[OPEN] For business.

[refinery]

#1 - At your service!

Ah, telephones. A luxury item. They're mostly reserved for people with enough money to live in Borough #1 or people of high status, but today could be a very lucky day! Maybe! Satoru is going door to door with a mission and that mission is to sell telephones. Or sell something. Sure, his main goal is to convince consumers that they need a telephone and simply can't live without it, but telephones are still a little pricey. So! Every telephone salesman needs a backup plan. He has a variety of backups carefully packed away in a sack. Plus, he's got an arsenal of skills. Leaky roof? He can fix that! Empty fridge? He can go shopping for you! Whatever it takes to make people think (even more!) positively of Varrick's business.

So, ahem. Knock knock!

#2 - Breaktime! Part I

It's less of a break and more of a "finished with work" kind of thing, but Satoru has taken refuge in Avatar Korra Park, something he finds a little funny because he'd only recently learned the name of the current Avatar. Oops. At the moment, it's around sunset and he's demonstrating quite the skill! The "cannot play sports" skill, if you will. He's doing it mostly to pass time (and to probably forget about how terrible of a salesman he is), so he doesn't seem too bothered when he misses his ball with the stick he's using, or when the ball doesn't go very far. At least he has a good attitude about it.

3 - Breaktime! Part II

Okay, so sports aren't his thing but that's fine. Sports aren't his passion! Engineering is. So he's ditched the ball and his stick he stole from nearby a poor, defenseless tree and pulls out a sheet of parchment. Instead of drawing a blueprint of anything—he's 100% sure he'll never build anything as cool as one of those airships any time soon—he folds it up into a paper airship instead. By the time he's got something airworthy, the sun's just about finished setting. To be honest, Satoru thinks his build is pretty good for it being made out of a sheet of parchment. When he throws it in the air, it even flies a little. Hooray!

Things are pretty terrific! Until he excitedly catches the paper airship and it catches ablaze out of nowhere. What. No. WHY?!

"C-Combustible paper?! Do they make that here?!"

Satoru instinctively drops the burning paper and it drops into the grass. At least he has the brains to snuff out the fire with the heel of his boot before it can spread. Hopefully... no one saw that....

"Who invents that kind of thing, anyway?"

Comments

3

[windfire_donuts]

That laughter Satoru hears as the paper ship explodes into flame isn't his imagination, but belongs to a boy about his age not far off who saw the whole thing. At first he'd been entranced by how the thing managed to glide a bit, but the way the young engineer panicked struck him as frankly hilarious.

"You're not a very good firebender, are you?"

[refinery]

NO ONE WAS SUPPOSED TO SEE THAT! He has a habit of making a fool of himself, especially as of late, but this was just getting ridiculous. Satoru knelt on the ground, poking at the blackened parchment with a contemplative frown on his face.

"Of course not," he said slowly, his cheeks a little red from embarrassment. "I'm not a firebender at all."

[windfire_donuts]

Nezha laced his fingers behind his head as he peered down at the boy lamenting his lost paper ship.

"You sure?" He sure looked a lot like a small child first discovering their bending, but it would certainly be odd for someone to get to his age before their bending emerged. "That looked like firebending to me. Sort of."

[refinery]

Satoru gathered the remains of the paper airship into his hands. Completely irreparable. Oh well. At least he hadn't spent his afternoon drawing up blueprints. That would have been devastating.

"I couldn't firebend to save my life," he said wistfully as he stood back up and held the ruined paper up so he could view it from all angles. "But I do agree that it's weird. Paper doesn't just... combust like that. Still, I can assure you that the paper would have more luck firebending than me."

From the look on Satoru's face, it seemed he was well aware of how ridiculous that explanation sounded. Either way, it sounded more plausible than him being a firebender. "Believe me," he added. "I've tried.

[windfire_donuts]

Nezha canted his head. For a moment, he considered pressing the matter, but eventually decided that he didn't really care enough, and besides, arguing would take effort.

"What was that supposed to be, anyway? Before it exploded."

[refinery]

That was probably a question the guy would regret asking. Once Satoru got going, he had a hard time shutting up.

"Oh! It was a paper airship. I've heard all about them but never got to see one close up, so I decided I'd try my hand at making one. Well, out of paper instead of steel. It's... a lot cheaper. I just wish it hadn't suddenly gone up in flames. It was still pretty neat, even if it was just made out of paper."

It was at that point where he finally seemed to realize he was rambling. "Sorry for the long explanation. Um... have you seen one up close before? An airship?"

[windfire_donuts]

On the contrary, the brunet listened with a good deal of interest... for the first few seconds, but it quickly tapered off and he found his attention being drawn elsewhere. At least until Satoru brought it back with his question.

"Hm? I've ridden in one." A bunch of times, in fact. His father being a politician meant they did a lot of traveling. Well, not anymore, it seemed. "They're okay, I guess."

3

[gainedacoupon]

Somewhere behind him Jin was clapping her hands in awe.

" Can you do that again," Jin asked with excitement in her voice. She happen to notice Satoru when she took a break from her own job and decided to follow him just because. She kind of felt like she got off on the wrong foot with him or something like that and she wanted to fix it. Well that is until she was distracted by this fire that came out of nowhere.

[refinery]

Oh, no. Now there was applause. Geeze, his face couldn't get much redder than this.

"H-Hello, Jin." No, he couldn't do it again. He wasn't a firebender. He wasn't! If he were a firebender he'd have had a heck of a lot easier time being an engineer! "I'm not really sure what happened, but I'm pretty sure I can't do it again."

