Chapter Text
Creatures born of forced mutation; a lack of light twisting them into something malicious, fangs longer than morality.
That’s what hero society creates.
No society is a utopia - but when is the line between light and dark blurred beyond recognition - when do monsters create heroes turn into heroes creating monsters? When does the fine line become the fine-line, a contrast made from those who manipulate the shadows?
The Hero Public Safety Commission strives to keep citizens safe. Employing only the best heroes, with ties in every agency and every licensed hero, they make sure everyone in the field is willing to say how high whenever the Hero Commission says jump.
It’s a wonderful system.
The villains emerge from nowhere, but the heroes always come first - always defeat the villains before they have a chance to share their story.
In the Hero Commission’s sealed files, is a seven-inch binder on U.A.’s most notorious new graduates, and that’s when the problems arise.
_
Graduation comes and goes without much fanfare.
Izuku made his debut as a pro years ago, when he was in his first year, like the rest of them did, so that’s not something he has to worry about - mostly, it’s the technicalities that change.
They don’t live in the dorms anymore. That’s a new one, but he’s got an apartment with Todoroki and Iida, after he lived with his mom for a while longer, because they both insisted he stay with them while he was apartment searching.
They had the room, and he needed the space, and so now that’s where he lives. They’re good roommates, all things considered, but it’s still strange, to walk into the still-new kitchen and see an empty counter rather than a somewhat annoyed Bakugou insisting everyone get out of the kitchen before he tries to blow them up.
It’s still strange, the silence at night; Iida goes to bed early and Todoroki tends to go to bed late, but shut himself up in his room on their days off like he’s still unaware that he’s welcome in the rest of the house.
It’s alright. Old habits die hard - Izuku has to resist the urge to tell his mom that he’ll be back soon every time he has to go to the grocery store. When he pulls on his red sneakers, he wants to look back and roll his eyes, tell her that he won’t get into any trouble.
She still calls him almost every day, which is good except for when it isn’t, because she’ll call while he’s at work if she’s seen anything in the news.
So, the technicalities change.
After Izuku moves in, he notices the little things; he notices the way patrols take more of a toll, the way hours change so that they’re barely home and their schedules don’t overlap as much as they used to.
That’s alright, that’s what they were told being pros would be like. Izuku knows that. Still, it’s a shock to him, when it happens, when he realizes he works at the same agency as Todoroki, lives in the same apartment, and still, hasn’t seen him in three days.
It’s also the first time he gets the idea that something is wrong.
_
“Are you coming to lunch?”
Izuku blinks and sighs into the receiver. Uraraka’s been inviting him over for lunch at her and Tsuyu’s apartment for two weeks now, and he can’t seem to find the time.
“Sorry, but I’m in the middle of some paperwork, and after lunch I have patrol. Maybe tomorrow?” He sounds apologetic, he knows, and that’s because he is. There isn’t time for a break. Between the bank robbery he stopped this morning and the bomb threat he took care of after, in another city no less -
There isn’t time. For anything.
“Oh,” Uraraka says, and she doesn’t sound surprised. “I have an all-day shift tomorrow, I don’t get my lunch break till three. Have lunch with Todoroki-kun instead for me, okay?”
“Why would I -”
“Oh, I gotta go, some interns called in for back-up, but it was nice talking to you Deku - Bye!” Uraraka sounds so happy, but it sounds forced, and Izuku can picture the bags under her eyes, the way this must be wrecking hell on her body.
Because it’s wrecking hell on him and he doesn’t know why. Aizawa warned them that being pros would be like this.
They’d be working constantly, almost always on call, and they didn’t always have time for things like friends when they were people to save and things to take care of, another villain, always another villain.
(He almost envies those of their classmates that were able to simply disappear; he hasn’t heard from Shinsou since they graduated a year ago, or Shouji, or Jirou. Save for when Jirou appears on Present Mic’s radio show, but he doesn’t know if she’s still doing that, because he hasn’t listened in a while. Tokoyami is toeing the line of underground and above-ground hero, but Izuku knows he’s overworked, too.)
“Bye,” Izuku says, sighing, long after Uraraka’s ended the call.
Well, he needs to finish this paperwork, make sure the incident is properly recorded so he doesn't have to go in and correct it like he had to do last time.
He works at Momo and Iida’s partnership agency - it’s called Ingenium’s Agency, though, because it used to be Tensei Iida’s business. When Iida took over after graduation, he partnered up with Momo, because Momo wanted an agency, too.
It’s just because they’re a new agency, that’s why they have to work so much.
(But why, if Ingenium’s Agency existed long before them?)
