Chapter Text
Something terrifying is going to happen.
Aizawa Shouta knows that the moment his terror of a boss calls him in for a meeting, mere days after he managed to drag his ass back to work after the villain attack at the USJ.
It can’t be about the villain attack’s damage, because the remaining teachers already had a meeting with their principal about that and his husband caught him up on it, the moment he woke up at the hospital.
Though, he has no doubt it’s about the USJ attack. In the last few days, that’s been the only thing on Nedzu’s deranged brain, and obsessively so. Shouta doesn’t trust that one bit. It drags up a feeling of discomfort and wariness, for a very simple reason. Nedzu is one of the most intelligent being’s he has ever met. His boss is capable of figuring out most things very efficiently, with absolute clarity. The USJ definitely should have been figured out by now, considering the League of Villains introduced themselves—except there is more to it. And that alarms Shouta. Because if there’s more to it, something that keeps his boss so entertained, then it cannot mean anything good for them, for his students .
So, when the door to the principal’s room open itself before he can open it himself, the irritation that Shouta usually feels about that fact isn’t present.
Instead, a feeling of absolute exhaustion and aggravation fills him, when he steps into the room only to be greeted by Nedzu cackling away in his chair, a laptop on his desk.
Why did he bother waking up again that morning? (Because he has a very nice husband and a very small part of him is worried about his students, who got through the USJ, but definitely not without mental scars).
“Shouta-kun,” Nedzu greets him, a strange glint in his eyes, “take a seat, please.”
The underground hero does as told, praying that he’s wrong and what he’s about to hear isn’t going to be as terrible as he assumes.
“As I recently went through the details of the USJ attack, I’ve made an observation, Shouta-kun.”
All hope drops down to hell. Shouta sighs resigned. “What observation?”
Nedzu starts to chuckle once more, and Shouta tries his best to stop himself from looking unnerved. No matter how many years he’s known that rat for, his imitation of a smile is still regular nightmare fuel for the underground hero.
Nedzu leans forward, clearly every intention to finally destroy Shouta’s last bit of sanity, after all these years.
“A few days before the USJ attack, someone managed to hack into the second layer of U.A.’s security defense.”
The teacher freezes.
“… What?”
“The second nonpublic layer.”
Oh god.
“I still haven’t managed to track the hacker just yet, but I’m very close.”
They were all going to die.
“I’m very excited to find out who’s capable of such an impressive feat. Do you think they’ll be up to play a game of chess with me?”
Now Shouta’s sure of it—God cannot exist, otherwise he’d have some mercy on their poor souls. There’s never been anyone who managed to get through the five public layers. For a good reason—Nedzu was merciless with how he set up the security defense for the files. Heck, back when Shouta was still his personal student, that rat threw him at the defense and told him to try and hack into it. It took him literal months to even get past the first three public layers.
“Do you think that hacker is behind that Nomu itself?” He finally asks after a whole minute of silence, his thoughts running haywire.
“No,” Nedzu immediately answers, gaining Shouta’s attention once more, ”that hacker left me a message.
The teacher’s head snaps up and he stands up to walk around the desk at his boss’ gesture, to take a look at the open laptop’s screen.
Dear Nedzu,
Are you a dog, a mouse or a bear?
I believe you’re a combination of all these animals and some others like a stoat, which would make you a chimera. Am I right?
But most importantly, you’re the principal of U.A.
You and your staff must be wondering about the League of Villains. Or well, at least that is what our leader, Shigaraki Tomura, calls it. In reality, he has not much idea on how to be a villain and as far as I know, the attack ended up being a complete failure. It must have seemed more like a circus act, with how many things apparently went wrong during it. Tomura threw a tantrum after it as well, like the man-child he is (_ _|||)
As the heroes present during the attack—Thirteen and Eraserhead, if I remember correctly—probably could tell, Tomura sees this whole thing as a game. He’s the embodiment of a sleep-deprived teenager that stays up all night to play action and adventure games whilst drinking an unhealthy amount of energy drinks. It’s rather annoying, because I’m the one who has to stay awake to play with him. This is why my sleep schedule will never be fixed. I wholeheartedly blame Tomura for that (ｰ ｰ; )
One of these days someone he cannot simply disintegrate if they don’t agree with him, will snap at him and he’ll face some sort of consequences for his behavior. I’m curious to see how that will go.
