Work Text:
As a hero, even as a young hero, Aizawa Shouta had seen some shit.
So as he blinked dazzle out of his eyes, got them accustomed to the low light level he now was in, an almost underwater kind of light, but red toned rather than blue, fading and brightening to no pattern, like a dying sunsets final gasps while the clouds of night come in….
Great, waxing poetic was not his usual thing, clearly the transition was a bit concussion-like but he focused, falling back on his training to scope his immediate surroundings.
Strange.
Air so dry it stung his nose, and in reaction he drank deeply from his single bottle, "Water is better in the body, if thirsty, drink!”
Only two years out of school the words of his sensei’s came to him so clearly, and he reached out to touch the wall nearest to him.
He didn't know what adobe might feel like, but perhaps like this?
Cool and smooth yet a faint pebbled texture but it was organic, almost flowing up and over his head, and he raised eyes to see -
Mind blanking for a bit because he’d never seen anything as … well…. Big.
Like a geode if it was the size of the fucking moon, and not coated in crystals but in these weird kind of buildings? He thought they were buildings anyway, but the light was sucking at his eyes, burning, dropping them hastily he gave the first of many wonders as to where the light was coming from, the far side of the place was so distant it was a faint brown red black blur of a bowl overhead but it was all lit the same.
Not daring to look up again with how badly his head was hurting now, Shouta followed his training, get under cover, remain calm, and hope like fuck the quirk effect times out.
The final swear was his own, but the feeling of this place earned it.
*
Shouta saw the first baby die as he watched what seemed to be the main life forms of the place, even though at that moment he didn’t know it was a baby.
The place he was in was ghostly, empty, the sound of wind and silence so thick it made his ears ring, when he’d heard something moving he’d hurried to investigate, finding what he could only think of as a demon.
Tall, clothes a layered shimmering something, or perhaps it was part of the body, clearly a thinking person as they carried an armload of scrolls, tutting as one fell, catching it with one of its many limbs to tuck back into the pile and then something fluffy waddled from a dark corner.
Round, clearly more fur than brains, it cheeped and bounced and waddled faster and the person looked down, smiled, lifted it with its free hand as it wriggled in glee and then -
Only not crying out through biting his own hand to silence himself, the alien person stuffed it into its suddenly cavernous mouth lined in dripping fangs and -
Ate it.
Crunch church crunch spray of blood and gone.
Shouta shook in horror for a long long time.
*
He found another of the fluffy things a few hours later, pale yellow rather than shimmering pink, it was eating the things, one of many things indeed, that he’d been wondering about.
Round as a ball, the color of fresh bones, soft and cool to the touch, his finger tip imprints would slowly fill back in after touching, and they smelt faintly of fish and they were everywhere!
Only though in what he guessed was a natural surface, so any rock, jutting up or layering one atop the other, deep dark cracks between, and patches of dust like dirt, there they were, like salt on a pretzel. If he wrapped his arms around them, he’d be overlapping his wrists, so roughly beach ball sized.
The new fluffy baby was shoving its face into one, mouth open wide and monching down as it mumbled in clear joy, and as Shouta was now out of drink, almost out of food, after it finished the entire thing it fell over but kept breathing, Shouta daringly ate a piece of the ball like thing nearest to him.
It tasted like water, if water wanted to grow up to be beef, very strange, and it melted in his mouth into near liquid and he’d either just killed himself horribly or saved himself, he wasn't sure, and as he pondered with a hand on his stomach a blur shot past and the sleeping fluff baby was gone, a spattering of blood drops all that was left, the thing that got it winging away too fast to even see properly.
He’d thought he had time to investigate the floof baby thing as it slept but, in a blink it was dead, despite being right beside a hero!
*
The mushroom ball thing didn't kill him.
Didn't kill him so much it became the only thing he had to eat and drink, and he was grateful down to his toes it existed, else he’d be dead by now.
The demons came in a variety of shapes, no two the same, and the floof babies seemed to be their only food, or if not then they were a delicacy of some sort to NEVER pass up on.
The adults? Maybe adult forms of the floofs? Anyway, the big baby eating fuckers shed silvery fist sized balls at odd moments, and all over quiver as they fell, kicking them aside after shuddering to pass them, and it was still mostly guesswork but he’d watched a group of them hatch, tiny silent red worms that dried into fluff and crawled into any crack big enough to take them.
