Archive of Our Own

Tomura stared at the monitor that was showing the room Bakugou and Midoriya were in curiously. Bakugou had been taken from hero summer camp or whatever the fuck they were doing in the woods because he was angry and powerful and a bit stupid, and therefore probably easy to turn against the heroes. 

Midoriya was another story. 

For starters, Toga wasn’t supposed to bring Midoriya back with her. 

Tomura, for better or worse, saw the only real hero, the only hero who wanted to help people indiscriminately, in Midoriya Izuku, and he wanted to let him grow so he could see the change a boy so powerful and so compassionate could bring about. 

He also, for better or worse, had a crush on him. Was it a little weird, being a twenty-year-old villain with a crush on a hero who had only just turned eighteen? Yeah, yeah it was, but the plus side of being the boss on his side of the battlelines was that there was no one to tell him he was wrong to feel the way he felt. 

Even Sensei grasped that. Sensei had watched Midoriya as much as Tomura did and came to the same conclusion, the boy was a true hero with little to no prejudice. He would save the life of a murderer if given the opportunity — and had, in fact. Sure, the guy was locked up in Tartarus now, but he literally murdered an innocent child. Even Tomura thought the guy was a waste of life, so the fact that a hero had stood between the murderer and that brute Endeavour and saved his life was — surprising. 

Sensei, when using his empath quirk to discern the way Tomura really felt about Midoriya Izuku, had actually smiled — and not one of the weird ones that sent a bit of a shiver down Tomura’s spine, either. A genuine one of happiness. And then he congratulated Tomura on having his ‘romantic awakening’ — not a weird phrase at all — because of someone worthy. Someone his beloved Sensei’s brother would have looked up to and admired. 

It was pretty awesome, if Tomura was honest, to have the go-ahead from his Sensei, even if he hadn’t intended to go ahead with shit quite yet. 

Either way, though, he was not supposed to be in the holding room towards the back of the League’s secret bar/base. 

So, there Midoriya was, handcuffed but not wearing a quirk suppressant. He obviously knew that, he’d immediately tested and that green lightning had flickered over his skin and then he just… shrugged and stayed handcuffed where he was. Curious. 

Then Bakugou woke up, and Tomura wasn’t an idiot, he’d seen the sports festival — even the heroes had resorted to cuffs and gauntlets and a gag to shut the brat up, so Bakugou wasn’t saying much of anything, but he was screaming and trying, pointlessly, to get out of bomb-proof gauntlets that were chained to the ground, the end of the chain embedded deep in the cement, and Midoriya? What was Midoriya doing?

Laughing. 

He was laughing at Bakugou with actual tears running down his face. 

Curiouser still. 

“Toga, you said he was… nice when you took him from hero summer camp, right?” Tomura asked without turning away from the monitor. Toga made a pleased humming sound. 

“I sure did! There was a girl, Ochako-chan, and she was really cute and I would have loved to see her bleed, but she called me a freak! And Izu-chan, well, he sighed like he was done with her shit and told her to ‘shut up and keep her quirkism to herself for once in her damn life’, to quote him exactly, Shiggy-chan.”

Tomura nodded along, still not sure who the hell Midoriya really was beyond a truly good and decent hero without prejudice or quirkism ruining his kind soul, because how could a boy who was as kind as Midoriya always seemed to be, be snapping at his classmates and laughing at one while he screamed and was, quite probably, terrified for his life?

It made no sense, and Tomura needed answers. 

“Kurogiri, warp in, remove the muzzle from explodo-brat, then warp back. I want to hear what they have to say to one another.”

Kurogiri intoned a flat affirmative and did as he was told. The second the muzzle was off, Bakugou was screaming at Midoriya a mile a minute. 

“Deku! You stupid useless fuck, you’re not even wearing quirk suppressants! Why are we still in here when you could get us the fuck out?”

Tomura repeated the phrase I will not dust him until I have the full picture five times in his head when he felt his glass disintegrate in his hand, anger forcing him to clench all five fingers around it at the way this entitled little anger-management-issues-case-on-legs was talking to Midoriya. 

“Why would I do that, Kacchan?” Midoriya asked in a mock-confused tone. 

“Why would you — I get that you’re functioning with less brains than an actual flea has on hand at any given moment, but we’re literally held captive in a fucking villain base right now, dipshit!”

Midoriya nodded patronisingly and Dabi snickered somewhere behind Tomura. 

“Alright, and we’re heroes, so a villain base is probably not the best place for us to be, right, Deku?” Bakugou snarled. 

Midoriya tilted his head. “Wrong, Kacchan.”

“Wrong — how am I fucking wrong, you actual worthless, quirkless, idiot?!”

Tomura hummed. Midoriya was, very clearly, not quirkless. Curious once more. 

“A villain base is exactly where you belong, you suicide-baiting dick.”

Dabi whistled. “Okay, I take it back, I like the kid.”

Spinner and Dabi had been arguing for weeks about whether Midoriya was interesting or not. Evidently, Spinner was correct when he claimed that Midoriya was a true hero, and Dabi was wrong when he claimed that Midoriya was a false do-gooder, but Toga had also been correct when she jumped in and assessed that he was likely more than everyone saw on the surface, it seemed. 

“What the ever-loving fuck does that have to do with anything, Deku?!”

Midoriya hummed. “Well, you’ll either die, or you’ll give in and join them and then die at a later date, so I’m really not seeing a downside to being here, Kacchan.”

Toga cheered like she was watching a sports game and Midoriya was winning. 

“Are you — wait, why would I die if I joined them? They wouldn’t fucking kill me for trying to join their—”

“I’d give it a week before Dabi — sorry, Touya — realised you’re a mini-Endeavour and cremated you on the spot.”

Everyone swivelled to look at Dabi, who looked surprisingly pale, but said nothing. So, Midoriya figured out who Dabi was before everyone else, huh? Tomura was starting to feel more and more vindicated that despite the fact he had a crush on a hero brat, he’d kind of picked the most morally-grey and yet good and intelligent hero there was, it seemed. 

“Oh my god, it’s like talking to an insane person. Alright, what the fuck does Endeavour have to do with any of this?”

Tomura let out a pained groan at how stupid the blond kid really was. Maybe he wasn’t such great League material, after all.

“You’re both volatile, abusive, pieces of shit that have no conscience as long as a win is within sight? That’s just an initial observation since I know you, sadly, and I know how fucking traumatised Shouto is, though. Ever try to murder your firstborn and not realise he’s joined the villains with the express purpose of killing you? That’d really even you two out as twinsies.”

“Dabi, we will be talking about this after—” Tomura started, but stopped when he realised Dabi looked like he was trying not to cry. He was a villain and an asshole, but even Tomura knew when to leave someone the fuck alone so they could break down in pseudo-privacy. 

“How the fuck do you — did they hit your head when they took you or something? You’re making even less sense than usual, Deku.” Bakugou actually had the nerve to sound minorly concerned after spending his initial words berating Midoriya for no good reason, and Tomura was still intermittently reminding himself that there was clearly a lot to be learned by listening to the two of them talk before dusting the blond brat. 

“Am I, or did you just stop paying attention to lessons in middle school when your ego and your quirk came in around the same time and are now struggling to follow basic logic because of it? Would it help if I added loud noises to my explanations?”

“Well, the boy certainly has some sass, I’ll give him that,” Compress commented in a thoughtful tone. 

“Deku, I swear to fuck, when I have my quirk back, you’re fucking dead.”

“Oh, oh no. Kacchan’s going to explode me. Again. That’s new and creative and not at all getting repetitive given you’ve been blowing me up since you had the ability to do it,” Midoriya replied in a flat, unamused tone. 

“That blond kid’s a menace!” Twice exclaimed. Everyone waited for his other personality to contradict him and somehow compliment Bakugou, but it never happened. Apparently, Bakugou was enough of a dick for both his sides to agree about it. 

“I have not been doing it since I had the ability to—”

“Then you’ve still been doing it too much because I’m running out of torso that isn’t scar tissue,” Midoriya interrupted dryly. Everyone tensed at that. How the fuck was the kid sitting there talking about being blown up so often he had no undamaged skin so casually?

“You lying little fuck I have not—”

“Alright, hold on,” Midoriya sighed, breaking his cuffs without… without activating his quirk. 

That wasn’t good for Tomura’s heart at all. He was a powerful villain and was highly attracted to someone who was equally powerful, fucking sue him. Plus, he kind of wanted to just… watch Midoriya break things that should have been difficult to, without breaking a sweat or using his quirk. It was objectively fucking hot that he had that level of strength. He’d hear no arguments about that, thank you very much. 

And then his shirt was off, and that would not have been good for Tomura’s heart either were it not for the fact that he hadn’t been exaggerating. At all. His body, from the waistband of his pants to his collarbone, was littered with the starburst scars that were the signature of a closely detonated bomb. 

“Shit,” Dabi hissed, and Tomura could feel the heat of his quirk flaring to life behind him, but couldn’t find it in him to tell him to subdue it. Not when the kid was about as fucked-up from quirk abuse as Dabi was himself. 

Bakugou, for the first time, was silent. Midoriya didn’t gloat, didn’t rub in the fact that he’d been right, and he also didn’t get up from the chair he was sitting in, but he did put his shirt back on, much to Tomura’s fifty-fifty disappointment and gratitude. 

