I May Be Small But My Spirit Is Mighty!

by StrayCatRunning

Summary:

Izuku took the famous UA entrance exam, and got (by his count anyway) enough points to be in a heroics class, so why is he in Gen Ed instead?

Or:

Nezu needs a tool, a very special tool, and he is very very sorry but the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one. But his one could do with a bit of help, which he provides.

Or:

Why on earth has Nezu listed Shouta as the single disciplinarian for a kid not just NOT in his class, but all the way on the far side of campus in gen ed?

Notes:

THIS IS CHAPTER ONE!!! I'll change the chapter count after I see it posted properly! :D

Chapter 1

Day three, things are going alright but.....

 

Closing his journal with a snap because so what if he was on day three?

 

He’d managed to get into UA, but, just, not like he’d dreamed of for so long.

 

By his count he got more than enough to get into heroics, but he was guessing a bit, and maybe he’d just gotten it wrong. Or everyone else just did that much better than he did?

 

Yeah, and maybe un-quirked pigs could fly!

 

Sitting in the front row - don’t want the quirkless kid to not be front and center, so much easier to torment them that way - bored blind, at least now they were getting into some actual meat of the subject rather than simply reviewing last year.

 

Quirk history, his favorite, a subject so good he read it for fun, never mind something useless like a grade.

 

Suddenly frowning, he raised a hand.

 

“Yes Midoriya?”

 

The sharp question was just like every other teacher he'd ever had, as if it offended them he’d dare to ask something, and he suppressed the gut churning reaction (because he'd vowed to be braver now he was older) as he said, “Mahmorto-sensei, I think you got the date wrong, the Utama uprising actually started two years earlier than you just said? And it was started by the charismatic leader Sasaki Sumiko, not the one you just attributed it to, he did take over when she was assassinated but - ”

 

He was just hitting his stride when the teacher sucked in a harsh hisss and said “How dare you!”

 

Ah, so, UA was going to be just the same despite it’s lovely hopeful handbook. However, he had to try, couldn't let the dream of an unbullied school life die without some effort to save it on his part, “But Principal Nezu said - ”

 

“Be silent!”

 

The target of may glares in his life, Izuku graded this one pretty high for how horrible it made him feel, because UA was like his last school, hands on as it were, and he wanted to duck down and hide but what was the point, he knew this, the teacher was wrong, if he just tried harder then maybe….

 

“How dare you talk about a subject as complex as this one, as if you understood it you quirkless little disruption!”  The teachers face twisted then in satisfaction and Izuku wanted to beg, to do anything, because the man was about to -

 

“Come with me, I’ll teach you not to talk back to a teacher! I’ll teach you not to disrupt my class!”

 

On script, this was so on script, just like his last school where he’d learned fast, week one even, to keep his head down, to do anything to keep them from hurting him again, yet he'd tried again like the fool he was, the day one orientation lecture had said UA was zero tolerance for bullying and sold it so well Izuku’d opened his stupid mouth when he knew better, zero tolerance the school might be but of course, that was for students with good quirks, no one could talk back to them never mind pick on them, ever. 

 

Clearly for the teachers too who always had zero tolerance for Izuku’s very existence and he was about to find out how badly this was going to go but then the script went, well, off script when the phone on the desk rang.

 

The entire class looked at it.

 

So did Izuku and the teacher, as if it was some strange new thing, rather than a simple communication device.

 

It rang six times before the teacher grabbed it with a “Yes? I’m really rather - "

 

“Oh... sorry.... Principal Nezu, if I could just - ”

 

An indignant expression to what must have been a question, “Of course I've read it, I’ve read all of them, he is - ”

 

“ - Oh… no…. I didn't - ”

 

“Very well, of course, if you insist but I do not see why this student - ”

 

“Of course, no Nezu-sama, I’d never question - ”

 

“Of course, I’ll head to Hound Dog’s department this minute, I just fail to see….”

 

Hanging the phone up with clear puzzlement, the man studied it for a moment and then, eyes squinched with anger that clearly over rode his confusion, went behind his desk, snatching out a discipline slip, and, glaring at Izuku the entire time, put five black marks on it!

 

Holding it out, he said, “Your disciplinarian is waiting for you in DR7, get out.”

 

Carefully taking the slip, knees wobbling in terror, Izuku got out.

 

He had no idea what was going on, but it was bad!

 

And he did know what five blacks meant on a D-slip, so his heart, already trembling at how bad it’d all been while actually in the classroom, evaporated along with his stomach as he started the long walk, just to provide room for all the dread that flooded in.

*-*

Nezu’d been waiting for this, and it only took two and a half days, nice and fast.

 

Over time he’d managed to get rid of the commission’s teachers in his school, one by one replacing them with his own people, fudging the notices and bio’s of the replacement staff to look like Commission approved people.

 

One by one he’d gotten changes in place to protect his students, cleverly crafted to - at first and second glances anyway - look like the party line.

 

One by one his plans had paid fruit and now he was one final department away from being sole controller and owner of UA, the most powerful school in all of Japan.

 

This teacher had just managed to step over the invisible line into getting his ass fired, because tenured teachers were almost impossibly difficult to get rid of but, they had just put FIVE black marks onto a discipline slip of a child who was listed as a single disciplinarian student.

 

After ranting at them!

 

After having been clearly ready to be unkind in more physical ways!

 

Five marks, on day three of school.

 

It took five marks to earn a physical discipline session, and this student had earned nothing more by their actions than a sweetie and a good job for being so smart and so brave.

 

Certainly NOT a spanking!

 

Rubbing his paws together, already transferring this particular student to the second of the five first-year gen ed classes, Nezu alerted the second person most affected by this.

 

Well, watching the tiny green haired child ghost down the huge empty hall to the Discipline Room farthest from his classroom, hugging the wall on their soundless way to a dreadful place indeed, one final unkindness by a teacher Nezu would be enjoying firing in about an hour or so, depending upon how long it took for Hound Dog to provide a lesson in receiving what one intended to inflict upon the innocent, an unforgettable lesson indeed!

 

Nezu sighed with a touch of regret, Midoriya Izuku, quirkless, and the perfect tool to get this particular job done.

 

Shame it was going to hurt the child as well but the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few…. Or the one.

 

Nodding, he picked up the phone.

*-*

Answering his phone was his first mistake, listening to his boss the second, and he asked, “You what?” with a morbid kind of confusion.

 

The words from on high made Aizawa Shouta, pro hero Eraserhead, consummate professional and totally grown up person -

 

Want to bang his head against his desk until sweet darkness took him.

 

Because he was clearly target zero for his boss today.

 

Scraping himself up, looking out at his class busily working on a How Much Do You Know On This Subject worksheet he said, "A single word from anyone and we'll see how creative I can be in making sure it doesn't happen again!”

 

Leaving them behind easily because even this early in the year, they knew to behave if he stepped out of the room, he smiled at Nemuri who was just headed his way to watch over them, hearing the first tentative murmurings from the class.

 

A fist bump and he was off, hurrying now, it would never do for a student to reach DR before the teacher.

 

Sole disciplinarian status for a gen ed student?

 

That was strange enough to raise the hair on the back of his neck, but gen ed was the far side of the main building, it would take a firstie ages to walk that distance.

 

Day three? What, the kid had to go all that way to just stand in a corner or do some lines? How stupid could their teacher get?

 

Or was the kid an incorrigible delinquent?

 

But if so they’d not have gotten into UA so Nezu was up to something.

 

Gen ed.

 

Shit.

 

Trying not to let it, Shouta’s heart hurt for a kid, a firstie, scared and alone as they walked a long lonely way to meet a total stranger who was supposed to discipline him.

 

Been there, done that, burned that fucking t-shirt!

*

Looking up at the door his long long walk’d brought him to, Izuku tried to make his heart slow down but five black marks were on the page that was shaking in his hand, clenched so tight it was crumpled around his white knuckles so he knew what was waiting for him behind that door!

 

But nothing about this would get better if he made the teacher wait.

 

Raising his hand he gave three of the softest knocks the world had ever known, only for the door to open instantly.

 

Looking up at the unfairly tall masc who’d opened the door for him, Izuku felt his heart break.

 

Shatter.

 

He'd been sent to DR to be beaten by one of his favorite heroes of all times.

 

Because five marks ment a mandatory spanking.

 

Izuku’d learned long ago to keep his head so far down in class he was invisible, just to avoid something like this.

 

The last time was two years ago, he still woke sweating in fear at the memory.

 

Believing the first day's lecture so much he'd actually spoken up in class? He was so stupid!

Handing the slip up he vowed to himself, if he survived, he'd never say another word in class again as long as he lived.

*

Looking down at the kid, firsties were always so tiny, but this one was -

 

Shaking.

 

He caught the slip, waved the kid in, said, “Shoes off and on the shelf.”

 

The first step to anything in DR was shoes off but the kid shook even harder, kneeling in what was nothing more nor less than a controlled fall to start fumbling his shoes off and, baffled, Shouta looked at the slip, hoping it might tell him why the kid was so clearly terrified.

 

Five marks, in bold black, met his eyes.

 

Wanting to curse Nezu to every level of hell available, but the fucker ruled the damned place so it’s be a wasted effort on Shouta’s part to just send his boss home!

 

Instead he motioned to the couch, pointing to the end.

 

“Sit there.”

 

The kid cringed as he passed him, fear, so thick it was a stink on the air.

 

Right, several other things stunk as well, so on silent feet Shouta went to the shelf of supplies and lifted down a blanket.

 

Passing the kid as he headed to the other side of the room, the kitchenette area his goal, he gave one flap to unfold it, and dropped it on the kid, covering him utterly.

 

The fact the kid made no noise at all was just one of about a zillion red flags, all waving merrily at him!

*-*

He was going to die.

 

His heart was going to stop, or his brain exploded, or the hero was going to beat him to death and save his bullies and teachers the effort but, trying to breathe, tiny gasps of breath all he could manage just then, Izuku took off his shoes, put them on the shelf, and sat where instructed.

 

Entire body shaking, he was only not sobbing because he was actually too frightened to cry.

 

Too frightened to watch the hero either, so he was shocked even more speechless than he already was when a blanket dropped over him.

 

The words, “Tell me about your day, from the moment you woke up to the moment you walked into this room, go.” easily made it to him under the soft fabric.

 

Sitting in the dark warm pocket the blanket created, Izuku sucked in a few breaths, not understanding anything other than the order.

 

Not the order itself, but how to do it, so he tried to speak, failed and then, with maximum effort, his voice wobbled into action.

*

 

Carefully simmering hot chocolate on one of the burners available in the tiny kitchen area, Shouta agreed, this kid could talk for the world.

 

Could give Hizashi a run for his money.

 

Might even be able to out-talk Tensi and Oboro when they got together to binge on cola icies and gummy candies.

 

Idiots.

 

But the word was fond in his heart, even if the twinge of nausea at the memory of being right there with them the last time, drink for drink and eating sour candies in a race to see who could -

 

Damn, had he been sick!

 

Focusing back on the kid who was not talking in a way a kid would to avoid a spanking.

 

Five marks, day three.

 

But as if he was trying with every bit of him to follow the order.

 

It might have been just to get the kid talking and maybe relax a bit but so far he'd learned the kid was living alone in a shed out back of the house of a family that, despite being related to him, didn't like him much.

 

Oh, that wasn't what the kid’d said, no, this kid should go into advertising because he was spinning it for all he was worth, insisting he had his own room, a little house really, and he'd timed going into the house this morning to avoid bothering his cousin who got headaches so was grumpy early in the day but that was okay because ….

 

This kid could probably put a good spin on where he was now if he wasn't still shaking with fear.

 

Switching the hob off Shouta carefully poured two mugs of chocolate syrup, because that was how he liked it, stirring a pinch of cayenne dust into his and made his way to the couch.

 

Sitting down he said, “Good, now, I need to see your face and hands, please.”

 

Midoriya Izuku, quirkless, five marks on a discipline slip on day three, had wound down to reaching the door of DR7 and was trying, clearly trying, to come up with something nice to say now.

 

That bastard of a teacher had made a terrified kid - and any kid was afraid going to DR, it was unavoidable, the place was fucking scary no matter how old you were - walk what must have felt like miles, just to torment him that little bit more.

 

Yes Shouta knew the plan, but his heart hurt for this little slip of a kid who was….

 

Staring at him with eyes drowning in tears, and dread.

 

“Here, take this, and be careful.”

 

“It's hot.”

 

He might have just as easily handed the kid a live grenade or rattlesnake for how shocked he was, but obediently he took it.

 

And that was it, other than staring at it that is.

 

Not able to help it, Shouta chuckled, “Kid, Midoriya, I promise I did not poison it.”

 

He almost wore it at that point when the kid flinched and started to deny anything like thinking that and and and -

 

“Stop.”

 

The kid froze, eyes exactly like a terrified rabbit.

 

Setting his mug onto the floor, Shouta reached out, very slowly, adjusting the blanket to wrap comfortingly around thin shaking shoulders, making sure it wouldn't slip down if the kid moved, and said again, “Drink. Careful. It’s hot.”

 

Quietly then, for a moment, they just shared the space.

*-*

Looking at the slip on the couch between them Shouta said, "My approach to DR is the one every teacher in UA is supposed to have, yet clearly the one who sent you here hasn't gotten the memo.”

 

The no shit expression was swiftly hidden but Shouta agreed.

