-December 21 - [Day 9]-

Chitose stood by an empty bus stop, lightly tapping her right foot in impatience as she waited for a certain public transport vehicle to show up. It's been a rather slow and uneventful afternoon, but for some reason the bus she's waiting for is taking a little too long to her liking. Maybe a villain attack impeded it at some point? That's always the most probable case.

Taking a deep breath, the young woman let out a loud sigh afterwards. She hated being idle. She always wanted to be on the move, and doing something productive while she's at it. It was because of this insistence on always doing something that made her reach the top-ranking positions of both the MLA and Shoowaysha Publishing faster than any of her contemporaries. She never once slowed down.

Chitose suddenly stopped tapping her foot, her mind drifting off to a thought.

'But is it the good thing?'

She remembered one of the renovations she did on her Yokohama mansion: an entire room hollowed out in preparation for her future children. She remembered even hiring the best interior designers and architects just to get everything perfect, before eventually locking the door once everything's done. That was years ago, the room was never used, and eventually just turned into a constant reminder of her lonely adult life, which is the main reason she never returned to that specific mansion in over a decade. She didn't even get it listed as part of her owned properties in MLA-related resource-pooling sessions, or so what Skeptic calls them.

But now she has no choice but to try and get there, if all methods of contact fail that is.

'Is never slowing down a good thing?' the thought repeated inside her head, going over and over for several loops, until it abruptly stopped a few seconds later. Maybe she's just thinking it's the case because she's never experienced the other side before? Or maybe her younger self is affecting her thought processes again?

The bus eventually arrived, snapping her out of her thoughts. Chitose immediately got onboard and went on her way to sit on the very far back end of the bus, away from most of the other passengers who might find her odd – especially with her wearing black-tinted glasses and a face mask to hide her facial injuries, on top of her physical mutations.

Inching her way a little more to the window beside her, she turned her gaze towards one of the three tallest buildings in the area, specifically the area where she temporarily lives. So far the Midoriyas have been accommodating to her. And now with the son seemingly changing his opinion of her overnight after being helped with his Conjoined Meta Abilities, staying with them had never been easier – although she could still hear the son occasionally compare her to a rotting beached whale whenever he talks with his mother about her. But then again, Chitose has heard worse opinions from people about her physical appearance. Overall, everything is going great. In fact, Inko had already told her that she could stay with them as long as she likes, preferably until all her issues are sorted out.

'Live with them as long as I like…'

Chitose kept her gaze locked on the specific building as the bus began to move off, her thoughts just repeating itself over and over. Of course she still needs to earn money for them back despite Inko repeatedly saying that training her son is already more-than-enough payment. She can't just leech off of them. That's just rude.

Her thoughts eventually wandered on the treatment she's been getting in that particular household. There was something off about it that she couldn't properly describe. It was very different from what she'd ever gotten from the MLA, Shoowaysha, her own housemaids, and her entire life for that matter. It has a certain vibe to it that differs from the rest.

Shaking her head, she set her focus back on the front side of the bus. Once she gets back at the MLA, she will definitely tell them to skip this particular area of Musutafu on their oncoming violent revolution.

'But why?'

Chitose suddenly blanked out. But why exactly? It's just a random family she found herself in, both mother and son have very underwhelming Meta Abilities – especially the son, they're just a bunch of irrelevant specks in the big picture, why bother trying to save them? She had no problem detonating some of her soldiers just a few days earlier, why try to spare some people she only met a few days ago?

Taking a deep breath and then sighing, Chitose brushed off the thoughts. She has more important things to worry about.

-[o]-

As with the usual traffic jams brought about by random villain attacks, by the time Chitose reached Takoba beach, it's already almost half an hour after sundown and a significant number of business establishments have already gotten their Christmas lights and decorations active. She wasted no time and immediately headed towards the specific Internet-Manga café she saw yesterday.

It was a few-minute walk, a rather leisurely task, and she eventually reached it. By her luck, the entire establishment is only populated at around 30% of its maximum capacity, perfect for trying out another method of contacting the MLA – this time much more complicated and secure and certainly wouldn't be able to be figured out by someone just looking at her computer screen.

