A few comments before starting:
1. Of course, I don't own My Hero Academia. Just saying.
2. There will be no pairings, if someone's asking
3. Bakugo swears a lot, and will continue to do so in this story. (I think nobody needed the warning, thought). Some other characters may swear occasionally.
4. Some OC will appear in the story but they will have minor roles. To quote Bakugo, they are just extra.
5. The story takes place somewhere mid-december.
6. All students of 1-A will have a role to play in this story, not just Bakugo and Midoriya.
7. I wrote many Fanfictions before, but it's the first time I actually decide to share one! It's a big day for me!
And the most important thing...
...Have fun!
Countdown to Reality
Day 1. Early morning. Start of countdown. 30:00:00
Worst nightmare ever.
Bakugo Katsuki could not remember what the nightmare was about, yet, he had rarely experienced such intense fear upon wake up. He abruptly sat up, drenched in sweat, his heart hammering crazily inside his ribcage. He wept his palms on his pants, not wanting to put nitroglycerin everywhere, and once he was sure he was not going to transform his room into a time bomb, he reached for his bedside lamp.
Shit, where was the damn thing?
He felt around his bedside table, searching for anything that could bring some light to the room, but his alarm clock and phone were also missing.
"For god Fuck!" He shouted, getting up.
The feeling of dread from his recent nightmare came back. Lamps, phones, and alarm clocks were not supposed to disappear in thin air. The room was also dark, nightmare dark. The ray of light from under his door was gone, as was the constant glow from the outside lampposts. He could not see a thing.
He leaned a little on the wall, feeling around for the curtains and window, and found none of that.
No lamp was one thing. No window was clearly another entirely.
The wall by his bed was made of cold, uninterrupted concrete. No light. No phone. No opening. Fuck, fuck, what the hell was happening? Memories of the League of Villain and his kidnapping reappeared instantaneously. Before he could think it through, he held his hands out and sparked them alight.
The bright, loud, flashing explosions cast a brief light upon a room that was certainly not his room at U.A. dorms. The place was small, with no windows. Katsuki pinpointed a switch on the wall and immediately reached for it.
A single bulb lit up, and he had to blink a few times to adjust.
No curse words left his mouth this time. Now that he could see, his dread sore to unprecedented levels. The small room had little furniture: the bed he had just left, the bare bedside, a small desk, a chair, and big plastic boxes along the wall. There were pictures above the desk, clothes neatly folded in the boxes, books piled up by the bed.
Some of the clothes were his, and he could recognize many of the books, but what spooked him the most were the pictures. He slowly crossed the short distance to the desk and blinked to make sure he was not seeing things.
There were some family pictures hanged on the walls.
Pictures showing his mom and dad smiling, having fun and visiting places he did not know they had been too.
Pictures he could trace back to his childhood, showing him and Deku playing around.
Pictures of himself at different ages, always within that very room, either alone or with his parents.
What the fuck was that about?! On the other walls, there was a map of the world and numerous pictures of foreign places, as well as postcards sent by his parents from overseas.
If it was a joke, it was not funny.
If it was not a joke and was the work of some sort of psycho, it was not going to remain funny for the fucker any longer.
Bakugo darted to the door, and if this shit was locked, he was going to explode it to pieces.
The key was on the door.
Bakugo looked blankly at the key. It was not making any sense. It was too real to be a dream, too elaborate to be a prank, too fucked-up to be the work of a psychopath. Kidnappers would not have left the key on the door, would not have hanged childhood pictures on the walls, and would definitely have heard about his Quirk and made sure he could not use it.
Bakugo opened the door, slowly, preparing to attack if needed.
The next room was a cramped cellar. His door was hidden behind a curtain, and the access obviously made to be difficult, boxes of unnecessary stuff piled up to block view and passage. Difficult. Not impossible. Bakugo slowly circled the chaos, making a beeline towards the ladder at the other end of the room. The hatch was closed with a padlock that he would have sent flying if the key had not hanged loosely just next to it.
Which did not make any fucking sense.
Bakugo pushed the hatch slowly, and the next room was a thousand times more surprising than the previous ones. He stayed on the ladder, not quite believing his eyes. This was the room where they kept the washing machines… at his parent's home. The door hanged open to the kitchen, and even if it was the middle of the night, he could recognize everything.
This was his home.
"What the fuck?!"
He jumped out of the cellar and made his way to the kitchen. How was he back to his parents' house? Why was there a room in the cellar? Why and how in hell had he arrived there?! Was this the effect of some quirk? A teleporting one? Hallucination one? The work of some villains?
He heard a faint noise, and swirled around, explosions immediately sparking to life.
"THE HELL, KATSUKI!"
