Chapter 2
"Alright, brat, what do you want to do in the future?" Despite his looks, Nemoto was actually far meaner than Irinaka. Living in the Shie Hassaikai Compound for 8 years had taught Izuku that. Sure, Irinaka could be cranky, but he was pretty decent most of the time. Nemoto? He was either being rude or egotistical, and Izuku wasn't sure which one he disliked more. It didn't help that Nemoto was his assigned teacher, seeing as Izuku was home schooled, and while he was good at teaching, he went about it in a rather rude way of it.
"Umm…well, I've considered a couple things…" Izuku replied nervously, scratching his curly hair with a gloved hand. Despite the fact he could now control his quirk well, he liked to wear the gloves simply out of habit, and if he didn't wear them his arms defaulted to what he liked to call 'ghost position' where his hands were as high as his elbows and draped down.
"Like what? We don't have unlimited time here, so hurry it up!" Nemoto spat as he adjusted his glasses.
"Well, the first thing I've considered is a scientist, like David Shield," Izuku said. Nemoto let out an 'eh'
"You'd probably do well there, I'll give you that,"
"I also considered being a doctor, seeing as my quirk is good for healing," Nemoto squinted his eyes.
"You say that as if you realized there's a better option," Nemoto said. Despite Izuku's partial dislike of Nemoto, he had to admit he was exceptionally good at reading people. Izuku sighed, knowing how Nemoto would probably react to what he was about to say.
"Well…it was after that that I realized that I would be even better at healing people if I could be there at the moment when they get hurt, so that's when I came to the conclusion that…that I should be a hero…" The room went dead silent, and Izuku could feel a calm rage coming from Nemoto. It was pretty obvious that mentioning heroes in a positive light around Yakuza was a poor idea, especially seeing as it's because of heroes like All Might that the Yakuza were as weak as they are today.
"Midoriya…I want you to listen very closely," Nemoto muttered with a scarily calm voice that just barely masked his anger, "Heroes are filthy scum that stomp down those who have been considered 'worthless' or 'bad' by society. They live only to push themselves higher atop the bodies of the 'villains' they defeat. They are no better than Villains. In some cases, they are even worse than Villains. Understand?" Izuku, however, would not give up. A true hero always stands firm by their beliefs, and he wasn't going to back down after a guy like Nemoto questioned his beliefs.
"But there are true heroes! What about Recovery Girl? Or 13? Both of them are non-combat heroes who focus on healing and rescue respectively!" Izuku retorted. Nemoto's hand balled into a fist, and he grit his teeth.
"But the vast majority are combat heroes who get paid to beat up villains!"
"If I trained my quirk, I could knock out villains with a single touch! No unnecessary violence in the first place!" At this, Nemoto stood up and slammed his hands on the table.
"LISTEN HERE, BRAT! THE BOSS WILL NOT ACCEPT YOU BEING A HERO! IT GOES AGAINST-"
"And who said I would not agree with Young Midoriya's ambition?" Nemoto went still as soon as he heard the voice, and when he turned around he saw The Boss standing in the doorway with an indifferent face to the situation, "While I do, admittedly, have certain opinions on heroes, I see no reason why Midoriya would be a bad one. His quirk would be amazingly helpful in rescue, combat and support, it would be a waste to force him away from heroics," As Nemoto spluttered, a familiar person poked their head in the room.
"Hey, Izuku, you done with school? I was wondering if you wanna go to the arcade," Kurono asked. Izuku, thankful for an excuse to leave, quickly stood up from his seat.
"Yeah, I'm done. Thanks, Nemoto. See you, Boss," Izuku said as he left the room and followed Kurono. Kurono had joined the Hassaikai a little after Izuku had been taken in by The Boss, and the two had quickly become best friends seeing as they were the same age. In fact, Kurono was also planning on going to UA like Izuku, but he'd be going into the Support Course, specifically Design, as he loved designing ideas for costumes and was quite skilled at it.
"So, you want to be a hero?" Kurono asked as they walked through the compound. Izuku shrugged.
"I know it's kind of a taboo idea seeing as we're surrounded by Yakuza, but ever since I watched All Might's debut video, I've always wanted to save people, you know? And, like, my quirk is perfect for it, as The Boss was saying," Izuku replied. Kurono hummed.
"Fair enough," Kurono shrugged. And so, they walked to the arcade in relative silence, occasionally talking about something or other. The most common topic was Quirk Science, which they both enjoyed, although Izuku was the definitive expert on it. Eventually, they arrived at the arcade, only to see that it's-
"Closed? Are you kidding me?" Kurono cried as they looked at the sign on the front door of the arcade. Izuku just sighed.
"Well, what now?" Izuku asked.
"I'm just gonna head back. Nothing else I wanna do really. You coming?"
"No, I might wander around town a bit," Kurono nodded at that and left, leaving Izuku outside the closed arcade. Izuku decided to turn left and start walking down the sidewalk. A couple people looked at him a bit as they walked by, which Izuku really couldn't blame he was practically asking for it by wearing a green bomber jacket with a purple fluff collar, a black dress shirt with a white tie, charcoal slacks, white sneakers and white surgical gloves. He did wish they'd look at something else though.
