MrMateusz - He did, didn't he?
Shahryar - Down bad to down atrocious is a surprisingly good summary of Ko's character development lmao.
TOPCAT-59 - She knows what she wants, and she wants it as soon as possible :D
Detrametal - Otsu Kawauso is, to be honest, best considered as being to otter what Miruko is to rabbits. Fighting her is a height of folly. And she has enough of a rep to make MLA go 'nope, not worth it' xD Koshi is, indeed, a menace to Izuku's viriginity and Eri is having a supportive family and that's great. As for Inko, well, someone had Doom music kick in and All for One is now suffering the consequences xD
The Northern DireWolf - Oh, boy. It's not quite yet the time for Nedzu to roll in but let's just say that he has a big moment xD
Naruto30 - Nope, it's Hawks the Number Three (then Two) Hero. Also the fic ends a bit too early for that, so unfortunately no Uraraka but you are free to headcanon future events and let's just say that Izuku and Uraraka might meet sooner rather than later xD
(***)
This time the incident started only with the indirect involvement of Izuku Midoriya. In fact, it was so indirect that it really barely counted as something that he caused. Although it had to be admitted that it was Izuku that started the chain of disastrous events.
Accidentally, of course.
Unknown to the world, Hawks's father was a murderer in hiding and an abusive piece of shit. He was rescued by Endeavor, before falling in with a bad crowd.
Namely, the Hero Public Safety Commission.
They made him do a lot of nasty things after wrapping him around their finger, making him see assassination of HPSC political opponents as a dirty job that allowed people like Endeavor save other kids like little Keigo Takami from their abusers.
Then Endeavor was outed as a less than stellar father himself, and while the generally understood circumstances made things a bit more complicated, there were no such circumstances in Thunderbolt's case.
Both of them were protected by the HPSC, which led to a deeply confused Hawks asking a variant of 'Mr. Mera, are we the baddies?' question.
This, together with an extraordinary amount of potentially compromising intel that Hawks was carrying in his head, led the Hero Commission to have an emergency meeting over the subject of 'what the hell are we doing with Keigo Takami?'.
Hawks managed to smell bad things about to happen to him thanks to someone whispering to him that there was a meeting concerning him happening right now. You didn't need a doctorate to realize that a council of shadowy villainous masterminds having a meeting about you (without you) right after you started asking questions of moral nature wasn't good.
So, he used his quirk to steal a copy of the hard drive containing HPSC's blackmail material concerning 'their heroes' while the meeting was still on-going, before valiantly dashing out of the window of the HPSC headquarters.
He knew where the copy was thanks to someone being very talkative about it, and Hawks long ago decided that, if something were to go very bad with his life, he was going to grab that backup drive and flee.
Ironically enough, the Hero Commission initially decided to keep him around under heavier surveillance. He was too useful, and they couldn't risk losing another Top Hero right after Endeavor and Thunderbolt.
Except, that's when one of the commissioners had a Bad Idea. No, more than that: an Extraordinarily Bad Idea.
"Why do we have to keep him around?" He asked. "Couldn't we replace him with someone less compromised and more likely to be loyal to the Hero System without our direct control? Some relatively minor but talented hero whose career we'd boost with our influence? Like, say, that ice hero from Deika that battled Overhaul?"
No, wait, it was actually more than just an Extraordinarily Bad Idea. It was the All for One of bad ideas. All the bad ideas in human history handily bowed to the supreme clown energy of that particular decision, crowning it as the dumbest decision ever unanimously.
The funniest part was that it didn't even matter, because by the time that the HPSC kill squad entered the room in the HPSC headquarters where Hawks was supposed to be chilling in, the only thing they found was an empty paper wrap that used to contain a handful of chicken wings.
Hawks took them with him, not one to let delicious chicken goodies go to waste out of something as unimportant as an assassination attempt, so they didn't even get a free snack out of the ordeal.
Besides, he was going to be a fugitive, he could as well take some provisions with him.
When Yokumiru Mera realized that Hawks took their blackmail database with him, the result could be simply summarized as 'total panic of biblical proportions'. Plus a lot of terrifying screams, and the HPSC president almost choking on her drink when she heard what happened.
