Chapter Text
Midoriya Izuku stared at the charred remnants of his notebook as the wind ruffled the water-warped pages. He clenched his teeth to stave off tears. Another notebook destroyed, this time his dreams dashed along with it. For the first time in a long time, he thought about not buying a new one. He thought about leaving this reminder of his hopes, his aspirations, his everything, at the top of this building. Because maybe he didn’t want to stand up again, only for the next person he came across to tell him he shouldn’t shoot for the stars. Maybe he didn’t want to be told that, even with his gadgets, even with his intelligence, Midoriya Izuku’s dream was nothing more than that.
A dream.
Izuku drew in a shuddering breath. A drowning feeling of resignation weighed on his shoulder, settling in the pit of his stomach. Hadn’t he known this all along?
“What did you do?”
Hadn’t he been told this a million times over by every single person he knew?
“Is that thing even my son?”
Hadn’t his own parents told him?
“That- That quirk’s not- it’s-”
What was it they called him?
“-villainous,”
With a glance at his surroundings, he distantly realized that he had reached the edge of the roof now. His brain brought him half an idea, a taunt.
“Take a swan dive off the roof of a building,”
And wouldn’t it be so easy, Izuku thought to himself as he watched cars move down the road, unaware of his internal plight. It wasn’t like Kacchan brought up something he hadn’t already thought of before. He knew he was worthless. Izuku had no one. He had nothing but memories of people who abandoned him. Nothing but an empty apartment and a lonely beach.
He stepped closer, putting his hands on the railing. To get a better view, the terrified part of his mind soothed as he leaned forward. Vertigo hit him subtly, his vision tipping as he did, the flat edge of the rail pressing uncomfortably into the skin of his exposed palms. The backs of his feet lifted off the ground, the wind kissed his neck lightly, a whistle, not a roar, as he started falling forward to- to-
Ripping himself away from the ledge, away from his poisonous thoughts, a wave of nausea hit him. Knees buckling underneath him, his hands hit the concrete to stop him from falling completely, scraping across the floor as his elbows gave out, too. God, what- what had he been about to do? Izuku gasped for air, feeling deprived of it, and scrambled back to his backpack, to his notebook. Every inch of him shaking, he shoved the ruined notebook inside his bag, not caring that he was destroying it further, and bolted down the stairwell that All Might left through.
He tried not to let himself think about the distant explosion, the thing that broke him out of his trance, the only reason he was stumbling down these stairs instead of- of-
Bile burned in his throat as he finally reached the bottom of the stairs. Breath hitching, legs burning, hands trembling, he ran.
He ran until another explosion brought him out of his terror-filled haze. The crowd obscured his view and he realized that his feet had led him to another hero fight.
A glimpse of an all too familiar swamp-green.
No, he begged, pushing his way through the crowd. Please don’t let it be-
The sludge villain.
And the heroes. The heroes were just standing there. Izuku turned his gaze back to the villain, to the victim it took, and remembered the feeling of slime forcing itself down his throat, of suffocating-
The sludge writhed as another explosion boomed within him, turning to reveal the face of his new victim. Desperate, blood-red eyes met his and Izuku didn’t have to think. He didn’t need to do anything but move.
Shouts followed him as he rushed past every bystander. He could care less that this was dangerous, he could care less about himself. If he had died in that underpass, they wouldn’t even be in this situation. When his backpack collided with his body, the villain turned, eyes gleaming with rage when they fell upon him, the boy who All Might saved.
Kacchan heaved in a gasp of air.
Izuku didn’t stop, though, because one gulp of air was not enough to save him. Lifting a thousand-pound weight off of a locked box in his chest, Izuku reached inside himself, as he sunk his bare hands into the slime, and pulled, ignoring the nausea that rolled over him at the feeling of his hands being encased in sludge, ignoring the reminder of his own near-death experience.
The sludge villain fell still and Izuku could almost hear the silence of the crowd behind him over the roaring in his ears. Energy he hadn’t felt in years flooded him, dizzying him. Heat furled in his core and stars danced in his clouding vision.
This was the feeling of something he pretended he didn’t have, something he didn’t want.
This was the feeling of a quirk.
A genetic mutation, Izuku would later find out upon his own research. Unique from his mother’s telekinesis and his father’s- he shuddered (at the reminder of his father or the slow ache overcoming him?)- fire-breathing.
Initiated by physical contact, not limited by five finger activation, his quirk put people in their own heads and forced them to agonize over their own flaws. Insecurity, he dubbed it quietly, where no one would ever hear the name.
(Reminders of how he obtained such information made the ache building in his head worsen.)
It manifested when he was touching his parents. They froze at some point during the movie they were watching, and only when Izuku moved to use the restroom did they snap out of his quirk. A fight broke out. The movie had been an act of goodwill from his mother, a silent, tense ordeal to distract his father.
Evidently, the night was not as subdued as they hoped it would be.
“That hellspawn is not my child!”
After his father left, she could barely stomach a glance at him. Before, they shared the pain, they were in it together. Apparently, that stopped the night his quirk manifested.
They never told anyone about his quirk.
She told him that he was quirkless and he didn’t deny it, not when it was the first time she had properly looked him in the eyes since that night.
“What the hell, Deku?” Kacchan’s snapping voice tugged him back into reality. A reality where blood dripped down his nose and every inch of him ached.
The pro heroes finally moved and All Might, that- that fucking bastard, shouted something about having empty soda bottles.
Izuku didn’t wait around to see what they would do to him for interfering.
The moment their eyes turned away from him, Izuku faded into the background. He had always been good at that.
His feet predictably led him to Dagobah beach. Why was it that he never failed to wander back here when things became especially unbearable? Why, when bittersweet memories stab his fragile heart every time he sees the glittering view of the sunset?
For the second time that day, Izuku leaned against a railing, this time for support.
He didn’t even realize he was falling until his back hit the sand.
Katsuki hated the way his throat couldn’t get rid of the feeling of that sludge fucker’s slime squirming down his esophagus. He hated that, no matter how much he spit, the taste of that disgusting slime wouldn’t go away.
