." One of the forsaken staff workers was speaking to a blood elf.

"But someone has to get the packages…"

"Assuming they're even there anymore! I'm telling you, it's eating the deliveries! Or worse!"

"Ah, what be the issue here?" Gerthi asked her.

"There is something in the warehouse," the forsaken said seriously. "It ate the bolt of cloth I stored in there."

"Did it now, hmm? Why would a critter be doing that?"

"Because something in there… is mutating things! Didn't you hear what happened to the rabbits?"

"Da rabbits?"

"Someone left a crate of rabbits in there… and they vanished… food turned into stone…. a fox turned into a scaly dragon-type thing."

"Don't forget the mana wrymling," the blood elf reminded. "Turned into a gnome."

The forsaken rolled her eyes at him. "No, I'm pretty sure that one is only a story. That's just too scary."

Gerthi shook her head, placing her hands on her hips. "I'm sure it all be some sort of simple mistake, yes? Da AAMS not be the best at organizing things, I have learned. Perhaps ya had better be double-checkin' where ya be putting things."

"No, it's the THING, I'm telling you," the forsaken insisted. "This wasn't happening before we had to mark off a portion of the warehouse."

"No? Why ya be doin' dat?"

The forsaken leaned in close, her voice dropping to a low, dry whisper. "Because there's a possible package for the Maggot Lord running loose."

"Is dere, now?" Gerthi smiled broadly. "Why don''t ya be tellin' me all about dat?"

Yes, it was fairly obvious why Arrayah had hired someone to find those records. . .

A rustling noise came from one end of the warehouse, before an entire stack of crates shifted. From behind and to the left, came Bralox, package held high above his head in triumph. "Anniversary present." He grunted. "Three months ago..." It was tucked under his arm in due course, the orc turning around to regard the large mess. "Can't we just right up a form that would let us rid ourselves of this all by fire and start over?"

Koudo jumped off the crate she had been sitting on crashing loudly to the ground, having forgotten she was still wearing plate. She blushed fiercely as she struggled to stand up and regain her composer.

Looking as if nothing had happened she looked up with large worried eyes and spoke hastily “Fire? Surely you are joking? Right?”