Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Inko was eighteen years old when she had her first baby. She had no idea what to do when she found out, and while her parents had tried to subtly hint that she got rid of the baby before having it, or even giving the baby away when she did, she kept it and named him Shouta, and he was the most precious and most important thing in her world. 

Shouta was two years old when his father disappeared from the world, having been killed in a villain attack. Not that Shouta understood at the time. Not that he would remember. He and Inko weren’t married, but he was still his father. He only remembered her crying a lot. He never asked about his father. 

Shouta was four years old when his mother met Midoriya Hisashi, and a year later she became Midoriya Inko, while Shouta became Midoriya Shouta. He didn’t understand much from what was happening, but he was happy his mom was happy now.

Shouta was five years old when his quirk came in the form of red eyes and floating hair. The other kids in his preschool were scared of him, especially when he couldn’t control it and his eyes would flash red and his hair would float without warning. His mother taught him how to use eye drops after the redness spread to his sclera as irritation, and he would tear up randomly from the dryness. He could hear murmuring from his classmates about how his quirk was scary and evil, and how it took away little Akari’s water quirk when he looked at her. Only a villain could do that.

Shouta was six years old when he decided he was going to prove them all wrong and become a hero. 

Shouta was ten years old when his first and only baby brother was born into the world. He held the tiny bean-shaped thing in his arms while his mom watched with exhausted eyes, her two children together. At that moment, nothing else mattered to him. 

Shouta was twelve years old when Hisashi left for America to work overseas. He was thirteen when Hisashi sent his mom files for divorce. He was fourteen when he made it into Gen Ed at UA. He was fourteen when he got second place at the Sports Festival and fifteen when he was transferred to the Hero Course. 

He was fifteen when Izuku was diagnosed as Quirkless. 

“What are you doing, Izu?” Shouta opened his room to find his tiny baby brother on his bed, coloring some papers with black, green and pink crayons. The hero-in-training crossed his arms over his chest as he approached and sat on the edge of his bed.

“I’m fixing Shou-nii’s hero costume!” came the gleeful reply. Shouta raised a brow and looked over the five-year-old’s drawing. It was a crudely drawn image resembling the costume he had sketched up to submit to the hero support team tomorrow. There were cat ears on what he assumed was his head, and neon pink and green cat-shaped heads all over his black jacket. Shouta snorted in his hand. 

“Oh yeah? You think I need neon kitties on my costume?”

“Uh, yeah?” Izuku replied, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “Shou-nii loves kitties, so you need kitties!”

“Really? Hmm… Alright, how about this,” Shouta hummed, pushing himself off the bed and to his desk on the other side of the room, shifting through the papers in the closed folder atop it and pulling out his costume application. Sitting back down with the folder under the paper, Shouta took a pencil and started drawing a paw pad on the side before pointing an arrow from the design to one of the boots. He spoke while writing another note on it, “I’ll add kitty beans to the bottom of my combat boots, how’s that sound?” 

Izuku brightened up at that and nodded excitedly. “A hero with kitty beans! Shou-nii is going to be so cool!”

“I’m gonna leave paw-print shaped indents in villains’ faces,” Shouta laughed. His little brother joined him and when they calmed down, Shouta noticed the smaller boy suddenly got… sad. His brows furrowed in concern. “Izu? You okay?”

For a moment, he didn’t respond, giving his older brother a sinking feeling in his chest as he frowned. Still, he stayed quiet to give Izuku time to process his words if he wanted to speak about whatever made him upset, though Shouta had an idea of why. 

“Shou-nii?” His voice was tiny and scared. “You’re gonna be a hero, right?”

Shouta frowned further in response before humming his confirmation. 

“And- and you’re gonna beat up the bad guys with your quirk?”

Ah… 

He couldn’t possibly forget that Izuku was diagnosed as Quirkless last month. Some part of him had hoped Izuku would go back to his happy-go-lucky self again, just pretend it… didn’t happen, but of course, that was wishful thinking. Of course he wouldn’t forget about it. Of course. This was life-changing for him. So, carefully, Shouta lowered himself on the bed, laying on his stomach the same way Izuku was. His shoulder nudged the younger boy’s.

“Hey,” he started, then nudged him again to gain his full attention. “Quirk or not, I’m gonna show you that you can be a hero just like me, okay?”

Izuku’s eyes shined with unshed tears, full of hope and a silent plea of—something. “Ka- The other kids, they say I can’t be a hero without a quirk.”

Shouta felt a tinge of irritation before letting it flow out of him through his nose like a running water washing through him. Don’t let him see you upset. Instead, the raven wrapped his arm over Izuku’s shoulder and squeezed him close to him. “Don’t listen to them. They’re all like five, so what do they know?”

Izuku snorted at that before sniffling, obviously trying not to laugh as he pushed against his big brother. “I’m five too, Shou-nii!”

“Uh, yeah, but you’re my smart little baby brother, so you’re obviously the superior five-year-old.”

“Shou-nii! That’s mean! No one’s better than no one!”

“See what I’m saying? What kind of dumb five-year-old says smart stuff like that?”

“ Shou-nii!” Izuku started giggling, finally catching onto the teasing just as Shouta smirked at him as he pushed against his brother again.

Suddenly, Shouta roared out, “ C’mere! ” just as he wrapped the five year old up in his arms and rolled over onto his back, Izuku squealing like a baby pig in glee. Shouta laughed and started tickling him and blowing raspberries on his shoulder—

“Ow!” Izuku suddenly cried out before wriggling out of his brother’s arms, accidentally kicking him in the gut in the process. 

“ Oof!” Shouta groaned suddenly, then rolled back on his stomach in alarm. “Izuku? What’s wrong?”

In response, Izuku whined to himself and held the shoulder Shouta was just blowing raspberries on. “S’nothin’.”

His eyebrows furrowed in concern. “That doesn’t sound like ‘nothing.’ Can I see?”

“Promise you won’t tell Mama.”

Well that didn’t concern him more. “Why not?”

“‘Cuz she’ll just get sad!” 

Yeah, that sounded about right. Shouta gave him an unimpressed slanted look, despite knowing that their mother would, in fact, get sad and probably cry. Then raise hell, if it’s something serious. Neither of them wanted that; he and Mom were still on somewhat shaky ground after Shouta got into the hero course when she… really didn’t want him to. He hummed.

“Okay, how about this,” he said in a lower voice. “You show me what’s hurting and I won’t tell Mama. I’m gonna have to tell her if you don’t show me it, though, got it?”

Izuku pouted his lip, upset but very seriously considering his options. Shou-nii or Mom? It was an easy choice, really. The boy conceded and shuffled close to his brother, who gently lifted his shirt up and over to reveal red marks on his skin. His stomach flipped. He suddenly regretted making the deal to not tell Mom. 

“Izuku, what is this?” He tried hard to keep his voice calm, low, steady. Not upset. Not upset. It still came out a bit frantic apparently, given the flinch Izuku gave. 

“It’s- it’s okay, Kacchan was just- he was just playing rough.”

“Izuku…” Shouta’s brows furrowed in concern. Katsuki had just gotten his quirk a few months before Izuku got his diagnosis, so he could understand how he was struggling to keep his quirk under control. He was probably still very excited and kept activating it by accident. Shouta sighed, rubbing his face. “Alright, come on. Let’s get some aloe vera on that, okay?”

“Promise you won’t tell Mama?”

“Izuku…” Shouta sighed. “It was by accident, right?”

Izuku seemed to perk at that, before nodding. “Ye-yeah! It was an accident! He didn’t mean to.”

“Then no one’s in trouble, Katsuki won’t get in trouble and neither will you. But if Katsuki is having difficulty controlling his quirk, don’t you think someone needs to help him?”

Izuku took that moment to worry his lip in thought as Shouta picked him up and took them to the bathroom. Mom was busy in the kitchen making dinner and watching a show on the TV, so she wasn’t focused on them. He closed the bathroom door and set Izuku on the counter. That was enough time for the five-year-old to finish considering his options, apparently. 

“Y- yeah, Kacchan should get help. But- but he’s so good at using his quirk already! He can focus and- and doesn’t let it burn the other kids either!” 

Shouta raised a brow. “So he knows how to not burn other kids, but he knows how to burn you?”

Izuku flinched again. “I- No! No… Kacchan didn’t mean it. He didn’t!”

The elder brother raised his hands to placate him. “Okay, okay, I believe you.” He did not believe him. But if he was going to get him to cooperate and let him tell someone, he was going to have to play the part. Besides, he wanted to give Katsuki the benefit of the doubt. He knows he and Izuku are best friends and he wanted Izuku to keep that—wanted to believe they would stay that way, so maybe it was just poor control over his quirk. Besides, it’s only been a few months since his quirk manifested, Shouta highly doubted he had enough focus that he could choose who to use it on and who not to. 

Izuku stayed quiet, pouting and looking away. Shouta let out a silent sigh before rifling through the cabinets for the green bottle of aloe vera. A second once-over on the wound and he saw it wasn’t bubbled or irritated, but very dry and very sensitive, apparently. “Does it still hurt?” he asked anyway.

Izuku nodded hesitantly. “Only a little, like when you touch it.”

“Does it hurt like when we went to the beach during the summer and you got red all over?” 

Another nod. 

“And remember when we put the aloe vera on your skin and it was cold at first, but made you feel better?”

“Yeah.”

“It’s gonna be just like that, okay? This is so it doesn’t dry too much and won’t burn anymore.”

He sniffled and nodded. Shouta nodded as he started to apply the lotion, all while compiling a plan to deal with Katsuki and his quirk. 

He ended up convincing Izuku to let him tell their mom, to which she… surprisingly took it better than they both did. Though, she gave Katsuki the benefit of the doubt more so than Shouta did and promised to talk to Katsuki’s mom about him and his quirk. 

That would have to do for now. His burns weren't something he could hide from her, anyway, so it was only natural. 

Call it paranoia, but Shouta didn’t want to shake off the creeping feeling that there was something else happening that Izuku didn’t want either of them knowing. So he bided his time and after a day or two, he offered to pick Izuku up after school. Mom tried to argue, saying now that he was in the hero course, he didn’t even have time for that anymore—to which he retorted with a sharp-tongued response that she was working late these days anyway, so it didn’t matter either way. That didn’t go well with his mom. 

Another argument about how if he wasn’t in the hero course, he would have time and he would be safe —but he would be just as safe as any other person, but there was more to this; he was doing this to keep people like her safe too. In the end, she started crying again, babbling something about his father and being alone to care for Izuku—another disagreement that wasn’t resolved because she couldn’t control her emotions and he was forced to drop the subject until they ( read: Mom ) could calm down. He brought it up once more two days later when he knew she’d be more emotionally stable to stand round two of the conversation, with a well-constructed plan and schedule. She finally agreed. 

Thank goodness.

“Yoooo Midoriya! Join us!” Yamada exclaimed next to Shouta’s ear, snapping him out of his own head as he put his things away in his bag, almost on autopilot. 

“What?”

“To the new juice shop, duh!” Shirakumo explained, bouncing around his table.

“Can’t, got plans.”

Yamada squawked. “What! With who?!” 

“We didn’t know you had friends!”

“Who said it was a friend?” Shouta raised a brow as he stood up, bag on his shoulder. “Mind your business, maybe?”

Yamada tsk’d playfully and crossed his arms while Shirakumo ooh’d at him. “A family thing, then? Why didn’t you just say so? We totally get it!”

Shouta rolled his eyes and started toward the door, expecting to leave the two in the dust—except they were right on his heels and he gave an annoyed sigh. He kept going. “What do you guys want?”

Shirakumo nudged his shoulder when the two caught up to him. “You’re super prickly, aren’t you?” 

He ducked his head somewhat, trying to hide the irritation. ‘Prickly’ wasn’t exactly a compliment. He was known for pushing people away in junior high, no one could get a read on him and no one wanted to test the waters with him. He’d rather get cold shoulders and self-isolation over villainization and a ruined reputation beyond saving. Stay in your lane and you’ll be fine.

He sighed again. “I’m picking my brother up from school.”

“Brother?!” Shouta winced away from Yamada’s excited squeal, “Awww, you have a baby brother?!”

Yep, he knew this was a mistake. Still—it was… refreshing that they were trying with him at least. They were trying, and he… yeah, he appreciated that. A lot, actually. 

(Later that day, he would reflect on them, the way they shoved their noses into his business, not caring that he had a ‘weird’ or ‘scary’ quirk, or even a prickly personality. He’d learn to lighten up, maybe even joke a little.)

Perhaps it was just their over-energetic personalities that made him feel reactive the way he was. He was quite the introvert, and often found himself overwhelmed by crowds and loud people, and while Yamada’s quirk was literally that, he could recognize that it wasn’t his fault and he had quite a firm control on his quirk—especially around him. 

They were still loud and rowdy, though.

But… Shouta found that trait… charming? Endearing? Welcoming? Welcoming… yeah. That’s what it was. They didn’t shy away from his glares, didn’t take his snide remarks to heart, and above all, they were kind.

So… maybe it was okay, to introduce them to his little brother. Lord knows he needs the good company.

Shouta sighed a final time, relenting. “Do you… wanna come with?”

