Olivium: I think I see where you're going with this. Flash rifts decay quickly and micro rifts are incredibly small, but Takehiko's temporal dilation ability releases some sort of stabilizing radiation that would be able to interact with the rifts and extend their half-live decay rates/ expand their spatial radius (since time and space are linked) when he uses it in the vicinity of a rift. Given that he is a dimensional anomaly himself, flash and micro rifts would occur around him more due to Clank bending reality enough to accept the protagonist's soul into it's baseline consensus. You can even make this a plot point for his structural analyzing quirk: when Takehiko was attacked by the villain in the orphanage, a micro rift opened up inside of him, and gushed dimensional radiation through his body. Normally, if this happened to someone, the body would expel it harmlessly because the genome is stable, but while he was being attacked, his quirk factor genome was not and absorbed the energy rapidly; this caused the quirk to mutate into a dimensional analyzing quirk while also preventing it's removal by the villain and Takehiko's coma due to the extreme pain absorbing dimensional energy is. Potential background lore over; now for why this matters: it'll act like a dungeon info screen, but instead of a required level and the number of floors, Takehiko would know if the rift leads to an inhospitable environment or not. It'll also serve as a conflict point for him as the "rift agencies" will have a form of cold war over him that can happen in the background congruent with the MHA plot. Overdose caffeine-induced ramble over; I really like how this story is going even though I hate how completely idiotic Takehiko has been in finding where he is. Granted, I can understand him freaking out about all this and being depressed; I would be too, but he already figured out this was a conglomerate universe back in the hospital when he found out Tiger and Bunny was real, but does nothing to figure out what other parts there are to it. Yes, I get that he's paranoid to all hell about someone finding out he's from a different dimension, but he has the "I have amnesia" excuse going for him, so no one at Mon Agency would look at him funny if he asks for a general things to know recap from one of them.

Re: Yeahhhhh... no. Takehiko's [Tactical Time Dilation] is a Software thing, not a Hardware thing; his brain processes information faster, he isn't actually dilating time; that's just an Outer Worlds reference he's/I'm making in calling it that.
Also, Clank wasn't so much "bending reality" with the Reincarnation segment of the story; for those that've read the Ender's Game series to the conclusion of the main line, words like "Aiua" and "Philote" would make sense. In that series, a crippled guy was able to make a "Philotic Duplicate" of his body from when it wasn't crippled, and have his "Aiua" 'jump ship' and leave his crippled body behind. Using Ender's Game jargon for the actual "reincarnating" was me putting my own twist on a genre that's been totally done-to-death in these sort of stories, if not anime in general.
When it comes to the Villain, you're reading too much into it. Nine (I think I've hinted at it enough that I can flat-out admit it's him) was unable to steal [Analyze Structure] from the original Takehiko Tokei because even though it was a Quirk, having [All for One (Copy)] didn't make it automatically compatible with him, similar to how Katsuma Shimano's father's [Cell Activation A] was incompatible with Nine due to Blood Type. In most cases, those who have their Quirks stolen are left in comatose states (Ragdoll), if not completely exhausting them (O'Clock). Because the original's Quirk Factor was "damaged" by the actional equivalent of ripping out a disc drive from the dash to get at the CD inside, "Takehiko Tokei" was "killed", leaving a "vacancy".
As for Takehiko losing his composure at times, he's still juggling with "Cosmic Nihilism" on top of his Stages of Grief; he's gone through Denial, Anger, and Bargaining, but while he's IN the Acceptance stage, the Depression stage before it still has a hook or two in him, stopping him from "100% committing" to the Acceptance part of it.
Also, after learning about Quirks, Takei only thought he had to worry about a "Superhero Genre" world, because no sensible person would keep digging to learn about "Dungeon Crawling" if you're told that.

Reception is a mixed bag, but I'm still having fun writing this and reading your reviews, sooooo... Let's light this candle!

*AHA*

Though I'd avoided leaving the apartment over the past few days to let the whole Meme thing die down, word had still spread that the "young ward" of the Mon Agency had grappled with an extra-dimensional monster and lived to tell the tale.

