Chapter Text
After that first time All Might had dinner with Izuku and Inko, Izuku began to see him a lot more often. It was strange, and it was a complete change than what had happened in his past life.
Izuku tried not to think too hard about how it was simply because he couldn’t reign in his emotions when he first saw All Might in the timeline.
It’s not like it was a bad change. Not at all, actually. Izuku was glad he got to see more of his mentor who he saw as a father figure.
If anything, now he saw All Might as even more of a father figure because of how often Izuku now saw him, especially when he offered fatherly advice and offered to help Izuku with his homework, even if All Might himself didn’t really understand the material that well if it wasn’t English.
The thing was, Izuku was still very aware of the fact that Toshinori was All Might, even if he hadn’t revealed that he was, which meant that Izuku was still technically quirkless.
That was fine though, since he often did rely more on his intelligence rather than his quirk. He guessed that was what happened when you had Eraserhead as a teacher. And, at this point, he was much more physically fit than he was at this time in his past life, so that might help with inheriting One for All. Even if he didn’t inherit it, however, the exercise he did would still give Izuku some sort of hope in passing the UA entrance exam.
There was also another side effect of the exercise that Izuku did. He was going outside more, which meant he saw more people, but it also meant that he was more likely to see people that he knew in his previous life.
The person Izuku happened to see the most often was Shinsou, weirdly enough. He wondered what happened in this lifetime for Shinsou to live near him while also being the son of Present Mic and Eraserhead.
Honestly, Izuku almost couldn’t get over the fact that his senseis, the two that are probably the most different out of all of them, were married with Shinsou as their son. He seriously wondered if they even lived this close to him in his past life or if this was a new development.
Sometimes Izuku would go out for a jog, and he would see Shinsou jogging as well. Sometimes they would wave at each other, and other times they would stop and chat for a bit before continuing their respective jogs.
One day, Izuku was out on a jog, and he saw Shinsou again, so they ended up talking for a bit, but, before they went off their respective ways, Izuku decided to ask Shinsou something.
“Hey, Shinsou, why don’t we jog together sometime? We see each other while jogging pretty much every day at this point, so I thought it would probably make sense to take the same route together. And, I guess we can also encourage each other in exercising and training to become heroes.”
“Oh, sure. I usually have a very specific route, though.” Shinsou rubbed the back of his neck, which Izuku noticed he did whenever he was nervous about something.
“Do you go somewhere whenever you run?” Izuku questioned.
“I do. I usually visit someone. Would you like to come with me?”
“Sure!” Izuku really wasn’t sure this was a super great idea, but he highly doubted that Shinsou would bring him into any kind of actual danger, especially since he trusts Shinsou a good amount, both in his previous life and this one. Although, Izuku wondered who Shinsou was visiting.
Shinsou started jogging in a certain direction, and Izuku followed him. They jogged for a while before Shinsou slowed down, and Izuku slowed down as well.
Shinsou turned towards Izuku and put a finger to his lips as a sign for Izuku to be quiet. This, of course, made Izuku a little bit uneasy, but he stayed quiet anyway and continued to follow Shinsou, who was tiptoeing to make his footsteps quieter. Izuku made the decision to follow suit.
They didn’t have to go that far. However, it was a nice neighborhood, so Izuku seriously wondered why they had to be so silent.
Eventually, the two of them entered a hidden area. At this point, Izuku was seriously wondering who Shinsou went to the trouble of meeting every time he went on a run when someone else suddenly entered into the area.
When Izuku heard the rustling, he tensed up, ready to defend himself against whatever threat was out there. But, when he turned over to the rustling, he found that it was Todoroki who entered the area.
Holy- he couldn’t believe that Todoroki was here! He couldn’t believe that Shinsou was meeting with Todoroki in what looked like secret! Why? Why would they meet up? When did they first start meeting up? As far as Izuku knew, the two never even met in his past life until a certain someone was expelled, so Shinsou ended up joining the hero course.
Todoroki looked equally surprised to see him, and Shinsou picked up on the mood quickly.
“Shouto, this is Midoriya,” Shinsou said immediately. “I’ve told you about him, right? I jog with him sometimes. Midoriya, this is Todoroki Shouto.”
Both Izuku and Todoroki were completely and utterly silent for a couple of seconds, so quiet that Izuku could clearly hear the wind rustling the leaves and the birds tweeting in the distance. In these couple seconds, Izuku ran through several possible ways he could handle this situation.
