Chapter 01
Black Sabbath
She's just wandering around the school ground. It hadn't come to her that she had been on the same place for over a year now yet she rarely diverted from the usual path she always takes. There are rooms she had never visited before; each makes her more awe than before.
It's getting late; she better gets to the dorm before everyone is worried even though she got Mr. Aizawa's permission to roam the ground. She only has one last room for her to visit, the room she looks forward to the most, her favorite room really.
She notices that the door is slightly ajar and the light is opened, seeing how it shines through the crack. As she approaches closer, she hears some voices from inside. She quietens her steps and peers through the crack, feeling slightly scandalous for eavesdropping but she is just curious.
The first thing she sees is something that makes her body comfortably warm and her heart calm. People might find her weird and off-putting for reacting to just by a person's back, but they won't understand. She knows that back so well it's like the back of her hand.
That is the back that shows safety and that everything will be alright. That is the back that she sees when rescue comes when things go wrong. And just the fact that that back is shown shows the amount of trust he has in her that they would never do anything to him behind him.
That back belongs to one man who she admires the most, who would give the world for their safety, who they would level a city to ground for his safety.
It not even surprising anymore at how much Aizawa Shouta cares about his students, and his students to him. He had done so much for them that they don't know how to repay him yet.
Jirou takes in a deep breath before tearing her eyes away from her teacher and looks at the other occupants in the room. She frowns in confusion.
There're three students sitting right in front of Mr. Aizawa. She had never seen them before; they could be the newest UA students.
One is a male with bluish green hair with one right arm and two left arms and is looking quite guilty as he gazes at the ground beneath his feet. He's also holding a very pointy electric guitar.
'A black B.C. Rich Warbeast; it's the Extreme series, judging all the bling it got. He's definitely a metalhead, probably prefers one of the extreme metal bands,' she thought to herself and lets her eyes linger on the guitar. She's not a fan of pointy guitars, but she admires them nonetheless.
The other male has a three sided pyramid for a head; each side has an eye on it. He sits rigidly in his seat but somewhat looks sheepish. Instead of an electric guitar, he's holding an electric bass guitar.
'Standard Fender Precision bass in all white. Classic and a go to bass with absolute basic (pun intended) but necessary needs. Why fix something if it isn't broken?' She only has the Fender Jazz bass in purple, preferring the two pickups option when compared to the P-bass's single (but split) pickup at the same price range.
The last student, sitting right in between the other two males, is a female with three long horns sprouting from her head. Unlike the others, she has a carefree smile on her face, and she is holding an electric guitar.
'Is that…?' Jirou squints, somewhat a little disbelieved. 'Is that the Gibson Monkey SG? Damn, she must be loaded to afford such limited guitar.' The girl is basically holding a replica of a guitar that shaped history. Owning it must feel extremely astounding.
"Bringing your own instruments to school without permission is prohibited. Since this is your first warning, they will not be confiscated," Mr. Aizawa lectures them with his arms crossed over his chest.
'Ah, so that's what it all about.' Jirou smiles slightly to herself. They're new to UA; they're bound to make mistakes ("It's okay to make mistakes; just make sure to learn from it," a tired, gruff but very caring voice rings to her ears).
"Next time, inform a teacher beforehand. And if it is a regular occurrence than UA can keep them safe here…"
Seeing that the music room is occupied, and that she doesn't want to intrude, she turns away and quietly walks back to the dorm. She's slightly dismayed that she didn't get a chance to spend a little time in the music room all by hers-
"You really are a Black Sabbath fan!"
She stops dead in her tracks, her thought grinds to a halt.
'Who did the girl refer to? It couldn't be to…' She turns around and quickly returns back to peer through the door crack, her eyes wider than before.
The two male students are looking away from the girl between them, looking very tense. The girl herself is the complete opposite, having a very wide smile on her face. Mr. Aizawa is currently rubbing his face with one hand in exasperation.
"Just… put the guitars and bass back in their cases."
"You sure you don't want to hold the Monkey SG?" the girl asks in a teasing manner, carefully holding out the said guitar at arm's length. "It the guitar that Tony Iommi used in Black Sabbath and created a whole genre with it," she continues with a singalong tone.
"It's a replica of the original, even if it is authorized by Tony Iommi himself."
"Just admit it-"
"Don't test me."
She couldn't help but tune the voices out and gets lost in her thought. Her mind is reeling with a new info she just discovered.
'Mr. Aizawa is a Black Sabbath fan?'
She never knew about this. In fact, she knows that none of her classmates knew about this.
And yet, somehow, a student she had never seen before, who is having a light banter with Mr. Aizawa (it's not the same as her and her classmates; the hidden fondness is absent from his voice and especially from his eyes) knew about it.
An unknown student knows something about Mr. Aizawa that she doesn't know.
.
"Kyouka?"
"W-Wha…?" she blinks herself awake from her thought and looks around her surroundings. Kaminari and Ashido are looking at her with mild concern. "What is it?"
"You were spacing off," Ashido points out. "Is everything okay?"
"Oh everything's good," she quickly reassures them, waving her hands in front of her. "I just got a lot on my mind. Nothing to worry about."
"Okay then," Kaminari relents, but not fully convinced. "Just so you know, we're here to listen. Okay?"
"Without a doubt." She gives him a soft smile, to which he returns back before putting the USB into his mouth and concentrates back on the homework given to them. Jirou really tried to concentrate on her own homework, but she's really distracted. She couldn't keep her mind off from one particular thing.