They agreed instantly. (And loudly.)

By the time they made it to Izuku’s preschool, most of the kids had already gone home. It wasn’t too late, though. The three boys had booked it to the train and then to the preschool without any stops—Shirakumo thought it was good stamina training, and while Shouta agreed and added that to his list of silver linings in his life, he still shot the cloud-quirked teen a glare as they panted over their knees at the preschool entrance.

“S-so… where is the… the little dude?” Yamada asked, out of breath but recovering quicker than Shouta. Curse both of them for having larger lungs than him. 

“He should be… over here?” Shouta panted, standing straight with a stretch and entering the preschool playground. “I told him to stay by the swings until I come.” 

The swings were empty.

His mouth felt as dry as his eyes, but kept a level head. Maybe he was just playing with another kid—there were still some lingering, waiting for their parents, some caretakers on the premises to keep watch. 

“Izuku?” He called out, half-expecting an excited five-year old to pop out of nowhere and scare him. No dice—he then walked up to one of the teachers watching a student play in the sand. He recognized her from the many times he’s come to pick Izuku up already. “Excuse me—do you know where Midoriya Izuku is? Green hair, freckles. He’s my brother.” 

He almost missed the dark look in her eyes at the name, but she kept her mannerisms friendly, a smile stretching her lips. “I saw him go off to play with little Bakugou Katsuki and a few other of his friends before you got here.” She gestured with her chin toward the treeline behind the playground.

Shouta narrowed his eyes at the direction then turned back to bow in thanks to the woman before the three boys made it toward where the children apparently were. Shouta had never ran faster in his life when he saw two children sitting on top of his little brother. 

“Hey?! What do you think you’re doing?!“ Shouta shouted sharply, activating his quirk just before he saw Katsuki put his hand on Izuku’s head of hair. Shirakumo and Yamada charged in after him, picking up the two children on top of Izuku and pushing them aside. Katsuki looked like a deer caught in the headlights.

Shouta helped pick his sobbing brother up, who instantly went to hug him, all while he kept his eyes on Katsuki. Almost sounding scandalized, the hero-in-training hissed out, “Katsuki. ”

The blond flinched. “Sh-Shou-chan!” 

“Don’t you ‘Shou-chan’ me, what the hell do you think you’re doing?! Using your quirk on Izuku?!” He blinked when his eyes started burning, then whirled around to the two others, (‘Hands’ and ‘Wings’ he dubbed in his head) the two still in his friends’ arms. “And you two sitting on him?! You could have hurt him! He has breathing problems already!”

“S-sorry…” the nameless boys sniveled pitifully. 

Shouta growled and turned back to the wide-eyed Katsuki before picking Izuku up into one arm and stomping over to grab the blond’s arm roughly. Katsuki yelped and tried to push off, his quirk blasting through his palms but with one glare of red eyes, they stopped. He shook his arm, hissing out, “ Stop that. You’re coming with me.”

“What- what’re you gonna do to us?!”

“What do you think?!”

The three UA students dragged the three bullies and one sobbing Izuku toward the teacher they had spoken to before, who spotted them after hearing the screaming children and ran over. “What happened?!”

“We caught these two kids sitting on my little brother and Katsuki went to use his quirk on his head .” The words were spat out like venom. Shirakumo and Yamada nodded in confirmation. He thought he saw the woman’s eyebrows twitch in a grimace as she saw Izuku sniffling against his brother’s shoulder. His glare must have been pretty intimidating since she actually gasped as if she was scandalized. 

She frowned at the children. “You three better have a good excuse for pulling that nonsense,” she scolded before turning her attention to Izuku, an obviously forced look of concern on her face. “Is he okay?”

“I’m half tempted to take him back to UA and see what Recovery Girl has to say about that,” Shouta sneered, the woman flinching. 

She didn’t hesitate to gather the two boys from Yamada and Shirakumo by the hands, dragging them inside the building and telling them to follow. Shouta let out a huff through his nose as they did, the blond still in his grasp and surprisingly silent and cooperative. He could tell something was formulating in his head as they passed through the halls toward the principal’s office—he could hear the woman berating the two boys as they walked.

Twenty minutes later, he, Izuku, and Mom were sitting in the principal’s office with the three boys, their families and Shirakumo and Yamada. The air was tense while he and his two friends explained what they saw—and finally the principal asked Katsuki for his recollection of events. 

The little bastard had the nerve to turn it around onto Izuku, who kept silent and crying with his head ducked in their mom’s lap. Saying something about how ‘Deku’ (Hello?? What the actual Hell On Earth?) kept following them when they told him to stop and he wouldn’t, said he had picked up a beetle and was trying to put it on Wings’ head (whitenoise blocked out the brat’s name) when he’s terrified of bugs, so they all sat on him and Katsuki wasn’t going to use his quirk on Izuku, he was putting the beetle on him.

To which the stupid principal had the gall to agree with, saying it sounded like Izuku was the instigator.

The room went into chaos—the sight of three UA students, all of which were in Heroics, mind you, storming the desk of a preschool principal who was apparently not paid enough to obviously care about the safety and well-being of freaking five-year-olds , all while shouting and yelling, was possibly a hilarious sight if Shouta had seen it from any other angle.

“You can’t possibly be serious?!”

“He’s just a kid!”

“Did you just try to justify two big kids sitting on a smaller child?!”

Even Mom had frozen in place, eyes widened as she turned to look at an equally stricken Mitsuki. The smell of sweetness permeated the room and it was only on reflex that Shouta spun his head around to nullify Katsuki’s quirk again before he could set off in a tantrum. Mitsuki smacked his small head to try and get him under control, angrily whispering to him.

“It’s learned behavior!” Shouta found himself shouting, flabbergasted by what he just saw. Mitsuki snapped her head up in alarm. Shouta gave her a disgusted look. “You seriously smack him every time he does something you don’t like?! No wonder he’s been doing that to Izuku! You taught him that!”

“Excuse me?!”

“‘He’s been?’” Shouta turned around to see his mother’s brows furrowed, staring at him before flickering over to her friend who looked just as clueless. “Mitsuki, I thought you said you talked to him?”

“I did! I- Katsuki! What did I say?!” Mitsuki turned to her son who just crossed his arms and looked about ready to cry. “Have you been using your quirk on Izuku even after I told you not to?”

He didn’t respond. The conversation went on for about twenty to thirty minutes, until Mom stood up with Izuku in her arms and demanded the principal get a handle on the rampant bullying, obvious quirk discrimination, and lack of responsible adults actually caring for the well-being of her child. She didn’t say “or else,” but she didn’t have to. It came with a silent threat, and Shouta tucked away a note in his head to ask his sensei for legal advice tomorrow. 

Mom spent a moment to give the parents of the other two kids a scolding too, of which they tried and failed to defend their little demons after she hit them with a glare so vile only a mother could have without being considered a villain. As they left, Yamada and Shirakumo followed behind Shouta, each of them giving the other adults in the room nasty and immature looks. 

At Mom’s prompting, they all filed into her car, an emotionally exhausted Izuku in his child seat sandwiched between them, while Shouta took the passenger seat. Mom took a deep breath then exhaled all her negative thoughts and energy, then turned around to Shouta’s new friends. “So! You’re Shouta’s friends? I’m so sorry we had to meet like this. I’m Midoriya Inko. Would you boys like to stay for dinner?”

The two boys beamed brightly. Shouta rolled his eyes in dismay, sinking into his seat with a soft groan.

And yet, he couldn’t hide the faint smile on his face.

Chapter Text

Shirakumo and Yamada formally meet Izuku in the car while Mom takes them through a drive-thru for dinner. Izuku, despite being visibly exhausted and close to falling asleep where he sat, was star-struck at meeting two of Shouta’s friends who were also going to be future heroes who attended the best hero school in Japan. Shouta had to admit, those two knuckle-heads were very good with children. They chatted with him easily, and before they could bring up the golden question every child is asked, Shouta sent them both a quick and subtle text, “Don’t bring up his quirk,” to which they both responded with two thumbs up emojis.

He was glad they understood. They were smart, given the arguments in that school office and everything else that went on, they could put two and two together easily. And, thankfully, they had tasteful opinions and weren’t absolute dicks like some people he knew. 

Instead of talking about his quirk, they asked him things like his favorite hero, if he wanted to be a hero, what kind of hero he wanted to be—all of which Izuku answered more and more excitedly. The change from the start of the car ride to the end was like night and day; from shy, closed off, hesitant and sad, to jubilant, excited, open and giddy. Shouta couldn’t help but watch with a smile through the rear view mirror, though he only joined in the conversation once or twice. He was happy to just watch. 

When they arrive home, they’re finally able to dig into their food peacefully, taking part in idle chatter here and there—Mom asking the boys basic questions about themselves, about school, simple things. Then after Izuku was finished eating, Mom excused herself to start putting Izuku to bed, leaving the three boys by themselves in the living room. Shouta busied himself with picking the room up and throwing away whatever trash he found. 

He felt… awkward. He had never had friends over, so he wasn’t really sure what to do. Well—he’s had friends over… back when he was, like, five. So that didn’t count. 

“Um…” he started weirdly, wiping his hands on a washcloth and avoiding the other boys’ gaze. No better place to start than the huge elephant in the room. “Th…Thanks, uh, for- for joining me today and, uh, helping me with Izuku.”

Shirakumo took the hook and started running with it, Yamada visibly following his cue. The cloud-quirked boy perked up and grinned at Shouta brightly. “Of course, man! Thanks for inviting us, and for your mom buying us dinner and stuff—but, dude, you were so cool!”

Suddenly Shouta felt uncomfortable and shy, his cheeks heating up as he looked at the two then glanced away. He started wiping the already clean counter with the washcloth. “I was just, you know, doing my job as a brother.”

“Yeah, but you didn’t hesitate for a second!” 

Yamada joined in, nodding. “You looked like a true hero, Midoriya!”

Shouta chewed on his cheek, then shook his head. “It’s- it’s different, I’m his brother, I’m supposed to be his hero whether or not I’m training professionally…” He had… opinions about that. Did he want to be a hero? Of course he did. It was his dream, and he was determined to go through with it—but did he think he actually had what it takes to be a hero? 

Well. That was another story entirely.

Just the thought made the raven deflate.

Shirakumo simply shook his head. “If it had been anyone else, you know you would have done the same thing!”

Suddenly Shouta was speechless, baffled at what to say in response to that—because he was right, but Shouta didn’t want to take the compliment at face value.

Then, like a saving grace, Mom came back into the room with a strained but still friendly smile. “Thank you boys so much for helping Shouta with Izuku today.”

Yamada and Shirakumo stood up when she entered, the blond replying, “It’s no problem! We’re glad we were able to help.”

Mom seemed to melt at that, heart almost visibly warm if her shining eyes brimmed with tears and hands over her chest were anything to go by. “You’re both so sweet. I’m so glad Shouta was able to find a friend in you boys.”

“Uh, if you don’t mind me asking, though? Is Izuku often bullied like that?” Shirakumo asked.

The woman’s expression fell at that. “I… Honestly, I’m not even sure, but I’m starting to suspect he has been.”

Yamada frowned. His voice is surprisingly gentle when he asks, “Is it because he’s quirkless?”

Shouta closed his eyes as a sigh left his nose and he moved to join them in the living room as they all sat down again. He crossed his arms and legs in a self-soothing manner—the talk about his brother being bullied sending waves of both anxiety and anger through his system. “He asks me almost daily if he could be a hero without a quirk, and sometimes he lets it slip that so-and-so said he can’t, or so-and-so said it’s too dangerous, or dumb, or what have you… It’s… Even from teachers, it’s absolutely despicable….”

The silence they held after that was almost like a sigil. A moment of silence for the dreams a poor boy held that went up in flames after one doctor visit. 

Then, Shirakumo spoke up, his fists clenched on his lap. “So what! Just because he’s quirkless?! Like that’s any of their business anyway! That- that’s so stupid!”

“Tell me about it,” Shouta grumbled. 

“Besides, I bet Izukun would make a great hero one day!” Shirakumo went on to say, his lips pulled up in a blinding smile. Could anything truly keep this guy pissed off forever? Shouta doesn’t think so, honestly.

Yamada smiled along with him, nodding enthusiastically. “Definitely, yo! He’s got the heart of a hero, there’s nothin’ that can stop him if he puts his heart to it!” 

Shouta tried to ignore the look of discomfort on his mother’s face at the discussion of her baby boy becoming a hero. He knew it was a sore topic for her—for the both of them, really. So it was no surprise to him when she took that moment to stand up, ending the conversation—but not in an unkind way. “Well, thank you again, both of you for your help and support today. Do you two need a ride home?”

They took the bait easily enough, both accepting the offering since they did kind of live pretty far away. It isn’t long before they’re bidding Shouta goodbye and filing out the door with Mom, leaving him alone to look after his kid brother. He sits in the living room by himself for a moment, pondering the weirdness of Yamada and Shirakumo, and finding himself appreciating that about them—then he sighs and stands up to head to his and Izuku’s shared room. 

