Chapter 1
If Izuku hadn't stopped to tie his shoe, he would have never missed his train. He was usually pretty good about keeping schedules, but he had been so caught up in training the night before that he had gotten a late start to the morning. He looked more disheveled than usual when he arrived at Batou Station. Being one of the top pro-heroes was hard work. By the time he noticed the crowds moving past him, the doors to the train had already closed and he was stuck waiting another ten minutes for the next train.
Having been Quirkless and unnoticed most of his life, it hadn't occurred to him that he could simply jump there using One for All and avoid all of the traffic that came with taking the subway, including the attention from the public. However, there was a humbleness about taking public transportation, and had circumstances been any different, he would have still be taking the subway to this day. If he hadn't, he wouldn't have met her.
She was the only person who hadn't really approached him or noticed him when he moved to stand in the back corner of the train car. He wasn't quite high enough in the hero rating system to be the number one hero yet, but he was quickly gaining traction, enough to be noticed by a few curious eyes on the subway. He wasn't wearing his hero costume, something that he always left in his locker at the agency where he worked, but a few people still recognized him even in his All Might track suit. It must have blown people's minds that heroes could be seen in public with slacks on like anyone else.
She had noticed his legs at least, well enough that she pulled her tote and oblong bag back so that it wouldn't inhibit him from moving forward to grab the closest free hand-rail- a bulbous pokeball attached to her purse jingled on a set of key rings built like a pocket knife as she moved it out of the way when his calf got too close -but that was the extent of it.
"Thanks," Izuku mentioned in passing but she barely acknowledge him. A dark pair of thin, horn-rimmed glasses sat on the brim of her nose as she kept her head tilted down towards her smartphone, occasionally swiping upward with the pad of her right index finger. He frowned slightly at the uncharacteristically rude gesture. Doesn't she realize she's on the subway? he thought as she hummed softly to herself.
"...sley, sage, rosemary and thyme..." He continued to hear her hum this line over the rattle of the train interspersed with talk of going to a fair and making a shirt, stopping only to jot something down in a Harujuku Girls notebook or tuck a strand of dark brown hair out of her face. He tried not to take it to heart, understanding that some people were probably having a rougher day than him and began meticulously planning out his day.
So if the trains are on-time and I use One for All once I'm out of range of civilians, I'll be able to escape the four block rush hour traffic jam and make it to the office five minutes before I have to clock in. Then if I skip pleasantries, I'll have a chance to make it to the morning meeting and go over notes with the other sidekicks before dishing out paperwork and going on patrol-
"Hey, do you know another word for lever?"
"Huh?!"
The girl in the corner was making eye contact with him now, spinning a decorative pen between her fingers. "A word. I need to come up with another word for lever, and I can't think of it." He turned his head, looking around for the person she was addressing before she nodded and spoke with a clear, resounding voice. "Yeah, I'm talking to you, Freckles. Got any ideas?"
"Uhh... support?"
"Hmm... no."
"Wrench?"
"Nooo..."
"I'm sorry," he apologized, rubbing the back of his neck. "I'm not really good at this kind of stuff."
"That's fine. It's not like a wrench or axle. It's like... a pressure point, something that's essential in order to lift something. Fruh... free... ugh something like that."
Suddenly, one of Mei Hatsume's many rants about her babies and their various upgrades came to mind as he answered with some hesitation, "...fulcrum?"
"Fulcrum! YES! THANK you! God, that was bothering me for hours," she exclaimed with a certain spark in her eye before scribbling the word down on her notebook and mumbling to herself, "don't know why I couldn't think of that. It's literally a character in Star Wars..."
"Sure. Glad to be of some help," Izuku smiled, his curiosity peaked. "What exactly did you need to know that for? Are you doing a crossword puzzle or something?"
"Hmmm? Oh... well it's kind of embarrassing-" she tugged shyly at the long ponytail that sat at the base of her neck so that it was fully straightened out, "-but I'm kinda doing research for a story I'm writing, and I couldn't think of the right word to properly express some technical jargon."
"Oooh so you're a writer? That makes sense," Izuku commented, his curiosity peaked with some interest. "What's it about?"
"What?" She blinked up at him, like she hadn't really heard what he was saying.
"Your story. What's it about?"
"Umm... well, it's hardly original but... it's kinda... fanfiction about... vigilante superheroes." Her voice got softer the more she talked about it, tugging at the blue earbuds that had been swinging from her ears and anxiously wrapping them around in her hands.
"Whoa cool! So you like heroes too! Are they based on any real pro heroes? Do you have any favorites?" Her chocolate colored eyes averted towards the back subway door to stare at her flustered reflection. Had he made her uncomfortable with his line of questioning? "I'm sorry! I don't mean to pry! I just really like talking about heroes."
"It's okay. No one's... really asked about my work before," she said mostly to herself. "So to answer your questions, yes, yes, and a couple. It's hard to pick a favorite, really. Just depends on my mood. So what about you? Do you have a favorite hero?"
"My favorite hero of all time has to be All Might," he gestured to his track suit. "as you can plainly see, eh heh."
"Pfft well, everyone loves All Might. He's so mainstream and has such cheery personality, plus the cameras love him," she shrugged with a smile. "Personally, I think right now my favorite hero is the Human Spider."
"Ohhh I've heard about him," Izuku said in recognition. He had written something about him in one of his older hero notebooks when studying some of the heroes that worked alongside All Might when he had worked in the United States. Hadn't Sero mentioned something about him too? "He does hero work in New York City, right?"
