Sparring
“She what?!” Glimmer screeches at Adora who’s sitting across from her at the diner, Bow sits next to Glimmer patting her shoulder to calm her down, “She offered you a job? Even though she knows what you’re doing there?”
“Yes. That’s what I just told you.” Adora replies as she takes a sip of her soft drink, “Can we order already? I’m hungry.”
“You’re always hungry.” Glimmer throws back, “So? You just walked out?”
“Well, what was I supposed to do?” The whine in Adora’s voice evident as well as her frustration, “I’m not qualified to work as her EA. I don’t even know what minutes are.”
“Oh, minutes are like a brief summary of…” Bow stops himself and grimaces when Adora glares at him, “What did you say exactly when she asked you?”
Covering her face with her hands, Adora groans, “I said I didn’t have a stopwatch.”
Her friends break out in laughter at her expense, before Glimmer says, “That’s the funniest shit I’ve ever heard! How can you be so bad at this?”
“Hey! I am not bad at this.” Adora protests with a pout, “They caught me off guard.”
“Okay…” Bow glared at Glimmer to stop laughing, “So they all knew you weren’t an EA, like right off the bat?”
“Scorpia didn’t seem to know.” Adora tries to justify, “I mean, Entrapta called me out pretty much when we met, and I was just being brought around to meet people!”
“What about Catra?” Bow asks nodding.
“I don’t know. She’s… I may have got a little distracted…” Adora admits burying her face in her hands, “Plus she wasn’t even wearing business attire! She was like in a tshirt and pants. She wasn’t even wearing shoes!” Adora sighs, “Then she kept calling me princess for some reason.”
Glimmer made a noise like she was surprised by that before she patted Adora on the shoulder, “You know, bosses don’t generally call their subordinates pet names, that was a glaringly big red flag right there. You should have called her out for that!”
Glimmer didn’t seem angry, just a little disappointed that Adora wasn’t able to undertake this assignment, “I know.” Adora agrees, “I should have said something…”
“Do you think that job offer is still open?” Glimmer asks as she thinks about the possibilities, “I mean, would she take you back?”
“Glimmer… I’m pretty I already burnt that bridge when I gave my staff card back.” Adora groans again.
“Okay.” Glimmer concedes, “So? What did you find out on your first and only day on the job for DE?”
Adora comes up and takes a breath to recount her work day, “Well, I had to go through a security check to even get into the lobby before I met Scorpia.” Adora starts, “She was so lovely though. Like someone that would give really good hugs. Like you Bow.”
Bow preens and smiles proudly at that.
“Then she brings me up to her office and I fill out paperwork. Then we go into the ‘Supplies’ room, which looks like a broom closet from the outside, but there’s actually a huge office slash lab in there. That’s where Entrapta works from apparently. She said she knew I was there on ‘false pretences.’” Adora sighed, “But it wasn’t like she cared too much. She pretty much challenged me to find anything that could be deemed corrupt.”
Glimmer nods along, “Did she threaten you?”
“That’s the weird thing.” Adora wrings her fingers, “She didn’t seem to care if I did investigate them. But then she said something about being a good fit as Catra’s EA.” Adora’s face reddens at thinking about the CEO, “But then Scorpia cut her off and then we went up to Catra’s office. You guys! The view was so amazing!”
“I bet it was.” The snarkiness in Glimmer’s voice makes Adora glare at her a little, “Too bad you still aren’t working there to find out how they even got a place like that.”
“Glimmer.” Bow warns as Glimmer huffs and stands down, “Go on, Adora. We’ll try not to interrupt.” He looks at Glimmer knowingly.
Adora nods in appreciation, “Anyways, Catra’s office is at the very top of the building. She made some snide comments about me being an EA and then let me get settled. I was about an hour in and she comes out and tells me we’re going to go meet a client. In the Crimson Waste of all places!” The blonde throws her hands up exasperated, “It was 2 hours away! Each way!”
“Who was she meeting at the Crimson Waste? That place is sketchy as fuck.” Glimmer asks, more interested now, “Ooh, was it someone suss?”
“Well, that’s the thing. It wasn’t even a meeting. Catra called it a ‘call out’.” Adora replies, quelling Glimmer’s excitement, “We ended up meeting the client at their bar.”
“Who was the client?” Bow asks this time as he sits forward in his seat in anticipation.
“Huntara. Big. Buff. Muscular. Cool.” Adora lists off and when she sees Glimmer smirk at her knowingly, Adora’s face heats up, “She was so… inappropriate.”
“How so?” Glimmer wiggles her eyebrows, “She hit on you?”