But, he hated Deku more than any of that.
The nerd had a quirk. A fucking quirk. The weakling had been looking down at him this whole time, huh? Laughing behind his back every time he called him quirkless?
He brushed off the heroes, hell, he brushed off All Might’s quick check on him before reporters swarmed him, and ran after that damned nerd. Katsuki needed answers and he wasn’t afraid to beat them out of Deku.
His malice stalled, when he caught sight of the blood trail he followed, but returned when he thought of the likely cause. Fucking freak lied to me, his inner voice snarled.
Deku was at the garbage beach, or all fucking places, leaning against the railing and casting a shadow from the sunset in front of him.
“Oi, Deku!”
Katsuki’s smug grin froze when Deku fell forward and over the railing without so much as a glance back. The trash, his mind thought frantically as he darted forward. What if he fell on something and impaled himself? Seemed like something his dumbass would do-
To a suppressed amount of relief, he caught sight of Deku laying in the sand like an idiot. Landing on the sand next to him with a thud, he grabbed a handful of the nerd’s collar to yell at him, only for the blood to drain from his face when he realized he wasn’t breathing.
“─amnit, BREATHE, YOU BASTARD!”
Something slammed into his chest like a freight train and Izuku lurched up, gagging on the copper-tasting liquid in his throat. Blood spewed carelessly from his mouth as he coughed and his body hit someone else’s.
“The fuck was that, Deku?” Izuku inhaled sharply, throwing him into another coughing fit. “So you were hiding your quirk this whole damn time? Is that it?” He prodded over Izuku’s receding spasms.
“K-Ka-Kacchan,” he stuttered, mouth thick with blood.
“Don’t Kacchan me,” the boy hissed, pushing Izuku off of him with a surprising lack of force. He stood, glaring down at him as sand clinging to him. “No wonder you wanted to hide your quirk. It’s so useless you can’t even use it without fucking dying.”
Kacchan walked away and Izuku didn’t call out to him.
Waking up in the middle of the night, stiff and sore, was hellish and made Izuku groan when he attempted to move. The knife gouging his brain wasn’t any help as he stumbled to his feet, but the world didn’t stop turning when something like yesterday happened and certainly not for Izuku.
The apartment was as depressing as the morning he left. As the definitely ruined, but maybe salvageable uniform churned in the washing machine, Izuku messed with a small army figure, thinking of his mother.
He tried to steer clear of thoughts concerning her for a multitude of reasons. One, the last day he saw her had been over eight years ago. Two, during the two years she stayed after his father left, she steadily grew colder towards him. And then three, which he added to the list only recently: she finally decided she could stop paying for the apartment. Why would she keep doing it in the first place, you ask? Izuku honestly had no idea. Guilt? Pity? Old time’s sake?
She sent in cash a week before rent was due. Always the same amount, which exceeded the actual cost of the bills since he rarely used half of the utilities. The landlady took the bills without looking up from her spreadsheet and never asked him where his mother was. Who cared, after all, when he was the only tenant who never pushed for another week to gather their money? The most Ms. Taira would do was thank him for not being a “little bitch like all the other shitheads I house,”, which Izuku chose to take as a compliment.
He saved the money, what he could of it at least, and planned on using it to pay for UA’s tuition. Izuku had been saving money all his life, his clothes, his shoes, hell, the untamable, bird’s nest on his head, was proof of his frugal ways. Sturdy trainers, patched clothes, cheap food, odd jobs, Izuku would do anything to earn money and keep it. UA might have been a hero school with a fair price range for their tuition fees but that didn’t mean the price wasn’t steep.
This, sadly, was the reason he sold his hero merch, All Might memorabilia included, a week ago. Even though parting with it caused something to shrivel in his heart, even if the guy was an asshole, he still loved heroes. Aside from that, anything with economical value in the apartment had been sold long ago, leaving him with a barren residence and a meager amount of objects with sentimental value.
But, by god, it had been worth it.
Izuku was in the final stretch. At this rate, he would actually be able to attend UA if he passed the exams. He just had to stay low and hope nothing fucking tried him because if something sent him to the hospital it would be a shitshow in more ways than one.
Rent, he could manage, especially with that new metal and mechanics shop opening up a few miles out. Food, psh, he had been living off simple food for years. Tuition, in the bag, so long as he didn’t break somebody’s million yen car or something.
Things felt kind of… great, actually.
Sure, Izuku had been, well, dead a few hours ago but damnit, he was alive now and this wild aspiration of his truly had a chance of becoming real.
The army figure in his scarred palm, small and colors flecking off from age, pressed against his skin. It offered reassurance and doubt but ultimately, the pleasant memories won this time.
A week later, when he heard the metal and mech shop opened, Izuku gathered his collection of usable parts and cleaned them meticulously. There were no other shops in the area that he could go to sell these things so he couldn’t afford for them to turn him away. Literally.
Kacchan left him alone, aside from the occasional fiery glare, and the others stopped asking questions on account of that signature ‘Kacchan glare’ being turned on them when they stepped too close.
Something inside him writhed, the churning like a pot of boiling water overflowing. The overflowing bit especially. It was like a fish in his grip, slippery, and thrashing to escape. And like hell he would let it. Things were going well, thank you, and he did not need his jacked-up quirk fucking up his plans. The constant aching was the icing on the cake and the piercing headaches were the cherry on top of it.
That was a reasonable reaction, though, Izuku supposed. Dying seemed a little extreme but he had kept his quirk locked up for eight years. Was this what withdrawal felt like? The manifestation of his quirk hurt but this was another level of danger.
The banner on the inside of the windowed wall said: Now Open! In big, curvy, red and orange font. A bell chimed pleasantly when he pushed into the building, the box heavy in his lithe arms.
The room he walked into housed bland, off-white walls decorated with succulents and objects standing out with bright color. Blue padded chairs lined the wall, the counter at the other side of the room reaching both ends of the wall. A gate and latch remained closed and everything felt utterly new. Overall, it was your cliché receptionist room. His mouth quirked up when he caught sight of the mini Present Mic figure by a similarly situated plastic cockatoo on its perch.
