Chapter Text
Trigger was an odd drug. Kurogiri had often pondered what effects it would have on his own quirk. Maybe it would allow him to make more portals? Increase the size of them? Who knows.
Though, he'd always imagined that he would test it in a sterile lab with someone to interfere if anything undesirable happened if he ever decided to pursue that train of thought.
He wouldn't have wanted it to happen in a gang fight.
And certainly not from a misfire a rookie Yakuza member shot.
By some miracle, the dart had gotten past a chink in his neck armor and into his physical body as well. Now, as his quirk ('s?) went haywire, something clicked back into place and he remembered.
Of all the hypotheses he had come up with while bored, he never expected to remember a past life.
One full of happiness and friends as a hero hopeful with an entirely different quirk.
Kurogiri (Shirakumo?) warped away whatever of the league that remained while still sound of mind, clouds and smoke swirling as one into ominous thunder clouds. Most of the gang Kurogiri couldn't bother remembering the name of was out of commission, Shira-Kurogiri's mixture of quirks swirling around the warehouse.
A rogue warp gate-cloud mixture rammed into Kuro- Shirakumo's body, suddenly giving the familiar feeling of vertigo that came whenever Kurogiri used his (?) quirk.
Shirakumo was aware of the sensation of falling for a few seconds, before, understandably, passing out when he hit a dumpster.
~
"Shirakumo! You coming to my place or Shou's?"
"I don't remember offering my house up, Hizashi."
"Aww, c'mon! You never let us come over!! It's no fair!"
"I don't understand why you'd even want to see my house, it's boring."
"Haha, Shou probably only owns a futon and jelly packs!"
"I have food other than jelly packs, jelly packs are just more efficient."
"Shouuu, jelly packs aren't food!"
There was some light laughter.
~
Oboro jumped awake, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
Why.. Why was he in a dumpster of all places? Did Hizashi play a prank on him or something?-
Oh. Yeah.
He was Kurogiri. Not Shirakumo. Kurogiri was a nomu made for the express purpose of raising All for One's successor. Right now, he was not a hero in training.
Right?
Kurogiri (Oboro) stared down at small human hands, noticing the absence of the mist that had covered him for his entire existence. Or.. The existence he was programmed to remember. Like a machine.
He was.. Brainwashed. His previous memories were neatly tucked into a box deep in his mind, never to be found again. Yet, the trigger drug somehow reawakened his other quirk, unknowingly breaking the seal on his memories.
Shirakumo (?) spent another few minutes confused in the dumpster before climbing out with his disturbingly human hands. It was an odd feeling of uncanny valley.
He sat at the top of the suddenly tall dumpster, halfway between falling down and jumping off and slipped. A fluffy cloud formed beneath him suddenly, automatically saving him from the fall without any hesitation.
Shirakumo warily noted that the cloud was a deep purple, instead of the chalk white he remembered it being. He experimentally stuck a hand through it, mind immediately being bombarded with locations he remembered.
The bar, UA, the USJ, and The Lab stood out among many other somewhat random locations. Strange. It was as if his previous quirk merged with his experimentally given one?
Kurogiri faintly noted that he was maybe a bit too calm for the situation. His programming was screaming at him to report to Sensei or the doctor or Shigaraki Tomura, but a larger portion of him was telling him to just.. not.
Shirakumo found himself wanting to listen to the quieter voice. His cloud puttered out eventually, dropping him lightly on the ground almost lovingly.
So.. He had free will, was in an alley who-knows-where, and had a different quirk (quirks?). Well. He should probably try and find some information? Yeah. Information.
Kurogiri (?) sat up from his spot in the (now that he was looking around) nasty alley, brushing his pants off. He dully noted that he was wearing crocs of all things and walked into the street, blending into the natural hustle and bustle of the city.
Okay. He had to make sure to avoid cameras if he was going to go in hiding, so that knocked a lot of places to hide off the list. His attention was stolen away by an old fashioned TV store playing the news on several different 'State-of-the-art TV's'.
