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Shouta was not having a good day.
They'd taken his binding cloth away before they'd folded the blindfold around his eyes. Right as he'd thrashed and, rightfully so, managed to land a blow and a bite on one of them, they'd stolen his capture weapon and tossed it aside like it was wet cardboard.
Metallic, the coppery taste of the blood had coated his tongue like a trophy before he'd hollowed his cheeks and spat it back out. Scowling even as his vision was already occupied by the dark, barely even a tunnel of light in the corner of his eyes where the fabric ceased. For his efforts he'd received a punch to the face -- likely from one of the heteromorphs of the group, the swordfish-looking one, judging from the stinging in his jaw where some of the spikes had brushed against and broken the skin of.
Shouta hates not being able to see. Not being able to use Erasure. Hates how earsplittingly loud the shackles around his wrists jingle. He hates not knowing where his capture weapon is, and, simultaneously, he hates knowing exactly how he landed himself in this situation. This sort of thing tended to happen every few years, to Hizashi's dismay, where vengeful villains would seize an opportunity while he was at his worst to get ahold of him.
Today was one such time. A single moment where an exhausted, slow blinking Shouta was off his game, already nursing an injury from the villain with a tiring mental quirk and trigger-happy with their karambit, and about to head home after he'd apprehended and sent them off with the police.
These guys had ambushed him in the alleyway just a few blocks ahead from their place, jumping through a boarded up window. He'd had adequate enough time to react. However, it had happened just as he was -- apparently inconveniently -- depositing his eyedrops into his eyes.
It was only through luck that he hadn't gone the full way back to their apartment, lest they find out where they live and mutter Eraserhead's whereabouts in the streets just enough for them to be forced to relocate. Hizashi would've been pissed; the both of them love their current flat with a vengeance. After all, his partner had spent a hell of a long time rummaging through page after page, calling real estate agent after real estate agent, just to find the one best suited to both their needs; close enough for Shouta to travel to the school via capture weapon without carpooling with Hizashi, and just close enough for Hizashi to only need to commute twenty minutes to the radio station after his shift at UA.
If they lost the apartment, Shouta's sure of one thing; if the villains didn't kill him, Hizashi would.
Not that these villains seem capable enough to actually pull off said killing, mind you. Or even too experienced with kidnapping either -- which could be on account of them just being rusty with pro heroes, or undermining him due to his demeanour, not entirely because of his notoriety in the underground, which would usually land him in hot water if it were taken into the equation.
But it doesn't even seem like they're using quirk-suppressant cuffs, if Erasure still being on the sidelines and somewhat active has anything to show for it. Blindfold or not, it's still stupid not to have them on hand on the off-chance that he did slip them off; which is what he'd say were he on their side.
How cheap.
Does he care? Not particularly, but he can muster up a bit more care when it comes to increasing his chances of breaking out of here without much of a scuffle.
Opportunities multiply as they are seized. Sun Tzu was ahead of his time, because cheap cuffs equal not just opportunity but escape, and the chance to potentially sneak in an extra coffee before homeroom even starts. Honestly, he could use the caffeine.
Experimentally, he shakes the restraints holding his hands behind his back. There's a dull pounding playing out in his head, the kind he'd normally take an aspirin for and move on with his life. Right now, it's a bit of a liability. Indicative of a headache he can't exactly sleep off in the confines of Recovery Girl's office right now.
Even without a mirror, he's sure that if he looked into one, two mismatched pupils would stare back at him, at least one blown wide.
Whatever the case, he forces a breath into his lungs. To blow away the fog his brain finds itself stumbling into; the wisps of grey puffs encircling like vultures overhead. Push past the ache in his joints, rolling his wrists to soothe them, even if it's a dull effort with how tightly the cuffs are locked around them, pinching at his skin. The scratches on his jaw scream as they're exposed to another cool gust of wind brushing his face.
(Ventilation. The occasional rattle of what must be an aircon tells him that much, even without sight. Meaning that he'd been dragged underground after they'd knocked him out. Probably.)
The pain's not the worst he's ever felt, so he pays it no mind. Instead, he focuses on the better task at hand-- a grin threatens the corners of his mouth when his thumb slips through a spot in the cuffs. Not as tight as he'd originally thought.
