SOULMATES [My Hero Academia]

Salt and Sugar - Rikido Sato

-

Sometimes I don't know why I fight it.

The universe, that is.

Life has a way of amplifying the bad to make it worse, or multiplying the good when you're lucky. Some call it karma or juju or fortune or chance...

My mom called it the business of luck: good, bad, and everywhere in between. Her whole side of the family had luck-based quirks, so we knew better than anyone what it felt like to be at the mercy of Lady Luck and her frivolous whims. Years of good luck passed with surprise lottery earnings, twins and triplets and quadruplets out the wazoo, good grades, bonuses and promotions, and tons of random gifts and prize winnings; but on the flip side, we'd suffer a bout of shit luck afterwards, complete with car accidents, court cases, broken bones, hospital stays, sudden illness, job loss, and miscarriages.

I can confirm from firsthand experience, through good luck or bad... the only things that are certain in life are death and taxes.

By a cruel twist of fate, I received a luck quirk like my mother's side of the family, and decidedly not the hella cool shapeshifting quirk my father used to help police with age progression, villain sketch descriptions, and scene recreations. Mom worked as a quirk teacher at a middle school in town, helping kids learn how to control the craziness in their genes.

And me? I don't know...

The only real guiding light in my life was the slip of laminated paper I received at birth with the last name of my soulmate printed on it. But even then, Lady Luck laughed in my face, because my soulmate's last name was Sato... only the most popular last name in Japan. So even that wasn't helpful.

In the meantime, I stocked shelves at the local 24/7 grocery store while I tried to think of a better way to find my soulmate. Overnight shifts gave me tons of time to myself - the store didn't get too many customers between midnight and six AM - and an acoustically perfect room for singing to an audience of inanimate objects. When I wasn't at the store, I performed at open mic nights for a little extra cash (if I managed to win the grand prize, at least) and a bit of free publicity.

I didn't really know what I wanted to do as a career or with the rest of my life, really... but I knew that I loved to perform. So, I figured I may as well keep going, keep saving my winnings, because my soulmate was taking their sweet ass time.

Except... I didn't always have luck on my side.

So here's hoping they show up sooner rather than later. Because if my mom's math is right, we have a bad luck cycle coming.

Like, next week.

And while fortune favors the bold...

It spurns lovers.

-

Rikido Sato rubbed a lazy hand over his tired face.

Why was good help so hard to find?

At the end of the day, he always counted the money in his till, wiped down every table himself, mopped the tile... and counted inventory. The new employee he'd hired at his bakery café consistently miscounted the product in the back room on Sundays - Rikido's only day off - and it drove him absolutely insane.

Because of the new hire, the cafe's backstock dwindled down to a single tin of baking soda, one 50 lb. bag of flour, and only half a bag of sugar... they'd never survive the rest of the week with those kinds of options. Their fresh supply of ingredients wouldn't arrive until Friday.