Chapter 62
.::Obligatory Rooftop Scene::.
"And that's the last of them!"
Hatsume dropped another spy bug onto the table, making a total of three. The one on the wall, one under the coffee table, and one attached to the underside of a chair at the kitchen table. Kyouka's stomach rolled as she stared at the devices, feeling eerily chilled by their presence. She had no doubt they were made by Yaomomo, they looked just like the ones she'd made in the training exercises.
"You're sure that's all of them?" she asked warily, tearing her gaze away to glance at Hatsume, and the pink-haired girl bobbed her head.
"Positive! This baby's never wrong!" She waved a handheld device with a screen and some bunny-ear antennae on it for emphasis. She'd said the name earlier, but it had been part of a long-winded ramble that Kyouka could barely catch. Hopefully Hatsume was right about its effectiveness in detecting them.
Hatsume's arrival had felt like an angel coming to save them. The inventor had shown up in the midst of their panic, having brought over an invention unrelated to their vigilante activity for Kaminari to test. Apparently his debt was still in effect, and she intended to use him as her battery until he paid her back. After being informed of the situation she'd barged inside to inspect the bug personally, and then went to the warehouse to fetch an invention to help search for more.
Kyouka really hoped that this was all of them, but even if there were more it probably wouldn't change much anyway. Who knew how long they'd been there? By this point the damage had already been done.
Kaminari looked understandably stressed, chewing his lip as he glanced at them. "You're sure they can't hear us, right?" he asked, and Hatsume nodded.
"Yep! They're dead, they're not gonna pick anything up!" She lifted the first one, which was still partially disassembled from her inspection, pointing to some pieces that Kyouka could barely even see. "I tried this kind of battery a couple times because they were cheap, but they run out of juice way super fast so I ditched them. I haven't done any in-depth poking around yet, but this part can be found in cell phones, so they're probably called remotely to stream audio. That would absolutely drain this battery in a few hours."
"Any idea how long it's been here?" Kyouka asked, but Hatsume shook her head.
"Nope. All I know is the battery is completely dead, so it's been totally used up. I might be able to figure out how it works if I look at them some more, though." Hatsume wasn't even trying to be subtle about her unspoken request to take the bugs home, but Kyouka just waved a hand at her.
"Go for it. You can get to work right now if you want. I really don't care, we've got bigger issues."
"That's an understatement," Kaminari groaned, hunching over and tightly gripping at his hair. "When did she plant those? It had to be while we were on a patrol or getting food, those're like the only times we leave, and we haven't done one since Saturday!" He raised his head, eyes wide and frantic as he asked, "What if she heard the phone calls?"
That was exactly what had Kyouka so anxious. The idea that Yaomomo might have heard the calls with Ashido and everyone else was just bad. Just thinking about it made her pulse quicken, and she had to remind herself to stay calm and try to think rationally. "Okay, so the police and heroes haven't come kicking down the door, so she probably hasn't told anyone we're vigilantes at least," she said. "So she might not know about that."
"Or they're staking this place out waiting for us to leave so they can follow us and catch us in the act," Kaminari moaned, making her wince and scowl at him.
"Idiot, don't say that!" she growled irritably. "We've got enough on our minds without worrying about that!"
"But it's like that Anjou chick said, paranoia saves lives in this world!" Kaminari countered.
"Yeah, but being too paranoid is just as bad, idiot!"
"Doesn't Aizawa-sensei always say we should operate as if we're in the worst-case scenario if we ever think our cover's blown?"
"He said that like, once. And I don't think he meant we should get too scared to leave your freaking apartment! I think he just meant we should be more careful!" She shook her head with an exasperated huff, glaring as she hissed, "And like I said, we don't even know if she knows that! She could've planted them, like, last week!"
"But Jirou, if she planted the bugs while we were gone, that means she must've seen us leave!" Kaminari countered frantically. "And we only leave for patrols! This is Yaomomo we're talking about! She totally would've noticed that Taser Brain and Punk Step showed up while we were gone!"
