Author note: Reading mha, I came across Shinso's fight with Deku. It struck me as incredibly sad. He's a good boy and just wants to be seen that way. When his classmates supported him after losing, he looked so small, like he really needed those kind words.

It made me feel like he rarely gets them, instead everyone is always kind of unintentionally hurting his feelings, but he doesn't let them know. And so I fell in love with his character and his shadowy eyes.

A shiny black tail swayed slowly back and forth. The cat it was attached to sat prettily on a curb of a busy street, staring up at the human that had stopped to talk to him.

"You don't look like a stray." The curious boy commented. He leaned his bike against a street lamp and squatted down low in front of the animal. "A collar? So, you're wandering?"

They watched each other for a moment, sharing the same bored expression. He reached a hand out, and the domesticated feline nuzzled acceptingly into his palm. He flipped the small quarter sized tag around its neck and frowned. "Doggo?"

It was a strange name for a cat, but Hitoshi Shinso had never been one to judge people. There was an address engraved beneath the name and the words 'please bring me home'. He hummed to himself, and scooped the healthy looking animal into his arms, careful not to scratch him on the zippers of his denim jacket. "You run away often, I see." The animal mewed in response.

The lavender haired boy reached into the pocket of his jeans to retrieve his phone and put the address into his gps. It was late in the day and traffic was heavy. Cars drove up and down the street with their headlights on, readying for the sunset. He wouldn't leave the pet to wander the night alone.

"Oh."

He turned to look at the old apartment that stretched upward behind him. He was apparently already at the location. It stood only 3 stories tall. The cat actually hadn't wandered far at all.

"Thankyou! I'm sorry! Thankyou!" A voice called and he looked around himself to find it.

"Up here!"

Hitoshi looked up to see a girl waving over her balcony. "That's my cat! I'll be right down!"

And she was. In a yellow frilled dress, a small brown girl with wild curls leaned into her knees to catch her breath."Sorry...stupid building. No elevator."

She was pretty.

"This is your cat?"

She smelled like a bakery.

She stood and smiled at him bashfully. "Yes. That's our Doggo. I know it's a strange name." She laughed, holding her arms out. The cat jumped into her hold before he could respond. "I only knew the Japanese word for dog when we adopted him. It is a bad joke".

"Well, he definitely seems to know you." Hitoshi nodded softly at the animal settling against its owner.

"Yeah. He's a mama's boy...wait, I know you?"

"Know me?...I don't think we've ever met." He responded, wondering if maybe the girl had just recognized him from the sports festival broadcast instead.

"You're right! That's it!! I saw you on tv!" She exclaimed. "You're the mind control man from the finals!"

Hitoshi blinked. He hadn't said anything. Maybe she was just foreign and using words incorrectly. "Ah. Yeah that was me."

He rubbed the back of his head. He wasn't exactly pleased with the way the sports festival had played out for him, but he supposed being recognized in the streets was an accomplishment aspiring heros reached for either way.

"That's a pretty awful quirk you have there, yeah?" She smiled.

Yeah?

He paused a bit, but sighed. His entire life, people had seen his quirk as easily villainous. It wasn't the first time someone had made that type of comment, although it wasn't usually so blunt. He let it roll off of him. It was just reminder that he still had a lot of work to do to change people's perceptions. "Hm. Well I should g-"

"Ah! I didn't mean that! I meant your quirk is, eh, evil? Er...no, no that's not right either." The girl seemed frantic for a moment before struggling over her own thoughts. The cat in her arms meowed loudly against her fidgeting and hopped from her arms. "Doggo!"

It sprinted down the sidewalk, toward the darkening city, leaving the two awkward humans standing alone.

The yellow plaid girl pushed her tan hands into her curls, visibly annoyed with her runaway pet.

"I'm so sorry, I have to get him. I didn't mean what I said. I'm just still with learning this language! Thank you for trying to help." She bowed low before taking off after it, the pads of her bare feet patting the sidewalk.

