Chapter Text
Izuku walks past whatever scene is happening that could gather such a loud crowd. It’s not like Izuku could be a hero so his notes were useless and that’s all he really got out of those fights, other than anxiety. So, Izuku wobbles on, head down and tears flowing down his face. What was he supposed to do now? All he ever wanted was to be a hero. He didn’t have any skills outside of that - he’s just a useless Deku after all - so now that he couldn’t be a hero… What could he do? Nothing.
Take a swan dive off the roof -
Izuku shakes his head to clear the thought. He didn’t want a quirk that bad. Did he? Izuku is nearly a block away from that fight now, but the crowd is still echoing in his ears. What could be possibly taking them so long to take down whatever purse-snatcher they decided to label as a villain enough to warrant, what is that, four heroes? With more on the way, too. Maybe they have hostages… They seem to have a fire quirk, judging by the firetruck sirens. Izuku couldn’t bring himself to care enough about that right now, though.
Maybe Izuku could play with his online friend today? He didn’t have many friends, so when he did hang out with Tomura - it took nearly three months before the guy even told Izuku his real name - it generally made him feel… different. It wasn’t like being friends with Kacchan. It was… Nice. He felt… good. Like he didn’t need to be there, but he was appreciated when he was. Maybe the reason it took so long to get Tomura’s name was ‘cause Izuku didn’t share his - he just got given the nickname ‘42’ because his user name is ‘Smallmight1442’. He needs to change that.
Maybe they could meet in person? Izuku didn’t usually do that sort of thing - he had the internet safety talk many times from his mother when he first started talking with Tomura - but Izuku needed company. He felt like shit, and talking with people is apparently something that could help that. But if he’s out any longer his mother will worry. Plus he was supposed to stream with Tomura later anyway.
Shit, he’s supposed to stream today!
Izuku boots up his computer, pulling on a clean shirt over his head and then putting on his headphones. He was late. Very late. Like, nearly half an hour late. Stupid All Might. Stupid mental breakdown. Stupid cuts need to be disinfected. Stupid -
“Hey! Dusty!” Izuku cheers, after joining the discord call.
“Hey, 42,” Tomura greets, “I was starting to get worried that something had happened to you,”
“Uh… Well, about that…” Izuku mumbles, clearing his throat, “Are you streaming yet or were you just waiting for me?”
“I - what, does that mean something did happen? I’m streaming, but if you aren’t up for it we can turn it off and just play a few chill rounds?”
“I - uh, no I can stream, I just, uh, I’ll be a bit quiet until I’m fully in the swing of things,” Izuku sets up his stream, just about to click start, “but I don’t want to talk about what happened while we are. Oh, and I’m changing my username,” Izuku clicks are on his desktop for a few seconds, leaving the stream button alone until he changes the username.
“Why?”
“I explain later, Dusty,” Izuku mutters, typing in his new user name. Carmine42.
“Carmine, huh?”
“Uh, look, if you don’t know, you don’t know, but those that know, know.” Izuku chuckles, “Just, uh, give me a second to - what game are we playing?”
“Uh, it’s a pre-quirk game called Among Us,” Tomura chuckles, “And I’ve invited a few friends for you to meet,”
*Carmine42* (stream highlights/giggles/the Q&A segmint)
Carmine gasps, “No! How dare you! I didn’t think you were - UGH! Traitor !” Carmine huffs, rolling his eyes and tuning into chat now that he had been brutally slaughtered.
“Oh, the name change? Yeah, I’ll make a video to explain the change within a few days. Probably,” Carmine sips his iced coffee, snorting slightly at the argument over whether he has black or brown hair.
“Uh, Yeah, I actually have green hair, guys,” more questions flood his chat.
“How old am I? I’m fourteen, just about to be fifteen soon. Uh, no, I don’t have a crush on anyone right now. I absolutely will make a video talking about my name change, I promise. I, uh, mostly just stream for fun, yeah. The money is nice, don’t get me wrong,” Carmine sips his drink again, “I don’t think this could fully support me in the future, honestly. I know Dusty has way more fans than I do - uh, he’s obviously the reason I got into streaming in the first place, and he’s been at it longer and he just has a bit more personality than I do.”
