[Midoriya Izuku ~ 02]

A/N: And here's chapter two for you all. This time around we'll see the onset of the path that will lead Izuku down the dark and seedy portions of society. It'll be slow going at first, but the effects of the upcoming interactions will prove far-reaching. Hope that you all enjoy!

Izuku's eyes shoot open, his body snapping upwards to where he's sitting up straight in his bed. His breathing comes off a bit ragged; the pains of the past day coming to the forefront of his mind and warding away his morning grogginess.

He can almost feel the explosions rippling across his skin, his body remembering the sensations of collapsing to the ground after Kacchan had attacked him.

Instinctively, he reaches for his ear, feeling for the familiar runny texture of blood. All the while Izuku's eyes dart around expecting the worst – only to find the opposite.

The barest amount of sunlight peers just past the blinds of the window, but it's enough to illuminate the room to his liking. His hero-based posters and paraphernalia dot the room as usual, taking up every possible nook and cranny of his walls and shelves.

All Might smiles at him as he does everyday, the plastic figurines that bear his signature smile making up the majority of the hero memorabilia that occupies Izuku's room.

The fact that he's in his room sinks in, the realization culling Izuku's panic in its place. He takes a few moments to breathe, closing his eyes as he lets time run its course to ease his beating heart.

Eventually, he opens his eyes again. A quick purview of his room reminds Izuku of the night before, right before he went to sleep. A quick glance at his bedside table and Izuku spots his notebooks. His most recent one – Notebook #2 – is still splayed open on the page that he was working on last night.

The sketch of Gang Orca is nearly done, with only the fin and upper half of the hero's head still missing. The small notes around the page — Fin aids with the control of high-paced movement, What's the physical makeup of his eyes and why do they look like that? Can the use of sonar disorientate him — are so jumbled that any other person would have a hard time following his train of thought.

Izuku reaches over and closes the book, tucking it into his bedside drawer just as he checks his alarm clock.

7:58 A.M. Just two minutes before he usually wakes up.

Izuku reaches his hand over and turns the All Might™ alarm clock off before it can start spouting out his favorite hero's catchphrase. And with that, he takes one last look of his surroundings, and gets all the reassurance that he needs.

He's at home. He's fine.

But

not

quite.

Izuku can feel the inklings of his quirk waking up as well, getting stronger as he becomes more lucid. He immediately cuts off the feedback from it and restrains its range, keeping his hearing confined to the boundaries of his apartment. He doesn't need to hear anything else.

He already knows enough about all of his neighbors, after all.

Like how the couple two doors down from him yell a lot. Their arguments often span late into the night, and they kept Izuku up late when he was still learning to control his quirk.

Or the man next door, who watches horror and wartime movies religiously. There's a lot of swearing in them, something of which Izuku knows his mother wouldn't approve of if she knew he was listening in. And so, he doesn't. Or tries not to, at least.

And there's the lady nearly half a block away; she has over twenty cats in her apartment. She talks and sings to each and every one every day, filling their food bowls and giving them baths all the while. She talks on the phone a lot too – sometimes to her niece in Osaka, other times to her brother who lives in Taiwan.

Izuku knows all of this because of his quirk. , just as much as he knows that it can be a bit invasive. It's because of his quik that he knows a whole plethora of information that he'd rather not know in the first place. And so, Izuku tries to keep his quirk contained, even if his control often slips. It's the best he can do for now.

Izuku looks back at his alarm clock.

8:01 A.M.

He turns his head towards the door. Behind it from down the hall come a few footsteps that grow closer with each step. Izuku isn't actually surprised by them, considering that he had heard them the moment they had begun in the kitchen. But he decides that he might as well face the door for when his mother inevitably opens it.

"Izuku, honey?" Midoriya Inko calls out as she knocks on Izuku's door, right at the moment Izuku had expected. "Are you awake yet?"

"Yeah!" Izuku answers. "I am." He ends up sitting up straighter in his bed by the time his mother opens the door to his room.

"Alright!" Inko cheers. "I didn't hear your alarm, so I was just making sure."

Izuku lifts one of his hands up to scratch at his bedhead. "I just woke up before it went off, is all."

"Oh? For any particular reason?" She smiles. "Usually I have to drag you out of the bed. Why was today different?""

Izuku freezes. It's a miniscule effort, and he wills himself out of his state almost immediately, relaxing his body and ridding himself of the sudden tenseness that had overcome him. He's pretty sure that his mother didn't notice the slight change at all. Or he hopes, at least.

