Chapter Text
His quirk was gone.
That’s what was messing with his head. Everything else? The nearly dying on his internship, the terrifying supervillain having his body plucked out of the rubble, being brought here to a fucked up underground lab to face terrifying human experimentation? All within the realm of expected when he signed up to be a hero. But his quirk? That was going to take a minute.
Oboro wasn’t sure how long he’d been here. It’d been at least a couple of days between the villain attack–watching Shou protect those kids as the rubble came down around him–and waking up to fluorescent lights and the smell of antiseptic. Since then it could have been a week or a year. He was in and out constantly, sometimes waking to find marks on his skin that weren’t there before, passing out again and finding the same surface smooth and even, not a freckle or a beauty mark in sight.
At first he thought maybe he just had to hold on for a rescue, but as his mind cleared, so did his prospects. He should have died when that building collapsed. No one would expect to find a complete body in the clean up. He was on his own here.
Originally, the Doctor–Oboro wished he had any other name to call him–had taunted him with threats of using his body as the base for a Nomu. Oboro had no idea what the fuck that was, just that it used his flesh and would break his mind. A half-life, worse than death.
The Boss Man, who Oboro still didn’t have even a title for, disagreed though. Something about it taking too long for his body to recover enough for that. Oboro was pretty sure he was fully recovered and would be healthy enough to kick the doctor’s head in if they’d wean him off the drugs. He wasn’t sure he should complain though, Boss Man thinking he was too weak meant Oboro escaped the Nomu fate. It did also mean though, that he lost his quirk.
It was an awful feeling, getting your quirk sucked out. Oboro wasn’t sure if he was supposed to be conscious or not, but Boss Man hadn’t hesitated, hand on his arm, almost gentle, until his soul was ripped out.
A quirk that could take other quirks. And presumably give his to whatever poor soul would become the Nomu instead. Oboro wasn’t the top of class 2-A, but he wasn’t stupid. He kept track of villain threats, police investigations, anything he had access to, and a few things he didn’t. Shouta took private lessons with Nedzu, and would sometimes share the supposed to be classified things the two worked on. He thought he knew most of the big threats hiding in Japan’s shadows, or at least the general Tokyo area! But this guy was more than hidden. He was a ghost, and managing that with such a powerful quirk? Oboro wasn’t liking his odds.
Especially now that he was quirkless. What other use did he have to these nutjobs? Would they keep him here until he was fully recovered and then shove a new quirk into him for these Nomu experiments? Or would he be taken out with the trash as soon as the bag filled up?
Oboro stared at the ceiling. There wasn’t much else to do. He was properly awake now, for the first time in a while–probably wanted to stop wasting drugs on him–but clarity brought no comfort. They should’ve offed him when he was under, would’ve been a lot nicer.
He was cuffed to the operating table–wrists and ankles–but he thought he might be able to sit up. It’d be nice to see the rest of the room he’d been trapped in if it was the last one he’d see. It took a monumental amount of effort, but Oboro managed it, shivering as the open back of the hospital gown was exposed to the air.
There was no convenient tray of scalpels, no computer in the corner. Not even a bottle of pills on the shelf he could take himself out with. The walls were tile except where it looked like cabinets had been ripped out, exposing concrete underneath. There was a bare folding table in the corner, and an open, empty looking filing cabinet. This was a forgotten, extra room. Oboro wondered if they’d also forgotten about him.
A sound came from outside the room. Oboro hadn’t spotted the door earlier because it was behind him, but it must’ve led to a hallway because he heard another heavy door slam some ways down.
He heard thumps, like someone was trying to force doors open. He waited, torso twisted around, eyes on the fogged glass square in the door, unsure of who it could be, his body torn between apathy and building adrenaline.
The doorknob jiggled, and then gave way, revealing the last thing Oboro was expecting to see right now.
A child, maybe five or six, froze in the doorway. Red eyes half hidden by scraggly pale blue hair–not dissimilar from Oboro’s own shade–stared into his, surprised and terrified and confused, but apparently just desperate enough to close the door and lock it behind him.
That task accomplished, the child turned back to him, eyes darting between Oboro’s face and the rest of the room. He was wearing normal clothes, a little ill fitting and worse for the wear, but definitely not a hospital gown, so hopefully not a human experiment. Did the Doctor or Boss Man have kids? Oboro didn’t want to entertain that particularly fucked up idea.
Oboro swallowed, instincts learned in two hard years of hero school beginning to fire up. “You okay kiddo? If you’re hiding from someone, that filing cabinet might be big enough to fit you.”
The boy’s head whipped back to focus on him. “I didn’t think you talked.”
Oboro raised an eyebrow. “No such luck kid, most of the time people can’t get me to shut up.”
The boy let out a huff that might have been a laugh, and inched over toward the filing cabinet, examining the limited space.
“Is someone trying to hurt you?” Oboro asked, not that he could do anything about it if someone was, but he’d have to try.
