Chapter 44

" The Phantom Thief and the Battle of the Puppies."

By the end of the previous night, and shared food, Hisato had been left to stay at the hospital with Jonathan since he agreed to make continuous, little checks on Alarice. Aizawa leaving the little Notebook that belonged to the ghost-quirk user there, for him to 'possess'. Not having a physical body did have some nice perks, or downsides, depending on how you looked at it. Being able to sleep in a space the size of a composition book was something Aizawa would definitely consider a 'perk'.

His friend anchored and safe, Aizawa had returned to the apartment he shared with Hizashi, who was, by himself, being weird. He dismissed it as distress over a student's comatose state. With him having to run back later that evening, for another day of puppy playtime for the hospital, he had an idea. An Idea that he was surprised to hear Nezu and Vlad agree so quickly to.

He wasn't too surprised with the student Vlad had suggested he take, either.

The rest of his students were up for the challenge of baby-sitting some hell-hound puppies. The ones who needed, and wanted, the extra credit were practically excited to sign up for what they probably thought was an easy job.

That evening, he was heading to the hospital, with Monoma at his side, and the young blond was quiet, if clearly anxiously curious, about what he was about to be doing. Aizawa would be keeping an observant eye on Monoma, for the whole playtime, for sure. He was hoping they'd have access to a different location for the puppies. He'd asked if they could use the pool area, but he had no idea if they'd get to use the small pool, or not. They were, after all, a hospital and it was primarily used for physical therapy.

"So what did you need my help with, Eraserhead?" Monoma was, as ever, just a bit full of himself.

"mn, You'll find out." He said rather dully as they walked past the doors of the hospital, heading down the marked paths to the daycare. Monoma took that as well as could be expected. Walking next to Aizawa, he looked like a young theatrical student, rather than a hero hopeful, dressed in his Hero uniform for the occasion, since technically, it was extra credit for Hero Studies.

Aizawa lead the way in, with a doctor who just nodded and smiled, accepting Aizawa's explanation on why Monoma was there.

"Well, I have some good news for you, Aizawa-san," the Doctor began, "or bad, depending. The older hell-pup, Skillet, or I guess Violet, since that is her name...well, her father is coming tomorrow to pick her up. So, one less pup, but then we'll definitely need you, as we're still struggling to get contact with many of the overseas parents." Doctor slid his card to let them in. A nurse with bandages on one arm, was patiently watching the hell-hound kids, who at least looked like kids now, but there was a pile of wristbands on the table. The doctor gave an audible sigh at that. "though they... keep doing that, so I'll miss Ski—Violet's help."

Aizawa just patted the stressed doctor's shoulder, and nodded to the nurse, who stood up, with a respectful nod to him in return. He caught Monoma making polite, if overly fancy bows to the two medical professionals.

He had to admit he was going to enjoy Monoma's reaction to these kids. "Monoma." he said flatly, ushering the showy teen over. "You're going in, first."

He opened the door, and Monoma went in, with a confident stride, if confused look on his face at the big bowl of water on the floor. Despite the age variation of the children, there was cleanliness in the room. Aizawa wasn't too surprised, these kids did seem together-enough, as a group, to help each other clean up.

He came in, behind Monoma, almost intentionally bumping into him, since the boy didn't finish walking-in, completely. Plopping himself down into the same child-sized chair, and dropping the pile of yellow that was his sleeping bag, behind him.

"We're baby-sitting?" Monoma said, somehow managing to look disgusted at Aizawa, who just had a slow smile cross his features, that turned into a toothy, Cheshire grin.

"Kids, It's puppy playtime, now." he said calmly. He noted Skillet's nod to him, while turning her back to strip-off her loose clothes. She was the first to be a young juvenile hell-hound, all metallic skin. Laser gave a big whooping noise, throwing-off his shift, before a sharp look from both Skillet and Aizawa reminded him of 'no lasers'.

Aizawa had to pretend he wasn't entertained by Monoma's slightly shocked look before, he realized he was surrounded by small hell-hound puppies. With that started and settled, Aizawa proceeded to take his position as observer of the puppies and Monoma, who gave him one look of concern, before the teacher waved him off, officially letting Monoma try to take the reigns on entertaining children.

Who also happened to be hell-hound puppies.