“Yes!” Adora buries her face in her hands again, “It was so awkward, especially with Catra there and I was working. She like, kept making… comments. Then she was like, ‘my office is over there if you want to...’ you know?”
Glimmer and Bow look at each other before the pair of them burst out laughing again.
“Guys, it’s not funny.” Adora pouts.
“What did Catra do?” Glimmer manages to get out between laughs.
“Nothing! She just let it happen. Like it happens to all her EA’s!” Adora is screeching now, flustered with everything, “She kind of just disappeared in the back to fix whatever she was broken.”
“Catra sounds like a piece of work!” Glimmer comments.
“But then she was like all apologetic about making me wait around and even got me lunch.” Adora smiles at the memory, “It was actually kind of sweet…”
“Adora!” Glimmer scolds, “You’re not supposed to like them.”
“I don’t!” Adora protests, “I mean, I don’t not like them. They don’t seem like the evil corporation that everyone seems to make them out to be.”
“Of course they won’t act like it if they know you were there to spy on them.” Glimmer chides as she rubs her face with her hands in frustration, “You were supposed to be the insider to expose their shoddy operations.”
“Catra seemed so sure that there was nothing ‘evil’ going on in the core group.” Adora finds herself defending DE for some unknown reason, “They don’t seem like they are a threat.”
Bow pats Adora’s hand, “We need proof, Adora.” Bow looks to Glimmer before continuing, “We need to know that they aren’t the ones behind the tech that’s been spreading the H virus around. When she was at the Crimson Waste, do you know what she was fixing?”
Adora shakes her head, “All I know is that she had to take apart something and put it back together and reset it. Huntara said it was a console and router.” Adora then remembers a key detail, “I think she was fixing the communication signals or something because I had zero reception until she had finished fixing it.”
“Hmm…” Bow rubs his chin in thought, “I didn’t know that was part of Catra’s role.”
“What do you mean?” Adora leans forward at the question, “What exactly do you know about her that I don’t?”
“Not that much, really.” Bow answers with uncertainty, “I mean apart from being the head of DE and being kind of, well, ruthless, I can’t say I know much about her role. I thought her role was mostly strategic stuff. Not hands on stuff.”
“Well, she was definitely hands on today.” Adora slumps back in her seat with a smile on her face, “She was so hands on that she got grease all over her clothes, face and neck.” Adora sighs at that memory, “Guess it’s a good thing I quit then.”
“She is quite charismatic though.” Bow adds, “I saw a video of her giving a speech to investors and charming the hell out of all those people in the room. By the end of her speech, I’m pretty sure she raised a few million.”
“What?!” Adora shrieks before shrinking back down embarrassed at being so loud, “Are you telling me, she’s like super rich?”
“Duh, Adora.” Glimmer rolls her eyes, “She’s the CEO of a multibillion dollar company. What did you think she gets paid?”
Adora shrugs, “Definitely not millions…” she mutters to herself.
“Ugh, whatever. I guess we’ll have to find another way to spy on them.” Glimmer huffs, “Let’s order already.”
“Wildcat! Where’s Adora?” Scorpia asks Catra as she looks around the office space, “You didn’t…”
“No, Scorp.” Catra sighs and leans back in her chair, abandoning the email she was working on for now, “She doesn’t want to work here.”
“What did you do?”
“I didn’t do anything. I’m not the one that lied about being an EA when they were here to spy on our company.” Catra breathes out, “She doesn’t want to be here. We don’t need her.”
“Oh, okay.” Scorpia senses Catra’s annoyance, “I’m sure we’ll be able to find someone else to help us find the mole that’s working with Horde Tech.” Catra sighs again, “Oh! How did your call out go with Huntara?”
“It was fine.” Catra replies flatly, “Idiot got drunk and turned it on before we told her to. I had to take the whole thing apart and put it back together before I could get her router working again.”
“You left Adora here on her first day, alone?” Scorpia looks at Catra disapprovingly.
Catra shakes her head, “No. I took her with me.”
“What?!” Scorpia’s voices goes up 2 octaves, “You took someone along with you on a 2 hour car ride?”
“Yeah.”
“Is that why she quit?”
“No. That’s not why she quit.” Catra growls back, “She quit because I confronted her. Why is it so hard to believe that I can’t be civil around other people?”
Scorpia makes a face as she chuckles awkwardly, “Don’t take this the wrong way, Wildcat. But you and Entrapta are really not the most… social?” Catra glares at her, “I mean, you weren’t exactly welcoming when she arrived. You weren’t even dressed properly. You know what they say, first impressions count.”
“That only applies to people that have something to gain.” Catra returns, “What does it matter if I’m not dressed up to the nines? You know I don’t like wearing suits.”
