Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Aizawa’s been teaching long enough that he can usually tell what he’s going to find in a student’s records after a short time of knowing them, but even so, Hitoshi Shinsou’s file raises the hair on the back of his neck. They put this kid in a residential care facility for children with dangerous Quirks at age seven. A kid with a newly developing brainwashing Quirk, abandoned by the people who should’ve been nurturing him and teaching him right from wrong and dumped into a facility with dozens of other children, minimal oversight, and rampant abuse. Those places make villains, not heroes.

“What’cha reading?” The couch cushions shift as Hizashi flops down onto the couch next to him, a sprawl of long limbs and blond hair. It’s his night off, which means the fuzzy corgi pajamas are out. Which means that any second the cat will abandon Aizawa’s lap in favor of a softer napping spot.

He sighs, stroking the little tabby between her ears. “Admin sent me the records for that student from General Studies I’ve been training. It’s…not great.”

His husband sits up a little straighter. “What flavor of ‘not great?’”

“Nine years in and out of residential care,” Aizawa says. “Never more than six months in a foster home before being sent back like a defective toy. You could set a clock by the drop in his grades.”

Hizashi leans in to read over his shoulder. “Shit.”

“Yeah.” 

“How does a kid like that get into UA?”

“Stellar test scores and sheer force of will, near as I can tell.” There are gaps in these records, lines to read in between and things the social workers don’t comment on or don’t know. Aizawa has spent long enough working with kids and their trauma that he can hazard a few educated guesses. He knows that when you give a child a Good job and a pat on the shoulder, they aren’t supposed to flinch. He also understands that a few short weeks of intensive one-on-one training isn’t enough to earn him the unwavering trust of a teenager who has rarely, if ever, been able to count on adults.

“Any red flags?” Hizashi asks.

Aizawa smirks. “This kid is nothing but red flags. But no, he’s not showing up to class injured or sick. He’s in a foster home not far from campus, which is probably the best case scenario here.”

“Hm,” Hizashi says, reading quietly.

He doesn’t need to say it. They’ve been together in one way or another for more than half their lives, and Aizawa can read that little sound like a dissertation.

Hm. He reminds me of you, painfully independent and about as trusting as a kicked dog.

Hm. You’re going to get over-invested in this one. I would’ve put money on it being one of your own students, probably Asui.

Hm. So this is the next student who’s going to break your heart.

“Don’t,” Aizawa says.

“I wasn’t,” Hizashi says, leaning casually back with his hands innocently in the air. The cat follows him, because of course she does, curling up on his chest like it’s the only place in the world she wants to be. Aizawa leans sideways, allowing himself to rest his head on Hizashi’s shoulder.

Hizashi runs long fingers through his hair and presses a kiss against his forehead. “Just…” he starts quietly, and holds his breath as Aizawa tenses. “Shouta, just remember you don’t need to save every kid all by yourself. If you run into trouble, tell me. Call Nemuri. Heck, even Yagi—” He breaks off laughing at Aizawa’s scowl. “Okay, maybe not Yagi. But can you let me help, at least, instead of shouldering the weight of the entire first-year class?”

It’s strangely difficult to just say fine. Which annoys Aizawa, which makes him actually want to say it, because like hell is he letting one little word get the better of him. “Fine,” he bites out, pushing himself back upright. “I have work.”

Hizashi gives him a quick kiss. “Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

He leaves his husband with their traitorous cat and gets ready for his patrol shift.

***

People have been telling Shinsou he’s scary since he was a little kid, and at some point, he started to believe it. It’s not like he can just stop having the ability to mind control people—and oh yeah, he’s tried. He can’t stop kids from hissing “Villain!” at him in the hallway or keep people around him from shying away when he comes near. Hell, he can’t even get adults to understand that he can hear them when they’re talking about him over his head. He’s always been scary Hitoshi Shinsou with the scary Quirk, and he probably always will be, if the whole hero thing doesn’t pan out. So he brushes his scary teeth and rubs his scary eyes and tucks himself into his scary secondhand Pokemon bedsheets and tries to ignore the way he can’t fully breathe when he stares at the ceiling at night, counting down the hours until morning. Until UA.

This foster home is okay. The Watanabes are a quiet, kind older couple who’ve been fostering for decades, and their household is small and hectic. They don’t touch him like they touch the littler kids—no hugs or whatever—but he’s the only teen anyway, and he guesses teens don’t need that kind of treatment. It’s not like he asks for it. He asks for as little as possible. When he was placed with the Watanabes, his case manager told them he was the easiest kid in the facility. (He knows, he was there for the whole conversation.)

So Shinsou tries to be easy. He does every chore assigned to him—especially cooking, which has always been his favorite. He helps with the toddlers. He barely talks at home, because conversations are hard. He used to watch the news with Mr. Watanabe, until that time a villain with the musical theatre Quirk turned the bystanders in a downtown street into a chorus line and the old man raised his eyebrows at Shinsou and said “Like you, eh?” He used to chat with Mrs. Watanabe while he helped her with the little ones, until the day she wondered aloud whether he was using his Quirk to make the toddlers more amenable to bath time.

He wasn’t. He wouldn’t. The last time he used his Quirk against another person outside of UA training, it was self-defense, and it sucked, and he felt nauseous for the whole three days he was in confinement after.

Now, he figures it’s easier to just disengage. He’s not getting beaten or starved, so it’s fine. This is the best place he’s lived since—well, it’s pointless to think about that. He is helpful and polite and mostly silent. He tries to smile, even though he’s been informed by other kids from the facility that he’s got “serial killer eyes.” He doesn’t make trouble. He goes to school, comes back to the house, helps out with dinner, and does his homework alone at the dining room table after all the kids are in bed. Except now, three evenings a week he trains with Mr. Aizawa.

Scary Shinsou gets to train with Eraserhead. E R A S E R H E A D. That fact spins off into space every time he tries to ground it and make it feel real. Eraserhead was one of his favorite heroes growing up, even though he didn’t have merch and was more of an urban legend than a public figure. His Quirk was mind-based and invasive in a way Shinsou’s own Quirk was, except that people understood it as good.

That’s all Shinsou ever wanted to be: Good.

So when he told Mrs. Watanabe about his schedule change, he made the mistake of letting a little bit of that excitement through.

“He’s a pro hero with a Quirk kind of like mine, and he was impressed enough with my performance at the Sports Festival that he wants to train me so I can test into the Hero Course! Isn’t that amazing?”

“Gracious,” his foster mother said, and took off her glasses to clean them on her shirt. Or to avoid eye contact. Both, maybe. He felt cold suddenly, like maybe she was about to tell him he couldn’t do the training.

“That’s quite an opportunity,” she said instead, her voice quiet. Then, the bombshell: “If Father asks where you are, we’ll tell him you’re being tutored. We saw your performance at the Sports Festival on TV, and he, uh… Well, I had to talk him down from rescinding your placement.”

Shinsou felt like he was standing over a chasm, like a cartoon character who’d run off a cliff but hadn’t looked down yet. It shouldn’t be a surprise. Every other placement he’d had had ended either in disaster or with his foster parents sending him back for fear of his Quirk.

Shinsou forced his face into a neutral expression. “He’s afraid of me.”

“It’s not—“ his foster mother started, and shrugged. “Imagining you is very different from seeing you in action.”

“I understand,” he said, biting down the question Are you afraid of me, too? The way her posture shifted while talking about his Quirk answered it clearly enough.

“So let’s just keep this between us,” she said conspiratorially, like they were plotting a surprise together, not hiding the greatest accomplishment of his life so far.

Shinsou nodded. It was okay. It would be okay. This was nothing new.

It is okay, he tells himself every time he shows up in the gym to work with Aizawa. He can do this work, learn to be a hero, test into the Hero Course, and then tell his whole foster family the truth. If anything, it’s motivational shame.

He puts every ounce of that shame into a roundhouse kick at the dummy in the middle of the gym, and if the sound that wrenches out of his throat is a little loud and raw, well, that’s just the fucking scariness working its way out of him as he moves toward becoming a good guy.

***

Aizawa likes to think he’s got a good rapport with his students, even if that rapport sometimes includes threatening to expel them if they don’t stop chatting through his lessons. Or practicing sparring moves in the hallway between classes. Or tossing office supplies at Minetta’s head to see what sticks, which was honestly pretty entertaining, but he’s not going to let them know that. The point being he likes to think he’s good with his students. But this new protege, Shinsou, is such a closed fist that it’s hard to tell if the kid even likes him.

Which…Aizawa is not the kind of person who needs to be liked. He survived the nation’s most rigorous Hero Course as the school’s first trans student, with no physical Quirk and an inseparable best friend who was a walking Rickroll. He defaults to politeness with most people, because they live in a society, but as a general rule he assumes that most people will not like him, and that’s okay.

But he wants this kid to like him. It’s ridiculous. The other day he heard himself make a pun to try and get a laugh out of Shinsou. A pun. He’s losing his edge. Or his mind. Possibly both.

If the kid liked his awful pun, he didn’t show it. He’s intensely focused on the training at hand at all times, brow furrowed and spine straight. Occasionally his gaze will go faraway in the middle of sprints or blocking practice, and Aizawa can’t tell if he’s on autopilot or dissociating. 

“Sit,” he says during their next lesson, taking a cross-legged stance on the floor himself. The kid follows suit and stretches his neck like he always does before a meditation session, and Aizawa corrects: “We’re not meditating today. At least not right this minute.”

Shinsou is quiet. He’s always so quiet. It’s almost uncomfortable, as much as Aizawa lives in quiet when he can.

“Today,” he says, “I’d like to test the bounds of your Quirk. On me.”

Shinsou’s eyes widen, and his shoulders curl inward just slightly. “You want me to brainwash you?”

Aizawa nods. “We’ll set parameters for tasks you can make me do, and I’ll resist you as best I can. If I’m going to train you up for the Hero Course, I need to know what your Quirk can really do. Seems like the best way to examine it is from the other side.” He retrieves a folded piece of notebook paper from his pocket and hands it to the boy. “My spouse wrote an agenda of five tasks, so I won’t have any prior knowledge of what you’re making me do.”

Shinsou takes the note and frowns as he opens it, reading.

“Don’t tell me any details, but can every task be performed in this room?”

“Yes, sir.” Shinsou’s expression returns to that serious focus as he studies the agenda.

“Good. That’s our first rule: We don’t leave this room while I’m under your control.” Aizawa sets his eyewear and capture weapon in a safe pile on the floor, with his phone face-down on top. “Rule two: Maintain your Quirk until all five tasks are complete, I’ve broken free, or your Quirk gives out, whichever occurs first.”

“But what if—” Shinsou starts.

Aizawa looks him in the eye, challenging. “Kid, if something else comes up that I haven’t thought of, you’ll figure it out. I trust your judgement.”

That seems to shock him more than the assignment. His fingers curl hard against the paper, crinkling it. He stares down at the floor for a long, unreadable moment, then gives Aizawa a tentative smile and says, “All right. When do we start?”

“We can start right now if you—” Aizawa’s voice halts in his throat just as his body seems to freeze. Excellent. Shinsou stares back at him wide-eyed and small, like a child anticipating punishment, and it takes Aizawa a moment to realize he’s left him just enough control to move his head—one last out, in case he needs it. Smart. He nods and sees Shinsou’s expression harden into resolve.

“Okay, Mr. Aizawa,” Shinsou says, taking a deep breath. A little smirk tilts his mouth. “Let’s dance.”

Being brainwashed is an odd feeling. It’s like nothing at first, just an absence of motion, but the moment Shinsou cranks it up to full power, it becomes a physical sensation that’s impossible to ignore. It reminds Aizawa of the first prickles of pins and needles in a limb that’s fallen asleep, or the fuzzy discomfort of restless legs in the middle of the night. Meanwhile, his body moves with him in the backseat of his mind, fully aware that it’s doing the fucking Macarena, because of course Hizashi would want to make him dance. He doesn’t resist for the first task, just observes the sensation. Once Shinsou has sent him through the full dance twice, he throws his mind against the wall of discomfort and shoves as hard as he can.

The Quirk roars back in response. It feels like the crackle between radio stations sounds, like the itchy phase of healing his eye socket where he wasn’t allowed to scratch or slap it, like the mental static he used to get on bad dysphoria days, those sticky-hot July days before top surgery when the choice came down to binding or being able to do his job without heat stroke, and he chose work every time, no matter his own—

Oh. It’s so easy to go down mental rabbit holes under the brainwashing Quirk and lose time. Interesting.

Aizawa resists and resists, but Shinsou’s Quirk is stronger than he anticipated. After nearly fifteen minutes, all five tasks are complete and he’s lying on his back on the polished hardwood floor, catching his breath and settling back into his own body like he’s been on vacation from it. His elbow is aching, and there’s a stitch in his side from running laps.

Shinsou crouches a few feet away, staring at him with big, anxious eyes. He’s flushed and out of breath from the exertion of maintaining his Quirk against a pro level opponent, and his hair seems somehow wilder than before.

Aizawa pulls a hand through his own hair. “Incredible,” he says, shaking his head. “UA’s testing system did you a disservice.”

All the air goes out of Shinsou. For a second, it looks like he might cry. Then he slips down to the floor and rolls onto his back, too, a few feet away from his teacher. An actual giggle bubbles up out of him. They lie there on the gym floor in their own thoughts for a minute before Shinsou says softly, “Thank you.”

  Aizawa lets his head sink to the side so he can see his protege’s face. Shinsou is staring up at the gymnasium ceiling, his expression relaxed and smiling. He looks like a fifteen-year-old for once, instead of an intent hero in training, and Aizawa knows he can’t waste this moment of openness. He assesses his options. Personal questions would be pushing too hard. School and training are safe topics, but too safe.

Aizawa opts for self-deprecation, which seems to at least be a commonality here.

“If you tell any of the faculty I had to lie down after a brief cardio session,” he says, “I’ll have to hunt you down.”

“I doubt you could catch me,” Shinsou fires back immediately, then shrinks a little.

Aizawa blinks slowly. Did this withdrawn child just sass him? A grin spreads across his face. His laugh echoes around the gym. Shinsou relaxes again.

“I hate sprinting, anyway.” Aizawa gives the kid half a glance as he lets slip, “Hizashi wrote it into the agenda to torture me.”

Shinsou is observant—moreso than a kid his age should have to be. The pieces click into place before the sentence is even out. “You’re married to Mr. Yamada?”

“Last I checked,” Aizawa says casually, because it isn’t a big deal. It shouldn’t be a big deal, coming out. But it was one of the scariest things he could imagine when he was a student here himself, and that old fear is always tugging at his sleeve, just like all the other ghosts on this campus.

He watches the information settle on Shinsou’s face. The boy shrugs with his eyebrows. “He’s…loud.”

Fair assessment. “Present Mic is loud. My husband isn’t always. Some pro heroes have a greater divide between their hero personas and their personal identities than others. It’s up to you how much of yourself you want to put into your hero persona.”

Mentioning heroing is a misstep. Shinsou pushes himself up to sit on his knees, his expression closing off again. Aizawa follows suit but keeps his limbs relaxed, trying to mirror a less fraught version of his student’s energy.

“Did being brainwashed hurt?” Shinsou asks suddenly, staring hard at the floor.

It occurs to Aizawa that with a Quirk like his, he likely hasn’t had much direct coaching on it. Not a lot in the way of feedback from adults he can trust.

“Not really,” Aizawa answers. “It’s a discomfort that gets stronger when you try to resist. Like cognitive dissonance, or an itch deep inside your brain.”

Shinsou chews on his thumbnail for a moment, then glances at his phone and says, “I should get home. Thank you for your time.”

Aizawa resists the urge to stand up with him and follow him to the door. His window closing, or maybe already closed, he throws out one last hook. “It’s truly a remarkable Quirk you have. Your foster parents should be proud.”

“They are,” Shinsou replies quickly, flashing a smile that doesn’t meet his tired eyes. He gives a quick bow before leaving out the back exit.

***

Shinsou is shaking when he gets home from one-on-one training. It’s always tiring to use his Quirk for extended periods, let alone against a pro hero, but this isn’t just that. He helps prepare dinner, his hands on autopilot at the stove, and gets the toddlers ready for bedtime and does his homework and can’t seem to—

His pencil lead snaps against a worksheet page, and for some fucking reason he snaps too and bursts out crying. His hands clap over his mouth, and his eyes dart to the doorway between the dining area and living room, where Mr. Watanabe is half asleep in front of a cable news channel.

There’s nothing to cry about. He used his Quirk on his teacher with full consent and got positive feedback. Nothing bad happened. Maybe it’s the first time he’s used his Quirk on an adult since the last time he was kicked out of a foster home, but this time he was invited to do it, not threatened into it. He’s at UA explicitly because of his scary fucking Quirk, and he’s going to become a great hero someday because of it, and everyone who’s ever avoided or abandoned him because of it will come begging for his forgiveness.

As long as he’s imagining impossible scenarios, he might as well have a pony, too.

He so does not have time for this. If he finishes his homework before 1:30am, he’ll still be able to get a good five hours of sleep. All he’s got left is a short English paper, which is Mr. Aizawa’s husband’s class, which sends his brain off on a new and different tangent about things he doesn’t have time to have a breakdown about. Maybe when he’s a celebrated pro hero with a pony he’ll take these thoughts out and examine whether he would also like a husband.

He presses the heels of his hands hard against his eyes, until his eyes are sore and all he can see are dim nebulas of misfired color receptors. The pain makes the tears slow. His breathing goes back to normal. In the next room over, Mr. Watanabe snores in his chair.

Shinsou tucks his tangled emotions away and goes back to work.

Chapter Text

Aizawa rolls that one soft “Thank you” from Shinsou Hitoshi around in his head for days. He doesn’t intend to, it just happens: every time he stares off into the distance, his mind dredges it up and replays it, picking out another detail. The surprised laugh. The long stretch of seconds it took Shinsou to process that he was being genuine. The way thinking about that makes him want to casually murder anyone who’s ever told that kid he’s less than worthy.

Aizawa would commit murder for any of his students, given the need, but it’s not everyday that a student comes along for whom he would commit murder electively.

When Hizashi comes home from his radio show at ass o’clock in the morning, Aizawa is awake in a nest of blankets on the couch, the cat draped over his shoulder like a heating pad.

“You were right,” he says.

“I know,” Hizashi answers as he shrugs off his coat, then grins. “About what?”

“Shinsou. I’m over-invested.”

“Hm,” Hizashi intones smugly.

“Shut up and help.”

Hizashi joins him on the couch but mercifully does not steal the cat or the blankets. He sits down with his feet on Aizawa’s legs with a yawn. “How can I help, love?”

“I just—” Aizawa makes frustrated hand gestures, but gently, to avoid waking the cat. “I want to be the adult this kid needs, but he’s clearly starved for affirmation. I know I have a tendency to say too little.”

Hizashi laughs, but not unkindly. “Oh, Shouta. You hold your cards so close to your chest that people don’t even realize you’re in the game with them.”

He’s not wrong. There’s a reason it took the two of them years of mutual pining to actually date each other. Still, Aizawa reserves the right to scowl. Stupid smart husband. “So what do I do with this? How do I…be different.”

“You don’t have to be different,” Hizashi says. “There’s no such thing as a perfect adult—especially at UA. Just pay attention like you do, tell him when he does well, maybe use your words a little more. Do your best.”

Aizawa hugs his own ribs under the blankets, wishing he could be buried under the earth. “I strongly suspect my best is not enough in this particular case.”

Hizashi doesn’t fight him on that, probably because they’ve had that argument before and he knows it only leads to a pointless irrational spiral on both of their parts. “Well,” he says instead, “If you want him to have access to another adult with a different interpersonal skill set, send him to my club.”

“You want me to direct a student to the GSA at random.”

“Kids don’t read that as an insult these days,” Hizashi says, pushing himself up off the couch. “It’s the Gay-Straight Alliance, it’s for everybody, and it’s a supportive community, which is exactly what a kid like that needs. Besides, he’s definitely one of ours.”

“You don’t know that.”

“Oh yeah? Maybe I haven’t been intensively training him, but I’ve had him in English class all year. I’ve read his essays. I’ve seen the way he interacts with his classmates. That kid doesn’t know it, but he is not straight.” Hizashi spreads his arms wide. “Tell me I’m wrong. When have I been wrong?”

“Well, there was—”

“Ooh, sorry, can’t hear you,” his husband says, making a show of taking out his hearing aids as he walks backwards into the bedroom. “Guess we’ll never know! Goodnight! Love you!”

Aizawa makes a rude sign, but Hizashi just makes a little heart with his fingertips before disappearing through the door. Sigh.

The maddening thing about Hizashi is he’s rarely wrong. Often ridiculous, frequently an asshole, but rarely wrong. He’s also comfortable with emotions and interpersonal relationships in a way that makes Aizawa’s brain itch thinking about it, which would make him an ideal person for Shinsou to have on his side. The GSA isn’t even a bad idea. Children benefit from the support of their peers, and lord knows this kid isn’t going out making friends of his own volition.

Ugh. Aizawa hates his stupid brilliant husband. Fine. Fine.

He’ll broach the topic. He just needs to find a way to do it without making it weird.

***

Shinsou is tying the laces on his gym shoes when Mr. Aizawa looms over him and shoves a photocopied flyer at him.

Shinsou frowns at the page. UA Gay-Straight Alliance, proclaims the giant bold font. All are welcome!

“You should attend,” Aizawa says, making exactly no eye contact. When Shinsou just stares at him, he adds: “This is not an assessment of your character.”

Shinsou blinks. “What.”

“I’m not implying anything about you. All are welcome. I know you’re free Thursday afternoons.”

His mentor has lost his mind. Is there a school protocol for this sort of thing? “Okay?”

“Building social bonds is an important part of becoming a hero,” Aizawa says stiffly.

Shinsou smirks. “Do you take your own advice or just hand it out for free?”

His mentor rolls up the flyer and taps him on the head with it. “Just for that, enjoy your crunches. 50 to start. Get going.”

“Aw, come on!” Shinsou objects, but all the teacher does is point to the floor. Ugh.

Shinsou does the ensuing barrage of core exercises without any more complaining, mostly because he’s thinking about that fucking flyer. It’s painfully obvious that Aizawa has ulterior motives, though he’s not sure exactly what. Maybe he’s got a secret mind reading Quirk and he knows that Shinsou is…what? Shinsou isn’t anything. There’s no point in him being anything. He’s got exactly one goal in his tiny little life, and nothing else about him matters. Nothing else about him will ever matter if he doesn’t get to be a hero. Not like anyone would want him, anyway—that point has been made clear to him on pretty much every conceivable level. He had to be on his very best behavior to get into foster homes. He had to push himself nearly to a breakdown to get his grades good enough to apply to UA, and plead with his caseworker to place him in a foster home close enough to bus there. Right at this very second he’s pushing himself to his limits to convince the Hero Course to even consider accepting him. The idea of shaping himself into a better person so anyone will want to take him to the movies and hold his sweaty hand in the dark makes him want a nap more desperately than Aizawa’s warm-ups do.

He’ll become a pro hero. Everything else can wait.

They practice sparring a little, and this, this is the good stuff. He’s never had a guardian who was willing to get him martial arts lessons, but the basics are already written in his body’s memory: use attacker’s weight against them, hit the weak spots, escape. Today’s lesson is on analyzing and reacting to opponents’ fighting styles. It’s thrilling watching Aizawa demonstrate different fighters’ attacks and trying to figure out for himself how to evade them. Evasion is key. Shinsou is never going to be known for his prowess in a fight.

Especially since, when Aizawa barrels at him like a brute strength villain who’s never had to learn to fight, Shinsou’s entire body lights up with adrenaline and his lungs forget how to breathe.

He’s on his back in an ammonia-scented utility closet at the facility, kicking wildly while the bigger kids’ hands scrabble to tear off his new shoes. They always learned so quickly not to say anything to him when they wanted to gang up on him, and laughter wasn’t enough for his Quirk to latch onto, but even if he could he’d get in worse trouble than them for using it on them, so it’s best to just—

“Shinsou. Hey. Hitoshi.”

Shinsou sucks in a breath. He’s standing still in the middle of the UA gym, his hands balled in the fabric of Aizawa’s shirt and his entire goddamn everything shaking like a nervous purse dog. His mentor is standing very still in front of him, his shadowed eyes concerned.

Shinsou releases his hands and takes a step back. Two steps. Three. His arms wrap around his stomach, and he forces them back down, forces his shoulders slack and his posture as relaxed as he can get it. Which is not very relaxed at all, but hey, isn’t it the thought that counts?

His heart is fucking racing.

“Sorry,” he says. “Sorry, I, uh. I wasn’t ready.”

Aizawa nods toward the pile of wrestling mats where their bags are waiting. “We’re done for today. Let’s sit.”

Shinsou tries to protest, but the words won’t come out, and suddenly there’s a weirdly gentle hand on his back guiding him toward the mats. He sits, buckling over with his arms locked hard around his middle. “Really, it’s okay.”

Aizawa sits down next to him, that hand still on the middle of his back. “Kid, don’t bullshit me. I work with pro heroes and teens learning to be pro heroes. I know a thing or two about PTSD.” He sighs, and his hand makes a slow circle on Shinsou’s back. “Deep breath in. Feel your feet in your shoes. Wiggle your toes and count to five.”

Shinsou does as he’s told, bumping his toes against the dense fabric of his gym shoes. He counts to five with the circles of the hand on his back.

“Breathe out through your mouth,” Aizawa says. “Good. Again.”

They go through the cycle a few times more, until Shinsou is rooted firmly enough in the present to feel like he would very much like to yeet himself out a window and end this embarrassment. He doesn’t say anything. It’s safer not to say anything. And anyway, he can’t remember the last time someone rubbed his back, and the sooner he speaks, the sooner it’s going to stop.

“I won’t ask you where you went just then,” Aizawa says, choosing his words like he’s doing an obstacle course. “But I need you to understand that if you feel unsafe at home, I can help.”

A bitter laugh wrenches itself from Shinsou’s throat. “Help. What would you even do? File a report and pat yourself on the back while they toss me into a new and different shitty situation?” The hand on his back stills, and he leans away from it, covering his face in his hands as the rush of angry words stems. “Sorry. It’s not— My foster family is fine. I’m safe. I just. Sorry.” His face feels hot with embarrassment.

“Nothing to be sorry for,” Aizawa says, and thank god his voice isn’t that delicate tone that people like to take with Shinsou when they figure out how broken he is. It’s just normal, tired Aizawa voice. “You’re entitled to your anger.” He tilts his head, considering something. “I’m probably supposed to tell you something about letting the past go, but honestly, I’ve never been good at that myself. A boy in my junior high class bullied the hell out of me for two years, and when I ran into him in a parking garage last month, I keyed his car. It was nearly twenty years after the fact and not pro hero behavior, but I’d do it again.”

Shinsou looks up at Aizawa, half smiling. “Did he recognize you?”

Aizawa shrugs. “Unlikely. I started transitioning after I got into UA. He didn’t even know he was picking on a boy.”

Oh. Huh. Shinsou is aware that the man who’s training him has now come out to him twice. It’s not a big deal, but it’s also kind of not not a big deal, it seems like? He’s used to people talking over him or shutting up completely in front of him, and to be freely given sensitive personal information feels almost like a gift. Shit, he should say something so he doesn’t come off as thinking too hard about this.

“That’s a hell of a way to keep your secret identity,” he says.

Aizawa smirks. “There are much easier ways.”

“I bet.”

His teacher goes quiet for a moment, frowning at a distant point. Then he reaches behind them, grabbing the GSA flyer that’s been sitting on top of Shinsou’s bookbag. Turning it over, he scrawls a phone number on the blank side and hands it back to Shinsou.

“This is my cell number,” he says. “My class has it in case of emergencies, so you should, too. If anyone makes you feel unsafe, call me. I’ll help you key their car.”

Shinsou can’t help but smile at that. No one’s ever offered to key a car for him. He folds the flyer carefully and tucks it into his pocket. “I will,” he says.

***

Aizawa shuffles toward the weekend feeling like a raw nerve from the conversation with his protege. It’s asinine. He’s worked with dozens of teenagers at this point in his teaching career, all of them with unique backstories, many of them with pre-existing trauma and even more of them with trauma that was handed to them by their alma mater. A kid with a dangerous Quirk and serious trauma from past abuse is not a surprise. Aizawa did the best he could in that difficult moment, playing the safe, supportive adult, and normally he would go home and take a nap about it, but this time it’s hard to put down.

So many things about this particular kid are hard to put down. 

Add in the fact that there’s an old part of him that’s always on edge for a few days after he comes out to someone as trans, and it’s an emotional double whammy that he did to his own goddamn self.

Hizashi notices, because he obnoxiously notices everything, always, whether Aizawa wants him to or not, and resorts to his usual tactics.

“The gang’s doing karaoke tonight,” Hizashi says, like he’s dangling a tempting piece of rare fruit. “You should come.”

“By ‘the gang’ do you mean ‘the faculty I can’t escape on campus all day?’” Aizawa doesn’t look up from the internship paperwork he’s reviewing.

“The very same!” He plucks the papers out of Aizawa’s grasp and lays the small pile face-down on the coffee table. “Come on, Shouta, I’m not going to let you waste a night off ruminating on the couch.”

“I am not ruminating.”

Hizashi leans in close, cheek to cheek, and whispers, “The bar just updated their track list and finally added more Johnny Cash.”

That’s fighting dirty. There are few things in the world more personally satisfying than relaxing his hard-earned voice with even harder liquor and singing sad baritone country ballads. His husband knows this.

“I’ll call the cab and do all the ordering for you,” Hizashi says, kissing his cheek. “You can sing ‘Hurt’ and make me and Nemuri cry.”

Aizawa’s brain wants to remain in the pit it has dug for itself, but dammit, that actually sounds like a great night. Especially the not having to talk to strangers part. He nods, and he’s grateful that Hizashi doesn’t gloat from the victory.

One outfit change, a cab ride, and four drinks later, he’s doubled over in his seat in a private karaoke room, struggling to not snort with laughter as Ectoplasm sings “Bohemian Rhapsody” with four of his clones. They are all off-key from too many tequila sunrises and naturally all wearing the technicolor crocheted sweater vest Ecto’s mother made for him for special occasions. This was an amazing idea.

Hizashi was right. Beautiful, brilliant, infuriating Hizashi, who refills Aizawa’s drink in between  nostalgic boy band songs and signs him up for all his favorites without needing to be asked and holds his hand when Nemuri does poppy love songs. He even manages to get Yagi up and crooning, which is nigh impossible because the Symbol of Peace only allows himself to get drunk on justice.

For as loud as the bar gets, Aizawa’s head feels quieter as the evening passes. Being responsible for no one but himself takes off pressure like removing a bullet-proof vest, and exercising his lower register at the microphone spreads a warm sense of comfort and confidence through him. He feels like himself—a bleary, giggly, slightly dizzy version of himself. Like drinking on the gymnasium roof as students, him and Hizashi and Oboro, the three of them thinking they were so grown up but still so very young. It almost doesn’t sting to touch those memories now, at least after that last round of shots.

What was in those shots. Nemuri, why.

Aizawa doesn’t know when they decide to leave. Maybe when he starts losing track of time. Or when he voluntarily sings a Taylor Swift duet. His head is spinning all the way out to the cab, and his mouth is moving without his permission.

“I don’t want to be a role model,” he’s saying to someone. “I don’t wanna shout who I am from the rooftops all loud and proud. I’m proud, but I don’t wanna be loud. I wanna be quiet and proud. So, okay, technically it’s partly my job to inspire the youth, but. They can be inspired by me maintaining an actual private life.” He gestures broadly with the hand his husband is not currently holding.

“You tell ‘em, love,” Hizashi says, one arm around his waist.

“I do not tell them,” Aizawa corrects him. “That is the point. You are mine and I am mine and my three-whiskey Johnny Cash voice is mine. Not theirs.”

“Right on,” says the cab driver.

Aizawa is dimly displeased that he’s been talking to a stranger, but he’s not personally responsible for said stranger and she has a nice lesbian haircut, so he decides to not be mad about it. He tells her about his cat for the rest of the ride home.

As soon as they’re home, Hizashi puts a tall glass of water into his hands and says, “Drink.”

Aizawa obeys, silently draining the glass as he watches his husband slip out of the night’s button-down and plaid slacks. So much hair. It’s soft and sleek and falls in gentle curves around lean muscles.

“You’re pretty,” he says into the half-empty cup. He signs pretty with one hand for emphasis. Pretty, pretty, pretty.

Hizashi smiles, his sparkling eyes crinkling at the corners. “You’re drunk.”

Aizawa tries to sign You’re right with one hand still clutching the water glass, sloshes water onto his sleeve, and laughs.

Hizashi perches on the edge of the bed next to him and ropes an arm around his shoulders. “Come on, now. You gotta finish the whole glass so you can get your prize.” 

“What’s the prize?”

“A peaceful night’s sleep.”

Aizawa hums. “You do love me.” He finishes the rest of the glass and sets it on the bedside table, but he doesn’t lie down. His head is rattling with words that want to come out. He stares at the closet doors, willing the words to fall into order. They don’t.

“You wanna change?” Hizashi offers.

“I wanna—no.” Aizawa folds his legs up under him like it will hide the scuffed black jeans he is definitely going to sleep in tonight. “I wanna,” he starts again, and drops his head on his husband’s shoulder. “I wanna be parents with you.”

“I know, Shouta,” Hizashi says, his voice as soft as his pretty hair.

It’s an old conversation. They don’t have the kind of lives that allow for lullabies and kindergarten parent-teacher meetings and little teeny tiny shoes by the front door. Such tiny shoes. No adoption agency would give two pro heroes who work at the most attacked high school in the nation access to someone tiny and breakable. Aizawa wouldn’t.

But that’s not all the words. Something new is circling in his mind. Get out, words.

“What about a teenager?” he says. His eyelids are so heavy.

“Like a certain General Studies student?” Hizashi says, and sighs. “Shouta.”

“It’s a good idea. It makes sense.”

Hizashi pinches his eyes shut for a moment, and when he opens them, they’re wet. Not sad country ballad wet. “Shouta, I worry so much about you,” he says, pressing his hands together. “You’re so devoted to your students you’d let yourself disappear if it meant saving them. I almost lost you at USJ because you saved your students instead of yourself—and I get it, that’s your job. It’s my job, too. It’s just…if we ever add someone new to our family, I want it to be because we want them to be family, not because you feel guilty for not saving everyone.”

Enough of the speech connects to hurt. Aizawa peels the arm off his shoulders and folds himself under the covers.

Hizashi bends down and kisses his face. “I know,” he whispers against Aizawa’s temple. “I know.”

They kiss and settle into bed near each other, with Hizashi’s arm bridging the gap.

“Get some sleep, love.”

He does.

***

Mrs. Watanabe doesn’t need him home until 5 on Thursdays, so if Shinsou happens to stick around campus after classes are out, well, it’s not like he’s inconveniencing anybody. And if he’s reading quietly in the back of a certain club’s classroom when the club begins to assemble, it’s not like anybody’s going to shove him out the door.

No one makes a big deal of it. Actually, the way one of the girls from the Hero Course glances back at him and smiles, it’s almost like they expect people to lurk. The other students chat and laugh and pay him even less attention than his class, and the tight wire between Shinsou’s shoulders begins to ease. It’s about two dozen people, half of whom he recognizes—some upperclassmen he watched in Sports Festival matches the last couple of years, a few students from the Sidekick Course, one kid from 1-B, the pink girl with the horns from 1-A, and that girl with the bouncy hair who nearly kicked the explosion murder guy’s ass at the Sports Festival. She’s the one who smiled at him. Maybe this is okay.

The door opens again, and in walks Present Mic, trailed by—oh for crap’s sake—Midoriya, who is asking questions a mile a minute and scribbling notes in a little notebook. Shinsou raises his book and slides down in his seat in an attempt to escape without actually running away.

Fortunately, Present Mic sends Midoriya to his seat with a little shoo motion and closes the door behind them. Then he does something Shinsou has never seen a pro hero do before: he removes his equipment in front of a room full of civilians. The directional speaker system clicks as he disengages it from around his neck, and he sets it gently on the end of the desk, along with his leather jacket and those sharp orange sunglasses. Donning a pair of large heart-shaped glasses from a drawer, he takes a seat cross-legged atop the desk. Even with his hair still in its patented gravity defying shape, he looks smaller this way.  The t-shirt he had on beneath his jacket has an old meme on it.

“Good afternoon!” he announces with a smile and shockingly little fanfare. “Welcome to the UA Gay-Straight Alliance. My name is Hizashi Yamada, my pronouns are he/him and they/them, and I will be your designated adult.”

Yamada has multiple pronouns. What. They can do that?

“First up today: introductions! Let’s start on this side of the room and go clockwise. Name, pronouns if you’re comfortable sharing, and let’s say favorite snack.”

Multiple students have additional pronouns he wouldn’t have expected, including fucking Midoriya. And that tall kid from Accounting likes natto, because of course the kid from Accounting likes natto. He probably shouldn’t be judging people in the GSA of all places, but gross. Accounting.

The introductions circle toward Shinsou’s end of the room, and his throat gets tight. What does he even say? Okay, everyone is doing given names. Does he even like food? Crap. Why is this difficult?

“Uh,” he squeaks out when his turn comes. “I, uh.”