"Erm… No," Izuku mutters. "I just… did, I guess."

"Well, alright," Inko chuckles. "Breakfast is just about done, so come out when you're ready, okay? And remember, I still need to reapply your bandages before I drop you off, so don't dawdle!" She leaves without another word, Izuku sensing each and every footstep she makes on her way back to the kitchen.

The mention of the bandages brings said wrappings to Izuku's attention. He had almost forgotten about them, wrapped up around an elbow that he had hurt yesterday. It's only now, after they enter his perception, that he begins to feel the cloth rubbing against his skin.

Izuku shakes it off, getting off of and making his bed. Taking another look at his room once he's done, he nods to himself before heading out towards the kitchen. Some mere phantom pains won't drag him down. He still has the rest of the day before him, after all.

"Please stop scratching at your gauze Izuku!" Inko lightly chides, her eyes peering through the rear view mirror and straight at her son of five years of age. "You don't want it getting infected if it falls off, you know."

"Sorry mom," Izuku mutters, inching his fingers away from his elbow. It still itches of course, and he really wants to scratch it. But he'll listen to his mother for now.

"Honestly," Inko sighs, "you boys roughhouse way too much for my comfort. You need to be more careful when you hang out with Katsuki, alright? I know that it's just a light burn, but still. I don't want to have to talk to Mitsuki and end up taking away your playtime."

Izuku averts his gaze and looks out the car window. "Yeah… I know."

Inko frowns, eyes lingering on her son before focusing back on the road. "Is something up, Izuku? You've been a bit down ever since yesterday."

"It's nothing, Mom," Izuku lies, managing to put up a smile. "I'm just a little tired."

"Ah! It all makes sense now!" Inko cheers. "You came home late after playing with Katsuki. And then I saw you up late drawing in that notebook of yours again. Something about that orca hero?"

At the mention of the hero, the dour expression on Izuku's face disappears almost instantly. "His name's Gang Orca! He's been rising in the ranks over the years, even topping the charts of 'Most Villainous-Looking Hero! Like an orca, he needs water and..."

Inko tries to listen to her son as he goes on and on about this 'Gang Orca,' but ultimately fails at keeping up with the words that come out of his mouth. It's not anything new, of course. He's always like this when he talks about heroes.

The car eventually comes to a stop as Inko pulls into the driveway of the nursery responsible for watching Izuku when she heads to work. She takes another look at the rearview mirror and towards her son, a small smile coming onto her face as she watches his animated movements. "We're here, Izuku!" She interrupts him. "Make sure that you don't go overboard, alright? And have fun!

Izuku pauses, eyes coming back into focus at his mother's words. "Oh!" He scoots over the seats of the car and opens the door, looking back one last time at his mother with a smile. "Bye mom!"

He hops out of the car, slamming the door shut. He waves as his mom drives off, only putting his arm down once she's no longer within visible range. Behind him, Izuku hears the approach of Miss Hoshino, one of the two caretakers that watch over Izuku and the others throughout the day.

Around her early thirties, partnerless given the lack of a ring on her hand, but full of energy and life. She basks in the attention the children give her, and she in turn does whatever she can to please them.

Izuku can't help but recite the information in his head. He can't help it, especially with people that he spends large amounts of time with. It's one of the few things he can do while being good at it; watching people and learning what he can just by observation. Or in some cases, with his newfound quirk.

Like right now.

Though his eyes are still glued towards the road, Izuku can tell exactly what Miss Hoshino is wearing. She has on her two green bangles today, both on her left wrist. Izuku knows this because they make a slightly louder ding as they clash together than her purple bangles do, and are slightly more 'chime-y' than her bulky blue ones. On the other hand, her earrings are the silver ones with blue jays on them. The birds twirl in a ring of silver due to the wind, with–

"Izuku!~ There you are!"

Izuku turns just as Miss Hoshino kneels down before him. "Good morning Izuku!" Miss Hoshino greets, a small rainbow-colored puff of smoke emanating from her hands. "How's my favorite little bean sprout doing today?"

"I'm doing good!" Izuku replies, eyes focusing on her green bangles and bluejay earrings. Just as his quirk provided to him.

"And what happened here?" she asks, her hand gently wrapping around Izuku's bandage elbow. "Why are you all bandaged up?"

"It was nothing," Izuku says. "Just an accident while I was playing with Kacchan yesterday."

"Aww," she gushes. "You and your nicknaming of Katsuki! I can never get over how cute it is!" She stands up, and begins leading Izuku inside. "Come on, Katsuki's already here. You two can go ahead and play until we begin our lesson, alright?"

