A long time ago, I learned that all people are not born equal. Our world is a world where the majority of people are born with a superhuman ability called a "Quirk," and a large number of those people use them to act as Heroes protecting innocents from danger, as if the reality of a manga or comic book has become the reality of real life. In the present day, eighty percent of the population has some kind of Quirk, which naturally means that the other twenty percent of the population doesn't possess a Quirk; those people are referred to as "Quirkless," and if you've been paying attention, you've already figured out that that's the category I fall into.
If there are about seven billion people on the planet, then that means the number of Quirkless people in the world is roughly 1.4 billion people. On the surface, that sounds like a lot, doesn't it? That's about as many people as you'd find in China or India, and those are the two countries with the highest populations in the world. The thing about those places, though, is that they have their 1.4 billion condensed into a single area. Imagine taking all of the people in one of those countries and trying to spread them out across nearly two hundred countries that are all spread out across six continents, and that's not even getting into things like small islands and sovereign states. I don't know the exact math, but just by thinking about it a little, it's clear that every place gets so few Quirkless people that you could go your whole life without meeting one. A Quirkless person doesn't have powers, yet their existence is the truly phantasmagorical one, and I somehow ended up in that rare breed.
Earlier, I said that a large number of Quirk users go on to become Heroes, but most people never actually use their Quirks for anything special and just live normal, humdrum lives. There's nothing wrong with that because that's just what they chose to do, but when you're Quirkless, it feels like you're not given a choice, like you have to live an ordinary life because you're inherently inferior to your peers. I don't believe in that way of thinking, though. Ever since I was a child, I've loved Heroes as much as the next guy—probably even more—so of course I want to be one when I grow up. People always make fun of me for saying that, but I don't care. I have just as much right to be a Hero, to be someone who can save lives and put people at ease with a smile, as anyone else in this world, so I'm not going to stop trying just because people tell me to stop trying.
Even still, that doesn't mean it's not hard to deal with, or anything. A person can only stay so strong in the face of adversity, and there are a lot of days when it just becomes too much to handle. I don't want to do something else with my life, but I wish I didn't have to go at it alone. I wish that I knew someone else in the same boat as me, that I could meet another member of the phantasmagorical species known as the Quirkless.
Like that would ever happen, though.
The average day for Izuku Midoriya went as follows: he'd get woken up by his little sister ten minutes before his alarm was supposed to go off, he and his mom would cook breakfast for three—four on the rare occasions that his dad was home, he'd watch the news for any reports of All Might doing anything heroic, he'd go to school where Bakugou would pick on him before, during and after class, and then he'd shuffle on home as quickly as possible. That was the routine Midoriya had practiced for the past several years; it wasn't wholly ideal, but nothing had ever happened to make it seem like it could ever be changed, so bothering to try and do so wouldn't exactly benefit him in any way.
That was what he thought all the way up until a seemingly innocuous morning in May. Everything had been going according to his usual routine, from his little sister waking him up to Bakugou teasing him before class, but then their teacher surprised them with an announcement Midoriya hadn't heard in years: "We're having a new student join the class today." The teacher brought in the new student and revealed them to be a girl with long brown hair and a yellow headband with ribbons tied at its ends. Most of the class, especially the boys, were abuzz with excitement, but Midoriya didn't feel that way. The girl might have been objectively cute, but every time there was a new student, it didn't take long for them to jump on the "Let's bully Midoriya" bandwagon, so he wasn't exactly looking forward to having to deal with another tormenter.
"Okay, introduce yourself to the class and tell us three interesting things about yourself," the teacher said.
"Only three? Kinda arbitrary, but okay," the girl said. "My name is Haruhi Suzumiya. My family just moved here from Nishinomiya, and I hope we can all get along. I like to play the piano, my favorite Hero is Mirko, and… what else… oh yeah! I'm Quirkless."
Midoriya nearly fell out of his seat, and he wasn't the only one. The looks on everyone's faces made it clear that they had no idea how to process what had just been said; even the teacher looked completely thrown through a loop. Seeing more than one Quirkless person in your life was an oddity in and of itself, but for someone to so brazenly declare themselves as such was something else entirely, and she did it all with a smile on her face.