Kyouka lost some of her steam at that, staring at him blankly. "...Shit, you're right," she muttered, feeling the blood drain. She hadn't even thought of that, but Yaomomo would absolutely notice the pattern. Especially if she was already suspicious, which she had to be if she snuck in and left bugs. Yaomomo wasn't the type to do something like that without good cause.
Then something else he said caught up with her. "Wait, Punk Step?"
"I don't know, a bunch of websites are calling you that now for some reason! I think it's a reference to some other vigilante, but—okay, does that even matter right now?" Kaminari threw up his arms in exasperation. "Look Jirou, Yaomomo has to know we're vigilantes by now! And what if she did leave that bug on Saturday? What if she heard the phone calls? What if she heard about Uraraka and Ashido and Todoroki, or Midoriya and the freaking League of Villains!?"
Kyouka stiffened at that, her blood running cold. "...Dammit," she hissed, squeezing her eyes shut and shaking her head. "Dammit, you're supposed to be the idiot! I don't want to think about this!"
"Okay, so this is fascinating and all, but I have absolutely no idea what's going on."
They both jumped when Hatsume spoke up, having forgotten she was there. Kyouka turned to find her sitting at the table with her tools spread out, goggles pulled over her eyes as she took apart one of the bugs. She didn't bother looking away from her work as she continued, "I don't really care what's going on with your personal lives, but you just mentioned phone calls and villains, and I know there's no teachers named Aizawa at our school."
She slammed down her screwdriver and turned around, lifting her goggles to look at them with a distinct frown. "You two said you're using my babies for vigilante work, but it sounds like there's more to the story. I need to know what you're caught up in and how it'll affect me and my branding."
The look she gave them was the most serious they'd seen her yet. Kyouka hadn't even realized Hatsume was capable of such an expression, her gaze almost scarily intense and full of silent promise of harm if they lied. One look at that face, and she knew they couldn't mess around. She glanced at Kaminari who grimaced back, clearly just as aware of the imminent danger if they mishandled this.
In that moment, Kyouka made a decision, and turned back with a sigh. "Screw it," she muttered under her breath, and then met Hatsume's gaze squarely. "We're hero students from another dimension where UA never shut down."
Kaminari made a choking sound, clearly not expecting her to outright admit it, but Kyouka ignored him as she continued. "As best as we can tell we woke up in our counterparts' bodies here, no idea how. We decided to become vigilantes so we could get you to make us gear like we have back home because our Quirks work best with support gear. That, and the publicity could help other people from our world notice us. At least four other people from our class are here too, but we only found out this weekend. There's a lot more going on than just that, but that's the short answer."
Hatsume's expression lost its intensity at Kyouka's explanation, her face becoming blank and completely unreadable. The tension in the air felt palpable as they waited for her response, Kyouka not daring to break eye contact. Finally, she blinked, apparently done processing everything.
"So then, you had me make you copies of someone else's designs?" she asked, and Kyouka just stared. What the heck?
"Seriously?" Kaminari blurted. "That's what you want to ask? Not about the whole 'we're from another dimension' or the fact there are others, or—you know, UA still exists in our world? You don't have ANY questions about that?!"
"No, it makes sense," Hatsume replied blithely, and seriously, what the hell? "You two obviously had some kind of training and experience, and your requests were way too detailed and thought out to be purely amateurs. Especially Battery-kun, who doesn't think about this stuff. Plus it totally explains why Battery-kun kept getting lost at school. But!" She rose from the table with a frown, eyes narrowed. "Are you saying my babies are based on someone else's designs from your world?"
Kyouka had no response for that, momentarily dumbfounded. At least Hatsume accepted everything more easily than she expected...? "Uh, for what it's worth, you're a support student at UA in our world?" she said hesitantly.
"Yeah!" Kaminari agreed, bobbing his head. "Actually, I don't know about Jirou, but you totally made my sharpshooting gear in our world! You spent like an hour explaining how it worked to me and having me test it in the lab!"
