#I don’t think inko would accept that much but small things for sure!

[xt1me]

My Hero Academia fic idea

I'm not even in this fandom so I'm never going to write this but I had a idea for a fic anyway.

So, on the day that Izuku was supposed to go to the doctor and get his get diagnosed as quirkless, instead his mother gets a phone call saying that all appointments were cancelled. Turns out previously a kid had come in with a very minor teleportation quirk. A teleportation quirk that only can transport very small things. Normally this wouldn't cause much of a fuss if it wasn't for the fact that they came in with the flu and germs happened to be very very small. Thus everyone in the clinic got infected with the flu and now they have to disinfect the whole place. So all appointments are cancelled.

Not having received his quirkless diagnostic yet he continues his day as normal. Maybe he hangs out with Bakugou. Since they haven't had their falling out they continue playing along with each other as normal. So they get a talk or they watch a TV show or something about 'sharing is caring'. And that gives Bakugou an idea. (I think it would have to be Bakugou’s idea, but he’s not been shown that Izuku is an acceptable target yet and his ego/inferiority complex hasn’t kicked in so he still friendly.) As far as he knows, Izuku hasn't got a quirk he was supposed to go to the doctor and get one but the doctor was sick so they have to wait for it. This, of course, makes total sense in kiddie logic. So after being told the real heroes share and share alike, Katsuki decides to "share" his quirk. And by that I mean he slaps a sweaty hand on Midoriya’s tells him to throw the hand in front of him and yell. Once he does Bakugou activates his quirk and Midoriya’s hand sparks (that being all he can do at the time). This makes a great new game to play which is what they do all day. Though I'm thinking that Inko at some point sees her child's hands getting red from shooting sparks and insist they use tissue with a Bakugou sweat on it instead.

This probably wouldn't have done much if it wasn't for the next time they go to preschool. Of course all the kids know that Midoriya was supposed to go to the doctor about his quirk so they start badgering him. And Midoriya panics and does what he’s been doing all weekend and throws a tissue with Bakugou’s sweat, yelling (they were playing just before class) and Bakugou, who has also been doing this all weekend, instinctively activates his power making the tissue explode. Now I’m guessing teachers of preschoolers have a hard enough time with regular kids full of energy, I can only imagine it's worse when these kids are suddenly developing superpowers. So the only thing the teacher does is to yell for Bakugou to stop using his quirk (there’s no way he wasn’t doing this all the time when his quick came in). And of course Midoriya’s doesn't want to get in trouble so he insists he did it.

There’s a stammering explanation about him sharing Bakugou’s power leaving the exhausted teacher with the impression that Midoriya has some sort copy quirk. Just another thing to keep an eye on. But they’re not getting paid enough for this so it’s just noted and they move on. Midoriya’s too shy to clarify things. And once Bakugou realises he thinks it’s funny. So they don’t correct anyone about it. After all it was only until Midoriya gets his real quirk. They might as well play a trick on everyone.

In fact Midoriya probably figures out how to copy his mom's power by finding a broken fishing pole. Tying the fishing gut around his wrist and throwing the fishing hook out catch on to small objects he can yank them back to his hand. And, of course, he obviously shares this Bakugou so they have a lot of fun playing with that and trying to figure out other powers they can copy and share. Parents probably do have to step in and make sure they don't attempt anything with fire with a hairspray and a lighter though.

Eventually of course Midoriya does get his quirkless diagnosis but I think at this point Bakugou is becoming incredibly unimpressed how no one in the school has figured out. Either that or he's having way too much fun sharing different quirks. For whatever reason maybe they don't have a falling out or maybe have they falling out and they make up but either way they don't actually end up telling anyone in school. Any school that looked aside (or possibly encouraged) bullying of a quirkless child it's probably not paying enough attention to what's going on to figure it out themselves.

Inko probably had a moment where she got a note from the preschool teacher about Izuku’s quirk usage and was very confused before realizing she never updated them with the proper paperwork. But after a long hard think maybe she decides it's better off if they don't know. She doesn't falsify anything, it's still on official records that Izuku is quirkless, she's just neglects to update the preschool. And the next school bases their records off the previous. It's scraping by on technicalities but it's not illegal. The school just failed to do the correct background diligence.

So Midoriya grows up to be a little less bullied and Bakugou isn’t one of his main antagonists anymore, after all the have a secret keeping them together. But he’s not, not bullied. (Aldera Junior High obviously don’t have much of an anti-bullying program.) He’s just not everyone’s only target. His constant muttering and scribbling in notebooks is probably still creepy to people but now everyone just thinks it has something to do with his quirk. It's assumed that he can only share quirks with people if he understands them. And he now has an outlet of his quick obsession. Trying to find ways to copy or “share” them. I have this idea that one of Midoriya’s bullies had a steel fingernail quick that he’d get away with hurting kids by gripping them too hard claiming ‘quick accidents’. So Midoriya "copied" it by borrowing some of Bakugou’s Mum’s fake nails and supergluing cut up aluminum cans. Midoriya’s probably still too nice to actually do anything in revenge but Bakugou isn’t. Especially if he can also get away with saying it was a quick accident (something he be too prob to do about using his own quirk). look he’s not an active bully to Midoriya, that doesn’t mean he personality has changed. So his classmate ‘know’ he can share the quick he copies, of course he only share’s with Bakugou, it’s not like they have any other friends.

And as Midoriya grows up he gets into chemistry and physics and does his own experiments with all the all the different ways to copy other people's quirks. Maybe aiming to go into hero support (although he still always wants to be a hero). He may or may not have looked up a tutorial how to do fire breathing to copy he father’s quick. He may or may not have been banned from doing that when he signed his eyebrows.

And then they get into Yuuei. Now UA actually does do proper paperwork so they know he's quirkless. But I don’t know where to go after this.

Maybe he's still gets One For All, maybe not. I like to think that either way he does manage to get in, maybe scraping by on rescue points, and as soon as the quirk assessment happens Aizawa figures it out. He’s probably kind of impressed. So despite the few moments of Midoriya being terrified he doesn't get expelled. Also making him the first teacher to impress Bakugou since he’s figured out the secrete he’s been keeping since he was five.

No idea what happens next. I had a vague thought of the class getting in on it and getting around being in trouble after some vigilante activity by copying each other's quirks or something. Throwing acid or using a laser getting an ice gun and a flame thrower. I bet just getting Hatsume Mei involved would be interesting. If Midoriya still gets One For All it makes for a good cover when he starts developing all the extra powers. Or maybe he gets his classes help faking all their powers and become a kind of quirkless All for One.

But I don't know.

So I'll guess I'll just leave this here.

[five-rivers]

If you're taking prompt what if Inko was the daughter of AfO and Izuku still gets OfA later. But he has fire breath like his dead beat dad thanks to his grandfather. Teach him for running out on his baby girl.

It had taken long enough that his minions were in need of a serious reprimand, but finally Midoriya Hisashi was sprawled on the ground at All for One's feet. He was suitably beaten, bound, and blindfolded, but alive, as requested.

"Hello, Hisashi. I suppose you didn't think you'd ever see me again." He used the man's first name, because he didn't care to associate his daughter's surname with this sniveling waste of space, even if he had legally adopted it at their farce of a wedding.

Hisashi froze. A whisper of smoke leaked past his lips.

"I wonder, do you even recognize my voice?"

"Shi- Shigaraki..."

"Oh, very good!" All for One clapped his hands in a show of false cheer. "So! You remember your father-in-law, but not your wife? Not your son?"

"I- I-"

"Because amnesia is the only acceptable excuse I can think of for abandoning them and trying to move all the way to Hokkaido. Unless you'd like to try a different one." All for One paused, and the silence stretched out before him, thin and brittle, much like Hisashi's bones. "I'm waiting."

"It- it isn't my fault," whined the man. "And I- I was always going to send money back. I just- I just can't live there anymore. I- Shouldn't you be pleased about this? You hated me and Inko get-"

All for One kicked Hisashi sharply. "Don't even say her name. I did hate your sham of a marriage. But as long as it made her happy, I put up with it."

Hisashi wheezed, more smoke filling the air of the disused underground parking garage they were meeting in.

"Speak clearly," demanded All for One.

"It- the boy. He's quirkless. I could- couldn't stay, with everyone knowing."

"Oh?" said All for One, voice suddenly silky smooth. He bent over and put his hand on top of Hisashi's head. "Well, lucky for you, that's something I can fix."

.

All for One dropped Hisashi on one of Garaki's carefully polished operating tables. "Make him into something interesting," he ordered, and Garaki scrambled to examine his new materials.

Meanwhile, All for One took a seat in one of Garaki's rolling chair. "I simply don't understand it," he said. "Who leaves their family just because they had a quirkless child? Unbelievable."

Of course, All for One had seen similar things many times before in his long life and knew they happened very well. He simply failed to understand. With his brother, even when he'd actively been trying to dismantle his empire... Destroying other people made sense, but family was special.

"He should be pleased by this outcome, really. Izuku won't be quirkless for much longer."

"You- you're giving him a quirk, my lord?"

"Yes," said All for One. "This fool's quirk, to be precise. And perhaps his grandmother's. I'll miss it, of course, but to be honest, I don't really use it the way it should be."

"But," said Garaki, "my lord, I've already diagnosed the boy as quirkless."

"Then you'll just have to practice your groveling for when you apologize to them." He paused. "Surely you aren't concerned about the medical reputation of a throwaway identity?"

"Not at all, my lord," said Garaki in a way that indicated extreme dissatisfaction.

All for One ignored him.

.

"Kacchan! Kacchan! Guess what? Guess what?"

"Go away, nerd!"

Izuku was undeterred. "I got my quirk!"

Kacchan scowled mightily. "No you didn't! You were dig-dag-dignoz-" The frown became mightier. "The doctor said you were quirkless, stupid deku!"

"The doctor was wrong! Watch! Watch!" He puckered his lips and a small tongue of flame emerged from between them. "And that's not it!" He pointed at a stunned Kacchan and a small gust of wind ruffled his hair. "I can do that, too! Mama said it's just like gramma's!"

"That's- you- You're still not better than me!"

"I know!" said Izuku, cheerfully.

"Hm, I don't know," said another one of the students watching, "Deku can do two things, and Bakugo just explodes..."

Bakugo's shriek of rage was audible throughout the entire preschool.

.

"Two quirks, Dad? Two? TWO? After everything you drilled into my head about how dangerous it was to give people multiple quirks? What were you thinking?" demanded Inko.

"Hardly anyone dies from just two quirks," said All for One, "and he retained the family adaptation for accepting multiple quirks, the risk was-"

"Not. Yours. To. Take." Inko punctuated each word with a jab to the chest, then sat down heavily in the nearest chair. "I hope you understand. I am furious with you."

"Inko, princess-"

Inko held up her hand. "No. If I see Izuku with another quirk, I will kill you. Do you understand? No warning, no third chances. If you're a threat to my son, you're dead."

"Perfectly," said All for One, choosing not to mention the longevity quirks all three of them had.

.

Watching illegally obtained footage of his grandson's entrance exam was and excellent way to unwind after a long and stressful day of being unspeakably evil.

Right up until the part where Izuku destroyed a giant robot by punching it to bits.

The heartrate monitor he was attached to unhelpfully informed him that his had skyrocketed. He had never told Inko about One for All. The entrance exam had taken place hours ago.

"Kurogiri!" he called. "Kurogiri?"

No response.

"Hello, Dad."

.

Izuku's acceptance into UA was marred by news of his grandfather's sudden death. He had been getting older, but he always sounded so full of life when they talked on the phone.

After the service, Izuku lingered by the grave. He reached into his jacket pocket and took out a small booklet, a copy of a vintage comic his grandfather had gotten him into. He put it down by the headstone.

"I was always too embarrassed to tell you this," he said, softly, "but the real reason I started to want to be a hero... it wasn't that old All Might video. It was this." He tapped the cover of the comic. "The way the hero never gave up..." Izuku sniffed. "It was just really inspiring." He wiped tears away from his face. "I'll make you proud. I promise. I'll be the best hero there ever was!"

.

In America, a woman named Morticia Roll paused. Her rather niche quirk was the ability to know who would be spinning in their graves the most, if people were able to spin in their graves.

Most of the time, that honor belonged to some random European dude. But Shigaraki Hiroshi sounded Asian... She shrugged and went back to her gardening. Whatever was happening, it wasn't any of her business.

[musicfeedsmysoul12]

fic title: the girl with flowers in her bones

Izumi learns she has a Quirk age six when the weird bump on her shoulder is inspected by a doctor who cuts it open to reveal a pretty flower.

Said flower quickly changed and becomes deadly, nearly killing a nurse before it’s destroyed.

No one knows how it got there but now people know about it. At first Izumi is happy. She has a Quirk.

Then she isn’t.

“It’s a useless Quirk!” Kacchan taunts her. “Perfect for a useless girl like you! Flowers under the skin! Pathetic!”

Kacchan burns her shoulder and she goes home crying.

Later a flower develops where she’s been burned and after some quiet conversation with Inko about how her husband had left because of Izumi’s Quirkless status and Izumi had heard it, they figured it out.

The flowers bloom when someone hurts her. They bloom and the doctors do a scan revealing many more flowers all over her- some were small and no one could see them. Little hurts the doctors theorized.

They still had to be removed. Izumi has been getting slower, becoming more exhausted each day. It’s the flowers.

Izumi numbly lets it happen.

But it happens again. And again.

Flowers bloom because people keep hurting her. They turn deadly when exposed to the air.

“Freak, monster, liar-“ it’s all shouted at her by her class. Kacchan leads the charge.

His flowers are always an orange lily. Hatred.

Izumi wonders if it means him or her who hates the other. When it becomes a sweet pea, she has a feeling she knows why she is receiving a goodbye.

She stops growing flowers for him. Because she knows she will only get pain from him, because he is no longer one she believes to be a friend.

“The flowers are signs of betrayal,” she changes the classification. “I can only be hurt by those I do not think would hurt me, those I trust. Once I stop trusting or believing they will not hurt me the flowers stop.”

Her mother sobs upon hearing it. Inko then goes and terrifies the Bakugou family, promising that unless Kacchan leaves her alone Inko would go after them.

Kacchan doesn’t listen.

So Inko slaps them with a lawsuit she wins. It’s enough for Izumi to go to a new school where she sits quietly and doesn’t talk.

There people whisper still but it’s sad whispers.

“Her Quirk hurts her.”

“No, it’s people hurting her which sets off her Quirk.”

“She’s so quiet.”

Izumi just works. The only one she trusts is her mother. Inko who tries so hard not to hurt her, who is honest and open. Who gives her books on flowers and smiles.

When Inko hurts Izumi she leaves violets and lavender. And they’re always small, so small. Small hurts, being too honest with her daughter.

Izumi loves her mother for it.

Izumi grows and soon she finds herself applying for UA. She wants to be a hero and her mother frets and admits she isn’t sure if Izumi can do but the two have researched and researched and well, they think they can figure a way out. Sports festival- she just needs to beat all the other students.

She thinks she can. The money they won from the lawsuit had helped Izumi not only get into a new school but also got her into a martial arts studio. Her mother insisted.

Probably was upset with how many flowers Izumi grew from cuts and burns and bruises. Those were the bigger ones, when they were left on purpose. They pushed against the skin, looked strange.

Funny, Izumi noticed that she didn’t gain flowers sparring.

“It’s probably based on intention. When you gain flowers from bruises or cuts and they’re from people doing it to hurt you and betray you, they come as flowers. But when it’s done as a fight or a spar it’s on purpose still but it’s not a betrayal of yourself.” Her Quirk therapist theorizes.

It makes sense.

Izumi goes to UA after failing the entrance exam and ends up in 1C where she finds herself meeting a boy who is like her. Sharp and broken and hurt.

Shinsou is a friend and she finds herself chuckling at his comments.

Their friendship only blooms truly though when she meets Kacchan again. He sees her and attacks, screaming. She fights back. Shinsou speaks and stops Kacchan and Izumi looks at him, seeing something similar back.

The situation ends with Izumi in the principal’s office telling her story. She looks him in the eyes tiredly.

Kacchan is removed from UA- apparently, the lawsuit hadn’t been included in his application.

“It was when he was ten!” His mother tries.

“It still happened and you lied,” Nezu tells her. Izumi isn’t supposed to be there but she went to the office to pick up some papers.

She thinks her homeroom teacher arranged it.

“The papers are supposed to show us if we need to watch out students for anything. You lied on the application.”

Izumi doesn’t know what to think as she slides away. She hasn’t seen Kacchan in years. Hasn’t spoken to him.

Yet he still tried to attack her. He hasn’t learned anything.

Izumi has left him behind. The pain he caused ended any relationship between them.

He is a child. He can learn, if he wishes.

She feels as if she is choking when she runs into someone.

“Ah,” the person says and she blinks at a girl with red and white hair. It’s long and in a braid as she stares at Izumi. There’s a burn scar on her face and as Izumi looks into her eyes she sees the same sort of pain Izumi has.

The girl nods and leaves and Izumi stares after her in confusion.

Then she has to head to class and Shinsou and it’s a mess.

A flower blooms under her cheek as she speaks and she wonders if it’s from the shock someone attacked her at UA or it’s because she always hoped Kacchan would change the longer she left him.

“It’s not the same.” She tells Shinsou. “I was in hell until I was ten and then just isolated after.”

“It’s close,” Shinsou tells her. He touches her cheek and she closes her eyes. “It’s growing?”

“Yeah. It used to be orange lilies. It might be the same now.”

It is. It’s removed by Recovery Girl and Izumi breathes and doesn’t try to think.

She doesn’t know what to think about anything.

She thinks in a way that expelling him was to much. She understands that they lied, that they removed the evidence of the trial. But did they truly know that it counted?

Kacchan is a child and needs to learn things.

At the same time, he tried to attack her.

Her mind feels muddled and confused and Shinsou tries to help but it’s different for him. His bullies were cruel and never stopped and yet he never expected it either to stop.

You can only be betrayed by a friend.

He tries but they fight and eventually he yells that she’s worthless if she wishes to let a boy who hurts her back into UA.

She flinches and he does too.

Shinsou reaches for her but she leaves, feeling sick.

Izumi wanders UA campus after that- a week after the Kacchan incident- a week after the USJ got invaded. With Kacchan in the office the class hadn’t gone to USJ, something all of them expresses relief about.

Izumi wanders and then runs into the red and white girl again. She’s training in the gym that all students are allowed to Izumi wandered to it out of habit. Usually she and Shinsou train- Shinsou finally accepting that he needs to train his body.

He’s not with her though, and she feels her shoulder ache.

Shinsou didn’t mean it, he was angry and didn’t understand. Izumi gets it.

But it still was a hurt.

“... are you okay?” The girl asks and Izumi blinks, realizing she’s been standing in the gym staring off into space.

“I’m fine.” She says. “I got into a fight with my friend.” The girl looks at her and Izumi sighs.

“My Quirk lets me know when I’ve been hurt,” Izumi explains. “The hurts become flowers under my skin. Ever hurt, physical, emotional, mental, minor or major.” Izumi sighs.

“... you were the one Bakugou attacked, the reason we did not go to the USJ.,” The girl says calmly.

“We were friends once. He hurt me badly, and we stopped. He tried again, my mom sued him and his family and they didn’t put the trial in his transcripts. So he’s been expelled and I just… I feel bad for him. He’s hurt me but I cared for him once and is it fair that he was a child when this happened and he’s still himself a child?” Izumi sighs. “Sorry. I-“

“I have similar feelings to my brother and mother.” The girl offers. Her face is slightly blank. She looks at Izumi, cocking her head slightly. “My father is not a nice man and he’s only stopped hurting us due to blackmail my eldest brother has given. I’m under the custody of my second eldest brother. My other siblings were deemed unsuited and my mother is in a mental health institute.”

“Oh!” Izumi blinks. “You didn’t-“

“You told me.” The girl shrugs. “I’m Todoroki Shouto.”

“Midoriya Izumi.”

It’s the start of something.

From the hurt Shinsou dealt jasmine is dug from Izumi’s skin and he apologizes over and over again. She tells him it’s not okay but she understands he didn’t truly mean it.

It makes her sad still.

She and Todoroki meet from time to time in the gym, speaking. Sometimes Shinsou joins them, sometimes not. He wishes to keep his Quirk private, wishing to get into the hero course like Izumi wishes.

Todoroki is kind, Izumi finds. She’s standoffish and blunt but she’s kind.

Her story is a sad one, told over gym meetings. Her father is Endeavour and he wished to overcome All Might. He had children to force it, and the abuse he placed his family through broke her mother.

Todoroki loves her mother. She loves her dearly but cannot face her.

“I used to blame myself, thinking it might be my fault she burned me. Natsuo, my brother, he got me into therapy and I’ve learned it wasn’t. I was a child, it was not on me. And yet my mother is ill.” Todoroki explains. “I care deeply for her but… I can’t face her right now. Because I have learned it is not my fault what she did and I have to adjust.”

Her brother, her eldest brother Touya, is a different story.

