Chapter Text
Hizashi adjusted his microphone as he leaned back in his seat, slinging an arm lazily over the back of the office chair. After recording an episode of his podcast for the past forty five minutes, regaling stories of ridiculous customer interactions he had throughout the week at the U.A. Superstore, he was beginning to grow restless. It had never been in the man’s nature to sit still for any length of time.
Energy thrummed just under his skin and left Hizashi vibrating a leg in a futile attempt to dispel the persistent itching that pressed him to do something other than just sit there. He shifted again, hoping the near constant movement would not be detectable in the audio this time.
“And then you wouldn’t believe what she did next! Without breaking eye contact with me, she continues dragging her tongue over the carton of ice cream, before proceeding to put the lid back on it and sticking it back in the freezer! I went to confront her and to get the ice cream she’d licked out of there, and what do I see when she moves? There’s the team leader - we’ll call him IcyHot - is standing there, filming this and not doing anything. WHAT I WANNA KNOW IS HOW DOES THIS KID HAVE MORE SENIORITY THAN I DO?”
Despite being unseen by his audience, his hands whipped above his head in disbelief.
“I mean it just doesn’t make sense! Sure this kid’s dad is the assistant manager - we’ll call him Entropy because that man’s temper is HOT and unpredictable - but I’ve yet to see him do anything besides try to get himself fired. And he sucks at it too.” Hizashi’s grin softened as he leaned forward over his desk again, resting his cheek in his palm and twirling a golden lock around his finger idly. “Once, he went and put the chocolate near the women’s pads thinking cross contamination would get him fired, but he ended up selling more chocolate that week than anyone else. The boy was celebrated as a genius.”
Hizashi’s gaze fell to where the time was displayed in the corner of his computer monitor, and his thoughts drifted to his next shift in the morning. He supposed he should wrap up his podcast for the evening, and followed up his latest tale with his familiar outro before switching his recording equipment off. He had some course work he wanted to review before going to bed anyhow. His eyes fleeted over the worn cover of the used psychology textbook that had been unceremoniously shoved to the side of his desk.
He extended his arms behind his head with a satisfied groan and reclined until his upper back was folded over the top of his chair. As each vertebrae pressed into the firm surface, they popped back into place with a pleasant click, which only served to encourage Hizashi to lean further into the stretch. The relief it brought to his spine after a long night's work was euphoric.
Although the Tales from Retail podcast was a small production and had yet to gain a large following, Hizashi genuinely enjoyed sharing the experiences he had throughout his week. There was a comfort to be had in sharing the absurdities of everyday life as a retail worker with those who would listen, knowing that they too could relate.
Misery loves company, and all that.
Though he didn’t know most of his followers, each time he went to record Hizashi was reminiscent of the feeling of catching up with old friends as he shared his negative experiences. He took comfort in the solidarity that came with the universal grind shared by those who had the displeasure of working in retail, laughing together at the ridiculousness the monotony of life brought rather than letting it break them down. He found it helped prevent the experience from chipping away at his own resolve. Hizashi hoped to get popular enough to receive calls one day, but so far, his listeners did just that: listen. Regardless, he was thankful for those that lent him their ears.
Having such a small fan base felt personal. Hizashi found himself often recognizing usernames of those that interacted with him on social media, and could be caught grinning at his screen as he caught up on his feed during his morning routine and on his work breaks. It was a highlight of his day to interact with his followers, and it was something he looked forward to every Saturday following the broadcast of his show as he awaited feedback from his listeners.
After turning in for the night, Hizashi rose bright and early the next morning with the sun, mindlessly going through the motions of his usual routine as he got ready for work. His morning commute was uneventful, which in a world of superheroes and quirks, is nothing to complain about. However, he found himself straining to keep his eyes glued to the road, fighting against the urge to look at his social media feed again like an addict waiting for their next fix. It wasn’t unusual for there to be an explosion of commentary on his feed following his podcast, and he’d missed scanning through it over breakfast that morning. Tragically, the phone charger he was holding together with tape and dreams had failed to charge his phone overnight, leaving it without any battery life. Thankfully the cord in his car was in better shape, and was in the process of reviving his phone. He’d have to check his comments when he got to work.
