This was a prompt fill for Kuroto & Mighty - First Meeting


Kuroto was sat at his desk, tapping away at his computer in his office at Gemn Corp. It was dark outside as it was late into the night, it was not an unusual thing for the Game Developer to still be working at this hour. He needed to create the most perfect God-like games after all, so he made sure to put the hours in.

That's when he heard a strange, scratching sound at the doorway. He looked over but there was nothing there, so he resumed his work.

It wasn't even a minute later when the scratching was heard again.

Maybe it was on the other side of the door? Kuroto got up and opened it to investigate, maybe a cat had somehow managed to wander into the building and made its way up here.

There was nothing there. He looked both ways down the hallway. Nothing.

Kuroto went back to his chair to begin working again, a sense of wonderment about what could have caused the sound at the back of his mind. There were likely few, if any, employees in the building at this hour of the night. They respected him too much to pull a prank and he would have seen them down the hallway as they tried to hide if for some strange reason they did. So what could it have been?


It had been a few days and Kuroto was once again working past sundown when he heard another odd noise. He looked around to see if he could find the source of the sound, his eyes ending up landing upon the only other occupant of the room. He was laid on the couch facing away from Kuroto, the sounds of beeps and boops from the console in his hands could be heard as he tried to clear the level he was on.

"Parad, what are you doing?"
"Playing the newest demo of Mighty Action X that you gave me, why?"
"Did you hear that sound just now?"

Parad blinked, pausing his game and turning to sit on the seat properly and look at the Game Developer.

"No? What sound? The only thing I've heard in this room is the sound of my game and you tapping away at your keyboard."
"Hmm... Nevermind. It's probably nothing."

Kuroto got up and headed to the doorway, maybe Parad was just too hyperfocused on his gaming to have noticed it or he was simply hearing things as he was getting tired.

"I'm going to the vending machine, do you want anything?"
"Did you get them to put in those energy drinks yet?"
"No."
"Then no."

Kuroto left, it was a pointless question really, Parad didn't need food and drink like humans did. Yet, he'd kept asking for a certain energy drink he remembered his human host enjoying when he was still a part of him. Foolish Bugster didn't know how good he had it to not have such needs.

He got a black coffee out of the vending machine, when he heard a sound coming from what seemed to be behind it. Kuroto looked out of curiosity, nothing was there, but that sound definitely didn't seem like one that had come from the machine itself.

Maybe he really was so tired he was hearing things, at least the coffee should help with that.

He returned to his office and looked at his desk, the letter blocks on it had moved, with the letter 'M' having fallen on the floor. There was only one other person in the room who could have touched them.

Parad could often be compared to a cat at times, he liked to be in high places. He could often be somewhat distant until he decided he felt like engaging with others, in which he could get almost too close as he appeared to lack an understanding of personal space. He had a cunning side that was shown when they were plotting for their grand plan. He was also in constant need of entertainment, while games often occupied him for great lengths of time, he'd often move around and needed other things to do while his console was charging or he'd just gotten bored of playing. If not relaxing, he could be quite troublesome if his need for attention was not met. So, Kuroto filled his office with things for him to do under the guise they were for himself so no one in the office questioned why something like a ping pong table was in there. There were also things in the basement where Parad usually went to when he wasn't allowed to be in the office for whatever reason, or to simply be out of Kuroto's hair for a bit. Maybe he'd gotten bored of playing his game demo, taking a little break to mess with his things. Maybe now his catlike nature had grown to him wanting to knock things off of his desk in his absence and he was waiting for him to come back and notice.

Whatever was the case, he needed to question him about it.

"Parad? Why did you knock something off my desk?"
"Huh? I didn't, I've been on the couch the whole time playing games."
"Then how do you explain one of the letter blocks being on the floor?"

Parad shrugged, eyes not having left his console once.

"I dunno, it must have fell on its own."

Kuroto sighed, frowning at the other man.

"If I don't have enough things in the office to entertain you, you know all you have to do is say somethi-"

The clattering of stationary cut through the air as Kuroto looked over to see his pot of pens had crashed to the floor. Parad looked over in surprise as well at the sudden loud noise.

"That wasn't me!"

Kuroto shook his head, he knew that Parad couldn't have knocked it over. Bugsters didn't have telekinesis as far as he knew and there was no reason for Parad to have kept something like that from him.

Kuroto headed over to the mess, he was sure it wasn't placed close enough to the edge to fall on its own. He searched around his desk as if there'd be some clue as to what had occurred. Nothing was there that could have knocked it off. Parad watched him curiously as he did so.

"Parad?"
"Hmm?"
"If you notice anything strange going on in this building, let me know."
"Uh... Right."

Parad went back to his relaxed position on the couch and resumed playing his game.

Kuroto had a feeling this wasn't a part of his grand imagination.