He was having a hard time trying to decide between paying attention to the abs — sweet merciful lord, the abs  — and the scars, and they were eliciting very different and contradicting reactions from him. It was difficult to deal with being turned on and furious at the same time. 

“Are you seriously just going to sit there?” Bakugou hissed when Midoriya made no move to free him. 

“Yeah.”

“Why?!”

“Think of it like an experiment.”

“An experiment.”

“Yeah.”

“Stop giving me non-answers.”

“Why?”

“It’s annoying.”

“Why?”

“Oh my god, this kid is hilarious,” Dabi snickered. Tomura had to agree, watching him aggravate the blond more and more was pretty funny if you dismissed the horrifying scars all over him. At least he was amusing Dabi and distracting him from the fact that he couldn’t have cried like a normal person anymore, even if he wanted to. 

No one liked it when he cried blood — least of all Dabi himself. 

“Because I want an answer! What fucking experiment!”

“Oh! I mean how long they’re all gonna watch us using that camera in the corner of the room before they realise I’m just gonna sit here and enjoy winding you up while they decide what to do with us? What do you think? About another five minutes? Maybe less now that I’ve pointed it out, but then again, you’re too stupid and volatile to actually shut up just because you have an audience, so if I know you, you’re just gonna carry on talking as if I haven’t said anyth—”

“Oh my god, shut the fuck up, Deku! See, this is why I always exploded you. You’re weak, annoying, and need reminding of your place in life, or you just keep fucking talking, forgetting you belong below me. Below everyone.”

“I told you guys he’d just keep talking,” Midoriya sang, winking at the camera. Tomura did not disintegrate the glass Kurogiri had replaced the last one with out of utter shock at that wink. Jesus that was a somewhat terrifyingly attractive wink. Sure, maybe the glass ended up as dust because he also wanted to dust Bakugou for insinuating Midoriya was less than him, when all Bakugou was was an aggressive quirk and an abhorrent personality, but it was mostly the fucking wink. 

Fuck, it was going to be bad for his health if Midoriya did one more ridiculously sexy thing while he was watching him. 

“Oh, Shiggy-chan, please please please can we keep him? He’s so fun and it seems like the false heroes failed him, too!” Toga begged with a frenzied grin that was a mixture of panic and protectiveness. 

Tomura had to agree, it seemed like Midoriya Izuku was such a good hero because he knew what it was to need one more than anything and yet was never saved or protected. Even now, he was regularly forced to interact with someone who abused him through the majority of their shared childhoods, which begged the question — were the teachers aware and ignoring it, or stupid and ignorant of it?

Whichever it was, they were still failing Midoriya by letting Bakugou work towards being a pro hero at all, never mind letting him work towards it in proximity of someone he physically and emotionally abused. 

“I don’t know about keeping him, but I don’t like making him stay in that room with the boy who abused him,” Magne commented, sounding fearful on Midoriya’s behalf. Tomura agreed somewhat, he wanted them separated as soon as possible, but he also couldn’t pass on information just because he had a soft spot for Midoriya. 

A voice in the back of his head that sounded suspiciously like Sensei reminded him that it wasn’t simply a soft spot and that it was becoming clearer and clearer that he and Midoriya had very similar, very painful pasts where the people who should have saved them never even tried, but he ignored it as best he could and told himself he’d find a way to make it up to Midoriya once they were done listening to the two boys. 

“As much as I hate to admit it, given the way he’s somewhat gone to bat for me and has clearly suffered at the hands of his own Endeavour, of sorts, I’d rather get him out of there sooner than later. I’d kill Endeavour given the chance, doesn’t mean I’d wanna sit across from him with no one else around,” Dabi commented, a little more quietly than he usually spoke. 

“Is he… Is he rapping pre-quirk rap songs?” Spinner asked incredulously, drawing everyone’s attention back to the screen, and yep, Midoriya Izuku was rapping pre-quirk era rap songs, much to Bakugou’s clear displeasure. 

Tomura was about to laugh, but then that brat just had to speak up. 

“You know, Deku, I wish I could go back in time and not tell you to kill yourself. Not because I regret it, but because it’d be so much fucking easier if I just killed you myself!” Bakugou screeched, sounding far more manic and disjointed than any member of the League ever had other than Moonfish, and even to the rest of the League, Moonfish had been somewhat disturbing. 

Midoriya just blinked at him. “Is that supposed to somehow be news to me?”

Bakugou just roared without actually saying anything. 

Midoriya rolled his eyes and looked at the camera. “Get me out of here before he starts screaming the word die like it’s his catchphrase, and I’ll tell Touya how very not like their dad Shouto is without lying about it. Leave me in here and he can kiss easy access to his baby brother and Endeawhore goodbye.”

“Get him the fuck out of that room, Shigaraki,” Dabi snarled. 

Tomura sighed. How was it that kidnapping two heroes was so exhausting? “Kurogiri, get the nice one out of the room, please,” he ordered tiredly. As soon as Kurogiri became visible on the camera feed, Dabi relaxed. 

“Endeawhore, huh? How didn’t I fucking think of that one?” he murmured quietly. Midoriya walked out of Kurogiri’s warp gate looking — cheerful. He was standing in a room full of villains and he looked fucking chipper. Tomura, had he not seriously had a crush on the guy, may well have sent him back to UA just to avoid trying to figure the guy's motives out because he was more confusing than a video game on extra hard mode with no instructions to tell the player what was expected of them. 

“Touya! Your hair looks shit, dye it back,” was Midoriya’s greeting. 

Tomura did not get paid enough for his job, he really didn’t. 

Dabi sputtered like he, too, had no idea what to do with Midoriya Izuku. Toga was giggling like the whole thing was somehow going according to her plan, Spinner looked utterly aghast that the best hero out there was also, somehow, fitting in with a villain group, Compress didn’t look anything thanks to the mask, and Magne looked like she wanted to mother hen the kid until he cried his trauma out. 

Tomura really did not get paid enough to deal with these people. 

“What the fuck is wrong with my hair?!” Dabi demanded after a good extra thirty seconds of floundering for a response. Midoriya squinted at him. 

“Have you seen your brother’s hair? It’s a work of fucking art and you’re sitting here with that going on when you could have your own peppermint mix?”

“Peppermint mix?” Toga squealed delightedly. Midoriya grinned and nodded. 

“Hey Toga. Sorry about Uraraka, she’s, um, well, she’s… she kind of just sucks.”

“She really does, huh, Izu-chan,” Toga replied a little mournfully. Midoriya hummed sympathetically. 

“What is happening right now,” Tomura whispered to himself. His day was going roughly zero percent the way he’d thought it would, and if Sensei was watching, he honestly didn’t know if he’d be amused or appalled. 

“I’m comforting Toga because a quirkist asshole judged her for a quirk-based need,” Midoriya stage-whispered, standing way closer to Tomura than he had been before. How the fuck did he end up less than half an inch from Tomura’s face without him noticing?!

“Hey, you, no getting distracted, you said you’d tell me about Shouto, so tell me,” Dabi snapped. Midoriya just raised an eyebrow at him somewhat imperiously and turned away, and Tomura weighed the potential outcomes of dusting Dabi for making Midoriya pull away from him when he’d been so fucking close. 

“Yeah, I broke all my fingers convincing Sho that his fire was his and not your dads and ended up getting like, blown the fuck up by the resulting explosion of his fire meeting the cold air, so you’re gonna have to try better than snapping like a moody teenager to scare me, but sure, I did say I’d talk about Shouto, so what do you want to know?”

“Well, you said he’s not like our dad. You sure?” Dabi questioned. 

“No, no, I deliberately let myself destroy the bones in my hands so I could help someone who takes after Endeavour,” Midoriya deadpanned. 

“Fucking hell where is this attitude when one of us spies on your school?!” 

Midoriya immediately cleared his throat and wore the same, serene, sunshine smile he usually did. “What attitude?” he asked in the most naive and confused voice Tomura had ever heard. 

Toga shivered. “That’s scary, Izu-chan.”

“It’s called a hero persona for a reason, Toga. I’m a nice person but that doesn’t mean I’m a fucking doormat, either. It just means that the people I save get the nicest version of myself.”

“That… makes an alarming amount of sense,” Spinner commented thoughtfully. 

“Mm, so, anyway, Shouto. Let me think, um, his favourite pastime is stealing your dad’s credit cards and buying himself, his class, and actual strangers the most expensive things he can think of, then returning the cards before Endeawhore realises they’re gone so that he never notices the money disappearing.”

Dabi snorted loudly. 

“He was terrified of his fire as well as hating it when he started at UA, like he accidentally used it during the cavalry battle and afterwards I’m getting dragged into a fucking dark corner so he can tell me a dramatic story about quirk marriages and then present his conspiracy theory that I’m All Might’s secret love child… which he still believes, somehow,” Midoriya added with an amused lilt to his voice. 

Dabi let out a pained and embarrassed groan at that. 

“Yeah, he also declared war on me instead of Bakugou back at the first year sports festival and Bakugou has hated him ever since, but then, well, like I said, broken fingers, screaming, flames, boom, we became friends, etc etc. So he’s fine using his fire now, never hurts him or anything.”

Dabi wiped a small trickle of blood from his eye, the closest he could physically come to crying with his burn damage, and Tomura studiously pretended not to notice, just like everyone else in the room. 

