Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Iida had volunteered Izuku to go shopping with him one chilly Saturday morning to restock Class 1-A’s communal fridge (which was somehow always empty at the end of the week).

So here they were, fitted with twin permission slips and armed with a metal cart, the two UA students walked up and down the aisles, looking for red peppers, chilis, and asparagus.

“And carrots, too,” Iida said, adjusting his glasses. He scrolled through the grocery list on his phone with extreme concentration.

Izuku saluted. “I’m on it, class rep!”

His friend beamed and moved to help him pick out the best carrots of the pile. It was times like these that made Izuku truly appreciate Iida as one of his closest friends.

“Look, look! It’s UA!” someone exclaimed, pointing in their direction. The heroes in training whizzed around at the shout, giving the young girl twin genuine smiles. Izuku waved shyly. He still had trouble interacting with the public in non-dangerous situations.

“I’m surprised people still recognize us from the Sports Festival, even without our school uniforms on,” he said, placing his bag of carrots in their grocery cart.

“Well, of course!” Iida replied, scouring the area for apples, his black messenger bag hanging from a shoulder. “We got broadcasted all over Japan, after all!”

“It’s kind of embarrassing,” Izuku admitted. “I didn’t do so well, remember?”

His close friend gave him a reassuring pat on the back. “Don’t worry! That means you can surprise everyone next year!”

“You’re right!” Izuku exclaimed, pushing the cart along. “Should we go check out now?”

“Not yet!” Iida replied, moving his hands up and down. “Amajiki-senpai’s birthday is coming up, right? Kirishima told me to buy him a present!”

Izuku grinned. His classmate had mentioned that he wanted to get their upperclassman friend one of those butterfly-themed aprons that always hung at the back of the store. “Right!”

A loud explosion halted their pleasant shopping experience, rocking the ground and sending canned foods off shelves. Izuku didn’t have to look at Iida for confirmation. Within a fraction of a second, the hero students abandoned their shopping cart and raced toward the smoke at the grocery store entrance.

“He ran out without paying!” a cashier informed them, ducking behind the register.

“Thank you, ma’am!” Iida shouted back, activating Recipro Burst—or was it Recipro Turbo, now? Izuku thought it was interchangeable—and speeding off after the villain. Izuku ran after him at a twenty percent Full Cowl, weaving between pedestrians and over low-hanging roofs to block off the man’s escape route.

It was a quick chase—their villain didn’t have a speed Quirk—so Izuku was able to capture him with Black Whip, throwing him against the pavement for good measure. Iida took off his gloves in order to tie him to a lampost in an intricate knot, grinning proudly.

“Good job, Midoriya!” he exclaimed, pumping a fist in the air. “Your quick thinking really saved us!”

Izuku beamed, fidgeting with the zipper of his teal All Might-branded hoodie. “You were really great with the capture tape, too!”

“Thank you!”

“Ah, shut up, would ya?” the villain grumbled, lolling his head back to face the hero students. His stolen goods tumbled onto the streets. “So loud. Who are you, anyway?”

“We’re UA students!” Iida answered, putting his hands on his hips in pride. “It would be wise for you to stay put: the police will arrive at any moment, now!”

Izuku patted down his pockets for his wallet, which contained his provisional license. He let out a sigh of relief when his hands felt the rectangular bulge in one of his back pockets.

“Future pro heroes, huh?” the man grumbled. “ Of course you are.” Then, he freed an arm from the tape—when had that happened?—and slapped Izuku’s ankle with it, sending a shockwave through his body. A feeling like Kaminari’s electric discharge hit him with a sudden dizzy spell, and when Izuku finally regained his bearings, the streets were unfamiliar and both Iida and the villain were gone.

“You like my Quirk?” the villain asked, sending a wild smile at Tenya Iida, who’d just seen one of his best friends disappear into thin air. “It’s called Vacation. Every person I touch with all five fingers disappears for twenty-four hours! It’s great!”

Tenya narrowed his eyes. How dare he catch Midoriya off-guard! He threw a kick at the villain, connecting with his head and throwing him unconscious. But as the man fell, his hand reached for the hero student, grabbing onto Tenya’s exposed wrist.

“I-Iida!” Izuku exclaimed, rushing over to stabilize his friend, who was clutching his head, dizzy and confused.

“Midoriya! You’re okay!”

Izuku frowned, letting his classmate stand on his own. “What happened? Was it the villain’s Quirk?”

Iida surveyed their surroundings. “Yes. He called it Vacation. Don’t worry, we’ll be back in Musutafu in twenty-four hours!”

They seemed to be in an urban area. Cars whizzed by the two high schoolers and people walked up and down the streets. Gray buildings and concrete parking garages towered over them and the sounds of traffic filled their ears.

“Ah, the bottoms of your pants are ripped up,” Izuku realized, looking down at his friend’s calves. “Do you have an extra pair?”

It was true: Iida’s engines burned through the fabric of his pant legs very easily, especially near the calves.

