Momo wasn't necessarily opposed to these charity balls.
But she didn't necessarily enjoy them either.
Setting down her Coach Clutch Handbag on the table, the teen took a few moments to adjust her blood-red off-shoulder flared dress before moving her way toward the main stage.
The speech would start any moment now.
Suppressing an exhausted sigh, the raven scanned the venue for a seat toward the back, eager to zone out throughout the entire event.
Then she could finally go home.
The thought alone brought forth a smile on the girl's face as she finally took a seat.
"All I have to do is make it through a boring, self-gratifying speech. Then I can go home, go to my room, and eat pizza bagels while watching cartoons." The raven allowed the content smile to wash over her face, the thought alone inspiring feelings of longing within her.
Bringing herself to the present, Momo gazed ahead unfocused, her mantra repeating within her head.
"One. Boring. Speech."
"I'm delighted to introduce our new initiative dedicated toward youth crime intervention, Magic Soul!"
Momo yawned as the woman's voice began to muddle, the fatigue she'd been desperately fighting already permeating her being.
If something didn't happen soon, she'd die of boredom.
As soon as the thought graced her mind, a kiss of green flashed in her peripheral.
Her eyes snapped open as she feverently searched the venue for sight of the object that'd slipped past her peripheral.
"I'm praying that isn't an assassin! When I said I wanted something to happen that is NOT what I meant."
Her currently scant hero training kicking in, the raven scanned all possible sniper posts before focusing on the stage containing the speaker itself.
"Nothing." The frustration danced on her sentence, a furrowed brow punctuating it.
She'd lost them.
"I'm probably so bored my mind is trying its best to entertain me. Thanks, mind." Stifling a giggle, Momo refocused on the speech.
And that's when she saw it.
"Is that…is that a moving Durian?"
Leaning forward slightly, the raven squinted her eyes in an attempt to get a better view of the stage in which the strange object appeared.
"No way…"
There, on the stage containing the organizer of the event, was a moving Durian.
"Am I so bored that I've lost my grip on reality?" Pondering the question briefly, the raven shrugged, arriving at her answer.
Going insane was definitely better than sitting through this speech.
Focusing her coal-black eyes, the raven curiously followed the Durian as it inched its way toward the hostess on stage.
Before producing a pair of scissors.
Coal-colored eyes widened as she shot from her seat, a mix of anxiety and fear permeating her features.
"On one hand, I'm hallucinating and end up embarrassing myself and my family. On the other, that's a transformation quirk user who was sent to kill the hostess and I end up with, well, a dead hostess." The raven weighed her options, feverently thinking up the best course of action before finally deciding on a solution.
Clearing her throat to gain the attention of the guests, the teen pointed a stern finger at the scissor-wielding Durian before asking a question.
"You all see that Durian, right?"
Murmurs permeated the venue as the attendees followed the teen's finger and sure enough,
They could very much see the sentient Durian.
The room fell silent as the guests all stared at the scissor-wielding Durian.
The aforementioned fruit, now sporting a pair of nervous emerald eyes, stared back.
"Is this a bad time to say I don't have an invite?"
It spoke.
A scissor-wielding Durian, with bright green eyes, had just spoken.
The venue erupted in chaos.
Security hastily pounced on the fruit, eager to protect the hostess from the would-be assassin.
"W-Woah! Do Durian lives not matter?!" The fruit dodged the umpteenth takedown attempt from event security as he closed in on the hostess.
Stifling a giggle from the sentient fruits joke, the raven produced a staff from her inner thigh before moving to join in the capture attempt.
Until the sentient Durian threw its pair of scissors.
Two stick figure-like arms separated, the airborne scissors mimicking the action, as the Durian continued to close the gap toward the horrified hostess.
"Qi Controlled Scissors!"
The airborne scissors adopted a deep blue, almost electric, aura as they tripled in speed, each half barreling toward the hostess.
"Shit."
Time slowed as each half of the Qi Controlled Scissors made a beeline for the trembling hostess, the blades elegantly dancing around the event security on their path toward the woman.
If the circumstances weren't so dire, she'd love to sit and watch the blades dance like that for hours upon hours.
But there were more pressing matters.
