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Midoriya Izuku couldn’t get out of his seat fast enough when Aizawa-sensei dismissed them for the day. He loved U.A, he loved his classes, and most of all, he loved learning, but he was definitely ready for a break. After everything that had happened in the past few months, what with the League attacks and Chisaki, he desperately needed a few days to just... relax. Maybe he’d even practice some of this ‘self-care’ that his friends keep yelling at him about.
Not that he was going to slack off. He wouldn’t dream of it. He was still going to stick to his daily schedule of working out and running. It would be unfortunate if his quirk started exploding his bones again because he was negligent. Maybe he could even ask Iida or Todoroki if they were willing to spar—
Something hit his shoulder. Was it an attack? Was this another logical ruse—
“You’re muttering again, Deku,” Urakaka pointed out, “We’re on break. Turn that brain of yours off, yeah?”
Oh, it was just Uraraka pulling him out of his own head. She was such a great friend.
“Sorry,” he said sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head.
“You’ve been spacing out more often, Midoriya. As a heroics student, it is imperative that you pay attention to your surroundings at all times,” Iida chimed in.
Izuku laughed a bit. Classic Iida, relating the situation back to heroics. He hadn’t said anything wrong, either. Izuku was getting more distracted lately. It was just so easy to get lost in his head. Thoughts were always flitting through his mind, but he noticed that in the past few weeks, it had turned into a frantic frenzy. His concentration was suffering for it too, causing him to ignore everything and everyone—
He walked into the door frame with a loud smack. Definitely spacing out more than normal, Izuku thought to himself, Great. He could hear Uraraka trying not to laugh.
“You know, I think I’m going to go to bed early,” he said.
“Yeah, you really should.”
Waving goodbye to his friends, he walked to his dorm. Why was he spacing out so much? Even as a kid, it had never been this bad. But then again, he was constantly writing when he was younger. When was the last time he did some writing, just for himself? He couldn’t even remember when he last opened #13. Maybe that’s why he was constantly spacing out—he needed an outlet. Should he try and sleep before cracking open #13, or should he start analyzing right away? Maybe the first thing he should do is a cost-benefit analysis of both ideas. It’s not like it’d take that much time—
“Are you okay, Midoriya?”
Izuku jumped and let out a small scream. “Kami, Todoroki. You scared me.”
“I can see that,” Todoroki noted, dryly, “You were standing outside your door for a long time. Are you locked out?”
“Nope! Haha, I just spaced out again. Don’t worry though, I’ll be fine. See you later!”
Todoroki looked unsure, but he left Izuku alone. Not wasting time, he opened the door to his room and made a beeline towards his desk. He should definitely do a cost-benefit analysis on whether or not he should go to sleep. For that, he’d need some paper, preferably graph paper. It was easier to make tables that way.
His fingers skimmed the various drawers on his desk, searching for the one he needed. Despite what people may think, his desk was a sacred place. While the top was messy and constantly covered in various sheets of paper and writing utensils, his drawers were always neatly labeled and organized. A disorganized top helped him concentrate. A disorganized drawer system left him scrambling. Besides, it took forever to color code the labels properly.
Opening the purple drawer labeled “loose paper”, he was faced with a difficult decision. Should he use the 4-squares-per-inch size or the 5-square-per-inch size? While the 4-squares size was convenient for measurement purposes, the 5-squares size fit his style of writing better. Which did he value more—presentation or functionality? This was supposed to be a quick analysis, so functionality should take priority. Decision made, he grabbed a few sheets of the 4-squares sized graph paper. Now he had to sort through his ruler drawer to find the right color and size…
It was refreshing, taking the time to set up properly. He truly appreciated the workload U.A. gave him, since it helped stave off boredom, but it often left him scrambling to keep up. He simply didn’t have the time to pick the right ruling for his lined paper when he had three essays due in two days, even if the right ruling can make or break the aesthetics of the assignment. He would never forgive himself for submitting his last modern art essay on wide-ruled lined paper instead of college-ruled, like a sane person. That was probably why he got a 98% on the essay instead of the 100% he was aiming for.
With his setup complete (two sheets of 4-squares-per-inch graph paper, his 15-inch clear, plastic ruler, a 0.7mm mechanical pencil, his favorite highlighter pack, and his backlog of Analysis Weekly podcast episodes), he got to work. First, he had to make a list of all of the scenarios that he was considering. Then, he could make a proper cost-benefits list for each decision. Next, he’d color-code each of the points he made according to how strong the argument was. Finally, he would tabulate this information in a way that was easy to understand (his favorite part). His cost-benefit analysis rarely failed him, so he was feeling pretty confident when the final table showed that he should spend the night writing in #13.