“He blamed me for the abuse. Said it was all my fault, hated the fact I was a girl too. Kept going on I was a screw-up, that I was disgusting. He’s in therapy to now but… I don’t talk to him. Ever if I can help it. Natsuo says he’s getting better but he won’t make me do anything. My sister keeps trying to get us to forgive our dad. We don’t want to.” Todoroki tells her. “It’s a mess.”

Todoroki doesn’t know what to do herself. Her brother was young when he became angry, and her mother ill. Neither were fully at fault, and yet she struggles.

It’s nice to talk to someone who understands.

Their friendship grows and Izumi wonders why it feels different then from her and Shinsou.

Yet as she watches Todoroki smile, she thinks she knows.

At the sports festival, Izumi and Shinsou manage to get to the tournament. They manage to claw their way to the semi-finals, determining who will go on to compete for first.

Shinsou insults her, curses her. And then he confesses.

Izumi keeps her mouth shut and shoved him out, even as she feels the flowers begin to bloom.

She does tell him she doesn’t feel the same.

“I know,” Shinsou tells her. “It’s Todoroki. You two smile all the time around each other, you laugh and have fun.” He shrugs sadly. “I just wanted to be honest.

Izumi accepts it, and later she finds the flowers to be yellow tulips.

One-sided love.

Yet first comes the finals, where Izumi screams at Todoroki to use her fire, even as the girl refuses to use it.

“I won’t use his power!” She yells.

“It’s not his! It’s yours!” Izumi cries back.

It’s chaos and destruction and in the end, Izumi has a silver medal.

And she has a smile she treasures.

It’s not love, not yet. But it has a chance to be.

A chance they cultivate, a chance they find becoming stronger and stronger as time goes on. As she and Shinsou enter the hero course, as she fights to protect a boy she barely knows on the streets of Hosu, protecting her hero mentor as well.

It’s a chance she takes, kissing Todoroki after the final exams. Todoroki accidentally burns her in shock and feels horrible.

Izumi treasures the fact a red rose blooms under her skin.

[softer-ua]

I was thinking about how Katsuki has never seen Deku in the hospital before and how Deku might be surprised to see him, and how that would probably hurt Katsukis feelings.

Then I decided to be self-indulgent and write the scene out. It was supposed to be short but I got super self-indulgent, because I like making Katsuki feel and making it hurt 🥰

I don’t wanna be unexpected

Deku carefully cracks open his eyes slowly taking in a dark unfamiliar ceiling and the heavy aching of his limbs, he isn’t fully cast anymore but a routine stiffness that tells him he had been.

 He’s grown used to this routine over the last year, he doesn’t even bother trying to sit up. Instead, he just scans the room the best he can from his semi-horizontal position. 

Turning his head to the left he sees an empty visiting chair and a small window letting in the city’s lights. It’s the only light the room has so it must be well into the middle of the night. 

Continuing to the right he sees a small nightstand filled with get-well cards and gifts. It brings a smile to his cracked lips, he’d most certainly cry if his body had the water to spare. 

If you told Deku a year ago that he’d get into UA he might have believed you, but never in a million years would he believe you if you told him he was on friendly terms with at least 1/3 of all of UA’s hero course students. 

Sometimes that felt like the most unbelievable part of everything. Having his idol pass his legacy to him to beat an ancient evil? Crazy but within the realm of his imagination. 

Making close friends with half his class and being at a minimum a positive acquaintance to most of his peers? It was almost unthinkable for a kid who’d spent his whole life being scorned and left out by even his teachers. 

Choked up by his feelings, Deku tries to swallow the painful lump forming in his throat. He’s worried so many people and let them down by getting hospitalized yet again. 

He’s too dehydrated to cry but he can’t help the dry cracked warble that escapes him. It takes a concentrated effort to clear his throat and not break down completely. It wouldn’t be cathartic at this moment, just painful. 

A small groan from the foot of his bed pulls his attention away from reading what he could of the cards. 

What he sees doesn’t instantly register with his groggy mind. That’s not uncommon, usually, the longer he’s out the more disoriented he is upon waking, his body might have made a full recovery but the brain takes longer to re-engage with its surroundings. 

Deku doesn’t expect to see Kacchan of all people in his hospital room at all, let alone when he first wakes up in the dead of night, but the blonde tuft of hair sticking up from a familiar orange hoodie turned makeshift pillow cradled in well-toned arms makes the figure resting over the edge of his hospital bed unmistakable 

Deku would know that pale face pinched into a grimace anywhere. 

It adds to the layer of confusion he’s grown used to as part of waking up hospitalized. It also adds a layer of dread and an equal amount of relief. Things must be pretty bad if Kacchan is here, but Kacchan is here and he looks completely whole. It’s a best worst-case scenario. 

Kacchan lets out a small grunt as he pushes his face deeper into orange cotton. Deku’s heart squeezes at the sight of the blonde's obvious discomfort. 

Kacchan should be at home sleeping in a real bed, not hunched over in a visitor chair clutching a hoodie for a pillow. 

Without thinking Deku calls out “Kacchan?”, his voice just above a whisper, a selfish part of him hopes Kacchan will stay asleep a little longer. That he’ll stay where Deku can see him and knows he’s okay. But he knows it’s selfish. So he calls again a little louder, his voice hoarse and scratchy from lack of use. 

The blonde shoots up, eyes near frantic as he looks around before red irises settle their sites on him with more concern than Deku ever remembers seeing on Kacchan. Well, at least outside a fight and directed at him.

He hopes they're not about to fight, but when it comes to Kacchans temperament… well he’d be a fool to dismiss the possibility of it. 

For a moment all Kacchan does is stare at him. It makes something cold and heavy settle in his stomach. Nothing scares Kacchan, and yet he looks completely shaken. 

“Deku? Are you really awake this time?” Katsuki tries to not make his whisper sound as desperate as he feels. There’s no point getting worked up over another dream or worse a still drug-addled Deku, but this Deku seems to recognize him for the first time, and although tired his green eyes shined with a level of coherency that’s been missing for a few days now.

Katsukis’s chest grew tight seeing it. It paled in comparison to the glimmer of brilliance that usually shone in those beautiful emeralds, but when compared to the unfocused glazed look he had been sporting the last few days? Well, Katsuki thought he just might collapse with relief. 

This is what he’d been waiting for, Deku’s been physically healed for at least 2 days now but consciously he’s been pretty touch and go. “Uh, I think so?” That’s definitely not the kinda question Deku had been expecting, but he has his own question he wants to get to before they get into that. 

Pushing through the dry burning in his throat Deku rattled off the most pressing questions. “How are you feeling? Is everyone okay? Did LOV getaway? What’s going on?” 

Annoyance flashes in Katsukis’s eyes before quieting with acceptance, of course, the nerd wants to know how everyone else is and the current status. Katsuki wanted the same when he first woke up, they were heroes in training, after all. Their own lives would always take a backseat to their self-appointed responsibilities. 

“Hold on. You sound like sh– not good.” Katsuki got up and got the nerd a cup of water and then helped him sit upright, trying to decide on what to tell him. Completely missing the way Deku flushed at his uncharacteristic gentleness. 

Katsuki decided on the bare minimum. 

“I don’t wanna talk about that sh- not good fight right now. All you need to know is that everyone is fine. You’re the only one still layed up, worrying everyone half to death. You’ve been out for almost a week, you woke up a few times but you were all loopy calling people by the wrong names.” 

Calling him by the wrong name. Deku must have said an incoherent hello to half the class only sometimes guessing who he was speaking to correctly or just talking to no one at all before immediately falling back asleep. Deku had of course asked about him more than a few times but not once did the bastard see him sitting right in front of him. 

It had taken every ounce of willpower Katsuki possessed to not throttle him, but he’d promised All Might that for the sake of Auntie Inko he wouldn’t upset the nerd. 

The pride Katsuki had just momentarily taken in thinking to get Deku water, the gentleness he took help the dweeb sit up, and managing not to swear when recounting the transgressions to boot turned ashen when he saw the way Deku shied away with guilt. 

A stubborn part of him felt righteous and believed Deku should feel guilty, a larger part felt a sense of failure in breaking his promise to All Might literally the first time he actually spoke to Deku. 

“Wait, if everyone else is okay what are you doing here?” Deku feels himself relaxing despite his guilt, contentment settling in the spaces where trepidation previously roosted, he trusted Kacchan to be honest. 

If he says everything’s fine then it is, but the lack of pressing news makes Kacchan passed out at the end of his bed even more confusing. 

The painkillers he’s on make thinking feel like everything’s ruining through Windows 95’, he can practically hear his brain's fan whirring. His mind can’t really pull up fresh thoughts, just old truths, Kacchans never visited before and he apparently has no reason to now.

Katsuki sighs as he slumps back into his chair. Deku’s still clearly confused and he isn’t sure he has the energy to repeat himself right now, then considering how he failed the first time he decides might as well try.

“Everyone is fine, everything is as fine as it can be at the moment. You’re in the hospital recovering from the fight with supercharged crusty mcdusty, but you are also apparently going to be fine” Dekus staring at him like he has two heads so he keeps talking. “The league is being dealt with, I’m not talking about the fighting until tomorrow at the earliest, neither of us is in shape for that conversation and I don’t know much myself yet”

Deku’s pinch brows and slight pout tell him he’s got questions, questions he can’t answer. Anytime he even thinks about how the fight went down he feels like he’s going to explode.

Trying to reign in every ounce of self control he possesses he slumps further in his chair rubbing his face and counts to five. Then kicks Dekus hospital bed for good measure, before speaking again.

“Deku just rest, you're clearly still out of it and I don’t wanna repeat myself a third time.” Seriously how many other ways can he say everything is, by a very loose definition, fine. How much clearer can he make it that he’s not giving anything else up?

“Uh you didn’t have to repeat yourself? I believed you the first time, Kacchan” Deku couldn’t help but feel like Kacchan was purposely misinterpreting his question, but why? It shouldn’t be a hard question, he’d really only asked to make conversation and clear up some brain cobwebs.

“Then why did you ask–“ Something ugly and broken twists in Katsuki’s gut as he slowly repeated Dekus' question in his head ‘what are you doing here’.

“I just didn’t expect to see you here if you didn’t have to be.”

Deku wasn’t, hadn’t been, asking why someone was there with him but why he, Katsuki, was there. Deku wanted to know why he was here instead of literally anyone else. Deku didn’t know that Katsuki had basically taken up permanent residence in here with him, probably couldn’t see the cot laying at the foot of his bed.

White-hot rage coursed through him in an instant, after everything they went through Deku thought he’d just ditch him to some extras in scrubs? Katsuki had a bad temper on good sleep, exhausted he was ready to put Deku back in a coma.

He struggled with the feeling of his palms heating, but the second before he felt like detonating Katsuki caught Deku’s eyes in full.

As always they show everything the nerds feeling and the familiarity soothes him in a way he can’t explain. Doesn’t ever want to explain.

It used to drive him up the wall like Deku was purposely giving him messages in a language he couldn’t read. Shoving in his face how inadequate he is in comparison.

Katsuki knows now that’s not the case and over the last few months, he’s actually been learning how to read Deku for the first time in his life.

And he’s discovering that even though it’s an advanced read for him he likes the challenge and even more he likes the victorious warmth that spreads down to his toes when he can tell just what Dekus is thinking without any words.

Right now Deku does look slightly confused and yet still so open and trusting, and his crooked shy smile proves that he is actually happy Katsukis here. His confusion is just that, confusion.

Always glad to see him, always caught off guard by his presence.

As much as the familiarity soothed the recognition hurt.

A couple of months on good terms doesn’t erase all the bad years, he knows this, he’s told himself as much a dozen-plus times.

He’s never visited Deku in the infirmary or the hospital before now.

At first just because his stubborn pride insisted that he couldn’t show weakness/care for someone else because he was above them all, that he had to constantly act like Deku was below him. Even when he recognized Deku as a rival he didn’t visit, partly because of lingering pride but mostly because he felt like he didn’t deserve to.

He was too much of a coward/slave to his pride to risk being turned away.

This time he hadn’t even considered Deku might not want him, he had just selfishly insisted he stay by his side for his own peace of mind.

To see Deku wanted him here but couldn’t understand why Katsuki would want to be here himself left his fingers feeling numb as all the adrenaline drained out of him.

Deku studied Kacchan intently, his explosive rival had turned to him and risen half out his chair looking like he was about to shout at him but when their eyes locked the words had apparently died on his tongue.

Now Kacchan was just staring at him with an unreadable expression entirely unmoving after he plopped back in his seat, never breaking eye contact. It was clear now that Kacchan hadn’t understood his question at first but now he seemed lost at how to answer.

Deku wanted to wait for Kacchan to speak but experience told him he shouldn’t hold his breath.

Besides it was late, as much as he desperately didn’t want him to go, Kacchan should be safely asleep in his own room. It’d be selfish to ask him to stay.

Kacchan probably hadn’t meant to stay as late as he did, he was just prone to falling asleep wherever he was once 9 pm rolled around. Deku knew first hand that Auntie Mitsuki had a very strict bedtime policy that had long been physically instilled into Kacchans psyche.

“Kacchan, it’s late you should head back to the dorms and get some real sleep. I feel fine.” At the sudden incredulous tweak of a blonde eyebrow, Deku rushed to elaborate, “I mean I'm of course tired, and a sore but I feel whole. This is a familiar routine for me, I’m okay.”

Katsuki thought back to what he told All Might a lifetime ago, “he never considers himself”.

Here Deku was laying in a hospital bed concerned about his sleep and knowing just what he wanted/needed to hear, that Deku was okay, straight from the source.

It’s all he’d wanted to hear for almost a week now and he had to press his lips shut into a tight line to keep the embarrassing whimper he felt clawing at his throat from escaping.

“I know that you can go to the front desk and the attendant will call for a UA shuttle, doesn’t matter the time, Todoroki has left as late as 3 am”

Oh if that didn’t have something ugly snapping its jaws and thirsty for blood inside Katsuki. At heart, he’s always been explosively petty.

As much comfort as Todoroki being almost equally worried about Deku had been over the last week anytime anyone so much as even accidentally hinted at the ways Katsuki had failed to be there for Deku before now had him seeing red.

Reminding him how others had stepped up and into the places, Katsuki felt he should have been, felt like a slap in the face. But coming from Deku the anger he felt turned inward.

Where he usually saw red, all he saw was green. Not the warm emerald hue of Deku sitting in front of him, but dark bitter jealous green.

Petulant ‘whys’ clawed at his ribs. Why did people who’d only know Deku for a year have a more prominent roles in the nerds life than he did after knowing him forever, why did Deku have to like those extras so damn much, why didn’t he realize sooner how important Deku was, why did he have to care about any of that at all, why did Deku have to bring up that goddamn candy cane, why did Deku want to send him away, why wasn’t Deku even half as desperate to stay by his side as he was, why why why?!

He voiced none of these thoughts, instead just continued staring grumpily ahead. Hoping Deku didn’t notice how heavy his breathing had gotten or how he tightened his grip on the chair's armrests.

Deku took another sip of water before continuing. “I’m happy you’re here, really, it means a lot to me.” He let a genuine full smile slip on his face, he didn’t want Kacchan thinking he wasn’t grateful for his presence.

He really was happy that Kacchan was the first person he got to see upon waking up.

Circumstantial or not the fact that Kacchan was here with him now was a deep comfort to him and a pleasant way to wake up. Usually, it was to his classmates' forced positivity or his overly fussy weeping mother and that never got easier to deal with. As confusing as the change was it was a nice one. And he told him as much.

Why did Deku always know exactly what to say to people? When he, Katsuki Bakugo, couldn’t say anything at all.

Normally the instant relief his body felt at Deku’s words just pissed him off, but tonight exhaustion took its toll.

He felt the tears he’d been fighting all week fall hot and sticky down his cheeks, embarrassment shame and guilt tinted his face a splotchy pink. When he felt the lump in his throat give way to a choked hiccup he didn’t just crack, he shattered.

Ugly sobs racked through him and he buried his face in his hands and dug his fingers into his hair.

Why was the only familiar part of this him breaking down in front of Deku? He’s known Deku his whole life. He should have been the first and last person in Deku’s hospital room every time from the very beginning if for nothing more than obligation. Any one of those times could have been the last time.

Deku would have slipped away from him, and Katsuki would have been one of the last ones to know.

He hadn’t because he knew it’d always end up like this, him blubbering like a baby over Dekus hospital bed and he couldn’t risk it before. Too desperate to keep that little voice inside him that picks apart his every sign of weakness quiet.

It never goes away and UA had made it so much louder, he couldn’t give more feed to the fire. That’s exactly what Deku does to him.

On bad days Katsuki feels the little claws of insecurity scratching at his brain comparing him to Deku, that Deku’s surpassing him because he’s weak and he’s going to get left behind, he’s going to be forgotten.

On equally bad days he surpasses Deku completely and the voice switches gears, telling him he doesn’t deserve Dekus praises. That he’s a hopeless brat with an oversized ego and Deku’s words are empty. Katsuki hasn’t earned them, and he never will, Deku’s just placating him.

Katsuki doesn’t have good days.

Why did he even care though, Deku has seen him cry a dozen times and never once has it changed anything, hell Deku cries all the time.

But Deku’s never been debilitated by crying the way he is, Deku always keeps moving like he doesn’t even notice he’s crying. But he, Katsuki, can barely breathe around his tears.

Because he’s weak and a coward and everything Dekus not. Deku’s light years ahead of him in being a better person and by proxy a better hero and he’s never going to catch up.

Delirious with exhaustion Katsukis thoughts keep spiraling out of his control, growing more and more vicious.

He doesn’t even deserve to call himself Dekus' rival, Deku’s going to leave him behind, Deku’s going to keep taking on the world by himself because he’s not strong enough to fight alongside him, Dekus going to get himself killed and it’s all his fault. He’s hyperventilating through his sobs now.

“Wha- Kacchan, what’s wrong?” Deku suppressed a small groan at stretching stiff unused muscles as his scrambled brain had him lurch forward to grasp Kacchans wrists, he can see where blunt nails dig into his scalp. Gently as he could, Deku replaces callused hands with his crooked ones.

“Hey look at me.” He lifted Kacchans head to meet his eyes and took deep slow dramatic breaths encouraging Kacchan to match his breathing. Red eyes frantically scanned his face and clutched his wrists tightly like a lifeline, desperate that Deku doesn’t pull away.

Slowly their breathing synchronized, the tears kept flowing though, Deku was certain he was crying now too but he made no move to confirm this. He just kept watching Kacchan, keeping his own breathing steady. This wasn’t the first time he’s had Kacchan match his breathing, but it is the first time he’s been this close and this obvious about it. Then again Kacchans never looked this desperate.

In the past when he’s noticed Kacchans breathing has sped up and his gaze looks far away he’ll nonchalantly sit down next to him like he hasn’t noticed Kacchans problem at all, then he’ll practice his own breathing exercises a little louder than would be considered polite. Consciously or not Kacchan follows suit.

He’d learned the tactic when he was 7 from his mom helping one of their neighbors on the way to the store, a very nice lady he called Auntie Kay. She had some kind of disorder that gave her bad anxiety and had apparently forgotten to take meds that morning and got overwhelmed by the noise. His mom used to be an assisted living caregiver before she became, well his mom, so she had experience with this kind of thing.

Later she explained what she’d been doing. That you're someone they have a long history of trusting you don’t want to get in their space, just reaffirm to them that they’re safe and try to get them to slow their breathing, focus on breathing out.

1, because It’s hard to concentrate if you don’t feel safe. 2, the human body doesn’t know if it has enough oxygen, it knows if it’s getting enough air and if it has too much carbon dioxide in it, and you breathe out carbon dioxide.

That day his mom was like a mini hero, saving the day with a smile. It made him more aware that there’s more to being a hero than just fighting villains, it’s about saving people.

He can’t fight villains from a hospital bed, he could still be there for others. He could be there for Kacchan.

After a minute he hesitantly thumbed away the freshest tears but that seemed to just make things worse as another sob racked through Kacchan and he tightened his grip on his wrists. It wasn’t until Kacchan finally spoke and he reflexively snapped his jaw shut that Deku realized he’d been making soft shushing noises.

Katsuki tightened his grip on Deku’s wrists as he choked on one last sob thinking that Deku was finally pulling away, but when he just continued to thumb his tears away and making soft little noises he let himself believe Deku wasn’t going to dismiss him again.

Katsukis never let himself be comforted like this by anyone, not even as a child, but he was too tired to fight it, too distraught to care about how selfish he’s sure he’s being, and too certain that Deku was the only thing keeping him tethered to reality.

He’s confronted his own mortality a few times this year but none of it had compared to being confronted in real-time with Dekus. Living with Deku so close to death over the last week had taken its toll on everyone but Katsuki especially had been unraveling more and more each day.

The first day he’d been ready to bring the entire hospital down if he didn’t get to Deku’s side immediately. It only got worse from there.

He’d grown more cantankerous than he’d ever been, but the fire in him had been dying out. By the time Deku first woke up and didn’t recognize him the only thing he’d say to anyone was the same mumbled shut up, only sometimes accompanied by half-hearted sparks daring anyone to try to remove him from the room.