For a variety of reasons, Midoriya couldn't take his eyes off of that smile.
The idea of Midoriya being unable to take his eyes off of Haruhi wasn't simple exaggeration, as it turned out. All of the lessons of the day went in one ear and out the other; it was hard to get invested in long division when you've finally met someone just like you after seven years of being alone.
His observations, as thorough as they were, didn't end up telling him much about her, though. From what he could see, Haruhi was just a normal girl who answered questions just like any other girl and laughed like any other girl. That might have been why the other girls in the class were taking a shine to her in spite of her being Quirkless; even if Haruhi was basically an endangered species, the fact that she was fashionable and good looking meant that it was worth getting along with her. It almost made Midoriya wish he was born a girl.
"Gotta tell ya Ribbons, for a Quirkless chick, you're actually fitting in pretty well." Midoriya sank down in his chair as he saw Bakugou stomp over to Haruhi and the girls she was chatting with at lunchtime.
"Thanks I guess, whoever you are," Haruhi said.
"That's Bakugou. He's the toughest guy in class, and he'd be the coolest if it wasn't for his attitude," one of the girls said.
"Sure as hell wasn't talking to you!" Bakugou said before turning back to Haruhi. "Like I said, for a Quirkless chick, you're surprisingly not much of a pathetic eyesore. You're way better than Deku, that's for sure."
"Deku? Is he the guy who's been staring at me all day?" Haruhi asked. The girls threw out a bunch of "Ooo"s as Midoriya sank further into his seat. "He's Quirkless too?"
"Yeah, but he's nowhere near as cool as you are, Haruhi! It's like you're Filet Mignon and he's beef jerky, or something," one of the girls said, prompting a laugh from Bakugou and the rest of her group.
"I actually like both of those things."
"Well then you'd probably love hanging out with Deku, then. You'll get along like two Quirkless peas in a Quirkless pod!" They all started laughing again. Midoriya didn't know if there was really a God, but regardless, he was praying to something that Haruhi wouldn't take the bait and would just stay with her group.
"I don't know about that, but I might as well say hello." There shouldn't have been any doubt that no one would answer his prayers, yet Midoriya still found himself being surprised. Without any consideration for himself, Haruhi walked over to Midoriya and sat down at the desk next to his. "So I'm gonna take a wild guess and say that Deku isn't your real name?"
"N-No," Midoriya said. "M-My name's Izuku Midoriya. Deku's just a nickname. I-If you want to call me that—"
"Nah, Midoriya sounds better if you ask me," Haruhi said with a smile. Midoriya didn't hate the feeling it invoked in him. "You probably overheard, but I figured out that you were watching me pretty much from the get go."
"I-I didn't mean to! It's just that I've never met another Quirkless person before, so…"
"Hey, it's fine. Be happy about this; if I found out you were Quirkless some other way, I probably wouldn't have gone out of my way to talk to you." Somehow, Midoriya started feeling even worse about himself.
"R-Really? Why do you say that?"
"Just take a look at the peanut gallery over there." Haruhi pointed to Bakugou and the girls she was talking to a moment ago. They kept glancing at the two of them, and every time they did, they started laughing to themselves. "They probably think it'd be a real riot if the only two Quirkless people in the class became friends, like us being together doubles the material for their standup routine or something. If I knew from the start that you were Quirkless, then I wouldn't have talked to you because they would have expected me to talk to you, and why should I do something just because people want it to happen?"
"Isn't that what you're doing right now, though?"
"No, it's different. In my scenario, no one outright tells me to talk to you and it's just the general atmosphere that expects us to bond. Here, everyone's openly made their intentions clear, which means there's an open dialogue about how we should get to know each other because we're Quirkless. They still expect us to talk because we're both Quirkless, but if I didn't talk to you, then they'd just make jokes about how I'd refuse to talk to someone just like me, saying stuff like, 'Don't go thinking you're better than you really are!' or something. Either way, I get made the butt of someone's joke, and you probably end up in the crossfire. Make sense."
"I guess," Midoriya said, only a moderate amount of truth to his words. "So if it's a lose-lose situation anyway, why'd you pick this choice?"