“You don’t have to wear a suit to work, Catra.” Scorpia rolls her eyes as she looks down at her own suit, “It just would have been nice if you weren’t dressed like you just got out of bed.”
“Well, I did just get out of bed. I wasn’t even supposed to be working yesterday.” Catra reminds her friend, “I only got up as a favour to you.”
“You know that’s not true.” Scorpia shakes her head, “You’re the one that chose her. And don’t try to deny it. I know who her contact is. And I also know you did a lot of research on her before she came here.”
“You’re making me sound like fucking stalker.” Catra scoffs, “Entrapta got involved too.”
“Yes. But she only helped to make sure she was compatible with your personality.” Scorpia reminds her friend this time, “You had that final decision.”
“And I made it!” Catra shouts angrily, “What do you want me to do? Huh?!”
The sudden outburst from Catra makes Scorpia take a step back guiltily, “I’m sorry, Wildcat. I guess some things just aren’t supposed to be.” The larger woman places a reassuring hand on Catra’s shoulder, “Don’t worry. We’ll find the mole.”
“I’m not worried.” Catra brushes Scorpia’s hand off her shoulder, “I’ll find whoever they are and I’m going to fuck them up.”
Scorpia shakes her head, “No. We aren’t doing that, Wildcat. We can’t risk you getting into trouble again.”
“What trouble?” Catra grins, “If no one knows about it, then there’s no trouble, right?”
“Wrong.” Scorpia firmly says, “You’ve put so much effort into being a better person. Don’t ruin it now. If we are going to do this, it needs to be done right. Okay?”
Catra doesn’t respond, being petulant for the sake of it. Scorpia does the one thing she know she really shouldn’t do, but it’s really the only way to get Catra to comply.
“Scorpia! Put me down!” Scorpia wraps Catra up in her muscular arms and pulls her up into the biggest bear hug while the smaller woman tries to get free.
“No. We do this right. Or I’m out.” Scorpia pulls Catra’s back into her front, holding her tight enough but not suffocatingly tight, “Do we have a deal?”
“Fine! Deal!” Catra scoffs unhappily, “Let me down!”
“Okay.” Scorpia gently releases her bear hug on Catra, “Good.”
“I get to start shit if they come for us though, right?” Catra asks smoothing down her clothes, “I’m not going to let whoever the mole is hurt our core group.”
Scorpia sends her a disapproving look, but she can’t deny the fierce loyalty Catra has for her friends, “Fine. But you are not allowed to start it. Defence only.”
At that, Catra grins. Small victories she thinks to herself.
“Okay, good. Now that we’ve got that out of the way, I need to get back to work.” Catra tells Scorpia softer than before, “Thanks. For having my back.”
“Always, Catra.” Scorpia promptly leaves while Catra sits alone on the top floor of the building, staring out the window before an email alert tone brings her back.
A few days later, Catra feels like she’s gotten over not getting Adora on board with them. She’s still going through a few more files to find someone with the expertise Adora seems to possess but all the potential people she’s been looking at, just don’t seem to sit right with her. When she came across Adora’s name by accident and did the research on her, the blonde ticked a lot of boxes. But now Catra was back at square one. There is still a mole in the company, and no one seems to know who it is, despite how good all the staff there seem to have it.
Catra’s ears on the ground has turned up nothing but positive feedback regarding staff satisfaction and there’s never been a bad word said anywhere about them. Apart from the rumours from external sources trying to take down the company Catra, Entrapta and Scorpia built up from the ground nearly a decade ago. Eventually she gives up on going through the files on her desk and heads down to Swifty. Yes. She was going to keep calling it that, despite Adora no longer working at the company.
She pulls out of the parking garage and decides to drive to a favourite spot of hers in the Whispering Woods just to clear her head and just get out of the building that she works and sleeps in. Yep. The top floor is not just office space. It’s actually where Catra sleeps at night. Same goes for Entrapta, albeit on a different floor and usually somewhere between her office and her secret lab located down in the basement floors. Scorpia was the only normal one of the 3, deciding that it wouldn’t be healthy to work and live at the same place, albeit unable to convince her friends of the benefits of not being at work all the time. Catra parks her car at her usual spot, just off the dirt road that leads to the top of the hill with the best views of Bright Moon. It wasn’t a well known spot due to no actual track leading to her secret spot. But Catra knows this spot well. This was where she went when things got too hard growing up or when she needed to cool off from getting into fights, more recently, it was just a quiet spot without a shitload of stimulation that made her think about work.
She walks the unmarked track up to her favourite spot and climbs her tree and settles up against it, just watching the world go by. She’s silenced her phone and knows that Scorpia will be wondering where she’s gone again, but right now, she can’t care less. She needs this break.