Was he addicted? Perhaps.
But when one’s work involved slaving away for a barely livable wage, a man should take what joy he can get. And oh, did the validation from strangers over the internet over his crappy dayjob bring him joy. Although Hizashi couldn’t overstate how grateful he was that it was enough to help him pay for his courses when he budgeted correctly. He wasn’t blind to the fact that he was fortunate enough to have a store owner that genuinely cared for his employees’ well being. The kindness that Toshinori Yagi showed his team was something that he didn’t often see in other retail settings.
Only 3 more years he chanted to himself.
The mantra invigorated him and left him with the confidence he needed to face day to day life in the retail world. The ‘I would like to speak to your manager’ people, the ‘this is why you work in retail’ people, and the ones that just plain decided they were going to ruin his day in one form or another. People that just liked to see the world burn.
Or perhaps that wasn’t right.
They didn’t seem to see much at all outside of themselves. It was more likely that they didn’t care about others so long as things went their way. It made Hizashi wonder if they really inhabited the same plane of existence he did. It was startling to know that anyone could have grown up without the seemingly universal experience of a shitty job. How anyone could be so removed from the world that they lacked that level of empathy was beyond him.
Arriving at the U. A. Superstore, he was greeted by their manager, Toshinori, whom he had called All Might in his podcast for the man’s size was impossibly buff. Although the sun had yet to reach its peak in the sky, Hizashi couldn’t help but feel as though it were already midday from the glow coming off the man. It was far too early to have so much energy, but he couldn’t help but feel grateful for the positive energy he shared amongst him and his coworkers.
“Ah, good morning Yamada!” Toshinori’s face split into a grin as he greeted the other blonde man, hand raised as he offered a small wave.
“What’s so good about it?” the assistant manager interjected, walking by with a paper coffee cup in his hand. That was good old ‘Entropy’, or Enji as his workers called him much to the man’s own irritation. It had become necessary to abandon formalities upon the employment of his own son to distinguish between the two. “It’s too early and this coffee is fucking cold,” he grumbled as he glared at the cup like it had wronged him. Lighting it on fire with his quirk, he sipped at it contentedly, unbothered by the boiling liquid or flame licking at his skin as he brought the lip of the cup to his face. Hizashi found himself wondering how the man had managed to engulf the paper cup in flames without burning a hole in it; yet it held up, a testament to the man’s borderline horrifying control over his power.
“Oh, Yamada, before I forget,” Toshinori began. “I need you to make an announcement when we open that we are having a sale on towels in the home furnishings department.”
“Roger that, sir,” Hizashi chirped in english, mirroring his manager’s blinding smile. The day his boss had realized the utility of his quirk in the store had been one of the greatest days of his employment at the U.A. Superstore. He loved every opportunity he had gotten to use his quirk at work. It was nice to be able to let loose from time to time, even if he had become an over glorified PA system. To flex the muscle that he had been forced to repress despite being such an instinctual part of his body was an opportunity he knew that not everyone received in their quirk society. And he couldn’t deny how nice it felt to be useful.
“Shoto!” Enji called as his son entered the store. Hizashi could pinpoint the exact moment the boy debated on turning on his heel and walking back out the door, his internal conflict surprisingly easy to read on his normally placid face. “Gather everyone in the break room and introduce the new kid.” Shoto, or IcyHot as Hizashi referred to him in the podcast, gave a long suffering sigh.
“No,” he replied, looking his father directly in the eye. “Do it yourself.” Hizashi’s eyebrows almost disappeared into his hairline as the kid turned and walked further into the store without another word, his internal debate won. He shifted uncomfortably, feeling as though he had been overstepping some kind of unspoken boundary by happening to be in ear shot during the exchange. Though he was Shoto’s father, given his status as the store’s assistant manager, Hizashi expected at least some kind of respect to be had, but there was literally none.
This kid desperately wanted to get fired.
“Damn brat,” Enji muttered to himself. “Yamada, call all the employees to the break room for the announcement.”
