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Acquaintanceship-982, often simply Acquaintanceship, and referred to as Mr Acquaintanceship in Oz, was a Mark X Clockwork Cherub of the Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids.
Description
Personality
As leader of the Blue Feather, Acquaintanceship was weighed down by the lack of respect his team got, as well as his difficulty in keeping his antics-prone underlings in line. He was desperate to be taken seriously by the rest of the Crew, and prone to throwing his all even to relatively minor endeavour, hoping each new trivial misadventure would be his ticket to destiny. Despite this tenuous grasp on reality, he was also capable of genuinely effective deductive reasoning if his wits were applied to a genuine problem. (PROSE: Acquaintanceship-982 and the Missing Mail Mystery)
Biography
Early work in the Blue Feather
The Blue Feather were originally housed in a derelict warehouse located on the opposite side of the Mainland Cloud, where Acquaintanceship had to use an upside-down crate as a desk. They weren't given missions of any importance, and indeed, it could be months in-between the missions they did get, disappointing as they were. For example, they once went months without any assignments at all after “the Great Grape Jelly Stain Catastrophe”, their grandiloquent name for the occasion upon which Marmalade-624 spilled grape jelly on his tablecloth and hired the Blue Feather to wash it off. (PROSE: Acquaintanceship-982 and the Missing Mail Mystery)
New headquarters
On April 29th, 2019, (PROSE: The Faction of the Fooling Fish) they were hired by Philatel-426 for an unusually significant operation: locating a bag of mail that had gone missing from the Cupid Post Office. They unsuccessfully interviewed a number of “suspects” — otherwise known as people who happened to be glimpsed at some level of proximity to the Post Office on the day of the crime — but at the last minute, Acquaintanceship realised the truth and actually solved the mystery: Philatel had himself stolen the mailbag, which contained blueprints meant to be transmitted from the Department of Architecture to the Department of Construction so that the latter could begin work on a new giant warehouse. The construction would have involved the destruction of the Post Office's west wing, which was officially vacant, but which Philatel secretly used to store his stamp collection. Rather than turn him in to the Department of Discipline, the Blue Feather blackmailed him into letting them use the selfsame west wing as a new HQ, while convincing the Department of Construction to build their new warehouse on their old site instead.
Just as they were getting settled in, Colonel-028 rushed into their new office with a new mystery to investigate: the theft of a pie from his windowsill. (PROSE: Acquaintanceship-982 and the Missing Mail Mystery) Having badgered badgered the Cupid Parliament into authorising an official investigation, he set the Blue Feather on the task. Following a trail of pie-crumbs, the Blue Feather found a Rift leading to the Faction of the Fooling Fish's headquarters in the Prime Universe, where they briefly confronted the Faction for the first time. After fleeing back through the Rift, they got the Department of Rifts to close it. After the Rifts reopened and had to be closed a second time after a second Fooling Fish incursion, the Blue Feather were assigned to guarding the location of the Rift, in case it opened again. (PROSE: The Faction of the Fooling Fish)
Continued efforts in the Blue Feather
Some time later, Acquaintanceship excitedly gathered the Blue Feather to tell them about their new mission (locating Investigation-464's misplaced coat). When the Cupid claiming to be Pessimist expressed enthusiasm at the prospect, Acquaintanceship finally realised that it was not Pessimist-242 but a cheap duplicate, and that the real article had gone missing. With the help of Pessimist's Fog Ship, they realised that he had been taken prisoner by the Drove of the Database-Compiling Dromedaries on the Prime Earth. Although the Ship briefly disappeared and stranded them in the Prime Universe, having been commandeered by Dromedary Head Assistant Researcher Darius, it returned almost immediately, having taken care of Darius with the help of Lord Thymon. The Blue Feather returned to the Homeworld and set forth in search of the missing coat. (PROSE: Pessimist and the Dromedaries)
When the Copper-Colored Council of Elders put the Cupid Suggestion Box in place, Acquaintanceship used it to leave a note suggesting that the Blue Feather be upgraded to replace the Scarlet Wings as the Crew's primary topics. When the Council rejected the proposal, pointing out the Blue Feather's less-than-impressive track record, Acquaintanceship tried to prop up its reputation by leaving an “anonymous” note praising the group, but the Council immediately saw through the charade and banned Acquaintanceship from using the Suggestion Box again. (PROSE: The Cupid Suggestion Box)
Mission to Oz
Acquaintanceship-982 was later assigned a solo romanticising mission to the Emerald City of Oz in one universe, where he was meant to romanticise at least one hundred people. Arriving in his Fog Ship, he made his way to the City, meeting the Guardian of the Gates, but was quickly whisked off to the Royal Palace by Omby Amby, who had mistaken him for Tik-Tok. There, he was led to a huge meetings of Ozites convened by Ozma to investigate the mysterious theft of the Magic Belt, Magic Picture and Great Book of Records, three of the most powerful artefacts in the land. Learning that romanticising the Ozites would be pointless anyway because they were all already under the effects of the Love Magnet which hung over the City's threshold, Acquaintanceship agreed to help them track down the thieves instead in the hope of romanticising them, and offered to fly them around the Land in his Fog Ship after it turned out the thieves had also dismantled Ozma's royal carriage.
