Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The world stopped, then began anew.

Thank you for installing Git, the free and open source distributed version control system designed to handle everything from small to very large projects with speed and efficiency.

Git for StarOS, version ∞

StarOS – Bringing harmony to this world of glass and stars since the birth of time. ©Eternity


“Mommy! Mommy!” Izuku barreled into the living room with all the grace and poise expected from an enthusiastic four-year-old. “I got my quirk! I finally got my quirk!”

“That’s wonderful, sweetie!” Midoriya Inko scooped up Izuku in a big hug, twirling in circles while her boy giggled. “Tell me all about it!”

Izuku twitched his nose in thought. “Um, I don’t really know. I see something, kinda. I don’t, like, really really see it. It’s words, and I don’t see the words, but they’re in my mind? I don’t really get what it says.” Izuku’s voice got quieter as he talked, suddenly feeling bad that he didn’t know what his own quirk was.

“That’s okay, honey. Whatever you’re seeing, how about you read it out to me, and I’ll help you.”

Izuku nodded multiple times like a bobblehead. “Right! So, um, the start says, ‘Thank you for in-stall-ing Git’, and then I don’t get a lot of the other words. What’s it mean, Mommy?”

Inko tilted her head, and then she smiled. “I’m not sure either, sweetie. I guess we’ll just have to discover it together! How about I make an appointment with the quirk doctor?”

“Yeah!”

“Why don’t you write down what you see, even if you don’t know what the words mean, so that the doctor can help?”

“I’ll get my notebook!” Izuku barreled back into his room to grab his notebook and some crayons. He finally had his quirk! He was the last in his class to get it, but that just meant his quirk was going to be the most awesome of all! He could feel it!

“Well, your son’s quirk is certainly unusual. I looked into everything as best as I could, but there was only so much I could do.” Inko and her son sat facing the quirk therapist, Dr. Kono Teruo.

“It took some time,” Dr. Kono continued, “but we were able to find a few references to the computer program that little Izuku’s quirk is referring to. Do you know about the Great Data Crash of 2035?”

Inko shuffled in her seat. “It sounds familiar. I’m afraid it’s been over a decade since my high school history classes.”

The doctor nodded. “Right. To summarize, in the late 20th to early 21st century, the world transitioned to storing information digitally rather than using physical copies. When society fell apart during the early Quirk Wars, the servers and infrastructure that stored that information broke down. It took decades for society to rebuild, but by that time most of that infrastructure was lost. Some information was preserved, but we don’t know a lot about the fifty or so years prior to the dawn of quirks.”

Izuku swung his legs back and forth on the chair. He was trying to follow what the doctor was saying, and he was a bit distressed that he was already getting lost. His mom patted him on his head and responded. “And this has something to do with my son’s quirk?”

“Yes. Specifically, the quirk is referring to a computer program that existed during that time. The program itself was lost in the Data Crash, but references to it still exist in archives. It was apparently called ‘Git’. To our best understanding, it was a program to help programmers collaborate on work. It kept track of when new lines of code were added, who wrote it, and such and such.”

“And… how exactly is Izuku’s quirk a computer program? What does this mean?”

Dr. Kono slumped in his chair. “That, I don’t have an answer for. Presumably, your son’s quirk will replicate the functionality of this ‘Git’ in some way, but this is an unusual situation, and I can’t help as much as I would want to. I do have some good news though.” The doctor picked up a binder he had on his desk. “Surprisingly, one of the few things related to Git that survived the Data Crash was an incomplete user manual. I took the liberty of printing it all out and collecting it here.” He patted the binder in his hands.

“My quirk already has instructions?!” Izuku jumped up from his seat in excitement. That was so cool! He’d been planning to write about his quirk in his Hero Notebook, of course, but to think that so much of it was already done! The binder in the doctor’s hands had so many pages! All the other kids in his class had already had their quirks for months. He needed to catch up to everyone!

The doctor looked embarrassed and slightly sad. “Unfortunately, again, it’s not as helpful as you might think. It’s clearly missing a lot of sections, and it’s not written in Japanese and no translations are available, but… to be frank, those are the least of my concerns.”

Izuku wasn’t listening anymore. He excitedly grabbed the binder, flipped through it, and read a random passage in the middle.

NAME

git-reset - Reset current HEAD to the specified state

SYNOPSIS

git reset [-q] [<tree-ish>] [--] <pathspec>…
git reset [-q] [--pathspec-from-file=<file> [--pathspec-file-nul]] [<tree-ish>]
git reset (--patch | -p) [<tree-ish>] [--] [<pathspec>…]
git reset [--soft | --mixed [-N] | --hard | --merge | --keep] [-q] [<commit>]


DESCRIPTION

In the first three forms, copy entries from <tree-ish> to the index. In the last form, set the current branch head (HEAD) to <commit>, optionally modifying index and working tree to match. The <tree-ish>/<commit> defaults to HEAD in all forms.

git reset [-q] [<tree-ish>] [--] <pathspec>…
git reset [-q] [--pathspec-from-file=<file> [--pathspec-file-nul]] [<tree-ish>]

These forms reset the index entries for all paths that match the <pathspec> to their state at <tree-ish>. (It does not affect the working tree or the current branch.)

Izuku let out a disappointed whine. “I can’t read this. Is this in English?”

“That’s debatable.” The doctor sighed.

Izuku frowned. He was going to fall even further behind Kacchan if he couldn’t read the instructions for his own quirk. But… that was okay! No one said being a hero was easy. If this is what he needed to do to become a hero, he’d learn every language in the world! And anyway, All Might knew English, so learning it would just make him closer to All Might.

“I’m going to learn English, and then I’ll understand my quirk!” Izuku pumped his tiny fist in the air.

The doctor looked at Izuku with pity. “I’m so sorry.”

Tick-tock. Tick-tock.

Fourteen-year-old Izuku stared at the wall clock, waiting impatiently for the end of the school day.

Tick-tock. Tick-tock.

Tick-tock. Tick-tock.

BRRRIIIIINNGGG!

“Don’t forget, all of you need to hand in your high school application forms by next Monday,” the teacher tried to shout over the class of unruly kids who were excited for the weekend. The bell that signaled the end of the day had rung, and no one was planning to stay in the school a moment more than necessary. Izuku felt that more than most.

Ten years.

Ten pointless, wasted years.

He was running out of time.

He was running out of time!

Izuku tried to slip out with the rest of the hoard of kids exiting the classroom door, but he stopped when he felt a hand grasp him around the back of his collar. “Where do you think you’re going, huh?!”

With a grimace, Izuku shook off the hand and turned to face his bullies. He expected this, of course. There was no way they would let him escape in peace.

There were three of them today. Katsuki, obviously—the only one who really mattered. Then there were two others looming behind him, trying to look cool. Or something. Izuku didn’t really care. “What do you want, Kacchan?”

Katsuki snarled. “You think you can take that tone with me, Deku?”

There wasn’t really a right answer to that question. Izuku decided to stay silent.

“You’re pathetic, you know that?” Katsuki continued, slowly stepping forward to take up more and more of Izuku’s space. “Too busy dreaming to face reality. You’re such a fucking embarrassment.”

“Definitely the words of a hero. You’re going to be so popular at UA.” Oh no, he said that out loud. Why did he say that out loud? Curse his stupid mouth!

“I’m going to be the greatest hero ever!” Katsuki roared. “Don’t you dare look down on me!”

Izuku started to respond, but he was cut off by Katsuki getting right up in his face, the threat of violence implicit in his rejection of personal space. “You’re never going to be a hero, Deku. Don’t even think about applying to UA! I’m the only one from this school who’s getting in, and I don’t want a pathetic loser like you following me around trying to ride my coattails!”

As if. I’m going to avoid you as much as physically possible at the exams. “Okay, Kacchan. I won’t apply to UA. I promise. Can I go now?”

Izuku struggled to keep a straight face as he saw Katsuki experience a whirl of emotions, the gears in his head turning as he tried to parse the nonsense that Izuku just said. After a brief pause, his expression became thunderous and he roared, “Don’t fucking lie to me, you bastard!”

Drat. It was worth a shot.

With a sharp grin, Katsuki continued, “Not that being a liar is anything new for you, you quirkless piece of shit.” He looked smug. Izuku’s comeback had backfired a bit, and he knew it.

“I’m not quirkless,” Izuku mumbled.

“Oh yeah? Prove it.”

And there was the rub.

Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out. Izuku’s chest heaved and his feet pounded against the sand as he jogged up and down the edge of a beach. A while ago he read about how jogging on sand gave you a much better workout than on pavement, and since then he changed his jogging route to pass by the nearby trash heap “beach”.

His altercation with Katsuki and his minions wasn’t as bad as he was dreading. Apparently, even they valued their weekend more than they enjoyed tormenting Izuku, and they weren’t willing to hang around the school longer than necessary. Katsuki stormed out before long, and then the remaining goons spent only a few more minutes pathetically trying to insult Izuku’s face, odor, life choices, genetic history, etc., before they got bored and wanted to go home. Small blessings.

He’d started working out a year ago. He didn’t go to the gym or anything, that was too expensive, but he had a set of weights and the internet, and that was good enough. He had an epiphany one morning that if the day came when he finally figured out his quirk, but he failed the Hero Exam because he was too physically weak, then he might as well just crawl into a hole and die. So ever since then, he made sure to stay in shape in preparation for the day he’d finally learn to use his quirk.

His quirk.

His goddamn stupid quirk.

He tried to hide from Katsuki how much the “quirkless” jabs hurt him, how much it stabbed at his deepest fears, but it didn’t matter. He knew that Kacchan knew.

At four years old, he apparently saw some sort of popup when he got his quirk. And then it never happened again. He didn’t actually remember the original event anymore; he was too young. He “remembered” it, but it was more like he remembered remembering it. It was an impactful moment of his young life and something he’d thought about over and over and over.

He remembered all the times he’d remembered it. But the day itself? If he were asked to describe what the “popup” looked like and what it said, he could tell you, but only because he knew how four-year-old Izuku had described it. But the original memory was gone.

He’d spent so many sleepless nights with ugly thoughts swirling in his mind. Did it even happen? Was he making it all up? Did he have a quirk at all?

But no. He knew he had a quirk. Whether he remembered it properly or not, four-year-old him had named some stupid program that really did exist, and one that he had no possible way of knowing about. It was real.

He just didn’t know what the hell to do next!

Nothing worked. Nothing helped. He’d spent so many years learning English and trying to decipher the user manual, only to discover that 1) it was practically gibberish, and 2) it was a manual for a computer program. He was a human being. What was he supposed to do? Where was he supposed to enter the commands?

There were a lot of avenues to try, and by god he’d tried every single one of them. Obviously, he tried experimenting with an actual computer. That went nowhere. Picturing stuff in his head never worked. In the VR games he played there were a lot of different ways to bring up the menu, such as making a certain hand motion or staring at a specific spot in space. He’d hoped that a screen would appear in front of him in real life if he just figured out the correct action, but no luck so far.

Judging by the manual, Git was a “command-line program”. It was apparently some ancient computer interface where you did stuff by typing specific words rather than tapping on icons. Like, instead of clicking a button you’d type “click button”, or something. He didn’t entirely understand, and most records from that time period were lost in the Data Crash, so he never would fully understand.

So, given that, he supposed that there might be some magic words that would start the “program” that was his quirk. And then he would say those words, or think them, or write them down, or something. And then it would work. But of course, if these magic words existed, then it was missing from the half-complete dog-eared user manual stuffed in a drawer in his room. Which meant it could be anything.

UA entrance exams were less than a year away. And it had already been ten years. His quirk was a mystery inside an enigma wrapped in a command prompt, and he was running out of time.

He was running out of time!

Breathe in, breathe out.

He had reached a part of the beach that wasn’t entirely covered in mountains of trash, enough that he could see the ocean cut across the brilliant golden sky. The sun was starting to set. It was time to go home soon; Mom would worry if he stayed out too late.

Izuku stopped jogging and began his cooldown walk. Between breaths, he started his ritual muttering.

“Start Git. Open Git. Start program Git. Begin Git. Start. Git start. Git open. Run Git. Git begin. Git run. Git new.”

He’d done this countless times in the past. If there really were magic words that would give him a quirk, then he’d just have to try every word. In every language he could think of. It had never worked before, and it almost certainly never would, but he couldn’t bear to do nothing.

“Launch Git. Git launch. Go Git. Go go Git. Git go. Git commence. Initial git. Commence Git. Turn on Git. Load Git. Git load. Git log in. Log in Git. Log in to Git.”

Leaving the beach, Izuku started heading for the nearby bus stop. The bus dropped him off almost right outside his apartment, which is why he chose this route. With the setting sun at his back, his shadow stretched long in front of him on the glimmering sidewalk.

“Boot up Git. Git boot. Compute Git. Input Git. Git input. Git in. Git help. Fuck Git. Git shit. Intro git. Initialize git. Init git. Git initialize. git init. Git creat—”

Izuku jerked to a stop, almost falling over himself. He brought a hand to his mouth. Something was different about that last one. His tongue felt weird, like it had moved in a way that it was never meant to. He didn’t understand. He felt almost dizzy.

And then he saw something. Except he didn’t see it. He’d forgotten this. Four-year-old Izuku hadn’t known how to describe it, but now he remembered how it felt. He didn’t see it. He was reading words, but he wasn’t reading, and they weren’t words. It wasn’t Japanese, or English, or anything. It was just meaning, plastered directly against his brain.

Reinitialized existing Git repository.

Izuku crumpled to the ground, right there on the sidewalk, and sobbed.

He had a quirk!

Chapter Text

It was time. Izuku felt his skin buzz in excitement, in impatience, in anxiety, in fear. On his desk in front of him were two items. The first was a brand new blank analysis notebook (this deserved a new notebook more than anything else in the world). The second was the beaten-up old binder that was his quirk’s instruction manual, the margin of every page filled to the brim with notes… a lot of them written in crayon (he didn’t take as good care of the binder as he probably should have when he was younger).

He’d been ridiculously tempted to start experimenting with his quirk immediately back near the beach, but he’d held back. Generally speaking, despite the laws against public quirk use, you could get away with it as long as your quirk wasn’t obstructive and it didn’t affect other people. But experimenting with a quirk with unknown capabilities in public? Hoo boy, the “dumb teenager” excuse wouldn’t get him far. If he were caught, he would’ve been in massive trouble.

So despite every fiber of his being needing to finally use his quirk, he sat there at the bus stop, shaking in his seat. When the bus came, he got on and found a spot to sit, shaking in his seat. And now he was finally home, in his bedroom, in front of his desk, shaking in his seat.

It was time!

He knew what he had to do now. Vocal commands worked! He’d read the user manual front-to-back hundreds of times over the years, and while there were a lot of sections missing, he had memorized a lot of commands that ought to work. The reason they never worked before was because his quirk hadn’t been initialized, but now the commands had something to apply to, so they should work.

Probably.

Hopefully.

Please please please pleasepleaseplease.

He was so scared.

Planting his arms against his desk in front of him for support, Izuku took a deep breath and announced, “Status.”

Nothing happened.

It felt like a hole had been carved out of his gut. He could feel his heart rate increase. His head started to get hot and his breathing had become sharp and ragged. “Status! git status!”

The feeling of his tongue twisting back on itself in an alien, unnatural way was the most pleasant sensation he had ever felt in his entire life. He still had a quirk! It was real. He leaned back in his chair and tried to get control of his breathing. Ten seconds into his quirk experimentation and he was already hot and breathing heavily as if he had just finished a long workout.

Okay, pull it together, Izuku! Don’t let your stupid anxiety ruin the best day of your life!

Right. Okay. No screwing around; he had a quirk now and it was about time that he got to use it! A message had been burned into his brain when he had spoken the status command.

On branch main

No commits yet

Untracked files:
  (use "git add <file>..." to include in what will be committed)
        all_might_figurine [80b16bf]
        all_might_pencil [c90addd]
        all_might_poster [415672f]
        all_might_undergarments [eb367ef]
        analysis_notebook [84e96b7]
        ballpoint_pen [3d672a3]
        desk [242a078]
        desk_cabinet/ [03cc22e]
        desk_chair [f089f30]
        desk_lamp [d58559e]
        git_reference_manual_(incomplete) [3c3fa55]
        laptop [06fd15e]
        pen_holder/ [3d911f8]
        phone [ff6ce7b]
        school_binder [58c5176]
        shorts_(beige) [2f6db00]
        sock_(white) [4d4f3f6]
        sock_(white) [877c765]
        sweatshirt_(black) [c1fc637]
        waste_basket/ [a33014c]
        water_bottle [4b77919]

Message truncated. Only local files listed
50,812,699,499,854,712,584,083,048,723,657,999,791,559,909,332,711,067,435,411,106,489,072,587 files remaining


He blushed when he read “all_might_undergarments”. Wait, why was he embarrassed? No one else could read this but him, and he knew what clothes he was wearing. Like, that was objectively the least interesting thing written here!

For example, that was a very, very large number at the bottom there. The implications of which were… too much for his brain right now. Put a pin in that one for some other day.

All right. Time to see if all that time pouring over the user manual was worth it. The basic idea behind Git was that it allowed programmers to save and share the revision history of their code. So, it was kind of like creating a save point in a video game. Each “save” was added to that file’s timeline, and the user was free to reload to any point in the timeline. If multiple people were editing the same files, then you could create multiple timelines (“branches”) where the file existed in multiple different states simultaneously.

The first line—“On branch main”. He shivered in excitement. He was so looking forward to making branches. That would have to come later though. For now, it was telling him he was on the main branch. Simple enough.

The next line was “No commits yet”. That was also obvious. Well, obvious if you knew what a commit was. A “commit” was the name for a save point.

The third section… this was interesting.

Izuku tapped his pencil absentmindedly against his notebook. His All Might pencil. It wasn’t anything special, really, just a normal pencil with All Might’s color scheme. The eraser at the tip was colored yellow as if it were a tuft of All Might’s hair. He had a few more of this exact kind of pencil in his desk drawer.

After a moment’s thought, Izuku placed the pencil down on his desk and stared at it with conviction. “Git add All Might pencil.”

He already knew that it hadn’t worked before he had finished speaking the command. The words sounded natural while under the effect of his quirk, but he sounded stupid otherwise. He felt his heart rate start to increase again, which further added to his stress. No, stop it! Stop it! God, why am I like this?

Swallowing, Izuku touched the pencil with the tip of his index finger and tried again. “git add all_might_pencil.” Oh, thank goodness.

Okay, Izuku, let’s not dwell on the fact that I’m apparently one slight inconvenience away from a panic attack. Focus! What had changed now that he added the pencil? “git status.”

On branch main
Changes to be committed:
  (use "git restore --staged <file>..." to unstage)
        new file: all_might_pencil [c90addd]


That made sense based on his understanding of how this all worked. Multiple things could be included in a single save point—a single “commit”—and his pencil was now one of the things that would be included in his next save.

Izuku picked up the pencil to see if there was anything different about it. After looking at it from all angles, he concluded that it was the same as it had always been. He went to place it back on his desk and—oh shit!

A transparent copy of the pencil was sitting on the desk in exactly the spot that he had picked it up from. Izuku’s eyes widened. He went to touch it, but his fingers passed straight through it. It was intangible, like a hologram. A smile slowly spread across Izuku’s face. His quirk was doing something! This was the first time his quirk affected something that wasn’t entirely inside his own head!

Oh wait, actually…

Izuku dug his phone out of his pocket and opened up the camera app. When looking at his desk through the viewfinder, the transparent pencil wasn’t visible. Huh. Okay, maybe it still was inside his own head, at least for now. It was probably the case that only he could see the virtual pencil. He’d ask his mom about it later.

The key word there was “later”. His mom was going to make it a big emotional episode when he told her he’d finally figured out his quirk—which was nice, don’t get him wrong, but it was going to be a time-consuming emotional episode and he didn’t have the time for that right now!

“git status.”

On branch main
Changes to be committed:
  (use "git restore --staged <file>..." to unstage)
        new file: all_might_pencil [c90addd]

Changes not staged for commit:
  (use "git add <file>..." to update what will be committed)
  (use "git restore <file>..." to discard changes in working directory)
        modified: all_might_pencil [c90addd]


His pencil was listed twice now. Once in the list of things that would be included in the next commit, and also in the list of things that would not be committed. Izuku looked back and forth between the transparent pencil on his desk and the real, solid pencil still in his hand. It makes sense, actually, Izuku decided after thinking about it for a moment. There are two entries because there are two pencils. The bottom one says “modified”, so that’s probably the solid one that I can move around. The other one is intangible, so I can’t touch it or “modify” it.

The status screen had already suggested the next command he should try, so he went for it. “git restore all_might_pencil.”

In an instant, the pencil disappeared from Izuku’s hand and reappeared on his desk, perfectly overlapping the virtual pencil.

Holy crap.

Izuku burst up from his desk. He just had too much energy to sit still right now. With a massive grin on his face, Izuku started pacing around his bedroom, almost hopping from foot to foot.

That was teleportation! Just that, and nothing else, was the quirk of a Pro Hero! There were so many possibilities for rescue and reconnaissance alone! And it was instant, with possibly no limit on the number of objects, or the size or weight, and possibly even no range limit. He couldn’t even think of a quirk like that without a range limit! Oh my god, could he use his quirk on living people? That was an endless rabbit hole all by itself. And, and—

—And it wasn’t just teleportation! Izuku scrambled to his desk and picked up the pencil. Like before, a transparent virtual pencil was left behind on his desk. Good to know, so that meant that it was still waiting for him to make his first commit. Oh man, he hadn’t even made his first commit yet! In a moment, in a moment. He had an idea, and it took priority. Part of him felt like it was too crazy to be possible, but he was almost completely confident that it would work.

Izuku snapped the pencil in half.

Fingers trembling, he placed the two broken pieces on his desk next to the virtual pencil. As expected, the virtual pencil was still whole and unchanged. “git restore all_might_pencil,” Izuku said.

The two broken halves of the pencil vanished, and the newly repaired whole pencil reappeared in the location of the virtual pencil.

Izuku squealed with glee.

After spending some time jumping around his room and chattering to himself, it was back to business. There was still so much he needed to do! Sure, his quirk was complicated and it would take a while for him to fully understand it (the user manual was a testament to that), but he’d barely scratched the surface so far. He still hadn’t even made a commit!

Oh, and he needed to talk to Mom! She didn’t know he’d figured out his quirk. He’d talk to her, he would, he would. Soon. Just not yet. There were more things he needed to try first.

Izuku sat back down at his desk. Let the quirk testing continue! The next thing to try was obvious; he’d already thought about it a couple of times. It was time to make his first commit.

Commits were the backbone of his quirk. They were the official “save points”—permanent records that he’d be able to access for the rest of his life, in theory. It was kind of lame that his first irreversible imprint on the timeline of the world was going to be the location of a pencil, but hey, he had to start somewhere.

Looking down at the solid pencil and the virtual pencil next to each other on the desk in front of him, Izuku announced, “git commit.”

The next thing that happened wasn’t what Izuku expected. His mind’s eye was taken over completely by… blank whiteness? It was similar to how he “saw” the words in his mind, but it was just blank. Like a fresh piece of paper, waiting to be used for… something. He felt an urge, a sense of indistinct anticipation. What was going on?

Oh! He was being dumb. The manual explained this, but he forgot about it in his eagerness. For each commit, you had to provide a description of what that commit was. Like, why you made it, and what you changed. Which made sense because if you had a lot of commits then it’d be hard to find the one you wanted otherwise.

The blank sheet in his mind was waiting for him to give an appropriate message. Wait, he wasn’t ready! This was his very first commit; he should have something cool to say! Like, when Neil Armstrong first stepped onto the moon, he had a good quote ready. He didn’t say, “That shuttle was so cramped! Man, I’m hungry.” Izuku needed something good, too!

He couldn’t think, though. The blank whiteness was pulsing in his mind impatiently. He was already taking too long. Okay, look, I’m not going to think of something profound in the next two seconds, and I’m literally the only person who’s ever going to see this. Keep it simple. This is my first commit, so just say that.

“Th-this is my first commit,” Izuku said weakly.

Th-this is my first commit.

Izuku was horrified by what he saw written on the blank paper in his mind. “No, don’t record my stuttering!”

Th-this is my first commit. No, don't record my stuttering!

His face fell into his hands and he groaned. “Ugh, how do I make this stop?”

He waited a moment, leaning back on his chair with his hands covering his face. Soon enough, a new message appeared in his mind.

[main (root-commit) 82493c9] Th-this is my first commit. No, don't record my stuttering! Ugh, how do I make this stop?
 1 file changed
 create mode 100644 all_might_pencil [c90addd]


Izuku was mortified.

He’d have to live with this for the rest of his life. Every time he viewed his list of commits, it would be there, right at the beginning! Was there a way to change the message of a commit? There was nothing in the manual about it, but was that because it wasn’t possible, or was it because that section of the manual was missing?

Was it worth dropping everything he was doing to reread the manual cover-to-cover yet again in the desperate hope that he missed something the first million times he read it?

There was a saying, “Comedy equals tragedy plus time.” Was that the case here? Decades from now, when he was old and grey, would he look back on his first commit message and chuckle with fond nostalgic amusement? Perhaps.

On the other hand, “Comedy equals tragedy plus time” was also how Izuku had justified every school day he’d had for years. Years from now, when he and Kacchan were Pro Heroes together, they’d look back and laugh at the innocence of their youth, all of the insults… all of the beatings… all of Izuku’s desperate misery as he tried and tried and tried…!

Dammit, pull it together! This was not the time for another depressive spiral! Literally just a few minutes ago Izuku was so happy and excited that he was bouncing around the room because he couldn’t keep still. That was more like it. Let’s do more of that.

All right. Izuku slapped his cheeks. Putting aside the message for now, I’ve made my first commit. What’s changed?

He looked down at his desk. The solid pencil hadn’t changed… oh, but the virtual pencil had disappeared. Things looked normal again.

How did that affect the commands he’d been using so far? “git restore all_might_pencil,” Izuku said.

The pencil disappeared and reappeared in the location that the virtual pencil was in before, even though the virtual pencil was no longer visible. It worked exactly the same as it had before.

Right, okay, this makes sense, Izuku thought, strumming his fingers on his desk. The transparency thing is basically showing me a preview of what my next save point will look like. But once it’s committed, the save point is invisible, and there’s no indication of where it is. I guess that’s understandable since I’m going to be making new commits all my life, so things would get cluttered if they were all visible to me at the same time, but… yeah, I’m going to need a lot of notebooks to keep track of all this.

Izuku picked up the pencil and moved it to the exact center of his desk. “git add all_might_pencil.” Picking it up, he saw that it left behind a virtual pencil. Yep, same as before.

He placed the pencil down again, now at the far edge of his desk. “git add all_might_pencil.” Upon saying the command, the virtual pencil in the center of his desk disappeared. Once again, he picked up the pencil, and he saw that it left behind a virtual pencil on the far edge of his desk.

This was what Izuku expected. Each time he added the pencil, it updated the location of the “preview” that showed what his next commit would contain. The transparent objects were temporary by nature. He was free to play around as much as he wanted without the commitment of a permanent record that he would live with forever.

“git restore all_might_pencil.” Again, as expected, the pencil disappeared from Izuku’s hand and reappeared at the far edge of his desk, overlapping the virtual pencil.

Huh, but how was Izuku supposed to restore it back to the location the pencil was in when it was committed? “git restore all_might_pencil,” he tried.

No change. The pencil stayed exactly where it was.

“git status.”

On branch main
Changes to be committed:
  (use "git restore --staged <file>..." to unstage)
        modified: all_might_pencil [c90addd]


Well, it was nice that his quirk was willing to give him help… after completely failing to do so for ten years. “git restore --staged all_might_pencil.” (Ew, those dashes tasted weird in his mouth. His tongue wasn’t designed to make those shapes.)

Nothing seemed to change at first, but when Izuku picked up the pencil he noticed that it no longer left behind a virtual pencil. All right, so that command was how you removed virtual objects that you didn’t want anymore.

And if there weren’t any virtual objects getting in the way… “git restore all_might_pencil.”

The pencil disappeared from Izuku’s hands and reappeared on the right side of his desk, precisely where he had previously committed it.

Cool. Well, that was one way to do it, although it would only work for the most recent commit. Once he made more commits, he’d have to figure out how to specify individual ones. He’d leave that for later though. First, he had to—

Wait a minute. Izuku’s thoughts halted as he suddenly realized an inconsistency. When I first “added” my pencil, I had to physically touch it. It didn’t work when I just spoke the command alone. But since then I’ve “added” my pencil multiple times without touching it.

Time for another test. Izuku around for something to try it with, and he saw the blank, unopened quirk analysis notebook in front of him on his desk. Oh yeah, he was supposed to be writing all this stuff down, wasn’t he? His pencil was supposed to be used for, y’know, writing, but instead it’d become the main subject of his experiments. Oh well, he’d do that soon, just… later.

…If nothing else he should start writing a list of everything that he was putting off for later…

Later!

Izuku held his hands in the air so that he wasn’t touching anything. “Git add analysis n—okay, I can already tell that’s not working.” He then placed his index finger on the cover of the notebook. “git add analysis_notebook. Huh.”

He slid the notebook to the other side of his desk, and a transparent notebook was left behind. He lifted his hands so that he wasn’t touching anything, then tried again. “git add analysis_notebook.”

The commands were working. The virtual notebook’s location updated to the real notebook’s location. So, the first time I add an object to my quirk I have to touch it, but every time after that I can just use its name. Cool.

But what if he had multiple objects with the same name? He had multiple “All Might pencils” in his desk drawer, after all. So many endless questions. He really did get the perfect kind of quirk for his personality, didn’t he? He’d be able to experiment for years and still probably discover new things!

That said, he should probably start winding this down soon, though. After all, he still had to tell Mom about everything. He hadn’t written anything in his notebook yet either, although that could wait until tomorrow. He should probably do most of his experimenting only once he was prepared to take it seriously and record his observations. Thank goodness he had the whole weekend ahead of him.

So yeah, he’d learned enough for now. He should probably let Mom know about all this.

…

…One more thing.

One more thing, then he’d tell Mom. There was one more thing he just had to try. He had to. He’d been waiting for most of his life to try this, ever since he had first learned just enough English to kinda-barely understand what the manual was talking about.

When he was a young kid and his classmates asked him about his quirk, his problem wasn’t just that he didn’t know how to use it, it was also that he didn’t know what his quirk was supposed to be in the first place.

“Hi! I’m Hana! What’s your name? Look, look at this! I can make flowers bloom and make them any color! What’s your quirk?”

“Hi, I’m Izuku. Your quirk is so cool! Um, I can’t use my quirk.”

“Why not?”

“…I don’t know what it is…”

He wasn’t surprised that his classmates eventually decided that he was a big fat liar pretending that he had a quirk. Sometimes Izuku even felt the same way. He couldn’t answer what his quirk was, or when he’d be able to show them it, or why he wasn’t able to use it, or even what his quirk was supposed to do if he could use it.

So when he had learned enough English to barely comprehend bits and pieces of the highly technical gobbledygook written in the manual, he wanted so badly to come up with a good answer to the question “What’s your quirk?” And between his poor understanding of the concepts within and his desperation to make it all worth it, he latched on to the coolest-sounding concept written within those pages:

“I can make alternate timelines!”

That was his answer. Sure, in follow-up questions he’d have to admit that he didn’t know how to actually do it, but he insisted that his quirk was that he could create alternate timelines. It was by far the coolest quirk he’d ever heard of, and it was his!

His classmates didn’t believe him one bit, of course. It was an even dumber-sounding lie than claiming that he didn’t know what his own quirk did. But Izuku latched on to it regardless. It meant something special to him. It meant something special because, despite what Kacchan thought, Izuku knew he wasn’t lying. It truly was his quirk. Once he figured it out, he’d be able to do it! He had so many daydreams of one day showing them all, at long last proving everyone wrong.

…Which made it a little disheartening when some years later—after his understanding of both English and Git jargon had increased—he came to understand that the “branches” described in the user manual didn’t work anything at all like the “alternate timelines” he had bragged about. Hopefully no one remembered his wild claims about how, in the future, he’d be a Pro Hero who could defeat villains by making timelines where they never became villains in the first place.

But whatever. “Branches” were still amazingly cool. And now it was time. He’d been waiting for this all his life. It was finally happening!

He was going to make a goddamn alternate timeline!

The user manual was unnecessary for this; he knew the commands by heart. Currently, he was on the “main” branch. “git branch normal-pencil.” That command would create a new branch—a new alternate timeline—branching off from “main”.

“git branch broken-pencil.” And this would create a second branch, also splitting off from the main branch.

“git switch normal-pencil.” This switched him from the main branch to the “normal pencil” branch. Nothing had changed in the room around him, which was obvious. All of the “timelines” would remain identical until he made changes to them.

Izuku once again moved his pencil to the center of the desk. “git add all_might_pencil.” Then, “git commit.”

The blank whiteness appeared in his mind. Right, this again. He was pretty sure that he was doing something wrong here. He knew that the manual had described a way to include the message in the command itself, but it had never seemed important to him so it had slipped his mind. Another thing to figure out later. “A normal, unbroken pencil.”

[normal-pencil 7b32e17] A normal, unbroken pencil.
 2 files changed
 create mode 100644 analysis_notebook [84e96b7]


Now for the fun part! “git switch broken-pencil.” This switched him to the other branch.

He picked up the pencil and snapped it in two. Placing the pieces on his desk, he spoke, “git add all_might_pencil.” Then, “git commit.” He was ready for the blank sheet to appear in his mind this time. “A broken pencil.”

[broken-pencil be05e17] A broken pencil.
 1 file changed


And that was all it took. He now had one timeline where the pencil was broken, and one timeline where the pencil was whole. Both timelines had their own history and could continue to evolve over time.

“git switch normal-pencil.” A normal pencil lay on his desk.

“git switch broken-pencil.” The pencil was broken in half.

“git switch normal-pencil.” The pencil was whole again.

Izuku started giggling.

His quirk was so cool!

Chapter Text

Izuku swept his gaze across his audience, eager eyes awaiting his performance. Okay, his audience was just his mom, but still. “git restore teacup,” Izuku proclaimed with great theatricality, waving his arms around pointlessly. Mom gasped when the teacup teleported from one end of the kitchen table to the other.

Also of note was that the tea within the teacup remained perfectly still and untouched, with no indication that it had been moved. Teleportation and other rapid movement quirks were notoriously… turbulent. You’d usually never want to use a teleportation quirk on a teacup like that unless you were fine with the tea spilling everywhere. The fact that Izuku could move it while keeping the tea completely undisturbed was an impressive showcase.

(Fine, Izuku knew that he promised himself that his experiment with branches would be the last thing he tested before telling his mom everything, but he lied. Sue him. He first tested this with his water bottle in his room. Was it so wrong to want to show off?)

“So, what do you think?” Izuku grinned.

His mom responded by scooping him up in a big hug. “Your quirk is wonderful, sweetie. I’m so happy for you!”

“It can do a lot more than that, too,” Izuku said into his mom’s shoulder.

“I can’t wait to see it.” Mom started rubbing his back. “Is it everything you hoped for?”

Izuku smiled. “Yeah. Yeah, it is.”

Mom returned the smile. “I’m glad. I’m so glad.”

He and his mom stayed embraced for a little bit, appreciating the moment together.

“I think we need to celebrate,” his mom said, pulling herself from the hug. “It’s getting late, but the supermarket should still be open. Let’s go buy a cake.”

That was a fantastic idea. “Yeah!”

The late evening walk was nice. The sun had set a while ago, but it wasn’t fully dark out yet. Izuku spent most of the time rambling to his mom about everything he had figured out so far and all the ideas he had in mind. His mom made sure to respond with the appropriate earnest and inquisitive noises.

They spent very little time at the store, picking out a soufflé-style cheesecake before heading home. It was getting late after all. Izuku continued right where he left off during the walk home. He knew that his mom wasn’t perfectly following the intricacies of how each Git command affected staged objects in different contexts, but he appreciated the effort all the same.

Arriving back home, Izuku washed his hands while his mom pulled out some plates and set the cake on the kitchen table.

“Hm, it’s getting pretty late,” Mom said when Izuku returned to the kitchen. “I think you should only have a very small slice. It’s not good to eat sugar at this time of night. But this is your big day, so you can take whatever you feel like having.”

“Aren’t you having any, Mom?”

“Oh no no, this is all for you! I’ve been thinking of going on a diet, so I won’t be having sweets like this for a while.”

“I have an idea about that.” Good thing he had just washed his hands. He leaned forward and touched the side of the cake with the tip of his finger. “Git add… cake?” Okay, that didn’t work. “git status.”

On branch normal-pencil
Untracked files:
  (use "git add <file>..." to include in what will be committed)
        all_might_undergarments [eb367ef]
        cotton_cheesecake [ad89d3b]
        fork [434af0b]
        jeans_(blue) [4f1dfcd]
        kitchen_table [5d62f1f]
        midoriya_inko [027b7bf]
        phone [ff6ce7b]
        placemat [ca69f34]
        plate [3e65429]
        plate [6698bd0]
        sock_(white) [4d4f3f6]
        sock_(white) [877c765]
        sweatshirt_(black) [c1fc637]
        vase [8e7d39c]
        wooden_chair [1de02e9]
        wooden_chair [ca783ea]

Message truncated. Only local files listed
50,812,699,499,854,712,584,083,048,723,657,999,791,559,909,332,711,068,077,101,971,990,446,842 files remaining


Izuku paused and stared at the list in his mind. One conspicuous item on the list, to be specific. Well, he had wondered about it—in fact, many of his ideas about how he would use his power for heroics had assumed that he was capable of it—but it seemed so much more disconcerting now that it was in front of his face.

The text “midoriya_inko”, sitting so innocently amongst the other items in his immediate surroundings… well, that was quite the rabbit hole.

Just, the implications of such a power…

…

…Could he bring back the dead?

How would you test something like that?

No, no, he wouldn’t want to test that. He hoped it was something he would never have to test.

“Are you okay, sweetie?” Mom asked with a tone of worry.

“Huh?” Existential thoughts for later, Izuku! “Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. git add cotton_cheesecake.”

With that, Izuku picked up his fork and proudly stuck it directly into the full cheesecake, not bothering to cut himself a slice first. With a mighty heave, he scooped up a giant heap of cheesecake and shoveled it directly into his face. He was chewing and grinning at the same time. It was delicious! He picked the right dessert.

And there was more where that came from! Swallowing his first big bite, Izuku took his fork and attacked the cheesecake again. This was fun!

As Izuku continued to shovel heap after heap of cheesecake into his mouth, his mom was looking more and more concerned. “Izuku, sweetie, I know I said I wouldn’t stop you from celebrating however you wanted, but don’t you think this is a bit much?”

Izuku held up a finger to wait for a moment—his mouth was too stuffed with cake to talk. After swallowing, he grinned cheekily. “No, Mom. Think about it. Watch this: git restore cotton_cheesecake.”

The half-eaten cake on the table reverted back to its pristine state. At the same time, Izuku let out a loud and awkwardly long belch that echoed around the kitchen. He held up a hand to cover his mouth, face heating up. Oh man, he was glad it was just his mom here because that was pretty embarrassing.

Thankfully, his mom was more focused on the cake that had reappeared. A light had seemed to go off in her head. “Izuku, are you saying…?”

“The burping was probably because the cake in my stomach suddenly got replaced with air. I didn’t really think it through totally. But yeah, you got it. No need to worry about calories anymore.” Izuku grabbed another fork and offered it to his mom. “Your turn!”

His mom gingerly took the fork, looking back and forth between it and the cheesecake. But whatever internal debate she was having came to an abrupt conclusion because she too stabbed her fork into the cake and took a big bite.

Izuku watched his mom tackle the dessert. She certainly wasn’t as violent about it as Izuku was when he devoured half the cake in less than a minute, but she was smiling, and he was glad to see Mom enjoying herself.

After a few minutes, his mom placed her fork down and wiped her mouth. It looked like she was done for now. “git restore cotton_cheesecake.”

The cake reappeared, and on cue, his mom also let out a big, long burp. “Oh! Oh dear.” Mom’s face turned faintly red. Good, now both of them could be embarrassed.

“Pretty great, right?” Izuku looked proud.

His mom laughed. “Your quirk is the best, Izuku.”

Yep, it sure was!

Today was a great day, the best day, but all days had to end eventually. Izuku was back in his bedroom after brushing his teeth and changing into his pajamas. He stared at his bed with wariness. Getting to sleep tonight was going to be a complete nightmare, he knew it.

How could he possibly get to sleep when there was so much stuff he still wanted to do? He hadn’t even scratched the surface of his quirk’s capabilities. He was probably going to lie there all night, mind whirring, coming up with all sorts of ideas and wanting to try them out, or at least write them down.

The only silver lining was he had the whole weekend ahead of him. Thank god tomorrow wasn’t a school day. If he had to go to school tomorrow morning and sit there quietly all day, he would just die.

As much as he wanted to stay up all night and play with his quirk, he knew he had to try to get to sleep. Izuku was never very good at all-nighters; he always felt like crap the next day. He had a full free day to experiment as much as he wanted tomorrow, and he knew he’d regret it if he wasted that time by feeling sluggish and terrible.

There was one thing though. Just one, he promised himself. One thing he absolutely, positively had to check before going to bed. He’d never fall asleep otherwise. There was no way.

That line from before, “midoriya_inko”…

It had made him think of something. He wasn’t sure if it would work or not—he wasn’t sure if he wanted it to work or not—but he had to know. Right now.

“Git add Midoriya Izuku.”

And… that was a no-go. Izuku’s shoulders slumped in… disappointment? Relief? He wasn’t sure. If he were able to use his quirk on himself, that opened up so many possibilities. He could heal his own injuries, or teleport around the place, or maybe even send himself back in time…?

But, in a way, it was reassuring as well that he’d never have to concern himself with that. His quirk was complicated enough as it was. And, well… it was awkward enough seeing his mom casually listed among the objects that he could control. He wasn’t sure how he would feel if his quirk also listed himself as one of the objects that it could manipulate as it saw fit.

That was enough existentialism for one day. It was time for bed.

Izuku woke up groggily. Well, he slept at least, although it was hardly a good sleep. He was thinking about his quirk all night, and then he was dreaming about his quirk all night. He woke up so many times it was hard to tell the difference between his thoughts and his dreams.

There was so much he needed to try! Not just the dozens of other commands listed in the manual, but a whole lot of totally obvious things that he was shocked he didn’t think of last night. Why did he never think of placing something in that same spot as a virtual object before restoring it? What would happen when two items tried to exist in the same spot at the same time? So many questions! So much to do!

Izuku rose out of bed, rubbing his tired eyes. ’Course, he had to wake up first. And there was a lot more to do in the morning. Brush his teeth, have a shower, get dressed, eat breakfast… oh no, he had to do his morning workout too!

He glared at the weight set propped up against his bedroom wall. Ugh, maybe he’d skip it today. Exercise sucked at the best of times, let alone when he’d be rushing to get it over with.

…No, no, he shouldn’t think like that. He had a quirk now. He was going to be a hero, for real. Not just hoping, not just dreaming. UA’s entrance exams were less than a year away. If anything, he needed to put his workout routine on overdrive, not start skipping days like a lazy butt.

He’d learned last night that he couldn’t add himself to his quirk. That meant that he had no physical advantages, and he couldn’t restore any injuries he sustained. As incredible as his quirk was, his body was a big weak point—one solid punch to the face from a villain would incapacitate him. There was a reason many of the top heroes had body-enhancing quirks of some kind. He’d been taking self-defense classes for a while, but that wasn’t enough. He needed to be in tip-top physical condition if he wanted to keep up with all of his future classmates.

Izuku slapped his cheeks. All right. Workout first. Don’t skimp, do it properly. Then shower and breakfast, and then I’ve got the rest of the day to myself.

He was going to be a hero!

Izuku sat at the kitchen table, twirling his All Might pencil in his hand. He’d decided to relocate to the living room for the day’s experiments. He was alone in the apartment since his mom was out running errands, and his room was kind of dark in the morning because his window faced away from the sun. It was nicer out here. His quirk analysis notebook and the Git reference manual lay open in front of him along with an assortment of other household items he’d haphazardly grabbed.

His eyes were drawn to his quirk analysis notebook. The completely blank quirk analysis notebook. The one he’d specifically gotten to record everything he learned about his quirk.

First things first. Time to start writing stuff down. I have time, so I can do this more systematically today.

With the reference open in front of him like a study guide, Izuku spent the next 40 minutes or so dutifully writing down everything he had learned so far in his notebook. He split his notes into three main sections.

First, a record of the experiments he had performed last night, including the commands he used and the text responses his quirk gave him for each command. He followed this with a list of new experiments that he wanted to perform.

Second, notes on each command he knew about. This was by far the largest section because this was where he listed all his ideas so far for how he’d use his quirk as a Pro Hero. He cross-referenced the Git manual a lot here, noting down the many commands he still needed to try. His entry for “git init” was mostly an angry rant about how unfair it was that his reference manual just so happened to be missing the most important command of all. The rant continued into a despairful realization that if a command that important was missing, then how many other essential aspects of his quirk were missing that he’d never know about…?

…Anyway, the last section was a simple checklist of his plans for today, and probably for the following days too depending on how long the list got. Yesterday night he had thought many times “I’ll figure that out later.” This time, he’d add a new item to his checklist each time he thought that.

Izuku put his pencil down. Wow, that had taken him longer than he thought. He flipped through his notebook and saw just how many pages he’d already written. Damn. If this was what he had so far, he’d need multiple notebooks for just his quirk alone. Considering how thick the incomplete reference manual was, that made sense.

Izuku cracked his knuckles. It was time for the fun part! He looked at the first item on his checklist.

▢ Objects with the same name?

This was a basic aspect of his quirk that he needed to have clarified. When I first add an object to my quirk, I have to both touch it and say its name. But after adding an item once, I can use my quirk on it without touching it, like when I say “git restore whatever”. But what happens if I add two objects with the same name and then try using commands without touching either of them? He had two identical unused chopsticks on the table in front of him to test this with.

He touched the first chopstick. “git add chopstick.”

new file: chopstick [f3ca01b]

And the other one. “git add chopstick.”

new file: chopstick [841874a]

The codes after the names distinguished objects that had the same name. He knew that already.

He shifted the first chopstick a bit so that the transparent (“staged”) chopstick was visible. As he learned yesterday, adding the chopstick again would update the position of the virtual chopstick. He lifted his hands so that he was touching neither chopstick and said, “Git add chopstick.” Oh. Huh. He was kind of hoping for an error message that would tell him what to do next.

Maybe it was a mental thing? He focused really hard on thinking about just the chopstick on the left, trying his best to pretend that the chopstick on the right didn’t exist. “Git add chopstick.” Still nope.

Hm. He touched the chopstick that he’d moved. “git add chopstick.” This worked; the virtual chopstick’s position updated to the location of the real chopstick.

Touching the chopstick made it unambiguous which chopstick he was referring to. The problem was he didn’t want to have to touch it every time. He wanted to be able to use commands on the chopstick remotely, just like how it worked when there weren’t multiple objects with the same name.

Wait. He was being dumb. His quirk literally gave him the answer.

He shifted the chopstick again. “git add chopstick [f3—ack! Ah, ack!” His tongue twisted when he pronounced the square bracket. Oh wow, that was weird. He thought he’d gotten used to the weird way he spoke when issuing commands, but that was something else. There was no such thing as pronouncing a square bracket, yet his tongue moved through some eldritch plane so that it could do it anyway.

Putting that aside, it looked like the command had worked, which was interesting considering that he didn’t get the chance to speak the full code.

The code for the first chopstick started with an “f”, while the code for the second started with an “8”. He tried again. “git add chopstick [f].”

And that worked. Apparently, he only needed to speak the minimum amount in order to distinguish the objects. If he un-added one of them, presumably he wouldn’t need to use the codes. “git restore --staged chopstick [8].” That should remove the second chopstick from his quirk. “git add chopstick.” It was back to normal.

Well, it was good that it worked, but it was kind of annoying that he’d have to memorize random codes whenever he added multiples of the same item to his quirk.