If it was possible, the boy looked even more surprised. “Um no, I don’t think so? He said he wouldn’t hurt me even if I’m in trouble, but I’m definitely in trouble and I don’t know if he lied.” The boy said, slowly but steady, as if he didn’t trust his own words.
“Why do you care though? No one ever did before.”
Oboro frowned, abuse case? Street kid? Gods he was too fucking young for that kind of shit. “Anyone who doesn’t care about a kid getting hurt is an asshole–don’t repeat that! Of course I care kiddo, it’s the right thing to do.”
He almost had the kid, until the last part. The boy sneered. “No one cares about the right thing, stupid, lying heroes. Are you one of them?”
Oboro pondered his answer, but a kid like this was too used to lies to take anything but the truth. “Not yet, I wanted to be, but now I’m here and all my friends think I’m de–gone, so.” Oboro shrugged.
The boy pouted. “You can say dead. I know what it means. My whole family is dead.”
Oboro cringed. “Ah jeez, sorry for your loss, kid.”
The boy looked down at the floor. “I’m sorry too.”
“Hey, it’s not your fault–”
“You don’t know me! It is my fault, my quirk killed them! Me! Now shut up and let me hide or I’m gonna leave.” The boy took a half step into the filing cabinet drawer and glared at Oboro, waiting for an answer.
Oboro tried to process that, but couldn't get all the way through. He then nodded, not wanting the kid to leave, and watched him tuck himself into the cabinet and all but disappear from view.
The kid… killed his family? Oboro knew some really rough things could happen during an initial quirk manifestation–Hizashi had permanently damaged his own hearing and blown out his parents’ eardrums as an infant–but death? And all of them? The kid clearly had meant multiple people, did none of them figure out what was going on? Figure out how to calm him down or separate themselves until they could get a professional to help? Usually really deadly quirks came from parents with relatively dangerous ones, so wouldn’t they have known to watch out for a quirk manifestation or taken the kid to a quirk counselor ahead of time as a precaution?
It struck Oboro as an entirely preventable tragedy, and it only made him feel worse about the guilt this kid was left with. It had to have been some sort of abuse/neglect situation for it to have happened. And the kid clearly felt guilty, he might’ve caught innocent family members in the crossfire of an incident with the abusive one or something like that.
Oboro felt entirely out of his depth. How do you comfort a child facing something like that? And how on earth does the child recover?
He glanced at the boy’s hiding spot, biting his lip, wanting to offer some sort of support but having no idea where to start.
“Hey, your shoe is sticking out a little too far, I can see the white sole.” Oboro said quietly, and the boy shifted a bit until the shoe was out of sight.
“Better?”
“Yup. You’re all hidden now.”
There was quiet for a moment.
“Do you think I’m evil?”
Oboro blinked. “Of course not.”
“You should. Sensei says I am. And that it’s a good thing.”
Oboro peered at the filing cabinet. “Well first off, good and evil are abstract concepts that aren’t really applicable in the real world, we all exist on a spectrum, shades of gray and all that. People do a mix of good things and bad things, and while some people definitely lean one way or the other, there’s always a bit of both.” He rambled, his throat drying quickly from disuse.
“Second, you’re a kid. My guess is that it was the first time you used your quirk, and it wasn’t on purpose. It’s a horrible thing that happened, but it’s not your fault, and it doesn’t make you evil. You made a mistake, and you already said that you’re sorry for it.”
There was some shuffling in the filing cabinet, the boy’s head peeked out. “You mean it?”
“Yeah, I do. And I’m not sure who this Sensei guy is, but he shouldn’t make a five year old feel like he’s evil.”
“Hey, I’m six!”
“Oh, of course, that makes it alright then.”
“...Does it?”
“No squirt, no it doesn’t.”
The boy’s nose wrinkled. “Don’t call me squirt, my name’s Ten–Tomura.”
“Tomura? That’s nice. My name’s Oboro.” Oboro pretended not to notice the slip, wondering why the kid would have changed his name.
Tomura squeaked and ducked back into the filing cabinet, Oboro wondered why for a split second before the door eased open behind him, and the hulking figure of Boss Man appeared.
“Morning.” Oboro said casually, eyeing the man’s three piece suit. “All dressed up for little old me?”
The man gave him a smile so condescending it could have dripped off his face. “Should’ve kept you on the drugs.”
“Damn right, y’all had the good stuff too.” Oboro said, spewing the first nonsense he could think of, desperately hoping this man hadn’t stolen a quirk that let him see through metal and vamping teenagers.
Boss Man gave him a look to suggest his nonsense wasn’t even worth an eyeroll, which–rude, his nonsense was always worth an eyeroll!
“I believe you’ve found something of mine.”
Oboro was genuinely confused for a moment, he hadn’t found shit. Did this guy mean Tomura? Was Boss Man Sensei? No wonder the kid was hiding.
