Chapter Text
He was late.
Fuck.
Makoto didn’t swear often, only when absolutely no-other word would suffice. And besides, it was rude to swear!
But possibly (he hasn’t lost it yet!) losing your job because of a reason you had no way of preventing? Only ‘Fuck’ would describe the feeling Makoto had right now.
Racing through the streets of Tokyo at 10:52 am, almost an hour late, Makoto could hardly think straight as he pushed people out of his way and he moved on pure adrenaline.
‘Just how bad is my luck?!’ Makoto yelled internally to himself, ‘I had a foolproof plan!’
Apparently, he did in fact have a foolproof plan after all, but not a Komaru -proof plan.
All of the mishaps had started when Komaru had woken up in the middle of the night on the couch and in her tired wander towards her bed, had accidentally stepped on Makoto’s phone charger line and disconnected it from the wall, which caused the low battery state phone to shut down completely.
As she was changing clothes to her sleepwear, she haphazardly had thrown one of the articles of clothing straight towards both of the manual clock, which it had dragged to the floor and made them malfunction.
She would’ve woken Makoto up when she was leaving for school…
..only if her school hadn’t been shut down due to fear of a disease outbreak that had one of the school teachers infected, a fact that she completely missed mentioning to Makoto.
As the office building finally came in sight, Makoto quickened his running pace, hoping that the conference was still on-going and that Byakuya would be merciful.
Rushing through the doors, Makoto thanked whatever god because the lobby was empty (only the receptionist was there), making the following action much less embarrassing.
“Hello sir, may I help you someho-” They started, but were stopped completely by Makoto’s screeching.
“MY NAME IS MAKOTO NAEGI AND I’M LATE FOR A MEETING ON THE 3RD FLOOR HERE'S MY IDENTIFICATION!” He yelled from the top of his lungs and threw his ID card at the receptionist as he ran past them towards the stairs.
“..okay then.” The receptionist quietly whispered, shocked to the core by what they had just seen. On their first day as well!
Running three sets of stairs when you’re already out of breath was not fun, Makoto concluded as he finally made it to the 3rd floor. Slowing down to a quick jog, he started to touch on his appearance, not wanting to look like a hobo as he entered the conference room.
Speaking of which he could already see at the end of the corridor.
Makoto sighed from relief and he slowed down to walk to the doors, now only a few meters away from the doors.
Only for the doors to open, a group of people walking out, not paying any attention to him as they walked past. When the last person walked past him, he finally saw his worst nightmare.
Makoto and Byakuya made eye-contact, Togami looking absolutely pissed.
Makoto opened his mouth.
“Togami, I can expla-”
“My office.”
Makoto said still as Byakuya started walking towards the elevators past Makoto. As he passed Makoto, Makoto followed him with his eyes, scared out of his mind of what would come.
After walking 2-3 meters past Makoto, Byakuya stopped suddenly.
“Now.”
And continued walking.
This got Makoto moving as he speed-walked beside Byakuya and followed him to the elevators.
The elevator ride to the top was awkward as hell, to say the least. Neither of them spoke. The whole ride was like fuel to Makoto’s already high anxiety, it already having peaked on the 3rd floor when they entered the elevator.
As the elevator dinged, Byakuya was the first one to leave, Makoto right on his heels. As they got close to Byakuya’s office, Makoto only had half of his plea to not get fired ready, but on the other hand, if Byakuya asked for extra sweat, Makoto could deliver, his suit somehow becoming hotter than the sun over the time that they walked to Byakuya’s office.
As Byakuya opened the door, Makoto expected to be on his knees the whole time, which in fact, he would be, not just in the context of what he believed.