He was definitely surprised, and he was almost certain that he couldn’t hide his surprise, so any kind of lying about that was out. Second of all, Izuku definitely recognized Todoroki, and, while he wasn’t entirely sure either of them noticed, it would be better to come up with something about why he recognized Todoroki.
Luckily enough, Izuku had the perfect way to properly articulate his surprise while also being easily able to answer why he recognizes Todoroki.
“Todoroki!” Izuku found himself saying before anything else, so he had to roll with that. “You mean, like the number two hero, Endeavor? That Todoroki?”
“Shh! We don’t mention his name here!” Shinsou reprimanded.
“Yeah, like that,” Todoroki said at the same time.
Izuku had so many questions.
“You must have questions,” Todoroki stated as if he and Shinsou talked about this meeting beforehand, and it made Izuku seriously wonder what kind of relationship Todoroki and Shinsou had, especially since Shinsou called Todoroki by his first name.
“Yeah, I guess I do have a couple.” That’s an understatement.
“I bet you’re wondering why I brought you here,” Shinsou said, cryptically.
“Why do you sound so suspicious?” Todoroki questioned. “What are you, a mob leader? Or are you, like, one of my subordinates, and I’m the leader, so you brought Midoriya to me in order for me to personally ask him to join our gang, but first he has to show that he has the guts to be a useful asset to us?”
“Why was that so elaborate?” Shinsou asked. “There was no reason to make that so elaborate.”
“Why was that what you sounded like?”
“Listen, Midoriya,” Shinsou said. “I swear I didn’t bring you here to join a gang.”
“I… didn’t think you did? But it was pretty weird with all the sneaking around and being quiet and telling me little to nothing about it.” Izuku was pretty sure he should have freaked out, but, honestly, this wasn’t even half as strange as when Aoyama gave him cheese that spelled out words in the middle of the night.
“Who’s Aoyama?” Todoroki questioned, and Izuku honestly didn’t even think he said that out loud.
“Oh, well, you know. He’s a guy I kind of know.” Izuku scratched the back of his head and hoped that Shinsou and Todoroki wouldn’t question it that much.
“He sounds creepy.”
“Yeah… a little… he’s just… weird.” Izuku decided to switch topics immediately. “Anyway, Shinsou, if you didn’t bring me here to join a gang, then what did you bring me here for?”
“Because Shouto wanted to meet you.”
“But what was with all the sneaking around?”
“My father doesn’t exactly like Hitoshi,” Todoroki answered. “At all.”
“Okay… why do the two of you meet up so often then? Because Shinsou implied that he meets up with you whenever he goes on a jog, and, as far as I’m aware, that’s pretty much every day.”
Both Todoroki and Shinsou stood there awkwardly for a moment. They looked at each other and had an entire silent conversation before answering Izuku.
“Well, we’re trying to get Shouto out of his situation, but we can’t really do that without proof, so we meet up to talk about plans for the future,” Shinsou explained, and Izuku was suddenly reminded that Todoroki’s father was awful to him.
“Why are you trusting me with this knowledge? Todoroki, are you really okay with me knowing about this?”
“I think so,” Todoroki answered. “Hitoshi has told me a lot about you, and he trusts you well enough, so I trust you too.”
Izuku was suddenly struck by an overwhelming amount of responsibility. He needed to help and protect both Todoroki and Shinsou, which was kind of a strange thought, but, to be fair, they were kids who needed to be protected.
Izuku ignored the fact that he was currently (technically) the same age as the other two as he internally made a vow to help them in whatever way he could.
“What are the two of you planning to do exactly, if you don't mind me asking?”
"Get proof, you know, like I stated earlier," Shinsou said.
"I, at least, am trying to get video footage of my father," The way Todoroki said 'my father' was somehow both emotionless and filled with complete and utter disdain. "I haven't actually managed to get a lot of it so far because I do my best to avoid him, and I can't really bring my phone when he 'trains' me, but both Shinsou and I are hopeful that we can gather enough evidence against him to make a solid case."
"Are you a bit young to be doing something like that? Isn’t doing that dangerous at all?”
Both Todoroki and Shinsou gave Izuku a serious face that should not ever be seen on two twelve-year-olds, but Todoroki was the one who responded to Izuku's worries.
"The situation I'm in is dangerous, and I don't want to be in it anymore. I want to be a hero, and I realized that I couldn't achieve that if I was held back by a villain disguised as a hero."
Something about the way Todoroki said that with such finality made Izuku feel like he couldn't breathe. His lungs constricted, and his heart beat too loudly, and he was gripped with complete and utter fear as he hoped that Todoroki would be safe.
