Chapter Text
“It’s still annoying you didn’t have to participate,” Denki grumbled as he rotated his shoulder. Today was a Meet-And-Greet for Future Heroes, and the entirety of class 3-A was at the mall. However, neither Izuku nor Hitoshi had participated.
Izuku just shot Denki a smug grin. “The benefits of going Underground.”
Denki snorted. “Bullsh-“
Izuku quickly covered his mouth. “Chargebolt, you can’t just use language like that while in costume!” Izuku giggled. “Think of the children who look up to you!”
Denki licked Izuku’s hand and smirked when he squealed and pulled his hand back. “Fine, I won’t curse. But you know you’re not Underground, you’re Twilight.”
Izuku wiped his hand on his shirt. “Excuse you, but my license says Underground!”
“Babe, Izu, love of my life. Your license might say Underground, but that interview you did with Mic last week says Twilight.”
Izuku reached out to take Denki’s hand. “You know why I throw my influence at mental health issues, Denks.”
“Yeah, I know.” Denki squeezed his hand and nudged his shoulder. “I love you, Izuku.”
Izuku smiled sappily at him and opened his mouth to say the same, when a little kid’s voice cut in. “Mommy, look! It’s Chargebolt!”
Denki let go of Izuku’s hand and turned to the kid with a wide grin. Even though he wanted to just spend the rest of the day going on a date, until he took off the costume, he was still Chargebolt, and today was still the Meet-And-Greet. “Heya kiddo!”
The kid was practically vibrating in his excitement and then ran over to them, holding out an autograph book. “Can I get your autograph?!” he shrieked. In his excitement, though, the kid tripped on his shoelace.
Denki moved to reach out to catch the kid, but Izuku was faster. In a split second, Izuku’s wings had darted out and prevented the fall, quickly followed by his hands on his shoulders. “Woah there, are you okay?” Izuku asked quietly.
The suddenness of the fall and then the catch startled the kid enough to activate his quirk. A bright flash of light surrounded Izuku for a few seconds, before quickly dissipating. “Izuku, you okay?” Denki asked cautiously.
“Uh, I think so?” he replied, standing up. “Hey bud, can you tell me what your quirk does?”
As Izuku asked his question, he let go of the kid. Instantly, there was another flash of light, and Izuku… well… changed?
He had been wearing a black hoodie that was at least two sizes too big along with blue jeans and black boots. But now he was wearing a neon blue t-shirt with the English word “Toothpaste” on the front, the UA gym pants, and red shoes. Those weren’t the only differences, though. Izuku was fairly muscular, especially on his back and arms, but now he appeared as though he’d never seen the inside of a gym.
What could have happened to him?
“Um. Where am I?” Izuku(?) asked, blinking and looking around. “Oh, hey Denki! Do you know where I am?”
Denki blinked away his confusion. He was a hero student, a third year, and one of the Big Three, he knew enough to not freeze up or panic.
Even if something had most definitely happened to his boyfriend.
“We’re at the mall. Give me a sec,” Denki crouched down in front of the kid, careful not to touch him. He had noticed that the kid was starting to tear up, so it was damage control time. He didn’t want the kid to activate his quirk again, still unsure of what it was. “Hey kiddo, you wanted an autograph, right?”
That must have been the right thing to say, as the kid brightened back up. “Yes!” he exclaimed, handing Denki his autograph book.
“Alright little dude, who am I making this out to?” he asked, looking up at the kid’s mother. She looked worried, clearly understanding what had happened but trusting Denki to handle things for now.
“Taro! Sone Taro!” the kid answered with a wide smile.
“Sounds great!” Denki opened the book to an empty page and wrote. ‘You’ve got the SPARK to achieve anything you set your mind to, Taro-kun! Keep that ENERGY flowing! CHARGEBOLT!’
Denki handed the book back to the kid and then stood and faced his mom. “Sone-san, do you think you and your son could spare a few minutes to have a chat with us at the police station? You’re not in trouble or anything,” he quickly reassured, “but we need to understand what happened.”
“Of course, Chargebolt-san.” She reached down to pick her son up. “Taro, do you want to see how a police station works?”
