A secretary is not a toy (scrooge x magica)

[lifesa_witch]

Cheaters never prosper? Whoever came up with that silly idea had clearly never met Magica De Spell. It was only fair in her mind - out of all the students, she knew she deserved to win this opportunity. Everyone else would have just made a fool of themselves.

Plus, if they had won, they might've incurred the wrath of the Queen Bitch. So in the end, her cheating was for the good of all.

One stuffed ballot box later, Magica was declared the winner - she would get to not only meet the world's richest duck, but get a tour of his headquarters. She would learn the ins and outs of his companies, and learn the tricks of the trade and blah blah blah. Let's be real - this was a business opportunity. She'd make nice, and worm her way into his good graces. Then, once she knew his tricks... she'd steal them and make them her own, only without his ridiculous morals.

Scrooge McDuck was the world's richest duck for now - but one day, and one day soon, that title would belong to Magica! One day, he'd be entering a contest just to be in her good graces!

Chuckling darkly to herself, she checked her reflection once more in the bus window before it pulled to a stop before his famous bin. She'd play the good girl suck-up role now, and take him for all he was worth.

Comments

[richestduck]

Scrooge always went to Career Day for the local high schools. It was largely to encourage future entrepreneurs (hoping somewhere was a solid rival to both keep him on his toes and keep McDuck Enterprises from becoming a monopoly) but also to scout for potential talent that might not be able to strike it out on their own and would be willing to work for him. Typically, he took his student for the day to the downtown offices, but this year things had gotten a bit crazier, and his one-day protege would have to come to the Bin.

The bus to the Bin actually stopped at the edge of the bridge. From there was the initial guard post to verify who was going in and out, checking ID badges and visitor lists as needed. Then she would be driven to the Bin itself and the Security office to receive a temporary security badge. Her access would be largely limited by necessity. As an added precaution, a background check had been run on her. True, it was doubtful she could be an agent of FOWL or looking to perform espionage, but it was standard practice at the Bin which was arguably more secure than Fort Knox.

Scrooge went down to pick her up from the Security Office himself, needing to stretch his legs from an already early start to what was guaranteed to be a very long day. "Miss De Spell? I'm Scrooge McDuck."

[lifesa_witch]

Magica had never seen Scrooge's photo before - the man was very private, and Magica was often very lazy. He was an old coot, they all looked the same. So she thought she knew exactly what to expect when she heard his voice.

"Mister McDuck, this is an honor!" She turned around, hand out for a cordial handshake, and ready to start laying on the bullshit. "I can't thank you enough foooooorrrrr...."

HELLOOOOOOOOO, NURSE.

Unaware her jaw had dropped, Magica froze, staring at the most handsome man she'd ever seen in her life, short as it was. Any schemes and plots were automatically forgotten.

[richestduck]

Scrooge was very private...and somehow the paparazzi always managed to make any public photographs of him look super old. (He almost swore that they photoshopped him to look older like most celebrities were photoshopped to look younger.)

"It's a pleasure," he told her, taking her hand to give it a firm shake. Despite his many years as a businessman, he'd never lost the callouses from hard work on his hands. "Sorry to make you come out this way."

[lifesa_witch]

Fuck her gently with a chainsaw.

"A-huh." She nodded dumbly, her own grip having gone limp like a wet noodle. She struggled to articulate anything further, her heart beating rapidly. What a fine time for puberty to kick in.

"No... no... it's good. Good to be here. Yes. very."

[richestduck]

"I know the Bin's a bit overwhelming, but you'll only be in a few areas, so less of a chance of you getting lost." He released her hand. "Though who knows? Maybe one day you'll be working here and learn to navigate it like the back of your hand."

He turned towards the door.

"I'll show you around a bit and let you see some of what I do, but unfortunately I will have to leave you a few of my other workers from time-to-time. Some of the emergency meetings I have today are confidential, I'm afraid."

[lifesa_witch]

She rubbed her hands a bit, wishing he'd held on longer. Or held her hand for the entire trip.

The mental image of that ridiculousness did jar her back to reality, if only for a bit.

"Oh! Right, right. Of course." She cleared her throat, trying to force her body to calm down. "Such big emergencies that you can't even tell me what they're about, right?" She walked quickly to catch up with him, noting no ring on his finger, thank goodness.

[richestduck]

No ring but not for lack of people trying, usually seeing the number of zeroes in his bank account without seeing him.

"Afraid not all of them, lass. We tend to stay as much out of government work as possible to prevent conflict of interest, but sometimes there's overlap we can't help. Today's one of those days, unfortunately. You'll likely hear the basics about it on the news tonight."

Natural disasters causing food shortages in an area his company operated in had a tendency to do that.

"But there'll be plenty for you to observe regardless. You won't be bored."

[lifesa_witch]

She wished she'd put on perfume. And more make-up. Or maybe less-make up. Would her brain shut up for three seconds?!

"I wouldn't have entered this contest if I thought anything about you.... your company would bore me." She tried to straighten up. "I'm here to learn." And tonight she'd do so much more learning - any girlfriends he had or women who'd thrown themselves at him, for instance.