“I do!” his friend replied, shrugging off his messenger bag. “It’s always good to have an extra! I keep that and two sets of glasses in here, just in case!”

Izuku was impressed. He hadn’t thought about doing that. Maybe when One for All became strong enough, he’d have to start bringing extra sets of clothes everywhere as well. All Might mentioned something about having to do that once. “Maybe we can find somewhere for you to change?” he asked. 

Iida nodded. “And maybe somewhere to eat, too. It’s important for mealtimes to be consistent, and it’s already two in the afternoon!”

Izuku pulled out his own phone from its pocket, checking the time. Indeed, his screen read 2:04 pm, but something was off. “Hey, Iida,” he spoke up, narrowing his eyes at the screen, “does your phone have any connection? I have an outdated model, so it may just be me, but…” he trailed off.

“No, my phone doesn’t have a connection, either,” his friend answered. “Strange.”

“Let’s ask around,” Izuku suggested, surveying his surroundings. Shops and office buildings lined the busy streets. Something was strange, though, but Izuku couldn’t quite figure out why.

Iida pointed to a restaurant a few paces away, where a strong, meaty odor of noodle soup originated from. “Why don’t we get lunch, first?”

“Good idea,” Izuku replied, already following his classmate into the restaurant, which was mostly empty save for a few customers who barely batted an eye in the hero students’ direction.

Their server was a young man who seemed barely older than Izuku with black hair and plain features. His name was Daisuke Yamamoto and seemed almost amused as he sat them down at a table for two and asked for their drink preference.

Because Iida had gone to the bathroom to change his pants, Izuku ordered for the two of them. “Two waters, please.”

“Ah, I see. Sorry if this may sound intrusive,” their waiter said, “but are you two headed for that anime expo this weekend?”

“The what?” Izuku asked.

“Ah, nevermind,” Yamamoto said. “You two really resemble characters from this show my girlfriend forced me to watch, but I guess I was just thrown off by your hair. Did you dye it yourself? It’s gelled, right? How do you get it to look so natural?”

Izuku was confused. “What do you mean?” he asked.

“I’m back!” Iida announced, marching up to their table. “Have you ordered yet, Midoriya?”

“Ah, no,” Izuku replied. “You wanted the beef stew, right?”

“Of course!” his friend answered. 

Izuku turned to their waiter. “Oh, do you serve pork cutlet?” he asked.

“We do.”

The hero student smiled. “I’ll take one of those. Thank you!”

Yamamoto walked away from their table muttering something like, “Yep, definitely cosplayers,” clutching his notepad tightly in his hands.

“He should take a break,” Iida remarked, sitting up straight in his seat like he was in class. “Jobs like these can be stressful!”

“You’re right,” Izuku said, bowing a little in thanks as their drinks were served. 

His classmate frowned, taking a quick survey of the room to make sure no one was within listening distance. Then, he leaned over the table, clutching his glass of water like it was his lifeline. “Midoriya,” he spoke up, adjusting his glasses with his free hand, “I haven’t seen a mutant-type since we got caught up in that villain’s Quirk.” His voice was low, and his tone was completely serious. 

Izuku realized that his friend was right. They hadn’t encountered anyone like that.

“Come to think of it, the waiter asked me about my hair earlier,” he said. “Everyone around seems to have black or brown hair, like yours, Iida. Come to think of it, the villain said that people he touched disappeared for two days, right? It seems that even he didn’t know where his victims were sent. Maybe it’s short-term time travel?”

“Midoriya,” Iida said.

“Could we be in an era before Quirks? But time-travel Quirks are rare and usually don’t mess with more than a minute or so at a time. Maybe his was just more powerful? No, he was an older man, so it wouldn’t make sense if we consider Quirk Singularity.”

“Midoriya,” Iida said.

“Maybe he boosted his Quirk with drugs? Endeavor said that they were less common than before, but Quirk-boosting drugs still do exist. But how much can—”

Midoriya!” Iida said.

“Huh?” he asked.

Their waiter was walking toward them, carrying twin ornate bowls of food and gawking at the hero students, wide-eyed and horrified. Izuku turned to the waiter and apologized sheepishly, but he couldn’t shake the feeling that there was something he was missing—

Yamamoto tripped on the tile floor, falling forward, and suddenly Izuku was there in a burst of Full Cowl, taking the tray of bowls from his shaky hands and catching the waiter mid-fall. 

“Are you okay?” Izuku asked.

“Are you actually Izuku Midoriya?” Yamamoto asked.

The hero student in question winced. “Ah, so you watched the sports festival, too? Wait—”

Their waiter let out a strangled gasp of terror.

They ended up offering Yamamoto a seat. Business was unusually slow, anyway, and the young waiter didn’t have much else to do, especially since he only had two customers in the restaurant at the moment.

“S-So you’re M-Midoriya,” Yamamoto stuttered, pointing to Izuku before moving his shaky finger, “s-so that makes you, ” he pointed at his classmate, “T-Tenya Iida.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you,” the class rep said, bowing.

