Conspiracy Theories, Espionage and Dance Heels

Author's Note: I hate these things, but they say communication is key; thanks to everyone who reads this fic. I'm using it to get back into writing long form after taking a couple year break. Sort of a training routine to flex my fingers and build up some writing endurance. Basically, I feel I got weak and need the exercise.

These chapters won't have consistent lengths, but I'll try to make them stop at a spot that makes sense. Probably could have cut the first one down into more sensible pieces, but hey, if you're here, it couldn't have been too bad, right?

Anyway, feedback is always appreciated, and I hope y'all enjoy the story as much as I enjoy telling it. Suave Deku annoyed the hell out of me till my friend pointed out, "he's just a grown-up band geek." Yes, a very powerful grown-up band geek. Anyway, on with the show.

He took a deep drag from his cigarette and savored the way the smoke filled his lungs. The acrid taste stopped bothering him long ago, and the nicotine had been an early friend once he'd made it Stateside. Being on the run required vigilance, and stimulants were a godsend.

Still, he knew the kid was bothered by his smoking. She'd wrinkle up her nose every time he came home with smoke on his clothes. Even taking the gloves off didn't help, and she was getting old enough and comfortable enough to speak her mind.

"Daddy, you really need to quit those things. They'll kill you," she finally told him.

He laughed, both at the absurdity of a little cancer getting him, and her insistence on calling him that. He'd never admit it, but he found it adorable beyond belief. He patted her head and bent down to her level.

"Then I'll just have to have you fix me back up, little one. Besides, you're up late. I'm going to have to yell at Riggs for letting you stay up."

"No. Riggs is kind, and you're changing the subject," she stood her ground. Crossing her arms and looking him dead in the eye. Very few people in his line of work could match her ability to look him in the eye when they stood against him. It was touching, and a good sign that the girl was getting better.

"I'll think about it, Eri. Now go to bed. I'll finish up my work for the night. If you go to bed fast, it'll be apple pancakes for breakfast."

"I'm getting too old to bribe, Daddy," but the girl hustled towards her room. He heard the water running from her sink and figured the kid got his message. She was a soft spot, and maybe he'd have to consider that at some point. He came out here and lit up a cigarette and got himself ready for the work at hand.

The woman before him sat bound to a chair he'd had bolted to the floor. People tried to break free during these little talks in the past. No one escaped. Still, break out attempts were a nuisance, and Riggs guaranteed this guest wouldn't be a problem.

"She's slippery, Master. But not one for brute strength."

Izzy took another drag from his cigarette and let it drop to the floor. He didn't bother to crush it out. Instead, he walked towards the girl and lifted the bag off her head.

"If you wanted to get kinky with me, you could have bought me a drink first. I'm pretty into the rough stuff, cutie."

"Miss Toga…" Izzy shook his head. Himiko Toga was not the kind of person he liked working with, but exceptions had to be made this far along in the game.

"I'm just saying, whips and chains excite a girl. I'd have come to you willingly if you'd just asked, Deku."

"No code names here," he pulled up a chair and sat across from her. "we're here to talk business not play capes and capers."

"Hmmmm, but I like to play," she leaned against her restraints, smiling at him and starting to blush. "I could play all night if you-"

Liquid metal shot from Izzy's finger and stopped shy of her temple. Once he had her attention, he pointed the spike at her knee.

"Take this seriously, Miss Toga."

"Fine, fine. Do all your 'business partners' get this treatment?"

"Only the annoying ones," he said. He leaned back in his chair and let the spike remain over her knee cap.

"So, what do you want then, Izuku? Why am I here?"

"I want you to be my informant in the League of Villains."

She did something Izzy wasn't expecting. She started laughing.

"Really? That's what you want? First off, fuck you. And second of all, fuck you. There is no more League of Villains. You saw to that when you tore poor Shigaraki into pieces and left him to die in a swamp," she managed to say between fits of laughter.