Hitoshi watched in mild confusion as she ran out of site. It was usually how his encounters with new people went, but the frilly girl was someone he'd never see again so he didn't spend much time on it. He mounted his bike and stood in spot for a moment, watching the street lamps turn on.

It was a strange memory to make, but she was the first person to recognize him since losing his match to Midoriya. It was a nice feeling, regardless of the weird string of insults that followed.

Either way, he hoped she caught her cat. It was getting late and she wasn't even wearing shoes. Villains had also been in a state of unrest ever since Almighty came to town.

He pedaled after her.

It felt silly, to try to offer his assistance after being insulted and told goodbye, but at the end of the day, she'd probably need help. Hero's don't pick and choose with victims. He was a hero in training after all. She couldn't have gotten far.

"I'm over here!" A sudden accented voice called from an alley. Her bright dress bounced into view.

Shinso docked his bike once more as the short girl bounded over to him. He frowned in confusion. How did she know he was looking for her?

"Ah, excuse me for intruding. I am sorry. I am Yenna." She shook his hand without him offering it. "I have a mind reading quirk so that's how I knew you were coming back to help me."

"Ah. I see."

She folded her hands in front of her face with an apologetic pout. "I uh, can't turn it off, so I'm not trying to invade your privacy. I hear everyone in my radius. Sorry." She offered as a disclaimer.

Involuntary mind reader? He looked down at the girl who stood uncomfortably close to him. She took a step back.

That's probably why she explained her cats name as soon as they met. Or how she knew he'd been found in the first place.

She really was pretty, and with a convenient quirk to boot. She must be popular.

Her face reddened.

"Oh...Ah, sorry I didn't mean t-" he started, feeling his face heat a bit and frowning at himself.

"No, it's okay! I shouldn't have reacted. Sorry." She interjected. "Your thoughts are your own. They belong to you. You don't have to apologize for anything. I shouldn't be hearing private things."

She sounded rehearsed, and he frowned. It didn't make sense for him not to apologize for making her uncomfortable. "You shouldn't ask people to ignore you. You said you can't help it." Did she spend her life pretending not to be bothered by things just because she thought she shouldn't have heard them? "Stop apologizing."

Yenna looked at him thoughtfully, and he wondered if it was his business to comment on how she coped with her quirk. She had the right to live as she pleased. He was projecting; disliking the thought of pretending not to be bothered and… and she was probably listening to him considering how quiet she'd gotten.

"Doggo," She spoke suddenly. "He jumped this alley wall. I don't know what's in the other side."

"I do" Hitoshi offered. "You can get there if you follow the street around. It's basically a big horseshoe."

"Oh! Ok, Thankyou! I haven't lived here long yet."

"Do you want me to give you a ride?" He offered, putting his hands in his pockets. He looked down at her shoeless toes. They weren't anywhere too unpleasant, but city streets were still city streets.

She seemed to nod in agreement, but then stopped herself. "I shouldn't trouble you."

"But you're not wearing shoes."

"You're right. I should ride with you."

He cringed at her obvious attempts to seem oblivious to his thoughts. She knew what he was thinking; why was she pretending she didn't?

She tugged at the hem of her dress, looking out of place. "It makes people feel more comfortable when I act like I don't hear."

He hadn't asked her aloud but nodded nonetheless. It felt like she was bouncing back and forth trying not to upset him.

She hopped onto the back of his long seat, sitting with her legs hanging from the side. He climbed in front of her, noting how cliché it all seemed. She giggled behind him as he pushed off down the street.

"About calling your quirk awful," She spoke again after a minute. "Where I'm from, we call things we like, bad. I try to translate my slang but it never ends well. I am still learning this language."

"You don't have to explain yourself." He placated.

"I do. It bothered you. I did not mean to offend you."

"Ah...well. I'm used to it, really. It's an invasive quirk."

"Only if you intend for it to be. I know how it is having a quirk that makes other people look at you funny." She spoke in a light tone, but he could feel the seriousness behind it. Or maybe he was projecting again. "They act like you're sneaky...or up to no good. But it's just because they know they would be bad if they had our quirks."

