Chapter Text
It all started a few days after the school festival. Shouta was in his yellow sleeping bag waiting for the students in 1-A to fill in after lunch. The students usually thought he was asleep when they saw him curled up on the floor, however the truth was that he never was.
For starters the students were far too loud for him to be able to fall asleep, secondly, it was surprising how much the students talked when they thought he was sleeping. He had learned that once in a while he could overhear something worth remembering or looking in to.
Like how he once heard Kouda, who rarely speaks in the first place, tell Tokoyami and Midoriya how he always had problems making friends and even with bullying I previous schools because he is so shy. Or when Yaoyorozu shared with Uraraka, Iida and Midoriya how uncomfortable she was with her revealing clothes. Or when he heard Midoriya comforting Kaminari for feeling stupid after failing a test. All those situations he could resolve by talking to the students in question and helping them with their problems just because he overheard them.
So here he was once again lying in his sleeping bag listening to a few students who came back to the classroom early. It seemed to be Uraraka, Iida, Asui and Todoroki discussing their training. He listened intently to what they were saying about their own progress when Iida brought up a certain green haired boy who Shouta now noticed didn’t seem to be there.
That’s odd, why isn’t he here yet? He couldn’t stop himself from wondering where he had gone since Midoriya most of the time could be found beside one of his friends, all currently in the classroom. When the groups conversation continued, he pushed the worries away.
“You looked really good out there today Iida!”
He heard Ochako say.
“You think so? I must say it felt good too. The help I got from Midoriya the other day really helped a lot.”
There was a slight blush going over Iida's cheeks before he turned the conversation toward Midoriya instead.
“He helped you too? He was helping me again a few days ago as well.”
Uraraka seemed to have missed Iida's blushing, but instead she was fast to note that Midoriya had been helping her as well. Shouta couldn’t help but notice the word again in that sentence. And he was more surprised when both Asui and Todoroki confirmed that they had received Midoriya's help as well. The mood shifted a bit and he could see through half open eyes that Uraraka’s shoulders were sloping and she was looking down at her feet.
“I feel kind of bad that he’s always helping me, and yet I can never do anything to help him...”
“I agree, Midoriya's tips have made me improve so much. I am certainly not a very good friend who can’t give him any help back.”
Shouta heard Iida agree with Uraraka and was surprised once again when Asui and Todoroki agreed with her and Iida as well.
“It’s true I also feel kind of bad about it kero. But there isn’t much I can do since whatever I think of, he has always already thought of.”
“Yes, but I’m sure he’s receiving all the help he needs from the heroes, so let’s not feel too bad about this.”
He heard Asui voicing her own worries, and then Iida's voice of reason. Shouta closed his eyes and agreed silently, there was no reason for any of them to feel bad about receiving help from a friend and not being able to give any help back. They were all teenagers, assuming they could or had to do that was unreasonable, that was their teacher's job.
Although it looked like the problem child had taken the roll as teacher for his friends. Even if that was nice of him, there was no reason to do that since he had his own progress to worry about and he could leave the rest to teachers trained to train others.
Shouta could feel a headache start to murmur in the back of his head when he realized he had to talk to the kid and make sure he understood that it was okey to focus on his own progress. Then he heard Todoroki's indifferent voice.
“I haven’t seen Midoriya talk to any of the teachers though. Not since All Might passed away. And even then he only ever spoke to All Might.”
Now that caught Shouta's attention. Hadn’t received any help or guidance from teachers? That couldn’t be right. Could it? At that moment the bell rang, and the rest of the students entered the room, including Midoriya, who Shouta noticed looked very tired. That was weird, he looked fine before lunch.
At the sound of the bell, the group already in the classroom took their seats like the rest of their classmates. Shouta was almost disappointed that the conversation had to end but put the thoughts away to worry about later. His eyes went over to Midoriya a few seconds before he turned around to begin the lecture. However, he silently promised himself to look into what the teenagers had been talking about later.
A few days later the headache had still not gone away, and Shouta knew exactly why. After the talk he had heard, and especially Todoroki's comment, he had watched Midoriya a little closer.
Now Shouta had always been a very perceptive person, he was an underground hero after all, it was his job to notice things. So of course he had noticed some of Midoriya's not so usual habits right from the start of the year. Like how he often bit down on his lip almost like he was chewing on it, or the way he always flinched when there was a loud sound or if someone touched him (although the flinching had gotten a little better since school started).
Those things he knew, but except finding the habits weird, he didn’t think a lot about them. Now however, he was thinking a lot. Unfortunately, none of the thoughts could be confirmed without any extra digging so he didn’t actually know anything yet. He hadn’t talked to the kid yet either so that was another headache to worry about. He could already picture the boy in his mind telling him that everything was fine, and that Shouta didn’t have to worry about him etc. etc. Wich on its own was I pretty big red flag.
Yep, there was a long couple of weeks in front of him. As expected from his problem child.