"I want you to take me on as an intern." I stated plainly as I leaned on the work bench.
"I don't take interns." He replied bluntly in his scratchy accent. His deep voice resonated in the tiny office. I briefly wondered why he wasn't in a bigger room on the newer side of the stadium, but then I realized this was probably a lot more private.
"I know." I replied honestly.
"Then why are you here?" He stressed as he picked up his pencil and made a few notes in Japanese next to some of his calculations.
"Because you're going to take me on as an intern." I answered smoothly. Tak Mashido glanced up from the plans he was working on and gave me a look of confusion. It was definitely a rare move for him, even if his expression wasn't that different from the emotional mask he usually wore. He quickly covered the slip by schooling his face back into its normal expression and returning his gaze back to the page.
"I graduated from MIT with a 4.0 in mechanical engineering and computer programing. I have won numerous bot design competitions and numerous fights as a controller. I am capable of doing everything from designing and building to getting coffee and dry cleaning." I listed. He looked completely unimpressed.
"There are others with the same credentials and more experience." He paused. "Get out." He commanded as he reached for the pencil again.
"You haven't heard the last reason Mr. Mashido." I broke in cuttingly. He put his pencil down with a snap before leaning back in his chair, obviously waiting for an explanation.
"One day you're going to need a new bot design and you're going to need someone you can trust to help you build it." I stated. "Zeus crushing everything in sight is great for business, but how long is that going to last? Technology changes; I mean, just look at how far things have come since the G1 bots. One day Zeus is going to meet his match and you need a new bot for when that happens or it's going to like the Noisy, Rubicon fight."
His whole body tensed and I waited for an explosive reaction. I had heard his temper wasn't pretty, and that mentioning Noisy Boy was one of the worst things you could ever do in front of him, but I decided to do it anyway to see if I could push him into this. Was it a bad idea? Probably, but I didn't care how loud he yelled at me, or what he threw at me, as long as it worked.
"And you think, that out of all the young guns that try to be bot designers, that you are the one to help me design my new bot?" He growled. I almost raised my eyebrows in shock at the fact that he hadn't thrown me out for merely insinuating that I could be on his level, but I managed to control my facial features.
"Your creation is yours. It's not my place to step in and tell you what to do, but I do want to learn how you build bots in the league. I realize my chances of having a job working on building a bot like Zeus are slim, but I would like to work in this industry." I answered honestly.
He paused for a moment to mull it over. I was afraid he had forgotten me when he closed his long fingers on the pencil and began drawing on a piece of paper. I stood awkwardly as he scribbled away. He eventually finished a drawing of the inside of a bot arm and tossed it in my general direction. He didn't even look up to see if I had it as he started writing notes in the margin of his already completed designs.
I managed to snag the page before it went off the end of the work bench without wrinkling it too bad. Spreading it out on the bench, I noticed several design flaws in the design. Careful not to be obvious, I snuck a glance at Tak. He was completely focused on the notebook in front of him and didn't seem to care one way or the other if I passed his test.
I absent mindedly chewed my lips as I reached for a pencil. The drawing was quickly done without a lot of detail, but the parts were clearly identifiable. I carefully circled several of the mistakes and then added in my corrections. I looked over it at least three times before I was satisfied I had caught everything and handed it back.
He took it from me without a word and scanned over it before placing it on a pile of scratch paper. My heart sank when he didn't reply. I felt sick as I turned to leave since he was so obviously dismissing me.
"Name?" He asked.
"Piper Hatton." I answered quickly.
"West entrance 5:30 a.m." He ordered quickly.
"Thank you, sir." I replied as I exhaled a breath I didn't realize I had been holding.
And with that, I knew I had been dismissed.
Excitement coursed through me as I shut the door behind me and turned down the narrow, gray hallway. The smile I had been containing tugged at the edges of my lips. I had gotten an internship with Tak Mashido. He was going to do everything possible to make my life a living hell to ensure I didn't come back the next day, but holy shit; Tak Mashido.
I was one step closer to my goal of being a bot designer. All I had to do was survive. I could make it; I was tough, but this was going to be a different challenge entirely.
League bot designers rarely took interns, and if they did, the interns life was usually a living hell. Tak Mashido was the only one that hadn't had at least one, but it wasn't for lack of trying. I knew of a lot of students that had tried everything imaginable to get a spot on his team. Everything short of breaking in a back door and showing up in his office, of course; that was probably because the idea was nothing short of insane. A move like that could get you banned from the fights forever.
Maybe all it took was a little tenacity to get on his good side. Either that or he was going to make an example of me so all of the aspiring bot designers would stop stalking him.
AN: Super random story idea. I loved the movie Real Steel, and I liked Tak's character. I know he's a little OOC here, but next chapter it will be better. Also, next chapter will have background information so it's not so confusing.