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Koki Tomohiro is a ten-year-old boy with floppy auburn hair and a love for heroes. He has a lisp, two adoring parents, and an older brother. He discovered his quirk on his fifth birthday, landed himself in a three-day coma, and a week later was officially registered as having an undiscovered quirk. This was a lie for his own safety. But that precaution was useless when it was the same doctor that diagnosed him who kidnapped him.
Koki Tomohiro
Quirk: Time Machine
Description: User can imbue an object with the ability to send whoever makes continuous contact with it for more than five seconds back in time. The object travels with them and is the only known way to send them back to the exact time they left, with the same activation requirement. It can only send back what was originally misplaced in the timeline. The object is then no longer usable as a conduit. Use of the quirk typically comes at the expense of a cool-down time of a month or so, and used to result in 1-3 day comas.
The quirk has not been further explored, aside from the recent milestone Koki achieved of being able to determine how far back in time someone is sent. This milestone is presumably the reason why his quirk doctor, Fubuki Hosojima, finally chose to strike. Two hours ago Koki’s older brother was supposed to pick him up from his speech therapy appointment. Dr. Hosojima took advantage of her colleague’s trust to pull Koki aside after the therapy under the guise of discussing his quirk. Yukari Tomohiro arrived to pick up his brother just a minute too late. Nobody in the hospital could find Koki or Dr. Hosojima, until they checked the security feed.
Twenty minutes ago, they were located one floor above the ground level of an abandoned apartment building. The doctor hadn’t even bothered to get rid of her—or the boy’s—phone. Fifteen minutes ago, Shouta was called in as the nearest available on-duty hero. Five minutes ago he reached the apartment. Backup waited outside, reluctant to test the unsteady structure.
Now, he was carefully pushing open the door.
Dr. Hosojima began showing signs of erratic behavior sporadically over the past few years. It was never deemed concerning and she was simply labeled eccentric by her closest coworkers. It looks like something had been bothering her ever since Koki’s quirk was discovered, but her motives are unknown. She’s had no loved ones pass away and both her parents are still alive in a nursing home. She’s never committed any criminal offenses before. Dr. Hosojima is one big unknown. The only known thing about her is…
Quirk: Mind Transfer
Description: Can take a person’s consciousness through contact. Cannot move until they either return the mind to its original body or transfer it into a suitable nearby living creature that does not have a human consciousness. Cannot transfer minds into extremely small things, like bugs or insects.
A tricky one, especially if she had the foresight to bring an animal with her, but Shouta’s own quirk should take care of that easily enough. She shouldn’t have any fighting experience, either. The only problems were it being a hostage situation and the possibility that she’s already bailed with an item capable of time travel. They don’t know enough about time-related quirks to know their impact on the world.
Despite Shouta’s best efforts, the door creaks as it opens, rocking on its rusty hinges. He holds his capture scarf at the ready, creeping in and thanking his luck that the floor is carpeted. He has to watch out for nails, though. The whole place is a mess, and to make matters worse it seems this specific floor is tilted at an uncomfortably deep angle.
There is shuffling coming from the kitchen - which resides at the lower end of said tilt - accompanied by out-of-place, cheerful humming. He can hear Koki sniffling, doubtless having cried himself dry.
“You’re such a good boy!” Dr. Hosojima says. Shouta sees the shadows of her movement in the hallway but doesn’t peer through the door in case she is facing his direction. “And you promise it goes back far enough?”
“It does, it does!” Koki sobs, voice thick with both tears and the full force of his lisp. “I promise!”
Koki only successfully decided the length of time someone travels once. In a controlled, safe, environment. Even if he managed to do so again under such high stress, he still can’t control where the time traveler will end up. This is a ridiculously dangerous and unreasonable undertaking for Dr. Hosojima, even if it hadn’t been illegal.
“Fantastic! I’ll make sure to give you a treat when I get back. Goodbye, sweetie!”