(Oh, no, baby you have plenty of personality!)
“Uh, I’ll do a face reveal if I even get up to a million followers,”
“Oh, hold on, is Dabi - was that his name? (Yes) - is he going near -” Carmine snorts, “Pfft, don’t do it, buddy, don’t go! She’s the imposter!”
The black space suit is sliced in half with a monster tongue from where the mouth would be on the pink suited character with a flower on her head, “Ooh! That looks like it hurt!”
(Dabi has joined the dead chat.)
‘Shit.’
‘Ah, very articulate,’ Carmine responds, snorting slightly and turning back to his other monitor - he may not be very famous yet, but he makes enough money from streaming for a pretty awesome setup - to read more of his chat.
“Oof, yeah, he does sort of have a street gang vibe to him, but I don’t want to assume anything,” Carmine stirs his coffee with his straw, eyes roaming over the monitor a bit more before he turns his attention back to where Toga is killing another one of Dusty’s friends - Compress?
‘So… Toga? ’ Dabi types and Carmine snorts.
‘Toga.’ He agrees.
“They haven’t even found our bodies yet-“
-Dead body reported-
“Never mind,” Carmine snorts again.
And suddenly, voice chat is flooded with noise.
“It was Toga - I was on cams,” Tomura starts, getting quickly cut off by Toga herself.
“No, no, it was Dusty! I was on cams, I swear, I saw him kill my sweet green bean, Carmine!”
“Carmine means red, not green,” A third voice - Charger? - pipes in, “I think it’s Toga,”
“He’s right, Carmine does mean red, but I’m in green! Well, as long as they get the imposter, right?“ Carmine muses aloud, snickering slightly. Only his chat can hear him, but it’s enough.
“I love red, but that’s not enough reason to kill me!” Toga argues.
“Guys… Mustard has been awfully quiet,” Tomura mutters.
“Way to stir the pot,” Carmine mutters, snorting slightly.
“- Don’t drag me into this!” Mustard cries, slightly offended by the sound of it, “It’s Toga!”
“They’re almost out of voting time - god, is it Dusty too?” Carmine asks his chat, sighing slightly at the answer (yes).
“They’ve done really well, actually, with wasting most of the voting time so that - OH! Mustard voted, bet it’ll be Toga to be ejected. I don’t know if Dusty could pull this on his own,”
- Toga was ejected.
1 imposter left.-
“Dusty… Did he kill a single person that round?” Carmine snorts, “Well, there are only four people left, so… Dusty needs to get his butt in gear,”
(Dusty proceeds to lose the round)
“I’m the imposter, I’m the imposter,” Carmine mutters, dancing slightly with the sing-song tone in his voice. Not that his chat could see much - his cam was centred lower than any face cams, directed at his torso, showing his keyboard, most of his desk including half his iced coffee, his dark-skinned hands and his godawful shirt that reads ‘pants’ - but his body language was visible.
Then the round begins, and Carmine can’t help but giggle like a deranged serial killer.
(AWE! Isn’t he adorable!?)
“I just need to not laugh during interrogations - eh, discussions - and It’ll be fine,” Carmine assures himself, giggling as he vents into medbay, kills someone and vents away as if he was never there.
Carmine cuts his giggles off at the ‘ dead body reported ’, making himself clear his throat and sound a bit more professional than he really needed to be. It would give him away, but it was the only way he could stop himself from giggling like an idiot, which would also get him caught.
“I swear to god, I just turn my back for one fucking second and then he died!”
“Oh, Really?” Carmine prompts, “How do we know you didn’t kill them yourself then?”
“Carmine’s the imposter,” Dusty says.
(Oh no. Dusty, not after the last round. No one is going to believe that.)
“That’s what you said last round… And then you were the imposter last round…” Charger mutters, suspicion in his voice, “I think it’s Dusty!”
(Look at Detective Charger go!)
Carmine struggles to maintain his composer, only just allowing a smirk to form behind his hands DustyBoi20 (only just changed from 19) gets ejected. Silent laughter can be seen shaking Carmine’s shoulders.
And two imposters remain.
Only five crew members.
