Izuku yawned loudly as he sat up, he hadn't slept this good in years. A weight on his chest drawing his attention downwards to see Kinoko clinging to his chest.
He lightly shook her, causing her to stir and look up at him. Kinoko promptly began blushing and scrambled off of him.
"Sorry about that," She nervously said.
"Don't worry about it," Izuku chuckled. He then looked down in what seemed to be anxiousness, "So, are we a thing now?"
"Well, I do really like you. But I don't like being tied down. I hate the idea of being with just one person. So if you're up to it, I wanna have a polygamous relationship," Kinoko answered.
"What does that mean?" Izuku began moving around her tent, grabbing his clothes and hastily putting them on.
"Basically, we're dating, but if we find someone that we both really like, then we can make them apart of our relationship," she explained.
Izuku sat down of the bed, "Hey, if it means I get to be with you. I'm open to anything."
Kinoko immediately started blushing as a grin spread across her face, "Oh flattery gets you everywhere!"
Izuku's phone buzzed with a text from Reggie.
The Cop: Incase you forgot, we still have three more conduits to find, I'll meet you outside the park and we'll try to find a lead.
Izuku frowned, he had honestly no idea where to start with finding the next conduit. Suddenly an idea came to his head, and he turned to his girlfriend.
"Hey, you wouldn't happen to know where one of the other conduits are? I mean, you did escape with them."
"Hmm. I think Ochako might be hiding out in a boat house near the pier, it's a pale pink color, you can't miss it. Although when you find her, I recommend you be indoors," Kinoko giggled to herself.
"What does that mean?" Izuku nervously questioned.
"Well if I tell you it ruins the surprise," Kinoko said.
Izuku rolled his eyes, planting a kiss on her cheek and saying goodbye before beginning to leave Kinoko's tent.
"Wait!" Kinoko called.
"Yeah?" Izuku asked, halfway outside.
"One last warning. Ochako is insatiable," Kinoko winked smugly.
Izuku then proceeded to turn into a blushing mess, and he refused to answer Reggie when he asked about it.
"Are you sure this is the place?" Reggie asked as the two walked down the pier.
"It's where Kinoko said she was," Izuku shrugged.
"And you're sure we're trusting her?"
"We're not going through this again Reg'," Izuku sighed.
The two walked on the boathouse, knocking on the door a couple of times to get the conduit's attention.
When she didn't answer, Izuku looked to Reggie and nodded, slowly turning the doorknob and opened the door.
"Ochako? We're not here to hurt you. We just wanna talk!" Izuku called out.
Suddenly a hand touched both Izuku and Reggie's backs, and their weight disappeared, sending them floating up to the ceiling.
A woman stepped out from the shadows, she had chestnut colored hair in a bob and eyes of the same color. She wore a pair of overalls over a yellow shirt and a pair of pale pink sneakers.
"Who are you?" She asked.
"Izuku Rowe, conduit and active D.U.P assaulter, I'm also a friend of Kinoko's," Izuku grinned from his place on the roof.
"So you're not with Augustine?" The brown haired girl asked.
"Fuck no!"
She looked at him skeptically, before pressing her fingers together and dropping them both to the floor, "Ochako Uraraka," she greeted as she stuck her hand out to help Izuku up.
"Well, I trust you can take it from here?" Reggie asked, dusting himself off from the fall.
"Yeah man, you can take off if you want," Izuku answered.
"Good, I have more work to do," Reggie waved goodbye to his brother and shot a cautious look to Ochako before leaving.
"So—" Izuku plopped down on a couch, Ochako soon following, "What got you caught by the D.U.P?"
"My parents ran a construction company, but they didn't have a lot of employees so they had to do most of the work themselves. When I got my powers I realized I could help them. I'd remove some of the gravity from heavy objects so that the labor wasn't as back breaking. Unfortunately one of the employees caught me doing it," Ochako said, it seemed like it was getting hard for her to talk, "He wanted... pictures in exchange for his silence."
"Bastard," Izuku whispered.
"Don't worry I never gave him any. I sent his lecherous ass to the sun," Ochako scowled.
"Good. Guys like that don't deserve the lives they're given," Izuku said.
"You don't think I'm a bad person?" She asked
"Hell no, anybody would've done the same thing in your scenario."
Ochako sniffed and wiped at her eyes, "Thanks. So what about you, why do you hate the D.U.P?"
"Well when you guys escaped Augustine tore through our town. Me and my brother are here to get her to fix our tribe. But we obviously can't do it on our own so we've been trying to get the help of other conduits," Izuku explained.