She hurriedly entered the building, and immediately announced her presence with a rather loud yelp as she accidentally bumped her head on the relatively low doorframe. Raising up a hand to rub the painful spot, she then eyed the way the entire entrance is designed, and only then she noticed that the horizontal stripe designs on top of the doorframe effectively fooled her into thinking that the door is taller.

'I should probably stop wearing heels…' she thought to herself as she walked towards the computers located in small cubicles intended for privacy purposes. On the other hand she could use the fully enclosed ones, but those normally require much more money than the standard ones, and she wants to save most of the coins given to her by Inko.

Reaching her favored area, she stopped a bit as she noticed odd coin-slots attached on the sides of the CPU cases of the computers in the shop. She stared at them in confusion, and only then a few seconds later she eventually remembered that modern computer shops all use the coin-slot payment method nowadays. She immediately raised an eyebrow on herself. How did she suddenly forget such a common modern thing? Is it because back in her younger years coin-operated computers in computer shops are not commonplace yet? And that memory is interrupting her current one?

Maybe?

'These stupid random memories are getting more and more annoying over time…'she thought as she gently pulled a chair from her chosen spot and sat on it. Pulling up her purse, she fished out a few coins and slotted them into the CPU coin slot in a grand total that would give her around one and a half hours maximum. Once the small screen beside the coin slot lit up and displayed a countdown timer, she pressed a blue button beside it to boot up the computer.

As the computer takes its time to ready up, Chitose leaned back a bit, pulling up her hands and resting them on her lap. A light fixture located just above her CPU case stylized to look like a wooden lantern soon caught her attention. Turning her head to the side, she discovered that there's an entire line of them, all adorned in Christmas decorations, with the shiny plastic leaves of the wreathes being lightly blown by the multiple overhead air conditioners creating a marvelous glittering effect.

Chitose then turned her attention to the overall aesthetics of the place. As with all Internet-Manga cafes doubling as a hotel, it has an inviting vibe to it, especially with its wooden theme. She continued looking around and eventually settled her gaze on the rows of cabinets just nearby stocked to the brim with various mangas. She stared at them for a moment, and was already thinking of going there a bit to read for a while when a light beep made her turn her head back to her computer screen.

Apparently the computer's been ready for minutes now, the beep is just a notification that its anti-virus just did a complete scan and found no threats.

Chitose discreetly looked around to see if anyone's looking at her. Seeing the coast is clear, she then leaned in and pulled out the keyboard tray. She would have been typing already if it weren't for her eyes suddenly locking onto the wallpaper of the computer, specifically towards an incredibly handsome bishounen-type anime character to the rightmost side of the screen.

The young woman found herself staring at the screen for a whole ten seconds before managing to snap herself out.

'… That was weird…'Chitose thought to herself as she once again had her eyes suddenly magnetized to it. She tried to avert it again, yet it was magnetized yet again. Getting attracted to 'pretty boys', whether real or not, is definitely a trait of her younger self, one of which she only grew out of around her mid-twenties.

'Hmmm… could it be that I'm currently below 25 right now? Maybe 20 or 21 which explains the college dreams?'

Taking one last look at the handsome anime character, Chitose got to work. She opened up a popular search engine and then clicked on the address bar, she then highlighted everything before hitting the delete key, clearing out everything. Now with the bar empty, she began typing out a series of letters, numbers, and dots, and then pressed the Enter key afterwards. The end result is a blank page with the words 'Error 404 Not Found' in the middle of the screen, but with the 0 a slightly different font from the rest.

She then double-clicked the center of the zero, followed by a double click on the middle of the word 'Found'. The moment she was done, a light click is heard from the speakers, followed by two faint beeps.

'I'm in…'

Chitose leaned her back onto her seat and mentally counted 10 seconds. By the time she reached 9, the 'd' on the 'Found' slightly changed its font to resemble the one used by the zero. Another quick beep is heard and then the words in the middle of the screen quickly changed to resemble a line of dots slowly getting longer every second on both sides.

Chitose instinctively nodded on what she saw. She has reached the 'loading screen' of the 'program'. By the time the dots reach the end of the screens, it will now attempt to connect to one of Skeptic's online networks, which will once again take up a few minutes.

