Chapter Text
At 8 years old, Izuku shouldered his backpack, clutched his stuffed rabbit tight, and ran for his life.
His heart pounded in his ears. He didn’t look back. He couldn’t. Even as he heard his mother screaming he didn't look back. Tears streamed down his cheeks, blurring his vision, but he didn’t stop. He let out a choked sob.
His little legs, trying to go faster than they could manage, caused him to stumble over cracks in the sidewalk and patches of uneven asphalt. His lungs burned, and his breaths came in short, ragged gasps, but he pushed onward. Behind him, the screams and heat faded, but he didn’t dare slow down.
Rounding a corner, Izuku stopped briefly to catch his breath, holding his rabbit tighter. He glanced back the way he came, his eyes wide with fear. I have to keep going.
The city grew busier as he continued onward, and he soon found himself lost in a crowd that parted around him as if he weren’t even there. One man did notice him, however, and Izuku caught sight of him standing a short distance ahead. He was tall with green hair and wore a sharp suit. His eyes were fixed dead on Izuku.
“Hey there, are you alright?” The man asked, stepping forward.
A wave of adrenaline washed over Izuku. The man was wearing a suit. He was with them. He was dangerous. He had to run.
“No!” Izuku yelped.
Izuku turned tail and bolted into the nearest alley. The man startled and made to chase after him, but Izuku quickly lost him.
His legs screamed for rest, and his head spun with exhaustion, but he refused to slow down. Izuku ran through several narrow alleys without stopping and, upon reaching their end, found himself on a filthy, deserted street.
Izuku stopped then, certain that the man hadn't followed him. He checked over his shoulder for good measure, then let out a sigh of relief. His chest was heaving as he looked around. There was some trash, a couple of people in rags, lots of trash actually, and was that a rat? He cringed.
A gruff voice spoke from behind him, and Izuku almost jumped out of his skin. “Hey, kid.”
Izuku felt a hand on his shoulder and spun to see an older man wearing a threadbare jacket and carrying a satchel. His expression was impassive, but Izuku could see concern in his eyes.
“Where’re you off to in such a hurry?” The man asked, crouching to meet Izuku’s eye level.
Izuku hesitated, his eyes wide and fingers digging into the plush fur of his rabbit. “I… I don’t know,” he admitted in a whisper.
The man studied him for a moment, taking in his disheveled state, before nodding slowly. “Got a place to stay?”
Izuku thought of home, his stomach twisting. He shook his head, the tears threatening to spill over again.
The man sighed and extended a calloused hand. “Well, I’ve got an extra bed at my place, you’re welcome to stay over if you’d like.”
Izuku stared at the hand. He wasn't supposed to talk to strangers, let alone follow them home, but where else would he go? He thought of the rat he'd seen scuttling about earlier, and after a long moment, he reached out, letting the man take his small hand in his own.
“Okay,” Izuku said.
—
“I said I ain’t payin’!” The man’s voice was loud despite his short stature.
“You don’t pay, you don’t walk outta here,” the other snarled back, his voice low and dangerous.
Rabbit was perched on a rooftop above, watching the confrontation unfold intently. His breath misted in the cold night air, and he absentmindedly fidgeted with gloved fingers. A classic drug deal gone wrong.
The larger man, whose bulky frame and turtle shell gave away his mutant quirk, stepped forward. The other man was nearly half his size and shrunk back, but he remained defiant. Rabbit had to give it to him, the man had balls.
“You think I care about your threats? This garbage isn’t worth a damn!” The smaller man spat, waving a vial of something dark and shimmering.
Rabbit narrowed his eyes. That’s new.
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” the larger man growled. “That’s power in a bottle, and you don’t stiff me on it.”
Rabbit stopped fidgeting and shifted slightly, his steel toed boots scraping against the rooftop edge. This was where things usually went wrong.
And then they did.
“Fine!” The larger man barked, snatching the vial from the smaller man’s trembling hand. “If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you what it does.”
Rabbit’s pulse sped up. Don’t do it.
The man uncorked the vial and downed it in one gulp.
The transformation was immediate. The man’s body convulsed, his veins blackened, and the turtle shell on his back began to crack and expand. His muscles rippled and grew larger, giving him not only one hell of a bod, but a full foot of extra height as well. Shards of sharp, jagged carapace burst from his skin, spreading across his limbs like armor.
The smaller man stumbled backward, terrified. “What the hell?” He stammered.
