a new addition (v)
cw: pet whump, implied kidnapping, bbu general warning
taglist: @whumpinggrounds @eatyourdamnpears @mackerelgray @writingbyjillian @the-inkwell-variable @ladywithalamp @motelbf
masterlist
In the first ten minutes Eva has been clocked in, she’s made herself a coffee and begun to review her trainees’ records for the day. One of her girls she’d left off with on a bit of a sour note the night before, not something she ever liked to do, but tensions had been high, both her and the trainee’s nerves had been frayed in different ways—Eva, with frustration; the girl, with fear. Neither one of those made for a good combination, and Eva elected to let the girl have a meal and a shower and rest up for the night, and they would pick up again where they left off.
Eva had spent the night after reviewing her work. It had been the girl’s organization day, but she couldn’t quite grasp organizing objects by color. Eva had her own shower and a meal, and realized in the process that the disconnect was in the way she was teaching the girl. She knew what she wanted Violet to do, but something wasn’t quite clicking in the girl’s head. Something in the instructions wasn’t making sense to her. And that wasn’t her fault, it was Eva’s.
Not unlike dogs, Eva thinks. You may know what you want the pupil to do, but if they aren’t delivering the desired results, more often than not, it’s not them—it’s you. What needs to change is how you teach them. Luckily, the trainees here could talk. Dogs, not so much.
With a quick tap, Eva marks the girl down for breakfast. No sense training on an empty stomach. Then she’ll take the girl to a neutral area and discuss yesterday’s lesson. It’s highly unorthodox, but Eva is all about getting the best results in the most effective way possible. Pain and punishment has never been her speed. She’s all about reworking and adapting and learning. If there’s someway she can help Violet learn better, she’ll do it.
She takes another sip of her coffee, then finalizes her sheet for the day. No sooner does she open her second trainee’s sheet does her phone ring.
One glance at the number, and she has it to her ear immediately. This isn’t a call she’s going to tempt fate by ignoring. “Hello?”
“Good morning, Handler Bronsky. I take it you’re in the building?” One does not ignore Director Corrine Haverson if they know what’s good for them.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Good. I need to see you in my office immediately.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Haverson hangs up on that note. Eva locks her tablet, takes the chance to finish off the last of her coffee—cold coffee is no good and throwing perfectly good coffee into the trash is not an option—and makes her way to Haverson’s office. The walk there isn’t long in distance so much as it is in time. Getting to Haverson’s office requires Eva to go down the hallway from the breakroom, to an elevator that hasn’t worked properly in weeks, despite promises from the electrical company that they would have it up and running at full strength in a few days, up three flights, and then down another hallway to a pair of solid oak doors.
Eva pauses to check her watch at the door: ten minutes it took her to get from the breakroom to the office. All because the elevator takes more time to get down to the proper floor and get up to the proper floor than it takes Eva to get through town with a red at every light. But such is life. Eva enters the office ten minutes later than she wants to, noticing immediately after seeing the pleasant calm on Haverson’s face the manila folder that sits on the desk in front of her. It’s a folder Eva knows well, after her fifteen years at WRU. Haverson is giving her a new trainee.
“You wanted to see me, ma’am?”
“Yes,” Haverson says, leaning back in her chair casually. “I take it the elevator held you up?”
“It always does, Director,” Eva says. She steps into the office, toward the front of the desk, but doesn’t sit, and won’t, not until she’s been invited to by Haverson.
Haverson tsks softly, not at Eva per say, but at the circumstances that led to her lateness. “I shall have to have another word with the company,” she says thoughtfully, frowning ever so slightly. “They have a new hire, as I understand. A young man. Perhaps I could convince them to repair the elevator sooner lest he offer his services to us in more useful ways, hm?” It’s a joke, a morbid one at that, but Eva doesn’t smile. Sometimes she doesn’t know if Haverson intends for such things to be taken as a joke or not. There’s a shine in her eyes regardless.
“That aside,” Haverson says, “I have a new trainee for you.” She hands Eva the envelope, invites her to sit, and gives Eva a moment to review the information given.
Eva leans back in the chair. It was only a few weeks ago she’d had to do this very thing again, but the process feels as though she’s doing it all for the first time. It always does. First page of the file is the standard intake information: height, weight, eye color. There isn’t a picture of the girl yet, that will come later. For now all Eva has to go on is the simple descriptions of her new trainee as noted by Tobias Matthews. That the girl has albinism comes as a surprise. Trainees with that condition come through rarely; Eva can’t recall such a trainee being in the system during her time.
The girl, officially designated 657128, doesn’t have a pet designation yet. She’s being held under the Nonproductive Pet banner. It doesn’t surprise Eva. Pets with 657128’s condition take months, sometimes years, to sell, and no one has ever seemed to find it necessary to put them into a designation immediately. Why put so much work into a pet that might not even sell?
Involuntary. Eva bites the inside of her lip. The only word in her career that has ever made her skin crawl with discomfort. She doesn’t read the specifics.
“She’s extralegal,” Eva says, not without a hint of apprehension.
“Yes,” Haverson concedes. “I am aware that you prefer not to work with the extralegals, but I feel this girl in particular will benefit from your touch.”
Eva holds back a sigh. Maybe it makes sense but that doesn’t make it better.
“She hasn’t signed her contract,” she says instead, looking back down at the file. Not unusual, given the girl’s extralegal status and her arrival a mere two days ago.
“No,” Haverson confirms. “Though I have hopes she’ll be an easy sign. I want you to evaluate her. If she’s fit to sign today, do it. If not, so be it. I trust your judgment.”
“Yes, ma’am,” Eva answers. That’s rare praise from Director Haverson. She’ll take it when she can. She tucks the papers back into the folder and closes it. “I’ll have Bridget on standby if she’s ready today.”
“Very good. Dismissed, then—go enjoy your new trainee. She’s in Isolation Room Twenty-Five.”