A/N: Chapter 4's arrived, and it's pretty long! You know, this and chapter 3 were originally one chapter, but I thought it might be better if I separated them. So... here it is.

Disclaimer: I have zero claim to BnHA. It's a cool series and Horikoshi is a genius, I don't own it. This was written for entertainment purposes only.

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Four – nothing here is kind

Izuku is woken in the morning by the sound of the door being flung open. He blinks open heavy eyes just in time to witness a pink-haired girl around his age being pushed into the room, the door closing shut behind her.

The girl picks herself up and slams herself against the metal door, kicking and beating at it uselessly. "Let me out!" she roars shrilly. "Let – me – OUT!"

She's not crying. Her eyes are yellow with strange pupils, and she glares at the door fiercely, to no avail. Outside, the guards ignore her.

Izuku's first impression of Hatsume Mei is that she is a hurricane.

She turns and her odd eyes zero in on Izuku. "You," she says. "Were you kidnapped, too?"

"Y-yeah," Izuku says.

That's all he gets out before the girl continues, speaking with a slight lisp, "That's great! Well, not great, obviously, I just mean – I'm Hatsume Mei. They took me from my aunt's shop – she does auto repair work. How long've you been here? Where'd they pick you up from?"

"A day. Um, I was at the park –"

"That Kumo guy came, right? He's soooo creepy. When Auntie comes she's gonna kick his butt. But until then, we gotta work on an escape plan. Can't let Auntie do all the work, yeah?"

Mei's stubborn optimism is contagious, and Izuku finds himself smiling back.

Something like an hour passes – he really wishes he has a watch – before somebody knocks on their door politely to give them breakfast. Their meals, white rice with veggies and soup and a paper cup of water, are served on plain plastic trays. Everything is taken away in what he guesses are an exact twenty minutes, even as Mei complains that she hasn't finished her miso yet.

'Training' does indeed start that day, like Akagiri said. The guards open the door again sometime later and lead them out. The hallways have white walls and white tiles, too, giving the whole place the look of a normal office building.

They are taken to what looks like a gym. There, they meet a woman who wears a yellow blouse, black skirt, and high heels, who has short brown hair and oval glasses.

Her name is Taya. She has some kind of analysis Quirk, Izuku thinks. She makes them take off their shirts and spends a few minutes just carefully examining their bodies with a nearly obsessive gaze. It makes him squirm, but he remembers Kumo's lazy reprimand and doesn't slouch.

"Acceptable," Taya declares after poking at the muscles of his legs. It's ticklish.

Izuku is a good runner, he supposes. He has to be, with all the times the bullies at school chase him.

"Too pale," Taya critiques while she pinches Mei's cheek. "Do you spend all your time in front of a computer screen, girl? No, let me guess, the TV?" She tuts, almost like a disapproving aunt.

She tells them to run three laps around the room. Except Mei can't keep up, and when Izuku starts slowing down to keep pace with her, Taya tells him to leave her behind.

There is an awkward stretch of time after he finishes, as Izuku stands nervously next to the woman, watching Mei dragging herself determinedly through the last lap.

"Oh, boy," Taya sighs, looking disheartened.

She will be their primary physical instructor for the next few years, she says after Mei finishes. She expects them to work hard, or there will be consequences.

Taya makes them do sit-ups and jump roping and more running that day – tiring but not too bad. Almost like P.E. class. There are push-ups; neither Izuku or Mei can do a single one.

Then there is an hour which Taya uses to teach them how to punch. They stand in front of a punching bag and Taya shows them the basic form, how to position their wrists, how to throw their weight into a hit. For a woman of her slim figure, she is surprisingly strong. Taya punches, and the whole bag swings back.

It is a strange sight, as Taya is wearing heels and makeup and a skirt.

Izuku and Mei each take a different punching bag, and they throw hits as Taya counts, "One – two – one – two – one – two – one – two…"

He punches hard but clumsily, feeling his knuckles going numb and knowing that they will bruise later, but not daring to stop. Mei, on the other hand, does not seem to be taking Taya seriously. She moves unenthusiastically, barely working at all.

Izuku steals glances at Taya's face, which looks more and more unimpressed the longer she watches Mei.

When they stop for a water break, the first thing Taya does is slap Mei across the face. He isn't even surprised. The smacking sound seems to ring in his ears as Mei's head snaps back, her hand coming up to cradle her cheek.

