Chapter Text
Deku ran down the alleyway, bumping into crumbling brick walls as his bare feet slid across smashed glass and loose stones. He could hear the shouts creeping up behind him, closer, closer, closer. He needed to get Further. It became apparent that he wasn’t looking where he was going properly when he bumped into a set of dark clothed legs. He looked up to see someone with a (super scary) face, nose scrunched and red eyes glaring at him. He took a shaky step backwards, away from the man.
“There he is! Grab him!”
Deku squeaked as he went to run past the man but was caught by the back of his shirt instead. “No! Get off me, I can’t go back!” Deku tried to hit the man's arm off him, but he huffed and lifted Deku off the ground.
“This kid yours?” The cloaked figures that had been chasing him had caught up and were smiling at the scary man. Deku thought they looked like they wanted to hurt him.
“Yeah. Brat ran off. Thanks for catching him for us.”
“Hmm.”
Deku squeezes his eyes shut, praying in vain that something would change or that he at least wouldn’t have to watch himself be handed over. Instead, he felt himself be thrown backwards by the man. His back hit against the brick wall of a building in the middle of the alley. He splayed his hands out to steady himself and stop himself from falling over onto his side, but caught his hand on a sharp rock, lightly grazing his palm and only just breaking the skin. He opened his eyes in time to see the scary man draw his sword and run at the figures, dodging their blows and striking down at their chests, making blood splash over the man and his surroundings. Vaguely, in the back of his head, Deku was glad he was outside of the splash zone.
The man turned and looked at him, corpses at his feet and blood covering his eyes like a cruel mockery of a mask. This man was RED. This man had saved him. Deku knew then, this man could save him.
*
The kid was staring at him. Stain didn't think he was supposed to feel this uncomfortable after saving some filthy, bloodied kid that had to be either 5 years old or younger, but he was staring at him. Oh God his eyes were so wide. Turning on his heel, the vigilante started walking away. Better to leave now than to accidentally alert any fake heroes to the scene and have to do anything more that will traumatise the child.
He was just about to leap up the balcony of an apartment complex when he felt a tug on his pant leg. Sighing, he turned to look down at the kid who was still staring up at him. God damn it. "What do you want brat?"
His eyes seemed to shine- oh god please don't start crying. With a huff, Stain knelt down so he was eye to eye with the child. The kid was stock still but still managed to look like he was trying to gather the nerve to say something to the vigilante "What?"
"Are you a hero?"
"I'm sorry- What?"
"Are you a hero?" Stain didn't know what to do with that.
"The bad people said there were people that wore weird clothes and went out and fighted them and it made it hard for them to do their jobs- but then I used to think that maybe then the heroes they hated must all be good people because if the bad people don't like them, then maybe they all hate the bad people too, and I hate all the bad people, because they do a lot of bad things that hurt not bad people."
The kid was so wrong in so much of what he had just spouted.
"So, are you a hero? Because you saved me from the bad people! And you look really scary, but then I thought that maybe that's just a thing people do? Like, I don't know a whole lot of people or what a whole lot of people do, but the bad people didn't look really scary."
He wondered how long he had been away from the real world to believe such lies. Or maybe he was just as ignorant as the majority of the populous.
"Some of them looked really nice, I heard from one of the bad people that in the 'wild' plants and animals will look really nice to atta-ract prey so that they can eat, and that's super cool, but I don't know what the wild is, do you know what the wild is? Have you ever been to the wild? One of the bad people said they did."
Perhaps the villains he had stayed with had brainwashed him into believing these falsities? It would be impossible to address it all at once and correct the child.
"But , If the bad people look nice to atta-ract the not bad people, do the good people look scary to scare away the not good people, and is that why you look so scary?"
But even so, shouldn't the child be more hesitant about someone that just committed multiple counts of murder in front of them?
"Because you're a hero, and that means you're a good person, but because you're good you need to be scary to scare away the not good ones?"
Stain sighed, he supposed he should at least try to answer the child's question. -If the kid would just-
"Shut up."
"......"
"Yes. I'm a hero, though not a true one. I look 'scary' to scare away all the villains and the false heroes."
"False heroes...?"
"Yes. In this world, there are many heroes, but there is only one true hero. Only one hero that deserves the title, and that is All Might."
Stain heard the kid mumble an awed 'All Might' under his breath before he continued on.
"My job as a hero in this society is to remove the bad heroes. The heroes that hurt people or are selfish, the liars and the cheats. I shall stain myself with the blood of all who refuse to take the role of a hero seriously. You understand?" The child nodded effervescently.
