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“Bakugo and Midoriya’s families contacted us - the boys had gotten sick, and will be back to school next week. Either way, we can’t waste time…”
Aizawa went on to talk, and Shouto knew he should have listened. He should have paid attention, he should have kept track of what Aizawa was saying. It was his future, after all, his education, his future career.
It was hard to think, though, when he sometimes still rubbed his wrist, as if looking for the bracelet.
All in all, it wasn’t even on his wrist for half a day.
It didn’t seem to matter.
His eyes were fixed on the two empty desks, and he hoped, he almost desperately wished that he was wrong, and that they didn’t run off.
-
Obviously the Nonary Scandal, as the press ended up calling it, it blew up everywhere. Uwabami and Malichor indeed got praised for delivering the four of them, with evidence, and ready to confess.
Many families found out what happened with their kids exactly.
Many families found closure.
It became an international scandal, obviously, as he had other bases of operations in different countries as well to run their Nonary Games.
There were some kids, who were still captive, kept for further testing.
Nobody really knew how did this get uncovered, but everyone was talking about it.
“Sooner or later, people will ask the questions of exactly how did Malichor and Uwabami found it out” Shouto said this to Reiko Yanagi, stopping next to her in the corridor. “I don’t know what will happen then.”
“The Nonary Scandal had always been full of coverups” She replied simply. “Even nine years ago, everything that happened to us got covered up. They got away with it. I don’t think it will be hard to hide our involvement.”
Shouto remembered the Hero Killer incident, how easy it was to cover things up that they didn’t want anyone to find out.
“Yeah… you are probably right.”
During lunch he sat down to an empty table, and suddenly there was another person sitting down.
Just the person he wanted to see.
“They aren’t back. Mr. Aizawa seems to think that they will be, though.”
“What do you think?”
“I don’t know’ Shouto admitted, looking up at his companion. “Before the weekend, I wouldn’t have imagined they would do anything like that. It’s almost like everything turned upside down during those nine hours.”
“Nonary Games have that effect, yes.”
Hitoshi Shinso seemed laid back, but knowing what was beyond that surface, was something entirely different.
-
It was hard to switch back. During those nine hours, it became almost instinctive, calling the ones in the same predictament by their first names.
Of course it would have been weird, and would have raised questions, so they had to switch back.
“Are you all right, Todoroki? You seem really out of it since yesterday.”
Iida was the one who asked him, brows furrowed.
“Yes, sure, I just… hope Midoriya and Bakugo will be better soon, you know?”
It was as good an excuse as any.
-
There where whispers about Zero.
Nobody knew where the rumours started, but they spread everywhere.
It was a vigilante in a gasmask called Zero who uncovered the Nonary Scandal.
Shouto read the comments one evening online, and just took a screenshot on a whim, and sent it to three numbers before he could rethink this sudden idea.
Look at that, you are famous.
Shinso replied in about two minutes.
I always wanted to be known by that gasmask-look, thanks
Shouto rolled his eyes, and didn’t answer.
There was no reply from the other two numbers.
-
But next day, Shouto’s phone rang during lunch hours, and he stopped on his tracks, upon seeing the caller ID.
Looked at it again.
No, he wasn’t imagining things.
So he just answered, before the caller would hang up.
“I somewhat thought you’d never talk to me again.”
Midoriya laughed a bit on the other side of the line.
“Would you like me to do that?”
“I’m pretty sure I saved your life again, so that would be rude of me. Or was that the first time I saved your life? This thing is still confusing.”
“Well, it’s not that confusing really, it’s simple - from my perspective it was the first time you saved me, from your perspective, it was not. Or maybe from my perspective it wasn’t the first either, seeing as you really ensured I kept existing, so again, it was probably not the first time you saved me, you know what I changed my mind this really is complicated, but I think…”
“Midoriya.”
“...sorry. For… everything. For dragging you through that.”
Shouto wanted to say it was alright - that he understood why he… why they did what they did.
Still, the words didn’t come to his lips.
Would it be wrong of him to approve of what they had done?
“Just come back.”
“I will.”
“...what about Bakugo?”
“Oh, I thought that came without saying” Midoriya’s voice was chipper now. “Of course he wouldn’t give up becoming a hero. The only reason we are away is… well… Uwabami and Malichor need everything we know about the whole thing so they can uncover everything while not letting everything leak out. I really don’t know how the whole Zero-thing is leaking out… it is quite embarrassing, though, isn’t it? I mean… Zero. As a concept. As a name.”
At this point there was another voice, shouting from the back, and still, Shouto could understand it exactly.
“You picked your hero name from a name I gave you, I think Zero is an improvement over that. Or maybe you only picked it because you heard the name from IcyHot’s perspective.”
“...that gives a whole new problem, don’t you think? I mean if I picked the name Zero because I saw from Todoroki’s perspective that I’d pick that name, then where did the name Zero came from? And…”
There was a yelp, and a sound of struggle, and then it was Bakugo who spoke into the phone.
