Chapter Text
The door made a heavy wheezing sound as it closed behind four figures dressed in spacesuits. They could feel the air pressure rising until finally everything was stabilized by the system. The tallest of them, with a patch on his chest saying “Iida Tenya” quickly walked deeper into the spaceship, heading for the console room. The rest took off their helmets, it was no point using them on Earth anyway. The director ordered them to fully dress up for the press and photographers, which Izuku wouldn’t hold against him if the man hadn’t slapped him in the break room half an hour ago. It wasn’t his fault he had troubles putting all the complicated garment pieces on with anxiety pulsing in his veins.
Izuku and his companions turned to the right from the main corridor, entering the sleeping chambers. It was a big circular room with a high ceiling wired with various cables and electronics. They were all connected to five phallic cryopods, which were glowing with cold blueish light, signalizing they were functioning properly. The crew took their place in front of respective pods and started undressing. Izuku bitterly realised that he once again had a problem with a front zip lock of his suit. Suddenly a round blushing face appeared between his arms and a pair of smaller hands landed on his chest.
“Don’t worry, Izuku! I’ll help you with it!”, Ochako stated brightly and a bit too eagerly started undressing him, one hand staying on the lock while the other sensually roamed his body. The green-haired man cringed internally and searched for help in the other crew member, but Shouto kept taking off pieces of his outfit, not even looking in their direction.
When Ochako was finally done with the main garb and started greedily grabbing his skin-tight undersuit, Izuku finally found courage in himself to push her off.
“Um, thank you, Uraraka, but we only need to take off the outer layer. Besides, shouldn’t you be checking if all the systems are running properly in the power room?”, he tried to focus her attention on different things. For a head engineer she was surprisingly careless.
“It’s all fine, please. A.M.Y. is one of the best working models of Mother System out there, surely it’s gonna be working well once Iida activates the main board and goes through routine check-up with her.”, Ochako countered, visibly unhappy about loss of touch. “If anything seems to be off, I’ll quickly fix it.”
Izuku didn’t feel reassured at all, there were many horror stories going around in academy how pilots lost their leading A.I. due to negligence and were unable to find their way back home. He supposed that was the price of giving all control to the system, not training new pilots how to operate the ship manually.
A few minutes later Iida, their captain and leader for this mission, walked into the room. Everyone’s attention focused on the tall man, who only adjusted his glasses while keeping a straight face.
"Check-up turned successful, A.M.Y. is fully functional and is right now setting course to D-R161. We will launch in 15 minutes, until then we are required to be already in cryogenic sleep."
The rest of the crew nodded and let out murmurs of agreement, starting to prepare their private capsules. Soon they were all done, nestled in the mouth of each cryopod, back spread on white leather bedding. It wasn’t exactly comfortable, the angle at which the capsules were positioned didn’t allow to fully lay down neither normally stand. Izuku briefly remembered it being necessary for the mechanism to work as it was supposed to, without accidentally killing the human inside. The green-haired man definitely wasn’t planning to freeze to death before the ship managed to breach the atmosphere.
Iida’s head popped up above him and his friend gave him a reassuring smile.
“All set up?”
“Can’t get any more ready.”, Izuku attempted to laugh but it sounded more like a strained sob. He felt panic slowly build up in his chest. How does one even prepare to be flooded with ice-cold liquid that will hibernate their body until the machine’s timer turns to zero?
“If it comforts you in any way, this model of capsules had only 8 lethal accidents caused by their malfunction and not human mistake.”, stated Iida while closing the glass door and sealing it. Izuku didn’t feel comforted in the slightest but it wasn’t like his captain could hear his complains through reinforced steel.
He could see the blurry figure of the man walking away to check up on others. Suddenly, he felt cool wetness on his feet. The cryogenic process has begun. Half-transparent liquid was steadily pouring from the holes at the bottom of the capsule. Izuku tried steadying his breath and put both hands on his shaking chest. It wasn’t his first time being hibernated, all pilots went through test runs to familiarize themselves with the feeling. But the only thing Izuku could remember from his first time was pain, fear and all-encompassing cold. Not his happiest memory from the academy.
He tried thinking of better things. The childish joy of looking at the stars through a telescope. His mother’s warm hugs. Discussions over tea with his mentor. The day he was accepted as a part of exploration crew, first people on a newly discovered planet.
