Chapter Text
Hell will freeze over by the time Shouta makes it to Class 1-A’s graduation day.
Greying hair, creaky back, the usual dry eyes. The whole nine yards of occupational hazards. By the end of the week, there was no doubt Midoriya, Todoroki, and Bakugou would have managed to wreck yet another building in Gym Gamma or Zeta. It was practically a class rite at this point.
To make matters worse, he’d had a bout with Hizashi the other night over their schedules, and because of said hellion class, neither of them had found enough time to hash it out. Letting the sun go down on their anger -- that is to say, letting it stew for longer than was rationally and, emotionally, necessary -- was not something they found themselves entitled to. With the world the way it is, the careers they hold the way they are, leaving things on the shelf was simply out of the question.
Still, with students as rowdy as theirs, heroics as bold of a industry as it is, there’s no helping falling behind. Volatile and fickleness do not coincide well with relationships; especially when you’re married to someone who insists on dragging himself down to spend time with you. There’s a time and a place for everything.
Why couldn’t Hizashi just understand that whatever responsibilities he tends to is much more important than spending just a measly second with him?
“Feels like we haven’t had a conversation in weeks.”
“We talk every day,” Shouta points out, untangling his capture weapon from around his neck.
Patrol hadn’t stretched out long, so he’d taken the opportunity to ditch the scene after exchanging a few civilities with Tsukauchi, bolting back home via rooftops as he hadn’t been too eager to catch anyone he knew on the way. There’s some blood flecks littered on top; thankfully not mostly his, but it just means he’ll have to either scrub it down later, or risk tossing it in the wash. Imagining himself attending to the first is much more plausible.
“I see you in the staff room often. Hallways too.”
Hizashi gawks at him. “That’s--” Shouta frowns when Hizashi starts giggling, none of the pleasant warmth bubbling out of the sound. “That’s not the same.”
Right as Shouta reaches a hand to zip down his jumpsuit, there’s a click as he feels hands circle his hips. Leaning back on instinct, his head slumps onto Hizashi’s shoulder as his partner’s hands linger and reach for the zipper to pull it down himself. Normally, he’d protest, but under no circumstances would he deny Hizashi a chance to ‘spoil him’, as he so often claims; especially not with what he’s implying.
“I missed you,” is whispered into his ear, hot breath huffing.
Once all is accounted for, jumpsuit sourly thrown off onto the floor to be attended to later, in the dead of the night when the neighbours won’t complain, Shouta resorts to plunking down on the bed. A satisfied sigh leaves him.
Shouta leans back into the pillow case, tracing a line over the sheets beneath it. There’s a stain from when they’d both rushed breakfast in bed a few days ago. Hizashi was one to fuss over mess, so there’s no pretending his eyes don’t widen ever so slightly upon seeing it, but, there’s the likelihood that like Shouta, he was swamped with other duties. Logical.
Easy, because it’s always easy, he agrees with, “I missed you too.”
Hizashi hums, hero costume long gone before he’d even walked through the door. Dressed in just a simple navy shirt and white shorts, he looks awfully good under the dim lighting of their bedroom, just for him to watch. God, he’d missed this. “Hey, Shouta?”
His finger stops curving around the purple circle. “Yeah?”
“Let’s take a week off.”
Higher brain functions lag. “What?”
He can’t have heard that right. In any way, shape or form, no world exists where Hizashi Yamada would suggest that.
“A week off,” his partner repeats.
Neither of them had voluntarily taken a day off since they’d joined UA five years ago. Even after USJ, Shouta had limped back into his classroom the moment he was cleared to walk, well being aside.
After that long of a 'no-show'' when it came to taking time off, beyond the usual injuries, this was clearly a long time coming. Sure.
But Hizashi can’t seriously be considering it. Especially not now, of all times, when the Symbol of Peace’s title had just crumbled. Taking care of their students had to remain first and foremost on Shouta’s list of priorities. Wanting anything to be different would be denying the broken world order.
“Shouta,” Hizashi’s voice drops to something pleading. Shouta ponders how exactly to make that sound go away while the other drops onto the bed beside him. Erasing his voice would be pointless. “At least take a second to consider it.”
“You didn’t even give me a chance to speak,” he points out, not denying the fact he likely would’ve objected if he had. Taking a breath, resting a hand on Hizashi’s shoulder as he snuggles into the crook of Shouta’s arm, he opts to ask the bigger question. Drag out the proposal by its knees. “Why do you want to take a week off?”
Hizashi’s hand wriggles between Shouta’s fingers.
“Shouta,” he begins, and Shouta settles in for the long road, digging his head back into the cushioned headboard. “You know as well as I do how much I love my job.” Hizashi says it the same way one would citing an itemized list. Building a case for a conversation he thinks he’ll win.
“All of my jobs. I love the kids. I love teachin’ English. I love being a hero. I love waking up in the mornings with you and poppin’ on to UA to teach the next generation, and I just-- I adore being able to think that the man I love is a teacher, just like me. I know you love it, too.”
Heat rushes to Shouta’s face, but still, Hizashi zooms along.
“I like being able to talk my listener’s ears off on my radio show,” he continues, and when Shouta twists his head slightly over to peek down at Hizashi, the man has his gaze trained on the ceiling. “Having my own dig? My own show? Something I’ve dreamed ‘bout since we were young and dumb and just the Three Dumbingos? It’s amazing. Awesome. I wouldn’t trade it for the world.”