Well, he thought, that store is a liar, seeing as those models are at least 14 years old. Kurogiri would consider himself as a conisour of televisions as Shigaraki Tomura had a habit of disintegrating them every time he didn't like something on the screen. Which was a lot.
And.. Why was a weather reporter saying the date was much farther back than it actually was? Was it April fools or something?
He quietly asked a stranger next to him the date.
"Huh? Well, it's on the TV 'innit? November 13th 20XX!" The man raised an eyebrow at him, Oboro furrowing his eyebrows back. He left the area, occasionally asking people what the date was. The answer never varied.
Okay. So either there was an entire crowd of very dedicated pranksters, or Shirak- Kurogiri time traveled.
It was hardly plausible, but Kurogiri could, in some way see how it could happen. An unpredictable teleportation quirk and a quirk enhancer? But time travel? Time travel was a thing from movies. There hadn't been one quirk recorded that could control time. Nighteye was almost an exception, but the hero couldn't have made Kurogiri in specific go back in time. Even if the man had the ability to, there would be 0 reason why unless he wanted to see the world burn.
He sighed to himself, dismissing the thought. The date was apparently set to after his 'death' so that could have many problems in the long run. He was assuming that his younger self was currently being experimented on, seeing as he wasn't being tortured in a lab right now. So. He probably wouldn't have to worry about the League if he stayed on the down-low.
It wouldn't hurt to be cautious though, so he snagged a well-off looking man's wallet and rented a room at the shittiest looking hotel he could find.
He slumped down on his new bed and the mattress creaked threateningly. His fingers dug into his suddenly soft hair and curled around the locks, making it more messed up than it was before.
Okay. So. He time traveled. His quirks combined with each other, due to an unexpected dose of trigger. He woke up in a dumpster, and he remembers everything now, and he's supposed to be dead. Okay.
This was fine.
He would be able to deal with this.
Oboro walked to the bathroom to rub water in his face, looking at his reflection.
His very young looking reflection.
Well.
That debunked a few of his other theories instantly. So.. Instead of his aged self teleporting into the past, maybe he teleported into his past self's body.
Who was currently a hero in training that had been crushed by a rock and should be being experimented on right now.
Ugh. Looks like it wasn't going to be easy to hide after all. How the fuck did he get in the dumpster?? Sensei was sure as fuck looking for him right now. Going to UA wasn't an option either, no matter how much his mind whispered that seeing Shouta and Hizashi and Nemuri and Tensei would be nice.
They dealt with it when he died last time, they sure as hell could deal with it now.
Kurogiri ignored the pang in his heart that thought gave.
It was better to just.. Disappear. Go off the radar for a while.
So he did.
~ 5 years later ~
Oboro was on a grocery run when he heard it. A shrill scream from an alleyway much like the one he woke up in.
Against his better instincts he ran towards it like his legs were moving on their own. A few muscular guys were standing in front of a girl, another girl, presumably the other one's friend, knocked out on the floor with blood flowing out of her head.
"Now girlie, do you have any clue who you just bumped into?" A man standing in front of the group with an octopus mutation quirk grinned, tapping a metal bat against his shoulder.
"P-please! Just leave me alone! I don't have any money!" The girl waved her hands in front of her, shielding her friend from view.
"This jacket costs a hell of a lot, woman, I think you'll have to pay me in another way, if you get my drift.." The thug smirked lecherously, and that was all Oboro needed to hear.
In one instant, the thugs were whisked away to the Sahara desert faster than one could blink. A whisp of dark cloud curled in delight before dispersing.
Oboro watched from a corner, waiting for the conscious girl to call the police before leaving. He had wanted to try to comfort the girl, but she'd totally reveal his identity to the police even if it was in good intentions. He was rather recognizable and he didn't want to deal with that.
Over the span of a few weeks, Oboro kept finding himself sucked into random situations that coincidentally ended in him taking down some bad guys. Something inside of him purred every time he saved somebody.
After a day where he ended up running into three separate instances of crime, Shirakumo finally decided to give in, and bought some Kevlar from a less than legal website. The next few days were spent developing a suit designed be practical in the most ways possible. No wasting time on looks. Near undetectable pockets were everywhere easy to reach, backup knives for his backup knives sewn into random places, and a high power taser (very high). He considered smoke bombs but figured his quirk already covered that field anyway.