 

“So, first, tell me again exactly what you did to make that teacher send you to me and we’ll go from there.”

 

*-*

Feeling slightly sick from the cocoa sludge but loving it anyway, Izuku told again how the teacher was mistaken, that the information would come up later in tests as it was a pivotal moment in history, so he’d just tried to….  

 

“Correct the teacher?”

 

Nodding Izuku sighed, “Yeah, I’m…. I’m….. I’m sorry, really SORRY but it's important!”

 

And then cringed, because even with a blanket and cocoa and being so nice and moving carefully and slowly so as to not make him jump, this was a teacher, and dangerous.

 

“I agree.”

 

Blinking as the meaning of those worlds trickled through his brain, Izuku looked up in shock, “You do?”

 

“I do, I agree, you were not just right to do as you did, but the teacher was absolutely wrong to behave as he did.”

 

“To give you what is essentially a demand that you be spanked, simply for drawing notice to their mistake, is so wrong as to be inexcusable.”

 

“This is why you were given a single disciplinarian, many students are in that category, don’t feel singled out by it, any student that needs a single person they can learn to trust in that role is given one.”

 

A simple way to protect a student being maliciously targeted by those wishing him harm, in other words.

 

It was also why, although Shouta wouldn't tell him, the child wasn't in Shouta’s class and was in gen ed, because the commission still had juuuust enough power to force them to not let him into the place he’d earned with a stelar run in the entrance exam.

 

Without any super power at all he’d used his admittedly tiny body, his admittedly sharp mind, and his clear to all, deeply insightful and caring nature, to not just take down robots but to achieve almost all of the hidden objectives, including how many many people he’d helped and inspired along the way.

 

Unlike the explosion kid that in no way earned a spot in his class yet was there anyway.

 

It was only how close they were to the plans grand finale that had Shouta not screaming the place down, the way he still wanted to do, because this kid was caught right in the middle and didn't even know it!

 

Saying softly, “Midoriya, remember this, if you earn it, I will give it to you, be it hot chocolate or a trip over my knee, and if you do go over my knee I will give you every single spank I believe you deserve.” 

 

“No one in existence however will EVER force me to spank you for shit that doesn’t even deserve a cross word, never mind an actual spanking.”

 

Watching their eyes blink slowly, green haired head nod as their flight or fight reflex powered fully down at last and tiredness hit like a stick, Shouta remained totally silent from that point on, letting himself fade from perception, a handy skill, and one this kid knew how to do as well at an instinctive level.  Useful, yet it was almost exclusively a trait of savagely bullied or abused children.

 

Making mental notes to investigate their home and previous education fully, Shouta simply existed while a child curled up and slept.

*-*

Izuku knew something was up when he went back to class and there was a different teacher in it.

 

His pratt of a homeroom teacher also taught this period, but it was Midnight-sensei, and while the boys and even a few of the girls predictably were drooling over her, Izuku settled in to listen, to watch, and to enjoy.

 

Because this was the face of feminism in heroics, and as such, she was a powerhouse indeed!

*-*

But he’d been right in his guess, and his heart sank right down to his toes and beyond at the end of class, because he took the change of homeroom slip with a carefully blank face, making sure to not touch anything but the paper, and bowed.

 

He had gotten into UA, and he was training for the sports festival as his single remaining chance at heroics, but now….

 

Now he was being used.

 

In a good way, he guessed, it just might have been nice to be asked!

*-*

It took three weeks to wind back up in DR, again it was the one as fucking far as possible from his main classroom so he walked the lonely halls, feeling small…. and stupid.

 

This teacher had insisted he do the introductory speech thing his first morning in their classroom, quirk, name, and a fun fact about himself and when he protested talking about his quirk she’d smiled with a sickening sweetness and said, “Yes, I’d heard you were a troubled child, sadly you just proved it but I am prepared for that, and for you.”

 

A discipline slip with his name in bold was tacked onto the board along with class notices and the bitch used a sharpie to make a bold black line on it.

 

“Now,” she smiled back at the class, “this is Midoriya Izuku, he’s quirkless, and as you see, a bit of a trouble maker so it might be best to just give him some space.”

 

Shuffling to his chair, rage and shame at war in his guts, at least no one tried to trip him up on the way and this teacher sat students alphabetically so he wasn’t sitting right in front of her.

 

Tiny mercies, always focus on the good lest the bad drag you down and drown you!

*-*-*

Izuku had found and was using the smallest, most out of the way gym to practice for the sports festival in, and had expected to just do more of his usual training method, looking at videos and trying to do it himself but….

 

Sparing droids!

 

UA had sparing droids!!!

 

He’d thought they were a work of fiction when he first heard of them, and they certainly felt like it when he saw one for the first time, but using one was a dream come true!!! Despite knowing how limited his only way of training himself was he was fully prepared to keep doing it but, he’d come on so far since he’d gotten access to them, finally having someone to use his hard earned moves against.

 

And they had a fight-dirty setting!

 

Three days in a row, right when school started, he’d used the precious three hours after classes when students were allowed to work on self study before having to go home, to simply read and practice with a unit, the keying in time it was called - according to the booklet anyway - and then, squaring up against it for real, on level one, proceeded to get his ass kicked to hell and back.

 

“Student needs to rehydrate and cool down.”

 

“Yeah, no shit.” Izuku gasped, starfished onto the ground as he tried to catch his breath, which seemed to be hiding somewhere near Neptune!

 

His eyes closed and he existed in aching limbo for a long mo - “Student needs to rehydrate and cool down properly.” - ment…. “Fuck.”

 

Debating on how long he could delay, but the spar-bots would absolutely call a teacher on him - page nine said so with no room for doubt - so he rolled with a groan and began stretching, forcing himself through the entire cool-down routine.

 

Then got a drink from his now room temperature bottle of water, a container he’d had forever, faded Present Mic decal just a hint of a line here, touch of color there, if you didn't know who it was, you'd never guess.

 

But Izuku loved it, it was his oldest reassure.

 

A long time he’d had it, pretending the hero was there for him, cheering him on, giving him a drink and care when no one else would, or did.

 

Swiping his thumb over the almost gone artwork, wondering if it was possible to do something about it, the way he usually did when he started feeling like this, he sighed.

 

“The gym must be returned to original settings by students whose session is about to terminate.”

 

“Yeah, I know.”  Staggering over to start putting the mats away to the stacks where they belonged, Izuku paused and smiled and then bowed, deeply and with heartfelt gratitude, "Thank you sensei-bot.”

 

Setting the space to rights, wiping down each mat as it was stacked, wiping down and cataloging any new scuffs or dents on the bot, one final glance cast at the room he pronounced it good enough and headed out, not seeing the bot's eyes powering down as it settled into place.

******

“He bowed to you awwwww Shouta, he is such a sweetheart!”

 

Shedding the exosuit letting him link to a training bot Shouta grunted, it'd been like a punch to the guts when the kid bowed and said thank you to what was, to everyone else, just a piece of equipment but the kid radiated sincerity.

 

“How is he still such a nice person?”

 

“No idea, but with you as a teacher, sneaky thing that you are, he at least has a hope of getting what he deserves!”

 

Running Shouta’s remaining class through his head, the explosive blond he’d kicked out day four, that one was in gen ed now, in the class with the replaced teacher, one that was handling the brats just fine now.

 

Handling them properly!

 

Knowing for a fact Bakugou’d been to DR a time or three already, he gave a huff of satisfaction, Echo-sensei was a hard ass, took no prisoners, he and Mic’d both interned with her twice as students, loved the hero so much, were still afraid of her a little bit too but liked to insist it was just respect for a formidable hero.

 

Yeah, that Bakugou kid was on his last chance but might make it yet with her in charge of him.

 

But Midoriya Izuku was still a worry, the kid had already spotted and used some of the loopholes in the training bots programing to work harder and longer than allowed, and they needed to get more food into him, underweight, undersized, quirkless, and the commission solidly against him.

 

Well, other than that he was doing just fine.

 

“So, how’re the rest of the probies doing?”

 

“Not probies Mic, shut the fuck up.”

 

Shouta’s long time friend and pain in the ass laughed and said, “Until they are your students for four months at least, they are sooo on probation!”

 

And, well, as he was already six students down, that really was kinda fair.

*-*

The alert to his phone had him out of the class room in an instant, and it was almost a repeat of the first time, except now….

 

When Midoriya glanced up in a lightning flicker, his eyes showed hope.

 

Not much gods knew but it was there.

 

So, just as before, Shouta silently indicated where he wanted the kid to sit, and again dropped a blanket on him, heading over to make a hot drink while the kid calmed down a bit.

 

Shouta already knew the kid had five marks on his slip, he’d seen it on the board, in plain sight of everyone in the classroom, a breach of the privacy regulations that had him fuming yet…..

 

As Shouta was dealing with Izuku, Nezu was firing one more of the commission's lacky’s, using her breaches of conduct against this student as the club to bash her with.  After, of course, having her too visit Hound Dog for a dose of what she’d sentenced an innocent kid to receive.

 

Almost like a going away gift, UA style!

 

This kid who was shaking under a blanket but was brave enough to peek out and take the hot  cocoa with trembling fingers, obeying the order to tell Shouta his entire day, from waking up to now.

 

They didn't have enough against the ones caring for him to just take the child, but it was clear neglect, he’d gone himself to see the shed that was his bedroom, and it brought back enough memories he too had to visit Hound Dog, but for him it was a  cozy visit to get his head back on straight, rather than an unforgettable spanking like the fired teachers received.  

 

Emotional abuse, even if the damage was invisible, was as bad as physical, but the situation was in play, he had to stay out of it and trust the system would do its job and as he listened to a morning spent alone, a family who never talked to him, just a bit to eat because, "The school gives me breakfast now, so I don't like to take anything more than a meal replacer drink, I can get a big can of the powder once a month with the little bit of my trust fund payment I get to keep cause keeping me does cost money so it’s only fair I pay what I can and if I just use one spoonful with hot water then it’s as good as a full meal and - "

 

It wasn't, Shouta thought to himself, it wasn't as good as a meal. He remembered that, the taste of mostly hot water with a hint of flavor, the tang of it against the back of his mouth, the way a chipped mug felt in his hands, warm, like comfort, even if it was as filling as drinking hot tap water….

 

Shoving the memories away, Shouta listened, and nodded, and asked the odd question here and there, and eventually they got to the reason he was sitting in DR waiting to get his ass handed to him.

 

“So, you corrected another teacher?”

 

White knuckles on a pristine mug, and the kid nodded, once, jerky and afraid.

 

“Go on.”

 

“It was the first law of thermodynamics, as applicable to quirks, she got it wrong.”

 

“Like, sooooo wrong.”

 

“So you told her all about it?”

 

Shouta knew exactly what the kid had done, because he’d had a moment to talk to Nezu as the kid made his lone way across the huge building to a destination no one ever wanted to arrive at.

 

“Yes, ummmmm, sorry.”

 

“Why are you sorry?”

 

This time he got to see green eyes study him, not long, just a moment, and then another gut punch to the emotions, “Because you have better things to be doing than wasting time on me.  And I knew it was gonna be another black mark, the final one, but….”

 

When Izuku paused for a moment, frowning, Shouta braced himself and was right when he got, “I’m not worth your time. I failed to get into heroics, hardly even made it into gen ed. I just waste people's time but the other kids needed to learn the right stuff, the right way, education is important, even for people like me, but it’s doubly so for the rest of them.”

 

Bowing slightly, “I really am sorry for taking up your time, we can just get it over with if you want.” The kid's hands were so tight on the mug now Shouta feared stress fractures to the delicate bones in his fingers!

 

“Do you remember what I said the first time we were here, Midoriya?”

 

“Huh?”

 

“What I said about being your disciplinarian?”

 

“Oh, that if I earned it you’d ummmm, well, you’d ummmmm….”

 

Having mercy on the kid, Shouta finished for him, “Spank you if I believed you deserve it?”

 

“Yeah,” clear relief at not having to say the word had Shouta hiding a grin, “but, ummmmm Tara-sensei said…. And it took ages to get….” (three weeks, it should take months at least, even for proper delinquents, which this kid wasn't) “to g-get five marks, and I did earn it so…..”

 

“No you didn't, and you know it, now, tell me about each black mark and why it wasn't deserved.”

 

Holding up a hand, Shouta said, “No, better idea, I want you to write it for me, in essay form, two pages for each mark you were given and why you did NOT earn them, handed in to me on Friday, so you have four days to do it.  Now, I don’t know about you kid, but I got zero sleep last night, rotten patrol, had to,” - he yawned and stretched, cracking his neck both ways for good measure before sliding down in a boneless heap - “sub in for someone, now, shush.”

 

Watching through mostly closed eyes as the kid goggled at him for a moment, suddenly grin and snuggle down in their own blanket Shouta though, maybe, just maybe, even with all the shit storm going on, this kid would be okay.

 

He’d do his best to make sure of it!

Chapter 2

Notes:

In this AU UA has FIVE first-year classes (not just heroics but business, support, medical, and all the rest), because students wash out so often that if they started with just forty kids they'd probably only graduate about ten heroes per year!

Not to mention all the other courses, which would lose plenty of students as well, even if not the numbers washing out of heroics, and the side shuffling of students into better suited course tracks must give the poor office people migraines.

But even starting with a hundred heroic firsties, by year five they are down to only about thirty to forty graduating heroes.

So each course track starts with five complete classes, and goes from there.

