Work Text:
Izuku Midoriya had always been correct.
Not usually correct.
Not surprisingly correct.
Not even annoyingly, freakishly, occasionally correct.
Always.
It had started when he was four.
His mother had been making dinner when little Izuku had toddled into the kitchen, pointed at the pot on the stove, and announced with absolute confidence, "The water is boiling at one hundred degrees Celsius because the atmospheric pressure is approximately one standard atmosphere."
Inko had stared at him.
Izuku had stared back.
Then, because he was four and had apparently decided that what the situation desperately needed was additional information, he had added, "Though the boiling point changes with altitude."
His mother had slowly put down her spoon.
"Sweetheart?"
"Yes, Mama?"
"How do you know that?"
Izuku had blinked.
"I don't know."
And that was the problem.
He didn't.
He simply knew.
By five, he could name every planet in the solar system, explain why Pluto wasn't classified as one anymore, and tell his mother precisely how much flour she needed to add if she accidentally doubled the amount of butter in a recipe.
By six, his kindergarten teacher had stopped asking questions she didn't already know the answers to.
By seven, he had corrected a visiting science teacher on the difference between mass and weight.
By eight, he had explained to a group of children why their paper airplane wasn't flying properly.
By nine, people had started coming to him deliberately.
"Midoriya, what's the capital of Mongolia?"
"Ulaanbaatar."
"What's seventeen times twenty-four?"
"Four hundred and eight."
"Why does my cat keep knocking things off the table?"
"Cats demonstrate exploratory and attention-seeking behaviours, and objects near the edge provide an easy stimulus. Also, she knows you'll react."
His classmate stared at him.
"...How do you know my cat?"
"You told me yesterday."
"Oh."
There was a pause.
"Can you help me with my homework?"
And so it continued.
Izuku became the human equivalent of an encyclopedia.
Then a calculator.
Then a search engine.
Eventually, someone jokingly called him "izugpt."
The name stuck.
It didn't matter that he didn't have a Quirk.
If anything, that was what made it stranger.
The doctors had checked.
His brain was completely normal.
His Quirk factor was nonexistent.
There was no mutation.
No psychic ability.
No supercomputer hidden inside his skull.
Nothing.
Izuku just knew things.
And, more importantly, he could explain them.
By the time he entered U.A., this had become less of a curiosity and more of a logistical nightmare.
Because U.A. had teachers.
Teachers had questions.
Students had questions.
The teachers' questions were difficult.
The students' questions were often stupid.
Izuku answered both.
"Midoriya," Iida said one afternoon, pushing his glasses up his nose, "what is the most efficient way to increase my running speed without sacrificing endurance?"
"Interval training combined with progressive overload. Your stride length is already quite good, but you're overextending your hip flexors when fatigued. If you shorten your stride by approximately three percent during the final quarter of your runs, you'll conserve energy."
Iida froze.
"...You analysed my running?"
"Yes."
"When?"
"During the sports festival."
"That was months ago!"
"Yes."
Iida looked deeply unsettled.
Across the common room, Kaminari slowly raised his hand.
"Okay, I've got one."
Izuku looked over.
"What?"
"What's the meaning of life?"
Izuku considered.
"That's subjective."
Kaminari frowned.
"That's it?"
"Yes."
"Come on, you're supposed to know everything!"
"I know what philosophers, theologians, scientists, psychologists, and various cultures have proposed."
"So?"
"So there isn't a universally accepted answer."
Kaminari stared.
"That's the first time you've ever said you don't know."
"I didn't say I don't know. I said there isn't one definitive answer."
"That somehow makes it worse."
Then came the day Nezu found out.
It happened completely by accident.
Principal Nezu was reviewing faculty reports when Aizawa entered his office.
"Problem," Aizawa said.
Nezu looked up from his tea.
"Is it the students?"
"Yes."
"Bakugo?"
"Yes."
"Excellent. What did he do?"
"He challenged Midoriya to a trivia contest."
Nezu's ears perked.
"And?"
"Midoriya won."
Nezu smiled.
"That isn't particularly surprising."
"He answered questions from twelve different academic fields."
Nezu's smile widened.
"Interesting."
"He also corrected the answer key."
Nezu stopped.
"...He did what?"
Aizawa dropped a stack of papers onto the desk.
"The test was designed by Yaoyorozu, Todoroki, and Iida. They deliberately made it difficult."
Nezu flipped through it.
Question one: advanced mathematics.
Correct.
Question two: quantum mechanics.
Correct.
Question three: Japanese legal history.
Correct.
Question four: international economics.
Correct.