Right now, the league has no proper goals. Wanting to kill All Might is no goal, that’s just Tomura being delusional.
Truthfully, Tomura just really hates heroes and unfortunately for society, his mentor is the boogeyman of the underworld, so his hate ends up with actual consequences for mostly innocent people. Mostly. There are some heroes who really should be in jail, but I’m sure you’re aware of that.
You must be wondering why I sent you this message. I was simply curious to see if I could and what your reaction would be ( ≧ ◡≦ )
Also, I wanted to apologize to Eraserhead. I was the one to steal the information of the class present during the attack. If it’s any consolation, I kept their quirks a secret from the league.
I think with that I’ve said all I wanted to say. The only thing left now is an introduction.
As you’re probably aware, red spider lilies also wear the name ‘corpse flower’, as a nod to them being a common sight in graveyards. It is also told, that the lilies draw in the blood of the dead, thus gaining them their appearance.
Although, this all makes the flower seem rather macabre, I cannot help but find it interesting. Furthermore, the flower’s scientific name ‘Lycoris radiata’ contains the Greek word for twilight.
Twilight is the period just before it becomes completely dark in the evening.
It’s rather befitting to me, as I am the last layer before the everlasting night of the league approaches and causes decay. Coincidentally, the flower’s symbolization of death fits me as well, as I am already dead.
Therefore, I conclude that calling myself Lycoris, is a good idea, don’t you agree?
So, unfortunately, we will have to resume this game at another time,
Lycoris ₍ ᐢ ̥ ̮ ̥ ᐢ ₎ *:･。
P.S. If you manage to track my coordinates down, I’d love to play a game of chess with you. Good luck d( ᵘ ꒳ ᵘ ✼)
“There’s… a lot to unpack here,” Shouta mutters, “dead? What does… Lycoris mean with being dead?”
“That’s something I would like to know as well,” Nedzu admits. “However, that can wait for when I track them down. As does the Boogeyman comment.”
And Shouta doesn’t doubt the principal will.
“That aside, although Lycoris managed to play it off as a playful message, they have dropped us quite a good amount of information.”
Shouta nods, frowning slightly. “Lycoris indirectly apologized for the attack. Doesn’t this letter hint at coercion?”
“It’s difficult to tell,” Nedzu counters. “It does seem very likely, however, Lycoris doesn’t seem to mind their job. In fact, they seem to be more against Shigaraki Tomura being the leader, than anything else.”
Shouta narrows his eyes, skimming over the letter once more. “You think we could use that?”
“Perhaps,” Nedzu agrees, “but only time will tell.”
Since the start of his career, Hawks has been speedily climbing up the ranks and his popularity has skyrocketed off the charts. Not only is he charming and laidback, he is also very fast and efficient. No one worries about him causing any collateral damage like Endeavour does whenever he appears during a fight, he battles crafty and swift, and he is as soothing as a rescue hero, always choosing the right words, when comforting or confronting anyone.
Thus, his adaptability and capability lead to the fact that he rarely has any common enemies or villains that he sees more than once—he catches everyone during the first altercation and then moves on, not looking back.
Of course, there is an exception to that as well.
The exception to that constancy comes in the form of a small villain (he’s actually not sure about that because he can’t even tell if they ever used a quirk or not) named Lycoris, that appears every week during some of his patrol times to annoy him.
(His patrol times change every two days; how do they even know when to appear?)
If people would know (if the commission would know), they would wonder why he still hasn’t caught that villain. Truthfully, it’s a bit more complicated than what anyone would think the reason to be. Hawks doesn’t want to catch the villain and turn them in.
Lycoris is concerning . Not in a way that’s dangerous to the public or anything like that. But in a way that causes Hawks discomfort. Lycoris is most likely a child. A child that has some ties to the newly surfaced League of Villains, from the hints they have dropped during their altercations, but a child nonetheless.
A child he’s seen stop during their escape route from him, to help an elderly woman across the street. And to get balloon down from a tree for a kid. And to carry the groceries for a woman with an injured arm.