Let me know if the above is clear as mud, cause I'm tired today! lol

_________________________________

Even expecting it, Izuku was still surprised to be shuffled to the third first-year gen ed class, bright and early the next morning, because thinking something was happening and having it proven were totally different thing.

 

Looking in the new teachers' tiny, mean little eyes, Izuku felt a thrum of something akin to terror fill him.

 

But it wasn't, he knew fear and all its flavors by now, no, this was more like….

 

Excitement?

 

Because this one too did the name-quirk-fun-fact-shit, and this time Izuku stood a bit straighter and said, “No thank you sensei. I will tell the class my name though. Hi,” he smiled at the faces looking at the show going down, “I’m Midoriya Izuku.”

 

“A fun fact about me is I like to read quirk laws and legislations across the past hundred years or so, for fun.”

 

“And it’s because of that fun fact that I know it is absolutely illegal to force a child to reveal their quirk status for any reason, unless it is in a life threatening situation or their parental unit or units is or are present, and this is neither one of those situations.”

 

“However,” - because Izuku had been thinking really really hard, all night long, and was a bit loopy from lack of sleep - “because everyone knows it anyway, I’m quirkless.”

 

“Thank you for your time.”

 

This teacher looked to be a stealth giver-of-pain, so Izuku was ready to dodge, and did when the first pinch headed his way!

 

But kids in both of his last classes had needed a readjustment of their attitudes, and the new teachers that had taken over were doing that. Izuku might not have any friends but he listened and used his eyes to keep abreast of any and all gossip.

 

He knew Bakugou had been to DR already, as had so many others that’d thought they were so sly and or untouchable for their behavior.

 

So if he was being used to get rid of bad teachers, and that was the almost inescapable conclusion at this point, then why not work at it, rather than letting them just hurt him.

 

He’d already noted the cameras, read the handbook to the point of memorizing the damned thing, and looked this teacher up.  He’d also looked up every other teacher currently working at UA, making note of how long they’d been employed, and student notes on the school website, all student run so it was funny, as well as informative.

 

As well as all that he’d worked on the essay Aizawa-sensei’d set him.  Kind of a punishment essay but really not, and he’d taken a LOT of care to follow the instructions, especially the, "Honestly, fully, and completely!” bits.

 

So he had, and instead of trying to apologize for it all, he’d studied each action, and reaction, not just his and the teachers but the students as well and the eventual outcome for all of them.

Outcome the best, a new teacher who’d take no shit from the students while at the same time, would make sure they were handled properly and learn from it, and outcome the best so far had happened in TWO classes, because of Izuku.

 

So Izuku’d been proud of his essay, even if he’d approached the door to class 1A like it might bite him, only knowing he had gym time as a reward waiting for him getting his hand in gear to knock on the door.

 

A command to come in, and he’d crept across the space to place the essay onto Aizawa-sensei's desk.  A quiet "Good Job, I’ll read it later, off you go.” and he’d practically bolted from the room!

*-*

Gen ed classes were let out two full hours earlier than heroics.

 

A fact that had his preferred gym always empty, not just how out of the way it was, the final hour before school closed its doors to everyone under the age of twenty might have another student or two show up, everyone was starting to stress about the sports festival just a bit, so more and more students were working on getting ready but he had two hours to work hard with a training droid all on his own.

 

Then a further hour to cool down and have a bit of fun, while making anyone seeing him think he was no threat at all, so he often did skipping rope to music, hard as fuck, especially after a workout with the droid equipment, yet it was amazing for dexterity and timing and looked stupid and foolish, unless you stopped and watched, which none of the students that wandered in bothered to do.

 

Well, the entire school knew he was tiny, quirkless, failed the entrance exam to boot, kept being switched to new home rooms, how could he be a threat to anyone in the sports festival? 

 

Looking up at his new gen ed teacher though as they went through the morning announcements, Izuku knew for this one breathing was a punishable offence but, he also knew things that drove teachers mental, even if nothing he ever did was against the rules.

 

So unlike before, he took that thrill of that something burning inside of him and transferred it to his knee, letting it vibrate up and down like a piston.

 

Silent, no squeak of shoe on floor, but he was front and center again in this classroom, the teacher couldn't help but see and yep, a twitch, and not much later a glare, by his count it took twenty three minutes before - “MIDORIYA!!! Stop that at ONCE!”

 

A silent knee bounce was counted as a non-disruptive-stim, and was clearly and utterly allowed.

 

But for him it got a black mark on a discipline slip when, an hour later, he started it up again.

 

The relief of doing it at all was enormous, because for so many years he’d had to hold himself so rigidly still he’d ached from it, so he did it again in maths, which was a different teacher, one of the newer ones, and they didn't even look twice, never mind give a black mark for it.

 

And the student who threw a balled up bit of paper at the back of his head?

 

They got to stand in the corner for it, after apologizing to him first!

*-*

This time it took a grand total of four and a half days to get five black marks, but he had to insist his disciplinarian be called, actually raised his voice and YELLED for that to happen because the bastard was dragging him to the door, was snarling about all the things he was going to do once he got him to DR and Izuku was beginning to panic now….

 

To cry….

 

When the door opened before the snarling masc’s hand even touched it, two Ectoplasm clones easily removing Izuku from the man's grip, a third clone hustling him out of the way as the teacher went insane, screaming all sorts of things that Izuku’d heard before but didn't have to now, because the clone holding his hand had put a pair of noise canceling headphones over his ears, blocking it all out, while leading him down the hall.

 

This time he didnt head for the couch first or even take his shoes off, instead he blinked in shock at the wordless offer because no one ever did that for him, yet he almost fell into the arms of Eraserhead who’d knelt down with his arms open for him, and held on tight.

 

Because for an instant he’d thought he was wrong, wrong that he was being used as a tool to get rid of bad teachers, and was about to - 

 

About to be -

 

He gave a sob and pressed tighter, and the pressure of arms around him was strange, and good, like a memory from when mama was alive and life was so much better.

 

Eventually, once again seated on the couch and starting from his alarm clock waking him up, and how much he hated that voice now yelling about how the day was here, he never even realized with how comfortable he was on that couch the number of things he usually kept hidden that were now coming out.

 

How that morning his aunt hadn’t just ignored him, she’d instead bemoaned the fact he was still a year and a half away from being able to live on his own, freeing up his shed to be an artist's hut for her but that maybe his habit of hero fight chasing might finish him off a bit sooner than that and how nice that would be.

 

How on the train he’d had to evade old classmates by eeling around and through other passengers and how hard it was to do that and not get adults mad at him as well but if he’d let them catch him he’d have been beaten half to death and then left posed on a seat because one of the bastards had a paralyzing quirk and how much they loved to do that to other kids.

 

How his travel pass was the only thing allowing him to even get to UA, and how hard it was to get it renewed this year, how very very hard.

 

But Shouta heard a few nice things, a pretty garden passed as he tried a new route to the station, a nice cat who let him pet it, breakfast in the cafeteria that took the shakes right away, lunch later to look forward to…

 

Nothing about friends, or his training, or his hopes or goals or dreams, but this time while the kid had been shaken and sobbing from stress, they’d gone to him for comfort.

 

Shouta might live alone with only six cats for company, (not counting his rotating door policy for his idiot friends) but even his cold dead heart felt all achy, like a muscle used unexpectedly after too long at rest when this odd little kid willingly took comfort from him, an arguably un-comforting person.

 

Drinking hot cocoa while listening to the child ramble about their day so far, he slipped in a question or two, giving him even more to look into, because that was a bad expression at the mention of All Might, and the man had been one of the ones insisting Midoriya Izuku not be allowed into the hero course, despite his points.

 

So, more work later finding out about any link between Izuku and Yagi to add onto their trying to get the kid free of his legal family, first though, “Did you do anything other than bounce your knee?”

 

“No Aizawa-sensei, and I was really quiet too! Cause I know he doesn't like me or anything like me, he said it often enough, how I’m a waste of resources and aren't there better kids than me and how I shouldn’t be here and all the rest, but I read the handbook, stims are allowed.”

 

“How did it feel letting yourself stim in class?”

 

And this was a trick question indeed, in a way the kid never spotted, “Good,” a relieved expression, “it felt good, sensei.”

 

“Right, six pages on stimming, pro’s and con’s as well as health benefits, along with all of UA’s accommodations for them, delivered to my hands the end of next week.”

 

“Do not work too hard this week and for the love of little green apples, try not to get into any more trouble between now and then, okay?”

 

A happy nod matched Shouta's wry smile, and then a flutter of fingers, a glance and away and nope, not on his watch, “Midoriya, any question you ask is a good question.”

 

“Oh, sorry, usually teachers hate it when I ask anything, I forgot you’re not like them, ummmm, do I have to go back to class now or….?”

 

He broke off with pink cheeks, and Shouta finished his question for him, “Or do we take a nap first?”

 

A shy nod and he smiled, “Kiddo, if I don’t get a nap right now Kaminari Denki is going to die later, so in order to save his life, close your eyes and shush.”

 

This time when the kid curled up he tentatively stretched out a foot, and Shouta instantly captured it, simply holding it carefully as he felt the pulse point speed up to a frantic pace and then slow down until the child slept deeply at last.

 

The stories of his day had already come with the information the kid had trouble sleeping, so this was for him, as well as for a very tired teacher.

*-*

Three mornings later, after working a bit more on the essay for Aizawa-sensei - and remembering a very satisfying session in the gym the day before where the spar bot, instead of what Izuku wanted to do, insisted he work on flexibility and speed, rather than power, leaving him once again as limp as a noodle on the floor - and successfully enjoying a ride to school, he pondered a few things.

 

One, that his early morning commute now had proctors on duty which had made it so easy and nice.

 

It was a brand new nation wide commitment to safety for all that the train system had rolled out just that morning, a surprise initiative!

 

The: See Something, SAY Something!

 

Day one for the brand new safety for all campaign and for the first time ever, Izuku had not a single issue on his entire journey.

 

He was feeling more relaxed than he’d ever felt at the start of a school day.

 

The other thing was, how fast the sports festival was blasting down upon him, and how far behind he still felt, and how he was on teacher number FOUR now and how he’d seen All Might smiling and posing near the school gates and….

 

It hurt his heart, but he didn't like the hero any more, like, at all!

 

So maybe it was good he wasn't in heroics if he’d have to be taught by that moron but no, that was still his goal, he just needed to get stronger and get far enough in the sports festival to transfer.

 

And, he covered his mouth to hide a giggle, get rid of another teacher.

 

Because he’d seen Bakugou again, from a distance at least, talking to a few other kids, and the blond looked good.

 

Usually he was like a jangling wire, all frayed and sparking, prone to zapping out in any direction, usually Izuku’s direction but even when the blond looked over, he’d just looked annoyed, rather than angry.

 

And Izuku did know the difference!

 

So the teacher replacements were helping in so many ways, even if it was a shock to see someone as strong and touted as his one time friend all the way down in gen ed, and he’d even heard a rumor he wasn't allowed to compete in the sports festival, citing the danger aspect and lack of control.

 

But Bakugou had really good control of his quirk, so if it was lack of control keeping him out, then it was a personal lack, rather than a quirk lack.

 

And despite trying really really hard not to let himself, Izuku was taking a huge amount of satisfaction that at least one of his bullies was learning better at last!

 

Stepping yet again into a new classroom, once again trying to decide what to do with the bigoted comments, this one about how no one else seemed able to handle the quirkless reject, Izuku stood a bit straighter, looked them dead in the eye, and said, “That is NOT true!”

 

Ducking the back handed slap attempt he let his eyes open wide, shock and horror in every word, "You can’t do that, UA has a strict disciplinarian policy, no teacher is allowed to lay hands on a student without firsYIPES!”

 

Then he was ducking a grab attempt, and three students got involved as he tried to avoid this teacher's rage at being stood up to by someone like him!

 

Tripped from behind because he was watching the dangerous adult rather than the students, he rolled and tried to come up but he was held now by two of them laughing, "We've got him sensei, here, we’ll hold him for you!”

 

Certain, almost certain anyway, of rescue Izuku didn't pinch nerve spots, or strike exposed areas, or kick free!

 

Instead he yelled bits of the hand book loud and fast and some of the other students were yelling too, not for him to shut up but for sensei to leave him alone, that he didn't do anything wrong!

 

‘Huh, that's new!’ Izuku thought as he braced for the incoming blow, the teacher striking like a snake and help wasn’t coming fast enough!

 

But the blow never landed, instead the man's arm was wrapped up, pulled back, and a twist had them bound head to foot in the capture weapon as the three holding him let go as if he was lava.

 

It didn't save them.

 

Those three, plus the teacher, were all removed, and Aizawa-sensei gave him a single look, then at the empty chair in the back of the class and he scarpered to it, much as he’d love to sit in DR quietly recovering from all the excitement, he really didn't want to miss this.

 

And it was glorious!

 

He’d never heard an anti discrimination lecture quite like it, and was taking notes feverishly by word three, and gradually everyone else saw him and started doing it too, and a magical two hours passed before his favorite teacher in the world finished, said he expected ten page essays from every single one of them on the unexpected outcomes of bullying and left the class in the presence of its new teacher.

 

A very nice woman, a retired hero, one of the good ones.

 

Shame he didn’t get to stay in that class, he’d have liked it but there was one more, just one more first year gen ed teacher from the previous principals tenure, and that one had to go too.