"Yeah. I just love his humor! His one-liners and witty banter are so fun and carefree, it's hard to be scared in that moment when he's there popping out zingers left and right. I think the only guy who can match him in sarcasm is Irony Man or Captain Deadpoole."
"Those are some good international pro-heroes. Do you have any local favorites?"
"Well there's Hawks and Fat Gum, although Ground Zero might be a close second for me for favorite hero. He's grown on me the last couple of months."
"Oh I know him!"
"You know Ground Zero?!" she gasped, her jaw slack and eyes suddenly wide and bright.
"Of course! Kacchan and I have known each other since we were kids through our parents. We practically grew up together." The girl clapped her hands together while pressing them excitedly to her lips as if to contain her rapidly increasing excitement and let out a slow-building, high pitched squeal that Izuku could only describe as fan-girlish.
"Oh my god, that's amazing! I freaking love his costume design."
"I know, right?! The support company who designed his costume did a great job with designing a suit with his Quirk in mind."
"Yeah, especially when it comes to making a memorable costume as well. I can't tell you how many times I've tried replicating his grenade gauntlets."
"That sounds amazing, but I hope you're working with safety in mind. Those things really pack a punch."
"Safety?" Her brow furrowed in confusion before realization hit her. "Oh! No, drawings. I can only do drawings. I can't make support items, though I wish I could. I get various inspirations for ideas for my stories by how a person's costume is designed to emphasize their Quirk and their personality. Sometimes I even go to fabric stores just to understand the material of an object."
"Wow sounds like you really get into it. I actually have a couple notebooks with notes on superheroes, though sometimes I do sketches for costumes or potential upgrades."
"Oh my god, me too!" She shouted with a sudden passion and vapidness like she had found a kindred spirit. Either she was oblivious to the glares or simply didn't care, because she continued talking rapidly and with an ever increasing volume. That shout had been the last straw to one of them as they were angry enough to growl 'keep it down! Some of us have to go to work today!'
"I'm so sorry!" she exclaimed before clapping her hands over her mouth to put a lid over her accidentally release of her vapid, fan-girl nature. Izuku noted that dimples outlined the slight crease of her cheeks as she turned red and gave him a bashful smile. "Sometimes I get a little loud when I'm excited."
"It's alright. I get like that too sometimes," he admitted and shared an awkward chuckle with the stranger.
"But where are my manners? In all that talk, I completely forgot to ask your name. My name is Alyssa. What's your name?"
"O-Oh, I'm Izuku. Izuku Midoriya."
"Nice to meet you, Izuku." He flushed at her forward nature of having them be at a first name basis. No one other than his mother called him Izuku. Even Kacchan only called him Deku, and he had known him for twenty years. Yet here was this strange girl calling him by his first name out of the blue.
"N-Nice t-to m-meet you too, A-Arisa."
"No, not ah-ris-ah. Uh-liss-suh. You know, with an L?"
"O-Oh, I'm sorry. My mistake!" He corrected himself, feeling a bit more like his awkward self. After all this time, he still got flustered when talking to a girl. However, he didn't get to sit long in the awkwardness as Alyssa continued to pick up the conversation where it left off and went onto inquire him about his hero notebooks. Comfortable with that subject, he felt himself slip into a familiar rhythm as he went on into discussions of various heroes he had studied and idolized to the point where he became more comfortable the longer the conversation continued. She seemed a lot more animated the more she spoke. He couldn't help but admire her passion. It wasn't until she glanced at her watch after hearing the loudspeakers talk over their conversation about whether or not luck based Quirks could be considered Quirks that she suddenly switched gears.
"Wait did that lady just say Dantooin Station?"
"Uhh... I think so." Honestly he hadn't been paying attention. Dantooin? Had they really been talking for that long that he was so close to his agency already?
"Oh shit! I think that's my stop!" She hurriedly began gathering her things, shoving them haphazardly under her arms and into her bag. When she stood up to take her leave, she was a much more imposing figure: curvy, confident, and almost a full head taller than him. Outside of Mt. Lady, whose Quirk let her cheat the boundaries of average height, he hadn't ever seen a girl this tall before. Was she a foreigner? That certainly explained her mannerisms and slight accent she had when she spoke.
"It was cool meeting you, Izuku. Have a good one!" He flushed again at the informal usage of his first name as he stammered a quick 'goodbye' as she exited through the sliding doors. When the train pulled away from the station, Izuku noticed a floral pen left on the ground by his feet and picked it up. A fake, red hibiscus flower had been duct-taped to the edge and had been well worn, the petals dingy and frayed with loose strands of thread. He recognized it to be the same pen Alyssa had been writing with earlier. Rather than throw it away, Izuku instead slipped it into his pants pocket and thought back to their conversation with fondness and a brighter attitude. In all of the excitement, it had never occurred to him to ask her for her email or what her last name was, a fact that he would soon be quick to regret.
Author's Note: I love Horikoshi's little references to the SW Universe, so as a Star Wars fan I thought to carry on that tradition. References for Star Wars are Dantooine, Batuu, and Fulcrum, an alias for rebel informants utilized in Star Wars Rebels, along with references to the Marvel Heroes Spider-Man, Iron Man, and Deadpool. Expect more Star Wars and other nerdy references. Thanks for reading!