The sentencing almost kills Kaname.
It's light, all things considered. The charges are heavy. Murder in the first degree, conspiracy to commit murder, and a bunch of other things. He should go away for life, for sure, but there's some kind of clerical error that no one tells her the full length of. Missing evidence, and a breach in his miranda rights. Instead of life in prison he gets five years. Suzume is relieved, but the family of his supposed victim is furious.
Suzume sits with Kaname on the courthouse steps while their dad is pulled into a police car bound for a high security prison.
She's figured it out by now.
Sanjiro had taken the fall for something that someone higher up in the Shie Hassaikai, and let himself be charged for murder in exchange for the Yakuza taking care of his family. Seiji and Satomi had given up on university, but Chiasa had handed them both stacks of pamphlets and told them to think about what they really wanted. Suzume had gotten brand new uniforms for school, and Kaname had gotten a laptop.
(No one had told either of them they weren't allowed in hero school.)
At the same time, he'd sold information to the police to get a lighter sentence, and to keep Seiji and Satomi from getting in trouble for their petty thefts.
"It's not fair," Kaname bites out, staring hard at the police car where they can just see their father's head, silhouetted through the windows. His red eyes are rimmed even further red.
Suzume can't find the tears that had flown so freely a month before.
"No," she agrees. "But there's nothing we can do about it right now."
"How can they do this? Dad's never killed anyone!"
At least, he had never kill the woman in the pictures they showed in the court room. They'd tried to shuffle the children out before those were shown to the judge and jury, but it was too late. Her face had been bloated in death, once pretty, with bruises around her throat and her eyes dull and dead.
"I know that. And you know that. But he plead guilty, and they found his hair and stuff."
"I hate it. I hate it!" His hands curl into fists and venom dyes his lips green.
Suzume leans on his side, her head on his shoulder. "Me too."
The police car drives away, with their dad inside of it. Lawyers and defendants, police officers and heroes, march up and down the steps around them. Mom and the twins are somewhere inside, settling things up with their attorney.
"He gave up five years for the lives of four children," Suzume says quietly. She's already told Kaname what she figured out.
"I wish you wouldn't say it like that."
"I'm not wrong, though."
He knows that.
That doesn't make his shoulders less tense or his eyes less red.
Suzume takes his gloved hand in hers and squeezes it gently.
"He's a good man. He's a good dad."
A good dad for sure. He was trying to be a good man these days, but she was certain that he had been worse in his youth. There was a look he got in his eyes some days that she had seen in her last life. Eyes that had witnessed blood.
"Yeah."
She saw All Might in the courthouse earlier. Well. She saw Toshinori Yagi in the courthouse, a scrawny skeleton walking around a suit a dozen sizes too big for him. He'd made eye contact for a split second before running off.
Coward.
The new scar on her temple throbs now and again. It won't be going anywhere.
"Hey, Kaname?"
He shifts under her.
"Hmmm?"
"Does this change what you want to do?"
Kaname is a dreamer. He is soft hearted and kind, even when he gets in more fights than she does. He sees what the world could be instead of what it is. She's jealous, sometimes.
He falls silent, and thinks about what she's said for a long time.
She can see a shadow falling just out of the corner of her eye. Tall, fluffy wings. Something red flutters closer to them.
Finally, she feels him shake his head against her hair.
"No. I still want to be a hero. They got the wrong person this time, so I'm going to be a hero who finds the right person."
"A hero of justice?" Suzume asks.
He nods, and she smiles, a quiet, private thing.
"It'll be even harder now. You have a 'villain quirk', and I don't have a quirk at all, and our dad is apparently a killer. Are you ready to face that?"
"Mmmm. I'm not giving up. I'll change things, just you watch."
Yes, her brother is a dreamer.
She won't be the one to kill those dreams.
"And you?"
Suzume let's out a sigh. "Kan. You're the only person in the world who thinks I'll ever be a hero. This doesn't change a thing. But the two of us… Kaname, we're gonna change the world."
The shadow moves towards them, growing closer and closer until it falls across their heads.
In unison they look up, and find a newly minted hero hovering over them. He's all soft smiles and wind swept hair. Bright red wings hover over his shoulders, and the red feather that had flashed in the corner of Suzume's eye returns to his wings.
Hawks.
He's new to the hero scene, maybe eighteen at the absolute oldest. They'd watched his debut on TV a few months ago. A kind faced young man with brilliant red wings.