Then, he thinks, and processes.
He should have lunch with Todoroki. It’s been a while, hasn’t it? Todoroki’s supposed to be working today, he has a full-day shift, but their lunch period lines up, even if Izuku is going to be spending it filing paperwork, and Todoroki probably will as well.
It’s better than taking their work home with them; they need all the sleep they can get, don’t they?
When was the last time he talked to Todorki, actually? Maybe it was when they switched the chore chart around so that it worked better with their schedules?
When did they do that, actually? A week ago, two weeks ago?
Izuku decides, then, that he’ll go and talk to Todoroki. He knows that Todoroki isn’t on patrol, it wasn’t on the scheduling board, so he should be in his office, which is a floor above Izuku’s. The paperwork can wait because Izuku might actually lose his mind if he has to stare at another letter of black ink.
He’s nervous, for some reason. To go talk to one of his best friends that he’s known since high school. It’s not his fault that he never has any extra hours to spare.
And it’s not Iida or Momo’s fault, either; he knows there are a couple of new hero laws passed by the Hero Public Safety Commission cracking down on heroes who like to get paid and not do their job at all, so they all have to work a little bit more. That makes sense, it’ll even out soon enough.
“Todoroki-kun?” Izuku says, knocking on Todoroki’s office. Usually, he’d go with first names, but they are in a professional environment, after all.
He gets a grunt in response.
Izuku takes that as an invitation because he never gets more than that with Todoroki when he’s focused on work, and steps into the office.
It’s… bleak, to say the least. The overhead light is almost too bright, casting harsh shadows across the space and leaving it almost lifeless, save for Todoroki’s slumped posture, turning a page sitting in a thick manilla folder in front of him.
The folder in front of him isn’t the only one around; far from it. The shelves are lined with various sets of paperwork, one side more neglected than the other; probably finished versus needs to be done, and Izuku shares the sentiment. Todoroki’s costume case sits on the floor, closed but not buckled down.
“What do you need?” Todoroki says, even and bland and absolutely just as lifeless as the area around him.
It makes a shiver crawl down Izuku’s spine. “Uh… Nothing, actually.”
The cordial, cold response is quick. “Then why are you here?”
Is it bad to want to speak to my friend because I can? Izuku thinks, immediately following with the realization of, oh, I can’t, because I have my own work to do that’s piling up more and more by the minute.
“Because I can be,” he says, anyway. “We haven’t talked in a while, I haven’t seen you at home. Have you been sleeping well?”
“Yes,” Todoroki nods, signing something off on the document in front of him, sliding it to another side of the desk, and picking up a new folder. “I’ve taken to napping at the agency, as I work night patrols now, but am still scheduled to be in during daylight hours.”
Izuku frowns. “That’s not normal. Have you asked Iida to change it?”
“I haven’t had the chance to speak to him about it.” Todoroki pauses, for a moment, looking the document over, his bangs falling in his face and giving him the aura of a God ready to fall. “Now, please, I do hope to finish this before I go home later.”
“Later? When’s later?” Just how overworked are we?
Todoroki shrugs. “Around dinner, I believe. I’m supposed to get off three hours from now, but there’s always extra work to be done, you understand.”
“Yeah, no problem. I’ll get out of your hair.”
When Izuku closes the door, gentle, he hears the tell-tale sign of Todoroki sighing and perhaps banging his head across his desk, and he can’t shake the chill that’s settled into his spine.
There’s a pattern here, and it isn’t just at their agency, is it?
Uraraka didn’t have time for lunch, barely had time to finish her phone call, and she works at Ryukuu’s agency. Todoroki’s barely home because he’s, apparently, working double-shifts and overtime on top of that. He himself hasn’t had the chance to do anything but go home and sleep and wake up and repeat it all over.
He hasn’t heard from Kirishima in a while, either. Kirishima used to text him daily, so he can only assume Kirishima hasn’t had the time to text him at all.
Izuku doesn’t tell anyone goodbye on his way out of the agency, even though he isn’t technically clocked out.
_
The villain stands tall, in front of Izuku. A hulking, massive figure, made of twisted steel and gnarled tree roots, hunched over as though the weight is making him buckle.
He’s slow but strong. Too big to get a regular suppressant bracelet on, and too aggressive to calm by talking down - Izuku knows, because he tried, and his ribs hurt from where he got hurled across the parking lot.
It’s the case of an uncontrollable quirk, which is why Izuku was called in, from where he was ordering a coffee at a coffee shop down the street - not a villain, no reason to call in an actual pro on the clock.
