Chapter Text
-5 years old-
“Unfortunately, it seems as though Izuku is quirkless…” the specialist Izuku’s mom brought him to droned on and on about the reasons he wouldn’t develop a quirk.
Inko Midoriya stared, tight lipped, at the doctor until he finished his spiel. She then looked down at her son, searching for any kind of reaction, concerned that he was going to be upset.
“Izuku,” she said softly, “do you understand what the doctor is saying?”
Izuku looked up from the notebook sitting on his lap, “Yep.” He went back to scribbling on the open page.
Inko and the doctor shifted nervously at his nonchalance.
“Are you- Is that okay?”
Izuku looked up again and shrugged, “I mean, at least Kacchan will stop bugging me about ‘being the fucking best’.”
The doctor choked. Inko slapped a palm to her forehead and made a mental note to speak with Mitsuki about her son’s swearing problem.
Izuku looked thoughtful for a moment and then he zeroed in on the doctor with a penetrating stare. “Tell me about your quirk. How does it work? Have you thought about…”
The doctor stared wide eyed as Izuku continued to mumble his questions quickly, not allowing the doctor a chance to even think about answering.
-12 years old-
“HEY! DEKU!”
Izuku heard Katsuki yelling from across the school yard as he quietly ate his lunch.
Katsuki took the news of his quirklessness more seriously than he ever did. He had immediately taken to calling Izuku useless, Deku, loser. Not necessarily in that order. Honestly, it wasn’t very creative of him and Izuku thought he could do better.
Izuku set his food down with a tired sigh, “Yes, Kacchan. What in the world could I possibly do for you today?”
Two of Katsuki’s goons stood slightly behind him, smirking and waiting for the “fun” to begin. This is how it had been going since the beginning of the year. Katsuki would hurl insults and occasionally his quirk, the class or whoever was around would laugh, and Izuku would go home to fix whatever damage had been caused. So far it had been minimal, but Izuku was just about done with Katsuki’s temper tantrums.
Katsuki opened his mouth to reply with whatever stupid shit he was going to spew today.
“You know you have leeches, right, Kacchan?” Izuku interrupted, glancing behind his childhood friend.
“I- what?”
“Leeches.” Izuku pointed behind Katsuki.
The two sneering idiots paused, comically looking from Izuku’s pointed finger to each other. After an agonizingly long moment, in which Izuku almost died of boredom, they seemed to understand what Izuku had meant. Leech number one’s face turned an angry crimson.
“Shut up, you quirkless freak! Who do you think you-”
Izuku interrupted once again, “Listen, Kacchan, letting these two single brain cell leeches is most definitely not going to help you become the number one hero.”
Katsuki stood in stunned silence. Izuku had never spoken to him this way. With this air of indifference. Usually, he was silent.
Izuku continued his rambling, “Their quirks are decent, but they aren’t interested in furthering their training or becoming anything more than what they are right now. They instead choose to smoke cigarettes behind the school gym and hit on girls in third year who are out of their league. It would probably be best if you-”
“You don't even have a quirk!!” Yelled one of the leeches. “So what makes you think you can talk about us like that, huh?!”
“Yeah.” the other leech tacked on, looking pleased with himself.
Izuku snorted, “What, can’t even come up with anything better than I’m quirkless? Your insults are severely lacking if you think that’s the best you can come up with. I could say anything and it would be better than the quirkless line. It’s getting old. Try harder.” Izuku took another bite of his lunch as the two stared at him, no doubt trying to come up with a rebuttal. Katsuki beat them to it.
“You want a better insult, Deku?” Katsuki’s smile was almost animalistic, eyes gleaming and palms crackling. “Since you're so tired of being called quirkless, maybe you’ll have better luck in the next life. So why don't you take a-”
CRACK.
Katsuki’s head snapped back, blood instantly streaming from his nose and down the front of his shirt. Izuku looked down at where he had fallen. Eyes dark and cold.
“I really don’t think you wanted to finish that sentence, Bakugo Katsuki. Not very “hero like” of you.” Izuku sneered squatting down to look Katsuki in the eye. “I’ll only say this once; I don’t give a shit about yout blown up ego, your mediocre quirk, or your fucking mommy issues. I have no interest in being a hero, so there’s no one for you to, and I quote, ‘beat to the top’, so there is no reason for you to keep chasing after me to try and prove yourself. I feel sorry for you, Bakugo. Get some fucking therapy and grow the hell up.”
And with that, Izuku stood, gathered his things, and walked toward the school gates.
“H-hey!” a leech called. “ School’s not over and I’m getting the principal!!”
Izuku rolled his eyes and kept walking. “Go for it! I won’t be back. Good luck, Bakugo! Don’t miss me too much.” And with that, he was gone.
Katsuki was uncharacteristically silent as he stood up from where he had landed. He had a broken nose, a bruised ego, a guilty conscience, and, most alarmingly, a heart that was beating way too fast to be considered normal. He’d never seen Deku act like that. Much less curse at him and throw a punch.
The leeches were talking about getting him to the nurse and then to the principal, but their voices faded into a buzz as Katsuki had a full blown identity crisis. He felt the weight of the words he’s almost spoken aloud and was intensely uncomfortable with how easily they’d almost rolled across his tongue.