Work Text:
Tensei had always admired how Oboro was with kids.
Even with his own expertise with Tenya at home, which Tensei liked to think there was a lot. When their parents got busier and busier with their patrols, Tensei was the one expected to take over and be put in the role of guardian for his younger brother.
Tensei sometimes fell through with kids he wasn’t close to. There’s something completely different about trying to engage a kid you’ve only known for a few minutes compared to the many years of a younger brother.
Tensei could read Tenya like a book. He knew when he needed encouragement when he needed space. And lastly, when to let him do things on his own, though it killed him to think of a world where his brother might not need him at some point, it would come sooner rather than later.
He couldn’t possibly know these things with other kids.
This was ever-present in the new mission they were given. Although “mission” was a generous word for what they were assigned.
Their work-study agencies were helping out at the local elementary school. Their goal was to try and get the kids excited about supporting up-and-coming heroes. It was good PR for both the work-study agencies. Not to mention the added bonus of giving them as more used to interacting with civilians in a hero capacity.
His Purple Highness had been the one to initially suggest the idea and pitch that it was good practice for work-study students. Tensei’ down work-study mentor agreed wholeheartedly and how it would be such a unique experience for them.
Tensei privately thought it was more likely their agencies found a way to allow them a break while still writing off hours on their logs.
But all parties had agreed, which found three of their little friend group all going together to entertain the various classes. Nemuri had apparently done a similar activity during her second year. For now, she was joining His Purple Highness on a patrol around the surrounding area. Yamada had been devastated he wasn’t able to join, he had practically cried on them all at lunch the other day about missing out on the opportunity. Had mourned that he had the perfect persona to get the kids excited. But Tensei could read between the lines and secretly found it adorable how much their friend wanted to stay by their side. So that just left the three of them to take on the classroom of kids. It sounded like mature responsibility when you fluffed it up as their mentors did, calling it “caring for the new generation”.
Even if in reality, they were set with easily amused small kids who ended up being more fascinated with their shiny hero-in-training costumes than any of them specifically. Still, there were much worse things they could have been doing with their time, such as the few days of learning to process paperwork, and their respective agencies had allowed them to handle it on their own.
It was good that all three of them were watching over the classroom together, the teacher had stepped out for a moment leaving the work-study students to watch over the kids.
The three of them had split up to try and tackle the most amount of kids. It was a good system. He was a little shocked at how good of a team they had all made. Even if they were doing separate things they all felt like one cohesive unit.
Oboro was currently entertaining the more excitable bunch, getting out their boundless energy through his clouds. Shota was off in the corner, in the perfect sight of having the small emo kids gravitating towards him. And Tensei kept entertaining the kids who were more, what he would call, relaxed. These were the kids that were sitting properly in their desks, lightly coloring some of the hero sheets Tensei had given out. They weren’t as energetic as the kids that currently surrounded Oboro or moody enough that Shota appealed to them. They were calm.
“I’d call them pencil-pushers, Ten-ten” is what Oboro had whispered close to his shoulder when Tensei had made the observation as they first stepped into the room.
Oboro wasn’t necessarily wrong, but Tensei would rather see pigs fly than agree with his friend at that moment. He would choose to ignore any comments of resemblance to him made later. Which if Oboro and Shota were involved would undoubtedly happen. It was always in good fun but those two could be vicious at times. Not that he would change anything about them.
Tensei looked over to the two of them. It was always interesting seeing Shota and Oboro interacting with other people. The personas they put on were so similar and yet so different from the selves they displayed in their smaller gang.
He was still surprised His Purple Highness and Tensei’s family’s agency had decided to partner, but he was grateful nonetheless. Tensei wouldn’t complain, their small group of friends hadn’t been able to hang out as much lately with the stress of the beginning of their second year. It was a welcome break from student pressures, and being able to claim that it was for work-related reasons was all the more calming of his worries.
Shota had seemed to be content to sit on the sidelines as far away from the kids as possible. He had his typical loner emo look going on, the slightly dark messed up hair, the dark bags under his eyes. He should have realized sooner that the kids ate that kind of stuff up. It practically screamed to them, “this is a big fun adult who’s different from my parents”. And it seemed like the group of kids in the classroom had fixated on his friend most specifically. Currently, Shota had one small kid trying to hang off of his arm and another pulling insistently on his jumpsuit leg.
Shota would forever deny it till the end of time, but kids had a tendency to flock to him, and he was good with them in return.
While his general face may have been to the untrained eye filled with annoyance. Tensei could see the careful watch he had on those around him. Making sure not to move his arm too much or too fast that the kid could hurt themselves. And while he seemed disinterested in what the smaller boy, who was pulling on his pant leg was saying, he was nodding his head and giving hums every few seconds as he listened.