Maybe there was a way for him to rename objects? The names that his quirk came up with seemed pretty arbitrary, after all. He should figure out how to do that at some point.

Another thing to look into later, Izuku thought as he dutifully added a new item to the bottom of his checklist. He then wrote down the results of his test and checked off the first item on his to-do list. One down!

Izuku chuckled when he realized that he’d checked off one item and also added one item. Numerically, he’d made no progress. This was going to take a while. Which was fine by him!

Next up:

▢ Two objects existing in the same spot?

He moved the chopstick off to the side, leaving behind a virtual chopstick. Waving a hand through it, he confirmed once again that the transparent objects were completely intangible. So what would happen if he restored the original object while his hand was still inside the virtual chopstick?

Well, he wouldn’t actually test this with his hands, obviously. He needed to use something he didn’t care about. Thus, he placed his math textbook on top of the virtual chopstick so that the chopstick was completely contained within the book. “git restore chopstick.”

Failed to automatically restore from index. A merge is required. Please commit your changes or stash them.

Interesting error message. Something to look into, for sure. Izuku’s eyes were drawn toward the instruction manual. Should he do it now?

…No, he shouldn’t get distracted. He was trying to be more methodical today after all. Technically, he got an answer to his question: It didn’t work. The error message suggested that there was a way to make it work, but that counted as a new investigation.

Satisfied with that logic, Izuku checked it off the list and added his new question as an item to the bottom of the list. Next!

▢ Multiple commands at once?

“git add chopstick; git add all_might_pencil; git add salt_shaker.”

That worked. With a pleased hum, he checked another item off his list. Some of them were simple, at least.

▢ What are saved locations relative to?

This was one of those questions he thought of in the middle of the night while he trying to sleep. The intangibility of the virtual objects at first implied that no forces could affect them—they were static, fixed points in space. But that was obviously wrong because the Earth spins at some crazy speed, and then it also orbits the Sun, and then the Sun orbits something else, yadda yadda. Furthermore, the theory of relativity stated that there was no such thing as objective motion in the first place, only relative motion. It was in the name—“relativity”.

So what were the virtual objects relative to? It could be the Earth, but it didn’t sound right to him based on how the reference manual described Git. The technical details went way over his head, but it seemed like file “hunks” were located based on their relative position to nearby “hunks”, not based on any sort of objective global positioning system or whatever.

If that were the case, shouldn’t his quirk work similarly?

He placed the chopstick on top of his math textbook. “git add chopstick.” Then he moved both the book and the chopstick off to the side.

Left behind was a virtual chopstick floating in midair, resting on top of a book that didn’t exist. Izuku waved his hand through it. Yep, static and intangible. “git restore chopstick.” The chopstick teleported back into position and clinked down onto the table, affected by gravity once again.

Izuku moved the textbook and chopstick back into position, the latter atop the former. “git add math_textbook; git add chopstick.”

Once again, he moved the book and the chopstick off to the side. Oh! He picked up the book. There was a virtual book on the table, as expected, but no virtual chopstick on top of it. Rather, the virtual chopstick seemed to be attached to the physical book. As he moved his textbook around, the virtual chopstick attached to the cover moved around with it.

Now that was interesting. And surprising—he honestly didn’t expect that to work.

Okay, what was happening here, exactly? If he added an object normally, then the staged object would be locked in place relative to, well, the Earth’s position, presumably. That’s why the chopstick hovered in midair at first. But if he added an object that was touching another object that his quirk was also tracking, then the position of the virtual object was determined relative to that object.

Hold on, this still didn’t quite make sense. Izuku picked up the physical chopstick. The physical book was attached to the virtual chopstick, but not the other way around. There was nothing special about the physical chopstick, and the virtual book was still statically locked in place on the table.

Was it based on the order in which he added the items? Once again, he placed the chopstick on top of the book. “git add chopstick; git add math_textbook.”

He picked up the chopstick, and this time the virtual book came along with it. Neat. Moving the physical book aside, he could see the virtual chopstick was hovering in midair, like before.

So it worked like a chain, or a layered cake, or something. He wasn’t good with metaphors. The first item would always be relative to the Earth, the second item would be relative to the first item, and so on and so forth.

Izuku waved the chopstick around in the air, watching the textbook move along with it. It was like they were glued together, except that of course the textbook weighed nothing. It was just the holographic image of a textbook after all. What would happen if he restored the textbook while it was moving? Flicking the chopstick side to side, Izuku said, “git restore math_textbook.”

The textbook flew off to the side at a surprisingly fast speed and landed in a crumpled heap on the floor.

…Oh.

Oh oh oh oh!

The restored physical object kept the momentum of the virtual object, even though the virtual object was weightless and intangible and so could effortlessly be moved at any speed at all.

Holy shit!

Izuku jumped up and down in excitement. He had to try this! He had to try this now!

…Maybe not with his math textbook though. Izuku scrambled to his bedroom and dug through his closet, soon enough finding a baseball. He came back out to the living room and picked up a chopstick, holding it vertically while his other hand positioned the baseball so that it rested on the top tip of the chopstick. “git add chopstick; git add baseball.” With that done, he placed the baseball on the table.

The physical chopstick in his hand now had a virtual baseball attached to its tip. All right, so he had to swing the chopstick and restore the baseball with precisely the right timing—like he was flicking a wand and casting a spell in those wizard movies.

Izuku faced toward the couch. Focus, aim… He swung his arm—“git restore baseball!”—forward.

The baseball bounced off the floor and crashed into the lamp next to the couch, knocking it onto the floor. Oh, whoops. Izuku rushed to inspect the lamp. Thankfully, the bulb wasn’t broken. Izuku put the lamp back in its proper position, adjusted the lampshade so that it was resting properly, and flicked the light on and off a couple of times to make sure it was fine. Yeah, good as new! Mom would never have to know.

Okay, so maybe he shouldn’t be testing this indoors.

It was as good of an excuse as any to get back to his notebook. He could easily get caught up in practicing the timing for the rest of the day otherwise. He’d discovered yet another aspect of his quirk that was a rabbit hole unto itself. His quirk had so many rabbit holes that it was becoming a rabbit warren. But he had to be disciplined!

Izuku sat back down at the table, spent the next ten minutes or so writing down what he’d learned and a bunch of ideas to try, added a half-dozen new entries to the bottom of his checklist, then finally checked off the original task. After a moment’s thought, he added a big smiley face next to the checked-off task. This one had been way more rewarding than he expected it to be. Anyway, next!

▢ Include commit description in the same command?

Right, this. The “blank whiteness” thing when he made commits was a bit annoying. He pulled over the reference manual and flipped to the page on “git-commit”. After reading through the available options, he decided to try out the “–m” flag, since it was short for “message”.

“git commit -m "Testing to see if I can include the message within the commit command itself".”

[normal-pencil a56ac54] Testing to see if I can include the message within the commit command itself
 8 files changed
 create mode 100644 baseball [664f0ed]
 create mode 100644 chopstick [f3ca01b]
 create mode 100644 cotton_cheesecake [ad89d3b]
 create mode 100644 math_textbook [c3774a0]
 create mode 100644 salt_shaker [67fb3d8]
 create mode 100644 teacup [9adaa97]
 create mode 100644 water_bottle [4b77919]


Huh, it was that easy? He should have done this yesterday. Oh well. Check!

▢ Git log?

Now he was getting into the commands that he knew about due to the manual but hadn’t tried yet. “git log.”

a56ac54 (HEAD -> normal-pencil) Testing to see if I can include the message within the commit command itself
7b32e17 A normal, unbroken pencil.
82493c9 (main) Th-this is my first commit. No, don't record my stuttering! Ugh, how do I make this stop?


Izuku felt unreasonably relieved that the log was in reverse chronological order—most recent commit first. That meant that once he made enough commits, his original commit would eventually be pushed off the first page and he would never have to see it again.

However, what was important to note here was the branches. He was still on the “normal-pencil” branch from yesterday, which yeah, it made sense since he had never switched back to the main branch. He didn’t want to be stuck on “normal-pencil” forever, though, so he needed to update the main branch. Also, the most recent commit on the main branch was his first commit, and that needed to be fixed. Desperately.

“git switch main.”

He was now on the main branch… and nothing seemed to be any different? All the stuff on the table in front of him sat there untouched. Izuku hadn’t been exactly sure what would happen when he switched branches, but he expected something to change.

What would happen if he tried adding stuff or making commits in this branch? “Git add baseball,” he said.

…Oh! Huh.

All right, he thought, let’s think about this. Why isn’t it working now?

He touched the baseball and tried again. “git add baseball.” And it was back to normal.

The baseball is acting as if I haven’t added it to my quirk before, so I had to touch it first for commands to work. I’m on the main branch now, but all day I’ve been on the normal-pencil branch. So now that I’ve gone “back in time” to the main branch, my quirk is no longer tracking the baseball because it wasn’t tracking at this point in the commit history.

Izuku nodded to himself. Yep, that seemed like a reasonable explanation. He went to record his new observation in his notebook. Now, where had his pencil disappeared to…?

Oh, duh, of course! Izuku facepalmed and laughed to himself. That’s what changed when he switched to the main branch. Obviously.

Izuku went to his room and picked up the All Might pencil that was resting on his desk in exactly the same spot that it had been committed yesterday.

He was starting to realize just how much of a logistical nightmare it was going to be to keep track of all of this stuff. He had made a few commits and added a handful of household items to his quirk, and he was already losing track of things. He’d wanted a powerful quirk, and he certainly had one, but hoo boy!

That was a problem for future-Izuku to solve, though.

Present-Izuku flipped through the reference manual again. If he wanted to update the main branch so that it included the object-tracking and commits from the normal-pencil branch, then he was pretty sure the correct command was “git merge”. As the name implied, this merged the history of the two branches. The part that made Izuku wary was the references to “merge conflicts”. This was when two file histories contradicted each other, so it ended up as a garbled-up mishmash of text that you had to sort out manually.

Izuku didn’t know how “merge conflicts” would manifest when applied to the real world. Frankly, he didn’t think that he was ready for it yet. Izuku felt like he barely understood how his quirk functioned; he’d had his quirk for less than a day, after all. He ought to get more experience with it before he accidentally fused two objects together or something and couldn’t fix it.

All that being said… was it even relevant? Would any conflicts occur in the first place? Izuku pondered this.

Think of it like a time travel movie. A merge conflict is like a time paradox. Something in the past has to be contradictory with something in the future in a way that can’t be reconciled, like if I broke a pencil in the past, but it was still intact in the future. Izuku fiddled with the pencil in his hands. But that can’t be the case right now. The only thing I changed on the main branch—in the “past”—was the location of this pencil. Everything else has been done in the “future”. I’m on the main branch right now, and I still haven’t touched anything other than this pencil, so there are no contradictions here. It’s a fully linear timeline. It doesn’t make sense otherwise. There’s no reason that the merge should fail.

Izuku went over the logic a few more times in his head and eventually nodded in satisfaction. He was confident about this. It would definitely work.

“git merge normal-pencil.”

error: Your local changes to the following files would be overwritten by merge:
        baseball [664f0ed]
Please commit your changes or stash them before you merge.
Aborting


…Ugh. Izuku bonked his head against the table. Right, he forgot he added the baseball.

“git restore --staged baseball,” Izuku said. “git merge normal-pencil.”

Updating 82493c9..a56ac54
Fast-forward
 8 files changed
 create mode 100644 baseball [664f0ed]
 create mode 100644 chopstick [f3ca01b]
 create mode 100644 cotton_cheesecake [ad89d3b]
 create mode 100644 math_textbook [c3774a0]
 create mode 100644 salt_shaker [67fb3d8]
 create mode 100644 teacup [9adaa97]
 create mode 100644 water_bottle [4b77919]


He felt relief when he saw the text “Fast-forward”. He actually understood his quirk enough to predict what it was going to do in advance! It was just as he said—the relationship between the two branches was a linear timeline from past to future, so merging the branches just meant that the past branch was “fast-forwarded” to be in sync with the future branch. He felt giddy. He was getting the hang of this!

Check! Next!

Izuku’s stomach rumbled.

Fine, lunchtime first.

Izuku continued in this vein for many hours. Every new test came with it dozens of new questions, all dutifully recorded in his notebook.

Wow, this is getting to be almost full, Izuku marveled, flipping through his notebook. I can’t believe I’ve written this much just today. All right, what’s next on the list?

He tapped his pencil against the next item.

▢ Wildcard characters?

This was another thing that he’d read about in the manual. An example of a “wildcard character” was an asterisk/star (*). Within Git, a star represented any letter and also any number of any letter.

For example, the word “fruit” was just that. But “*fruit” was different—the star represented a missing prefix. So “*fruit” might mean “grapefruit” or “kiwifruit”, but it would not mean “fruitcake” because the star was on the wrong side.

Both Izuku’s math and science textbooks lay on the table in front of him, conveniently both names that ended with “textbook”. “git add math_textbook; git add science_textbook.”

The two were added to his quirk, as usual. That was the slow way. Now for the wild way. “git add *textbook.”

The command worked. Next, Izuku shoved both textbooks off the table. The science textbook opened up midfall and squashed its pages under its own weight upon landing. But that didn’t matter because: “git restore *textbook.”

Both textbooks teleported back on top of the table, undisturbed. Nice.

This technique wasn’t particularly useful at the moment, but it opened up a world of possibilities when he figured out how to rename objects. That would allow him to create collections of objects that he could manipulate as a group. Say that he set up a bunch of traps in a hideout and renamed all of them to have the prefix “trap”. Then later he could say “git restore trap*” and let all of them loose on every villain in the hideout at once. He added the idea to his notebook.

Hm, if a star represented any number of any character, then what would happen if he just used it by itself? “git restore *.”

Minor mayhem occurred around Izuku as everything he’d added today returned to its last-staged location. His pencil vanished from his hand. Everything on the table in front of him rearranged itself, and the cheesecake from the previous evening reappeared in the center of it all. A chopstick and baseball appeared together in the middle of the living room, hovering in the air for an instant before tumbling to the carpet below.

Izuku giggled. This was fun. Anyway, on to the next item. Now where was his notebook?

…

Where was his notebook?

Izuku’s heart plummeted into his stomach.

Where was his notebook?!

Where was it?!

It couldn’t be.

No.

Feeling like a zombie, Izuku got up from his seat.

No no no no.

He walked slowly toward his bedroom.

No no no no no no no.

He opened the door, and the notebook was there, resting on his desk.

No no no no no no no no no no no.

He picked it up and flipped through it. The pages were blank. The notebook was pristine, brand new.

NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!

How? How did this happen?! It makes no sense! I haven’t used my quirk on my notebook at all! This is bullshit!!

He thought back as hard as he could about everything that had happened so far.

…Wait.

Yesterday, when he first tested branches.

[normal-pencil 7b32e17] A normal, unbroken pencil.
 2 files changed
 create mode 100644 analysis_notebook [84e96b7]


That was it, wasn’t it? He committed it right then, while it was blank. He committed it, not just added it, which meant that there was no “virtual notebook” visible that would indicate to him that his notebook was in a temporary state.

But… but… when he switched to the main branch earlier, his pencil teleported back to his room because that’s when it was committed on that branch. Shouldn’t the notebook have done the same? Or shouldn’t there have been a “Your local changes will be overwritten” warning when he merged? Because there sure as hell were a lot of changes made to that notebook!

Izuku pinched his brow. No… he had it wrong. The notebook was only added to the normal-pencil branch. When he switched branches, the notebook became untracked because the main branch took place in the past compared to the normal-pencil branch. It wouldn’t have been affected by anything. He merged the branches, so the notebook was fast-forwarded through being tracked, then committed as an empty notebook, and then everything since then had been unstaged changes.

…It made sense. He hated to admit it, but it made sense.

Izuku slumped onto the floor and held his head in his hands.

It was all gone. It was really all gone.

And it was his fault.

You moron! You stupid Deku!

He’d spent all day on it. He’d tried so hard. It was almost entirely full! He’d drawn diagrams and everything! So many pages, so many notes, so many ideas, so much work, all wasted.

…

FUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK!

Izuku felt tears coming to his eyes.

He was too dumb for this quirk.

Chapter Text

Only fifteen push-ups left! C’mon, you can do this! Izuku thought, trying to act as his own personal cheer squad. His arms were shaking from exertion.

You’re almost there! 4… 3… 2… 1…!

Done! Izuku groaned and sat back, rubbing his pained arms. Push-ups were saved for last, so he was done now. Izuku hated getting up early to do these workouts before school, but the alternative was worse. He didn’t have the time to both do a workout and go for a run back-to-back, so one of them had to happen before school and the other after. He originally had it the other way around—going for a morning run before school—but having a full day at school, then working out, then homework was just too miserable. He liked running, so that helped to break it up.

Man, it was already a school day. The weekend flew by way too fast for Izuku’s taste. If only he had just a little bit more time…

Like, a month, at least. A month-long weekend would be nice.

Izuku started his cooldown stretches. On the bright side, I can show my quirk to everyone at school! They’ll see that all along I was telling the truth!

Admittedly, he’d stopped caring about what his classmates thought a long time ago. Being able to prove them all wrong was nice, but it wasn’t as cathartic as he once thought it would be. Now that he had an awesome quirk and knew for sure that he would go to a hero school (hopefully UA) and become a hero, the approval of his classmates seemed so much more… inconsequential.

Izuku was going to get into a hero school, he had no doubts about that. Getting into UA specifically would be harder. They wanted the best of the best after all, and they only accepted around thirty-five new hero students per year. Was Izuku among the top thirty-five best kids his age in the whole country? The odds weren’t in his favor.

But getting into a hero school? One of the lesser ones? He could be a fat slob when he showed up to the entrance exam and he’d still probably get in once he showed the examiners his quirk. It was just too bonkers and versatile and dangerous to ignore. Just one touch and anything and anyone was permanently at the mercy of his crazy reality-warping quirk.

Is this privilege? Is this what Kacchan feels like all the time?

Izuku finished his stretches. Walking over to his desk, he picked up his half-full analysis notebook. He’d intended to rewrite it yesterday, and he’d started to, but then he got distracted by wanting to try out new things, so it was instead a mishmash of some stuff he remembered from two days ago and a whole bunch of new things he’d thought of.

My backpack is tracked by my quirk, and I’ve previously staged it, so it should act as the anchor point for any objects that I stage while they’re touching the backpack, Izuku thought. He considered his logic a second time, nodded to himself, and placed his notebook inside his backpack. “git add analysis_notebook; git commit -m "Monday morning backup".”

Satisfied, Izuku exited his room. He was gross and sweaty and it was time for a shower.

The classroom bustled with adolescence and chatter. Class hadn’t started yet, so friends bunched up into groups, hanging over each other’s desks as they talked about their weekend, joked around, and other aimless gossip.

Izuku sat at his desk alone because he didn’t have any friends.

For once, he didn’t mind. Smiling brightly, Izuku hummed to himself with a pen in his hand and his analysis notebook wide open and vulnerable in front of him. He was rapidly doodling and jotting down notes inside, ones he wouldn’t care about losing, looking for all the world like what he was writing was the most exciting and important thing ever.

“Oi, Deku!” Katsuki stomped over to his desk. “What the fuck are you smiling about, huh?”

It was amazing how predictable Kacchan was. He legitimately took it as a personal insult that Izuku was smiling. Maybe it was a blow to his pride, like “How dare you be happy after all the years of effort I’ve spent making sure you’re not”?

Izuku turned to face his former friend. “Kacchan, I figured out my quirk!” he exclaimed brightly and loudly.

The din of the classroom noticeably became quieter after that proclamation. Several students started listening in. Izuku could imagine their thoughts: Wait, he’s serious? The quirkless liar actually has a quirk?

Katsuki’s face bunched up in disbelief and anger. “The fuck? You don’t have a quirk. You’ve never had a quirk. Show me.”

Izuku sighed theatrically. “Oh, no, I couldn’t do that. Quirk use is prohibited in the classroom, after all. I would never break such a sacred rule.”

“Bullshit. You are a fucking liar! God, it never ends with you.”

“So instead,” Izuku continued as if Katsuki hadn’t spoken, “I’m writing down all the ways I’ll use my quirk when I become a Pro Hero. Look at how much I’ve written so far.” He flipped through the notebook to show off the pages and pages of densely written notes.

“Fuck off! You’ll never be a hero, Deku! You’re never going to be anything but scum that I scrape off my feet!” Katsuki was yelling loud enough that everyone in class was watching now.

“Agree to disagree.” Izuku turned away and started writing stuff in his notebook again, seeming to ignore the loud blond beside him.

Thrusting his hand forward, Katsuki tore the notebook right from Izuku’s grip. “Quirks aren’t allowed in class, yeah?” he snarled menacingly, holding Izuku’s notebook up for all to see. “Bullshit.”

With that, a firecracker went off in Katsuki’s hands. Everyone watched as Izuku’s notebook went up in flames, Katsuki grinning all the while. After a few moments, the notebook was black, charred, and unusable.

“git restore analysis_notebook.”

The destroyed notebook abruptly vanished from Katsuki’s hands and reappeared on Izuku’s desk, fully mended. Quiet gasps could be heard in the room. With a happy hum, Izuku got back to writing in the notebook as if the whole confrontation hadn’t happened.

Katsuki stared gobsmacked.

“All right, kids, settle down,” the teacher said, strolling into the room. “Class is starting now. Please return to your seats.”

It took a few moments, but Katsuki eventually shuffled back to his desk.

Izuku leaned back in his chair and smiled. That was totally worth it.

The lunchroom bustled with adolescence and chatter. They were free from classes at the moment, so friends formed groups together around the lunch tables, stuffing their faces with food as they made plans for after school, goofed off, and other aimless leisure.

Izuku sat at a table alone because he didn’t have any friends.

He didn’t mind though. Well, he did a little, but Izuku definitely told himself that he didn’t mind. Just because he had a quirk now didn’t mean he was suddenly going to be popular. His classmates had had years to settle into friend groups, and it was far too late for Izuku’s social status and reputation to suddenly flip.

Really, it was a good thing. Truthfully, all he wanted to do right now was keep making quirk notes in his notebook. The morning classes were the longest continuous period of not using his quirk since he had gotten it, not counting sleep. He was itching to get back to work. So it was good he had this time to himself. Definitely. Small talk with classmates he barely knew would just be awkward. No thanks.

Wait, someone’s coming to my table! he thought eagerly.

“Hey, you’re Deku, right?” A boy he vaguely recognized as one of his underclassmen sat down in front of him. A part of Izuku was really tempted to reply “No”—his name certainly was not “Deku”—but he didn’t know this boy’s name either, so it was likely that this was a genuine misunderstanding.

“Uh, I guess. My name’s Midoriya Izuku.”

“Yeah, cool cool.” The boy didn’t introduce himself in return. “Hey, so, you just got a quirk that repairs things, right?”

The news had spread that quickly? Izuku didn’t even know who this guy was. I guess that someone getting a quirk at our age is a hot topic for gossip. “My quirk is a bit complicated, but yeah, that’s one thing it can do.”

“That’s aces, yeah? So, it’s not my fault, but this happened earlier.” The boy pulled a phone with a smashed-up screen out of his pocket and placed it on the table in front of Izuku. “My mom’s going to be real pissed if she sees this, so, like, fix it?”

Ah, it was easy to see how people had misunderstood his stunt earlier. “Sorry, my quirk doesn’t work that way. It’s more like I can create save points. I’ve never seen your phone when it was intact, so I can’t do anything here.” Izuku picked up the phone and handed it back to the boy. “Again, sorry.”

“Oh.” The boy scowled, then walked away without saying another word.

Wow, rude.

Izuku sat there and took a few bites of his lunch.

When he got into UA, he’d change it. He’d change everything. No one at UA would’ve heard of the lying, quirkless Deku. No preconceptions, so he could be whoever he wanted. He’d put himself out there. He’d be the confident hero student Midoriya Izuku who was friendly, athletic, charming, and who could control time and space. He promised. He swore to himself. It would all change. It had to. He’d make it so.

In the corner of his vision, he saw Katsuki enter the lunchroom. Dammit. Izuku quickly shoveled the rest of his lunch into his mouth, awkwardly chewing and swallowing slightly too large bites. Katsuki’s gaze was scanning left and right across the room. Izuku tried to turn away, but he couldn’t help but meet Katsuki’s eyes. All right, we’re doing this then.

Izuku sighed as Katsuki stomped over to his table, grabbed him by the arm, and started dragging him out of the lunchroom. A couple of Katsuki’s goons were with him as well, hanging back. It wasn’t worth making a scene, so Izuku allowed it to happen. Actually being dragged would be humiliating though—it was better to pretend that they were equals and this was all mutually agreed-upon. So Izuku made sure to keep pace with Katsuki as he was led out of the lunchroom.

Katsuki continued to drag him into the hall, heading toward an exit door that led to a secluded spot behind the school. “git add bakugo_katsuki,” Izuku whispered, letting the loud bang of Katsuki slamming open the door muffle his words.

Once outside, Izuku tore his arm out of Katsuki’s grip and turned to face him directly. Two of Katsuki’s minions loomed behind him, trying to look tough like they were in a gangster movie.

They stared at each other for a moment, but Katsuki was never one for silence. “Was it fun,” he growled, “making a fool out of me?”

Kinda, yeah. “Is destroying other people’s property fun for you?” he retorted.

“Hiding your quirk all this time!” Katsuki shouted as if Izuku hadn’t said anything. “Were you looking down on me?! You bastard, have you been laughing at me all these years? Going around all high and mighty, pretending you didn’t have a quirk?”

“Wh—what? Kacchan, are you insane?” Izuku yelled back, flabbergasted. “What are you talking about? I never hid anything! You think I wanted to be known as a delusional quirkless kid? You think I wanted to have no friends since I was five?”

“No one gets a quirk this late. Even late bloomers only get their quirks a few years late. You had a quirk this whole time!” Katsuki proclaimed this as if it were some grand revelation.

“Yes! Yes, I have! I’m not a late bloomer! I’ve always had a quirk! You know, like I’ve been saying for my entire life!” Why did Izuku even need to defend this? Wasn’t it all blatantly obvious?

“So, what, you’ve always had a quirk, but you were just too stupid and incompetent to use it till now?” Katsuki said it mockingly as if the very concept was ridiculous.

Izuku threw his hands up in the air. “Yes, fine! I was too stupid to know how to use it until now. That’s exactly what happened. If that’ll get you off my back, I’m happy to admit it!”

Katsuki spat at the ground by Izuku’s feet. “Bullshit. You’re a bastard, but you’re not stupid. Once a liar, always a liar. But it doesn’t matter because no matter what quirk you have, you’ll never beat me. You’re a pebble on the side of the damn road, and you need to learn to stay in your fucking lane.”

Yeah yeah yeah, he’d heard all this before, thanks. He definitely needed to be reminded for the ten millionth time about how much he sucks and how he’ll never amount to anything.

“Don’t look at me like that!” Katsuki suddenly erupted. “I’m better than you!” Huh? Was Izuku making a face? He honestly couldn’t tell. “You think whatever lame quirk you’ve been hiding all this time can stack up against me?” Katsuki let loose an explosion in his hands for emphasis.

“git add bakugo_katsuki,” Izuku responded simply, updating Katsuki’s staged location.

“You wanna fight? I’ll kill you!” he roared.

“git commit -m "Kacchan is an asshole!".” Izuku was about to tell him about how “Kacchan is an asshole!” was now engraved into history for the rest of time, but then he realized just how much context he’d have to go into to explain why this was funny, and so the joke died on his tongue.

“Fucking die!” Katsuki launched forward, readying a right hook.

“git restore bakugo_katsuki.”

Katsuki vanished mid-lunge and reappeared in his original position. “—You wanna fight? I’ll kill you!” he roared.

The two minions jolted backward in surprise, alarm on their faces. Oh, shoot, Izuku had completely forgotten they were even there. He was pretty sure Katsuki had, too. They had faded entirely into the background.

“Fucking die!” Katsuki launched forward again with another right hook.

“git restore bakugo_katsuki.”

Katsuki vanished and reappeared. “—You wanna fight? I’ll kill you!”

Huh, this was the first time Izuku had used his quirk on a person. He didn’t know that their memories were reset as well. It was obvious in retrospect, but in Izuku’s head, he imagined Katsuki getting increasingly frustrated each time one of his attacks failed to connect. This wasn’t as fun when Katsuki didn’t know what was happening.

“Fucking die!”

“git restore bakugo_katsuki.”

“—You wanna fight? I’ll kill you!”

This was getting nowhere. The goons were visibly starting to freak out too, seeing their leader seemingly stuck in a time loop. Izuku decided it was time to walk away.

“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” Katsuki shouted, launching forward to grab Izuku by the shoulder.

“git restore bakugo_katsuki.”

“—You wanna fight? I’ll kill—huh?” Katsuki stumbled. Izuku was walking away, no longer facing him. “Fuck, you can teleport? Bastard. You think that’s gonna help you escape me? Fucking die!”

“git restore bakugo_katsuki.” He opened the door that would lead him back inside the school.

“—You wanna fight? I’ll kill—huh?” Katsuki stumbled. This time, however, one of the goons grabbed him by the shoulder, stopping him from launching himself at Izuku again.

“Hey, uh, Bakugou, maybe we shouldn’t mess with him.” The goon was sweating a bit, barely hiding his panic.

“What the fuck? Are you scared of Deku? That little shit couldn’t—”

The door slammed shut, cutting Izuku off from hearing the rest of Katsuki’s rant.

He sighed. Can lunchtime please be over already?

The rest of the school day was tedious as always. In Social Studies, Izuku filled out a math worksheet assigned to them in the previous class, barely paying attention to Mr. Nakamura as he blandly regurgitated stuff Izuku already knew.

UA only accepted the best of the best, and that applied to academics just as much as heroic potential. Other hero schools were fine with dumb brutes, but UA prided itself on nurturing intelligent, tactical leaders of the field. If Izuku was going to get into UA, he needed to prove that he was capable. So, was Aldera Junior High giving him a best-of-the-best education that would help him out-compete the smartest, most driven students in the country?

Hahaha.

Hahahahahahahahaha.

Students with wealthy families could hire private tutors to help them get an advantage, but Izuku couldn’t afford that, obviously. Thankfully, if you were determined to learn, there were a lot of fantastic free resources out there that could do the job. There were many lectures online that went over the same content that school was teaching him, except shorter and explained far better.

Thus, school nowadays was just a review of stuff Izuku had studied a long time ago. It was nice to double-check that he hadn’t somehow missed any topics, and exams were a good way to confirm that he had successfully retained all the information he’d learned, but otherwise, he tried to use lecture time to finish as much homework as he could get away with so that he wouldn’t have to do it later.

The school day was almost over. Izuku started surreptitiously packing his books away. He’d have to escape quickly if he didn’t want to be caught by Katsuki again.

“Midoriya. Bakugou. Please see me after class,” Mr. Nakamura declared.

Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me.

The bell rang, and the rest of the students happily ambled out of the classroom, split between heading to after-school clubs and heading home for the day. Before long, only the three of them remained—Izuku, their teacher, and Katsuki, who was looking just as annoyed as Izuku.

“Now boys, I heard you two had a disagreement earlier today at lunch,” Mr. Nakamura said. “Specifically, Midoriya, I hear you used your quirk offensively to hurt Bakugou, one of your fellow classmates. What do you have to say for yourself?”

“Deku didn’t do jack shit! Do I look hurt?” Katsuki exclaimed. “How did you even hear—ugh, it was those two idiots, wasn’t it? They snitched.”

“It doesn’t matter if neither of you are hurt, the intent is what matters,” their teacher replied. “Furthermore, I hear Midoriya only attacked you with his quirk due to your own aggressive behavior. As you know, at Aldera we have a zero-tolerance policy against both quirk usage and bullying.”

Izuku and Katsuki looked at each other in shared bafflement. Katsuki scrunched his face up as if to say, “Can you believe the shit that’s coming out of this guy’s mouth?”

“Now, I’ve been an educator for many years. I know that emotions can run high among boys your age. However, I must make it clear that this behavior is not acceptable and will not be tolerated moving forward.”

“You never—” Katsuki began, but he cut himself off. It was obvious to Izuku what Katsuki was going to say: “You never cared before.” However, by saying it, he would implicitly be admitting that he was guilty of bullying and quirk usage and all of it. For whatever reason, the school cared about this now. It’d be dumb for Katsuki to call attention to it, and for all of his faults, he wasn’t dumb.

Katsuki was clearly confused as to what was going on, but the pieces were falling into place for Izuku. There was a Freudian slip in what his teacher had said: “…will not be tolerated moving forward.” Implying that it had been tolerated up until now. Which, yeah, obviously that was the case. But the key insight here was that the teacher was aware of it too. Therefore, something had changed.

What had changed was that some bullies had snitched to the teachers about Izuku’s reality-warping quirk. Probably acting all freaked out by it, worried that Izuku would use it on them too. The school administrators now knew that Izuku had a quirk powerful enough to scare a group of bullies. And Izuku had made no secret of his plans to get into UA and become a hero.

The school didn’t just have one golden child anymore. It now had two UA hopefuls with powerful quirks under its roof, and it was suddenly vitally important to prevent the two of them from killing each other before graduation.

“The two of you will be coming with me to the office for your detention,” Mr. Nakamura continued. “I hope that both of you take this time to reflect on your actions.”

The teacher led Izuku and Katsuki to the school office, where they were shown several boxes full of paperwork. They were instructed to file the paperwork in the filing cabinets, ordered by date, and that their detention would not end until the task was complete.

Izuku took a look at the first page in his stack. It was some report from the Ministry of Education regarding budgets for various programs. The next page was a printout of an email correspondence between some people on the school board. Wait, hold on, wasn’t this all confidential information? Were students even allowed to see this, or was the teacher just pawning his own work on the two of them and pretending that it was for detention?

Who was he kidding, he knew the answer to that question already.

I hate this school.

He and Katsuki worked quietly and efficiently, silently agreeing to shut up and try to get this over with as quickly as possible. There was a lot of work to do though, and the tedium of it all unfortunately gave Izuku a chance to think.

Earlier today had been the first time he’d used his quirk on a human being, and the fact that his quirk reset the person’s memories raised some very uncomfortable questions.

It seemed fine at the time because Katsuki had only lost a few seconds of memories, but it wasn’t limited to just that. After all, Izuku could say “git restore Bakugou Katsuki” right now, and Katsuki would immediately vanish and be replaced by a version of him who had never experienced the last several hours.

So what happened to the Katsuki who vanished? Did that version of him just… die?

This all came back to the question of “What truly is a person?” and all of the age-old philosophical quandaries that arose from thinking too deeply about it. The classic Ship of Theseus thought experiment asked whether a ship was still the same ship even after all of its components had been replaced. You could apply the same concept to a human being: after some amount of time, every cell that made up a person would eventually be replaced, so was that person still the same person?

To Izuku, the answer was obvious: “Yeah. Of course. Duh.” And thus, the dilemma of the Ship of Theseus was solved: it was still the same ship. Duh.

If a person wasn’t their body, then what was a person? An easy answer was “their mind”, but that answer had its own drawbacks. If you killed a person, and then you grew a clone of them in a vat with exactly the same thoughts, feelings, and memories, was that the same person? Clearly it wasn’t, but why? You could try adding qualifiers like “it has to be one continuous uninterrupted consciousness”, but that definition had its own hazy edge cases. When a doctor resuscitates a medically deceased patient, is the person who wakes up still the same person? Metaphysically speaking, was there any actual difference between that scenario and the scenario where the person was replaced by a clone? If you presuppose that there was a difference, did that establish that souls must exist?

Throughout time, philosophers have pondered these questions—and many others like them—because they were interesting brain teasers that sparked lively debate and allowed everyone involved to feel smart. Unfortunately, Izuku was pondering them because he had no idea how his quirk worked and he was freaking out!

Is that what Izuku had been doing to Katsuki? Killing him, then replacing him with a clone?

And it wasn’t like it was just limited to this one day, either. Years from now, when they were both Pro Heroes (and had repaired their relationship maybe?), Izuku could one day say “git restore Bakugou Katsuki” and Katsuki would be killed and replaced with an angry fourteen-year-old version of himself.

Sure, he could continuously commit Katsuki. Every day, perhaps, so that he would never lose more than a day’s worth of memories. Perhaps that would be something he did as a hero in the future: commit his teammates every day so that he could bring them back to full health if something ever went terribly wrong.

But that wasn’t what Izuku wanted to do now. He didn’t want that responsibility, especially considering that he had accidentally deleted his notebook only two days ago. He wasn’t ready for this.

There was another solution though. His commands didn’t work on objects before he added them for the first time—he needed his quirk to go back to treating Katsuki like that. The command to stop tracking an object was “git rm”, where “rm” was short for “remove”. It was the opposite of “git add”. He hadn’t had a reason to use the command yet, but he remembered it clearly from the reference manual, and it was detailed in his notes.

“Mr. Nakamura, sir, uh, my quirk can actually continuously affect other people until I specifically remove it. Do I have permission to undo the hold my quirk has on Kacchan?”

Katsuki bristled. “The fuck do you mean you’re still using your quirk on me?”

The teacher was lounging on a chair, busy texting someone. “Yes, of course. You should have done that a long time ago.”

“Right, yeah. git rm bakugo_katsuki.”

Katsuki abruptly stopped existing.

The papers he was holding fell and scattered all over the floor.

The office room was eerily still and silent.

“…What?” Izuku whispered.

What?

Mr. Nakamura rushed behind him and started shaking his shoulder. “What happened? What did you do?”

“I-I don’t know!” That wasn’t supposed to happen.

That wasn’t supposed to happen!

Both of them stared at the empty spot where Katsuki used to be.

His quirk could delete things? Just gone, poof? His quirk could delete people?

Oh god, he killed Kacchan.

Izuku’s heart was racing, and he could feel himself start to hyperventilate.

Oh god.

Wait, no. He needed to calm down.

Breathe, Izuku.

He could fix this. Sort of.

He’d made a commit of Kacchan.

Izuku’s mouth was dry as he muttered, “I-I know where Kacchan is.” Was. Will be. “Um, this way.”

He didn’t wait to see if his teacher would follow him. He raced downstairs, retreading the same path Katsuki had dragged him earlier, down the hall, through the exit door, out to the secluded spot behind the school.

Mr. Nakamura had followed him. He wasn’t far behind, just exiting the door.

Izuku stared at the empty patch of ground in front of him. “G-git, ahem, git restore bakugo_katsuki.”

Katsuki appeared out of thin air. “—You wanna fight? I’ll kill—huh?” He stumbled to a stop.

Izuku watched as Katsuki darted his eyes around this way and that, looking increasingly distraught. What must this look like from Kacchan’s point of view? A moment ago he was confronting Izuku at lunch, but now the sun was low in the sky, and Izuku… well, he didn’t know what expression he was wearing right now, but he felt like a total wreck. The two goons had vanished, and their teacher was there instead, a look of grave concern on his face.

Izuku stepped forward. Katsuki tensed up as if he were expecting an attack, but something about the situation must have changed his mind since he didn’t immediately start swearing or back away.

Izuku threw his arms around Kacchan and cried.

The sun was already setting by the time Izuku got home. He certainly wasn’t going for a run today. It was too bad; he could’ve used the chance to clear his mind.

His mom was already there when Izuku entered the apartment. She’d been waiting for him. “Izuku, I got a call from your school today,” Mom said, hands on her hips. “Care to tell me why—sweetie, oh sweetie. What happened, my baby? What’s wrong?”

Did he look that bad? Maybe the tear marks were still visible on his cheeks.

“Hi, Mom. Um, I’ll tell you, I promise I’ll tell you soon. But I really, really need to do something first. I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I’ll come out soon, just… hold on.” Without waiting for his mom to agree, Izuku rushed to his room and slammed the door.

The Git reference manual sat innocently on Izuku’s desk. He glared at it with betrayal in his eyes. The entire way home, only one thought had been in his mind, circling endlessly, digging into his skull: Why didn’t it work?!

Why the hell did “git rm” erase Katsuki? It was supposed to just untrack him. He wasn’t crazy. The manual had a section where it listed example commands to accomplish various tasks, and that was one of them! Izuku sat down at his desk and flipped through the pages in fury. He knew what he read. He wasn’t making this up! Did the manual just lie? What had gone wrong?

He found the page he was looking for and read through it carefully.

…

Squeezing his eyes shut, he slumped forward, his forehead hitting his desk with a thud.

The correct command wasn’t “git rm some_object”.

It was “git rm some_object --cached”.

Why?! Why “cached”? Who in their right mind would ever make “stop tracking this object” and “delete this object from existence” the same command?

And really, why “cached”?! Even if you were crazy enough to make these two wildly different things the same command, why not give it a name that made sense, like “untrack”? What did “cached” even mean?!

Oh, and don’t forget! There was a step two to this process. Because of course there was. Of course you couldn’t just untrack the object and be done with it. No-no-no, next you had to commit the fact that you had untracked it. Otherwise, the untracking could be undone like anything else. Not the other way around, oh no! When he added something, it was tracked immediately. But untracking had to be committed; only then would his quirk be happy.

Happiness is fleeting. Only commits are forever.

Izuku squeezed his eyes shut and sighed. It was time for quirk testing. He really wasn’t in the mood, but it had to happen.

He looked around his desk for something he wouldn’t mind losing. “Git rm ballpoint pen.” That didn’t work, which wasn’t a surprise. His quirk couldn’t seem to affect anything unless he added it first. He picked up the pen. “git add ballpoint_pen.”

Now for the real test. “git rm ballpoint_pen.”

error: the following file has changes staged in the index:
    ballpoint_pen [3d672a3]


That was… mildly reassuring. Sort of. His insane, dangerous quirk that could instantly delete things from existence had a safety feature: he couldn’t delete things without committing them first. And, inherently, once something was committed, he could always return it to that state. There were still countless ways that Izuku could screw up and ruin everything, but he’d take what he could get.

Next, Izuku grabbed his pencil and placed it in the center of his desk. “git rm all_might_pencil --cached.”

rm 'all_might_pencil [c90addd]'


The pencil was still there. So far, so good. “git commit -m "Untracked All Might pencil".”

[main 1bfc8e5] Untracked All Might pencil
 2 files changed
 delete mode 100644 all_might_pencil [c90addd]
 create mode 100644 ballpoint_pen [3d672a3]


Izuku wasn’t a fan of the wording his quirk used. Apparently, his quirk figured that if he wasn’t tracking something, then it might as well not exist. It didn’t matter. His quirk claimed that it had deleted the pencil, but it was still there on the desk in front of him, so whatever.

Now for the moment of truth. “Git add All Might pencil. Git restore All Might pencil.”

Izuku let out a sigh of relief. It worked. Commands no longer worked on the pencil. It didn’t undo anything that he’d previously done, of course. The commits he had already made of the pencil were still there, and they would always be there. He could recover those commits if he needed to, but he’d have to go out of his way to do so. Until he added the pencil again, it would no longer be affected by any normal commands Izuku casually spoke aloud, which was the important part.

There was one last thing to do. He couldn’t delay. It would just get harder and harder the more he overthought it, and his mom wasn’t going to wait for him forever.

Izuku pulled out his phone, scrolled through his tiny number of contacts, and called Katsuki.

“What the hell do you want, shitty nerd?!” Katsuki answered instantly. He must have already been using his phone.

“Um, I’m sorry, Kacchan. I’m so, so sorry about earlier, you have no idea. You don’t have to forgive me, I don’t know how to make it up to you, I’m just sorry. But, uh… I still need to remove you from my quirk, and I’m scared after last time, so just keep talking while I do this so that I know you’re okay.”

“What the fuck? You’re experimenting with your quirk on me over the phone?”

“Yes, just like that, keep talking. git rm bakugo_katsuki --cached.”

“What the hell are you doing? Don’t ignore me, you bastard!”

“Good, that’s good. git commit -m "Untracked Kacchan".”

“Answer the fucking question, Deku!”

“Git add Bakugou Katsuki. Okay, thanks, bye.”

“DON’T YOU DARE HANG UP ON ME YOU FUCK—” Izuku hung up on him.

Izuku leaned back in his chair, staring blankly at the ceiling for a few minutes.

Today sucked.

Chapter Text

It was the day of the UA entrance exam.

The last ten months had been a whirlwind of training, quirk practice, physical conditioning, self-defense lessons, studying, quirk brainstorming, and so much else. Time had seemed to have passed agonizingly slowly while Izuku was in the middle of it, but now that the day had arrived it felt like it had happened way too fast! Was he really ready for this?

Well, it didn’t matter if he felt ready or not. He’d have to be.

Izuku was up early in the morning. He’d already showered, brushed his teeth, had breakfast, and all the other daily morning rituals. He was in his room now making his final preparations for the day ahead.

Izuku’s quirk, as amazing as it was, was fundamentally about preservation. He could save the state of objects and bring them back to how they were at previous points in time. That was incredibly useful in countless situations, but there was a key issue: heroes were generally reactive, not proactive. Heroes were called in when things were already messed up, and it was the hero’s job to fix it.

This contradicted the basic premise of Izuku’s quirk. Izuku was best at preserving things as they were, but that ran counter to his job as a hero. If he encountered some situation where a villain (or natural disaster, or whatever) had caused destruction, then preserving the destruction was the exact opposite of what he should do.

He was similarly restricted when it came to combat. Sure, he could use his quirk on villains directly, but that required touch. His quirk didn’t help him physically—he was still a normal squishy human. He needed ways to handle situations that didn’t rely on him getting within striking distance of villains with powerful physical enhancement quirks who could knock his head off his shoulders.

The UA entrance exam was a great demonstration of this dilemma. Izuku had no idea what the exam would entail. He was going in blind. Whatever happened, he’d have to improvise on the spot. It matched the kind of unpredictable environment he’d face as a real Pro Hero. If he was unlucky and his quirk couldn’t help with the tasks they wanted him to perform, then he needed to prove he was capable even if he had to act effectively quirkless.

With all that being said, even though the exotic time-warping aspects of his quirk would be of limited use, Izuku still had a few tricks up his sleeve. He’d had months to prepare for this after all.

Izuku put on the special vest, cargo pants, and socks that he’d prepared for this day. The vest and pants had tons of pockets, straps, and hooks that could be used to carry any number of items. Which was exactly the point. “git switch tool-belt,” Izuku commanded.

Immediately, Izuku was bogged down with an exorbitant amount of equipment strapped to every piece of available surface area on his clothes. He was too encumbered to even move with a shield, a first aid kit, lots of rope, a baton, a metal baseball bat, a net, caltrops, a bola, handcuffs, a dagger, a slingshot, a helmet, a spray bottle filled with apple juice, a small axe, a flashlight, a thermal imaging camera, a lockpick set, and so much more all weighing him down.

It was a good thing then that he didn’t need to carry any of it. He carefully removed all the equipment he was wearing and placed everything on the floor of his room. Left behind were dozens of virtual objects—weightless, intangible virtual objects—all anchored to his vest and cargo pants and easily summonable with a simple “git restore”. The vast majority of it wasn’t going to be useful, but all that mattered was that something would be. Hopefully.

(He felt like he needed to explain the “spray bottle filled with apple juice” part. He emailed UA to tell them that his quirk allowed him to summon objects from home, and he asked what he was allowed to summon. They said it was fine so long as he provided a list for their approval. His original list included pepper spray, but they asked him not to bring real pepper spray. However, for the purposes of the exam, they’d honor substitutes. Should the exam involve fighting mock villains, then the actors would be instructed to treat the apple juice like pepper spray.)

He was as ready as he was ever going to be.

Izuku went downstairs to see his mom waiting by the door. After putting on his shoes and jacket, Mom gave him a big hug.

“Knock ’em dead, sweetie. I’m so proud of you, no matter what happens. I love you, Izuku.”

He hugged her back. “Love you too, Mom.”

Nothing more needed to be said.

Izuku gazed up at UA in wonderment. It was so… big. That sounded stupid to say, but Izuku was never great at poetic descriptions.

The school grounds were crowded with seemingly thousands of students. Sure, not all of them were here for the Hero Course exam, but it was still intimating for Izuku to see just how many hero hopefuls he was up against. Out of this massive crowd, only thirty to forty of them would actually be accepted into heroics.

