The first time Izuku had used his Quirk, had also been the day his father had died.
He had been sitting on the counter, his mom making dinner while his father watched the news in the living room. Safe, normal, he’d been so happy.
The high had worn off when a man had burst through the door.
Faster than his young brain had ben able to comprehend, his father had leapt to his feet to confront the man while his mom grabbed him and ducked behind the counter.
The sounds of a struggle seemed to last forever before a deafening crack! Rang out and all was still.
His father had not been the one to make it out of that encounter.
Izuku didn’t remember much about what had happened next, and for that he was grateful. What he did gave him nightmares to this day.
A hulking figure.
His mom pushing him behind her, telling him to run. Run far far away from this place.
The bright red light that seemed to ripple around the man.
Overwhelming fear and the urge to pull.
He’d blacked out for a minute, and had woken up just in time to realize his mom had thrown him over her shoulder and was making her way out of the house, leaving his motionless father behind.
Izuku had seen the lights of many people in his life, and even now, ten years later, he still thought that his father’s light had been the most beautiful. It had been so many things at once, Izuku had never wanted to stop looking.
Which is why he remembered the exact moment when it went out.
At five years old, Izuku Midoriya lost his father.
The next day, him and his mom were on a plane to China. Three years after that, they moved to India and than to America a year later. It had been a life of constant movement, of being ready to bolt at any given moment. His father had died because his mom’s phone had been tapped, making it so the Villains had been able to track him, so she made sure nothing like that ever happened again.
With a Quirk that let him take other peoples Quirks when he touched them, Hisashi Midoriya had been a very sought-after man in the criminal world, despite his best efforts at remaining unknown.
Bad early life choices was all his mom would tell him whenever he asked about why the underground world knew about him at all.
His father had been sought after because of his Quirk, but a child with a similar one? One that was potentially more powerful? The Villain groups were practically foaming at the mouth. They’d been hunted, and done their fair share of hunting when necessary. His mom had taught him how to fight, how to keep his head down, when it was okay to take other peoples’ Quirks and how to smile so brightly no one ever suspected that ‘sweet boy and his mother’ when two bodies turned up in a river.
Inko Midoriya was someone many would describe as ‘soft’, or ‘kind’, maybe even ‘overly emotional’. Izuku had never understood why, because to him, his mother was a woman of steel.
They never saw the look in her eye when her family was in danger, or the time she’d took down half a dozen men when they’d taken her child. She was a kind and loving woman, but not one to be trifled with.
It hadn’t been easy, but it was what they needed to do to survive, and as long as they had each other they would be fine. That life was lonely though, and ten years after they’d left his mom had decided it was time to go back to her native land, her real home. They’d made plans, set up fake identities and a backstory so that nothing would be suspect when they arrived.
At fifteen years old Izuku Midoriya returned to Japan alone.
…
Walking to school with someone else was a simultaneously bizarre and yet pleasant experience.
To the surprise of both Shinsou and Izuku, they were actually going to the same school, which considering what school it was, had been a real shock. Who would have guessed that two students attending the most highly admired and rated school in country were homeless and living together in an abandoned warehouse?
Living with Shinsou had been strange at first, but after discovering they went to the same school, albeit different Departments, the two had gotten along quite nicely, Shinsou even christening him with the nickname ‘Green Bean’ which he, quite frankly couldn’t argue against. Shinsou had seemed shocked when Izuku had agreed to live with him, and in all honestly Izuku wasn’t sure why he’d agreed to do so himself. He had no reason to trust the other boy, in fact, the first time he’d interacted with Shinsou he’d immediately used his Quirk on him. In all fairness though, he had been crashing in a place he knew someone was already using, so maybe that didn’t really count against him.
“Are you excited?” Izuku said, thankful that the taller teen had slowed his steps so that he could more easily keep up.
Shinsou snorted. “Ah yes, I’m so very eager to being treated as secondary compared to all the Hero Course students with ‘Heroic’ Quirks.”
Ouch, someone had woken up on the wrong side of the…couch? Izuku didn’t really know at this point. He was pretty sure Shinsou didn’t sleep half the time anyway, so did this metaphor even work? Was he spending way too much time thinking about this? Was life just a hallucination he was having?
“What about you?” Izuku looked up at Shinsou. “Excited to be bumping elbows with all the other Herolings?”
