specific tw: food/eating, chronic pain, anxiety. see masterpostfor genre + general tw.
notes: god i missed this fic
you sit on the edge of your bed – the one at yamada and aizawa’s house, not the one at your foster family’s house – and stare at the piece of paper in your hand. your phone is in your other hand, open to the contacts page. your favorites – your mentors and amanatsu-chan – hover at the top of the list. everyone else in your phone is either your foster parents or someone you’d done a school project with.
you don’t really want to call him – talking over the phone is just asking for a dry conversation that cannot be easily escaped. texting him is awkward but… less so. and not contacting him is worse, because if he gets in and so do you, you’ll have to see him every damn day, knowing you effectively ghosted him before you even talked.
you type midoriya’s number into a new contact and send a quick text.
specific tw: food/eating, chronic pain, anxiety. see masterpostfor genre + general tw.
notes: god i missed this fic
you sit on the edge of your bed – the one at yamada and aizawa’s house, not the one at your foster family’s house – and stare at the piece of paper in your hand. your phone is in your other hand, open to the contacts page. your favorites – your mentors and amanatsu-chan – hover at the top of the list. everyone else in your phone is either your foster parents or someone you’d done a school project with.
you don’t really want to call him – talking over the phone is just asking for a dry conversation that cannot be easily escaped. texting him is awkward but… less so. and not contacting him is worse, because if he gets in and so do you, you’ll have to see him every damn day, knowing you effectively ghosted him before you even talked.
you type midoriya’s number into a new contact and send a quick text.
you: hey, it’s [surname], from the exam
you plug your phone in to charge and lay down to take a nap, exhausted after the exam, when your phone buzzes on the floor next to your bed. your mattress is on the floor – it’s comfortable and you’re not going to fall very far out of it – so it’s easy to reach your phone. the screen glows with a text message. how the hell is he awake after getting nearly his entire body healed? shouldn’t he be practically comatose?
midoriya: oh hi!! this is midoriya!
so many exclamation points. anxiety. pleaser. you brush the unnecessary thoughts away and unlock your phone to open the message. several more pop up.
midoriya: you already knew that tho, sorry
midoriya: did you still want to tell me about your quirk?
midoriya: it’s okay if you don’t!!
jeez, he types as fast as he talks.
you: yeah, i can still tell you abt it
you: tomorrow work for you?
you pull the quilt further up to block the light coming from the window behind you. your head sinks into the pillow; your head hurts. the bright screen is making it worse. it feels like your brain is six feet outside of your skull, raw and exposed in the open air. your neck aches.
midoriya: yes! tomorrow is great! i live in musutafu, so if you do too, and if you want, we can meet up? i really don’t have anything to do while i wait for UA to release the results (;´・`)>
the kaomoji is cute. it makes the corner of your mouth twitch. the idea of seeing someone you don’t know well, however – that makes your skull nearly crack. you say yes anyway.
you: sure. i live in musutafu too
well, at least for the week while you wait for the results. no point heading back if you’re going to be attending school here. (not that you want to head back. being here is much easier.)
midoriya: great!! i’ll text you tomorrow about it ヽ(´▽｀)/
you turn on do not disturb and put your phone face down on the floor. your head fucking hurts, the bones in your fingers feel like they’re vibrating and grinding each other into dust, and you’re going to sleep. hopefully it’ll go away if you sleep.
—
aizawa is slumped over his bowl of rice and egg, but neither you nor yamada, presumably, is worried about him face-planting this morning – his grip on his chopsticks is good enough to indicate that he is, in fact, awake. yamada is eating at the speed of light in order to get to the radio station on time – not that he’s ever late in the first place.
you stare down at your bowl of tamago gohan. “hey, uh…”
yamada pauses and nods encouragingly, still stuffing rice into his mouth. aizawa turns imperceptibly towards you.
“do applicants get points for rescuing other applicants on the exam?”
aizawa is trying not to smile, or at least you assume he is, because he shoves his face down into the capture weapon he’s already wearing.
yamada looks blankly at you, chewing.
“yeah,” says aizawa, and shoves some rice into his mouth.
you go back to eating.
yamada chews faster and swallows in a hurry. “you’re not supposed to tell them that, shota!” he hisses, like it’ll do any good.
aizawa shrugs. “they already knew. illogical to lie to their face.”
“it’s not lying if i don’t say anything.”
“omitting information.”
“omitting information that they are not supposed to have!”
“omitting information,” aizawa says, firmer.
“and they say i’m the loudmouth?”
“cheap shot.”
“still scored.”
aizawa huffs – he’s not really annoyed – and turns to look at you. “why?”
“i saw someone at the exam only rescue people – they didn’t get any points from the robots.”
aizawa nods and eats some more rice. “they’ll be fine.”
yamada gets up to put his dish in the sink, “but don’t tell them that.”
“sure.” good thing you didn’t ghost him, then, since you’re probably going to end up in the same school.
your phone has a few texts waiting for you when you get back to your room after washing the dishes.
midoriya: i’m basically free all of today – we could meet at the takoba beach park?
you: okay – i can take the 4 pm train
midoriya: okay!! ill meet you at the station at 4:15?
you: see you then
you put your phone back down and crawl under the covers for another nap. your hands still feel like the bones in them might explode.
—
the train is mostly empty, so you sit in the back – you can see all of the doors from there – and put in one earbud. you leave your phone on do not disturb again, with only aizawa, yamada, amanatsu-chan, and midoriya’s notifications allowed. those are the only people you’ll need to talk to today.
the more rural and suburban areas of musutafu open up as you leave the city – more space, less places for people to hide, fewer people in the way. not quite as rural as your legal residence, though.
you can see him through the window of the train as it slows, waiting on the platform. he has his backpack on – which looks a little poorly proportioned on his broad frame – and a stupidly big smile. his expression actually hurts your stomach a little bit.
the doors slide open and you step off.
“hi!” he waves and you raise your hand in response, then shove it into your pocket.
“hi, midoriya.”
he looks at you, and you want to look away. neither of you speak, and neither of you look away.
“midoriya, the beach? how do we get there?” you prompt, finally ripping your gaze away, the silence too aggravating for you.
“right, right, yeah, uh, just follow me? i’ve been going there since i was a little kid and i spent a lot time there this summer so i know the way really well!”
you walk beside him. “i have one question, before you start asking me things.”
he nods way too quickly.
“actually, two. one – why do you want to know so much about my quirk? two – did you score any points on the exam yesterday?” you fix your gaze ahead, but you’re still watching for his reaction, which will hopefully be unguarded, since you’re not looking directly at him.
midoriya chews on his lip and walks a little faster. “for the first one, it’s because i find quirks really interesting! i’ve been analyzing them since i was a kid because i wanted to be a hero, and i really liked watching the fights and the news clips and, and, ah, i uh, didn’t get any points. no.”
“did you apply to the support department as well? they’d probably like to have a quirk analyst.”
“no, i didn’t. i really wanted to be in the hero course…” he tangles his fingers in his hair. “it probably sounds ridiculous. but i did really, really want to. i thought that maybe i’d have a chance.”
you hum. “maybe you still do.”
he whips around fast enough to break his neck, “what? but i didn’t– i didn’t get any points, i didn’t get any of the robots except that giant zero pointer that broke my arm! it would be stupid to keep hoping, you know? even if i passed or did well on the written exam…” he stops walking, looking at his feet. “even then, i need to accept that i won’t get in. i didn’t get any points on the practical, and i need to be realistic about it.”
you’re not sure if he’s telling you or himself, but a smile tugs at the corner of your mouth, and you look at him from the corner of your eye. “but they never said admissions were based on points, so you still have a chance, right?” you leave out the part about rescue points.
midoriya laughs, bright and clear, sudden, and it burns like chlorinated pool water in your sinuses. he claps a hand over his mouth and then drags it down his face like he doesn’t know what to do with himself – he probably doesn’t. there’s a long silence as you start walking again, and he jogs to catch up.
you’re in step again when he almost trips over one of his feet in a sudden fit of excitement, apparently done processing (mumbling) and ready to launch into a rant.
“i might have a chance, i, i might actually have a chance. i can’t believe it, how did i miss that? that makes so much sense, though, because they just said we could gain points, not that it actually mattered how many you got… oh my god–”
“we’re here, midoriya.”
the waves, crystal blue, lap gently at the beach. it’s the afternoon, but the beach is relatively empty and calm, not crowded with people. or crowded with the piles of garbage that had washed up there. “this is much cleaner than i remember it being.”
just like last time, he follows your conversation jump without issue. “yeah i, i kind of spent the whole summer cleaning it?”
“nice. i’m sure the whole community appreciates it.” you have to actively work to make sure it doesn’t come out flat. you’re not entirely sure it works. you really do mean it, you think.
the compliment or the tone must set off some kind of alarm in his head, because he’s immediately waving it off. “no, no, no one knows i cleaned the beach! it was a personal project and it’s – oh no, now you think i picked this spot to brag about cleaning the bea–”
you kick some sand at his shoe, hands still in your pockets. “midoriya. i don’t think that. it’s fine.”
“really?” you’re quiet, and he slowly un-pretzels his arms from around his head. “oh, uh. okay. good!” he nods to himself. his smile slowly comes back until it feels like the sun is blazing full force in your face, bright enough to make you look away at a bench that happens to be to your right. it’s in the ocean grass right before the sand begins.
“we could sit over there?”
midoriya nods again and you sit down on the bench, one knee pulled to your chest. he sits next to you, cross legged, shoes on the bench, and pulls out a notebook and pen. the sun glows marigold on the white pages.
he scribbles your name down at the top and turns to you, “do you have a hero name yet?”
you rest your chin on your knee. “i haven’t picked one, no.”
he beams, and it feels like you’re in front of a solar flare. “that’s okay! i can help you come up with plenty later, if you want! or if you already have some ideas but you just don’t know which one to pick, i could help you with that too.”
you wait a few seconds to see if he’s done talking – this rant isn’t an anxiety tangent, so no need to interrupt it. “sure.”
“so, can you just manipulate energy in your surroundings? or produce it? or store it? can you absorb any energy at all, no matter the form?”
he writes as you respond.
“it has to… i have to use my physical body as a conduit in order to manipulate it. i can’t change it without it passing through some part of me. and i can store that energy, and i’d assume every form, although i haven’t tried nuclear, and for safety’s sake i won’t try it.”
midoriya keeps scribbling, apparently unphased by the nuclear comment. he pauses and taps the pen against the page, humming. “but what about sound, or light,” he mutters, the tapping speeding up, probably keeping time with his thoughts. “you can’t really touch those forms…”
“yes you can.”
he stops tapping his pen, blinking at you.
“if you can hear it or see it, you’re touching it, or more accurately, the energy is touching you. same thing with heat – if i can feel the heat from a fire, i’m touching the edge of that energy source, which means i have access to the whole thing.” this is starting to feel oddly like a quirk counseling or training session.
“is there a limit? to the amount of power you can hold? do you have to release it? what happens if your quirk gets canceled or you turn it off while holding energy – wait, wait, can you even turn your quirk off? does it work that way? what about turning off the absorption and the storage separately? can you do that?” he’s practically vibrating, pen blurring in his hand as he switches between writing and tapping the pen on the page.
you wish you’d brought a notebook, just to keep track of all of the questions. you grab at them, trying to keep them all centered in your mind until you can get through all of them. you lunge for the topic in general instead. “yeah, i can hold onto it – the more energy there is, the harder it is to hold onto. like dropping soap in the shower. if my quirk is cancelled, the energy dissipates. so far that’s been harmless.”
you have no idea how he can keep writing without looking at the page. he’s looking at you instead, beaming.
“and what about turning your quirk off? can you?”
“yeah, but i prefer to leave it on and just… intentionally not absorb anything.”
he turns to you and you can feel the next question that’s coming – why? doesn’t that lead to symptoms of overuse? – so you reroute the conversation.