And Shouta already knows there’s something else dwelling beneath the depths of Hizashi’s words.
Hypnotic red spirals in his partner’s verdant green eyes spin as the man sits upright, removing himself from where he’d been huddled up next to him. Hizashi’s breath catches, anglerfish on a hook, planting a hand flooding warmth into Shouta’s thigh as he grips it.
“But I would give it all up if keeping it meant losing my time with you, Shou.”
Shouta bites his lip. Well, shit.
“And a week off would do us good,” the other continues, looking dreamily through him, wringing his hands out the same way one would balancing two items side by side on a scale. "I swear to you. It would. It’s just a week off. Some days it feels like we’re drifting further and further apart, and I just-- you know. I want a day where we can be Hizashi and Shouta, not Present Mic and Eraserhead,” Hizashi reasons, smiling.
The other seems to stall for breath. “I don’t want to lose you. Seriously, I’d give it all up,” he repeats, emphasizing ‘all’.
Vehemently demanding he not do so would be to ask of the impossible.
“You’re not going to,” Shouta replies. He’s not sure if he’d meant it to sound reassuring or not. Beating around the bush seems a wanton cruelty.
“But we--”
He hesitates. Reconsiders his words.
“I want to spend time with you, too,” Shouta admits, freely, and watching the hope in Hizashi’s eyes trickle brighter does nothing but make his teeth rub against the inside of his cheek harder, and as much as he wants to not put his foot down and just simply go along with it as he always has, make Hizashi happy-- images of Shinsou and Hagakure and all the others who need him more right now are enough to sway past the irrationalities and crush delusion in a tight fist.
Reaching up, Shouta takes Hizashi in hand, cupping the edges of his jaw and brushing a thumb over his lips, his mustache. The man shivers under his touch.
Pretending any longer than necessary would be a foul blow. “But right now,” Shouta says, softly, “There’s bigger things than us. We can’t take a week off together, Zashi.”
Hizashi flinches back as if punched.
Withdrawing, the warmth under the pads of Shouta’s fingers dissipates within a matter of seconds as Hizashi inches away from him, plopping onto his elbows before righting himself and sitting up.
“Will you…” A sigh. Shouta wishes he could be anywhere else right now. “At least take more than a minute to think about it?” the other asks. The sereneness in his voice is betrayed by the way his gaze rakes over Shouta and bolts away, hurt boiling within the undertone of dotted scarlet.
Reducing himself to a mutter, he shakes his head. “No,” he says, glaring. “I have to put my foot down. We can’t. You know why we can’t.”
He regrets the choice of words immediately when Hizashi rounds on him, red rapidly fading over to disbelief when Shouta finds himself backed against the headboard.
“Your foot down?” Hizashi repeats. His quirk infuses enough volume into his voice to make it come out in a pitchy growl, but there’s something tinged beneath it that convinces Shouta anger is not all there is to this.
Erasure does not activate. “Your foot down? You’re treating this like I’m-- like I’m one of your students?”
“You’re not one of my students,” he emphasizes. “You’re twisting my words. You know I didn’t mean it that way.”
He still regrets it.
“I know,” his partner says, faltering, folding back into himself. He seems to realize how close he’d gotten, retreating until Shouta has his personal space returned to him once more.
Still, this is a conversation clearly not over. “Shouta,” he says, again, quieter. “What am I to you right now? Your husband? One of the listeners from Class 1-A?”
That isn’t fair. After everything that’d happened at Kamino thus far, what his students needed held much more dominion over spending time with Hizashi at the current moment; hell, Bakugou and Midoriya had gotten into a full-on brawl the very night after the fall of All Might, one of them having irrationally blamed themselves for it. The others had been uneasy afterwards, some holding back the usual pep in their step that Shouta could never bring himself to undertake but hadn’t minded seeing in his students, because it meant they were thriving, happy. Admitting it would never happen, but continuing to be strict with them made the most sense, because it brought some sense of normalcy back. Having every guiding light flicker out simply because the brightest one in the room did holds no justice; keeping the torch aflame to aid them on their trip across the sea into becoming heroes? Absolutely.
He misses Hizashi, too, but… Bright as the light he radiates just by presence alone, not even Shouta can outlast the sun like he can constantly.
“My husband,” Shouta says immediately.
Hizashi ignores him.
“Do I have to be one of your kids to spend time with you? What,” Hizashi bites, and here comes trouble to cast a shadow, the dark creeping into his features as he blurts out, “Do I have to call ya Aizawa-sensei, too?”
And suddenly, Shouta finds himself at a crossroads with only one obvious choice.
Hackles raised, he hisses, “Shut up, Hizashi,” hair rising from his shoulders. A red glare paints Hizashi’s face as he stares, wide-eyed, back at Shouta.
Shouta drops his clenched fists into his lap. Lets them open up like a flower in bloom.
“That was cruel,” he comments, knowing it true. Telling Hizashi to shut up, knowing the endless times he'd vowed to be one of the few who never did? Needlessly cruel. You’re a moron, Aizawa. “I’m sorry.”
The dip in the bed dwindles as Hizashi removes himself.
“Yeah,” Hizashi breathes out, looking anywhere but him, voice raspy. Erasure usually has that effect on him. When it takes his voice. “That was-- a low blow,” he laughs.
Suddenly, Shouta finds his hands much more interesting of a sight as the other continues. "Okay. I’m going to go into the bathroom. I’m going to shower, and-- We’re going to discuss this another time. Yeah?”