"Why would I help you stay informed about a group you've already cut the head off of?"

She waited. Izzy didn't answer her. Her laughing continued, but he could see the unease spreading throughout her. She stopped, looking at him with a mixture of suspicion and fear.

Good, she's starting to get it.

"What do you know that I don't?"

Izzy stood up, thought fuck it, and lit another cigarette. He offered a drag to Toga who took it and watched him intently as she exhaled.

"In the next few weeks, Shigaraki's remains will arrive back in Japan. Some of your former contacts will reach out to you, Dabi I suspect if he's smart, and stage a heist for your beloved leader's corpse. From that moment on, I want everything. Where the body is moved to, whose moving it, and where your real boss shows up to take possession of it."

He offered her another drag, which she took. A myriad of thoughts and feelings played across her face.

"Even if that's true, why would I help you? What's in it for me?"

"The usual," Izzy responded. "Money, enough to retire on. The chance to spread a little mayhem, and…" he snapped his fingers.

Behind him a light came on, revealing the villain Twice bound and bloodied. Toga's eyes widened seeing her friend so brutalized.

"I really hate torture. It's not very effective on the individual and I have a personal history that makes me despise the practice. Still, it's pretty effective when you use it on someone's friends and loved ones."

"Toga, don't worry about me! Don't give this bastard a damn thing! Tell him whatever he wants to hear! I am absolutely terrified of that man."

"It goes without saying, until the job is done, your friend stays with me."

She growled up at him. "And when exactly is the job done?"

Izzy laughed. She was mad, but she'd cooperate.

"Once All for One is dead, of course."

The briefing room at Shoto and Momo's start up agency was cozy compared to the others they could have held this meeting in. Iida tried to insist on holding it at his agency, but the thought of bright fluorescent lights beaming down on their heads and assaulting their eyes made most of the assembled heroes want to vomit. The reserved and modest traditional Japanese room Shoto put together for the place felt more soothing to the hungover heroes.

Uraraka watched her friends and colleagues with a mixture of pity and worry. Her quirk forced her to make friends with queasiness very early on in her training. Mr. Aizawa pushed her to extend her time in zero gravity and extend the number of objects she could suspend. It'd been torture on her inner ear but an unintended side effect was that the morning after a part never seemed to bother her. A couple of Ibuprofen for the head ache and some water and she bounced back. Iida obviously didn't.

Iida sat towards the front of the room, green behind the gills but still trying to exude authority. He fooled no one, leaving Shoto as the only one able to string together a coherent thought do to his abstinence the night before, and string he did.

The pin board at the front of the room looked like a conspiracy theorist fever dream. Strings of all different colors, widths, and lengths connected pictures, thought bubbles, and question marks as Shoto continued to put more words together into a mumbling mess than anyone of them had heard him say in their years of knowing him. It kind of reminded her of Izzy when he'd been talking about her saves. Her thoughts once again turned to the man.

"-and thanks to the intel we've received from Uraraka we know the suspect spent some time living in the city just fourteen miles south of where Shigaraki was found. This could tell us that Izuku Midoriya has a connection to the death of Shigaraki and might be able to tell us who or why he was killed."

"I still say it's an imposter," Bakugo spoke up. Uraraka turned to the hot head. On her way into the agency she noticed him frantically talking to someone on the phone. Tears streamed down his eyes as he yelled. It wasn't the normal bravado he put on. He was yelling from pain.

"Auntie, it can't be him. I know they never found the body, but I saw him fall! I was there, and I couldn't…" he shuddered. Uraraka felt to urge to reach out to the man, a first for her. He shook himself from his pain and stood up straight.

"Just please, if anyone comes by the house claiming to be him, don't let him in. Call me. Lock the doors, don't let him in, and wait for me to get there. Please, Auntie."

With that, Bakugo hung up the phone and walked into the meeting. Shoto moved to another part of the map, working off a string connected thought bubble Alive or Dead?