“i have some questions for you, midoriya.”
you can see the way he mentally stumbles, tripping over himself as the momentum of the conversation shifts in an unexpected direction. “you have questions for me? about me? me?”
what he means is what could there possibly be to ask about, to know about him. a terrible sense of familiarity curls in your gut, so you abruptly swerve away from the quirk questions. you won’t reduce him to that, even if that’s what he’s reduced himself to, or perhaps what he’s beenreduced to.
“why do you want to be a hero?”
“it’s been my dream since i was a kid. and recently it’s become someone else’s dream for me, too, so i can’t let that person down!” he clenches his fist and smiles like he’s facing something down. it’s a childish kind of joy, one that should look out of place on a soon-to-be-hero’s face, but he wears it well.
you cock your head, “but… why is it your dream? it just being a dream isn’t a reason.”
“it’s my goal to save people, both from villains and from the possibility of villains. i don’t want anyone to be worried about being a victim,” he says, simply.
you nod and rest your chin back on your knee. “who’s your favorite?”
“all might! he’s just… i want to be unbeatable like that, so that way no one has to worry, so that people will see me and think ‘i’m safe now.’ i want to make people happy and safe, and he does that really well!”
he beams at you in the afternoon sun. “what about you?”
“my favorite?” you pull your other leg up onto the bench and turn to face him, mirroring his cross-legged position.
“yeah, your favorite!” he’s still holding his notebook and pen, but he’s not tapping or writing anymore. just waiting for you to answer, focused.
a smile cracks across your face, barely unrestrained. “eraserhead, present mic. but gang orca, fat gum, ingenium, joke, and midnight are close behind.” they’re all great to hang around. sakamata-san sucks at monopoly, though.
“they’re all really cool, yeah! have you met any of them? i was really lucky and got all might’s signature a few months ago.” he flips his notebook to a different page to show you.
“why am i not surprised that he signs in all caps?”
midoriya beams even brighter at that, laughs, and it stings a little less in your lungs than the first time. you have to force yourself to pick the conversation back up and not let it drop into the quiet white noise of the waves.
“yeah, i’ve met all of them, actually.” at yamada’s saturday game night. nemuri and emi are always there, and tensei used to bring kid’s games when i was small.
midoriya almost throws his notebook in his excitement, hands flying around again. “you met all of them? how?! they’re all so busy and their agencies are in completely different places! some of them don’t even do signings, so there’s no way you could have met them without either looking for them in their patrol areas or seeing them by chance, but that’s a lot of heroes to just see by–”
you reach out and take the pen out of his hand. his jaw snaps shut. he plays with the corner of one of the notebook’s pages, staring down at it instead of looking at you like he was before.
“sorry,” he says, quieter, slower. “i know that all the talking and mumbling to myself is annoying and creepy.”
you hand the pen back. “it’s not.” he looks like he gives himself whiplash from how fast he looks up.
“it’s not annoying,” you say it again, shrugging. “i just… i could explain it to you if you just ask. no need to wonder about it.”
he clutches at the pen with both hands, holding onto it tightly. he chews his lip again. “you’d answer? i know i’m asking a lot of questions. i don’t want to be a bother!” he lets go of the pen with one hand so he can wave rather frantically.
“if you were being a bother, you would know.”
midoriya’s smile comes back, not full force, wobbly and nervous, mercury knocked slightly out of orbit, bright and unsteady. he shuffles so that he can sit facing you. “so… then how did you meet them?”
you twist the truth as it rolls off your tongue. “one of them is my mentor.” two. “i met the other pros through them.”
he looks so incredibly excited that you worry all that energy will tear his body apart. “oh i have a mentor too! i can’t tell you who it is, so you don’t have to tell me who yours is, that would be unfair. do you think everyone at UA has a mentor? is it common?”
“i don’t think so, at least not for first years.”
midoriya slumps back against the arm of the bench. “oh, that’s a relief! at least i have a little less catching up to do, then.” he sits up fast enough that he almost falls off the bench. “i don’t mean that i’m ahead of everyone! i did not mean to come across that way, i just meant, uh.”
“you meant the gap you’re trying to cross is smaller than you thought it was for a second.”
he nods and relaxes again. you study him for a few seconds.
“you’ll catch up,” you say. he will.
midoriya looks at you like there are stars in his eyes, shining, glossy, probably because he’s tearing up. “i hope you’re right. there’s a lot riding on you being right.”
“i’m always right.”
he laughs. this time it doesn’t sting at all. “i hope you’re right about that, too.”
“you’re always hopeful, it seems.”
“i try.”
that makes you laugh through your nose. he glances at you when you do, and you see his smile melt into something soft, thoughtful. hopeful.
reblogs and comments are very much appreciated!! ଘ(੭*ˊᵕˋ)੭* main taglist here,series taglisthere. back to gt&h masterpost.
specific tw: canon-typical violence, bullying, and injury (midoriya breaking his bones), brief mention of uraraka throwing up in line with canon, bakugo does call reader a bitch just in case anyone has some gender issues w that. see masterpost for genre + genre tw.
notes: bakugo is a bully here, but fear not i will be doing my best to do him justice in this series.
the UA lecture hall looms in front of you, and you’re not going inside of it. not because you’re avoiding the written exam, or because you want to stay out here with all of the other people – loud, chattering, grating on your ears. no. you’re out here because it’s sunny and warm, and, both fortunately and unfortunately, loud. this is the best place to charge your quirk for the physical exam.
you watch the other students arrive as you bask in the heat and light and noise, observing the ways they walk and talk and approach each other: ankle injury, probably acts rashly, touching her hair to calm herself down; nervous, shy, doesn’t like his smile. easy to figure out. you move on to observing the next group of students – might as well, there’s nothing else to do while you wait.
specific tw: canon-typical violence, bullying, and injury (midoriya breaking his bones), brief mention of uraraka throwing up in line with canon, bakugo does call reader a bitch just in case anyone has some gender issues w that. see masterpost for genre + genre tw.
notes: bakugo is a bully here, but fear not i will be doing my best to do him justice in this series.
the UA lecture hall looms in front of you, and you’re not going inside of it. not because you’re avoiding the written exam, or because you want to stay out here with all of the other people – loud, chattering, grating on your ears. no. you’re out here because it’s sunny and warm, and, both fortunately and unfortunately, loud. this is the best place to charge your quirk for the physical exam.
you watch the other students arrive as you bask in the heat and light and noise, observing the ways they walk and talk and approach each other: ankle injury, probably acts rashly, touching her hair to calm herself down; nervous, shy, doesn’t like his smile. easy to figure out. you move on to observing the next group of students – might as well, there’s nothing else to do while you wait.
specific tw: canon-typical violence, bullying, and injury (midoriya breaking his bones), brief mention of uraraka throwing up in line with canon, bakugo does call reader a bitch just in case anyone has some gender issues w that. see masterpost for genre + genre tw.
notes: bakugo is a bully here, but fear not i will be doing my best to do him justice in this series.
the UA lecture hall looms in front of you, and you’re not going inside of it. not because you’re avoiding the written exam, or because you want to stay out here with all of the other people – loud, chattering, grating on your ears. no. you’re out here because it’s sunny and warm, and, both fortunately and unfortunately, loud. this is the best place to charge your quirk for the physical exam.
you watch the other students arrive as you bask in the heat and light and noise, observing the ways they walk and talk and approach each other: ankle injury, probably acts rashly, touching her hair to calm herself down; nervous, shy, doesn’t like his smile. easy to figure out. you move on to observing the next group of students – might as well, there’s nothing else to do while you wait.
a blonde man with spiky hair walks through the gate, scowling, hands shoved in his pockets. you watch as he zeroes in on another man – solidly built, with green hair and a curled-in sort of posture – standing by himself near the steps, about ten feet away. you want to say they’re friends, but that doesn’t seem right, with the way the first guy is practically stomping toward the other one. maybe not friends, but they definitely know each other.
the blonde grabs the other boy by a backpack strap and yanks him forward, “what are you doing here, nerd? trying to one-up me, hah?”
yeah, they definitely know each other, and they definitely aren’t friends.
the guy with green hair is shaking and trying to push the other man’s hand off of his bag. “i’m just here to take the exam, i have the right to apply, kacchan–”
“and do what? cheat to get in? you’re not good enough to get in, so what’s the point in trying, deku?”
fuck it.
you’re over there in a flash; the sunlight and conserving your quirk for the past few days has made it easy to use bursts of kinetic energy like that.
the blonde man – angry guy, you decide – sees you approach and whirls around, still gripping the other guy by the strap of his backpack. “fuck off, extra. this is between me and deku.”
you blink at him. “no.”
the nervous guy – deku – starts scrambling to get out of the angry guy’s grip, and the blonde’s hand starts popping with what look like small explosions. he looks like he’s about to start some kind of tirade, so you cut him off.
“look, i don’t know who either of you are, or what you,” you jab a finger at angry guy, “think you’re doing, but you shouldn’t be getting in people’s heads before the exam. it’s underhanded and nasty to undermine someone’s performance like that.”
deku, green hair, whatever his name is, is whipping his head back and forth between the two of you, looking like a deer in the headlights of two oncoming cars, not knowing which direction to run. “uhhh–”
angry guy snarls. “i am bakugo katsuki, and this is deku, and you’re a nosey bitch that i’m going to turn into a stain on the ground.”
you grab him by the shirt and suck the heat and noise and light right out of his palms. “no,” you hiss, “i’m the nosey bitch that you don’t want to mess with. leave, or i report you and you don’t get to take the exam.” you pry his hand off of deku’s backpack and shove angry guy away. “get.”
he stumbles back, switching between glaring at you and his smoking palms, which he shoves back into his pockets. he’s hiding his hands; unnerved, then. “fine. i’ll see you after, deku, when they’re not around to get in the way,” he throws another scowl over his shoulder and stalks off, into the exam hall.
you turn back to deku, who is staring after the other boy, stunned. “are you okay?” it comes out so stiff that you can hear your parents telling you to talk nicer.
he shakes his head and looks back at you. he still looks dazed, eyes flitting around your face, swallowing nervously. “yeah, yeah, i’m fine. mhm. just fine. totally.”
“do you want me to report him? i know the proctor, and he’ll kick that guy out for bullying.”
he shakes his head even harder, taking a step back and waving his hands in a frenzy of activity, flushed, “no! no, you don’t need to report him, i promise he doesn’t mean anything by it, kacchan has been my friend my whole life, he just shows it a little differently, you really don’t need to report him – he needs to take this exam, he’s perfect for the hero course, really. yeah. i promise, you don’t need to report him.”
you look him over, eyes narrowed, skeptical. “mhm.” he looks like he’s going to combust. you switch directions before you have to deal with even more awkwardness, “i’m [surname] [first name].”
he visibly relaxes. clearly he’s glad to have moved on from potentially reporting his ‘childhood friend.’ “midoriya izuku, and it’s great to meet you!”
midoriya’s smile is so bright that you wonder if you could use it to fuel your quirk. the thought makes you smile, just a little. “yeah, good to meet you too.”
you stand there and watch him fidget. the conversation might be dry and awkward as hell, but nothing gets people to talk like silence, and he keeps looking like he’s going to reach for something in his bag.
“can i…” he chews his lip, then brightens, practically bouncing on the balls of his feet. “can i ask some questions? about what you did to kacchan’s quirk?”
your smile almost drops, but you keep it up. he can use this information against you, if the exam is structured that way. he doesn’t look like the type, but… it’s not smart to share that type of thing. you don’t owe him anything – you just saved his ass, and his friend’s ass by way of not reporting him; if anyone owes anyone, he owes you. and you’d really prefer not to discuss this, anyways.
midoriya is almost vibrating with excitement. he gets a notebook and pen out so fast that he almost drops them. the look on his face is so hopeful, bright; it makes it hard to say no.
“fine.”
“so, you extinguished his explosions, right?”
you nod.