“Did our dad — did he see Sho using his flames and think he’d won, though?” 

Midoriya hummed. “Sort of. Before our match he came up to me telling me how weak I was and how Shouto’s his ‘greatest masterpiece’ and I basically told him that Shouto was Shouto, not his anything, so he’s not my biggest fan, either.”

“I fucking knew I liked you,” Dabi snickered. Tomura felt somewhat possessive at that comment but reined it in to allow Dabi time to hear about his family. 

“Anyway the only other thing I can really give you is that initially, Sho was all I’m not here to make friends, and obviously, I took that as a personal challenge, and now he likes petting Koda’s pet bunny with me on Sundays and says that he wants a cat.”

Dabi blinked. Tomura blinked. Everyone in the room except Kurogiri and Midoriya blinked. 

“What? He thinks cats are cute.”

“I’m getting him a cat,” Dabi muttered. 

“Feel like that might ruin the kitten that his boyfriend was planning on getting him for his birthday next year, but sure, he can have two cats,” Midoriya bargained with a grin. Tomura’s heart gave a traitorous flutter at how real that crooked grin was compared to his ‘hero’ smile. Sure, the hero smile was bright and warm, but the lopsided one he was currently wearing just seemed so much more authentically Midoriya in nature. 

“He has a boyfriend?” Dabi asked. Tomura could practically smell protective-big-brother energy pushing to the surface under his scarred skin. 

“Shouji, yeah.”

“The fucking mutant one?” Dabi asked, and before anyone could blink, he was pinned against a wall with an angry Midoriya covered in quirk-lightning snarling in his face. 

“Say it again. Go on, say it again.”

“...What?”

“Act as if having a mutant quirk is a bad thing again. I just spent twenty fucking minutes listening to fucking Bakugou’s bullshit while you were up here watching like we were a zoo exhibit, and I really can’t see Sho begrudging me injuring you just a bit for being quirkist after having to sit and deal with his psychopathic delusional ass without Shou there to calm me down.”

Spinner practically had cartoon heart eyes as he stared at Midoriya in unrestrained awe, and Tomura barely managed to stop himself from rolling his eyes at the adoration on his face, but he understood it. Spinner faced a lot of quirk discrimination as someone with a visible mutant quirk, and there was Midoriya, staring Dabi down like he was the incarnation of death and unofficial guardian angel of those with mutant quirks. Tomura got it, even if he kind of hated someone else looking at Midoriya like they were in love with him. 

“Alright, Jesus fuck, sorry for insulting the guy’s quirk,” Dabi bit out. Midoriya patted his fucking cheek like Dabi was an unruly toddler and not a murderous villain before stepping back and hopping onto a barstool like he hadn’t just had a very close brush with his own living cremation, and Tomura, once again, wondered what the fuck was happening around him. 

He was half tempted to text Sensei and ask him to watch through the cameras so he could be sure it was all actually happening and he wasn’t hallucinating or something. 

“Alright, now, the only problem is that Shouto is somewhat,” Midoriya paused, biting the inside of his cheek as he tilted his head in thought before continuing, “repressed. That’s probably the best word for it, he’s fucking repressed, and people have a tendency to think that means he’s just like his dad at first glance.”

Dabi frowned. “But he’s not, right? I mean you said he isn’t.”

“No,” Midoriya shook his head. “He just learned how to bury his emotions so far down even he isn’t sure what they are most of the time, so you kinda have to learn to read him without expecting a verbal explanation. Like, when he’s embarrassed, or… other things I doubt his brother wants details of, his left side smokes a bit.”

“Other things?” Dabi asked with narrowed eyes. Midoriya’s green eyes lit up with mischief and Tomura forced himself to sigh inwardly instead of out loud. The kid was more chaotic than most of his own party members! He was the poster boy for the chaotic neutral character alignment!

“Yeah. Like when he’s asking me what thot means and I answer honestly or asking me what dick pics are, those things.”

Dabi sputtered again. Toga giggled. 

“He asked you what dick pics were? Isn’t it, like, self-explanatory, Izu-chan?”

Midoriya smirked. “I told Shouji to demonstrate.”

Dabi, in what was apparently a family trait, accidentally let a fire start in his left hand. 

“Please, please, tell me my baby brother did not ask you what thot meant, or what a dick pic was, or anything else of that nature. Please?”

“Oh shit, probably shouldn’t mention the time he accidentally burned his clothes off practising with his fire in front of about seven of us,” Midoriya said. At a perfectly audible volume. While looking right at Dabi. 

Tomura was quitting. He was quitting and becoming a vigilante, it sounded more peaceful than whatever the current fuckery around him was. 

Dabi got a dangerous expression on his face then. “Why the fuck would I not want to hear about that? If that’s all there was to it, why would it bother me?”

Midoriya was silent for a minute, and then, to Tomura and Dabi’s shared horror, answered with, “It’s how he and Shouji got together.”

“What the fuck is going on at hero school?” Magne questioned, looking upwards like she was hoping a deity might answer her. 

“And what were you doing, hm?” Dabi questioned. Tomura shot him a dirty look. Could the man not just let anything go? Although, when he thought about it, Tomura kind of wanted an answer to that question, too. 

Midoriya grinned viciously. “At Shouto’s request, I was taking photos of him naked with Shouji wrapped around him to hide just the important bits and sending them to Endeavour with captions that read like porn titles.”

The whole League seemed to hold their breath collectively as they waited for Dabi’s reaction, but they weren’t waiting long before Dabi was throwing an arm around Midoriya’s shoulders and snickering. “Alright, my mind is made up, you are the best worst influence Shouto could have asked for and I am so fucking glad you met him and are far more than meets the eye.”

“Thanks! Hey, Shou, your brother likes me,” Midoriya said with a smirk, wiggling his…his phone. Tomura rounded on Toga. 

“Why does he still have a fucking phone, Toga?”

“Oh relax Shigaraki, I turned location data off. Shou, want me to give your big bro my phone so you two can catch up?”

“Yes, please, Izuku. Thank you for calling me and also, I hate you for telling him about Shouji and the photographs.”

“Do you really, though?”

“...No. Not really. How could I hate the director of Two-toned Twink and His Boyfriend with Seven Dicks? You’re my favourite chaos gremlin and you know it.”

Midoriya cackled and tossed his phone over to a stunned but oddly proud-looking Dabi, who fiddled around before mouthing silently at Tomura that he had, in fact, for some reason, turned his location data off and then walking out with a dopey, big-brother grin on his face. 

“Alright, I have to ask — have to,” Magne asked in a tone of voice that reminded Tomura of an exasperated and somewhat disturbed parent. “What the hell is your deal, Midoriya?”

“Hm. Well, I could be a dick and deliberately talk around in circles like I do with Bakugou, but I actually like Toga and she looks like she might scream if I don’t admit it soon, so, uh, I’m kind of Himi-chan’s friend outside of school?”

Tomura blinked. Blinked again. The reality around him wasn’t changing, though. 

“How? What? When? What?” he snapped at both of them. 

“Yeah, so she stopped me from killing myself when I was still in middle school, and I’ve always made sure to give her blood to stop her from going… full murdery-no-blood Himi-chan, which is the version you currently have, because it’s really fucking hard to provide blood bags to known villains when you’re a hero student.”

Tomura decided to address the I almost killed myself when I was in fucking middle school thing later when Toga wasn’t gazing at Midoriya with stars in her eyes and a soft smile on her face that he’d definitely never seen before and he could address it fucking properly. 

He also made a mental note to work much, much harder to get blood for Toga. Not only did she need it, but she saved Midoriya’s life. Tomura had gratitude to express and a perfect way to do it. 

“How is Toga blood deprived?” Magne asked in a concerned tone. 

“She needs a decent amount every day or her quirk will drive her closer and closer to murderous insanity so that she ends up with no choice but to kill to get it. I analysed her quirk for her as thanks for the whole life-saving thing and honestly, yeah, she accidentally kills people when she’s bloodthirsty, but is that her fault, or is it society's for turning its nose up just because they wouldn’t want to drink blood themselves and refusing to help accommodate her quirk needs?” Midoriya challenged with a defensive air about him. 

Huh. He was protecting Toga. He was actually defensive and protective of Toga. It was sweet if Tomura pretended that Toga hadn’t been lying to him about being friends with his crush for— fuck. They were friends and Toga was very well aware of Tomura’s huge fucking crush on Midoriya. Ohhhh no. Nope, nope, Tomura was ignoring that and moving past it or he was going to accidentally dust the whole damn bar. 

“Mmhm! I need far more than even three people can provide safely in a day, although the amount of time I had to go without before I found you guys after Izu-chan was unable to keep finding me to give me his means that some of this damage is a little… permanent?” Toga admitted with an uncharacteristically sheepish smile. Midoriya pulled her against his side and stroked her hair comfortingly and it was a little adorable, watching him act like Toga’s big brother when she was, at best, only a month or two younger than him and technically far more independent in terms of her living situation. 

“It’s not damage, Himi-chan, it’s just a bit of a difference from what people like to think of as normal, okay?” Midoriya murmured quietly enough that only Tomura and Magne, the two people closest to them, overheard. Magne about melted at the adorableness of a hero student reassuring Toga that she was perfectly fine the way she was, and Tomura was… besotted. 