Her classmates do not know about it yet, that Mr. Aizawa has a favorite band and that someone unknown somehow knows about it. She doubts they will react as strongly as her, but then again they can be a lot more.
She can't believe it herself, but…
Jirou Kyoka is jealous.
It's such a niche thing to get jealous about. A person's favorite band is such a trivial thing to really dwell on and getting work over.
But maybe it is not as niche as she initially thinks it is. Because this is Mr. Aizawa she is talking about, a person she admires the most, a Hero, her Hero. She should know such trivial information with little resistance. She wants to know more about him. But he is such an aloof and very private man that doesn't share personal stuff. Hence, very little is known about his personal life.
And that includes his favorite band.
Yet, somehow a bunch of nobodies knows something about him that she doesn't.
That lone information already opens many more doors.
How long has he been a fan?
How did he find them?
Did someone introduce the band to him?
Who's his favorite bandmate?
What instrument does he prefer?
What's his favorite song?
Her mind grinds to a halt at the last question.
'Do they know what his favorite song is?'
She reruns the conversation once more in her mind. No specific songs were said, only that Mr. Aizawa is a Black Sabbath fan. Suddenly, Jirou feels giddy.
She could be the first one to figure out his favorite song.
"Sorry guys but I have to go," she informs them as she makes a record speed of gathering her stuff and shoves them inside her bag, earning a startled and surprised look from her peers.
"Where're you going? Back to your room?"
"Yeah, I need to do something."
"Alright, good luck on whatever it is."
"Thanks!" she shouts over her shoulder as she sprints out the common room and into the elevator. She taps her foot impatiently, demanding for the elevator to go faster. She almost squeezes her way out the doors in order to get to her room faster. When she finally inside her room she's already booting up her computer before her bag could hit the floor.
She quickly opens the online music library as soon as the computer finally booted up and searches for Black Sabbath albums. She sucks in a deep breath when she realizes that there are a total of nineteen studio albums released by the band.
'There are so many songs to go through…' There's got to be more than a hundred songs to go through. She doesn't know if she can do this. Then, her mind flashes to her teacher. She steels her eyes and makes a firm resolves. She grabs her headphones and puts it on before opening up the first song.
Despite being a metalhead herself she didn't give a lot of thought on Black Sabbath which is quite a crime and a disservice for not showing appreciation to the originator. She's much more into the modern type of metal songs with progressive metal is where she's at.
'Might as well as start from the absolute beginning, the song that birthed a whole genre,' she thinks to herself. She muses to herself at how funny it is about the current song: Black Sabbath from Black Sabbath by Black Sabbath.
She will be the first to know his favorite song.
.
"Ah, sh-" she curses when she notices the time. She quickly but safely throws her headphone to the side before standing up and quickly exits her room. She sighs in relief when she notices that the elevator is nowhere near the ground floor, meaning she's just on time. She waits inside once the elevator is on her floor before it stops on a certain floor.
Mr. Aizawa enters.
"Jirou," he greets with a nod before standing right next to her. She greets back with a small smile as the elevator door closes. Then, they wait in silence as the elevator descends.
It's becoming a routine. One of them would accompany him in the elevator to watch him go on his late night patrol. She doesn't remember who started it, but she did remember Mr. Aizawa grumbled about it but didn't stop them from continuing.
They're just worried about their teacher. He had done so much, this is the least thing they could do. Tonight is her turn.
She glances at Mr. Aizawa from the corners of her eyes. He's leaning back against the wall behind him with his eyes closed. Seeing him relax eases her, knowing that his chronic pain is not bothering him right now. She takes a quiet deep breath, feeling a little nervous and a bit awkward at about what she is about to do.
She starts humming.
It's a little hesitant, too quiet and off key, mainly because it's a very new song to her; she had only listened to it just a little over an hour ago, and she hums the guitar riff. As she doing so, she keeps an eye on Mr. Aizawa, gauging his reaction.
She doesn't notice any change; no foot tapping or a humming. Mr. Aizawa didn't even react to the tune.
She doubts she is too quiet; the elevator is small and they are right next to each other. She doubts he doesn't know the song, because it is the song that created history, and that he is a fan as well.
So he's either don't care or he is not the person to visibly react to music. She would not be surprised on the latter.
Or maybe he has a very strong willpower to resist. Nevertheless…
'So not Black Sabbath then,' Jirou pouts. She can cross that song off the list. Part of her not really dismayed about it; Black Sabbath (the song) is not quite a jam to listen to (at least to her anyway) and people has their own taste.
And she is determined to find Mr. Aizawa's taste.
The sound of the elevator ping rouses her from her thought as Mr. Aizawa pushes off from the wall, stretching for a bit.
"I'm off," he mumbles to her as he exits the elevator.
"Be careful, Mr. Aizawa. Please come back safe," she calls out to him. He slows down before halting to a stop.
"I'll try." He continues on his journey. Jirou lets out a quiet sighs as the elevator closes.
She remembers the time when Mr. Aizawa came back bleeding after promising her that he will be unharmed. She remembers how he apologized for breaking her promise. She's more distraught by his injured state than his promise. Now, he stops promising to come back safe, only trying to come back to the best of his ability.
She wants him to be safe nonetheless.
This is to appease my headcanon that Dadzawa is a fan of Black Sabbath
Be warn, there are some guitar related technicalities and lots of Black Sabbath talking. If you would like, try listen to the songs.