He’d have an interesting time if he ever took up teaching, Tensei thought with a smirk. Not that he necessarily saw Shota as one to make his way to teach but it could happen.
Tensei turned over to the other member of their group trio. Kids really did gravitate towards him as well, probably in a larger quantity than they did Shota. Oboro was currently resting on the floor, at the heart of where a majority of the kids are. He would tease his friend about it later but Oboro really did love the spotlight.
Two kids were inhabiting both of his knees and another child was pulling on the wispy blue hair. Oboro was softly manipulating it in and out of the kid’s grip. It almost looked like a tug-of-war, but Tensei wasn’t concerned, Oboro loved being playful with his quirk and subsequently his hair. And everyone loved his quirk in return. Who could forget the four kids currently in the air, each occupying their own cloud, moving in a small circle formation around where Oboro was sitting. He was acting as their own personal merry-go-round. The thought brought a smile to Tensei’s face.
Now Oboro would have a blast as a teacher. He seemed to be delighted at being able to show his quirk off for others, especially children. He always got a certain gleam in his eyes when a kid would look at them with excitement in his eyes, reflecting back their energy tenfold. Especially smaller kids with their boundless energy and insistent questions looked overjoyed by someone who seemed to feed off that excitement. Oboro would sure be enjoying himself for their time here.
Tensei let his eyes roam over the classroom before they caught on the corner where two kids, a small boy, and a girl, seemed to be staring at each other, in the midst of an argument. Standoffs between kids were dangerous for a variety of reasons. Small fists could fly at any moment, which was bad enough for fragile bodies and kids who didn’t know how to take a hit well. Fistfights though were the least of his problems.
With quirks manifesting around this age, it added an extra bit of uncertainty and danger to every situation. When quirks did manifest prior to an incident the kids often had minimal lack of control and understanding, which made for an even worst time. If they manifested during, well the least said about it the better.
They’d have to deal with it delicately. He was about to make his way over before Oboro put the various kids that were climbing on him and his clouds down. They stood up quickly and had crossed the classroom in record time.
The quickness of his movement seemed to jostle Shota out of his brooding as he looked over. As if suddenly realizing the number of kids that have gravitated towards him, it was like a switch flip and Shota was now in his entertainment mode, moving his hands and trying to engage them in conversation. All with the goal of keeping the set of students’ attention on himself.
Tensei tasked himself with the same, keeping the rest of the kids entertained as his friend dealt with the issue. He trusted Oboro enough to break up a grade school fight with minimal issues.
Even looking over now made any last fears go away. Oboro was crouched down between the two of them and had a hand resting on each kid’s shoulder. The kids didn’t look particularly happy that Oboro had broken up whatever argument had been going on but the glares had stopped. Oboro was giving the mile-wide smile that usually calmed those around him. Give them a few minutes and their small group would be sharing laughs.
Tensei felt a small tug on his leg, he looked down and met eyes with a small child with surprisingly big eyes.
“What’s up, little man?” he asked. The kid didn’t respond, only stared. Tensei reminded himself not to be unnerved by it. Sometimes Tenya was nonverbal, only seeming to express with movements of his eyes and leading hands. The kid in front of him seemed to do the same, taking Tensei’s hand and bringing him over to one of the desks.
Tensei followed along, stopping at the desk and looking down at where a small little drawing sat.
The drawing had what Tensei had assumed to be a family, three larger stick figures and two smaller ones with a black sky overtop them. Odd choice for a background, but maybe the kid just didn’t have a blue crayon? There seemed to be some characteristics drawn, such as one of the smaller stick figures having a skirt and pigtails, and the other resembling the boy himself. While there were defining points, the whole of the stick figures looked blurry in a way.
The only thing that didn’t have the hazy vagueness to it seemed to be the small dog in the corner of the photo, with a surprising amount of detail on the coloring of white with tan patches.
“Is that a corgi?” Tensei asked. The kid just looked at him and nodded before going back and drawing, seemingly done now that Tensei had seen his photo. Tensei shrugged to himself before looking over the rest of the kids who had been sitting. They all looked fairly calm. Two kids in the front seemed to be sharing their coloring materials back and forth with each other.
Good calm kids. A glance towards Shota showed that even their emo friend was doing fine with the kids in his care. He was crouched down and seemed to be telling a story to a small group who all had their eyes fixated on him. See Shota? It’s not so bad.
Before he could check on how Oboro was doing he heard a large booming laugh. Tensei turned towards the corner in time to see Oboro laughing with the two kids. They both had wide smiles on their face. One hanging on Oboro’s arm, nearly used as a swing. The other seemed content to play on the small cloud that had been conjured up. Successful de-escalation, it had appeared.
Tensei smiled to himself. Yeah, his friends were good with kids.