“How do you know our names?” Izuku asked their new friend, picking up a clump of rice and pork between his chopsticks and taking a bite. The food was heavenly. The eggs tasted sweet and salty on his tongue, and the sauteed onions complemented the pork in such a perfect way that the—

“Midoriya,” Iida said.

“Ah, sorry!” Izuku exclaimed, feeling his face go red with embarrassment. He had been analyzing his food, again.

Yamamoto tried to hide his staring. “It’s alright,” he said, typing up something on his phone before turning its screen to face the hero students. “I recognized you because of this, by the way.”

Izuku was staring at himself in 2D.

“Oh no,” he said, covering his face. He suddenly wanted to be anywhere but here.

“‘My Hero Academia,’” Iida read the title of the digital promotional poster. “What is this, a TV show?”

Yamamoto nodded. “Yeah. I asked your friend earlier if you two were going to that convention going on in Tokyo.”

“Huh. Interesting!” Iida exclaimed, picking up some noodles with his chopsticks. “We’re characters in an anime, Midoriya! And it looks like you’re the main character!”

“This is awful,” Izuku insisted, unable to look at Yamamoto, who probably knew about all the All Might merchandise in his room despite never meeting him in person before. 

“So this world doesn’t have Quirks?” Iida questioned.

“Nope,” Yamamoto answered. “Would be cool, though, right?”

The conversation topic segued naturally, and suddenly they were talking about less frightening things, like the weather, the date—”March 2020?” Iida asked. “Definitely pre-Quirk era.”— and Yamamoto’s aspirations to study abroad in Brazil for university. Before they knew it, an hour had passed and both Iida and Izuku had finished their food.

“Ah, where do we put this?” Izuku asked.

“That counter over there,” Yamamoto replied, pointing at a shelf a few paces away from where they sat. By now, the front of the restaurant was empty save the three teens and a woman with their back turned to them, talking loudly on the phone.

“I’ll take your bowl, Iida,” Izuku said, and he decided to show off a little bit, stacking the bowls before using Black Whip to carry their tray of trash to the designated counter. Iida sent him a look but didn’t say anything: after all, there were no laws against public Quirk usage if no one had Quirks, and Izuku couldn’t break these rules if there weren’t any to begin with.

He idly wondered about how society functioned. Maybe he wouldn’t have been teased and bullied so much for ten years, tired of his own disability. Here, he would have been normal.

Yamamoto gaped, his jaw dropping in pure shock. Izuku suddenly realized that using his Quirk in front of someone who hadn’t seen one, ever, might not have been a good idea.

“Ah, sorry,” he apologized, “that was insensitive of me, I—”

“What was that?!” the other boy exclaimed. “I thought your Quirk was One for All!”

Izuku froze. Black Whip pulsed wildly then disappeared.

“One for All?” Iida asked.

“Oh man, I forgot!” Yamamoto cried out, burrowing his head in his arms. “I’m an anime-only! Of course there would be unforeseen developments in the manga—”

“The manga?” Iida asked.

Izuku held back a scream.

The waiter groaned. “—and I just got spoiled, didn’t I?” 

Izuku and Iida walked out of the restaurant with more questions than they had when they went in. 

“So we’re in a world where we’re manga characters!” Iida exclaimed. “Interesting! We must find a bookstore immediately to see if this is true!”

Izuku pulled up his jacket hood over his head, hiding his green locks beneath the fabric. He was terrified. “Iida, I’m not sure—”

“Midoriya, it’s you!” his classmate suddenly shouted, pointing to a giant billboard with a promotional movie poster on it. Izuku turned around on instinct, regretted it, and pulled down his hood even lower, flushing in embarrassment. A few passerbys gave them weird looks but overall paid them little attention.

“You’re on it, too,” he muttered, following his friend around the streets. Iida shot him a mindful, questioning look but otherwise said nothing. 

The bookstore was quiet but very large. Colorful comics and figurines covered every wall and shelf. An entire aisle of school textbooks lined a wall. Iida looked like he was in heaven, and Izuku smiled a little at the sight.

The lady at the front smiled as they entered the store. Izuku hid behind his friend, hoping that she wouldn’t notice anything strange about her new customers.

“I’m going to find our series,” Iida told him. “You wanna come?”

“Okay,” Izuku replied.

“Maybe I’ll buy a few volumes!” his classmate continued, almost skipping through the aisles like he was in a candy store, even though it seemed that he’d—whether he realized it or not—gravitated toward the math textbooks. Izuku made a note to himself to buy his friend a good book for his friend’s next birthday.

He was the one who found their series first, surprisingly. Iida had gotten distracted with an advanced chemistry textbook on the other side of the store. 

Izuku took a deep breath. He could do this. It was just a comic, after all. 

He flipped to the first page, stared at preschooler Kacchan beating up his four-year-old self for a full second, and shut the book immediately. He considered, for just a moment, running away and digging himself a hole to curl up in and cry himself to sleep. 