"Well, I actually did feel like talking to you, so it was the lesser of two evils." Haruhi smiled at Midoriya again, and he got a vague idea of what sort of feeling it was invoking: genuine camaraderie.
Midoriya didn't remember what he ended up talking about with Haruhi, but he knew that it was a lot and was carried out through the rest of the day. Just as Haruhi predicted, most of the class was paying special attention to the fact that they were talking to each other, but it felt more manageable than the usual teasing he had to deal with. Just as Midoriya predicted, Haruhi was still pretty much a normal girl, but the fact that she was talking to him of all people was a miracle in and of itself, so he wasn't going to complain.
The next day, Midoriya and Haruhi met up at lunch again to talk about random stuff. Midoriya was slightly delayed by Bakugou taking another chance to pick on him for random stuff, and when he finally made it to the desk next to Haruhi, she had one of her eyebrows raised in a quizzical manner.
"You know, for someone who's supposed to be your friend, Bakugou sure treats you like crap," Haruhi said.
"I-I know that, Suzumiya-san, but it's more complicated than that," Midoriya said.
"What, is it some kind of S&M-type thing?" Naturally, Midoriya spat his food out all over his desk.
"Th-That's not it, at all!"
"Yeah, I know. That reaction was priceless, though." Midoriya didn't like that smile as much as the others.
"Look, I know that Kacchan's sort of kind of a big jerk, but we've known each other since we were little kids, so I know that beyond all of that, he's still a strong person who always succeeds at whatever he tries to accomplish. I-I've never really been good at anything, so I can't help but admire that."
"This reads like one of those manly man things that my lack of a Y chromosome apparently keeps me from understanding," Haruhi said.
"Is it? I don't really know much about those kind of things, myself," Midoriya said.
"Well, maybe it's one of those things where hate turns into love—or I guess love turns into hate and then back into love? I don't know. I don't really have any experience with this kind of stuff."
"Having friends?"
"Having bullies." Now it was Midoriya's turn to raise an eyebrow. "Most of these people, if not all of them, have been picking on you ever since you were diagnosed Quirkless, right? Well, I never had to deal with anything like that."
"Never?"
"I mean, there was always the occasional jerk who thought it'd be a riot to make fun of the Quirkless girl, but other than that, kids have always left me alone for the most part. I don't know why though." If Midoriya had to guess, he'd say that it was because her being an objectively cute girl superseded her being Quirkless, but he kept that to himself for a variety of reasons.
"I wish I had that kind of luck."
"I think it was less luck and more just making the right choices in life. Now that you got me around, you probably won't make the wrong ones any time soon, so you can be happy about that."
"Y-Yeah, I guess so." Despite the hesitation in his voice, he really was glad to hear that.
Midoriya and Haruhi kept having talks like that every lunch period for the rest of the week; for the first time in forever, Midoriya's routine was broken in even the slightest degree. They never talked about anything heavy handed or existential, just normal kid stuff like school, family, and who would win in a wrestling match between All Might and Mirko. It was all just normal kid stuff, nothing to get that excited about, but in Midoriya's defense, he couldn't remember the last time he got to do anything of the sort.
"Again, Suzumiya-san, All Might just completely outclasses Mirko in raw power, so there's no way for her to win," Midoriya said.
"Yeah, but her small size should give her an advantage, right? Not to mention all the mud making things slippery," Haruhi said.
"But that'd hinder Mirko as much as All Might, wouldn't it? Also, when did this become mud wrestling?"
"When I realized how great it would be to see those two duke it out while covered in mud. Don't tell me you've never at least thought about it for Mirko."
"Can't say that I have."
"Can't or won't?"
"Either or, I guess?" Midoriya asked with a shrug. He then caught sight of the clock and saw that lunch was nearly over, and with it being a Saturday—a half day—school would end alongside with it. "Suzumiya-san, do you have any plans for the weekend?"
"Why do you ask? You gonna feel lonely from not getting to see me for a whole day and a half?" Haruhi asked with a grin.
"I-I'm just curious, that's all!"