The entire venue, including Momo herself, waited in bated breath as they watched the distance between the Qi-Controlled Scissors and the hostess grow smaller and smaller, until eventually,
They sliced through her brown locks.
A puff of smoke enveloped the Durian, revealing the true form of the assassin? Barber? Momo didn't know at this point.
But what she did know, however, was that the boy before her was absolutely breathtaking.
His unruly hair matched his shining green eyes as a plethora of freckles kissed his cheeks, instilling an aura of innocence within the boy.
And then there was his smile.
His grin remained almost blindingly bright as he danced around event security, a twinge of playfulness within his emerald-colored eyes.
Momo always considered herself partial toward the refined, stoic types, but now,
She was seriously reconsidering that.
His mix of innocence and playful mischievousness felt refreshing, especially when adding in his simple ensemble which consisted of a pair of black shorts in tandem with a white hoodie, the Chinese character for 7 embroidered on the top left.
Even though he was probably, most definitely, a wanted criminal, Momo felt as though that added to the constant subversions that made her so drawn to him.
Quite frankly, the boy looked as though he couldn't hurt a fly and yet here he was, sneaking into a highly guarded event as a Durian of all things just to cut off the hostess' hair.
It was enough to make her laugh.
Her giggles halted the greenette alongside his would-be captors as they turned to her, looks of confusion permeating their faces.
Feeling their gazes on her form, the raven waved a hand dismissively before speaking.
"I-I'm sorry, it's just, sneaking in as a Durian to cut off the hostess' hair with Qi-Controlled Scissors isn't at all what I thought I'd see tonight." The teen struggled to speak through her giggles as her expression shifted to one of pure elation.
A light dusting of pink settled upon the greenettes face, causing Momo's heart to flutter in her chest. Throughout their brief interaction, one thing was abundantly clear to the raven.
Her taste in men would never be the same.
The greenette flashed her a bright smile, the relatively minuscule action doing wonders to her heart, before speaking.
"It's my pleasure. Always happy to make pretty girls smile!" The boy punctuated his sentence with a wiggle of his eyebrows which elicited yet another laugh from the raven.
Cute, playful, skilled, and funny?
Yeah, she was hooked.
Watching the heir to one of, if not the, most prolific families in the nation speak to what was essentially street trash seemed to snap the security guards from their stupor as one of them threw a swift left hook to the boy's skull.
Which hit air.
Looking up, the guard's eyes widened out of their sockets. The boy, who'd outmaneuvered military-trained security and minor Pro Heroes, cut the hair off the hostess before flirting with the heir to the richest family in the country,
Was being dragged through the air by a bird about the size of his palm.
The aforementioned greenette stuck his hand out, recalling his Qi-Controlled Scissors before calling out to the raven for the final time.
"I really enjoyed talking to you! Oh, and sorry for ruining your event thingy! Someone paid good money for me to cut her hair mid-speech so y'know…Oh! If you wanna pay for a job just look up "Seven" on the boards! If you don't know what that is then call me! Oh wait I don't have a phone…"
Momo giggled at the greenettes antics, watching as he flew further and further away while his voice grew more and more distant.
Flashing his million-dollar smile one last time, the greenette flew through a now-open skylight, another, slightly larger, blue chicken hitching a ride soon after.
A million and one thoughts flashed through the raven's mind as she allowed her smile to grow even wider before one peculiar detail overtook her brain.
"Was that chicken smoking a cigar?"
"Great job Izuku! You're getting better every day!"
The three sat in a small barbershop as the larger chicken thumbed through the day's earnings, an excited grin settling on his beak.
The aforementioned teen offered a laugh, a sheepish expression painting his face.
"Thanks, Dai Bo. Will this be enough for this month's rent?"
The larger chicken smiled wider, his gravity-defying cigar somehow staying in his beak.
"This month?! With this job, we're covered for at least the rest of the year!" A feathered wing rested itself atop the greenettes head as its owner locked eyes with Izuku.
At least Izuku thought Dai Bo was looking at him, the chicken constantly wore sunglasses, even indoors.
The aforementioned chicken lightly ruffled the younger boy's locks before speaking once more.
"You're a good kid, Izuku, I don't know where I'd be without you. Now if only you'd take actual contracts, then we'd be rolling in it!"
