Joe's Note: One of my reviewers pretty intelligently pointed out that there was a fairly quick progression from 'hey, I just met you' through 'and this is crazy' to 'but I have questions, answer maybe?' in the rewrite of this story. Which I feel is understandable given that the original version of this story had Izuku meeting Amora and lifting Stormbreaker on the very same day, launching him into a very complicated new existence with very little gap time. Now that there's a bigger gap between the two events, I've decided to stretch out that window a bit further and drop in a few more encounters between Izuku and Amora, explaining why Izuku finds out more stuff about the Asgardians before actually becoming Thor. Also, (a)home Café is a real, multiple location maid cafe chain in Japan. Sadly most sites do not permit the at sign, so I couldn't stylize the name the exact same was as it is in real life. Oh well.
Dedications & Thanks: To Nicholas, Howard, Jade, Alexander, Tibor, Alonsis2, Daniel, Clark, Adrien, erlking, ridillin, Haematite, Charles, Jacky, Edward, Andrew, Roofcrawler, Wil, PbookR, Samuel, Mikey, Beverly, Daniel, Charles, Crygon20, Subtle, Christopher, Stephen, Fablesrogue, Morgan, Joseph, Jason, RileyWestfall, bloodylord, Marc, Ziryo, Chris, George, Koby, William, Devin, JJbelle, David, Gavin, TheTenthAncestor, Lookshy, Mauday, John, Roman, Warren, and Jess for sponsoring me on P-treon, and making it easier for me to spend more of my time writing.


Izuku decided to give it a few days before visiting Endurfæðing Park again, if for no other reason than to take some time and process the many and varied revelations that he'd been subjected to upon his last visit. Loki... was alive. After a fashion, but Koli was really at least some version of Loki under her pretty teenage girl façade. Sylvie was really Amora the Enchantress, who... Izuku knew veritably nothing about apart from the fact that she was Loki's friend and presumably not just some garden variety Asgardian teenager.

Today, he was going to change that.

Dodging Kacchan so that he could leave school unmolested involved him circling through the floors of Aldera Junior High School several times to lose his... friend... but soon enough he was on his way to the park and his rendezvous with Amora. Sylvie. Lushton? He probably shouldn't call her Amora in public given that her name was clearly privileged information, and he wasn't comfortable calling her Sylvie yet. Lushton would have to work for now.

Izuku entered the park and hovered near the gazebo as a cute redheaded girl took her turn approaching Stormbreaker. She had a fascinating quirk that allowed her to enlarge her hands and he wanted to ask her so many things about it, but he managed to restrain himself to an excited squeak and vibrating in place as he watched her attempt. Predictably enough, she was unable to move the hammer despite her best efforts and quickly gave up before bowing to Sylvie and departing the park with her parents.

As soon as she was available, Izuku darted over to her side and help up his book excitedly. "I'm back. I have more questions for you."

"Of course you do." Rolling her eyes, Amora - it was okay to think of her by her real name, or at least Izuku assumed as much - ran her fingers through her hair before letting out a sigh. "Can we just have story time instead? You sit and listen to me tell you things instead of you pestering me with questions?"

Nibbling on the end of his pencil, Izuku considered the offer. On one hand, it meant finding out more about the mysterious woman. On the other hand, it meant that not only would his questions go unanswered, but that he'd probably end up developing new questions that she presumably wouldn't answer either. Then he realized... she wasn't some hero that he was meeting in public, who couldn't politely brush him off without looking bad. Despite her origin and powers, she was just as much a private citizen as him. She could be telling him to go away before she called the police. Maybe he should take what he was being offered and be grateful for it? "Story time sounds great."

Amora smiled at him indulgently before reaching over to ruffle his curly green hair. "Don't worry, Midoriya, I'll make it worth your while. And..." She trailed off, peering down at him as he blushed up at her. "What did I say?"

"You called me Midoriya." Continuing to blush darkly, Izuku fiddled with the top corner of his notebook. "Yobisute... it's very forward of you, Lushton-san. I, erm, I don't know if I could return the favor. I mean, we just met a few days ago and I was raised to-"

Groaning, Amora shook her head slowly. "If anything, you should be assuming that I have absolutely no respect for you. Not... that. Japanese culture is so weird. I've lived here for decades and I fear I'll never get the hang of it." When Izuku opened his mouth to apologize, she waved dismissively. "No, I know exactly how honorifics work here and I just... don't care most of the time. That was my fault. If we're going to make a regular thing out of this, though, could I perhaps call you Izuku-kun? Or maybe... Izu-kun? I'm not really the type to make friends, but since you seem intent on it..."

