Chapter Text
When people first glance at Shouji Mezou, the idea that he likes to cuddle seems unfathomable.
Tall, muscular, imposing, intimidating, these are the basic adjectives people have labelled him with, with the list going even further if not listed to not bore you this early. Even as a young child whose quirk had just manifested, his six arms have been a source of nervousness and outright fear amongst his peers.
His signature mask, covering most of his face save for his hair and eyes, which he had begun to wear as he grew older, did nothing to abate the unnerving aura he radiates.
Let me tell you though, all this fear and uneasiness is unwarranted.
Beneath that terrifying aura, Shouji has an extremely soft heart.
Gentle, kind, great with people and selfless - those are the adjectives that rightfully should be the ones to describe Shouji.
And, not to forget, that he loves to cuddle.
Though to be frank...that has been hard. And you can blame his terrifying aura for that.
Don’t get me wrong, Shouji has no difficulty making friends with those who are able to see past his intimidating looks. But while there is a closeness between him and those in his circle, the level of intimacy that comes with cuddling don’t usually come from friends. Sometimes, yes, but not always. And not with Shouji’s situation, for that matter.
Usually, Shouji isn’t one to complain, but there are those moments in his life where he craves for the warm intimacy from cuddling with someone.
He is one huge softie, so sue him.
Even when he set his sights on furthering his education at U.A. High School, his inner desire for bodily warmth did not abate.
Especially when a green-haired broccoli boy came falling out of the sky and into his arms. Literally.
The U.A. practical entrance exam is one of controlled chaos. Those with hopes of earning a spot in the school’s coveted heroics course battle against giant mechanical robots bearing points that will eventually sift through the stock to narrow down to the most eligible. Quirks are used freely and without restraint.
Shouji thought he is doing a decent job so far. If his mental calculations hadn’t failed him, he is at 30 points so far. Atop one of the fake buildings that make up the imitation city that is the battle centre, Shouji ponders his next move as his fellow candidates fought it out below.
A two-pointer robot swoops towards him. Shouji takes it out with a roundhouse kick which sends it careening towards another building across the road. That’s 32 points so far.
Settling back down, Shouji ponders how to bump up his score.
The answer comes rolling in, inciting panic among the candidates.
Shouji hears the screams. He peeks over the edge to see other candidates running. He turns to see what are they running from, and his heart drops.
A massive robot, looming over the city blocks, a massive ‘0’ painted on its front, is rumbling down the road towards the fleeing candidates, knocking into buildings and kicking up dust in huge quantities.
Shouji now understands their haste to escape.
And he shares that same sentiment. There’s no point trying to take on this hulking piece of metal, it wouldn’t benefit him.
Until it indirectly did.
Just as he turns around to book it like his fellow candidates, Shouji notices activity happening away from the fleeing candidates. Peering over the side again, he sees something unimaginable.
There is a girl, with light brown hair. She is trapped by some fallen debris, her leg stuck. The zero-pointer robot is rumbling closer. Any closer, and she’ll be crushed, Shouji realises.
But some distance away, there is a boy, with curly green hair, wearing a turquoise tracksuit and red high-top sneakers. He appears to be crouching down, powering up like an engine revving before ignition. What the boy does next blows Shouji’s mind.
Like a bullet fired from a gun, the green-haired boy shoots into air, blowing away the dust clouds around him. As he flies towards the zero-pointer robot, he pulls back a clenched fist that is glowing with red fluorescent streaks.
And with a loud, “SMMMMMAAAAAASSSSSHHHHHH!!!!”, he punches the zero-pointer with such an explosive force that the hulking machine is thrown backwards with a huge hole to the face.
Shouji watches dumbstruck as robot self-destructs, and explodes into a crumpled mess that crashes back onto the road with a colossal roar, shaking the ground like a small earthquake. As the dust clears, Shouji quickly notices another problem.
The boy had shot high up into the air to decimate the robot. But what goes up must come down. And down came the boy, screaming as he fell like a rock.
Shouji immediately sees how wrecked the boy’s limbs have become after such an explosive attack. Flopping about uselessly as he falls, there is no way he can use them to protect himself from the coming impact with the ground.
So Shouji does something that can only be described as dangerously reckless and insane.
Stepping backwards, he takes a running leap, and jumps off the building he’s on into the air.
Spreading his arms out to catch the wind, he is airborne for a moment, before he begins a downward glide.
The ground quickly approaching, Shouji reaches his foremost set of arms out to catch the falling boy. The moment they intercept can only be seen by those watching as one of sheer luck at such a height. It had been either a hit or a miss.
Thankfully, it is a hit.
With the boy safe in his arms, Shouji braces for the impact.
Growing out more arms to cocoon his charge, Shouji curls in around the smaller boy as he smashes into the side of a building with a loud crash. His bones scream from the force of the collision, his mind shaken from the sudden stop. He sticks to the side of the building for a second, before sliding down to the ground, still curled around the boy.
Shouji stifles a groan. God, did that hurt!
There he lay on the debris-riddled sidewalk, thoroughly in pain, but alive. The green-haired boy in his arms trembles from the adrenaline pouring from his broken body.
Footsteps race towards them.
“Oh my god, are you two okay?!”
Shouji recognises the voice from the brunette who was trapped in the zero-pointer’s path. He rolls over to meet her worried eyes. The other candidates mill around, watching the scene.