Every so often over the next week, Kuroto kept hearing strange sounds as if a small creature was around and out of sight. Sometimes, he'd find things had been knocked over or moved, yet he could never find what was the cause of it all.

Then, one morning he'd gone to one of the break rooms that his employees would use so he could fill up the bowl of sweets that was on the table in the middle of the room. He did this to give them a little energy boost and give the appearance of a kind and caring boss, so that they in turn would work harder to develop his amazing games. A God must show good will to those that deserve it. After all, it served as encouragement for his lambs, his employees to do a good job.

He filled it up then made himself a coffee from the machine that was placed on the edge of the room. Due to this he was facing away from the bowl and when he was done making his coffee, he turned around to see that there were some empty wrappers on the table. Yet... He never heard anyone enter and exit the room, they would have atleast greeted him, he's their boss after all. Kuroto moved over to the sweets bowl to inspect it and under the table. Nothing. He looked in the cupboards, becoming frantic in his search. What could have done that without him noticing? He had considered that mice had made their way into the building, but they shouldn't be able to unwrap sweets. As he was looking, one of his employees entered the room. Tsukuru Koboshi, he recalled.

"Ah, good morning President." Tsukuru greeted as he made his way over to the coffee machine.
"Morning."
"Are you looking for something?"
"No, I just came to get a coffee and was checking if we were out of anything."

Kuroto didn't want to mention to a mere underling what he'd been experiencing lately, without evidence he might come across as someone who was beginning to lose his mind.

"And have some sweets? Thank you for providing us with a little treat to get us through the day."
"Ah, no. Thank you for your hard work, these sweets are just a small 'thank you' for your daily efforts in developing the best games for Genm Corp."
"I appreciate it and I know I'm not the only one who does."

Kuroto nodded and tidied up the wrappers, he didn't really want to get into small talk with others right now, he wanted to find the sweets thief. But he had to try and act like a normal competent boss who cared about his employees.

"Oh, by the way there's been rumours in the office lately."

Kuroto cocked his head to one side. Rumours?

"What kind of rumours?"
"That this building may have become haunted."
"I see..." So it wasn't just Kuroto that had experienced strange happenings recently.
"Sometimes things go missing, just little things though, then show up in odd places. The sound of scratching or something moving around in the walls. Things suddenly fall over without warning. The other night I felt like a presence was watching me."
"This building isn't that old, maybe you are just tired? You've been working so hard and we are on a tight schedule to get our games released in a timely manner. It could be that your imagination is working overtime?"
"Ah, maybe you're right Sir. I'll make sure to take care of myself so I don't get sick and hold us back on developing games."
"Of course, I'll come by to see how your team is getting on later, goodbye."
"Goodbye President!"

Kuroto took his coffee and headed back to his office. This couldn't be some elaborate prank Parad had created in his boredom, he knew he had to avoid the Genm Corp employees at all costs, he wouldn't be foolish enough to start messing with them. Besides, messing with them is potentially messing with the development of the company's games and they needed those as part of their plan. Some things here didn't quite add up anyway, Parad couldn't have done some of the things Tsukuru described. So something else must be 'haunting' the Genm Corp building. It was beginning to bother Kuroto, messing with him is one thing. Messing with his employees means messing with his games getting made which messed up his plans. He couldn't forgive someone or something getting in his way. He will find the source of this nuisance and put a stop to it.


Kuroto was working away at his desk, another late night working hard to make his God Tier games a reality when he heard it. Something was scuttling around in the darkness of the office that was only illuminated by his laptop. Still, he looked around to see if he could notice any movement. Kuroto got up, moving to the other side of the room to turn the light on, squinting slightly at the sudden brightness.

There.

He barely saw it, but something was there. Something small and pink crawled under the couch. Kuroto rushed over, getting on all fours to look underneath. It was gone.

He had no idea what it could be. No animal that he knew of was such a bright colour. But he also knew that this wasn't his mind playing tricks on him.

Kuroto got up and went back to his desk. As he got back to work, he kept glancing around to see if he could spot the creature again.

As time passed, he didn't see anything in the corner of his eye, but he felt like there was a presence. A presence that was keeping its eye on him all through the night until he left work.


Kuroto was going to find this creature no matter what. When he set his mind to something, he wouldn't stop until he achieved it. He made a plan and since the creature seemed to prefer making its presence known once it got dark, he was going to execute it tonight.

He left a handful of sweets on his desk and got to work. Then, after a little while, he pretended to leave for a bit. It was a simple trap really, nowhere near as elaborate as the other schemes he was currently plotting. Kuroto paced down the hallway to give the creature enough time to notice that it was safe enough to come out of hiding, then he hurried back to his office and flung the door wide open. He'd left the light on this time so that he could clearly see what was there.

"Aha! There you are, you little sweets thief!"