“did you deactivate his quirk? can you put fires out? is it an oxygen manipulation quirk? or a chemical reaction manipulation quirk? maybe you’re planning to work with water hose as a rescue hero?”
the variety of guesses, the possibilities, they make your head buzz, so much to think about. you file those away for later, when you can look them over in detail. “no deactivation, yes i can put fires out, no oxygen manipulation, and it doesn’t work too well for being a rescue hero.”
midoriya scribbles frantically, smile splitting his face, glancing up at you and nodding in between notes. after a while he stops and cocks his head. probably waiting for you to explain. you could toy with him and make him guess, which is what you usually did to people at school. but he just wants to know for the sake of knowing. that much is obvious, just from the pure excitement he’s exhibiting over basic questions. it’s stupid to do this, you remind yourself, if the exam pits us against each other, he’ll be fully capable of taking me down – or at least of planning to take me down. it’s stupid – but he looks so happy, and you may not be in the same exam section, so you do it anyway. you give, just the tiniest bit.
“it’s energy manipulation.” i won’t answer any more questions after this.
“i have so many questions– can you–”
present mic yells from inside the hall – the presentation on the written exam is about to start. the other students start to make their way inside.
his face falls – god, he wears everything on his sleeve, doesn’t he – and it makes your chest tighten. weird.
“i can explain after the exam, if you want.” it makes the weird chest feeling go away, at least.
just like that, he’s beaming, pen flipping in his hands, writing something down before tearing the paper out of his notebook and handing it to you. “i’m not sure, uh, if there’ll be an opportunity to talk after the exam? so here’s my number?”
you take the paper. he freezes and abruptly goes bright red, obviously realizing something.
“oh my god i did not– i totally did not mean it like that i just wanted to talk to you about– i’m so sorry that was so rude i promise– i wasn’t– i uh–” he covers his face with his hands. “i cannot believe i just. oh my god.”
you just put the paper in the outside pocket of your bag. “i didn’t think you meant it that way, so it’s fine.”
“thank god,” he mumbles, still hiding behind his hands.
that’s not something you’re gonna try and read into. you point toward the hall. “midoriya, we should probably go inside. the exam information session is gonna start and i’d rather not miss it.” it sounds awkward, stiff, but it’s the best you can manage.
“right, right! crap!”
—
this is almost too easy, you think, downing robots with localized electromagnetic pulses. it’s quick work, and it doesn’t take too much energy. you didn’t even need your capture weapon for this – it just makes it easier to maneuver, but you would’ve been fine without it.
still, you are starting to run out of energy. you’d refused yamada’s offer to charge you by screaming positive statements at you – you were going to pass this exam without help, thank you very much – and as much as electricity was a great charging source, it really concerned your parents and your mentors when you used electrical outets. fire was, similarly, out of the question. the point is, sunlight only does so much, and your palms stung from all of those electromagnetic pulses, and you’d absolutely wiped the floor with the rest of the contestants – you stopped the twenty initial robots dead in their tracks with a giant pulse right off the bat. so yeah, your battery capacity is running a little low.
of course that’s when a giant, towering, zero point robot shows up. there’s a woman trapped under rubble left behind by one of the more destructive candidates, she’s struggling to push it off. energy thrums under your skin and you’re off like a shot, speeding toward her in a blur of kinetic energy and the robot is approaching and you’re almost there and–
and the energy runs out and you fall hard, still going some unholy speed, tumbling across the pavement with the force of your momentum like you’ve been thrown from a speeding car. you land in a heap next to the young woman. you sit up – completely fine, and slightly recharged from the impact – and start trying to dig her out from under the slabs of metal and concrete. you have to pump kinetic energy into your limbs and back to lift the rubble. your bones are starting to feel a little brittle.
“if i can touch it with my hands, i can float it away,” she says, jerking her chin towards the rubble on top of her. she seems remarkably calm, even if her jaw is clearly tense – from pain or fear or both, you’re not sure.
either way, you nod and focus on the chunk of concrete pinning one of her arms. the ground is shaking as the robot gets closer. you need to hurry.
a flash of green flies by. you keep pushing the rubble until she has a full range of motion, and she floats the rubble off of her.
there’s a terrible crunching noise – you look up. midoriya is falling from the sky. the robot is incapacitated. and you are out of energy again. you have maybe five seconds. your capture weapon can’t reach that high, and it has more than enough tensile strength to hold him, but you’d risk his momentum slamming him into the ground at such a short distance.
you turn to the woman next to you – thankfully she’s visibly unharmed, other than a few cuts and bruises. “hey, can you float people too?”
she nods, exhausted and draped over a floating piece of rubble, one that had been under her when she was trapped. you shove her and the rubble through the air, approximating where midoriya will land – she reaches out to grab him just before he hits the ground.
everything falls out of the air. you’re grateful your feet were out of the way of the cement chunk. she throws up over the side of it. you’re even more glad that you were out of the way.
midoriya is lying on the ground, limbs twisted at awful angles, miraculously alive and not passed out or dead. you sit next to him on the pavement, careful not to touch him, because frankly his arm looks like the bones have been liquified.
“i’ve got some questions about your quirk, dude, never mind mine,” you say, wondering why the absolutefuck someone with a bone breaking quirk would want to ask about yours, which was comparatively pretty straightforward.
“yeah, me too.” it’s strained, but either he can’t feel anything or he’s got an insanely high pain tolerance, because he should be passed the fuck out from using a quirk that intensely. for his sake, you hope his brain has decided to cut off all those pain signals.
“you can still talk? while your arm and legs look like they’ve gone through a meat grinder?”
he winces. “is it that bad?”
“worse.”
“hopefully recovery girl gets here soon.”
you wonder if you should even ask, but he seems like he’s willing to respond to most things. anything. “so you’re telling me… you didn’t know your quirk was going to do that to you?”
“yeah.” he goes along with the topic u-turn, like you’d predicted.
“you propelled yourself hundreds of feet in the air and punched a giant metal robot in the face, not knowing what your quirk would do?”
“otherwise both of you would’ve been crushed. i couldn’t just let that happen!”
“thanks, i guess? although, since you’re so interested in it,” you huff a laugh, “you ought to know that my quirk would’ve protected both of us. you kind of broke your bones for nothing.”
he’s quiet. you get the feeling he’d be putting his hands over his face again right about now, if his arm wasn’t pulverized.
“but i appreciate it. not letting people you’ve just met get crushed by a giant robot. and now we’re even, too.”
you watch a watery smile flicker across his face, but it’s not a grimace. he can’t feel his arm and legs, then, at least. the thought soothes you.
recovery girl arrives, and you stand up. she can take care of midoriya and gravity girl. “see you at UA.”
you hear him say something like, “but i didn’t score any points!” as you walk away. rescue heroes exist for a reason, midoriya. and there is no separate exam for them.
you can only hope you’re right.
reblogs and comments are very much appreciated!! ଘ(੭*ˊᵕˋ)੭* main taglist here,series taglisthere. back to gt&h masterpost.
pairing + wc: parental erasermic + reader, midoriya izuku x reader in future chapters just not in prologue; 3.7k
specific tw: discussions of human trafficking + child abuse by villains, mention of foster system, mentions of death, mentions of chronic pain, collapsing buildings. see masterpost for genre + general tw.
notes: i’m rlly happy to be re-releasing this w gender neutral reader + some minor tweaks to the style! <3 pls enjoy!
your chamber is cold, dimly lit, and soundproofed. there’s very little for you to draw energy from, but there’s no worry of you getting too cold – the faint lights, far above, are enough for you to generate heat using your quirk. just not enough for you to get out, and just enough to make you strain as you force your quirk to keep running.
sensei stops outside your chamber – you can feel the buzz of electricity in his cells, and you press your tiny hand to the wall, trying to figure out exactly where he is on the other side of the one-way mirror. the warmth of your hand drags against its cold surface, a blur of barely-there fingerprints, the lines of your palm smeared with the motion.
pairing + wc: parental erasermic + reader, midoriya izuku x reader in future chapters just not in prologue; 3.7k
specific tw: discussions of human trafficking + child abuse by villains, mention of foster system, mentions of death, mentions of chronic pain, collapsing buildings. see masterpost for genre + general tw.
notes: i’m rlly happy to be re-releasing this w gender neutral reader + some minor tweaks to the style! <3 pls enjoy!
your chamber is cold, dimly lit, and soundproofed. there’s very little for you to draw energy from, but there’s no worry of you getting too cold – the faint lights, far above, are enough for you to generate heat using your quirk. just not enough for you to get out, and just enough to make you strain as you force your quirk to keep running.
sensei stops outside your chamber – you can feel the buzz of electricity in his cells, and you press your tiny hand to the wall, trying to figure out exactly where he is on the other side of the one-way mirror. the warmth of your hand drags against its cold surface, a blur of barely-there fingerprints, the lines of your palm smeared with the motion.
you stop when sensei is directly in front of you. the buzzing in his cells sings to you. you press closer to the mirror. there’s another pocket of electricity, but it feels odd, shifting; sensei is probably talking to that man with purple fog over his face. but you’ll never be able to hear them, not with the way your chamber is insulated, so you walk back to your bed, in the back corner of the room.
it’s starting to get warmer in the chamber, so training will be soon. you’re only allowed large quantities of energy when they know you’re going to use them up.
but hours pass, and the chamber is too hot, your whole body buzzing as the energy tries to jump out from under your skin. maybe it’s a new training exercise, a new way to push the limits of how much energy you can absorb. either way, you have to keep drawing it in, or it’ll get too hot.
you fall asleep and wake up sweating, skin crackling, and the air smells humid and warm and full of ozone. it’s hard to breathe, it’s so heavy – your lungs keep trying to hold it in, extract every last drop of energy from it. you have to force yourself to exhale, hard, like sensei taught you.
there’s light cracking through your skin, but you register it only faintly, too focused on grappling with the twisting, writhing mass of energy and trying to force it to stay in the center of your body.
but it’s not staying still – every time you push down on a wave of energy trying to escape in one direction, it just pulses out in the other. maybe, if you just let a little bit of it go, you’ll be able to hold on to the rest of it?
you hold your arm out, intent on discharging a small sound wave – but the cracks on your arm, the light energy seeping out of them in wisps, it scares you, and suddenly that ball of energy is tumbling out of control.
the wave of kinetic energy ripples out of you and slams into the walls of your chamber – they splinter with a deafeningly loud sound, folding and tearing like wet paper into the chambers next to yours, and the one-way mirror shatters into millions of tiny shards. but it doesn’t stop there – the entire building is shaking, and you can hear the other mirrors shattering and see the other walls crumbling throughout the warehouse. and then the ceiling comes down on top of you.
–
shota gets the call at six in the morning. or rather, he gets the call, but hizashi picks it up, because there’s no way in hell that anything is waking him from the dead of sleep on his day off.
except hizashi, who just shakes him awake and hands him the phone, saying, “it’s for you, babe. something about an explosion.”
“eraserhead speaking.” he wants to complain, but he knows it’s not the operator’s fault, and he knows there’s a reason they called him in on his day off.
“we need you to suppress some kind of explosion quirk in the warehouse district. there’s a collapsed, sorry, still collapsing building, and some fire and electricity issues. the fire department is dealing with the parts of the building that are burning, but there are people trapped inside, and the heat signatures indicate that one of them – a child, judging by size – is causing uncontrollable explosions, which are making it difficult to get anyone out. cementoss is currently stabilizing the building.”
“i’ll be there as fast as i can.” he can’t find it in himself to complain anymore.
as shota swings himself across the city on his capture weapon, rapidly approaching the warehouse district, he can see a plume of smoke billowing against the orange of the sunrise. he stops on top of a building and uses a nearby lamppost to lower himself to the ground.
the collapsed warehouse is smoking, and steam is rising off of it in the early morning light, but it is thankfully no longer on fire. cementoss is fusing cement slabs together in an effort to keep it from caving in further, and infrared hero, aptly named infra (hizashi calls her “heat seeker”) is intently watching the building. shota approaches her for debriefing.
“it was hard to see, earlier, with all of the fire interfering, and it’s blurry because of the heat retention of the concrete, but there are at least twenty people inside, half or more of which are children. there’s someone close to the center of the structure who is periodically letting out bursts of heat, and who we assume is also producing some kind of kinetic shockwave.”
