Chapter Text
The first time it happens, it’s with Kirishima.
See, the students of 1-A have an… inside joke, of sorts. To be quite honest, Shouta would contest the fact of it even being labelled as a joke.
The ‘joke’ goes as follows: throw things at Kirishima.
The punchline arrives every time the boy unflinchingly deflects the items with his quirk.
Apparently, to a class of fifteen-year-olds, this is the absolute funniest shit in the world.
Shouta would never claim to understand the humor of it. Even so, he allows it. One hundred percent because heroes need to have sharp reflexes, and having items constantly thrown at you is an effective way of training them. Not because it tends to make even Hitoshi crack a smile. Not at all.
It is an unassuming Tuesday when it - as the majority of good things do - finally goes wrong.
For context; Class 1-A had a quiz today. Nothing too hard, certainly nothing too different.
Kaminari, in a way exhaustively characteristic of the lightning-quirked boy, is the last to finish. That is why, when the kid saunters up to Shouta’s desk with his test - his finally finished test - in hand, everyone watches. At the exchange, the students’ gazes shift to Shouta, no doubt in apprehension of what will happen next. He allows himself to revel in their anxious foreboding for a minute. He lazily gathers the stack of tests and taps the edges on the desk to straighten the pages.
“Study hall,” He says simply. He watches as every student individually slumps in their seat with relief. “Stay quiet and don’t bother me.”
And that is what they do, for approximately the first thirty seconds.
Shouta has his sleeping bag two-thirds of the way zipped when something in his peripheral catches his attention - Sero’s arm, cranked all the way backwards, a pink eraser clutched tightly in his hand.
Shouta doesn’t even have the time to think ‘please, god, not today,’ before Sero launches the eraser at mach-level speed, straight at Kirishima.
Luckily, the red-haired boy seems to sense the impending danger, because his head shoots up. His eyes widen and his arms instinctively shield his face before-
“Ow!”
Just about the entire class - sans Hitoshi, who had fallen asleep immediately after finishing his test and has yet to stir - whirls around at Kirishima’s exclamation, because that’s not part of the joke.
Sero blinks owlishly, looking thoroughly confused. “Dude,” He says. “You literally saw that one coming.”
“Yeah,” Bakugou butts in. “You have a quirk for a reason, shitty hair.”
“Ugh,” Kirishima groans in reply, rubbing the spot on his arm where the projectile made contact. “I don’t have it.” He explains, looking mildly annoyed.
…What?
To their teacher’s bewilderment, a couple students in the class nod their heads in sympathy. Shouta looks at Sero to gauge his reaction to what seems to be a completely nonsensical statement. The kid’s eyes widen, though not in confusion, but something akin to understanding.
“Oh, shit,” Sero says sheepishly. “My bad, dude.”
And… Shouta is… confused.
What doesn’t Kirishima have? Certainly, he’s not talking about his-
The bell rings, signaling the end of class. He doesn’t have time to call out to Kirishima before the boy leaves.
He thinks about it all day.
That evening, Shouta walks to the 1-A dorms, intent on inquiring what the fuck the kid was talking about. Because if Kirishima was talking about his quirk, then there is some sort of problem that Shouta has not been made aware of.
He walks into the common room to see Kirishima rapidly punching holes into a folded piece of paper with quirk-sharpened fingers. The students sitting around him clap and cheer when Kirishima unfolds the sheet, and the shape of it loosely resembles a snowflake.
Shouta decides to let it go.
Two days later, in an event that had initially appeared wholly unrelated, it happens with Sero.
The kid walks into class wearing a bulky winter coat despite the fact that it is currently September. It’s not hot outside, per se, but the morning air is comfortably warm. Warm enough for the kid’s attire to register as glaringly inappropriate.
Shouta decides not to ask. In the world of quirks, it isn’t wholly uncommon for someone to have some sort of internal mutation that results in... alternate thermoregulational body mechanisms. Tsuyu, for example, tends to run cold due to her frog-like anatomy. But even she appears unbothered by the temperature in the classroom, perfectly comfortable without any additional layers.
Now that he thinks about it, he probably should ask. If there’s something about the kid’s quirk that affects his body in ways that Shouta isn’t aware of, it needs to be addressed. He resolves to wait until the end of class to bring it up, not wanting to draw any unwanted attention to the boy.
Though, it seems that the kid has no problem drawing attention to himself. He fans himself with his notebook throughout the entire class, and on several occasions he excuses himself to go to the restroom. By the end of class, Sero is alarmingly red-faced and sweating profusely.
Before Shouta can bring up the boy’s odd behavior, Bakugou stomps over to Sero. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” The blonde demands. “Just take your fucking coat off.”
That’s certainly not how Shouta would have phrased it, but whatever.
“I can’t,” Sero whines in reply. “They look weird!”
Kaminari walks over to the pair and fixes the boy with a confused look. “...What look weird?”
Sero gestures wildly and frustratedly at… seemingly his entire body. “I just-!” The boy throws his hands up in exasperated defeat. “Ugh, hold on.”
Shouta hears the rustling of fabric. He turns around then, placated, and begins to gather the papers on his desk. Finally the kid’s taking the stupid coat off.
“Holy shit!” Mina exclaims out of nowhere.
“Ew, what the fuck?” Bakugou says, outwardly disgusted.
Kaminari bursts out laughing so suddenly and so violently that Shouta wouldn’t be surprised if his appendix ruptured.
