Chapter Text
From Fanboy to Boyfriend
Moving is a pain, but every bit of it was worth finally moving out of his old man's house. Todoroki dropped the last set of boxes on the counter before glancing around at his new apartment. It was still relatively empty; he still had a lot of work left to do on the apartment. However, he already felt more at home than he had living with his father.
Todoroki was working at Endeavor's Hero Agency for a couple years prior to moving to his new agency. Despite their rocky relationship, he wanted to train and learn as much as he could before leaving to pursue his own aspirations as a Pro-Hero. Despite his less-than-pleasant upbringing, he was still glad to use what his old man taught him. He was going to surpass him and be a hero he could be proud of. Their relationship had gotten slightly better since his high school days, but it still was not where it should be.
Thankfully, before he lost his mind, he got accepted to work at Pro-Hero D-U-I's agency. He had applied on a whim during one of the fights he had with his father, and they were the first ones to get back to him. He did not think he would receive such an opportunity to work at a well-respected agency and get away from his father. It was a well-known agency that was just started a couple years ago, yet it is almost on par with Endeavor's own agency in terms of quality of heroes. It had more up-and-coming heroes, so they were mostly relatively young. He was more than elated to take a job that required seeing less and less of Endeavor while gaining new experiences to further advance his career. He got to interview with two of the three Pro-Heroes in charge of the agency, and from what he gathered, they are very young (possibly even around his age) and passionate heroes. Uravity and Ingenium… were their hero names, if his memory serves.
While working at his father's agency for one too many years, he saw too much of his father every day. He was thankful to have a place where it was just his own space. Even if he wanted to live with a roommate, it was very frowned upon in society to reveal your civilian identity to anyone else as a Pro-Hero. The government wanted to make precautions to ensure the safety and identity of the Pro-Heroes who were risking their lives to protect the safety and peace of their communities. Their hero costumes tend to be more on the concealing side, especially their facial features and any quirk-revealing traits to help mask their identity. There is absolutely no reason for Pro-Heroes to reveal their civilian identities—especially the higher ranked ones—to anyone. This makes it easier for Villains to take advantage and attack heroes when they least expect it (or their loved ones). Of course, it is up to the hero themselves if they would like to reveal such confidential information about themselves to those who are close to them.
Even hero courses taught in high school were extremely exclusive and small to maintain confidentiality and identities from the masses and each other. It did not leave much options to interact with other aspiring heroes. If they were to have practice matches with others from different classes or schools, they were to always wear their hero costume.
Aside from his immediate family and cohort that he studied with (he had no choice in this regard since they saw each other daily), nobody else knew that he was Pro-Hero Shoto. He intended to keep it that way. Some people choose to disclose the information to very close friends, but he didn't have anyone like that. He grew up without friends, and he had no time to make any while training all the time. He was barely close to two of his classmates, but he did not maintain contact with them after graduation. He occasionally hears about them on the news. He believes that they both work at the agency he is starting at, but he's not too sure honestly.
While he still had a lot of stuff he had to unpack, he was supposed to start work early tomorrow. He supposed that the rest of his stuff can wait, as he dug out his futon and toiletries. By the time he finished brushing his teeth and laying down on his futon, he fell asleep almost immediately.
Midoriya Izuku hears the chatter speculating details of the new hire the moment he walks through the doors of the agency. He knows that there's a new hero starting today and that the hero will be working under him to fill a vacancy in his department. However, he actually does not know their name yet. He forgot to ask Uravity or Ingenium for the hero's name. He figures that he'll probably find out once he sees the new hero anyway, so it does not really matter since he trusts Uravity and Ingenium's hiring decisions. He had a feeling Uravity was also hiding something from him, but he has just learned to not question her tendencies. It is quite unusual that they kept the name hidden from him for so long. Even though the three of them were partners, he rarely gets involved in the hiring process for a variety of reasons. The most recent round of interviews was no different.
If he could remember correctly, Midoriya came back to his office that day—completely sweaty and sticky from his most recent assignment. While he really enjoys his work as a Pro-Hero, this was just one of those days. He spent an hour chasing down a villain who attacks with slime and gooey substances. Unfortunately, most of this will require much more time to get rid of than he suspected. And most unfortunately, he will have to miss out on sitting through the final round of interviews for potential new hires. He was too preoccupied for the past week running after villains to even look through the names of heroes interviewing that day. He repeatedly apologized to his fellow partners Uravity and Ingenium for the mishap, but they are completely understanding like usual.
Pro Heroes Deku, Ingenium and Uravity met each other in high school and immediately became close friends. Upon graduation, they decided to start their own hero agency together, employing mostly younger upcoming heroes that have the potential to make it big. They had no idea that their agency would turn out as big as it did in just a few years.
Since Pro-Hero Deku is requested for more assignments across the city as the Number 1 hero, he tends to be busier fighting villains and skip out on the administrative tasks. While Uravity focuses more on search and rescue missions, rather than taking on villains head on, Ingenium is particularly excellent at taking on the administrative tasks and filling in wherever necessary. Ingenium occasionally leaves the tasks to their assistants too if he is needed out on the field. However, he prefers working with heroes directly and doing work around the agency rather than field work. It was nice that the three of them have three areas of interest and expertise that makes managing an agency easier.