“Screw you IcyHot for that fucking message, what the hell?”
Shouto couldn’t help but smile a little.
“Well, it made you talk to me, so I guess that’s progress. Good to hear your voice.”
“Screw you.”
“You sound extremely healthy to me.”
“Fuck you, I have explosive diarrhea.”
“...that is a disgusting mental image.”
“Good” Bakugo sounded extremely pleased with himself. “You deserve it.”
“Do I get my phone back?” Midoriya piped up.
“No.”
-
“I don’t really want to go home for the weekend.”
He rarely spoke like this, this forward, but Shinso on his side, he felt like he could. Even when he talked about his family, he was never really talking like that.
Talking got easier, and it wasn’t just because of what happened during the Nonary Game - he got more open either way, thanks to his classmates. But that was still… somewhat different.
“Well, why aren’t you coming over, then?”
The way Shinso offered it made Shouto stop on his tracks, and Shinso shrugged.
“My parents work a lot even during the weekend, not like you’d be a bother.”
So he did.
-
“Better write a blog post about how you went over to an urban legend’s place.”
“You really enjoy that, don’t you?”
Shinso grinned as he led Shouto towards his room.
“There are message boards full of speculation about Zero. Hell yeah I am enjoying it.”
“It is quite unlikely that it will ever be revealed, Shinso.”
Shinso just shrugged.
“Of course not. Zero will stay a cryptid, and that’s fine by me. By the way, we are alone, so. Call me whatever you want.”
Shinso hopped down to his bed, patting it next to him, and Shouto sighed, sitting down.
“Alright, Hitoshi.”
“Well, I thought you could call me Zero, but…”
Shinso was grinning, and Shouto grabbed one of the decorative pillows and threw it as his head, and Shinso laughed.
“I invite you over and this is how you thank me? How ungrateful.”
-
That night though, that night found Shouto curled up to Hitoshi’s side, with Hitoshi’s right hand playing with his hair, and he couldn’t let the thoughts go, how much his life had turned upside down just over one week.
-
Shouto kissed Hitoshi the next day, and it was almost nostalgic, as if he had kissed Hitoshi before, but he couldn’t put a finger on how and when.
But maybe it was time to stop asking questions about his memories, or things he had known.
It was sunday afternoon, and they were alone, and Hitoshi pressing him down to his bed, and not easing up on the kiss, and Shouto just didn’t want to think about anything anymore either way.
-
He supposed it was kind of messed up, that he slept with one of the people responsible for dragging him through all that hell only just a week before. He supposed it was also messed up, how much was he missing the other two responsible.
Maybe, in a way, Shouto was still captured by Zero.
All three of them.
-
Next day, he was sitting already in the classroom, when the door opened, and there was Midoriya, poking his head in, unsure, his eyes immediately meeting Shouto’s.
For a few moments, it was like time has stopped - even though Iida had hurried up to Midoriya right away, and others had greeted him too, it seemed like Midoriya only had eyes for him right now.
And Shouto smiled.
“Welcome back.”
And Midoriya smiled back.
-
Obviously Bakugo was not far behind - another thing that was kind of weird, not seeing him around Midoriya all the time. Then Shouto remembered, that it was always the case before last week - Bakugo never actually followed Midoriya around all that much. So many things were hidden behind the surface nobody understood, nobody realised.
Nobody saw behind their pretenses.
“Hey Midoriya, feel better?”
“Yup!” Midoriya nodded, bright smile on his face. “I had a nasty fever, I was almost literally burning up but I’m fine now!”
Shouto almost choked on air, and a pen fell out of Bakugo’s hand.
-
He remembered, remembered the way the seven-year-old Midoriya’s terror rippled through to him through time, he remembered hearing his shaking voice. He remembered the way his face was burning up, because... because the paradox was undoing itself, holy hell, he was having a fever because he was literally burning up, if Shouto would have had messed up, if he went another way, if he…
-
“You are very quiet.”
“That was not a funny joke, Midoriya. About you burning up.”
“Oh don’t you start too!” Midoriya puffed his cheeks, almost adorably. “Kacchan has no sense of humour either.”
“Because it’s not fucking funny, shitty Deku! See? IcyHot agrees.”
“What’s not a funny joke?” Shinso caught up to them on their way to have lunch. “Is this about the Schrödinger’s Cat is Alive/Dead shirt with the zombie cat on it? Because that was hilarious too.”
“See? He appreciates my sense of humour.”
“Well nobody had asked Mindfreak about this, did we?!”
-
At lunch, Reiko Yanagi had walked up to them, and slapped Midoriya and Bakugo up the head, before moving along.
“They know what they had done” She said simply to her classmates.
And neither of them really complained.
-
“I actually don’t think it’s all that funny either” Midoriya admitted it to Shouto the next day, when they were alone. “But maybe if I joke it away it won’t be that… heavy, I guess. I know Kacchan blames himself for… well. That. Even though there was nothing really to be done, and neither was I his responsibility, but… you know how he is. About wanting to be the best hero, and the best heroes never lose. And he feels like he lost back there.”
