The years began to pass in the blink of an eye.

The boys enrolled in Nabu Elementary, same class, thankfully. They didn't exactly make any friends while there, but they didn't get bullied, so they had that going for them!

On Mondays and Wednesdays, after school, they would go to the martial arts studio to learn how to fight…at least, learn to fight from a teacher that Izuku quickly proved to be better at fighting than. Either way, on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays, the boys typically went to Inko's law firm if she was working that day, otherwise they just went right home…and would usually go to Izuku's usual spots to learn fighting themselves or parkour. Either way, they would eventually get home and, at some point, do their strength training, Hitoshi would usually take a nap while Izuku did homework, then after dinner, Izuku would do more research (either on quirks on into different methods he could use for fighting or any kind of hero work) while Hitoshi did homework. After (or, depending on the day, sometimes during), Izuku would excitedly put some show on the t.v., from Avatar the Last Airbender ("Everyone has to watch this show at least once, Toshi!") to Dr. Stone ("Do you think I could teach myself to make support items like the stone device? That would be a great capture item-" "Jesus, Izuku, no!") to Pokemon ("Pikachu, I choose you!" "God, I wish I could just sleep like Snoralax."). Inko and Hisashi often joined, and on the weekends and family nights, they watched a lot of these shows, plus more recent ones.

And, by the time the two boys went to Nabu Middle School, after a lot of paperwork, some court visits, with a small little "oh my god congratulations!" party where the Bakugous came over with Auntie Mitsuki forcing Katsuki to apologize for the situation, when introductions to the whole class were done…

"Izuku Midoriya, I like to analyze quirks, and I want to be a hero."

The other kids started to whisper among themselves as Izuku shrugged and sat back down-he didn't have to state his quirk (or…well, lack thereof) if he didn't want to. So what if people didn't like that? The kids that came with them from Nabu Elementary didn't know, either, and they typically avoided the two, but as long as Izuku had Hitoshi, then it didn't matter to either of them.

Hitoshi stood up as Izuku sat down.

"Hitoshi Midoriya, Izuku's my twin brother, and I also want to be a hero."

Life changed drastically.

….

"Oi, Greeny!"

Izuku paused and turned to see one of his classmates walking up to him.

"Hey, Nakamura," Izuku said. "Did you need something?"

"You and your brother are really gonna try to get into the UA hero course?" Nakamura asked.

"Of course we are!" Izuku said. "I mean, it's no secret we want to be heroes together and have been working towards that."

Nakamura scoffed, shoving at Izuku's shoulder. "With your villainous quirks?"

"...huh?" Izuku asked.

"Come on, we ain't dumb," Nakamura hissed, shoving Izuku harder-ha. Izuku barely budged-he's fourteen, doing 140 push ups, sit ups, squats, and 14 km runs each day. Hitoshi stuck to around 100 of each and 7 km each day, sometimes not even that. He was better at parkour than Izuku was, though.

"I never said you were," Izuku said. "I mean, how could I when I never even talk to you?"

"Yeah, when trying to hide your freaking quirk," Nakamura said, shoving at him again. "I recently made a friend from that old school of yours and learned what your real quirks are."

Izuku raised an eyebrow. "Nabu Elementary?"

"No, Aldera Elementary, you freak," Nakamura hissed. "Does the name Fushiguro ring a bell?"

"Should it?" Izuku deadpanned, but meanwhile, his heart was pounding. That's really bad-no muttering right now, Izuku, be conscious of if you're talking or not…

"It should, because he told me your quirks!" Nakamura said. "Brainwashing and Paralysis!"

…was Fushiguro…ok, you know what, he really was that stupid.

"Brainwashing takes away your free will, Paralysis takes away your ability to move, of course," Nakamura said, acting as if he'd won-as if he hadn't just said the dumbest thing he possibly could have. "You two are just villains in the making-"

"First of all, quirks don't make villains," Izuku said. "Brainwashing is a quirk that I have seen many different uses for in hero work, including being immediately able to diffuse any hostage situation-"

"It's a villain's quirk," Nakamura said.