He was just planning to just use his quirk on people from a distance, probably from the top of a building, but it honestly never hurt to be prepared.
He allowed himself a second of bewilderment over what he was planning to do, before donning his gear and jumping out his window. He formed a small storm cloud to carry him up to a tall building, sitting cross legged and double checking his mask and hood.
He dropped off the cloud, rolling on the ground and formed another 2 small clouds under his feet to speed him up while he jumped across roofs.
He teleported a few criminals to varying countries as he ran by, efficiently covering the most crime infested areas of town.
He honestly couldn't remember the last time he had felt so alive.
~
A detective dropped a thin file on the desk of a dog quirked man. He sighed.
"This is all we have on them sir. Sorry."
The dog headed man furrowed a brow and opened the file.
"Jesus, all you have are the names of his victims! No descriptions, no names, no pictures, nothing!" The detective winced.
"With all due respect, sir, that's all we could get." The detective looked to the side, a prominent frown on his face.
"I doubt we would know they existed if their quirk wasn't so apparent. For what it's worth, I think they're having an american phase, seeing as the past 5 criminals have all had to find their way out of the rocky mountains." The american rescue heroes weren't too happy about that.
The dog headed chief sighed.
"I think it's time we get some heroes on this case. It won't get solved if we don't." His paws pinched his snout. The detective nodded.
"I think I have just the guy for the situation."
~
Shouta Aizawa wanted to sleep.
Really wanted to.
Because if he was asleep, he wouldn't have to deal with this most recent vigilante.
He glared at a paper thin file, crinkling the information inside. They knew 3 things about this person.
They were a vigilante.
They had some type of teleportation quirk.
And they hadn't been spotted by a single person.
Not one.
So he was essentially dealing with a ghost. Great.
He violently sucked a jelly pack, not even stopping to savor the artificial lychee taste. The hero's hair billowed in the wind, occasionally whipping himself in the face. He endured, just barely too lazy to push it away.
According to the data from the vigilante's last victim, they were mostly patrolling the more crime infested areas of town, so Shouta would start there. Hopefully they wouldn't suddenly decide to change up their route for now reason. Shouta wouldn't quite put it past them..
People were trying to call the vigilante 'Specter' apparently, because nobody had even seen a glimpse of the person.
Shouta sat in silence for a few hours, looking around periodically. It was a full moon.
A flash of movement in the corner of his eye had Eraserhead whipping his head back and making eye contact with a shadowy figure a building or two away.n
Said shadowy figure's eyes widened before they started jumping away, which was beyond suspicious, so Shouta followed them despite his perch being so comfortable.
The sacrifices he made for heroics..
This person was probably a petty robber or something, judging how they panicked and ran away when they saw him instead of attacking. Then again.. The way they jumped from roof to roof seemed unusually well trained for that type of hypothesis. Maybe an agility quirk?
Eraserhead powered his quirk up, watching with satisfaction as the figure faltered in their steps. He wrapped his scarf around a nearby air conditioner unit and flung himself over to the building he had the runner cornered on.
The person (he was going to assume they were a guy, based off of their stature) was backing away slowly, cautiously. It seemed like the dude pulled out all the stops, face mask, hood, goggles that.. Seemed vaguely familiar, and an entirely black outfit.
It's honestly what Shouta would have tried to make his own costume if it weren't for the support course at UA having different ideas (One Hatsune Mei's mother scowled at nothing 'It was too gloomy!)
"Mind to tell me why you ran away from me?" Eraserhead's eyes were beginning to sting, but his quirk helped intimidate the guy (he thinks). Said all blackout clothed man said nothing, just staring at Shouta wordlessly with an intensity.
"I'm going to have to detain you for quirk usage and running from a hero anyway, so what's the point in being silent?" Shouta could feel his eyes beginning to close, he needed to make sure this guy wasn't going to ditch the second his quirk deactivated.
The guy was still staring at him. Aizawa stared back tiredly. The man's body was actually shaking a little now that Eraserhead was looking closer. He furrowed his eyebrow before his eyes closed without his command.