~*~*~*~
Izuku was confused. He hated being confused.
Just a few minutes ago he was playing World of Legends with Tenko while working on budget revisions for the business course and teasing Shouto for getting ganged up on during the last heroics exercise class 3-A had. He was still trying to get all the paint out of his hair, and Hitoshi wasn’t helping.
But now he was disconnected from all of his familiar signals, and he didn’t recognize this mall. He was glad Denki was here, yeah, but Izuku had a feeling this wasn’t the same Denki he knew.
He looked the same, yeah, but he was acting a lot more mature than normal. Izuku could see the tension along his shoulders, but he couldn’t hear it in his voice. Denki would normally be fretting over something strange happening like this, not calmly directing a woman and her son to the police station.
Izuku hadn’t said a word since Denki had signed the kid’s autograph book, letting him take charge of things. He seemed to know what he was doing, and Izuku was still trying to get his bearings. He would admit, though, that seeing Denki like this, taking charge of a situation with confidence, was really impressive. Normally it was either Izuku or Neito who took charge when something happened.
This was a really nice change of pace.
Denki nudged Izuku’s arm lightly. “Are you okay? You’re being really quiet.”
Izuku nodded. “It’s just nice seeing you take charge like this,” Izuku admitted. “I’m not used to you being the one to step up. It’s normally me.”
Denki quirked an eyebrow at that. “What are you talking about? Between the two of us, it’s always me who does the public interactions, especially when a civilian is involved.”
“What? No, you’ve always been jumpy and overly energetic in stressful situations.” Izuku tilted his head. “Unless…” he trailed off, starting to suspect something was very very wrong.
“Unless..?” Denki prodded.
“Unless you’re not the same Denki I’m used to,” Izuku muttered.
Denki let out a sigh. “Yeah, that’s what I’m afraid of. You don’t look or act like my Izuku, not really.”
Izuku tapped into a signal to connect to the internet access. He wanted to look up the kid, Sone Taro, to see what his quirk was. Something very clearly happened, and from what it looked like, it was the kid’s quirk.
It only took him a few moments to find his way into the National Quirk Database and pull up the kid’s information.
Name: Sone Taro
Quirk: Reality Swap
Type: Emitter
Description: The user possesses the ability to send someone to a parallel reality by touching them. These alternate realities exist alongside their own, with subtle or potentially drastic differences in life choices, personalities, or even the world itself. The quirk triggers upon physical contact between the user and another person. Upon activation, the touched person is instantly transferred to the alternate version of themself in a parallel reality, and their alternate version is transferred to the original reality.
Reversal: The touched person can only return to their original reality by coming into physical contact with the user from the alternate reality. Nothing will happen if the user touches the swapped person.
Limitations: The user has no control over the specific alternate reality the touched person is sent to. Each swap leads to a random parallel version of themselves. The user has no prior knowledge of the alternate reality or the state of the touched person's alternate self. The biggest danger of this quirk is if the alternate reality is one where the user does not exist, making reversal impossible.
Oh. Oh, this explained everything.
“Shit,” he breathed. “I’m in the wrong reality.”
“What was that?” Denki asked, leaning closer. “You were too quiet.”
“I’m in the wrong reality,” Izuku stated. “I’m not your Izuku. Oh, Uncle’s going to freak when he finds out I’m missing.”
~*~*~*~
“Every year, I swear the students just get dumber and dumber,” Shouta grumbled as he was grading essays. The first years were only a few months into their first Law and Ethics class, but they should be able to do basic research at this point.
Katagawa v. Tokyo was about collateral damages, so why was this essay talking about wage differences?
Shouta reached up to massage his temples. If he just set the essay on fire, would anyone believe it was an accident?
He was brought out of his musing by his phone. Glancing at it, he saw Kaminari’s contact. What does he want now?
“Is the event over already?” Shouta asked.
“What? Oh, yeah, it’s over,” Kaminari confirmed. “There was an incident after the event, though. Not a villain attack or anything!” he quickly added. “But, um. Can you meet us at the police station?”
Shouta narrowed his eyes. “What happened?” he asked as he got up, reaching for his capture scarf.
