Maybe it Wasn't

by SingingInTheRaiin

(sequel to Was it Worth it?) Aizawa finally encounters Haru again, but still can't convince the kid to just give up on his so-called family and let himself be taken care of properly for once. But he can at least invite him home for dinner and to meet the cats. Surely Toshinori will be okay with a disrupted date night if it's over something as important as a child's life. (one-shot)

A/N- Got a new tattoo on my wrist/forearm that makes it real awkward to type while it's healing so please forgive any typos!

Aizawa wasn't sure whether he should be surprised or not to find Haru on the same rooftop they'd first met on three years ago. If Toshinori were here, he'd probably say something about how poetic it all was. Well, no, he'd probably call Aizawa a total moron. If All Might was here, he might say something about the poetry of it all. Aizawa had never cared much for poetry, though.

He wasn't sure what had made him think to come here of all places. It was a huge city, and it's not like the search for the League of Villains had yielded any results in the month since the USJ incident. But Aizawa had gotten a feeling that this was the right place to be, and he'd ended up being absolutely correct.

Haru was sitting on the very edge of the roof, with his legs dangling over the side, and his long white hair, which looked greasy from not being washed recently, was pulled back into a messy ponytail blown around gently by the light evening breeze. Aizawa sat down next to the kid, and wondered what he was supposed to say. It's not like this was exactly a normal situation. For either of them, really.

After a minute of sitting there in complete silence, Haru slowly turned his head to look at Aizawa, who had to stop himself from gasping out loud at the sight. Haru had looked pretty bad when they'd last interacted, but even if he'd been a little out of it at the time, Aizawa would have definitely remembered any injuries leaving Haru with only a single eye.

The boy could obviously tell where Aizawa's attention was, and he frowned. "Tomura wasn't happy that I helped you before. The only reason he didn't do any worse was because Kurogiri- the one with the warp quirk-" he clarified at Aizawa's confused look. "Kurogiri explained how I went back home willingly, and am still loyal to my family."

"Are you? Still loyal to your family?" Aizawa couldn't imagine anyone wanting to stay with someone so violent and cruel towards others, but he couldn't even begin to comprehend how anyone could stay with someone so violent and cruel towards them.

Haru shrugged. "They're my family," he said in a tone that implied his answer should make things quite clear. He must've understood that Aizawa didn't find it clear, though. It was odd to think that a mere child who Aizawa had really only known for all of an hour total seemed to get him so well, especially compared to some of the friends he'd known his entire life. But this wasn't about Aizawa, it was about Haru, and getting him somewhere safer. Somewhere he wouldn't be at the risk of being severely injured for going against his guardians. "They must love me. That's what family is supposed to do. We just have a lot of differences between us that can make it tricky to get along sometimes."

"It isn't safe for you there," Aizawa said softly. "They're never going to stop finding reasons to hurt you. It's not going to get better unless you get out of there."

Haru furrowed his eyebrows, though the one over his missing left eye seemed to be much stiffer to move. "It's not like I'm locked up in a cage in a basement somewhere for villains to just pop by and torture me whenever they feel like it. I can come and go whenever I want, just like any other kid. I only get hurt when I make stupid mistakes."

"You think saving my life was a mistake?"

Haru definitely looked conflicted by that question. "You're a hero," he said in an almost helpless sounding voice. "People like you are necessary. The world needs you."

Aizawa could feel anger building up in him, though of course none of it was directed towards Haru, so he was careful to keep his voice neutral. "And you think that you're not needed?"

Haru scoffed. "I know that I'm not." He let out a soft sigh, and then turned away to look out at the nighttime view of the cityscape. It really was a picturesque sight from as high up as they were. "Having a quirk doesn't automatically make you useful."

Aizawa tilted his head. "You said that Tomura and the other villains believe you to be quirkless, right? Did he know the full extent of how you helped me when he hurt you?"

"Yeah, Kurogiri wasn't going to lie to him for me. I told them that I'd never been in a situation where it would manifest before, and that it only happened with you because I was riding on a lot of emotions. I'm not sure how much worse things might have been if he didn't believe me about that."

As a teacher, Aizawa had gotten asked plenty of questions over the years that he'd had no answers for, but he couldn't recall ever feeling quite so guilty about not knowing what to do. He was a hero, the whole point of which was to save people, but he couldn't even save one little kid? Some hero he was.