He had more control over his quirk however. How hard must it have been forming relationships while having a "sketchy" quirk you couldn't control. He questioned internally, but realized it was probably pointless to filter himself around her. "Yeah...it'd be easy to manipulate people if you knew their thoughts." He responded, letting his bike coast down the street's steady slope. "I'm sure everyone's worried about you blackmailing them."

"I hate it." She affirmed, holding her hair from her face with a frown. "I would never do something like that. Just knowing that I can makes people act different...they're careful around me. They try to be so careful that they end up thinking in circles. It's...it feels…"

Lonely.

"Inauthentic." He finished for her. He didn't know why she was being so open, but he was definitely willing to have a conversation about something he felt so often. "Everyone being overly cautious around you all the time can get tiring. They live like you can take advantage of them at any moment. They don't mean not to trust you."

"But they don't, either way." She finished.

He nodded. "I suppose we do get the same type of reaction." Hitoshi mused, feeling slightly vindicated, talking with a fellow unsavory quirk holder. He pumped the brakes on his bike once reaching the street's bend. "We have useful quirks though. No one combats that much, to me at least." He was powerful and that was starting to become widely known. The reactions weren't all positive but he'd expected as much. He was still going to be a hero, despite what people thought of his quirk. He'd show he was just as good as everyone else.

"No! You're better than anyone else!" Yenna suddenly barked. She jerked her legs outward and the bike swiveled hazardously for a moment.

Shinso looked over his shoulder at her, surprised. She looked at him with a panicked face, startled from the near fall, but shifted her expression into a stern face. It only managed to come off as cute and slightly grumpy. She seemed a bit prettier each time he looked at her.

Her face flared and the stern look morphed into a flustered one.

"Sorry." He apologized reddening as well, turning back to watch where he was going.

She didn't tell him his thoughts were his own again, instead continuing her previous thought. "Everyone can see how easy it would be to be bad with our quirks. They would do it. We don't. We are different from them. We want to be good. We are good when it would be so easy to be evil. We are better than them." She spoke in her short sentences, trying to get her point across in a language that wasn't her own. "They would be selfish."

Hitoshi smirked, hearing her push out the thoughts that he himself had had multiple times in his life. There were too many times people talked about what was possible with mind control and how they were shocked he'd choose to use it for others. That, in hand, told him that they would've used it for themselves. It was part of what pushed him to fight for a spot in the hero course in the first place. He was going to be the opposite of what everyone thought he should be...and his life would be just as grand. "Quite an ego you've got there."

"That's not what you really think." She laughed. "You're a little inspiring for having such an ambition. I've never— Aah! There he is!"

Yenna suddenly shouted, pointing to the ledge of a vacant stairwell. Her oddly named cat sat perched patiently on the bottom step as if waiting for them to catch up. Shinso slowed his bike before rolling to a stop on the sidewalk.

The barefoot girl hopped down to retrieve her cat a second time.

"Finally. You annoying thing." She grumbled to her pet as she walked back to the eternally tired looking boy. "Thankyou for helping me."

He nodded, relieved that they'd actually managed to find a lost cat in a busy suburb. "I'll ride you back around." He felt a bit uplifted. Whether it was from helping a stranger, or having said stranger admire him, he didn't know.

His gestures were small compared to the type of work he wanted to do with his life, but helping people was helping people. Reuniting a girl with her cat was a nice start toward heroism, even if no one acknowledged it.

"You're a hero to me." Yenna smiled sweetly at him.

Hitoshi paused, feeling his heart react to her words. He blushed, frowning. She knew it's what he wanted to hear but that didn't make it feel less genuine. Her gratitude was real. Her very specific word choice however...

"You're having fun with this." He accused.

She put her hands up defensively but her smile didn't wane. "I try not to listen. Sometimes I don't realize the difference between someone's thoughts and their actual words before I respond...but yes, I enjoy it sometimes. It's cost me a friend or two." She laughed, hopping onto his bike.