Satisfied, Izuku grabbed his cost-benefit sheets and threw them in the recycling bin. The sheets had done their job in guiding his decision-making—no use keeping them around. He opened the white drawer labeled “analysis”. This was where he kept all thirteen of his Hero Analysis for the Future series. Pulling #13 out, he cringed as he noticed the sheer amount of water damage and sludge stains. The volume held plenty of emotions within the pages—the joy at All Might’s signature, the fear of his first near-death experience—but Izuku had to admit that the book was trashed. Continuing to write in it would be a messy endeavor, but he couldn’t just throw it away. He could always copy the analysis over and number the new book “13B” or something.
His mind made up, he opened the green drawer labeled “empty”. He kept all of his empty notebooks here, since he had a tendency to go through as quickly he wore down Aizawa-sensei’s patience. Picking a new book from the pile and changing from Analysis Weekly to Hero Watch, he got to work. He was only a few sentences into the rewrite when he heard someone knock on his door.
Turning the podcast off (and boy, was he behind ), Izuku got up. As he opened the door, he tried not to let his annoyance seep through. Was it too much to ask for an hour to relax, he grumbled, I just sat down to do some proper analysis, too. Iida stood in front of him, looking particularly stern.
“Midoriya! No one has been able to contact you for hours. You missed dinner.”
“Isn’t it early for dinner? It’s only been like an hour since class was let out.”
Iida looked at him with concern. “It is currently 10:47 pm, Midoriya. I have been knocking on your door for the past 5 minutes.”
“Oh.” He didn’t really have a response to that. “Sorry? I must have zoned out pretty hard...”
“Please grab some dinner and go to sleep, Midoriya. While we may be on vacation, it is our duty as U.A. students to get at least 8 hours of sleep per night and to not skip meals.”
“I just spent the past few hours doing a cost-benefit analysis on going to sleep. After careful deliberation and the death of two sheets of graph paper, I determined that sleeping wasn’t worth it.”
Iida opened his mouth, then closed it again. After a few moments, the boy spoke again. “Did you say a cost-benefit analysis? ”
Izuku blinked. That’s what Iida was confused about? “Yes.”
“Why?”
“I wasn’t sure if I should sleep first or do some writing first, so I made a comprehensive cost-benefit analysis of both options. Writing won,” Izuku explained plainly. Why was this so difficult to understand?
Iida, once again, looked stumped. He also looked concerned. “When you did this... analysis ...did you factor in that it’s nearly 11 pm and that you need at least 8 hours of sleep?”
Izuku smacked his forehead. “I didn’t factor in what time it was when I did the analysis, since it was supposed to be quick—”
“—Classes ended 6 hours ago, Midoriya—”
“—but I should totally do that! Thanks—”
“—Midoriya—”
“—I’ll be sure to redo the table I made—”
“— Midoriya —”
“—And I’ll also factor in your opinion—”
“—MIDORIYA!”
He blinked. “What?”
Suddenly, Iida placed both of his hands on Izuku’s shoulders. “As your friend and Class President, I am highly recommending that you grab some dinner and go to sleep .”
“—I’ll be sure to add your opinion to the table and give it the proper importance—”
“—Midoriya, you misunderstand. By highly recommend I meant ordering. You will be grabbing dinner and going to bed in the next hour. Are we clear?”
“But—”
“ Are we clear? ”
“Yes, Class President,” Izuku said, sullenly, “Thanks for checking in.”
“Not a problem. Have a good evening.” With that, Iida walked away.
Izuku didn’t feel particularly hungry, but an Angry Iida was a Bad Iida, so he went downstairs anyway. He quietly grabbed some food and made his way back to his dorm. He was a bit annoyed at Iida. What if Izuku didn’t want to eat dinner at 11 pm? What if Izuku wanted to skip dinner? It was like his friend didn’t trust him to take care of himself, which was preposterous. Izuku was sixteen years old and not dead yet, which meant that he could take care of himself pretty well (broken bones notwithstanding).
He could just ignore Iida’s “recommendation”, but he didn’t want to disappoint him, either. When was the last time someone cared about him enough to force him to eat? The kids at his middle school made it their life goal to trash his lunch, Kacchan would just tell him to die already so he wouldn’t waste resources, and his mom would leave him alone as long as he promised to “eat later”. Iida showing actual concern was huge, so he couldn’t ruin his friendship over this. Even if he had a comprehensive table that could theoretically prove Iida wrong.
