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They’ve only just moved into the dorms the first time Shigaraki shows up in his room. It’s late. way past his bedtime, but he’s under house arrest, so it can be argued that he doesn’t really have a bedtime. It’s not like he has to go to classes in the morning.
At first, he thinks the swirling purple vortex is a sleep-deprived hallucination. It feels too much like a projection of his current variety of nightmares to be reality, and so he just blinks at it in steadily growing confusion.
This can’t be real, right?
There’s no way the League is trying to break directly into UA—they can’t be that stupid.
Right?
As he watches, someone emerges. Shigaraki is wearing that disembodied palm pressed against his face, and two others are gripping his arms, but the rest he must have left behind. Otherwise, it’s definitely him. Same baggy, black long-sleeved shirt and black pants. Same red shoes.
He stands for a moment in the middle of Izuku’s dorm room, seemingly taking it all in.
Izuku is mostly unpacked, but there are still a few All Might posters he hasn’t gotten a chance to hang up. They’re in protective tubes scattered throughout the room. He’s also got a shelving unit he’s been neglecting putting together that’s leaning haphazardly against his desk, and the boxes of merch that’s supposed to go on it are wedged into a corner.
He doesn’t like having people in his room unannounced, even less so when it’s messy. His mom taught him to never greet guests with a mess, and for some insane reason, that’s the first thing that pops into his head right now.
Like this isn’t a villain.
A villain who very recently kidnapped Kacchan and has tried on multiple occasions to kill him and his classmates.
Shigaraki clicks his tongue and actually sneers. “Figures.”
It’s the only word he says before he’s stepping back through that swirling purple vortex.
“Uh…”
He should do something, right? Call Sensei or the police. Literally anything that isn’t just sitting here staring at the portal that is still wide open in the middle of his dorm room. Slowly, stupidly, he’s standing up and shuffling closer.
“Don’t.” A voice rumbles from the swirling purple smoke the moment he reaches out a hand to touch. Golden wisps narrowing down at him in a look that somehow manages to come off as disapproving despite lacking any other telling features.
With a startled squeak, he stumbles back, clutching his hand to his chest like it’s been burned. “Right! Sorry-”
Why is he apologizing?
His eyes snap towards his door, wondering if he has time to run. If he screams, would the others hear him? He doesn’t want any of his classmates to get hurt-
“Don’t do that either.” The purple smoke shifts, seeming to undulate as the villain speaks. Forcing his attention back from the door. “Just. Sit.”
“Um…”
“Sit.”
Swallowing hard, he moves back over to his computer chair, heart pounding so loud he can’t fathom that he’s the only one hearing it. His legs are shaking as he drops back down, knees pressed tight together and fists clenched on his thighs. This… isn’t good. This is very very very bad.
It feels like forever before Shigaraki is stepping back through the portal, but his renewed presence doesn’t bring any answers. If anything, he now has twice as many questions.
Shigaraki has a TV and what looks like a game console balanced in his arms. He shuffles awkwardly under the weight of them but manages to make his way to Izuku’s desk. Then, he stops and side-eyes Izuku from behind the hand on his face, the corner of his mouth ticking up in another sneer. “Well?”
“Uh…” He’s hesitant to shift his gaze away from Shigaraki for even a second. Certain that all he needs to do is blink, and he’ll get dusted. It’s only the growing aura of impatience seeping from the villain that finally forces him to shift his gaze back to his desk.
Even then, he keeps Shigaraki and the swirling purple vortex in his peripheral vision.
All his school books and several of his analysis notebooks are scattered across the surface. Usually, he’s pretty meticulous with his things, but he’s still settling in, and he’s been so worried that this house arrest (even if it’s just for three days) will severely impact his standing in class. He doesn’t want to fall any more behind than he has to, and he’s been scrambling to keep up with the work that Iida and Yaoyorozu bring back for him and Kacchan.
“Move,” Shigaraki hisses, kicking at Izuku’s desk to regain his attention.
“Oh!” Somewhere in all the depths of his confusion, there’s a spark of understanding. “Y-yes! Okay-” He’s scrambling up out of his computer chair, hurrying to gather the piles of his homework into neat stacks and sliding them off to the side.