Pointing out the fact his hair is still wet would only stir something else up again.
“Yeah.”
And that had been the end of that. Not satisfactory in the slightest. No real apologies were given, and no real conclusions had been met, and yet, they hadn’t scrounged enough time out of their schedules to be together in the same space beyond their usual of either collapsing into bed and hastily leaving without so much as a goodbye, the occasional comments on students in the staff room, him taking Hizashi's watch to charge in the night when he'd forgotten, or opinions on red ticks.
At one point, just the other day, Hizashi had made rather crass observations about how much harsher he’d been treating his students and Shouta, in kind, considering nothing had changed in his style, had responded with scathing retorts about him being too tender with his.
Neither had deigned it necessary to follow up afterwards. Nemuri had dragged Hizashi off afterwards, a sent off beep to Shouta’s phone informing him Yagi would make an appearance in Class 1-A’s next Heroics Physical, so he’d gone the other direction to take care of that. Make sure the No.1 -- the former -- wouldn’t get himself killed accidentally.
It’s just another tick to add to the long growing list of topics they’ll have to dredge up, eventually, once time falls back into their hands.
For a whole host of reasons, it just can’t be right now.
He’s got problem children to deal with, and, problem children or not, ‘children’ is just a dampening bonus to the title.
“I don’t believe this holds any relevance to the lesson I’m currently trying to teach,” he states bluntly, eyeing them. Tempted as he is to glare with Erasure, he’d run out of eyedrop bottles just this morning and hadn’t had the opportunity to sneak away to the nearest store come homeroom, and breaking his years-long early streak over his wellbeing being inconvenienced, of all things, was, as anyone could put it, illogical. Piteous as it was, he’d rather his students rest assured over his punctuality remaining just as it was. “Mind sharing with the rest of the class exactly why you think it is?”
Even from the teacher’s podium, he can pinpoint the exact moment sweat drops roll off Sero and Kaminari’s temples, the eyes of the class darting back and forth from Shouta to their two classmates.
Maybe he should’ve stayed in bed a while longer.
“Sorry, sir,” and though it does not vanish, Shouta can already feel the displeasure spinning in him simmer down at the apology. There’s shame written in both of their faces. Reprimanding them any further is, null, and, vaguely enough, reminds him that today was meant to be one of their study periods. “We were just talking about Ectoplasm’s homework assignment, Aizawa-sensei, "Sero explains.
“But, wait, Sero, we were--”
Shouta lifts a brow as Jirou brusquely nudges Kaminari in the shoulder, causing the latter to flinch and hiss.
He sighs. Children. “You were?” he prompts.
Curiosity aside, he’s not actually expecting a response, trap as it is. If they drop it, they drop it.
(“Okay. I’m going to go into the bathroom. I’m going to shower, and-- We’re going to discuss this another time. Yeah?”)
And, if they just so happen to respond with something he doesn’t find as amusing as Kaminari seems to find it, that’s nothing some well-earned suicide laps won’t fix.
He blinks. Either the art project they have tucked away in the corner is an eyesore, long, black and wiry as it is, or-- well, it’s gone.
Jeez.
Shouta rubs at his eyes, forcing down a yawn, still glaring. “Well?”
“Nothing,” Kaminari squeaks out. Jirou looks on approvingly; Shouta can spot how Sero finally wilts in relief.
Whatever it was, Shouta just hopes it doesn't become his problem. And if it does, he hopes it's soon. God forbid his students start thinking they’re liabilities, too.
With that resolved, he grunts, flicks a page, and turns back to the board. “Now,” he begins, solemn, “Onto chapter--”
Maybe he should’ve just sucked it up and ran for the hills to buy those eyedrops, Shouta thinks, eyeing the table ware suspiciously. Or maybe he’s finally lost it. Years of being married to someone utterly convinced you’re fine to keep around will delude you into such ideas.
(At least said someone’s doing fine, it seems: earlier, Hizashi had taken the liberty of shooting off a text informing him he’d been called away from UA for a short recon mission needing Voice. The lack of his usual flair of rampant emojicons or capitals was undeniably hurtful, but not unprecedented. It’s a wonder he even texted at all.)
“Aizawa-kun! What’s troubling you?”
The jelly pouch he’d been sipping away at splinters in his hand as it’s crushed in place, some of the liquid spurting out into his mouth and down his throat before he can even think to chew the solid residue. Coughing, he bangs a fist against his chest as apologetic, grating words ring out in front of him.
Speak of the devil. Well, not quite. Hizashi himself hadn’t appeared. But something close; an extinguished sun, more like.
Table escaping his eyes’ wrath, Shouta clears his throat, setting down the ruined jelly packet with a grimace, and stares dead-up at Yagi Toshinori.
“What,” he rasps out. “What do you want.”
Though he’s not entirely certain where it comes from, a chair is pulled out, and suddenly he can find Yagi sitting down to face him. Sitting wrong. Why is he sitting on a chair backwards? His long legs jut out from other side, frame towering over it enough to render the pursuit of resting on it pointless. And leaning his arms over, nonetheless, crossing them? How buffoonish. “You look down in the dumps, my friend,” Yagi offers, voice grim.
Despite himself, Shouta snorts.
“Don’t I always,” he drawls. Is he meant to take offence to this? In the past, not even All Might’s attempts at wriggling his way into Shouta’s circles had worked, and though it had now since Yagi had broken free of that shell, claiming he’s affected by most of what he comments would be a lie.
