Chapter 8: Of Interviews and Rats

"Get back here!" Kamui Woods screamed at the small figure he and Mt. Lady were chasing.

"I'mma squish you like a freaking bug if you don't!" Mt. Lady screamed as she ran down the road at her full height.

The figure ignored them, choosing to focus on fleeing across the rooftops. The figure had a bag slung over their shoulder, and their grip was tight as though their life depended on it. Despite the weight of the bag, they were easily jumping across the gaps between buildings. Even worse (for the heroes) the figure was actually slowly getting away. Between that and the fact this chase was occurring late at night, the heroes were doing all they could just to keep sight of the figure.

Suddenly the figure jumped down in the gap between buildings. The two heroes shouted and turned to run through the cranny between buildings. With Kamui flying across the roof and Mt. Lady standing taller than most of the buildings, neither hero noticed the figure clinging to the underside of a fire escape. Once they couldn't hear either hero, the figure clambered back up the fire escape and dashed in the original direction they were going. As they ran, an idea hit them.

Stopping on a roof, the figure pried a vent open and slid the bag inside. They heard it fall a bit, but also heard it hit a surface around four meters down. Perfect. They could come back for it later. They just had to see which building-

"THERE THEY ARE!"

Crap, they weren't expecting more heroes. Gritting their teeth, the figure pushed the vent cover back in place and fled. Without the bag weighing them down, they were a blur in the night.

They were gone before the other heroes reached the rooftop. The heroes gave chase, not noticing the damaged vent cover.

—

Two weeks later…

—

Izuku sighed as he typed away at his desk. It had been around a week since the whole Korusa Memorial Incident. The incident where he both uncovered a villain plot and essentially rescued Todoroki Rei, Endeavor's wife, from said plot. The incident that resulted in Endeavor straight-up thanking him, and telling him the words he would have sold his soul to hear years ago.

As he thought more about this, he wound up thinking about his current situation. Not even half a year ago he had begun his crusade to get fired from this agency. Back then everyone treated him like a secretary, or would dump their own paperwork on him. He had gone through two years feeling underappreciated and belittled.

Within the past few months, he had gotten the respect of so many other heroes and employees. He got a very loving girlfriend (and boy, did she remind him of that for several nights straight after Korusa). Yeah, the triplets from accounting still dumped their work on him sometimes, but those were less common due to said girlfriend keeping an eye on them. He had earned the praise of pretty much the entire Todoroki family, and one random burned-smelling guy who saved him from a mugging earlier that week.

Half a year ago, he wanted nothing but to flee from this place. But now…did he really want to?

He was shaken from his thoughts when he saw the two interns and even Onima walking around the office. Curious, he watched them and saw they were laying down small black squares in the corners of the room, under empty desks, and in any small nook they could find.

"What's going on?" Izuku asked one of the interns as they got close.

"Apparently the surrounding businesses have been hearing rats in their walls," the long-haired intern (Izuku felt bad for not knowing his name) explained. "So we're taking precautions in case they show up here too."

"We're really hoping they don't show up," Onima piped up as he walked by. "Apparently there's gonna be a marriage interview today involving the Yaoyorozu family."

"The Yaoyo-" Izuku choked. The Yaoyorozu family was one of the wealthiest families on the entire planet . Their daughter, Momo, was the pro heroine Creati, a woman who reached the Top Ten within a year and a half of graduating. She was also among the Three Beasts of UA, the three students who performed the final defeat of the League of Villains during their second year. To say she was one of the greatest heroines of the generation was not an understatement by any definition.

"And she's marrying Shouto?" Izuku asked after recovering his voice.

"Nah, today's just the interview," the short-haired intern waved. "Just to see if they wanna go through with it."

"Hence why we're putting traps everywhere," Onima held up something that looked like a black box with teeth. "Now, if you'll excuse us…" The sidekick and two interns moved to the next room. Izuku watched them leave, then went back to typing. That was an interesting schedule, but didn't affect his workday unless they needed him to guide the Yaoyorozu family in, or help lay traps.

—

"You need me to help lay traps?" Izuku asked Burnin'.

"Sorry to drag you away like this," Kamiji sighed as she and her shorter boyfriend (who was holding a bag of traps) walked down the hall, "but Endeavor wants us to put traps in every possible spot. I swear, it's almost like he's scared of rats or something."