Yeah, no. Shouta’s not letting this get any further. He darts into the kitchen so fast he nearly stumbles over the child trussed up by the doorway. A mess of school supplies is strewn over the tiled floor, which sags worryingly in the middle, and the middle-aged woman that is Dr. Hosojima is at that moment picking up a brightly colored All Might themed pen. The quirk-affected object, Shouta assumes, as he lands just in front of Koki and snares Dr. Hosojima with his capture weapon. His satisfaction when the pen drops out of her hand is brief, because the next moment the floor screams and the middle of the entire kitchen floor tumbles down. Shouta scrambles backwards but the weight of Dr. Hosojima drags him down even as he lets go of the capture weapon. Behind — and soon above — Shouta, Koki lets out a terrified yell but thankfully does not fall in after them.
Crap. Shouta lands on his left ankle hard and partially busts his goggles as his face hits a wall. Dust chokes the air and seeps in through the new crack in his goggles. That’s a sprained ankle, at least, and diminished quirk use. He can’t see anything through the dust but he can hear frantic movement ahead of him. He walks forwards carefully, mindful of hidden debris and fists at the ready. He catches a whiff of clean air - hears the squabble of police at the other side of the building - and realizes he’s walked into an alley. He can just barely make out Dr. Hosojima, who is reaching down for something.
Panic flares. It only takes a few seconds for the time travel to activate, so he can’t let her touch it for long. He springs forward brashly and lands a punch with his quirk activated - but the next instant has to clench his eyes shut because the dust stings much more than he thought it would. She slaps his hand, and suddenly it’s like he’s a marionette with its strings cut. His body topples to the ground and he feels the tug that yanks his mind temporarily out of his body - and judging from the new point of view, into the subconsciousness of Dr. Hosojima.
He can feel her lips form a curse word as she glances down to where the quirk object presumably was. Only her head is moving; the rest of her body is rigid. She looks at his body but looks away again at the sight of something darting out of the alley. Was that a —
One warping sensation later and suddenly Shouta has a body again.
And, apparently, four legs. An extra appendage. Dark fur. Whiskers. Hyper senses.
Double crap.
“Where did that darn thing go,” Dr. Hosojima mutters, although it takes Shouta a moment to decipher the words with his new ears. The dust is clearing up - or maybe cats can see better in this sort of atmosphere - and she is patting her hand on the ground through the mist to feel for the pen. Shouta struggles onto to his…paws and takes a few tentative steps. It seems the cat’s muscle memory is working in his favor. However, Shouta doesn’t even spot the pen until Dr. Hosojima picks it up because the colors have been muted from cat colorblindness and further covered by a layer of dust.
Let’s hope this is covered by muscle memory, too, Shouta thinks, and jumps.
“What the heck!” Dr. Hosojima shrieks as he clamps his teeth into the fingers holding the pen. A second later his scrabbling feet figure out how to unsheathe their claws and he holds onto the back of her hand for dear life.
“Let go you mangy beast!” She hisses as she tries to pry his mouth open with her other hand, which seems to have been injured at some point. He dangles in the air, swinging his hind legs in the hopes that he can lash out with those as well. “Crap! How is your tiny mouth so strong?!”
She doesn’t have further opportunity to shake him off because a moment later time seems to freeze. All of Shouta’s upgraded senses cut off except for the sensation popping ears. He feels a loss of gravity briefly, and then reality slams back into existence. Shouta lands on the ground with newfound grace but witnesses Dr. Hosojima fall on her butt with a dazed expression. They are in a different and intact alley, the time of day is late afternoon instead of evening, and the quirk object is clutched in the villain’s hand, covered by her sleeve. Please let it be the same day, please let it be the same day, he chants.
As much as Shouta would love for her to hold onto the pen for another five seconds and return to whenever they came from, he would also like to come with. He springs again and Dr. Hosojima barely rolls out of the way. She jumps to her feet just as he crouches and tries again — and lands a vicious kick to his midsection. Shouta goes flying, hitting one of the alley walls and slumping to the ground. Dr. Hosojima turns to run out of the alley as he struggles to recover his breath.
She’s going to get away! He thinks in despair.