Then he decided that he could make it through the first chapter (he’d faced worse, before!), skimming through Kacchan’s threats, his Quirkless diagnosis, and the Sludge Villain incident. He watched himself ask if he could be a hero and reminisced through his interaction with All Might, his second encounter with the Sludge Villain, and the moment his idol told him he could be a hero. He smiled a little bit at that. 

Objectively, the art was very good for a manga. Izuku really liked the author’s expressive style and impressive panels. He also felt a bit embarrassed: it was like the whole world saw him uglily sob on his knees before All Might. He was very different than the person he was almost two years ago, after all.

“Ah, Midoriya!” Iida said, causing Izuku to drop the book in shock. “I see you’ve found our series!”

“Uh, Iida, I… uh…”

His friend laid a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “If you don’t want me to read it, I understand. After all, your life is supposed to be a private matter.”

Sorry, All Might. It’s for the greater good… 

“N-No, it’s okay,” Izuku decided. “There’s just s-some information in there that’s a bit c-confidential.” He looked up at his friend. “Can you keep a secret?” he asked.

“I can,” Iida answered, picking up the first volume from the floor where Izuku had dropped it. “You’re my close friend, Midoriya, and I would never betray your trust!”

Izuku let out a sigh of relief. “Thanks, Iida.” He turned away. “I-If you don’t mind, I’ll buy us some dinner and walk around for a bit. This… it’s too embarrassing for me to read, I think.”

“I understand!” Iida exclaimed. “Don’t worry about me. Just be back at seven!”

Izuku escaped the bookstore, panic welling up within him. So much for the secret of One for All.

Meanwhile, Tenya Iida sobbed at his close friend’s past misfortunes, sniffling loudly into a pack of tissues. 

Izuku came back to the bookstore at 6:45, finding his good friend scribbling in a notebook and flipping through volume thirteen with a serious expression on his face. The small package of tissues next to the floor where he sat was half-empty.

“Hey,” Izuku spoke up.

Iida dropped his book and rushed forward, enveloping his friend in a tight hug. “Midoriya!” he exclaimed, grabbing his shoulders and shaking Izuku’s upper body back and forth like he did when he was worried for him. “I-I…”
“I got us some dinner,” Izuku said, holding up his plastic bag. “Let’s go outside for a short break, okay?”

They found a bench overlooking a small urban park and occupied it for themselves. Izuku talked about the nice people who helped him around the city and the music store he toured (Jiro would have loved to see some of the antiques they kept in there), but Iida looked zoned out, barely listening to his friend’s ramblings.

“Iida?” Izuku asked. “About my Quirk…”

“Midoriya, there’s a traitor in UA,” he replied. “All for One knows you’re All Might’s successor, and I think Todoroki’s brother is a villain.”

Izuku gaped and almost dropped his food. “ What ?!”

Iida lifted his notebook to Izuku’s face, showing the color-coded claims with detailed descriptions, questions, and sources down to the page and volume number.

“Oh.”

“I’m not even halfway through,” Iida said, putting away the notes. “I promise to catch up, though.”

“When does the bookstore close?” Izuku asked.

“Ten. Why?”

The hero student frowned. He didn’t know what he expected out of the manga, but apparently, it was more important than he had thought. “Let’s go back and read until then.”

Iida seemed to understand. “I usually carry a lot of cash with me. If we pool enough money together, we can buy any volumes we don’t get to. The more information we find, the better.”

The woman at the front counter bowed at the two UA students as they reentered her bookstore once again. Izuku was in the middle of surrendering the last of the cash he carried on him to his classmate for the greater good. Iida immediately made a hurried waddle toward the back of the store.

Izuku had other plans. 

He approached the woman carefully, a bit unsure of himself. Even at home, he wasn’t very good at talking to people he’d never met.

“Hi,” he greeted, waving shyly, “can I ask you a question?”

“Of course!” the woman answered, brushing down her apron. She looked overwhelmingly friendly. “Ah, but first of all, nice cosplay! You really look like Deku!”

“Thank you,” Izuku replied because he didn’t know what else to say. He thought his hoodie was able to hide his hair, but apparently it wasn’t.

“Is he your favorite character?” she asked. 

Izuku managed an awkward laugh, hoping the lady couldn’t see his embarrassed face. “I-It’s All Might.”

“Cool! Mine’s Jiro. She really resonated with me during the culture festival—ha, get it? Resonate ? Kirishima’s great, too. His middle school backstory had me in tears! Oh, and Togata… I think he deserved One for All, personally. But that’s just my opinion, of course.”

“Uh,” Izuku said. Well, she wasn’t wrong…

“Mineta can rot in a ditch, for all I care. He should’ve been expelled ages ago! But Todoroki , on the other hand—” There was a strange look in her eyes, and Izuku took a step back.

“Do you know where the author of My Hero Academia might be right now?” he asked. For some reason, Izuku felt really uncomfortable talking with this lady.

“Oh, Horikoshi-sensei? Probably at the convention going on in Tokyo, giving out autographs or something. I personally wanted to go but I wasn’t able to get a ticket. I have this job, too.” She let out a deep sigh, turning to face Izuku. “There’s always next year, though! I thought you were also heading there, to be honest.”

