Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Naomasa sat at his desk and looked at the grainy security camera footage that was sent to his laptop. It was of a recent villain attack this morning. Nothing really interesting happened, the usual stuff that’s to be expected. Except for what happened at the very end, while the villain was being arrested. The villain was temporally knocked out and restrained. Soon after he woke up and tried to use his quirk only to find it wasn’t working. He was a bit hysterical, (especially since there is no means to supress quirks unless you have someone like Eraserhead on the scene, which he is not by the way) but it was swiftly dealt with.

Similar incidents like this have happening for quite some time now, with villains losing their quirk for a few days or weeks, to some never getting their quirk back. What makes it all the more frustrating is that it’s only in the past 1 or 2 years that police have actually caught onto this, for the simple fact that these incidents have been happening more frequently the last few years. If every case that was reported to have villains losing their quirks just before or after capture, only to get them back in most cases, then it goes back almost 5 years. Which leads to the question, is someone taking their quirks? If so then that leads two possibilities: the first being a vigilante of sorts, the second and more dangerous option is that the man Toshinori told me about is taking them. But that then leads to the question why give the quirk back? Hell, why even take it in the first place, if it’s going to come back anyway? That rules him out then, which is great cause he’s meant to be dead anyways…I hope.

So that leaves us with the first possibility of vigilantism. Based on the previous cases that have been documented, villains seem to only lose their quirks when heroes are around already fighting them. Second there is always a crowd no matter how big or small. Third, there have been no reported cases were a villain loses their quirk before the heroes arrive. And finally, all cases happen during daylight and all cases happen within Musutafu. So whoever is doing this isn’t actively seeking villains out, but is definitely seeking out fights between heroes and villains. And given how much coverage the fights get, it’s not very hard for them to find them.

As he thinks this, something catches his eye. Naomasa looks at the crowd of people watching the fight in the corner of the screen and rewinds and plays the footage. There, just barely in the line of sight of the camera, an arm shoots out slowly towards the direction of the villain as he started to wake again the heroes aren’t paying the villain any attention as they still thought he was knocked out at that moment. The hand out stretches and makes a grabbing motion and pulls away, all in a very quick and deliberate motion. The arm then disappears back into the crowd. Just before the arm could completely disappear however, a mop of green hair wearing a black uniform and yellow backpack can be seen for just a moment attached to said arm.

“It looks like we might finally have a lead.”

><><><><

I just made it. Izuku thinks to himself, as he quickly steps into the classroom, just before the bell rang signifying the start of the school day. Quickly he sits down, no one pays him any attention. While waiting for their teacher to arrive he looks at his closed hand. In his hand he can feel a light weight sitting there, although there isn’t anything actually there. I really cut it close coming in late with taking that villains quirk. But it looked like he was going to break out of those restraints so it was definitely a good idea. I’ll give it back in a few days.
Izuku slowly brings his fist to his chest, making sure no one is watching. He focuses on the weight in his hand and shifts it into his chest, where he can feel other similar weights there. There’s something comforting about having the weights inside him.

The homeroom teacher some comes in and begins to take roll call. While he does this, Izuku takes out his hero notebook and starts filling it out about the new heroes Kamui Woods and Mt. Lady. He doesn’t notice when the teacher starts talking about high school applications and everyone starts using their quirks.

“You’re also going for U.A., aren’t you Midoriya?” The teacher says, with a thin strained smile.

That catches his attention, and silences everyone else simultaneously. As he slowly looks up everyone looks to him. No one says anything for amount. Not sure what to say. Some smile, but its strained.

“W-wow Midoriya…” someone says, unsure what else to say. Others making similar remarks, trying not to make eye contact.

“So you and Bakugou will be going to U.A. together then.”

Bakugou makes a tsk noise and doesn’t turn around.

The awkward atmosphere quickly disperses when the teacher starts the morning classes.