They too ate the shroomballs, from below, and in deeper wider cracks congregated well out of reach, and then, somehow, must become the waddling balls of fluff.
Four feet, clumsy clawless cat paws complete with toe beans, and every single one a different color.
Somehow, they must become, if they lived that is, the demons that ate them, because there was NOTHING ELSE in the entire place, wind and dust and silver balls and wriggly worms and floof and demons.
Demons that once must have numbered in the millions yet now were few, scattered, mostly alone, shedding eggs and eating their own babies, their own children.
Little ones that lit with joy at seeing their death approaching, never trying to escape.
It hurt, oh gods he'd failed to save another one, it managed a single cry as it was chewed up like he’d eat a piece of boneless fried chicken and Shouta only didn't throw up because he didn't dare.
No noise, the demons were large, Shouta wasn't, and his strength was beginning to fail faster now.
Shroomballs were food and drink, but not enough, not good enough for his needs.
He was going to die here, in the red black dark, watching infants die.
* ~ *
He saved his first one only a few hours after realizing he was going to die on an alien world, heard it meeeping as it waddled, never even looked to see what color it was, just lunged, snatched, bolted!
Ran for its life because he could hear an adult coming up fast, but they were big, Shouta was not, he slid into the bolt hole he’d been using to sleep in since he’d gotten to this hell hole.
High on a mound of stone, a natural fissure, but it opened inside to a huge space, clearly not the right kind for the fuzzy worm stage, he’d tucked a few shroomballs in, they bled a pinkish liquid for a few seconds when cut, gushed it out but then coagulated and sealed the wound, he had six and the thing in his arms made a happy wriggling mumble as he set it down.
A good look now he had it safe, it weighed about five kilos tops, probably a bit less, felt oval, short legs, big flappy paws, he ran a careful hand along where its head should be and it made an indescribable noise of pure joy and vibrated a thrumming purrr.
Almost dying from cuteness overload and surging stress Shouta continued to carefully examine it, it had no neck, turned its entire body to look at him with a big gummy smile, no ears but enormous eyes, blinking sleepily right before it fell over.
A shaky hand assured him it was still breathing, its belly covered with short velvet fur, yet the top was an explosion of floof!
He’d seen an angora rabbit once, groomed for a show, a cloud of floof the likes of which he’d never seen but this little thing was just that floofy, maybe even more!
And it had a tail, he spotted it once he looked closer at the legs, no knees, no wonder they waddled, a puppy tail hid under the fluff, like the face it too also velvet rather than floof.
Ever so carefully easing a finger into its mouth, the gums were as squishy as they'd looked yet if he stupidly pressed down somewhere in the softness was something razor sharp, no wonder it could devour the shroomballs so easily. Shouta wiped his finger clean of blood and put a bandage on, running his fingers lightly through the insanely soft fur and fought his tears back into their normal box.
Already he’d die to protect it, and while it was hard to tell in the dark red light even this cavern emitted, it was green.
Green with black highlights, to go with the big green eyes.
“Izuku,” he whispered, “I’ll call you Izuku.”
*
No idea of time, the light stayed the same always, he woke to something snuggled up under his chin and he gave a sobbing laugh, he loved it so much already, dangerously loved it.
Using his waning strength to create a floof proof barrier he left it crying meeps behind him as he set out, surely there was something else to eat in this rock, or water, gods he was so thirsty!
Instead of food he came back with three more floofs, a spiky blond, one that matched the reddish black light, and a bright pink one.
Settling Katsuki, Mina, and Eijiro into the place with food and snuggles, maybe they matured fast?
Fast enough that if he hung on, didn't die too soon, maybe they’d mature and survive.
Without the quirk timing out, and no rescue having shown up, Shouta now set out to live as long as possible, praying that unlike humans these babies grew up fast!
*
Cornered, nine floofs hidden in his cave in the hills behind depending upon him to return to them, exploring in desperate hope to find more resources, a tooth shaking buzzzz in his head slowly morphed into communication of sorts.
It couldn't physically reach him, and Shouta was trained in mental communication so when he felt *?!?!?* he projected several images of his own species.
