Chapter Text
Izuku was not having a Good Day. He usually didn’t, but today was especially bad.
Yesterday, what Izuku had dubbed “The Sludge Incident,” happened. It was disheartening to know that even All Might didn’t think he could be a hero, but even with the depressive truth and injuries, Izuku would be damned if he missed school.
The greenette slipped past the outstretched feet of his classmates, letting the jeers of his “attempt of a heroic suicide” slide off his back. It wasn’t what he was doing, he didn’t want to kill himself!
Izuku took a breath, ignoring how it caught in his sore throat and slipping into his seat.
The boy let himself fall into his familiar routine, grabbing a wipe and scrubbing off his desk before taking out the ruined notebook.
Izuku stared down at it before pulling out a fresh notebook, a pen, tape, and scissors.
First things first, get All Might’s signature out of there.
Izuku carefully flipped through the pages, smoothing them out as he came to the desired page. Taking a glance to make sure nobody would destroy it, the bush-haired boy gently lifted it up, slicing right at the seam, careful to stray far from the ink.
It took a little while, what with the extra care he was taking, but eventually he had cut out both pages, and pulled out a blank piece of paper.
Lying them down, Izuku smoothed out the water damaged pages once more before placing tape on the backside, flipping it over, and slowly pressing it onto the fresh sheet.
Placing it aside, Izuku got to work copying down what he could from the damaged and smeared pages into the new book, keeping an eye on Katsuki’s empty seat. Inko would have told him if Kacchan was put into the hospital, or was injured bad enough to stay home, so the greenette hoped he would just get here before the class started.
28 Minutes later, the blond strode in. Almost immediately, classmates crowded him, words muddled together as they all talked over each other.
Katsuki snarled at them, shoving them aside with an annoyed command for quiet before dropping into his seat. Izuku waited for the others’ attention to stray back off of Bakugou before he grabbed the sheet of paper.
Turning around as quietly as he could, Izuku held up the signature. As usual, Katsuki had been ignoring him, but his head snapped to the other boy, giving him a glare.
Izuku murmured his words out, voice soft and unobtrusive in the noisy classroom. “I got All Might’s signature yesterday. You can have it, Kacchan”
Katsuki’s eyes widened a fraction as he looked down at the page, snatching it out of the freckled boy’s hand to stare at it.
“Holy shit, you got his fucking signature, Deku!”
Izuku smiled, bittersweet at his old friend’s excitement. In the quiet of the morning, classmates groggy and unnoticing, Katsuki didn’t act as mean. There were no shoves or shouts, no growls to get out of his way.
Izuku knew why Katsuki acted like that, he really did. But it didn’t make it hurt any less that he was the reason Kacchan didn’t have real friends anymore, that the kindest thing for both of them was to act like they never knew each other. Katsuki had a real chance at life, at anything, and defending Izuku just brought him down.
Izuku couldn’t blame him for that.
The day passed with little preamble, everything the same as it always was, minus some sharper jabs, insults, and ‘suggestions’.
Aunt Mitsuki had been waiting to pick Katsuki up at the end of the day, and Izuku nearly groaned as any remaining bullies watched him drive off, turning towards the grennette.
Izuku knew those looks.
The second he saw them start to move; he bolted. It was a bit harder to run with his injuries, his lungs starting to burn in seconds, but he ignored the creaking joints and sore muscles in favor of gripping onto his backpack straps, falling into a dead sprint as soon as he turned onto the street.
He didn’t glance behind, knowing they wouldn’t be far to follow, the boy instead listening to try and gauge distance by sound.
Izuku’s mind spun, flicking through the different routes he could take. “Okay, okay, okay-“ if he passed through the nearby clothing shop, Miyake-san would let him out through the back. The route only worked for four days out of the week, but the older girl would always let him slip through when she was on shift.
Making up his mind, Izuku weaved around a few alleys, finally taking a glance to make sure his classmates wouldn’t see as he slid into the store, giving a rushed greeting to Miyake-san, who stepped away from the register to open the back exit. Izuku gave a few quick, grateful words before she closed the door, locking it behind her, and the freckled teen was off again.
He took it a bit slower this time, keeping quiet as he looked for a suitable place to hunker down, where the fanned-out bullies wouldn’t find him.
He landed on an alley next to an old gardening shop, letting out a shaky breath as he slid to the concrete floor, hidden behind the stacks of clay pots and mulch bags.
“who the fuck are you?”
Izuku nearly jumped out of his skin at the scratchy voice, hand flying up to his mouth to silence the yelp as he turned, staring owlishly at the older teen seated just a few inches away, protectively clutching a 3DS, which upon further inspection, was plugged up to charge in the shop’s extension cord.
“So- Sorry! Is it okay if I sit here for a bit? It’s totally cool if you want me to leave I can find another place to hide I promise I won’t be long- Wait-“ Izuku paused, brain stalling for a moment to gather itself up from his rambles enough to answer the boy’s question. “Uh, I’m Midoriya!”
Izuku tried to bow, but clipped his shoulder on a loose brick, hissing at the sudden impact and shooting a hand up to rub at the ‘stubbed’ shoulder, letting out a rather pathetic moan of embarrassment.
The other boy was quiet for a long moment, mouth open slightly and appearing to be processing the words just as much as Izuku was himself before slowly closing his jaw, then opening it again to speak.
“…it’s fine.”
The boy eventually settled on, still tense and wary in that bewildered, confused way as he turned back to his DS.