Scream, Number Eight Hero and one of the Commission main lackeys, actually ended up choking on their food and had to be hospitalized. Mostly because she knew exactly what sort of dirt on her was in the database.
The HPSC President moved quickly and decided to activate the blackmail they had on Hawks.
Thirty minutes later all the TV Stations in the country announced that Hawks was suspected of multiple homicides (namely, the murders that the HPSC had him commit) and was on the run following a failed attempt to arrest him.
The announcement actually ended up interrupting the cartoon that Eri was watching in the heights of Detnerat Tower. Prompting everyone present in the room (namely, Ko, Hypothermia, Tagawa, Geten and Eri, who actually parroted what the others did) to immediately look at Izuku.
"It wasn't me this time!" He quickly shoots back. He is only partially correct, as he did start the domino reaction that led to the event in question, but he didn't know that, so it wasn't a lie.
Three minutes later he got a call from Re-Destro, the man asking him if Izuku was somehow involved in the event. Izuku once again said that no, he wasn't involved. When Re-Destro disconnected, Izuku spent about fifteen minutes thinking it over.
Re-Destro, in his error, didn't ask Izuku for his thoughts about the matter. As a result, he doesn't know that Izuku (thanks to his contacts with the Vigilante Alliance) knows that the vigilantes suspected Hawks of being the HPSC's chosen assassin for a long time.
Mostly thanks to Lady Nagant, whose demise was actually rather overexaggerated, something that Izuku could attest due to Kaina Tsutsumi occasionally attending his mother's tea parties.
As a result he immediately decided that Hawks must have gone rogue, and that the whole event sounded like a great occasion to deal some significant damage to the Hero Commission!
Thanks to his contacts with Knuckleduster, Stain and Mr. Compress (internet for now, even they didn't know where he was at), he obtained some crucial data on the location of the HPSC search parties.
This, together with a number of other things - including his giant database about Hawks' past behavior and even the information he learned about the behavior of hawks in case he was actually somewhat influenced mentally by the eponymous animals - gave him a lot of data to work with.
As a result, he had a list of suspected hideouts and something akin to the most likely route of Hawks' escape within an hour from the event.
He then approached Geten.
"Geten-niichan!" Izuku asks with a smile that immediately makes the quirk supremacist's heart melt. "There is a hero convention out there that I need to urgently attend. I'll wear my disguise, but could you please accompany me?"
Now, a person with absolutely basic social skills would have understood that Izuku was lying through his teeth at a glance. A person with average social skills would have realized that someone like Izuku wouldn't be surprised by a hero convention happening. A person with good social skills would quickly deduce that the fact that Izuku wants to go somewhere in a hurry right after such an event is, to say it simply, sus.
However, a half-eaten chocolate-flavored donut with sprinkles had more social skills than Geten. As a result, he fell for it completely and was happy to be of help to his younger brother.
All of that led to a chance encounter between Hawks, a very confused Geten and one completely unconfused Midoriya Izuku.
It happened right behind a local McDonalds that Hawks had just left, having apparently entered them without his wings on (and with a wig that he wasn't really clear where he got from and probably stole from someone on the street) in order to obtain a pair of fake mustaches that were nowadays added to a Happy Meal for some extremely unclear marketing reasons.
In other words, Hawks was very busy discovering that being locked in his house as a child, then being trained by the HPSC and then doing what the HPSC told him to didn't prepare him for his role as a fugitive. Or even to live as a part of society without the whole 'murder for us and we'll deal with your taxes and associated paperwork for you' situation.
Geten didn't realize that his younger brother played him like the cheap kazoo he was until Hawks freaked out that he had encountered a hero (he didn't remember all of them, but the only people ready to wear a parka in such a temperature were heroes, villains and, probably, exhibitionists that wore nothing underneath) and promptly summoned his feathers.
"Wait, we're on your side!" Izuku interrupted the soon-to-be massive battle between a former Top Hero and one of the living nukes of the MLA in the alleyway behind a local McDonalds. "We're here to help you!"
Geten was greatly surprised by that statement himself, but wisely decided not to level down the neighborhood, unless Hawks tried to injure Izuku.
He, in a twisted way, was still the same quirk supremacist who thought that ones meta-ability strength should define your position in society (which, to be honest, totally wasn't a thing in the Hero Society where strong and flashy quirks make you naturally predestined into fame, glory and money) as before meeting Izuku.