It’s dark by the time she comes back down from her secret spot and gets into Swifty. Catra sits behind the wheel for a while and thinks about where she wants to go from here. It’s too early to head back to the office or her home and it’s also too early for dinner. So she goes to the next logical place she can think of going that’s not a bar. The gym.
Adora’s working up a sweat on the bench, completing her drop sets of dumbbell chest presses since the bench press stations were full, it’s always full on Monday’s. Everyone knew that Monday’s was chest day. That didn’t matter to Adora though, she was flexible and it was always good to mix things up with her exercises. She finishes her last set, shakes out her arms and puts all her weights back before wiping down the bench. Still not quite feeling like she’s done yet, Adora decides to go into the boxing area to work the bags a little before she finishes up for the night. As she’s working through a few combinations she spots Catra dumping her workout bag in the corner and limbering up. The shorter woman smirks over at Adora as she wraps her hands and knuckles, shaking out her limbs before grabbing a skipping rope and warming up in the corner. Adora doesn’t’ know why she feels like she’s blushing, but her whole body is heating up, and she isn’t even going that hard currently.
Catra keeps her eyes on Adora throughout her entire warm up, smirking every time Adora chances a glance over her way. She walks over to the bag next to the blonde and gives it a test punch.
“Hey Adora.” Catra rasps out and the blonde turns around so suddenly, that she nearly trips over her own feet, “You okay there?”
“Uh, yeah?” Adora answers as she feels all the blood go to her head, “What are you doing here?”
Catra shrugs, “Punching something always seems to make me feel good.”
Adora startles a little when Catra lands a hard punch in the middle of the bag just to prove the point, “Feel better?”
Catra sighs, holding the swinging bag in place, she shakes her head, “No. Can’t say that I do.”
“Want to spar?” Adora blurts out before her mind can catch up, “I mean, if you want to…”
“Yeah, sure. Why not?” Catra shrugs again, “Just a warning though, I’m a bit of a brawler…”
The confused look on Adora’s face makes Catra laugh, “Does that mean you fight dirty?”
“Probably.” Catra replies, stifling her laughter enough to answer, “I don’t usually spar. I only fight when I have to. And I haven’t had to in a while.”
“Uh, okay…” Adora takes that information in, “What kind of fights did you get into exactly?”
“I don’t know…” Catra rolls her neck, “Bar fights, fist fights, fighting over a girl… I don’t know.”
Catra rubs the back of her neck as she looks away from Adora who’s just looking at her blankly, “Uh, okay… over a girl?”
“That’s what you got out of that?” Catra laughs, “But yeah… I thought she’d like me better if I fought for her. But she was just getting back at her ex, so I was really fighting for no reason.”
“Did you at least win?” Adora asks stepping closer to Catra.
Catra smirks at the blonde, “Well, yeah.” Adora’s eyes widen in amusement, “I bloodied up my fists for nothing. Didn’t even get the girl.”
Not really knowing where to go with the conversation next, Adora takes a step back, “So? Are we going to spar?”
Catra looks around the empty room, “Sure.”
They both move into the middle of the room where there’s a sparring area marked out and they just look at each other. Adora’s trained in some martial arts before, so she knows she can take Catra on quite easily. Pound for pound, she’s bigger and stronger than her sparring partner. She watches Catra, swinging her arms around and kicking out her legs.
“Do you want pads?” Adora suggests, she doesn’t want to really hurt or leave marks on Catra, “I mean, I don’t usually use them, but if you want, I can put them on. You know, just so when I connect it won’t hurt as much.”
Catra stops moving around and quirks an eyebrow at Adora, “And what makes you think you’ll be able to land a shot on me?”
“You just said it yourself, you’re a brawler.” Adora rolls her shoulders and answers this time feeling more confident, “And I’ve had a bit of training in this kind of thing.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“How much training?” Catra tilts her head as she waits for an answer.
‘Uh, I’ve got black belts in karate and taekwondo. And I’ve done a bit of judo and jiu jitsu.” Adora lists off.
“Hmm. Impressive.” Catra deadpans with a smirk, “So, you’re going to hand my ass to me then?”
“Probably.” Adora smirks back as Catra nods, “Actually, I have a proposition.”
“Shoot.”
“If I win…” Adora looks up like she’s thinking, “You give me my job back.”
Taken aback, Catra raises an eyebrow to the blonde, “You want to work for me as my Executive Assistant? Even though you don’t know how to do it?”
Adora nods, “Yes. But, I want to have full access to everything.”
“Why?”
“You said DE is not evil.” Adora throws back at Catra, “Then let me prove it.”
Catra takes a breath in and thinks, “And… what do I get if I win?”
