"What the hell are you doing?" Aizawa snarled, his hair floating as the electricity in the alleyway stopped.

Izumi leveled a glare at him. "Stopping a mugging. What are you doing?"

"Stopping illegal Quirk usage," the hero shot back.

Izumi rolled her eyes with disdain. "She took my Quirk," the man whimpered on the ground.

"Shut up," Shouta barked out. "I'm taking you to jail after I'm done with this... Problem Child." He turned his head back to Izumi. "Give him his Quirk back."

"No. He doesn't deserve it." The green-haired teen crossed her arms in defiance. "The ability to amplify the electricity his body creates in his fingers, and he uses it as a taser to mug women in back alleys. I should give it to some Quirkless kid - at least they'd actually appreciate it."

Well, she did have a point. But... "It's not about deserving or not deserving, Izumi." He might as well continue using her name, since he had already shouted it out. "Quirks are not something to be taken."

"Riiight... coming from the guy who can-" her eyes darted towards the whimpering man, as well as the trembling woman at the end of the alley who hadn't made a noise yet, and she decided to end her sentence, the point made clear.

"That's temporary - there's a difference."

"And you're saying that if you could make it permanent, you never would? That you've never met someone who you can look at and say that they don't deserve their Quirk? True villains?"

The attempted-mugger started sobbing harder. "Please... I'm just low on rent... please... never again..."

Aizawa grit his teeth. "You don't get to make that decision. You are not judge, jury, executioner. A lot of heroes seem to forget that nowadays. Now give him his Quirk back."

". . ." Izumi stared at her adoptive father for a few moments in silence. It was then that the man noticed her normally-green eyes were scarlet, and entirely lacking of emotion. Then, she blinked and they were back to normal, gone so fast he wasn't sure if they had ever been there in the first place. "Alright. Guess I'm getting some practice, huh?"

She touched the man, and after about five seconds of concentration, he collapsed to the ground in relief. "Thank you, thank you..." Izumi looked down at him, frowning, but said nothing.

"Don't thank me yet," Aizawa muttered. "You're still coming with me to the precinct."

"Yes, of course, of course..." The man nodded slowly. Izumi turned around, and the man flinched.

Izumi looked slightly hurt, her features hardening, but then softening again. "If this really was a one-time thing, you'll probably only be kept for a few days. Maybe a fine." She didn't look the man in the eyes before turning back around. "I'm... sorry."

The vigilante then approached the trembling woman, who scooted away in fear. "Hey, hey, hey, it's alright. Gloves. You see?" She held up her hands, displaying that she had put her gloves back on. "No danger here," she joked, trying to calm the woman down, who shakily allowed herself to be pulled to her feet. "Everything will be just fine."

"So... are we going to talk about that?"

"I won't if you won't," Izumi offered.

"Wha- I- No-" Shouta sputtered for a moment before closing his mouth and thinking about his words. "That's not what I meant, Problem Child, and you know it."

The teen sighed. She constantly seemed like she had been forced to grow up too fast, so much so that Aizawa forgot that she was still in the process of maturing sometimes. "I don't regret it."

"You should."

"But I don't," Izumi pointed out, "and you saying I should doesn't make me."

Aizawa rested his face in his hands and pulled downwards, stretching the skin slightly. "You know, I could still turn you in for illegal Quirk usage."

"If you were going to do it, you'd have done it already."

He hated it when she was logical like that. "I could still ground you though," he pointed out.

"Oh nooo~" The girl said sarcastically. "What will I do without the phone I don't use and the friends I don't have?" Both of them winced at that admission.

"How about... no training for two weeks? And no vigilantism indefinitely regardless," the black-haired Pro enunciated the final word, making sure his charge understood.

Izumi's bright-green eyes trained on him. "Two weeks ? That's just cruel, da-...ude."

"Da-ude?" Eraserhead snorted. "I've been called many things. I don't think Da-ude is one of the more common ones. And yes. There's one month until the Yuuei entrance exam, so two weeks of being grounded, and then you can put in some last-minute training." Izumi covered her mouth and made a weird sound that seemed to be somewhere between a snort and a laugh, her body shuddering. "Something funny?" The hero asked with a raised eyebrow.

"No, no, no!" Izumi waved her hands. "It's just..." She froze for a few seconds before continuing. "... I think we both know I'm not training for the entrance exam." She had a point. In the state she was in currently, regardless of which exam Yuuei chose for the incoming applicants this year, she would no doubt ace it. "Actually, that brings up another question I had - why didn't you put me in the Recommendation Exam?"

"Do you want to stand out even more?"

Izumi flushed. "Well, no, but-"

"-Exactly." Aizawa cut her off. "Besides, those Recommendations are really for top heroes and wealthy donors. If a Yuuei teacher submitted their own kid and they got accepted..."

"Nepotism," Izumi finished. "That makes sense, I guess."

"You know, kid, you sure have a large vocabulary for a fourteen-year-old," Aizawa noted. "And, really, there's no reason for you to be this smart unless you have a genius level IQ. Not that it's a bad thing," he hurried out the last sentence.

