Clary:
The
truck looked like the sort of thing you might want to drive to the Apocalypse in. The wagon it towed might have been a foreshadowing of a happier, more whimsical world to come afterward. Clary pulled in and, with a compass built into a handmade brass-and-oak dashboard, angled for the closest thing she could get to a north-south parking spot on the edge of the parking lot, where she'd be out of the way of ordinary vehicles.
Dismounting, she unsnapped the olive-drab tarp from the pickup's canopy to reveal the PV solar cells that covered the canopy's shell. She stowed the tarp, then retrieved her sailwing wind turbine and fastened it to the telescoping mast attached to the rear of the pickup. She unfolded the sailings and locked them into place. Unlike heavier conventional wind turbine blades, they were more like high-performance sport kites, made from tensioned fabric and bamboo struts. The fabric sported colorful batik designs incorporating ideograms from Tibetan prayer flags. She tightened the tension cables, then turned a crank to raise the mast. Might as well charge up the wagon's batteries, right?
Satisfied, she locked up the truck and headed into the store.
"
I make soup because it's the most cost effective way to eat a meal and-" a geeky-looking guy said to a cute girl at the counter--both employees, apparently. Clary arched an eyebrow, but resisted the temptation to suggest a hydroponic gardening system as an alternative to industrially-extruded ramen, at least, if that was the kind of "cost-effective soup" he was talking about. He fumbled his way toward inviting the girl over for soup. Both were blushy and awkward, but also kindof adorable, so Clary decided not to interrupt. She wasn't in a race, after all. She poked around a little, and found the book section, where a young woman was looking quite flustered as she set about trying to deconstruct an Eiffel Tower of Books and reorganize them.
Huh? Okaaay, Clary thought, wondering why the budding architect would be creating book displays without the consent of the person apparently running the book section. There was a lot of book-reorganizing to do (the book-architect had been quite industrious), and it would probably all need to be done before Clary started bringing in stacks of her own books to prepare for today's event.
"Pardon me, can I give you a hand?" she asked. "Name's Clary Shae." Dressed in a billowy linen blouse, caramel colored leather doublet and kilt, bison leather belt with capacious utility pouches, matching calf-boots with rows of gear-shaped brass buckles running up the front, flowing white scarf, and of course, her brass goggles, Clary looked like she'd just stepped off of a pirate airship, or maybe come in out of the Wasteland. "I'm the author of
Don't Wait for the Zombies and
Carnival at the End of the World, got a reading, discussion and book-signing here for today. You the person I need t' talk to 'bout settin' up?"
@Noctis the Devious
Hayley's mind was still in full rant mode when she turned, arms full of books, but was stopped in her tracks - both mentally and physically - when a freak'n steampunk pirate asked her about setting up and introducing herself as the writter of two of the books currently on the recently neglected reading list she had been meaning to get around to. Somewhere between fangirling over the choice of attire - she absolutely loved the style - and panicking over the fact her floor, nor her for that matter, was not prepared for this, the grip on the mound of books pressed against her chest slackened and said literary works tumbled to the floor, startling the gawking brunett out of her, well, gawk. "
