MHA

Chapter-1

I took a deep breath from my cigarette while staring at the building in front of me. It was the agency of my target, Pro Hero Checkers Rank No 135. A friendly and familiar face for all the citizens of Minato and an old hand in the hero industry or at least that was everybody believed. I had been told to investigate the Hero and lo and behold, cases of fake arrests to boost popularity and accepting bribes from criminals.

In my opinion, these were just small-time charges, he was not truly involved in anything with too much violence and other than not busting drug dealers, his record as a Hero was exemplary in all other instances and was even commended by All Might. He even recently had 2 children with his wife and was planning on announcing his retirement.

Unfortunately for him, I had been given instructions to retire him permanently. The Hero Safety Public Commission, the organization to which I was a slave had deemed him too high risk to society. A hero taking bribes and faking arrests for popularity didn't align with the heroic society, they wanted to cut all loose ends and I was meant to deal with him and any others involved in his less than reputable activities and destroying any evidence of his actions.

After my investigations, it was really simple to deal with the drug dealers and gangs who were bribing him, all who knew about the Hero's corruption were dealt with and the rest of the network was disbanded with the help of anonymous tip offs to the Police Department. The villains involved in the fake arrests were dealt with as well and the ones still in prison would find themselves dead in a series of prison fights and accidents caused by overzealous guards who wanted to stop the fights.

All I had to do was take out the bastion of corruption, the hero who could destroy the fragile society established by the HPSC and the actions of All Might or so I had been told by my superior. Honestly, he just seemed like an average man who took some actions to earn a bit of side money to support his family when he was a struggling rookie. Was it something wrong? Of course, it was but did he deserve to die for it? Not really, but the completely logical action of putting him in prison for a few years was completely discarded by the HPSC and I had been called to clean him up instead.

As I stood there across the street, staring towards the building in front of me. I waited for Checkers to enter the agency. The agency had undergone a recent renovation due to a fight and the pavements had to be fixed. I had very carefully concealed an explosive device under the pavement and was now waiting for Checkers to walk over the explosive, so that I could trigger the explosive.

As I was about to finish my cigarette, I saw the target appear, he was walking towards the agency chatting talking on the phone, from the scattered bits of conversation I could barely hear, I assume it was his wife.

Slowly, he made his way to the spot with the explosive and then I pressed the trigger concealed in my pocket. There was a huge flash and noise, I didn't need to confirm his death, his quirk was an emitter type and did nothing to protect his body. Now, it was time to sell the act. I pretended to be shocked from the explosion with the cigarette slipping through my fingers and bumbling about to pull out my phone to call the police.

This is the problem of being in a decent neighborhood, cameras everywhere and a man smoking near a hero agency for a long period of time is a red flag, not all would care to notice it but I did not become a cleaner without paying attentions to the details.

After reporting the situation, I ran towards the agency and moved towards his body. I reached his body and then discreetly looked for a pulse while pretending to examine him to provide first aid. He was dead just as I had expected, the body with burns which made it look hideous.

I couldn't help but feel a drop of satisfaction at a job well done, even though I knew it was wrong to be happy about killing him. The planning and set up coming together always filled me with pleasure and perhaps this was the reason I was called upon for these kinds of missions. It takes a special kind of person to kill people in such a clinical manner. A good person, would never be able to do this job before breaking and I was not a good person.

As I stood up, and saw the crowds around me with the sidekick of Checkers approaching, I loudly stated, "I am sorry. He's already gone."

I could see the expressions of the crowd turned to a kind of muted sadness and the sidekick, Pieces cry out in his grief and I felt like the worst kind of man to walk on the planet.

I looked at the young detective in front of me, a young up and comer personally backed by the new chief of police, Kenji Tsuragamae. Naomasa Tsukauchi was a characterization of an ideal cop in my opinion, diligent, honest, with a strong sense of morals. Right now, I was giving my statement at the Hosu police station.

"So, Mr. Sleeper is that all that you recall about the events occurring today." Naomasa asked with strong gaze.

I knew his quirk was like a polygraph but I also knew it could be fooled if the person was absolutely relaxed and been trained to lie or believed the lies to be the truth.

I gave a firm nod in response, "Detective, I have given you all the information abouts the events I saw take place." I ensured to control my body language to be perfectly natural and spoke to him, "I hope we can catch the perpetrator of this heinous crime."

Naomasa looked at me and nodded, "Thank you for your help. But I am sorry even though you are a Pro Hero this case is under the jurisdiction of the Police Force and your help while appreciated cannot be taken."

As he finished saying that, we were approached by a middle-aged man in a cheap suit with messy hair and stubble on his chin, "Calm down, rookie. Sleeper knows the score and honestly speaking we might need his help with this one."

Naomasa straightened his back and saluted the man, "Sir."

I chuckled at that reaction, "Yamato, you need to ask the rookies to relax a little. He looks like a dog asking for his master's command."

Naomasa's face immediately crumpled at my remark and Yamamoto laughed at my joke, "He will learn eventually. Yasu, don't make those dog jokes anywhere near the chief, he's very sensitive about it."

I shrugged, "Sure, no problem. So, notice anything about the case."

He took a deep breath, "Naomasa, pull up the car. Let's go out, so we can have a discussion."