This was not the voice of a fucking villain. It was the voice of his damn mother. She switched on the light and Bakugo let his hands drop. His mother, wearing her nightgown and holding onto a mug of black coffee, apart from the obvious anger, had a look on her face he had never seen before.
Fear. Deep, rooted to the bone fear.
"Do you fucking have a death wish, shitty brat?!"She half-screamed, half-whispered, slamming her cup down on the table. "The fuck are you doing here, firing your exploding shit at people?! You almost gave me a heart attack, I swear!"
"That's what I'd fucking like to know!" He shouted back a lot louder than her. "I was at U.A. dorms and I just woke up in that shithole in our cellar! What the fuck have you and dad been doing down there, hanging up all those creepy pictures and gathering my things?!"
She opened and closed her mouth.
Twice.
That look was still on her face, and it felt wrong. His mother was not supposed to look scared. Never.
"Fuck, give me your phone," he spat, deciding he would try to understand what his parents were doing in the cellar later. "Mine must have stayed in the dorms. I need to call Aizawa or All Might to tell them the school still got some fucking security issues, and that I just teleported to the other side of the town!"
His mother did not move. Not at all. She just blinked at him, as if he had suddenly turned completely mad.
"...school? Which School are you speaking about, Katsuki?" She said slowly, her voice suddenly softer than it had been in years.
"U.A. fucking hero school! Which other fucking school do you think I go?"
She grabbed a chair, and sat there, avoiding his stare. Bakugo let out a growl of frustration, but before he could scream more, tears slowly ran on his mother cheeks. Sad, silent tears.
He stopped whatever sentences he wanted to start.
He had never seen his mother cry.
Never.
"Katsuki, baby," she whispered, and he felt even more rooted to the spot, not remembering his mother ever calling him that. "…I'm sorry baby, I'm so sorry… you are my hero, you are my hero, and you know that, … right?"
For one thing, it was the first time his mother was actually saying something like this, so fuck no, he did not know. Second, his mother was obviously having a total mental breakdown right in the middle of the kitchen, whatever the reason was. Third, Bakugo was not sure they were safe. He needed to act, to understand why he was not at school anymore and could not dwell on words leading to dangerous emotional slopes.
"Give me the fucking phone before all U.A. starts thinking I'm gone again!" He pressed on. "And spare me the fucking sobs!"
…Which only resulted in having her crying more. Silent tears changed to loud, unstoppable hiccups and sobs. Furious, he crossed the distance towards her, wanting to search her pockets by force if needed, even if he was going to listen to her sermons later, but time was pressing, he had no idea if what had happened was going to happen again and…
"Katsuki!"
He froze. His dad was standing at the kitchen door. Which in itself, after the explosions, the shouting and the crying was highly unsurprising. What was much, much surprising was the tone he used.
His father had raised his voice, something Bakugo had wondered all his life if he was physically capable of. His father was supposed to be the sweet one, his mother the dragon, not the other fucking way around!
"Son, what are you doing up here?!"
"That's what I fucking want to know, but I…" Wait. Wait up. Bakugo's mind raced up. What was he doing up here?
Before he could even process the sentence, his dad had seized his forearm and was dragging him towards the other end of the room, to the hidden ladder. His mother did not move from where she sat, sobs growing even louder with each passing second.
"You think it's funny?" His dad asked, his grip being like iron. "Spouting some nonsense around, having your mom blaming herself? You are not a child anymore! Grow up!"
Bakugo finally snapped out of his daze. He fought his dad's grip and forced him to let go. "What the fuck?!" He shouted, almost, almost, raising his hands between them. "Spouting nonsense? Have you heard yourself?! Mom's gone emotionally nuts for whatever reason, and I teleported here or some shit happened, and you want me in that creepy shithole?! What's wrong with you?"
"Teleported?"
"YES! From fucking U.A. school, dad! From fucking U.A. where I live, where the incompetent teachers are supposed to keep us safe, and where I should be sleeping at this hour! This does ring a bell, or have you gone nuttier than mom?!"
His dad took a deep breath. "Katsuki. We had this discussion ten times already." He suddenly seemed a lot less angry, and a lot more tired. "Whatever you've just dreamt about, it is not real. You are not attending any school; You've never been, since you were four. There is no U.A. School, and this house is where you live, where you've always lived. Last time you dreamt, it was about you living in a volcanic island with dragons, this time it is about a boarding school. It need to stop. Your mom cannot take it. Not anymore."
The seriousness in his father's voice and the tiredness had Bakugo shut up.
A dream? U.A. had been only just a dream? As soon as the thought crossed his mind, he knew it was not true. U.A. was not a dream, not at fucking all.
