"I'm so sorry about all of this..." Fukukado sighed, settling down into one of the chairs in the school cafeteria, "If I had known that the first years would be like this..."

If Aizawa were to use one word to describe this week at Ketsubutsu, he would say that it was a disaster. Fukukado's students were alright, but Midoriya's old classmates were just plain terrible. He had been keeping an eye on those kids whenever he could, and while he could stop them from making snide remarks every now and then, Aizawa was getting reports from the other UA students, and even from the Ketsubutsu second years, whenever one of those spoiled brats did something to make fun of Midoriya.

Aizawa wasn't against teasing in general; he had been the butt of way many jokes that Yamada and Shirakumo liked to pull while he was in high school, but those pranks had been harmless and funny, and there was absolutely no malice behind them.

These kids were actively poking fun at Midoriya, making fun of him and putting him down for being quirkless. No matter how much Midoriya proved himself... all they would do is judge him based on his genes. It was terrible.

"I know it's not your fault, Joke." Aizawa sighed, as a young lady with short, black hair placed three drinks on a tray that was on the counter. Kan thanked her, before he grabbed the tray and brought it back to the table.

"How the hell can you drink coffee at this time? The lady at the counter looked so confused when I gave her the order." Kan grumbled, as Aizawa grabbed his iced coffee off the tray. Fukukado had ordered some lemon tea, while Kan himself was having some soda.

"Ah, don't worry about it." Fukukado laughed, taking a sip of her tea, "Her name is Yameru Toki. She's a new hire, from about a month ago, since the previous worker retired due to a back injury, and having to take care of children. She's still getting the hang of things around here."

"Are you sure it's safe to be hiring new staff at this point in time? Some unknown villains could use that opportunity to sneak into hero schools, especially since Ketsubutsu Academy, unlike UA, doesn't just purely hire pro heroes who have already gone through multiple checks by the government."

"That's what I tried to tell the principal... I guess that's what happens when you have a school that didn't originally start with a Hero Course, but was in an optimal location and grew popular enough that a Hero Course was added." Fukukado sighed, and leaned back into her chair, "But I don't think Yameru is bad, per say. She's clumsy, and forgetful, but she's really skilled with knives, so she's really handy to have around... at least, according to our cook; he's getting old, and she's far more efficient with slicing up meat and fish and anything other things they need to cut. I don't think she's as good as your little quirkless green bean, though; I think if he ever wanted to quit being a hero, he could always become one of those cooking stunts men."

Aizawa narrowed his eyes, "What on earth are you trying to say, Joke?"

"Aren't we getting a little off topic here?" Kan shook his head, taking a sip of his soda, "I... honestly... I didn't know what I was expecting. We knew it was bad... imagine what it was like when there weren't any teachers who were defending him."

"Why do you think Nezu destroyed Aldera?" Aizawa sighed, "Those schools failed. Their families failed. And it might be too late to change them in high school."

Fukukado groaned, "I purposely put him in the class with the nicest homeroom teacher. Yuaka is a nice and friendly guy, but honestly, he's too soft with kids. I can guarantee that he's nice to your kids, but he can't whip our students into shape either. And I can't do anything about the other subject teachers, since the lessons rotate around, so they're all bound to meet Midoriya a few times this week."

"This is a disaster." Aizawa shook his head, downing his coffee in one gulp.


Midoriya sighed, trying to ignore the mild headache that was pounding through his head. He did have a mild fever when he woke up, but it was barely detectable, with his already higher than normal body temperature, but that wasn't enough to deter Midoriya from facing the new day.

He had no idea what was wrong with him. It couldn't be food poisoning, since he ate the exact same thing as his friends, but besides from that... Midoriya couldn't think of anything that could be the case of his headache and nausea. He was probably homesick or something like that... he never did like leaving UA for no reason, and it was probably made even worse when his former classmates made him remember all the abuse that he suffered through when he was in elementary school and junior high.

He just hoped that he could get over it soon; he didn't like the sensation of nausea that was bubbling up within him.

"Ah... Midoriya..." The homeroom teacher called out to him, just before he and his UA friends reached their classroom. Midoriya perked up at the mention of his name, and the friendly teacher just beckoned the group towards him.