 

Just because Izuku didn't know what was going on, he knew he was doing something good, and while it was scary, heroes did scary stuff sometimes too!

*-*

“Going a bit hard on him maybe?”

 

Watching Shouta shift into a throw, the weight of the droid syncing equipment slowing him down not a jot, despite how heavy it was, his very long time friend grunted and stepped back, offering his hand to the holographic child, assisting it to rise.

 

Knowing the gym this particular child preferred to hide away and train in was linked to this one, as was the equipment Shouta was using, including the eternity floor, Hizashi sighed, “It’s not fair what’s going on but beating the child into the ground might not help?”

 

A grunt.

 

And the kid went flying, only to roll and come up and dive back in, throwing a handful of dust at the droid's eyes.

 

Fight-Dirty was a setting, and the kid used it, but it was a shock to see someone so innocent looking laser focused on the effects his dirty move reaped him, and he crowed as the droid's eyes blinked, deactivated, and moved in for the kill.

 

It was Izuku's bad luck that eyes were not the only thing the droid was using, and that Shouta could see just fine, so in a totally expected - by Hizashi anyway - move Shouta upped the ante a notch and took the kid down, laying a blunted knife across his neck.

 

A pause and the kid said, with a defeated sigh, “Yield.”

 

“Good,” standing up, Shouta helped the hologram up again, and repeated “good, but eyes are not the only thing people use to see with.”

 

“Oh, huh, I never thought of that, what senses were you using just then when I took out your eyes?”

 

A short discussion on infrared, echo location, electrical impulse detection and ways to disrupt them, and to detect they were in use, and Shouta had the kid go again.

 

And Hizashi had to agree, the kid never gave up, never stopped trying, and when he was actually shaking in the legs as he stood to go again, Shouta instead braced and said, “Push me.”

 

“Huh?”

 

“Imagine a circle,” a gesture, “that size, and push me out of it.”

 

Confused yet willing, Izuku did.

 

By the third time he was soaked in sweat, and the droid he was shoving said, “twice more” as it passed across the invisible line.

 

Squaring up, eyes blurring as sweat dripped down his lank hair, Izuku threw himself at it, shoving and grunting until he’d managed the final two times.

 

A solid “Good, now, cool downs.” had him automatically bowing and backing off to begin.

 

Watching the droid start the very surprising act of putting everything away, after wiping it all down, when he finally caught his breath Izuku said, still twenty minutes of cool down exercise to go, “Thank you for your help, I don't think I’d even have a shot without it.”

 

The bot only blinked its eyes at him and settled into its nook as other students came in.

 

A few rude comments as to how ragged he looked were easy to ignore. Grabbing a shower, dragging footsteps and a huge meal in the cafeteria before even starting the journey home and he was smiling tiredly, a feeling of accomplishment settling into his bones.

*-*

Stomping along thronged coradoors he wasn't feeling any accomplishments as he clutched the hated slip, because it wasn't the get a bad teacher fired slip, but one that had him actually in proper trouble.

 

He'd been trying but the old hariden was sly, and sneaky, and never said or did anything to get in trouble, and instead managed to bait Izuku into being rude.

 

He’d fired up in defense of underground heroes, and then, maybe he was tired, well, yes, he was tired, but it didn't excuse….

Looking up at the door he sighed, because he might have enjoyed his times here before but he suspected that enjoyment was over.

 

Nocking gently the door opened, and he looked up at the dark eyes looking down at him, and tried to say something, but he was so mad, and angry at himself, and frustrated, he almost stomped into the room, kicking his shoes off, and said, voice tight, “Lets get it over with, you have better things to do than deal with me.”

*

This time his kid had done something to earn DR.

 

Not a five mark spanking, but a lecture, corner time maybe, but -

 

Izuku’d been mostly respectful, even when that old bitch provoked him, stinging words designed to get in under a kid's defenses and hurt!

 

So Shouta’d been expecting an upset child, and simply pointed to the corner and said, “Stand there until I tell you to come out, and while there I want you to think about how others actions sometimes drive our own, and how sometimes others actions are aimed at driving our own.”

 

A blink of surprise as the kid stared at him so Shouta added, “Do you need me to show you the way?”

 

Yelping Izuku scurried away, parking his nose where two walls met, a place of very strange time warping capabilities indeed, and Shouta smiled as he set about making hot drinks.

 

Keeping a close eye on the kid he saw when clenched tight fists relaxed, when wire tight shoulders and spine slumped, when angry frustrated silence devolved into quiet talking as the kid worked through it in his own head.

 

So many marks against the kid for that simple need to vocalize, while other students were even praised for the same habit, called a sign of intelligence.

 

Shouta hated his own species sometimes, but the simple directive Nezu’d come up with after Shouta told him all about how difficult Izuku’s commute to school each morning was, and then following the kid while keeping out of sight, seeing with his own eyes what the kid dealt with, but that one act led to a nationwide anti-bully campaign every single morning, in places where the entrenched bias in schools couldn't stop it.

 

Or workplace bullying, that too couldn't touch this, because the call-in number was run by a hot line, and heroes were responding.

 

Young heroes, new heroes, heroes eager for the notice, and the feel good factor of helping kids learn to be better.

 

Not too far along now and yet the difference was huge!

 

All from one quirkless child denied, by the powers that be, a place he’d earned.

 

Settling onto the couch, Shouta wondered if he’d have even started talking to Izuku if he’d been his teacher. Well, talking beyond school stuff that is.  He’d never have guessed from looking at him that his home life was neglectful, or that….

 

Cutting that thought off because they almost had this kid free of that, he said, “Times up kiddo, come here please.”

 

Seeing the exact moment the mugs were spotted, the naked relief and then the confusion, he jerked his chin to the spot on the couch the kid usually sat, or well, slept.

 

Watching them settle slowly and carefully, tucking their feet under them as they took the mug, Shouta couldn't help it, he smiled.

 

“Ummmm, I’m in trouble, right?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Oh.”

 

“Tell me about what you did, and why.”

 

Frowning as Izuku tried to tentatively put into words how angry he’d been, and how standing in the corner had helped him calm down, “Even though it’s awful, I've never ever stood in a corner before, but, I think it helped?”

 

“Why is that kiddo?”

 

“Did it give me time?”

 

“Yes, that’s one reason.”

 

“Oh, and let me think it through alone, but you being here helped, even though I thought I’d be getting…..”

 

Shouta wanted to laugh out loud when the kid realized if he said the word spanking he might remind an authority figure he’d maybe actually earned one, and then he hummed with approval when the need to understand outweighed the fear of the actual maybe perhaps getting it.

 

Because he was holding a hot cocoa, both of them were, and spankings seldom happened over cocoa.

 

“Mmmmmmmm now, talk me through all your corner time thoughts, and relax, yes you earned corner time, and apologizing in written form to that nasty piece of work simply because of their position of authority, so go on, give me your best shot.”

 

Listening to the kid work themselves through it all, up to and including realizing how the woman had manipulated and driven his anger, using it to force him into this position, he finally sighed.

 

“I played right into her hands, didn't I?”

 

“Yes.”

 

“Oh.”

 

The very sorrowful face looked up in surprise as Shouta followed up with, “But she is a master at that trick, and it might not be the first time you’ve met it, but dealing with her is like a level one player meeting a level one hundred and expecting to win.”

 

“The very best you could have done in that situation is to politely agree to disagree. But she’d not have let you, not for long anyway.”

 

“Am I being used to get bad teachers out of UA?”

 

The room had been so calm, so peaceful, Izuku’d felt so relaxed after the time in the corner and even more so holding a mug of hot syrupy goodness because Aizawa-sensei used almost no milk at all, just enough to make the cocoa powder go all runny, like melted chocolate.

 

It was yummy!

 

So the words just slipped out, and he didn't have time to panic when the hero laughed and said, “Yes, although I bet a million yen you’d figure it out after the final teacher was kicked out, oh no, don't feel bad, I bet against Nezu, which was stupid, and cost me.”

 

“But as it all goes on the summer picnic, no worries, we even get a water slide.”

 

“Really?”

 

Eyes big as saucers and Shouta, remembering how he worked with literal children who were nowhere near as childish as his coworkers, solemnly nodded and agreed, “Really.”

 

The he sighed as he answered the actual question properly, “So, yes, you are being used to get rid of bad teachers, and I’m sorry you are in that position.”

 

He in no way intended to tell a literal child about how his spot was stolen from him because that was in no way helpful, instead was working hard to get him past the first two rounds in the sports festival to prove beyond a shadow of a doubt he’d earned being in UA when the kid once again blind sided him.

 

“Thank you.”

 

“What for kiddo?”

 

“Ummm, for training me? The spar bot, it acts different when you control it. It's good, the other times, but I can tell when it’s you, so I wanted to say thank you.”

 

Blinking in bemusement, Shouta finally settled on, "You’re welcome.”

 

And then they settled in for Shouta to hear all about the kids day, and then to talk about how to drive conversations in the direction of your choosing, and a few reading suggestions and a few videos to watch to help him learn and then it was the final bell ringing.

 

“Izuku, I can't explain, and I’m sorry, but I can't train you openly…..”

 

“Is it because I’m quirkless?”

 

“Yes, now” - cutting the hurt off at the pass - “you tell me why.”

 

A long pause as the kid started thinking really hard, eyes going unfocused and mouth starting to nibble and then to talk very very softly until the kid's head snapped up, eyes unfocused as he finally got loud enough for Shouta to hear him clearly, “OH MY GODS, the train thing!”

 

“It has to be that!”

 

“The train thing, I saw Eraserhead, that morning he followed me, I saw him in the glass, a mistake, had to be but he reflected, just for a moment, but I saw HIM and then the big See something SAY something started and,” suddenly breaking off to look at the hero, he said, “it was you!”

 

“Nezu.”

 

A frown and then, “Okay, you and Nezu, and the entrance exam was really hard,” devolving again into almost inaudible speech, Shouta simply listened, and approved - “...really stupid too but then….”

 

“....Did I do it? Did I pass? But if I did…. I’m in gen ed and getting teachers fired, and all the rest of the teachers are either good heroes or newish teachers and….”

 

“....The commission?”

 

“Principal Nezu is trying to get UA out of…..  All about control…. Has to be…“

 

“....I passed….”

 

“Had to have, but if someone is strong enough to keep me out of heroics then they have more power than they should have, so who has that much power and that only leaves ooooooh fuck, yeah, that bastard, and he’s the commissions dog.”

 

“Their bitch.” Shouta agreed and the kid convulsed so hard giggling he had to save the mug before the kid fell off the couch.

 

Helping him up, Shouta was not surprised to see Nezu drop down out of the vents, saying “I was never here, understand kitten?”

 

The kid nodded eagerly, and Nezu set about explaining to them all kinds of totally unsuitable for anyone his age to know information, much of it totally restricted to very high level heroes.

 

Learning the fucking symbol of stupidity had crushed this kids dreams on a rooftop had Shouta’s blood boiling, but Nezu simply smiled like a sphinx, so clearly a plan was being formalized to deal with that shitpile but instead of going into that, his boss softly asked.

 

“Do you have any questions for me, little one?”

 

A long pause and then the kid lifted their chin and asked, “Why me?”

 

“Because you have been the victim of long-standing systemic abuse, and as such can see it, and when given half a chance and a little bit of back up, you have indeed stepped up and spoken out against it.”

 

“You are also a lightning rod. I have watched you child, people gravitate to you, good AND bad, you attract attention, and to get my school free at last I will use any tool, you included.”

 

A considering pause and then Nezu said softly, “You passed.”

 

A cocked head and Nezu continued, “Yes indeed, the entrance exam, as illogical and stupid as it currently is, you passed it.”

 

“Top of the middle third percentile, so much higher than almost two thirds of the accepted candidates, you did it.”

 

“Yet I had to place you in gen ed because I am only almost ready to topple the government (not mentioning he was currently involved in doing just that), not absolutely ready, and you are the one to suffer for it.”

 

“Even if you win the sports festival right now you will not be accepted into heroics, unless we can get rid of one final claw, one final teacher, and then several things happen all at once, and one of them is my taking possession of this school in its entirety via a shell game of companies.”

 

“And no, you totally shouldn't know about this but, you are the most affected.”

 

“Do you want to be limelight or twilight or underground?”

 

Eager green eyes blinked for a moment and then said, “I wanted to be limelight, but without a quirk I couldn't see a way, not once All Might said that, but, I’ve been thinking really really hard because I have new information I didn't have before and I think, I think I see a way." Looking over Izuku asked, "How do you control the spar bot Aizawa-sensei? And how tough are they in a real world setting?”

 

A considering pause, and then a Nezu laughed.  “It’s called an echo suit, and I think you might be onto something.”

 

“For now though, I’m marking you absent from the rest of classes for the day and we will all go have tea and snacks, because if you have another mug of the chocolate sludge Aizawa-sensei makes, you’ll both be ill!”

Notes:

------------------

All Might defeated the sludge villain before it almost killed Izuku, and had a containment unit that he did NOT drop as he lept away.

Izuku did grab his leg, they did land on a roof, and the dread question was asked with the usual answer, this time much harsher and without revealing his disability, of "NO, you can't be a hero without a quirk!"

Hence Izuku no longer liking the man, Bakugou never meeting the villain, and Yagi intentionally helping the commission block Izuku getting into heroics when he passed the entrance exam.