He wanted to say something else, about how he'd make sure to find Haru a family that would love him and take care of him, when his phone went off as if it knew what an inopportune time it was. But he saw Toshinori's name light up the screen, and knew that he couldn't just ignore his significant other. The man had been doing a lot worse since his fight at the USJ, and though Aizawa was reluctant to admit it allowed, he was pretty damn worried.

So he shot Haru a quick apologetic look before getting up and taking a few steps away before answering the phone. "Toshi? Is everything okay?"

There was a couple seconds of light coughing from the other end before the idiot responded. "I should be the one asking you that. Where the hell are you? It's date night."

Aizawa lowered his phone for a moment so that he could glance at the time, and swore under his breath when he saw how late it was. He put the phone back to his ear. "I'm sorry, I got caught up and lost track of time. I don't know…" he trailed off when he realized that he could hear giggling, and glanced over to see Haru covering his hand with one mouth as he laughed.

When Aizawa just blinked in confusion, Haru finally lowered his hand, and laughed for a few more seconds before clearing his throat. "It's okay. Don't upset your husband by missing out on your date."

"He's not-" Then he sighed, and changed the topic back to something relevant. "Making sure that you're safe is more important than spending time with someone I see every day."

Haru narrowed his eye. "Nothing is more important than love."

Aizawa arched one eyebrow. "How would you know? Got a hot date waiting somewhere for you?"

Haru snorted. "Yeah right. You really think I've got time for relationship drama with everything else in my life." He shook his head, laughing softly like Aizawa had just asked something funny. "But you do have a hot date waiting for you somewhere, and you should really go. It's All Might, isn't it? I only saw you two in a room together for a couple of minutes, but that's my guess anyways."

While Aizawa never saw the point in putting effort into hiding a relationship, he'd made it pretty clear from the beginning that he was dating Toshinori, and that was it. Even if he was the same person as All Might, they were different enough to matter, and All Might wasn't the one Aizawa liked. He found the exuberant, constantly smiling hero to be a bit on the annoying side, and he could admit within the privacy of his own thoughts that he didn't like the way All Might dwarfed him completely in hero form. But there were still so few people who even knew that All Might even had a weaker form, and Aizawa wasn't sure how much Haru had realized from the brief interaction he'd witnessed.

After a moment, Haru sighed. "Look, I don't really know how you guys act most of the time, but I'm sure that, at least in emergency situations, you aren't subtle at all."

Aizawa lifted one shoulder in a short half-shrug. "In my defense, I was literally dead at the time. It's not like I could really do any kind of acting."

"Whatever. Go meet up with your hot date." He could see the worry on Aizawa's face, despite the scarf covering half of it, and the fact that Aizawa was usually pretty good at not telegraphing his feelings. "Come back tomorrow night and I'll be here. Not to go off with you anywhere, or anything like that, but just to talk, if you're interested. Not that I'm just assuming you are, since I know I'm not a super interesting person to talk to or anything. Maybe it's just a coincidence that you ended up here at the same as me, and now I'm just gonna… yeah." He offered up a smile that looked too self-deprecating for someone so young.

If the kid honestly thought that saying anything in that tone of voice would convince Aizawa to leave him alone, then he was sorely wrong. Aizawa just knew that Haru wouldn't be here on this rooftop so late at night if he didn't want to get away from his so-called family, even if he was unwilling to admit it. Aizawa reached out one hand, and tried to adopt a comforting look on his face, though he was sure that he sucked at it because he'd never really cared to comfort anyone before. "Toshi's always complaining about how we never mix things up a bit." Bringing a kid around to hang out instead of having a date would certainly change things up. Though it only took another second for Aizawa to realize how that actually sounded, and he was relieved when Haru just laughed at him instead of running away in fear.

Haru sighed once he calmed down from his bout of laughter. Aizawa grumbled about how it wasn't funny, though he was actually glad to hear the kid laughing like that. Anyone who could still laugh like that wasn't entirely a hopeless case. "Look, I was raised my entire life by various villains, and even I'm better at socializing, and general communication with other humans, than you are."

"Yeah, yeah, laugh it up wise guy. I'm serious though. It's not like a pair of crotchety old men are particularly capable of having much fun, but maybe it beats hanging out up here all night."

Haru blinked once, then tilted his head back to look up at the sky. In the short time they'd been chatting, the sky had gotten completely dark, and all of the stars had come out. "If I went with you, I'd be in a bit of an ethical bind." Aizawa furrowed his eyebrows, and Haru sighed again. "I'd see All Might in his natural habitat, and potentially get a chance to see his weaknesses. As someone who wants heroes to save the world, I'd have to keep that information to myself. But as someone who wants to make my family happy, especially when they're so angry over my last screw up, I'd have to share whatever I learn."