Since it will still take a while to get there, she decided to minimize the webpage for a bit and go check up on her social media account on GlobalConnect in the meantime, on the thought that the army might have already tried to contact her there. Upon logging in, she was immediately greeted with her last post on the night of December 11, simply titled 'Here's to New Beginnings!'

It was a simple text-only post.

Chitose raised an eyebrow on that one particular post. It was just meant to be a reference on the upcoming MLA Revival Party on December 12, but indirectly referenced her current state as well. Could it be that a Genie-like Meta Ability heard it and made it come true? Farfetched and extremely stupid, but not entirely impossible, especially in a world of Metapowers.

She continued scrolling down, seeing more and more of her past posts. She was fully expecting some changes with her account or something was altered just like what happened to her bank accounts. But she was completely wrong. Everything is very much still intact.

Continuing on her scrolling, she eventually reached her first post of the year. It is just a random text-only post saying how much she loves herself and is happy being single. Compared to her other posts, that one had thousands of likes, a vast majority being from the other members of the Liberation Army.

Chitose took a deep breath and sighed. There is nothing absolutely true about that particular post. But at least everyone got fooled, right?

The young woman did another sigh before deciding to just stop looking at her older posts and just scroll back to the top of the page. Upon reaching the top, she immediately clicked on a small speech balloon icon on the top right side of the screen. It brought up a chatbox, displaying a sizeable amount of contacts.

Her eyes immediately widened as to what she saw. Not a single Liberation Army member, not even Re-Destro and the other high-ranking members, attempted to contact her all this time, not even send a single message. Scratching her head in confusion, Chitose refreshed the page and re-entered her account information, but nothing changed. She did it again the third time, and the fourth time, but it's still the same. Why did they not contact her? They couldn't have just forgotten about her, right? Maybe there are just network errors on her part?

Brushing off the thoughts, she then tweaked a few privacy settings and set up a temporary name of Blue Cheese. Afterwards, she searched up Izuku's account and sent a chat request, which got accepted within seconds of her sending it out. And just a few seconds later, there's already a message from him.

'Hey Kizuki! Nice Temp Name you got there! You know what it got me wondering, does blue cheese come from blue milk?' Izuku's message said, followed by multiple laughing emojis carefully aligned to make it look like they're trying to eat the cheese emoji in front of them. It got a light chuckle from Chitose, finding the entire thing cringy, but nonetheless funny. As she was about to reply she decided to check on the MLA network connection first. Seeing that it's still only halfway, she went back to the chatbox with Izuku and typed out a response.

'Yep. And blue milk comes from blue cows. Plenty of those in my home planet."

'LOL. Oh and by the way, Mom told me to ask you if you arrived there safe. So did you arrive there safe?'

'Yes, why?'

'Nothing.'

'What's for dinner?' Chitose typed, quickly glancing over to the 'MLA Contacts' loading screen a bit before quickly minimizing it.

'Don't tell her I told you but Mom's planning a surprise visit there in thirty minutes. She said something about all of us eating out at a nearby Sukiya restaurant.'

'?' Chitose leaned back on her seat, one raised eyebrow. 'Why? Is there a special occasion?'

'She said she's worried about you being lonely this Christmas. And then there's that whole fiasco about your mother and the bank account going empty. She thinks you need a little more emotional support this coming holiday.'

'Okay…?' Chitose raised an eyebrow as she typed, not knowing what to feel about the generosity. Normally, when people are oddly becoming nice, it only means they want something from her. It's always the case starting from her gradeschool years all the way until now. Never once it was any different.

She stared at her response for a few seconds, thinking about what the Midoriyas could be planning to ask her. Do they need more money? It's fine, she can whip out full essays within minutes anyways. Is Inko panning to ask her to train Izuku some more? It's fine too, that means more time to study Izuku's Conjoined Quirks, despite how underwhelming they are.

She was about to flat out just ask Izuku what do they want from her until a series of soft beeps emanated from the computer speakers, signifying that the connection to Skeptic's network is now complete.

