Who: Lorna Dane and Caleb Rivers When: Early November Where: Stark Tower What: Break room chat Rating/Warnings: Low Status: Complete
Caleb was trying to cut back on the numerous breaks he took, but still the guy needed one every now and then. At least now he stayed in the building. Although he often wandered the floors of Stark Tower that he didn’t work on, and had probably visited the break room on each one. Which is exactly what he was doing today.
When he entered one of the break rooms he saw a woman he hadn’t seen before. Not that it was all that shocking considering Stark Industries was huge. “Hey,” Caleb said with a nod to the woman as he walked over to the vending machine to get himself a snack.
Lorna was eating leftover meatloaf and reading on her phone when someone came in. He was younger than her, but not younger than some of the employees she’d met. Tony apparently loved his wunderkinds. She smiled at Caleb and waved. “Hi! How are you doing today?”
She seemed friendly and she had a lot of energy. “I’m good. Just getting through the day,” he said punching some numbers into the vending machine. “How are you?” he asked before bending down to grab his bag of chips.
“Not bad. A little overwhelmed. I just started here and I had the hardest time finding the breakroom.” She wasn’t frazzled anymore, but only a few minutes before starting on her food she’d been in a much sorrier state. Lorna was grumpy when she was hungry.
“Yeah this place is huge,” Caleb agreed opening the bag of chips. “Looks like you found it okay though,” he gave her a small smile before popping a few chips in his mouth. He pulled out a chair at the table the girl was sitting at. “You mind?” he asked. “Name’s Caleb.”
“I did, thank goodness. My meatloaf would have been lonely without me.” She shook her head at his question. “Not at all. I’m Lorna.” She held out her hand to shake his, a smile on her face. “What do you do here?”
He shook her hand before plopping down in the seat he had just pulled out. It was always nice to meet someone new. “That depends. How much do you know about computers?” Caleb asked grabbing chip out of the bag and popping it in his mouth. For people who didn’t work at Stark he usually just told them he was in tech, it was easier than trying to explain and for some of the people that worked at Stark too. There were a lot of departments after all. Not everyone understood the whole computer aspect. Just like he didn’t know the science.
“I understand enough to write a webpage, but that’s the limit of my knowledge. I’m an astrophysicist so light programming is pretty helpful to know.” She loved her job, but she also admired the skills that other people had. Computers weren’t foreign to her, but she knew enough to know that she didn’t know enough.
“Yeah I know nothing about astrophysics,” Caleb replied with a grin. But that’s how it went at Stark. There were lots of different departments. The place was full of people with different talents. It was a pretty cool place to work. “Seems like there’s always someone new to meet. You like working here so far?”
Lorna nodded, “The past few hours have been nice. Everyone seems pretty happy to be here, which is good to see. Have you worked here long? You seem so young.”
“A few months,” he shrugged. He knew he looked young. He was fairly young compared to most employees. But he didn’t dwell on it. He was good at what he did. That was all that mattered. “But yeah it’s a pretty great place to work. I’m sure you’ll like it here.” Tony was a great boss. Granted he was the only real boss Caleb had but still. “But speaking of I should probably get back.”
Lorna nodded, smiling brightly. “Me too. It was nice to meet you!” She packed her lunch things up, preparing herself internally for the rest of her work day.