Fandom Island and Town

Okay, so there was a dance tonight, and Jim had been lined up with a blind date, which was kind of exciting, and kind of... weird. Back home, he was very much a minority, and it was kind of difficult to date within the species. Which he was sort of a fan of. Not that he judged anyone who wasn't, sure. People came in all sorts of weird and wonderful shapes and sizes and all of that. But he had enough trouble wrapping his head around girls in the first place, never mind alien ones.

So, gold star to Fandom for being full of human-shaped ladies.

He was going to just spend his shift at the Portalocity Office wondering what in the world he was supposed to do to keep a human-shaped lady that he didn't really know entertained for an evening.

While skilfully ignoring a mess of complaints that kept going to the company's voicemail. While he didn't really agree with Portalocity's customer service policies (or lack thereof), he was pretty sure that organizing the interdimensional delivery of several million exotic species of man-eating flower bouquets was not actually his job.

[Open!]

Jim had shown up for his first shift at the Portalocity Office this morning, blissfully ignorant of any strange goings-on around the island today. Really, he was more worried about the quizzes that he had to take before he could be considered an actual employee of Portalocity.

Look, Jim was out in the middle of space when Portalocity was really sucking. This was new and exciting, even for him.

Question 58.

A customer fresh through the portal approaches you with a wild look in his eye, ranting about alien brain slugs and maple and ginger instant oatmeal. Occasionally he changes languages and continues his rant in alien tongues that you are completely unfamiliar with. What do you do?

A. While he's speaking, use Portalocity's travel guides to select the most expensive route possible and suggest an exciting tour of several systems, eras, and pits of primordial soup, all of which showcase oatmeal in some capacity.
B. Tell him about Portalocity's new Interstellar Traveller Program, explaining at length the Babel Fish* promotion for only $49.99 (American, Earth Standard) upon registration.
C. Call security.
D. Assuming you are an extraterrestrial with at least basic higher brain function** slug him. Explain the humorous context to this gesture if necessary.***
E. Refer him to Portalocity's hiring office. Cultural diversity and multilingualism are two traits that we value in our employees.
F. Smile and nod until his next portal arrives.
G. Quietly redirect his route through a Swiss Taco Bell and charge him for an extra passenger (the brain slug) while he isn't looking.

* Installation of Babel Fish not included, not available in some systems, Portalocity not liable for any damage caused to non-humanoid brain-stems by alien leeches provided through this promotion.
** All Portalocity employees are required to pass a basic IQ test prior to signing any contracts. Minimum IQ required for employment at Portalocity is π.
*** Many of Portalocity's customers are incapable of comprehending humor and have been known to become irrationally upset if you, for example, take a large chunk out of their jugular with your teeth after they complain that they haven't had a bite all day.

Jim had chuckled his way through most of the questions on these quizzes, but after a while he was starting to have his doubts.

"Wait... they're serious?"

[Open!]

Okay, so whatever had been going on around the island had let up, and the island had moved, and all was well again. It was. It really was. Except for one thing.

There was something bright and colorful and exciting looking just on the other side of the causeway, and once again, Jim was stuck at work.

Not that he'd spend his entire shift sulking because he couldn't run off to Disneyland to explore, or anything.

Just most of his shift.

Fixer-Uppers is open. And sulking.

[And OCD-Free!]

Jim had nearly outright refused to come in to work today. After all, what good was a repair shop where the employee on shift didn't even have hands?

Or, for that matter, one where he as so stupidly short that he couldn't see over the counter. The wings kind of managed to make up for that. A little. But it wasn't like he had any idea what he was doing with them, and he'd ended up knocking over a few things with a pair of hopelessly flailing hind legs before he'd just given up and landed on the counter.

He was pretty tiny. The counter would hold him.

"Because I'm not already short enough when I'm not a pony," he grumbled, before sitting down and trying to work a screwdriver with his mouth.

[Open, and OCD-free!]

Seeing as Jim worked on the weekends and that this was the one that kicked off break week, it seemed to him as though he had two options.

First, Jim could choose to sit around and mope because the island was parked in an awesome place, filled with awesome things to see, and here he was, stuck inside and missing out on all of it on a weekend. And second, he could make the best of it, knowing that the rest of the week was going to be whatever he wanted to make of it, and what was one day inside doing something that he enjoyed doing, anyhow? Not a big deal at all, that's what it was.

In the end, Jim decided to strike a sort of happy medium, grabbing a tool belt and taking any of his smaller projects outside to work on, in the sunshine. Any of the bigger stuff, he'd still be stuck in the back for. But for things like telephones and alarm clocks? Being able to take that stuff just outside the door was awesome, and he was going to snoop around the shop for as many small appliances to tinker with as he could possibly find.

Even if it meant that he had a clear view of that horrifying sign of Rikku's for the majority of the day.

[Open!]

Another day in Japan, another day of rain. Jim sighed as he looked out the front window of Fixer-Uppers, chin resting in his hands, daydreaming of the good old days, where there was sunshine, and...

And mostly sunshine, really.

Once he got over the ho-hum attitude brought on by a week of rain, he'd probably get around to trying to work an alternative power source into his solar surfer. It had been a really fancy doorstop all week.

Sigh.

[Open! And OCD-free because I am lazy! LAZY.)

Well, Jim had survived his first week on Earth, for better or worse, and had somehow managed to get himself a job while he was at it. Considering the conditions of getting the job had involved him flying his surfer into a garbage can in an alleyway last weekend, he still wasn't entirely certain what to make of it all. The fact that his boss was apparently both insane and severely colorblind didn't help that much, either.

But getting to use the equipment here, and get paid for it?

Apparently, Jim had been sent to Heaven for summer camp, not Earth.

Today was going to be spent looking over all of the little odds and ends that were sitting around here, so that he could better acquaint himself to the differences between Earth technologies and the far more familiar materials that he worked with back home. So far, the lack of more solar-powered devices was getting kind of disappointing. The plug-in appliances were kind of cool, though.

The radio that he'd demolished in his efforts to figure out how they made use of electricity here probably didn't agree, so much. But on the plus side, when he put it together again with the help of a few other parts he'd found sitting around, it also doubled as a cellular phone. And a toaster.

[Open! And OCD-Free! Whee!]