Aizawa felt stupid for not considering something like that, but he quickly figured out what he wanted to say. "You won't be meeting All Might," he said firmly. "Regardless of what you may think, I am not with All Might. I am with a regular man, and that is the only person who you'll see there."

Haru tilted his head to the side in consideration for a moment, and then he shrugged. "Eh, what the hell. As long as you make sure I'm back here at this rooftop by morning, it should be fine. There are no rules against hanging out with friends." He gave Aizawa a pointed look, though Aizawa wasn't sure what he was supposed to understand from that.

Aizawa wasn't sure he'd classify himself as friends with the kid, not exactly, but it was better than enemies, so he decided not to argue with the label. "I thought you said you can come and go whenever you want to."

Haru nodded. "I can. But sometimes it's best not to poke the bear if I don't have to. And Tomura's been in a pretty bad mood lately. He's pissed that he missed out on the chance to kill All Might."

"And you? How do you feel about the fact that he was unable to kill All Might?"

Haru gave Aizawa an unamused look. "I already told you that I want the heroes to save the day and I really don't have any desire to see people like Tomura or teacher in a position where they could hurt people as much as they want to."

Aizawa couldn't help arching an eyebrow at that. "But it's okay for them to be in a position where they can hurt you as much as they want? And who's your teacher?"

Haru hummed under his breath, and then very blatantly didn't answer the question. "So are you taking me to check out your pad or what?"

Maybe it wasn't a good idea to lead the child of villains straight to his doorstep, but he knew that Haru wasn't evil, and he wanted to give him a safe place to be. Maybe he'd- his thoughts cut out when he realized that he could faintly hear Toshinori's voice calling out to him. He glanced down and saw his phone still in his hand, with the call still going. He sighed, and then raised it up to his ear again. "Sorry about that. I don't know how much you heard, but I hope you don't mind us having a guest over." Then he hung up before he could hear any of Toshinori's potential objections.

It didn't take very long to walk back to the school, where Aizawa's car was parked. He didn't feel a lack of trust towards Haru being near the school, but he was still glad that it was nighttime and no one else was around, because he wasn't sure what any of them might think. They drove to Aizawa's apartment in silence, and then Aizawa gestured for Haru to walk in before him.

The kid shot him a wary look, but didn't hesitate more than a couple of seconds before walking inside. Immediately, all three of the cats rushed forward, eager to see who the newcomer was. Aizawa felt a little offended that they all swarmed Haru instead of him, since they usually hated strangers, but he could see from the look on Haru's face that the kid already adored the cats.

While Haru was busy kneeling down and scratching all of the cats behind their ears, and in all their other favorite spots like some kind of freaky cat whisperer, Aizawa walked past him and headed to the kitchen. Toshinori was sitting at the island, wearing his usual baggy tee shirt and sweatpants, eating from a bowl of that disgusting cardboard flavored cereal he liked. Even though he must've heard the door open, and all the cats stampeding, Toshinori waited a very long moment before finally looking up. "So who's our guest?"

Aizawa sank down onto the stool next to Toshinori, slowly unwinding his scarf from around his neck. "Remember that kid from the USJ incident? Well I bumped into him today, and I couldn't just leave him out there."

Toshinori nodded once. "Alright. Our next date night better be the most amazing thing I've ever experienced in my life to make up for how much you worried me, but alright." He finished the last couple spoonfuls of his garbage cereal, and then slowly got up to put the bowl down in the sink. Aizawa got to his feet as well, ready to catch his significant other if the man were to suddenly fall, or have another coughing fit.

They both went back into the living room, and saw that Haru had made himself comfortable on the floor, with his lap and hands completely occupied with giving the cats all the attention they asked for. The greedy creatures acted like Aizawa didn't treat like like royalty, but he couldn't deny that it was nice to see the content look on Haru's face, and he couldn't bedgrudge any of his cats the opportunity to be spoiled rotten.

Aizawa sat down on the couch, and motioned for Toshinori to sit next to him. Toshinori did, though he kept looking back and forth between Aizawa and Haru curiously. Even with one eye now missing, Haru was pretty recognizable, and Toshinori had to be thinking about his promise to help Aizawa save the kid. If only Aizawa actually knew how to go about doing that, though.