"I can imagine." He responded, hiding any trace of pity. He doubted she wanted it.

"I just try to learn from it. Practice waiting for mouth words."

Mouth words. He coughed.

"You're laughing at me!"

"I thought you said my thoughts were my own." He teased.

"Now you're the one having fun." She said pointedly.

"Maybe." He smirked, pedaling his bike back around the city bend.

Yenna held her cat close to her as she watched the wild haired boy pedal her back up hill. She probably would've struggled with the task, especially with another person onboard. He was surprisingly strong beneath all his frowns and quelled angst. Maybe that was a given with all U-A students.

"Alright. Here we are.." He rolled to a stop in front of her apartment building. The sun had set entirely and a sole street lamp eliminated the space between the duo and the old building. "Goodbye."

Yenna scoffed, hopping from the bike. "You're pretty stoic, aren't you? The quiet serious type?" She questioned, turning to face him.

"And you're pretty blunt." He responded stoically.

She laughed. "Yeah. I get that a lot. It's probably a result of my quirk." She shrugged. "My whole life, it's felt like everyone just speaks their mind. I just ended up doing the same…although not many people speak their mind in reality, so it's probably a personality flaw at this point. I end up talking a lot more than I should too...like now."

"I don't mind it. I've enjoyed it this far." He offered, speaking before he realized what he was saying. She smiled.

"Thanks. I'm glad you don't think I'm insufferable."

"Shouldn't you know what I think of you?" He raised a brow.

Yenna blushed, looking down at her bare feet. "I know you think I'm pretty." She answered honestly, wiggling her toes.

Hitoshi rubbed the back of his head with an unnerved laugh. He did think she was cute, and surprisingly appreciated the short moment they had just spent together. A bit of him felt reluctant to just leave and live with only a nice memory...

Yenna rocked on her heels, looking at him expectantly.

"Hmn...well, I guess, I should go...that is, yknow, unless…"

He knew what he wanted to ask, but uncertainty pulled at his words. He'd never been one to be concerned with what he said to people, but he'd never exactly asked someone out before. It was normal to have second thoughts right?

The knowledge that, that person could hear your second thoughts was probably an obstacle most people didn't have to deal with however.

Yenna giggled.

An unexpected feeling of exposure pulled at him.

He was used to people judging him, but rarely did he ever seek anything from those who did. In honesty, it'd probably be easier if she just responded to his thoughts. It'd save him a portion of the embarrassment. It felt more natural when she had done it before anyway, rather than making herself wait to be addressed.

"I can meet you tomorrow at 3...if that works for you." Yenna pitched quietly, blinking up at the boy she'd watch overthink his words.

He jolted, realizing she'd accepted his unspoken offer for a date. "I thought you were practicing waiting until people spoke?"

"I am." She nodded, curls bouncing around her face. "No one has ever wanted me to respond to their thoughts though...it's interesting. You dislike when I wait for mouth words."

"Is it more comfortable?" He inquired.

"Extremely." She sighed in exasperation. "It feels like someone has finally accepted me and is okay with what I am haha- ah, oh but that's probably a bit personal to reveal, huh?" She pulled an awkward face at her words, trying to distinguish the line between honesty and divulging too much once again.

Hitoshi felt himself smiling at her. "No, it's fine." She didn't know it, but she'd given him the same feeling of acceptance. It was pleasant. He'd met someone who knew his intentions were good, despite his quirk or how he carried himself. He felt almost relieved to be able to see her again.

Yenna smiled thoughtfully at her feet and Hitoshi reddened, knowing she'd heard him. She'd politely chose not to responded to him. It was probably easy enough to tell when certain thoughts were too embarrassing. She reached into his pocket and put her number into his phone, texting herself, before sliding it back to him. "I'll see you tomorrow at 3."

He blinked at her and then laughed. "You really are straightforward."

"Comes with the territory." She smiled sweetly at him and turned to walk into her building.

'Hopefully you wear shoes next time'. He thought pointedly.

His phone vibrated and he checked his texts and smiled.

"I will."