"Have you heard of the American hero Skycrawler?" Izuku asked. "His quirk is called Slide and Glide. Interesting enough quirk and something that a particular hero has-he started as Japanese, fun fact, before being forced to transfer over to America due to certain circumstances-right, mumbling, but, fun fact! There were three villains with the exact same quirk as him that he faced at one point! Skycrawler used his quirk in order to save people and slide around to bring people to safety, while these particular villains, called the Three Sturm und Drang Brothers, who used it to look up girls' skirts and steal their underwear. So? Which is it? Hero or villain quirk?"

"T-That's-you're lying!" Nakamura said.

Izuku shrugged. "You can do your own research on the subject if you want-not my problem if you don't. Only makes you look dumber-just like taking Fushiguro's word for that subject."

"Why shouldn't I?" Nakamura snapped.

Izuku smirked, looking him in the eye. "Because I don't have a paralysis quirk." With that, he turned to run off-

Nakamura grabbed Izuku's shoulder. "It's so stupid that you think you can lie about your own quirk-why, ashamed of it?" Nakamura snorted. "I mean, you could always pray for a different quirk in your next life and die or something-I'm sure we'd all be thanking you for that-"

Izuku grabbed onto Nakamura's hand and twisted it behind him to restrain him, leaning in close to Nakamura's ear.

"Believe what you want about me-honestly, I really don't care," Izuku hissed. "But I'll have you know that saying that is unacceptable, so here's what we're going to do. We're both going to forget you ever said that, and if you even think about saying that again…well, I'm sure the teachers would love to hear about suicide baiting like that-if not the teachers, then the police-or perhaps…what hero school were you planning on applying to, again? UA like everyone else? Or was it Isamu you had your eyes set on since it's close enough that you can move in with your grandparents…?"

Nakamura went still and pale.

Izuku shoved him away, then pointed at a camera nearby. "And if you even think about trying to claim that I did anything, don't forget that I can ruin you in a heartbeat."

With that, Izuku turned and stormed off, leaving a shocked Nakamura behind him.

Izuku walked for about ten minutes before glancing behind him, but he knew that Nakamura wasn't there-he was going to put that entire conversation out of his head-Nakamura was a moron, Izuku didn't need to even consider anything he said as serious.

Izuku huffed slightly, then sighed, looking up as he continued his walk home.

Walking home was so boring when Hitoshi wasn't there! But nope, he had a doctor's appointment today that Mom took him too, and it was for a sleep specialist in a different part of the city, so the lucky twin got to skip the second half of the school day. Well, he wasn't lucky that he was dealing with pretty bad insomnia (it was actually normal for people with mental quirks, there was a particular chemical in Hitoshi's brain that people without mental quirks didn't have called exoustonin, coming from the Greek word exousia, meaning power, that would typically move throughout the quirk nerves in the body, and in situations with adrenaline, exoustonin would increase in amount alongside adrenaline, causing the quirk to become stronger than typical, but people with mental quirks had exoustonin centered around their brain to help with the mental strain of what they were causing, and due to the chemical makeup of exoustonin in comparison to melatonin, the body would instead choose to produce more exoustonin instead of melatonin on a regular day-to-day basis, making it harder for people with mental quirks to sleep as easily without taking supplements, like in Hitoshi's case, where he was having trouble even taking his usual naps recently as he got older and his quirk became stronger, causing his body to lack melatonin, which was the cause of the appointment and the need for medication-Mom had been getting him over-the-counter supplements, but a prescription would be a better option due to the amount of prescription melatonin medication that wasn't generic and made for mental quirks in mind-

There was suddenly a sound behind Izuku, and he immediately sensed some kind of…presence behind him.

Before Izuku could even turn around to face the newcomer, they were upon him-it was some kind of green sludge that started to shove themself down his throat-

"A meatsuit-a perfect disguise!" the villain said as Izuku clawed at the goo-it wasn't completely solid, slipping through Izuku's fingers and making it likely impossible to physically shove the villain away-all kinds of mutation quirks such as this have some kind of weakness, would biting work, or would they be able to control the sludge still in Izuku's mouth-moving down throat, how long can he go without air again? A few minutes, that's what he had to resolve this-

"I didn't know he was going to be in town-I'll have to lay low for a while and escape," the villain was saying-ok, so there was at least some kind of mouth-mutation quirks like this would make it near impossible to find a throat to punch at, but if Izuku could reach this villain's mouth and start shoving his hand down their throat or something, perhaps that would be enough distraction to buy him more time-would his body naturally expel the sludge and vomit it out, or would he have to figure a way to get the sludge out in a different manner-he was going to run out of time if he didn't-

There!

