Chapter Text
Hizashi starts to seriously reconsider his whole understanding of Shouta when a maniac with a gender-bending Quirk manages to get both Shouta and Nemuri in one go. They’ve been fighting some branch of the League of Villains – mostly the minor, annoying ones – and Hizashi had just turned around from screeching at a whole group of assholes with mutation Quirks when a light flashes, blinding him momentarily.
When he blinks away the spots from his eyes, the shopping center they’ve been battling in is suddenly a lot quieter and emptier. Just for a moment. Then, there’s an earsplitting shriek that rivals Hizashi’s for volume. He doesn’t recognize the voice – it’s almost deep enough to be Shouta’s, and he’s tensing, ready to rush in, when the smoke clears, and Hizashi feels himself freeze.
Nemuri and Shouta don’t seem hurt, but they also don’t seem like Shouta and Nemuri.
Nemuri’s clearly pretty upset. She has a tendency to turn red when she’s angry, and right now she’s nearly maroon as she pats down her much bulkier arms. Her suit hangs awkwardly around her suddenly flat chest, and the seams along the now much more substantial thighs are threatening to burst. Her long hair is much shorter on the sides, longer near the top; it’s the trendy haircut that all the teens have these days. She’s got stubble and a very obvious adam’s apple – she was a knockout as a woman and hasn’t lost any of that appeal as a guy, but the loud shrieks tell Hizashi that she probably doesn’t want to hear that right now.
Shouta’s sitting on the ground, legs awkwardly crossed, looking more annoyed than anything else, and Hizashi feels himself suddenly having to talk himself through the process of breathing. The most alarming part of the transformation from male to female Shouta is that all the weird inconsistencies of his looks as a guy make a lot more sense as a woman. Shouta’s always been boney and sinewy, but the added hints of curves under his bulky clothes make him look elegant rather than awkward – he doesn’t have the body fat to be curvy, but there’s something softer to him now. His cheekbones are a little less sharp, his chin somewhat rounded. The hair length is the same, although the stubble is gone, and it doesn’t seem like Shouta’s any shorter. The part that’s making Hizashi most uncomfortable is Shouta’s eyes.
As a guy, Shouta always seems a little exhausted, and he’s famous for his glower. Student rumors say that Shouta has a secondary Quirk where his infuriated gaze can light a person on fire. As a woman, though, the addition of long, dark eyelashes gives that look a more sultry element, particularly as he peers out through the curtain of his bangs. The scar underneath his right eye just adds to it, honestly. Shouta catches Hizashi staring at him, and his lips quirk up at the corner – fuck, that’s another thing that Hizashi can’t help but fixate on, now that he’s noticed it. Shouta’s lips have always been a tad thin. The gender switch has filled them out, and he looks very, very kissable.
“Another one for the books, right?” Shouta says wryly. His voice is still on the low end for a woman’s, but like with his eyes, it’s now seductive rather than threatening. Hizashi has to suppress a shiver.
Jesus Christ, who would have thought Shouta was his type? He’s never seriously looked at Shouta in that way, never considered it. In a world full of Quirks, this seems like an oversight – he probably should have had a contingency plan for having his best friend turn into his definition of a bombshell. He likes women – likes their breasts, their full lips. He likes their colorful clothes and eyecatching makeup, likes watching them walk by in heels. He’s got a particular fondness for pale women with dark hair, and a real thing for women who could kill him, which Shouta could do in either gender. Shouta doesn’t look like he’d be the kind of woman who wears any makeup or fancy footwear, but he rather looks like he could be a starlet from the 1950s, if he put some effort into it. As it is, dressed as male Shouta, he just looks soft and feminine, as if he’s wearing a boyfriend’s shirt on a Sunday morning.
Hizashi tries to swallow, but his throat is too dry to handle it properly.
“We might need to restrain Nemuri,” Shouta continues, pushing his hair back from his face and blinking up at Hizashi. It’s on the edge of erotic, and Hizashi immediately feels sick – this is such a weird way to be feeling about his male-but-not-currently best friend. “I don’t want her rampaging and murdering anyone.”
“I…and you’re not feeling weird? About…” Hizashi asks, his voice much more shrill than he thought it would be – it’s loud enough that Shouta winces a bit. Hizashi gestures frantically at Shouta’s body, trying to will Shouta back to male-ness and his sudden, confusing feelings gone. Shouta mostly looks puzzled.
“Is this about the fact that I’m female right now?” Shouta’s tone is purposefully bland. Hizashi nods his head a tad frantically. “I’m fine with this. Don’t be weird, Hizashi; I’m still Shouta. Come on, it looks like the League has taken off. Nemuri’s going to get us arrested for property destruction if we don’t stop her.” He gets to his feet. Hizashi was wrong – Shouta’s a little shorter, just enough that the cuffs of his shirt hang over his fingertips, and with the scarf still floating in the air, the collar of Shouta’s shirt is loose enough that Hizashi can see the jutting of Shouta’s collarbone and the swell of breasts. He has to suppress a squeak.
The best way to describe the way female Shouta moves is that he lopes, lazily swaying his hips as he meanders over to where Nemuri is still in the middle of her meltdown, sleep-powder trailing from the tears in her costume. Shouta’s hair flairs out around his head in a halo as he activates his Quirk – probably a good idea, considering how hysterical Nemuri is – and Hizashi feels a very unwelcome swell of heat somewhere deep in his gut. Shouta’s Quirk and fighting has always been absolutely amazing to watch, but he bets that as a woman, Shouta’ll be utterly breathtaking.
