AN: I just watched the "Rise Of The Silversurfer" for the first time. I'd put off watching it for a long time, but I figured I should go ahead and see it. I wanted to get a refresher on personalities and whatnot.
Thanks for the reviews and follows, they truly warm my heart and I get a real kick out of it. 3
DISCLAIMER: I own a rather nice car, but MARVEL owns this fandom.
Seated on the lounge couch with the tray of lattes sitting on her lap, Darcy's lips quirked in amusement as Dr. Richards tried to explain the awkward situation.
"…and so I'm sorry if there's been any confusion, but I didn't even get to really look at your resume and…" He was cut off as she put a coffee in his hand and set the rest on the coffee table in front of them, "Relax Dr. Richards, drink a latte," and she'd reach into her computer bag, pulling a folder from it then putting it in his free hand, "There's my resume, complete with additional references and a copy of my diploma. Oh, and a headshot," She smirked, "I look super good in that picture."
Reed accepted both things and sipped the hot beverage, flipping the folder open, Sue and Johnny stood behind him looking over his shoulder. "You worked with Dr. Jane Foster?" That made Reed perk up, "I've read a few of her papers, and she's brilliant." "Yeah, she is," Darcy smiled fondly, thinking of the mousey woman, hoping that wherever she was she was managing to eat at least one good meal a day.
"Your degree was in political science," Sue took the paper from Reed's hands, and raised a brow at the girl.
"Well, this isn't the first time I've been the only applicant." She offered them a toothy grin.
"This headshot is nice; would you happen to have any bikini shots?" Johnny leered at her, and Sue punched her brother in the arm, "Johnny!"
"Look, Miss Lewis, you seem like a nice young lady, and I can gather from your references that you'd be able to keep up with assisting despite your background being in a social science, but given recent situations…"
Darcy didn't let him finish, "You mean the whole super power thing? That sounds real groovy but it's not good enough to blow me off. You sent the acceptance email, I gave up my apartment and moved all the way to New York, so you're going to give me the job that was promised. Or pay to compensate me for my time and travel."
Reed winced, they didn't have much money in their accounts, so there was no way they could do a bulk payment like that. And he certainly couldn't just turn her away after she'd picked up and moved her entire life on their account. He glanced at Susan, who nodded at him, clearly she agreed that they needed to hire her. The young lady seemed professional enough and she'd worked for a physicist before so he could expect her to handle things. "Okay, of course, the job is yours. Given the mix up you're free to start tomorrow instead if you'd prefer…"
"Nah, I'm already here. I'll start by cleaning up the lab," Darcy was on her feet and down the hall, electing to find her own way around instead of being shown about.
"Well I like her," Johnny spoke up, smirking and grabbing one of the cups from the table, "She just owned Reed. And did you see that rack?"
"Who's rack? What did I miss?" Ben had returned, his heavy steps announcing his presence before he'd even spoken up. "…Who went to Starbucks?"
Darcy's head peaked out of the lab, "Hey, do you want your texts alphabetized or running on the Dewey Decimal system?" She paused for a moment to take in the sight of the 6'4 man made of orange rock, gave him a wink, and then looked back at Reed expectantly.
"Uh, alphabetically works just fine. Thank you."
"Sure thing Dr. Boss man," Before she disappeared again, leaving a confused looking Ben Grimm.
"Who was that?"
"That would be Darcy Lewis, the assistant Reed hired without meaning to hire," The blond man explained, "Oh, and I feel like there's not a huge need for this because the rock man's still in mourning and Reed, well, you're kind of asexual these days, but I'm still going to call it. DIBS!"
Sue gave her brother a flat look and opened her mouth to explain the dangers of sexual harassment in the work place.
Darcy let out a small breath of relief once she was alone in the lab. The brunette had always kind of viewed herself as a behind the scenes person so she'd been inwardly anxious when she talked back to the newly mutated man, while she was kind of on the snarky side and had studied politics she didn't feel too comfortable with confronting people one on one (taking snobby hostesses down a peg didn't count), and was glad that he'd been such a pushover. She couldn't imagine if he'd stood his ground and told her no, which would've put her in a bad position with Agent Coulson, who'd probably of taken away her nice sparkly new paycheck and kickass apartment which had a killer view of the cityscape.
Clearing her head she immediately started throwing herself into the reorganization of Dr. Richard's lab, which was a huge mess. She eyed the stacks of yellow legal pads, countless used coffee mugs, and towers of books covering the counters with a shake of her head. So much for that bachelor's degree she'd worked so hard to get the last 4 years, maybe when she got her master's she could do something really prestigious like clean windows. "Oh, spoke to soon," She said aloud, noticing the hundreds of stick notes plastered to the windows. Somehow this wasn't entirely what she pictured when Coulson offered her a job with SHIELD, but it was still better than other jobs she'd had in the past so she couldn't complain too much. When she'd gotten her internship with Jane she'd been treated to a similar first day cleaning spree. Luckily for the pop-tart consuming scientist Darcy had picked up fantastic organizational skills when she TA'd for her high school's librarian, a kind old woman with a case of crippling obsessive compulsive disorder who required that Darcy Ceram wrap all of the book covers, so this was nothing.