Auntie Inko was distraught too but she had let All Might take her home after that first visit and encouraged her to rest there saying something about how no mother should have to see this side of hero work or whatever.

The doctors were probably just worried about what all those tears might do to their equipment, Katsuki certainly had been even if he hadn’t said so.

Katsuki had promised Inko he’d stay by Deku’s' side, she’d looked conflicted about something but they both silently agreed that was a discussion for another day.

Katsuki doesn’t know what to say now but desperately feels like he needs to say something.

He’s terrified it’ll all come out wrong and freak Deku out, Deku who just woke up for real for the first time! He’s terrified of saying nothing and losing his chance to say anything at all because Deku just woke up for real for the first time in a week!

Deku deserves to hear him apologize for everything, but he doesn’t feel like he’s ready to be forgiven and if Deku doesn’t forgive he doesn’t know what’ll happen to him, he may very well implode.

If Deku turns him away then the kindest thing the universe could do for him would be to ignite every nitroglycerin-soaked cell in his body and just let him go. But the universe isn’t kind and will instead make him force himself out of this room and into a UA shuttle and into a life where everything green fades into bleak gray.

“Kacchan, your muttering” Deku says with the softest smile Katsuki has ever seen, and he feels like all his broken pieces have begun melting.

Deku stays silent, thumbs rubbing gentle circles. He seems content with doing nothing more than smiling at him until the sun comes up. And Katsuki feels another sob rip through him as he forces himself to speak.

“I meant it when I told you to keep your eyes on me.” The desperation in his own voice sounds like nails on a chalkboard to him. “I want you to know to look for me, and that I’ll be there. Even outside of heroing. I want you to expect me at every turn, forever. I don’t wanna be unexpected”

Deku leans forward and Katsuki thinks he’ll stop breathing all over again until their foreheads bump together. Deku’s looking right in his eyes, and he’s so close Katsuki's eyes can barely focus on him. They just stay like that for a small eternity while Katsuki’s heart beats wildly for entirely different reasons. One’s he’s not sure he’s ready to understand.

“Okay, Kacchan”

[dynyamight]

Hello! Could you do this one :

192 - You make me feel alive. For the first time ever, I feel like I can breathe.

Thanks ☺☺

192. You make me feel alive. For the first time ever, I feel like I can breathe.

“My, you’ve grown so tall and handsome, Katsuki! I can barely recognize you!”

Bakugou shrugs stiffly, hands deeply shoved in his pockets. “..Evenin’, Auntie.”

“Hurry, hurry!” Inko quickly beckons him inside the apartment, with frantic hand motions. “The cold air will get you sick the longer you stand out there.”

After a few tentative steps inside, and offering a mumbled pardon of intrusion, Bakugou makes a look around the small home.

God, everything looked eerily the damn same.

The miniature sofa, the kotatsu, the TV airing the local news, the rickety old dining table, in the same faded wood color just like before. The kitchen, probably looks the same, too.

Nothing new.

And, oddly enough, Bakugou was glad. Familiarity was very much needed, right now.

“Let me take your coat, dear.” Inko shushes quietly, right beside him. When Bakugou twists his head down, he looks to see her offering a soft smile.

Something in his chest clenches. “Nah, s’fine.” He coughs, struggling to meet her gaze. “..We’ll be leaving soon, anyway.”

“You know, that’s what you always told me, back when you two were kids.” Inko voices gently, “Waiting at the front door. Ready to head out, as soon as Izuku stepped out.”

“It warms my heart to see you two together.” She says, gazing at him, with that same comforting expression she used to give him long ago.

The inside of his palms are damp, sweating nervously. All he can offer is a quick nod of acknowledgment, without losing his cool in front of her.

Sure, they weren’t close before, but Inko only remembers him as that child. The one that was her son’s best friend. The one that knocked at her front door, jumping in his sneakers excitedly. The little boy who guided her son out of her home, and brought him back, safe and sound.

And, the same guy who was once the source of all of her beloved son’s distress, turmoil, and torment.

He hopes Midoriya has told her redeeming things about him, now that she knows that part. Because, there’s no way in hell he can sell himself any better.

A door to the right of the hallway opens in that instant.

With his back turned away from them, Midoriya steps out in an obnoxious All Might pajama set, barefooted.

He’s holding up two sweaters, dangling from each hand. “Mom!” He calls out towards the dining room, “Which one looks better? Yellow or red?”

“I can’t tell, Izuku.” Inko states easily, “Turn around.”

Doing a double take, Midoriya pivots in his stance, almost tripping over the long pants. “Oh, when did you get behind-?”

Midoriya’s face drops, before the shirts hit the floor.

Bakugou snorts, while Inko intently gazes at the fallen clothing. “I would think the burgundy one would look wonderful, sweetie.” She advises, regardless.

Quickly, Midoriya gathers and shoves his sweaters in his arms, and hurries back into his room, slamming the door shut. The click of a lock echoes, alongside a bunch of stressed, inaudible words.

“..You sure you don’t want me to take your coat?” Inko asks him. This time, there’s a knowing, small teasing expression on her face. “Izuku might take a while longer.”

Bakugou doesn’t wait for long, seated under the warming kotatsu. His drums his fingers on his thighs, here and there. And, the heat does get a little stuffy, while wearing black jeans and a turtleneck.

But, otherwise, it’s not intolerable. Inko had offered him plenty, during his wait; a hot mug of ginger and cinnamon tea, a small plate of cookie biscuits, and her silent, yet welcoming company. She even insisted on covering his shoulders with a large blanket, engulfing him completely.

“Anything for you.” Inko reassures him, despite having not voiced anything. “You have done so much to keep Izuku happy. It’s the least I can do.”

The overbearing politeness runs in the family, like a disease.

He feels he should thank her, or better yet, try to have a conversation with her. But, each time he builds up the internal guts to say something, the words get caught in his throat.

He wants to make sure he says the right thing to Midoriya’s mother. Unfortunately, he desperately wants her approval.

So, when Midoriya finally walks around the corner, in a nice pair of jeans and that same burgundy sweater from before, Bakugou’s relieved to say the least.

He feels saved.

“Now, the night is only getting colder, by the minute.” Inko hurriedly tells them, as the three of them walk to the front door, “This winter season has been terribly freezing! My heart can’t handle either of you catching the flu, let alone both of you! So, try to make it home not only safe, but healthy. Oh, and if you are unable to catch the last train, please let me know! I will gladly-”

“It’s okay.” Midoriya reassures her, putting a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t worry, Mom. We’ll be okay.”

“I know, I know. Just please-”

“Call you when we’re on our way home.” Midoriya answers easily. “Yeah, I will.”

“..You promise?”

“I promise, Mom.”

They share a sweet, long embrace, which Bakugou can’t help, but look away.

Something about their close bond, and unashamed love for each other feels intrusive for him to be a part of.

Something that he doesn’t deserve to be a part of. At least, not yet.

Instead, he solely focuses on readjusting his winter coat over his shoulders.

On their languid walk towards the metro station, a few blocks away from the apartment complex, Midoriya slips his hand in his.

“You told me 20:00, Kacchan.” He whines, however.

Bakugou rolls his eyes. “It was.” He corrects in a huff, “Until you fucking said I could drop by an hour early.”

“Wha—? When did I say that?”

“During our damn lunch break, yesterday.” Bakugou incredulously stares at him. “The hell? You were the one who came up to me and literally said it yourself. How your conference for today with the academy got cancelled. ”

For a moment too long, Midoriya stays silent, visibly mulling over the words in his head. Each quiet second makes Bakugou more internally baffled, downright shocked.

If it weren’t for Midoriya’s warm hand loosely holding onto him, he’d crackle a couple explosions, in spite.

“Oh. I did.” Midoriya breathes out laughing, bringing his other hand to his face. “I completely forgot.”

“Shitty Deku.” Bakugou grunts. “Starting the night off wrong, already?”

“Hey! Don’t go making me feel bad, Kacchan!” With pleading eyes, Midoriya looks up at him. “I didn’t mean to forget. School’s been hectic recently, and you know that.”

Those huge, bright green eyes. His kryptonite.

Bakugou clicks his tongue. “..Whatever. S’not like the wait was awful.”

“Oh god, I hope my mom wasn’t too much with you.” Midoriya messes with Bakugou’s fingers in between his, tightening and letting go of them.

“Not at all.” Bakugou lies.

Smiling, Midoriya lets out a big sigh of relief. “Thank goodness. If you two didn’t get along tonight, I might have had an aneurysm.”

“If you had to choose—” Bakugou starts.

Midoriya narrows his eyes. “Stop it.”

Bakugou scoffs, slipping out an air of mirth into it. “Obviously your mom.”

“Obviously, it would be too hard of a decision to make.” Midoriya corrects. “Hopefully that time never, ever, ever comes.”

Despite trying not to smile, Bakugou feels the traces of a smirk on the corners of his lips. “If that day ever happens, always pick Auntie.” He states easily, “Her heartbreak would be so fucking intense. Put all natural disasters to damn shame.”

With a small, slipped out laugh, Midoriya bumps their shoulders together, softened by their winter coats. “You are weirdly making sense, Kacchan.”

“Of course I’m making fucking sense. She cries over the thought of someone taking you away. Villain, or not.”

“Every mother is like that!”

“Hell, I’m damn surprised Auntie didn’t flip her shit from seeing me.” Bakugou honestly confesses finally, more to himself than to Midoriya. “Dating her one and only son, and she didn’t even freak out about it.”

And, just like that, Bakugou knows something is wrong, from the moment Midoriya stays quiet.

They continue to walk, despite the sudden tense mood between them. But, that doesn’t mean Bakugou doesn’t want to demand Midoriya to speak up, the longer he keeps his mouth shut.

But also, he doesn’t want to ruin their night, and so, he waits begrudgingly.

Right as the two are on the outskirts of the metro tunnel, Midoriya twiddles Bakugou’s fingers nervously.

“..I haven’t told her about us yet,” He admits, face morphed in guilt. “But, I mean, she could very easily guess our intentions tonight. So, maybe— I don’t know —she might know.”

Bakugou hums, allowing himself a few seconds to process that. He then breathes a long air through his nose. “..I figured.” He simply says.

“It’s not like I want to hide us.” Midoriya voices aloud, furrowing his brows. “It’s just with graduation coming up, and the academy still looking for an agency to accept me as anything, and then my father suddenly wanting to come back into our lives, she’s just been a little stressed with everything going on, including myself. And, I don’t want to potentially ruin us and-”

With a tight grip, Bakugou halts them to a sudden stop.

When Midoriya worriedly gazes at him, he offers him back a nod. “Yeah, I get it.” Bakugou firmly states.

“Kacchan, I-”

“You’re fine. Don’t worry about it.”

And, he really means it.

While people bypass them, heading through the automatic doors of the metro station, they both remain standing, staring back at each other.

The first to break is Midoriya, releasing a big, tired sigh. “You’re right.” He frowns, looking away. “I’m totally ruining this date night. I’m sorry.”

Pulling his hand out of the hold, Bakugou instead brings his arms over Midoriya’s shoulders. He hugs them close. “No, you’re not.”

“I am.” Midoriya responds backs, muffled.

“We’ve been on more shit dates, Deku.” Bakugou tells him in his ear. “And, this ain’t one. It barely even began.”

“A whole year, and I—I haven’t even told her.” Midoriya shakingly admits. “I’m such a coward.”

Bakugou huffs. “You’re not. The talk ain’t easy. Hell, telling my hag and old man about us was like pulling teeth out of my damn mouth.”

“..At least you told them.”

“Listen, you went through a lot of shit, two years ago.” Bakugou reminds Midoriya, bluntly. “The running away. The dropping out. The undercover work. The public hate. Getting together after all fucking that, probably wasn’t even the best move.”

“I still remember it all.” Midoriya mumbles.

Bakugou tightens his hug. “And, since then, life’s been a total bitch to you. I fucking wish you didn’t get half the crap you have to deal with, because it runs you into a damn mess.”

“But, I—”

“So, just focus on the important shit, right now.” Bakugou breathes out, pressing his head against Midoriya’s. “Us? We can wait. No, I can wait. I’ll be right beside you, until then, and even after that.”

Lifting his arms up and around Bakugou’s back, Midoriya holds onto him, just as tight as him. “..You promise?”

Bakugou exhales a short sigh. “I promise, Izuku. We’ll be okay.”

Letting go, Midoriya gently pushes away from Bakugou’s grip, causing them to finally part, for who knows how long.

Before the secondhand embarrassment of people witnessing them sinks into his pride, Bakugou’s redirected to the watery eyes of Midoriya, as he quickly blinks them dry.

“God, when did you get so—?” Midoriya wildly moves his hands around, gesturing over at Bakugou.

On the other hand, Bakugou scrunches his nose. “The hell does that mean?”

“So supportive?” Immediately, Midoriya shakes his head. “No, you’ve been supportive, that’s not the right word. So kind? Uh, that doesn’t sound right..”

“You mean romantic.” Bakugou puts it bluntly.

A rush of red floods Midoriya’s face, matching his sweater and shoes. “Don’t say it so loud, Kacchan!”

“I wouldn’t have to, if you weren’t asking dumb ass questions!” Bakugou yells back, crossing his arms definitively. “We’re together, Deku! Of course I’m gonna tell you fucking sappy shit.”

“Shh! You are making us be a public scene!”

“Too late! We were a public scene the fucking moment we stopped in front of the damn metro like stupid lovers at the altar!”

It starts slow, with nothing, but Midoriya blinking up at him.

But then, a slipped sputter starts and a bubbling laughter erupts from Midoriya. He grabs onto Bakugou’s arm, helping him from not bending over in giggles.

“W-We really did!” Midoriya barely says, wheezing, “Lovers at an altar. A-And, you literally gave me vows!”

It takes Bakugou forcibly grabbing his idiotic, cackling boyfriend to finally move aside, and walk through the station’s entrance. He refuses to focus too much on the fire heating his face.

He’s never making outlandish, romantic gestures in public, ever again.

They missed their train, obvious from the lengthy moment they had outside. But, neither of them were upset about the ordeal. Instead, they gradly bought tickets for the next train to Tokyo, with only a thirty minute wait.

As Bakugou starts to shift comfortably in his bench seat, right beside him, Midoriya rests his head on top of his shoulder. “Thankfully, we still won’t miss the movie premiere.”

“Because your weird ass is making us leave hours before midnight.”

“For situations like these!”

Bakugou scoffs a short laugh. “I guess it’s reasonable.”

Grabbing his hand into a loose grip, Midoriya twiddles with Bakugou’s fingers once more. “Thank you. For tonight.” Midoriya whispers.

“You needed time to chill the fuck out. With the shit you’ve been facing, let tonight be the night you forget about it.” Bakugou grumbles, “Besides, I haven’t been able to steal you away, for my damn self.” He tacks on.

Midoriya smiles back at him, head comfortably slumped on his shoulder. “You make me feel alive, again. And, for the first time ever, since the start of this year,” He sighs, longingly up at Bakugou, “I feel like I can breathe.”

Bakugou brings him closer, chin tucked in his curls. “Good. I need you to breathe, at least once and a fucking while.”

Midoriya snorts. “Just at least once?”

“And, a fucking while.” Bakugou reiterates, “I’m not a monster.”

“No, you’re not.” Midoriya chuckles, bringing his legs over Bakugou’s lap. “You’re my monstrous boyfriend.”

“That’s fucking right.”

For a while, they stay just like that; close, intimate, and stuck together, without a care of the outside world. Maybe it’s from the intense conversation from earlier, but Bakugou doesn’t feel deterred to back away. Instead, he feels comfortable in holding Midoriya, and not letting go.

“You know,” Midoriya starts, “My mom wouldn’t freak out.”

Bakugou raises a brow. “..Hm?”

“About us. She wouldn’t freak or flip out like that.”

“C’mon, Deku.” Bakugou scoffs, shaking his head. “You don’t gotta lie to me, now.”

“I’m serious.” Midoriya reaffirms strongly, emphasizing his words with a tightened grasp around his hand. “She wouldn’t.”

“I’m not the type of guy you bring to your damn family. Seeing me as anyone’s partner is like fucking failing at life.”

Midoriya brings a tentative hand, cupping the side of Bakugou’s face. His fingertips are rough, yet linger there softly. “Just promise her you’ll make me happy and keep me safe.” Midoriya states easily, smiling brightly. “And, she’ll welcome you with open arms, all over again.”

[sarahjtv]

BNHA Chapter 325 Spoiler Analysis: United As One

The week has passed and so has summer.  Damn...  At least Shonen Jump’s got my back.  And Deku is finally welcome home thank god.  Now, give this kid a damn good meal, sleep, and a motherfreaking bath already.  NGL, this week has been busy for me and I’m tired AF, so I think I’ll only go over the parts that stuck out to me:

Man, god bless Kota for running up to Izuku to help him!  This kid has been through so much yet he still decided to run up to Izuku to help him.  He’s sobbing his eyes out too 😭.  I’m pretty sure he’s apologizing for not moving during the Muscular fight (in Kota’s defense, Izuku would’ve probably died if not for Kota) and he’s telling Izuku that “I am here” (OF COURSE HE SAYS THOSE WORDS) so Izuku doesn’t need to cry anymore.  And to top it all off, Kota calls Izuku “Nii-chan” which I’m pretty sure means older brother 😭❤️ If Horikoshi brings Eri in next week, I’m going to cry waterfalls dammit

The Fox Lady is so kind and pretty dammit Horikoshi give her a name already!  She’s so happy to see Deku again and thanks him for saving her.  Even calls him “Mr. Crybaby Hero” 😭  The way she picks him up like a small child is both sweet and funny too ☺️ I await the fanart!

A-AND THEN SHE AND KOTA HUG DEKU 😭💚💚💚💚

On a more serious note, the Fox Lady mentions that she got rejected from a lot of evacuation centers because they don’t accept mutant types like her.  Of course discrimination still exists in this world.  Of freakin’ course.  Just like in the real world...  And considering that Horikoshi mentioned that Shoji would have a role in the future and also show his face finally in some interviews (Horikoshi also teased that he wanted to give Shoji a bigger story YEARS ago), I have a feeling this subject will be brought up again in the future.

The Old Star Man from the first chapter/episode who encourages Deku to be a hero returns this chapter to give a big speech to the crowd.  This guy is a real one ✊.  Basically, he says that the crowd needs to shut up and understand what’s going on for a hot minute.  That everyone projected All Might’s “Perfect Heroness” onto the every other hero that they all forgot that Heroes are just people at the end of the day.  If the people don’t support the heroes still fighting now, they’re screwed.  Ultimately, it’s the civilians who have to save the heroes when they’re hurting.  Not just other heroes.  Horikoshi, please give this man a name too, he’s long deserved it.

Then the boy in the All Might shirt who’s been protesting for the past 2 chapters says something reasonable for once.  His views on Deku have been mixed around thanks to all the things that have been rumored about Deku on the internet and word of mouth.  Which kinda justifies his anger and doubt, but he still should’ve have been a jerk to Deku and Ochako.  

Deku finally speaks a full sentence declaring that he and his friends and mentors will make everything ok again.  I can’t wait to see that promise be fulfilled, my son 💚

We change focus to Shoto, Endeavor, and Hawks (who are confirmed to have been outside the barrier for the past few chapters; I was wondering about that).  They’re finally being allowed into UA for now.  Unfortunately the 3 of them probably would’ve caused more discourse if they entered while the civilians were rioting.  Endeavor and Hawks from the press release and just Shoto existing really.  Please let them stay there permanently.  

Gotta say that Endeavor looks so freaking tired throughout this whole thing.  The Toya thing + The Deku thing must be weighing extremely heavy on him.  I do feel bad for him honestly.  

Hawks tells Endeavor how OFA has, in a way, connected everyone together.  All Might to Deku to Class 1-A back to Deku to Ochako to the people.  And if the people can truly care for others, then the future will be bright and heroes will have all the time in the world just like Hawks wanted at the very beginning of his story.

There’s this really beautiful double page spread (teased in one of Vol. 31′s extras) of the civilians offering their umbrellas to the kids.  Kirishima’s crying happy tears, Kota and Mineta are running up to Deku, the All Might Shirt dude is offering Deku his umbrella, Kaminari is smacking Bakugo over the head 😂, Iida’s holding Deku’s hand to guide him, and INKO FINALLY GETS TO BE WITH HER SON THANK THE LORD 💚😭 

Shoto 💙 Our resident pretty boy is looking at this scene and ultimately decides that he and Endeavor are going to stop Dabi together.  He decided this before back in the hospital, but I think his decision is more final here.  I really need him to properly reunite with Deku though and I’m sure they have A LOT to talk about.

