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Izuku
The sudden burst of screams and roaring, only slightly muffled by the café walls, was a probably a pretty good indicator that something wasn’t right.
“Honestly,” Izuku sighed as he accepted his coffee carrier from the terrified girl behind the counter. She was gone the moment the tray was out of her hands.
The ground shook hard enough to rattle chairs and tables over the parquet and loose tiny flakes of plaster from the walls. Izuku stumbled his way over the window, dodging the rush of patrons trying to escape the café. His eyes immediately met a tower of shiny red scales over well-defined muscle. A leg, then. He looked up. And up.
The bell over the door jingled mockingly when Izuku stepped outside.
“EXCUSE ME!” He yelled. At the dragon.
The dragon (an incredible quirk, if only its user wasn’t literally firebombing the streets) ignored him and continued to roar and spray washes of flame after the fleeing crowd. Diplomacy appeared to be a no-go, then. Izuku briskly pulled out his phone and, for the first time since he’d received it, hit the emergency call button for the Ingenium Agency heroes. If Iida wasn’t on the scene in five minutes or less, Izuku would eat his favorite red sneakers.
In the meantime, however…
Sadly, Izuku set down his drink carrier and reached into his bag of donuts. So much powdered, maple-glazed goodness about to be wasted. His friends would be so disappointed. Oh well.
Rearing back, Izuku lined up the shot, thanked every deity he could think of that Uraraka had bullied him into combat lessons, and hurled the poor donut straight into the dragon’s open eye.
“I said,” Izuku called over the sudden uproar, “excuse me!”
The dragon’s whole head swung around until both of its baleful, glowing eyes were fixed on Izuku. Oops.
“You know you’re breaking all kinds of laws right now, right?” Izuku lifted his hands up, only to find that they were shaking. Time to pull a page from All Might’s book.
He offered a wide, unshakable smile and started ticking things off on his fingers. “There’s the quirk usage in the street, of course, but you’ve also managed violence, endangerment of life, and destruction of public and private property.” Izuku gestured briefly to the melting road and smashed storefronts that surrounded them. “That’s enough for at least a twenty-year sentence. And practically my whole job is to read the rulebook, so I’d know. Was it really worth it?”
Izuku was allowed one second of hope before the dragon opened its mouth to reveal a growing spark in the back of its throat. Great.
Without hesitation, Izuku snatched up one of his coffee cups and flung it into the dragon’s mouth. The lid burst off as it landed, and coffee practically exploded over the dragon’s whole muzzle. The spark died.
The following look of horrified astonishment on the dragon’s face would’ve been comical if its next act hadn’t been to straight up try to bite Izuku in half. Izuku took a desperate leap to the side, tucking and rolling as he landed. Uraraka would be so proud.
Risking a glance back over his shoulder, Izuku saw the dragon’s next lunge in time to dive and roll again, only this time he didn’t wait before taking off down the cracked, scorched sidewalk.
How long had it been? Two minutes? Three? Farther away from the center of danger, Izuku ran across several braver (or possibly stupider) souls who’d stayed outside to watch. Thankfully, they didn’t need any additional convincing to flee when a two-story-tall, fire-breathing tank of a quirk came thundering down the road toward them.
Desperately rummaging around in the torn donut bag, Izuku wrapped his fingers around the final powdered ball and flung it blindly toward the dragon’s face. It made contact in a sugary cloud, but he was only allowed a microsecond of satisfaction before the dragon let out a shriek so piercing Izuku was pretty sure his ears were bleeding.
“Iida!” He practically screamed into the wind, his shins and ankles jolting with the force of his sprint. “Could really use some help right now!”
Right on cue, a silvery blur rushed past on Izuku’s left, and he screeched to a halt, coughing in the lingering clouds of dust on Iida’s trail.
“Recipro Burst!” Iida shouted, and Izuku watched with immeasurable relief as the dragon’s head—entire body, really—was launched up and back with the strength of Iida’s kick. The dragon hit the ground with all the force of an earthquake.
“Todoroki,” Iida called.
“Got it.”
Izuku spun when a warm hand landed on his shoulder, and he looked up to meet Todoroki’s mismatched eyes.
“You too?” He asked, a little surprised. It was rare than Ingenium Agency sent more than one of their powerhouses to a random scene.
