Chapter Text
Years ago, hundreds of people acquired abilities... except they were not abilities but a mutation of them as they had limitations and could be passed down through genes and were called 'quirks'. The world began evolving into a society where the strong were right and the weak were wrong, until heroes came to change that society forever and transform it into a black and white world where heroes existed and were hailed as saviours- but that world did not exist in a criminal run city like Yokohama.
Ever since quirks began appearing, a border between Yokohama and the rest of the world appeared, not in literal but it was clear that an invisible line was set between Yokohama and the outside. Before quirks appeared, abilities existed first- however they were not hailed or the norm but those who had them were seen as abominations and a danger to everyone. They were experimented on, hunted and taken advantaged of, but now the rest of the world treats supernatural abilities as something so normal that it seems to wipe out the treatment that ability users faced. Yokohama was not saved, and they do not want to be saved by outsiders. Heroes do not exist, because if they truly do then Yokohama would've welcomed them in years before it was turned into a criminal run city abandoned by the rest of the world.
"Chuuya come onnn! It'll be great!" a girl with pink hair clung on a red haired boy's arm. Her name was Yuan, and the boy she was clinging to was Chuuya, Nakahara Chuuya, the 'King of Sheep'.
'The Sheep' is an organisation run entirely by kids, the 'street rats' people would call them. They're lost strays without a home and no adult to trust. All they had was each other and they lived by stealing and violence but currently, they were in a bit of a pinch. A few days earlier, some of the kids tried to steal something from the Port Mafia which stirred some trouble and now they were on the run. Chuuya doubts that he'd be defeated if it was just some Port Mafia nobodies, but he couldn't risk the other kids getting hurt so he agreed to evacuation without hesitation and now here they were, hiding near the border between Yokohama and the outside world.
"We'll get to experience something new. I've heard stories about the outside but going there ourselves is different," Shirase, a boy with white hair joined Yuan in trying to convince Chuuya.
"Seriously, why do you guys want to go across the border so much?" grumbled Chuuya, hands in his pockets.
"Why wouldn't we want to? It'll be so fun! Come on Chuuya, pleaseeee," Yuan begged. "We'll be over and back so quick the other kids won't even notice that we're missing!"
Facing his friend's determination, Chuuya let out a sigh and walked towards the border, "fine. But just for a few minutes ok?"
"Yay! I knew you'd agree!" Yuan laughed and ran after him, looping her arms around his arm once again.
"Thanks for agreeing Chuuya, we couldn't go on our own," Shirase walked on the other side of Chuuya.
"No problem. Let's be back quick just in case something happens to the other kids," spoke Chuuya.
As soon as they stepped outside the border, they could already tell there was something different. The road leading to Yokohama was more well kept than the streets of Yokohama that seemed damaged and cracked from all the gang violence. The air seemed fresher and while they shared the same sky, the view outside Yokohama felt more peaceful however for Chuuya, he personally preferred the night sky in Yokohama's perspective, it just felt so much more alive for some reason.
"What are you kids doing near the border so late at night?" a man with long black hair and tired eyes questioned in the distance. At his words, the three members of The Sheep were immediately alerted.
"Shit! I didn't think there'd be anyone else here at the border! Chuuya! Hurry!" panicked Shirase, grabbing onto Chuuya's arm. "Don't attack we have to just flee! We're citizens of Yokohama so we'd be in bigger trouble if we attack people on the outside!"
"... You're citizens of Yokohama?" the homeless looking man raised an eyebrow, surprised by the words that he had just picked up. "Don't move."
"Hurry Chuuya!" Yuan tugged Chuuya's arm hurriedly.
"Tch, you're lucky I can't hit you old man." A red glow engulfed the three as their weight seemed to vanish. "Hold on tight," Chuuya began running back towards Yokohama with his two friends holding onto his arms, but the homeless hobo would not let them go so easily.
"Ack!- Help!" Yuan shrieked as a long white fabric that looked both like a scarf and bandages wrapped around her arm.
"I said don't move," the older man tugged onto the restraints to hold Yuan in place.
"Get off!" Chuuya touched the white fabric and the man became surprised when he felt his scarf becoming a lot heavier than it was before, making him unable to tug Yuan back any longer. "Hurry! You two run!" Chuuya ripped the scarf, freeing Yuan before shouting at the other two to run.
