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30 years ago.
He doesn’t remember the start of it. Not that it really mattered. His parents had been villains, good ones too.
25 years ago.
He grew up knowing villains the way other kids knew heros. Indoctrination is a funny thing, always a double-edged sword. Of course, villains did tend to be more disagreeable people than heros, and internal conflicts were common-- but his parents didn’t neglect him. They protected him well. He lived a good childhood, and grew into a bubbly personality with an enthusiasm that seemed untameable.
22 years ago.
His parents died. He had no extended family, and was instead taken in by the villain organization that his parents had belonged to for years. He learned toughness. He learned what it meant to survive.
15 years ago. Mission start.
“Yamada Hizashi.”
“Huh?”
“That will be your name for the entirety of this operation. You best get accustomed to it.”
“Ah… Yes sir…”
He stood in an office, facing opposite of the voice that addressed him from behind computer screen static. There was a slight echo in the tall, cold, room, and each sentence was echoed faintly back to him, as if the building itself was some kind of comic book villain’s assistant, nodding and grinning feverishly and repeating every word out its boss’s mouth. Well. Every place has its charm.
Just a week prior he’d been alerted of the new mission he would be undertaking, and in the days since he hadn’t gone ten minutes without hearing a new comment on the topic.
“Damn lucky kid. You realize how easy you’re gettin’ off with this? While we’re out bustin’ our asses--”
“Shut up, shithead. You wouldn’t be able to last a day on undercover work. Constantly gettin’ asked questions you don’t know the answer to, comin’ up with lies on the spot. This kid here, he’s clever. He’s savin’ our asses doin’ this.”
“Why’s someone this young being sent on a mission as dangerous as this, though…? How can we trust that he won’t crack under the pressure? He’s not very experienced, you know.”
“No, no, it’s because he’s this young that he’s doing this. Haven’t you heard? They’re gonna enroll him in UA. We’re growing an artificial hero from the ground up. What is it those whackjob teachers call them… Eggs? We’re hatching a hero egg. It’s genius, really.”
Although the constant talk was annoying, he couldn’t deny that it was all perfectly true. He’d never had a say in the matter from the start. He was the only one under the age of sixteen in the organization, and transferring someone in as a second-year already put them in the position of an outlier, so that was key. His quirk was combat-oriented and he was talented in controlling it-- again, key, because admitting someone upon basis of recommendation would have increased the complexity of the mission tenfold. Now, he received one final comment.
“Today you have been made a vital piece of a master plan. You have been entrusted with a great deal of responsibility, but I have faith that you will deliver. Do not prove me wrong.”
“Yes, sir.” He bowed his head and turned to exit the room, but was stopped when the voice sounded again.
“What is your name, again?”
He paused and took a deep breath.
“Yamada… Yamada Hizashi.”
14 years ago. First goal: Admittance to UA. Complete.
He poked the mass of dark hair that rested on the desk beside him with the eraser end of his pencil.
“Psst.”
Five seconds of silence.
“Psst.”
Five more.
“Psssssttt--”
“What in God’s name do you want?” A single bloodshot eye glared at him from behind thick locks.
“No no, it’s not God’s name that I want, I was wondering what yours is.” He flashed a beaming smile to rival that of a toothpaste model.
The glare intensified before returning its focus back to the desk, and he almost thought he wouldn’t receive an answer when a muted grumble reached his ears.
“Aizawa Shouta. I’m going back to sleep now.”
“Wahh, cool name!! I’m Yamada Hizashi!!"
13 years ago. Second goal: Fit in. Be amiable with members of your class. Complete.
“THE VOICE HERO! PRESENT MIC!!!”
He didn’t hesitate a second before scrawling those words in all capital letters on the hand-held blackboard in front of him.
He added a few stars around the borders then sat back and stared at it contentedly before stealing a glance at his (self proclaimed) friend next to him. When he saw Aizawa’s board as blank as his expression, Yamada’s jaw dropped in shock.
“You still haven’t decided on a name?!!”
Not bothering to look back at him, Aizawa droned, “I’m not planning on appearing in any media, so it doesn’t really matter to me.”
“All right… Then, how about…” Mic pensively tapped his chin with the end of his pencil, the eraser bouncing off his skin.
“ERASERHEAD!!”
“Fine, fine, whatever…”
Mic scooted his chair over and leaned in close as he watched Aizawa draw the letters with surprisingly neat handwriting.
“Ooh… Does this make us matching? I mean. Not really matching, but, we’ll both have hero names that I thought up, so that’s matching in a way, isn’t it?”