Izuku’s foot bounced, the greenette’s ears strained to listen as his classmates winded through the streets and alleys. A couple passed by the mouth of this one, which Izuku sucked in a quiet breath and stilled every time, but each left, only ever sending a glance past the garden shop storage.
Izuku became aware of the small beeps and quiet music coming from the other teen’s device, and the smaller boy leaned over a bit, looking at the screen.
The pale-haired boy was playing Animal Crossing. Izuku continued to watch as he played, the boy sending increasingly frequent glances and side eyes towards him before pausing the game.
“What’re you even doing?”
The blue-haired teen says, mild irritation spread throughout his face and voice.
Izuku snapped out of his spectating with a startled flinch. “Sorry. Wh-what version of animal crossing are you playing?”
That seemed the right response, as the older boy perked up slightly and let himself talk, SparkNotes info dumping about the game. When his words teetered off, Izuku gave a hesitant hum, speaking up again. “What’s your name? Mine’s Midoriya, oh, wait, never mind, I already said that.”
The older teen ignored the last part, though. “Shigaraki,” was his reply, and Izuku beamed a slightly less hesitant smile.
Talking with Shigaraki was a bit awkward, and Izuku could tell that the boy had possibly even less social skills than himself, an almost impressive feat, but they managed a stilted conversation. Izuku spoke about a few of the games he liked as well, but eventually the conversation turned to heroes. Not exactly unusual for Izuku, but it gave the greenette pause when Shigaraki frowned, tensing in anger at the topic.
Pausing, Izuku spoke again “Do you not like heroes?”
Shigaraki shook his head, scowling as he answered. “No, they’re all self-centered hypocrites who smile for the cameras but leave the people who actually need help in the mud.”
Izuku frowned as well, mulling over how to answer. As much as he loved heroes, there certainly was some truth to what Shigaraki-san was saying. It was definitely a hyperbole and generalization, but Izuku knew exactly where Shigaraki was coming from. “Some of them are pretty crappy, huh?”
Shigaraki gave him a strange look at the words, but nodded, starting to rant.
“Heroes only work for the fame and money, they don’t care about helping people! They make all the civilians ignore problems, all ignoring them because “Oh, a hero will come! A hero will help with that!” the older teen’s voice drew up in a mocking tone, punctuated by an eye roll as he continued. “but they don’t! All these people are left behind and hurt because everyone else decided to be a fucking selfish coward.”
Shigaraki was angrily sulking, arms crossed over his knees as he glared.
Izuku stared at the ground, mildly shocked as his mind turned the words over. Hearing someone else say it was far different to his rambled notes, and the boy let out a few of his passing thoughts about the points, half of it simply mutters slipping out.
Shigaraki collected himself once more, falling into another point of his anger after Izuku had replied, dumping out his own thoughts and opinions.
“They turned society to shit, too, always promoting these big, strong, ‘heroic’ quirks. Those quirks could be just as easily used for crime and destruction! But noo, be scared of the person with fucking claws instead of superstrength”
Izuku piped in more with this. “Yeah, quirkism is shit.”
The greenette mirrored Shigaraki’s pose, arms crossed over his knees.
“there’s a large disparity in what hero fights make the news. Most of the publicized ones, the villains have mutant or otherwise ‘weird’ or ‘scary’ quirks. People think that just because you don’t have a strong quirk, you’re as useless as goddamn dirt!”
Izuku shoved his face down, wiping at his eyes. It would be so awkward if he started crying right now. A long moment passed as both boys calmed themselves down before continuing the conversation/debate at a more sedated pace. Izuku slipped in his more positive opinions, which made Shigaraki bristle, but Izuku was well-versed in getting what he wanted to say out without angering the other person.
Shigaraki wasn’t entirely hateful of all heroes, thankfully, when the greenette asked if there were any he liked.
“Eraserhead is okay, I guess. Underground heroes are better. Fuck them, still, but yeah.”
Izuku smiled softly, and the conversation turned mostly random. A few pointed opinions here, some senseless tidbits there. Eventually, though, Shigaraki turned to look Izuku in the eye.
“Midoriya, were you the kid from the news yesterday?”
Izuku froze, but nodded. Hopefully he hadn’t read or watched one that mentioned his quirklessness.
Shigaraki was silent, seconds ticking by like molasses before he spoke again. “That was,” he paused again, trying to find a suitable start for the sentence. “You were good out there. Okay I guess. Nobody else was doing anything, even the ‘heroes.’”
Izuku’s shoulders slumped a bit, the boy letting his eyes drift as he replied.
“I didn’t want Kacchan to get hurt. I knew I wasn’t supposed to, but he just looked so scared. Kacchan never looks scared.” The greenette’s voice crumbles slightly, unsure of how to word his tumbling thoughts.
“The blonde explosion kid?” Izuku nods at Shigaraki’s question, pulling his phone out and scrolling through the camera roll, landing on an old photo of the two, from before everything went to shit. Technically it was a photo of a photo, but it was still clear and visible on the cracked screen. Shigaraki gave a small hum in leu of response.
Izuku let out a tired sigh at the time, 5:43pm. He needed to be getting home, before Inko worried too much. The greenette slowly stood up, grabbing his bag. Izuku gave a quiet goodbye to Shigaraki, the blue-haired teen mulling over a thought before letting it slip out.
“Don’t listen to whatever anyone else tells you. What you did was more heroic than what ‘real’ heroes do. Don’t become a jerk or whatever. Bye.”
Izuku gave the boy another small smile, muttering out a chocked thanks before slipping out of the alley, back towards home.