Chapter Text
-----Izuku’s P.O.V.-----
“This better be worth it, Deku. If you lied to me, I’m gonna make you regret it,” Kacchan grunted angrily. He was sitting down against the wall across from Izuku, who was all but dancing in place in the middle of the room.
“It is! You’ll see! It’s only a minute away!” Izuku could feel the sun as it dipped lower and lower. It wouldn’t be long now.
Izuku’s mom, Midoriya Inko, sat on the couch watching TV, occasionally glancing at the two boys that were waiting for the sun to set. She couldn’t quite hide the small smile on her face, looking forward to what was about to happen.
“And why are you wearing a dress?”
Izuku immediately leapt to his own defense. “It’s not a dress! It’s a lion-cloth!” His mom had to cover her mouth to stop her laughter from being heard, but couldn’t quite stop her shoulders from shaking.
“It’s a ‘loin-cloth’, Izuku.” Mom turned her attention to Kacchan. “It’s because of how his Quirk changes him. You’ll see.”
Kacchan just folded his arms, still looking doubtful. He’d see soon enough. Then Izuku felt it. The sun had finally set.
Even now, days after the first change, he wasn’t used to it. His entire body tingled, and for a moment he couldn’t feel anything. Then, over the course of half a minute, he grew larger. His muscles expanded, giving his skinny body some definition. Tiny black wings grew out of his back, stretching out to a rather small three-foot wingspan. Bony spikes under his skin formed on his elbows, knees, and around his forehead. His ears elongated into a leaf-like shape. A two-foot long tail grew out of the base of his spine. The tips of his fingers sharpened into claws. His feet grew larger, and his entire foot was reshaped, making him walk on talon-like toes. His skin turned a green shade, slightly lighter than his hair. He couldn’t see it, but he knew his eyes were glowing white. As he finally reached his impressive height of three feet, ten inches—a colossal six inches taller than normal—he let out a mighty roar!
Mom finally couldn’t hold in her laughter at the squeaky-sounding roar, which caused Izuku to pout. It would be better when he was older! It wasn’t his fault he was still four!
Kacchan was starring at Izuku in awe. “That’s totally awesome! What can it do? What do you call it?”
Izuku promptly ruined the badass look he had been going for by grinning and sitting down in front of Kacchan. “I don’t know everything for sure, but I’m stronger, faster, tougher, and I will probably be able to fly when I get bigger.”
Kacchan looked disappointed. “You can’t fly?”
Shaking his head, equally disappointed, Izuku quietly muttered, “My wings are too small.”
With a face of determination, Kacchan nodded seriously. “Let’s find out how strong you are!”
The two boys spent most of that weekend doing all sorts of experiments during the night, only falling asleep when Mom finally forced them to stop and sleep so they wouldn’t completely ruin their schedules.
-----Izuku’s P.O.V.-----
[[The following scene was written to the awesome and inspiring music in this video. The voice at the beginning is also Goliath’s voice in this chapter and any time he’s Goliath instead of Izuku, though obviously not while he's younger. https://youtu.be/NyQwHPITom4]]
Izuku carefully shifted his body, letting the warm air currents of the city carry him. The dark night was as clear as day to him. He had to be careful about being seen flying around by a pro hero, since they tended to not like him flying around, but he couldn’t help it. The desire to protect was impossible to ignore.
A scream sounded in the night, but it almost immediately cut off. It was enough to attract Izuku’s attention though, and he flew toward the source. He had to look around for a minute to find the likely cause in an alley.
“Don’t worry, girlie. It’ll feel good after we get started, I’m sure.” The man was standing over a girl who couldn’t be more than fourteen, the same age as Izuku. She wasn’t moving at all, and her shirt had been taken off, leaving her in just a bra and shorts.
Izuku couldn’t see her clearly from where he was, but he saw enough. His eyes lit up as he let the anger flow through him, instinct driving him into a dive at the man. He let out a roar at the last second, causing the man to look up into the sky with eyes filled with fear. Izuku grabbed him under the arms, lifting him into the air and tossing him into an open dumpster that was sitting between the buildings. The man was unconscious by the time he fell inside.
