Chapter Text
By age three, Izuku Midoriya had mastered a handful of things.
One: the fine art of yelling "I am HERE!" at a television screen with the solemn authority of a knight swearing fealty to a sword.
Two: the ancient martial discipline of screaming at thunder until it left.
And three: the deeply philosophical ability to launch himself off furniture with the blind conviction that landing was someone else's problem.
But beneath these toddler truths, something more delicate was taking shape. A pattern. A rhythm. Gojo Satoru noticed it first. It wasn't hard to, not when the kid was basically a mood ring with legs.
It started with a morning—just a normal one, as far as toddlers and their psychic stowaways went. Izuku toddled out of bed, hair a soft mossy green, eyes wide and sleepy. Full green. Full control. Gojo hadn't nudged a thing. Then Izuku's foot snagged on his pajama leg, and he stumbled. A quick, tiny yelp—and Gojo's knee-jerk concern flared like a switch.
And just like that, blue bled into the green like ink in water.
Eyes too pale for a child. A flicker of frost through the hair. It passed in a blink. But Gojo saw it. He felt it. Not just the fear—his own fear echoing in the boy—but the response. The reflexive tint of his presence in the kid's form. "...Huh," he muttered, watching the color drain back to green as Izuku recovered, unbothered and off to tackle a suspiciously large plush All Might.
At first, he chalked it up to weird luck. The kid had a quirk, maybe. Or some residual feedback loop.
But the pattern kept repeating.
Whenever Gojo's emotions surged—concern, affection, sharp flashes of protectiveness—Izuku's hair would frost at the tips. Eyes would glow faint blue, the kind of blue Gojo saw every morning in the mirror but never expected to reflect back in this way. And when he held still, when he withdrew into silence, gently separating his awareness from the boy's sphere of self?
Green. Soft, unmuddled green. The child's own signal.
The rest of the time—half-asleep, excited but unfocused, frustrated with a sippy cup that betrayed him—the colors shifted in shades. Mint, teal, aquamarine.
He was a spectrum in motion. Gojo was just the prism. Izuku's hair changes with the seasons. Or so Inko thinks. Maybe the weather. Maybe diet. Maybe it's just a "quirk thing." But Gojo knows better.
Gojo, of all people, is learning restraint. He's still Gojo Satoru, still occasionally calling the neighbors "NPCs" in his internal commentary, but now... he's watching.
Because one day Izuku reached for a butterfly with a pale, glimmering hand — and Gojo hadn't meant to reach too. Because once, when he was upset, Izuku's eyes flickered blue in the nightlight, and Inko blinked twice. Because there are moments Izuku seems to laugh at a joke Gojo thought but didn't say.
And Gojo thinks:
"Oh crap. He's syncing. Like, fully syncing."
Meanwhile, Inko just thinks her child is incredibly imaginative and needs fewer picture books about heroes before bed.
Across Japan, Hisashi Midoriya calls home every Sunday.
"Sorry, can't video, baby," he chuckles in his warm, businesslike voice. "Spotty connection in the lab again." Izuku babbles to the phone. Inko smiles. Gojo doesn't trust it.
The voice is right, the story's consistent. Something about gas dispersion research in California. Developing quirks in utero. Genetics and anomaly triggers. Big words, small comfort. Gojo doesn't say anything. Not yet. He can't prove it.
But in a basement under false names, a tall man with white hair, a face too smooth smiles into the dark. He's flipping through Nomu files. One page is labeled: "Spontaneous Manifestation: Regeneration / Possession-Type?"
On the screen, a freeze frame of Izuku — half-white hair, bright eyes — chasing a floating plush toy with his mouth open in joy.
All For One smiles.
"You take after me, don't you, little one?"
He doesn't need proof. His hair tells him everything he needs to know. The rest of the world can wait.
But his family? His family is already special.
It was finally summer.
The sun was warm overhead, dappled light flickering through the park's sleepy trees. Sand clung to tiny fingers, dusting knees and elbows as two small boys crouched over a shallow crater of their own making.
The red shovel glinted between them like a prize.
"I had it first!" Katsuki's voice cracked sharp like a pebble flung into still water. "I’m supposed to win! You always try helping first and lose!" Izuku blinked. Not at the words, not really. He was used to Katsuki's fire. But something stirred deeper than the usual sting—like sunlight blooming behind his ribs, a quiet voice lending courage from somewhere deep inside. Brave. Love. Pride.