“and cementoss has constructed a pathway so i can extract the person without disturbing the rubble and crushing other victims?”
“yes–” infra starts, and is abruptly cut off when the building rumbles, the ground shuddering along with it, the pavement near its base fracturing. “yes,” she pauses, eyes narrowing, “but you might want to wait while cementoss deals with whatever might’ve come loose just now.” she hands him an earpiece so she can direct him to the source of the explosions.
shota stands there, watching the wood and cement and metal smoke and steam, until cementoss gives him the go ahead.
he picks his way through the rubble, listening carefully to infra’s directions. sirens wail in the background, and broken glass crunches under his feet, but he can hear children crying through all of it. shota moves faster, pulls his goggles over his eyes.
infra tells him to stop and look down and to the right. all there is is a pile of debris, and it makes his heart leap into his throat. he starts digging through the chunks of cement, using his capture weapon to pull away particularly heavy or sharp pieces and to keep any large ones from falling. he has to work quickly, or risk getting hit by whatever quirk is hiding under there.
it only takes a few seconds, and then he’s looking down at a child – maybe seven years old, a little kid, curled up in a ball with their arms around their knees. there’s fissures in their skin with light pouring out of them, ashes in their hair. their eyes are glowing a terrifying, brilliant white – shota activates his quirk, hair floating up, and all the light evaporates from that tiny little body, they just look like a normal, scared kid.
it hits him that they really should’ve sent someone who was better with children. maybe gang orca. well, he might as well bite the bullet.
“i’m eraserhead. what’s your name?”
“[surname].” the kid looks up at him, face blank except for a slight frown. “what did you do to me? where did it go?”
shota offers his hand, and they take it, standing up. “where did what go?”
shota doesn’t have an answer.
he leads them out of the rubble, and thank god for the fact that they’re following – he really does not want to deal with a kicking, screaming kid in the middle of an unstable structure. the sunlight glints off of warped rebar, sharp and threatening. he tugs the kid slightly behind him.
“the energy. your hair went up and it went away.”
he has no fucking idea. “you’re right, it went away.” sometimes, telling kids that they’re right is the fastest way to get them to be quiet. surprisingly, it works.
they follow silently, gripping his hand with their tiny, slightly chubby fingers, until they finally get out of the rubble maze. now that the exploding kid is out, it’s safe to extract the other victims.
he crouches down in front of them, still holding their hand. “i’m going to leave you with the medical team, okay? they’re gonna check you over and take you to the hospital, if needed. i have to go get the other people out of there.”
except when shota stands up and tries to move away, they aren’t letting go. he tries stepping away again. it doesn’t work. it’s not just that they’re not letting go, it’s that he can’t break their grip – which is ridiculous, they’re a child, and their hand doesn’t even encompass his, meaning there’s a point where it should, in theory, be easy to break their hold.
theory isn’t holding up.
“you need to let go, or else i can’t get the other people out.” maybe he can guilt them into letting go? thankfully the other heroes on the scene are already digging through the rubble for the other victims.
they shake their head furiously, making some of the ash in their hair fly off. “no, sensei said i have to stay here. i can’t leave.”
shota resists the urge to drag a hand down his face. he really wishes tsukauchi was already here. “this is a school?”
“yes.” they nod solemnly.
“but this is the warehouse district.”
they stare at him. he tries breaking their grip again. they squeeze his hand tighter, and shota hears one of his joints crack.
“you can tell the police about the school and sensei when they get here, but you need to let go. i have to do my job. besides, your sensei is still in there, and i need to go rescue them.”
they cock their head, but loosen their grip a tiny bit. “no, sensei isn’t here. he left with the man who makes purple mist doorways. i think all the teachers left. i felt it, when they disappeared.”
felt it? grip strength? explosions? he can think about whatever the hell is going on with this child’s dangerous, wack ass quirk later. “okay, but the other students are still in there.”
“no,” they scrunch their eyes shut, grip tightening. “i can’t feel them. except amanatsu-chan. no one else is there.”
shota has a horrifying thought about heat signatures and dead bodies. he motions infra and one of cementoss’ sidekicks over.
“where is amanatsu-chan?” he asks, making eye contact with the sidekick, who is paying very close attention to the kid.
“she’s right next to where i was. in the room to the right, ‘cause she’s a month older than me.”
he turns his back to the kid and looks at infra. “that is the only person we need to rescue right now. everyone else is probably dead, according to them.”
infra looks toward the building, scanning. “the heat was probably trapped by the collapsed structure, and the fire made it difficult to see, but now that some of the rubble has been moved and the fire has been put out… there is only one heat signature that could possibly belong to someone who is alive. everything else… not even hypothermic bodies get that low.”
the sidekick rushes off with infra to guide them.
shota drags the kid along with him to the ambulance, which is now useless, with the exception of the two kids, and sits with them while the medical team looks them over. they still won’t let go of his hand, but he could break their hold now, if he needed to. if he wanted to.
he doesn’t.
—
they get the kid to the hospital, only with shota riding in the ambulance next to them, but they’re fine, and so is the other kid – a little girl. the only reason they decide to take the two kids to the hospital in the first place is because there’s nowhere else to take them, and they really, really need to see a quirk specialist. the other kid had some kind of odd, controlling speech effect, and he cannot, for the life of him, figure the first kid’s quirk out.
he leaves them with the quirk specialist, whom both kids use the sensei honorific for – they do that for every nurse and other adult, too – and goes back home to sleep. it’s almost the afternoon, but he doesn’t care. it’s his day off, damn it.
—
fuck that quirk specialist. he and hizashi are going to have to help the kid manage their quirk, according to his medical advice. thankfully, cementoss and tiger are more suited to the second kid.
he picks the problem child up from the train station in civilian clothes, hizashi next to him, cap pulled down to hide his face, hair half-down and not in that ridiculous cockatoo style. the kid’s brand new foster parents give them their phone numbers.
hizashi smiles at the kid and takes their hand, obviously completely forgetting that he’s not dressed as present mic. he does that around kids. “what’s your name, little listener?”
“[surname].” they turn to shota and blink accusingly, like he was supposed to tell hizashi.
“your first name, though?” hizashi prods, and shota laughs quietly through his nose.
“six.”
he stops laughing.
hizashi laughs awkwardly, his complete opposite, and definitely trying to smooth the situation over. “well, do you want to be called something different?”
their eyebrows furrow, and they reach for shota’s hand; he lets them. fine, they can hold both of their hands, dammit.
“is that allowed?”
hizashi gives him a look, one that means what the fuck. “yeah, yeah that’s allowed.”
“i think [first name] would be fine then.” they nod, like it’s an important decision.
“okay, [first name] it is, then. can i call you [first name]-chan, little listener?” hizashi says, starting to walk in the direction of their home. honestly, shota forgot that people use that honorific for children. he tries to avoid them in rescue missions; they’re uncomfortable around him, find him unnerving.
[first name] nods again. “mhm.”
“great! you can call me yamada-sen–” shota activates his quirk to tell him to shut up without actually telling him to shut up in front of the kid.
“no sensei honorific,” he mutters, thinking of the warehouse.
“you can call me yamada. that’s aizawa, kay?”
they nod again.
great, he’s training a child.
—
turns out they don’t need much training. the email from the quirk specialist explained that they could absorb energy and then manipulate its form, but it did not explain the frankly worrying level of precision they had.
they’re standing in the park, across the street from their hero-specialized apartment complex.
“i’m going to scream, kay? and you’re going to try to absorb it, and then we’ll see what you can do.” hizashi is still holding the kid’s hand, fifteen minutes after they’ve gotten back from the train station. shota is starting to worry that he’s getting attached. who is he kidding – of course hizashi is attached.
“aizawa will shut your quirk off if it’s too scary.”
they nod, already frowning in concentration. hizashi steps back and screams “HELLO!” at the lowest level possible. it still makes the grass ripple and the leaves on the trees shimmer. the kid just giggles, unphased, eyes glowing, and the grass and trees behind them are completely still, undisturbed. their control is disturbingly tight.
“again!” they shriek, relaying every bit of hizashi’s volume, and shota has a sickening thought about the types of bonding activities this kid had in that warehouse. training is playtime, to them.
all the pieces fall into place; the blacked out, confidential police reports, the inability to locate biological parents, the overpowered quirk, the ridiculous level of control for a child, sensei, the other children, the number six. quirk trafficking. all for one. collecting successors. his stomach turns.
he jerks back to the present as hizashi laughs and complies, yelling “HELLO!” again. shota can see the worry and caution seeping into his stance, though. they’ve been together long enough that he knows they’re both having the same thought, because hizashi isn’t stupid, and he’s seen every ugly little thing the world has to offer.
this time the kid doesn’t yell back, just holds out their hand. “wanna see what i can do?”
shota gets ready to activate his quirk, and hizashi nods.
their hand bursts into flame. shota’s hair flies up on reflex, a familiar burn in his eyes. the fire goes out, and a blast of light spirals off of their skin and dissipates into the air.
they all try several times more. [name] sends electricity crackling across their arms, drills a hole in the ground with a push of kinetic energy, makes their whole body glow with light, lifts a rock that no child should be able to lift. not once do they seem scared, not once do they hurt hizashi or break anything they don’t mean to.
they don’t need help managing their quirk. they need an outlet. (they need parents).
—
the years pass quickly; he and hizashi get teaching positions at UA, he expels and re-enrolls hundreds of students, works the streets at night. hizashi runs his radio show and works as a daylight hero and teaches english. they train [first name] every weekend, until the kid occupies the spare room at their house and the cats almost like them better than shota. [name] stays with their foster family during the week, and hizashi says he misses them, and shota wishes he could say different. (he doesn’t).
they watch the way they avoid going to their teachers when they need help, avoid going to their parents, and only ever come to them, shota and hizashi. shota thinks they have issues with trust, hizashi says they have issues with authority. shota worries about what that means they see their mentors as – authority figures they can trust. (it doesn’t worry him at all).
they crush exams and don’t talk to other kids, and hizashi and shota only know this because hizashi tries to make dinner table conversation about the kid’s classes and friends, and [name]’s answers are noncommittal, “i’m near the top of the class, okay?” and “i don’t really have any.” they proudly tell them that they punched someone in the face for bullying another kid. they ricochet wildly from sullen and silent to laughing obnoxiously loud. hizashi worries for their social development, shota tells him that they can’t go to parent teacher conferences, because they’re not the damn kid’s parents. (they are. [name]’s foster parents don’t go.)
they get sick after training some days, staying an extra day instead of traveling by train, just lying in bed while their quirk makes their whole body hurt,because it was cultivated for power, not for compatibility with the human body. hizashi calls their parents, who call the school, and he makes them tea with honey and lemon. shota sits in their room with them and the cats. the next day, after they leave, hizashi will say, “it’s just the weekends, but it feels like we’re raising them,” and shota will say, “we’re not.” (they are).
he teaches them how to use a capture weapon after they beg for months. they’re terrible at it. they keep trying. they get better, and they like heroes in black costumes and they listen to english music, and they want to be just like them, and they’re loud and sharp and sarcastic and competitive and sometimes quiet and kind, and it doesn’t make him cry into hizashi’s shoulder at night, it doesn’t. they don’t have a kid. they don’t. (they do).
—
they want to take the UA entrance exam, and shota wants to throw himself in front of a bus. he tells hizashi as much.
“shota, you can’t just expect them to be a civilian. they want to be a hero.” he’s doing his hair, yelling from the bathroom so shota can hear him from where he’s laying in bed, wondering how much longer he can stay there until he has to get up and go teach the brats.
“it’s dangerous, and they’re a kid, hizashi. kids always want to be heroes, it doesn’t mean they have to be.”
“first of all, they’re almost an adult, UA is a college. and even if you still think of them as a little kid, they have training, two mentors, and a burning desire to save the entire world. good luck stopping them. and it’s not like we haven’t been encouraging them for their entire life by giving them said training!”
“but it’s dangerous!” he sits up and slaps the quilt.
he hears hizashi sigh and sees him stick his head back into the bedroom. “they’re in too deep to stop unless they suddenly hate heroes. plus, we literally teach kids how to be heroes. you literally are a hero. you have no room to talk. none.”