He keeps himself quiet so the curly-haired toddler isn’t woken up by him—but finds that he didn’t need to anyway. The subtle movement on his bed told Shouta he wasn’t actually sleeping in the first place. With a sigh, Shouta sits down next to his bed, back against the wooden twin frame. Time to look the bull in the eyes.

“I know you’re awake,” he says with a soft voice. Just in case. 

Predictably, Izuku doesn’t respond, but he moves some more on his bed, telling him that he is, in fact, very much awake. 

He sighs again. So it’s the hard way, isn’t it? He tries a different angle. “At least tell me if you’re okay. Does anything hurt, Izu?”

After another pause of quiet, the hero student finally gets a response. “No…”

At least he was okay then. 

…Then again, Izuku was very good at hiding things, especially injuries apparently. He’ll check him over tomorrow morning. 

“Okay…”

More silence. Sure, Shouta loves the quiet game, but this is getting to him a little bit. Thankfully, he doesn’t have to wrack his brain for some more weird ice breakers with his own brother for long, when Izuku turns around in his bed and starts playing with his hair a little bit. Shouta leans his head back to look at his brother, his All Might doll tucked in the arm not playing with his hair, some of the doll obscuring his face a bit. Even in the dim lighting, he looked exhausted and was no doubt on the verge of passing the hell out. But dammit if Izuku wasn’t a stubborn fighter.

“Your friends are nice and cool…” 

Shouta couldn’t help the smile that snuck up on his face before he turned back around with a hum. “Yeah, they are.”

The next day is pouring buckets of rain, much to Shouta’s chagrin especially after he left his umbrella with a stray kitten on the way to school. He made a mental note to buy another one on his way home so his mom doesn’t ask too many questions about it. He’s not sure how he can explain giving a homeless newborn cat a 1000 yen umbrella without having her laugh at him.

He could say he left it at the train station—nah, being scolded was worse than being laughed at. 

Whatever. He’ll take the minor loss.. Things happen, and besides, it was a kitten. A cute kitten.

The same cute kitten that Shirakumo brought to school with him, along with his previously donated umbrella. What. 

During their home period, Shirakumo and Yamada both took the chance to ask him how Izuku was doing, which surprised him. He didn’t actually expect them to care that much about him or his brother. Maybe it was the pessimism in him, but he especially didn’t think they’d care about Izuku after they learned about his quirk status. It was a nice surprise, though.

“He’s doing fine this morning,” Shouta replied easily. “He’s staying home with my mom today.” 

—And going to the doctor to check his injuries he got the day before. Just in case. She had called a new pediatric office, greatly disliking their previous doctor and how nonchalant and uncaring he was when he gave Izuku his diagnosis. She had spent quite a while last night after dropping off Yamada and Shirakumo to their homes looking for doctors who not only specialized with quirkless patients but were highly suggested by quirkless patients through their reviews. 

Again, maybe it was the pessimism in him, but Shouta didn’t want to get his hopes up for his baby brother, as unfortunate as it was. 

Yamada leaned over to his desk, nudging his shoulder with his elbow. “Hey, hey, do you think we could ever come over and see him again?”

Confusion slammed Shouta like a truck, and judging by the amused looks on his new friends’ faces, it was obvious. He tried to regain his composure as quickly as he lost it, but he was still fumbling over his words anyway. “Uh—I mean, uh, y-yeah, sure?”

Then comes the dreaded joint practice with class 2-B later in the day. 

Shouta’s stomach was in knots all day leading up to this lesson. He was already insecure about his work and his quirk in private, he didn’t need to put it all on blast in front of another heroics class—granted, they all knew his quirk, or the gist of it from his performance at the Sports Festival, especially given he had taken second place. That was pretty important, yeah. And it put a huge target on his back for jealous students in both Gen Ed and Heroics who were already in the course the year prior. 

Unfortunately his anxious and intrusive thoughts about himself were reinforced by the muscles-for-brains Sensoji from Class 2-B, taunted about his quirk and how useless it was. If you had this quirk, I bet you’d be singing a different tune, idiot. He desperately wanted to defend himself, snap back, do something, but it was almost as if all his energy had been sapped away or drained from him by Sensoji’s mere presence. The fight in him was gone, and he wanted nothing more than to go home and curl up in his bed, give up heroics and maybe work in a cat cafe somewhere far away from this city. 

But then the thought of Izuku crossed his mind, and he found his racing, panicked thoughts stopping in its tracks. 

Izuku was looking up to him as a role model. Shouta had to give a good example, show him that he can do it, quirk or not. If someone as lame and useless as Shouta could do it, even with a useless quirk, then Izuku could do it even better with his smart brains and quick wit. 

Quirk or not. 

With that thought in mind, Shouta’s expression hardened as he looked his own bully in the eyes, and with venom on his tongue, he told him, “Screw you.”

Suffice to say, he didn’t win their sparring match. 

It was about a week later when a knock came to the door. 

“I’ll get it!” Shouta called before Mom could explain anything—and confusion twisted his expression when the Bakugous greeted him at the door. Instantly, he narrowed his eyes and opened his mouth to demand what they were doing here, but his mom stopped him.

“Oh, you’re here! I’m sorry, Shouta, I forgot to tell you they were coming today.”

Okay, Shouta wanted to reply with, and they’re here because…?? He wisely kept his mouth shut and stepped aside to let them in. He crossed his arms over his chest and kept his eyes trained on the blond five year old who held onto his mother’s hand like a safety blanket. Katsuki glanced at him once then looked away instantly.

Should he feel bad for scrutinizing and intimidating a five year old? Maybe. To be fair, though, said five year old has been terrorizing his little brother for who knows how long and even lied to save face, which a five year old should not know how to do on the fly, yet here they were. 

Mitsuki had a pained smile on her face when they filed into the small living room. After Mitsuki had dropped off the food she brought in the kitchen, the Bakugous took the couch while Mom took the armchair on the side. Mitsuki had Katsuki in her lap, while Shouta awkwardly stood with Izuku in his arms off to the side. 

“We came to apologize formally,” Masaru said, as if to explain to Shouta, who was apparently the only one out of the loop. It made sense, he supposed. Still, he would have liked a heads up. 

Mom looked like she was trying to not cry, forcing a smile like it was the most painful thing in the world. Shouta furrowed his brows as he took on the scene. He caught Mom’s eyes then, and gestured to the child in his arms with his eyes questioningly. What do I do with him? Did she want the kids around to hear the conversation? She had a look in her eyes that said she was going to be bringing in some big guns somehow. 

She seemed to get the point quickly and perked up. “Oh! Shouta, would you take the kids to the park for a bit? Dinner’s not ready yet, so I’ll call when it’s done.” 

He didn’t ask questions and instead nodded obediently, setting Izuku down and gesturing for Katsuki to come along. Hesitantly, the boy hopped down from his mother’s lap and followed Shouta as he quickly dipped into the bedroom to fish for his jacket and cell phone, then he took both the boys’ hands in his and walked them out the door to the nearby park. 

Just as the door started closing, he heard Mom say in a low voice, “Mitsuki, you have to stop hitting him—”

His stomach dropped with anxiety and was happy he didn’t have to hear the rest of the conversation. 

Five minutes later, he finds himself pushing both of the five year olds on the swings in tense silence, and though Izuku has a nervous smile on his face, he’s the only one who has an expression other than somber. 

Then Katsuki started kicking his legs to be let off, to which Shouta complied, grabbing the chains lightly to ease him to a stop—then Katsuki jumped off and ran to the nearby spring rockers. He seemed especially upset. That’s when Shouta mentally kicked himself for giving a freaking five year old the cold shoulder earlier. With a grimace and a sigh through his nose, the hero-in-training kept pushing Izuku’s swing though with less vigor than before, trying to figure out what to say to Katsuki. An idea sprung in his head, the most obvious one unsurprisingly, and he stopped pushing Izuku, instead saying to him that he’d be back and gesturing to him to stay there. 

Making his way to the explosive child angrily rocking back and forth on the dragon-shaped spring rocker, Shouta kneeled by him. “Hey, what’s the problem?” He tried his damndest to keep his voice gentle as he spoke. 

Katsuki, remarkably (not), didn’t reply, but he could hear the huffs of frustration puffing out of his nose. His face contorted around, struggling to think about his next words apparently. Shouta gave him time to think, just like he does with his own little brother when his words get tangled in his head. 

Then the rocking slowed to a stop, and instead of anger, Shouta recognized a simple upset on his face. His mouth opened, hesitantly almost. “Do… You’re gonna be a hero, right?”

Alright, he didn’t expect that one, he’ll admit. 

Shouta scratched at his cheek, pondering how to answer that—he wants to be, yeah, but…. He’s not about to spill his insecurities to a toddler. “Yes.”

Katsuki remains quiet for a bit longer before he sucks in a deep breath. “Do you think… can I be a hero, even if I was being bad?”

Yeah, he should have expected it was going there. 

Still, something inside him softens at the way the ashy blond speaks, hesitant, unsure and shaky, something he had never known Katsuki to be. He wonders what to say in that moment, then the realization hits him that he’s the resident adult at the moment, the one both of the boys were instructed to listen to at all times—Katsuki was smart, but he was also a hero fanboy, viewed him like a brother as well, and called him ‘Shou-chan’. He could say anything and he’d believe it. Hopefully. 

Tactfully, he goes at it from another angle. “Do you think Izuku could still be a hero even though he’s quirkless?”

Katsuki huffs and says, “No, he’s too weak.”

“Who told you that?” 

“Everyone says so, so it must be true.”

“Okay, so if everyone says that…” he pauses briefly, trying desperately to say something that could reach Katsuki’s heart. “... All Might was a bad hero, would you believe them?”

That gave him a start, and the blond boy perked up, eyes wide as he stared at Shouta. “What?! No!”

Shouta smirked. Got him. He pushed himself up to stand and offered his hand to Katsuki. “Alright, come on.”

Katsuki took his hand, and with his free hand, Shouta gestured for Izuku to come over. He took the boys to a nearby bench on the edge of the playground and sat between them. “What do you think is needed to be a hero?”

At the same time, Katsuki answered with: “A powerful quirk!” just as Izuku said, “Being nice!”

Shouta tried to ignore the glare Katsuki sent Izuku’s way. 

“Wrong,” Shouta said instead. “You could argue that the hero Sir Nighteye has a weak quirk, but he’s All Might’s side-kick. What do you think about that?”

Izuku answered, “Um! I don’t think his quirk is w-weak, um… his quirk lets him see the future, and that’s- that’s super cool! And- And he can dodge hits before they come, and, um, he can find people, and know where they’ll be and stuff!”

“Yeah, but he can’t use his quirk to punch villains, can he?” Shouta offered. Izuku pouted at that and shook his head, no. “But, that doesn’t mean he’s a bad hero because of his quirk, does it? He’s All Might’s side-kick, after all, and he’s saved a lot of people with his quirk.”

Both the boys shook their heads, agreeing that he was a cool hero because he was All Might’s side-kick. 

“So, again, what makes a hero?” 

Izuku and Katsuki kept quiet, thinking real hard this time about their answer.

“Saving… people?” Katsuki finally offered. 

Shouta smiled. He was finally getting it, he sensed. “Exactly. It doesn’t matter what kind of quirk you have. Sure, there are certain quirks that would be better for certain things, like an x-ray quirk for searching for people, or a water quirk for putting out fires, but that doesn’t mean anything if the person doesn’t want to help or save people, does it?”

He could see the moment it clicked in Katsuki’s head, like a lightbulb turning on inside his brain and lighting up his eyes. “Oh!”

“You getting it?” Shouta chuckled. “Take my quirk, for example. What’s my quirk do?”

“Oh! Oh!” Izuku raised his hand as if he was still in class. With a laugh, his older brother gestured with his chin to him. “Shou-nii’s quirk is Erasure! You- you can erase quirks with your eyes!”

“Very good, Izu. Now, Katsuki, what do you think of my quirk?”

Katsuki took the time to consider the question, humming as he thought and kicking his legs gently. “Shou-chan… stopped me from using my quirk on Izuku, so he wouldn’t get hurt… So you kept, uh, you kept Izuku safe.”

Shouta nodded and put his hand on the blond’s head. “Yes, exactly. But your quirk is what’s called an emitter quirk. Do you boys know the different types of quirks?”

“Um!” Izuku once again raised his hand. “Em-Emitter, Mut-Mutation, and- and, uh… Tran… Transform, uh… Changing ones!”

Shouta nodded. “Transformation, yes. There’s also passive quirks, but you’ll learn about that in school later. My quirk only works on Emitter and Transformation quirks, though. There are many many people with mutation quirks out there, so my quirk would be useless against them. If I went up against a mutated villain, I would be fighting quirkless. What does that say about me as a hero?”

“Um…” Katsuki started. “That you have to ad… adopt?”

Shouta snorted at that. He ruffled Katsuki’s head. “A dapt , but yes, to an extent. Does my quirk mean I’m going to be a bad hero?”

Both boys shouted, “No!”

