Chapter Text
If there is something that has gotten you this far, it is that unnamed fire that burns inside of you. Maybe you can call it ambition, but you’re not sure. Way back when, when you were still in school getting your ass kicked or doing everyone’s bidding with your head hung low, that fire had been there, and it hadn’t felt like ambition. You probably will never be able to put your finger on it. Only now that you are well established in your job and in your own skin do you dare consider that word; the lesson was hard to learn, but after getting pushed to the ground time and time again without doing anything about it you started valuing yourself, your time, your work. Pushing back, speaking up, and all those things that your younger self considered blasphemy and thought of with fear.
The lesson was hard to learn, but dear God, you learnt it , and now there is nothing that can get it out of your brain.
A top ten hero doesn’t show up to your scheduled meeting? Well, that is simply because he is an asshole that doesn’t care for someone else’s time, and you won’t be simply lying around waiting for his call. It is the date, time and place written down on your planner or nothing.
The guy’s assistant begs over the call and over text. She somehow even gets Yuki’ email, and explains how outrageous your behaviour is and that this is a bad look for the company. Now, your friend is never one for subtle words, so she showed you her response to you before sending it so that you could make sure she wasn’t going overboard.
Mrs. Sato
I do not know how much knowledge you possess about me, my partner or our company, so I will take the liberty of explaining to you that it is not a bad look. Our time is just as valuable as any pro-hero’s, no matter their position in the ranking. By refusing to be at your beck and call we give out the image that we are a company of respectable people who know their worth and make it known to others. May I remind you that it was you the ones who signed a contract with us, not the other way around. My partner is always free to schedule a new meeting, as long as she is assured that pro-hero Hawks will assist as it is expected. If not, feel free to rescind your contract and look for another support technician.
Regards,
Techn. Nakamura.
The original email had a lot of aggressive phrases, which you softened to passive aggressive and then just a bit more passive, because you want them to know that this kind of thing doesn’t fly through, but at the same time you don’t want to cause any drama.
You get a response three days later. This email is signed by a new assistant, and it is a simple template to help schedule the next meeting, which bodes well, right?
Hawks doesn’t show up to that one either.
This time you had secluded in your email that you would wait for him only for fifteen minutes and then back to work it was. The new assistant shows up like the old one, but instead of trying to hold you back or to get you to say you would be paying attention to your phone for an impromptu meeting, she apologizes profusely. After a little bit of back and forth she explains that there was an emergency and shows you the news of the villain attack on the media before calling you a taxi that she will pay for.
You are still quite, and understandably, displeased by the whole experience, and Yuki sends an ultimatum.
“Augh, this sucks!” she complains to you over the breakroom. Her lab coat is positively ruined which means that she has been working non stop and said work has encompassed her attention so much she hasn’t noticed the coffee stains all over. “I’ve been splitting my head open coming up for items for this asshole and he never fucking shows up! How am I supposed to know what he needs if he doesn’t tell us so?”
A week after that, you finally get to meet the man (or should you say boy), the legend, in person.
From what you gathered, Hawks has been on the scene for barely a year now. Despite his lack of contacts and support technicians for his first year in his pro-hero career, the boy rose through the ranks like a fucking helium balloon effortlessly drifting up to atmosphere. This along with his very promising modelling career gave him a public image that many pros would kill for and, you guess, a little bit of a habit of being conceited by everyone. Companies were throwing themselves of top of him to get his agency to sign with them, but for some reason he had landed in yours, specifically requesting for Techn. Nakamura, your lab partner and best friend.
Judging from his new assistant’s attitude, you expected him to be there before you, and to act at least a little bit apologetic about his previous cancellations.
By the time he arrives, you have already ordered. The assistant said that he’d pay for the meal and you are already pretty pissed.
Average height, tousled clothes and hair, a calm smirk on his lips, Hawks walks into the private dining room with a lazy step.
“Sorry about that, there was a kitten caught up in a tree,” he laughs.
He laughs .
Your greeting is beyond curt, and out of the corner of your eye you catch his assistant desperately trying to sign something to him with her hands. Probably telling him to tone down the cas mood a little, can’t he see that you are not happy about this? Your eyes are nailed on his, and you notice how jarringly different from the rest of him they are; everything about his looks, the way he moves and talks shows a very young man that likes to lie back and laze around. Languid would be the word.
His eyes, on the other hand, flutter around the room a mile per hour, taking everything in with a calculating air that makes you frown. It feels as if he is looking for something and that even he doesn’t know what it is.
Still, as observant as those golden eyes may seem, he either doesn’t pick up on your vibe or doesn’t care, because he doubles down on his act.