And what was he supposed to say to that? Especially to someone so bitter that he had been denied a chance at his dream over something he couldn’t control? How was he supposed to explain that he was terrified that the identification records weren’t going to hold up? That someone could figure out what his real Quirk was? That he was worried that if someone said or did the wrong thing it would trigger a panic attack?
“You should have gotten into the Hero Course.” He says instead.
Shinsou nearly tripped over nothing. “W-what?”
“You should have gotten into the Hero Course.” He repeated. “That exam was totally biased, even with the rescue points. They could have split non-physical Quirks into a different arena or made different exams based on what type of Hero you wanted to be. Instead they just made one that blatantly favored people with physical destructive Quirks.”
Shinsou composed himself. “A Quirk like yours is perfect for it.”
Ah, yes, the telekinesis Quirk that he was pretending to have. Changing records was hard, so he’d just kept his mom’s Quirk the same on her papers. It would be easy enough to believe that he’d just developed a stronger form of telekinesis based on the Quirk his mother had. Nothing to be suspicious of there, at least as long as you didn’t realize that the ‘telekinesis’ he had was really several Quirks working together.
Izuku merely hummed in agreement. “I am pretty lucky.”
Ha! When has luck ever been on his side?
…
Ochako was completely and totally lost.
Seriously! Why didn’t U.A. give out maps or something? The school was huge! How was anyone supposed to find their way around here?
After wandering for several minutes, she managed to make her way to the correct hallway and that was when she saw him.
Hair as messy as the first time she’d seen him, her savior was standing in front of a classroom door with a look of resignation, an apple in one hand and the doorknob in the other.
“Hey!” she called out.
Not startling the slightest bit, the boy turned to look at her, his bright green eyes noticeably duller than the last time she’d seen them.
“Hi.” He said eventually. “Uraraka, right?”
“Yup!” Ochako grinned. “You’re in 1A too?! I’m glad that there’s at least someone I recognise, you know?”
He nodded but didn’t look particularly enthusiastic.
She decided not to take it personally. “Let’s go in together, okay? It’ll be less scary that way.”
A ghost of a smile traced his lips. “Sounds like a plan.”
No sooner did the pair step in the classroom did Ochako know this was going to be a headache.
“You cannot put your feet on the desk,” Blustered a large spectacled boy. “It is disrespectful to your classmates, and to this prestigious institute.”
The target of his scolding didn’t look all that bothered. “Shut it, Private School.” The blond boy sneered.
As the door closed behind them, both of their attention shifted.
The blond blinked in surprise and…recognition? As he stared at the green haired boy beside her. Oh my god she didn’t know his name how stupid could she be?
“Deku!?” The blond blurted, anger momentarily forgotten.
Ochako whipped around to look at her companion. For a fraction of a second his eyes were wide in shock and-was that fear? She saw him tense and it almost looked like he was about to bolt before the moment passed and his expression smoothed over.
“Fuck, what’s your full name again?”
A shadow passed over Deku’s? face. “Midoriya.”
There was a moment of hesitation on the blonde’s part before he nodded and accepted it.
Ochako felt completely out of the loop.
Thankfully, the upright boy with glasses decided it was time to introduce himself. “Hello. I am Tenya Iida from Somei High School. It is a pleasure to meet you.”
She grinned brightly. “Nice to meet you! I’m Ochako Uraraka.”
Iida than turned his attention to Midoriya. “You deciphered the true meaning of the exam.” He practically shouted. “Clearly, you were the better contestant. If I had known of the Rescue Points I would have aided you in your endeavor to get Uraraka out of the rubble.”
Ooooh, they must have all been in the same testing arena.
“So you’re saying that you would’ve only helped someone under threat of extreme injury if you knew you were going to get points for it?”
While the class hadn’t been loud before, the silence was now deafening.
“I-I-that’s not-” Iida sputtered.
The sound of Midoriya taking a bite of his apple reverberated around the room.
“What are you all doing crowded at the front?”
Ochako squealed and spun to face a…yellow caterpillar?
A scruffy looking man unzipped the sleeping bag and stepped out. “It took you all 8 seconds to quiet down. You’re wasting time and it’s illogical.” Pulling a gym uniform out of seemingly nowhere, he continued. “I’m your homeroom teacher Shota Aizawa. Put these on and meet me outside. Anyone not there within five minutes is expelled.”
With that bombshell, he walked off.
“At least this’ll be interesting.” Midoriya commented, taking another bite of his apple.
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