"I don't think you were the main designer for my amplifier jacks, but you probably helped a bit," Kyouka added with a shrug. With Hatsume's personality, she suspected she'd try to dip her nose into all the support gear requests that got sent to her class.
That seemed to placate Hatsume, who had clear interest in her eyes. "Oh, really?" she asked. "And how would you say the gear I made her ranks compared to your gear there?"
"Uh..."
Later, a message appeared in the group chat on FacePage from Jirou.
'Good news and bad news. Bad news: Yaomomo bugged Taser's apartment. Don't know when or what she might have heard. Probably knows we're vigilantes tho because Yaomomo. Going to confront her now. Taser on standby ready to run if I don't report back to him in an hour.
Good news though: the inventor is fully briefed and open for requests. So if any of you guys want some support gear, speak up.'
There was about a minute after the message was sent before the first reply came in. 'What the actual hell?'
The morning tutoring session had been slightly less awkward than Izuku feared thanks to Shinsou bringing Sushi along. It went better than breakfast had at least. It turned out Aizawa really liked cats, a fact Izuku already knew but hadn't really thought about that much. The friendly feline seemed to have been the perfect balm for Aizawa's frayed nerves, staying on his lap the whole time and even nuzzling his face.
(Was it weird that Izuku felt proud of Shinsou for bringing Sushi despite his earlier misgivings about sharing her?)
Honestly, Izuku felt a bit bad they couldn't leave Sushi with him. Even Shinsou had looked a bit guilty at taking her away when Kurogiri fetched them for lunch. That had been kind of anxiety-inducing on its own, not really knowing how he would react to Sushi being with Aizawa. Fortunately he hadn't commented on it though, patiently waiting for Shinsou to retrieve the kitten before leading them away.
Now with a full stomach and no obligations Izuku set out to accomplish his main objective for the afternoon: talk to Toga.
He found her in the bar area with Twice, Magne and Mustard, gathered by the counter watching something on a tablet. "This is so weird," Twice whispered, and Izuku paused to wait for the usual contradictory statement only to be surprised when none came. Curiosity piqued, he peered over their shoulders and saw...
"Is that Mr. Compress doing a card trick for a bunch of kids?" he blurted in disbelief.
"Yep," Mustard replied, not looking away from the screen as Mr. Compress expertly shuffled cards in front of an awestruck crowd of children wearing colorful party hats. The villain looked different than usual, wearing a domino mask and trading his trench coat for a black formal vest and pants with a blue shirt. Even his gloves were white instead of their usual red, and his hat lacked the feather.
One of the children pointed to a card and he turned it around before clapping his hands together, a dove appearing when he pulled them apart and flying off. "Ooh, he even did the dove thing!" Toga squealed in delight. "I love the dove thing!"
"What is happening," Izuku whispered, totally lost.
"Someone hired him to perform at a birthday party yesterday," Mustard explained while Izuku stared. "The parents recorded some of it so he got a copy of the video."
"It's the weirdest thing ever!" Twice declared vehemently before adding, "That looks so fun!" Izuku just continued to boggle the screen as Compress pulled a rainbow of knotted handkerchiefs out of his sleeve.
"...Okay, I think I'm done," he said after a few seconds. "Toga, could I talk to you in private?"
"Right now?" she asked, glancing up from the screen. Izuku side-eyed the image of Mr. Compress looping the knotted fabric around who he presumed to be the birthday girl.
"...If it's okay?" he replied before hastily adding, "If you want to finish the video that's fine—"
"Nah, I can watch it later," she cut in, sliding off the stool. "And it's kinda hard to watch it while crowding with other people anyway."
"We're totally gonna play it on the TV later tonight," Mustard added. "Bet you two thousand yen that Mr. Compress will give some speech about it."
"No way, he'll totally do that!" Twice denied before immediately adding, "You're on! Wait, no! I didn't mean that—"
As he began back-tracking Toga skipped off with Izuku trailing behind. "So what do you wanna talk about?" she asked as they entered the hall, and he gulped.
"It's... about what you gave me yesterday," he said. Her steps faltered briefly before she quickly bobbed her head with a smile.
