Before the precinct warden can log the rusted sword's serial number into his heavy wooden tally book, a sweeping feudal retainer—his silk robes billowing dramatically through the damp maritime fog like an agitated department head bursting into an open-plan office—interception-slides directly into Ryan's path. With a breathless, high-pitched urgency that sounded suspiciously like a frantic vendor reporting a missing staging crate five minutes before a product launch, the retainer demands an immediate, itemized accounting for the missing mate to the blade before the strict sunset muster locks the perimeter gates.
Ryan lets out another long, soul-weary exhale, the kind usually reserved for discovering that an external catering supplier had delivered half-defrosted beverage pallets to a downtown pop-up activation. Shifting the heavy canvas strap of his messenger bag across his aching shoulder, he reaches into his coat pocket and rolls his mundane plastic ballpoint pen between his fingers. With the deadpan diplomacy of an events coordinator accustomed to smoothing over logistics bottlenecks, he meets the retainer's furious glare with a mild, steady expression. "If the primary asset tag wasn't logged properly during the cross-docking phase," Ryan murmurs, his tone entirely level, "I can file a discrepancy report, but really, we should check the auxiliary holding bay before we start talking about a muster penalty."