Izuku finished up his dinner and decided to go to bed. It was getting pretty late, and he had all day tomorrow to work on #13B. He slipped on a pair of pajamas, quickly brushed his teeth, and jumped into bed. Closing his eyes, he waited for sleep to overtake him.
It never did. Every time he was about to fall asleep, a new thought came into his head. What if Uraraka’s quirk wasn’t Zero Gravity? What species of frog was Tsuyu, exactly? Could Todoroki make lightning with his quirk? How quickly could he copy #13 over to #13B? His brain was too awake to fall asleep. Writing a few more analyses would be a great way to relax, right? That was the second bullet point on the pros side of doing analysis (highlighted green for being a strong argument), so he knew that it was true. It was just transferring old notes into a new book, so it shouldn’t take too long. He sat down at his desk and got back to work.
“DEKU!”
“GAH!” startled, Izuku fell out of his chair. Who the hell was yelling his name in the middle of the night? Was it an emergency? He took his headphones off (which were oddly silent), and raced towards the door.
“What’s wrong? Who died? Is there a villain attack—”
“Nothing’s wrong, Deku,” Uraraka started.
“Cool. Why are you yelling my name in the middle of the night, though? Not that I don’t appreciate your company—”
“Deku,” Uraraka placed a hand on his shoulder, “It’s 9 am.”
What?
“But it was 11 pm a few minutes ago…” How had he not noticed that it was morning?
“Did you sleep at all last night? Is that why your hands are covered in graphite?” Uraraka sounded worried.
Izuku looked down at his hands and noticed that they were, in fact, streaked with the shiny grey of graphite. Being ambidextrous had its perks.
“Huh, I guess I accidentally spent the night writing. Oh well. I’ll be down in a second.” He shot her a double thumbs up. “I’ll be fine, Uraraka. It’ll take more than sleep deprivation to kill me.”
Uraraka didn’t look convinced. “You missed dinner last night, and according to Iida, he had to pull rank to get you to go to sleep. Except, you didn’t go to sleep. Clearly, you can’t be trusted to take care of yourself. So, if you aren’t down in five minutes I’m going to carry you downstairs, you hear?”
He was touched by her concern, really, but also annoyed. Izuku was clearly capable of taking care of himself. He didn’t need someone to force him to eat breakfast.
“I’ll hold you to it.” He nodded curtly.
Uraraka left after that, letting Izuku think. He wandered over to his desk, just to see what he was working on. It seemed that he was halfway through #15. Reading the last few pages, he remembered that he was halfway through an analysis of Eri’s quirk. While the girl herself didn’t like her quirk, maybe if she gave her a proper analysis she’d be more open to practicing with it? He could certainly finish it before meeting with Uraraka...Izuku grabbed his pencil and started to write when his door flew open.
He dropped the notebook, guiltily.
“It’s been ten minutes, Deku. You are coming downstairs, right now.”
“I’ll be down in a—HEY!”
Before he could blink. Uraraka had slapped his arm and put him into a fireman’s carry.
“PUT ME DOWN!”
“NOT UNTIL WE GET DOWNSTAIRS!”
Izuku’s ears burned from embarrassment. The snickers of his classmates as they made their way down the hall didn’t help. He couldn’t even try and get himself out of Uraraka’s grip—doing so meant a one-way ticket to getting stuck on the ceiling. What a pain.
“Why are you carrying Midoriya over your shoulder?” Todoroki’s voice floated into his ears.
“Todoroki, help! She kidnapped me! From my room !” He tried to twist his body to face Todoroki but failed. Damn Uraraka and her superior grappling techniques!
“Deku here—” she patted his shoulder “—didn’t eat dinner last night. Or sleep. I’m forcing him to eat breakfast.”
“Ah,” Todoroki nodded in understanding, “Carry on.”
“TODOROKI, YOU TRAITOR. ”
Soon, he was placed on a stool, gravity (or was it buoyancy? He’d need to run the idea past her later) returned to him. Before he could dash off, Uraraka spoke.
“Leave that stool and I will burn your notebook.”
“You wouldn’t.”
“Try me, Deku. Don’t leave the stool.”
“Shinsou is now my best friend,” Izuku declared, “You, Iida, and Todoroki suck.”
“I’m not helping you off of the stool, Broccoli. Any true insomniac knows the value of food,” Shinsou remarked.
Izuku jumped. Since when was Shinsou in the kitchen?
