Ranma

"Hey, could you do me a favor? Bring this package of meat over to our scribe, will you, she hasn't eaten all day!"

That was how it started. It's how it always starts. You're always eager to help, of course, it's just that it's a busy clan you live in and sometimes people forget how truly awful you are at helping. You mean well. You take the package with excited violet eyes, and bounce-spin off to carefully deliver it - at least, that's what you intended to do when you started the motion. Mid-leap, you catch sight of someone you meant to talk to yesterday. You angle all six of your wings, change trajectory, and dive-bomb the poor nervous Wildclaw.

"Hey! I was just wondering if you'd heard about the new batch of eggs they hatched yesterday and I was told to ask you to watch them but that was also yesterday, come to think of it, so maybe they found someone else to do it? Really terribly sorry though that I didn't tell you earlier, this is probably useless information now but I figured I ought to pass it along anyway, might as well, right?" You pause for a breath and, long-used to your antics, your clanmate interrupts before you can go any further.

"Hey, it's all right. She knows you tend to... forget things, so she made sure to have someone else pass the message along later just in case you'd misplaced your thought." Her smile is forgiving enough to let you ignore the news that tasks handed over to you are basically considered pointless now. "Run along, I think one of the others is looking for you. Something about a missing familiar?"

Oh no, you'd clean forgotten! Three days ago you'd found someone's familiar, wandering stray, and you'd set up an ad to help it find its dragon. You thank the Wildclaw quickly and zip off in a different direction. You have to find the person who'd replied to your ad - no, you have to pick up the familiar from your den first. You do a u-turn in midair and head straight back where you came from, and a little past.

Someone else is waiting for you, a little Fae. It takes you a moment to remember why he's there, but then you sigh and have to resist the urge to bonk your head against the nearest cave wall. "Sorry, sorry. Yeah, I'll get your treasure for you, completely slipped my mind you were coming by today, really..." Your voice trails off as you head deeper into your quarters, and you fetch the proper amount before returning outside. "Here you go!"

"Thanks for keeping it for me!" he chirps, as cheerful as one can get if one's only option is monotone. "Didn't want my visiting cousins to get their hands on it, you understand."

You mumble something distractedly about of course you do, you've had the same troubles yourself at some point or other, and then you're nudging your way out of your lair convinced that you're forgetting something. You almost look down to check what this squishy thing wrapped in paper is that you're holding, but then you bump nose-first into an Imperial lady in your distraction.

"Oh, hello," she goes, blinking in confusion. "Did you need anything?"

"I have no idea what I'm doing," you admit.

She smiles kindly and says, "None of us do, dear." You shake your head, open your mouth to explain, but then you remember what you were doing and hurl yourself back into your den.

Pick up the familiar, brush past the bewildered Fae - what is he still doing in your den? Oh, has it only been thirty seconds since you left? - and make a beeline for the direction the Wildclaw had indicated. Or were you following someone else's instructions? You can't remember, so you just keep forging on, because it's better to be doing something less urgent than something not productive at all.

You nearly barrel into your target, but you suppose it's a good thing you reached her at all. She's a fellow spiral, your companion in absentmindedness and misplacing things, and she's delighted to have her familiar back. She thanks you profusely, and you have to force yourself to leave and not be invited to lunch tomorrow as thanks. You're pretty sure you had something planned for tomorrow, but will you really remember before you miss it? Probably not, if you're being honest.

Once you leave the other spiral, you hover a moment in midair, suddenly unsure of your direction. Where do you go now? What's the most important thing on your to-do list, and can you even remember anything on your to-do list in the first place? All your flying around and 180-turns catch up with you, and you settle on the ground with a motion like a falling ribbon, coiling into a pile and almost knotting up your tail end. There's no point in going anywhere right now unless you can figure out where you're going - if you end up heading in the wrong direction it's counterproductive to have to turn around and head back. But just sitting here feels wrong down to your bones, the lack of motion settling in your teeth and making you frown. Even when you sleep, it's an on-off switch: one to the other, and no in-between zero-motion idleness.

You go to rest your head on your front paws so you can better dwell on your despondency, but a crinkle makes you sit all the way back up again. What's that you're holding, there? Have you been holding that all this time? Wow. But seeing it reminds you - your poor clan scribe never remembers to eat, and this package is sorely needed if the dragon it's from is to be believed.

The way to her office is clear; you've been on errands there many a time, and you think you'd be considered a friend to the dragon practically living there if she wasn't always too busy for interaction. But today you seem to have caught her on her break: she's lounging out front for once, in all her shimmery Guardian glory. She seems pleased to see you, which immediately cheers you up.

"Hey! I brought you some food, sorry I'm late-"

And another thing is she's never afraid to cut you off. "What d'you mean you're late, you're right on time! Any earlier and I'd have bitten your nose off for interrupting." Her grin tells you she's joking. You pass over the slightly-squashed package, and she accepts it gratefully. "You know, you might think of starting some sort of courier business. You're fast as shadows at sunset when you've got your mind to something, and iffen you've got some sorta list mayhaps you'll forget less."

You mull on her words all the way home. (Between her office and your den, you settle another three previously-forgotten favours, but instead of mulling over how long it took you, you're just glad you finished them at all.) It's long past time when you should have picked up a niche in this clan, and she might be right. A list would definitely help, anyway.

Written by cinderrain