Raw666 - All I can promise is chaos
Detrametal - Yeah, Garaki and AFO are... pretty heavy. Don't worry, Inko is working hard to make them much lighter :v You'll see a snapshot of that in next chapter I think.
Guest - Ah yes, chaos
Shahryar - Yes, Geten needs some character development to be passable ngl :V
(***)
To be honest, the next few days were sort of a lull in Midoriya's life. The MLA gave him some time (after making him sign the loyalty contract) to get used to the concept of being, technically, a villain now.
Then he went for an internship with Skeptic, which happened around the time when they all got to witness Eraserhead and a small army of police officers dragging the Aldera faculty out of their school, thanks to the whole thing being on TV.
Even All Might showed up, if only to stare with righteous fury at said faculty members.
As per the unofficial deal between Trumpet and Nedzu, the whole 'free quirk usage that the faculty encouraged' bit somehow didn't come up in the media. Faculty-encouraged quirkism, abuse, and a cover-up of several suicides did.
Prompting a media clusterfuck of biblical proportions that forced the government to start observing the public schools for signs of bullying or blatant quirkism with much greater intensity, proving once more that you can't expect the government to do shit until someone dies and it becomes a piece of public knowledge.
Hearts and Minds Party ended up slightly improving in the polls (not to mention Koku Hanabata becoming slightly more popular) thanks to Nedzu admitting publicly that the warning that something was immensely wrong in the school came from the leader of the H&M Party.
He made this flow of seasonal votes a bit more permanent by making the Hearts and Minds Party be especially zealous about fighting quirkism in school as a result.
What's more, the party actually scored a major spike in voters afterward thanks to Koku Hanabata making a rather intense speech about how from the point of view of his party all quirks were beautiful signs of one's individuality. And that discriminating people whose individualities were perceived as 'villainous' or 'gross' (complex mutants and more complicated simple mutants were there) was, to be honest, a dick move.
Nedzu ended up dealing with Bakugou by assigning him to some serious anger management therapy, and counseling, and keeping him on permanent probation when hate crimes were involved. It also severed the budding friendship between him and the hardening kid from the sports festival, because said hardening kid had a very… sharp policy when bullying was involved.
Nedzu must have seen Aldera as his personal enemy afterwards (or how far was the rat ready to go to maintain his backstory, Re-Destro concludes), to the point of actually buying the whole building.
Then publicly and in front of the cameras demolishing it with a crane and a large wrecking ball.
Right after that, Akatani Mikumo released a clip based on that event onto his blog (Skeptic helped direct it), with a carefully timed 'I CAME IN LIKE A WRECKING BALL' as a soundtrack.
As a result, the Wrecking Ball Nedzu figurine somehow became the most popular piece of Mr. Principal's hero merchandise.
It was, honestly, the least explosive part of Izuku's brief internship with Skeptic.
(***)
"Midoriya." Re-Destro massages the bridge of his nose. If he got a penny each time Midoriya accidentally destroyed the career of a Top Hero, he would have two pennies. Which isn't much, but it's weird that it happened twice and in a single month.
"I-I'm sorry?" Midoriya shrinks a little in front of the Grand Commander. Skeptic is doing his best to not draw attention to himself, the man standing right next to Notebook, his unofficial ward for a week.
"Alright, I'm calm." Re-Destro says. Having a stress-powered meta-ability had made him an authority in all the mental gymnastics one used to make oneself calm down. "Can someone tell me what exactly happened?"
"W-well, uhm, S-Skeptic-san was s-showing me w-what his c-company is c-capable of, a-and..." Midoriya lets out, only to be interrupted by Re-Destro raising his hand.
"Notebook, with all due respect, I was asking the person that was supposed to be responsible for you for these few days." Re-Destro says, Skeptic shrinking a little more. "Especially as you're still a minor. Skeptic, what the fuck?"
Honestly, Rikiya Yotsubashi just doesn't enjoy seeing Midoriya shrink in horror so much. He's willing to let him have some breathing space.
"Well, uhm, Notebook asked me how good I am at hacking." Skeptic replies out, avoiding Re-Destro's gaze. "I believe that he wanted to know who is better, me or Mechanist, whom he apparently met in person."
Oh, of course, Skeptic and his legendary 'I'm the most skilled and intelligent person ever' delusion. To be honest, he was incredibly skilled with computers, being certainly comparable to Mechanist in hacking (despite Mechanist being a cyborg with a technopathic quirk), he just…
…disliked it when someone implied otherwise. And was ready to go far to prove them wrong.
