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You were having a bad day.
It’d been a long, exhausting day at Might Tower, made only worse by the downpour outside. You just needed to print out a couple dozen things, and then you could go home... to your quiet, lonely, cheap apartment.
You’d had the brilliant idea of using the printer on the top floor, knowing that no one would be on that floor today. It was totally abandoned, and you could just… enjoy the quiet.
Your Quirk, Echolocation, gave you an incredibly heightened sense of hearing, alongside big bat ears. If you focused, you could hear someone’s heartbeat from several rooms away. So it was nice to retreat from the constant hustle and bustle of the floor you usually worked on.
You scuttled out of the top floor’s printer room, and were heading back to the elevator when it happened; the landing bay door opened, and you were suddenly, completely drenched, head to toe, in rainwater that’d built up on the roof.
It’d been a bad day. A very bad day. That just got so much worse.
You started crying.
Loud, ugly, runny nose sobbing as you looked down at the thick stack of papers that were now completely destroyed and useless, and you’d have to print them out all over again, and you were so tired, you just wanted to go home-
“I’m so sorry!” the Symbol of Peace said, when he landed and saw your sorry state, and the waterlogged papers now spread out on the floor. “I didn’t think anyone would be up here, given the time of day and weather…”
“I just wanted to use the printer!” you wailed, taking deep heaving gulps of breath between each word. You realized you were making a fool of yourself, that this would probably get back to your boss, that you’d be in trouble somehow. That’s just the kind of day it had been.
Then, something unexpected happened- a pair of strong, warm- if rain soaked- arms wrapped you in a tender hug.
People could say what they liked about All Might, but no one could deny that he gave amazing hugs.
You relaxed, bit by bit, as you began to calm down in his arms. Your sobs petered out, leaving you exhausted, soaked to the bone, and still needing to print out all those papers before you could leave. You buried your face into All Might’s shoulder just a little bit more, wishing you could stay in his arms, where nothing bad could happen.
But you were an adult- and more importantly, his employee- so tentatively, you let him go, and he did the same. You’d only actually been in the same room as All Might a handful of times, let alone spoken with him, let alone been hugged by him. You sniffled, and tried to wipe your runny nose on your wet sleeve- predictably, it didn’t do anything to help.
“I… I’m sorry for that, sir, I just-” you started, voice small, not making eye contact. Now, outside of the protective halo of his arms, your embarrassment was eating you alive.
“No, no- it was all my fault, I’m the one who should be apologizing!” All Might said, waving your apology off. “I’m sorry for not signalling ahead- for getting you and your papers drenched.”
You shook your head. “No, it’s… you were right, it’s late, and I should’ve known better to come here with the weather,” you said with a defeated sigh. “I’ll… clean these up, print them out again… then I can finally go home.”
(All Might would never admit it, but in that moment, you seemed so small and sad and… frankly, pitiable that there was little he wouldn’t do to see you smile again. He knew you had a nice smile- he’d seen it as Yagi.)
“Nonsense!” All Might laughed, hands on his hips. “It was my blunder that led to this mess, so I shall clean it up! Including explaining things to your manager tomorrow!”
It took a moment for it to click what he meant, and you let out a little gasp when it did.
“You will?” you asked, to which he nodded. In your exhausted state, it was almost too much to handle; grateful tears welled up in your already red, puffy eyes. “That’s really sweet of you- thank you.”
“Of course!” All Might said cheerfully. Then, noticing how you were shivering, he seemed to consider something. He let out the tiniest sigh- so quiet that an ordinary person would never be able to hear it- and said, “Why don’t you come with me, and we can see about getting you in some dry clothes?”
It was All Might. The All Might. What were you supposed to do, not trust him unquestioningly? You followed him, though your brain did kick in when the Might Gate began to slide open.
“Oh, I…I don’t think I have the clearance to be back here,” you said dumbly.
All Might laughed and assured you, “You’re with me! It’s more than alright.”
He led you through a fancy office, and you couldn’t help but notice how… clean it looked, to the point of looking like something out of a magazine more than anywhere people actually worked.
The transition from office to apartment was abrupt, and left you more than a little surprised. It dawned on you slowly that All Might had brought you to his apartment, and you let out a little gasp.
The… cleanliness, the feeling of a place being not lived in- it still permeated that space, even as it was supposed to be All Might’s home. The only signs of life and personality you could see were a huge shelf, full of DVDs, and… a big cluster of pill bottles on the kitchen island. When he caught where your gaze had gone, All Might rushed over to clean it up, shoving them all in a drawer, out of sight.
“Apologies! I don’t often have guests here,” he said, nervously. You could hear how his heartbeat sped up, and you gave him your approximation of a reassuring smile.
“That’s okay. This is kind of like… your own Fortress of Solitude, then? The Apartment of Peace?” you attempted to joke.
