Izumi swung her legs as she looked down at Musutafu below her. Her bag rested on her back, slightly heavier than when she had come originally, stuffed with a few pairs of clothes to compliment the new set she had on her body. It had been... nice while it had lasted, she supposed. 'More than nice,' her traitorous mind whispered into her ears. A few droplets fell from her eyes as she tried to steel her soul again.
"Problem Child?" A voice came from behind her, startling her.
"Ai-... Eraserhead-san," she greeted, pretending to not notice how he cringed at the word.
"You... don't have to leave, you know," he told her, making sure to not make any sudden movements as she hung over the balcony, swinging her legs carelessly. Was she certain that she wasn't going to fall, or did she just not care either way?
"As if you guys want me here," she scoffed. "I'm not blind, you know. I hardly see you guys during the day, if at all, and you patrol nearly every single night."
Aizawa scrunched his eyebrows in confusion, before realization slowly dawned on him. "Problem Child..." He murmured, his mouth twitching upwards in a smile. "We have jobs during the day, you know. We're teachers."
The legs stopped kicking the air. "... eh?" Izumi asked, confused. "But you're heroes."
"I'm an Underground Hero, and Hizashi only takes specialized jobs due to his Quirk. Neither one of those is bringing in moneybags. But we both teach - at Yuuei. Did you never wonder why I was so focused on getting you in there?"
Izumi's head whipped around quickly. "You work at Yue-ei-?" Her question turned into a shriek as her sudden movement carried her body over the railing. Eraserhead was there in hardly a moment, grabbing at her arm, his hand sliding up as he struggled to get a grip on the girl. After what felt like an eternity, his fingers locked around her hand and he yanked her up. She landed on her hands and feet and sprang up, eyes wide, breathing heavily.
"Jesus Christ, Izumi! You nearly gave me a heart attack!" Aizawa rubbed his forehead, already anticipating the headache. No response came from the girl. He snuck a look.
Izumi was staring at her hand. Her ungloved hand, which Aizawa had just touched. Well, this would be interesting. 'I suppose she has to tell me now,' Aizawa thought to himself, but found that he was in no mood to joke.
"I can... take people's Quirks."
It was a simple answer, but one that made very little sense to Aizawa. Try it as he may, though, he could not activate his Quirk. It was like he had been smacked with Quirk Suppression cuffs, but worse. There was just... nothing there.
"Is that all there is to it?" He tried to stay calm. He was a Pro Hero, goddamnit! If he couldn't keep his cool through this one, tiny thing...
Izumi fidgeted. "Not... exactly. I can give them, too, theoretically... And when I have them, they're powered up. Like... stronger," she explained.
Aizawa leaned forward. "What do you mean, 'theoretically'?"
The teen twiddled her fingers. "W-well... o-obviously, I've never really had... 'practice' with it..." Aizawa nodded.
"So, did you... you said your Telekinesis Quirk was your mother's, right? Did you mean that literally?" Izumi nodded slowly, curled up in a ball with her hoodie tucked over her knees. "Did you st... did you take it from her?" Izumi shook her head frantically.
"No! I would never!" She didn't offer further explanation, though.
"Alright," the man nodded, finding that, for once, he wasn't incredibly tired or needing coffee. Did that mean it was related to his Quirk? Or was he just too hyped up on adrenaline to notice being tired? "Can you try to give me back my Quirk now? You have some inclination of knowing how to do it, I assume." Izumi nodded again, and Aizawa was finding that he really didn't like it when she was like this. He preferred her spunk, her flare, her attitude. Not this... meek shell that appeared whenever she felt like she had done something wrong.
She placed both of her hands on his arm, and like magic, Aizawa felt warmth flowing back into him, and the sense of discomfort that had been pervading his body for the past few hours disappeared. It was like getting back something he hadn't even known he was missing, quite literally. He breathed a sigh of relief. So that was what people felt when he used his Quirk on them... he didn't envy them. Maybe he wouldn't use it on his classes so much...
"That wasn't so bad, Problem Child." Oh, and she had passed out. Goodie.
"Her entire body is a Quirk Factor, Shouta!"
"I don't even know what that means, you old ha- ow! Ow!"
"I am the Youthful Heroine! Youth! Ful! Do you even know what that word means, you ungrateful brat?"
"Stop whacking me!" Aizawa demanded, but was silenced by another whack.
"Then stop bothering me," Recovery Girl shot back. "Your daughter needs to rest!"
Aizawa was silent for a few moments. "Fine," he ground out. "But as soon as she wakes up-"
"Yeah, yeah, I'll notify you. Now shoo, brat!" It was funny to hear her adopted father (and goodness was it weird to think of Aizawa-san like that) be shooed away like a troublesome teen, but Izumi didn't dare twitch a muscle in case they noticed.
The room was silent for a few moments. "I know you're awake, you little brat." Izumi held still. The police wouldn't handcuff an unconscious girl, right? Wait, was she handcuffed already? She heard a sound that was somewhere between a sigh and a growl. "Your breathing patterns changed. And the monitor picked up your heart rate increase. Stop pretending."
Izumi slowly elbowed her way up, blinking her eyes open to see that she was not, in fact, handcuffed. She was... in a hospital bed, or an approximation of one, maybe. Wait, where was she? Recovery Girl was here - she had heard the Pro say her name... Yuuei? She caught the logo on one of the walls as she looked around. She was in the Yuuei infirmary! The monitor started to beep as her heart rate picked up. How had she gotten here? What had-
Her Quirk. She had used her Quirk on Aizawa-san. It was a miracle she wasn't in Tartarus already.