Kuroto pointed over at it dramatically, no one else was around to see his maniacal state, so he didn't have to hide his true self. As he spoke, his mind began to register just what it was exactly on his desk right now. The creature turned its tiny body and jumped in surprise, its eyes going wide at being caught with a sweet in its hands. Kuroto blinked and furrowed his brows, a tone of confusion and surprise in his voice.

"Mighty!?"

As Mighty proceeded to make a run for it, Kuroto rushed over to the desk. He slammed his hands down as Mighty jumped down and slipped under the couch.

Kuroto mentally stopped himself from bending down to try and grab it, forcing it out of its hiding place. No, he couldn't do that. How rude of him would he be to treat one of his creations like that?

He calmly went around his desk and sat down.

"Mighty? It's alright, you don't have to hide. I won't harm you."

He waited a few moments... Nothing.

"I just wanted to meet one of my creations. Surely you wanted to meet your creator too? Or you wouldn't frequent my office so much."

Mighty peeked out from under the couch, now sweetless. He must have eaten it while staying hidden from view.

Kuroto put on his best friendly smile, one more genuine than his usual.

"There you are... Surely just the one sweet isn't enough? I have plenty more right here. You're perfectly safe to come over here and eat some sweets with me."

Kuroto pushed the sweets in Mighty's direction, then he proceeded to take one for himself and eat it. Mighty watched him, the two of them had a short staring contest until the tiny video game character decided to make his way over to hop up onto the desk. Kuroto observed Mighty as he made his way cautiously over to the sweets. Then he sat down and grabbed the sweet closest to him and began eating.

Kuroto took another sweet for himself and watched as Mighty ate happily. He was honestly surprised that this was the creature that had been 'haunting' the office for the past few weeks. Mighty must be a Bugster, it was the only explanation. Although, the how and why was another question. He wasn't aware anyone had gotten the Bugster Virus, nor had he purposefully infected someone. Also, why Mighty in particular? What made the Bugster Virus create a good or bad character from the video game it originated from?

Mighty would not be much use in the grand scheme of things. He was small in size and despite being mighty in strength, he would be unwilling to help at the cost of potentially harming others. At least with Poppy Pipopapo he was able to figure out a way for her to be useful without making her aware that she was just another pawn in his grand plan as a Game Master. He adored his creations and he would make sure they played in the best role possible.

Mighty was really cute as he happily ate. The Mighty Action series of games were one of Genm Corp's most popular, with the main character being adored by many different kinds of people. Mighty was loved so much, it had somewhat become the company's mascot. Maybe that's all Kuroto needed to do, let Mighty hang around the office whenever it liked. If it learnt to sit still long enough it could just pretend it was a plush toy.

Yes, that was a great idea actually, Kuroto was a genius.


Some time had passed since Kuroto had his mighty encounter. He was once again working away in his office when Parad materialised into the room and moved over to the desk. The Bugster placed his hands down upon it and leaned over.

"So... Any progress on our plans... Game Master?"
"Not right now, we're too busy with our latest game for me to work on that."

Parad frowned unimpressed, Kuroto understood, the plan was moving too slowly for his liking as well but he also had a gaming empire to run.

"I'm sure there's something around here you can entertain yourself with in the meantime."
"Is that Mighty!?"
"Huh?"

Parad moved to the edge of the desk where Mighty was sitting comfortably, Kuroto hadn't noticed when it had arrived and placed itself there. The Bugster lifted Mighty up in the air as high as he could, looking up at it with a childishly excited grin.

"He's so cute! You didn't say you were bringing out a new line of toys!"
"Ah... That's actually a prototype, please be careful with it, Parad."

Parad brought Mighty down to his chest, his grin replaced with a small sulky frown.

"I'll look into getting them to make a second prototype that you can play with all you want."
"Eh? You don't need to do that, it's not like I'd break it."
"Just put it down, Parad." Kuroto sighed and frowned at him.

Parad blinked, unsure why Kuroto was so bothered about him holding Mighty. It was just a plush toy, not something fragile at all. He set Mighty down gently and looked at Kuroto unamused.

"I guess I'll go play games in the basement then."

Parad teleported away and Kuroto let out a breath of relief. He looked at Mighty who was stretching, did it get stiff from trying to be as still as possible? He petted it with a small smile on his face.

"You did well pretending to be a toy while Parad was around."

Mighty closed its eyes, its expression appearing happy.

"I think you deserve some of the sweets in my drawer as a reward."

Kuroto got some out and handed them to Mighty, who happily started to eat them. It was nice having his own little secret hanging around his office. Now and again maybe he'll hear another story about how the office appears haunted or maybe he could get Mighty to pull a prank on Parad to keep him out of his hair for a bit.

For now though, he was happy to enjoy the company of one of his favourite creations.