Kara Danvers (lastof_krypton) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2020-09-29 00:52:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, david xanatos, kara danvers (supergirl) |
Who: Kara Danvers & David Xanatos
When: Backdated: End of July
Where: Xanatos Enterprises
What: Kara's First Day at Work
Rating/Warnings: Family Friendly
Status: Complete
Xanatos knew better than to think that he’d be able to land another Personal Assistant of Owen’s caliber. Owen seemed to know what Xanatos wanted before even Xanatos knew, and had always been able to anticipate his needs. That, and his range of skills had made it possible for Xanatos to not worry too much about his heads of securities, and he could always trust Owen to keep the ship running, as it were, when Xanatos wasn’t at the helm.
It was why Owen had been left in New York to run things there while Xanatos forged ahead in California. But more than once, Xanatos wished that Owen was here.
Still, he had high hopes about Kara. He didn’t trust her, not in the way he would trust Owen. He got the impression that Kara was a little more on the moral side of the equation, and so he was unlikely to ever have as much use for her as he did Owen. But sometimes having the moral types around could be fun, and she had an impressive resume with her work at Stark Industries. He was eager to see what it was that had led her from getting moved from a job as a PA to a job as head of PR.
More importantly than that, however, was the fact that he’d seen her on the Network, and had seen her talk about the powers she’d gotten from the dreams on more than one occasion. The idea of not even attempting to make use of those powers…. Well, he simply couldn’t imagine that. He didn’t imagine she would be as easy to trick as the gargoyles in his dreams had been - they’d been asleep for a thousand years before he had awakened them, and had no grasp at all of how things worked in the modern age - but if he couldn’t get some use out of her, well, he would have to admit that he’d been losing his touch.
He’d just finished a tour of his skyscraper - the upper ten floors were dedicated to Xanatos Enterprises, the two floors below that were the apartments - one of which was where Winn lived, though Xanatos hadn’t disclosed that - and the lower ten floors were other businesses, including restaurants and coffee shops. The sixth floor was for Nathaniel’s dream studies - yet another thing that Xanatos didn’t disclose.
“I come by helicopter in the morning, so you’re unlikely to see me coming up,” Xanatos said, finishing the tour in his office. “Though you’ll likely hear me if you’re here already. I don’t tolerate tardiness, though if I ask you to pick me up coffee or something to eat, assume that implies that you can pick something up for yourself as well, should you want anything. Did you have any questions?”
Kara had not expected the job offer from Mr. Xanatos, but knowing that Winn worked at Xanatos Enterprises had made accepting the offer easy because it would almost be like the dreams where they worked at Cat Co together. Of course she knew that they might not see each other all the time like they did in the dreams, but at least this way they were bound to see each other from time to time in passing.
“Wow, helicopter? That’s pretty awesome.” When she had met Winn on the roof a few weeks earlier, when she had shown him that she could fly, Kara had noted that the roof was big enough to land a helicopter and now it made sense why. “No, I don’t think so.” At least Kara couldn’t think of anything off the top of her head at that moment.
“I thought so,” Xanatos said, with a bit of a smirk. It was no secret that he was fond of his helicopter. “If you’d ever like a ride, feel free to ask. Best view of the city, if you ask me.” Of course, he suspected that Kara had already seen the view of the city from above.
“So, Kara, why don’t you tell me a little about yourself?” he leaned casually against his desk, one leg crossed in front of the other, holding himself up with both his hands. “What do you like to do in your free time?”
Kara had indeed seen the city from above quite a few times now. She would use any excuse to fly, much like in the dreams. Of course she didn’t know that Xanatos knew any of that or that he was on the Network so she wasn’t about to mention any of that just yet.
“Well, I’m originally from Seattle and I live here with my sister,” Kara said as she watched Xanatos, trying to think of anything that might be interesting, but aside from being Supergirl there wasn’t exactly much that Kara could think of that made her interesting, “In my free time I’m usually baking or hanging out with friends and every now and then I dabble in journalism.” Not that she had done anything recently, but she was always keeping an eye out.
“I hope you like to share,” Xanatos said, winking. “I love some good baking.” He was teasing, mostly. He wouldn’t say no to a homemade cake or a cookie, but he certainly wouldn’t expect an employee of his to bake for him. Not unless they were his baker, in which case, that was their explicit job.
“Journalism?” That he hadn’t known, and he felt a stab of irritation at himself for the glaring gap in his research on her. He managed to keep said irritation from his voice and from his face, however. “Do you have anything published? I’d love to read it.”
“Oh, trust me, we usually bake enough to give away to practically everyone we know.” Considering it was just Kara and Alex, they usually over baked when they got bored and had enough to share with friends, “So don’t be surprised if I come in with something on a Monday morning.” In fact, Kara was likely going to bake something that evening as a thank you to Mr. Xanatos for hiring her.
She shook her head in response to his question about being published, “Nothing big. Anything I’ve done has been on a much smaller level. A local paper here and there.” Kara had always taken the jobs that no one else really wanted as a way to show that she was flexible with the things she wrote in the hopes that one day she’d get offered a bigger story.
“Still, getting published at all seems like quite the accomplishment,” Xanatos said, as though he’d never been published. He had, of course - his work showed up in scientific journals, and he’d certainly been quoted in enough news articles to count for something, but he was also the head of a multinational, multi-billion dollar company. “I’ll have to see if I can find your articles once I get home.”
He reached behind him for his coffee mug and took a sip, frowning a little at the tepid coffee. But, caffeine was caffeine, so he took another sip. “So, you used to work for Stark, huh? Was there anything there you thought they did especially well? Or anything in particular they did that caused you to leave?”
“I’m sure you can find a few of them if you google me.” Not everything she’d written for had an on-line archive, but there were definitely a few articles out there on the internet with her name on them. When he asked about Stark she had to think for a moment, “One thing that stood out right away was just how technologically advanced Stark Industries was.” Not that Xanatos Enterprises wasn’t, because she had certainly noticed just how advanced they were as well, but Stark had been the first place she’d worked where it sometimes felt like she was working in a sci-fi movie or something, “And there wasn’t nothing nefarious or anything that happened that caused me to leave really. Mr. Stark simply left California and soon after he moved the company to his new location.”
“Well, it’s good to hear that there wasn’t anything terrible that caused you to leave the company,” Xanatos said. “I don’t know how he ran things there, but here you’ll be more than just a glorified gopher. I’ll be expecting you to pay attention to the day to day well enough that, if for any reason I am unable to carry out my job, you’ll be able to keep things running until I return. I like to be very hands-on in how my business and all its divisions are run - some CEOs expect their managers to keep things running while they simply collect their paycheques, but I have a very specific vision for Xanatos Enterprises, which requires a more direct approach. The man who’s currently the head of operations in New York, Owen Burnett, was my personal assistant before I decided to open up the California branch. Do you think that’s a level of responsibility you’ll be able to handle, should it come to it?”
Kara listened as Xanatos listed off jobs that she might have to do at some point and nodded when he finished, “I think that’s definitely something I can handle.” She didn’t think that anything could be tougher than when she had started working for Cat Grant, in the dreams and Tony Stark, while being very dedicated to his work, had had a more fun approach to work at times, but either way, Kara was fully committed to doing whatever her job entailed.
“Good,” Xanatos said, reaching out a hand toward her. “Well then, Kara, I look forward to working with you in the future.”