Chitose hurriedly signed out from her GlobalConnect account and immediately opened the other webpage. It's now a blank white screen, the 404 Error no longer present. Everything is ready, and the only thing that she needs to do now is click the bottom right corner of the screen, directly on the invisible button that would signal that it was 'Curious' who's trying to connect.

It didn't take long before a chatbox appeared on the top left of the screen. 'Who is this?' it asked in a font that only Skeptic is allowed to use.

'It's me, Curious.' She typed back, her message automatically being assigned with her font.

'Nice try. In case you don't know, the person you're trying to impersonate has long since turned into a hilariously funny glop of tomato paste.'

Chitose raised one eyebrow, unsure what to feel about the way Skeptic said something about the 'hilariously funny tomato paste'. She was about to type in a response when another message came in. 'I know where you are.' It said in a threatening shaky font.

'Skeptic, it's me, stop fooling around.' Chitose typed back before looking at the icons of the chatbox, hoping to find something that could allow her to attach files, but found none. 'Where's the army? Where is everyone? What about the League? What happened to the Revival Party? I fell onto the road after levitated by Toga and then woke up in a ditch, and then the next thing I know I'm twenty years younger and everyone's gone. And then there's an illusion dome around Deika. And I can't contact anyone and now my bank account is empty. Is there a plan I'm not aware of?'

'Hmmm… you do sound like Curious. Hold on, I'll send a file, double-click that and it'll automatically install software on your computer to allow me to use your webcam.'

'You figured out that I'm Curious just with what I typed in? You're not even going to ask what am I doing in an Internet-Manga café in Musutafu? Where are you people? Where's the League?'

Skeptic didn't answer, and instead sent a file, which Chitose quickly double-clicked. After a quick installation, a black square appeared on the chatbox, and then turned into a view of the ceiling a few seconds later. The webcam is finally on.

Chitose didn't waste time and immediately swiveled it downwards and faced it directly on her, but not before taking off her face mask and sunglasses first.

'…' came Skeptic's response, followed by, 'It worked…'

'What worked? The Fountain of Youth? You know what happened to me?' Chitose typed in, slightly wondering how come Skeptic didn't even ask about her facial injuries.

'I was talking about an experiment I did when I was in highschool, idiot. You're getting more and more narcissistic as time goes on.'

Chitose raised an eyebrow after seeing the response. What part of her text made her narcissistic? 'Skeptic, if I was a narcissist, then I wouldn't be the top donator to the Liberation cause, wouldn't I? So what happened to me, why am I younger? You seem like you're not even weirded out by it, do you know what happened to me?'

'I may be the most perfect person around, but I'm not the one who has the answers this time.'

'Where's Re-Destro? Is he okay? What happened to his leg?'

'Re-Destro is fine.'

'Also why am I listed as dead on the news? And why is my photo the same one as when me and Trumpet faced the League? Your cameras are the only ones aiming at my direction at the time. Also why is my bank account empty?'

'Perceptive as always, Curious. But we're currently in a meeting right now and I'm afraid we have to get this one cut short. I have your location, where do you suggest pick-up?'

'Perceptive? You're not really the tiniest bit surprised I'm suddenly 20 years old again? In fact I'm even getting these weird habits from back then like I'm now really back to being 20!'

'You're still as hideous as ever, Curious. Your age-regression did nothing to that. In my humble opinion, you still look significantly more pleasing as splattered tomato paste. I also preferred you stayed that way, but as it turned out it's not the case.'

'Thanks for the compliment,' Chitose rolled her eyes, half-wondering what's up with Skeptic's sudden obsession with tomato paste, 'I haven't heard that one before.'

'We're going by speedboat. We'll be able to pick you up by tomorrow evening.'

Chitose paused for a bit, instantly wondering about the odd choice of transport. 'Is the army at one of the island resorts? Why the speedboat? Why not by car or helicopter?'

'Yes.'

'Yes what?'

'I'm going to have you picked up by speedboat. Pick a place in Takoba beach where you want to get picked up. In case your brain got fried from whatever happened to you, pick a place where you could be easily seen.'

'There's a pile of rusted trailers on the eastern side of the beach, near the lighthouse. They're the only pile there, you can't miss them.'