If Izuku did well today, he would be one of them.

He took a determined step forward, a step toward his destiny.

“OUTTA MY WAY, DEKU!”

Katsuki had come up right from behind him and shoulder-checked him to the side. Izuku stumbled and had to stop himself from falling over.

What an asshole. Two could play at that game. “Out of my way, Kacchan!” he shouted, running up to Katsuki and shoulder-checking him in return.

Katsuki must not have expected Izuku to retaliate because he wasn’t ready to catch himself. He stumbled to the side, his foot catching on a slightly raised piece of the walkway. He pitched forward and was about to face-plant into the ground—

—A girl slapped Katsuki’s shoulder and he started floating in mid-air.

“Release!” the girl called once Katsuki was upright. “Are you all right? Sorry for using my quirk without asking first. But it’d be bad luck if you fell, right?”

Katsuki stared at the girl for a moment, and then he raged. “I DON’T NEED LUCK! I’M GOING TO BE THE GREATEST HERO EVER! WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE? I DON’T NEED YOUR HELP! I DON’T NEED ANYONE’S HELP! STAY OUT OF MY FUCKING BUSINESS!”

The girl stood there shell-shocked as Katsuki turned away and stomped his way into the school, scowling all the while.

Izuku held his face in his hands. Classic Kacchan. Please, please don’t be in my class.

The girl was still standing there. Wait, this was a chance for Izuku to practice being the new him! The cool hero student! He walked over to her. “Hi,” he said, grabbing her attention. “Uh, I saw the whole thing. Just letting you know, that guy you were talking to, Bakugou Katsuki, I’ve known him for pretty much my entire life. Kacchan is like that with everyone. It’s not just you. Your quirk is really cool.”

The girl faced him. She was just a little bit shorter than him, with big eyes and a brown-haired bob cut. “Oh, um, thank you. I’m Uraraka Ochako. So, is he your friend?”

…He hadn’t introduced himself. He introduced Kacchan before introducing himself. Stupid Deku! “I’m Midoriya Izuku, and… uh, no. No, he isn’t.”

Uraraka looked embarrassed. “Right! Got it, sorry.”

C’mon! Stop making this awkward! I’m supposed to be playing the part of the confident, charming hero student. Man, I need more practice at this. “Yeah, so, I wanted to say something because you didn’t deserve that at all. That was really nice of you, you just kinda got unlucky. Anyone else would have appreciated the help, but for Kacchan specifically… next time, just let him fall.”

Uraraka snorted. It was pretty cute. “Don’t worry, if he doesn’t want help, I’m not going to help him again. Ever.”

Izuku tried to remember what the guides online said about how to make people like you. Flattery was a big one, especially if you pointed out specific things that a person did. It demonstrated that you were paying attention to them. “You have amazing reflexes! Kacchan was barely falling, and then you were already there swooping in to save the day! You were really cool. Are you here to take the Hero exam too?”

Uraraka blushed and smiled at that. Score! “Yeah! You too? I’m pretty nervous, but I figure we all are. Let’s do our best!”

“Definitely! I hope to see you in class.”

“Right back at ya!” Uraraka held her fist out for a fist bump, which Izuku happily returned. The two of them waved goodbye to each other and started heading toward their respective exam rooms. The written exam was before the practical exam, and each student had an assigned classroom and seat.

Izuku was in a good mood. See? He could make friends! His social skills hadn’t completely atrophied over the years.

It was time to begin the exam. Hopefully he could keep this positivity going.

Izuku felt he did… okay on the written exam. Since he had deliberately studied beyond his grade level, Izuku recognized how the exam was structured. The first half was a tougher version of the same kind of standardized exam that he’d soon take to graduate from Aldera. This was what students their age were expected to know if they’d been keeping up with their studies. Izuku was confident that he’d aced this section.

The second half ramped things up quickly. Izuku was fine for the first page because it covered topics he had learned during his self-study. But every time Izuku flipped to the next page the exam seemed to jump another grade level, and it didn’t take long for Izuku to go from being confident, to being cautious, to being worried, to just guessing and praying.

Most of the questions were multiple choice, so maybe Izuku would get lucky. Unfortunately, the math section required you to show your work and not just select your answer. He had to give up on that section entirely once it started introducing weird symbols like “∀𝑥∈𝑆”.

It sucked, but Izuku had to remind himself that he had studied beyond his grade level. He objectively knew more than students his age were expected to know. UA may have gone Plus Ultra with their written exam—as they did with everything—but it wasn’t reasonable for a high school to demand its students to have mastered the entire high school curriculum before even getting into high school. The exam was probably just designed to give a chance for the geniuses to show off.

His mood was buoyed by the final question of the exam, an essay question, and by far the easiest of them all.

– Why do you want to be a Pro Hero? –

Izuku had known his answer to this question for nearly his entire life. He had self-reflected many times over the years, and it always came back to one simple truth:

Helping people makes me happy.

There were additional factors, of course. If he just wanted to help people, why not become a doctor, or a charity worker, or any of the other ways a person could help others?

Truthfully, it all came back to the video of All Might’s debut. That was when he knew he wanted to be a hero, and that feeling had never changed. On that day, disaster struck. Unsuspecting people were suddenly faced with the worst day of their lives, crushed under the weight of terror and torment, engulfed by a chasm of pitch-black despair. And then… the sight of a hero coming to save them was enough to drive away that darkness, bringing in light and hope.

That’s what Izuku wanted. He wanted to be there. He wanted to see it. He wanted to feel it. And yes, he wanted to be responsible for it. Izuku wanted to be one of the people bringing light and hope. Helping people in that context was what made him feel the most happy. He could be a charity worker instead and know, in the abstract, that his work helped a lot of people, but that’s not what he most wanted.

Was that selfish? Was it wrong that he wanted instant gratification? Izuku didn’t think so. There was nothing wrong with wanting to devote your life to something that made you happy.

Furthermore, from a purely practical perspective, heroics was visible and heavily marketed. In his essay, Izuku cited several examples of donations to and engagement with charitable organizations going up by thousands of percent just by All Might promoting them once. He could spend his whole life helping others, but that was dwarfed by the impact he would have if he inspired just a handful of people to spend their lives helping others.

Izuku finished his essay, reviewed his answers, then closed the booklet and put down his pencil. It looked like about half the students were still working.

One test down. One to go.

Izuku made his way to the auditorium where they would be prepped for the physical exam. Looking for his seat, he was once again astounded by how many other students were here and how many amazing quirks he could see. He had his work cut out for him if he was going to prevail over them all and earn his spot.

He found his seat, and… oh, it was next to Kacchan. Ugh. Right, their school would have sent in their applications at the same time, so the two of them had successive applicant numbers. Katsuki glared at him when he sat down, but thankfully didn’t try to start anything.

A few minutes passed as everyone found their seats. When everyone was settled, Present Mic unexpectedly leaped out from behind the stage and made a cool pose. It’s Present Mic! Izuku barely stopped himself from squealing. He listened to his radio show every week! Present Mic was here, in UA. If Izuku got in, Present Mic would be one of his teachers! He could talk to him about his show in person! The reality of it all was settling in. This is what his life could be like every day if he passed this exam. He was so excited!

Present Mic sashayed up to the podium. “For all you examinee listeners tuning in, welcome to my show today! Everybody say ‘YEAH!’ ”

The excitement was unbearable! “YEAH!” Izuku cheered, so happy to be here, so close to his dream.

His cheer echoed… echoed… echoed around the silent auditorium. The students in front of him turned and looked at him strangely.

He was… the only one…?

Izuku shrunk into his seat and tried to hide his face. It felt like he had swallowed a rock, and he was burning up all over. Next to him, Katsuki was nearly biting his arm off trying to stop himself from laughing hysterically.

Just put him out of his misery already. He could dig a nice hole and live there for the rest of his life. Tour guides could make a spectacle of the native Hole-Dwelling Deku, and then everyone would point and laugh. That was all he was good for.

“YEAH!”

Izuku’s head jerked up. That voice. Wait, was that really…?

He looked to where the cheer had come from, and halfway across the room, he saw a familiar brown-haired girl with a bob cut. Uraraka met his eyes and grinned cheekily.

Izuku almost cried there and then.

“YEAH!” Another person? Who was that? Izuku looked, and it was some boy with spiky red hair. Izuku didn’t know him. Why did he cheer? Did he just not want to be left out?

After that third cheer, silence settled over the auditorium. No one else spoke up.

Present Mic leaned back in a casual pose. “It sounds like only three people want to be here,” he announced in an impish tone. “Where’s that enthusiasm? Where’s that Plus Ultra spirit? You’re all here because you want to be paragons of virtue and justice for the country, and as far as I can tell only three of you have a good attitude. Maybe they deserve bonus marks. Let’s try that again. Everybody say ‘YEAH!’ ”

“YEAH!!” boomed the students. Izuku looked over and was delighted to see that even Katsuki joined in, although he looked like he was biting a lemon while doing so.

“That’s more like it! Now, let me give you all the rundown on the practical exam…”

Izuku followed his exam group to Battle Center 2 at Ground Delta. The idea that a high school could afford an entire fake city on school grounds was crazy. The idea that a high school could afford multiple fake cities was completely outrageous.

UA is awesome! Izuku thought gleefully.

The school grounds were big enough that his group needed to take a bus ride to the exam location. Izuku was very thankful for the bus ride because during that time he came up with a plan. Not a foolproof plan, but he was pretty happy with it. He knew exactly what he was going to do.

He was going to rock this exam! Hopefully.

His group all bunched together near the giant entrance gates to Ground Delta. The test would be starting soon. Izuku saw the different ways that people prepared themselves. Some students were lightly stretching, looking totally relaxed. Izuku envied them. Others were clearly nervous, some frozen in place while others paced back and forth. Some of the more socially brave ones started up strained small talk with each other, mostly a bunch of terse variations on “Feeling ready?” and “Good luck”. Izuku himself was wondering if he should risk saying some commands now before the exam officially started, or if that would count as cheating.

The gates suddenly opened with a bang. “Go!” Present Mic yelled from somewhere.

Huh? Everyone looked at each other in confusion, conversations halted and stretches frozen in place. Now?

“There are no countdowns in real life. Go!”

Oh! Okay, then. Izuku jumped in the air and called, “git cherry-pick rollerblades --no-commit.” He landed wearing a pair of rollerblades, having swapped locations with his shoes. The streets of the fake city were pretty much all smooth cement, which was perfect for him. He quickly skated his way into the exam zone. There were some other students with mobility quirks who were ahead of him, such as a boy with engines in his legs, but Izuku had a great head start compared to most of his competitors.

Next, he needed a weapon. “git restore baseball_bat,” Izuku shouted. A metal baseball bat materialized into existence strapped to his hip like a sword. He grabbed the bat and held it out proudly. Oh yeah, Izuku was a real teen delinquent now! Charging around a city on rollerblades while wielding a baseball bat. Now all he needed was a spray can so he could graffiti up the place.

Izuku came across his first one-pointer robot. It was an army-green mech with a one-wheel design. It had riot shields for arms and guns for its hands, and it was quite a bit larger than Izuku himself. He started to feel a bit nervous. It was much bigger than it looked like in the presentation slides. The baseball bat might not cut it.

While large and dangerous, the one-wheel design wasn’t great for close-quarters maneuverability. Izuku zoomed past and tagged the robot. “git add one_pointer_robot.” He added the robot in preparation for the next step of his plan, but before that, he needed a quick and reliable way of destroying them.

The one-pointer had trouble turning around, so Izuku zipped behind it where it had fewer defenses and bashed the back of its head in with the baseball bat. Unfortunately, one swing wasn’t enough; it started to turn and point its gun-hands at him. Izuku had to bash its head in a second time before the robot stopped moving.

From his angle behind the robot, Izuku could see colorful exposed wires running up to the robot’s head. Pulling out those wires was probably how students with less combative quirks could defeat the robots. That could be faster than using his baseball bat. Izuku would keep the option in mind, but he had another idea that he’d try first on the next villain bot.

“Since when can you bring weapons?!” someone shouted at him.

Izuku turned to see a boy run up next to him, some purple-haired kid. “Since always!” he replied. “You just need to get them approved first.”

He could see the soul leave the purple-haired boy’s body. Yeah, tough luck, bud.

Izuku didn’t blame him. UA’s website said “You are not required to bring anything with you to the exam”, which was a very sneaky way of saying absolutely nothing at all. Izuku figured it was probably designed to reward students who thought outside the box and engaged with a trivial degree of intelligence gathering (i.e. sending an email and asking).

Anyway, Izuku couldn’t get distracted by the kid having a mental breakdown next to him. It was time to execute the next stage of his plan. “git grep one_pointer_robot --untracked.” The command worked! Izuku grinned in triumph.

Another explanation was in order. The “grep” command could be used to search the contents of all files across all commits in a repository. Izuku had no what “grep” was supposed to mean. It obviously meant “find”, but some lunatic decided to call it “grep”.

Regardless, he could use the command to find an object that he had previously added to his quirk. By appending the “--untracked” flag, he could also use it to find all objects similar to it within a certain distance radius. Thankfully, that distance was measured in kilometers, so it covered the entire exam arena. Izuku now knew the locations of every one-pointer robot in the city.

Izuku found it difficult to describe what he was seeing. It wasn’t “seeing” at all. It was as if all one-pointer robots in the city now had bright red outlines around them, except that it wasn’t limited to his actual eyesight. It was a 360º sensation that ignored walls and any other obstructions. He just knew where they all were now. He could “see” them all, clear as day.

From his experiments, he knew this would last for five minutes or until he used another grep command. The time limit was inconsequential because he could use the command again at any time to reset the timer. The actual issue was that grep commands overwrote each other. He knew the locations of every one-pointer robot, but not the two-pointer or three-pointer robots.

Izuku had a plan for that too.

He zoomed off in search of one of the other types of robots. Thanks to his rollerblades, he moved fast and quickly found a two-pointer. It was larger than the one-pointer, but also slower. Izuku zoomed past and quickly tagged it. “git add two_pointer_robot.”

Tossing the baseball bat aside, Izuku said, “git restore slingshot marbles/.” This summoned both his slingshot and a bag of multicolored marbles. Each of the marbles had different objects anchored to them. He armed himself with the slingshot and specifically plucked out the blue-colored marble. Facing the two-pointer, he pulled back and aimed carefully. With precise timing, he released and yelled, “git restore bowlb!”

A bowling ball materialized at the location of the marble moving at speeds as if it had been shot out of a cannon. It crashed into the two-pointer nearly punching straight through its body. The robot collapsed, mangled and broken. It had stood absolutely no chance. Izuku excitedly pumped his fist in the air. He’d been worried about using this technique due to the potential of collateral damage (and because it was difficult to get the timing right, even with nearly a year of practice), but the villain bots were so large that it wasn’t a concern at all. He wouldn’t need to bother with the baseball bat.

Oh right, he should also note that “bowlb” was short for “bowling ball”. He’d learned how to rename objects, and getting the timing down was a lot easier with a one-syllable word.

“git restore marbles/blue,” he said to return the marble to him. “git grep two_pointer_robot --untracked.”

Izuku now knew where all the two-pointer robots were but at the expense of losing his knowledge of the one-pointers. He’d fix that soon, but there was still one type of robot to go.

He didn’t have to search for a three-pointer, it was right in the middle of the street in front of him. The three-pointer was basically a tank. He skated up to tag it (“git add three_pointer_robot”), and he felt uncomfortable even getting that close. Izuku had no idea how UA expected most applicants to be able to deal with it. It was large, protected on all sides, with huge projectile launchers on its back, no obvious weak points—

“git restore bowlb.”

—and equally vulnerable to being obliterated by a cannonball. Boo-yah!

There was one last step in his plan. Currently, he could only “grep” one kind of robot at a time. That in itself was a huge advantage, but ideally, he wanted to be able to locate all three kinds simultaneously. And he knew exactly how to do that. This was a job for wildcards, baby!

“git grep pointer_robot --untracked,” Izuku commanded, and he suddenly knew the precise locations of every villain bot in the city.

One might note that he’d previously had to use a star as a wildcard character, so you might expect that he meant to say “*_pointer_robot” in order to match “one_point_robot”, “two_pointer_robot”, etc. There was a good reason why he didn’t have to do that here, and usually he’d take the time to explain, but there was no time for that right now because he had robots to smash!

The city was Izuku’s playground as he zipped around on his rollerblades, using the 3D mental projection in his mind to find and target entire groups of villain bots. He skated in, demolished multiple bots with a few well-timed magic words, then without slowing down moved on to the next group of bots, rinse and repeat.

The combination of his speed, power, and informational advantages made Izuku totally unbeatable compared to his fellow competitors. He was dominating this test. He was going to get into UA, wasn’t he? He felt lightheaded just thinking about it.

A couple of two-pointers were rushing down the street chasing after a poor kid with antlers, shooting small sandbags at him. The other student was trying his best to escape, but he was being pummeled. He had an obvious big bruise on his face and likely many more under his clothes. “git restore bowlb,” Izuku said, destroying both bots and allowing the other boy to get away.

Izuku felt so bad. If you weren’t strong enough to smash the bots or weren’t fast or sneaky enough to rip out the wires, then you were pretty much screwed. UA didn’t play around. Far from being proper competitors, a lot of students here were unintentionally performing the role of civilians caught up in a villain attack, panicked and despairing looks on their faces and all. It was depressing to watch. He felt awful for all the other kids whose dreams were being crushed in real time.

It was so easy for Izuku to imagine himself in the same boat. If he hadn’t figured out his quirk, then he would’ve spent all year practicing stuff like physical fitness tests, judo takedowns, first aid, obstacle courses, and anything else that he thought a hero exam might test him on. He would’ve been so furious and despondent when he discovered what the exam actually was.

Whenever he noticed it happening, he made sure to go after the bots who were chasing after examinees. It seemed like the nice thing to do, and it wasn’t like he was giving up any points. Maybe it’d give the other students a chance to catch their breaths and think of a strategy. You couldn’t plan when you were panicking.

“Two minutes remaining!” a teacher shouted over the loudspeaker.

The ground shook, and a great long shadow crested the city looming ominously. Someone screamed, and then more screams followed.

Izuku turned to face the commotion and looked up.

And up… and up…

Izuku barely stopped himself from shrieking. That’s the zero-pointer?! A robot larger than the surrounding buildings stomped its way through the exam arena, crushing anything unfortunate enough to be in its way. What in the world is UA thinking?!

The other examinees around him were screaming and running away from the colossal death machine as fast as they could. Izuku was about to do the same, but a splash of color against the grey concrete stopped Izuku in his tracks.

He looked closer, and what he saw terrified him. Oh hell, someone’s there! A student was lying there seemingly unconscious in the robot’s path of destruction. If it kept its current path, the zero-pointer would crush the kid to death in less than thirty seconds.

Swallowing his fear, Izuku skated up to the other student lying face down on the ground. It was a boy with blond hair. “Hey!” Izuku shouted, crouching down to shake the boy’s shoulder. “Are you awake? Can you get up?”

The boy languidly raised his head and gave him a dumb smile. “Wheeeey…” he said cheerfully, then thumped his head back against the ground.

Oh no! He has a concussion! Izuku thought.

The zero-pointer was seconds away from crushing them both. Izuku rapidly weighed his odds. He could out-skate the robot on his own, but could he do it while dragging along another person? Especially an injured person? Maybe if he lifted the boy in a proper firefighter’s carry, but he’d never tried skating while holding someone like that, and would he even have the chance to try?

The timing was too tight to risk. Izuku had a better idea anyway.

The colossus’s right foot stomped down right near them. That was good, the robot would lift its left leg next, so the right foot would stay put for the next few seconds. Izuku skated to the foot as fast as he could, narrowly avoiding the debris the robot was kicking up all around it.

The instant Izuku’s hand touched the robot, he rattled out, “git add zero_pointer_robot; git commit -m "Bot"; git rm zero_pointer_robot.”

The zero-pointer robot anticlimactically ceased to exist. The looming shadow disappeared, revealing the sun and bright blue sky.

All was quiet.

“Time’s up! The exam is over. Everyone, please return to the entrance. If you’re injured, wait where you are and we’ll come to you.”

Izuku let out a relieved sigh. He sat down on the ground and tried to calm his racing heart. That was crazy. That robot was seriously going to kill them. You’d think that UA had safety measures and the robot would stop before it actually crushed the two of them, but it wasn’t even slowing down! It was literally just a step away from killing them. Even if it was programmed to stop, it was cutting it way too close for Izuku’s comfort.

Izuku breathed deeply, in and out, in and out.

He was really tempted not to tell the teachers that he could bring the zero-pointer back. Let them think their wildly expensive iron giant was gone for good. Payback for putting him through that terror.

He wouldn’t, but he was tempted to.

Izuku lay down and looked up at the sky. A smile crept onto his face.

He did it.

I AM HERE! As a projection!

You may be surprised to see me. I understand your confusion! Ha ha! I am proud to say that I will be teaching at UA this upcoming year!

I will now announce your results! Midoriya Izuku, your performance on the written portion of the exam was very strong, and your performance on the physical portion was even stronger.

58 villain points! More than enough to qualify for UA on its own.

But that’s not all. The entrance exam is not graded only on how well you can turn robots into scrap. This is a job that requires putting yourself in danger and risking your life to help others. Your heroic spirit is graded by a panel of judges and awarded a score.

40 rescue points! Bringing your score to 98 points total, the highest this year!

Congratulations, young Midoriya! I look forward to seeing you at UA.

This is…

…your hero academia!

Addendum:

git goosebumps

Nedzu scrolled through the Git documentation on his tablet with undisguised glee. When he read that one applicant’s quirk was based on an old computer program, he was quite intrigued. The student’s file in the quirk registry mentioned that there still existed an instruction manual for the program (partially corrupt, unfortunately), so Nedzu searched through ancient archival data for it so that he could get a better understanding of Midoriya Izuku’s abilities.

What he found astounded him. He wasn’t even pretending to pay attention to the entrance exam anymore. He could review the footage of it later. This was far more interesting!

“Principal Nedzu,” Vlad King said gravely, eyes focused on a particular screen. “What that student did to the zero-pointer… can he do that to people?”

“Oh yes, of course. He has no limits at all!” Nedzu chirped. “He could do it to the whole country if he wanted to, at any time, in an instant! I’m certain ‘git add Japan’ would work if he tried it. Isn’t it wonderful?”

Nedzu could smell a wave of terror wash over the Pro Heroes in the room. He even smelled it from Aizawa, who he thought was above that sort of thing. How disappointing.

Silly humans! It was a common shortcoming with species who were used to being at the top of the food chain. If you spent all your time being afraid of apex predators, then you’d never get anything done in life! They shouldn’t be scared of Midoriya Izuku, they should be eager to help him reach his full potential! How could he help his staff understand?

Oh, of course! He should go into great detail about the many other world-shattering things Midoriya could do if he chose to. That would help! After all, nothing was scarier than the unknown.

Chapter Text

Izuku was almost jittering in his seat in excitement. It was Day 2 at UA, and next on the schedule was Hero Basic Training with All Might. All Might! Holy crap!

When Izuku learned that All Might would be teaching this year, he thought for sure All Might would mostly be focused on the senior years. Objectively, it seemed like the best use of his time rather than teaching kids who may not have even learned how to throw a punch yet. But no, All Might would be treating all three years equally. Izuku had never been more happy to be wrong. It was just like Japan’s greatest hero to be so fair and principled!

Man, how did All Might even find the time to teach at UA? Even after decades in the business, All Might hadn’t slowed down as a hero at all! When Izuku got home after school yesterday, he immediately caught up on all the hero news he missed (as was his daily ritual) and discovered that All Might had gone on a crazy twelve-hour shift that day literally leaping from city to city and resolving countless incidents. How was he supposed to keep up that insane pace and also teach all hero course students from all three years at UA at the same time?

To Izuku, the answer was obvious. All Might was just that cool!

Rewinding a bit, Day 1 at UA had been a little weird. Entering the doors of Class 1-A, he got his first look at the peers he’d spend the next three years with. His initial impressions of his classmates were positive. Uraraka was in his class, which was fantastic. He’d already made a sort-of friend before the school year even started. The boy who he’d saved from the zero-pointer (Kaminari Denki) was in his class too, which was nice. He seemed cool.

The bad news was that Katsuki was also in his class. Uuuuugh. At least he seemed just as miserable to see Izuku. Good, they could suffer together.

Izuku didn’t get to know the rest of his classmates yet, but everyone seemed friendly enough. He was really worried that he’d find himself stuck in a class full of Kacchans. But so far it seemed like everyone was just as excited and grateful to have been accepted into UA as Izuku was, which was a far cry from the egoism he had feared.

The weirdness started when the class met their homeroom teacher, Aizawa Shouta, who introduced himself while wearing a sleeping bag. He told them that they’d be skipping the opening ceremony and forced them all outside for a quirk assessment test. After berating the class for not taking things seriously enough, Aizawa said that the student who came in last would be expelled.

The situation wasn’t great for Izuku. He couldn’t use his quirk on himself, and in general, his quirk wasn’t very useful for a physical fitness exam. How could he use his quirk to help him with a grip strength test, or a standing long jump test, or repeated side steps, or seated toe-touch?

He had a few ideas though. He asked Aizawa if he could use his quirk to summon some items to help him, and he was surprised when his teacher said that no, he could only use what he had on him right now. That seemed hypocritical given that Yaoyorozu, a girl who could create objects, was free to use her quirk, but Izuku didn’t fight it.

First was the ball throw test, so Izuku went to Yaoyorozu and asked if she wouldn’t mind making a thin wooden rod for him. With his quirk, he could anchor the ball to the end of the rod and flick it far into the distance, taking advantage of how objects retained their velocity when restored. Yaoyorozu was happy to make it for him, but both students were surprised when Aizawa came over, confiscated the rod, and claimed that Izuku could not rely on the help of others.

Izuku tried a few more times by adding some of the school equipment to his quirk, but Aizawa told him not to mess with school property and that any scores he got that way would not be counted.

It had become abundantly clear that Aizawa was determined to make Izuku do the test quirkless. He was deliberately blocking off any attempt of Izuku’s to use his quirk despite dressing it up in language like “Villains won’t give you time to prepare.” It was obvious to the whole class. The other students were also confused as to why their teacher kept focusing on Izuku specifically.

The only silver lining was that Izuku wasn’t the only student who did the tests quirkless. Quite a few students in the class didn’t have physical enhancement quirks. Kaminari had an electricity quirk, which didn’t help at all. Others included Jirou (who had some sound-related quirk), Kirishima (body-hardening), Kodai (grow or shrink things), Hagakure (invisibility), and Rin (scales), all of whom were like Izuku and had to do the tests effectively quirkless.

Perhaps there may have been some creative ways for the students to use their quirks in an unconventional manner to help with the tests, but after seeing how Aizawa treated Izuku for trying, no one was willing to invite their teacher’s wrath on them. Izuku could see a few ways that Kodai could have altered the sizes of some equipment to help her, but that would count as messing with school property, and Izuku had already been loudly scolded for attempting that.

Their group as a whole ended up at the bottom of the ranking. Izuku was fit enough that he managed to get 16th place (Kirishima and Hagakure ahead of him) while poor Kodai got last. Then Aizawa revealed that he lied and no one would be expelled, leaving everyone relieved and upset and confused.

All in all, Izuku’s first day at UA wasn’t what he’d hoped it’d be. For the rest of the day and into the evening, Izuku spent a lot of time wondering in dismay why his homeroom teacher seemed to hate him. They’d never interacted before and knew nothing about each other. Aizawa’s only impression of him was as an anonymous new student like any other in his class. Why did he have such a problem with Izuku? Or, at least, why did he seem to have such a problem with Izuku’s quirk? His quirk was the best! Why would anyone have a problem with it?

What, did bullies have a special “bully-sense” that let them know who’d been bullied before and would be vulnerable to it?

It was only late at night while he was trying to sleep that Izuku had an epiphany. Aizawa had made a big stink about “heroics is not a game” and “the world is unfair” and “you need to take this seriously”. That couldn’t have come from nowhere; Aizawa had been a teacher for many years and was used to teaching egotistical teenagers who just wanted to be cool and popular. Izuku himself had worried that the class would be full of Kacchans.

So, when viewed from the outside, Izuku was the student who had gotten first place in the entrance exam by a large margin. He demolished the villain bots like it was nothing. He vanished the zero-pointer in an instant. He’d clearly been having a lot of fun as he skated around the city, perhaps not treating the exam with the grim intensity Aizawa thought he should be. With dawning horror, Izuku came to an awful conclusion: Aizawa thought that he was a Kacchan!

Izuku was a big hotshot with a powerful quirk. Obviously, Izuku had been told his entire life that he’d be an incredible hero. Obviously, Izuku had a big ego and a swelled head and he casually used his super dangerous quirk to lord over his peers.

Obviously, everyone in Izuku’s life had always told him “Yes”, so Aizawa believed that it was his job to tell him “No”.

Aizawa wanted him to feel powerless. He wanted Izuku to see how weak he was when he was unprepared.

Izuku needed to know that he wouldn’t always get his way. He needed to be shown that he wasn’t the best.

He needed to be humbled.

…Well, Izuku did say that he wanted to play the part of the cool, confident hero student when he got to UA. Guess it was working.

With all that being said, Izuku knew his theory had a few holes in it. For one, if Aizawa was worried that Izuku was a Kacchan, then why did he let the actual Kacchan run wild during the test, ultimately achieving second place? Izuku had no answer for this. Regardless, he couldn’t think of any other possible explanation for Aizawa’s behavior, so he’d have to work with what he had.

All right. Now that he knew what his teacher thought of him, what should he do now? The simple thing to do, the mature thing to do, would simply be to talk to Aizawa and explain his thoughts and feelings. Let him know that he understood where his teacher was coming from, but that his concerns were unwarranted.

But in his heart, Izuku didn’t think that would work.

Izuku was sensitive to the way people thought, and Aizawa had already revealed a lot about himself. Aizawa’s trickery and dishonesty—his power trips like not allowing them to the opening ceremony where they could meet the other students and teachers—betrayed the fact that he didn’t respect his students. They were kids to be managed, not worked with. It was an explicitly unequal relationship. Aizawa was the experienced hero. It was fine to be unreasonable, to talk down to them, to screw with their feelings, because he knew better than his stupid students.

Would confronting Aizawa actually improve their relationship, or would he just take it as Izuku whining that his teacher was mean and wasn’t being fair? People didn’t like being told that they were wrong. If anything, they tended to double down whenever it happened.

That would just make everything worse.

There was an alternative approach that Izuku could take instead. As far as he could tell, Aizawa was doing this because he thought Izuku needed to be humbled. He thought he was saving Izuku from his “massive ego” getting him killed in the future. He thought he was being a good teacher.

So, perhaps he could just… let Aizawa think he was right.

If Izuku acted like a normal kid, showing off his quirk, trying his best to be cool and confident (like he wanted to do at UA anyway), but then also displayed his maturity and sense of responsibility over time, then what would Aizawa have to complain about? He could pat himself on the back and think “Job well done”. He will have successfully shown his hotshot student that having a powerful quirk wasn’t everything and that he needed to take all aspects of hero work seriously.

People liked being useful. People liked being proven right. If Izuku proved Aizawa right, then Aizawa would have a more positive impression of him from that point onward, which would be helpful to Izuku in the long run.

In his short life, Izuku had a lot of experience in handling other people’s pride and innate sense of superiority.

He was used to bad teachers. Unlike his previous bad teachers, Aizawa cared. It was just that he was thoughtless and cynical about it. Izuku could deal with that.

It sucked… but it was fine.

Yes. Yes, this was a great plan of action that would definitely work to improve his teacher’s opinion of him. He was sure of it.

Anyway, that was enough reminiscing for now.

“I AM HERE! Coming through the door like a normal person!”

The class erupted in cheers and excitement as All Might goofily strode into the classroom, every step of his somehow ending up in a cool pose. Izuku almost leaped out of his seat. OH MY GOD IT’S ALL MIGHT!!

All Might smiled broadly at the class, waiting patiently until the clamor died down. If Izuku had his way, it’d never die down. He was jittering in his seat, physically forcing himself not to bolt out of his chair and run right up to his hero. All Might’s really here! In the flesh! He’s right there, just a few meters away! He’s going to be our teacher! How is this real life?

Once the classroom was quiet enough, All Might spoke over the remaining chatter. “Thank you, thank you. I’m happy to see all of you future heroes so pumped up!” Even All Might’s normal speaking voice had a bellowing tone to it. He commanded attention in a very natural way—it felt like whatever All Might said was the most important thing you’d ever hear. He was so cool.

“Hero Basic Training is where you will learn the basics of being a Pro Hero. In your first year, we will mostly focus on physical conditioning, combat, rescue, and cooperation with your fellow heroes. You’ll take the most units of this subject.

“We only have so much time today, so let’s get right to it! I believe that we should start new chapters in our lives with a bit of excitement, so we’re going to jump right into… Combat Training!” All Might lifted a remote in the air. “And to go with that are… these!” He made a show of pressing the large red button.

At the back of the class, numbered lockers popped out of the wall. Is that what I think it is? Izuku thought giddily.

“Costumes!” All Might boomed. “This is how you will present yourself to the world, young men and ladies. These costumes were made based on your quirk registrations you sent in before school started. When you wear your costume, know that you are a Pro Hero, and as such you represent all of heroics and the responsibility that carries. It is a mighty weight to bear, but I believe in the strength of each and every one of you.” He paused for dramatic effect, then continued. “After you change, gather in Ground Beta!”

“Yes, sir!” the class chorused.

In the changing room, Izuku and the other boys got their first looks at their costumes. Izuku’s costume was simple and not very flashy. If someone asked, he would’ve said that he valued practicality first and foremost, and he had plenty of time to redesign it to look better later. In reality, he was too self-conscious to submit his childish drawings in his UA application, so he let the support company handle it.

For the moment, his costume was made of tough fabric colored green and black with some red highlights. The main body was covered with various hooks, straps, and pockets, but the designers had done of good job at integrating them so it didn’t look haphazard. His head was protected by a retractable hood that had telescopic metal plating woven into the fabric. It was basically a helmet disguised as a hood, which meant it both protected his neck and looked cooler than just a helmet.

His face was protected by a removable metal mouth guard with a rebreather, which served multiple purposes. Since Izuku’s quirk required him to speak out loud, it was important to be able to hide his mouth so that he could use his quirk without giving villains advance warning. It also allowed him to speak in situations like a burning building where smoke inhalation was an issue.

Kaminari came up to him. He’d gone with a black leather look accented with white lightning bolts. He also had support gear of some sort attached to his right arm. “Hey, Midoriya!” he said with a wave. “Looking pretty badass there. Nice costume.”

“Thanks, you too! You look stylish. I like the patterning,” Izuku replied. “I didn’t really have an aesthetic in mind when I sent my request form, but I like the colors they chose for me.”

“Yeah, it looks good on you.” Kaminari paused for a moment. “Hey man, I didn’t get a chance to say this before, but thanks for saving me at the entrance exam. I was totally out of it at the time, but they showed me the footage later.”

“Of course! I wasn’t about to leave you to get crushed.”

Kaminari shrugged. “They say the zero-pointer wouldn’t have actually crushed me, but I’m not sure I would’ve passed if I ‘died’ during the exam. So, really, thank you. I owe you one.”

Izuku nodded. “That rescue shot me up to the top of the exam rankings, so I think we’re already even, but I get it. You’re welcome! We’re going to be classmates for years, so we’ll have lots of opportunities to help each other out. By the way, your concussion is all healed up by now, right?”

Kaminari looked to the side awkwardly. “Oh, uh, I didn’t have a concussion, thatwascausedbymyquirk. But! It’s okay now! See this baby?” He lifted his arm and showed off the gear attached to it. “UA made this directional blaster for me, so I can direct my lightning wherever I want now easily. Long range, too! It’s awesome!”

Wait, what had Kaminari just said? “You aren’t immune to your own electricity?” he asked in surprise.

Kaminari suddenly looked a bit panicked. “No! No, I am, just not entirely. My brain kind of gets fried if I overuse it, and that’s what you saw at the exam. But! Like I said, that’s not a problem anymore. I have this now, so you’re never going to see me like that again. Everything’s great!” he grinned and gave a cheery thumbs up.

But Kaminari didn’t have that device for his entire life up until now. Izuku recognized the look on Kaminari’s face, his behavior, his desperation. It was so painfully familiar. The dots were connecting in Izuku’s head.

“People bullied you because of your quirk, didn’t they?” Izuku said sadly. Before Kaminari could start sputtering out denials, Izuku continued, “It was the same for me.”

Kaminari was shocked out of whatever he was going to say next. “Wait, really? You? How?”

Izuku immediately regretted saying anything. Right, no wonder Kaminari was trying to avoid the subject. Talking about this felt awful. But it’d be way worse if he stopped now after already bringing it up. “Believe it or not, I didn’t know how to use my quirk until a year ago, so my classmates thought I was lying about having a quirk. It sucked. It really sucked. Everyone made of me for being a delusional weirdo.” He sighed. “And I know how stupid this sounds coming from the guy who scored first place, but I got lucky with the entrance exam. I need gear and stuff to help me with my quirk too. You saw how useless I was at the test yesterday.”

“You mean how useless we both were,” Kaminari grumbled. “What the heck was up with that anyway? Sensei was being so weird to you.”

“Sensei introduced himself to us while wearing a sleeping bag. He’s a weird man.”

Kaminari laughed. “True, true! Hey, so… look, man, I didn’t mean for this to get heavy or anything. I just wanted to say thanks for the exam, yeah? I got lucky with it too because we were facing robots and because you helped me, but I’m going to be an awesome hero from this point forward, so I can help you too whenever you need it!”

“Right on!” Izuku beamed. Kaminari gave another thumbs up and turned to leave, but before that Izuku took another stab at trying to be more open with his feelings. “Hey, Kaminari… we’re here now. Both of us. Doesn’t matter what people thought. We made it.”

Kaminari smiled softly. “Yeah. We did.” He paused, then held his fist up.

Izuku grinned and fist-bumped his new friend(?), and they both walked out together to meet with the rest of the class and All Might.

“Hi, Uraraka!” Izuku called out. He and Kaminari had walked to Ground Beta where they met up with the others. “Your costume looks great!”

“Oh, Midoriya! Um, I’m glad you think so.” Uraraka looked embarrassed. “It’s not really what I wanted. I asked for it to be astronaut-themed, but instead it’s…” She squirmed inside her skintight bodysuit, obviously uncomfortable with feeling so exposed.

Kaminari came up to join them. “They ignored you? Really? That’s weird. They made me exactly what I asked for,” he said, showing off the support gear attached to his arm.

Uraraka looked sheepish. “Not exactly. My quirk makes me nauseous when I overuse it, so I asked if there was any way to help with that. Apparently, the bodysuit squeezes pressure points on my body, and that helps somehow.” She shrugged. “The note said that adding a full astronaut suit as a second layer would make me overheat during hero work.”

Izuku pondered that. “Maybe you could wear a light jacket overtop instead?”

“Oh, I know!” Kaminari jumped in. “You could get a flight jacket like the ones that jet pilots wear. I guess it’s more sky-themed than space-themed, but aren’t a lot of astronauts also pilots?”

Uraraka thought about it. “Hmm, I’m not sure. That’s more of a military thing, right? I want to be a rescue hero, so I’m not sure it fits.”

Kaminari scratched the back of his head. “Well, uh, you know, it was just an idea.”

“Oh, no no!” Uraraka waved her hands frantically. “It’s a good idea! Thank you! I appreciate it.”

“I’m sure we’ll think of something,” Izuku said. “I bet our other classma—”

“I see you all have arrived!” All Might shouted. The three of them jumped in surprise. Oh! Class was starting. Right, okay. They grouped up with the rest of their classmates in front of All Might.

“It’s a common belief that battles with villains mostly take place outside. If you think of my own famous battles, none of them occurred indoors. In reality, that perception is entirely false! Imprisonment, black markets, backroom deals… In this society of heroes, truly intelligent villains hide in the shadows!”

All Might raised a finger. “However! This goes both ways. Even though heroics is a public-facing career, most of your work as a hero will never be known to the public. And that is critical to keep in mind at all times! Who you are in the dark is just as important as who you are in the light. Your job as a hero will require many sacrifices to save people who may never know they were in danger at all.

“I have spent much of my career being as visible as possible so that I may inspire peace and safety across Japan. But that is not the only approach to heroics, and it is also not always the most helpful. Even an old man like me had to learn that lesson myself recently. A helping hand that cannot be seen lifts a person just as much.”

All Might clapped his hands together. “I apologize for the sudden lecture! Now then, let’s get on with it. In this exercise, you will be split into two-person teams of heroes and villains. The villain team will hide a bomb within a hideout; they must protect the bomb or catch the hero team. The hero team must catch the villains or acquire the bomb within the allotted time. You will use capture tape to capture your opponent; any attempts to seriously injure your classmates will result in immediate disqualification.” He pulled out a box filled with numbered balls. “Now let us draw lots!”

Everyone crowded around to grab a ball. Izuku ended up with a ball marked “G”.

“Hey, what’d you get?” Kaminari asked him. “I’m on Team E.”

“I’m on Team G,” Izuku replied. “Uraraka, what did you get?”

“I got Team B,” she answered. “I guess we need to go find our partners.”

Izuku checked with a few other students and soon enough found the person with the matching G ball. It was a tall quiet boy with a kind of rock-shaped head. Kouda, if he remembered correctly. Izuku didn’t know much about him.

“I will announce the first teams!” All Might pulled out another set of balls. “The heroes will be… Team B! And the villains will be… Team G!”

Oh shoot, he was up first! And Uraraka was on Team B, right? He looked over and saw that Uraraka was already coming over to meet him. The invisible girl, Hagakure, was with her.

“Hi again!” Uraraka said brightly. “Your partner is Kouda? All right! We won’t be going easy on you! Let the best team win, yeah?” She stuck out her hand for a handshake.

Izuku shook her hand. “Of course! We won’t be going easy on you either.”

Uraraka grinned and went over to talk to Kouda. Izuku turned to face Hagakure, whose hero costume faded away so that she became fully invisible. Cool. Izuku stuck out his hand for a handshake awkwardly, not sure if he was pointing his hand in the right direction. “Let the best team win!”

An invisible hand grabbed his own. “Right back at ya! Hope you two are ready to lose!” Hagakure said cheerfully.

A sudden thought crossed Izuku’s mind. “git add hagakure_toru,” he mumbled as quietly as he could while he was still holding the girl’s hand.

“Villain team, go in first and set up! Hero team, in five minutes you will break in and the battle will start. Everyone else, head to the monitor room.”

Time to do this!

Chapter Text

“What are you thinking, Kouda?” Izuku asked. They stood in a room with a large papier-mache bomb in the center and two doors leading to adjacent rooms. Every room in the building had at least two doors, probably so that they couldn’t just barricade a single entranceway.

Izuku had realized a problem, and he felt really dumb for not thinking of it earlier. He was wearing his brand-new costume, so he couldn’t summon anything he’d prepared in advance because it was all anchored to his normal clothes. He had a long list of things that he wanted to talk to the Support Department about, but that wouldn’t help him here. The Battle Trial would have to be a test of how well he could utilize his quirk in its raw state with no preparation.

Kouda was silent for a long time, then he whispered, “I don’t think I can help.”

It was kind of hard for Izuku to hear him. Kouda’s voice was very soft. “Don’t say that. What’s your quirk?”

“I can talk to animals and ask them to do things for me.” Kouda looked down at the ground. “But there aren’t any animals here. There should be mice or other critters around, but the building isn’t real. I think the walls are just solid blocks. And there’s no food here.”

Izuku nodded. “All right. Do you happen to know how to fight? Have you taken self-defense lessons or anything?”

“No.” Kouda curled in on himself further. “My dream is to be a rescue hero in forests and mountains. I don’t like fighting.”

Oh no, Kouda was losing heart already. Maybe he could cheer him up? “That’s an amazing dream!” Izuku insisted. “You’re going to be incredible! If all the animals in a forest can help you, you can do so much. Like, hikers won’t go missing ever again. You’re going to save a lot of people.”

“Yeah. That doesn’t help me now though.” Kouda squirmed again. He was really uncomfortable. “I’m not sure I should be here. I barely passed the exam. I wouldn’t have without my bird friends. They told me where the robots were and where people needed help.”

It was weird. Everyone Izuku talked to in his class so far believed they barely passed the exam and only got in by luck. Granted, he only had a sample size of two, but it was kind of telling. UA put so much pressure on you that no matter how good you did, it still didn’t feel like you were good enough. The written exam was like that too. It was designed so that you’d start to fail as you got further and further along into it.

During the physical exam, Izuku knew at the time that he’d done excellently at it. However, on the very first day of school, Aizawa went out of his way to put Izuku down and make him feel like he wasn’t good enough.

Man, UA was harsh.

“It’s fine if you don’t want to be a fighter,” Izuku said. “You’re going to be an awesome hero no matter what. And it’s the first day of class. At our skill level, size and weight are way more important. You could probably capture Uraraka or Hagakure by just falling on one of them.”

Kouda let out a little laugh. Nice job, Izuku!

Izuku was proud of himself for handling this as well as he had, but internally he still felt very awkward. It was such a weird role reversal for him.

Kouda was a gentle, peaceful person by nature. Looking at it from Kouda’s perspective, he was partnered with the top scorer on the entrance exam, the exam that glorified destruction and violence. Their first hero exercise involved fighting their classmates over a bomb. Kouda wasn’t going to take charge here. It was all Izuku’s responsibility.

At Aldera, he was at the bottom of the totem pole, the delusional Deku. The other kids considered him to be fair game to make fun of. Now he was at UA, among the best hero hopefuls in the country, and it was taken for granted that he was the leader.

“Oh, um,” Kouda hesitated. “I don’t remember what your quirk is. Did you say?”

“I can create alternate timelines,” Izuku’s mouth responded by habit, like a dumbass. Stupid, stupid. He shook his head. “Sorry, it’s more like I can create save points. It’s hard to explain, and I don’t think we have time right now.”

“Will it help us against Uraraka and Hagakure? I don’t know how we can defend against someone invisible.”

“No worries there. git grep hagakure_toru.” Izuku grinned with self-satisfaction. “I have a few ideas…”

Izuku patrolled the hallway near the bomb room, trying his best to look alert and paranoid. He frequently whipped his head back and forth toward any little sound or creak the building made. Occasionally he spoke terse updates to Kouda over the headset, stuff like “No sign of them yet.”

It was all an act. He knew exactly where Hagakure was, and it was a struggle to keep himself from smiling. The magic of grep (what a dumb name) meant that he was aware of the invisible girl’s precise location at all times. Grep didn’t at all feel like sight, the sense was more similar to proprioception. He knew where Hagakure was, where each of her limbs were, where she was looking, everything.

At the moment, Hagakure was softly and carefully walking up to him, invisible capture tape in hand. Izuku had to admit, she was good. Really good. He’d figured that since he knew exactly where she was, he ought to be able to spot her with his normal senses somehow. Maybe hearing very quiet footsteps, or maybe seeing dust in the air slightly out of place. Something. But no, she was giving out no signals at all. Izuku was extremely impressed.

Hagakure snuck her way closer and closer until she was right behind him. She readied her capture tape. This was it.

Right when Hagakure leaned forward to wrap the capture tape around her seemingly oblivious opponent, Izuku ducked out of nowhere and swept his leg backward. Hagakure was already unbalanced from leaning forward, so she tripped on Izuku’s leg and fell toward him. Izuku flipped around and caught her in a bear hug. “Ah!” she yelped in shock at the sudden reversal.

Izuku had already ripped the capture tape from Hagakure’s hands and started wrapping it around her, taking advantage of her shock and his larger size to keep her held in place. He’d nearly knotted the tape when all of a sudden Hagakure slithered out of his grip.

Izuku gasped in bewilderment as Hagakure contorted her body to slide right out from the tape wrapped around her. He tried to grab hold of her, but it was like trying to grip water. Somehow she kept on angling herself just right that his fingers slid right off any part of her body he tried to grab.