“Of course.” Todoroki’s mouth twitched. “We could hardly leave our secretary to fend for himself.” He took a firm step forward, and a path of ice shot across the ground before exploding into a glacier around the dragon. No matter how many times Izuku saw it, he was pretty sure he’d never get tired of the effortless display of power.
“Aww, there’s nothing fun left for me,” came a voice from over Izuku’s head.
“Uraraka!?” Izuku yelped, jumping back. Uraraka did a midair flip before gracefully drifting down to land on her feet.
“Yup! When we heard it was you who’d pressed the emergency button, we had to make sure it wasn’t actually the end of the world or something.” She gave him a gentle flick on the forehead. “How do you keep managing to get into these situations alone?”
“I don’t try,” Izuku whined, but Uraraka only laughed.
When the police cars and cleanup heroes started to arrive on scene, Iida finally came jogging over to their little huddle.
“I’m glad we made it in time! Midoriya, are you alright?”
“All good,” Izuku reassured him. “Just a little shaky. And coffee deprived. I lost mine to the…” He briefly glanced over to the naked, squirming man the police were dragging away from the iceberg. “Well, to that guy.”
“We can certainly remedy that,” Iida declared. “There’s an excellent café quite close to our agency, if I recall correctly.”
“They have the best eclairs,” Uraraka said solemnly, licking her lips. “Get me one of those and I won’t even complain about the lost donuts.”
Ochako
Of course the story was all over the news the next day, even though it mainly just featured Iida and Todoroki’s part of the showdown. In fact, somehow the only mention of Midoriya was a single, blurry phone shot of him standing beside Todoroki, which, in Ochako’s opinion, was wildly unfair. But Midoriya never seemed bothered by the public’s continued failure to give him the credit he deserved, so there really wasn’t much else Ochako could do.
She’d misplaced one of the components of her hero costume the night before, so she ended up cheating a little and using her quirk to dodge the crowds and get to the Agency a little faster. She would still be late, but hopefully Midoriya would let that much slide.
When she pushed through the front doors though, she was surprised to find Todoroki standing in Midoriya’s usual spot, his hands clasped together in about as nervous a gesture as he ever made. Ochako raised an eyebrow and hurried over.
“Oh good,” were the first words out of Todoroki’s mouth. “You’re here. Something’s wrong with Midoriya.”
Seeing as the Agency wasn’t collapsing around them and Todoroki didn’t seem too panicked, Ochako assumed it wasn’t anything immediately serious. How had Midoriya managed to get into trouble before the first coffee break of the day? “What happened?”
Todoroki’s brow creased just a fraction. “We don’t know. He keeps insisting he’s fine, but he just seems… off.”
“Uh-huh.” Ochako said. “Purely out of curiosity, why aren’t you helping him?”
“He’s not letting me; or Iida for that matter. Iida thinks it’s because he… admires us too much tell us what’s wrong.”
“And you think he doesn’t admire me?”
“No! I—” Ochako caught the flash of genuine panic in Todoroki’s eyes and relented.
“I’m joking, I’m joking; I know I’m a little less intimidating overall. I’ll take care of it. Hold my calls!” She gave him a jaunty wave before darting to the elevators.
When she reached Midoriya’s office, the door was fully shut, which was the first obvious clue that something was wrong. He’d given Ochako full permission to bother him whenever she wanted though, so she pushed it open without hesitation.
Midoriya’s head shot up, and Ochako stared at the shining tear tracks that highlighted the shadows under wide, watery eyes.
“Oh my god, Midoriya, what’s wrong?” She rushed to his side, where he was already hiding his face back in his arms and feebly flapping a hand at her.
Midoriya’s voice came out muffled. “O-oh, nothing, I’m just—being stupid. You know how it is.”
“I most certainly do not know how it is, and you’d better tell me about it,” Ochako insisted. She paused, then softened her next words. “If it matters that much to you, then it definitely matters to me. Did you get hurt yesterday?”
“…No.”
The hesitation was more than enough to let Ochako know that Midoriya was a liar, liar, pants on fire. She dropped her hands firmly on his shoulders and spun him in his chair until they were fully facing each other. “Tell.”
Midoriya sighed, slow and miserable. “It really is just me blowing things out of proportion. The worst injury I got yesterday was some singed eyebrows, nobody died in front of me, and Iida took the dragon down no problem! I didn’t sleep well last night, that’s all.”
“…Because of nightmares?” Ochako asked, narrowing her eyes at him.
He nodded, and took a surreptitious swipe at the last of the wetness on his cheeks.
