Nezu blinked staring at the different reports littered across his desk and found himself in a rare state of bafflement, one of the skills his quirk allowed him to learn to fully retain all the information he read and collect it in an organized mental library he had also learned to build through some books on visualization.
And with this nifty little trick he could easily recall any information he needed by going back through the shelves in the right section, data that could be connected was easily linked for ease of access in his brain and that made it child's play to find connections that weren't "apparent" to most, and currently that just made it all the clearer when he hadn't made any progress on a case.
His request for other heroes to forward any information had been received rather well and he had more than enough reports where Deku-Sensei was indeed mentioned but there wasn't anything of substance in those reports, for the most part it was just incidents where Deku-Sensei was said between two criminals in passing, and the few people that had been actively looking for info on the broker were quickly stonewalled.
Nezu himself had seen such a thing for himself when he had been at the station to collect more data in person and was blessed with a chance to watch Scripture interview a dealer for the Russians that she had overheard saying something about Deku-Sensei when the dealer wasn't speaking in Russian.
He watched as the interview continued as expected until Scripture tried to leverage a softer sentence if he would tell her something about Deku-Sensei only for the man to laugh at her "Do you think I'm stupid? If I told you anything about Deku, I would be dead by the hands of my own men before I ever made it to Tartarus." The man scoffed at her and after that proclamation the man wouldn't say another word about anything related to Deku-Sensei.
Nezu knowing how the Russian mafia grew their members with an ingrained sense of deep loyalty to the members above them and doubly so for members higher up in the food chain as this dealer was found the comment was… alarming for several things that it implied about Deku-Sensei's position in the criminal world.
Because if what the dealer said was correct then Deku-Sensei despite being an outsider held so much power that a group based entirely in loyalty to their own that Deku-Sensei was placed well above their own high-ranking members, of course there was the possibility that Deku-Sensei was a member of the Russian mafia but given his ties to rival factions that was an impossibility, so it left Nezu with quite the conundrum.
Because the only way he could think of a person gaining so much power with the group was as previously mentioned by either being in the mafia or have strong ties to a high member but that wouldn't explain how Deku-Sensei could move about through any gangs' territory without causing an uproar, or perhaps Deku-Sensei had been around long enough to build strong ties or deals with the Russians but that was just as hard to believe.
The documents spread across his desk were from the past ten years (the minimum amount of time necessary) and he had scoured them for any scrap of information that he could find that could hint at Deku-Sensei or his aftermath existing before September '72 and found nothing of the sort, something that meant either Deku-Sensei was so good that he didn't leave any trace which would have been impossible even in the current era or Deku-Sensei has only been around for less than a year as he previously believed.
The more Nezu tried to find out about Deku-Sensei the more paradoxical the figure would become, Deku-Sensei had strong ties to powerful groups that don't take kindly to outsiders butting into their business and has a presence that implead that they had been around for far longer than physically possible from the evidence, and they inspired so much fear/awe that the criminals connected to them would never dare to double cross them.
He couldn't help thinking back on that old metaphor of Schrödinger's cat, until someone could finally find Deku-Sensei they would never truly know anything more than what Deku-Sensei could be, which made Deku-Sensei more interesting than most of his puzzles, but it also made him more cautious since Nezu began to suspect that whoever Deku-Sensei was they were in the rare ten percent.
Human behavior was simple to understand with a little time and effort and he has often made psychological profiles of criminals to be dispersed amongst both heroes and the police alike but something that he did regardless of what they asked about him is he never gave a profile in absolutes and always a 10% part where the subject would do something unpredictable, and he did that for one reason, humans were complex and there were some that didn't conform to logic.
Nezu's go to metaphor for this principle when as follows: Lock a person in a room with one window and one door and they will do one of a few things, 30% of people would do nothing and wait to be let out, 60% would try to escape the room they could be further divided as so.
10% of them would try and fail, 10% yell and demand to be freed, 20% would try to get the door open, and the last 20% would try to break open the window to get out.
And for that last part of the equation was made up of a very small portion of the population, about 10% of people would do something he could never predict, like reach into their pocket and pull out a key and just leave the room since they stole it earlier, those ten percent of people could be either the most dangerous or the most valuable people in the world because they couldn't truly be put into a corner.
Aizawa Shouta was excellent example of the latter, a man that by all rights should have become a villain after all the years of abuse piled onto him for something as benign as his quirk instead turned into a spiteful grumpy hero that was adored by most who knew him and absolutely loved by children and animals alike while putting the fear of God into the students he watched over so they would survive in heroics.
And much like he expected Aizawa was the first person to give him something alternative to consider in his search for Deku-Sensei, a quirk that worked as an NDA was an interesting prospect and might hold some weight behind it if it had some measure of enforcement as well as a way for Deku-Sensei to know if the NDA was broken, there wasn't enough evidence for him to codify it and would keep the idea in his back pocket as he looked for more information.
An NDA quirk would fill in some gaps such as why people were so cautious of speaking of Deku-Sensei to certain people and perhaps it would make it easier to work in favors as he suspected Deku-Sensei did since discussion of payment mentioned was rarely mentioned when people spoke of Deku-Sensei.
His laptop dinged bringing Nezu out of his musing and he checked his email and saw an email from Himawari that he had an informant tell him that two low level pleaders were talking about offering to work for Deku-Sensei in return for his services, a small tidbit that confirmed three things for him.
