A new story I want to experiment with. Tell me what you all think. Also at the end of the first chapter, I will be asking a question, I want everyone's opinions on it. Anyways here we go, title might change later.
Pain.
That was all Izuku knew at the moment, as he lay beaten on the ground. He clutches his ribs as a single tear goes down his cheek. A blonde boy with small explosions popping from his palms stands over him with a menacing snarl on his face.
This was Katsuki Bakugo, his tormentor.
It was after school, Izuku had tried his best to avoid Bakugo, but Bakugo was quick to corner him. He cornered him alone, not even allowing his lackies to come help.
"Mind explaining to me what the fuck this is DEKU?!" Bakugo digs into Izuku's backpack and pulls out his test. On the test was a number. The number 89.
Izuku coughs as pain passes through him again.
"Are you TRYING to make me look bad you little shit?! Are you trying to surpass me?!" he shouts as his voice grows, which makes Izuku want to curl up and be as small as possible.
"I made a Ninety Two, I don't need your shitty ass getting anywhere close to me! You hear me!" he shouts as he uses one hand to lift up the skinny boy by the collar.
"Y-yes K-kacchan. I'm s-sorry I had m-made a score close t-to yours." He stutters out with shaky breaths.
Bakugo sends one last glare at Izuku before dropping him, and kicking him in the ribs for good measure.
"God, you're so fucking PATHETIC! Always trying to make me look bad! Just curl up and die already!" he shouts as his eye twitches and the explosions in his palms grow bigger.
"You should just fucking die you quirkless shit! You aren't going to be a hero, you aren't going to be ANYTHING!" he growls out before stomping off.
Izuku stayed down for a few more minutes, making sure that Bakugo was gone. He soon got up and looked down at his ruined uniform. It was covered in grime and mud. There were some tears and burn marks at his collar.
Izuku sighs.
'Another ruined uniform. How am I going to explain this to mom?' he questions internally.
To Izuku, Katsuki had 2 moods. A good mood and a bad mood. When he is in a good mood, he would make fun of Izuku and publicly embarrass him. His friends might join in as well, using their quirks on him.
When Katsuki was in a bad mood, the bullying grew far worse. He would beat up Izuku, burn him, damage his uniform, destroy his homework, and many other things. To Katsuki, Izuku was his own personal punching bag when he was in a bad mood. Not even his friends could mess with him while in a bad mood.
He noticed Katsuki looking more stressed than usual that morning. So he tried to make himself small and avoid his attention. It didn't work. Right as class ended, Izuku felt the heated glare of those piercing red eyes.
Izuku tried his best to avoid Katsuki when he was in one of his bad moods, but he failed again. Like he does with everything in life. He was a failure.
He held back tears as he picks up his backpack and ruined test.
The worst part wasn't even the beating or ruined clothes, it was his words.
'Kacchan didn't mean it. He was just angry' he tried to rationalize and tell himself.
At one point the two boys were best friends when they were young. However it all changed when Katsuki got his quirk. He allowed the praise to get into his head, and once Izuku was diagnosed as quirkless. He completely stopped caring about the boy.
However Izuku still wanted to be a hero without a quirk. Something that Katsuki didn't like. He has been bullying him ever since, trying to make him quit his impossible dream.
Izuku gets himself together. He was a little dirty and scuffed up, but he can just tell his mom that he fell or something. He would find an excuse sooner or later.
As Izuku navigated the alleyways, he soon found himself lost. He was just running from Kacchan, he didn't bother to try and find a way out. As Izuku walked by someone, that person began to follow them.
At first he didn't notice, however after a few minutes, the person would come into view of his peripheral vision. They were tall, around 6 ft, and had on a massive brown hoodie that covered his face, the only thing visible was a blonde goatee.
Izuku was about to make a run for end of the alley however the guy called out to him.
"Kid, your run or scream, and I'll gut you like a pig." He says in a rough and gravelly voice.
Izuku freezes in his tracks, fear encasing his entire body and all of his nerves. The hooded man walks next to him and wraps his arm around his shoulders.
"The other hand reaches into his hoodie pocket, he brandishes the blade of a silver bayonet, showing just enough for the shine to be visible to Izuku.
Izuku's eyes widen as the man smirks.
