Chapter Text
The second that Reigen Arataka answered the phone he knew that he would regret it. For a man in his line of work he should really invest in Caller ID. “Is this The Voice?” a nasally man was on the other end of the line. A man who had to work for the Pacific Sun Union, or at least for Jodo. No one called Reigen that if they weren’t part of the same asinine—
“Jodo-sama, Head Master of the Pacific Sun Union wishes to issue a cease-and-desist order for the use of the name ‘Spirits and Such’ for your business,” the man said. He rambled off the words like they were a proclamation. Knowing how things were in PSU, it was most likely that the phrase was written down somewhere.
Reigen’s eyes narrowed. Oh, was this the tactic the old man wanted to use today? Fine, two could play at this game. “I didn’t catch your name,” Reigen said.
“Oh, sorry,” the idiot on the other end of the phone sounded flustered. “I’m known as the Terrible Twos.”
“The Terrible—” Reigen had never heard of this guy and on the spot decided he didn’t care to know. It was just another sign that leaving the formal costumed villainy and hero gig was the best decision he had ever made. “Anyway, you can tell Jodo-sama,” he said the name with all the respect of someone talking about a dead rat, “that the PSU only owns the rights to the name ‘Little Spirit’ and not the word ‘Spirit’ itself.”
The window at the other end of the office shattered with a loud clatter of glass. Several skinny men wearing spandex bodysuits with the logo of the villainous Claw organization stood up from the wreckage. “Haha!” one of the Claw goons said. “I am here to destroy your puny office and end—”
He never finished his speech. A mass of energy propelled him straight into the wall and a coma simultaneously. To be fair, the goon never stood a chance against his opponent: one Serizawa Katsuya formerly known as Umbrella Lad, formerly a high-ranking member of the criminal guild known as Claw, and now deputy director of the Spirits and Such Agency.
Serizawa, prim and proper in his suit, cracked his neck, eyes bulging with rage. He yelled with all the fury of a man with his powers and abilities combined, projecting just how uttering screwed these no-name thugs from Claw really were.
“Excuse me!” Reigen snapped. “I’m on the phone, can you keep that down?”
Serizawa gave his boss a sheepish grin. “Sorry.” He turned his attention back to the thugs. “I’m just going to have to use my fists. Too bad there’s only a few of you.” He gave them a sweet smile, tempered with violence. “I could use the exercise.”
Three grown men crapped their pants at the same time.
Reigen went back to his phone call, Serizawa could easily handle things from there. “Were you saying something?” he asked Terrible Twos.
“The PSU thinks that you are capitalizing on their trademark by using your face and the word ‘Spirit’ in your advertising,” the Terrible Twos said.
Reigen nearly choked right there at the sheer audacity of the statement. “Excuse me,” he said, “the PSU only has image rights to pictures of me from when I was like, ten and the codename ‘Little Spirit’ specifically. Oh, and real classy getting a ten-year-old to sign a contract, by the way.”
A young man’s voice piped up. “Didn’t we have to sign a contract?”
Right, Kageyama Mob and his brother Ritsu were here. The two teenage boys sat on the couch ignoring Serizawa’s fighting behind them. After nearly six years of coming to the office, they were used to this kind of nonsense by now.
“That was a standard employment form,” Reigen said, covering up the receiver. “That was for tax purposes.”
“Whatever,” Ritsu muttered, not looking up from his book.
The two boys had come to him as youngsters at the behest of their parents. Both boys possessed some amazing powers but their parents had been reluctant to sign them up for the Sidekick-to-Hero program with the Pacific Sun Union. Reigen thought it was the most sensible thing their parents had ever done.
But someone had to train them and a former sidekick who had been the protégé of Mogami Keiji, The Exorcist himself—
Those were years Reigen wished he could forget but if his knowledge could keep the Kageyama Brothers out of the system well, he’d just have to suck it up. They were nearly adults now though and Reigen didn’t ultimately know if they were going to keep their freedom or tie themselves to lives of professional heroing or villainy.
For now, he had a stooge to yell at about copyright infringement. “Where was I?” Reigen asked. “Right, since I am now an adult using my adult image you don’t have a leg to stand on.”
“But the word ‘Spirit’—”
“Is being used as a descriptor,” Reigen said. “If it was a possessive that would be a different story.” Reigen knew all this from consulting his lawyers before ever starting this venture. If he was going to challenge the PSU’s dominance on helping people and keep the threat of Claw at bay, he needed as much bureaucracy on his side as possible.
Because there was nothing in this stupid, stupid business that those Guilds respected more than rules and regulations.
Reigen grinned to himself, he could hear the Terrible Twos stuttering on the other end of the line. Although he wasn’t part of the costume game anymore, Reigen was still the inheritor of not only The Exorcist’s fortune, but his mission: to expose Claw and the Pacific Sun Union for the bumbling morons they were.
It was going to take a while, possibly even a lifetime, but Reigen Arataka was up to the challenge.