One final dip freed Hagakure from the tape completely, and she frantically jumped away from him. She seemed shaken. “Jesus fuck that was close!” she exclaimed, breathing heavily.

Izuku dumbly looked down at the (now visible) tangled capture tape in his arms, and then back up to Hagakure. “How did you do that?”

“How did you know I was there?!” she blurted in response.

Fair enough. They both had talents they’d rather not reveal to the enemy.

The two of them looked at each other. Hagakure seemed to startle again when he looked directly into her eyes. Oops, he had given away that he could “see” her. Not that it wasn’t obvious already, but he might have been able to play it off as instinct or something, even if it wasn’t a believable excuse.

Nothing to it then. This was just going to be a straight-up duel. They both got into fighting stances and then launched themselves at each other.

Izuku had a number of inherent advantages in this fight. For one thing, he was just bigger and heavier. That couldn’t be taken lightly—there was a reason that all combat sports were separated into weight classes. Having a longer reach meant that you could strike your opponent without getting close enough that they could strike you in return.

Additionally, Izuku’s grep-fueled proprioception meant that he knew exactly where Hagakure was planning to strike him. Hagakure actually had two disadvantages here. In Izuku’s martial arts classes, they were taught how not to be predictable in fights. Stuff like quick hits, feints, and sudden changes in direction and speed to keep your opponent guessing and unable to anticipate your next move. Since Hagakure was invisible, she had learned none of that. Even without grep’s precise motion detection, all of her movements were blatantly obvious and predictable well in advance.

…All of this meant jack shit as Izuku immediately found himself on the defensive, quickly being driven back by Hagakure’s flurry of attacks. What the hell?!

It didn’t matter that Izuku knew what Hagakure was going to do next when he wasn’t fast enough to do anything about it. She was ridiculously flexible too; she kept on sending powerful kicks straight toward his head that he was barely able to back away from in time. Izuku certainly couldn’t lift his leg up that high, and even if he could he’d be left wide open. But Hagakure was so quick and efficient that she left no openings for him to counterattack.

They were getting closer and closer to the bomb room because Izuku had to keep on retreating. Even when Izuku tried to strike Hagakure in return, she just slid away from his punches like it was nothing.

He somehow managed to get a couple of decent hits in that Hagakure had to actually block rather than effortlessly weave around, but it was incomparable to the number of hits she was getting on him. He was going to be so bruised after this, even with his new costume that was blunting the blows.

He thought he was a pretty decent fighter. He thought he had an advantage (multiple advantages!), but he was squandering it because Hagakure was just so much better than him. It sucked. Good for her, though.

Izuku winced in pain as he barely blocked another kick that was headed straight toward his face. It would have knocked him out cold if it connected. Hagakure huffed in frustration. “Fuck, you’re good,” she grumbled. Oh, he was? Really? That made him feel a bit better. It sure didn’t feel like it from his perspective.

Izuku backed into the bomb room wondering if there was any way he could hold Hagakure at the door. She had less freedom of movement there. But then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Uraraka racing toward the other entranceway from the hall outside. Kouda was desperately running after her, but he wasn’t going to catch up. Dammit, he named their traps “trap_left” and “trap_right”, but with Hagakure barreling down on him, he couldn’t remember if that was from the perspective of inside or outside the room. Whatever, this was what wildcards were for. “git restore trap_*.”

Rolls of capture tape appeared stretched across both doorways like spider webs. Uraraka couldn’t slow down and crashed right into the trap, tripping on the tape and rolling into the room, capture tape wrapping all along her. Kouda caught up, out of breath, and saw Uraraka lying dazed on the floor. With a graceless thump, he fell right on top of her. Haha! Go Kouda!

Kouda searched for the end of the capture tape so that he could tie a knot and officially capture Uraraka. She squirmed under him, but with his size and weight Kouda wasn’t going anywhere. Uraraka was trapped, and there was nothing she could do about it!

At least that was what Izuku thought, but then Kouda started floating. He panicked and lost his grip, resulting in him awkwardly floating in the middle of the room, flailing his arms about, swimming to nowhere. Right, a weight advantage doesn’t help against someone who can make things weightless, Izuku thought, mentally kicking himself. Then he had to block another literal kick from Hagakure.

“Get it, girl!” Hagakure cheered.

Uraraka untangled herself from the tape and launched herself at the fake bomb.

“No!” Izuku shouted.

“Yes!” Uraraka responded with glee.

Well, guess he had to pull out his last trick. “git switch other-room.”

The bomb vanished. Uraraka sailed straight through the spot the bomb used to be and nearly crashed into the opposing wall. “What the heck?!” Uraraka yelled, spinning around to stare directly at Izuku. Hagakure too had stopped fighting to stare at him. Her gaze was intense.

Izuku whistled innocently.

Uraraka looked at him suspiciously. “Hold on, is this allowed? The villain team can’t just make their bomb disappear, right?”

“Nope, that’s not what I did.” Izuku went over to Kouda and pulled him down so that he was standing upright again. Uraraka graciously canceled her quirk. “The bomb’s still in the building, just somewhere else now.” He gave a cheeky grin. “Better go find it!”

Hagakure threw her hands in the air and groaned. Man, she sounded angry. Regardless, the girls pulled themselves together and sprinted out of the room. They knew that, if they were lucky, they might be able to find the bomb before the boys reached it, which would grant them an automatic victory.

“C’mon, let’s go!” Izuku said to Kouda, and then both of them ran downstairs to the room directly beneath the previous bomb room. The fake bomb sat there untouched. The two split up to guard each entranceway.

“I wasn’t able to get Uraraka,” Kouda whispered miserably as they waited for the hero team to find them. “I screwed up. I’m sorry.”

“It’s totally fine. Hagakure beat me black and blue too. Neither of us screwed up—the girls are just awesome. And we definitely haven’t lost yet.”

They waited another minute, and then Izuku sensed Hagakure coming their way. “Heads up, they’ve almost found us… Oh, they have found us. Hagakure sees you. But now she’s backing away.”

“Are they planning something?”

“Must be. They can’t win by charging us directly because I can just move the bomb back upstairs. And if they split up then we can just gang up on them one at a time.”

Kouda thought about that for a moment. “If they can’t get at the bomb, then they have to try to capture us instead.”

Izuku nodded. “That’s what I’m thinking. If I were them, I’d focus on taking me down. Once I’m out of the match, I’m not allowed to move the bomb around anymore.”

“How much time is left?”

“I’m not sure. Not long. They’re going to have to make their move soon—oh, here they come! Hagakure is on your side!”

Izuku turned to look for Uraraka, only to suddenly see a filing cabinet flying through the air straight for his face!

“Release!” Izuku scrambled out of the way as the filing cabinet tumbled into the room and slammed onto the floor with a loud clang. Uraraka entered the room, and to his right Izuku saw that Hagakure had entered the room as well. He and Kouda both had totally failed at guarding the entranceways.

Oh well. “git switch first-room.” The bomb vanished again.

From the sudden smug look on Uraraka’s face, he knew he’d made a mistake.

“Do it!” she shouted at Hagakure. Huh? What could Hagakure do? Izuku turned to look and saw power radiating from across the room. His jaw fell open in shock. Was that really Hagakure? Light itself seemed to distort around the invisible girl, gathering together in a ray of shining brilliance.

Hagakure leaped and performed a grand uppercut. “SUNRISE… SMASH!”

The explosion was deafening! The great display of power had blown the ceiling wide open! Not wasting a second, Uraraka made herself weightless, jumped through the hole in the ceiling, and landed in the room above. She placed a hand on the fake bomb in triumph.

“Hero Team wins!” All Might announced over the intercom.

But Izuku wasn’t paying attention to any of that.

He didn’t see Uraraka’s feat.

He didn’t notice All Might’s announcement.

He was solely focused on the mutilated form of Hagakure collapsed on the ground.

Hagakure’s arm was completely shattered. Izuku suddenly regretted how detailed his grep-sense was. He could feel her bones pointing in the wrong directions and gruesomely piercing her skin. He could feel the way her arm was only barely still connected to her shoulder. His own right arm seized up in sympathetic pain.

Izuku was breathing hard, his heart pounding frantically. What did she do? What the hell happened?!

She was lying prone on the floor, delirious and whimpering. It felt like she wanted to scream in agony, but she didn’t have the focus or energy to do so. Blood was everywhere. Shit, was she bleeding out?!

All Might was still chattering over the comms congratulating them on a job well done. Kouda was helping Uraraka jump back down to the lower room. What was everyone doing? Why were they acting like everything was fine?

No one else could see her, he realized. Only him.

“HELP!” Izuku screamed into the comms. “ALL MIGHT, HELP!”

Uraraka and Kouda startled and turned to face him. A blink later and All Might was already in the room. Izuku didn’t even see where he came from. In all the videos he’d watched, he’d never seen All Might move that fast. “Young man, what—”

Izuku’s arm trembled as he pointed at Hagakure’s prone body. He expected to have to explain the situation, but All Might was already on it. With anguish on his face, All Might rushed to Hagakure’s side and very gently lifted her so that her crippled arm was supported and no additional harm would be done. Izuku had no idea how All Might knew what happened without being able to see Hagakure, but it was clear he knew how to take care of someone grievously injured.

“I am sorry, please inform your classmates that today’s exercise is canceled,” All Might said, then he soared out the window with Hagakure carefully tucked in his arms.

“Huh? What’s going on? What happened to Hagakure?” asked Uraraka nervously, running up to him. “Why are you staring at the wall?”

Izuku wasn’t staring at the wall—he was staring in the direction of Hagakure. He could still sense her thanks to grep.

“Midoriya! What happened? Please tell me!” Uraraka pleaded.

Frankly, Izuku had no idea what happened. Hagakure’s quirk was invisibility, so what was that punch? And why did it destroy her arm? Could an injury like that even be healed?

He swallowed and turned to face Uraraka and Kouda. “Right, sorry, I’ll tell you what I saw…”

Izuku didn’t return to his classmates. Uraraka and Kouda would have to explain to them what happened. Rather, Izuku followed the light in his head that pointed him to Hagakure. He could feel that she was lying down now, so she was probably in a medical bed.

Finding Hagakure took more time than he wanted. He knew where she was relative to him, but he still had to navigate UA’s confusing corridors to reach her. Eventually, he found and entered the infirmary. He heard faint voices coming from one of the rooms.

“Did you seriously teach her nothing, you baffoon?!”

“I swear, I didn’t know this would happen, I would never have—”

“Now now, let us focus on our immediate concerns. Finger-pointing can come later. Please inform of us your diagnosis, Chiyo.”

“Hmph. I’ve stopped the bleeding, but I cannot use my quirk on Ms. Hagakure in her current state. She requires fairly extensive surgery to arrange her bones in the proper positions before using any sort of accelerated healing quirk. Unfortunately, her invisibility prevents me from performing that surgery myself.”

“Young Tooru is—”

“Be quiet, Toshinori. I know of an overseas specialist with an echolocation quirk, Dr. Maharaj, who often performs difficult surgeries such as this. He is often booked solid, but hopefully we can fly him in to Japan within a reasonable time frame. There will be permanent damage to her arm regardless, but the longer we wait, the worse it will be.”

“Consider it done. How long do we have, and what are our next options if the doctor is unavailable?”

“I’ll have to do more tests to be sure, and we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”

Izuku knocked softly and entered the room. Hagakure was lying on a cot near the back. The other three occupants of the room reacted in different ways to his presence. All Might was sitting in a chair far too small for him, head held in his hands. He didn’t look up or even seem to notice Izuku’s entry. Conversely, Recovery Girl very much noticed Izuku. She turned and glared daggers at him—it looked like she was a moment away from screaming at him to get out, held back only by professionalism.

Principal Nedzu, however, visibly perked up when he saw Izuku. The small creature waddled over to him. “Good afternoon, Mr. Midoriya. How may we help you?”

Izuku cleared his throat nervously. “Um, I can heal Hagakure, sort of.”

All Might looked up, suddenly paying attention. Recovery Girl stared at him sternly. “Elaborate.”

“It’s not healing, exactly. My quirk lets me make save points. I can revert Hagakure back to right before we started the Battle Trial, but, um, it affects everything. Her memories. She wouldn’t remember any of this. For her, it’ll be like nothing ever happened.”

“YES! YES! DO IT! PLEASE DO IT! PLEASE!” Hagakure abruptly shrieked from the bed, startling them all. Whoa! Izuku didn’t know she was conscious. Wouldn’t they have pumped her full of painkillers? How badly must she be hurting?

Nedzu clapped his little paws together. “That covers the issue of consent. Very well, I will use the class recordings and UA security footage to create a video covering the pertinent period of time. Toshinori, please show it to Ms. Hagakure when she returns.” He walked over to the door. “I shall go do that now, so please carry on without me.”

The principal left. Izuku turned back to the others. “Um, All Might?”

“Yes, my boy?” All Might looked horrible. Deep guilt was etched onto the lines of his face. It looked so strange to see the Symbol of Peace like this. And his voice was softer than Izuku had ever heard it.

“When I restore Hagakure, she’s not going to be here. She’s going to be where I saved her, which is back on the training field. From her perspective, she’s just about to start the Battle Trial, but then everyone around her will vanish. Maybe you should be there so that she’s not alone and so that you can explain everything to her?”

All Might patted him on the shoulder. “Yes, yes. That is an excellent idea, my boy. I will go.” He paused. “Thank you.” He then left the room as well.

One last thing to do. Izuku walked over and sat down on the chair next to Hagakure’s bed. “Um, Hagakure, you’re listening, right?”

He received a pained grunt in reply.

“I just want to be really, really clear about what my quirk actually does.” His mouth felt like sandpaper. He swallowed and forged ahead. “I’m not healing you, I’m not rewinding you, I’m not changing you back. I’m undoing you. I’m replacing you with a previous version of you. I don’t know exactly how it works, but it’s possible that this process kills you, and then a different Hagakure Tooru takes your place.” Recovery Girl looked deeply unhappy with every word that came out of his mouth, but she didn’t say anything. “Are you absolutely sure you want to do this?”

Hagakure turned to look at him, wincing in pain as she did so. She looked miserable and in utter agony. It was obvious she’d been crying. “I want this,” she rasped. ”Please just kill me already.”

Well… fair enough, he supposed. He grabbed hold of her uninjured hand with his own and squeezed. He didn’t need to touch her to do this, but some part of him didn’t want the girl to be alone when she ceased to exist. “git restore hagakure_toru.”

The words left his lips, and then the bed was empty.

Izuku wiped his eyes and leaned back in his chair.

What a day.

Addendum:

git under her skin

Hagakure Tooru felt horrible.

Not just physically, although that was a massive part of it. The pain she felt was unbearable. She couldn’t even look at her arm without feeling like she needed to throw up. She took one look at her bloody fractured bones piercing her skin and had to look away. It was repulsive.

More importantly, however, Tooru felt like a fraud. She didn’t deserve One For All.

Tooru had always wanted to be a hero. As much as she wanted to be a frontline hero and show herself to the world, she knew that wouldn’t happen with a quirk like hers. So she devoted herself to becoming the best at what she was best at.

Uraraka had been worried about going up against Midoriya. He was the top scorer on the entrance exam, after all. Tooru had responded by pooh-poohing Uraraka’s concerns entirely. He’s not so scary, she said. We both beat his ass on the assessment test yesterday. Don’t be intimidated.

Tooru bragged with complete confidence that she would take Midoriya down before he even knew what hit him. This type of exercise was made for her. Stealth takedowns were her bread and butter. She’d humbled so many overconfident hero-wannabes before. It would be a piece of cake.

And so, it was a real kick in the gut when Midoriya beat her at her own game. She’d almost been taken out of the match instantly and only managed to escape at the last moment by nearly dislocating her shoulders. That would have been mortifying if she lost like that after all her bragging.

It stung, but not all was lost. She knew she was an excellent fighter, even without her invisibility. With her invisibility, she was unmatched. Her martial arts classes had long since given up on pairing her up against just a single other person. No one could protect themselves from a punch to the face that they couldn’t see, so one-on-one spars were too easy for her. Instead, Tooru tended to fight against whole groups of other students all at once. They’d try to protect each other, limit her movement, and hopefully get in some lucky strikes. And even still she often won those fights. She was such a great fighter that she could take on her entire martial arts class at once and come out on top. A one-on-one fight like this one, even if Midoriya could somehow see her, was her chance to shine!

Which made it all the more distressing when she threw everything she had at Midoriya and the fucker just wouldn’t go down.

She didn’t understand. She was a lot faster and more skilled than him, but it didn’t matter. It was like he knew what she was going to do before she did it. It was infuriating. Nothing she did was working. This should have been easy, but she just couldn’t do it!

Midoriya had even gotten a couple of hits on her, and they hurt. He was strong. If she was injured, she wouldn’t be able to keep this up. The only thing she could do was keep him busy enough that he couldn’t counterattack. If she let up for even a second, she wasn’t sure what would happen.

What was even worse was the painful realization that he was holding back. This was the guy who got second place in Villain Points on the exam (losing only to the guy whose quirk was literally explosions). He was perfectly capable of putting in enough force to destroy robots, and she’d heard he somehow even defeated the zero-pointer. The zero-pointer! Fucking how? He obviously could use his quirk offensively and highly destructively, but he wasn’t doing it because they weren’t supposed to hurt their classmates.

This exercise was what she was best at. This was her chance to prove herself. She was putting everything she had into this, and she still couldn’t win against someone who was holding back because he didn’t want to hurt her. It was humiliating.

For nearly all her life, all she had was her invisibility. She never had anything else to help her. She’d trained for so many years for this exact situation. If she couldn’t win here, then what was even the point of her being a hero?

Tooru was relieved when she finally managed to get to the bomb room. It was a slimmer victory than she hoped for, but they’d done it. Uraraka was going to win for them right now! But the fire in her chest was abruptly doused with cold water when the bomb disappeared.

The whole fight didn’t matter. Midoriya never even needed to fight her—he did it for fun. To stall her a bit. He could just teleport the bomb around and there was nothing Tooru could do about it. The whole time he was just playing with her. She and Uraraka were doomed from the start; Midoriya outclassed them both.

As for Kouda… it wasn’t nice to say, but Kouda didn’t do much. The match was really more of a 2v1, or a 2v1.5 at best. And they were still losing.

But Tooru couldn’t lose. She just couldn’t. All Might was watching, and she needed to prove she was worthy of the trust he placed in her. It was obvious that All Might had chosen this to be the class’s first lesson for her sake. He prepared that whole speech about “an invisible helping hand” and everything. They wouldn’t have done this exercise if it weren’t for her. Tooru was sure of it. This lesson was built around her exact skillset precisely so that she could show off.

She couldn’t live with herself if she lost.

That’s why Tooru did what she did. She didn’t know how to use One For All, and she hadn’t bulked up as much as All Might recommended because she wanted to remain nimble and flexible, but she was desperate. She needed this. Tooru would prove that it wasn’t a mistake to entrust her with this power. So she went for it. Her moment of triumph!

What a joke. What a fucking joke.

From what Recovery Girl was saying, she’d fucked up her arm permanently. And for what? To barely eke out a victory in a 2v1 against an opponent who wasn’t trying all that hard?

She wasn’t worthy. She was a complete failure. She should give One For All back so that All Might could find someone who actually deserved it.

On cue, the door to her room in the infirmary opened, and in came Midoriya. For fuck’s sake, why was he here?

…She hated him. She hated him so much. Just looking at him made her angry. And she knew it wasn’t his fault. They barely knew each other, but he seemed sweet and friendly enough. Strong, talented, and humble. He was everything a good hero should be.

She hated him for it.

“Um, I can heal Hagakure, sort of.”

Of course he could heal people too. Here he was, the perfect little hero, coming to save her. She couldn’t beat him when she was in her element, but for him, it was just one of his many talents. God, she was such a horrible person. Midoriya was just trying to help, and all she felt was resentment. Her gut churned with self-loathing. She was scum.

She wasn’t normally like this. She thought she was a good person. A kind person. All Might himself seemed to think that she was worthy of being his successor. She hated that she felt like this. She hated that her pointless jealousy had led her to make such an idiotic decision. Now she would have to live with the consequences of her fuckup for the rest of her life.

Everything was wrong. She didn’t want this. She didn’t want to be like this. She wished today had never happened. She’d give anything if she could take it all back.

“It’s not healing, exactly. My quirk lets me make save points. I can revert Hagakure back to right before we started the Battle Trial, but, um, it affects everything. Her memories. She wouldn’t remember any of this. For her, it’ll be like nothing ever happened.”

Holy fuck, you’re shitting me. “YES! YES! DO IT! PLEASE DO IT! PLEASE!”

In a few moments, Hagakure Tooru would cease to be, and she couldn’t be more thrilled about it. This had all been a big mistake, but she was getting a second chance. She wasn’t going to waste it.

The new her wouldn’t truly know what happened. The new her wouldn’t have experienced any of the feelings she felt right now. The new her would learn how to use One For All properly, and so this would never happen again. Midoriya Izuku would just be a cool classmate of hers who helped her out. Their relationship would be a clean slate.

She didn’t want to hate him. She didn’t want to be the type of person who would hate him. She’d do better next time.

Who knows, maybe they could even be friends.

Chapter Text

It was a new day. Izuku had just gotten off the train and was heading to UA to start his third day at hero school. It had been an… eventful first couple of days, for sure. Not really quite what he’d expected, but hopefully these were just growing pains. The Battle Trial yesterday was fun and satisfying, so long as he ignored how it ended.

With that said, it had only been two days, and he was already starting to make friends. At least a little bit. That alone made it a million times better than the last ten years of schooling combined!

Izuku walked along, lost in thought, when suddenly someone poked him on the shoulder. He whipped his head around, but no one was there! Wha⁠—?!

He heard soft giggling to his left. Oh! “git grep hagakure_toru.” Hagakure was there skipping alongside him. “How long have you been walking with me?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” she teased. Her school uniform then materialized, visible to the naked eye once again.

While it was nice to see Hagakure looking chipper, Izuku didn’t feel ready to face her again so soon. The imagery of the girl begging him to revert her yesterday stayed with him all last night. Even after he warned her that he might be killing her by using it, she asked to die. That was… Izuku didn’t want to think too hard about it.

Truthfully, despite his warning, Izuku didn’t really believe that his quirk worked by killing people and replacing them with a newly created clone. If he sincerely thought it did, he’d never have suggested using his quirk in the first place. He justified his belief based on how his quirk consistently seemed to be incapable of creating anything new. It only ever reused things that already existed, or existed at one point in the past. It shifted things.

Like, even when he used “git rm” on an object to delete it, he had to commit the object first, which saved it. Was he really deleting objects, or was he just temporarily shifting them into pocket dimensions or something? The fact that he couldn’t delete uncommitted objects implied that his quirk couldn’t destroy things. So far, every application of his quirk involved shifting things through time and space, not creation and destruction.

It had to work like that, because the alternative was unacceptable.

Anyway, Hagakure was still walking beside him. He couldn’t let memories of yesterday deter him. C’mon, Izuku! He tried to hype himself up. Your classmate wants to talk to you! A girl wants to talk to you! Speak with her like a normal person!

Izuku shoved down his anxieties and made sure to smile brightly at Hagakure. “I’m glad you’re in high spirits after yesterday! I was kind of worried about that.”

She shrugged. “Well, it won’t lie, it was pretty weird. Like, I was shaking your hand, and then you and everyone disappeared! I was so confused at first. But it was pretty cool too! I’m literally the girl who leapt through time!” She mimed zipping forward with her arms. “Not many people could say that!”

“That’s a cool way of looking at it. I’m sorry about everything, regardless. I hope you’re not too upset about losing those memories.”

Hagakure shrugged. “Eh, it’s not like I missed much, and the principal showed me a video of everything that happened, so I basically got the gist of it.” She turned to face him directly. “Also, don’t say sorry, it sounds like you really saved my bacon! I’m here because I wanted to thank you. So yeah, thank you.”

“You’re welcome! I kinda wanted to talk to you about our battle yesterday.” Izuku felt pretty bad that the memories Hagakure lost were of her first-ever hero exercise at UA. Sure, he understood why Hagakure wanted to forget the pain of her shattered arm, but personally, he would’ve hated to lose a memory of his accomplishments. He felt awful for stealing away the pride of her very first victory. “It’s too bad that you’ve forgotten it. You don’t have the memories anymore of you kicking my ass!”

“Oh, really?”

“Yeah, really!” he exclaimed. “Didn’t you say you watched the video? I’m bruised all over from the beating you gave me. I hope that someday I’m as good as you.”

Hagakure hummed. “You seemed to hold your own pretty well from what I saw.”

“Eh, I was kind of cheating,” Izuku said dismissively. “Well, using my quirk isn’t ‘cheating’, obviously, but… hold on, let me describe this better.” His quirk was always so difficult to try to explain. “When I use my quirk on something, I can also then track its exact position. It’s not like a vague feeling, it’s extremely precise. So if I use it on a person, then I can feel where they are, the direction they’re looking, I can feel the muscles tensing in their body, everything. I can generally tell what they’re going to do before they do it.”

“That’s handy.” She was impressed.

“It is, and it was doubly effective on you,” he continued. “I can tell you’re not used to people being able to see you, so your movements are pretty obvious. No offense. I’m usually able to win sparring matches by using my quirk to predict my opponents, but I was totally out of my league when it came to you. Like, you’re so good. I was floored.”

“I am a pretty damn good fighter, yeah,” she said, pleased by his praise. “I wouldn’t count yourself out, though. We’re all in school to help each other out, so maybe we could get together sometime and practice sparring. I could show you my skills and teach you some stuff.”

“I’d love that!” Izuku beamed. “Thank you so much! You’re a lot better than me, so I’m not sure what I can bring to the table in return.” He paused. “Well, you don’t have much practice fighting against people who can see you, right? So I guess fighting me would be useful for you. Even if our skill levels aren’t really comparable, I’m sure I could help.”

“Sounds great!” she chirped. “It’s a date, then.”

Izuku’s cheeks reddened a little bit. “You just had to put it like that, didn’t you?” She laughed at him in return. “Har har. Anyway, I’m not sure when would be the best time—wait, what the heck is going on?”

The two had reached the gates of UA only to find a huge group of reporters crowding the entranceway and accosting any poor soul brave enough to try to squeeze past them.

“Hey, you! How are All Might’s classes?”

“Will you tell us about what the Symbol of Peace is like as a teacher?!”

“I would like to speak directly with All Might!”

“How would you rate All Might compared to your other teachers at UA?!”

“Just a little time is fine! Just let me see All Might—”

Oh, jeez. It was going to be a nightmare to try to get through this. They were going to be late for class, weren’t they?

He sighed and turned to Hagakure. “Do you think there might be a back entrance we could take—” He stopped mid-sentence. Hagakure was grinning cheekily at him. “What’s that look on your face? Do you have an idea?”

Hagakure looked surprised for a moment, then schooled her features. Oh right, she probably wasn’t used to Izuku being able to see her. “I have an idea, yeah.” Her school uniform turned invisible once again, and she offered her hand to him. “Take my hand.”

Um, okay. Izuku grabbed her hand and then was shocked to see his arm vanish. He whipped his head around. It wasn’t just his arm, his whole body was invisible, clothes and backpack and all!

“Wow! You can make other things invisible too? Wait, of course you can, you’ve been doing it with your clothes. But you can extend it to other people?”

“Yup!” she said smugly. “I just learned how to do it recently. When I was younger I couldn’t extend my invisibility at all. It’s a good thing, too. Otherwise, I couldn’t use a hero costume and I’d have to do all my heroics in the nude.”

Izuku mentally scoffed at the thought. As if. “I’m sure UA could’ve made you an invisible costume. A lot of heroes have costumes made with DNA-infused fabrics so that it works with their quirks.”

She shrugged. “Sure, but then it would be invisible all the time, like me. This way I can turn it on and off. Anyway, we’re wasting time. Let’s go!”

“Right!”

Izuku expected Hagakure to circle the perimeter of the crowd, but instead she dragged him right into the middle of it! The heck? He was about to ask her what she was doing, but the words died on his lips when he saw Hagakure weave through the crowd like it was nothing.

With astonishing grace and dexterity, Hagakure slipped through gaps seemingly way too small for her, dipping and pivoting around the reporters without even grazing them. It was hypnotizing to watch. In contrast, Izuku was a giant klutz bumping into everyone as he tried his best to copy Hagakure’s movements. Several reporters looked around confused when he bumped into them, but since they didn’t see anything they dismissed it.

No wonder Hagakure was able to escape his grip in the Battle Trial yesterday. She was incredible. This was what a real hero was like. This was the caliber of skill expected from students of UA. He had to step it up if he wanted to keep pace with his classmates!

Breaking through the crowd, the two passed the gates and officially entered the grounds of UA. They could walk normally again. Izuku reddened a bit when he realized they were still holding hands. Uh oh, this would be a delicate procedure! If he let go of her hand too fast then it’d be rude, like he was a boy who still believed in cooties. He let go as gingerly and naturally as he could, and he became visible again.

Hagakure was strutting along obviously pleased with herself. She should be! “That was crazy back there! I’d compare you to a ninja, but frankly, I think ninjas have nothing on you!” he gushed. “You’re amazing, Hagakure! How’d you even learn to do that?”

She puffed out her chest a little. “I’ve had a lot of practice! I’ve always wanted to be a hero, but there’s only so much you can do with just invisibility. I’ve had to make it count!”

With just invisibility? “Sorry, um, I’ve kind of been avoiding the topic because of what happened yesterday,” Izuku said cautiously, “but what do you mean by ‘just invisibility’? You’re like ridiculously strong. You blew a hole in the ceiling! I mean, you hurt yourself doing it, but still. Do you have two quirks? I’ve never heard of anybody with two quirks.”

“Ah, um…!” She was a bit flustered. “…That part of my quirk came later. A lot later. Just recently. That’s why I don’t know how to use it without hurting myself yet. I don’t have two quirks, it’s part of my invisibility.”

Izuku was flummoxed. “It’s part of your invisibility? Are you sure?”

“Yeah!” She pulled herself together. “It turns out I actually have a stockpiler quirk. My invisibility is caused by my body absorbing light into itself. Basically, all through my life, all of the light that touched me was being collected by my quirk and stored as a well of energy. I’m a solar-powered hero!” She pumped her fist. “Problem is, I have a lifetime’s worth of power stored within me, so it’s dangerous for me to use right now.”

“Oh, wow! That’s so cool! Yeah, I see why you need to be careful with it. But that’s an incredible quirk!” Izuku’s eyes gleamed. “Heh, in the future you’ll have a built-in excuse to take vacations in tropical resorts: ‘I need to recharge my quirk!’ That’s a nice benefit.”

Hagakure chuckled politely at his lame joke.

Izuku’s brain was running wild with the possibilities. Was there any energy loss over time, or was her stockpile only drained when using her super strength? Did she have to convert it to strength, or could she emit it back into the world as light, like a laser beam? How far was she from her max capacity? And how long would her current stockpile last, anyway? He supposed it would depend on the efficiency of the solar conversion and how much she used at a time…

“…Hold on, I don’t get it,” Izuku said. “How is your quirk extracting energy from light without affecting the light itself? Like, when light is absorbed, it makes things darker. But for you, it seems like light is passing straight through you, or maybe bending around you? I don’t see how your quirk is collecting energy from light without compromising your invisibility.”

Hagakure froze. “W-well, uh. T-that’s… it’s what the doctors told me, so it’s probably true, right? I-I mean, quirks are bullshit, y’know?”

Izuku thought about it for another moment. “Wait, sorry, I’m being dumb,” he groaned. “Visible light is only a tiny, tiny part of the electromagnetic spectrum. We’re exposed to a lot more light than what we see. Like, the sun emits a bunch of ultraviolet light. Your quirk is probably absorbing the spectrums we can’t see while letting visible light pass through or something.”

“Y-yeah, that makes sense. Look, um, at the moment, I’m more worried about not blowing myself up than the exact mechanisms of it all. Okay?”

“Yeah, that’s fair.” Izuku nodded and continued on anyway. “I think you should look into it in the future. Normal quirk counselors don’t have the facilities to test for exotic quirk effects, but UA sure does. The teachers could set you up for some quirk testing where you get exposed to different electromagnetic frequencies and see how they affect you. Who knows, you might find out something crazy like you’re immune to gamma radiation or whatever.”

“…Huh.” Hagakure paused and seemed to think about it. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. I think I will do that. Thank you.” She relaxed a bit and smirked at him. “You’re really into this sort of thing, aren’t you?”

He grinned. “Guilty as charged! My own quirk is stupidly complicated and it’s taken a lot of time and effort to figure it out. You should see the multiple notebooks I’ve written on it!”

“Hmm. I think I’ll take you up on that.”

At last, the two of them arrived at the doors of Class 1-A. If there was one downside to how massive the school was, it was that it took a while to get anywhere. Izuku pushed open the doors and smiled. Day 3 at UA, and he was sure this day would be a good one! Third time’s the charm!

“Let’s get down to homeroom business,” Aizawa drawled. “You will be taking part in an important activity this morning, one that will impact your school life for the rest of your time at UA…”

Izuku squeezed his fists in dread. The suspense in the room was palpable.

“…Choosing a class representative.”

Oh, come on! The tension released like air from a balloon. Then the chatter began in earnest.

“I want to be class rep! Pick me!”

“Me too!”

“I want to do it!”

“It’s a job made for moi!”

“I’ll be the leader!”

“Let me do it! Me!”

Aizawa used the distraction to collapse to the floor and zip up his sleeping bag.

“Silence, please!” Iida thundered over the din, vigorous arm movements punctuating his command. “The class representative’s responsibility is to lead others! It is not a job for just anyone who wants to do it! It is a calling that requires the trust of those around you!” He swept his gaze across the room. “I propose we hold an election!”

“We haven’t known each other for that long, so how could we have trust or anything?” Kirishima pointed out the obvious issue. “Won’t everyone just vote for themselves?”

“Hold on, before that, are we sure everyone actually wants to be class rep?” Honenuki asked. “You need to be really organized, and you’ll have to go to a lot of meetings, and it’s just a whole bunch of extra work in general. Who here has, like, the aptitude and spare time needed to take on the job while also keeping up with our hero work?”

That put a real damper on things. Students looked at each other awkwardly as they realized the responsibility they’d have to take on if they got the role. Was it really worth it?

“Yes, we should still all want to do it, ribbit,” Asui proclaimed confidently into the silence of the classroom. “That extra work is proof of your capability. It proves that you’re a leader and that you won’t shirk from responsibility. It shows that you have the trust of other soon-to-be heroes, ribbit. When we graduate, it’s the type of thing hero agencies will look for that distinguishes you from everyone else.” She looked around the class, meeting everyone’s eyes with her own. “We’re all students of UA. If you’re not striving to go Plus Ultra, then why are you here?”

A beat of silence. And then the room erupted again.

“Pick me!”

“I’ll be a great leader!”

“You can all trust me!”

“I can do it!”

Izuku noticed that Honenuki looked annoyed. His comment was a ploy to try to lessen the competition, but Asui cut through the bullshit. Ha, nice try, man. That kind of hustle wasn’t Izuku’s thing, but he could respect the strategy behind it.

Izuku raised his hand. “Hey, everyone!” People continued shouting over each other. “Excuse me! Guys!” It eventually got quiet enough that Izuku could say his piece. “How about we just make it a rule that we can’t vote for ourselves? Someone could check the votes to make sure no one cheats.”

“I am opposed to that!” Iida bellowed. “The secret ballot is an essential aspect of democracy! Absent the privacy of a secret ballot, voters can be influenced by intimidation, bribery, and blackmail. As heroes, we must uphold the social pillars of our nation at all times!”

“Dude, it’s a class election,” Jirou deadpanned.

“That is entirely besides the point!”

“Um!” Uraraka spoke up. “It would work if we had someone neutral to count the votes, right? Maybe Sensei could—“

Aizawa interrupted with a loud, exaggerated snore.

“…Okay, maybe not.” She shrunk back down in her seat.

“This is going nowhere.”

“Just give the role to me! I can do it!”

“No way! I’d do a way better job!”

“As if!”

Asui raised her hand. “I have a suggestion.” The whole class quieted to listen to her. “We can combine both approaches, ribbit. First, we can choose to publicly nominate someone other than ourselves, and then at the end, we all anonymously vote for one of the nominated candidates. Does that work for everyone?”

There was a wave of murmured agreement. It was probably the best that they were going to get, and Iida didn’t make a fuss about it either. Silence settled over the classroom as everyone waited to see who would be the first person to speak up and nominate someone.

“Um,” Izuku said. “I guess I’ll get the kind of obvious one out of the way? I nominate Asui. She seems to know what she’s doing.”

She ribbitted softly. “Thank you, Midoriya.”

“Also,” Izuku continued. “Uh, are we allowed to nominate more than one person?”

The class pondered the question. “I don’t think so,” Yaoyorozu eventually said. “That leaves open the opportunity for some joker to nominate the whole class, and then we’d be right back to where we started.”

Kaminari leaned back in his chair and smirked. “Yep, I’d totally do that.”

“We’re looking for someone smart and organized, right?” Hagakure spoke up. “All right, so I nominate Midoriya!”

Izuku was startled. “Me?”

“Yup! When I looked through your notebook earlier, it was literally just checklist after checklist! Pages and pages of it! I don’t know anyone who writes checklists for fun. You’ll be perfect for the job!”

Izuku was caught up on her first sentence. “Wait, when did you look through my notebook?!”

“You told me I should look at your notebooks,” she said playfully. “That was less than ten minutes ago!”

Augh! It was true! Curse her invisibility!

“Let me see!” Sero said next to him, grabbing Izuku’s notebook off his desk.

“Hey!”

“Oh damn, it’s true! It really is all checklists!” Sero marveled, flipping through the pages. He stopped and read some of it. “Huh, what the heck are you writing in here? This one just says ‘rerere’.”

Izuku’s face burned. “Give it back!”

“Rererererere!” Sero mocked. “I dunno, guys. Maybe Midoriya is organized, but all he’s writing is nonsense. Does that really count?”

Izuku snatched his notebook back from Sero and hurriedly shoved it in his backpack.

Ashido giggled and then spoke up. “Hey, so if we’re going for someone smart and organized, then I nominate Yaomomo! She got first place on the written exam and she’s a recommended student, so she’s the smartest of anyone here!”

Yaoyorozu blushed. “I wouldn’t say that. Knowledge is not the same as intelligence. I appreciate your endorsement, however.”

“I’m a recommended student too,” Honenuki mumbled, but nobody paid attention to him.

“Excuse me,” Kodai said quietly, raising her hand. She had a very soft voice. “I would like to nominate Rin Hiryu. He escorted me through the crowd of reporters earlier by making himself all spiky.”

“O-oh!” Rin scratched the back of his head nervously. “I-I mean, it’s what anyone would have done, right?”

“But you were the one who did it,” she insisted. “Rin was very sweet and considerate, and he helped me feel safe. That’s what we all should want from a leader.”

Rin spluttered and his face turned entirely red. It didn’t look like he’d be capable of coherent speech for a bit.

“I nominate myself!” Katsuki boomed, interrupting the sweet moment. “I’ll do a better job than any of these losers!”

“You can’t nominate yourself, you moron,” Hagakure said.

“Sure I can! I know I’m the best person here! Just because you guys don’t recognize greatness doesn’t change the facts!”

“Bakugou has a bit of a point,” Honenuki mused. “…Hey, no, stop looking at me like that, you guys! Listen! What I mean is that none of us really know each other, so someone fit for the role might not be nominated because none of us know about them. Maybe we can do speeches or something to try to persuade someone to nominate us?”

“That is a very perceptive observation! I completely agree!” Iida bellowed. “I shall begin! My esteemed classmates, I humbly request your support as your potential class representative! I offer a steadfast dedication to upholding the rules and principles that define this great institution! I believe that—”

“No way, Iida. Not gonna happen,” interrupted Jirou. “You’re bad enough already. I don’t want you to have actual authority over us.”

Oof. It was true, but she shouldn’t say it!

Iida deflated and sat back down. The classroom was quiet as everyone awkwardly looked at each other waiting for the next person to make their speech.

It seemed that Jirou had killed the initiative. No one was willing to ask to be nominated and risk being mocked for it.

Yaoyorozu spoke up. “Is that everyone, then? Our four nominees are Asui, Midoriya, Rin, and myself?”

There were indistinct murmurs around the classroom, but nobody seemed to disagree.

“All right, then.” Yaoyorozu used her quirk to create a ballot box and twenty identical blank voting cards which were then handed around the class. “Everyone, please write down the name of the person you’re voting for and add your card to the box when you’re done.”

Upon receiving his card, Izuku wrote down his own name and inserted it into the voting box. The box was passed around the class until everyone had voted, and then it was collected by Yaoyorozu at the front of the class.

“Hold on, why is Yaoyorozu counting the votes?” Rin said. “She’s a candidate. Isn’t that a conflict of interest?”

“Indeed!” Iida declared. “I shall tally the—”

“Kirishima will count the votes!” Ashido said brightly.

“Huh? Me?” Kirishima was startled. “Why me?”

“Why not you?” Ashido retorted, still smiling.

“Uh…” He looked around aimlessly. “Okay…?”

Iida fumed in his seat as Kirishima went up to the front of the class and emptied the box of votes. He wrote the names of the four candidates on the whiteboard and started adding tally marks after the names for each vote.

He paused upon reaching one of the votes, then rolled his eyes. “Bakugou, dude, you weren’t nominated, you can’t vote for yourself.”

“Don’t tell me what I can’t do, shitty hair!”

Kirishima brushed him off and asked the class at large, “So, do we make him vote again or just ignore his vote?”

“I’m not voting for any of those losers!”

“Hey, how about this,” Kaminari said. “Give his vote to one of the other four at random. Y’know, spice up the election with a little RNG.”

“Fuck no!” Katsuki shouted. “There’s no fucking way that I’ll let my vote go to Deku!”

“Who’s ‘Deku’…?” someone in the class wondered quietly.

Katsuki growled. “Fine! Fuck, whatever. I vote for frogger.”

Asui turned to look at him. “My name is Asui Tsuyu.”

“Does it look like I care, frogger?!”

Asui stared at Katsuki for a few moments, her wide eyes gazing into him. She then turned back to the front of the class and looked at Kirishima. “I don’t want his vote.”

“I don’t think you need it anyway,” Kirishima said. He’d continued tallying up the votes while Katsuki was busy bickering with the class. He stepped away from the whiteboard and revealed the results.

Asui:    |||| |||
Mido:   ||||
Rin:     ||
Yao:    ||||

“All right, so, Asui is class rep no matter who gets Bakugou’s vote,” Kirishima said. “I guess Yaoyorozu is vice-rep unless Bakugou creates a tie by voting for Midoriya.”

“I already told you, I’m not voting for fucking Deku!”

“…No, seriously, who’s ‘Deku’…?”

Katsuki facepalmed and groaned into his hand. “I’m not voting for fucking Izuku!”

“Right, cool, so we’re done here,” Kirishima said in relief. “Our class rep is Asui and our vice-rep is Yaoyorozu.”

“Woo, woo, woo! Go, Tsu! I was rooting for you to win!” Ashido cheered.

“Didn’t you nominate Yaoyorozu?”

“Eh, does it matter?”

There was scattered applause as Asui and Yaoyorozu walked to the front and turned to face the class. “Thank you all for putting your trust in us, ribbit.” Asui bowed.

“We promise to live up to your expectations.” Yaoyorozu bowed as well.

“God, you kids are so noisy,” Aizawa grumbled.

Chapter Text

The cafeteria bustled with adolescence and chatter. With morning classes behind them, friends gathered around the lunch tables, eagerly sharing food and stories. Students joked around, discussed the year so far, and indulged in random gossip.

For the first time in years, Izuku did not sit at a table alone, because he had friends!

“Hey, Mido, my man,” Kaminari said, punching Izuku’s shoulder as he sat down next to him. “Too bad about the class rep thing. You were just one vote away from being vice!”

“I did my part,” Hagakure said, sitting across from him. Next to her sat Uraraka. “Better luck next time.”

A wobbly smile bloomed across Izuku’s face. “So, you two voted for me?” Kaminari and Hagakure nodded. “And so my third vote was from…?”

“That was me!” Uraraka said cheerfully, waving her hand in the air. “Guess it was just us though.”

How could he express that he was already so unbelievably grateful that he had three friends willing to vote for him that it didn’t matter that no one else did? This was the first time he’d ever had friends at all! Should he say that? No, that would be weird.

“Thank you so much, you guys,” he said, doing his best to fight back tears.

“No problem,” Kaminari said. “I gotta ask, that notebook of yours is for your quirk, right? What does ‘rerere’ mean, anyway?”

Oh, that. Izuku’s face reddened again involuntarily. “It’s short for ‘reuse recorded resolution’.”

Kaminari tilted his head. “Yeah, I don’t know what that means, but you should have said that at the time, man! You didn’t say anything, so Sero just made you look dumb. You could’ve turned it around so everyone would see that you’re smart!”

…Huh. Kaminari was totally right, wasn’t he? Izuku had screwed that up. He’d instinctively felt ashamed by all the weird things he wrote, like he was still back in Aldera where everyone made fun of him for his made-up quirk. But now he was a hero student at UA, and his notebooks were valuable assets filled with legitimate hero stuff.

He clearly needed more practice at this “being confident” thing.

“I wouldn’t have beaten Asui anyway. She got twice my votes,” Izuku deflected.

Hagakure shrugged. “Maybe not, but you could’ve beaten Yaomomo. Then we’d have two greenies for our class reps!”

Uraraka nibbled on her lunch. “I feel bad for Honenuki. He was trying to be subtle, but it didn’t work. And, well, Iida wasn’t trying to be subtle, and it also didn’t work.”

“Day three is kind of too early to make this decision. Like, I nominated Asui without thinking too much about it,” Izuku admitted. “Sorry about that, Hagakure. You nominated me but I couldn’t nominate you in return.”

“Pfft! Don’t worry about it.” A mischievous gleam entered Hagakure’s eyes. “By the way, Midoriya…” she said with a tone of innocence. “Please, call me Tooru. After all, you did give birth to me.”

Izuku choked on his food.

Kaminari’s and Uraraka’s heads whipped back and forth between the two of them. “Okay, what in-joke am I missing here?” Kaminari asked.

He’d been caught off guard, but Izuku got the joke. What now? Right, this was friendly banter, this is what friends did. He would play along. “Sure, as your father, call me Izuku.”

“Calling my father by his given name? Nah, I’ll call you Daddy.”

Never mind, playing along was a terrible mistake. “Please don’t do that,” he begged, but Tooru was already cackling.

Uraraka leaned over and fake-whispered to Kaminari, “You think they’re going to explain, or will they just leave us in the dark?”

“Pretend you don’t care. Reverse psychology and all that,” Kaminari whispered back.

Tooru was still chortling away. She was way too proud of herself. Izuku rolled his eyes and turned to his other two friends. “You know how Tooru hurt herself at the exercise yesterday? I healed her, in a way. I can use my quirk to make save points, so I did it by reloading a save from before the Battle Trial started. So, it’s possible, maybe, that my quirk recreated her, so…”

“I’m a new me!” Tooru chirped.

“…Yeah,” Izuku finished lamely.

“Oh, wow, you were being way more literal than I expected.” Kaminari threw his arm around Izuku’s shoulder. “So, how’s it feel to be a father at your age?”

Izuku groaned. “Don’t you start now…” The girls both laughed at his suffering.

Kaminari grinned. “Seriously, though, it’s going to be weird if only you two are calling each other by your given names. Call me Denki!”

“Call me Ochako!”

Izuku smiled. “Hi, Denki. Hi, Ochako.” A thought came to his mind. “We’re in heroics, so all of our classmates are people we’ll eventually have to trust with our lives. I think we’ll all become close sooner or later. Guess we’re just doing it sooner.”

“Look at us, one big happy family,” Tooru said.

“Uh, by the way, Tooru,” Izuku said. “I’m sorry for bringing this up again, but… um, in the video that Principal Nedzu showed you, it must have included the very end, right?”

