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Tama was greeted by a short secretary, her eyes lifting as the white-haired man entered. "Give me your name?" She could make a few assumptions about someone coming in looking for a loan now. If it was someone they didn't know, it was a good way to slam them with inescapable interest due to a variant loan scheme. But if it was someone Adam recognized--

Well, she had been told to bring anyone who asked about loans to him directly, anyway. Said he had an extra vetting process to go through, just to make sure.

Once provided with an answer, she stood up and beckoned for him to follow her. "Mr. Bal is just in his office, and he can serve you."

-------------

Adam was thriving.

The operation to take over the bank's operations had been an astounding success, really, to a level he knew they were capable of but hadn't quite been expecting to come to fruition since it did require the operation of other people. He was good at this though -- quite good -- and snaking in the offers to resign or step aside was a game of how skilled he could be at manipulation. It resulted in him being where he was now, in an office that had some of the trappings of offices he admired: fidget toys for nothing other than entertainment, frames displaying his degrees, shelves with a few interesting knickknacks that had interesting and sometimes fabricated stories from his travels, and lovely wooden lacquer on the furniture.

He was kicked back in his seat, one leg crossed over the other and set on his desk. Adam felt like a boss in the truest sense of the word; did he work for anyone at all anymore? It was enthralling, in a way, and he felt goosebumps on his skin as he pondered the fact that he was, now, by himself and alone on this financial side of things.

The knock on his door by his secretary broke him out of his fantasyland.

"Mr. Bal?"

Adam leaned forward, folding his hands on his desk and glancing at the door as if he hadn't just been relaxing and chillaxing at all. "What do you need me for?"

"Got someone here looking for a loan!"

Mr. Bal's lips upturned.

"Bring 'em in."

Once the secretary told Adam the provided name, he might have laughed quietly to himself.

If Mr. Mistoffelees--not a name he pictured anyone really using these days outside of a musical theatre production--didn't give away by itself that this was someone he should be interested in, it was the first name of Tama that caught his attention. Mr. Bal hadn't interacted with the guardian cats of their team terribly much because he had never needed to as an agent. Senshi needed them a lot more than agents did, and in some ways he was grateful for not needing to access their basic level services.

But in other ways, he knew that Mauvians were terribly useful for their technological magic, and he couldn't help but wonder what one of their esteemed Mauvians could possibly want with a loan.

The secretary let Tama in, and with a bow of her upper torso, she left the room.

Adam waited a few moments to be certain she left, before typing a few things on his computer. After a few moments more, he tapped his fingers against the desk and then stood.

"Mr. Mistoffelees, welcome." Adam stood up and gestured to a fancy chair in front of his desk. "Feel free to take a seat. Would you like anything? Some water?" He moved toward a watercooler that was sitting in the room. "A bit of boric acid, perhaps?"

A code word, if anything. He'd see if Tama caught up to what he was referring to.

Adam chuckled quietly. He got it. Good.

"I could certainly arrange that," he got himself a glass of the purified water from his watercooler nevertheless, and went ahead and got Tama one too anyway. He was uncertain how long Mr. Mistoffelees was going to be there to talk, but perhaps he would find himself a bit ... parched. "That isn't mineral water, necessarily, but if we have a lot of things to discuss you may find you need that."

He slid around Tama without another word, taking his seat at the other side of the desk. One of the fidget toys was scooped up, a small cube with several fidgets all throughout. Adam spent his time idly rolling the rolling ball back and forth, feeling the cool metal under his fingers with a satisfied sigh. "I understand from my secretary you're here for a loan." A Mauvian! There for, of all things, a loan!

He supposed a loan was a bit easier to manage than, say, a credit card, but he was fairly sure those had less regulations, too.

"What are you looking for? A private loan? A school loan? A home improvement loan?" Maybe he was in the same project that half the team seemed to be on with that Rift house. "I'd like to see what we can do for you, esteemed Mistoffelees."