“but those kids are–”
“less well-trained? not our kid?” hizashi raises an eyebrow as he cuts him off.
shota shuts his eyes and lays back down. “fuck.” he wants to go back to sleep. “they’re not our kid,” he adds, as an afterthought. it makes his stomach twist.
“sure,” says hizashi, and goes back to doing his hair.
—
“kid,” you hear aizawa say, and you look up from your homework. it’s a saturday.
“yeah?” he’s standing in the doorway, holding a flat, white box, like the kind fancy clothes come in.
aizawa shuffles in and sits on your bed. he pats the space next to him, “sit.”
you set down your pen and sit next to him, cross legged, in your pajamas, eyeing the box. he puts it on your lap and you lift the lid off; inside is a pile of black fabric, one long, thin strip, with threads of metal glinting in it.
“you’ll need it for the exam,” he says, and stands to leave.
you clutch the cool, heavy fabric to your chest, knowing it’s the ticket to your dream, your chance to prove yourself. “thank you.” thank you for believing in me.
“don’t mention it.” of course, kid.
reblogs and comments are very much appreciated!! ଘ(੭*ˊᵕˋ)੭* main taglist here,series taglisthere. back to gt&h masterpost.
power, the touch of the gods, comes at a price. it’s something you pay for, willing or not, and it’s not a choice you get to make – it is either a blessing that guides your way, a burden you have to bear, or both. the issue isn’t that you’re powerless; the issue is that you’re powerful, and you’re not sure if you want to be, and more importantly – you’re not sure if you’re allowed to be anything else.
you’re splitting izuku’s soul apart at the seams, your mentors are worrying themselves to death, and you have no idea who, or what you are.
pairing:midoriya izuku x reader, ft. parental erasermic
genre:angst, hurt/comfort, found family, excessive lore and worldbuilding
all students begins this fic at age 18. UA is a university.
general warnings: violence, injuries, anxiety, chronic pain, generally unhealthy mindsets, cursing, food/eating, exercise/training. discussion of child abuse and human trafficking by villains. canon bullying, violence, etc.
ongoing!! this is a fun personal project for me, i will never abandon it, but it does not have a strict ending, i’m keeping it relatively open for my own enjoyment.
power, the touch of the gods, comes at a price. it’s something you pay for, willing or not, and it’s not a choice you get to make – it is either a blessing that guides your way, a burden you have to bear, or both. the issue isn’t that you’re powerless; the issue is that you’re powerful, and you’re not sure if you want to be, and more importantly – you’re not sure if you’re allowed to be anything else.
you’re splitting izuku’s soul apart at the seams, your mentors are worrying themselves to death, and you have no idea who, or what you are.
pairing:midoriya izuku x reader, ft. parental erasermic
genre:angst, hurt/comfort, found family, excessive lore and worldbuilding
all students begins this fic at age 18. UA is a university.
general warnings: violence, injuries, anxiety, chronic pain, generally unhealthy mindsets, cursing, food/eating, exercise/training. discussion of child abuse and human trafficking by villains. canon bullying, violence, etc.
ongoing!! this is a fun personal project for me, i will never abandon it, but it does not have a strict ending, i’m keeping it relatively open for my own enjoyment.
power, the touch of the gods, comes at a price. it’s something you pay for, willing or not, and it’s not a choice you get to make – it is either a blessing that guides your way, a burden you have to bear, or both. the issue isn’t that you’re powerless; the issue is that you’re powerful, and you’re not sure if you want to be, and more importantly – you’re not sure if you’re allowed to be anything else.
you’re splitting izuku’s soul apart at the seams, your mentors are worrying themselves to death, and you have no idea who, or what you are.
pairing:midoriya izuku x reader, ft. parental erasermic
genre:angst, hurt/comfort, found family, excessive lore and worldbuilding
all students begins this fic at age 18. UA is a university.
general warnings: violence, injuries, anxiety, chronic pain, generally unhealthy mindsets, cursing, food/eating, exercise/training. discussion of child abuse and human trafficking by villains. canon bullying, violence, etc.
ongoing!! this is a fun personal project for me, i will never abandon it, but it does not have a strict ending, i’m keeping it relatively open for my own enjoyment.
power, the touch of the gods, comes at a price. it’s something you pay for, willing or not, and it’s not a choice you get to make – it is either a blessing that guides your way, a burden you have to bear, or both. the issue isn’t that you’re powerless; the issue is that you’re powerful, and you’re not sure if you want to be, and more importantly – you’re not sure if you’re allowed to be anything else.
you’re splitting izuku’s soul apart at the seams, your mentors are worrying themselves to death, and you have no idea who, or what you are.
pairing:midoriya izuku x reader, ft. parental erasermic
genre:angst, hurt/comfort, found family, excessive lore and worldbuilding
all students begins this fic at age 18. UA is a university.
general warnings: violence, injuries, anxiety, chronic pain, generally unhealthy mindsets, cursing, food/eating, exercise/training. discussion of child abuse and human trafficking by villains. canon bullying, violence, etc.
ongoing!! this is a fun personal project for me, i will never abandon it, but it does not have a strict ending, i’m keeping it relatively open for my own enjoyment.
specific tw: anxiety, injuries, exercise (bc hero training). see masterpostfor genre + general tw.
notes: i apologize to anyone who wanted a not slow-burn romance. i’m terrible fjfj
you’re walking onto the field with midoriya and the rest of the class. aizawa is leading the class to the throwing pitch. his earlier comment about you being ahead had made it seem like you were the most obedient student, and the idea of being the teacher’s pet makes your skin crawl. you’re making your way to the top without favoritism as a stepping stone, and you need to know he’s not playing favorites.
but that wasn’t favoritism. that was a sharp comment used to keep the class in line. and, as a side effect, to put a target on your back. he was challenging me to do better.
you are where you are as a result of your own work, and it had better stay that way.
the class shuffles into a little crowd in front of aizawa, chattering nervously. he begins talking, and the whole class almost immediately falls silent, anxious to hear the test guidelines. “we’ll be testing your quirks today.”
specific tw: anxiety, injuries, exercise (bc hero training). see masterpostfor genre + general tw.
notes: i apologize to anyone who wanted a not slow-burn romance. i’m terrible fjfj
you’re walking onto the field with midoriya and the rest of the class. aizawa is leading the class to the throwing pitch. his earlier comment about you being ahead had made it seem like you were the most obedient student, and the idea of being the teacher’s pet makes your skin crawl. you’re making your way to the top without favoritism as a stepping stone, and you need to know he’s not playing favorites.
but that wasn’t favoritism. that was a sharp comment used to keep the class in line. and, as a side effect, to put a target on your back. he was challenging me to do better.
you are where you are as a result of your own work, and it had better stay that way.
the class shuffles into a little crowd in front of aizawa, chattering nervously. he begins talking, and the whole class almost immediately falls silent, anxious to hear the test guidelines. “we’ll be testing your quirks today.”
gravity girl’s hand shoots up.
“yes?”
“what about the entrance ceremony? orientation?” she wrings her hands.
“UA is known for having a freestyle education system. the professors are no different. there is no time to waste on ceremonial things. you have three years to become heroes, and that time is better spent learning than attending ceremonies,” he looks out over the class, and when no one raises their hand, he continues. “do you remember the no-quirks-allowed gym tests you participated in in middle school and high school? the ball throw, 50-meter dash, endurance run, etcetera?”
you see a few people nod in front of you, but mostly everyone just stares.
“it’s irrational to bar quirk usage on those exams. all that does is prevent you from reaching your highest potential.” aizawa turns sharply to look at bakugo, kacchan, asshole-bully-guy from the practical exam, whatever his name is. “bakugo-san, how far could you throw in high school?”
“sixty-seven meters.” he has a kind of bitter, snarling look to his face.
aizawa dips his face down into his scarf, and you know he’s hiding his smile again. he hands bakugo a softball. “do it with your quirk.”
bakugo takes the ball and steps into the circle.
aizawa pulls out his phone. “do whatever you want, but stay inside the circle.”
bakugo grins with too many teeth and stretches a bit. midoriya shuffles nervously next to you. you wonder if you can block the sound of explosions fully.
bakugo finishes stretching and winds up to throw, sending the softball rocketing off into the sky with a powerful blast from his hand and an eloquent “DIE!”
you muffle the explosion and the shout a little bit in your and midoriya’s area at the last second. he glances at you, mind clearly already spinning like a hamster on a wheel, but you don’t say anything.
aizawa holds up his phone, “705.2 meters,” he says. “it’s rational to know your limits; only then can you push beyond them, and only then can you build a foundation on which you can become a hero.”
there are various cries of excitement from your classmates, elated to have free reign over their quirks and to be able to show off in front of potential new rivals and friends.
aizawa laughs; the whole class pauses to look at him. “you all want to be heroes, right? and you think this is awesome? that it’s fun? that it’s a game? well, the person with the lowest score across all of the events will be judged as hopeless and lacking potential, and i will expel them.”
and re-enroll them, you think smugly, knowing aizawa is and has always been too much of a softie to expel a student permanently without a much stronger line of reasoning.
but the rest of the class doesn’t know that, just like they hadn’t known when aizawa was finished explaining earlier, inside, and the cluster of students erupts into chaos.
“that’s completely unfair, sensei! it’s only the first day!” gravity girl protests. you think of training sessions in the warehouse and the lack of mercy from sensei. aizawa was and is far more fair to you than sensei could have ever been.
“the world is full of unfairness,” aizawa responds, echoing your thoughts. “as heroes, it is your job to find, overcome, and correct unfairness. and for the next three years, you’ll be training and studying non-stop in order to improve your abilities to the point where you can do that. UA will put you through the wringer. it will feel unfair.” get used to it.
—
izuku worries that he’s about to die of a heart attack. he is paired with kacchan for the fifty-meter dash, and he’s completely unprepared for this test.
if i use one for all once, i’ll be incapacitated by pain for the entire rest of the exam, which means i have to choose one of the later events to boost my score.
one for all will only occur as a burst, since i can’t sustain it, so it’s no good for me to choose the endurance run, side stepping, toe-touch, or sit ups. the fifty-meter dash will be first, so i can’t choose that. grip strength and long jump come after, both ideal for a burst of power, but both too early for me to use one for all. that leaves the ball throw, which is in the middle, but later than the other options…
“choose the ball throw,” you whisper from next to him, completely nonchalant.
izuku jumps in surprise, although at this point it’s not that he’s surprised he’s mumbling his thoughts aloud, it’s that he’s surprised that you listened to him talk.
“you’re right that it’s the best for a burst of power and that it’s the latest opportunity you’ll have.”
he flounders. they’re my competitor, they shouldn’t be helping me – if i do well, they could be expelled instead! but maybe they know they don’t need to worry about being expelled, because they’ll do well enough? maybe they don’t think we’ll really be expelled?
“midoriya,” your voice pulls him out of his head again. he’s not sure if he was talking aloud this time, and you give no indication either way. “it’s your turn.”
he tries his hardest to race against kacchan, he really does. he does better than in high school, at least, but he ends up with a mouth full of soot from an explosion too close to his face. izuku steps back on the sidelines and tries his best to focus on the ball throw, to think through minimizing damage and maximizing power output.
instead, he watches you step up to the starting line. you’re racing the woman with the ponytail, who has made herself a light motorbike, the kind built for sudden acceleration in races. the air around you shimmers like a mirage, wavering, unstable. your eyes glow brighter and brighter.
aizawa starts the race and you’re off like a shot; he barely even sees you move, but you skid to a stop in a cloud of dust, ponytail lady following close behind.