“Can I feel them?” Shouta hears Kirishima ask excitedly.
Wait, what?
At this point, Shouta’s concerned that Sero has some sort of horrific tumor or some other body malformation that he neglected to tell anyone about. He turns back around to look at the group of students, just barely able to catch a glance as they walk out of the classroom door. Sero has his coat tucked under his arm.
It takes only a single passing glance for Shouta’s unconscious brain to register that something is glaringly wrong.
Sero’s arms. His elbows.
Shouta stands so abruptly that he knocks over the cup of coffee on his desk. He ignores it. He bolts to the door, clutches the frame with white knuckles. His hair whips his face as he looks around wildly in an attempt to catch sight of Mina’s horns or Kirishima’s hair or Bakugou’s explosions - anything to inform him of the direction that the group of students had turned. But it seems the group has long since been swallowed by the sea of students, because he can’t see them.
God, where did they go? What happened? Sero- his quirk. Why doesn’t the boy have his quirk? Are his tape dispensers detachable? How are they detachable? They’re under his skin! How could he just not have them?
Shouta’s mind is plagued by such rapidly racing thoughts until halfway through the day.
Luckily, (hah, he never thought he’d say that,) Shouta is assigned to monitor the lunch room today. He keeps his eyes peeled for the boy.
He’s quick to spot him. The boy’s elbows are back to normal.
Well, not normal, per se, but they’re back to the way they’re supposed to look.
Shouta lets out a long, heavy breath, feeling the tightness in his chest unravel at the sight. He has no choice in that moment but to question his sanity. Honestly, he wouldn’t be surprised if his current class is the one that finally makes him lose it.
The first time Shouta is close enough to observe the cause to the effect, it is the following day, and he is simply too stupid to put the pieces together.
It happens in the morning. Class hasn’t even started yet - there’s a precious forty-three seconds left before it does.
Shouta is dragging his feet as he walks down the now mostly-empty hallway and towards his classroom, cup of coffee in hand.
He catches sight of two people loitering outside the door to his classroom. With a squint, he recognizes one of them as Kaminari. The kid is speaking animatedly to a shorter, green haired boy that Shouta doesn’t think he’s ever seen before.
Somehow, the green-haired boy senses his presence despite having been facing away from him. He turns to fix the hero with a curious gaze, and Shouta notes that his eyes are as green as his hair. At the sight of him, the boy's face quickly morphs into something that looks suspiciously close to... recognition.
And that… isn’t supposed to happen.
Shouta’s an underground hero. He isn’t supposed to be recognized. His job relies on his ability to come across as indistinct and unassuming. The fact that this random kid - who isn’t even one of his students - somehow recognizes him is… odd, to say the least. It's unlikely that the boy recognizes him from around the school, seeing as it's so early in the year, and Shouta tends to avoid taking his class to assemblies altogether.
As the distance between them shortens, Shouta is able to make out more of the boy’s features. Four perfectly circular freckles form a diamond shape on both cheeks. There is a light, but undeniably there, X-shaped scar across his nose, large enough to span onto his cheeks. The boy blinks at him, twice, before he turns his gaze back to Kaminari.
By now, Kaminari has noticed Shouta’s presence as well. At the return of the green-haired boy’s attention, he sheepishly points at Shouta, and then at the door to 1-A.
The green haired boy nods, then, curls bouncing with the movement. Kaminari offers him a cheery, overexaggerated wave, before turning towards the door.
At that point, Shouta’s close enough to hear when the green-haired boy says, in a small voice, “Ah, wait.”
Kaminari jolts. The boy turns with his eyes wide and newly alight with a mix of surprise and excitement. His smile grows impossibly wide as he nearly vibrates with emotion. It’s another odd reaction, one that leaves Shouta wondering what he’s missing.
“Yeah, what’s up?” Kaminari replies, voice gentle. Uncharacteristically so.
At his student’s tone, Shouta’s brows furrow. Kaminari is intentionally keeping his voice down, reigning in his emotions - things Shouta didn’t even think the kid was capable of. He doesn’t have time to further analyze and hypothesize the potential reasons for it before the green-haired boy mumbles a response, quiet enough to where he can’t quite make it out.
Kaminari can, apparently, because at the boy’s words, his eyes widen.
“Oh, yeah!” He exclaims.
And then, in the middle of the hallway, Kaminari grabs the boy by the shoulders, and leans down to kiss him square on the lips. It’s a quick thing, lips lingering no more than a second. As Kaminari leans back, disconnecting their mouths with a loud and comically exaggerated “mwah”, Shouta swears he sees sparkles lingering in the space between the boys’ faces.
Kaminari actually leaves, after that. He offers the freckled boy a quick “See ya, dude!”, and enters the classroom.
That was... weird. That was weird, right?
The green kid, after saying a small goodbye to his… friend, turns back to look at Shouta. The boy, red cheeked, gives the teacher a polite bow, before turning around and scurrying down the hallway. Shouta watches him until he turns the corner.
Yeah, that was weird.
Later, in class, Mina not-so-discreetly asks Kaminari to charge her phone. The boy declines.
“I can’t,” He stage-whispers apologetically. “I don’t have it right now.”
Shouta nearly whirls around and demands answers, right then and there. But he’s avidly against wasting class time with non-class matters, so he refrains.
And soon forgets.
He only remembers that something was even wrong the next time he sees the kid.