Carmine mutes himself and he wheezes - eventually collecting himself enough to breathe, “Get wrecked, Dusty.”
* Town of Salem.*
“I’ve never played this game before, how do I kill people?“ Carmine asks innocently, making the rest of the slightly smaller crew who are still playing with him and Dusty bust out in laughter.
“Good to know you’re a killing role,” Dabi comments, and then the day starts with three dead bodies.
Carmine is hung.
Carmine cackles.
Carmine is the jester.
“Oh, you sneaky bastard!” Dabi seems to slam his hand on the table - or whatever he’s playing at - muttering curses under his breath.
Carmine hears someone’s loud ass keyboard typing, even though it’s the middle of the night.
“Oh! Someone’s in the mafia!” He jokes.
“Ha - jokes on you, bitch, I’m writing out my will!” Charger announces, and Carmine snorts.
Charger was not writing out his will.
In fact, Charger was the mafioso.
Screaming ensues.
*The Game Of Life*
“Alright, guys, only one round of this before we end the stream,” Dusty comments and Carmine snorts.
“So just like, you know, life,” He comments with a small giggle and Dusty sighs.
“Ah, I’m being screwed over. Just like,” (Dramatic ass [ba-da-da] sound effects) with jazz hands, “Life!” Another louder sigh, and Toga giggles.
“Bam! That’s Life!”
(Carmine likes making these jokes)
(Thanks for watching, but that’s all I have for today! Enjoy similar videos, like my Carmine giggle compilation!)
After the stream, Izuku stays on the call with Tomura. ‘ Just for a minute’ he had said. Until I won’t hurt myself again if I’m alone is what he thought. Izuku has his earbuds in, allowing him to hold his phone in his hands while they talk.
“So… Are you going to explain why you suddenly changed your user name?” Tomura sounds concerned, and Izuku sighs, flopping onto his bed.
“I - I was, y-you know, uh, attacked by a villain earlier today…” Izuku takes a deep breath, “And, uh, All Might was there.”
“I don’t like where this is going…”
“I asked if he thought that s-someone like me could b-be a hero…” Izuku bits his lip to keep himself grounded and not a sobbing mess.
“Carmine…”
“He said no ,” Izuku rolls over to face the wall with his phone now in a death grip - another attempt to stop the tears threatening to spill out of his eyes, “what am I supposed to do with that? ‘ Just be a cop or something’ ?” Izuku laughs breathlessly, though really there is such a deep ache in his chest that hurts so bad that Izuku could only cry his pain out.
“Carmine,” Tomura’s voice cuts Izuku out of his sobbing, just enough for Izuku to breathe deeply.
“I’m okay. I think.” Izuku huffs, “I just… I’m sorry. I know I’m no fun when I’m like this,” Izuku wipes his eyes, sitting up, “Thanks for listening.”
“What villain?” Tomura asks, and Izuku sighs.
“Uh, look, I didn’t exactly have time to ask his name or anything like that, but he was made out of… Sludge? Tasted nasty, uh, but I think he’s in custody? Don’t worry too much about it.”
“Tasted? Did he… Uh,”
Izuku blinks for a moment, confused. Then he understands. There are very few reasons a villain would be going in someone's mouth. And the way Izuku experienced is very much directly correlated to the villain's quirk specifically.
“Oh! No. He, just, wanted to uh, take over my body? Like possession?” Izuku shudders, “I passed out when all Might saved me,”
“Did you see a doctor about it?”
“N-no?” Izuku frowns, “Do you think I should’ve?”
“... YES!” Tomura practically yells, making Izuku flinch minutely, “In what universe is it okay to leave a fourteen-year-old alone with no medical attention after a villain was trying to possess him!?”
“I-I-”
“Is your mother asleep?” Tomura cuts off Izuku's stuttered explanation.
“Y-yeah… why?”
“I know a guy you can see for your medical shit, if you can sneak out to meet up?”
“I - Sn-sneak out..?” Izuku bites his lip, “I don’t know, Tomura, I - Ugh, stop it - you’re making that face, aren’t you?”
“You’ve never even seen my face. What makes you think I’m making ‘that face’?”
“... you’re making that face,” Izuku concludes, sighing, “I guess, I could meet up with you.”