That in of itself wasn't so-bad, since short attention spans would eventually enable me to venture outside without being molested for pictures or voicemail requests. What actually made my situation worse was how someone that had seen me out with Gran Torino correlated one thing to the other, and now there were some local reporters pestering Kuroko at the agency to let them interview me.

It wasn't that anyone thought I'd become "the next big thing". In all likelihood, my experience would go into a "fluff piece" to help make what'd come out of that Rift less-frightening to the indolent masses. Other than Hero vs Villain fights, monsters or goods coming out of the Rifts were something that captivated human attention, making my first-hand experience something of a hot commodity. Doubly-so since those that ventured into the Rifts usually held tight to strict NDAs upon becoming employed by the S.T.M.O.

Though the nature of the meme had framed my achievement as something comical, it was undeniable that what I'd endured was something very few outside the STMO had ever experienced; hands-on contact with an entity from another universe. And while it was true that the thing I'd grappled with had been "one of the small ones", the novelty alone would make for an interesting story; maybe even referenced in a case study to aid those who "cracked'" under the strain of similar incidents..

Since I didn't want my "fifteen minutes of fame" to sour my first Thanksgiving with the Mon Agency girls and Hitomi's family, I asked Kuroko to set up a meeting so I could clear my palette.

The way I figured it, the sooner I laid my cards on the table, the sooner people would lose interest in what happened after "the magic is (was) gone".

*AHA*

"Thanks for agreeing to meet with me," the gaunt-faced man that Kuroko vetted said to me from across a table in the corner of the apartment lobby, Doppel hiding out as a little old lady at a table two down from us, a random cat from who-knows-where sleeping cozily in her lap. "The name's Tokuda Taneo, I'm a freelance journalist."

"Nice to meet you," I greeted in turn.

"So, I understand Smith-san told you what we'll be discussing today?" the man said activating a recorder on his phone, as well as a backup recorder off to the side.

"You want to ask me what it was like grappling with a football with a cockney accent; 'soccer ball' for any western readers."

"Pretty much, yeah," the man said amicably. "Though I'm surprised someone as-young as you cares about the distinction."

"Well, Japan is one of the most-immigrated-to countries at present; even if it's for as-shallow a reason as-..."

"As?" Taneo inquired the moment I clammed up, before visibly turning off the recording devices and pushing them across the table for my own purview.

" . . . For as-shallow a reason as getting to see All Might in-person," I returned after Doppel gave me a subtle nod.

"Oh? Not a fan of the No.1?"

"I've been attacked by Villains three times on non-sequential occasions, and once by an evil man-eating football, and Heroes were late to arrive during all of them," I answered frankly. "So no, I'm not exactly a fan of Heroes in general."

"Ah, well that's fair. Heroes can't save everyone, unfortunately," the man said scratching the back of his head.

Seeing this man accept any verbal criticism for who Japan basically treated like "Super-Jesus", I gave Taneo another once-over, since he seemed to have more going for him than blindly worshiping the ground that Heroes walked on.

Gaunt-faced with circular wire-rim glasses, he had dark wavy hair brushed away from the right side of his forehead. His eyes were cobalt-colored, and his distinguishing feature was that his left eye had no visible pupil, but a lighter-colored dot in his iris. He was dressed like a freelance journalist would, ready for sudden changes in temperature, but unobtrusive enough he could get close to a target without them being on guard.

"Out of idle curiosity, what Quirk did you use to defend himself?" Taneo asked, making no move to reclaim his recording devices.

It seemed like the man at the least wasn't treating me like "some dumb kid" and talking down to/at me, going out of his way to imply that what my Quirk was or was not, would have no bearing on the content of the article.

" . . . All I had going for me was an eye for detail, hand-eye coordination, and a rush of adrenaline," I replied after a moment, non-committal enough so I weren't outright advertising I was Quirkless in the event I continued to train with Gran Torino.

