Work Text:
It was a reflex to say, “Good afternoon, what can I do for you today?” with a bright smile on her face any time the door to the office opened.
When she actually registered that the people who entered through that door were three armed gunmen, it was all Leah could do to keep the smile on her face. Now that the reaction had been had, she strongly suspected that taking it back would be worse.
There were masks over the men’s faces, but the smirk was clear in the voice of the one who answered, “Bring your boss out here, girlie. We have a little business with him.”
“Of course,” she kept the smile plastered on her face, “let me pull up his schedule.”
All Leah did on a day to day basis was watch the desk and answer phones. She wasn’t in charge of anyone’s schedule, she didn’t make protocols, she followed them and did it fairly well. She did actually have access to Mr. Wayne’s schedule in a “view only” capacity, but anything that was supposed to go to him was routed through his actual assistant first. She just watched the desk.
That said, 90% of watching the desk involved convincing people that the person they were looking for, be it on the phone or in person, wasn’t actually available right now. It didn’t matter if they were or weren’t there. There didn’t mean available, but people didn’t always understand that. Mr. Wayne (and the rest of the C-suite offices past this desk) had jobs that weren’t meant for interruptions every half an hour. The number of times that she’d smiled to someone’s face and lied about Mr. Wayne’s exact whereabouts was high. Informing people that he was in today, but in another part of the building was an easy one. Or he was in a meeting. Or on the lunch break that he hadn’t bothered to actually take. Or that he was at the construction site, Wayne Enterprises was always building or revitalizing something somewhere. And somehow Leah didn’t think she’d be safer if she listened to the armed kidnappers. She knew Mr. Wayne wouldn’t be any safer. And 90% of her job was just lying to people anyways. So she thought fast.
Mr. Wayne’s schedule indicated that he actually was in his office right now. Completely clear, no conflicts, no appointments that couldn’t be missed, no meetings, no child’s event that would require him to be gone. Fuck. For once it definitely would have been easier if she was telling the truth. But if she could keep smiling through the lady who wanted to speak with the CEO of a company about her son being fired from an entry level position and spent twenty minutes screaming about it, she could keep to her script for this. She closed the calendar and glanced at the clock. It was 2:11– go.
“I’m so sorry,” she kept her tone just as pleasant as it would be if someone was walking in for any other unscheduled meeting, “But Mr. Wayne is currently in a meeting which is scheduled to last until 2:30. Though honestly this type of meeting tends to run long, you’d probably have much more luck coming back around 2:45. Or you’re welcome to wait on the couches if you prefer not to leave and return. Goodness knows I prefer the central heating whenever I can get it.” Finish with a scripted chuckle, and it’s exactly what she would say to anyone else.
There’s something to be said for good manners and a friendly mien, Leah thought, because she didn’t immediately get shot. On second thought, maybe she should stop thinking about it and rely on the script.
Goon-spoke-first snorted, “I don’t think we need to wait for the meeting to end, you can get your boss now.”
“I would if I could, sir,” she smiled. Time to actually rely on that quick thinking, “Unfortunately the door is locked for this type of meeting, and I physically can’t open it.”
Goon-very-tall-man was up next, “They don’t even give you a key?”
“No sir, it’s an electronic lock that’s controlled from Mr. Wayne’s desktop. There is an override built into the fire suppression system, would you like me to set that off?” Actually, Leah didn’t think she’d ever seen Mr. Wayne lock his office. People who weren’t supposed to be there were deflected at the desk, and anyone else was welcome. Still, it sounded believable, that was the important thing. Pointing at the fire alarm was icing on the cake.
“Hell no!” Goon-spoke-first answered, “You think we wanna call EMS now?”
“Then you’re welcome to wait on the couches,” Leah smiled. Fuck. Did that mean they had gotten up here with no alarms going off?
Tall Goon was the first to go. The guy who hadn’t said anything followed close behind, and only Goon-spoke-first was waiting at her desk, “You better not call anyone, girlie.”
“Of course,” Leah said, “In fact, here.” She pulled her phone out of her purse and made a big show of shutting it off, and then closed it in a drawer behind her. All appearances aside, she didn’t actually want to die. And she probably needed to figure out a way to get out of the room.
“I’ll go grab your complimentary waters.” She stepped carefully out from behind the desk.
“I think we’d rather you stay where we can see you,” Tall Goon said menacingly.
“Are you sure?” She was careful to keep the question puzzled and polite, “Only, they’re chilled, and we’ve got the heat on pretty high. You’ve gotta be warm in all those layers.”
“Dude,” it was the quiet guy who interjected, and based on his tone of voice he seemed to be much calmer about this than either of the other two, “she put her phone in the drawer and any panic button would be on the desk anyway. If anything, it’s better to get her away from it, and I could use a water.” He turned to her, “Just don’t take too long or we’ll have to come after you.”
Thank fuck for that. She was totally putting in a request for a panic button in the near future. Given normal WE security protocols, she was actually surprised she didn’t already have one. “I’ll be quick about it.”