Izuku built a radio because it seemed easier than fixing another phone that actually emitted sound. His phone was a relic, and it looked the part, too. He found it while scavenging and kept it for no reason other than the ridiculous hope that one day someone would want to communicate with him. With the radio, on the other hand, Izuku worked until the voices and melodies came through the speaker clearly.
Present Mic’s radio show quickly became one of his most visited stations. He was loud and exuberant, something Izuku could never be. The music he played stayed in Izuku’s head for days, humming in his veins and beating with his heart. The man was amusing, too, whipping out subtly snarky remarks and deceiving wit just as much as he said a corny joke.
When (when because he could not afford to think if) he attended UA, would Izuku meet him? God, how would he cope with meeting him and Eraserhead? How would he not faint on the spot when all of his teachers were his literal heroes?
Eraserhead was an Underground hero, so Izuku supposed he maybe shouldn’t be aware of him, but he was exactly the hero that Izuku wanted to be. Out of sight, working primarily in ambush and close-ranged attacks. His quirk erased others but he fought entirely quirkless against mutation quirks, so Izuku could, too, especially with his inventions.
A tall woman with salmon pink hair grinned at him from behind the counter. Her cropped hair, spiked up like it had its own personality, had nothing on her golden eyes. The color dipped into copper and she blinked, her smile becoming more of a show.
Quirk, his brain warned. She’s seeing something she doesn’t like.
Damnit, he wanted to sell her shit, not have a subtle quirk used on him.
“Hi,” he said quickly, heaving the box onto the counter. “Do you buy scrap metal and parts?”
She pulled the box closer and rummaged through the organized, flatter pieces of metal to see the parts he brought. “I sure do from you,” she said, eyes glued to the contents of the box. The knot in his chest loosened, a sigh of relief passing his lips. Again, her eyes flashed bronze, flicking to him, and he tensed. Her eyes drifted to the exposed scars scaling his left arm and his patience snapped.
“Stop that.” He took a step back, hackles rising and his eyes narrowing. “Do you want to buy them or not?”
“Stop what?”
“Using your quirk on a minor without consent,” he gritted out. “That’s illegal, you know.” Not that he would report it. That would require going to the police, who would probably ask for his guardian.
The burly woman laughed, setting him even further on edge. “You’re kinda fiery, you know that, green bean?” She produced a pen and clipboard, sliding it across the counter. “I don’t know where the hell you found parts like this, but I’d be damn stupid to turn you away. Read the form, write your basic info, sign on the dotted line, blah blah blah.”
A rivet of fear speared through him as he sat on one of the chairs and began reading.
“Where’re your parents, sprout? They send you over with all this by yourself?”
Bitterness tasted sour in his dry mouth. “Busy,” he muttered, standing and handing over the filled out papers.
“Right.” She tapped the paper with the pen. “Midoriya, you say that cash is the preferred payment. I don’t presently have enough to pay you, so would you prefer digital payment? I don’t think anyone wants to walk around with this much money on them, anyway.”
He glanced at the box, then at her. “How-” he gulped. “How much money do you owe me?” Stupid question, he realized immediately. If she couldn’t pay him right off the bat, then it was a reasonable amount more than he guessed all this was worth. “Nevermind,” he added nervously.
“One, never ask someone what they owe you. People will never pay if they think they can get away with it. Two, I’m guessing you’ve never sold anything like this before. And three, I owe you-”
Izuku’s knees went weak when she told him the number. Oh damn. Oh shit. Oh fuck. He laughed, high-pitched and unbelieving, hands rising to do who knows what. That was, oh god, that was way more than he thought he would get for a few sheets of metal and used parts.
Maybe miracles did happen.
“Woah, you good, kid?” His eyes snapped back to the lady. “Kinda blanked out on me for a second.”
“I can wait,” he croaked. “Pay me what you can and I’ll wait for the rest.”
“Alright, give me a second,”
In the apartment, Izuku held his head in his hands, a mad giggle that matched the grin on his face.
“I can make it,” he whispered, breaking the silence. “Fuck the world, I’m making it to UA.”
“At this point, I feel like I should put you down as a business supplier,” Mitsu said as he put down a box full of money-making material for the third time.
He blushed and took the clipboard she offered, signing his name. Izuku would keep coming here and selling what he scavenged and cleaned for as long as she would let him. Tuition fees were a bitch and Izuku didn’t have time for debt or interest adding up. He needed enough for three years, and he would pay his way through half of his second year by the end of the summer if he kept this up.
Every Sunday, thirty minutes after they open, Izuku meets Mitsu and they exchange money, metal, and small talk. Mitsu showed off a picture of her wife and daughter, Izuku told her that he built things in his spare time. She pushed, a few times, for information on his parents but relented before he became too uncomfortable.
Mitsu apologized for using her quirk on him without permission and explained her quirk. It was called Current State. When she activated it, her quirk revealed the physical and emotional state of a person to her. After some questioning on his part, Izuku found out that she received her answers through feelings rather than actual words. Mitsu described it as a compass, pointing her in the right direction.
“Oh, hey!” Mitsu burst the fifth time he showed up. “My wife, as you know, works the books, but Mei’s coming in today to work on her inventions. They’re dying to meet you, so feel free to come back around one-ish.”
Internally, he balked. The short interactions he had here with Mitsu still kept them at acquaintance level. Coming in and meeting her family would break that barrier, that protective wall of security.
Part of him, a traitorous, longing part, wanted to. Save for Mitsu, no one spoke kindly with him. No one turned their gaze upon him as if he mattered. His brain whispered that they might be like her, like Mitsu, instead of his mom.
“I’ll see if I can make it,” Izuku mumbled, not missing how Mitsu lit up.
“Hell yeah!” She shouted after him as he exited the building.