Colour becomes a far presence. For a split second, out of the corner of his eye, the flooring in the room goes from the typical schoolish grey to peeling yellow carpet.
When Shouta rounds on it, suddenly sprinting up and hammering a hand over Yagi’s shoulder to peek at it, it’s gone. Gone?
What the hell was that?
“Uh, Aizawa-kun?”
A blink. He’s… alright. Just means he should get some more sleep. Seeing things is not something he’d like to add to his resume, empty as it is save for his position at UA and as a hero. Hizashi would laugh Shouta silly if he saw him like this.
Sighing, he retreats back to his position, cleaning off Yagi’s shoulder before withdrawing his hand, too, then brushing that on his knee. He sits back in place.
“That didn’t seem out of the ordinary at all,” Yagi comments, brow raising.
Shouta glares. “If you’re going to tell me I look like shit, call me Shouta,” he says, bluntly, then blanks when he realizes he has no idea why exactly he offered up the name.
Point blank, Yagi seems delighted anyway.
“Alright, Shouta,” he corrects.
Eclipsed by something earnest, the former No.1 continues, to Shouta’s dismay. “Are you sure you’re alright? I know you and Present Mic have been having a bit of a…” he pauses, seeming to consider his next words carefully.
Okay. Moment over. Maybe he should wrap Yagi up in his capture weapon.
“Rough time,” Yagi eventually decides.
It’s not inaccurate, nor entirely wrong, but to have someone meant to symbolize the essence of peace threaten the careful veil by casting a spotlight on their ‘troubles’ makes something in Shouta’s chest fill with unease. He doesn’t see how that’s any of the Symbol of Peace’s business, former or not.
Additionally, Present Mic? Not Hizashi? Weren’t those two on a first name basis already? He'd assumed that they'd been getting on rather well, with the way Hizashi had showered Shouta in endless excitement over having one of favourite heroes on a first name basis with him -- or had Yagi simply run out of time in the politeness window to ask whether they were married or not?
Casting that aside, Shouta shoots him a stern look. He blinks wearily. “And what makes you say that?”
The other casts him a glance, as if saying “isn’t-it-obvious?”
He sighs. Electing to admit a half-truth seems rather fine. “I ran out of eyedrops. Didn’t have time to run to the store, and they hurt like hell.”
And, additionally, I’ve been seeing things the entire day and think it might be because of that, he thinks, but explaining that would require too much effort and draw too much attention to his newfound insanity; better for Yagi to think him irritable and not a future psychiatric patient.
Because Yagi is an angel carved out from the cusps of hell, he sees through it. “Shouta-kun. Many years of heroics--”
Of that much, Shouta knows, grumbling. He thinks back to a time when he and Hizashi, baby-faced still, had crowded into a cramped bathroom stall after dozens of All Might fans had flooded the streets after the man had saved someone just a miles away from Musutafu.
And though it was only five years ago, now, it was still a time before he and Hizashi both had taken up the reigns as UA teachers, and Shouta’s quirk hadn’t been efficient enough to cancel out the Bombers in the Sky Egg due to the smoke; and yet, when the building had officially collapsed, All Might had come to save the day once again, arriving just in the nick of the time. Barely.
Still, he’d saved the day, and he’s an efficient hero despite his posturing. Shouta listens further.
“Have taught me to read between the lines.”
Yagi seems to shuffle further, chair screeching as it edges closer to Shouta’s.
“And years of my own refusal to prioritize myself have come back to haunt me,” Yagi seems to say, gentle, shifting more forward. “I took my youth for granted.”
Shouta barely stiffens when they’re eye to eye. He knows what he’s implying.
Him walking into the UA staff room weeks before the start of term, revealing his figure to be a falsehood, a propagated lie? The first step.
Kamino just happened to be the second and last.
Shouta had held his tongue both times.
There's something phlegmatic about the way Yagi sighs, as if wistfulness is all he can strive for in the quiet of this spare office. "I don't consider myself much of a fool even on my worst days, though I know it can be true, " and to that Shouta has to stifle a snort at the irony, "But I'm well aware of the image you portray. The man some take you for, due to it. We're... in a way, birds of a feather."
His disbelief must show on his face, because laughter crinkles over Yagi's features, slightly leaning back as a palm lifts to cover his mouth and cough something moist.
"Don't take it too literal," he reassures, wiping his face. Being on par with All Might -- the same one who spews blood part time -- would be an actual nightmare. "I just mean you shouldn't think running yourself into the ground and following me on that path is wise.”
And with that, Shouta's mood is soured over.
As if the whole world isn't watching.
"You told me once that we would take care of the students together from here on out.”
Shouta feels a rush of déjà vu run through him, as if Yagi is pulling this from somewhere, but he has no memory of saying such a thing. When did that happen? Perhaps he’d implied something, and Yagi had run with it?
“So, let's do our best to keep at it,” Yagi says, cheerful, now. “Whether you believe it or not, Class 1-A looks to you when things go wrong. They admire you too much for you to continue believing your care comes second. That goes for the connections you share. The people you love, too.”
