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Despite All Might's bright and cheerful exterior, Toshinori had never been an extrovert. He had, however, successfully deceived everyone around him that he was, and he couldn't decide whether it was a blessing or a curse. Nana had told him that he wasn't a good liar (and she was right), but look at him now. A successful conman. And one who wanted to escape the crowds.
Good God, the 128th annual Hero Gala was turning into a madhouse. Toshinori was a little worried they'd trample someone with how they were all squeezing into each other to ask him questions.
“Is it tiring, being a hero as long as you have?”
Yes.
“Do you have any plans to retire?”
He wished.
The next question was quiet. In fact he was almost sure he was the only one that heard it; nobody else reacted.
“Are you looking for a successor?”
His head whipped in the direction he had heard the small voice, but he couldn't figure out who had asked.
“Excuse me?”
He hoped someone would repeat the question but got nothing. Silence, aside from the barrage of other questions.
“Excuse me, I'm afraid I need to use the restroom. I'm happy to answer your questions when I get back!”
He hoped they would disperse by the time he returned. Now he just needed to find a place where he wouldn't be bothered. Somewhere quiet.
The balcony? It was freezing outside, so most people avoided it. Sure, that would work, hopefully. One For All coursed through him at all times, keeping him warm. If he met Endeavor he would just throw himself off the building. Toshinori didn't…. dislike the man, per se, but it's difficult to like someone who consistently shows you such envy and contempt.
Decision made, Toshinori snuck to the bathroom and deflated into his assistant. His suit shrunk with him, like David promised him it would.
He quickly made his way to the balcony, where there was only one other person, smoking as they leaned against the banister. The light of the moon shone through cracks in the clouds and illuminated them with a soft halo of light. Toshinori blinked a few time and rubbed his eyes before deciding that the person was, in fact, subtly glowing. Must be an element of their quirk.
An icy breeze rustled through Toshinori's blazer and he pulled it tighter around himself, shivering a little bit. It had been seven years, and yet he still forgot that none of the advantages of the musclebound All Might carried over to scrawny, sunken-in Toshiniori Yagi.
“If you're that cold, you should probably go back inside,” the voice was soft. Not just soft, but young. It sounded vaguely familiar.
Regardless, it was the voice of someone young enough to be a child and, as Toshinori approached, he realized it was in fact a child. He couldn't be any older than thirteen, wearing a perfectly fitted suit, smoking a cigarette at the Hero Gala.
All Might would say something bombastic about how young people shouldn't smoke, but Toshinori wasn't All Might right now, “If I go back inside will you stop smoking?”
The boy exhaled, the cloud of purple smoke obscuring his green eyes, “probably not.”
“Then I’ll stay,” who was he to tell this kid what to do? They were both destroying their bodies. Toshinori gazed into the starless sky, basking in the peaceful silence.
“This isn’t nicotine,” the boy said, still surveying the city below. Toshinori’s attention was drawn back down to the head of curly green hair as the boy continued, “it’s a new quirk suppressant, in the process of development. I’m just testing it out.”
“Oh,” Toshinori blushed with embarrassment, “I’m sorry for jumping to conclusions.”
“It’s alright. I’m used to it,” The boy inhaled again and Toshinori paid attention to his face for the first time. He wasn’t sure he had ever seen such a young child look so old. The bags under his eyes were almost mistakeable for bruises, and he gazed at the city like he was looking at a trashcan that had been knocked over by a car and spilled rot and refuse all over his front yard. His lips were pulled up into a quiet smile, tugging at the scar that cut across the left side of his jaw, but the boy wasn’t smiling at all.
Toshinori coughed and tried to continue the conversation, “Do you… Work at the company that makes this suppressant? Or is this something like a paid test?”
He chuckled and tapped the cigarette(?) against the banister, the ashes crumbling and falling through the air,”... Sure, something like that.”
Toshinori had a gut feeling he shouldn't keep probing but this wouldn't be the first time he had ignored his instincts, “which one?”
The boy met his eyes for the first time and his lips tugged into a larger smile but his eyes were hollow, and he quickly looked away, tugging at his tie, “... Both.”
Great, not only did he still not understand the situation, but he had also made the child unhappy.
Toshinori searched his mind for another topic of conversation, before finally landing upon their current location.
“How did you end up coming to the Gala? Is one of your parents a hero or-” suddenly realized he sounded like he was interrogating the boy, he backpedaled, “not that you have to answer, I was just curious because you… Well, you don't seem like you want to be here.”
“I did want to be. I begged my dad for a ticket, and since he…. Knows a few heroes, he was able to get one for me. All I had to do was-” he shook the cigarette in the air, “try this.”
Toshinori was about to ask if he knew the child's father before the last part, but he couldn't imagine keeping company with the type of person that would make their child be a test trial for a medicine just to let them go to an event.
“I see. I understand what you meant now,” but… “If you wanted to come, why do you seem so…”
“Unhappy?” He laughed again, though this time it was sharp, self-mocking, “ Because I'm pretty sure my dad only agreed to prove a point, and he's proved it. I can't wait to go home and see his smug face, ‘I was right’ written all over it.”
“What point is that?”
“That heroes ultimately live in a glitzy world that disconnects them from the civilians they're meant to protect and, well, I don't entirely agree with that, plenty of people go to fancy parties, but…”
“But…?”
The kid sighed and sank further onto the banister, his chin on his arms, wincing as the dress shirt dug into neck, “Do you ever think about gladiators?”
“In Rome? The Colosseum and all that? Not often, to be honest.”