Then again, guys like Eraserhead and Sir Nighteye were "functionally Quirkless" when it came to things like spontaneous natural disasters and upper-tier Heteromorphs, sooo…

"Hm. Well, to be fair, my own Quirk wouldn't have been of much use either," he said rolling back his left sleeve and raising up his arm, a variety of camera lenses sliding out of his skin at all angles, one even sliding out of his cheek and pointing completely to the side. "Hell, my Quirk doesn't even come with a camera flash, so all I could've really done was take one of those 'death selfies' before getting eaten," he chuckled as he withdrew his protrusions.

" . . . So, you wanted to ask me a few questions?" I said after giving him his recording devices.

"I guess it's prudent to start at the beginning. What were you doing at the park that day?"

"Hanging out with a girl I knew."

"What were you doing when that Rift opened?"

"Papi and I were waiting for our sitter to come back with some sodas. She'd bent over to pick up an American quarter someone had dropped when she thought her shorts ripped. A moment later I look over my shoulder and the Rift was just… there."

"And when the 'Rift Beast' first appeared?"

"Well, at first, I thought it was just some kid fucking around with their space-time Quirk, since a football was what'd rolled out, but when these beady little eyes like firelight opened up…"

Thinking back on it caused an involuntary shudder I was unable to suppress.

"After that, things got a little… hectic…"

"In what way?"

" . . . People were eaten alive, or had chunks taken out of them like in a bad snuff film. There were Quirks flying around in every direction hitting everything that did or didn't move. Partway through all the screaming, the 'Football from Hell' set its eyes on Papi and… I guess my body just, 'moved on its own'."

"Hoh?" Taneo hummed with a glint in his eye. "And when you engaged the 'Rift Beast' in CQC, what was going through your head?"

"Oh, I was completely terrified. Terrified beyond the capacity for rational thought in fact. I think the only reason I was able to move at all and not become some thing's snack, was because I'd endured Villain attacks thrice over already and I'd already become… inured to that sort of thing…"

"I see… It must've been quite frightening."

"Yeah, well, it wasn't like a Hero was going to magically appear and make the monster go away. The only one I could count on to save me, was me."

"Hmmm… From what I've learned, Kuroyama Papi was a 'Bird-Class' Heteromorph. Why didn't the two of you just fly away? Allegedly, you two had gone flying together before that point, at your first meeting."

"I see you've done your research."

"Admittedly, your friend garnered her own fair share of attention after submitting herself to RDA custody alongside you," Taneo answered, implying he'd done his own research in advance; or at least had had someone else do so unless Kuroko had volunteered the information herself. "If you weren't made to sign any sort of NDA, there are some people who would be interested in hearing what the RDA's accommodations were like."

"What's to say? We rode in a hovercraft with no widows, so it might as well have been a bus, she and I played video games, ordered takeout, napped, and that was about it, really," I shrugged. No need to advertise Papi and I sleeping together in the same bed. "As for why Papi didn't just fly us off, or just fly off on her own… I think that first kid getting eaten alive and leaving nothing but a blood stain and a shoe behind, shook her up worse than it did me."

"Well, it's a good thing that you stepped up when you did, otherwise there would've been more deaths," Taneo hummed appraisingly. "Although, I have to ask… What possessed you to reach into its mouth, pull out its tongue, and coil it into the shape of an American football before chucking it the way you did?"

"Ugh… That damn YouTube video again…!" I grumbled angrily. "Like I said, I was terrified 'beyond the capacity for rational thought', so of course I'd do something incredibly and monumentally stupid."

"Hah, well I suppose that's one way of looking at it!" he said with a wink and-Was that an actual star-shaped twinkle coming off his eye?

*AHA*

For the next several minutes, this interview between the two of us continued. Apparently, Kuroyama-san had stonewalled anyone from interviewing Papi, so it fell onto me to tell the story, even if he hadn't expressed as such to Kuroko. The dialogue between Taneo and I wasn't anything out-of-the-ordinary, just a continuation on the original string of inquiry, with a few tangents sprinkled here and there. It was highly unlikely that everything I said would make it into the article, but you could always cut down after-the-fact; not the other way around.