Izuku arrived at one o’clock on the dot and walked in without any preamble, tensing when he realized other people were sitting in the chairs. Right. This was a business and it was the middle of the day. An employee stood in Mitsu’s usual spot, looking bored and utterly uninterested as they lounged in the desk chair. They had a cat quirk, it seemed. Furred, pointed ears that flicked towards the sound of his entrance and slit pupils surrounded by blue irises darted to him.
Lazily, she pressed a button and spoke into a microphone. “Ay, Boss, ya boy’s here,”
Not two seconds later, a girl that looked like Mitsu’s daughter burst into the room and grabbed him by his shoulders to push him further into the building. He gaped at the sheer size of space. Dozens of workers milled about and even more inventions were being tweaked. It was a mechanic’s heaven.
“Hi, I’m Hatsume Mei!” She shouted into his ear over the sudden whir of machinery. “Future CEO of Hatsume Industries!”
Her hands on his shoulders sent bells ringing in his head, all of them screaming don’t touch don't touch but he put his shaking hands into the pockets of his cargo pants and offered her a smile as she practically wheeled him around. “Midoriya,” he yelled.
She let go of him without warning, causing him to shoot forward and stumble. They were in front of a red door.
“Zuzu, open the door!”
Promptly, he flushed red, eyes blowing wide. “W-What?” He asked breathlessly.
“Open it!”
He wasn’t too sure whether the handle would electrocute him or if this was a normal door because this certainly wasn’t a normal girl. Still, he opened the door to reveal a smaller workspace with tables and stations. Mitsu and her wife looked over, their hands dropping from where they previously gestured with them.
Ayumi looked the same as she did in the picture Mitsu showed him. Her eyes and braided hair shone, bright and silver, a stark contrast to her dark skin. Thin gray lines on her neck displayed the gills she could utilize. Her ears were fin-like and webbed, like her fingers, fanning out when they entered the room.
“You came!” Mitsu cheered, rushing over with her wife. “Meet my wife, Ayumi, and my daughter, Mei!”
Ayumi waved a webbed hand, smiling softly. She gestured with her hands again and Izuku watched with curiosity.
“Yumi says it’s nice to meet you, Midoriya.”
He looked at her sharply, then back to Ayumi’s hands. “That’s a language?”
All of them let out a laugh, making him redden. Mitsu nodded, though. “Yeah, kid. Japanese Sign Language, or JSL for short. Ayumi’s quirk only lets her talk underwater so all of us know it.”
“Really? Would it be clear underwater? Or maybe garbled? Can you breathe underwater, too? Wait, you have gills, sorry. Are you able to withstand water pressure if you go deep? Do your ears help you hear better above and under the water? Or just one of those? Do your gills seal when you’re out of water? Do you have a preference for salt or freshwater? Does it matter at all? What about-”
“See, I told you,” Mitsu grinned. “He’s a riot.”
Ayumi smiled weakly, looking at him as if he was an enigma. Mei, on the other hand, lit up and began vibrating.
“Mom, you didn’t tell me he asked those questions!” She cried out in betrayal. “We could have made so many babies by now if I had known!”
Izuku blinked, then promptly turned red, stepping back. He glanced at Mistu, who appeared exasperated, and Ayumi, who was having the time of her life, laughing silently.
“Hatsume Mei,” she began tiredly. “Explain yourself before he passes out.”
“They’re my inventions!” She shouted, grabbing his shoulders and putting her face inches from his. “Mom says you invent things and bring premium scrap. I’m keeping you.”
Mei did, actually, ‘keep’ him, in her own way.
She began showing up when he dropped off his weekly findings and proceeded to drag him into her workshop to ask his opinion on her babies.
“See, if I can just figure out how to disregard the laws of gravity, then my baby will take flight,”
“Why don’t you just do away with the propellers and put in the hover tech that the Shield company makes?” Izuku questioned, thinking of the parts he had previously brought in. “If they’re accessible in some way, I could probably find you the parts by the time I come back-”
Only with the strength of weeks of sifting through and hauling pounds of scrap metal was he able to stay upright when Mei slammed into him, stealing him into a suffocating hug. He tensed, feeling her skin connect with his, and shoved down the panic that shot up at the contact. The clothes he wore scratched against one of Kacchan’s latest burns but he held in the resulting hiss.
The scars on his left arm tingled, unused to the amount of pressure her arm put on them.
“Are you going to UA?” Mei asked, somewhat hopefully, when she released him.
The question sounded so different coming from her. She wasn’t asking it to mock him or put him down.
Mei was asking him because she wanted him to go.
“Yes, I am.” Goosebumps erupted over his skin when her face broke out into a glorious grin. Happy. Mei was happy that he wanted to go to UA.
The first time he brought them all the Dagobah, it had been upon Mei’s incessant nagging and pleading. Ayumi and Mitsu were curious, too, so they had decided against fighting Mei’s will.
Their jaws collectively dropped when he threw his arm out with a weak ‘tada’. To be fair, at this point, he had cleared out half the beach on his own.
Sometimes, when the thought of returning to the apartment became unbearable, Izuku holed up inside a pile. A part of him, desperate and longing, hoped to catch a glimpse of purple mist and glowing yellow eyes, but he often pushed those thoughts aside. Izuku took the Hatsumes to the other side of the beach where they were unlikely to search far enough to find his hideout.
It had been a month since they all officially met, and since then Izuku had taken up Ayumi’s, admittedly surprising, offer to help him learn how to fight. They had an entire room in their house dedicated for training and Izuku was never one to pass up such an amazing opportunity handed to him on a silver platter.
“This-” Mitsu gestured wildly at the mounds of garbage. “-is where you get all your scrap?”
Ayumi tugged Mei off of the railing before she could fall over it and turned to him with careful curiosity. “So you rummage around all this, clean it, and bring it to us to sell?” she signed slowly, letting him catch the words as she made them.
Izuku, who did little else with his time other than study, analyze, tinker, and haul garbage, had begun learning sign language. Having a conversation with someone, through somebody else’s translation could be a hassle and Izuku wanted to be able to speak with her.