Izuku grasped at the villain's mouth, causing the villain to pause whatever they were saying-not really something that Izuku cared about-as Izuku felt a tongue, teeth, his other hand-wait, the villain has eyes! Perfect!

"What the hell are you doing, kid?" the villain asked. "Do you think you even-"

Izuku reared his fist back and punched the villain's eye and teeth as hard as he possibly could while kicking even harder.

The villain screamed, drawing back slightly-it was enough to get some of the sludge away from Izuku's mouth, allowing him to grab onto the thinner layers and pull, gasping for breath as his foot landed on the ground-good! Izuku squirmed more until both feet were on the ground-

There was another sound behind him-Izuku can deal with this guy's friend later, he had to get away while they were distracted-Izuku broke free from the villain, gasping for breath as he stumbled back, vision slightly blurry as he found his footing, stumbling his way into a fighting stance-

There was a blast of wind that blew Izuku back, causing him to fall to the ground and roll a little-ok, that hurt, so this guy's friend was more powerful, that would lead to some trouble for Izuku, but he could figure out how to get out of here and call the cops-he can't get arrested for unlicensed quirk usage or vigilantism when he doesn't have a quirk, but it would definitely get him less of a lecture if he didn't engage more than he had to-and the hospital visit would not be pleasant, either.

Izuku peered over to the villain and their friend, mind already starting to take in the approximate wind speed in order to figure out exactly how much power this guy must have-

All thoughts immediately left Izuku's head as he comprehended exactly who was standing there.

Izuku's jaw dropped-that was the Number One Hero standing there-it was All Might! The All Might in the flesh-he wasn't in his hero costume, in a white t-shirt and regular pants, a grocery bag in hand-was All Might going grocery shopping? In Musutafu, so far out away from his typical patrol route-

All Might looked around at all the sludge before taking out two soda bottles from his bag-if Izuku zeroed in on the brand and made a mental note of it-if All Might buys that brand of soda, then Izuku should buy that brand of soda, too!-before All Might…dumped out all the soda and started to gather up the sludge-oh, right, capturing the villain, that's a good idea-Izuku looked around, the sludge was scattered about everywhere-it wasn't all connected, either, which meant that the quirk most likely was more of a control and separation quirk where the villain would be able to control all the sludge even when it wasn't connected-at least, to a certain extent, since it was likely the sludge was entirely the villain's body. In cases like this, a container of some kind would be used, and while plastic bottles weren't the best option in general due to its ability to hold up entirely dependent on how well the villain could move around-

"I suppose from how much you're talking you're not suffering from any infections in your throat or lungs!"

Oh my All Might I was talking out loud.

Izuku felt his face immediately go red from embarrassment as he found himself gathering up sludge further from All Might and bringing it closer-it has a more solid consistency now that the villain is unconscious, but it's still clearly a liquid-approximately the same consistency as jello-wait, no, muttering again, Izuku really needs to curb that habit and stop getting himself into situations like this-

"There we go-villain successfully captured!" All Might said, holding up the two bottles that the sludge villain was contained in. "Sorry that I did not arrive sooner-the sewers are very tricky to navigate, after all!"

"Oh, that's completely understandable-wait, can you please sign my notebook?!" Izuku asked, scrambling to get his backpack off his back and taking out Notebook 13, quickly flipping to the nearest two empty pages and holding it out, along with a pen, to All Might. "If it's not too much trouble-"

All Might took the pen and signed the notebook, causing Izuku to beam with joy-he had All Might's autograph!Best day ever!

"Thank you so much!" Izuku said, bowing rapidly. "I promise I'll make it into a treasured family heirloom-thank you so much!"

