Izuku stepped out onto the tranquil beach, the calm waters barely lapping against the softest sand he had ever touched. Everything felt more beautiful here, and he had even seen Ori in so many new lights that he could hardly believe she was the same person. Eva also seemed to be experiencing something similar; she was really coming into her own and becoming a beautiful young woman that could casually beat the shit out of most dudes without breaking a sweat. Perhaps the most important thing was that this vacation had given him time to think.
Think about his place in life.
Think about where he had come from, and where he was going next.
The calm ocean nearly mirrored the clear night sky, making it feel like he was walking into a globe of stars beckoning him to jump in and go for a swim.
From his earliest years, he had always wanted to be a powerful hero. He had always wanted to be like All Might and have people recognize his strength. Being Yakuza was to stand on the other side of a very defined line from Hero. While not a complete villain, he had come to terms that the majority of the things the Amagi group did were simply illegal. From the fight pit, to the casino, the drugs, and the insurance schemes, they—and now he—were criminals.
It wasn't until this vacation that he had found the exact reason why he had been so okay with all of this.
Power.
It had started with Ori and the promise of tattoos. Then it was the exhilaration of the fight pit. Then it was family. But at the end of the day, he found himself enjoying the power being Yakuza brought.
He honestly wasn't bitter that he hadn't been able to become a hero anymore. If anything, he was grateful for it. He had gotten to find out so much about himself, his family, his father, and so much more about this world than he would have if he went to U.A.
And then there were his friends. Tanaka, Ita, Sho, Wakan, and all the other members were all close to him, and they treated each other with respect. Eva stood out from that group as someone that was hard to place; she was closer to where he placed Ori as someone that was just a bit more important to him.
Ori… Ori was Ori. She had been the catalyst for his current life, and he wanted to keep her in his life. Part of him had been worried that they were only close because his addiction to getting tattoos matched her addiction of giving them perfectly. Their quirks were just beyond compatible. But, he was sure now, he was in love with Ori.
A plume of fire erupted from the beach and stretched over the ocean for a dazzling moment that remained etched into his eyes as he made his way towards its source.
Hanabi Midoriya. His grandmother. He had only known her for less than half a year, but he couldn't help but feel like she had done a better job raising him than how own mother did. It was because she believed in him. Everything he did she supported, and sure, she tried to guide him, but she never lied to him. That, and she was the kind of crazy badass that he wanted to be when he was her age.
She stood knee-deep in the sandy shore, a warm glow coming from her submerged hands while steam billowed up all around her. Every breath she took caused the sea around her to boil as she worked a glowing object with her hands.
"Grandma?"
"Hmm?"
"What are you doing?"
"Making souvenirs." She snapped her head back to him and nodded towards a chair she had set up on the secluded beach. "Mostly just trying to wear myself out for the plane ride home tomorrow morning." She let out a laugh that was closer to a cackle and flashed a smile at him before returning to her project. "Though part of me is hoping I sleep in and you leave my wrinkled ass here."
"Please, you'd be bored of this place in a week."
"Ha! Within a week I'll be hunting sharks with a harpoon just to feel alive!" Her cackle carried over the sea far more than it should have, as though she was sending a warning to every single sea creature there that they were simply sport to this crazy old woman. "But don't worry, I'm not ready to leave everything to you just yet."
"Wait." Izuku felt his blood run cold enough to freeze the ocean. "What?"
The light in Hanabi's hands faded, and she held up a small piece of glass that drew every piece of light into itself. It was as though a star had fallen from the heavens and had been given form and shape. "Don't go acting all modest, you're a smart kid." She turned and started to walk towards him. "Ambitious too, I see so much of myself in you." She placed a warm hand on his chest right above where Hisashi rested. "A bit of your grandfather too, and more than a bit of your father as well."
She walked past him, her words leaving him brimming with pride and filling him with a sense of unease. "It shouldn't be a surprise that you're going to be leading the Amagi."
"But, wouldn't someone else be better? Like Wakan?" Izuku held up his hands as he followed after his grandmother.
"He's a hardass, but he's too old and has the leadership abilities of a blind duck in the snow."
Was that an actual saying?
"What about Ita?"
"No drive."
"Sho?"
"He's on my side and thinks you'll be a good head."
"Tanaka?"
Hanabi just looked at him for a moment with only the sound of the ocean to mock how stupid his words were.
"Right, too stupid."
"Don't worry so much, Izuku. I'll stick around until you're ready, and even then you'll know where I am if you ever need an old woman to come save you." She cracked a smile and placed down the piece of glass on a flat rock where some others sat. With a groan, she plopped down onto her chair and stretched. "Just figure I'd let you know what's in the cards."