"You're saying that there are bad good people and good bad people right? That sometimes, they say they're one thing when they're not. Like the plants! It's why the bad people looked like good people sometimes! You're saying that not all heroes are good people, even if they look like it! But All Might is a good person! And you'll be a bad person, to help people to have more good people! Right?"
Stain found himself sighing again. This kid, for as young as he is, is smart but still- "That's a very... simplistic way of looking at it. But yes. That works."
The young child seemed to radiate joy and excitement at his words. God, how do his eyes get so wide and sparkly.
"What's your name mister?"
"My name?"
The child nodded vigorously. At least Stain could be sure that the kid didn't have a concussion or some other concerning head injury.
"It's Stain: The Hero Killer."
"Hero Killer? Does that mean the bad people I was with were heroes?"
Stain sighed, if the kid was adamant to ask questions, he might as well try to get more information out of him. If there was a problem that the heroes weren't taking care of, he might as well do it. He hated the idea of what must happen to a child stuck inside a building with 'bad people' for them to end up looking like this tiny brat. God knows if there were still more kids back wherever this one had run from. "Probably not. They were probably villains. But tell me Kid," he quirked an eyebrow "why were you with 'the bad people'?"
The kid's hesitant smile dropped quickly as he looked back at the still warm corpses laying on the floor of the alley "They took me and Kacchan away a long time ago. I don't really know why I was with them, only that I hadn't left yet."
"Kacchan? Was he your friend?"
The Kid started sniffling loudly, his head dropped, nose and eyes running equally. "Yeah. They took Kacchan and I away from the fun place. But then they took Kacchan away again and I don't know where he is."
Stain found himself sighing again. He'd probably regret this, but he didn't feel like there were many other options at the moment. He couldn't leave the kid alone and abandon him. The kid was distraught and probably didn't know where he was.
From the sounds of things, the kid had been in 'the bad place' for so long that he didn't remember a whole lot about life outside 'the bad place'. This kid was talking about 'good people', 'bad people', ' bad places', 'fun places'. What the hell was the fun place supposed to be? A restaurant? A play area? A park? A school? The Kid didn't seem to be very astute with language or speaking. The Kid clearly needed help, but Stain didn't think that he could trust the heroes or the cops with the kid's wellbeing.
He looked down at the kid that had since stopped sniffling, and was trying to climb up the high wall of the balcony that Stain had tried to escape up earlier. It seemed like the kid was going to try to copy him anyway. It couldn't hurt right? Keep the kid around for bit, get information on the supposed criminal syndicate, teach the kid how to protect himself, drop him off at a police station in a month or so. What could go wrong?
"What's your name, Kid?"
"Huh?"
"Your name, Kid. What is it?"
"Deku."
"Deku?"
"Uh huh."
Stain was not calling a kid Deku. "You ever get called anything else?"
"Umm... I think... maybe... it was spelt the same?"
Oh God okay. Spelt the same as Deku? What kanji were used to write deku again? Derru and Hisashi?
Derru - Izurru - shutsu - shu. Hisashi - hisasshii - ku - kyuu.
"Was it Hisashi?"
The Kid scrunched up his nose in what looked like discomfort.
"Izuku?"
The Kid shrugged. "Dunno. It sounds right?"
Stain nodded. "Well okay Izuku. You want to come with me?"
Izuku grinned. "Yeah!"
He was still struggling to get onto the wall of the balcony and Stain, despite himself, felt a small smile tug at his lips. "You need any help there Kid?" Izuku shook his head with a grunt as he jumped up, managing to grasp his hands on the ridge of the balcony, legs dangling a couple of inches away from the floor. "You sure?"
"Uh huh." With impressive strength, the kid managed to pull himself up onto the wall... but quickly lost his footing and almost tumbled off the other side. Stain lurched forward and grabbed him by the back of his ragged shirt before he could land and hurt himself, picking him up much like he had when they first met all those minutes ago. Izuku pouted at him, eyebrows furrowed at him like he was some sort of traitor.
"That was a good try Kiddo. But how about you just hold onto my back right now. We can work on your parkour later." Izuku grinned up at him nodding eagerly, before squeaking as he was thrown onto Stain's back, clutching around his neck painfully and using the knives attached to his sides as footholds. Stain tapped on his tiny little monster hands gasping out "loosen up Kiddo". Accompanied by another squeak, Izuku quickly grabbed onto the shoulders of his vest, finally allowing Stain to breath again.
With a grand sigh of relief, Stain started quickly climbing up the balconies, scaling the building with a practiced ease. A quiet gasp sounded from Izuku when they reached the roof, overlooking the city. Concrete walls that encompassed the shining stars that fell under the dark blanket that was the cloudy city sky. Stain had grown accustomed to such views, but he supposed to someone like Izuku, to someone with such an unknown past, this might be the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.