"Well, if you must now, my parents are actually taking me to see a baseball game after school today. It's my first time ever going to one, so I'm pretty excited about it." The smile on her face didn't leave any room for doubt. "You know, my aunt was supposed to come with us, but she got the flu and can't make it. We've got an extra ticket, so—I mean, if you're not busy with anything—"
Haruhi was interrupted by Bakugou slamming his hands down on their desks.
"You're sure getting chummy with Ribbons, huh Deku? Tell me, do Quirkless people like you have some kind of animal magnetism?" Bakugou asked.
"K-Kacchan, that's not—I don't know—"
"Obviously we don't. I mean, you're the biggest animal around, and neither one of us feels like hanging out with you," Haruhi said.
"The hell'd you just say?!" Bakugou shouted. A few onlookers laughed a bit at Haruhi's comment, and it took a great deal of willpower for Midoriya to not join in.
"Okay, as funny as it is to see someone talk back to Bakugou, you've been hanging out with Deku way too much," one of the girls in the class said.
"Yeah, it was kinda funny at first, but you should know that getting too close to that loser is only going to hurt you in the long run," another girl said.
"Says who? You? You're only telling me to stop hanging out with Midoriya because you got bored laughing about it behind our backs, so how much stock should I put into your words, anyway?" Haruhi asked.
"Excuse you?! Where do you think you get off, you little—"
"K-Knock it off! Suzumiya-san didn't do anything, so leave her alone!" Midoriya said. It wasn't like Midoriya to be so forceful with his emotions, but he wouldn't be able to sleep that night if he let Haruhi do all the fighting.
"Finally found some balls, did ya? Guess it's easy to act tough when it gives you a chance to play at being Hero. That's the only way a Quirkless loser like you could ever be one, anyway," Bakugou said.
"My dream has nothing to do with this, Kacchan. I-I just don't think any of you should make fun of Suzumiya-san when all she's doing is—"
"Are you stupid, or something?" Haruhi interjected. Midoriya turned to her with a look of confusion, a look that was matched by the rest of the people still lingering about in the classroom.
"S-Suzumiya-san?"
"What you were just talking about. You just said you wanted to be a Hero? Even though you're Quirkless?"
"Y-Yeah. So what?" Haruhi sighed and put a hand to her face.
"Are you kidding me? No wonder all these people make fun of you if you're talking about stupid stuff like that all the time!" For the first time in a while, everyone started laughing at Midoriya.
"M-Me wanting to be a Hero isn't stupid!"
"It is when you don't have a Quirk. Heroes and Villains alike tear up city blocks every other week like it's nothing, and you really think you could keep up with them without a Quirk of your own? Shouldn't you be smarter than that at this point in your life?" More laughter from their peers.
"I-I'm not an idiot—"
"Coulda fooled me!" Bakugou cut in.
"—I-I know that becoming a Hero without a Quirk is basically impossible, but why does that mean I shouldn't even try? I want to be a Hero just as much as Kacchan or anyone else, so don't I have the right to try?"
"Just because you have the right to something doesn't mean you should act on it, you know," Haruhi said. "If you want to help people that badly, try becoming a doctor or a firefighter or a police officer or something; those people save lives just like Heroes, and they're just as respected in the community."
"That's not the same! All of those people are too limited in what they can do to help, but a Hero is able to take action whenever they want and save hundreds of people because of that. That's why I want to be a Hero: so I can save as many people as possible and put a smile on their faces, just like All Might!"
"Yeah, just like All Might, the Symbol of Peace who also has a Quirk. Don't you hear how little sense you're making? It's always All Might this and All Might that with you, but I bet that if he were here right now, he'd tell you to give it up just like anybody else."
There had to have been more laughter from Bakugou and the rest of the class, but Midoriya didn't hear it. Haruhi's words were soft, yet it felt like they had the force of a pistol at his ear. As such, he was left deaf to the world, even when Bakugou got up in his face with what had to be taunts centered around what had just transpired.
Haruhi stood up and exited the room, not bothering to give him a second glance. Just like that, he was thrown back to zero.
Thanks to the severe blow to his morale, the weekend seemed to drag on forever for Midoriya, with him just going through the motions with as little effort as possible. When Monday came along, he didn't even struggle when his little sister woke him up too early; when he got to school, he barely even reacted to Bakugou's pre-class bullying. Things had gone back to normal, but none of it seemed to matter anymore.
