Chapter Text
Beauregard Lionett slams the cardboard box onto her new desk, coughing and spluttering in the resulting cloud of dust. She glares at her new office one more, but it remains as disordered as when she first stepped in here. The drawers in the desk hardly close for all the files stuffed inside them, the shelves are on the brink of collapse, and not an inch of the floor is visible under the sea of papers.
She sighs. “I already fucking miss fieldwork.”
Why did she even take this promotion? Sure, field research was somehow both dangerous as fuck and boring as hell, and every day was a coin flip for whether she’d be risking her life chasing down some monster or stuck for hours in a conversation with some old lady who was definitely just seeing things, but it was a lot better than THIS. She knew there had to be a catch when she got that email from Ikithon about this new position, but she figured it would be some supernatural bullshit! Something exciting, at least, not disorganised files and backed-up paperwork.
She never talked to Caleb Widogast when he was here, but from what she’d heard the guy was almost creepily obsessed with his job, so she expected this place to look like a lab. Then again, there are also some pretty weird rumours going around about what happened to him, so maybe she shouldn’t expect him to have a rational filing system. It’s not like anyone else in this shithole is rational.
There is a curt knock at the door, and Beau grunts something resembling a “yeah?”
The woman who opens the door is, to Beau’s surprise, actually pretty hot. Her hair is shaved on one side, and on the other is cut into an uneven blonde bob. Spanning from her left eyebrow to below the collar of her shirt is a pretty gnarly, recently-healed scar. She glares at Beau like something she scraped off the bottom of her shoe, but to be fair Beau looks at most people the same way.
“Hey,” she starts, trying her best to sound friendly. “Are you–?”
“Astrid Becke, archival assistant,” the woman says, cold as steel, in a faint Zemnian accent. “Mr. Ikithon has sent Eadwulf and I to aid you in restoring the archives.”
Beau tenses. Of course he fucking did. He couldn’t just leave her alone down here to do her job, no, she needed handlers to make sure she wasn’t slacking off. Ikithon can’t stand to have blind spots.
“He didn’t tell me anything about that,” she replies gruffly.
She didn’t think it was possible to shrug condescendingly, but Astrid manages.
“Your predecessor left this archive in quite the state of disarray. Mr. Ikithon thought you might like aid in restoring it.” She arches an eyebrow. “Should I tell him otherwise?”
Beauregard grits her teeth. She really wants to say yes, but she knows as well as Astrid that fixing this archive on her own would take fucking centuries. Even if that’s not the real reason she was sent down here, she might as well put her to use.
“No,” she says through her teeth. “I’ll have to email him later about how grateful I am for the extra help.”
She inhales deeply, trying to recover her thin veneer of professionalism. Do not get demoted on the first day.
Giving her new assistant her sweetest smile, Beau says, “Could you and… Eadwulf, please get started sorting the statements alphabetically for me? I’d love to help, but Mr. Ikithon has given me the exclusive task of creating audio transcripts of all of the statements.” She does an impressive imitation of that fake-sympathetic I’m-sorry-I-can’t-help-more grimace as she gestures to the box on her desk. “As you can see, I have a lot of work to get started on.”
Astrid flashes a smile that doesn’t reach her eyes. “Trent Ikithon has suggested that we sort by date.”
Beau flashes her a wider smile. “Good thing I’m your boss now. Not Trent. You answer to me.”
Astrid’s lip curls, and she opens her mouth as if to say something scathing, then apparently thinks better of it and says instead, “Of course, Ms. Lionett. I won’t keep you any longer.”
Beau manages to wait until the door clicks shut to slump over her desk, rubbing her aching cheeks. Eurgh. She hates having to be diplomatic. With any luck, her new “assistants” are as eager to get to know her as she is to know them, and she can keep cashing in her paycheques while they do the boring work without her input.
Unfortunately, she wasn’t lying when she told Astrid she had work to do. Reluctantly, she reaches into the box of statements and pulls one out at random. Hopefully it’s at least something interesting.
Beau clicks on the old tape recorder that she’s for some reason supposed to use, and flattens the file in front of her.