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Izuku had long since resigned himself to the fiction that his father was “working overseas”. He knew better, of course, but that was the story he and his mother told people whenever they asked about his father.
“Oh, Hisashi?” Inko would laugh charmingly and wave a dismissive hand. “He’s working overseas at the moment! He stays in touch though, of course, and is a part of Izuku’s life as much as possible!”
“My dad calls every week!” Izuku would chirp in agreement, and he and his mother would exchange a look as the other people cooed or tsked and pitied the two of them for their “sacrifice” and for “being alone for so long.”
Izuku always tuned out when people commented on his mother’s lack of ring and “my son would be just perfect for you, loves children, wouldn’t you like to meet him, dear?”
Izuku and Inko always laughed the hardest when people started trying to play matchmaker. His father, on the other hand, didn’t take half as kindly to the busybodies as his son and wife did.
The truth was, “Midoriya Hisashi” doesn’t exist. Well, that’s not quite true. Izuku is sure that there is, or was, someone out there with that name, but Midoriya Hisashi is not his father, isn’t related to him at all. “Midoriya” was the name his mother chose when she married his father, named after the hair color she and her husband shared that Izuku ended up inheriting.
And his father wasn’t “working overseas”. He worked in Tokyo, close enough to visit most days and never stayed away for more than a week, two at the most if he was incredibly busy. Izuku always knew his father loved him, knew that he wanted to be with Izuku and Inko as much as possible, and that if he had to stay away for awhile it was because of work and not because of want.
But Izuku would be lying if he said he didn’t hate all the lying he had to do, that he didn’t want to tell people how amazing and loving and supportive his father really was. Izuku wanted to scream at his bullies, at everyone who looked down on him because he was Quirkless, that he could be a Hero, that his father fought functionally Quirkless and he was the only Hero to ever be a sidekick to All Might !
But Izuku wasn’t stupid. He knew that being connected to a powerful limelight Hero like Sir Nighteye, let alone acknowledged publicly as the Hero’s son, was dangerous . Villain reprisal would become a very real possibility if Izuku and Inko’s true connection to his father came out, and that wasn’t a risk his parents were willing to take. So Izuku became “Midoriya” instead of “Sasaki”, and invented an absent father overseas and pretended it didn’t hurt when people made snide comments about his “deadbeat dad” in front of him.
Because his father was amazing . Not just as a Pro Hero that straddled the Limelight and Underground worlds, a Hero that had one of the highest case closure rates and lowest collateral damage percentages in the entire system, but as a parental figure as well. His father was there for practically every milestone, from Izuku toddling to his hands across the apartment floor to Izuku finding out he was Quirkless.
Izuku remembers that day clearly, the devastation he felt at the presence of an extra toe joint, the heartbreak in his mother’s eyes as she hugged him to her and sobbed apologies. He remembers his father slamming his way into the apartment and gathering Izuku into his arms, wiping the tears from Izuku’s cheeks as his yellow eyes stared deep into Izuku’s green ones.
“C-can I still be a Hero without a Quirk, Dad?” Izuku remembers asking. “Can I be like you? Like All Might?”
Izuku remembers how his father crushed him to his chest, rubbing a large hand up and down his back as he murmured promises into his son’s curly green hair. “You can be a Hero, Izu, if that’s what you want. You can be like me, like All Might. You’ll be the best Hero, I swear.”
Inko remembers how her husband’s eyes remained staunchly yellow as he refused to activate his Quirk on his distraught son, refused to See the life their baby was going to have and what he was destined to become.
Inko never knew if she hated Mirai for that decision, or was grateful to him for not setting their child’s future in stone. Especially when Izuku did end up developing a Quirk just before entering U.A., and even more so when Izuku returned home late from the Entrance Exam with a note from Recovery Girl advising her to keep her son home for a few days as the extended healing he received for breaking both arms and one of his legs had seriously depleted his stamina and needed time to recover.
Inko’s face had gone chalk white as she stared between her swaying son (her baby that apparently had a Quirk that was so strong it broke his bones! ), and the note in her hands, wishing beyond all hope that her husband hadn’t been tied up at work and not there yet. Izuku seemed to be standing only through sheer force of will, exhaustion marked in dark purple bruises beneath his eyes as he waited for Inko to say something, anything .
The silence stretched uncomfortably long before Izuku finally broke it. “I -- I have a Quirk, Mom,” he cheered tiredly, and Inko felt her heart skip a beat at the excited light in her son’s eyes.
“I can see that, Izu, and I’m so happy for you,” Inko smiled gently, locking her panic down tight as Izuku yawned so widely it seemed to split his face in half. “But we’ll celebrate tomorrow, hmm? Your father will be here when you wake up, he got tied up at work tonight, but you can tell us all about it then. In the meantime, Recovery Girl said you need rest. Why don’t you head to bed?”