“A-Ah, I a-am!” Izuku lied. “My friend and I just got l-lost!”

The woman looked like she didn’t believe him. “Good thing there’s still tomorrow. Is your other friend dressing up, too?”

“Y-Yeah! He’s Iida.”

The lady looked pleasantly surprised. “Oh, right! I almost didn’t see the resemblance! He’d make a good Iida. You know, Iida’s been practically irrelevant since the Stain battle. It’s like he doesn’t matter anymore.” She leaned over the countertop. “Well, at least he’s better than Bakugo. Ah, but if it were a contest between him and Mineta, I’d kill off Mineta. At least Bakugo’s kinda hot.”

Izuku really didn’t want to talk to this person anymore, but he knew to put aside personal feelings for the sake of a mission. “Do you know who the UA traitor is?” he asked.

“Ah, that?” The woman laughed loudly. “My money’s on Kaminari, but some people make some good arguments for Hagakure and Monoma.”

Izuku furrowed his eyebrows. He was pretty sure all of his friends had heroic spirits. “So you don’t know?”

“Nah, it hasn’t been revealed. But it’s definitely a hundred percent Kaminari. Just look at his early design: it’s so villainous! And the sign he made on his forehead during that one interview! Believe me, he acts dumb on purpose!”

Izuku realized that he wouldn’t learn anything important from talking to this lady. “Thank you for your time,” he said, bowing respectfully and scurrying away. He really didn’t want to continue that conversation. It felt like sitting in a pool of tar: a bit unsanitary and definitely bad for his health.

He found Iida in the middle of volume fourteen, frowning at the pages.

“The woman at the front told me that the mangaka’s in Tokyo, right now,” Izuku informed him, sitting down next to his friend. “If we sneak into the convention, we can ask about our future.”

“Do you really think it is a good idea to know our fates?” Iida asked. His nose remained buried in black and white pages. 

Izuku frowned. Iida was right. “I… I don’t know.”

“Let’s go,” his friend suggested. He didn’t look very happy. “I want to ask Horikoshi-sensei some questions, myself.”

Izuku nodded. He supposed that, if the mangaka himself knew how events would play out in the future, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to find him, even if they only had less than a day to do so. “Oh! The bookstore’s closing soon,” he spoke up. “Did you figure out which books you want to buy?”

Iida nodded, pushing his glasses up his nose. “If we set aside enough money for meals tomorrow, we will still have enough money to buy five volumes. I personally would pick the books without us hero students on the cover.” He held out volume twenty-five to Izuku’s eyes, and Shigaraki’s manic face stared back. “I recommend twenty-one, twenty-four, and twenty-five. But since we see the League of Villains on the cover of twenty-three, and since twenty-six is the last one…”

“Whatever you think is best,” Izuku said, firmly believing his statement. Iida was a good friend, after all.

“Once the store closes, let’s find somewhere to rest for the night,” his classmate suggested. “We’ll wake up early and catch a ride to Tokyo.”

Izuku could see the cloudy expression in his friend’s eyes. It bothered him a little. “Iida, I know we’re striving to be heroes, and breaking into an anime expo is definitely illegal—”

“I know,” his classmate replied, his eyes steely. “But it’s for the good of our world. We learned a little bit about that at UA, right? Going after Stain was not very heroic of me, I understand. But if we can discover the identity of the UA traitor…” He trailed off. His friends were the suspects, after all, and he didn’t want to view them as potential villains.

Izuku faced his close friend. Sooner or later, he knew he would have to explain his Quirk to Iida, but for now, they had a mission.

Chapter Text

Izuku found himself shaken awake by Iida. 

Last night, they had ended up passing out on a park bench with weary minds and questions left unanswered. He’d been too embarrassed and self-aware to confront Iida about many things: One for All, Kacchan, Shigaraki, the traitor, the Todoroki family…  

The sun had yet to rise, and Izuku sat up with a start before tumbling off the bench unceremoniously. His mouth felt like sandpaper and his neck was sore. The blue limited-edition All-Might jacket he had wrapped himself with had fallen on the ground sometime in the middle of the night and had a new green-brown tint to it. 

“We should start walking if we want to get to Tokyo on time,” Iida said, holding out a hand. “The train should get us there, and then we can find some breakfast.”

Izuku nodded. He thought that maybe his classmate was being careful around him, but he remembered that Iida had always been exceptionally kind. With a smile, he took his friend’s outstretched hand. “Let’s go.”

On the way to Tokyo, Izuku spotted some cosplayers on the other side of the train car. They waved at the UA students and Iida saluted back in a very Iida-like fashion.

Izuku took off his jacket and shook some excess dirt from it. They’d been sitting in silence for a few minutes, and he was getting restless. Unwelcome thoughts clouded his mind, nagging at his conscience.

“I guess you want answers,” he spoke up, looking anywhere but his class president.

“About your Quirk?” Iida asked. “I already understand the basics.”

“I’m sorry for keeping it a secret,” Izuku blurted out.