The inside of the building is chaos incarnate. The rest of Izuku's peers are showing off their quirks left and right, causing a cacophony of noise every which way. Of course, Izuku notes, this is just how it normally is inside the school.

After all, nursery schools are one of the few places where quirks are allowed to be used without a license. Izuku looked up the reasoning, and apparently it has something to do about it being better to let children learn to adapt and properly control their quirks.

Miss Hoshino and Tusken Nursery School's other caretaker, Mister Yoshioka, have been trained to handle the unstable nature of quirks that come at an early age from their students. And yet, Izuku finds, they are often quite overwhelmed by their job.

As such, Izuku doesn't really react when Miss Hoshino suddenly separates from his side and darts across the room towards another student, shouting for the young girl she's heading towards to drop off of the ceiling.

If anything, Izuku doesn't mind. He feels the slightest tinge of abandonment, sure. But he knows htat it's a stupid feeling to feel. After all, her departure leaves him with a chance to find Kacchan.

It doesn't take much to locate his friend. Izuku finds him surrounded by the others from yesterday. They are all gathered around Mister Yoshioka.

Strangely enough, Izuku has discovered Mister Yoshioka as being the polar opposite of his workmate. He's around fifty, and he's rather clueless around children. And, despite his best attempts to appease his students, he never is able to reach the same degree that Miss Hoshino is capable of. It's a wonder he works with kids in the first place.

Izuku wonders if it has to do with some sort of past trauma, considering how often Mister Yoshioka stares off into the distance when he interacts with Tama-kun and Sumi-chan, both blue-haired individuals just like himself.

Before he can get losts in his own thoughts again, Izuku brushes the thought away. He focuses back on Kacchan, and can't help but let out a quiet giggle.

Mister Yoshioka has a stuffed elephant in his hand, blue cloth and all. A flash of light – an indication of using his quirk – sprouts from his hand, enveloping the toy elephant. When the light dies down, the elephant is moving, its trunk waving in the air and it's stubby legs carrying it forward.

But Izuku winches as the toy is handed towards Kacchan who, as expected, subsequently blows up the little creature in his hands with a blast from his quirk.

"I already told you, I don't need no shitty moving toys!" Bakugou shouts.

Mister Yoshioka narrows his eyes. "Bakugou, watch your language. What you said was a bad word, and bad words aren't good for you."

"I can say what I want, you shitty teacher!"

Mister Yoshioka sighs. His hand slides over his face, and Izuku can tell that he's done with dealing with Kacchan. "I'm going to go and see if Hoshino-san needs any help," he relays, standing up. "You can go along and play around with whatever if you really want, Bakugou."

It's as Mister Yoshioka leaves that Izuku decides to announce his presence.

"Kacchan! Guys! I'm here!"

Bakugou and the other five boys all turn around simultaneously to face Izuku. Instantly, Izuku can feel the shift in the air. Something's… wrong.

His friends begin snickering, whispering to each other as they look in his direction. Izuku takes care not to listen in with his quirk, allowing his friends to keep up their privacy.

Eventually, Bakugou makes his way to the front of the group. "Deku, took you long enough."

Izuku tilts his head. "De…ku…?" he enunciates. "What's that supposed to mean, Kacchan?"

Bakugou smirks. "It's your new nickname, nerd!"

"Really!?" Izuku perks up. "Yay! Thank you, Kacchan!"

The others erupt into a mass of laughter, some having to lean on the other to hold themselves up. All the while, Izuku remains clueless.

"What's… what's so funny?" Izuku asks.

"You didn't let me finish, Deku." Bakugou steps forward, moving until he's mere inches away from Izuku. A grin appears on his face as their eyes meet.

"Your new nickname," Bakugou scoffs. "It means you're useless, worthless." Bakugou's grin widens. "Just like your weak ass quirk."

The others explode yet again into an uncontrollable fit of laughter. They walk off to do whatever, leaving Izuku still and frozen in his spot. His mind is reeling, thoughts racing second by second as the past few moments are replayed over and over and over in his head.

A single word is all that can escape from the chaos that envelops his mind, sounding out barely above a whisper, and yet with so much emotion filling its seams.

"Why?"