Once he’s cleared a sufficient amount of space, Shagaraki bumps him aside with a shove of his shoulder. Rough and not caring that he nearly knocks Izuku off balance. The expression behind the hand on his face is annoyed but fixed on the items he’s carrying.
Izuku wants to ask what the hell is happening, but Shigaraki hasn’t tried to kill him yet, and he feels like he’s on thin ice as is. So, instead, he watches as the villain sets his burden down on the desk and begins fiddling with cables and connections. Izuku doesn’t play a lot of video games personally, but he recognizes the system as being a little old school. Something Kacchan might have owned when they were younger and long since upgraded to a more up-to-date model. It’s bulky, but well cared for, and the TV is a cheap boxy thing you could probably buy pretty much anywhere.
There’s a pair of controllers and more wires than Izuku would ever know what to do with, but Shigaraki seems pretty adept at what he’s doing. It takes the villain only a few minutes to get everything up and running, making a satisfied sound as the TV comes on and the logo swirls across the screen in a simple start-up animation.
“Wha-”
“Here.” Izuku’s words are cut off with a choked noise as he gets one of the controllers shoved into his gut with more force than was strictly necessary.
“What- what is this for?”
How Shigaraki manages to give him such a withering look, with his face mostly hidden by a disembodied hand, is beyond his understanding. The villain’s lip curls up in a sneer, tongue clicking against his teeth. “Are you stupid?”
Izuku sputters, indignant, “N-no! I just- What is going on?! Why- why are you here?!” A villain. In his dorm room. Not just any villain: Shigaraki. The leader of the League and the reason Kacchan had been kidnapped!
And he is- what? Supposed to just accept that Shigaraki only wants to play video games?
The lanky villain in front of him groans, head falling back to stare at the ceiling. “Can’t you just shut up?”
Izuku blinks, then narrows his eyes. “No?” He gestures frantically around them like maybe Shigaraki somehow hadn’t noticed where he’d warped to through the hand on his face. “You’re in my room?! You’ve tried to kill me and my friends multiple times, and- and you kidnapped Kacchan!”
“Kacchan?” Behind the hand on his face, Shigaraki’s lip curls as he says the name, head cocking to the side. “Who the hell- oh. The angry one,” he scoffs, amusement twisting up his features. “Surprised he lets you call him that.”
The reaction makes Izuku bristle defensively, the plastic of the controller in his hand creaking as he squeezes it. “We’re childhood friends.”
“Interesting.” Seemingly unbothered by Izuku’s confusion, or maybe just forgetting about it entirely, Shigaraki moves towards his bed. Climbing onto it so he can lounge against the wall, facing the TV. “The others told me about you. Said you got real possessive about him. Guess that makes sense.”
“That’s not- I was just worried. You took my friend.”
Now he is the one forgetting his own confusion. Shaking off his momentary distraction, he tosses the controller on the bed, fists clenched at his sides. “I don’t know what you’re doing here, but you need to leave!”
“No,” Shigaraki says simply, nudging at Izuku’s abandoned controller with his foot. “Now pick that up and play before I start getting really annoyed.”
He doesn’t get it. The more they talk, the more confused he becomes.
“I’m not playing with you. You’re a villain. You want to kill All Might.” He gestures around his room, pointedly emphasizing all the All Might merch he’s managed to unpack so far. Kidnapping Kacchan was bad enough, but his very first encounter with Shigaraki and the League of Villains had been because they’d attacked the USJ, specifically to murder the hero he looked up to the most. “Why me? Why come here? Especially now?”
Shigaraki groans, head falling back against the wall.
Off to the side, the swirling purple warp gate shifts and changes back into the shape of a man. “I’m wondering the same thing. This is unusually reckless behavior, even for you.”
“I’m bored. I couldn’t think of anyone else worth bothering.”
“What if I tell everyone you’re here?” Izuku’s head tilts up, chin jutting out defiantly, sparks of green dancing over his skin. “This place will be swarming with heroes in seconds.”
Shigaraki snorts, “You’d be dead before any of them even get close, kid.” He nods to the door of Izuku’s dorm room. “You or one of your little friends. I’m not picky.”
The threat, as expected as it had been, makes his blood run cold. Color draining from his face, he can feel some of his bravado starting to wane. “Y-you wouldn’t-”
“Wouldn’t I?” Shigaraki’s shoulders shift in a half-hearted shrug. “Sure, I might get caught, but not before I take someone down with me. Do you really want that on your conscience, hero?”