When the chemical liquid reached his chin, Izuku closed his eyes and mouth, not letting any of the coldness get inside. He sat there, fully encompassed in the rapidly freezing substance. He counted seconds, one, two, three…
At eight his mind started to become a little fuzzy, so he allowed himself to drift away. He was deep within cryogenic sleep when the spaceship “HERO” burst through the atmosphere, leaving the blue globe of Earth behind.
✩
He was seven. Mud and grass caked on his knees. He was just coming down from the hill he snuck up onto in the middle of night. He couldn’t let his mom know her little baby boy frequently left the house past midnight, only to watch stars through the telescope he got for his fifth birthday. Amongst many space themed gifts this one was his most beloved. It had a few indents and scratches that were covered with star, comet and rocket stickers. Izuku almost always had it with him, lithe boy barely being able to hold huge case and piles of notebooks in his arms was rather a comic sight. Many adults chuckled at him as he was going back home in early morning (he accidentally fallen asleep on the hill), but he paid them no mind. He was in his own world, made out of shining galaxies and spinning planets.
He couldn’t really remember when this obsession started, it feels like it has always been with him. His mom only encouraged him to explore it, so he did with a fervour only a child could possess. He had a collection of notebooks filled with pencil drawings and illegible gibberish, probably describing everything he read about in books about cosmos. Sometimes it bothered him that he had no one to share those notebooks with. All the kids at school always made fun of him, pointing fingers and whispering to each other. Izuku didn’t want to know what they talked about. They never wanted to listen to him either, so he spent school hours alone, sketching vast blue dotted with stars.
His mom was also worried about Izuku’s lack of friends. But he kept reassuring her that it was fine (it wasn’t), they weren’t mean to him (they were), that he was okay with being alone (he wasn’t). Nothing what she would offer him wouldn’t help anyway. He just didn’t fit.
✩
Izuku woke up from the dream with a sharp intake of breath. Cold crisp air filled his lungs, causing him to immediately start coughing. He blindly started massaging his throat while hunching over, which led to him falling out from cryopod that was now open. He stayed on his knees for a while, desperately trying to learn how to breathe again. Spots danced in front of his eyes as his body was adjusting to room temperature, the special body-tight suit producing warmth that spread all-over his body. When he calmed down a little a hand appeared on his back, patting it gently.
“Are you ready to stand up?”, asked as blunt as ever Shouto. Izuku nodded to him mutely and the taller man grabbed his hands, pulling him upright. “It took me longer to adjust, you are doing good.”, he tried to comfort, for which Izuku was grateful. He definitely didn’t want to spend more time here than necessary.
“How far are we?”
“We have a week before we arrive at D-R161. Iida woke up first together with Uraraka. They pulled me out yesterday but they let you stay for a while longer. Uraraka said something about you finally getting enough sleep.”, Izuku grimaced at that. It’s true, before the mission he was sleeping the least out of them all, constantly anxious and stressed, going through all notes and preparations over and over. He couldn’t rest when there was his first real flight looming above his head. However he also didn’t want to be left behind. His childhood fears creeped to the front of his mind, triggered by the eerie dream. He tried to remind himself that these were his friends, they were all a little bit weird, a little bit unfitting in the eyes of others. He could trust them.
Shouto helped him walk to the canteen, a small room near the sleeping chambers. It had a round table at the centre and walls lined with various shelves, holding everything to prepare a nutritious intergalactic meal. Izuku sat down while his friend started pulling out boxes and taking small plastic bags from them.
“What would you like?”, he turned to the green-haired man, at the same time as Ochako entered the room. She smiled widely at the sight of Izuku and ran up to him.
“I heard that you had woken up! Hope you had a good rest.”, she attempted to hug him but Shouto’s arm blocked her way.
“He’s still recovering.”, he quipped, at which she bowed apologetically, instead opting to take a sit right next to Izuku.
“I- uhh, I’ll just take a bowl of borscht. Thank you, Todoroki.”
“And lecsyan noodles for me!”, added Ochako, at which the other man nodded and started pulling out necessary packets. Izuku wasn’t surprised in the slightest by her choice. She grew up an old colonized planet with a harsh weather, a lot of people from there specialised in difficult physical jobs, usually being used mercilessly by bigger conglomerates. Ironic how in times of progress and ever-present technology human workers were still needed in most physically demanding fields.
