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“Hey everyone!”
The camera jostles, and green hair pops into view. Midoriya Izuku’s winning smile fills the screen as he adjusts the angle, clearly in a moving car. “Today we’re here on another call from a resident in Kyoto. There’s been reports of suspicious activity going on in an abandoned shrine, so they decided to send the Ghost Trio to investigate! I’m super excited; apparently there’s rapid temperature changes and low mutters that videos can barely pick up on, and there’s even the feeling of something glaring at you when you walk in—”
“Deku, turn the goddamn camera off.” A voice complains from somewhere in the background. “And we definitely didn’t agree on the Ghost Trio name, so shut up. Get over here so you can parallel park, I REFUSE to let this bastard mess up our van.”
“I’m a better driver on long drives, Katsuki, I don’t understand why this is so important to you.”
Izuku gives a final peace sign before shutting off the camera, sighing as he looks over at his two best friends that he’s definitely in love with. Shouto’s sitting in the driver’s seat parked outside their motel and he looks amused as Katsuki glares angrily from the backseat. “I can park just as well as Izuku,” Shouto says, gesturing to the relatively empty parking lot. “I drove us here, didn’t I?”
“Yeah, only because I needed to sleep after editing our last video!” Katsuki snaps. Izuku watches as he clenches his fists and then exhales, letting out a stream of white fog. Hm. It is relatively cold in here, since Shouto keeps the AC at a medium 65°F and refuses to change it when he’s in charge of the radio and air conditioning.
Nevertheless, Izuku (politely) shoves Shouto out of the driver’s seat and easily parallel parks, grinning in triumph when Shouto gives him a deadpan thumbs up outside. Katsuki huffs and gets out to start unpacking their equipment, muttering about power surges and motel Internet.
Izuku still doesn’t quite know how he got here. He’s a 22 year old college graduate that finished out his degree, and on the drive back home to gather the rest of his items so he could begin the moving process to a new city, someone got T-boned in a thunderstorm and he pulled over to help.
Izuku had gotten out of his car, helping a woman and her child out of their vehicle, when an approaching car skidded in a puddle, careening straight towards them, and he pushed the family out of the way. Poof! Immediately gone, white light and everything.
Right! Yeah, that’s pretty important. He’s dead. Like, full on confirmed death, the paramedics couldn’t save him, and he woke up floating above his grave, startled and shocked at his turn of events. For that matter, the way that Izuku can interpret, he’s able to moderately function in the real world as the weird, nice equivalent of a poltergeist.
So now he hangs out with two friends he met after running into Todoroki Shouto at a horror movie premiere, and Bakugou Katsuki had, after meeting him at a film museum, had sarcastically suggested starting up a ghost adventure show, and then these idiots kickstarted it from there.
Izuku shakes off his memories and stares down at his hands, realizing that his hands are pale and becoming translucent. Fear crawls up his spine and Izuku focuses on making them solidify again, breathing a sigh of relief when it works.
“Hey idiot, you getting out anytime soon?”
Izuku yelps when Katsuki appears at his door, raising an eyebrow. “Kacchan!” Izuku wheezes. “Stop scaring me like that! Do you need something? We have about three to four hours before we have to show up at the shrine and meet with the resident. Do you need any help with the equipment?”
“No,” Katsuki snaps. “You’re currently the least annoying out of you and rich boy. I still don’t know how we got here making fucking ghost videos, but if we are doing this as a solid hobby, then I wanna be sure that we make the best adventures. Don’t fuck up the information.”
Izuku nods resolutely. His entire job is to research any location they’re given, and see if they’re actually good to make an episode off of. So far, they’ve been doing a pretty good job! Izuku’s keeping an eye on their YouTube counts and they’re not too bad.
They get checked into their motel room and start prepping for their investigation. It doesn’t take too long for Izuku to get his script and make sure that he’s ready to go with the shrine history. With Katsuki as their main cameraman, and Shouto as a fan-favorite due to his looks and vaguely confused face most of the time, Izuku knows this will definitely be a fun time.
Plus, they always genuinely do have weird occurrences happen to them. There’s always comments about how floating items appear in the background sometimes, and the EMF reader picks up some words that no one else clearly spoke. So maybe, with the three of them together, they can find something super exciting!