Stain started jumping over buildings, revelling as the small child at his back made happy squeaks and giggled quietly with each hurdle. He wasn't worried about being heard by anyone, given that Izuku had his face buried in the loop that his head scarf made around his neck, muffling the small noises even to Stain himself. Even so, he kept an eye out for any heroes. The last thing he wanted to have to deal with right now was trying to fight of any semi-capable Fakes with this miniature koala to protect. It wouldn't be impossible, but Stain figured he didn't want to test his chances.
Stain looked over his shoulder at the kid that was starting to fall asleep on his back. He needs to find somewhere to stay the night. He couldn't hole up on a roof or in an alleyway tonight, not with the Kid. He didn't want the Kid to get sick, that would just cause a whole load of other issues that he didn't really want to deal with. It's not like he was the most put together person. He knew people that were willing to help him and aide his cause. People that saw the truth of the world and were willing to offer offerings of food so that he wasn't constantly finding and stealing from corrupt business owners. However, that didn't mean he trusted any of the ones located nearby to supply somewhere to stay the night. Vaguely, Stain remembered an abandoned office block that was on the market to get converted or destroyed that he'd stumbled into when he had first arrived in the city. Stain quickly changed his trajectory, heading towards his place of residence for the night.
*
Deku wasn't sure where they were going, but he was sure Mr. Stain was taking them somewhere nice. He had been running for ages but he wasn't even out of breath. He was so cool! He had climbed that building really really fast like- like a fast wall climber!
Deku hadn't been able to climb the first wall, and that one was so small! He couldn't wait until Mr. Stain taught him how to be good at park-or too. He knew he'd be super good at park-or because Mr. Stain was super good at park-or, and Mr. Stain was amazing so he'd be really good at showing Deku how to do it. And Mr. Stain had even given him a new name! Deku didn't know how he felt about that though. He was happy! Really he was! But by not being Deku anymore, did that mean he was leaving Kacchan? Deku didn't want to do that, but he figured he wouldn't be leaving Kacchan if he was still Deku in his head.
He snuggled into the back of Mr. Stain's neck, searching for warmth in the fabric. Deku didn't know where they were, but it was really cold. Mr. Stain was really warm though! So it was okay. He yawned slightly, eyes fluttering shut. "Get some rest Kid. I'll wake you up when we get there."
Izuku yawned "Okay Mr. Stain." and so, Izuku slept.
*
Gently, Stain started to wake Izuku, whispering his name and lightly shaking him. Izuku's eyes slowly opened as he blinked blearily. "Mr. Stain? Are we there now?"
"Yeah Kid," Stain said, crouching down, and letting Izuku slide off his back. He watched as the kid drowsily stumbled across the building, but his eyes widened at the room and- okay, Stain knew it wasn't the most impressive or put together place but it was the best he could do at short-
"Woah! It's so big!" All of a sudden the kid was giggling as he ran around the room, and Stain definitely was not expecting this. Where the hell had he been kept before?
Stain crouched down to reach eye level with Izuku before placing his hands on his shoulders "You shouldn't run around, you need to sleep, and that will only make you more awake." Izuku frowned, but nodded. Before curling up on the floor. "Umm. What are you doing Kiddo?"
Izuku looked up at him "Going to sleep?"
Stain bit his lip. He took off his scarf and eye cover, before pooling them on the floor as a make shift mattress. "Sleep on that Kiddo."
"Really?" Stain looked the kid in his wide, Wide sparkly eyes. Oh God. Don't start crying.
"Yeah."
"I really like you Mr. Stain."
*
Deku curled up on the loose fabric that felt oh so soft.
It was warm, warmer that it had been in a really long time.
Deku wasn't alone.
Deku didn't like being alone, and he wished he was with Kacchan, but he wasn't alone right now, because Mr. Stain was here with him, and that made Deku super happy. Even though he'd be even happier with Kacchan here too. But Deku knew, that Mr. Stain could help him find Kacchan, and then Deku would be super duper happy, and maybe then, he could even become Izuku for real!
Deku grew up knowing that Kacchan was amazing and smart and red. When Izuku was saved by Mr. Stain, he realised that he was strong and safe and red. Deku wondered if it was weird that he wanted to be smart and strong and red. Deku wondered how long it would take him. With Mr. Stain teaching him, he'd be red in no time.
When Deku finally fell asleep, he dreamed of red eyes, red scarves and red liquid. It was a good, happy dream. The first in a long time, but far from the last.