As luck would have it, such thing popped into existence just as Izuku thought that.
And by popped, I mean exploded.
KABOOOM!
Izuku's head violently twisted back to see smoke rising from an alley and he could just barely see orange tinting the walls. He ran over to where a crowd was already forming, and as he pushed his way to the front of the group he started to fully see the scene that was unfolding in front of them. There was a villain made of some kind of dark green sludge, and inside the sludge Izuku could see a figure struggling to break free. Izuku could see that the figure seemed to be a boy around his age, with spikey blonde hair and angry looking red eyes. For some reason, he looked familiar, but Izuku couldn't put a finger on where he'd seen him before. A couple seconds later, an explosion popped from his palms, and suddenly Izuku realized who this was.
"Kacchan?" Izuku whispered as he recognized him fully now. Yes, Bakugou seemed to have not changed much in the past few years when it came to looks. As for personality? Well, Izuku hoped he had mellowed out since the last time he saw him. Then, Izuku realized what he was doing. He was watching his old childhood friend slowly be suffocated by this villain (and now he realized that he also realized how it was kind of fucked up how everyone else was just watching too), and not only that, but nobody was able to help him. The heroes had arrived while he was thinking, and although there were 4 of them, none of them could get close. Backdraft was stuck fending off fires caused by Bakugou's explosions, Kamui Woods seemed to be evacuating people from nearby houses, some new hero with a gigantification quirk was trying to get in the alley, and Death Arms was being extremely useful by doing jack shit and standing to the side.
'Is nobody going to even attempt to save him?' Izuku wondered. And as he thought that, a girl with orange hair in a ponytail rushed in towards the scene. Izuku was astonished by it. She seemed to be his age, and yet she was rushing into this situation without a second thought?
And yet, the next thing Izuku knew, he was running next to her. Izuku tore off his jacket and chucked it at the villain, blinding it for a moment. Unfortunately, his quirk didn't work against liquids, so he was basically quirkless against the villain. Fortunately, the girl expanded her fist to a much larger size and in a couple movements pulled Bakugou out of the sludge. However, at that point, the villain had gotten Izuku's jacket out of his eyes, and was about to attack the girl.
'Not on my watch' Izuku tore off one of his gloves and slammed his hand to the ground. The ground in front of the girl was torn apart, and a second later was reformed into a wall, which blocked the villain from attacking her.
"Great work, citizens, but I'll take it from here!" Out of nowhere, All Might appeared and smashed through the wall Izuku built, and in the process, he also created enough wind pressure to blast the sludge villain all across the alley. There were a couple seconds of silence before suddenly it began to rain.
"Did All Might just change the weather in a single punch?" A voice from the crowd asked. After that, the crowd exploded into cheers, cheering for All Might and his weather-changing punch. All Might did a quick peace sign to the crowd and then turned to Izuku, Bakugou and the ginger girl.
"Young Citizens, that was quite the stunt you pulled! You're lucky you're unhurt. Anyways, I've gotta go! Get home safe!" And with that, All Might jumped away.
"I- well…holy shit I just met All Might," Izuku spluttered out.
"That's what you're focusing on right now?" The girl said. Izuku turned to her and shrugged.
"You really expect an idiot who ran into a villain attack to be logical?" Izuku replied.
"Fair enough,"
"Anyways, I'm Izuku Midoriya, and you are?"
"Itsuka Kendo, I'd shake your hand but I'm covered in sludge," Kendo laughed at her joke, which was short lived as the heroes now approached them.
"That was extremely foolish! You could have killed yourselves!" Death Arms started. Izuku didn't like Death Arms much, mainly because Death Arms was a pretty stupid name and he just genuinely didn't give off a good vibe. Izuku rolled his eyes.
"Listen, I was doing better than you, seeing as all you did was stand by the crowd. And before you say something like 'I was making sure they stayed back' you did a bang up job of that anyways because Kendo-San and I both ran up here," Izuku spat back. Death Arms looked slightly uncomfortable about being called out and rightfully backed off. Kamui Woods, bless him, actually checked on Bakugou before scolding Izuku and Kendo.
"On the bright side, none of you seem to have any bad damage. According to the law, I have to scold you for using your quirk in public and also running into an active villain event. According to my ideals, I have to tell you that you did an awesome job and that I will pretend this never happened, capiche?" Izuku and Kendo nodded. After that, paramedics checked on Bakugou but he was cleared as he had no lasting injuries and didn't need any healing. That left Kendo, Bakugou and Izuku alone.
"I didn't need your help, you fucking extras!" He growled, which made Izuku realize two things. One, he'd become even worse since he last saw him, and Two, he didn't recognize him. Although considering his current personality and how he interacted with Izuku back when they were kids, Izuku was a little grateful that he hadn't realized who he was yet.
"So you would have preferred that we just watched you suffocate from that villain?" Kendo replied. Bakugou huffed.
"A weak villain like that couldn't suffocate me!"
"On the contrary, he probably could have. He was basically drowning you in the sewer equivalent of honey, and if I had to guess, you'd have probably been a goner in another 30 seconds if nobody stepped in," Izuku commented. Bakugou looked at him in disdain before standing up and shoving his hands in his pockets.
