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Endeavor knew the only way to become Number One Hero: follow the Hero Public Safety Commission’s orders. When their smarmy-faced president had asked him to burn down the door to a civilian home in Musutafu, he hadn’t argued.
As he watched two men in suits drag a sobbing Inko Midoriya away from the baby crib, he felt a pang of doubt. But she was the wife of a villain. His handlers hadn’t been completely clear on if she knew she was the wife of a villain, but surely she must. Otherwise the Commission wouldn’t be hauling her off to a secret prison without a trial. One of the men plunged a syringe into Inko’s neck, and she collapsed sideways. Endeavor felt relieved that her screaming had stopped.
Stepping forward, Endeavor picked up the sobbing infant from the crib. He knew how to hold babies from his other children. A tiny bit of warmth from his hands always seemed to soothe them. He rocked the green-haired infant as he wailed.
Endeavor brought the baby back to the Hero Commission President as ordered. He told himself that he was doing the right thing. The child would be better off being raised by the Commission instead of a villain.
Nana Shimura stood framed by the street lights. A winter wind whipped at her hair. Her eyes blazed ferociously. She said, “I want you to become my successor.”
Chizome Akaguro shifted his backpack and scowled. “Why me? I just got expelled from hero school.” Bitterness colored his voice. He’d tried to point out the flaws of Hero Society, and no one had wanted to listen to him. He’d started to believe that it was impossible to change the system from within.
Nana grinned, a fierce yet proud expression. “I want you because you’ve rejected the ideals of the Hero Public Safety Commission. Because of those bastards, I lost someone important to me. The person who would have been One for All’s eighth successor.” A pained, flat frown replaced her smile. She’d smiled less frequently ever since Toshinori’s abduction. “The Commission is completely out of control. They commit all sorts of crimes, and because of their power, no one holds them accountable. Endeavor, the Number One Hero, is their puppet. But I know that you would never bend to the will of the Commission.”
“I won’t.” Chizome spoke with cold determination. “I’ll bring Japan’s heroes back to the path of justice. I accept your noble charge.”
He’d already decided on his hero name. As he would purge the stain of the Commission from Hero Society, he would call himself Stain.
Touya Todoroki screamed and screamed. He burned alive, inside and out. He’d never known it would hurt this much. At age thirteen, he hadn’t even known such pain existed.
“Shhhhhh,” a male voice whispered. A hand touched his forehead. That hurt even more. The voice whispered, “Statis. Ice. Restoration. Sleep.”
Cold replaced heat. Then Touya’s world faded away, ending his pain.
He woke to renewed agony, but not quite as strong as before. A drugged fog lay over his mind. Bandages covered his body. He groaned, stirring.
A woman’s voice said, “He’s so young. Can he truly be the one to bring Izuku back to us and take revenge on Endeavor?”
The same man from before replied, “He has a powerful quirk, Inko. And after I give him a heat-resistant body, it will be even stronger. More importantly, he has no known connection to us. When he attacks the Commission, they won’t know to blame us. They’ll believe him to be motivated by personal vengeance. That way, they can’t take Izuku hostage.”
Touya groaned.
The man touched his forehead. “Sleep again. Then we’ll discuss your revenge on Endeavor, who discarded you like a failed tool and left you to burn. I’ll give you a new name: Dabi Shigaraki.”
Stain kicked down the door of the hero agency. “I’m here to purge you!”
Those inside scattered, hiding under their desks. One tried to jump out the window. These cowards dared call themselves heroes?
Leaping forward, Stain nicked the fleeing hero, then licked his blood. The man toppled face-forward to the carpet. “Please don’t kill me,” he whimpered.
Stain threw back his head and laughed. “Kill you? I’m Number One Hero! No matter what ridiculous rumors the Commission has been spreading, I don’t kill people. However, you’ve been taking bribes from the mafia, so I’m revoking your hero license and placing you under arrest.”
He whirled on the woman hiding under her desk. “You’ve been embezzling money from the agency, so you’re also fired.” He pointed at the stunned man holding a cup of coffee. “From my investigation, you didn’t know any of this, but that just proves you’re a total incompetent. You’re also fired. And you’re fired, and you’re fired, and you’re fired…”
After yet another successful day cleansing Hero Society, Stain sat on a maroon couch across from a talk show host whose name he couldn’t remember. He disdained these interviews, but they were an important part of the job. He needed to spread his message.
The woman gushed, “It’s such an honor to have the Number One Hero in my little studio! You’ve inspired people across Japan to rise up and take action against crime. Citizen arrests are at an all-time high.”
This was Stain’s moment. He cleared his throat. “I believe the ‘smile, everything will be okay’ ideology promoted by the Hero Public Safety Commission has encouraged complacency for too long. Conviction breeds strength. Whether a citizen or a hero, everyone has the power to stand up for what they believe in.”