Kaminari is sitting on the floor of the common room, five charger cords in his mouth and one in each of his ears. Several of his classmates sit in a circle around him, holding charger cords of their own, ready to shove it into another orifice of the boy’s body.
Shouta does not interrupt.
The first time he actually exits the interaction with more information than which he entered, is with Jirou.
It’s a Sunday afternoon. Shouta enters the common room to find the girl laying on the couch with her legs hanging over the arm, kicking lazily. Her eyes are closed and her arms rest behind her head. She looks at peace.
But it’s wrong.
Because Jirou is missing her earjacks. She’s missing her quirk.
Shouta blinks once, twice, and when the sight of Jirou without her earjacks does not dispel, does not prove to be a simple trick of the eye - like he had previously assumed the vision of Sero without his dispensers to be - he speaks.
“Jirou.”
He feels guilty for a second, fearing that he spoke too sharply when Jirou jolts upward in startlement, but then he realizes, with a twist in his gut, that she hadn’t heard him coming.
Jirou looks at him with wide eyes. “Sensei?” She asks, tilting her head to the side.
Does… does she not know?
“Your-” Shouta’s voice cracks, he swallows thickly and tries again. “Your ears. Your jacks…”
To Shouta’s utter bewilderment, Jirou seems to relax at his unspoken question.
“Oh, someone else has them.” She says, as if that’s a perfectly valid answer.
Shouta's eyebrows furrow, because what the fuck does that mean. “I’m sorry?”
“My friend,” Jirou clarifies, as if that answers his question. “My friend has them.”
Once again, what the fuck.
Shouta squints, examining his student carefully. Someone has her earjacks, and apparently that’s… fine?
“Ah… Okay…” He says slowly, somewhat awkwardly. If Jirou isn’t concerned in the slightest, then… perhaps he’s overreacting? “I wasn’t aware that they were… detachable…”
Jirou’s eyes take on an odd glint at that. She stands and offers a small shrug, before she turns away from him.
“Usually, they’re not.” She says, and leaves the room.
That statement is one that shocks Shouta into silence, into stillness.
Because what the fuck. What the fuck.
The next time he sees the girl, it’s later that evening. She’s in the kitchen, conversing idly with Yaoyorozu and Tokoyami. Twin jacks hang from her ear lobes as if they've always been there.
Shouta feels like he’s going to have an aneurism.
An answer, of sorts, comes the following Wednesday, when it happens with Mina.
Shouta announces that the class will be having a previously unscheduled session of battle training. After telling them to get themselves ready and meet him out on the field, he turns to leave. He is loudly interrupted.
“Sensei!”
He sighs, turns towards the direction of the exclamation. “What is it, Mina.”
If the pink girl is cowed by his tone, she certainly doesn’t show it. She bounces up to stand in front of him, effectively obstructing his only means of escape.
“Ah, well,” She starts, tapping the tips of her fingers together nervously. “I didn’t think we’d be working with our quirks today, so I thought I didn’t need it, so I kind of don’t have it right now?”
Shouta’s first, second, and third instinctive reactions to that involve loudly yelling ‘what the fuck.’
Luckily, through his years of being a high school teacher, Shouta has long since learned to suppress such inappropriate exclamations and other instinctual violent urges. He takes a deep breath, through his nose and out his mouth. He squints at Mina as she twiddles her thumbs anxiously. Then he remembers.
Kirishima, Sero, Kaminari, Jirou.
“Someone... has your quirk, right?” He asks slowly.
Mina nods. Shouta pinches the bridge of his nose when she offers no further explanation.
“Well, can you get it back?”
Mina nods again. “Yeah, I just need to go find him!” She says, immediately turning towards the door.
Him. It’s a him. Shouta files that piece of information away.
He is quick to stop her with a hand on her shoulder. “Do you know where he is?” He asks, because the girl’s phrasing was not the most convincing.
“Yeah!” Mina says, much too enthusiastically. “He’s in the support course!”
Okay. Alright. Shouta now knows a total of three things about the phenomenon that’s been plaguing his mind for the past week.
- There’s a boy.
- He is in the support course.
- He can… borrow people's quirks.
Finally, he’s getting somewhere. He’s finally fucking getting somewhere.
“Okay,” He says, takes a measured breath. “Okay. Come with me.” When he’s sure the motion won’t cause the girl to immediately bolt, he releases his hold on Mina’s shoulder. He turns to the rest of the class. “Everyone else, change and go to the field. Do not use your quirks until I get there.”
Shouta leaves the room, Mina in tow. He’s going to figure this out. He’s finally going to figure this out.
Between Shouta’s naturally long strides and Mina’s hyperactive skips, it takes them very little time to reach the classroom of 1-H. He knocks on the door, though only out of politeness, because he then slides it open without waiting for a response.
Despite not even knowing who he’s looking for, Shouta spots him immediately.
It’s that one kid. The green one.
The boy sits at a desk in the back corner of the room. He holds the tip of his finger against the intersection point between two pieces of metal, slowly dragging it downward along the crease. The metal sizzles and melds together under his finger. His tongue pokes out from between pursed lips, his palpable concentration is something that Shouta hesitates to interrupt.
Mina however, seems to have no qualms doing so.
“Midori!” She yells, startling the boy - Midori? - who flinches so violently that he flings a blob of acid (Mina's acid. That's Mina's acid. That's Mina's quirk) across the room, which promptly burns a hole into the floor. The boy hastily lifts his goggles from his eyes, pushing them upward and into his hair like a headband. Despite Mina being the one to have called him, the boy’s gaze meets Shouta’s first. His eyes grow wide at the sight of him, before they flick over to the pink girl bounding in his direction.