“3.03 seconds,” the counting machine chirps helpfully, followed by ponytail’s time.
iida huffs and adjusts his glasses, and izuku remembers iida’s time: 3.04 seconds. holy shit. they’re faster. his hands itch for his notebook.
the grip strength has you nearly crushing the measuring device with hundreds of kilograms of force, and the standing long jump sends you ridiculously far. every event has him watching the air ripple around you and preparing for the smell of ozone and a crushing display of power. he watches kacchan fume as you stay ahead of him in every event, palms smoking.
then it’s time for the ball throw.
izuku steps into the circle. he takes a deep breath and prepares to throw with every ounce of power one for all can provide. but the end of the throw doesn’t feel like it should, it’s like he’s losing his grip on the ball, but that isn’t it.
“46 meters,” says the measuring machine.
his heart drops. he had tried to use one for all, and not only was he an unfit vessel, unable to contain that level of power, he couldn’t even call on it properly. the odd feeling of losing his grip is still there.
“i erased your quirk,” says aizawa-sensei, a good distance behind him.
izuku whirls around. that’s what that odd feeling was. my quirk was gone.
aizawa-sensei’s capture weapon is hovering around him and his hair is standing up. “the entrance exam is ridiculous and irrational. you cannot control your quirk; it incapacitates you. but you were still allowed in. after that throw, do you know what would have happened?”
izuku’s heart bangs against his ribs. he gets the sense that the question is rhetorical, so he keeps his mouth shut.
“you would have been unable to throw again without healing, just like in a combat situation, where you would be unable to aid your allies because you would either be physically incapacitated from the injury, or mentally incapacitated from the pain. you cannot be a hero if saving one person will take you out of commission.” aizawa-sensei sighs and closes his eyes tightly, hair floating back down as he snatches the ball with his capture weapon and hands it to izuku. “you have your quirk back. try again and get it over with.”
izuku’s face burns, his eyes sting. his classmates are chattering around him, and he hears kacchan make a comment about izuku probably being expelled. and the thing is, izuku knows, he knows that he hasn’t caught up, that he’s not even close to where everyone else is, that his quirk is working against him and that in his current state, he really did get in by luck.
but he stuffs his anxiety back down because he has another shot and he is not going to waste it, not when for the first time in his entire life, he has a friend, someone who believes in him.
yes, he has his mother, but she had scarcely begun to believe in him by this morning. yes, he has all might, but he is all might’s successor, it’s practically a requirement for him to believe in izuku. but you, you had no such obligation, no previous ties or relationship with him to maintain, no reason to butter him up or flatter him or say meaningless things.
izuku thinks of you, sitting on that bench at the beach, the calculating way you’d looked at him and said, completely confident in your words, “you’ll catch up.” he had hoped you were right, that even if he had to work harder than everyone else, he would be able to catch up. but in that moment, holding the ball on the dusty pitch, something clicks in the whirring of his mind: he has to make you right. for the first time in his life, someone believes in him, and instead of having someone to prove wrong, someone to defy, he has someone to prove right.
he was right to choose the ball throw. he was right to watch how the rest of his classmates used their quirks creatively, and even if his is new and uncontrollable and dangerous, he can use it just as creatively. he remembers the way you explained your quirk - your body as a physical conduit.
izuku throws the ball and releases the entirety of one for all through his finger at the last second. his vision blurs as the bones in his finger shatter, but he breathes through it as best he can, grinning madly, shoving his fist against his shirt in a weak attempt at pressure.
he’s shaking as he turns toward aizawa-sensei, and you, hovering just behind him, “i’m still standing, i can still fight,” he grits out, and he watches the barely perceptible nod you give him. aizawa-sensei ducks his face down into his capture weapon and izuku sees your mouth twitch in a suppressed smile. he smiles so hard that it hurts, even as his finger swells, purple and blue with bruises, pulsing pain in a sharp, terrible way. he can barely see you through his tears of both pain and relief, but he smiles.
“705.3 meters,” aizawa-sensei reads, and izuku wipes his eyes with his good hand just in time to see kacchan lunge for him.
but kacchan stops a couple meters away. aizawa-sensei’s capture weapon is wrapped around kacchan’s head and body, keeping him restrained, although he’s still shouting.
“stop using your quirk. i’m getting dry eye.” aizawa-sensei huffs and drags kacchan back toward him. you’re standing nearby, like before, and you look just as vicious as that day outside the exam hall.
“we’re moving on to the next events. stop wasting time.” aizawa releases kacchan, and izuku breathes as best he can. he still has the endurance run, sit ups, and toe-touch to get through.
—
the endurance run has always been your favorite, mostly because of the mental component, and because it was your favorite part of training on the weekdays, which you spent at your family’s house. it was always nice to get out of the house and run along the streets before your parents were awake, a peaceful and quiet moment to yourself.
this is anything but peaceful and quiet. yes, it’s an endurance run, but what it really is is a longer race.
you’re running in a dead sprint, neck-in-neck with iida. he’s taking strides as long as he can, pushing harder and harder to keep his pace and to pull ahead of you. you’re grasping at every bit of sunlight and ambient heat and noise that you can, even the noise of tennis shoes on the track, fueling yourself with your quirk and hurtling forward.
the finish line approaches. your feet are pounding the track, chest heaving, and iida is tearing along next to you. you cross the line and keep running, both of you going too fast to slow down, and as you taper off into jogging, you hear the machine chirp out your times.
they are the same.
iida slows to a walk. you do too. you turn backwards to watch the others race. he mimicks you.
yaoyorozu, the woman who sits behind you in class, has crossed the line on the motorcycle she used in the first event. midoriya is in the middle of the pack, looking a bit worse for wear. his hand is clearly bothering him, as is the idea of being expelled.
iida’s exhausted, resigned sigh makes you look at him. “[last name]-san… i do not think anyone outside the iida family has ever tied with me or beaten me in a foot race.”
“i’m glad to have someone to race against,” you say, unsure of how to respond. you stop to stretch.
“indeed.”
—
izuku’s stomach twists as he stands in a crowd of his classmates, waiting for the results. there’s nothing particularly notable about any of his records, except the ball throw. he runs over them all again, just in case he forgot something that could save him. there’s nothing to find. the ground sways underneath him.
you appear at his side, apparently a magnet for his anxious mumbling. “midoriya,” you say, cold and quiet, and he feels the ground still. “if you’re worried about being expelled, don’t.”
it’s simple, offers zero explanation, and is weirdly cryptic. it still makes his stomach flip a little less violently.
“here are the scores.” aizawa-sensei flicks upward on his phone and projects the rankings.
izuku starts at the top of the list (in doing so, he realizes how optimistic that seems, and how that will let him down in the gentlest way possible). your name is at the top, tied with a “yaoyorozu momo,” who he thinks is the woman who did the endurance run on a lightweight motorbike.
he skims down the rest of the names, over a “todoroki shoto,” kacchan, iida, but that’s as far as he gets before aizawa-sensei says something.
“the lowest scoring student will not be expelled.”
izuku’s heart drops out of his goddamn chest in relief, straight through his ribs and into the ground.
“what?!”someone shrieks.
aizawa-sensei grins like a cheshire cat, and it is not comforting. “it was a logical ruse.”
“i’m starting from the bottom,” izuku murmurs to himself.
“the bottom of the top,” you reply. “you worked hard to get here. keep working hard so you can stay.”
—
after a trip to recovery girl’s office, izuku returns to the classroom. aizawa-sensei is napping in the front in his yellow sleeping bag. there are syllabi and various course documents on everyone’s desks, but at least five students are clustered in the back of the class, around yours and yaoyorozu’s desks.
he sits down to look at the syllabi, but he’s instantly distracted by the topic of conversation behind him: quirks.
“i can make anything non-living, as long as i know the chemical formulas and have enough lipids,” yaoyorozu explains.
“and what about you, [last name]-san? you kept up with pretty much everyone. do you have a strength quirk or something?” the question comes from a floating uniform – hagakure, izuku reminds himself.
he expects you to explain the basics, if not the details of your quirk. but you’re silent as you cast your gaze over the group of students, and you shake your head a bit when you make eye contact with izuku. he gets the message: don’t say anything. “my quirk is similar to yaoyorozu’s in that it’s an all-purpose type of thing. other than that, you don’t need to know anything right now. i will explain it in the future if necessary.”
his heart stops; he’s never been part of a secret before in his life. and this is a secret that’s special in a different way entirely. you’d told him all about your quirk, no resistance at all, handing over every bit of information he’d asked for. but here you are, refusing to tell your classmates anything, even though it would be beneficial for future training exercises.
izuku doesn’t like being selfish. he thinks it’s wrong. but he watches you snap at a blonde student with a lightning bolt in his hair (kaminari denki, his mind supplies) when he keeps pushing for information on your quirk. he watches your classmates guess your quirk, watches you batting them around like a cat with a mouse in its paws. your responses are short and clipped, ice cold, closed off. he realizes that he’s the only one being included here, the only one you bother to treat just a little more gently, openly, and his head spins. he is your exception in that moment, and he’s deliriously happy with that revelation.
izuku doesn’t like being selfish, but all his life he’s been the one excluded, never the exception to the rule, always the example; he thinks he might be okay with being selfish about you.
reblogs and comments are very much appreciated!! ଘ(੭*ˊᵕˋ)੭* main taglist here,series taglisthere. back to gt&h masterpost.
letter #2 for my700 event to:@x-zho prompt: diluc + “it’s been a while” + angst/comfort notes:i literally made this prompt with diluc in mind LMAO so good for you <3 also i’m always happy to write stuff for you + for diluc!! and i’m v much enjoying your other req. anyways, i hope i did him justice <3 enjoy mwah
dearest,
i sincerely apologize for not contacting you sooner. i’m not sure if i’m even permitted to call you dearest, love, or anything of the sort after such a prolonged and unwarranted absence. it’s been a long four years away from mondstadt, away from you, but i have in no way expected you to anticipate my return.
i left quite… abruptly, four years ago. i did not warn you of my departure, nor did i give you – or myself – the chance for a proper goodbye. i should be back within a month’s time, although there is no definitive date on which i will arrive, as delays due to weather and the collapse of roads are quite common when traveling by foot across teyvat.
i fear i have hurt you deeply with my sudden departure and lack of contact for the past years. it is no excuse, but i hope you will understand that i did not want you to see me in such a state. i believe that, in any case, you will find me to be a very different person from the one you used to know. as such, i don’t expect you to see me, nor are you under any obligation to do so, but i would appreciate it deeply if i might be able to take up a bit of your time, just to see your face again.
i know that a written apology is hardly sufficient for how i left things, and in any case i could beg forgiveness from dusk until dawn and never deserve it.
i’ve missed you more than i could possibly express, and more than you may know. as i find myself growing unbearably weary, i find that i wish to return to mondstadt, and specifically, to your embrace.
i hope this letter finds you in good health, and not wanting for anything. please know that should you ever require my assistance, you need only ask.
with all the love i may be allowed to bestow upon you, yours, diluc ragnvindr
thank you to everyone who’s ever read anything i’ve written here! i’d never thought i’d have a following/interaction of any kind here, and i’m beyond grateful to everyone who has interacted + the wonderful friends i’ve made !! to celebrate all of you, i’ll be doing blog ratesandletters<3i’ll be writing for both bnha and genshin!
blacklisthara.700 <3 if you don’t want to see the event!
specific tw: anxiety, overthinking. see masterpostfor genre + general tw.
notes: sure, everyone reading this knows you got into UA - but do you know you got into UA?
you’re laying on your back on top of your quilt, earbuds in and one of the cats sitting on your stomach while you pet her. she’s your favorite cat, azuki, a birman with grey and white coloring. her job, and the music’s job, is to crush the anxiety bubbling in your chest.
the UA exam was easy, even the practical. you have no reason to worry about getting in, and even if you did have reason to worry, you could easily get into shiketsu or some other university. but that competitive drive stabs at you, demands that you go to the top school, and anxiety crinkles like bubble wrap.
letter #1 for my 700 event to:@naostm prompt: scaramouche + “thinking of you” + enemies to lovers tw: scaramouche is not a nice guy – as expected. death/killing mention. notes: i hope my scaramouche characterization is satisfactory ???? no idea what the hell i’m doin wHOOPS
missed me? thought so. typical.
