Fix Up #4: Messy Residence [Mia]

Mia wasn’t a true pig, but she was admittedly a slob. With her habits of rushing out in a morning to get on patrols or rushing out whenever there was an emergency car chase or hold up or the like, she’d left the apartment in a state more than enough times, and with two special occasions coming up she needed to make the effort to tidy up…but as much as she could summon the energy to fight crime, the energy needed to just clean her dang apartment was not something she was able to conjur so easily.

The first event she needed to worry about was the hero organization inspecting her. Given the students were progressing well and internships were coming up, they needed to inspect Mia’s workspace. Not many people came directly to her offices with hero requests given it was more of an emergency business, but given the interns were going to be seeing this and had to be instilled with ‘japanese values’ she had to make sure the offices were in tip top shape. She only used her office to file expense reports and damage sheets and the like, so it was a barely used part of her home anyway, but still, she was told to make the effort, and so that was what she had to do regardless of how she felt on the matter.

On the other end of the stick, her home upstairs was gonna be host to a family dinner really soon, the first big family get together in a while to celebrate how succesfful she’d been as a hero so far, and even celebrate the fact she’d managed to snatch the kid Jaz she really appreciated as an Intern. Ultimately she knew her family knew she was a slob, but she wanted to leave a good impression that she was doing well living on her own…so either way she looked at it, she really needed to clean the fuck up.

She just didn’t wanna do it herself.

Looking through whatever Japan had instead of the yellow pages in 2070, probably some online blog of handymen and the like, she’d picked one of the first to catch her eye and ended up calling them. From some yelp reviews they seemed like a pretty small business, so she felt like it’d be good to lend a hand. Over the call, she’d had no idea what a cleaning service should cost so the number she threw out for payment may have been a little high, but given how lazy she was being over this, it felt fair to give. Confirming when it needed to be done by, the call was over, and all Mia could do was wait on them arriving on that day.

Her pointed ear twitching when she heard the door bell ring, a small hall space leading up to her offices from the elevator allowing people to step out and wait for an answer, Mia called out “Come in! It’s unlocked!” As she walked towards the door. Whenever she was home she didn’t care to keep it locked since…well. If anyone did walk in, they’d realize quickly they walked into the wrong person’s apartment, regardless of their intentions on doing so. Waving to the cleaner, Mia was dressed in a casual white shirt, open long sleeve flannel shirt, and torn up jeans, though whether they were torn up by design, or torn up from use, was hard to tell. Red Horn’s prominent…red horn, was standing as normal on her forehead through her blonde hair, the Oni grinning just a little. “Ah mate, you’re a lifesaver for this. Anything you need to get started?”

The kid didn’t have much reaction to seeing her, which she was kinda glad for. She didn’t want some fanboy asking her questions about her work rather than cleaning her place up. On some level it did bum her out, just a tad, but she supposed even if he did recognize her maybe he was just being professional…or maybe he legit didn’t recognize her. It helped to ground her if that was the case, and remind her she needed to keep making an effort if she wanted to achieve what she wanted to do. Fame wasn’t everything but when she did the shit she did, some recognition was damn appreciated.

“Just outlets? Alright. I pay the electricity as part of the rent so that ain’t an issue in the slightest.” She smirked idly and rolled her shoulders back, walking to the back of the room and gesturing for him to follow so he could get himself set up. Walking about her desk, she fell back into her chair. Despite not knowing kent’s personal opinions of the place, the office, while the furniture was nice, was VERY scarce. Mia had an open desk with way too much open space around it, a side room with glass walls and blinds to seal it off if people needed privacy when addressing her, and a small set of couches around a coffee table if anyone needed to wait to see her, for whatever reason. She personally didn’t have much care for t he furniture, as she leaned back in her office chair and placed her feet on the desk itself.

“Dry clean the carpets…? That a thing?” She asked, not really all that aware of deeper cleaning habits, but she shrugged it off and sank into her seat deeper with her arms behind her head. “Eh, whatever you think is best. I’m not picky I just want the place clean-ish and. Well. I can’t be assed.” She blatantly admitted. “Lemme know if I’m in yer way or anythin’ though.”