There were no two ways about it, Midoriya Izuku was a hero to villains as much as he was to the people society actually accepted, and if that didn’t make him a truly good person, nothing did. All the reservations Tomura had previously used to keep his feelings at bay and focus only on the physical appeal of Midoriya — on a personal level — were gone, because Midoriya accepted Toga as she was. Midoriya cared about Toga, about protecting mutant-quirked people from quirkism, about Dabi and his family bullshit, about the people that everyone else cast aside without a second thought, and Tomura had no good reason to stop from admitting to himself that he was falling in love with the guy anymore. 

“Toga, honey,” Magne started. Toga’s yellow eyes snapped to her Big Sis. 

“Mmhm?”

“Tell us the truth, how bad is what the blond boy did to Midoriya here when they were younger?”

Toga scoffed so scornfully that Tomura was a little startled. Toga didn’t get judgemental or serious often or easily at all. 

“For starters, who said he’s stopped? You saw him in there, he’d have blown Izu-chan to pieces if he had the freedom to, and for real real? Like, worse than most villains — the people we see as villains, too, not the kind we are. Used Izu-chan as a target for his quirk practice when Izu-chan was quirkless!” she hissed venomously. 

“You were quirkless, honey?” Magne asked softly. 

Midoriya’s eyes flashed with something Tomura couldn’t name for a second before he answered. “Until the day of the UA entrance exam, yeah. My quirk breaks my bones pretty easily, so it didn’t come in until I was strong enough to sort of handle it. I was fourteen when I took the exam.”

“You have control over it now, don’t you?” Spinner asked in mild alarm. Midoriya hummed thoughtfully. 

“I use it in percentages. I started off somewhere between one and five percent. I can now use up to seventy percent easily and eighty if I push it, but any higher and it’s right back to my bones being shattered to dust.”

Spinner gagged. 

Tomura understood the reaction. He was a little horrified that Midoriya’s quirk was so physically damaging to his body, and somewhat panicked internally at the thought of Midoriya’s bones turning to dust inside his skin just because he used his quirk. He wanted — he wanted to protect him. Sure, Midoriya was far from fragile or dependent on others for his safety, but Tomura still wanted to take him and stop the world from hurting him any more than it already had. 

And that started with definitive answers about the Bakugou brat's behaviour — because he sure as shit was no longer a League candidate, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t be somehow handled while he was in their custody, now did it?

“Alright, well as disturbing as that information is, could you perhaps tell us why Bakugou treated you so callously?” Compress asked, on the same page as Tomura already. His face was obscured, as it always was, but the League knew him well enough to detect protective intensity and concern in his voice. 

“I mean, I’m not inside his head, but as far as I can tell it’s because I hadn’t planned on letting being quirkless stop me from being a hero, and he hated the idea that someone could be a hero without one when he needed his flashy quirk to be told he was suited to it. Schools and adults played into his delusions about how important and amazing he was, and every time they did, it became more and more of a personal affront to him that I didn’t deem having a quirk a necessity if I wanted to save people.”

Lord, Spinner was back to it with the hero-worship eyes. Tomura didn’t even blame him, but if people could stop falling in love with his Midoriya for five minutes, that’d be fucking great. 

“Alright, so you were an ambitious kid, what’s wrong with that? He didn’t have realistic expectations of himself, man!” Twice chimed in. Midoriya took it in stride, though, smiling almost indulgently in Twice’s direction like he was trying to reassure him that what he said wasn’t hurtful. 

“Okay, that explains — but does not justify — the boy’s hatred of you, but the physical attacks? Using his quirk against you?” Spinner pressed. He seemed to be struggling with the fact that while Midoriya was, in fact, a better hero than even Stain had originally thought, he’d led the kind of life that would have guided most people right to their own League of Villains. It was tough to swallow, even Tomura could admit that. 

“I can’t explain that at all. I know he hated that I stood up for the other kids he bullied, and I know he hated that no matter how much he used his quirk on me I never stopped doing it, but you heard him in there. He’s got no valid reason beyond simply hating what I stood for,” Midoriya concluded with a shrug. 

“Alright,” Magne replied uneasily. “The suicide-baiting, why did that happen?”

“Your guess is as good as mine, Big Sis Magne,” Midoriya replied easily, proving just how much Toga had spoken to him about the League and just how little Midoriya had used that information against them whenever they went up against UA in one sentence. “Usually it was just spider lilies on my desk, but the day I met Himi-chan, he told me to jump off the roof so I’d get a quirk in my next life, and honestly, it wasn’t about getting the quirk as much as it was about not having to deal with his shit anymore.”

“How did Toga save you?” Tomura asked curiously. To his surprise, Toga blushed while Midoriya grinned fondly. 

“Threw a knife into my shoulder to startle me,” he replied with far too much affection given the actual words he’d said. 

“Izu-chan! I just wanted to get your attention away from the edge of the roof,” Toga whined. Midoriya gazed at her expectantly until she growled playfully. “Fine, fine, I also kinda wanted your blood. But in my defence, I had a feeling Izu-chan’s blood would be the best, and it is!”

Compress swung his head in Tomura’s direction. “I’ll regret asking what it tastes like, won’t I?” he muttered quietly as Toga hummed happily while Midoriya, with practised ease, took a blood donation kit from her and started to drain his blood into a bag for her. 

“I feel like we really will, but I also want to know,” Tomura admitted. They shared a look for another few seconds before turning back to Toga and Midoriya, who was letting Toga play with his hair while he literally bled for the girl. Did the guy just have to get a bit more perfect with every passing minute? Could he have not made it easier for Tomura to maintain some kind of professional, hero-to-villain boundary between the two of them while there were people around who could probably see how smitten he was with him?

“Toga, what does… Izu-chan’s blood taste like?” Compress asked apprehensively. 

Toga turned to him, one hand still buried in Midoriya’s green curls, and Tomura wondered if they were as soft as they looked. Toga’s expression became unexpectedly serious and loving as she replied, “Safety, acceptance, and home.”

Magne pushed her sunglasses aside as she wiped a tear away from her left eye and smiled down at the two of them like she couldn’t have been prouder of the unusual pair of friends. 

“Himi-chan,” Midoriya prompted. Toga rolled her eyes. 

“Fine, fine, it kinda tastes like candy as well. Like pop rocks coated in sugar. Never met anyone else who has legitimately sweet blood before, like sweet sweet as opposed to just not-metallic.”

“Well done,” Midoriya whispered. Tomura didn’t understand what Toga had done well, but Toga’s smile told him that she was beyond pleased with the praise. 

“May I enquire what Miss Toga did well, Midoriya?” Compress asked. Tomura made a mental note to buy the guy a pack of cards or some shit as thanks for asking on his behalf. Toga seemed to shrink under the curious glances of the League, and Tomura wondered just how often she felt shy like that without Midoriya around, who she clearly trusted to hide her when she felt too exposed. She seemed to burrow into Midoriya’s side a little, but Tomura was over feeling any jealousy about their relationship. 

It was clearly platonic, more familial than anything else, though he was a little envious of how easily they touched one another, it wasn’t the kind of contact he wanted with Midoriya, though. He wanted to like, hold the guy's hand and shit, stroke his hair, kiss him — generally things that were not familial in nature, at any rate. 

Midoriya yanked the needle out of his arm, pulled the tubing from the blood bag, and pulled a — a fucking crazy straw from his pants pocket, before sticking the straw into the blood bag and handing it to Toga, shooing her across the room to drink it.

“Himi-chan acts as if she’s not embarrassed by her quirk needs, but she is, and I’ve been encouraging her for the last year or so to be more open with you guys about it, but she thinks you all consider her weird or disturbed and doesn’t like to admit to the reality of her situation very much.”

“Do you just carry a twirly straw around for Toga’s blood? That’s adorable! How crazy that the hero kid is giving out his blood like he’s a juice box, he’s as weird as we are!”

Midoriya ignored Twice, but not unkindly, and focused on Magne, who seemed to be clutching at her non-existent pearls with a pained expression. “It’s not that she doesn’t trust you, it’s that I’m the first person who never cared about the blood, like at all, so she doesn’t expect that from people. I’m the exception, not the rule, right?”

Magne nodded seriously. 

“Well, the thing is, I get a lot of texts about how she feels somewhat uncomfortable with all the jokes about the blood-drinking. I mean seriously, a teacher once pulled my phone out of my hand before I had a chance to read it and my entire theory of heroics class heard Izu-chan, they’re acting like my nutritional blood needs are a fun personality trait that’s funny and not a serious biological need again, what do I do? being read out and I had to pretend we were fucking role-playing,” Midoriya groaned. 

Tomura snorted. “And they bought that? An empathetic vampire text role play?”

With a cocked eyebrow, Midoriya snorted right back. “Right, because the number one hero student texting with a member of the League of Villains about their blood dietary needs like a quirk nutritionist sounds so much more believable. Please, go tell someone, anyone, that I’m sitting around your villain bar and gossiping with you all, have fun making them believe that.”

“Fucking hell, Shouto was right, you are brutal, Midoriya,” Dabi snickered from behind the group. 

Midoriya dragged his hand down his face with a groan. “What story did he tell to reinforce that particular point, Dabi?”

