You're Hired? (Closed, Sigga)

Lies, lies, and more lies. When would she learn? Well… technically Sigga was very much aware of the potential consequences her bullshitting would result in. Plenty have called her bluff and the unfortunate reality of it was that now her words were being used against her. It wasn’t her fault, though. It was that literal snake-of-a-woman, Sigga’s case worker or parole officer, whatever you wanted to call the Pro-Hero who had goaded the UA student into making some false assertions. Assertions which she was now forced to follow through on.

The bald girl let out a deep sigh, alleviating some of the unwanted tension in her shoulders as she made her way across the building. Truth being she was immensely relieved the correspondence from her younger foster-sister remained a secret, and that her routine meetup with the snake-woman only ended with the girl having to follow through on her claims to be actively applying for internships. Apparently a clerical error or some other such nonsense had delayed Sigga’s enrollment at UA by three months and she had completely missed the Sports Festival. That was one of the primary locations prospective Pro-Heroes were scouted by various agencies and subsequently offered internships. In Sigga’s case, she had to do the legwork and applications herself.

There probably wouldn’t really have been any consequences to the fish not bothering with internships after talking so big, but that smug look; the innate assumption that presumed Sigga wasn’t just unworthy of becoming a Pro-Hero but incapable of even putting in the minimal effort expect of a UA student really aggravated her. It was all one-hundred per-cent true, of course, but still… Nobody liked being thought of as an inexorable failure.

She really should have kept her trap shut, though. Ugh.

Sigga rounded the corner, proceeding through another branch of the hall. Students and teachers passed her by, everyone occupied with their own thoughts and troubles. The girl was nervous. She was nervous and annoyed with her own pride. At least the discomfort would soon be over.

The generic internship application form in her hand had been filled and she had meant to drop it off earlier in the day. The recipient of which, the Flame On Agency, was apparently run by a third-year homeroom teacher right here at UA. Not a coincidence, but merely a convenience saving the girl the trouble of having to leave the academy grounds. Sigga had no intention of handing her application directly to the teacher, though. In fact she purposely stalked the teacher’s lounge and waited for the incarnadine-haired man to exit it before slipping in. Alas, best-laid plans and all that…

The girl had the misfortune of running into another teacher in the lounge. One who, upon learning of the girl’s goal, had politely offered (well, more like insisted) that the girl return at a specified time guaranteeing her an audience with the very person she had so carefully been trying to avoid meeting in person. Great.

It wasn’t like she hated this Firebrand. She didn’t even know him. The girl simply had a deeply seated distrust of people in positions of authority and what was a teacher/pro-hero/agency-manager if not an authority figure. Sigga already had an incredibly uncomfortable conversation with the UA principal recently. There was no reason to believe things would go better here.

Before she knew it her feet had led her to the teacher’s lounge. She did a quick cursory check to make sure her UA uniform didn’t have any incongruities in it, a last-minute bit of procrastinating before she reached the door. Time to face the music, the student thought cynically. One of her head-fins twitched. Sigga rapped her knuckles on the door twice, opened it, and waltzed on through.

The first thing Sigga noticed upon entering the room was the distinct lack of occupants, save for her and the person she was meant to be meeting. That somehow made things worse. Though it meant there wouldn’t be any witnesses to whatever faux pas she happened to commit, it also made the atmosphere in the lounge feel… constricted.

Like spheres of fossilized resin Sigga’s eyes spotted Firebrand, also known as Y- …wait. What was his actual name again? The girl’s inner monologue swore at itself. She had only just looked it up! Okay. Okay. That’s fine. Everything is fine. As the student crossed the room, her inner self-coaching was disrupted by the Pro-Hero casually retrieving a crimson sucker, unwrapping it, and plopping it into his mouth. An otherwise insignificant action, it looked very much like he was now enjoying the very same brand and flavor of candy Sigga favored. For whatever reason this benign action coupled together with his tattooed appearance seemed to perplex the girl, at least up until the man broke the silence.

