"I really think they're trying to kill us."
"You're so dramatic, Nei," Hitoshi dismissed with an affectionate eyeroll.
"No, no! He might have a point!" Denki defended lightheartedly, leafing through the papers he was given, mind half on the conversation and half on his task at hand. "This year's schoolwork is really intensive, and now they're adding another internship on top of it. Maybe it really is to kill off the weak."
"Too bad I'm not going down that easy!" Neito declared as he bolted forward to grab his own stack of flyers, reinvigorated and ready to get down to business. He always was ready to accept a challenge! "Let's see them try to call me weak!"
"Holy shit…" Denki whispered under his breath before leaping up, his flyers scattering everywhere. He repeated louder, "holy shit!"
Hitoshi glanced over at the flyer that Denki was holding tightly in his hands and let out a low whistle. "You're being recruited by Hawks? That's great! Are you going to take it?"
"How could I pass up the opportunity to intern with the number two hero?! I'd regret it for the rest of my life!"
Neito stepped forward to pry the flyer out of Denki's hands, and Denki quickly let go with a sheepish grin.
"Don't want you to rip it. You're going to be a big hot shot someday, and you'll want to remember this moment, I'm sure," Neito mused, a soft smile on his face at his blonde boyfriend's barely contained excitement. "I can get it framed in gold for you, if you want."
Denki snorted, though he wondered if Neito was being serious. Knowing him, he probably was. Denki swore he'd never get used to this and wondered how Hitoshi did. After a glance in Hitoshi's direction only to see him shrug uselessly at him, Denki figured out that Hitoshi hadn't figured it out quite yet, either.
Neito's eyes scanned over the flyer, and he asked, "I wonder why Hawks chose you." He hummed in thought before adding, "I wonder if he has something in mind…"
"How do you mean?" Denki asked, looking over his shoulder to look at the flyer again, but wisely keeping his hands off of it.
"Well, he taught Tokoyami how to fly. I wonder if he saw some untapped potential in you, too."
Denki smiled as he thought about the shocked faces from all of his classmates, himself included, as Tokoyami literally took to the skies in their mock battle of their second year at UA.
"If he does and he's successful, I'll teach you everything I learn!" Denki promised easily.
It wasn't unexpected, but it still made Neito feel warm and happy that Denki made it a priority to always make Neito feel completely welcome to his quirk, like it was meant to be both of theirs from the beginning anyway.
As the soulmates got up to leave, gathering their own flyers and helping Denki pick up his own and neatly stack them once again, the Hawks flyer lying proudly on top, they each pulled Denki in for a quick kiss before leaving through his dorm door, promising to meet up for training the next morning before class.
Denki swore he would never get used to it, and he couldn't wipe the smile off his face even an hour later.
"What has you so happy?" Toga asked, amusement dancing in her voice.
"How can you tell?" Denki responded, answer her question with a question, still unable to force the corners of his mouth back into a neutral position. He flopped back onto his bed, holding his phone lightly against his ear as he smiled dumbly at his ceiling.
"It's in your voice. I can tell you're smiling. Now, spill! Is it about the soulmates?"
"Of course, it's about the soulmates!" Denki laughed out. "They kissed me! Both of them! And every time it happened after the first time, it felt like the first time all over again!"
"I'm not surprised," Toga responded, thought Denki knew what she meant by hearing a smile in a voice and was sure that she was smiling as she said it. "You freely admitted to being in love with them—"
"Back when you kidnapped me."
"—Back when we kidnapped you, but that's all in the past! Water under the bridge!" Toga insisted, making Denki laugh loudly before returning to her original train of thought. "And the chemistry you three had at the waterpark! Don't think I didn't notice how it was almost like you were reading each other's minds! I don't think I've ever seen anything like it before!" And, after a short pause. "After heavy consideration, now I'm sure I've never seen anything like it before!"
"Well, you're in a good mood, too, I can tell," Denki offered, hoping that Toga would tell him what has her in such a good mood as well.
"Hanging around the waterpark with other teenagers who actually didn't mind being around me… well, you know, after getting over the whole me being a villain thing—"
"No biggie."
"That's what I'm saying! Oh! Also, we have a hero trying to infiltrate the League right now!"
Denki sat up, heartrate increasing, the smile finally wiped off his face. He pressed his phone against his face, his grip on his phone tightening every second. "What?"
"He thinks he's being so sneaky!" she snickered. "Like he doesn't think that we would figure out that he will report every little thing back to the Hero Commission!" Her snickering turned into full belly laughing.
"That sounds a little risky," Denki offered quietly, hunching in on himself, suddenly too self-aware about the anxiety wracking his body for his liking.