"And in order to prove yourself as the holder of the biggest dick in the hacking world of Japan…" Re-Destro replies dryly. "... you decided to hack into the house security of Thunderbolt, the Number Three Hero."
Not for long, if the recording of a large crowd of people dousing Thunderbolt's effigy in gasoline (before setting it aflame while chanting variations of DEATH TO THE FALSE HEROES) in front of the National Diet was anything to go by.
And that's without the ongoing trend on social media to burn his merchandise and post recordings of them going up in flames.
The fact that the firefighters' response was publishing a short instruction on how to burn his merchandise in a safe and environmentally friendly way rather than telling people to cut it out due to the risks of fires said a lot.
"Err, yes." Skeptic admits. "He had pretty good internet security for his own computer, but I got in through the company providing him with the physical security measures. I let Notebook watch what was happening inside, to prove that I managed to do it, and then left for about ten minutes to get a coffee."
"And during those ten minutes, Thunderbolt got back home." Re-Destro takes it over. "And, apparently angry about something that happened at work, started to viciously beat his teenage daughter over some completely idiotic reason that was purely a pretext to unwind on her. Her resigned reaction making it clear that it wasn't the first time either."
Skeptic nods, shrinking a bit more.
"And Midoriya, bleeding heart and so on, immediately posted the recording on his blog, claiming to have received it from an anonymous source inspired by his apparent public takedown of Endeavor." Re-Destro continues. "Then you returned to the room with your coffee, and realized what happened."
Skeptic nods again, clearly avoiding the Grand Commander's gaze.
"And then, being the responsible adult you are, you sat right next to him." Re-Destro continues, but this time with his voice as dry as possible. "And scoured the past recordings on the server of Thunderbolt's home security for more material that you immediately began to randomly post on numerous internet pages. All while cackling maniacally right next to a clearly enthusiastic Midoriya that was cheering you the whole time." Rikiya sighs painfully. "Did I miss something out in that retelling of events?"
"Well, the HPSC took down his blog a few minutes after I returned with my coffee, so I had to counteract their move." Skeptic decides to defend himself. "Since I was technically fighting against the dogs of the state, I had no time to consult you over the operation details and…"
Skeptic sees the look Re-Destro is giving him and shuts up.
At least the blog is back up, because someone in the Hero Commission realized that it's impossible to keep the affair hidden and, if anything, doing this makes the public ask questions going alongside of 'who is doing the censorship, why they acted so quickly and what else is being hidden from the public when heroes are involved'.
Officially it was an overreaction of the company hosting the blog that thought that someone was using their infrastructure for a slander campaign.
"Alright." Re-Destro takes a deep breath. "Skeptic, I'm going to interpret this situation as you seeing yourself in Thunderbolt's daughter, seeing your rather… complicated past family history. If you find potent blackmail material of this type again, be so kind as to warn us before you use it so we can make sure that our political and media branches are ready to take advantage of what happens, instead of being completely surprised by it. Got it?"
"Yes, sir." Skeptic nods. Clearly relieved that the subject was over.
"U-uhm, Y-Yotsubashi-san?" Midoriya lets out, still not fully ready to use their villain names. "W-what will happen to that girl?"
Of course he wants to know that.
"You don't have to worry yourself over that." Re-Destro replies quickly. "I've heard through the grapevine that Nedzu offered UA to act as her legal caretaker, a bit like what he's doing with Shoto Todoroki."
Mostly because that girl had a quirk to equal her father, and no one was especially interested in seeing someone like that (with a long list of valid grievances about heroes as a whole) going villain.
Midoriya appears to be relieved.
"Just please, please, if you accidentally uncover more shocking things about Top Heroes, I'd like to learn it from you, not from the TV." Re-Destro then says, practically begging Midoriya at this point. "If you find out that, I don't know, All Might's quirk is a transferable bullshit one, that Best Jeanist is secretly a furry, that Hawks is a covert governmental assassin or that Miruko is having a secret affair with Hero Killer Stain, you go straight to me, got it?"
He has no idea why Midoriya looked freaked out for a moment while Re-Destro listed a few completely ridiculous and certainly untrue random scenarios. Then again, Notebook looks like he was on the verge of dying out of anxiety for most of the time, so it was most likely nothing.
(***)
Three days later the time finally comes for Izuku Midoriya to have his weekly internship with Re-Destro himself. Which, among other things, means unleashing Izuku 'QUIRKS ARE SO COOL' Midoriya upon Detnerat Company.
