DISCLAIMER: I do not own My Hero Academia. If I did, you best believe what happened in the manga recently, and most of the plot as we know it, wouldn't have happened. This work is not for profit, but for my own fun and creative fulfillment. I do however own the OCs used in this fic, sorta?

Originally Written: May 2021

The rest of the day was a bit of a blur for Tenya. He could vaguely recall Midoriya helping him to his dorm room, changing him into pajamas, and putting him to bed but everything after that was a bit of a blur. All the crying and the high emotion of the morning must have drained Tenya more than he thought he did. His eyes fluttered open and he looked around the room.

If the sunlight peeking through the drawn curtains was any indication, it was around mid-afternoon now. He fumbled around his bedside table as he tried to find his glasses. Midoriya must have taken them off and put them somewhere different when he put him to bed.

His dorm room door opening halted his search for the moment. Turning slightly, he looked to see a multitude of blurs walking into the room. The combination of the dark and his horrible vision made it difficult to figure out who was who, but he could make guesses.

"Oh!" exclaimed Uraraka softly. "You're awake!"

Tsu croaked, "How are you doing-ribbit?"

Tenya blushed slightly, "I'd be better if I could find my glasses."

"Oh!" said Midoriya embarrassedly before setting them into his hands. "Sorry! I placed them kind of out of reach didn't I?"

As Tenya put his glasses on, he looked to see his friends already making themselves comfortable in his dorm room by going to their usual spots. Yaoyorozu was sitting with Tenya on the bed, Uraraka and Tsu sat themselves down in front of the bookshelf, Todoroki went to the desk, and Midoriya just sort of wandered around the middle due to his boundless energy.

"Are you okay Iida?" asked Todoroki. "Midoriya didn't tell us much other than he had taken you to your room because you weren't doing well."

Tenya turned to Midoriya, "How many people saw?"

Midoriya shook his head frantically, "No one! Kacchan and his friends were in his room doing some studying. Hagakure and Ojiro were in the gym training. Aoyama is out cheese shopping. Koda and Sato and Tokoyami and Shoji are out on a double date."

"What about Mineta?" asked Tenya. He wanted to cover all of his bases before he talked about it.

Uraraka and Tsu cackled evilly before Uraraka said, "He's probably still trying to get out of the dumpster we threw him in last night."

"You did what?" asked Tenya. While he loathed Mineta as anyone else with a brain would, he couldn't allow such behavior as the Class Representative. "You shouldn't disrespect a classmate like that!"

"He was crawling underneath the tables trying to look up the girls' skirts," said Todoroki dully.

Tenya nodded, "I suppose I can let this slide."

Uraraka waved her hand in the air, "Enough with the grapist! What's going on with you? Are you sick?"

"I wish," muttered Tenya, shaking his head slightly. He knew he should have been hesitant to talk about this. He had been raised with the fact that you kept family drama within the family in order to close ranks and keep the reputation from being damaged, but Tenya found he didn't care anymore. It was because of that reputation that his mom had been forced out of town. If anything, he wanted to scream what he had learned from every rooftop in the city.

"Did something happen at your parents' house?" asked Yaoyorozu, putting a reassuring hand on his shoulder.

"Grandparents."

Yaoyorozu's eyebrows narrowed in confusion, "You went to visit your grandparents instead? But aren't they both dead?"

Tenya shook his head and grabbed the picture on his bedside table, "Do you guys remember the picture that fell out of the blazer pocket when we were dressing Midoriya for his date?

Midoriya nodded, "Yeah. It was you at the hospital after being born. What about it?"

"I had spent all week being confused about the picture. The woman in the picture looked nothing like my mother and the age wasn't matching up with the knowledge I had in my head. So I went home to find out more information."

"What happened?" asked Tsu, curiosity leaking into her usual monotone voice.

"They told me that the girl in the picture is my real mother. The people I had thought to be my parents are really my grandparents."

Uraraka's eyebrows rose in shock, "Wait really? If they're your grandparents, then that means your brother is…"

"My father," finished Tenya.

"Oh my," said Yayorozu, eyes widening in shock. "How are you handling all this Iida?"

Midoriya added, "You don't have to tell us anything if you don't want to. You need time to process this after all."

"Have you spoken to Tensei about this?" asked Todoroki.

Tenya shook his head, "It's fine everyone. If I'm being honest, I'm feeling rather unsure right now. The shock has worn off, but I feel as if I just want answers right now before I really unpack how I feel."

"But how are you feeling now?" asked Tsu. "If you don't address these feelings now, they'll only get worse."

Todoroki nodded, "Why don't you start with telling us a bit more about the situation?"