Chapter 3

Notes:

See if you can spot the bit that makes me laugh every single time I read it! :D

 

____________________________

Sitting in the much more relaxing space of Nezu’s private quiet room, Izuku breathed a moment and drank a bit of his tea, because it was very nice.

 

Pulling the Sports Festival Rules and Guidelines tome out of his bag as soon as his cup was empty, easily flipping to the section he’d given a purple sticky note, Izuku asked, “So, I’m in Gen Ed which means I can bring support items as long as they are built by me. Does that mean designed and built by me or simply built by me?”

 

“Built," replied Nezu instantly, "if you were in the support course you’d have to design them as well.”

 

“Soooooo, just to be sure, cause I am not gifted in any way when it comes to design, trust me, I’ve tried. However, if I say…. downloaded a design, such as, just for example you understand, a spar bot and echo suit, and then using the resources available to me as a student of this fine establishment, build and practice with them….”

 

“Could I use them in the sports festival?”

 

Shouta thought his boss was going to combust with how happy he was, “Yes!” And soft paws clapped in excitement, “Yes you can!”

 

“Okay, good.” and the kid ticked something off a list and went on, question after question about how the tech worked at a basic level, how shielded was it against attacks of all kinds, how adjustable could it be made, such as different shapes and sizes of remote unit and feedback sensitivities and…

 

For a kid who thought he was no good at design, when Shouta finally called a halt Izuku and Nezu (and somehow Higari’d shown up as well), had full plans and time blocked out to work on it and Shouta was roped in for training the kid in the use of it, despite how covert his part had to be.

 

Fucking political bullshit, the worst kind, but they were so close.

 

Even Shouta didn't know all the parts, all the permutations, but nothing rode right now on this kid in the festival other than his own plans, now hooked into Nezu’s, because, for all how insane it sounded…..

 

The kid was small, easily a third less mass than the usual kids his age, quirkless, was reasonable at self defense - and would get better - and frighteningly adaptable and intelligent yet would die in an instant in limelight heroics, if a villain didn't kill him, one of the commission's own tools would.

 

Yet tech, which most heroes sneered at, might change the entire game for this kid.

 

This, in Shouta’s not so humble opinion, was going to be…. interesting.

*

The child was a delight.

 

Watching Shouta escort him away, Nezu spent a moment to wish he could treat this student the same as all the others, before letting that go into the simmering burn of his emotions.

 

Rage.

 

It drove him.

 

Reaching out to contacts, brokers, all the various pieces of the Great Plan, students across the past two decades now all grown up and in all the places he needed them to be.

 

One final teacher remained to block his way.

 

The instant that one fell, the commission would suddenly see - he’d make sure of it even - that all their control pieces in Nezu’s empire were gone and then, like the powerful always did when threatened, they’d panic.

 

And attack.

 

They would attack a school as famous as his one, that he now owned outright, the final confirmation had just fallen into his inbox like the treasure it was.

 

Pouring a fresh cuppa with hands that only slightly shook, after this was over he really might need a vacation!

*

Six weeks until the sports festival.

 

Six weeks and not just one plan but several.

 

Six weeks and information no student his age should ever possess.

 

Six weeks and he might actually pull it off, because now….

 

Now Izuku had help!

 

Looking at the so called Lab Partner he’d been assigned - and hadn’t his current home room teacher looked like she’d bitten a lemon when he’d handed the permission slip, signed by the head of Support itself to her, the poisoned sweetness as she’d said, “Oh how sweet, they do know how pointless helping you is, don't they dear? What with you having no future at all, being quirkless as you are? They do know, don’t they?”

 

Good thing he’d watched those videos Aizawa-sensei’d assigned him, because those, plus the feeling of support/trust already given to him kept him calm, and he smiled just as sweetly up at her and said, “How is it pointless helping me, Amara-sensei, please, will you explain it to me?”

 

Half the class were cringing by the time she was done, never raising her voice, and not long before Izuku would have been in tears, or screaming in rage, or playing into her hands in a dozen different ways, not least of which was believing her.

 

Now however he smiled beautifically (he’d even practiced the expression) and said, “I think you’re wrong in every possible way, and your words simply highlight your deep seated bias and bigotry.  Having said that though, you are in a position of power and should know better than to let that nasty stuff in your heart show through, I’m impressionable, think how your words affect me.”

 

“May I please be excused now, I don’t like to keep a good teacher waiting.”

 

She blew like a volcano, but it was an implosion, rather than magma and pyroclastic flow, so much more dangerous as she pointed to the door and said, “Go on, Izu-chan, get out and waste someone else's time.”

 

Carefully angling so she’d not be able to get a hit on him if she tried, Izuku raised his head a bit more and said, "Please don’t call me that, only people I love get to do that, my name for you is Midoriya!”

 

Then he slid out the door before she could say a single word more, breathed a gasp of fresh air in the hallway, fighting the urge to cry with relief of getting out of there, he gave himself a solid c plus for adding the word good in front of teacher, cause that was a sting indeed, and in a fit of madness he gave himself a B plus for correcting her use of his name.

 

Now though, he’d have to watch her, because that expression was nasty, and promised pain.

*

Scarred doors met his eyes as he reached Support, and Power Loader handed him over to one of his own students and….

 

The girl’d studied him for a long moment, then said, “Quirkless.”

 

“Yep,” tilting his chin higher, “that’s me.”

 

The girl leaned in a bit closer, eyes and face almost frighteningly intent, and finally said, “Do you have any idea how amazing the babies we’re going to make together will be?”

 

A moment of existential dread and Izuku carefully asked, “Precognitive quirk?” cause he liked boys soooo much more than girls, girls were pretty yes but, just, not his thing but…..

 

“No, funky eyes and a techno bent.”

 

“So, by babies you mean…?”

 

Patting the blueprint she breathed the word, “Inventions.”

 

“Good, good to know, now, we are not inventing - ” which is as far as he got when she slammed both hands down and yelled loud enough to roll a few things off the table, “OF COURSE WE ARE!!!"

 

Being tugged over to a computer interface workstation, she said, “Now, watch, we need to make your away feature - that’s what we’ll call the droid interface so we can talk about it around the dweebs - but it has to be your height, you don't have time to make it AND learn to use it if it’s got a different eye level than you!”

 

“And see see see here, balance is the key, how many times does the sports festival have something needing extra nimbleness?”

 

Running right over his trying to answer, because the answer was ALWAYS she nodded like her head might fall off! “YES, so time CRUNCH!!! ”

 

“Look, see, the human brain is amazing, but learning to remote ballance on TWO LEGS is too much, this’ll take at least three weeks to build so you only have three weeks to learn it so FOUR LEGS, if we start with four then after the SF you can upgrade with all new features!”

 

“Go grab me file stick A11-TW9, we’ll start with a parts recipe and go from there.”

 

“You don’t have anywhere to be today do you?”

 

Thinking of his old empty dirty leaky shed, he laughed and said, “No, nowhere at all.”

 

“Goood,” and the girl gave a softer, more real in a way smile, and repeated,” Gooooood! Cause we gonna rock da world!”

Izuku gave up on sleep after day two.

 

Mei Mei

(she insisted he call her that after a spirited debate, which he won, about how his away feature needed to be smaller than him, to keep the mass the same but how losing a few inches would....)

showed him a crawl space filled with blankets, introduced him to the after hours snack service, and by that point even a hero was powerless to get them to leave.

 

However, they both got a stern talking to and Izuku braved his bastard relations to get a special project permission slip filled out because he wanted no part in what might await him if he didn't do this properly.

*

“Won't see you for three weeks?” His uncle stared down at him, "Good, give it here.”

 

They’d stopped being physical when he was about ten, two years of it though still had him on eggshells around them, not knowing that it was a hero who’d seen the bruises on his face and talked to them about it, one day when they were doing the weekly shopping, while they'd sent him to pick out the weeks fruit.

 

His guardians good luck was they were an inexperienced hero, so took their words of clumsy child falling down in the playground for the truth but from then on they didn't risk hitting him again.

 

But their words were just as bad, worse even so Izuku breathed a sigh of relief when Aunt came in, talking about her day and the new supervisor and all the shit she never shut up about.

 

Later, as he packed his stuff into hiding, grateful and excited for time away from it all, instead of trying to sleep he simply got on a train and headed back to UA, yes it was late, like, pitch black dark but he didn't want to be here anymore.

 

Leaning back as the train rocketed along, he never noticed falling sound asleep.

*

A conductor woke him, at the end of the line and the end of service for the day.

 

Blinking, Izuku felt a jolt of panic, a stranger was close, the train was stopped, the entire space was empty and “Whoah, easy kid, do you have a phone?”

 

“Ummmm yes?”

 

“Good, do you have anyone to call to come get you?”

 

A blank frozen moment because the relations would die before doing something like that but, a brief lecture from his favorite hero not too long ago and four phone numbers to memorize, and a clear laying down of what would happen if he was in trouble and DIDN'T call one of the numbers had him reluctantly pulling out his phone.

 

Old, cracked, memory alone letting him know where the faded away numbers were, and he prayed no one answered as it rang and rang and, “Izuku, what’s wrong?”

 

“Oh, ummmm, sorry, I was stupid, fell asleep on the train,” he was crying now, almost impossible to speak and the phone was removed from his hands, tissues replacing it, and a one sided conversation and then he and the very nice woman sat on a bench until a small, battered, nondescript vehicle pulled up.

 

Even then the woman didn't stop doing her job, insisting on seeing some identification before handing him over.

 

Trying so hard to not cry, to just bow and apologize for being so much trouble, he was blindsided by a big hug and, “I’m proud of you, calling for help is never easy.”

 

He was asleep only a few minutes into the drive, and only woke up as the sun was rising.

 

Other than the lecture on planning things out in full, because “Sitting in UA square all night long is NOT a good plan, Little Listener, not no way, no how!”

 

Feeling a bit steamrolled from meeting Present Mic first thing in the morning, he’d been given a clean set of uniforms to put on, shown to the shower, and once all clean and dressed, fed to the bursting point while the bright hero chatted and fended off cats, and Aizawa-sensei spoke in grunts, ate with his eyes closed, fended off cats just as if he had them open, and eventually Izuku started his school day, still dazed from lack of sleep and wondering if that was how most families worked.

 

He really wasn't sure anymore but it’d been nice.

 

Seeing his most hated teacher as she strolled into the room, he felt a shiver of actual fear as she gazed for a moment at him, before turning and doing morning announcements.

 

An endless morning of poisoned jabs, not just at him but at everyone dreaming of making it far enough in the festival to be noticed, Izuku knew not a single one of them had the drive or desire to do more than dream but it was okay for kids to dream!

 

Okay for adults to dream too!

 

Just to dream, to wish, to imagine what it’d feel like to do it, even if you never would, but the bitch dripped poisoned honey around the room like a malignant bee and finally let the class rest for a moment when the literature teacher came in.

 

An easy class, yet Izuku enjoyed it because it was never boring.

 

Even better, his new schedule had him for the next two hours in the support department, and then he had one hour for physical training, and then two more hours with Mei Mei and if they were lucky, they’d manage to get two more hours before being forcibly dragged out of the building.

 

Still not sure where he’d actually be sleeping, other than a maintenance tunnel maybe, Izuku shrugged and decided to not care, food and shelter and a project steadily eating his entire focus, that was enough.

*

It was later, when he and Mei Mei and the rest’d been kicked out of the support department to “GO EAT!!! Cause if you gremlins don't eat something right the hell now I’ll lock you out for TWO BLOODY DAYS!!!”

 

A stampede of support students jammed the doors for a laughing moment and then they were all headed for the cafe.

 

“Oh loook, it’s the reject brigade, do you think they actually believe they have a hope in the sports festival?”

 

The words brought all of them to a screeching halt, because, “What the fuck?”

 

Tina said it for them all, and for a moment everything was still, and then one of the five facing the six of them drawled, “I was wondering, is it cheaper to buy one of you for a sex toy, cause some of you’d be not too bad for that, looks wise anyway or to commission one of you to make a good one?”

 

Someow, the hall was crowded now, and it was hard to breath, and the little voice in his head screamed “CALL AIZAWA-SENSEI!” and instead of obeying it, he said fuck that shit and landed a sweet sweet punch right on the sexist bastards nose!

 

It was the signal for an all out brawl, and it was dirty, and chaotic and Izuku pulled Mei Mei and Tina back behind him as she took a foot to the ribs so he spun and lashed out and loads of other students were there and fighting along with the support kids and then -

 

Ice cold water!

 

Hammering down onto the entire screaming raging fighting mob!

 

An absolute waterfall of icy water drenched the entire hallway, bringing the riot to an instant end.

 

“Oh fuck.”

 

The words were soft, from one of the kids wearing hero course pips, and Izuku agreed because....

 

Aizawa-sensei was always so comforting, even now when he was radiating smoking displeasure, and Power Loader-sensei was there too, collecting his kids, and several other teachers gathered up clusters of kids, Nezu-sama even showed up, taking the ones who’d started it away with him and Hound Dog, leaving two other groups of hero course students, all of them first years, their sensei’s taking them away too.

 

Which left Izuku and four other students, all clearly belonging ot Aizawa-sensei, who was radiating -

 

Actually, Izuku wasn't sure, because yes the man looked disappointed and …. Something.