“Me neither, but I like looking into history. It's interesting the way it seems to cycle, the way all the same things happen all over again, just in a way that looks different.”
“I agree that history tends to repeat itself, but I'm not sure exactly what you're talking about.”
“In Rome, bread and circuses was the idea that you could throw shallow things, like bread and gladiator fights, to the masses to satisfy them and keep them distracted from larger issues like class inequality, widespread poverty, slavery, and so on. All the horrific stuff that was happening in Rome, you get the idea.”
“Yeah,” Toshinori was starting to see the connections.
“Gladiators were often a sort of celebrity to the average Roman, but they still watched and cheered when they fought each other, or when they fought wild animals. They didn't stop watching even when they died, torn to pieces by their opponents.”
The boy was looking at him again, but his eyes were far, far away.
“It's not that different from how people are about heroes is it? They're celebrities, but we watch them get ripped to pieces over and over, and hero villain fights? People watch them with rapt attention, hero as gladiator, villain as wild animal.” He laughed again, almost manic this time, speaking faster and faster, “The gladiator dies, they watch. The animal dies, they watch. It's no wonder people hold no sympathy for villains, but then again, the government holds them up as the country's main problem like a jingling bell to a dog, distracting them from all the actual issues that heroes can't fix; the issues that create villains in the first place!”
He had ranted so intensely that he had to take a few moments to pant once he was done, yanking off the tie that had been strangling him and shoving it in his pocket. After his breathing returned to normal, he ran a hand through his hair.
“... Sorry, that was probably a lot.”
“No, I understand what you mean,” It was hard for Toshinori not to notice that, despite him being the number one hero, despite there being more heroes than any other time in history, the crime rates had not decreased but risen.
“I'm friends with a lot of people that most of society would consider ‘future villains’, as if they don't deserve sympathy or empathy, as if they aren't that way for a reason.”
The boy practically gnashed his teeth with anger, before sighing and quickly calming down again.
Toshinori hesitated but eventually threw out a risky question, “you said you hang around a lot of ‘future villains’, would most of society consider you one as well?”
The boy smiled again, vicious, bright venomous eyes to match, “I'm the worst one. If they make a wild animal of me, I'll burn the collisseum to the ground and rip out the emperor's throat.”
There was an awkward pause. Toshinori wasn't sure what to say to the thirteen year old child that had basically threatened to destroy Japan and kill off the government if he became a villain.
“Sorry, that was definitely too much. By the way, I don't think you ever answered my question earlier.”
“What ques-” Toshinori froze. He turned to look at the boy with an almost mechanical stiffness.
The boy leaned against the railing, facing Toshinori, his whole face glittering with mischief, “My question, from before, when you were trying to get out of the crowd. Not a very number-one-hero thing for you to do, by the way.”
“You knew I'd look for somewhere deserted.”
“I guessed.”
“What do you want?”
“Genuinely? You've always been my favorite hero. I just wanted to know what you were actually like. They say you should never meet your heroes, but you're not so bad at all.”
Toshinori laughed but it sounded more like a cough, “Not so bad, huh. What a glowing commendation,” wait, he was getting off track, “your question.”
“Your successor?”
So he hadn't misheard.
This was not… A good situation. There were very few people who knew the nature of All Might's quirk, and the two people on his side would never, ever tell this random kid. Then again, the kid hadn't shown any hostility towards him, so it didn't seem likely he had anything to do with All for One either. He would've been just a small child when the man died.
He could bluff and see what happens?
“I don't know what you mean. What would I need a successor for?”
“Your quirk.”
Okay. That didn't work.
Toshinori lowered his voice, “kid, how do you know about that?”
The kid shrugged, “Logical guess. I'm honestly surprised nobody else has guessed, considering how public most of your life story has been. It's a good sign though, you must not be hated by villains if they haven't been picking apart each tiny element of your life story for flaws and weaknesses.”
Toshinori's heart stopped, “so you weren't 100% sure-”
“Until you confirmed it just now, yes.”
Toshinori sighed. Then sighed again. If Sorahiko ever learned about this, he would never let it go.
“Why do you want to know?”
The boy looked at him, scanned him up and down, and then raised an eyebrow.
Ah.
“Okay, I see what you're saying. But still, whether I am or not is confidential.”
“I understand. Can I ask you one favor?”
“That depends-”
“Don't ever give it to me.”
“Wha-”
“No matter how I ask. No matter how I look. No matter who's with me. Never give it to me. Make up whatever excuse you have to. Tell whoever you do give it to that they shouldn't ever give it to me either.”
“Why?”
“... I can't tell you, I'm sorry.”
“It's okay,” Toshinori paused for a moment, “I'll never give it to you, no matter what you do.”
The boy breathed a sigh of relief, a tiny, real smile appearing.
It abruptly disappeared when his phone rang. Toshinori had never seen a teen answer a phone quicker.
“Hello father-”
“Yes, I saw him, he-”
“No, I couldn't talk to him, he was surrounded by people-”
“Yes, I tried, you should see my elbows-”
“I don't know, he disappeared after that-”
Yes, I even asked his assistant, he didn't know either-”
“Yes.”
“Yes. I know. I'm sor- I apologize. I'll do better next time.
“Yes.”
“Love yo-” He stopped short.
Apparently, his dad hung up.
The boy gave a weak smile, “He isn't always like that, he's just- he's been in a bad mood recently.”
Somehow, Toshinori doubted that.
“Anyway, I, uh- I have to go home now.”
“It was a pleasure speaking to you, young man.”
“It was nice to meet you, All Might.”
“And young man?” The boy looked up, “Please stay safe.”
“... I'll try.”