Question five: obscure biological trivia.
Correct.
Question six—
Nezu paused.
"This question is wrong."
"Yes."
"Who wrote it?"
"Yaoyorozu."
"She'll be devastated."
"She was."
Nezu looked down at the answer.
Midoriya had written a detailed explanation showing that the question contained an incorrect premise.
There was even a citation.
Nezu's eyes gleamed.
"Aizawa."
"No."
"I haven't said anything."
"You're thinking something."
"I am."
"Don't."
Nezu leaned back.
"How much does he know?"
Aizawa sighed.
"We don't know."
Nezu's grin became positively predatory.
"Then I suppose we should find out."
The first test took four hours.
Nezu asked him about mathematics.
Izuku answered.
Physics.
Answered.
Chemistry.
Answered.
Biology.
Answered.
History.
Answered.
Languages.
Answered.
Economics.
Answered.
Engineering.
Answered.
Psychology.
Answered.
Law.
Answered.
Medicine.
Answered.
Computer science.
Answered.
Astronomy.
Answered.
Philosophy.
Answered.
Nezu slowly began removing his teacup from his mouth without drinking.
Finally, he asked, "How?"
Izuku sat politely across from him.
"I don't know."
Nezu's eyes narrowed.
"That answer again."
"Because I don't know how I know."
"Can you forget information?"
"I don't think so."
"Can you learn something you didn't already know?"
"Yes."
"How?"
Izuku thought.
"I read it."
Nezu blinked.
"That sounds normal."
"It is."
"Then why do you retain everything?"
"I don't know."
"Do you remember your first word?"
"Yes."
"What was it?"
Izuku smiled.
"Mama."
Nezu softened.
"And your second?"
"Encyclopedia."
There was silence.
Nezu put down his teacup.
"Of course it was."
It became an experiment.
Not a cruel one.
Nezu was far too curious to be cruel.
He simply wanted to understand.
Izuku was given books.
He read them.
Then he was given more books.
He read those.
Then Nezu began deliberately selecting increasingly obscure material.
Izuku continued.
At one point, Nezu handed him a translation of a sixteenth-century medical manuscript.
Izuku read it in forty minutes.
"Several of these treatments are dangerous," he said.
Nezu stared.
"Why?"
Izuku explained.
Nezu laughed.
Not because it was funny.
Because he was delighted.
Aizawa, watching from the corner, became increasingly concerned.
"You're enjoying this too much."
"Shh."
"Nezu."
"I'm conducting important research."
"You've given him three thousand pages of material."
"Four thousand."
"That's worse."
Izuku looked up.
"Principal Nezu?"
"Yes?"
"Would you like me to summarise the books?"
Nezu's eyes practically sparkled.
"Yes."
Izuku did.
He summarised four thousand pages in twenty-three minutes.
Aizawa closed his eyes.
"I hate this school."
The problem was that word spread.
At first, it was contained to U.A.
Then teachers began asking Izuku questions.
Then other students.
Then visiting heroes.
Then support staff.
Eventually, someone from the Hero Public Safety Commission heard.
And that was when things became dangerous.
The Commission requested a meeting.
Nezu attended.
So did Aizawa.
So did Izuku.
A dozen officials sat around a polished table.
One woman cleared her throat.
"We'd like to understand Midoriya's capabilities."
"He doesn't have a Quirk," Aizawa said.
"We're aware."
"He isn't a strategic supercomputer either."
"We're aware."
"He's a teenager."
"We're aware."
Nezu smiled.
"That's what makes him so entertaining."
The official ignored him.
"Midoriya, how much can you remember?"
"Everything I've experienced."
"Everything?"
"As far as I know."
"How much information can you process simultaneously?"
"I don't know."
"Can you predict future events?"
"No."
"Can you calculate probabilities?"
"Yes."
"Can you solve unsolved mathematical problems?"
Izuku tilted his head.
"Which ones?"
The room went silent.
Nezu slowly leaned forward.
The official stared at Izuku.
"You're saying you can solve unsolved mathematical problems?"
"No."
The official relaxed.
"Good."
"I said I don't know which ones you're referring to."
The room went silent again.
Izuku continued.
"Some problems are unsolved because nobody has found a proof yet. Some have been demonstrated to be difficult but remain open. Some are poorly defined. If you provide a specific problem, I can attempt it."
Aizawa looked at Nezu.
Nezu looked delighted.
The Commission looked terrified.
The final straw was the brain scan.
It wasn't supposed to be exciting.
It was supposed to confirm that Izuku's brain was, medically speaking, completely ordinary.
Instead, Nezu got involved.