What changed was that he now realized that there are people with other talents (like Izuku) and that if Geten wanted to be the god-overlord of the neighborhood, he needed to make sure that people with weaker meta-abilities but other talents could live their lives safely in order to support his existence (by, for example, producing food because he had no skills on that field himself, or giving him meta-ability tips), which implied protecting them from threats.
So that they could continue to live in peace, so that he could benefit from said peace and their lives.
Which, again, totally didn't change him from a wannabe quirk tyrant into a wannabe quirk feudal lord. Not to mention totally not making him obtain a pro-hero mindset but with some extra steps.
In short, he was completely ready to battle god to protect Izuku Midoriya.
Thankfully, he didn't have to, because Hawks wasn't a god and decided to see reason.
"That's great, kid, but I really don't think that you can help me." Hawks replies, deciding to not involve random teenagers in his new (and already rather uncomfortable) life of a fugitive. "Unless you happen to know where to find some villainous organization with common human decency that could help me survive against the Hero Commission."
He is about to take off, when Izuku ends up replying.
"Pick a number between one and four." Midoriya says, giving Hawks a pause.
"Why?" Takami asks, looking questioningly at the kid.
"Well, I know four of them, so I need you to decide which one I will contact you with." Midoriya replies, looking completely unfazed. As if a sixteen years old kid encountered behind a local McDonald knowing four different villainous organizations fighting against the government was a normal thing.
…
"Four." Hawks says, part of him suspecting that it was some very weird hidden camera prank.
Unfortunately for them, Stain's wandering troupe of hero killers, Mr. Compress's wandering troupe of righteous thieves, and Knuckleduster's not-wandering troupe of urban guerillas lost the game.
Instead, Izuku Midoriya ended up inviting Keigo Takami to Deika. To the utmost confusion of Geten who was still standing there, trying to comprehend Notebook casually inviting Hawks to join the Meta-Liberation Army, just without dropping the name itself.
Still in the back alley behind the local McDonald, right next to a large bin full of something that was very, very smelly.
Frankly speaking, Re-Destro would have cried if he had seen a recruitment meeting for his beloved organization happening in such a place. However, to be honest, what the Grand Commander would never know about, couldn't hurt him.
Izuku quickly proved to have the most street smarts out of their entire company (despite Hawks being a Top Hero and Geten being a supervillain) and had them hide in another back alley, while obtaining a slightly more competent disguise for Hawks.
They kept the mustache because, to be honest, it would draw the attention of people from the wig, making the wig appear more genuine and Hawks' mustache looked like something that was put on due to a lost bet.
The fact that the trio managed to arrive in Deika without further ado was a great testament to what sort of clowns the HPSC had on its payroll in general.
On the other hand, he did get rid of his feathers for some time, having them fly after them in a distance and glue themselves to the outer side of the shinkansen they used to get close to Deika City.
Although in the defense of the HPSC, they totally expected Hawks to (if he ever betrayed them) take his phone with him (if only to make sure that he didn't lose his progress in Animal Crossing that he played religiously) so that they could track his phone.
Mostly because they made sure that Hawks didn't have an awful lot of skills that weren't about fighting. Someone else did the investigations for him, leaving him even more dependent on the HPSC. He wasn't a natural born fugitive, as stated. If he knew that phones could be traced, he probably knew that thanks to seeing that in some action movie.
He didn't. He would actually have taken his phone with him; however, the HPSCs' main anti-rogue Hawks countermeasure was stopped from working by a very simple fact. Hawks just forgot to take his phone with him when he was summoned to the HPSC headquarters.
As a result, Hawks fled from it with only his chicken wings and a wallet.
All of this led to (one still very confused) Hawks finding himself on the doorstep of Rikiya Yotsubashi, one of the wealthiest people in the country, whose reaction to seeing Hawks on said doorstep could be summarized as 'what the actual fuck, Midoriya?!'
Actually, not summarized. Yotsubashi said that verbatim. But then Midoriya (he introduced himself to Hawks en route) practically pulled Hawks inside, allowing him to realize that Koku Hanabata, the head of the Hearts and Minds Party, was also in the room, sitting by a large table.