“Don’t be. It’s necessary, right?”

“There’s more,” Izuku said, fidgeting with his fingers in his lap. “I’m the ninth user of One for All, right? By now, the Quirk has stockpiled enough power that its core is starting to becoming unstable. I’m starting to develop the Quirks of my predecessors.”

Iida looked intrigued. He shifted his glasses. “Like that black energy?” 

“Yeah. It’s called Black Whip, and it was the Fifth’s Quirk.”

“So... you’re destined to fight All for One. That’s a big burden.”

Izuku looked down at his lap. He felt a phantom weight on his shoulders. “Right. But he’s in prison, now, so it’s okay. But if Shigaraki is his successor, I’ll probably end up fighting him as well.”

“Don’t worry,” Iida said. “If I know anything about Class 1-A—and I do: I’m class president, after all—we will fight along with you. We know it’s dangerous, but we became heroes for a reason, right? Don’t feel like you’re alone.”

Izuku felt a wave of relief he didn’t know he needed. “Thanks, Iida, for everything.”

“Of course! It is my duty as class president to care for the needs of my fellow classmates!”

It was a long train ride, but their phones didn’t have an internet connection in this alternate universe, so Izuku and Iida stared at the scenery for a little, unsure of what to do. They were teenagers, after all, who didn’t know what else to do but look at their phones on public transport.

“We should arrive in six minutes and fifty-four seconds,” Iida told him. Earlier, he’d tried to read some of the volumes he bought last night, but it seemed like he was too traumatized (or carsick or something like that) to continue for the moment.

“Good,” Izuku replied. “I wonder what an anime expo is like.”

“You haven’t been to one?!” his classmate exclaimed, surprised.

“Ah, no. Did you think I did?”

Iida turned away.

“What?” Izuku exclaimed, feeling a flush of embarrassment cross his face. “Iida! I… Where in my series does it state…” He took a deep breath. “I know I’m a big hero fan, but my walls don’t have room for anything but All Might merch!”

“I apologize, Midoriya,” his friend replied. “As class president, I should not have assumed anything about your hobbies. There is nothing wrong with being an anime otaku if you are able to keep up with your studies.”

“Ah, i-it’s ok.”

Izuku was sure his fellow hero student definitely thought of him as someone who tended to have unhealthy obsessions over weird things. And All Might wasn’t a thing.

Iida placed all of the newly-bought manga in his satchel with a ginger hand, sorted in volume order. “It seems like we are about to arrive,” he said. “Ready?”

There were still things Izuku had to tell him but now wasn’t the time.

“Yep!” he cheered back.

Tokyo was a bit different than what he remembered it to be, but Izuku felt a strange familiarity with the place, especially with its rectangular skyscrapers and busy streets. 

“We have to hurry,” Iida said, checking the time with his watch.“We only have five hours before our time limit is up.”

“Twenty-four hours, right?” Izuku asked, lightly jogging behind his friend’s long stride. “That’s how long the villain’s Quirk lasts.”

“Right. And if we want to get to the anime expo, we need to go…” Iida turned around, at a loss. 

Izuku frowned. “Is five hours enough? We’re not even at the expo site, yet.” 

“I do not know,” his friend admitted, taking off in a random direction. “We should ask for directions.” 

“You’re right.”

Iida looked contemplative. “I hope we can make it to the expo on time: I have an important question to ask Horikoshi-sensei,” he finally said. “It’s about Shigaraki.”

“What about him?” Izuku asked, clutching his jacket tightly to prevent the chills down his spine. A hand unconsciously reached protectively for his own neck.

“I need to ask Sensei about him.”

Somehow, Izuku figured that now wasn’t a good time to ask. 

A woman in minimal clothing and bright, orange hair strutted past the UA students in thin, black high heels.

“Maybe she knows where to go,” Iida said, waving her down, and Izuku nodded in agreement. Maybe he’d talk to his friend another time when circumstances were less dire.

“My name is Masaki,” the woman introduced herself. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you too,” Iida replied. “Do you know the way to the anime expo?”

“Ah, of course!” Masaki answered. “I thought your cosplay looked familiar. “You’re Ingenium!”

Iida looked floored, his jaw dropping in surprise. “O-Of course!” he exclaimed, beaming like the morning sun. People usually associated the hero name with his brother, after all.

“Can you take us there?” Izuku asked. “We’re… trying to get there early.”

“Sure,’’ she said. “Great minds think alike, after all.”

“We are forever in your debt!” Iida shouted, bowing. Izuku followed suit.

“You make a good Ingenium,” she said, and Izuku could practically feel his friend’s newfound joy emanating in radiant waves. 

There was a slight spring in Iida’s step for the rest of the walk.

“Masaki, what do you do at an anime convention?” Iida asked. “It’s our first time attending one.”

“Your costumes are pretty good for first-timers,” she replied, “I couldn’t tell. But to answer your question… do whatever you want! Buy some figurines, eat some good food, go to panels, take cool pictures with people…”

“Interesting!” 