"We can't just leave you Chuuya!" argued Yuan.
"Yeah we- Chuuya?!" before Shirase could finish his sentence, both he and Yuan who had made contact with Chuuya began to float away towards the border. "Chuuya stop this! Hurry and get over here!" shouted Shirase.
"You guys go first! I'll take care of this old man first then come later!" Chuuya shouted back, staring at the black haired man with threatening eyes. "It's just me and you old man."
"Whatever you're about to do, I suggest you to not do it, your quirk is useless against me," spoke the man.
"'Quirk'?" Chuuya raised an eyebrow, "I don't know what you mean by 'quirk' or whatever is it but I'm gonna crush you."
"You don't know what a quirk is?" questioned the man. "I see... you're an ability user then. It seems that it's more common for people to have abilities than quirks in Yokohama."
"Quit blabbering!" Chuuya lunged towards the man with frightening speed. The homeless looking man attempted to restrain him with his scarf but all attempts to capture Chuuya was dodged without issue and soon, Chuuya appeared right in front of the man, fist swung back.
"Sorry kid, but this will be it," the man's eyes turned into a glowing red colour and Chuuya was bewildered when he felt his powers leaving him. But as his powers left and the feeling of vulnerability crept into his skin, something else came.
Destroy everything.
"Ngh...." Chuuya clutched his head as a voice appeared in his head. It didn't feel his- it didn't feel human but if it wasn't his then whose was it? The voice felt both distant and deeply engraved in his mind at the same time.
Destroy...
The man's expression then turned to confusion then worry as he witnesses Chuuya land on the ground, clutching his head like a fearful, confused child. He looked physically in pain, though the man was a hundred percent sure that he had not landed a single hit on the boy even once, but it was clear that the kid was suffering from something. "Hey kid-" the man knelt down and tried to reach his hand towards the boy but an outburst made him flinch back.
"SHUT IT! SHUT IT!" the boy seemed to dig his claws into his head, but when the man had tried to touch him he seemed to jump back warily and dig his left hand into the back of his neck.
"Calm down!" the man shouted, in hopes of snapping the boy out of whatever he was going through, deactivating his nullification quirk while at it. This seemed to work as the boy stopped panicking and let go of his neck, his fingertips covered in fresh, red blood. "Hey are you-" the man could not ask the boy anything before the boy had collapsed right in front of him.
'Seriously, what the hell just happened?' the man grabbed the boy's hand that had blood slowing drying on his fingertips. 'Is this kid ok-' the man froze, not from seeing the blood gushing out of the back of the boy's clawed neck but the print on the boy's neck, 'A158'. Ok no, this boy is not ok.
"Hospital first, questions later," the man mumbled as he picked up the boy and began making his way to the hospital.
.
.
.
Soft. Something beneath Chuuya felt soft, but it shouldn't be considering he was a street rat and spent everyday of his life sleeping on a hard floor and not something this soft. He immediately jolted up, sensing that something was wrong and he was right, seeing himself being surrounded by four white walls and medical equipment that he has never seen before in his entire life, but for some reason he felt uncomfortable on the inside. The smell of medicine and disinfectant made his stomach churn.
"So you're finally awake." Chuuya's eyes turned to look at the homeless man that he had fought the night before. "You're covered in scars and missing a lot of nutrients for a kid your age, assuming you're around 13 or 14."
"Where the hell am I?" Chuuya glared at the man. "Who are you?"
"I'm Aizawa Shota, also known as 'Eraserhead', a professional hero," the man answered.
"'Professional hero'?" Chuuya scoffed, "there's no- you fucking took me away from Yokohama?!" realisation dawned on his face. Heroic beliefs were not common in Yokohama but everyone knew that outside Yokohama it is.
"You were outside of Yokohama when I found you," Aizawa clarified, "I didn't just snatch you away from your city."
"Well I'm leaving," declared Chuuya.
"You won't be. You're gonna be answering my questions truthfully or else."
"Or else what?" Chuuya narrowed his eyes.
"I have also captured your two friends."
"Sonovabitch!" Chuuya attempted to charge at the man, but when he felt something tugging his wrist back he had realised that he was handcuffed to the hospital bed. "What the fuck?"
"We had to have you handcuffed because you have self harming tendencies," explained Aizawa.