At least not without committing some sort of fraud or felony...

"One final question, and this is strictly off-the-record," Taneo asked repeating the pacifying motion from before. "Who's your favorite Hero? Your biggest inspiration?"

"What makes you think I even have one?"

"Being a critic of Heroes, and having a favorite Hero, aren't always mutually exclusive," the man replied. "Plus, you wouldn't have agreed to become a 'young ward' if you were completely averse to the idea of Heroes in the first place."

" . . . If I ever had to say who my biggest 'inspiration' was, it'd only be in the hypothetical that I became a Hero."

"So then in that hypothetical scenario, who would your inspiration be?"

"I guess I'd have to say my biggest inspiration was…"

*AHA*

"The 'Crusher of Justice: Wild Tiger', hm?" Taneo hummed to himself inquisitively as he left the Mon Apartments.

As far as this freelance journalist was concerned, on the outside, Takehiko Tokei had nothing 'amazing' about him. The fact that he didn't flaunt some flashy Quirk without provocation like every other kid who found themselves in front of a reporter did after 'being brave' in the face of a Villain, either meant he didn't have one, or had been born with a "Useless" Quirk and was already of the resigned opinion that he couldn't use it to become a Hero.

Or at least not a high-grossing one.

That in of itself was a misnomer of course, since nearly every Quirk, even the "high-class" ones, could be considered functionally useless in front of their exacting antithesis. Gigantification Quirks would be considered "Useless" against high-yield military weapons; Plant Control Quirks would be considered "Useless" against wildfires or lava floes; Electrical Quirks would be considered "Useless" in a flood zone, Emitter/Transformation-Erasing Quirks would be considered "Useless" against Heteromorphic Quirks; etc. etc.

That he had dropped the name of the Hero whom in some circles was retroactively considered the "Proto-All Might" of the Corporate Age of Heroes, was strangely counterintuitive when one considered that Takehiko wasn't a fan of All Might specifically.

In his own lifetime, Kaburagi Kotetsu wasn't as much of a commercial success as his contemporaries, barely skirting through the hyper-competitive nature of the Corporate Age without being replaced due to repeated arguments with sponsors regarding what made a good Hero and his priorities therein. Even when his partnership with Barnaby Brooks Jr, colloquially known as "Barnaby" or "Bunny" to the more hardcore fan demographic, had gone on to inspire the Buddy Heroes system that predated the interdepartmental cooperation of the Commercial Age, other "Hero Duos" continued to eclipse him in terms of popularity and commercial success. It was only after he'd officially retired and the "pay walls" of the Corporate Age began to come down, that people began to realize how much of a true hero Wild Tiger really was.

Taneo himself was an ardent All Might fan, but not for the superficial reasons everyone else of his generation had; During the terrorist bombing of that industrial complex 15 years ago, 24 peoples' lives were at risk, and the blaze was so-great that even the rescue squads hesitated to take action.

One of those that were rescued, of which they all had been, had been Taneo's own father, and without even thinking about it, he'd turned his Quirk, [Whole-Body Lens], on that one moment where he and his father had reached out for one another.

After submitting the photo he had taken, All Might's back to the blaze and two industrial workers over and under his arms, his signature smile on his face, that was when he realized he wanted to become a journalist; later choosing to go freelance so he wouldn't be bogged down by the politics and egos of the huge publishing companies.

Initially, he'd thought his Quirk was only useful for taking snapshots on vacation, but that one moment, captured with such clarity, had helped define the course of his entire life, and what he wanted to do with it.

It was also how he discovered that the events which held the most meaning to him, had the most "staying power" in his internal storage; whereas reproductions of less-pivotal moments would grow cloudy over time, until fading entirely. And since his Quirk didn't come with a USB port like some "Machine-Class" Quirks did, he could only preserve hard copies; and while they could still be scanned, it just wasn't the same as the real McCoy.