"The fact that Yoroi Musha, the 'Equipped Hero,' is still around as a popular and active hero is astounding, considering his age. Though, with the way that his quirk enhances his armor to make up for his loss in reaction time, strength, and speed, it makes sense that the man is still so high in the rankings. Still, his attitude could use some improvement. Take last week for example, when—"

The pen stops in its place, having reached the edge of the paper. As Izuku's muttering dies down, his eyes dart across the confines of the page. Much to his surprise, he finds that he's filled up every single bit of space on this page of his notebook as well. That makes ten pages in total, all filled to the brim with scribblings and sketches; all over the course of his stay at the nursery.

It's the end of the day now, the others who aren't already gone just waiting to be picked up to go home. Izuku's outside at his usual spot, sitting on the ground and leaning up snug against the nursery's outer wall. Usually by this point, Izuku's only finished working on three or four pages in his notebook.

But somehow, today he's finished ten.

"How?" Izuku mutters to himself.

He takes a moment to recall what could have been different about the past few hours. Usually, for recess and lunch he'd cram away at his desk working on his notebook. On the odd day that he did, he'd write about any incidents he and his mother stumbled upon on morning commute.

The one problem that plagued Izuku's life was getting lost in his thoughts, and his time spent buried in his notebooks was proof of that. He'd sit there for ten, maybe fifteen minutes, and would likely go on for longer if one of the others didn't interrupt him and call him over to play.

But today. Today...

"Nobody came to check on me," Izuku realizes with a cock of his head. "Huh... That's strange. Usually Kirihara or one of the others would come to look at my work. Did they just forget today?"

A sudden thought comes to mind. "Deku…" He mutters, trying to find a sense of the word to his own ears. "Did they really—"

A blaring sound of a car horn jumbles Izuku out of his thoughts. He looks up, finding his mother waving out from the passenger side window of her car.

Izuku sighs as he pledges himself to finish the entry on Yoroi Musha later, closing his notebook and placing it in his backpack. It's not long after that Izuku's inside of the car, his mother's heavenly voice greeting him as he buckles up.

"Izuku! How's my little boy doing?!"

Izuku hums as the car breaks off onto the main road. His face goes through a blend of expressions before settling on something more reflective of confusion before he finally answers. "It was… alright, I guess?"

"Just alright?" Inko asks.

"Yeah," Izuku reaffirms, his face betraying his sense of loss. "It was just… different than usual."

"Different can be good!" Inko cheered. Her face then lost that cheer momentarily after. "But I guess that it depends on the situation. What was different about today?"

"Some of my friends didn't come over to play with me," Izuku says. "But it might have been my fault. I'm not sure really."

"Oh. Well, I suppose that we're talking about the bad type of 'different,' then. Do you have an idea as to why that happened?"

—It's your new nickname, nerd—

—It means you're useless, worthless!—

Izuku gulps. He blinks, shaking his head to wrest the memory away from his mind. "No…" he mutters. "I can't really think of anything."

Inko frowns, eyeing the sullen expression on her son's face. But then a sudden thought comes to mind; something that she'd originally been planning to tell Izuku before she saw that hurt expression of his. The realization exchanges her frown for a small smile. She knows exactly how to turn the situation around on its head.

"Well," Inko begins, "it's nothing that you should be worrying about right now. You can just ask them outright tomorrow if anything's wrong, after all!"

Izuku's expression brightens, the boy almost bounding out of his seat in joy. "You think so?"

"Oh, definitely! So don't worry about it for now! After all, I have a surprise for you!"

"You do?" Izuku asks, all signs of gloom gone from his face as he bounces in his seat. "What is it? What is it?"

"Whoa there, Small Might!" Inko laughs. "I'll tell you! But you've got to calm down first. I don't want you accidentally unbuckling your seatbelt again."

Izuku pouts, crossing his arms. "Fine." He looks over to his mom with a smile. "So what is it?"

"You sure that you're ready? I'm not sure if you are..."

"Mom!"

"Alright, alright!" Inko cheerfully relents. "Since you've been a patient boy, I'll tell you! Your father is coming home this weekend!"

Izuku's eyes widen at the information. "He is!? But I thought he wasn't coming back for another month?"

"He normally would," Inko says. "But something happened over in Hokkaido this morning. Your father's workplace was the site of a villain attack, you see."

"Is he okay?!" Izuku yells.

"He's fine," Inko replies. "The place just got a bit messed up is all. He's going to be staying at home for a bit while they fix the place up. And based on the amount of damage, your father said that he'll be with us for a whole month! Isn't that exciting?"

"Yeah it is!" Izuku pumps his fist in the air. "I get to see dad early!"

A/N: And there it is! Chapter two, and we're already seeing some more changes to the story. Hope none of you are too surprised; it's an AU, after all.