“How’s it going?” She asks excitedly, not even waiting for an answer before continuing. “Wow! I never even thought about using my quirk like that! I always think about my acid as something to break things down, not meld them together. That’s so cool, Midori!” She claps her hands together, bouncing on the balls of her feet.
‘Midori’ smiles nervously and blushes at the praise, but he doesn’t speak.
Mina appears to be completely unperturbed by this, as she continues without faltering. “Okay, so, I know I said you could have it all day, but Aizawa-sensei-” (She jerks a thumb in his direction, the boy looks back over at him. When Shouta meets his eyes, he hastily averts them. Once again, odd.) “-sprung a battle training on us last minute so I kinda need it back.”
Shouta carefully watches the kid’s response to this. Something negative is to be expected, but the boy’s handling of his outward reaction will be telling. Shouta prepares for disappointment, betrayal, maybe even anger. After all - from what he is able to deduce from the little information he has - Mina is having to retract from whatever sort of deal that the two had previously made.
The boy’s face however, does not reflect any emotion that Shouta had braced himself for. He catches the briefest flash of panic in his eyes before it is expertly concealed. The kid nods quickly and a little frantically in order to show his consent.
Mina grins widely. “Cool, thanks!”
‘Midori’ stands a little hastily, the blush from earlier is not only still present on his cheeks but getting darker by the second. The boy is just barely taller than Mina, but she still has to get on her toes to touch their lips together.
And oh, shit. Things are finally starting to make some fucking sense.
Shouta looks away, purely on instinct because, well, ew. His gaze surfs over the other students in the room. Many of them watch the exchange, watch ’Midori’, eyes wide and wary. A handful glare with outward disgust. A single look from Shouta causes them to divert their attention, but the looks - of unease, of disdain - remain clear as day.
(And suddenly, Aizawa Shouta is back in school
He’s in school and getting absolute and constant shit from everyone.
In the best - and thankfully, most - of cases, they’d simply fear him. They’d be afraid of him and what he could do to them and their 'God-given power' and thus steer wholly clear of him. To be quite honest, he was perfectly fine with that, preferred it, actually.
But then there were the ones that didn’t fear him. Those that didn't fear him, hated him.
And they made it very, indisputably, painfully clear why.
His quirk.
That’s always what it came down to. Sure, they’d make it about other things; they’d call him awkward, say that his hair was scraggly and ugly or that the bags under his eyes made him look creepy and weird, but he knew that they wouldn’t have cared about any of those things if his quirk weren’t what it unfortunately was.
And if… if that’s what Shouta went through for being able to erase someone’s quirk...
Then he cannot imagine what someone would go through for being able to take it.
Shouta suddenly, achingly, feels for this boy.)
The two disconnect. Mina giggles.
“Ooooh” She says, wiggling her fingers. “It’s weird how different it feels, suddenly having it after… well, not having it.”
The boy tilts his head and nods, face sympathetic.
“Sorry to take it back so suddenly, I’ll let you borrow it again some other time!” Mina says, looking genuinely apologetic.
The boy waves his hands in front of himself in a sort of ‘it’s no big deal’ gesture.
Mina’s grin softens. “Aw…” She coos, as if unable to help herself. “You’re the cutest, Midoriya.”
Wait, Midoriya? Is that his name? Shouta hopes so. It’s certainly less... unfortunate than ‘Midori’.
Midoriya brings his hands to his cheeks as his blush returns at full force.
Mina lets out a laugh. She reaches forward to ruffle Midoriya’s hair. She doesn’t appear to notice the way Midoriya flinches slightly backward at the movement. Shouta does, because he’s looking for it.
After that, Mina turns to leave. “I’ll see you later Midori!”
Midoriya curls his fingers in a small sort of wave in response. His eyes slide to Shouta then, looking more than a little intimidated.
Shouta is very aware that his appearance tends to come off as quite threatening, it’s actually a quality that he frequently uses to his advantage. But…
Shouta... doesn’t want that right now.
The man consciously tries to soften his features in a way he seldom does. He offers the kid, Midoriya, a single nod.
Just before he turns to leave, Shouta sees Midoriya’s eyes widen further as he gives the man a jerky nod in response.
As he walks away, he hears the other students. There's not a doubt in his mind that Midoriya does, as well.
“That girl really just let him take her quirk, huh.”
“Imagine letting him steal your quirk.”
“I don’t think I could ever trust anyone enough to let them have my quirk.”
“Well I’d certainly never trust anyone who could take it.”
'Take.' 'Steal.' As if he’s a thief. As far as Shouta’s observed, the boy has done nothing to warrant such a label.
Though, he supposes he doesn’t really know much about him, not yet.
Later that day, he ventures to the teacher’s lounge, intent on finding someone who does.
He walks in to find Hizashi scribbling on papers with colorful gel pens at his desk and Hitoshi lying face down on the couch. Nothing abnormal there.
He opens his mouth to bring up the kid, but then Shouta realizes he’s still not... entirely sure of the boy’s name.
“There’s this kid,” He starts. Hizashi tilts his head in his direction to show that he’s listening even as he continues grading papers. “Green hair, green eyes, fr-”
“Midoriya?” Two voices interject. One is from Hizashi, the other from Hitoshi, who Shouta notices has removed his face from the crease in between the couch cushions and is now fixing him with a curious gaze. Hizashi has looked up from his stack of papers as well.