That Takehiko had been attacked by Villains on three "non-sequential occasions", with Hero intervention only appearing after-the-fact to the detriment of his parents first, he himself, and then to his trust of the HPSC… It made it perfectly reasonable for him to hold them to higher standards than most children his age would've.

Nowadays, people were so-used to treating Hero vs Villain fights like spectator sports, that they'd utterly forgotten how once upon a time, the mere hinting of a Villain Fight going on would've sent people running for the hills; often until their legs stopped working.

It was undeniable that All Might's efforts had created the greatest uninterrupted era of peace that Japan had seen in decades, but in the same way that media outlets prepared eulogies for public figures well in advance, many publishers were already preparing for the backlash of what it meant when Japan's holding pillar, its 'Symbol of Peace', was suddenly gone.

It was a little heart-breaking to discover a child who didn't look at All Might the same way he did, even the superficial part of it, but it did his heart good to know that the superhuman society that had taken so much from him, was beginning to "give back", even if it was "too little too late".

*AHA*

The following day, Doppel picked up a copy of Rift Ramblings & Records magazine, a niche periodical that was half-science, half rift-related tabloid. The reason it read halfway like an American "tabloid" magazine was because when it came to Rifts and the infinite possibilities they allowed, there wasn't always something like "empirical evidence" to back up claims of what was within, or came out of, aforementioned Rifts.

What was published was in of itself more like a transcript than an actual article. It didn't do anything to "romanticize" what had occurred that day, instead remaining surprisingly faithful to the source material that Tokuda Taneo had collected from me. It didn't go out of its way to refute that people had in fact been killed as well as maimed like a "fluff piece" would have, but instead played more like a cautionary tale, with only a sprinkling of "anyone can be a Hero to someone else" mentality, as well as the mandatory plug of- "If you see something, say something." -forewarning.

Me personally, I didn't think they had to be so overt with the whole thing, but people had experienced a massive degradation of self-preservation instinct due to the spectatorial nature of what Heroes did, so I didn't fault the magazine too harshly for treating their reader base like a bunch of braindead idiots who needed to have things like this spelled out for them in plain English.

Hopefully now that I've laid my cards on the table, people will start to lose interest in the whole debacle and I can move on with my life.

Although… I did decide to hold onto the copy that Hitomi had brought for me, if only for the novelty of having my picture in a published magazine.

*AHA*

With Thanksgiving on the horizon and all the pre-order chickens at every KFC in Asaka already bought-out, it was a good thing that the Mon Agency and Manaka family had planned to DIY in advance. Unfortunately however, this also meant that all the grocery stores were stuffed to the gills with last-minute shoppers who were stripping the shelves bare like a swarm of locusts.

Under ordinary circumstances, the sheer volume of people would've intimidated the hell out of me in this eleven-year-old body. However, having Kuma act as a living plow while I went alongside Hitomi and Mitsumi, really helped to make the whole ordeal bearable; even if more-than-once I had to stop Quirk users from plucking out-of-stock ingredients from our own cart.

"Takei-chan, I hear you're making rice stuffing for us this year~" Mitsumi said cutely, her three eyes brimming at me. "You said it was your favorite, right?"

"Yeah, although it isn't the healthiest thing you could eat," I answered, thankful that I was able to find a duplicate of the recipe my mom always used in this world as well. "So I understand your family will be eating with us?"

"That's right~" Mitsumi beamed happily before her binocular eyes closed. "Thankfully that prick Fumio won't be attending," she continued before her top eye closed, and her two opened. "Still, I miss him…"

Eesh. I'd hate to be whatever guy or girl tries dating her in the future… And don't even get me started on the potential sex life.

"Anyway… don't you guys worry about the chickens. Kuroko's family raises free range, so we'll be good on that front. Let's focus on getting everything on our list. I'm sure the others will get whatever we can't here," I hum looking down at the list in my hands, numerous items already checked out.