A moment of speculative silence and then, a feeling of hunger, and he almost laughed, *No, no eat *myself* fight defend*
*Ahhhhh protect yourself, as adult you are???*
*Affirm correct adult myself*
Not words, but not far off them, Shouta received, *How this place youself present???!*
Giving up totally on even trying to explain he gave a feeling of catching his foot, stumble trip falling
*Accident?*
*Afirm!*
A feeling of losing interest and Shouta gave a questioning of his own, an image of a floof, one being eaten, his horror and despair *?????!!!*
Brief puzzlement before, *Hunger, food, satisfy*
*You eat your young because they taste good!?!*
*Afirm!*
And it simply wandered off at that point, clearly bored with the conversation, and him.
On his way back to hiding Shouta cut five shroomballs and saved a new floof, blue.
*
Trapped in a different nook this time, fifteen floofs keeping him busy now, struggling to keep up with their shovel mouthed toothless monching of shroomballs, the same demon, going by feel anyway.
It felt confusion strong enough to hurt, and hunger, and an image of one of the adults Shouta had given him to explain who and what its species was, and then a floof with a human face *???!!!*
It took six repeats of the sequence before Shouta got it, the thing was asking what Shouta did with young of his own species!
Taking the sequence he replaced the human faced floof with a baby, a strong possessive overlay, and then
*Care, careful, attention, love for the imagined infant, fast forwarding baby to child to teen to adult, each step *care*love*attention!!!*
In return he was given confirmation of his guesses, the eggs being shed, fuzzy worms hiding, a change deep in the rocks, and then food, easy food, willing and eager and eaten.
*So different you me us!!!*
As Shouta wasn't hiding his abject horror at seeing a floof as just a willing meal, he missed the adult departing, bored again with the head achy conversation.
*
Six more times the thing had cornered him, weak as a floof now, Shouta’d given all he could of child care to it, of how his species loved their offspring, how important they were!
And along the way his collection of floofs grew to twenty one.
Violet, green, yellow, ice white, black, silver frosted black, red brown, bright red, he had so many colors, they were all so funny, and now he lay with them crawling all over him, almost too weak to move, because the final blow….
He had no way to give a number to the time it took them to mature, but the curious one indicated it was a long long time indeed.
His babies were doomed, as soon as Shouta died, they’d either starve or be eaten.
Tears leaking helplessly he laughed as Katsuki and Jirio licked them away, curling to cuddle as many to him as possible.
His only hope to convert the curious one to a caregiver a solid fail, and now he was too weak to try again.
*
A whisper of cool wind was all the warning he got before a portal opened, head high and an arm reaching through, “SHOUTA MAN COME ON!!!”
Instead he grabbed Hitoshi and tossed him through, gripping Hizashi’s hand to press their own code, I’s me me me save them them them as he grabbed Tsu, chucking her into the void, grabbing the next and next and next until he ran out and started throwing any shroomballs in reach and only when he couldn't reach anymore, did he let Hizashi drag him home.
Home, cold, bright, he winced and whistled, and his floofs peeped back, the heartbreaking cries tailing off into joyful found-you squeaks, he was on the floor, piled up with them, someone placing an IV -
The wash of Recovery Girls quirk, words barked, words he should know, quarantine, dehydration, starvation, but he simply held his babies and tried not to black out.
He failed the not blacking out thing but as he had his most trusted teachers and his very best friend in the room with him, it was safe enough, they’d not hurt his babies.
*
Ten days of almost no food and only alien weirdness liquid to drink had Shouta a bit loopy once the survivors high started to fall, and he’d insisted on being left on the floor, although he’d been caged off from his floofs so they didn't get tangled in his IV lines again, or chew on them again, and he was on a heated padded mat to keep him comfortable.
He could stick his hands out though the bars, and felt like a starfish with hands and feet stuck thought them, his babies all trying to cuddle to them, gods bless Hizashi, he was on the floor too under a pile of multicolor fur bright enough in this lighting to make a rainbow look dull.
“Katsuki, you know better than that, let Izuku go!”
Even with his eyes closed he knew the sounds of Kats throwing a fit, and Izuku getting himself involved, and Tensi and Tsu now involved, and Shouta had to get up, needed to get involved but couldn't even lift his stupid head and a growl, low and vibrating had him saying with a pavlovian response of some kind, “I am not stupid I am injured, that is different and I need,” - the growl came again as he paused - “WILL I WILL be kind to myself!”
“Good pup, well done.”
“Now, I have brought several people, your…. Floofs? Yes floofs, are insanely trusting and clearly need care so, for now, I have brought Nemuri, Oboro, myself, Hizashi is already here, as is Chiyo, the recovery team that got you home are separated into the next bunker over, no one leaves for the next six weeks, and you will begin feeling better soon.”