AND WE FINALLY GET TO PROPERLY SEE AIZAWA AFTER GOD KNOWS HOW LONG AND HE’S SO HANDSOME 🖤 MY MAN IS LOOKING GOOD WITH AN EYEPATCH?!?  And he does have a prosthetic robot leg and apparently Mirko does too.  God, he looks so tired, but he’s so proud of his kids Imma cry again 😭

Anyway, it’s looks like he’s still recovering from the war in the hospital and apparently also there to help with the whole Kurogiri situation, who’s been transferred to a research lab.  It seems like Aizawa’s trying to bring back Shirakumo somehow.  If they do, I wonder if Shirakumo will even still be alive.  We can assume that he might still be alive since he did tell the Heroes about the hospital, but it’s uncertain.  It would be nice to have that sweet soul back 🌤

Also, the Heroes are aware that Himiko Toga’s still out there and they’re taking extra persuasions to make sure she isn’t one of the refugees.  They also know her limits too, so that’s good.

The last panel is of All Might standing outside of UA, but his back is turned against them.  He has this uncertain look on his face too.  I honestly can’t read it for the life of me.  I gotta wonder why he isn’t walking in there now that everything seems to be ok.  Maybe he doesn’t want to accidentally cause more problems?  The public did start to hate him with the whole “I Am Not Here” sign on his statue in Kamino...  Deku does need him though.  Ugh, I’m so worried for this man.

And I do have a theory.  It’s a long shot and a dark one: What if Toga found Stain while running off and they teamed up together.  Then Stain found and took All Might captive and Toga took some of All Might’s blood to transform into him and now she’s the one outside of UA.  I can’t say if All Might is dead or not.  I really, really, REALLY, don’t want him to be dead.  Stain says that All Might is the only one truly worthy of being a Hero, so I doubt he would actively kill All Might.  But, god there’s so many death flags surrounding this man.  I don’t even know if he’s going to make it through the entire series tbh.

The end chapter teaser says “The rain continues on...” so I doubt this pain is over.  We have a bit of a calm, but I am so anticipating the next storm.

Me waiting for even more pain:     

[strawberryfics]

Dating Headcanons

Izuku x Reader, Todoroki x Reader, Denki x Reader

Warnings- uhh some implied things

Izu

It would start as puppy love. He would be infactuated with you. 

He would write everything about you in his notebook. He has a multiple one notebook dedicated to you. He would so draw you and your hero outfit all the time

He would either do the traditional confession with the cherry blossom tree or accidentally blurt it out, either way, he would stutter and ramble like crazy

He calls you Puppy but If someone calls him out for it he's going to become a blushing mess.

If you call him Izu he gets so soft and weak in the knees.

Dates with him are always going to be an adventure. One week it may be a simple study date and next thing you know you're going to a Hero Convention cosplaying each other

If Inko likes you, Deku will fall in love with you a second time guaranteed 

 The Dekusquad would like you other than Uraraka. In her mind, you did steal Deku tho. You might have to drag her but whatever

You're going to have to reassure Deku all the time. He's going to have random moments where he doesn't think he's good enough for you or his quirk but if you cuddle him he’ll be good again.

In the beginning of your relationship, his kisses are going to be very simple and short but as you progress there going to get longer and passionate. He will moan into your mouth if you pull his hair.

Overall dating him is going to be so wholesome and fun

Todo

When Todoroki first starts getting feelings he's going to be confused. Probably thought he was dying tbh. Iida or Deku would have to explain the bases of having a crush. “But I don't wanna crush Y/n”. Once he understands he's going to be buying you expensive things and basically force you to accept them.

He's going to confess only a couple days after he understands what a crush is. He’ll pull you aside before class starts and confess right then and there. 

Once you're in a relationship with him you're going to have to explain a lot of things to him. He's never had someone model a healthy relationship so he's going to have a lot of questions

 He will introduce you to his siblings and Mom but his Dads out of the question. If his Mom likes you he's going to be starstruck. Fuyumi would love hanging out with you and Natsuo would love pulling pranks with you

Help him dye his hair completely white Make sure to reassure him about his scar and quirk. If he knows you love the things he hates about himself you're getting a ring hands down he doesn't need to think about it. You're automatically the one, he's going to protect you and love you forever.

He would have nightmares pretty often so he will call or text you in the middle of the night. If he ever has a nightmare while you're sleeping over he’ll simply hold you tighter and go back to sleep.  

His kisses are very sweet and short but can get heated fast. Please be careful this man will have you dripping Love you

Overall he's going to be sweet and innocent Dense but he’ll love you with all his heart so 10/10 right here

Denki

First off why just why. Your in for so much 

He's going to start the friendship off with his normal flirts and jokes and slowly realize that he likes you. 

He's going to become a full-time simp. He's going to tell you every story about things he's done to try and impress you. He pulling even more pranks on Bakugou hoping that you'll find them funny. He's even upgrading his flirts and jokes just for you.

He’ll probably confess at 3am not even comprehending what he's doing. You two were having a movie marathon when he randomly just started ranting about how he likes you while fighting sleep and then passed out because he's tired

He would wake up late afternoon and realize what he said and freak out but when you woke up you would assure him the feelings were mutual

Pda is through the roof, he's always touching you. 

You guys would go to arcades and movie theaters for dates. He would be obsessed with getting you a stuffed animal at every claw machine he sees.

It's no secret Denki isn't doing super well in school so if you try to tutor him his grades might go up just a little but almost every study session is going to end with cuddles. I don't make the rules.

If you're ever mad or sad or any emotion other than happy. He's going to show up to your dorm with all your favorites in his hands and cuddle you till your smiling again.

His kisses are so cute. You're going to get little sparks of electricity in every kiss whether it's small or long. He's very sloppy when it comes to his kisses too so his face is going to be all over yours. 10/10 would recommend it tho

[romiithebirdie]

From the Furthest Tether: Part Five

Everything was dark, the only light coming from a few dull-looking lights that continued to flicker constantly like a dying flame of an old candle.

Water droplets fell from the rotting ceiling of a rundown warehouse where the villain group known as the Paranormal Liberation Front had chosen to lay low while they recovered from their earlier injuries.

Izuku felt like he was floating, watching the villains converse with each other while Tomura Shigaraki heaved over his elite Nomu creations whom were currently being used as nothing more than a makeshift throne for the leader.

One of the Hero Killer's main followers had stood up, attempting to call out Shigaraki's odd behaviour while Izuku's insides twisted with discomfort and fright, while the other villains didn't seem to sense the scent of death in the air, the teen could.

Shigaraki's entire aura was completely different; calmer than usual, yet had a dangerous edge that the teen could feel, even in his current phantom form.

Speaking of which, was this the doing of One for All? Or some kind of link that Izuku had with Shigaraki due to them meeting back in the subconscious of both Quirks?

Thinking about it made his head hurt…

"Now that your concerns have been duly noted there is a more pressing matter that needs to be addressed."

"Which is?" The blunt voice belonging to Dabi piped up from the background. The eldest Todoroki child looking completely unbothered by the many pairs of eyes staring widely at him, the other members of the group fearful of Shigaraki's response to his tone.

Thankfully, All for One who was currently using Shigaraki like a puppet, chose to wave off Dabi's remark as if he were nothing. "Just the little spy in our midst," Shigaraki's crimson orbs suddenly honed in and immediately connected with Izuku's own fearful emeralds.

He can see me?

Was that even possible? Izuku fought back a heavy gulp.

That being said, the teen wouldn't have put it past All for One to have some kind power that allowed him to sense the strange link between the two successors…

Either way, this was bad. Really bad.

"No need to worry, though," he looked in the direction of the teen, his rough voice sounding as if he'd swallowed sandpaper. Pointing a finger from the mangled hand, old burned scar tissue littered across his remaining fingers as they twitched erratically; "Soon everything we've strived for will be in our grasp."

Snap out of it, Ninth!

Izuku gasped loudly, clutching his head and cursing darkly as he gripped the bedsheets of his hospital bed tightly.

Why was this happening to him?

Everything was moving so fast, his brain was completely overwhelmed.

Tears of frustration stung his eyes and he blinked hard, fighting them back with all the energy he could muster as he breathed out sharply. Every time something was going right for him and his friends, there was always something that completely tore that newfound hope to shreds.

It wasn't fair.

Especially when the talk with All Might, once he'd arrived at the hospital, had gone down so well. Aside from Izuku's own worries, he had been quickly pacified by his mentor's comforting and reassuring words.

To Izuku's relief, they had discussed the Eri concern and addressed it straight away, with All Might immediately getting into contact with U.A and his acquaintances from the Police Force. His mentor had also informed the boy that Aizawa had been discharged a day prior and was currently recovering back at U.A, albeit with the Pro undergoing physiotherapy to help get him used to his temporary leg prosthetic.

"There are measures being taken to protect Young Eri so try not to worry yourself," his mentor had explained, offering the boy a faint smile tugged across his thin face. All Might had left after Izuku had gotten a visit from his doctor who'd then informed the pair that the teen would more-than-likely be discharged from the facility a lot sooner than they had thought.

About an hour or so later, his mother had arrived and Izuku finally allowed himself to lean back against the plush pillows to finally relax. However, this was quickly short-lived when his mother announced something that nearly made Izuku choke on his own air;

"Your father called me last night," Inko's voice was soft as she folded Izuku's old nightshirt into a neat little square before placing it in the bag that she had brought with her. "We talked for quite a while."

"With Dad, uh...You did?" Izuku's mouth and brain suddenly felt as if it had been set on autopilot. Was it weird that he felt oddly...numb to that revelation? He hadn't heard from his father in years, surely he should have been happier about hearing this?

Inko nodded, humming delicately, sliding another one of Izuku's shirts into the open bag, "He was concerned, of course. I caught him up with what's been happening, he's…" she paused. "He proposed something that I've been thinking about since last night."

Izuku's heart thudded under his freshly laundered nightclothes. He dreaded what he was about to hear but had to ask nonetheless: "What was it?"

His mother inhaled sharply, nibbling on her bottom lip, "He wants us to come overseas so we can be together as a family. Like before," her hands began to tremble. "There's so much that Hisashi and I need to discuss but right now, Izuku, I feel it would be for the best."

"W-What are you saying?" Izuku felt queasy, was his mother seriously suggesting that he pack up all his things and move abroad? To live with a man that he barely knew?

"Izuku-"

"I can't just leave!" Izuku's voice grew louder. "What about U.A? My friends?" All Might.

Inko's own temper flared and she glowered at her son, gesturing to his bandaged limbs, "Look at yourself, Izuku!"

The younger Midoriya visibly flinched, swallowing the retort back down his throat and averting his guilty gaze away from his mother. His eyes wandered along the lines of thick gauze around his knuckles and he shakily exhaled; unsure what to say next.

Was there anything he could say? He was completely tongue tied.

Thankfully, Inko was the one who broke the awkward silence by running a hand gently through his curls, "I'm sorry, Izuku."

He tried not to wince at those words. It honestly felt like he'd been punched in the gut.

"But I don't know what to do at the moment."

"Mum-"

"Stop," her voice was quiet but firm. Izuku's eyes moved along each part of Inko's face, noticing the blotchy skin from crying, the heavy bags under his mother's eyes and the way her hair just hung limply over her face like a set of old curtains, dreary and aged.

Was there anything he could say to her right now?

Aside from…

I'm sorry.

                                            .-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

"Here are your discharge papers, Midoriya-san."

It was as simple as that.

Before he knew it, Inko had been given Izuku's hospital paperwork and had then quickly ushered her son into a cab alongside All Might. After a short and frankly slightly awkward car journey, they had eventually arrived back at U.A High School where they had then escorted Izuku to the dormitory facilities.

To Izuku's relief, his classmates had respected his space and quietly offered greetings to him as he limped towards his dorm room, his adult supervision carrying his luggage for him due to his arms still being heavily bandaged.

His mother hadn't mentioned their earlier talk and Izuku wanted to keep it that way for the time being. She had left after barely speaking and All Might had offered to walk her to the gates, which she begrudgingly accepted. Izuku noted the hardness in her voice when she spoke to the retired hero, a tone that Izuku had rarely heard Inko use in all the years of his life.

He prayed that she didn't give All Might a hard time once they were out of earshot. They had left quite a while ago…

From the other side of his locked door, he heard the distant sound of his classmates calling out loudly to each other, Izuku recognised Kirishima's cheery voice and he felt his lips tug into a small grin.

Maybe he should have gone downstairs and taken part with the others…

Izuku glanced at the red and blue striped clock on his wall and sighed, his chest tight as he shuffled over to his drawers to begin loading his clean clothes back into storage. Although it wasn't the same as his bedroom at his mother's apartment, he was glad to be back in a familiar place…

For how long? Came the unwelcome and unwanted nag in the back of his already-racing mind as he clenched his teeth together. He had no time to worry about the what-ifs right now, what mattered was getting back on his feet and concentrating on his Quirk control.

DANGER!

Izuku blinked, ears buzzing. He could hear laughter in the distance, was One for All reacting to something else? Maybe it had something to do with the connection he was sharing with Shigaraki-

A loud slam against his window completely destroyed his own concentration, his heart jumping in time with his body.

The walls violently quaked and Izuku soon stumbled. He had barely enough time to react as a massive hole seemed to be forcibly ripped through the wall to the outside.

The impact shook off the teen's balance as he fell to the floor, kicking back against the carpet as he shuffled up against the door. A large, scaly hand clamped around the broken pieces of plaster and a familiar face peered in that sent waves of absolute terror up Izuku's spine.

It was another Nomu. Did that mean the League were here? Speaking of that, how could they know that he'd returned or where his dorm room was?!

Izuku moved his hand towards the doorknob of his dormitory door and the creature screamed loudly squeezing itself through the small hole with little resistance. Izuku pressed himself up against the door frame, bandaged arms and legs screeching at him as the Nomu loomed over him. Sharp pieces of broken brick dug into it's thick hide, small trickles of blood forming around it's body as it slammed a heavy palm straight against Izuku's jaw, the movement cutting off any attempt that Izuku had at crying for help.

A crackle filled the air and Izuku's attention was drawn away from the fact that the Nomu currently had him pinned to the door by his head. With a narrowed gaze, the teen's eyes fell upon a tight-fitted collar around the creature's massive neck. Due to the odd crackling noise, Izuku soon noticed the device attached to the thick leather, which looked to be some kind of radio device.

"Excellent work, No. 1977. Remember this one needs to be alive. For now, at least."

Izuku paled, recognising the person talking immediately.

That blend of eerie voices, like an unhinged duet completely out of sync with each other.

He attempted to speak, a choked gasp cut off as the creature tightened it's grip. He knew that voice all too well; the man who planned out multiple attacks on his friends, the one who was involved in the incident in Kamino and most recently, the Jaku attack...

Tomura Shigaraki.

[deiitaelric]

Amnesia / bakudeku fic part 2

Part 1

Shortly after, they reached Izuku’s house.

“Mom, I’m home!”

“Welcome, sweety!” was heard from the inside of the flat.

“I’m bringing company” Izuku added, taking off his shoes.

“Oh, yeah? And who is it?”

“Sorry for the intromission” Katsuki said, taking off his shoes as well. When the little cute woman turned the corner and looked at him, she smiled as wide as his son.

“Oh my... Katsuki? Is that you?”

“Yes, auntie, it’s me” Katsuki accepted the tight hug before entering the living room.

“Do you even call my mom ‘auntie’? We had to be very good friends” Izuku smiled, closing his eyes and missing the sad look on Katsuki’s face.

“I guess my son told you already about his condition”

“He showed me his report”

“It’s easier for him to just show that to people instead of explaining the whole thing, you know?” Katsuki nodded slightly. “Are you and your family back in town?”

“Yeah, we’re settling in our old apartment. I’ll look for somewhere for my own once college, though”

“Oh. I’ll miss the lovely family who were renting your apartment, but I’m really glad you all are back” Inko squeezed Katsuki’s shoulder, smiling at him, before heading to the kitchen. “Stay for dinner, okay?”

“Thanks” Katsuki turned to look around at the known place. It had been several years since the last time, and somehow everything looked the same and completely different at the same time. Izuku was sitting on the couch with a book on his hands. He made a movement towards Katsuki and started to flip the pages. As Katsuki got closer, he could see it was a photo album.

“Here” Izuku said, pointing at one picture. Katsuki sat at his side and those pretty green eyes fell on him, shining. Katsuki looked away, and then at where Izuku was pointing. It was a picture of both of them, with no more than 3 years old, smiling at the camera. “It’s you, right?”

“Yeah” Katsuki blurted, taking the album away from the other’s hands. “Yeah, this is us”

“I think there’s some more” Izuku reached a hand and flipped a few more pages of the album now resting on Katsuki’s lap. There were a bunch of images of them as children playing together, in costumes for some party and even some sleepover. However, the more they grew, there were less and less photos. Until they reached the last one. “That’s you as well, right? I think there are no more”

“I guess not. That was the first day of middle school”

“We didn’t hang out together that much in middle school, huh?”

“Not really”

“I see. Why, though?”

Katsuki looked at himself in the image for a moment before pulling the album close aggressively. Izuku jolted at his side and jolted one more time when his mom called for them.

“Hey. Are-are you okay?” Izuku asked already on their way to take a seat on the table.

“Yeah, sorry about that”

They ate and maintained a small chat. Izuku kept peering at Katsuki from time to time, trying to read his expression.

Once they finished, Katsuki helped to clean up the table as Izuku went away to change his clothes into more comfy ones.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?”

“Yeah, I’m fine”

“It’s odd, right? Seeing him not remembering you after all you go through together”

“Maybe is better for him this way, I mean-”

“I know you two had problems in the past, but he kept caring about you after all. He would be ecstatic about seeing you again if he… you know”

“I’m not sure about that… I don’t know how much you know, but I wasn’t fair with him our last couple of years” Katsuki sat at the table again, looking away through the window.

“I know, honey, but you were just kids back then and my son is very aware of the feelings of others. He always were” Inko sat in front of him.

“He’s easy to hurt being that way. And I hurt him and then left. I don’t even know why I’m here. I just… I saw him and couldn’t help but approach. I didn’t even think about it, you know, about all I did to him, I just… Walked into his life again like nothing happened”

“Katsuki, you’re a good man. Maybe you would feel better talking to him. Maybe he would even remember, and so you two can solve your problems”

“I don’t know, I don’t want to bring back those moments to him. Like… For what? I mean-”

“Maybe I have something to say about this, don’t you think?” Izuku was standing a few feet apart, looking at him piercingly.

Part 3

[simplybakugou]

Grown Up

↝ Your nerves and feelings are high when you finally meet your boyfriend’s mother.

BINGO SPACE: Meet the Family

⋆ PAIRING: prohero!midoriya x fem!reader ⋆ WARNINGS/TAGS: fluff ⋆ WORD COUNT: 1750

A/N:  in the midst of moving into a new place i somehow managed to write another @bnhabookclub​ bingo piece! this was so cute to write and i really enjoyed it. thank you to the lovely @sanguinekeigo​ for requesting midoriya for this prompt! the midoriya transparent cap is from the bnha google drive!

FULL BINGO MASTERLIST

✐posted 08.18.2020✐

Your hands were shaking in your lap the closer you got to the Midoriya house, the bouquet of flowers in your hold being the only thing you could balance out your nerves. The more you mentally reassured yourself that everything was going to be okay and that nothing would go wrong, you once again thought about all of the things that could go wrong over this dinner.

“Don’t worry, Y/N, everything’ll be okay,” Midoriya comforted you from beside you in the car. 

You glanced over to your boyfriend, suppressing your laughter as you could see sweat nearly pouring down his forehead as his hands were ghost white from how tightly he was gripping onto the steering wheel. “Izuku, you look more nervous than I do.”

His anxious expression settled down into a small smile as he looked at you once arriving at a stoplight. “I just really want Mom to love you as much as I do.” You felt flustered and touched by his sweet words, leaning over to give him a peck on the cheek before the light turned green.

If someone had told you that you would be dating the number one hero in the world, you would have called them crazy, never being able to perceive such an outlandish thing to be true. But here you were, on your way to finally meet your pro hero boyfriend’s mother after dating for over a year.

After moving into a new city, you managed to land yourself a job as a receptionist at a top hero’s agency: Todoroki Shouto. To say you were ecstatic would be an understatement as you never imagined to actually get the job you had been praying to get. In no time you assimilated into your new living space and work environment. 

But what you didn’t know was that being the first person that anyone who walks into Todoroki’s agency sees meant that you would meet a variety of pro heroes, including Midoriya himself.

One day after having to deal with some official business with his former classmate and close friend at his agency, Midoriya decided to pay a visit to Todoroki’s agency in person rather than sending his assistant over. This was one of the decisions he made in his life that he didn’t dare to regret.

The second he laid eyes on you he nearly choked on his own breath, astonished by your beauty. He stumbled on his words as he tried to explain to you that he had to meet your boss and you found his trepidation adorable. Since then Midoriya found himself coming up with any excuse he could think of to see you or even to catch a peek at you through the glass doors of the agency while walking by the building.

You had him wrapped around your finger without even knowing and once you did catch onto his little crush, you decided to ask him out yourself, almost making him spontaneously combust in the process.