Mia was resting back in her main office chair, not wanting to be rude by any means but she also didn’t just wanna leave the guy alone to do his work. That seemed kinda rude too even if sitting here watching him probably gave the impression she was just making sure he didn’t do a shitty job. He seemed kinda diligent anyway, using some weird ass powder even she didn’t realize the purpose of but she assumed he knew better than her. The add for his business had been really vague afterall so as far as she knew at this current moment, he was totally just an odd jobs person like cleaning, cooking, whatever.

“Oh something like that. Really I barely use the office space unless I have to file damage reports and that’s usually just a few hours at the weekend or something.” She shrugged casually, that’s all this space was for for her till she branched out and got a few other heroes working under her, but that was unlikely to happen if every hero ended up as independent as her. It probably showed in the fact this room really wasn’t all that untidy, but she did need to make an impression. “Got some big wigs from the hero association coming over to evaluate me or whatever. I ain’t too worried but…eh. Gotta make a good impression.”

She’d pull her legs down off her desk and pull in a little, leaning over the desk instead on her elbows, not thinking of anything better to do right now then literally just watch the guy work. As he mentioned he was saving up for something better, she smirked, and felt a bit better for hiring him over just any old cleaning business that had the biggest ad. “Well hopefully this job should be able to help ya save towards it. What ya need the office space for if ya don’t mind me asking? The ad I found was just saying you do ‘odd jobs’?”

“Mmmm…” Mia groaned back as he mentioned heroes having to worry about damaging the property and stuff like that, and yeah it made sense, they were heroes afterall not good guy terrorists (she didn’t wanna say vigilantes cause she used to be one herself afterall, and she knew a lot of vigilantes were better behaved than even her) “They make us write reports, compare them to police reports and try to see what the facts are. After that, I get so much docked from my pay to help cover the damages that may be deemed unnecessary or excessive. It’s still just a percentage of the repairs, buuuut…yeah. Let’s just say if I was a little calmer, I might be a lot richer than I currently am but…” She shrugged casually, she was still one of the toughest heroes on the scene, so she didn’t worry too much about the paycheque. She wasn’t even in it for the money afterall. “Does give me a good reminder not to go overboard though, so you’re right there.”

She chuckled a little of the question of ‘do you get reviews’ and she nodded along. “It’s kinda like any other job. I mean, we have celebrity status, but we’re still government employees. If we do too much shit they don’t like we get our licenses revoked. In this case it’s not aimed at me personally, they’re just gonna show me a few upcoming hero candidates that I might have to work with, fill me in on some new legislation, keep me updated. Still, need to make sure I keep my office tidy or they may remember that and throw me at the bottom of the list if I ever think I need a sidekick…not that I ever think I’ll need one, but better safe than sorry yeah?”

As he tried to get under the couches, she smirked and pulled out from her desk, striding over to the couch and before he gave up, she’d hook a hand under one side of the couch, and tip the whole thing up without any sign of strain. “Get in there quick. Don’t need to worry too much but I may as well get it cleaned while you’re here.~” She didn’t mean to be too cheeky but even if she didn’t care much about being clean she may as well get her moneys worth.

As he went on to explain the situation of wanting to expand his space and what he was aiming for, he sounded like some sort of inventor just looking to make some cash and Mia felt pretty interested in seeing where something like that might go in this day and age. She eased back into the couch after she placed it back down, though she’d stand up again and start to move to the stairs as he started whipping down the couch and everything else. “Well you’re certainly earning your pay at the very least.” She’d smirk. “Hey I ain’t good at finding shit for people to do, but you should call me sometime and…I dunno. Shoot me some ideas of what you could do. Who knows I might take you up on the offers. I’d love to see a spunky guy like you make it big!~”

“Hey, I wouldn’t go calling your friend there the ‘supporting cast’ in your life or whatever.” She chuckled a little, not really scolding him for his choice of words but just poking at it for a bit of a laugh in that regard. “I mean sidekick is like, the official term for people working under other heroes, so I get to use it, but I’m pretty sure if this friend of yours heard you call him the ‘supporting cast’ he’d probably get a bit miffed.” She snickered a little more and rolled her eyes a little, wondering if the kid had a bit of an ego to him. Given her own ego she couldn’t fault him if he did, but at least she kept hers a bit in check to be polite.