[richestduck]

"Then you'll learn more than any amount of schooling could teach you. Come along, lass."

The old man walked rather quickly, leading the way through the hallways and elevators to his office at the top of the Bin. There was a spare seat set up near his desk so she could work on a few tasks he'd set up for her to do. Nothing that would result in the stock market collapsing if she misjudged it, but still interesting and a bit of what he had to do on a regular basis.

Behind the desk was the massive painting of himself on an assembly line, the painting a mute reminder to Scrooge that he might be a very visible worker on the line but despite all the wealth in the vault (whose door was across from the painting) he was still a worker on the line.

"There's a small bathroom if you need to use it. You've got access to go down to the cafeteria for lunch and your meal'll be covered by me or it can be brought up here."

[lifesa_witch]

Lass. Tee-hee.

Thankfully, she did manage to listen and not just stare longingly at the painting that she hoped she could get a bootleg copy off of the internet. Another thing to be thankful for was that Magica did have some brains - the tasks performed wouldn't be perfect, but they would showcase her ability to think outside of the box and track some loopholes others would have missed.

She also resisted the urge to use the paper to write down possible baby names, so there was that.

"A working lunch would suit me best. I couldn't imagine being able to relax knowing I wasn't being useful."

[richestduck]

That earned her a smile. "A hard worker! Good to see that! It'll get you far!"

He showed her the pages on the desk. "You'll be observing me when possible, obviously, but these are for when I can't let you come with me. Little problems from around the company to give you some idea of what goes on in a major corporation like McDuck Enterprises. There's no 'right' or 'wrong' answer to these in the sense of scoring for a test; these are real-world problems which have consequences for a poor decision. But don't worry, lass: You'll not be destroying any economies with these." He gave her a wink.

[lifesa_witch]

Unf. Magica bit the inside of her cheek so hard she thought she might bleed.

"Still..." She said slowly, internally trying to douse flames. "I'd hate to be anything but an asset to McDuck enterprises. I've done my homework - you have your hand in so many facets of Duckburg, that by helping you, I'm helping my own home town."

[richestduck]

"Aye, that you are, but you might also be helping someone else's hometown on the other side of the planet. You never can tell." He tapped the side of his beak with his finger. "But that's neither here nor there. Today it's just things local to this area. No need to force you to brush up on a situation brewing halfway around the globe after -- "

A phone on his desk rang. He grimaced.

"It never stops, I swear. One moment." He picked up the handset. "Hello?" Then a pause before he began speaking in fluent Cantonese.

[lifesa_witch]

Magica quickly found a chair and sat, so she could tightly cross her legs. How many languages could he speak? She hoped Italian was one of them.

She looked away, trying to be polite, unaware that she hadn't stopped smiling for some time.

[richestduck]

Finally, he ended the call, rubbing the bridge of his nose. He gave a quiet swear in Scots-Gaelic before looking back to her. "Sorry 'bout that. Unrelated problem to the major crises today, thank goodness."

[lifesa_witch]

She almost wanted to thank him.

"Never apologize for things beyond your control." She replied calmly. "I don't expect the world of business to be a smooth path. The best way to get ahead is to work with surprises, not against them."

[richestduck]

"Are we sure there's anything I can teach you today?" he teased as he sat down at his desk, unlocking a drawer to pull out some paperwork. "Come over here and take a look at this. This is a proposed contract with another company. Nothing secretive here, but tell me if anything jumps out at you about it."

[lifesa_witch]

Magica obeyed, walking over and trying not to take a good whiff of his scent.

"It's my first time seeing something like this," she admitted, reading and double reading it carefully.

[richestduck]

"I understand," he told her, "but you're gonna have to look at one of these at some point. Might as well have someone who's experienced in reading contracts give you some tips on what to look for."

[lifesa_witch]

"I'm all ears, Mister McDuck." A little harmless eyelash fluttering.

[richestduck]

He gestured to the papers again. "Give me your thoughts on what you read. What drew your attention and would you accept the contract as written?"

[lifesa_witch]

Magica's eyes went back to the contract, reading it over a third time.

"... Some of the language seems to be repetitive, which doesn't really inspire confidence. If it was once or twice, that'd be understandable, but more than that just says they're not wholly confident or sure about what they're pushing."

[richestduck]

"That it? And would you accept it?"

[lifesa_witch]

A pause of hesitance.

"It's a bit of a nitpick, but... I can't stand it when people can't use the 'it's' and apostrophes correctly."

She leaned back. "Maybe I'm just being stubborn, but I can't say I'd accept it as is."

[richestduck]

"Aye, the basic grammar mistakes are downright childish. Whoever their lawyer is should be ashamed.

"You seeing the repeated sections and being uncomfortable about them was a good eye, but it's the opposite of what you originally suspected. When you remove the repeated sections that are trying to sell me on the idea..."

Scrooge pulled out a thick red pen and started crossing out the repeated sections.

"...Now read it."