“Do you read My Hero Academia, too?” Izuku asked.

“Ah, of course!” Masaki exclaimed. “Bakugo’s my favorite character!”

Izuku broke into a small smile. “He’s a good friend, isn’t he?” 

“Yeah! He was a huge jerk at first, and he told Deku to kill himself, but we find out he’s actually a complicated person! And my second favorite is Endeavor: he’s a child abuser for sure, especially to Shoto, but that fight between him and the High-End really inspired me as a person!”

Iida looked uncomfortable, as if he really wanted to interject, but seemed to stop himself. Izuku just smiled awkwardly, reminding himself that he really needed to have a conversation with his friend.

“My own dad wasn’t the best,” Masaki continued, “but watching My Hero gives me hope that we’ll have a better relationship in the future! Endeavor really changed as a person, and it was really cool. A few weeks ago, I sent him a text, and he actually replied! It was better progress than we’ve seen in years.”

Izuku figured that Masaki was the type of person who either shared too much about herself.

“I’m glad Endeavor inspires you,” Izuku said. Endeavor was a good hero, and it showed in his patrols, fights, and billboard ranking. 

The dome of the convention center could be seen from a block away.

“Yeah! Now, if only Deku would just get with Uraraka already… It’s sooo obvious that they have feelings for each other!”

Both Izuku and Iida had no idea how to respond to that.

They parted ways with Masaki at the convention entrance. Iida claimed that they were waiting for someone and urged her to go on ahead without them.

“What do we do now?” Izuku asked. “We need badges, and it’ll be obvious that we don’t have them.”

“What if we sneak in from another entrance?” Iida asked. “Maybe from the back?”

Izuku looked around. “I don’t think it’ll work: they seem to have cameras. Maybe we can just hide in the crowd? It’s getting pretty big.”

“If Yaoyorozu was here, we would have a lot less trouble,” his friend remarked, crossing his arms.

Izuku nodded, deep in thought. “Why don’t we explain our situation to someone? Like a hero?”

“Ah, wait, there aren’t heroes here, are there. How do they catch villains?”

“Midoriya—”

“A police officer! We can look for one.”

“Midoriya.”

“Iida, I remember how they used to put out fires!”

“Midoriya, I found an officer.”

Izuku twirled around, looking in the direction of his friend’s extended finger. “Oh. Right.”

The officer was a little shorter than Iida and looked like he was falling asleep on his feet. Izuku felt a bit concerned for his well-being.

“Excuse me, officer,” Iida spoke up, waving him down. “Sir! Can you help us? I’m Tenya Iida and this is Izuku Midoriya, and—”

“The front entrance is to the right,” the officer interrupted them.

“He doesn’t believe us,” Iida whispered to Izuku, who was very sure that the officer could hear their hushed conversation.

“Let’s go somewhere else,” he suggested.

Iida checked his watch. “Midoriya, we have four hours,” he reminded him.

Izuku pulled his friend away from the cop. “Let’s sneak in. Blend in with the crowd.”

“Good idea.”

Booths, stalls, merchandise, and people were everywhere. Izuku was in heaven and Iida kept having to physically reel him back from examining beautiful works of art. 

“Midoriya, this ‘Monkey D. Luffy’ guy isn’t—”

“Iida, it’s a Todoroki figurine! That’s so cool!”

“You’re right! There’s also you— ”

Izuku pointed at a stall. “They have Uraraka posters too!”

“Of course.”

“Iida, look! It’s you! Are you sure we don’t have any more cash?”

“Midoriya—”

“Hey, I have that exact same All Might shirt at home!”

Midoriya, we have an hour! Where’s the Horikoshi-sensei panel?!”

Izuku brought himself back to reality and stared at his stolen brochure for a good three seconds. “It’s in fifteen minutes. Do you think we’ll make it?”

“I’ll ask,” Iida replied, turning to a random stranger clad in a bodysuit. “Sir! I have a question!”

The man turned around. “Nice Iida outfit!” he complimented. “What do you need?” 

“Do you know where the Horikoshi-sensei panel is?” Iida asked, taking the brochure from Izuku’s hands. “I know it’s on the second floor, but we’re having trouble finding the room…”

“Don’t bother,” the bodysuit man said. “If it’s Horikoshi-sensei, the panel is already full.”

“But there’s a whole thirty minutes until it starts!” Izuku exclaimed. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah. ‘My Hero Academia’ is extremely popular, after all.”

“I see,” Iida replied, bowing. “Thank you for your guidance! Your costume is very nice!”

“Thanks,” bodysuit man said and left with a curt wave. 

The two UA students finally found a way to the second floor through a flight of stairs near the back of the building. Every other entrance had many police officers around and they didn’t want to risk being spotted.

“Do you think that, if we ask, Horikoshi-sensei will change our world for us?” Iida asked once they were alone.

Izuku frowned. “What do you mean?”

“He’s the mangaka, right? If he wanted to, he could give us all a happy ending.”

“Oh, right. Maybe. Do you really think we’re affected by what he draws? It could be the other way around.”