“A little louder, friend,” Mr. Yamada says with a smile, tapping his ears. For the first time, Shinsou notices the neon devices in his ears—not hero equipment. Hearing aides. Oh.

“Hitoshi Shinsou,” Shinsou says, forcing his voice out at a normal human volume. “He/him. And, uh, I suddenly don’t remember what I like to eat.” Shit. Why did he say that part out loud.

“Ice cream taiyaki,” Midoriya offers from a few desks over. “I remember you got one at the Sports Festival. It looked really good.” He looks to Hizashi. “Actually, sir, can I change my answer to ice cream taiyaki, too?”

“For the last time, Midoriya, you’re not being graded on this. It’s an ice-breaker activity.”

The group laughs, and Shinsou is relieved to realize they’re laughing at Midoriya, not at him. Midoriya takes it in stride, smiling and ducking his head a little, and when he glances back at Shinsou, there’s a kind, knowing look in his eyes that makes Shinsou think this distraction was intentional. Spare the new kid from humiliation by being a giant fucking nerd? Yeah, that fits what he knows of the guy.

The club moves on, ice-breakers wrap up, and new orders of business are addressed. A few of the students have been collecting signatures on a petition to designate two of the school’s restrooms as “all genders.” The floaty girl—Uraraka—is designing an LGBTQ+ Safe Space sign for faculty members to put on their doors if they sign a pledge about it. And apparently the main activity today is decorating posters for the club room, as if the current collage of rainbow garlands, pride flags, and gender and orientation infographics isn’t enough of a statement.

Oh, but of course they aren’t just decorating posters. Hizashi has them writing positive affirmations, like this is a juvenile group therapy session at the facility and they’re going to chant My Quirk is dangerous, but I don’t have to be together. Shinsou briefly considers fleeing the room, but he can’t work up the nerve to bring more attention to himself before someone is handing him a box of paint markers and Midoriya is calling, “Shinsou, come over here!”

And then Uraraka says “Yeah, Hitoshi, join us!” and the pink girl with the horns—Mina—is grinning and waving him over and—what. Is happening.

Shinsou glances over his shoulder just in case there’s another, more appealing Hitoshi behind him, even though he knows logically it’s just the wall. Maybe the wall is named Hitoshi. No, that doesn’t make sense. Walls can’t use paint markers. The world is backwards and he feels a little like he’s going to throw up, but he walks over to the little cluster of desks they’ve pushed together and takes the empty seat. Mina makes an arm gesture like this is some sort of victory.

“So first we need to pick an affirmation,” Uraraka says. “Any ideas?”

“I started a list,” Midoriya says, flipping open his notebook. Of course he did.

Mina plucks a yellow paint marker from the box and starts doodling a little sunshine in the corner of the poster paper. The sunshine has horns like hers. “We could do something about being smart and adorable,” she says.

“Hitoshi, what do you think?” Uraraka says.

“I don’t know,” he says, trying not to collapse in on himself like a dying star. “Where do we even start?”

“Well,” Midoriya says, turning toward him, “what’s something nice somebody’s said to you?” He taps his pencil against his chin, his eyes bright and so genuinely happy to focus on him that it’s hard to look at him and hard to look away from him at the same time. How is this guy real?

Shinsou has trouble thinking in the face of that, so he say the first thing that comes to mind, which is “I’d key a car for you.”

“Ooh,” Mina says. “That’s good.”

Midoriya dutifully adds it to his list.

The three Hero Course students debate suggestions while Shinsou nods and pretends like he’s not completely out of his depth. They’re all so confident and cheerful, and he feels like a tired, angry potato in comparison. Especially next to Midoriya, Mr. (Mx?) Nearly Perfect who used his every match in the Sports Festival to encourage his opponents.

Midoriya has scars on his fingers from where he sacrificed them in his match against Endeavor’s son. There’s a layer of pale pink glitter polish on his nails that shimmers in the light as he writes in his neat, compact handwriting, and Shinsou imagines him at ease in his own room, choosing between nail polish colors and carefully decorating his damaged hands. The mental image is oddly endearing.

They don’t go with I’d key a car for you, partly because Uraraka points out that it’s not terribly school appropriate and partly because they can’t figure out a good way to restructure the sentence as a personal affirmation. Instead, Mina draws a simple I belong in big bubble letters and they fill them in with pride flag colors. Shinsou is pretty sure he’s never belonged anywhere in his entire life, and coloring a poster about it isn’t going to make it so. Still, he takes the paint markers Uraraka hands him and quietly makes rainbow stripes on the B. He hopes the other students won’t notice him eyeing the wall decor to make sure he gets the color order right.

He goes quiet, because quiet feels safer than making conversation with people he barely knows. Part of him expects to be dragged into a sudden interrogation over why he’s here, a bright light in his eyes and the club regulars demanding answers, but that moment never comes. In fact, no one has questioned his presence since he got here, and Midoriya and his friends seem weirdly happy to have him in their group. They catch on quickly that he’s not going to be a sparkling conversationalist, but Midoriya keeps glancing at him anyway as if to check on him.

“So, uh,” Midoriya says as he helps hang their poster near the classroom door. “I hope we didn’t scare you off. It’d be nice to see you here again next week!”

“Sure,” Shinsou says, and feels himself smile. “Building social bonds is an important part of becoming a hero, right?”

Midoriya laughs. It’s a good sound.

Shinsou takes the opening to ask something he’s been wondering since the icebreaker activity. “Hey, how do your pronouns work? I get he/him, but I haven’t heard the other one before.”

“Oh! It’s really interesting, actually! ‘Ou’ has been around since the 16^th century, and linguists think it came straight out of Middle English, which…is not what you asked.” He rubs a hand over his own neck and looks away. “It doesn’t really matter, anyway. This is the seventh pronoun set I’ve tried using since the school year started, and I don’t think it’s for me.”

“That’s…a lot.”

Midoriya shrugs. “I’m planning on figuring out my whole identity before summer, and the process of elimination seemed like the fastest way to do it.”

Shinsou is pretty sure that’s not how it works, but far be it for him to correct the guy’s research methods. He keeps his mouth shut and offers Midoriya and the others a perfunctory smile as everyone is saying goodbye.

“Hitoshi,” Yamada calls from across the room as it empties. “Come here for a sec.”

He goes up to the desk obediently and stands on the side opposite the pro hero, who is splayed out on his chair like a hoodie that was tossed there haphazardly.

“It was good to have you today,” Yamada says with a beaming smile. Sitting up straight, he pushes a folder of printed pages across the desk. “Here are our club guidelines, calendar, and the zine the students put together last semester. There’s also a list of contact information for club members who offer their discrete listening ears for students who are questioning their identities. The students really run the club, but I’m here to have your back and be a supportive adult.” He folds his hands over his knee, leaning forward. “So, Hitoshi, what do you need in this moment? Don’t overthink it.”

Shinsou glances at the rain sluicing down the classroom windows. It’s pouring down in such thick sheets that he can barely see the gym building from here. This time of day his bus commute will be two transfers and fifteen minutes of walking in that cold, wet mess.

“An umbrella?” he says, half joking, and then ducks his head, because that’s definitely too much to ask for. “It’s okay, it’s my own fault for not grabbing mine this morning.”

Yamada just smiles. “I’ll do you one better. How about a ride home? You’re on 14^th, that’s the same direction I’m going anyway.”

Shinsou can’t think of a polite way to reject an offer that kind, so he says, “You know where I live?”

Mr. Yamada gathers his things and shrugs on his jacket, giving him a knowing little smile. “Kiddo,  I have a near-photographic memory and a job at the most prestigious and high-risk hero academy in the country. I could tell you your cat’s social security number.”

Shinsou smiles in spite of himself. “Those icebreaker activities are kinda useless to you, huh?”

“Nah. The way people describe themselves is way more important than how they fit onto forms.” Yamada pats a hand on his back, warm and solid, pointing them both toward the door. “Let’s get you home.”

Yamada’s car looks like every other nondescript gray Toyota in the faculty parking lot, but inside it has soft, cushioned seat covers that are already warm and a screen that plays a little song when the doors open. The rain outside is just shy of freezing, and the heated passenger seat makes Shinsou feel like he could sleep forever. A fuzzy cat bubblehead nods gently on the dashboard as they pull out of the parking lot, and the whole car smells of coffee and, mysteriously, a crackling fireplace.

“Sorry for the mess,” Yamada says offhandedly, nodding at the papers and empty coffee cup in the backseat. “Shouta comes out here to grade and nap in peace sometimes.”

Of course he does. Shinsou would. This car is like a hug on wheels. “Where is he tonight?” he asks.

“Debriefing with his students’ internship supervisors. Then patrol.”

It’s already 6pm, and Aizawa has hours of work left? A stab of guilt hits him under the ribs. His mentor is already this busy and took him on, too?  “Busy day.”

“He likes it that way. Truth be told, we’re both compulsive over-commiters.” Yamada glances his way and offers a conspiratorial smile. “I think his favorite days are the ones he gets to work with you.”

Shinsou was not expecting that, and he has no idea how to react to it. “Oh,” his mouth says as he stares at the road ahead.

“Has he ever told you how he got into UA?”

“No.”

Yamada’s eyes soften. “He started in General Studies. Couldn’t get into the Hero Course because the tests focused too much on physical Quirks. Then along comes the Sports Festival, he wipes the floor with me in one-on-one battles, and the administration lets him test in. That hadn’t happened before, and it hasn’t happened since. You’ll be the second time in the school’s history that a General Studies student upgrades to the Hero Course.”

Shinsou sits with that information for a moment, unsure what to say except, “If I get in.”

“You will.” Yamada says it with such easy confidence that for a moment, it’s easy to believe.

Then reality comes crashing in, the weight of all the training Shinsou still needs to do, the way he broke down during sparring last week, the long line of people who’ve told him he should give up and become a villain.

Without looking away from the road, Yamada says in his warm, steady voice, “You deserve to be here, Hitoshi. You’re incredibly talented, you’re driven, and you’re kind. You’ll make a great hero someday. And in the meantime, you’ve got Aizawa on your side, and me too, if you want.”

Shinsou’s throat feels tight. 

When they park in front of the Watanabe house, Mr. Yamada gives him a pat on the shoulder and says, “You’re basically on my way home, so the offer of a ride always stands, okay?”

“Thank you, sir,” Shinsou says, giving him a polite bow from outside the car.

Yamada grins. “Knock off the ‘sir’ crap. I’m not a sir, anyway. Outside of class, you can call me Hizashi.”

Shinsou smiles. What a weird person. “Well then, thank you Hizashi,” he says, and closes the car door.

Chapter Text

There’s a moment when training clicks, Aizawa sees it with his protege over and over again: the moment Shinsou stops hesitating and starts giving that dangerous little smile when they’re sparring, the moment he starts moving out of instinct instead of thought, the moment he surprises Aizawa and pins him so suddenly that Aizawa laughs out loud. Shinsou is getting stronger in all the ways he needs to in order to become a hero, and he’s more driven than half of class 1-A. He even seems steadier emotionally, smiling easier and rarely becoming unmoored during their lessons.

Truthfully, Aizawa doesn’t think he’s ever been prouder of a student. He isn’t going to say that, because he’s not Hizashi, but he hopes the message is clear from the way he keeps upping the ante in Shinsou’s training. Last week was obstacle courses and pitting Shinsou’s Quirk against his own. This week, he’s got something new planned.

“Are you serious?” Shinsou says.

“Am I ever not?” Aizawa replies.

“Well, there was that time you made a pun at me.”

“That was an aberration.” Aizawa unwinds his capture weapon from over his shoulders in dense loops and hands it to his protege. It feels odd, handing this carbon fiber extension of himself to someone else, but if it responds to Shinsou the way he thinks it will, it could be another major leap forward.

Shinsou holds the capture weapon like he’s afraid to drop it. He turns it over delicately, grazing his thumb along the spot on the edge that’s had a barely noticeable tear in it since the USJ attack.

Aizawa clears his throat. “It goes over your head.”

“Give me a minute, I want to remember this.” The boy’s eyes shine, wide and focused. “It’s not every day I get to hold Eraserhead’s iconic capture weapon.”

This fucking kid is going to kill him. He wants to do right by him so badly. What would Hizashi say to that?

“Yeah, well, someday soon you’ll have your own.” Aizawa crosses his arms and puts on a scowl he hopes isn’t too harsh. “Put it on.”

The scarf settles around Shinsou’s shoulders like a bird landing on a fence.

“Oh my god,” he says with a laugh. “It practically floats! I always assumed you walked like that because your capture weapon was heavy, but—wow!”

What does he walk like? Doesn’t matter. “Take the end and flick it with your hand like this to set it in motion,” Aizawa instructs, demonstrating the movement with his arm.

Shinsou mimics the gesture, and the capture weapon extends six whole feet in the air before falling limply to the gym floor.

“You need to put more power behind it,” Aizawa starts to say, but before he can add a but not too much power, the kid hauls back and hurls the end of the weapon forward. The capture weapon twirls around his shoulders as it leaves, spinning him around. Aizawa side-steps as the capture weapon loops back, wrapping his protege from ears to ankles and pitching him to the ground. He leans over the boy, who blinks up at him with a dazed expression. “It’s not a baseball. If you throw it without knowing what you’re doing, it will throw you right back.”

It takes Shinsou a while to unravel himself and get back to his feet, but as soon as he does, the capture weapon is back around his neck and he’s ready to go.

“Let’s start with the basics,” Aizawa says, and gets to work starting from the very bottom. One of the upsides of having had to painstakingly teach himself his own fighting style is he knows everything about it. The forms were built to his own strengths, some of which are also Shinsou’s strengths, and he’s able to explain why each movement works. He also remembers the early days of teaching himself, the frustration and hopelessness when something didn’t work, the elation when it did. He sees that same elation in front of him when Shinsou gets the capture weapon to return to his neck without strangling him for the first time.

It took Aizawa three days to get that to happen. Shinsou did it in half an hour.

They practice aim, distance, and using the capture weapon to assist with traveling. Shinsou surpasses expectations in all but the last. When he attempts to swing off a beam in the ceiling, the capture weapon misses and he falls. And he falls. And he falls. Half a dozen times, then a dozen. Finally, he takes a running leap before missing his mark and skids across the floor with a loud, too-familiar squeak. It wasn’t a hard enough landing to really hurt him, but by the way he isn’t popping back up, it’s clear they’ve passed the point of useful practice and have moved on to the frustration phase. Aizawa always pushed himself well past that point when he was training, because he didn’t have a mentor to tell him not to. All of his stupidest injuries happened after he got frustrated.

He picks up Shinsou’s water bottle and walks it over. Standing over the kid, he says, “That’s enough for today.”

“I can keep going,” Shinsou says, although his crumpled position on the floor says otherwise. “I just need a minute. I can get this.”

“You will get this. Just not today.”

“I can do it!” Shinsou insists, hauling himself up off the floor.

“If you keep throwing yourself at this today, you’re going to get hurt and angry with yourself, which will make next time harder.” Aizawa holds out the water bottle and shakes it meaningfully.

Shinsou scowls at the floor, his shoulders slumping. Glancing at Aizawa, he flicks the capture weapon out to grab the water bottle and pulls it back. The water bottle sloshes as it lands directly in his hand, and the student takes a long, annoyed swig from it, not realizing what he just did.

It took Aizawa months to grab an object with his capture weapon like that, without really thinking or staring directly at it. That’s instinct.

All at once, he can envision this kid years down the line, holding his own on team missions, throwing his foolish ass into trouble whenever possible, all this raw talent and determination shaped into an incredible hero whose work will save countless lives. He’ll be amazing. Aizawa wants to be around to see it. More than that, he wants to be there for the moment Shinsou realizes he deserves it.

The kid will take a while yet to catch up with class 1-A, but he deserves to be there. He deserves the same learning experiences. He’s ready for more than he thinks. The path forward begins to solidify in Aizawa’s mind, and he takes out his phone, tapping out a message.

“I guess you need this back,” Shinsou says, handing over the capture weapon with a sigh. “Can I borrow it again next time?”

“No need.” Aizawa loops the weapon back around his neck without looking up from his phone screen. “I’m contacting the equipment shop. Next time, you’ll have your own.”

***

It’s a wonder Shinsou doesn’t miss his bus stop, because he’s fucking floating from excitement. His face hurts from smiling, and he’s spent the whole ride with his forehead pressed against the window, hiding his face from the other passengers to keep anyone from being unsettled. Scary Shinsou with the scary smile is getting his own capture weapon! How is he supposed to get through the day tomorrow without exploding? Is this why people in musicals burst into song? 

At least tomorrow is Thursday, which means he’ll have the GSA meeting and his new Hero Course sort-of friends—and great, now his stomach is doing flips on top of all the rest of the excitement. This is a terrible combination.

He doesn’t know what to do with himself when he gets home, because he feels like an untied balloon floating toward power lines. Seeing Mr. Watanabe in his chair in front of the TV helps to temper his grin into a more manageable smile. He drops his school things in their designated spot by the front door and goes to the kitchen to help Mrs. Watanabe with dinner prep.

“You’re late,” she chides gently.

“Sorry,” he says, washing up, but he knows he doesn’t sound sorry at all. A laugh bubbles out of him.

His foster mother glances up from chopping vegetables. “What’s funny?”

“Nothing, nothing.” Shinsou tries to tamp down his excitement, but it won’t go. He tries to take a deep breath to calm himself down, but instead of exhaling, he says all in a rush, “Training is going really well and Mr. Aizawa is getting me my own capture weapon.”

He knows he shouldn’t have said it the moment it leaves his mouth.

Mrs. Watanabe freezes, her knife halfway through a line of carrots. She stares down at the cutting board, her expression losing all its usual softness. “Hitoshi. You can’t talk about that here.”

Her tone slaps the smile off his face. He watches his hands dry themselves on the towel. In the next room, Mr. Watanabe grumbles at the news. If his foster father had heard that slip-up…

“Right,” Shinsou says flatly. “I’m sorry.”

He comes back to earth, his feet heavy on the tile floor and his expectations folded neatly and tucked into a drawer in his mind. He swallows his voice and goes to help Mrs. Watanabe with dinner. At least he has cooking to do. Holding all the ingredients and recipe steps in his mind helps to push everything else to the side. It’s concrete and unemotional and doesn’t require anything more than a set of hands and a bit of memory. As long as there are steps to follow, he doesn’t have to think about anything else. 

After dinner is done and the toddlers are put to bed, he sits at the dining room table and stares blankly at his homework, willing his brain to think of something other than the capture weapon. It won’t get off the topic long enough to solve a trigonometry problem, and he knows Ectoplasm is going to make him re-do the assignment later if he leaves anything blank.

His brain is lingering on the sensation of being pulled into the air with the capture weapon right before he fell, that moment of weightlessness before his mistake. His shoulder aches from the landing, but god, he can already imagine what it’ll be like when he gets enough practice to get it right. Those brief moments of clarity with the capture weapon felt like what he imagines it’s like to have a physical Quirk.

Shinsou is usually very good at being silent, but he hasn’t been this excited about something in—actually, he can’t remember the last time he was this excited about something. Maybe never. It’s not like his UA acceptance letter, which was tinged with disappointment from being shuffled into General Studies, or getting into a foster home, which was always relief cut with anxiety. This is new. Bottling this up feels like trying to shove an actual ship into a bottle. He’s going to lose his goddamn mind if he doesn’t share this with someone immediately. 

He only has a couple of numbers on his phone—a few classmates he worked with on a group projects, his homeroom teacher, Mr. Aizawa, his case manager, and his foster parents. No good options there.

But.

He pulls the GSA packet Mr. Yamada gave him out of his bag and flips to the back page. Ha. Of course Midoriya’s name is among the volunteer peer counselors. Shinsou types in the number and a short message, then  hesitates. What if—no. Midoriya is the single most upbeat and encouraging person he’s ever met. When Shinsou told him Aizawa was training him to test into the Hero Course, Midoriya was extremely Plus Ultra about it. He’s not going to tell him to fuck off.

Send.

hey it’s shinsou. can I tell you about a good thing?

Ten seconds later, a response comes in: Of course!!!!

So many exclamation points. He smiles.

today mr aizawa let me try his capture weapon and now hes getting me one of my own

He sends the message and ducks, covering his head with his arms. It’s too much to look directly at. The phone buzzes after just a few seconds.

THAT’S AMAZING

It buzzes again.

Shinsou, you’re going to be such a cool hero!!!

And again.

Have you thought about your hero costume yet? Or your name? I can help if you want! Oh and have you thought about any equipment that might help your Quirk? Because I have some ideas if you want to get together and brainstorm sometime. The capture weapon is so versatile it’ll play well with nearly any other type of equipment, except maybe heavy mechsuit type equipment, but that doesn’t seem like your style anyway and—

It keeps going. Shinsou watches the texts roll in, letting Midoriya babble happily at him until the unmoored excitement inside him settles like a warm blanket.

***

Normally, Thursday afternoons are Aizawa’s time to work on his lesson plan, arrange special class projects, and grab a nap before he goes out on patrol, but today, he’s in Principal Nezu’s office trying to perform a small miracle.

“I was less prepared than him at this point in my own schooling, and I was allowed to participate in the internship program,” he says, trying to strike the right balance of passionate and professional in his tone.

Principal Nezu nods over his teacup, giving him an unreadable smile. “Of course, but you were moved into the Hero Course by that point. We’ve never had a General Studies student intern with a pro hero, not in the entire history of the school. Why, the paperwork alone—”

“I am happy to handle any paperwork necessary to make this happen,” Aizawa says, realizes he’s spoken out of turn, and adds a hasty, “Sir.” He waits a beat, but the principal doesn’t speak. “Sir, these are unusual circumstances, but that’s exactly why they require unusual methods. I am training this student in Binding Cloth fighting style, in which I am the expert and only practitioner. This fighting style is best learned in a real-world setting, and this student benefits from hands-on instruction. I truly believe the best way to prepare him to test into the Hero Course is to let him intern with me during the break next month. Midnight has already volunteered to provide additional supervision if you decide it’s necessary for the student’s safety, and I have a long list of pros who owe me favors.”

Nezu regards him with shrewd rodent eyes, sipping his tea. Aizawa always gets the sense that the principal is mentally flaying him and roasting him on a spit, and he’s only 80% sure that’s paranoia.

“Well,” Nezu says brightly, “you certainly are one for firsts! Provided you can get young Shinsou’s guardians to sign off on the idea and draft firm waivers with the legal team, I’m happy to support you in this endeavor.”

Aizawa breathes a long sigh, closing his eyes and bowing his head. “Thank you, Principal Nezu. I promise you won’t regret it.”

“I have no capacity for human regret, only vengeance,” Nezu replies cheerfully. “Be on your way, now.”

Aizawa retreats back to his office and closes the door. Laying out his notes across his desk, he mentally calculates how to pitch this to a student’s foster parents. If he plants the seeds with them now, he can calm any nerves they have well before they need to sign any forms. The courts already granted UA carte blanche in Shinsou’s training when he was accepted into the school, so it’s all down to guardian permission.

The first parental contact on Shinsou’s file is his foster father. Aizawa dials from his office phone.

A gruff masculine voice answers.

“Good afternoon, Mr. Watanabe,” Aizawa says, putting on the closest thing he has to a pleasant phone voice. “This is Shouta Aizawa, one of the teachers at UA. I’d like to speak to you about Hitoshi Shinsou.”

“Has he done something?” the man says, throwing him off for a second.

“He’s actually doing extremely well. That’s why I’m calling today. Hitoshi is an exceptionally smart and driven young man with a uniquely powerful Quirk. In the short time we’ve been training one-on-one, he’s made incredible progress with both his Quirk and his physical and strategic abilities.” Aizawa waits for a response, and when none comes, adds, “As a pro hero with a mental Quirk myself, I know how vital it is that students like Hitoshi get a chance to prove themselves, and that’s why—”

“Tell me about this training,” Mr. Watanabe says curtly.

So Aizawa does. He outlines all the work they’ve done with sparring, the progress he’s seen from a single session with the capture weapon, the incredible potential of his Quirk.

“I see,” says Shinsou’s foster father, and Aizawa isn’t sure if he’s imagining it, but the man’s voice sounds icy. But then, meeting with Nezu always leaves his social acuity a little off-center.

Nezu. Yes. The whole reason for this call.

“I’m seeking your permission to have Hitoshi intern with me during the break next month. The Hero Course students have already completed their internships, and my goal is to give Hitoshi an intensive, hands-on experience in the field that will help prepare him to test into the Hero Course—with the backup of myself and other pro heroes, of course, so he will be as safe as possible. The school administration has already given permission for this as a special exception, and...Mr. Watanabe?”

The line has gone dead. Of course there would be technical issues during the most important part of the conversation.

Aizawa dials again. The line rings several times, then goes to voicemail. He leaves a message with both his school and personal phone numbers and leans back in his chair to give the man a few minutes to call back, unable to place the heavy feeling in his stomach.

***

If Shinsou keeps staring at Izuku Midoriya’s freckles, he’s going to trip over his own feet and beef it in a totally empty, unobstructed hallway. That is not future pro hero behavior, but he can’t seem to help it. Every time he drags his eyes away while Midoriya is talking, they slide right back like those fucking freckles are teeny tiny adorable black holes. And god, even thinking of them as face black holes doesn’t make it stop, and it really should. A horrifying thought strikes him: Did Mr. Yamada notice him acting like this during introductions at the GSA? Is that why he sent the two of them out to hang flyers for the GSA all-campus movie night, to get Shinsou’s weird staring face out of his sight?

What is wrong with him. He grabs a flyer and slaps it against the wall at random, letting Midoriya tape it into place.

Midoriya doesn’t seem to notice that anything is off, because he’s still talking about hero costumes. He’s got half a dozen rough sketches of costume ideas for Shinsou in his notebook, which is open in one hand while he grabs tape from the roll on his wrist. “A lot of heroes disguise the origin points of their Quirks, like Eraserhead does with his eyes. What about something with a tall cowl so no one can see your mouth move?”

“Wouldn’t that muffle my voice, though?” Shinsou says.

“Hm.” Midoriya scribbles something in his notebook with a pencil he’s had tucked behind his ear. “Maybe go the other direction and add a megaphone?”

Shinsou frowns at him. “A megaphone.”

Midoriya looks up at him, bites down a laugh, and says, “Okay, no. You with a megaphone wouldn’t be right.”

“I don’t even know if it’d work with my Quirk.”

“Good point. We should do some testing.”

“We?” Shinsou repeats.

The guy shrugs like it’s not a big deal—which, to be extremely clear, it very much is. “Yeah, I mean, I’m not an expert or anything, but I can be a sparring partner or help test your Quirk or something. I want to help you get into the Hero Course. It’s where you belong.”

Shinsou stops walking. His arms curl to his chest until he’s hugging the stack of flyers hard enough to bend them.

Midoriya gets a few paces ahead before realizing and turning around. “Hitoshi?”

How can you just say things like that? Shinsou wants to say.

What makes you so sure I’m good?

Does anyone actually live up to your ridiculous faith in them?

Shinsou swallows. “I, um.”

“Are you okay?” Midoriya looks like he wants to offer a hug, which is definitely too much and would almost certainly cause some sort of implosion.

“It’s too much,” Shinsou manages, wincing at the awkwardness of his own words. “This topic. Can we, uh?”

“Oh, sorry, I know I can get kind of intense. One topic change coming up!” Midoriya gives him an easy, warm smile and looks around the empty hallway, as if searching for a new subject to babble about. “So,” he says, “think Mr. Yamada made enough flyers?”

Shinsou looks down at the entire ream of paper in his hands and laughs. It’s not much of a joke, but there are more flyers than students, and that’s pretty funny.

“Come on,” Midoriya says. “Let’s hit the third floor.”

They’re quiet all the way up the stairs, and Shinsou notices that Midoriya is chewing on his lip about twenty feet before the guy takes a deep breath and says, “I think I’m done with the examination of my gender.”

“Yeah?” Shinsou says. “I noticed you didn’t have an alternate pronoun in icebreakers today.”

“Pretty sure I’m just a he/him kind of cis guy. Which is okay, and I know it’ll make things a little easier for me in the long run than the other options, which brings up a whole new examination of how to best use my privilege.” He gives a determined look to a faraway point in the hallway. “But I’m still going to keep the nail polish. Guys should be pretty when we want to.”

“Damn right.” A little quieter, Shinsou asks, “So, if the gender exploration is over, does that mean your orientation is next?”

“Oh, that’s been underway since the beginning of the year,” Midoriya answers immediately, flipping his notebook open to a different page of charts. “I’ve been tracking my attraction to a selection of celebrities, pro heroes, and classmates since September on a 1-10 scale to see whether my interest in various genders shifts over time or—uh—” His cheeks flush pink all at once, and he claps his notebook shut before Shinsou can peek at it. “That…goes past the point of ‘weird,’ doesn’t it?”

“A little bit,” Shinsou says, because it’s true. But he has to admit, having a chart for these things does sound like it’d clear some things up.

He is beginning to realize who would be scoring points on his own chart. His cheeks heat.

“So, um,” Midoriya says, rubbing the green scruff at the back of his neck, “Basically so far it’s all across the board. I like girls, but boys and non-binary people are nice, too. Everyone is kinda nice, really, but in different ways, and maybe in a sort of, kind of asexual spectrum way? I’m not sure. I need more data points before I can establish priorities and decide on a label.”

“Maybe you could just say ‘I don’t know’ for now,” Shinsou suggests, holding a flyer to the wall.

Midoriya laughs so hard he misses with the piece of tape. Making a little pfft noise between his lips, he shakes his head like it will get rid of the idea. “Anyway, how about you? Have you figured yours out yet?” When Shinsou goes quiet, he looks back at him with wide eyes and says, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to assume! You could be a straight ally, and that’s totally okay.”

Shinsou’s throat feels tight, like it’s too full of words to let them out. His eyes bounce from Midoriya’s to those fucking freckles and down the strong lines of his arm to his strong, stupid, pretty hands with their green glitter nail polish.

“I don’t think I am straight, though,” he says quietly. Then he ducks his head with a choked, happy noise he doesn’t recognize. “I’ve never said that out loud before.”

“Wait, wait,” Midoriya says, touching his shoulder. “Do I get to be the first person you come out to?”

“I guess?” Shinsou says, his voice too high.

“Hitoshi,” Midoriya says, absolutely beaming. “That’s amazing! What an honor!” And he hugs him.

Shinsou feels like he’s going to fall over. His head is spinning and Midoriya’s arms are wrapped around him and he can smell the guy’s shampoo, and oh god, why isn’t he doing something with his hands, what do hands do, why is he inept at basic social interactions.

He hugs Midoriya back, lightly at first and then definitely way too tight. His friend is solid and warm, warmer than he expected, and he makes a happy little half-hum, half-laugh when Shinsou squeezes him.

Shinsou tries not to think about how long it’s been since he was last hugged.

Midoriya lets him end the hug and doesn’t say anything when Shinsou wipes one eye on his sleeve, but he does point out, “You’re buzzing.”

Shinsou digs out the phone that’s vibrating in his pocket. Mr. Watanabe has texted him three times in two minutes.

Hitoshi. I’m here to pick you up.

You’re coming home immediately.

Get your things.

“I, um,” Shinsou says, unable to decipher anything but the icy cold washing over his body. “I have to go. Now.”

Handing the rest of the flyers over to Midoriya, he sprints back toward the GSA classroom to get his bag.

***

Aizawa hasn’t been able to shake the uneasy feeling in his stomach since the call with Watanabe, who still hasn’t called him back. He worked on his lesson plan in his office and skipped his usual nap just in case, but it’s nearly time for patrol, and he needs to accept the fact that maybe this internship idea isn’t going to pan out after all. At least he hasn’t discussed it with Shinsou already—the kid would be heartbroken.

He’s just locking up his office to head out when his cell phone rings. The number is unfamiliar. Could be Watanabe.

“Aizawa,” he answers.

Someone on the other end of the line gives a muffled, sniffly laugh. “You picked up.”

It’s Shinsou. He’s crying.

The uneasy feeling crystalizes instantly into a bone-deep protective rage. “What happened? Are you okay?”

There’s a sound like cloth over the speaker. “They’re getting rid of me,” Shinsou says, voice breaking. “My foster parents. They picked me up from campus and told me I’m too dangerous to stay with them. Over text! They won’t even talk to me, it’s like they think I’m going to--” A sob chokes off the thought.

“Where are you now?” Aizawa asks, trying to keep the snarl out of his voice.

“In the closet in my room. They think I’m packing.” Panic pitches the kid’s voice high. “I can’t go back to that res facility, I can’t. It’s too far from UA! I can’t stay in the program, I can’t keep training with you if—I can’t! If I have to go back there, it’s over. My life is over.”

The last few words have a promise in them that Aizawa doesn’t like.

“You don’t have to go back,” he says. “Okay, Hitoshi? I’m going to come get you right now. We’ll figure something out.”

There’s a creak on the other end of the phone, and Shinsou’s voice hitches. Cloth shuffles, and the boy cries out.

“No, no, no, please! I can’t, please!”

The line beeps, call ended.

Aizawa is going to crush his phone if it stays in his hand. His capture weapon is floating with his hair, an electric sensation crackling behind his eyes. He leans against the wall and takes a long breath in, willing his anger to settle into something that won’t actively get in his way. He’s no use to his kids when he’s this angry unless he’s actually fighting off villains—and regardless of his class designation, Hitoshi Shinsou is one of his kids.

He calls his husband and fills him in on the situation on his way to the faculty parking lot. Hizashi, bless this perfect human, just swears and says, “I’ll meet you at the car.” And once they’re actually at the car, Hizashi takes the driver’s seat without any debate and leaves a hand on the center console so he can take Aizawa’s hand and help ground him.

“It’ll be okay,” he says, and laughs in that beautiful voice. “I don’t know what the fuck we’re gonna do when we get him, but it’ll be okay. This is foster parents and bureaucracy, not villains.”

“We’re trained to deal with villains,” Aizawa says bitterly.

Hizashi squeezes his hand.

Of fucking course they hit rush hour traffic, because people are the worst and this entire world is broken and Aizawa is going to murder the driver in front of them who’s creeping along under the speed limit while texting.

He can tell it’s too late before they pull up in front of the Watanabes’ house. The windows are all dark in spite of the twilight, and the carport is empty. He jogs to the front door anyway and knocks, politely at first, and then significantly less politely. The next-door neighbor’s curtains part, and a little old woman’s face peers out, scowling at him. He shoots her a rude sign, because it feels good to be a petulant child when he’s losing, and because the odds she’ll understand it are reasonably low.

Hizashi reaches for his hand as soon as he’s back in the car.

“They’re gone,” Aizawa says.

“Shit,” Hizashi responds.

Aizawa leans back in his seat and pushes the heels of his hands against his forehead. “I think this is my fault.”

“It’s not.”

“I called his foster father to pitch him the internship, and immediately after hanging up on me, he tells Hitoshi he’s too dangerous, gives him the silent treatment, and kicks him out. That’s not a coincidence.”

“Shouta,” Hizashi says sharply, grabbing his arm. “This is not your fault. This is the fault of a system that is beyond broken and a couple of weak, scared people who should’ve done better. You’ve done more for that kid than most adults he’s had in his life. You’re still working to help him. And so am I. Now shut up and let me make some calls.”

Aizawa stares at his own phone while his husband looks up the number of Shinsou’s case worker and navigates the hellish tangle that is trying to get employees of a government agency on the phone outside of normal business hours.

Aizawa listens to his husband’s impeccable phone voice and watches the minutes flick past on the car’s digital display as he rolls his own words around in his head. I’m coming to get you right now. That right now is already stretched to its breaking point, and he can only imagine how long it must feel to a scared kid.

“I’m taking him home with us,” he says while Hizashi is on hold with a supervisor at the nearest residential care facility. “He needs a place to stay where he can remain at UA, and if we let him get placed in another foster home with fearful civilians, it’s going to compound the harm that’s already been done to him. I’ll lose him anyway.” He locks eyes with his husband. “Please, Hizashi. Just until we can find him something more stable than this mess.”

Hizashi takes a deep breath. Letting it out, he says, “I’ll set up the futon in the den if you’ll order dinner.”

Aizawa leans into the space between them and kisses him. “I love you.”

“I know. Shh, shh!” He flaps a hand and speaks into the phone, where the hold music has stopped. “Hello, yes? You can? Oh, you’re a miracle. Yes, please transfer me.”

All told, it takes five calls and forty minutes to reach the right person and find where exactly to go. That’s more than forty minutes too damn long for Aizawa’s liking, but there are very good reasons he isn’t the one behind the wheel or handling the calls, and those reasons involve an increased risk of entirely justifiable homicide.

The social services building downtown is empty except for a custodian in the lobby, one office with lights still on, and a familiar shape slouched in a chair in the hallway.

“Hey, kiddo!” Hizashi calls, breaking the silence of the seventh floor.

Aizawa runs. Shinsou has barely raised his head before Aizawa is crouching in front of him, capture weapon floating uselessly around his shoulders, saying, “I’m sorry I’m late.”

Shinsou looks so small, curled in on himself with his face tear-streaked and a white trash bag full of his things sitting on the chair next to his. “I didn’t hurt them,” he says, shaking his head. “I didn’t use my Quirk on them.”

“I know you didn’t, Hitoshi,” Aizawa says.

And suddenly there’s a crumpled child leaning into him, head on his shoulder and hands clenched in the fabric of his jumpsuit.