Turns out, it was the case of an uncontrollable quirk with an already unstable man with a rep sheet longer than all the paperwork Izuku’s had to fill out recently. The quirk has something to do with different elements, but he can only guess that it was enhanced illegally somehow.
“Who do you think you are?” the villain asks, roots obscuring where his mouth and chin are supposed to be. In the caverns of their eye sockets, metal gleams.
So, no punching him in the face.
“Deku,” Izuku answers, clearly and concisely, standing in a defensive pose and waiting for his opening; sluggish, that’s good for him. And he’s sparred enough with obscenely strong opponents that he should be able to take this guy down, no sweat. The problem only arises if he’s able to clearly control the elements stuck to his body, and so far, he hasn’t managed that. “Pro-hero.”
“Pro-hero?” the man scoffs, which, given the fact that Izuku is out-of-uniform, isn’t all that surprising. He isn’t making any move to attack, but he had just thrown a goddamn tree onto the roof of a skyscraper, so… “You’re little more than a child.”
“Nineteen, actually,” Izuku says evenly, watches with bated breath as the villain turns to the side to look at something outside of his peripheral vision - he doesn’t register Izuku as a threat.
Given the fact that he debuted by breaking all the bones in his arm on live television at age fifteen, he’d think this guy had a clue, but apparently not.
Izuku sighs to himself, glances at the roots that cover every area of the man’s hulking figure, enlarged by the metal wrapping around his body like a suit, and takes off.
The double-coated area - with trees and steel - are most difficult to injure, but Izuku can see the minuscule area of his ribs where the trees give way to the solid-colored steel and steel alone. Based on normal body proportions comparatively, it’s two inches thick.
Yeah, he can kick that.
Izuku grins, sees the man’s head swivel to the side too late; “It’ll be embarrassing to get beaten by a child, right?”
Bang.
The impact of Izuku’s boot on the man’s side pushes the man back several feet, Izuku landing and skidding across the pavement with little more than a single loud breath. He’s off-kilter, off-balance, and he’s already lost.
Izuku knows this, standing there and not bothering to further attack.
He followed protocol; he called back-up for an opponent more than two times his body weight with a dangerous quirk.
The explosions that ring out through the air aren’t deafening, but they’re hot enough to leave the steel of the man’s face bright red from the impact and a howl of pain, swinging out wildly at the sound of noise but never able to make contact.
Bakugou’s impressive.
Always has been, always will be, but nowadays his power is more concentrated, focusing on making small explosions have more of an impact - the price to pay for choosing to work in such a populated area.
From the sidelines, Kirishima tosses Izuku a box, and Izuku catches it with ease - ah, quirk nullification handcuffs, unstable mutation type. They’re too small to fit on the man’s wrist, but all Izuku has to do is press the button on the side and watch it enlarge, almost like a hologram projection.
Bakugou’s got his hand over the man’s face, ready to ignite if he does anything stupid, grinning like mad; he doesn’t have his mask on, and he only has one gauntlet on. He either just came out from another fight, or he was too -
Oh.
Izuku’s blood turns cold.
Bakugou doesn’t even realize he’s missing the mask or the other gauntlet because he’s exhausted, Izuku’s guessing, from the bags under his eyes and the subtle shake to Bakugou’s hands that can’t be from so minimal use of his quirk.
He doesn’t say a word, but offers a smile, as he puts the handcuffs around the man’s ankles while Kirishima does the same to the man’s wrists. Then, and only then, does Bakugou jump-off, his boots stomping against the pavement.
“Easy catch,” he says, all bluster and no bite, and Izuku knows this because Bakugou’s shoulders are sagging and he needs sleep, he can’t keep going like this.
They lived together for three years, in the dorms. They’ve known each other all their lives. And if there’s any workaholic out there, it’s Kacchan - every time he’s on the verge of a breakdown, mental or physical, the signs are all there.
The signs are there, now.
“I did all the hard work for you, Kacchan,” Izuku says anyway, because if Bakugou wants to banter, then he’ll give him the banter. He can only hope that Kirishima will talk some sense into him, make Bakugou take a nap or something.
But when they all gather around, standing together while Kirishima holds tight to the man’s handcuffs, who isn’t trying anything anymore, the steel and wood slowly receding from his body, Izuku can see that Kirishima is in the same boat.
Dark eye bags, sagging shoulders, leaning too much to his left instead of relying on his right.
Something is wrong.
They’ve been overworked, too.
Perhaps they can sense they’re all thinking the same thing, that it isn’t the time to catch up when they have better things to do, because Bakugou scoffs two minutes in. “The authorities are taking for-fucking-ever. I’m taking this guy down to the station my fucking self.”