Izuku nodded tiredly, enveloping Inko in a hug so strong it briefly lifted her from the ground, before releasing her and shuffling off to fall face forward onto his bed.
If he wasn’t so tired, Inko knew he wouldn’t have believed her deflection. Izuku was as smart as his father, after all, and Inko couldn’t hide her emotions on a good day.
When Mirai made it to the apartment not even 20 minutes later, Izuku was dead to the world, and Inko was staring at the note lying innocently on the kitchen table, a cup of tea long since cooled beside her and tear tracks dried on her cheeks.
“Inko,” Mirai greeted her with a smile, pressing a kiss to her forehead as he looked around. “Where’s Izu? Has he headed to bed already?”
Inko nodded mutely, gaze still on the note. Mirai, ever the analyst, caught on to her mood immediately. Taking in the tableau of tea, tear tracks, and note, he quickly sat beside her and grabbed her hands in his.
“Inko, what’s wrong? Is Izuku alright?” he murmured, thumb sliding over her skin soothingly. Inko made a strangled sound in her throat as the tears began anew, extricating a shaking hand and tapping the note.
“Izuku developed a Quirk today,” she choked out. “A strength-augmentation Quirk so powerful it broke his bones . Recovery Girl had to heal both his arms and one leg in order to send him home.”
Mirai froze, his hold on Inko’s hands tightening to the point of discomfort before abruptly releasing them. “Did you say a strength-augmentation Quirk? That injured him so severely that Recovery Girl had to keep him at UA hours after the exam ended to heal him?” he repeated softly, an odd tone to his words she had never heard before.
Inko wiped the tears from her eyes as she turned to look at her husband, flinching at what she saw there. There was no excitement in his gaze, no relief that their son was alright. Instead, all Inko saw was incandescent rage . His eyes burned a sickly, molten gold as he readjusted his glasses perfunctorily, clenching his hands so hard his knuckles turned white with the pressure.
Inko exhaled shakily as she slid to stand before him, taking his face in her hands as she drew his gaze up to hers. Stroking his cheekbones soothingly, she stared into his eyes and slowly, so slowly, the furious light dimmed until his eyes were back to the normal color she loved. Mirai buried his face in her stomach as he wrapped his arms around her waist, mumbling, “I’m going to kill him, Inko. I’m going to murder the Symbol of Peace and no one will be able to pin it on me.”
Inko choked out a half-laugh, half-sob as she clutched him to her as well. “Have you considered that maybe I like a little bit of murder in my life, especially if this is about what I think it is?” she asked, dread bubbling up in her stomach at the implications of what her husband had just admitted without admitting.
Izuku, her child, her baby , was the ninth holder of One for All, the Quirk previously held by All Might. A Quirk that, by all appearances, was intent on destroying her baby from the inside out, too powerful to be leashed in a teenager’s body. A Quirk that had nearly destroyed its previous owner in a grudge match with a centuries old Villain and ruined her husband’s relationship with the man that was his Hero.
A Quirk that seemed destined for tragedy.
“Did he know, Mirai? Does he know who Izuku is? Does he realize what he’s done? ” Inko pleaded desperately, tears obscuring her vision as her shoulders shook with sobs.
Mirai shook his head into her stomach, and Inko couldn’t help the whine that escaped her. Mirai began muttering under his breath, plans to kill All Might mixing with methods of training for Izuku and ways to get in contact with the Hero who had destroyed their partnership, their friendship, so many years ago without even a second thought.
When Mirai got like this, Inko never understood how no one ever made the connection between her son and her husband. All someone would have to see was the fanatical All Might worship shared by he and her son, the instinctive, analytical way they looked at the world and picked it apart, how Mirai and Izuku both tilted their heads just so when trying to figure out a problem, and their overwhelming need to help others above all else in order to connect the two. Her son was practically her husband in miniature, and Inko felt hatred burn bright and hot in her chest for the Number One Hero.
All Might was an idiot if he didn’t realize just who he had condemned to his death-sentence of a Quirk, if he didn’t see the shades of her husband in the face and actions of her son. Mirai had been his sidekick for years, his partner , and if All Might didn’t see the resemblance then he was an even bigger fool than she had already thought him to be. If Inko had to bury her son due to All Might’s negligence, had to bury her husband as he burned himself to the ground trying to figure out this Quirk and save their child, All Might wouldn’t have to worry about All for One because Inko would ensure her face was the last thing All Might ever saw.
As her son slept soundly in the other room and her husband clung to her muttering creative death threats against the Number One Hero, Inko spared a glance toward the limited edition All Might poster her husband and son had absolutely insisted needed to be displayed on their living room wall. Her fingers twitched, and the poster ripped loose from its hanging, crumpling unceremoniously to the ground.
She would make sure her baby survived to become the Hero he was destined to be, even with this cursed Quirk. She didn’t need her husband’s Quirk to See that.