For Midoriya this relationship was a big deal. Due to all the work he put into his high school career and the work he was currently doing to maintain his number one status, Midoriya was never able to find the time to actually focus on his love life. As nice as it would have been to get a girlfriend during high school, it unfortunately never happened. So once the two of you started dating, Midoriya began falling for you fast. You made him feel ways he could only imagine feeling. This made him all the more nervous for the love of his life to meet one of the most important people in his life. It would be his first time bringing a girl over for his mother to meet and he was both excited and terrified with how this meeting could go.

Finally you both arrived in front of Midoriya Inko’s home and Midoriya stayed frozen solid in his seat. You nearly had to pull him out of the vehicle yourself just to get him to go to the front door. And once he did, you were both sweating buckets as reality set in.

Right when you pushed the button to ring the doorbell, the door swung open as Inko stood in front of the two of you with a quivering but wide smile on her face, one that was similar to her son’s. It was quite evident from the second you saw her that Midoriya took after his mother almost entirely.

“Izuku!” Inko exclaimed joyously, reaching up to hug her son who had grown so much taller than she was.

Midoriya hugged his mother tightly, not being able to remember the last time he had seen her in person.

Once Inko pulled away from him, you handed her the flowers you had bought her and she thanked you vehemently before accepting them, clasping one of her hands in yours. “You must be, Y/N. Izuku’s told me so much about you!”

“It’s nice to meet you, Ms. Midoriya,” you replied as she embraced you as well. 

“Oh no, please call me Inko!” She insisted, opening the door further for you both to enter. “Come in, you two! I have dinner ready!”

You thanked her as you stepped inside, Midoriya right behind you. You both stood staring down at the impressive spread of dishes laid out across the elongated table. The surface was covered in your favorite dishes as well as Midoriya’s.

“Mom, isn’t this too much?” Midoriya asked.

“Of course not!” Inko shook her head as she urged you to take a seat. She smiled at you. “Izuku told me what your favorite foods were so I made them!”

“Thank you so much,” you said, making sure to thank her as much as you could before you and Midoriya began eating.

Inko’s place was much more spacious than the previous apartment her and her son lived in during his U.A. days. Once Midoriya began earning a truckload of money thanks to his highly paying job, the first thing he did was buy his mother a house to which she responded with a river of tears. The walls were plastered with Midoriya’s face and it made you smile, showing exactly how much she truly and genuinely loves her son.

“So, Y/N, you work at the Todoroki agency, correct?” Inko asked, beaming at you in eagerness.

You chewed and swallowed your food before answering. “Yes. I work as a receptionist at the front desk actually. That’s how Izuku and I met.”

Midoriya nodded, his face practically glowing from his wide smile. “I always got nervous whenever I had to meet Todoroki and Y/N was the person I had to talk to everytime I walked into the building.”

“That sounds like you. So I’m guessing Y/N, you were the one who asked him out?” Inko asked amusingly.

You chuckled, nodding along. “Of course! He couldn’t even say hi to me without freaking out.”

You and Inko erupted into a round of laughter with one another and although he was on the butt end of your teasing, he was glad that things were going well. 

As the night went on, the dinner went relatively well. Inko asked many questions, wanting to get to know the woman that her only child fell in love with. The more she got to know you, the more she understood how much of an amazing, kind, and caring person you were. She was comforted with knowing that Midoriya was in good hands.

“I’m going to go to the bathroom real quick. I’ll be right back!” Midoriya quipped, heading upstairs towards the restroom.

Inko watched as her son walked away, waiting until she heard the door close to quickly get up and grab something from under her seat. She made her way into the living room, urging you to follow her silently as you both sat onto the couch. She had a photobook in hand and she smiled gently at you. “It’s only right that I show you some pictures of baby Izuku. This is what parents do when they meet their child’s significant other, right?”

You laughed, nodding. “Of course! I’d love that.”

Inko opened the book, revealing the first picture of Midoriya as a newborn in his mother’s arms. Inko was overjoyed in the picture, her eyes flooding with tears. “I still remember this day like it was yesterday.”

You smiled as she turned the page and you both laughed at the sight of a naked baby Midoriya and you could already envision your boyfriend’s blushing and embarrassed face once he came and found out that his mom was revealing his past like this. 

The photos progressed throughout Midoriya’s childhood until the final picture captured him in his U.A. uniform about to go out the door with his signature quivering smile on his face. Inko looked down fondly at the picture, touching it with her index finger.

“Back then he was so small, just barely taller than I was… and now he’s all grown up.” She paused for a moment. “He was so dead set on going to U.A. and being a hero and I still get scared from time to time whenever I see the news and he’s constantly putting his life in danger. In the past I tried to hold him back because I was afraid that he’d get hurt. But I know now that he just cares too much about people and wanting to help others that I can’t hold him back.”

She turned to you, tears in her eyes as a few teardrops streaked her cheeks. “I know this might be a lot to ask for, but could you please look after him? You must know as well as I do that he can’t help but get himself caught up in some kind of trouble all the time.”

You smiled at her, embracing her into a hug. “I’d be honored, too. You don’t have to worry like that anymore. I’m here to watch after him.”

Inko nearly sobbed as she cried silently on your shoulder. “Thank you so much, Y/N. I’m so glad he has someone as wonderful as you in his life.”

Midoriya leaned back on the wall as he smiled to himself as he had been listening this whole time. The biggest invisible weight had been lifted from his shoulders. 

He was overjoyed to know that the two women he loved the most had finally met.

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[doomfisthero]

Dads for Deku: Day 3

Prompt: Family Bonding (Tokuda Taneo)

Setting: Canon-Compliant

Izuku had no idea how the two of them met. He wasn't even aware that his mother was open to meeting new people, with his father technically still in their lives.

“Honestly, I wasn't planning on it. It just sort of happened,” his mom said one night over dinner. “We ran into each other down at the corner bookstore, he saw what I was reading, and...” Midoriya Inko blushed like a much younger woman. “...we hit it off so well. He asked me out for coffee, and that was that.”

It bothered Izuku that he'd been too busy with school to know what had been happening with his mother, but he was more concerned with her own well-being. “Is he treating you well, at least?” Izuku asked, picking at his katsudon with a sudden lack of hunger.

His mom smiled gently. “Oh, Izuku. I'm doing just fine, I promise. He's such a considerate man, he makes me feel like a queen.” There was a lull in the conversation, and then she continued. “I've actually invited him over this weekend for dinner. I was wondering if you'd like to meet him?”

Izuku nearly dropped his chopsticks. “Oh, uh, of course!”

Inko smiled with relief. “Good! I think you'll get along. He's always been so calm and kind. And he's a reported, so maybe you two could talk about current events in Hero society.”

That had been the first clue. Izuku looked up with new interest. “A reporter, really?”

“That's right. His name is Tokuda. Tokuda Taneo.”

And that was the very large second one. Thankfully Izuku managed to mask his shocked outcry with the excuse that he'd heard of the man before. (Not technically a lie, just a whole lot left unsaid.)

He couldn't stop fretting all the way to the end of the week. Tokuda seemed like a good man, considerate of Izuku and All Might's shared lineage and trustworthy in keeping that secret. But this was his mom. Things were completely different.

When the night of the dinner arrived, Izuku returned home for the weekend and dressed nicely along with his mother. It probably wasn't necessary, she'd said, but she wanted to look good for Tokuda and Izuku wanted to support her.

At exactly the time that Inko had arranged, there was a knock at their apartment door. She hurried to answer it and smiled warmly. “Taneo! I'm so happy to see you tonight. Please, come in!”

In walked the reporter that Izuku had met many months ago, not terribly long before the raid on the Shie Hassaikai. He was also quite well-dressed, wearing a handsome tan vest and blue button-down shirt over khakis and dress shoes. Aside from that, he looked pretty much the same as before.

“Thanks so much for having me, Inko. I'm honored to be in such lovely company,” he said, kissing her on the cheek and smiling at Izuku. “Hello again, Izuku! I wasn't expecting to run into you again like this. I suppose a good kid like you would have such a wonderful mom.”

Izuku laughed along with his mom, but with a bit less sincerity.

“Okay, dinner's almost ready, so please make yourself at home! I'll let you and Izuku talk for a little while in the meantime,” Inko said. She glanced toward Izuku at smiled at his affirming nod before rushing into the kitchen.

Tokuda walked into the living room and sat himself onto the couch, sinking into it with bliss. “Oh, this feels good. I was on my feet all day hunting for a good scoop,” he said. He shot Izuku a mischievous smile. “Hey kid, you didn't hear this from me, but Kamui Woods is opening a him-brand cafe over in Tokyo. All-natural and stuff. He's put a ton of work into it.”

Izuku's eyes widened. “Really? I heard he was planning some new business ventures, but I didn't...” He caught himself and petered to a stop, watching Tokuda with a solemn gaze. “Can we talk?” He asked.

Tokuda met him with a gentle but serious smile and nodded. “Yeah, totally. Take a seat?” He patted the couch next to him. Izuku sat a little further down at the other end; if that upset Tokuda, it didn't show.

“So...what have you and my mom been up to?” Izuku asked. He felt incredibly awkward talking about this sort of thing, but he wanted to seem serious.

The reporter accepted that question with a small nod. “Really, we're just hanging out. We go out to eat and keep it casual, we go on walks and chat about books and our jobs and all that. Just seeing how things go.”

Izuku swallowed that with grace. It was easier than if they'd gotten serious really quickly. “And what do you think of my mom?” He asked.

Tokuda's face turned wistful. “She's an amazing woman, kid. Smart as a whip, super interesting. Everything she does, she does it sincere and focused. I love that.” He looked at Izuku and gave him a placating look. “But I'm not rushing into anything or making it a big deal before she's ready. We have a good thing going, and I want to keep it going as long as she does.”

“...You know I'll never forgive you, right?” Izuku asked. “If you ever do anything to hurt her.” The thought of his mother in pain stabbed into Izuku's stomach like cold knives.

“I wouldn't expect you to, buddy,” Tokuda replied, his usual calm smile thinned into a serious line. “That's the last thing I ever want to do to her. I swear.”

After a long and pregnant pause, Izuku nodded. “Okay, just making that clear,” he said. He really couldn't think of any reason to distrust that promise. He'd still keep an eye out; his mom deserved someone who'd be there for her.

“Absolutely, man,” Tokuda said. “...Hey, she doesn't know about your Quirk and All Might, does she? I don't get the sense that she does.”

The mention of One for All sent Izuku's spine tingling. He was in this territory again, a realm of secrets and taboo knowledge. “No, she doesn't,” he said quietly. “You can't tell her.”

It killed him to hide this from his mom, but he didn't need her worrying about him anymore than she did. He didn't need her becoming a target for Shigaraki and the League.

Tokuda looked Izuku in the eye. “I wouldn't dream of it. I can't imagine what could happen to her if the wrong people got ahold of her and she knew. Your secret's as safe as ever, buddy.”

Izuku felt some of the weight leave his chest. “Okay...okay, thanks. That's really good to hear.”

Tokuda slid closer to Izuku on the couch and slung his arm around the boy's shoulders. “Like I said, anything for you and your mom. She's every bit as special as you are, you know? You're a damn lucky kid to have her.”

Izuku smiled and nodded. “Yeah, I know. I really am.”

And as Inko saw her two men – one young and old, one old and new – seated next to each other and waited for a moment to announce that dinner was ready, they both knew that things would only change further from here, for better or worse. But the ace reporter and the Hero-in-training were more sure than ever that they would have each other's back, and that made things feel a little less frightening for both of them.

[belladxne]

i will see you where the shadow ends | chapter 4

[see notes for ao3 and ff links]

part of the put your faith in the light that you cannot see series AU: Breath of the Wild pairing: KiriBaku word count: 5,133

chapter 4: there’s a fog from the past that’s giving me, giving me such a headache

When Eijiro starfishes on the ground at the bottom of the tower, it’s not long before Inko’s leaning down over him, watching him with a fond expression. She’s content to chat with him like that for a minute or so while he gets his bearings, and when he gives an abridged, glossed-over summary of how atrocious fast travel was, she insists that if he lost his lunch he’ll just have to let her cook him a big dinner to make up for it.

“Well, if you’re gonna twist my arm about it,” he laughs gently, though he’s getting a little worried about overexerting her hospitality.

They agree again that it’s only fair he should help gather enough food for their dinner, and he figures it can’t set him back too much to hunt and forage a bit before heading for the nearest shrine. That decided, he dusts himself off from where he’d been slumped on the ground, and makes for the Forest of Spirits.

That’s where Eijiro meets his first Korok.

The little guy almost gives him a heart attack, too—Eijiro’s climbed an odd stone formation in the middle of the forest, hoping for a vantage point to hunt from, and is slightly puzzled by a large rock just… sitting there. It’s kind of huge, maybe bigger than his torso, but not quite big enough to make a good perch, so he doesn’t want to stumble over it while he’s focused on aiming his bow.

He heaves it over his head, just planning to heft it out of his way, when all of a sudden a triumphant little trumpet sounds and Eijiro drops the stone in alarm at an explosion of fairy lights in front of him. He barely hardens the dragonscales on his head fast enough to avoid concussing himself.

“Ya-ha-ha!” the forest spirit cheers, while Eijiro whines and rubs his head. “You found me!” The Korok bounces in absolute joy and utter delight for a moment, before suddenly tilting its head at him in apparent confusion. “Huh? You’re not Hestu!”

“Um,” Eijiro manages. The little spirit sounds so betrayed. “Sorry?”

“You can… see me?” the Korok asks next, apparently more concerned with this fact than with Eijiro’s apology. “I didn’t know your kind could see the children of the forest!”

“I… I guess I didn’t either?” Eijiro answers. It’s probably not strictly true—it’s more like the case of him being dragonblooded. He knows what a Korok is, recognizes one on sight—he’s probably seen them before? But he hasn’t thought about it at all, hadn’t even thought about their existence or the potentiality of meeting one, so he may as well have been blind to them before now.

“Wow!” the little plant cries, awed. Eijiro is glad to see that the betrayal has been left in the past. “You must be very special! Like the Deku Sprout!”

“Thanks?” Eijiro says, and it occurs to him that most of his contributions to this conversatiion have been in a confused and questioning tone. Might as well keep up the streak. “Um, and what is that exactly?” He feels like he should know. The term sounds familiar, like a mental sensation of a word being right on the tip of his tongue.

“Not what,” the Korok gasps, scandalized. “Who! The Deku Sprout is a person! We Koroks love the Deku Sprout. He’s the Great Deku Tree’s successor, and he’s wonderful!”

Oh. Of course—with that, the information does come flooding to mind. A long chain of heroes chosen by the Goddess Farore, with Her blessing passed down between them, tasked with protecting Her creations. Nature in particular, but She’d created all life in the land and this chosen hero was meant to look out for all of it, accordingly. Her magic would grow in them, keeping them strong and youthful until it would begin to overtake them, and they would have to settle in one place as Her magic transformed them into a giant tree—the Great Deku Tree.

And then they would pick another hero worthy of Farore’s blessing—someone to receive a mere sprout of their power, to store and cultivate on their own as they protected the land. That was the origin of the name Deku Sprout, but that name for them was probably more popular among creatures of the forest than regular Hylians. That was why it hadn’t been immediately familiar.

He was pretty sure Hylians had preferred other titles for the role, but the current Great Deku Tree, a legendary hero named All Might, had taken so long to choose a successor that most had forgotten the legends, and the titles with them. Eijiro could vaguely remember that there were tales of how All Might had prolonged his retirement and transformation for so long that he’d gone into his last few battles with bark already overtaking his skin.

“Oh—you’re right, sorry, sorry.” Eijiro nods his acknowledgement and understanding of the Korok’s words. “But… you said I’m like him? I don’t... think I’m the Deku Sprout.”

“Of course not!” The Korok uses a tone that makes it sound like he’s trying to explain a very simple concept to a very silly small child (and the irony is not lost on Eijiro), like Eijiro’s not understanding him on purpose. “The Deku Sprout is in the castle!”

“In… there?” Eijiro asks somewhat dubiously, nodding his head in the direction of Hyrule Castle, though their view is blocked by all the trees in the way. The place doesn’t exactly seem hospitable, clearly.

“Oh, yes!” the forest spirit chatters, clearly eager to gush about this topic. “He’s a hero, Mister! He’s protecting all of us! He’s been fighting the Calamity for a long, long time, but he’ll be back soon! All Might said it won’t be long anymore, and then he’ll come back to the forest.”

In the castle? Holding the Calamity off? “Huh...” Eijiro manages, but it comes out weak and distant to his own ears, as his thoughts race. The voice, his voice, he knows it’s coming from the castle—is that what the voice has been doing, too? It makes sense—he hadn’t said as much, really, but he was asking for Eijiro’s help, and he’d said he was waiting and that the monster was regaining strength. A long time… was he fighting All for One for all of those one hundred years?

“Um, I gotta... go...” he tells the Korok distractedly. He’s got a lot to think about now. For a moment he almost wonders, are his voice and the Deku Sprout one and the same? But, Farore’s associated with green, not golden light, and besides, nature powers wouldn’t let someone talk to him in his head. Unless they would, but it wouldn’t make any sense. So… are they in there together, then?

“Okay!” The Korok seems oblivious to how lost in thought Eijiro has become, dancing excitedly from foot to foot. “But wait! If you run into Hestu, please return this to him.”

Eijiro’s not sure where the seed that the Korok produces came from, since it’s not like the little guy has pockets, but he takes it and stares at it blankly. It’s… literally just a seed. There’s probably a lot of others like it. He has no idea why he’s being tasked with this. “Um… okay? But I don’t know who Hestu is.”

“Doesn’t matter! You’ll know him if you see him. You can’t miss him!”

Eijiro figures he might as well just accept it.

He returns from hunting with three Korok seeds in his pockets, and two foxes that he’d managed to catch—which he skins and cuts up for Inko to begin cooking into stew before he finally steels himself for the next shrine. Inko thanks him warmly and sees him off, but there’s something tense in her demeanor.

Her eyes seem tight with worry, but when Eijiro tries to ask what’s wrong she just waves him off and makes him promise to be safe. He doesn’t hesitate to give her his word—he couldn’t bear to make her worry, but really, as uneasy as he is about the shrines, he knows he can handle them.

The ruins aren’t far from Inko’s home at all—honestly, he’s had to pass them at a distance, a bunch. It doesn’t take him long to make his way to them, and they’re surrounded by… odd shapes of some sort, the kind he’s seen dotted around the Great Plateau in several places, but this is the closest he’s actually gotten to any of them. They’re all tarnished and moss-covered, too much so to make out what they might have looked like once, and he can’t figure out what they were for.

Not statues, surely, because their positioning is too random and too haphazard. The only thing he does know, is now that he’s close enough to make out details, they fill him with the most visceral unease and dread he’s ever felt in his life.

He spends a solid minute staring at one, throat dry and palms clammy, before he manages to convince himself to inch closer. There’s no reason he should be so—so—so scared shitless by a hunk of lifeless material. They’re stationary. What’s his problem?

Man up, he chides himself, swallowing roughly as he pokes around one. It’s… not so bad when he gets in close, because he can focus on just the area right in front of him, and ignore the whole shape. It’s made of metal, he realizes, knocking on a scuffed and dulled part of the material and hearing a hollow and muted clang as he does so. Squatting down, he leans a hand against the moss-covered material and peers into one of several openings near the bottom of the shape.

As he runs his hand around the opening, brow furrowed in thought as he tries to piece together what these things are and why they agitate him so much, something comes loose in his hand. Pulling it out, he stares at—a screw?

Something similar had come out of the automatons he’d been forced to fight in the last shrine. Looking up at the shape again, Eijiro bites his lip, his unease building again. Was this another machine just like those? Near the top, he now realizes there’s a circular indent that—that looks like the eyes of the automatons, where their lasers had fired from.

Eijiro blanches.

He can’t imagine what machines of this size would do—what kind of damage that eyes of that size could cause. He grips the screw he’d pilfered tightly to keep his hand from shaking, and suddenly his fear doesn’t seem as ridiculous or confusing to him now. He’s just glad they’re all clearly defunct. Taking in a shaky, steadying breath, Eijiro stands and backs away quickly, regardless.

He just… doesn’t want to be around them. That’s all.

He skirts around it as he moves further past the battered and half-collapsed walls of what the map tells him used to be the Eastern Abbey. Skirting through one opening, he makes his way into an area clearly far more open than it once was—there’s half of an archway in the center of the space, the only testament to whatever walls once divided this particular area. There are two more of those intimidating defunct machines lodged in the rubble on either side of that arch. Beyond them stands a complete doorway in one of the few whole walls, though its opening is sealed over with debris.

Still, these walls are all cracked and littered with ivy and plantlife, so climbing them won’t be any problem at all. Eijiro’s not worried as he makes his way forward—at least, not about how to get to the shrine. He wishes he didn’t have to walk so closely between the lifeless machines, though.