“Hitoshi!” The Voice Hero exclaims, much too loud, in Shouta’s opinion (and probably in Hitoshi’s as well, if the boy’s wince is anything to go by.) “Are you friends with the Little Listener?”
Hitoshi grimaces. “I don’t know. We tolerate each other, I guess.” He says, waving his hand dismissively. The way he then turns his face away to hide his pinkening cheeks do not support his claim in the slightest.
Hizashi gives Shouta a knowing look. The man holds a hand against the side of his mouth as he stage-whispers, “It sounds an awful lot like they're friends.”
That seems to be the final straw for Hitoshi, because he then leaves the lounge with a huff, still blushing.
Shouta decides to ignore all of... that, for the time being.
“Midoriya, yes,” He says. “You have him in class?”
Hizashi seems to sober at his tone. The man tilts his head, visibly confused. “...Sometimes, why?”
Shouta blinks. “What do you mean ‘sometimes’? Does he skip class or something?”
“Oh, no!” Hizashi shakes his head. “His schedule is just a little, uh… complicated. He showed up on the first day already fluent in English, so there was no reason to make him take classes.”
Shouta raises a brow. “In the past, that’s when you’d start forcing them to learn Sign.”
“Yeah, well,” Hizashi scratches the back of his neck. “There was no reason for that either, seeing as he knows it as well.”
“He knows English and Sign?” Shouta asks, a little incredulous.
“Yeah, so there wasn’t really much else that I could teach him.” Hizashi pauses, taps a finger against his lips. “...I think he actually takes lessons with Nedzu, instead.”
At the undergroud hero's wide eyed gaze, Hizashi hastily waves his hands in front of him.
“I mean- I’m not entirely sure. His whole file aside from his name is password protected, and from what I’ve gathered, not even Maijima - that’s his homeroom teacher - can access it. But I’ve seen him with Nedzu quite a few times.”
And that's… a lot of information, huh. A lot of information that Shouta has absolutely no idea what to do with. The kid’s file is password protected? Completely inaccessible aside from his name?
Why? What is there to hide?
“Why are you asking about the Little Listener?”
Shouta... hesitates. He casts a quick glance at the door that Hitoshi had exited not long before. Hizashi doesn’t have to follow his eyes to understand. When his husband speaks next, it’s quieter.
“His quirk.” It’s not a question.
“It’s… He’s…” Shouta falters, because what is he? What is Midoriya, to him? Some kid he’s only seen twice in person and has yet to speak a single word to? Someone he lays eyes on and can’t stop the lurch in his chest because that’s him. That’s Shouta. Scared and hurt because everyone and everything in the world seems to be actively working against him.
“...Familiar.”
Hizashi gives him a soft, sad look. He doesn’t say that he knows, because he doesn’t. He doesn’t say that he understands, because he doesn’t. Because the only part of it that he understands is the fact that he could never understand.
“He is, isn’t he.”
The conversation ends with that.
The first time Shouta actually talks to the kid is when it happens with Uraraka.
It is nearing curfew, and the girl is not in the dorms.
She is in Gym Gamma, according to the ID card log that Shouta is able to access as her homeroom teacher. Seeing as he’s going to pass Gym Gamma on his way to the dorms so he can do a headcount, he decides to be proactive and stop there on the way.
He walks in to see his student floating in the air. She’s wearing a pair of fingerless gloves with what appear to be small jets attached to each palm. It is only when she nearly reaches the ceiling that Shouta notices she’s wearing boots with identical contraptions on the soles. Small bursts of fire shoot out of each jet at seemingly random intervals, but then Shouta notices that Uraraka seems to be controlling it, using the flames to propel her in different directions as she floats. Every time she activates one of the jets, she lets out a giddy laugh.
Then, Shouta takes notice of the other person in the room. Midoriya.
The kid stands below Uraraka, firmly settled with his feet on the ground. He holds a notebook in one of his hands, and a pen in the other. Both of his pinkies are raised so they don’t make contact with either of the objects. Shouta wonders if…
“Oh, Sensei!” Uraraka exclaims suddenly, likely just having noticed his presence. Shouta really needs to teach his students about situational awareness. “Is it curfew already?”
Shouta lifts his arm to glance at his bare wrist before he replies. “No, but it’s getting close.”
“Oh, okay,” The girl looks down at the green haired boy. “Guess we should start packin’ things up then, huh?” She lifts her arms above her head and activates both jets, which propel her slowly downwards. When Uraraka’s feet are mere inches from the ground, Shouta sees Midoriya shift. The boy lifts his hands, presses the pads of his fingers together, and whispers a small ‘release’. Uraraka drops the final few inches onto the floor.
It takes the girl a second to adjust to the literal change in gravity. She turns to Midoriya and grins. “It’s so cool to be able to practice with my quirk without the backlash!” She exclaims excitedly, but then she frowns slightly. “What about you, Midoriya? Are you feeling okay?”
Midoriya smiles. He offers her the universal ‘ok’ hand gesture. Uraraka purses her lips.
“...Are you sure? I mean, I’m not exactly light, and you’ve never used my quirk before…”
The kid waves his hands dismissively and nods. Uraraka fixes him with a skeptical glare, but lets it go.
She pulls off the gloves and boots and deposits them into Midoriya’s hands which, now that Shouta knows to look for them, have visible pink finger pads.