"OH MY GOD! THAT CHICKEN'S GOT A GRENADE!"

. . . what?

*AHA*

"-THE FUUUUUUUCK!?" I cried as Kuma enveloped the three of us, and our groceries, in a smothering bear hug, the grocery store's occupants fleeing for their lives around us. The Bear Heteromorph weathering the literal body blows like a boulder being dashed upon by mentally retarded salmon, after several seconds the aisle we were in was devoid of life, apart from those that had been trampled into the dirty linoleum tiles.

I see that they're still moving, so I guess there weren't any Black Friday-style casualties…

"Do I even want to know what would make an actual person utter a sentence like that…?" I asked irately as Kuma's arms unfolded from us.

"Probably not, but we should probably leave anyway," Kuma hummed as we all wove through the abandoned shopping carts, discarded groceries, and writhing bodies.

"YOU BASTARDS! HOW DARE YOU DENY ME MY PUMPKIN PIE FILLIIIINNNNG?!"

That's why this asshole gave live munitions to poultry!?

*AHA*

By some miracle, there was still someone behind one of the registers when we left the aisles. By the look on his face, he'd endured Villain attacks at this (and possibly previous workplaces) so many times in the past, that he'd arbitrarily decided it was more effort than it was worth to do anything other than man his post to collect "hazard pay".

By another such miracle, we were able to get everything to the car by the time the grocery store was swarmed by low-level Heroes trying to make a name for themselves before the holiday.

By yet another tangential miracle, no-one died during the course of "The Great Poultry Scare" as it would come to be known the following morning.

"OH FUCK, WE MISSED ONE!"

. . . hah?

*AHA*

"HOW THE FUCK DO YOU ASSHOLES MISS A CHICKEN WITH A GRENADE?!" I shrieked from behind Kuma's van as a pink de-feathered chicken waddled out of the grocery store on its drumstick legs, a dark green explosive held within its bare wings.

To make matters worse, the quote/unquote "Heroes" in attendance all shying away from the damn thing!

"DAMMIT YOU ASSHOLES, YOU HAVE ONE, JOB! AT LEAST TRY TO LOOK LIKE YOU'RE EARNING YOUR PAY!"

"Y-You shouldn't say such things like that…" Mitsumi in her cutesie persona chastised.

"Christ, and everyone wonders why my opinion of most 'Heroes' is so damn low…" I mutter as Kuma and I load everything into the van.

He and Hitomi wanted to just ditch everything, but I was like- "Fuuuck that!"

"HEY CHICKENSHITS!" a fierce voice called out from above. "WHAT'S THE MATTER WITH YOU ALL?! YOU YELLOW!?"

The next moment a buff dark-skinned woman with white hair and rabbit ears swooped down and drop-kicked the grenade chicken into the far distance, a bright explosion going off in mid-air causing the other "Heroes" to let out a relieved sigh.

Taking a closer look at the real Hero, now that the danger had passed, I saw that she had an athletic build with muscular arms and legs, standing slightly below (what I assumed to be) "average height". Her skin dark, her eyes red, eyelashes long, and white hair reaching past her waist with long rabbit ears bearing a slight crook, resting upon her derriere was a white round tail, giving her the Heteromorphic traits of an albino rabbit. Albeit, one that was incredibly jacked and clad in a white cobalt-trimmed "Combat Unitard" with a gold crescent on her chest, white and cobalt leggings going up to mid-thigh with armor on her heels, toes, and shins, white fighting gloves, and a matching mask but with tiger stripes on it.

"You can go up to her you know," Hitomi said poking me in the cheek, having caught me staring. "If you see a Hero you like, ask for their autograph. It's perfectly normal," she said producing a hard-backed pocket journal with an attached pen.

"Whoa… Is this…?"

"I was going to give it to you for your birthday, but I held onto it just in case you found a Hero you liked early," she said holding up a white-and-neon green pocket journal with a matching pen in the spine, the golden insignia of Wild Tiger pressed into the front.