Rabbit cursed under his breath.
Below, the mutant swung a massive, clawed arm and smashed a dumpster into the alley wall. There was the sound of grinding metal and Rabbit saw cracks forming in the brickwork.
Rabbit moved.
Launching himself from the rooftop, Rabbit descended into the alleyway. He landed with a roll a few feet away, drawing the mutant’s attention. “Uh oh, looks like someone ran out of pizza,” Rabbit said as he got up, dusting himself off.
The mutant roared again, louder this time, and came in swinging. Rabbit grinned and brought up his hands, taking a fight stance.
A split second later Rabbit leapt to the side, narrowly avoiding the claws that came for his throat. With a grunt, the mutant swiped again, but Rabbit darted away. The mutant's armored fist struck the wall, and chunks of brick exploded outward.
The mutant charged, coming in swinging with a massive armored left hook. Rabbit ducked low and slammed his fist into the beast’s ribs. Rabbit hissed under his breath, the kevlar knuckles on his gloves did little to protect his fist from the blow. The mutant barely flinched.
Shit. Carapace. Right.
The mutant spun with a wide and sloppy backhand. Rabbit dodged, then rushed forward, driving his knee into the mutant’s gut. This time, the force drove the mutant back a step. Good, that was progress.
The mutant snarled, lunging again, enraged. Deciding to take a risk, Rabbit grabbed the mutant’s outstretched arm and twisted sharply. He was too heavy for Rabbit to throw, but he was still able to use momentum to slam the mutant into the alley wall, leaving him dazed. Sharp bits of shell tore through fabric and dug into his skin as he did so. Rabbit winced. There went the hoodie he had just patched up last night.
Rabbit briefly glanced toward the smaller man who was slumped against the alley wall nearby. He was worried he might make a break for it if things with Turtle Boy went on much longer, and honestly a little surprised the man hadn’t left already.
By the time Rabbit returned his focus to the mutant, he had recovered and turned to face him again. Rabbit grunted as he avoided the strike that came next, and drew his knife from his belt, slashing at a break in the armor on the mutant’s arm.
The mutant howled, clutching his injured arm, but he didn’t stop, instead lunging again, completely reckless and uncoordinated. No time to worry. Rabbit came in low and close, side kicking the mutant’s knee, the heel of his steel toed boot landing with a sickening crunch.
The mutant collapsed to one side with a strangled cry, and Rabbit took advantage. He drove the butt of his knife into the base of the mutant’s skull, hard enough to daze but not kill. The mutant slumped forward, his breathing heavy and labored.
Rabbit pulled a zip tie from his pocket and bound the mutant’s hands with it. “That’s not goin' anywhere,” Rabbit said confidently, patting the zip tie.
Rabbit straightened, breathing hard. “Well, that was fun,” he said to no one in particular.
He turned toward the smaller man, who was still cowering by the wall. “You. Don’t move,” he ordered, leveling the knife in the man’s direction.
The man flinched, his eyes darting between Rabbit and the fallen mutant, then nodded.
Rabbit sheathed his blade and pulled out a burner phone, dialing his favorite number. He pressed the phone to his ear, waiting as the line connected. "Tsukauchi, you’re gonna want to see this," he said when the detective picked up. "Bring backup, and maybe a hazmat team for good measure."
Rabbit heard a sigh through the phone, smirked, then hung up and sent his coordinates to the detective with a heart emoji.
He walked over to where the smaller man still stood. "Alright, let’s have a chat," Rabbit said, his voice low.
The man gulped. “L-look, I don’t want any trouble,” he stammered. “I didn’t even want the stuff!”
Rabbit raised an eyebrow, though he knew the man couldn’t see it with his face covered. “Yeah, I caught that part. You were pretty loud about it. But you know something, and I’d like to know it too,” he gestured to the restrained mutant. “What was in that vial?”
The man shook his head quickly. “I don’t know! I swear! I just… I was curious, okay? But when he started talking about how it would ‘unlock potential’ or some bullshit, I was out. I told him I didn’t want it!”
Rabbit leaned closer, squinting.
“I’m not lying!” The man said desperately. “I just wanted something to take the edge off. You know, normal stuff. I didn’t want this,” he gestured to the now unconscious mutant. “You saw what it did to him!”
“Where’d he get it?” Rabbit asked.
The man hesitated, his gaze flicking to the alley’s exit. Rabbit didn’t move but let his fingers drift toward the knife again. “Don’t make me repeat myself.”