Dabi grinned a little maniacally as he came into Tomura’s line of sight and held up a scarred hand, ticking fingers down as he went. “The Mineta Changing Room Incident, the time you tried to convince Monoma to copy your quirk just so he’d break his bones in the process—”

“I take no responsibility for trying to make vocal homophobes pay for their bigotry,” Midoriya interrupted, but Dabi just grinned wider and kept listing things. 

“—and were actually disappointed that he couldn’t! Something he refused to describe which is apparently simply known on campus as Midoriya’s Feral Moment—”

Tomura was very interested in that one. 

“—The time you had sex with Kaminari and pretended to forget so that it wouldn’t become a repeat thing—”

It was weird, to be both insanely jealous and entertained at the same time, but that was exactly how Tomura felt. Insanely jealous of Kaminari — he knew which one that was, and he was pretty in a very conventional way, which didn’t give him a whole lot of hope for Midoriya being interested in him — and very amused because it seemingly wasn’t good enough for a second go. 

“—and the time you ‘forgot’ you were in English class and sat there swearing in English for a good twenty minutes, knowing the rest of the class wasn’t fluent so only the teacher would understand you, before Present Mic was able to get you to stop, which was apparently your revenge for him ruining the Feral Moment.”

“Is there a point to this, Dabi?” Midoriya asked in amusement, sliding his phone back into his pocket after Dabi tossed it to him.

Dabi nodded very seriously. “I’ve decided to adopt you as my new little brother. You’re a great bad influence on Sho and you really are a chaos gremlin, as he calls you. I think I’d be remiss in my duties as a chaos gremlin myself if I didn’t actually adopt you.”

Midoriya wrinkled his nose. “Ew. I’ve kissed Sho before. I’m not becoming his brother by proxy, adopted or otherwise.”

Tomura was getting a bit sick of how jealous he was of hero brats at that point. Sure, Midoriya was a hero and he was the exception to the general rule of how much heroes sucked, but the fact that there were now two heroes who had — at minimum — kissed the person who was shaping up to be the damn love of his life was… Not fun. 

He could let the Shouto thing go, probably, since he seemed to be Midoriya’s closest legitimate friend, but the Kaminari kid was on thin fucking ice in his book. That ice would probably crack if he ever found out that the electro-idiot was trying to sleep with Midoriya again. 

“Yeah, I know, he mentioned it, but given that his reaction was that was very wrong but very right, and yours was fuck that was like kissing family, I think it can be forgotten, no?”

“How could it be both wrong and right?” Spinner asked with a confused frown. 

“Sho didn’t know if he was gay or not yet,” Midoriya supplied with a shrug. 

“How did he not know if he was gay when he lives with almost exclusively very muscular male hero students?” Dabi asked with an amused snort. 

“It’s Sho. He wouldn’t have known he was gay even if you put him in front of a naked Edgeshot and fuck I did not just say that out loud.”

“I’m sorry, my little brother's hero crush is Edgeshot? Give me your phone back, I have trauma to inflict.”

“Oh sure, we’ll just tell him how you’re a huge Hawks simp while we’re on with him, shall we?” Midoriya snickered. 

Dabi faltered. “How the fuck did you know that?”

“I talk to Hawks, obviously.”

“How the fuck does he know that?” Dabi screeched in panic. 

“...No comment.”

“New little brother, answer the question before you find yourself being kicked through a window.”

Midoriya paused before pulling his phone back out and tapping the screen a couple of times, holding up the universal ‘wait a minute’ finger in Dabi’s direction. 

“Izu! What's up, man?” Hawks answered on speaker. Dabi tensed but didn’t seem to dare move or even breathe properly, it seemed. Tomura was busy trying to understand how the fuck Midoriya and Hawks were on given name levels of familiarity, but there definitely wasn’t any kind of flirty undertone to the greeting, and he doubted Midoriya would have called the guy if they had any kind of romantic relationship anyway. 

He might have enjoyed creating chaos and fuckery, but he didn’t like to inflict pain when he cared about someone, and he cared about Shouto and therefore Dabi by extension. 

“Hey, Keigo, yeah, can you just remind me of that time you were explaining how you knew Dabi had a crush on you?”

“His pants don’t fucking hide much, Izu. It’s not even a story, it’s a cautionary tale to wear pants with more give in the crotch. Or even just to arrange things properly in your underwear, like seriously, it doesn’t take that much forethought to just tuck—”

Dabi screamed. High-pitched and shrill screamed. 

“...Izu, please tell me you’re not hanging out with Dabi right now?”

“Alright.”

“Izuku!”

“I’m hanging out with Dabi.”

“Why?”

“Boredom and kidnapping.”

“…Did you kidnap Dabi?”

“Why does he assume you kidnapped me?!” Dabi demanded with an affronted tone to his words. 

“It’s something he would do just to see if he could,” Hawks snorted. 

“The rest of the League are here too, you know,” Midoriya said as if that would somehow relax the number three hero. 

“Oh my fucking— you are literally the most stressful person in my life, Izu!”

“Aw, thanks, Keigo. That means a lot,” Midoriya grinned. Tomura was contemplating whether or not he should just be a hero since they seemed to actually be more unpredictable than villains, by that point. 

“Did you seriously only call me to embarrass Dabi?”

“Absolutely.”

“What did he do?”

“He was mean about Sho’s crush on Kamihara!”

“Is that Edgeshot’s civilian name? You know I don’t bother keeping track of boring people, Izu.”

“Ah, but think about how they’re both at equal levels of emotional constipation and propriety! It’d be a match made in organisational hell, Keigo! Think of all the bowing and calling each other san and calligraphed date invitations!”

“Please stop trying to set Edgeshot and Sho up, Izuku.”

“I haven’t done that since he got with Shouji, in my defence.”

“...Fair. But seriously, that’s your version of appropriate payback? A villain teases his little brother — indirectly — over his hero crush, you call me and get me to talk about a very awkward hard-on while I’m presumably on speaker?”

“At this point, there should be no room for surprise left regarding how protective I get over Shouto. He’s like a newborn deer trying to walk on ice, but with less grace and situational awareness. He needs protecting!” 

Dabi snorted at that. “Fuck, that’s so true.”

“What is happening in my life?!” Tomura yelled. He was going to implode if one more weird, completely inverse of his expectations thing happened, he just knew it. 

“Have you given Shigaraki a breakdown?” Hawks asked, sounding far too amused and nowhere near appropriately stressed enough about the idea of Midoriya being around a potentially unstable villainous mastermind. 

“Remains to be seen. Ooh, ooh, I know, tell him the thing, Keigo!”

“Which one?”

“The one from when we got drunk and made prank calls to Endeavour.”

“I’m going to marry him,” Dabi muttered. 

“No you fucking are not,” Tomura snapped. 

“Not your fucking hero boy toy! Hawks,” Dabi hissed back quietly. 

“Are you sure about that? You might actually die, Izu. I don’t have time for your funeral, the plans are far too extensive for me to organise on my own, I still haven’t managed to track down the live lion you want there, and—”

“Live lion?” Magne mouthed to Tomura with a perplexed frown. 

“I’m sure, I’m sure,” Midoriya was saying. 

“Your life is so chaotic it stresses me out, you know.”

“That’s the fun of it! They’ve got Bakugou in the basement, you know. Might kill him.”

“I didn’t hear that.”

Dabi smirked at that. Maybe Hawks was less modern-day-standards heroic than they’d all thought? Even Tomura could agree that given that he seemed to be part of Midoriya’s fucking Chaos Cult or whatever it was that somehow kept him living and causing terror wherever he went. 

“I know. So, the thing?”

“Are you sure, Izu? Like really really sure?”

“A good ninety per cent, yeah.”

“Give him the phone.”

Midoriya tapped the speakerphone button so that the call was private and handed it to Tomura with a grin. 

“I’m so going to regret this,” Hawks muttered almost to himself. Tomura frowned but waited patiently for him to say whatever was, theoretically, going to make him murder Midoriya. “Alright, Shigaraki Tomura, you are Izuku’s villain crush.”

Aaaand dust phone. 

“Aw man, I just got that after I accidentally used my quirk and broke the screen on the last one!” Midoriya whined. Tomura was really fucking lucky he couldn’t dust himself because he absolutely would have at how adorable Midoriya sounded in that tone of voice. 

Dabi stared at Midoriya. “What did you make Hawks tell him?”

“Who my villain crush is,” Midoriya replied with unrepentant amusement as he smirked and wiggled his eyebrows suggestively. Dabi gaped at Tomura, who could only manage a stiff nod, before turning back to Midoriya. 

“It’s him?” Dabi questioned, pointing to Tomura with a bit too much disbelief for his liking. Midoriya nodded with a mischievous wink. In Tomura’s direction. 

So fucking lucky he couldn’t disintegrate himself, seriously. 

“Oh, this is fucking priceless,” Dabi cackled. Tomura levelled him with a glare. 

“Please, keep mocking me, guy who apparently got a hard-on at simply being in Hawks vicinity and didn’t manage to hide it.”

Evidently, Tomura now knew exactly how to shut Dabi up in the future, if nothing else, based on his sudden silence. He was choosing to focus on that and very purposefully not on the fact that somehow, Midoriya had a crush on him. He was capable of acting normally, despite that world-changing knowledge, surely. 