As the kid seemed to zone out for a second at the idea that Mia might be willing to hire him for future work, she tipped her head to the side, wondering if she’d triggered some thought process sand easily getting curious about it, but she wouldn’t be rude and pry. He might just wanna get in and out and do his job so if he wasn’t willing to share what’s on his mind she wasn’t about to force it out of him either. At the very least he did seem to regain the power of speech in time, so that was good.

As he went to describe what he was working on, she quirked her brow, wondering what he was making armor for when it clicked. “Oooh. Trying to get into the business of hero gear or something? Well that’s good to hear! Gotta have someone with the brains making the shit for us huh?~” She held a cheeky little grin as she commented on that, assuming she had the right end of the stick. As he went on to ask what they needed working next, she got up and started moving towards the stairs, taking a hop skip and a jump up and gesturing out to her general living Space. Since Mia didn’t spend much of her time at home it wasn’t TOO messy, but loose sports bras, a half eaten packet of crisp or a loose drink can were lingering about, and she leaned back against the wall as Kent made his way up after her. “Not too big a mess for ya I hope lad.” There were no deep stains or the like, it was just like…a lot of general ‘littered’ bits and bobs.

Mia smirked a little as he commented on expecting worse, and subtly elbowed the guy with a sly look. “Hey what’s that supposed to mean? I look like a messy gal to you?” She’d chuckle all the same, knowing that it indeed could have been much worse than this. “Really though ya shoulda seen how I lived back in America. Back then I didn’t exactly have the budget of a hero, so it was like, the same amount of mess in a much more cramped and shitty apartment. Sometimes got into those ‘where the hell is the floor’ situations when I just left a bunch of sweat soaked clothes on the floor…” Huh, a benefit she’d never noticed of having a hero costume. The fact that she could actually wear that shit without getting it drenched in sweat from a fight.

As he continued to clean up for her, Mia naturally walked to the kitchen space, which wasn’t it’s own separate room but was more divided by a few walls and an open doorway. The fact it had a huge serving window made it feel like it was just a decoratively walled off portion of the same room depending on how you looked at it. “Hey, I know I’m paying you but yer working hard, I’m gonna make myself some brinner if you fancy a plate?~” Brinner was of course slang for having breakfast food for dinner. Breakfast was just her speciality was the only reason for the offer, and, besides. “I always make a mountain for myself anyway, so it’s no extra effort if you want a plate or anything?”

She’d start making the food all the same, pulling out full packs of bacon and sausages and throwing them in the pans, licking her lips the moment the food started to cook and eagerly watching the bacon sizzle as she started to crack eggs into a third pan and even bumped a tray of hashbrowns into the oven. “How’s it going out there anyhow? Need a hand getting under the couch?” If he even tried to lift the furniture, he’d find it all shockingly heavy, as Mia had her furniture made with reinforced framing so she didn’t accidentally crush it. It made all of her furniture more expensive, sure, but it was worth the cost so she didn’t just collapse back into her couch after a long day and feel it snap beneath her.

“OH America didn’t have a hero program back when I lived there but I heard they’re starting to adopt it. Part of the reason I actually came to Japan. They saw for even a vigilante I’d managed to gain a positive following so they scouted me to be one of the first recruits for a hero program here…learning Japanese was a bitch but I guess it’s all worked out.” She shrugged with a pretty casual smirk. She did miss her home but the work she got here was worth it. Maybe she’d try and transfer back to America one day, but for now she was pretty settled, and given her family had moved with her, so were they, and she wasn’t about to rip them up from their jobs again so soon or anything like that…maybe her little brother. He still didn’t have a job afterall.

“Linner huh? What is that? Sandwhiches for dinner or what?” Sandwhiches were the only real food she associated solely with lunch, but either way he at least seemed to be on board with the meal. It’d still take a while to cook and while Mia took pride in her breakfasts she knew she had the time to leave it to cook for a bit while she helped out her cleanrer, heading out of the kitchen with a light chuckle and, much like downstairs, managing to lift the furniture onto it’s side with ease, doing so one by one as he made his way around the room. “Sorry it’s all so heavy. I need to get the stuff specially built so it doesn’t just break on me. After a long day my muscle mass goes right up so it’s best to take precautions. Exhausted Mia’s not exactly gonna remember her furniture can’t handle her weight ya know?”