He kind of felt touched when they both delved into their pseudo-fanboy mode, yelling about how he’d be an awesome and cool hero, even cooler than All Might—a compliment that made Shouta blush a bit in embarrassment. He didn’t think he’d ever surpass that man. He didn’t think he really wanted to, really, but he wasn’t going to tell the kids that. Still, he tried to smile shyly and chuckle his awkwardness away. “Alright, alright. So we’ve established that quirks don’t make a hero, and every quirk has its weakness, so why can’t Izuku be a hero like you, Katsuki? Even though he and I would fight the same way, quirklessly?”

Katsuki went silent again, this time looking away from both of them. Shouta could tell Izuku was somewhat uncomfortable with the topic, but he wondered if it was because Katsuki was here and uncharacteristically quiet. Then to their surprise, Katsuki started sniffling and quietly crying. 

“Katsuki?” Shouta’s eyebrows weaved up in concern as he drew Katsuki onto his lap. 

“Everyone says quirkless kids die a lot!” he sobbed, rubbing his eyes. “Mama said, and- and all the teacher too, they all said Izuku would- would die if he became a hero, and- and I don’t want Izuku to die! I wanna be a hero with Izuku!”

He frowned. That’s definitely something he’s going to have to bring up to Mom. His brother definitely doesn’t need to hear crap like that, and no responsible adult in their school should be saying that, period. Izuku took the free space on his lap next to his friend, quickly hugging Katsuki as he quietly cried as well. 

“Don’t cry, Kacchan,” he whimpered. “We’ll be heroes! Kacchan’s gonna be the coolest hero, better than All Might!” 

Shouta hugged them both, softly shushing them and muttering words of comfort while he rocked them back and forth. He could hear Katsuki mumbling apology after apology to Izuku while the smaller boy simply kept repeating, “It’s okay, Kacchan.” 

After a while, the boys had calmed down but were visibly exhausted. It was pure luck when his phone buzzed in his pocket, a text from his mother saying dinner was ready and to start heading back. He felt that same anxiety from before when they had left the apartment return like a stalking predator. At least Katsuki and Izuku had made up. Hopefully there wasn’t an argument or something with the Bakugous. He knows how Aunt Mitsuki is on a regular basis, and while Mom was as gentle as a butterfly, get her wound up enough and she could be just as explosive as Aunt Mitsuki.

“Alright, kitties,” he softly started. “Ready to head home and eat some good food?”

Baby steps, he thought. Baby steps.

Chapter Text

Izuku remembers sitting in the doctor’s office and feeling the ground from under him slip away into nothingness as the words “he’s quirkless” left the doctor’s mouth. 

One moment, he couldn’t even sit still in his seat waiting for the results—the next, he felt something inside himself crush to dust like a piece of broken chalk that someone stomped on. It was almost like the time he got sick from the cold and his face and body were cold and hot at the same time—but it was so much worse than that. He’s heard of the term ‘heartbroken’ before; is this what that felt like?

He cried a lot after that. He cried at home, he cried in class, he cried at the park…. It wasn’t long before the kids at school started treating him differently too. 

He thought he had a lot of friends—Mama’s said he was a social butterfly before, and plenty of the other kids were nice enough and loved playing heroes with him. But then they learned about his quirklessness and… there was a large gaping hole that somehow appeared between him and his classmates. Even Kacchan started being weird.

Some kids laughed at him. Some, he heard saying he was contagious. Even when he cried, which he did so often nowadays, no one would care.

He felt anxious to be around his teachers now. All he would hear when they thought he wasn’t listening was mutterings of dream crushing comments:

“Poor Izuku, he’ll never be a hero now.”

“He’ll probably die before he has the chance to.”

“Best not to get attached.”

It hurt and filled him with a dark, black and icky feeling of fear.

At least Shou-nii was there for him. He was a hero!

Izuku would ask him a lot: “Can I be a hero without a quirk?” He tried not to expect much; he was a smart kid and knew that even though Shou-nii wasn’t a grown up, he had a lot of smart advice—but mostly, Izuku just wanted someone to soothe the pain in his heart. He could tell that Shou-nii didn’t know what to say most of the time though.

Until the day he caught Izuku messing with his hero costume design and was told that he could be a hero and that Shou-nii was going to prove it to him.

That felt like a turning point for Izuku. Like he was finally able to breathe right. Everything felt like it was finally going to be okay….

…Until he approached Kacchan and his friends to play after school.

They never said no, but they were less than welcoming—still, Izuku considered Kacchan as one of his closest friends, maybe even his best friend (and sure, maybe he had hurt him in the past with his quirk, but he just had a hard time controlling his quirk so it’s fine!). There’s no way he’d start talking like those meanies did when they thought he wasn’t listening. Yeah, he was a bit tougher than most kids their age, but he was also super sincere and felt with his whole being! 

He still wanted him around, and they were definitely still friends—right? 

…Right?

He trailed them through the small forest behind the schoolyard, silently picking up rocks he found cool and wanted to show off to Kacchan—then he stumbled upon a beetle. He called out to his friends and said he found a cool beetle, but… 

Well, they were far away and couldn’t hear him. So he picked the beetle up and chased after them to show it off—he really couldn’t figure out what went wrong. What did he do? Why were they so angry with him? Did he do something wrong? Why would they trap him like that?

Why did Kacchan try to use his quirk on his face?

On purpose?

When Shou-nii and his friends swooped in to save him, he was in too much shock to be in true awe. The feeling continued to linger until he was set in his car seat and the realization that Shou-nii’s friends were future heroes struck him—the whole situation was pushed to the back of his mind to deal with later while he focused on asking the two boys question after question. 

Shou-nii’s friends were so cool. 

They even said he could be a hero, even without a quirk.

Since that day at the schoolyard—no, since hearing Shirakumo and Yamada say he could be a hero, things started to look up for Izuku. At least in his head. 

School was still butts though.

That next day was awkward enough, to say the least. The teachers went back to being nice like how they were before Izuku was diagnosed with Quirklessness—but it felt so forced now, and that was somehow worse than being treated like a contagious virus. 

And yet, he would still take that over how Kacchan began to treat him after that day.

It was like Izuku was worse than just a quirkless kid. It was like he was suddenly a deadly plague. His best friend ignored him at every turn, turned down every attempt at conversation—wouldn’t even look in his direction. Not a single shred of acknowledgement, as if he wasn’t even there. 

Like he was nothing.

And that… that hurt more than any burn Kacchan could inflict on him.

Izuku had no choice but to push through the emotions; bare his teeth and deal with it—and so he did, albeit with tears in his eyes and a tight stomach full of dread each morning.

And then the Bakugou’s showed up at the door… and- and then Kacchan cried.

And, well—all men were not created equal; that’s what Izuku learned all those weeks ago. But seeing Kacchan crying in Shou-nii’s arms for Izuku’s sake, like he wasn’t just a nothing with no quirkless, like he was someone worth something… maybe somehow, all men were created with some level of equality.

When Shouta and the kids returned home, the adults were bustling with nervous energy in the kitchen, Mom and Mitsuki fixing the food on the counters while Masaru busied himself with setting up the dinner table (with the coffee table being the designated kids’ table). Shouta could tell something had happened while he was gone with the kids, judging by how Mitsuki and Mom both were trying and failing to hide their sniffling. Anxiety stirred in the boy’s stomach, wondering if they had fought or not—his mom wasn’t hot-tempered like Katsuki’s mom, but she could still get fiery when she wanted to.  

He hoped it was more of a ‘we solved our differences and are learning from each other through heart-felt conversation’ type of emotional high rather than a ‘we can’t agree with each other over Katsuki’s behavior and are just pretending to be civil for the sake of the kids’ type of emotional high. He suspected it was the former, given how Mitsuki and Mom still had a brighter expression despite the dried tears. He wondered what they talked about—though, he had a sneaking suspicion he knew it had to do with the boys. He made a note to ask Mom later.

The tense mood didn’t last too long, thanks to the boys rushing in and making a bee-line to the TV in the living room. Katsuki made himself at home next to Shouta’s little brother as Izuku started flipping through the channels until he landed on the Hero Net channel. The show Incredible Rescues started playing, one of All Might’s civilian rescues lighting up the screen—the two toddlers started cheering in unison at the sight, and while Shouta cringed at the volume, he could instantly feel the tension between the adults melt away at the two. 

Mitsuki wiped at her face again before a happy smile lit it up, mirrored by Mom’s subtle sigh of relief. 

Yeah , Shouta thought, letting his tight muscles loosen as he began to help the parents set up dinner, they’re gonna be fine.  

Peace. 

Shouta was a fool to think the peace from his brother’s life would follow him to his own school life, given the way that Muscles-for-Brains Sensoji towered over him while trying to head to his, Yamada, and Shirakumo’s (and now that Kayama chic’s) regular lunch spot on the roof. A smirk that could put the cheshire cat out of business stretched across his face, making Shouta narrow his eyes in contempt. 

“You know, it figures,” he sneered. 

Shouta merely raised an eyebrow, not dignifying him with a response. He wanted to shove right past him, but he knew it would probably just gain them more attention than it was worth. 

“Oh, just that useless quirks seem to run in your family.”

He felt his stomach grow cold. His jaw clenched. “What did you say?”

Sensoji’s smirk grew darker. “Word on the street says your brother caught the quirkless.”

It felt like a rug was pulled from under him—like he was shoved under a microscope for all the world to see. Like ice water dumped over him, a new kind of rage bubbling under the surface at the sheer audacity he had. Fists clenched tightly at his sides, and he was just about to act on his impulse when someone grabbed his wrist.

“Whoa, there, we’re all heroes here, aren’t we? Why fight?” 

Shirakumo. Shouta blinked the red away, hair falling to his shoulders as his friend took his stand between the two. He let out a breath of frustration he didn’t realize he was holding in. Sensoji’s smirk faltered for just a moment before it returned with a loud, bitter laugh. “ ‘Heroes.’ Yeah, sure. We’ll see how far those weak quirks will take you two; The living Contagious Quirkless and The Glorified Precipitation Machine.”

“Hey!” Shirakumo snapped. “That’s Mr. Glorified Precipitation Machine!” 

Sensoji grimaced, upset that his remark didn’t have the desired effect on the cloud-quirked teen. Shouta found himself chuckling at his friend’s response, his previous rage melted away by Shirakumo's infectious attitude. He was almost envious of him; impervious to a bully’s sharp tongue. Imagine that.

Shirakumo waved his finger at the pompadour-wearing student with a shake of his head. “Man, Sensoji, you’re too cool to be actin’ like this. It would be real sucky if Nedzu heard there was some student bullying problem right under his own nose, ya know?”

That made the other student click his tongue in disdain. “Whatever,” he growled. “Nobody likes a snitch, Cloudy.”

Shirakumo narrowed his eyes and leaned forward, not backing down. “Call me Cloudy with a chance of Piss Off, Bob-omb.”

Finally, Sensoji scoffed and left. The white-haired student let out a loud sigh and deflated like a balloon when Sensoji turned the corner out of sight. “Phew! That was scary, huh?”

Shouta rolled his eyes. “I had that.”

“I know, but I would’a preferred if you didn’t get yourself expelled, buddy,” his friend laughed and patted him on the back heavily while they left to their usual hangout on the roof. 

“Wait, he said that?!” 

“Volume!” 

“Oops, sorry, Mido!” 

Shouta rubbed at his ears as he lowered his blond friend with a glare. 

Kayama huffed with irritation, arms crossed over her chest. “What a shame, and he was so handsome too.”

“You and I both know that’s not true.”

“Heh, yeah, you’re right.” Kayama winked and stuck her tongue out. “Anyway, still totally uncool.”

“Tell me about it.”

“Yeah, so, like, discriminating people based on their quirk status is totally uncool-”

“I didn’t mean literally.”

She just cackled in response as Shouta rolled his eyes, trying to fight off a smile—whatever semblance of a smirk he had fell off when he remembered his ‘conversation’ with Sensoji before Shirakumo showed up. The reminder that someone in his school training to be a hero could be so… so insensitive and bigotted…. He couldn’t understand it. It filled him with disgust, even more so when it was his own brother the student was making fun of. 

Shirakumo leaned forward, looking at him with his brows furrowed. “Midoriya, what he said wasn’t true. You know that, right?”

Shouta shook his head. “I don’t care about what he says about me. I just—he took shots at Izuku. How’d he even find out about that?”

Kayama poked Yamada with a hum. “Well, it’s not like you boys are the quietest bees in the park.”

Yamada sputtered. “Well, it’s- I can’t- It’s not my fault my quirk bass booms me!”

“I’m about to muzzle you, Yamada,” Shouta playfully smacked him behind his head. 

Yamada pouted with a sigh, crossing his arms. “Sorry…”

“Aw, c’mon, it’s not his fault,” Shirakumo reached over to pat the blond on the shoulders. “‘Sides, literally no one else would care if they overheard us talkin’ ‘bout Izukkun. Sensoji’s just a bully; of course he would use anything he could to tear you down.”

Yeah, that made sense. Shouta brought his knees up and leaned his cheek on the top of them, letting out a deep sigh. “Again, I don’t care what he says about me. I just don’t want Izuku being affected by this somehow. He already gets bullied at school, imagine being bullied by a hero-in-training he doesn’t even know .”

A rare quiet fell on the friend group, a solemn air around them. Everyone but Kayama had been around Izuku enough to love the kid and the desire to protect a dear friend was strong; even if Kayama hadn’t met him yet, and she may have been new to the group, but that didn’t mean she didn’t share that same feeling. 