Hizashi nodded sheepishly, wasting no time as he cleared his throat.
“ALL EMPLOYEES TO THE BREAK ROOM FOR AN ANNOUNCEMENT,” he announced using his quirk. His voice boomed through the store and echoed as it reverberated off the walls. “ALL EMPLOYEES TO THE BREAK ROOM FOR AN ANNOUNCEMENT.”
As soon as everyone was gathered, Enji stood in front of the group and all but pulled a little green haired boy to the front with him. The kid received a light smack on the back in greeting, causing him to squeak in surprise and lurch forward with the motion. He introduced the boy as Midoriya and explained that he would be shadowing several people throughout the day for the next week until he was assigned a department to help with. There was a small round of half hearted greetings from the room, and Enji pointed to one of the closest workers.
“Yaoyorozu,” he declared. “You’ll be showing him the ropes today. Tomorrow, Bakugou will take him for a run in the outdoors department. The next day-”
“Damn it why do I have to babysit the new kid too?” Bakugou demanded.
“Because you sat in front today,” Enji replied simply, as though it were the most obvious thing in the world, and took another sip of his coffee. “And because you destroyed some of our merchandise showing a customer how to use a chainsaw, ruining our shipment of orchids in the process, and nearly got us a lawsuit.”
“Orchids are fucking stupid,” he grumbled, glaring off to the side. Seemingly unphased that he had admitted to their boss that the destruction of the store’s products had been at least partially a conscious decision. “No one can keep them alive, what’s the point?”
“That is exactly the point. The more they kill, the more they have to replace.” Enji replied. “We’re in the selling business, kid, not the keeping plants alive business.” This was met with a snort of disbelief from the explosive boy.
“Now, off you go,” smiled Toshinori. “I’m sure you will all be great friends!”
“Yeah, right,” Bakugou muttered, getting up and leaving for the outdoors department before anyone else could assign him something else to do.
Momo took this opportunity to turn to her new ward. “I’m Yaoyorozu, but you can just call me Momo since it’s a bit of a mouthful.” She greeted, a small smile gracing her lips as she directed him towards the door. “Come on Midoriya,” she said. “Let’s get started.” The green haired boy scrambled after the brunette as he said his goodbyes over his shoulder and bowing out.
Moments later, before anyone could rise from their seats and begin their day’s shift, Shoto burst into the room.
“Guys there’s a homeless guy digging through our trash!” he said urgently, eyes widened ever so slightly. “And he’s wearing the security guard’s uniform. I think he killed the security guard and stole his clothes!”
“Hahaha that’s hilarious,” Kaminari snorted. “Nah man, it’s gotta be that possum-thing again, I swear!”
A scoff brought the group’s attention to Shinsou. “Not this rat story again,” his eyes rolled in mock annoyance, though the lilted smirk spread across his face betrayed his amusement.
“Not rat, possum!” Kaminari argued.
“What rat?” Shoto interjected, brow arching as he opted to ignore his coworker’s indignant cries.
Kaminari bristled. “Possum!”
“Denki won’t stop going on about how he’s seen this possum the size of a human rummaging through the garbage in the alleyway,” Shinsou replied, putting a sarcastic emphasis on the species name. “Swears it flipped him off before running away with some pizza in it’s mouth.”
“This homeless guy had pizza in his mouth too!” Shoto gasped, eyes deepening in thought.
“SEE!” Kaminari said. “I’m not the only one that saw it! Oh my god what if - wait wait listen. Okay so there I was, taking the trash into the back alley, when I saw it. The possum creature hunched over and digging through the trash. I musta made some noise or something because it noticed me and that’s when it flipped me off. I looked back to see if Hitoshi was seeing this too, but I was alone. Then I turned back and there was this homeless looking guy standing there instead of possum. I swear his eyes were like… glowing read and he was looking at me like he was going to murder me!” Kaminari shivered. “It was terrifying. I dropped the trash and ran back inside because I was not about to get attacked by a werepossum.”
“Werepossum? Are you suggesting that the store is being haunted by some kind of random human-possum cryptid?” Shinsou accused as he laughed at the absurdity of the concept.