"I'm really sorry," Ochako looked down in guilt.
"Don't apologise for escaping, I'd rather it be this way," Izuku smiled.
That got a genuine smile out of Ochako, one that he wished to see more of.
"Give me a second will you?" Izuku asked, grabbing his phone and stepping outside.
He dialed up Kinoko and waited for a few seconds, as soon as she picked up he was cut off, "Yes you two can go on a date."
"How did you know I was gonna ask?" Izuku questioned.
"Because I was just about to call you to ask the same thing," Kinoko giggled.
"I think I'm gonna like this polygamy thing," Izuku said.
"Oh trust me so do I," Kinoko then hung up.
Izuku walked back inside, "Hey, do you wanna go do something, just the two of us?"
"What about the D.U.P?" Ochako asked.
"Hey, they ain't got shit on us, especially if we're together. There has to be something you wanna do," Izuku answered as he sat on the couch with her.
"Well…" Ochako trailed off.
"Bowling, really?" Izuku asked as he finished tying his shoes.
"What?" Ochako asked back with a chuckle.
"I'm not complaining or nothing, just don't know if you're ready for this loss," Izuku mocked a sigh.
"Winner gets to pick what we do next?" Ochako propositioned.
"Sure, I'll be thinking about it while we play," Izuku snickered
"Oh you're about to get trounced," she laughed.
"We'll see about that!"
"How?!" Izuku frustratedly yelled, "How the fuck did you manage to get only strikes?!"
"My dad taught me, never lost a game in my life," Ochako answered.
"You're dad sounds like a cool dude," Izuku said.
"Yeah...he is," Ochako sighed.
"So, you won, what are we doing next?" Izuku suddenly asked as he stood up, taking Ochako's hand and having her stand up with him.
Ochako seemed to think about it for a few seconds before she grinned, "Follow me!"
"This is surprisingly relaxing," Izuku said.
The two were back in Ochako's boathouse, putting a new coat of paint on one of the more dilapidated rooms.
"Painting has always been one of my favorite things, at least in this context. I could never dream of trying to make actual art," Ochako chuckled.
"Well you never know. You could end up in a museum at some point."
Ochako just laughed and waved him off, "So, I've given you some of my emotional exposition, why don't you share yours?"
Izuku's smile fell a tiny bit as he sighed, "I have issues with controlling my anger. I get a kick out of getting into fights, it's why I took up boxing in the first place. I just got this rage inside me that bubbles up every so often, I know it's wrong but I can't help it most of the time."
"It's not wrong though," Ochako said.
"What do you mean. I shouldn't like getting into fights...should I?"
"You seem to know where to direct all that anger anyways, assholes like the D.U.P," Ochako walked over to him and wrapped her arms around his neck, "There's nothing wrong with you Izuku."
"Thanks," Izuku smiled.
The two went back to painting in silence, the only sound being their breathing until Ochako grabbed a paintbrush and lightly flicked it, peppering Izuku's face with small flecks of yellow.
"Oh you are so going down!" Izuku grabbed his own brush and flicked it at her.
For the next few minutes they fought, although they rarely hit each other aside from a few droplets on their faces.
Eventually Izuku set his brush down and rushed Ochako, picking her up in a bear hug and essentially immobilizing her.
She dropped her brush and burst into a fit of giggles as Izuku spun her around before putting her back down. Suddenly, they went silent and just looked into each other's eyes.
Izuku dipped his head down and pressed his lips against hers, Ochako immediately reciprocating. After a bit they separated, a thin string of saliva still connecting their mouths.
"How about we move this somewhere more comfortable." Ochako looked around the room at the wet paint on the walls, "And dryer."
An explosion went off in the distance, sending both Izuku and Ochako scrambling to get up. Out of the window, they saw a mushroom cloud appear on a D.U.P stronghold, and Izuku knew exactly who caused it.
"I need to go," Izuku suddenly said as he began running about to get his clothes on.
"What why?" Ochako asked.
"Because wherever there's an explosion, my brother is usually at the epicenter of it," Izuku answered.
On his way out the door, he pressed his lips to Ochako's cheek.
"You might wanna go meet up with Kinoko by the way." Izuku handed her a slip of paper, "Don't worry, I'll see you again soon."
'ello everyone, as you can see I'm British now. Just a quick update, I know I said that I Am Thou would be next week but I got the date of my test wrong so I Am Thou will be coming out of hiatus the first week of December. Here's a link to the two discord servers I lurk in the most:
The Hoard: https/discord.gg/dkrE77m
LoM: https/discord.gg/R9BU25t
That's it for now, Peace.