She walked around the corner towards Mr. Wayne’s office. There were not, actually, complimentary waters for visitors. Mr. Wayne did, however, have a mini-fridge in his office full of waters, sports drinks, and some health-smoothie concoction with weird ingredients Leah was pretty sure only rich people could justify drinking on a daily basis. He’d told her several times that she was welcome to grab something from it if she ever forgot to bring her own water bottle, or just wanted something out of it, and she’d even taken him up on it on occasion. Here’s to hoping he wouldn’t mind her taking three at once.
His office was all the way at the end of the hall. Normal protocol involved knocking on the door and waiting for an answer before she entered, just because Mr. Wayne liked the heads up. He was actually a really good boss and Leah was normally happy to accommodate the relatively few specific requests he made. She was worried that they might hear the knocking sound outside, though, and it was probably paranoia but she couldn’t quite manage to shut the voice in the back of her head up. Maybe he would also consider these extenuating circumstances.
When she slipped past the door and pulled it shut behind her, Mr. Wayne very abruptly cut himself off from saying something about a warehouse–some new acquisition or another, she guessed reflexively, even though she really didn’t have time for speculating–and turned to her, “Is something wrong? You’re usually pretty good about knocking.”
Leah was pretty sure that if she dropped the smile now she was not going to be able to go back outside. She darted to the mini-fridge, and hoped he would forgive a little tonal dissonance “Yes, actually, there’s three armed gunmen outside waiting on complimentary waters since they think your office door is electronically locked until 2:45 or the fire alarm goes off, whichever happens first, so if you could call the police while I bring these back out so they don’t follow me and shoot us both, that would be lovely, thanks Mr. Wayne!”
She didn’t give him an opportunity to respond, because if he was going to panic that was going to make her panic. She didn’t think he would? Mr. Wayne was usually much more put together in the office than he seemed in the tabloids. The exception was people he didn’t want to talk to, which honestly seemed like a very useful facade, if she was under as much scrutiny as he was she might do something like that too. But even if he was gonna be calm in a moment, she didn’t want to see that first rational panic, so she just prayed that he had it and stood up. She completely ignored the “Leah, what are you-” behind her, three cold bottles clutched in her left arm as she eased past the door with her right.
She gave herself one deep breath at the corner before she rounded it back to the desk. She walked very calmly to the couch with the armed gunmen, and did her best not to look at the guns in question. “Here are those waters.” She directed the smile to the calm goon, it was the easiest to fake, but she handed a bottle to everyone.
She walked just as calmly to her desk, and she thanked whatever God there was that none of them tried to stop her.
She sat down and very deliberately didn’t turn to her computer, just picked up a pen and paper to give herself something obviously non-communicative that she could still use to stare anywhere but at them. What could she write, though? They needed groceries again, didn’t they? Would that help her distract herself?
Eggs
Milk
Almond Milk? (double check with Avery)
Laundry things–detergent, dryer sheets
Meal One
Pasta
Tomato Sauce
Ground Beef
Meal Two
Taco Shells
Apparently, it was enough of a distraction, because Leah picked up the ringing phone on reflex, “Wayne Enterprises C-Suite. This is Leah. How may I help you?”
“Leah!” The voice coming over the phone was familiar and saying more, but a little hard to concentrate on over the man pointing a pistol at her and stalking closer.
“Better watch what you say, girlie.” Goon-spoke-first was back to growling.
“I’m so sorry, sir, just a moment,” Leah said into the phone before drawing the receiver away from her mouth and covering it, “It’ll raise more alarms if calls aren’t answered in the middle of the work day, sir, I’m just going to do my job.”
He lowered the gun but notably didn’t holster it. She put the phone back to her ear, “So sorry for the delay, sir, could you repeat that?”
“All good, Leah, Dad mentioned the situation that’s been going on lately,” oh, oh that was Richard Grayson, wasn’t it? He stopped by the office sometimes when he was in the city, that’s why she knew the voice. “Say, I know the CFO was bringing a baby in sometime this week, phone volume isn’t loud enough to bother them, is it?”
Considering that no such baby was in the office at any point, Leah could only assume he was asking if he could be overheard. Clever lie, though. Maybe hostage negotiation was a skill they taught police officers? “No, definitely not.”
“I’ll keep my voice down anyway,” he continued, matching his tone to the promise. “You think you can come up with another reason to get out of the room? Might be a fight in there sooner rather than later.”
“I’d have to go the labs to pick up those reports, but there’s a lot keeping me at my desk, I’m not sure when I’d get the chance.” Somehow she didn’t think the goons would actually let her leave, but maybe setting something up was worth a shot anyways.
“Good,” Mr. Grayson (“Call me Dick,” she remembered a cheerful voice saying) said, “try that. If it doesn’t work, just hit the floor behind your desk. It goes all the way to the ground and will keep you from being an obvious target. Crawl out towards the offices rather than the elevators, so you aren’t crossing the center of the room. If you can’t get out on the facade now, play along until you have friendlier company, alright?”
“I can do that.” Leah said, remarkably reassured by having an actual plan rather than just a series of reflexes, “And I’ll have those to you as soon as possible.”