"Glad to save the day!" All Might said. "Well, I had better get going!"

Wait…what?

"You're…leaving already?" Izuku asked, blinking. I know that I'm talking, but he hasn't called any paramedics to check on me-what if I suffered from brain damage due to the suffocation? Not to mention that the villain jammed their way down my throat and could have potentially caused infections-there were things floating in that sludge-getting me into the hospital and making the report would be the most efficient way of making sure that I don't contact anything from this attack-I understand that All Might is a busy hero-one of the busiest in Japan due to his status-so perhaps it slipped his mind, but that could be dangerous, especially if my response time in escaping was even a little later-

Before Izuku could even comprehend moving, he was grabbing onto the hero's leg to ask a question-there was one question Izuku always wanted to ask the hero, and if the hero was busy, it was all Izuku could do just to ask-but All Might took off into the air before Izuku could even let a word out, and the two were suddenly flying through the city-

"What, kid, you have to let go!" All Might said, attempting to shove Izuku off-

"If I do that, I'll die!" Izuku shouted, the wind blowing in his mouth and eyes-this was not comfortable at all.

"Oh…right," All Might said. "Just…close your mouth and eyes-I'll land soon."

Izuku did that, gripping onto All Might's leg tighter as he felt the hero hold onto him, too.

It wasn't long before All Might landed on a roo and was turning and scolding Izuku-yeah, that was reckless, Izuku was usually better than this, but he didn't expect that All Might wouldn't notice him holding onto him!

"Knock on the door-someone will come and let you down," All Might said, turning to leave-

"Wait, I just have a question!" Izuku said desperately.

"I will not wait!" All Might said. "I really do have to go!"

"I just…" Izuku trailed off, then took a deep breath. "Is it possible to become a hero, even if I don't have a quirk?" All Might stopped in his tracks, but Izuku looked at his feet, fidgeting with his hands. "I don't…I don't have a quirk of my own, and almost everyone that knows says I'll never be able to be a hero-my family believes in me, but that's…that's any family, you know? My friends, my classmates…no one else believes that I can do it, but more than anything in the world, I want to be a hero and save people with a smile, just like you do-" He looked up, then stumbled slightly-that was not All Might standing in front of him! "Wha-who are you?" He looked around. "Where's…where's All Might?" The hero wouldn't have left silently-at the very least, there would have been a gust of wind-taking stock on the man in front of me, he's…he's wearing the same clothes that All Might was wearing, not to mention that his hair is similar enough-All Might's quirk is energy based if my assumptions are correct, perhaps upon activation it buffs up his body in such a manner, but then it would make it strange for him to suddenly deactivate his quirk, especially in front of a random middle schooler when it wouldn't be known by the general public-

"You are…a very strange child," the man said. "You're…scarily accurate. I am All Might." He buffed up for a moment-yep, that's All Might-then went back, sitting down and…coughing up blood?!

Izuku immediately dug out a handkerchief and tossed it over to the hero, who took it and dabbed at the blood.

"Thanks, kid," All Might said, leaning against the railing and looking at him. "As you can probably guess, you shouldn't tell anyone about this form-I've done everything in my power to keep this under wraps."

"Of course-it seems to be a weaker form, so any potential weakness would be a bad thing to share with anyone-right, mumbling, sorry," Izuku said.

"That's a good point-seems like you already understand," All Might said, then lifted up the edge of his shirt to show…that looked painful. "I got this five years ago in a villain fight-destroyed most of my internal organs and part of my lungs."

"Five years…Toxic Chainsaw?" Izuku guessed, thinking.

"You know your stuff, kid, but no, no one knows about this villain," All Might said. "Even with my quirk, I was almost killed by this villain."

Oh, I don't like where this is going.

"So, honestly?' All Might continued as Izuku's heart dropped. "No, I don't think you can be a hero without a quirk."

Izuku's brain completely came to a halt as he just…stared at his…at the Number One Hero. The man that he'd looked up to for his entire life.

"If you want to save people, try becoming a firefighter, a doctor, or even a police officer-people don't value them as much because there are heroes around, but it's a fine profession," All Might said, standing up and walking to the door, just…leaving.