In other words, Hawks doesn’t even want to catch Lycoris and jail them. Hawks wants to help them, because he’s worried. Even though they are tied to the league, Lycoris is genuinely just a good person. He can tell from their actions and the fact, that they never seem to genuinely want to harm them. The only reason Hawks is chasing them is because Lycoris was involved in a commotion at some grocery store and then managed to evade being caught by him. Hawks was naturally curious. One thing led to the other, and now the winged hero has been chasing after the villain for around two years.
(If he’s honest, the chasing is less out of a need to apprehend the kid and more of a want to check up on them.)
“It’s been a while, hasn’t it,” he calls out towards the kid, a smirk on his face, “have you been busy?”
The hooded kid turns around to face him. His face is hidden by a mask and a pair of googles with neon green lenses. Then he holds up his phone at the hero.
~ ヾ ( ・ ω ・ )
He holds up his hand and waves at the kid.
“Just a heads up, I know JSL, if you’d prefer that.”
He tells him as he descends from the sky and lands a bit further from the kid. The kid shrugs his shoulders, types something and then holds up the phone again.
It’s fine, I’m still not good enough with sign language. For now, typing like that is a bit faster—You’re one of the few people with really good eyesight, so I don’t have to drag my tablet around…
He nods, walking closer to the kid, but stops before he’s too close. The villain won’t allow him to get too close.
Then the kid types even more on his phone and Hawks smiles, knowing exactly what will happen next.
So, about your eyesight—is it as good as the one of an actual hawk? Can you also see from over 100 miles away? I’m pretty sure you can, because usually find a lot faster than I expect you to, but maybe I’m just really bad at evading you. Is your visual acuity also 8x times that of a human? And what about your color perception?
The hero grins upon reading the question. Leave it to Lycoris to always have something new to ask about, whenever they happen to run across each other.
“I’m a bird of prey, kiddo,” he teases him, “my eyesight has to keep up with that.”
You’re a human with some traits of a hawk, if anything! You still eat stuff like salads and vegetables, I know you do. I saw you that one time at that corner store.
Hawks whistles as he raises an eyebrow. “Are you admitting to stalking me?”
Stop joking. Why would I wanna stalk you? You’re pretty boring. I just saw you on my way somewhere.
Ouch. Right into his heart.
That u = ⊹⋛⋋ ( ՞ ਊ ՞) ⋌⋚⊹ ???
Hawks splutters. “Hey! What did I do to you? I’m always super nice! I even give you a head start when I chase you.”
Yeah, because you have wings. How am I supposed to compete with a dude that can fly??? Not everyone is blessed with cool, red wings.
“Cool and red wings? I see, someone’s jealous,” he teases, grinning at the other. “How about it then? Want to go around flying?”
Even though he asks the question, he already knows the answer.
As always, you know why I have to decline. The public’s definitely going to want to know who that random kid you fly around is.
The hero sighs, a bit dejected. Truthfully, he’s very well aware of that. And even if the public wouldn’t care, the commission sure would—and there is no way he’ll let them know about Lycoris’ existence.
Plus… soon I’m going to make an appearance.
Hawks frowns upon reading the words.
The League of Villains is making their entrance. Unfortunately, that means for me that Tomura will drag me with him, because he’s an ass.
Hawks’ heart drops down to his stomach upon reading these words. An appearance… out there? In the public eye?
The Hero Public Safety Commission will find out about Lycoris. That’s bad. Very, very bad.
“And you can’t… stay hidden? At all?”
The kid shakes his head. At least I get to mask my face, otherwise I’d be done for.
Then the kid looks at his phone, nods once and lifts his phone at him.
I gotta go, need to run an errand. Was nice to see you again （｡ ≧ ◇≦）ﾉ
Hawks waves back and watches as the kid vanishes in the shadows between the buildings.
The biggest reason he refuses to catch the kid is, that he doesn’t want the commission to know of him. He doesn’t want the commission to be able to touch that kid.
Shaking his head, readies himself to fly back up. He’ll think of something. He has to.
(The commission cannot be trusted with kids, especially with ones that are very skilled.)
“Welcome back, Izuku-kun.” Kurogiri calls out to him as he walks into the bar, taking off his mask and goggles.
“I’m back,” he mutters in reply. “Is Tomura in his room?”
The bartender nods. “He’s playing Minecraft.”
Izuku groans. “Ok, I’ll go play with him.”
God, he’s exhausted.