"Good call, I don't bullshit around kid. Now follow me and you won't be hurt." He says as he slowly guides Izuku into the maze of alleyways and away from the busy street.
Izuku turns his head towards the busy street, eyes desperate to meet anyone's, to have anyone call recognize his distress.
Nobody, not a single person turned towards him. Everyone kept going on about their day. The man looks down and sees him looking towards the street.
The man sighs.
"Give it up kid. Trust me, none of them would help you. Even if they did see you, they wouldn't take action. They would simply say 'Oh a hero will help' and go on about their day. People these days don't care. They rely on heroes too much and leave everyone to die." The man says in a more insightful tone, as if speaking from experience.
Izuku looks up at him as his throat chokes on a sob. He does his best to hold back tears. The thought of never seeing his mom again terrified him.
"Now c'mon kid we got-" A figure suddenly in front of them.
Both stop in their tracks and looks at the new person.
The person was a little shorter than the man next to Izuku. He had a cane with him. He wore a massive gravity defying cloak, a white striped shirt, along with white striped slacks to match. He had white hair and piercing blue eyes. Said eyes were leveling the man next to Izuku with a glare.
"Release that child you cretin." He says with disgust.
The man next to Izuku growls in anger before taking a breath and removing his hood.
His face was covered in tats and piercings. He had a nose piercing, 2 lip piercings, 3 rings on his right ear, and his right eye was completely tatted black(or maybe an effect of his quirk?) while his other eye was a deep shade of lavender, contrasting his blonde mohawk. He had no eyebrows and bags under his eyes. His skin had a slightly darker olive tone.
He smiles and closes his eyes, while pulling Izuku closer to him.
"What do you mean? I was simply getting my nephew before anything bad happened to him. Isn't that right?" he turns his smiling face towards Izuku, but Izuku saw under the mask.
'Don't try anything kid.' Was what the underlying expression read.
Izuku nervously nodded and turned his eyes towards the new comer, his smile was wobbly as he tried to stop the tears forming.
"Y-yeah, I g-got lost and h-he is getting me b-back home." He stutters out while trying to reel in the shaking.
The man's blue eyes studied Izuku's face. He saw the fear, the tears he was holding back, along with his nervous posture, and shaking body. Not to mention his uniform was filthy.
His face hardened as he glared at the criminal once again.
"This clearly isn't true, the boy is shaking like a leaf and you don't look trustworthy to begin with." The man says, glaring at the criminal next to Izuku.
"What the hell is this? Some kind of profiling shit? What are you some bigshot hero? You think because I got tats and piercings I'm a criminal?!" he starts to get loud, which makes Izuku terrified. He didn't know the man or what his quirk was, nor the one with the blue eyes. He didn't know what to do.
"I am no hero, however I can clearly tell you must be trying to kidnap the lad. Besides that, I watched your entire interaction from the rooftops. I saw it all. Even if I didn't see it, I would not have let you pass." He says coldly, tapping his cane against the floor.
"Tch, well whatever, you caught me, now what?" Within the blink of an eye, the arm around Izuku quickly wrapped him in a headlock, the other hand pulling out the bayonet and holding it against the barely exposed part of Izuku's neck.
Izuku at this point cried, he felt the air draining from his lungs and the point of the cold steel against his throat.
"You try anything, I'll kill this kid. Back off fucker." He said with a glare.
'Am I gonna die?!' Izuku thought internally as the blade feels like the icy hold of death clinging onto him.
The other man stood there, his face goes from anger to being more stoic.
"You are already defeated. I have contacted the police and pinged our location. Any minute they will show up and arrest you." The older man said with a smirk.
The criminal's eyes widen for a second before going to normal, pressing the knife deeper into Izuku's neck, a small drop of blood sliding down the handle.
Right before anything else can happen, they hear a voice from above.
"Hey what's going on down there?" a woman shouts from a fire escape on the side of an apartment building.
The criminal saw he was screwed. The man had blocked off his path to the other side of the alley, there was an open street behind him, and a woman above was getting suspicious. He had no choice. He had to kill the guy.
The criminal throws Izuku to the ground and rushes the older man. The tattoes on the criminal's face begin to slightly glow. They glow orange as he seems to pick up speed. His right eye goes form black to a low orange color as well.