“You mean the part in the infirmary? Yeah, what of it?”

Izuku swallowed. “So, you’re… okay with what I told you then?”

“Am I okay that the old me was killed and I’m just a replacement Tooru? Yup, no problem at all,” she said with a laugh.

…Was she being sarcastic? It didn’t seem like it, but he wasn’t sure. Denki and Ochako were both staring at her like they couldn’t tell if this was another joke or not.

Tooru sighed. “I’m serious. Izuku, dude, I get where you’re coming from, but you’re way overthinking this. By your logic, every single moment of every day we’re continuously murdering the person we were a second ago. After all, they don’t exist anymore, right? The ‘me’ that just said that sentence is dead now. The only things that are real are snapshots of the present.” Tooru waved her hands around. “Yeah, sure, your quirk makes things confusing because you’re reordering cause-and-effect in a way our brains aren’t used to. Like the ‘me’ that exists right now originates from before the ‘me’ that a past version of you remembers once knowing. But when you zoom out, every moment always has a ‘me’, and I’m still me in the present, the same as I’ve always been. I feel fine, so what’s the problem?”

Well, that was one way of looking at it. And she accuses me of overthinking this? Izuku thought, bewildered. “Uh, that’s good. I’m happy to hear that?”

“That’s deep,” Denki said. Tilting his head, he continued, “Well, I think it is? It sounded deep, at least.” He faced forward. “Hey, Ochako, please don’t tell me you’re a smarty-pants like these two. I don’t want to be the only dumb friend here.”

Ochako giggled. “You’re not alone! Dumb friends unite!” They high-fived over the lunchroom table.

Did Denki say that as a joke, or was he secretly insecure like Izuku was? Man, being social was going to be so much easier once he stopped having to overanalyze every interaction. “You’re not dumb. No one here is dumb. Like, we all passed the written part of the entrance exam. Anyone who passed that nightmare of a test isn’t allowed to call themselves dumb.”

Like a synchronized performance, all three of his friends threw back their heads and groaned.

“Don’t remind me of that test, man!”

“I thought I failed before even getting to the physical exam!”

“I was keeping track. I couldn’t have gotten better than 60%,” Ochako moaned. “But All Might praised me for getting a great score in my acceptance video. What did they want from us?”

Complaining about school—truly the most universal teenage bonding experience. The mood lightened as the four of them continued to chat, jumping from topic to topic without any real purpose, enjoying spending time with each other.

It was so nice to have friends.

“Tooru, can we talk quickly?” There were only a few minutes left on their lunch break. Izuku caught up to Tooru when she started heading back to class.

“Sure, what’s up?”

Right, how should he explain this? “I know you said you were fine with me reverting you yesterday, but there’s more to it. Um, as long as my quirk is tracking you, I can theoretically use it on you whenever. Like, right now, if I wanted to, I could send you back to right before the Battle Trial, and you’d forget the last day—not that I’d do that! I wouldn’t! But unless I specifically untrack you, I could. I just haven’t untracked you yet because then I wouldn’t be able to see you anymore, but that’s kind of a dumb reason. So, uh, I figured I should probably untrack you, unless you think otherwise?”

“You wouldn’t be able to see me anymore?” she said quietly. Then she spoke in a normal tone of voice, “I still need to practice using my strength without hurting myself. Not that I want to rely on you, but it might not be a bad idea to have a failsafe in case I destroy my bones again. So, I don’t mind you using your quirk on me.”

Izuku hesitated. “I don’t think… um, are you really sure about that?”

“What, you think I can’t make my own decisions?”

“No, no! That’s not what—”

“Relax, relax!” Tooru interrupted. “Sorry, I didn’t mean it like that. I just… I don’t like thinking about what would’ve happened if you weren’t able to heal me yesterday.” She rubbed her arm unconsciously. “And also… well, I don’t mind. It’s fine.”

Izuku bit his lip. “Right, well… the alternative is maybe I can make a save point of you every day, so even if the worst happens you’d never lose more than a day, and likely not even that much.” He put a hand to his chin and thought about it more carefully. “Technically I wouldn’t be making a proper commit, because then you’d be reset if I switch away from my current branch and switch back, so instead I guess I’d re-stage you every day. Although that means I can’t revert you to earlier than the most recent re-stage, but you wouldn’t want that anyway… and I’d need to unstage you before making any other commit so that you’re not included by accident, so maybe I can make a throwaway branch that only tracks you, make a single commit there, and then I can cherry pick from the branch later… sorry, you don’t understand a word I’m saying.”

“Nope! But it sounds like you do, and that’s what matters. So, how does that work? Should we meet every morning so you can make a backup me?”

“Um, no. My quirk works remotely. So I’d just do it in my own time. Once I’m tracking something, I can do whatever I want to it, whenever I want. That’s how I summon things to me, and stuff.”

“Oh.” She stared at him in thought. “…Does that include making things disappear, like the zero-pointer?”

“…Yes.” He swallowed and had to look away.

Tooru was silent for a long time.

“Dude, your quirk is scary,” she said eventually.

“Look, this is why I wanted to untrack you!” Izuku exclaimed.

“I… no. No.” She looked him in the eyes. “It’s fine. I trust you.” Her mouth twitched like she couldn’t decide whether to smile or frown. “No point in not trusting you, frankly.”

“You can change your mind whenever! Just let me know, anytime, and I’ll stop!”

“Sure. If I do, I’ll let you know. Now, c’mon already! Class is gonna start any minute and who knows what Aizawa will do if we’re late!”

“Right, okay!”

That could have gone worse, he supposed.

It was late evening. The sun had already set; the surroundings were illuminated only by a waning glow at the horizon. Izuku was at the local park carrying a small bag containing stuff that he’d scrounged up from around his apartment—scissors, a roll of string, and a package of small S-shaped hook hangers.

He didn’t mean for it to get this late. At Aldera, he could get most of his homework done during the school day, but the accelerated schedule at UA (due to half the school day being devoted to hero training) meant that between school, training, exercise, homework, dinner, and other various chores he found himself with very little free time. He wasn’t used to this.

Regardless, he had a quirk experiment planned for tonight, and he was damn well going to do it! On the bright side, the park was empty this late at night, so he wouldn’t get in trouble for public quirk use.

One aspect of his quirk that he’d failed to take advantage of so far was multiple degrees of relativity. When he added an item to his quirk, by default the virtual object would exist in a static, unchanging position relative to the Earth’s rotation. But if he added an object while it was touching another object that he had previously added to his quirk, then the virtual object would exist relative to the object it was touching. That was how he summoned items to himself. While he couldn’t anchor objects to his own body (because he couldn’t add himself to his quirk), he could anchor objects to his clothes, which was pretty much the same thing in most circumstances.

But that was only one degree of relativity. One object was anchored to the Earth, and a second object was anchored to the first object. What if he kept going? What if he added a third object relative to the second, a fourth relative to the third, and so on? Were there any interesting things he could do with that?

Leaving the park’s walking trail, he dropped everything he was carrying in an open grassy plain. What should this test be called? “git switch -c project-skyward-string,” he decided.

Getting to work, he reached a hand into the air and then measured out a length of string that matched the distance between the ground and the tips of his fingers. He cut about ten lengths of string and tied the ends of the first piece to two hooks.

All right, so to create a chain of relative positions, the order in which he added the objects mattered. He left one hook on the ground. “git add hook.” He then picked up the other hook and held it as high into the air as he could reach. “git add string; git add hook.” With the virtual objects now in place, he could relax his arms and make a commit of this setup. “git commit -m "Step 1 of Project Skyward String"; git tag s1.” By tagging this commit with the name “s1”, he could easily refer back to it later.

Izuku picked up the next piece of string he’d prepared and tied it to the second hook. He then picked up a third hook, tied it to the other end of the string, and held it in the air as far as he could reach. “git add string, git add hook.” Because he was only touching one set of items at a time, it was fine that all of these objects had the names “string” or “hook” because touching the item made it clear which one he was referring to. “git commit -m "Step 2"; git tag s2.”

Here was Izuku’s idea. Usually, Izuku could never anchor an object to somewhere he’d never been in the first place. He could hold a hook above his head, and that was the highest that the hook could be. If he reached into the air, saved a commit, and then applied the commit, then the hook would reappear at that same elevation before falling to the ground.

But if each hook was saved relative to a previous hook, then the height would be determined by the elevation of the previous hook in the sequence. Usually, objects had to be touching to anchor them to each other, but that was what the string was for. A hook was anchored to a strand of string, which was anchored to another hook, which was anchored to another piece of string, which was anchored to a third hook…

In theory, he could apply each commit in sequence, and each hook’s height would compound on the previous one. The first would appear six feet in the air, the second would appear six-plus-six-equals-twelve feet in the air, the next hook eighteen feet in the air, and so on, not accounting for gravity pulling the whole thing downward at the same time. It didn’t necessarily have to go straight upward either because it was all relative to the initial anchor on the ground that he could angle in whatever direction he wanted.

Strands of string connected each of these hooks, thus, “Project Skyward String”.

It was like an extendable grappling hook, except way more finicky, and much stupider.

This was just to test the theory. Nothing that he was doing tonight would be directly practical for hero work. Izuku repeated the same process of tying the hooks together, holding one in the air, committing its relative position, and then continuing onto the next one until he had finished assembling his long piece of rope made of ten strands of string linked by hooks.

He’d tagged each commit in sequence with a step number, “s1”, “s2”, etc. Now he had to rapidly checkout each tag one after the other. “git checkout s1.”

Note: switching to 's1'.

You are in 'detached HEAD' state. You can look around, make experimental changes and commit them, and you can discard any commits you make in this state without impacting any branches by switching back to a branch.

If you want to create a new branch to retain commits you create, you may do so (now or later) by using -c with the switch command. Example:

git switch -c <new-branch-name>

HEAD is now at 51eae0e Step 1 of Project Skyward String


A warning message immediately appeared in his mind’s eye. The heck? Behind the warning, he saw that the first hook appeared six feet in the air, the string hanging down below it, before immediately falling back to the ground once gravity caught up. He wasn’t really paying attention because he was distracted by the warning. What had gone wrong?

…Oh. Oh, it was this stupid warning again! Izuku facepalmed. He forgot about this. It happened whenever he switched to anything that wasn’t the most recent commit in a branch, and it was really annoying! It didn’t have anything to do with his experiment, it was just a bother that he’d have to put up with.

All right, now that he knew what to expect, it was time to try again. This time he’d ignore the warning and keep reciting commands like he meant to do. “git switch main.” That reset the experiment so that he could apply the first commit again. “git checkout s1.”

Note: switching to 's1'.

You are in 'detached HEAD' state. You can look around, make experimental changes and commit them, and you can discard any commits you make in this state without impacting any branches by switching back to a branch.

If you want to create a new branch to retain commits you create, you may do so (now or later) by using -c with the switch command. Example:

git switch -c <new-branch-name>

HEAD is now at 51eae0e Step 1 of Project Skyward String


While the hook was still in the air, he quickly said, “git checkout s2.”

Note: switching to 's2'.

You are in 'detached HEAD' state. You can look around, make experimental changes and commit them, and you can discard any commits you make in this state without impacting any branches by switching back to a branch.

If you want to create a new branch to retain commits you create, you may do so (now or later) by using -c with the switch command. Example:

git switch -c <new-branch-name>

HEAD is now at b2db0aa Step 2


You have to be kidding me! It’s seriously going to warn me for every single step? “git checkout s3.”

Note: switching to 's3'.

You are in 'detached HEAD' state. You can look around, make experimental changes and commit them, and you can discard any commits you make in this state without impacting any branches by switching back to a branch.

If you want to create a new branch to retain commits you create, you may do so (now or later) by using -c with the switch command. Example:

git switch -c <new-branch-name>

HEAD is now at 7f883d2 Step 3


Oh my god, GO AWAY!!

Izuku’s mind was being swarmed by popups. Behind all the popups, it looked like his idea was actually working. The string had been lifted about fifteen feet in the air, and Izuku could’ve kept going to lift it higher, but he didn’t bother continuing. The string and hooks fell to the ground with a quiet clang.

This wasn’t workable.

Imagine if he were facing a villain, and then he got blindsided by a whole bunch of overlapping popups appearing in his mind. He couldn’t afford to be distracted or waste time closing popups when he needed to focus on fighting villains or saving people.

Augh!! This was so stupid! He didn’t need the warning, so why was his quirk insisting on it?

Was there an alternative way to do this that wouldn’t result in the popup? Izuku put a hand to his chin and considered the problem.

The issue that the message was complaining about was that, by switching to arbitrary commits, he was going “back in time”, and so any changes he made would be ignored in favor of the most recent commit made to the branch. To fix that, instead of swapping between commits in the commit history, he needed a way to apply the changes that were made in one commit to his current state. That would keep everything in a nice, linear timeline.

He thought about it for a while. He’d been using his quirk for nearly a year now; it shouldn’t be too hard to think of a command that would do what he needed.

Eventually, he nodded to himself. He had an idea. “git switch main,” he said to reset everything. “git diff s1.” This command meant “show me the difference between my current state and the commit ‘s1’.”

A holographic hook and string appeared in his view hovering in midair where he had raised in over his head. However, unlike usual virtual objects, these had distinct green outlines around them. At the same time, the physical hook and string lying on the ground had visible red outlines around them.

The “diff” command showed a visual preview of what had changed between commits. The old version was shown in red while the new version was shown in green. Thus, this was saying “these objects, currently in this red position here, will move to this green position here if the commit is applied”.

By itself, this wouldn’t solve Izuku’s issue. It was just a visual preview, not the actual thing. But “diff” had a secret extra feature: You could save the difference between two things as its own item (called a “patch” by the manual), and then apply that patch to turn the preview into reality.

“git diff s1 > p1.” This created the patch object, which he called “p1”.

Now to apply it. “git apply p1.”

The hook teleported six feet into the air, pulling one end of the string along with it, and then fell to the ground. The result was exactly the same as the previous test, except this time there was no stupid warning message getting in his face! Woo!

(…Jeez, his quirk took so much effort to do anything…)

Izuku spent the next several minutes creating patch objects for the differences between each of the tagged commits, labeled “p1” through “p10”. This whole test was turning into a bit of a hassle, but hopefully it would be worth it.

Done! All right. It would work this time! “git apply p1.” The hook teleported into the air and began to fall. “git apply p2.” The second hook also teleported upward… but the first hook had already nearly fallen to the ground, so at best the second hook only got up to seven feet in the air. “git apply p3,” Izuku said as quickly as he could. The third hook continued the pattern, teleporting into the air but not gaining any meaningful height because the hook that it was anchored to had already nearly reached the ground thanks to gravity.

Izuku stopped. He literally couldn’t speak fast enough for this to work.

But… but… this didn’t make any sense! During his first test, he saw the structure reach at least fifteen feet in the air. He only stopped because the popups were bothering him. He wasn’t speaking the commands any faster than the previous time.

Shouldn’t applying a commit and applying a patch of that commit do the same thing? He didn’t get it. What had changed?

Izuku fiddled with the pile of string by his feet, thinking through the problem carefully. A patch of a commit only included the change that was introduced in that commit itself. Whereas if he checked out a commit directly, then that also included the history that led up to that commit. The difference between them was that a commit was an event within a timeline, whereas a patch was an event unrelated to anything else.

So, in his first experiment, he wasn’t speaking the commands any faster than his second time. That meant that the hooks must have been falling at the same rate, but for some reason, it didn’t affect the height of the structure. The only thing that made sense was that each time he checked out a commit, it reapplied all the commits that had led up to that point since it was part of a timeline, and by definition, a timeline had to include everything that had happened.

Was there a command that he could use to sequentially apply all the commits on a timeline all at once?

…

…Oh my god, I am so dumb.

If this worked, he was going to be so mad. Well, he’d be happy, but he’d also be so mad.

Izuku took a few steps back from the pile of string and hooks on the ground. “git switch main,” he said to reset the experiment for hopefully the last time.

Now for the moment that would prove whether or not he was the stupidest person on the planet. “git switch project-skyward-string.”

In an instant, the string sprung skyward. For a brief moment, the structure of string and hooks reached about fifty feet into the air before gravity reasserted itself and it all fell back to the ground.

It worked. Switching to a branch meant to jump to the most recent point on some given timeline. In order to get to the end of a timeline, everything that was included in that timeline had to have happened as well, because that’s what a timeline was. All of it was applied at once. And since each hook was relative to the previous hook, the heights between them added to each other until the whole thing reached fifty-plus feet into the air.

Man, Izuku wished he could feel proud of himself. His experiment was objectively a success, but he was still berating himself for his tunnel vision. If he forgot how branches worked, then what other incredibly obvious things was he forgetting about right now?

Right on cue, the waning sunset finally surrendered to the dark. The faint glow at the horizon had just faded enough that Izuku’s night vision could no longer keep up. The park was illuminated only by distant street lamps and the gentle nighttime starlight.

Izuku looked around the park he was in, barely able to see anything around him.

…

What the hell was he doing flouting public quirk laws in a random park in the middle of the night?

He was a UA student. UA had entire facilities devoted to quirk training. He could be doing all this with proper equipment and a whole staff of Pro Heroes ready to help him with anything he needed. Just earlier this morning he had recommended to Tooru that she should take advantage of UA’s facilities to find how how her body reacted to different light frequencies.

Izuku’s head fell into his hands, ashamed and embarrassed over his absolute stupidity.

He could blame the oversight on habit. After all, he’d been experimenting on his own for most of the previous year. It made sense that it might not immediately cross his mind that he didn’t need to do everything alone anymore.

That explanation didn’t quite ring true to him, though.

Izuku stared up at the night sky. It was a new moon, but the sky was bright. The starlight shone with unusual intensity. He could almost picture the rays of starlight shining down around him.

He held up his hand, palm facing upward. He imagined a ray of starlight striking his palm. “git add starlight.”

Oh, shit. Fuck. That worked. Why did that work?

Izuku continued to stare up at the universe, not sure what to do next.

“git diff.”

The night sky burst into a kaleidoscope of reds and greens. His quirk was trying to show him how the starlight had changed since he added it a few seconds ago… whatever that meant. The “diff” starlight was brighter than the normal night sky. Was it because the diff collected all of the starlight that had been emitted since he added it, shining all at once?

Cumulative light. He was reminded of how Tooru’s quirk gathered and stored light that passed through her, converting it into energy.

“git diff > starlight.”

Now he had some concentrated starlight stored as a patch object that he could use to briefly brighten the night sky in the future. Not that he had any earthly idea why he’d use it.

…

Izuku didn’t entirely lack self-awareness. Why had he spent so much time tonight screwing around with compounding relative motion and diff patches and all the rest of it? He knew why. He recognized that the reason he was so interested in all these exotic, finicky usages for his quirk was because it helped distract him from the big, obvious, dangerous, horrifying things he could do instead.

There was a reason why he intuitively avoided doing his quirk experiments where smart, knowledgeable, helpful Pro Heroes could see him. He didn’t want people to know exactly what he could do with his quirk, and he didn’t want anyone to challenge him on what his limits actually were.

It was nice to pretend that his quirk had limits. Achieving cool things by working around those limits was fun.

…

What if, right now, he said “git rm starlight”?

Even worse, what if he said “git rm Earth”?

He would never dare do it. He would never dare try it.

…

“Dude, your quirk is scary,” Tooru had said earlier today.

She didn’t know the half of it.

…

Izuku loved his life right now. He was having so much fun. He loved experimenting and pushing the limits of his abilities. He was a student at UA. He was going to be a hero. He had friends that he liked and who liked him in return! He was happy! He wouldn’t trade what he had right now for anything in the world. He was so grateful for everything his quirk had granted him.

But deep in his heart, in a dark place that he never wanted to admit aloud, he knew the truth.

He was so scared of his quirk.

Chapter Text

Today was rescue training!

Earlier that morning, Aizawa announced that they’d be going on a field trip. Class 1-A was promptly herded onto a bus bound for a facility that specialized in simulating disaster scenarios—fires, earthquakes, flooding, and everything in between. Additionally, two special guest teachers would meet them there.

This wasn’t a surprise to any of the students. Apparently, they were actually supposed to do rescue training last week, but it was delayed because the class had to redo the Battle Trial. Class 1-B had gone last week instead, and they were happy to spill the beans about everything.

Izuku was so excited!

The bus was filled with friendly chatter as they drove to their destination. Overall, most of the class seemed pumped, but there were a handful of exceptions. Katsuki seemed pissed that he wouldn’t be able to blow anyone up today, but that was nothing new. Denki was sitting next to Izuku, and while he wasn’t obvious about it, Izuku could tell that Denki was a little stiff.

Shooting lightning was a very combat-focused quirk, and there weren’t many obvious ways to use it for rescue. He could understand why Denki was a little nervous. Izuku considered pointing out that Pro Heroes had to deal with situations that their quirks didn’t help with all the time, but it was clear Denki was trying to pretend that everything was fine, so calling him out on it was probably a bad idea.

“Ribbit. Excuse me, Hagakure?”

Tooru had been watching the scenery pass by out the window, but she turned back to face her classmates. “What’s up, Asui? I mean, Ms. President,” she teased.

“My friends call me Tsu, so everyone here can call me that.”

“Sure thing, Tsu. What’s up?”

Tsu looked at Tooru with wide eyes. “I tend to speak what’s on my mind. I hope I don’t come across as rude.” She paused to see if Tooru would object, then continued. “You appear to have two quirks. Both invisibility and strength that rivals All Might’s. I didn’t know it was possible for someone to have two quirks.”

Ha, Tsu asked almost exactly the same thing Izuku had last week. Well, it was no surprise, Tooru’s abilities seemed completely unrelated to each other from the outside. He wondered if Tooru had asked the teachers yet about setting up some advanced quirk testing. It’d be a huge benefit if she knew exactly which electromagnetic frequencies her quirk could convert to stored power. Maybe she’d talk about it now?

…Huh, Tooru still hadn’t said anything. She was biting her lip and looking mildly panicked. Tsu continued to stare at her calmly. What was going on? Did she get nervous in front of crowds? Should he step in and help her explain? Or maybe she wanted to keep that aspect of her quirk secret for some reason? Maybe Tooru learned some drawback to her quirk like she was weaker in the dark, and she didn’t want that weakness exposed? Izuku wanted to help his friend, but he didn’t know what was wrong.

In the end, he didn’t have to do anything because Ashido stepped in and accidentally bailed Tooru out. “Girl, what are you talking about? Aren’t there a bunch of people who have more than one quirk?”

Tsu put a finger to her mouth. “No, ribbit. It can appear that way, but it always comes down to multiple expressions of a single quirk.”

“No way!” Kirishima butted in. “Then how do you explain Midoriya and all the weird things he can do?”

Tsu’s gaze turned to Izuku. Oh, wow, her stare was intense! Suddenly he understood why Tooru had gotten nervous. Izuku hadn’t done anything wrong, but those big wide eyes staring into his soul made him feel like he needed to repent for every time he’d ever snuck an extra piece of candy when his mom wasn’t looking.

She eventually turned back to Kirishima. “I don’t know what Midoriya’s quirk is. It makes no sense.”

Harsh, but fair.

“Endeavor’s son in Class B has two quirks,” Jirou said, twirling one of her earphone jacks around her finger. “He has a fire quirk and an ice quirk. Although I hear he doesn’t use his fire for some reason.”

“You hear, or you overheard?” Ojiro raised an eyebrow.

Jirou frowned. “Same thing. It’s not on purpose.”

“I wonder why he only uses half of his quirk?” Izuku pondered aloud. “He must have a reason for it. Fire and ice are opposites, so maybe they conflict with each other and make both less effective?”

“Or he could just be bad at using fire,” Denki said. “Better to master one thing than to spread yourself thin across multiple things.” He thought for a moment, and then his eyes widened. “No offense, Izuku!”

He laughed. “None taken!”

“He’s just an arrogant bastard who thinks he’s better than everyone else because his daddy is Endeavor,” Katsuki spat. “If he thinks he can get away with only using half his power then he’s in for a rude awakening. I can’t wait to kick his teeth in.”

Tsu rolled her eyes. “Please don’t antagonize Class B, ribbit.”

Katsuki leaned over his seat and stared at Tsu. “Does it look like I was talking to you, frogger?!” he shouted, daring her to respond.

Tsu met his gaze easily. “My friends call me Tsu. So please, call me Asui.”

Katsuki looked like he was about to explode, but thankfully he was interrupted. “Settle down, kids,” Aizawa grunted. “We’re here.”

“Welcome, everyone, to the Unforeseen Simulation Joint! Or as I like to call it, the USJ!”

Izuku’s and Ochako’s eyes both widened in glee. “It’s the Space Hero, Thirteen!” / “It’s Thirteen, my favorite hero!” they said at the same time. They both grabbed onto the shoulder of the closest person, which was Denki for both of them, and started shaking him back and forth. “She’s so amazing, she’s rescued people from countless—” / “Just two weeks ago there was a big landslide in—” / “—such amazing control of her quirk—” / “—and wow, it was like she was able to lift the entire mountain off of—” / “—inspired so many others to go into rescue heroics—” Izuku babbled into one of Denki’s ears while Ochako babbled into the other.

Denki’s expression grew more and more befuddled as he was jerked back and forth between the two fanatics. “Somebody save me,” he whispered.

“I’m thrilled to see that you’re all so enthusiastic!” Thirteen exclaimed. You couldn’t see her expression behind the space helmet, but she had a jovial tone of voice. “The USJ is a facility I helped design that simulates many kinds of natural disasters, from fires to floods to windstorms to shipwrecks and many more!”

“It’s amazing! This place is incredible!” Ochako cheered, marveling at the view. The sheer size and scope of the facility was unreal, with some zones shrouded in a raging inferno while others were practically underwater.

Thirteen chuckled. “I’m glad you think so because you’re going to get to know this place very well over the next three years! In many ways, rescue heroics is heroics in its purest form. As heroes, your job is to save people, and that’s what the USJ is all about.”

Iida raised his hand and then started talking immediately. “Sensei! I believe there is supposed to be another hero to assist us in training today! Why is it that you are the only one here?”

Thirteen hummed. “Hm, it’s a mystery, isn’t it?” She turned away from the students and pointed toward the fountain in the middle of the facility. “Oh, look at that, what could it be?”

Izuku peered into the distance to see a big cloud of light blue fog emanating from the fountain area, quickly flowing out to fill the volume and obscure the surrounding field. It was heavy smoke, unnatural, rolling toward them across the ground and growing larger and larger. What was going on?

Suddenly, something shot up and out of the clouds at great speed. It was a solid cloud carrying a person on it. The cloud circled high around the facility at impressive speeds before flying toward the group of students. Stopping on a dime, the cloud and its heroic passenger hovered in the air next to Thirteen.

It was the rescue hero Loud Cloud! Izuku barely suppressed his squeal.

Loud Cloud was famous, especially by the standards of rescue heroes. His quirk allowed him to create solid clouds and control them telepathically, allowing him to transport all kinds of things with ease. His ability to create fleets of clouds to lift whole populations out of disaster zones was legendary!

Looking at him now, sitting confidently atop a small cloud of his own making, Izuku was reminded of a character from their classic literature class. The class was focused on historical portrayals of heroics from ancient cultures. There was some centuries-old classic they were forced to read that was about some kid who flew around on a cloud. What was the name of that character again? Son Goku? Whatever, it was a boring book anyway.

“Hey there, little heroes!” Loud Cloud shouted from his seat upon his cloud. “I hope you all are ready for some action! We’ve got a lot planned for you today, and not much time to get to it all, so you better be prepared to go Plus Ultra!”

“You could save time by sparing us the theatrics,” Aizawa drawled.

“Ha! Where’s the fun in that, Shouta?” Loud Cloud laughed, then turned back to the students. “To help with everything, we have even more special guests for you all!”

Loud Cloud snapped his fingers with a flourish, and then suddenly three more clouds with passengers launched out of the fog in the center of the facility. The clouds zipped around the facility, looping around each other in intricate patterns in the air. Trails of mist followed their paths, creating dazzling spirals and arcs. It was so cool.

After completing the impromptu aerobatics demonstration, the clouds zoomed to the group and halted right before hitting the ground, gracelessly dumping off three older students… who looked very nauseous. Izuku stifled a laugh. The guest students clearly weren’t prepared for what they had just been put through.

“Behold! Three volunteers from Class 2-A!” Loud Cloud announced. The older students struggled to their feet and tried to look cool for their kouhais. “They’ll be assisting in your exercises today!”

Loud Cloud pointed to the first student on the left, a girl with light brown hair and doe eyes. “First up, Utsushimi Camie, The Glamourous Hero: Illus-o-Camie! Her illusion quirk will help us by creating crowds of civilians that you’ll have to take into consideration, and she also has a few surprises in store that will add even more excitement to the simulated disasters!”

The girl struck a pose and held up a peace sign. “Thanks for having me, fams! This is going to be mad lit!”

“Next,” Loud Cloud continued, “Akatani Mikumo, The Garden Hero: Greenheart!” The student was a nervous-looking boy with messy black hair. “He can reshape organic material. Today, he’ll create civilian golems for you to save. These are more lifelike than simple training dummies.”

“…Hi,” Greenheart said awkwardly.

“Last, but not least,” Loud Cloud pointed to a blonde-haired girl with fangs, “Yasuda Himiko, The Cosplay Hero: Copycat! She can transform into other people, including replicating any injuries they’ve sustained. She’ll be helping you with diagnosing and treating injured civilians.” Loud Cloud paused for a moment, then said quietly, “Yasuda, these are first-years, so can you please tone down the level of blood and gore in your transformations today?”

“Nooooo promises!” Copycat sing-songed.

Loud Cloud grimaced but continued regardless. “All right, we’ll be splitting you up into three groups with one teacher and assistant each. Each group will do their exercises in a different zone, then we’ll all regroup at the end for a class activity.”

Thirteen took over. “We’re splitting you up for a reason. As Pro Heroes, you’re responsible for others’ lives, so you can’t afford to make mistakes. At the same time, no one can experience every possible situation. Thus, learning from the personal accounts of your fellow heroes is absolutely essential.” She paused for emphasis and spread her arms wide. “Talk to your friends after class about their own trials today. Learn from them. Remember, you’ll be coming here a lot during your time at UA. We expect you to learn from the mistakes of your classmates even if you’ve never personally visited a zone before.”

Izuku nodded solemnly. That made sense. The atmosphere had been lighthearted so far, but this was serious work they were doing. The class settled into determined stances.

“Looks like you’re all raring to go! All right, let’s get on with it!”

Izuku ended up in the group headed to the Conflagration Zone with Loud Cloud and Greenheart. Ochako was in Thirteen’s group, which she was thrilled by. He was happy for her.

From the outside, the Conflagration Zone looked like one giant dome of fire. Upon entering, they discovered that the large dome actually had many smaller domes within it that each simulated different kinds of emergencies. Peering inside the different domes, he saw a warehouse fire, a small group of residential houses on fire, a bush fire, and others.

“Welcome to the flames of Hell!” Loud Cloud announced cheerfully.

He wasn’t kidding. They weren’t even in any of the inner domes yet and it was already uncomfortably warm.

“Now, take a look at this!” Loud Cloud gestured to Greenheart, who placed his hands on the ground and pulled an organic-looking mannequin out of the earth. “My pal Greenheart here has formed golem dummies throughout the test environments. As you’ll soon discover, they feel like real unconscious bodies—they bruise and breathe and have a heartbeat. You’ll be rescuing these guys from their fiery fates!”

“They scream too,” Greenheart said.

Loud Cloud kept talking. “We’re going to try to tackle as many of these domes as we have time for, so I’m actually going to split you up once again! You three!” He pointed at Aoyama, Jirou, and Ashido. “You’ll start with the tower dome! You three!” He switched to pointing at Izuku, Yaoyorozu, and Kirishima. “Hold tight! After I show the first group what to do, you’ll head for the canyon dome!”

Loud Cloud sped away on his cloud with the first group following him, which was convenient because Izuku wanted to do something first. He shuffled over to Greenheart and inspected the golem dummy lying on the ground. It was breathing in and out like a living mannequin, if the mannequin also had a layer of skin over it. It was honestly pretty creepy.

“Hi! Greenheart, right?” Izuku said, grabbing the older student’s attention. Izuku had already forgotten what his real name was, but hopefully he could avoid admitting that if he used his hero name instead.

Greenheart nodded in reply without saying anything.

Right, um… “I’m Midoriya Izuku, I don’t have a hero name yet.” He gestured at the golem Greenheart had pulled from the ground. “There are golems like this all throughout the zone, right? Do you know of Pixie Bob? This looks way more advanced than her golems, but it looks like you can create them just as fast. Can you use your quirk remotely like she does, or did you have to set this up before our class arrived?”

Greenheart stared at him for a while before answering quietly, “I prepared them earlier… why are you asking me questions?”

“Well… I think it’s cool! This golem is really lifelike. It looks like its skin even has pores!”

“You noticed!” Greenheart beamed. “It took a long time to get the texture right. It’s hard to make something that feels like skin out of earth and plants and such.” Talking about his work seemed to open him up a little.

Izuku knelt to touch the dummy’s arm. Ew, it really did feel like skin. “git add golem,” he said clearly, in full view of Greenheart. The other student didn’t call him out on it, so he continued, “You did a good job! It feels very close to the real thing.”

“Thanks! It’s more than just skin deep too, heh. My golems have a network of simulated nerves under the skin to detect injuries. They scream and flail to let you know when they’ve been hurt.”

“Ah… they scream, huh?” Izuku wasn’t looking forward to that.

“Yup!” Greenheart nodded. “It’s an important part of the simulation. Panicking victims living through real disasters aren’t going to be calm and inert.”

That was a fair point. “You’ve put a lot of work into this. Thanks for volunteering to help us out today!”

“Thank Himiko too, later—sorry, I mean Copycat. She helped me so much when designing these guys!” Greenheart was getting more enthusiastic the more he talked. “She just knows so much about the human body. I couldn’t have gotten all the responses right without her.”

“Oh? Does it react differently depending on the injury?” Izuku asked.

“You got it! She and I spent a lot of time calibrating the responses so that the golems accurately react to the type and severity of injuries they could receive. It was pretty hard work sometimes. I had to forcefully hold down a screaming and flailing golem while Himiko stabbed its chest open to confirm that the nerve clusters were working and that it correctly distinguished between different intensities of pain. No one else wanted to help me with that. They were being all dumb and said it felt too much like torturing someone. I don’t get it. At least Himiko understands me!” Greenheart’s eyes gleamed and there was a faint blush on his cheeks.

“…Uh huh. Um, I’m glad you have such a reliable partner?”

“She sure is! The next step is to design a new model with a proper circulatory system. The plan is to base it on the vascular bundles that transport food in trees and plants. It just isn’t right that the golems don’t bleed. We’ll know that we’ve gotten the realism down once we can strap down a golem, saw off its limbs, and watch it beg and scream and flail and bleed just like if we were cutting open a real human!”

“…Yeah.”

“It’s the next generation of anthropomorphic test devices! I have a friend in the business course who’ll help me get in contact with the H.U.C., and hopefully they—”

“Hey, Midoriya!” Kirishima jogged over to the two of them. “Yaoyorozu wants to scout out the canyon area in advance. Coming with?”

He could kiss Kirishima for saving him from this conversation! …And then he immediately felt bad for thinking that, especially given that he was the one to try to start a conversation in the first place. “Yeah, I’m coming!” He looked back at Greenheart. “Uh… you’re doing really impressive work! Good luck with everything!”

“Thanks! Take good care of my golems during your training!”

“Sure,” Izuku said, then he and Kirishima jogged to catch up with Yaoyorozu. She was already approaching the entrance to the canyon dome.

Yaoyorozu turned to face them. “Ah, there you are, Midoriya. Did you learn anything from Akatani?”

More than he bargained for, yeah. “Well, I’ve tagged one of the golems, so I’ll be able to pinpoint the locations of all of them in the area when we start.”

Yaoyorozu was surprised. “Is that another one of your quirks?” she asked.

“That’s awesome!” Kirishima took his statement at face value. “We’re gonna rock this, man!”

Izuku walked up to the dome. They couldn’t enter until their teacher returned, but they could peer inside and get a sense of how the zone was designed. The main area consisted of a residential block of houses of various shapes and sizes, all ablaze. A small canyon separated the fiery area from an open, safe field with only a narrow rope bridge connecting the two. Presumably, they’d be tasked with rescuing dummies from the burning town and transporting them across the rope bridge to the safe zone.

“Midoriya, am I correct that your primary quirk is saving the state of something and reloading it later?” Yaoyorozu asked. “How far does that extend? Can you preserve the state of this entire dome all at once?”

“I can, actually!” Izuku grinned. Usually, he had to touch things to start tracking them with his quirk, but he had a way around that. He walked up to the dome and touched the glass exterior. “git add canyon_dome/*.”

As long as an object contained other objects, he could treat the entire outer object as a “folder” and add everything it contained all at once. He’d noticed all the way back on Day 1 of using his quirk that “desk_cabinet/” had a trailing forward slash, but it had taken him a while to figure out what it meant.

Yaoyorozu looked pleased. “Can you make regular backups during the exercise so that we can roll back to an earlier point if we need to? Say, if a structure collapses and we need to fix it quickly.”

“Good idea! git switch -c canyon-dome; git commit -m "Before starting",” he said. “All right, our first save point is before entering the dome. We might not be allowed to use this one, but whatever.”

At that moment, Loud Cloud zoomed over to him on one of his clouds, returning from showing the other group to their station. “Hey, little heroes! Are you already performing reconnaissance over here? Nice job! Looks like you three are ready. Let’s do it!”

Chapter Text

Izuku was bang on the money. Starting from the safe zone, their task was to cross the miniature canyon using the rope bridge, rescue the golems from the burning buildings in the model town square, and transport them back across the bridge to the safe zone. To pass the test, they needed to save at least 80% of the golems. There was a big stack of crates in the safe zone that stored firefighting equipment—protective wear, axes, rope, fire blankets, flashlights, various tools, tanks of both dry and wet chemical suppressants, and so on.

The narrow rope bridge was intended to be a bottleneck in both directions. You both had to lug the proper firefighting equipment from the safe zone to the fire, and you also had to lug the golems from the fire to the safe zone, both using the same passageway. Izuku could see the tricky balancing act the simulation required of you. What did you prioritize? How many trips back and forth could you afford to take? If you needed a certain piece of equipment but didn’t bring it with you, was it worth going back to grab it, or did you improvise with what you had?

Well, it would’ve been a tricky balancing act. Too bad this group had both Izuku and Yaoyorozu.

“git grep golem --untracked. Here, let me—”

“Don’t bring any unwieldy tools. I can create anything we need when we need it.”

“I’ll just anchor all this stuff to me so that I can summon it to us when we need it. Save your quirk for making gear that we don’t already have.”

“Make sure everything fits on your utility harness. We’re going to need our hands free to carry the dummies back with us.”

“It looks they only gave us a few fire grenades, but that’s okay. I can restore them, so we can use them as often as we want.”

“I know the chemical compositions of common fire suppressants by heart, so it’s not an issue either way.”

“How often do you think I should save our progress? Every three minutes or so?”

“That works. Kirishima, what are you doing? Why haven’t you put on your protective gear yet?”

“I don’t need it. Have you ever tried to set a rock on fire?”

“You at least need to wear a respirator for the smoke, and you could still overheat. Take these ice packs and put them under your clothes.”

“But I’m planning to charge directly into the fires. The ice will just melt.”

“I can restore the ice packs too. It’s fine.”

All geared up, the three crossed the rope bridge and headed for the town square, walking through a field of dry yellow grass to get there. There were little over a dozen burning buildings. Most of them were single-story homes and fake business storefronts, but a couple of them were multi-story apartment buildings.

Yaoyorozu looked a little overwhelmed. “They expect us to rescue an entire town for our very first exercise? Shouldn’t we start with rescuing one victim from one building?”

“This is UA! Plus Ultra, baby!” Kirishima cheered.

“Only half of the buildings have golems in them. I can sense where they are, remember? The other buildings are just decoys.” Izuku pointed to one of the houses. “That house has three golems, so let’s start there.”

His partners nodded and followed him to the burning house. The front door was shut tight and completely aflame, blocking their entrance to the house. Hm, they had fire axes that could break open the door, but they would have to get in really close to do it and stand directly in the fire. That wouldn’t work. He needed to be able to break open the door from a distance. Maybe he could pull out his slingshot and fire a bowling ball at—

Kirishima charged at the door and broke through in an instant.

…Oh, right. They were a team. Izuku needed to get out of the thought process that just because his versatile quirk could do something didn’t mean it was the right tool for the job. He’d spent nearly his whole life thinking about Git, and that might not necessarily be a good thing.

“You looked really cool busting through the door like that, Kirishima! Real hero-like!” Izuku called into the house.

Kirishima scratched the back of his head bashfully. “Heh heh, thanks, man! Hey, so, I’m basically fireproof, so is it fine if I go on ahead while you two get stuff ready here?”

Yaoyorozu nodded. “Yes, the dummies represent injured or trapped civilians, so time is of the essence. Go find them and determine the shortest route to the exit.”

Kirishima gave a thumbs up and marched into the house to find the rescue dummies. Izuku and Yaoyorozu meanwhile pulled out their extinguishers and used them to carve a safe path through the house to carry the dummies back with them.

“Found them! Straight ahead and to the right!”

They followed Kirishima’s directions and arrived at the living room where three golems were huddled up in the far corner. Kirishima casually swung the largest one over his shoulders in a move that was obviously well-practiced; Izuku and Yaoyorozu copied his movements as best they could with the two others. The three carried the dummies toward the cleared path, but unfortunately, Izuku wasn’t paying close enough attention because his golem’s head bumped against the doorframe when he tried to exit the room.

“Ow. Ow. Ow,” the golem spoke flatly. Izuku cringed.

“They talk?!” Kirishima looked creeped out.

Yaoyorozu ignored it and remained 100% on task. “Let’s move it, people! We need to transport the survivors to the evacuation zone.”

This was probably a good time to make a save point. “git add canyon_dome/*; git commit -m "First house".”

The three of them exited the house and began hauling the dummies to the safe zone. The golems were pretty heavy, and even with the ice packs the swelting heat was exhausting, so it was a more difficult task than Izuku expected.

“Ow. Ow. Ow.”

It didn’t help that his golem never shut up.

They left the town square, cut through the field of dry grass, and then crossed the bridge single file, laboring under the weight of the golems. “Okay, we’re definitely not doing this right,” Kirishima spoke up. “It’s gonna take way too long to bring the dummies to the safe zone one by one.”

“I was thinking the same thing,” Yaoyorozu said. “I can create an encampment in the middle of the town square. We can set up some tarps and spray them down with water to keep the area cool and prevent it from catching fire. Does that sound good?”

Izuku nodded. “Let’s do it!”

The exercise proceeded more-or-less steadily after that. They set up a camp in the town square to temporarily hold the rescued golems, then Izuku pointed them to the next building to tackle. Kirishima led the way, charging straight through walls and any other obstructions that blocked their way while Izuku and Yaoyorozu acted in support roles. Thanks to both their quirks, they never needed to return to the safe zone to get extra equipment. Izuku suspected that they were trivializing a lot of the prepared obstacles. For example, when they found that one of the apartment building’s stairwells had collapsed, Yaoyorozu simply created a ladder on the spot.

That didn’t mean everything went smoothly. Izuku wasn’t the only one to accidentally injure the very people they were trying to save. They had one entirely avoidable dummy death as well.

They were just exiting one of the apartment buildings when the golem on Yaoyorozu’s back started screaming out of nowhere. They all startled for a moment, and then suddenly Yaoyorozu shrieked and slammed the dummy on the ground. The dummy was on fire, and—oh shit, Yaoyorozu’s hair was on fire too! She slapped the back of her head violently, starting to panic.

“I got you! I got you!” Kirishima pulled out his fire extinguisher and sprayed it all over Yaoyorozu’s face. The foam covered her eyes and mouth, blinding her and causing her to stumble around the hallway. All the while the golem was on fire and screeching on the floor.

“AAAAHHHHH!!” the golem wailed, a guttural cry of agony, writhing in pain as it burned alive on the ground. Yaoyorozu would be fine, so Kirishima turned the nozzle toward the golem, hoping to save it or at least stop the fire from spreading any further.

The screaming trailed off and died pathetically. It was too late. All that was left of the golem was a charred black corpse soaked with extinguisher agent. Its face was frozen in open-mouthed horror. The smell of burnt rotten wood permeated the air.

The three of them looked at each other awkwardly.

“…Um, let’s just keep going, I guess.”

Besides that mishap, things had gone well enough. After rescuing everyone, they piled the golems onto three wagons that Yaoyorozu created. They all hitched themselves to a wagon harness and began the small trek out of the model village and back to the bridge.

A nasty surprise was waiting for them there.

“Oh, come on!” Kirishima yelled in frustration. While they were busy rescuing the golems, the fire had spread along the grassy field that separated the town from the canyon. It had reached all the way to the rope bridge, which was now fully ablaze. There was no way they could cross now. Even if they braved the fire, the bridge looked like it would give way at any moment.

…And there it went. As Izuku watched, the fraying ropes split in two and sent the wooden planks crashing into the abyss below. Good timing. Honestly, this was all simulated, so it probably was timed. He just called it an “abyss”, but he saw a safety net down there when they crossed the bridge earlier.

Out of curiosity, Izuku knelt and felt the grass. As he suspected, the blades of grass felt synthetic, like some sort of plastic. “This is all part of the exercise,” Izuku said. “The grass isn’t real, so the fire isn’t real either. It couldn’t have spread to the bridge unless it was supposed to.”

“But how is that fair?” Kirishima complained. “None of us have flying quirks or anything. What are they expecting from us?”

“We were supposed to secure the escape route, I believe,” Yaoyorozu pondered aloud. “I suspect that, normally, teams would have to go back and forth over the bridge more often, so they would have noticed the spreading fire. Then we would be forced to split our focus between saving the victims and saving the bridge.”

“Bah. So now we’re just screwed, then?”

“No, it’s fine. We prepared for this,” Yaoyorozu said. “Midoriya, you’ve been making saves this whole time, right?”

Izuku grinned. “Yup!”

“Excellent. Can you roll everything back to maybe fifteen minutes ago? Not just the bridge, but our surroundings as well. We still need to pull the dummies through the field, which we can’t do while it’s on fire.”

He’d been making commits roughly every three minutes, so fifteen minutes would be five commits ago. The most recent commit on a branch was called the “head” of the branch, and you could refer to previous commits using the syntax “HEAD~5” (“head minus five”, or “five commits earlier than the head”). He could use the command “git reset” to roll everything back to that commit.

All simple enough. Izuku nodded and declared, “Git rese—”

He panicked and cut himself off.

He almost said it.

Testing his suspicions, Izuku turned around and placed a hand on one of the golems. “Git add golem,” he said.

Shit.

He tried again. “git add canyon_dome/golem.” This time it worked.

Izuku grimaced. “Okay, bad news. The golems are considered to be part of the canyon dome, so if I reset the environment then it’ll also teleport all the golems back inside the burning buildings.”

Kirishima groaned and Yaoyorozu facepalmed.

The clock was ticking. The bushfire was encroaching on them and would soon block the path back to the village. “All right,” Yaoyorozu said, back in business. “We need to leave and come up with a new plan. The fire is spreading quickly. We’ll be trapped if we stay here for much longer.”

“Wait! I can still figure this out!” Izuku pleaded. He’d been studying his quirk for nearly a year. He should know by now how to restore one thing but not another. His classmates were relying on him! “Just hold on a bit longer, please.”

“Fine, but be quick! We don’t have much time before the fire reaches us.”

Okay. Think, Izuku, think. He buckled down and tried to remember everything he could about rewinding changes in Git. By default, “git reset” redefines the head of the branch to be any arbitrary commit that I choose. It also has multiple modes like “--soft” and “--hard”. A soft reset leaves the working and staging areas unchanged and only changes the commit that the “head” points to, while a hard reset reverts everything to a previous state. All of these operations work on entire commits, not parts of commits. What I need to do is split things up so that I can revert everything except the golems. Okay, git reset won’t work.