And stomps off, with Kirishima in tow, of course.
Izuku didn’t even get the chance to get a word in.
But when he looks at his watch, his break is nearly over, and he needs to go to work before he’s late.
_
“There’s a problem,” Izuku says evenly, sitting across the table from Yaoyorozu, and Kirishima.
See, really, he should have Momo, Iida, Kirishima, and Bakugou across from him, but there was no way in hell he was going to be able to drag Iida out of his office and he prays to God that Bakugou is resting. He himself had to wait two weeks to schedule this dinner, simply because they’re all so busy.
Kirishima hums, from where he’s sitting - and he looks nice, professional, like a real businessman and hero rather than the laid-back nerd he’d been when they were in U.A. They don’t have time to be kids anymore, do they? Eighteen came and went and now they’re paying for all the ties they slacked off when they could’ve been training.
It’s too much. It’s too much.
Because they didn’t slack off, they didn’t. They were kids, and they were supposed to be training to be heroes six hours a day with plenty of hours of downtime. Instead, they were the problem class.
They were the students with trouble following them around like a magnet - Izuku can’t even name all the battles he’d been in before he was even legally allowed to buy alcohol. He is still not legally allowed to buy alcohol, but he’s worked sixty-five hours in the last week and he wants to drop dead.
“There is,” Kirishima says, eventually.
Yaoyorozu seems to have caught onto the tense atmosphere, subtly checking her watch.
Which brings Izuku to his point. “We work too much. You know that, right? You realize that?”
“It’s just because it’s a new agency partnership-”
“We opened a new agency, it’s expected -”
Yaoyorozu and Kirishima look at each other, confusion momentarily creasing Kirishima’s brow - he always has been the most expressive out of that pair, but he nods, slowly. “Yeah, Midoriya, man - new agencies and new partnerships are always gonna have a rush before things settle into place and slow down.”
With the way he says it, it’s almost like he’s trying to convince himself of the same thing. Izuku thinks of all the times he’s seen the DynaRiot Agency on the news for one save or another, the outbreak in the media when they first opened. The controversy surrounding U.A.’s two-time Sports Festival winner with the most marks on his record for being aggressive having the funding and resources to open a whole damn agency.
But Kirishima was there, and they’ll always be one of the best partners-in-crime that Izuku’s ever seen, ever will see. They may not know it yet, but they’ve already made such an impact, even if it is just with their class and on Izuku.
“It’s been a year,” Izuku says, slowly, contradictory to the ticking of the clock that commands their every move these days. “Things should have settled down by now. All of us - all of us - are on the brink of collapsing. And we’re the only ones working like this.”
“No, all the other employees -”
“Yaoyorozu,” Izuku says again, stressing to get his point across because God does he need someone else to realize how wrong this is. “Who is in charge of scheduling shifts?”
She opens her mouth to respond, and shuts it just as quickly, looking contemplative.
Izuku nods, and turns to Kirishima. “And at your agency?”
Again, the same response - the answer on the tip of their tongue, until Kirishima realizes he has no damn clue who’s in charge of his own damn agency. Not that Izuku can blame him, but he can’t help but think, if one of them were just a little more observant -
“That’s what I thought,” Izuku sighs, taking a drink from his water. “Tell me when you can answer that. How is Kacchan?”
Kirishima knows the answer to that, at least. “Good. I told him we had dinner to go to, but he totally blew me off. I think he’s napping in the office?”
“Napping in the office?” Yaoyorozu doesn’t seem as distressed as she, perhaps, should.
Kirishima shrugs. “Yeah, we put a futon in there and everything. We don’t have much time to go home nowadays, or ever really, so that damn thing probably sees more use than our actual bed. Beds. Our actual beds.”
Kirishima isn’t fooling anyone, Izuku thinks, taking another drink of water to stifle his laugh. He doesn’t know how the hell Kirishima and Bakugou are managing a secret relationship with all the busy work they’ve been given, but if they have, good for them. They’ll tell everyone when they’re ready.
“That’s a good idea…” Yaoyorozu mumbles, which is probably a bad thing for anyone that values going home at the end of a long workday.
“Yeah! Being in yesterday’s clothes sucks, though, can’t say I recommend it. Actually, after dinner, I gotta stop by and bring him some, he’s got a 5 AM shift tomorrow.”
“And that’s normal?” What? Izuku is going to pry because being busy is the exact reason he chose to meet with the two of them.
Kirishima looks at the menu, suddenly. “Er - Yeah. He likes working mornings more, for some reason, so he has more mornings.”