“Dehydration to the point of kidney failure is nothing to treat lightly, keep your eyes closed and I will name a color and you give me the floof’s name and as much personality as you can, alright little one?”
Little one, the words were like a stab of homesickness, Ryou'd always called him that. Shouta felt tears falling, he’d been so lonely since graduation, and now he had babies and they were sure to take them away from him how was he going to care for them he couldn't care for himself on a good day just look at him he was next thing to homeless cause the cat cafe he loved needed help to stay open and the day-care next door was about to close so he was helping them too and that animal shelter was broke and how could he not give to them too but he didn't want his babies to go, please don't take them….
Someone took his hand, and a pressure to his head, oh, Hound Dog was cradling his face like he was a student again, rubbing a thumb to wipe tears away, “Shouta, no one is taking them.”
“No one will take them, ever, we are going to help.”
“We only just learned about your pay situation, dearest, did it ever occur to you to ask for help?”
“No, I see it didn't, and we will be discussing that soon enough, however, the cafe and all the other people you have been helping are going to be fine, Nezu has assured it, he would be here too but one of us needs to be outside in the world making sure things go our way.”
“Now, tell me all about the spiky blond one, I am certain that one is called Katsuki, right?”
A sob masquerading as a laugh when Shouta agreed, “And the one he probably just tried to eat is green with black overtones, Izuku.”
Voice getting slower and slower he just named and described them, “Tooru so colorless as to look like spun glass, little Fumikage almost void black, Sato light yellow, so quiet you forget he's there and then he tries to trip you up….” he was mumbling and slurring and didn't remember reaching the end as sleep once again dragged him down.
*
Having watched it all from his point on the ground, up on an elbow as floofs wriggled over and around him, one squeezing under his arm even, tail wagging like a puppy, Hizashi finally managed to sit cross legged on the ground, catching the blond tank who was once again after the green one who was clearly enjoying the chase, slow and waddling as it was, and laughed, although he too was crying.
“I shoulda checked - ” “No sweetheart," Ryou firmly broke in," we all know what he is like, we all should have guessed, not just you.”
“Shouta cares deeply, giving his heart totally when he gives it, and yet is utterly terrified to ask for help, a habit of a lifetime I’d thought we’d gotten a handle on but clearly not!”
“He should be glad of the chaos of the moment and his needing to recover, otherwise the discussion of all of this would be…. Memorable.”
Hizashi shivered, he’d had a few of those discussions and didn't want any more, thanks!
“Now, Nezu darling, give us a rundown on the Floofs please, and the plan.”
Knowing his own fluffy love as well as he did, Ryou could clearly see the stress, so he smiled his calmest expression and saw Nezu relax a touch and say, “Right, preliminary data first.”
“I sent in a duplicate quirk user to you, a very nice young fem. She is keeping up with the Floofs demand for food in the form of duplicating the fruiting body of some kind of mushroom analogue that Shouta managed to get to us, and well done indeed his quick thinking.”
“Using data taken directly from our Shouta’s brain of his recent trip - and yes, we will both be dealing with the lecture and retraining portion of his discipline, how dare he not just use his bloody words to ask for…..”
Huffing as he ground his teeth for a moment Nezu sucked a deep breath and said, “By taking the information it gives us more speed, which we badly need, the mushrooms need something like sedimentary rock, mineral rich, above a deep water source, yet no water upon them, not even dew, another nice team is working on them right now, taking the extreme dryness of the air Shouta experienced, and what was clearly a water resource deep within the stone they grew upon and within, they have a cluster now growing well, even if not getting as big as the originals."
“If that project succeeds then keeping our new little ones healthy is assured, but so far the replicated fruiting bodies are doing that job, so please do not worry.”
“The visual of what the darlings can grow into is a tad alarming yet the interactions with the adult Shouta had show a mind, adaptable, and enquiring, so with love they should grow into thinking beings, although the timeline is a mystery for now.”
“A deep scan by our lovely Chiyo,” - they all looked over at where she was sound asleep draped by fluffy bodies purring and they smiled - “revealed they detect the world through their very soft fluff.”
“Watch it, even inside it shifts as if in a wind, they have no detectable sense of smell yet the receptors at the base of each strand of fur works like many things, a moths antennae, a cats whisker, a catfishes barbels, so they do sense their world very keenly indeed.”