He let his confusion show on his face. “I haven’t found jack. As you can see,” He tugged on his restraints. “I can’t go much of anywhere. What did you manage to lose?”
“You can stop talking now. Tomura. Your lessons are waiting for you.”
Boss Man looked past Oboro, straight to the filing cabinet. The room was dead silent, and Oboro couldn’t breathe loudly enough to cover Tomura’s scared pants.
“You are above this foolishness, don’t make me pull you out of there.”
Oboro could hear the kid’s breath shift to panicked wheezing. There was no point in trying to hide him any more, but maybe Oboro could do something else.
“Tell the kid he’s not in trouble.” He said, in the assertive hero voice he’d been training with Hizashi for the last year.
Boss Man seemed surprised he’d talked again. “What?”
“Tell the kid he’s not in trouble. He’s scared you’re going to hurt him and the best way to get him to come out is to tell him otherwise.” Oboro was fairly certain any decent child caretaker would know that, but this monster was clearly anything but.
The large man levied a long look at him. As if he were actually seeing Oboro for the first time. Oboro didn’t know if that calculating glance was sizing up where best to punch him or something far worse.
“He’s right, Tomura. You are not in trouble. I don’t expect you to get things right on your first try, and you will not be punished for learning. However, you need to return to your lessons so you can do so.”
The panicked breathing in the filing cabinet steadily slowed, and after a minute, Tomura peeked his head out again. “You mean it?”
“I do. When have I lied to you?”
Tomura frowned, as if not sure of the answer to that, but in a move that Oboro considered very brave, he decided to trust the man, and climbed out.
Boss Man made no indication if he was relieved or at least pleased by this outcome, merely opened the door and gestured for Tomura to exit before him.
Tomura crept forward, doing so, but stopped at the last moment to turn and wave at Oboro. “Bye!” He said, clipped.
“Bye kiddo.” Oboro replied, gaze darting back to the Boss, who was staring at Oboro again, thick white eyebrows ever so slightly furrowed. He waited for the man to say something, perhaps to kill him, but no such luck.
The door swung shut behind him, and Oboro was alone again. Waiting for the end.
It might’ve been six hours, it might have been an entire day. Oboro wasn’t sure when the door to the room opened again. He wasn’t sure if he’d dozed off somewhere in that time or not. You can only stare at a wall or the ceiling for so long before it begins to feel as mind numbing as sleep.
Oboro was immediately tense, though he took his time sitting up. Not that he could go fast with the limited wiggle room on the handcuff chains.
It was the Boss Man, in a different suit from earlier so maybe it had been a day. The Doctor wasn’t with him, but this guy struck Oboro as the sort who was willing to get his hands dirty. Was he going to kill him now?
Several quiet seconds passed, maybe a minute. Oboro couldn’t think of anything snarky to break the silence, he simply waited. For death or something else.
“You have two options.”
Oboro blinked, then raised an eyebrow. Options… were good? Though he imagined this wouldn’t be a very pleasant would-you-rather question.
“The first is death.” The man said plainly, as if he were listing lunch choices. “The second…” He hesitated, looking at him again with that same heavy stare.
Oboro bit the inside of his cheek, hard enough to draw blood. Come on, get this over with. What horrible choice would he be presented with that would make him want to choose death?
The man sighed, a long thing coming from so big a person. “I am a busy man, I’d forgotten how intensive childcare is, and I don’t have the time to see to all his needs. You take care of the boy, I let you live.”
Oboro couldn’t keep the confusion off his face. Horrible option number two was childcare? He nearly started laughing.
Now, being serious, kidnapped nanny to a likely also kidnapped child wasn’t a great situation by any stretch of imagination, but it was a hell of a lot better than dead. And, well, Tomura seemed like a kid in need of help and Oboro’s hero instincts were still there. It’d be good for the kid to have a non-criminal caretaker around. And the boy was pretty young, this could give him years to figure a way out.
Boss Man seemed to spot the glimmer in Oboro’s eye. “I wouldn’t get your hopes up. Try anything and it’s not just you who’ll suffer consequences.”
Oboro grimaced, not liking the sound of that threat.
Well, thinking way ahead in the future–something he never thought he’d do again-even if he didn’t manage to get out of here, he could still make a positive influence in a kid’s life before kicking it.
Seemed fair enough.
“Alright Boss Man, you’ve got a deal. I’d shake your hand, but.” Oboro wiggled his cuffed hands.
The look of exasperation on the man’s face told Oboro this might at least be interesting.
“You will call me Sir.”
Oboro made a face, gross, but saw no reason to argue something like that.
The man unlocked his cuffs, wrist and feet, and pulled clothes from… somewhere.
“Change, and meet me at the end of the hall.” Boss Man said, looking down on Oboro from an unfairly high height as he stood up and stretched out his stiff, disused muscles.
“We’ll see how long you last, Shirakumo.”
Oboro shivered slightly at the sound of his name. It didn’t belong here, coming from the mouth of someone like that.
He almost wished he was given a different one.