Hanabata promptly looks at Hawks, before looking at Midoriya, his face completely expressionless. He then sighs loudly, takes off his glasses, and puts them on the table at a reasonable distance from himself, before collapsing onto the table in question.
Oof?
Hawks is extraordinarily confused, and really hopes for some answers.
Izuku tells him to sit, before sitting right next to him. Yotsubashi sits on the other side of it, right next to Hanabata. Geten sits right next to Midoriya.
Izuku then quickly narrates the events that led to the situation in question. Hanabata actually wakes up mid-way, clearly only pretending to have collapsed the whole time.
"Midoriya." Yotsubashi sighs painfully. "Don't you have a feeling that you've slightly overstepped your boundaries somewhere in the middle of this… story?"
"Uhm, no?" Midoriya looks at him with slight confusion. "You've made me a First Advisor, according to the quirk contract I've signed it's actually legal for me to attempt recruitment of people as a result."
Yotsubashi actually facepalms over this.
"Yes, technically you're right." He then says. "I permitted this because I didn't expect anyone to believe you, especially not a Top Hero. Also, didn't I say something about you being supposed to listen to other first advisors? Due to, well, being a minor?"
Midoriya points at Geten.
"Geten doesn't count as adult supervision, and we both know it." Yotsubashi says dryly.
"Hey!" Geten seems to have taken offense. Yotsubashi and Hanabata stare at him over the table until he decides to concede the point.
"Alright, Hawks." Yotsubashi sighs. "As Midoriya stated, we are actually a group opposed to the Hero Commission, and in the process of doing our best to overthrow its corrupt regime and instill some serious changes in the system. Before you ask, it was members of our organization that were responsible for the misdeeds of Endeavor, Thunderbolt and Aldera Middle School being revealed to the public."
Well, Endeavor and Aldera were theoretically outed before Midoriya joined the organization, but he was now a member of the MLA so it totally counted as the organization's successes, right? Especially since Curious and Trumpet were involved.
"Well, that's cool." Hawks gives him a thumbs-up. "Job well done. Seriously, a big fan of your work."
He isn't even joking. He had enough of a traumatic backstory to go nope after seeing Thunderbolt viciously beating his daughter up. Yeah, nope. If the HPSC actually knew and protected such a piece of shit, they deserve everything that's coming for them.
"Great, thank you." Yotsubashi nods. "Look, you can probably understand why I'm not going to be immediately welcoming towards you. In fact, you're going to be on house arrest for a moment, until we confirm that you're not some sort of deep undercover agent of the Commission."
Rikiya Yotsubashi would have to be a complete buffoon or an idiot to willingly let someone like that know the full extent of the MLA works without proper loyalty check-ups first! It felt like something that the dumbass that attacked the USJ and got their ass - pun intended - handed to them would do.
"Oh, understandable." Hawks nods. "To be honest, I kind of realized that I can't live on the streets for shit like two hours into my life as a fugitive. For as long as it's not a prison cell, I'm alright with that. Oh, and drop me some chicken wings from time to time."
Being able to pick a slightly less morally awkward cage sounded like a good start. He'll find a way to escape cages as a whole further down the line.
"Before that, I think you'll like to have this." Hawks pulls the big external hard drive out of his pocket. He doesn't miss Yotsubashi and Hanabata being slightly nervous for a moment.
"What is it?" Yotsubashi asks, taking it off him.
"A complete back-up of HPSC's blackmail database." Hawks replies calmly. "All the dirt they have on 'their' heroes. Several hundred gigabytes of stuff."
Silence in the room.
"A what?" Yotsubashi manages to speak first.
(***)
Re-Destro had Skeptic connect the hard drive to a computer unconnected to the Detnerat Tower's network, just in case it was some very 5D chess attack plan including a virus infection carried over by Hawks into the middle of the MLA stronghold.
Skeptic quickly confirmed that there were no bugs in the hard drive. It was encrypted heavily, thankfully the MLA had access to that particular encryption code thanks to Skeptic's tireless work in infiltrating the HPSC.
The HPSC was smart enough to keep shit like that on the internal, super-secured networks with no connection to the internet. They didn't expect Hawks though.
Inside were numberless folders named after pro-heroes, segregated according to their current ranking.