“Unfair, Hawks was in his underwear at the time,” Midoriya interjected. Tomura blinked at him before raising an eyebrow at Dabi. 

“Why were you around Hawks when he was just in his underwear?”

“Dabi burned his clothes off. Funny how that just happened, isn’t it?”

“I might have adopted you, but I will fucking murder you,” Dabi threatened. Midoriya remained unbothered. 

“Sure, because that’ll go over great with Shouto.”

“...Fuck. Alright, I will murder someone you’re fond of.”

“Your choices are Shouto, Himi-chan, Shouji by extension since Sho loves him, Amajiki because he’s as much of a baby deer as Shouto is, Aizawa, and kind of Shigaraki.”

“Kind of Shigaraki?” Dabi repeated. 

“I mean give me a day to actually talk to him and it’ll be probably Shigaraki. I don’t like many people, people aren’t all that likeable, you know?”

“How are you even kind of fond of him already, kid?” Spinner asked, looking more concerned about Midoriya liking Shigaraki than anything, which, rude. 

“Himi-chan likes to talk. A lot. So I hear about you all. A lot.”

“So just to clarify, nothing he’s done today has caused this slight fondness for our leader?” Mr Compress verified. 

Midoriya hummed. “I mean, he kinda keeps looking at that screen like it’s a struggle not to kill Bakugou. I relate, so there are points to be had there.”

Tomura grunted. It really was fucking hard not just warping into the room and dusting the guy on the spot. Before he could actually address that, though, Midoriya was turning to Toga with what Tomura was certain the entire League was coming to recognise as Midoriya’s I’m-going-to-sew-the-seeds-of-chaos face. 

“Himi-chan! Turn into me and go and drive Bakugou crazy!”

Toga squealed excitedly. “You have the best ideas, Izu-chan! Anything off the table?”

“Hm. No killing or maiming, including via blood loss, but minor cuts and abrasions allowed.”

With a nod, like she was expecting the limitations, Toga turned to Tomura. “Can I? Please, Shiggy-chan? I owe that fucker for every single day he made my Izu-chan hurt!”

Tomura sighed heavily. “I think I’m going to quit after today is finished, but fine, go and perform the work of Midoriya’s Chaos Cult, Toga,” he agreed with a tired wave of his hand in the direction of Kurogiri, granting permission for him to warp Toga-as-Midoriya into the room, before slapping his hands over his face and sighing again. 

“Aww, don’t do that, then what villain do I have to enjoy fighting against?” Midoriya purred. Right in his ear. He could feel Midoriya’s breath on his neck. With only a split second to decide how to react to being purred at, he elected to keep his face buried in his palms. No one could see him turning bright fucking red, that way. 

“I believe my life would have been calmer had I joined an actual insane asylum as a voluntary patient,” Compress muttered from somewhere to Tomura’s left. 

Midoriya still hadn’t moved from being pressed against Tomura’s side. 

“Ooh, ooh, Twice! Can you make copies of me? To go and help Himi-chan play? I want to see if we can make Bakugou actually snap into certified insanity and I just feel like one of me isn’t enough for that.”

Tomura raised an eyebrow, not that anyone could see it. Midoriya would make a shockingly good villain, all things considered. He was smart and used his knowledge like a weapon, which would have made him valuable from a purely professional standpoint even if he didn’t have the most OP quirk Tomura had ever come across other than Sensei. 

A telltale white noise sound crackled to life, and Tomura slowly looked up, finding the TV Sensei used to communicate with them turned on, not just on audio but visual as well. What was Sensei thinking, revealing his somewhat vulnerable physical state to a hero, even if that hero was Midoriya?

“My boy, are you enjoying yourself?”

Tomura opened his mouth, but evidently, the day wasn’t done fucking with him. 

“Sure am, Dad,” Midoriya chirped. 

Wait fucking what. 

“Did he just say dad?” Dabi choked out. 

“That he did, Dabi. That he did,” Sensei hummed. He was smirking. Sensei never looked so damn happy before, what the fucking fuck was happening? Was Tomura hallucinating after all?

“Do you think, perhaps, you are finished being such a destructive little devil for the day, Izuku?”

“Do I have to be?” Midoriya pouted. 

“Now now, you know I never like to stifle your wonderfully chaotic brand of fun, but I do believe that Bakugou is about ready to murder Toga, and I know how fond of her you are, so perhaps you’d like to head back down, my boy?”

“Sure! Kurogiri, my room first and then the basement, please,” Midoriya replied, flashing Kurogiri a smile as he walked through the warp gate. Midoriya had a room in their base? Fucking where?! No, no, there were more important things to address, such as—

“Sensei, I — what the fuck?!” Tomura screeched. Was it the smartest idea to yell at his terrifying boss? His terrifying boss who he’d talked to about having feelings for the boy who turned out to be his son? No, no it wasn’t, but Tomura was at — no, far past his limit of fuckery for the day, and his restraint had been spent almost exclusively on trying not to visibly enjoy Midoriya’s presence in the bar. 

“Ah, an explanation, yes, that does seem in order. Very well. Izuku is my biological son, although I shamefully abandoned him and his mother when he was born, feeling them a distraction from my work. As it happened, Izuku grew up with difficulty. Everything you know, everything you learned today about his childhood, was the unfortunate truth of his life. Aside from details of his parentage, he hasn’t told any of you a single lie — yes, including his crush on you, Tomura.”

Tomura would, earlier in the day, have blushed and stammered and denied, but he was at a point where he was simply grateful for having not been lied to about something as important as his first real romantic feelings for someone and glad to be getting a real explanation for the tornado of chaos that was Midoriya Izuku. 

“I suppose it bears confirming that Hawks is a double agent, turned to our side by Izuku after he somewhat, ahem, decimated the leader of the HPSC and forced them to also turn to our side. The HPSC head and Hawks are both working on separate jobs that will achieve the same goal — inside knowledge on every important figure in the hero community. Hawks, grateful as he was to no longer have every second of his life controlled by the Commission, and fond as he is of Izuku, was more than happy to use his talents to assist us in reaching our goals.”

Tomura caught Dabi looking shocked but pleased, and smiled a little. Maybe there was going to be a happy ending for him and Hawks, after all, now that he knew Hawks could be trusted. 

“Shouto, as well, Dabi, is aware of who Izuku is and what he is truly at UA to do. He has been on our side since their first year when Izuku absolutely did destroy his hands for Shouto’s benefit. You can rest assured that Shouto has never been safer than he was from the moment Izuku recognised the signs of abuse and took him under his wing.”

Dabi chuckled fondly, clearly already attached to both his biological little brother, and the one he had adopted… Their boss's son. 

“As a UA student, Izuku has been slowly working out who is truly happy with the false hero society that exists and who believes in the kind of hero Izuku himself is. Yes, he is truly a hero, and yes, he intends to remain one, but he will never bow to people who expect him to be like Endeavour and cause nothing but destruction, killing petty pickpockets just because he can. I am so proud of him. I find it difficult to express, but suffice to say, his startling intelligence plays a large part in why our planning has improved as of late. You have all been, indirectly, following Izuku’s orders, given through me.”

Spinner had passed hero worship and gone right into believing Midoriya was an actual God among men, from what Tomura could tell. 

“I met Izuku when he was twelve. He was… I shall not gossip, but I will admit that the boy in our basement shall not leave this place untouched for the horrors he wrought on Izuku. He is the true measure of a villain, a child who was so power-hungry, so illusioned by hero society that he believed there was absolutely nothing wrong with physical, mental, and emotional abuse of Izuku. Still believes it, in fact. Not that you can hear him since I have muted the feed, but he’s currently lecturing Toga-as-Izuku on all the ways he is supposedly better than my son and more worthy of life. Tell me that is not true villainy, to have believed such from the age of four, and I will show you the scars I was able to heal on Izuku. What you see is a mere thirty percent of the damage that was done to him, the part that could not be healed away no matter what we tried.”

Tomura found himself hissing like a cat at that revelation. Midoriya was covered in scars, his body a tale of violence and victimisation for no reason other than hero society made it acceptable, and that was thirty percent of what had originally been done to him? Even if Sensei had intended for Bakugou to leave the hideout alive, Tomura probably would have gone against orders and killed him for that alone. 

He glanced around and found everyone in the room, barring Compress and Twice since their expressions were covered, were wearing matching looks of horror and disgust at what Midoriya had lived through. Sure, he was the personification of expect the unexpected, but he was good and kind under it all. He deserved everything good and instead lived through hell, and there wasn’t a person in the room that wouldn’t kill for him, Tomura knew. 

The funny thing was, aside from Bakugou, Tomura didn’t see Midoriya being the kind of person to want someone to die for wronging him, which was a little ironic since he had every excuse to be as manic as Toga and Twice combined. 

“Ah. I see you are all realising that Izuku, despite living a separate life from you all, is truly one of us. Yes, he’s special that way. How else would we have Eraserhead and Principal Nedzu themselves on our side?”

Tomura sucked in a harsh breath. Eraserhead? He was a huge threat, and he was playing for their side! And Nedzu, well, the actual smartest creature alive was on their team, too. He grinned, feeling victory flow through his veins like a certainty. 

“Now, as for the real kicker here, the real news — have any of you figured out my boy's quirk yet?”