The woman clasped her hands together. “That’s why your fans say you’re changing the field of heroism for the better. It was an upset when you took first place, despite the rumors of the Commission rigging the vote.”
Stain snorted. “They definitely rigged the vote. But I won by too much of a landslide for them to cover it up.”
“How would you respond to people who question the huge number of heroes who have been fired by you? Japan’s number of heroes is currently the lowest it’s ever been.”
“But those who remain are worthy.” Stain leaned forward. “A hero without strength or at least basic competency is worse than none at all. I’ve encountered countless heroes who accept bribes or focus on producing merchandise rather than stopping crime. They belong in jail, not the hero rankings. Well-intentioned but weak heroes actively make dangerous situations worse by bumbling around or getting taken hostage. Those, I fire for their own good.” His gaze burned. “Being a hero is a dangerous job. We have higher fatality rates than any other profession. It’s not simply a publicity source for glory hounds. No one should become a hero without a true calling and power to back it up.”
The woman clapped. “That’s the tough but fair outlook we’ve come to expect from the Symbol of Conviction!”
Stain smiled and privately counted the seconds until he could finish this interview and head to the filming of Hero’s Kitchen. He found cooking a cathartic outlet for the stress he built up from his hero job. The media adored seeing him show a softer side on the cooking show. Stain wasn’t even changing his attitude on purpose. Cooking relaxed him.
Sitting in his living room watching television, Shouto Todoroki scratched the bandages on his arms left from the day’s training. His father had gotten even more violent ever since losing his Number One Hero position to Stain. Shouto wondered if he had the conviction necessary to become a hero. He’d never considered any other options, because his father had never allowed him any. But he didn’t like training. He didn’t have a calling to help people, just a vague desire to get revenge on his father. Would he be a bad hero with such a petty motive? Did he even want to be a hero at all?
Truthfully, Shouto had always wanted to become a chef.
Izuku hit the steel floor with a grunt. His prosthetic hand clanked on the floor. The cell door closed behind him.
Eri immediately leapt up from her bunk, as far as the chain around her ankle would let her move. “I’ll heal you, big brother.” Her horn glowed, and his broken arm and broken ribs mended. She did not try to heal his missing hand. She knew it would only be cut off again. His hand had been taken as a threat to a father he’d never even met. Izuku believed his handlers also found it useful to be able to take his prosthetic away whenever he misbehaved.
Rising with a groan, Izuku protested, “Dad got the worst of it today. You should have healed him first.”
Eri bit her lip. “I tried, but he wouldn’t let me.”
From his bunk, Toshinori Yagi said, “Eri doesn’t have much power left. She couldn’t heal both of us.” His voice was small and weak. Bandages covered his scarred body. The latest gauze on his stomach soaked red.
“Don’t try to talk, Dad,” Hawks said, brushing a lock of hair off Toshinori’s sweaty forehead. Despite the gentleness in his voice, his eyes blazed with rage. The chains fastening his wings twitched. He locked eyes with Izuku, and shared helpless fury passed between them.
Toshinori coughed, a dry, wracking sound. “Where’s Kiana?”
“The Commission sent Lady Nagant all the way to Hokkaido this time.” Bitterness filled Izuku’s voice. The Hero Public Safety Commission never let all their captives be in the same room at once, or leave their prison at the same time. Izuku loved Eri, Hawks, and Lady Nagant like siblings and Toshinori like a father. He’d never known his birth family, but they were his family now. The Commission used that against them, taking each hostage against the others at different times to force them to carry out missions.
Toshinori locked eyes with Izuku. He mouthed, “Soon.”
Wary of the cameras everywhere, Izuku did not react. But a flame of defiance rose up under his chest.
The family had a plan. They’d discovered where the Commission kept the keys to their quirk suppressant cuffs and the tracking ankle bracelets. Once they were free, Toshinori and his children would make the Hero Public Safety Commission Headquarters run red with blood.
Shouto Todoroki swallowed, fiddling with the old bandage on his wrist. Bright lights shown overhead. He stared at the counter and utensils in front of him, wondering if he was truly ready to appear on Hero’s Kitchen.
At the front of the room, Stain spoke with a cameraman. Shouto quaked to be so close to the current Number One Hero. His father despised Stain for supplanting him, but Shouto had always admired Stain’s incorruptibility—so different from his father, who constantly received phone calls and shady orders from the Commission.
In a strange contrast to his day job, on Hero’s Kitchen Stain was known as the nice judge and Kotaro Shimura as the strict one. Maybe Shouto should be more worried about the latter. He looked around, but didn’t see Kotaro Shimura anywhere.
“Why the nervous face?” Kotaro asked from behind him. “You earned your place here, the same as every other contestant.”