Care coming second, huh? Where’d he get that from, one of his “Teaching for Dummies” books? Shouldn’t he be directing that type of energy towards their students? They do have an upcoming lecture surrounding motivation and burnout, soon, and the need to prioritize self-care in a world that demands self-sacrifice…
Well, it shouldn’t be for him. For all Shouta knows, this information could be coming into one of Midoriya's ears and heading out the other, with how much of a bone-breaking, kind yet stubborn brat he is, and there's no chance in hell Yagi hasn't told the kid with how much of an admirer Midoriya is of All Might. This kind of message really shouldn't be for him. A grown adult.
Offering a scoff, he looks away.
Seizes in on a singular word. "Don’t be silly," he says, almost chiding if not for the grit seeping into his voice at the reminder. "They don’t admire me."
Indulging in the fantasy that he could be anything but the ‘gloom and doom’ everyone else but Hizashi sees him as is laughable. Senseless. It’s customary for anyone to consider themselves, for a moment, worthy enough to be thought of admirable, but only a few like Present Mic and the other heroes in their faculty who've undergone the transition from hero to teacher make the cut effortlessly. Not that he minds, much. Admiration gets you nowhere in the lawless land of the underground; a bitter pill to swallow, the kind of rude awakening that gets you killed when you find yourself all alone and unprepared.
Once he's done, he takes the tall order of slumping into his chair.
Shouta ignores the stunned look.
Staring at the ceiling, he feigns obliviousness to the flicker of yellow creeping into the corner of his vision, and sighs. God, could this day get any worse? He just wants to get home to Hizashi and apologize. “Not to mention, I find it rather telling you assumed I wasn’t telling the truth,” Shouta drawls out, scrutinizing the other.
Though he isn’t exactly sizing him up, Yagi seems to shy away regardless, chair scraping against the floor as he ditches it, standing up. “I really don’t have my eyedrops.”
Humming, it seems as if Yagi considers it, for a moment, staring at him as if looking for an answer.
Shouta stares back.
Whatever answer he finds must satisfy him, as he lets out a small sigh.
“Then I suppose, as a good colleague, and friend,” and Yagi says it with such vigour that Shouta questions if the obvious somberness from earlier had been chased out with a broom. Probably. “I should get you some?”
Nevermind. He won’t wrap Yagi up in his capture weapon to be left for the wolves that call themselves the media after all.
“That would be appreciated,” Shouta says, eyes fluttering shut.
In the meanwhile, maybe he’ll crawl into his sleeping bag; take a nap. Seize the day before Yagi comes back. And pretend whatever monstrosities his brain has deemed worthy to taunt him at the moment aren’t a yellow striking enough to remain memorable, and grade those damn papers before he comes back home to Hizashi.
Nap accounted for, eyedrops acquired, sore eyes soothed and a curt bow to Yagi later, it’s a swift drag through the rest of his classes before the sun dips a little lower and patrol rolls around. Hustling off is everyone else’s business, and so Shouta keeps to his, making haste to go through his routine check of the Class 1-A dorms before departing; of course, along the way, he’d stopped by the staff room to pick up some of Hizashi’s things, too. Leave it in the dorms. Busy as he is, he wouldn’t have had enough time to turn around for the rest of his stuff. Saving him a trip back seemed only sensible.
Normally, he would have left much later, Shinsou's training session to boot, but apparently the teenager had other plans tonight. Considering Shinsou never derails a session nor asks for much beyond the usual awed embarrassment at being busy, greenlighting it had been nothing. Besides, it would reserve some well-needed time for a talk -- just the opening he'd needed, actually.
Maybe Shouta should send the kid a postcard. If not for the fact he already knows Shinsou would assume he’d grown another eye, he would’ve already hit it off with the post office.
Before he’d swung out of UA for patrol -- skimming over the news quickly just to see if anything about Present Mic crawled into view. Certain headlines gleam over the relevancy of the Shindo scale and inform him of a possible earthquake later on in the day; a non-issue, given the new preventative tech in place, especially at UA, but enough that he'll have to ensure Kan's there to reassure the students in the case it does hit.
Other titles run questions of how new generations would hit the ground running since All Might's leave from the hero world stick out, but none warrant concern or even care to cast a second look over. After that was dealt with, he’d shot off a quick text to Hizashi to let him know.
No response, but, reasonable. Hizashi needs time. He'll give him that.
After a few hours of dealing with some nobodies who figured they could get their kicks in, one cat stuck in a tree (a call he won't admit to lingering too long on, calloused fingers sliding through the stray's spindly black fur at a crawl before he'd managed to get his act together), he trudges through the streets. Scours a spare glance at his phone once he hooks it from one of his pouches.
Shouta maintains a straight face as the checkmark of ‘delivered’ stares right back at him.
Present Mic being Present Mic aside, it wasn’t unusual for their jobs to snow them in and take priority. Hell, he knows it well. It’d been the very same argument he’d held at an arm’s length.
Still, there’s no denying it isn’t off. Even back years ago, when Hizashi had landed in the hospital, it had taken Shouta barreling into the examination room for his phone to stop beeping. With how much it had kept pinging, he’d assumed he would’ve had to replace it just for the racket to cease.
Alas, as an alarm down the corner pricks up, hands automatically bulldozing through his capture weapon to latch onto his goggles and toggle them over his eyes, the thought is shoved aside for later.
Soon as it'd come, the supposed villain from around the corner shop is apprehended and tightly wrapped up in his binding cloth. Villain was a kind term for it; the idiot hadn't even used his quirk, rendering bringing along Erasure (not that he can leave it behind) pointless. To make matters worse, he'd brought the equivalent of a knife to a gun fight, what with his baseball bat and Shouta’s tanto. Which, again, he’d never even had to use, as the guy swung like he hadn’t played a sport in his life. It’s not like Shouta is any expert himself.