“I wish my moms would let me soft through scrap metal all day,” Mei whined.
Both of her moms stiffened, glancing at each other as Mei pulled Izuku down to the beach by his arm.
“Where are his parents?” Mitsu said aloud idly in concern.
Ayumi frowned, watching Izuku pull Mei out of the way of a tilting trash pile. “We should ask if we could meet them later.”
Mitsu grumbled, leaning against the railing to face the city. “Already tried a few times, Yumi. He shuts me down faster each time I bring it up.”
Ayumi clicked her tongue in annoyance, joining her wife on the railing. “He must have a lot of free time, to learn enough of JSL to hold a proper conversation with me, bring in his own gadgets, and collect all of his findings to bring to us.”
Mitsu turned to face the ocean, observing as Izuku pushed a pile of collapsing trash to the side, where it clattered loudly. “It’s dangerous out here.” She chewed the inside of her cheek. “What parent in their right mind would let their kid do this? I would certainly not be trusting enough to let Mei run around with a bunch of strangers all day.”
“It would be easy to conclude that he has subpar parents then, no?”
“Sure, but… I just don’t wanna assume, y’know?” She twirled their keys on her fingers by the ring. “What if they’re busy people or they’re trying to be good parents?”
Ayumi raised a hand to Mitsu’s face, turning her head to face her. She smiled gently. “Then we should decide what to think when we meet them.”
Being able to wear gloves again turned out to be a godsend. He used to wear them when he was little and his mom would throw them into his face, horrified at the mere idea of having to touch him, but Kacchan exploded the safeguard once he noticed them. Izuku couldn’t give him a response when he asked why stupid Deku wanted to wear gloves in the middle of spring, and bam, bye-bye gloves.
The only solution to that became focusing on keeping his quirk locked away and never ever touching anyone for any reason.
With the Hatsumes though, he felt the safety of gloves settle back into place.
Izuku’s mind wandered to thoughts of his quirk too easily lately. He doubted it was strong. How could it be, after years of disuse? The repercussions of using it alone made his resolve to never use it cement itself further.
Questions loomed in the back of his head, though. Queries about his quirk because how could he resist when he analyzed the quirks of others so deeply? With every notebook he finished, every quirk he scrutinized, Izuku realized that there had to be more to his quirk than he concluded. The tiny shred of information he had, information that he hadn’t even garnered, could be the tip of the iceberg. His mind whirred with possibilities and questions that he refused to find the answers to.
That was where his knowledge ended and Izuku knew that there was more.
Could he import himself into the person’s mind? If so, could he interact with them, or would he be a spectator? Could the person rationalize and accept that, yeah they’re flawed, but dammit everyone is? Would his quirk still hold them inside their mindscape? How long could he hold a willing volunteer? What about a villain who wanted out?
Stop it, he berated himself. This quirk is never going to be used.
His questions would go unanswered. He could be a great hero- without his quirk.
All Might’s voice echoed in his head, his words forever branded into his psyche. “You can’t be a hero.”
Fucking watch me, he snarled back.
UA exams were tomorrow.
Mei planned on applying for a spot in the Support course and Izuku wished her future teacher luck. He knew she would scare the shit out of students and faculty alike. God, he could already picture the face of some poor Support student as she grabbed them by the shoulders, shouting, “Do you want to make babies with me?”
For Izuku, the Hero course was his only route. When he initially did research on the physical and written portions of the exam, Izuku had been shocked by how much the physical exam favored those with flashy quirks. Fighting against robots was meant for people with quirks like All Might’s or Kacchan’s. What about people whose quirk relied on people? A torrent of anger flickered through him. Did the faculty seriously think that physical quirks were the only useful ones? It seemed a little hypocritical when two of the teachers would have had to claw their way into the Hero course.
What had Midnight done, when her quirk was of no use against towering machines? What had Eraserhead done, when there were no quirks to erase?
The guidelines of UA only recently changed to allow quirkless students in, but only a few years prior had they begun allowing people to apply for the use of homemade support items to use in their exams.
How many students fell through the cracks because of their implicit bias?
In the morning, Izuku picked at the vibrant tones of color on his nails that Ayumi painted on him a few days prior and checked his mental list.
Clothes; check.
Granola bar; check.
Keys; check.
Backpack; check.
Said backpack was the most interesting part of the items he carried with him out to the car that the Hatsumes were currently sitting in. Mei roughly pulled him inside, her excitement bleeding into her strength. Both of them were built like brick walls at this point, from having to haul machinery around Dagobah and the shop.
“Have everything you need?” Mitsu inquired as he buckled in.
“Yep,” he nodded.
Mei grabbed his face with both of her hands, pulling him nose to nose with her. “Zuzu,” she started, sounding far more serious than he has ever heard her. “Are you ready to stick it to the UA faculty?”
“Hell yeah, MeiMei.”
Ayumi snorted, glancing at Mitsu, who shrugged at the silent accusation. He rarely cursed when they were first becoming comfortable around each other but after nine months around them all, he could curse enough to make Kacchan blush.
The ride passed quickly, their departure onto the walkways that led to UA full of hugs and encouragement.
At the stairs, he glanced back, briefly meeting Kacchan’s eyes. He was bundled up in nice clothes, clothes far nicer than anything Izuku ever owned, and stalked down the path silently. His eyes narrowed at Izuku and he hastily looked back at Mei, who continued her rant on how bogus one of her mothers’ competitor’s prices were for their services.
“I’d say good luck,” Mei started, a grin forming on her features. “But you don’t need it!” She slapped him on the back, practically knocking the air out of him, and skipped away to find the Support course exams.
During the written exams, he found himself intrigued by the fact that there were optional open-ended questions. They surrounded his thoughts on their current society and touched base with the morality of having ‘hero’ schools such as UA.
He reached the end of the page and raised his hand. Ectoplasm, or perhaps an Ectoplasm clone, floated over to him. He asked if he could have more paper. Maybe-Ectoplasm provided it within a minute and stayed silent.