Ochako explained to them once how she wasn’t really that interested in space travel but her parents drastically needed the money, so she enrolled in the academy in hopes of joining a big crew with equally big pay. Izuku admired her for her strength and persistence, though he couldn’t help being sometimes… overwhelmed by her odd customs she acquired living in a completely different world. Especially her handiness regarding him was very off-putting, but he didn’t want to insult her or make her feel worse about her upbringings. He knew too well how it feels to be excluded from a community.
Shouto put two steaming bowls in front of them. They both thanked him and eagerly dug up into their respective dishes. Izuku sighed happily as the taste of beetroot hit his tongue, hibernation always made him exceptionally hungry. Through the sound of silverware clanging and slurping, the freckled man idly observed Shouto prepare his own meal. He took two sealed packets to a nearby 3D-printer, putting them both into a box on the side and closing it. He then picked the settings on the machine and soon three round metallic heads were producing a laser-like streams of light, carefully crafting a cold soba bowl into existence. Izuku never studied the inner workings of futuristic 3D-printers on spaceships but the view was quite entertaining. He supposed he could ask Ochako later how exactly the powder within packets turned into edible food.
Soon they all finished, putting away the dirty dishes into a container that would later clean them automatically. Izuku felt a lot better, so without Shouto serving as his cane they all walked into the console room. It looked like any other console room Izuku had seen in books. Huge, empty yet lined with thousands upon thousands of lights and switches. Most of them weren’t even for humans, they served solely as a use for Mother System, the leading A.I. that controlled everything on a small exploration spaceship like theirs. It was a development that took space industry by a storm. It solved the problem of losing personnel and wasting time on training pilots. Now every time there was a mission organised that didn’t require many people and was considered dangerous, small ships with Mother System were send out to scout the area. Simple, convenient, cheap.
Such was Izuku’s first mission as well. Their crew was sent out to perform research on a newly discovered moon of a gas giant far away enough that it hadn’t been explored much before. D-R161 seemed to be close enough to sun to flourish, which showed on the cameos from satellites. It’s sibling moons were mostly covered in stone and craters, unhabitable. Apparently, the newly discovered one was deemed promising enough for big corporates to take interest in it. Yet it was too far away in a too unpredictable area, hence the solution was to pick people that were easily discardable. Those, who could be replaced without a problem but still reliable enough to gather all the useful data.
Izuku and his friends perfectly fit their requirements. Freshly out of academy, with promising grades but displeasing comments. Second son of a renowned spaceship building company, youngest child of the Counsellor of Interstellar Trades, daughter of two builders from a colony, unknown boy from a small town somewhere on Earth, mentored by one of the legendary pilots and space explorers. They were all sorts of misfits, unwelcomed by others, and that’s what made them stick together. Despite their antics and differences, Izuku thought of them as a rather well working team. They were the closest thing to a family he had since the loss of his mother and mentor.
“Welcome to the main deck, head biologist Midoriya Izuku. Please collect prescribed data from a monitor to the right.”, A.M.Y.’s artificial voice informed him. Izuku came up to a small screen build into a wall, taking out a transparent tablet from a bin below. The screen started showing him instructions how to use the item, receive messages and find tasks he was supposed to complete. Ochako came up to him and immersed in some kind of idle chitchat about how A.M.Y. sounded exactly like her deceased aunt. Shouto joined Iida in the front, who was observing if all systems were working smoothly, occasionally staring into the vast emptiness of space through the front window. Even before reaching their destination, they still had a lot of work to do.
✩
Six days later Izuku found himself nervously pacing in the laboratory. The small cubical room didn’t provide much space for walking, as it was crammed with various items, tables and boxes that he and Shouto gathered. It was the only lab on the ship after all, so the head botanist and head biologist had to share one workplace.
Izuku tried to sweat anxiety out of his system, tomorrow he had to be at his best game. Landing on an unexplored planet, going out to scout the area and gather as much data as possible – those weren’t easy tasks by no means, he couldn’t drag his team down. He knew he should’ve just gone to sleep to gather energy, but the unease prevented him from leaving the lab. He checked once again all items he will be taking with him to the surface tomorrow, reloading batteries, switching on all devices to search for any hiccups, even though he had already done that earlier during the day. He felt stupid with how suddenly he doubted his every move. The green-haired man scolded himself internally, reminding his anxious nature that they were here to prove everyone who ever mocked him for being different that he could do it. He could find happiness under this ocean of stars.