Izuku has always dreamed of being a hero. Has always considered heroes, especially All Might, to be awe-inspiring. An ideal worth reaching for with all his might. Yet somehow, when the villain calls him one, it feels almost like a slur. Shigaraki takes a word that holds so much power in Izuku’s heart, wraps it with barbed wire and deadly spikes, and throws it at him with the intent to maim. The vitriol lancing right through him and dragging all his failures to the forefront.
Not being able to save Kacchan, not being able to help All Might.
Barely able to handle the quirk he’d been blessed with without shattering into a million pieces.
The leader of the League of Villains is sitting on his bed, and there’s nothing he can do about it. Trying to fight, trying to call out for help—anything he does would risk alerting his classmates and someone else getting hurt.
Izuku deflates like a balloon that’s slowly leaking air. His entire body sagging and his eyes dropping to the controller he’d tossed on the bed. Shigaraki nudges it with his foot, the hand on his face doing nothing to hide the self-satisfied smirk of victory he’s wearing.
“Fine. I’ll play.”
“Atta boy.”
----
And so begins the strangest relationship of Izuku’s life.
They played for hours that first night. Izuku knows he should have gone to Aizawa the second Shigaraki disappeared back through that swirling vortex, taking his TV and gaming system with him, but truthfully he’d had a hard time believing that any of that had actually happened. Once Shigaraki was gone, there wasn’t really any evidence that he’d ever been there at all, and it felt easier to just… call it a strangely vivid dream.
Except it happens again and again. Over and over.
Each time, Izuku is so shocked to be left standing at the end of it that he can’t bring himself to tell anyone about it. Every instinct inside his body is at war with itself. On the one hand, he feels like he’s betraying the heroes, betraying All Might specifically, by not saying anything. On the other hand, he can’t help but feel like maybe this is a chance to reach out his hand to someone.
Maybe it is naive of him to think that he can change Shigarki’s mind or get him to renounce being a villain, but Izuku can't help but feel like maybe there is something beyond Shigaraki’s hatred that is worth saving. The more time they spend together, the more the villain seems to relax. To the point where Izuku was genuinely surprised when the older man stepped through the portal one day without the hands he so frequently wears all over his body.
They’d make an appearance again sometimes. Especially whenever Shigaraki seemed overly agitated about something. His temper was always shorter, and Izuku noticed that he also scratched at his skin with a little more intensity. So it didn’t take much effort to figure out that the hands, as gruesome as they are, seemed to bring him some kind of comfort.
Despite Shigaraki being a villain, Izuku couldn’t help but feel a little blessed that the other man felt comfortable enough around him to go without them, even just sometimes.
---
“Stop getting cheese dust on my bed, jerk.” He kicks at Shigaraki's hip. The villain barely tips over, giving Izuku a deadpan look as he shoves an obnoxiously large handful of cheese puffs in his mouth.
Cheese dust coats the gloves on his fingers, his mouth, and the front of his tattered shirt. “Make me.” He makes a show of dusting it off right onto Izuku’s bedsheets and seems to take great pains in smearing his orange coated fingers across All Might’s smiling face on his comforter.
Izuku growls and takes the opportunity to snatch the controller out of Shigaraki’s lap. “I’ll tell Aizawa-sensei you’re here.”
The threat, unfortunately, just makes Shigaraki’s face split in a grin full of bits of cheese puffs, eyes wide and suddenly manic. “Promise?”
Izuku’s own expression falls. “Ew.”
Shigaraki’s sudden burst of laughter would be startling if he hadn’t grown used to this sort of exchange by now. It’s almost comfortable in its familiarity, and Izuku can’t help but wonder if this is what it’s like to have an older brother.
A villainous older brother that dusted one of his rare All Might figures.
And killed people.
That last thought makes his nose crinkle, attention focusing back on the TV hanging above his desk. He’d had to do a lot of compartmentalizing when this became a frequent occurrence, shuffling all the bad things Shigaraki did into a box in favor of the (probably misguided) hope that he could somehow make some meaningful change in the older man.
Not that it was easy acting like he didn’t know Shigaraki still wanted to cause All Might’s downfall. Or that he’d kidnapped Kacchan. Or even that the TV currently hanging on his wall was stolen.