Izumi gave an awkward chuckle. "I spent a couple years sleeping in a library. Turns out, when you don't have school and barely sleep, you have a lot of time as a child..." She laughed awkwardly.

"Barely sleep?" Shouta pressed, and the girl tensed up instantly.

"Yeah." She changed the topic. "I... I'm not going to stop being a vigilante."

The Pro Hero sighed, catching the intent but letting it go. "If you get caught by someone other than me, it could result in you not being able to go to Yuuei or become a hero, you know."

"I know, I know, it's just... In the grand scheme of things, a Hero License is just a plastic card. It doesn't help me help people any more than without it."

Aizawa was silent for a few moments. "Maybe. But it keeps you safer. If villains attack a hero, they're going to start getting tracked by the Pro Heroes Association. If they attack a vigilante, then it's just a half-hearted police report." Izumi grew slightly red, but Shouta rectified his statement. "I'm not saying that's the way it should be, but that's the way it is."

There was a moment of silence between the duo. "I... I know. I just... I just wish that I could change that. Don't you?"

Aizawa snorted. "Every. Single. Day, Izumi." Despite the atmosphere, the green-haired teen's face brightened a little bit as she smiled as her adoptive father said her name with fondness. "But it's very difficult to do that without public support. And when the public doesn't even know..." Izumi nodded slowly. "Also, to answer your earlier question... yes." The teen looked at Aizawa with befuddlement.

"Which question?"

"Do I ever see villains and wish I could take away their Quirks permanently." Aizawa sighed. "I... It's a selfish desire, Izumi. Quirks are a part of people, just as much as your fingers, or your eyes, or your nose. And, yeah, sometimes I see a villain and see how they're hurting people, and know that when they get out of prison they're just going to do the same thing again, and I wish that I could take their Quirk away permanently. But people don't stay the same forever. Sometimes, bad people become good."

Izumi was silent for a few seconds. "Do... Do good people ever become bad?"

Thoughts flashed through Aizawa's head, unbidden. At the edge of them laid All Might, and his concerns. "Some-... sometimes, yes."

Izumi, as promised, didn't do any real training the next two weeks. Not combat training, anyway. But she trained physically. It seemed like whenever she had energy, that's all she was doing. Aizawa finally had a treadmill put in her room because of how much she was jogging around their flat.

It was fancy, as far as treadmills went. It was covered by the HPSC as a Hero Expense, so Aizawa was free to splurge on it. He was still surprised that she hadn't worn a hole in it, though. He'd also have to consider getting her weights or a lifting station - her room was still pretty bare as far as rooms went. She had her bed, her bag, a couple clothes strewn around the room, and now her treadmill. Hopefully, that would become a different story soon.

And then, just like that, the two weeks passed, and it Izumi was back to being able to train again. However, seeing her abilities, Shouta had a different idea for training in mind.

"Alright, take my Quirk."

"Eh?!" Izumi looked at the man in shock.

Aizawa nodded, looking at her expectantly. "I want you to take my Quirk, keep it for a few minutes, and then give it back. You need practice with it, and obviously not a lot of people are going to volunteer for it."

Izumi looked desperately panicked as she shook her head. "I don't think that's a good idea."

"I trust you," Aizawa pressed. "And we both know that you need practice with it. It-" The man chewed his tongue for a second as he thought through his sentence. "If you used it responsibly, you could... use it to help people. To become stronger."

The teen was quiet. "I... don't want to become stronger..." She whispered. "I just want to stop hu... start helping people." She admitted. "If I need to be stronger to do that, then fine. But I don't want to steal Quirks just so Ican be stronger. I never want to be like that." She finished with resolution. Aizawa once again wished he knew more about her past. There had to be something there to explain this.

"I get what you're saying. But... you also can't be wearing gloves all the time." Shouta gestured towards the girl's hands, which were clad in a new pair of gloves that had a red-yellow gradient on them, coming close to a sunset. "Speaking of, what happened to your other gloves?"

"Dirty." The girl replied. "I'll wash them soon."

"Hizashi can do it," The man waved her off. "He does all the laundry."

Izumi shook her head. "No, that's fine." She said, slightly forceful.

'What an odd hill to die on...' Aizawa thought. He shrugged. He'd stop arguing, but have Hizashi do it anyway. She didn't need to do everything herself. "Regardless... you're not taking my Quirk to get stronger. You're taking it to practice, so maybe when you start going to school you can hold hands with a boy-" Izumi started blushing. "-or maybe a girl-" The blush grew in strength. "-and most importantly, you won't be limited by a flimsy piece of fabric. You can't risk being thrown in combat and accidentally taking another hero's Quirk." The blush started to fade as the mood became a bit more mellow.

"I... I suppose." She really didn't want to do this, Shouta noted. There had to be something else, something obvious he was missing. "Alright. Tell me when." She tugged her gloves off, the sunset patterns rippling as they fell to the carpeted floor.