"No need to worry!" Toga tried to placate. "We meet him at places that we determine, and he has no idea where our base is located. We have Kurogiri on standby every time, so if it's a trap, we'll be pulled out immediately!"
Denki blew out a breath from his puffed cheeks. "If you say so."
"I do say so! It's been so much fun recently! More freeing and relaxing… and it all started after the whole thing with you… or maybe after All For One was captured and Shigaraki truly took over without any oversight. So much happened so quickly, I'm not sure what the exact cause was. Maybe all of it combined? But we've all been having so much fun!"
Who knew being friends with a villain would be so emotionally taxing? All Denki did was worry all day!
He worried all day about his hero friends, too, so he guessed he was just a worrier.
"Just be careful," Denki asked, his voice giving away how worried he was.
"Oh, it's not me you should be worried about! Twice and Dabi are the ones who are out recruiting!" Toga chirped.
"Not helping," Denki snapped.
"So, then, after we kiss Denki goodbye, Neito and I walked out of the dorms right into Todoroki! Spilled his soba everywhere! So, like the good fellow classmates we strive to be, we helped him make a replacement. He invited us to eat with him, and we couldn't exactly turn him down. Have you ever spent more than five minutes with him? He's hilarious!" Hitoshi rambled, drying the dishes that Yamada was handing to him after a quick wash. "Anyway, that's why I was late for dinner."
"And not hungry," Yamada added with a nod.
"That just means we have extra leftovers for lunch tomorrow!" Hitoshi countered. "It's not like Endeavor will miss the extra money it took to feed three people instead of just the usual one. Actually, Todoroki offered to have us for dinner again, and offered caviar… and oddly a saltshaker filled with gold flakes instead of salt." Hitoshi shrugged. "He said that gold flakes are edible, and Neito agreed, so I'm inclined to take their word for it. It might be edible, but I don't know if it would actually taste good or if it's just a status thing for rich people."
Hitoshi handed the dried bowl over to Aizawa, who was tasked with putting them away, but Aizawa just stood there with the bowl in his grip, a thoughtful look on his face.
"Back up," Aizawa demanded then, deciding that no, he really couldn't just let Hitoshi gloss over major details like that. "You said you kissed Denki goodbye?"
Yamada smiled as Hitoshi handed Aizawa another cleaned and dried bowl, only for Aizawa to stack it on top of the other as he stared down at the kid. He knew he was in for quite the entertainment. Dinner and a show? He was being spoiled!
"Well, yeah," Hitoshi muttered, brow furrowed with confusion. "I already told you both that Neito and I were going to take Denki on a date to the waterpark, so I thought that you would guess that this would be the natural order of things."
"I thought you meant, like, a friend date."
"A friend date?" Hitoshi snorted. "What the hell is that?"
Aizawa looked to Yamada for help, who just shrugged uselessly at him with a huge smile on his face.
"Besides, I already told you that I love Denki. Remember? It was the first time I successfully captured you," Hitoshi reminded, flinging the dampened dish towel over his shoulder and leaning against the counter.
"Only because I was distracted," Aizawa muttered under his breath, though the corners of his mouth quirked up.
"Damn it!" Hitoshi shouted suddenly, letting his head fall into his hands in tragic despair. Aizawa and Yamada startled at the loud exclamation and were about to ask what was wrong, but there was no need because Hitoshi continued in a dramatic whine, "I should have saved the reveal for training so I could get you again! If I would have known that you were such a prude—"
"I'm not a prude!" Aizawa interjected indignantly.
"Do you have anything to say about this?" Hitoshi asked, turning everyone's attention to the quietly smiling Yamada.
"I think I'll sit this one out," Yamada tried to diffuse, but his husband wasn't having it.
"No, no! I think I want to hear what you have to say!" Aizawa demanded, finally turning around to put the dried bowl up in the cabinet where they belonged.
After a brief hesitation, Yamada braced himself, offered a traitorous smile to the two, and blurted, "like father like son?" with a shrug of his shoulders.
"And what do you mean by that, Hizashi?" Aizawa demanded, hands on his hips as he stared his husband down.
"I would also like to know," Hitoshi offered matter-of-factly. "I don't see how I can be compared to a prude."
Hitoshi ran from Aizawa, laughing loudly and dodging the capture weapon that snapped at his heels.
"Well, you trained him well," Yamada offered after Hitoshi made a successful escape to his bedroom.
"Maybe too well," Aizawa muttered, but he had a smile quickly growing across his face.
Aizawa and Yamada shared a knowing, comfortable smile. Every interaction with Hitoshi further proved to them that they had made the right decision, and every day was more fun and interesting than the last.