“You suck at this game.” Shigaraki’s laughter mellows to an amused snort as he lounges on his side, head propped in his hand instead of bothering to sit back up again.
The rankings of their last Pro Kart race are listed on the screen with Izuku’s All Might all the way at the bottom and Shigaraki’s Mirko annoyingly in first place.
“I suck at every game.” Tossing both their remotes aside and getting to his feet.
“What crawled up your ass and died?” For a second, it almost looks like the villain actually cares. He’d sat up on Izuku’s bed, at least. “Usually, you’re far more annoyingly optimistic.”
Truthfully? This giant secret he is keeping from literally everyone that matters is starting to weigh on him. He is starting to let his guard down, to grow comfortable with the villain’s presence. Even though he loses every game that Shigaraki doesn’t let him win out of pity, these game nights are fun. They banter and laugh. He was even surprised to find that Shigaraki knows a lot about heroes, though he really shouldn’t have been, considering the other man’s goal is to bring all of hero society down. They’d debate things, and as much as the other man hates All Might, he'd still pay attention to what Izuku was saying.
It really was what he imagined having an older brother would be like. One that seemed effortlessly cool with his dry sarcasm and insane video game skills.
“Why do you keep coming here?” He’s got his back to the villain, which every hero on the planet would chew him out for, but he doesn't care. If Shigaraki was going to dust him, it would have happened already. Sensing the older man’s irritation and that he is about to speak, he interjects quickly. “And don’t say it’s because you’re bored!”
He turns, face set and chin tilted up. Determined not to let his questions get derailed again. “You’ve mentioned a thousand times that Spinner is who you usually game with. Why not do this with him? He’s got to be better at this than me.”
Shigaraki groans, head falling back and rolling his eyes to the ceiling. “Why do you keep asking these stupid questions?”
“St-stupid?!” His arms cross, anger spiking. “You’re a villain!” As nice as this could be sometimes, he can’t help but feel like he’s the only one who seems concerned about that. “Wha-what happens when someone finds out, huh? I’ll- I’ll get in trouble. People might get hurt-”
“Hey!” The older man sneers in Izuku’s direction. “No one is going to find out shit unless you tell them.”
“You honestly can’t believe that, right?” He gestures to the door of his dorm room. “Two of my classmates have quirks that let them hear things at long distances. It’s not about if someone finds out, it’s about when.”
Shigaraki’s jaw clenches, his entire body tensing with a snarl that feels more animal than human. There had been a time when that look in the other man’s eyes might have made him lock up in fear, but he’s almost surprised when that doesn’t happen. Instead, he sets his own jaw and doesn’t let his spine buckle under the force of the villain’s displeasure.
He’d watched Shigaraki stuff his mouth so full of ohagi that he looked like a hamster.
It’s hard to fear anyone after you've seen them like that.
It’s part of why he’s never truly feared Kacchan. He’d been realistically skittish around him, but he’d never been scared. Not when he’d watched Kacchan grow up. It’s hard to take fists and insults seriously when one of your earliest memories of the person throwing them at you involved your bully getting an All Might figure stuck up his nose.
“I just… want to know. Why? I know it- it’s not to get me in trouble. You could have done that a thousand times over. Is this some kind of- of- I don’t know, weird recruitment tactic?”
Shigarki’s face drops, brow arching. “Are you serious?” He gestures at the room around them. “It doesn’t take a fucking genius to figure out that turning you against All Might is a waste of air.”
For some reason, that has him sputtering, cheeks flaming. It’s not like it was wrong. He just… doesn't particularly appreciate his (minor) obsession being pointed out so blatantly.
“Okay. Fair.” He tries to regain some of his fire from before, but he feels a little like a rapidly deflating balloon. “Still! Can’t you just- explain? I know you’re not fishing for information because you don’t ask questions, and you change the subject a lot when I talk about UA.” He shakes his head. “It just… doesn’t make any sense. Why me? Why all this?” His voice drops, almost afraid to ask his next question. “Do you… want to leave the League?”
“Shut up.”
“That’s it, isn’t it?” He perks up, eyes widening slightly. Before he can stop himself, the words are rushing out of him in a torrent. “If you’re wanting to quit being a villain, I can help! I can vouch for you! And- and we could find some way to help with your quirk. I’m sure Aizawa-sensei or All Might would listen if I talked to them, I could-“
“I said shut up!”