Izuku stood there for a minute, just…staring into the distance…

…then all of his thoughts came rushing back to the surface.

I have been able to fake a quirk for this long-enough to convince people that I'm not quirkless-

"I don't think you can be a hero without a quirk."

-I was already away from that villain and had come up with strategies to get away and not get in trouble-I can cancel out quirks with chi-blocking-

"I don't think you can be a hero without a quirk."

-Eraserhead! He has a quirk like chi-blocking that works from a distance, but mine lasts longer-I don't have the distance advantage there, but I could still-

IF THE NUMBER ONE HERO SAYS YOU CAN'T BE A HERO WITHOUT A QUIRK, THEN THAT'S THAT-

-All Might's an idiot!

Izuku's eyes widened at that statement-how could he think such a thing, All Might's the pro hero-

There was an explosion in the distance that cut through Izuku's thoughts, and without another thought, he looked around, and at the edge of a neighboring building, there was a fire escape.

All Might would still be in the stairwell, and…I don't think I can run into him right now.. So, let's do this instead.

Izuku stepped back, then turned and ran, jumping and quickly scaling down the building's fire escape, walking towards whatever hero fight was happening now.

…..

Katsuki didn't expect to get attacked by a villain on the way home, especially not one that didn't even flinch from his explosions.

These dumbass heroes weren't doing jack shit! This was their entire job, and not one of them could figure something out?! This sucked! It was getting harder and harder to breathe with every second-he was going to get out of this, but his explosions only knocked off a bit of the sludge at a time, not enough, not going fast enough-

Then, from the crowd, someone very familiar came running and chucked something at the villain.

…..

OH MY GOD THIS IS SO FREAKING STUPID!

Izuku ran forward before he could stop himself, chucking his backpack as he analyzed the situation.

The eyes are a weakness as I realized earlier, and I'm strong enough that I can hit the eye from this distance-direct hit, he's reeling back enough-

Izuku grabbed onto Kacchan's arms and yanked as hard as he possibly could, breaking the explosion user out of the sludge, enough for Kacchan to gasp for air-

"You BRAT-" the sludge villain yelled, moving to engulf Izuku as well-

Izuku stumbled back, holding onto Kacchan tightly as he stumbled away from the villain, jabbing his hand upward at the villain's eye-

-and that was the moment that All Might showed up.

After All Might defeated the villain (again), everything moved fast.

Izuku and Kacchan were pulled aside by the heroes on the scene, Kacchan praised for protecting himself-

"You shouldn't have done that, kid-you could've made the situation worse-"

"You didn't even get Bakugou away from the villain-I heard the initial explosion and can take a wild guess at approximately how long he was unable to breathe based on how close he was to passing out," Izuku said. "Meanwhile, I showed up and was able to get the villain away from him within 30 seconds. It shouldn't take 5 heroes almost letting a hostage suffocate for a random child in the crowd to come in and do something, and All Might comes along and simply take over from there-how did a kid with no professional hero training manage to do more here than you? Without a quirk used at all?"

The heroes were quiet.

"That's what I thought," Izuku said, getting up and grabbing his backpack-all his things had been gathered already, so he was good to go whenever. "Well, I'd better get home-have fun with clean-up." With that, he quickly walked away, pushing past the crowd of people still standing there. Some of the people glanced at him, others even starting to greet him, but Izuku just wanted to get home.

…

Ugh, my uniform smells, and I have a feeling that Mom, Dad, and Hitoshi would know about that from seeing the news-I should probably turn on my phone to see…I just need a little more time to think, I'll say I forgot to check it after school, not the first time it's happened, after all-usually Hitoshi answers, so I don't have to check right away, so it's a bad habit at this point to just ignore it-

Today was rough, I need to stop distracting myself from that.

No martial arts today, so I just need to head straight home and continue my workout routine-if I want to be a hero, I need to be physically strong and smart, so maybe I'll see if I can find another fighting style I want to find out-

All Might said I can't be a hero. He's…he's the number one hero, so…he has to be right, right? I can't be a hero-I…I can't-

"Oi, Deku!"