"Not even enrolled, and you're already in the infirmary..." Recovery Girl rumbled angrily. "A panic attack, no less. You were a vigilante, and you still get scared enough to pass out. This generation, I wonder..." The ire in her voice was unmistakable. "Listen, girl. I've known Shouta for years. And I've never seen him care about anything as much as he cares about you, except for maybe Hizashi. So get your act together, and I better not see you here again at least until you're enrolled!" Chiyo Shuzenshi pointed a finger out the door. "You're good to go. Now scram!"
Izumi didn't need to be told twice. She was out the door in a heartbeat, and almost ran into Aizawa with how fast she was running. Instead, he ended up catching her in a rough approximation of a hug, and she was surprised enough that she halted her momentum. "Sheesh, Izumi... If you're going to run, at least let me time you." Shouta tried to joke. Instead, he was met with more tears. He was quickly discovering that Izumi was somewhat of a crybaby.
"Please don't call the cops on me!"
"I'm not going to call the cops on you, Problem Child. I meant what I said. There's no such thing as a Villainous Quirk. All Quirks have the power to harm people - as well as help them. One of the most important pieces of Hero Schooling is learning to use it correctly." Izumi definitely wasn't bawling like a child as Aizawa held her awkwardly. "Do... do you want to get something to eat...?" He wasn't the best at parenting, but kids liked food. He knew that for a fact.
Izumi nodded, and tentatively held her hand out. Aizawa's eyebrow twitched, but he grabbed it anyway. The kid was uncomfortable. He knew that, too. And it was kinda his fault. As they began to walk out, they passed by a man who looked like he was straight out of a hospital ward. For some reason, however, Izumi wanted to run up to him and say hi, and he just gave off an aura that made her want to trust him. She smiled at him, and he smiled back, even though it looked slightly haunted on his sunken face.
The moment passed. "Who was that? He seemed nice." Izumi asked Aizawa, who hesitated, a clear sign he was about to tell a lie.
"All Might's secretary." Izumi raised an eyebrow.
"Why would All Might's secretary be at Yuuei?"
Aizawa huffed, realizing that he had backed himself into a corner. "All Might is planning on teaching at Yuuei when the Spring Semester starts. So he was most likely delivering some paperwork..." the Pro trailed off as a weight tugged at his arm and he realized Izumi had stopped moving. She was oddly silent. "Izumi?" He remembered suddenly that she hated All Might for an unknown reason.
"Oh, goodie..." A wicked smile tugged at her face, the sadistic visage incredibly off-putting on her otherwise innocent form as the tear streaks from her earlier fit had yet to dry. "I get to be taught by the man who killed my mother."
Aizawa knocked on Izumi's door. "Izumi, I'm going out patrolling. If you want to come with me, you can." There was no response from inside, and Aizawa sighed. She hadn't said a word since they left Yuuei, even through lunch. It was now the nighttime, and she still wasn't saying anything, only fueling Shouta's internal monologue. He didn't know much about All Might, no, but he had talked with him slightly at the few meetings Yuuei had had involving his state and potentially teaching.
From the view that Aizawa had got off him, All Might was many things. He was a very happy-go-lucky person despite his career and condition. He seemed very talkative, very simple, very kind, which Izumi seemed to have picked up as they passed him in the hall. He had once been late because he had been too busy getting sidetracked saving people on the way over, and then had the heart to apologize for wasting their time. So, All Might was many things, and Shouta didn't like him, but he was still the model image of a hero. So... a heartless killer? He was having a difficult time connecting it to the man he had seen spending ten minutes softly coaxing a kitten out of a tree while it constantly scratched and hissed at him.
'Maybe her mother was a villain...?' He unconsciously was trying to rationalize it, wanting to believe Izumi and her reasoning for her emotions. 'But, no, All Might has one of the highest uninjured capture rates out of all of the heroes, perhaps even the highest. A lot of them end up surrendering as soon as he appears. A fight to the death...?' But Izumi had told him that telekinesis was her mother's Quirk. Not especially dangerous, even when used as well as Izumi had been as a vigilante.
'So, crossing that out then... Killed while he was battling a different villain? Caught in the crossfire?' Aizawa donned his costume as he prepared to hit the streets. 'Again, All Might has an incredibly low property damage count, but low is not zero...' He reasoned, and then caught onto what he was doing. He wanted to believe both Izumi as well as his own pre-conceptions. It would do him no good to keep pointlessly speculating. He would just ask Izumi... when she was talking again... maybe...
It wasn't more than fifteen minutes before he heard a scream echo out through the desolate city. He was rushing over, noting the unusual occurrence of it being a male scream. Possibly a fight going on, then. He got close to the source before he heard it again. "Give it back!" 'Give what back?' He thought, increasing his speed. "Please! Please! Please..." a choked sob was heard as he got closer. It sounded like a man broken.
Aizawa peered over a rooftop as he began to assess the situation. There were three figures in the alley - a hooded figure, a woman curled up near the back, and the man he had been hearing sobbing on the good at the hooded person's foot. He appeared to be relatively uninjured; a few bruises here and there, but nothing major. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, please... Just give it back... Please..."
'Drugs? Money? Medicine?' He wouldn't intervene until he had the whole story. It would make the police report easier. Electricity arced throughout the alleyway from the hooded figure's fingers, but made no movement towards the sobbing man.
Finally, the hooded figure spoke. And it was nothing like he what he expected. No, instead of hearing a gruff drug dealer, he heard, "You don't deserve it."
Despite all of his training, Eraserhead couldn't help himself as he jolted in shock. "Izumi ?"