This wasn't a strange concoction in his head.
It's a reality. But also this world was certainly strange. And it was only about a day he was stuck here.
He'd overheard conversations, pretending to sleep and rest when he didn't need it, between Recovery Girl and the mouse-bear-rat-thing Nezu, and the man Toshinori. He'd overheard conversations, and they spoke of strange things, Yet he listened in. Most of them were what to do with him. What the best way to deal with him would be, like he was some sort of discarded toy.
He'd shown up in no databases, apparently. The world kept records of people and their "quirks", and there was no Danny, no "Daniel", or no quirk known as Ghost related to any Danny. Which made him feel better because if there was anything Danny remembered about universes, is that they can sometimes have separate forms of yourself. Or that's what movies taught him, at least, and that one trip to Salem with the Infi-map. Or was that back-in-time and one of his ancestors? He didn't know.
It was also a weird school and not a hospital. What kind of school needs a hospital in their building? If any school needed it, Danny decided, it was Casper High. So many ghost attacks in one day can lead to a lot of damage that Danny tried his best to not stop, but it wasn't always in his favor. He knew there were some times were people were sent to the hospital, and Danny couldn't help it, it was an occupational hazard. He always made sure to visit those people, even though being in the hospital made him nervous and think about the accident.
And then, around the afternoon of the second day, another kid came in. He was Danny's age, just a bit shorter than him (or, Danny assumed, he was sitting in the bed, playing one of those puzzle games with bright colorful graphics and obnoxious music on a spare tablet), and had a head of curly, green hair. Danny was used to wild hair colors, he had his own white hair at points, and Sam had gone through phases of dying bright streaks in her hair.
But green hair?
Danny was starting to think he'd fallen into an anime or something. But that was ridiculous.
The boy looked nervous- there was a solemn expression to his face, like he'd witnessed something bad, but not quite life-threatening, too- and he held onto his hand delicately, like a sling. One of his fingers was swollen, twisted, and purple.
"Ah, Midoriya. Aizawa said that you'd be coming this way after class." Recovery Girl slid from her chair and walked over to one of the closets. "Just sit on the other bed, sonny, I'll be with you for a moment."
The kid, Midoriya, nodded. And then he looked at Danny-wide eyed with curiosity and confusion.
Right. This is a school. He must be a student. Danny couldn't help but wonder what kind of school had kids breaking their fingers in their lessons, some sort of superhero-school bullshit that Danny didn't quite pay attention to when he was listening to other conversations.
"Oh. Hello." The boy said, taking a seat on the second bed. The room wasn't too big, only big enough to fit three beds on the one wall, and Danny was sitting in the one furthest from the door. Away from the other students- but why hadn't any others come in sooner? If this superhero school was as wild as it sounded, shouldn't more kids be in here? "Who are you?"
"Danny." Talking to the random kid wouldn't hurt, would it? He was never told to not talk to anyone. He didn't reach out his hand, holding the tablet tightly. He definitely didn't fit into this universe, in more ways than one.
"Nice to meet you, Danny. I'm Midoriya Izuku. What class are you in?" Despite the anxious feeling that wafted off of him, Midoriya wasn't too shy at all. In fact, his voice was pleasant, if a bit awkward and high.
"I'm not, uh..." He wasn't sure what he could say. He knew that the talk he had with Nezu was supposed to be confidential, but the adults hadn't told him much more. At the rate he was getting information, Danny was about to just transform into Phantom and fly out of here and go on his own.
He'd read up on the world on the tablet, though. Superheroes everywhere, no doubt with abilities that could track him. He'd lay low, go with what the people around him did, and figure out his way home when no one was looking.
"Ah! Here." Recovery Girl interrupted, taking Midoriya's hand and giving it a large kiss. Is that how her quirk worked? Danny felt himself shudder, watching as she wrapped the boy's finger in a splint with speed that shouldn't be possible for her age. She pulled a lollipop out of her pocket, smiling. "There you go, all patched up. Come to me tomorrow morning, and I'll remove the splint. If you take a shower, just remember to wrap it in plastic."
"Thank you, Recovery Girl." He spoke slower this time, looking a bit more fatigued.
"Also, Midoriya? Would you do me a favor?" Recovery Girl glanced over at Danny. "Could you take Danny here to Nezu's office for me?"