“Well, uh, I’m revoking best friend privileges, then.”
“I am deeply hurt,” Shinsou said in a deadpan, “How will I ever survive? Truly, woe is me.”
“Fuck off.”
“MIDORIYA—”
How many people were in this kitchen without Izuku noticing?
“—It is unbecoming of a heroics student to swear! Please, censor yourself.”
“Sorry, Iida.”
“You can apologize by eating your breakfast.”
A bowl of food was placed in front of him. Absent-mindedly, he started eating. Soon, his thoughts flittered towards the analysis on Eri’s quirk that he had started. From what he’d seen, her quirk was centered on her horn. It also seemed to be a type of power stockpiler, since the use of her quirk caused the horn to shrink. Did she gain energy passively, or did she need to do or eat something, in particular, to regain energy? Was it possible—
Something hit his head, hard. “Ow!”
“Eat, or I’ll throw more pens at you,” Shinsou threatened.
“I am eating,” he grumbled. He took the pen and pocketed it. A free pen was a free pen, after all.
“No, you were staring into your bowl and muttering. Look, it’s cold now.”
Izuku took a bite. Shinsou was right—his food had gone cold. Quickly he finished the rest of his breakfast.
“Thanks for the meal,” he said, “Gotta bounce.”
“Nope. You, mister, are sleeping on the couch,” Uraraka said.
“What? No, I need to finish—”
“—What you need to do is go to sleep. I don’t trust you to fall asleep unsupervised, so you’re on the couch for today.”
“I need to train! And finish writing!”
“Should have thought of that before you pulled an all-nighter. Now, do I need Shinsou to force you to sleep?”
“Shinsou’s quirk doesn’t work like that—”
“What was that? Did I just hear ‘ Uraraka, my beautiful best friend, please knock me out ’?”
“...I will go on the couch, but I can’t promise that I’ll go to sleep,” Izuku conceded. There was no use arguing with her when she got like this.
He laid down on the couch and closed his eyes. Sleep wouldn’t come. All that came were his thoughts and ideas about Eri’s quirk. Maybe he could calculate the rate at which she gathered energy? That should help Aizawa-sensei train Eri and take away some of her fear. He did have enough observational data to make a few approximations.
Sitting up, he pulled the pen that Shinsou threw at him out. He looked around for a piece of paper, but couldn’t find anything. Shrugging, he uncapped the pen and scribbled on his hand. Black ink appeared on his skin. Perfect.
“Go back to sleep, Deku.”
“Nope, not until I write something down.”
“Shinsou, please knock him out.”
“While I would love to, Broccoli was right when he said that my quirk doesn’t work that way. Too advanced.”
“HAH! I promise that I’ll go to sleep after this. My brain can’t stop thinking about it, so it’s better to write it down then try and force sleep.”
“As a fellow insomniac, I can confirm,” Shinsou chimed in.
“Shinsou,” Uraraka screeched, “You’re supposed to be on my side.”
“Shinsou, you are officially my best friend again,” Izuku stated as he wrote down when exactly he saw Eri’s horn grow bigger.
“...Nevermind, Broccoli’s lying and you should really put him to sleep.”
Izuku ignored the purple-haired boy and kept writing.
“Midoriya, I must insist that you stop—”
“—Iida, I love you, but I don’t have any paper nearby and you guys won’t let me leave. This is all I have. So hush.”
“Writing on your arm isn’t the solution to—”
“—It is for me. The quicker I write this down, the faster I’ll go to sleep.”
Soon, he ran out of space on his right arm. The good news was that he finished his list, so he could dedicate his left arm to tabulating the data.
“You told me he was sleep-deprived, not absolutely insane,” Shinsou stage-whispered.
“He said he wanted to write something down, but all I can see are numbers,” Uraraka whispered back.
Laughing at his friends, he finished the data table on his left arm. It looked like he had enough space to start the linear regression calculations, so he did just that. Unfortunately, due to his lack of calculator, he had to do all of the arithmetic by hand, which forced him to finish his work on his left leg. The goods news was that it left plenty of space on his right leg to write out his final conclusion.
“There...That should be a good guess...at the piecewise function...that estimates Eri’s...energy production…” He yawned while talking. His mind was blessedly empty, leaving him calm and relaxed. He felt better than he had in a long time. More tired too. He should definitely do this more often.
“Brocolli, with all due respect, but what the fuck .”
“I’ll explain later...let me...sleep…” He curled up on the couch and sighed in relief.
What a great way to start his vacation.