The man gulped. “He said he got it from someone. A distributor. Some guy higher up the chain. I don’t know who, okay?”
Rabbit tilted his head, studying him. “What else?”
“That’s it! That’s all I know!” The man insisted, his voice rising. “He didn’t tell me a name or even what it’s called, he just said it’s powerful stuff and to keep my mouth shut about it.”
Rabbit furrowed his brows. “If it’s so hush hush, why were you arguing about it in the middle of an alley?”
The man grimaced. “He wanted me to take it, said it’d change my mind. I told him no. That’s when things got heated.”
Rabbit eyed the broken bricks and scattered debris around them. “You don’t say.”
He sighed, then pulled out another ziptie. “Hands where I can see ‘em,” he said.
The smaller man complied, albeit begrudgingly. After binding the man’s hands, Rabbit stood up and took a brief step back to survey the scene. The mutant had been taken care of and was still on the ground, no longer a threat. The other man had been dealt with and had even had something interesting to say. Rabbit was done here.
His eyes drifted back to the mutant. He was still curious about the substance he had taken. He walked over and crouched down next to the mutant, inspecting him closely. He’d dealt with his share of druggies over the months, but hadn’t seen anything this extreme before.
A faint glint of glass caught his eye and Rabbit looked toward the mutant’s pocket. He reached for it, pulling the mutant’s torn jacket aside, and found another vial. He let out a low whistle, slipping it from the man’s pocket and examining it closely. Up close, he could see that the liquid inside was a dark green and shimmery, almost like an oil spill.
Before he could mull it over, the sound of sirens began to approach. He quickly shoved the vial into his jacket pocket then glanced over at the smaller cowering man, who was still sitting motionless against the wall, his eyes wide with fear.
"Don’t get any ideas," Rabbit said, giving him one final look. "Stay put."
With that, Rabbit fled the scene.
—
Detective Naomasa Tsukauchi was bone tired as he pushed open the door to his office. 4 AM and he was finally ready to clock out.
He sat in his chair with a groan, resting his elbows on his desk and putting his face in his hands. It had been one hell of a shift. It had started off normal, maybe busier than usual, then Rabbit had called him.
The police station would get a few calls from Rabbit a night, but it was rarer for the man to call Naomasa himself. That was only for serious cases. Given the phone call, this case had not been what Naomasa had expected.
He’d arrived at the scene with four police officers and a forensics team at the ready, which proved to be overkill. They found two men with bound hands, one unconscious, and an alleyway in complete disarray.
They ID’d the unconscious man as Onishi Katashi, a man with a mutant type quirk called Shell that gave him a turtle shell, go figure, and two prior arrests for drug possession. The conscious man tried to make a break for it as soon as the police had arrived on scene but failed miserably. His name was Mano Hachiro and he had a metabolism based quirk. No prior arrests.
Both were taken into custody and had been interrogated by Naomasa himself. When he’d woken, Katashi hadn’t remembered anything, likely due to receiving a blow to the head. Damn Rabbit and his concussive tendencies.
Hachiro gave them a good idea of what had transpired but had given no information beyond that. They knew that Katashi had taken a drug, probably meth or something, and fought Rabbit, hence the state of the alleyway, but that was it. It seemed like any other drug case, so why had Rabbit called Tsukacuhi personally?
Naomasa rubbed his dry eyes, having given up on thinking and trying to wake himself up. He still had to drive home. Or maybe he’d just sleep in his office. Yeah, that was a good idea.
He rolled over to the wall in his chair and flicked off the overhead light, then sighed and rested his head on his desk, ready for a good night’s sleep. Then something on his desk caught his eye.
He had missed it before, but right next to his mug of half drank coffee from earlier was a small, glass vial with a strange green liquid inside. He frowned, leaning closer. Next to the vial was a folded piece of paper.
What the?
Naomasa sighed, then picked up the note and unfolded it.
"Look into this for me? xx"
The detective groaned. At the bottom of the note was a drawing of what he assumed was supposed to be a rabbit giving an exaggerated thumbs up.
Naomasa looked around his room, his brows furrowed. How had he even gotten in here?
Then he saw a screw on the ground near a vent cover. Ah.
“Of course,” Naomasa muttered under his breath, pinching the bridge of his nose. "He’s getting bolder."
He'd have the cover bolted shut later.
He gently set the vial down, then got up and went to go make himself another cup of coffee. He had a long morning ahead of him.