"I'll help you." Izuku found himself saying. "I don't know what I can do, but I'll help in whatever way that I can."
Todorioki looked hopeful.
"We can discuss it," Todoroki said. "Probably at some later date though."
"Agreed," Shinsou stated. "You need to get home soon, right?"
Todoroki nodded.
"Then I'll bring Izuku with me next week. I think we can come up with something he can do over that time period."
"Why can't I come here sooner?" Izuku questioned.
"It's more difficult to be sneaky with more people. If it's just me and Shouto, there's less of a chance of us getting caught, but I took a bit of a risk taking you here." Shinsou explained. "But, if you are truly willing to do anything to help, then we'll believe you, but you have to recognize that this entire undertaking is for Todoroki's safety."
"I understand," Izuku said with as much seriousness as he could, although he was a little bit put off by his own voice of all things. It's been about twelve years since he died (?), and he still has yet to get accustomed to how young his voice sounds.
"We need to go now," Todoroki stated. "I need to get back to the house by a certain time so that these meetings stay a secret."
"Come on, Midoriya. We need to leave. I'll fill you in on anything you need to know at a later time." Shinsou promised.
"Of course."
Todoroki left the area, and Izuku was honestly surprised by how quietly Todoroki left. He was stealthy as an adult, from what Izuku remembered from his past life, but Izuku didn't know that Todoroki had the ability to be silent as a twelve-year-old.
Shinsou showed Izuku how to quietly escape from the area, and soon they were back to an area where they could speak freely.
"Sorry if we couldn't answer all your questions," Shinsou commented. "We were a little bit pressed for time."
"It's okay. I get it. I just don't have a lot of context for all of this."
"Feel free to ask questions. We have plenty of time right now." Shinsou stated. "That is, if you don't have anything that you need to do right now."
"The only thing I need to do today is help my mom cook dinner, which isn't until the evening."
Shinsou laughed, and, no matter how much time he spent with Shinsou, it still put Izuku off-guard, if only because Izuku never really heard Shinsou laugh in his previous life. However, the sound of Shinsou's laughter was nice, and it almost never failed to make Izuku laugh as well, even if Izuku didn't really know what Shinsou was laughing at.
"Sorry, I don't really know why I found that funny," Shinsou explained once his laughter faded away. "Especially since I'm helping Beebee make dinner tonight."
"Hopefully nothing will burn due to either of us helping."
"That will only be a problem if Dad decides to help out." Shinsou was smiling, and it made Izuku happy to see Shinsou smile so often.
"I do actually have a question about you and Todoroki, if you don't mind me asking."
"Ask away. I know this entire thing was something that was kind of sudden."
"What kind of relationship do the two of you have? I'm not trying to be rude or anything- you don't have to answer this if you don't want to- but I noticed you call each other by your first names, so I was wondering how close the two of you were."
Shinsou stayed silent for a moment, and Izuku was just about to remind Shinsou that he didn't have to answer the question at all if it was too personal, but Shinsou answered despite the personal nature of the question.
"We think of each other as brothers. Actually..." Shinsou rubbed the back of his neck. "Our relationship with each other kind of encouraged us to do something about Shouto's situation. Since Dad and Beebee got me out of a similar situation when I was younger, I thought they could help us get Shouto out as well."
"How old were you when you got out of your situation?" Izuku questioned. "Sorry if I keep asking really personal questions. You really, really don't have to answer them at all, and I understand if I've, like, crossed a boundary or something."
"No, I mean, yeah, the questions are a bit personal, but I don't mind answering them for you, especially since you're now involved with Shouto and me. I was adopted by Dad around fiveish years ago, so it was when I was around seven."
"So are you trying to get Aizawa-san and Yamada-san to adopt Todoroki?"
"That's the end goal, yeah." Shinsou looked directly at Izuku. "I truly do love and care about Shouto, and I really do want him to be safe."
"How long have the two of you known each other?"
"I'd say about three years."
"How long have the two of you been trying?"
"A while. It's difficult to get a case together when Endeavour is the number two hero, so the majority of people trust him and think he could never do any wrong because of that."
"I really hope one day Todoroki will be safe." Izuku paused for a moment before continuing. "With you and Aizawa-san and Yamada-san."
"Yeah, I really hope that too." Shinsou gave Izuku a smile that has been more and more frequent in this lifetime. "If you have any more questions, don't hesitate to ask. I know we're just kids, so it doesn't really feel like we can do anything, but we're trying the best we can."