Izuku tries to think nothing of strained looks on his classmates and awkward silences. He used to it. Ever since his quirk manifested, people have had trouble trying to talk to him. Hell, even being in the same room as him, makes people kind of jumpy. Their all somewhat anxious around him because their afraid of setting him off or annoying him. No one will out right say it, but in the whispers they think he can’t hear or when he just enters or leaves a room, he hears them. Their scared of his…villainous quirk. Not that he can really blame them.

You see Izuku’s quirk is called Take All. When he makes physical contact with someone he can forcibly take away some ones quirk, and store it within himself. However he cannot use the quirk he has taken for himself. He can if he so chooses give the quirk back when he touches that person again. Thankfully, none of his classmates know that he actually doesn’t need touch to take the quirk away, so long as they aren’t too far away from him he can take it. It just takes longer for him to do it that way, whereas touching someone will allow him to take it instantaneously.

He’s quirk is believed to be a mutated version of his mother’s very strong telekinetic quirk. Although on the quirk registry it says it a weak version that can only pull thing towards her, she can actually move any size object in any direction she wants. She just never bothered to update it.

Izuku didn’t bother either with updating his either. Believing that when he became a hero if a villain ever got their hands on his quirk registry he could still have the upper hand in some way.

At the end of the day, while Izuku was putting away his books, Bakugou approached him. He didn’t say anything until everyone else left the room.

“So, you’re planning on going to U.A., huh Deku.” Bakugou’s says, more like a statement rather than a question. There’s no real bite to the childish nickname either. Before Izuku can say anything he continues.

“Well even if you do get in, it doesn’t matter, I’m still going to be the next number one hero.” he lets of a few sparks from his hands and storms out the door.

For all the years that Izuku has known Bakugou, he still finds it hard to figure him out at times. Over the years, they grew more distant from each other, but they still referred to each other with their childhood nicknames. Bakugou thankfully doesn’t treat him like he’s carrying some dangerous virus either but more so like a rival. Which is fine, it’s nice to have someone outside his family treat him as normal.

Just as he leaves the school grounds, Izuku’s phone vibrates. It’s a text from his dad, asking if he can get some stuff from the local grocery store, before he came home. Easy enough, he was going to go visit his mom anyway and the store is in the same direction. So he heads to store and gets what he needs. As he heads in the direction of his mom, he walks under the street bridge. Thinking about the fight from earlier he doesn’t hear the sounds coming from underneath the sewer manhole. With a bang the lead shoots up and hits the tunnel ceiling. Suddenly being brought of his thoughts, Izuku stumbles as he turns around to see green sludge appear with two large eyes looking at him and an even larger mouth of teeth.

“A medium-size body to hide in” the sludge gargles. Caught off guard, Izuku tries to get away, but isn’t fast enough. The sludge sweeps him of the ground and raps around him.

“Relax kid, I’m only hijacking your body.” He cackles. “After 45 seconds it won’t hurt anymore.”

In a moment of panic Izuku let’s slip the quirks inside his chest. Panicking he flails trying to get the sludge out of mouth and nose. I don’t want to die, I don’t to die… he repeats over and over in his head. Before he can even think it though, Izuku shoots his hand upwards where he can feel the villain’s quirk and grabs it and immediately pulls his hand away. The sludge villain screeches as his quirk was forcibly taken from him. The sludge turns back into a man. Because of the sudden forced transformation back into his human form, the villain passes out from the pain it caused, releasing Izuku from he’s grip. Thankfully the villain had pants on him…somehow…

Izuku fell forward onto his knees and started coughing out his lungs, keeping his fist closed so as to not loss the quirk. When he managed to keep his lungs inside his body, Izuku looked over to the villain’s unconscious body and say that he was handcuffed.

When did he- Izuku cut himself off when he saw a man in a tan long coat and matching hat standing over the villain. He also had a rather plain looking face, with matching brown hair and eyes.
“What did you do exactly kid?” Said the man.

Chapter Text

Naomasa was passing through a suburban area, on his way to see if he could find any more information about the person that was at fight this morning, when he got an alert that a villain with a sludge-like quirk was in the area, snatching purses. There was an underpass nearby that immediately came to mind as a good spot for a villain to go unnoticed as they looted whatever purses and bag they took.

