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English
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Published:
2025-11-02
Updated:
2025-11-16
Words:
1,565
Chapters:
2/?
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He's cute.

Summary:

You're a retired superhero turned SDN dispatcher working along with Robert Robertson to manage the Z-Team. On your very first work day you run into Sonar. He's cute, you think. But haven't you seen him before?

Notes:

Haven't written in ages, feel free to give me ideas for the story and correct my mistakes if they annoy you 🤞

Chapter 1: Day zero

Chapter Text

He’s cute. It’s the first thing that comes to mind when you see him. You hadn’t known at the time that he’d be your coworker someday. You hadn’t even ‘retired’ from being a superhero yet. By the time you’d crashed into bed, your ribs bruised and spirits crushed, you weren’t even thinking about what would come next.

You’d rot at home for nearly a year before you finally decide to start doing something with your life again, which is when you send an e-mail to your local SDN headquarters. 

They don’t respond quickly, likely running a check on you to see if it’s a scam. The number at the end nearly has you falling out of your chair. Is the job that bad? You suppose it’s because they typically hire people just at the end of the peak of their career, unwilling to let go and in need of some major convincing. It must feel like a major downgrade. Hell, if you were still working, it would be a downgrade. But right now? As you watch your savings dwindle every month and the pile of clothing next to your washing machine rise? It feels like it’s your last chance at saving yourself before you give up. Besides, you’ve never been one to back down from a challenge.

You end up doing part of your training online while you wait for your work clothes to arrive. You’re glad you can still wear comfortable jeans and sneakers beneath the button-up, or you think you might perish a week in. It’s easy to slip into the simple routine, and you even start doing more work around the house. It feels refreshing to finally be employed again, to have to clean your apartment up for potential visitors and to have groceries delivered for your breakfast and the packed-lunch ideas you’ve been dying to try ever since your TikTok feed caught onto your recent employment.

 

 

When you step into the building for the first time, you realise another reason why the salary is so high. It’s so busy with new heroes here, it only makes sense they’re willing to pay so much for new dispatchers. You’re eager to meet the team and hit the ground running, at least, that’s what you’d claimed in your last email to Blonde Blazer, this district’s main hero.

You make eye contact with him then, Sonar. You’d seen his messages in the group chat, heard about how much of a nuisance he is from Robert. He’d seemed funny enough over text, occasionally charming and smart, too. Seeing him like this is different, the reality of what he is setting in. He’s not the kind of person you usually fall for, cocky nerds have never been your type. You prefer confident people, people who are strong and know that they are. You suppose you were never looking for a life partner before, just someone to fight with. Like Flambae, although you doubt you would have liked him a year ago. His ego too much to bear for you at any point in time.

You’re still staring when Robert walks up behind you, giving you a friendly clap on the back and attempting to lead you towards Sonar. You flinch, but all three of you pretend not to notice as your fellow dispatcher introduces the two of you, “This is Sonar, arguably our smartest hero. He’s a Harvard graduate, you know?” The smirk is audible in his tone; he’s teasing the other man, an inside joke you still don’t get.

“You been talking me up to the new hire, Bob-Bob?” His ears visibly perk up a little, and he offers you his hand. “It’s true, though, I did go to Harvard. Then I ran an international money laundering operation.” Your eyes widen a little and you make mildly panicked eye contact with Robert. “That’s… interesting. I’m the new dispatcher working with Z-Team. Apparently you guys are troublesome enough to require two babysitters,” You joke, trying to move on from the comments about his crimes as you shake his, surprisingly human, hands. 

“That makes sense, that shitbag Flambae keeps causing fires on the job… and don’t get me started on Waterboy, even if he is funny.” You nod along with what he’s saying, despite having no prior impressions of the two men aside from their professional chat messages over the past week.

Chapter 2: A year ago

Summary:

A short look back into what their first meeting actually looked like

Notes:

I did update chapter 1 aswell! Not much changed, but I do like it better:)

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

Your chest is heaving while the villain you were supposed to fight digs desperately at the rubble burying you. Light makes its way through the cracks, and you can barely make out his face through the slowly growing gaps. His eyes are wide, ears pressed down to his head, almost disappearing into the rest of his fur. This isn’t how it was meant to go.