Izuku nods, taking this information in stride, all things considered. “Does he get enough rest? I know, plus ultra and all, but…”
“You think something is going on with scheduling and would like to know how far it extends,” Yaoyorozu finishes for him, polite and proper as always, but there’s a hint of anger in her voice that makes it clear she understands, far more than he does, probably.
She knows what’s going on, or at least some of it, even if she just picked up on what happened.
Izuku nods again, for confirmation. “Yes, that’s what I believe is happening. I’ve had a glance at some of my co-worker’s schedules, and some of the other pros, and none of them have as many hours, with as little pay. It’s like we’re being worked to the point of exhaustion.”
With a thoughtful hm, Yaoyorozu turns her attention to the menu, allowing Kirishima time to process the information presented in front of him, to parse through it and see if it’s just their agency that’s like this, or if DynaRiot is faring any better.
“Now that you say it…” Kirishima mumbles, but picks it back up, louder, “I thought it was ‘cos Bakugou and I just opened, but I do guess that was a year ago. Most of our pros and interns don’t have the same crazy schedule.”
“And who, in your agency, does have the same schedule?”
Kirishima hums. “Uh… Probably just me, Bakugou, Aoyama, and Ashido. Maybe Ojirou?”
“But concretely,” Yaoyorozu interjects, a terrible, terrible look of realization on her face, “you can say it’s only alumni of our class?”
“Well… yeah.” Kirishima looks like he wants to elaborate, but doesn’t know how, and Izuku doesn’t know what else to add, either.
They spend the rest of dinner in near-silence, making awkward small talk, and they’re saved by the bell - or, in this case, Kirishima’s phone ringing and letting him know he’s urgently needed in the office.
(He won’t even have time to stop by his apartment and get Bakugou clean clothes. How long can they keep living like this?)
_
“I think I know what’s going on,” Yaoyorozu said, quietly, walking into Izuku’s office in the dead of night.
Izuku’s only half-listening, because he’s around four seconds away from passing out on his desk, eyelids drooping and limbs heavy, because he’s supposed to be filling out this incident report for earlier and he can barely register the ink on the page.
“Figured what out?” He says, trying his damnedest to appear lucid and coherent, even if that’s obviously not the case.
Yaoyorozu frowns. “Why are you still here, Midoriya? Shouldn’t you be at home sleeping?”
Izuku shrugs. “I clock out in an hour. Why are you still here? What’d you figure out?”
That gets her to grimace, at the least, soft footsteps echoing across the otherwise silent and barren office. “I’m on overtime. I think… I think we’re, specifically, being targeted.”
“Targeted?” That wakes Izuku up, as much as it can. He pushes himself into a better position, pushing his shoulders back to refuse the urge to slouch forward and give in to the exhaustion.
Yaoyorozu nods, looking around the office, anywhere that wasn’t at Izuku, that wasn’t at all the paperwork sitting on his desk. Either she feels guilty, or she’s trying to make sure they aren’t being watched. “Targeted. Our class.”
“Why our class?” They’ve already graduated, it makes no sense - there’s no reason to target their specific group of twenty anymore, no reason to make their lives a living Hell. Now they come individually instead of as a package deal, so there’s -
Yaoyorozu sighs, her lips pulled into a thin, tight line, so different from the carefree girl he used to see on the weekends they spent in the dorms, rather than braving the journey home when it was so likely they’d get attacked, or get into some trouble on the way there. “I don’t know. I’m working on it, but I just… I don’t know. It’s nothing good.”
“And who’s targeting us?”
That makes Yaoyorozu lean in close, her hands bunched together on the edge of his desk, a secret and sin passed between the two of them in the dead of night. “The Hero Public Safety Commission.”
Izuku is wide awake, now.
They spend the next hour discussing the HPSC and all the reasons they haven’t liked them over the years - and none of them are applicable, why are they doing this, but Izuku’s too invested in the theory to let it go.
Aizawa’s always been outspoken about the corruption he saw within hero society, always told him and pushed them to their breaking point because they needed to be the change, needed to be the next generation.
It was unfair, to put that on teenagers, kids at the time. It’s still unfair, and plus ultra is the only reason they work themself to the edge of collapse. But he still knew, still told them so many times without actually saying it, that the Hero Commission was corrupt.
So Izuku believes her.
(They both end up passed out on the floor of his office, a crick in his neck and his back aching in the morning.)
_
“Izuku.”
Izuku blinks, the world coming back into focus.
It’s instinct, to analyze where he is and what he’s doing - they’re in the street, he doesn’t remember why, storm clouds are humming above them, skyscrapers and buildings at the edge of his vision, and in the center of it all, Todoroki.