After a moment of brooding, the girl then stood up with a huff, arms at her hips as she hummed. “Well, boys, moping around isn’t gonna fix anything.”

“What are you talking about?” Shouta dryly mumbled, raising his head slightly. 

Kayama grinned at him slyly. “That Sensoji’s never been put in his place before. And I don’t like bein’ a little snitch with no evidence either. That being said…” a mischievous gleam filled her eyes behind her glasses. “I like to consider myself somewhat of an internet sleuth.”

“Wait, what?” Yamada looked at her quizzically. 

Shirakumo wrinkled his nose. “Explain, woman.”

Kayama pulled her phone out, waving it around. “Come on, don’t tell me you don’t wanna look up some dirt on him?”

Shouta sat up straight then grinned widely. The two boys next to him saw his expression then balked. 

Yamada leaned back from him. “Eugh, what’s with that look, Midoriya?!”

Shirakumo did the same, grimacing. “Oh geez, that’s so… creepy… stop that…” 

Kayama, on the other hand, only mirrored his mischievous aura. “Let’s get cracking then!”

Chapter Text

MIDnight: lmaooooo i got smthng

Shouta’s phone buzzed on the kitchen counter, bringing him out from his daze of mechanically filling Izuku’s snack bag full of celery, baby carrots, and peanut butter dip. He zipped the final baggy close and turned his attention to his phone. 

GLORIFIED PRECIPITATION MACHINE LOL: omg plse drop the @ 

the ring irl: can you not sound like a pick-me girlie for two seconds?

GLORIFIED PRECIPITATION MACHINE LOL: idk can u maybe dl rime like i’ve asked u to like 389456846 times

Shouta rolled his eyes in amusement and set his phone down so he could focus on putting the baggies of fruit snacks in a fabric lunch bag. 

“Izuku, are you ready?” he called out.

“One minute!”

Shouta raised an eyebrow at the tiny muffled voice coming from their shared room. Shuffling followed his brother’s answer, finishing with a grunt and something falling on the floor. He sighed and closed the lunch bag before making his way to their room. 

There, he found Izuku struggling to fit several of his All Might action figures and two plushies in his All Might kiddie backpack. The boy paused like a deer caught in headlights then smiled sheepishly to his brother, who simply leveled a deadpan stare at him while his hands rested at his sides. 

“Izu-kun, what did Mom say about bringing your expensive action figures and plushies to the park?”

Izuku deflated at the question, a pout centering on his face.

“That they’ll get lost an’ we can’t buy ‘em again….”

Shouta couldn’t help but smile. Izuku was a good kid and listened to the rules to a tee—when it was convenient for him. The elder brother knelt down to Izuku’s level and gestured to his backpack with his chin. “And you wouldn’t wanna lose your precious stuff, yeah? How about we bring something… less… likely to be lost?”

Izuku still looked put out but he seemed open to the suggestion thankfully. Shouta smiled and started to unpack the backpack of all the attempted smuggled action figures while his brother sat down to decide on which toy to bring—then he paused at the sight of a chocolate bar wrapper.

“… Izuku…”

The boy glanced up before freezing. Caught red-handed. 

Shouta held the wrapper in his hand, then clenched it tightly. His fist trembled. 

“… Izuku… ”

“Uh oh—“ 

Izuku bolted out of the room screaming, an irate Shouta following after right on his heels. Luckily for the bratty kid, Mom stepped out of her room at the noise, still in the middle of getting ready to head out to the park with them—Izuku dove under her skirt and popped out behind her. 

“What is going on, you two?”

“Shou-nii’s gonna kill me!” the little liar screeched with an accusatory finger pointed at Shouta.

Two could play that game. Shouta pointed back at him, crinkling the wrinkly wrapper in despair. “Izuku ate my last Ingenium Chocolate bar I was saving for lunch tomorrow!”

“Well maybe you shouldn’t have left it out!”

“It was literally in my school bag buried at the bottom!”

“Well—uh, well then maybe you shouldn’t leave your bag out in my room!”

“We share the same room, you tiny little sh—“

“ Enough! ”

Oops. Mom yelled. That shut both of them up with clicks of their mouths. Eyes turned to their mother who sighed to herself loudly. “We’ll go to the store and buy you another one, Shouta, just stop threatening your brother—and Izuku, you know better than to dig around in your brother’s stuff…”

“Yes Mama…”

“Fine, Mom…”

“Now can you both apologize to each other now?” 

He didn’t want to. It’s not like he actually did anything to the snot. He glared at the boy with a narrowed-eye pout just as Izuku grumpily puffed his cheeks out and glanced away. 

“Sorry, Izuku…” Shouta grounded out. He ought to smack the brat with his celery snacks baggy. But he won’t (he so wants to).

“Sorry, Shou-nii…” 

Aww, that almost sounded sincere… until he stuck his tongue out at him and ran back to their room—Shouta yelped and took off after him, only to have the door literally slammed in his face. The hero-in-training growled loudly and let his fist fall on the wooden door, the other rubbing his nose. “Izuku! You little—”

Mom let out another sigh—of endearment this time—and waltzed to the door, arms crossed over her chest as she leaned her back against the wall. “Oh well, Shouta, if he doesn’t want to come out, we’ll just have to go to the park and play Heroes with Katsuki all by ourselves! You know… since he doesn’t want to go, obviously.”

Shouta tried to conceal his snort and relaxed his form, mimicking his mother’s position. “Yep, sounds like it…”

He heard a soft gasp behind the door and smirked to himself when the sound of scuffling followed thereafter. If he knew his brother, the boy was probably debating his options. 

Shouta rubbed his chin and loudly hummed. “You know, that’d mean we’d be down a player, Mom.”

“It sure would,” Mom agreed, appearing thoughtful. “You know, I bet you Katsuki would love to play All Might this time!”

“Maybe he’d be the new main All Might when they all play Heroes next time.”

Finally, the exasperated tiny shout of “Fine! I’m coming! I wanna be All Might!” came through the door all the while Shouta shared his victory smirk with Mom. They knew how to work a five-year-old.

Shouta sat with Shirakumo, Yamada, and Kayama at a picnic table by the playground that Izuku and Katsuki were playing on—Mom and Mitsuki were sitting by each other on a nearby bench chatting away as they watched their toddlers hop around like maniacs playing tag with their Pro Hero Action-figures. 

The raven haired teen tapped his knuckles on the wood of the table, bringing the attention back to the center and away from the stupid squabble his two idiot friends were having over if raisins were better than grapes. “Alright, are you gonna spill or what, Kayama?”

The girl across from him giggled in amusement and leaned forward with her phone, a dangerous glint shining in her eye and Shouta couldn’t help but smirk. Whatever had her giddy about tearing down that two-pint bully had to be good—and Shouta couldn’t wait to get his hands on that. Information was golden, afterall. 

“Right, right—” Kayama started as the rowdy boys next to Shouta finally quieted down. “So check this out. I didn’t even need to do that much digging, by the way, but man was this a rabbit hole.”

“Kayama, get on with it.”

Shirakumo elbowed Shouta.

“Ow! Ugh… Please.”

Kayama winked at Shirakumo at that, smirk tugging at her lips before pulling out a packet of paper—printed out screenshots, apparently. “I saved all these on my computer at home, so I’ll email you guys later, but here’s the treasure trove, boys. Feast your eyes on the degeneracy!” 

Shouta pulled the packet closer to him, flipping through the pages quickly before returning to the first page. There it was—screenshots of his social media page, confirming his name and screen name, followed by screenshots of post after post full of nothing but derogatory comments about quirkless and disabled people. It made Shouta’s jaw clench when his eyes passed over the word “Pinkies” multiple times. He wasn’t even reading the posts deeply—he didn’t think he could even stomach doing that knowing his kid brother was playing without a worry in the world with his best friend not even ten feet away from him—knowing that this bastard had the audacity to be in hero training all the while declaring quirkless people to be not worth saving.

Then he read one post by accident—it made his stomach boil uncomfortably, in a way he hadn’t felt since finding out Izuku’s dad had left them high and dry. 

‘if i ever have to save a quirkless dude during a villain attack, i’d rather just let the villain win lol’

Who says that?

His mind flashed to Izuku, giggling happily as he chased Katsuki around the park. It wasn’t even two weeks ago that the two had been crying to each other in his own arms, the blond child scared to pieces over Izuku potentially dying. The thought alone was enough to make him want to tear the paper into tiny shreds then throw up in a nearby trash can—but he kept his wits about him and took a deep breath to regain his composure.

Kayama watched him with a steady gaze, calculating and full of something like admiration. Admiration for what—Shouta could only guess, but he shoved the thought aside and let his eyes return to the sheets in front of him. The girl sighed audibly and tapped on the paper, gaining his attention back. “You think that’s bad? You’re not ready for this.”

She reached over to the packet and flipped the pages a few times. Shouta ignored the way Shirakumo and Yamada leaned uncomfortably close over his shoulders, thinking to himself: how could it possibly get worse than this? Kayama stopped flipping the paper—and, oh wow, yeah, it definitely could get worse.

The dude was on a notorious anti-quirkless forum, with the same username no less. The idiot. Did he not think this could be traced back to him? Shouta shut his eyes and leaned back, brows furrowed tightly in slight stress and agitation—then he began to rub the bridge of his nose. 

“I’m gonna kill him.”

“No, no, you are not,” Yamada said.

“Yes, Yes, I am.”

“You will not! Midoriya! You’re a hero-in-training!”

“So what!”

Shirakumo shook his other shoulder, whining loudly: “Midoriyaaaaa! You’re not gonna kill him!”

Shouta groaned and pushed the two boys away from him as he stood up and began pacing in the grass. “I- Fine! I won’t kill him but I’ll make him wish that I did. Screw being a hero for two seconds—Next time I see him, I’m filleting him like a fish and shoving his own bones down his gullet like a garbage dispenser.”

“Holy crap.”

“A’ight, I’ll admit, I’m a little scared.”

“Midoriya, you’re being super attractive right now.” 

Shirakumo and Yamada gave Kayama a disturbed look as she leaned forward on the table with a hand supporting her head and her lips pulled in a rather unsettling smile. Shouta paused his pacing to shoot the girl a confused yet somewhat judgmental expression before returning to his angry pacing. 

“He seriously has the- the- the balls to roll up to UA, the best hero-training academy in Japan, while carrying that laundry list of abysmal opinions—”

“‘ Abysmal?’ ”

Shirakumo elbowed Yamada. “Shh, let the man rant! This is the most he’s spoken since—dude, this is the most he’s spoken ever!”

“Ow! Fine, fine, sheesh…”

Yet again, Shouta ignored the audience. His fists clenched by his sides as he walked, nails digging into his skin, only giving it a reprieve when he struggled with finding his words just to claw at the air in front of him before returning them to their cage at his sides again. “I mean—how hard is it to do a simple google search on his socials! What a—if he—can you imagine if he ever actually became a hero? Can you imagine if-if he’s fighting, and finds a quirkless kid—what if he actually lets them die? I-I can’t have that kind of bastard in charge of saving my kid brother! Not when he wears those bright red shoes—you know how rare pinky support shoes are in Japan?! How expensive ?! Just for him to be able to walk comfortably—and just, I-”

Shouta stopped in his tracks when he caught sight of his brother and Katsuki running toward them. Something in his stomach flipped, instantly putting him on edge—but over nothing, right? Izuku, the annoying little brother he always wanted and finally got when he was ten years old, smiling so bright it could rival the sun. He was fine and happy—there was no way he knew about Sensoji and his trash opinions—even if it wasn’t fair. 

He was alright. Izuku had Katsuki, and he had Shouta, and Mom, and Yamada and Shirakumo—he was fine. 

Shouta took a deep breath in, then out, forcing his shoulders to relax as his brother and his kid friend approached. Both of them tugged at one of his hands each. 

“Shou-nii! Shou-nii! Play with us!”

They both chanted his name with demands to play with them—Shouta really wasn’t in the mood to be playing with them, but… he needed a distraction. 

“Fine, fine… but only if you can get Shirakumo and Yamada to join in too.”

“Wh- what?! Why just us?!”

“Yeah, why not Kayama too?!”

“Yeah, why not me too?! What if I wanted to play, huh!”

Well, the real reason was that she was wearing booty shorts and on the off-chance that she’s in front of him climbing something, Shouta did not want to get jumpscared by anything he didn’t want to see. Was he going to say that? No. Was he going to stop her anyway? Also, no. He knew Kayama would do whatever she wanted to regardless of anyone’s opinions, so it was illogical to fight it. 

The boys took the challenge, though, and raced towards his classmates, tugging on them by their hands and pulling them to the playground. Kayama followed along happier than ever while Shouta sighed and grabbed all their things to bring over to the mothers to watch. He shoved the packet of screenshots away in his bag, not bothering to hide the look of disgust as he unceremoniously buried it away. Dumping all their packs by Mom, who agreed to watch it, he sighed once again and decided to deal with his revenge on Sensoji later.