She'd move a book here, used a whole container of bleach that she'd found in a closet, she filled filing cabinets, put up a few framed pictures she found lying around, and gathered wires left and right. Before she knew it the sun had gone down and she was emerging from the lab, which everyone had seemed to avoid except for a few incidents in which Sue Storm dragged her younger brother out after he barged in on her before he could even utter a word and Reed bringing her a sandwich upon his ex-girlfriend's insistence.
"Okay, so, everything is done." Darcy announced, walking out into the main area, carelessly wiping her hands on her skirt. "Yeah right, I've seen that madhouse, there's no way you got it clean that fast," Ben snorted, "It's been what? 6 hours? That place needs a week at least." "Man, don't you know that I've got mad skills when it comes to this stuff," She dismissed him with a wave of her arm, "Just do me a favor and don't touch the stack of papers in the blue folder, I need to convert that data to digital," Reed walked into the lab and stood in shock, "I don't think it was even this clean in here when I moved in…" He'd allow himself to wander his lab as if it was a completely new place. "Like I said, I'm good at what I do," Darcy smirked.
"And what all do you do?" The fire-starter slid on over to her smoothly, putting an arm around her shoulder. He looked down at her with those devilish baby blues and wiggled his brows.
"I always carry a Taser." She looked up at him flatly, pulling her beloved weapon of choice from a holster that had apparently been hidden under her skirt, though Johnny had no idea who considering how tight in looked on her curves.
"I like my girls a little electric," He wiggled the fingers resting on her shoulder and leaned his face a little closer to hers. Tempting death had always been a specialty of his, and there were worse ways to die than being electrocuted by a pretty girl. Sure, she had that bookish thing going on, but he was kind of into naughty librarians.
Darcy crinkled her nose at his bad joke and opted to step on his foot as hard as possible, "And I like my men a little less annoying,"
Johnny yelped and Ben let out a deep hearty laugh, "God, Reed, I love this girl. I'm glad you accidently hired her." "As am I," Reed had returned from the lab, "I'm shocked that Dr. Foster let you go," "Well, she got invited on a trip to Iceland or somewhere that I couldn't follow her on," She shrugged, "anyways, I'm going to jet. What time do you want me to come back tomorrow?" Reed considered this, "I want to begin physicals and analysis tomorrow concerning the mutations we're currently manifesting, so a bright and early start is probably best…" Johnny moaned in the background at the prospect of waking up early, "…how's 6 am work?"
"I'll be here. It was nice meeting you all, see you later," Darcy smiled at 3 out of 4, and gave a cold stare to the remaining percent, before picking up her bag and leaving.
"It's really great in here," Reed said, leaning over to stare back into his lab. "…Maybe I'll start some work tonight…" Sue shot him a look, "Or you could get some sleep and work tomorrow." "…Or that." Reed had forgotten how much of a fussy mother hen Susan could be, but it brought a smile to his lips, he'd actually always liked how compassionate and caring she was. Their eyes met and there was a moment of wistfulness between them before Reed broke it, "Right. We should all get some sleep."
Sue looked away right after him, "Yeah, good idea, night," She'd depart to her room and Johnny rolled his eyes at the pair, "Dude, you're so transparent," He'd pat Reed on the shoulder and went off himself.
Reed looked to Ben, a curious look on his face, "…I'm not, Sue's the one with invisibility…"
Ben Grimm just shook his head.
Coulson looked at his phone from the back of a town car driving him to a hotel. He'd received an email from Darcy giving her report for the first day, it included her brief interactions with the group, various bits about the research in the lab, and a small bit of ranting over the amount of "manual labor" that she had to endure. Phil bit back a small chuckle when she described Johnny Storm's hitting on her as a reason she "needed more money to buy hand sanitizer in mass quantities for bathing to get the sleaze off".
"There's a bit of traffic sir, you know LA, so it's going to be a little longer of a drive," The driver spoke up from the front seat, interrupting Coulson's reading.
"Oh, that's fine. I'm just going to listen to some music," He smiled calmly at the man in the black newsboy cap, and reached into the inner pocket of his suit, producing a solid black 80GB IPod with an Adventure Time sticker on the back of it. He popped the ear buds in and relaxed some in the backseat. While she lacked a certain tact in her daily report, Darcy Lewis had fantastic tastes in music.