His only way home steps out of the alley and—
—is bowled over by a small child.
“OhmygoshI’msosorry!” The kid blurts, hurrying to clean up the mess that spilled from the backpack he was holding. A backpack so obnoxiously yellow that even cat colorblindness can’t dim it. “Miss, are you okay?”
“Yes,” Dr. Hosojima snaps, snatching a pen from the assortment on the ground. She stalks out of sight and Shouta limps his way as quickly as he can to the mouth of the alley, trying to catch a glimpse of her in the afternoon bustle.
But there on the ground is the quirk object, being picked up by a child’s hand. Shouta blinks, filled with an overwhelming feeling of relief that Dr. Hosojima hasn’t just made off with the time machine. Then his eyes drag up from the hand to its owner.
“Oh,” Izuku Midoriya says. “Hi there, kitty.”
Shouta startles back into the alley at the sight of the obviously younger version of his student. Midoriya’s face falls and he slips the pen - shoot, Shouta needs that - into his backpack. The boy straightens up, brushing off his clothes and glancing around, then flinches at something behind him.
“Sorry, I’m heading your way,” Midoriya mumbles, which is all the warning Shouta gets before this literal preteen darts into the alley. Shouta watches in befuddlement as he practically dives behind a dumpster, and then the tramping of feet alerts him to a trio of other children rushing past the alley. It surprises him more than it should to see a young Bakugou leading the charge, expression as murderous as ever.
Shouta pads over to Midoriya, who is still behind the dumpster and rummaging through his backpack. The boy looks up when he notices him and gives a beaming smile with no indication that he’s just narrowly avoided a pack of what were obviously bullies.
“Hello again!” Problem Child says cheerfully, but this time in a whisper. He looks just barely old enough to be in junior high. His black uniform is rumpled and stinks of a unique sweetness mixed with smoke. Shouta can’t see any burn marks, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t there.
What he wants to do is leave the alley, find Nedzu or a Pro who can help him, and then track down the villain and head home. Then have a word with his Midoriya and Bakugou. But he can’t waste time trying to tell someone about his circumstances because Midoriya has the time machine. Who knows how soon the villain will realize she picked up the wrong pen and hunt Midoriya down? Shouta can’t risk Midoriya losing the pen, either…
Wait.
What.
What is Midoriya doing, reaching out his hand…
Yeah, no. Not happening. Shouta does not have time for this. He turns tail with a huff and trots just out of reach. Huh. How does Midoriya nail that kicked puppy look so well?
“Hey, come on,” Midoriya coaxes. “Here, kitty kitty kitty…”
Like a mature adult, Shouta narrows his eyes and growls.
“Whoa, okay,” Midoriya says, quickly withdrawing his hand like a sane person confronted with an aggressive stray cat. “Sorry.” He pulls out a phone, checks it, then stuffs it in a pocket. Next to come out of the backpack are a battered notebook with an indecipherable label and—the All Might pen turned time machine.
“Wish I had some sort of treat,” he mutters as he closes the backpack, stands up, and slips it on all while being oblivious to the intense stare Shouta treats the unordinary writing utensil in his hand.
‘Give it to me,’ Shouta tries to demand before Midoriya can leave the alley, but cat muscle memory does not include the Japanese language. Some strange noise comes out of his mouth that might have passed as a meow if it didn’t also sound like he was simultaneously underwater and being strangled. Midoriya doesn’t seem to hear over the city noises, but does cast him one last glance before heading out the opposite end of the alley from where he’d entered.
It takes him only moments to notice Shouta trotting alongside him hyper-vigilantly. “You’re...following me?” The boy blinks, then smiles. “Guess you just don’t like being pet…” Midoriya is perfectly content to navigate the streets notebook in hand with a cat trailing him, even slowing down with irritating amusement to wait for Shouta to catch up using his ridiculously tiny legs a few times. It’s annoying to navigate the crowds as such a small animal and although they begin to thin out, Midoriya picks up pace and waits for him less as they get closer to wherever the Problem Child’s destination is.