Midoriya takes them and puts them in a small bag, which he then slings over his shoulder. He then waits politely as Uraraka puts her own shoes back on.
When she stands back up, her cheeks appear noticeably pinker than usual. “Is it- I mean, can I- um…” The girl rubs the back of her neck nervously. Midoriya, red cheeked as well, just nods. Uraraka grins sheepishly and gives him a quick peck on the lips. Sparkles, again.
“Thank you, Midoriya! It’s super kind of you to do this for me.” Uraraka says earnestly. Midoriya waves her off. He tends to do that a lot, Shouta notes. The two students meet Shouta at the door. Uraraka offers him a wide smile and wave. Midoriya gives him a single nod, which he responds to in kind.
Gym Gamma is only a short walk away from the 1-A dorms. Uraraka fills the silence with idle chatter, to which Shouta assumes Midoriya replies with appropriately timed nods and shrugs, since she never falters.
When they reach the 1-A dorm building, Midoriya smiles and waves at Uraraka, who then scurries inside. The boy turns, probably to offer him the same goodbye, but falters when Shouta makes no move to leave. Upon the realization that Shouta is apparently not finished with him, something akin to fear flashes in the boy’s eyes. It happens for hardly even half a second, but long enough to make Shouta ache.
“Relax,” He says, voice soft in a way that would probably give his own students whiplash upon hearing it. “I’m just going to escort you. Do you live on-campus?” He asks, because he has a feeling.
The kid looks skeptical, eyes quickly glancing from his face, to his hands, and then back to his face. He nods slowly, and doesn’t protest when Shouta takes it as a que to begin walking - either content to allow him to do so, or accepting of the fact that he has no choice.
Immediately, Shouta notices something. Midoriya is walking intentionally slow. He allows Shouta to walk in front of him so he can lag behind, just out of his sight. Shouta… doesn’t like that. So in turn, the man slows his steps as well, only quickening when the boy catches up to him so they walk side by side. Every time the boy slows in order to slink out of his sight, Shouta does the same, effectively preventing him from doing so.
The boy seems to catch onto his actions very quickly, and relents. He allows Shouta to walk next to him, but maintains a solid distance of three feet between them, just enough to where the man wouldn’t be able to touch him if he reached his arm out. Shouta accepts that this is the best he’s going to get.
It only takes the pair a few minutes to reach the 1-H dorms, significantly smaller than the hero course ones. The support course students are not required to move into dorms like the hero course students are, as there is very little reason to believe that anyone with ill intentions would target them. Typically, the students outside of the hero course who choose to live in on-campus housing have, well… extenuating circumstances that make them safer at school than at home. So, when Shouta pairs the fact that Midoriya lives in the dorm with the way the boy acts - fidgety and scared and far too used to expecting the worst out of people - he can’t help but be just... a little worried.
Shouta expects the boy to offer him a simple nod or a bow, before walking straight inside, but that isn’t what he does. Outside the door, the kid stops, turns to face Shouta. Upon meeting his gaze, Midoriya ducks his head and hunches his shoulders slightly.
He’s cowering. Making himself smaller as if it's an instinct to do so. He’s scared. He’s scared of him.
The realization leaves a sour taste in his mouth. Shouta wonders how many times Midoriya has been intentionally led away by a person he’s supposed to be able to trust, only for them to use the privacy to hurt him without the risk of his screams being heard.
Shouta wants to say something, to reassure the kid in some way, but he’s never been good at providing comfort. He instead allows the kid to find his words first before he offers any of his own.
The boy pulls his hands close to his chest, wringing his fingers together.
“I can stop, if you want.”
Oh, that’s Midoriya’s voice.
It takes a second for Shouta to register the words. “I’m sorry?”
The boy lowers his head further, allowing his hair to shield his eyes when he speaks. “Using… um- using my quirk.”
Shouta blinks. Oh. Oh.
“Do you take people’s quirks without their permission?”
Midoriya's gaze shoots up. He shakes his head quickly, seeming appalled by the very idea of doing such a thing.
“Do you give the quirks back when they ask?”
Midoriya vehemently nods.
Shouta shrugs. “Then I don’t see a problem.”
Midoriya’s eyes widen, at that. Shouta wonders if this is the first time that someone has told him that they don’t have a problem with his quirk. Or that his quirk isn’t a problem. Or that he isn’t a problem.
He hates that it’s so familiar, that everything about this kid is all so familiar.
Shouta slowly removes his hand from his pocket. He watches the way the movement makes Midoriya jerk in alarm, take a half step backward, grip the straps of his backpack tighter, but he doesn't stop. He slowly, so slowly, lifts his hand, and places it on top of the kid’s head.
Midoriya looks up at him with wide eyes, muscles still locked in anticipation for a blow that never arrives. Shouta sighs.
“You’re good, kid.”
Shouta thinks that he meant to say that in a ‘You’re good. You’re not in trouble,’ sort of way, but judging by the way the boy’s breath hitches, he let another meaning seep into his voice and weave its way into his words.
Instead, he allowed himself to say that in a ‘You’re good, kid. You’re not bad. You could never be bad,’ sort of way. He doesn’t try to take it back, because he believes it.
Midoriya looks at him, outwardly scrutinizing, as if he expects Shouta to retract his statement, to point and laugh at him for daring to believe that he could ever be more than what society has already deemed him to be. Shouta wonders how many times that has happened for Midoriya to learn to anticipate it.