Office? You mean I can get out of this stupid bed? He'd been permitted to get up and stretch if his legs got tired, but because today was some big-important class day-
No, wait. He remembered, now. It was the first day of school today. How'd he forget that in so little hours? Daniel James Fenton, brain cell population: one. Sam joked that he lost all of his remaining brain cells in the portal accident, after all. The joke stung, but it seemed to be true.
"Oh, sure. It's the one by the front, right?"
"Yes, it is." Danny had been given, thankfully, a shirt and pants that weren't destroyed like his old ones were, by whatever creature had attacked him behind the willow door. In fact, it was the same uniform that Midoriya appeared to have on, sans the nice shoes, the jacket, and the tie. He looked like a student of this place- and hey, his old tennis shoes weren't nearly as annoying as the large, red sneakers that Midoriya was wearing, either. That's a good thing.
Was it, like, a cover or something?
"Nezu just wants to meet with you to discuss a few... things." Recovery Girl commented, giving him a wink as he walked out of the door, following Midoriya closely.
Danny nodded. Should he thank her, too, for helping and healing him? It messed with his own speedy healing, so maybe not. Either way, by the time he thought about it, he was out of the door and in the actual school.
"So, what class are you in, Danny?" Midoriya asked again, with a little less enthusiasm and slightly droopy eyes. But his finger looked better, even though it was under a lot of bandages and in a splint.
Think, Fenton. "Uh, I don't know...Yet."
"Oh. Are you a transfer student?"
"...Yes." He didn't know what he was agreeing to. The odds of seeing this Midoriya kid again, after he gets out of UA? Slim to none. So that was good.
"You're coming in pretty late. I mean, today is the first day, but for UA's school, not many students can get accepted on a rolling basis. Or, well, none, I think." Somehow, Midoriya said that in one breath. Danny was amazed by this kid- even though he was pretty sure they were both the same age. "Do you want to study heroics, or do you want to go into support or business? Or are you in Gen Ed?"
"Uh, I..." Danny faltered over his words. So much for his fake cover- though, walking through the halls, passing a student every now and then, he was definitely out of place. He must've landed in Japan, in an alternate world, with superpowers- oh no.
Oh no.
He was in an anime, wasn't he? What cruel universe would do this to him? Multiverse? And there's also the fact that he's the white-haired anime boy who's either dead or going to die. He's dead! He's half-dead.
"Heroics." Danny stumbled out, already uncomfortable after the weird silence between them. He cleared his throat, quickly covering, "Sorry, jetlag."
"Jetlag?" Midoriya asked, but stopped immediately. "Oh, we're here."
The door, just like the one he noticed in the hospital-room, the infirmary, was huge. Like, it was twenty feet tall. There wasn't a handle on the door, just a metal plate to push on, which stretched from about a foot off the ground all the way to the near top.
"Well, I hope to see you again, Danny." Midoriya said, before his eyes caught someone in passing. "Bye!"
Danny waved. Midoriya was certainly something. This entire world was certainly something.
Nezu was waiting for him in his office, just as Danny was told. His desk was unique. It had a strange collection of objects that could've been found in strange trinket shops, antique marts, or just in the trash. It reminded Danny of a hoard of some sorts. The desk was much taller than the principal, but his stool was adjusted to be enough that he sat above it. There was a plush chair pushed next to the desk. The rest of the room was scant of decor, only having a couch with one side ripped to shreds by some claws, a cat-scratcher torn to pieces, and a coffee table with an empty mug on a coaster, a teapot on a shelf, and a large lamp. "Ah, Danny! Please, come in." Nezu greeted, his voice pleasant.
He didn't realize he'd stopped at the door to gawk at everything. He'd seen lairs weirder before in the Ghost Zone.
"Would it be more comfortable to talk here, or on the couch?"
"Here's fine," Danny said, motioning to the desk. Nezu nodded, motioning for Danny to take a seat. He did, and the plush chair was definitely as soft as it looked. He had to hold himself up to avoid sinking into it. Nezu was a man(?) of unique tastes.
"You are adamant as ever with having no one we can contact discussing your situation, right?" Nezu asked, but it was more of a rhetorical question.
Danny truly didn't have anyone in this world. He wasn't lying, despite what they might be thinking. He did have a family, his parents, his sister, but he couldn't focus on them , else he'd start to focus on Amity Park again, which sent him into a bit of a spiral of what if something happened, what if Dan got out, what if a ghost attacks that's too strong for Sam and Tucker and Jazz and Valerie, what if... And, really, in his situation, he couldn't afford to think of anything else but getting home. And how weird this world was.
"No."