Worryingly, it is at the sound of a violent crashing noise that Midoriya completely forgets about Shouta and barrels around the corner of the street they were on. Shouta streaks across the pavement to keep track of him, and finds on the next street over…a villain fight.
Of course, he thinks in exasperation. Of course he’s one of those kids…
Some no-name villain is tossing cars with what looks like a basic strength quirk, fighting against who Shouta thinks is Death Arms. There’s a few civilians scattered about, watching the fight. Midoriya stays a commendable distance away from the action, taking notes so fast they couldn’t be coming out as anything more than scribbles. Shouta hovers, worried about the fight suddenly moving, but despite the villain turning about to be have decently powerful telekinesis or magnetic quirk - as evidenced by him suddenly throwing all the manhole covers in the area at Death Arms - the arrival of backup wraps the situation up pretty quickly.
The real problem is when Midoriya literally bumps into Bakugou and co. as they turn to leave, once the villain is packed away and the area is temporarily cleared of heroes. He is on the receiving end of a blatantly purposeful shove, the force staggering the boy in place.
“Skulking around the real heroes again, Deku?” Bakugou sneers. “So predictably desperate.” Shouta isn’t listening to their conversation, however — Midoriya has, once again, dropped his pen. Now’s his chance to grab the quirk object and find help. He edges closer to the pen at the feet of the group of boys, hoping to pick it up before they can stop him. No such luck.
“Hey Midoriya, isn’t that your pen?” One of the unnamed boys says with a laugh. “That your cat, too?”
He pounces, but he’s too late. The other bully scoops the pen up. “It’s an All Might one, so it’s totally his!” Shouta contemplates seriously maiming these schoolchildren, but also knows they won’t hesitate to kick him if he tries anything.
They glance around, ignoring the spitting cat at their feet, then spot something on the street. “Hey—wouldn’t that be perfect place for Deku’s trash?” His companion nods his head in agreement, sharing a vicious smile with his friend. As Shouta looks where their attention was drawn, he hears Midoriya break away from his less-than-friendly conversation with Bakugou.
“Wait, please don’t—!” The Problem Child tries, even as the bullies toss the time machine into the manhole left open from the villain fight. Shouta doesn’t even hesitate to leap after it.
The drop isn’t a problem, because cats have magical powers. The voices of Midoriya and Bakugou’s little gang echo into the sewer, which has an understandably overpowering stench. The pen is thankfully laying in sight. Shouta considers his options: he could touch it for the required five seconds and go back, but he’d be stranding Dr. Hosojima in the past where she could wreak unknown havoc on the timeline. He doesn’t know the exact date they landed in, so it would be hard for Koki to make another time machine to retrieve her - even then, it’s possible that the objects can’t bring back someone who was displaced by a different, used up, time machine. He should go back up and find something to grab it with.
Except, crap. The ladder’s rails are round. How is he supposed to climb it without opposable thumbs? He really didn’t think this through.
As Shouta valiantly struggles to pull himself up the damp, slippery rails he can hear the continued jeering of the bullies. They’re bold, pulling something like this at the site of a recent villain attack when the heroes or police could come back to wrap things up at any moment. Kids are nasty little things, and despite Midoriya’s impressive quirk he isn’t one to stand up for himself — and they are taking full advantage of that fact. It takes a few minutes beyond the disposal of the All Might pen before they grow bored and leave. There’s no sound coming from Midoriya during this, except for when Bakugou presumably uses his quirk. Shouta’s not sure what happens then, but he doesn’t like it.
When the bullies leave, Midoriya mutters to himself harshly, and there’s a scuffling noise. It takes Shouta a moment to realize the boy is walking away from the manhole. Before he can do anything to draw his attention, however, someone else arrives.
“Hey! You little—er, I mean, hey kid!” Shouta’s heart sinks at the sound of Dr. Hosojima’s voice. She’s already found them, despite the fact she barely got a glance at Midoriya and has no resources in this time to fall back on.
