To Be A Hero ↠Avengers x HP Crossover

Chapter 13- Stork Industries

3 hours later...

"Okay, how about this one?" Amy asked, adding it to the top of the pile. "Sales assistant at a grocery store, 15 hours a week."

Eliza peered over. "That'd be great, except it says Thursday required, which would clash with work."

Eliza took her glasses off and rubbed her eyes. They had been at it for hours, yet every time she looked at the pile, it appeared to remain unchanged. 

They had the perfect system. Amelia would shift through the jobs and would add any possible prospects into a pile that Eliza would then research on her laptop. It had been years since she had ever used a laptop, but she soon got back into the swing of it. Oh, how she'd missed just being able to simply google a question instead of having to sift through a pile of books for the answer. Will had charmed a laptop for her after one of their regular movie nights. It worked perfectly as long as no magic was performed whilst the laptop was actually turned on.

At first, the job hunt had been going very well, snacks were shared in-between little sing-a-longs, and morale was high. But as the possibility pile grew shorter, and the rejection pile grew larger, the mood shifted.

Some jobs weren't flexible enough to accommodate her Thursdays off. Others required years' worth of experience, including working at regular fast food chains surprisingly. Many jobs only offered an 8 hour work week, which wouldn't have helped Eliza's issues at all. Perhaps she was just being too picky, but none of the options seemed to jump out or excite her in the least. Until at last, with only 5 listings remaining

"What about Stark Industries?"

"Stork Industries?" Eliza asked bewildered. "What's that then, delivering babies? I thought they called themselves midwives?"

"What? No, not stork, Stark!" Amy laughed. "There's an opening as a personal assistant."

Opening a new tab, Eliza searched up the company. "Here we are," she sat back up on the sofa, allowing Amy to see.

"Stark Industries is a weapons and technology company founded by Howard Stark. In World War II, Stark Industries built 100,000 planes to help the Allied forces, quickly establishing them as a military contractor, which they still are today. Stark Industries also assisted the Strategic Scientific Reserve in their fight against HYDRA-"

Eliza paused, "Who's Hydra?"

"No idea, keep reading."

"After Howard's death in 1991, ownership passed to his only son, Anthony, more commonly known as Tony. The company was run by Howard's lifelong friend and business partner, Obadiah Stane, until Tony Stark was old enough to take over. Under Tony's leadership, Stark Industries became the world leader in the development of manufacturing advanced weapons."

Eliza grimaced. She wasn't all that keen to be working for a weapons manufacturer. She'd already spent her childhood fighting in a war. Joining a company that essentially profited from wars was less than ideal. Well, it was until she read the next paragraph.

"Stark Industries is quick to be labelled as a weapon manufacturing company. However, they have branched out into many other scientific fields, including aeronautics, robotics, micro-technology, and fringe sciences. That's not to mention the work and assistance completed by Stark industries during the Manhattan project or the millions of lives saved through their enhancing medical technology. One of the companies' latest breakthroughs is intelli crops. Whilst not much is currently known about this project, it has been claimed that it aims to prevent starvation in many countries in South Asia and the sub-Saharan regions of Africa."

Maybe the company wasn't so bad after all. This Tony Stark had clearly branched out during his time as CEO. Sure, they were still primarily weapon manufacturers, but their medical and scientific projects seemed to have been growing rapidly annually since 1992.

That evening, after Amy had left, Eliza applied for the job. She would be a personal assistant to Miss Virginia Potts and would be required to work four days a week, from 08:30 to 18:00. The job also promised to be very hands-on and demanding due to "recent circumstances."

After some more research, Eliza learnt that "recent circumstances" was really a code for "our CEO has been kidnapped and we don't know what's going to happen or if he'll be back."

From what Eliza could gather, Tony Stark had gone missing two months ago in Afghanistan shortly after a weapon demonstration. Search groups were still regularly going out, including Colonel James Rhodes, who had accompanied Mr Stark on his demonstration trip.

Aside from the unfortunate kidnapping of the companies CEO, the job seemed to be perfect. It was just what she needed, something long and challenging enough to keep herself from getting crazy bored in her flat.

Her cv had been a tricky one to write as neither her job nor her school existed in the muggle world, let alone her qualifications. In the end, she had claimed she was previously a school nurse. This wasn't technically a lie as she did work under Madam Pomfrey during her school years. Her other reasoning being she was worried about putting down a hospital nurse in fear they'd check the records, and she'd be outed. It was a lot harder to track down old school records than hospital records, that's for sure.

Eliza grabbed her journal and sat cross-legged on her bed, getting ready to write her daily goodnight message.

Dear Hermione and Remus,

Merlin's beard, it's been an awfully busy day today. I met up with Amelia earlier today. Her uncle is a squib, and he'd sent us a list of job vacancies to sieve through. Blimey, it took us ages! If I didn't have Amy, I definitely would have given up. Nothing seemed to fit until at last she found one. It's a personal assistant job at Stark Industries, 4 days a week, so I can still work at the office on Thursdays. I applied for it this evening, so fingers crossed! I even bought a phone so they'd have a way to contact me. I ran out just before they closed. It's not a new phone by any accounts, but it was cheap, and I can answer calls on it, and right now, that's all that matters. I've kept it wrapped in its box until Will can enchant it to work in this magical flat. I don't want to risk it exploding on me if they call.

I've also made some progress with my wizarding job. I've composed the final draft regarding the possibility of opening an aurors department within the ministry here in America, like we have at ours. So far, I've had some positive feedback from ex-aurors, so hopefully, the high council agrees.

Hope you're all well. Send my love to the rest of our giant, mismatched family.

Lots of love,
Eliza x