Aizawa doesn’t quite know how to handle this, but he wraps his arms around the kid and rubs a circle in his back, just like he did when Shinsou had a panic attack during their training. The boy’s trembling slows.

Hizashi lays a hand on his shoulder. “I’ll talk to the case manager. You handle things out here.”

That seems like the opposite of how things should naturally go, but Aizawa isn’t about to let go of Shinsou right now, so he nods.

Hizashi smoothes his hair down into a respectable bun and lets himself into the case manager’s office. The first syllable of a cheerful, professional greeting comes through before the door swings shut.

God, he loves his husband.

***

Shinsou feels like his head is stuffed with cotton, and also that cotton is angry, and possibly on fire. He sits up as straight as his heavy head will allow, taking a sip of the juice drink Aizawa bought him from the vending machine down the hall. It’s supposed to be melon. It doesn’t taste like melon. But that might be partly because the whole world feels muffled and dim, since his brain’s been in panic mode for the past three and a half hours and his senses are all wrung out.

Aizawa occupies the chair next to him, tapping out messages on his phone, his own half-drunk bottle of energy drink abandoned in his lap. He’s been quiet for a long time, and except for one phone call that had him up and pacing down the hall, he’s been right here, his shoulder touching Shinsou’s like a reminder: he’s not going back to the residential facility, he’s got adults who’ve got his back, he’s safe for now.

Shinsou hugs his legs tighter to his chest and rests his chin on his knee. There’s a dim sense memory of this pose in the back of his mind, of being very small and upset and his parents sitting with him. He remembers a soft, shushing voice and a hand on his head. The warm, safe feeling of curling against his mom’s shoulder. It wasn’t safe, though, not really. As soon as his Quirk manifested…

He doesn’t realize he’s crying again until Aizawa ropes a tired arm around his shoulders and shifts as if to let him lean in.

“It’s okay,” Shinsou says, sitting up straighter as he presses the heels of his hands against his eyes. “Don’t—it’s okay.”

“It’s really not,” Aizawa says quietly. “Hitoshi, you don’t deserve this shit. You know that, right?”

The idea of answering that question makes him want to walk into the fucking ocean, so he just shakes his head noncommittally and takes out his own phone to signal an end to the conversation. Aizawa seems to take the hint, but now Shinsou’s staring at his phone screen, which is still displaying the last string of notifications he refused to answer from his foster parents. His foster mother’s This is for the best and Please forgive us and You’ll understand if you ever have your children to protect, and his foster father’s cold Don’t make a scene and a dozen other pleas and commands fill the lock screen.

His hands shake as he opens his texts and deletes the group chat, then blocks and hides their contacts. The idea of either of them trying to check in on him later makes him want to throw up.

There’s one more unread text left. Of course it’s from Midoriya.

Hey Hitoshi, I hope everything’s okay. It was good seeing you today.   

There’s a little green heart emoji at the end of the text. What the hell does that mean? He doesn’t even know where to start responding to that, so he leaves it on read. The only safe thing on this phone is Solitaire, which he plays until his mind feels comfortably numb.

“All righty!” Mr. Yamada announces as he steps out of the office, trailed by the case manager. “Shouta, we need a signature from you, and then we can get this show on the road.”

The case manager, a small woman who somehow looks even more tired than Aizawa, steps out of her office just long enough to collect Aizawa’s signature on a clipboard, then gives them a nod and says, “Thank you.”

“Thank you for coming in late to handle this,” Yamada says in the most earnest voice Shinsou’s ever heard come out of the man. “You’ve made a difficult situation easier.”

They exchange pleasantries, and she retreats into her office, immediately turning off the overhead lights as if to say We are CLOSED, please return your unwanted children in the morning!

Shinsou stands up, hauling his bookbag over one shoulder and leaning to balance the weight of his trash bag full of worldly possessions.

“I’ll get that,” Yamada says, taking the trash bag from him.

“Mr. Yamada, you don’t have to—”

“Hey, I told you,” the teacher says, smiling at him through his normal person glasses. “Call me Hizashi.”

“Hizashi, I—” he tries, and can’t find the words. Everything inside him is too big. It will tear him apart like old newspaper if he lets it out. He gives up and stares down at his feet, which are cemented in place.

“You want to carry your own stuff?” Aizawa asks.

Shinsou nods. “Please.”

Yamada—no, Hizashi, he has to remember—hands him back the trash bag, and he holds it in his arms in front of him like it’s a large, ungainly stuffed animal. It’s heavy from the shoes and school books on the top strata, but he’d rather his arms ache than have to watch another adult walk away with his things. Hugging the bag to his chest calms the anxious, fluttery feeling behind his ribs a little.

If Hizashi is hurt by the rejection of his kind gesture, he doesn’t show it. Resting a hand on both Shinsou and Aizawa’s backs, he says, “Well, my boys, let’s go home.”

It’s a mercifully short car ride, with the traffic long since died down and the downtown crowds dispersed. Shinsou is grateful, because his skull is thrumming with a building headache from stress and crying, and the road noise doesn’t help. The cloud-soft fuzzy blanket in the backseat is a comfort, though.

The Aizawa-Yamada apartment is on the top floor of a small, modern building outside the city center. The entryway is smaller than the house Shinsou just came from, but as soon as he steps into the front hall, the floors warm his feet. He follows Hizashi through the apartment as the person points out the place he can leave his coat, the toilet and bath, the cat—

Hold on.

“You have a cat?” Shinsou says, crouching to greet the animal. The little tabby trots up to him and gives his finger a quick assessment before head-butting his hand.

“That’s Pichi,” Aizawa says behind him. “She followed me home from patrol a few years ago.”

“‘Followed him home,’” Hizashi repeats, making exaggerated air quotes.

Pichi puts her front paws on Shinsou’s knee and pushes herself up to bonk her head on his chin. Her purr is deep and crackly, like she’s the reincarnation of a heavy smoker. He decides on the spot that if Hizashi and Aizawa decide to kick him out, too, he’s going to steal their cat and live with her in an alley behind a ramen shop. It’s nice to have a backup plan.

Pichi follows him to the spare bedroom, where Hizashi is unfolding a futon for him. The room has a wall of closets, tall windows overlooking a residential street, and a collection of electronics and musical instruments.

“Ignore all this,” Hizashi says, waving a hand at the desk full of what looks like recording equipment. “I’ll move it in a bit. The left half of the closet is mostly empty, so feel free to unpack.”

Shinsou sets his trash bag of stuff down on the floor at the foot of the futon and hesitates. “How long will I be here for?”

Hizashi opens his mouth, but before he can speak, Aizawa’s voice answers from the doorway: “We don’t know.”

Shinsou turns. His mentor is leaning against the door frame, looking more exhausted than he’s seen him maybe ever. He’s shed his costume in favor of sweatpants and a black henley. It’s a little weird to see a teacher barefoot in loungewear, but it’s certainly not the weirdest part of Shinsou’s life right now.

“I just mean,” Shinsou says, “are we talking one weekend? A couple weeks? Kinda no point in unpacking if I’m only here for a few days.”

Aizawa and Hizashi exchange a look that’s hard to read. Concern? Confusion?

“You’re here as long as you need,” Hizashi says. “If a permanent placement becomes available, your case manager will reach out, but in the meantime, we are your foster family and this is your home.”

“Oh.” All the air rushes out of Shinsou, and he sits down on the edge of the futon with a whump. Pichi hops up onto his lap, giving a worried meow.

“And that’s your cat,” Aizawa says with a smirk.

Shinsou pets the cat as he wraps his mind around this new reality. He gets to stay here with two of his favorite people from UA…indefinitely? He gets half a closet to himself? He gets a cat? It seems too good to be true.

“I’m ordering takeout,” Aizawa says, crossing his arms. “What do you like to eat?”

“I…have no idea,” Shinsou answers.

“Ah, we’re at the brain mush stage of the evening,” Hizashi says knowingly. “Comfort food it is.”

The cat is purring in Shinsou’s lap. The desk in the corner is empty. His things are out of the trash bag and placed carefully: desk, bed, closet. There is a bowl of warm food in front of him at a small but sturdy table. Time slides through his brain without really registering, but he’s here. He’s safe. He’s okay—or at least, sort of okay. Okay-ish.

When the lights are out in his quiet new room in his strange new household, he pulls his phone out of his bag and checks it again. Still just that one text from Midoriya: I hope everything’s okay. It was good seeing you today. Green heart emoji.

He stares at the text bubble for what feels like an hour, then types and hits send.

long day, but it’s ok. you too. And a purple heart emoji, because he can’t convince himself not to.

***

The bedroom door clicks as Hizashi closes it. Aizawa watches him move through the room, pulling his t-shirt off over his head, folding his glasses neatly on his bedside table, making the mattress dip as he sits to take out his hearing aids.

Aizawa feels shaky, like he’s waiting for bad news to drop. He waits for Hizashi to turn his way and signs, Are you angry?

Hizashi frowns at him, turning to sit with a better view. Angry why? he signs back.

Because— Aizawa huffs, trying to think of a different way to say unilateral decision because he doesn’t know the sign for it. He settles for I didn’t give you a choice. 

Hizashi points a thumb back toward the door, in the direction of the room where their new foster son is already sleeping. Then he shakes his head. This was the right choice. He was the right choice. I’m not angry.

Aizawa sits upright and pulls his husband into a hug, kissing him from his temple down his cheek to his mouth and murmuring “Thank you” against his lips.

Hizashi laughs and whispers, a little too loud, “You know you’re never getting laid again with a teenager in the house.”

Aizawa pulls away just far enough to sign Fuck you.

Unlikely, Hizashi replies, giving him a playful shove.

Aizawa tackles him to the mattress and pulls the covers over them both, drawing them into their own warm little bubble. The light of the bedside lamp filters through the fabric, a dim yellow tone that nearly matches Hizashi’s hair. Hizashi with his expressive smile-lined eyes and his ridiculous facial hair and his incredible open heart. How does this person still look at him so softly after all these years, when he knows damn well he married an obstinate mess?

Aizawa cradles his husband’s face with one hand, brushing his thumb over that ridiculous little mustache that he secretly adores. Hizashi kisses the pad of his thumb and makes a comfortable little humming noise.

It’s been such a long, complicated day. The familiar sensations of Hizashi’s body against his takes some of the edge off, letting Aizawa sink into the weight of his exhaustion instead of fighting it. The smell of overlapping hair products might as well be aromatherapy. The heat of his skin feels like home. 

Hizashi pushes aside his bangs and kisses him on the forehead. “Go to sleep, love. I already called you and Hitoshi in sick for school tomorrow.”

Aizawa pushes himself up, ruining the bedsheet cocoon. “Wait, what?”

“Sorry, I can’t hear you,” Hizashi says, turning off the light and rolling himself up in the comforter. “It’ll have to wait until morning.”

“You asshole.”

“Oh, it’s no trouble at all. I know you’ve needed a day off for a while.”

Aizawa gives him a shove, but there’s no fire in it.

Hizashi somehow manages to yawn smugly. “I love you, Shouta.”

Aizawa ropes an arm around him anyway, sighing, and falls asleep with his face in the curve of his husband’s neck.

Chapter Text

Shinsou jolts awake in a panic and doesn’t know where he is. The sunlight is coming from the wrong angle, and there are no toddlers crying or radio drifting up from the kitchen, which means it’s not the Watanabes’ house, which means they’ve sent him back to the facility, which means—don’t cry, don’t draw attention, swallow down your Quirk, head down, just shut up— 

He holds himself very still, trying to stop the jagged rhythm his breath is making in his throat. By the time he realizes the futon is too soft to be government-issued and the walls are beige wallpaper instead of gray cinderblock, his body is already spiraling into panic, throat tight, mind rolling through the same exit plans over and over, every part of him shaking.

Shinsou pushes himself upright and tries to take deep breaths. It’s okay. It’s okay. The Watanabes tried to send him back because of his Quirk, but Aizawa and Hizashi were there. They took him home. This is their home. Their cat is snoring next to his leg.

It’s okay, at least for now. It’s okay.

Taking a shaking breath, Shinsou leans over and presses his face into Pichi’s fur. She makes a merp noise in her sleep, and it’s cute enough to shove the panic train off its tracks a little.

It’s okay. It’s okay it’s okay it’s okay.

He exhales slowly. What was Aizawa’s suggestion? Count to five and wiggle your toes. He tries that. The sheets are warm and soft against his bare feet. His breath sounds less like a shiver. He looks around the room for something to focus on that isn’t the choked feeling in his throat. Outside the window is a bright blue sky with little patchy clouds streaked across it. He counts clouds. A bird lands outside the window, bobs its head, and takes off again.

It’s okay. It is. The adults abandoned him again. Adults do that, it’s not a surprise. As worst-case scenarios go, getting sent home with his two favorite teachers is one of the better options. It’s convenient for his schooling, they probably won’t outright abuse him because ethics, and they already understand his scary fucking Quirk more than any of his previous foster parents. If he’s quiet and unobtrusive and doesn’t hurt anybody, maybe they’ll let him stay until he gets into the Hero Course.

Shit. School. What time is it?

It takes him a second to find his phone in the new configuration of stuff, and when he does he nearly jumps out of his skin. It’s 12:30pm. Why didn’t his alarm go off? He’s going to be in so much trouble. Shit shit shit.

He bursts out of the bedroom pulling his school uniform shirt on over the t-shirt he slept in and stops in the living room as his brain catches up. Aizawa is stretched out across the couch under a fuzzy blanket, a laptop and folders of tests spread out on the coffee table in front of him.

Aizawa is asleep at home in the middle of a school day.

This doesn’t seem right. Should he—

Shinsou realizes he doesn’t even know how to get to campus from here. He doesn’t have a key for the door. There’s no way around it. He’s gotta ask. He tiptoes across the room and crouches near the couch. “Excuse me, Mr. Aizawa?”

“Mmf,” comes the response.

“Um, I’m late for school.”

Aizawa peels open one eye. It takes a few blinks for the words to register. He stretches, and pushes himself up. “You’re not late. You’re out sick.” He sighs, checking his phone. “We both are, because Hizashi is a meddler.”

“But I’m not sick,” Shinsou objects. “I’m fine! I can still catch my afternoon classes.”

Aizawa looks at him like he’s seeing someone else there. His expression softens. “Normally I’d be with you on this, but you slept for fifteen hours straight, kid. After what those people put you through yesterday—” His voice is mostly flat, but there’s a hint of a scowl on those people. “How are you?”

Shinsou exhales and rests his heels on the floor. He doesn’t know how he is. Historically, how he is has almost never mattered. “I’m fine,” he says, like instinct.

“Remember the mindfulness techniques we started with on week one?” Aizawa says, looking skeptical. “Scan your body and tell me again.”

Shinsou takes a deep breath and breathes out through his mouth, letting his eyes slide closed. His body feels heavy and empty at the same time. Hands are still shaky. Mind full of intrusive memories. His head pulses with the kind of stabbing ache that reminds him how much he cried yesterday. His stomach is going to devour itself if he doesn’t eat something soon.

“Sad,” he says, without really meaning to. “My head hurts and I need to eat.”

“We can do something about at least two of those,” Aizawa says, getting up. “Grab yourself a painkiller from the bathroom cabinet. I’ll heat up lunch.”

The medicine cabinet in this place could supply the high school for a month. Every type of over-the-counter painkiller imaginable is there in triplicate, with a stash of bandages, sports tape, and what looks like a DIY suture kit. Every shelf is packed full except the very bottom, which houses two toothbrushes, a couple of prescription bottles, and a wooden box with a cluster of vials, syringes, and alcohol pads inside. A small yearly calendar is wedged into the cabinet behind it, with X’s on Wednesdays. Most Wednesdays, anyway. A lot of them are blank since the school year started.

It’s weird to think about Aizawa missing doses of his hormones—or missing anything. The guy is scary competent. Even when he’s asleep he’s a little intimidating.

Shinsou grabs one of the ibuprofen bottles and dry swallows a pair of pills while checking his phone for messages. It’s not like he expects there to be anything. The exchange with Midoriya yesterday was long delayed, and he didn’t exactly open it up for a conversation. So why is he a little disappointed that there’s nothing new? And why can’t he stop staring at that little green heart emoji like a translation is going to appear beside it?

Aside from his hands, he’s finally stopped shaking by the time he sits down at the kitchen table in front of a bowl of reheated leftovers. Aizawa sits across from him, nursing one of those packs of jellied nutrition shake he sometimes brings to training. Shinsou wonders if anyone in this household eats homemade solid foods, and there’s a pinch of pain inside him as he misses cooking dinner with Mrs. Watanabe.

They exist together in silence for a few minutes. It’s not like the obligatory silence Shinsou is used to living in. He feels like he could maybe even say something and wouldn’t get in trouble, but the habit of not saying anything is hard to break.

Aizawa speaks first, anyway. “Your key is on the shelf in the entryway. Hizashi and I can drive you to campus, if you don’t mind arriving a bit early, and there’s a bus just down the block for when you need to get yourself home.”

Home. He’s bent and stretched that word to mean so many places it’s basically meaningless. “Okay,” he says. “Thank you. Uh. What are the rules here?”

“Rules?” Aizawa repeats, frowning. “I hadn’t thought about that. Uh, clean up after yourself, don’t let the cat have your food, and if you need to get Hizashi’s attention when his hearing aids are out, wave a hand or flick a light. Don’t tap his shoulder, he gets jumpy.”

“What about chores? Curfews? Disciplinary actions?”

Aizawa sits back, crossing his arms. “Hitoshi, are you going to stay out partying until two in the morning without warning?”

“No.”

“If we ask you to help out with something, will you?”

“Well, yeah, probably.”

“If you mess up, will you let us talk with you about it and figure out an appropriate solution or punishment?”

Shinsou’s voice gets stuck in his throat. Talking with him when he’s in trouble? Sounds fake. He nods, for lack of a better response.

Aizawa shrugs. “Then I don’t see the need for a chore wheel or whatever you had at your last home. You’re a reasonable kid, and your problem’s never been a lack of structure.” He chews his lip for a moment, then adds, “I want you to tell us things, though. If something big’s going on in your life. You didn’t tell your previous foster parents about your training with me, did you?”

Shinsou shrinks into his chair. “Mrs. Watanabe knew. She said not to tell Mr. Watanabe because he was already afraid of me from watching the Sports Festival.”

“Motherfucker,” Aizawa hisses. “I called him yesterday afternoon to discuss the possibility of an internship. I told him about the work we were doing. I didn’t know, I’m sorry.” 

“It’s okay.” Shinsou shoves his hands into his lap where they can shake without being seen. It’s weirdly vindicating to hear an adult—and a teacher and pro hero, nonetheless—swear on his behalf. His mind takes a second to catch up. “Wait, what about an internship?”

Aizawa’s stern expression shifts into an actual grin. It’s mildly terrifying.  “I’ve gotten special permission from Principal Nezu to take you on as an intern during the break next month. If you want to, that is.”

“YES,” Shinsou says, and all of a sudden he’s out of his seat with his hands flat on the table, his own shout making his head pound. He swallows his voice and says quieter, “I want that, yes.”

***

Aizawa has never been great at resting. Sleeping, yes—he can sleep nearly anywhere at a moment’s notice—but resting, intentionally being still and inactive? Absolutely not. Why do people even like that. Rest today is made even more intolerable by the fact that, alone with his new ward in a home environment, he’s starting to see all the little red flags the kid doesn’t even know he’s waving around.

Shinsou walks on the balls of his feet as he moves through the apartment and closes cupboards with the care of an explosives specialist diffusing a bomb. He flinches slightly when spoken to unexpectedly, capitulates to everything, and doesn’t speak unless spoken to, even though he clearly enjoys the company. The one that really makes Aizawa want to scoop out some past caregiver’s eyes with a melon baller is the way the kid is never fully at ease, even underneath a fuzzy blanket on the couch.

There’s a difference between a kid who’s uncomfortable and a kid who’s hypervigilant from trauma, and Aizawa knows that difference intimately—he sees it in his classroom, in the teachers’ lounge, in himself after difficult missions. He was the same after the USJ attack, positioning himself with his back to the corner of the room and his lines of sight open, a minimum of three different routes of egress mapped out in his head at all times. Once when the cat knocked the TV remote onto the floor it took him ten minutes to get his breathing back to normal. It’s the same with Shinsou. A shout comes from somewhere down the hallway, and he can see the kid’s pupils dilate, can measure his breathing by the quick rise and fall of the blanket.

Aizawa considers himself pretty good at adapting around the trauma reactions of others, because he damn well has to be in his job, but with this particular student—with this vulnerable child who is entirely his and Hizashi’s responsibility as of yesterday—it’s harder to handle. Maybe it’s a good thing that he and Hizashi never figured out the parents thing, because if the protective rage he’s feeling about his brand new teenage foster son is anything to go by, he’d probably level a city if someone pushed his own toddler on the playground.

Credits roll on the cooking show they’ve been watching, and Aizawa says, “What do you want to do now?”

“I’m fine with whatever,” Shinsou says, even though he’s clearly about ready to vibrate out of his skin.

Aizawa feels much the same, though his is from a different, angrier set of emotions. Usually when his brain is this overwrought, he needs to do something physical to wear it out.

That’s not a bad idea, actually.

“Wanna go grab a space on campus and practice with your new capture weapon?” he suggests.

He barely gets the whole sentence out before Shinsou is throwing the blanket off himself and getting ready to go.

They take the bus to campus. Normally Aizawa would take this as a chance to sneak in a fifteen minute nap, but like hell is he going to leave his ward—protege—student—foster son? What is he supposed to call him now? His kid works, he supposes. It’s not inaccurate. He’s got twenty-one of them. He’s not leaving his traumatized fucking kid without backup on an unfamiliar public transit route. So he lets his head rest against the back wall of the bus and keeps an eye on the other passengers. The bus isn’t busy this time of day, and no one sits within two rows of them—possibly because Aizawa makes uncomfortable eye contact with anyone who looks like they’re going to and stares them down until they find another seat.

Every time he glances over to check on him, Shinsou is staring at his phone screen. Aizawa isn’t going to pry, but he’s pretty sure it’s the same text thread every time.

“Any cars you need me to key?” he asks quietly, a few minutes from campus.

Shinsou startles, then lowers his shoulders and smiles sheepishly as he hides his phone in the pocket of his hoodie. “No, it’s all right.”

They walk from the bus stop to campus together, and the closer they get to the towering main building of UA, the more Shinsou seems to fidget with the hems of his sleeves. Nervous. In need of distraction.

“Scenario,” Aizawa says. “You come upon a trio of villains attacking civilians in the city center. Their Quirks are superstrength, kangaroo, and slime. What do you do?”

Shinsou’s brow furrows. “What’s the status of the civilians, and where am I approaching from?”

They go back and forth, Aizawa fleshing out the scenario and Shinsou picking apart potential solutions, for the rest of the walk. By the time they reach the equipment shop in the basement of the administrative building, Shinsou has figured out three strong potential paths to subdue the hypothetical villains with minimal harm to civilians or property. All of his solutions are more elegant than the one Aizawa took when he faced the actual scenario during his first year as a pro.

Shinsou’s new capture weapon is perfect. It’s exactly like Aizawa’s, minus the wear and ever so slightly lighter. When Shinsou puts it around his neck, it doesn’t matter that his hair is a mess and he’s wearing an old, torn hoodie; the way his shoulders square and a quiet ease creeps into his expression, it’s the most he’s ever looked like a hero.

They grab their usual gym and run through warm-ups before Aizawa hauls the practice dummies out of storage and shows Shinsou how to use the capture weapon to grab a target, pull a target through the air, and knock a target the hell out with a well-placed head-slam. If they both get a little too much cathartic joy out of the last lesson, well, that’s just a perk of the job.

Once Shinsou has a better grip on the capture weapon, literally and figuratively, it’s time to try travel again. Aizawa punches the control panel in the wall, and up through the floor comes an obstacle course built of tall spires and valleys. It doesn’t exactly mimic a city skyline, but it will do in a pinch. Aizawa shoots his capture weapon at one of the spires and runs, using gravity to fling himself up into the air and onto one of the lower platforms.

“You next,” he calls back.

Shinsou is too tentative in his approach, but he manages to roll himself safely out of the jump instead of crashing, which is progress.

“Good,” Aizawa says. “Try again.”

He tries until all the elements are there—speed, angle, capture weapon grip—and arches up into the air to make a near-perfect landing on the platform.

“Excellent,” Aizawa says, clapping him on the shoulder.

Shinsou grins. “What next?”

“We’re going to work our way up there.” He points to the top of the obstacle course, a jagged platform just under the steel beams of the gymnasium roof.

“What if I fall?”

“I’ll catch you. Let’s go.”

Aizawa demonstrates each swing and then watches Shinsou follow him as closely as possible. With one win under his belt, the kid is more confident than before, less hesitant in his movements. They practice on the shorter areas of the obstacle course for a while, but Shinsou is eager to push himself further. He needs to be plucked out of the air a couple of times when he overshoots his landing, but he’s a remarkably quick study. So quick, in fact, that Aizawa lets his usual attentiveness slip slightly, so when the kid launches himself toward the second tallest platform and mis-aims, Aizawa doesn’t catch him right. His capture weapon grabs a flailing arm, but it’s too late for a safe landing.

Shinsou hits the ground between platforms, and Aizawa’s stomach drops twenty feet to the floor. Oh, god. He’s been responsible for this kid for less than twenty-four hours and he’s already broken him out of pure, unadulterated incompetence. Why did he think this would be a good idea? Any of this. Who had the bright idea to bring a living being made of breakable parts home for him to take care of? Using a ceiling beam as an anchor point, he swings down and runs to his kid, trying not to have his internal crisis on the outside.

Shinsou is lying on the floor in a heap. The heap swears loudly. Well, at least he’s not dead.

“Hey,” Aizawa says, crouching over him. “Are you hurt?”

“Think I messed up my ankle,” Shinsou says, wincing as he sits up. His left leg is curled in pain, that foot sitting at a sharp angle against the floor. “That was stupid. Sorry.”

“Not your fault.” Aizawa gives the ankle a quick inspection. Good news: The skin is unbroken, so not the most severe he’s seen. Bad news: The kid has an obvious panic response to having his shoe removed, and Aizawa clearly needs to murder someone for that.

The infirmary is in the next building over from the gym, and Shinsou allows Aizawa to be his crutch for the walk there. With one arm around the kid’s back and an arm over his own shoulder, Aizawa realizes he’s hardly ever had physical contact with him outside of crises. That should probably change. He knows he’s not the affectionate, affirmations-spouting caregiver that Shinsou needs, but if Hizashi can fill part of that gap, maybe Aizawa can stretch himself to cover the rest.

“What have we here?” Recovery Girl tuts as they hobble into the infirmary. Thankfully, the room is otherwise empty—none of his students present to ask why he’s on campus during a sick day. That also means none of his students have broken their foolish little heads open in his absence. Bonus.

“Possible sprain,” Aizawa says, helping Shinsou up onto the bed by the window. “He took a fall on the obstacle course.”

“You can’t mean the obstacle course that Cementoss crafted specifically for advanced Hero Course student training,” Recovery girl says sweetly. “Only a nincompoop would think to take a General Studies student on that. Now, shoo! Let me speak with my patient.”

Just a few minutes later, Shinsou has acquired a juice box, an ice pack, and a lipstick print on his still swollen ankle.

“No more obstacle courses,” Recovery Girl warns them. “Now stay horizontal for half an hour or you’re going to get up and fall right back down again.” She disappears into her private office, and a blast of K-pop is muffled by the door closing behind her.

Aizawa pulls up a seat next to the bed, crosses his arms, changes his mind, and offers Shinsou a pat on the shoulder. The kid’s eyes are fixed on a distant point out the window, but he leans toward that touch like a houseplant trying to grow toward the sun.

“I’m sorry I messed up,” Shinsou says again.

Aizawa wants to contradict him, but the odds of that actually getting through are nearly nonexistent. “What happened?” he says instead.

“I got distracted. I was hoping for a text, and my phone went off in my pocket, and…” Shinsou exhales heavily and finishes the rest of his orange juice, frowning at the city outside. When he looks back at Aizawa, there’s something determined behind his eyes. “You said you want me to tell you about life things, and I want to, but I don’t know how. It’s not—” He glares at the ceiling and gestures vaguely.

Aizawa hazards an educated guess. “Not something that comes easily to you?”

Shinsou nods.

“Believe it or not, talking about life things doesn’t come easy to me, either.”

That gets a smirk out of the kid, which is a small success.

“That text you were hoping for. Tell me about it.”

Shinsou looks out the window, his cheeks going pink. “I don’t know what I was even hoping for, I just— What does it mean when someone sends you a heart emoji? Is that flirting, or is it just friendly? Does it matter what color the heart emoji is? If they’re just being friendly and you send a heart emoji back, will they think you’re flirting and decide never to talk to you again, and if so, isn’t that kind of hypocritical?”

So it’s going to be that kind of life thing. Aizawa is critically under-caffeinated for this kind of conversation, but he tries anyway. “Emoji nuance is more Hizashi’s domain, but yes, that would be hypocritical. Do you want this person to be flirting with you?”

“I think so,” Shinsou answers. “I don’t know. How do you know if you like someone? Like, romantically?”

Oh boy. Does Recovery Girl have an IV drip for caffeine.

“That’s a big question,” Aizawa says. How was it when he was a teenager pining after his best friend? “I guess, uh, you want to be with them a lot, look at them, maybe touch them. You start liking the things about them that should annoy you.”

“Dammit.” Shinsou rubs his hands over his face. “He’s so annoying and I don’t even care.”

He. Hizashi is going to be so smug.

Shinsou seems to realize he’s let the pronoun slip as soon as Aizawa does. He peers up through his fingers and says, quieter, “That’s the thing. I don’t even know what I am, there’s just this one boy. And I. I don’t know what I’m doing.”

Those uncertain eyes hiding under that cloud of hair make Aizawa want to do something, be better, not fail this one. He reaches out, like Hizashi would do, and brushes messy hair out of Shinsou’s face. “You don’t have to know everything, Hitoshi. You’ve got a good head on your shoulders and a good heart. Anyone who really sees you will understand that, even if you send them the wrong emoji.”

Shinsou’s head leans against his hand, and the kid closes his eyes, looking annoyed. “How did you figure out this stuff?”

“I mostly didn’t.”

Shinsou frowns at him. “But you’re married.”

Aizawa chuckles. “Believe me, I was not responsible for that.” He’s still being frowned at, so he elaborates. “Look, I only ever had strong feelings for one person, and it took eight years, a meddling friend, and a near-death experience to get me to own up to it. Turned out we’d been mutually pining all that time. It was disgusting. If an idiot like me can figure his shit out, you’ll get there, too. And you’ll probably have more fun, because you’re having these realizations in high school instead of on long solo patrols of the sewer network.”

“Gross.”

“Yeah. I don’t recommend it.” Aizawa slouches back in his seat. “You wanna tell me who this boy is?”

Shinsou’s eyes go wide, and he mouths the word “NO.”

Fair enough. “You wanna talk about capture weapon strategies?”

There’s the ticket. Aizawa lectures, and Shinsou asks questions, until that ankle is good as new and they’re allowed to go.

***

The first weekend in the Aizawa-Yamada apartment is weird. Aside from Pichi’s 2AM terror streaks and the occasional sound in the hallway, the place is quieter than anyplace Shinsou’s stayed in years. He didn’t know what to expect of his new foster parents, but quiet and Present Mic were definitely not words he would’ve thought went together. Hizashi comes and goes in a flurry as he rushes off to his apparently numerous jobs, but in between, he hangs up his persona along along with his leather jacket and is just the chill, weirdly non-yelling version of himself he presents at the GSA. He hums softly as he cooks and is so goddamn tender with his husband that it’s almost cringe-worthy. Late on Saturday night, Shinsou spots him wandering the apartment without his hearing aids or glasses, wearing fuzzy pajama pants and a pastel kitty t-shirt. Shinsou’s pretty sure he’s hallucinating right up until the moment that Hizashi stubs a toe in the kitchen and looses a vocaloid-sounding curse that he realizes he is not creative enough to imagine.

Meanwhile, Aizawa is…Aizawa. Stern, hard to read, suspiciously kind, and now occasionally wearing a cat. His schedule is nearly as busy as Hizashi’s, but there’s hardly any divide between work Aizawa and home Aizawa. His whole wardrobe is black and loose-fitting. He’s no less intense in his own living room than he is during training sessions, and always watchful of the people in his orbit, like they’re bracing for an attack and he’s appointed himself the lookout. The lack of change is kind of comforting, when everything else around Shinsou has changed so much.

It’s extremely weird when their work schedules overlap and leave Shinsou alone in the apartment for Sunday afternoon. One time Shinsou read an article about a room scientists engineered to absorb all sound, where if you stood in it for too long you’d go insane from how hyperaware you got of your own heartbeat, and the apartment without the teachers is not far off from that. He can’t remember the last place he lived that wasn’t filled with the sounds of other kids.

Hizashi said “Make yourself at home and eat whatever you want,” but those terms seem too vague to trust. Shinsou stares into cupboards and fridge compartments for half an hour before making himself an egg on rice, because there are plenty of eggs and several pounds of rice, so he probably won’t be stepping on anyone’s toes. There’s also a cupboard over the fridge with baking ingredients sealed in a plastic bin under a fine layer of dust. More ingredients that no one would miss if he used them. He makes a mental note of that for later.

He eats and washes his dishes. He turns the TV on and then immediately back off, because its sound punctures the quiet like popping a balloon. He tries to play with the cat, but she’s more interested in the sunny windowsill than her feather toy.

His phone goes off, and he jumps.

It’s a text from Midoriya: Hey, a bunch of us are going to the mall because Ochako needs moral support trying on formal dresses. Wanna join?

Going out into the world can’t possibly be worse than going insane from the sound of his own heartbeat. Plus: freckles.

Sure, Shinsou texts back.

He manages the bus trip without getting lost and waits by the terminal until Midoriya and his group pile out of a bus, laughing and chatting. It’s not a big group, thank god—just Midoriya, Uraraka, the frog girl from 1-A, and that fire and ice guy from the Sports Festival, who for all his showy gifts is walking behind the rest of them like he’s trying to be invisible. Relatable.

“Hitoshi!” Midoriya exclaims, jogging up to him and extending a hand toward the rest of his clique. “You know Uraraka, and this is Todoroki and Tsu.”

Todoroki does a stiff little bow with his head, and Shinsou returns it. It’s nice to know he’s not the only awkward quiet one. Maybe they can not talk together. That would be nice.

Uraraka has a family wedding to attend next weekend, and Midoriya has assembled a list of every store in the mall that sells women’s formalwear in her size, ranked by price from lowest to highest.

Shinsou is happy to have nothing really to do here. There’s a pleasant, unrushed vibe in this group as they move through stores, and the others seem to welcome him without question, even if he doesn’t contribute a lot. Everyone has a role. Uraraka hates shopping for herself, so Midoriya and Tsu pull dresses for her and Todoroki finds coordinating accessories, a job he’s remarkably good at, which leaves Shinsou holding purses and dress options. He also adds an appreciative nod or golf clap whenever Uraraka comes out of a dressing room in a new look, because he knows nothing about fashion, but she is innately adorable.

There’s one dress in particular that makes Shinsou realize he is maybe not exclusively into guys, and he’s grateful she doesn’t like that one, because if she spends too long wearing it the group will surely notice that their human coat tree is turning pink.

Three stores in, they find the right dress, a soft sky blue thing that makes Uraraka look like a princess on her way to brunch. Todoroki produces a sparkly necklace and a pair of matching heels from the clearance section, and Uraraka gets so carried away twirling in her new outfit that she starts floating, and Tsu grabs her hand to pull her back to earth. Everyone claps.

“Mission accomplished!” Midoriya announces, checking something off in his little notebook. He’s such a dork. Why is that charming? 

The group starts to break apart in the hallway outside the store, where Todoroki announces that his sister is picking him up and leaves to meet her with hardly another word. Shinsou admires that kind of efficiency in escaping social situations. He’d do the same if he could, but unfortunately most of his own social situations these days involve a certain annoyingly cheerful freckled nerd he can’t seem to stop chancing looks at even though there are people to see him.

“I want to try that new ice cream place in the food court,” Midoriya says. “Who’s with me?”

“Ice cream?” Tsu says, frowning into the cowl of her bulky knit sweater. “It’s freezing outside, Midoriya. What’s wrong with you?”

“We should probably head home, anyway,” Uraraka says, still grinning from the thrill of the twirly dress. “Tsu’s coming over for dinner, and we need to get groceries first.”

“Hitoshi?” Midoriya looks at him with a hopeful gleam in his big stupid beautiful eyes. “They have taiyaki. I’ll pay.”

“I—” Shinsou can’t come up with a good excuse, and honestly, ice cream taiyaki does sound really good right now. “Okay, yeah.”

Uraraka and Tsu head off toward the bus terminal, and Midoriya leads the way toward the promise of ice cream. The shop in the food court does indeed have taiyaki, and in multiple combinations and levels of ridiculousness. Shinsou gets one that looks like a Magikarp, with mango ice cream and candied orange shavings on top, and Midoriya gets one with obnoxiously green pistachio ice cream, because apparently green is just his theme. Green ice cream, green coat, green ambiguously romantic emojis.