"Okay!" she chirped, and spun to skip in the opposite direction. "Then let's go to the roof!" That had Izuku faltering this time.
"The roof?" They could go to the roof? Wait, not the time. "But why?"
"So no one can hear us, silly!" she replied, and Izuku could only follow lamely. They had to grab their winter coats first, Izuku awkwardly waiting outside Toga's room while she grabbed hers and some boots. He felt even more awkward when she followed him to his own room so he could do the same, but then they were off to the roof. Cold air assaulted him almost instantly when they opened the door, making him grateful he'd also grabbed a scarf.
Izuku had never thought about what the roof of the former hospital must be like. It had tall chain link fencing surrounding it, probably to prevent any patients from jumping if they somehow got up there. It had snowed a bit last night, too, coating everything in a thin layer of white powder that made it slippery. Toga happily bounced across the roof to the far end while Izuku followed more carefully, the blond girl turning to wave at him with a grin. "Come on Mido-chan! Over here!"
"I'm coming," Izuku replied, more focused on not slipping on the powder-like snow. Once he arrived he glanced through the fence, drinking in the sights. This was his first time really seeing the area around the base with his own eyes since Kurogiri always teleported him. It was... pretty underwhelming, honestly. Everything looked rundown and not abandoned, but not really the kind of area with a lot of traffic. Just a forgotten part of the city where only the destitute and desperate would live.
"So, you wanted to talk about my present?" Toga asked, and he gulped before nodding.
"Y-yeah. It's just..." He trailed off, a thousand questions racing through his mind, but he could only settle on, "Why?" Why did she give it to him? Why did she think he might want or need it? What was her motivation?
Toga shrugged, still smiling as she gazed at the street. "Well, you're planning to help bust them out, right?" she asked casually, so blunt it had Izuku jumping and staring at her with his jaw hanging open. She ignored his shock, continuing, "But Jackie and Tsuki-chan can't run away if they have those bombs on their ankles, so you need to figure out how to get them off first. So I thought it'd help to have one to look at!"
Izuku just stared, brain struggling to process her words. "Why would you help us though?" he finally managed to ask when his voice came back. "Don't you like it here?"
"Of course I do, silly!" Toga replied, rolling her eyes. "The Alliance is so fun! I've got all sorts of friends here like Twicey and Tomu and Magne—and you!" She turned to him with a toothy grin, showing off her sharp incisors. "We've had so many fun adventures together, Mido-chan! Like trying to see if Seiko-chan sleeps, or where Giri gets the homework, or that time we had that prank war with Mustard and accidentally broke Tomu's controller, so we all had to get him a new one before he noticed!"
"Yeah, we've had some crazy adventures," Izuku agreed, mentally reeling at the last one. That one was new.
"We have, right? So much fun!" Toga clapped her hands together, eyes sparkling with delight. "Everyone here is so nice, and I love it here! No one tells me that blood is gross or liking stabby-stabs is bad, or that my Quirk is gross or scary or that I'm creepy! I can totally be myself and no one tells me to stop! I can't imagine living anywhere else!"
She paused then, her smile fading slightly. "But when I was a kid, I didn't get a choice," she added more quietly, and Izuku felt a chill as a sudden pit of dread settled in his stomach.
"Toga," he said after a moment. "Were... were you...?" He trailed off, afraid to ask. Toga rolled her shoulders as she turned back to the street.
"You know, I didn't even mind it at first," she said softly. "When I was a kid people always told me my Quirk was creepy, even my own parents. Liking blood was wrong, I shouldn't find it so pretty. and drinking it was even worse. Everyone told me that wanting to become someone was wrong, and I shouldn't act like that around other people. That it wasn't normal."
The corners of her mouth lifted slightly in a strangely soft smile as she added, "But then one day these guys showed up, and told me that it was okay, and it was good! They said my Quirk was great, and blood was absolutely pretty! And wanting to become someone I loved was totally natural for me because that's how my Quirk works! They said if I went with them I could drink all the blood I wanted as long as I helped them! And so I did, and it was great! I got to show my love in the way I always wanted!"