“As well as loving belly rubs.” Hizashi murmured as Izuku rolled right over and demanded pets.
“Indeed,” Nezu chuckled, “and I look forward to meeting them in person, yet I do indeed have to be out here, everyone involved right now are sworn to secrecy, and the Floofs themselves are now legally listed as quirk generated life forms, infant level, with all the rights, responsibilities, and safeties available already in place.”
“Hizashi, Oboro and Nemuri, are you all still alright with being listed as a quad partnership along with our wandering baby finder?”
Three voices with one tone, a firm “YES!” And he laughed, “Indeed, and I already know Shouta feels the same, he was just waiting to get established before asking and then fell off the rails a bit so now we are back on track….”
“Twenty one is still too many for four adults, legally as well as for their own best health, so in order to circumvent that, are you three willing to engage in a pack-structured contractual partnership with myself, Ryou and Chiyo, because that gives us seven adults, letting us focus on three offspring each.”
“That is still pushing the legal limit slightly but - ” “Yes, Nezu, yes!”
Nemuri giggled, saying again, “Fucking yes, if Shouta loses even one of these things he’ll go insane, talk us through housing, how do we keep being active heroes, or do we put that on hold for a few years, and if not how are we - ” “NEM, shhhhh!”
“Bossy boots,” dropping her face to a sleeping Floof, “Zashi is a bossy boots.”
“Thank you for the room to speak.” Nezu said briskly but his ears were tilted at a happy angle so Nemuri knew he wasn’t cross with her, “I am assembling a full medical team to ascertain what, if any, food of our realm they can eat, what dangers to avoid for them, and as I said food is sorted but more is better, while you are in quarantine Cementos is building us a house, get in touch if you have anything you want, don't worry, the hot springs are being piped into a nice deep pool in a special room attached to the main dwelling, and the kitchen will be huge, and each private room had a kitchenette for the coffee addicts, and night owls, but any needs you have or even simple wants, reach out soon.”
“So far the babies are doing fine with the air available, as Shouta did there, you will have noticed it is quite dry right now for you, we are raising the humidity very slowly and will monitor them closely, but so far they seem to be incredibly adaptable, but please get the shoe away from Katsuki, lest he eat it.”
The footwear was rescued, and Hizashi gave the no longer cuddling Izuku a stern "Drop it kiddo!" and the little thing gave him a slow blink and slowly opened his mouth and rolled the shoe he’d gotten hold of into sight, dropping with a small soggy thud as he spun and waddled away from the crime, being caught by Oboro and snuggled, one of his own clouds lifting Katsuki into his arms as well, he slid onto the floor with a laugh to snuggle the clearly two naughtiest of the fluff crew.
Answering the deep fear in the room Nezu said, “They are OURS, as of three seconds ago they legally belong as adopted children to Pack Nezu, and are wider wards of UA to give even more legal protection.”
“They are healthy, doing well, Shouta will recover, we have their food growing already and a quirk that will provide limitless food for them until the growing experiment begins to produce fresh.”
“All of you, we will live, and learn, and love them all, and now it looks like nap time, so all of you relax, we have this in the bag!”
*
Sitting back with a sigh Nezu wished he was in the bunker too, but this way he was on top of the government trying to snatch legal ownership of the new life forms away from them, could get teams into place for any need that showed up, and could watch on six different cameras to keep in touch properly with the goings on of the awesomely cute life forms.
The adult versions, he looked at the printed out memories from Shouta’s memory and gave a slight shudder, but…..
Other than the bizarre eating of their own offspring, the ones Shouta had seen, and the one he interacted with, seemed not much different than….perhaps an academical or focused researcher maybe, distracted from real life as the world burned around them, the way scholars so often had done in the human past.
Ivory towers did tend to hide the world from view.
Looking again, no, he’d not fear this species, not fear these babies, and not fear the children they’d grow into.
And perhaps one day they would be able to reach out to the realm their new children came from and offer help, because it was not natural at all what was going on there.
For now though, he looked again at his family, all on the floor, all cuddling fluff covered babies, and he smiled and got back to work, this new family needed plenty of work to get off the ground properly!
Right up his alley really.
_____________________________________________________
T’chask looked over at the quartered off portion of the room, firmly and successfully resisting eating the three larvae squeaking and bounding around in it.
Food had been given, and somehow, her hands had reached out with gentleness, stroking the fur, soft, and peace had filled her.