Right as the criminal was inches away from slashing the older man's throat, to his surprise the knife stretched. As if the air itself was elastic, he pushed more, thinking he can cut through it.
The knife kept stretching no matter how much power he put into it.
The criminal backed off, the orange glow on his tattoos and right eye fading.
"What the hell is this? What is your quirk?" The criminal asks as he gets annoyed. His left eye begins twitching.
The older man only smiles at his frustration.
"Its none of your concern. All I know is you won't be hurting anyone you monster." He says.
Izuku and the criminal watch in shock as the older man leaped off the ground as if it were a trampoline.
Before Izuku could process what happened, he realized that he was now in the arm of the older man who was now right next to him.
The criminal's eyes widened before he growled. His right eye and tattoos glowed again as he tried to rush them.
The older man does a simple hand gesture.
Izuku watches in shock as the criminal that was about to slash them bounces off the air in front of them, and is launched back into a far wall in the back alley.
The older man looks at Izuku with a small smile.
"I apologize for what is about to happen, now please brace yourself." The older man lets go of Izuku and puts his hand on the ground. To Izuku's surprise the ground itself turned elastic and he was launched high into the air.
At first Izuku looks down and nearly pisses his pants as he sees how high up he is and sees himself rapidly descending down.
He flails his arms until, just like before, the air below him becomes elastic and he bounces. This time not really high, but forward.
'Is this his quirk? What could it be? The air and ground can become elastic, how far does he elasticity expand, can he make objects elastic, what happens if he makes a trampoline elastic, how high could I go, could muttermuttermuttermutter-' his mind was full of thoughts as he continued being guided through the sky with elastic air.
As he continues getting into one of his muttering sessions, he didn't realized he landed safely on top of a building, along with the older man looking at him with curiosity and slight concern.
The older man walks up to Izuku and snaps his fingers.
"Hey lad, are you okay?" he asks with concern as his features scrounge into confusion.
Izuku is snapped out of his trance by the older man. He blushes out of sheer embarrassment.
"Y-yeah I'm f-fine." He says rubbing the back of his head.
The two stand in an awkward silence. The older man takes this as his cue to introduce himself.
"That's great to hear lad. I am glad to be of service. You can call me Gentle Criminal, the most well mannered criminal out there." Gentle takes a bow.
Izuku just looks at him in surprise and shock.
Gentle gets up from his bow and takes in his face.
"What's the matter? Is it something I said?" he asks.
Izuku shakes his head and takes his chance to speak.
"N-no i-it's just that why would you n-name yourself Gentle Criminal? Y-you aren't a criminal. You s-saved me b-back there." He stutters out while looking down.
Gentle raises an eyebrow.
"Why young man I am a criminal. I may not be a murderer or barbarian, but I am a criminal." He says matter of factly.
"W-well criminals w-wouldn't have h-helped me." He says
"I only helped because kidnapping is something that is beyond the line of villany."
"V-villains d-do that and other s-stuff all the time." He says meekly, scratching the back of his head.
"Allow me to rephrase that." Gentle does a dramatic throat clearing.
"Beyond the line of my villany. I am a villain, not some savage. I don't steal, kill, kidnap, or do no atrocious lawbreaking. I am here to introduce a new brand of villany. Hence why I am called Gentle Criminal. I will leave my mark on the world by exposing the true nature of heroes and society!" He says with a smile. His blue eyes more friendly as his white mustache blew in the wind.
At first there is silence.
Gentle considers that revealing himself as a villain was a bad idea. However he looks at the boy who was now bowed in his ragged uniform.
"Th-thanks Gentle Criminal! You s-saved me from being k-kidnapped. I c-can't thank you enough. Y-you aren't a v-villain in my book. I w-want to once again say t-thank you." He says while shaking in place as the day's events truly hit him.
Izuku was crying as he bowed. Something Gentle took notice of. His performance voice went away as his eyes showed sympathy.
"Are we nearby where you live young man? I can escort you home to make sure nothing else happens to you." He says softly.
Izuku looks up, tears down his face and a wobbly smile.
"Y-yes, d-down the street." Izuku points to his home. He then realizes he never introduced himself.