 

Resolving to do an instant brushing up on reading facial expressions and body language because he had no idea what the man was feeling, regardless, it surely spelled doom for them but, was Izuku supposed to go with them, but he wasn't a hero student, but -

 

“Izuku, with me, you four as well.”

 

Relief at having that much direction Izuku fell in behind them all, but one of them, long dark hair pulled into a ponytail now looking like she'd gone backwards through a tornado, dropped back and took his hand, holding it as if it was the most natural thing in the world.

 

And seeing how the other three were holding hands too, maybe it was?

 

It really did make him feel better, so he hoped it helped her too as they reached a door that was still scary, despite all the good times he’d had behind it lately.

 

Not willing to speak up, lest he make it worse, he stayed silent when Aizawa-sensei said, “Explain.”

 

Everyone else stayed silent too and the teacher sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, and if his head hurt as bad as Izuku’s, then he felt really sorry for the teacher.

 

“Right, starting over, injuries.  And if I find an injury you didn't tell me about that will be five extra you earn for yourselves, so, injuries?”

 

Confirmation on where this was going made everything exactly zero percent better!

 

Slowly raising his hand, Izuku looked up, and then right back down again, because the look he received in turn made his stomach go all squiggly and the floor really did need him to keep an eye on it but he managed to say, “Ummmm, at some point I kinda fell and got kicked, here” - pointing to several places, all of them aching but not too bad - “here and here and on my back, feels burning, like maybe acid but strong vinegar rather than……”

 

“Ummmm yeah, right, and my, I got,” he rubbed gently along his jaw, “punched, here, hurts.”

 

“Good, thank you, let's see.”

 

Being carefully examined as his heart slowed down at last, nothing was judged dangerous, an acid neutralizing cream rubbed on for Izuku, bruise cream, a pain pill and a bottle of water seemed to be enough for the rest of them as Sensei checked each one over, Aoyama giving a mournful, "My sparkle Sensei, it is dimmed.”

 

Izuku’s sparkle felt pretty dimmed too as they then got to tell their point of view of the entire debacle and then were each pointed to, and then a silent finger directing them to corners, or in Izuku’s case as the room only had four, to a blank spot on the wall.

 

Once in place stern words, “Time starts now.” and then silence fell like a clap of doom.

 

Trying to focus, to think, to plan, surely there was something he could do to get them out of it, but.... he’d thrown the first punch! There was no getting out of that, and the dark haired girl, he’d seen her roundhouse kick one of the bastards right into a wall!

 

And the sparkle one, he’d crashed into the legs of another, yelling something in french it sounded like, and Izuku didn't know much of that language but he did knew enough to know it was shockingly rude and utterly heartfelt in defence of Izuku’s very own lab partner!

 

The others had fought, clearly, but Izuku’d not gotten to see them in action, maybe once this was all behind him, his bottom clenched just at the words but he forced himself mentally onwards, not realizing in the silence everyone could hear his soft voice -

 

Maybe Nezu-sama would let him see the footage? He’d never been in a mob fight before, it’d been awful but he’d learned so much, kicking that one kid behind his knees and a few good hits to the ribs got them right out of the fight so that was pretty good, cause all the bodies made big motions impossible without hitting friend rather than foe and -

 

Bit by bit he worked though to reaching DR when, “Times up, all of you, to me.”

 

And oh.

 

Oh no.

 

His tiny sound of distress was matched by everyone, because Aizawa-sensei was holding a paddle.

 

He was going to - “No Izuku, you are not going to die, nor are any of the rest of you.”

 

“However.”

 

Dark eyes looked at each of them, “When is it okay to escalate a fight from verbal to physical?”

 

Swallowing in dread, Izuku managed to whisper, “Never, sensei, never ever.”

 

“That's right Izuku, so, in that situation, what should all of you have done, and I’m not just talking about you five, but everyone in the riot.”

 

Izuku tried, but his voice failed and he really needed to figure out who everyone was when the blond kid jerked his chin up and said, voice almost a squeak, “Run away.”

 

Everyone looked at him and he said, “What? It's what we should have done.”

 

Then, when they all kept staring he suddenly rolled his eyes, “No, shit, not like that!”

 

“Then what mon ame?”

 

“We should have looked those fuckers right in the eyes, memorizing their faces, and then gone and gotten a teacher, like, RUN and gotten a teacher, cause someone was gonna throw the first punch and damn, lil green dude, that was some right hooooooh yeah ummmm, sorry.”

 

The kid wilted and Izuku stepped right out of the line up and over to him, giving him a hug and saying, “It’s okay, Aizawa-sensei knows I threw the first punch, and by now he knew exactly why I did, even if I know I shouldn't have.”

 

“Cause you are right, we should have grabbed Mei Mei and the rest of the support gremlins and just fucked out of there and instead I punched that shit for brains and now we’re all in trouble!”

 

Turning while still holding tightly to the pretty boy's hand, Izuku said, “It’s my fault.”

 

When his teacher would have said something Izuku shook his head and said, “No, not the reason for fighting, that wasn't my fault at all, but I know better, I knew it then, I even thought about how I needed to get you, I could have called or even YELLED, Nezu-sama would have picked it up in the security program.”

 

“I started the fight though, I punched first, so I should get the punishment, not them.”

 

Then all hell broke loose when the four raised their voices, insisting they get theirs and no one else should get any and Shouta let it go on for a bit, they needed to get some of the fight out of their system, and arguing over who deserved to be paddled more was, he guessed, one way to do it.

Calling a halt to it when they got a bit too loud, Shouta gave a cough and they all froze, turning back to him, eyes flickering to the paddle, to his face, paddle again and then firmly to the floor.

 

Yeah, he remembered being right where they were now, yet sadly his hands were tied, not just by the clear rules on how to handle this situation, but because they had bloody well earned what they had coming.

 

“Fighting in the halls is not allowed.”

 

“Escalating verbal to physical in a fight is not allowed.”

 

“De-escalating is what should have been done in that situation, or removing yourselves and others from it, either would have worked.”

 

“Nothing you did was unexpected however, you are all first years, even you Izuku,” - intentionally using the kids given name, he saw the minute relaxation across huddled shoulders - “there were over twenty students in that hallway fighting, so no, your actions and reactions were totally normal.”

 

“It was, however, wrong.”

 

“Right now I’m going to give you a lesson to hopefully remind you what to do the next time this happens, because it will.”

 

“That wall there, put your toes on the line on the floor, pull down your pants and underwear, bend over and place your hands on the wall.”

 

The horrified expressions almost had him laughing, almost, instead he raised an eyebrow and pointed to the line and, reluctance in every one of them, they followed his order.

 

“Ummmmm sensei, what about my skirt?”

 

Aoyama asked the question, yet three of the five had chosen to wear the skirt option today. “Shorts and underwear down, I’ll tuck the skirt out of my way.”

 

A mumble that might have been thank you, or fuck me, or kill me now please, and Shouta let it pass.

 

A few more directions and he had them lined up, two paces between each to give him working room, and he let them stand for a moment before speaking.

 

“For fighting in the halls you've earned ten with the paddle.”

 

A quiet sob and he shook his head with fondness. He couldn't go easy on them, they were solidly in the wrong, but he’d chosen the smallest effective paddle to use, meaning it would take two spanks to equal one of the larger, heftier paddles.

 

Effectively cutting the spanking in half, even if they wouldn't realize it until they were older, and met that same larger, heftier paddle for something equally teenaged stupid.

 

Stepping to the first in line, Aoyama, he lifted and tucked their skirt out of his way and said, firmly, "We do not escalate a fight!”

 

Firmly landing two matching spanks on the pale and shivering back side, his kid lept and danced with an “Owwww Sensei ow ow ow!”

 

Shouta stepped two steps forward, tucked another skirt out of the way, repeating: “We do not escalate a fight!” And landed two more spanks, this time Denki lept and yelped and owowowwwwwwed!

 

So dramatic, he thought with affection, as he once again tucked a skirt out of his way, Jiro this time and she dropped her head with a whimper and, seeing she had a bloody tattoo on her bottom she bloody well should, that was so against the rules as to be worth a spanking all on its own!

 

But he ignored it as if it was done in invisible ink - Hizashi was his best friend, and he’d gotten his first tat at twelve! - and repeated the not so magic words, and landed two sharp spanks, leaving her too yelping and dancing at the sting.

 

Because yes, even this little paddle stung like a bitch!

 

Next came Izuku, and how kind of Momo to have put him between her and Jiro, and he was already crying, both hands pressed so hard to the wall it was like he was trying to phase through it but, just like the others, Shouta simply said the words, landed two sharp spanks, and Izuku yelped, hissing and gasping as his feet shuffled frantical in place.

 

Momo next and she too danced and cried out and that was two spanks each, out of ten.

 

Sighing as he returned to the beginning of the line again, this time he said, “Fighting in the halls of UA is not allowed! Nor is fighting anywhere on school grounds!” Because he’d seen the tiny twitch to Izuku’s shoulders, and Denki as well, loophole kids indeed so he neatly stitched that one shut and instead of repeating the words each time, he smartly delivered two spanks, stepped forward, and repeated the procedure, until all of them were crying and desperately dancing their feet at the sting and the speed of it.

 

All of them were prone to getting lost in their heads, or spiraling, so he stepped to the beginning again and said, “We do not use physical violence when simply getting help will do the job!”

 

This time again he said it right before he landed the twin spanks on each now pinkening bottom, and by the time he was done with the last two all of them were sobbing.

 

‘Been there, done that, remember the fucking fire!’ He thought as he, once again, returned to the beginning where Aoyama gasped, “No, please Sensei, please we are all so sorry, please no more!”

 

We! His kids, they never failed to step up for each other, we are all sorry, yeah, Shouta knew they all really were sorry but this lesson was important!

 

“ALWAYS come get me, ALWAYS call me, your safety is important! I will back you up in any situation, this included, because not only do we not escalate a situation to violence, your safety is important to me!”

 

Letting those words sink in he added, “So you will remember this moment the next time anything like today happens. Your"  SPANK "Safety"  SPANK "Is"  SPANK "Important!"  SPANK!

 

Wailing Aoyama rose onto tip toes and almost let go the wall, only Shouta reaching out and pressing them gently into place kept him there, saying “Remember, dropping your hands earns you extra.”

 

Waiting for his kid to recover enough to remain in place he kissed the top of his head, said, “Be brave.” And moved over to Denki who already knew exactly what came next.

 

Grateful the room was quirk dampened he had to catch Deni’s hands too as the final spank landed, giving the reminder to keep them in place.

 

This was an exercise in self control, reinforced by the solid fire in their bottoms, a lesson they’d remember for a long time hopefully, just as he and Hizashi and his two other idiot friends still remembered when they were in this situation for the exact same reason!

 

Damn, he wanted to rub his own ass at the memory but instead he delivered the words and spanks to Jiro, who kept her hands firmly in place, sobbing out heartfelt sorries and he kissed the top of her head too, just like the others and moved forward to Izuku.

 

Who was shaking so hard Shouta was deeply concerned, bone shaking shudders and for him he placed his hands over the tiny ones against the wall, saying “You can.”

 

The kid twisted to look up at him, and Shouta smiled, “You earned it, and you will stand here and take your medicine properly, because you are strong enough.”

 

The mix of stern and kind, and Izuku nodded, shivering slowing a bit, and just like Hizashi so long ago, the kid was brave enough to take what he’d earned, even if he, like Hizashi, YOWLLLED as the paddle kissed down, “Your” SPANK “Safety” SPANK “Is” SPANK “Important” SPANK!

 

Incoherent babbling sorries and pleases and never do it agains and Izuku too got a kiss to the top of his head and the final one, Momo, who was always so poised and reserved, all just a front, hiding who she really was, but now she gasped, “I’m so sorry sensei!” and he placed his hands over hers too, and said, “Remember this Momo, this is a lesson you will use almost every day for the rest of your life.”

 

"Your" SPANK "Safety"  SPANK "Is"  SPANK "Important"  SPANK!

 

Dancing on her toes, yelping cries as she too began to sob, and thank the gods he was done!

 

Letting a final kiss fall onto her head, he gathered them up into his arms and simply held them in a bunch as they broke out in renewed weeping.

 

In that moment he felt like two people, the him just finished giving spanks, and the him who’d just received them, yet there were fifteen years in the middle.

 

Mentally consigning the rest of the world to perdition, he sat them down at last in the big squashy beanbags the room came equipped with, and got them hot chocolate sludge, him too, and then proceeded to work them through it fully, step by step, and then as they nodded off he covered them up.

 

Sighing, he finished his own spicy wonderful happy making sludge with a smile, and suddenly wondered, did Izuku know he was spending the next three weeks with him?

 

Turned out no, no the kid did not!

*

Shouta hadn't expected three weeks with a quiet kid to be difficult in any way, and nor was it.

 

Izuku was sparring with actual spar bots an hour each day, Shouta easing a few times a week into that role to make sure he was still advancing in his skills but mostly he was working with the rest of the hellspawn because Izuku was fully occupied in building one of the damned sets.

 

In all the classes Shouta’d ever shepherded into heroics, he’d never yet had a class like this, and he once again gave Denki the now familiar lesson on NOT going over his limits he knew already he’d have to go and drag Izuku by the ear out of the support department just to have enough time for a late dinner.

 

Because he and his new best friend were so deep into this project, they’d never even noticed that bitch of a teacher’d finally done the deal and gotten herself sent to jail, rather than to Hound Dog for an unforgettable chastisement.

