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

[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."

[lifesa_witch]

Magica blinked - now that those sections were removed...

"... It reads way more professional and confident." She replied. "If they'd just done away with those sections before, I probably wouldn't have hesitated before accepting it."

[richestduck]

"Reads more professionally, yes. The repeated sections with the less self-assured feel to them are a trick, and not a very good one." He tapped his finger on a clause. "Re-read this clause right here. Ignore everything else you've read."

[lifesa_witch]

Magica did, very slowly, this time going it over it once - twice - three - and four times.

"... Hm. This... seems like it'd be more of a sacrifice on our part without much gain."

Our. Oops.

[richestduck]

"Exactly. Some of the boats in the fishing fleet here in Duckburg are privately owned by their captains. I more or less rent their services which means if they find a better deal from a rival company or working independently, they have the freedom to tell me to shove my money where the sun don't shine. This clause would require all boats in the fleet to be owned by their company. They'd do it legally, but they'd be effectively stealing those ships." He tapped it again with his finger. "This clause is why I'm rejecting the entire contract. The repetitive sections were designed to make it look like they didn't know what they were doing so I wouldn't pay too close attention to the key details."

[lifesa_witch]

Magica couldn't help but preen a bit, glad she'd gone with her instincts on the first try.

"Its a little clever, in a devious sort of way. But I imagine after reading hundreds of contracts, you start to notice these things right away."