Now, to work away at them...
"Heya. You ready to talk?"
"I was ready the first time," Shouta points out, words tacit enough to make the cheerful criminal's breath hitch.
While he's not completely certain which idiot this is, he can guess they're both remembering the same incident with the fingers. Memory reimbursed, there's still a hint of hand-sanitiser and blood coating his tastebuds; like a blanket of snow over a grassy plain.
Shifting, he can hear the padding of boots as they cross the threshold into the room, gravel burrowing further into the concrete nipping at the exposed skin of his torn jumpsuit. Pinpointing the exact moment they tread close enough to stand in front of him, a shift in the air as they seem to kneel down. It's only through years of underground heroics knocking common sense into him that he doesn't stiffen when they reach behind his neck, calloused fingers brushing past his stubble, then the loose strands of his hair.
He realizes what they're doing soon enough when the fabric crisscrossing his face falls away.
Vision comes back to him in increments as he blinks.
The first thing he notices when his mind swats a hand through the blurriness and clears it up is his capture weapon tucked neatly in the corner. A clear contrast to before, when they'd slammed it against the wall after they'd pulled it off his head. It's even folded the same way a typical support department student would, and how he likely would've done it had the novelty not worn off after a while and he'd resigned himself to hanging it off a hook in the genkan.
Grunting, he turns his attention back to the villain who'd given back his sight.
"So what's the next method of torture you've got in store for me," he drawls. "And how much's the ransom."
Stacks of cash filter into his mind like visual apparel. Between the 5 jobs spread between them both, they'd have enough to stop working for the next few years or so without issue. Beyond that particular fact, Hizashi claimed they 'had the big bucks' for a reason.
Still, Shouta knows that if you give them an inch, they'll want a mile, so perhaps cash isn't the most appropriate.
Whether or not they would even take the cash payment -- he shudders at the thought of them asking 'JCB or MASTERCARD' -- he's still breaking out of here and taking them down.
For some inane reason, they seem to pale. "Torture? Ransom?"
Arching a brow, he tilts his head, cinching the sarcasm to dig into the curiosity that the almost-statement sparks.
They have to be well aware he's a pro hero at the most prestigious hero school in the country, especially after the whole conference regarding the summer training camp. His face was broadcast for all to see and to mock for losing one of his students to the League of Villains. Even without that knowledge, they'd had to have seen him somewhere; perhaps just as plain Eraserhead, but, again, only Eraserhead. After all, that was the only name they addressed him by while beating him in. They have to want something in exchange. In return.
Whether it be frying his nerves, subjecting him to a whole list of scrutinies, or plain and simple money, it has to be something they want.
They can't just want him.
Gird your loins, my favourite listener, Hizashi's voice booms into his head. I can already bet you're in for another round of stupidity!
"We're not torturing you," they mutter. "I think it's the other way around; you're feisty. And priceless, too."
Now that gets him to laugh. Despite the underlying threat to what has to be the supposed 'value' of his quirk, he laughs.
Ms Joke would probably baulk at him finding this funny. Go off on a tangent about having her art be disrespected, and demand sweetly for him to laugh at least once at one of her jokes (and not the marriage proposals) in exchange. The blindfold's still around his bare neck, tickling at his skin, because he doesn't have his capture weapon. His uniform is wrecked as if it'd undergone a fight in the ring and lost with a cat, with how many new scratches and tears are on it. Blood stains greet his sight when his eyes bore over the rest of his jumpsuit, both a mixture of his blood and these villains; just dark enough for him to squint his eyes at in the dim light provided by the overhead lamp of this room, but not clear enough to be spotted by his students at a distance.
They blink at him as if it's a confusing concept. "What?"
"What's your stance on torture? What qualifies?" he asks, eyes fixed on them. Glancing away, their white hair bounces like a cloud when they run their hands through it. Taking advantage of their distraction, Shouta coughs while he messes around with the cuffs behind his back, only pausing when they look back at him.
Clearing his throat, biting down the hiss of pain when his right thumb crooks at the right angle and snaps, he continues. "Do you need to pluck my nails off for it to count? Punch my throat in? Cut my hair?"
