Beleaguered Bureaucrat/Playing With

Basic Trope: A bureaucrat who likes to help, but has many things to do at the same time.

Straight: Alice wants to get a weapon, but Bob is busy with his paperwork.
Exaggerated: Every time Alice wants help from Bob, he has a busy schedule to do.
Subverted: Bob doesn't exercise any of the low-level rule bending or personal judgement that's expected of someone in his position—even by the standards of his fellow bureaucrats, who consider him a bit of a Neidermeyer.
Played for Laughs: As Alice walks in the door, she is nearly buried under a literal pile of paper which was lying just outside the door... and has now crashed into similar piles lying all around the floor. This is apparently Bobs workload for the day. When she apologises to Bob, Bob calmly says "sorry, little busy, could you maybe come back later about that weapon? Yes its on the list; yes I know thats the ultimate weapon needed to defeat Me Me the Evil, you're only the third person to file a request for an ultimate weapon this week."
Played for Drama: After Alice quietly and politely files the request for the weapon, Bob tells her sullenly to come back in three days. When Alice says "This is serious!" Bob, looking increasingly frazzled as he hears Alice explain the gravity of the situation, with a face that says that this isn't the first request like this he's heard, snaps his pencil, gets out of his chair, upends the desk, and goes on a ten minute rant about how he hasn't slept in two days because of trying to get various items out to people who also desperately need them, followed by a brief rant about how Alice gets all the promotions/attention/respect for her actions in the field while he's stuck behind a desk all day. After this, he storms out, leaving a stunned Alice in his wake, who now needs to formulate a plan as to how she's going to get the weapon she needs quickly.