“Uh… what do you want?” Adora replies before she huffs playfully, “Not that you’re going to win.”
“Hm… what do I want?” Catra replies, looking up at the ceiling, “If I win, you come work for me in a dress, one that I get to pick.”
“What?!” Adora blusters out, “That’s… that’s not even going to happen.”
“Could happen.”
“Nah uh!” Adora argues petulantly, “I’m going to take you down so fast, you’re not even know what hit you!”
“Okay.” Catra smirks, “Deal?”
“Deal.” They shake on it and then step back into starting positions.
“What are the rules?” Catra asks as they start dancing around each other, “Do I have to knock you out to win?”
“No!” Adora almost shouts, “If you are down on the mat for 10 seconds then you lose.”
“So… you want to pin me?” Catra smirks as Adora blushes, “You don’t need to spar with me if that’s your angle.”
“Shut up!” Adora tries to cover her blush, “It’s not like that!”
“Sure, Adora.” Catra drawls.
“Come on, lets fight already!” Adora goads, “No more talking.”
“Why not, princess?” Catra chuckles as she moves around, light on her feet, “Is it, putting you off?”
Adora groans and then throws a few combinations at Catra, jabbing at her midsection before kicking at her knees. Catra laughs as she easily fends it off. Sure, Catra doesn’t have formal training per se, but what she has, she’s learnt through life and death situations. This, however is not a life and death situation. So, she’s happy letting Adora take the lead and Catra defends lazily. She lets Adora land a few hits every now and then, just to let the blonde think she’s got the upper hand. After about 2 minutes, they are both puffing hard. Adora’s movement slowing down considerably as she’s been doing most of the attacking, while Catra only has to react.
“What’s the matter, princess?” Catra pants out, “I thought you were some kind of martial arts expert.”
Catra relaxes her body, knowing what would happen next. And boy does she let it happen.
Adora sweeps Catra’s front leg and then throws her onto her back, and Adora is quickly on top of the shorter woman, pinning Catra’s arms above her head easily.
“You give?” Adora grunts as Catra smirks from under her.
“Yeah. I give.” Catra surrenders, a grin on her face, “You can, uh, get off me now.”
Adora grins smugly before leaning down so she can whisper into Catra’s ear, “I bet you like it when I’m on top.”
Catra laughs as she ‘struggles’ under Adora, “Get off me, princess.”
Adora rolls her eyes and gets up, pulling Catra up with her. Wiping the sweat off her brow, Adora goes to grab her water bottle and towel. Catra does the same. Adora walks over to where Catra is stretching, “So, I guess I got my job back, huh?”
“You technically always had it Adora.” Catra replies after swallowing her mouthful of water, “You never resigned and I never fired you. Technically, you’re still an employee.”
“What?” Adora shakes her head in disbelief.
“Yeah. I mean the fact that you’ve missed a whole week of work without giving any reason is just, I don’t know, really unprofessional.” Catra is smirking at Adora again as she wipes her face with a towel, “I guess you’ll have a short week. Since you’ve already missed today.”
Dumbfounded, Adora just stares at Catra. Her mouth is still open and she doesn’t know what she’s supposed to think, “Are you kidding me?”
Catra shoves her drink bottle and towel into her bag, “No. Why would I joke about something like that?”
“Catra!” Adora huffs, “Why couldn’t you just have told me that, instead of doing all of… this?”
“You’re the one that suggested we spar. All I wanted to do with beat the bag.” Catra replies as she starts walking towards the door, “Oh, and Adora?”
“Yeah?”
“Be in the lobby at 8am tomorrow.” Catra tells her, “I’ll meet you there. Fuck, I’ll even where shoes.”
Adora laughs, “Okay. But I’m not wearing a dress!”
“I didn’t win. So no, you won’t have to.” Catra replies as she opens the door to exit the room, “I look forward to sparring with you again.”
Adora shows up to DE lobby at 745am and waits at the security desk again. It had taken 20 minutes to convince security that 1) she was actually an employee – despite not have her staff card and 2) she was meeting Catra. The second part was probably harder as Catra was not answering her phone and no one in the office upstairs was being helpful. The security guard that had managed to get on the phone to Catra was not happy after being getting an earful from the CEO about waking her up so early. Eventually that security guard managed to get confirmation that Adora could wait in the lobby and that Catra would be down at 8am.
It's 755am now and Adora is texting back and forth with Bow and Glimmer on their group chat when she hears the familiar raspy voice behind her.
“Lonnie!” Catra walks straight up to the security desk with a mischievous grin, “I feel like I haven’t talked to you in forever. Thanks for being my wake up call. Should I get you to do that for me every morning?”