“Oh my god,” Sero laughed, eyes bugged in their sockets as his gaze bounced between his coworkers. “And it must steal pizza from the dumpster as food for its young and flips people off who try to stop it.”
“Awe!” Mina cooed, causing Hizashi to jump. He hadn’t realized she had been hovering behind him.
“I’m pretty sure it was just a homeless guy in the security guard’s suit. We should call the police and let them know there might be a naked dead guy somewhere,” Shoto pressed urgently, though Hizashi could see a spark of interest in his eye that he was clearly suppressing.
“No way he’s dead,” Kaminari replied.
“Yeah, have you seen that dude? He’s like jacked as hell, I refuse to believe the cryptid could have taken him down,” Shoji nodded to himself as he added his own thoughts on the matter.
The Sero nodded in agreement. “The security guard is just probably running around naked and embarrassed right now.”
Kaminari’s mouth fell open and his shoulders stiffened, a sudden realization hitting him as he gestured wildly to catch his coworkers’ attention. “No, no, dude! The security guard IS the cryptid!”
“Oh shit,” Shoji’s eyes widened as this revelation sunk in.
Hizashi listened to the kids banter on about this supposed cryptid and the fate of the night guard in amusement before the realization hit that he’d never actually seen the night guard himself. He idly found himself wondering just what kind of man he could actually be. If he and the cryptid were one in the same? He’d certainly heard of weirder quirks than a possum transformative type. Well okay, perhaps not weirder, but definitely out-there ones. He mused over the potential stories his supposed coworker could pose for his podcast in the future.
Bakugou poked his head back in the break room. “Anyone wanna fucking tell me why the gardening section is now the storage place for pet food?”
“Wait what?” Toshinori asked, coming back to reality after listening to the kids’ stories.
“There’s goddamn pet food all over the gardening section!” Bakugou replied.
It was then that Hizashi noticed Kouda hovering behind Bakugo, signing frantically. “That’s where it went?! Oh thank god I thought I lost it!”
“You thought you lost an entire section of pet food?” Toshinori repeated in disbelief.
“I’m sorry!” Kouda signed again.
“Well put it back!” Bakugou barked.
Kouda’s fists clenched in front of themself as they nodded frantically and rushed off to do just that, and Hizashi furrowed his brow. Why was the pet food in the gardening and outdoors section? Better yet, how had anyone moved all of that in one night?. And why? He found himself wondering if anything else had been changed around?
Deciding to take the opportunity before opening hours to investigate, Hizashi made his way into the main part of the store and wandered the aisles. He had initially written off any obscurities in the products layouts as Shoto’s attempts to be reprimanded, and wanted to take a closer look and determine if any of the changes couldn’t be accounted for by the half and half teen. At first, nothing seemed too out of the ordinary. Things were well stocked from the night before, and everything seemed to be in its place.
That is, until he reached the freezer section.
There behind the glass, made up of dozens of flavors of ice cream containers stacked and rearranged, was a giant calico cat face staring at him. If Hizashi were being honest, it was really well done. Admittedly, even beautiful. But all of the brands were mixed together, and lacked any semblance of structure. How long had someone had the doors open, designing this monstrosity? Was the icecream not half melted in all of the containers from having been exposed to the room temperature air? There was no way that there weren't products that had spoiled in that time. The cheshire grin of the cat mocked Hizashi’s horror. It would take hours to undo this. Hours that would surely have the ice cream melting all over again.
Turning tail and quickly walking out of the aisle, Hizashi decided it wasn’t going to be him that discovered this today, and therefore it wasn’t his responsibility. He was sure that one of the kids would have fun playing in the freezer anyhow. Besides, this would be the perfect opportunity to have them take on some more responsibility themselves.
Kids needed to learn stuff like that, right?
“And that, dear listeners,” Hizashi said over his podcast as he wound up his report. “Was when I ran face first into a shelf that wasn’t supposed to be there and got knocked flat on my ass. And from where I lay on the floor in agony, I just knew then and there, it was going to be that kind of a day.”