Haru looked up at the two men, and then gently pushed the cats aside so that he could get up and sit down in the chair across from the couch. The cats followed him, meowing and flicking their tails around as they requested that he continue to pet them. Haru laughed, and shook his head before giving Aizawa an amused look. "I love your cats."

"Oh good, then why don't you keep them?" Toshinori suggested in a voice that was only half-joking. It wasn't that the blonde had anything against animals, but he'd never been nearly as enthusiastic as Aizawa about taking in strays. Then again, Aizawa had taken in Toshinori, so the man had to have at least some acceptance of the bad habit. And there had been five cats originally. Putting two of them up for adoption had been part of the compromise of them living together.

Haru didn't seem to understand that it was a joke, and he just slowly shook his head while frowning. "I don't think that that would be a good idea. Some of the others don't really like animals and can get pretty mean to them." He crossed his arms over his chest instead of giving the cats anymore attention. For some reason they seemed to actually respect his feelings, and quietly slunk away. They'd never shown that kind of respect to anyone else, including Aizawa. "That's actually how I learned about my quirk. I didn't know I had one growing up because I didn't have any of the markers for one, and I'd never used it before. I was like eleven, I think, when I figured it out. The most adorable little kitten somehow ended up in the hideout, and one of the others killed it. I took it outside for a burial, and it ended up coming back to life right in my arms."

That was interesting. So it wasn't just humans that the kid could bring back. It made him wonder what the entire scope of Haru's quirk was, since he'd never gotten the chance to ask anything about it before. He wasn't really sure how appropriate it would be to ask detailed questions now, though. Normally he didn't have to, since all of his students had all of their information about their quirks in their official files.

While he sat there for a moment to think, Toshinori leaned forward to cough up some blood, and Haru looked startled. He started to lean forward, reaching out towards Toshinori. "Are you okay? Let me help-" And then all Aizawa could think of was the fact that he couldn't even remember being dead, but a quirk like that had to have some kind of a catch to it, and Aizawa didn't want Toshinori to be dead at all.

"No!" Aizawa barked out before he could think of a more polite way to say it.

Haru froze with his hand hovering in the air, and his eye looked a little teary. He slowly lowered his arm, resting it on his lap so one hand was grabbing the other too tightly. "I wasn't gonna…" he trailed off, then got to his feet, going carefully to avoid any sudden movements. "I shouldn't have come here. I need to get home."

Toshinori gave Aizawa a slightly disappointed look. "Shouta," he murmured. "What the hell are you doing?"

Aizawa let out a loud sigh of frustration, then abruptly stood up and walked over to where the kid was still standing awkwardly. "I'm sorry," he apologized in a gruff voice.

Haru shrugged. "It's fine," he said softly. "There's no reason for you to believe that I'm not a villain. I'm just going to go now." He turned his head slightly to peer past Aizawa, at where Toshinori was still seated. "I hope you feel better soon." Then he turned towards the apartment door, and Aizawa wanted to kick his own ass for being an idiot. Any decent person would react by wanting to help someone who coughed up blood, and there was no reason to assume that Haru had intended to kill the man and bring him back to life. There was a short pause, and then Haru continued talking to Toshinori. "I don't know what's wrong with you, because I'm not a doctor, or anywhere remotely close to having any kind of medical knowledge beyond the basics, but if there's something seriously wrong with you, and you want it to be fixed, I can do that for you. I'm not a villain though. You'd have to do the hard part yourself."

He turned to leave, but Aizawa reached out to grab Haru's arm. "Did you just tell Toshi to kill himself?" he asked slightly incredulously.

Haru shrugged again. "I'd bring him back right away if he did. It would fix whatever's wrong enough to make that happen," he gestured towards the blood staining Toshinori's pants. "But if he doesn't want that, then I'm not going to try to force him in any way. I'm not a villain," he repeated stubbornly.

Aizawa sighed. "I know. I know you're not. But what do you even know about your quirk? How did you know that it could bring humans back to life and not just cats?" He didn't want to think about Haru getting him killed back at the USJ over a hunch or something.

"I've done it lots of times before. When I know that Tomura or the others are going out to do bad things. I wait until they get back to the hideout so that I know they won't see me, and then I'll find wherever they were, and bring back as many of their victims as I can. It might be harder to get away with now, though, since Tomura knows about my quirk."

Aizawa felt guilty for jumping to any conclusion a minute ago. It was clear that despite his bad situation, Haru had done everything he could to make the best of it. "Why would you still go back to them? Giving you a place to sleep and food so you don't starve isn't the same as actually caring about you."