(Izuku’s hoping they’re not picking up his own ghostly frequencies, because that’d be pretty embarrassing, but he’s doing his best to not let it interfere with his work.)
The drive over to the shrine is pretty calm. Katsuki keeps fiddling with the camera, glaring angrily at it, and Shouto’s hands barely move from the wheel. Izuku’s ready to go with his spiel in the passenger seat, and starts mumbling under his breath to try and recite what he knows.
Behind him, the EMF pings. Katsuki makes a startled noise and Izuku hears him stab at it. “What the fuck? Doesn’t this thing go off when there’s ghost frequencies or something? Are you telling me our damn car is haunted?”
“That’d be the cherry on top,” Shouto says, a small smile on his face, pulling into the parking area before the torii gates that lead to the shrine. “A trio of ghost hunters find out that their car is haunted. Ooh, better yet, one of them is a ghost! That’d be a plot twist you’d never expect. Actually, that wouldn’t be bad for the conspiracy board…one moment, please, while I write this down.”
Izuku’s completely stiff in his seat. He feels like his breath has been taken away and he desperately wills his hands to not go translucent again. Behind him, Katsuki sucks in a sharp breath. “Shut up with your stupid theories,” he snaps, but Izuku can detect an undercurrent of fear in his voice. “Let’s just get this over with.”
There’s a woman waiting for them when all three get out. She looks worried, briefly glancing behind her into the darkened area, and sighs with relief when they approach. “I presume you are the ones helping us with our…issues?” She asks. She’s taller than Izuku, surprisingly enough, and gives off a very regal appearance. “Thank you so much for this, by the way. My name is Yaoyorozu Momo and I’m one of the former caretakers of this place. Normally, the shrine would be preserved and kept up to date, but due to the temperature fluctuations going on in Kyoto, it’s currently closed and abandoned for the time being.”
“That’s strange,” Shouto frowns. “Do you think these fluctuations have anything to do with the ghostly rumors surrounding the place?” Izuku tunes in, jotting down notes as Katsuki rolls his eyes.
“I’m not quite sure what’s going on,” Yaoyorozu says, clasping her hands together. “But there’s been multiple reports of an uneasy presence in the area since they started happening. It almost feels like someone’s glare is directed at you, and you can’t quite shake the feeling unless you’ve left the shrine.”
For some reason, Katsuki almost seems guilty, before shaking it off and nodding his head at the looming torii gates up ahead. “Is that the barrier for the so-called ‘bad feeling’?” He asks gruffly. “How far does the range go, if you know?”
“Yes, that seems to be the barrier for now.” Yaoyorozu nods. “Like I said, I’m not sure what the cause is, but I’m honestly at the point of believing that it is indeed a ghost. The range extends only to the torii gates, thankfully. You have full reign over the property, and please let me know if you need anything! I’ll be in my car watching soap operas.”
Yaoyorozu heads off, and Izuku straightens up. “Well gang,” he grins, waving his notepad around. “Time to get to the bottom of this! Kacchan, you got the camera? We can start filming after we bow to the torii gates and make our way in. Any objections?”
“Yeah, that I’m not paid enough.” Katsuki mutters, but he relents and follows them in.
Sure enough, the path to the shrine is dusty and covered with leaves. The chill isn’t as bad as it could be in the hours of night, but judging by the lack of moonlight, there’s a high chance they’ll experience those temperature fluctuations. Izuku’s prepared with salt in his pocket, a flashlight, and anything else he could hold in his pockets.
(The odds that it’s Izuku doing all this are pretty high, though. He’s been told that his presence can sometimes be off-putting, but the different temperatures and the uneasy presence are new. Maybe there’s a second spirit? Maybe he’s unlocked another cool power? He’ll have to figure it out later.)
Katsuki makes sure that he’s filming before sighing and pointing his camera directly in front. Izuku shivers at the sharp chill that goes down his spine, and tries not to look at him. It’s kinda weird that the feeling only happens when Kacchan gets super angry…but wouldn’t this be a constant? He glares so often at us, you’d think we could feel it all the time! Maybe it’s a fluke. It could be another ghost, especially in a place as old as this.
“I’m gonna turn on the EMF,” Shouto says as they approach the shrine. Weirdly enough, he’s the one that Izuku and Katsuki choose to send into battle the most. His deadpan expressions and hilarious way he seems to vibe through life is pretty popular on their channel. “Any objections? It feels like the ghostly presence is pretty strong here. Izuku, can you sprinkle some salt on the steps? Give it a cool flourish too.”
