Work Text:
Miss Joke knew that when Nedzu offered her a position at UA a lot of things would change. She knew that she’d get lost in the maze that these people (and a rat) call a campus. She knew that she’d miss her former students and coworkers dearly. But most importantly she knew that her paycheck would be nearly doubled. What Emi didn’t know is that the tech at UA was nigh incomprehensible to an outsider like her, and everyone expected her to just figure it out! So there Miss Joke sat, staring at her laptop screen like an idiot unable to log into the thousands step, high security, digital labyrinth, that was the UAs grading software.
Emi shut her laptop and stood up, she decided to take a walk to clear her frustrations and hopefully find someone that could help her. Emi walked the long empty hallways, it was her planning period and most other teachers were teaching instead of roaming the halls. She had given up hope of finding a coworker to assist her, she was making the voyage back to her classroom when she ran into “Eraserhead! My knight in shining armor!” Emi said, bounding toward him. It always amused her, the way he flinched at her voice.
“It’s too early for this Joke” he said, not turning to face her, and continuing about whatever occupied his life.
Emi reached out, her hand only had to brush his for him to stop in his tracks “please, I could really use some help” she said, her voice dropped into a more serious tone, but maintained brightness and levity.
“with what?” He asked, finally facing her. Eyes are ever intense.
It'd be so easy to make a joke, but instead, she told the truth “UA's impossible grading application, I can’t even log in!” She said with a laugh despite how embarrassing it was to be wandering the halls for help.
“yeah” he said ever so casually. “I could help, where’s your computer?”
Emi lead Shouta to her classroom with a long string of ‘thank you’s.Upon entering the room Emi goes right to the small teal couch nestled in the back of her classroom between bookshelves. On the couch sat her laptop closed, right where she had left it. She took up the laptop, placing it in its rightful spot on her lap, and gestured for Shouta to sit next to her. And he did.
“UA's whole system is a mess for new teachers to figure out” he said shifting the laptop to sit upon both their knees. “Luckily for you, I’ve had to deal with it for the past 8 years” The couch was just barely big enough for the both of them. Shouta and Emi were just shy of shoulder to shoulder. Their hands brushed as they punched in UA passwords and security codes. Their heads but as they both leaned in to read the tiny font on one of the many websites they parsed.
Shouta was seemingly too focused on guiding her through the seventh circle of cyber hell to realize how close he was to her. Emi however, did notice. She hadn’t been this flustered around him since their very early hero days, she quickly got over it at the time, her initial crush becoming an ongoing joke, but 12 years later, on the little couch tucked in the back of her classroom, her old crush started to feel real again.
Miss Joke had finally logged into the grading application, she familiarized herself with the interface, intently clicking around and typing in values, no doubt making her new students panic over fluctuating grades. Emi was startled out of her concentration when something fell onto her shoulder, she quickly realized that ‘something’ was Shouta's head, he had fallen asleep on her, another thing that hadn’t happened since their early hero days. She smiled fondly as she recalled it; Shouta and her had just finished a mission, it started as a normal night patrol but turned into an impromptu raid that lasted till the early morning. They went to his agency to fill out paperwork, and found themselves on a similar little couch. Shouta was already tired as always when he arrived at work that day and the patrol turned raid didn’t help, he didn’t finish half his stack of papers before he was passed out on Emi's shoulder. It was about 20 minutes before he had shaken himself awake, and when he did, he was nothing but nonstop apologies for the next few days.
Emi let Shouta sleep as she continued to click around on the website, god knows he needed any sleep he could get. Maybe it was the boring website, the quiet classroom, the methodical clicking,or the steady rise and fall of Shouta's chest against her side; whatever it was, it slowly lulled her to sleep, before Emi noticed herself getting tired, she was already asleep.
Emi woke to the sound of the bell, Shouta apparently did too, he sharply jerked up from her shoulder upon realizing what had happened. “I’m so sorry,” Shouta said, running his hand down his face, “that was terribly unprofessional.” He didn't dare look up at Emi, but she could still see the redness of his face.
Emi herself was far too flustered, frazzled, and foggy from sleep to come up with a quippy response, instead, “yes- I’m sorry too- uh - thank you” is all Emi managed. Emi's stuttering drew a curious look from Shouta, THE Miss Joke was nothing if not outwardly confident and quick witted, she had a joke up her sleeve for any and every situation - any but this apparently.
“you’re welcome, I’m sorry, again,” Shouta said, heading to the door. “…but…” he said, hand poised on the door knob, not yet opening it, “if you need to figure out any other website, I can help” he left immediately after he finished the sentence, giving Emi no time to respond. Perhaps Emi was reading into his barely changed face, or his slightly different demeanor, but she was sure his statement was an invitation, he was throwing a lure to see if she’d bite. Emi toyed with the idea of him, wanting to spend time, with her, alone.
Before she could dwell on the thought any further, a group of students entered and took their seats. Miss Joke shook her head, freeing the last hour from her mind, she promptly jumped into teaching as her students filed into the classroom. Miss Joke passed out syllables, took attendance,and started to explain the course overview, all before she realized, that she was yet to start the arduous process of setting up UA’s complex, unintuitive, nightmare of an LMS.