They find an open table sandwiched between a fountain and a group of little kids celebrating a birthday. Midoriya is telling a funny story about the animal whisperer guy in class 1-A summoning an army of squirrels to get out of a Math exam, but it’s hard to pay attention over the rush of water and the echoing voices of a dozen loud kids. The food court is under a windowed dome that seems to amplify and bounce the voice of every screaming child under it, and Shinsou can’t tell what direction each sound is coming from, only that he’s surrounded and exposed. The part of his brain that’s always convinced he’s going to end up back in the res care facility is having a fucking field day with this setup, calling up memories of similar noises and echoes of old paranoia.

He doesn’t realize how shallow his breathing’s gotten until Midoriya says his name. It’s too late to not be an embarrassing wreck of a person, and if Midoriya ever did actually have anything close to heart emoji feelings for him he’s definitely squashing those, but his brain is playing a Best Of Loud Noises montage, facility mealtimes and being shouted at and waking up to someone else’s crying toddlers in the middle of the night.

He stands up and walks as quickly as possible away from the noise. He’s not sure where he’s going until he finds himself in an empty hallway behind a bookstore, next to a fake potted plant and a door that says Employees Only. Pressing his back against the wall, he slides down to sit on the ground next to the fake plant, wiggles his toes in his shoes, takes a deep breath.

“Hitoshi?” comes Midoriya’s voice from a little ways away. “Can I help?”

Shit. Of course Midoriya followed him. Midoriya would ride the Titanic to the ocean floor if he thought it’d make the ship feel better.

He shakes his head. “Sorry, I’m—it’s—it’s been a bad week.”

“Hey, no need to apologize, I get it. I’ve had some of those since starting at UA, too.”

Midoriya approaches quietly and slides down to the floor a foot away from him, extending a handful of napkins. It’s only after a second of staring at them that Shinsou realizes he’s got mango ice cream running down his hand. He cleans up his hand and tries to eat the overhanging bits of ice cream threatening to drip, even though his heart’s not really in it anymore.

“We don’t have to go back out there,” Midoriya offers. “It is a little loud.”

“Why are you so nice to me?” Shinsou says.

“Why wouldn’t I be nice to you?” Midoriya sounds baffled at the very idea. “Look, if you want to talk about it, I’m right here, but if you just want to sit here and eat and then go home, that’s cool, too.”

They sit in the quiet for a little while, eating their ice cream. Shinsou manages to finish most of the Magikarp taiyaki before he gets tired of chewing, leaving just the tail in a bundle of napkins in his hand. Midoriya is properly savoring his ice cream in spite of the train wreck  he’s opted to eat with, and the way he closes his eyes and smiles to himself while he chews is kind of cute. He seems so genuinely happy—so genuine, in general. It’s sometimes hard to believe this is the same guy who mangled his own arm to prove a point to Todoroki in the Sports Festival. But then again, given that he’s currently sitting on the floor of a staff access hallway to keep Shinsou company, maybe that fits. Either he’s got a deep-seated martyr complex, or he’s actually just the best person Shinsou’s ever met. 

Shinsou is struck by two thoughts at once: first, that he actually wants to tell Midoriya, well, everything, and second, that he wants to kiss him.

Like hell is he going to do anything about that second one, though.

“So, um,” Shinsou starts, trying not to stumble over his words. “On Thursday during the GSA, that was my foster father texting. My foster parents decided they couldn’t handle my Quirk. They were scared I’d use it on them, so they kicked me out.”

“Oh shit,” Midoriya says. He takes a moment to process the information, his eyes darting around the hallway before meeting Shinsou’s, big and full of concern. “Do you have somewhere to stay?”

“Yeah.” Shinsou looks at his feet. “Mr. Aizawa and Mr. Yamada picked me up from my social worker’s office. I’m staying with them until, I don’t know, they find me a better situation? Their cat is really cute, so. That’s nice.”

“Are you okay?” Midoriya asks.

A laugh jerks out of Shinsou’s throat. He shakes his head. “No. I mean, maybe in a month or two? Or a few years? But right now I wish I could brainwash myself and not have to worry about what comes next. There’s always something awful right around the corner, and I’m so fucking tired.”

It feels good to say it, even if it will probably scare Midoriya away from him.

But instead of fleeing, Midoriya offers him a sympathetic smile and says, “That sounds really hard.”

They sit in that for a minute before Shinsou says, “You’re not gonna give me a pep talk about it?”

“Nah,” Midoriya replies. “I save those for battle tournaments.”

Shinsou gawks at him, then starts laughing. He laughs so hard that tears run down his face, and he has to wipe them on the sleeve of his jacket because all his napkins are sticky with ice cream. “You’re the worst.”

“I know,” Midoriya says, and the soft acceptance in his voice makes it sound like he’s been told this before, a lot.

Shinsou elbows him gently. “I mean that in a good way. Most people don’t care like you do. You’re like the All Might of giving a shit about other people.”

“That’s—that’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me!” Midoriya leans forward, big fat wobbly tears dropping from his eyes. “Ah! Sorry, I’m such a crybaby.”

“It’s okay, I think it’s kind of cute,” Shinsou says, and as his brain catches up with his mouth, his face flushes. Oh. Oh no. He just—oh no. Time to sink into the ground and start a new life with the mole people, because he’s just forfeited this one.

Midoriya just laughs and says “Thanks” while he wipes his face on his sleeves. Once his face is mostly back under his control, he says, “Can I hug you?”

Shinsou nods, and then Midoriya is leaning over and his arms are tight around him and he smells really good and his curls brush against Shinsou’s cheek. Shinsou wraps his arms around his friend and hangs on. The angle is a little awkward, and he’s hyperaware of the fact that they’re in a mall hallway next to a large fake potted plant that hasn’t been dusted in years, but it’s nice. Midoriya’s arms are as warm as the rest of him, and god, it’s so good to have someone who doesn’t judge him for falling apart. Shinsou doesn’t even care about his silly little crush—if he can just keep this friendship, it will be more than enough.

That’s when Midoriya pulls away and kisses him on the cheek.

Shinsou freezes.

“Hitoshi, I like you a lot,” the guy says. “I’ve wanted to tell you for awhile now, and it’s okay if you don’t feel the same, I just, uh…” His voice tapers off, and for the first time in probably ever, Izuku Midoriya seems lost for words.

“Oh,” Shinsou says.

“I really value your friendship!” Midoriya adds, a little too loudly, as he scoots back to his position a foot away. “And I don’t want to do anything to jeopardize that, so if you want me to never mention it again, please just tell me and I won’t.”

Shinsou’s heart pounds in his throat. He should take that offer. He should let this be an ill-advised footnote in his high school career. He should buckle down and study and train and get into the Hero Course and become a pro, and then maybe someday after he’s proven he’s not a lost cause he can consider letting himself have crushes.

But he wants this now. And if Midoriya, the smartest, best person he’s ever met, thinks he’s worth wanting, there might be some grain of truth to it.

He wants it to be true. He wants to live up to whatever Midoriya thinks he is.

He slips his hand into Midoriya’s.

Midoriya gives him a look like he’s just done something amazing, and damn, that feels good.

“I feel, um,” Shinsou says, ducking his head. “Yeah. Yes.”

“Okay,” Midoriya says with a squeeze of his hand. “Cool.”

“Cool.”

Their eyes meet, and they both grin and look away. Shinsou feels lightheaded, in a good way.

Somehow they find their way back to a sort of normal conversation that doesn’t involve panic attacks or feelings, and Midoriya finally gets to finish the story about the squirrels, but their hands stay together until it’s time to go home.

***

Aizawa shambles home late Sunday night, worn through from a patrol that ran long thanks to a deeply inept gang of villains trying to tunnel into a bank from beneath. His legs are sore from a drawn-out chase through the sewers, there’s a headache blossoming behind his eyes from dealing with the police, and his elbow is aching because that’s just what it does since the USJ attack. Opening a pickle jar makes the damn thing ache these days. He’s ready to be unconscious for the next four or five hours when he opens his front door and finds the apartment still alight and his husband and foster son on the kitchen floor for some reason.

They’re sitting shoulder to shoulder with their backs against the kitchen cabinets and their legs stretched out across the tile, sharing a piece of…is that cake?

“Shouta!” Hizashi says brightly, raising his free hand. The other is holding the plate with what is definitely cake on it. “Welcome home, love! Did you know this kid can bake?”

This kid smiles, his eyes twinkling in spite of his obvious exhaustion. “It’s not a big deal.”

“Speaking as a person who was banned from using the faculty microwave for a year, this is a big deal,” Hizashi says. He holds the plate up to Aizawa, handing over his fork. “Try this. He just whipped it up out of nowhere.”

“You had the ingredients,” Shinsou says. “I just found a recipe online.”

“Like some kind of magical cake fairy. He even cleaned up as he went!”

“That’s just basic courtesy.”

Aizawa tries a bite of the cake and is suddenly hyperaware of the fact that it’s the first food he’s eaten all day that didn’t come out of a tube or packet. It’s good, especially for being cooked by a teenager at 2am. He’s picky about food texture sometimes, and this is soft and fluffy enough that it doesn’t bother his mouth. “Good job,” he says, nodding at Shinsou. “You do a lot of baking at your previous foster homes?”

The boy nods. “Cooking too. Big households always need help in the kitchen, and I’m a quick learner.”

“You are,” Aizawa confirms. He sighs, sliding down the wall to take a seat on the floor himself. Sleep can wait a little while. “I know why I’m up this late. What about you, chef?”

“I couldn’t sleep,” Shinsou answers softly.

“Does that happen a lot?”

The kid looks right at him with those hollowed out, exhausted eyes, and says, “Do I look well-rested to you?”

Point taken. “Well, you should probably give sleep another try soon. We all should. School starts in just a few hours.” The words burn his brain as he says them.

“School!” Hizashi says, smacking his forehead with the heel of his hand. “I keep meaning to ask! How do you want us to treat you at school?”

“What do you mean?” Shinsou says.

Hizashi hands off the cake plate to Aizawa and gestures with his hands. “Like, do you want us to acknowledge you in the hallway, say hello, address you by your given name, any of that? Or should we just treat you like any other student?”

Shinsou draws his knees up toward his chest and stares down at his bare feet. “I don’t know. I guess just treat me like any other student? It would be weird to have to explain this to my classmates.”

Translation: Don’t draw attention to him. A reasonable request.

“What about at home?” Aizawa says.

Shinsou frowns.

Aizawa pushes his sluggish brain to process words better. “Would you like us to call you Hitoshi or Shinsou at home? Everyone calls me Aizawa, but if you’d like to use my given name at home like Hizashi does, that’s fine, just don’t use it when you have friends over.”

“You can call me whatever you want,” Shinsou says, and then, “Wait. I can have friends over?”

“Of course,” Hizashi says. Projecting an obnoxiously American accent, he enunciates, “Mi casa es su casa!”

Shinsou stares at him with a familiar weary expression, waiting for some clarity to come.

“It’s your home, too,” Aizawa translates, taking another bite of cake. “Yes, you can have friends over. Just ask first.”

Hizashi ruffles the kid’s hair playfully and slings an arm over his shoulder. Shinsou allows it, smiling to himself.

“How was patrol?” Hizashi asks.

“Ugh.” Aizawa shakes his head and downs another mouthful of cake, as if it will help erase this night. “This bunch of idiots were trying to dig into a bank downtown from the sewer with two jackhammers and a burrowing Quirk. Except they got their north and south confused and drilled through the floor of a sandwich shop next-door…”

He tells most of the story, leaving out the couple of near-misses he knows would make his husband worry. Neither of them used to have so many near-misses when they were in their twenties, but like their own UA teachers emphasized, aging is the arch nemesis of a pro hero.

Hizashi combs his fingers absently through Shinsou’s hair while he listens. By the time Aizawa is done recounting the night’s events, Shinsou’s eyes have closed and his head is drooped onto Hizashi’s shoulder.

Asleep? Hizashi signs with his free hand.

Aizawa nods, smiling. It’s nice to see the kid actually relaxed.

Hizashi laughs silently and signs Trapped under cat.

I got him. Aizawa crouches and gently hoists Shinsou up into his arms. The kid already weighs about as much as Hizashi, but he’s sturdier and less noodle-armed, with a few years of growing left to do yet. He makes an annoyed whimper as Aizawa stands up.

Aizawa’s carried plenty of people in his line of work, but it’s different without the adrenaline and the world collapsing around him. He’s got too much brain space available to think, to catch himself smiling at the kid, to recognize that he likes coming home to his husband and kid, and to see the attachment forming like an anchor roped around his neck. It’s only been three days. He should absolutely not have let Hitoshi into their home, because someday they’re going to find him a better living arrangement and it’s going to hurt like hell.

Aizawa deposits the kid in bed and finishes off that slice of cake before he goes to sleep himself.

***

Back at school, it feels like nothing has changed, except that everything has changed. Shinsou’s classmates are having the same old arguments about the pro heroes they idolize, time marches on from one lesson to the next, and he feels just as invisible as before in the hallways. Except…

When Hizashi—Mr. Yamada—comes in to set up for English class, he shoots a broad smile at Shinsou’s corner of the classroom. He also calls on Shinsou to translate words he knows damn well Shinsou is struggling with, because they talked through his English homework at home last night and Hizashi is the kind of bitch whose love language is pop quizzes.

And in after school one-on-one trainings with Aizawa, he notices Aizawa is a little less stiff with him, a little more watchful. He’d blame the obstacle course incident, but it’s not just that. His mentor smiles a little easier and drops compliments more readily. He also seems to have a personal quota of awkward shoulder pats he’s trying to meet, which is hilarious.

And when Shinsou passes the students from class 1-A in the hallway, Midoriya makes deliberate eye contact with him and grins like a fool. One time he shoves his hands into his pockets and pivots to walk backwards so he can continue making big moon eyes at Shinsou after their paths cross. Uraraka taps him on the arm, and he flails and laughs as he floats toward the ceiling. Shinsou ducks his head and merges with the crowd before the other Hero Course students realize he’s the one making Midoriya embarrass himself.

They’re talking a lot over text. In between classes, through lunch most days, and into the night, Shinsou’s phone keeps vibrating with alerts. Midoriya tells him all the funny things that happen in class 1-A, his new theories about pro heroes in the news, and one rainy day, hourly updates on the wetness level of his left sock after he mis-aimed jumping over a puddle on the way to school. (The sock updates are somehow riveting. How is this guy so talented at hero stuff and words and being adorable? Frankly, it’s unfair.)

Shinsou doesn’t feel like he contributes as much to their conversations, but he asks questions and complains about Math and sends little drawings of their teachers as cats, because cats are really all he knows how to draw. Midoriya responds with so. many. emojis.

You know, I’m doing pretty well in Math, Midoriya texts over lunch one day.

Braggart, Shinsou replies, smiling.

We could study together sometime.

Shinsou stares at the words for a full minute before typing out, I’m allowed to have friends over. He pauses, then adds I can cook dinner. Thursday after GSA? and hits send.

It’s a date! Midoriya replies.

Oh shit, is it? Did he just ask Midoriya out on a date? Should he ask for clarification, or should he just play it cool and have no idea what’s expected of him and go into what might be his first date ever completely unaware of—

Midoriya, bless his overthinking brain, follows up with: If you want it to be a date, I mean. I’d like it to be a date, but it doesn’t have to be if you’re not interested. We can just be friends if you want, no pressure.

Date is good, Shinsou replies, his pulse pounding in his throat.

A little green heart emoji appears on the screen.

It turns out that Thursday is the best possible day for this plan, because it’s one week since he was kicked out of the Watanabes’ home, and his impending first date is enough to knock that thought completely out of his head for most of the day. By the time he sits down in the back of the GSA room, it’s a wonder his body can even breathe autonomously, so much of his brain is yelling DATE WITH MIDORIYA DATE WITH MIDORIYA DINNER STUDY DATE FRECKLES. 

The theme of the GSA meeting is Representation Matters, which means half an hour of meaningful discussion about why it’s important to see characters who reflect a queer audience in media, followed by an hour and a half of every other club member trying to convince the group to watch their favorite shows. At one point, Mina stands up and gives an impassioned speech about how straight doesn’t have to be the default and every character on TV should be considered bisexual until proven otherwise. The kid from Accounting who likes natto stands up and angrily draws a venn diagram to explain queerbaiting. Midoriya takes notes, because of course he does, but his other hand creeps under the desk and holds Shinsou’s, and between the fascinating debates and the secret hand-holding it’s almost like they’ve started their date with a movie.

Hizashi offers Shinsou a ride home on his way to his patrol shift, but Shinsou politely declines. Instead, he buses back to the apartment with Midoriya, holding hands and awkwardly smiling at each other. It’s easily the best bus ride of Shinsou’s entire life.

In the apartment, Midoriya is quiet for a few minutes as he looks around, assessing the living space like it will give him more observations for the notebooks he’s probably filled writing about Eraserhead and Present Mic. It’s the cat who drags him out of his muttering spiral by bumping up against his leg and demanding pets.

“Oh, you are cute,” Midoriya tells Pichi, rubbing her cheeks. She purrs back at him.

“She knows it, too,” Shinsou says, digging ingredients for dinner out of the cupboard. “Just wait, she’ll be begging for scraps in a few minutes.”

The prophecy is correct: as soon as Shinsou starts assembling ingredients, there is a little tabby winding between his ankles, making sad noises at him.

“You’ll get no pity from me, Pichi,” he says, pointing a spatula at her. “I watched you eat a whole shrimp yesterday.”

Midoriya laughs and comes over to join him by the stove. “What are we eating, anyway? I didn’t realize you were actually cooking.”

“Oh, uh, pork cutlet bowl. Is that all right?” Shinsou goes rigid as he realizes he didn’t ask about food restrictions and didn’t ask Hizashi if he had plans for the pork and forgot to pick up breading on the way home and—

“Are you kidding? That’s my favorite!” Midoriya looks genuinely thrilled. Scanning the countertop, he says, “How can I help?”

Shinsou gives him rice to make and vegetables to chop, so it takes half the time it normally would cooking on his own. Before long, the pork is sizzling in a pan, the veggies are ready, and Shinsou is mixing up a sauce from the assortment of bottles in the fridge door. He tastes it himself, then hands the spoon to Midoriya to try.

“That’s good.” Midoriya looks up at him, and his eyes dip to Shinsou’s chin. “You’ve got a little sauce. Let me—”

His thumb touches Shinsou’s chin, lingering as it wipes away whatever’s there. Shinsou can’t help but stare at the face of the guy in front of him, big curious eyes and ridiculous freckles and gently parted lips. His body is humming with how badly he wants to kiss him. As if he’s ever kissed anybody before. As if he’d be any good at it.

Midoriya looks him in the eyes, and Shinsou has time to think Oh before that hand is cupping his jaw and Midoriya is leaning in. There’s a pause like a question, and Shinsou crosses the rest of the distance between them himself, pressing his lips to Midoriya’s.

It’s soft and sweet and over before Shinsou can figure out where the hell to put the spoon he’s holding. His cheeks are hot. It feels like Uraraka has just floated him toward the ceiling.

Midoriya rocks back on his heels, biting down on a smile. “Was that okay?”

Shinsou nods emphatically and leans in to try it again. He still hasn’t figured out where to put the spoon, but he doesn’t care, because it turns out kissing is totally worth the hype.

The rice cooker sings its little “I’m done” song, making them both startle and laugh. They fill up their bowls and sit at the kitchen table across from each other to eat.

Eating dinner is hard when every time they look up they both start grinning. Studying, when they get to it, is even harder.

Shinsou’s brain doesn’t want to think about numbers. It only wants to think about the beautiful weirdo sitting in front of him. But that weirdo is explaining trigonometry to him, and he needs to listen.

Midway through their second attempt at the chapter, Midoriya sighs and says, “Do you want to keep at this?”

“No,” Shinsou says. “Maybe we should take a break.”

“Yeah,” Midoriya says, and then they’re both on their feet and kissing again.

Midoriya is all joy and warmth and giggles, and it’s a little overwhelming to have all that directed right at him. It’s a lot overwhelming when they’re sitting on the couch and Midoriya runs his  thumb along Shinsou’s cheek and says, “You’re so pretty.”

Shinsou leans his head away from the touch. “That’s not funny.”

“It’s not a joke.” Midoriya tilts his head. “Why would I joke about that?”

“I don’t know. No one’s ever said that about me, so—” Shinsou covers his face with one hand. “You don’t think I’m scary looking?”

Now Midoriya looks downright offended. “Of course not! Who said you were scary looking?”

“Pretty much every kid I grew up with,” Shinsou says quietly.

“Well, they’re objectively wrong!” Midoriya insists. “You’re intense and brooding, which is a very popular character type in anime love interests, and you’ve got broad shoulders and nice hair and beautiful eyes and—ugh, I’m so mad I want to make those assholes a chart about how wrong they are.”

Shinsou doesn’t understand what his heart is doing. Everything Midoriya just says feels backwards, but hearing him say it makes it slightly more believable that someone would actually want him like Midoriya seems to want him.

The wanting is extremely mutual. Shinsou feels like a big messy tangle of want. He wants to keep Midoriya looking at him like that. He wants to be whatever it is this amazing person sees in him. At this particular moment, what he wants more than anything is touch. He’s never wanted to touch anyone this badly before. It’s like his skin is screaming for it, and the only thing that will make it shut up is Midoriya’s hand on the back of his neck, or Midoriya’s lips on his, or the heat of Midoriya’s skin under his palm.

Shinsou isn’t sure how much time passes, but he’s got Midoriya underneath him on the couch and they’re exploring some advanced kissing techniques when the front door opens.

“Are you kidding me?” Hizashi’s voice calls from the entryway.

“Shit,” Shinsou says, springing back upright and pulling his shirt down.

Not one but both of his foster parents are home early, and based on the swearing and laughter, he’s pretty sure they just saw him making out with a boy on the couch where they watch The Great British Baking Show. They do not look thrilled about it.

Aizawa walks straight into the living room and looms over the couch with his arms crossed. “Hitoshi,” he says sternly. That edge in his voice is too familiar. Is this how he gets kicked out of this place?

Shinsou flinches. “I asked permission.”

“To have a friend over. You omitted critical information.” Aizawa glances over his shoulder. “And you left food out where the cat could get into it.”

Shinsou hisses a curse under his breath and jumps off the couch to go clean up the bowls that Pichi is happily licking. “Sorry. I’m so sorry. You two are, uh, home early?”

“I got slimed by a villain and had to cut patrol short,” Hizashi says, holding up a plastic bag full of his hero gear. His hair is plastered straight down by a viscous green gunk, and he looks deeply unhappy about everything.

Midoriya has pushed himself into a sitting position and is trying to get his wild hair and rumpled shirt back into place. “Good evening, Mr. Aizawa. Mr. Yamada. You have a lovely home.”

Aizawa glowers.

“I told you Midoriya was the crush,” Hizashi calls as he deposits his bag of oozed upon clothing on the washing machine in the hallway.

“Yes, you’re very smart,” Aizawa sneers. “Take your shower. I’ll deal with these two.”

Shinsou rinses off the bowls and shoves them into the dishwasher, returning to the couch for his sentencing.

Folding his hands in his lap, Midoriya says, “Mr. Aizawa, I can explain.”

“Midoriya, forget whatever martyr shtick you’re about to pull.” Aizawa drops himself into the armchair across from them. “Hitoshi’s not in trouble.”

Shinsou lets out his breath and deflates into the couch. “Oh, thank god.”

He may not be in trouble, but Aizawa is still glaring at him. “I see worse violations of trust in my classroom practically every week—including some by this problem child. It doesn’t seem fair to punish you for being an idiot teenager just like the others.”

“Thanks?” Shinsou says.

“Don’t thank me yet. I haven’t figured out what to do with you.” Aizawa leans forward, elbows on his knees, and folds his hands under his chin. He thinks like that for an achingly long time, and when Midoriya tries to ask a question, he silences him with a look.

Shinsou and Midoriya sit at opposite ends of the couch, waiting. When Shinsou glances over, the boy passes him an apologetic smile. There’s still affection in those big green eyes, so maybe he hasn’t totally ruined things with this awful timing.

After what feels like an eternity, Aizawa makes a decisive sound in his throat and stands up. Retrieving his laptop from the coffee table, he turns on the TV and connects the two devices. His desktop background is an illustration of kittens playing with yarn, which normally Shinsou would snicker at, but now seems like very much not the time.

A slideshow presentation opens on the TV screen, and Shinsou’s stomach drops.

The first slide reads: Comprehensive Sex Education

“This,” Aizawa announces, “is the Sex Ed course I designed last year, which was rejected by the school administration. It was intended as a three-day lesson, but we’re going to cover it all, right now, because if you’re doing it, you should at least be educated in it.”

Shinsou wishes for a lightning strike. A sudden power outage. An attack by giant space monsters. “We weren’t—” he starts.

Aizawa holds up a hand. “I don’t care what you are or aren’t doing now. I just want to give you the information you need to be safe in the future.”

Midoriya raises his hand. “Is this lesson trans- and asexual-inclusive?”

Aizawa shoots tiny eye daggers at him.

The presentation is, in fact, trans- and ace-inclusive. It’s also inclusive of people with Quirks that affect their anatomy, like animal or weapons Quirks. There’s even a sample role-play conversation for how to respectfully react when your partner has genitals resembling a different species or inanimate object, and it’s a good thing this is a condensed version of the course, because the idea of talking about cloacas on his first date makes Shinsou want to turn into an ooze and disappear through the cracks in the floorboards. (Ooze Quirk is also touched on in the lesson.)

Midoriya takes notes. No one is surprised. It’s kind of comforting, honestly, a little shred of normalcy.

It’s less comforting when Midoriya asks questions. Like “What can you do instead of kissing if your partner doesn’t have a human face?” and “Do you have any reading you can recommend on penetration alternatives?” and “How much do condoms typically cost?”

The answer to that last one is, apparently, nothing, provided you ask Recovery Girl nicely.

“Are we talking about Recovery Girl’s secret prophylactic stash?” Hizashi says, joining the party fresh out of the shower. He perches on the arm of the couch in sweatpants and a Kidz Bop t-shirt. “She’s a treasure. I brought her a nice thank you card just before we graduated, and she let me fill all my pockets with condoms. Those babies lasted me the better part of three years, and they made great balloons—”

“For my twentieth birthday party,” Aizawa says, his hand over his face. “I remember.”

“Always check the expiration dates on condoms,” Hizashi says, wagging a finger at Shinsou and Midoriya. “Expired ones pop easier, and nobody wants to eat from a charcuterie board that’s had an exploded condom balloon on it.”

Midoriya nods and takes a note.

Hizashi pauses the presentation to demonstrate proper condom application technique on a cucumber, and then, thankfully, they’re moving on to a lecture about consent. This, at least, involves no mental images Shinsou won’t be able to scrub out of his brain. And it makes sense. Anything other than enthusiastic yes means no. Don’t touch someone unless you’re sure they want you to. Don’t make suggestive comments or send nudes uninvited. Don’t be a dick, basically.

When the final slide of online resources goes up, Midoriya takes a photo of it on his phone and says, “This was actually really helpful.”

“Good to hear,” Aizawa says. “Any last questions?”

Shinsou wants to sit on his hands until this is over, but he actually does have a question. He raises a hand, since that seems to be what they’re doing. “Is there anything you wish someone had told you about this stuff when you were younger?”

“Yeah,” Hizashi answers, waving the cucumber at him. “If an object doesn’t have a flared base, your butt will take it away from you. Also, you can’t shock an emergency room nurse. If you need help with something embarrassing, just go.”

Of all the horrors they’ve heard tonight, that’s the one that makes Midoriya drop his pencil, red-faced.

Aizawa thinks for a minute before answering. “Your body is perfectly fine the way it is, and no one who’s worth showing it to will mind the things about it that you get hung up about. If your body bothers them, they don’t deserve access to it.” He closes his laptop, and the TV screen goes blank. “That’s it, kids. You’re free to go. Don’t fuck on my couch.”

“We weren’t going to!”

Shinsou helps Midoriya gather up his stuff and escorts him to the door, because hanging out after that whole thing seems like an obvious non-starter. Hell, Midoriya probably won’t want to ever look him in the eye again, let alone study together. Some first date.

Midoriya lets himself out into the hallway, then turns back, his hand in the back of his hair. “So, uh. That was educational.”

“Yeah,” Shinsou says, holding the door mostly closed behind himself. “They blew that way out of proportion.”

Midoriya looks him in the eye and grins. “Maybe next time you can come to my place, and I can tell you you’re cute, and my mom will give us a lecture on wedding planning.”

They share an awkward laugh.

“I’m really sorry they’re so weird and I’m so weird and we didn’t get any Math done,” Shinsou says, keeping his voice down.

“It’s okay, I kind of like your weird family. And I really like you.” Midoriya leans in and gives him a kiss on the cheek. “Thanks for having me over. See you at school.”

Shinsou stands in the doorway and watches him walk away down the hall, feeling so bizarrely lucky that there must be another shoe waiting to drop.

Chapter Text

Before Aizawa knows it, having Shinsou in their care has started to seem normal. His feet now anticipate the extra pair of shoes lying haphazardly in the front entryway instead of tripping over them. He’s come to learn the kid’s soundtrack of tiptoes and gentle cupboard creaks and muffled laughter. In the middle of the night, if he smells something baking, his brain wakes him up and walks him into the kitchen for taste testing and commiseration. Shinsou has a usual spot on the couch, a cupboard shelf stocked with snacks and ingredients he shyly added to the household grocery list, and a chair where his backpack lives. The only person who ever uses that chair anymore is Midoriya, who’s over at least once a week—with adult supervision—and Aizawa and Hizashi have a group chat with Inko Midoriya to keep track of their kids.

All these things would have sounded inconvenient a few short months ago, but now they’re fitted neatly into his life as if filling empty spaces. He likes knowing that when he opens the apartment door, Shinsou will be there, studying or watching TV or trying to teach the cat tricks she is too stubborn to learn. The apartment feels more lived in. Hizashi is home more often, because “My husband misses me” doesn’t have nearly the weight with his various jobs that “I have a child who needs me” does. Even the cat seems happier, probably in part because Hizashi and Shinsou conspire to sneak her treats.

Shinsou’s training has been coming along nicely, and it’s a damn good thing, because the semester break is creeping up on them, and he needs to be ready for his internship week. He’s still rough around the edges, as is to be expected with a young hero learning a complicated new fighting style, but he’s mastered taking down dummies with the capture weapon and has made literal leaps and bounds in using it for travel. No one’s going to tell Recovery Girl, but he’s using the third years’ obstacle course like a playground these days. Aizawa can tell his confidence is finally steadying at a reasonable level, and while part of that is all the practice, positive changes in his home and social life are likely contributing to the rapid skill acquisition. Even the best students’ work suffers in times of uncertainty and stress, and having supportive caregivers, friends from the GSA, and the human equivalent of a “We’re #1!” foam finger as a boyfriend certainly can’t hurt.

Last week when they brought in volunteer faculty—and Midoriya, who insisted on inserting himself into everything—to test the limitations of Shinsou’s Quirk, they walked away with a few ideas for new hero equipment and the knowledge that the kid can hold eight pro heroes and one scrappy first-year under his control at once. That alone should’ve qualified him for the Hero Course, dammit.

Today, they’re trying something more challenging: one-on-one sparring with capture weapons and Quirks. Aizawa wins the first two rounds handily, but on the third, Shinsou ropes his capture weapon around Aizawa’s eyes and evades his reach.

“How d’you like this?” the kid says, his voice circling Aizawa. Suddenly carbon fiber grips his right wrist and wrenches his arm backwards, hard enough to make his old elbow injury flare like a stab from a railroad spike.

“Shit,” Aizawa hisses, and that’s it. Shinsou’s Quirk grabs hold of that syllable and lets itself into his brain, freezing him in place. He holds onto just enough of his consciousness to feel pain ripple through his body as he gets tossed to the floor.

When Aizawa’s mind sharpens into coherence again, Shinsou is crouched over him, pushing his goggles up onto his forehead.

“I didn’t mean to throw you that hard,” Shinsou says, offering him a hand. “Was that okay?”

Aizawa hauls himself up off the floor and claps his protege on the shoulder. They actually did it. The kid is ready. “Yeah,” he says, “that was really good.”

***

“I have a present for you,” Midoriya announces as they settle in for the last GSA meeting of the term. He presents Shinsou with a large giftbag, which is covered in cartoon All Might drawings.

“Gross,” says Mina, the other member of their little group who’s here early. “Don’t give your boyfriend lingerie at school.”

“It’s not lingerie!” Midoriya says. “Mind your business!’

“Do your gross romantic stuff away from my delicate virgin eyes,” Mina retorts.

Shinsou opens the bag and pulls out a carefully folded mass of black fabric with long gray and lavender stripes. As he unfolds it, the colors click. “Is this your hero costume design?”

“Yeah!” Midoriya says. “My mom made it. It doesn’t have to be your forever costume, I just figured you could use something other than your school uniform to wear for your internship.”

The fabric is thick but lightweight, and the more he looks at it, the bigger the lump in his throat gets. It’s beautiful. It looks a little long in the legs, but he can cuff the pants. That’s a thing bisexuals do, right? It’s perfect.

“I love it,” he whispers reverently.

Midoriya beams.

Shinsou tucks the costume back into the bag and gets up to give his boyfriend a quick kiss. “Thank you.”

“Gross,” Mina chirps.

“What’s gross?” Uraraka says as she walks in, then sees them and smirks. “Oh, them. Ew.”

Shinsou doesn’t pay either of them any mind. He’s learned that with his GSA friends, gagging sounds are a form of endearment. It’s okay, he and Midoriya return the favor on the rare occasion that Uraraka brings Tsu to the club.

“I’m so proud of you,” Midoriya says, hugging him. “You’re going to do amazing.”

Shinsou’s chest feels warm. He doesn’t know what to do with all the faith Midoriya has placed in him, so he just holds onto it and hopes he doesn’t let him down.

***

The night before the break, Aizawa turns in his grades as early as humanly possible and rushes to the parking lot to meet his husband.

“Hitoshi’s at the Midoriyas’ until at least 7pm,” Hizashi says, reading his mind as they get into the car. “That leaves us with two hours, give or take traffic.”

“And you said I wouldn’t get laid with a teenager in the house.” Aizawa hooks his fingers into his husband’s collar and pulls him into a tease of a kiss. “Drive fast.”

Hizashi obeys.

They barely make it into their building’s elevator bay before they’re all over each other, kissing like a couple of idiot twenty-somethings with years of mutual pining to make up for. It’s thrilling to feel so desperate for the person he’s known for more than half his life now, to have the heat of Hizashi’s mouth on his neck under the florescent lights while they wait for an elevator.

It’s slightly less thrilling when the doors part and their elderly neighbor steps out with her two teacup dogs, eyes them up and down behind her coke bottle glasses, and says, “Good evening, boys.”

Hizashi leaps to a casual, non-kissing stance.

“Evening, ma’am,” Aizawa says stiffly.

The old woman shuffles out toward the front doors with a disdainful sniffle.

They board the empty elevator. As soon as the doors close, they’re laughing, leaning against each other.

“Maybe she’ll have a nice, long walk,” Aizawa says, “And we won’t have to deal with her banging on the wall.”

“I’ll bang you on the wall,” Hizashi says with an eyebrow waggle.

“Oh my god.”

Aizawa doesn’t have time to give the pun a proper cringe before his husband is hoisting him up, hands under his ass, and pinning him to the wall of the elevator. Hizashi surges forward, and Aizawa welcomes him into his mouth, bracing his arms on the safety rail and curling his legs around Hizashi’s waist. They’re going to have to figure out a way to delete the security camera footage if a crime occurs in the building tonight, because no way is he letting his contacts at the police station see him in this position, even fully clothed.

Fortunately, there are no old ladies or tiny dogs in the hallway when the elevator reaches their floor. Hizashi doesn’t put him down, just jogs for their door with Aizawa laughing and cursing in his arms. Getting inside is a losing fight with gravity, and as soon as the door is open, Aizawa is on the floor of the entryway amongst the shoes, something twinging in his side and whatever’s left of his dignity bruised.

“Sorry, sorry,” Hizashi mutters, stumbling out of his shoes and coat.

Aizawa shucks off his boots and scrambles to his feet. They leave their phones on the entryway cupboard and deadbolt the door just in case before returning to the matter at hand.

Hizashi has always been able to do lightspeed costume changes like an actress backstage between acts. He’s down to his underwear in the entryway. He takes his time getting Aizawa out of that jumpsuit, though, parting the fabric a little bit at a time and leaving warm touches and nibbles on the exposed skin. It’s too slow, too gentle, too little compared to the elevator.

“I am going to kill you,” Aizawa grumbles in his arms.

“You always say that, but you never follow through,” Hizashi says with a grin, planting a chaste smooch on his nose.

“Bed,” Aizawa orders. “Now.”

“Yes, sir,” Hizashi says, laughing.

The cat is sleeping on the bed, because of course she is.

“Pichi,” Hizashi sing-songs at her softly. “Pichi, move.”

“Just pick her up!”

“She’s such a precious little croissant, though.”

Well, that’s accurate. She is a precious little croissant.

Aizawa sighs, gently picks up the cat along with the throw blanket she’s nestled into, and deposits her on the living room chair. Then he closes the bedroom door, strips off his jumpsuit, and finally drags his husband onto the goddamn bed.

Here, he can wrap himself around Hizashi and let go of his control over his tired, stubborn body. Hizashi knows exactly where to touch to turn off his brain and draw sounds out of him that he’s never made for anyone else.