'Goodbye.'

And with that, Skeptic signed out, and the chatbox immediately closed on its own. Chitose tried to regain contact with him again, but no matter how many times she tried and waited, she somehow just can't connect to the network anymore.

"Hmmph… at least I'm finally getting picked up now," she whispered to herself as she stared at the blank screen, waiting for yet another one of her attempts to connect. But just like her attempts earlier, it once again ended in failure. She was about to try again when she suddenly heard a series of soft beeps from her speakers that sounded as if she received a notification.

Raising one eyebrow, she opened up her GlobalConnect account again. It's only then she noticed she forgot to use the newly-implemented secondary log-out feature, and because of that her account is still temporarily active in the next few minutes after closing.

There was a message from Izuku. 'Spoiler Alert! We're already halfway there! Got any news on your quest to go home?'

'As a matter of fact I did. I finally managed to connect with some folks!' Chitose paused for a bit, thinking of a good excuse just to hide her real goals. 'They said they finally arranged the most competent lawyers in the country and they're ready to do rich people things!'

'So you're leaving? When?'

'Tomorrow evening.'

'I guess this is goodbye then?'

'Yep.'

'By the way we're almost at Cybersleuths, you may want to greet us here or else she's gonna make a scene. You know who.'

Chitose just typed in a laughing emoji as a response before logging out. And with that, she closed the webpage, and went back to the desktop screen, once again finding her eyes automatically locking onto that one handsome anime character on the right side. The staring persisted for quite a few minutes as Chitose pondered whether to continue browsing the internet.

But since she's done contacting the MLA anyways, and she doesn't want to risk getting embarrassed in whatever scene Inko is going to make (if ever what her son told about her is right), she decided to just shut down the computer, even if there are still minutes left in it.

But not before once again taking a minute-long stare towards the very attractive anime character that's part of the desktop background.

Exiting the establishment after putting her disguise back on, Chitose immediately made her way across the street and positioned herself under a street lamp. It wont' be long now until the Midoriyas arrive, might as well place herself in some place where she's more easily seen. As she waited, she couldn't help but notice that there are now more Christmas lights and decorations scattered about as compared to when she just arrived earlier, with more of their combined lights and holiday aura figuratively lighting up the otherwise dull scenery.

'I wonder why Skeptic's such in a hurry…' a random thought entered Chitose's mind as she silently swayed back and forth, observing the holiday decorations around her. 'Did something also happen to him? Did he get younger too? What about the rest of the Liberation Army, did everyone turn back to their twenties?' she continued dwelling in her thoughts, not minding the cold winter wind. But the main thing that stuck in her mind is the speedboat Skeptic told her about. Why speedboat? Why choose an odd mode of transport over more practical ones like cars and aircraft? Is it because she's near Takoba beach? It simply didn't make sense. Furthermore, there are two island resorts within the property list of the MLA, what does going to a private island resort had to do with the Liberation, especially at this time? Shouldn't everyone be at the Gunga Mountain Villa? Planning for the next Liberation phase?

'Are they waiting for me to arrive? But Skeptic should've said that…'

Chitose stood where she is, now motionless and confused. A whole lot of things just didn't make any sense. But that's okay, she's going home now. She'll finally know what's going on. Hopefully it's not too serious.

Hopefully they can bring her back to her original age.

She was about to wander in her thoughts again when the sounds of approaching footsteps caught her attention and made her look to her right. And there they are, the Midoriyas, both wearing winter clothing – with Izuku unusually wearing almost double than that of his mother, with an added bonnet and winter ear muffs on his head. And sure enough, based on the disappointed look on Inko's face, it looks like the mother did in fact plan something.

Taking one last glance on the specific cubicle she occupied earlier, still visible from the glass windows of the establishment, Chitose walked off to join her temporary acquaintances (or at least what she thinks are her temporary acquaintances). She was about to say something when Inko raised a hand and spoke first. "This surprise would have been much better if it weren't for some people hellbent on taking out all the fun!" she said, accompanied with a slightly-exaggerated cartoonish staring towards her son, who immediately backed off one step and whistled like nothing happened.