“Shouto,” Izuku says evenly, blinking away the stars and focusing, instead, on Todoroki himself. He’s - well, he’s always been nice to look at, but he looks more alert and awake right now than he has in weeks, more life returned to his skin and his veins, the bags not quite as visible.
Either he’s really good with make-up, or he’s been getting more sleep lately.
(Is this the result of his and Yaoyorozu’s conversation? That was three days ago, he doesn’t think she’d be able to do anything in that timeframe. Then again, soon enough, they’re going to collapse. He knows that. That’s what the HPSC was hoping for - that they collapse, that they’re more susceptible to changing what they think just for a break.)
Todoroki hums, and Izuku wonders, why am I in the middle of the street?
Thankfully, Todoroki answers that one for him. “You were attacked on your way out of the agency. I’ve got the villain subdued and he’s being taken in for processing. Surprise attacks like those are rather difficult to counter.”
Izuku nods, rubbing his head and standing up, finding his legs are stable and he doesn’t feel like keeling over. Oh, then it’s not the worst surprise attack it could’ve done. He remembers the Burnbright Stadium debacle when he was in his second year - holding everyone hostage in the stadium and then a brainwashed Midnight nearly suffocating everyone with her quirk.
That had been a surprise attack, alright. This was a minor setback.
“Yeah, they are. No one else is hurt?”
“No. The only injury is you.”
“I feel fine,” Izuku nods, stretching each of his limbs, his fingers - finding nothing other than the usual aches that he’s gotten accustomed to living with. “Has the attacker said anything yet?”
“No. They’re silent.”
Izuku nods, again, takes Todoroki’s hand when he offers it, and they both go right back into the agency.
_
The second day of interrogation, when the attacker is questioned why he’d attack the #43 hero - pretty good, for nineteen -, or who he is, he’s found dead in his cell.
There’s no reason why he was found dead. He’s just… dead. They don’t find a cause of death, and if they do, they don’t listen to Izuku’s pleading to tell him why.
Someone wanted that man dead, because he wanted Izuku dead, and he failed.
That’s the only logical reason he can think of.
(Izuku is given his schedule for the next week, and apparently he’s been bumped up to seventy hours a week.)
_
“Izuku,” Yaoyorozu says, a desperation to her tone that Izuku isn’t used to hearing, not now, not from her, but it instantly puts him on alert, no matter how sluggish he feels. “You need to get out of here.”
“What?”
He figures it’s the only appropriate response. He doesn’t need to get out of here, he just clocked in, and he’s going to wrap up a trafficking case with Iida if he has the time. (He never has the time, never will have the time, but it’s better than leaving it unsolved, he needs to finish his case-)
Yaoyorozu huffs, glancing side to side like she had that night, when she came into his office eto tell him the HPSC was actually behind their overworked hours. That they’re being targeted. “You need to leave. Now. With - with Todoroki if you can find him. And you - you can’t come back.”
“I don’t understand,” Izuku says quickly, but he’s already catching on quicker than he’d like and he really, he doesn’t - why would the Hero Public Safety Commission want them, really, and why would they choose today to act?
(What was that assassin after? Who sent that assassin, the man that died in a cell without any dignity, who paid him enough to make him consider that a viable option?)
Yaoyorozu shakes her head, not now. “Just - leave. You can’t come back. I recommend getting some things from your apartment, please. You have to disappear.”
“I can’t just-”
“Yes, you can,” Yaoyorozu says quickly, and her tone leaves nothing to be argued with.
Izuku’s leaving.
He grabs his bag, of which he’d set on the ground by his desk, with his hero costume and everything else he deems important enough to put in there, and nods. He’s leaving. He’s leaving, and he doesn’t know why, but they don’t have the time to talk about it.
Yaoyorozu leaves without another word, and Izuku would be lying if he said he didn’t notice the shake to her hands at her sides, the way she didn’t look him in the eye.
But he trusts her, because she’s nothing if not a woman of honor, loyal to a fault, and if she says something bad is going to happen otherwise, he believes her.
He won’t be coming back into the office for a long time, he figures, exiting the room without so much as turning off the light and using his quirk to decrease the time it takes him to run up the stairwell to Todoroki’s office.
“Shouto!” he calls out, but Todoroki already seems to have the memo, holding his hero costume in one hand and a document in the other.
“Yes, I’m almost ready. I know where we’re going.”
_
Where they’re going turns out to be a run-down apartment on the bad side of town with little furnishings, a nest of spiders in the corner that no pro-hero with common sense will touch (thankfully, Todoroki does not have common sense and takes them outside for Izuku), and a single box of Red Bull that lives in the refrigerator.