it’ll be a wonder if this letter finds you in one piece – you’re so weak that i wouldn’t be surprised if someone else had killed you off already. do your best to make sure that doesn’t happen, darling, because i’ll be back soon. i’d apologize for putting a target on your back with what i’ve done to the tsaritsa, but if you can’t handle a little pressure, then you’re clearly just as weak as all the other humans.
you should be grateful i’m sending this letter at all, brat, because that false god is breathing down my fucking neck every second. when i killed some of her soldiers, i took a little something off of one of them. it reminded me of you and your irritating chattering. good riddance. i’ve enclosed the dead vision. it was an electro vision, like yours, before i killed that guard.
you’ll never hope to compare to me in terms of power, but i despise everyone else who dares to wield my element with such inferior technique. instead, i’ve begun collecting every single electro vision i come across — they are rightfully mine, after all. you can have this one, seeing as i have no use for it. you’d do well to remember that your power comes from me and no one else.
prove you’re not so pathetic that you can’t survive without me.
letter #1 for my 700 event to:@naostm prompt: scaramouche + “thinking of you” + enemies to lovers tw: scaramouche is not a nice guy – as expected. death/killing mention. notes: i hope my scaramouche characterization is satisfactory ???? no idea what the hell i’m doin wHOOPS
missed me? thought so. typical.
it’ll be a wonder if this letter finds you in one piece – you’re so weak that i wouldn’t be surprised if someone else had killed you off already. do your best to make sure that doesn’t happen, darling, because i’ll be back soon. i’d apologize for putting a target on your back with what i’ve done to the tsaritsa, but if you can’t handle a little pressure, then you’re clearly just as weak as all the other humans.
you should be grateful i’m sending this letter at all, brat, because that false god is breathing down my fucking neck every second. when i killed some of her soldiers, i took a little something off of one of them. it reminded me of you and your irritating chattering. good riddance. i’ve enclosed the dead vision. it was an electro vision, like yours, before i killed that guard.
you’ll never hope to compare to me in terms of power, but i despise everyone else who dares to wield my element with such inferior technique. instead, i’ve begun collecting every single electro vision i come across — they are rightfully mine, after all. you can have this one, seeing as i have no use for it. you’d do well to remember that your power comes from me and no one else.
prove you’re not so pathetic that you can’t survive without me.
thank you to everyone who’s ever read anything i’ve written here! i’d never thought i’d have a following/interaction of any kind here, and i’m beyond grateful to everyone who has interacted + the wonderful friends i’ve made !! to celebrate all of you, i’ll be doing blog ratesandletters<3i’ll be writing for both bnha and genshin!
blacklisthara.700 <3 if you don’t want to see the event!
specific tw: anxiety, overthinking. see masterpostfor genre + general tw.
notes: sure, everyone reading this knows you got into UA - but do you know you got into UA?
you’re laying on your back on top of your quilt, earbuds in and one of the cats sitting on your stomach while you pet her. she’s your favorite cat, azuki, a birman with grey and white coloring. her job, and the music’s job, is to crush the anxiety bubbling in your chest.
the UA exam was easy, even the practical. you have no reason to worry about getting in, and even if you did have reason to worry, you could easily get into shiketsu or some other university. but that competitive drive stabs at you, demands that you go to the top school, and anxiety crinkles like bubble wrap.
specific tw: anxiety, overthinking. see masterpostfor genre + general tw.
notes: sure, everyone reading this knows you got into UA - but do you know you got into UA?
you’re laying on your back on top of your quilt, earbuds in and one of the cats sitting on your stomach while you pet her. she’s your favorite cat, azuki, a birman with grey and white coloring. her job, and the music’s job, is to crush the anxiety bubbling in your chest.
the UA exam was easy, even the practical. you have no reason to worry about getting in, and even if you did have reason to worry, you could easily get into shiketsu or some other university. but that competitive drive stabs at you, demands that you go to the top school, and anxiety crinkles like bubble wrap.
you stomp on it, and every single bubble pops, leaving you flat and apathetic. you haul azuki further up so that she can curl up next to your head. your whole body itches with the need to do something, anything.train, run, talk, kick something, anything. but you’re going to lie there and ignorethat nervousness if it kills you. there’s nothing to do but wait, and you’ll be damned if you let this stupid, irrational fear run your life.
there’s a gentle knock on your door, so gentle that you almost think it’s just part of the track you’re listening to. you sit up sowly. the cat jumps off the bed and walks toward the door to rub her chin on yamada’s pajama pants; he’s standing half in the room, half behind the door. azuki purrs loudly and smashes her face into his shin.
“hey, can i come in?” he’s holding a letter. your stomach jams itself against your lungs.
you nod and take your earbuds out. yamada sits on the edge of your bed.
“is aizawa home yet?” you ask. he might want to be here to watch you open it.
yamada laughs, hoarse and booming, a little wheezy. he spends all day yelling. “yes,” he says, looking smug. “he’s sitting in the kitchen, stress-drinking coffee. he won’t admit it, but he’s scared of both possibilities.” he hands you the letter. “why don’t you open it and put him out of his misery.”
the front of the letter is addressed to you, the back embossed with the UA logo. you slip a finger under the edge of the envelope and begin prying it open. your hands shake so badly that you can’t rip it open cleanly, and the top edge ends up a mangled mess of paper. “i couldn’t put him out of his misery if i tried.”
yamada just nods.
there’s a projection disc inside the envelope. couldn’t they just send a letter? you shake your head and put the disc down on the comforter, careful to leave it upside down so it doesn’t accidentally start playing. you stare at it. your skin buzzes with impatience.
“you know shota will be proud of you, we’ll be proud of you, no matter the result, right?” yamada says. you can’t see his expression, unwilling to look up, but you know it must be horrifyingly forgiving.
your head spins as you pick the disc up, anger and anxiety wrestling in the eye of your hurricane mind. the pride yamada has in you makes something inside you rage and thrash, desperate, fighting against a lull, like a predator just before a tranquilizer dart takes effect.
you nod.
“do you want me to stay?”
the brief, impossible scenario of bursting into tears in front of yamada flashes into your mind. it won’t happen for a multitude of reasons, but it’s enough to put you off the idea of another person in the room. “no, it’s okay. you can go worry with aizawa.”
he snorts. “okay, kiddo. i’ll go worry with him. not that i’m worried, i know you’re going to get in, i just… let us know when you’re ready.” he rests his hand on your shoulder, and it’s so gentle and so yamada that it actually soothes you.
the anxiety fizzing underneath your skin dissipates, just for a second. “alright. i’ll let you know.”
azuki follows him to the door, yowling. he scoops her up. “i’ll take her with me. she’ll make shota feel a little better.” he shuts the door behind him.
you flip the disc over, and a projection comes to life above it.
all might comes into the frame and announces that he’s teaching at UA. the exact words skim over the surface of your mind as you will the video to progress faster, to just get to the results so you can have some goddamn peace of mind.
“with fifty-five villain points and thirty-five rescue points, not to mention a nearly perfect score on the written exam, you’re a shoe-in for UA, young [last name]!” all might booms, giving you an aggressive thumbs up. “welcome to your hero academia!”
the projection narrows to a thin black line and disappears. elation flits through your veins and leaves you to flatline on something empty. you know competition will jumpstart your heart later, anyways. you stare at the wall of your room, a few feet from the end of your bed.
numbers float through your mind. fifty-five. thirty-five. ninety points. scores are never disclosed to the public, so they’re meaningless without comparison. you can only assume that the shoe-in comment means you’re above the median score. good enough to get in, and good enough to be above the median, but nebulous, hanging somewhere between the top and the middle, and abstract and pointless in the face of real combat, real rescue situations, real villains, real quirk use. enough to get in, but not enough to matter.
your phone buzzes next to you on the quilt, startling you out of your reverie. midoriya’s contact pops up on the screen. your fingers hover over the accept call button.
you’d met him earlier, at the beginning of the week, and after that you’d occasionally texted, speculating about the exam or discussing the latest villain fight from the news. but you hadn’t called, and phone calls are much harder to escape than texting conversations. you can’t just leave whenever you want to, and your responses have to be more immediate. you’re running out of time, you realize, watching your phone shift a little on the quilt as it rings.
you put your earbuds back in and accept the call.
“hi, midoriya,” you edge in as soon as you hear the call connect, knowing he’s going to start talking the instant you pick up.
“hi [last name]!” you hear him take a deep breath, and you know he’s about to talk as fast as he can. “i already told my mom this but i wasn’t sure who else to call because i don’t really have anyone else to tell except my mentor? but i’llsee my mentor later so it would be redundant to call him, and i shouldn’t call kacchan about this since he’ll be angry enough as it is when he finds out through the school, so i called you, since you’re the only other person i talk to and who i think should know about this.”
the world passes around you like you’re in a bullet train, blurring fast and meaningless, distracting you from what he’s saying. “what is it you wanted to tell me?” you take a shot in the dark and hope that it’s accurate enough to keep the conversation on the rails.
“yes, right! uh, anyways, i… did you get your UA results yet? i don’t want to tell you this if you haven’t opened your results yet!” he must be practically vibrating with excitement.
you huff, a soft, barely there laugh. “yeah, i just opened them. i think we all get them at around the same time.”
“okay, okay so!” his voice gets thick, like he’s talking around the urge to cry. you hear him sniff. “i, i did it! i got in!” he laughs a little hysterically. you’re sure he’s openly sobbing, hand clapped over his mouth. “you were right, well sort of, there were points for rescuing that nice lady from the zero pointer, so you were right that i had a chance, just not right that points didn’t matter.”
“i was right, ultimately,” you push.
“and i was right to be hopeful,” he pushes back. you can practically see the determined gleam in his eye.
you play with the edge of the quilt in your lap. “what course?”
“i’m in the hero course, [last name], the hero course. and all might is going to be teaching us. all might.”
“us?” you say slowly, “isn’t that a little presumptive? what if i didn’t get in?” the corner of your mouth tugs up, and alone in your room, you still force it back down, just out of habit. just in case leniency now means leniency later.
midoriya stutters on the other end of the phone. “i– you– what? you had to have gotten in! i saw you taking down those robots – the ones at the beginning should’ve been enough on their own, but then i saw some other ones near the end and you should have some points from helping rescue that nice person from the zero pointer. there’s no way you didn’t get it. unless you’re right and points don’t matter and they just decided to let me in for some other reason? maybe because of my mentor? and the points were all a ruse? maybe–”
a laugh bubbles up in your throat. you barely manage to suppress it. “midoriya,” you cut him off.
“yes?”
“i was joking.”
“oh… oh, well thank goodness because i don’t know anyone else except kacchan in the hero course, and i didn’t want to be all by myself, and maybe you don’t either – not that i’m saying you don’t have friends or–”
“midoriya.”
he hums, voice pitching with nervousness.
“it’s fine,” you continue, “and i’m in 1-A. are you in A or B?”
“that’s great! that’s amazing! i’m in 1-A too! i’m going to have so soso much catching up to do but that’s okay, that’s perfectly fine because i did it! we did it! we’re going to UA!”
you have catching up to do, untold amounts of it, considering you’ve never met your other classmates. and considering midoriya will probably accelerate to the top of the class at light speed.
the thought of classes and work spills over into your earlier discussion with midoriya about mentors, and you remember that aizawa and yamada are waiting in the kitchen, probably ridiculously concerned because you’ve been sitting in your room for so long.
“i should probably go, i have a few other people to call about the acceptance.” you fumble for a way out of the conversation after midoriya’s inspiring mini-speech.
“yes, right! go do that.” he sounds so bright and clear, even over the phone.
“i’ll see you in class,” you say, lowly enough that you’re not sure he’ll hear. you’re not sure why you say it, either.
“alright, yeah, i’ll see you then. bye?”
“bye, midoriya.”
