🤜 hope van dyne | marvel cinematic universe

[unexpendable]

	✔ Cʀᴏssᴏᴠᴇʀs/AU ✔ Aᴄᴛɪᴏɴsᴘᴀᴍ ✔ Pʀᴏsᴇ	✔ Pɪᴄᴛᴜʀᴇ ᴘʀᴏᴍᴘᴛs ✔ Oᴛʜᴇʀᴡᴏʀᴅʟʏ ✔ Sᴛᴀʀᴛᴇʀs	♥ F/M, F/F ⏰ Uᴘ ᴛᴏ ᴅᴀᴛᴇ

Comments

she does not have a supersuit :(

[highlyemotional]

maybe she will one day

[unexpendable]

[Hope doesn't often find herself stealing things from Darren. It will draw too much attention to her and she doesn't want Darren to view her as an enemy - at least not yet. But she also doesn't think that this bright blond ball of sunshine that he's managed to secure as an assistant needs to be subjected to him twenty four seven.

So she borrows her for the day. Caroline gets summoned to her office just as Hope is getting ready to head out the door again.]

I hope you've had your coffee because it's going to be a long day.

[highlyemotional]

I've had three since Mr. Cross woke me up at four this morning to bring him a cruller.

[ from a bakery that was both an hour away and not open, but caroline has seen the devil wears prada more than a dozen times and she refuses to be a one off assistant who gets fired over a donut. she has PLANS and this job figures into those plans, even if it is just a stepping stone. she's not going to be an assistant forever, but this job (and the recommendation she will get from it) is her first step. she has to nail it.

still she offers hope one of her patently friendly smiles, stepping back so the woman has room to leave with the obvious intention of following her. ] But I can get you one before we leave, if you'd like.

[unexpendable]

[Hope is aware of that, and it's such a waste that Darren subjects her to his macho male power tripping, but that's a conversation for another day.]

No, I'm fine. But I will need you to take notes for all our meetings today.

[She opens the door for her and gestures for her to head to Hope's car.]

After you.

[highlyemotional]

Of course.

[ caroline smiles wider, more real, when hope opens the door for her because that's really sweet and frankly she is kind of unused to it here. mystic falls wasn't the rat race and she wasn't as prepared for an office space like this as she thought she'd be. it's been a learning curve but she's excelling at it so that's nice. ]

Who are we seeing today? [ caroline is already thinking about looking them up and finding a personal tidbit about them to use to ingratiate herself and maybe a note about preferences so she can send them a follow up fruit basket. ]

[unexpendable]

We have lunch with Pepper Potts who is visiting from New York, and a mid-afternoon meeting with Rand Industries. They haven't said which member of their team they're sending, so let's hope it's Joy and not Ward.

[Nothing against Ward Meachum, but this is prior to his getting clean and being liberated from his not-dead dead father.]

[highlyemotional]

But Ward's so handsome. [ caroline, please, let's focus on the big picture here, not your attraction to older men. messy older man who would definitely make the mistake of a younger woman.

but that is neither here, nor there. caroline is still excited to meet powerful women in business. ]

[unexpendable]

Handsome, yes, but ... there's something off about him.

[And she'd rather not expose her new assistant to it.]

Joy's much better to deal with if you actually want to keep a meeting on track.

[highlyemotional]

[ caroline gives a shrug that somehow manages to say "well, she's a woman so i'm not surprised she keeps things running smoothly". she's sat in on so many of darren's meetings that she knows for a fact men can't keep on track. ]

What are the meetings about?

[ she doesn't expect hope will want her to have files and paperwork magically prepared since she just found out about all these meetings, but caroline!!! is a perfectionist!!! ]

[unexpendable]

Pepper is mostly personal. We're friends, and while we may talk a little shop, we're also competitors so she's not going to be sharing too much.

[There's going to be a lot of story swapping about Tony Stark, basically.]

Joy and I are working on a joint project. One of our subdivisions is working on revolutionizing some med tech to help streamline the distribution of certain medications. Since Rand essentially made their bones in pharmaceuticals, we want to see if they'll be willing to co-sponsor some clinical trials.

[If she's going to be taking notes, Caroline should know what she's looking for.]

If watching Tony Stark has proven anything, it's that any good tech company needs to know how to diversify, and medicine is one of the steadiest growing industries in the country. If things don't go well with Darren's latest weapons projects, the medical division will keep the doors open and provide a lot of funding for the projects that come after.

[highlyemotional]

[ caroline's phone is out immediately, not in her hands and then suddenly in her hands, and she is definitely already taking neat, neurotic notes on the topics of these meetings. ]

He killed a lamb yesterday, I don't think his weapons project is going to go well.

[ it's lucky that caroline's self-control is so well kept because the rush of blood when that lamb went from fluffy adorable animal to puddle of blood and fur almost broke her right then and there. ]

[unexpendable]

[Hope nods because yep, her point exactly.]

Exactly why we need to diversify. Darren's projections for his profit margins are high, there's no questioning that, but we still need to fund the company until he gets there.