Izuku snorts and does a little twirl for good measure as he sprinkles salt everywhere. They may be ghost hunters, but they’re unconventional! Helps when you’ve got an actual ghost on the team, although Izuku’s been starting to get a sneaking suspicion that there might be another in their trio. Is it Katsuki, who sometimes seems like a powerful poltergeist? Or Shouto, whose presence is enough to make a chill go down their spines?
“Turn on the EMF,” Katsuki grumbles as he points the camera at the object. Izuku zips up his little fanny pack with the salt and they all gather around to pay attention and try to capture a voice. In Shouto’s hands, the EMF clicks on and blinks green. All three idiots look down at the reader and sweatdrop as the wind picks up.
Whispers start pouring out of it, and if Izuku focuses hard enough, he can hear, “Kacchan’s arms…black tank top…should wear it often…”
Oh my fucking god. That’s Izuku’s voice. That’s what he was thinking in the shower this morning!
“What the fuck,” Katsuki says. For a split second, Izuku panics and wonders if he heard the message, but then remembers that Katsuki’s hard of hearing and sometimes can’t understand Izuku’s mumbling. It seems to be in his favor for today. “That’s not any of us, right? None of us were talking?”
The temperature suddenly plummets. Izuku exhales in shock, an icy chill sweeping through the trees. The entire shrine seems to plunge into darker shadows. “It appears to be colder here,” Shouto says plainly, blinking as Katsuki and Izuku immediately glare at him. “Am I…correct?”
“You and your fucking internal thermoregulation,” Katsuki hisses. “Yes, idiot, it’s a lot colder than it was! I’m pretty sure that ponytail chick was right! I didn’t think this dumbass place would actually be haunted! There’s gotta be a ghost in here!”
“What are the odds that one of us is a ghost and we’re causing it?” Izuku jokes, making his flashlight briefly shake as he laughs. He’s trying to keep the situation light-hearted on the off-chance that he’s actually right. “Honestly, that’d be the funniest plot twist of all time. C’mon Kacchan, quit your shit! We’re here to make content, baby!”
“Shut up,” Katsuki rapidly smacks Izuku’s shoulder. He sounds more tense than usual, voice tight as he stays true to his job and keeps the camera steady. “I’m dead serious right now, shut up, Deku. What if it’s YOU, huh?”
Before Izuku can even think about defending himself, Shouto raises his hand. “I’m going to split up from you,” he says, ignoring the outraged gasps from the other duo. “I think this is the most productive way to ensure that we capture this ghost on film.”
“So no like, actually capturing the ghosts like those four American guys do in that movie?” Izuku asks, trying not to let himself discorporate. “Or revealing that the ghost is actually someone rich haunting this place? To scare people away and sell the land for profit?”
“Am I an idiot?” Shouto asks incredulously, whirling around to them, eyes wide. Katsuki opens his mouth but Izuku shushes him. “There’s no way in hell that we’re confronting this! We’re just here to take the video, get them on film, and dip. I don’t know about you, but I want to sleep in a bed tonight and not deal with a curse on my family. Fuyumi would kill me.”
Without another word, he takes off running into the shrine. It might be the fact that he grew up sheltered, but Shouto doesn’t do any proper etiquette when he gets into the shrine. Katsuki and Izuku watch him vanish into the shadows, red and white hair turning liquid black.
Izuku breaks the silence after a few moments. “He’s going to die in there, isn’t he?”
Katsuki snorts and jostles the camera. “Sure is. Well, c’mon Deku. We’ve got a ghost to capture on camera. If you don’t shit your pants tonight, I’ll treat you to dessert after this.”
“For the last time Kacchan, I didn’t shit my pants, I was constipated from Shouto’s cooking and you just so happened to pop up from behind the door in that haunted jail. My scream was purely for theatrics.”
“Nothing about you is theatrical, you just scream like a bitch.” Katsuki says, and laughs when Izuku smacks him on the shoulder. “Whatever. Well, if that chick said we’re in the range for the ghostly presence, then we can try to pinpoint where it’s at. Aren’t you scared, Deku? You wanna say something for the viewers?”