"And, why me?"

"Because he meant every possible spot." Moe stopped and opened a maintenance hatch. "This'll take you to the gap between the floor and the ceiling of the lower floor. Just set down the traps in that bag and you're good. As for why you need to…" The heroine actually looked aside as she explained, "You're the only one small enough to fit in the gap."

"...Damn my shortness," the green-haired quirkless sighed before slipping on a headlamp and moving to the hatch. Before going in, Kamiji gave him a quick peck on the cheek.

"I'll give you another one when you come back out, ok?" she smiled. Izuku, now blushing, only nodded and slipped into the hatch.

"Into the dark, oh noble men," Izuku muttered to himself, deepening his voice to quote a movie he and Moe saw a few nights ago. "We must stand strong against the vermin of the deepening shade, and breathe not the fiberglass of modern men." He slipped a cloth mask over his face to protect against dust and whatever was in the gap. He continued to quote the movie, parodying the lines to fit his current situation as he set out sticky traps and some of those toothy boxes he saw that morning. Honestly, this work wasn't too bad.

"...and that's when the stupid bald elf declared he'd destroy the world to try bringing his old society back," Izuku muttered, having run out of quotes and gone on to describing the movie's plot to himself while laying out more . "And yeah, that was stupid as balls since he's the one who destroyed his own society in the first place. And people actually like the guy? Get real, he's as cool as a-"

Izuku stopped when he heard some skittering. Crud, was there an actual rat down here? He quietly scooted towards the noise. Maybe he could throw a sticky trap at it and catch it. He had to be quiet, though. He didn't wanna spook the rat into hiding. Worse yet, he could hear voices beneath him. There was a very good chance the wedding interview was occurring literally right underneath him.

If this had happened months ago, he would have been as noisy as possible, hoping to sabotage the interview and get fired. Now, though, he couldn't bring himself to make too much noise. It felt wrong after everything that had happened.

"Come here, lil' rat," Izuku whispered. "If you behave, I won't do too much…" He turned a corner around a pile of cords and loose insulation. The minute he did, he froze. His headlamp had indeed illuminated a rat.

A 1-meter tall rat with sleek back hair in a nice coat.

Which was also looking right at him, drawn by the lamp.

…

"RAAAAAT!" Izuku screamed. The rat screamed right back and rushed at him. Izuku threw the sticky trap at him. It nailed him in the cheek, but didn't slow the Rodent of Unusual Size down in the slightest. He tackled Izuku, trying to reach his throat with his sharp rat teeth. Izuku just kept screaming and wrestled with the rat.

The pair rolled around the gap, screaming and hitting each other in a manner reminiscent of slapstick comedy. After a minute or two of tight-space melee, the quirkless man managed to pin the rat down and just started punching him hard as he could. After two punches, the floor under them broke and both fell into the room below. Both fighters slammed into a hard surface, but Izuku recovered faster and continued punching the rat in the face. He landed five punches before Izuku noticed where exactly he was.

He and this rat had indeed fallen onto the one table in the room below them. Because this was the conference room. Specifically the one where the marriage interview was happening. On one side of the table, Endeavor and Shouto were staring at him with wide-eyed shock. Endeavor's flames had all but extinguished from shock. On the other side was the Yaoyorozu matriarch, with Creati sitting next to her in a fancy outfit.

Izuku and this giant rat had literally crashed the marriage interview.

…

"Uuggh…" the rat groaned.

BAM!

Without even looking, Izuku delivered one last punch that knocked the rat out.

—

Initially, the heroes of the Agency simply secured the giant rat, seeing they were really a small person with an extensive Rat-type mutation. After uploading his picture to HeroNet, however, they got a hit on his identity that required an Interpol presence. The officers arrived in a bit under half an hour and were quick to take over the situation. A few of the officers set up a ladder under the hole in the ceiling so they could take pictures of the gap Izuku fought in, and the rest processed the rat himself.

"His name is Ratigan," the Interpol detective read from his tablet as other officers carried the unconscious rat. "He's an A-class villain from England. He's got a few murders to his name, but is rap sheet is mostly along the lines of grand larceny."

"Wait," Izuku spoke up, "isn't this the guy who pulled off the Big Ben Caper?"