"I am Izuku M-Midoriya, i-it's a pleasure to meet you Gentle Criminal." He says shaking as he begins to bow deeper.
Gentle laughs this off.
"It's fine Midoriya, no need for formalities. Let's get you home. Do you trust me?" he asks tapping his cane on the ground.
Izuku immediately shakes his head yes.
Gentle smiles brightly.
"Great! Alright jump off this building!" Gentle says with too much enthusiasm.
Izuku freezes up, getting bad memories.
'Take a swan dive off the roof and hope for a quirk in the next life!'
Izuku felt as if his chest got stabbed with a thousands pins and needles. He shudders.
Gentle was preparing his legs to leap off the building until he saw how petrified Izuku looked.
"Are you alright Midoriya?" he asks.
Hearing the voice of his hero snapped him out of his thoughts.
Izuku quickly looked up, his shaking temporarily stops as he takes in a deep breath. He couldn't let him know about Kacchan or what he said. He will play it off.
"S-sorry, I'm still g-getting used to your q-quirk." He says sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck.
"Its fine Midoriya, now then, let us be off!" At that, both jump off the building at the same time. The street below was empty as the sky was painted in a myriad of orange, yellow, and purple. A sign that the evening sunset was soon approaching.
The air below them becomes elastic before they hit the ground, the two are pushed up as if on a trampoline.
For the first time in what felt like ages, Izuku smiled. He let a small grin come across his face as he and Gentle kept bouncing off of air membranes. Now that he was used to the sensation of using the air as a trampoline, it was actually kind of fun. A child's kind of fun when they are on a merry-go-round.
Izuku does not remember the last time he smiled like this. Sure he smiles a lot when the new All Might merch comes out, or when gushing about villain fights, but this kind of smile was different. The last time he remembers smiling like this was when he and Kacchan were young and went to the All Might Amusement Park together with Aunt Mitsuki and Uncle Masaru.
'Feels like a lifetime ago when that happened.' He thinks, his smile faltering a bit.
In his room, he still has the photo that Mitsuki took.
It was him and Katsuki, arms around each other shoulders, smiling brightly in their All Might onesies. The two of them held matching All Might action figures in their other hand.
That was a better time. A time where he and Katsuki were best friends. Where they always hung out together and went to each other's houses. Before he got his quirk, while Izuku didn't.
Izuku shakes his head.
He has to let the past go. Kacchan hated him. He needed to accept that and move on.
Clearing his head of negative thoughts, he looked down and saw his apartment in view. He and Gentle land, Gentle creating a small air membrane so they wouldn't fly too far up.
"Well, I must be off. Have a great day Midoriya." Gentle bows before getting ready to take off.
Gentle is about to leap off until Izuku grabs at his coat.
"W-wait Gentle. I h-have a question." He says.
Gentle raises an eyebrow and sets his cane down.
"What is it Midoriya? Is it important?" he asks.
Izuku lets go of his coat and stands up straight. He looks Gentle in the eyes.
"C-can someone without a q-quirk be s-something?" Izuku said "something" instead of hero for a reason. He said "something" because of Katsuki and his constant talk of him being a worthless good for nothing piece of shit.
Izuku doesn't know it yet, but he didn't say "hero" because having Gentle, who is in his own words a criminal, save him from being kidnapped kind of changed his line of thinking.
There were no heroes around. There were no heroes there when he needed them. If it wasn't for Gentle, who knows what that man would have did? Who knows what would have happened to him?
To Izuku, Gentle was his hero.
"What do you mean something?" Gentle asks confused.
"I mean can quirkless people do something with their lives? Can we become more than just stepping stones?" he asks in an almost pleading tone.
Gentle quickly read through his words and noticed he said "we".
'So the boy is quirkless.' He thought solemnly.
Then it clicked.
It all made sense now.
The boy's timid nature, his posture, his stutter. These could be symptoms of bullying. Symbols of discrimination.
Gentle himself had never knew any quirkless people back when he was in school. However he heard rumors of some kid from another school. The poor kid was being tormented. They say that they found the kid in the alley, along with a shard of broken glass and slit wrists.
Gentle's mind never let that image go. The thought of some kid dead in an alley haunted him. Suicide was not a topic he could think of. Gentle internally shook at the thought of that being the fate of Izuku.