He did not believe any of it, but the fear from his nightmare was back, terrible and unforgiving, eating him up alive. His father's words had an echo of truth he could not brush away so fast, and yet, it was not making any sort of sense, none at all…
"One day, your mom's going to break and someone is going to investigate! They will know you live hidden here! That day, Katsuki, we will not be able to protect you and they will take you away! You know what happened to people with Quirks like yours! I don't want to say it, son, I really don't want to, but the noise you made just now… if someone had heard… you need to understand, to grow up! If they take you away, you know what I will pray for?!"
He looked on the verge of tears.
Fuck.
"I will pray they fucking kill you fast! Because death will be the only good thing that could happen to you!"
Now both his parents were sobbing. Both his parents seemed also convinced that U.A. was a fantasy, while Bakugo knew it was not. Both his parents mental health was at risk and…
"I need to find Recovery Girl or…"
"You never believe me after a dream, Katsuki. I know. Just take my phone, check the internet, check that the person you need to call doesn't exist, not for real, and then, go back down, and close the doors before someone fucking sees you!"
His dad slammed the phone in his hands, turned around, and left Bakugo between the washing machines.
Midoriya Izuku woke up at dawn.
Just as Bakugo Katsuki, he did not wake up in his bed at U.A. but in his mother's house. He instantly recognized his room, his things, and before even noticing he was not exactly in the right place, he saw something was horribly off.
Where were his All Might posters?
He sat up very slowly, breath stuck in his throat.
"They… must be at U.A." He said aloud, relief washing over him. Then only did he notice that he was not at the school. Izuku looked around in daze, wondering why his memory was failing him.
When had he come back?
Some noise was coming from the living room, followed by his mother sweet voice. "Honey?! Honey I am heading out first! Get out of bed, you are going to be late for school!"
"I'm awake, mom!" He answered back, flinging his legs on the floor and getting up.
"See you!"
The front door opened, closed and then his home was silent. Izuku, still half-asleep, grabbed his phone, and looked for his uniform. Only it was not there. Frowning a little and still wondering what he was doing there, he headed to the bathroom, the most likely place to find missing clothing.
Was he really this late?
06.30 displayed his phone, which was still okay. What was not okay was the number of messages and calls he had received and missed. 93, which was more than he was normally receiving within a week.
Izuku slowly pushed open the bathroom's door, going through the list of names.
Something was wrong with his phone. His contact list had changed entirely, and most names were those of people he had never heard about. A few others were people he had known at some point in middle school or before, but with all the bullying, Izuku never had their numbers.
He frowned. Had his phone been hijacked?
More surprisingly, Kacchan's father had tried to call him four times, the first time at 4 a.m., and sent him about thirty messages:
Shitty Deku, I've lost my phone, I use my dad's, answer
FUCK, ANSWER YOUR PHONE
If you don't answer I gonna kill you
DEKU
He stopped reading. The rest was a non-ending list of curses written in capital letters.
Kacchan would never call him unless it was immensely important. That he had tried that many times was very concerning. Izuku felt a little more awake suddenly, hesitating to call him back.
He looked around the bathroom, this time wondering for good what he was doing there.
The uniform was in front of him.
Neatly prepared and folded, with his nametag on the vest.
The only problem was it was not a U.A. uniform.
"What…?" Izuku said, starring without understanding. He unfolded it, his mind racing. Had the other one been damaged? How? Why? Why change it to a completely different one if that was the case? He could use his gym clothes for a while if the uniform had an issue…
The sound of another message reminded him there also was a huge problem with his cellphone.
From Saeri Sumire-san:
Hey, do you want to eat with me at lunch? Mom prepared too much lunch for me alone ^^
Izuku had never heard from that person before. He knew he should answer all the persons he did not know to tell them they had the wrong number…
He would do that when on the train. He had no time right now. He had to solve the uniform mystery and probably to call Kacchan back.
Or else he would probably explode upon arrival.
Probably.
New message. New messages. Plural.
From Sato-buddy:
Watch the news before leaving
My dad's in it, they made a big catch tonight
He is the new hero today!
!
Izuku took the weird uniform and decided to get ready. Then he dropped by the kitchen, and grabbed a small breakfast, mainly some rest from dinner.
He could not remember dinner, and now it was growing into a big concern.
Did he hit – again – his head during training? Was that the reason why Kacchan had called him so many times in the night, to tell him not to sleep on a concussion he might have caused? Nope. This was not Kacchan style. More like "Good you did not die" as a morning welcome. That was his style.
He was going straight for Recovery Girl before class. Memory loss was definitely not okay, and he was not even sure he had actually hit anything in the previous training.
Izuku switched the TV on, because whoever was Sato-Buddy, if there was a new hero in town, he wanted to know. He chose the information channel and sat in front of the screen, finishing his breakfast.
He almost dropped it.