Izuku jolted slightly, but he stopped and turned his head to see…

"Kacchan," Izuku said, fully turning to face his…former childhood friend.

Kacchan squared up, and Izuku tensed up, ready to throw a few punches if he needed to-

"Don't think that you accomplished anything back there-I didn't need your help-I'll never need help from you!" Kacchan said, then spun around and stomped away.

…did he seriously chase me down to tell me that? What a-

"What a jerk."

Izuku turned around to see-

"Hitoshi!" Izuku said, quickly giving his brother a big hug as he felt tears come to his eyes.

Hitoshi hugged Izuku back immediately. "Mom got called into the office, and someone wasn't answering his phone, and since we usually walk home this way…I figured…" Hitoshi trailed off, pulling back slightly and giving Izuku a concerned look. "What's wrong?"

"Bad day," Izuku mumbled, burying his face in Hitoshi's shoulder. "Just…just want to go home."

Hitoshi pulled back slightly and instead tucked Izuku under his arm, then made a face.

"You're pretty slimy-that villain from the news, I'm guessing?" Hitoshi asked.

"Yeah," Izuku said. "It's pretty gross-"

"I AM HERE!"

Hitoshi and Izuku both jumped and turned to see All Might himself jump out from an alleyway and look over at the two of them…

…before promptly shrinking into his smaller form with a burst of blood coming out of his mouth.

"WHAT THE FUCK?!" Hitoshi yelled, and All Might looked right at him, eyes wide as he slowly blinked.

"Uh…I didn't see you there," All Might said, wiping at the blood.

"WHAT IN THE EVERLOVING SHI-!" Hitoshi started yelling, but Izuku elbowed his twin in the side, cutting Hitoshi off with a glare.

"How about we just go home and go to sleep?" Izuku groaned. "And shower?"

"Ah, first things first, Young…man that I met earlier-" All Might started.

Hitoshi whipped around to stare at Izuku. "You what?!"

"Hush for a moment, 'Toshi," Izuku sighed, looking at All Might. "What do you want?"

"Ah…well…a moment alone, if you don't mind?" All Might asked, looking at Hitoshi, who simply tugged Izuku into his side a little more.

"Like hell I'm stepping away from my twin," Hitoshi said, glaring at the number one hero.

"If you have anything to say, he's going to hear about it, anyway," Izuku said.

"...what's going on here?" Hitoshi asked, glaring at All Might.

All Might opened his mouth to respond-

"Never meet your heroes, I suppose," Izuku said. "Because your heroes think you can't be a hero without a quirk."

All Might winced as Hitoshi's jaw dropped, then he stepped fully in front of Izuku, his glare hardening.

"What the fuck is wrong with you?" Hitoshi snapped, then looked at Izuku. "Let's head home-Dad gets off his shift soon, I think, so you should probably take a shower before that-"

"Wait!" All Might said, stepping forward. "I just want to apologize for earlier-I was wrong!"

All Might…wrong?

Hitoshi paused as All Might looked at Izuku.

"Back there…when all the heroes on the scene were standing aside, you were the only one to move and help that boy," All Might said. "You acted quickly and very well might have saved that boy's life. Earlier, I said that you couldn't be a hero without a quirk. I was wrong, forgive me."

But…heroes aren't wrong-

But he was. And he's saying that he was.

"Well, at least you acknowledge it," Hitoshi said. "My brother's gonna be one of the greatest heroes there is, fuck you very much."

All Might glanced at Hitoshi, looking uncomfortable, then he looked at Izuku.

"I'm very sorry for what I said earlier," All Might said. "It's been a few years since I've met anyone with as much conviction as you-in the moment, while all the heroes on the scene-as I-hesitated to step in, you rushed in and saved that boy. So, let me reanswer the question you asked earlier. Yes, you can become a hero."

Izuku felt tears come to his eyes as he started shaking a little. Hitoshi noticed and held his brother a little closer to him to stop him from falling-

"That said, I have an offer for you. Being a hero without a quirk would be difficult and full of uphill battles, so it would be much easier for you to take my quirk to help with your journey."

Both boys paused and stared at him.

"I'm sorry…what?" Izuku asked.