Afterward, Izuku grabbed his backpack and made his way to a specified room, led by a Maybe-Ectoplasm.
Maybe-Ectoplasm didn’t enter with him into the dark room. A few lights allowed him to see the silhouettes of several people sitting at a long table. The ominous effect given off by their shadowed faces didn’t do shit for his confidence but he set his backpack on the table provided for him and set himself into his fuck-it-I’ll-show-you mode that Mei managed to find out about. When she did, she didn’t want to let him crawl back into his shell and lose that fire she caught a glimpse of. It was more than what she usually saw. There was anger in it, ugly emotions that Izuku rarely expressed.
“You’ve come to present us with support gear to use in your practical exam.” a monotone voice drawled from the center of the table.
There were no questions. Just a prompt. A simple invitation.
Izuku refused to stutter, and, for once, he didn’t. These people would listen to him. He needed them to allow him to use his support items.
He brandished his multi-purpose knife first, explaining each tool. He had a feeling he caught their attention when he provided a demonstration of the jet of flames that the tiny thing could produce. From there, he segwayed beautifully into his gun and the bombs he would be shooting out of it. The transition from those to his shoes was slightly less smooth, but it wasn’t absolutely horrendous, so he counted it as a win.
The explanation of the physical exams passed without much fanfare. Well, aside from the fact that he was seated directly beside Kacchan and got called out in front of an amphitheater of people for mumbling about Present Mic.
In his t-shirt and shorts, Izuku loaded his gun and holstered it at his thigh. He flipped through his multi-tool and kicked the heels of his shoes together, testing their functionality.
His shoes were made to increase mobility and provide some extra support for when he fired his gun. Knockback was a bitch and he braced his arms for it, thankful for the Hatsumes’ guidance in making them. They could hover and shoot him into the air if needed but there was more experimentation to be had before any confidence could truly set in. Propelling seemed like the best choice to not chance his feet being blown up and he told the people at the table that something could go wrong.
Safety before pride.
He knew impressions were important and that even if he couldn’t see the people at the table they could most certainly see him but being cocky and injuring himself after hyping himself up would be disappointing for the judges who would decide his fate.
The shoes were really the only thing in his arsenal that he warned them about. The gun definitely could be considered a risk but it was heat and hard impact that triggered an explosion. Heat produced when the gun fired and hard impact given when it smacked into something. The pouch at his hip was lined with a cooling system that didn’t catch too much attention when he showed it off but it was vital to not blasting himself to smithereens.
Mei’s machines tended to blow up and have bulk, but Izuku’s were more discreet and had a stripe of rainbow. The shoes, for example, were dark in color, with flames of color rising on the sides.
The bombs were a complex brew composed of ingredients that Mei squealed at. When put together it created a slime-like substance that solidified when frozen and blew up in a surprisingly big explosion for the ammo being the size of a large marble. The gun shot them specifically and could hold up to ten at a time without blowing up. In a small bag that weighed heavily against Izuku’s hip, he kept the rest of his ammunition. The gun, per Mei’s nagging, was mostly black but (and this was the product of her incessant warnings that someone would hate the lack of color on his baby) there were strips of rainbow running from the butt of the handle, up the barrel and to the muzzle. It resembled a very large Glock.
“Gay Glock, gay shoes,” Mei listed off, peering over his shoulder as he tweaked his inventions.
“Gay gadgets,” Izuku concluded.
“Gay life,” Mei retorted, pumping her fist against his.
An alarm sounded without warning and Izuku shot off instantly, his shoes propelling him into the faux city and leaving the other examinees in the dust. In the Hatsume house, if you didn’t have reflexes, you died. Izuku lost count of all the times he had nearly been impaled, burned, slashed, blinded, dumped in water, electrocuted- He could go on.
Present Mic’s voice shook them from their stupor, sending the lot of them running after him.
Tackling the head of the nearest robot, he practically tore off the piece of metal protecting its wiring. A quick scan and he jabbed at the robot’s insides, his shoes flinging him back in time for it to explode. He grinned and shot deeper into the city.
“Wouldn’t the explosives he showed us be more effective?” All Might asked aloud, several of the staff around him nodding as they watched the boy ricochet from robot to robot. Nedzu eyed the boy who leaped from machine to machine, charging at them and only utilizing a simple tool to take apart robots that even some with destructive power balked at. His gun remained holstered to his thigh, his ammunition at his hip.
“He has a limited amount of firepower. If he used it all in the beginning there might be nothing left to rapidly increase his score in the last half.” Nedzu wiggled in his seat, watching as the boy helped another student out from under a collapsed robot. When he saw that the child was fine Midoriya Izuku ran off with a bid of good luck.
The teachers around him inched away when they caught sight of the grin on his face. There was a reason some humans thought of him as a bear, after all. Nedzu picked up the sheets of paper Midoriya turned in, one among many who attempted his optional questions, but his views were controversial, bordering on radical.
Nedzu designed his questions in a way from them to be taken in many directions.
What do you think of society as it is?
What is your opinion on ‘hero’ schools?
Two simple questions that garnered varying responses that were ultimately, and boringly, the same.
But Nedzu was pleasantly surprised when Ectoplasm handed him the papers of the children who answered his questions.
He especially liked the answer to his first question, as morality had never his strong suit.
The society of ‘heroes’ and ‘villains’ that we have created is unsustainable. It is toxic. We see this best in the Symbol of Peace. For now, because of him, we are able to enjoy an era where crime is at an all-time low, but what happens when the Symbol is gone? What happens when he inevitably retires? There will be a surge of crime, a wave of emboldened criminals that will be undaunted when All Might is not there to keep them in check. Who will we turn to? Endeavor, who has lusted after the Number One slot for decades? There is a reason no one could surpass either of them. No one could pass Endeavor because he is merciless when it comes to achieving his goals. It is displayed in his ruthless methods and notorious rage. All Might is another matter entirely. He remained beyond reach because he works without stopping. Remember that month All Might vanished and everyone panicked? Even then, there had been a rise in local crime all around.