"That's okay, Ms. Midoriya, I'm really not into loud surprises anyway."

"It's not just gonna be a loud surprise, Kizuki…" Izuku muttered before instantly being told once again by his mother about how there is nothing to be embarrassed about her singing voice. The two then went back and forth for a whole minute in a massive debate whether singing should only be done by people with magnificent voices or not, only stopping after Chitose raised a hand.

"Uh… are we really eating out? I kinda didn't really bring any money-"

"My treat!" Inko immediately straightened herself and gestured for the young woman to follow her. "You've done so much for us, Kizuki, it's only the right thing to return the favor. And before you ask, no, this is not the same money you earned us."

"You know, compared to the few other guys Mom took in, I gotta say you're the best," Izuku said with a light nod. "Also you should probably stop wearing high heels, not a lot of air in the Stratosphere ya'know?"

Chitose couldn't help but shake her head, a smile tugging on her lips. While yes the joke is once again cringy, she still found it funny.

And also inexplicably heartwarming.

"Izuku, let the girl wear what she wants to wear!" Inko said in a joking tone before gesturing once more towards the two to follow her. "Let's hope Sukiya's not too full yet."

Chitose simply nodded in response and started following along, with Izuku walking closely beside her. It was a rather cold night, far colder than what she's normally expecting despite being in Central Japan. Has it always been this cold or she's just too used to the concrete jungles of Tokyo and its heat-retaining traits?

'I could really use a vacation-'

"Hey uh, Kizuki," Izuku softly muttered, his voice stuttering from the cold. "I haven't told Mom about the whole 'leaving' thing. I think you should be the one to tell her about it. Quick tip though, if you don't want the entire restaurant staring at us, try to wait until we get home before you drop the bomb."

"Your Mom's gonna make a scene?"

"She tends to get attached easily. She said she's been like that ever since Dad left, or so she told me," Izuku said, shrugging a little afterwards. "I dunno really."

Chitose nodded, half-wondering and half-feeling relieved she didn't spontaneously go reporter-mode and go rudely ask about it. "Hey Midoriya, you said your Mom took in other 'guests' right? How are they?" she asked as she shoved her hands within the pockets of her jacket.

Izuku shrugged. "Well they're mostly just okay-ish," he said, his face looking a little unsure. "One of them was also badly beaten up like you are. Either way all of them just stayed overnight and left as soon as possible. And that's it. We never heard of them again after that."

"Hmmm… so how am I as a guest?"

"You're pretty good, Kizuki. I'm quite surprised to be honest. For a daughter of a millionaire, you don't seem to be the stereotypical snobby rich kid I see too often at UA. I wish more rich folk would be like you," Izuku said with a smile, despite stuttering multiple times as he shivered form the cold. "The world would be a whole lot better place if that's the case."

Chitose was about to nod, but there's just something about the entire way Izuku's smile framed his freckled face that made her go the other way and say, "you're adorable, you know that?" instead.

"Yyyyeah… I get that a lot." Izuku's face slightly turned red and he looked away. "P-people always tell me I could pass off as someone who's five years younger."

"By the degree of the pinchable-ness of your cheeks, I say you could pass off as a five year old and no one would notice," Chitose said, trying her best not to chuckle at her own cringy joke. But either way, Izuku does have youthful-looking features that effectively halves his physical age. She was about to ask him why is he wearing almost twice the winter clothing than that of his mother when Inko suddenly turned around.

"You think my son is adorable, Miss Kizuki?"

Chitose almost jumped back in surprise. "Uuhh… it's a-"

"Mom… now's not the time for that…" Izuku muttered, at the same time making an exaggerated facepalm gesture. "I'm hungry…"

Inko simply giggled to herself and continued walking in front. "I'm just asking. Besides, any compliment my son receives indirectly applies to me anyways."

"Same goes with criticism…" Izuku muttered sarcastically, to which his mother just replied back with a story about how she used to turn heads back when she was in highschool, and how her son should appreciate being born with an adorable mother and shared her features.

"How about you, Kizuki, have you been turning heads lately?" Inko asked, deliberately ramping up her voice to block Izuku's retort about how most her story are just straight-up lies, especially the 'adorable' part.