He turned his head to look at Aizawa, only to realize he was nearly nose-to-nose with his classmate, and for a moment, they stared wide-eyed at each other with equal expressions of surprise. The moment was short-lived, and Aizawa’s surprise quickly shifted to annoyance. He clenched his teeth and hissed, “Do you mind?”
Mic couldn’t stop two short giggles from escaping his mouth.
“No, I don’t mind, but I’ll back up for your sake anyways.” He returned to his desk, but not without a wink.
12 years ago. Third goal: Become a hero. Complete.
“ERASER!!”
He puffed out his chest and pointed his index finger at Aizawa with incredible mock conviction, striking a pose in his new leather jacket and tight vinyl pants, his other hand still toying with the large speaker system now wrapped uncomfortably snug around his neck.
“How do I look?! As a pro hero. Wonderful, dashing, right?!”
Aizawa, his attention on the paperwork in front of him which would officialize his status as a pro hero, mumbled the reply “No different from always.”
The room went silent save for the scratch of Aizawa’s pen against paper, and Mic’s hand fell to his side. Noticing the change in atmosphere, Aizawa paused and looked up to see a faint pink decorating Mic’s cheeks.
“Wh-- I meant-- like an idiot. No different from always, you still look like a dunce. Not dashing in the least,” Aizawa hurriedly returned his eyes to the paper, ignoring the way Mic’s eyebrows had raised, and that dumb smile that had just begun to form on his lips, the same smile he always had when Aizawa gave him a compliment, intentional or not. That smile was making an appearance more and more often, lately. Aizawa feigned a cough and brought his arm up to his face, covering the blush that had begun to appear.
10 years ago. Fourth goal: Attain a staff position at UA. Complete.
“SHOUTA!!”
He yelled as the apartment door opened, and promptly rushed in, shoving a hand-sized card in Aizawa’s face.
“What…”
“LOOK AT IT!!” He furiously shook the card, it’s surface tapping against Aizawa’s nose.
“How the hell am I supposed to look at anything when you’re waving it like that?” He snatched the card out of his hands, and walked to the kitchen, where he sat on a stool and placed the card on the counter, inspecting it.
UA STAFF
TEACHER
HERO DEPARTMENT
PRESENT MIC
Aizawa’s eyes widened, and he ran the tip of his finger over the UA insignia printed in the top corner.
“When did you…”
“Last month!! There was an opening! And I was one of the first applicants, and I got accepted last week, but I wanted to keep it a surprise, and today I finally got the ID…”
Aizawa turned and looked at Mic. At his proud smile and eager posture, the way his gloved hands were clenched into excited fists at his side. He couldn’t see his eyes behind his sunglasses, but he knew the way they were crinkling at the corners, bright green irises seemingly sparkling.
Mic looked at him too, and saw the way he didn’t blink when those tired eyes scanned him. It was something he’d noticed he’d do when he saw a cute cat too, or when he stared at his favorite painting in the art museum on the other side of the city. It was a beautiful way to look at things. Mic wondered if what he saw was the same thing he did when he looked in the mirror-- a fake, a rat, a villain. He hoped he never saw it.
“What?”
“H-..Huh?” Mic shook his head, coming back to reality.
“Your face got awful serious all the sudden.” Aizawa blinked, his eyebrows lowered. The room was silent for a moment.
“Got the shits again?”
Mic’s mouth dropped open, then screwed up into a twisted cringe.
“THAT WAS TWO WEEKS AGO!! AND IT WAS BECAUSE OF THAT DAMN TAKEOUT!! I TOLD YOU THAT RESTAURANT WAS SKETCHY, I DON’T KNOW WHY YOU LIKE IT SO MUCH!!”
5 years ago. Strike one: Become emotionally involved. Complete.
“Eraserhead, huh…? Congratulations.”
Mic twirled the ring around in his hand, rubbing the engraving on the inside. /Always./ He took a pensive breath, slipping the ring on to his finger only to take it off again and resume fidgeting.
“... Yeah. Thank you.”
The ceremony had been beautiful, outdoors, with just enough breeze from the ocean to take the edge off the summer sun shining bright and golden overhead. Clean white suits, flower petals on the grass. Mic had organized the wedding in its aesthetics, on the condition that Aizawa organized the guest list. Mic had held those rough and scarred hands in his, looked into his dark brown eyes and told him, “I will love you forever.” In that moment, the words were endlessly sincere. Mic’s eyes saw nothing but him, his head thought of nothing but him. A blissful tunnel vision, now torn apart by the accomplice sitting on the worn couch in front of him.