What about “git revert”? That command essentially creates an “anti-commit” that does the exact opposite of some previous commit. If one commit moves something a meter to the right, then I can use revert to automatically create a new commit that moves it a meter to the left, canceling out the change. Same problem, though. It’s still an operation that primarily works on commits as a whole, not specific parts of them.

How about “git checkout”? It’s similar to “git switch”, but while that command can only switch to branches, “checkout” can switch to any commit and treat it as if it were the head of its own branch, although it results in that annoying “detached HEAD state” warning popup whenever it happens. Strangely, it also lets me checkout specific objects from the index, replacing the working area version of an object with the staged version. I don’t understand how those two functions relate to each other. It’s another example of one command doing two different things, like how both untracking and deleting objects use “git rm”. Is there a way of checking-out both a specific commit and a specific object at the same time? I don’t know. I don’t remember.

Is “git cherry-pick” an option? That command plucks a commit out of a branch, disentangling it from its surrounding context so that it can be reapplied somewhere else. It’s useful to use along with tags so that I can create new branches out of some arbitrary combination of previous commits. It’s a good way of avoiding that “detached HEAD state” warning message too. Does the command help me right now? Maybe? I’m not sure.

What about “git stash”? That command does two things. First, it takes all changes made since the last commit and saves it all as a patch object, then it restores everything back to the state of the most recent commit. If I could then use that patch object and only apply… No! Goddammit, that’s just the same issue in reverse! Instead of needing to partially revert the working area, which I don’t know how to do, I’d need to partially apply a patch object instead, which I don’t know how to do either!

FUCK! Why does Git have so many different commands for reverting to a previous commit, and yet none of them work? Why is this so complicated?!

While Izuku was stuck in his head and mired in the complexities of his quirk, the bushfire had completely surrounded them and trapped them by the edge of the canyon. The searing heat pressed in from all sides as the firestorm approached them, suffocating and relentless. “Any time now, Midoriya!” Yaoyorozu shouted at him.

“I’m thinking!” he yelled, the pressure on him building and building and crushing and crushing…

Okay, Izuku, calm down. You’re panicking. There might be a way to make it work with one of those other commands, but I don’t have time to figure that out right now. Go back to the tried-and-true: git restore. That command changes the working area to match the staging area. In simpler terms, “real” objects are moved to the positions of the “virtual” objects. But, importantly, it doesn’t do anything if the real and virtual positions already match.

If I add just the golems but nothing else right now, their virtual positions will be updated and a “git restore” won’t affect them. But how do I alter the restore command to point to a specific commit rather than its default behavior of using the staging area? Like, I think there might have been something in the manual about this, but I don’t remember the syntax for it. But, but… it should work! As long as that setting exists and I’m not misremembering. I just need to know what the right syntax is, and then… yeah, it’s my best shot right now.

Izuku pulled out his phone, opened up the Git reference manual PDF he’d saved, and scrolled as fast as he could to the relevant section.

“Midoriya! We’re trapped in a wildfire! It’s going to reach the wagons at any moment! Why are you checking your phone?!” Yaoyorozu sounded so pissed with him.

“I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” he cried, fingers trembling as he tried to find what he was looking for.

Okay! Okay, this is it. Okay. Oh god, if this doesn’t work then I’ll never be able to show my face to Yaoyorozu or Kirishima again.

“G-git, sorry, git add "canyon_dome/golem [*]"; git restore --source=HEAD~5 canyon_dome/*; git restore "canyon_dome/golem [*]",” he said as clearly as he could, fighting down his nerves.

The fire surrounding them vanished and the rope bridge returned to normal. The dummies were still there and unaffected by the command.

Oh, thank god. The weight on Izuku’s chest lifted and he let out a long sigh of relief.

The rest of the exercise was a foregone conclusion. The three of them spent the next few minutes going back and forth across the bridge, ferrying all the golems to the safe zone. When Kirishima arrived with the final golem, a buzzer sounded, signaling the end of the test.

They did it.

“Well done, little heroes! Let’s go over your results!” Loud Cloud said, standing next to a screen that showed video footage from the activity.

The three of them sat on one of the benches located in the area, taking a short break after the demanding lesson. Yaoyorozu had created a handheld mirror and was trying to take a look at the back of her head where her hair had caught on fire earlier. She frowned at what she saw.

“As a whole, your group did an excellent job!” Loud Cloud praised. “We don’t usually expect students to succeed the first time you tackle one of these courses, but you three rose to the challenge and pulled it off! You worked together seamlessly, leveraging both your own abilities and the strengths of your partners. You all should feel very proud of yourselves.”

They all grinned at each other, elated. “Ha, we rock!” Kirishima whooped. “First time we’ve ever done this and we already got it down pat!”

“Ah… no,” Loud Cloud said. “If this weren’t a simulation, all three of you would have died.”

“Bwah?” They all let out various noises of surprise. Well, that sure was a downer.

Loud Cloud nodded. “You all made several fatal errors. Which is to be expected, of course. Your teachers will go over this in a lot more detail tomorrow in class, so I’ll just cover a few major things right now.”

He clicked a button on his remote and a video started playing on the screen. In the footage, Izuku pointed at a wall and said that he sensed golems behind it, and then Kirishima charged straight through the wall in order to reach the dummies faster.

“You made this mistake several times. If this building were real, the ceiling would have collapsed on you all at that moment.”

“What?” Kirishima faltered. “But I didn’t even touch the support beams…”

Loud Cloud shook his head. “That’s not what I mean. Yes, to your group’s credit, you made sure to avoid the obvious load-bearing support pillars. The part that you didn’t consider was that the building’s structural integrity was already compromised. Additional pressure was being put on sections of the building not designed to support that weight, and the impact of destructive actions like knocking down walls would have caused the already precarious structure to collapse. You were busting through obstacles as if you were in a safe, solid, undamaged building, rather than treating it with the caution it deserved.”

“Oh.” Kirishima cringed and hung his head. “Sorry, guys.”

“I’m not singling you out,” Loud Cloud clarified. “All three of you were there. I understand that you were prioritizing speed, and that’s a good thing, but none of you considered the potential dangers of being so reckless inside a burning building. Like I said, your group made this same mistake several times.”

He clicked his remote again to show various scenes. “Continuing on, none of you were careful about checking for fires out of sight before rushing through areas. That’s somewhat excusable for Kirishima, but not for Yaoyorozu or Midoriya.” In the footage, Izuku watched himself blindly darting around a corner. From the footage, he could see that the hallway he was thoughtlessly about to run through was fully ablaze. The moment he turned the corner without checking if it was safe, the fires in the hallway extinguished themselves so that he didn’t accidentally run straight into the flames. Yeesh. That was embarrassing to watch.

Loud Cloud continued, “This general carelessness was the main cause of your group’s only casualty.” The footage showed Yaoyorozu hauling one of the golems on her back through the apartment building, the dummy’s head and legs sticking out to either side. She was so focused on reaching the exit that she didn’t notice when her gait thrust the golem’s head straight into a fire behind her. The golem started screaming, the fire spread to Yaoyorozu’s hair, and they reexperienced Kirishima spraying her in the face with his extinguisher and the golem flailing and screaming on the floor as it burned alive.

Yaoyorozu had covered her face with her hands, so Izuku couldn’t see her expression, but her ears were burning red-hot.

Loud Cloud clicked the remote again, and the footage changed to show the final stretch of the exercise. Oh no. The scene showed the bridge collapse and the several minutes that followed. Izuku felt bad at the time, but it was so, so much worse watching it objectively. While Yaoyorozu and Kirishima were panicking and trying to pull the wagons away from the ever-encroaching fire that surrounded them, Izuku just stood there like a total idiot trying to remember the correct commands, half-oblivious to the roaring flames that threatened to burn them to ashes.

It was mortifying. “I’m so sorry,” he blubbered. “I promise I’ll be faster next time.”

“Midoriya, the issue isn’t about speed, it’s about communication,” Loud Cloud said. “There’s nothing wrong with needing time to do something. You can plan around that. The problem is that you left your allies in the dark in a dangerous situation. Nothing was stopping you from helping your teammates retreat to a safer location before using your quirk, but you tried to do everything yourself without considering the situation as a whole.”

Izuku nodded, ashamed. It was funny, in its own weird way. Of all the flaws Izuku expected he might have as a hero, he never would have guessed that ego would have been one of them. It came from a different place than someone like Katsuki, of course—Izuku wasn’t trying to prove that he was the best, but he was trying to prove that he was capable and deserved to be there. All those years of self-doubt had taken a toll on him.

Loud Cloud was completely correct. He should have admitted that he didn’t know the correct command and helped the others retreat instead, but that would have been embarrassing, and so he didn’t.

“I know it’s a bummer to be confronted with your mistakes in full HD, but let me reiterate that the three of you did a fantastic job,” Loud Cloud said. “You weren’t expected to complete the course the first time you did it. Be very proud!”

No one seemed very proud. Kirishima was still kicking himself over killing them all multiple times without realizing it, Yaoyorozu was ashamed over causing their group’s only causality and hurting the people she was supposed to save, and Izuku was busy rethinking his entire approach to how he used his quirk.

It was true, Izuku should have swallowed his pride and been more open with his teammates. But at the same time, the whole situation shouldn’t have happened at all. Having to pull out his phone because he couldn’t remember the correct command syntax was an inexcusable mistake. He could never afford to do that while battling a villain or something.

He needed to be better.

Loud Cloud clapped his hands together to refocus everyone. “All right! We’ll regroup with Greenheart and your classmates, and then let’s kick off the next course!”

They followed their teacher as he zipped along on his miniature cloud, the group all lost in their own thoughts. To make himself feel better, Izuku reassured himself that it could be worse. As confusing as his quirk often was, his saving grace was that he was the only person who could use Git. His manual was written for the original computer program and focused heavily on how to share your work with other people. It covered stuff like “remote repositories” and “upstream branches” and “pushing” and “pulling” changes, not to mention some even stranger terms like “access tokens” and “credential authentication”.

Thankfully, he could ignore all of it. If he had to learn all that too, he might as well give up. It hurt his head just imagining the chaos that would unfold if other people were also capable of splitting the timeline, merging things in, overwriting changes, adding their own commits into his branches, and generally mucking about with everything whenever they wanted. He had enough trouble dealing with his own stuff! How would it even be possible to keep track of that sort of thing? It would be like trying to follow a time travel movie with multiple time travelers all independently messing with the timeline simultaneously.

Izuku shivered at the mere thought. What a nightmare.

Thank goodness Git didn’t exist anymore, sparing the world from such a headache.

Chapter Text

Each group ended up having time to run through two more courses. Izuku was paired with Kirishima and Aoyama to brave the forest fire dome, and lastly he tackled the factory dome with Jirou and Ashido.

Izuku was so relieved when Loud Cloud announced that they were finished. He was exhausted and sweltering, and he still felt dehydrated despite guzzling multiple bottles of water. He was so ready to be done with this. Yaoyorozu probably had it the worst, though. She looked noticeably thinner than she did at the start of the day. She was probably regretting using her quirk so liberally.

They weren’t heading back to UA just yet, though; they still had to take part in the final activity of the day. Thankfully, Loud Cloud told them that it just involved talking. They could rest now, it was fine.

They met with the rest of their classmates at the Flood Zone where the exercise was set to take place. They were on a platform that overlooked the artificial lake. Izuku gravitated over to Denki and looked over his friend. Denki’s clothes were utterly drenched, his hair was frazzled and sticking up all over the place, and his eyes kept fluttering shut as if he were ready to collapse and fall asleep at any moment.

Denki’s gaze swept over Izuku as well. “Heh, glad I’m not the only one who looks like a wreck,” he laughed. “You were in the fire area, right?”

“Funny, I was going to say the same to you. I guess I don’t win any prizes for guessing you were here in the Flood Zone?”

“Ha, nope.” Denki grinned and shook his head like a dog, spraying water droplets everywhere. “But man, it was all worth it. Y’know why?” He leaned in like he was telling a secret. “I just got to spend a bunch of time ordering Bakugou around, and he wasn’t allowed to complain!”

Izuku’s eyes widened. “I’m listening!”

“We were here saving ships and stuff. Bakugou was useless because his quirk doesn’t work in the water, and it was too dangerous for him to use inside a sinking ship. I was on the bridge powering emergency generators and handling the ship controls, and Bakugou got assigned as my assistant to do whatever I needed, which was mostly to haul shit around for me.”

Incredible. “I need to hear the full story later!” Thirteen did tell them to talk to their classmates about their experiences, after all. Izuku was just doing his due diligence as a good student.

While they were talking, Tooru wandered over to the two of them. She kind of ignored Denki and spent a moment taking in Izuku’s appearance. “Wow, Izuku, you look like total shit. What, did you get lost inside a tanning machine?”

Did the fire zone leave him looking that red? “Oh yeah? Well, you look like…” Izuku began to retort, and then he trailed off as he took in the appearance of… the completely invisible girl in front of him… dammit.

Tooru leaned forward right in his face. “What was that, Izuku? I look perfect and immaculate as always? Is that what you meant to say? Why, yes, I am pretty and perfect! I’m glad you noticed!”

Izuku groaned while Tooru laughed at him.

Thankfully, he was spared from any further embarrassment. “Welcome back, everyone!” Loud Cloud announced. The students all turned to face him. “I think we can all agree that today’s been a fun and productive day! Before I turn it over to Thirteen, I hope you all will indulge me for a few more minutes.”

He zipped on his cloud to hover above Aizawa. “Believe it or not, I wanted to be a frontline hero when I was your age. I was in the same class as Shouta here. While my pal planned to go underground and stick to the shadows, my goal was to go out there and kick butt and catch villains and get merch deals and all the rest of it. I’d be the coolest hero ever! Villains wouldn’t know what hit ’em when I was around!”

His cheery tone stopped. “And then I died.”

The tonal whiplash was immediate and effective.

“A building fell on me during a battle with a villain. And I died. I’m still here, so I didn’t stay dead, obviously, but it was a close call. I needed to be resuscitated. I don’t remember much from that day, but there’s one memory I can never forget.

“For what felt like hours, I was buried beneath the rubble of the building. It felt like my entire world had ended. I was in the pitch-black, a piece of rebar puncturing my gut, broken, bleeding, crying, dying, and alone.” He paused. “And then there was light. A rescue hero found me, she soothed me, she told me that everything would be okay. I was saved. I finally passed out, and then I woke up in the hospital a week later.

“Everything changed for me that day. When I returned to UA after a long recovery, I knew that I couldn’t do the same thing as I did before. I didn’t want to battle baddies; I wanted to be someone’s hero.

“For all you students, it’s easy to get caught up in the moment. The USJ is exciting at first, and then you run through some rescue courses, you get tired and frustrated, you worry about your grades, all of that. I get it. But it’s worth it to take a step back and really think about what you’ve accomplished. Every successful rescue you’ve made today represents a person whose life you saved. It’ll be a defining moment in that person’s life that they’ll remember forever—the day a hero saved them. Internalize it, feel it, because it’s important.”

Loud Cloud let out an exaggerated laugh into the solemn air. “I hope I didn’t bring down the mood too much! But this last exercise from Thirteen today is a bit of a downer as well, so I want you guys to understand what all of this really represents. Anyway, I’ll shut up now. Thirteen, over to you!”

“Thank you for your impassioned speech, Loud Cloud,” Thirteen said. “The weight of responsibility that we bear as heroes is both rewarding and, at times, overwhelming. Unfortunately, despite your best efforts, no matter how powerful you are, you can’t always save everyone. That is what this last exercise will be about.”

Apparently, this test also involved being split into groups. Thirteen quickly split them into five groups of four. It wasn’t based on anything in particular, just on who they happened to be standing next to. Izuku ended up in a group with Tooru, Jirou, and Tokoyami.

Thirteen pressed a button on the control panel next to her, and a low, mechanical rumble began to vibrate through the floor. Izuku peered over the edge of the railing as the artificial lake below started to churn. Slowly, a replica island began to rise from the depths. The model was about ten meters in diameter, intricately detailed with scaled-down skyscrapers, winding roads, little trees in little parks, and… Oh! Izuku recognized it now! That was I-Island!

Confirming his thoughts, the screen next to Thirteen lit up to show an overhead diagram of I-Island. The diagram labeled various facilities, showed a population density map, marked key infrastructure locations like power generators and the electrical grid, provided information on shelters and emergency routes, and many other details. Uh oh, whatever this exercise was, they’d have to use all this information, wouldn’t they?

“Below us is a scale model of I-Island,” Thirteen said. “Despite its name, I-Island is an enormous ship that travels the ocean, not an island. It really should have been called ‘B-Boat’.”

No one laughed.

Thirteen continued without skipping a beat. “While I-Island is a marvel of engineering, it suffers from a known design flaw: vulnerability to tsunamis and flooding, much like a real island. Unlike a real island, a devastating tsunami could potentially sink it. Conventional ships can navigate rough seas by steering into waves with their hydrodynamic designs, but I-Island’s circular shape and lack of mobility make this impossible. Thus, the designers of I-Island had to devise their own solution.”

Down below, a dozen large steel pillars rose from the water on one side of the model I-Island, each with a curved flat shield on one side that interlocked with the other pillars to create a solid, impenetrable wall. The pillars were pretty large even at this scale—Izuku couldn’t imagine how large they would be in the real world, assuming the model was accurate. They would tower over the skyline.

A large wave simulating a tsunami crossed the lake at speed, heading toward I-Island. It struck the shield instead; the wave was easily dispersed outward and I-Island remained untouched.

“As you can see, the designers of I-Island went Plus Ultra and constructed enormous shields around the exterior that can be raised in times of emergency,” Thirteen said. “However, the massive power requirements for these shields limit how quickly they can be raised, which brings us to our exercise.

“Here’s our scenario. An impossibly unlikely and unlucky event has occurred: Two different tsunamis are headed for I-Island at once from opposite directions, and they will both strike the island in ninety seconds. Each group will take turns controlling the flow of power to the shields from this control panel. The less power a shield receives, the slower it will rise.

“I’ll spoil it now: You don’t have time to raise all the shields. Specifically, you only have enough time to raise about half of them. Your group needs to decide what to prioritize, and you need to decide quickly.”

Ah. He understood now. Some people had to die, and they got to decide who. Joy.

Ojiro spoke up, “So, this is like the trolley problem?”

“Partially,” Thirteen replied. “The trolley problem is about action vs. inaction, which is not the case here. You are heroes, so you always need to take action. However, it’s similar in that you can’t save everyone, and there are no right answers. We simply want you to make a decision and then be able to justify your decision to your peers.” She gestured to the monitor on her left that showed the diagram of I-Island. “You’ll use the information displayed here to help guide your decision-making.”

Rin raised his hand. “Don’t the groups that go later have an advantage? Like, they can study the map for longer and stuff.”

“Don’t worry, this won’t be graded. It’s a gentle introduction to high-pressure scenarios. In the future, don’t be surprised if we suddenly surprise you with an impossible choice in the middle of a seemingly unrelated activity, but for today, we want this to be a roundtable discussion.”

Denki rolled his eyes. “Since when does UA do gentle introductions? Sensei practically threatened to expel us all on the first day for no reason.”

Thirteen turned to stare at Aizawa. Aizawa stared back, unashamed. After a few moments, Thirteen apparently decided it wasn’t worth it and turned back to the class. “Every teacher has their own teaching style,” she said diplomatically. “Now, does everyone understand what to do?”

Izuku nodded, as did the others.

“All right. You’re up, Group 1! I’m activating the simulator now. The two tsunamis will hit the east and west sides of I-Island in ninety seconds. Go!”

Tsu, Yaoyorozu, Rin, and Kodai quickly approached the control panel. Immediately, Yaoyorozu flicked the switches to start raising several shields on the west side. Then, the four of them began to quietly argue with each other, pointing at different things on the map and making small adjustments to their strategy as they came to an agreement on what was most important to protect.

Down below, the west side of the model island had its shields raised while the east side was unprotected. The ninety seconds were over quickly, and the two miniature tsunamis crashed over the island. The west side was mostly intact, while most of the model buildings on the east side retracted into the island to symbolize their destruction.

That was that. Thirteen waved the group back from the control panel to rejoin their classmates.

“First of all, excellent job, Yaoyorozu,” Thirteen praised. “You immediately jumped to action, which was the correct call. Every second counts, so it’s important to get something started even if you change your mind later. Students in previous years usually don’t clue in on that until a few groups have already gone.”

Yaoyorozu blushed. “Thank you.”

“Now, please explain your group’s decisions.”

With a nod, Yaoyorozu gestured to the display. “We chose to prioritize protecting the regions that would allow I-Island to support its population while they await external help. As you can see on the map here, the shielded sectors contain the hospitals, emergency equipment, food storage, water treatment, and other vital infrastructure.”

“That is a very sensible strategy,” Thirteen said. “However, I’ll point out that the regions you allowed to be destroyed have a far greater number of residential and commercial buildings. You can see by the population density map that a much larger proportion of the island’s population will be on the side that you left unprotected.”

Yaoyorozu faltered a little bit, but Tsu was ready for that response. “I’m planning to be an aquatic rescue hero. I’ve looked into things like this, ribbit,” she said. “I-Island has a population comparable to a medium-sized city, and it’s in the middle of the ocean. It’s not enough to send a plane there to pick up the survivors and fly off; there are too many people for that.” Her voice was serious. “If the infrastructure is destroyed, then we’re just dooming the surviving population to a slow death of thirst and hunger and succumbing to their injuries.”

Yaoyorozu spoke again. “Yes, it’s unfortunate, but it’s unavoidable that in such an isolated location, the residents of I-Island will need to survive on their own for a while.”

“Very practically minded of you. Would you really be able to do that, though?” Thirteen asked solemnly. “Would you truly choose to see whole neighborhoods be washed away? Is it heroic to stare a family in the eyes and decide that their lives are not worth that of a wastewater treatment facility?”

No one in the group seemed to know how they should respond to that.

“Remember, there are no right answers here. I just want you all to think about it. You’ve given a good explanation for your decisions, so I’ll let you go,” Thirteen said. “All right. Group 2, you’re up!”

Aoyama, Honenuki, Kouda, and Kirishima stepped up. Immediately, Honenuki took over the control panel. “Here, let me do it. I have an idea. Look, we need to space out the shields…”

Izuku peered over the railing to see what the group was doing. It looked like instead of only raising the shields on one side, they were raising every other shield so that the entire perimeter was partially protected. Honenuki flipped another set of switches. Down below, the shields were halted before they were fully raised, and the other half started to rise instead. Clever! There wasn’t enough time to raise all the pillars, but you did have enough time to partially raise most of them.

Well, Izuku thought it was clever. He was disabused of that notion when the two tsunamis hit. Rather than protecting the island, the partially raised pillars acted like a funnel to direct the water up and over the weakest link in the chain of shields. Even worse, all the energy being directed into a smaller area just made the result even more devastating. Jet streams of water surged into the model on both sides, flooding the entire island.

Honenuki’s face crumpled, and the other group members awkwardly looked away.

Speaking delicately to soften the blow, Thirteen said, “That was a good try, and it’s very noble that your group attempted to save everyone. However, you underestimated how much force a tsunami carries. All that energy has to go somewhere, and the shields don’t properly redirect it unless fully deployed. It was an understandable mistake, but a mistake nonetheless. Unfortunately, this round resulted in everyone’s deaths.”

The group shuffled off to rejoin the class. “Sorry, guys,” Honenuki mumbled.

“It’s cool. Wanting to save everyone is super manly!” Kirishima tried his best.

Thirteen got everyone’s attention again. “Group 3, you’re up!” This group consisted of Denki, Ochako, Katsuki, and Kamakiri.

“Um, Thirteen?” Denki said. “I can power machinery directly with my quirk. I did it earlier in the shipwreck area.” He raised his hand and showed off some electric sparks for emphasis. “Can I use my power to help speed up the shields?”

Thirteen was pleased by the question. “I like that you’re thinking outside the box! Your idea would be effective for this miniature model, but remember that it’s meant to represent the full-sized I-Island.” She chuckled. “We’ve had some sneaky students in the past who have tried things like hacking the control panel to supply extra power to the shields, so now there’s a circuit breaker installed that will trip if more electricity is supplied than expected.”

Denki shrugged. “Yeah, figured.”

Thirteen continued, “With that said, you’re allowed to use your quirks here if it genuinely would help, but you need to justify to me that your idea would work in a real-world scenario.”

They could use their quirks? Huh. Well, Izuku knew what he’d be doing then.

The next round began, and the group quickly got to work. Katsuki and Kamakiri were arguing and shoving each other away from the control panel, which was funny because, as far as Izuku could tell, they were on the same page. They both apparently just didn’t trust anyone else to do the job right but them.

It looked like they were going for a simple strategy, the opposite of the first one. The island’s east side was protected while the west side was wide open. They’d chosen to prioritize the most populated areas and not worry about medical facilities and infrastructure. When the mini-tsunamis hit, many parts of the island were flooded, but the residential sectors were the least affected.

They rejoined the class, and Thirteen began the discussion once more. “From what I can see, you based your shield placement solely on the population density map and ignored all other data. You chose to protect the most populated areas while allowing most of the infrastructure to be destroyed. Please explain.”

Katsuki scoffed. “Only a loser decides to give up before trying. Yeah, sure, keeping everyone alive long enough to be rescued is a big, complicated problem. Frogger and friends couldn’t think of a solution after thinking about it for less than a minute, so they decided to let everyone die instead.”

Ochako squirmed as she listened to Katsuki pointlessly picking fights with their classmates. “What he means is that we need to give ourselves as much time as we can. We need to keep people alive in the moment so that we have more opportunities in the future.”

Thirteen hummed. “Your answer is quite vague. What specifically do you have in mind?”

“Just like… who knows what’s possible?” Denki said. “There are a lot of crazy quirks in the world. We need to save everyone first so that the people who might be able to help have a chance to do so. Anything else isn’t very Plus Ultra, it’s more like Minus… uh, I didn’t think this through. What’s the opposite of ‘Ultra’? Doesn’t matter, you get what I mean.”

Aizawa surprisingly spoke up next. “So, you do not accept responsibility? You’re leaving the survivors in a terrible position, wiping your hands of it, and saying that it’s someone else’s problem to fix now?”

“No!” Denki exclaimed. “That’s not what I mean. I’m saying that I don’t know everything. I don’t know most things, and that’s okay. We don’t know enough, and we don’t have enough time to make that judgment call. All we really know is that a bunch of people are going to die if we don’t do anything, and we need to save them. Everything else can come later.”

“You can fix a lot, but you can’t fix death,” Kamakiri said.

Apparently that was good enough for Aizawa as he nodded and slunk back into his sleeping bag.

“I’m very happy to hear these different perspectives! It’s what this exercise is all about.” Thirteen beamed. “You’re up, Group 4!”

This group was Tooru, Jirou, Tokoyami, and Izuku himself. They all stepped forward.

To be honest, Izuku didn’t like this test. It seemed like the antithesis of Loud Cloud’s speech earlier. Loud Cloud emphasized the importance of each individual life, but the scale model of the island didn’t just represent one life—it represented an entire population. And yet, those lives had been miniaturized to the point that they didn’t even exist. The island had model buildings, but not model people. The class was making these decisions over who lived and who died while standing on a raised platform, far away, physically above it all. Why? Why was it all abstracted away?

If he looked at it from the school’s point of view, he supposed it made sense. They were only a few weeks into the school year. The test was about forcing the students to choose who they would save and who they would let die to prepare them for similar choices they would face in the future. Maybe later in the year they’d have to make choices like that while staring at lifelike human models, but there was no point in forcing that trauma on a bunch of teenagers this early.

Still, he didn’t like it. Every single one of those lives was a Loud Cloud pleading to be saved, and Izuku was determined to save them all.

Izuku straightened up and looked each of his teammates in the eyes. “I want to try something,” he said. “You can all throw me under the bus if it doesn’t work. I don’t mind. Just please let me do this by myself.”

“Huh, you’re not usually so forward.” Tooru smirked. “I like it. Do it, dude.”

Jirou shrugged. She didn’t care.

“The fervor I see in your enigmatic orbs moves me to accept your judgment on this affair,” Tokoyami intoned.

Dark Shadow hopped on Tokoyami’s head. “He means we wanna see what crazy shit you’re gonna do this time!”

“I’m activating the simulator now,” Thirteen said. “Go!”

Izuku approached the control panel and placed a hand on it. “git switch -c i-island-test; git add control_panel; git commit -m "Default control panel position".” These commands created a new timeline for the test and saved the control panel in the neutral position.

“git branch island-east; git branch island-west.” This created two more timelines that each branched off from the neutral position.

“git switch island-east.” Izuku switched to the “east” timeline. He quickly flipped the switches on the control panel so that all electrical power was routed to the east side of I-Island, causing the shields to begin rising on that side of the island. “git add control-panel; git commit -m "I-Island east shields".” This state was saved.

“git switch island-west.” This switched him to the “west” timeline. The control panel returned to its default position, and the shields on the model below stopped their ascent. Izuku then flipped the switches on the panel in the opposite direction so that all power was routed toward the west side of I-Island instead. The shields on that side of the island started to rise. “git add control-panel; git commit -m "I-Island west shields".”

Now for the moment of truth. It was time to merge the timelines. Izuku stepped back from the control panel and commanded, “git merge island-east island-west.”

There was a crack.

In an instant, every eye snapped toward the area right above the control panel. Suspended in midair was a jagged fracture, shimmering and refracting light like a crack in an invisible pane of glass… yet the glass was reality itself. It was as if the world was made of glass—had always been made of glass, even if they were never aware of it before—and the fracture made it visible to them all. It was both mesmerizing and terrifying. The crack snaked outward with alarming speed, a spiderweb of splinters racing through the air. The fissure snapped and cracked and kept spreading until—

—Reality shattered.

Auto-merging control_panel
CONFLICT (content): Merge conflict in control_panel
Automatic merge failed; fix conflicts and then commit the result.


A spike of pain drilled into Izuku’s head. He expected it, but he still winced at the sudden headache.

The glass had shattered. The constitutional firmament—the barrier that separated mundane reality from the endless beyond—had broken. Large, translucent crystals of firmament collided and interlocked at impossible angles, jutting out from the singularity at the center of the fracture. Trying to look through the broken glass revealed a kaleidoscope of possibilities through each plane. From one viewpoint, the switches on the control panel were flipped in one configuration; from another viewpoint, they were flipped in an opposite, contradictory configuration. Various viewpoints revealed every possible permutation of ways to merge the timelines.

If you looked through the cracks in reality just right… if you peered between the possibilities… right on the edges between boundaries… there was endless black. It was a breathtaking black, the black one would see looking up into the infinite expanse of the night sky. Little stars floated in the black, shining brightly and flowing down cosmic currents that spiraled in fluid patterns.

Alien starlight shone through the cracks in the firmament.

…But Izuku wasn’t paying attention to any of that. He was used to it. He’d seen it all before. Totally old hat by now. No, his gaze was focused entirely on the model I-Island below.

All shields on the model below were rising simultaneously. That was the good news. The bad news was that Izuku could see little reflected shimmers of strained glass in various spots in the model below, especially where the shields’ east and west edges met. Uh oh. Izuku watched nervously. He would definitely fail if a merge conflict occurred on the island itself. It shouldn’t, though. There was nothing inherently paradoxical about all the shields rising at once. Izuku crossed his fingers.

The shields slid into place, and the shimmering glass below settled down. With a triumphant grin, Izuku watched the two tsunamis harmlessly strike the shields. He pumped his fist and let out a quiet whoop. I-Island was perfectly protected. Everyone was safe.

Izuku turned back to the class. Absolutely no one had paid any attention to his success. They were all still gaping open-mouthed at the sphere of broken reality around the control panel. Welp, he supposed he had some explaining to do.

“Midoriya.” Aizawa broke his gaze and turned to look Izuku in the eyes. “What did you do?”

It was always nerve-wracking to be the target of Aizawa’s attention. Izuku tried to project as much confidence as he could. “Right. So, basically, I created one timeline where I directed power to half of the shields and then another timeline where I directed power to the other half. Then, I merged them so that the model received power from both timelines simultaneously. The circuit breaker didn’t trip because, in each timeline, it received the correct amount of power. That’s my quirk, by the way. I can create alternate timelines.”

“YOU WERE FUCKING SERIOUS ABOUT THAT?” Katsuki screeched.

“So, this here,” Izuku continued, gesturing to the merge conflict beside him. “This happens when there’s a contradiction between the timelines. Basically, this is what a time paradox looks like. When I resolve the conflict, only one possibility will become the ‘true’ one. But until I do that, it acts as if both possibilities are happening at once. Like, in terms of how it affects the outside world.” Izuku trailed off after this. Was that a good enough explanation?

There was a strained silence. And then: “Oh, come on!” Sero threw up his hands in exasperation. “Midoriya pulled another crazy power out of his ass? How are we supposed to compete with that?” There were some strangled laughs.

Denki walked up to the merge conflict to look at it more closely. He gingerly touched one of the jagged pieces of glass. When nothing strange happened, he slid his finger down the edge of the firmament. “Ow!” Denki suddenly yelped and pulled back his hand. There was a small slice in his finger that started to bleed. He laughed and held up his hand for everyone to see. “Look! Look, guys! I’m so cutting edge I cut myself on a time paradox!”

Thirteen tried to bring things back on track. “Very, um, impressively done there, Midoriya. However, I did mention before that you could only use your quirk if it would work in a real-world scenario. This was effective for the model, but I don’t believe you could do this for the real I-Island.”

“No, I could,” Izuku said. “Probably not exactly like this, but the general idea should work. My quirk doesn’t really care about scale. Using my quirk on a pebble feels exactly like using it on a boulder.” He paused. “Or a mountain,” he muttered.

Thirteen was silent for a while. “…I see,” she said eventually.

Aizawa was up by the control panel, examining the merge conflict from all angles. Suddenly, he winced and had to avert his gaze. Huh? Hold on, what did he see in there? “This was meant to be a thought exercise, problem child,” he barked. “We wanted to see how you would handle a stressful situation. Your reaction to being put under pressure is to do this?”

“Of course!” Izuku said proudly. “Always. If it means saving people, I’m willing to do whatever it takes, no matter how far I need to go. That’s what it means to be a hero.”

Aizawa looked thoroughly disturbed by his answer. What, why? That was a totally heroic response! What was Aizawa’s problem?

Thirteen stood by Aizawa to also examine the sphere of broken reality where the control panel used to be. “Um… we still do need to move along. This can be… fixed, right?”

“Yeah, of course. I have to fix it, actually. Doing this gives me a really bad headache. I can bear it for now, but it’ll get worse and worse until I resolve the merge conflict.” Izuku walked up to the control panel and stuck his hand through the different planes of possibilities. Unlike with Denki earlier, the shards of firmament didn’t hurt Izuku. He touched each paradoxical switch in the correct timeline to indicate which position it was supposed to be in, and each time he did so, the shattered glass in that spot mended itself.

“git add control_panel; git commit,” Izuku said once he was finished.

[island-west 47d2f9f] Merge branch 'island-east' into island-west
 1 file changed


“All done,” Izuku said. Everything was back to normal.

There was a beat of awed silence.

“Ribbit. I told you, Midoriya’s quirk makes no sense.”

Addendum:

git to the heart of it

Leaning back in his seat on the bus, Denki finally had a chance to examine the cut on his finger more closely. He hadn’t had a good look at it earlier, but now that they were all headed back to UA, he had some time to himself to properly inspect what he had only glimpsed before.

He tilted his finger side to side, trying to get a good angle to squint directly into the cut. The bus ride admittedly wasn’t helping. It was challenging to keep his hand steady with all the bumps and jitters inherent to driving.

There! A grin leaped onto Denki’s face when he spotted what he was looking for. When he tilted his finger at just the right angle, he could peer through the thin vertical slit into the boundless cosmos beyond. Starlight shone through the fractured reality contained within the cut on his finger.

Man, it was so freaking awesome!

Unfortunately, it was probably going to heal soon. The rift was a lot easier to see earlier when he first cut his finger, but now it was so thin it was barely visible. What a bummer.

It made sense. Izuku’s time paradox had caused a crack in reality. The world needed a little bit of time to heal, just like every other living thing. It seemed perfectly reasonable to Denki.

Even though it was probably dumb, part of Denki wished the cut wouldn’t fully go away. All the coolest heroes had cool scars, and he would have the coolest of them all, a star-scar! Although, scars on the tips of your fingers weren’t all that cool, so maybe it was for the best.

As much as Denki really wanted to show this off to his classmates before it disappeared, he held off. He knew they’d get the wrong idea about it. He would’ve shown it to Izuku, but he wouldn’t be able to show him without grabbing the attention of his classmates nearby. They’d get all worried and freaked out, and then Izuku would get even more scrutiny from everyone, which was so dumb. Izuku’s quirk only ever saved people; it never hurt them. No different than Izuku himself, really.

It was crazy that no one else thought that Izuku was the coolest guy ever.

When they first met, Izuku said he’d been bullied before UA. Denki found it hard to believe then, but now? Yeah… yeah, he could see it. Denki didn’t think that Izuku noticed that most people in class didn’t talk to him much. Maybe the little interaction he did have with them was already more than he was used to?

It wasn’t like his classmates were mean or anything. Not at all. But there was definitely some degree of… distance. Izuku was lost in his own head half the time, saying weird things in an unpronounceable language that sounded like something between English and eldritch. The way he used his quirk (quirks?) made it seem like he was commanding the world itself to follow his orders. He was brimming with talent and confidence one moment, only to shy away whenever anyone commented on it.

He was the class enigma. No one knew what to make of him. All the teachers seemed a little scared of him too, adding to the whole mess. Denki had heard the phrase “The Mystery of Midoriya” thrown around. Whispers like “What’s hiding behind that smile?” lingered in the air, everyone searching for the real Midoriya Izuku behind the facade he showed the world.

Which was so stupid! Denki wanted to tear his hair out whenever he heard his classmates talk like that. There was no mystery! Midoriya Izuku was the least mysterious person ever! He wore his heart on his sleeve. Denki felt so lucky to have a friend like Izuku because he didn’t have to worry about hidden agendas or feel like he had to decipher unspoken implications with him. Izuku was straightforwardly honest and genuine about everything.

Denki was a simple dude. For once, he was happy about that. He often missed the subtext in conversations and ended up saying something stupid because of it. Someone would have to spell things out for him, and then everyone would laugh at him for being a dumbass. Denki would laugh along to seem like he was in on the joke, even when he felt awful inside.

But there was something to be said for seeing things as they really were. Denki knew he was right. He wasn’t missing anything this time. Everyone else was trying to overthink the blatantly obvious, and it was maddening!

Denki was glad he wasn’t alone, at least. Ochako and Hagakure understood too. Bakugou got it as well, although he didn’t really count. He just called the whole class a bunch of cowards and spent the rest of his time pissed off. Denki was a little annoyed that he agreed with Bakugou on something.

Denki stopped gazing into the ripped veil between worlds on his finger and turned to look at Izuku. Hagakure was sitting next to him and teasing him about something. Izuku was blushing and trying his best to keep up with her jabs, but he looked happy. Ochako sat across from them and stared at the two with the predatory eyes of a matchmaker.

To be honest, Denki didn’t know exactly what Hagakure’s deal was. She acted a little differently when Izuku was around, not that Izuku himself had any way of knowing that. She became even more teasing and competitive, always wanting to brag and show off. Ochako was totally convinced that Hagakure had a crush on Izuku and acted that way because she was trying to impress him.

And, like… maybe? It wasn’t like Denki understood girls. Ochako was a girl, so she obviously understood girls better than he did. But it just didn’t quite ring true to him. Maybe he was projecting, but Denki knew what it felt like when people made fun of him, and that was kind of the vibe he got from Hagakure. Her teasing didn’t seem like flirting… there was a bit too much of an edge to it. It was more like she wanted to one-up Izuku, be the one in control of the conversation.

Denki felt shitty for comparing her to his bullies. He knew Hagakure liked Izuku and didn’t mean anything bad by it, but he couldn’t lie and say that the parallels weren’t not not there. (Wait, was that the right number of “not”s?)

Anyway, if he had to describe their dynamic, it was like she was trying to provoke Izuku into being her… rival, or something, except that Izuku was a bottomless well of praise and encouragement who never said a bad word about anybody. She poked him, and he took it, so she poked him harder, and he kept on taking it. It was all more one-sided than it should’ve been.

But Denki knew he was a little biased, maybe a little too defensive. Izuku didn’t need defending. Maybe Ochako was right. Hagakure wanted to impress him, and he wanted to be impressed. Izuku was receptive to all of it because he thought everyone was amazing. Nothing about that was one-sided. It was just the way it was.

Denki took another look at the big smile on Izuku’s face as the two chatted. Meh. Izuku was happy with whatever was going on there, so it wasn’t any of his business.

He turned back to look at his finger so he could gaze at the stars again. Disappointingly, no matter how he twisted his hands or what angle he looked in, he couldn’t get a view of it anymore. The cut on his finger was still there, but the rift had healed.

Aw.

Denki leaned over and punched Izuku in the shoulder. “Hey, man, you’re really cool.”

Izuku turned to him in surprise, a big flush erupting on his face. “W-why’d you say that?”

“No reason. ’Cause it’s true.”

Izuku didn’t seem to know how to react at first, but he beamed brightly after a few moments. “You’re really cool, too!”

“Thanks, man.” Denki gave him a thumbs up, and then he relaxed for the rest of the ride back to UA.

Chapter Text

Izuku walked down the halls of UA toward the Support Department. It was finally time for him to meet his assigned first-year support engineer. He’d been looking forward to this for a while. His quirk was at its best when paired with support equipment, and he was eager to see what the support students had planned for him!

He was riding high in general. Tomorrow was the weekend, and he made plans with his friends (his friends!) to go hang out at the mall (he was going to hang out with his friends at the mall!). He had no idea what teenagers did at the mall, but he was going to find out!

Coming across a large steel door, Izuku double-checked the room number. Yep, this was it, the first-year workshop. Why did they need such a sturdy door? Whatever. Izuku opened the door to find a bunch of support students working away at their stations. Sounds of arc welding and metal hammers pounding away were punctuated with sporadic staccato swears.

Izuku turned to the closest student, a boy with fish gills for ears. “Excuse me? Hi, I’m looking for—”

The boy took one glance at him and yelled to the room, “Hey, Hatsume! Your guy is here!”

A pink blur suddenly appeared before him. Izuku took a step back involuntarily. “You!” the girl exclaimed, her crosshair-shaped eyes piercing his own.

“Um, hi? Are you Hatsume Mei?” Wait, that wasn’t a good introduction. He was meeting someone who would be in charge of gear he’d be relying on with his life. He tried again: “It’s nice to meet you. My name is Midoriya Izuku.”

Hatsume(?) ignored him, grabbed his arm, and physically dragged him to her work table. All right, he didn’t need to be polite here, got it. At her station, Hatsume started digging through a box of stuff on her workbench and flipped through various blueprints, still ignoring Izuku.

What was he supposed to say here? “Um, you were assigned to be my support partner, right? Did the teachers tell you about my quirk?”

Hatsume snapped her head over to look at him. “I wasn’t assigned to it, I earned it! Get it straight, greenie!”

…Huh?

Apparently, Hatsume noticed his confusion and took pity on him enough to explain. “Do you know what the most infuriating part of being an inventor is?” …Wait, that wasn’t an explanation.

“Uh… having a great idea for something but not having the money or material to make it?” he tried.

Hatsume tilted her head. “That too, but that’s not a problem now that I’m in UA. No, it’s the constraints!” She started flapping her fingers together like a talking mouth. “ ‘No, Mei, that’s too heavy for a hero to carry around,’ ‘No, Mei, that requires too much power,’ ‘No, Mei, that’ll become deadweight after just one use.’ ” She grinned and gripped him by the shoulders. “But you! You have no constraints!”

Izuku beamed. This was good! This was really good! Hatsume wasn’t just going to make him standard old equipment—she understood his quirk and was excited about it! “I get it. Since I can summon stuff to me, you don’t have to worry about a lot of the normal requirements for hero gear.”

“Yeah, duh, that’s why everyone in class wanted to be your support partner. We ended up doing a battle royale tournament where we each brought a piece of gear to compete with, and the winner got first pick of the hero students.”

Izuku’s face heated up in bashful pride. It was hard to believe what he was hearing. The support students literally fought over him? That was… so embarrassing, and so flattering. He didn’t know what to say. “Well, um, congrats on winning! It’s cool that you already know how to fight with the gear you make!”

“Nah, I didn’t use any of my babies. You never use untested equipment when it matters, and this mattered. I just brought a large axe.” She looked alarmingly smug. “My opponents forfeited after I swung it near their heads a few times.”

“O-oh.”

“You’re going to be testing some babies for me,” Hatsume blithely continued. “In your entrance exam footage you used rollerblades to get around, which is no good at all. Utterly useless in a real-world environment. Wowee! The big, strong hero halted by his greatest nemesis: a tiny patch of grass!”

“I could have swapped back to my normal shoes if I needed to—”

“The point is, here’s what you’ll be using instead!” She pulled out a pair of mechanical shoes. “Hover skates! Like skating, but you can skate over any terrain! Normally, this would be impractical because hero patrols go on for hours and the battery runs dry too quickly, but I don’t have to worry about that!” she squealed.

“You made me hover skates? That’s so cool!” Izuku eagerly went to grab the skates, but Hatsume pulled them away from him. “Huh?”

“This is my baby. My inventions are my babies. You’ll take good care of them, right?”

“Yes, yes, of course I will. I promise.”

She stared him down and spoke with dead seriousness, “All my babies are sentient. They feel pain. So you better take care of them.”

Izuku’s mouth opened and closed soundlessly like a fish out of water.

“Don’t listen to her. She’s joking. Sentient AIs require a massive mainframe,” Power Loader said from another student’s station, apparently having overheard the conversation. “She’s just mad because another student broke one of her inventions yesterday.”

“He put it in the laundry,” Hatsume shrieked. “People should treat my babies like a real baby!”

The rest of the class couldn’t let that statement go.

“You blow up half your babies, Hatsume,” one student jeered.

“You set one of your babies on fire to see if it could put itself out.”

“You slam your babies into your other babies to test their durability.”

“Look, I’m a very spirited mother, okay?!” Hatsume shouted back at the class.

Izuku took advantage of the distraction to grab the hover skates and marvel at them. It was such a great idea. He wanted to try them out now!

“Back to business! I need you to do some tests for me.” Hatsume pulled over a box full of power banks and picked up an odd contraption with a funnel-like shape. “I don’t know how precise your quirk is when you summon objects, so I made this in case there’s some variance. As long as you can summon a fresh battery anywhere within this spherical volume here, this will force it into the right position to recharge your main power cell that I’ll be integrating into your costume.”

“Ah… I think there’s been a misunderstanding about my quirk.” Hatsume’s expression instantly darkened, and she looked like she was about ready to stab him. Izuku waved his hands frantically. “In a good way! In a good way! My quirk doesn’t just displace objects through space, it displaces them through time. I don’t need to summon fresh batteries because I can restore the same battery over and over and get unlimited power out of it.”

Hatsume dropped the box she was carrying, its contents spilling all over the floor. She didn’t notice or didn’t care. She stared at him, open-mouthed. Taking a step forward, she put her hands on Izuku’s shoulders and started shaking him.

And shaking him.

And shaking him.

She kept on shaking him.

She paused shaking him for a moment.

She kept shaking him more.

“Are you telling me that I can make single-use babies? That blow up on purpose? And you can reuse it over and over?”

“…Yes?”

She shook him even harder.

“Marry me.”

“W-what?”

Hatsume finally let go of him and returned to face her workbench. She picked up her stack of blueprints and suddenly ripped them into pieces. Grabbing a metalworking hammer, she enthusiastically started smashing the gear on her table to bits.

“H-hold on, stop! What are you doing?”

Hatsume’s smile was as bright as the sun. “I need to completely rethink my approach to you! Everything I’ve made so far is useless now!”

“Wait, wait! But I still want to try the hover skates!”