"Nah, not really. Girls don't normally come in a random mismatch of colors after all," she said with a light shrug, deliberately making up a stupid excuse instead of just telling the truth that the only times she ever turned heads are with people noticing how ugly she is.

"Not to be rude but is the whole 'mismatched colors' thing because of genetics or just coincidence?" Izuku suddenly asked as he continued to shiver from the cold. "Also now that I think of it, is there a hidden genetic rule that makes girls with colored skin to have hair in the same hue?"

"There's a whole study of it by Professor Katagawa of Kyoto University. Long story short, there is indeed a genetic rule. In my case, my colors are just the result of messed-up genes. Completely harmless."

"Have you seen anyone with different colorations like you have? Aside from your mother?"

Chitose shook her head. "No, not really. Like you said, all the colored girls I saw have basically the same colors for their skin and hair."

"Could your unusual colors be connected to your strange insides?" Izuku asked, genuinely curious. "Any idea if you're also a one-of-a-kind person like I am with my Conjoined Quirks?"

"Maybe?" Chitose shrugged. For the longest time she never really found any answers to her strange coloration and odd internal mutations. But could it be just a rare case just like Izuku's Conjoined Quirks? An oddity never seen before? Could she be hiding something still undiscovered? "Maybe," she repeated.

"Hmmm… so we're both one-of-a-kind then," Izuku said, nodding profusely and muttering something. "You really are something huh, Kizuki? Who knows, maybe you do have a Quirk and you just don't know it?"

"Maybe, Midoriya, maybe…" Chitose nodded and continued to walk. As they continued on their trip, she couldn't help but notice that Izuku's shivering has intensified despite his already thick clothing, she was about to ask a question about it when Inko suddenly stopped, gesturing towards a particular street lamp up ahead. It took a while for the young woman to notice that the 'gesturing' is apparently Inko pointing at the restaurant right across the street.

'Sukiya' Chitose thought to herself, seeing that rather simplistic logo of the restaurant plastered on a signboard on its roof. The overall aesthetic of the restaurant itself is quite plain, a design choice of the founder. And like all Sukiya restaurants during the December months, there's a rotating Christmas tree placed just right outside the entrance.

"You guys don't get KFC chicken buckets for Christmas?" Chitose asked, eyes lingering onto the small ceramic cow functioning as the star on top of the rotating Christmas tree as the three of them walked towards it.

"We tried last year," Izuku spoke out, immediately moving towards the door of the restaurant. "I literally had to wait 5 hours! Imagine that? At least this one's got good Katsudon so-" he didn't finish and he immediately went inside.

"Being the daughter of a high-ranking executive I bet you always had chicken buckets for Christmas," Inko said as she walked one step in front of the younger woman. "Let's go, I hope you're hungry."

Chitose silently followed, deciding not to respond anymore. In reality she haven't really tried them yet on fear of becoming out of shape, and she knows her figure is the only she has going for her, physical appearance wise. She was about to enter through the doorway when she instinctively ducked, seeing the familiar horizontal stripes on the top-most part of the doorway just like the ones at Cybersleuth. But unlike at Cybersleuth's, the horizontal stripes are part of the door decoration, and there's no low-hanging doorway to duck from in the first place.

Chitose hurriedly looked around, checking if ever anyone saw her suddenly ducking. Luckily for her no one saw it. But if there's one thing that stood out from her sudden checking , and that is the restaurant is actually in fact quite empty despite the view from outside. People just mostly sat on the seats closest to the huge glass windows lining the sides of the building.

Raising an eyebrow at the odd sight, Chitose naturally wondered as to why that is, and was only stopped when she saw Izuku standing next to the only vacant seats that's beside the window, discreetly waving at them. And with that, off she went, with the mother trailing behind her.

As she walked she noticed a few odd glances here and there, in which she just brushed off as people just wondering as to why she is wearing sunglasses and a face mask inside a restaurant at night. But as long as no one there recognizes her as being suspiciously similar to the Shoowaysha executive that supposedly died a few days ago, everything's fine.