Maybe he shouldn't have freed that particular idea from the depths of his head. Lest they get any grand ideas. It'd be rather inconvenient if he returned to school with a fresh cut, or a distinct lack of nails for Hizashi to fuss over. Having plenty of his nails torn off the bed in the past means he's well aware of what a pain it is.
One such villain had taken advantage of that and had painted them red -- 'to match his eyes', they'd said, 'when he used his 'lovely quirk'' -- before they'd done it.
Criminals are irrational. And disgusting.
He pauses, thinking back to the 'priceless' threat. "Or would that be too much? Damaging the package?"
They might want to sell Erasure; that wasn't uncommon, for him to be captured for such purposes. Nullification quirks were surprisingly few.
Seemingly taken aback, the criminal in front of him shakes their head at him frantically. "No! We're fans of you, Eraser! We'd never torture a great hero like you, jeez. Don't jump to such conclusions."
Higher brain functions offline. He stops fiddling with the left cuff.
"What," he says, mouth dry.
"You were just being a bit uncooperative earlier," they ramble on, nonplussed. "I mean, you nearly bit Yoretsu's finger off!" It might even sound explanatory, like how he'd guide his students toward the right answer, if not for the confusion already working its way into his fog-addled brain. "Plus, your hair's apart of your image. We'd never cut it, even if you had taken off her hand as well-- in a world of weird quirks, we could probably get someone to regrow it for her, right? We just didn't want to pass up the chance to meet you in the flesh. That's a once-in-a-lifetime chance, man."
Is this how Hizashi feels about those fan clubs of his? Shouta's dignity seems to be dying away every second.
Like the sun, exploding violently in a shimmering ball of plasma and flame. Conversely, unlike the sun, it's not exactly happening in a billion years or so, but now. He doesn't have to be called Present Mic to consider himself tactlessly and unwantedly present.
Now, in this petrifying, humiliating pocket of time, some puzzle pieces from earlier fall together.
After all, the way they'd tucked away his capture weapon is much too neat. Although they'd thrown it at first, perhaps that was just in the heat of the moment, to rid him of something to fight with.
To take it a step further, the expressions as they'd gotten ahold of him mimicked Midoriya's first time interrogating him on his quirk. Or Shinsou's measly attempts at pretending he didn't already know who Eraserhead was, of hiding the spark in his eyes when Shouta had suggested they train together after his performance at the sports festival. Even Shigaraki's, albeit brash and irrational 'admiration' back at USJ, even if he hadn't been awake long enough to truly take in the uttered words, Tsuyu had commented afterward that the villain had called him 'cool'.
He doesn't know whether that disturbing fact still remained true or not. But what he does know is that, beyond their underlying differences, they'd all had stars in their eyes when they'd looked at him.
And then there were the cuffs.
Was that on purpose too? To give him a fighting chance?
He feels ill.
"Is that so," he finds himself grunting, disbelieving, straightening up from where his knees are kissing the ground. Pain bursts in his right thumb like a tide swelling when his wrist meets the cool cuff. The only reason they don't clatter or have attention drawn to them is because his fingers, not already out of commission, catch the cuff by their tips and hold it up as he slips free. "Capturing a pro hero just to gloat, then? You have a pretty shit way of showing your appreciation. You blindfolded me."
The only time he's ever done that was while training with Hizashi when they were younger. Nowadays, he had a strong enough lid when it came to not letting his quirk rise to the surface, and neither he nor Hizashi were big fans of quirk-suppressants. Blindfolds, muzzles, or otherwise.
Hell, he hadn't even let Hizashi be muzzled or have his mouth gagged while training-- he'd always proposed simply using Erasure continuously, whether it be at a distance if they weren't facing off each other, or something else. No matter the amount of eyedrops he'd have to spare. Or how long his eyes would burn afterwards.
If a fan had muzzled Hizashi like these idiots had blindfolded him, he'd have their heads.
"Well. Um. I removed it," they mutter, rubbing at the back of their neck.
What a bad idea that was, too. How can he have morons for 'fans'? They'd given him the upper hand, taken away the only restraint they had on his quirk, and he didn't even have to lift a single finger in the process.
Mostly. It's true that he did force his right thumb out of place already. Metaphorically, not a single finger was lifted to remove the blindfold. That had been all their (rather unwise) doing.