Touching on Endeavor’s behavior, therein lies another flaw. Being a hero does not mean the same thing it did during the Vigilante era or beforehand. It is an occupation. Hero schools are where roves of children are sent to attempt to become heroes or support them (i.e. business/marketing courses, Support, or General Education, where the majority of Hero course rejects end up)
Someone I knew as a child, my best friend even, manifested a powerful, flashy quirk. Like a flipped switch, he was surrounded by yes-men and praised in abundance for his accomplishments. People turned blind eye to anything he did that could be considered wrong because of his quirk. They said, “He’ll be a great hero with a quirk like that.” and that was it. Because his quirk was suited for heroism, that made him a hero. Heroes don’t use their quirks on other children for fun or belittle everyone around them. No one should label a child a hero, not with what that word means nowadays.
And since heroism has been broken from its definition, it isn’t a far leap to say that the term ‘villain’ has as well.
What about the children with not so flashy quirks, not so heroic, or ‘useful’? Every day, I see and hear people throw around the words ‘hero’ and ‘villain’. I think of the man Endeavor maimed for stealing a bag of groceries, of the woman who was arrested for vigilantism because she used her quirk on a bank robber. Villains, people labeled them.
That man stole because his family was starving because of the high tax rates. Tax rates that will only continue to rise because heroes cause collateral damage wherever they go. Think of Mount Lady, who destroys entire streets each time she uses her quirk. Think of Death Arms, who regularly bashes in walls.
That woman’s quirk was Ventriloquist. She took control of the ten robbers the moment she was given the chance and held them until the police arrived, in turn suffering from severe quirk exhaustion. When she was discharged from the hospital a few days later, the police arrested her for illegal quirk usage. I won’t disparage the police for arresting her for illegal quirk use, the problem is that this situation isn’t original. Many other people have quirks that, with the right forethought, could save them from a similar situation. And that’s exactly what happened. Another woman with a quirk that could trap people in bubbles with a touch and make them float pulled the same thing and saved a jewelry store full of people. She got a slap on the wrist while the other woman is spending several years in jail.
I think of the children born powerful, like my friend, and wonder what happens if they don’t want to be a hero, wonder if they are given a proper choice. I think of those with quirks like Ventriloquist, who are forced to claw their way up the latter when others are given an escalator.
And what about those who fall? What do you think happens to the outcasts and so-called freaks, who give up?
They become what everyone has always said they would become.
What is a hero without a villain? They have no meaning. Hero society creates more villains that it will ever be able to fight. It has created a stigma around those with less desirable quirks and it has put people into boxes.
Hero. Villain. Civilian.
The world we live in is made of shades of gray, not clean cut like so many have been led to believe. We are living in an unsustainable world, one that will come crashing down on us one way or another if we don’t make some serious changes.
To say Nedzu was excited would be an understatement.
I anticipate the ripples you’ll make with those kinds of thoughts, Midoriya.
Nedzu passed the papers to Shouta and he internally groaned because what devil-child could have possibly caught the rat’s attention? He accepted the papers and took note of the fact that it was flipped to the second question.
What do you think of ‘hero’ schools?
Shouta wasn’t sure if he wanted to read something that gave Nedzu that kind of glint in his black, beady little eyes, but he suppressed a sigh and read the answer.
Hero schools, while necessary in the current time we are in, are schools that facilitate the idea of creating child soldiers. There is a reason that there has been debate on whether or not to have them. The hero career is one that not just anyone can take up. Students apply for the Hero course for noble reasons, others for money, many for fame, but the bottom line is that they are all signing up to be heroes.
Heroes are faced with life or death situations daily, so one would think that training them specifically for those types of situations would benefit them, right? It does, in many ways, prepare the students for their career of choice, but it also puts them in great danger while doing so.
In UA, the Sports Festival is a necessary event to rake in the funds that keep the school running. It brings attention to the school, allows students in other courses to gain attention, and provides Hero students the chance to show off their quirks and get internships. In theory, this is great for everybody, but what about those with quirks that have specifications or limitations? Their weaknesses are being broadcasted for the world to see just as their strengths are. Villains could easily find recordings of past Festivals to analyze the quirks of the latest batch of heroes.
Internships happen when a hero offers to take an apprentice on the job. Hero students signed up for this, yes, but the question of “Should we allow this?” comes into play. Students, children who are fifteen to sixteen years old, are taken out on patrols and face villains with their mentor beside them. This is after the Sports Festival, which means the students are sent out about a month and a half after they begin Hero school. How much can the teachers cram into their heads in that amount of time? How much can they express and emphasize the seriousness of the job they are being sent out to do?
What happens when a student slips up or can’t handle a situation? The government places the lives of civilians in the hands of children. They put these Hero students in the line of fire. There have been deaths during internships-
Shouta stopped reading, turning to glare at Nedzu. He flipped back to Midoriya’s previous answer and blinked at it in surprise. He turned to the first page, read the name, and glanced up at the screen, where Midoriya Izuku leaped onto the head of a Two-pointer, saving the boy who had been cornered by three of them. Of course, this was the problem child that came up to them with the request of a bomb-gun and a flame-throwing multi-tool.
Despite the gleam in the principal’s eyes, Shouta could feel his lips twitching to form a grin.
He has potential.
Toshinori could not tear his eyes from the boy if he tried to because there he was. The child that he saved and who subsequently saved him and another student. Reporters and fans swarmed him the moment the fight was over, keeping him from following the boy for a few minutes. It ended up being too long.
He wondered about the boy’s quirk because, on his application, he was registered as quirkless. He wondered what the boy’s quirk could be, how terrible he considered it if he was willing to lie on a formal document like this to hide it.
On the rooftop, the boy had asked him, “Can I be a hero without a quirk?” and Toshinori said no. Though, watching the boy tear through the robots, seeing the light in his eyes brighter than they were during their last meeting, Toshinori cursed himself.