A warm smile nestled itself onto Dai Bo's beak as he watched a light pink settle on his protege's face.
Shaking the wing from his head, Izuku spun in his barber chair as he spoke to his teacher.
"I dunno. I have no idea who I was in my old life, but the Izuku here today wants to help people, not just kill them for no reason." As his mini-speech finished, Izuku stopped spinning in his chair, a melancholic expression on his face.
Dai Bo caught sight of it and embraced the teen, Xiao Fei doing the same.
"I know, Izuku, and I'm sure you'll help plenty of people during your time here. Now come on, I want Laziji!"
"Isn't that cannibalism?"
"Who cares?!"
Momo didn't consider herself the stalker type…
But.
Something about that boy had utterly infatuated her, and when Momo Yaoyorozu was interested in something,
She'd head to the ends of the earth to learn everything about it.
The raven popped another Pizza Bagel in her mouth as her free hand feverently scrolled through the webpage.
She'd been at it for hours, sifting through census reports, hospital records, school dossiers, and everything in between in search of the boy she'd seen at that charity event. But so far,
No luck.
Throwing her arms up in frustration, the raven snagged her cell phone and texted one of her close friends from school.
She'd searched through countless gigs of data and yielded no results, nothing even so much as mentioning him, which meant she needed to think outside of the box, she needed to think crazy.
And who better to supply her with an off-the-wall idea than her good friend Kyouka Jiro?
The raven absentmindedly sipped from a juice box as she waited for her best friend to respond. Despite how late it was, she knew the rocker girl was wide awake.
"Probably listening to Best Buds…again." Her charcoal-colored eyes fluttered shut as a giggle reverberated through her room.
"I'm funny."
As soon as the sentence escaped her lips, her phone pinged.
Kyouka had texted her back.
SMS
Rock Hawd: Did ya need something?
Creati: Yes, I'd like your opinion on something.
Rock Hawd: Shoot.
Creati: So let's say, hypothetically, you wanted to find someone but they don't exist. What would you do?
Rock Hawd: Dude what?
Rock Hawd: Are you searching for ghosts or something?
Creati: No! That isn't what I meant.
Rock Hawd: Then whaddya mean?
Creati: It's like, you've seen them and stuff, but when you look them up they don't exist online.
Rock Hawd: …
Creati: Kyouka?
Rock Hawd: …
Creati: Did I say something wrong?
Rock Hawd: Momo, you're my best friend, you know that right?
Creati: Of course!
Rock Hawd: So I can be honest with you right?
Creati: Always!
Rock Hawd: Kk. I'm gonna hold your hand when I say this; whoever you're looking for is probably, most definitely, a wanted criminal.
Creati: …Shit.
SMS
Why hadn't she thought of that sooner?
He snuck into a charity ball, resisted arrest, and cut off the hair of the hostess, of course he wasn't in the best legal standing.
The teen ran lithe fingers through her raven locks as she pondered her next move.
"On one hand, he could very well be a wanted criminal, and associating with him any further would tarnish my and my family's reputation and even land me in prison. On the other hand, I'm very, VERY, curious."
Hugging her knees to her chest, Momo contemplated her next choice carefully. Should she choose the incorrect action, her and her family's legacies could be ruined in an instant. Truly a difficult choice to make.
Just kidding.
It was a very easy choice for Momo.
Refocusing on her monitor, the raven hastily switched to a VPN before opening Tor and typing in a .onion link she'd seen her father use a plethora of times.
The killer rankings.
If her hunch was correct, then the board the boy was talking about prior was this one and he was listed on it somewhere.
Which meant Momo had a lot of scrolling to do.
Turning on a random video essay on her phone, the raven began to scroll.
And scroll.
…and scroll,
Until finally, after three hour-long video essays, she'd managed to find the boy.
"Alias: Seven, Kills: 0, Rank: #17,369"
Jus a little after-word while I have your attention.
Like a couple of my stories, I had the idea for this while sleep deprived so I have no real outline of where it's going just a rough idea.
Per usual, that means the ships are up to whoever reads this and feels like reviewing with their choice.
As always, WORD IS BONDDDD!