[gainedacoupon]

"Awww, well that was still pretty cool," she said with an amused smile.

She wandered over to the paper that was now in ashes and poked at it with her sandal. Did they really make paper that exploded into fire in this time period? Seems like a waste of good paper!

[refinery]

"You think so...?" Satoru raised a brow at her. Personally, he liked the paper airship before it burned to ashes, but the fire was kind of neat... if only it hadn't startled him so much.

"Have you ever come across paper like that before?"

[gainedacoupon]

She shook her head with a sheepish smile. She couldn't really tell him why though. She had to keep it hush hush that her and others were from another time period.

" I'm afraid not. It's really different. Maybe it's a Republic City thing."

[refinery]

"Yeah, maybe." He frowned at the ashes of his paper airship. "Heh. I must come off like such a tourist. Sorry about that. But you know, the more I think about it, the more unlikely it seems. Combustible paper could end up burning down a store."

On the other hand, it definitely wasn't him. Definitely.

[gainedacoupon]

" Are you kidding me? I'm way worse than you are. I'm pretty sure I've frightened my fair share of people who live here because I'm not familiar with a lot of these things."

She gave him a look with her hand on her hip.

1

[georgeous]

[ Having just moved in to his new apartment -any apartment at all- George doesn't really expect anybody to knock on his door.

Actually, he never expects anybody to knock on his door because at home he lived in a fancy mansion and people simply knew better than to come by unannounced. In that sense, both apartment and knocking are a setback and, frankly, a let-down.

Despite this, he opens and fakes a smile. ]

What is it?

[refinery]

Hello!

[ He smiles brightly, but it's tinged with a bit of nervousness. This isn't going to woooooork. Nobody wants to be bothered with things like this, he just knows it! ]

Could I borrow a few moments of your time...?

[georgeous]

[ George raises his eyebrow and the smile immediately take on a condescending tone. Even on alien worlds... ]

You've already started doing just that, so continue.

[ He's totally going to leave you standing in the doorway though, not stepping to the side just yet. ]

[refinery]

[ Oh boy. It almost seems like breaking and entering now. ]

O-Oh! Right, sorry, sorry. Well, if you've heard of Varrick Industries, you know that the company has supplied Republic City with some great, ground-breaking technology and... the company feels that everyone should be able to communicate to their friends and loved ones more easily. So I guess my first question is... do you... have a telephone...?

[ It's hard to sound confident when the person you're talking to seems bothered by your presence! But hey, he doesn't mind standing in the hall for this conversation. It wouldn't be the first time. ]

Because no one has done it yet, #2!

[lavamylife]

[And because I'm horrible to Bolin.

[Bolin is on his training regimen for pro-bending, and today that requires him to get out of the gym and go for a run. And there's no better place to do that than Avatar Korra Park! ... Since after all it's named after one of his best friends, so it's a good place to connect with her when he's not actually connecting with her in the physical sense. Or something. It makes sense in Bolin's head.

[At any rate, Bolin just happens to be in a jog as he passes by while Satoru is playing sportsball. And it just so happens that Satoru will have either the best or worst luck of his life when a ball that he actually does manage to hit comes sailing right towards Bolin.]

Whoa!

[Bolin practically stumbles as he manages to (just barely) avoid the projectile. But in doing so he's going to fall to the ground, causing a small dustcloud from the pathway to float upwards around him.]

[refinery]

[ HOORAY! HE HIT THE BALL! At least it won't be connecting with Bolin. Grateful for this guy's quick reaction time, Satoru drops his stick and runs right over to him. He might not be great with a ball (or maybe he is considering he nearly clobbered the guy), but he's a fast runner. ]

I'm so sorry! Are you okay? It didn't actually hit you, did it?

[ Satoru offers both f his hands so he can help Bolin to his feet. ]

[lavamylife]

[Bolin is uninjured; he's taken worse hits with the ground in the pro-bending ring, though his shirt is a little dusty, which is no big deal for Bolin. He allows Satoru to help him up; after all, he seems like a nice guy... as do most people Bolin meets.]

Oh yeah, I'm totally fine. I really should have been paying attention there because, [he whistles as he makes his hand zing by his face in a straight line,] that thing was close. I didn't realize how far they could get hit.

Thanks for seeing that I'm okay though!

[refinery]

No way, it's not your fault at all. Although I'm actually surprised I hit the ball that time....

[ Seems like one hit out of ten attempts. Maybe it was better that he hadn't been counting. ]

You're... sure you're okay? You seem sturdy and all, but...

[lavamylife]

Me? Oh yeah, yeah. I've taken worse hits than that in the pro-bending ring, believe me. This is absolutely nothing.

[He certainly does seem alright.]

Oh, by the way, I'm Bolin. You?

I know this is ten years late and I apologize four million times for that

[refinery]

[ ..Pro-bending.... Oh! Right! That arena... thing in the city. ]

My name's Satoru. Part-time engineer, part-time can't-play-ball-to-save-my-life. Again, I'm really sorry about that. I know you said you're fine, but...

[ But it's embarrassing to nearly hit someone while practicing. ]

Are you sure there's nothing I can do to make it up to you?

FIRED! (oh alright, i forgive you)

[lavamylife]

Hey, you could have fooled me about the can't-play-ball thing. I mean, that thing went whooooooosh right through the air. [This is totally accompanied by a hand motion of Bolin's hand sailing through an imaginary sky before streaking past his face.] It really was pretty incredible. I'd say you're better than you think!

[Nonetheless, Bolin shakes his head.]

Hey, I've been hit with boulders before. Falling on the ground isn't going to rough me up.