*ding-dong*

The sound of the doorbell snapped Inko Midoriya out of her exhaustion-induced daze.

'Did I fall asleep again…?'

Only a couple of moments ago she had to calm a rabid Izuku as he caught All Might once again defeating a slew of villains with just a single punch. And if she was being perfectly honest, no matter how many times she saw it, she couldn't get the excitement of it nor did she really like the fighting, but Izuku would jump up and full sprint around the house with an All Might action figure, while also yelling the various catchphrases the All Might would yell out. She didn't know how a five-year-old could be so excited about heroes. Well, she was getting past the age of really caring about those things after all.

Another ring of the doorbell would lead her back from her momentary thoughts.

"I'm coming!"

She got up from the couch and started heading towards the door, not really expecting much except for maybe another cheeky salesman trying to sell her something ridiculous.

"If this is another method for you guys to get me to buy something, again I'm not interest…"

Looking out from her door she wasn't met with a sleazy buttoned-up salesman that she had expected, rather she didn't see anyone in front of her. But as she looked around the door she saw that it was a young girl, around the same age as Izuku looking at her, maybe a bit shorter too.

"...-ed."

'Rabbit ears? This must be new…'

"What're you doing here little one? You don't look old enough to be out here by yourself. Where are your parents?" She asked after putting on a quick smile and looking around for the kid's possible parents.

The girl beamed back at her with the cutest smile she has ever seen (bar Izuku). "My family and I moved next door and they said that they wanted to meet the neighbors but I headed out first because I wanted to talk to you first!"

"Is that right?" 'Maybe that's why there was so much noise the previous morning' "I've never got your name…"

She looked at the kid waiting for an answer, but after a few seconds of awkward silence and the two just smiling at each other, she just guessed that it was too much for a 5-year-old girl to understand the queue she gave.

"What's your name, little one?"

"It's Rumi! Rumi Usagimiya!"

"Well Rumi-chan, how about you bring your parents over so we can have a chat with each other hm?"

"Okay!" she exclaimed as she… hopped(?) over next door and yelled for her parents "Mom, Dad! Hurry up! The neighbors want to meet you!"

Soon after Rumi went back to grab her parents, two other rabbit-eared people appeared out of the neighboring door sill. They still looked as though they were fully moving in, but they did seem to be nice people. As the Usagimiya family approached, the mother of the group was the first to say something to her, "Pleased to meet you…?"

"Inko Midoriya, but you all can just call me Inko, we're going to be around each other quite often anyways." Inko said with a quick bow.

"Oh of course! I'm sure you've already met little Rumi-chan here, but my name is Kimiko, and my husband here is Dunichi." Kimiko replied as she returned the gesture.

"Nice to meet you both. I hope that the landlord has been treating you guys well so far!"

"Oh it's been great so far." replied Kimiko, "It's certainly new coming to the city area, so much that…"

A few minutes of chatter later, a pair of rabbit ears jumped up in front of her vying for attention. Gosh! She got so engrossed with introducing herself and talking about the city, she forgot to introduce her own kid!

"Oh my! I've gotten so distracted that I almost forgot about my own kid! Before you guys go back to finish moving in, I'd like to introduce my own child." Turning back into her apartment "Izuku! Come meet the neighbors!"

Walking up to the front door he looked at his mom, slightly dejected "But kaa-san, All-Might was just about to leave!"

'Sigh, he'll never get over him will he?' "Well, I just wanted you to meet the neighbors as they were nice enough to come over and give us a greeting. They even have someone your age!" She gestured over to the Usagimiya family, "This here is Kimiko, Dunichi, and Rumi-chan," returning her attention to the fluffle in front of her as she put her right hand on Izuku's shoulder.

"This child of mine is Izuku. I'm sure he's pleased to meet you guys as well"

Looking back from his mom, he laid his gaze on the girl in front of him, only for his eyes to slowly gaze upwards towards Rumi's rabbit ears.

"Bunny ears?!"

Taking a slightly offended look Rumi responded "They're rabbit ears, not bunny ears you dummy!"

Ignoring the blooming arguments between the children, Inko chuckled and turned her attention back to the adults, "I see that they're hitting it off already"

"Yes, yes they are." Dunichi replied, "I hope that our visit didn't interrupt anything important, but we will have to excuse ourselves as we have to meet with the other neighbors and finish settling into our new apartment."

"Oh no, you all hadn't interrupted anything important, well maybe Izuku's All Might watching, if anything it was wonderful to meet all of you!" She gave a slight tug at Izuku's shoulder to halt their ongoing debate of being a rabbit or a bunny, of which Izuku gave a small pout and crossed his arms, "And Rumi-chan, if you need anything, you can come by ok?"