 

 

It was meant to be a routine day for Victor. Well, as routine as a criminal’s life can get. He’d tumbled into some pretty deep shit after Harvard, though his friends had taken to it like a fish to water. That’s not to say he minds, but it certainly wasn’t what he thought his future looked like after he got his diploma. 

With a sigh, he shuts his phone off, slipping it into his suit pocket. He rubs his eyes, wondering why this deal had to happen so early in the morning anyway. Waking up at the asscrack of dawn for a deal? This guy has to be new. It’s whatever, he thinks to himself. He gets paid anyway, and he doesn’t have to do much but stand there and look scary. 

Someone honks outside his apartment, and he rushes down. No need to get in trouble with his landlord again. The door to the busted-up Ford Fiesta is open, though he’s not sure it ever locked properly. “Victor, my man.” The driver says, already driving off before he had any real chance of buckling his seatbelt.

“I’ve been telling you to just call me Sonar, dude. If we get caught,- The point is, Sonar is way more badass. Victor makes me sound like I’m a basement dweller.” He says quietly, though his tone is resolute. He can’t stand the thought of being caught, as impossible as it seems. He knows even the smartest criminals get caught once an SDN subscriber catches wind of it and labels them a villain.

The driver, an alligator hybrid named Marvin, raises his hands, temporarily taking his hands off the wheel. The car swerves dangerously as he tries to ease the tension, “That’s cool. I’ll keep it in mind.” 

Sonar nods thankfully, fidgeting with his sleeve, “Thanks. Anyway, what kind of uptown rich kid wants to buy crack at the crack of dawn anyway? We trust this guy?” He tries desperately to change the subject from his nerves to hide the rest of the group’s favourite topic. 

“You know we don’t, that’s why they sent us. We look scary to ‘em, hopefully scary enough, he pays us extra.” Marvin’s the real believer, smart enough to graduate with a business degree but dumb enough to think he’ll never get caught. Or scammed. Sonar’s got a bad feeling about today, though, as much as he tries to think about literally anything else.

 

 

When you arrive at the scene you were dispatched to, you’re immediately on high alert. The alligator guy, whatever his name was, is unconscious on the ground. Some old lady in the area had called it in: two suspicious mutants driving through the neighbourhood in a car with tinted windows. The story didn’t entirely add up, but even the nearly deaf old lady had heard the explosion that shook the surrounding area. You were dispatched on your own, naturally. You’re at the peak of your game, and another hero is just a distress call away. You’ve never hit that button on your earpiece, though, and to this day, you’re unsure if it actually works.

Lowering into a crouch, you start to wonder why you haven’t retired yet. It feels like you’re in a horror movie… or a particularly violent pornography. It’s easy to shut your mind off and make your way to the supposed criminal when you realise he’s still alive. He jerks awake as you come close, eyes wide with fear as he looks at something far behind you. “There’s someone behind me, isn’t there?” you say sarcastically, waiting for the inevitable crack of a punch straight to your temple. When that doesn’t come, you open your eyes. He shakes his head, points at something in the far corner. “It’s my- It’s the other guy. When he wakes up, he’s going to freak out. Literally, like the Hulk.” “The comic book hero? Really? Okay..” 

You can hear him muttering behind you as you get up, but you don’t pay enough attention to actually make out the words. It’s a miracle this guy is actually powered. Lately, it seems like any big-time criminals have disappeared off the map. You suppose this guy could still be some failed experiment, however. When you finally spot him, the giant man-bat monster in the dark, the ground has begun to tremble. You feel.. Afraid. Afraid to get closer, terrified to step away, still in place, incapable of doing anything but watch as he gets up. You think it’s a he, at least. It’d be a real shame for your career to end in a fight against some non-sentient creature.

Notes:

Sorry it took so long! Karma from all my works up to and including this one hit me all at once, So I had to drop out of college and got diagnosed with a debilitating illness!

As always, comments including further ideas, corrections, Seething hatred, support and anything else you might want to include in your digital footprint are all entirely welcome <3