"Lesson one," Taya says, voice now cold. "When I tell you to do something, you do it with one hundred percent effort. And when I talk about consequences, I mean it."

Mei goes without lunch that day. Her tray is still given to her, but it is mockingly empty. Izuku avoids her gaze as he eats his own meal.

He gives her the two rolls he slipped into his sleeve later, turning away from the cameras in their room at an angle where he is mostly sure his actions will not be noticed. Mei smiles at him gratefully in a wavering way. She kneels down in the guise of tying her shoelaces, ducking her head so that her long hair hides the way her cheeks – one still horribly black and purple – puff out as she gulps down the food quickly.

There is more 'training' in the afternoon, and afterwards they are given the evening to themselves. They shower and sit on their beds, Mei taking the one opposite Izuku's, and they talk quietly about unimportant things.

There is no more conversation about escaping, or badmouthing Taya or Kumo or the rest of their captors. Izuku thinks that even Mei is a little afraid now, that someone will hear and bad things will happen.

Three more children join them the next day, in the middle of another afternoon with Taya. Shinsou Hitoshi and Kaminari Denki, both boys their age, and Takahe Akayo, who is two years older. Hitoshi is dragged into the gym first by a guard and has wild purple hair and deep bags beneath his eyes, ones darker than Kumo's. He is sullen and rarely talks. Then comes Denki, who is blond (with a black streak) and scared, but he grins weakly at Izuku and it is wide and bright.

Akayo has bat ears and wings. They aren't allowed to talk while they 'train', but she tells them her name when lessons for the day finish and they are walking through the hallways together, led by yet another pair of armed, silent guards.

Hitoshi and Denki are pushed into Mei and Izuku's room, solving the mystery of who will be occupying the last two beds. Akayo, however, is led to another room, where she stays alone for the night, like Izuku did on his first day.

There are others who come. They join in twos and threes, most days. Sometimes they arrive in training, and other times Izuku and his roommates – teammates, Taya calls them. If they're in the same room, they're teammates – peek out the window in their door to witness another boy or girl shouting as they are thrown into their rooms – their cells.

Most are Japanese children. Then there are those who speak English or Chinese or Korean or Malay or Spanish or all sorts of other languages. The Order of the Triumvirate, Izuku realises with sickening clarity, is not a weak organisation. They must be influential, to be able to capture children from across the world.

"Smuggling rings," Mei suggests one night, when the lights are out, and they are curled up in their beds, listening to the sounds of each other's breathing.

"They must have people who have access to the Quirk registries," Izuku whispers quietly back. "Or… something. Most of us here have useful Quirks." Not me, he doesn't say. "Quirk therapists, specialists, doctors, government officials…"

"Shut up," Hitoshi mutters. "M'trying to sleep."

"You stay awake for hours, anyway," Mei replies. Denki, who has buried his head beneath his pillow, snorts out an agreement.

By the time the arrivals trickle to a stop, there are over forty children at the training hall each day. Izuku knows all their names. There is Hana, who mouths rude words at the guards' backs; Youichi, who gets extra food because of his Quirk and shares it with the younger children; Mickey, who can't speak a proper sentence of Japanese but is trying very hard to learn; Kenji, who uses his Quirk to make mosquitoes sting the Triumvirate people. (He tries more subtly after a guard finds out and breaks his arm.) There are little Emi and Mari, who can fly and make things heavier respectively, and many, many others.

More trainers come, and they are split into separate groups and separate training halls. Kenji tells him about his instructor, Howler, and how he sends his dogs chasing after them if they move too slowly. He hears of how Emi cries one day when one of the hounds snaps its jaws around her calf, and how the infirmary is told to strap her down and not give her anesthesia as they set the broken bones and stitch her skin up.

Izuku's team stays together under Taya, like all the other teams stay together. In a way, he is glad for her. She is not kind – nothing here is kind – but at least she is fair. She gives them breaks and tells Denki to take two days off after he catches the flu during swimming lessons. She doesn't make them practice their aim by throwing knives at each other or beat them until they learn like Youichi's instructor does. She isn't unnecessarily harsh.

If they are good, she will talk to them. About how they are in the Kantō region (in Tokyo, maybe?) and about everyday news – the local elections, how the weather is getting bad lately, how the plane that crashed near Hokkaido has been found. About politics and her associates and, sometimes, what the Order really does.