“Oh right, the hover skates. Those don’t matter anymore. You can throw them out.”

“But… I want to try them,” Izuku begged.

Hatsume rolled her eyes. “Fine, whatever.” She grabbed a power bank from the box and plugged the cord into a port on the shoes. “It’s crude, but this is just for testing. You can send this battery back in time once it runs out of power?”

“Yeah, let me set it up.” He put the battery in his pocket to anchor it to that location. “git add power_bank. I’m ready.”

“Good. Now, move it! To the gym!”

UA had multiple indoor exercise gyms with different environment setups. Gym Theta was a track and field gym with a floor made entirely of sand. The idea was that running and exercising on sand gave you a better workout than smooth flooring. Each sector had sand at different coarseness levels, from fine-grained to lumpy gravel. Students could customize their workouts by choosing the specific type of—

“Have you ever ice skated before, greenie?” Hatsume interrupted.

Izuku was sitting on the floor and putting on his new skates. “No, just rollerblades. But it’s similar, right?”

“Probably. The hover skates work like ice skates—a thin strip on the bottom of the shoes generates the hovering effect. The strip adjusts its energy output to match the terrain so that your movement feels smooth. When the energy strip aligns with the direction you’re moving, there’s essentially zero friction between yourself and the ground. You’ll just keep on gaining speed, especially on an incline.”

“So, you’re telling me to be careful because it’s easy to go uncontrollably fast on these?”

Hatsume didn’t acknowledge Izuku to be part of the conversation. “Your actual costume will have an integrated power cell, but the battery I gave you probably only has a few minutes of charge. It’ll start beeping when it’s low on power. That’s your cue to use your quirk.”

Izuku beamed. “Sounds good! I’m ready!”

“Good.” Hatsume knelt next to his hover skates. “Your costume will have controls for your gear, but for now…” She pressed a button on the shoes to turn them on.

Izuku stumbled a bit when the shoes activated and lifted his feet off the ground, but he quickly regained his balance. He started skating forward, a broad smile spreading across his face. It really was like rollerblading! As he approached the sand field, his body instinctively tensed up, bracing for the uneven terrain. But to his delight, there was no difference—skating on the sand felt just as smooth as gliding on the school’s polished floor. Excitement bubbled up inside him as he sped towards the rock field. Again, the transition was seamless. He felt a rush of exhilaration. No matter where he skated, it was as if he was floating effortlessly across a perfectly smooth surface.

This was amazing! It was absolutely perfect for city maneuverability, combining speed and flexibility. He pictured himself interning with Ingenium, skating alongside him through the streets, saving people, catching bad guys. What a thrill! He was already looking forward to showing it off to Denki at their next hero class.

As Hatsume predicted, he heard a beeping sound come from his pocket after only a few minutes. “git restore power_bank.” Fixed!

Speaking of Hatsume, she was by the door and looking a little impatient. Right, he was keeping her from returning to the workshop. Technically, this test was just to see if he could restore power to the skates, and he could, so he didn’t have a good excuse to keep her waiting for much longer. He should probably stop soon…

…Oh. Uh oh.

“Hatsume, how do I stop?” Izuku yelled.

“What do you mean?” she yelled back. “Didn’t you say you’ve ice skated before?”

“No! I told you I’ve only used rollerblades. There’s usually a heel brake on the back, but there isn’t one here.”

“Oh, right. Well, it’s exactly like ice skating. So do that.”

“But I don’t know how!”

“Well, figure it out!”

Izuku faceplanted into the sand.

“That’s not how you do it!”

After several minutes of Izuku fruitlessly trying to get the sand out of his everywhere, Hatsume lost patience and dragged him out of the gym so that she could get back to her tinkering.

“Here,” she said, handing him the hover skates. “Take these home with you so you can practice over the weekend or whatever.”

Izuku eagerly took them, but then a thought occurred. “Are we allowed to bring support equipment home with us?”

“Sure, why not?”

…Well, he had plausible deniability. Hatsume told him it was fine, and who was he to question his support engineer?

“Thank you so much for all of this, Hatsume!” Izuku gushed. “I’m so glad you’re my partner. I kinda expected this to be a lot more boring, like I’d be testing summoning shields or something. But no, your very first baby is something I already love. Thank you!”

Hatsume snorted. “Don’t be too impressed. This is nothing. Like, literally nothing. I’m giving you those shoes just to distract you while I make your actual gear. I’ll be making some rocket boot babies for you next! Since you have infinite fuel, you’ll be able to fly through the air as high and as far as you want!”

Holy shit.

The next day, Izuku felt his nerves act up once again as he sat on the train heading for Kiyashi Ward. He’d been so excited to meet up with his friends yesterday, but the more he thought about it… well, the more he overthought it. He’d only talked to his friends before in a school environment in the context of them all working toward becoming heroes. But now they were meeting on the weekend, at a mall. What did you even do at malls? Shop? Chat? What did teenagers chat about? It was easy at school because there was always a class or activity they were doing to talk about. But now he had to just come up with interesting things to say! How did people do that? Had he read any good books lately? No, all he’d read recently was the stupid Git manual! What kinds of things were his friends into? What if it turned out he had nothing in common with any of them? Would they all still be friends after today? AUGH!

He tried to calm himself down with a little bit of people-watching. A few new passengers entered his train car at the next stop. There was a haggard mother dragging along her excitable little boy, a nervous man wearing a suit that didn’t quite fit, a teenage girl in a bright pink and yellow skirt wearing earbuds and colorful sunglasses… which seemed to be floating in midair… because the girl was invisible…

Wait, that was Tooru!

“git grep hagakure_toru,” he muttered so he could see her properly. She’d noticed him too and was looking right at him. He gave a shy wave. The seat beside him was empty, so he awkwardly gestured at it.

Tooru accepted the offer and plopped herself down next to him. “Fancy seeing you here!”

“Hi, Tooru,” he said. Funny coincidence that they met up on the same train. Well, it wasn’t actually that odd. They were headed to the same place and planned to meet there at the same time, so it was pretty likely, all things considered.

They sat together as the train got moving again.

…

Now what?

They couldn’t have a conversation here. They were on a train with a bunch of people around them. Everyone else on the train was quiet, so if they talked, everyone would be forced to listen to them and overhear everything. That would be way too awkward.

…On the other hand, Kiyashi Ward was still at least twenty minutes away. Was it more awkward than sitting right next to a girl for that long in dead silence?

He turned to look at Tooru. Unlike him, she seemed pretty comfortable. She was wearing earbuds and lightly bobbing her head to the beat of whatever she was listening to. Lucky her. Well, she didn’t seem to think that there was anything wrong with them just sitting quietly in each other’s company, so maybe he was overthinking things.

He groaned in his mind. Of course I’m overthinking things. I’m always overthinking things.

Tooru noticed that he was still looking at her. Uh oh, he didn’t mean to stare! Dammit! She tilted her head quizzically, then removed an earbud from one of her ears. Oh, does she think I want to talk?

She handed the earbud to Izuku, smiled, and then turned to face forward again. Okay, so they weren’t talking. Izuku hesitantly placed the single earbud in his own ear and was greeted with the sound of pop music that he vaguely recognized but knew nothing about. He faced forward again, leaned back, and tried to get comfortable.

The two teenagers sat side by side for the rest of the train ride as they listened to Tooru’s playlist together.

“Who were you texting all that time?” Tooru asked as they walked to the meeting place in front of the mall. “You don’t have to answer if you don’t want to, but you seemed to be getting kind of mad at whoever it was.”

What was Tooru talking about? Sure, he pulled out his phone halfway through the train ride, but he wasn’t texting any—oh. His face heated up. “It was nothing. I was just reading stuff on a forum.”

“Which one?”

“…PHO.”

“PHO? What’s that?”

“Um, Pro Heroes Online. I was arguing… I mean, someone was claiming that… um, it doesn’t matter. It really, really doesn’t matter.”

She giggled at him.

“So, a-anyway, have any thoughts on what we should do when we meet up with Denki and Ochako?”

“Dunno, we’ll figure it out.” She smirked. “So, instead of listening to my music, you spent the whole train ride on some forum for nerds getting pissed off at an internet troll? Yep, sounds like you.”

No! Please let me change the subject! “There’s nothing wrong with being passionate about heroes,” he defended. “…I mean, even if I wasn’t literally dedicating my life to it.”

“Never said otherwise.” She skipped ahead of him a little bit. “My handle on PHO is ‘NowYouSeeMe’, by the way.”

Oh, goddammit. Izuku blushed even harder while Tooru cracked up. Tooru getting one over on him was starting to become a concerning pattern.

“If you’re on PHO too, then you have to know how frustrating it is to read some posts on there, right?” Izuku said. “Like, I really want to say, ‘I go to UA! That hero is my math teacher! I know for a fact you’re wrong!’ But I can’t prove that without doxing myself.”

“Yep, I know the feeling. It honestly still feels crazy to me that I know so many heroes in real life now after years of seeing them on TV and talking about them online. Like, younger me dreamed of one day meeting Eraserhead.”

“You knew of Eraserhead before UA? I kinda figured I was the only one who did.”

“I’ve looked into a lot of underground heroes. I imagined meeting Eraserhead one day so that he could turn off my quirk and I could finally see myself in the mirror.” She gave a rueful smile. “Didn’t work.”

Izuku winced. “Sorry.”

“Eh, it’s fine. But yeah, before I learned about the strength part of my quirk, I thought I’d have to be an underground hero, and that meant learning everything I could about it. Everyone’s always surprised to learn there’s way more to remaining unseen than just being invisible. But that should be obvious, right? Sight’s only one of the five senses.”

Izuku nodded. “If you try to infiltrate a villain hideout and have to break open a door, they’ll know you’re there whether they can see you or not.”

“Exactly! The best underground heroes are the ones you never know exist at all. I figured that’s what I needed to be.”

Something was subtly… off about Tooru’s tone of voice there. It could be his imagination, but…

Izuku took a good look at Tooru. She was practically skipping alongside him, wearing a garishly pink and yellow dress, very conspicuous compared to the fairly conservative clothing of the other pedestrians around them. She wore sunglasses so that anyone could see what she was looking at. She was wearing bracelets on each of her wrists so that you could tell where she was moving her hands. She’d put on a large sunhat, which nicely framed the shape of her head. Despite her quirk, she made sure that everyone would see her.

It was… incongruous, wasn’t it? The image Tooru put out to the world compared to the words she was speaking.

Izuku decided to take a chance. He suspected he knew the answer to this question already. “Was being an underground hero always your goal, or did you ever dream of being a spotlight hero?”

She turned to stare directly at him. “No, you’ve got it wrong. I’m going to be a spotlight hero. That’s what I want. Sorry, I should’ve been more clear.”

Izuku stayed quiet. Tooru stared into the middle distance, her mouth twitching as if she had something more to say but wasn’t sure if she should. He recognized that expression; he’d worn it himself many times.

He figured he was prodding at a sore subject, and that confirmed it. Despite the short time they’d known each other, he felt he’d gotten to know Tooru decently well, and he knew she didn’t like feeling vulnerable. Whatever she wanted to say would involve talking about her feelings, and that sucked. He knew that from experience. If he said anything now, she’d probably clam up and change the subject. The best thing for him to do was say nothing.

They walked together in silence. Izuku hoped it wasn’t an uncomfortable silence. He tried his best to seem unconcerned. Casual, friendly, non-judgmental. He wasn’t sure if it was working; it wasn’t like he had experience in this sort of thing. She would either say what she wanted to say, or she wouldn’t, and either was fine.

After a few minutes, Tooru spoke up again. “It’s been my dream to be a hero ever since I was a little kid,” she said slowly, testing the waters. “I wanted to be just like All Might. You know, someone who makes people feel safe just by showing up. I wanted to beat the villains, save the day, and make everyone happy. Stuff like that.

“I worked hard for it. And people were supportive, too, until I told them what I really meant. They’d say I’d be a great underground hero, or an undercover hero, or an infiltration expert. But when I tried to explain that wasn’t what I wanted, they’d say something like, ‘No, no, no, you silly girl. How can you inspire people if they can’t even see you? That’s ridiculous.’ And if I wore bright clothes or makeup so I’d be more visible and inspiring, they’d say I’d negated the only thing I had going for me, no better than someone quirkless. People had this idea of what was possible for me to achieve in my life, and if I strayed from that, I was just being a stupid child wasting my gifts.

“And look, I love my quirk. I wouldn’t trade it for anything. But it’s not all that I want to be. Maybe it’s dumb, the invisible girl who wants to be seen…”

“It’s not dumb,” Izuku said quietly, wanting to say something but not wanting to interrupt.

“It’s cliché, at least. And, well, it’s hard to stay motivated when the whole world tells you you’re wrong. I even met a Pro Hero, a real big shot, someone I really respect, and he told me the same thing. And… that hurt, a lot. So, for a long time now, I’ve given up on all that. I was being dumb and greedy. I’d still be a hero. I’d still save people. It was enough.”

Tooru trailed off after that. Izuku waited, but it didn’t look like she was going to continue. Which was odd because that obviously wasn’t the end of the story. Wasn’t she telling him about how she would be a spotlight hero? “And then you found out about the strength aspect of your quirk?” he prompted.

“…Yeah.”

Izuku waited another moment, but it seemed like that was all he was going to get out of her. Huh. Well, he certainly could relate to Tooru’s story. “That must have felt so nice, so vindicating. Screw everyone and the little boxes they put people in. Trust me, I know how great it feels to finally show everyone what you’ve always known you were capable of.”

“Um, yeah, definitely.” Tooru looked uncomfortable for a moment, but then shook her head free of her thoughts. “For fuck’s sake, what am I doing? Sorry, I didn’t mean to whine at you about stuff that doesn’t matter. I don’t know why I said all that.”

“I don’t mind. I’m happy to listen to anything you want to talk about.” Tooru always had her guard up around others, even when she was laughing and joking around. Especially then. He felt privileged that she’d lowered her walls for him, even if just a little bit.

Huh, but now what? Tooru isn’t looking for advice, she just wanted to get stuff off her chest. What’s something supportive I can say to prove I’ve been listening to her? “That hero you said you respect? I hope you meet him again one day to show how far you’ve come,” he tried.

Tooru looked like she was stifling a laugh. What? Did he say something funny?

He tried again, “Anyway, what you’re doing is definitely working! You’re going to inspire a lot of people as a hero. Like, just right now, quirk or no quirk, you’re the most visible person around!”

A dangerous grin crept onto Tooru’s face. “Maybe so, but I could be way more visible than this.”

Uh oh. “…Are you going to do something embarrassing?”

“Yep, but don’t worry, I won’t leave you behind. We can be embarrassed together!” That wasn’t what he was worried about!

Before Izuku could get out a word of protest, Tooru ducked behind him and once again demonstrated her ridiculous flexibility. She hoisted a leg onto one of his shoulders and, in one smooth motion, used it as a fulcrum to lift up her whole body. Settling onto his shoulders, she placed her hands atop his head. Izuku stumbled under the weight of suddenly carrying a teenage girl.

Tooru decisively pointed forward atop her throne. “Onward, my trusty steed!”

“W-what?” Tooru bopped him on the head. “Ow!”

“Horses don’t talk, you dingbat!”

Apparently they were doing this now. “Neigh, neigh,” he deadpanned.

“See, you’re getting the hang of it already!”

…He’d let her have this. If she wanted to embarrass them both to distract from the embarrassment of sharing her feelings, then he’d play his part.

Izuku held on tight and strode forth to the mall, Tooru cackling and waving her arms about above him. Everyone they passed by on the sidewalk stared at them, a few annoyed by the two teenagers causing a scene. Oh well. If nothing else, Tooru had certainly succeeded at making them the most visible they could be.

“You know, I was joking. You don’t actually have to carry me all the way to the mall.”

“It’s fine, you’re pretty light.”

“Scoff! Are you calling me dainty? I’ll have you know I’m in amazing shape. Not a shred of fat, it’s all toned muscle!”

“Would you rather I call you heavy?”

“Nah, I was planning to be offended no matter what you said.”

Izuku laughed.

Not long ago, Izuku had been worried that his friends wouldn’t like him anymore once they got to know him outside of school.

What a stupid thought that was.

Chapter Text

Kiyashi Ward Shopping Mall teemed with weekend crowds drawn out by the sunny weather. The mall was known for having many shops that catered to people with unusual body types. Izuku marveled at the diverse array of mutation quirks around him. Huh, did Tooru’s quirk count as a mutation quirk, or was it an emitter quirk that was always active? Was there even a meaningful difference between those two descriptions? Whatever.

Anyway, Denki and Ochako had already arrived and were waiting at the front plaza. Matching grins appeared on their faces when they saw Tooru seated on Izuku’s shoulders. “Having fun up there?” Denki teased.

“Yup!” Tooru replied brightly.

“Not an ounce of shame, huh?”

“Nope!”

Tooru hopped off Izuku’s shoulders and immediately targeted her next victim. “Ochako!” She scooped the other girl into a big hug.

Ochako happily reciprocated. “Tooru!”

As the girls had their greeting hug, Izuku looked at Denki hesitantly. He felt a small pang of jealousy that girls could be so casually affectionate with each other. What did guys do? He couldn’t hug Denki! Could he?

Denki raised a fist. “Hey, man!”

Izuku fist bumped him. “Hi, Denki. Good to see you guys!” Yeah, a fist bump. That was cool. That was what the cool kids did.

“Have any of you been here before? What should we do first?” Ochako asked.

“Food, obviously!” Tooru said. “I’m hungry! I haven’t eaten lunch yet.”

“Me neither,” Denki said. Izuku and Ochako shook their heads as well. “Sounds like a plan!”

They arrived at the bustling food court and split up to browse the available options. Izuku ordered a standard beef bowl, and then he surreptitiously bought another item from a bakery kiosk while his friends were off getting their own food.

Regrouping at a table, they all dug into their lunches with some intermittent chit-chat as they planned their day. Tooru was determined to take Ochako clothes shopping, and Izuku and Denki were tripping over themselves to try to escape being dragged along with them.

Once everyone had finished, it was time for Izuku to strike! He leaned over to grab the box he had bought from the bakery earlier. He placed it in front of him on the table, his friends eyeing him curiously. With a small flourish, Izuku opened the box to reveal a giant slice of chocolate mousse cake. It was rich and dense and probably contained a full day’s worth of calories. Izuku happily started stuffing his face with cake, being sure to watch his friends’ reactions.

“Whoa! Izuku, you’re really going to eat all that?” Denki stared at him in shock.

Izuku swallowed and grinned. “I sure am! I eat desserts all the time!” He punctuated his statement by gobbling up another huge bite.

“Are you serious? What the hell?!” Tooru had stood up from her seat and leaned over him in anger. “I’ve been on a fitness diet for ages to stay in shape for UA! How?!”

Izuku shrugged and kept munching away, chocolate all over his face. He preened under the bafflement and jealousy he was receiving from the other three.

He didn’t want to drag this out too long, though. He hadn’t come close to finishing his cake (it was a big slice!), but he might as well skip to the punchline. Izuku patted his mouth with a napkin. “git restore chocolate_mousse_cake.” The original cake slice reappeared on Izuku’s tray, untouched. Izuku let out a small burp into the napkin.

His friends looked back and forth between him and the cake, gobsmacked.

Izuku gave them all a cheeky grin. “I eat desserts all the time, and I still stay fit!” he said meaningfully.

Ochako looked at him wide-eyed. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

Izuku smiled and nodded.

His friends all looked at each other. Denki raised an eyebrow. Tooru jerked her head in the direction of some nearby shops, visible to the others thanks to her sunhat. Ochako’s lips thinned, and she nodded decisively to both of them. Conversation complete, Tooru and Ochako stood up, grabbed each of Izuku’s arms, and physically started dragging him away into the mall.

“Hey!” They were leaving behind the cake—it was still just sitting there on their table! But the girls had a vice grip on him and had clearly decided that Izuku wasn’t allowed to move under his own power anymore. Izuku looked back to Denki for help, but the look in Denki’s eyes made it clear he was on his own.

“You’ve been holding out on us, man!”

“I can finally have sweets again!”

“Just think, guys! We can get a big tub of ice cream and just gorge!”

“Endless mochi! Oh my god, endless mochi!”

“Chocolate and peanut butter! I need slabs of chocolate dunked in peanut butter, stat!”

The group spent the next several minutes arguing about where to go first and physically pulling Izuku around the mall, completely ignoring anything he had to say. Protests, advice, suggestions, it was all irrelevant. Izuku sighed with a smile and resigned himself to his fate as a calorie-free dessert dispenser.

In the end, they made their decision with a few rounds of rock-paper-scissors. Ochako won and gleefully dragged them all to a cafe that sold premium mochi. Together, they bought one of every flavor, then sat at a table in the far corner of the cafe to avoid being spotted and accused of cheating the cafe out of sales. Izuku spent the next little while restoring the same box over and over so that his friends could gorge on all the different flavors, stuffing themselves without ever feeling full.

While still crewing on a mouthful of mochi, Tooru poked Izuku on the nose. “This isn’t the end. I am going to have slabs of chocolate and peanut butter, and you’re going to help me if it’s the last thing you do.” She swallowed. “Another day, though.”

Izuku mock saluted. “Aye aye, ma’am!”

Tooru narrowed her eyes and poked him on the nose again. Whatever intimidating look she was going for was lost when she grabbed another handful of mochi and jammed it into her face, her cheeks puffing out like a chipmunk.

Izuku turned his gaze to the others. It seemed that Denki was a bit of a picky eater. He had a few flavors he liked and waited until Izuku restored the box again before re-eating the same types. Ochako looked like she was in heaven, but she was starting to get annoyed by Denki always snatching the same few flavors before Ochako herself could try them.

Ah, they were running low. “git restore mochi_box/*.”

His friends all simultaneously let out big belches, and then they dug in again.

Izuku nibbled on a mochi of his own. They were going to be here for a while.

“Are you sure you guys don’t want to come clothes shopping with us?” Tooru asked with a dumb smirk on her face.

“Nope! Nope! We’re good!” Denki said.

“Aw, fine. Hear that, Ochako? The boys want to be left alone to do whatever lame things they do when we girls aren’t around. Now, c’mon!” Tooru swung an arm around Ochako and started leading her away.

Ochako twisted around to wave to them. “Bye! See you later!”

Izuku and Denki waved back as the girls headed elsewhere. Once they were out of sight, Izuku turned to look at Denki. He hated to say it, but Tooru had a point. What were the two of them supposed to do by themselves? Heck, what did teenagers even do at malls? Izuku still wasn’t entirely clear on that point. So far, he had “eat” and “buy things” on his list of activities. Was that it?

Denki turned to look at Izuku. Izuku looked back. They looked at each other for an awkwardly long moment. Eventually, Denki spoke up. “Wanna head for the arcade?”

Oh, what a relief! Denki knew what he was doing. “Sure!”

They learned from a nearby directory kiosk that the arcade was on the top floor of the mall, so the two of them jogged up several flights of stairs rather than taking the escalator. They were hero students and needed to squeeze in exercise whenever they could.

“Hey, Izuku, you should show that dessert trick to everyone else, too,” Denki said, breathing easily despite running up stairs. “Or, better idea, we should have a big food party with greasy pizza and stuff and invite the whole class. I think it’d really help.”

“Help with what?”

“Nothing! Just, y’know, class camaraderie and stuff.”

That did sound fun. “Good idea! Maybe after the Sports Festival? Like, we can help set up a post-festival party?”

Denki nodded. “Rock on!”

Entering the arcade, Izuku was immediately assaulted by the lights and sounds of flashy graphics and ear-piercing sound effects. It had been a long time since he’d been to an arcade, and he’d forgotten just how loud they were.

“What do you want to do first?” Denki half-yelled at him.

Was this the time for Izuku to admit that he’d basically never played arcade games before? He’d had no friends since he was five or six years old, so no one had ever invited him to hang out at the arcade. He’d been to them on his own a few times, but he felt lonely and stupid wandering around the aisles while groups of friends played and laughed around him, so he never stuck around long. It was too sad.

…Nope, today was not the day to admit those feelings to his first friend in a decade. “You pick. I don’t really play video games.”

“What? Really?”

“I mean, a little, but I’ve never really gotten into it.”

“That sucks, man! And here I told everyone that you’re a video game protagonist.”

What? “Sorry, what?”

Denki gestured enthusiastically. “Yeah! No one can figure out what your quirk is, so I said you’re like a video game character! Like, you make save points, and you summon things from your inventory, and you have some kind of detective vision, and you can even make the world glitch out!”

Izuku blinked. Huh. That honestly wasn’t bad.

“I know that’s not exactly it,” Denki continued, “but you gotta give people something, man! I don’t get why you’re so secretive about your quirk.”

Izuku blushed. “I’m not secretive! There’s just no good way to explain it.”

Denki crossed his arms. “Try me.”

Well, he asked for it. A small grin crept onto Izuku’s face. “My quirk replicates the functionality of Git, a version control system for software development. Broadly speaking, it lets me track the state of objects over time and arbitrarily split, rearrange, and merge their histories across multiple branching timelines.”

The conversation stuttered. Surrounding them, the arcade was a sensory overload of flashing neon lights and vibrant screens vying for attention. The air pulsed with a cacophony of clattering buttons and victory chimes.

“…Huh?”

Izuku laughed and turned to walk further into the arcade.

“Wait, no, say that again! And who are you calling a git?!”

After flitting from cabinet to cabinet, Denki eventually decided on one for them to play. “Here we go! Ultimate Heroes Unleashed. It’s a beat ’em up where you pick a hero and fight waves of villains. It’s co-op, so I’ll be able to help you out.”

Izuku stepped up to the machine and looked down at his controls. There was a joystick and six buttons.

“It’s really more like a cross between a fighting game and a beat ’em up,” Denki continued. You’ve got light, medium, and heavy attacks. Heavy attacks do the most damage, but they’re slow and leave you vulnerable, so maybe stick with light attacks while you learn the timing. But definitely use heavy attacks when the opponent is stunned. Also, better to use low kick attacks because you have a chance of tripping your opponent. Hold away from an enemy to block, and double-tap the joystick to turn and dash. You can also counter by dashing forward into an attack—wait, that’s frame-perfect, don’t do that. Ignore what I just said.”

Izuku hummed. “All right, I think I got it. Run around, hold back to block when I’m near enemies, mash buttons when it’s safe, and let you deal with anything hard or complicated.”

Denki gave him a thumbs up. “Exactly!”

The hero selection page appeared on-screen. Izuku blinked in surprise when he saw the available characters. He grinned as he read each character’s name in turn: “Full Power”… “Aspire”… “Sparrow”… “Killer Rabbit”…

Izuku giggled. “I guess they didn’t get the rights to any hero’s actual likeness?”

“Ha, no. But it’s part of the charm!”

The fanboy in him wanted to pick Full Power, but Izuku went with Killer Rabbit instead because the overly muscular anthropomorphic rabbit was just funnier. Denki picked Chief Cotton, and then they were off.

As expected, Izuku sucked, but that was fine. They were playing co-op specifically so Denki could carry him through the campaign. It was still fun to mash buttons and watch Killer Rabbit’s detailed animation of decapitating zombies with her thighs. The main problem was that the two of them shared a life pool, so every time Izuku died, it drained lives from both of them.

They reached a boss, a giant wolf that took up half the screen. It lunged forward and used a bite attack, going straight through Izuku’s block and killing him once again.

“No, you can’t block boss attacks. You have to evade or counter… never mind.” Denki realized at the same time as Izuku that they were out of lives, so Killer Rabbit wasn’t going to respawn. Denki’s eyes narrowed in concentration. “Right, damn, the boss is balanced around fighting two players, and I only have one shot to beat it. Okay, I need to focus.”

Izuku took his hands off the controls and watched his friend play. At first, Denki played defensively as he learned the boss’s patterns, but it didn’t take long for him to get right in the wolf’s face and start beating it down. Izuku was incredibly impressed by Denki’s skill. Despite being directly in front of the boss, Denki wasn’t taking a single point of damage. He was countering every single attack thrown his way, even the rapid multi-hit moves. Didn’t Denki say that counters were frame-perfect? How was he hitting so many in a row like that?

His eyes drifted downward to watch Denki’s hands on the controller. To his surprise, there was electricity softly sparking along Denki’s fingers. His hand movements were kind of mesmerizing: fluid, steady, not a single wasted movement, and acting with perfect timing. It was a melding of human grace with machine-like precision, electricity pulsing in time with his actions. What in the world was Denki doing with his quirk?

It was at that point that Denki noticed his hands sparking. “Shit!” he spat out, distressed. The flow of electricity abruptly stopped, and his movements returned to that of an average, clumsy human. He missed the next counter, and the boss’s super attack drained the rest of his health.

Game over.

Denki looked pretty frustrated with himself, but he tried to act casual. “Man, I thought I almost had it! Eh, can’t win ’em all.”

“Why did you stop using your quirk at the end?” Izuku asked. “…Wait, no, dumb question. If we were caught, we’d probably be kicked out for using our quirks to cheat.”

Denki grimaced. “Sorry you had to see that.”

“What were you doing, anyway? I’ve never seen you use your quirk like that in class.” Izuku rested his chin on his fist in thought. “Huh, using electricity to power your movement… oh! Brain signals are literally electrical impulses, so control over electricity means control over your own nervous system! Do you use your quirk to give yourself improved muscle control and faster reflexes? Something like that?”

Denki looked at him like he had sprouted a second head. “What are you talking about? No, man, I just have bad quirk control. It’s… uh, it’s always been a problem for me.”

Huh? As far as Izuku was concerned, that response was a total non sequitur. “No, no, you were way better at the game when you were using your quirk.”

“Yeah, that’s ’cause I was in the zone. It’s kind of hard for me to keep a handle on my quirk when I’m too focused on something. It leaks out. It’s always gotten me into trouble.” Denki frowned. “I thought I’d learned how to keep it under control, but I guess I still suck…”

Every word that came out of his mouth was more concerning than the last. “No, Denki, that’s not what—”

“I didn’t want you to see. I swear, I’ve gotten so much better! Can we please drop it?” Denki pleaded.

Izuku wanted to respond that he most certainly would not drop it, but then he examined his friend more closely. Denki looked upset and uncomfortable, subconsciously curling in on himself. This… this was a sore subject for him, and there was obviously a lot to unpack here.

…He could wait. It was the weekend, and he was at the mall having fun with his friends. Denki was already agitated and feeling defensive. As much as Izuku wanted to dig into it, this wasn’t the time.

“Is there something else we can do together that would be easier for me to learn? Maybe a driving game?” Izuku said to change the subject.

Denki perked up and led him around the arcade, searching for something else to play. Eventually, they settled on versing each other in air hockey. Denki was still better, but Izuku felt that he put up a pretty good fight!

Izuku paid close attention to his friend for the rest of the afternoon. He never saw the telltale sparks of Denki’s quirk again.

After a while, the girls messaged them to say they were done, so they headed back to the central plaza to meet up. When they reunited, the sight of Tooru with multiple bags full of stuff—compared to Ochako’s single, lighter bag—reaffirmed that Tooru had been the main driver behind the shopping trip. They’d both changed the clothes they were wearing since Izuku saw them last.

Izuku had forgotten what Ochako was wearing before, but it had been perfectly normal-looking and unremarkable. Tooru had clearly taken offense to that because now Ochako was dressed in something almost as bright and loud as Tooru’s own tastes. She wore a light, floral-patterned sundress with bright pink cherry blossoms popping against the white background. She’d also tied her hair back into a tiny ponytail with a red ribbon.

As for Tooru, she’d switched it up and was wearing a deep blue dress with wave patterns meant to evoke that famous Edo-era print of the stormy seas. It was almost like she was wearing a painting, which actually worked on her thanks to her invisibility. It would probably look tacky on literally anyone else, but as a floating art project, it looked good.

“Hey there, boys. What do you think?” Tooru twirled on the spot to flare out her dress. Ochako meanwhile blushed heavily and seemed like she had to stop herself from covering herself up.

Tooru noticed this and grabbed Ochako by the shoulders to stop her from turning away. “Ochako here is feeling a little nervous about looking so cute in public.”

“Don’t tell them that!” Ochako whined.

“So why don’t you guys help boost her confidence! So, Denki, what do you think of Ochako?” Tooru’s voice was innocent, but she had a smug-ass grin on her face. She knew exactly what she was doing. Thankfully, Tooru had no practice hiding her facial expressions, and Izuku didn’t plan to let her know he could see through her facades.

“The clothes look cute,” Denki said. He paused and thought about what he’d just said, and then he tried to clarify, “I mean you look cute, now that you’re wearing those clothes.” He blushed in embarrassment and realized that he’d made another blunder. “Not that you weren’t cute before! It’s not about the clothes!”

Ochako was beet red and holding her face in her hands while Tooru was trying very hard not to laugh. “What about me, Denki? I’m here too, or are you just entirely focused on Ochako?” Tooru said, egging him on.

“Uh… your clothes are cute, too,” Denki said, making the same mistake again. “I mean, I can’t see you, so…” He kept digging himself deeper. “I guess you might be cute?” And he hit rock bottom with that one. Denki realized it as well because he immediately shut up and turned to Izuku. Save me, his eyes pleaded.

Okay, Izuku, Denki lobbed you an easy home run here. Help a friend and be cool all in one go. Just don’t stammer! Even cheesy lines work if you say them with confidence. Don’t think about it! Just say it! “I agree with everything Denki said. I can see you, Tooru, and you’re very cute.” YES!!

(To be honest, he didn’t know either. As precise as grep was, it had the aesthetic appeal of reading measurements off a sheet of paper. But being a good friend was more important than the truth in this case.)

Tooru looked a little caught off guard, but she quickly composed herself and put her hands on her hips. “Look at you, trying to be cool, huh?”

Izuku felt his ears get hot. No! Don’t let her ruin it! It wasn’t fair that she always got the last word. “I’m not trying to be cool. I am cool!” he exclaimed, which was just a more verbose way of saying “Nuh uh!”, but he couldn’t come up with anything better on the spot.

“That you are!” Tooru smiled.

They all continued to hang out for a couple more hours. They stumbled across a pet store that graciously allowed them to pet the little bunnies. Izuku bought himself some new hero merch. He was dragged to an ice cream parlor so that his friends could eat guilt-free sundaes. They chatted and laughed and all had fun together.

Eventually, the day came to an end. They all said their goodbyes and headed home. They’d all see each other at school soon enough.

Izuku returned to his apartment, babbled about his day to his mom who was eager to hear all about it, and then went to his room to think about his plans for the night.

He hadn’t had a chance to practice with his hover skates yet. He looked out his bedroom window at the setting sun. Hm, it was kind of late. It’d be better to do it tomorrow. Actually, he first needed to look up some videos online of how you were supposed to brake on ice skates. Then, he’d go down to the beach to practice so that he had sand to land on when he fell.

Izuku went over to his dresser and pulled out a special pair of red socks that he hadn’t worn since the entrance exam a couple of months ago. These socks had his rollerblades anchored to them. He grinned. It was time for an upgrade!

Izuku put the socks on and sat on the edge of his bed so his feet weren’t touching the ground. “git checkout rollerblades.”

Note: switching to 'rollerblades'.

You are in 'detached HEAD' state. You can look around, make experimental changes and commit them, and you can discard any commits you make in this state without impacting any branches by switching back to a branch.

If you want to create a new branch to retain commits you create, you may do so (now or later) by using -c with the switch command. Example:

git switch -c <new-branch-name>

HEAD is now at d58a2e2 Anchored my rollerblades to a pair of red socks

A warning message? What was… oh, it was this stupid warning again! The same one he kept on getting back when he was doing his tests with hooks and string in the park. Ugh! Izuku dismissed the message without reading it.

Anyway, the pair of rollerblades materialized on his feet, perfectly snug. And no longer necessary. Who the heck would use rollerblades ever again if they could use hover skates instead? Nobody! That’s who!

Izuku shivered in giddy anticipation. Soon, potentially very soon, he might get to say something like, “Who would use hover skates if you could use rocket boots instead?” Seriously, holy crap. Hatsume had only made him a single support item so far, and she was already rising the ranks of his most favorite people in the world.

But one step at a time!

He took off the rollerblades and put them away in his closet. Then he sat back down on his bed and put on his new hover skates. Maybe Denki was onto something when he called him a video game character. This felt an awful lot like upgrading your equipment in an RPG and discarding the old stuff. “git add rollerblade_(left) rollerblade_(right) hover_skate_(left) hover_skate_(right); git commit -m "Anchored hover skates to red socks".”

[detached HEAD 9868e8b] Anchored hover skates to red socks
 4 files changed
 create mode 100644 hover_skate_(left) [7ef4a95]
 create mode 100644 hover_skate_(right) [0f4e550]


Done! Well, almost. Lastly, he had to rename his “rollerblades” tag to “hover skates”. Izuku used tags rather than branches for stuff like this because full timelines often had too much prior history associated with them that he often didn’t want to have to worry about. Tagging individual commits and cherry-picking them on a case-by-case basis helped to reduce the potential side effects.

“git tag hover-skates rollerblades.” That renamed the tag from “rollerblades” to “hover-skates”. Well, he was pretty sure that’s what the command did. It had worked for him so far.

All right, now he was done. “git switch main.” The hover skates disappeared off his feet since he had returned to the main branch. He was once again just wearing his red socks. Tomorrow, he’d head down to the beach and summon the skates once he got there.

Hm, he should probably check to make sure the rename worked correctly. “git checkout hover-skates.”

Note: switching to 'hover-skates'.

You are in 'detached HEAD' state. You can look around, make experimental changes and commit them, and you can discard any commits you make in this state without impacting any branches by switching back to a branch.

If you want to create a new branch to retain commits you create, you may do so (now or later) by using -c with the switch command. Example:

git switch -c <new-branch-name>

HEAD is now at d58a2e2 Anchored my rollerblades to a pair of red socks

A pair of boring old rollerblades appeared on his feet.

…Huh?

What happened? Why hadn’t it updated?

He absently slapped the side of his rollerblades as if that would somehow fix it.

Umm… okay. “git switch main,” he said to reset things back to the default.

The rollerblades vanished off of his feet. He once again was just wearing red socks.

He looked around his room.

…What happened to my hover skates? They’re not in the commit tagged hover-skates, and they’re not in the main branch either…

He reread the warning message that was still displayed in his mind.

You can look around, make experimental changes and commit them, and you can discard any commits you make in this state without impacting any branches by switching back to a branch.


…Shit.

Shit!

He renamed the existing “rollerblades” tag to “hover-skates”, but that just updated the name—it didn’t update what the tag pointed to. The tag still only affected the rollerblades. When he upgraded to hover skates, he made a new commit, and that commit wasn’t tagged. Then he… switched back to the main branch…

“You can discard any commits you make in this state by switching back to a branch.”

Goddammit! Git, you piece of shit!

Did he discard his hover skates? Were they gone now? Banished into nonexistence?

Oh god, Hatsume was going to kill him. “I’m sorry, your baby is gone. My quirk ate it.”

Izuku paced around his room in a frenzy.

…No, no, the skates couldn’t be gone. He committed it. Commits are forever. That was the entire basis of his quirk.

But the commit wasn’t part of any branch, and he hadn’t tagged it with any name. So, like, if you drew a timeline on a piece of paper where you had events connected by arrows, this would be like if there was a single event off to the side somewhere unconnected and inaccessible to everything else. The commit existed, but he didn’t know how to get to it!

The only way to reach the hover skates would be if he knew the ID of the commit—that is, the series of random numbers and letters that preceded the commit description. It had flashed in his mind when he made the commit a few minutes ago, but he wasn’t paying any attention to it! Why would he?

If he ever needed a commit ID for something, he would usually use “git log” to see the complete history of a branch. But that was for branches. The whole problem was that the commit wasn’t part of any branch!

There had to be a version of “git log” that wasn’t specific to branches, right? What he needed was the equivalent of the history tab in web browsers, a chronological list of stuff that happened recently. Please, please, that had to exist, right?

Izuku tore the Git reference manual from his desk drawer and spent the next several minutes poring through it for anything that mentioned “log” or “history”. One page caught his eye:

NAME

git-reflog - Manage reflog information

DESCRIPTION

This command manages the information recorded in the reflogs.

Reference logs, or “reflogs”, record when the tips of branches and other references were updated in the local repository. Reflogs are useful in various Git commands to specify the old value of a reference. For example, HEAD@{2} means “where HEAD used to be two moves ago”, main@{one.week.ago} means “where main used to point to one week ago in this local repository”, and so on.

That seemed… promising.

“git reflog,” he said hopefully.

6e35b33 (HEAD -> main) HEAD@{0}: checkout: moving from d58a2e2 to main
d58a2e2 (tag: rollerblades, tag: hover-skates) HEAD@{1}: checkout: moving from main to hover-skates
6e35b33 (HEAD -> main) HEAD@{2}: checkout: moving from 9868e8b to main
9868e8b HEAD@{3}: commit: Anchored hover skates to red socks
d58a2e2 (tag: rollerblades, tag: hover-skates) HEAD@{4}: checkout: moving from main to rollerblades
6e35b33 (HEAD -> main) HEAD@{5}: checkout: moving from backup-apr29 to main
5a02a5c (backup-apr29) HEAD@{6}: commit: Nightly Tooru backup
731c747 HEAD@{7}: commit: Nightly Mom backup
6e35b33 HEAD@{8}: checkout: moving from main to backup-apr29
:

There it was. “9868e8b HEAD@{3}: commit: Anchored hover skates to red socks.” Izuku let out a big sigh of relief. That was scary. Hatsume wasn’t going to kill him after all.

Well, not for this, at least.

It was honestly pretty interesting reading the ref-log. It was a thorough record of everything he had ever done with his quirk. He mentally scrolled through the pages and pages of entries. He could remember exactly what he had been doing at the time for nearly every listing. It had only been a year, but he was already feeling nostalgic for a lot of it.

After many minutes, he reached the bottom of one page and immediately grimaced.

82493c9 HEAD@{9102} commit: Th-this is my first commit. No, don't record my stuttering! Ugh, how do I make this stop?


Nope, he wasn’t feeling nostalgic for that commit. It was still an embarrassment on all levels.

Regardless, that was his first commit, so it was the end of the line. There shouldn’t be anything else after it.

…

…

Why were there still more pages remaining?

Why were there still a lot more pages remaining? He’d scrolled through the entire history of his quirk, and he was only on page 43 out of 685.

Izuku mentally scrolled to a random page later on in the ref-log.

He read a few lines, and his heart skipped a beat.

It felt like the world had tilted on its axis, just a little bit. Just enough for Izuku to feel unbalanced, like what was solid and real suddenly couldn’t be relied upon anymore. A pit of dread settled within him, a gaping hole in his stomach.

He scrolled down rapidly, eyes catching the occasional message, each worse than the last.

...
17d9718 HEAD@{11509} commit: Backup of ua_strike_force
...
fc52f83 HEAD@{11587} commit: Anchored to assault_rifle
...
7d79b2c HEAD@{11638} commit: Merge branch 'one-for-all' into new-order
...
b332a74 HEAD@{11670} commit: Reverted massacre
...

“Reverted massacre”? What the fuck was that supposed to mean?!

What was all this?

What was he reading?

He kept on scrolling. He couldn’t stop.

It just kept going.

Izuku had to consciously control his breathing to stop himself from panicking.

Was someone else born with this quirk before him? Were commits shared across everyone in the world who had Git as a quirk?

That was the only thing that made any sense. He must be reading the entries from the previous person who had this quirk before he did.

Who was it? It didn’t sound like they led a very happy life.

Why? Why… any of it? He didn’t understand.

…

A thought occurred to him. What was the last thing this person did before Izuku used his quirk for the first time? What was the most recent entry in their life story?

Maybe that would give him a clue to… whatever the fuck all this was…

Fingers trembling, Izuku mentally scrolled back up the ref-log.

He kept scrolling, feeling the pit in his stomach grow and grow.

…And there it was. The previous user’s last commit.

The description was long. It was clear that the person was just rambling in their final moments.

Izuku swallowed his fear and studied the words in his mind.

f8e2a37 HEAD@{9103} commit: U-used, ahem, used filter-branch to rewrite history so that All For One never existed, starting from when I got my quirk at four years old. No existing commits will be reachable from any branches, and I'm going to disable the repository immediately after this.

I'm sorry, Kacchan. I know you didn't want me to do this, but I just can't take it anymore. It's dangerous, it's stupid, I get it, I know, I know, but I... I want to see everyone again, even if it won't be them, and it won't be me. Everything that's happened will be undone... and no one will ever know. I-I'm so sorry, everyone.

When I rebuild the new global timeline, I'll also try to make a few more changes, including corrupting all information related to Git. All of this is risky already, so I'm not going to push it, but hopefully I can stop the new me from learning how to use his quirk. If I'm going to do something this drastic, then I don't want there to be any possibility of these old commits from this broken world being accessible.

I hope I don't fuck this up.
I hope you forgive me.
I hope it was all worth it.

Izuku couldn’t think.

He couldn’t process the words he was reading.

It was too much for him right now.

What… what was he even supposed to think after reading that?

His brain latched onto one phrase. Right at the very beginning.

filter-branch

That was a Git command. He recognized it from the manual, although he had always skipped past it because it was obviously something he shouldn’t use.

This was something he could do right now. He could look up what that command was.

A concrete, productive action. He should focus on just that right now, and everything else could come after.

Robotically, Izuku flipped through the Git reference manual on his desk.

He found the page he was looking for. His eyes were blurry. He had to blink a few times to focus, and then he read its contents.

NAME

git-filter-branch - Rewrite branches

WARNING

git filter-branch has a plethora of pitfalls that can produce non-obvious manglings of the intended history rewrite (and can leave you with little time to investigate such problems since it has such abysmal performance). It is riddled with gotchas resulting in various ways to easily corrupt repos or end up with a mess worse than what you started with, and as such its use is not recommended. If you still need to use git filter-branch, please carefully read SAFETY (and PERFORMANCE) to learn about the land mines of filter-branch, and then vigilantly avoid as many of the hazards listed there as reasonably possible.

DESCRIPTION

Lets you rewrite Git revision history by rewriting the branches mentioned in the <rev-list-options>, applying custom filters on each revision. Those filters can modify each tree (e.g. removing a file or running a perl rewrite on all files) or information about each commit. Otherwise, all information (including original commit times or merge information) will be preserved.

WARNING! The rewritten history will have different object names for all the objects and will not converge with the original branch. You will not be able to easily push and distribute the rewritten branch on top of the original branch.

Please do not use this command if you do not know the full implications.

“Heh. Hehaha.”

The warning to never, ever use the command was placed before the description of what it actually did. That said it all, didn’t it?

…

It was funny, really. All things considered, it was all pretty ironically hilarious, wasn’t it?

Izuku lay down on his bed, giggling with broken laughter as his world collapsed around him.

…What the fuck had he done?

Chapter Text

Aizawa stood at the front of the class with his usual air of stern aloofness. “In preparation for the upcoming Sports Festival, we have an important class today.” He gave a rare grin. “You will all be picking your hero names.”

A cheer started to erupt among the students before being quickly and awkwardly silenced by Aizawa’s glare.

He stared at them all for a few more moments, then continued, “Strictly speaking, these code names are temporary. You won’t officially register your hero names until you earn your Provisional Hero Licenses in Year 2. However, these are the names you will use to introduce yourself to the world during the Sports Festival. Take this seriously, or—”

“—You’ll have hell to pay later!” Midnight burst into the classroom with impeccable timing. “What you pick today could be your hero name for life. You better be careful, or you’ll get stuck with something you regret.”

“Midnight is going to have final approval over your names. Public relations is not my strong suit. Yes, shocking, I know,” Aizawa drawled. “The name you give yourself is important. It helps reinforce your image and shows what kind of hero you want to be in the future. Your hero name tells the public what you represent. This is your first and best chance to control the narrative of your personal hero’s journey.”

Having concluded his rousing multi-second speech, Aizawa collapsed to the floor, zipped up his sleeping bag, and fell asleep.

The next ten minutes were filled with hushed whispers and squeaks of marker against card stock. My hero name… Izuku thought, tapping his fingers against his desk.