The feelings weren't his, not exactly. But they shimmered quietly, steadying the wobble in his lower lip. He picked up a green plastic bucket instead, voice small but certain.
"Helping others is good," he said simply. Katsuki scowled, fists curled at his sides. "Tch. Whatever." He turned, stomping off toward the swings, leaving the red shovel abandoned in the sand.
Izuku didn't chase him.
The afternoon wore on, warm and slow. Birds sang sleepy songs. Other kids came and went. Izuku stayed, shaping towers alone with his fingers, pressing leaves into walls for decoration. Then—soft footsteps. A shadow at the edge of the sandbox.
Katsuki, with cheeks blotchy from wind or maybe something else, stood holding a scraggly dandelion. He didn't look up.
"It was in the grass," he muttered, then shoved the flower into Izuku's hand like a secret he didn't want caught saying out loud. Izuku smiled and didn't say anything. Together, they built a crooked, crumbling sandcastle—tall on one side, sagging on the other, with the dandelion perched like a crooked little flag at the very top.
And just like that, they were okay again.
That night, after a warm dinner and a quick bath, Izuku was curled up in bed with his All Might blanket clutched in one fist. Inko sat beside him, smoothing his damp curls back, her voice gentle.
"So... how was your day, sweetie?"
Izuku hesitated, little brows furrowing. "Umm... Kacchan was mad again. We played in the sandbox. I was making a bridge. He stepped on it." Inko's lips twitched. "Oh?" Izuku sighed like a tired office worker. "I didn't want to fight. But then..."
He looked up at her, green eyes uncertain. "Then the... the feelings came again."
Inko stilled. "Feelings?"
"Mmhmm." He poked his chest. "Here. In my tummy. Like they're watching. They feel strong. Not scary. Just... there. Like a hug but made of light. They said I should talk to Kacchan." Gojo, deep in the background of Izuku's soul, buried his head in his hands.
"Kid. Kid, no—"
"You don't tell your mom about the ghost gut-feelings!"
"She's going to wrap us in ofuda and burn sage."
"I said something like... helping people is good. Then Kacchan got more mad. Then he left. But he came back and gave me a flower." Inko blinked, processing the whiplash.
She tried to smile. "That's... a lot for one day."
Izuku nodded solemnly. "I didn't want to tell you before. 'Cause they're weird feelings. But they helped." Inko tucked the blanket closer around him. "They come often?"
"Sometimes," he mumbled sleepily. "Only when I don't know what to do."
Inko pressed a kiss to his forehead, her heart doing slow, quiet flips.
She turned off the light and walked to the door. Then paused. Looked back. Izuku was already dozing.
But inside, Gojo groaned.
"She's going to call a therapist. Or a shaman. Or both."
"...Actually I might deserve that."
The next morning, Izuku squirmed at the kitchen table while Inko gently dabbed a warm cloth beneath his eyes.
"Ow—mama, it's itchy..."
"I know, baby. You said they hurt again today?" He nodded, rubbing under his lower lashes with tiny fists. "Sometimes... they feel hot. Like light is coming out." Inko's smile was calm, but her grip on the spoon was tense. Something about this wasn't normal.
The clinic was unnaturally quiet for a Tuesday afternoon. Inko sat beside Izuku on the examination bed, her fingers tightly laced around his tiny hand. His eyes were back to soft green today—calm, content, quiet. But the memory of yesterday's piercing cyan glow still haunted her. And those strange scratchy sensations under his eyes he kept mentioning?
Something was off.
The doctor, a kindly woman with half-moon glasses and two quirks of her own, tapped her pen against the folder and cleared her throat.
"Izuku Midoriya, 3 years old, 4 as of July 15th. Hm. I believe there's been a misdiagnosis," she said finally. Inko blinked. "Misdiagnosis? But the results said—mutant-type—"
"Yes, initially. The early presentation—those under-eye markings and the alternating eye and hair color—resembled a mutant-type quirk. But after observing his vitals during activation states and the EEG patterns during 'emotional flares' as you described, I'd say it's... far more complex." Inko's grip tightened. Izuku looked up at her, confused.
The doctor continued, "I've never seen anything quite like this. It's an Emitter-Transformation Hybrid, centered around the ocular region, I think. But that's not all. Based on the patterns you've tracked, and the coherence in how he describes the emotional feedback. Almost like... it's echoing something. Or someone.... this quirk might be sentient."
