ᴍɪssɪɴɢ || ʙᴀᴋᴜɢᴏ x ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

ᴄʜᴀᴘᴛᴇʀ 𝟺

Date: October 19, XXXX
Time: 11:51 a.m.
Location: Hero President's Office

For the millionth time in the last hour, Toshinori runs his hands through his hair, tugging at the ends in frustration. The clock on the wall seems to slow down, each tick...tick...tick sounding farther apart than the last. He swears the world is messing with him. Since when did time go by so slowly? He's been sitting here for only an hour but it's felt like three.

With a sigh, Toshinori leans his head back, bumping it against the wall as the flimsy plastic chair creaks beneath him with the shift of his weight. Closing his eyes, his senses become all too aware of every tick of the clock. It'll only be a matter of minutes before he loses his mind completely and starts cursing. Not that Toshinori is usually one to curse, but the enormous amount of stress and worry he has suffered through over the last month has done it's damage.

His patience has suffered.

And, that damn clock isn't helping.

Just in the nick of time, the door to his immediate right groans as it opens, revealing a tall man with an elegant, freshly ironed, forest green suit on. Toshinori stands at attention out of habit, facing the Hero President of Japan, the one man in the entire country with jurisdiction over all pro heroes. The man smiles at him with recognition and waves him inside of the office.

Toshinori is quick to follow, he has wasted enough time outside waiting for an opening in the president's schedule to talk to him. Now is his chance.

"Sir-"

"Please Toshinori," The Hero President cuts him off with a dignified smile, gesturing to a chair in front of a grand mahogany desk, "We've known each other too long for you to still be calling me 'sir'."

"Shuta," Toshinori corrects himself carefully, "I wanted to talk to you about Phantom and what it means for the city now that she's missing."

It's been almost a full month now since your disappearance, leaving Japan without a No. 2 Hero to protect it. Crime rates have increased due to your absence, showing just how much you did every day to protect this country. Even now, Toshinori has a hard time thinking about where you might be, what might be happening to you, who might have taken you. Just the thought makes him feel like he's going to choke up and start crying again.

He's cried too much in the last month.

You're okay.

You have to be.

Shuta nods along to Toshinori's statement, turning from where he leaned against his desk to round it. He picks up a file with your hero picture clipped to the front and flips through the first few pages inside, humming as he does so. He mumbles to himself for a moment, before turning the file to face Toshinori and placing it in front of him to look at.

There is a picture front and center on the page, a chart of your agency's activities in the last month since your disappearance. Your record of villain catches and arrests are much lower compared to previous months, as anyone would expect with you not being there to run things. Toshinori raises a brow at this, wondering why Shuta is showing him this in the first place.

"Phantom's agency is slowly falling apart without her there to actively run it. Rockslide has temporarily taken over, but some of the sidekicks don't respect him the same way they did with her. They are threatening to leave their jobs and find work elsewhere," Shuta states, slapping the file shut and the twinkling look in his eyes disappears, turning cold and empty, "Do you understand what this means, Toshinori?"

"We need to find her as soon as possible-"

"No."

"No?"