The machine scanned.
The technicians checked the results.
Then checked them again.
Then called someone else.
Then someone else called someone else.
Finally, the lead technician walked into the observation room looking pale.
"Principal Nezu."
"Yes?"
"His brain activity is... unusual."
"How?"
"It's not abnormal."
Nezu's smile faded slightly.
"Then what's unusual?"
"He's using more of his brain than average."
Aizawa groaned.
"That sounds like a myth."
"I know."
The technician swallowed.
"But that's the problem."
Nezu entered the room.
Izuku was sitting inside the scanner, perfectly calm.
"Are you all right?"
"Yes."
"Any discomfort?"
"No."
Nezu looked at the screen.
The image was astonishing.
Not because Izuku's brain was physically enormous.
It wasn't.
But neural activity was lighting up in region after region, networks communicating at speeds the technicians couldn't quite explain.
It was like watching a city at night.
Except every light was on.
Nezu stared.
Then smiled.
"Fascinating."
Aizawa immediately recognised that smile.
"No."
Nezu ignored him.
"What if we increased the cognitive stimulation?"
"No."
"What if we introduced additional—"
"No."
"What if—"
"Absolutely not."
Izuku raised his hand.
Everyone stopped.
"Yes, Midoriya?"
"I have a suggestion."
Aizawa sighed.
"Of course you do."
"If you want to understand my cognition, we could compare my brain activity while answering different types of questions."
Nezu's eyes sparkled.
"That is an excellent idea."
"No," Aizawa said.
They did it anyway.
The experiment lasted six hours.
By the end, Nezu had enough data to write three research papers.
The Commission had enough data to develop a migraine.
And Aizawa had developed the distinct expression of a man reconsidering every career decision he'd ever made.
Izuku, meanwhile, was eating a sandwich.
"So," Nezu said, "what have we learned?"
Izuku swallowed.
"That my brain doesn't appear to have any obvious abnormalities."
"Yes."
"That I process information unusually efficiently."
"Yes."
"And that increasing the complexity of the problems increases neural activity but doesn't appear to cause fatigue at the same rate it does for other people."
"Yes."
Nezu smiled.
"Meaning?"
Izuku thought.
"Meaning we don't know what my upper limit is."
Silence.
Aizawa slowly put down his coffee.
The Commission official looked horrified.
Nezu looked ecstatic.
"Exactly."
Six months later, the Commission had a problem.
A very large problem.
Because Izuku had started helping.
Not officially.
That was the problem.
He helped Aizawa optimise training schedules.
He helped Recovery Girl identify patterns in injury reports.
He helped Power Loader redesign support equipment.
He helped Yaoyorozu understand material chemistry.
He helped Iida with logistics.
He helped Todoroki understand thermal transfer.
He helped Bakugo with explosive chemistry.
He helped Kaminari with electrical engineering.
He helped everyone.
And then Nezu started asking him questions about U.A.'s security.
"What would you change?"
Izuku looked at the blueprints.
"Everything."
Nezu laughed.
"Wonderful."
Izuku pointed.
"These cameras have blind spots."
"Yes."
"These doors can be bypassed."
"Yes."
"Your network architecture is vulnerable to lateral intrusion."
Nezu's smile slowly disappeared.
"How vulnerable?"
Izuku explained.
By the end, Nezu had quietly called the IT department.
Three hours later, the entire security system was being rebuilt.
The Commission became aware of this.
Then the hero agencies.
Then the government.
Then foreign governments.
Soon, U.A. began receiving letters.
Most were polite.
Some were desperate.
A few were frankly terrifying.
Nezu read one aloud.
"'We respectfully request access to Midoriya Izuku for consultation regarding national infrastructure.'"
Aizawa looked at him.
"No."
"Agreed."
Another letter.
"'We would like Midoriya to assist with international hero coordination.'"
"No."
Another.
"'We would like Midoriya to advise on global economic stability.'"
"No."
Nezu smiled.
"What about this one?"
He held up a letter.
"'We would like to invite Midoriya Izuku to participate in a multinational scientific conference.'"
Aizawa shrugged.
"That one doesn't sound terrible."
Nezu nodded.
"Agreed."
Then he read the last line.
"'Attendance is mandatory.'"
Aizawa stood.
"Burn it."
Eventually, the Commission called an emergency meeting.
The room was packed.
Hero representatives.
Government officials.
Scientists.
Economists.
Security specialists.
Everyone wanted one thing.
Izuku.
Nezu walked in carrying a folder.
"Good morning."
Nobody answered.
He sat down.
"Before we begin, I would like everyone to remember that Midoriya Izuku is sixteen years old."