Torn, because the man, sneering crookedly and tapping his cigarette over an ashtray, was not congratulating him on his marriage. He was congratulating him on ensnaring himself inextricably deeper into his mission, into his very own lies and tricks and illusions. The way his glossy eyes squinted in the low light spelled a phrase unsaid: “Good fucking luck.”
1 year ago. Strike two: Stray from the objective. Complete.
“Mic.”
“Mic.”
“M--”
Mic jumped, blinking rapidly. A low groan escaped his throat, which was throbbing, raw and sore. He tried to move his hand, and was met with a sharp pain shooting up his arm. Where was he?
“Oh thank god…” Midnight sighed deeply, letting go a breath she’d been holding.
“I told you he’d be fine. What, did you think I’d lie to you? You think I’m new to this?” Recovery girl replied in a tone of disbelief, quietly shaking her head.
Oh. So that’s where he was. That’s what all the blurry white was-- the ceiling of the UA infirmary. He tried moving his hand again, only to have someone else’s cover it, and gently hold it in place.
“No, Hizashi. Not yet.” A voice, deep and soft, murmured beside him.
Mic turned his head, and found that a stiff, scratchy material restricted the movement of his neck. A brace.
“You knocked yourself out pretty good, Mister. I don’t know what you were expecting taking on a villain twice your size all on your own. He was a monster. Not that you’d remember after that bump on your head, though.”
It’s true, Mic didn’t remember fighting him. But he remembered the events before. The words that had reached his ears through the grapevine, that his organization would soon be sending an attack to breach the walls of UA. The cold, dense feeling in his gut, the anxiety shaking his fingers for days before he glanced out the window and saw a familiar face walking on the street below him. How had his legs run that fast? His mind had been left three steps behind. Perhaps his sense of pain had, too. The face he’d recognized was that of one of the most powerful grunts he knew, with a muscle manipulation quirk that gave him incredible mass and strength. Mic was no longer confused as to why a bone-deep ache was currently radiating through his entire body.
The pain didn’t matter so much after he blinked again, though, when he saw Aizawa’s face mere inches away from his own, his eyebrows knit together in concern, the corners of his mouth curling upwards slowly as Mic met his eyes.
“You’re a real idiot, you know.”
No kidding. He’d just sent a member of his own association to the slammer. In a dark twist of irony, he’d committed a betrayal within a betrayal and deliberately shut down another mission-- and by extension, compromised his as well. This wasn’t pretty. Well, the situation wasn’t.
Aizawa was.
1 month ago. Strike three (You’re out.): Reveal mission. Complete.
“Traitor…” he muttered, inaudible at first.
“There’s gotta be a traitor in our midst.”
Why did he say that? Why? Even now, he can’t answer that question with confidence. The knowledge of what he was doing, of who he was, was a constant storm above him, raining and pouring. Increasingly each day seemed like monsoon season, and the waters had now reached dangerous levels-- perhaps this was a cry for help. But what help? There’s no lifeguard to pull him out of this one. This guilt isn’t a swimming pool, it’s an ocean. That day the water made a crack in the dam, and before he could register the words coming out, he was defending the hypothesis that would mean the termination of his mission. Maybe that’s what he wanted. Even then, though, he’d had some silly illusion in his head that there was a possible future in which that termination wasn’t something ugly and blood-soaked. That it would just be over, and he could go back home and hang up his jacket and leave the memories outside the door. He would walk down the hall and into the living room and see his Prince Charming laying on the couch with his eyes closed, a hand absentmindedly petting the cat who lay on his belly. Just like that, they’d live happily ever after. But in truth, he knew that he was no star-crossed pure protagonist. He was a villain. And there are no happy endings waiting for him.
1 week ago.
He knew it was coming, and soon. He never returned the looks, but he felt the stares on his back, everywhere he went. He didn’t hear their voices, but he knew the words they spoke when they turned away, what all the topics of the recent meetings had been about, and why his attendance had not been requested.
It was inevitable, and perhaps that knowledge was what hurt the most, despite the fact that he’d known it from the start. All things come to an end, for better or for worse.
For better or for worse, he still came home that night and smiled with the same toothy grin he’d flashed when they first met eyes all those years ago. The air felt just as heavy in his home as it did everywhere else, but he ignored it, the same way one ignores the pain of a wound as they utter their last words.
“I love you, Shouta…” The man in his arms did not reply, but Mic didn’t mind. He knew they both understood the state of the present, and the path of the future. But now, in this moment, all that mattered is that he could still feel his warmth, his thick hair, and scarred skin. His heart beating, strong and unfaltering. It reassured Mic. Even when he was gone, as long as that heart kept beating… That would be okay. Mic would be okay with that.