Silence. Tomura knew he hadn’t guessed there was anything much special about it beyond giving Midoriya ridiculous strength, stamina, and speed stats. 

Sensei smiled a little sinisterly. “It’s All Might's quirk.”

“What?” Tomura gasped. 

With a truly evil villain cackle, Sensei nodded. “Indeed! My boy, in his infinite wisdom, played the long game. Saved that blond brat’s life while he was quirkless, when the heroes on scene stood by watching the child die because they didn’t have the supposedly right quirk. Now, I’m sure none of us would have thought it a great loss for that child, in particular, to be snuffed out early on, but those heroes, they only knew he was a fourteen-year-old boy, and still, they stood and watched him suffocate to death while my boy, powerless, ran at a villain and saved his abuser's life because it was the right thing to do!”

Tomura shivered at the pride for Midoriya and absolute hatred for Bakugou he could hear in his Sensei’s voice, but it was a pleasant feeling. 

“Regardless, when he performed such an act of heroism, despite the fact that the useless false heroes on the scene berated my boy for being in the way and praised Bakugou for how heroic he was as he struggled to save his own life, All Might was watching and, for once, was not an idiot. He saw the heroic potential in Izuku and offered him his quirk, the quirk I have been battling to get back my whole life as it belonged, rightfully, to my brother! Well, now it is back in the family, and ready to be used against the false heroes. Tell me, how much longer do you think hero society would remain standing if Izuku truly decided to take them down? With his smarts and strength, it would crumble in an instant! Still, that is not his aim, not quite. No, Izuku’s idea was more well-thought-out than that. His idea was to slowly work his way into the spotlight as a paragon of heroics, then flip the script. Show the world what being a true hero really is, how a real hero did not discriminate and play judge on who deserved saving while the false heroes stood by committing manslaughter practically! And while he’s doing that, he’s helping me make our battle plans, or at least, the ones where he won’t be a part of the fight.”

A pause. 

“You see, Tomura, he really wasn’t lying. You’re his very favourite opponent. He’s, well, a surprisingly bloodthirsty little thing once you set him off, and— ah, well, why tell, when he could show? Take a look at the screen, I suppose.”

Tomura shifted, trying not to let it show just how big of a compliment he found it that he was actually Midoriya’s favourite villain to fight against as he turned his attention to the screen showing Bakugou’s holding room just as Midoriya stepped out of the warp gate and—

Sweet merciful lord, I cannot reasonably be expected to watch this with Midoriya’s dad watching me while I watch it. It’s not fair. I’ve done nothing to deserve this hell. 

Midoriya, instead of wearing his hero costume or the jeans and t-shirt he’d been wearing when he was abducted from the training camp — was he abducted, though, or did he just decide to pop over for a visit with Toga? — was in a strange mixture of a hero costume and a villain one, tight and black and torturous to Tomura’s heart and health. 

He had a set of throwing knives strapped to his left thigh, and a katana slung across his back, while a simple black leather eye mask similar to the one Spinner wore in his weird Stain cosplay was the only decoration on his face. He was perfect. 

If earlier, Tomura had been unable to stop himself from acknowledging that he had real feelings for Midoriya, now, well, it would be impossible to pretend those feelings weren’t incredibly strong and serious. Enough so that he was going to swallow his residual fear and get Sensei’s permission, as Midoriya’s father, for him to ask Midoriya out. 

There was a crackling sound as the sound linked to the visual of the room was returned by Sensei, just in time to hear Bakugou’s somewhat fearful swearing as Toga allowed her disguise to melt away and reveal who she really was. She and Midoriya fist-bumped before she pressed an affectionate kiss to his cheek and wished him luck. 

“So, Kacchan, has that subpar common sense of yours caught up to what’s really going on here, yet?” Midoriya drawled, dropping into his previous seat with grace and a cruel edge to his smirk. 

“What the fuck, nerd?” Bakugou snapped. 

“I really wouldn’t start with that shit, Kacchan. I mean sure, you might be wondering if I’m really me, so here—”

Midoriya paused, letting the green sizzle of his quirk run over his skin before powering the quirk down and quirking a brow at the boy across from him. 

“—now you know it’s me, not Himi-chan. So, guesses? Have I been turned into a Nomu? Have I been brainwashed by the League? Am I a double agent, here to save you? What have you got, Kacchan?”

The nickname was said with a little more bite every time it was voiced, and Tomura could feel a bit of a smirk stretching across his face in response. 

“Probably fucking brainwashed, knowing how fucking dumb you are,” Bakugou scoffed. Midoriya just shook his head a little pityingly. 

“You know, it’s only partially your fault how fucking dumb you are. I mean no teacher ever really expected you to actually do anything, right? There were no demands for homework returned on time, no making you read aloud in class or even a warning to do the assigned work, just a never-ending rain of compliments about your perfect, flashy quirk. How were you supposed to know that you were being done a disservice?”

“A disservice? I’m gonna be fucking number one, worthless idiot. Even if I was let down by those Aldera fucks, it hasn’t held me back one fucking bit!”

“Hasn’t it? I mean you still haven’t realised we’re in the League of Villains territory, and I’m quite clearly not tied up or being controlled or whatever, and yet you seem to think somehow, you have the power in this situation.”

“Fuck, do you ever just get to the point, you’re so fucking annoy—”

Before he could finish his sentence, there was a throwing knife embedded in Bakugou’s shoulder, and Midoriya didn’t look like he’d even moved to do it, nor were there any green embers in the air to signify him having used his quirk to throw so quickly and accurately. Bakugou grunted but didn’t let out the scream of pain the set of his shoulders told Tomura he was suppressing. 

“Shut up, Bakugou,” Midoriya said coldly. Bakugou stiffened at the lack of a cutesy nickname and watched Midoriya a little more warily. 

“Now, here’s what’s about to happen — my dad is going to take your quirk. Then he’s going to manipulate your memories so that you do remember that you’re a quirkless Deku, but not anything else. You won’t remember that I’m best friends with Himiko, or that Dabi’s apparently adopting me as his little brother, or that Eraserhead is on our side and hates you, or that Nedzu, also, is on our side and hates you. You won’t remember that All for One is my biological father. You won’t remember anything other than how painful the removal of a quirk is, and of course, that I fought off Shigaraki himself, getting decayed a little in the process, to save your life since you became weak and helpless with no quirk to back your anger problems up. Any questions, before you become ineligible for the hero course?”

Tomura did not like the implication that he was going to have to use his quirk on Midoriya, but he could do it if it helped him. He would do it if it was what Midoriya needed for his revenge plan to work and his cover to remain intact. 

Bakugou had questions, a lot of them it seemed, but they were shrieked and garbled, he was speaking so fast and hysterically. Midoriya cocked his head and reminded Tomura of an apex predator in a beautiful way as his eyes narrowed at Bakugou. 

“No questions? Alright, awesome, in that case, Kurogiri, please go and grab Dabi so he can help escort Bakugou to see dad,” Midoriya said, speaking calmly even as his eyes glowed with venom. Dabi happily stepped through the warp gate and into the interrogation room before manhandling Bakugou to his feet, burning him a little accidentally in the process. Tomura had no pity for the bastard as he hissed at the burn on his shoulder, though he hoped his dad used a healing quirk to fix it up so he didn’t garner undeserved pity from the heroes after Midoriya had ‘broken them out’. 

“Tomura,” Sensei’s voice intoned. 

“Yes, Sensei?”

“Enough pining over my boy. Either ask him out or I’ll tell him I approve of the blond one back at UA, and my opinion means a lot to Izuku, Tomura. You two have the potential to be the couple that change the world side by side, but you need to get yourself together and actually express your interest in order to make that dream a reality. Am I understood?”

Tomura gulped. Not exactly what he’d been expecting Sensei to say, but it saved him the awkwardness of asking permission to make a move, so he mumbled an affirmative just as Bakugou’s yelling could be heard through the TV set, signalling his arrival at Sensei’s room. Tomura knew his Sensei had an infallible memory-replacement quirk, he’d seen it in use before, so all he had left to worry about was using his decay on Midoriya. 

A few minutes later, Kurogiri opened his gate and Midoriya stepped back into the bar, back in the clothes he’d been wearing when he arrived instead of the insanely hot outfit he’d worn to taunt Bakugou. Tomura wondered if there had been a point to the outfit other than trying to show Bakugou he was free and comfortable enough there to have a costume change, but ultimately, didn’t care since it had been a fucking good outfit to see Midoriya in. 

“You guys watched, right?”

Everyone nodded and Midoriya smiled apologetically at Tomura. “Sorry you’ve got to use your quirk like this, I know you don’t like to decay people who don’t deserve it, but you’ve got enough control to make it work. I need you to decay my skin on my forearm so it looks like you tried to grab me to prevent me from leaving, and then just a little on my face so it looks like you tried to kill me, alright?”

It really was fucking not alright, Tomura felt sick at the idea of dusting Midoriya even a little bit, but he could do it. For Sensei and Midoriya and their dream of a better future for the misfits of society, he could do it. Still, Midoriya was going to hurt bad once it was done, and asking out a guy when he was trying not to scream in agony because of you didn’t sound all that fun to Tomura, who had never asked someone out in his life, so he jerked his head and walked into a different room, Midoriya on his heels. 

He was not asking Midoriya out with an audience, his awkwardness stats were high enough as it was. 