The brief smile fell and her frown returned deeper than before, gaze growing more distant. "But it got boring after a while, so one day I decided I wanted to go home. And then..."
She didn't finish the thought, but she didn't need to. Izuku had a pretty good idea of what happened. It didn't sound like the Alliance had been the ones to kidnap her, but either way, she hadn't become a villain willingly in this world. At some point she wanted to back out, but the option was taken from her. "Do you ever still... want to go home?" he asked, but she shook her head.
"Not really. There's nothing to go back to anymore, and even if there was, I don't think I'd be that happy. Everyone always said how creepy my Quirk was, so I'd just have to go back to hiding it again. It took a while to think blood was pretty again and feel okay showing my love, but by the time Aiko-nee showed up I liked it too much to not use it again. Normal people just wouldn't understand."
She shrugged before turning to him with a sharp-toothed grin. "So when she said she knew someone close to my age who wouldn't be scared, of course I said yes! And I'm so glad I did, because I got to be friends with you and Twicey and Tomu and everyone else! I even get to call up Aiko-nee whenever I want, and play with Seiko-chan too!"
Her smile quickly faded again though, and she turned back to gaze through the fence with a small frown. "But Jackie and Tsuki-chan didn't choose to be here. That Eraserhead guy is a hero so he knew the risks, so it's not a big deal. But Jackie and Tsuki-chan are just teens like us. They didn't choose to get kidnapped and recruited into this, even if Jackie's a vigilante."
Her expression felt oddly solemn, the slight downturn to her lips and the distant look in her eyes a stark contrast to her usual manic smile. Izuku didn't realize she was capable of such an expression, not until now. "It's not right to force teens to be villains if they don't want to," she said softly. "I like this place, but they obviously don't. And I don't want them to be here if it just makes them sad."
A heavy silence followed that, Izuku just feeling numb at the revelations. Never in his life would he have predicted she'd been dragged into this life unwillingly. Toga had always felt so unhinged, and even in this world that felt true. She always had that manic smile, still loved stabbing people and found blood gorgeous. It was clear that despite how it started, she enjoyed her lifestyle in this world.
But right now, that look on her face told him that she still found it wrong to force that on others.
He swallowed harshly, trying to gather his thoughts. "So... you're willing to help us escape?" he asked slowly. "And you won't tell anyone?"
"Sure. Everyone's gotta draw the line somewhere, and this one's mine." She shrugged before glancing at him more sharply. "But you said 'us.' Are you leaving too?" Izuku stiffened, wondering if he should be honest, but ultimately he swallowed and nodded.
"Y-yeah. This place... What everyone is doing is wrong. And at this rate, Shigaraki is going to just keep kidnapping people to fill my 'party.'" His face twisted at the thought, shuddering. "Even if Kacchan and Hijack weren't kidnapped for that, once they're gone he'd probably go after more people to replace them. I don't want to be responsible for more kids ending up here. I think... the only solution is to leave."
Toga tipped her head as he finished, looking at him contemplatively. "Huh, I guess you're right," she mused, turning to lean with her back against the fence. "Tomu would totally do that, I didn't think about that. You're really smart, Mido-chan!"
Izuku blinked in surprise at the praise. "Uh, thanks?" he said awkwardly.
"Also, are you having an episode?" she asked, and he froze as she glanced at him. "I mean, I kinda thought you might be because you keep calling me Toga instead of Himiko like you usually do when we're totally alone, but you also just called Tomu 'Shigaraki' and you also seemed kinda lost yesterday."
Izuku stared at her in horror, heart pounding anxiously. He didn't want to confirm it, because he still didn't know if he could trust her or not, but she'd noticed too much to deny it. "...I guess, kind of?" he finally said with a shrug. "I-I just..."
"You don't have to tell me," Toga said with a shrug, once again stunning him. "I'm probably like a stranger to you, and we never talked about this sorta stuff before anyway so I don't think you'd wanna trust me even if you weren't having one. But I won't tell!" she added, flashing him a grin. "It'll be our little secret! It'll be way too hard to run away if Tomu gets super-protective!"
