Work Text:
It starts with a letter.
As the number one hero in Japan, Toshinori gets a lot of fan mail, so letters are not an uncommon part of his day. Mirai deals with most of it when he can, passing them along when it requires a little more thinking than just encouraging children to shoot for their dreams.
The letter is crisply folded and accompanied by a child’s drawing that leaves him a little bit in awe, printed in a ridiculously neat hand with two signatures at the bottom. One is the child’s, he’s pretty sure, with the other being their mother. Toshinori has read it ten separate times and still can’t think of a response. It’s been sitting on his desk for almost a week and a half, burning a hole into him as he answers other letters, until he has to force himself to finally answer.
Dear Mister All Might, it reads, have you been well? My name is Midoriya Izuku.
The final stroke is jagged, like the child was tugging on their mother’s arm in excitement. It’s such a small thing, barely noticeable over the rest of the letter, but it’s the detail that makes Toshinori’s heart swell the most. Or maybe it’s the little please take care of yourself at the end.
Either way, it sticks with him long past his own response.
---
He gets one more letter from the same child, almost a year later.
It starts the same way, overly formal in a way that most of his fan mail isn’t, only the handwriting is shaky and obviously written by a child. There’s only one name at the bottom, this time, and it’s jarringly short compared to the rambling paragraphs he remembers.
Can someone quirkless still become a hero like you?
It sticks in his throat, fighting against his ribs with every villain he faces afterward until it beats in tandem with his heart. He wants to say yes, wants to tell the kid that he used to be quirkless, too, and knows exactly the sort of turmoil it causes. But that would cause so many issues and he can’t let it get out. Mirai would murder him for tanking his public relations, for one, and then Sorahiko would bring him back and kill him again.
He’s had the letter for three months, tucked away in the inside pocket of his suit and worn soft from rereading. It's with him through his hospitalization, tucked underneath his pillow, and past that when he's finally able to get back out on the streets.
Toshinori still can’t bring himself to answer it.
---
There's a kid at the beach.
Toshinori has only been back in Musutafu for a few weeks, and most of them have been spent unburying his old apartment from the decade worth of dust that accumulated while he was in America. This is the first time he's seen anyone there among the piles of trash, though, even if they're swearing up a storm at a rusted hunk of metal that might be the remains of a microwave.
He stops for a moment, watching them drag it back to an old flatbed truck while his groceries grow warm on his arm.
There's something familiar about the way they move despite struggling with an older television set that looks far too big for them. The confidence, maybe. Because Toshinori wouldn't exactly call it grace when the kid trips over something in the sand not even five seconds later, spilling onto their front and nearly slamming face-first into the tv. The cursing that reaches his ears a moment later startles him out of his trance.
He hurries to put his vegetables away before they start to spoil, turning the question over in his mind. If he had to guess, it almost reminds him of the underground heroes he's worked with in the past. The same sort of loose movement that easily translates to free running over rooftops in the dead of night.
The kid's still there a few hours later.
They haven't made much progress since Toshinori saw them last, but he figures they're doing good enough just trying to clear up Takoba Beach. It's a respectable venture by itself, made more so that they seem to be by themself.
His heart flutters in his throat as he approaches the kid, a couple unopened water bottles in one hand and his courage in the other.
They glance over from where they're juggling a couple toasters and catch him coming with a startled look, brows furrowing. The pile shifts in their arms, almost dropping onto their foot and barely managing to swipe it up before it hits the sand. Unfortunately, that means the rest of the appliances tumble out instead.
They clamp their mouth shut around the first half of a curse.
"Sorry," Toshinori says when he gets close enough to not shout, "I didn't mean to startle you."
The kid eyes him for a moment before gathering the toasters back up and dumping them in the back of the truck, using their shirt to wipe away what they can of the sweat soaking their curls. He swallows around the awkward lump in his throat and offers out one of the water bottles.
Their eyes flick from the bottle to his face.
Apparently he looks trustworthy enough, because they take it with a short nod, cracking open the lid and draining it just as quickly. And that's an odd thing to receive in his diminished form, too skeleton-like to be comfortable for most folks.
"Don't worry about it." They say, tossing the empty package into the mound of trash behind them with a lopsided grin. The scarring on the side of their face makes his breath catch, a spiderweb of deeply indented lines and pale starbursts, and tugs the edge of their lips up into a perpetual half-smile anyway. Toshinori doesn't let his gaze linger too long, giving the kid a smile of his own in turn.
They don't shudder, surprisingly - if anything, theirs only gets wider.
"Are you cleaning the beach by yourself?" He finds himself asking after a moment. They shake their head, rolling one of their shoulders and jerking a thumb toward the cab of the truck. Toshinori can't see anyone in the driver's seat but there's also a few tall piles of electronics and appliances between them.
"Nah," they say, slumping back against the tailgate in good humor, "someone's gotta keep an eye on me while I work."
"Oh?"
The kid makes a face, somehow managing to convey both disgust and easy acceptance. "Community service."
Ah. That explains it. Not well, because Toshinori is still mostly confused as to why someone would assign Takoba as community service rather than something less physical, but well enough. He doesn't know what to say to it, though, shifting uncomfortably beside the truck.
"It's a very big task they gave you, then." He finally gets out. They shrug, going back to cleaning up after a few more moments of rest.
"Beats sitting in jail for a few years." The kid says cheerily, hefting another microwave onto their shoulder with the same confidence he glimpsed earlier. It's...strange, hearing that from someone who doesn't look a day over fourteen. They don't look like a villain, either, so it's hard imagining what they did to earn the sentence. "Mom said it used to be a pretty popular spot way back when she was a kid."
Toshinori feels a little bit useless, standing around while they're working, but no matter how much he doesn't like it, he doesn't dare get in the way. "It was."
"Yeah?" The kid asks, turning toward him. "What was it like?"
They're genial enough about him being there, asking questions about what Musutafu was like back when he was a child and chattering away at him for a good hour or so. Toshinori doesn't even realize the time's gone by until an officer he semi-recognizes sticks their head out of the driver's side window.
"Izuku, are you almost ready to head out? Your curfew's in an hour." Tamakawa says, one ear flicking to where he's standing. Other than a cursory glance, the feline-headed officer doesn't pay him any more attention than he does the scenery.
"Gimme a second!" The kid chirps, unhooking a twisted bicycle from over their shoulders and packing it into the already full bed. They turn to him with a grin, shaking flakes of rust out of their hair, and offer him a short bow.
"It was very nice to meet you. Thank you for speaking with me." They say, and there's something about their wording that digs at his memory. Toshinori fights back a frown and sets the jarring sense that he's forgetting something aside for later.
"You as well." He says with a nod. Pauses, then offers a shallow bow of his own.
"Yagi Toshinori. I live around here, if you'd like the company again." Toshinori shouldn't be offering, not when he still has so much to do before he starts teaching on top of his regular patrols, but the urge presents itself quickly and he can't quite bring himself to resist it.
The kid's grin is almost blinding.
"Midoriya Izuku." They say, scratching at their cheek. And, shit, he knows that name from somewhere, burned into his memory despite not being able to recall the context. "I'd like that, I think. It gets lonely out here - Sansa just sleeps most of the time."
There's a sharp noise from the front of the truck that almost sounds like a growl. Toshinori shares another smile with the kid before they clamber into the passenger seat, loudly asking what's wrong with having someone to talk to while they're working. The truck sputters to life after a moment.
They wave to him before the truck disappears back onto the road, hanging out the window before being pulled back in. He stands there for a few more moments, shifting his attention to the way the sunset glints off the remaining mountains of trash.
Midoriya Izuku.
If only he could remember where he learned it.