Izuku stared up at her with wide eyes. "You... you want to give me a nickname? I haven't had a nickname other than Deku in years. I would... I would be honored." Bowing toward her frantically, he peered up over his bangs at her bemused face. "What would you like me to call you? I don't want to overstep my bounds by calling you something you don't like." That and to be honest, he wasn't terribly original when it came to names. Nothing really came to mind to shorten 'Lushton Sylvie' but he was probably overlooking something obvious.

"Sylvie-chan would be okay with me, Izu-kun. Koli and I tried nicknaming each other by Japanese conventions when we first came here and it went abysmally." Amora made a pulling gesture at the space between them, summoning a glowing yellowish-green stool into existence. "Now, take a seat and let me tell you about the time that I met Doctor Strange..."


"Sylvie-chan! Koli-sama! Are you using a spell to keep the rain away? That's so fascinating! I have questions!"

Before Izuku could even make it to where the pair of Asgardians were standing, Loki shuddered and opened up a portal beneath her feet that she abruptly dropped through, disappearing through it and leaving Amora on her own. Turning to him, Amora offered a welcoming smile. "I may need to get your phone number, Izu-kun. I can't tell if she dislikes you or fears that you might discover more of her closely guarded secrets, but I've been trying to get rid of her for an hour and you just..." Snapping her fingers, Sylvie shook her head. "I wish I could do that sometimes."

Clutching his notebook tightly to his chest with one arm as the other held his umbrella over his head, Izuku bowed apologetically. "I didn't mean to make her leave. I want to talk to her really badly. I have so many questions for her."

Amora chuckled softly at that, reaching up to ruffle his hair as she seemed so fond of doing. Most Asgardians seemed to have longer hair than him, and fairly straight at that. Maybe his messy curls were a novelty to her? "I know you do. One of these days you'll manage to catch her and ask her all the questions rattling around in your brain. Now, has there been any progress with that 'sludge villain' who's still evading capture?"

"No but I don't think that'll change today." Tilting his head back a little, Izuku nodded upward at where fat drops of rain were splattering against the plastic of his umbrella. "The rain would dilute his form, making him less powerful and possibly even make it hard for him to remain cohesive. He robbed another store yesterday, I can't imagine him risking things by coming back out today. Especially with All Might in the city; that's going to be a bad enough match up for him when he's at full strength."

Humming softly, Amora glanced up at where rain was continuing to splash a yellowish-green hemisphere of magic that hovered over her head before glancing down at Stormbreaker. "Well, I doubt anyone will be coming by today to try their hand at lifting Thor's hammer, and to be honest I can't really bring myself to care if someone does. Would you be interested in going somewhere that… isn't raining?"

Izuku reached down, brushing his hand against where his wallet rested in his pocket. Hmm. He had enough money for that Valkyrie, King of Asgard statue that someone has recently listed on eBay out of their private collection… but not if he spent overly much on anything else this week. So he could go somewhere, but not anywhere expensive. And he could only afford to pay for himself. Which wasn't terribly gentlemanly, even if Amora was technically the one inviting him somewhere instead of vice versa. And his mother had always raised him to be the best gentleman he could be. Maybe… maybe he didn't necessarily need another statue? It didn't really go with the rest of his room, but it had caught his eye because of the stories that Amora liked to tell him about her adventures in Asgard and Tønsberg.

Eep! Amora was staring at him. He was being rude by not responding to her question, wasn't he? Izuku cursed his tendency to get stuck in his thoughts; how many other times had he made things awkward by just staring back at a person as his mind raced? Quick! Answer! "That sounds… better than standing out in the rain? Did you have something in mind or just 'not raining'?"

"A maid cafe!" Amora clapped her hands together excitedly even as Izuku's jaw dropped at the suggestion. "There's one nearby that gets great reviews for their food and drinks, and equally good reviews for the quality of their workers."

Fidgeting awkwardly, Izuku glanced down at where his hands were digging into the cover of his notebook slightly out of nervousness before meeting Amora's gaze again. "I've never been to a maid cafe before. I'm pretty aware of the fact that I'm a quirkless loser, but I didn't want to fall to the level of loser who pays girls to pretend to be nice to him. There's desperate for positive human contact and then there's desperate, and I didn't want to be that desperate."