“bye!”
you hang up before the awkward chain of goodbyes can continue, and sit there in your pajamas, phone held loosely in your hand, projection disk in your lap, quilt pooling around you. the world spins lightly, only inside your head. the room is still. the hurricane in your mind is not, propelled onward by some unseen force. the air is cool and dry; you shut your eyes against it, against something.
you take a deep breath and haul yourself out of bed.
the wooden floor is cool and smooth, grounding as you stand there, willing yourself forward, something about the idea of your acceptance to UA being acknowledged holding you back. like petting the spine of a cat the wrong way, or hugging someone you despise, a special form of discomfort that makes you angry first and uncomfortable later.
you dig your nails into your hand and plow forward, opening the door and walking down the hallway to the kitchen. aizawa is sitting at the kitchen counter, surrounded by three different coffee mugs, and yamada is perched on a stool next to him, hand on his arm. words ball up behind your tongue, different ways to announce your acceptance. a thought tumbles out like the first spray of snow in an avalanche.
“have fun dealing with me in class.”
yamada, in his typical emotional manner, jumps up and runs to hug you. “i always knew you could do it,” he says, hugging you tighter, and it doesn’t make you angry or uncomfortable. it never has, no matter how afraid you were that it might begin to one day. yamada and aizawa have never been the people to make you angry.
“you will be more tolerable than the other students, most likely. and don’t make me expel you. expelling and subsequently re-enrolling my own student would be illogical and embarrassing.”
yamada lets go of you and returns to his seat next to aizawa. you sit down at the end of the counter.
“i won’t disappoint you,” you say, looking aizawa dead in the eyes.
he sips his coffee, and you get the feeling he’s hiding a smile behind the rim of his cup. “i never thought you would.”
—
izuku is standing in the subway car – he gave his seat to an elderly woman, she needed it much more than he did – when he sees you board at a stop near UA. you’re blank-faced with your earbuds in, just like the last time he saw you at the subway station near his apartment.
he hopes you’ll see him and come stand with him, a little fluttering thing in his chest, wishing for a friend. you walk further into the car, hands in your pockets, unhurried even as the subway pulls away from the stop and begins to move. you’re looking down just enough to avoid the gaze of most people in the car without seeming shy. he sees you pause a few seats away from him, gaze locked on the ground near him. and then, in a heart-stopping, anxiety-inducing moment where he wonders if his wishing actually worked and he has some obscure quirk he only now activated the condition for, you approach him, eyes flat and expressionless, but addressing him.
“i recognized your shoes.” you grab the ceiling handle next to the one he’s holding and take one earbud out.
izuku feels a blush spread under his freckles at the comment. he is suddenly hyper aware of his shoes. “yes, uh, they’re… distinctive?”
he watches the way you smile, if it can be called that. it’s faint and could easily be mistaken for the natural position of someone’s mouth, a slight upturn, if he hadn’t seen the flat, even slight frown, to your face when you weren’t paying attention to anything in particular. he desperately hopes that your smile is not a cruel one.
you raise an eyebrow at him after a moment. maybe your smile was cruel?
“your tie is tied wrong.” the way you say it makes it sound like a fact, but not like an insult. he suspends judgement on your smile. it’s something he can figure out later. his hyper awareness switches from his shoes to his tie.
“yeah, i don’t really know how to tie it? i never learned because my high school uniform didn’t have a tie, and neither did my middle school one. i tried googling it but it was kind of difficult to figure out? i’m not the best with spatial awareness and geometry, so i tied it kind of messily…” izuku touches the back of his neck, and his hyper awareness switches to that instead, knowing that you know that it’s a self-soothing gesture, meant to smooth out his fraying nerves. it has the opposite effect and he can feel the way his mind tailspins into a feedback loop of his own behavior, out of control and swerving wildly inside his head.
his eyes refocus on you when you step closer to him. he almost stumbles back in surprise, but catches himself with the ceiling handle.
“i’ll fix it,” you mutter, shrugging, hands already on his tie. izuku is pretty sure his entire body goes bright red at your close proximity – although that would happen from being that close to any person, contact has always flustered him and he assures himself that it’s just the nerves from his first day that are making him like this. but he’s self-aware enough to know that that assurance is only a half-truth, and that he wants to impress you, to be your friend, and he’s been down this path before and he can only hope this one ends in a better place than it previously did.
the wormhole of his thoughts spits him back out in the real world, with you smoothing his tie down after fixing it. “thanks,” he chokes out, incredibly grateful when his – and your – subway stop arrives and the train comes to a halt – he can take the time of walking off the subway to process what just happened.
except he doesn’t get that time, because you pull both of your earbuds out, coil them around your fingers, stuff them into the pocket of your blazer, and say “let’s go,” which just leaves him speed walking after you.
you walk so fast that he worries you’re both late, but according to the time on his phone, you both still have twenty minutes before you even need to be in the classroom.
“do you know anyone in 1-A?” you ask him, staring straight ahead as you pass through UA’s gates.
thirty-six students, four recommendations, split in half, twenty people in 1-A. he hopes he knows only you, because everyone else at the exam – except maybe the nice woman with the gravity quirk – terrified him. “no, i don’t think so.”
“me neither.” except me, they know me? but that was probably implied…
you start up the stairs. there’s a ridiculous amount of flights, and he’s terribly glad that he’s much more in shape now than he was at the beginning of the summer. you’re still speed walking – stepping? – up the stairs, and it would’ve been embarrassing to fall behind or struggle to keep up.
izuku stands in the stairwell and stares down the long hallway of the floor classroom 1-A is on. his hands sweat.
your voice breaks through the cloud of anxiety forming in his mind like the beacon of a lighthouse. “it’s good that you don’t know any of them. there’ll be plenty of new quirks for you to take notes on.”
as soon as you’re done talking, you’re already walking towards the classroom entrance. izuku scrambles after you and manages to fall into step as you reach the door. it’s extremely tall and wide – probably to accommodate students and teachers with quirks that make them bigger in some way, like wings or a tail or a quirk like fat gum’s. you slide it open.
he stands next to you in the doorway, eyes flickering over the different students. kacchan. the scary fast guy from the exam. the nice gravity girl.
izuku looks back at the whole room and sees every student staring at both of you. the fast guy with glasses approaches and he blanks, mouth dry, fingers shaking.
“i’m iida tenya. i attended somei private academy. please do not sit with your feet on the desk like bakugo-kun is doing, it is disrespectful.” he makes a sharp, downward sweeping motion with his arm, hand parallel to the ground, and it’s sudden enough to startle izuku into talking.
“i’m– ah, i’m midoriya izuku. pleased to meet you, iida-kun.” he feels like he’s running down a hill too fast, feet milliseconds from tangling and sending him sprawling.
“i’m [last name] [first name].” the lack of pleasantries makes izuku feel like his throat is closing a little bit from the potential confrontation. then he remembers that you don’t use an honorific for him, and his throat closes a little more, thousands of reasons dancing in his head.
iida pushes his glasses up and stares izuku down. well, the space between you and izuku. “i… midoriya-kun, [last name]-san. both of you understood the practical exam far better than i did. you understood its true purpose and test. it does not please me to admit this, but you were both superior candidates to me.” he sighs, “midoriya-kun, you especially i would like to apologize to. i believe i was rather rude to you at the exam instruction seminar. i misjudged you.”
izuku is pretty sure his jaw is on the floor. he tries to explain, but the words won’t fit right in his mouth, “i– didn’t? the exam was just? iida-kun i– i didn’t, i’m not superior–”
“midoriya,” you butt in. “take the compliment. and sit down. sensei will be here soon, and it’s best that everyone is in their seats when that happens.”
izuku refocuses on the rest of the class, searching for his seat, and realizes that every student is watching the exchange between you, him, and iida. most of them hurriedly sit down at your comment, suddenly aware that they are in a classroom and that they want to make a good impression on their professor.
he hears you huff and sees you take a piece of paper out of your pocket, probably to check your seat number. you make your way toward the back of the room and sit down in seat nineteen, in front of a woman with glossy black hair in a high ponytail. izuku checks his seat number. eighteen. he sits down in front of you. kacchan is sitting directly in front of him. izuku fiddles with his tie.
a couple of students are still hanging out near the doorway when a yellow sleeping bag, with a person in it, flops down between them. the students jump in surprise, and one screeches.
the sleeping bag unzips slightly. izuku gapes; eraserhead is our homeroom professor.
“if you’re here to socialize, then get out. if you’re here to learn, get in your seats.”
the students scramble to sit down.
eraserhead stands up out of his sleeping bag and walks to the speaking podium, checking his watch. “only five seconds,” he mutters, and izuku can’t tell whether he’s looking at him, you, or the woman behind you. “still, time is a precious resource. you all will need to behave in a rational, efficient manner to get what needs to be done, done.”
kacchan scoffs lightly in front of him. eraserhead ignores him.
“i’m your home room professor, aizawa shota. pleased to meet you. don’t give me a reason to expel you, and don’t be late.” he surveys the classroom, but no one says anything in response. “change into your gym clothes. head out to the grounds. we’ll be conducting a test of sorts today.”
the class waits for him to continue, to explain the test. izuku’s mind buzzes with the possibilities, and with the reality that he is completely unprepared for this test, that he has no idea what it is, or how it will be scored, and that he is behind the others in every way possible.
the buzzing cuts off as he hears you stand up behind him, and then aizawa-sensei says something just after you do so. “what are you all waiting for? [last name]-san is already ahead of you.”
the entire class rushes to catch up.
reblogs and comments are very much appreciated!! ଘ(੭*ˊᵕˋ)੭* main taglist here,series taglisthere. back to gt&h masterpost.
thank you to everyone who’s ever read anything i’ve written here! i’d never thought i’d have a following/interaction of any kind here, and i’m beyond grateful to everyone who has interacted + the wonderful friends i’ve made !! to celebrate all of you, i’ll be doing blog ratesandletters<3i’ll be writing for both bnha and genshin!
blacklisthara.700 <3 if you don’t want to see the event!
thank you to everyone who’s ever read anything i’ve written here! i’d never thought i’d have a following/interaction of any kind here, and i’m beyond grateful to everyone who has interacted + the wonderful friends i’ve made !! to celebrate all of you, i’ll be doing blog ratesandletters<3i’ll be writing for both bnha and genshin!
blacklisthara.700 <3 if you don’t want to see the event!
bc this is a follower celebration event, you must be following @/izukxnnie in order to participate — new followers are always welcome <3 this event will be open from may 9th - may 22nd.
letters — !(4/10 requests)
guidelines
send me a prompt from the list + one character + any additional information (optional).
specify platonic/romantic + genre (optional)
i’ll write a letter from your chosen character <3
example request: ajax + delayed return (+ it’s reader’s birthday)
rules
one letter req per person!
i’ll have 10 slots open, i’ll open more if there’s a lot more requests than anticipated.
for character availability + what i will/won’t write, see my general rules.
prompts
goodbye
it’s been a while
thinking of you
apologies
return home
a day in the life
presence required
from an outside sender
blog rates — !
forfandom-based blog rates, if you’d like me to include the s/o section, send whether you are a minor or an adult + any gender preferences u may have.
normal blog rate
url ♡ not sure i understand? | good | i wish i’d thought of this | how did you get this before everyone else? icon ♡ i have no idea what it is i am so sorry | v cute | aesthetic !! | pls send me the png ty mobile theme ♡default | pretty <3 | i’m a bit envious? | i would steal ideas from u w/ permission desktop theme ♡ same as mobile | pretty <3 | i’m a bit envious? | wishing i had your skills!! posts ♡ n/a (empty) | not familiar with | this is so cool omg! | i’m gonna be here for hours <3
bnha blog rate
role ♡ civilian | student | pro | teacher | villain | vigilante | sidekick | support engineer quirk type ♡ accumulation | transformation | mutant | emitter | quirkless friends ♡ (based on role) s/o ♡ (based on role) aes desc ♡
genshin blog rate
vision ♡ anemo | cryo | dendro | electro | geo | hydro | pyro weapon ♡ bow | catalyst | claymore | polearm | sword team role ♡ dps | sub dps | healer | shielder | crowd control nation ♡ inazuma | liyue | mondstadt friends ♡ (based on nation) s/o ♡ (based on nation) aes desc ♡
finally, a shameless plug for my kofibc i finally made one (you are under absolutely zero obligation to donate anything).