 

Calling on an old student to put what was effectively a fucking hit out on a present day student? A student belonging to Nezu?

 

Yeah, she was gonna rot in jail!

 

Izuku though was heading to a trip across Shouta’s knee, or Hizashi’s if Shouta was occupied spanking the shit out of another student, cause they were all going so far over the top with training for the damned festival it was going to do Shouta’s head in!

 

Snatching Tsu out of the way of cascading ice, calling the entire class into a line to give them a final talking to, and this time he looked each one in the eyes and said, “Last warning, the next time one of you tries to kill someone, or yourself, getting ready for a FIELD DAY I’ll be using my paddle on you and making sure you stand up to eat for the next three bloody days!”

 

Breathing a sigh as they all focused properly at last, he worked them hard, yet left them enough energy for the essay he’d assigned.

 

A much lighter workload came into effect the final two weeks before the festival, but even now teachers were cutting back on homework.

 

Now, if he could just keep them safe for a little bit longer, the entire stupid thing would be over!

 

Maybe he'd go with Nezu on holiday when this was all over? Cause by damn they both needed it at this point!

 

Notes:

_____________________________

The entire down fall of the Hero Commission and the restructuring of society is going full guns right out of sight, but Nezu is working hard to keep the impact of it all away from his students as best he can.

In this AU, adults are working hard to let kids be just that, KIDS!

Chapter 4

Notes:

I wasn't gonna post the finish today but it's cold, like, COLD!!! So spent most of the day cozied up to the log burner.

Here you go, just a bit of the writing I got done today! lol

_____________________

 

“We did it.”

 

Looking at the gleaming items ready and waiting, Izuku repeated, “We did it?”

 

“Yeah, WE DID IT!!! Now,” Mei Mei damned near feral with excitement, “testing!”

 

“Hatsumei Mei and Midoriya Izuku, I KNOW you were not about to go test brand new tech without alerting a teacher, were you?”

 

Being used to the utter lying little rugrats all support students were, Higari was utterly unprepared for Izuku to say, “Ummmmm yes? I’m so sorry Power Loader-sensei, I just got all excited cause, we did it, look at it, we did it!”

 

Almost bouncing in place Higari laughed at how eager the kid was, and then asked in a loud tone, “WHAT IS THE PROTOCOL FOR WORKING WITH BRAND NEW TECH?”

 

Letting the entire class chant the rules and procedures, as well as insisting they all finish with the justly earned consequences of breaking those same rules, once they were done, as a group, with medics on stand-by, they all headed out for the testing range, Shouta on his way to meet them in the gym.

 

He was the unacknowledged expert in shadow tech, he could do things with an echo suit no one, least of all the designers, would ever even imagine was possible, so he was the best for the task.

 

Even if watching him don a suit built for a tiny kid had several of the teachers who’d snuck in to watch muffling giggles.

*

Simply letting the suit feedback at standing rest, Shouta hummmmed, so far so good.

 

The remote unit was different to the normal one he usually used but he approved.  Hind legs slaved yet independently reactive to the front legs - he'd gotten a blow by blow from Izuku of the argument leading to its having four legs, and laughed a few times cause the two kids together were just funny - two arms as a nod to a human blueprint, hooked feet that could splay out to cross soft soils or mud, could come to a point, could climb and hang and…. the kids did good.

 

It all fed back properly as the diagnostic powering-on sequence ended, even if it was silly tiny on him!

 

Letting his own body fall into a ready stance, he put the visor down and worked through forms, letting the nerve feedback give him the illusion of being a different shape, different height, different everything.

 

He loved it, loved echo suit tech, it was so niche yet he’d thought for years it was tailor made for heroics, especially for people with mobility issues who wanted to be heroes anyway.

 

A way to walk with no legs, a way to run for those who couldn't even stand,but up until now no one he'd ever suggested it to have agreed.

 

Dancing now, the pinch and chafe of a suit too small, yet they’d made allowances for it with extra long straps and clasps, and Shouta slowly warmed up the bot, seeing through its eyes, feeling with its nerves, climbing and dancing and jumping and running and sinking like a stone in the pool only to climb dripping to shake itself off at the other side.

*

Giving feedback to the two inventor builders, a few things needed addressing, yet the suit could be used, so they’d work on tweaking it during school hours, and after classes he and Izuku would work on learning to use it.

 

It was being called a mobility aid, used by a student who was differently abled.

 

And as Shouta was an expert, he was the logical person to teach said student.

 

In the background, adding to the stress and draining sucking soul crushing exhaustion that made each day damned near hell, Nezu was now in full on attack and the commission was going down!!!

 

Had already lost UA fully to the fuzzy menace, only Nezu’s people now held the national school board, Nezu too controlled the courts, every judge hired across almost fifteen years were his, lawyers, medics, heroes, reporters, social media experts - you name it, Nezu controlled it or every key player in it.

 

Shouta didn't know all the parts in play, he simply did his parts when directed to do so and tried to keep his students from killing themselves and each other getting ready for a stupid game!

 

Just that day he’d taken Shouto aside and, failing all else, had spanked that stubborn backside bright bright red!

 

Because he didn't have to use bloody flames but if he could make them, he had to control them!

 

It was a breakthrough moment, and now the reason for his student not using one half of his quirk was dumped onto Nezu, who’d looked Shouta dead in the eyes, one of his own twitching slightly, and said, “Good, right, excellent, I’ll add that to column seventy nine.”

 

And then disappeared up a vent leaving Shouta planning a forced vacation for his boss, because he damned well needed it!

*-*

Suiting up for the first time, Aizawa-sensei talked Izuku through the process, together checking the fit for each section, having already been assured of a spanked butt if he lied about how any of it felt, it took three days just to suit up!

 

Each time a piece fit poorly, or a catch was in the wrong place, or a feedback loop didn't light up green on the diagnostic tablet and back they went to the work station at the side of testing gym nine to fix one more bloody thing.

 

But finally, Izuku stood side by side, he in the echo suit, his away feature standing poised and ready, and slowly and carefully he worked through the beginning forms, talking all the time.

*-*

Living through another body was a trip and a half!

 

One day he'd have infrared and ultraviolet vision, as well as the usual human spectrum.

 

He’d see in total blackness, hear the smallest of sounds, might even feel the world fed back to him through pings of electricity and sound alone.

 

For now simply learning to use four legs and two arms not his own was enough!

*-*

Sitting down with a wince, Mei Mei laughed at him, saying a heartless “Told ya so!”

 

“Yeah, well….”

 

“Uh huh, told you he’d catch you and what did I say he’d do?”

 

Letting his head fall onto the table, curling his arms around his head, he managed to say, “Power Loader Sensei got you too, last week.”

 

“Yep, buy my ass is all better, and you JUST got spanked for, what was it again?”

 

“I hate you.”

 

“No you don't, and now you won’t try to sneak in extra working time with the unit.”

 

Looking in the huge indignant gaze that had just lifted to stare at her in shock, she grinned, "Yep, hypocrite to the end me but you gotta admit Zu, we both need some sleep!”

 

A quiet, “That you do!” had them both yelping, only to dive into two heroes arms as Power Loader came to take her for food, and Aizawa-sensei came to make sure Izuku get some rest.

*-*

Living with a teacher was strange, and scary.

 

Not scary that it was an adult who followed their own rules, and enforced the clearly set rules of the school as well, but just everything was new, and strange, and scary but mostly in good ways.

 

Watching the man do his evening routine, eating and a walk and interesting programs on the telly or books or music and always cats, six, an abundance of riches indeed as Izuku helped feed and brush and entertain them.

 

Even having earned ten with a paddle after the mini riot, so bad, so awful!

 

But….

 

As bad as it was, and he’d danced on the tips of his toes with the sting of it and cried so hard, ow ow OWWW!!!

 

But, pondering it.....

 

Aizawa-sensei could have used a big paddle.

 

They’d earned it, talk about stupid bone headed things to do, a full on riot in hall number thirteen B?

 

Yeah, the mouthy fuckers who started it really were out of line but Izuku himself had escalated it and then all the others JUMPED on that opening like a duck on a June bug so…

 

Reaching around and rubbing at the remembered burn, even he agreed they’d all earned it.

 

So why use a -

 

Not small, cause ouch, not a small paddle but so many were bigger, and they’d….

 

Earned it.

 

But Aizawa-sensei’d paddled them, it hurt, Izuku would never ignore that loud voice in his head again when it claxon-ed that he needed to get an adult, especially now he had adults to actually get!

 

Small paddle - not even knowing his hands moved as he measured his estimate of the paddle of doom in the air, one hand and a bit wide only, and then from memory of having seen one, the paddle size he’d have expected to have gotten for what they’d done.

 

That one covered his entire bottom, and “Ohhhhhh, oh wow, he did, but no, he didn't, but it would have been, ouch, so ouch so bad but it was bad, I’ll never forget it, learned soooo better but, it would have been so much worse but, I don't, I don't, I just don't….”

 

“What don’t you understand, Izuku?”

 

Leaping with a yelp as his not being alone crashed into his head, as did the fact he’d been talking aloud.

 

“No you don't, if you apologize you’ll have to do two litter pans!”

 

Blinking in shock at the threat, “AND, right now, before we get to what's bothering you, what is your talking aloud called?”

 

“Ummmm, a verbal coping method?”

 

“Goood, that's right. And what is it a sign of?”

 

Feeling his face heat with the rage of several suns, Izuku managed to squeak the work, “Intel, ummmm, intelligence?”

 

“That’s right, now, say it again as a statement, rather than a question.”

 

It was so hard but, by taking a deep breath of air, Izuku managed to say again, "Intelligence!”

 

“Good, that’s exactly right.”

 

“Now, what don’t you understand?”

 

And now every piece of Izuku was exploding with mortification but, having already seen Aizawa-sensei “remind” a student to answer the question, and not wanting to learn if he’d do it to Izuku too - because he was pretty certain he would - another deep breath and….

 

“Why the smaller paddle?”

 

*

 

As long as Shouta’d been a hero, and a teacher, no one had ever called him out on using a small paddle, ever.

 

Kids - and not so kids as well - were just grateful the spanking was over, they didn't analyze it!  Was the kid giving, like, points or something?

 

“Why do you think I’d use a smaller paddle?”

 

When in doubt, keep them talking.

 

The kid almost squeaked the words, “Cause it’d be bad but not as bad as a big one?”

 

“Go on.”

 

“Yeah, like, ummmmm, we really earned it, earned worse even, me especially and no, no no no I don’t want more, learned, like, SOOOOO better, learned better better better!”

“It hurt!” a sniffle as Izuku remembered how it felt, innocent wood smacking down and the FIRE! “Yeah, it hurt, and I’ll never forget it but, keeping my hands up was even harder, staying in one spot for all of it cause I’d earned it but didn't want it!”

 

Wiping eyes now spilling tears just remembering how hard it’d been keeping his hands on the wall, “But keeping in place, keeping our hands on the wall, it was a self control exercise too, cause we’re going to be heroes,” (hiding a smile at how his kid didn't even try to hide how certain he was of his goals now, growth indeed) “and heroes HAVE to have self control so it worked.”

 

“Sooooo worked.”

 

A hand reached around and rubbed again at the remembered burn, “Yeah, it worked.”

 

Looking up at Shouta, Izuku gave a hesitant smile, “I think you used the smaller paddle cause it’d hurt, but the spanking would be over faster, cause,” he winced, “you gave two spanks, and then two, and then two again and then finished with four but, if you'd done it with a big paddle, it wouldn't have been a spank on each side for two, it’d have been a spank across the entire thing, TWICE!”

 

“So, it’d have been like, double what we got!”

 

“Is that why?”

 

“It is.  You are all young, you’d earned that spanking, thoroughly earned it, yet discipline is designed to teach, not traumatize or injure.”

 

“What I gave you is exactly what you earned, and needed, both to learn not to do it again, but to pay for what you’d done.”

 

“How do you feel about it now?”

 

“Relieved.”

 

The word was out almost before the question was finished, and Izuku looked as surprised by his answer as Shouta was by the speed of it.

 

Repeating, “Relieved,” Izuku paused and frowned and said, “and stronger? Cause it’s like when I fell into that verbal trap, and got sent to you, and watched videos later and read articles, the next time she tried to get me like that I was strong enough to not fall for it.”

 

“It was scary going to DR, cause it always is, cause ouch, no fun, no fun at all, but it made me stronger, and now….”

 

“Now?”

 

“Next time that happens, next time someone says something shit stupid hurtful about or to someone I like, I'll be stronger.  Stronger and better and handle it properly.”

 

“So, handle it how?”

 

“Oh,” Izuku laughed, “I’ll listen to what’s said, memorize the faces of the ones saying it, take my friend or the victim away with me, while calling for help.  And I will NOT punch them, unless all communications are down, and all surveillance equipment is down too, and there aren’t any witnesses either.”

 

“Then I might punch them first, and then do the rest of it.”

 

Shouta couldn't help it, he tipped his head back and laughed, because the kid was not wrong!  However, answering to the inner grown up in him, he did add, “If you do punch first, ten with the paddle awaits, no matter your age.” 

 

And Izuku giggled and said, "Fair!”

*-*

Three weeks to build it.

 

Three weeks to train with it.

 

Now, on an infinity floor, suits synced up and working beautifully, Izuku looked up through the visor view in his helmet at the crowds screaming in excitement.