He wasn’t however expecting to find a civilian being attacked by the sludge villain when he got there. Quickly he radioed for back up, stopping the car in the middle of the road and jumped out, gun in hand.

He also wasn’t expecting to see what was about to happen. The civilian from what he could see through the sludge raised his arm and formed some sort of gesture with his arm. The villain momentary stopped, then immediately started screaming removing itself from the civilian he could now see was a boy. The villain also began to change from his sludge form into his human one, passing out in the process. The boy was coughing up what little remains of the sludge from inside him.

While the boy was heaving, Naomasa called in, saying that support wasn’t needed and just to send in an extra squad car to pick up the unconscious villain and a paramedic to check the kid over. He then proceeded to handcuff the villain. The kid seemed to have finally calmed down earlier and was now looking over the villain. He seemed to be a bit confused.

“What did you do exactly kid?” I asked. It seems he only just noticed me. He stares for a moment before saying

“I-ah, I erased his quirk.” He’s voice, a hoarse.

Lie.

“Hmm.” I look at him for a moment, taking in his appearance. Green hair and eyes, freckles, black uniform and yellow backpack. He a match to the suspect from the fight earlier today and can erase quirks. Looks like the day’s going to go easy on me for once. The second squad car and paramedic came quickly and the villain was carted away. The paramedic did a look over the kid and stated that he was fine.

After the paramedic finished up, I approached the kid again. He looked at me and he seemed a bit skittish.

“I am detective Tsukauchi Naomasa, may I ask what your name is?”

The boy pauses for a moment.

“Midoriya Izuku, detective sir” Midoriya says.

Truth.

“You can call me Tsukauchi, if you prefer. I’m going to need you to come down to the station to give a statement, and we have to call your parent or guardian then.”

Midoriya doesn’t look like he wants to go, but he nods anyways. We then make are way to my car. Midoriya sits in the back of the car and we drive down to Musutafu Police Station. I park my car in the staff car park, and we make are way inside. I have Midoriya sit down in one of the empty interrogation rooms so I can then grab the files on this morning’s fight as well as other incidents with villains losing their quirk. Have Sansa, a fellow officer with a cat head, do a quick background check and look up Midoriya’s quirk registry. I take Midoriya’s file from Sansa, but be I leave him he calls out to me.

“Oh, Naomasa, that villain with the gigantification quirk from this morning has his quick back, not too long ago, as well as a few others, but they were subdued before any serious problems occurred.”

I raise my eye brow at that new piece of information.

“When did they get their quirks back?

“Umm,” Sansa tilts his head to the side and hid ears twitch as he thinks. “Just around when you called in for back up for the sludge guy.”

I give a small smile to Sansa and thank him before entering the room.

><><><><

Midoriya is more or less calm when Tsukauchi enters the room, but still feels a little anxious having to sit inside an interrogation room and not out in the main foyer were they could just as easily get a statement from him.

“Now Midoriya, I would like you to recount the events leading up to and during the incident that took place earlier today.” Tsukauchi says to Midoriya. And so he does, telling him everything, from leaving the school to his dad’s text, to him going to the store, to then planning on visiting his mom, right up to when the sludge villain attacked him.

“It says here in your registry that your quirk is Take All. Could you tell me how it works?” Tsukauchi asks, already knowing the answer.

“Ah yes” Midoriya hesitates for a brief, almost unnoticeable moment. “My quirk lets me erase other people’s quirks. But I need physical contact for it to work.”

Lie and Half-Truth.

“That’s a very interesting quirk Midoriya, are you interested in becoming a hero?” Tsukauchi asks. Midoriya’s face lights up at the question and answers with a very confident yes. You don’t need a lie detector to know that was true, especially with such a bright smile. Unfortunately that smile isn’t going to stay on that face for long.

“Now Midoriya, you are aware that using your quirk outside of self-defence is against the law, correct?” it was poised as a question but obviously wasn’t.

Midoriya was caught off by the question and began sputtering when he tried to come up it a response. Before he could though, Tsukauchi continued on as nothing happened.