"And you do realize that you are in the safest space you could be, yes? This is a school taught by pro-heroes, built by them. If there are any villains or anyone out there who plans to hurt you, harm you, or anyone you care about, you are safe to discuss the details of them here, if you wish."
That's something that Danny thought was nice. The adults in this universe were cognizant of the world around them, at least. They were aware of how easy it was for kids to be manipulated into doing things they didn't want to do. Danny had seen it happen with ghosts like Spectra, who tormented kids to misery to feed on them. They were more aware of the manipulation that came in the forms of people like Vlad Masters, who was sweet like honey on the outside, but tied you up when you weren't looking and trapped you.
"No, there-there really, really isn't." Not in this universe, at least. Hopefully, Nezu wasn't a mind-reader and could hear every single one of Danny's thoughts. He knew how to reign it in and keep it to himself, memories of Freakshow and his body being controlled by someone other than him coming to mind, but it felt like traveling through the door in the Ghost Zone under the willow tree had definitely left him frazzled.
Probably what unwilling multidimensional travel did to your psyche. Jazz would have a field day with this.
Nezu nodded. He spun his stool around to the large computer on his desk. It looked like it came from the early 2000s, but it was still alive and working, and had the most updated apps, apparently. "You don't have any records- this came across as a problem to us and the police force as well. How can a child turn up in the world without a single paper to his name?" Nezu chuckled, before glancing back at him. "We've created a few interim papers, but a few papers, such as your Quirk registration, need to be signed by yourself."
"O-okay..." Danny said.
"That being said, U.A. cannot be your permanent home." Nezu turned back to his computer, reaching behind it and grabbing a pile of papers. Maybe not a pile, but with Nezu's height, the papers looked massive. In reality, there were only about ten. "Although we have debated building dorms in more recent years, and I will still push for it, U.A. is not a place for one to live, just for one to learn. We've enrolled you in a protection program that will keep your records private to everyone but professional heroes and higher-ups in law enforcement. That's what two of those papers are for- your "identity"."
Danny shuffled the pages, and found them- written completely in Japanese kanji. The more he stared at it, though, the more he was able to understand it. The letters appeared to flow off the page and rearrange themselves into English that he could understand. Thank Clockwork. Whether it was truly the ghost of Time's intervention or just a pro of multidimensional travel, Danny didn't know, but he was thankful nonetheless.
"Since you didn't give us a surname name, we provided one for you. Is it satisfactory?"
Yuurei, Daniel. He was in Japan, so last names always came first. Danny Yuurei felt awkward and clunky, but he wasn't going to give out Fenton, or try and make one up for himself. "Yeah, it's fine."
"Great! Feel free to look at the last few pages as I speak," Nezu said, leaning over his desk. "As a part of your 'cover', we've decided that a possible option is enrolling you as a transfer student to U.A. here."
That's exactly what he told that Midoriya-kid! It would work out, and Danny wouldn't be the liar in the end. And his weird awkwardness in the hall could just be a part of his "jet-lag".
"However, we cannot just say you're in, Danny." Nezu said, grabbing one of the trinkets on his desk. It was a Rubik's cube, but instead of a square, it had, like, eight sides. Tucker tried to solve one of those in middle school and could only solve for one color. "We'd ask that you at least take a modified version of our entrance exam, if you so wish to. If you do not decide to come here, however, there are many host families that work alongside the protection program that would take you in, and you'd attend either a regular school or a homeschool program of your choice."
Options, options, options... Danny flipped to the last few pages, all applications for the school. His fake-name was printed out, already, along with general descriptions of his body- 5'5", black hair, blue eyes, caucasian, though his weight was scribbled out- and his quirk, "Ghost".
God, why did he have to think of a terrible name?
U.A. was going to not be the best place to "lay low". In fact, it was the worst possible choice that Danny could make. What if his powers slipped? What if his secret slipped? But- hiding in plain sight. He would be around heroes, he would be able to overhear, sneak around, find a way home on his own.
"Okay, I'll try your entrance exam. When is it?"
"Recovery Girl has given you an all-clear, if you left the infirmary on your own." Nezu said. "We could start now, though most of the students and teachers have left for the day. So, is tomorrow good for you?"
"I, uh- sure?"
"Splendid!" Nezu clapped his hands, or more accurately, his paws. "I'll let the teachers know, and we will arrange a test for you tomorrow."
A test? Oh, no, this was the worst outcome, his links to the higher-ups in society be damned.