"Yes, Bakugo, we have imposter as one of our possible leads, but we should consider others. Based on Uraraka's description of Miss Josephines, we can't rule out a supernatural phenomenon might be occurring."

Here came the rabbit hole.

"The excess heat, the fact that she dropped off the map and Jirou couldn't track her, and the apparent deceased nature of the suspect leads me to believe…" Shoto took a deep breath.

"…we could be dealing with a Faustian/Satanic situation in which Uraraka was lead to hell by the demonic projection of Bakugo's former classmate or the Devil himself taking that form in order to spread Villainy throughout the heart of Japan."

The group groaned.

"Momo, he's cute but how do you put up with him? Demons? Really? We're a hero agency, not a church," Mina whimpered.

"Mina, I think we have to consider every possible option, even the more…" she looked at Shoto, "outlandish ideas. The fact is, Uraraka was the only one who talked with the man or saw this second club. So, what do you think, Uraraka? Demonic, ghostly, or just a dramatic villain?"

She thought hard back to last night. Her head wasn't the clearest, but nothing seemed supernatural. Sublime and extraordinary? Sure. Still, Bakugo was adamant that Izzy couldn't be real. That he'd killed him in fact. Bakugo held many terrible qualities, but he wasn't prone to lying or exaggeration.

"I don't know, the place is definitely unnatural. However, we don't know Izzy's quirk, or the quirks of those who work under him. If he truly is a villain, dramatics might help him project an air of mystery and fear that helps him control his underlings and enemies. We've seen it before."

She waited for a response. Everyone was staring at her, but no one was responding. Mina smirked, and Tsu raised her head.

"Izzy? Uraraka are you in heat over this villain, kero?"

Blood rushed to her face as fast as it drained from Iida's. Rage seemed to flush away most of the sickness as Iida began to chop his arms through the air in a way he hadn't done since second year and accidently hit Mr. Aizawa in the chin.

"That is a ludicrous and slanderous assertion to make about your friend, Tsu. The nerve. Uraraka is a devoted hero of the highest order and insinuating she'd have impure thoughts about a villain is a terrifying and horrific idea to espouse!"

"But he's hot, kero." Tsu looked at Uraraka. Mina was giggling and even Momo was covering her mouth to hide her laugh. Shoto began furiously scribbling and pinning a new string.

Izuku Midoriya, succubus?

Kirishima saw her discomfort and stood up.

"Everyone, we're ganging up on her. We all know Uraraka is one of the most heroic people in this room. She wouldn't fall for a villain. Let's take five and come back to this with fresh eyes, huh?" He stood up and began guiding Iida out the door. Kaminari and Bakugo followed suit, leaving her alone with the room and her girls. There was silence for all of five seconds before Mina jumped from the table and her hangover stupor and was at Uraraka's side.

"So Izzy huh? He's cute right. Ohh he looked cute. And he took you to a secluded VIP club? A whole club within a club?! Clubception? Ohhhh I need this. Spill everything."

"I umm…I don't know what you want me to say. He's the target of an investigation."

"And loaded and hot, kero."

"Money doesn't make a person," Momo huffed. Her friends gathered around her. Uraraka grew more and more uncomfortable. Maybe she needed her friends over the last few months. Maybe she'd missed them in her loneliness. This 180 turn from being out of loop to the center of attention though was unnerving.

"Guys I don't know…I mean I guess he's cute."

"He's a smoke show. I can confirm," piped in Jirou. "Scares me knowing he can drop you off the map. I couldn't pick up where you were at all. So scary, but objectively hot."

"Yeah, what was that about?" Mina pondered. "Did he just remove your device before you left and we didn't see it? Jirou had a full-blown freak out when she couldn't track you."