"Whatever. Buzz off," He said as he left, leaving just Kendo and Izuku. They were silent for a moment.
"…Wanna get ice cream?" Izuku asked
"Mint Choc-Chip and Apple? That's a weird combination," Kendo commented as they walked towards the compound from the ice cream shop. Izuku raised an eyebrow and glanced at Kendo's ice cream.
"Like you can talk, with your coffee and vanilla ice cream," Kendo shrugged at this response and stuck her tongue out at Izuku. It turned out they were a surprisingly compatible duo, despite seeming like complete opposites. Perhaps it was because they both wanted to go to the UA Hero Course, but maybe it was some other reason.
"Anyways, did you recognize that guy back there? Just looked like you knew him from somewhere from the way you looked at him," Kendo asked. Izuku licked his ice cream in contemplation.
"Yeah, I-,"
"I AM HERE!" Out of nowhere, All Might appeared from an alley, and his sudden appearance made Izuku accidentally disassemble his ice cream and Kendo crush hers, although Izuku was lucky enough that he could just reassemble it.
"A-All Might?!" Izuku and Kendo cried out at the same time.
"Yes! I Am-," All Might said before spitting out some blood and he suddenly went from a large muscular man to an emancipated skeletal man with sunken dark eyes and looked nowhere near like All Might.
"Ah! You're not All Might!" Kendo cried.
"Y-you're an impostor! A villain!" Izuku accused, pointing a finger at 'All Might' while licking his ice cream. 'All Might' sighed and looked at them.
"No, I am All Might. It's just…y'know, complicated, yeah?" Kendo and Izuku raised an eyebrow, and 'All Might' cringed as he realized they didn't believe him. So, in response, he lifted his shirt up to reveal a nasty wound on his side.
"This is a wound I got in a battle 6 years ago, one that wasn't broadcasted to the public. Since then, I've gone from being able to do hero work all day to only 3 hours. Understand?" All Might explained as he let his shirt fall back down to cover the wound. Kendo and Izuku looked at each other, and Izuku gave a look that he hoped said 'May as well believe him for now. If he is a fake, we can probably beat him'. Kendo nodded and they looked back at All Might.
"All right then, but why are you telling us this?" Kendo asked, folding her arms before immediately regretting that as she realized she still had ice cream on her hands, which she promptly wiped across a stone wall. All Might assumed a dramatic pose and lifted his arms up towards the sky.
"Young…erhm, what are your names?"
"Izuku Midoriya,"
"Itsuka Kendo,"
"Yes, Young Kendo and Young Midoriya, I am here because I believe you are both worthy choices for my quirk, One for All," All Might announced, which put a look of shoc on Izuku and Kendo's faces.
"One for…" Kendo started.
"All?" Izuku finished.
'That's right! My quirk has been passed on from generation to generation, and soon I will need a successor, which is why I have come to tell you about all of this,"
"Ok, but like, is it really a good idea to tell the both of us?" Kendo asked. All Might looked at her and raised an eyebrow.
I'm…afraid I do not understand?" He replied. Kendo sighed.
"I mean, how many people would want your quirk? Millions, hell, billions probably. So what do you think happens when you tell two teens that they're both being considered for this power that-,"
"I don't want it,"
Kendo stopped talking and looked at Izuku along with All Might, which Izuku took as a cue to continue.
"I mean, your quirk is amazing, All Might, but I feel like if I took it then that wouldn't be fair to Kendo. I mean, My quirk is already super strong, seeing as I can instantly destroy anything I touch or heal people, so adding super strength on top while leaving Kendo with just being able to enlarge her fists- no offence -seems kind of unfair, y'know?" Kendo opened her mouth to reply and then closed it again, unable to find the words. She did this a few more times before responding.
"I…are you sure, Midoriya?" She asked. Izuku nodded immediately.
"100%. The world would be better off having you as the next symbol to look up to than me, anyways," Izuku shrugged. All Might hummed before clapping his hands.
"Well…uhm, if that's so, I guess…Young Kendo will become my successor?" All Might said. Kendo nodded.
"It would be my honor to become All Might's successor, sir," All Might smiled.
"Fantastic! From what I can tell, you seem in good enough shape to do this, so…" All Might said as he plucked a hair from his head, "Eat this!" Kendo went dead silent.
"I'm sorry, what?" Kendo asked as Izuku watched with mild amusement.
"My quirk can only be passed on through the consumption of my DNA! So come on, chew it down!" Kendo hesitantly took the hair and gulped it down, making a pained face as she swallowed. After that, she looked at All Might.
"Ok, what now?" She asked.
"It should come in by tomorrow. How about we all meet up at Takoba Municipal Beach tomorrow morning at 6:00 AM to test it out, eh?" All Might suggested, which they all agreed to. Izuku and Kendo stood there for a moment as All Might left them alone together, neither of them talking to each other. Izuku silently thanked the gods that nobody had just seen what had taken place there between them and All Might.
.
.
.
"What the fuck?" The voice of Hari Kurono called out, which made Izuku droop in frustration. He really had to stop jinxing himself.