Haru shrugged. "It just is what it is, ya know? Why do you care, anyways? As far as you should be concerned, I saved your life in exchange for what you already did for me. There's no reason for you to keep acting so nice to me." Aizawa wouldn't consider himself a nice person in general, and he really didn't think that any of his actions towards Haru could be considered particularly nice. The fact that Haru seemed to genuinely believe what he said only made Aizawa feel worse.

While the two of them stared each other down with very intense looks, Toshinori surprised them both by getting to his feet and clearing his throat. "Stay for dinner," he said in a voice hoarse from all of his coughing. "Neither of us are very good cooks, but we've never gotten food poisoning before either."

There was a moment where Aizawa was sure Haru was going to turn down such an insane suggestion, but then Haru let out a small laugh. "Alright, I'll stay, but only if you let me handle the cooking. I've been told that I'm quite gifted in the kitchen." A melancholy look flashed over his face for just a second before it was gone.

Toshinori and Aizawa glanced at each other to have a quick and silent conversation, where Aizawa wondered if Toshi was sure about inviting the kid to stay, and Toshi reminded Aizawa that he'd promised to help. And he felt like he owed the kid, since he'd saved Aizawa when Toshinori had been unable to do so himself.

With that settled, the two men agreed to Haru's terms, and led him into the kitchen. They both sat down on the stools at the island, mostly exchanging mindless smalltalk while Haru bustled around the space like he'd been born to it. The most that they helped was occasionally telling the kid where to find some ingredient or another that he was looking for.

Soon enough, the room was filled with a very delicious aroma, and then Haru slid a bowl of ramen in front of each of them. It had everything that Aizawa was usually too lazy to include, making it a complete meal. It was pretty impressive looking coming from the kid who'd only been one-eyed for less than a month. "I'd make something more complicated, but I wasn't expecting to be cooking, and your pantry seems to be lacking in basically everything." Then he put a third bowl down on the opposite side of the island, and hopped up onto a stool. As he bent over to eat without dripping anything on his lap, Aizawa wondered if kidnapping the kid to keep him away from harm would count as unethical.

But he just looked so content sitting there, and then he leaned back after a moment to tie up his long hair so that it wouldn't fall near his bowl. If one were to look past the missing eye, all they'd see was a kid. A good kid, who deserved a lot better than the hand he'd been dealt in life.

When they were all finished eating, and the dishes had been shoved carelessly into the sink after Aizawa insisted that Haru couldn't cook for them and clean up for them on top of that, Haru politely asked to be taken back to the building he'd been picked up from. Aizawa felt reluctant to return the kid to such a hostile environment, but he knew that even if he said no, Haru would find a way back on his own, and he wouldn't even have the protection of a vehicle and a hero, considering all the dangers that came out at such a late hour.

As they got closer to the building, Aizawa glanced over just in time to catch Haru looking almost wistfully at a bar they passed. He grit his teeth and clenched his hands tightly around the steering wheel at the thought that the villains had maybe gotten him addicted to alcohol, or had just hurt him so badly that he felt alcohol was his only release from all of it.

Though it was odd, because despite how late it was, and the fact that bars would usually be at their peak business around now, that one seemed pretty dull. No bright lights to draw potential customers in, and through the thick curtains in the windows, Aizawa could only make out a couple of silhouettes. But maybe it was just closed for the night, or a private club, or something like that.

By the time Aizawa looked back at Haru, the kid was staring listlessly out the passenger side window again, and Aizawa tried his best to shrug off his concern since he knew that there was nothing he could do about it at the moment anyways, no matter how much he wanted to help.

They reached their destination a minute later, and Aizawa parked the car carefully before turning his full attention to Haru. "Are you sure you want to go back? If you've changed your mind, I can get you somewhere safe, and far away from those villains." He hoped that Haru would say yes to that idea, but knew that it wasn't a very likely outcome.

Haru sighed tiredly, and reached up to run a hand through his hair. "Life's not always very fair is it?" There was no nice answer to that kind of question, so Aizawa just stayed silent. Then Haru abruptly changed the subject to somewhere Aizawa hadn't been expecting. "Do you think that it's wrong to bring people back to life?"

"Why would it be wrong? You only help innocent people who were killed by villains, right?"