The alien had shown her how they dealt with offspring, waking a memory of times long past, a mystery indeed. Was what she remembered a true memory or false?
If true, they shouldn't eat the larvae, should instead care for them, that their own certainty of -
Love?
Loving care?
Larvae approached adults with a joyful certainty of at least not being eaten, remembering the few sounds they did make as she ate them, it was shock, surprise…. wrong.
Eating them was wrong!
How had that happened?
Now when she looked up at the realm, almost empty, the feeling filled her that this, all of it, was wrong.
Nodding as she set out to find research materials, voom’chtalls were not her preferred food but all could eat them, grow well and maintain well upon them, any larvae she found from this point forward would be taken to safety, and she would pass the word.
First though, she carefully picked up the tan one, rolled it over, and stroked its belly as it wriggled and peeped at her, a joyful sound indeed.
Cuddles, the alien said this was called, and it was good.
*
“Where would you put a curse upon an entire race and make sure it stuck, little one?”
Any adult she spoke to all had the same malaise, one that once plagued her as well, disinterest.
It soaked them, leaded their limbs and slowed their speech and dulled their eyes.
She felt it not, because larvae were the antidote, not eating them but interacting with them.
She had five now, and two others she knew had taken her advice, now had larvae of their own, and were bright and mind clear, so yes, a small sampling yet a successful one indeed.
On her back, a new game with the tiny ones, lifting them into the air above her and doing lazy swooping S curves as they peeped and wheeeeed in joy.
They were beings of joy.
“When do we lose that joy?” She wondered aloud, knowing from her research that they needed spoken words to learn to speak.
Had all the adults died, leaving only unhatched eggs, her species would die, yet perhaps live on, because without teaching their brains didn't turn on properly, no speaking, no reading, no real thinking.
Yet, uneaten and uncared for, what indeed would happen to them?
So she spoke her thoughts aloud, and her two mind clear ones did as well, T’chala and Chs’aam, who between them now had ten larvae.
Mind returning to where to place a curse, clearly a curse, disinterest.
Insidious indeed, remove interest and you remove drive.
In only two ways had her people escaped the curse, joy of flavor that sadly turned into eating their own offspring, and research, a single point of interest, and it could be anything.
T’chala studied lintel moldings that spanned the Interregnum gap, not a date but a moment when the thin three bands above a door became three slightly thicker bands.
That was it, that was what she studdied.
And Chs’aam was just as narrow, and pointless, as too had she been.
“Where did they put it, little one?”
Suddenly frowning at her silver frosted grey, slowly saying the words aloud, “I know where I’d put it.”
Seeing what let her see, actually noticing for the very first time, light, “I’d put it where light comes from.”
*
Leaving her larvae was difficult, yet she did it.
Leaving them with her two sisters-in-interest, her larvae joining theirs, they’d found another adult willing to listen, the curse must be failing now.
Her world almost dead from it but it was failing, lifting, and she did the ritual to reach the light, not difficult, it just needed power, of which she seemed to have more lately than before, then perhaps she could break the final hold the curse had upon them all.
Light, it was a place, overlaying her reality, bleeding through, an experience rather than an intellectual happening, and as expected, she did indeed find something.
The light had a heart of darkness, and it was indeed failing, and it fell to her blade and her rage and her power, although it almost killed her as it fell.
*
Time uncounted to recover, her interest mates received her, cared for her, healed her, and then rejoiced with her, because while it was nearly empty, her realm was once again free, light bright and yellow red, and with the light had slowly returned foliage, and with foliage had returned life.
Small-life, her realm had never hosted any large life other than her own, yet small life, winged and legged, flying and crawling in amongst the leaves and flowers, lifting from the deep rocks, down where moisture lived, down where all things start.....
It would take many turns of time for her species to once again thrive, yet on the brink they had been saved, saved by an alien, and a question.
Perhaps one day she would find them again and ask questions of her own.
___________________________________________
Floofs grew, slowly, and with truly hilarious moments.
Shouta accidentally inventing an entire language of whistles, starting with whistle codes for each, and spiraling from there.
Now they all spoke it, and it trilled out quietly through the city, as they all lived and experienced life and the joys thereof.
The sight of a startled floof, their velvet legs, tail, face all eyes and lipless mouths that usually smiled, yet when truly startled their long sensory strands would stand straight up, making them look plugged into a power socket.