It was probably unhealthy of him to do this; to be sat in his bed, staring at the packet of “evidence” against Sensoji with the only light being from his phone, which read 2:02AM. 

Izuku was passed out in his own bed across from him, hugging his worn out All Might plushie and a new Ingenium doll they’d got after the park, completely tuckered out from playing so hard with the park kids. He was so innocent, just a child with so much ahead of him—both good and bad. 

He still could feel his blood boil at the mere thought of Sensoji letting a child die at the hands of a villain just because they were quirkless. 

It was almost too much to handle inside himself—the feeling of gasoline boiling in his chest and stomach, threatening to pour over and set himself ablaze was overwhelming. The teen wanted so badly to destroy something, wreck his room, tear down the posters, break the beds, shred every piece of paper he came in contact with—but, he wasn’t that kind of person. He was logical and thought things through. A deep breath pulled into his chest.

And think things through was what he was going to do.

He could submit this to the principal and leave it in his hands—maybe have Sensoji expelled? Blacklisted from all hero training programs? While his mind told him that was the right thing to do, another more irrational and somewhat chaotic part of him felt it wasn’t going to be satisfying enough. The logical part of him wanted to argue, but the feeling of selfish indignation was stronger.

Maybe it was because of how late it was; the vulnerability of the night with the only witnesses about being the light of his phone and the smiling faces of All Might plastered on Izuku’s wall posters were the only things present to keep Shouta from acting like an insufferable, rebellious teenager. As if those paper eyes of a hero watching over the room would judge him somehow—Shouta was logical but that didn’t stop his sleep-deprived mind from regressing into a more child-like state and giving sentience to inanimate objects.

Dark green eyes twitched back to the red numbers illuminating the opposite corner of the room: 2:43AM. Great. He was too wired to sleep now, and too many ideas swirled in his mind. He had to write something down, do something with his brain and hands and paper—or phone. 

Shouta swallowed thickly and cringed his nose as he folded the packet small and slipped it inside his pillowcase under the pillow, then clicked the flashlight off from his phone. He settled down under his sheets and tapped on his notes app—then the brainstorming began. 

One idea bled into another—the more he wrote whatever popped into his head, the wider his grin became. Slowly, he resolved to follow through with his own revenge. 

For one day , he thought. One day only, screw being a hero.  

And so, the planning stage of this operation began.

Chapter Text

“See anything, All Might?” 

“Nothing yet, Sir Nighteye. It’s quiet. Too quiet….”

Izuku and Kacchan both stood at the tippy-toppest part of the playground (that being the tall slide), surveying the entirety of the park. It was Kacchan’s turn being All Might so Izuku was his reliable side-kick. Everything was peaceful in the park… too peaceful…. 

Well, it was to be expected when the only things that really moved were the cars on the streets, passerbys on the sidewalks, and the squirrels picking fights with the local bird population. Izuku had his money on the birds winning whatever it was they were squawking over (birds were crazy like that—he's seen tiny little chirpies run entire ravens out of areas before).

“Does your quirk sense anything, Sir Nighteye?” 

Izuku put his fingers to his temples and scrunched his face in concentration. “Mmmmm… nothing, All Might… except… Ah, I see…!”

Kacchan perked up and gave him his full attention. “What is it? A Villain?”

Izuku opened his eyes and looked around the playground again, just barely able to peer over the safety bars. “Hmmm, a new kid!” He pointed between the bars at a kid with blue hair and glasses. He had an adult with him who looked just like him but older in a white hoodie. Izuku hummed to himself then smiled, looking back at Kacchan. “Hey, Kacchan, let’s ask that kid if he wants to play heroes and villains with us!” 

Kacchan kicked his leg lightly. “Izuku! I’m All Might, remember? But sure, maybe he can be the villain. I’m tired of just being on the lookout over squirrels.”

“Yay! Okay!” The younger boy bounced up and with his best friend on his heel, they both slid down the slide and ran over to the new kid. “Hi!”

“Hey, play Heroes and Villains with us!” Kacchan ever-so-nicely demanded. 

The kid blinked, completely caught off guard by the two kids at his face. He looked back at the adult with him, who smiled and nodded in an attempt at encouraging him. Turning back, the boy stepped closer and Izuku could see his legs were misshapen—no, rather mutated. Oh! A mutation quirk! Izuku almost started buzzing with questions, but somehow stopped himself (he’ll leave that for later, totally!!).

“Um, okay!” The boy agreed. “My name is Tenya!”

“Great! I'm Izuku and this is Kacchan!”

“Oi! Dweeb! Don't introduce me like that!” Kacchan shoved Izuku lightly and nodded his head at the new boy. “I'm Katsuki! Call me Kacchan and you're dead, got it?”

Izuku put his hands over Kacchan’s face and laughed nervously, ignoring the way his friend then tried to bite him (he missed). “Don't- don't mind him, he's just grouchy we can't play Heroes and Villains without villains! Do you wanna be our villain?”

Tenya frowned, looking uncomfortable at the exchange. “I can't be a villain. My brother's a hero, so I wanna be a hero too!”

Kacchan scoffed. “Well duh, we all wanna be heroes!”

“Aw gee… hmmm, let's see…” Izuku hummed, brainstorming. “Oh! Let's ask Shou-nii and his friends! Shou-nii plays Heroes and Villains with me at home and plays the villain all the time with me!”

He took two steps before his brain short circuited and he spun back around, a wild expression on his face. “Your brother's a hero?!”

It took an embarrassing amount of time to recover from learning Tenya’s brother was the Ingenium (Shou-nii was going to lose it!! AND HE WAS RIGHT THERE!!) but eventually Tenya managed to get both Izuku and Kacchan back on track with their plan on recruiting Shou-nii and his friends to play Heroes and Villains with them. It took very little convincing on their part to drag Shou-nii, Yamada, Shirakumo and his new friend Kayama into their game. 

(Tenya may have promised to introduce his brother to them after the game. Score.)

The three younger boys climbed the playground equipment and settled at the top of the slide as their ‘base’ while they planned. 

“Okay, I'm gonna be All Might, and Izuku’s gonna be Sir Nighteye, so who are you gonna be?” 

“Aww, I wanted to be All Might this time…”

“I hardly got to be All Might! It's my turn anyway, you always get to be All Might.”

Izuku gave a pout and crossed his arms. Yeah, maybe so. Still. “Fine…”

“Um!” Tenya interjected. “I wanna be Ingenium, if that's okay!”

“Okay! So you're the new recruit, and All Might's new sidekick!”

“But Kacchan, All Might's only ever had one sidekick—”

“I know that, Izuku! We're pretending!”

“Oh, right.”

Kacchan shook his head then went to the bars of the playground, looking down at the four teens playing villains. “We're ready! We're gonna be All Might, Sir Nighteye and Ingenium!”

Yamada saluted him with a wide grin, while Shirakumo beamed and announced back: “Cool! We're gonna be the Nightmare Gang! I'm Dark Cloud, Yamada’s Whisper, your bro is Blackout and Kayama is…”

Izuku looked over to where Shou-nii was talking to Kayama, and he barely heard him tell her, “You are not calling yourself Miss Teabagger, pick a better name.”

“Ugh, fine, you party pooper,” she rolled her eyes playfully then made a cute pose with two peace signs by her cheeks. “Call me Pixie Dust, then!”

Kacchan scoffed from above. “That's lame.”

Shou-nii sighed with an amused huff and shook his head but didn't argue.

“‘The Nightmare Gang’ sounds super cool though,” Tenya muttered to Izuku, to which he whispered back with a grin, “I know right!”

“Okay we're ready!” Yamada announced, waving his hand to the boys atop the playground. 

“Remember, no quirks,” Shou-nii sternly reminded his friends. “This is just pretend.”

Shirakumo rolled his eyes and playfully pushed him. “We know that!”

“I was talking to Yamada.”

“Ouch, man.”

“I'm just saying.”

Izuku giggled into his hands while he watched his brother interact with his friends. They didn't have to choose villain names or a plot or anything, but he knew Shou-nii liked to pull out all the stops for him. 

Their Heroes and Villains storyline went like this: the Nightmare Gang were smuggling illegal woodchips from somewhere far away into Japan, and Sir Nighteye has warned All Might and Newcomer Ingenium about their latest load in the Playground Port (that's the playground). 

“Halt, evil villains!” All Might (Kacchan) shouted from his perch on the top of the slide (the port warehouse had a fancy slide for sure). “I AM HERE! So drop the woodchips and no one gets hurt!”

“Yeah! What he said!” Sir Nighteye (Izuku, remember!) added, pulling himself above the fence of the playground below All Might. 

“What should I do, guys?” Ingenium (Tenya!! New friend!! Keep up!!) whispered to the two.

“Say something cool!” Sir Nighteye whispered back. 

“Oh, okay! Um…” Ingenium cleared his throat and mimicked Sir Nighteye’s position on the fence bars and pointed down at the villains. “Surrender now and we may be able to negotiate timeout rules for your jail sentences, evil villains!!”

“Maybe if All Might finds a safer spot to stand on, we'll listen to demands,” came the dry drawl of the villain Blackout (Shou-nii!!), his hands in his pockets all cool-like.

“Never, evildoer!!”

Blackout broke character. “Katsuki, get down from there. If you fall and break your arm, I'm laughing in your face and you'll feel bad.” 

Kacchan (he paused being All Might) scoffed, rolled his eyes and jumped off the slide top next to Izuku and Tenya while grumbling, “Stupid Shou-nii and his stupid rules, ruinin’ my fun… Okay, can we keep going now?”

“Yeah, keep going.”

Okay, so the story continues.

“I lied about listening to demands, by the way,” Blackout said. “We're still smuggling the woodchips.”

He pointed to Whisper (Yamada!!) and Dark Cloud (Shirakumo!!), both of which were holding handfuls of woodchips all while looking like chipmunks caught red handed in some crime (which this was totally a real crime, by the way!). All Might turned red with indignation and he took off down the playground hall, shouting for his two side kicks to keep up and to block those two villains from leaving. Ingenium was shockingly fast (though not unexpected, he's super fast!!) and quickly cut off Dark Cloud’s path, startling him enough for him to drop his bundle of woodchips with a shriek—meanwhile Sir Nighteye barely managed to stand in front of Whisper's way before he got away (the second, smaller playground was the safe zone). Sir Nighteye and Ingenium then launched at their respective villains, clinging to their legs and effectively detaining them.

All Might cackled as he stood before Blackout, arms crossed with a wicked smile of victory on his lips. “What now, villain? Your lackeys are blocked and there's no way out now. Face it; You've lost.”

Blackout smirked. 

“I would expect nothing less from the Symbol of Peace himself,” he said coolly. “But in your arrogance, you forgot to take into account one thing.”

Sir Nighteye gasped. One thing? What could he mean? What was—oh. Oh no. How could he have missed this?

“Watch out, All Might!” he shouted. 

But it was too late. All Might was picked up by the arm pits by Pixie Dust (Miss Kayama!!) from behind. She squeezed him like a doll and giggled while she cooed and coddled him, swinging him as she spun around dramatically. “Gotcha, you cutie patootie!”

“Argh!! Unhand me, villain!!” All Might squirmed and kicked the air, pops of small explosions erupting from his palms. 

Blackout’s hair raised then, the pops ceasing. The villain then strode forward. “Poor All Might. What's a hero to do, I wonder? Who will save the distressed hero?”

“No! All Might!” Ingenium cried out. (He was now on top of Dark Cloud like he was a pillow) 

All Might growled at the villain, red meeting red. Then, he smirked—Blackout frowned. “Keh. You're all the same…. Underestimating me. I'll show you!” 

And with that, he kicked back, hitting Pixie Dust in the lower abdomen making her drop him as she groaned in shock and pain—he then shot forward and tackled Blackout’s legs, tripping him up and making them both fall backwards into the woodchips. All Might sat on the villain’s chest with a prideful grin. 

“Gotcha!”

Blackout stared wide-eyed up at the hero, blinking the red away before snorting and sitting up. “I concede, O Symbol of Peace. You're far too powerful for me and my crew.”

All Might stood up, crossed his arms then stomped his foot on the villain’s chest, huffing through his nostrils with pride. “That’s what I thought, Villain! And you!” he turned around, pointing at Pixie Dust who finally recovered from the stomach-kick he delivered to her before. She raised her hands up in defeat. “Yeah, keep your hands up! You’re under arrest!”

So that was their first round. Kacchan was so cool! The group ended up playing three more rounds, Kacchan and Izuku swapping roles of All Might between each game (even though Kacchan got really mad about that, but Shou-nii made sure he was playing fair, so it was fine!). At one point, they decided the teams were uneven for a Hero vs Villains setup to be fair, so Tenya offered to enlist his own brother for their game. 

“Oh! That’s right! Your brother is a hero, right?!” Izuku exclaimed, stars in his eyes. 

Tenya smiled with pride. “Yeah! He’s the new Pro-hero Ingenium!” 

Izuku heard Shou-nii choke on his water behind them. He paid him no mind. The stars in his eyes burst into fireworks and he practically buzzed with excitement, thousands of questions storming his mind—how was it having a brother who was a pro-hero? What was his quirk like? Does Tenya have a similar quirk? Can he have an autograph?!