*AHA*

"Man, I can't believe you guys got scared of a little explosive poultry!" Usagiyama Rumi laughed at her previously-quivering peers.

The other Heroes, some of which were twice Rumi's age, visibly fumed at her, but couldn't do anything more than scowl.

"Hah~ I love it when I win~" the albino rabbit Heteromorph grinned as police showed up to apprehend the "Poultrymancer" whose face she'd kicked in moments before. That the "grenade chicken" had continued its quote/unquote rampage meant that whatever Quirk the guy was using, was one of those "Automatic" sub-types.

Just as she was about to bound off for her next case, sneakered feet were heard running toward her from the parking lot. Mirko, looking over her shoulder, saw a young tiger Heteromorph with blond and brown-striped hair clad in hand-me-downs making his way toward her.

'No. Wait. It's just the hair,' she hummed, realizing that the fin-like "ears" pointing backward from his head were held up with gel. 'Well, to each their own,' she hummed. "Yeah?"

"You… You looked really cool out there when you kicked that grenade chicken. Can I… get your autograph?" he asked nervously, holding out a snazzy white-and-neon green autograph book with gold accents.

"Sure, why not. Who do I make this out to?"

"T-Takehiko Tokei," the boy answered.

"I see. Well, nice to meet you, Takei-kun~" Mirko grinned, the boy blushing as she flipped backwards through the autograph book, only to realize it was blank all the way through. "Hoh?"

"I… I don't have a high opinion of so-called 'Heroes' weaker than bike cops who strut their stuff like peacocks," Tokei answered bashfully when he caught her eyeing the blank front page, his expression souring a little as he eyed the other Heroes in attendance who'd been caught taking a step forward like the kid were coming to them.

"Hah! Me neither!" Mirko grinned, rewarding the kid with her best signature for his honesty, capping it off with a swooping crescent moon for added flourish. "You know… You look familiar…" she hummed tapping her chin. "Where have I seen you before?"

"I-I'm sure I just have 'one of those faces'…" Tokei stammered with darting eyes, cheeks darkening.

"No, no, I've definitely seen you somewhere before…" Mirko hummed tilting her head from side to side. "Oh I remember now! You're that 'No Tongue-kun' kid from the internet, ain't ya?"

"F-f-fucking memes…!" the blond bit out furiously, gnashing his teeth as his face reddened. "That is not what I wanted brought up today…!"

"Ah, don't wanna be famous 'for being famous'?" she asked. "Fair enough. Still, I have'ta say, it took real guts grappling with that whatever-it-was like that~ You keep up the good work, I might even make you a sidekick someday. Maybe~" she grinned.

"I… I don't have such lofty aspirations…"

" . . . You aren't one of those little creepers who dresses like a kid but's actually in his thirties are you?"

"N-N-N-No, of course not!" Tokei yelped. "I'm just… well-versed for my age."

"Ah, I'm just messin' with ya~" Mirko grinned dropping to a knee and pulling him in. "You got a phone? C'mon, I'll let you take a selfie since you're the only one who stuck around, what do ya say?"

*AHA*

"Th-Thank you again," Tokei replied after Mirko took the selfie with him.

"Ah, no big deal. Even I can give out a little fanservice once in a while."

"N-Not just for the autograph and the selfie…" he countered. "You probably saved Thanksgiving just now, so… Thank you! Thank you so much!" he said bowing at the waist, Mirko looking up from him see a curvy mono-eye, a cute three-eye, and a literal bear of a man waiting by a van in the parking lot.

" . . . Kid, let me give you a little advice," Mirko said dropping to a knee and looking him straight in the eye. "The one thing in this world that'll never betray you is a day's hard work. You get what I'm sayin'?"

"Yes. I do," he answered. "But… unless I'm able to get strong like you someday…"

"Kid, I ain't tellin ya to become a Hero; there's plenty of kids who try and fail every day," she interrupted. "All I'm sayin' is, hard work always returns dividends."