“So, Mr. Hawks. If you would be so kind to let me know abo-”
“Hey, hey, calm down. I just got here!” he chuckles, making the same gesture you saw your father make to spooked horses many times, but to you. “I see you’ve already ordered. Don’t blame you, I’m starving...”
“Hawks.”
He looks almost bothered when his eyes lift over the menu into yours.
“It shouldn’t be hard for you to understand that I am tired of these meetings, if we can even call them that,” you say. Maybe stating it aloud will let him know you’re not in the mood for playing. “Now. For some reason you have refused to disclose what you need or want from us through email. Whatever reason you have, I bet it is understandable. Now, if you could tell me so that I can get back to work and your technician can get started, that would be great.”
Hawks lets out a sigh and rolls his eyes so hard that his head goes back a little bit. You grab your chopsticks so hard that the sound of wood splintering fills the silence, and you notice how his wings perk up and his expression turns neutral in a millisecond.
“I-” His assistant is up before he even finishes turning to her with a smile, and he waits until she is out of the room before continuing: “It is quite simple, actually. I just need a visor to help protect my eyes while I fly around, and something to block out the noise when I need to focus.”
In the time you just stare at him, a cloud moves through the sky and slowly blocks out the sun, sinking the windowed room in shade. You notice that Hawks’ eyes seem even brighter in the shadows instead of darker, and that he is totally not joking.
“You went through all the trouble… Of getting to sign with us without having any experience with support items whatsoever, and the meetings. You made me wait a total of over an hour! Just for two items that you could buy on Amazon? Some goggles and a pair of noise cancelling headphones?”
Hawks shrugs as a response, and maybe he was expecting you to chuckle, because he seems confused by you taking a shaky breath in to calm your anger.
“Look, lady, I want the best. I can afford the best. You are the best. The math is not hard.”
Now, in retrospective you will admit that your reaction was not rational. What Hawks said makes sense. You probably have all those years of bad experiences that taught you mistrust to blame for the feeling that he is hiding something from you; that man refused to disclose anything through email and made his assistant walk out… For a visor and some noise cancelling device.
“That is it?”
He nods.
“Well.”
You start gathering your things, the meal not even half eaten in your place at the table, and you get that strange moment of genuineness from him again when he seems completely and utterly confused. It is gone as soon as it showed, though, and he is back to looking mildly annoyed by the whole situation in no time.
“Here is how we will do things, since you have an obvious difficulty with scheduling and making proper use of people’s precious time.” You almost miss his second eye roll when you stand up, almost being the key word. “The designs will be sent to your agency and we will give you a period of forty eight hours to get back to us. No response means we proceed as intended. For the trials we will schedule a meeting at our company, so that you don’t halt our work with your tardies.”
It feels like you are suddenly talking to a statue or a grumpy man. Hawks’ breathing is so faint it looks like he is dead, sitting with his back very straight, eyes nailed on the table with a shadow over them and wings tense and held high, proud.
Eventually he lets out: “Could you send the designs through a courier? To reduce chances of someone getting their hands on them.”
You nod. “That can be arranged.”
“Great then.” And he looks up at you, expression neutral again. “Sorry for being such an irresponsible client and wasting your precious time.”
Teachers at U.A always warned you to get ready for difficult clients. Sometimes heroes can get a little high on their fame and they start acting like rock stars from the quirkless ages instead of what they are: public workers that are there to protect the people. You graduated three years ago, and this is the first client that has been so disrespectful, at least to your face, so it is understandable that you don’t feel prepared for the murderous rage that climbs from the pit of our stomach up to your throat.
Still, you handle it pretty well. You swallow the scream back down, give Hawks something that can’t be considered a nod, and turn around to leave.
It isn’t until you have gone down from one of the top floors to the street, and that you are outside, meters away from the valet waiting at the entrance of the restaurant, that you let out the scream, muffled by your closed mouth.
Resting your back against a wall, you watch as people hurry past, trying to calm back down before making your way back to the company because you do have a lot of work to do.
The sound of people squealing and calling his name makes you turn around to see Hawks rushing out of the restaurant, a wide smile on the lips for his fans. He waves and kicks up into the air, crimson wings beating and flying him away as people ohh and woah at the sight. It only has you gritting your teeth and thinking about starting a classical office worker addiction, like smoking or day drinking, to deal with this asshole.
It isn’t until you are working at your desk, right outside Yuki’s lab, that you realize Hawks left basically right after you, which means he didn’t eat shit and left right away despite supposedly starving.
You shrug it off as another part of his act and keep working.