Swinging back around in the air, Izuku carefully landed next to the girl, gently wrapping his wings around his shoulders as a sort of cape. The girl had long orange hair held back in a ponytail. She wasn’t moving at all.
To respect her privacy, Izuku averted his gaze from her nearly topless body and grabbed her shirt, gently covering her. She hadn’t moved, though her eyes were looking at him. “Can you not move?” Her eyes jerked from side to side. That was probably the best she could do.
Izuku grimaced. He couldn’t leave her here like this. “I’m going to pick you up and take you to the hospital, okay?” To his surprise, she seemed to be calming down, if her eyes were any indication. Most people seemed terrified of him.
She moved her eyes up and down, probably the closest thing to a nod she could do right now. Izuku gently knelt down to pick her up, pausing as he shifted her into a sitting position. Getting her shirt on was going to be difficult, but he couldn’t very well leave her in just her bra. He could feel the blush spreading over his face. “I’m going to help you get your shirt back on. I’ll try my best to not tear it.” It was times like this that made him wish he could change back into a human at night.
The girl seemed to hesitate for a moment—what little she could when all she could move was her eyes—before slowly doing the up-down-nod motion again. Taking that as permission, Izuku carefully removed her shirt and did his best to not stare at her red bra as he gently pulled the shirt over her head and breasts, pulling her arms out of the sleeves. It was embarrassing, and she was incredibly cute, but he was determined to be a gentleman after what almost happened to her.
After finally getting the t-shirt back on her, Izuku carefully lifted her into his arms and stood up to his full six-foot-eight height. He reached into the pouch on his waist and removed a blue-tooth headset that he placed in his ear before he walked over to an escape ladder. He began to climb, holding the girl easily in one arm; she weighed almost nothing to him. He noticed her beginning to blush as her head was pressed into his chest while he climbed. He hit the button on the blue-tooth to open the call he had set up for speed dial.
He left an anonymous tip on the would-be rapist to the cops, giving the location, before hanging up as he reached the roof. It was times like this he was glad his voice was so much deeper while in gargoyle form. Finally getting the space he needed, he carefully shifted the girl in his arms and spread his massive wings out to their full twelve-foot wingspan. “I’m going to be gliding, so try not to freak out. You’ll be perfectly safe.”
With a glance at her eyes to make sure she understood, Izuku leapt off the building into the thermals of the city. It didn’t take much time or effort to travel like this. He quickly managed to reach the hospital, approaching one of the open windows on the third floor. He stopped gently on the window sill and carefully folded his wings as he crouched to enter the room.
A voice spoke up from inside, catching his attention. “One of these days, I’m going to get you to use the door.” Izuku turned his attention to the doctor in the room.
“Sorry, Dr. Kenzo, but you know I can’t let just anyone see me.” Izuku walked over to the bed in the room. Technically, this was more of an office, but Hashimoto Kenzo kept the bed hidden behind a curtain, specifically because of Izuku. They had met years ago when Izuku saved him from a villain, carrying him out of danger just before Eraser Head arrived to stop the villain.
Ever since, the doctor had been helping to take care of Izuku and his occasional rescuee when needed. Officially, the hospital had no idea how these people kept getting in without going through the normal procedures. Unofficially, many members of the staff were well aware of the vigilante and his efforts to protect the local people. None of them were going to say anything about it though.
“So, what do we have this time?” The doctor asked as he approached the bed.
“Some guy was standing over her. He had taken off her shirt.” The glowing eyes Izuku gave him made it more than clear how angry Izuku was at the attempt. “I stopped him before he could do more, but she can’t move anything except her eyes. Must be a Quirk.”
Dr. Kenzo grimaced. “I won’t be able to do much for her, but I’ll keep an eye on her until she can move. I’ll see to it that she gets taken care of. You get out of here. You need to rest sooner or later.” The smirk on the man’s face told Izuku he knew as much as Izuku that sleep wasn’t something he ever got enough of, what with his nightly patrols.