Uraraka turned inward and debated herself. How much could she tell them? She didn't know they hadn't been able to hear her or track her movements. She'd been prepared to tell the truth about Izzy finding the beacon. She figured they would have heard him catch on to them, but the minute she'd walked through the door with him, they couldn't find her. Maybe he really was some sort of devil? A handsome, kind, well spoken…

"Earth to Ochaco, won't you please respond?" Mina poked her shoulder.

"Hmmm? Sorry. Yeah, he must of slipped my tracker off when we were leaving Shoot the Sky," she lied. It was only a little one, right?

"Okay, so he's smart. We should have figured on that. I'll make another-"

"No," she interrupted. The girls looked at her. "No, if he found the first one, he'll be suspicious and check if I'm wired again. I'll have to go in alone. I know it's not ideal, but I think I'll be able to get more out of him if he believes he can trust me," she finished. She waited for the ribbing she'd get for wanting to be alone with the man, but it never came. Concerned looks met her from all her friends.

"Girl, we trust you, but that's dangerous. You'll be going in there tonight alone, with no backup. We don't know what he's capable of. You're a Recovery Hero, not a spy."

"I'm a hero, period. Hero's do whatever it takes to ensure the safety of those they protect. Right now we don't know anything about this guy other than he might have been connected with the Shigaraki case. If I must put myself on the line to give us a chance to stop him, then that's what I'll do."

The room looked at each other, Momo finally breaking the silence.

"So be it. Just be careful. Now come with me."

Uraraka looked at her friend, confused.

"We have to get you an outfit for tonight."

"What's wrong with the dress you already made me?"

The room looked her dead in the face, everyone one of them.

"You can't show up on a date with a guy like this, in a club like that, wearing the same thing you had last night. You aren't a broke college girl. You're a hero."

"Or at least a girl with friends, kero."

With that, her friends closed in on her, and Urarka began to feel like an injured seal in a shark tank.

She brushed her now longer hair behind her ear and paced up and down the sidewalk outside of her apartment. Her new dresses flowed around her knees, lifting slightly with each step. A dancing dress Momo had called it, though why it had to plunge so deep and show off her cleavage she couldn't place. Still, the new shoes were lovely, and not too bad as heels went. She felt she could reall move in them.

The girls had stormed her studio apartment and transformed the space into prep room. Momo brought in a lighted mirror and had Shoto carry in a beautician's seat. Even with his strength, the poor man was huffing and cursing under his breath.

A knock on the door was followed by Aoyama and his friend Patrice. She hadn't seen the sparkling hero since he returned from his tour of France post-graduation. His friend was short, like Mineta, but put together in a fine three-piece suit of cream that complimented his dark complexion.

"Thank you boys, for coming on short notice," Momo led them to their victim. Uraraka sat in the chair under a smock. Momo was still in the process of making her dress.

"Shouldn't I…you know…be dressed before doing hair and makeup?" she looked at her gathered team of torturers. Patrice laughed and stood behind her on a step stool, running his fingers through her hair.

"My flower, you will need time to bloom. Let Mama Patrice get started. This will take a little while, but the results shall be magnifique," he finished and began running his finger tips under her eyes and through her hair. She felt the skin on her face lighten, and watched in the mirror as each pass of her fingers lengthened a strand of hair. Her short bob began to grow and she watched in the mirror as her face brightened, relieved of the strain and exhaustion from the night before.

Mina leaned towards Aoyama and whispered, "his accent isn't…French."

"Oui," Aoyama answered. "He's from Seattle. We both just share in the art of being fabulous."

Mina accepted this and took a spot by Tsu on the couch. She was going to ask about the sailor she saw her crawling all over when a sharp knock came on the door. They weren't expecting anyone else. A small envelope slipped under the door. Momo moved from her post by the mirror and picked it up.

Inside the silky envelop as small purple card with gold lettering stated

6:15. I'll send a car around front. Don't forget, you owe me a dance.

Momo brought the card to Uraraka who took it and looked at the note.

"A dance, huh? Must have missed that in the debrief."