"How about Izuku-kun and Rumi have a little more time getting to know each other, while we finish up everything else?" Kimiko suggested.

"That'd be great!" Turning her attention to Rumi, "So how about it Rumi-chan, do you want to play with Izuku?"

"I do!" she excitedly replied "And maybe I can make him say that I'm a rabbit and not a bunny! Because I'm definitely not a bunny!"

"How about you two head inside and play, and I'll cook something up for the two of you."

"Anything with carrots please!"

"But bunnies eat carrots!" Izuku interrupted as the two children were slightly ushered in by a chuckling Inko.

As the two children went inside to bicker and play whatever children play, she swore that she heard Izuku whisper to himself, "Those are definitely bunny ears."

"Well I hope to see both of you soon to get Rumi!" she said as the Usagimiya family made their way to their other neighbors.

As she closed the door, she heard a bunch of talking and laughter coming from the living room. 'Hopefully this is the start of a great friendship' she thought as she walked towards the kitchen to make some curry with side carrots.

~~~

He was excited, he had finally turned 6 years old. The last few months were awful because he had to go to SCHOOL!!! But it was finally time for him to go to the doctor and find out what his quirk was! Super strength like All Might? Or maybe even Flight? What if he got both?! He's been extra jumpy for the last couple days, and he spent more time watching heroes on his computer than normal.

'Invisibility maybe? What about super speed? I hope it's a really strong one! I want to be strong enough to be a great hero after all.'

"Good afternoon Midoriya-san and Izuku-kun. Are we finally ready to see what Izuku-kun's quirk is?"

"YEAH!" Izuku yelled out. Chuckling a little inside, Inko knew that he would be excited for this but she didn't know that it would be to this level and for as long as it was. Though she couldn't lie and say that the anticipation wasn't killing her either. 'Hopefully the quirk is enough to keep him safe'

"You wouldn't know Shuntaro-san, it's gotten to the point where it's the only thing that Izuku would talk about."

"Hah, I would know Midorya-san, my own child was bouncing around the house before finding out what his quirk was."

"Kaa-san, when are we starting!?" Izuku excitedly asked as he jumped up and down.

"Oh of course Izuku, you've been waiting for this for a while."

"Well let's get to it then, as you know Izuku-kun, you took the x-ray last week, and we've kept your x-ray hidden just for this moment! And it seems that your quirk is…" Looking down at the x-ray film, his expression quickly fell.

"What is it? What is it???" Izuku practically begged.

Only moments of silence, interrupted only by the doctor's hushed whisper of "How could this be?"

"... I'm sorry little one. But after looking far and wide… it seems like you don't have a quirk… Which shouldn't happen anymore, as it's thought that there will no longer be any quirkless people." the doctor started rambling on to himself.

As if his world shattered, Izuku stilled, becoming ignorant of the world around him. Inko also couldn't believe it and was put into somewhat of a shock that Izuku was also feeling.

"There shouldn't be any way, right? I mean, there have been examples of people who've been quirkless, but those were all the way in the past. So he should be guaranteed to have a quirk right?"

Pulling up a piece of film the doctor began to explain. "Well Midoriya-san, near the beginning of people getting quirks, we noticed a pattern found in those that had quirks. It was a genetic mutation that wasn't found in humans before then. And so we hypothesized that this mutation was found only to be present in someone with a quirk, but not in someone without one. And in the following years of a quirk-dominated society, we'd also have some people who were still born without any quirk at all and those people didn't have the mutation. Since then though, there haven't been any examples of a quirkless child until this moment." Upon seeing Inko's still apprehensive expression the doctor explained a bit further.

"So whenever we are looking for whether or not a person has a quirk, we would generally look for an extra toe joint that should have been right here." He said as he pointed at Izuku's x-ray of his foot.

"And no matter how many times I look at the x-ray I just can't find the extra toe joint. I'm sure that this is something that we'll have to send to the labs to make sure that we have genuinely found someone without a quirk."

"We're extremely sorry for this Midoriya-san, but there's no chance for your son to have a quirk now or well, ever. And as far as I'm aware, Izuku may be the only living person in Japan without a quirk, and maybe the whole world too… And seeing how this news is both monumental and terrible, I'll get the office to waive the bill for both quirk consultations and the x-ray."

"No no, it's fine," Inko replied a bit absentmindedly as she took a look at Izuku, worried for his current mental state as the normally energetic child hasn't said anything for the last couple minutes. "Thank you Shuntaro-san, we'll be sure to come by for our yearly checkup at a later time," she said as she stood up and bowed as the Midoriya family began to leave the clinic.

The car ride back home was uneventful as well, as the Midoriya family was taking in the news in their own respective silence.

Once they got to their home, Izuku walked straight to his room, not having said anything since getting the news.

Inko didn't know much of what to say, as she knew how important this was to Izuku, she couldn't really convey how apologetic she felt for him or how it could possibly get better. Slowly walking up to his room she opened the door carefully and quietly, and as she entered she heard faint sniffles behind the noise of a booming voice. She found Izuku sitting in front of his computer and watching the same All-Might video that got him into heroes in the first place. She trod towards him, though Izuku must've heard her entering and he turned around to her slowly.

"A-all Might's been there for everyone, he saves everyone with a smile too…" he said while wiping the tears flowing down his freckled cheeks.

Wrapping her arms around him, she brought him in for a close hug. "Shh, it'll be ok. Everything will be ok."

"Kaa-san… I-is it still possible? C-can I still be a hero like All Might?"

Those few words broke her heart. She couldn't really say anything to answer that. Affirming it would give false hopes, and denying it would just make it worse. And so she pulled him closer, tears threatening to drip down her face. All the while Izuku was crying his heart out.

Oh how bad of a day it was for the Midoriya household.