“Fuck off, Catra.” Lonnie responds with an eye roll and a smile as Catra fist bumps the head security guard, “Next time, pick up your damn phone!”
Catra just laughs as the other security guards try to look busy in the background, “How’s things down here?”
“Yeah, ever since we got the extra guards, it’s been good.” Lonnie replies with a sense of sincerity, “Haven’t had one of those HT jerks get past Rogelio yet.”
“Have there been a few more?” Catra looks towards the front doors, “Any ideas you want to run by me?”
“Yeah, a few.” Lonnie answers truthfully, “But, I think you’ve got someone waiting for you.” She gestures over to Adora, “Says she’s your new EA or something. But doesn’t have any accreditation or any documentation to support that. I thought she quit the other week.”
Catra eyes Adora, who’s face has turned a bright shade of red at hearing them talk about her ‘absence’. Catra turns back to Lonnie, “Yeah, she is my EA.”
Lonnie nods in Adora’s direction, “You’re all good to go Adora.”
“Thank you.” Adora replies softly as she follows Catra back to the elevators. Once inside she looks down at Catra’s feet, “Seriously? Those are not shoes.”
“I don’t know what you are talking about.” Catra replies, lifting her right foot and shaking her fuzzy blue slipper in the air, “Besides, 8am is early for me.”
“Did you come to work in your pajamas or something?” Adora pushes.
“Something like that.” Catra shrugs.
“What’s the plan for today anyways?” Adora asks as they both watch the numbers on the floors increase, “You know I’m not an EA. So? What am I going to be doing then?”
Catra doesn’t answer as she continues to watch the numbers increase to the top floor and Adora doesn’t press Catra further.
The door opens and Catra steps out first, Adora following behind. They walk past Adora’s work station and straight into Catra’s office. Catra gestures for Adora to take a seat on the chair opposite her desk chair.
“Sorry, I don’t like talking business in the elevators.” Catra says casually to which Adora nods uncertainly, “Here.” Catra holds out Adora’s staff card and Adora takes it slowly.
“Thank you.”
“You can get into every room in this building. That includes everything on this floor, Entrapta’s labs and wherever else you can think of that has a swipe card access.” Catra tells her as she takes her seat behind the desk, opening her laptop, “There’s a mole in DE. I need you to find out who it is.”
“Oh…” Adora was not expecting that, “So, you want me to work a job, inside a job?”
Catra tilts her head to Adora, “Not really. I mean, you were going to spy on us anyways.”
“This is not the same thing, Catra.” Adora leans forward on her chair, putting her hands on Catra’s desk, “How exactly am I even supposed to do that, I don’t even know what your mole has done.”
Catra reaches down and opens a drawer, pulling out a folder, “Here. Everything I have on what this mole has been up to.” Catra drops the folder on her desk and Adora picks it up and starts flipping through it, “Whoever it is, they have been sneaking information on our projects to Horde Tech.”
“So?”
“So?” Catra sighs, “It means they have the means to sabotage our next reveal.”
“I don’t get it.” Adora leans back in her chair.
“What don’t you get? They want to ruin us.” Catra says like it is obvious, “We don’t even do the same things, yet they have been actively trying to bring us down.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.” Adora shakes her head as she continues to flip through the file.
“Well, not really. It kind of makes perfect sense.” Catra runs her fingers through her messy bed hair and then sighs again, “Fuck. I knew they would never let us be independent.”
“Who are you talking about?” Adora closes the file and puts it back on the desk.
“Horde Tech.” Catra answers flatly, “They still think I owe them.”
“For what?”
“For everything. We all worked there when we were still teenagers.” Catra reminisces, “I needed a job and they were hiring. I didn’t know what they did. I was just the janitor.” Adora nods but remains silent, “That’s where I met Entrapta and Scorpia. Entrapta was with the head guy, Hordak. So very wrong though… he is like way older than her and well, lets say things didn’t work out between them and she broke off to get away from him. Scorpia wasn’t fairing much better. Though she wasn’t sleeping with her boss.” Catra chuckles to herself, “She was working security there. They’d berate her and talk down to her all the time, even in front of clients.” Adora sees Catra clench her fists on top of the desk before releasing them, “Anyways, I’d been around HT for long enough to know they were up to no good.”
“Really? Like what?” Adora’s perks up at hearing that.
Catra looks around and then dead straight into Adora’s eyes, the blonde swallows hard, “Whatever I tell you in this room, stays in this room. Got it?”
“Got it.” Adora agrees.
“Do you remember that major black out in Bright Moon about a decade ago?” Adora thinks back and vaguely remembers it to start with before it something clicks in her head.
