Why Exactly Are We Stuck Working For This Guy?!

I entered the Journal office, only to be greeted by an absolutely horrendous stench. Week-old sushi rolls. Gross. That stench was unmistakable.

Mr. Hedoro was here. On days when he was here, he liked to completely take over our operations. 

“Thish headline is crap!” Mr. Hedoro screamed at Masuda and Aoki. “Myshtery Witch Saves Sushaki?! Afpsholute garbage.” Mr. Hedoro spoke as if he always had some kind of food in his mouth, probably food that had been stuck in there for months. It wasn't any speech impediment that I could tell. He was just like that. He looked like he couldn't make it in sumo: he had the size for it, but his honor was nowhere to be found.

“Mr. Doro, if I may object,” Aoki tried to tell him. “We have over four hundred witnesses on the record confirming the headline to be true.” Even Aoki and Masuda were struggling to avoid breathing while they were in his presence.

“Fpake news,” Mr. Hedoro protested. “Everyone knows witches are bad news. Look at this fpoto! Every time one of these monsters show up, one or more of these witches are right there. She's even fleeing the shcene! Only criminals flee the shcene of the crime!”

“M- Mr. Doro,” Masuda added, “we were there. W- we have interviews and anecdotes f- from dozens of witnesses. W- we couldn't retract this story even if… if we wanted to. This witch is a he- hero!”

“Why's she camera-shy then?” Mr. Hedoro asked. Ugh… True to the nickname we all gave him, everything about him screamed trash. “Hm? Eshplain that to me, and I might give you a raise.”

I knew I had to say something.

As I approached Mr. Hedoro, I could feel his presence slowly suck the life out of me. Or maybe it was the stench of raw fish… However, I could not waver in my resolve to set the record straight.

“Mr… Doro, have you even seen a Senshi series?” I asked him. I struggled so much to not call him Mr. Hedoro to his face. I wanted to so badly, but I had to at least try to stay professional.

“Of coursh, I haven't, Aoki,” Mr. Hedoro answered, to the wrong person. “What do you think I am, twelve?!”

“I didn't ask that question,” Aoki corrected him, before pointing to me. “She did.”

“Intern!” Mr. Hedoro screamed at me. ‘Where’sh my coffee?!”

“It's right there on the table where it's always been,” I answered him. “Now, back to my -”

“You seem to not undershtand how things work around here, intern,” Mr. Hedoro rudely interrupted me. “You fletch me my coffee and everything elsh I ask you to fletch me. Now, gfet me my coffee.”

It was like I didn't even exist to him. I was just the… thing… that fetches him stuff.

“Get it yourself,” I told Mr. Hedoro. “I don't know how things work elsewhere, but at the Susaki Journal, we have a certain degree of respect for each other. We aren't too lazy to get our own coffee.”

“Awful shnappy for an intern, aren't you?” Mr. Hedoro asked me. “I should remind you that I shign your pfaycheck. Get shnappy with me again, and I'll make sure you're unempfloyed for the rest of your miserable life.”

That was when the panic set in. No matter how much I wanted to stand up for my coworkers, the integrity of our work, and most importantly my good name as a magical fighter, Mr. Hedoro was my boss. He may have been slimy, but he always made good on his threats.

“Yes, sir…” I begrudgingly said as I went to get him his coffee.

Doormat Ayame, they used to call me in school. No matter how much I resolved to stand up for myself and for others, I still fell victim to my own nasty tendency to be a people pleaser. I hated it so much, but it was part of my dummy brain's way of interpreting doing the right thing. 

“Now, as pfor the rest of you, about this shtupid headline,” Mr. Hedoro then explained to the others, “Put an ad on the pfront page for tomorrow'sh paper. We pay CASH for pictursh of witches. If we can get a picture of the Prime Minishter in a bikini, we can get a better picture of these hooligans. We are going to prove these witches are evil! That'sh going to be the line my papersh are towing, and I won't hear any compflaintsh about it, undershtood?”