He ruffles the kids hair just once. Midoriya watches as he retracts his hand and puts it back into the pocket of his joggers. His eyes then flick back up to his face, Shouta keeps his expression carefully neutral.
Midoriya blinks once, twice, three times. He looks like he wishes Shouta would just take it all back, make things easier by pulling him to the side of the dorms that the streetlights don’t touch and hurt him.
And goddamnit, Shouta gets it.
He gets how it feels, when someone finally accepts you, after you've long since been convinced through cruel words and ill intentioned hands that nothing about you is acceptable. After you’ve been taught that things are the way that they are because you are who you are, and you are unacceptable.
And when that proves to be false... what you must think. How confused and angry you must be to learn that no, things don’t have to be that way, they never had to be that way, because you are acceptable, you always have been.
Shouta watches as Midoriya’s eyes become glassy. But the kid doesn’t cry. The dam doesn’t break.
Midoriya jerks his head in a single nod. “Okay,” He whispers, as if testing the word, as if testing the potentiality of things actually being okay.
Shouta gives him a small nod in return, if only to assure the kid that he’s being heard.
The kid slowly allows his arms to drop back down to his sides, even as his hands continue to tremble.
The kid whispers the smallest ’thank you’ the world has ever heard, before he leaves quickly.
Shouta watches him through the glass door of the dorm building until the boy turns a corner, and is obscured from view.
He wishes he knew how to help him.
Shouta wonders if Midoriya had been intentionally making himself scarce, before. Because now he feels like he sees the kid all the time.
On Tuesday, he spots the kid eating lunch with Todoroki, sitting in one the farthest corners of the lunch room. Few words are exchanged between the two of them for the duration that Shouta watches them, but playful gestures and small smiles are shared. Their postures are more relaxed than he's ever seen from either of them.
On Wednesday, he passes the boy walking in step with Hitoshi in between classes. When Hitoshi sees Shouta, he casts him a pair of desperate eyes that plead with him not to acknowledge what he saw. Shouta looks obliviously away. He is sure to tell Hizashi the next time he sees him.
On Friday, he wakes from his nap in the teacher's lounge to see the student signing rapidly to Hizashi, too quick for him to even begin to decipher. His husband responds with a wide smile and over-exaggerated gestures even as he speaks his responses aloud.
On Saturday, he watches Mina and Kirishima drag the obviously unwilling boy through the halls of the 1-A dorm - which is against the rules, might Shouta add. Students are not allowed to enter the dorms of other classes. Still, he doesn't interrupt.
In every instance, the kid looks terrified to be in his own skin. Shouta guesses that that's just his perpetual state of being. Which is... relatable, quite honestly, but worrying nonetheless.
It is only during the following Monday that he gets a chance to actually interact with him again.
Upon his quest to find the perfect nap spot, he spots a tuft of green in the garden - which, of course, is to be expected, but upon closer look Shouta notices that it is decidedly not a bush.
It’s Midoriya, sitting next to Yaoyorozu on one of the wooden benches, surrounded by assorted flowers.
He has both arms spread out in front of him, palms facing outwards as if pushing against an invisible wall. He appears to be explaining something to the girl, who looks positively captivated.
Before either student can notice him, Midoriya stands suddenly, and walks closer to the fountain in the middle of the garden. Yaoyorozu follows closely behind. He stops to stand directly in front of the fountain, hands still facing outwards and towards the water. His palms begin to glow brightly, emanating pink and blue sparks that dance in the air like fireflies - Yaoyorozu’s quirk.
The boy seems to steel himself for a second before he quickly flicks his hands down and towards his sides-
With what appears to be liquid fire trailing behind them. The flames fall from his palms and into the fountain, extinguished by the water.
What the hell?
Shouta pushes past the bushes and towards the two students, footfalls loud enough for them to hear and subsequently whirl around to face him. He must look terrifying and more than a little ridiculous, emerging from the shrubbery with one foot still in his sleeping bag.
“Oh,” Yaoyorozu blinks at him, “Hello, Sensei.”
Shouta nearly snorts at the absurdity of it.
“Yeah, hi,” He says, “What was that?”
The girl tilts her head. “Diethylzinc,” She says simply.
He pinches the bridge of his nose. “I don’t know what that is.”
Yaoyorozu visibly brightens at the opportunity to explain it to him. “It’s a chemical compound containing hydrogen, zinc, and carbon that reacts violently upon exposure to air.” The girl pauses, allowing Shouta the appropriate time to digest... that, before she continues, “Midoriya had the idea of using my quirk to produce and weaponize it for offensive purposes!”
At that, Shouta’s gaze slides over to the boy, who now appears to be trying his hardest to develop a quirk that would let him disappear. He nervously wrings his hand and pulls his fingers, eyes fixed on the grass below his feet. The sight causes Shouta to feel a sharp and sudden pain in his chest.
God, he can’t even be mad - not when the kid looks like that.
Actually, Shouta probably couldn’t be mad at him no matter how he looked.
...He wonders if the boy knows that he has Shouta wrapped around his scarred and slightly crooked finger.
He shuts that thought down near-immediately - the trembling of his hands and hunch of his shoulders tell Shouta that the boy still expects the worst out of him. He’d be lying if he said it didn’t hurt. He sighs.
“Alright.” He barely suppresses a frown when Midoriya flinches at the sound of his voice. “That’s… fine - not a bad idea, actually - but not something you should be testing without supervision.”