He's a pretty boy who gives off the feeling of someone way more laid back than they actually are.
He's as much a tragedy as anyone else.
In some ways, Suzume thinks he might be their opposite. They are all three the children of criminals, but their father loved them and sacrificed himself for their sakes. They all dream of becoming heroes, but Suzume and Kaname have no one in their corner but each other, no one believing in them.
Takami Keigo, from what she recalls, was born with a selfish shit stain of a father, and a mother who basically sold him to the public safety committee because they knew he would make a fine hero.
If she ever knew the full extent of what that conditioning was, she's forgotten it by now.
She thinks she and Kaname are much better off than he is, anyways.
She wouldn't trade her family for all the quirks in the world.
"Hey, are you kids lost?" he crouches in front of them, a kind smile on his face. Suzume eyes him.
"We're not really kids," she mumbles, and sits a little straighter. They're both on the smaller side, their whole family is, but curled together on the courthouse steps they must have looked tiny.
"I'm fourteen, thanks," Kaname adds.
He's actually a week or so away from being fourteen, but that's beside the point.
"And we aren't lost," Suzume adds. She holds her hand up to Hawks expectantly, and he pulls her to feet, bemused. "Our mom and brother's are inside. We're just waiting."
"Ah, my bad."
Kaname climbs to his feet as well, and dusts the dirt off the seat of his pants.
"Still, I can at least walk you inside," Hawks motions to the courthouse. "I bet the two of you have had a long day."
Suzume glances down the street, where the police car is long gone.
"That's one way to put it."
Suzume's gaze is drawn to a flash of light and a pair of news vans. A crowd of reporters is about to descend on the police station, and there's no doubt in her mind that at least a few of them would have swooped in to talk to Kono Sanjiro's youngest children. Suzume has a fresh scar on her forehead, and her knuckles are busted and bandaged. Both she and Kaname had bruises under their clothes from Ryuhei's classes.
They would make quite the front page editions.
Red wings sweep out, across her shoulders, and Kaname's, when Hawks steps between them. His firm hands touch between her shoulder blades.
"Let's get you guys inside," he says kindly. He doesn't point out the reporters stepping out with their camera's flashing and their rabid smiles.
Suzume let's him guide them inside, his red wings a shield on their backs.
"Are you angry with me?"
Suzume cocks her head, her dark eyes on Osachi. The Shie Hassaikai boss, Rio and Kai's father. They all sit in the base where she had spent countless afternoons and weekends, teaching Kai how to handle children and keep his temper.
He's… well. None of them are good people, but there's an honor in the Shie Hassaikai and Osachi embodies it well. He had struck a deal with Sanjiro, and he had gone through with all of it.
They had moved to a new house, a nice one in Sheeli, and changed their names to their mother's maiden name, Yusada.
Yusada Suzume didn't sound as nice as Kono Suzume, but they were trying to avoid attention for now.
They all had their own bedrooms, and Suzume had a new school and new uniforms. Ryuhei had recommended her to someone new who was closer than he was to continue her training, and less involved in the Yakuza than he was.
It was.
Nice enough.
If you didn't count the fact that her father was rotting away in prison.
And if you didn't mention the part where an older girl had stepped up to defend Suzume from her very first bullies, and the next week had vanished after stabbing a boy to death and drinking his blood.
"I mean. Yeah," she says at last. Her legs are crossed under her on the couch in Kai's livingroom. He sits at a barstool at the counter, pretending like he's not listening to every word said while he beats the shit out of Kurono at checkers.
"I never forced your father to take the deal. It was always his choice," he says, quiet and firm, and Suzume knows he's not lying. He doesn't need to.
"I know," she promises. She sighs and toys with a stray strand of black hair. Most of it is tied back with a handkerchief. There's a scrunchie on her wrist that holds lock picks, a birthday present from Kurono. "And I'm mad at him, too."
"I'm mad at you for offering the deal, I'm mad at him for taking it, I'm mad at All Might for arresting him, I'm mad at Bairei for killing that woman-"
"How," the boss cuts her off suddenly, "Did you know it was Bairei?"
Suzume blinks at him.
"Huh? Isn't it obvious?"
"We covered that up," he points out, and Suzume has to bite the inside of her cheek.
Now that she's starting to pay attention to the world again, she's forgotten that not everyone sees things the way she does.