Can she track Shouta’s consciousness, since it’s still out of his body? Maybe he should have sought out Nedzu after all, if only to draw her away from Midoriya.
“Uh, yes?” No Problem Child, do not talk to this strange lady who may or may not still look like an utter mess and who you already saw once today. Stranger danger, Midoriya, stranger danger.
“I think we accidentally switched pens,” she lets out a convincingly embarrassed chuckle. “I had an All Might one that looks just like this, except it’s an ink pen and not a mechanical pencil. Normally I wouldn’t be such a creep and just get a new one—but it’s for my nephew’s birthday in an hour and I don’t know where to find another one on such short notice.”
“Oh! I’m so sorry, I didn’t even notice—”
“You have it, right?” She asks with just a hint of impatience.
“Uh...” there’s a pause as the backpack is unzipped. “Oh!”
“What?”
“It must be the one that fell in that manhole...oh.”
“What.” Her tone is getting a little dangerous now.
“I can’t believe I forgot about the cat! What if it’s stuck?!”
“...cat?! Is he still down there?”
Please notice she immediately knows who you’re talking about, kid. At least be suspicious of her.
“Um, he should be...he didn’t come back out.” This is probably not what Dr. Hosojima wants to hear, because Shouta can guess that she’s panicking over the possibility of him having left without her. Seems this isn’t the right date in time for her plans after all.
Dr. Hosojima sticks her face over the sewer opening with a dreading expression, but it soon dissolves into a victorious one. “Ha!” She laughs, looking down on Shouta. “This is amazing. You’re totally trapped, you little bugger!”
He hisses at her. “Oh boy, this is too good,” she gloats. A confused ‘huh?’ comes from the out-of-sight Midoriya. “You can’t get back up! Ha, you—haha! Is the object not working for you because you’re a cat? Or did you think I’d just come along, let you come back with me, then let you stall me enough to be arrested?!” There was another, more deranged laugh this time. “Not today, hero!”
“‘Hero’?” The oblivious Problem Child echoes. Why in the world is he still here when this woman is laughing maniacally and talking to a cat?!
Dr. Hosojima starts down the ladder, and Shouta immediately backs away from it. The quirk object is laying off to the right, and Shouta bats it deeper into the sewer so she can’t grab it immediately, but there’s not much else he can do except hope that a situation similar to how they ended up in the past in the first place will re-enact itself. As Shouta leaps at her ankles, he thinks he sees Midoriya peer through the manhole with a frown.
“Not this again!” She shrieks, kicking him into the shallow stream of the tunnel. Shouta splashes ahead of her and nips at her hand as she reaches for the time machine, causing her to pull back. He keeps going, picking up the pen as tightly as he can. As expected, she immediately holds onto it. Now he just needs to keep his grip until—
—a pointy shoe slams into his stomach and he reflexively lets go. She walks backwards to the ladder, grinning as Shouta tries to recover. And then a backpack falls on her head.
“Sorry!” Midoriya calls nervously, barely using the rails as he climbs into the sewer and politely avoids her stunned body. Shouta idly wonders how many books are in that bag. The boy hesitates, but picks up the pen and backpack and turns to Shouta. “I’m picking you up!”
Midoriya is still cautious as he approaches, but Shouta dashes to him quickly. They need to leave here before she wakes up, and now that Midoriya appears to have a vague idea of what’s going on Shouta should prioritize alerting someone of his situation. Shouta lets himself be manhandled and restrains himself from startling when he realizes he’s going into the backpack. Thankfully the pen is put in one of the front pockets and he doesn’t fully zip up the pouch Shouta is in before climbing onto the ladder.
“Get back here you brat!” Midoriya flinches, then begins struggling. Shouta glances down; Dr. Hosojima is latched onto the kid’s ankle, baring her teeth aggressively.
Just use your quirk, Shouta thinks, before remembering that Midoriya is still at the point where he breaks bones if he uses his power. Thankfully, at that moment police sirens become audible. Dr. Hosojima lets go with a gasp, then gets up and scurries far down the tunnel, out of sight. Midoriya is quick to get to the surface, where a few police are waiting.