During the split second he was blind Shouta could have sworn he heard a long gone voice whisper his name.
When his eyes opened, all that was left was a wisp of mist.
~
Holy fuck
holy fuck holy fuck holy fuck holy fuck
Fuck.
Oboro was very not prepared to run into his childhood (?) friend/hero out on one of his patrols. Let alone freeze like an absolute imbecile- He's been doing this for weeks now and never once been seen. He bit his fingernails in an anxious habit he'd just rediscovered. Did Shou see his quirk? Kurogiri was pretty sure his face coverings were covering everything, even the band aid on his seemingly always injured nose. (It was a constant cycle of different accidents, this time it was from when he opened a door too fast. Oboro's considering the possibility of having a third latent bad luck quirk.)
Besides the point, he may have to lay low (again) on his patrols for a month or two sadly.
It would be better if he kept his distance from his friends. For their safety, of course, All For One was a bad person to be on negative terms with. That was all.
The hollow feeling in his heart stated otherwise though.
~
Oboro went out a few more times that week, refraining from his now usual schedule of going out every night (He had nothing better to do!). There also seemed to be more heroes on the prowl recently for some reason. He had spotted Kamui Woods, who usually was more of a daytime hero patrolling at 2 AM, a few interns, and even Gang Orca, who usually didn't patrol in his area.
Kurogiri sighed, staring at the sale price for 2 different brands of butter for an abnormally long time. The first brand didn't taste as good with Mac-and-cheese, but cost less than the fancier version that was absolutely delicious with the cheesy noodles. Choices, choices.
Soon after Shirakumo had figured out that he timetraveled, he tried everything he possibly could food-wise in a maniac feeling of freedom. Mac-and-cheese stuck with him. So this decision was important.
He could probably try and nick some spare cash from some random suspiciously rich criminal, but that took more effort than just simply hasta la vista-ing them to Mt. Everest and Kurogiri wasn't really in the mood.
He sighed again and put the cheaper butter in the cart sadly. He was trying to save money anyway.
He made sure his hood and medical mask were covering his face before going up to the cashier. She stared at him a bit oddly for just buying butter but didn't say anything thankfully.
Shirakumo observed even more heroes patrolling the area. There were literally 1 on every street he went on! Maybe there was a villain on the loose or something, Kurogiri would have to see if he could find them on his next patrol.
As Oboro was pondering how he would go about that, he ran into a black mass slightly taller than him that smelled faintly cat-like.
"Oh, pardon me-" Oboro began automatically, looking up to see- Shou?? He quickly snapped his head in the opposite direction.
"Oh it's no problem. Are you alright?" Shouta drawled. Oboro felt himself panic. He didn't know why he always froze up around Shou, what with his grand 2 interactions with him.
"I'm fine." He wheezed, looking in every other direction than at Shouta. There was some old gum at that street corner, nasty.
"You don't.. Sound fine." Shouta sounded pained to interact more than necessary. Shirakumo felt a bead of sweat roll down his temple.
"Absolutely fine. Fine as can be! I've never been finer!" Kurogiri nervously giggled. He sensed Shouta nodding hesitantly.
"Great."
"Yep."
They stood still for another second until Shou started walking away.
Stupid Stupid Stupid!
Shirakumo smacked himself in the face a few times. Way to not be suspicious, great job, Kurogiri! You just had a completely normal unremarkable interaction with Shou that definitely won't result in him thinking about it later and figuring out that he was Shirakumo and time traveled from the future and being in danger from Sensei for knowing and dying a horrible, painful death while Shirakumo watched.
Oboro basically killed him.
He nervously bit his nails all the way back to his apartment, bar of butter melting in his grocery bag.
He kept his eyes firmly on the news for the rest of the night. There weren't any reports about underground heroes being murdered, so hopefully Shou was safe for the time being. There was an awful lot of talk about some new vigilante though.. And in his area too. Shirakumo was surprised he hadn't run into them yet. He shrugged, stirring his inferior mac and cheese.
It tasted like sadness and regrets but at least it saved him 40 cents.