The screen showed an image his brain could not process, and words he refused to acknowledge because it did not make any sense at all. None. At. All.
Police officers were leading people to a police van, and several shapes of corpses were blurred out in the background.
The people left alive were all displaying blatant quirks, horns or tails, skin of unlikely colors and eyes shining a little too much. The words underneath read "37 Quirked discovered! Government congratulate the police for the operation."
What…?
Izuku switched on the sound.
"… as I've been saying, this is not the first time it happens this year. Yes, it is good such an operation happened, but the government is hiding the truth from us. If such operations are needed, it means the Quirk toes-test is not 100% working, or that the inspections are not properly done everywhere." The guest was explaining to the journalist. "And it is a concern. People with powerful and dangerous Quirks must still live in the city without us knowing and their very existence jeopardize our entire society."
"Kondo-San, does that mean your party think more coercive measures must be taken?" The journalist asked.
"Of course we must. Quirked people must continue to be denounced, and when found out we must make sure we understand how their Quirks work and how they spread in the children DNA, so that it does not further harm our country. This has been our fight for decades and I hope we can soon finish deterring the most dangerous ones."
"Yet, some concerns have been heard from…"
"The human rights protection organizations? Madam, what do you think we are doing? When we put a person who can spread toxic gas from his breath in a controlled environment? We are protecting everybody's rights! Normal people must have the right to live normal lives without such menace over their heads, and quirked people must have the right to live without the constant fear of hurting or maiming someone."
"Many quirks are said to be less than harmful sir…"
"Yes and these people are released into the society after receiving proper education about their abilities. That's what our rehabilitations centers are for, and these people can get normal lives and normal jobs after it. But you must understand we cannot do that for extremely volatile or dangerous Quirks."
"Many say very few people actually manage to get the degree from these schools and that when they do, they are often arrested again…"
"Figures show otherwise…"
Izuku shut the sound off.
Was that a prank? It must be a prank. What he had just heard could not be true, and could not be actually happening in direct live on TV with nobody saying anything.
He looked at his phone, his uniform, and something felt horribly wrong. Like, really wrong.
Okay, this was a bad dream, this was a bad dream, he was going to wake up and be at U.A. He was not living this. Not right there not right now.. and…
The doorbell rang.
Izuku jumped off the sofa, his bowl of rice exploded on the floor and he… was in panic mode. If this was true… He had a dangerous Quirk! All of U.A. had a such quirks… Kacchan… he needed to call him back. Right now. Just to make sure this was indeed a prank and not that they were suddenly living an impossible nightmare… and ask him why he couldn't remember how they had landed in such a situation and make sure he was okay, and Uraraka, and everybody, and All Might, and…
The doorbell rang again.
Izuku rushed at the door. Whoever that was, he needed to stay calm. He had been Quirkless, he was known as Quirkless, and this was just a stupid prank, but his registration had changed when he joined U.A. and…
"Izuku! If you're still sleeping, I'm going alone!" This was a girl voice. A girl he did not know and… "I texted you earlier! I have great lunch to share!"
He opened the door. The girl in front of him was perfectly looking normal, she wore the same uniform has he did and she was all smiles.
"…S-Sumire-s-san?" He said, hoping she was not Sumire-san at all.
"Yeah, yeah, the only me, Izuku. Are you coming? I do not want to be late. There is a history test this morning."
"I…I…I need to g-grab my things f-first," He said, and slammed the door in her face.
How was this girl knowing him?!
He rushed to his room and called the phone Kacchan had used. It rang once. Twice. Three times. Izuku felt his stomach tighten.
In the news, there were corpses. None of the journalists had spoken about it.
As if it was a normal occurrence.
"…Hello?" Instantaneous relief washed over him, but this was not Kacchan. This was his dad.
"…H-hello, t-this is Midoriya Izuku speaking…"
"Oh, Midoriya-kun. I'm so sorry. My phone had a problem this morning. It called you several times and sent you incoherent messages… it was not my intention. I've erased everything and you should do the same. I hope you still slept?"
"I-I…I did b-but…"
"I'm at work, Midoriya-kun. Let's catch up later. Tell your mother Mitsuki wants to drop by this week. Have a good day…"
"Wait!"
Kacchan's dad hung up and Izuku immediately tried to call him back. His calls were ignored.
Panic building up, he then slowly got up, closed his fists and let his consciousness reach One for All. His quirk was still there, perfectly normal. He breathed out.
Whatever was happening, he was still normal, he was still himself, and he had not dreamt an entire life.
Something might have happened to the country, maybe to the world, and he now had to understand why and how. His friends were probably in danger, and Izuku knew he had to find a way to contact Kacchan, but first…
Sumire-san was at the door, ringing the doorbell like crazy.