The country's biggest developer of support equipment. Both for a lot of heroes and civilians who prefer customized furniture and other things that are tailored to be comfortable and ergonomic for their altered biology.
It was the biggest mistake in the long list of big mistakes that the MLA leadership made in regards to Izuku Midoriya.
It was like letting a starving wolf into a barn full of sheep while the farm owner and their dogs were out of town.
Re-Destro was there mostly to serve as an interpreter. His years of experience with the variety of nerds that populated Detnerat's research department (while getting routinely overexcited about things and lacking social skills) made him reasonably fluent in Midoriya.
He manages to translate his mumblings to Japanese and vice versa quite easily.
Midoriya spends most of the day casually giving Yotsubashi's engineers existential crises of varied intensity.
On the second day, Re-Destro decides to showcase his own meta-ability, because it's clear that Izuku is dying to know and is just too anxious to ask a supervillain about it. So, he ends up showing him the result of a 100% Liberation, how Claustro works and even blowing up a training dummy with Stress Output Burden.
Rikiya is fluent in suppressing his own stress… and in causing it when needed. Although it's not exactly feasible for fights, he can't go 100% in a fight against a weak opponent because he just can't focus on his mind exercises to get there in a fight, all while the fight itself is not dangerous enough to force him to go to 100%.
Midoriya stares at him in awe, next to a group of engineers responsible for Claustro that came to show their lovechild in action. But then, he asks.
"That's super cool, Yotsubashi-san!" He says, and Re-Destro smiles smugly. "And your armor is great! But, errr, where are the weapons?"
"... weapons?" Re-Destro blinks at him.
"Yes?" Midoriya appears confused at Re-Destro's lack of understanding. "Your 100% Liberation makes you bigger and stronger, however, your combat style is clearly focused on brawling, similarly to All Might. However, with a frame this big you could have easily wielded a weapon to increase the damage you can inflict, while making it more varied in case you encountered someone with inborn resistance to blunt damage. Actually, now that I think about it, Stress Output Burden is something that you can shape to a degree, right? If you had a sword from the right materials, you could have coated it with your excess stress energy for massively increased damage!"
…
"Notebook, my boy." Re-Destro says officially. "When it comes to creating support equipment, one has to consider not just 'how good something is' but also whether it's economically feasible and whether the designs can work, as simplicity is important. Making things more complicated makes them more likely to be damaged in combat or malfunction."
Midoriya looks down a bit.
"However, this is a sword." Re-Destro adds dryly. "And I'm the richest person in the country." He looks at the engineers. "SO WHY THE HELL DON'T I HAVE A GIANT KATANA TO CUT MY ENEMIES DOWN WITH?!"
Because, now that Re-Destro thinks about it, wielding a two or three meter long katana coated in crackling black energy, with enough strength to cut a JSDF tank in half is not only extremely practical but also would look incredibly cool.
"W-well, errr…" The head engineer in charge of Claustro is clearly uncomfortable with being put in the spotlight. "... you demanded an armor that would increase your stress level and give you increased durability. There wasn't anything in the file about weapons."
Re-Destro does his best not to facepalm, and somehow, succeeds.
"From now on, if anyone, anyone in Detnerat has an idea about how to make an MLA member stronger with equipment, I want to know it. Even if this isn't part of what they were asked to do, got it?" Re-Destro asks. The engineers nod, giving Midoriya slightly worried looks. "Alright. Notebook, any more ideas to share?"
"Missile launchers?" Izuku asks more than says, clearly confused with what just happened.
"... elaborate?" Re-Destro asks. He isn't sure how to put it, but those two words were certainly intriguing.
"I m-mean, your increased durability and strengthened frame while you're i-inside Claustro means that you should be capable of withstanding recoil of heavy w-weaponry." Midoriya replies. "You could take advantage of its modular construction to create several heavy weapon slots on Claustro, calling the correct weapons to arrive with its own propulsion, like Claustro itself does. So, for example, a shoulder mounted autocannon or a missile launcher to deal with crowds of weaker enemies, or machine gun attachments to your side to keep the enemy in front of you suppressed or…"
Midoriya stops speaking, realizing how deathly quiet the room had become. The engineers are staring at him in complete shock.
"W-what?" He asks as he begins to freak out again.
"Notebook, my dear boy." Re-Destro puts his hands down on Izuku's shoulders. "You have a beautiful mind, and don't let anyone, anyone, tell you otherwise. Now, please make a full list of potential attachments that you can think of."