Izuku squints into the camera. “I’m cold,” he says flatly. “Honestly, it could be someone who’s trying to sleep here if they don’t have a home. Who knows? We can’t rule out anything, since it’s, y’know, the dead of night and we came in with no plans.”
“Oh, I’ve got a plan,” Katsuki reassures him. “It’s the plan of: if someone comes at us, we run and leave Candy Cane behind. It’s foolproof. They can stick around and annoy him about his stupid colored hair.”
“It’s genetic, Kacchan, I’ve already told you this—”
A branch snaps. Katsuki and Izuku whirl around to see nothing in the trees. Leaves mockingly wave at him, dancing in the wind. “What the hell was that?” Katsuki whispers, pointing the camera at the direction of the noise. “Can you see anyone over there?”
“If this is another one of your pranks, I’ll legitimately be upset.” Izuku warns. “I don’t want to see another inflatable tubeman that you’ve hooked up to our backup generator. I WILL say, though, that if this isn’t your prank, then I suggest we run.”
Katsuki gives him a Look before staring back into the horizon. If he concentrates enough, he can see a hand wrapped in ice start reaching for them. “Nope!” He announces, scruffing Deku’s collar, yanking him back with a yelp. “We’re getting the hell outta here. That’s not our problem. We gotta go find Shouto, I think that’s a GREAT idea.”
“Oh my god you saw something,” Izuku gasps, successfully managing to free himself from Katsuki’s grasp. “DID YOU GET IT ON CAMERA? Is there something coming after us?!” They continue running towards the shrine again, and Izuku actually takes the time to drop into a quick bow. Katsuki snarls at him (while also bowing) and drags him by his hair inside.
The shrine is dark and dirty. There’s no lights on or white talismen anywhere, and even more worrying, no sign of Shouto. Izuku points his flashlight into the shadows, staring in shock at the lack of footprints. “He did come this way, right?” He whispers, trying to see if he can spot his partner anywhere. “Where the hell did he go?”
“I don’t know,” Katsuki huffs, exasperated. “Maybe that bastard went back to the van or something! Maybe he really did just leave us here! You think it’s revenge for the meat locker incident?”
Izuku balks at that. “I…hadn’t considered that. Oh. Alright then. Well, let’s see if we can find him at the car so we can regroup and figure out what our next step is.”
As they turn to leave, a figure appears in the doorway. Katsuki and Izuku take a step back and stare up at the ghostly white image that shimmers, ice cracking down its form. Everything around it starts to freeze, sighing heavily as it shifts in the wind. The building gets an icy sheen on it as the ghost approaches, creating frost in their hair. The camera lens also gets iced over, preventing any video from taking place.
To his horror, Izuku feels bits of his body fading in and out, making the ice fall through him. He violently shivers and Katsuki holds him closer, and something weird happens. There’s a rush of heat on his left; it’s Katsuki, who’s pinning the ghost with a glare so strong, there’s actual fire behind it.
“Fuck off,” Katsuki growls, stepping up. “Leave us alone and find your own peace somewhere else. This is no place for you, asshole!”
The ghost pauses in its track. Izuku looks between the two of them and squints at the ghost, seeing a glimpse of someone familiar. He takes a step forward, trying to stop the shaking as the icy air hits him again, and feels Katsuki’s burning gaze at his back.
Izuku swallows, and reaches a hand out. “...Shouto?”
Katsuki freezes. The ghost stops and looks directly at Izuku before the ice melts off it, making a puddle on the floor. Sure enough, Shouto’s face appears as he looks confused at the two of them. “Guys?” He asks, voice wavering. “Oh good, I was looking for y’all, but something scared me in the woods between the shrine. I panicked and tried to find you guys, but I got stuck in the trees.”
Well. This certainly puts a dent in their plans. Katsuki backs up and hits a wall, bracing himself as his eyes are huge. “What the fuck?” He whispers, looking between the two of them. “Why aren’t you FREAKING OUT, DEKU?! This seems like something you’d lose your goddamn mind over! Why are you so CALM!”
“Wait, hold on,” Izuku says, after Katsuki’s done yelling. “So you’re also a ghost?”