"I… I don't know what to say." Izuku kicked the sand at his feet and then looked up towards the stars. "I'm pretty sure being a Yakuza head is a long way away from being a hero."
"Meh." That noise served to bring out every single fault in the hero society they lived in kicking and screaming into the light where it was ultimately found wanting. "Being a hero ain't nearly as glamorous as you think it is. Nor are they as good as you think. Just as you're aware that we aren't all bad, they aren't all good."
"What do you mean?" Izuku sat in the sand beside his grandmother and followed her far off gaze towards the ocean.
"You learned about Destro in school right?"
"Yeah, didn't he lead a terrorist group?"
"Ha!" Hanabi barked and then adjusted herself in her seat. "That's a title I never thought I'd earned."
"Huh? You were a member of the Meta Liberation Front?"
"Fuck yeah I was! And we weren't a terrorist group either!" She kicked her legs and glared forward like she could see the memory vividly. "Not at first, at any rate. We started off with peaceful protests; you know, a bunch of college students following around some older guy that had ideas we liked. Hunger strikes in front of the Diet, standing out in the rain, blocking streets, anything we could think of to get the message out that quirks shouldn't be outlawed. That they were a new part of human nature."
"We had sister groups all over the world, mostly in first-world countries where the governments were strong enough to ban quirks. For a while, it felt like we had hope. Then Quirktocracies sprung up. Les Smerti most of all put the fear in people of what quirks could do unchecked. And our conservitive shithole of a country seized up with fear all the way to the top of the government."
"Things began to change. Fast." Hanabi let out a long sigh and closed her eyes. "It was a protest like any other: a rally to remove the anti-quirk laws that felt like a noose to so many people. The police fired tear gas at us. It triggered someone. They retaliated, quirks were activated." She leaned to the side and pulled a large blunt out of her bag and ignited it with the flick of her finger, its embers floating up to join the stars like lost ducks in a pond. "You could tell me that the first to act were plants and I would believe you without a second thought. I've seen enough bullshit to know that's how the government works."
She took a long hit of her blunt and let the smoke flow through her nose before she sighed and continued. "Then, the heroes came, and in that moment, they made themselves known as dogs of the government. That was when the movement turned more extreme. I stopped being a part of the movement afterwards, but it carried on. I still don't think half the attacks were actually from Destro."
Izuku sat forward, the history he had been taught in school was being rewritten right before his eyes again. Why did it feel like the truth in all its honest and ugly glory was coming from his grandmother, a woman who sounded like she had lived a dozen lives in her life? "What happened afterwards? I mean, to you?"
"Almost got arrested, my family kicked me out, met your grandfather, married him, became the matron of a Yakuza gang, had your father, and he got in more trouble than I ever did." She took another hit and glanced his way. "The rest you probably already know."
"But, what else has the government done?" Izuku asked, still staring at the smoke as it swirled about in the cool sea air.
"Besides making deals with a bunch of Yakuza?" Hanabi gave a short laugh. "They weren't afraid to kill to keep the peace. Not every hero is as pure as All Might, or as stubborn and prideful as your cousin."
"Cousin?"
"Huh? Oh, right, my maiden name is Todoroki. I'm Endeavour's aunt, which makes him your cousin or something."
That made way too much sense given the raw firepower Hanabi showed off. "Grandma."
"Hmm?"
"Could you please limit yourself to the number of times you blow my mind in a single night?"
She let out a puff of smoke and looked at her blunt. With a shrug, she offered it to him.
He declined.
With another shrug Hanabi let out a sigh. "But, you should be aware, the Hero Public Safety Commission has teeth that they're not afraid to use. Have you ever wondered why you haven't heard of any heroes making deals with villain groups for mutual benefit? It's because the heroes that do this are eliminated in the name of preserving the way things are."
"Really?" Izuku asked. It was true, he had only become aware of heroes working with the Yakuza because he was one. It would make sense that desperate heroes would try to make a deal with villain groups, or maybe there were even corrupt heroes to begin with that saw an opportunity and took it.
"Yeah, you know Lady Nagant?"
"The hero killer?"
"Heh, I'm sure she pruned a few bad apples, but, what she was really locked away for was killing the president of the HPSC."
"Fuck," Izuku blinked and then leaned back until he was laying on the sand. "Is there anything else I should know?"
"Hmm, you know those Hatsume kids?"
"Yeah?"
"They're Nagant's little brother and sister."
"Fuck."
"You said that already."
AN: It's my birthday! (7/7) I'm doing a Dono-drive for Ori art so if you want to participate feel free to head to my twitter! Yoji19816784See you next chapter!