Chapter Text
It all started when Midoriya was 5 years old.
He was sitting at the dining table with his mother, who had made katsudon that night, happily humming the All Might theme under his breath.
It wasn’t a particularly exciting Saturday, nothing extraordinary had happened earlier that day. Izuku went to kindergarten, ‘played’ with Kacchan, came home, watched All Might defeat a few villains on the television- nothing to signify anything going amiss.
But Inko definitely noticed when her son’s smile faded, staring blankly forward for a few moments.
She furrowed her brow in worry as Izuku’s eyes wandered around the apartment from where he sat, searching for something with a confused look on his features.
“Izuku, honey, is there something wrong?” Inko questioned gently, making the young boy peer up at her from where he was ducking under the table. That’s where she first noticed the new sliver of red in his usually bright green eyes.
“Mom, is there anyone else here? I heard someone say something,” Izuku asked, sitting back up in his chair, looking at Inko with innocent curiosity. She frowned in confusion, she didn’t hear anything.
“No? It’s just the two of us here, maybe it was just the neighbours?” She responded softly. Izuku looked as if he was about to agree and move on, when that hint of colour in his eyes suddenly engulfed half of their usual green. Izuku’s brow suddenly furrowed as he looked up at his mom.
“I’m not the neighbours,” Izuku stated, even though it sounded slightly more like a question. Inko’s eyes widened, but before she could say anything, a strange… ‘interaction’ played out in front of her.
“Wha- I didn’t say that?!”
“Of course you didn’t, I did!”
“Wh-Who are you?! What’s going on?!”
“I’m Izuku, and I dunno!”
“But I’m Izuku!”
“So we’re both Izuku? That’s not weird at all.”
“Why are you in my body- Why do you have my name?!”
“What do you mean? This is my body!”
“Huh?! N-No it’s not!”
“Is too!”
“I-Is not!”
“Is too!”
Inko blinked wildly as her son argued with... himself, bewildered by whatever was supposed to be happening. She had no idea what could have spurred this on- nothing abnormal happened during the day that could have caused something like… this.
When the young greenette tried to stand up from his seat, his limbs seemed to have a mind of their own, and he ended up falling face first onto the wooden floorboards. Inko gasped and quickly rose from her own seat, rushing to her son’s side.
“Ow! What did you do that for?!” ‘Izuku’ growled, trying to push himself up from the floor.
“What do you mean?! I was trying to walk but you st-stopped me!” Izuku defended, his voice cracking, causing it to lose any intimidation it held.
“I stopped you?! I didn’t do anything!”
“Y-Yes you did! My right leg didn’t move, so you must have done something!”
“Oh so it’s my fault huh?! Maybe you’re just dumb and don’t know how to walk!”
“Wh-what?! Of course I know how to walk!”
“Sure you do! Dummy!”
“That’s enough!” Inko commanded, causing the ‘boys’ to look up at her in shock. Tears lined her green eyes as she crouched down to her son. Her expression soon softened along with her voice.
“None of us know what’s going on right now, but fighting isn’t going to solve anything,” She sighed, gently scooping up the freckled boy into her arms and walking over to the sofa. “So, instead, why don’t we try and figure this out by talking to each other? Okay?”
Midoriya shyly nodded while also glaring off to the side, giving two very different signals to their worried mother. She placed him on the plush seat and sat down next to him, giving him a gentle and patient look.
Izuku started trembling, tears peeking out from the corners of his eyes, “M-mom… I-I-I’m scared-” He cut himself off, scowling down at his shaking hands, “Hey! Stop making my eyes blurry, you crybaby!”
“Now now, calm down you… two?” Inko started, unsure on if she should refer to her child as more than one. The boy looked up at her and blinked away the tears from his dual-toned eyes. Surprisingly, they both stayed silent.
She sighed deeply, raising a hand to gently pat the young boy on the head. “There we go. So there’s two of you right now?” Izuku nodded slowly, “It looks like it.”
Although it was rare, children could sometimes be born with a quirk that had no relation to their parents, it was a mutation that was so uncommon it was almost unheard of. But, it was also the only explanation that Inko could think of that could have caused this strange occurrence. She smiled sweetly at her son, moving her hand from his head down to his cheek.
The response, again, was mixed, with Izuku leaning into the touch, while also blushing and glaring off to the side.
“Sweetie, I think this might be your quirk!”
…
The statement took a moment to sink in, one could almost hear the gears turning in his head.
Midoriya’s eyes suddenly lost almost all its green tinge, replaced by a dangerous red. The boy growled and pushed her hand away from his face. Inko seemed shocked at the sudden hostility.
“So that’s all you see me as, huh?! Just a ‘quirk’?!” The boy fumed, hands clenched into fists, “I’m not just some wacky super power for someone to use- I’m a person too!”
Inko blinked, “T-thats not what I was saying, sweetie-” The now red-eyed boy interrupted her, seeming to try and back away from her. She felt her heart crack at the action.
“Then what did you mean then, huh?!”
She knew the boy was just misunderstanding what she meant, but seeing her son act so aggressive, she couldn’t help but feel teary-eyed. Inko needed to think quickly to try and fix the situation before it got out of hand.
“You aren’t a super power that’s going to be abused, uh, Izuku,” She started, holding in the waterworks with a gentle smile. “I’m sorry that I called you that, I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”
She scooted slightly closer to ‘Izuku’, causing him to squint at her, but Inko continued, “But you’ve only just, uhm, woke up today. You can understand why I made that assumption, right?”
‘Izuku’ stared into her eyes for a few moments, before looking down at his hands in thought. She wasn’t wrong, he supposed, maybe he acted a little too drastically to her statement. He had only ‘woken up’ a few moments ago, and even though he had all these memories, part of him knew he was only an observer to it all.
Watching, being unable to interact with the world around him. A third party.
Clenching his hands into fists again, he looked back up at his mother who was waiting patiently for his response. The wall behind her suddenly looked more interesting to him as he responded, “I guess… I’m sorry, mom.”
Inko smiled down at the freckled boy, opening her arms to invite him into a hug. ‘Izuku’ hesitated, but slowly slid back over into her embrace. At that same moment, his eyes returned back to a dual-tone.
“Th-that was mean, other me…” Izuku mumbled, clutching onto his mother like a koala,. “I’m sorry for pushing you out, other me, I was stupid,” the boy responded to himself.
Inko suddenly giggled, causing the boys to release her and look up at her in confusion. She smiled brightly, “I’m glad you two are getting along! Though, I think we should pick another name for you, so we don’t get confused.”
The boy blinked. ‘Oh, yeah, that might be helpful.’ ‘Izuku’ thought
‘W-wait, we can hear each other’s thoughts, too?’ Was the response, his eyes shifting to the left.
‘I mean, that would make sense if we share a brain’ His eyes shifted to the right as he replied.
The two boys then had an internal conversation, eyes moving from side to side, sometimes mumbling out their responses. Inko just looked down at them and waited quietly, not exactly sure what was going on, but was patient nonetheless.
After a few moments, their red and green eyes focused back onto her.
“H-hey mom?” Izuku asked quietly, his eyes mostly green, “I-If you had another son, wh-what would you call him?”
Inko hummed softly and gently started to pet her son’s head once again. She thought for a few moments, revisiting old memories, trying to find anything she might have wanted to call her child before he was born. She recalled an old conversation with Hisashi about her possibly having twins.
She smiled sombrely, “What about Mikumo?”
The red slowly pushed out some of the green as her son’s demeanour shifted.
“Yeah, I like that!”