“Nightmares of a two-story tall dragon? Of running and being unable to escape? Of missing just one step on the road? Of fire and screams and crumbling buildings?” Ochako pressed.
Midoriya blinked up at her with eyes as round as the moon. “How…”
“Midoriya, we’ve all had those nightmares, and don’t let anyone, no matter how cool they are, tell you otherwise. It’s practically in the job description.” She slumped a little. “I never really thought about it before, but all the dangerous situations you’ve been in before… you were never really on the frontlines of the action. This battle, you had to face head on.”
“But nothing happened to me!” Midoriya’s eyes were shining again and he sounded honest-to-god frustrated. “I’m just the secretary, you guys took care of the actual fight.”
“Something did happen to you,” Ochako said, moving her hands up from Midoriya’s shoulders to clap them over his cheeks. He made a muffled noise, but she ignored it. “You, the secretary, almost entirely unprepared for battle, took on a terrifying dragon quirk with nothing but donuts and coffee, and won in all the ways that mattered. The criminal was distracted long enough for Iida and Todoroki to get there, and focused enough on you that he didn’t bother attacking any other civilians.”
Ochako stared Midoriya directly in the eyes and poured all her concentration into getting her point across. “As far as I’m concerned, your part was more important and way cooler than ours. You were the real hero yesterday.”
For a moment, time froze, Midoriya’s faintly-trembling lip the only indication he was still there. Then, to Ochako’s utter lack of surprise, he burst again into tears.
With a half laugh, half sigh, Ochako reached over to the call system to press the buttons for Iida and Todoroki, then moved in to throw her arms around Midoriya’s shaking shoulders. “It’s okay to not be okay. Don’t shut us out. After all, what are heroes for, if not to help?”
“Well, probably not to deal with their emotionally unstable secretaries,” Midoriya mumbled into her collarbone. Ochako promptly drew back just enough to swat him over the back of the head before hugging him even tighter.
Midoriya yelped, a tiny sound, then resumed crying, even louder this time. Barely a second later, Iida came bursting through the door, Todoroki hot on his heels.
“Midoriya?!”
“He’ll be okay,” Ochako informed them. “He’d just processing nearly dying to a dragon yesterday.”
Iida and Todoroki made identical, frankly hilarious, sounds of understanding before shuffling in to join the hug. Well, Iida did anyway, in his usual stiff-limbed, awkwardly affectionate way. Todoroki mostly just stood at Midoriya’s side with a single hand (the warm one, Ochako noted with approval) laid on his shoulder. Apparently that was more than enough for Midoriya though, if the tear-streaked smile on his face was any indication.
Eventually, Midoriya’s sobs tapered off, and after he’d used one or fifty tissues, he stood and wobbled around his desk. “Thank you,” he said, also for the fiftieth time, just a terrifyingly sincere as the first time it had come from his mouth. “I think I need some water now.”
“Of course,” Iida said brusquely, as he marched over to the door. They all followed at a much more relaxed pace.
When the door swung open, there was a great crash and chorus of shrieks as half the Agency’s administrative and maintenance staff came tumbling into the room.
“What—” Midoriya started, but one of the girls interrupted him.
“Izu-chan! You’re alright!”
A dozen other voices echoed the sentiment.
“We were worried about you, you know,” one of the guys—who Ochako was ninety-eight percent sure was a janitor for the lobby—said solemnly.
“I’m sorry,” Midoriya said, dipping his head. “I’ll try not to let it happen again.”
“Oh, you can let it happen again if you must; just get some actual help when you do,” said the terrifying supplies manager, her glasses glinting under the normally soft lights of the office.
Then, despite his apologies and protests, Midoriya was promptly swept up in the tide of people. Since it was in the general direction of the water cooler, Ochako wasn’t going to worry too much.
When she looked over at Iida and Todoroki, they had a shared expression of faint awe that Ochako was pretty sure was mirrored on her own face.
“Who would’ve thought?” Todoroki said quietly.
The three of them watched for a moment longer before Iida clapped his hands together. “Well, if Midoriya is in good hands, then there’s no point in wasting daylight hours. Back to work!”
As she stepped into her office, Ochako shook her head and sighed a little. The security tapes from the day before were still open on her computer, paused on the exact moment a cup of coffee had exploded over the dragon’s head.
Why they didn’t just let Midoriya at all the villains of the world, she had no idea.