Chapter One: Suichu Jumi: Origin
A/N: (WARNING: This note contains possible manga spoilers.) Welcome to my first BNHA fanfic! This story is a slight AU just for how One For All works in it. I won't be incorporating the additional quirks that pop up in the manga, and I will also be ignoring the recent revelations about OFA not being able to be passed on to someone with a quirk—I actually came up with the idea for this story before that was even revealed. So with that in mind, please enjoy the story, and leave a review letting me know what you think!
The number one pro hero, Deku, placed his hands on his hips as he stood on the top of the skyscraper overlooking Tokyo. He took a moment to rest his sore shoulders and knees, cursing the old injuries that had begun wearing on his health. After thirty years of being Japan's Beacon of Hope, it was only inevitable that time would catch up to him; he just wished it didn't come with such achy joints.
Years of breaking bones and collecting scars like hero merchandise had begun breaking down his body. His doctors told him that the ligaments that protected his joints were deteriorating, and if he continued hero work for too much longer, the pain would become debilitating.
A far more natural retirement than his mentor had gotten, but a forced retirement, nonetheless.
"I'm going to have to start looking for a successor of my own soon," Deku mused, placing a hand under his chin. His eyes lifted to the sky. "All Might, how on Earth did you know who the right person was?"
The thought had been weighing heavily on his mind in recent years. Ever since All Might had passed twenty-nine years ago, just after Deku had taken the spot of number one hero, Deku had known the titanic responsibility of One For All now rested solely on his shoulders. That didn't prepare him any better for making that decision, though. All Might never even told him how he was supposed to find possible successors! Was he just supposed to pick someone off the street?!
And now, at the age of fifty-five, even older than his mentor had been when he had passed the torch down, Deku knew his time as the number one hero was coming to an end.
Most of his friends had retired, either due to age or injury, and the majority of heroes on the streets these days hadn't even been alive when he first became number one. It was only a matter of time before the Beacon of Hope had to step down, but he had no clue what he even wanted his successor to be like.
Deku sighed. If only the perfect candidate would just appear in front of him.
He snapped out of his thoughts as a cry for help drifted through the crisp fall air, carried along on a foul wind tainted with the smell of smoke. His aging but still powerful body did as it always had done and launched into motion before he could give it a second thought.
One For All surged through his legs as he rocketed into the sky, aiming his landing for the source of the smoke; an apartment building engulfed in flames, surrounded by other heroes that were attempting to get past a villain in order to rescue the trapped civilians inside. The villain, a woman dressed in all black leather, was spreading an oily, flaming substance around and making it difficult for the heroes to get close enough to take her down.
Deku made the split-second decision to leave the villain to the other heroes and came crashing down on the opposite side of the building, immediately dashing through the back door and scooping up anyone he saw. Green lightning crackled across his body as he moved faster, blurring throughout the apartment building and depositing civilians outside.
Over and over, he repeated the process, grabbing anyone still trapped in the burning building and zipping back outside to hand them off to waiting heroes. The flames reached out to lick his boots as he ran, but it was as if they were moving in slow motion; Deku was gone before the fire could ever reach him.
It wasn't until he reached the last apartment on the top floor that he stopped still; a teenaged girl was blocking his path, slight shoulders squared as her legs trembled. Water trickled from her hands as she stubbornly tried to put the fire out, but she was hopelessly overwhelmed; for every drop of water she flung at the fire, massive tongues of flame roared out and turned them into steam. However, the girl refused to give up, sending stream after small stream into the inferno.
"I'm going to save you!" She shouted into the blaze. Deku could hear her parents' screams as they begged their daughter to leave and get to safety. "I won't leave you! I'm going to get you out of here!"
Deku paused for only a second, stunned by the tenacity of this diminutive girl, before snapping back to action.
She whipped around as Deku stepped up behind her and placed a soothing hand on her shoulder, her eyes widening as she saw the towering visage of the Beacon of Hope. "Deku?!"
Deku nodded firmly. "It's going to be alright, young lady. Why?" He grinned, his broad chest flexing as his arms began sparking with One For All. "Because I can do it!"
Deku brought his hands together in a powerful clap that instantly snuffed out the flames on the entire top floor of the building. Without missing a beat, he surged forwards, grabbing the girl and her parents to his sides as he passed them. With the family secured, he danced around falling beams and across scorched holes in the floor, his quick footwork like poetry in motion. Reaching the far wall, Deku launched out of the window to land safely in a crouch on the street below.
"All clear!" Deku shouted to the surrounding heroes, setting the family down on the asphalt and smiling as the heroes immediately doubled down on their firefighting efforts, dousing the rest of the flames with vigor now that the civilians were evacuated. The worst of the crisis was resolved, and now the cleanup could begin.