"This may... seem weird..." The homeroom teacher, who Midoriya remembered as Mr Yuaku, spoke up, fidgeting slightly, "Do you know some of my students? Like Hareda and Nagai? They're not usually like this... I'm not sure if... maybe you offended them in the past... or anything..."

"They are old classmates of his." Shinsou butted in bitterly, "Izuku hasn't done anything to them."

"I see..." Mr Yuaku nodded, before sighing, "I'm sorry about their behavior... and I apologize in advance for the lack of discipline. I'm a... rather new teacher here... at least, compared to the other teachers. My word doesn't have as much pull as other teachers. I understand that they're being very mean to you... but please, give me some time to work things out with them. I believe that with enough convincing, I can get them to change their tune."

"Not to be rude, sir." Shinsou scratched the back of his head, "That's really nice of you and all... but people are stubborn. How do you think discrimination has lasted for so long?"

"I get where you're coming from, but it's not exactly the children's fault. If they were raised like that, surrounded by people who discriminate against quirks... they would think it's normal." Mr Yuaku replied, "They need someone to guide them, and show them the correct path."

"Good luck with that." Monoma muttered, before Mr Yuaku glanced at his watch, "Alright, I think you should get to the classroom. I don't want to mark all of you as late."


"Loser!"

Midoriya felt himself being shoved down the stairs again, but this time, the strength behind the push was much harder. Instead of just pushing him off balance, it felt like someone had literally body slammed into him, sending him tumbling down the stairs, crashing into the corner of the wall at the bottom of the staircase.

His shoulder hit the wall a bit too hard, and there was that familiar feeling of his shoulder being dislocated. Midoriya bit down a groan, before pushing himself up into a sitting position, as Monoma pulled him up, wary of all the Ketsubutsu students around them who had stopped, looking at the boy in concern, "You okay?"

Midoriya nodded, before he slammed his shoulder back into its socket, eliciting many weird glances, winces and gasps from the other students, before he and Monoma continued on their way.

"Doesn't it hurt whenever you do that?" Monoma asked, but Midoriya just shrugged nonchalantly. He could take the physical abuse. He was tired of getting injured when it had nothing to do with villains, but still, he was going to be stuck here for a few more days. There was no point in kicking up a fuss for absolutely no reason.

"You should stand up for yourself every once in a while." Monoma huffed, "You know you're not as bad as they say. Why don't you fight back or anything?"

Midoriya just remained silent, not saying a single word.

"Oi! Deku! I bet your father is useless! You keep saying he's a pro hero, but what kind of pro hero has a quirkless kid!?" Nagai laughed.

Tears welled up in Midoriya's eyes, and he kicked the bench in the changing room. He wasn't wearing any shoes, and his foot hurt, despite all the training he did with his dad, but Midoriya didn't register the pain.

"Shut up! Don't talk about my papa like that! He's the best hero out there!"

"Oh yeah? Tell me, what kind of hero wants a useless piece of garbage like you?" Tsubasa stuck his tongue out, like any other seven year old would, "Only a useless hero wannabe would keep a useless child like you!"

Midoriya gritted his teeth, before he saw red. He lunged forward, grabbing onto Tsubasa and harshly slamming him into a locker, growling, "Don't ever talk about my dad like that ever again!"

Hareda tried to punch him, but Midoriya easily dodged it and punched him in the chin, before kicking him into the bench, before he whirled around and punched Nagai in the face, breaking his nose.

One of his other classmates who could always extend his fingers to shove Midoriya down the stairs reached out, but the angry greenette immediately grabbed his fingers and gave them a violent twist, ignoring the screech in pain from the boy, before he pulled him forward and dug his knee into his chin.

"What's going on here?" His teacher poked his head into the changing room, "Why are you all fighting?!"

Clutching his bleeding nose, Nagai pointed at Midoriya, "Deku beat us all up for no reason!"

"Shut up! You guys beat me up every day! And then you insulted my papa!" Midoriya screamed back.

"Midoriya, you're suspended for a week. I'm going to call your parents." The teacher glowed at Midoriya, hoping that the tone he used would be enough to subdue the angry six, almost seven year old child.

The green haired boy just glared at the teacher, before leaving the changing room, the protests of his teacher ringing behind him.