“Hey, A-A.M.Y.? What time is it? Is everyone asleep already?”, he threw the question into the empty room, not waiting long for an answer.
“It is 02:00 according to Earth military time. Captain Iida Tenya had already retreated to the dormitory. Head botanist Todoroki Shouto had already retreated to the dormitory. Uraraka Ochako’s last registered position was the bottom left engine room.”, Izuku thanked the A.I. quietly but it didn’t respond this time. Making up his mind, he left the lab and headed in the direction of engine rooms, hoping that a quick chat with his friend will ease his nerves.
When he reached the other side of the ship he could clearly see it was being used be the engineer. One of the metal floor tiles was dislocated and a bright light illuminated the walls from below. Various items were discarded all over the floor, Izuku recognised a few of them as repairing tools. He crouched and peaked into the hole, his view obscured by bright light and vines of cables.
“Uraraka? Are you there?”, he whispered and almost instantly a brown-haired head appeared above the floor surface, nearly headbutting him in the process.
“Izuku, hi! What can I help you with? Why aren’t you sleeping? All the other guys already went to the dorms, you should too if you don’t wanna be a zombie tomorrow.”, she rambled while pulling herself up from the hole, a few tools clattering on the tiles as she emptied her hands and pockets on an utility belt attached to her bodysuit. It was unzipped at the upper part, showing off her sport bra and skin slightly dirted by inner mechanisms of the ship. Izuku helped her stand up and started gathering discarded items, cleaning up the hall.
“Is something wrong with the ship?”, he asked her, worry evident in his tone.
“Nah, just encountered some minor fuses that were busted and needed replacement but its nothing dire. At worst we wouldn’t be able to turn on lights in the dining room.”, she didn’t seem to share his unsure demeanour, joking easily. “What about you? Did you find something that needed my help?”, she said that with a strange glint in her eyes that Izuku didn’t bother to identify.
“Oh! No, no, just was lonely and, you know, couldn’t sleep at all. Because the true mission starts tomorrow, and yeah, I know you know, I just cant help stressing about something going wrong. I’ve been having those weird cramps in my stomach, what if it means something? What if I’m being warned by the universe that I should not set foot on that planet? Oh god, I should probably tell Todoroki too, he’s going down with me after all-”, while spiralling into a mumbling rant he didn’t notice the woman walk so close to him, so her suddenly grabbing his arms coerced a surprised yelp from him. Ochako was looking him up and down, set of warm hands rubbing his biceps and oh. He didn’t like this.
“I think I know just the right way to help you forget about it. If you wanted my company you could’ve just said so, Izuku.”, she crooned, pressing her chest to his. Her face started leaning closer, eyes shutting, lips puckering and Izuku panicked. He harshly pushed Ochako away, who tripped on one of the tools on the ground and landed on her butt.
“What- what are you doing?!”, Izuku choked out, too stunned to form more precise sentences. Sure, Ochako had always treated him a bit differently than his other friends. Since the day he met her at the academy, she kept circling around him, frequently in his space, a little overbearing, a little bit too much. Yet he stayed silent, not wanting to embarrass her or worse, insult her. Maybe people in the colony had just different boundaries. Izuku didn’t want to lose his first real friend. But this? He didn’t agree to this. He didn’t want this. Ochako was his friend and only friend.
“This… this is not okay!”, he pointed vaguely at the woman still laying on the floor with an expression of utter shock. “I- I need to go. Now.”, he managed to force the last sentence out with his broken voice, then ran to the dormitories, shutting himself in his sleeping cubicle, praying for the sleep to silence his rampaging mind.
✩
The first thing that woke him up the next day was a muted ruckus reaching his ears. Izuku slowly blinked his eyes and peeled the covers, mind clearing the sleep fog inside. He got out from his cubicle at the same time as Shouto bursted through the door to the dorms. The taller man’s usually indifferent features were pulled into a frown.
“Midoriya.”, his voice sounded urgent and Izuku felt the tension rise drastically. “We need you on the main deck.”