To put it bluntly, he bungled his first impression. Telling the boy he couldn’t be a hero and not half an hour later he was willing to put everything into teaching him and making him his successor. Midoriya’s mood darkened when he told him what he thought was a harsh reality that the boy needed to accept. Toshinori could feel the words crushing him, chafing on his skin and ringing in his ears.
“You can’t be a hero,”
His hands curled into fists as Midoriya finally unholstered his gun. The boy hadn’t lied when he said the ammunition packed a punch. The first robot to fall victim to an explosion was blasted to pieces to the obvious joy of Midoriya, who smiled and looked down at his gun with pride as he stood alone in a street.
Toshinori chuckled.
He’s already proving me wrong.
He counted five more shots before he would have to resort to tearing the robots apart again. If he spaced out the shots or could find a group, maybe he would be able to-
A window shattered as he passed it, the glass grazing the skin on the top of his nose. Izuku flinched at the sound of glass falling onto the street. Rubble left from the destruction of the other examinees shook on the street from the vibrations. Following the noise, he turned onto a street with several other examinees on it. They all faced him, gaping at something behind him in abject horror. One of them screamed and bolted down the street, others following quickly once they snapped out of their shock.
The Zero-pointer stood tall above them all, the deafening grind of its inner mechanics almost muting out everything around him. Izuku stumbled back, ready to high tail it out of that monstrosity’s way when he heard a shriek over the Zero-pointer’s thunderous movements.
He stopped and scanned the street, ignoring the few who screamed at him to leave. His eyes snagged on a brown-haired girl who alternated from pressing her hand to her mouth to putting her hands on the rubble that had fallen over her, pushing at it desperately. Izuku kicked his shoes against the ground without another thought, propelling himself across the street in the blink of an eye.
He nearly flew past her, the force from his shoes too much, but his hand caught the edge of the piece trapping her, the jagged rock slicing into his unscarred palm as the hunk of concrete shifted off of her. Ignoring the pain that rocketed through his system, Izuku landed beside the girl as she clawed at the road to get herself further away from the Zero-pointer.
Quirk overuse. Wounds in her leg oozed blood through her leggings. She must have been completely out of it by now.
“I’ll get you out,” Izuku promised her as he lifted her off the ground. He glanced up, his breath catching in his throat when he took in the Zero-pointer’s distance from them. The girl was depending entirely on him to get her out of here, but how would he do that? His shoes were only stable enough to carry him long distances without blowing up. His gun-
His fucking gun.
He let the girl’s weight fall completely against his front, looking at the tiny switch at the handle of the gun with the kind of solemness found at a funeral. “I worked so hard on you, too,” he whined, though the words were lost to everyone but him. He flipped on the emergency switch and hurled it as high and as far as he could.
Not daring to stand still any longer, Izuku held the girl against his chest, twisted, and hurtled down the street as rapidly as his shoes would allow with the weight of two people . His shoes sputtered under their combined weight but the valiantly kept on functioning, aiding in their escape as they pelted down the road.
The explosives went off. He tucked the girl’s head into his shoulder and jumped into the air with a grunt. As soon as the resulting air of the blast reached them it thrust them further away. Izuku kept the girl’s head against his body, glad enough for her when shrapnel dug into his back.
They still had the fall.
The ground was coming too fast and his shoes were busted. The best he could do, he thought grimly as he relinquished his hold on the girl’s head, was break the fall for her. He flipped them in the air so that he would land first and braced for impact. For pain as the robot bits were shoved deeper into his body. The girl let out a scream that barely reached his still-ringing ears and looked frantically at him.
Maybe this is why tuition is so high, Izuku thought as the pain from a bit of a giant robot that had just crushed a fake city radiated through his body. His hand throbbed terribly, the pain distracting him from the darkness beginning to cloud the edges of his vision.
“Are you- hugh- okay?”
Blinking, he realized that they stopped falling. Weird, Izuku had expected a lot more agony and suffering and whatnot. This was more of a floaty feeling. Perhaps shock was much more of a drug than he realized.
The girl abruptly turned them, sending a wave of nausea coursing through him as they swayed. Swayed…
In the air?
The weightless feeling disappeared without warning and both of them crashed into the asphalt. Izuku coughed, the abrupt irritation of his wounds jolting him out of his daze.
“How’s your leg?” He gulped down the lump in his throat, coughing again because of the dust he inhaled.
Present Mic’s announcement sounded throughout the city, his voice making it through the cotton in his ears. The end of the exam. Izuku hoped he passed.
“Oh my god, your back- hugh-”
“‘M fine,” he said as nonchalantly as he could manage. “Jus’ a light stabbing.”
He closed his eyes and blocked out as much as he could. He’d felt things digging into his back before; things were usually explosive when it came to Izuku and Mei, but he’d never experienced having so many things lodged in his back.
Suddenly, but not unbiddenly, relief washed over him and his body untensed. The girl caught his eye and he offered her the best smile he could manage before giving in to the beckoning darkness at the edge of his vision.
Silence stretched for what felt like hours in the observation room, none of them unfazed enough to make an utterance.
Midnight promptly broke it with an astonished “Holy shit,” as one of the stronger applicants lifted Midoriya off of the torn-up street, per Chiyo’s request.
“You totally thought Nedzu was going to let that thing crush them, didn’t you?”
“I did not!”
Nedzu rewound the video, causing all the chatter to cease as they observed Midoriya’s actions a second time. They watched as the boy turned to run with the others and froze at the sound of Uraraka’s cry. Watched as he scanned the rubble and flew towards her without a second thought and freed her. Getting the rubble off her had been a fluke but everything else? Using his last explosives to stop their biggest threat? Using the resulting blast to propel him and the girl even further? Twisting in the air and planning to shield the girl from the fall with metal sticking out of his back?
“Teachers of UA,” Nedzu addressed, feeling quite giddy. “Meet Midoriya Izuku, our top scorer in both the practical and written exams.” Nedzu rolled the video back to Izuku standing in the dust, the girl leaning heavily against him as he stared at the Zero-pointer with determination instead of fear.
Again, silence struck the staff.