"If you're comfortable of course," added Midoriya, frantically looking around the room nervously. Tenya chuckled. Midoriya was always trying to make sure that every person in their friend group was comfortable and never felt forced to share anything they didn't want to.

"It's fine Midoriya," sighed Tenya as he rubbed his hands together nervously. He recounted the story his grandparents had told him to his friends. He couldn't look up at them as he talked. He knew if he saw their sympathetic faces, he might break down into another crying fit. It was hard enough telling the story about how his family hadn't even wanted him at first without seeing sorrowful faces around him. When he finished, he looked up to see his friends staring back at him with sympathetic and horrified faces.

"Pardon me if this seems rude to those of you who are wealthy," started Uraraka, hatred filling her voice. "But fuck rich people."

"None taken Uraraka," agreed Yaoyorozu. "That is truly despicable. But also unsurprising."

Todoroki nodded, "Those of a higher social class are more likely to turn their cheek to things that cause waves."

"What are you going to do?" asked Midoriya. "Have you heard from your...father yet?"

Tenya shook his head, "I can't look at my phone. I know I'll see messages from them trying to take back what they said. I know it's not respectful, but I just can't get over hearing them say those words to me."

Tsu put a finger to her lips, "I'd argue cutting someone out of your life who called you an unwanted fetus and kicking your mother out of town is quite warranted-ribbit."

"Mm," agreed Todoroki. "I haven't spoken to my father in months."

Tenya shook his head, "I just can't get what he said out of my head. If I hadn't been dropped off at their door, they wouldn't have taken me in. They didn't care about me at all. If my mother hadn't made that choice, my life would have been completely different...and they wouldn't have cared."

Yaoyorozu put a hand on Tenya's shoulder, "You can't go down that path Iida. First, the situation was out of your control. You were a baby. If you start thinking about what could have been done differently, you'll stop growing and be consumed by the anxiety."

Tenya caught Todoroki smiling proudly at Yaoyorozu from the corner of his eye. Tenya suspected that his friend had had a crush on the girl for a while, but was too socially awkward to do anything about it, but he shared his friend's sentiment. It was great to see his fellow class representative have such confidence after the self-doubt she had experienced last year.

Before Tenya could respond, a knocking at the door pulled the group of the little world they tended to become absorbed in when they were together. Since he was the only one up and walking around, Midoriya opened it and was slightly shocked to see who it was.

"Kacchan! Iida!" exclaimed Midoriya nervously. "W-what are you doing here?"

Tenya's eyes widened as he saw Tensei in his wheelchair in the hallway with Bakugou holding the handles. The feisty blonde didn't seem as irritated as he normally did. Tensei caught Tenya's eyes, but Tenya looked away. He still wasn't sure what he felt yet.

"Older Four Eyes showed up demanding to see Younger Four Eyes," huffed Bakugou. "I was coming anyway to get shitty Deku so it made sense to take him here."

Midoriya smiled at his boyfriend, "Aw is Kacchan mad his love cuddles got cut short?"

"Fuck off shitty Deku of course not," growled Katsuki, the tips of his ears turning pink being a dead giveaway that the blonde was lying.

"It's okay Kacchan," cooed Midoriya softly. "We can go to your room and cuddle."

"Would it be alright if you gave us some space?" asked Tensei politely, ignoring the flirting.

Tenya's friends nodded and began to clear out as Tensei wheeled himself into Tenya's room, closing the door behind him. Tenya became very aware of the empty space between the two of them as he wheeled himself over to Tenya's bedside. Tenya became very fascinated with the comforter that was in need of a good wash.

"So you know now," started Tensei. Tenya could hear in Tensei's voice the awkwardness that he was feeling.

Tenya nodded without looking up at Tensei. The two men sat in awkward silence. Tenya could hear Tensei open and close his mouth a couple of times, as if he was unsure where to begin. Tenya sat there, not sure whether he should be the one to initiate contact or if Tensei should be the one to do it.

"I think," started Tensei with a deep sigh. "That I should tell you my side of the story. I'm sure you heard a very biased and harsh version of events?"

Tenya nodded in agreement. He found himself unable to say a thing. While he may be sixteen years old, he'd never felt more like a scared little kid than in that moment. Tenya also knew that if he said anything, he would start bawling.

Tensei nodded, "Once I finish, I'll answer any questions you may have for me and we can figure out where to go from here? Does that sound good Tenya?"

Tenya nodded once more without looking up to meet Tensei's face.