The neighbor lady does bang on the wall before they’re done, but by that point, Aizawa is beyond caring about a little noise.

Afterwards, it takes a while to come back down into his body. Hizashi curls around him, all warm, sweaty limbs. Lips press a dry kiss against the back of his neck. The neighbor’s TV is on loud enough to hear the commercial break. That twinge from earlier is back, stabbing him in the lower abdomen violently enough to make his body cringe in on itself.

“You okay?” Hizashi says against his shoulder.

“Cramps,” Aizawa mutters. “I think my body’s trying to have a period again.”

“Aw, love. How long’s that been happening?”

“Few weeks.”

“A few weeks,” Hizashi repeats. “Shouta.”

“It’s fine.”

“Being in pain for weeks is not normal. You should see a doctor.”

Aizawa rolls his eyes. “Right. Because that always helps.”

The last time he went to the gynocologist, he had to explain to the admin staff in front of an entire waiting room full of women that yes, he’s in the right place, for fuck’s sake trans men exist, and then the doctor had offered the oh-so-helpful suggestion of a hysterectomy. Again. He’s lost count of how many well-meaning cis doctors have casually recommended he get his internal organs surgically excised. It’s not like he’s going to actually use his uterus, but it pisses him off that the entire medical establishment wants to sterilize him. Not to mention the lunacy of taking time off work to remove a part of his anatomy that’s never given him dysphoria anyway. He thinks of his uterus like he thinks of his appendix—he will live and let live with this vestigial organ unless it threatens to explode and kill him.

A sharp cramp hits him, and he exhales carefully through his nose, trying not to worry his stupid attentive husband. It’ll be fine. He just needs to ignore this until it passes and try and get through Shinsou’s internship unscathed.

***

Shinsou is so excited he can’t sit still. His first patrol starts in the afternoon, but his body forces him awake in time for what would otherwise be a full school day. He takes a long shower, makes himself breakfast, finishes the book he’s supposed to read over the break, and bothers Midoriya with about a dozen texts.

When Aizawa finally shambles into the waking world, curled in a comforter like a walking cocoon, Shinsou is deep cleaning the kitchen. Aizawa pauses halfway across the living room and blinks at him like he’s some kind of mirage.

“Good morning,” Shinsou says, trying to keep his voice normal. “There’s coffee.”

The comforter emits a grumble of acknowledgement, which makes Shinsou smile. Aizawa’s cocoon form first thing in the morning is a familiar sight by now, especially after late nights and difficult missions. After being exposed to all his competent, intimidating sides as a pro hero and teacher, it’s kind of comforting to get the soft, unguarded version, which happens to look ridiculous as a bonus.

It takes half a cup of coffee before a head of dark hair emerges from the cocoon and Aizawa says, “I suppose you’re eager to get started.”

Shinsou nods so quickly it’s more of a vibration.

Aizawa sips the rest of his coffee and sighs. “I guess we can start early. Get your things.”

Since Eraserhead doesn’t have his own headquarters, they use the Hero Commission district office adjacent to the police station to suit up. Shinsou has only tried on the costume Midoriya gave him long enough to check the fit, and now that he zips it up and lets it settle on his shoulders, it feels suddenly real. He doesn’t have a class or a hero name yet, but his reflection in the locker room mirror looks like a hero in progress. The long stripes down the sides of his costume give him the illusion of height and keep him from looking like just a cheap Eraserhead clone. The gray is just a few shades darker than his capture weapon, and the lavender damn near matches his hair. He looks good.

He also looks mildly terrified. That’s normal, right? It’s gotta be.

“Okay,” he says with determination as he and Aizawa leave the police station. “What do we do first? Scan the sewers? Leap rooftops? Find a mugging to stop?”

“You sound like Midoriya.” Aizawa smirks. “First, we have an errand to run.”

They stop at a bodega, where the owner greets Aizawa like a regular and puts a bag of fresh fruit on a tab for him. Shinsou knows damn well he doesn’t eat anything food shaped at home if he can avoid it, so what this could be for, Shinsou has no idea.

They carry the bag a few blocks to an encampment on a vacant lot where a few dozen tents and temporary shelters are erected. Aizawa leads the way into the middle of the encampment, where a few people are listening to music on a portable radio. Upon closer inspection, the radio is a person’s head.

“Hey, Eraser,” says a man’s voice from the radio speaker. “Who’s your shadow there?”

“Intern,” Aizawa says, and hands him an orange. “Cops treating you all right?”

“They’re keeping their distance.”

“Good. And everyone else?”

One of the others, a woman with a stony exoskeleton, says, “A couple of young guys with flashy Quirks been coming around after the bars close the last couple nights, looking to start a fight.”

Aizawa gives her an orange, too. “We’ll circle back at closing time and keep an eye out. Is Mei around?”

“She went signing.”

“Thanks.” Aizawa passes out a couple more pieces of fruit and hands the bag back to his intern to carry.

As they head out of the encampment, Shinsou asks, “Do you do this a lot?”

“An underground hero connects with the invisible networks in the city,” Aizawa answers. “Our unhoused population sees more of what’s going on out here than the police or heroes do.”

“So you trade them fruit and protection for information?”

“The fruit is to build goodwill and trust. We protect them because they’re members of our community.”

They walk to an off-ramp from the highway across downtown, where Aizawa waves down an old woman with a cardboard sign collecting donations on the sidewalk. She picks up her backpack and walks over to greet him.

“Mei,” he says, “this is my intern, Shinsou.”

The old woman looks Shinsou up and down. “Is he any good?”

“He will be.” Aizawa reaches for the bag and hands her a peach. “How’s your knee today?”

They chat for a few minutes. Shinsou is starting to wonder just how much of this job is small talk when Mei scrunches her nose and says, “You hear about that villain calling himself Bitterroot?

“No, tell me,” Aizawa says.

“He recruited that kid I was helping shelter this winter, and let me tell you, he is not a good influence on the youth. Him and his gang of destructive wannabe eco-terrorists. Big guy with a plant Quirk and some grand plan to return the city to the earth.” She snorts. “If he really wants to reduce his carbon footprint, he sounds like a great source of wind power.”

“That kid you were sheltering,” Aizawa starts.

Mei shakes her head, and her weathered face is so sad that Shinsou wonders if it’s unprofessional to hug someone on the job. “Kiyoko,” she says. “Such a smart girl.  If it wasn’t for her no good parents putting her out on the streets, she would’ve been going to university in the spring. She was on the waitlist for housing and applying to jobs when that bastard got to her.” 

Shinsou tries to swallow down the lump in his throat. That could’ve been him all too easily. The system is so full of cracks that people fall down and get lost. If Aizawa and Hizashi hadn’t come to get him that day—

“I’m sorry,” Aizawa says. “We’ll do our best to find this guy and get Kiyoko on the right track.”

“You had better hurry,” Mei says, her voice deadly calm, “because if I find that man first, you’ll be locking me up next.”

Aizawa probes the topic, sussing out the general area Bitterroot’s gang seems to be hiding out in and a few less reputable rumors about them. He hands Mei a few dollars from his own pocket and accepts a pat on the cheek from her before moving on. They roam around the city, checking in with Aizawa’s usual contacts and keeping an eye on things from the sidewalk, for a few hours.

It’s deceptively quiet work. Whenever Shinsou looks over at his mentor, though, he sees those dark eyes scanning the street, picking up and cataloguing details about the other people around them. When they stop at a ramen shop for dinner, they take a table facing the front window, and Aizawa gestures at the busy street with his chopsticks and says, “Which of these people is carrying stolen goods?”

Shinsou stares at the people in view of them and tries to work it out by process of elimination. There are people carrying shopping bags, bookbags, purses, and coats. One woman has a cat in a basket—surely it’s not her. Wait. He squints. There’s a young man walking quickly across the street with something tucked under his jacket.

“Did that guy steal a box of cereal from the grocery store?” Shinsou says.

Aizawa nods as he slurps his noodles.

“Do we need to do something about that?”

Aizawa shakes his head. “If you see a civilian stealing food, leave them be.” He scans the street again. “Which of those cars is stolen?”

They play those scavenger hunts for the rest of the meal, culminating in the hardest question: “A villain attacks right now, and you can’t fight him, only escape. Who do you prioritize saving?”

All the answers feel wrong. That’s probably the point. There’s no use in assessing the value of one human life over another if a moment’s hesitation could be the difference between life or death. Pro heroes don’t get to be like self-driving cars, weighing whether the lady with the cat is worth more points in some lightning quick tally than the man stealing cereal.

“Whoever I can save,” Shinsou answers after a while. “Maybe I could start a sing-along, activate my Quirk on whoever joined in, and get them to safety?”

“Hm. That’s not a bad idea. Weird, but not bad.”

They brainstorm techniques to get civilians responding to him as they leave the restaurant. The sun goes down not long after, and the quiet of the job starts to feel more like anticipation than waiting. Every so often, Aizawa pauses and presses fingertips to his left ear, listening to hero chatter on an earpiece. Whatever else is going on in the city, it doesn’t require a pair of heroes with non-physical Quirks. Shinsou almost wishes something would happen, but he knows that’s not how a hero is supposed to think. Wishing for something to do is wishing for harm on civilians (or at the very least, property damage).

Aizawa doesn’t let him stay bored for longer than a couple of minutes, anyway. There’s always a hypothetical conflict to talk out, an alley with a secret outlet to point out, or a story to learn from. Aizawa shows him how to navigate rooftops, swinging from fire escapes with their capture weapons and kicking up pea gravel underfoot. Then he takes him into the sewer tunnels and shows him how best to maneuver in a tight space. They pass the site where villains tried to drill up into a bank vault a while back, and Aizawa maps out the entire fight and chase on the spot. They go back to the police station and consult with the officers on possible leads for Bitterroot’s gang, but there isn’t much to go on yet.

No villains today, but at one point late in the night, they pass a parent carrying a tired child, and the kid points at them and says, “Look, mama, heroes!”

And damn, Shinsou is going to float on that feeling for days.

***

Aizawa wakes up on the third day of Shinsou’s internship feeling like shit.

“Man, you look like shit,” Hizashi says from the other side of the breakfast table.

“Same to you, darling,” Aizawa mutters. Their kid has made coffee cake, but the idea of eating makes him want to throw up right now. The idea of moving kind of makes him want to throw up. His guts are cramping more ferociously than they have since high school. Doing a mental symptom check, he rules out a few suspects--too low to be liver issues or gallstones, wrong side for appendix. Could be a kidney stone, but he was bleeding a little when he went to the toilet earlier, so odds are the culprit is the uterus. Surprise, surprise.

“Do you need to take a sick day?” Hizashi whispers, hopefully out of earshot of the teen currently bustling around the kitchen.

“I’m fine,” Aizawa grumbles into a gel pack. “Didn’t sleep well.”

The last part is a lie, but he doesn’t feel like explaining his body’s betrayal out loud, and anyway, he knows what Hizashi would recommend already, and he is not taking a day out of the internship that he and Shinsou have been preparing for for weeks to stand in line at a clinic and have to explain his anatomy to a doctor. He’s worked through worse—doing a team mission while passing kidney stones, running three miles in the sewer on a broken foot, dragging civilians out of a collapsing building with a punctured lung and three broken ribs. Hell, he went back to teaching with a shattered eye socket and about thirty other injuries right after the USJ attack and changed his own dressings in the faculty restroom. Hizashi hadn’t been too happy with him, but he did it. This is no different.

It’s fine. He’s fine.

“Are you okay?” Shinsou asks at the Hero Commission district office, when Aizawa winces putting on his utility belt.

“I’m fine,” he reiterates. “Just trapped inside a decaying mortal body.”

Shinsou smirks at that but keeps an eye on him as they start their patrol.

The unhoused encampment just outside downtown is in disarray, the southern half of it torn up like a hurricane came through. Scraps of colorful tent fabric and personal belongings scatter the ground, which is split by a maze of thick, winding roots that weren’t there yesterday. Aizawa does a mental count as he runs over: twenty-two tents and structures remaining, which means fifteen were destroyed. Mei’s structure was one of the ones hit, the corrugated metal roof she painted flowers on last summer lying bent atop a pile of debris. He doesn’t see her in the small crowd at the middle of the lot, where people are picking through a stack of food containers.

Aizawa approaches and hands his entire shopping bag to Dial, the encampment’s informal leader. “What happened here?”

Dial shakes his radio head, and his speakers play a rumbling, crashing noise and screams. “Villain attack early this morning. A big guy with some kind of plant Quirk stomped his feet and did that to half the lot.” He shrugs toward the mass of roots biting up from the ground. “He had Mei’s foundling with him.”

“Kiyoko,” Shinsou says. “That’s her name, right?”

“That’s right,” Dial says. 

“The villain goes by Bitterroot,” Aizawa says. “Mei’s been talking about him.” Shit. “Where’s Mei?”

Dial turns to static and won’t look at him. His partner, Iwa, lays a stony hand on his shoulder and speaks for him.

“Hospital,” Iwa says, the pebbled surface of her exoskeleton shifting with anger. “They singled her out—wrapped her in roots and bashed her against the ground. It was horrible.”

Aizawa is going to burn that guy to the ground. He feels sick, and he’s pretty sure it’s not just his body betraying him this time. “I’ll get some friends out here to help you rebuild.  We’ll make sure this doesn’t happen again.” He turns to Shinsou. “Go see what you can help them with. I need to make some calls.”

Shinsou immediately nods and jogs over to the group that’s sorting through food containers. Good kid.

After a few calls with the district office and one post to a locked pro hero channel, the help starts trickling in. Pro heroes show up one or two at a time—locals on patrol, faculty colleagues, even a few of Aizawa’s former students answer the call.  Some come with trash bags and shovels to handle cleanup. All Might arrives last, grinning atop a truck filled with camping supplies and food donations. When the pros start talking logistics, they realize that Shinsou has already started a list of who lost what in the attack, and Aizawa’s stupid treasonous body is briefly overwhelmed with a warm sense of pride in his kid.

Everything is kind of warm, actually. His body is sweating from the effort of ignoring the stabbing in his guts.

Once the relief efforts are firmly underway and new tents popping up on freshly flattened ground, Aizawa lets himself sit down for a moment. It’s a critical error. Curling into a camp chair makes the pain flare in fun new directions, and also makes him never want to move again.

Maybe Hizashi was right. But the necessity of his job won’t just disappear if he stays home on the couch with a heating pad. And Shinsou is doing such good work. And there’s an eco-terrorist wannabe out there recruiting vulnerable teens and beating up unhoused old ladies. The encampment community—along with the rest of the city—won’t be safe until that guy is apprehended.

Two of the pros agree to guard the encampment while the rest of them divide up to search for Bitterroot and his cronies. Aizawa takes Shinsou and heads south, across the highway where Mei usually signs and into the light industrial district across from some of the city’s low-income neighborhoods.

“If I was a giant root monster man who preys on vulnerable youth, where would I be?” Shinsou says.

“Somewhere with dirt,” Aizawa replies.

He’s not entirely serious about the dirt thing, but it’s not long before they spot lines of suspicious roots extending from the foundation of an abandoned garden center.

Aizawa stills, keenly aware of the fact that he’s about to introduce a half-trained fifteen-year-old into the orbit of a dangerous villain. “Roof,” he whispers. “There are skylights. We search the building from a safe distance, and if they’re in there, we call for backup.”

Shinsou nods, his eyes bright with determination. This fucking kid.

Aizawa touches his shoulder and makes a Quiet gesture, then propels himself up onto the roof with his capture weapon. Shinsou follows, landing almost silently on the gravel roof.

They creep from one large paneled skylight to another, peering over the edge and scanning the interior of the building. The rusty retail shelves below are strewn about, old containers and dusty bags of potting soil littered across the floor. It’s shockingly green inside, plants growing from every conceivable surface, thousands of tendrils reaching toward the light. That’s definitely not normal.

A scream echoes from the greenhouse at the rear of the building. 

Shinsou hits a defensive pose, fists balled and capture weapon alight. Aizawa drags himself upright, realizing too late how slow his body is reacting. The haze of pain makes everything feel distant, like his head is swimming.

He taps his earpiece to send out a message to the local patrols. “We found the villain Bitterroot’s hideout, and somebody’s home. Sending coordinates.”

The scream comes again, and he starts running toward it, instinct overriding everything else. Fuck his broken body’s complaints, fuck wearing kid gloves with his perfectly capable intern, someone is hurting and he needs to help.

He only has a moment to note a group of people gathered under the greenhouse roof before a tree root breaks through the glass. His foggy brain doesn’t react quickly enough to dodge.

The root grabs him around the middle like a doll, making pain explode through him like he’s been ripped in half. He wonders who’s screaming this time and thinks dimly, Oh, it’s me before he goes hurtling across the roof.

***

Shinsou doesn’t think he’s ever heard his own heartbeat this loud before. It’s banging in his ears as he takes off after Aizawa, throwing his capture weapon at his mentor’s falling body. All that practice catching practice dummies pays off: he catches him just before Aizawa can roll off the side of the building. Maybe it didn’t pay off quick enough. People aren’t supposed to flop like that. Oh god, is he too late? Is this going to end up being one of those tragic origin stories?

He kneels at Aizawa’s side and rolls him over. Unconscious, but still breathing. He’s pretty sure that’s a breath. Please, please, please let him keep breathing.

What’s the emergency protocol for this kind of thing? They just went over it again yesterday. Best practices for interns are to send an alert, get somewhere safe, and wait for backup.

Shinsou turns on the emergency earpiece that’s been riding in his left ear all week. “This is Shinsou, Eraserhead’s intern,” he says. “Eraserhead is down. Unsure of condition. We’re on the roof. Villain is active—”

An enormous rumbling, shattering noise brings him to his feet. Roots break through the greenhouse ceiling and clench into the roof like gnarled fingers.

“Shinsou, we hear you,” says a woman’s voice. “Backup is coming. Get to safety and do not engage the villain. I repeat: Get to safety and do not engage.”

“Not sure I have much of a choice,” Shinsou says, watching a hulking figure rise over the lip of the roof.

So this is Bitterroot. He’s enormous, at least eight feet tall, with skin like birch bark and brittle dried leaves for hair. The roots grow and bend around him like a spider’s legs. He’s grinning, but he doesn’t look happy.

Shinsou glances at Aizawa, pale and crumpled. The idea of running for safety and leaving his mentor—his fucking foster dad—lying here defenseless makes his whole heart rise up and yell NO. Absolutely not. Shinsou will do everything in his power to protect him, and if the worst happens, like hell will he let him die alone.

Don’t cry. Don’t panic. Think.

No matter how much practice he has with his capture weapon, Shinsou is pretty sure he can’t take down a guy who’s basically his own forest with it. His only chance is his Quirk. Mei said this guy was full of hot air, and she was right, because it’s no more than a few seconds of dramatic intro before the guy opens his mouth and starts fucking monologuing.

“Oh, look at this little sapling all alone up here! You poor wee thing, shaking in the shade of the skyscrapers. When I’m done with this city, there will be nothing left of it but a glorious canopy, rich dark earth below our fingertips and all this civilization turned to footholds for the forest.” Bitterroot lowers himself onto the roof and walks toward Shinsou on his spiderish root legs, in an unhurried pace that says he knows he’s already won. “How does that sound to you, little sapling? Would you care to join me in making my perfect world, or shall I return you to them earth as compost?”

Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic.

Shinsou lets his capture weapon settle around his shoulders and raises his hands in surrender. “I don’t know,” he says, unable to keep his voice from shaking. “I’ve never tried gardening. It sounds boring.”

“Boring?!” the villain cries. “How dare you—”

Shinsou activates his Quirk.

The villain freezes, the indignant expression sliding off his face.

It’s a firm grip and not much mind to contend with. Shinsou steps toward him, reaching for control of all those roots. The gnarled masses of root recede and break away from Bitterroot, leaving him just a very large man with an ugly color scheme.

Shinsou walks right up to the villain, his pulse hammering in his ears. The last time he used his Quirk on someone who was attacking him—really attacking him, not practicing or trying to win a match—he felt like a monster. But this? This feels righteous. Terrifying, but righteous. He makes the enormous villain walk backwards a few steps, testing his hold on the guy’s mind. It’s firm. He makes the villain stick a finger up his own nose. Still terrifying, somehow.

“Hey, boss?” calls a voice from below in the greenhouse.

Right. Shit. He’s got a whole gang.

Shinsou walks Bitterroot to the edge of the rooftop beside him. Below, there are five people, all younger and smaller than their leader. One of them, a girl with glowing orange eyes and baggy clothes, still has roots wrapped painfully tight around her legs. He guesses that’s the source of the screaming. There’s another kid with the head and tail of a desert lizard, a small boy with mushrooms growing from his hair, and another guy who has no discernible Quirk but looks big enough to cause some damage. Shinsou wonders if the girl is Mei’s friend.

“Who the hell is this guy?” shouts the kid with a lizard Quirk.

Shinsou makes Bitterroot cross his arms and defer to him with a nod.

“I’m an old friend of your leader’s,” he lies, trying to look taller.

“Old friend?” says the boy with the mushrooms. “You’re like twelve.”

Shinsou activates his Quirk and prays the others won’t notice the mushroom kid has frozen in place. “And who exactly are you?” he says, shooting them a challenging look.

“Beardo,” the lizard kid says, before shutting up for the foreseeable future.

“What happened up there?” asks the plain guy, and then he, too, is brainwashed.

“Boss?” says the girl with the glowing eyes. “Boss, talk to us. What’s happening? Hey, guys? Why is no one—” She swallows her voice as realization hits, then glares up at him without another word.

Dammit. This one’s smart. Shinsou ducks behind Bitterroot as the girl fires her eye lasers, exploding the spot where he was just standing into rubble and smoke.

If he can just get her to talk, maybe this can be over.

Hot orange light sparks from the ground near his feet, making him jump. Crap, she’s trying to aim at him through the ceiling. No, not quite. The beam of light cuts in another direction to his right, then to his left. She’s trying to—

The roof caves in underneath Shinsou and Bitterroot, dropping them twenty feet onto the remains of a cashier station. He has just enough time to make the villain catch him in those huge tree trunk hands so his head doesn’t explode on impact.

A laser shoots right past his ear, audibly burning through his hair. Shinsou dives behind Bitterroot and makes the villain stand up in front of him. He wonders about the ethics of using a villain as a human shield, but if he’s lucky there will be time for that later.

And if he’s not lucky?

A light fixture explodes behind him, showering down sparks and glass shards.

A laser beam rebounds off a domed security mirror and hits the floor a foot from Shinsou’s left hand. Okay, so she’s really talented and deadly, plus she’s onto his Quirk.

He could rush in with his capture weapon. That’s what Midoriya would do. But he’d like to live to see Midoriya again, and running at a person who can explode him with a glance seems like not a good way to achieve that.

If this girl is who he thinks she is, maybe he can still get a word out of her—or at least keep her occupied until help arrives.

“It’s Kiyoko, right?” he shouts. “Mei’s been looking for you. She got hurt pretty badly this morning, last I heard she was in intensive care.”

There’s a solid five seconds with no lasers. He peeks around Bitterroot’s leg. Kiyoko is staring right at him, her mouth slightly open.

He takes a chance, standing up so he can see her more clearly. Her gaze follows him, and he can see her biting her lip to keep from responding.

“Dial and Iwa and the rest of the encampment, they’re okay,” he says. “They’re already rebuilding with the help of some pro heroes. All Might showed up with a truck full of donations. That’s what heroes do, Kiyoko. They help people. This guy?” He pats Bitterroot’s arm. “This guy doesn’t care about helping anyone but himself. He was hurting you, right? Before we got here?”

The girl shrinks in on herself like the words hurt and takes an awkward step back, her movement constrained by the roots around her legs. “I didn’t mean for Mei to get hurt,” she says. “Boss said he needed to cut my ties to the people who held me back.”

Shinsou could Brainwash her. He probably should. Instead, he says, “Someone who cares about you wouldn’t treat you like that. Mei wouldn’t treat you like that.”

Kiyoko’s hand creeps up to her mouth, and she crumbles as much as the roots around her legs will let her, sobbing into her gloves. Her tears glow like lava and emit steam when they hit the ground. “I didn’t mean it,” she repeats.

Shinsou steps out from behind the big villain with his hands raised to show he’s not any danger to her. “I know you didn’t,” he says. “I’m going to help you in any way I can, okay? I’m a hero—or, well, I’m trying to be a hero.”

When backup arrives, Shinsou is sitting on the ground next to Kiyoko, prying the last of the roots away from her legs. He holds onto his Quirk until the pros have the villain and his other minions contained, and hands Kiyoko over directly to All Might, who promises to hear her out.

It’s only when he’s in the back of the ambulance, holding tight to Aizawa’s hand, that Shinsou feels the weight of everything that just happened. It’s too big. It’s too much. How does he even start processing all of this?

A few months ago, the answer would have been to choke it down like a dry-swallowed pill and quietly break down when no one was around to hear him. That’s the way he’s handled capital-e Events in his life for years. It was the only way.

It’s not anymore.

Shinsou takes out his phone and dials Midoriya.

“Hitoshi?” His boyfriend’s voice is warm and concerned, an immediate comfort. “What’s going on? Aren’t you supposed to be at your internship?”

“I am.” Shinsou stares down at his mentor’s hand, limp in his own. “Things went bad.”

“Are you okay?”

“I’m in an ambulance with Eraserhead. Can you just--” It feels childish to ask, but he’s already in it. “Izuku, can you stay on the line with me until we get to the hospital? I don’t want to be alone.”

“Of course,” Midoriya says. “I’m with you, of course.”

***

Aizawa knows before he opens his eyes that he’s in the hospital. It’s the smell, that specific cheap cleanser they always use, combined with the angle. Hospitals always insist on keeping the head of his bed raised slightly, as if being truly horizontal and thus potentially comfortable breaks some cardinal rule of healing.

Hospital. Definitely on some kind of painkiller—the strong stuff that makes his brain feel fuzzy. He really fucked something up, then. What did he—

There was a villain. Where is his kid.

“Hitoshi,” he says, prying his eyelids open. They’re so heavy.

The room crystallizes around him, a small private room with large windows. Someone in a white coat is checking his fluid drip.

“Hey there, sleepyhead,” the someone says. Too cheerful. Must be a med student. “Your son’s right here with you, okay?”

There’s pressure on his left hand. He rolls his head to see.

Shinsou is slouched in a chair next to the the bed, clinging to his hand. He’s still wearing his jumpsuit and capture weapon, and his eyes are tired and red-rimmed. But he’s all in one piece. He’s alive. He’s okay. 

Aizawa squeezes his hand back. “Villain contained?”

Shinsou nods, not looking him in the eyes.

Okay. Okay, that’s all he needs to know for now.

Aizawa licks his dry lips and turns back toward the someone in the white coat. “What’s damaged?”

“You had a laceration on your scalp, a cracked rib, and a pretty severe case of ovarian torsion that landed you in emergency surgery,” the doctor says. “They found a cyst the size of a lemon on your left ovary, which was twisting it around its own ligament and cutting off its blood supply. The ovary wasn’t salvageable by the time they got in there, so it was removed along with the cyst.”

“Oh,” Aizawa says dimly. Ovarian torsion. He didn’t even know that could happen. Makes sense. “Is that what that was.”

“How long was this going on for?”

He tries to remember. “Uh, a few weeks, I think. Acute since this morning.”

The doctor makes a little huh noise. “That’s an eight or nine on the pain scale for most people. You pro heroes are tough cookies.”   

“When can I go back to work.”

Shinsou makes an alarmed noise and squeezes his hand so hard he can actually feel it, unlike the rest of his distant body.

“That depends on your healing factors,” says the doctor. “I’m told Recovery Girl is on vacation, so you’re stuck healing like a civilian for at least a few days. You’ll probably be released tonight, but I wouldn’t rush getting back to heroing.”

Goddammit. “Thank you,” he tells the doctor, who gives him a little nod and leaves the room.

Aizawa collects himself with a deep breath. His chest feels tight, but the cracked rib or whatever doesn’t hurt. Few things actually hurt yet. It’s kind of a nice change. But that prognosis. The last time he had to heal like a civilian was after his top surgery, which was three weeks of discomfort in a compression garment and even longer regaining his full range of motion.

Well. He can heal like this for a few days, and then when Recovery Girl comes back she’ll hit fast forward on it. He can still teach after the break, at least. And he can help with whatever wrap-up is needed on this villain.

He turns his head toward Shinsou. “All right, debrief. What happened after I was out?”

The kid stares him hard in the eyes and says, “No.”

“No?” Aizawa repeats.

“No.” Shinsou lets go of his hand. “I’m not going to let you go right back to business as usual. What’s wrong with you? You could’ve died.”

“I don’t think torsion is generally a fatal issue,” Aizawa starts, but he’s interrupted by Shinsou’s chair squeaking back as the kid stands up.

“No, it’s an eight or nine on the pain scale! That you were working through like some kind of self-sacrificing lunatic! The EMTs said you had a fever, too. No wonder that villain caught you so easily.” Shinsou’s hands are balled at his sides and shaking. “He tried to throw you off a roof! If I hadn’t caught you—if you’d been alone today— It’s so easy to die in this job, and you’re just going to throw yourself around like you don’t matter?”

Aizawa opens his mouth, but no sound comes out.

“You matter so much,” Shinsou says, his voice rising as he starts to cry. “You, Shouta Aizawa, you fucking idiot, you matter so much to so many people. I don’t know what Hizashi would do without you. Or what your students would do. Or me. You can’t do stuff like this! You can’t pretend that Eraserhead is the only important thing! You have to take care of yourself!”

He’s yelling by the end, and Aizawa is stunned into silence. The last few words hang between them for a moment, and then Shinsou suddenly looks at the open door and the room his voice has just echoed around and withdraws into himself, arms crossed and head low.

“I’m gonna go get myself some tea,” Shinsou says, and heads for door. Just before reaching it, he turns around and adds, “Also, I know you’ve missed your T shot for the last three weeks. You can’t keep doing that. I set a reminder on your phone while you were in surgery.” He disappears into the hallway.

Aizawa stares after him for a minute. Did he…did he just get scolded by a teenager?

His phone is waiting for him on the little table attached to the bed. Picking it up, he checks his reminders. There’s a new one slotted in right between his Wednesday meetings and his usual patrol shift, titled take t shot don’t be a stubborn asshole. There are also several new entries on their household’s grocery list app, all for fresh fruit and vegetables, and Shinsou has sent the household group chat a link to an article titled Thirteen Easy Tips to Improve Your Work-Life Balance.

Aizawa snorts. Okay, okay. Point taken.

The phone vibrates, switching its display to a photo of his husband crooning into a karaoke mic a few birthdays ago. It takes him a couple of rings to find the thumb dexterity to pick up.

“Hey, love,” Hizashi greets him warmly. “How are you doing?”

“Not dead yet,” Aizawa says. His voice feels raw.

“Well, that’s good news! I’m on my way there. I just left a meeting at the district office. Did you know Shinsou incapacitated a team of five villains with no damage to himself or them?”

Hizashi fills him in on the details of how everything happened. Apparently a security camera in the adjacent parking lot caught Shinsou saving him and subduing Bitterroot with his Quirk.

Aizawa is so proud of that kid.

“It’s incredible,” Hizashi says. “I didn’t have nearly his presence of mind when I was that age.”

“Neither of us was that smart at his age.” Aizawa sighs, scratching at the bandage on his right temple. “Hizashi, he yelled at me.”

“Shinsou did?”

“When I woke up. He yelled at me for not taking care of myself. And I think he intends to make me eat leafy greens.”

Hizashi laughs so hard that Aizawa can hear him setting the phone on the passenger seat to avoid blowing out the receiver. After a minute, he’s back on the phone, composing himself. “I love that kid,” he says.

“Yeah,” Aizawa replies. It feels like too much to say the words, even though Hizashi comes to them so easily.

He does love that kid. He just can’t look that fact in the eye without thinking about losing him.

But it’s okay. Everyone’s okay. His ego is bruised, and the next few days are going to suck, but for now he’s got good pain meds and his husband is on the way and they’re probably going to need to make a grocery order for kale tonight to appease their angry foster child.

“I’ll be there soon,” Hizashi says. “Love you.”

“Love you, too,” Aizawa says, and ends the call.

***

Shinsou’s anger dissipates like like air leaking out of a punctured balloon as he walks through the hospital with his vending machine tea cooling in his left hand. It’s strange. He’s used to being angry. He’s been angry for most of his life, but mostly in a selfish, why me sort of way. This worried anger doesn’t have the same roots to it.

Roots. Ha. He is never ever ever taking up gardening after today.

He walks the halls until he finds a couple of pro heroes lingering in a waiting room. They’re younger pros, a couple of Aizawa’s former students who showed up to help at the encampment earlier. One of them, a woman with a fur-covered costume and horns like a ram, strides over when she sees him.

“Hey, you’re Aizawa’s intern, right?” she says. “How is he?”

“A stubborn pain in the ass,” Shinsou answers without thinking. Before he can flinch at his own voice, the pro hero laughs.

“That sounds like our teacher,” she says.

The other pro, a person with a reflective helmet and mechanical wings tucked behind their back, offers him a handshake. “You did good work out there, kid. Impressive Quirk.”

“Oh, uh, thanks.” Shinsou doesn’t know what to do with his face. What does a normal human face do? “Were you our backup? I’m sorry I didn’t introduce myself, I had to go with the ambulance.”

“No, no,” says the electronically amplified voice under the helmet, “we were back at the encampment. We just saw the video.”

Video?

“Oh, and the woman Bitterroot targeted this morning is doing better,” the ram-horned hero tells him. “Mei Kasai. They moved her out of the ICU an hour ago. Thought you’d like to know.”

Shinsou thanks them both and wanders back toward Aizawa’s room. He should share the news. Or be there for his mentor. Or something. Between the fading anger and the post-adrenaline crash, his brain feels like wet newspaper. He sits on a metal bench outside Aizawa’s room and lets himself stare at the opposite wall for a little while. His phone keeps buzzing in his pocket. When he finally summons up the energy to look at it, there are a bunch of texts from Midoriya.

Hitoshi you’re amazing!!!

I’m so proud of you OMG. Like I already was, but even more now!

Emojis. So many emojis. Hearts and sparkles and…a stop sign and a tree?

This kind of press could really jump-start your career!! Pro hero teams are going to be lining up to work with you, this is a really big deal!!!!!

It takes him a full minute of staring at the screen to realize he needs to scroll back. Midoriya sent him a link to a news article with the headline Student Hero Rescues Pro, Takes Down Villain Team Solo. In the body of the article is an embedded video that appears to be taken from security footage. It’s him. On the rooftop. Facing off against Bitterroot. The journalist added a photo of him, too, the unfortunate ID photo from his last school, where he didn’t even attempt to smile and looks like he hasn’t slept in forty years.

The article is…nice. He thinks. It’s hard to read with his hands shaking.

His phone buzzes as a call from Hizashi comes in, and he fumbles the phone onto the floor and swears, his voice too loud and too high.

The call ends before he can pick up, and the door to Aizawa’s room opens. There’s Hizashi, standing in the doorway, his own phone in hand. Their eyes meet, and without a word, Hizashi slides onto the bench next to him and wraps him in a hug. His sweater smells like home, and there’s a sprinkling of brown fur on the shoulder from Pichi napping on the clean laundry. He’s warm and solid and not asking any questions or needing any help or yelling at, and Shinsou clings to the knit fabric.

“Hitoshi, sweetheart,” Hizashi says softly over his shoulder. “I am so grateful for you.”

The words are too much. They don’t fit in his head. He doesn’t know how to respond. Are there classes on responding to this in the Hero Course?

Hizashi hugs him until Shinsou is able to relax, his head drooping onto the shoulder of that soft cardigan. God, his head is heavy. Every bit of him is so heavy, once he lets himself notice it. He wants to sleep for a year.

The hospital releases Aizawa as soon as he’s proven he can choke down a sandwich. It’s getting dark out, and Shinsou would fall asleep in the backseat of the car, except that his stomach is suddenly gnawing on itself. He watches the yellow glow of the street lamps slide across Aizawa’s hand on the center console, realizing dimly that his internship week is probably over now, what with his employer being limited to bedrest for the rest of the break.

That should disappoint him. Instead, all he can think about is the moment of finally deactivating his Quirk when the pros had the villains restrained, feeling the hum of those other minds snap back into place and watching the pro heroes seamlessly pick up the task just as he set it down.

Anyway, he made the news, so that’s nothing to complain about.

When they get back to the apartment, Midoriya is waiting just outside their door with a grocery bag. Shinsou has probably never been so happy to see someone in his entire life. Midoriya sets the bag down just in time for Shinsou to jog across the remaining distance and drag him into a hug, a kiss, anything he can get, and for once, Shinsou doesn’t care that his foster parents are right there.

***

Aizawa can’t believe he’s thinking this, and he will probably blame it on the painkillers later, but thank god for Izuku Midoriya. The overachiever brought them homemade meals he and his mom prepped for the next couple of days, immediately made Shinsou visibly relax with his touchy-feely presence, and distracted him in the kitchen with minimal talking. For bonus points, the little meddler hasn’t asked a single question about Aizawa’s surgery. Midoriya is single-minded when he has a goal in front of him, and tonight’s goal appears to be supporting Shinsou.

He’s all right, that kid. He can stay.