"Deku, sir!" One of the nearby heroes ran up, a young man wearing shiny silver armor with a sword strapped to his hip. "The villain that caused this blaze escaped. She was throwing around something that smelled like gasoline and kept lighting it on fire, and none of us could get close enough to stop her. But wow…she ran away hissing mad as soon as she so much as saw you!"
Deku turned to the hero addressing him. The Swordsman Hero, Excalibur, Deku's encyclopedia-like brain supplied. Quirk: Living Sword. He can make any sword he's using come to life and talk like it has a mind of its own. Fresh out of Ketsubutsu, but a sharp mind for combat situations.
"It's alright, Excalibur," Deku asserted, "We'll send a search party out as soon as we get this sorted. What matters most is that everyone got out okay. I've confirmed the civilians are all safe; are there any injured among the heroes?"
"Just some minor burns and scrapes, Deku, sir. We've got everything handled from here!" Excalibur responded, almost vibrating in place as he attempted to stay calm speaking to the number one hero.
Deku laughed, subconsciously running his fingers across the salt-and-pepper streaks through his hair. "Enough calling me 'sir', you're gonna make me feel older than I already do!"
"Nonsense, sir! You'll always be there to save the day!" Excalibur exclaimed, a wide smile on his face. His sword chimed in with a nasally voice, "Yeah! Deku forever!"
Deku nodded and began walking away, his smile fading as his aches became noticeable through the fading adrenaline. He knew he didn't have forever; he barely had another couple of years before his joints would begin hurting too much and his aging body wouldn't be strong enough to continue hero work. He couldn't let excitable young heroes like Excalibur know that, though, not while Japan still needed its Beacon of Hope. "Oh, All Might," Deku sighed internally, "History really does repeat itself, huh? Is this how you felt?"
Just when he began to lose himself in the nostalgia as he retreated, he heard footsteps across the pavement as a voice called out to him. "Wait! Deku!"
Deku turned as the young girl he had rescued earlier ran up to him, panting heavily as she escaped her parents' embrace to dash over and grab his hand to stop him from leaving. He eyed her curiously, noting her slight build, black hair so dark it looked almost blue in the light, and deep blue eyes.
"Deku, please, I need to ask you," she gasped, lifting her head to look him in the eye. "I want to be a hero that makes people feel safe, just like you, but my quirk isn't strong enough to save anyone. Is it possible to be a hero with a weak quirk like mine?"
Deku's eyes widened as memories flooded him of standing before his hero 41 years ago, asking him the very same thing. "I want to be a hero just like you, All Might, but I'm quirkless. Is it possible to be a hero without a quirk?"
In front of him, he could almost see a scrawny nerd with a mop of green hair, desperate for someone to believe in him. It was uncanny how similar this scene was playing out to the day everything changed for him.
But he wouldn't let history repeat itself exactly as it was before. He refused to make the same mistakes as All Might had made. He knelt to the girl's eye level, taking her other hand as he stared at her.
"Tell me, young lady," Deku murmured, half-lost in the past. "What is your name?"
"My name is Suichu Jumi." She stated confidently, refusing to break eye contact. "And I want to be the kind of hero that people feel safe around. I want to be a shield for the defenseless!"
Deku considered her intently, noting the nervousness and fear of rejection hidden behind her brave face, and the determination and conviction underneath those. She was so much bolder than he ever was when he was her age, but he could easily see the same qualities in her that his mentor must have seen in him. Suddenly, every question he had been asking himself earlier was answered in an instant.
He could slap himself for ever wondering what he was looking for in a successor. Now that this girl was in front of him, it was so obvious.
A heroic spirit, an unbreakable will, and the burning desire to be a symbol to people in need. How could he ask for anything else?
"Young Suichu," Deku smiled, rising to his full height as he stepped back to get a good look at the girl that would be the future tenth holder of One For All, even if she didn't know it yet. He spoke the only words he'd ever wanted to hear, the only words he could speak in a situation like this. "You can be a hero."
Suichu double checked the address on the note that Deku had given her before he left the scene of her smoldering apartment. She was standing in front of a sprawling complex, with a massive pool visible to the side of the main building on her left, and a wide field off in the distance to her right. This definitely looks like the house of the number one hero.
She still couldn't believe that Deku had offered to train her. The Number One hero! The Beacon himself! She'd been so sure he was joking when he'd told her she could be a hero, but the words he'd whispered as he leaned in to tuck the note into her hand were too raw with emotion to be a cruel prank. "You remind me of myself when I was a boy," he'd muttered. "Meet me at this address a week from now, and I'll help you realize your dream."
All she had to do was knock on the door, and her path to being a real-life hero would begin.