"When I first started middle school, I was a lot like you. I was a stickler for the rules, I didn't tolerate goofing off or nonsense, and I listened to everything my parents and authority figures told me to do. The perfect Iida child everyone wanted me to be. But one day near the beginning of my first year, a new girl transferred into my class. She was unlike anything I had ever seen or been before. She was opinionated, loud, passionate, and didn't seem to care what others thought about her. She made a group of friends fairly quickly. I used to watch them laugh and tease each other from where I sat in the cafeteria during lunch. I had never seen such unbridled joy. I remember thinking to myself, didn't they care if people looked down on them or thought they were crass?

One day, she caught me looking at her and waved me over. I was awkward and incredibly uncomfortable about the whole thing. Here was this fierce girl who burned so bright, and I was just this gangly rich kid with the weight of an entire family's expectations on my shoulders. I asked her why she wanted to talk to me, and she said that I looked lonely. We started hanging out more after that, and she took me to all sorts of places. I slowly integrated myself into her friend group and I began to develop a personality of my own outside of the expectations placed upon me.

During this time, I began to get incredibly disillusioned with the path my family had set in place for me. Just because I had Engine, that didn't mean that I wanted to or had to be a Pro Hero. She pointed out to me that it was unfair of my family to force a destiny on me that I might not want. I should be able to choose the path I wanted outside of being an Iida. This didn't make my parents happy. As we got into the start of our second year, we did indeed do some of the things that they probably told you about. We snuck into nightclubs, I skipped out on the curfew my parents put in place for me, but they didn't mention the other things we did."

"What were they?" asked Tenya, curiosity peaked.

"We would go to Quirkless Rights rallies and parties. We'd go door to door trying to raise money for homeless Quirkless kids so they could get shelter and the proper care that they needed."

"Why?" asked Tenya, looking up at Tensei for the first time since he had come in. He could feel his eyebrows furrowing as he took in Tensei's face, no doubt lost in thought at the years of memories.

"My parents left some key parts out of their telling of the story," growled Tensei. "That girl who you can probably guess is your mother, Aino Reika, was diagnosed as Quirkless. Her mother was quirkless and her dad's Quirk was something that had to do with pulling zippers I think. She wanted to try to make the world a better place for those like herself. When we would hang out with just the two of us, she'd tell me stories about the bullying male Quirkless kids received because of it and how she'd be treated as a fragile glass flower that needed protection because she was a girl. It made me mad. Reika was one of the strongest people I knew, and the fact that people thought as much got under my skin. One of the few times I brought her over to our house, I could see the judgement in my mother's eyes when she saw the Quirkless Rights shirt that she had on."

Tenya's eyebrows shot up, "Wait. Are my...grandparents...Quirkist?"

Tensei scoffed, "The amount of times I heard them complain about Quirkless Rights activism when I was growing up should give you an idea of what their views are like. I didn't agree with their sentiments of course. It's why I always did my best to support Quirkless Rights activism when I was an active Pro Hero. Anyways, Reika and I began to get very close during our second year. We began to hang out separately away from the group and soon that turned to more. It consumed me. One thing led to another and well...she told me in December that she was pregnant. I'll be honest and say that I was scared. She also told me that she wanted to keep the baby. That scared me more. What fourteen year old boy wouldn't be? Becoming a parent when I myself was still a child? But once I got over that, I knew what I had to do. I would take responsibility for my actions and do my best to provide for my girlfriend and our child. I'd start working as soon as I possibly could in order to pay for things that she needed. I told as much to her parents, who I expected to throttle me for getting their daughter pregnant, and they explained to me that while they weren't happy with the choices that we made they were happy that I was taking responsibility for my actions and that they could see how much I loved her.

I wasn't expecting things to go well with my family at all. I wasn't kidding myself into thinking that they'd go along with my plans. When we told them, I thought my father was going to have a heart attack right on the spot. They started yelling at us. They called me a disrespectful brat who had no care for legacy or what our family had built. They called her a trashy gold digging whore trying to make up for her Quirkless status and her poor family. I almost punched my dad on the spot when he said that to Reika. Once the anger stopped, they told me there was no way they would let me abandon becoming a Hero and work to support the baby. At first, they tried pushing for the idea of her getting an abortion and being done with it all. Reika pushed back against that and said she wasn't going to let two assholes decide what to do with her body. So instead, they issued the ultimatum that they told you about. I was horrified and heartbroken. I didn't want to be away from her and I wanted to meet my child so badly. But at the same time, they were threatening to ruin Reika and her family. I couldn't let that happen to one of the best things in my life. So we agreed to their turns and that was the last night I ever saw her."

Tenya could feel his heart breaking in his chest and whispered softly as tears began to stream down his face, "They wanted to abort me? They told me that they would never do something like that to a girl."