A subtle gesture by Amora expanded her magical umbrella to cover him, and he hesitantly lowered his more mundane umbrella as she smiled down at him reassuringly. "You won't be a lonely loser visiting a maid cafe if you visit with me. We'll just be two average teenagers spending an afternoon out together. At a maid cafe."

When she put it that way, it didn't make him sound nearly as pathetic as he feared going alone would make him. And so Izuku nodded hesitantly, swinging his yellow backpack down off one shoulder so that he could tuck his notebook into it. "I mean, I know why I would want to go to a maid cafe. As much as I don't want to admit it. Why do you want to go?"

"The pretty girls, of course. Among others, I've dated both Thors. I'm perfectly capable of appreciating the fairer sex the same way you do." When Izuku's face fell, Amora's gaze became considerably more guarded. "What? I thought your mortal society was over such hangups these days."

Izuku flapped his hands anxiously at the scrutiny. "No, not that! But you're the only person I really spend time around. How am I ever going to get a girlfriend if you also like girls? Why would anybody pick me if they could have you?"

A peal of laughter escaped Amora at that. "I tell you that I'm pansexual and that's your takeaway. Izu-kun, you're adorable. First of all, we may have considerably different taste in girls. Secondly, even if that's true of the first girl we meet together, if I date her then I'm free to help you date any girls that we meet after that. Unless I date the second one too. I have been polyamorous before. Limitedly, but I do have experience."

Fingers itching for the notebook that he'd just packed away, Izuku gave a start as Amora turned and started to walk away, hurrying to keep up and stay under the protection of the spell that was keeping the rain at bay. "Is that a story I can hear?"

"Hmm? Oh, it's not terribly interesting. I was a couple's unicorn at one point. I don't know if there's a Japanese word for that; unicorn is definitely an American term. I was, hmm, their desperate attempt to spice up a stagnating relationship." Amora flicked out one hand palm up and conjured a pair of glowing busts that made Izuku's eyes widen. "You'd probably be interested because of the 'who' more than the 'what'. It was Scott and Hope Lang. It was back when I was first settling in on Earth, maybe two or three years after the Blip?"

He was definitely interested in that who! He recognized those names: Ant-Man and the Wasp! Amora had dated two members of the second lineup of Avengers? She'd mentioned knowing the Avengers, but Izuku had assumed it was more of a polite, distant 'knowing', like she'd met them in passing because of them coming to visit Thor in Tønsberg or something. Not that she knew-knew them. There were so many gaps in records from that period, and Izuku found himself wondering how many of them Amora might be able to fill for him.

In less time than he would have thought, Izuku found himself standing in front of the Musutafu location for (a)home Café as Amora bounced excitedly next to him. Turning to the blonde, Izuku raised an eyebrow curiously. "You're more excited about this than I expected."

"Generally I despise the cult of celebrity that the hero industry has become, but for this, I'll make an exception. I read a lot of reviews online before deciding to ask if you wanted to come here with me." Grabbing Izuku by the hand, Amora pulled him through the doors and into a bustling cafe where all the waitresses... were dressed as superhero-themed maids? Izuku's eyes widened as an All Might maid boisterously announced her presence before slipping past him with a tray of drinks. Serving other tables were a scowling Endeavor maid and a Hawks maid with a tiny pair of red wings fastened to the back of her dress. Before Izuku could erupt into muttering as his eyes flicked back and forth around the cafe frantically, Amora tilted her head back and bellowed. "Ég er hér."

While most of the occupants of the cafe stared at her in confusion, one maid in particular poked her head out of the kitchen and waved... was that a miniature version of Stormbreaker? They had a Thor maid? "Ég mun vera rétt hjá þér!"

As the hostess showed them to a table, Amora grinned widely at Izuku. "They have the only Asgardian speaker outside of Tønsberg at this cafe. Loki and Sigyn used some sort of magic to help accelerate the learning process. I've been dying to come and meet her but I couldn't think of an excuse to come to a maid cafe on my own. Didn't want to seem weird, same as you. So... I suppose we're both getting something out of this expedition?"

Izuku offered an uncertain smile. Personally, he thought he was going to be getting far more out of this visit than her. It was full of hero memorabilia for him to inspect and if (a)home's reputation was anything to go by, the maids would be veritable founts of trivia about their respective heroes. But if it she said so... "You're welcome?"