“You see Midoriya, this morning there was a fight between a villain with a gigantification quirk, and the heroes that responded to the situation. When the villain was captured and regained consciousness, he tried to activate his quirk, but was unable to do so. There was footage of the incident and you were in the footage making a grabbing gesture towards the villain as he awake, while the heroes were looking away. I would like to note I also say you make a similar gesture when the sludge villain had you in its grasp. Now then, would you please tell me why you lied to both me and on the quirk registry about your quirk?”

Midoriya was completely under prepared for the interrogation that just decided to happen and it was clear a day on his face. Before his brain could even form some sort of response, Tsukauchi decided to drop one more bomb.

“Also for the record Midoriya, my quirk is called Lie Detector and I will know when you do.” He says, all with an innocent smile on his face.

Midoriya, quickly realising that he can’t possibly get out of this all in one piece, caves under the detective’s sharp yet innocent stare. He sighs, not realising he was holding his breath, and tell the detective.

“For why I didn’t fill the quirk registration form properly, is because as I got older and came to understand my quirk better, I thought that when I become a hero, if a villain got my quirk information they could use it against me.” He say as he nervously scratches the back of his head.

“As for why I lied to you detective, it’s because everyone, aside from my mom, thinks my quirk is villainous and everyone shy’s away or avoid me altogether.”

So far he’s telling the truth.

“And why is that?” Tsukauchi asks, all of a sudden, feeling he doesn’t want to know the answer.

Midoriya looks down and bites his lip.

“It-its b-because, I can per-permanently take away their quirk and keep it for myself, either by touching the person or from a short distances away.”

Shocked, Tsukauchi looks at Midoriya as he looks anywhere but the detective. Midoriya continues on though.

“But I can’t use the quirks myself, I can only store them within me or in small objects.”

Tsukauchi quickly hides his shocked expression.

“What do you mean by you can take quirks from a distance and store them in small objects?”

“Ah, my quirk is believed to be a mutation of my mother’s as she has a telekinetic quirk and she can pull objects towards her, hence the why I can take quirks from a short distance away, but we don’t know where the other effect came from.”

The room remains quiet for a few more moments before Tsukauchi can compose himself.

“The incident this morning, why did you take the villains quirk?”

“I noticed that the villain was waking up and looked like he was about to break free, and none of the heroes ore police had paid any notice, so before I really thought it through, I took his quirk so to stop him from escaping. I was going to give it gave after a free days” he quickly added, “but when the sludge villain grabbed me I panicked and let go of the quirk.”

All True.

“Have you ever done this before?”

“Yes.”

True

“How long have you been doing this for?”

“I’m not sure exactly, but at least for a 5 or 6 years.”

True “That explains a lot actually. We’ve had several cases where villains have lost their quirks, only to get them back later.” Tsukauchi says. Midoriya shifts uncomfortably in his sit after hearing this.

“You do know that what your doing can be classed as vigilantism?”

“Yes sir.”

“Is there anything else you can tell me about your quirk?”

“Depending on the size of the object I can store multiple quirks in it. If the object takes damaged or is destroyed, the quirk will return to the original user. I can only store about 5 quirks at a time inside me, anymore and it puts me under serious strain and I’ll pass out and loss the quirks in me, but not if the quirk is already in an object. I can also sort of sense quirks around me like a radar, but I’ve never tested how far it reaches.” While he spook, Tsukauchi wrote everything down.

“Anything else?” Tsukauchi says and sees Midoriya shift his gaze away from the detective and places his hands on the table, in an attempt to stop fidgeting.

“Umm, I also have a note book at home where I keep a list of quirks I deemed too dangerous to give back. One quirk page with a small summary of the quirk and the original owner.”

Tsukauchi quickly finished writing and stood up from his chair.

“Wait here amount please Midoriya, I need to discuss some things with my supervisor.”

Midoriya nods at Tsukauchi as he leaves the room. Now that he’s left along Midoriya places his head on the steel table, going over in his head what on earth just happened and all the possible ways this can go until he mumbling an incoherent mess of words into an empty room.