They're even showing off how nervous they are.
"And you're not just any pro hero! We can't help but gloat a bit," the villain tacks on, almost absentmindedly as they stare at him. "You're E-r-a-s-e-r-h-e-a-d!" Spelling it out like he's a toddler simpering for approval too? Such attentive fans. "You're something else!"
How irrational. Hizashi doesn't have fans like these, does he? For all he knows, there could be more idiots like this lurking. Why can't he have regular fans? Ones like Midoriya or Shinsou, the kind who, though they tire him out, do it in the name of good intentions, and aren't the kind who purposefully want to cut him up just to talk. He'd take even Shigaraki-- at least he knows what to expect from that particular villain. Homicidal as he is.
Whatever the case, Shouta's had enough of this.
There's a crack as he dislocates his left thumb.
"Uh. What was that?" the fan asks.
The metal clinks as the cuffs are dealt with promptly.
Throwing his head back, Shouta's hair whips up, fully freed from the bindings of the pink elastic he'd used to tie it up during his trip home earlier. A trip he'd really like to be getting back to. "I'm something else, aren't I? I'm Eraserhead."
He'll deal with whoever dares to come in afterwards; he knows he certainly wants a chance to kick that guy with the swordfish for a head.
Shouta won't even need his capture weapon to make quick work of this.
"That's the last damn time you're going without a tracker."
"Hizashi," Shouta protests.
His partner wipes off the grime on his temple with the cloth in a gentle contrast to his words.
"No 'buts', mister," Hizashi grits out. "This is the seventh time in three years that you've had your ass kidnapped during patrol! Does that not seem concerning to you?"
Jet-black eyes squint disbelievingly. "Were you keeping count?" he baulks. Even he doesn't tally up the attempts. It's rather pointless. Flattening his expression into something blank, he tacks on, aimlessly, "Hizashi, you don't even track your steps anymore because it was a 'nothing burger' to you."
That, and because Shouta had tinkered with the app just enough to make even scrolling for the amount of steps an impossible task. Training is reasonable, but overdoing exercise in the name of things like image and the meaningless words of others was a worse form of it. Who needs an exact number of 20,000 steps taken per day anyway? It was illogical. Especially after the first time Hizashi had fainted.
"I'm not married to my steps, am I?" Hizashi's jaw drops. "Hold on, wait, does you getting kidnapped not raise any alarm bells in your head, dude?! It coulda gone a lot worse! They could've killed you!"
Scowling, Shouta thinks back to the autograph they'd asked him to sign right as he was taking them into custody.
What weird fans.
"Probably not. They barely even counted as villains."
Hizashi's forced smiles are worse than his disapproving sighs. "Right. Villains or not, bee-tee-dubs, we're going to pay a trip to Chiyo when we head to UA. Get that concussion of yours checked out."
He raises a brow in questioning.
"Your eyes are blown to bits, hun," Hizashi clarifies coolly.
Resigned to his fate, Shouta shrugs. Might as well. He was going to go to Chiyo anyway. With the cuts on his torso and all -- the other injuries he'd sustained certainly didn't help -- the adrenaline of the moment had clearly worn off, and now he was facing the brunt of it. Not that it hurt all too much, but it would be more convenient not to suppress a wince each time he moved.
But, maybe it's not as bad of a day. Hitting two birds with one stone is rational.
Going to her with these new injuries means he doesn't have to discuss what happened on patrol earlier.
Pressing a kiss to his now bandaged-up cheek, before Hizashi's head falls onto his shoulder, his partner whispers into his ear the equivalent of an execution; "And just to let you know, you're not going to class. We're not having another USJ."
Shouta's head falls into his hand. Right before shooting back upright when his thumbs swell up with another rush of pain, ebb and flow disturbed by the sting of his joints crackling and remaining wobbly.
He'd forgotten those were still out of place. What a pain.
Gritting his teeth, Shouta looks up at his husband, who'd separated from him in his moment of despair.
"I'm not popping those back into place for you either," Hizashi adds, green-faced. "Chiyo can handle all that jazz."
Shouta has an idea.
A pause.
"And don't you dare think I'll let you do it either, you menace."
Shouta no longer has an idea.