"I will. Thank you." Izuku wasn't really sure what he was thanking Shinsou for, but it was for something.
"You're welcome."
Izuku and Shinsou went their separate ways, and Izuku couldn't stop thinking about how he could possibly help Todoroki and Shinsou.
The situation also made him wonder about Eri. He wondered how old she was at this point, if she'd even been born yet. Izuku hoped she was okay.
Izuku briefly entertained the idea of Aizawa and Yamada adopting Eri, though that probably wasn't that far off from what happened in his past life, with how much time Aizawa spent with Eri, people might have actually thought she was his daughter.
Izuku got home and got out his notebook. He did his best to sketch out Todoroki and not mark down anything about him, even though he basically knew all about Todoroki's quirk. He would wait to ask about Todoroki's quirk the next time he saw him.
It was less weird to put non-heroes in his notebooks nowadays since they weren't just for hero analysis. In this series, it's all about quirk analysis, and he made the decision to make an entry for every person he met and got to know.
He put basic things about people's quirk, along with possible uses and weaknesses he could notice. It was good practice for figuring out the quirk of a villain, and, even though he was already fairly good at doing that, there was no reason to not practice.
After drawing Todoroki, Izuku decided to play video games until his mom called him to help out with dinner.
Izuku chose to play some of his calmer video games that didn't require a lot of critical thinking to play since he wanted to think about stuff as well.
Mostly he wanted to think about what happened that day.
It was really weird how much Shinsou trusted him, and even weirder how much Todoroki trusted him. Izuku supposed that he'd known Shinsou for at least a year or two at this point, not nearly as long as Shinsou's known Todoroki, but it was still a substantial amount.
Then agian, Izuku supposed that a year or two was a lot for a twelve-year-old. It was certainly enough to learn how to trust someone.
Izuku guessed that he was just so used to knowing and trusting only the people he'd known for years and years that, at this point, it was very strange when people trusted others when they hadn't known each other for at least ten or twenty years.
Izuku smiled to himself as he thought about how twelve-year-olds haven't even lived for twenty years, and so they definitely wouldn't have been able to know someone for that long, even if it was their own mother.
It was just kind of weird to think about the whole thing. Like, Izuku, himself, was probably over fifty at this point because he was around forty when he died. And yet, here he was. Physically a twelve-year-old. It was all just really weird and really strange.
Izuku wondered if he should have questioned this ability more. Like, does it only give him one second chance? Does it work multiple times? Does it have to have certain parameters for it to actually work?
The problem with experimenting with his quirk was the fact that it related heavily to his own death, and it would literally be a death sentence if he ever attempted to experiment with his quirk at all. It would just be very dangerous, and it might lead to a more permanent death for himself.
And then there was the entire thing with the butterfly effect. How much had Izuku changed just by doing things differently than he did in his previous life? It seemed like a lot, at least from what Izuku could see from the changes he'd seen already, but he wondered if there was a much larger effect that he just wasn't aware of. Or even effects.
There was the thing with All Might becoming even more of a father figure to Izuku than he already was. There were times when he saw other kids that were in Class 1-A with him. Izuku didn't see all of them, but enough that it was a little odd with how many he'd seen. There was the fact that Eraserhead and Present Mic adopted Shinsou, although Izuku was unable to confirm nor deny whether or not that happened in his previous life. But, now, Izuku was finding out that Shinsou was trying to get Todoroki to become his brother, and it was all just a lot to process and deal with.
Izuku knew that, after All Might retired from becoming a hero, Endeavour worked towards being a hero to be proud of, but that didn't exactly erase years of abuse. So, even with the idea that Endeavour becomes a better person later on, there was no telling if it would actually happen again because of all that Izuku had done to change the timeline.
It was because of the fact that Izuku didn't know for a fact what would happen in the future anymore that he supported Shinsou in getting Todoroki far, far away from Endeavour, so Izuku promised to help.
He still didn't know how he could help without making the situation worse. Izuku knew that intervening in abusive situations could make the situation worse, so it could be possible that the best thing he could do was nothing.
Doing nothing didn't exactly sit right with Izuku, but, after years of training and being a hero, he understood there were certain things a hero couldn't and shouldn't do. There were certain things a civilian couldn't and shouldn't do.
Because, even if all of them become heroes in the future, they were all still children currently. That made them civilians. Yes, it frustrated Izuku, and he wished that he could just punch every single problem he ran into, but he knew that he couldn't.
So he took a deep breath, in and out, and zoned out. He played his game, which had music that seemed to sway back and forth, and the repetitive nature of the game allowed him to relax for a while.