She eventually reached the seats Izuku picked and sat next to him. "Should I sit here or should I sit-"

"Kizuki, I'm giving you the permission to sit next to my adorable son," Inko said right after she arrived. But before Izuku could retaliate for being called adorable, she immediately spoke again about ordering beef bowls for the two of them and Katsudon for her son, before quickly leaving.

It was only then Chitose noticed that the restaurant doesn't have waiters to take orders. Instead, people are lining up at a counter and appear to be placing orders to the person manning it.

"Psst, hey Midoriya, look at them," Chitose hurriedly tapped Izuku's back, who responded with a sarcastic muttering about how he's not adorable and people should stop calling him that, and discreetly pointed at the line of people placing orders. "So instead of waiters, people line up there to place orders there instead? And only then a waiter brings food to us?"

"You've never been in these places before…? Not all restaurants have waiters you know…?"

Chitose blanked out for a bit, and eventually returned her gaze to observe the strange way people order things. Back in her younger days, she was far too poor to even afford going at standard restaurants, and just ate at the school canteens and food stalls. And almost the instant she was recommended by Re-Destro and got a job at Shoowaysha, she was immediately earning too much to allow her to go to higher-end restaurants consistently. She never really experienced what's between the edges.

"That's amazing…" she whispered just loud enough for Izuku to hear. "I never knew about this."

"Sometimes I don't really get the rich folk…"

Chitose lightly nodded, a reflex she developed over the years whenever people nearby are talking and she's not listening. "Hey Midoriya, how come you're twice as covered-" she didn't get to finish as Inko suddenly reappeared, with a young man in uniform right behind her carrying a tray containing three porcelain bowls and glasses filled with tea.

As what she expected, the man put down their food in front of them and immediately left after a small bow and a quote about enjoying the meal.

"So how's it going?" Inko said as she sat down on the other side of the table.

"Kizuki's having a "culture" shock right now," Izuku muttered as he took off his ear muffs and slung it over the back of his neck before reaching over and grabbing the Katsudon bowl positioned right in front of him. "Rich people do live on a different scale huh?"

"Midoriya, it's not culture shock, it's just…" Chitose's voice trailed off, thinking of a better word.

"Culture shock," Izuku butted in, snickering slightly. "You're shocked about our 'culture' here."

"No, that's not it."

"Yes it is." Izuku snickered again. "Culture shock."

"Midoriya if you don't shut up I'm gonna call you adorable for the rest of the evening," Chitose said with a stern expression, instantly silencing the young man, who instead immediately muttered something incomprehensible before getting a spoonful of his food. He muttered again afterwards about how he hates having freckles. And another one about hating having big round eyes. And yet another one about hating having both freckles and big round eyes.

"My son gets easily flustered whenever he gets called cute by girls," Inko said, making a face like she's just barely hanging on from telling a joke. "Happens all the time."

"I'm not flustered. I'm… I'm uh… I'm just mad," came the reply from the clearly-annoyed son. "I'm burning with madness, seriously."

Chitose lightly shrugged at the exchange, and set her eyes onto her bowl as both the mother and son continued to argue. It was a simple beef bowl, but the main thing that caught her attention is that, compared to the bowls of both Izuku and Inko, hers has significantly more garlic bits.

It may just be a minor thing but she was stunned that Izuku actually remembered, and then told his mother about it. Despite being in the MLA and Shoowaysha for so long, no one has ever bothered to remember actual minor details about her. The small act alone felt vastly different and otherworldly for reasons she can't explain.

She stared at her food for a few more seconds as she was overwhelmed with a strange heartwarming feeling, before eventually shaking it off. "Um, Miss Midoriya?" she suddenly asked, instantly stopping the bickering of the two.

"Yes?"

"I've managed to make contact with the guys back home. I'll be leaving tomorrow evening."

Notes:

Yep! Here comes Skeptic and his tomato paste again!

...

So a little story for anyone noticing this fic's similarities with my (now-discontinued) MVA fic:

I didn't like how MVA turned out, it had too many prominent characters and it's already over 30 chapters and the plot barely moved, so instead of continuing it I just made another one with only one main character. And since I already planned too much stuff on MVA and don't want them to go to waste, I just put them here.