The smell of fire and burning flesh filled his mind, causing the nausea that he had pushed down to bubble up again.

The first and last time he had ever stood up for himself...

It wasn't worth it.

He's already lost one family.

He couldn't afford to lose another.


During lunch, Midoriya had gone to the bathroom, and while Shinsou wasn't too sure how this all started, but he had to admit, he really enjoyed aggravating the boys that made Midoriya's life a living hell.

"Wait, you're gay!? Eww!"

Shinsou just rolled his eyes at the blatant homophobia, "I'm as straight as a lamp post, and that's exactly how straight your spine is going to be after I've beaten the shit out of you."

"Why does UA even accept homos like you! You're disgusting!" Hareda stuck his tongue out in disgust.

Shinsou decided to omit the fact that his dad was probably much gayer than him, and just sighed, replying snarkily, "Okay boomer."

"We're the same age, you fucking villain!" Hareda spat back.

"Oh, I'm so sorry for this misunderstanding. I was not aware that you have a brain that's the size of a peanut." Shinsou shrugged nonchalantly, "Clearly, your mental age is nowhere near your actual age if you're acting like such a spoilt brat."

"Shut the fuck up!"

"Oh no! Swearing! My worst nightmare!" Monoma drawled dramatically, "I can't come up with any comebacks! Someone please come save me and back me up!"

"Are you just running out of insults, or is that all the vocabulary you have?" Shinsou smirked, "Maybe you should pick up a dictionary or a thesaurus, you guys do have a library in this school, don't you?"

He could hear Shindo cackling like a maniac behind him, slamming his palm onto the table, and Shinsou decided that this was probably the only occasion that he was going to be in some sort of agreement with the demented sprite can.


Midoriya sighed, nausea clawing at his throat as he walked through the empty halls of Ketsubutsu, trying to find the classroom that he belonged to, with a sleepy Shinsou walking beside him, yawning, having just had a light breakfast of some salted biscuits that Shinsou had packed.

Just the previous day, Midoriya had gotten into the classroom with his table covered in ink. He didn't have any time to clean it up before the literature teacher entered the classroom, and he was immediately chewed out before Midoriya could say anything to defend himself.

Monoma, Kendo, and Shinsou knew that it couldn't have been Midoriya, since the boy didn't even pack any ink to begin with, and after reporting it to the teachers, Aizawa had found out that the literature teacher had already been in a bad mood from a bout of stomach ulcers.

That, Aizawa could understand, since the Erasure hero himself was always irritable whenever his dry eye kicked in, but still... that was no excuse to blow up at the poor child like that.

It was obvious that some of the teachers... didn't seem to like him too much, but they couldn't really do anything about that at the moment.

Shinsou yawned again, and pushed open the door to the classroom, "At least... if there's anything here from overnight... we can clean it up immediately. And if someone comes in early -"

The lavender haired boy immediately paused as Midoriya froze up completely, staring into the classroom. Before he could react, Midoriya immediately took off running, and Shinsou whirled around to follow Midoriya, "Zuku! Where are you going?"

As the taller boy chased after Midoriya, Shinsou managed to catch a glimpse of whatever made the greenette have such an adverse reaction, and needless to say, it made him sick to his stomach.

A vase of blood red spider lilies stood prominently on Midoriya's temporary desk.

Midoriya raced towards the nearest bathroom, hastily dashing into one of the stalls. He hardly made it to the toilet bowl before his stomach churned. He tried to force down the bile, as he sank to his knees by the toilet bowl, before he emptied out his stomach's contents, forcing everything out.

"Hey, it's okay." Shinsou squatted down beside him, gently rubbing circles into his back, "It's alright. Everything would be fine."

Midoriya breathed heavily, retching continuously until only clear liquid was dribbling out of his mouth. Despite being empty, his stomach kept on contracting violently. His throat was sore from all the stomach acid, and tears were forming at the corners of his eyes as he heaved.

They didn't know how long they stayed there, before someone entered the bathroom.

"Ah! Hitoshi! We were looking for you and -... Izuku? Are you alright?" Iida's voice rang out, and the bespectacled boy poked his head into the bathroom stall.