This is the second time I’ve done this, isn’t it? A lifetime ago, I sat here and decided on a hero name.

I wonder what I chose last time? Am I going to choose the same thing this time? I mean, we’re the same person.

Or maybe we aren’t. That Izuku’s life was completely different. He knew how to use his quirk from the start. It must have been such a mess trying to use my quirk when I was a little kid. Was I friends with Kacchan then? Is that why I’ve never been able to fully let that relationship go, no matter how big of a jerk Kacchan acts? Residual emotions from my previous life…?

Mm, probably not. Now that I have real friends, I’ve barely thought about Kacchan since starting UA. Huh. I hadn’t noticed. That’s so weird to think about.

Who was I friends with the first time around? It would be nice to think that I was still friends with Denki, Tooru, and Ochako, but it was kind of a fluke that we all met each other first. Would I have a different group of friends if things played out differently? Kirishima’s pretty cool. I wouldn’t mind being friends with him. Or maybe I was in Class 1-B, and this is all moot. I should talk to Kirishima more. Just because I have friends now doesn’t mean I should stop trying to make new friends.

“Now, students, who among you is ready to share?” Midnight called from behind the front podium.

“We’re presenting these?!” Kirishima blurted.

“Of course! If you’re too embarrassed to present your name to your classmates, how do you expect to present your name to the world?”

Izuku looked down at the blank card in front of him. He had an idea for his hero name, but it was kind of cheesy. Many heroes had names based on their quirk, so that part of it wasn’t unusual, but Izuku still felt uncertain. His classmates were going to see this. Everyone was going to see this.

“I’ll present mine first!” Aoyama exclaimed, leaping from his seat and joining Midnight at the front of the class. “Prepare to be amazed!”

Wow, Aoyama is confident. He’s not nervous about showing off to the class at all! He must have a great name. Is my name too dumb in comparison? If all my classmates have cool and creative hero names, I might need to scrap this and think of something better.

“I am… The Shining Hero: I Cannot Stop Twinkling!” Aoyama twirled on the spot. “Mes amis, you can’t deny my sparkle!”

Izuku immediately wrote his hero name on the card, all worries and anxieties forgotten.

“Don’t you think that name’s a bit long?” Ochako said hesitantly.

Jirou snorted. “Yeah, like that’s the problem with it.”

“It isn’t too long, no,” Midnight said, sounding like she was thinking something over. “However… no, sorry, I believe I need to veto this one, Aoyama.”

Aoyama gasped. “Pourquoi?”

Midnight nodded to herself and turned to address the whole class. “This is a good lesson for all of you. There isn’t anything wrong with lengthy hero names so long as you keep in mind that they will be shortened, both by the public and by your fellow heroes. Communication needs to be clear and concise when you’re out on the field, so it’s important to choose a name that still works when abbreviated.” She grimaced. “I learned that the hard way the first time another hero called me ‘Mid’ during a raid.”

Aizawa barked a laugh from his place on the floor. Midnight retaliated by kicking his sleeping bag.

“I understand perfectly!” Aoyama said. “But I do not see the problem. ‘Twinkle’ is also an exquisite name!”

“Ugh, your name will be shortened to ‘Twink’, you moron!” shouted Katsuki, who believed that “tact” was an enemy to overcome like any other.

Aoyama paused. He looked down at the card in his hand. He stood there for a moment. “…I shall revise and return shortly!” he said eventually, stepping away from the podium and returning to his seat.

“Ribbit.” Tsu raised her hand. “I have one. Is it okay if I go next?”

“C’mon up!”

Tsu walked to the front of the classroom. “I’ve had this name in mind for a long time,” she said, planting her card on the podium. “The Rainy Season Hero: Froppy.”

“That’s delightful!” Midnight squealed. “It’s concise, memorable, and it makes you sound approachable. The public will love it! Approved!”

The classroom applauded Tsu as she blushed and returned to her seat.

Confidence boosted thanks to their class president taking the lead, the rest of the students came up to announce their names one after the other.

“Red Riot!” Kirishima said to applause.

“Creati,” Yaoyorozu said a little self-consciously, but she was buoyed by her classmates’ positive response.

“Chargebolt!” Denki announced with a confident swagger.

That was a cool name! Izuku made sure to clap louder than usual.

“Uravity!” said Ochako with a wobbly smile.

Very cute! Izuku clapped loudly for Ochako, too.

“I Cannot Stop Sparkling!” Aoyama sang.

Well… “Sparkle” and “Spark” were better shortened names, at least?

Next up was Katsuki. Oh boy. He stomped up to the front of the class, his usual scowl on his face. Katsuki didn’t give any introduction—he just set the card in front of him and stared at the classroom in challenge. “The Bombshell Hero: Killer.”

Midnight rolled her eyes. “No, no. Your hero name can’t be Killer.”

“Why the fuck not?” Katsuki exploded. “It’s a killer name!”

Midnight sighed and looked annoyed that she even had to explain this. “As a Pro Hero, you represent an ideal the public looks up to. Your name has to have positive connotations.”

“Bullshit,” Katsuki spat. “ ‘That was a killer move!’ ‘You killed it out there!’ It has lots of positive connotations!”

“Bakugou, this is your codename for a career that often involves physical confrontations with other people. You need to consider your name in that context.”

Sero decided to jump in. “Forget the ‘Killer’ part. What about the ‘Bombshell’ part? You know that people are going to call you a blond bombshell? Like a pin-up model?”

“Yeah, what of it? It’s true. I’m very sexy.” Katsuki pumped out his chest in pride.

Izuku ducked his head and covered his mouth with his hands, barely stifling a laugh. As much as Izuku couldn’t stand Katsuki a lot of the time, he was so jealous of Kacchan’s raw, shameless confidence in himself.

“You need to pick a different name,” Midnight insisted.

“No, I already picked this one.”

“You have to.”

“No.”

Midnight pinched the bridge of her nose. “Just go back to your seat. We’ll talk about this later.”

“No. We won’t,” Katsuki said, stomping away.

“Me next! Me next!” Ashido exclaimed, waving her hands in the air. She skipped up to the front podium and placed down her card. “My name is Alien Queen! Or ‘Queen’ for short!” she said smugly.

“You mean that horrible monster with the acidic blood?” Midnight shuddered theatrically. “You shouldn’t be choosing names of villains for your hero names. Pick something else.”

Ashido stared right into Midnight’s eyes and smirked. “No.”

Midnight put a hand to her forehead and sighed. She then kicked the sleeping bag again. “What’s wrong with your class, Shouta?”

“Don’t blame me. They came this way.”

Pouncing on the brief distraction, Ashido quickly skipped back to her seat and sat down with an innocent smile.

“All right! I’m next!” Tooru said. She walked up to the front of the room and turned to face the class. “My name won’t make sense unless I show you all something first. I’ve been working on this for the past few weeks, and I’m ready.” Tooru took a breath, and then power started to radiate from her, emanating from a core of light in her chest. Wait! This was the same power that Izuku felt from her during the Battle Trial right before she destroyed her arm! What was Tooru doing?

The stockpiled light radiated from her body, projecting outward in multicolored rays. Her form shimmered into view like ethereal glass. Izuku’s jaw dropped as he realized that Tooru was visible, and to the naked eye! Her translucent skin refracted the light from within her like a prism, giving her the appearance of a girl crafted from colorless clear crystal. A soft halo of light surrounded her, giving her an angelic appearance. Every slight movement she made was accompanied by glimmering, colorful reflections.

She was a girl made of diamonds and rainbows.

“My name is Prismatic Angel,” she announced, her smile visible to all. “Or ‘Angel’ for short. Thanks for that, Mina.”

“No problem, girl!”

Izuku grinned brightly as he clapped as loud as he could, the rest of his classmates joining in on the applause. Tooru dimmed back to her normal state of invisibility and returned to her seat.

All right, my turn next. Izuku stood up and walked to the front of the room. Turning to look back at the class, Izuku let his gaze wander over his classmates.

There was Ochako, cooing over Tooru’s new form. Tokoyami and Dark Shadow looked to be arguing over what their name should be. Iida was still lecturing Katsuki over his choice of hero name while Katsuki snarled back at him. Kirishima hovered over Kamakiri’s desk, the two bouncing increasingly manlier-sounding names off each other. Rin and Kodai were in the corner, seemingly lost in their own little world. Denki was paying Izuku his full attention, looking forward to hearing his hero name.

Tears suddenly brimmed in the corners of his eyes. This… this was fun. All of this passion and heart. These moments of happiness and laughter. Having people around who he cared about and who cared about him in return. This was what Izuku lived for.

He wouldn’t allow this to be taken from him.

Never again.

“Midoriya? Have you thought of a name?” Midnight prompted.

Right, everyone was waiting for him to speak. Izuku refocused and addressed his classmates. “So, um, as versatile as my quirk is, it’s ultimately all about making save points. Saving things. Given that, and my goals as a hero, one name feels the most fitting to me.” Izuku set his face in determination and revealed his hero name.

“The Committed Hero: Saver.”

Izuku’s breaths came in steady puffs as he jogged up the familiar path of the nearby mountain trail, the cool evening air refreshing against his skin. The soundscape of the forest eased him into a state of calm. Each step brought him closer to the viewing platform at the summit, where he often stopped to rest and take in the view of the sunset.

He wasn’t jogging just for exercise. Today, more than most days, it was a moment of reflection for Izuku, a chance to clear his mind and think.

Yesterday night had deeply shaken him.

Izuku had spent most of last evening lost in his head, overwhelmed by what he’d learned. The previous day’s revelation gnawed at his very sense of what was real, the basic foundations of what he could rely on. Exhaustion eventually forced him into an uneasy sleep, but his mind kept whirring and whirring through the night, through his dreams, through everything.

Part of him wanted to look away. To bury it, to never think about it again.

It would have been so easy, too. If he’d never seen those old commits in the first place, then nothing in Izuku’s life would change. That world was gone now. He’d made sure of it.

It, literally, did not matter. No one would ever know, and no one would ever care.

And yet…

Something had occurred to him during his restless sleep. A simple question. And once he thought about it, he couldn’t get it out of his head. It stayed with him. In some strange way, it grounded him. He’d spent the night spiraling under the horrible realization that everything he thought he knew had been a lie… and yet, this thought somehow overshadowed even that.

It was a strange question. An egotistical one, even.

The facts were there in black and white. A previous incarnation of Izuku rewrote the history of the world after some cataclysmic war destroyed everything he cared about. Izuku’s whole life was the “good future” that the previous Izuku had created. It sounded like the plot of a time-travel movie, but it was the truth. The commits were there, and commits were forever. There was no avoiding it.

But it raised a question: How did the world get to that state?

More specifically, How did Izuku let the world get to that state?

Again, it sounded egotistical, but it was a valid question. Izuku’s quirk was about preserving things. It was about restoring objects to earlier states. No matter how much destruction had occurred, Izuku should have been able to fix it. That was the entire point of his quirk.

The very fact that Izuku was capable of rewriting the flow of time further supported this. Izuku always knew that his quirk had the potential to be one of the strongest in the world, but even he was caught off guard to learn just how powerful he really was. It was beyond imagination.

Commits were forever. If Izuku truly wanted someone to live, then they could never die. And yet, the message from the previous Izuku implied that he had rewritten the world to bring back his dead friends.

If Izuku’s quirk truly was that powerful, why would he have let it get that bad to begin with? Given that the previous Izuku was willing to use such a dangerous command, he’d clearly gone all out, yet he still needed to risk it all and sacrifice his entire world in a last-ditch ploy to save everyone.

How could Izuku reconcile this contradiction?

…

Well, in truth, it was easy.

The answer was very obvious.

What would happen if Denki or Ochako were fatally struck by a car on their way to school tomorrow? Izuku wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. He had all this power, but he’d never made a commit of them, so it wouldn’t matter. They’d be dead, and that would be that.

Izuku was very, very careful with his quirk. He didn’t save people, or buildings, or infrastructure, or anything important like that. No, he saved pencils. He saved rollerblades. He had all of this power, and he used it to restore his clothes every morning to avoid doing laundry.

What would he do if he had to take things seriously? What would he do if war ravaged the world?

Apparently, the answer was that he’d be a spineless little shit.

Oh, he’d fight, obviously. Of course he would. He’d scream and bleed and put himself through hell to fight with everything he had. The commit descriptions from the reflog gave him a pretty good idea of what he’d been up to during the war. Restoring weapons to give everyone infinite ammo. Instantly plopping down military forts in arbitrary locations by anchoring the whole thing to a marble. Reusing the same equipment over and over. Deleting enemy strongholds. Anchoring people to objects, then restoring the object to another location to teleport people around at the cost of only a few seconds of memory loss. And, well, “reverted massacre” spoke for itself.

But it wasn’t enough. And by the time he realized he couldn’t hold back, it was too late. The end of the world had come and gone. He’d been reactive rather than proactive, and so he doomed them all. He couldn’t fix what was already broken.

The previous him had fucked up. There was no getting around it. The previous him knew that he fucked up. The guilt ate him alive until he was willing to risk everything to fix it.

Izuku was not going to make the same mistake twice.

After jogging for a while, Izuku reached the viewing platform at the summit, taking in the scene below. Rows of houses stretched out, their rooftops glowing softly in the evening light. He could just barely make out the tiny little dots of people in the streets bustling about their evening routines. Homes glowed warmly as the families inside settled down for the day. Looking into the distance, the waning sun was half-hidden below the horizon.

Izuku stood there and gazed upon it all.

And he thought.

There was a fundamental incongruity in his quirk. A key part of it that never really made sense.

It wasn’t something that he noticed immediately. For the first few months after gaining his quirk, he was so thrilled about it that he took many things for granted. He had a complicated quirk and was learning the very basics, so making some assumptions in those early days was natural.

Revisiting some of those core assumptions later on revealed the inconsistency. He saw it, he recognized it… and he chose to look away from it. He couldn’t do that anymore.

Izuku’s quirk was based entirely on language. He used his quirk by speaking Git commands, and then those commands affected the world. At its core, it was actually a very simple quirk. The commands were complicated, but the activation requirement was as simple as it could be. He spoke commands. That was all there was to it.

And there lay the issue.

If the only real activation requirement for his quirk was that he spoke a command, then everything else he did to use his quirk suddenly became highly suspect.

For example, why did he need to touch an object to start tracking it for the first time? His quirk never told him to do that. It was purely a rule that Izuku had intuited by himself, had assumed. But, truthfully, it never made any sense.

If touch was an activation requirement, then why did he only need to do it the first time? His quirk worked remotely after that.

If he treated an object like a folder containing other objects, then he didn’t need to touch the inner objects for his quirk to start tracking them. Touching the closet in his room and saying “git add closet/*” was enough to add everything within to his quirk—the wildcard character represented every object within the “folder”. He didn’t have to touch each item in his closet individually.

Conversely, sometimes touch appeared to be a requirement even after he started tracking an object. If two tracked objects had the same name, such as if he added two identical pencils to his quirk, then commands would fail unless he touched one of them to clarify which one he meant.

But touch wasn’t the important part. If he wanted to clarify which object he was referring to without touching it, an easy way would be to rename one of the objects first. He had multiple options available to him.

That was the key. Touch wasn’t a requirement, and it never had been. The only thing that his quirk cared about was that his commands couldn’t be ambiguous. An ambiguous command would fail. Touching the object that he was talking about was one way to remove that ambiguity, but it wasn’t the only way. It was a convenient shortcut, nothing more.

So long as his commands weren’t ambiguous, there were no limits. He could affect something on the other side of the planet without ever having to be there. His quirk didn’t care. Everything was equal under the watchful eyes of his quirk.

Izuku admired the sun as it dipped below the distant hills. The scenery had dimmed just enough that a handful of stars were just barely visible when he looked up at the sky.

…

…

It went without saying that you generally couldn’t see the sun and the stars in the sky at the same time. The former blotted out the light of the latter. You might be able to take a picture of it with some careful setup and the correct exposure settings, but you couldn’t see it with your naked eye. While it would be very cool to see a sunset where the stars were bright and visible at the same time, it wasn’t exactly realistic.

But hadn’t Izuku created that patch object a while ago that contained stockpiled starlight? If he wanted to, he could apply the patch, brighten the stars, and see the fantastic view of the sunset and starlight together.

The stars looked a bit dim? No matter. He could fix that.

He could do anything he wanted.

“git apply starlight,” he commanded.

The faint stars above suddenly flashed incongruously bright, casting an otherworldly glow over the landscape. The vibrant hues of the sunset flared on the horizon while the stars shined with conspicuous intensity above him. It was a surreal, magical sight.

And then the magic shifted, and something strange and alien took its place.

Izuku didn’t know what triggered this, but as he looked upon the landscape below, double vision usurped his senses. It felt similar to when his quirk displayed popups and error messages in his mind. Those messages were never part of his actual vision—they existed as something subtly different. He saw them in his mind’s eye even when his physical eyes saw the world as normal.

The same thing was happening now. His physical eyes saw the sunset, the rows of houses, the trees, the roads, the world as usual. But in his mind’s eye, he saw something else entirely overlaying the ordinary world.

From his perch above, Izuku saw the landscape replaced by a flat plane of black glass, stretching from horizon to horizon. It was a comforting and warming black, not an empty or deathly black. It was the black one would see looking up into the infinite expanse of the night sky, full of wonder and possibility. Looking down into the glass, he could see little stars floating within it, shining brightly and flowing down cosmic currents that curved and spiraled in fluid patterns.

It was the night sky, inverted and solidified.

The firmament.

The sun was still there, hovering by the horizon. It was only a semicircle of light, still mid-sunset. Half of it was luminous, radiating heat and warmth. The other half was hidden below the horizon, immersed in the glass. The sun looked like it was cut neatly in half by the night sky itself.

Above him, the real sky was unchanged. The stars were still shining unnaturally bright.

Starlight shined from above, and from below.

None of this changed what Izuku saw with his physical eyes. He still saw the normal world with its roads, buildings, and people, but he was suddenly hesitant to call the normal world the “real” world.

He breathed deeply, gazing upon the world of glass and stars.

Izuku wanted to be a hero. He and his friends were all training to be heroes. They were all trying their best, putting in their all.

It was time for him to do the same.

The previous version of him had sacrificed everything so that he could be here now. The world was reborn for his sake. He couldn’t let that sacrifice be in vain.

His fingers trembled.

Izuku needed to add objects to his quirk before he could affect them. But once he did that, they were under his control.

So, what if he added… everything?

He swallowed. He… he should make a new branch. What was the right branch name for this?

“git switch -c master,” he decided.

Izuku looked up at the stars, and the weight of inevitability consumed him.

Twinkling down the stars whispered, Save them all.

Git add star.

Git add star.

Just say it, Izuku.

…

Say it.

…

“git add *,” he breathed.

For the first time ever, Izuku’s quirk struggled. The star character—the single wildcard—represented any length of any character, meaning that it represented every possible word and series of words. He had commanded his quirk to add everything, unambiguously, and his quirk strained under the impossible demand.

Time froze as his quirk processed the boundless mass of data, and Izuku’s mind froze alongside it. For an unknowable span of time, the cosmos existed in a suspended state of deadlock, static and unchanging, as if reality itself held its breath…

—And then it was over. The stillness shattered, and time resumed its relentless march forward. In the end, all Izuku experienced was the vague sensation that an eternity had passed in the blink of an eye.

One step remained. He had to make a commit. He had to make this permanent.

“git commit -m "Universe backup #1".”

[master a0632c2] Universe backup #1
 50,812,699,499,854,712,584,083,048,723,657,999,791,559,909,332,898,826,542,279,213,047,541,397 files changed


It was done. He let out a breath. He couldn’t change his mind now. Commits are forever.

Izuku’s double vision ended. The view of the flat, endless firmament that underlay reality faded away to reveal the normal world once again. From his place at the summit, he could see families finishing their evening strolls and children reluctantly heading indoors. Chirps of birds and other woodland creatures surrounded him. The distant hills framed the scene, the sun having set behind them.

All of it was part of his quirk now. All of it under his control.

Izuku looked up at the sky and gazed upon the stars and galaxies above. The galaxies that belonged to him.

It was all his now. It was part of him. His to cherish. His to love. His to protect.

Everyone was part of him now. No one had to die. For every soul that passed to the beyond, he could bring them back—the saver of souls.

He made his decision.

Staring into the heart of the cosmos, Izuku pledged a vow that transcended the boundaries of space and time:

My name is Saver.

I will save everyone.

END

Author’s Note:

That’s all, folks! If you missed the previous author’s note, read that to learn why the story’s ending early.

If I could go back in time, I would’ve written something that could be completed in 80-100k words like a normal-ass book rather than doing a full canon rewrite. Instead of telling a complete story, the 80k words I did write only ended up covering the first season of the show, which is only 20% or so of the full fic. That was really stupid of me, and I’m annoyed with myself. I don’t know what I was thinking.

Well, that’s not true. I was thinking that I’d have a lot more free time, and I didn’t plan for anything else. Oh well. Live and learn.

A commenter mentioned last chapter that I’d pulled a classic software developer cliché with this story. The project began with a simple idea, but scope creep started to set in as I developed it. Then various delays and real-life obstacles caused the project to fall behind schedule. In the end, I had to scale it down to a Minimum Viable Product to get it finished and out the door. The parallels are completely unintentional, but it’s hilarious, and it genuinely makes me feel better about all this. 😆

Anyway, the rest of this chapter is my planning document (for those who are interested). I rewrote it to give more details and explain things in full sentences since my actual doc was just a bunch of bullet points with 1-5 words each as prompts to myself, not something understandable.

Before diving into this, I want to be clear that the vast majority of this story was made up as I was writing it. I call it a “planning” doc, but it’s more of an “idea” doc. Sure, I have notes, but they’re just ideas. I throw away ideas and come up with new ones all the time. This is just a snapshot of what my doc happens to look like right now. I have these things penciled in at the moment, but it’s not necessarily what I would have written. I honestly don’t know what the hypothetical completed story would’ve looked like.

In terms of these first 15 chapters, I’d say that the biggest change compared to my original notes is Tooru’s entire existence in the story. She just showed up one day and largely replaced whatever Katsuki’s role in the story might otherwise have been.

All right, let’s begin.

Sports Festival

My overall goal with the Sports Festival was to keep it short! So many fics have their pacing drag to a snail’s pace during the arc, and I wanted to avoid that. It would still have to take up several chapters, but basically all of my decisions here revolve around trying to get through it as efficiently as I could. A lot of battles are anticlimaxes both for the joke and so that I can get through them quickly.

This is probably my least favorite planned arc in the story, and part of me is glad that I never have to write it. This arc has the highest probability of me scrapping everything I’ve written below and doing something else for the Festival instead, assuming that I managed to come up with a better idea.

• Before the Sports Festival begins, the Support Course ambushes Izuku and asks/demands/threatens that he go along with their plan, which is to make support items (and Izuku by extension) the star of the show.

  • Since Izuku’s quirk lets him summon items, he’s allowed to use any support gear he wants. The Support students want to take full advantage of this.
  • You know the part in the original manga where Hatsume shows off her gear in the fight against Iida, hacking the announcer box, humiliating her opponent, and turning the fight into a commercial? Take that concept and extend it to all of Izuku’s fights. Each fight has Izuku summoning different gear each tailor-made to countering his opponent. While he fights, the Support student who made the current gear he’s showing off gets to advertise the product via the hacked announcer booth.
  • This is the arc’s main running gag. The entire festival gets hijacked by the Support Course.
  • Izuku accepts for a few reasons. One, he wants to maintain a positive relationship with the support students. Two, Denki probably tells him that his quirk scares some people, so he’s wary about showing off the crazier parts (like merge conflicts) on live TV, and using support gear lets him avoid all of that. Three… because he has no spine when it comes to people asking him for help.

• Izuku is the first-year representative and has to give the student pledge. Expect extreme secondhand embarrassment as Izuku overthinks himself into a puddle.

• Obstacle Race & Cavalry Battle: Who even cares?

  • One thing: During the Cavalry Battle, Izuku adds multiple students to his quirk so he can use grep to track them. These students are accidentally included in a commit later. Izuku notices after the festival, but he can’t do anything about it besides untrack the students he committed. This is important for later.

• Due to the convoluted mess of Izuku anchoring dozens of different support items to himself and trying to swap between all of them, he accidentally restores his gym uniform during one of his fights, teleporting it back to his locker. Izuku ends up in his underwear on live TV. Specifically, his lucky All Might underwear. Yes, there’s a reason I drew attention to that underwear in Ch. 2.

• Katsuki is 100% focused on Izuku and barely pays attention to his other classmates, which bites him in the ass. My current idea is that Honenuki sinks Katsuki into the concrete, and Katsuki can’t escape (we know from the Sludge Villain that Katsuki can’t use his quirk if his hands are covered in goop). Katsuki only falls for this trap because he didn’t know what Honenuki’s quirk even was.

• As for Todoroki, I’m not sure. My original idea was that Izuku and Denki would together figure out how Denki could use his quirk to increase his reflexes. During Denki’s fight with Shouto, Shouto would flood the arena with ice like usual, assume he’d won, but Denki would pop out of nowhere and shock Shouto into unconsciousness.

  • I’m not happy with this for two reasons. One, Denki’s upgrade is too similar to Tooru’s, so it’d be better if Denki learned this after internships. Two, it means both Katsuki and Shouto lose due to their inflated egos and underestimating their opponents, which is repetitive.
  • One reader suggested maybe Katsuki and Shouto could be rivals in this fic since Izuku has buggered off from being Katsuki’s rival. I might have had Katsuki beat Shouto in a big thrilling fight, then have Katsuki lose to Honenuki anticlimactically.

• The whole arc is a bit of a redux of the dual perspectives joke from the Battle Trial (Ch. 7).

  • From Izuku’s perspective, he embarrassed himself during the student pledge, he became a public laughingstock when he fought in his underwear, and all his successes so far have been due to the Support students rigging everything in his favor.
  • From the perspective of the rest of the students, Izuku is an unstoppable force effortlessly steamrolling the competition. Everyone is terrified to be pitted against him because all who do suffer a humiliating defeat.

• The finals are Izuku vs Tooru. Izuku’s fights up to this point were basically all one-sided commercials/bloodbaths, whereas in Tooru’s case no one could defend against an invisible punch to the face (unlike in canon, Tooru can make her uniform invisible thanks to the boost from OFA).

  • At this point, Tooru reveals her version of Full Cowl (the “girl made of diamonds and rainbows” thing). Izuku is completely caught off guard by her sudden speed and strength and she throws him out of the arena.
    • Tooru trained with Gran Torino off screen. After what happened during the Battle Trial, All Might asked him for help.
  • Izuku is saved thanks to his hover skates. Technically he doesn’t touch the ground, so it’s not a ring-out. Izuku retaliates and wins by summoning some absolute nonsense that Mei and the Support students were planning for the grand finale, like a giant robot.
  • Izuku is the winner of the Sports Festival.
  • Possible scene, not sure if I’d include it or not: Some portion of the crowd consider the hover shoe ruling to be bullshit and cheer on Tooru as the “true” winner. Tooru flips them off and defends Izuku’s win. After all, she knows that Izuku could have beaten her in an instant and the only reason any of them had a chance (to a certain definition of “chance”) is because he wanted to play fair. The idea that she was cheated out of her deserved victory is bullshit and she says as much.

• Overall, the public is annoyed. The Support Course sucked the fun out of the whole thing. Izuku displayed enough skill and versatility that he’s begrudgingly accepted as a deserving winner, but his waltz to victory made the festival boring. Everyone comes away from it feeling like they just watched a giant infomercial.

Hero Names

• This would’ve happened post-Sports Festival, like in canon, but I wrote it early because it fits nicely into the final chapter.
• Somehow or another Katsuki manages to keep his hero name, meaning that his and Izuku’s hero names are “Killer” and “Saver”, respectively. I was unreasonably proud of myself when I came up with these names, and it’s basically the only reason why this scene exists. Nearly everyone else just keeps their hero names from canon.
• Anyway, let’s talk about the other major exception, Tooru.
  • Tooru’s version of Full Cowl affects her own quirk’s ability to bend light, making her a shining rainbow-colored beacon when she uses her strength. Importantly, this means that whenever she uses her strength, she’s blindingly bright and visible. When she wants to be invisible, she has to not use any strength.
  • This isn’t a real limitation, it’s a psychological one caused by Tooru thinking of her invisibility and One For All as two separate quirks rather than a single merged quirk that’s capable of controlling light.
  • As far as Tooru is concerned, she thinks that she can either be a shining bright spotlight hero or a sneaky ninja, but not both.
  • To use her full capabilities, she’d have to learn how to reconcile these diametrically opposed aspects of herself. Get it, get it? The themes of her character arc are reflected in her powers! Look at how smart I am!
  • By the way, this story ignores the whole “Only quirkless people can use One For All without dying” twist. Instead, I decided that only quirkless people can unlock the quirks of previous users. Otherwise, One For All just powers up the user’s original quirk. So no, Tooru wouldn’t have unlocked Blackwhip or anything.

Internships

• As a lot of people guessed, Izuku would catch the eye of Star and Stripe, a fellow reality-warper whose quirk works by stating commands out loud.

  • I originally planned for Izuku to do a work study with Star and Stripe (not internships, I mean the arc in Season 4, replacing Sir Nighteye). By then, Mei would have built Izuku’s entire hero kit so he’d be able to keep up with Star and Stripe (using rocket boots to fly, for example).
  • Unfortunately, then I remembered that the only reason they did work studies in canon was because the class got Provisional Licenses, and they only got licenses so that they could legally defend themselves from attacks from the League of Villains, which wouldn’t happen in this story.
  • Still up in the air how I would’ve dealt with this. I didn’t want to “waste” Star and Stripe too early while Izuku was still learning the basics of hero-ing. I was thinking that maybe rather than Izuku doing a dedicated internship with Star and Stripe, she’d check up on Izuku’s progress multiple times throughout the story whenever she happened to be in Japan for other reasons.

• I hadn’t decided who Izuku would have his internship with (maybe a hero who once worked with Star and Stripe to forge that connection). However, since I also decided against Denki upgrading his quirk in time for the Sports Festival, I’d probably have Izuku and Denki intern with the same hero so that they could work on Denki’s quirk together.

  • You know the scene after the Internship arc where they do a rescue training race and Izuku shows off Full Cowl to his classmates for the first time? Since Denki’s upgrade is basically a partial, weaker, more situational version of Full Cowl, he’d probably fill in the role of canon Izuku in that scene.

• All throughout the story, we’d be seeing where the rest of the League of Villains ended up in this timeline. We already saw Kurogiri and Himiko in the USJ chapters. I’d likely have some of them appear during hero patrols. Mr. Compress is probably hanging out with Gentle Criminal and La Brava, Izuku pops into a video game store owned by some guy named Tenko, etc.

• The scene in the story summary (“Reality shattered like broken glass. … A building collapsed, and it did not. An explosion devastated the surroundings, and it did not…”) had to happen at some point, and it would probably be around here somewhere. I wrote that description with no thought toward how it would fit in the story, I just wanted to write something eye-catching.

  • There’s no real way to fit the scene as-written into the story. For example, this line from the description: “Izuku groaned. Great, another merge conflict, he thought. What a pain.” would never work because the scene describes people getting caught up in the merge conflict, and Izuku is too kind and careful and empathetic to ever be dismissive of other people like that. Still, I could make the scene work in broad strokes.
  • Like all of my ideas, the details are very up in the air. Say that some villain aping The Joker has set up bombs in two different public locations (e.g. a mall), and for some contrived reason defusing one bomb instantly detonates the other (and for some reason people can’t evacuate). One of those classic “Who will you heroes choose to save? HAHAHA!” type things.
  • In theory, Izuku could save everyone by adding everyone to his quirk, letting the bomb go off, watch as hundreds of people die painful deaths, and then restore all the dead bodies. For obvious reasons, Izuku would rather find another solution.
  • Instead, Izuku does some convoluted stuff to create a building-sized merge conflict (if you thought a control panel-sized merge conflict was weird…), freezing reality in place when the bomb goes off.
  • He resolves the merge conflict by establishing a world where the bomb goes off and the building is destroyed, but everyone inside the building is from the other timeline where the bomb didn’t go off. Everyone is unharmed and standing in the ruins of a destroyed building.
    • By the way, people directly affected by (or enclosed within) a merge conflict aren’t harmed by the broken glass/firmament. They can pass through it like Izuku. Denki was hurt because he was an “outsider” trying to interfere.
  • The public at large sees the building-sized merge conflict (probably shown on the news and spread on social media), giving the public their first glimpse at the eldritch horror masquerading as a cheerful hero student.
  • Actually, now that I’m writing this, it might be better if this scene takes place after the stuff that goes down with Iida. It would help reinforce why Izuku would be willing to do something so crazy just to avoid restore-ing people. Speaking of Iida…

Iida & The Hero Killer

• Just like in canon, Ingenium is paralyzed by Stain and Iida goes to take revenge. Unlike in canon, no League of Villains means that there’s no attack on Hosu.
• When Iida finds Stain, nobody is there to save him. Stain kills him.
• Class 1-A return from their internships and learn that Iida has been murdered.
• This is where the accidental commits of his classmates Izuku made during the Sports Festival comes back into play. Izuku restores Iida from the most recent backup from back then, which happens to be right after Iida learned about the attack on his brother.
• From Iida’s perspective, he just got off a phone call with his parents and is stewing in rage and grief and plotting revenge… and suddenly it’s weeks later, and he learns that he already went after Stain for revenge and died from it. He’s just a clone with Iida’s memories that Izuku created with his quirk.
• This is important. Unlike Tooru, Iida feels like an imposter. He’s not the real Iida, the real one died fighting Stain.
• This makes him not value his own life. He’s not the real Iida, he’s a replacement. His family isn’t his real family. Now he’s more determined than ever to kill Stain. He needs to avenge not just Ingenium, but also the life of the real Iida Tenya. And it doesn’t matter if he dies again in the attempt—Izuku will just create another copy anyway.
• I’m not entirely sure how Iida’s arc ends. I’d have to feel it out while writing it. He probably gets himself into a life-threatening situation, and while he lies injured he thinks, “I don’t want to die.” That snaps him out of his suicidal tendencies and puts him on the first small steps toward recovery.

Final Exams

• ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Forest Training Camp

• N/A. In canon, the location of summer training changed due to the attacks by the League of Villains, which didn’t happen here. I could have the class do something similar in a different location, but I decided to replace all of this with a different arc:

I-Island

• Izuku is invited to I-Island. The public reason is that, thanks to the Sports Festival, Izuku has become the poster child among the public for the effective use of support gear for hero work, so Izuku was invited to I-Island to see the latest and greatest / as a publicity stunt.

  • Privately, the viral footage of Izuku’s building-sized merge conflict caused some scientists on I-Island to want to study what Izuku can do to the fabric of reality.

• You may have noticed that this planning doc doesn’t really have any villain attacks or big action scenes. This was intentional for two reasons. One, this story explicitly takes place in the “Good Future” after previous-Izuku rewrote reality to make things better. Two, I absolutely hate writing action scenes.

  • Regardless, there needs to be some payoff to all the build-up of Izuku getting stronger and stronger and more capable with his quirk, and this arc would be it.

• I hadn’t worked out any real details, but the basic idea is that even though All For One has been erased, Dr. Garaki is still around and has been plotting in the background. Dr. Garaki successfully transplants All For One’s quirk factor into Nine (from Heroes Rising) and Nine and Dr. Garaki’s army of Nomus attack I-Island to get something they need.

  • This is directly inspired by The Only Hero by Squeakyclarinet. Fantastic fic. Go read it.

• Nine’s original and most powerful quirk is Weather Manipulation, which he can use to strike I-Island with wave after wave of devasting tsunamis. Good thing that I-Island built protective shields and Izuku is there to ignore the power requirements by breaking reality!

• From a storytelling perspective, the benefit of doing this on I-Island is that Izuku needs to save the day alone with no backup (All Might is back in Japan, no other powerful pro heroes are around, etc.) Additionally, they’re in the middle of the ocean, so Izuku has no reason not to go all out.

• This is basically all a power fantasy at this point. Along with the “obvious” things like flying around in Mei’s Iron Man-style power suit, summoning whatever crazy shit she’d made, taking advantage of whatever experimental gear available on I-Island, etc., there are also all the absurd Git options available to Izuku thanks to being in an isolated location where it’s easy to avoid collateral damage.

• For example, Izuku’s quirk requires defined boundaries to add things, but those boundaries can be completely conceptual. Say that Nine uses Weather Manipulation to create a thunderstorm, and Izuku retaliates by treating the clouds as a boundary, add-ing the entire area covered by the storm to his quirk, then rm-ing the air contained within to create an instant horizon-spanning vacuum implosion.

  • In the movie, it took two One For All users working together to take down Nine. So yeah, no holding back.

Provisional License Exams

• N/A

Eri & Overhaul

• Eri is rescued immediately when she first escapes from Overhaul. During the escape, a doll Eri had with her is broken.

• Later, Eri says that her “curse” rewinds things or makes things disappear. She demonstrates by fixing her doll: “git restore princess_doll,” Eri says.

• Surprise! Eri’s quirk is Git, not Rewind. Rather than quirk-erasing bullets, Overhaul was trying to use the power of Git to take over the world.

• Because Eri, from a Git perspective, is considered to be a repository rather than a file (see the next section for details about this), Izuku decides to help Eri through an interactive rebase to edit Eri’s memory of her childhood so that, from her perspective, she was never kidnapped and tortured.

• Interactive rebases in Git are a form of rewriting history. Izuku and Eri walk through an interactive rebase together. Inside a dreamlike vision, Izuku and Eri view all of Eri’s past horrible memories, then step-by-step Izuku removes all the terrible elements and replaces them with happy memories instead.

• In this story, rebase affects the Git user’s personal experiences, but not the overall timeline.

  • For example, when Izuku edits out a past event where Overhaul tortures Eri, she both no longer remembers the event and the scars from that torture vanish from Eri’s present self. However, the world itself is unaffected—Overhaul still remembers it happening.
  • This is different from filter-branch, which edits reality to fit with the newly established timeline.
  • Besides helping Eri, the main purpose of this plot point is to foreshadow and establish the mechanism for how a previous version of Izuku might have done something similar to himself.

• After the rebase, Eri is a happy and healthy child… whose quirk is Git, and she’s eager to use it. Uh oh.

• After a fanfic’s worth of Izuku mastering Git, it’s finally time for him to deal with the hell of remote repositories and pushing and pulling changes. “git remote add eri.” Izuku is the only one who can effectively supervise the six-year-old reality warper and can (in theory) undo the messes she makes.

• At some point, Izuku realizes that it doesn’t make sense to combine their histories, so he instead makes Eri a submodule of his own repo. “git submodule add eri.”

  • Most readers of this story won’t understand why this is funny, but any experienced Git users in the audience will recognize the hell that Izuku created for himself.

• The comedy hijinks would be interrupted by Overhaul attacking. Obviously he wants Eri back, but he’s also now targeting Izuku since he also has Git. Overhaul wants Izuku either under his control or dead.

• Overhaul is the final boss. He also has a touch-based quirk that he can use to instantly kill people and destroy structures. In many ways he’s Izuku’s opposite, since Git is about restoring and preserving.

• Izuku is in a bad spot.

  • He wasn’t prepared for a sudden attack, so he doesn’t have his hero costume with him and can’t summon Mei’s gear.
  • Izuku’s usual instant win condition (touching someone to add them to his quirk) is actually Overhaul’s instant win condition (Overhaul can touch-kill him faster than Izuku can speak a command).
  • Overhaul intimately knows how Git works, so he doesn’t fall for any tricks. For example, Overhaul makes sure to stay out in the open air. If he entered a building, Izuku could add Overhaul by add-ing the building and everything within, but Overhaul knows how to counter Git bullshit like that.
  • Izuku has to protect Eri, so his movement and options are very limited.

• Izuku is, of course, saved by the Power of Friendship, in true shonen fashion. (Well, “Power of Friendship” in the sense that Izuku has friends who can hit things very hard.)

  • Ochako has learned to make gravity her bitch.
  • By now, Denki is the male Mikoto Misaka he was always meant to be.
  • There aren’t many ways to defend against an invisible seemingly-out-of-nowhere One For All-powered punch to the face.

• Despite their victory, there are innocent casualties. For example, Overhaul might have destroyed some building during the fight, killing the innocent people inside who were living their normal lives.

• Izuku, of course, feels very guilty. Innocent people died because he was too weak. This is probably(?) when he searches the reflog to see if there’s any way to save those people, and he discovers the logs from the original Izuku.

  • There’s no way to revive people he never saved. He realizes that the first Izuku made the same mistake: he was reactive rather than proactive. This leads to…

The Ending

Before I wrote a single word of this story, I had a specific ending in mind. However, my plans changed… maybe around Chapter 8 or 9. Don’t remember exactly. Either way, I’m first going to describe my original ending, then I’ll explain why I think that ending isn’t quite right and the adjustments I have in mind for it.

• Back in Ch. 3, Izuku attempted the command “Git add Midoriya Izuku”. When it didn’t work, Izuku made the faulty assumption that he can’t use his quirk to affect himself.

• This is false. The actual reason the command failed is that git add is for adding files. “Midoriya Izuku” is not a file, he’s a Git repository (the thing that contains files and their histories). Commands that affect files don’t work on him, but commands that affect repos do.

  • By the way, this is something Izuku learns at some point earlier in the story, not all at the end like this. He figures this out before meeting Eri, which is how he knows how to edit Eri’s memories.

• There are multiple things that Izuku figures out from here, but the most important one is git clone. This command makes a copy of a given repository. “git clone midoriya-izuku izuku-2” creates a clone of Izuku whose mind is connected to the original Izuku via a hivemind (since they share the same repo, and Izuku is a repo).

• Furthermore, Izuku can clone his consciousness into more than just copies of himself. In real Git, you can clone a repo to any path on your computer, so Izuku can do the same. For example, if Mei makes Izuku a robot body, Izuku can command “git clone midoriya-izuku robot_body” to clone his consciousness into the robot Mei made.

  • Hell, maybe Akatani Mikumo (Greenheart) comes back into play and Izuku clones himself into Mikumo’s golems.

• Of course, all of these clones are just as much Izuku as Izuku himself. Git is a distributed version control system, after all. One of Git’s key features is that it’s not centralized; no specific repo is considered to be the “real” one. The true Izuku is the collection of all Izukus.

• In the end, along with adding the entire universe to his quirk, Izuku clones his consciousness across the entire universe as well, all part of a hivemind that together administrates all of reality, truly completing Izuku’s apotheosis.

• The end! The ethics of it all intentionally left vague! Beautiful and terrifying in equal measure! Let my readers walk away from the fic conflicted over whether they’ve actually been reading a horror story the whole time! 😇

Anyway, this is the ending I planned from the beginning. I think it’s pretty cool. The one-sentence elevator pitch for this fic (from the very start, before anything else was decided) was “Izuku has a quirk that lets him manipulate reality like a computer program, and he eventually becomes admin of the universe.”

So, what’s the problem?

Pretty simple really. My planned ending dismisses all the development, achievements, agency, etc. of every character besides Izuku. And that was fine during initial planning when Izuku was the only character who existed in my notes, but it became an issue once I actually started writing the story.

If this fic were focused exclusively on Izuku as a bit of a lone wolf with no real friends, this ending would be fine, but that’s not what I chose to write. Why am I bothering writing about Tooru and Denki and Ochako if they’ll be left behind in the end and nothing they do matters?

Furthermore, this ending isn’t even all that faithful to Git. “Admin of the universe” sounds good on paper, but I didn’t give Izuku a programming quirk, I gave him Git. The whole point of Git is collaboration with other people, and that’s something most of the fic sorely lacks.

Of course, I never wanted to fundamentally change the ending. It’s fun! I like it a lot! I just wanted to change it to not be so exclusively Izuku-focused.

So, what did I decide on? Well, I’m not entirely sure, and I haven’t figured out any details, but probably at some point Izuku figures out how to share Git with other people. Thus, his friends, Eri, and anyone else Izuku trusts are able to do the same thing. They live out their normal lives as Pro Heroes on Earth, and when they feel ready, they merge their consciousnesses with the ascended versions of themselves cloned into the universe.

In the end, the whole cast all become gods, and they spend their days fussing over universe-spanning pull requests and dealing with merge conflicts until the end of time. 😁

…Wait, that sounds like a living nightmare. 🤬

Anyway, the ending I wrote in the chapter above is an abrupt and simplified form of the original ending. I didn’t want to introduce a bunch of new concepts and commands at the last moment, so I had Izuku “only” make a backup of the universe. On its own, that’s actually pretty much useless because Izuku is still stuck in a normal, vulnerable human body with limited perception and brainpower. In the hypothetical scene that follows Izuku’s grand proclamation at the end of this chapter… you’d just see Izuku switching back to the main branch, returning home and going to sleep, and then the next day at school he’d start preparing for the Sports Festival with his classmates.

Even though we don’t see it, you can assume that Izuku eventually figures out all the additional features of his quirk in the months and years that follow. “Canonically”, everything that I described above eventually happens mostly as described, it’s just that the story as I’ve written it ends early with a thematic (rather than literal) apotheosis.

Misc.

• You might wonder why Aoyama is at UA and has a quirk if All For One vanished 10+ years ago in this timeline. The answer is… I completely forgot about the traitor plotline. It seemed wrong to go back to the previous chapters and edit him out of the story, so instead I’ve come up with an extremely shaky excuse: Aoyama’s parents immediately made a deal with AFO once he was diagnosed quirkless so that Aoyama’s quirk would still manifest at the usual time when he was around 4 years old. Izuku was the last in his class to get his quirk, so there’s a small window of opportunity for AFO to give Aoyama a quirk and then vanish soon after when Izuku’s quirk comes in.
• I didn’t get a chance to use this, but in scenes from other characters’ points of view, I wanted Izuku’s dialogue to appear in a crazy font when he uses his quirk. For example: “ꚽꛈ𖢧 𖦪𖤢ꕷ𖢧𖣠𖦪𖤢 ꔪꛎ𖢧𖢧𖤢𖦪ꚲ.” (“git restore battery.”)
• Despite all indications to the contrary, no shipping was planned for this story. I know that in the previous chapter the characters were all unusually flirty, but honestly I was in full “fuck it” mode while writing that chapter.
  • Considering that my writing tendency is apparently to write shippy dialogue between my main characters, I can’t 100% guarantee that there’d be nothing at all, just that nothing was planned. Like, if I felt that it made sense for the characters for Izuku and Tooru to try going out on a date, I might have shrugged and written it, but it would never be the focus of the story.
  • Again, I still expect that nothing would have happened.
• A few people have asked why All Might passed on his quirk if he’s not injured in this timeline. The reason is that, in this timeline, Yagi Toshinori is happy. He succeeded in everything he wanted to do as the Symbol of Peace, and he isn’t a depressed old man clinging to the one thing that still gives him joy. As such, he followed in the footsteps of his mentor Nana and passed on his quirk while he still had plenty of time to train the next generation.
• Unless I thought of a better pun, the title of the final chapter was planned to be “git goød” (“git god”).
  • Speaking of chapter title puns, the chapter where the students choose their hero names was planned to be called “git your name out there”.
  • I have so many puns ready for chapter titles, you have no idea.

Last Scene

Izuku’s “double vision” in the final scene kind of comes out of nowhere, and as it stands I don’t think it’s super clear what’s being described. Izuku is viewing the firmament (the same firmament that shatters during merge conflicts). Izuku’s quirk refers to this alternate view of reality as “StarOS”. Refer back to the very beginning of Chapter 1:

Thank you for installing Git, the free and open source distributed version control system designed to handle everything from small to very large projects with speed and efficiency.

Git for StarOS, version ∞

StarOS – Bringing harmony to this world of glass and stars since the birth of time. ©Eternity


That’s basically what Izuku saw. He was looking at the underlying OS of reality. There are several fun little lines that foreshadow stuff in Chapter 1 (including the very first line of the story!).

While this story didn’t turn out the way I wanted, I’m still very happy I wrote it, and I hope you guys feel some closure.

Thank you everyone for reading! It’s been fun! 😁