“You were just kids.”
“Still. You know how Kacchan is like. So if I make fun of it, maybe it takes the edge away, I guess.”
“...how much do you remember?”
He didn’t have to specify, Midoriya looked down.
“Everything is tangled up. I do remember what… would have happened, you know. I remember burning. I also remember other possibilities I had seen through the field.”
“Was there one where I… fell into a water and got… stabbed, maybe?”
He remembered the pain and the bad feeling he got in front of door 2, and as soon as Midoriya jumped, he knew he was right.
“That was a bad one…” Midoriya whispered. “I don’t know if they really happened or not. I don’t know there are… maybe timelines out there, other realities where those happened. Because when I think about it, there’s this…”
Midoriya didn’t look at him, he almost looked slumped, lowering his head, and Shouto didn’t know the answer either.
He didn’t know if there were universes out there, where the Nonary Game got some of them killed.
Universes where Zero failed, and Izuku Midoriya ceased to exist.
But he knew what to say.
“Those were just that. Possibilities. And you used the knowledge about them to steer me into the right direction. That’s it.”
Midoriya looked up at him, and smiled a little, sad smile.
“You are saying the same thing as Kacchan does… but you can’t be sure about it, can you?”
Shouto stepped closer, taking Midoriya’s face between his hands.
“I don’t think we can” Shouto said it in a soft voice. “Not like we know everything about how the field works. But right now, at least, we are living in a good timeline. A timeline where you exist. You are not a living paradox anymore. And I was… a bit afraid you’d run and never come back.”
“Would you have chased me down if I had done so?”
“I don’t think I would have ever stopped looking for you. Not after all of that. Not a chance.”
“Good thing I came back, then.”
Shouto didn’t know what prompted him to kiss Midoriya, but he did, and Midoriya kissed him back.
-
None if this was in any way smart.
-
“If we look at it from a logical standpoint, the multiple universes theory holds more merit than the theory that he just glanced into the future and had seen possibilities. Because where the hell would the possibilities come from? They have to come from somewhere, don’t they?”
“He literally saw the future, that’s how we got linked.”
“That’s exactly it. He connected to you. You, as in a single point, a specific person, who exists. A fixed point. Something tangible.”
“The field isn’t exactly tangible.”
Bakugo angrily kicked a stone away.
“I know that. I’m just saying, once you accept the field as existing - and why wouldn’t we accept it, we have more than enough proof for that, you gotta realise it works with existing data. Not hypotheticals. Transferring information. It makes no sense he would see hypotheticals. I think he really did see those universes where it all went all fucked up. Where our Nonary Game failed.”
Shouto didn’t bother pointing out that in this case, he lied to Midoriya.
They both did.
Instead…
“You know… I think this is a lie that all of us just pretends to believe. Because for Midoriya too, it’s easier to believe this is all that happened, that… it was just a closed time loop.”
“Of course it wasn’t a closed fucking loop” Bakugo hissed. “If it would have been, Deku wouldn’t have had those fevers for all those nine years, whenever his resolve weakened. There was always a chance it could have gone wrong.”
-
None if this was, in any timeline, in any reality, smart, but when, by the end of the week, Bakugo yanked him close for a forceful kiss, he didn’t even want to resist.
-
Neither of them had ever tried to define what the four of them were to each other. Maybe there weren’t even any words to define it. Katsuki and Hitoshi had seen Izuku burn once, but then he didn’t, Izuku and Shouto once connected through an invisible field through time, against all odds - the three of them had kidnapped Shouto to save Izuku, endangering all four of them, and more people.
Shouto and Zero.
Three Zeros.
Shouto looked at the other three bickering while they were walking through a park, and thought to himself that all the conspiracy theories couldn’t predict this.
-
“So, technically, are we cryptids? This is a very important question.”
Obviously it was Hitoshi who asked this question, when all four of them were in his room.
“Well, I definitely seen a post like Zero is real and he sucked my dick behind McDonald’s and I don’t know what you two had been up to, because I definitely did not suck anyone’s dick behind any McDonald’s” Katsuki muttered.
“Aren’t we closer to an urban legend?” Izuku muttered.
“I don’t think that in this instance it fucking matters, Deku.”
It was complicated.
It was messy.
Really, thinking about it all too much still made Shouto’s head hurt, even though it was nowhere near the discomfort he felt while subconsciously accessing the morphogenetic field. No, that obviously didn’t happen since then - and he hoped he’d never have to do it again.
That neither of them would have to do it again.
“That means Shouto could earn a lot of money with revealing he is dating local cryptids.”
“Or a lawsuit” Shouto replied in a dry voice. “For harboring you three.”
“Technically you guys are at my place, so there is no harboring. Fraternizing on the other hand…”
Yeah.
None of this was smart at all.
But when Shouto was sitting by Hitoshi’s bed, Hitoshi on one side, Katsuki on the other, and Izuku sprawled over all three of them, he decided that for at least a little while longer, he would be fine with not being smart.