Uraraka went red. This amount of attention was already uncomfortable, and now Izzy had to add to the dramatics with an over the top presentation and calling card.

"He's a little over the top."

"If Shoto did these things for me, I'd marry him tomorrow," Momo joked.

"If Ras did, I'd have his tadpoles, kero."

"Gross, Tsu. Not the time," Mina rubbed the bridge of her nose.

"Didn't stop you and Kiri, kero." Tsu shrugged and ignored her pink friend going pinker. Uraraka ignored her friends as Momo looked at her thoughtfully, and then with a malicious glee.

"A dance. We can work with that," she said as she turned around and began producing her dress.

Three hours and all fussed over later, Uraraka stood outside her building ready for the evening. Her new hair grazed her shoulders and framed her face well. Patrice really was a fantastic stylist. Aoyama produced a seemingly endless supply of accessories for her, but a sensible bag and studded diamond bracelet was all she picked out. Still, Mina insisted on an emerald necklace that now hung right between her…well it drew the eye that was for sure.

Checking the news screen at the café next door, she could make out that it was 6:10. Her friends insisted that she had time, but once she was ready, she was out the door. They'd offered her something to drink to calm her nerves, but she wanted a clear head. She needed to remember tonight. This was still a hero mission after all. This had to work.

6:15 on the dot a long white yellow Cadillac pulled in front of the building. Out of the driver's seat Riggs emerged in full chauffeur dress. He took off his cap and bowed to her.

"A pleasure to see you again, Miss Uraraka. Thank you for joining us this evening," the elder man straightened and opened the back door. Inside the back seat was an expanse of cream leather, and a chilled bottle of champagne sat off to the side. Uraraka nodded and entered the car. Riggs took his place up front and began driving.

"The master regrets that he couldn't pick you up in person. Some business has pressed him at this time. He will however, meet you at Miss Josephine's upon your arrival," Riggs said.

"Does Izzy have a lot of business at night?" she asked. She saw Riggs eye her through the rear-view mirror. She expected distrust, or even snark, but the possible henchmen just laughed.

"That'll be a question you'll have to ask him. How goes your investigation so far?"

So he knows. Uraraka kicked herself. She wasn't an espionage hero. Someone from Hawks' agency should be on this case. Not even two nights in and her cover was blown. So why was she still being allowed in.

"You're too hard on yourself, Miss Uraraka. The master is well aware that his actions warrant investigation from curious heroes. He accepts this. Regardless, he enjoys your company."

"Why me though," she asked a looked for anything in the old man's expression. She'd been asking herself that since getting home last night. Why, in a country full of heroes, was she special?

"The master's ways are his own, but I think, and if you tell him this, I'll deny it, he senses a kindred spirit in you. Someone who will give of themselves endlessly to protect the people they care for, and bring them what they need."

"If that's true, why the secrecy? Why didn't he train to be a hero?"

Riggs grew grim, but he sighed and the harsh look gave way to sadness.

"Whose to say he isn't a hero? Not legally of course. But aren't we all he heroes of our own story?

"I'm talking about legality, not philosophy, Mr. Riggs."

"Very true," the old man nodded. "Very true."

They rode in silence the rest of the way there, passing Shoot the Sky and it's already growing line of hopeful entrants.

"We've passed the club," she said as they glided away from the front of the building.

"The master asked you to meet him at Miss Josephine's," he said. He turned the car down a back alley and waited. After checking the mirrors he looked into the back with a sad smile.

"My apologies, Miss Uraraka. But protocol dictates a level of discretion be taken here."

The ground began to rumble under the car. She looked outside to see what was happening, but her eyes began to grow heavy. Outside, a woman watched her intently as a group of men stood at the entrance of the alleyway.

"Just a precaution, you understand. While the master requests your company, and wishes to help with your investigation, there are some secrets I can't have you knowing."

She leaned back into the leather seat, her eyes refusing to open.

Now you've done it, she thought as she slipped out of consciousness.