His stream of muttering was interrupted by Kacchan shaking him excitedly, ushering Tenya to hurry up and go get his brother already!! Their new friend laughed and saluted at the two before running off to his brother across the park to drag him into their game. Izuku grabbed Kacchan’s hands and the two squealed in excitement together, jumping up and down until Shou-nii approached and calmed them down.

“Remember not to hound him, okay?” he told them. “He’s off duty and taking care of his brother at the park, so try not to bring him too much attention.”

“But- but- but, Shou-nii! He’s one of your favorite heroes!”

His brother’s face instantly burnt as red as a tomato, eyes blowing just as round as one too before he grit his teeth and muttered threateningly, “Izuku, shut it.” 

Izuku covered his mouth to stifle his giggles but Kacchan just pointed directly at him and laughed. Yamada and Shirakumo came around and they both swung their arms over Shou-nii’s shoulders on each side then. Izuku could recognize the cheeky smirks on their faces—they were going to tease him, and Izuku was perfectly fine with watching that unfold. Seeing Shou-nii in a state where he was just as stutter-y and awkward as Izuku could get was a rare sight and it brought his little brother endless giggles. 

“Well, well, well, we thought you didn’t have a favorite hero,” Shirakumo chuckled.

Yamada cackled, “Yeahh, what’s up with that, Mido?”

The blush that burned Shou-nii’s cheeks grew darker and he crossed his arms like the grump he was. “Tch. Of course, everyone has their favorites….”

Shirakumo then began to pinch his cheeks lightly. “Yeah? I thought you didn’t care about that stuff…. Unless… gasp! Don’t tell me!”

“You’re secretly a soft guy on the inside!” Yamada feigned surprise, matching Shirakumo’s performance with the same exact smile. 

Shou-nii seemed to melt into his scarf and Izuku almost felt bad enough to tug him away, but these were his friends and if it was really a problem, Shou-nii knew how to put a stop to it. Plus, it was funny. 

Then a funnier thought stuck up on him. He ran up to them and tugged at Yamada’s pants, gaining his attention. “Did you know! Shou-nii’s super favorites are actually—”

Shou-nii picked him up and hung him like a bag of potatoes, hand over his mouth. “And that’s enough out of you, you tiny flea.” He giggled from behind the hand, then licked him (of course, he had to, duh.)—which led him to dropping the boy and Izuku ran off with Kacchan, cackling like crazy gremlins. Shou-nii scowled at him and wiped his hand on his pants, glaring at the two who ran up the playground equipment and stuck their tongues out to him from between the bars. “Ugh! Izuku, you nasty little—!”

Then it got even funnier (well, looking back at it) when Tenya came back with his brother in tow, the older hero appearing sheepish as he smiled and waved at everyone. 

“Hey there, thanks for playing with Tenya!” he started and offered his hand out to Shou-nii. “I’m Iida Tensei, his—” 

“I-I-Ingenium, right?” Shou-nii stammered, accepting the hand. “I-I mean, crap, uh, yeah. It’s no problem. I’m Erasure- I mean Shou- uh, Midoriya Shouta, sorry. This is Izuku, and that’s Katsuki.”

The others each then made their own introductions, though Shou-nii’s friends were much more eloquent than Shou-nii had been. Izuku, on the other hand, was fanboying like crazy with Kacchan (Kacchan was much cooler about it, though!). 

Thankfully, Tensei took it in stride with heartfelt laughter. Shou-nii seemed especially embarrassed by his own mild fanboying, but Tensei didn’t seem to mind the attention nor the way the teen tripped and babbled over himself. He almost seemed endeared by it.

In the end, Tensei joined the Heroes team, Izuku taking All Might again, while Kacchan decided he’d be someone different like Gang Orca, and Tenya and Tensei were both Ingenium (though Tensei said Tenya was Mini-genium, to which Tenya happily accepted).

They played out a hero vs villain gang battle with pretend-quirks (at Shou-nii and Tensei’s insistence—Kacchan tried not to be grumpy at that), up until Mama and Auntie Mitsuki called them all in to start heading home. Izuku felt sad about it, but he was also really tired. Kacchan and Auntie Mitsuki headed off first while Shou-nii and his friends packed up their things.

“Bye Tenchan!” Izuku rushed at his new friend, arms wrapping around his shoulders in a bear hug, squeezing him. “I hope we can play again, it was super fun!”

Tenchan looked surprised, suddenly seeming shy as he returned the hug with a sheepish smile on his lips. “I had fun too,” he replied. 

When Izuku pulled away he beamed brightly. “My brother’s gonna be a hero too, so me and you are gonna be hero brothers together! I’m gonna be a hero too, you know—maybe we can all be heroes together and work together a bunch!”

“Yeah!” Tenchan nodded, growing just as excited as his new friend. 

If you had asked Shouta how he thought his day was going to go when he and his family were going to meet the Bakugous at the park, as well as his close schoolmates, he would’ve said something along the lines of, “get more info on what’s-his-face Sensoji, then maybe play some playground Heroes vs Villains with the kids.”

Well, he was technically correct, he just didn’t realize that would come with meeting THE Pro Hero Ingenium. One of his all-time favorite pro-heroes who only takes second to the Wild Pussycats. He looked like a cross between a Gundam bot and a power ranger, he was efficient in both rescues and villain takedowns and he was top of his class at UA which let him start up his own agency only a few years after graduating. Sure, he was considered a limelight hero, but he wasn’t… how would he say it? He wasn’t a celebrity hero—he prioritized rescues above all else and Shouta admired that. 

It was actually surreal to be playing Heroes vs Villains with THE PRO HERO INGENIUM. He almost didn’t want the day to end (but he had serious things to consider and plan out when they got home, so… yeah). 

As they were packing up to leave, though Ingenium and his little brother were staying a bit longer, Shouta swore to himself, I am not a fanboy. I am not a fanboy. I am not a fanboy. I AM NOT A FANBOY.

Oh, how weak he was, for he was his brother’s brother, and dammit, heroes are cool, and dammit, Ingenium is insanely cool and also right here.

It took very little—really, only Yamada nudging him while Shirakumo shoved a pen and paper into his hands—for him to break and he found himself red-faced standing at Ingenium’s side, waiting for his attention to turn from the mothers to him. Thank God for Mom subtly gesturing to him and gracefully ending the conversation. 

“Oh, hey there, bud!” Ingenium smiled in greeting. “Need something ‘fore you head off?”

“Um, I-” Shouta stammered, his face burning up. This was so insanely unlike him, he had no idea what to do with himself. He never once thought in a million years he would meet any of his favorite heroes outside of hero training, and by then he’d assume the glitz and glamour of it all would have worn out on him and he wouldn’t be as fanboy-ish as his brother was anymore, and yet here he is, twisting his tongue in his mouth while he pretended to be cool or whatever. 

Thankfully (or regretfully), Yamada, Shirakumo, and Kayama chose that moment to rescue him and offer up their own sheets of paper for autographs. 

“We’d love to get your autograph!” Shirakumo took the lead. 

Kayama then added gracefully, “And maybe some tips for some up and coming junior heroes too?”

Shouta felt stupid just nodding and humming along. Ingenium laughed at their approach, but it was a sound of endearment that made Shouta only slightly embarrassed but not enough to want to hide in a hole and dry himself into dust like he had been not five seconds ago. 

“Oh? That’s right, I heard little Izuku say his brother was going to be a hero too, huh,” Ingenium nodded, taking each paper carefully and signing them with his hero name and a small doodle of a hedgehog on the corners. Shouta was absolutely framing his autograph when they got home. Ingenium caught his eyes then, making the black-haired teen freeze and heart seize as if captivated. “That’s you, right?Are you all training to be heroes?”

“Y- yes, sir, that’s right.”

“Hmhm!” They each agreed with excited nods of their heads. 

“What school are you all going to?”

“We go to UA, sir!” Yamada explained while Shirakumo added, “We’re all second years!”

“Ahh, second years!” Ingenium sighed with a wistful smile on his face. “Second years are permitted to intern with agencies, right? I’ll be sure to keep an eye on you all when the Sports Festival comes around this year. As for advice… Well, don’t lose sight of why you’re on this path.”

Shouta was handed his copy of the autograph and it felt like gold in his hands. He looked back up to the Pro Hero like he held the stars, taking in every word and holding them in his mind as if they were sacred texts. 

He continued, “I may be relatively new to the scene, but it’s all too easy to get blinded by the spotlight and all the attention. People make us out to be gods, but we’re just like any other person, really. We just want to help people—so I guess what I really mean to say is, make others your priority. People want to be saved quickly when trouble comes, so make their rescues quick and flawless, and rely on your teammates. When all else fails, your friends will always have your back.”

The four teens shared glances with each other, each holding a signed autograph of the hero in their hands. Right, the whole reason they were going to be heroes in the first place—well, the idea was to help people. But was that what Shouta really wanted?

He thought back to his conversations with Izuku, how Izuku wanted to be like All Might, how he wanted to be strong and help save people just like him. He thought back to his conversation with Katsuki on the bench with Izuku, what he told them about what being a hero meant. 

But was that really him? Sure, of course he wanted to save people. But why?

Really, what he wanted was to change the hero scene, open their eyes to more “lowkey” or unconventional quirks, open the door for Izuku and quirkless kids as a whole. He wanted to show Izuku that he could do it—that if Shouta could, so could he. He wanted to show everyone who doubted him that he could do it, that his quirk wasn’t villainous. He thought about Sensoji, how he mocked his quirk as “contagious quirklessness”, the days crying in primary school when others didn’t want him to look at them for fear of losing their quirks. He was here out of spite, really. 

He didn’t… want that. 

His eyes lowered, taking in the playground around them, saw the new kids arriving with their families; Women across the street walking and laughing together; Some school kids running to catch a public bus; a mother and father walking home with groceries; an old man sitting on a bench, enjoying the weather of the day. People living and breathing with their own lives and problems and thoughts. Any moment, a villain could erupt in the streets and it would be Ingenium’s job to help keep all these civilians safe. These lives were in their hands as heroes. 

Was Shouta up to the task?

He then turned and watched Izuku and little Tenya saying their giddy goodbyes together, promising to play again together soon. 

For Izuku? For his mom? His friends? Yes, absolutely. Without hesitation. 

For the world? The people who lived in it, no matter how ignorant and ruthless they could be?

Shouta looked back down to the signed autograph in his hands, the way the pen had indented the paper and nearly broke in other parts due to not having a solid surface to write on. He studied the small little hedgehog in the corner, such an unnecessary detail but silly and more endearing nonetheless. Ingenium was more than just a hero too; he was a brother, a son, a friend. Anyone could be him, just as anyone could be Shouta too. 

To save lives, to be a hero. 

He would have to build that empathy, he supposed. 

Chapter Text

Here's the thing about Midoriya Shouta that not many people realize: He loves his family. He would do anything for his small, fragile family. He would sell his body parts if it meant their survival—he would find a way to deconstruct the world just to reconstruct it in their image if it came down to it. He would become a hero to rewrite the rules of society for them.

He would abandon his own morals for them. 

Midoriya Shouta and Midoriya Izuku were two peas in a pod when it came to their love for their tiny little family, and on a glance, one wouldn't be able to tell how similar they were. The truth was, they were very similar. 

As far as physiques went, freckles and green-tints were about the only shared traits (Shouta’s hair could be a beautiful iridescent green when the light hit his head just right—and his eyes were just a very, very dark green). But underneath, both were stubborn as hell. They both could be very passionate about things they care about, even if they were shown in different ways. They had strong morals, a love for heroes, and cared deeply for animals (Shouta was definitely a cat person, but Izuku was just an animal lover in general—he didn't have favorites yet). Both brothers were diligent in school, and had faced the same crowd of judgmental idiots when it came to quirks. And somehow they both found it difficult to sleep at night, much to their mother's dismay. 

As far as the surface knowledge of both Midoriya boys went, that's where their similarities ended—to Shouta, at least.

Izuku was the sun, while Shouta was the moon. Izuku was a beacon of joy and strength despite his rocky start in life. His heart was the size of a planet with no end in sight, even wide enough to forgive anyone who hurt him and see the good in them instead. He was endlessly selfless, first to take the blame if it meant helping someone else, and always being the first one to offer a hand to another fallen child. 

Izuku was everything good in the world and he was going to make waves in society one day.

Shouta on the other hand was standoffish at best, apathetic at worst. At least, that's how he saw himself anyway. He didn't go out of his way to make friends, he didn't care to impress anyone. He didn't share the same interests as his peers (his interest in heroes was specific—he disliked most limelight heroes, even finding himself cringe at even All Might sometimes), he was awkward, and enjoyed the silence of his own company more often than not. 

When he saw tragedy on the news, Shouta could only frown then carry on with his day, while Izuku sometimes cried for the people who lost their lives or their homes or loved ones in these events. He was an overflowing bleeding heart, and Shouta was an empty cup that inched away from the encroaching excess. 

Care and passion, feeling the full weight of life and its effects, was tiring and draining, and he sometimes wondered if he really could handle the strain of heroism—but then he'd see Izuku trying so hard despite everything, and that tiny torch in his chest would light up once more.