Thankfully, All Might laughed, and his heartbeat returned to normal. “Something like that!” he said, putting the last of the pill bottles away.
As he walked back to you, you debated whether or not to say something - shifting your weight from one foot to the other, you made your decision.
“Sir, it's… you don’t have to be embarrassed about taking medicine. I do too,” you told him quietly, sincerely.
He seemed caught off guard, almost startled, by your words, and you almost regretted saying anything at all… but then, his smile seemed to relax into something more… heartfelt. Something touched.
“It… thank you,” he said, voice quieter than you’d ever heard it. “I… I’d appreciate it if you didn't… mention it to anyone. It’s not something I want the public to know.”
“Of course, sir. My lips are sealed,” you said, then made a zipping motion across your mouth, before locking it shut.
His smile turned into a goofy grin and he laughed, putting a hand on your shoulder. “Now, let’s get you some dry clothes!”
Not two minutes later you were being (politely) shoved into the largest bathroom you’ve ever seen with a bundle of clean clothes in your arms.
You started to fill the bathtub (You weren’t sure when a bath was added to the equation, but you wouldn’t question it. That was quite possibly the biggest and most luxurious bathtub you’d ever seen, and after the day you’d had, you very much wanted to use it.) when your ear twitched. You heard an unfamiliar sound, like a sudden rush of air, followed by a sigh that sounded heavy and weary… and not quite like All Might.
You paused, but heard nothing else over the sound of running water- so you shrugged and put it out of mind.
Sinking into warm, bubbly water, you considered something else that had bothered you since All Might had unceremoniously derailed your night- his breathing.
It sounded strange. There was no way around it. And it didn’t sound strange in a way that you recognized, either. You knew what it sounded like when someone with chest congestion, or asthma, or bronchitis or even lung cancer breathed in. The sound of All Might’s breathing didn’t match any of those.
But it did sound an awful lot like how it sounded when Mr. Yagi breathed in. Which was perhaps even stranger.
When you were around someone enough, you start to mirror their habits subconsciously - this was the excuse that Mr. Yagi gave when people pointed out how much he had in common with All Might. Which you supposed checked out… for everything except breathing.
You knew Mr. Yagi had some kind of issue with his lungs, though you weren’t sure what- why on earth would All Might’s breathing sound like his?
Meanwhile, Yagi Toshinori was trying to catch his breath. He’d already been running low on time in his muscle form, and being forced to stay in it around you was not helping the situation.
But he couldn’t just leave you wet and miserable and alone.
He would just deal with it, he reasoned as he carried the damp ball of fabric that was your clothes to his washer. It wouldn’t take too long to wash and dry them, but it would certainly take long enough that few, if any, public transportation options would be available by the time they were done. And the thought of you walking home in this rain, after going to so much trouble to dry you off… he sighed. Truthfully, he’d already made up his mind to insist you stay in the guest bedroom.
He’d just have to lock his own bedroom door tonight, he supposed.
You were absolutely swimming in All Might’s clothes.
The two of you should’ve expected that, really. The shorts he’d lent you went down to your ankles, and the shirt was much the same.
"I'm sorry, I don't... have anything smaller," the greatest hero of your time said, rubbing the back of his neck awkwardly.
You smiled up at him. "It's alright. It's just for the night, anyways."
"Yes, well, I- um, speaking of the night! It's very late! So we should both go to bed," All Might said. The look on his face gave nothing away, but the pounding of his heartbeat certainly did. It was like... he was either extremely nervous, or under a heavy strain. Or perhaps he had a medical condition- something like POTS maybe? He did have a lot of prescription medication.
In either case you weren't going to disagree- both because you were exhausted, and because you didn't want to go against your host's wishes.
"Yeah, I know I'm tired, and I can only imagine how exhausted you are," you said with a small smile.
All Might gave you that quieter, less bombastic smile, and you couldn't help your stomach doing flips at the sight of it.
You bid him goodnight, closed your bedroom door- and then there was that whooshing sound again, accompanied this time by wheezing, to your great alarm. It was almost enough to make you turn back and open the door again- but in your hesitation, All Might had already made it to his bedroom and closed the door, with the distinct click of a lock being set.
You supposed... if he really was hurt or something, he wouldn't have locked his door.
You sighed, and placed the contents of your pockets, carried over from what you'd been wearing earlier, on the bedside table- paperclips, 3 pens, your wallet, phone and keys. Uneasily, you settled into bed.
You couldn't sleep, naturally. You didn't have your earplugs, and the sound of electricity humming in the walls, the rain pouring down outside, and the wind howling outside...it all sounded so loud to your ears.
And of course, you could hear every detail of All Might's nightly routine. You could hear his suit fall to the floor, you could hear the shower run, you could hear him brush his teeth... and you could hear him sigh and hiss and generally alternate between exhausted and pained noises.