000

To Monoma, this wasn't quite hell, but maybe being surrounded by hell-hounds, he could still call it that.

The kids weren't inherently bad, but they weren't inclined to listen to him. Given that they had stripped down to transform, stealing their quirks was ill-advised, unless he wanted to be naked as well. Which he did not.

Monoma was snapped back to reality as one with gigantic ears, too big for his, or her, little gangly body, was attached to his coat tails, again.

"Hey, come on, you wouldn't like it if I bit your tail, would you?" he offered, trying to placate them. When the puppy fell off, as he lifted the fabric, they only barked and wagged their tail at him. Great. He tried to walk away, trying to be careful to not step on them, but they followed, en masse.

They yipped, barked, and whined at him, trying to catch him on the ground, again. He'd made the mistake of trying to treat them like actual dogs, only to realize they were dogs with the intelligence of human children... so significantly smarter, and intentionally ganging-up on him.

As a pack, with the real capability to dog-pile him, literally onto the floor, and with no way to stop them, he just got dog-piled. He stood-up from then on, to keep them from jumping up onto him. The toys in the room were pretty much all human toys, nothing for a group of 'puppies' to play with. He could tell from their insistence on biting and hanging off his coat tails that they desperately wanted a rope toy, or two.

As ridiculous as that thought actually was.

Looking over towards the only 'adult', he saw Aizawa was curled-up... safely on the table, but right next to where 'Skillet' and 'Laser' were; a location the rest of the pack was apparently more than happy to avoid. He'd chosen his spot to nap well. Another puppy was laying hidden under one of the little kid structures. Their little eyes, tiny spots of blue, were watching them, but they didn't move.

In fact, more than once, he was pretty sure they had disappeared entirely from view a few times.

Slipping out of the pack with a skillful leap, Monoma made it to the door, and knocked on it, eyes going to Aizawa to see if the teacher was paying attention. He noticed the tiny slit between his eyelids, before the yellow caterpillar sat up.

"What are you doing, Monoma?" He asked, not yet moving from his spot, probably warm and comfortable. Laser and Skillet were now watching as well.

"The puppies..." Monoma gestured to the group that were now sitting and looking expectantly at him. They were certainly enjoying messing with the teenager. "they need more toy options, something more than just my lowly costume to play with"

He knew his coat-tails were likely to be the target of an attack, any minute again.

"mhn... This is true." Said the caterpillar, who managed himself back up to his feet and escaping the cocoon, to emerge just a man once again. "I can obtain that, quickly enough."

All of the puppies were quick to scamper away from him, Monoma noticed.

"You'll stay here with them, I'll be right back." Aizawa said quite sternly, and managed to leave the room with none of the puppies making a run for the door. Clearly so afraid of him, that they wouldn't run past him for the chance of an escape. Monoma put that little nugget of knowledge into safe storage.

They were then left, with no real adult in the room, and all eyes were on him.

Well, that was his time to shine, wasn't it?

"Well,that does feel a little better, now that he's not in the room, doesn't it?" Monoma added some gesticulation to his little preaching. He eyed the drooly puppy, standing in the bowl of water, steam rising from it. "He'll be back of course, but have you pups... considered that with your greater numbers, you could overwhelm him?"

They were thinking about it, or at least listening to him tell them about dog-piling Aizawa, next time he was in the room.

Of course, as he was explaining, he noticed the smallest of the pups, bite and pull the yellow sleeping bag Aizawa was known for. Sniffing it anxiously, before sticking his head in the sleeping bag.

"Why, there's a good idea, if I ever saw one!" He came over to the puppy, who pulled their head out, to look up at him, then continued sniffing the bag. "It doesn't look like much, but this is where he spends a lot of his time."

Encouraged and amused by the fact the little pack was following him, he lifted the hood and the puppy who had pulled it down, stuck their head inside, then climbed all the way in.

"I know! Let's see how many of us can fit inside!" he comically stuck his own head in, though he held his breath. This action was enough to convince the rest to follow suit. They didn't file-in, in an orderly fashion, and he noted the puppy who had been hiding, even came out, to investigate.

Hell-pup after hell-pup, one biting his hand even, managed to get inside the yellow sleeping bag, and then lay down, eventually laying on each other. So that when he looked into the opening, there were 10 hellish puppies looking back at him. A smile spread on his face, because it was fairly entertaining. Then, he noticed Skillet get up, and daintily walk over, before squeezing herself in. Whether she was getting in, to pull puppies out, or play along, went unanswered, as the door opened.