“My brother didn’t have to be hurt by Stain, you know,” Iida continued. “If he wanted to, Horikoshi-sensei could write that all away.”

“But that’s only if he’s influencing our decisions,” Izuku replied. He was shivering, now, and wrapped his dirty jacket tighter around himself. “What if it’s just a coincidence?”

“Did Bakugo really tell you to jump off a roof, or was that written in for him?” Iida asked.

“He wasn’t really thinking—”

“It was very villainous of him! If I were Aizawa-sensei, I’d—”

Izuku combed at his hair in a burst of frustration. “Iida, don’t worry about us. You’ve read, right? You know we’re doing better—”

“Are you really, though?”

“Yes! We are! You know Kacchan’s a hero, Iida.”

“I understand—”

“We’re all learning what it means to be a hero, Iida,” Izuku interrupted, feeling very guilty about it, “even Kacchan. And I’m not sure what you’ve read, but all of these villains and sad moments help us grow as people, so they’re not entirely bad. Even with all the attacks we’ve experienced, I’m still proud of how much we’ve come since we’ve started.”

“No, Midoriya. I read a little further ahead, today, and you’re in—”

“Iida,” Izuku continued, “y-you can’t tell me what you’ve read. Just… keep it to yourself.”

“But—”

“Hello?” someone asked. A police officer appeared around the staircase, scaring the two UA students into silence. She smiled at them and held out a welcoming hand. “Can I see your passes? Please have them around your neck in the future.”

Iida turned to his close friend with wide eyes and pointed up. Izuku freaked out and used Black Whip to slingshot the both of them to the next floor. The officer let out a strangled gasp.

Izuku let his friend through the stairwell door and slammed it behind them. Then, the two of them walked away as fast as they could.

Iida was the one to spot the huge crowd of people waiting in front of a large auditorium: the site of the Horikoshi-senses panel. They found themselves waiting next to a pair of teenagers around Izuku’s age, wearing matching UA uniforms.

“Your uniforms look very nice!” Iida complimented them.

“Thanks,” the girl replied, twirling in her skirt. “It took a long time to make this, and Ren had to help me.” She gestured to the boy next to her.

“Nice to meet you,” Ren said.

“Midoriya and Iida, right?” the girl asked. “If you wanted to look more like a couple, you should have been Izuku and Shoto instead.”

“I’m sorry,” Iida remarked, “we’re not dating. Todoroki and Midoriya aren’t either if I’m not mistaken.” The class president turned to his close friend with a slight accusatory look.

“Nope, not dating,” Izuku confirmed, slightly weirded out. He and Todoroki were good friends and nothing more, after all.

“No, not that,” the girl said. “I’m talking about ships. Like, who would end up best with each other. Mostly romantically.”

Iida frowned. “I don’t understand.”

Ren was quick to join the conversation. “Like Jirou and Kaminari, or Midoriya and Uraraka.”

“Oh,” Iida replied, “I think I understand.”

“I’m Sai, by the way. Nice to meet you,” the girl spoke up. “Do you two have any ships?” she asked. “My favorites are… Shoto and Izuku, Kaminari and Shinsou, Bakugo and Uraraka, and… I guess Shinsou and Deku isn’t bad either.”

Midoriya took a step back.

“And Bakugo and Deku. That’s pretty hot. Iida and Mei is a good one, too.”

Iida frowned.

Ren sighed. “Once she gets started, it’s hard for her to stop,” he said.

Sai laughed, putting her hands on her hips as if she was proud of herself. “You give me too much credit. Well, one thing’s for sure: my favorite ship of them all… is Mineta and being tormented for eternity.”

“I think we need to go,” Iida, who had learned something new today, spoke up.

“Yeah,” Izuku, who was actually (believe it or not) very good friends with Mineta, agreed. 

“You don’t want to stay for the Horikoshi panel?” Ren asked. “With the number of people here, there’s no way you’ll get a seat if you leave now.”

“Sorry, we are in a hurry,” Iida apologized, even though, to Izuku, his voice didn’t sound very apologetic at all. Then, the class president walked away, hardly waiting for his classmate to follow.

As Iida led him around, Izuku caught glimpses of conversation here and there about his series.

“Iida, what do you think ‘Dad for One’ is?” he asked, curious.

“I do not want to find out,” his friend answered, and Izuku found himself agreeing. 

They caught a glimpse of Horikoshi-sensei (a middle-aged man that held some resemblance to their homeroom teacher, it seemed) on stage at the panel. Izuku didn’t know how, but they’d snuck their way into the auditorium a few minutes late, and even though they didn’t have seats, Izuku was glad they made it. On the other hand, he was suddenly reminded of how difficult their task really was: hundreds of die-hard fans surrounded the UA students, blocking all exits and occasionally bumping into one of them.

The mangaka was answering some personal questions from the audience: his favorite manga, his daily routine, his inspiration for the series…

“We need to get his attention,” Iida whispered, clenching his fists. “Maybe we can get a mic…”