“Yes!” She snaps her fingers in recognition, “The black out happened at the worst possible time! I was walking home from Glimmer’s house and all the lights went out. Then everything went crazy. Not like straight away.” Catra watched Adora talk, amusement in her eyes at how animated the blonde was getting and using her hands, “There’s like people fighting and looting. Cars are running up the back of each other because the traffic lights had all gone out and then I was being chased by some thug trying to rob me.”
“Yeah…” Catra nods, “I was in the middle of playing video games with Traps and Scorpia…” Catra admitted before realising something, “Hang on, you were chased by thugs?”
“Not thugs, just a thug.” Adora corrects and then her lips tug up into a smug smile, “I got the better of that jerk anyways. He probably won’t be having children anytime soon.”
“Oh, snap!” Catra laughs, “That’s fucking ace!”
Adora laughs as well, “I don’t condone violence. But, he had it coming.”
“I’m sure he did.” Catra managed to rein her laughter in, “Anyways, you should have infiltrated HT instead of here. There’s more shit going on over there, than here.”
“My firm had me assigned here.” Adora confesses, “How is it there’s like no information on you, Entrapta or Scorpia? Anywhere…”
“Uh, remember that thing about nothing we talk about leaves this room?” Adora nods with a raised eyebrow, “That’s because Traps scrubs most of our information off. There are only some bits of general info about each of us around just so we don’t raise suspicions with the authorities. That’s also why we don’t list our names on the DE sites.”
“Bow found a video of you giving a speech to investors?” Adora looks at Catra’s fingers drumming on the desk.
“That footage was leaked deliberately.” Catra replies, “We leaked it. Entrapta did up a model for how we could increase our funding with investors. Leaking the video so it became viral made more sense to get our company off the ground. My name was scrubbed from the video. All anyone could make out was the company name and our vision.”
“What exactly do you do here at DE?” Adora looks at Catra, she honestly has no idea what Catra’s role even is.
“What do I do? Or what does DE do?” Catra questions right back.
“Both.”
“Well DE as a whole, looks after the communications infrastructures in most places around the world, to ensure that we’ve got enough satellites up in the air to ping off whenever people need to communicate. You know like a mum or dad calling each other about picking up milk or when you get stranded in the middle of nowhere and you think your phone has no coverage. But we’ve got other little side projects too.”
“Hang on… at Huntara’s bar I had no signal on my phone.” Confusion in Adora’s voice as she tries to piece all the information together, “How can you say that you’ve got coverage when there was none, and it isn’t exactly rural.”
Catra chuckles, “If you had an emergency, your call would go through. It’d pick up on one of our satellites and point you in the right direction. That’s why every phone has an emergency call function that only goes to the emergency services.” The explanation seems to have quelled Adora’s question, “Huntara fucked around with something she wasn’t supposed to.” Catra adds knowing what’s on the tip of Adora’s tongue, “Okay, basically we’ve got a pretty big unit in her bar. I used to work for her you know.”
“She called you a menace.” Adora tattles with a smile, “Apparently you used to sneak into her bar a lot?”
Catra chuckles, “Yeah, I did. Believe it or not, she’s actually one of the more positive role models I had in my life growing up.” Catra sighs thinking about the past before shaking her head and getting back on track, “Anyways, Hunt’s got a pretty big comms unit in her bar. I built it with Entrapta when we left HT and it’s sort of one of the first hubs we built. No one thinks to look in a bar for stuff like that.”
“But she did something to it…?”
“Yeah, she turned it on before we were ready on our end.” Catra rolls her eyes, “Fucking jammed the signal due to the different frequencies we were running. It was lucky it only affected the CW.”
“Right…” The blonde feels like she’s getting a headache with all this new information.
Catra stands up abruptly and Adora just looks at her in surprise, “Get up, princess.”
“Why?” Adora stands up from her chair hesitantly.
“I guess I’m going to have to show you how to be an EA to me.” Catra grins as she walks over to her office door and opens it, “Come on.”
Adora rolls her eyes, “And what exactly are you going to teach me?”
“Well, first of all.” Catra grabs a notebook out from the stationary cupboard and hands it to Adora, “Grab a pen, will you?” Adora does as she’s told, “Take your seat, princess.”
“You know you can’t keep calling me that?” Adora challenges, “It’s completely unprofessional.”
“Says you.” Catra brushes her off, “Anyways, I’m going to show you how to take minutes. And I don’t mean with a stopwatch.”
Adora turns red in embarrassment, “Fuck…”
“Also, no swearing.” Catra scolds lightly, “Only I may fucking swear. Since I’m the boss and all.”
“Fuck off!” Adora pushes Catra’s shoulder.