“This is something you need to be here for,” Kaminari hesitated. “But the short answer is, uh. Quirk accident?”
“Quirk accident.” Shouta was already out the door. “Right. Put Izuku on the phone.”
“See, that’s going to be a problem.”
“Kaminari Denki. Put. Izuku. On. The. Phone. Now.” Shouta growled.
“I can’t?”
“What does that mean?”
“He’s not here, Sensei.” Shouta could practically see Kaminari slump at the admission. “I don’t know where he is.”
Shouta would neither confirm nor deny any traffic violations he may or may not have made while speeding to the police station. He also would never admit to running inside the station.
Slamming the door to Tsukauchi’s office open, Shouta snarled out, “Where is my son?!”
The three occupants of the room all stared at him in surprise. Kaminari and Tsukauchi glanced at each other nervously, but Izuku just tilted his head. Wait, Izuku?
“I thought you said he wasn’t here?” Shouta glared at Kaminari. “He sure looks here to. . . wait. . .” Shouta had just noticed how different Izuku looked from how he normally looked. “Izuku?”
The Izuku look-alike grimaced. “Both yes and no,” he hedged. “My name is Aizawa Izuku, but this isn’t the reality I’m from.”
Shouta sat down on the couch in the office and narrowed his eyes at this new Izuku. “Care to explain further?”
“It seems a kid at the mall activated his quirk and touched the Izuku you know. The kid’s quirk is called Reality Swap, and it caused me to swap places with the Izuku from this reality,” he shrugged. “So now, your Izuku needs to figure out how to come back, because the only way is for the Sone Taro in my reality to use his quirk on your Izuku.”
Tsukauchi sighed in defeat. “I’m not sure how the kid figured this all out so quickly, but he knew exactly what happened before they even got to the station. The kid’s mother hadn’t even told them about the kid’s quirk yet or anything.”
Izuku raised an eyebrow. “What do you mean you don’t know how I did it? I tapped the signals like I always do. What, does your Izuku not signal tap or something?”
“What do you mean by that? Tap the signals?” Shouta asked.
“What do you mean by that? Does your Izuku call it something else?” Izuku scratched his cheek. “When I just barely enter the Stream, I call it tapping the signals. What does your Izuku call it?”
“The hell is the Stream?”
Izuku stared back and forth between everyone in the room before he flopped backwards in his chair. “Of course, we have different quirks.” He sat up straight again. “Okay, so my quirk is called Datastream, and it’s also the name on my Intelligence Hero License. Which I don’t have on me. It’s sort of like a technomancy quirk. I can see and access various electronic signals, primarily internet and wi-fi, but I can also access cell towers and satellites in a pinch. When I access those signals, I can stream the internet through my mind, or even send my consciousness out to access another computer network elsewhere.”
Shouta stared at him for a solid five minutes before he managed to say, “What.”
“What’s your Izuku’s quirk?” he asked instead of repeating himself.
Kaminari is the one who answered. “Izuku’s quirk is called Screech Owl. It’s a mix of transformation, emitter, and mutation quirk. The mutations aren’t visible, but for the transformation parts, he can have wings and talons. His emitter aspect is voice based, he can screech at similar volumes to Present Mic.”
“Huh. Yeah, that’s a very different quirk.” He tapped his finger against his chin for a few moments before he shrugged and grinned widely. “No matter, I’m sure Nedzu-jii will be able to figure out what happened and find the kid sooner or later so we can swap back.”
Nedzu-jii? What?
“Nedzu-jii? What?” Tsukauchi echoed Shouta’s thoughts.
Izuku nodded his head happily. “Yeah! In my world, Nedzu trained me on how to use my quirk properly, and in the process, we grew really close. He’s always considered Uncle Shouta to be his pup, so when I was adopted, I became his grand-pup!”
Tsukauchi pinched the bridge of his nose. “I don’t know what part of this entire day is the worst: Screech being swapped into another reality or getting Nedzu’s freaking grandson brought into ours.”
“Oh, definitely getting me,” Izuku replied with a cheeky grin. “Have I told you that I’m the Vice Principal of UA yet?”