He saw the kid being led away by the criminal, however he never did ask why he was in the alley in the first place. Gentle considered asking what he was doing in the alley, and why he looked so beat up and his uniform scuffed. Part of him wanted to know all the details so that he could try to help the poor boy.
Another part of him knew that is was not his business. That he was a criminal and the kid was a hero fanatic. He knew that he wasn't close enough to ask any of those questions. He could only hope that the kid wasn't thinking about harming himself.
'This kid is pure. He doesn't deserve to be tormented. I can only hope that he isn't going through anything too bad.' Gentle remembers the pure mirth on the kid's face. A childlike wonder as he bounced through the sky itself. Once the fear was gone, the kid seemed to look so happy.
Gentle decided that the kid had enough of people putting him down. He had enough of people telling him 'No.' Gentle decided that for once, he was going to be the hero. The one to help the kid.
"Yes."
Izuku's eyes snapped open, inside of his mind he hears broken glass as his dark illusion is shattered. He looks at Gentle as tears stream down his eyes.
He misheard him. He had to have misheard him. There's absolutely NO way he said what he thought he heard.
As if Gentle read his mind he once again says that word.
"Yes. Yes, quirkless people can become something more. They have as much potential as any other person. Quirk or not, we are all human on the inside. Quirkless people are not doormats, they are people with dreams and aspirations just like anyone else." Gentle says looking into the setting sun, as if recalling a memory.
"Nobody is a stepping stone. Everyone has a purpose. Just because someone has a quirk doesn't mean they are above everyone else."
Izuku wanted to interrupt. He wanted to say Gentle was wrong. He thinks back to Kacchan and how he is put on a pedestal. How he is above everyone. He has top grades of his class, and an amazing quirk with a unending drive. However Izuku was too mesmerized to stop him. The man speaking before him seemed like a messenger from a higher being. Izuku absorbed every word as he continued speaking.
"Those who discriminate against the quirkless disgust me. They are no better than villains in my book. That is coming from a villain himself. Hate speech should not be tolerated. Just because someone doesn't have a quirk, doesn't mean they should be outed as 'worthless'. That is just horrible and atrocious." Gentle says grabbing him forehead and shaking it at the thought of some poor kid getting bullied.
Gentle then sighs and looks down at Izuku, who has stars in his eyes and a happy expression.
"That is my thoughts on it, Midoriya." Gentle finishes. Then he hears crying.
"Th-thank you Gentle Criminal!" he shouts in between sobs.
Gentle had the urge to help the boy. To comfort him through whatever turmoil was going through him. However he knew that in the end he was a stranger and needed to get going.
Gentle smiles.
"You're welcome. I must be off." Gentle says.
This time he launches off. He doesn't look back.
Izuku tried to scream 'Wait.' He wanted to know more about him, but his hero was already gone. He was bouncing in the skies, soon he became a dot, and disappeared out of his vision.
Izuku looked at where he saw his idol a few moments ago.
Izuku then realizes he needed to get inside and that he had a lot of explaining to do.
Izuku sighs.
He then turns and walks towards his building and walks towards his home. Izuku uses his key and tries to silently turn the knob. He tries to sneak in and hopefully avoid his mom.
Inko Midoriya was not a woman you would want angry.
Izuku sneaks inside. He closes the door as quietly as he could. However the moment he shuts the door, he feels an overwhelming presence. IT was a presence that struck fear into his heart.
He gulps and slowly turns around to face what felt like a demon.
Inko stood there, her arms crossed, and her glare square on Izuku.
"IZUKU MIDORIYA!" she shouts as she begins to scold him.
Danjuro Tobita, also known as Gentle Criminal, was now descending home. He was making the air elastic and walking from the sky as if there were stairs in place. Gentle then lands on his fire escape. He opens up his window and goes inside.
Since his apartment was close to the top, he left his window open because the chance of someone breaking in was very slim. Gentle would remove his cloak, take off his boots, and put down his cane and would collapse on his bed sighing.
The exhaustion of the day catching up with him, Gentle didn't want to get up. He just wanted to let the lull of sleep pull him in. However he knew that wasn't an option. He had to make dinner and check on his newest video that he uploaded 3 days ago.