“Do you know that? I love you so much.”
1 day ago.
He left everything that day.
Ungraded papers, happy birthday cards. Birth certificate, forged. His UA student uniform, that he still kept in a box in the closet. The speaker system he’d spent a whole year building and installing in every room, so the music never got far away. The leather jackets he’d been collecting since he was seventeen.
Two rings on the nightstand.
What did he care? Why would he miss it? All those documents, cards, certificates and records were all written with that fucking fake name. But somewhere along the way, it had started to feel real. Not when his teacher had called it out and he had answered, not when he had wrote it a thousand times and repeated it a thousand more. It was when Aizawa Shouta said his name that it sounded real. Maybe it was because he’d wanted that name to be his. Something like, ‘If that’s the name he’s calling, then that’s me.’
It was all too real. A mask that became part of his skin. And now he had to rip it off.
“... Hizashi…?” Aizawa rubbed his face, and his eyes cracked open to look at the face of the man kneeling by his bedside.
He smiled and gently shook his head, placing a hand on Aizawa’s cheek. With his thumb he lightly brushed the corner of Aizawa’s lips, and looked into those deep brown eyes, glazed over with sleepiness. It was 3am. When Aizawa woke up in the morning, this memory should seem like a dream. He wished so desperately that every memory could seem that way, that he could wake up tomorrow with no clear recollection, only the faint notion that /perhaps/ something had occurred in those days past, but nothing of great consequence, that all of this would fade into nothing and he would continue on his way unaffected by the rest.
For Aizawa, at least this moment would be a dream. For him, the memory would be burned like a brand in his mind.
10 minutes ago. Mission end.
“Yamada Hizashi.”
“Yes.”
“That has been your name for… how long, was it?”
“Fifteen years, sir.”
“Ah… Truly a long time. And you held out quite well.”
The voice was momentarily muddled by television static. The warped light of the screen manipulated the shadows of the room, and the pupils of his eyes, unprotected by sunglasses, shrunk and dilated in alternation to adjust.
“Excuse me.” The static settled.
“Now… You have made mistakes. You are more aware of that than even I am.” The voice paused. If it was to gauge a reaction, then there was nothing to find, because he didn’t flinch, didn’t shudder, didn’t clench his fists. Green eyes stared unblinkingly forward, waiting for him to continue.
“However, I don’t think any punishment will be necessary. The work you have completed has allowed great advances in our organization. Advances that you have seen yourself…”
The image of Aizawa’s scar flashed behind his eyes.
“... and some you have yet to see. I understand you have not come with much, today. And readjusting will not be easy. But I assure you, living in reality has its perks as well.”
Now.
“Good afternoon, Present M--”
“That’s not my name.”
Kurogiri paused, and looked at him for a moment from his place behind the counter. His dark face betrayed no emotion, as usual, but it was clear what was going through his mind.
He took a seat on the barstool at the end, put his elbows on the counter, and put his head in his hands.
“You’re wearing your hair down today.” Kurogiri remarked as he resumed his task polishing glassware.
“Mic was the one who put his hair up.” He didn’t move his eyes from the counter.
Even without looking, he was aware of the gaze he was receiving. Boy, had he gotten good at feeling stares.
“Perhaps it would be best to cut it.”
He didn’t respond for a while, just silently ran his fingers through his hair. It was soft, that’s what Aizawa would always say. That had been his excuse for petting it and playing with it, as if he were more a cat than the one they already had. His fingers twitched and paused.
“Don’t wanna use my quirk anymore either.”
He felt the stare shifting.
“Try as you might, that may be unavoidable. Your role now is the symbol of UA’s internal weakness. One way or another, you’ll be made to stand at the front lines. And regardless of your unique status, missions will continue to be assigned, and you will be expected to complete them, just like the rest of us.”
He switched to rubbing the bridge of his nose. He felt his breath hissing against his palms.
“What you did wasn’t easy, and we commend you for that. But it is over now.”
A drink was set in front of him, and the glass hit the counter with a ‘clink’.
“Today marks the start of something new.”
His arm swung out and struck the drink, and the glass hit the floor with a shattering symphony, cascading cracks and snaps bouncing their echos off the hard brick walls. The sound of something that was, in the past, a beautiful and carefully crafted object, transforming into its present form, ugly and dangerous.
Scattered across the floor, the broken glass caught the light and sparkled, as if offering a knowing wink.
“Someone new.”