A pause. The lights didn't flicker, but Gojo felt like they did.
A high whine buzzed through his skull. Loop. Loop. Loop.
Emitter... Transformation... Sentient... Eyes...
He was laughing. Internally. Then he wasn't.
Gojo felt it. The pulse. The deep, echoing vibration inside his being. Not like he was sharing space with the kid. He was the space.
The white hair, the eyes, the warped emotional feedback that only got stronger with time—he'd chalked it up to a quirk fusion gone sideways, some over-the-top magical genetic-cursed energy backdoor. But this...
He looked through Izuku's eyes from within, and for a moment, he remembered his hands. His Six Eyes. His infinity. Then blinked, and they were gone.
Back to being a voice. A presence. A ghost inside a child's body.
Inside a kind, soft-hearted boy who thought helping others was always good, even when it hurt. Gojo's voice, quiet and tight in the mind-space, echoed:
"Welp. That's new."
Izuku squirmed a little under the doctor's gaze. "Mama? Is the scratchy under-eyes because of the feelings?"
Inko's breath caught. The doctor smiled softly. "It's possible. We'll run more tests, but it's safe to say—your quirk's growing with you, Izuku-kun." Gojo felt the words sit heavy like a crown.
Growing with you? Nah. He was the growth. A ghost in the genome.
A sentient sword, reawakening in the hands of a toddler. And for the first time since waking up in this timeline, Gojo Satoru truly understood:
He wasn't attached to the quirk. He was the quirk. Not a power sharing the boy's body. The quirk factor from the boy's DNA. "Alright, kid. You don't know I'm here yet. But I'm watching. And when you're ready..."
A soft hum of power curls around Izuku's bones like a promise.
"...I got you."
Later that night, Inko sat at the kitchen table with a warm cup of barley tea in her hands, her laptop open in front of her. Izuku had finally gone down for a nap—still clutching that ridiculously sparkly plush goat she had gotten him. She hadn’t understood why he’d latched onto it so fiercely in the store, stamping tiny feet until she gave in. But the way his eyes had lit up, as if someone else had been cheering him on, made her wonder.
She clicked the refresh button.
Mothers of Quirk-Blessed Toddlers
(Private Support Group – 12 active users)
It wasn't much. A tucked-away corner of a parenting forum. No flashiness, no public-facing tags. Just a dozen exhausted mothers and a handful of suspiciously quiet usernames that had been there since before the first thread. Most of the posts were about sensory quirks, food aversions, or "how to politely tell your MIL not to try triggering your child's quirk for fun."
Inko hesitated for a second, fingers hovering above the keyboard.
Then she typed:
"Hi... I'm not sure if this is the right place, but has anyone's child ever talked about... being guided by invisible feelings? Not voices. Not hallucinations. Just... strong emotions that feel like they're coming from somewhere else?"
She bit her lip. It sounded ridiculous. She hovered over the 'Post' button for a full ten seconds before clicking it.
Refresh.
Nothing.
She sighed. Took a sip of tea. The apartment smelled faintly like fried tofu and rain—from dinner last night, and it lingered in the way oils always did.
Then the notification pinged.
1 reply from user "HiddenQuirk72"
Inko clicked.
It was one word.
Possession.
Her blood turned to ice.
User: ConcernedAuntie42
"That's rare, but not unheard of. Uwabami's quirk — the snake hair? One of the snakes acts on its own. They say it recognizes faces even she doesn't. People call it a sentient mutation. Yours might be something similar?"
Another reply chimed in.
User: FolkloreJunkie
"Look up 'Sentient Quirks' in the Hoshino Institute archives. Some mutations develop full cognitive autonomy. Most are harmless. Some... bond with the host."
Inko exhaled slowly.
Her fingers hovered above the keyboard, unsure if she wanted to ask the obvious question:
Bond with what?
She stood up slowly. Her knees felt unsteady. She knew it was probably just some unfunny troll. Someone trying to get a rise out of a tired new mom. But still—
She went to the hallway closet. Pulled out the old shoebox buried under winter coats. Inside were the emergency candles, old sticks of sage, sandalwood incense, and the tiny brass bowl her grandmother used to use.
She lit a stick of sage.
"...Just to be safe," she muttered, and closed the door.