Claiming that is not in his territory; what he will say, however, is that his students could do leagues better, that's for sure. And that’s certainly saying something: he’d personally had to bear witness to Aoyama kicking a basketball backwards.
For a silver lining, there’d been an incessant torrent of vibrations ringing out against his waist, indicating that on some level, Hizashi had almost certainly texted him back.
Circumstantial evidence? Not a likelihood. It wasn’t as though he considered handing over his personal numbers a hobby like certain heroes he knows -- Nemuri's antics were unbearable when she complained afterwards about being hassled, though he understood the sentiment, he just couldn’t fathom why she’d willingly toss out her number out into the open and not anticipate the fall out - so, logically, it can only be one person.
When he finishes talking to the local police and hands the villain over to be taken away, Shouta finds his mouth opening and closing once his eyes scan over the message.
Then at the contact.
Calloused hands grip the phone's sides with a hazy fervour, pinky slipping from underneath and palm tightening to compensate for the loss. Something pale and a dim hue of yellow, again, pokes at the corner of his readily blurring vision. Nothing’s there.
He looks back down at the phone.
Gathering himself, coughing, he maintains enough composure to offer a stilted goodbye at the scene, barely acknowledging the stunted looks of concern exchanged by the officers with nothing much more than a sneer as he veers the other direction, steps frantic.
The sun tips out of the horizon as he runs.
“And you’re sure you want to go in there by yourself?” Tsukauchi questions owlishly. “Again, Eraser, you could just stay on the other side. No one would blame you.”
He’s never been more sure about anything.
“Yes,” he grits out, doing his best to keep his voice low, lest Tsukauchi have second thoughts. Pleading his case would turn south rather quickly. Hampering the obvious irritation threatening to spill out, he continues, expression flat. “Might as well get this over with.”
Tsukauchi offers him a sympathetic once-over. “I hear you.”
He chances a preemptive inhale. Exhales. Sucks in another breath, then presses his palms against the arms of his seat to push himself into a standing position, eyeing the glass door with something the other people present would consider an intense glower, but he labels necessary.
On the other side of that transparent glass awaits an answer in the reeds. Something he’ll pounce into and pluck out by the throat, if he has to, wriggle it around in his fingers and fold it into a fist.
Maybe he should’ve heeded Tsukauchi’s advice from earlier and ‘phoned a friend’. Quickly, Shouta dismisses the spontaneity for what it is. Delusion. Nemuri would take it upon herself to either fiercely interrogate this guy herself and risk sedating him in the process, or sedate Shouta himself once she slipped on over to the precinct.
Unlikely, but, still. Glimpsing the possibility alone is enough to prowl away from the thought.
Having already texted Nedzu the circumstances, receiving a polite message in reply and an insistence to ‘go ahead’ after informing him he’d send Cementoss over to watch 1-A, Shouta all but jams the handle down until it nearly cracks -- inciting a hiss from someone -- and stomps into the room.
The criminal’s head turns up. Curious as a cat, they seem, until their eyes land on him, pupils constricting as their teeth poke out to bite at their lower lip. Whatever victory must have been laid bare is all but stripped away with a matter of seconds. Satisfaction is not something Shouta would describe the feeling he gets from it as.
They must know him. From their reaction, they have to.
The implications of that are absurd, but it tells him one thing: there’s the faintest possibility that Present Mic and Eraserhead might’ve done something to cause this. Otherwise, there’s no plausible reason for them to have connected the dots on them being involved.
Something could have leaked. How? Why? Questioning it is for later, however.
When home becomes home again.
Shouta deigns to keep his demeanour on the ‘down-low’, as Hizashi would call it -- biting down on the idea of thinking about his partner right now -- and stares the fucker right back in the eyes.
Vision fully clearing, red ombres paint the dim of the room as his hair lifts up fully, bangs brushed up by defied gravity, and Erasure creeps out from hiding to glare outright. Its claws jut out as he slams his hands onto the table. The echo of the villain’s restraints clink into the room uncomfortably as the shackles rattle, bang ringing out in turn. Yellow pokes from the peripheral, a welcome intrusion.
He’s calm when he cuts to the chase. “Where are you keeping Present Mic?”
They look at him with a nervous air. Had Fat Gum really called this one in?
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. I'm not keeping anyone anywhere! Who even is that?”
Shouta huffs. Fat chance. Everybody knows who Present Mic is. “I think you do,” he grinds out.
If getting to the bottom of this is the last thing he does -- or second last, he thinks, envisioning blonde hair and tinted sunglasses tossed aside -- then so be it.
“Eraser, you can sit down,” a voice calls over the intercom.
Shouta shoots an unblinking glare over his shoulder. Really? Really?
Static fizzling out to a close as they seem to realize their mistake, voices quiet, he resumes surveying the villain’s features.
Eyeing them now, you wouldn’t envision them as the typical kind of kidnapper. Trafficker. Nor one you’d picture were you to work out a true crime story. You wouldn’t spot them in a line-up unless their features were, to a tee, described one by one in chronological order. Features as unobtrusive as they are, a plain haircut you wouldn’t be able to pick out of a crowd, brown eyes to follow, they seem much too... average, and young, for crime to be something they’d so easily turn to beyond the usual reasons of desperation.