Haru kept stubbornly staring out the window instead of turning to look Aizawa in the eyes. "Yeah. And maybe the occasional hero. But what if they're supposed to stay dead after they die? What if there's some kind of after life where everything is good and they're happier than they've ever been, but then I just dragged them away from there without even asking? What if it was always their destiny to die at the time they did, and I just changed their entire fate, and therefore the fates of everyone they're ever going to interact with after being brought back? What if they were just better off staying dead?"

Aizawa wasn't quite sure what to say. It's not like he'd ever met anyone else with any kind of resurrection quirk like this, and he personally didn't believe in any kind of afterlife anyways. He hadn't really considered the moral implications of being able to reverse death. And technically, Haru could also cure any disease or injury. He really could change a lot of peoples' lives in so many major ways. It was far too much power to be left in the hands of a child. Yet another instance of the universe screwing Haru over. And it's not like Aizawa was some kind of expert in helping people through their existential crises.

But there was one thing Haru had said that had set off a small red flag in Aizawa's mind. "Do you think that you would be better off dead?"

Haru finally looked at him, apparently startled by the question, and then he shrugged, and seemed to sink down in his seat. "No. Not really. Maybe sometimes, but mostly not. But are there some people who are better off dead? Like what about my parents? If they were really so bad when they were alive, does that mean they're off being eternally tortured somewhere? Does it make me a bad person to not bring that back? Would people like that ever really change? Would it really matter even if they were willing to?"

"Look, I don't have all the answers, kid. What I do know is that you deserve a lot better than the life you've got, and if you let me, I'll do everything in my power to get you somewhere you do deserve to be."

Haru smiled. "You're seriously the nicest person I've ever met." He lunged over to pull Aizawa into a hug, and Aizawa had no idea how he was supposed to respond to that, so he just sat there stiffly until Haru finally pulled away. "Thank you for everything, but I can handle myself."

"But you shouldn't have to. Tell me where the League of Villains hideout is and I'll make sure that none of them can ever touch you again. I can make sure that you're safe and happy. Are you really so resistant to that just because you think that those people are your family?"

The kid smiled sadly. "To be perfectly honest, I've tried living the normal life. I was in a temporary foster home for a few weeks after my parents died. There were other kids there too, and they told me the truth about the world."

He didn't continue, so Aizawa had to prompt him. "What is that truth?"

"The truth is that nobody cares about the kids like me, and they're right not to. My parents were evil people who caused so much damage to everyone they encountered. To innocent people who did nothing wrong. And then, out of all the potential parents who passed through that foster home, the only ones willing to take me in were Tomura and teacher. All the others were disgusted to even look at me, knowing that I'm the spawn of two people who were so horrible. You can try all you want to find me a new home, but the truth is that no one else in the entire world is going to want me. And I can't really blame them for that. I'm kind of a mess, ya know?" He sighed, and then unbuckled his seatbelt, and got out of the car, though he paused before closing the door. "Tell Toshinori that my offer to heal him still stands. If you need me, you'll know where to find me." Then he gently closed the door, and hurried off towards the building they'd met on.

Aizawa knew that the League wasn't hiding in that building, and that the kid was too smart to lead him straight to the villains, but he did have to wonder why the kid had picked that building out of all the ones he could've chosen. Maybe it was special in some way. Or maybe it was close to where the League had set up their base of operations. Either way, Aizawa wasn't going to be getting any answers about that. At least not for today.

He waited until Haru was inside the building before turning the car around to head back to the apartment. Today felt like it had been a bit of a bust, though he felt like at least a little bit of progress had been made. But he couldn't stop thinking about Haru's parting words. About people not wanting to adopt the children of villains. Were there other innocent children out there who'd been similarly discarded simply because of who they were born to? He'd have to look into it, of course, but he couldn't see any reason for Haru to lie about such a thing.

And it wasn't until he was back at the apartment, cuddled up next to Toshinori in their bed, that he realized just how much he'd been affected by Haru in the short time they'd known each other. Toshi reached out to lightly brush his thumb against Aizawa's cheek. "Why are you crying? What happened?"

Aizawa sniffled once. He hadn't even been aware that he was crying until Toshinori had pointed it out. "It's a tragedy," he whispered. "I feel so helpless. Why can't I do anything?"

"You'll think of something," Toshinori whispered back, a slight wheeze in his words. "You always do. I believe in you."

Aizawa wanted to ask what he'd done to inspire such faith, but he could tell that Toshinori had already fallen asleep, so he just cuddled closer to his significant other, and wondered if there was anything he could do to save that damn kid.