He’s hardly more than a few steps into the clearing when it happens—the machine on the right, it moves. The top of it rattles and lifts, the whole creation suddenly glowing red as it spins to face him, and then—that fucking sound, like a gong or a hand slamming down on an out of tune piano, and Eijiro—

Eijiro can’t fucking move as the eye lights up piercingly blue and stares him down. His blood turns to ice in his veins and his breath feels solid in his lungs as he tries to choke past it and every muscle in his body draws painfully tense and he can’t—he can’t—

He can’t move and can’t think and he can’t afford to run he has to stay and fight, but there’s no point it’s over he can’t do this they’re going to kill him, they’re going to kill them both, and then they’re going to kill everyone and he can’t stop it he just has to—

The eye shifts colors. The blue’s suddenly deep and dark—a line of red light beams out of it, directly onto Eijiro. A strangled gasp gets caught in his throat, and he runs. Involuntarily he scrambles, nearly tripping over his own legs. He manages to slam himself behind a ruined wall, in the same instant a white-hot beam of light flares past where he’d just been. It blasts into a wall behind him, a sob escaping Eijiro as an explosion of flame and light bursts at the impact point. It sears his skin, even fifteen feet away.

Eijiro presses himself flat to the wall, legs curled close to his chest, face buried in his knees as he struggles for breath. His heart’s pounding so painfully he thinks it’ll break his rib cage and he grips tight around his legs with one arm, his other hand gripping at his own hair tight enough to hurt.

He needs—he needs to—fuck, he has to get away from here, he can’t—he doesn’t know what that thing is but some deeply ingrained part of him must, because he still can’t control the trembling of his limbs or the stinging of his eyes. He can hear it, on the other side of the wall, a constant whirring and deep, menacing humming all paired with a mechanical grating as it turns its head back and forth, searching for him.

He has to go. He knows without trying that his sword would break on this thing before he could get any real damage done. It’s armored, heavily, and even its insides are made of metal. His sword’s fine, but he knows the difference between fine and good or even great. It could never survive an attack on that thing.

He could just… he could continue to use this wall for cover, and get as far as his legs will take him, keeping obstacles between them until he’s gone and doesn’t ever have to do this again. It would be easy. It would be easy, but…

He has to get to that shrine. He has to get off this plateau, and help the voice—fuck, the voice, he’s in the castle, with something so much worse than this stupid, stuck robot that can’t even move. Why the hell can’t Eijiro get himself together? He knocks his forehead against his knees over and over, trying desperately to manage something other than the choked, hiccuping gasps that keep escaping him.

How can—how can he even think about running away from this? If he can’t jump into action now, when it’s his own life on the line and his enemy can’t even move, how is he ever going to help anyone else? How is he ever going to face All for One? The voice… Eijiro’s going to fail him. He can’t give in here.

He still can’t even draw a full breath properly, but he can’t let it stop him. He moves to grab the hilt of his sword, starting to push himself up against the wall beside him before—before—he slumps, sliding back down the wall and onto his ass. His knees are still too weak to hold him, but even if they weren’t, it’s his resolve that failed.

Eijiro knows he can’t fight this thing. He hasn’t seen a weapon on this plateau that could even make a dent. He’s being a coward, he knows, but… but he doesn’t want to die fighting a battle he can’t win. He’ll never help the voice that way. So… so he has to figure out something else.

His mind scrambles through what he knows, trying to figure out something—any piece of information he can use. Think. He tries to comb through what just happened, to pinpoint anything…

It hadn’t targeted him right away. That’s what he realizes first. It had taken a moment, to find him, and only then did the red light flash towards him. And—and it hadn’t fired right away either. The red light had lingered on him, a strange clicking sound emanating from the machine, until a final beep. It had fired a split-second after that. But—but it also hadn’t moved. The line of red light had locked in place after the sound, while Eijiro kept moving, and then it had fired, at where Eijiro had been.

So—so if he moves fast enough…

He can get past this thing.

He doesn’t want to risk getting close to the machine, and he doesn’t want to bet his life on being fast enough to dodge only in that split-second where it can’t track him, but… there are walls littered all around them. The shrine is surrounded on all four sides. If he can just keep to cover, moving faster than the beam can focus in on him, until he can scale that last wall—it won’t be able to target him.

Eijiro has a plan. He can do this.

It goes off without a hitch, more or less, for the first sixty seconds or so. Yeah, he’s scared out of his godsdamned mind the moment he sees the flash of red, every time he sees it—but he only has to sprint through the open twice, and both times are fleeting. He makes it around a corner, out of the thing’s sight, but even as he sags with relief he refuses to believe he’s out of the woods.

The place is littered with the remains of those machines, and now he knows he needs to be wary of all of them. He finds himself at a dead end, walls around him on most sides, so he tries to loosen his muscles and gets to climbing. Despite his protesting muscles, he heaves himself over quickly.

He finds himself a little too out in the open—the machine has a line of sight on him from here, if it thinks to turn around, so he sprints again for the wall to the side of the shrine. It won’t see him from there, at least. But just as soon as he makes it, he sees—there’s another one up ahead. And it gives a shudder.

The second one lights up, its eye turning to Eijiro, and his heart stops.

His heart stops and he runs—he doesn’t freeze up this time, bolting for the wall, and he doesn’t even waste time looking for handholds. He just feels claws overtaking his hands, and he jabs them into the stone with enough force to crack it himself, making his own handholds as he claws his way up. He’s over just as the beam locks on, hurling himself past the wall heedlessly of the fall waiting.

He rolls to dispel as much of his momentum as he can, scales hardening across his skin to absorb what force he can’t, and then—

And then it sinks in. He did it. Part of him wants to whoop for joy but the rest of him is still too breathless and shaky, and he lets himself flop flat on the long grass that’s overtaken the ruins, right at the foot of the shrine. He doesn’t remember if he was the praying type before he woke up in that shrine, but he lays a hand over his pounding heart and thanks each of the Goddesses and Bakusatsuo in turn, earnest and sincere.

Ja Baij Shrine does give him another rune. It won’t get him off the plateau, but it is badass.

He can now summon bombs, two types of them, out of the slate at will. He doesn’t know how often he’ll need that, but just having the option makes him feel pretty damn powerful. Admittedly, the trial this shrine offers is just as easy—maybe easier—than the magnesis trial had been, but he keeps messing it up.

When he first comes in, the adrenaline is only just draining from his system, and all of his limbs feel heavy with exhaustion. The fear response from earlier hasn’t fully left him, either, and it makes his hands just a little shaky—the result is he keeps fumbling his grip on the bombs, not quite judging his throws correctly. Several times he has to stop to take a few deep breaths, shake his hands out, and hope for the best as he attempts the same toss he’s messed up two or three times already.

Still, he gets through it in about the same amount of time, and he endures Ja Baij’s weird purple mist and spontaneous disintegration with only some contained distaste and not outright panic this time. Progress!

When he steps out of the shrine, the same odd energy that’s been humming under his skin since the first one is there still, stronger now. He’s still unsettled by it, but—but whatever it is, the ‘strength of these monks’ spirits’, it’s supposed to help, so he tries not to let it bother him. He steps out into the beginning of sunset, and he realizes—

He’d thought there could be nothing he’d ever hate more than fast travel, and he was so wrong. Standing on the surface of the shrine, realizing he’ll have to get past those looming machines on the other side of the walls, Eijiro doesn’t have to debate long. He pulls out the slate, braces himself, and taps Oman Au Shrine on the map—it’s farther, but like hell is he going to climb down the tower a third time, in this state.

He’s in hell for all of the five seconds it takes him to be ripped across the plateau, but, hey, he doesn’t throw up this time!

Sure, he stumbles to his hands and knees as soon as he arrives, and he has to close his eyes to ride out the waves of nausea that hit him, but he doesn’t even dry heave so he’ll take the win. He takes as many deep breaths as he needs to to calm his stomach, and then he pulls himself to his feet, heading back towards Inko’s home once more.

It’s really nice, to have somewhere that cozy and safe to recoup, after all the worst of today.

Inko looks about ready to cry when he arrives back at her tiny house, two more Korok seeds in his possession. Actually, he can’t be sure she doesn’t actually start crying—he has to look away fast, just in case, before he’s in danger of his own waterworks possibly starting in response to hers.

“Oh, you’re safe, thank goodness,” she breathes, waving him in almost frantically. He can’t even get a word out before she’s ushering him into a seat at her table, and she keeps him there with a hand firmly on his shoulder, not even letting him move to dish his own meal up. She ladles the stew she’s had simmering for the past two hours or so into a bowl herself, and puts it in front of him.

He’s not sure where all the nervous energy comes from, but it doesn’t fully fade through most of the meal, even as they talk over their dinner. Every time she stands—to dish up seconds for either of them, or to grab something across the room—she finds an excuse to touch Eijiro, laying a hand on his back or shoulder. One time, she even strokes his hair, the gesture motherly and caring. It’s like she has to keep reminding herself he’s there and not hurt. Eijiro doesn’t know what to make of it.

It’s well and truly dark out by the time Eijiro finishes eating, and that’s when it finally hits him—

“Oh… I should probably figure out somewhere to camp out for the night.” He hadn’t even thought about it before, and he wishes he’d thought to get set up someplace before it was dark out. Still, he doesn’t think it’ll be too hard. It feels like something he’ll know how to do.

Inko raises her eyebrows at him. “What are you talking about? You’re staying here, of course.”

“Really?” he blurts, surprised and hesitant. “Are… are you sure? You’ve already fed me twice, and given me hair ties, and helped me out so much today, you don’t have to—”

“But I want to, and I will,” she says, firm. It’s hard to argue with her, especially with gratitude swelling in his chest, but…

“I—I really don’t want to be a burden—”

“You could never,” she insists gently, but she leaves little room for argument. “I would never forgive myself if I made you fend for yourself in your situation. You’ll stay here tonight. And tomorrow, if we haven’t figured out how to get you down from the plateau, either. I want to do this for you, and you’re going to let me, young man.”

“Okay...” He swallows, and his voice is not just a little wobbly, thank you very much. “Um… where...”

“You’ll take the bed,” she says without looking at him as she begins to gather their dishes, and Eijiro shakes his head.

“I can’t! I couldn’t make you sleep on the floor, and it’s your house!”

Inko just shakes her head, glancing his way with a warm smile. “You can. I wouldn’t be using it much, anyways. It would be a waste. Trust me, dear, getting old ruins your sleep. You can’t sleep through the night anymore, and you’ll be napping throughout the day no matter what you do. You’ll take the bed.”

“But that’s not fair,” Eijiro protests. “You keep doing so much for me, at least let me repay you by letting you keep your bed.”

Setting their stacked bowls down, Inko reaches across the table to lay a hand over his, regarding him with a fond, no-nonsense look. “Eijiro, honey, you do not have to repay me for a single thing. You deserve a good night’s sleep after the day you’ve had, and I won’t accept no for an answer. Besides, I have some things I want to work on tonight. I think I have an idea how to help you get down safely, so I won’t be sleeping much tonight anyways. I insist, and it will make me happier than any other sort of repayment you could give me.”

Eijiro presses his lips together, and he can feel a lump in his throat. She’s so kind and helpful, and he doesn’t even know what he did to deserve it. Letting him have her food, some of her things, even her bed, and on top of it all she’s planning to lose sleep working on a way to help him tonight. He doesn’t understand but he’ll never forget how much he owes her as long as he lives.

“Why—” He has to clear his throat, voice a little hoarse. “Why are you… so nice? You’re doing so much for me—and I appreciate it! I really, really do! But you don’t even know me, why...”

Inko’s expression softens, and turns just a little sad. She takes a deep breath, and the smile she offers him is heartbreaking.

“You remind me—an awful lot, actually—of my son,” she tells him quietly. She clasps her hands in front of her and her eyes grow distant, but thinking about him clearly brings her so much joy. “I haven’t seen him since he was your age, but you’re just like him. You’re both such sweet, polite boys. It’s—it’s a terribly dangerous world out there, but he’s keeping people safe, just like you want to. You both think so much about other people—and you’re so brave.”

Her voice wavers on the last word and then—and then she’s crying, tears an absolute flood, and before Eijiro realizes it he’s got tears spilling down his cheeks, too. “Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—”

“It’s all r-right,” Inko says, but he can barely make it out through her tears. “Really, it is, I just—I just love him so m-much.”

“I can tell,” Eijiro says, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes, but it doesn’t do much to stem the flow of his sympathetic tears. “He’s—he’s got a really great mom.”

“I have a really w-wonderful son,” she responds, and Eijiro can’t see with his hands pressed to his eyes, but he can hear that her weeping is only getting worse, and it just makes his worse in response. “I kn-know he’s thinking about m-me every day, just like I think about him. And that’s why I’m looking after you, Eijiro. I w-want to look after you the same way I’d—I’d hope someone would look after my baby. So just l-let me do that, okay?”

“Okay,” Eijiro just barely manages, his own voice wobbling and wavering just like hers. He pulls his hands away from his eyes to see her frantically trying to stem the flow of her tears with a handkerchief, but it’s not getting her very far.

“Good,” she wails, and together the two of them are a complete and utter mess.

Eventually they manage to pull themselves together, enough so for Inko to finish cleaning up after their dinner and for Eijiro to get ready for bed. He doesn’t have the heart, after all that, to argue with her further, and the complete and utter happiness on her face when he finally starts to climb into the bed makes getting past his hesitation completely worth it. He hopes that wherever her son is, he understands exactly how wholeheartedly wonderful his mother is, and cherishes her appropriately.

By the Goddesses, Eijiro hadn’t realized how exhausted he was after everything until the exact moment his head hits the pillow—he tries to stay awake long enough to plan out how to get to the two shrines left on the plateau tomorrow, but it’s in vain.

The last thing he sees before his eyes shut for good is Inko pulling out a sewing kit and something that looks like a blanket, maybe? It’s vibrant red and has the winged Triforce symbol of Hyrule on it. He doesn’t even have time to wonder how a blanket might help him get down from the plateau before sleep barrels into him with all the force of one of his newly-acquired bombs.

[musicfeedsmysoul12]

My Brother

Summary: When Inko is fifteen she is handed a picture of her and a blonde boy. She asks who it is. "Your brother. Your parents gave him up because he was Quirkless." Inko spends the next part of her life looking for her brother, only for her son to pull him into her house one day, announcing he found Uncle Toshinori. 

On AO3

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  When Inko was fifteen, her aunt pulled her to the side and handed her a photo. The photo featured her as a little baby, green hair showing above her head, dressed in a little jumper with a pacifier in her mouth. She’s being held awkwardly by a blond boy with big blue eyes, a big grin across his face.

  “Who’s this?” She asked her aunt, curious.

  “Your brother.” Her aunt told her.

 “What?” Inko asked. She looked at the photo again. “Is… what happened?” She asked her aunt, clutching it in her hand.

  “Your parents waited for his Quirk. He didn’t have one.” Her aunt told her, blunt. Her aunt’s hands were threaded together, clutching each other. “They didn’t like that.”

  “... but they work with Quirkless Discrimination agencies. They donate money to…” Inko began but her mind began clicking, thinking.

  Her father’s slight sneer when talking about Quirkless people when they were home, just the family. Her mother’s muttering about donating money being a pain.

  “... they’re pretending.” She whispered. Her aunt nodded.

  “They are. Its status, it’s trendy. Pretending you aren’t a bigot.” Her aunt shrugged. Inko didn’t want to believe. She gave the photo back anyway when her aunt asked her.

 She had to talk to them.

 -0-

  “YOU’RE NOTHING BUT A BUNCH OF LIARS!” She screamed at her father. “He was my brother-“

  “He was useless to us!” Her father snapped. “Quirkless- worth nothing in the long run. Your useless Quirk at least makes you a viable bride-“

  “GO TO HELL!” She screamed and ran up to her room.

  “Calm down, she’ll understand. He wasn’t worth it.”

  Screw that. She grabbed her cell phone and called her aunt.

  “Auntie, can you bring your truck?”

  “Of course.”

  It didn’t take long for Inko to pack up what she needed. She ignored the knocking of her mother when it happened and she waited.

  Her aunt showed up.

  “Haruka! Why are you here?” She heard from downstairs and came down, carrying a few bags.

  “The rest are upstairs. I refuse to be in a house of hypocrites.” Her parents didn’t like it, yelling she was overreacting.

  Her threat to tell everyone the truth about her brother had them letting her go.

  Maybe she was overreacting. Maybe. She thought so the moment she got in her aunt’s big grey truck, the one she used to deliver things. She looked to the front door where her parents were glaring at her aunt who stood with her arms crossed.

  Her tall aunt, blonde hair hanging down her back, like her brother’s, Inko’s father. She was tall, tough. Inko looked up to her. Ever since she was a little kid and her aunt had thrown her father into a wall when he’d dared hit Inko.

  “You treat your kid right or I’ll hurt you.” She’d threatened.

  Inko blinked, mind going to many incidents in her life where her aunt had stepped in to stop them from hurting Inko. Where her aunt had told her to not listen to her mother who picked at her appearance, where her aunt had snuck her food when her mother forced her into a diet. Where her aunt had given her money and helped her open a bank account her parents had no control over and had fought with her parents who tried to demand she give them the information.  

  Sitting in the truck, she realized that maybe… the fact they would do that, lie like that… that was the final straw.

 -0-

  Living with her aunt was different. Inko found herself smiling more. Her aunt had a sense of humour that encouraged loud laughter. She never made Inko do anything she didn’t want and even let her drop out of some clubs that her parents had made her go to.

  Inko found herself happy for the first time in a long time as she and her aunt tried to find out how to find her brother.

  It was hard though. The files weren’t kept and her parents had given up all custody and signed multiple forms. As well, it had been fourteen years back.

  Then her aunt got sick. Very sick.

  “Cancer,” the doctors told her. “Pancreatic- most likely from all the chemicals she transported over the years.”

  Pancreatic. Even in the 23 century, it was impossible to cure. Medical research in cancer and other such diseases had tapered off when Quirks became a thing. More focus was on that for a good fifty years or so. Then after that more focus was on other sorts of diseases brought around by Quirks or researching how to help people affected by Quirks.

  “I’m not dying until you’re old enough to be an adult.” Her aunt grunted when Inko asked her how she was feeling. “Eighteen kiddo.” She bared her teeth. “Gotta hold on.”

  Inko was eighteen and just finally finished high school when her aunt died. Her aunt had been living at home still, stubborn and refusing to go to hospice.

  Inko came home after a night out after graduating high school to find her dead.

  The funeral was a hard affair, her parents at least respectful enough to not start anything until after when they tried to get her to move back in with them.

  “I was already accepted into university and will be living in the dorms. As well I told them you are not allowed to ever call and change anything about my classes or living arrangements.”

  They were so mad and she got a call from the dorm manager who told her that they’d had several calls from them within a week. Each time demanding she not be allowed to room there or threatening them.

  None worked. Inko ended up cutting off contact with some help from a friend she made in a study group, Midoriya Hisashi. He was so handsome and kind. He also understood her struggles.

  “I grew up in the foster system for a good portion of my life. I got adopted at fourteen and… they weren’t good. Obsessed with the idea of being my parents, burning things I had of my biological parents. They were the sort of abusers who were kind, the ones you don’t realize are hurting you.”

  It was like Inko and her own. She didn’t know their controlling behaviours, their actions were abuse.

  Not until her aunt and her brother.

  Soon after a few heart to hearts, they started dating, something that her roommate Mitsuki loved.

  “He’s freaking handsome, you go girl!”

  When Inko graduated with a degree in culinary arts, Hisashi proposed while heading to law school.

  They got married the summer after. During that time though they discovered that Hisashi’s adopted parents died. Inko made the choice to try and let her own parents back into her life because she saw how much it hurt him.

  “He’s so nice honey-“ Her mother said when they got in, stopping at seeing one of the photos in their apartment. Her and her brother.

  Inko kept an eye on her mother after that, right up to the time she caught the woman trying to take it down.

  “Stop it!”

  “He’s not your brother he’s some      thing-    “ Inko didn’t let her say another word and shoved her out.

  She didn’t talk to them again.

  “Please don’t regret it,” Hisashi told her.

  “I won’t,” Inko told him.

  She continued to look for her brother, her husband helping. But it was hard. Harder, even more, when she became pregnant at age 28, just when Hisashi was finishing law school. They took a break, Inko going on maternity leave from the bakery she was working at.

  She gave birth to a perfect little boy she loved dearly. Hisashi loved him too, even as his work became demanding. Being part of a hero’s legal team was hard after all. Especially a destructive one like the Empire who could cause earthquakes by accident.

  Mitsuki already had a son named Katskii herself and the two hoped their sons would become friends, and it looked like they would though Inko worried. Katsuki was a headstrong little boy who seemed to love bossing others around. He was sometimes mean to Izuku and his meanness was cruel in ways she knew could cause problems.

  Mitsuki at least also saw it. But her own parenting didn’t work well.

  “My parents used to slap me around,” she told Inko blankly. “My dad once held my head underwater for a minute because I pissed him off. I… I try you know? But… where’s the line?”

  “My parents controlled every aspect of my life. They would force me on diest when I was already too thin, would go through my emails and phone. My dad hit me too, but my aunt… she stepped in each time.” Inko told her back. They both knew already, but it was nice to talk about.