Today, that tiny torch was set ablaze in a cold anger that slowly but surely increased with intensity as the days passed by.

He had taken to picking up Izuku after school, even if it meant racing the train to get home—he ran a tight schedule and he'd be damned if it was off by a single second because he'd rewrite the laws of physics for Izuku, and he didn't trust his teachers or little leeches he calls classmates around his tiny, wholesome, annoying baby brother. 

Every day, he would arrive with red cheeks and a winded pair of lungs, but he just viewed it like stamina training. Every day, he made his way to that tiny little school yard playground for Izuku, and every day, he would watch the flea children skitter about like he was a hawk. Every day, he waited for someone to slip, waited for his chance to strike and bite the neck of his prey because Shouta was a snake, coiled back, eyes piercing and hunting, hungry for his little brother's injustice to be paid for—but to his chagrin, those teachers wearing their little comedy masks wore them well, and they used their fake angel wings taped to their backs like a second set of limbs. 

Rome wasn't built in a day, as they say—and painful change wouldn't take overnight either. He wasn't so ignorant to think their biased and bigoted mindsets would suddenly disappear after one measly callout, where the most intimidating person in the room was a stupid, pissed off 15-year-old. 

Still, as long as he was there to scrutinize the little insects as he held Izuku's hand and asked him how his day went, offering him some snacks while they passed the gates and headed home, they didn't so much as breathe in Izuku’s direction. It wasn't the ideal change, but it was a definite step up from children dog-piling his tiny brother over a beetle that may or may not have even existed. Little victories.

Maybe he was wrong for this, but he hoped that they'd slip up soon. It was only a matter of time—monsters can't hide in human skin forever; their bodies were too big for the cramped shell of a human vessel. When they finally break, Shouta knew he wanted to be there for it, to be the one to protect his brother and to exact justice on them with his own hands.

For now though, he was satisfied to simply listen to Izuku babble on about school and how they made flower pens out of pipe cleaners and construction paper, dropping his own comments and questions here and there. Izuku said he wanted to give the pen to Mama, but actually forgot it at school—he got a bit sad at that, making Shouta frown, and he wondered if that was really the truth or not. He wasn't going to push though, instead saying that maybe they could stop by the store before home and grab some pipe cleaners and construction paper to remake the flower pens, that way they could give them to each other and they wouldn't have to forget them anywhere.

Izuku brightened up immediately and agreed with a boisterous “YES!” 

Shouta chuckled then pulled his phone out to text Mom the plan before he started to route a way to the nearest general store. Or maybe a crafts store would be best….

He was nearly shocked entirely out of his thoughts when he raised his head up and caught the eyes of Sensoji. He stopped mid-step before immediately turning with Izuku to cross the road. Nope. No. Nuh uh. Not today. Or any day, really. And not in front of his kid brother, hell no. 

Sensoji watched him with a knowing smirk on his stupid face, perched on a very shiny and obviously new motorcycle as he chatted away with friends on the side of the road. 

Shouta felt hollowed out, a strange sense of dread he had only felt once and that was when Hisashi sent his mom divorce papers and his mom had cried for days, to the point she had even gotten herself sick and couldn't leave her bed for probably a week, if he remembered correctly. Aunt Mitsuki and Uncle Masaru had to help out around the house a lot back then. 

But even still, this dread was different—it was choking, it was piercing, and it was overwhelming. He felt exposed and like a piece of him was violated somehow.

Sensoji wasn't supposed to be here on this side of town—he wasn't supposed to see him with Izuku. He wasn't supposed to see Izuku at all. 

He switched Izuku to stand on the opposite side of him, inside the sidewalk so Shouta could shield his image with his body. He tried to continue acting normal, for Izuku’s sake, and continued humming noncommittal responses to prompt the boy to keep talking like normal—but dammit, Izuku was smart as hell and he could sense something was off, so he quieted down, his words not holding the same level of excitement as before. 

He could feel that bastard’s eyes tracking them, trying to set him on fire. His skin itched like rats were scratching him. Shouta adjusted his hold on Izuku’s hand, feeling his palms start to get clammy—he felt like he was back in primary school, when his meaner classmates would hunt him down like a dog just to beat him up, or just to get a feel for his routine home. He would have to take different routes every day just so they didn’t know where he lived. That sort of stuff stopped around junior high—when his bullies could no longer stalk him without consequence and when they couldn’t senselessly assault him just because he was different. 

But this is high school, hero academy, and his little brother was here. 

It was so easy for him to slip back into that battered schoolkid mentality, it was almost scary. He kept his senses sharp, tempted to just pick Izuku up and dip into the nearest store just to call someone, but he thought better of it. 

Instead, he turned his attention back to the task at hand and swerved between passerbys on the street, blending into the evening crowd and sighing a breath of relief when he stopped feeling that burning behind his head. The thumping in his chest slowed down to some semblance of calm and he could think clear enough to remember where they were headed.

“Shou-nii,” Izuku timidly mumbled, grabbing his attention. Shouta hummed. “Are we okay?”

Damn his smart little brother's observation skills. “Yeah? Why wouldn't we?” 

Izuku shrugged, humming nonchalantly. “You got sweaty.”

Shouta clicked his tongue and stopped walking just to wipe his hand against his pant leg before going back to hold his brother's hand. “We're fine, don't worry about it. You wanna tell me what you're learning in science?”

Like a fish to a worm, Izuku took the bait and his expression lit up as he delved into rambling about all the animals they were learning about. Shouta sighed while he hummed along. 

That night, the three of them made silly little flower pens and traded them around each other. Mom had a blue flower pen from Shouta, Izuku got a red one from Mom, and Shouta got a yellow one from Izuku. It settled in nicely with his school stationary pack along with his other pens. Internally, he dared Sensoji to comment on it.

This was probably the most emotions he's ever felt in his life. The closest thing, he supposed, was probably the elation when he stood in front of the world on one of the pedestals at the Sports Festival last year. But feeling on top of the world was leagues different than the bubbling, boiling rage that made his skin feel like it was going to peel and crack from the magma of his anger.

He had spent weeks on this, using the opportunity to sharpen his stealth and info gathering skills—or rather, that was the excuse he gave himself anyway. Was this incredibly illegal and could get him suspended and possibly even expelled with a red mark on his record? Sure. Did he care? Not particularly.

Was this maybe even amoral? Well, see, when it came to his family, and particularly Izuku…

Nothing was off the table for Midoriya Shouta.

So no, Shouta didn't care, and he was tired of playing nice and having the title of hero hanging over his head when he had to share a class with this ape-shaped waste of oxygen bigot who had the nerve to even tease at the good name of Izuku. 

Then he had the nerve to show his face in Shouta’s territory? Lay his filthy eyes on his perfect and obnoxious baby brother? Then taunt him at school as if he had the right to even exist in the same time and space as Midoriya Izuku? 

Calling him weak, weak, weak. Weak quirk, weak bloodline, weak genes, weak weak weak weak weak—?!?!

The bruises left on his skin during co-class sparring, the acid on his lips as he sprayed vitriolic rhetoric after meaningless insult after pointless jab—it was enough to drive the boy mad. And yet, he could handle that. He could say whatever he wanted to him, because at the end of the day, Shouta was in the hero course because he earned it, and- and yeah, maybe some days it was harder to accept that than others, and maybe he still felt like an outsider, and imposter who was tricking everyone around him—but that? That could be dealt with after hours when he could compartmentalize and deal with the harder things in a way that the internet called ‘unhealthy’, which was fine. This wasn’t about him. He could deal with all that crap about himself—but Izuku? 

Ahaha. Ahahahaha. Morals be damned, truly.

But regardless, Shouta prided himself in being nothing but logical and composed, and this? This was perfectly sensible.

He just had to be careful he wasn’t caught, was all.

So. The thing he did?

Light stalking, is all. 

He meticulously followed, found and took careful notes of the late night haunts Sensoji often found himself at when the sun went down on weekends. Shouta had to give credit where credit was due, sadly; Sensoji was a diligent student. Stayed inside during school nights and wasn’t very adventurous when it came to places he frequented (that is to say, they were remarkably tame and boring compared to where Shouta’s overactive imagination would place the other). 

Still, each place had their blind spots—quiet corners and blackout zones with no camera action whatsoever. 

It was one such night, and Shouta tracked the parasite down to an old arcade that ran hours late. It was raining, and everyone at home was asleep (thankfully he had run Izuku ragged playing heroes earlier in the day, so the little punk was knocked out cold in bed)—so sneaking out was a piece of cake. 

He was armed with a wooden bat, a dark jacket and a black baseball cap. 

When he got there, he saw the fool’s bike leaning on its stand, stupidly parked in one of the blind spots Shouta had figured out earlier. He smiled and steeled his bat in his hands as he stood in front of it. It was a quiet night, sans the heavy rain that poured, but soon—

CRASH!

Its alarm started screeching, but Shouta didn't care. He swung again, and again, and again, until the bike fell over pathetically. Then he slammed it again, and again, and again—

Sensoji came rushing out of the arcade, swearing loudly when he realized it was his bike. He froze at the condition of it on the floor. Shouta vaguely wondered if he got the bike as a birthday gift or something. He didn’t care, though. 

He was gone, anyway.

He watched from the shadows of a distant building as Sensoji screeched like a banshee in rage at the condition of his bike. He held the laminated papers Shouta left behind, bending the material in his hands—it was copies of the screenshots Kayama got for him, highlighted and circled. 

“Be careful what you say,” was written in marker on it, bold and angrily written. 

It was a boldface threat—blackmail, yes. And if Sensoji had an ounce of intelligence in his waste of space body, he would keep his mouth shut lest a certain principle finds a very neat and organized manila folder on his desk come morning. 

He stayed a bit longer, watching with a sick sense of satisfaction in his chest while the bully swung his head back and forth, trying to find the ghostly culprit who did such an unspeakable crime to his beloved bike—but to no avail. With a chuckle, Shouta spun on his heel and walked back home.

“You were sneaking out!”

A damp hand slammed over the mouth of a tiny five-year-old. “Shh! Keep your mouth shut, brat!” 

Izuku stared impossibly wide-eyed at his brother. Shouta couldn’t tell if he was studying him with the intention of brotherly blackmail or brotherly mimicry. Both options were terrible. 

“I’m going to let go,” Shouta started slowly. “And when I do, I want you to stay. Quiet. Do you understand?”

“Mmmffmmph.”

“Just nod your head or something.”

Izuku nodded, and Shouta sighed, then lifted his hand away from his brother. Said brother instantly gasped loudly. “MAMAAAA!”

“Izuku, you—!”

The living room lights turned on, feet stomping the floor—Shouta shook off his wet clothes and chucked them to the corner of his room just as Mom frantically opened the door. Shouta covered himself dramatically, activating his quirk in a glare at her.

“What’s going o—”

“MOM! Close the door, I’m changing!”

“Oh! Oh my goodness, I’m so—”

“Mom! The door!?”

“Right! Right, I’m sorry—” 

The door shut closed and Shouta hurriedly slipped his pajamas on before opening the door again. “Mom—”

He was instantly overwhelmed with her questions as she held his face, turning him every which way. “Are you okay? What was that? Is Izuku okay? Why did he scream? Wh—” she paused, confusion on her face. “Why is your hair wet?”

Shouta sighed through his nostrils, gently peeling Mom’s hands from him and hugging her instead. “I’m fine, Izuku’s fine. I was just changing my clothes ‘cuz I got hot and Izuku woke up and got scared is all.”

“Nuh uh!” Izuku’s indignant voice sounded and Shouta kicked the door with his foot. 

Shouta huffed softly. “As for my hair, I took a shower not long ago. I woke up all sweaty and gross.”

Mom nodded along, then placed a hand over her heart, letting out a deep sigh of relief. “Okay, alright. That’s fine, then… you both scared me. Oh goodness…. Okay, good night then, baby. Let me say good night to Izuku, he’s probably still a bit scared huh?”

“No, no, it’s okay, Mom. I’ll put him back to sleep, don’t worry. Just go back to bed, it’s fine here and it’s late.”

“Well… okay, then. Good night, sweetie. Good night, Izuku!”

His muffled farewell sounded through the door and Shouta closed it behind him as he entered back into their shared room.

Izuku sat on his bed with his arms crossed and a pouty face that looked stuck between admiration, astonishment, and disappointment.

“You lied to Mama.”

“Uhhh, nuh uh,” Shouta panicked but didn’t stumble over his words. Ummm, he was not going to teach his brother about lying today, but also he was tired. Adrenaline still pumped through him like a fire hydrant. “It was just a… logical ruse, you know? It’s something some underground heroes have to learn."

Izuku’s eyes then sparkled.

Got ‘em.

Before the boy could launch into his typical hero-induced questionnaire, however, Shouta made quick work in swaddling his little brother in his All Might blanket and setting him in bed. “Aaand heroes need their sleep too, remember? So let’s try and do that, hm?”

He feigned a yawn, then smirked when Izuku caught it, the action making him drowsy. “Mmkay… that was cool, then…”

“Yeah…” Shouta hummed, settling into bed himself. “Good night, Zuku.”

“Good night, Shou-nii… Love you.”

“Love you too.”