Izuku somehow managed to dress up fully without tangling in his pants or ripping part of the suit, and he quickly ran after Shouto to the console room. All the other crew members were already gathered there with various faces of distress. Izuku saw something flash in the corner of the front window so he walked closer and immediately froze. The sheer size of the gas giant was intimidating, an enormous globe of orange, white and brown completely encompassing their comically small in comparison spaceship. A bit closer to them was one of the moons, D-R161. Their destinated point. The planet was a complete opposite of the one it was orbiting. Smaller, black with hues of indigo and turquoise. As their ship drifted near it, there was vaguely visible sort of fuzz around it, occasionally illuminated by a stray lighting. Izuku’s eyes widened.
“The dust storm on D-R161 is increasing in pace. Origin: lifted dust and rocks from nearby moons G-1E0, S-0M4 and I-KR4. Possibility of majorly damaging the ship’s structure upon contact: 0,0000032%. Possibility of majorly damaging a reinforced spacesuit: 0,0080%. Possibility of majorly damaging unprotected human tissue upon exposure: 79%.”
“79?! There’s no way we can land there today, not even talking about the mission!”, Ochako looked at Iida in desperation. “It’s too dangerous. I won’t let Izuku get down there!”
“I’m going with Midoriya too, though…”, Shouto added unhelpfully. Everyone started arguing at once, trying to shout over each other. They had their whole schedule planned and it had to be followed to a boot. The amount of supplies was reduced for conveniency on the organiser’s part, it was rationed to match perfectly the amount of time they will stay out of cryopods. They couldn’t afford to waste one whole day.
Iida gripped the console’s countertop harder.
“A.M.Y., calculate the usage of supplies adding 24 hours to the original set amount. That is… hoping the storm will pass until then.”, their captain murmured the last part, not wanting to worsen the already breaking morale of his friends. A.M.Y. stayed silent for longer than usual and when she answered, to Izuku it sounded more… forced.
“Calculation unavailable. The spaceship “HERO” must enter the atmosphere of planet D-R161 at the designed time.”
“But- this is an order!”
“Order denied. Unable to provide further assistance. The landing process starts in 30 minutes.”, the crew looked at each other in shock. To their knowledge, the Mother System should always obey orders from captain of the ship, it was a specially prepared A.I. designed for operating the ship. Even though Izuku’s knowledge about technology and inner workings of leading systems were sparce, he was certain this reaction must’ve been programmed as a part of A.M.Y.. Someone had ordered to make them unable to change schedule of the mission. He felt sickness taking all over his body.
“Iida-“
“We don’t have time. Prepare yourself for the landing.”, the man quickly cut off Ochako, turning back to the console and starting to switch on buttons and pull forth levers. He had to overlook the process in case the A.I. failed. The rest of the crew reluctantly went to do what was required from them: get ready for the start of the true mission.
Izuku spent the whole left time crammed in the lab, going through his notebooks in hopes he will feel a tiny bit better. During the landing the ship shook a few times, causing some items to roll off the desk. In the worst moments Izuku curled in the corner, clutching his notes tightly and praying for it all to be finally over. Then he felt the whole structure groan and vibrate, heard the little grains of sand scrape over the metal and suddenly, the ship was no longer suspended in the air. The have reached the surface.
✩
“I don’t like this. We shouldn’t be letting them go alone in this weather.”, Ochako tried to change Iida’s mind one more time. Shouto and Izuku were donning their reinforced suits at the moment, pulling all the safety straps and locking the clasps of their helmets. Someone had to check if the ship’s external structure wasn’t too damaged, besides they could gather some data while doing so instead of coming back with empty hands.
Iida only shook his head in response to her complains. The decision has already been made by the three men.
“They will be outside for maximum 15 minutes and not any longer.”, he stared pointedly at the two. “Just go around the ship once, get whatever measurements you can, don’t move away from the ship further than 2 meters unless necessary.”