Everyone shifted uncomfortably.
"And," Nezu continued, "he is a student."
More uncomfortable shifting.
"He is not a government resource."
Silence.
"He is not a weapon."
Silence.
"He is not an oracle."
Silence.
"And he certainly isn't your personal search engine."
Aizawa, sitting against the wall, looked pleased.
Nezu smiled.
"Unfortunately, there is another matter."
He opened the folder.
"Midoriya has been asked whether humanity could colonise Mars within the next fifty years."
The room leaned forward.
"And what did he say?" someone asked.
Nezu's smile became enormous.
"He said yes."
The room erupted.
"That's impossible—"
"Under what conditions?"
"What's his projected timeline?"
"Could he provide the necessary calculations?"
Nezu raised one paw.
"However."
Everyone stopped.
"He also said it would be a terrible idea."
Silence.
"Why?"
Nezu closed the folder.
"Because, according to him, we have several thousand much more immediate problems."
The room slowly sank into silence.
Nezu looked toward the window.
"Such as climate stability. Energy infrastructure. Food distribution. Resource inequality. Political instability. Hero society's structural dependence on individual superpowered actors."
Nobody spoke.
"He has opinions," Nezu continued.
Aizawa muttered, "That's putting it mildly."
Nezu smiled.
"And he's usually correct."
That evening, Izuku sat in the U.A. common room doing homework.
Kaminari watched him.
"Dude."
"Yes?"
"Do you ever get tired of knowing everything?"
Izuku paused.
"I don't know everything."
Kaminari pointed at him.
"You literally just explained quantum mechanics to me."
"Basic quantum mechanics."
"You fixed Yaoyorozu's chemistry problem."
"It was an error in her equation."
"You told Iida how to optimise traffic flow."
"Yes."
"You helped Uraraka understand orbital mechanics."
"Yes."
"You explained to me why I shouldn't put a fork in a toaster."
Izuku looked at him.
"That one was obvious."
Kaminari frowned.
"Exactly!"
Izuku smiled.
"But I don't know everything."
"What don't you know?"
Izuku looked around the room.
His friends were talking.
Laughing.
Arguing.
Being teenagers.
He thought about it.
"I don't know what I'll become."
Kaminari blinked.
Izuku continued.
"I don't know what everyone will do tomorrow. I don't know what choices people will make. I don't know which things will matter most to me ten years from now."
He smiled.
"And knowing facts isn't the same thing as knowing people."
Kaminari stared.
"That was weirdly profound."
"Thank you."
"I wasn't complimenting you."
"I know."
"Stop doing that!"
Izuku laughed.
Across the room, Nezu watched through the doorway.
Aizawa stood beside him.
"You've created a monster."
Nezu shook his head.
"No."
He watched Izuku smile as his friends laughed.
"I think humanity simply discovered it had been underestimating what a person could become."
Aizawa sighed.
"That's almost inspirational."
"Thank you."
"Don't get used to it."
Nezu's ears twitched.
"Besides, I have another experiment planned."
Aizawa immediately looked suspicious.
"What experiment?"
Nezu smiled.
"I've been wondering whether Midoriya can teach himself things faster if he has access to multiple simultaneous information streams."
"No."
"You didn't even let me explain."
"No."
"Imagine the possibilities."
"No."
"His brain could become even more efficient."
"Nezu."
"Perhaps we could connect—"
"If you try to plug that child into a computer, I will personally throw you out a window."
Nezu considered this.
"Third floor?"
"Yes."
"Reasonable."
Aizawa turned away.
Behind them, Izuku looked up.
"Principal Nezu?"
"Yes?"
"I can hear you."
Nezu froze.
Aizawa slowly covered his face.
Izuku blinked.
"You don't need to conduct the experiment."
Nezu's eyes lit up.
"Why not?"
"Because I already know the answer."
The room went silent.
Nezu leaned forward.
"And?"
Izuku smiled.
"It wouldn't work."
Nezu stared.
"Why?"
"Because computers already have access to vastly more information than I do."
A pause.
"And?"
Izuku shrugged.
"They just don't have friends."
Nezu's expression softened.
Aizawa looked away.
Kaminari yelled from across the room.
"THAT WAS SO CHEESY!"
Izuku laughed.
Nezu laughed too.
And somewhere, in an office several kilometres away, the Hero Public Safety Commission received yet another report about Midoriya Izuku.
Threat level: unknown.
Strategic value: incalculable.
Recommendation: do not antagonise.
And beneath that, added by a very tired official:
For the love of God, stop giving the boy ideas.