With every noise, every sound, every footfall, you became more and more convinced that you weren't listening to All Might anymore.
You were listening to Mr. Yagi. You knew this to be the truth. The question now was how? How were Mr. Yagi and All Might... the same person? It was the only conclusion you could come to, besides Mr. Yagi secretly having a Quirk that let him switch places with another person, because you would have heard another person enter the apartment. The only heartbeats you could hear were his and your own.
Alright. All Might was secretly Mr. Yagi. It still didn't fully make sense to you, but you supposed you simply... had to accept that as reality.
...What now?
What did you do with that information?
Ultimately, it was a silly question. You'd do what you've done your entire life: quietly keep someone else's secr-
Your train of thought was utterly derailed by the sound of sniffling.
Sniffling? No, now it was-
Oh. He was crying. Mr. Yagi- All Might- was crying. You closed your eyes, trying to focus, perhaps to figure out why he was crying... but you already knew why, didn't you? You knew Mr. Yagi had some sort of chronic pain, and the way he'd been wheezing earlier implied that being All Might was some kind of strain on him.
The greatest hero in the world was alone, crying himself to sleep, because he was in so much pain. You felt your heart break for him.
You didn't think you had any tears left in you after your meltdown earlier, but you found yourself crying right alongside him, wishing more than anything that you could, in some small way, comfort him.
Instead, you stared at the ceiling and listened as his sobs gave way to fitful slumber.
You yourself slipped into something of a trance- the constant noise that kept you awake melded into a blanket of white noise. Too loud for you to fall asleep, but still somewhat soothing all the same.
The coughing didn't break that trance at first. It blended into the background. It was the heavy thump of something- someone- falling that brought you back to yourself. By then, the coughing had turned severe, with a horrid retching noise, like someone trying to clear out their throat.
That got your attention. You strained your ears, everything but the sound of Mr. Yagi's hacking coughs and racing heartbeat fading away. Before you could consciously think about it, you were on your feet, aimed at the door.
He'd locked his door. You'd told yourself that he wouldn't do that if he thought he wouldn't be okay, but... but you couldn't just sit here, listening to the Number One Hero struggle to breathe.
You couldn't just sit here, listening to Mr. Yagi, who always remembered your birthday, choke on his own blood.
You grabbed the paperclips from your tiny pile of things, and ran out of the room. You were glad- not for the first time- that you'd binged so many videos about lockpicking a few years ago; it took you no time at all to pick All Might's lock and slam the bedroom door open.
It was exactly as you'd heard it- Mr. Yagi had fallen out of bed, and was coughing up into a small bedside trashcan. Blood dripped down his chin, and he looked up at you with shock, despair, and confusion.
"Don't worry, I've known for hours," you blurted out, which, for some reason, did not seem to comfort him at all. You dropped to your knees beside him and asked, "Do you need me to call emergency services? Is there any way I can help?"
He shook his head at first, then croaked out, "Medicine... kitchen." Another awful cough, and he opened his mouth to speak again; you were already on your feet.
"Don't say the names just yet- let me get to the kitchen, then say them," you instructed. "I'll be able to hear you, even if you whisper."
It was no wonder All Might had been so jumpy about the pills on the counter- each and every bottle was labeled as being for one Yagi Toshinori. Grabbing the three bottles and one inhaler he'd named, as well as a glass of water, you scurried back to his side; at the very least, his coughing had died down.
With trembling hands, he dutifully took his pills and used his inhaler before downing the rest of the glass of water. He sat with his back to his bed and his long legs stretched out in front of him; you mimicked the way he was sitting, your hands politely folded in your lap as you waited for one of you to say something.
A handful of minutes later, Mr. Yagi let out a frustrated sigh and said in a low, almost monotone voice, "Please don't tell anyone about this."
You blinked. "Of course, sir. I'm used to keeping secrets."
He accepted that, then thought about it, then turned to look at you with a confused expression. "What do you mean by that?" he asked, and... fair enough.
"My ears- my Quirk... I hear things. I hear everything. My Quirk doesn't have an off button, so... I've heard many, many things I shouldn't have. When I was just a kid, I... didn't have a firm grasp on privacy because of my Quirk. I didn't understand that people didn't want me to know the things that I did, and I was a social pariah because of it. Eventually, I just... learned to play dumb. Act like I'd never heard anything at all. Pretend like my hearing isn't quite as good as it actually is." You let out a sigh of your own. "People don't want me around when they know just how much I can hear."
Mr. Yagi eyes widened, alarmed, and you prepared yourself for rejection. Hopefully, at the very least, you'd get to keep your job.
"But that's not fair," he said instead, brows furrowing. "You can't help your hearing."
You blinked, and then blinked again. "Of course not. But most people don't care about that."