Even though Izuku was a hero in his heart, and he desperately wanted to save people, he also noticed that, in his years of being a hero, he needed to sit down a take a breather every once in a while in order to be able to save even more people.
Afterall, he couldn't save people if he was tired and stressed beyond belief.
So he got into the rhythm of the game, taking water, food, and bathroom breaks as necessary.
"Izuku!" Inko called. "Come help me make dinner!"
"One sec!" Izuku called back as he saved his game and turned off his gaming device. "What are we making today, mom?"
"Well, we're going to be making chicken and pepper poppers because I wanted to try something a bit different."
"Sounds good! What's first?"
Inko directed Izuku through the recipe for the pepper poppers while she prepared the chicken. The pepper poppers were fairly simple- Izuku just needed to cut them in half, get rid of the stem and seeds, and then stuff them with the cheese mixture.
The cheese mixture had a bunch of cream cheese, parmesan cheese, herbs, and breadcrumbs, and, honestly, Izuku had no idea what could possibly go wrong with these, other than they might be too spicy for some people.
He sprinkled a bit of paprika and cayenne pepper over top of them and popped them into a 350-degree oven for about twenty minutes.
"They should be done by the time I'm done with the chicken," Inko said.
"Do you need any help with those?" Izuku asked.
"No, not with these. You helping me make the pepper poppers was great."
"Alright."
Izuku basically just waited around for twenty minutes for the food to all cook. About ten minutes in, the house started smelling really, really good, and Izuku felt his stomach growl.
After that, someone knocked on the door, and Izuku practically jumped up to see who was at the door.
"Hey, Yagi-san!" Izuku greeted.
"Young Midoriya, you really don't have to be so formal with me," Toshinori said. "Please, just Yagi is fine."
"Alright, Yagi." It almost felt kind of weird to call him that. It was weird to call him Yagi-san, but it was a different kind of weird. "Dinner's going to be ready soon. Would you like to join us?"
"Oh, well I suppose it can't hurt. How about I help set the table?"
Izuku knew very well that Toshinori probably wouldn't be able to eat that much, as he barely touched his food whenever he came over to have dinner, but it was fun having him during dinner anyways.
The two of them set the table, and soon all the food is done cooking and ready to eat. They all sit down at the table and get some food for themselves, with Toshinori getting less than everyone else.
Izuku doesn't know how many calories are in one of the pepper poppers, but he can't imagine they only have a small amount, so they might be good for Toshinori to eat.
He really should do more research on what a person without a stomach should be eating, since, he can't exactly eat nothing, can he?
"So, Izuku, what did you do today?" Inko asked.
"I went for a jog this morning," Izuku answered. "I talked to Shinsou for a little while, and we talked about jogging together at some point. When I got home, I mostly just played some video games. I can't be training all the time, after all."
Izuku conveniently left out the part about Todoroki, since he was supposed to be keeping it a secret, and it really wasn't his secret to tell.
"Well, it's nice that you're taking a break every now and again. You really do work too hard." Inko said, and Izuku could suddenly feel the weight of the world on his shoulders, the same weight he had when he was a hero.
"I would be inclined to agree," Toshinori said. "While it's great that you want to become a hero, and it's even greater that you realize the extent you need to go in order to protect people from harm, going too far could lead you to cause yourself permanent damage."
Izuku did his best not to glance towards Toshinori's stomach when he said that, but he was almost certain that Toshinori saw him glance downwards towards the scar.
Toshinori had that confused look in his eyes, but Izuku paid it no mind as he continued talked.
"I'll do my best to not hurt myself in the process of becoming a hero." Although doing so may be necessary, especially since he might not actually be ready to receive One For All when he's able to obtain it before the UA exam.
Not to mention that Izuku sustained plenty of permanent damage to himself in his last life before he even reached his second year at UA, but he just kind of assumed that it was all part of becoming a hero. He still felt phantom pain in his hands sometimes, despite there no longer being scars there, not to mention the phantom pain he had occasionally in his chest, though that only appeared whenever he thought too hard about the way he died.
"I really hope you don't," Inko stated. "I just want you to be safe."
Something about that phrase made Izuku feel guilty. His mother was still alive by the time he died. He wondered if that timeline still existed. It was upsetting to think of his mom mourning over him.
"I promise I will." Izuku didn't want to think about that. "How did your day go? Anything new?"
And as Inko explained the new machine she was writing an instruction manual, Izuku made another goal for himself: stay alive.