The three of us were seated in a quiet bar sipping on some drinks while I waited for Yamato to begin talking,

"Introductions first" Yamato began and pointed towards me, "Naomasa, this is Pro Hero Sleeper or you can call him Yasu. He is an investigative hero who works closely with the police force." He then pointed towards his kouhai, "This is my new kouhai. Tsukauchi Naomasa top graduate of the academy. With a damn useful quirk."

I raised my eyebrows, "That sounds impressive. What kind of quirk is that?"

Yamato glanced at Naomasa who was stoically sitting there without touching his drink, "Maybe, I will tell you later. After all, it's rude to share other's secrets. Though I am sure if you put your mind to it. You will figure it out."

I nodded at that response and looked at him, "Now, about the case?"

Yamato sighed and scratched his head, "It was an explosive device placed underneath the pavement. I heard from his sidekick; it had recently undergone repair after a villain fight. Somebody placed it there when they were fixing the pavement. I will be heading to the construction company to ask some questions." He looked at me, "Though, I heard you were the first on the scene. What were you doing there?"

I looked at him and sighed as well, "I was investigating the recent cases of Instant Villains. I know you know about the group called Villain Factory. I ran into a dead end and was randomly walking around and taking a smoke to clear my head. Who knew, I would be close to dying from some bomb."

Yamato patted my shoulders, "You have a serious case of bad luck, my friend. It's good, you were at the other side of the street or you might you have been caught up in it as well."

I smiled at the reassurance, "Thanks. I feel lucky as well. But I need a distraction now. All my other cases are dead ends and I need to do something after seeing a hero die in front of my eyes."

Yamato raised his hands and smiled, "Sorry about that, Yasu. This is out of my hands, the chief wants to work with Nighteye on this one. Naomasa and I will be heading to his agency in a while." He reassured me, "Don't worry, we will get the guy behind it for sure."

'I sincerely hope not.' Was my internal response while outwardly scoffing, "Best of luck with the crazy fanboy."

Yamato laughed while Naomasa looked confused and said, "Fanboy?"

I looked at him and said, "Meet Nighteye once and then you will see." I finished cryptically

I then looked at Yamato and smirked, "Thanks for paying the meal tonight. After your friend has gone through such a taxing ordeal, I knew you would cheer him up."

Yamato blinked at that and squawked, "I never agreed to paying for your drinks."

I looked at him and said, "Really, how cruel of you, Yamato. I can't believe you would ask a friend who almost died to pay for his own meals."

He looked about to protest before saying, "Fine, just this once."

I smiled at that and signaled the waiter for more drinks.

"Yamato senpai, was it really okay to give so many details to Sleeper? "Naomasa asked with a careful tone while driving his senior who might have had one too many drinks.

Yamato who was barely keeping him head straight on the car seat hiccupped and responded, "It's okay, Nao. Yasu is a good guy; you can trust him. You will be seeing him a lot. He's a Pro Hero who works a lot with the police much more than those other arrogant jerks."

Naomasa kept his eyes on the road but furrowed his brows and replied, "I have never heard of him before."

Yamato chuckled, "That's because he doesn't have a flashy quirk and he doesn't get involved in villain fights and rescue operations. He is like us, a detective, he tracks down and investigates illegal activities which are beneath the notice of other heroes." He finished with a sneer

Naomasa gave his senior a sideways glance, "You don't like heroes, senpai."

Yamato smiled at the question, "No, nothing like that. Heroes are required for the functioning of our society. But the system is messed up, Nao. Heroes don't care about saving lives or protecting innocents anymore, all they care about is the money earned and popularity." He held up his hand when he saw Naomasa about to rebut him, "I know, Nao that all heroes are not like that and some of them genuinely want to do good but they are few and far in between. Nao, why did you join the police?"

Naomasa looked pensive at that statement before replying, "It felt like the place where I would be able to contribute most to society."

Yamato smiled and smacked his hands together, "Exactly, see you get it. The Police keeps the peace and protects the citizens. That's our duty and how we help the society. The Hero system was created to deal with Quirks and it was a success but it's become corrupted by the idealization of heroes because of media and franchises. Everything is about heroes these days and no one is out there looking out for the little guys. The ones who need our help the most."

Naomasa nodded without replying, but Yamato continued, "That's why Yasu is the good sort. He knows what it is like to be at the bottom of society where nobody gives a damn about you. I met him when he was brat and I was a rookie, caught him stealing food from a house."

Naomasa frowned, "So, he's a former criminal."

Yamato smacked him from the side, "None of that nonsense, I know in our society, people look down on you if you are associated with villainy or crimes but Nao the police must have compassion. Some of them never had the chance to do anything else." He smiled, "Yasu is a good example. I fed him and put him in a decent shelter instead of arresting him and sending him to jail. I gave him a chance and look at him now, he became a pro hero even without a quirk suited for the career."

Naomasa looked to his side and saw his senior look like a proud father or older brother and couldn't help but ask, "Why did you help him, senpai? Anybody else would have arrested him and forgotten about him afterwards."

Yamato looked at him with his gaining a far away look, "I don't know, Nao. Maybe I just wanted to help or maybe I didn't want to see a brat die an early death because of his idiotic actions." He looked about to fall asleep and said, "or maybe it's because his eyes looked like they were asking for help." He finished and immediately fell asleep.

Naomasa glanced at him and looked thoughtful, many years down the line, he would remember this conversation multiple times and reflect about how it changed his view of the world.