That... slightly assuaged Izuku's fears. He didn't know if he could fully believe her because she was Toga, but given how genuine she'd been the rest of the conversation, he wanted to believe the best of her. "Thanks, Toga," he said with a weak smile, before hesitantly adding, "Or, uh, H-Himiko, I guess...?"
She tilted her head at his awkward stutter. "Mido-chan, you look way too uncomfortable saying that," she announced. "Just call me Toga or Himi-chan instead!"
The second option had him doing a double-take. "Do I actually call you that?"
"Nope, but you can!" She giggled as she skipped away, leaving Izuku staring after her dumbly. After a few seconds he shook his head and raced after her, grabbing her sleeve to stop her.
"Wait! You got us that anklet, but you also told Shi—Hijack you could unlock it for him! So you have to know how they're opened, right?" It was something that had bugged him since he first found the bracelet, and her explanation for why she gave him the anklet made him wonder about it even more.
She shrugged as she turned to face him fully. "Yeah, they have this little key fob thingy," she said, miming the shape with one hand. "You wave it over the light and it'll unlock it automatically! But after Tsuki-chan got one too and was allowed to walk around, Tomu or Giri hid them somewhere else. I dunno where. I only found the spare bracelets yesterday morning while looking for stuff in a storage room."
"Stuff?" Izuku repeated.
"Stuff," she confirmed cheerfully. "I dunno where the key is anymore, it's probably in one of their rooms. But I thought you could still maybe figure out how it works if you have one of the bracelets!" Izuku nodded slowly, feeling his heart pound.
"Right... It really is helpful." He smiled, more genuinely this time as he added, "Thanks, Toga."
"Don't mention it Mido-chan!" she replied with a grin. "Now let's go inside! It's way too cold up here!"
"You can say that again." Izuku followed her with open relief at escaping the bitter chill, feeling some more of his tension fade. He still didn't know how much he could trust Toga, but he felt she was at least sincere about wanting to help them escape. He could only hope he was right.
About five minutes after Jirou's ominous message, another text appeared in the middle of a frantic conversation on FacePage.
'Okay, so update: Toga knows I'm having an episode. But I think she might be trustworthy? Will tell Space full details in person.'
Then: 'wait WHAT was that about Yaomomo and bugs!? oh no what if she heard the phone calls and everything about me, oh nonono if they come here they might get hurt sensei said the heroes wouldn't be able to handle themselves, or he implied it at least'
A reply appeared seconds later. 'Hold on forget about that, what was that about TOGA!?'
So two big announcements!
First: I've started posting a Shinsou-centric murder mystery called Smoke and Mirrors! We came up with the idea on Discord on Wednesday night, and it was just too perfect for the Halloween season. It's at three chapters already but I'm slowing down updates now to focus on some other stuff. I'm aiming to keep it under 10 chapters so let's see if I can pull that off!
Second, but bigger: at long last, Aftershock has finally been posted.
Aftershock is co-authored by CocoaNerd from AO3, who came up with the original premise on Ignite's Discord (and who I then basically strong-armed into being the co-writer). The basic premise: one day there's a Second Quirk Boom that causes hundreds of people in Japan to suddenly develop a second Quirk. As time passes more people get them, and five years later, Izuku finally gets one too...
This is just one of those premises that has near-infinite potential. We've been working on it since June and brainstorming all sorts of ideas and directions it could go. We have so many ideas we're already talking about two series of side stories focusing on "canon"-compliant stories called Aftermath and cracky "what if X got X Quirk" and similar stuff called Aftershook. I can promise you that it WON'T be a canon rehash, I think any chances of it remotely resembling canon got thrown out with all the extra Quirks. We're just so excited to FINALLY be sharing it with everyone! I posted the first chapter today, but we're planning to update every Friday so expect the next chapter later this week.
Please go read Aftershock. If you like Ignite, I think you'll REALLY enjoy that one too.