  When her son, Izuku, was four though she sat in a doctor’s office and heard the worst discussion of Quirklessness in her life.

  “That test hasn’t been allowed to diagnose Quirklessness for twenty-years!” she shouted at the doctor. “Blood test, now!” The doctor was pissed and refused so she stomped out with her son, making sure each parent in the waiting room knew the doctor was using outdated medical information before rescheduling an appointment with a different doctor.

  Inko was darkly pleased that Dr. Tsubasa ended up being reprimanded and forced to take more classes. There was some issue with his grandson but his parents dealt with that.

  Yet, when the blood tests came back, Izuku was diagnosed as Quirkless.

  “He has no Quirk himself, though we believe any child he has with a Quirked individual will have a much more powerful Quirk than their other parent.” the doctor said. He was nicer at least. Izuku was so fragile, so small about this as they went home. He watched his favourite hero video, Inko watching from the door to the office.

  “...Mama, can I be a hero too?” little Izuku said. Inko felt like breaking down. She didn’t think so. Izuku was so small, so little. And she had never heard about a Quirkless hero. But then she thought of her brother.

  “I don’t know sweetie,” she finally admitted. She walked up to him and knelt down, hugging him. “But… I think you can do your best.” It wasn’t enough and she knew it but she also knew too well the Quirkless statistics.

  That was the first night she told Izuku about her brother. She showed him the picture and explained.

  “I won’t be like my parents,” she promised him. And she wouldn’t. Hisashi promised as well, and the two worked hard to make sure he was happy.

  Inko did eventually go back to work when Izuku was five, hoping and praying her son would be okay.

  She knew he was lying when he came home with ruined clothes and claimed it was all accidents. She knew he was lying when he tried to claim he was okay. But she couldn’t do anything. Not without actual proof.

  She hoped Katsuki was helping her son.

  She had a terrible feeling he wasn’t.

 -0-

  Inko and Hisashi began talking about opening a cafe when Izuku was six. The little boy was all for it, offering ideas and his own thoughts. They were happy. Inko still looked for her brother but she had accepted it might never happen. Izuku dreamed of being a hero. Hisashi was doing well at work.

  And then…

  Empire accidentally destroyed his own agency. Lost control.

  Hisashi didn’t make it.

  The large payout from the agency plus the Hero Public Safety Commission was enough for Inko to not have to work for years if they were careful.

  It didn’t fix a single thing.

  Inko would admit she lost herself for a year, completely unable to think or do anything. She wandered her apartment blankly.

  It took her son hiding a broken wrist from her to snap her out of it. She was horrified and she marched into the school to scream at them. She listed exactly what she knew about anti-Quirkless Discrimination laws, and what she could do to them.

  Izuku stopped being hurt that bad. But emotional abuse from his peers and teachers was harder to figure out.

  Inko began to work on the cafe again, as well as she began helping out at rallies on anti-Quirkist ideas. Inko also made sure Izuku knew he could go to her no matter what, but also tried not to be her parents. She tried not to butt in at any time and let him live his own life.

  As he got older she wondered if she should try more. If her hands-off approach was as bad as her own parent’s actions to her.

  But she was terrified. She didn’t want to be them.

  Inko watched as her son got older, as he got more secretive and worried. She tried to get him into programs but each time she was refused. Or they would let him go but then stop, saying he kept having people come and harass him.

  “Then why is it his fault?” she asked them. They shrugged.

  It was just easier to get rid of him than others. Izuku got very quiet after that and stopped wanting to do extra things.

  She worried and worried and she would look at the photo of her brother. She wondered if the worry she had would be for him as well. If she had grown up with an older brother who was hated, who had to fight to be respected by anyone.

  She was pretty sure she’d be more of a mess.

 She also imagined though, a tall man coming in to help with Izuku. Who would help fight against the school. Who would be with her through the death of Hizashi.

  She often stared at the photograph of her and her brother, wondering what if.

  The cafe she started had a copy of the photograph and any person making any Quirkist comments was thrown out in seconds. She provided a safe space for everyone, and she found that by doing so she got a lot of customers from people who struggled to find a place in society.

  It attracted other attention to, including a man she was fairly certain was an underground hero who came in with a black jumpsuit, getting the darkest coffee. He was a nice enough man though, and Inko found herself enjoying conversations with him. Mostly about cats or his loud friend she wanted to tell him was hitting on him.

  When a loud man came in asking for the ‘regular coffee order’ for the jumpsuit guy she stared him down.

  “Ask him out, we’re all done with his pining.” The man spluttered. “He talks about you nonstop. I don’t know his name, he pays with cash. He has mentioned you though enough I can recognize you on site. Ask him out please.”

  Shuichi, one of the cafe workers snorted. “We’re all done. Please just date him already.” The lizard-like teen continued to work while the blonde spluttered but did leave with the regular coffee and an order for himself.

  A week later both showed up, holding hands.

  “Yay! The pinning is over!” Shuichi said from where he was trying to help Izuku with math, his angry mutters about how the teachers were purposely fudging his grades making Inko plan another trip to the school to threaten them.

  “Yay!” Izuku laughed, the nine-year-old grinning at the nasty look he got. “You don’t scare me. I saw you sneak a cat in here in your scarf.”

  Inko found herself laughing harder than ever that night, and the two- Shouta and Hizashi- became friends of the family.

  As time continued to tick by, even with moments like the one where she made friends with the two she kept worrying. As Izuku got more and more nervous about school, as she saw scars he kept claiming she was mistaken about. As Mitsuki began whispering her worries over her son and how the school seemed to not worry over his anger or his attitude, as they seemed to ignore it.

  She tried to talk to him but didn’t know what to do. She felt lost.

  Then, he was fourteen and came home with a smile on his face and a spark in his eyes. He spoke happily and told her of his plan to start working out soon. She smiled and told him she was proud. It was March, nearing the end of his second year of middle school and she was happy he was happy.

  A week into his spring vacation, he opened the door to the apartment holding the hand of a tall blonde man. She frowned.

  “Izuku?” she asked him before she got a good look at the man. Her eyes widened at seeing that face.

  “Mom… I found uncle Toshinori.”

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0- 

Is Shuichi who you think it is? Yes. Originally I was like: this is just an AU where it just so happens All Might is Inko’s brother but then my brain went: okay but- so Spinner is good in this AU as he managed to find a job with Inko and is the older brother figure to Izuku.

Hope you guys liked this! Next part would be a One Shot from All Might's perspective then we actually get the story-story from Izuku's!

[des-draws]

1-A autistic hcs!

Alright it’s already past midnight here but. I’m still posting this.

Back in my 1-A pride hcs post I also mentioned my autistic hcs, and said I might elaborate on them in April. But because I am a master of procrastination, of course I left it for last minute. 

But either way, here you go; over 3k of projection and infodumping. I’m gonna leave an AO3 link in the replies if it’s easier for you to read there.

(general tw for some mentions of ableism, and specifically tw for ableism/child abuse/ende*vor in the very first bulletpoint)

Todoroki

Ende*vor absolutely refused to believe that there could be something “wrong” with the one supposed to surpass All Might, and so he ignored any and all traits Todoroki would show, punished him for the ones he couldn’t ignore, and chalked up the meltdowns he caused him to Todoroki being a brat.

As such, Todoroki spent a lot of his life masking and hiding and suppressing himself.

Thankfully, much like with everything else, after moving to the dorms he’s starting to unlearn all that internalized shit and instead accept himself for who he is- including indulging in suppressed stims, special interests and other autistic behaviours in a safe, accepting environment. 

He’s found that cold soba is apparently a samefood for him- he knew he liked it enough to eat it all the time without getting bored of it (not that he actually does, since with their hero training a balanced, diverse diet is important), but he didn’t know there was a word for that.

Monotone voice and trouble with facial expressions, you know how it goes. He actually tries to use the “correct” tone and make the “correct” expression, if only so that the people he’s supposed to protect don’t think of him as “aloof”, but he gets easily tired of going back to the masking. He cares, he cares so much, this is just not one of the ways of showing it that comes to him naturally.

Can people please stop talking in metaphors and idioms around him and expect him to know the translation to everything. Thank you.

He’s reluctantly letting himself indulge in his recently discovered special interest on a certain manga series; he’s been buying the volumes, and at some point Sero found him reading one and they started bonding over it. Now Todoroki goes to Sero when he feels like infodumping- though, he has to be careful not to spoil anything. Sero is a way behind since he doesn’t go through the volumes like someone’s chasing him. He has, however, helped Todoroki make a blog where he can infodump about it, spoilers and all. He’s quickly becoming “fandom famous”, Sero says- and even though Todoroki’s not sure what that means yet, he’s very happy to see others as into the series as he is.

Iida gives him stim and fidget toys all the time- Todoroki is reluctant to keep them as the other says, since he could buy them himself, but Iida insists. Todoroki especially likes the tangles. He’s building himself quite the collection.

He’s also invested in some high-quality sound-cancelling headphones. Long overdue, but better late than never.

Favorite stim: TBA, although clenching his fists around his thumbs is something he’s always done- even before he had a name for it, or knew why it was so comforting. 

Midoriya

His special interests are Quirks and All Might (the Hero Persona™ rather then the person)! He can infodump about different quirks and theories on how to use them and “what if x quirk exists how would that work” for hours. He’s spent entire evenings arguing on forums about which of All Might’s hero outfits was most efficient and useful for what was needed. Inko, on more than one occasion, had to lure him out of his room with the promise of a rare comic book so he would eat something.

On that same vein, he is appalled by some of his classmates’ hero costumes. He’s too polite to be that crass about it out loud, but in his brain he’s always going “what in the everloving fuck is this???? Who let a teenager go into battle naked???? Did she just go ‘oh yea give me a pair of gloves and boots and I’m set’ and they let her??? Who agreed to this?? Nothing tracking her vitals, nothing keeping her warm in fucking December????? This is just irresponsible”

So you can imagine the rants he goes into when one of them does ask him for advice on how to update their costume.

He likes visual stims a lot- you know that thing where you shut your eyes and wave a bright phone screen in front of them? He loves that

Having trouble emotionally regulating means lots of crying. Not a bad thing, just. A thing. That a lot of people don’t expect when they first meet him.

Inko has always tried her best to accommodate him, but there’s only so much to do when they’re just getting by. He’s very understanding though. She gets into making DIY stim toys for him, and as he grows up he joins in and it’s a very pleasant pastime for the two of them (to the point that he’d rather keep them as mementos of the time spent together than use them for stimming).

Favorite stim: Hand-flapping and back-and-forth rocking!! Classic and good!

Iida

No volume control we die like men (he’s trying to work on it but a lot of the time he’s louder than he realizes. His friends never fault him for it tough.)

Always loved putting his toys in a line- lines are neat! Don’t you see how tidy everything looks now? This is fun! Unfortunately, kids his age didn’t have the same opinion and just chalked it up to him being a “neat freak”.

The kind to separate his food into sections. He had to get used to eating with company in school, since no one wanted to sit with him during lunchtime before, lest they be subjected to his “bizarre eating habits”.

His family is, thankfully, very supportive and accommodating. They were a little worried when he moved into the dorms, but he reassured them that his classmates are just as accepting and understanding. And besides, he’s not the only “out” neurodivergent kid around anymore!

Has copied the language habits of his parents around Important Customers and never stopped. No one in his family talks quite as formally as he does in casual settings, but hey, better to be too formal than too informal and be considered rude, right?

Owns quite the collection of stim toys. Cubes, squishies, tangles, slime, kinetic sand- you name it, he has it! It’s not so much for himself, since he has a few favorites and sticks to them, but keeps the rest more so for anyone else that might need them.

He’s partial to the fidget pen- he likes fidget cubes too, but they’re usually a little small for his hands and harder to work with.

Doesn’t use memes quite right, but is always eager to learn where they originated from. Kaminari (always good-heartedly) never misses an opportunity to explain them to him, and gets so proud when one of Iida’s attempts lands.

He was kind of worried he’d look out of place on stage in the Cultural Festival, but with his friends reassuring him it’s alright, not only did he go out there, but had lots of fun as well!

Very routine focused. He loses half an hour of sleep and he’s already thinking about re-structuring his entire schedule.

Orange juice is a samefood. That boy need his orang juice

Special interest in the mechanics that go into hero costumes and quirk-assisting gadgets. It’s why he was so eager to accept help from Hatsume during the sports festival (he has mixed feelings about this one), and he’s sure they would work well together if only she stopped trying to make him a test subject.

It’s also something he and Midoriya can spend hours going back and forth about. Iida doesn’t usually lose track of time, but he can’t help it when such an interesting conversation is happening!

Screw “quiet hands”. In this house we wave our hands around intensely enough to almost smack someone (“but not actually smack them!! Always be aware of your surroundings!!”)

Favorite stim: Believe it or not, running! The wind resistance, the stomp of his feet, is all Very Good!!

Kirishima

He used to chew stuff a lot- first as a way to get used to his new, sharper teeth, and then because he just liked how very stimmy it is! But he’d also chew stuff that’s not really supposed to be put your mouth so his moms helped him find healthier stim alternatives, since actual chewelry were either a) not stimmy enough, b) wrong texture or c) destroyed too quickly and he’d just go back to chewing unhealthy stuff.

Since he’s grown enough to not go through chewelry at a breakneck pace, he keeps a couple at hand for when he’s studying- helps him focus! He was kinda embarrassed to bring one to his and Bakugou’s study sessions at first, but after Bakugou admitted that he’s also autistic he started keeping one on his person during them- assuring the other that he’s taking proper care of washing it and everything.

He used to bite on his hands as well- still does when he's under extreme stress (imagine summer camp/AFO showing up at Kamino levels of stress) even though he's grown out of it for the most part.

Hyper-Empathy Station. Makes him good with people (and animals) but leaves him exhausted more often than not.

“Hey don’t you get tired of sticking your hair up like that every d-” “It’s routine bro you can’t just quit it that would be chaos”

Whether he wears it up or not, his hair always seems to be a very good tactile stim, both for him and, surprisingly, Bakugou. When it’s up, the pointy spikes are very satisfying to run one’s hands over, just rough enough to slightly scratch the palm, but just light enough to not completely bring them down. When it’s down, Bakugou doesn’t miss an opportunity to touch it, which works for Kirishima too, since having people run their fingers through his hair is very relaxing to him.

He Cannot handle kinetic sand and most slimes. It either feels grainy and dry or too wet and sticky. The crunchy sound sand makes when it’s cut is like nails on a chalkboard in his head. It’s just not for him.

Gullible. Please be nice to him he just wants to believe in the good in everyone

Special interest on Crimson Riot!! I mean, come on; basing his hero persona on him, naming himself after him? Turning to interviews of his in moments of doubt and uncertainty, finding comfort in media about him? Yeah

Has a couple Comfort Sweaters™ and a single comfort plushie- a shark one, the first gift his Ma got him when she met his mom. It’s been patched and stitched up dozens of times, and barely holds itself together, which is why he never takes it out of its safe place in the closet unless he’s seriously in need for some comfort and has already exhausted all other options.

Bro, We Are Autistic . Its Ok To Stim Around Me . Im Ur Best Friend . I Love You . ... Bro, We Are Infodump ing Now . . No Dont Stop Bro .. Bro ...

Favorite stim: Bumping his hardened fists together!! Sometimes he’ll simply rub his hardened knuckles back and forth together- it’s more discreet, and while not as satisfactory, still good for emotional regulation.

Bakugou

Branded a problem child early on, Bakugou had the majority of his meltdowns called “tantrums” instead. So he decided that if everyone treats him like a brat, he might as well be one.

Even before he started losing his hearing, he had some auditory processing issues- which is why he hates hates hates when Midoriya mutters (and similarly, why he didn’t immediately turn his back to Kirishima- the guy talks loud and clear like 95% of the time. Bakugou can appreciate that, even if he won’t say it).

Face blindness is inconvenient as all hell, which is why he gives people ridiculous nicknames: connecting names to faces is difficult enough, and at the beginning he doesn’t really care to try and memorize them anyway, so he just finds a prominent characteristic to remember each of them by. 

[Insert Smart Guy Meme] “You can’t be deceived by fake politeness and sarcastic compliments if you react aggressively to everything people say to you”

Loves his routine and having everything planned. If you drag him into something out of nowhere and disrupt his schedule he will be mad at you for a week minimum (something his friends found out the hard way)

Prolonged human interaction is absolutely exhausting, more than any quirk training exercise, and he gets cranky at the speed of light when he reaches his limit. As time goes on he does find a few people (first Kirishima and then progressively the rest of the Bakusquad) that aren’t as exhausting for him to be around for longer and longer. He still needs his alone time, but now he knows that he can recharge around them as well, if he feels like having company.

Drumming is Very Good stim-wise. So is spicy food, which is why he likes it so much.

Pressure stims are The Worst for him- weighted blankets, tight vests, anything at all that might constrict him in any way? He Will react like cats do to cucumbers. The only exception is that once in a while, when he’s exhausted but can’t seem to ground himself enough to drift off, he’ll ask Kirishima to just. Lie on him, also like cats do, just until he falls asleep.

This is a No Socks Zone. These foot prisons are absolute sensory hell, and with how sweaty he gets it’s only made worse. 

How Can People Talk About Emotions While Simultaneously Looking Each Other In The Eye This Feels Disgusting I Will Blow Something Up: an autobiography

Favorite stim: Tiny explosions popping in his palms. Sure, grand light shows are fine and all but small ones, just big enough to feel through the roughed-up skin of his palms have a certain calming effect. Sucks that people immediately jump to assuming he’s threatening them when he’s just trying to cool down.

Tsuyu

Very blunt. She doesn’t mean to be rude, but sometimes it comes across like it when she’s only trying to be honest and offer advice.

Raptor hands 24/7. what an icon

Has trouble with physical contact in the sense that she’s??? not really sure how to do it??? She offers hugs and hands to hold left and right but it always feels like she’s just. doing it. Like how one would tie a loose shoelace or button up a shirt. It’s not like she hates it, but her nonchalance when someone does hug her makes people assume she’s being cold- which is not the case at all! She’s just offering comfort in a way she knows other people will understand even if it’s not really doing much for her.

Jelly is a samefood! She likes sour apple jelly the best 

Kind of a black-and-white mind. She’s working on seeing the world in shades of grey though, since she saw how her Absolute thinking can impact her friends.

Low/no empathy. She hates that to some people’s eyes that automatically makes her a bad person. Kindness is a choice, one that she doesn’t need empathy to make every day.

Favorite stim: Her near constant kero-kero-ing is very much a vocal stim, as well as echolalia!

Yaomomo

Makes her own stim toys using DIYs rather than her quirk, and is very eager to make any personalized ones for her friends! 

She also likes experimenting with what kinds of textures she can make using her quirk.

Has a semi-popular account where she uploads videos of her playing with slime and kinetic sand regularly.

Much like Iida, she adopted the more formal ways of speaking from her parents and house staff and has trouble toning it down (not that anyone faults her for it).

Very picky about who touches her. She genuinely does not want to come off as the Snobbish Rich Girl but sometimes when someone touches her with no warning or consent she feels like crawling out of her skin 

In the exact same vein, she was extremely hesitant to admit that the futons at the training camp drove her up the wall with that hellish texture. She didn’t want to be the nitpicky one and make a new one using her quirk, either. If anything good came out of the disaster that was the training camp, it was that she didn’t have to sleep on it another night, she thinks (and then feels terrible about it).

Her special interest is tea! Like, actual tea that you drink. Just look at how she lights up when she gets an opportunity to talk about it, or make some for others!! It’s also a samefood for her- she tries to be diverse, but there are a couple with juuust the right combination of smell and taste that she will always go back to.

Sometimes she won’t even drink any- just the process of making it is extremely comforting.

Favorite stim: Double-sided sequins! Tactile-visual stim combo!

Koda

Largely nonverbal. Talking to people is too stressful 99% of the time. Animals are way better listeners anyway.

No volume control we die like men part 2 (but it’s the complete opposite from Iida, in that he can never seem to raise his voice enough)

Likes his peace and quiet, and can easily go into sensory overload if one too many sounds are happening at once. He wants to invest in some headgear for his hero costume that helps him tune out distracting sounds so he can focus on matters at hand while still being able to hear and help those in need.

A plushie hoarder if I ever saw one. His room is the Ultimate Comfort Corner. 

Favorite stim: Humming to himself. Reluctant to do it in the presence of others, but increasingly comfortable around friends.

Aizawa 

Samefoods with those juice pouches he always keeps around

Permanently exhausted due to having to interact with people

Talks in a monotone and has trouble making expressions

His sleeping bag is very good pressure stim. It’s also very hard for him to replace it, because it has to be Just Right, so by the time he does find one that is Just Right, the old one is practically falling apart.

The only reason he’ll sleep in a bed is if Mic is there to share it with him. Otherwise it’s too cold and exposed and weighted blankets can only do so much.

He kinda misses the time before he got top surgery for the sole reason that binders offered a very comforting pressure stim. However, he acknowledges that it’s for the best he got it, since a lot of the time he’d bind for longer than it’s safe. He was lucky to still have the option of getting surgery.