Chuuya looked bewildered. "Self harming tendencies...? God that's hilarious! What the hell are you talking about?"
"Unconscious self harming tendencies then I suppose," the older man pulled out his phone and seemed to write it down. "If you haven't noticed, the back of your neck has been patched up because believe it or not, you clawed at your own neck."
"Back of my..." Chuuya touched the back of his neck, feeling the surface of a bandage patch resting on top of his nape. He suddenly turned to look at Aizawa with a pair of alarmed, warry eyes.
"Calm down, if you answer all my questions honestly then everything will be fine," Aizawa tried to assure the wary teen that looked like a frightened cat with all its fur spiking.
"I'm not answering nothing! You think these handcuffs are gonna stop me from breaking out?!" a red glow engulfed Chuuya as he was about to break the handcuffs but he froze at the man's words.
"Then I will simply nullify your ability once again."
Chuuya stopped himself from letting out a shudder. The feeling of being stripped of his power that he had used to protect his friends all these years was terrifying and left a vulnerable feeling. But not only that, it felt like something was breaking inside him, like a barrier had vanished between him and whatever was fucking around in his head-like it was letting a monster crawl out from the deepest part of his brain.
Seeing the red haired boy settle down, Aizawa grabbed a chair and sat in front of Chuuya. "It's good that you've calmed down. Now answer my questions truthfully or whatever happens to your friends will be up to the law."
"I didn't know that 'heroes' use blackmail and threatened people," Chuuya had a threatening look as if daring the man to harm his friends.
"You're an unidentifiable figure meaning you're a possible threat to the city, I am merely doing my job." Aizawa placed his phone down and let it record the conversation. "Name?"
"Nakahara Chuuya."
"Age?"
"15."
"Older than expected. Birthplace?"
"Yokohama."
"Ability?"
"Upon the Tainted Sorrow."
Aizawa raised an eyebrow, "'Upon the Tainted Sorrow'?" he questioned.
"Abilities have weird ass names. In short it's gravity manipulation," explained Chuuya.
"Guardians?"
"None."
"None?" Aizawa once again raised his eyebrow. "No parents or anything?"
"You're asking an orphan that. No parents and no guardians, don't even remember who gave birth to me."
"Elaborate."
"I can't remember shit before I was 7."
"And after you were 7?"
"I joined a gang of kids called 'The Sheep'."
"And that gang does what exactly?"
"I'm not ratting no one out," Chuuya narrowed his eyes.
"That's fine, I won't push further," the man spoke. Chuuya actually felt a little... surprised that the man had actually let it go that easily. He then asked a couple more questions like how he survived without guardians, how his environment was like and a couple other things. Then finally, he gave Chuuya an offer, "become a hero Nakahara."
"What?" Chuuya stared at the man as if he was telling a joke.
"I've talked to the Hero Public Safety Commission and the principal of UA which is a prestige school for heroes and they decided to offer you a chance to go to UA even though you are a citizen of Yokohama."
"There's no fucking way that I'd join a school for heroes," Chuuya made a look of disgust, though it was reasonable considering where he was from and from what Aizawa had heard from his childhood. He was a child who was raised and raised other children. There was no one to help and Yokohama was clearly a 'survival of the fittest' place from all the scars the doctors had found on Chuuya's body.
"It's a chance to live a better life and for your friends at The Sheep to live better Nakahara. Heroes are paid very well and have lots of privileges. You can maybe even perhaps take those other kids out of Yokohama to live peacefully here. With that money you could feed them and live well with all your friends, don't you want that?"
Chuuya clenched his fists. It was clearly a manipulation tactic but even though he knew, he just couldn't ignore it, especially since it involved the chances of his friends- his family living a better life. In truth, it was also possible to live well in Yokohama since they were already use to the violence.... but money.... they needed the money that they didn't have, and now this man was offering a job with privileges and money.
"I... I'll do it..." Chuuya grit his teeth. He knew he was cornered the second this man mentioned his friends.
"The entrance exam is in three months. From now on you're going to be living with me and my husband," Aizawa turned his phone recording off and got up. "And kid... sorry about lying to you about having your friends in captivity," he left the room. Chuuya froze.
"MOTHERFUCKER!!!!!!!!"
He got tricked. Really badly.