Root dragged his feet as he walked wearily to his office. It had been a painfully long day and he still had a ton of paperwork to go through. The bloody dwarves from accounting were always making stupid mistakes. (I mean, who doesn't know how to add two and two?)
He was looking forward to reaching his office and just sitting down. Not doing anything productive, just good, old fashioned sitting down. Well, for as long as he could ignore the towering mountain of paperwork piled on his desk. He grumbled quietly to himself as he let himself into his office, his retina's burning from the bloody 'thing' Foaly had insisted he install in his door.
The first thing he noticed when he walked into the room was the massive pile of empty peanut butter jars stacked on his desk. He panicked and started shouting, because that is what he did best.
"WHAT IN THE NAME OF ALL THAT IS SANE AND-"
A head popped up from the teetering tower of glass,
"OMG!" It squealed, digging the rest of its body from the death trap of jars. "I can't believe I'm actually meeting you! Everybody said it wasn't possible but I knew that if I got the generator to run on broccoli juice that I could get here somehow!"
It was a girl. A fangirl...
Root shuddered. The stories about these girls proved them to be even more dangerous than the unidentifiable fish that were occasionally dredged up from the sludge of the rivers in Dublin. He would have to deal with this... creature, in a secure manner. Oh, and she could not be allowed to get to comfortable because she would end up sticking to him like a limpet, or some other equally sticky something.
The girl grinned at him and threw herself into his chair. Root could literally feel his brain boiling in his skull. Screw 'secure manners' and textbook behavior, this... this... THING was in his chair. The same chair he'd been craving all goddamned day.
"GET OUT OF MY CHAIR!" He roared, stomping over to the chair in question and tipping it backwards in order to knock the annoying parasite off. It worked and the girl was left staring up at him on her back.
"Wow," she whispered in complete awe. "You're exactly like I thought you would be..."
Root ignored her completely, preferring instead to finally sit in his chair and picking up the phone on his desk. He dialed the number for Foaly and groaned as he heard the girl chattering away happily in the background.
"You know, one time I ate a peanut butter covered banana and it was probably the best thing ever! Do you guys even have bananas down here or is it only like... I dunno... tomato plantations or some sort of crazy shit like that?"
Root drummed his fingers on his desk impatiently, waiting for Foaly to answer. After another agonizing couple of minutes Foaly finally picked up his end of the communication line.
"Greetings Root. How may I do for you today?" came Foaly's consumer friendly voice
"Can you please tell me how a girl ended up in my 'high security' office?" Root asked politely, his voice laced with poison.
"OOOOOOOOOOOOH? What type of girl? Is she wearing a little red dress and stockings? 'Cause if she is then she's probably a-"
"No, Foaly. She is not a hooker." Root managed from in between gritted teeth. "She's a fangirl."
"Oh, do you know that if the fangirlness is directed at you, sometimes they're actually as good, if not better than real hook-" Foaly's musings were cut short by the girl grabbing the phone from Root and screaming into it.
"Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaai Foaly!"
Root only allowed this because he could imagine the look on Foaly's face at this display of character perfectly. It was much to his surprise when the girl laughed... She laughed as if Foaly had said something really funny to her. She looked at Root and whispered something into the receiver before bursting into laughter again.
Why did life hate him so much? The girl whispered a swift reply to whatever hilarioous thing Foaly had said now, still giggling slightly before hanging the phone up. She looked at Root, grinning deviously. Root had given up at this point and had melted into the comfort of his chair in an attempt to disappear. The girl stood and walked over to where Root sat, pulling something from her pocket in the process. He groaned and tried to face away from her maniac expression but she just stopped the chair from swiveling with her foot. She leant over him and opened her palm, dropping something into his lap. He winced and looked down.
It was a spoon.
"OK, what the hell?" He asked, more irritated than scared by now. She answered by sitting on his desk, scattering empty jars before pulling out a remaining full one and producing a spoon of her own.
"OK, Julius. Let's talk."
An hour later Root was loosening up and actually eating the peanut butter. He even -God forbid- grinned occasionally. Foaly had been right, the girl thought triumphantly (whose name was Emer, by the way), there was nothing that Root liked more than to get someone's undivided attention.
She plonked the jar in front of him and told him just this.
A minute later was dragging the unconscious Emer down the corridor, ignoring all the stares he was getting. He reached Foaly's door and pressed the buzzer down angrily. He ignored Foaly's greeting, speaking over him straight away.
"It's your problem now." He tossed the girl in headfirst through the doorway before turning around and walking casually back to his office, the noises of Foaly's anticipated mental breakdown echoing through the corridor behind him.