“Hey kid!” One shouts in surprise. They parked with awareness of the open manhole cover, but are obviously baffled at seeing a child climbing out of it. “What were you doing in there?”
“I’m sorry, officer!” He replies. “It’s just–my cat got stuck down there—” the officers are understandably even more wide-eyed at seeing Shouta poke his disgruntled muzzle into view, “—so I had to go down there to get him out. Uh...I think there’s a woman down there, too, but I got out as fast as I could!”
The expressions on the officers’ faces are laughable. As it is, Shouta just wishes this entire series of events was a dream. He certainly needs the sleep.
“Uh, that’s alright, kid,” the first one said. “Just see if there are any police around to help before doing something like that. I’m sure you know there was a villain fight here about ten minutes ago, so be aware of that, too. And we’ll check out that person you mentioned. What’s your name?”
“I-Izuku Midoriya.”
“Okay, Midoriya. We’re going to clean up the area a bit, so it’d help us if you clear out. If we have any questions, we’ll contact you.”
“Uh, alright! Bye!”
They walk through the city for a nerve-wracking half hour before Midoriya enters a building, and then an apartment. It doesn’t sound like anybody is home, but Shouta assumes this is his house. This is only cemented by the fact that Midoriya dumps him gently out into garish All Might-themed bedroom. They stare at each other for a moment before Midoriya talks.
“Can you understand me?” The Problem Child asks with unsurprising intuition. Shouta can’t nod his head fast enough. “So she’s not crazy. She’s a villain, then? I wonder what her quirk is, that it can...do whatever happened to you...”
Well, she’s still crazy, but now is not the time to argue that point. Shouta nods again, then swats the kid to make him pay attention as he falls into a mumbling tangent about Dr. Hosojima’s quirk. “So...what was up with...that whole situation?”
Shouta levels a deadpan look at him in reply.
“Uh, yes or no questions—right.” The boy thinks for a second. “Are you really a pro hero?”
He nods. Midoriya brightens and, sensing another tangent, Shouta flicks him with his tail. Chastised, he continues, “which one?” Shouta shakes his head firmly, because that’s not an important question. Midoriya seems to understand and leaves it alone, albeit with some disappointment.
“Is that pen important?” (Yes) “...can you find a way to tell me why?”
Shouta hesitates, then looks around the room. There’s a lot of clutter, but it’s neatly organized and he manages to find a calendar on the wall. He jumps onto the closest piece of furniture – a desk — and somehow manages not to knock over the five million figurines that adorn it in the process. He then reaches and tugs at the calendar with his teeth. As Midoriya pulls it down with a confused look, Shouta grabs a mechanical ink pen and jumps back into the floor. Taking the hint although still dubious, the Problem Child lays the calendar down, clicks open the pen for him, and watches.
It takes a bit if effort, but Shouta manages to strike through the year part of the calendar date. And then points at it decisively.
“What does that mean?!” Midoriya cries. Shouta rolls his eyes and carefully flips the page to point at the unedited date. Then he slowly points at Midoriya, turns the page, and points at the crosses out year and back at himself. He does this once more and waits for Midoriya to make something of it. “...so, this year is related to me somehow...and not related...to...you...”
Shouta can see the dawning comprehension in his eyes.
“...no way,” Midoriya breathes, staring at Shouta. “You’ve traveled in time? And–oh, the pen is a time machine?!”
When Shouta nods, the Problem Child looks like he’s on the verge of fainting from sheer excitement. The muttering storm he descends into takes far more prods than usual to bring him out of. At the very least Midoriya realizes it’s most likely the result of a quirk and not simply futuristic technology.
And then: “So how can I help? You need the villain before you go back, right?” Shouta bobs his head, but also tries to telepathically relay that under no circumstances is Midoriya ever getting near that villain again. When the message is deterred by Midoriya’s thick skull, he tries to wrangle the kid’s phone out of his pocket. Through a series of time-consuming questions, Midoriya ends up nervously calling a very special number.