~~~~

Masegaki Primary School

It's been a couple days since Izuku has been at school. He's been quite depressed the last few days. So much so that Inko let him stay home to maybe recuperate his feelings, but try as she may, this was something that he would carry with him for the rest of his life. Eventually, he had to go back to school. And eventually, he'd have to figure out how to live his own life being… quirkless.

"Izuku honey, I know it's a terrible time to be going to school, and I'd love to keep you at home for longer but we both know you can't do that for too long." With a quick kiss to the forehead Inko waved goodbye to Izuku as he exited the car and headed towards the school that he so dreads now.

Before heading in Izuku glanced back at his mom in the car and turned back to the school, starting to head in.

'What am I going to do with him now…' Inko thought to herself as she saw the retreating figure of Izuku enter the school.

Nothing felt too different since the last time he walked through the halls to his homeroom, but everything felt a little more gray as he looked at the school around him. Arriving at his chair he sighed.

"Hey 'zuku! Where were you the last couple days?" Rumi excitedly asked from the chair next to him.

"Oh. Hi Rumi. I was just… at home." he replied dejectedly as he sat down.

"I was just about to ask Auntie Inko where you were too! But my mom wouldn't let me! She just told me that you were doing something important! Why were you home anyways? Were you sick? Are you ok?" she asked as a slightly worried expression appeared on her face.

"No, I wasn't sick Rumi, and I don't really want to talk about it."

Her ears visibly fell as he laid his head on his desk.

"Well okay then. You can tell me if you want to…"

The rest of the day was uneventful. His head all but slammed on the desk as soon as he saw the class work that he had to work on (It was simple addition), and there wasn't really much else, except for Rumi following him around like usual, except this time she was asking him once more where he was, albeit a bit more subtly as she wasn't trying to directly ask him the same question again after he asked her not to. Maybe he should tell her, maybe he should keep it to himself. He didn't know what to do, it was just all so new to him.

As he started his trek back home, he heard Rumi starting to hop towards him. Her ears were still dejectedly down. Had he really made her this sad with his dismissal of her questions?

Rumi's steps got a bit more reserved as she got closer to Izuku, and by the time she was right next to him, she had a troubled look on her face as she debated on how to ask Izuku a question that's been on her mind the entire day. "So 'zuku, I can still come by… right? It was so boring to just sit around all day at home, and I couldn't really talk with anyone at school. They still think it's kinda weird that I have rabbit ears… and I'm still not really making any friends… and I dont really know if you still want to play together..." she trailed off while keeping her gaze away from Izuku's eyes.

Oh… that's what she was so troubled about. He guessed she was right, she really did only talk with him. No one really dared to come close to her or even really talk with her, except to make a comment about her ears. Maybe he was being a little too closed off after all.

He put his hands in his pockets and looked up at the buildings surrounding them, "I never said that you couldn't come over."

Her ears instantly perked up, "Really? Then let's go right now!" she said as she grabbed his wrist and started to drag him back to their apartment.

And after what had seemed like forever, Izuku smiled once again.

~~~~

A/N

It might've been a while, and I still need to get better at writing I see. I've been struggling with perspectives, which I always kinda sucked at, and my balancing of how descriptive a scene should've been. Which is also why I'm going through the chapters I already wrote even though I shouldn't… It just really annoyed me.

Again, I kinda want to see this story going but chapters might be a bit sporadic as I won't have much time to write anymore, but my profile should say something about the updates that I might push out.

2/4/25