What a name choice!

Adam noticed where Tama's eyes went and popped open his desk for a moment, fishing another one out. It was pushed in Tama's direction.

The Mauvian couldn't keep it, but he could certainly borrow the toy while he was in the room. Adam did not have a problem with that. Was it primarily because Tama was a member of his team, and no doubt should be kept in good relations? Perhaps. If Tama was favourable to him, if Adam needed a favour for anything like the technology at the bank, it would be easier to convince him. Adam planned to keep it that way.

"Home Improvement?" Adam moved to look at his computer, typing in a few things to pull up the proper forms. Without even stumbling once, he marked that the one he was dealing with deserved a special rate that had been marked with a series of codewords.

One of them? Frit. If asked, it was an acronym. For Renovations In Tract.

What it was? An anagram for Rift.

"Tell me, what are you looking to fix up? Tell me why you need this money, and perhaps most importantly, how much do you think you need?"

In the interim, Adam started rearranging things to run his falsified credit check.

"Of course, of course. Zoning laws are usually the biggest part to deal with on a bigger project." Of course, it came down to were there even any kinds of restrictions Tama would need to obey in an underworld with no solid bounds?

Not a question he cared to ask. That was Tama's problem, not his.

His was typing in this social security number they had skimmed from people with excellent credit. He kept them in rotation; each one would only be used once or twice. The numbers that had been skimmed also primarily came from the older crowd; they weren't as likely to actually follow up on the credit check and figure out why it had been made in the first place.

There were a few other things he needed to do to make sure the loan did not then appear on their account, but that was neither here nor there at the moment. Adam just needed to field the formalities so Augusta Bank could keep their nose seemingly clean.

"Oh, good news, Mr. Mistoffelees. It appears you have been authorized for that amount if that is what you need. Likely more if desired." Adam rubbed his thumb against his fidget toy. "Are you building from the bottom up?"

Complete custom job... now what was one of their resident Mauvians up to?

There was a lot to build in within the Negaverse, he knew, especially in the dead kingdom that called itself the Rift. To imply he wanted to go completely from the ground up left a lot of interesting potential, especially for a Mauvian. Could be quite the technologically advanced little abode...

Colour him curious, but this was a time in which he would need to ask at a later time. While this location was a Negaverse operation, and surely nothing he said would be of terrible concern to security staff, it was still something he didn't want overheard. Plus, not every employee they had on the rolls was a loyal devotee to their overlord of the depths.

Yet.

"Taking into account your needed building materials for a ground-up operation," he typed away, "inspectors to help with zoning laws," laws he drew from Destiny City's laws, of course, "and any money needed for variances -- I could likely authorize you for a bit more than double your original request if you would like. Your credit is absolutely pristine, Mr. Mistofflees."

He quickly winked.

"But in any case, would you mind signing the little pad in front of you, sir? You should see a little pen attached to it, and a screen there which will transfer your authorization to the form on the screen. Then I can get the formal agreement printed for you to pursue and sign -- very boring stuff, really, on the way to something truly exciting."

An accomplishment of his own, no doubt. An accomplishment that felt like theirs, even if it was absolute bullshit he would have done for one of their own again and again? Also permissible.

He smirked as he saw the paperwork signed on his screen, and then he stood up to fetch the formal documentation from his printer to give to the not-currently-a-cat who had strolled into his office with his absolutely fascinating proposal. What was Tama up to that required this kind of monetary resources from outside the Negaspace? He'd have to pull on his ear elsewhere about that.

For now, though?

He handed off the stack of papers to their new owner.

"We'll have to take the information for the account you would like this loan to deposit to, of course--account and routing number, please--and discuss the terms of repayment, but you do get some leeway in the first sixty days. This is all just terrible busywork," he rolled his eyes, "but my secretary surely can handle it."

Or Adam would, seeing as he was talking to a literal cat.

"Any further questions for me, Mr. Mistofflees?"