“This is Nedzu,” the animal’s cheery yet threatening voice comes. “Who is this and how did you get this number, might I ask?”
‘Principal Nedzu?!’ Midoriya mouths at Shouta in disbelief before mustering up the courage to reply. “Uh, I’m Izuku Midoriya sir...I swear this isn’t a prank, but a cat claiming to be a pro hero...who travelled in time…he had me call this number...”
“Ohmygoshthatsoundsridiculous, he totally thinks I’m pranking him,” Midoriya broke off and whisper-muttered. A long, intimidating ‘hmmmm’ comes from the phone, not particularly helping this state of mind.
But then: “And how does he propose he travelled through time?”
“Uh...there’s this pen...I’m don’t know what activates it, though. But there was this woman – villain – who I think changed him into a cat somehow, so somebody else must have used their quirk on it?”
“What sort of pen might that be?” Midoriya looks completely lost at this point, but Shouta realizes that Nedzu must have knowledge on Koki Tomohiro — and more specifically, his love for heroes. Is it a habit of Koki’s to make time machines out of his hero merchandise?
“I-it’s a mechanical one...it’s also All Might themed...?”
“I’ll be there shortly,” and then the call ends.
Midoriya blinks at the phone. “But doesn’t he need my address?” Shouta guffaws as best he can, only freaking the boy out more. Within minutes the doorbell rings. Thankfully Midoriya checks through the peephole before opening it to make sure it isn’t Dr. Hosojima, which is a very real possibility.
Nedzu doesn’t enter the apartment, merely casting an appraising eye over both of them. “I believe this something to be settled at U.A. I have a consultant with a telepathy quirk who will be meeting us there. Young Midoriya, if you could bring the quirk object and come with us…oh, and tell your mother you’ll be late home because you’ve been called to follow up on that villain attack you saw earlier.”
The Problem Child looks unnerved by Nedzu’s knowledge but somehow takes it in stride. He retrieves his backpack, calls his Mom, and then asks, “Uh, why am I going to U.A.? Not that I’m not happy to help…and go to U.A.…”
“A person of interest has a quirk that can transfer human minds into animals. It is possible she can track his consciousness when it is out of his body, which means she could be close to this very building,” he answered, echoing Shouta’s earlier thoughts. “Now, let us be off! I have yet to determine who the unlucky pro to be sent backwards in time and be trapped in an unfamiliar body is. Although, I do have my suspicions…”
If you have a suspicion, just ask already, Shouta thinks grumpily, following the group as they leave.
“I could do that as well!” Nedzu exclaims, startling Midoriya and seemingly reading Shouta’s mind without the need for a telepathic translator. “You certainly have the same expressions. Eraserhead, is it not?”
Reluctantly, the pro-turned-cat nods. The rest of the way down the stairs Midoriya babbles a slew of outdated - for Shouta, at least — statistics in praise of his fighting style and career. He does his best to remain impassive to the one-sided conversation, but it’s…nice to hear that despite his underground status at least one person who isn’t a student (don’t know they are a student) or coworker recognizes him for his efforts.
Snipe is apparently the car’s driver, so there is no lack of talking from Midoriya as they drive to U.A. Nedzu is growing alarmingly interested at every point of analysis Midoriya makes, and Shouta notes to himself to warn the principal not to steal the boy into an apprenticeship after this to avoid disrupting the timeline. For that same reason, he’d already considered and almost unwillingly dismissed the notion of alerting the school to the future villain activity. As Shouta is ushered into Nedzu’s office with Midoriya’s backpack, he witnesses the Problem Child corner Hizashi as the Voice Hero passes by. Snipe just looks relieved to earn his throat a break, and shamelessly leaves Hizashi to Midoriya’s mercy.
“Now, is everything Midoriya told me correct?” It’s the first thing Nedzu asks when they’ve sat down and the telepath has been instructed on a very censored version of Shouta’s situation.