As Izuku was at the window, about to jump out, a voice called out from the room. “T-t-thhh-an-k... y-ooou.” The voice was slow and strained, but it was clearly a girl’s voice. Turning back in surprise, Izuku saw that—while she couldn’t move—the girl had turned her head and was smiling at him. “N-n-n-na-me?” She could barely speak, but she clearly wasn’t scared of him. It was actually somewhat of a novel experience to Izuku.
With a gentle smile, he gave her his vigilante name, knowing better than to give his real one. “Goliath.”
-----Izuku’s P.O.V.-----
Izuku carefully wrote down his thoughts on Mt. Lady’s Quirk. He had a few ideas on how he might combat someone with that kind of Quirk, but he knew it would depend very heavily on being Goliath to deal with it.
Izuku’s impressive five-foot-eight muscle-bound body just couldn’t make up for the difference in power between him and such a powerful Quirk. He still pushed himself as hard as he could, working out, pushing his body to its limits and beyond to get as fit as he could. He had learned early on that his gargoyle body multiplied the abilities of his human body. He took martial arts classes three times a week on top of going to the gym every other day, except Saturday. Saturday was his day to just spend time with his mom and Kacchan after school.
Izuku was so focused on making his notes that he only tuned into what the teacher was talking about when his name was mentioned. “Oh yeah, Midoriya, you want to go to U.A. too, right?”
Izuku sighed as he knew what was coming. Most of the class immediately started laughing, making comments about how a “Quirkless kid like him” could never get into U.A.
Kacchan let off an explosion into the air, silencing the laughter. “Hey, you extras! Don’t you dare look down on him. Just because you’re too blind to see how far he’s come, doesn’t mean I’ll let you talk about him however you want. We’re going to dominate U.A. with ease! Even when he can’t use his Quirk, he gives me a challenge. With it, he’s my equal! None of you shitheads can even come that close!”
It was always like this. Izuku knew he could probably beat most of them in a fight outright without his Quirk. It wasn’t worth it though. Kacchan took offense to them insulting him though, and made sure to do his best to stop it. As long as Kacchan was around, nothing would ever happen.
After school ended, Kacchan and Izuku split up. Izuku had to get home to grab his karate uniform before they met up again for the after-school martial arts class they took together. He knew he was helping people as a vigilante already, but he still wanted to get into U.A. That meant he had to pass the entrance exam. He wanted to be an official hero.
Izuku had horrible luck. On one hand, Izuku had an incredible Quirk that (he knew from experience) put him on the same level as Kacchan. On the other hand, that only mattered at night. As long as the sun was in the sky, he was effectively Quirkless, aside from his ability to always know where the sun was and how long it would be until sunset.
Not even with all the skills he had and a body that was about as strong as a human could get would make up for not having a Quirk, not when it really mattered.
“A medium-sized invisibility cloak.”
Izuku was so caught up in his thoughts that he didn’t notice what was happening until it was too late. He spun around, taking a basic defensive stance as soon as he heard the voice. Before he could do anything, a giant mass of sludge leapt at him, wrapping around his body. He tried to grab a hold of it, but his hands slid right through. It began to force its way down his throat. “Don’t worry, I’m just going to take over your body. Calm down.”
Izuku most definitely did not calm down.
“It’ll only hurt for about forty-five seconds. You’ll feel better soon.” Izuku couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t get away. He couldn’t do anything. He was going to die. He knew it.
“Thanks for the help. You’re my hero.” That mocking voice made Izuku wish he could at least make his eyes glow with how angry it made him. At least as a gargoyle, he might have stood a chance. As just a Quirkless boy, there was nothing he could do. “I didn’t think he had come to this city.”
Izuku felt his body growing weak, everything getting darker. He wasn’t going to last much longer. “It’s all right now, young man.” That voice. It couldn’t be! “I am here!” Izuku struggled to focus his eyes to see him, but the voice told him what his eyes could not. All Might was here. “Texas Smash!”
Izuku finally passed out.
-----
After Notes: Behold, a rough reference for Goliath as he appears in this fic. He has Goliath’s hairstyle, but perhaps a bit shorter. While his face isn’t quite as square, it’s definitely NOT the baby-face Izuku has. It would be closer to a middle-ground between the two, so it's still clearly Izuku, just far more defined.