(this has been a safe binding psa, please don’t do what he did)

He does however, tend to wear a tight, though still breathable undershirt at near all times. 

As much as he complains about Mic’s mustache, he actually likes it. He tried to kiss Mic once when he shaved it for the first time in forever and instantly went “yea no. This isn’t working. Feels wrong and bad, Put It Back™”. Didn’t kiss him again until it grew back.

Everything Happens So Much

He talks back to cats. Like, actually meows back at them. Very good echolalia, makes Mic’s day to walk into a scene like this

Favorite stim: Petting cats! The fur of different breeds offers a variety in texture and when they start purring a very good auditory stim is added to the mix! And when they sit on him and add a pressure stim? Cats are the whole package!!

That’s all (for now?) Thanks for reading!! Hope you had a nice Autism Acceptance Month!!!

[animestans]

Hi guys! So since its the 14th, I decided on doing a small scenario thing 🥰 If you have any suggestions on how to improve, please tell me! Hope you enjoy it 😂✨

Disclaimer: I know I don't own you, and I don't own BNHA 😂

BNHA - Valentine's Day

(TW - some have slight swearing)

Bakugo💥

"Ugh, why would anyone do that shit? It's all lovey dovey crap. That and a waste of money." Boom boy gave you a glare as he shoved his books down on the table. He'd just been about to study with you when you'd asked such an important thing.

"Fine." You shrug, giving a smile as you pull your phone from your pocket. "I'm sure if you don't want to spend the day with me, someone else will."

He doesn't reply as he takes out some more supplies with a huff. Pretending as though he didn't hear that last sentence of yours.

"We going to study or what? You're the one that wants my help on this."

Ignoring him, you just sit and tap at your phone. Then place it down on his desk. "Fine, what we starting with?"

Glad that you dropped the whole "Valentine" idea, he starts to go over what was taught, making you write down key points.

Not long after you'd messaged, you get a text. Then another, then another.

"Turn ya damn phone off if it's going to keep blowing up."

"Oh, it's just people responding!" Giving a sly grin, you pick up the phone as someone starts to call, putting it on speaker. "Hey Mineta!"

That boy. Normally, neither of you gave him the light of day, but you decided to mess around for a bit. If Bakugo didn't want to take you anywhere, you'd find someone who would.

The glare sent your way almost made you laugh.

"Hey! You want to be my Valentine righ-"

Creepy grape boy couldn't even finish his sentence, before Bakugo grabbed your cell and ended the call.

"Fine. Fine, I'll do what you want." He shoved all of the books aside. "Just tell me where you wanna go."

Shoto 🔥

"I'm not quite sure I understand, Y/n." He was in bed, hair disheveled and voice soft as he had a blank look on his face.

Sighing a little, you move to kneel near him. "You've not heard of it?" You couldn't help the small frown appearing. True, his family was a little dysfunctional, but there was still a slight expectancy of sorts that he knew what it was.

"No." He sat up, giving a simple answer as he moved out of bed to sit down beside you. "Can you tell me?"

"It's just a day for couples, really. That's all."

"A day for couples?" The confusion was still there.

"Mhm," you hum and stand, grabbing your jacket off his chair. "We can just chill together. It's just a day where you just express how much you care about someone."

He gave a little smile. "Sounds nice. Of course I'll be your valentines." Getting up himself, resorting his hair and then spinning a card. "What do you want to do first?"

"Cinema?" You ask as you follow him out his room and down the steps, grinning.

"Ladies first." He stated calmly, letting you out the door, closing it quietly. Whilst you were babbling on about the films that were just being released, he just listened.

He'd found his person, and he was more than looking forward to the valentines that would hopefully follow.

Shinsou 🗯

Class was shit, to say the least. The entire of 1A didn't really seem to want to listen to the sub. Aizawa being on some Hero's mission.

Bakugo's lot were just chatting loudly, with Mina making them all laugh by spouting silly facts.

You'd researched as much as you could, going out of your way to buy expensive chocolates just for a certain purple haired male.

Apparently, it was customary to give chocolate to the guy you liked in Japan. You hoped google hadn't given you the wrong information, maki your way to 1B with ease. The teacher was trying to subdue the rowdy ones of the class.

It took a little while of walking through the school to finally find him. In the corner of the library.

Bounding over - as quietly as possible, of course - you sat directly infront of him. "So, how's you?"

"I'm fine, y/n. Yourself?"

"Good!" Giving a happy nod, and pulling out the chocolates from your bag. "I got you these? I did some research and it said if you want to-"

"Thank you." His calm tone stopped your small tirade, and he lightly took the chocolates.

"Was google right? Did I do it rig-"

"Yes." He snickered, looking up and directly at you. "It was right. But I'm surprised you'd choose me."

"Sod what other people think. You're not a villain, and ya nice, so..." the shrug you offered made him smile.

Although quiet about it, it meant more to him than you realised. It was nice to have someone on his side.

Denki ⚡️

"It's Valentines!" You yelp as you shot out of bed, getting ready for the day. Having slept in most of the morning, you wanted to make the most out of the rest of the day.

Immediately calling your favourite person. "Hey Sparky, Wanna meet up? That is, if ya have nothing on, today."

"Sure thing, whatcha wanna do?" The immediate reply made you smile a little.

"To be honest, I dunno."

"Wanna come round mine?" You could picture him wiggling his eyebrows in a suggestive manner.

"We could meet at the park?"

"Aight, what time?"

"Just after lunch? So about 1?" You check your watch. More than enough time to beg your mum for more cash.

"Sure! Meet you near the apple tree!" He ended the call, and you run downstairs.

After what felt like hours and hours of trying to bargain with your parents, they finally gave you some more money. It was nearly one, by the time your speech was over - so you ran the entire way to the park.

"Ya here, finally!" Denki waved as you slowed your running to a fast paced walk.

"Yeah, sorry, had to get my parents approval."

He rolled his eyes for you. "Strict parents, eh?" Pulling you down to sit beside him. "We could make out here and no one would know!" He cheekily stated, moving closer.

"You're such a flirt!" You laugh, used to his ways and shaking your head slightly.

"Oh come on, it is Valentine's day..." he pouted, looking like some sad puppy.

Laughing, you give him a chaste kiss. "Fine, will you be my Valentine, Denki?"

Unexpecting your response to his comment, sparks flew from his hands. He put his thumbs up grinning. "Perfect! Sounds perfect!"

Izuku 🥬

It didn't take long to walk to his house. You rang the doorbell, hiding the present behind your back.

Inko answered, giving a soft smile. "Ah, it's nice to see you, Y/n, come on in."

"Thanks!" You step inside, shivering from the cold a little. It was February, snowing, icy, and a little treacherous. You'd almost fallen and broken his gift about 3 times!

Taking your shoes off, you look to Deku's mum. "Is he in?"

"Oh, yes he's upstairs! You know how clumsy he is, I can't have him training in the ice and snow." She chuckled and walked to the lounge, as you went up to his room, knocking.

"Deku, it's me, can I come in?"

He spluttered, putting his comic down. "Sure!"

Opening the door, you leant - carefully - against the wall.

"Do ya know what the day is?"

"The fourteenth, why?" Deku glanced at you, unsure of why you were even at his house. He knew it was at least a twenty minute walk, and it was not the nicest of weather outside.

"Of February, it's the fourteenth of February." You emphasised, waiting for it to click.

You knew it did when he started spluttering.

Then you continued to speak, smiling. "Can you be my Valentines?"

He stared, suddenly going for quiet for a second. Shock obvious. "Me? You want me? To be your-"

"Yes, of course! Also, I got ya something!" You removed your hands from your back showing him the latest All Might figure. "Managed to get it today, last minute!"

He slowly took it from you, placing it on his little counter full of All Might figurines, eyes wide. "Thank you y/n!"

"No problem, anyway, what's ya answer?" You asked, not as patient as normal.

"Uh..yes!" His eyes sparkled as he pulled you closer, into a hug. "I'd love to!"

"How about a snowball fight?" You grin, getting out of his hold and running downstairs, him following almost immediately.

Mina 💓

Jumping up and down with excitement, whilst trying to get ready at the same time, was not the easiest thing to do.

Mina had accepted you to be her Valentines, and it was finally the day.

Once ready, you quickly sprint to hers.

"Ya ready Mina?" You call, knowing her window is open.

She grins and engulfs you into a hug the moment she steps outside. "Of course I am. Ready to go shopping?!"

"Of course!" Nodding, you show you're purse. "I'm well prepared!"

Perusing the streets, not a care in the world, you two buy all sorts of things. Clothes that you're probably not going to even wear, along with some nice jewellery...which you have no idea when you'll wear it. Shoes - you don't buy as many as Mina, though.

It was a chilled event, the weather wasn't too cold, even for a February day, which was nice. Spring felt like it was well and truely on its way.

"How about we grab some lunch?" She gave a laugh and stood up from the seats - you two taking a break from the shopping frenzy.

"Sure, l'm guessing you know the best places here?" Grabbing your purse, and your copious amounts of bags, you walk beside her, grinning ear to ear.

"Someone's happy!" She exclaimed as the two of you take your seats at a cozy cafe.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Good point!" She smiles, going up to order and pay as soon as the both of you decide what to eat. Handing you the biggest muffin you've ever seen. "They only had one left."

"Lucky me then!" You immediately start on it, chatting to her in between. Although not alot was happening, and it was almost like any other weekend day, it didn't matter. You just wanted her company.

And all she wanted, was you to be happy.

Kirishima 🪨

Groaning, you flop out of bed. At least there were no classes. It was, however, 6 in the morning, and you knew that once you were up, it was unlikely you'd fall back to sleep.

So, since you were up, you decided you may aswell find something to watch. Bingewatching Netflix was the only thing you really wanted to do when you had cramps from hell and a headache that wouldn't damn leave.

Four or so hours passed of you being zombie like, in a weird position to stop the cramps. Your phone buzzed and you glanced at the sweet "good morning" text. He always sent you, no matter what. It was like you were the first thing he thought of when he woke up.

You immediately replied with a morning text yourself, before seeing another message pop up.

"It's Valentines day. Want to do anything?"

Damn.

You'd completely forgot. You hadn't got him anything, and you didn't want to disappoint.

Even though your body protested the entire time, you were quick to get ready, turn the tv off, and sort your messy hair.

Unsure of how to reply, you simply don't, racing to the nearest corner shop, and buying his favourite sweets.

Once you were sure you'd got things he liked, a groan somehow made its way out of your mouth as you replied.

He asked for you to come to his, so that's what you did. It only took about 10 minutes to get to his, knocking on the door faintly and presenting your gifts.

"Aww babe you didn't have to!" He gave a sweet smile, taking the treats.

"Couldn't turn up with nothing, that'd be unfair."

Kirishima was quiet for a moment, before bringing you inside. "How about a disney movie day? Fort and all? Along with snacks?"

You didn't even have to say anything, but he knew when you weren't feeling your best.

"That sounds great." You nod. "I'll get the snac-"

"You'll turn the tv on and pick a film, I'll sort the rest out." He had to be seen as manly, of course. And it seemed to him, to be the right thing to do.

Deciding not to argue, you make your way over to his bedroom, sitting down and grabbing the remote.

Within ten minutes, he had the blankets, the pillows, he'd got the snacks ready, in perfect reach for the both of you - which was always handy, and hot water bottle just to your left.

Then, he was quick to sort out the fort, before pulling you close so you were more or less in between his legs.

"Play the film then!" He started braiding your hair - like he always did when you were coming down with something.

He didn't need to ask, he just needed to help. Which he did extremely well, as during the day, you slowly started to forget about your cramps and backpain, enjoying the quiet night in.

[stillness-in-green]

Shigaraki, the League and “Redemption”

(In this post: 1700 words about how much I feel like stories/meta in which Shigaraki is rescued or redeemed miss the entire point of Shigaraki.)

It's a big open question how much of Shigaraki's backstory was engineered by All For One.  We're not even sure if AFO is the villain who killed Nana's husband, the event that kicked off the entire downward spiral of the Shimura family, much less what degree of involvement he had in Tenko's manifestation of Decay.  There's a tremendous amount of well-thought-out, interesting meta and fic about what will happen when Shigaraki finds out the truth, whether he can or should still be redeemed as he currently stands, or how Tenko might have been saved from ever becoming Shigaraki to begin with.  While I have read and enjoyed quite a lot of those theories and stories, I still find myself bothered by the prevalence of that line of thought because it ignores the fact that hero society stands condemned regardless.  

Whether or not AFO gave Tenko the Decay quirk knowing what would happen, whether he found out about Tenko the night of the accident or never lost track of Kotaro from the very beginning, in truth, none of that matters to the narrative of the League on the whole.  Nothing about Shigaraki's past has any bearing on the pasts of the other members. Trying to decide how to "save" Shigaraki avoids the fact that he is the leader of the League of Villains and their pain still stands regardless of their leader's history. 

You cannot act as though saving Shigaraki--with All Might, Inko, Izuku, Eraserhead, anyone--would redeem hero society, because Shigaraki is not hero society's only victim. He's not even its most straightforward one!  The condemnation he articulates of the world he lives in can't be addressed by him realizing he was manipulated by AFO all along or getting a good therapist in prison, because the world he lives in has failed a good many more people than just him. 

Let's break it down.  

The League Members

Twice fell through the cracks because of a lack of social support after his parents were killed in a villain attack.  He was just a teenager back then--what arrangements were made about where he was going to live?  If he was old enough that foster care/being placed in a group home wasn't a good option, did he instead have a stipend from the government?  Where was the social worker who should have been overseeing his case?  Where was his homeroom teacher when he dropped out of school?  What support should have been available when he wound up homeless on the streets?  Heroes stop villains and are rewarded both socially and monetarily for doing so, but the much more difficult and involved work of dealing with the fallout from those battles is clearly undervalued, badly so, in comparison.  Hero society, which prioritizes glamorized reaction over everyday prevention, failed Bubaigawara Jin.

Spinner had the wrong kind of face.  X-Men-style mutant discrimination left him isolated and alienated, shunned by the inhabitants of his backwater hometown because of his animal-type quirk.  To say nothing about the threat of violent hate crimes implied by the existence of a KKK analogue!  But it goes further than just the bigotry of his neighbors--Spinner's quirk was also unremarkable, meaning that, in a society that prizes flashy and offense-based quirks in its heroes, Spinner would have had few if any role models.  Given how many heroes there are, it seems strange to consider that there isn't a single straightforward heteromorph for Spinner to idolize, but given how strongly he latches onto first Stain's warped ideals and later Shigaraki's nihilistic grandeur, Spinner is clearly a young man desperate for a role model--if a hero that fit the bill existed, he wouldn't be a villain today.  So he's failed directly by his community for their bigotry and indirectly by society for the way it told him, in a thousand ways big and small, that Iguchi Shuuichi was not a person worth valuing.

Toga had the wrong kind of quirk.  It's true that, more than anyone else in the League, she feels like a character who would always have struggled with mental stability, even with the best help imaginable--but she didn't get the best help imaginable, did she?  She got parents who called her a freak, who berated a child barely into grade school about how unnatural and awful the desires she was born with were.  She was put into a quirk counselling program that apparently only caused her to feel more detached from society.  If Curious' characterization of quirk counselling is at all accurate, it seems to focus not on how to manage one's unusual or difficult quirk in healthy or productive ways, but rather on stressing what society considers "normal," on teaching its participants how to force themselves into that mold.  Hero society wants people with different needs to learn how to function like "normal" people; it is unwilling to look for ways to accommodate such people on a societal level.  Toga Himiko was failed by a society that demonized and othered her for a trait that she did not choose and innate desires that she never asked to experience.

And then, most prominently of all*, there's Dabi.  We all know where the big Dabi backstory mystery is going, and his is the most open condemnation of hero society of them all.  Dabi was raised on a heady cocktail, parental abuse mixed liberally with unquestioned acceptance of the fundamental importance of having a powerful quirk.  Whatever else can be said of Endeavor's path to redemption, the old Enji is emblematic of everything wrong with hero society: the fundamental devaluing of those without power, the fervent strain to push oneself past one's limits over and over and over again, regardless of the consequences to your health or your relationships, the practice of raising children to glorify a dangerous profession that fights the symptoms of societal ills rather than the root causes.  The ugly secrets hidden in the Todoroki house are the ugly secrets hidden within hero society's ideals, and because he embodies those ideals so thoroughly, of course Endeavor is lionized and well-paid by a society that never had to see Todoroki Touya's scars.

Mirror of Reality

All of these issues map to things in real life, and I don't only mean in a vague, universal sense--I mean they reflect on specific and observable Japanese problems. Read up on koseki family registries and consider how the dogged insistence on maintaining them impacted the Shimura family, tracked down by a monster.  Look into societal bias against orphans and imagine how it shaped peoples' reactions to teenaged Jin and his alleged 'scary face.'  Read up on how Japan approaches mental and physical disabilities, on what it regularly does to homeless camps, on what responses get trotted out when someone comes forward with a story about closeted abuse.  The League embodies these issues in indirect, sometimes fantastical ways, but they're not what I would call subtle, either; there's a reason the generally poor, disenfranchised League members are contrasted with powerful, urbane criminals like All for One, callous manipulators like Overhaul, and entrenched pillars of society like Re-Destro.  

Hero AUs are a fun thought exercise and all, but the League exists to call out and typify very real problems in heroic society and, by metaphorical extension, modern day Japanese society as well.  Hero society studiously looks away from its victims.  It doesn't want to see them and it thinks even trying to talk about them is disruptive and distasteful.  There's no indication in-universe that there's even a movement trying to change this state of affairs.  Certainly there are a great many things that could have changed to spare the BNHA world Shigaraki Tomura, but none of those quick, easy solutions would have saved Twice or Toga, Spinner or Dabi.  The League of Villains is the punishment, the overdue reckoning that their country will have to face for its myriad failures--for letting its social safety nets grow ragged, for failing to stamp out quirk-based prejudice, for allowing its heroes to operate with so little oversight.  For growing so complacent that not one person had the moral wherewithal to extend a hand to a bloodied, lost, suffering child.  

Shigaraki, Past and Future

One of the most heartbreaking and yet awe-inspiring aspects of Shigaraki's characterization in his Deika City flashback is that he was thoughtful and compassionate enough to reach out to other kids who were being excluded and teased by the rest of his peer group.  The League is foreshadowed for him even as a child, because even back then, he was a kid suffering repression and repudiation and so had empathy for others in similar straits.  Young Tenko is the person who would have reached out a hand to the scary but obviously needy Tenko wandering the streets; Tomura, despite everything All For One did to him, still retains that core of fellow-feeling that invites other outcasts to play with him.

"Saving" Shigaraki without addressing the societal flaws that created the people gathered under his banner negates the entire point he and the League exist to raise. I think readers will be forced to confront those flaws alongside Midoriya and the rest of his classmates, who the story has made a point to keep mostly isolated and on a steady PLUS ULTRA diet of all the same rhetoric that leads to consequences like the League to begin with.  I only wish more of the fandom--hero and villain fandom alike--was on the same page and writing their fic and meta accordingly.

Footnotes and Etc.

*The only characters in the League whose backstories we don't have much window on are Mr. Compress and Magne, both of whom are framed as seeing society as repressive.  Magne openly says as much to Overhaul; Mr. C intimates it to the 1-A kids during the training camp attack.  I'm inclined to hold off on commenting on them very thoroughly, though, because in neither case do we know exactly what drove them to crime in the first place. That's not a huge problem for Sako--if anyone on that team is into flamboyant villainy for the sheer joy of it, it's him--but I would definitely want to know more specifics about Magne's personal history before I correlate her experience as a trans woman with her portrayal as a violent, even lethal, criminal.  That would get right into the problematic elements of portraying all these societal outcasts as villains, people who undoubtedly have a point, but have taken to terrorism to illustrate it.  It's very possible that, for all that the League maps to real problems in Japan, we're still going to get a very mealy-mouthed, "But it's still wrong to lash out when you could protest nonviolently and work with your oppressors to seek a peaceful solution," moral from all this.

P.S.  None of the above meta even takes into account the multiple non-League characters whose stories illustrate various failings of hero society--Gentle Criminal, Hawks, Shinsou, even Midoriya himself, as those endless reams of Villain!Deku AUs are ever hasty to expound upon.  Vigilantes touches on the idea of "hero" and "villain" categorizations as being almost entirely political in their inception, as is also hinted at with historical characters like Destro.  Seriously, the mountain of problems with hero culture just looms higher with every passing arc!  

P.P.S.  I absolutely do not mean to imply with this meta that Japan suffers uniquely from any of the problems discussed above.  Other countries obviously have their own difficulties with homelessness, accessibility of care, victim blaming, and so forth.  Horikoshi is writing in and about his own culture, though, and stripping Shigaraki of his villainous circumstances in the interest of making him happier and/or more palatable strikes me as being kind of culture-blind in a way that it’s very easy for Western fans to unthinkingly slip into.  Just some food for thought.