><><><><

After what felt like for ever to Izuku (it was actually 30mins), Tsukauchi walks back in with another officer with a dog head. Izuku quickly sits back up and straightens himself somewhat.

“Good evening Mr. Midoriya, I am Kenji Tsuragamae, Chief of Police.” As he says this Midoriya can’t help but swallow his breath in anticipation.

“We should be arresting you for quirk use without a licence, and for vigilantism, but Tsukauchi and myself have come to an agreement that I think will benefit both of us, woof.”

“You’re not going to arrest me?” Midoriya asks, confusion written all over his face. wait, this he just woof?

“No, instead we’re going to give you a deal. In exchange for you not to go to a juvenile detention centre, since your underage and for none of this to appear on your permanent record, you will work for the police force as a type of consultant, to help us detain dangerous villains by taking their quirks and store then in notebooks or other objects that can’t be destroyed as easily, that the police will then hold onto. You will also report directly to Detective Tsukauchi for when you are needed or to ask permission from him in the event you are at a villain fight and can assist the local police force or heroes to detain them, but are to do it from a safe distance and only if no other suitable personnel are there, since you are a civilian. You will also be given a temporary quirk licence that must be renewed at the end of every month for this work and only this. Is that suitable for you Mr. Midoriya?” Chief Tsuragamae asks.

Midoriya was shocked. Then tears began to spring forth form his eyes. The detective and chief were taken aback by the sudden shift in emotions.

“…yea-yes, that’s… thank you so much sir!” Izuku all but shouts and immediately stands from his chair and does a perfect 90 degree bow at the hip.

“Wonderful to hear, woof.” The chief smiles at the boy. “You can start next week, but first, please bring in the notebook you mentioned earlier. We also need your parent permission, but I believe that shouldn’t be too hard.

Chapter Text

Announcement!

Hello my fellow Ao3 users. This is Cathanode speaking to you after god knows how long (a year and a half, if we’re going to be specific.)

I owe you all an explanation, and an apology to basically letting you all hang waiting for an update that was never coming.

Essentially what happened was I got lazy, and just never bothered writing.

When I initially started writing INSOMNIAC and The Collector, I was basically on a fanfic high, were I had been reading so much stuff on Ao3 I got it into my head that I should write all these wonderful ideas I have in my head without putting any real thought into what I was actually getting myself into.

After the initial first chapter release, I came down from the high and I didn’t know where the hell the stories where going. I had ideas but nothing concrete.

I’ve kind of got back into it again, but this time I’m actually going to put more actual (thought-out-a-plan) work into this. I’m probably going to overhaul the initial chapters, haven’t decided as of yet but I’ll think of something. I want a beginning, middle and an end to the stories I’m going to be writing, none of this, “I’ll keep writing idea’s without any definite ending in sight with an indefinite hiatus to boot”, cause if that’s the case I don’t think I’ll ever finish it or just drop it, leaving you all wanting more went I don’t want to give it. I feel like a jerk because of it. Which is why I’m posting this to being with, so I can both become more active and follow set goals, finish them on time (cause I procrastinate way too much), and help ease the responsibility induced guilt I feel that I owe you all an explanation, and you deserve more. Especially after all the positive comments and kudos I’ve gotten from you all.

When I got those initial comments and kudos, I felt a form of joy/gratitude I didn’t know I needed. You have no idea how happy I was when I got those. I was very nervous the first time I published online and I didn’t think anyone would actually like what I wrote enough to leave a comment or a kudos or hell, subscribe for more! It was a confidence boost I didn’t know I needed. And leaving you all without hearing a think from me for so long I felt guilty and kept pushing it off.

Wow I rambled quite a bit there, so in summary:

I’m sorry for the indefinite hiatus
I’m going to really try and work on these stories properly and possibly overhaul them.
I want to return the joy and positivity you guys gave me for reading, commenting and all the kudos you gave me, on my stories.
I have a lot more ideas I’d like to write, but we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.

If you managed to get through this long-ass ramble of an apology, thank you.
Cathanode.