On the other hand, this helpless patient routine can get chucked into the river.

“This is asinine,” Aizawa announces when his husband insists on bringing his pills to him. “I can get my own medication. I hurt less now than I did this morning.”

“That’s not the convincing argument you think it is,” Hizashi says, frowning at him.

It’s true, though. The surgical site barely hurts. The worst part at the moment is the discomfort of the CO2 gas they used in his surgery trying to escape his body, spreading pressure and deep muscle aches throughout his abdomen and shoulders. Even that is a mostly ignorable, temporary inconvenience. Lying back in his favorite chair with his feet up helps a little.

“Anyway, I’m not trying to emasculate you,” Hizashi says. “You’re trapped.” He gestures to Aizawa’s legs, where the cat is stretched out using the dip in the blanket like a hammock.

Aizawa blinks slowly at the cat, who is snoring. How long has she been there?

“Did you know you’ve been under a cat for the last half-hour?” Hizashi asks pointedly.

He will know if the answer is a lie. Aizawa shakes his head.

Hizashi hands him his pills and a glass of water and gives him a fond, exasperated look until he’s swallowed both the medication and the whole glass. Then he kisses his husband on the forehead and leaves him be.

Aizawa sleeps on and off, like he usually does on the good painkillers. He catches half an episode of a gameshow on the TV, snippets of conversations, and the sharp, startling pain of Pichi pushing off his stomach as she leaps off the chair.

In the evening as the windows go dark, he wakes up just enough to catch Midoriya reading news items about the day’s incident aloud to Shinsou.

“Oh,” Midoriya says, more of a punctuation mark than a word.

“What is it?” Shinsou replies, his voice apprehensive.

“It’s just…someone in the comments found your profile on the foster system website.  There’s a whole thread here of people saying they’d adopt you if they could. A bunch of people have signal boosted it.”

Aizawa stays very still, his attention rising to the surface. Important, his brain says.

“What’s even on my profile?” A tsk noise. “I hate that photo.”

Midoriya reads the profile aloud. “‘Hitoshi is a smart, kind, respectful boy who hopes to be a pro hero someday. He enjoys reading, video games, and helping out in the kitchen. Hitoshi would love a home with pets, especially cats. Because of his Quirk, he is not recommended for families with’—never mind that part, whoever wrote this sucks.”

Not recommended for families with small children or vulnerable elders, Aizawa’s memory supplies. Whoever wrote that does suck.

“Hitoshi,” Midoriya says earnestly, “this could help you find an adoptive family.”

Aizawa’s heart shouldn’t sink at that idea. What’s wrong with him. Painkillers and a martyr streak, mostly. Shut up, brain.

“Hitoshi?” Midoriya says, because Shinsou hasn’t responded.

Shinsou’s voice is small. “Can we talk about something else?”

Aizawa sleeps.

The next time he wakes up, his head is clearer and the living room is lit only by the light over the kitchen stove and the blue glow of Shinsou’s phone screen. The kid is sitting on the couch by himself. In the dark. At three in the morning.

“You should be in bed,” Aizawa says. His voice feels fuzzy and unused.

Shinsou startles, then sits up defiantly straight and says, “Someone has to keep an eye on you.”

“I seem to remember someone lecturing me about self-care.” Aizawa shifts to face him, and oh, that was a mistake. Maybe the reason he’s feeling more clear headed is the pain meds are starting to exit his system. He’s not scheduled for another dose for an hour.

Shinsou moves to the edge of the couch cushion as if he might have to make another dramatic catch. “Are you okay?”

“I’m great.” Aizawa swears through clenched teeth. “I hope Recovery Girl is having a lovely vacation.”

“I can get Hizashi.”

“Don’t. It’s okay. I’m okay.” Aizawa exhales slowly, finding a position that doesn’t make his surgery site hurt so badly. “It’s not a ‘something’s wrong’ pain, it’s a ‘you fucked up and now you have to heal from it’ pain. You learn the difference in this job.”

Shinsou stares at the coffee table for a long minute. “I’m sorry I yelled at you.”

Aizawa shakes his head. That hurts too. Oh, right, head injury. His body is a big bundle of fun tonight. “There’s nothing to be sorry for,” he says. “You were right. I have a bad habit of losing myself in my work.”

Shinsou is quiet again, studying his own hands. “Shouta, do you like yourself?”

The question shouldn’t feel difficult. Aizawa assesses. He can appreciate his own intelligence and strength. He sees snippets of what Hizashi sees in him, and he likes those. The rest is an unpleasant muddle of things he’s tried teasing out in Hero Commission-mandated therapy over the years. “Sometimes,” he answers. “Why?”

“I always assumed becoming a pro hero meant I’d start liking myself,” Shinsou says. “Kinda sucks to find out that’s not what happens.”

Oh. Aizawa is a terrible guardian. He reaches a hand across the space between his chair and the couch and waits until Shinsou tentatively grasps it.

“I know there’s not a damn thing I can say to fix this,” Aizawa says, holding on tight to his hand. “But Hitoshi, I can’t imagine not liking you. Even if you didn’t save my life today. Even if you weren’t one of the most promising students I’ve ever had. Even if you weren’t going to be a hero at all, I would still like you. And so would Hizashi. And Pichi. And obviously Midoriya.”

Shinsou smiles a little. “You admitted I saved your life.”

“Yeah, you did. Thank you for that.” Aizawa squeezes his hand before releasing it. “I’ll try not to let it go to waste.”

Chapter Text

“Hey, Hitoshi, can you come over?” Midoriya’s voice is oddly small on the phone, and the fact that he called instead of texting sends up a red flag.

“What’s wrong?” Shinsou asks.

Midoriya hesitates, which is also worrying, but at least he doesn’t try to make something up. “Something happened today at the mall. I just spent three hours in the police station talking about it and I don’t really wanna—“ A sigh. “Mr. Aizawa knows by now. So, can you?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m on my way.”

Shinsou is shoving his homework for finals week into his backpack when Aizawa appears in his doorway and asks, “Need a ride? Inko can bring you back home.”

It was embarrassing at first that his foster parents and Midoriya’s mom have a group chat, but sometimes it’s kind of nice.

Aizawa brings him up to speed in the car: Midoriya was cornered by the leader of the League of Villains at the mall, threatened with a disintegration Quirk to the throat, and released unharmed. No wonder he sounded so shaken on the phone. When they get to the Midoriyas’ apartment building, Shinsou thanks Aizawa and sprints up two flights of stairs. He takes a moment at the front door to fix his hair and straighten his posture so Inko will continue to say he’s such a nice young man, then knocks.

Inko answers the door with a tight-lipped smile and welcomes him with a hug. She’s the queen of hugs. After the Sports Festival, Shinsou hadn’t thought he could possibly be more jealous of Midoriya, but meeting his mom blew that idea out of the water. Inko Midoriya is exactly the kind of mom he used to daydream about when he was in the res care facility, warm and kind and genuinely invested in her son’s happiness and well-being. She hugs like she hasn’t seen him in years, every single time, she’s always overjoyed to have help in the kitchen, and her smile is a small, bright star. She is the most Mom mom who ever mommed, and the fact that Midoriya gets her all to himself makes Shinsou blazingly jealous and grateful all at once.

Tonight, she ends her hug by pulling Shinsou down to her height and planting a kiss on his forehead. “Thank you for being here,” she says firmly. “You’re a good boy.” He can tell she’s been crying, which makes his heart skip a beat.

Crossing the apartment, he finds Midoriya in his room, sitting on his bed staring at the wall. Midoriya glances at the doorway and startles, then shakes his head. 

“Sorry,” Shinsou says, though he’s not sure what he’s apologizing for.

“It’s okay.” Midoriya says. “It’s not your fault. I just had a bad time with a guy in a dark hoodie today, and in my peripheral vision—”

Crap. Shinsou is used to people mistaking him for a villain, but scaring someone he cares about hurts. He removes his hoodie and folds it up as small as possible to leave on top of his backpack. Hopefully the League of Villains guy wasn’t also wearing one of Hizashi’s hand-me-down American concert t-shirts.

“How are you?” Shinsou asks, sitting on the bed next to his boyfriend.

Midoriya shrugs. “I don’t know. Kind of numb. Angry.”

“My signature combination,” Shinsou says, which earns him a smile. He extends an arm around Midoriya’s shoulders, and the invitation is accepted. The weight of Midoriya’s head rolls onto his shoulder as the two of them sink into a comfortable position atop the pile of All Might pillows and plushies. The All Might shrine seemed like overkill at first, but on a night like this, it’s pretty comforting to be surrounded by squishy, grinning cartoon symbols of peace. Nothing bad can happen under All Might’s watchful eyes—all 148 of them. (Shinsou has counted.)

“I keep thinking I should be better at dealing with villains by now,” Midoriya says with a frustrated sigh. “I’ve been training for this all year—longer than that, really, and after being entrusted with—” He cuts himself off sharply, going stiff suddenly.

“Entrusted with what?” Shinsou asks gently.

“Just…UA,” Midoriya says. “I wanted to go there ever since I was little, and I only got in because other students pushed for me. All Might even fought for me to be admitted. I want to live up to the hope they placed in me.”

Shinsou has lied by omission enough in his life to be an expert in it. He senses the weight of something unsaid there, but now isn’t the time to push. Instead, he points out, “Look, you haven’t been training all year to have the leader of a villain team threaten your life while you’re shopping for camping gear. That’d rattle anyone. It’s easily in the top five worst places a villain could surprise you.”

Midoriya shifts so he can look at Shinsou’s face, frowning. “Wait, what are the other four worst places?”

“Well, number one is any kind of bathroom scenario.”

“Naturally.”

Shinsou thinks for a moment. “Number two is bathing. Like you’re taking a hot soak and a villain pops up from between the suds.”

“Uh-huh.” Midoriya wipes a residual tear from his eye.

“Then you’ve got the end of a cafeteria line. You’ve got your tray loaded up and you’re waiting to pay, but there’s a villain, so all of a sudden your life’s in danger and you’re holding up the line for everyone else, and you’re hungry.”

Midoriya cracks a smile. “And the last worst place?”

Shinsou meets his gaze, putting on his best serious face. “In your sleeping bag while you’re camping. You’re in an unfamiliar environment, far from civilization, and you wake up to your arch nemesis gently spooning you. It’s threatening and it makes you question your sexuality.”

That gets the laugh he was going for, plus a smack in the head with a stuffed symbol of peace. Shinsou retaliates by throwing a mini plush at close range, and then it’s all-out war, pillows and plushes flying. Shinsou takes a fist-sized squishy All Might to the nose and can’t bring himself to care because he’s giggling like a little kid. Within a minute, the floor of Midoriya’s room is scattered with memorabilia, Shinsou’s hair is a wreck, and his boyfriend has him half pinned to the bed.

Midoriya shakes a vinyl All Might figure out of his t-shirt, then leans down and kisses Shinsou. “I think you’re kinda my favorite person,” he whispers.

Shinsou’s breath catches. He knows it’s not a joke, because Midoriya wouldn’t, but it’s not—that can’t be true. For so many reasons. The easiest reason is literally all around them.

“There are seventy-four All Mights in this room who would beg to differ,” he says.

Midoriya sits back on his heels, blushing. “Okay, well, you’re one of my favorite people. And you’re in very good company.”

Still seems fake, but Shinsou has learned that contradicting Midoriya on emotional matters leads to lectures with annotated notes and sometimes charts. One time there was a slideshow. Why do the most important people in his life show their affection via slideshows?

He tosses a pillow at Midoriya’s face, and Midoriya retaliates by dodging it and coming in for a slow, sweet kiss.

Shinsou holds onto him, keeping their bodies close together. “You’re one of my favorite people, too,” he says against Midoriya’s cheek.

It’s weird how normal it feels to say that. It’s just a fact. He rarely feels as okay as he does with this wonderful nerd. He can even look into the future a little with him, picture them growing into pro heroes together in the same class, supporting each other through licensure exams, sharing a friends group and secrets and inside jokes. He’d even like to have sex with this person someday, which is new and A Lot. All of it combined should terrify him after a lifetime of having every rug pulled out from under him mid-stride, but with Midoriya, it feels somehow safe.

“I’m glad you’re here.” Midoriya props himself up on one elbow and cards his hand through Shinsou’s hair. “I’m gonna miss you next week.”

“You’ll be having too much fun to miss me,” Shinsou says. “Toasting marshmallows, telling scary stories around the campfire, sleeping under the stars…”

“Getting my ass kicked by Aizawa’s training regimen,” Midoriya adds wistfully. “I wish you could come to the training camp with us. You belong in that class.”

Shinsou’s heart twists in his chest. “Maybe next time,” he says.

***

Dear Misters Aizawa and Yamada,

I hope this email finds you well. We have received an inquiry about Hitoshi Shinsou from a potential adopter. She has been pre-approved by the agency and has completed a successful home visit. You’ll note in her application (see attached) that she has prior experience raising a child with a dangerous Quirk and has a sibling who is a UA graduate, making her an especially good fit for this particular child.

Please reach out to her at your earliest convenience to schedule a first meeting. Best of luck, and thank you again for opening your home to a child in need in these unusual circumstances.

Aizawa has read the email from Shinsou’s social worker so many times in the three hours since he received it that it’s stuck in his head like a commercial jingle. He probably shouldn’t be looking at his phone so much, but it’s a quiet night, and the Hero Commission has had him on short, partnered patrols since he came back to work after surgery. Tonight’s partner is a young pro with an X-ray Quirk who’s happy to surveil the area in silence. He will provide a glowing review to any agency she chooses to apply to on that fact alone.

He wonders if Hizashi had a chance to read the email during his shift at the radio station. That question is answered the moment he steps out of the district office and finds his husband sitting in their car in the parking lot, listening to screaming vocals at a volume that rattles the vehicles around it. Aizawa approaches the car and waves a hand until Hizashi notices him and cuts the music.

“You haven’t pulled out the screamo in awhile,” Aizawa says as he settles into the car. “Everything all right?”

“I just needed to think.” Hizashi peels out of the parking lot and takes Aizawa’s hand on the center console. “Did you see the email from Hitoshi’s social worker?”

“Yeah.”

“What do you think?”

“I think…” Aizawa sinks in his seat, pushing his hand through his hair. “I think on paper she sounds like a good fit. Exactly what we’ve been hoping for for him.”

“And?”

“And I don’t trust it. Not with his adoption profile in the comments section of every article on the Bitterroot incident, and not with UA under targeted attack from villains. Let alone the very real possibility of him getting hurt in normal, non-villainy related ways if it falls through.”   

Hizashi exhales slowly, staring down the road. “If anyone hurts this kid again, I’m going to prison for murder.”

Aizawa smiles to himself and squeezes his husband’s hand.

“Okay. This is doable. Other foster parents do this all the time.” Hizashi shakes out his hands one at a time and takes a calming breath. “So, we, what? Schedule a meeting with the potential adopter. Finals week is almost over, but next week is your training camp, so it’ll have to happen after you get home, because like hell am I doing this without you. We can grab coffee together with her and Hitoshi, introduce them, see how it goes? Or maybe ice cream. He like ice cream.”

Aizawa can’t pin words to the feeling that rises in his chest. “Yeah,” he says. “Right after training camp. You schedule it, I’ll tell him.”

***

Shinsou has been dreaming about being adopted for more than half his life, but when the words “A potential adopter wants to meet you” come, from Aizawa, standing in the kitchen with a pot of simmering soup between them, they don’t hit like he expected. There’s a pop of unreal joy, like a soap bubble, followed by a cold plunge of dread.

He’s going to have to move again. He’s going to have to get to know another unpredictable adult. What if they hate him? What if they hurt him? What if he hurts them? Worse, what if they like him, then get disappointed when he screws up and don’t want him anymore?

Why don’t Hizashi and Aizawa want him anymore? He knows that question isn’t fair, but still, it lodges in his mind like a splinter.

“Hitoshi?” Aizawa says gently.

This is supposed to be a happy moment. Shinsou should be happy. When he texts Midoriya about it, Midoriya will be all emojis and exclamation marks. He should smile.

He smiles. “That’s…wow. All right. What happens next?”

“Hizashi’s arranging a meetup for when I get back from the training camp. We’ll go with you, help you get to know each other, see if it’s a good fit. She looks promising on paper.” Aizawa crosses his arms. “She’s got two cats. Thought you’d like that.”

That’s twice as many cats as he currently gets. Point one in potential adopter’s favor.

Oh, no. Thinking about cats makes it feel real and pressing. There’s an actual person out there with two actual cats who wants to adopt him. He’s going to meet her in just over a week. This time next month he could have a permanent family and two permanent cats.

It’s too much. His hands shake. He wiggles his toes against the cool tile floor and counts his breaths to try and avoid a panic attack.

Aizawa reaches out and rubs a steady, comforting circle on his back. “You’re not in this alone, Hitoshi. And you don’t need to make any decisions right now. Focus on your soup. Then study for finals. Then sleep. That’s all you need to do tonight.”

That’s an order of events Shinsou can wrap his head around. He finishes the soup and doles it out for himself and his foster parents. He studies math formulas for his exam tomorrow. He tries to sleep, but it takes a long time.

The rest of finals week slides past in a haze, and Shinsou honestly isn’t sure how he scored on his exams, but he hopes he didn’t fail anything. Aizawa heads out with his class on Saturday morning and leaves behind a small stack of paper for Shinsou on the table: the potential adopter’s application, with confidential information redacted in black marker.

He memorizes her name and address, reads through her personal history with kids with dangerous Quirks, looks up her UA alumnus brother—a sidekick—online. He finds her social media pages and scrolls through photos of her, all smiling. Here she is hiking on a mountain trail with her adult son. Here she is at a cat cafe with a friend. Here she is posing with a sweater she knitted. Would she knit him a sweater, if she adopted him? Nobody’s ever knitted him anything. It sounds kind of nice.

He texts the photos to Midoriya, who can’t respond during the day because the training camp is keeping him busy.

They made us fight dirt monsters and trek through a forest to get to the camp, Midoriya texts him the first night, and I’m so excited for you, she seems nice!!

The second night, Midoriya texts back a link to the potential adopter’s user profile on a popular message board, and they dig through four years of posts, commenting back and forth and assessing her tastes. She’s really into figure skating and has correct opinions about one of Shinsou’s favorite TV series, plus she’s kind to other users on the forum.

The third night, Midoriya doesn’t text back. It’s only when Hizashi comes home early from his shift at the radio station and sits him down to talk that Shinsou understands that something terrible has happened.

“UA sent an emergency alert out to the faculty,” Hizashi says, his hands a knot of nervous energy in his lap. “It’s a sensitive situation, so I don’t know much, but I didn’t want you to hear it on TV. Villains attacked the training camp tonight. There were a lot of injuries, one pro hero is missing, and a student has been kidnapped.”

The entire world shifts under Shinsou’s feet. “Who?” he asks.

Hizashi shakes his head. “I don’t know, but Shouta texted me the words ‘not dead’ twenty minutes ago, so that’s…comforting? I guess?” He forces a laugh while wiping his eyes. “I can’t even fault him. I’ve been telling him for years to let me know he’s not dead when something goes wrong. I should’ve been more specific.”

Shinsou hugs his stomach, unable to stop the worst-case scenarios running through his head.

“I’m sorry,” Hizashi says, giving him those big wet eyes. “Welcome to the worst part of the hero career track.”

***

Aizawa has never been so angry in his life, not even at himself.

Half the upcoming Hero Course of UA in the hospital with toxic gas inhalation or injuries sustained in combat.

Katsuki Bakugo—his fucking student, his charge—kidnapped by the League of Villains.

All during a training camp for children at an undisclosed location. How did it go so wrong? He should have been out in the woods supervising the rest of his class instead of leaving them to the Pussycats. Vlad could have easily taken on the task of catching up the remedial students. If Aizawa wasn’t on Recovery Girl’s orders to “take it easy” after an emergency surgery caused by his own goddamn stubbornness, if he’d just been out there when the villains attacked—

“You should go home,” Vlad King says, settling into the chair next to his with a vending machine coffee. They’re both still in their hero costumes, and the blood hero’s bright red and white suit looks almost comical against the tiny, pastel green hospital chair. “I’ve got this shift. Go get some sleep.”

Aizawa scoffs. “Yeah. Sleep.”

Every room along this hallway is occupied by one of their students, the story of UA’s failure to protect its kids is just hitting the news outlets, and he’s supposed to sleep? Unlikely.

“You know as well as I do we’re expendable in this situation,” Vlad says, as if the idea doesn’t give him hives. “There’s a team assembling to get Bakugo back, and we won’t be on it. They have our statements. There’s nothing you or I can personally do to get our students out of here sooner. We can just take shifts here and wait for news.”

Aizawa rubs his hands over his face and stares across the hall into the room where Midoriya is lying unconscious and covered in bandages. It’s been thirteen hours since the attack, and in between police business and visits to the other students, he’s been here in this seat, watching that kid faze in and out of consciousness. When he had his first seizure around two in the morning, the nurses had to shoo Aizawa out of the way while they dealt with it.

Maybe he would be better serving his students by going home. It’s not like he’s doing any good here, and Recovery Girl arrived not long ago, so things will be looking up soon.

Aizawa curls over his phone, which has been silent for a record time of thirty-seven minutes now. Vlad is right—the rescue operation doesn’t need them. They probably won’t even find out Bakugo’s been retrieved until hours after it happens, assuming it happens. Assuming the League of Villains didn’t take him with the intent of meting out vengeance for their lost nomus, or stripping out his endocrine system and using it to build explosives.

No. This is a villain-making endeavor, Aizawa’s sure of that much. He’s equally sure that Katsuki Bakugo, for all his bravado and temper, is a future hero through and through.

Aizawa rests his forehead on the edge of his phone and takes a deep, steadying breath. Bakugo isn’t going to rest, so why should he be allowed to? And Inko Midoriya will be here soon to see her son—he should be here to meet her. His other students’ families will be coming in the next few hours, too, as news disperses and questions arise. He needs to be here to answer those questions. If Shinsou was the one missing, he wouldn’t want whoever was responsible to sleep. He’d want the whole world turned upside down until his kid was found.

“I’m staying for now,” he tells Vlad. “If you want to get some rest, you can go home now and relieve me tonight.”

Vlad frowns at the wall across from them for a minute, then accepts his fate and stands up. “Fine, we’ll do it your way. Call me if anything changes.”

“I will.”

Vlad leaves. Aizawa stays.

He speaks personally with every parent who comes to see their student. He fields calls from the police, Principal Nezu, and his journalist contacts. He greets Inko at the front entrance and walks her to her son’s room, keeps a gentle hand on her shoulder while she cries over Midoriya’s sleeping form. He answers questions, and questions, and more questions. He doesn’t have nearly as many answers as there are questions.

Twenty-four hours after the attack and thirty-six hours since he last slept, Aizawa trades shifts with Vlad and rides the bus home.

As soon as he steps inside his own safe, familiar apartment, the emotions of the past day bubble over like an unwatched pot of water, and he barely stops himself from punching a hole in the wall of the entryway. The television in the living room is tuned to a news station, and even from here he can see Bakugo’s school photo behind the news anchor and the words UA and failure on the closed captions.

So the whole world knows now. At least he won’t have to rehash the details for his family.

“Shouta, is that you?” Hizashi calls from inside, jogging to the front hallway.

Aizawa crumples, pressing his head to the wall and choking on the sob that rises up. Steady arms curl around him, and Hizashi holds the back of his neck and sways gently, murmuring comforting nonsense in his ear. It’s okay. It most certainly is not. They’ll find him. He can’t know that. You’re going to be okay. A blatant lie.

An emergency is still happening at this exact moment, and there’s nothing he can do but lean against his husband and keen like a wounded animal. How did he allow this to happen?

Bare feet tiptoe toward the front hall, and Aizawa wipes his face on his sleeve and pulls himself out of his body’s pitiful spiral just in time for Shinsou to see him. He knows from his own school days that there’s nothing scarier than seeing a teacher cry when something’s gone wrong. He needs to get his shit together. He needs to project unity and confidence, like Nezu’s most recent memo to the staff said.

Collecting his nerves, he turns to Shinsou and says, “Midoriya is in stable condition and expected to make a full recovery. Recovery Girl’s already seen to him.”

Shinsou’s eyes go wide, and he slumps against the wall like someone cut the wires holding him up. Aizawa knows that feeling too well.

The TV stays on the news station during the dinner Aizawa barely tastes, after his family goes to bed, and through the night as he sits frozen with his phone in his hands, relying on the faulty closed captioning with the volume off. Around three in the morning, Shinsou shuffles out of his room and burns off whatever nightmare it was this time by baking a half batch of cookies. They come out cracker thin and caramelized around the edges, and he mutters apologies about it as he joins Aizawa on the couch.

They don’t eat the cookies, but they don’t sleep, either.

***

The reporters camped out in front of the hospital recognize Shinsou first as he and Aizawa walk over from the bus stop, and having cameras and microphones shoved in his face makes him wish he had either looser morals or a less villainous Quirk to use on them. 

“Shinsou! Hitoshi Shinsou, do you know the missing boy?”

“Are you here to see your friends that UA failed to protect?”

“How do you feel knowing that UA doesn’t care about the lives of its students?”

“Uh, no comment?” Shinsou says, looking up at Aizawa. “Right?”

That’s the moment when the reporters recognize the unkempt man in all black who’s walking with him and surge forward, surrounding them.

The questions hit like acid. “Aizawa, how did you let this happen?” and “Is this what parents should expect from your teaching?” and “How do you justify being here when one of your students is missing?” as if Aizawa is personally responsible for the mess the League of Villains made. Someone in the back throws out “Are you replacing the student you lost with Hitoshi Shinsou?” and Shinsou wants to turn around and curse that person out, but he doesn’t want to make things worse.

Aizawa sets his jaw stiffly and says nothing, guiding Shinsou toward the front doors with one protective arm. They slip through the glass doors into the lobby, and the voices of the reporters go from a cacophony to distant street noise as both sets of doors shut behind them.

“Still wanna be a pro hero?” Aizawa says with a wry smirk.

Shinsou’s pretty sure the question is rhetorical, but he says “Yes” anyway and holds his head high.

Aizawa’s exhausted eyes go so soft looking at him that for a second Shinsou thinks he’s going to cry again. Instead, he sets a hand on Shinsou’s head and gives him a little nod before heading toward the elevators.

Upstairs in the wing of the second floor that’s being guarded by pro heroes, there are only a handful of UA students left. Between details the press leaked and the sparse details Aizawa has shared since he came home last night, Shinsou has gathered that the majority of the injuries were from some kind of poisonous gas Quirk. Most of the students who got hit with the gas have already been released to their families, so it’s just the ones who had to engage in actual combat that remain. He spots that bird-headed kid from 1-A curled up with a book in one of the rooms they pass, and the guy from 1-B with the metal Quirk in another, getting scolded by a nurse.

Midoriya is sleeping, which isn’t a surprise from what Aizawa’s told him. On the way over, Shinsou had imagined himself sitting down next to Midoriya’s bed and holding his hand while he sleeps, but that isn’t possible in reality, because both of his arms are encased from shoulder to fingertips in casts.

“I’m going to check on the other students,” Aizawa says, touching his back gently. “Just down the hall. I’ll be back soon.”

“Okay,” Shinsou says, even though the idea of not being in the same room feels weirdly vulnerable.

Aizawa slips out the door without a sound, leaving Shinsou alone in the room with his boyfriend’s sleeping form.

Shinsou stands awkwardly next to the bed for a minute, then pulls over a chair from the other side of the room. The chair’s feet squeak on the floor, and a selfish part of him hopes the sound will wake Midoriya up, but it doesn’t. He slouches in the chair at Midoriya’s bedside, folding his hands together and trying to figure out something to do or say. It’s the second time in a month he’s wound up sitting next to someone he cares about while they’re unconscious in a hospital bed, and of all the ugly side effects of training to be a pro hero, that has to be the one he hates the most.

There is so much waiting in the pro hero world, and all of it is the worst kinds of waiting. Waiting for something terrible to happen, waiting for backup while your heart pounds out of your chest, waiting in hospitals, waiting to breathe until you know who’s alive and who isn’t. Shinsou knows he’s got the talent and drive to be a pro hero, but does he have the emotional fortitude to do this whenever something goes awry?

Maybe not, but watching Midoriya’s chest rise and fall in his sleep, he thinks it would be worth the heartache. Being around Midoriya and Aizawa and Hizashi—all these heroes he loves—is worth this. Even if the world turns against pro heroes. Even if he fails all his exams and can’t get into the Hero Course and has to get a desk job or something.

He sits by Midoriya’s bed and writes a letter on the hospital notepad, which he leaves folded on the bedside table when he and Aizawa leave.

***

“Shit.”Aizawa untangles the tie he’s been attempting to tie for the past ten minutes.

“Shouta, if you’d just let me help,” Hizashi says from the bed, a sad note in his voice.

“I can do it,” Aizawa grumbles, trying again. “I did this every day for years. The muscle memory is still there, it just won’t—goddammit.”

“I know you can do it,” Hizashi says diplomatically. “Under normal circumstances, which these are not. Did you sleep at all last night?”

The answer is no, and that’s a fight he is not willing to have right now. Dropping his arms, he says, “Fine. You do it.”

Hizashi has the tie perfectly knotted for him in what feels like half a second, and he realizes that time isn’t moving like it should. Ah, so he’s hit the phase of sleep deprivation where his brain stops tracking time correctly. Right before going on live television to represent his employer. Perfect.

“Weren’t you going to shave?” Hizashi asks.

Aizawa hisses. “Knew I forgot something.”

“I’ve got you.” His husband leads him to the bathroom, sits him on the edge of the tub to stop him from swaying, and carefully removes the past few days’ worth of stubble. Hizashi’s touch is soft and efficient, not a single wrong turn to the razor in his hand. The closeness calms some of the nerves swarming in Aizawa’s head. When he tips his head back for Hizashi, he thinks he could almost fall asleep like this, his head in Hizashi’s hand. Like he used to fall asleep on him and Oboro when they were teenagers. He knows they had bets going about the weirdest places he would fall sleep. They had so many stupid bets that never got collected.

Did UA have to hold a press conference after Oboro died? He can’t remember. He wasn’t exactly coherent at the time.

Will he have to do another press conference if Bakugo dies?

He flinches at his own thought, and Hizashi clucks his tongue, adjusting his head again to get that spot at the corner of his jaw.

When they step out of the bathroom, Shinsou is waiting to present him with a gel pack and a bottle of water. This fucking kid. His mind seizes on the fact that if all goes well, he won’t be coming home to this kid for much longer. Avoiding eye contact to keep himself collected, he takes what’s offered and eats before he leaves.

In the green room behind UA’s press room, Principal Nezu gives Aizawa and Vlad a pep talk that could be described as both cryptic and threatening. So, normal Nezu, then. It ends with “Remember: You are humble, you are somber, you know nothing more than the press do, and if you stray from that image, we will have a murder on our hands. Possibly two!”

Aizawa glances sideward at Vlad, whose expression confirms his suspicion. Their job isn’t to reassure the public, it’s to obfuscate the real plan. So the retrieval team is going in soon. Will it begin before or after the press conference ends? Aizawa breathes deep into his core to slow his racing pulse. If he’d known he’d be playing the distraction today, he might have actually tried to sleep last night.

No, that’s a lie. But he would’ve at least had another coffee.

The press conference is a blur of camera flashes and strangers he wants to punch calling out questions. Aizawa manages to hide his disdain and not chew anyone out for their insulting questions, which is about the best that can be expected of him today. Nezu doesn’t scold them afterwards, which he takes to mean they did a passable job.

As soon as they’re back in the green room afterwards, Vlad turns on the television in the corner, and they sit to wait for the news. It doesn’t take long for the reports to start coming in, and then suddenly, all attention shifts to Kamino Ward.

***

Shinsou watches the world change live on TV, alone.

Hizashi got an alert on his phone that pulled him out of the apartment in full costume, none of Shinsou’s friends are picking up their phones, and the cat won’t come near him because he’s shaking so hard he accidentally elbowed her, so it’s just him on the couch, unable to take his eyes off the screen as All Might fights against a faceless villain. No one on the news team understands what’s happening. The reporter on location can’t stop crying. Shinsou can’t stop crying. The Symbol of Peace is being murdered in front of them. What is there to do but watch it happen and cry?

When All Might emerges from the dust skeletal and bloodied, a wail rises from one of the nearby apartments. Shinsou claps his hands over his mouth, feeling sick. His bare toes clench the edge of the couch cushion.

“Come on, All Might,” he whispers against his palms, wishing he had one of Midoriya’s three dozen plushes to hold onto right now.

Midoriya. Midoriya is awake by now to watch this. Oh, god. Shinsou tries calling him again, but it goes straight to voicemail.

Whoever was wailing in the neighboring apartment is yelling now. They’re not alone. The building has never been so loud, and it’s all people yelling at their TV screens as a villain with somehow dozens of Quirks uses every damn one of them against All Might. The old lady next door is banging something on the floor or the wall, but she’s also yelling at her TV, her reedy voice shrieking, “KICK HIS ASS, YOU SKINNY SON OF A BITCH!”

The skinny son of a bitch kicks the faceless villain’s ass, just barely, and the sound that follows is like nothing Shinsou has ever heard before. It’s screaming and cheering, and it’s coming from everywhere—the walls, the hallway, and especially through the partly open window, out in the muggy night air, as people flood the street below.

People are celebrating All Might’s win, but Shinsou is frozen in place. He may not be in the Hero Course, but he knows enough about the pro hero life by now to understand that this isn’t a victory.

It’s an ending.

They’ve all just watched All Might fight his final battle. The man is still standing, his costume hanging off his bony shoulders, but the Symbol of Peace is dead.

What happens to the pro hero world without him?  The entire life path Shinsou has laid out for himself and fought to make happen feels like it’s crumbling in front of him. The only thing he knows with certainty is that the world just got much, much more dangerous.

Call me when you get this, Shinsou texts Midoriya.

It takes over an hour for Midoriya to finally call, and when he does, he’s somewhere loud and full of other voices.

“Izuku,” Shinsou says, his shoulders drooping. “Thank god. Did you see the news? Are you okay?”

Midoriya talks over the end of his sentence like he doesn’t even hear him. “Hitoshi, I can’t do this anymore.” His voice is missing its usual lively spark. It sounds like he’s been crying—unsurprising—but his tone is oddly flat.

“Can’t do what?” Shinsou says.

“This. With you. I’m not in a place where I can—“ A shaky breath. “My life is a mess. You have no idea.”

Cold spreads through Shinsou’s insides. “So explain it to me.”

“I can’t. Hitoshi, I’m sorry. I can’t do this anymore. It’s over.”

“Izuku--”

“Stay away from me. Please.”

The gentle beep of the call ending snaps Shinsou’s stupid naive heart right in half. 

***

Every available pro hero in the area wants to aid in the rescue effort in Kamino Ward, which means commuting in a local pro team’s supersonic jet, which means Aizawa is nauseous on top of…well…everything. At least Hizashi was on the backup call list, so they get to sit together as they hurtle toward the hole in the world where All Might made his last stand. Aizawa normally has a firm policy against acknowledging their relationship when they’re in costume, but nothing about tonight is normal. He holds Hizashi’s hand the whole way there and doesn’t give a shit if his former students in the next row notice.

Kamino Ward has been split by a crater that could be seen from space. Oh boy, rubble. His favorite.

They’re assigned to a team and start searching for survivors. Hizashi’s Quirk is uniquely suited to this kind of work, though Aizawa knows he dreads it. Hooking up his directional speaker system to an app on a tablet, Hizashi sends out pulses of sound and builds a three dimensional map of air pockets and bodies underneath the fallen buildings.

Aizawa helps excavate. His Quirk isn’t helpful for much in this situation, so he’s just an extra pair of hands lifting chunks of concrete and rebar, and an extra pair of ears listening for voices beneath his feet. As the night wears on, he starts to hear Oboro’s voice calling to him from under the rubble. It’s impossible. It’s just his mind doing the same upsetting ventriloquism act it’s been pulling since he was sixteen. But he hasn’t slept in three and a half days, and when he spots a tuft of pale blue hair beneath a flattened car, he lurches for it instinctively.

It’s a kid’s doll, not a crushed teenager, and the hair isn’t even blue, it’s white. He’s losing his mind. Kind of surprised it lasted this long.

By some twisted miracle, Aizawa isn’t the one who hits his limit first. As they’re investigating two blocks out from the epicenter, Hizashi goes dead silent and sits down on a mound of bricks, his hero persona falling away all at once. Aizawa drops the cinderblocks he was carrying and rushes over, kneeling in front of his husband and taking the tablet carefully from his grip.

“This was apartments,” Hizashi says, his face pale and his eyes unfixed behind his sunglasses. “Old building, pre-earthquake codes. It’s. It’s really bad.”

Aizawa flags down one of the organizers, a rescue and recovery hero with a projection Quirk who’s been acting as a living billboard for instructions. She studies the tablet and radios in a pro with a superhearing Quirk to listen for heartbeats.

“You need a break?” the organizer asks Hizashi.

“Gimme a minute, I just—” Hizashi says, squeezing his eyes shut and clearly trying to rally himself. His voice isn’t Present Mic, it’s just Hizashi, worn through and on the verge of tears. The knuckles of his clenched hands are turning white.

Aizawa hears Shinsou’s voice rattling around in his head, clear as day and pissed as hell. You’re just going to throw yourself around like you don’t matter?