The hero held his hand out. "Go ahead." Breathing in deeply, Izumi reached out, her eyes closed as her hand slowly inched towards Aizawa's. And then... her fingertips brushed his arms, and her eyes shot open and her hand clamped down, and Aizawa could literally feel the power being drained out of his body. But he had something else he needed to confirm, gritting his teeth to brush through the pain as he stared at the teen's face.

Yes. Nearly blood-red. And the hair on his arms raised as he looked at them, their sheer apathy provoking the flight or fight response within him, something about them just televising the fact that within seconds, this tiny girl could absolutely crush him mercilessly. And then, it was done. The red faded away, replaced by the normal green. They were both silent for a few seconds, Izumi biting her lip.

"Can... Can I give it back now?" She was shaking, Aizawa noted.

"Go ahead." And just like that, he had his ability back. Her eyes didn't turn scarlet when she was giving them back. That was... interesting. He had a question, though. "Hey... when you have my Quirk, do you know what differences its powered-up form has from mine?"

Izumi nodded slowly. "Mhm. The power-up can differ from Quirk to Quirk, for yours, it's pretty small. Mainly, it just gets rid of the side-effects."

"The... side effects?" Aizawa questioned, leaning forward.

The teen stilled, as if realizing that maybe he didn't know. "The... uh... the dry-eye and insomnia?" Aizawa blinked twice, resting back. That was... interesting

"Al... right... Is there-" He cut himself off. He couldn't allow himself to be selfish. "How about the guy from two weeks ago?"

Izumi nodded again. "His original Quirk was basically Taser Fingers. The human body generates its own electrical current, and he could power it up to a high enough of a degree in his fingers to project it a few inches. When I had it, I could just... project it from all over my body, and it could go a little bit further. I think I could probably shoot it, if I tried, but obviously..."

"And did he get those power-ups when you gave it back?" He was pretty sure he knew the answer, but it wouldn't hurt to ask.

Izumi shook her head. "No, no... or else I would just go around taking and giving heroes their Quirks back," she chuckled. "It's only when I have them..." It might've been Shouta's imagination, but the greenette seemed somewhat miserable when she said that last part.

"I see, I see... Now, I want you to touch my arm again, but this try to not take my Quirk."

Izumi looked at him incredulously. "I don't have control over that."

"That's what I'm trying to teach you, Problem Child. You need to establish control eventually, and unless you want to go to a Quirk Specialist, this is the best bet." Izumi breathed heavily for a few moments as she thought it over.

"Alright," she conceded.

Again, Aizawa held his arm out, and Izumi reached her hand out. And then... contact. Nothing happened. Izumi's eyes widened as she finally felt skin-to-skin contact for the first time in years. But she wasn't sure what-

Oh. Eraserhead's hair was floating as his Quirk activated. "You need to remember how this feels, alright, Izumi?" His voice was strained, oddly enough. "I'm going to release my Quirk, and we'll go from there." His hair fell, and there was a second or two where neither Quirk was active. Izumi marveled at it, and her intense concentration only held for a few moments before she breathed out and it broke. Her hand clamped down, and then it was done.

She started breathing heavily, falling backwards onto the floor as she tried to catch her breath. She laid there for a few moments, Aizawa mimicking her on the couch. After about a minute, they both recovered somewhat. "Back..." Izumi muttered, holding out her arm. Shouta pulled her up, feeling his Quirk come back as he did. Izumi fell on top of him, practically pinning him to the couch. "Mm... comfy... dad..." Was all she said before she passed out.

And there the two stayed, Aizawa afraid to move in case he woke her up, and it was the position Hizashi found them in when he got home from his radio show. He snickered quietly, and pulled out his phone and snapped a few pictures despite Aizawa's furious face. Present Mic snickered as he hustled upstairs to put his stuff away.

"She called me dad," Shouta told Hizashi as they stood together, doing laundry.

Hizashi smiled. "Nice!" He said, his Quirk slightly overpowering the words, making Shouta wince. "Bet you liked that," he teased.

Aizawa glowered at the bubbly hero next to him, passing him another piece of Izumi's clothing to wash.

"... Eh?" He heard as he went to grab another piece of clothing. "Geez, you didn't go too hard on her in training, did you?"

Aizawa turned to his boyfriend, confused. "What do you mean?"

Hizashi held up one of Izumi's black-and-green gloves, which held a massive dark stain in the center. "Well, I'm no expert at this, but I've cleaned your suit enough times to know that that's blood." Aizawa stared at the glove. He was missing something, something, something...

Nothing came to mind. Maybe it was from their bout on the tennis court, the glove that wasn't torn... He blinked in concentration, but came up with no better answer. Finally, he replied, "I guess so. I'll try to tone it down a little bit." There was no blood on anything else, but the glove kept coming back to Aizawa. It wasn't a small amount of blood by any means. How would she have hidden that? Was it from some vigilantism that he didn't know about?

Try as he might, he felt that there was something that he was missing. Something important. And he needed to figure it out... fast.