Eridan Ampora was fresh out of training. Eridan Ampora was hot shit. Eridan Ampora had the top score out of everyone in his graduating class. Eridan Ampora was the only one of them heading to ISIS. The International Secret Inelegance Service. Eridan Ampora had a liscence to kill. Eridan Ampora was ready for this. Eridan Ampora had just arrived at the building that served as ISIS headquarters. The ground floor was under the cover of a fully functional electronics store. Eridan Ampora had arrived for his fist real day on the job. He approached the customer service desk and saw a small girl with short black hair and red cat eye glasses.
"Oh you must be Eridan!" Man, her tone was annoying. She seemed too happy. Eridan nodded at her, a bit uncomfortable at being called by his first name. He didn't know what he was expecting, at the training academy, her rarely talked to anyone besides his instructors. Even his instructors hadn't referred to him by his name, but by his number on the list of students, 27303. He'd have to get used to talking to her, he supposed. You can't avoid the front desk lady.
She looked him up and down, her eyes straying to the purple streak in his hair. Eridan never really gave a shit about first impressions and it's not like purple in his hair in any way affected his capability in the field.
"Well follow me." She sighed. "Rox!" She shouted into the seemingly empty store. "I'm taking the new recruit downstairs to meet the techies! Run the store or a bit!"
Eridan saw a blonde pop out from one of the aisles. "No problem Janey." The blonde did a mock salute and 'Janey' smiled.
"Alright come on newbie, time for the baptism." Eridan had no idea what she was talking about but followed her none the less. She lead him back through the Employees Only door. To the left of the door labeled Storage there was a silver door with no handle. She punched in a code on a keypad mounted on the wall.
"All key codes will be listed in your debriefing packet in your office. For now, I'll take you to the basement to meet the techies and get your Quartermaster assignment." The silver door slid open to reveal an elevator. Once inside, she punched a different code into a keypad and the door slid closed. She turned back to Eridan. "Well you're talkative." Eridan continued to stay silent as the elevator lurched downwards. This girl seemed wholly unprofessional to Eridan. Not that he would ever tell her that. When the elevator stopped and the door slid open, Eridan was immediately assaulted with the scent or metal, light that was too bright, and the sound of heavy base. A tall, muscular man walked passed them, hardly noticing them with the pile of metal in his arms. A guy with obnoxious triangle sunglasses on, who was standing near the sound system, turned down the music, which caught the attention of everyone working. Eridan herd a rainbow of voices.
"Hey asshole, what gives?" Came from a guy coding on a computer.
"What's going on?" Came from a guy with welding goggles working on a robotic arm.
The man who had been carrying the pile of metal, dropped it into what Eridan assumed was a scrap pile. He turned toward the elevator, showing Eridan a pair of cracked, square sunglasses. "Jane. What brings you down here?"
"Oh great, hopefully this one will last longer than the last one." The man at the computer turned around, displaying a pair of sunglasses that had one red lens and one blue lens.
"Shut up Sollux! He just got here! I brought him down here to meet you guys because he has a job today!" From Jane.
Pointy shades dude walked over to where Eridan and Jane were standing. He was in a black tank top with an orange hat on it, a pair of grey jeans with grease stains and leather gloves. To Eridan, this guy looked like a major prick.
"Alright, we'll make this quick so we can get back to our project. I'm Dirk. Got any requests? Come to me. That idiot over there," He pointed to the guy on the computer, Sollux, Eridan remembered.
"Dick." Said Sollux.
"Is Sollux." Dirk pulled a wrench from his back pocked and threw it at the wall near Sollux. "Hey, asshole get back to work. That one," Dirk pointed at welding goggles, "Is Horuss. And that monster," He pointed to the guy by the scrap metal, "Is Equius."
Jane turned to Eridan. "Techies are the guys that make all the fancy spy toys and gadgets for us to use. All of our techies double over in some way. Dirk doubles over as a field agent. Equius, Horuss and Sollux double over as handlers. They work with agents in the field to make sure that our missions are clean and quiet." Eridan knew what handlers were, but he let her talk. She seemed a bit air headed.
"All right Jane, take this kid upstairs to meet whoever the hell else he has to meet and leave us to it." Said Dirk.
"Fine, fine." Jane huffed and ushered Eridan back into the elevator. Before the door slid all the way closed, Eridan heard the music being turned up again and the sound of a saw cutting through metal. She punched in another code and the elevator went up. When the door slid open once again, they were face to face with a wooden desk. Behind it was another girl with black hair and cat glasses. Her hair was longer than Jane's and her glasses were white. "Eridan, this is Aranea." Aranea didn't look up from whatever she was typing.
"Yeah Jane? What do you need?" Eridan noticed a flash of something on Jane's face. He could tell she didn't like Aranea. "Aranea this is Eridan, he's new today." Jane turned toward Eridan again. "Aranea is in charge of personnel. She's also a handler."
"Yeah, new guy, your office is the last door on the left in the hallway to your right." She jerked her chin in the direction he should go.
"Okay Eridan," Said Jane. "All the info you'll need will be in the envelope on your desk. So I'm going to head back to the store and let Roxy loose." Jane turned around and vanished into the elevator, leaving Eridan with Aranea.
"Alright, Meenah, I got the door open but you need to go now!" Eridan hadn't noticed the Bluetooth on her ear. There was a spider on it. "No, now Meenah, I don't care if he's seen you, you neeed to get in there. Good. Yes. Seven from the left. Alright the code is..." Eridan let her voice trail off behind him as he passed her and walked down the hallway.
The office that Eridan had been assigned had a desk, a desktop computer, two chairs in front of the desk and a manila file folder on the desk next to the keyboard. Jane was right about the file. It told him everything he needed to know about the building, including the elevator codes. It also told him that his handler was a man by the name of Sollux Captor. Joy. He'd have to go back to the basement to get his assignment. On his way out of his office, the name plate across the hall from him read Feferi Peixis.
As he passed Aranea, he tuned out her yelling and punched in the code to take him to the basement.