Eyes fixed on Midoriya, he nearly startles when Yaoyorozu sheepishly replies, “I’m sorry sensei, I got a little too excited about the implications of using my quirk to produce naturally pyrophoric chemicals.” The sincerity in her voice makes Shouta want to slam his head into a brick wall.
He runs a hand through his hair. “Yeah, I bet.” He turns to look back at Midoriya. “Kid, did that burn you?” He asks, hands twitching in his pockets where he consciously restricts them as to not startle the boy, even when he wants to use them to examine him for injuries.
The boy finally looks up at him, at that. He quickly shakes his head and holds both of his hands out to Shouta, showcasing two unburned palms.
Shouta must frown or furrow his brows or otherwise portray his bewilderment because Yaoyorozu speaks up.
“Midoriya’s fireproof. We wanted to work out the technical aspects of producing and utilizing the chemical without having to worry about getting burned. Once we figured out that part, we were going to try and see if there’s a way that I could use it without causing myself any injuries.” She explains.
...And that… leaves Shouta with even more questions. His gaze drifts slowly to Midoriya, who seems to have become frozen in fear.
Midoriya’s… fireproof? How is he…
Wait.
A quirk. That’s a quirk. It has to be.
That fact shouldn’t be one that nearly knocks the breath out of Shouta’s lungs, but it is.
This whole time, Shouta had been so focused on Midoriya’s quirk as being the ability to borrow and return quirks, he hadn’t even considered the fact that Midoriya could have quirks that he never gave back.
...Why hasn’t he given it back?
No. No. Shouta’s not going to make assumptions. He’s not going to- to… criminalize Midoriya. He doesn’t know the situation...
He… he doesn’t know anything.
And he hates that.
He takes a deep breath. “Okay,” He says, voice carefully controlled. “It’s- that’s fine. Still, I would like you to inform me when you’re doing stuff like…” He gestures vaguely, “That.”
Yaoyorozu nods respectfully. Midoriya jerks his head in a motion that can just barely be considered a nod as well.
“Understood, sensei,” Yaoyorozu casts a nervous gaze to Midoriya, outwardly as concerned as Shouta feels. “We were just finishing up anyway…”
After a kiss and a wave, they go their separate ways. Shouta follows Yaoyorozu back to the 1-A dorms. He does not walk Midoriya back this time.
He stalks towards Nedzu’s office the following day, intent on getting answers from the sole creature he can be sure actually has them.
The rat calls at him to enter before he even knocks on the door. There are already two cups of tea ready at the principal's desk.
They sit in thirty two seconds of silence before Shouta breaks it.
“You obviously know why I’m here.” He deadpans.
Nedzu nods. “I do.” He says, takes a sip of his tea. “What I do not know is why you are concerning yourself with a student that is not your own.”
Shouta nearly scoffs. He would bet a large amount of money that Nedzu knows exactly why he’s concerning himself with a student that is not his own. He plays along nonetheless.
“Well, he might as well be,” He replies, because it’s true.
“Ah, yes,” The principal carefully aligns the pencils on his desk so that they’re perfectly parallel to each other. “He does seem to have forged quite a few connections in 1-A.” The rodent says, almost wistfully.
...Yeah, they’re getting nowhere. He has a feeling that that’s exactly what Nedzu intends.
Shouta thinks of the questions he wants to ask - all four thousand and seventy-three of them. For now, he settles on the most important one.
“Is Midoriya... safe?”
Nedzu’s eyes glint, like that’s the one he expected to hear. “There are two ways that I could interpret that question.”
God.
Sometimes Shouta wishes that his paycheck didn’t rely on his ability to refrain from strangling rodents that got on his nerves. Because honestly? He is getting sick of the rat's games.
“Well then answer both,” He growls.
The smile leaves the principal’s face only long enough to take a sip of tea before it returns at full force.
“Midoriya poses no danger to anyone here.”
Shouta’s gaze does not waver, that’s not the answer he cares about.
“And as long as the boy is at UA, he is the safest he can be.”
Shouta’s eyes narrow at the obviously intentional avoidance of a solid answer. “And just how safe is that.”
Infuriatingly, Nedzu shrugs. “Only time will tell, I suppose.”
Shouta wants to pull all of his hair out and eat it.
The man stands abruptly. If the principal isn’t going to give him any actual answers, then Shouta isn’t going to allow him to waste any more of his time. He makes his way towards the door, intent on leaving before he can do anything he regrets.
Just before he can open the door, Nedzu speaks up.
“Aizawa,” He starts. “Your class will be going to the Unforeseen Simulation Joint for rescue training tomorrow, yes?”
The underground hero furrows his brows at the change of topic. He does not turn around to face his superior as he replies slowly, “...Yes?”
“How would you feel about Midoriya joining you on that trip?”
Shouta does turn to look at Nedzu, then. The principal’s hands are clasped together on the table, head tilted just slightly. There’s an off, unhinged sort of look in his eye.
“...I don’t see a problem with it.” He says slowly.
Nedzu smiles with way too many needle-point teeth. “Great!” He says, hopping off of his chair and ambling his way towards the door, just so he can open it for Shouta - which honestly, he's kind of mad about. He was looking forward to slamming it when he left.
“And Aizawa,” The principal calls after he is already halfway down the hallway.
“Watch him.”
Shouta suddenly feels cold.
When he looks back, Nedzu is gone.