It isn't the shout itself that's shocking. No, Shigaraki is off the bed faster than he ever really expected the other man to move. One moment he is loose-limbed and sprawled out, and the next he is towering over Izuku and making him stumble frantically back towards his desk. Rage twisting his entire expression into something monstrous.
Instinctively, One For All activates, green lightning arcing over his entire body even as his heart lurches all the way up into his throat.
“I-“
Before he can say anything more, that purple vortex is opening once more, and Shigaraki is gone.
—
He has to stop for a moment to flex his hands before he finally manages to fish his keys out of his pocket. It’s seasons like this that he truly regrets the damage he’d wracked on his body as a teenager. The cold feels like knives seeking out all of his healed breaks.
Once he gets his apartment door open, he rushes inside and hastily closes it on all the trappings of winter. Let the biting cold and icy winds batter against his walls; he is home, and soon, he’ll be cuddled up cozy under the kotatsu. Breathing a sigh of relief, he turns towards the thermostat and kicks on the heater before he even humors the idea of taking any of his warm layers off.
Only once he hears it humming to life does he finally kick off his boots and start to unravel his scarf. Hat, gloves, and then finally his coat, which thankfully has snap-on buttons to better accommodate the arthritis.
It has been a long time since he's considered himself anything even close to physically frail. Even as a teacher and technically retired hero, he still makes an effort to keep in shape. He may not be able to lift over 255kg anymore, but he can still lift 190 without too much trouble. So, days like these, where he feels like everything takes twenty times the normal amount of effort, always feel a little disheartening. Just getting into his comfort clothes feels like this monumental task that requires a long, hot shower in hopes that it’ll maybe help his joints ease up a little.
Dressed in one of his ‘T-shirt’ shirts, with a long-sleeved undershirt and his thickest pair of lounge pants, he gathers last night's leftovers, his special heating gloves from Hatsume, and a couple extra blankets. There are a whole week’s worth of assignments to grade and other things he could probably be doing, but right now, none of that matters. He wants to decompress.
Turning on the TV and then his laptop, he changes the output until his desktop screen is showing on the large screen. Shaky hands shift the mouse until he is clicking a small icon with Gentle and La Brava’s logo on it. The program opens, and he types in the encryption code followed by a few different passwords.
Finally, a popup takes over nearly the entire screen, the man on the other end giving him a disinterested look.
“Midoriya.”
“Tenko.”
The other man rolls his eyes, huffing a laugh under his breath. “Told you to stop calling me that.”
“Nope.” He grins, “I can tell you like it.”
Tenko clicks his tongue and sneers, “Whatever.” Red eyes flick over Izuku on his screen. “It’s cold. You’re just watching today, right?”
Izuku nods, pulling over his plate and offering Tenko a soft smile. “I’ve got my gloves on, so maybe I can play a little later.”
Tenko sighs like this whole situation is an immense burden he’s been saddled with and not something they do every other night. “Alright. But no backseat driving. You still suck at this.”
“I tried to help one time!”
“Yeah, and then we immediately lost.”
“Whatever,” he huffs. “See if I bring you my mom’s cookies next week.”
That seems to shut Tenko up, or at least he’s silent as he glares at Izuku. He’s changed a lot over the years, streaks of black starting to grow into his white hair and his skin a lot healthier now. His attitude is still there though, so not everything has changed.
“What do you want to watch?” he says finally, settling back against what appears to be a gray wall. The inside of his cell. Izuku tried to get them to move him. He is quirkless now, hardly a Tartarus-level threat, but between the government saying no and Tenko himself refusing, his hands were tied. This set-up, a TV and video games with a special encrypted connection that only allows Tenko access when Izuku opens it first, had been the compromise they’d given him.
“League of Legends—it’s fun watching you curse out some thirteen year old.” He flashes the answering glare that response earns him a wide grin.
Tenko mutters some choice threats under his breath as he starts up the game, the screen adjusting so his video feed slips into a corner.
Even with the smaller image, he can see the barely restrained amusement on the other man’s face.
With a steaming bowl of food in front of him and a content smile on his own face, Izuku settles in for the night.