After cleaning himself up that day, Midoriya came into the conference room to discuss hiring decisions with Ingenium and Uravity. Ingenium typically is most involved in the hiring process, but he usually runs the decisions by Uravity and Deku anyway—just so they know who is being hired. If Midoriya is not present to meet the potential heroes himself, Ingenium and Uravity will try to hide the name from him just to keep things impartial and talk only about their discussions during the interview and their background. They believe that his fanboying tendencies may cause biases when hiring bigger name heroes. In general, Midoriya has more knowledge about all upcoming and current heroes than anyone else—even the ones that are more underground or less popular. As a precaution, it is simply easier to just hide the hero's name from him. There are times where Ingenium and Uravity will not let him sit in on interviews because he knows too much about each potential candidate to be impartial. That's probably the biggest reason why they're always okay with him missing the interviews here and there, he figures.
He vaguely remembers the details of all the potential hires after being bombarded with information from the interviews and resumes. However, there was a hero who previously worked with Endeavor's agency. He had some pretty impressive talents, but Ingenium and Uravity were unwilling to disclose his quirk to him. They said it would give away the hero immediately. However, they were both intrigued by the hero—much like himself. They ended up choosing that hero as their final candidate, for his incredible background and existing work in the field. Midoriya didn't know his quirk, but Ingenium and Uravity insist that it is extremely powerful and unique.
Uravity came by his office the moment he walked inside. "Deku-kun, are you excited?" Uravity was leaning on the doorframe to his office with a playful smile on her lips.
His draped his coat on the back of his chair slowly; his hand made its way to the back of his neck as he chuckled softly. "About the new hire for my department?"
"I assumed you would be more excited about it." At this, Midoriya was still confused. He still had no clue what she was referencing.
"I mean I'm excited that we're no longer short-staffed," he answered slowly.
Uravity gave him a weird look before finally remembering something. "Ah! I forgot that I have not mentioned his name to you yet." If possible, her smile grew brighter and wider. "Pro-Hero Shouto," she started slowly, as if waiting for his reaction, "you're a big fan of his, aren't you?"
At the mention of the name of his favorite hero—aside from All-Might of course—Midoriya's eyes widened and lit up like a Christmas tree. "Yes! I just think it's sooooo cool how he has two quirks, and he just seems so mysterious and aloof. But it's super amazing how he fights with villains strategically. He has great control over his quirk, but what makes him cool isn't his strong quirks… it's also due to how he uses it against other villains. In his most recent battle—"
"Deku-kun," she interrupted his rant, knowing that it might take a while for him to stop talking if she let him ramble on about Pro-Hero Shouto. He still was not comprehending where she was getting at. "He's going to be working with us now. Remember that one hero Ingenium and I interviewed the other day that we felt had a lot of potential… well that was him. You agreed with our decision after we told you about him. That's why we didn't want to tell you about his quirk because he's the only one registered with that quirk. You would have known right way, considering how much you follow his work and analyze other heroes in general."
Midoriya's jaw dropped considerably. His hands froze, gripping the back of his chair tightly. His heart started beating out of his chest. There was no way he heard that correctly. "Pro-Hero Shouto? H-here?" he managed to ask. Then, his face turns into one of understanding and starts rambling again. "When you mentioned his name, I didn't think he was our new hire. During the interviews, you just mentioned it was a hero from Endeavor's agency. I was wondering why they would leave such a high-paying position just to come to our agency. It makes sense that it would be Pro-Hero Shouto… even if it's not very prominent in the media since Endeavor's press team does a good job of hiding this fact, but I think it was listed on an independent hero forum once deep down in the comment section somewhere… and if you watch enough interviews with Hero Shouto, you'll notice that his face twitches slightly whenever anyone mentions their connection to each other. It's really subtle though, so I don't think other people would pay attention…"
He did not mention to her that he met him in high school briefly during a tournament, and Hero-Shouto confided about his tragic past to him after Midoriya confronted him about using his full power in battle. Of course, even though both of their personal identities were supposed to remain a secret, he knew that it was definitely Pro-Hero Shouto that he fought against when he was younger. Since Midoriya followed Hero Shouto's career for so long since the incident, it was hard to mistake it for anyone else—his quirk and fighting mannerisms were so unique. It was an incident he remembered quite fondly, which is why he kept it a secret for so long. Since then, he has been particularly fond of the hero, following all his stories since he became a more prominent hero. Who would have thought that he would get the chance to get to know him directly like this?
Uravity nodded. She smiled a little at his enthusiasm. "Yeah, he's coming here to start at 9 AM. But I just wanted to remind you to be professional… since he is working under you," she teased. "I know he's your celebrity crush, after all."
Midoriya immediately flushed. "He's not my celebrity crush," he denied promptly. However, he was extremely excited and could hear his heart pound loudly in his chest thinking about officially meeting one of his favorite heroes.
Uravity just rolled her eyes at his denial. "Yeah, sure Deku-kun." She went on to talk about something she witnessed during her morning commute, but he was only half paying attention. Wow. Hero-Shouto is going to be working with him. His inner fanboy could barely contain his excitement.
This is going to be so exciting!