 

Trying to ignore the changes in his life, how he now lived full time with Shouta rather than a stop gap to allow for extra training, how his family’d lost him, and access to his trust fund and inheritance which they'd been bleeding dry and now had to pay back, how the commission had been ripped wide open, gutted like a fish, roasted with all appropriate seasonings and now the chef was calling the shots cause Nezu was now in charge of the entire country!

 

So many changes, so many lives turned upside down, all of it happening with no input from Izuku, and he was trying to keep calm about how often Shouta was being sent here, there and everywhere on Nezu’s orders, how all the teachers and heroes of UA were!

It was such a relief though to have Hizashi stay with him if Shouta had to be away over night, even if he did insist he could stay alone, his new foster dad just gave him "the look" and said, "Not on my watch!"

Izuku was still trying to figure out the dynamic between the two heroes, and trying to stay out of it, but they were so good together it was stupid for them to live in two seperate places, especially when Hizashi stayed over so often he had his own room in Shouta's house!

 

But he’d gotten a few sit down talks about how to do his part with everything going on right then across the country - mostly it all boiled down to not worrying, keeping up with his work, and enjoying his time off while not slacking so that is what he was working on.

 

In order to keep things as normal as possible, the sports festival was going ahead as planned, so Izuku’s plans too were full speed ahead.

 

‘Okay brain, focus, brand new hero commission aside, we need to earn our place!’

 

Listening to the pledge given by one of the hero students, he too placed a hand across his chest and repeated the words of service, thrilled the same way every time he spoke the measured phrases.

 

He’d been assured he was going to transfer into the hero course to take his rightful place, but for his own piece of mind he wanted to earn it again, while proving an echo suit could let anyone be a hero.

*-*

Having chosen a smaller even than him final form he was only half the height of most of the contestants, yet only he and a few others were ready when the ground suddenly swept with ice.

 

A simple jump, because he’d been listening.

 

No one could watch the heroics classes and students training yet Izuku had ears and a brain, hero students were the MOST gossiped about kids out there, and now he used the information he’d gotten on them simply by paying attention, to avoid the simple quirk based double handicaps of a bottlenecked starting line and a flood of ice.

 

Because, well, the walls of the tunnel were cement, his legs easily able to penetrate and support his weight as he lept free of the ice, scrambled up and over -

 

Leaving most of the crowd behind, Izuku hit top speed and easily outpaced the front leaders.

 

Ducking under the familiar robots he rolled, dodged, lept and was past them too and he was laughing at the chasm.

 

Seriously?

 

A remembered warning to not be cocky had him spider crawling rather than running across and it was a good thing he did because his rope let loose, sending him free falling with a yell as he clamped legs arms and emergency grippers around it, while leaving two limbs free to be shock absorbers for when he hit the far wall.

 

The smell of burning rope and a glance over his shoulder let him know who'd just tried to get him out of the competition, bloody gen ed bastard, and he cursed at the lost time as he began climbing, one leg no longer responding properly.

 

The wonky limb slowed him down, by his best guess he was about eleven or twelve when -

 

“A minefield? Fucking seriously?”

 

A deep breath, a moment to calm himself down and he switched to infrared and, just like a dream, the soil was a different temperature at each mine, showing up beautifully.

 

Just before he set out a bitter tone from behind, "What the fuck?" as several explosions happened at once, a kid he’d seen a time or three and really rather liked, Izuku paused, twisting his head right round and said, “I’ll make my steps as easy to see as possible, just follow me.”

 

Leaping off in bounds instead of tiptoeing through, each time he touched down his four legs made a nicely marked square to aim for, he set a course that the kid could follow, leading in a zigzag random looking series of stepping points where a foot was safe to fall.

 

It added three minutes to his time, placing him at twenty third place, the gen ed following him twenty fourth.

 

Looking back Izuku had to laugh because he’d gained an entire group following his safe path, and Present Mic was crowing something about heroic spirits!

*

The calvary battle was so easy, especially with Shinsou helping.  Izuku’d not even let him catch his breath before he spun around and nabbed him for the inevitable group round, and combining a brainwasher, a frog tongued girl who insisted on his calling her Tsu, and a shockingly cute electricity user, with Izuku's ability to fucking fly….

 

Because why not build that into his equipment and then hold it back for just the perfect moment?

 

……they aimed at the fringe groups, let the heavy weights fight it out for the top numbers, and easily gained enough points to pass, keeping each one grabbed out of play by Tsu thrusting them skywards for Izuku to grab, easily keeping their total out of everyone else's reach.

 

At one point Izuku was tempted to try for a big number, but heroes didn't abandon their team in search of glory hogging, so he easily ignored the impulse and dove once again to snatch a new headband from Tsu’s tongue.

 

Third was a lovely place to be!

*

 

One v one however had Izuku in a near panic attack, alone in a room as he took a break, coming back to himself surrounded by blank walls and emptiness while the stage was reset.

 

He almost cried, but managed to hold it back as he ate and drank and used the loo and followed the orders he’d been given to “Rest up lil listener, everybody has to do the same thing right now as the stage is set. So don’t let me catch wind of you not resting, get me?”

 

It would be a foolish person indeed who'd ignore THAT tone so Izuku did as Hizashi’d told him to and felt much better, the quiet of the room supportive and protective now instead of oppressive.

Especially with the two notes tucked into the bento box, one from both of them, telling him how proud of him they were!

 

*

Pulling his visor down once he was back in place, he activated his away feature and squalled in shock as he skittered backwards, causing deep purple eyes to widen in equal shock and an echoing yelp as Shinsou fell on his ass and skittered away before both of them began to laugh!

 

It took them a bit to calm down but once they did there was no time to chat, the match ups were announced and, “Oh shit!”

 

Right there on the board was his name and the powerhouse of 1A, Todoroki Shouto.

 

“Well fuck me!” Izuku said, and from right beside him came, “Yeah, rest in pieces!” and at least he could laugh at something, even if it was just the deadpan humor of someone just as underdog as he was.

 

Round one, the first match up even.

 

“Well,” he tilted his head up to look at Hitoshi, grateful the kid’d insisted he use his given name, “at least I'm gonna die quick, and hey, the good news is we won't meet up, cause your quirk wont work on me using my gear, it’d have sucked so hard if we got matched up cause you’re gonna be a great hero!”

 

Trotting off he never even saw the shock, and almost hidden smile behind him.

*

Studying the wire tight figure facing him, Izuku had only an instant before a wave of ice slammed his way but….

 

It was so predictable! A clearly telegraphed motion of the students body, almost dance-like, and an easy three seconds to coil and leap and stab and Izuku was climbing.

 

Easy as anything.

 

No idea what to do next though so Izuku took a moment to just enjoy the view.

 

Poised so high up he could see the crowds now, and the announcers booth so he waved and flashed an electronic smile and got a “HEEEEY cool jump! But now what Viewpoint?”

 

Looking down at an impatient hero student Izuku waved and gave a cheeky wink, electronic face still grinning, and dodged back out of the next wave of ice’s way.

 

Using thermal vision briefly - it was a great tool but confusing at high speeds - the kid was dangerously chilled, right down to almost black in spots, and their imminent peril by quirk back lash gave Izuku a very bad idea.

 

Thrusing off, free falling, he caught himself on a curve of ice and slammed so hard into the kid's chest they both rocketed out of the ring like corks from a fizzy drinks bottle.

 

“IZUKU WINS!!!”

 

“What?”

 

Still lying on the downed heroics student, Izuku laughed and said, “Yeah, you went out first, I win.”

 

“Well, fuck me.”

 

“No thanks, I'd rather have a first date instead.”

 

“What?”

 

The absurdity of it all had Izuku cackling as he tried to get spidery legs to work right, staggering in a combined hysterical laughter and now badly damaged unit, and instead was helped upright by his former opponent.

 

Who repeated, “What?”

 

Seeing honest bafflement in the kids face, beginning to shade to hurt feelings, Izuku grabbed their hand and said, “No nonono sorry, I’m not laughing at you, just at how stupid I'm being spouting memes at you, now, are you okay?”

 

“Yes, but.... are we going on a date or not?”

 

“Do you want to?” And the words were so absurd in relation to himself that Izuku almost started laughing again but instead managed a strangled, “I could be anyone!”

 

“Yes,” they were walking now to the first aid center to be checked out after their match, “you can, I just want to know if you are someone who wants to go out with me.”

 

“Because if you don’t then it wasn't very nice of you to ask.”

 

And there it was again, under the almost icy blankness of the kids non expression, hurt.

 

“If you promise not to kill me once you know who I am and that I don't have a quirk, then yes, I know a cafe we could meet up at - ” Izuku would have said some time next week but instead - “Today? After the sports festival?”

 

Running his schedule, and plans, through his head Izuku gave a tentative, “Okay, but if I get too hurt….”

 

“Right, I’ll meet you there, if you don’t show I know it’s for a good reason.”

 

And then the ice user just turned and walked away.

 

Leaving Izuku baffled and standing in the first aid area in a mechanical body so he hastily removed himself, trying to ignore the snickers from all corners as he hunted up Mei Mei who had his spare parts for the repairs badly needed right then.

*

His next match up was the electric kid from Shouta’s class, and as his unit was already buffered and insulated against electric quirks, all Izuku did was run full tilt at the kid, ignore the eyes widening in shock, leap at full speed to pass them in the air, grabbed as he passed and used his momentum to swing his victim in a deadly arch and cast him from the ring.

 

Landing neatly on legs that he’d had his partner in crime have a look at for him between her own rounds, Izuku basked in the roar of the crowd.

*

 

His final round the hardening kid simply grabbed and threw HIM, landing him in a skidding heap of clattering metal and he laughed as he rose, or tried to, because this fall had killed the patch jobs Mei’d done, so he waved and said, “A little help?”

 

“Sure thing dude, whow, how manly to ask for help, what class are you in do you need me to take you to the medics?”

 

Deciphering the babble through partly damaged speakers, Izuku laughed and said, “No, not really, I just need to get my unit to safety and power it down.”

 

“Duuuuuude, are you a robot?”

 

“No, oh my gods no, I’m just using my away unit to fight, it’s a proof of concept for a new kind of - ”  pausing as he broke himself off Izuku said, “Ummmm, sorry, but you won so they’re gonna need you pretty quick, good luck and seriously, thank you for the help!”

 

Relieved to have his unit in a safe place, and to have made the third round, because it settled the worry in his heart that he didn't deserve his place, because now, yeah, now he knew he did!

*

Shucking the equipment with tired motions, sighing in relief at how well he’d done, he staggered over to drink about a gallon of mineral rich water to help replace some of what he’d sweated off during his matches.

 

Then, in the quiet of the auxiliary gym he ate the second bento he’d started the day with and headed out to watch the final rounds, feeling rather grateful he wasn’t in them!

*

Meeting “Call me Shouto!” in the stands and for the boy to agree he DID want to go on a date after the festival ended, Izuku was totally unprepared to suddenly be facing down an enraged Endeavour but he rolled with it, up to and including when the person now snuggled up to him said, “This is Izuku, he’s my quirkless boyfriend, now, we have an award ceremony to get through before our date," throw a mocking salute, and finish with, "catch you later daddy-o.”

 

As the entire speech was spoken in a dead level, bored as hell tone, Izuku almost died from holding in his laugh, only letting it go once they were out of the literal firing line, and even then he tried to smother it when Shouto said, “I am really sorry, I don’t know what made me say that, especially without asking first, please, if you want me to go back and - ”

 

“Oh hell no, if you need a quirkless pretend-boyfriend for the next six months just to mess with his head, I am sooooo down for that, Endeavor is a terrible hero, anything that upsets him is good!”

 

Mismatched eyes studied him intently, and then a tiny tiny uptick to almost perfect lips had Izuku blushing, "If you mean it, yes please!”

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Which is how one Midoriya Izuku got far enough in the Sports Festival to transfer to heroics with all due ceremony, gained the first of his two boyfriends - for realsies, cause the pretend bit lasted a grand total of three days - had the teachers of all five year-one heroics classes fight it out just to get him in their class - entire epics were written by students who were there to see Aizawa-sensei curb stomp his fellow teachers just so he could have his very own foster son in his class - and proved beyond a shadow of a doubt that anyone with the right equipment, mind set, and support, could be a hero!

 

And eventually Izuku married his boyfriends, not just the hot as hell Shouto but also the pretty purple Hitoshi, had a cracking career as an underground limelight hero which was every bit as complicated as it sounds, especially as it involved not one but two completely separate hero identities, and eventually retired to teach shadow tech to future heroes, which he and Mei Mei continued to perfect over the years.

 

Aizawa Shouta, who’d planned to grow old alone with his cats, pestered by his pesty best friends as and when it suited them, instead admitted his heart belonged to Hizashi when Izuku asked point blank late one night, proposed, got legally contracted to the ecstatic blond and they were so proud of their son that everyone said they'd both become insufferable to be around!

 

But with Izuku in their lives, how could they not brag!

Notes:

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The plan for Yagi and his quirk - which I never got to in the story - was to bait him into giving it to a student, kicking the fool out of UA, and then having the student transfer the quirk to someone better suited for having it.

Yagi gave it to Mirio, and because of its destructive nature, Nezu had him give it to someone totally brain dead on life support, scheduled to be turned off.

By then it was just too strong to be held by one person, All for One was properly dead - about the only thing Yagi managed to do right in this AU - and the quirk died a quiet death with its final host.