Question for next time: What would be the most chaotic message/revelation to throw into the group chat (besides the obvious "Dabi is your brother" one)?
(Also: this week is going to be very emotional and stressful for everyone in the US. I have stated in the past how important it is to be able to take a step back and focus on something else, so expect another chapter of Ignite this week!)
...
Also, as a final note exclusive to FFN: I have to be honest, FFN isn't that great of a site. Yesterday when I cross-posted Smoke and Mirrors, it gave an error message within an hour after I posted it. I found out when I refreshed my traffic page to see if I got any new views, and it gave me a "story not found" message. It came up after a couple hours, but I was wary of posting the third chapter until 2 AM. And after that, it vanished again. As of writing this at 7 PM, it is still gone. In fact, as of writing this, Aftershock is ALSO not visible on FFN's website. From what I'm told, both are only visible on the mobile app. When I mentioned this on the Discord, another writer who posts here said that the latest chapter of HIS story isn't showing up at all after updating. I'm subscribed to his story (it's Incident Zero by Ya Boy Guzma by the way), and the link in the email I got brings me to an error page. Even now, that chapter still isn't up.
The main reason Ignite's chapter was a few hours later than usual today? I wanted to make SURE Aftershock would be posted without any issues before I plugged it. And now that it's 7, I'm done waiting and posting this chapter anyway.
Last night I wrote a long rant about all this at 12:40 AM, BEFORE I knew that Chapter 3 of Smoke and Mirrors glitched out and BEFORE Aftershock. Between that and Aftershock, I feel kind of done. These are far from my first issues I've had with this site, but this is the biggest issue I've encountered to date. I found out that Smoke and Mirrors was down AGAIN from a PM from someone who wanted to read it after getting an email notification with its summary. This is not a pet peeve, this is a genuine, serious issue that is hurting both writers AND readers.
At this point, I genuinely can't recommend FFN to new writers or readers. I could write an essay on all my problems with it, but to name a few: the search and filter systems are clunky, you can only tag four characters which is an abysmally small number, there's no way to respond to reviews besides PMs... We can't even do strikethrough text or internal links to other stories on this site. You know what's dumb about those last two points? When you upload a new chapter in the doc manager, the toolbar on the Copy/Paste textbox will show strikethrough and links as options. They're removed in the textbox used when editing the chapters, and that one ALSO adds an option for line breaks which is absent from the initial upload textbox! Why the hell do those even have two different toolbars!?
I have no faith that FFN will fix ANY of this. In the entire time I've used this site, the only notable change I can recall was adding the option to copy/paste chapters into the doc manager rather than have to upload each one as an individual file, which I recall bugging me back in what, 2009? (Come to think of it, maybe THAT'S why the toolbars don't match.) This site has a LOT of design issues, and I don't think they'll try to improve it anytime soon. I don't even mean a radical overhaul/redesign, I'm talking stuff as small as having the proper login link if you go to your follow page on the mobile site while not logged in. They seem more focused on the mobile app, but even then FFN's biggest issues are at the base level.
If you can, PLEASE go over to AO3.
It is genuinely so much better. The tag system can be intimidating at first, but once you get used to it you'll realize just how cumbersome and lacking FFN really is. It's so great to be able to filter out every single NoTP and all the College/No Quirk AUs. Also: I can actually reply to you there, even if you're a guest! (And if you're into Erasermic, I have some stories I only post over there!) You won't be able to make an account right away because they automatically put all new users on a waiting list, but it usually takes only a few days at most to get approved. Trust me, it's worth it.
Also, there's just way more MHA content because AO3 already existed by the time it started. From what I can tell a lot of writers moved to AO3 as soon as it was an option because FFN is just that bad. People used it because it was the ONLY choice for many years, and as soon as they had an alternative they happily jumped ship.
So please. PLEASE do yourself a favor and use AO3 if you can. I'll keep posting Ignite to the Call, Aftershock, Smoke and Mirrors and my Naruto stuff here because I'm already cross-posting anyway, but honestly? I don't think I'll bother cross-posting anything else in the future. It's just not worth it.