"Yeah. You did. But there's only a few people high enough up that you would be willing to trade my dads life for, and among them two of them are gay and this was absolutely a 'crime of passion'. The woman died of strangulation, which marks out Nakahara, since he's only got the one arm, and Tomoe, since she's not strong enough physically to do that without drugs already being in the woman's system. Which, the toxicology report showed none of, or it would have been mentioned during the court hearing, especially considering my father's quirk."
"All of that narrows it down to three people. Akiko was in Kyushu when she died, visiting her daughter. Higuchi would have shot the woman to death. So, it was Bairei."
Osachi stares at her for a long minute. Finally, he asks, "How long did it take you to figure that out?"
"I… dunno? As soon as they showed her picture in court. She looks like Bairei's ex-wife, too."
"I see."
"Yeah," Suzume glances over, and realizes that Kai and Kurono are staring at her too.
"You might one day be a very dangerous person, Kono Suzume."
Suzume cracks the smallest smile. "I'll take that as a compliment. You aren't planning on keeping me and Kaname from trying to enter hero schools are you?"
"You're still thinking of that?" he asks. She nods. "No, we won't interfere. It was part of your father's deal, that after he takes the fall we support your family whatever way you choose to live your lives. If you and your brother are really determined to go down that path, I've already agreed not to interfere."
"If they let either of us in."
"If they let either of you in, yes. I admit, I would rather you join us than waste your life away chasing that dream."
"It's only a waste if I don't get it done."
Suzume tilts her head back, her eyes narrowed in thought. They definitely didn't know that her dad had sold them out to the heroes, or this conversation would be going very differently, and Sanjiro would already be dead as a traitor.
"You know," she begins. "I think I'm always angry."
"We know," Kai says dryly from the counter. He ignores the dirty look she sends him in favor of winning his latest game. "That's why you want to be a hero in the first place. Not because you care about justice, or protecting people, or anything else. You just want to prove people wrong. You're the most vitriolic child I've ever met."
"Do you own a mirror?"
Kurono turns away to hide the way his eyes curve behind his dark blue face mask, so Kai doesn't see his smile.
Osachi draws her attention again, his voice grave. "Despite what you just said, I already gave your father my word. We won't interfere with your goal, but this is part of his deal as well; If either of you ever truly become heroes, we cut all ties with you, and we are Yakuza and hero. Nothing more. Takahiro and Rio's Marriage means nothing."
It stings, but it isn't a surprise. It's comforting, actually. There'a measure of belief, however small, in there that this might be possible at all.
This world will never let you be a hero.
Suzume looks down at her hands. She turns the scrunchie on her wrist around and around. The lock picks are hard under the cloth, and familiar.
"I understand."
She's still angry. Angry at Osachi. Angry at her father. Angry at the world.
They aren't good people. She knows that. And she's probably (definitely) already complicit in a few crimes.
Suzume glances at Kai out of the corner of her eye. He hasn't taken the name Overhaul yet. He's Yakuza, not a villain. Not yet.
She knows he can become something horrible. There are monsters under his skin, and darkness in his veins. His knuckles have broken open on the jaws of those who would badmouth the Shie Hassaikai. He's willing to do anything to restore their honor and lift them back to their rightful place.
In at least one timeline he went so far as to put his own father in a coma to bring that goal to life, and tortured his niece as well.
But she's seen him laugh so hard it's breathless and shocked, she's felt his bare hands on her skin take her apart but remake her anew, despite his own mysophobia. She's seen him take in person after person, tools perhaps but ones that he takes care of all the same and people that he's honest with.
Suzume cannot assume that what happened before will happen here. It would be silly. She has no idea how much of an effect she's had on, well, anything, or how much of an effect she'll have. She had no idea how accurate her faded memories of this world are anymore at all, if they were perfectly accurate in the first place.
So she's just going to have to live, and see what happens.
Anyone is capable of an atrocity, and anyone is capable of a kindness. She's always known that. It's no different now.
(It's cold in the warehouse, so, so cold and her blood cools under her body while her own baby sisters weeps above her with blood on her hands
Hard rock presses against her, her body is broken, everything hurt and doesn't and a villain puts her back together with hives on his hands)
Although she's definitely going to be keeping an eye on Eri and her quirk. She doesn't know what all she can do, she's a quirkless twelve year old whose claim to fame is having Yakuza babysitters, but Eri is just a kid, and she doesn't want anything to happen to Taka.
So.
She'll keep an eye on things. And if it comes to it… If it comes to Kai and Kurono and the people she's spent so many years around, or the life of one little girl, the choice is pretty clear.