All in all, not the best place.
However, it’s good enough for Izuku, because it’s a safe house and Todoroki assured him that it’s under an alias, one the Hero Commission couldn’t possibly trace back to them.
Izuku doesn’t believe that, but it’ll be safe for the time being.
They’ve stayed in the little apartment for a grand total of two days, and have had no outside contact since. Izuku threw his phone out at the first opportunity - there really is no cyberprivacy these days, and if the HPSC is really after them, they’ll need to dispose of such things.
It’s lonely.
There’s a single, old, thick TV in the living room, and Todoroki always has the news playing.
Endeavor has declined comment on the sudden disappearance of his son, though he says as much on live TV with a grimace and Izuku watches practiced lines flow past his lips - “I haven’t the slightest clue where my youngest son has disappeared off too. However, this would not be the first time he’s done something as reckless, and there’s no need to worry. Thank you for your time.”
It’s the politest thing Endeavor has ever said to the media, which means it was written and scripted out for him - and Endeavor’s agency has always been closely related to the HPSC, solely because he’s the current number one.
So, it’s true, then.
Todoroki shows no signs of being distressed by his father’s words, so Izuku lets it go.
There’s nothing on the news about his own disappearance. Is it bad that Izuku’s upset?
“We’ll have to leave soon,” Todoroki hums, sitting on the kitchen counter with a chipped Garfield mug filled with cheap coffee. “We’ve perhaps already stayed too long.”
“It’s been two days, Shouto,” Izuku says, an empty plea and he knows it, both their eyes tracking the news headlines.
DYNAMIGHT MISSING IN ACTION; the headline reads.
Despite the fact that Red Riot is the closest person to Bakugou and on the scene, he’s sporting a grimace rather than tears, and the reporter doesn’t ask him for a statement. Izuku has a feeling he knows what’s happening.
Yaoyorozu was right.
They’re being targeted.
Bakugou wouldn’t just disappear, not without a fight, not the way he and Todoroki did - it makes sense they’d have to take him down swinging. But how did he disappear?
It’s a thought for another day.
For now, Todoroki sips his coffee while Izuku grabs a duffel bag off the floor, and they don’t say a word as they leave.
_
Todoroki is gone.
Izuku doesn’t know where, but he was awoken by the sound of the creaky safehouse door opening, the one they arrived in a day ago, and the bed is cold where Todoroki had been lying. It’s a one-bedroom apartment and it’s in another shady part of town.
While he’d like to fall back asleep, the sudden exit causes far too many red flags to pop up in Izuku’s thoughts, so he shelves the idea of sleep, instead glancing out the dirty window at the city below.
Full of life, full of lights, and blind to the fact that he’s being hunted like an animal for a reason he can’t fathom.
Why would the Hero Commission target them? They’re the most promising heroes that have graduated in years, the kids to survive the Hell that U.A. put them through. The next generation, the one rising from the ashes All Might left at Kamino Ward, the ones that Bakugou still blames himself for and Izuku still mourns.
He probably stares out the window for hours, until the sun rises and the night lights vanish in favor of early risers going to work, of the night owls going to sleep, all unaware of Izuku, this one, crucial moment, where he has time to think, time to reflect.
Todoroki doesn’t come back, though.
When Izuku stops looking out the window and starts to go about his day, rubbing the bags under his eyes, the bag containing Todoroki’s stuff is gone, and there’s a single note tucked between the cabinets in the kitchen. Hidden enough for no one other than Izuku to see, should anyone come looking.
It’s on a beige sticky note and it reads stay separate. leave in a day. don’t follow. no outside contact.
Slipping the note into his pocket, Izuku wonders how long he’s going to live like this because he can’t live alone. Has never been able to, never will be able to.
_
Despite the fact that Todoroki warned him to stay away from most everyone, two weeks later finds Izuku sitting in a booth at a run-down restaurant that serves the best katsudon he’s had in years, ugly sunglasses obscuring his eyes and an Earphone Jack sweater on.
He’s alone in the booth until a figure appears draped head-to-toe in black, a bell sounding above him being the only sound he makes.
Hitoshi Shinsou all but disappeared after graduation, but Izuku can tell that time hasn’t had any bearing - he’s still got the eyebags, still has unruly purple hair tucked into his hood. The startling difference, for Izuku of course, is the two eyebrow piercings, a nose stud, and snake bites.
(He looks good with them, at the very least. Izuku’s PR manager would kill him for wearing his piercings out in public.)