Before she could even raise her hand, the door slid open and she was face to face with a motherly looking woman with pink cheeks and brown hair in a bob cut streaked with gray, leaning on a pink cane and wielding one of the brightest smiles she'd ever seen. With no warning, the former number five pro hero Uravity was in front of her!
"Hi there!" Uravity greeted cheerfully. Suichu almost had to look away from the brightness of her smile. "Suichu, right? Welcome, welcome! Deku told me you'd be here any moment, and I didn't believe him 'cause he always gets times mixed up, but here you are! Come on in!"
Uravity ushered her inside, where they entered a large and open family room filled with comfortable looking couches, solid wood coffee tables, and hero merch all over the walls. On the back wall was a gigantic fireplace, framed by pictures of Deku and Uravity in casual clothing holding kids of various ages.
"Sit down and make yourself comfy! Deku should be out in a minute. I'll make you some tea!" Uravity urged.
"Oh, no thank you, I'm not much of a tea—and she's gone…" Suichu trailed off, recognizing the futility. Resigning herself to waiting, she plopped down in one of the offered couches—and boy, they definitely were very comfy—and began looking at the pictures on the wall by the fireplace.
They seemed to be a progression of the family as the years went on; the earlier photos were just Deku and Uravity, both in their hero costumes and in casual clothes. As the pictures went on, the family grew; first, a baby girl bundled in the arms of overjoyed new parents appeared, and then when that baby was a toddler, a baby boy began showing up. The picture that looked the most recent showed a much older Deku and Uravity posing with the two kids, now fully grown and in hero costumes of their own, and included a rather angry-looking blonde woman who was standing off to the now-grown man's side.
Uravity trundled back into the family room, holding a tea tray in one hand and leaning on her cane with the other. She sat the tray down on the coffee table in front of Suichu, and plopped herself down in the adjacent couch. Noticing Suichu eyeing her cane curiously, Uravity smiled a little sadly.
"I gotta use this dumb thing ever since my left leg got crushed a few years back. My own fault really, I should've paid more attention to where that stupid villain was tossing all that rubble, but I don't really mind 'cause now I have an excuse to sit back and watch my kids be their own heroes." Uravity grinned mischievously. "And I'll let you in on a little secret…nobody says crap about floating around in public when you start waving a cane at them!"
Suichu definitely did not snort with laughter at that. Not at all. But her already high opinion of the former number five hero definitely went a little higher.
Deku descended the staircase in a hurry, rushing past them and down the hallway entirely oblivious, muttering to himself about not being ready and how did All Might do this and how could he possibly be a good mentor? Oh gods how could he think he could do this and—
"Sweetheart, we're right here!" Uravity interrupted exasperatedly, trying to hide her fond smile behind her hand.
"H-Hueh?!" Deku made a sound that was a cross between a hiccup and a shout as he spun around. "Oh! You're already here! Uh…hi! I mean—welcome!"
Suichu desperately tried to hold in her giggles at the sight of the Number One Hero, the Beacon of Hope, being reduced to a flustered mess.
"Never mind that Deku! C'mon, tell her the good stuff already! I'm tired of waiting!" Uravity joined in the giggles.
"Yes, dear," Deku obediently agreed, plopping down in the armchair across from Suichu. He turned to face her as his face stopped flushing and turned serious.
"Suichu Jumi. I told you that you can be a hero, and I stand by that. I will train you until your body, mind, and quirk are strong enough to get you into any hero school of your choice. These are facts and are entirely independent of what you say to my offer," Deku told her, intensity sparking in his eyes.
"Offer? Huh?" Suichu asked.
"You see, Suichu," Deku's intense visage cracked a bit as he grinned excitedly, "I am not a natural-born hero. My quirk was given to me, passed down like an Olympic torch from my mentor to myself. The crystallization of the power and will of those who came before, growing stronger as each new user cultivates it and passes it on. That is my quirk, the legacy of the first heroes handed down across generations: One For All. If you agree, I want you to be my successor, the tenth wielder of One For All. Suichu Jumi, next…it's your turn."
Deku's Hero Files: Midoriya Ochako, the Infinity Hero: Uravity.
Quirk: Zero Gravity. The user can remove the gravity from any object they touch (up to 1,000 tons) with the pads on their fingers and restore it by touching those pads together. Great for rescue work and devastating in combat. A dynamic quirk for a dynamic woman.
The former number 5 pro hero and married to the number one hero Deku (lucky guy, that one). She retired a few years ago after receiving an injury to her left leg that left her reliant on a cane (or her quirk) to walk for long periods of time. She doesn't mind, though, because it lets her watch her children's fights as they grow into their own incredible heroes. A bubbly, cheerful woman, who is incredibly frugal for herself but happy to spend her massive salary as the former number 5 hero on her parents and children.