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Aizawa knew his cats. Knew their habits and there personalities and needs.
He did not like it when they started to change, when they stopped paying as much attention to him as they normally would. The dirty white Persian – and probably part maine coon due to her massive size – would no longer run against his legs and demand a space on his shoulder.
The three sister small black juvenile cats only wound around his legs and demanded attention and food very often. They would watch him, with poise and grace and disinterest from the bin they loved to sit in the sun on.
The cats were being fed and loved by someone else, and Aizawa had to say that he needed to find who this person was and stop them. It had to be a crime somewhere, preventing him from this feline love when his apartment was vehemently anti-cat and his husband was allergic and thought hairless cats were not something he would ‘feel the vibe from shou, they look like naked mole rats on trigger.’
At least the one he called pirate still loved him. The dappled old man, who had a dark patch of black fur over one of his eyes looking incredibly like an eye patch, with the little wood-coloured leg also adding to the allusion. He was Aizawa’s first love, before he went to UA and needed release from the world. Before all the others, Pirate was his, and no new imposter could take him away from him.
Huffing at the third time this week that the majority of the cats ignored his kibble offering, and with only a few of the older ones accepting his fuss, Aizawa knew he needed to track this heartless criminal down and take them to Tartarus, or maybe just hide the body. This was a crime too great for prison.
Pirate meowed at him softly, pawing his trouser leg for him to be lifted up. Aizawa took that to mean he agreed with his murder plot.
All he needed to do now was set the trap.
Izuku was having, A Night. Capitals needed. He was barely able to keep his tears contained as he slowly made his way to his favorite spot. One of which he knew All for One had no eyes on.
And now all he wanted to do was curl up with the cats he had found in the barely accessible ally way. He hoped that big fluffy white one was there, they were so very cuddly and nice and Izuku needed to cry into a big white living teddy bear tonight.
Not only had he failed to save that person tonight, he had also seen Tomura.
The first fact alone would have sent him off the street for a week, but the second fact sent a shiver of pure cold fear deep into his heart.
Knowing that All for One allowed him to roam, allowed him to do what he wanted. His moves were always calculated and sending Tomura – who Izuku was sure didn’t even know he was there – to where he and his mother were currently living, was a calculated move.
While he had promised to keep his distance, with the monthly gift of a large allowance. Which allowed Izuku to indulge on three of his passions, hero merch, vigilantism, and the cats, it also meant that his father had total control over their finances and could – and has – taken it all away before. Nearly forcing them onto the street before Izuku had apologised for whatever slight his father had made up.
He graciously allowed him to be a vigilante, allowed him to save people who couldn’t save themselves.
Not that he could save his mother.
He curled around his favourite cat, one he called Bear. And sobbed into his long white fur.
He had dropped his goggles and mask – of which the mask was embroidered by his mother, and totally forgot to pick them back up when his phone buzzed. A summons, his father probably found out about his mother. He left the area in a daze, his hands numb and head number. He didn’t want to see him tonight.
So he went home to a cold empty house and let his phone ring on the counter.
He woke up in the vault a few hours later – it wasn’t unexpected he just wished he could feel something other than numbness.
Aizawa came back to his den, and unlike other times he came back at this time of night, the cats were – finally – fighting for his attention. Hungry little meows echoed in the close space as they finally realised who truly loved them and looked after them.
He only noticed how The Great White One was curled protectively over something and had not come for food only after he had gotten away from the three big trippers. Whatever he did she did not come closer, and when he tried to see what she was standing over she hissed at him. Low and angry, like a mother cat over a kitten. Even the other cats she was weary of, batting them away when they tried to come for a sniff.
Pirate gave him a deadpan look when Aizawa looked at him for help, almost as if he were shrugging and telling him to deal with it himself.
Approaching slowly, lowering himself closer to the floor to look smaller and friendlier and not upset or angry – because he was very upset this was the first time he had been rejected by a cat and it stung – he just needed a little peak at what the cat was hiding. Just incase it was something that could point him to the criminal who had been stealing the hearts of his cats. Even with the vindictive side of him glad that cats were so fickle.
Ha take that, they came back to me so easily!
Then he saw the embroidered mask and green, teched-up goggles. The smile slipped off his face. If course it was that child. He pouted, and this was the only place he would pout – the cats could never tell anyone and there was no security cameras here to pick it up! He couldn’t think that this child was stealing his cats from him. It was a funny joke when he assumed it was a criminal or some random adult human. But now this was serious.
A child vigilante was a very serious thing in his books.
This is why he never indulged in joking. Even in his head. He now felt guilty.
God now he would have to organise some way to get this kid some help away from the vigilante thing. His behaviour had been concerning for along time, and now at least Aizawa knew where he would come regularly.
Time to call The Backup Squad.
Not that he ever agreed to that name.
Izuku was ‘let out’ from the vault a couple of days later. He hadn’t moved him into his base yet, and Izuku suspected he wouldn’t. All Might had found him once, and he could do it again, and his father was nothing if not a paranoid planner.
But he might yet move him.
Izuku didn’t like not knowing things, and so for the day after he was dropped off by Kurogiri back into his home. Empty but surprisingly warm and clean – All for One probably was something to do with that – he planned.
None of them were very good, none of them were plausible, and none of them would ever happen, Izuku hoped. But it was comforting to have the illusion that he could do something. That he a quirkless vigilante could stand up against the oldest super villain in the world. Even if he were part of the eternal group – a group whose invitation his father had shunned so many times, and one he was vehemently against Izuku joining – he would stand no chance.
The next night he went to the most expensive butcher he knew, and brought the nicest cuts of meat with his fathers card and went back to his home to prepare them for the cats. Making sure to remove all the bones for the older cats to nibble on and all the meat was cooked nicely. He cooled them down and made his way out after eating some of the lean bits of the meat. He ignored the meals in the fridge, Kurogiri never spiced them enough because Tomura lacked any ability to have anything nice in his life – and that meant bland boring food.
What he did not expect, after feeding the cats and letting his ragged soul soothe, was for what looked like a homeless man to jump him, arrest him, and take him to UA.
The only cat who tried to do anything about it was Bear, all the others were sleeping off the feast Izuku had brought them, and were too lazy.
Then he was face to face with Nedzu, and one of his plans was opened to him.