Stellar Mistakes

The Secret in the Library

The next day, Lucy still did not have anything for her proposal. There was no edge, no surprise, and she could not come up with anything. She began to get a sinking feeling of hopelessness. Her friends mentioned that she was looking a lot paler these days.

She went to Fairy Tail's library in the basement. Although most things were on computer now, the company still kept this space, with rows of books and journals, some of it simply not available online. These were old commercials long forgotten, information about products that no longer existed, data on companies that went out of business before Lucy was even born, and the history of Fairy Tail's past work, stuff too boring or obsolete to bother archiving online.

Loke had told her not to be beholden to the past, but she was not getting anywhere. Maybe she could find something of the past that would spark an idea. She was desperate for anything.

The deeper she went into the library, the older the material got. On the very last shelf were records from the time when the company was rapidly growing, a boom in the economy timed with new star employees. There was a file of past proposals, and she recognized the name Precht Gaebolg, the former CEO of Fairy Tail. She saw a thick dossier from Yuri Dreyar, and Lucy wondered if that was the current CEO's father. There was even a treatise on the psychology of advertising on the post-war generation written by the founder of their company, Mavis Vermilion. Lucy really would have loved to read that, but it did not apply to modern audiences. She could not let herself get distracted.

She figured all of this would be too old; they probably did not even use the same buzzwords as modern ads. She was about to give up when she saw a cardboard box tucked away in a corner, almost as if to hide it. Although she told herself not to get distracted, perhaps it had something special. As she walked over and saw the other edge of the box, she saw a name written in sharpie: Loke Leo.

'No way! Mr. Leo's old works? This ... this is a treasure.'

Lucy dropped to the ground and pulled open the box. Sure enough, there were proposals in Loke's handwriting. The second she saw it, it was like she was struck by a blow to the stomach.

Rejected. And another one: rejected. Another proposal, and a different one. All of them rejected proposals, each of them a gem in her eyes, although rough. She could see how he had not yet polished his work, but he was creative. Oh, he was very good, even back then.

She pulled out an entire notebook filled with writing, ideas, facts, observances, almost pure black from all the writing filling its pages. She found hand-drawn storyboards, scribbles about ideas, lines jotted down as he thought of them. His writing was sometimes neat, sometimes chaotic, the look of a tired hand and frustrated creator. Ideas were crossed out with big, angry-looking X's. At times whole concepts were slashed out so violently, she could see the pen lines etched into the following page from the sheer pressure he put into it, obviously at his limit and furious at his failures.

Despite that, Lucy saw that each of these ideas were from a man who saw the world differently. These were not average proposals. They were ahead of their time. They were edgy and creative. All of the concepts that did not have Rejected stamped on them were things Lucy knew she could never come up with. They were masterpieces showing both genius and the progression toward that brilliance. He had not miraculously arrived at Fairy Tail as a star. He worked hard and fervently to rise to that level.

She noticed a common theme to his proposals, rejected and approved alike. The focus of all of them was not on the product being sold. Normally, advertisers would lift up the product and show how great it was. That was what the typical commercial did. Loke gave all the attention to what was happening around the product.

'Oh, I remember this soft drink commercial. It told an actual story about a man sent off to the war to fight. We saw his struggles, and the wife at home worrying sick over him. The actual product didn't even appear until the end, when the man comes back home to hug his wife, and his child brings his dad a soft drink. That emotional ending hit everyone. People talked about that commercial for months. It made the product shine, but it also honored both soldiers and the closeness of family. Oh, and there's this commercial about an astronomical event at the observatory, the one that inspired me to become an advertiser. And this commercial, I really loved that one. That's right ... I like commercials that make me feel like I've just watched a whole movie. It's merely a fifteen second commercial, but you get to know the feelings of the people in the main character's life.'

Suddenly, she understood what Loke was looking for.

'I need to turn how we feel about the GMG on its head. I need to show what the Grand Magic Games are made of. It needs to be a story, a whole movie, that makes the Games into something beyond what the average person thinks. It has to be edgy, surprising, yet engaging, relatable on a deep level. It's not about athletes, but the common human spirit. I get it now. He's been hinting at this the whole time.'

She discreetly took one of the notebooks and put the rest back in the cardboard box. Lucy clutched the book to her chest like a treasure and hurried back to her department.