Work Text:
When Shinsou Hitoshi shows up to work that fine Tuesday evening to the horrifying discovery that the coffee machine is broken, he already knows he’s in for a treat.
And then Deku strolls in all cheery eyed and bright smiled like he’s not currently coming off an eight hour shift and Hitoshi just about resigns himself to his fate.
“Hey Persuasion!” Deku beams, handing him a coffee with a flourish because he’s the exact kind of bastard to not warn Hitoshi in advance that the coffee machine was broken while also being a fucking sweetheart to not deprive Hitoshi of his much needed pre-patrol ritual.
Inside Deku are two wolves, Hitoshi muses, draining half the 16 ounce cup in one long go.
Deku waits, still beaming, practically bouncing on the balls of his feet and Hitoshi sighs.
“Thank you Deku.”
“Of course, it was my pleasure!” Deku grins.
Hitoshi rolls his eyes and takes another long drag. Man, energizer bunny doesn’t even begin to cover it.
“So…” Hitoshi drawls once he’s sufficiently topped off and awake enough to finally notice that Deku is still in his hero costume even though he should have clocked out an hour ago. “What are you still doing here?”
“Oh uh,” Deku scratches at his cheek in embarrassment. “I had to leave for a couple hours midday. Boss said I could just make it up by staying late.”
Hitoshi frowns and squints at him. “Define a couple hours.”
“Ahahaha…” and now Deku is simply the very picture of sheepish. “Like… I clocked out at around eleven. And clocked back in at four?”
Hitoshi stares. “Is this for that Make-A-Wish thing? Deku you could have just taken the day off. Why would you–”
“Ah you know. My patrol. I couldn’t just not do it.”
Hitoshi raises an eyebrow because literally that’s what the sidekicks are for. Then again, Deku not taking time off is kind of an old argument for them.
“A-Anyway, my point is, it’s been ages since we did a run together. And Villains never expect me at nighttime anymore so it could be fun! Tsukauchi even gave me this awesome case about a deal going down by the docks, come on Toshi, you know you want to!”
Hitoshi stares first at Deku then down at his almost empty cup of coffee and then back up at Deku again. “...this is a bribe isn’t it?”
“Yup!” Deku cheers, popping the p sound and everything.
Hitoshi sighs. “If you would have just told me the machine was broken I could have picked up my own on my way in.”
“Yup!” Deku cheers again, popping the p even more obnoxiously. “But then I would have lost my bribe.”
Hitoshi groans before draining the rest of his coffee bribe and tossing it over his shoulder into the wastebasket where it fucking belongs, the traitor. “You’re not gonna let this go are you?”
“Nope!” Deku beams, popping the p yet again.
“...can you be like… fifty percent less annoying?”
Deku laughs. “I can try.”
And well, that’s as good as Hitoshi is gonna get so he takes it.
Deku briefs him on the way and then they settle in for a good old fashioned stakeout.
Hitoshi does the math on Deku’s overtime figuring they have about three hours left together before Deku needs to clock out for real.
“You know,” he whispers into his comm, staring down at the scene below through his special issued REHBs (REcording Hero-Grade Binoculars). “If you wanted to team up, you could have just put in for off hours at any time. Or you know. Asked me.”
He can practically hear Deku pout at him and he can’t resist turning the REHBs slightly to face the top of the next shipping container so he can see it. He watches silently as Deku frowns to himself and twirls a strand of Blackwhip around his finger as he petulantly waits for the signal.
And then Hitoshi remembers that REHBs record everything the hero looks at and he quickly yoinks it back over to the villains and hopes no one at the agency will notice.
(they will of course notice.)
“You never want to talk about work with me,” Deku suddenly mumbles.
Hitoshi snorts. “Yeah it’s called having a work life balance. We’re just coworkers when at the agency, Deku.” He stresses the name slightly to hopefully get his point across.
“Yeah well. We can still talk about work after. It’s hard enough getting time together when our schedules are all reversed like this.”
Hitoshi sighs. So that’s what this is about. “Well maybe if a certain someone would stop volunteering to cover all the weekend shifts like he’s the only one that can fucking cover them then maybe he would have more time to spend with a certain other someone who always makes it a point to take the weekend off.”
His tone is as mild as he can manage. Fuck he could be talking about the weather for all the inflection and emotion he’s putting in.
Which is good.
Because Hitoshi is definitely not emotional about this at all.
“Oh.” Izuku says and the sound punches through Hitoshi like a hit to the stomach. “Toshi I–”
“The products changed hands,” Hitoshi interjects, dropping the REHBs to be collected later now that they’ve already streamed the footage of the evidence to the agency. “Let’s go kick some ass.”
Hitoshi still has some pent up frustration if he’s being perfectly honest which is exactly why he didn’t want to mix things while on the job. But it’s fine. Because Deku clearly has some pent up feelings of his own and between the two of them they make short work of the gang of villains currently trying to run.
And it’s exhilarating honestly. Getting to fight with Deku again like they used to before his career had taken off and he’d stopped taking the night shift.
Back to back as they fight, Hitoshi with his capture weapon and Izuku with Blackwhip, yanking and tossing and flinging villains left right and center in an almost coordinated kind of dance where only the heroes get to stay on their feet.
Hitoshi flings them high and Izuku drags them low and the villains slam into each other in a satisfying smash that would have even All Might clapping.
Finally Hitoshi trips the last one and Deku takes to the air, a rapid combo of Float and Full Cowling sending him rocketing around off the nearby shipping containers, slapping cuffs on all the villains in a blur that they can’t fight off.
By the time his whirl of motion comes to an end the entire gang has been immobilized in a giant jumble of hands cuffed to legs cuffed to hands that they have no hopes of breaking free of before the cops show up.
“That was fun,” Deku grins, clearly still high on the adrenaline and shooting Hitoshi a sappy look as a result.
Hitoshi flushes. That look has no business showing up at his workplace.
Deku acts like he hasn’t done anything, giving a dramatic sigh as he checks his watch. “Damn, it’s too bad I’m out of time.”
“Yeah yeah,” Hitoshi grumbles, ducking his head low into his capture weapon to hide his still red cheeks from view. “Thanks for the team-up Deku, it’s been real. I’ll take it from here.”
“Okay!” Deku beams, immediately gearing up to hop away with a cheery wave. “See you at home?”
Hitoshi splutters, the flush crawling up the back of his neck. He quickly checks that all the villains are actually unconscious before replying. “Yeah babe, see you at home.”
Only five more hours to go.
And who knows, maybe Izuku will actually take off work this weekend.
Hitoshi smiles to himself as he heads back up to retrieve his REHBs. He’s already looking forward to it.