Gentle with a grunt, gets up and stretches. He hears some bones pop and smiles in satisfaction.
"Time to check on my newest heist!" he says with enthusiasm.
He does a final a stretch and walks over to his computer. He goes to his newest video on MeTube. He smiles as he scrolls down. He sees that he has over 130 views, a milestone compared to last week.
"Finally people recognize my greatness." He says as he scrolls to the likes and dislikes. His smile vanishes as he sees that his video has 40 dislikes and 0 likes.
'Nobody at all liked this caper?' he thinks.
His face soon goes to surprise as he sees the overwhelming amount of hate comments. So many people made fun of him. The more he scrolled, the worst the comments got. Some of them turning into death threats and suicide baits.
Gentle had seen enough. He would sigh and shut off his computer. The hate comments were far worst this week compared to last week. He just didn't understand why people couldn't see the art or craftmanship behind his schemes.
Gentle rubs a hand through his white hair as he sighs. He gets up and walks to the kitchen. He then prepares some cup ramen and puts it in the microwave.
Besides the sound of the microwave, silence permeated the home of the infamous Gentle Criminal. He looks around. Everything is the same, as it always is.
'Since when did things become so mundane?' he asks himself as the ramen finishes and the ding of the microwave alerts him to this. He goes over to the microwave, taking it out and grabbing a pair of chopsticks.
He silently sits on the table and slurps on the ramen, not bothering to wait for it to cool off. Danjuro reflects on the events of today.
That morning he went and got his daily dose of Golden Tips Imperial. It was the best in the morning in his opinion. After chatting with the owner, he left.
Around late afternoon he would be plotting his new scheme. He had read about how an ice cream company was putting less ice cream in their containers than what the labels said. He was planning on exposing them.
He went over his plan in his head and was heading towards a store that sold said brand. That was until he noticed a patch of green hair in an alley. He would land on a rooftop and look down at the kid in curiosity. It was a kid, a kid that looked to be in middle school, he noticed the uniform and its condition. He saw the nervous look on his face and questioned if he was lost
Gentle was considering going down to ask the kid was he lost until he notice a hooded figure approach him. HE then saw how nervous the kid got. How the figure lead him away from the street.
Something inside of him told him he couldn't allow this man to take this child.
So he decided to go down and take action.
The rest was history.
Danjuro could only hope the kid was ok.
Izuku was now in his room in his pajamas. After he was scolded by his mom, he showered and ate dinner. She of course had lots of questions, even about the uniform.
Izuku hated lying. He hated lying to the one person who cared about him. He only did it because he knew that she couldn't bear to hear the truth. He didn't want to see her upset.
Izuku was at his computer. He needed to find him. With the way Gentle spoke, he seemed like he had a fanbase.
Izuku had to search for almost an hour to find Gentle. He had scanned most results of MeTube until he had to put in extra tabs and info and all of that.
Izuku looks at the video with stars in his eyes. Gentle wasn't hurting anyone, he wasn't even stealing. He was simply telling the truth about how people are getting scammed by these companies. Sure the knife was a bit much, but he saw that he wasn't a bad guy.
Once the video was over, Izuku immediately clicked Subscribe, clicked the bell and dropped a like. He was above to scroll down and leave a comment, until he saw the cesspool that was the comment section.
He was horrified by how violent the comments got.
'This is horrible! How can people be so cruel to someone who didn't do anything wrong?!' he thought as more and more comments were becoming worst. Death threats, suicide baits, threats to any relatives, even some people claiming to be hackers and threatening him with putting his personal info on the dark web.
'He did nothing wrong. Why is he receiving so much hate?' Izuku actually started to feel anger. A simmering anger settled in his chest. He hasn't felt anger in a while. Not even when Kacchan beat him up for wanting to be a hero. He always took it and kept smiling.
Seeing his savior receive such degrading comments lit a fire under Izuku. He couldn't allow this to go on any longer.
He needed to find his savior and help him through this.
That concludes chapter 1 of this story. Later I plan on having Izuku join Gentle in his misadventures. This story is going to be more goofy and not so serious. For those that want to know about La Brava, she is coming up soon. Anyways next chapter will focus on Izuku in school, his doubts about heroes, and will introduce La Brava. Hope you all enjoyed.