“Great! Try to leave for those reports now, and if you can’t, someone will be there in a few minutes, literally, less than five. I’ll let you go attempt your getaway.”
“Buh-bye, sir, have a great rest of your day!” Leah set the phone down. She turned around and plucked an empty binder up for those “reports.”
She walked towards the elevator calmly, but tall-goon intercepted her. “You told the man you were being kept at your desk. You can wait half an hour to get the reports after we got what we came for,” he said simply.
Now was the time to put her hands up and politely acquiesce, Leah was pretty sure, so that’s exactly what she did. She picked her pen back up and kept adding to her list.
Eggs
Milk
Almond Milk? (double check with Avery)
Laundry things–detergent, dryer sheets
Meal One
Pasta
Tomato Sauce
Ground Beef (x2)
Meal Two
Taco Shells
Cheese
Avocado
When the lights shut off abruptly and even the windows turned black (since when could they do that?), Leah hit the floor. She crept forwards as carefully as she could given the pitch black, and the shouting of the goons was more intimidating than she wanted to admit. There was clanging and the sounds of a fight, and holy shit those were gunshots, and way faster than she was able to get out of the room, the lights were turning back on.
“Are you alright?” It was a low voice, but not unkind, and Leah cautiously stood up to find Batman himself peering over her desk.
She glanced behind him to find all three goons knocked to the floor unconscious. Shit, had that even been two minutes? Well, if she could be polite to the armed gunmen, she could be polite to the guy who had saved her from them, “Totally unharmed, Mr. Batman. Thanks for the quick intervention.” She had been expecting police, but she certainly wasn’t going to turn down a clearly very efficient vigilante.
“Of course,” Batman said. And then there was the faintest hint of a smirk on actual Batman’s actual face. “You handled that well. If this doesn’t convince you to quit, you should ask your boss for a bonus.” He pulled a cluster of zip ties from somewhere and knelt down to start securing the unconscious men.
As she watched him work, Leah felt the panic she’d been barely holding off settle in. She sat heavily in her chair and closed her eyes. What the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck, what the fuck.
By the time she pulled herself together enough to look up, Batman was gone. Apparently vigilantes could just make no noise at all, that’s neat. Avery would be pleased to have another point in favor of the “Batman totally has superpowers” argument.
She should probably go thank her boss for calling Batman. Was that a normal thing to do in this situation? Maybe normal wasn’t applicable to this situation.
Leah forced herself up onto shaky legs and walked down the hallway again. This time she knocked on the door to Mr. Wayne’s office. A “Come in!” rang through the hall, and she slipped past it again
Mr. Wayne was a mess. His hair looked like he must have been running his hands through it the entire time she was up front, and he’d taken off both his suit jacket and his tie. Even his cuffs were undone, but Leah couldn’t blame him. If she’d had the privacy to fall apart, she absolutely would have, and there’s no way he didn’t have some kind of trauma from the amount of times he’d been kidnapped. And now she was realizing those were just the ones that made the news, since this would probably be kept as quiet as possible. Maybe she shouldn’t tell Avery after all. “Hey, Mr. Wayne.”
He was already rounding the desk, “Leah! Thank God you’re alright. You came in and said there were gunmen and then you just darted back out! That was incredibly reckless!”
“Sorry,” Leah winced. In hindsight that had been a little thoughtless, “I was mostly running on autopilot there. I didn’t mean to freak you out more than the situation already was.”
He smiled softly, “I’m just glad you’re not hurt.”
“Me too!” It was easier than she would have guessed to let out a relieved laugh, “That was stressful. But I wanted to thank you. For the–” actually she had no idea how Mr. Wayne had called the hero, “Batman thing.”
“Right.” Mr. Wayne paused, “Uh, how much do I have to bribe you to get you not to tell the press about that?”
“Oh!” She hadn’t even thought of that, “No, of course I won’t tell the press you have some way to contact Batman, that would be really bad information to advertise!”
Mr. Wayne looked surprised. Was he that used to people only looking out for themselves? Some things about being rich sounded nice sometimes, but the kind of people it must attract seemed like a lot to deal with, “Thank you. It’s, uh-” he paused again, “with how often people around me get kidnapped or held hostage, it’s useful.”
Leah nodded, “That makes a lot of sense. Actually, on that note, I was thinking about something one of the guys said. Is there any chance I could get a panic button installed at the desk? Just in case this happens again.”
Mr. Wayne nodded back vigorously, “Absolutely! I’m sorry you didn’t already have one. And surprised you aren’t running screaming, actually, this is usually around when people do that part.”
Leah couldn’t help the giggle, “This is a really nice job, Mr. Wayne. Armed gunmen aside, I’m not giving up that insurance coverage.” He grinned. Well, since he didn’t seem to mind the joke, “Though I will say, The actual Batman told me I ought to ask you for a competency bonus, and you did just offer me a bribe…”
Mr. Wayne blinked and then threw his head back and laughed, “Leah, after today, you get a whole raise. A good one, too, we’ll call it hazard pay.”
Well. Maybe there was something to be said for service industry reflexes after all.