Everyone nodded in agreement, though I believed it was mostly out of fear. Mr. Hedoro was large and in charge. Nobody would be allowed to act or say otherwise.

“Oh, and…” he added as he made his way out the door, “the nesht person to call me Mr. Hedoro ish getting fired. Have a nish day.”

Despite his size, Mr. Hedoro slipped out of that door with the grace of a snake.

•

None of us spoke to each other for the rest of the day. No talk about baseball or fashion or monsters or cats or anything. Mr. Kaneko didn't even order food like he usually did. Nobody was ever in the mood to speak after Mr. Hedoro came to town.

I was busy cleaning the printer right before we were to close up for the day when I saw the puppy standing outside the back window.

“Ayame ~woof! You gotta come out here now! Two more sorcerers just appeared ~woof!”

Of course, Aichi had to come find me right before work was over…

I tried to ignore him. Work wasn't going to be over for another twenty minutes. But then, out of sheer convenience, Mr. Kaneko walked up to me and put a hand on my shoulder.

“You can leave a bit early, if you want,” he told me. The first words anyone had said since Mr. Hedoro left the office seven hours ago. “You did good, kid, standing up to Mr. Hedoro like that.”

“But…”

“Listen,” Mr. Kaneko explained. “If one of us gets fired, we're all going, too. We're a team, Ayame. Don't forget that. The only reason he hasn't replaced us with robots yet is because robots don't have the heart necessary to do this kind of work. He needs us more than we need him.”

I wasn't sure why, but hearing that kind of encouragement from Mr. Kaneko was enough to put a smile on my face.

•

I left the office to find two sorcerers, one male and one female, dressed in black robes, flying above the city streets on broomsticks. I assumed they were looking for people to turn into giant monsters. Aichi ran up to me as soon as he spotted me.

“I dunno what those two are up to, ~woof, but it can't be any good,” Aichi told me.

“I don't need Hollow's Intuition to tell me that,” I replied. “Let's get moving!”

“I thought you'd never say so, Ayame!”

“Flower Power! Rise Up, pretty pretty please!”

“~woof! Let's do this!”

The iris sigil appeared at my feet, and slowly rose as it transformed my outfit into the battle outfit, hakama first, then kimono second. The bows and ribbons were next to appear. I had gotten used to the feeling of having a bow and ribbons growing in my hands. Finally, my staff appeared, ready for me to whack baddies with it if needed.

I ran over to where the two sorcerers were. They had flown close enough to the ground to where I could greet them. Rather than be confrontational immediately, as I had done with Meteron, I decided to go with a more cordial approach. Maybe they weren't evil magic users looking for people to turn into monsters.

“Hey!” I shouted. “What's up? Nice day for a stroll on a broomstick, isn't it?”

“Cut the cute talk, Flower Girl,” the woman told me, in a vaguely Texan twang-y accent. “Ya ain't gonna stop us from taking over the world.”

“Yeah, maroons like youse ain't got no business messing around with our plans, capisce?” the man asked in a vaguely Brooklyn accent. “I'm Blaze.”

“I'm Aurora!” the woman added.

“We're the sorcerers who will set the world ablaze with our wicked love!” The two of them were now speaking in unison. “Star-X (Star-Cross)!”

“Oh, look, Aurora!” Blaze said with excitement in his voice. “A local we can toin into a monster!”

“Well, butter my toast, Blaze, you're right! Let's go get ‘em!” Aurora added.

“Not if I have anything to say about it!” I shouted at them. I tried to fly up to them, but they performed the macarena together, shouting in unison “Magical Piercing Arrow!”

In an instant, I felt something rip right through my gut. Everything went black. I could feel myself falling, but not much else.

When I came to, the first thing I heard was a man roaring loudly, “Rawr!!! Gimme all your money!”

Oh, gods… Not him…