What the hell is he doing. Measuring his sleep deprivation in days instead of hours as if it will bring his student back safe. Chasing ghosts through a field of rubble because if he takes care of himself for one goddamn minute it means he’s letting someone else get hurt. Holding himself personally responsible for all the bad shit that happens in the world isn’t just self-destructive, it’s selfish. There are so many people around them right now, hundreds of pro heroes and even civilians picking through the wreckage of Kamino Ward, and every time another survivor is pulled from the debris they all stop to cheer, a wave of joy and solidarity. He’s only a small part of that.

The kid was right.

“Mic doesn’t need a minute,” Aizawa tells the organizer, handing over the tablet. “He needs to be done here, and so do I, if you can spare us. We’re teachers at UA. We were already at our limit before we arrived.”

“I understand,” the organizer says, and sounds like she actually does. “Look, not to downplay your contributions, but half the pro heroes in Japan showed up for this recovery effort, so you’re expendable. Don’t burn yourselves out here. Go home. Your community will need you in the aftermath.”

As they walk toward the pro who’s ferrying people to and from the site, Hizashi leans his head on Aizawa’s shoulder and says, “You must be listening to Shinsou, because I know you don’t listen to me.”

“Maybe I’ll start.”

“Like hell you will.” Hizashi is shaking, but at least there’s a smile in his voice. “Smart kid. Maybe we oughtta keep him around.”

The words tug something in Aizawa’s chest, but it is too late and they are too much of a mess to for him to try and make a real conversation out of a half-hearted joke.

On the ride home, he leans against his husband and tries to sleep. It doesn’t work, but he tries. That has to be worth something.

***

The last time Shinsou felt like this, he was seven years old, staring through the wire mesh window of the res care facility’s intake office as his parents walked toward the exit down the hall. All the kids’ shows said that family was for good and parents always came back, but watching them walk away, he understood that he was the exception to those rules. Family was for good for people who weren’t like Shinsou. Parents only came back for kids who didn’t scare them.

The minute Shinsou thinks something is going to be okay, the world has to remind him that he doesn’t deserve okay, let alone stable and happy, or getting to be “kinda my favorite person” to someone he thinks he might love.

Everyone leaves Shinsou behind. His parents did it, every foster family he’s ever had has done it, the UA administration did it, Midoriya did it, and Hizashi and Aizawa are going to do it, too, as soon as they can pawn him off on someone else. Hell, they left him here alone while the world was falling apart. It’s been hours. He doesn’t even know what time it is, but the apartment is dark except for the TV screen and the blue glow of his phone, which is down to 5% battery because he’s been sending texts every ten minutes to his boyfriend. Ex-boyfriend. Ex-favorite person.

If he tallies up all the things he’s lost today, the weight of it will crush him. He can feel a panic attack building in the back of his head, everything tight and loud, and the only thing holding it off is the sound and color of the TV news.

When the apartment door opens, it’s been dark out for so long that a gray rim of pre-dawn light is creeping along the horizon. Shinsou hears Aizawa and Hizashi murmur in the entryway, the shuffle of boots being removed and coats shrugged off.

They’re home. Finally. That will be a comforting distraction. Anything to get him out of his head. Shinsou stands up and approaches the front hall, crossing his arms and trying not to look like he’s on the verge of a breakdown.

Hizashi is the first one inside, and he doesn’t even make eye contact. Walking past Shinsou, he goes straight to the couch, turns off the TV, and leans back like all the air’s gone out of him.

“Hizashi?” Shinsou says, his voice creaking.

“He needs a break,” Aizawa says from the entryway, taking a moment to make the sign next to his ear that means Hizashi’s turned off his hearing aids.

He needs a break. From Shinsou? Sure. Everyone does, apparently. Shinsou swallows down a surge of bile and forces himself to talk to distract himself. “What happened? Are you okay? Is he okay?”

“Rescue effort,” Aizawa answers, his tone flat. “We’re fine. We should all just get some sleep.”

Shinsou’s voice is shaky, but if he doesn’t talk about something other than what’s in his head, he’s going to fall apart. “What happened with that student who was kidnapped? Did All Might save him?”

“I don’t know,” Aizawa says, more of a grumble than an answer. “I just need to go to bed.”

Shinsou feels so fucking useless. “I wish I’d been there to help, in Kamino Ward. At the fight or picking up the pieces afterwards or—”

“No, you don’t,” Aizawa cuts him off, eyes glinting. “I had friends there. I had students there. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The words hit like a slap. Shinsou’s chest constricts, and his throat won’t let enough air through. Aizawa tries to move past him in the hallway, but Shinsou steps in front of him.

The words won’t stay inside him. They all come out in a rush. “No, I know the whole fucking world changed while I was stuck here watching it on TV and neither of you would pick up your phones. I know you’ve spent months telling me I belong in the Hero Course. I know all I’ve ever wanted is to be a hero.” Not true. He wanted Midoriya, too. “This is my business, too!”

“No, this is my business!” Aizawa yells, too loud, too close, right in his face. “You are an unlicensed child in the General Studies Course!”

The sensation of hot breath on his face and his ears ringing from a shout sends Shinsou’s body straight into fight or flight mode. It chooses fight, fingers balling into fists, legs coiling, shaking like one of the buildings crumbling on live TV tonight. “I am a future pro hero,” he bites out, his own voice rising. “You said so.”

“Guys, please,” Hizashi says from the living room, sounding exhausted.

“Please what?” Shinsou says, his voice high in his throat. Nothing makes sense, except that everything makes sense, because the natural equilibrium of his existence is everything sucking. “Please what? Please shut up when we scream at you? Please don’t complain when everything goes to shit and no one wants you?”

Aizawa raises his hands, finally looking him in the eye. “Hitoshi, calm down.”

All the fire’s gone out of his voice, but it doesn’t matter, because it’s all in Shinsou now. He’s burning alive, all raw nerves and anger. Everything is different and everything is wrong and Aizawa’s words feel like an old res care coordinator telling him Calm down and Stop exaggerating and You must have provoked them.

His last foster father texting him Don’t make a scene to avoid talking to him in the social services hallway.

His mother teaching him to read and then speaking to him with a dry erase board for months, before she got too afraid of him to even do that.

His voice cracks over the words “Why doesn’t anyone want me?” at the same time that all the fire in him explodes outward. His Quirk grabs at everything around him, so when Aizawa says his name and Hizashi makes a startled noise, they’re both caught in his net, frozen in place.

Shinsou freezes with them for a second, processing what he’s just done. It’s the thing every parent he’s ever had has been terrified he’d do to them one day. It’s the thing his mother and father lived in fear of. He’s been so careful to not be the thing everyone is afraid he’ll be.

They were right to be afraid of him. Here’s his rotten core, exposed for anyone to see.

That’s it. That’s the end of all the good things he’s scraped together. His life is over.

Aizawa’s face is frozen so close to his, eyes wide and mouth half open. He even looks scared.

Scary Hitoshi Shinsou uses his scary Quirk to walk his foster father out of his way, and then without looking back, he runs.

***

When Aizawa comes back into his mind enough to shake off the brainwashing, he doesn’t know how long it’s been, but he knows he fucked up.

“Hitoshi?” he calls. The apartment is silent. Opening the front door, he scans the hallway. “Hitoshi!” he yells.

“Shh!” his elderly neighbor hisses as she shuffles by with her tiny dogs. “Can’t you people do anything quietly?”

Aizawa might be three and a half days into sleep deprivation and in the middle of multiple crises ranging from family level to national, but he’s coherent enough to know that’s bait. Instead of taking it, he stops her and asks, “Ma’am, have you see a teen boy with lavender hair?”

The old lady huffs. “You mean the one who nearly ran over my dog on our morning walk?”

“Yes! Which way did he go?”

“Took off across the park,” she says. “That had to be twenty minutes ago. You’ll never catch the little menace.” 

Aizawa’s breath hitches. He’s been running sprints with that kid for long enough to know how quickly he can move when he’s motivated. And if he’s crossing the park, he’s headed toward—where? Downtown? Midoriya’s? The river?

“Thank you,” Aizawa tells his neighbor, letting himself back into the apartment.

Shinsou’s shoes are still in the entryway. His phone is on the couch next to where Hizashi is frozen. He’s out there fleeing to god knows where, barefoot, with no way to be reached, in his pajamas.

Aizawa kneels on the couch and turns Hizashi’s face toward him, patting his cheek to try and snap him out of it. They haven’t tested Shinsou’s Quirk with a distance longer than the length of the gym, but if it’s anything like the other mental Quirks Aizawa’s helped to train, it will wear thin the farther away its user goes.

It takes a few minutes of pats, shaking, and other assorted physical stimuli to get Hizashi to come to. The thing that actually does it is lifting his husband’s finger to his open eye. As soon as the pad of his finger gets within a few millimeters of his cornea, Hizashi flails his arm and jerks away, saying, “Jesus Christ, what is going on in this house?”

Hitoshi hit us with his Quirk, Aizawa signs.

Powerful Quirk, Hizashi signs, stretching his neck.

He ran off. I don’t know where he went.

Hizashi frowns at him, then at the front door, then turns his hearing aids on and takes out his phone. “I’ll call the police.”

Aizawa reaches out and covers the phone with his hand. “Kid’s been afraid of being treated like a villain his whole life, and he just used his Quirk on two pro heroes. You think he’s going to react well to a police intervention?”

Hizashi curses. “Shouta, what happened? I didn’t catch most of it.”

Aizawa replays the events in his head, feeling sick. “I yelled at him. Abused kid, night of a national tragedy, and I snapped and yelled at him.” He drags a hand over his face, trying to trace back the things Shinsou was saying in those last moments. Something about no one wanting him, which might as well be the thesis statement carved into that kid’s psyche. Shit. “I stumbled onto a trigger I should’ve known was there and stomped down.”

Hizashi doesn’t try to tell him it’s not his fault, which is good, because this time it really is. “We’ll find him,” he says firmly. “We can reach out to his GSA friends and see if anyone knows where he would go.”

“I’ll try Midoriya,” Aizawa says, grabbing his keys. “I’m going to see if I can track Hitoshi down on foot. You stay here in case he comes back on his own. He doesn’t have his keys.”

Hizashi pulls him into a quick, steadying hug, then lets him go running out of the apartment.

Aizawa dials as he jogs across the street toward the park. Midoriya’s phone rings several times, then picks up with a rush of background noise that takes Aizawa a moment to identify: the chatter and rush of a morning train.

“I’m really sorry, Mr. Aizawa,” Midoriya says instead of a hello.

Aizawa pauses. “What are you sorry for?”

“Uh, I guess that depends,” Midoriya answers. “What are you calling about?”

Is it possible to glare over the phone? Aizawa tries, startling an early morning dog-walker who’s in his path. “Shinsou,” he says, because he doesn’t have time to play Guess Midoriya’s Newest Misadventure.

“I’m really sorry,” Midoriya repeats, his voice wobbling. “He’s such a good person, and I just wanted to do right by him by keeping him out of my mess. I didn’t want to hurt him.”

Aizawa pinches the bridge of his nose as the pieces come together to form an ugly picture. “Midoriya, did you just break up with my kid?”

“He didn’t tell you?”

In the glow of the fading streetlights, Aizawa can see every corner of the park to tell that it’s empty. He finds a couple of bare footprints tracking mud from the lawn across the sidewalk, headed in the direction his awful neighbor pointed. They lead toward a crossroads, one of the biggest intersections in the area. Left leads to residential, right to shops, straight toward downtown. Downtown means the highway, the river, and tall buildings—easy places to hide or get hurt.

“No, he didn’t tell me,” Aizawa says, taking off across the street. He hesitates at the corner, then picks straight and runs. “We got into an argument when I got home, and he ran off. I’m trying to find out where he went. Do you have any ideas?”

Midoriya sucks in a breath, and amidst the background noise, Aizawa hears a familiar voice yelling an insult at someone. His pulse goes loud in his ears.

“Midoriya,” he says, his feet slowing. “Is Bakugo with you?”

“Yeah.”

Aizawa pauses to lean against the wall of a building, because his legs suddenly don’t want to support his weight. He takes a deep breath. “We will talk about that later.”

“Yes, sir. Sorry again.” Midoriya swallows. “I don’t know where Hitoshi would go, aside from my place.”

“Call if you think of anything,” Aizawa says, and hangs up.

Midoriya dumped Hitoshi, he texts his husband.

A minute later, Hizashi texts back a swearing emoji, an axe emoji, and a skull emoji. Same.

No clues from Ochako or Mina, Hizashi follows up. Inko will keep an eye out for him just in case. Have you tried your network?

This brilliant, perfect human. Of course. Use your resources, Shouta.

He sends an emergency alert to his contacts at the encampment near downtown: MISSING KID: Male 15yo 5’9” lavender hair, wearing blue pajama pants & grey t-shirt. Info only, do not approach. He adds a recent photo, a selfie they took together on the first day of Shinsou’s internship, and crops himself out.

A few fruitless blocks later, a reply comes from Mei. Of course she’d be up this early. got half the camp out looking, she texts. we got downtown and the river covered Dial says you owe him strawberries

Whoever finds the kid can have a gift basket and a night in a hotel, Aizawa fires back.

you’re on, comes the reply.

***

It isn’t until Shinsou is a couple miles from home and wandering through downtown that he starts to feel his feet. Even though the night is warm, he’s stepped in enough puddles that there’s cold mud cracking between his toes. The soles of his feet are scraped and sore, and every time they land on the sidewalk, there’s an audible slap and a jolt that goes up his shins. He’s not sure when, but at some point, something sharp got embedded in his left heel. It’s the same side he sprained an ankle on the first day he was living with Aizawa and Hizashi, and as his adrenaline ebbs, he feels the ankle rolling to avoid putting pressure on that wound.

At least the sidewalks here are mostly clean. It’s ass o’clock in the morning, and the shops along this stretch are all dark windows and neon signs, except for one all-night ramen place on the corner that’s bright as day. Hardly anyone else is out yet.

His body keeps moving, but it takes him a while to realize where it’s going. This is the route Eraserhead walks on patrol on quiet afternoons. He’d mapped it out online after their first day and tried to memorize it, as if that would impress Aizawa.

There’s no impressing Aizawa now. No working toward being a pro hero. No nice little temporary family and no nice little temporary cat. He’s ruined it all. It didn’t even take much, just one bad night. So everyone was right about him after all. If it only takes one bad night to slip into villainy, how much of a hero could he be? Never mind what kind of a person that makes him.

His parents must have understood how rotten he was inside. They were right to get away from him. No wonder they didn’t want him. No wonder Aizawa and Hizashi and Midoriya and the Watanabes and all the rest didn’t want him. He doesn’t want himself, either. It’d probably be best for everyone if he got rid of himself, but he doesn’t know how to die without inconveniencing yet another person who doesn’t deserve to deal with his shit. Jumping off a building means there’s cleanup for someone else. Drowning means fishermen find his remains. Would it be unethical to brainwash a villain into killing him? Does it matter? Dead boys don’t need ethics.

If he abandons his useless morals entirely, he can pick any strong looking stranger off the street and brainwash them into snapping his neck. He won’t even have to climb stairs or find a bridge. Maybe this is the one good thing his Quirk can do.

His left foot sends a spike of pain up his leg and rolls, jerking him into a fall. All his weight lands on that ankle, twisting it sideways, and when he hits the ground, his body lights up with every iota of pain the adrenaline has masked.

“Hey, you okay?” someone across the street calls, but she’s young and skinny and probably not what he needs if he wants to—

If he wants to—what? Commit suicide via an innocent bystander?

Jesus, Shinsou. What the hell is wrong with you?

He bites down on his lip and pushes himself back to his feet, ignoring the person. Walking as quickly as he can on his messed up ankle, he takes the next available turn, away from people.

It’s a dead end, terminating in an alley with a loading zone for a nearby shop. He stares at the cinderblock wall in front of him, and whatever crusted emotional glue’s been holding him together for the past half hour finally breaks. He doesn’t want to die, and he really doesn’t want to hurt anyone else to do it, but his life is over. What else is there?

Folding himself into a dark corner, he hides his head in his arms and has the panic attack he’s been staving off all night.

***

Aizawa’s phone buzzes as he’s headed toward the river. It’s Mei.

he’s in the alley behind the downtown Lawson and the parking ramp.

Changing course, Aizawa picks up his pace. He knows exactly the spot. He once fought a villain with a goat Quirk in that alley and woke up in a dumpster.

I owe you, he types before breaking into a sprint.

you owe Kiyoko, Mei replies. she spotted him

Aizawa hasn’t run this fast since his first time testing out Shinsou’s Quirk. His body is exhausted and shaky, but he barely feels it as he moves. Only half a mile away from trying to make things right. A quarter mile. Two blocks.

When he approaches the alley, he sees a teen girl with glowing orange eyes leaning against the wall just outside it. She’s got layers of jackets hanging off her elbows and an unlit cigarette in her mouth, and when he jogs up, she straightens up to face him.

“I was gonna follow him, but I don’t think he’s going anywhere,” she says, keeping her voice low like she’s trying not to spook a deer nearby.

“Thank you,” Aizawa says. “I owe you.”

The girl, Kiyoko, shrugs. “I kinda owed the kid. Just take care of him. And get Dial his strawberries.”

Dial will get his strawberries. Aizawa is going to buy a whole bodega worth of produce to share with the encampment.

He takes a deep breath and ducks into the alley.

Shinsou isn’t far inside, curled up in a ball in a corner underneath a wall of faded posters and graffiti. His breath is coming in gulps big enough to make his whole body shudder. Aizawa’s heart aches.

“Hitoshi,” he says softly, and realizes he has no idea what to say to make this better. He walks over and sits on the dirty ground next to his kid, offering a hand on his back.

Shinsou startles but doesn’t look up at him. “I’m sorry,” he chokes out from between his arms.

“It wasn’t your fault,” Aizawa says, smoothing the back of Shinsou’s shirt with his thumb. “It’s my job to protect you, and I didn’t.”

The kid goes so quiet that Aizawa can hear the fabric move when he raises his head. His face is streaked with tears, and if Aizawa had been paying attention when he came home, he would’ve noticed how dark the rings under his eyes look today and how he hasn’t brushed his hair or changed out of his pajamas from yesterday. He should’ve noticed. Maybe if he’d slept, or if his class wasn’t in crisis, or if the world wasn’t burning down around them, he would’ve. He will notice next time. He will.

“I brainwashed you,” Shinsou says miserably, wiping a scuffed hand across his eye.

“Not your fault,” Aizawa says. “You’re a kid. You’re my kid, and it’s my job to keep arguments from escalating like that. Instead, I yelled right in your face when you were already hurting. That was me failing you, not the other way around.”

Shinsou stares at him, his eyes darting around Aizawa’s face like he’s trying to decipher a riddle.

Apologize. Say the words.

“Hitoshi, I’m sorry,” Aizawa says. “Will you come home?”

The boy pulls back from him, frowning. “No, I—no. I should go back to the facility. I’m not safe to be around. You don’t want me. The lady with the two cats probably won’t want me after this. No one wants me, it’s—it’s just the way things are. I get it.”

Shinsou is babbling, his voice wavering and cracking, and Aizawa can’t stand it. Circling an arm around the boy, he runs his fingers up through tangled hair and leans him in close. Shinsou’s voice cuts out with a sob.

“That’s not true,” Aizawa says, resting their heads together. “We’re going to meet her next week, and I’d bet everything I have that she’ll want to take you home to her cats.”

Shinsou presses a curled hand against his mouth. His voice is barely there. “How could anyone want me?”

“How could anyone not?” Aizawa says, the words punched out of him. “Hitoshi, we love you. I love you.” He draws back just enough to look him in the eye. “We want you to have a permanent family that’s supportive and—and not dysfunctional pro heroes who can’t cook or relax, but that doesn’t mean we don’t want you. You hear me?”

Shinsou’s eyes stare past him, his brows furrowing, and Aizawa isn’t sure if anything he says is landing.

“You’re not getting rid of us, Hitoshi,” he says, cradling the kid’s cheek with his free hand. “As far as I’m concerned, you will always be a part of our family, no matter where you end up. Is that okay with you?”

Shinsou’s eyes settle on his, and finally, it seems like something gets through. He swallows and nods, slowly at first and then emphatically, his eyes blurring with tears. Leaning in, he presses his face to Aizawa’s shoulder and circles his arms around his waist. He feels so much more solid than the first time he held onto Aizawa, in the hallway of the social services building. Hard to believe it’s been so little time since then.

Aizawa wraps his arms around the boy and feels the vibrations of sobs in his sternum. Shinsou is warm and curled taut like a spring, and god, he wants to protect this kid more than anything. It’s a familiar feeling, that protective urge. Nearly as familiar is the heavy ache of failure that chases it.

He’s going to do better. He’s got to, for Hitoshi.

Found him, he texts Hizashi when he gets a chance, sending his location. Bring the car.

The kid takes a long time to cry himself out, and Aizawa doesn’t blame him. If there were anything left in his crusty, exhaustion muddled brain tonight, he’d be crying, too. He holds on tight and presses a kiss into the boy’s hair, hoping that any of this conversation will stick.

The car pulls up at the mouth of the alley after not too long, and Hizashi bounds out. Then Shinsou is in his arms, apologizing and getting shushed with “It’s okay, love, it’s okay. No harm done.”

After a little shushing, Shinsou pulls back and looks between them both. “Midoriya broke up with me tonight,” he says, like he’s just remembered.

“We know,” Hizashi says, sighing. “I’m sorry, kiddo.”

Aizawa pats him on the shoulder. “Want me to key his car for you?”

Shinsou frowns. “He doesn’t even have a drivers license.”

“I can wait.”

That actually gets a laugh, which is practically music after tonight. Maybe the kid will be okay. Aizawa will do his best every day to make sure he is.

***

At home, Shinsou washes the muck off his feet and lets Aizawa remove the shard of glass from his left heel and assess his twisted ankle. It hurts a little to put weight on it, but not nearly as much as last time.

“How is it?” Hizashi says from the doorway, where he’s standing with a fresh set of pajamas for Shinsou in hand.

“Probably not sprained,” Aizawa says, wrapping the ankle in a long bandage. His hands and voice are unexpectedly gentle. “If it’s still hurting in the morning, we’ll take you to see Recovery Girl.”

Shinsou’s throat is raw. He’s barely spoken since they got into the car, and the idea of speaking now sounds like the opposite of fun, but he needs to. The whole world is broken except this one thing.

“I—“ he starts, and needs to take a steadying breath. “I love you, too. Both of you.”

Stepping between Aizawa and a villain felt less exposed than that handful of words. They’re true, though.

Aizawa’s face breaks into a smile, which is the best and most unsettling thing he’s seen in ages. He smiles a little scary, but maybe they’re both a little scary. And maybe that’s not the worst thing.

Suddenly, Hizashi is perched next to Shinsou, arms around him, breathing out a satisfied little hum into his hair. Shinsou lets the weight of his head rest on his foster parent’s shoulder and closes his eyes. He’s so tired.

Aizawa fixes the bandage in place around his ankle and lowers the foot to the floor. “Glad we’re on the same page,” he says. “Now, can we get some sleep?”

“Please,” Hizashi says.

Shinsou could sleep for a year, but once his teeth are brushed and he’s in fresh pajamas, he finds himself leaning on the door frame of his bedroom, unable to make himself go inside.

“You okay, kiddo?” Hizashi says.

The idea of waking up alone in a room makes Shinsou’s throat feel tight. The idea of asking for what he wants is almost as bad, but then again, he’s already been such a mess tonight. How much more damage can he do?

He hugs his middle. “I don’t want to be alone.”

Hizashi doesn’t even hesitate. “Come on,” he says, grabbing a spare blanket off the couch. “We’ve got room for you.”

Aizawa is already shoulders deep in a blanket cocoon, and when Shinsou settles into the middle of the bed between him and Hizashi, he just nods and slings an arm across Shinsou’s chest. The weight is comforting, anchoring him in his tired body to the soft mattress and the fuzzy blanket. It feels weirdly normal, like so many things do with these two.

He falls asleep in the comfortable space between them.

Chapter Text

The third or fourth time Aizawa’s phone insists on ringing, he slaps it with one heavy hand and pulls it to his ear under the covers. “What.”

It’s the administrative office from the school. “Good morning, Mr. Aizawa, I’m calling to inform you that Principal Nezu is requesting your attendance for a follow-up press conference on campus today at 11am.”

“No.”

“No?” the administrative assistant on the other end says, sounding confused.

“I’m not available today, and neither is Yamada,” he says gruffly. “Family emergency.”

“Ah. I’m so sorry. Take all the time you need. I’ll let the principal know.”

Aizawa hangs up without saying goodbye. His phone screen flashes with unread messages—journalist inquiries, chatter from the pro hero channel, the official notification that Bakugo’s been returned safely to his parents, news alerts about yesterday’s disaster. He drops his phone off the edge of the bed and enjoys the thunk it makes agains the rug. Maybe if he’s lucky, he’ll step on it later and break it.

Hizashi is snoring lightly on the other side of the bed, a comforting sound.

Between them, Shinsou stirs under the fluffy blanket and blinks bleary-eyed at the morning light. “There’s another emergency?”

“This is emergency rest,” Aizawa says, patting his pillow.

“Oh, okay,” Shinsou says, laying his head back down. His hair is a pale cloud in the morning sunbeam that’s stretching across the bed. “Also, it’s…” He tries to make a familiar sign with the hand that isn’t shoved under his pillow, but it doesn’t quite read right.

Aizawa glances down the bed. The cat is curled up between them, her chin on the lump that must be Shinsou’s knee.

Trapped under cat. “Not quite. Here.” Aizawa reaches out to correct the sign. Shinsou’s fingers bend sleepily under his until it’s right, and he repeats the gesture a few times, his eyes drooping closed. Then he’s out.

Aizawa runs a hand through his kid’s hair and lets himself drift off, too.

The next time he wakes up, the sun has moved across the room, the cat is gone, and Hizashi is missing from the other side of the bed. Next to him, Shinsou is snuggled deep into his own blanket with his phone in front of his face, worry lines collecting between his eyebrows.

Aizawa stretches his neck against his pillow and rolls onto his side to face him. “How’re you doing?”

Shinsou frowns at his phone. “Fine.”

“Really?”

A sigh. “I don’t know.” Dropping his phone to the pillow, Shinsou inches further into his blanket cocoon. “I’ve been reading news about the battle last night for an hour, and I can’t shake this feeling that everything’s gonna be different now.”

“It will be,” Aizawa says, and privately kicks himself. Not exactly the comforting guidance a kid needs. He tries again. “There was life before the Symbol of Peace, and life will go on after. No matter what villains are coming up behind All For One, the pro hero community will rise to meet the challenge and win.”

“You really believe that?”

“I do. I wouldn’t be doing this job if I didn’t. And I definitely wouldn’t be teaching the next generation of heroes.”

Shinsou thinks on that for a minute, then nods. Glancing down at his phone, he says, “Midoriya texted me.”

“Yeah?”

“He wanted to ask if I’m okay and apologize. Like, a lot. He seems to think he’s the reason I—“ Shinsou looks away. “Y’know.”

“What did you tell him?”

The kid picks up his phone and shows the text log to him. It’s a long string of rambling apologies and excuses on Midoriya’s end and a single text from Shinsou that reads: I’ll be fine. Contrary to popular belief, not every crisis is about you.

Aizawa smirks. Good boy.

“Is that too harsh?” Shinsou asks, chewing on his lip.

“Not at all. Midoriya’s got an inflated sense of personal responsibility. A common issue in heroes. That’s why I don’t recommend dating them.”

Shinsou raises an eyebrow at him. “You married one.”

“So I speak from experience.” Perhaps more accurately, Hizashi married him and his obsessive need to save everyone. But it’s too early in the morning to think about that right now. Instead of lingering on it, he asks, “Think you’re going to talk to Midoriya beyond a pithy comeback?”

Shinsou shrugs, looking down. “I don’t know what I can say to make him change his mind.”

“It’s not up to you to change his mind. Breaking up with you was his decision to make. But if you want to still be friends after this, you should consider actually talking to him.” Aizawa rests a hand on his kid’s head and gives it a sympathetic pat. “His decision was bad, for the record. He was lucky to have you.”

Shinsou does that thing where he furrows his brow and inhales like he’s going to argue, but instead he just crosses his arms and quietly says, “Thanks.”

***

Last night is scribbled out like redacted information in Shinsou’s mental map of time. Looking directly at it hurts, like his head still hurts from crying so hard. He catches his reflection in the mirror after a shower and finds that, after trying to wash everything down the drain, there’s still a burst blood vessel in his right eye, a tiny red explosion next to his iris that won’t let him ignore what he did. His foster parents are being too kind to him, and he feels grateful and sore and empty and wrong.

His ankle feels normal by dinnertime, and that seems wrong, too. It shouldn’t be this easy to come back from the worst thing he’s ever done. Nothing is this easy. He doesn’t trust it.

At the dinner table, with his foster parents eating across from him and Pichi winding around his ankles begging for scraps, Shinsou stares at his bowl and watches green vegetables and sautéed chicken blur into a single color. He doesn’t realize why until a hot tear tumbles down his cheek. 

“Hey,” Hizashi says, tipping his head to the side. “What’s going on in there, Hitoshi?”

Now everyone’s staring, even the cat. She probably just wants chicken, but it’s not great being stared at by three sets of eyes. He sets down his chopsticks and covers his face with his hands. “I don’t understand,” he manages. “Why are you being so nice to me?”

There’s a silent stretch, and the tap of utensils being set down.

“Why wouldn’t we be nice to you?” Aizawa asks.

“Because—“ Shinsou drops his hands, unable to get a full breath. “Because I brainwashed you! I snapped and used my Quirk on you like a goddamn villain! The thing everyone’s been afraid of me doing forever, the whole reason my parents left me— The worst thing I’ve ever done, I did to you, last night, and you’re acting like its no big deal!”

“Kiddo,” Hizashi says gently.

“I’m not your kiddo.”

“Hitoshi,” Hizashi corrects, leaning forward and folding his fingers together. “If that’s the worst thing you’ve done in your whole life, then I’d say you’re doing pretty good at the whole not being a villain thing.”

Shinsou’s mouth works, but no sound comes out.

“Villainy isn’t having a scary Quirk,” Aizawa says, poking the greenery in his bowl. “It isn’t defending yourself or making a bad call when you’re in crisis. It’s a pattern of harm caused intentionally. Do you intend to brainwash us again?”

“No,” Shinsou says, frowning.

“Did you do it on purpose?”

“Not really, but—”

“If you’d been clear-headed, would you have done it?”

“No, of course not!”

“And have you been tormenting yourself all day about it, worse than any punishment we could possibly give you?”

Shinsou crosses his arms.

“I thought so,” Aizawa assesses.

“So you’re not gonna punish me or anything?”

“Sure,” Aizawa says, shrugging. “No TV for a week. Better?”

That…actually does feel a little better, even though it seems like more of a kindness than a punishment. The TV is all news out of Kamino Ward now, anyway, and probably will be for a while. He’s seen Aizawa struggle to keep himself away from it. Shinsou stares at his bowl, trying to will himself to eat.

In the quiet that follows, Hizashi leans back in his chair and runs fingers absently over the shell of his ear. “Did you know my Quirk manifested at birth?”

“No,” Shinsou says.

“The first thing I ever did was blow out the eardrums of everyone in the delivery room.” Hizashi shrugs. “And there were more after that, before my parents figured out a way to dampen my Quirk, and later, when things went wrong. I could easily have ended up in a facility for children with dangerous Quirks just like you, if my parents hadn’t assumed the best of me. I was just lucky—supportive family, adequate adaptive tech and training, and a Quirk that didn’t come with a truckload of stigma. You weren’t so lucky, and that’s not your fault.”

It’s not that simple. Shinsou’s parents did their best with him. If it could have gone differently, it would have. He shakes his head. “They must have seen that you weren’t a real threat.”

“Kids aren’t threats,” Hizashi says. “And they shouldn’t be treated like threats. Every kid deserves the kind of support I got, and that includes you.”

Shinsou’s pulse rises, and he doesn’t understand why. He agrees, on a basic level—everyone deserves that. But him? “I literally brainwashed you,” he says, aware that his voice is louder than he intended.

“Yeah, you did,” Hizashi says easily. “And I permanently deafened like six people before I could walk. What’s your point?”

“But—“ Shinsou looks to Aizawa, who’s watching their back and forth and placidly chewing. No help there.

How does he evict this feeling from his chest? Every kid deserves those things, but he’s the exception. He doesn’t. It’s the only way his life makes any sense. If there isn’t something uniquely wrong with him, then why have so many people left him?

He tries to make arguments and fails, curling his hands into fists on the table.

“Hitoshi, sweetheart,”  Hizashi says, laying a hand over his. “You spend a lot of time trying to talk people out of loving you. It’s not gonna work on us. You’re too charming and we’re too stubborn.”

Aizawa snorts into his food.

“That one especially,” Hizashi adds, pointing a thumb at his husband. “I’m afraid you’re just going to have to trust us when we tell you you’re lovable. Now, eat your dinner.”

Shinsou’s brain won’t reconcile the things Hizashi says with the reality he knows to be true, but after the last few days of chaos and stress, he doesn’t have the energy to do anything but take these new words and let them settle in. He can believe that these two people love him, even if he doesn’t fully understand how. Maybe that’s okay for now.

He eats his dinner and sneaks Pichi a piece of chicken under the table.

***

They meet with Shinsou’s potential adopter at a park on a quiet Tuesday afternoon, and it goes well. Aizawa likes her instantly. Her name is Ms. Nakamura, and she’s a tiny fifty-something-year-old woman in a sweatshirt with cats on it who strikes him as both genuinely warm and tough as nails. She brings along her adult son, a friendly young man with a wind direction Quirk that takes the breath from other people’s lungs. (The dangerous Quirk is mostly under control these days, but when he has a sneezing fit over the flowers on the boulevard, Aizawa fees lightheaded from oxygen deprivation for a moment.)

They get ice cream and sit at a table on a gently rolling hill and talk for two hours. Aizawa’s eyes barely leave Shinsou the whole time. The boy is smiling—shyly at first, and then then wider as Ms. Nakamura talks about her cats. She brings pictures on her phone, of course, which gets passed around the table with reverence at every adorable snapshot. She describes the process of raising a child with a dangerous Quirk, the rocky points and victories, and her son helps her fill in the details from his own experience. Shinsou goes very still when she mentions a medical emergency her son’s Quirk caused her. Aizawa rubs his back until he feels the kid take a few deep breaths.

Near the end of their visit, Ms. Nakamura’s son and Shinsou gather everyone’s trash and wander off toward the bins, getting into a conversation about something. Aizawa rests his chin on his hand and watches idly as they linger around the trash bins. The son is doing most of the talking, while Shinsou stuffs his hands into the pockets of his jeans and smiles at the ground.

This could work. Aizawa can see it: Shinsou’s quiet, well-supported life with this kind woman who doesn’t mind a challenge and her two photogenic cats, weekends with the son home and the two of them slowly becoming brothers, a normal home filled with love and understanding and structure. It’s a good fit. His stomach feels hollow.

“He seems like a wonderful boy,” Ms. Nakamura says, watching their kids talk across the park.

“He is,” Hizashi says. “We’re very fond of him.”

“I can tell.” Her eyes meet Aizawa’s, and he gets the sense that she’s not afraid of him, or of much else. “Mr. Aizawa, you’ve been so quiet this whole time. Is there anything you would like me to know about Hitoshi?”

Even if you give him a desk in his room, he’ll do his homework wherever people are, because he can’t focus in quiet.

When he gets upset, rubbing a circle between his shoulder blades helps ground him.

You have to love him loudly and without reservation so he’ll start to believe it.

He’s going to break your heart, and it’s absolutely worth it.

Aizawa studies the wood grain of the table and says, “He likes to help in the kitchen. Do you bake?”

In the car after their meetup, Hizashi turns the ignition and says, “Well, boys, what do we think?”

“She’s okay,” Shinsou says in the backseat, his arms folded behind his head. “Her son is kind of a dork, but not in a bad way.”

“You’re kind of a dork, so that works out great!” Hizashi says cheerily. “Shouta, what do you think?”

Aizawa’s knuckles dig into the side of his head. “It seems like a good match. It makes sense.” He tries to shake the unfair urge to trash talk that perfectly nice woman and comes up with: “Her cats are very cute.”

Everyone in the car agrees on that.

“Do you think she liked me?” Shinsou says. Behind his forced casual tone, his voice is thinner than usual.

“She called you ‘wonderful,’” Hizashi reports, grinning.

“Huh.” Shinsou’s arms drop into his lap, and he doesn’t say anything for the rest of the ride home.

***

There’s only one person Shinsou wants to talk to about the meeting with the potential adopter, and he spends the rest of the afternoon pushing that traitorous thought out of mind. He hasn’t touched the text thread with Midoriya in nearly a week. Until now, just thinking about it made his stomach churn from anxiety and hurt.

But his stomach is already churning from the day’s meeting. What’s it gonna do if he does text Midoriya—get even more pointlessly nauseous? Not possible.