"But-" he stopped, presumably so he didn't simply repeat himself- it wasn't fair. You'd long become dulled to the unfairness of people holding your Quirk against you, but with Mr. Yagi's almost innocent and naive indignation over it- you felt that old, bitter anger begin to be dredged up, just a little bit.
"Regardless," you said, steering the topic back to him. "I'm used to keeping secrets. Playing dumb. You don't have anything to worry about."
His face fell, and he looked away. Solemnly, he said, "I'm sure you must have questions."
You shrugged. "Yeah. I mean, I think I've got the gist of it- being in All Might mode is a strain on you, so you spend most of your time as Mr. Yagi. Right?"
His face flushed red with embarrassment, and he nodded. He was silent, tense, presumably waiting for you to ask another question... but you weren't used to having to ask questions like this, and you weren't sure what he wanted you to ask… so you stayed silent as well.
His long fingers drummed on his thighs, impatient. Eventually, he spoke up again.
"I was injured a few years ago in battle," he said at last, in a dull, detached voice. "I lost my stomach and left lung. Because of that injury, I can only be All Might for a few hours a day."
You sat with that information for a moment, then said sincerely, "I'm sorry that happened to you."
You placed your hand over his, and he turned to look at you, surprise clear in his eyes.
"What?" you said, confused at his reaction.
"Huh? No, I just-" he stumbled over his words. "Aren't you... disappointed?"
You blinked. "Disappointed about what?"
Mr. Yagi made a frustrated noise. "That- That All Might is so weak and frail! That I'm not..."
"What, perfect?" you said, furrowing your eyebrows. "I mean... it's kind of shocking, I guess, but... I'm not disappointed in you for getting hurt. That'd be stupid, and cruel to you."
You didn’t like the way Mr. Yagi looked at you then- like you were doing him some great, impossible kindness by just… not being mean to him. What was he expecting?
You sat, unsettled, in the silence that followed and in thinking more and more about what he’d told you, certain things began to fall into place.
“You became a hero right after college, right?” you asked.
“I- yes, I did. Why do you ask?” he replied, confused.
“And ever since then you’ve just- been All Might, full time- well, until you were injured. But before that, it was just… you never really did anything else, right? I mean- everyone knows about those three days a few years ago,” you said.
He blushed, and looked away. “W-well, yes. I mean-” He began twiddling his thumbs nervously. “There were always people to save, work to do, so I’ve never…”
“So you never actually developed any of the skills you need to do your job as Mr. Yagi,” you said.
He froze, then looked at you with a betrayed expression. “Was all that a roundabout way to say I’m bad at my job?” he asked incredulously.
“No, not really- it was just… it makes sense now,” you said. “You should probably… do you want me to teach you some of the basics?”
Maybe you shouldn’t tell him that the only reason people don’t think he and All Might are sleeping together, and that’s why he has his job, is that they can’t stand to be around each other. It’d probably be too much for one night.
“You… you’d do that for me?” he asked, stunned, and there was that look you hated again. Why was the Number One Hero, the Symbol of Peace, expecting cruelty at every turn?
“Of course I’ll help you out,” you said with a shrug, trying to make it seem like it wasn’t a big deal- because it wasn’t.
The two of you sat there, leaning against his bed and talking quietly. The sound of Mr. Yagi’s breathing, his heartbeat- they were so close, they drowned out everything else.
Eventually, you both fell asleep.
The next day, you called out sick.
Both you and Mr. Yagi had royally fucked up your backs sleeping the way you did, and beyond that, you had been awake most of the night. So you went home, dug out your heating pad, and slept most of the day.
(You’d tried to convince Mr. Yagi to do the same, to just get some rest, but he stubbornly refused, and you didn’t have the energy to fight him on it.)
The day after that, you went in to work as usual.
You weren’t really expecting anything to be different, even with what you knew now, and for the first half of the day, it wasn’t. It was at lunchtime that you were startled by a sudden touch on your shoulder, and when you turned around, a very shy looking Mr. Yagi was standing in the entrance of your little cubicle, holding a very cutely wrapped bento box.
“Sorry, I tried to get your attention…” he said sheepishly.
“No, no, it’s fine. I have to- I wear earplugs, most of the time. Helps me focus,” you explained. “What’s up?”
“I was just…” he shifted his weight, a faint blush dusting his cheeks. “I was hoping I could eat with you?”
You blinked, then smiled at the hopeful look on his face. “Sure,” you said, grabbing your fruit salad and turning your chair so you could face him. He grabbed a chair from somewhere nearby, and sat down happily.
You’d thought, at first, that he’d wanted to come over and get started on learning the basics- but it quickly became clear that all Mr. Yagi had wanted was just… company.
You popped another piece of melon into your mouth. You could give him that much, at least.