(***)
By the end of the weekly internship at Detnerat Company, Midoriya became something akin to the company's patron saint of mad (but brilliant) inventions. To the point where Re-Destro actually ended up finding a shrine that the engineers (jokingly, or so Yotsubashi hopes) made in his image.
When they heard that his internship was over, a few of them actually cried. Making Izuku Midoriya extremely confused.
On the other hand, the boy clearly started to at least slightly believe in himself. It took him a moment to feel comfortable enough to start thinking that they were all saying those compliments for real, not to bait him into believing them just to backstab him.
It was pretty nice to witness, in Re-Destro's opinion. The future of the hero support equipment deserved to be allowed to thrive and change the world for the better!
He also most likely didn't make the decision that, if something were to happen to Mischief, he would find a way to adopt Izuku Midoriya.
Somewhere on UA, a pink-haired girl accidentally hits a Boss Music Playlist while looking through youtube for something to play in the background while she invents things. She decides that it's a good enough background noise and leaves it at that.
(***)
Right before the first month of Midoriya Izuku in Deika City ends, Geten returns from his solitary training once again. His eyes are that of a madman. Then again, Re-Destro, to be honest, barely notices the difference.
"Geten-san!" Midoriya, of course, beams at the man. "Did it work?!"
Re-Destro explained the internal factions to him, but for some reason, Geten doesn't register as hostile in his eyes. Despite the man being as quirkist as you can get, all of Izuku's memories of him don't include a single hostile word from him.
Because Izuku didn't let him say them, filling his mind with a new understanding of his own meta-ability, forcing Geten to spend another week or two on intensive training to confirm the existence of the completely new aspect of his meta-ability.
"Yes, YES IT WORKED!" Geten shouts back, Notebook beaming at him in pure, concentrated happiness. "But this doesn't mean that I acknowledge you as a member of the Meta-Liberation Army!"
Oh, God. Re-Destro realized it just now. Geten is… wait, what's the term for when you're to racism what a tsundere is to love? Is there even a term for that? Despite all his education, Rikiya Yotsubashi has no idea how to name the… errr… fascinating phenomenon that he is just witnessing.
Midoriya doesn't bat an eye at the lack of acknowledgement. He's probably too used to it to bother. Instead, he focuses on what's really important to him right now.
"This is awesome, Geten-san!" Midoriya smiles widely. "Your q… meta-ability is just awesome!" Geten gives him a smug smile. "But I think I have another idea! Have you ever tried creating different forms of ice by, for example, freezing water under sufficient pressure?"
…
"Say what?" Geten blinks at Midoriya.
(***)
This time, Geten doesn't immediately fuck off from the Detnerat Tower. Probably thanks to the 'Not Exit' stickers (as well as the accompanying reinforced windows) limiting his ability to just randomly jump off the windows. This is actually reassuring, since Re-Destro wasn't even sure if Geten could read.
Instead, he ends up testing the hypothesis right there.
Ten minutes later, an MLA warrior with a minor strength amp quirk slams a large piece of Geten's normal ice with a hammer, crushing it completely. Then he tries to do the same to the new, highly compacted, and hyper pressurized ice that Geten made with Midoriya's instructions.
The damage is minimal.
Yes, the special ice used like ten times more water for the same volume. But it worked. And could be used for things like, say, the teeth and fangs of Geten's ice dragon. Or the tips of the spears of whatever ice soldiers he made.
Or for personal body armor.
Re-Destro can practically see the man reflecting on his previous life choices. He has no idea of the details, he isn't the one getting hit by a retrospection, but it's most certainly there.
Eventually, Geten returns to the world of the living and heads towards Midoriya before putting his hands on his shoulders. Like Re-Destro did a few days ago, actually.
"Notebook." Geten actually uses his MLA name, and that alone speaks volumes in Re-Destro's opinion. "I'm sure that a lot of people were telling you that as a quirkless person you're useless, a pointless waste of space, a relic of times that passed, and so on."
Midoriya is clearly having Vietnam-style flashbacks out of his words.
"I'm also sure that you know that a significant part of the MLA, namely the Radicals, subscribes to those ideas wholeheartedly." Geten continues, completely ignoring Midoriya's trauma. "And because of that, I have to ask you for something very, very important."
Re-Destro decides to watch the event for now. He also thinks that he's about 90% sure that Midoriya expects to be suicide-baited after this. The reason why isn't intervening is that he is 95% sure that it's not going to be this.