“Midoriya,” Shinsou says evenly, sliding into the booth and barely glancing at the menu with a small nod. He already knows what he wants, then - then again, he was the one who invited Izuku here. Izuku’d only been once before, in third year, with Kaminari and Uraraka insisting he needed to try it.
“Shinsou,” Izuku says right back, trying to keep the questions out of his voice. He doesn’t know why he’s here - just that Shinsou showed up at his safehouse, a new safehouse, this one on the better part of town that happened to have exorbitant housing prices, saying they should talk with an address on hand.
“How’s life underground treating you?” Shinsou asks, taking a sip of Izuku’s water, across the table, not a hint of an emotion flickering across his face.
And when Izuku thinks about it, Shinsou’s right. Shinsou could’ve been dead in a ditch for all they knew, for the entire year past graduation, but he’s underground. That’s expected of an underground hero. It’s life underground.
(That’s why he treats Aizawa as more like a near-ground hero, rather than completely underground. Because of some high-profile cases in his youth, his hero persona was exposed to the media, although most articles about him mysteriously vanished a year later.)
Izuku doesn’t bother trying to take the water back, instead shrugging. “Quiet, lonely. I was with Todoroki, but he… disappeared.”
This doesn’t seem to bother Shinsou in the slightest. Why would it - disappearing is his specialty, so of course, it wouldn’t cause alarm. “Have you been keeping up with the news?”
“As best I can.”
Shinsou nods, sliding the water back across the table, a stray lock of purple hair falling from under his hood. If it wasn’t so gelled up, he’d have bangs. “Then I suppose you’ve heard the news - Kirishima’s disappeared, too.”
“Disappeared like… Todoroki and I did, or how… Kacchan did?”
“Disappeared like I did,” Shinsou says, lips tugging into a slight frown. For him, it might as well be a wail of anguish. “Off the face of the earth without a trace or a warning. I think… I think he followed Bakugou.”
Izuku has so many questions, and the ones solely about Kirishima are barely even scratching the surface. “But the Hero C -”
“Shut it!” Shinsou slaps a hand over Izuku’s mouth, glancing around rapidly. No one seems to overhear them. “Don’t just say that, they have eyes everywhere.”
“Why would the - they have eyes in a rundown restaurant?” Izuku says, almost amusement slipping into his tone before he realizes the situation.
How dire is this, if they can’t even say Hero Commission out loud?
Shinsou shakes his head, a question for another time, but doesn’t say as much out loud. “There isn’t much I can tell you, but you need to keep moving. It’s best to keep separate, but there are times when it’s unavoidable. This… you might not be able to go home, Midoriya.”
If Izuku’s being honest with himself, he’s only dared to think about that in the odd hours of the night when the silence is overwhelming. He used to call his mother, every day, but he hasn’t seen her in probably a month, by now, hasn’t spoken to her, heard her voice.
It makes him homesick, makes him wonder just how Shinsou disappeared so easily, without a care in the world, like cutting contact with the people who care about him is as easy as breathing.
“I know,” Izuku answers, voice low and filled with grief he hasn’t processed yet, things that’ll come back to haunt him when he’s got a chance to think.
Shinsou nods, again. “Glad we understand each other. It’ll be… tough, I know. I’ll try to keep you updated, and I can give you places to stay.”
Good, because I’m running out of safehouses, Izuku thinks, but bigger things overshadow the simple thought. “How do you know all this, Shinsou? And how are you not being targeted?”
The grin Shinsou flashes him is nothing more than menacing - a lot like Bakugou’s war grin, if Izuku’s being honest. “You know how underground heroes work, right?”
“Of course I do.”
“Then you know that we don’t ascribe to the same principles as them?” The HPSC. “We do what we do by night for a reason, Midoriya. If they could find me, they would’ve put me down ages ago.”
Izuku doesn’t answer.
Shinsou continues. “And they’re looking to put you down, too. It’s the subtle things, at first. Overworking you, exhausting you - too many battles and too little time. Then it’s the quiet revoking of your license. It's already happened, by the way, I checked your file. You’re not a hero anymore. And then… they put you down like a rabid dog.”
“Why?” It’s barely a whisper. Izuku doesn’t know if he can say anything more than that - his stomach is twisting and he’s afraid nausea will overtake him if he says anything more.
“I wish I could tell you,” Shinsou sighs. The troubled look in his eye is far away, and Izuku wonders if he’s thinking of simpler times, of high school.
(Was it ever simple? They spent high school nearly getting killed, over and over and over again, survived things that could kill any hardened pro, things that will haunt them to their deathbeds. It wasn’t fair. They were kids.)