The fact they had no fear, making them so easy, and so incredibly difficult, to parent, and to keep safe.
So many ways to die if you had no fear, not least of which was simply being taken after having wandered away, following a scent, or feeling, or the bright fluttering wings of a butterfly.
Deep water, shallow water, ANY water a terror until they all learned to swim, because it drew them all like moths to a flame, only ten times more dangerous!
The amazement when they all, one by one, grew knees and the waddle turned to a run, yet they still had no fear, Shouta had enough for all of them, all of the parentals did, yet with knees had also come language, and the beginnings of explaining to them that not everyone was their friend, and not every drop of water needed to be splashed about in.
The first was easy, the second impossible.
Now they were bipedal, because they grew, changed, so much more human looking now, still young, still so young, they aged slower than humans, twice as slowly, yet for their loved ones it was still too fast.
Izuku a chatterbox, Katsuki hotheaded, Denki scatterbrained, Momo steady, all so different, all so loved, Nezu had started a pre start school for them, guessing the need for role models, they were natural mimics in so many ways, and now they were almost their own species equivalent of teens but....
When did puberty hit for them? Could they even reproduce on earth? The mushroom balls did well enough although they never got to the size Shouta had brought home with himself, medium orange sized at best, rather than beach ball, although as they'd adapted to earth they'd taken to the food with enthusiasm.
A worry though as they grew and changed, because all species sought to reproduce, and Nezu wanted grandfloofs one day damn it, as did all the adults.
Yes their kids might not be grown up, or even near it, but time marched on regardless, and without plans they’d just be winging it.
To date they’d kept them all alive, all healthy, all engaged in learning, friends, hobbies and fun and plans for their own futures.
Life was very good indeed.
Yet, the snarl of worry never left him now, and in stealth Nezu assembled a team, and finally confessed to his family, and as always they forgave him, knowing his own nature wouldn't let him leave a puzzle alone, never mind something so important to them all.
Which is how Shouta once again found himself in a very strange place, only now the light was clean, and the air, still nose sizzlingly dry, smelt of life rather than dust.
Along cracks and stones edging the paths and roads there still were fist sized silver eggs, and he knelt down to look into a crack to see pinpoints of light staring back, fuzzy worms that would grow one day into floofs.
And then, after wandering a bit, hiding as effectively now as then, he felt again the crackling buzz of communications, welcoming and relieved.
*here?!return?!welcome!!!*
*Thank you* he sent in return, and then paused as he watched children like his own, yet so very different, many limbs, wings, fins, tendrils and tentacles and scales and more, all with varying tufts of sensory fibers fluffy and blowing in the wind of their running/flying/scrambling/ and he gave an image of his twenty one children to the presence in his mind, so different, so much the same.
Painful in a way to see children growing up, a relief indeed to see them HERE, where once they’d been little more than a squeaking chicken nugget.
*Indeed, you save them all*
*???*
*Fact!!! When you asked me why it gave me a new focus within the curse, helped me redirect others, we found and defeated the darkness and now all are free, although we are still so very few*
*You though, I feel/see/know a parent's concerns, come, show me you, meet you me, and we will talk as parents who wish to watch our children grow into parents themselves*
*Because from the vision in your mind, indeed they will not survive there, eggs will hatch, a joyful laughter, fuzzy worms will wriggle, sadness now, and then they will fail, grow cold, and die*
*Let us together fix this problem, because I will not have it!*
Sorrow from her, *And you a problem ours to fix, as you fixed the first, we are too few, already larvae die for lack of bonding, they emerge, feed, seak, fail, and die if no adult takes them*
Shouta felt shocked horror, and she agreed, and tentatively he offered his own species as caregivers, either here or in his home realm, even knowing his family was going to have words with his impulsiveness he offered, because they’d agree as well, fully and totally.
Saving babies was what heroes did, after all!
________________________________________________________
In the end it took two worlds to solve the problem, to fill a roundball realm with returned life and laughter, as humans became surrogate parents for floofs, both in the ball and on earth.
And as floofs turned to their own accepted name of Yokai, those on earth sent their eggs home to Ball to rest in cracks and hollow places until they too hatched into fuzzy worms, and newly emerged larvae emerged to claim a parent of either species.
Travel between worlds was easy with the static portal Nezu’d made happen, forcing governments to bow to his preemptive broodiness, and as time rolled on, two worlds entwined through the love of babies, and floof!