All Might wasn't there, but Hawks, obviously, was. Endeavor and Thunderbolt were there as well. Oddly enough, there was also someone else among the Top Ten.
"Wait, Best Jeanist?" Re-Destro blinks at the computer screen. "The Commission has dirt on him? I thought he was close with Nedzu." Skeptic takes that as an invitation to open up the folder.
It's a video file plus some documents. Skeptic activates the video file.
It's a recording from some… hotel room? A woman was there. A woman painfully familiar, due to the whole Sinful Nun outfit aesthetics that Re-Destro could recognize with his eyes closed.
"Wait, is that… Purity?" Re-Destro says, staring at the screen in surprise. "Head of the Creature Rejection Clan?" She was clearly bound by some threads, but Yotsubashi would have heard if Best Jeanist arrested that woman. Did she escape? But what exactly was so condemning in such a video?
Best Jeanist shows up on the screen, Purity making no attempts to struggle. Then… Tsunagu Hakamada shows up in the camera view.
Re-Destro slams the pause button the moment Best Jeanist starts pulling out a fursuit from some container off-screen.
He turns his head towards the rest of the viewing group. Midoriya covered his eyes. Hawks covered his ears. Trumpet covered his mouth. Curious looked actually dejected that the recording was paused.
Ah yes, three wise monkeys and a curious… Curious. How splendid.
"This… didn't happen." Re-Destro says dryly. Everyone but Curious nods in unison. "Also, Midoriya? Do you remember me mentioning four completely untrue scenarios as examples of what I want to be informed about when you'll discover them? I vaguely remember Best Jeanist being a furry and Hawks being a governmental assassin on the list."
"Uhm, yes, sir." Midoriya admits. "But I didn't know about Best Jeanist, though in hindsight it makes sense, as I knew for certain that Purity had a husband that she never mentioned the name of, that was apparently good at b-bondage." Oh, god, they are married. And oh god, Midoriya knows what bondage is, who has corrupted the sweet summer child so much?! "And I only had a vague suspicion about Hawks being a governmental assassin."
Yeah, Re-Destro wasn't even told about it, he figured it out from Hawks being on the run from the Hero Commission that somehow obtained very convincing evidence for his responsibility for the crimes out of the blue.
"So why did you make such a strange reaction back then?" Re-Destro replies.
Midoriya shrinks a little.
"W-well, you mentioned Miruko and Stain having an affair, and…" He decides to admit it openly. "It's k-kind of not my secret."
Miruko. And Stain. Having an affair. Wow. Re-Destro is terrified, thinking that they fit each other like a glove and hoping to dear god that either of them was sterile or there would be no saving Japan.
"Oh, the Commission knows about that." Hawks wakes up, making all eyes in the room converge on him. "They tried to blackmail Miruko by showing her a recording of her and Stain doing the deed."
"The Commission had a recording of that, and Miruko somehow isn't their lackey?" Re-Destro asks, shocked. "How the hell did that happen?"
"She told them to get a better camera and work on angling, because she couldn't even get off to that." Hawks replies. "Then mentioned that she's enjoying her hero career and that they want her to continue it instead of joining her boyfriend and beating heroes up left and right. They decided to back down afterward."
…
That was somehow the most Miruko response to an attempted blackmail that Re-Destro could possibly imagine. Trumpet and Curious seem to be in agreement with him on that.
Re-Destro should probably ask Midoriya if All Might's quirk is transferable, if he is actually All Might's secret love child and if Inko Midoriya's husband is actually the mythical quirk thief (to check the remaining 'wild and certainly untrue theories' that Re-Destro had).
But he really thinks that it's enough wild revelations for the day.
"Well, Hawks." Re-Destro instead says, with a well-trained smile and a thumbs-up gesture. "I must say that if we manage to confirm the authenticity of the rest of the data, your honesty with us will be all but confirmed. And if so, you can consider yourself a new member of our organization."
"Sweet." Hawks appears to be satisfied with this. "Two questions. When can I get something to eat, preferably chicken wings, because I'm incredibly starved? And what organization did I just join?"
Oh God, not another overly powerful dumbass.
(***)
No, Best Jeanist isn't canon in my fics outside of this one :v But hey, it's hilarious.
Next chapter includes a most unexpected expansion of the MLA, that's all I can say right now.