Fate, Tomura knew, was a fickle thing. Make a plan and God will laugh — hadn’t he read that quote somewhere before, from the pre-quirk era? Well, God sure was laughing it up good when it came to Tomura and plans lately because before he could open his mouth and say the words, his back was against a wall and—

Oh. 

Oh. 

Midoriya was kissing him. 

Midoriya was fucking kissing him. 

He should really kiss him back. That would be the normal reaction to have to being kissed by someone you were fairly certain was your predestined soulmate or some shit, right? Okay, he could do that, he could kiss back, it was just pressing his lips against Midoriya’s, it wasn’t rocket science or a complex puzzle game, it was just exerting pressure against Midoriya’s lips with his own lips. 

He could do that. 

Ohhh fuck he was kissing Midoriya. Was he having a heart attack, too? It was a very inopportune time to drop dead, finally getting to kiss someone he literally had dreams about, but at least he wasn’t dropping dead before getting to kiss him, he supposed. 

He didn’t really know what to do with his hands. He was a little paranoid that he might accidentally decay Midoriya in the wrong place, or dust his clothes, which would be—

Would be—

Did he seriously just make himself moan thinking about decaying Midoriya’s clothes off him?! Tomura was convinced he was his own worst enemy by that point. Who moans because of a thought they had entirely by mistake? It wasn’t even like they were fully making out and the moan was expected, although the way Midoriya was gently biting Tomura’s bottom lip was quite pleasant, to say the least. 

Midoriya pulled away a little, and Tomura felt very crowded with Midoriya’s considerable bulk pressing him against a wall — not that he disliked it, oh no, it was more than enjoyable having so much of Midoriya crushed against him, though he was somewhat sad that the kiss was over already. Midoriya reached up and gently tucked some of Tomura’s hair behind his ear and breathed out like he was trying to steady himself, and wasn’t that a nice thought, Midoriya being just as affected by the kiss as Tomura was. 

“I’d stay longer if I could, but the idiot’s had his memories changed by now and I need to get back in there to ‘rescue’ him. Can you do my face first?” he whispered. His eyes were so many different shades of green, Tomura observed suddenly. He nodded dumbly and Midoriya took his hand in a gentle grip before leaning in and kissing Tomura again while bringing his hand up to Midoriya’s face. 

If it weren’t for the fact he had to concentrate hard on doing a surface-level decay of his skin without damaging the muscle beneath, Tomura could have spent much longer thinking about how good it felt to cup Midoriya’s cheek the way he was, but the dusting was done far too soon and from the way Midoriya was clenching his jaw, it really hurt. Tomura felt guilty as fuck for it. 

“We should get you some artists gloves so you can do that without the decay activating next time,” Midoriya mused. Tomura blinked stupidly. Next time? He really wanted a next time, even after experiencing Tomura’s quirk? He was still hardwired to avoid exposing his weaknesses, though, so he didn’t voice the thought, tucking it away to possibly talk about with Midoriya at a later date. 

“You want your forearm doing now?” he asked shakily. Midoriya nodded. 

“Mmhm. Once it’s done, I’m gonna bust the wall to the interrogation room down and you guys need to start screaming like you’re chasing me. I’ll then break the outer wall and get Kacchan out of here. That okay?”

Tomura grunted his affirmative and wrapped his bare fingers around Midoriya’s forearm. This time, he could see Midoriya’s expression as he used his quirk, and while he looked uncomfortable — who wouldn’t be, really — he didn’t look agonised. Maybe the face was simply a more sensitive area to decay? Something for Tomura to work out at a later date, on a target that was not his… Whatever Midoriya was. 

Fuck! He was supposed to ask Midoriya out. He had to do it otherwise Sensei would make good on his threat to encourage Midoriya back to Kaminari — Sensei didn’t make idle threats, after all. 

“Midoriya, do you want to, um, the— I— date?”

Fuck me with a chainsaw. 

Smiling brightly, but not mockingly, Midoriya nodded and extracted his injured arm from Tomura’s grip. “Sure, but I’m not dating a guy who’s calling me Midoriya. Izuku is better.”

“Um. Yeah. Izuku.”

Seriously, where is the nearest chainsaw?

Despite the injuries, Midoriya — Izuku — was acting like he was fine, which Tomura couldn’t even be surprised by. He’d seen more than once how Izuku was able to just keep going no matter how injured he was, but still, he’d been expecting him to make a swift exit once the injuries were in place so he could get Recovery Girl to heal him up. 

So when instead, he leaned in and kissed Tomura’s cheek so fucking sweetly, Tomura was more than a little surprised. 

“I expect your personal attention next time the League goes up against my class, okay, Tomura?” Izuku purred. That purr was a fucking weapon and it was being wielded by a probable masochist with no shame, it seemed. Dangerous, if not slightly — very — hot. 

“Count on it, hero brat,” Tomura retorted. He had no idea where the bravery and boldness suddenly came from, and he had a feeling it’d be gone before long, so he wasn’t going to question it while he actually had it — especially not when it made Izuku’s eyes light up with a kind of threatening heat. Was all he had to do to get him looking like that threatening to fight him? Maybe that was why Sensei seemed so confident about them making a good pair, aside from their shared painful pasts — Izuku being shockingly into fighting the guy he was dating, because if there was one thing Tomura could do, it was fighting hero course brats like it was his—

Okay, it literally was his purpose in life, but still. 

“Perfect. Don’t you dare take it easy on me, either,” Izuku grinned ferally. Tomura was in love, and he was never letting the chaotic whirlwind of probable masochism, violence, and mayhem before him go. Not for anything in the fucking world. 

And then he was pressing one last, knee-shakingly hot kiss to Tomura’s lips and disappearing in a flash of green lightning. 

“I’m so texting Sho about this,” Dabi’s rough voice cackled. Tomura turned to glare at him and found his turquoise eyes more alive than they had ever been thanks to Izuku reuniting him and his baby brother, it seemed. 

“About what?”

“We made a bet on whether or not Midoriya has a pain kink since the guy seems to barely notice broken arms and shit. Sho thought not, and I have evidence otherwise. Brilliant!” the asshole gloated before walking away, tapping at his phone screen. Tomura didn’t even begrudge him the wager since Dabi, while irritating as all fuck, was one of his people and deserved to find some modicum of peace in his own tortured life story. 

Tomura shrugged. He definitely didn’t have a fucking problem with Izuku liking a bit of pain, although he had a feeling it’d take a while before he was ready to figure out what he liked in that regard. Hopefully, he’d have a long fucking time to do so, though. 

As he stepped back into the main bar, he glanced around with a smile. Was his life a chaotic mess of violence and confusion? Absolutely. Was his sort-of boyfriend a perfect match for that? Abso-fucking-lutely he was. 

Would Tomura change any of it? No, no he would fucking not. 

Katsuki sat down across from Principal Nedzu with trepidation. It had been two days since Deku managed to break them out of the windowless, doorless room inside the League of Villains’ base, rescuing Katsuki, and he was finally feeling ready to figure out his future. 

Neither Deku nor he had known where they were being held, since they were warped in and out of only rooms that held no windows to show them their surroundings, and Deku had been in such a fucking panic after Crusty tried to dust him that he’d just shot off with One for All activated, focused with terror on getting as far away as humanly possible. 

For once, Katsuki didn’t blame him. With his face and arm decayed slightly, hair messed up and eyes wild, it was clear he’d gone through a life-threatening hell, although Katsuki hated that he’d had to be rescued in the first place. 

He wouldn’t have needed the shitty nerd to do a damn thing if that potato-faced fucker hadn’t stolen his damn quirk, but he had, so Katsuki was left as a damsel in distress with no way to save himself. If he’d had his quirk, he would have fought those fuckers, and even if he was decayed a bit, he would have taken them down with him, unlike fucking useless Deku. 

Katsuki was number one material and he could handle that shit. Deku belonged somewhere in the 50-11 rankings of the hero chart, with the others who couldn’t hack being attacked by a major villain, and that was understandable. 

“Now, Katsuki, I called you here today to work on your curriculum,” Principal Nedzu stated. Katsuki nodded, it wasn’t like he’d need to do quirk training now, which was good since it would free up time for him to hone his combat abilities. 

“There are definitely more academic subjects available to you now that you’re moving to General Education, although you could also try the Support or Management course if you’d prefer. Which takes your fancy?”

Katsuki blinked and felt the urge to let explosions surge in his palms, scare the little rat-faced fucker for daring to suggest Katsuki was anything less than hero course material, but of course, he couldn’t. 

There was no quirk to be activated, no scaring to be done. 

He was quirkless and weak, just like Deku had been before All Might gave him a quirk, a quirk that couldn’t be taken by potato face according to All Might, which explained why he’d been left useless and pathetic while Deku was still powerful and in the hero course when it should be the other way round. 

If things were right with the world, they’d be in each other's shoes, not the situation they were actually in. 

With a resigned sigh, Katsuki began to look over the supplementary course options for Gen Ed. A quirkless weakling didn’t belong in Support, where even they were admittedly tough as hell to experiment with dangerous things like they did, and he sure as shit didn’t have the patience to manage another hero, not when he should be a hero himself, so Gen Ed it was. 

Where someone like him, quirkless and weak, truly belonged. Below the others.