First stopping in Munchkin Country, the possé met the Phonograph of Oz, who had spotted the thieves: a trio of imps who had been turned into buttons by the Wizard of Oz many years ago, long enough ago that the spell had faded on its own. Thanks to the Phonograph's directions, Acquaintanceship knew to fly towards Winkie Country, but on the way through the forest which separated the two Countries, they were attacked by three kalidahs. After evading them, they reached the mountains of Jinxland in Quadling Country, where they found not only the imps, but also their master: ex-Wicked Witch of the South Blinkie, now once again in possession of magical powers thanks to the Belt. Gloating, Blinkie unveiled a field full of hundreds of imp statues, which she intended to bring to life as an unstoppable army using the Powder of Life. Acquaintanceship attempted to romanticise Blinkie right there and then, but his shot missed and instead knocked the bottle Powder out of her hands. Taking his chance, Acquaintanceship grabbed the bottle and ran off with it into his Fog Ship, but Blinkie (who had yet to realise he had the Powder and thought he was just escaping) used the Belt to cause him to crash into the forest.
Acquaintanceship was unharmed, but the Ship was down. Out of other options, he used some of the Powder of Life to attempt to repair his Ship, with the effect of bringing it to life as a sentient entity. Startled, he dropped the rest of the Powder onto his bow and arrows, which similarly came to life. Together, they returned to Jinxland and managed to romanticise Blinkie and the Imps, who subsequently apologised to everyone and returned the magical items. However, the Ship's inexperience with flying itself caused it to crash again with Acquaintanceship itself, injuring him this time. With the Bow and Arrows finding them, however, the Imps worked with Tik-Tok to repair both of them. Healed, Acquaintanceship was offered the chance to stay in the Emerald Palace as a permanent resident but turned it down, unlike the Ship, Bow and Arrows. With the Ship staying behind, Dorothy thus used the power of the Magic Belt to send Acquaintanceship back to the Cupid Homeworld instead.
There, having elected not to elaborate on his adventures and the fact that the Ship, Bow and Arrow had turned sentient and “rebelled” of their own accord, Acquaintanceship was castigated by Penalty-534 for his unimpressive romanticisation record and for losing his equipment. To punish him, Penalty immediately assigned him another mission, to a magical land considered even more of a hassle to deal with than Oz: Wonderland. (PROSE: The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids)
Late 2019
As leader of the Blue Feather, Acquaintanceship was technically a member of the Cupid Parliament, and made an effort to attend every session, but his suggestions were not usually listened to. He was present at the debate concerning whose responsibility it was to change the ink in Stenographer-123's typewriter, struggling to be heard as usual. After illusory magic rabbits flooded the Cupid Parliament building, however, one of his suggestions was finally officially accepted as he became the first to officially “motion that we run for it”. (PROSE: Magic Trick)
On Christmas Day, with Celebration-665 having introduced the holiday to the Homeworld for the first time as the Festival of Giving, (PROSE: The Frost King's Treasure) Dandy-432 organised a dinner party in the Blue Feather's wing of the Department of Postal Services' building. Acquaintanceship attended it with the rest of the Blue Feather. In a possible version of the party where Philatel-426 had declined Dandy's invitation, shown to Philatel by the Ghost of Christmas Present, Acquaintanceship reacted to Dandy's summary of his talk with Philatel by declaring that the Postmaster was “missing a fine party”. After waking from his Christmas Carolesque tribulations, Philatel wound up attending the party after all, and partaking in the various party games with which they followed up the dinner. (PROSE: A Copper-Colored Christmas Carol)