A few minutes before class was supposed to start, the door opened again. Midoriya turned to it on instinct, and much to his displeasure—or maybe much to his disappointment—Haruhi walked in. His eyes didn't linger on her as much as they had the past few days, but they were there long enough for him to notice that she wasn't smiling like she had been since she first transferred in.
If there was a single emotion that could be used to describe her face, Midoriya would have gone with "melancholy."
Still caught up in the aftermath of how things went the previous week, Midoriya didn't join up with Haruhi for lunch, though it didn't look like she was even in the mood for it. Haruhi wore that melancholic look on her face all day, not even bothering to say a word. She didn't even pull out any food at lunchtime, just choosing to sit there and stare off into space. It was an odd thing to look at, but Midoriya didn't have it in him to pry.
Eventually, the end of the day came about. Midoriya collected his things and started heading for the door. In the corner of his eye, he saw Haruhi getting up, but her books and pencils were left scattered about on her desk. Not only that, but she didn't head in the direction of the door, she headed in the direction of Bakugou and his gang, who were still lying about in the back of the classroom.
Midoriya thought it was best to see where that was going.
"What do you want, Ribbons?" Bakugou asked. Haruhi said nothing. "What, you think you can just hang out with me while you and Deku are having your little fight? I got better shit to do than entertain your Quirkless ass, so quit standing there and spit it—"
Without a single iota of provocation, Haruhi punched Bakugou in the face and sent him flying into a bookshelf. Midoriya didn't know what was louder, the sound of Bakugou's impact or the collective sound of everyone's jaws dropping.
"What the fuck was that for?!"
"Emotional catharsis, that's what!" Haruhi said. "Want some more, 'cause I'm happy to provide!"
"I'll kill you, bitch!" Bakugou jumped at Haruhi, his Explosion Quirk at full blaze. He only grazed her a bit, and from there, the two of them devolved into a storm of fists that flew around the entirety of the room and destroyed everything in its path. It was the most ridiculous thing Midoriya had ever seen in his life, yet he couldn't bring himself to take his eyes away from it.
Either fortunately or unfortunately, their teacher quickly showed up to break up the fight, and Midoriya was allowed to think about how he had no idea what had just happened.
Midoriya was still upset with Haruhi. He still didn't want to talk to her, he still didn't know how to approach her, yet he still found himself waiting around after school for her to be done getting lectured by the principal. It was only an hour out of his day, but it had to be done.
"Surprised to see you here. Here I thought we were on the outs," Haruhi said the second she stepped out of the school.
"I-I know but… Hey, where are your parents?" Midoriya asked, hastily changing the subject.
"The principal wanted to talk to them and Bakugou's mom some more in private, so they told me to head to the car."
"W-Were your parents mad?"
"Oh yeah, livid even. Bakugou's mom seemed to take it in stride, though. According to her, I actually did a good thing by socking him in the face. Glad I got someone's approval."
"Y-You punched Kacchan in the face. How many people did you think would be okay with that?"
"Beats me. Probably you at least." Midoriya took in a quick breath. "Come on, he was asking for it. Don't tell me you weren't even a little happy to see that. For as much as you put Bakugou on a pedestal, it must have been amazing to see him get taken down a peg, right?"
Midoriya wanted to do nothing in response, but in spite of his better instincts, he found himself giving a weak nod.
"Even still, why did you do that, Suzumiya-san? Where did that come from? Did… Did something happen since the last time we talked?" Haruhi's expression became downcast, her melancholy magnified.
"Midoriya, have you ever thought about how insignificant we all are in the grand scheme of things? I've started doing that," was what Haruhi said in a single breath.
"What do you mean?" was all Midoriya managed to say in response.
"You know that baseball game I talked about going to? When I got to the stadium, I was shocked to see that it was filled with more people than I had ever seen in one place before. I could hardly take a step without bumping into someone, and the people on the other side of the stadium all looked like grains of rice from where I was sitting. I asked my dad how many people were at the stadium, and he said that since it was a sold out game, it was at least fifty thousand. Up until then, I never knew that a single place could even hold that many people.