"I'm sorry you had to hear the truth, Tenya. That's something no child should ever have to hear. They were probably trying to make themselves look better in the hopes that you would be as mad," said Tensei. He looked like he wanted to comfort Tenya but was too scared to initiate contact.

"What happened next?" asked Tenya, voice thick as he tried to restrain his tears with all his might.

"Probably things you can imagine. My parents forced me to stay with my grandparents. They weren't nearly as harsh about the whole thing as my parents were ironically. If anything, they were sad they wouldn't get to see the baby. But they told me something that's stuck with me to this day. They said the best thing I could do now was become a hero that my child could look up to, even if I wasn't in their lives. I used that as my motivation to become a hero. I cleaned up my act so my parents wouldn't find anything to bitch about, but I never lost the charm that Reika brought into my life."

Tenya looked up at Tensei through his teary eyes, "Y-y-you became a Pro Hero for me?"

"Of course," smiled Tensei. "I wanted to become a man that you would be proud of. But anyways, sometime into the second semester of my third year of middle school, the doorbell to the estate went off while we were eating a family breakfast before I went off to train for the UA entrance exam. The staff were given the day off that day, so I went to see who it was. By the time I made it to the front door, whoever had rang it was gone and all that was left was a baby wrapped in a blue blanket in a basket. There was a folded up piece of paper with your name, birthday, and a message to give you the chances she never could as well as a picture after you were born but I didn't care about any of that. I picked you up and held you in my arms. You were napping at the time, but I was just so happy. You were so small and innocent. To be honest, part of me was afraid I'd hurt you or crush you due to how big I was getting. I was so focused on you I didn't hear my parents coming in. Father almost started yelling and woke you up, but I glared at him to be quiet. Now that you were in my arms, there was nothing anyone could do that would take you away from me.

Once they got over the shock, it was my mother who suggested they'd pass you off as a second child. I was furious at the idea of keeping it a secret, but I swallowed my pain because I knew if I didn't agree they'd probably send you to an orphanage or something. And then you know the rest. I'm happy to answer any questions you have."

Tenya nodded as he mulled over his brother's story. It hurt that his grandparents didn't seem to care about his existence at all, but the love in Tensei's voice more than made up for it.

"Were you going to tell me?" asked Tenya, voice hesitant and unsure and thick with tears.

Tensei chuckled sadly and began to tear up as well, "I don't think there's been a day since you arrived on my doorstep that I haven't wanted to pull you into my arms and tell you everything. Every time I saw you call my grandparents your parents felt like a dagger to the heart. I hated them for what they did, but you loved them so I learned to hide it well. If it were up to me, you'd have always known. I never cared about the tabloids or the Hero Rankings. I just wanted my son."

Tenya could feel tears running down his cheeks, "Have you reached out to her? To Aino?"

"I tried a couple times in the beginning and a couple more after you were here," started Tensei. "But she changed her number and none of our shared friends knew her new one or where she went. I've tried looking a few times, but I haven't been able to find her."

Tenya nodded. Mentally storing that piece of information away to handle at a later date, he knew what he had to do next. But a question from Tensei pulled him out of his thoughts.

"So where do you want to go from here? If you want to go back to the way things were, that's totally fine and you can keep calling me your brother. I'd totally get if you're angry at me for keeping this from yo-" started Tensei through his tears before Tenya interrupted.

"NO! You've always been more of a parent to me then they are or ever were. You've been the person I've looked up to and wanted to be like my entire life. I could never be mad at you for something that was out of your control. I don't want to call you Tensei or Big Brother anymore. I want to call you my father," finished Tenya, tears streaming down his face.

Tensei wiped away a tear of his own, "I honestly never thought this day would come."

In a burst of emotion normally unlike himself, Tenya wrapped his arms around Tense-no..his father and pulled him into the tightest hug he could possibly give. Though he was much bigger now, he somehow still fit comfortably against his father's chest. He could feel strong hands beginning to rub his back as Tenya laid in the crook of his father's neck. This felt right. In the past, he had never felt the love that came from sharing affection with his grandparents. It never really felt like they were receiving the emotional satisfaction that he was delivering. It had never felt right to him like hugging Tensei did.

"I love you Father," yawned Tenya softly, eyes starting to fade as the emotional high he was on began to fade and left him feeling tired again.

His father pulled Tenya out of his arms and pushed him back into bed, being sure to take the glasses off properly this time, and rubbed his forehead affectionately, "I love you too Tenya. You're my whole world."

As Tenya began to fall back to sleep again, he couldn't help but feel excited about what the future held. He'd finally found home in his father's arms, and they could begin to develop that bond as best they could. Most importantly, he'd find his mother. But for now, he was content with just lying here with the love of his father lulling him to sleep.