The truth is hard to look directly at: He misses Midoriya. Shinsou is very good at putting people who’ve hurt him into tidy little boxes and banishing them to the Do Not Think About shelf in the back of his mind. He can hold a grudge like he’s getting paid to do it. But the longer he sits with what Aizawa said the morning after, the more he thinks he might be right. Midoriya didn’t abuse him or dump him on his social worker’s doorstep. He’s just a guy who didn’t want to date him anymore for some reason. A guy who used to be his friend. A guy who still cares about him, judging by the last text lingering unread on Shinsou’s phone.

I’m sorry everything is terrible. If you want to talk, I’m here.

Shinsou wants to talk. God, does he want to talk—and not to Aizawa, who’s at some kind of after-hours meeting anyway, and not to Hizashi, not about this. He knows his foster parents want what’s best for him, but talking with them about his potential adoption hurts. It just makes him think about how much he’ll miss them. Meanwhile, Midoriya can cut through nearly any emotional topic with sound logic and charts and enthusiasm. And that smile—no. Nope. He is not thinking about Midoriya’s smile. The smile is off-limits, along with the freckles and the blushing and basically the whole face. It’s not his face to enjoy anymore.

Shinsou makes it through dinner with Hizashi before he starts to feel like a soda bottle someone’s been kicking around. He helps wash the dishes, then retreats into his room and unlocks his phone.

I want to talk, he texts.

It only takes a minute for the three little dots to appear on the left side of the screen, and Midoriya replies, I’d like that. Phone or in person?

Shinsou considers the options. Phone makes him nervous. The last time they spoke was on the phone, and it didn’t go so well.

Meet me in the park across from my place, he texts.

ETA 15, Midoriya texts back.

Shinsou paces his room for approximately ten minutes, his phone clutched in both hands, then ventures out into the apartment. He leans over the back of the couch where Hizashi is grading papers with the cat on his lap. “Hey, I’m going to the park to meet Midoriya. Is that okay?”

Hizashi leans back to give him a nosy smile. “We’re rendezvousing with Midoriya again?”

“We’re talking with Midoriya. Don’t be weird about it or I’m gonna feel weird about it.”

“Okay, okay. Stay where I can see you from the window and take your phone.” Hizashi waves him in for a quick hug. “Good luck. I love you.”

“Love you, too,” Shinsou says. The words feel strange to say so casually, but at the same time, they’re so obvious that why wouldn’t he? He’s always wanted to have someone to say that to on his way out the door. He’s always wanted so many things that are becoming real right now, and it’s all a tangle he can’t talk about with Hizashi and Aizawa.

Hence the need for Midoriya. That needs to be the only reason.

The night air is humid, but at least there’s a light breeze rippling through the trees. Shinsou leans against a wall at the edge of the park, facing the street, and lingers on his phone while he waits.

That old lady from next door comes by on her evening walk with her two little dogs, and he straightens up and pockets his phone. “Good evening, ma’am.” 

The neighbor lady purses her wrinkled lips and hurries past him with a mutter under her breath. Still mad at him for stepping on her dog’s paw that night, then. He should bake her something as an apology. Or maybe he should just let it go, because if Ms. Nakamura wants him, he’ll only be living here for a matter of days.

That probably shouldn’t make him so sad.

The bus drops Midoriya off halfway down the block, which it turns out is just far enough away to allow for a full-blown internal crisis while Shinsou tries not to watch him walk the whole way. Is this a terrible idea? What if Midoriya was lying about wanting to see him again? Oh god, he’s still really cute, this is not going to go well. What if Midoriya notices him noticing his cute face? What if they get into an argument? What if they can’t be friends again? What does he do with his hands?

“Hi,” Midoriya says shyly as he stops a few feet away, his hands stuffed into the pockets of his baggy shorts.

“Hi,” Shinsou echoes, knowing he does not sound even the least bit cool or collected. “So, um.”

“Yeah.” Midoriya scratches the back of his head and gives an awkward chuckle. “You wanna, uh?” He shrugs toward the park.

Shinsou nods. They walk together, a foot or two apart, into the darkening city park. Shinsou steers them into a quiet alcove off the path not far in where a couple of benches are sheltered by the boughs of tall flower bushes. He can still see the light of the apartment window across the street, and most of the park, so it’s a good spot.

There are two benches, but Midoriya sits on the same one as him. Maybe that’s a good sign. That’s something friends do, sharing park benches. Friends are also usually able to make eye contact without looking instantly away like their retinas are being burned, but it’s a start.

“Thank you for coming,” Shinsou says, sandwiching his hands between his knees.

“I’m just glad you reached out,” Midoriya says, and it’s really nice to hear that genuine tone in his voice again.

Shinsou doesn’t know where to start, so he just drops the big ticket item with no preamble. “We met my potential adopter today.”

“Oh my god!” Midoriya’s hands fly up into the air. “Hitoshi, that’s amazing! How did it go?” His familiar bright, excited, I’m Going To Take Notes On This voice makes Shinsou’s shoulders relax a little. Maybe this friends thing is doable.

Shinsou tells him all about the visit with Ms. Nakamura and her son, and he genuinely seems to want to hear it all, down to the flavor of ice cream she ordered. (It was mint, which is gross, but ice cream preferences are not a dealbreaker in a possible parent.)

“She sounds kind of awesome,” Midoriya says when Shinsou is done word-vomiting at him. “Did you get to ask her son any questions?”

“Yeah, uh.” Shinsou pinches his eyes shut, trying to get over the lump in his throat. “I helped him with cleanup one-on-one and we talked a little. He said his Quirk sometimes got out of hand as a teenager when he was angry or tired, and every time it got used on her, she always sat down with him after and talked out their feelings about it.”

“That sounds good.”

“It sounds exhausting,” Shinsou says. 

“Well, it’s not like you brainwash your parents on the regular,” Midoriya says, like it’s a joke. In the silence that stretches out between them, he studies Shinsou’s expression, and his eyes go wide. “Oh crap, I’m sorry!”

“Not on the regular,” Shinsou clarifies, keeping his head down. “And not on purpose. And no one got hurt. But yeah. I was—I was arguing with Aizawa, that night after All Might, and he yelled, and suddenly it was like I wasn’t there anymore, I was lost in these bad memories, and I just—I used my Quirk. On them.” He exhales shakily. “And then I ran like hell because I thought my life was over.”

“Wow,” Midoriya says softly. “That must’ve been so scary for you. I’m sorry.”

Scary for him. Shinsou dares a glance up and finds Midoriya turned toward him with a sympathetic expression. After the shock of Aizawa and Hizashi’s un-horrified reactions, this one is slightly less of a surprise, but it still feels like too much.

“Anyway, they were amazing about it,” Shinsou says, looking at the paving stones under his shoes. “They said they loved me and it wasn’t my fault and took me back home. They were like…worried about me instead of scared or mad. It felt like someone finally got it.”

“That’s huge.”

“Yeah.” He shakes his head. “So this adopter seems kind of perfect on paper, and she’s a really nice person, but every time I think about her adopting me it feels like I’m losing my home instead of finding one. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know what I can do. It’s all just adults moving me around however’s most convenient for them, and I don’t really get a say.”

Letting himself say that out loud feels like releasing a pressure valve in his mind.

Midoriya nods. “Hey, Hitoshi, can I hug you?”

“Yeah,” Shinsou says before his brain catches up, and all at once his ex-boyfriend’s arms are around him and soft green curls are pressed against the side of his head. His body returns the hug without hesitation, and god, the weight of Midoriya in his arms feels good. The smell of his hair against the scent of the flowers could be a bestselling candle at one of those upscale shops downtown. No. No, that is a weird, non-friends thought for sure.

The hug lingers a little too long, and when Shinsou pulls away, he doesn’t go far. Neither does Midoriya, who’s staring at him in a way that feels almost naked. It’s no surprise when Midoriya leans in and kisses him, but it still doesn’t make any sense.

Shinsou grabs a fistful of Midoriya’s t-shirt as he kisses him, but after the initial rush of want and comfort, his stupid logical brain makes him open his hand and pull away. He can’t trust himself to lean far enough away, so he stands up and paces, his hands grasping frustratedly at the air.

“Crap,” Midoriya says, flattening a palm against his forehead.

“That’s not fair,” Shinsou says, rounding on him. “You dumped me. You don’t get to be cute and kiss me after you dumped me!”

“Right. You’re right.”

“That really hurt, Izuku. What happened with me that night wasn’t because of you, but it hurt, and I still don’t understand why you did it.” Shinsou stops pacing and locks his arms across his chest. “So what was it? What made me not one of your ‘favorite people’ anymore? Did I do something wrong?”

“No!” Midoriya stands up to face him. “No, Hitoshi, you didn’t do anything wrong. Nothing changed with you. I still care about you, so much.”

“Then why? What changed?”

Midoriya bites his lip and shakes his head. Tears come down his cheeks so fast it startles Shinsou into lowering his voice.

“Are you okay?” he asks.

Midoriya shakes his head again, and then he breaks down.

Shinsou takes his arm and guides him back to the bench so they can sit down. Midoriya cries like he’s never seen him cry before, all ugly noises and snot bubbles. Shinsou doesn’t know what to do—what he’s allowed to do—so he takes Midoriya’s hand and holds it between them until the sobs turn to hiccups. Then he asks, “What’s going on?”

Midoriya wipes his nose on his shirt like a little kid and, infuriatingly, shakes his head again. “I can’t tell you. I can’t tell anyone. Some things you just have to bear alone. That’s what heroes do.”

“That’s bullshit.”

Midoriya blinks at him. “What?”

Shinsou shrugs. “That’s bullshit. Heroes work together. And anyway, if I’m too young to be at fault for brainwashing my foster parents, you’re definitely too young to be silently soldiering through whatever’s serious enough to make you cry like that.”

“It’s not that simple,” Midoriya tries.

“So it’s a secret. Tell me. I’m great at keeping secrets.” Shinsou gives him a challenging look. “If I told half the stuff I know about some of my old foster homes, people would be in jail, and I don’t even like those people. You’ve gotta tell someone or else you’re gonna explode, so tell me.”

Midoriya stares at him, the gears clearly turning in his brain, trying to out-logic that.

Shinsou holds out his right pinky finger. “Swear on my future Hero Course admission I won’t tell.”

That seems to decide it. Midoriya screws up his mouth and links their pinkies. Then he takes out his phone and turns it off completely. Shinsou glances back at the apartment window and does the same.

Inching closer, Midoriya lowers his voice and says, “Y’know when All For One was being taken away and All Might pointed to the news cameras and said ‘You’re next?’” He waits for Shinsou’s nod, then looks up at him with serious, tired eyes and says, “He was pointing at me. I’m All Might’s successor. He handed his Quirk down to me.”

Oh, shit.

While the park gets darker around them and the lamps along the pathway flicker on, Midoriya tells him a story about the last year that makes Shinsou’s insides go cold. It starts with him meeting All Might after a fight with a slime villain and ends with him and like half of class 1-A helping Bakugo escape from Kamino Ward while the world watched his All Might’s final battle.

Everything about Midoriya suddenly makes more sense. The volatility of his Quirk, the overwhelming savior complex, the scars and calluses on his hands—it’s all because he got handed the #1 pro hero’s Quirk and told to live up to its legacy. All Might has always been one of Shinsou’s idols too, but right now he wants to punch the Symbol of Peace in the face. That’s way too much responsibility to put on anyone, let alone a Quirkless fifteen-year-old superfan.

By the time Midoriya is done explaining everything, they’ve gravitated toward each other on the bench again, their shoulders pressed together and Shinsou’s bent leg touching Midoriya’s thigh.

“You get why you shouldn’t be with me now, right?” Midoriya says. “My life is so complicated. And scary. It’s killing my mom to watch it happen up close, and she doesn’t even know I’m All Might’s successor. I don’t want to inflict this on you, too.” He pinches his eyes shut and adds, in a rush, “And I know it’s selfish to complain when I’m so lucky in so many ways.”

“It’s not selfish to complain about this,” Shinsou says, elbowing him. “Your personal hero roped you into something so huge and dangerous that it probably violates like every child endangerment law.”

“But I get to be the next Symbol of Peace.”

“Yeah, that guy who turned into a living skeleton on live TV last week because he used too much of himself up? You’re allowed to be freaked out about following that act. Anyone would be.”

Midoriya is quiet for a while. “Do you think I’ll be a good Symbol of Peace?”

The idea of earnest, supportive, incredible Izuku Midoriya as the Symbol of Peace is so perfect it floods warmth through Shinsou’s chest, drowning out the worry that comes along with it. He grins. “I think you’ll be amazing.”

Midoriya smiles a little. He’s not his usual bubbly self, but he seems less weighed down than he was when they started talking. He leans back against the bench and closes his eyes. Between them, his hand is resting on Shinsou’s, their fingers half interlaced. Neither of them moves for what feels like ages.

Shinsou works up his nerve and says, “Izuku, I don’t like not being with you.”

Midoriya shakes his head. “Me neither, but—“

“‘But’ nothing,” Shinsou interrupts. “You decided I couldn’t handle your complicated, scary life without even giving me a chance to try. My life is complicated and scary, too, and you’ve never once flinched away from it.” He curls their fingers together against the warm wood grain of the bench. “If you really don’t want to be with me, I’ll respect your decision. But I still want to be with you. If you’re game, maybe we could be complicated together. ”

Midoriya swallows hard enough to see and turns toward him. His hand doesn’t move away. “You’re really not scared after everything I just told you?”

Shinsou doesn’t know how to hammer it into this self-sacrificing nerd’s head, so he leans in and kisses him.

“Oh,” Midoriya says, and kisses him back. His mouth breaks into a grin. “Okay.”

Making out on a park bench with his once-again boyfriend doesn’t solve all of Shinsou’s problems, but it’s enough to make everything feel slightly more tolerable. After waiting at the bus stop with his head on Midoriya’s shoulder, it’s easier to breathe.

When he goes up to the apartment after, Hizashi doesn’t even pretend he wasn’t watching the whole thing like a long distance chaperone. His expression is smug, but so delighted that Shinsou can’t even be mad when he says, “So, we are rendezvousing with Midoriya again?”

Shinsou rolls his eyes. “I am back together with Midoriya. You are the weirdo at the window.”

It’s hard to look annoyed with the full power of Hizashi’s sunny disposition aimed at him.

“I’m proud of you, you know that?” Hizashi says. “You’re collecting good people.”

Shinsou thinks about how false that statement would’ve been six months ago, and how scared and isolated he felt before UA and the GSA and his weird little foster family. Ms. Nakamura and her son seem good, too. Whatever happens from here, he’s got good people in every direction.

“Thanks,” he says. “I’m learning.”

His foster parent extends a hand to solicit a high-five, and Shinsou gives it without bothering to hide his smile.

***

Aizawa’s capture weapon is collecting dust on the entryway shelf while he pulls on a tie every damn day instead. If someone had told him when he interviewed to teach at UA that he’d end up playing ambassador for the school’s new high-security dormitory system, having awkward conversation after awkward conversation with his students’ parents while stuffed into his one good dress shirt, he might have run in the opposite direction.

He’s spent more time crammed into a car with Yagi and his ugly yellow pinstripe suit in the past two days than he’s spent in his own home, and it’s starting to wear on his nerves. Aizawa should be out on the streets fighting the villains who’ve crawled out from under every rock in Japan recently. He should be home with his husband and kid, enjoying the last vanishing days of normalcy before they have to start packing for the move. He should definitely not be the friendly face of UA’s rebranding and restructuring effort—they really should’ve gotten someone who smiles for that.

Everything is changing. It’s not just the world of villains and pro heroes that got scrambled when All Might flamed out. His job wants him to be Shouta Aizawa the person instead of Eraserhead the underground hero. He and Hizashi are going to have to leave their apartment of six years to live in a teacher’s suite in the new dorms. His life feels like it’s folding in on itself to fit into the tiny, insular world of the UA campus.

And then there’s the email he’s been avoiding all afternoon. He knows what it says, even if he hasn’t read past the first line.

Ms. Nakamura wants to move forward with adopting Shinsou. It’s not a surprise. It shouldn’t shock him. It shouldn’t make his phone feel like a training weight in his pocket. It definitely shouldn’t steal his attention in the middle of a sit-down with the Kaminari family where he is supposed to be extolling the safety of the new dormitories to them.

Kaminari’s father asks a question directed at Yagi, and it’s a good thing, because Aizawa doesn’t catch the words at all, stuck in another conversation with his own selfish mind.

Shinsou being adopted by Ms. Nakamura won’t mean he’s gone, he has to remind himself. Given the layout of the new dorms, they’ll still be in the same building during the school year, only two or three floors apart. The boy will still be part of his life. He will, like Aizawa told him not long ago, still be family.

He just won’t be arguing with the cat in the kitchen when Aizawa wakes up. His things won’t be scattered around the apartment, little reminders everywhere that the space is all of theirs. When he visits them, he’ll only be a guest, and when he wants to go home, he will leave.

Aizawa hasn’t allowed himself to feel much since the adoption process began, and the idea of Shinsou’s home not being with him and Hizashi in such an actual, concrete way knocks the breath out of him.

This is not the time.

“How do we know this environment will be good for our son?” Mrs. Kaminari says, and the edge of fear in her voice cuts through Aizawa’s thoughts. She’s sitting on her tasteful living room couch with one arm around her son and the other fidgeting with one of her rings. “Living apart from his family, with minimal adult supervision, the target of all those villains? That doesn’t sound safe for a child—or good for his mental health or his grades.”

“Mo-om,” her son complains. “I’m almost sixteen! I’m not a child!”

“Until you learn to do your own laundry without starting a fire, you’re a child.”

“Ugh,” Kaminari groans. “That was one time.”

“You see why I’m worried?” she says, sending a pleading look right at Aizawa.

“Your concerns are legitimate,” he replies. “And I can assure you, they’re shared by the entire staff and faculty of UA.”

“We all want what’s best for young Denki and his classmates,” Yagi adds. “Similar institutions have demonstrated that a dormitory system can be every bit as safe and healthy for students his age as a normal home environment.”

“Mom,” Kaminari says, “We live like five minutes from campus. I’ll be over all the time.”

“But you won’t be here,” his mother says, and the way her voice goes rough on that last word feels too close, like she’s yanked it right out of Aizawa’s chest.

The Kaminaris’ bright, comfortable living room seems like a closing fist around him. “Excuse me,” Aizawa says, giving as polite an out as he can before walking back out the front door to the car.

Leaning against the car, he closes his eyes and tries to steady himself.

Shinsou will be fine adopted by that perfectly nice woman and living in the dorms during the school year. He’ll probably be over at Aizawa and Hizashi’s campus apartment all the time. But he won’t be here in the way he is now. He won’t be their kid, not really.

He should be.

Aizawa wants him to be.

What a selfish thought. They need to do what’s best for Shinsou, that’s all it comes down to.

But what is best for Shinsou?

Aizawa has assumed all this time that a household with two pro heroes is not best for anyone, but in the time since Shinsou came to live with them, he’s become so much more at ease with himself. His nightmares have become fewer and farther in between, as evidenced by the trend in his late night baking habits prior to…everything last week.

Last week was bad. That night, the night Shinsou ran off, was such a colossal fuckup that Aizawa thought they might lose him for good. But they didn’t. When Aizawa reached a hand across the rift between them, Shinsou reached back and took it. The boy he offered to train after the Sports Festival wouldn’t have taken that hand. That boy definitely wouldn’t have handed him a gel pack this morning and told him he loved him. That boy wasn’t secure enough in himself to be out, let alone have a boyfriend whose mother adores him.

Aizawa frowns at his reflection in the car window and takes a deep breath. What were Mrs. Kaminari’s metrics for her son’s home environment?

Safety. That’s an important consideration, but Shinsou will be safe on campus regardless of which home he goes back to on weekends. He has demonstrated his own ability to assess risks and defend himself in his internship. He seems to feel secure at home now.

Mental health: also important. Shinsou’s improvement there is not exactly linear—mental health never is—but it’s on a general upward trend. He has friends and solid relationships. He speaks up more. He doesn’t flinch when touched, and he smiles when complimented. He’s recovering from that perfect storm of awfulness last week like he genuinely believes it wasn’t his fault. Like the worst thing he thinks he’s ever done is survivable. That is objectively an improvement. That is damn near miraculous.

What was the last metric? Right. Grades. That will offer an objective measurement. Aizawa has been too concerned with other things to check Shinsou’s grades. He takes out his phone and logs into the school’s parents and guardians portal. Shinsou’s marks started off shaky but began to stabilize around the time he moved into the apartment.

This is… If all of this data were distilled into a student’s file lying open on a table in front of him, Aizawa would not see red flags. He would see healing.

He exhales, his shoulders going slack as he decides. He’s going to have to convince Hizashi. This can’t be a unilateral decision. And he’ll give Shinsou the choice, too. If any one of them doesn’t want this, it’s not the best for anyone.

He grabs an energy drink from the car and goes back inside, preparing an argument for Mrs. Kaminari at the same time that he prepares one for his own husband.

By the time parent meetings wrap up for the day, the group chat with Inko is a dozen texts deep in arrangements for Shinsou to have dinner at the Midoriyas’ and he has a text from Hizashi saying We need to talk about the adoption. It’s good that Shinsou is elsewhere. This is the kind of discussion that Aizawa knows could take hours, if not several conversations over the next few days, like when he brought Pichi home from patrol, or that argument in IKEA when they first lived together. However long it takes, he will make his case and stand by it. If Hizashi breaks his heart, he will do it with all the evidence, and Aizawa will deal.

The apartment smells like a freshly finished shower and one of their go-to frozen dinners in the oven. The cat greets Aizawa with hungry chirps and winds around his ankles as he pads down the front hallway.

In spite of the oven timer babysitting the meal-in-progress, Hizashi is still in the kitchen, slouched over the island with his elbows on the countertop and his phone out. His hair falls over his shoulders, neatly combed and not quite dry, and despite the fact that this is a rare day off, he’s wearing slacks and a button-down and his most boring civilian glasses.

“Hey,” Aizawa says, assessing the situation and trying not to jump to conclusions. There are plenty of reasons his husband would dress like  a respectable adult on a day off. It doesn’t mean he’s geared up for an argument.

Hizashi sets his phone down without making eye contact and folds his hands on the countertop. “Shouta, we both know we can’t put this conversation off. Let’s just get into it.”

He is absolutely geared up for an argument.

Aizawa’s heart sinks. “Okay,” he says, collecting himself enough to straighten his posture. He rounds the kitchen island and stands a few feet from his husband, crossing his arms. “Where do you want to start?”

“Ms. Nakamura,” Hizashi says with a shrug. “She seems like a fine fit for Hitoshi. Good parent. Stable household.”

“Fewer hospital visits than ours,” Aizawa says with a smirk. “He’d do well with her. I agree.”

“Yes. And meanwhile, us?”

Aizawa’s body stiffens. Of course Hizashi would know he’d want to adopt the kid. Of course his beautiful, brilliant husband who puts the dots together too fast for his own good would understand the trajectory of his thoughts. Aizawa rolls through his mental outline of his argument and decides to start with the preamble he’s been writing in his head all afternoon. “Hizashi, I understand why we’re not ideal candidates for parenting. Our lives are punctuated by chaos and violence. You have three fucking jobs. I—“ He exhales slowly through his nose. “I do have a tendency to lose myself in saving everyone else. That night after karaoke a few months ago, when I was drunk and rambling about adopting him and you said it was a bad idea, you were right.”

Hizashi hangs his head toward the countertop and says quietly, “You actually remember that?”

“I do. I remember you saying that I felt guilty and I just wanted to save someone. And you were right.” Aizawa takes a deep breath, readying himself with reasonable arguments and evidence to make his case. Just as his mouth forms the word “But,” Hizashi interrupts.

“Fuck being right.” Hizashi raises his head, and his eyes meet Aizawa’s, challenging. “I don’t want to be right about this. In fact, I refuse. I was wrong.”

“Wait. Wait, what—” Aizawa’s not sure what words are supposed to come after that. This is not the argument he was bracing for.

“No, it’s okay, I was wrong, and I need to own up to it.” Hizashi is pacing the kitchen tile now, his hands fluttering through signs as he speaks aloud. “When we were flying back from Kamino Ward, the only thing holding me together was the thought that I’d get to wake up the next morning to you and Hitoshi. I love being parents with you. I love getting to see him grow into himself a little bit more every day. I love the way you give him confidence and he softens your jagged edges. I love that you’ll actually eat a vegetable if he cooks it for you. I thought you were going to lose yourself in trying to save that kid, but all he’s done is highlight the best parts of you. And yell at you to take care of yourself, which personally I’m a fan of.”

He stops pacing and drops his arms to his side. “I know I said that parenting doesn’t fit into our lives, but we made room for him, and I can’t imagine not having him here anymore. I want him to be ours. I want us to be his. And I think if we let him get placed with that perfectly nice woman without at least giving him that option, I’m going to regret it for the rest of my life.”

Aizawa is too stunned to remember his own arguments. “Hizashi…” he starts.

“Tell me not to start the paperwork right now. Give me one good reason Hitoshi doesn’t belong with us.” Hizashi gives him a defiant look as he takes out his hearing aids and drops them on the countertop, and says in a softer voice, “Sorry, can’t hear you.”

Aizawa has never loved him more. He closes the space between them and wraps his husband in hug tight enough to feel the vibration of laughter through his chest. Hizashi squeezes him back, swaying side to side like he can’t contain all his energy. Aizawa kisses the side of his head, his cheek, his lips, and bump their foreheads together. Their noses touch, and Hizashi grins, stealing another kiss.

“I love you so much,” Aizawa says.

“Just to clarify, is that a yes?” Hizashi pulls away to get visual confirmation.

Yes, Aizawa signs back, nodding. “Yes,” he says out loud. He would write it in the sky if he could. Vandalize a billboard. Hang a sign on the cat. Yes, yes, absolutely fucking yes.

Hizashi grins, pure sunshine, and signs, Do you want to ask him, or shall I?

***

Midoriya rides the bus home with Shinsou, even though he’s just going to have to turn around and take it right back. It’s kind of him. Shinsou is perfectly capable of getting himself home on the familiar bus route, but being summoned home early by his foster parents still makes him anxious, even if the text from Hizashi said everything’s okay, followed by an assortment of cheerful emojis.

Midoriya sits between Shinsou and the aisle, arm around his shoulder, a comfortable headrest. His breath is warm against Shinsou’s temple. 

“It’ll be okay. Maybe the school is giving you a chance to test into the Hero Course. Or maybe it’s adoption news. Or they’re getting another cat.”

“Or maybe nothing is okay and those emojis are a lie,” Shinsou says. He wishes he hadn’t eaten dinner. His stomach is one big knot.

Midoriya rubs his arm. “I’m pretty sure Mr. Yamada isn’t capable of lying via emojis. Would it make you feel better if I hung out in the park for a while, in case you need backup?”

“No,” Shinsou says. “I mean, yes. But don’t, your mom will worry. I can handle this myself.”

“You can,” Midoriya says firmly. “You’re one of the most capable people I know.”

That’s new. And kind of an honor, considering the source. Shinsou curls closer against him and laces their fingers together for the rest of the ride.

Midoriya walks him to the front door of the apartment building, gives him a kiss, and says, “Good luck. I’m here if you need anything.”

“I know,” Shinsou replies, smiling in spite of himself. “Go home, Izuku. I’ll text you later.”

The smile that Midoriya gives over his shoulder as he turns toward the bus stop could power a small city for a month. Those damn freckles stand out even in the twilight. Shinsou watches him just long enough to be sure he reaches the bus stop safely, then lets himself into the building.

When he gets inside the apartment, Hizashi and Aizawa are sitting in the living room, TV off, no laptops, no papers or exams in front of them. Whatever it is they’re doing, they’re doing it right the hell now. Okay. Shinsou squares his shoulders and walks into the living room.

“Hey, Hitoshi,” Hizashi says brightly. “Have a seat.”

Shinsou perches on the armchair so he can see both of them at once. Hizashi’s tone is bright and cheerful, but his posture doesn’t quite match it. Usually his limbs tend to sprawl, but now he’s pulled in on himself, leaning forward, with his hands in his lap and one knee jiggling. The last time he couldn’t control that particular nervous tic, there was a student missing.

Beside him, Aizawa is his usual unreadable self, perfectly still. He’s not making eye contact, which isn’t abnormal for him but also feels ominous, given everything else.

“Am I in trouble?” Shinsou asks.

“No,” Hizashi says quickly. “No, honey, we wanted to tell you you’re getting adopted.”

Oh. Oh.

The reality of that sentence hits him in the chest like a shove. Ms. Nakamura wants to adopt him. A permanent family is exactly what he’s wanted since he was little. Any kid at the facility would by thrilled by this kind of news. He should be thrilled. Why isn’t he thrilled? Why does his body feel so far away all of a sudden?

“Ms. Nakamura is a lovely person,” Hizashi goes on. “We think she’d make an excellent parent for you, but we also—“ He glances at Aizawa, who’s staring down at his hands. “Well, we’ve talked about it, we checked with your case manager, and Shouta and I— Hitoshi, sweetheart, are you okay?”

Shinsou should be excited. He should be relieved. Instead, his breath is coming too fast and too small, and his brain is a wall of guilt. So many kids at the res care facility are there until the system spits them out as barely legal adults. This is the dream. This is what everyone wants. Why does it feel like this? What’s wrong with him?

“No,” he manages to say.

Aizawa moves off the couch and kneels in front of him, laying hands on his. “It’s okay, this is a lot. Deep breaths. Feel your toes against the floor.”

Shinsou nods, mirroring Aizawa as he takes a long breath in, holds it a few seconds, and exhales. It helps. A second and third breath help, too. He can feel the thin fabric of his socks slipping against the wood floor as he moves his toes, and that pulls him back into his body enough to grab Aizawa’s hands and hold on.

“Better?” Aizawa says gently.

Shinsou nods.

“There’s another option,” Hizashi says from the couch. “If you don’t want to be part of Ms. Nakamura’s family, we’ve talked it over, and—”

“Stay with us,” Aizawa interrupts. His gaze trained on Shinsou, intent and strangely nervous. “Please. We want to adopt you.”

Shinsou’s voice doesn’t work for a minute. “You do?”

Aizawa clenches his jaw shut and nods.

“We’d love to,” Hizashi says. “But this is your decision. We understand if you’d rather have a more stable parent who doesn’t go running off into danger. Someone you can come home to and not worry about. Someone who knows how to cook and relax and just be a person.”

“And has two cats,” Aizawa adds.

Shinsou stares as the words sink in. They want to adopt him. They want to adopt him, after seeing his mess up close for all these weeks? His two favorite adults, who love him. Who he loves. He can choose them?

It’s so easy to breathe all of a sudden.

“Can we get a second cat?” he says.

Aizawa makes an uncertain sound in his throat and looks to Hizashi, who slumps back into the couch with his hand on his forehead and says, “I’m gonna be outvoted on everything cat from now on, aren’t I?”

“Damn right,” Aizawa says, smiling.

Pushing himself out of the chair, Shinsou wraps his arms around Aizawa and buries his face in his shirt collar. Warm, eager arms return the hug, and his t-shirt tightens across the back as fingers grasp the fabric.

Questions bubble up from inside Shinsou. “How does this work?” he says. “Do I need to change my name? Do we have to go to court? Will I have a room in your apartment on campus? Can cats visit the student dorms?” He pulls back so he can read Aizawa’s face and realizes he’s missing a piece of foundational information. “What do I call you?”

Aizawa smoothes Shinsou’s hair out of his face. “What do you want to call me?”

That’s almost as easy as saying yes to them. “Is ‘Dad’ okay?”

Aizawa’s sharp eyes soften, suddenly wet with tears. He coughs out a laugh and nods. “Yeah,” he says. “I’d like that.”

It seems wrong that Hizashi is all the way over on the couch. Shinsou reaches out for him and pulls him into a hug, too. Resting his cheek against the fuzzy shoulder of Hizashi’s cardigan feels like coming home, all softness and comfortable smells and a familiar voice humming through the body against his.

“Does that mean I get to be ‘Mom?’” Hizashi asks, and his tone isn’t quite joking.

Shinsou thinks of the they side of Hizashi’s pronouns that only come up in the safety of GSA meetings, the fuzzy pastel pajama pants and cheap wine on Great British Baking Show nights, the overwhelming safety of his—their—particular hugs. Mom feels warm and welcoming, just like Hizashi.

“Yeah,” he says. “You’re Mom now. Deal with it.”

Hizashi’s voice slips into a run of delighted synthesizer notes, then laughter. “I accept your judgement.”

Shinsou grins into Hizashi’s shoulder and reaches for Aizawa’s hand, which is still where he left it on the arm of the chair. There are so many questions yet to answer, and the whole world is changing—his whole world is changing—but for the first time since he can remember, nothing feels scary.

***

Hitoshi’s adoption is finalized by a judge the same week that students move into the dorms, and naturally, Hizashi suggests they have a party. In their new campus apartment. Their private apartment, where Aizawa keeps his private things, like his underwear and his testosterone kit and their relationship. But their son is so excited by the idea of hosting a party that Aizawa says yes anyway. They’re all still dressed in their court clothes, Hitoshi with a hoodie over his button-down.

It’s kind of fun to watch reality dawn on the faces of the kids who didn’t know Aizawa and Hizashi are together. He watches Todoroki connect the dots during his first ten minutes in the apartment, staring first at the loud blond helping Hitoshi distribute the cake he made and then at Aizawa lingering in the kitchen. His expression shifts from puzzlement to mild horror, making Aizawa smirk.

Yes, kid, the teachers are married. No, you weren’t supposed to know. Yes, if you bring it up in homeroom, you’re getting suspended.

Todoroki says nothing. None of the students address it directly, actually, which is a smart move on their part.

Hitoshi hasn’t stopped smiling since the judge signed off on his adoption, and every time Aizawa looks at him, the feeling that rises inside him is almost too much to handle. It’s love and pride and gratitude that he gets to help shape this incredible kid’s life. It’s like what he feels for his students, but with the volume cranked up so high the knob has come off in his hand. He’s come close to crying a few times today. Hizashi has cried three times, because of course he has.

Aizawa spends most of the party on a stool in the kitchen, alternating between working on lesson plans on his laptop and keeping the cat away from the assorted snacks on the counter. In between tasks, he keeps an eye on the gaggle of teens across the apartment, who are telling loud jokes over a card game someone brought. He doesn’t catch every word, but it must be something raunchy, because Midoriya is beet red and Ururaka has laughed herself off her chair.

“Do you think the GSA would benefit from a sex ed lesson?” he asks when Hizashi comes to loiter in the kitchen with him.

“We’d have to get parental permission, but sure,” Hizashi says. “Send me your slideshow. I’ll try to do it justice.”

Aizawa watches the teens play cards. “I was thinking of presenting it myself.”

Hizashi goes still, setting down his drink. “You’d come to the GSA? On purpose?”

“It’s about time, don’t you think?” Aizawa shrugs at the party in their living room. “Why should I keep being quiet about who I am when it’s brought everything good I have into my life.”

Hizashi is going to cry a fourth time today.

Aizawa smirks, running fingers along his husband’s chin, and kisses him. There are students in their home who see it, and he doesn’t care anymore. He’s represented the school on TV in civilian clothes and sat in a social worker’s office in full costume, and now his whole world is here on campus. Here in front of him.

The card game ends in cheating accusations and a roar of laughter, and Hitoshi jogs into the kitchen. “Hey Mom, Tsu challenged everyone to Quirk Frisbee. Is that okay? We’ll just be down on Field C.”

Hizashi beams, just like he does every time he gets called Mom. Aizawa’s pretty sure the kid’s been sneaking more Mom’s into conversation just to get that sunshine smile.

“Sounds good to me,” Hizashi says. “Shouta?”

Aizawa considers it for a second, then leans toward his son and says conspiratorially, “Bring your capture weapon, and take out Ururaka and Todoroki first.”

“Thanks, Dad.” Hitoshi takes a step toward the living room, then remembers something, turns back, and unzips his hoodie. His new kitten, a colorpoint with little white socks, is curled up sleeping between the layers of fabric. “Take this,” he says, presenting the kitten to Aizawa. “I don’t think she’d like Quirk Frisbee.” With that, he all but sprints back to the living room to join his loud friends in whatever loud friend thing they’re doing now.

Aizawa watches the teenagers abandon their dirty plates and cups in an excited rush to go be loud outside. “We’re never doing this again,” he tells Hizashi.

Hizashi laughs. “You say that now, but soon enough it’ll be his birthday, and you’ll be sitting in this same spot, annoyed and proud and ready to do it all over again next time, because it’s for him.”

Aizawa sighs as the horde of teenagers makes their way out the front door. “How did I become the pushover parent?” he asks, gesturing with the kitten in his hand.

“Oh, Shouta,” his husband says. “It’s cute that you think you were ever going to be anything else. You’ve been ready to do anything for that kid since the moment he came to live with us.”

In retrospect, that’s true. He never stood a chance. Neither of them did. And thank god for that.

He’s not used to being able to see the future so clearly. Now it’s laid out in milestones and celebrations. A party in the common room with music and dancing when their son gets into the Hero Course. Dinner out in the city when he gets his provisional license. A road trip when he learns to drive. And there will be thousands of other smaller celebrations, every day, in the form of words and hugs and occasionally kittens, because Hitoshi deserves to be celebrated and Aizawa is determined to do it as much as possible.

Hizashi is right. He’s a total pushover.

Hizashi is always right. Except for that one time.

“Come on,” Aizawa says, tucking the kitten into his own shirt and rolling up his sleeves. “Let’s clean up.”