When Izuku and Shouto were fully geared up Iida handed them two short bulky guns. Izuku recognised it as a disintegration blaster, a safety weapon creating short bursts of laser disintegrating the matter they hit. Their ship only had those two on board. When he looked at his friend questioningly, he only answered with “better safe than sorry”. With that Iida left the corridor with Ochako, sealing the entrance behind them and activating the decompression. A.M.Y. started counting down the time until the entrance airlock will open. Izuku gulped audibly and closed his eyes. The next time he opened them, there was no metal door in front of him. Only grey darkness of the dust storm. He and Shouto turned on the lights on their helmets and walked out from the spaceship. Izuku could feel little rocks graze the material of his suit and internally thanked whoever designed the sturdy clothing. They walked carefully around the ship, shining their lights on the machine while the green-haired man gathered samples and data on the device attached to his suit. It was barely readable but they had to work with what they had.
During next turn something caught his attention. He strained to see through the flying dust and he swore he could see a yellowish glow in the distance.
“I see… light? Todoroki, I think I saw something.”
“What?”
“It’s shining. Somewhere over here.”
“Midoriya, don’t leave further than 2 meters.”, but Izuku wasn’t listening to him anymore, completely transfixed by the phenomenon. Maybe the storm was finally clearing?
Against his better judgment he started walking towards it. First slowly, tentatively, trying to catch something on his scanning device but it showed nothing. Then more confidently, as if he was being reassured by the soft warm glow. Before he even noticed he was outside of ship’s range, its shape barely visible through the storm.
“Midoriya, I don’t see you on the scanner.”, Iida’s concerned voice ran from build-in comms.
“One minute, Iida, I think I saw something.”
“Midoriya, you are disregarding my order. Get back to the ship, NOW.”
He disregarded that order too, going further and further into the storm. He ended up in something akin to a centre of cyclone, one spot clear of harsh beating of dust and rocks. He could see the sun peeking through the darkness. It was breath-taking.
Then it happened. He first felt the presence before he heard it. The insistent feeling of being watched. All the hair on his body stood up, legs going still. Then came the sound of gravel moving under a pair of feet, almost impossible to hear in the ongoing weather. Before Izuku could react in any way his view was obscured by red. Swirling, blazing pools of vermilion, eating him alive, setting him on fire. The thing that broke him from paralysis was the feeling of his helmet clasps being unlocked and it being pulled off by a pair of big, clawed hands. He started panicking, trying to call out to anyone but his tongue couldn’t form words, the comms buzzed with static. He tried taking gulps of air as long as he had it but it was futile, the atmosphere on this planet was deadly for humans. He prepared for his instant demise, closing his eyes in fear.
Suddenly he could clearly hear the storm’s mighty roar, feel the wind caressing his cheeks, mingled with the breath of a creature currently holding him immobile. But the death didn’t come. Izuku slowly opened his eyes and instinctively gasped. He could breathe. Emerald eyes widened in shock and confusion, reflecting in matching set of crimson. Izuku quickly sobered when he heard his helmet hit the ground and felt two hands return to his face, this time having direct contact with it. They were rough, calloused and covered in scales, yet very warm. Izuku tried to pull back and started trashing. Fear washed over his body as he found himself restricted by something that seemed to be a tail. The creature was easily twice his size, the shorter man focusing on its face which had surprisingly human features. He was just about to start screaming when his lips were blocked by another pair.
He was being kissed, he realised blearily.
He was being kissed by an alien creature.
Izuku’s mouth dropped and the thing took the opportunity to slip its tongue inside it. He once again tried to fight it when he felt something liquid and tangy hit his tastebuds. His body started to grow weak and pliant, mind hazing over, the world loosing focus. The last thing Izuku registered was the pair of red sharp eyes, burning itself into his memory.
✩
“What do you mean you can’t find him?!”
“I’m trying, he just disappeared from my vision! Have you tried contacting him?”
“I can't reach him. He must’ve ventured out of range and the storm is only making it harder.”, Iida dragged his hands down his face in frustration. Ochako was standing next to him with unreadable expression.
“I’m going for him.”, she stated harshly.
“You can’t! I’m not losing another crewmember!”
“You already fucking lost one! You can't stop me, I’m going out there-“, here angry burst was cut off by a noise incoming from a speaker connected to Izuku’s intercom. She immediately stopped talking and ran to the device.
“Izuku?! Izuku, is that you?! Answer me!”
For a long time, there was only silence interrupted by short buzzes of uneven static. Then, suddenly one short word was being spoken, though it was hard to determine whether it was even a word or an animalistic growl, for it had nothing to do with a human sound.
“MINE."