One: a possible gender for them to narrow down their search for Deku-Sensei as a person, second: that Deku-Sensei had indeed been trading in favors as well as money for information, and third: Deku-Sensei had workers underneath him in some kind of network, perhaps that was how Deku-Sensei would get his information and why his poking around didn't turn up much in solid info on Deku-Sensei, Deku-Sensei might work entirely from behind the scenes sending others in his place which would explain his ability to move through various territories when people were normally so territorial.
He'd need some time to reconsider some things with these facts in mind but before he could really dig into these possibilities Nezu heard footsteps heading toward his office, knowing the sound of the boots by heart Nezu didn't bother trying to put away his multiple reports in any big hurry, instead he moved over to the coffee machine and got it started.
Aizawa proceeded to stalk into his office a minute later and the man let himself fall upon the couch and groaned, Nezu's tail swayed behind him at a moderate pace rather than the fast pace it instinctively wanted to go at and he had to restrain himself from chirping, knowing that Aizawa still found his office as a safe space to destress even after all these years despite the man's trauma with his previous schooling was a point of personal pride for him.
"Hello Aizawa." Nezu greeted a touch more subdued than his normal "cheer" in case the man had a headache, Aizawa frequently escaped to his office if he was overwhelmed, a habit that developed during Aizawa's time as a student and continued when Aizawa began teaching here.
The possibility Aizawa was able to find comfort in his presence because he himself was not a human being often resurfaced when Aizawa escaped to his office, Aizawa's ability to interact with other humans was severely lacking even when he was civil due to how cold he was to them, but he had no such trouble with the numerous alley cats he befriended, a theory he toyed with from time to time.
"Facing a bit of trouble?" Nezu inquired with the tilt of his head getting some grumbling from the man and he couldn't quite make out what Aizawa was saying given his face was buried in the couch, with a beep from the coffee maker Nezu poured a cup then sat himself down on the arm of the couch.
Once Aizawa smelt the coffee he lifted his head glancing at him and revealing a dark U-shaped mark on his face, before Aizawa moved so that he was upright enough to accept the drink, Nezu waited for Aizawa to take a few sips and saw a great deal of Aizawa's tension drift away "Nemuri is being annoying and it was giving me a headache, couldn't nap in the breakroom." Aizawa explained rather curtly, not that he could blame his former student, the naps he took throughout the day boosted his average sleep time to seven-hours.
It was an hour short of the health requirement but that was certainly better than just five "Well, your sleeping bag is right where you left it Aizawa." Nezu briefly commented jumping down from the arm and moving back to his desk as quietly as possible, Aizawa drank about half of his cup before he was alert enough to notice the piles of paper on his desk.
"That about Deku?" Aizawa asked "Indeed." Nezu replied simply as he began to reorganize the reports by district, he didn't miss how Aizawa scowled "And they still won't green light an official investigation?" Aizawa scoffed shaking his head clearly annoyed.
Nezu could understand why it was frustrating for most heroes that investigations required physical grounds either in evidence or verified verbal testimony for permission to get an official investigation started, but as frustrating as it was the rule was there for good reason, heroes despite being civil servants were very powerful in modern society and the only thing keeping the less savory heroes from starting witch hunts were these rules.
"Not currently, how are things going with the Yaizu vigilante?" Nezu responded switching the topic and almost instantly Aizawa's mood soured and he sank deeper into the couch. "I managed to figure out a hair color, but I had to get a hoof to the face for my trouble." Aizawa answered and that certainly explained the odd mark on the man's face "Ah, what color is the boy's hair?" Nezu inquired seeing as that was certainly an improvement.
Given the area and the timing it had been quite difficult for Aizawa to get a good look at the boy's features even if he could get within ten feet of the boy much less from the many meters away on the rooftops "Either a dark green or black." Aizawa told him and Nezu filed that away for later when he looked through the public database for quirks, Nezu would've checked earlier but there was one too few limiters but now he had three and that should be enough to find a close enough match, oh and he'd have to look for any NDA related quirks while he was at it, a quirk that specific would have far fewer candidates for him to comb through.
His left ear twitched upon hearing the click of heels approaching "Kayama is coming." Nezu warned and Aizawa cursed under his breath, swiftly got up then proceeded to hide under his desk and wrapped himself up in the sleeping bag hidden there, Aizawa had just managed to get himself settled when Nemuri was just outside his door "Kayama come on in." Nezu called quickly opening a random file and locking his eyes on the first paper.
The woman peeked her head in and saw his desk full of paperwork "Sorry to interrupt sir, I was looking for Aizawa, have you seen him?" she asked a meeker given he looked like he was in the middle of important work, Kayama like most students found him unnerving to be around and he gave her a nice little smile "I'm afraid not, I've been quite busy." Nezu told her and Kayama nodded with a gulp "I see, sorry sir, I'll be going now." She hastily said closing the door and swiftly leaving.
He waited for Kayama to be out of earshot. "I shall wake you when your class starts Aizawa." He informed the man and Aizawa gave a soft grunt of understanding before he tried to force himself into sleeping, something few would attempt while Nezu quietly worked above them, especially if they were smart enough to be wary of him as a super-intelligent animal… yet Aizawa would paradoxically seek him of all people for comfort.
Aizawa was truly an oddity that belonged to the ten percent.
Most people: Nezu probably has tiny spy cameras and proximity alarms to know when people are getting close to his office.
Me: Well, yes but he's also an animal with a better sense of smell and sharper hearing that could just use his eidetic memory to figure out who was coming and how fast they'll get to his door.