‘Yes, I did get turned into a cat, sent back in time, and then fought a crazy lady over a pen in the sewers,’ Shouta thinks loudly with extra details irrelevant to the question, just to relish in the increasingly incredulous look on the telepath’s face. Someone else deserved to suffer from this, and if it was an innocent consultant, so be it.
“And do you have any further proof you’re Eraserhead?” Nedzu doesn’t bat an eye at the sewer comment, but Shouta knows he’ll bring it back up soon.
‘Hizashi’s the one who picked that name,’ he starts with, before listing various other things only he or those close to Nedzu would know. Once his legitimacy is established, Nedzu probes for the exact details of the case, and Shouta reports the events that occurred after he came back in time as well — making sure to remind Nedzu not to mess with the future events.
“How very interesting,” Nedzu muses, once the sewer fight tale in particular is finished. “Midoriya would make good hero material, even though he’s quirkless.”
Shouta is so startled by that statement that he nearly falls out of his seat. Nedzu wouldn’t just be wrong about something like a quirk.
The principal looks confused by his reaction, then his expression clears up sharply. “Ah, I don’t believe I need you to be present for this next bit,” The principal tells the consultant, who nods his head and leaves, seemingly reflecting on their life choices. Once the door is shut Nedzu looks at Shouta once more. “Do you know Midoriya in the future?”
Hesitantly, Shouta nods. “Is he not quirkless, then?” He shakes his head, not liking the contemplative expression on Nedzu’s face.
“…A late bloomer, then,” Nedzu says resolutely, but Shouta has the feeling that’s not what Nedzu really thinks is the answer. Although he needs to confront Midoriya and Nedzu on the ‘late bloomer’ part back in his time anyways. “Well, if you don’t have anything else to tell me, I think that’s all I need to know! I already have people searching for the older Dr. Hosojima discreetly, with a watch on the present one in case she seeks herself out. I’ll be very careful not to disrupt the timeline, I promise…except that I’ll arrange for back-up for that alley by the apartment building to help out once you and Dr. Hosojima arrive back in your correct time. All we have left to do now is wait!”
And wait they do. Midoriya is roped into playing chess against Nedzu at some point - freeing his victim, a never-before-seen speechless Present Mic - and Shouta mostly window-watches. At one point he spots his younger self across campus, which is weird as all heck. It takes only a hour until the report that they’ve located Shouta’s Dr. Hosojima…raiding a hero merchandise store at the mall for All Might pens. Yeah, she definitely isn’t in her right mind. Midoriya is sent out of the office again and they bring her to U.A. kicking and screaming. She enters the room mid-tantrum, but calms down upon seeing the quirk object. They’re all eager to get it over with, so Snipe none-to-gently forces her to make contact with the pen at the same time as Shouta.
Five seconds later, they’re tumbling into a clouded alley, choking on dust. “Police!” Someone shouts. Several figures rush into the crumbled building, presumably to free Koki. “Put your hands in the air, Dr. Hosojima!” Shouta scrambles to his body and watches the deranged doctor get easily taken into custody with quirk-suppressing cuffs.
“Eraserhead, right?” One of the medics present asks when the dust clears enough to notice him. At his nod, the medic gestures to herself. “I’m Anri Hida. I’m going to make skin contact to reverse the effects of Dr. Hosojima’s quirk, okay?”
Heck yes. He nods again, and she walks over to press her fingers against his body’s face. A few moments later, and the world spins into proper human focus. He lets her check the rest of his injuries out - watching the dazed cat he’d been in run out of the alley with mixed feelings - before he gets up and immediately calls Nedzu.
“Ah, hello Aizawa!” Nedzu answers. “Done already? Is there something I can help you with?”
“Yeah,” he grunts. “You know what it is. I expect to meet you and Midoriya in your office Monday after classes. And Bakugou, at some point...”
“It would be my pleasure! But I hope you don’t mind — All Might should be a part of the first conversation as well.”
He pinches the bridge of his nose as he mutters an agreement and hangs up. Of course All Might is involved somehow. When is he not?
It’s going to be a long weekend, but he has a feeling Monday is going to be even longer.