"The very same piece of shit," the detective nodded. "He disappeared from England a month ago, after Basil, England's current Number One, led raids on several of his hideouts. Three weeks ago he was spotted in the next town over, and had been pursued by heroes ever since."

"If he was hiding from heroes," Endeavor growled, "what was he doing in my ceiling?"

"I wish I knew. The last time anyone spotted him was two weeks ago, when he was being chased by a few heroes across some rooftops." The Interpol detective messed with his tablet a bit before continuing, "Apparently the heroes chased him through this block that night. That's all we got."

"Has he committed any crimes since arriving in Japan?" Izuku asked after a minute.

"Yeah, he robbed Shingeki Jewelers the same night the heroes chased him. The heroes weren't able to retrieve the jewels he stole."

"Can I climb that ladder real quick?" Izuku asked. The detective looked at Endeavor, who nodded his assent. Izuku shot up the ladder and crawled back into the space above the ceiling. After a couple minutes, he came back out with a large cloth bag. After jumping back down, he set the bag on the table and opened it up so everyone else could see.

"That's a lot of jewels," another officer whistled.

"When I first saw him," Izuku explained, "he was crawling in a specific direction. I found this lying at the bottom of an air shaft in that direction. I bet if we look on the roof right above that shaft we'll see signs of it being opened."

"So he came in here to retrieve his stolen prize," Endeavor nodded, rubbing his chin. "But why did he wait so long before coming to get it?" Izuku gave this some thought before his expression lit up.

"He didn't!" Izuku declared, startling everyone. "This morning, Onima told me the surrounding buildings had been hearing rats in their walls. I bet they were hearing Ratigan looking through all the buildings. Chances are the surrounding buildings all look identical from above. Combine that with it being nighttime and the stress from being pursued, he probably couldn't remember which building he hid the bag in. So he had to look through all of them, and that's why it took so long."

"...That makes perfect sense," the detective nodded. "What's your hero name, kid? I'll put in a good word for ya to my superiors."

"His name is Midoriya Izuku," Endeavor grinned. "He's not a hero, though he should be."

"...Still putting in a good word," the detective nodded. He turned to order the officers while Endeavor took Izuku's shoulder and pulled him from the conference room.

"...Sorry for crashing the interview," Izuku apologized after the door closed.

"There's always next time," Endeavor nodded. "Besides, you did it by performing a heroic action. Can't blame you for that." He pulled out his checkbook, wrote out a check and handed it to Izuku. The green man's eyes widened when he saw the amount written on it. "A bonus for your continued heroism. Keep up the good work." Enji gave Izuku a hard pat on his shoulder before walking away. Izuku was too stunned to move before Shouto and Yaoyorozu Momo walked up.

"Uh, hi," Izuku greeted. "Sorry for the-"

"THANK YOU!" both heroes exclaimed.

"...wuh?"

"Thank you for crashing the interview," Momo bowed her head.

"We know our marriage would technically be a boon to both families," Shouto explained, "but the truth is neither of us are attracted to each other. Plus…" Shouto seemed to blush a bit as he continued, "a bit after our conversation about my quirk, I…I asked out one of my former classmates. I just never got the courage to tell my father I already had a girlfriend."

"And I'm dating his sister!" Momo declared. "So it would really be-" She and the two men in the hall just realized what she admitted. Momo's face slowly turned red as her hero uniform as she looked away.

"Y-you've been dating Fuyumi?" Shouto asked. "How long?"

"Um," Creati replied, "we've been seeing each other since graduation, but we really got serious during New Year's last year."

"New Year's…wait, that was the night Fuyumi didn't come home until morning…Did you-"

"A-HEM!" Momo loudly cleared her throat before reaching into her purse. She pulled out a small stack of bills and set it in Izuku's still-open hand. "Consider this a thank you from me for giving me more time to inform my mom that I like women."

"And here's my thank you," Shouto put his own wad of bills into Izuku's shaking hands. "I believe the correct term is…you really saved our bacon." Both heroes gave the frozen quirkless a quick hug before rushing down the hall at the call of their parents. Izuku did not move for several minutes. He didn't even lower his hands until Kamiji Moe walked up, noticing the three-months-earnings in her boyfriend's hands.

"So," she smiled, "does this mean we can go to that American Bistro this Friday?"

"...We can go to the American Bistro this Friday," Izuku finally squeaked.