"If someone from the MLA tells you any mean words about your status as quirkless…" Geten says as officially as he can. "... I want you to tell me their name, so that I can make them play Dance Dance Revolution barefoot on my ice needles."
…
Ouch.
Midoriya actually looks at Geten with total shock, clearly expecting a completely different outcome when the supervillain starts his little speech (which also happens to be the longest coherent series of words that Re-Destro ever heard him say).
"A-alright, Geten-san!" Midoriya beams at him, relieved beyond the constraints of mortal ken. "I will do so!"
"Great." Geten nods with a serious look on his face. "But if you have any more ideas on how to make my meta-ability stronger, you're going to tell me, yes?"
"Of course I will!" Midoriya smiles widely. "Y-Your q…, meta-ability is incredibly versatile in its apparent simplicity, and since you've trained it so hard to such a level its possibilities are almost endless! A-actually, I think I might have one more idea for now. Have you ever tried to…"
Oh, God. One more month of this and Geten will probably be able to solo Hero Society.
(***)
Re-Destro has no idea how it happened. No one in the MLA understood the process in question. But in a span of just a few more days, Geten and Midoriya started acting like brothers slash best friends for life. Geten hung around Notebook for most of the day, glaring angrily at anyone who wasn't satisfyingly nice to his best friend.
It had its downsides.
"STOP DOING THIS!" Re-Destro yells out of the window of his office in the Detnerat Tower. Outside of it, Geten and Midoriya were in the process of sliding down a massive ice slide that coiled around the entire skyscraper.
The whole thing wasn't made right from the start. Geten was clearly training his control over ice by disassembling a slide behind them and reassembling it in front of them. It was a massive feat of control, one that also made the entire slide make completely unpredictable twists.
Geten was too good to accidentally drop him. Just in case, Midoriya was wearing proper protection (elbow guards, knee guards, and so on) with some ice on it, so Geten could control it in an instant.
He proved it by safely stopping their slide in a heartbeat when Re-Destro shouted at them.
Midoriya whispered something to him. Geten nodded before facing Re-Destro.
"Grand Commander!" Geten says loudly. "This is actually very good training and stress relief. You should consider joining us, seeing as it could do wonders for your health! Your meta-ability makes you naturally nervous and…"
"IT'S NOT MY META-ABILITY THAT'S MAKING ME NERVOUS!" Re-Destro yells. "YOU'RE MAKING ME NERVOUS! WE'RE A CONSPIRACY, WHAT IF SOMEONE NOT FROM THE MLA SAW YOU RIGHT NOW!"
It's technically legal, private property, and so on, and Deika is full of MLA members, but it would certainly cause questions. And someone might be passing through the city or something, right?
Midoriya whispers something to Geten's ear again, and Re-Destro was once again painfully reminded that Geten was being a bad influence on the kid.
"Using your meta-ability to obtain happiness for yourself and those close to you is a human right as understood by the Meta-Liberation Creed." Geten replies surprisingly eloquently, probably quoting Midoriya. Re-Destro opens his mouth to shout at him again. "Destro would have joined us."
(***)
Curious looks through the window, interrupting her official MLA meeting with Trumpet for a moment, just to look at the beautiful landscape of Deika.
Then she lets out a loud shriek, almost falling from her chair.
"What happened?!" Trumpet shouts, rising from his seat, probably terrified that they were being attacked or something.
"I, err…" Curious blinks at him. "I think that I just saw Re-Destro sliding down Geten's ice slide with Geten and Midoriya. That can't be true, right?"
(***)
Re-Destro's daughter and Geten's sister, (her friend, and unofficial caretaker) return from their overseas trip a week later, bringing a completely new level of chaos to the daily life of the Meta-Liberation Army's leadership.
(***)
Izuku: I w-won't join MLA!
Re-Destro: We'll let you analyze 100 000 meta-abilities.
Izuku: ... I'll j-join the MLA!
Re-Destro: I won't slide down with you!
Izuku [through Geten] - Destro would slide down with us.
Re-Destro: I've been successfuly convinced.
Same overcompetent dumbass energy, ngl.
Also RIP Thunderbolt, once again, you exist just to suffer. Similarly, RIP any hero/villain that will get to fight Re-Destro after this. And RIP Midoriya Izuku, because the love interest is about to return home.
Geten held for about a month. Which is a respectable score when Midoriya is involved.