"When I got home, I pulled out my calculator and started doing some math. I remembered reading once that the population of Japan was around one hundred million, so I divided that by fifty thousand, and you know what I got? Two thousand. That stadium was filled to capacity with thousands of people, yet they only amounted to one two-thousandth of all of the people in the country; if that was a fraction of a fraction, then that meant that I, a single person, was just a fraction of a fraction of a fraction."
A short breeze passed by and ruffled Haruhi's hair; it only served to emphasize the weight of her words.
"It was at that moment when it finally hit me: I'm not, nor have I ever been, anything special. I used to think that everything I do in my life was unique and helped make me my own person, from the way I tied up my ribbons to the way I'd get excited everytime Mirko appeared in the news, but that's wrong. If there are really so many people in the world that a packed stadium can be seen as a tiny statistic, then that means the things I think are so uniquely me are probably being done in the exact same way by someone else, and that someone probably thinks that it makes them special, too."
Another breeze came and went through Haruhi's hair. Midoriya just stood there in silence. He didn't know enough about the world to spout out any philosophies that she might find useful, and he couldn't come up with any comforting words that wouldn't be interpreted as patronizing. He didn't know what he could do to help her, but he knew that he wanted to, if only to get rid of that melancholic look on her face.
However, after a few seconds, Haruhi's melancholic look was replaced with one of frustration.
"It pisses me off just to even think about it! There are seven billion people on this planet, so they can't all be duds, right?! There has to be even a few interesting people in the world, so why wasn't I born as one of them?! Why Midoriya, why?!" Haruhi said all of that while stomping her foot against the ground with the speed and precision of a jackhammer.
"I-I don't know! I mean, I'm also just a nobody, so—"
"Yeah, you are a nobody! You're as boring and straightlaced as they come! If you opened up a dictionary and turned to the word 'milquetoast', there'd just be a big picture of you in there!" If that was Haruhi's attempt at cheering herself up, then he would have liked to suggest something else. "That fits you to a 'T', but you know what sets you apart from all the other nobodies? You're trying to do something about it! You can't live with being some average Joe for the rest of your life, so you're trying to be a Hero! After all, who's more interesting than a Hero, right?! And to think I thought you were an idiot for wanting to do that! If anything, I'm the idiot for even thinking of mocking you for it!"
If that was an apology, then Midoriya was willing to take it. More importantly, Midoriya couldn't help but feel like Haruhi was both wrong and right in her assessment of him. Midoriya really did want to be a Hero so he could help people, but he'd be lying if he said that a part of him wasn't in it for the glory, that a part of him wasn't aiming for it so he could be a person everyone looked up to. There shouldn't have been anything wrong with that. He spent over half of his life dealing with people trying to make him feel like he was nothing, so of course there was a part of him that wanted everyone to see him as something.
Midoriya kept all of that to himself; he was too distracted by Haruhi sticking a hand out with a smile on her face far wider than the previous ones he had seen, even if there was a hint of desperation in her eyes.
"Let's do it, Midoriya. You and me, let's show everyone that we matter. Let's let everyone in the universe know that we're here. Let's become the greatest, coolest, and most interesting Heroes in the world, Quirklessness be damned! How about it?!"
"Y-Yeah. Yeah. Yeah! Let's do it!" It was as if a wave of pure charisma had shot out of Haruhi and washed over him. A part of him might have just been going with the flow, but Midoriya could tell that the entirety of his being wanted to be on the same page as her, regardless of how much she might have been taking control of the conversation. There wasn't a single part of him that didn't want the same thing Haruhi wanted, so it wasn't at all surprising when he found himself shaking her hand in earnest.
A person can only stay so strong in the face of adversity, and there are a lot of days when it just becomes too much to handle. I don't want to do something else with my life, but I wish I didn't have to go at it alone. I wish that I knew someone else in the same boat as me, that I could meet another member of the phantasmagorical species known as the Quirkless. When I was in sixth grade, on a day I would never forget, I had my wish granted in the form of Haruhi Suzumiya, a person I would never forget, and after a stumbling block or two, the two of us decided to support each other on our paths of becoming Quirkless Heroes.
Little did I know that it was going to become far more complicated than anyone could have imagined for so, so many reasons.