Shouto cried out and covered his face protectively. Then he let his arms fall, sheepish. For a moment, he’d thought Endeavor was about to launch another “surprise training attack” on him. But of course his abusive father couldn’t be here. His eyes stung with tears. He’d messed up already. Kotaro was notorious for making people who appeared on his cooking show cry. No doubt he would rip Shouto apart.
Instead, Kotaro said, “I apologize for startling you.” His gaze fastened on the injury on Shouto’s arm. “Do you have any other triggers I should know about?”
Shouto looked at his feet. “I get startled easily. And, uh, I don’t like to be referred to as an object or a ‘perfect masterpiece.’” He waited for Kotaro to ask why he wouldn’t like being called perfect.
Kotaro only nodded. “Thank you for telling me. I promise not to say anything that triggers you on the show.” He walked away.
Shouto remembered Tenko Shimura once giving an interview about his famous chef father. Tenko had said that he grew up thinking the person on TV hosting cooking shows couldn’t be his dad, even if they had the same name and looked identical, because his dad had never once shouted or seemed angry around him.
Perhaps Kotaro was very different from his public image as Japan’s “Gordon Ramsey.” Shouto was starting to look forward to the show, and not just because of how angry his father would be.
Dabi stood on a park bench, monologuing. Blue flames danced around him. “Hero Society is corrupt, and I will kill—”
Tenko Shimura tossed a net at Dabi. The villain batted it away, his hand setting it alight.
Instincts from watching his father’s cooking show throughout his childhood took over. Tenko screamed, “Dabi, you idiot, you’re on fire!”
“Err, yes, that’s my quirk?” Dabi’s flames stopped in his confusion.
Tenko screamed, “You’re going to burn this place down, you idiot sandwich!” He grabbed a Nomu and decayed it. “CAN’T YOU SEE THIS VILLAIN IS RAW? HOW DO YOU EXPECT ME TO SERVE THIS TO THE POLICE? Go apologize to Tsukauchi, right now.”
Dabi dodged a pillar that Tenko decayed to fall on him. He ran away, screaming, “Why do you always act like you think you’re on a cooking show, you crazy hero? You interrupted my big speech again! Also, why the hell is your hero name ‘Burn’ when you have decay powers? This is an insult to people with fire quirks.”
Proving once again the reason for his name, Tenko chased after the villain, screaming, “One out of ten monologue score and two out of ten for your minions! They’re black, smelly, and completely inedible!”
Somewhere, watching his son on television, Kotaro shed tears of pride. Stain fingered the handmade kitchen knife Kotaro had given him as part of his hero costume. He would one day pass it along to Tenko Shimura, the Nineth Successor to One for All.
This started the worldwide meme that Dabi must be the only villain worthy of being Tenko’s rival because he was fully cooked.
All for One mussed Dabi’s hair. “I think that monologue was at least a solid six.”
“Only a six?” Dabi pouted.
Inko handed Dabi a handmade bento. “Don’t be too hard on our boy.”
All for One sniffed. “I have high standards. Besides, you didn’t even finish. You can’t let heroes distract you. If they shout, you shout over them. Or kill them and monologue over their corpses, that works too.”
Inko said, “Stain’s agency is merely a distraction. Don’t forget our real objective—the Hero Public Safety Commission.” Her face hardened.
Dabi hugged her. “I won’t, Mom, I promise. I’m going to bring Izuku back home to you no matter what. I’ll kill my sperm donor to complete our revenge. Then we’ll all be a family.” Dabi didn’t need his siblings, who’d turned away from him. Someday, Izuku would become his little brother instead.
Admittedly, Shouto quitting hero school to become a chef was absolutely hilarious. Imagining Endeavor’s rage made Dabi giggle. This was even better than the perfect masterpiece dying in battle. Dabi decided that Shouto could live after all.
OMAKE TIME!
Omake: Izuku and Big Brother Dabi
Dabi: Want to roast marshmallows?
Izuku: Yay!
All for One: What have I told you about using fire in the vault, Dabi?
Izuku: But Daaaaad! I love S’mores!
#
Omake: The Time Tenko Murdered His Dad
Kotaro: (Standing before the bathroom mirror) I am a lean mean cooking machine.
Five-year-old Tenko: Dad, what are you doing?
Kotaro: (Dies of embarrassment.)
#
Omake: Meanwhile on Hero’s Kitchen
Shouto: My steak isn’t cooking fast enough! (He uses his fire on live television.)
Endeavor: I see you’ve overcome your silly trauma. When will you use your fire to become a hero?
Shouto: I don’t recall being able to create fire as part of my quirk.
Endeavor: But you just—
Kotaro: Escort this has-been off the set. He’s bothering my new favorite apprentice.