“Yes, Izuku.” Shouto bows his head, ashamed as he hovers off the ground. He doesn’t notice Katsuki freezing in place next to him as he forces himself to maintain a solid form. “I’m sorry I kept it hidden from you for this long, but there’s only so much I can do when we travel together all the time. I promise I never had any intentions to harm both of you, or to haunt you until your own deaths—”
“Dude, shut up.” Katsuki interrupts him, his eyes going wide. “Repeat that, Deku? Because I think I just heard you say that you’re ALSO a ghost? As in plural? If you’re a ghost and you’ve been fucking with us this entire time, I swear I’ll end your existence. Er. Uh. Again, I guess.”
Izuku wills his hand to fade and sticks it through the camera. Shouto stares at him, godsmacked, while Katsuki yells several curse words in a row. “Surprise? I got hit by a car that lost traction in the rain in the mountains. It personally wasn’t my favorite, but I at least saved the mom and her daughter I went to help!”
“Sounds like something you’d do,” Katsuki says, but he doesn’t sound mad. “Well, fuck. This is something I really wasn’t expecting from any of you jerks. Why didn’t you SAY anything?”
“Do you know how terrifying it is to reveal to your partners that you’re a ghost?” Izuku retorts. “I thought I’d be, like, banished with salt or even worse, kicked out! I didn’t want to live on the streets again as a ghost! It sucks!”
“This explains why we kept shutting down all talks about dating,” Shouto says, mumbling to himself. “If it makes you feel better, Izuku, my family still doesn’t know I’m dead. I decided to leave my home to rebel against my father and unfortunately ended up being stabbed by some guy somewhere in Tokyo on my joyride. I still don’t know where I died, to be honest.”
Izuku tries to say something sympathetic, but yelps when Katsuki cocks a fist back and aims it directly at Izuku’s face. “KACCHAN!” He hollers, annoyed, but jerks back when he realizes that Katsuki’s fist didn’t actually hit him; it’s gone through him instead.
He takes a second to understand what’s just happened. Shouto’s the accidental ghost that’s been haunting them for a while, Izuku’s also a ghost that’s been messing with their frequencies, and Katsuki also appears to be a ghost, if his shimmering form is anything to go by.
“I didn’t want to say anything since I dealt with a serial killer,” Katsuki says, pissed, “but I GUESS if everyone’s a ghost, then whatever. What’re the odds? If you’re a ghost, and I’m a ghost, then who’s running our ghost channel? Man, we’re the WORST. Why the fuck are we hunting ghosts then?”
“I thought it’d be ironic,” Izuku says weakly, while Shouto shrugs and says, “wouldn’t YOU try to find others like you? And it led me to you two, so it wasn’t all that bad?”
“So are we the ones accidentally haunting the shrine?” Izuku asks, tapping his chin. “It’d make a lot of sense, since we make up most of the activity…Shouto’s the temperature fluctuations, Kacchan’s the ‘really angry glare’, and I’m, uh, the mumbling. Sorry about that.”
Katsuki rolls his eyes, stuffing his hands into his pockets. “This is stupid. I just want to go home and figure out our lives now. Since all of you decided to be assholes about the whole dating conversation we had about a few months ago, I want to reopen that topic. I don’t think being ghosts is going to stop us from holding hands. We could’ve been doing this from the start.”
“Do we still have to pay rent?” Shouto asks in the background. “...Since we’re legally dead?”
Izuku ignores him for a moment to gesture around all three of them. “Can we get outta here first? I wanna stop haunting this poor shrine for Yaoyorozu. Maybe we can drop by a ramen shop nearby and we can have a chat about this.”
The three ghosts—partners, at this point—make their way to their van and explain the situation to Yaoyorozu. She nods, thanks them profusely and hands them their down payment before sending them on their way.
As they drive off to a nearby ramen shop, with Katsuki wiping the ice off his lens, Izuku looks over at Shouto and furrows his eyebrows. “...Were we really the ones haunting it?”
“Hell no,” Shouto says immediately. “There was an ancient demon haunting the place, but it scared me so I turned into my ghost form and scared it off. We just happened to actually fix the problem while we were there.”
They’re all silent for a moment before Katsuki snorts, shaking his head in exasperation. “I think we can retire from ghost hunting and use our profit for more important things while figuring out how to live like ghosts together,” he says, and Izuku honestly thinks it sounds like a great idea.
“...Do you think we could open up our own haunted house attraction?”
“Shut up, Shouto.”