“Nemuri,” Shouta calls, even and low, “Calm down.”
“No!” she screams, tears pouring down her face. A stream of snot is trickling out of her nose. As hot as she is as a guy, that kind of ruins it. “I hate this, Shouta! I can’t balance! There’s something weird in my pants!”
“That’s a dick, you dumbass,” Shouta says, pushing his hair away from his face. Gosh, he really is such a pretty woman. “You’re fine. We were just hit by a Quirk – it’ll wear off in a few days. Let’s go check the database to see if we can figure out who did this.”
“I’m not beautiful anymore!” Nemuri wails, throwing her arms heavenwards. “What is life without my beauty?!”
“If you don’t come along now, we might never get it back,” Shouta sighs. That seems to convince Nemuri to shut up, and she sniffles, wiping her cheeks. “We should probably call Nedzu and Tensei. We’re going to need more resources than what we have if we want to figure out who has this kind of Quirk.” Shouta pulls out his phone, painstakingly flipping through his contacts. Watching Shouta trying to deal with technology always makes Hizashi anxious – Shouta’s always just so terrible with it, and he’s tempted to rip the phone away and do it himself. He would, he swears. He’s just…too busy checking out his best friend.
“You make a really hot chick, Shouta,” Nemuri sniffles, wiping at her nose. “I remember when I used to be a hot chick. Those were the days.”
“That was five minutes ago, Nemuri, calm down,” Shouta says, typing as slowly as humanly possible. “You make a very good-looking man, if that’s any consolation.”
“It’s really not – my dick feels weird. Is it suppose to feel like it’s being mashed into my body?”
“That might have more to do with your costume than with the dick. No one needs that much spandex.”
They keep bickering as Shouta types impossibly slow. Hizashi can’t bring himself to say a word. Finally Shouta tucks the phone away, and heaves a sigh. “Alright, I’ve alerted them. Tensei says he’s searching the database. Let’s get back to the school.”
He lopes off, a still-crying Nemuri following behind him. Hizashi follows, feeling numb.
Right. Shouta makes a hot woman. Hizashi is very into him, and female Shouta checks every box Hizashi has ever had, but it's fine, he can handle this. This can only last a few days, right?
----
Wrong. It’s been nearly a week, and the Quirk’s effects show no signs of wearing off. Hizashi is at his wits end.
The worst part of the whole transformation is that while Nemuri is deeply, deeply upset about it, Shouta doesn’t seem to care at all. He doesn’t adjust his behavior in the slightest, and doesn’t seem to notice the stares he gets. He just continues to be Shouta – the strict teacher, the underground hero who prefers to avoid the spotlight, Hizashi’s best friend. The only concession Shouta’s made about the differences between the genders is that he had Nemuri take him out to get a bra – they’d discussed it, blandly, in the break room, while Hizashi tried not to hyperventilate at the idea of a Shouta with breasts. Which is what he has now – Shouta, just with breasts and…other things.
Hizashi’s not really sure how he wants Shouta to be reacting. Be upset, maybe? Shouta seems to accept his new body pretty easily, and never corrects new people when they refer to him by feminine pronouns. Hizashi gets the sense that Shouta wouldn’t care if he never flipped back to being male, and that makes him a little uncomfortable. If Shouta’s going to be happy as a woman, Hizashi kind of thinks that he should put a little more effort into his appearance. Shouta’s looks make more sense as a woman, but Shouta never does anything to capitalize on his new-found elegance.
Then again, Hizashi doesn’t know what he would do if Shouta did make any effort to dress up. The curves he can glimpse under Shouta’s ill-fitting clothes are already enough to distract him, and if Shouta ever wore anything that wasn’t three sizes too large for him, Hizashi thinks he might combust.
He doesn’t appreciate the impromptu existential crisis Shouta’s thrust upon him. He’s defined himself by his gender, and his attraction to women. Shouta’s easy acceptance of a new gender identity and the fact that Hizashi finds him hot as hell is starting to keep him awake, staring at the ceiling. Shouta’s always been his best friend, and Hizashi has always platonically adored him. Now, there’s an edge to it that Hizashi finds himself shying away from examining. Shouta’s going to go back to being male eventually; he has to nip whatever this in the bud before it really starts fucking with him.
No one seems to be reacting as strongly as Hizashi is to Shouta’s transformation – Shouta’s class just rolls with it, and still address him as “sir”, though Shouta doesn’t even react when other classes refer to him as “miss”. Nemuri keeps loudly insisting that people refer to her as a woman, and Nedzu has to talk to her after she keeps punching people who refer to her as a man. That’s kind of the baseline reaction Hizashi expects, and Shouta’s apathy is putting him on edge.
He had a standard for how he interacted with Shouta, an expectation of what their relationship was and would be. They would be best friends, stand up at each other’s weddings, live near each other, maybe spoil each other’s kids. He’d fully planned on forcing one of his kids to marry Shouta’s hypothetical spawn, so that way Shouta would never be able to escape. They’d go to the same retirement home and he’d steal Shouta’s dentures.
But now the edges of that plan blurs, and horrifyingly, the faceless wife Hizashi had imagined himself finding fades like a mirage. Instead, he’s just got the image of Shouta, blinking up at him from the ground. It’s a new definition to himself, another aspect to himself that he didn’t know he had, and Hizashi isn’t sure he likes it.