“Also, that’s inappropriate touching. Can’t have that.” Catra shoves Adora right back, “Anyway, sit.”
With a huff, Adora sits down on her chair and places the notebook on her desk before pulling out a pen from the drawer in front of her, “Fine. Show me how to take minutes.”
Catra chuckles as she starts explaining how and what minutes are and why they were important in terms of documentation. She even pulled out her call out summary to the Crimson Waste that she completed herself to cover her expenses, the job requirements, if it was completed and then the time it took. Adora studied the document in her hand and nodded before handing it back to Catra.
“No, you need to file this away, princess.” Catra smirks and when Adora looks around at how to do it she chuckles, “Okay, well I guess I have to show you how to file too.”
They spend the rest of the morning working through EA duties including how to set up and schedule meetings, how to write emails and answer the phones formally and which rooms or spaces in the building would be suitable for meetings. By the end, Adora has filled half of her notebook, before she sits back and shakes her wrist out from all the writing she’s been doing.
“Why do I need to know how to do all of this?” Adora finally asks while getting up from her seat so she can stretch her legs.
“This is your cover, isn’t it?” Catra asks right back, “I can’t exactly introduce you to DE as the investigator on site to weed out the mole, can I?”
Adora frowns a little, she really didn’t want to be Catra’s EA, but the CEO had a point. She can’t exactly dig around and ask questions if everyone knows why she’s there. “Fine. Who else know about this?”
“Just the core group.” Catra answers as she leans back on the stationary cupboard.
A smile tugs on Adora’s lips as she looks up at Catra, “Oh, do you mean the Super Pal Trio?”
Catra groans loudly at hearing the name, “Fucking Scorpia…” She mumbles under her breath, “I can’t believe she fucking told you that.”
“What? It’s not that bad. My friends and I are call the Best Friends Squad.” Adora happily admits, “Besides I think it’s cute.”
“Shut up, it’s not cute!” Catra groans but the blush is evident on her face, “And do not mention that name outside the core group, or so help me… I will kick you out so fast…”
“Calm down, Catra.” Adora laughs, “Remember what you said? What gets said here, stays here.”
The quirk in Adora’s eyebrows has Catra narrowing hers, “Damn straight!”
The exuberance in Catra’s reply makes Adora laugh again before reeling it back in, “I think we need to talk more about how I’m supposed to be able to find this mole of yours. And also, if you have anyone in mind you want me to question…”
“Yeah, that’s good thinking!” Catra agrees, “But let’s do that after brunch.”
“Brunch?”
“Fuck yeah! I haven’t eaten anything at all today.” Catra rubs her stomach, “Plus I still haven’t gotten ready for work.” The confusion comes back on Adora’s face, “Seriously? This is not what I usually wear at work.”
“Really? I mean you weren’t even wearing shoes the first time we met.” Adora recalls, “Plus, you weren’t exactly dressed like you were going to be in the office.”
“I was right about you.” Catra smirks much to Adora’s continued confusion, “Scorpia thought you were kind of airheaded.”
Adora gave out an involuntary indignant huff in response, “What were you right about exactly?” she snaps at Catra.
Raising her hands in surrender, Catra’s mirth dies down a little, “I was right that you’d be perceptive enough to know when something is off.” Adora looks at her with a narrow stare, “Was I wrong?”
“I, uh…”
“Don’t answer that.” Catra waves her response off, “There’s no way you won’t come off sounding incompetent or pompous.”
Catra makes her way back into her office and picks up a set of keys, “I’ll be back in like half an hour and we can go grab brunch.”
“Hey! Where are you going?” Adora rushes over when it looks like Catra’s walking through another ‘Supplies’ door, “Oh, wow, seriously?”
“What?”
“You live here, don’t you?” Adora furrows her eyebrows.
“So, what if I do?” Catra asks right back as she unlocks the door.
“Isn’t that like a building violation?”
“Not unless you rat me out.” Catra grins as she opens the door, “Oh, by the way, you won’t have access to doors with physical keys. You’ve only got swipe card access.”
Adora looks at her swipe card and then back to Catra, “Can I see inside?”
“You want to come into my home?” Catra asks perplexed.
“I mean, if that’s okay…” Adora fidgets a little, now embarrassed at being so bold as to have asked in the first place, “You don’t have to, but it’d be cool to see what the other side of this floor looks like.”
Catra thinks about it for a moment before she grins a little wider, “Tell you what, you beat me again when we spar and I’ll show you.”
With that, Catra goes into her home and shuts the door behind her. Adora just stares at the closed door with one thought in her mind. There’s no way she’ll lose to Catra in another sparring match, so it’ll only be a matter of time before she gets to have a look inside.
Or so she thinks.