"R-Right. I understand! Thank you for everything, Usagiyama-sama! I'm looking forward to seeing you in the Top 10 someday!" he bowed deeply before running off, the Rabbit Hero scratching awkwardly at her ear from the praise.

"Well shit, now I have to make it to the Top 10~"

*AHA*

"Hah? Didn't know that was your type, Take-boya~" Mitsumi's 'Top-chan' persona sneered at me after catching me make mine and Mirko's tiger-masked selfie my phone's wallpaper.

"Sh-shut up!" I snapped back. "I just thought she was really cool, that's all! She came up with the selfie idea all on her own!"

"I didn't hear you say 'noooo'~" 'Top-chan' cooed tauntingly.

"Bite me."

"I'm sure Zombie-chan would~"

"Kids. Behave," Kuma sighed as they drove home.

"I think it's really sweet~" Hitomi smiled as her little sister and 'little brother' bickered in the back seat, the mono-eye giggling as the two tugged at the corner of eachothers' mouths.

*AHA*

"As far as 'Seasonal Events' go, this one's been pretty wholesome so far," Sigmund said as he and Clank observed from the farthest afar. "Not sure if his meeting with the 'Rabbit Hero' counts as a 'Flag' though…"

"Sigmund, I highly doubt his life is going to turn out like one of those 'Galge' Gal Game Dating Simulators," Clank chastised.

"It's just 'Galge' for short. No one calls it a 'Gal Game Dating Simulator'," the former cleaner bot hummed.

"Anywho, it seems like his Aiua is acclimating to his Philote without any lasing consequences," the Caretaker of the Great Clock mused. "However… it is too soon to say conclusively that there will not be any side-effects."

" . . . You think that Rift opening up so-closely to him might've been…?"

"The chances are equally good that it was purely circumstance."

"Still, though, you and Clank ended Dimensionality hundreds of years ago. Why's it still happening in that world?"

"A dilation of time, most-likely. Nothing can be done about it in that world, because what has been done about it at-the-source has already been done at the 'epicenter' of the event…" the former Warbot defect grumbled.

"So all we can do is wait then, for the trans-dimensional 'back-pressure' to ease up?"

"We will have to, unfortunately. Too much intervention from across space-time… It was what necessitated the creation of The Great Clock in the first place…"

"What about the Super Robot Wars~?"

"That… is the result of a completely separate and wholly unrelated can of cosmic worms, that I refuse to talk further of."

"You're just upset that no alternate Ultra-Mech versions of you ever showed up for those epic crossover events~"

*AHA*

AN:
When I thought about how someone might want to interview Takei after what had happened, I immediately thought to the anime-exclusive Taneo Tokuda from My Hero Academia Episode 64 – "The Scoop on U.A. Class 1-A".

I'd heard of him, saw a few snippets on YouTube, but didn't actually see the episode until… the 18th of April (circa 2022). As far as "recap episodes" go, it was handled very well in that it was narrated as an internal monologue by someone whose business it was to think on those sort of things, instead of "just an info dump" by a "disembodied voice" like when the writer is too-lazy to have that come up in a more "organic" fashion.

Also, while it's implied that Taneo can hold onto the pictures he takes internally for "as long as he wants", I thought it'd be more-meaningful if the less-meaningful ones were to "fade over time", whereas the one where All Might saved his dad would have the longest clarity out of his entire "portfolio".

Or at least that's the idea that came to me when I saw that the photos came out of the left side of his chest, which is commonly associated with the location off the heart; when in actuality it's nestled safely behind the lungs and sternum.

While him being "freelance" may've been treated as a throwaway line, I decided to add a little nuance to his character, hence the whole- "so he wouldn't be bogged down by the politics and egos of the huge publishing companies" -line. 'cause after all, isn't that the sort of thing FanFic are for?

Mirko's appearance with an early version of her Hero Costume (derived from her "What if…?" picture in the My Hero Academia: Vigilantes spin-off) was a last-minute addition I came up with alongside the- "That chicken's got a grenade." -line from forever ago.

Anyone able to guess where that's from~?