"Shhh, it's okay..." Shinsou gently patted Midoriya's back, before he turned to look at Iida, who had hastily rummaged through his backpack to take out a spare plastic bottle of water that he always brought with him. Shinsou uncapped the bottle and tried to offer it to Midoriya.

"What happened?" Iida frowned, greatly distressed that his friend was throwing up, and Shinsou scowled, "Go check our classroom, and find Dad."

At the mention of the word "classroom", Midoriya immediately pulled his head away from the bottle of water, and turned back to the toilet bowl to throw up again.

Iida blanched, and despite knowing that he shouldn't run in school hallways, he immediately raced out of the bathroom at breakneck speed.


After Iida had reported the situation about the flowers to Aizawa and having Todoroki burn them up gloriously, the rest of the day seemed relatively normal.

At least, as normal as it could be.

Midoriya had to go back to change into a clean set of clothes, and had gotten back to class ten minutes late, but Mr Yuaku was very nice and understanding and didn't mark it down on his attendance.

The literature teacher had apologized to Midoriya about the ink incident, though she didn't sound very apologetic, and the other teachers opted to just leave the greenette alone and didn't call on him, or draw any attention to him for the rest of the day.

However, by the time lunch rolled around, almost everyone in school had heard about the spider lilies in some way.

"Izuku, are you okay?" Uraraka slammed her tray down harshly, looking at her friend in concern, as the boy nodded, sipping his iced soda.

"It's... fine..." Midoriya looked away, "At least... it wasn't as bad as the last time... something like this... happened..."

Shinsou blanched. Spider lilies were usually planted around cemeteries, and are associated with final goodbyes, as these flowers grow wherever people part ways for good. He knew this very well; he's also gotten a vase of spider lilies before, while he was still in elementary school, and he had a chill run down his spine when he searched up the meaning of the flowers.

What could be worse than that?

"What happened last time?" Monoma asked the question that had been lingering on everyone's mind.

Midoriya lowered his head, "There was a picture of me on my table... and there were candles... newspaper cut outs… lit incense... there was also a card that said some... bad things inside... It was like... I was looking at my own funeral..."

The poor boy couldn't even finish his statement, before he stood up and raced out of the cafeteria in the direction of the bathroom, with Shinsou once again chasing after him.

But Midoriya wasn't the only one that wanted to throw up; all the UA, Shiketsu, and even the four Ketsubutsu second years looked absolutely sick and disgusted. Midoriya had gone through all that pain and betrayal; it was a miracle that he had decided to open his heart out to his new classmates, slowly learning that he could trust and rely on them.

"What went wrong with our society?" Yaoyorozu asked, clenching her fists, breaking the silence.

No one had an answer to her question.


Shinsou just sat on the bed as he stared out of the window, his arms around the smaller boy, who was checking the news on his phone.

Midoriya seemed warmer than usual, but Shinsou couldn't tell if he had a fever, or he was just agitated and stressed from the day's events. Aizawa had given him the option of skipping the training session to rest early, but by then, Midoriya still wanted to participate in training.

"Hito." Midoriya bumped his head up against Shinsou's chin, "What's wrong?"

"They didn't just mock you, you know? It's psychological cruelty. They wanted to break you so much that there was nothing left. How... how could you still trust all of us... after something like that..." Shinsou gritted his teeth, tightening his hug around the smaller boy, resting his chin on top of Midoriya's fluffy mop of hair, "What they did was just... terrible..."

"I know that. But you are different." Midoriya softly replied, but the taller boy just sighed, "I get that but... from your perspective... how?"

"I don't know. I'm not so sure myself." Midoriya admitted, leaning back into Shinsou's chest, "Many things have changed... but you trust me, right?"

"Of course." Shinsou puffed a cheek out, shifting his position so that his chin was resting on Midoriya's shoulder, and the greenette turned his head so that he could look at Shinsou in the eye, "Then trust me when I say that I know it won't happen again."

"Fine." Shinsou muttered, "I'll take your word for it."

Silence filled the room, as Midoriya continued to scroll through the news, before he heard Shinsou grumble, "If I find out who did that... I'm going to shove that vase so far up their ass, they'd be spitting up ceramic splinters for the rest of their life."

A small amused snort escaped from the back of Midoriya's throat.

"I'll hold you to your word."