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Moving to Willowridge hadn't been your first option, but it was the only one that made financial sense. You were going to school at E.U. for business management, but Coleville was just too expensive, even living in the dorms, so you transferred to the Willowridge campus. There was an apartment complex with plenty of studio apartments for the college kids, and you rented the only ground floor apartment they had left. There was a trade-off, of course. You didn't have to climb up and down seven flights of stairs every day because the elevator was perpetually broken, but you did hear every argument, party, and session of loud sex your neighbors decided to have.
Well, college life was college life, regardless of where you lived.
The only real problem was that the water was an odd color and tasted funny, and before your first day in your new place was over, you were in the hospital for suspected salmonella poisoning. You were in the hospital for over two days, and when you were released, there was a large stranger in your apartment, looking under your kitchen sink.
"Excuse me," You said in alarm.
The stranger jumped and hit his head on the cabinet, swearing and dropping a wrench. He stood up, and you could see he was wearing a workman's jumpsuit. You were suddenly confronted with a solid wall of man, easily seven feet tall, with a broad... everything. He was a troll, you realized, and judging from the dusty, pebbly texture of his skin to the tusks jutting out from his lower jaw to the hair like green moss that curled around his ears, he was a field troll.
Trolls were distantly related to orcs, though they didn't have the same warrior culture as orcs did, if you recalled correctly. They were typically creatures of nature, keeping to the forests and mountains, often seen as slow or stupid. You weren't sure if those claims were true or not. You'd met a few before, and they seemed normal to you.
"Sorry," He said very slowly, his voice deep. "Are you... the one... that... got sick?"
"Yes," You replied, coming inside the apartment but leaving the door open. "And who are you?"
"Sorry," He repeated. "I'm Geteb. I'm the... plumber... for the building. I came to... fix the pipes."
"Oh," You said. "What was wrong with them?"
"The pipe... that p--pulls water.... from the city... broke... and street water... got in it," He replied in the same slow cadence. "That's why you... got sick. Your apartment is... the first in the line. When you... got s--sick, we shut it... off. We only just now... turned it back on."
"Well, I guess it's good no one else got sick, then," You said, trying not to come across as bitter.
"I'm sorry... you did," He said solemnly, though it was an odd sound, like a puppy whimpering after being scolded. "I... b--brought you... clean water." He pointed to several jugs of water that were stacked along the wall in the kitchen area.