Aizawa stood there, staring at the yellow sleeping bag full of puppies. Skillet's back-end hung out the opening, and Monoma stood there like he was about to present this to him.

"What? They wanted to explore!"

000

Aizawa, for the next trip, did not make the mistake of bringing Monoma with him, instead brought Chargebolt Kaminari, whom the puppies were ecstatic to see and play with. It earned him some slight favor, by bringing the more chipper blond in. Laser certainly was happy about it.

Hisato was doing his part, in the evening, keeping the comatose student... entertained? It was a strange affair, but her father didn't stop him.

Jonathan still sat quietly, trying to read and concentrate, but he kept looking at the arrangement of flowers set up, and waiting for when Alarice woke up and saw them. Really what else was he going to do? Not much else.

The flowers had come in, that morning, from apparently some Pro that she worked with, he really couldn't tell, though their Hero name was written in English. He would have to thank "fatgum" for the flowers and card. It sat next to the other two cards, one from her class and one that appeared, even from the other Hero class. UA seemed like nice people.

As the week slowly crawled by, Jonathan was always there, but Sunshine never showed herself. Icarus must have come by, there was a letter from them, there on the table, when Jonathan came back from lunch. He didn't question it.

If anything, it only strengthened his resolve, when Hizashi came back, near the end of the week. Or caught him when he came in, another card in hand.

"It's from one of her classmates she's close to." He stated calmly, putting it on the table with the others. "Asked me if I could take it to the room, for her. Her color looks better."

"It does." Jonathan said with a shrug, then let out something like a laugh, but it was kind of like a harsh bark. Hizashi looked startled at him. "I just realized, of the blond adults in her life, you're the nicest, and actual Hero here!" He gave one more barking noise, before he calmed down. "Have you thought about what I said?"

"I... well, I have but... I mean, why is it so important you hand your daughter over to me? Isn't she going to go back, with you? Sunshine said she was only here to prove she could get a full provisional, and she did, so isn't she going back?" He said it like facts, and hid his own misgivings about sending a promising young heroine back to where she was clearly achieving nothing. Jonathan just nodded to the man's very reasonable questions, then he held out his hand to all the cards, and the thoughtful get well gift of flowers.

"Look at this." He said with his tone dropping to being thoughtful. "She has friends here, it would be cruel to take her away from that, for starters. No, I'd rather she didn't come back with me, to the states, as much as I care for her."

"Surely she has friends in the states, right?" Hizashi asked, though he accurately predicted Jonathan's comeback to that.

"Have you ever heard her talk about that? Mention some friend from the states? Seen photos?" Jonathan said rather sadly. "No, in the states, the shadow of my sins hangs over my family, and I'll be honest, my pup is not the easiest to make friends with, even when she wants to. You could argue that I should not have encouraged my child to enjoy a "foreign hero" as she did, but it made her happy, and she learned a new language from it. I could not tell her no."

"Erh... I can't say I don't appreciate that, I mean... I'm happy that I made her happy, but that's... not really enough, you know?" he tried to offer, even though, somewhere in his mind, he realized he had already gone from teacher to pseudo-parent when Sunshine had failed to be there, for Alarice.

"I know." Jonathan said simply, nodding. "It just, would be better for her to stay where she has friends, where she's learning, doing something she wants... hm.. It would be easier if she had a home here, rather than in the states. I suppose I would need to talk to your Boss, wouldn't I? Is there any way you can put me in contact with him? I'd like to thank him, either way..."

He was interrupted by the doctor walking in, Hizashi expertly hiding his stress and internal conflict at the conversation. Jonathan acknowledging that Hizashi was a tough sell for all his light-heartedness. Hizashi slipped easily into Interpreter for Jonathan, all professional and smooth.

The news for Jonathan was good: They'd be waking her up tomorrow. They didn't know precisely when she would wake up, but they'd be putting reversal drugs into effect that morning, and she should be conscious by the end of the day. It could be fairly intense, since there was no way to tell how much she would remember from before, how much pain she may or not be in, how much she would be able to hear, etc.

Jonathan nodded at the news, and they hoped for the best.