“I think so…”
Another voice echoes across the fake city.
“Time’s up listeners! That’s all you have!”
Shouji barely registers the voice as Present Mic’s, bringing the practical exam to a close. The brunette speaks again.
“Can you move? Is anything broken?”
Shouji isn’t sure if he had broken anything when he crashed into the building. He did, however, feel the green-haired boy go still in his arms, losing consciousness.
Screw his own bones, the boy needs medical attention now!
“Medic…we need a medic here…” Shouji manages to grit out in pain.
Right on cue, a high-pitched, elderly voice cut through the suspense.
“Well done, everyone. You all did well.”
Recovery Girl, the youthful medic hero, has arrived. She goes around to the candidates, planting kisses to heal whatever injuries they sustained.
“Come, come, have some gummies.”
The brunette calls out to her, “Recovery Girl! We need your help quick!”
“Ara…what happened here?”
Recovery Girl ambles over to Shouji.
“Oh dear me, are you alright, sonny?”
“I’m fine…” Shouji replies, “But he…isn't…”
His arms shift and retract, bringing the green-haired boy back into the world.
Recovery Girl’s eyes widen in shock, “Goodness me, what happened to him?”
“He saved me,” the brunette explains, “My leg was stuck under debris as the zero-pointer was coming. He catapulted into the air and destroyed the robot with a single punch. But his limbs were completely wrecked from the blowback. Then-”
She glances at Shouji, “Sorry, what’s your name?”
“Shouji.”
“Then as he was falling, Shouji-kun leapt off a building and caught him in mid-air,” the brunette continues, “Shouji-kun then crashed into a building, while protecting him from the impact.”
Recovery Girl tut-tutted, “Such recklessness, I swear to all that is holy I will wring Nezu’s neck if it is the last thing I do…”
The medical heroine sighs, before composing herself back into professionalism, “No matter, nothing to worry about, my dears. A kiss each should fix things up right away.”
Recovery Girl leans forward, and presses her lips onto one of Shouji’s arms and the green-haired boy’s forehead. Shouji immediately feels her quirk work its magic, the pain and soreness his body had been subjected to washing away like a receding wave. The other boy’s mangled limbs also began to heal, returning to proper angles, the skin on the wreck arm reforming as it went.
Shouji then feels the lethargy hit him, the side-effect of Recovery Girl’s quirk. She offers him a few gummies for his troubles.
“Take them, you’ll feel much better quickly.”
Shouji takes the candy, forms a mouth from his free arm, and pops them in.
Recovery Girl scans the still-unconscious green-haired boy.
“Hm…he still displays the effects of quirk overuse,” she mutters to herself, “Better get him to infirmary just in case.”
She turns to Shouji, “Keep him still, will you? I’ll call the medi-bots here.”
“Yes, Recovery Girl.”
The elderly medical heroine goes off to the side, speaking into the intercom in her headpiece. Shouji sits up, keeping the unconscious boy still in his arms.
He glances down at the boy. His emerald-green hair is a mess of curls, crowning over a face that still had traces of baby fat around the cheeks and a smattering of freckles dotting from the bridge of his nose and spreading across his face.
He’s cute.
Shouji is surprised that his brain had come to such a conclusion. But he isn’t going to deny it, that’s for sure. The boy really is cute.
And, if his senses aren’t deceiving him, the boy is burrowing slightly into his chest, as if trying to curl into his warmth.
Shouji’s mind shuts down, and his heart begins to sing.
Beneath his mask, a soft blush spreads over his cheeks, and his hidden mouth stretches into a contented smile. His eyes flutter shut, and moe flowers start flying all around in heaps, littering the debris-riddled street and getting into people’s faces. Someone chokes when they swallow a flower by accident.
Safe to say, no one watching the scene quite knows how to react, especially about the flowers that just keep coming and coming.
Undeterred by the fact that she is waist-deep in flowers, Recovery Girl turns to the battle centre’s entrance gate, “Ah, right on time.”
Two medi-robots, holding a stretcher, zip into the scene, kicking up a wind that blows away all of the flowers. Shouji opens his eyes, his smile fading away behind his mask.
“Shouji-kun, please put the boy on the stretcher,” the elderly heroine instructed.
Shouji wanted to scream his refusal to hand over the boy, to never let go of his new cuddle buddy and hightail out of the centre with the cinnamon roll in his arms into the sunset. But his better judgement reins in his emotions before he can make a complete fool of himself.
He barely knows the boy beyond their equally-reckless stunts from earlier. Heck, he doesn’t even know the boy’s name!
He’ll need to go into this slowly.
And so, it is with great reluctance that Shouji gets up, walks over to the medi-bots, and gently places the unconscious boy onto the stretcher. His hands linger, before pulling away entirely.
Recovery Girl joins the robots, “That is all, everyone. You’re dismissed.”
With that parting note, she ambles off towards the gate, the medi-bots trailing beside her with their cargo.
Shouji watches them disappear through the gate, ignoring the sounds of his fellow candidates as they slowly make their leave, chatting with one another over the events of the exam.
About the green-haired boy. And him.
“I hope he pulls through this quickly…” the brunette from earlier hopes earnestly.
Shouji shares the sentiment.
Also, he hopes that the boy, whoever he is, gets into the hero course.
He really wants to see him again, and learn his name.
The name of his first-ever cuddle buddy.
To Be Continued.