(The only indicator of a troubled life is the pale blemish on their hand, a faint carnelian but highlighted further in the glare of a lamp.)
But then again, most criminals tend to cross the lines of logic.
Shouta blinks. Lets his hair fall to his sides and back into his face, red glare evaporating, kicking the tantalizing urge to prod into them with his usual methods further to the curb.
With a puff of breath and a finger, his middle bang is skirted somewhat to the side as he leans forward, propping his elbows in such a way for his chin to rest on top of his hands. Slumps himself forward as if bored.
“You seem like a clever person,” he comments, idly, watching as their expression shifts to something baffled. “Let’s cut the chit-chat out, hm? Let’s talk shop.”
“Shop?” they blink, jittery. “Like… the supermarket?”
Shouta startles.
That is… well. They’re young, but if they’re turning to such a serious thing as kidnapping, or, he doesn’t shudder, quirk trafficking, they should know the jargon.
He thinks back to earlier. Clever person. Hm. Maybe they just proved him wrong, he decided. Shouta elects to give them the benefit of the doubt regardless. From the information he’d been debriefed, they’d been plucked from a place where service was far in between-- and he’s not talking about phone signals.
In that area, villains were frequent, heroes were sparse, patrols scarce enough to warrant concern from the UA end of things: had they not all been caught up in enough work already, or dealing with the security of the school at its core, Principal Nedzu would have sent some teachers out to help.
Rationally: This could be a scared civilian from an isolated, dangerous area.
The air in the room turns to transparent fog when he speaks again. “Let’s not waste time on pleasantries when both of us know damn well you know where Present Mic is,” he clarifies.
Still stupefied, there’s an onset of horror that washes into their features. “I swear to you, I don’t! I really don’t! I was just there when it happened!”
Eureka. “When what happened?”
Their mouth snaps shut.
Shouta’s teeth grind in his mouth, He doesn’t have time for this.
Hizashi’s voice flickers on in his head. You want the deets? Don’t scare them off.
“Hey,” he says, forcing something tender into his tone. Petrified, their gaze rises from whatever their sight was trained on behind Shouta, to focus solely on him. Boot twisting against the floor as he rolls his ankle, he waits placidly for them to ease up a bit, hoping that all of his years of teaching students will bear fruit. Testing them before they prove to be able to offer what he needs -- they need, this goes beyond him, Present Mic is a renowned hero with a powerful quirk and can’t just, disappear -- seems a surefire way to lose them.
“He… the guy,” they start, tense. Shouta’s ears prick up. “The hero? The Mic one you keep talking about? Present Mic?”
Shouta doesn’t badger them on their interesting wording. That would require a very different conversation to this one.
A nod.
Suffice to say, their face readily turns from a blank canvas to a red sea as they flush, rebound dismay doubling back as scarlet flicks across their nose and cheeks with the weight of his reaction.
You’re making some good progress there, Mind-Hizashi supplies, sounding far too pleased with himself for a person so far away. Told ya.
Presumptuous, he answers back.
He doesn’t internalize it when no response is given. A poor imitation can never measure up to the real thing.
Instead, he focuses on the feeling of the table beneath the padding of his fingers. The scratches he’d sustained over the years whilst working with his binding cloth have rubbed down his nerves beyond the point of desensitization, sparking little feeling in them at the hot friction. Not enough to prevent him from caressing Hizashi when opportunity arose, but just enough to make hurt pliant.
Static crackles. “Hikaru Tanata, please continue.”
Shouta does not look back to flare daggers at them for interfering. This is their mission, after all; he can prioritize staying stoic long enough if what they request is reasonable.
Despite the image, a hint of a frown curves up on their lips upon hearing the name. Shouta notes that for later.
“R-right," they mutter, the sound akin to a certain green-haired student, stammer jittery and cold in comparison to the warmth he usually feels. It's clear they're an adult, but there's no stopping the whims of a mind that refuses to shy away from likeness. "Sorry. Shit, man, I-- this is hard.”
“You have some time,” he mentions offhandedly, turning over his phone. They don’t. Under the illusion that they do, though, most people break.
The next words they begin with to tell their story are telling.
“He just vanished,” they blurt out.
Shouta braces himself for the worst.
“You’re seriously letting them go?”
“The evidence is circumstantial,” Tsukauchi informs him begrudgingly, but there’s no mistaking the dullness in his eyes, purple poking out from under them, lack of shine made prominent in his pupils when the overhead lighting catches. Sensitive as his eyes are, the glitter of fluorescent lighting in the overcast of the night in the windows outside of a All in all, still, it translates to one thing, and one thing only: this precinct is starkingly inefficient.
Shouta grunts, lifting his cup of coffee to his lips. His grip stays locked around the handle even when he realizes nothing but air makes it to his mouth. He’d refilled it just earlier.
Tsukauchi passes a frown over him, gaze trailing down to his cup, before falling back to him.
“Hey. Eraser. Doesn’t mean we’re giving up on Mic -- Hizashi,” he corrects, motioning to the bustling office around them. “The cameras are still pending further review. We’re required to loop them out of custody unless we have a warrant or dead-on evidence to suggest they were involved, as per civilian rights. You know this. We have a good chance of finding Hizashi within the next 24 hours.”
“I thought we established we'd remain professional around here,” Shouta mutters, but doesn’t object to the name change regardless, some levity supplied by Tsukauchi stating they wouldn’t be hasty when it came to throwing in the towel.