In moments when those of different teams can meets, little snatches of time where they can talk quickly, the others tell him about the one trainer who breaks Akitashi's jaw, how Shun disappears one day after he breaks down during training, and how Michizane, the oldest of them at fourteen, is found dead in the bathroom one morning, having hung himself. They are not called by those names in front of the Triumvirate people, of course, as the guards and trainers will hit them if they do. They call each other by the new names. The ones that sound like – like villain titles. Only in the privacy of their rooms, where they are sure no one will bother to discipline them, do they refer to each other by their original ones.

Taya chooses uncomplicated names for them. (He's glad – Kenji's is a long, complex English word that nobody can pronounce, and they all hate it.) Denki is 'Flare'. Hitoshi is called 'Proxy'. Mei is 'Q', because apparently Taya is a James Bond fan.

Izuku himself is 'Kingpin'. It's a weird name, and he asks Taya about it one day while she seems to be in a good mood.

"You were each picked for different reasons," she says. "Flare and Proxy for their Quirks, Q for her mind and her talent with technology, and you purely for your intellect. I frankly don't understand what the Triumvirate wants to do with you children, and I don't care." She shrugs. "I just follow orders."

Taya is usually talkative, but she is rarely this honest. Izuku catches the others – his teammates, he reminds himself – leaning in so they can hear better.

"Your names all have to do with what your role will be in this organisation," Taya says to him. "I'm guessing Q will be in charge of tech and support…"

Mei did, after all, hack into government files at the tender age of six. The Order took notice of her because of that, Mei told them. And her IQ results were high as well – not even close to Izuku's, but still genius-range.

"…Flare and Proxy will be sent into the field most often. You might be as well, but your selling point is your mind. You'll be in charge of operations, of planning and strategy. Every army needs a good general. You'll be groomed to be the leader of this team, and if you work hard, you'll get to be high up in the ranks, and you'll be near irreplaceable."

Irreplaceable. That's what Izuku wants, needs to be. It lowers his chances of being vanished like Shun was, gives him leverage, and buys him time to escape. He's sure he can come up with something – he's smart, he knows that, everyone tells him that. It might take years, it might take decades, but he'll find a way out of this Order of the Triumvirate, and he'll take the other kids with him.

"I'll confess, I've grown fond of you." Taya gives him one of her rare, thin smiles. "Become essential to this organisation, prove yourself a good investment, and hopefully you won't die. That's why your name is Kingpin."

Izuku nods, and they get back to work.

They will never be a combat-oriented team, not like some of the other groups. That's alright. Combat isn't everything to crime, anyway, Izuku is learning – he loves heroes, he does, but with every lecturing talk that Taya has with them, it becomes more and more clear that the real villains are those that stay low and work behind the scenes, not the flashy criminals that many pro heroes chase.

Maybe, when he gets out of this place, he will become a hero that deals with these sorts of serious crime. Or maybe he'll join the police.

Taya talks about the police force in negative tones – this detective ruined that operation, the insider they had in that precinct turned out to be a spy on them, this villain and that criminal were arrested, what a pity, they were pretty decent guys. Izuku didn't understand, at first, how any villain can be described as 'decent', but he thinks he does now. Taya is a criminal, too, after all, and she's nice to him. And they are all being trained to be villains – how many other criminals were forced into their positions? How many others are good people?

Sadako confesses to him, one day, that she is afraid of forgetting her name. They are walking in the hallways. There is no one accompanying them, because they all know the way from the training halls to their rooms by now, and because the Triumvirate people seem sure that none of them will try anything anymore, not after they killed a whole team for trying to dig a hole through a wall and jump out of the building.

(Taya says that they killed that group's families, too. All of them, their throats slit in the middle of an unsuspecting night.)

Sadako says in a hushed tone, "Mari's already starting to forget hers, I think. I don't think she remembers Emi is her sister."

Izuku wavers, because this is something Kacchan has always said was useless – but he knows it isn't, so he says, "I have an eidetic memory."

"What's that?"

"It means I'll never forget anything," Izuku replies. He smiles hesitatingly up at Sadako, who has unnaturally long limbs and is two heads taller. "…so you don't have to be scared of forgetting your name. I'll remember for you."

He rarely stutters now. Taya says that big boys don't stutter.

