Chapter Text
“Something’s wrong”
Izuku sighed, “Nothing’s wrong, Em”
“Something’s wrong”
Izuku opened his mouth to reassure him, when he felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He turned around to see a swirling vortex of purple and black. Great.
Izuku just wanted a peaceful lunch where he could talk to his alters. Was that too much to ask? Earlier this morning, he’d specifically told his friends that he needed some space. As soon as the bell rang, he had slipped into the vents and made his way out of school.
He’d run across the green, swiping his student card at the entrance of the fake city. Now, here he was, sitting on the roof of a skyscraper, where could talk to his alters uninterrupted, eat, take notes on quirks, and just generally relax. He really didn’t have the energy to fend off the League today. But maybe he could get notes on Kurogiri? May as well, I mean, they won’t let him leave so…
He watched the inky blackness as a figure emerged from it, rapidly analysing this new information and cataloguing it with the rest of his mental file on the mysterious warp quirk.
Izuku ignored the emerging villain in favour of scribbling furiously in his notebook. As such, he didn’t notice Emerald trying to switch until he appeared in the Inner World.
“Aww shit”
Emerald blinked, scowling at the villain. They could feel Izuku watching but ignored him. They had more important things to worry about.
“The hell do you want?” Inside their head, Izuku whined at the brash tone they used.
“Em, he’s dangerous. I don’t want you getting hurt”
Emerald scoffed, “As if he could lay a hand on me”. Shigaraki looked outraged.
“You’re just an insignificant NPC, Midoriya. Sensei wants you for some reason, probably for an experiment. But you have the chance to be part of something greater, you have a chance to be part of Sensei’s great empire! Join me.” He dramatically reached his hand out.
Emerald burst out laughing. Shigaraki recoiled.
“What are you laughing at, Brat? I’ve offered you the chance of a lifetime” Emerald stopped, blocked the others from viewing, and straightening to look Shigaraki in the eye.
“Ok, several things. One, I’m laughing at you, Man-Child. Insulting people isn’t a great way to get them on your side. Two, I fucking hate you, so there’s no way I’d join you. Three, I ain’t insignificant, bitch. I’m the hidden boss of this level.”
The villain lunged, hand reaching for their face.
Emerald twisted to the side, grabbing his wrist and forcing it backwards, taking sick pleasure in the resounding crack.
Shigaraki let out a strangled cry, wrenching away from the other and cradling his broken limb.
“Like I said, I fucking hate you.”
This time, Emerald lunged, sweeping across the ground and pulling Shigaraki’s legs out from under him. The man landed on the concrete with a thump and another crack. Emerald smirked.
“Oh, that sounded like a fractured skull. If you don’t stop fighting now you could make it so much worse.”
Shigaraki pushed himself slowly off the ground, taking a few staggered steps towards his opponent.
“Looks like a concussion too, fingers crossed for brain damage.” The man collapsed, finally succumbing to his injuries.
Emerald wandered over, breaking another two of his fingers and delivering a sharp kick to his side, before taking his phone and dialling Kurogiri.
They collected Izuku’s belongings, before running down the stairs and into one of the building’s bathrooms.
Shouta was having quite a good day. ‘Zashi hadn’t woken him up with his screeching, he had gotten a whole 5 hours of sleep, and none of his problem children had done anything stupid. He was even feeling somewhat peaceful. This peace was completely shattered when Nedzu popped his goddamned snout out of the vents and dropped a flash drive onto his desk.
“I think you may want to watch this. When you figure out why and how and such, please tell me.” With an infuriatingly calm smile, the rat-bear-mouse-thing popped back into the vents and was gone.
As much as Shouta had planned for the day’s gym class, this was more important. He set everyone to sparring and left Yaoyorozu in charge of assigning partners.
“Problem Child, could I speak to you please?” Normally he would be blunter, but the kid was undoubtedly traumatised, and that meant he had to be soft. Problem Child shot up, eyes wide.
“Uh, of- of- of course Aizawa-sensei” Shouta swept off, turning the corner and into a small courtyard, fenced in by trees.
“You know that Nedzu has cameras all over the school, yes?” Midoriya’s nod was slow and more than a bit confused. “And that he notifies me, as your homeroom teacher, if you do something worth investigating?” The nod was even slower this time. “Then could you please explain this?” Shouta pulled out his phone, unlocked it and pressed play on the video.
Midoriya watched in silence, eyes widening minutely. Shouta clicked the off button, stowing his phone back in its pocket.
Midoriya didn’t move.
“Problem Child?”
“Problem Child?”
“Problem- Midoriya?”
“Mid- Midoriya!” The kid snapped back into reality, flinching violently. Shouta frowned, filing the response away to analyse later.
“Yes, Aizawa-sensei? Oh, sorry. Did I zone out again? I do that sometimes, sorry. It isn’t really something I can help though, but I’ll do my best to not do it again. Wait- I’m not going to get in trouble am I? because I know that some teachers don’t like when I zone out, but I didn’t think you would mind. Oh, damn. I’ve probably annoyed you. You probably think I don’t care or something. I’m sure whatever you were saying is very important, only I don’t know what it was. If you could repeat it, that would be amazing, but if you can’t that’s fine. I- oh, I was rambling, wasn’t I? Sorry Aizawa-sensei.” Aizawa blinked.
“Right, so. I understand zoning out, it’s fine. No, you won’t get in trouble. I’m not annoyed, but I am worried that you expected me to be. That’s a problem for later, though. I was just asking you what you were doing, why you didn’t call for backup, and why you have apparently been hiding majority of your skills. Also, what did you say to him?” The kid tensed almost imperceptibly.
“Right. Well, um, see, the thing is, I kinda- can’t tell you?”
“You- can’t tell me?” the Problem Child almost tripped over himself to explain.
“Well, I’m physically able to tell you, but I think there are some people that wouldn’t like it if I told you. They’re pretty secretive. I do want to talk to them about telling some people, you being one, but I don’t know how well they’ll respond to the idea. And even if they did let me tell you, I don’t know if I’d be comfortable with telling you everything just yet, and without certain facts, it really won’t make much sense. And also, it pretty complex, so I wouldn’t be able to explain it all and answer your questions and stuff between now and the end of class.” The more he heard, the more his heart sank.
“Problem Child, you don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to, but are you involved with a gang, or drugs or something?” Midoriya’s eyes widened.
“Oh, gosh no! I- well-” He paused. “Yeah, ok. I have not engaged in any illegal activities that you aren’t already aware of. I have knowledge of some crimes that you don’t necessarily know about, but I wasn’t part of them in any way, shape or form. I cannot tell you how I know about them, or what they are. Nothing I am withholding from you has any potential to cause you or others harm by virtue of not knowing it.” It was kind of disturbing how iron tight that statement was, as if the kid had practised this kind of stuff. Shouta hoped he hadn’t.
“Ok, I can live with that, Problem Child. But if you decide you want to tell someone, or need to talk about anything, I’m here. Ok?”
“OK.”
In the privacy of his office, Nedzu frowns, replaying the footage of his student’s statement. The pauses seemed almost as if someone was feeding him lines. This was worrying. But, given the statement, he wouldn’t intervene just yet. It was much more entertaining to see Aizawa struggle, anyway.