“Sure we are.”
Shouta sighs when Tsukauchi bumps a hand over his shoulder nudgingly. The man looks even more worse for wear. “I’m failing to see what you’re trying to get at, Tsukauchi.”
There’s a prolonged stretch of silence. Long enough for Shouta to debate whether to ask if the other is feeling alright, if only for politeness’ sake, but asking if anyone else is alright right now makes something in him pulse with lividity.
“Say, Eraser,” Tsukauchi begins, hesitant. There’s a sheepish look to his expression that makes Shouta falter in his frown. “Do you believe Tanata?”
Shouta sets the cup down.
The idea that he'd somehow overcome his refusal of spirituality -- and the rather grating, inate optimism (beyond the natural shine of a certain few) that some seem to foster -- is disputable. Irritating, even.
He’s never believed in fate or destiny or, hell, this idea that some divine entity up above has a path carved out from the day you set foot on this Earth. Because, on the one hand, what Tanata had been claiming back in that stale room there was improbable. Far-fetched.
“I’m telling the truth! One second he was there, helping my friend up, the next, boom! Gone! In a blink of an eye!”
Nobody can just ‘vanish’ unless a quirk has anything to do with it. A quick talk to their friend on the paramedics arrival after the mission was over and a check-over later confirmed their quirk had nothing to do with teleportation or making people ‘vanish’ into thin air.
It was a benign quirk that could be applied in artistic industries like freelance; a production of a paint like material. Nothing to suggest anything harmful. Nothing deceiving.
On the other hand, Tanata remains their only lead, supposedly witnessing it first-hand, given that the world had the gall to hide Hizashi away without even a lingering trace. No finger prints.
No quirk activations that Shouta -- Eraserhead -- could wish away with just a look.
Absolutely nothing.
(“Shouta, will ya make me the happiest man on Earth?”)
Maybe he doesn’t believe in fate. But he does believe in someone else.
“Do you?” he pushes back. Doesn’t tempt fondling with the ring tucked under his jumpsuit, inscribed titanium breathing smooth against his skin.
("A week off?"
If only he'd agreed earlier.)
Pausing seems dangerous nowadays. There's one that lingers out like an echo after he asks, Tsukauchi seemingly taking a moment to contemplate it, hesitant.
“Perhaps,” Tsukauchi admits, studying him.
Hours passing have made the incredulity within Shouta recede from the shoreline, waves lapping aimlessly at the sand-- there’s nothing spontaneous about the way Shouta zooms in on the possibility.
Shouta takes the liberty to ask without the guise of a question. “We still need the kid for the investigation. Whatever they said back there can't be all there is to it.”
“…We do,” the other agrees, momentarily slipping his eyes shut. Jet black irises lock into contact with Shouta’s own when they snap open. They dart away when Shouta’s hands skim the rim of his cup. “And you're right. Honestly, though? It's a miracle we've managed to make them stay as long as they have.”
Small mercies. Sure.
Relenting, Shouta hums in assent, brushing fingers over his stubble. Unlike Hizashi, although he has a baby face, his skin has never kept the same impossible softness despite the years of products and care his partner keeps thrusting his way, too insistent. Hizashi's face is always dewy and sun-kissed, a result of all the ridiculous fruits of his labour and life.
Shouta has always adored seeing the effort he put into keeping his image up. Not that he had to, but if it made him happy... will he get to see Hizashi happy again this weekend? Shiny, splitting into a toothy grin and flashing that stupid, goddamned finger gun he always insists looks cool. Really, all it does is advertise an effortless image of gung-ho, making other people -- fans, they call themselves -- think they have free reign to him.
Tsukauchi glances away. “Oy, Eraser.”
“Yeah?”
Not even nearly a decade and a half of hero work manages to prepare you for everything. A wad of cash finds itself pressed to Shouta’s chest, staggering a bout of air to escape from his mouth in a puff, atrophying sound and mind. “Go get yourself another coffee.”
Shouta opens his mouth to object.
“We’ll hold the fort down here,” Tsukauchi interjects. Mouth useless, dismantled, Shouta clamps it shut. The detective presses the money further into his jumpsuit. “Seriously. Go. You look like death warmed over.”
And to that, looking at his palms now, he won’t deny.
Shit, he feels it, too. His head’s still throbbing, like he’s swimming through some sort of vast fog, dull pressure looming overhead that he’ll chalk up to nerves. Lack of sleep. Not eyedrops, since he’d already gotten those, the added weight in one of his utility belt pouches a memo.
The nap may have done him good in the moment, but it’d been hours since then, and crashing was inevitable without caffeine getting ahold of him. Recalling it now, there’s the vague memory of him crushing his only jelly packet at lunch time, with Yagi’s arrival -- not that he blames him (perhaps a bit), but it only means he’s been running on empty since last night.
Grunting, he grabs the money from between Tsukauchi’s fingers and tucks it into a spare pocket. Issues a quick two fingered salute while snatching his empty coffee cup. And goes to clear his head; maybe call Nedzu once he’s done. Reconvene with Nemuri, the other staff. Yagi if necessary. Inform Shinsou he'll have to place a raincheck on their training sessions for now. Issue a public statement.
(Dammit, will he need to talk to the radio staff, too?
Quick as he thinks it, Shouta finds he doesn’t quite mind it.)
If they want Hizashi back quickly, they’ll need all hands on deck.
He does not make it to any vending machine.