Sadako looks relieved. He makes her swear not to tell anyone. Word still gets around, though, because one day Mickey comes up to him and mutters in broken Japanese, "My mom is Angelica. She's a math teacher. And my brother's called Jo."

Hana says, "My family lives in Miyagi. My dad's phone number is 0229-239506."

"I got bullied for my Quirk," Hitoshi says quietly. "Everyone said that Brainwash was a villain's ability. I guess they were right."

Izuku doesn't know what to say to that. That night, they all pile into Hitoshi's bed, he and Mei and Denki, sprawling on the thin mattress in a tangle of limbs while Hitoshi complains.

They sleep well.

"I was in an orphanage," Hana tells him. "I got a big brother, Yuri, but he was adopted so we haven't met in a real long time."

"I was supposed to go to a concert before they took me," Youichi, who is eleven, says. "D'you like rock music? I do. And I've got two sisters, they're in college. My best friend is Korean, his name's Sunghyon and he hates kimchi."

"I was rescued by Ingenium once," Kenji reminisces. "He was super cool, like, pow!, and the robber went down. He said I was really brave."

"I have three siblings," Denki says. "Two sisters and a big brother: Kyoko, Ryuuha, and Ryoma. We have the same hair. We lived with our uncle, he's an electrician."

"Mom died because of a villain," Mei confesses. "Her name was Hatsume Rei, and I don't have a dad 'cause he left when I was small. My aunt's really cool, but I miss Mom a lot."

Emi says, "Mari's my little sister."

Mari says, "Emi's my big sister."

"I want to be a hero," Akayo whispers.

They are important things, things that the others want to remember, but are afraid of forgetting. So, Izuku remembers for them.

And every morning, when he goes to the bathroom to brush his teeth, he stares into the mirror and tells himself, Your name is Midoriya Izuku. Your mom is Inko and you once had a friend called Bakugou Katsuki. You like katsudon. You're going to escape one day and become a hero like All Might.

It is almost cruel that he can vividly remember his mother's long green hair, the way she hugged him when he cried, the smile she always got when she cooked. They are important things, things that he cannot have anymore, things that he cannot forget, and as the days pass by he isn't sure if that's a good thing or not.

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A/N: And here we get a glimpse into Izuku's life in captivity, and the beginnings of his indoctrination. It's subtle, I'll give 'em that, and I love Taya (my baby!) but she's not a good person. Yes, she is relatively kind to Izuku and the others, but she is stealthily getting them used to the environment they live in now and getting them around to a criminal's way of thinking. Don't worry though, Izuku will never become one of those brainwashed, evil, brutal characters you sometimes see in other fics. I love him too much for that ;)

Indoctrination is not good, guys! This is a real problem in the real world which I admittedly don't know much about, which is why the methods Taya and the Order are using might seem incorrect or ineffective to those experts out there. Sorry, eheheheh...

We also see how Taya is encouraging Izuku to work hard and become useful - 'irreplaceable' is the word Izuku uses. It's a flawed line of thinking, cuz if Izuku becomes truly irreplaceable, the Order of the Triumvirate will hunt him down if he escapes and kill him if there's no way they can get him back. But our Izuku is still a kid despite his high intellect, and he's allowed to make mistakes.

On another matter: I know there are a lot of people out there who hate OCs, which... I can understand. I'll try not to use too many of them, but OCs are important for this fic. Most of them will be other subjects of Project 022, villains, and members of the Order of the Triumvirate, and I put a lot of thought and time into each one, so please try to put up with them! Some of them you'll probably never see again, some will surface later in this fic, and some, like Taya, Akagiri, and Kumo, will show up a lot. I understand if my OCs put off a lot of people, so I'll try not to make too many, but they are my babies so please give them a chance...!

Don't hesitate to give feedback, even if it's for something like grammar or punctuation! Tell me what you think so far about my OCs, the Order, how I'm portraying Izuku's time in captivity so far, the names I gave Hitoshi, Denki, Mei and Izuku, etc... Criticism is always welcome!

I've also decided: my other BnHA fic, Chrysalism, will be taken down for now as I concentrate on this fic. I have a lot of ideas, but I write pretty slowly and I've found that writing Chrysalism and focusing on Hiraeth at the same time is pretty hard. So, in the interest of saving time and effort, Chrysalism will be deleted. For now. It'll be back... I'm sorry for those who liked it, though!

See ya!

- wondersing