“Oh! Uh, h-hi. Hello. Uh…” Sigga stammered, silently cursing the other teacher that had set this up. A meeting? Why a meeting? She just wanted to drop off her pointless piece of paper. Now not only was she wasting her own time, but she was wasting the time of Yajiri-sensei. Oh! Yajiri! Bureizu Yajiri! That was his name! The fish remembered now.

Putting on her best impression of someone chipper and not in the least bit nervous, Sigga offered a subtle smile with her greeting. “Tendō, Sigrid,” said Sigga. “Thank you for taking the time to see me,” the diplomat continued, walking up to Firebrand. She had been careful to keep her internship application free of smudges and wrinkles, which she now held out for the teacher. There was no cover-letter attached.

“I just wanted to submit my application to Flame On and answer any questions you might have.” Pleasedontaskanyquestionspleasedontaskanyquestions. She had managed to keep herself relatively composed. All that was left was for her counterpart to acknowledge her existence and dismiss her, never to be seen again. At this point she had technically completed her primary mission. She wouldn’t go bragging about it though. 

Of course it would escalate into an interview. She knew this. Dreaded it too. Things always got worse before getting better. You’d think the opportunity would please the fish and, yes, once the whole affair had been soldiered through she’d be glad of the experience. But whatever rehearsing she had done prior to showing up had seemingly evaporated from her mind; absorbed into the unknowable ether. Sigga knew how to improvise though. She knew how to think on her feet. It was more difficult while butterflies were break-dancing in her stomach, but not impossible.

His question really shouldn’t have felt like such a curve ball. But at least she managed to immediately formulate a response. “Experience,” the girl replied succinctly, matching her reply’s length to the question posed. It was far easier to react if she simply took the question sincerely. Coming up with some made-up counter would have been more arduous than simply asking herself why would she apply for an internship? Formulating an answer also had the added benefit of altering her purpose; her goal. Now she genuinely was gunning for the internship, even if the decision had been made this very second. Bombing the interview would have no negative consequences that she could think of, so the fish went all in.

She quickly realized that though her answer had been relatively honest and accurate, it sounded far too coy for an interview. Obviously she was looking for experience, but that retort couldn’t possibly satisfy. Without pausing, the UA student expanded on her reply. “I’m looking for a learning experience that could help me in narrowing down what field of heroics I should focus on.” It was quite fortunate she was only in her first year at UA. There was still plenty of time to come to a decision, but she still knew relatively little on the subject of work done by hero agencies and, more specifically, on what field would interest her whether it was rescue, combat, hostage negotiation, etc. Formal training was definitely something she lacked.

“I wasn’t able to enroll at UA immediately at the start of the school year,” Sigga continue, momentarily forgetting about her nervousness as she accepted one of the offered suckers, “-so I missed the Sport’s Festival. I didn’t want to wait for another opportunity to get scouted so I figured I’d look into local agencies myself.” It was partially true. She definitely didn’t like waiting for things to go her way. They seldom did. “When I found out Flame On was run by one of UA’s instructors I decided to look into it. Knowing your proximity to my place of study was definitely the first thing that caught my attention. When I dove in deeper to what kind of work the agency did…” Her voice trailed off, not quite sure of how to verbalize her thoughts as they formed. She paused a moment, then continued. “I read Flame On 'as done everything from disaster relief to hostage rescue. I- I honestly don’t know anything about that kind of stuff...” It was difficult not to get flustered talking about herself so much, especially with that last self-depreciating remark. Also she kept saying I too much. Whatever. “-but I’ve got a good work ethic and think that the diversity in your agency’s jobs would be the kind of experience I need.”

One of her head fins twitched again, as the girl finished her ramble and fell silent.. It had been difficult to keep eye contact while she spoke, her peepers occasionally darting at some unimportant thing in the room. Sigga’s hands, fitted with pink mittens despite the warm weather outside, fiddled with the sucker still in its wrapper as she waited for Firebrand's follow-up query. The truth was that the one thing the fish probably needed most out of this hypothetical internship was some bloody intrepidity; some self-confidence.