Archive of Our Own

Izuku blinks, feeling so very strange. He cranes his head up, staring at the startled bystander he bumped into. As he feels his tail- he has a tail now- shake back and forth, he very empathetically thinks what the fuck. 

He really, really should have listened to his mom and her warnings and should have gone home like a good, normal kid. Instead, as usual, as soon as he heard there was a hero fight nearby, his feet led him straight towards the altercation without a second thought. Already, his hero analysis notebook appeared in his hands, and he began scribbling away, muttering rapidly as his eyes dissected the fight just a few meters away from him. 

“Um, kid?” Someone says next to him. 

Izuku jumps, his eyes swiveling to a rather tall but unassuming adult who looks back at him in bemusement. 

“You find hero fights often or something? Because you’re acting like you do this on a daily basis.” The man then pointedly stares at the notebook in his hands. 

“Uh,” Izuku flushes. “S-sometimes? I’m j-just a bi- big hero nerd, I guess.” 

The man nods, apparently finding this to be an acceptable answer. Just as Izuku was going to ask him the same question, because the man seems pretty nonchalant about the whole affair as well, someone shouts, “WATCH OUT!” 

Then everything becomes a bit more chaotic. Just a few seconds ago, the Metal Hero: Chivalry was fighting some villain with a quirk that allowed them to produce red strings, kind of like Best Jeanist, when the ground beneath them begins rolling, from the center and then made its way towards where Izuku and the little crowd that had gathered to watch the fight. 

The pavement starts moving so fluidly, almost like a wave, causing Chivalry and the villain to lose their balance. The others around Izuku start panicking as well, and suddenly Izuku was being shoved back by the crowd.

He falls to the ground, and his notebook and backpack are sent sprawling on the rolling floor as well. Izuku felt his ears pop loudly, and then his entire body started tingling, similar to the feeling of a body part going numb after not moving for a long period of time, except now it was every one of his limbs. He feels dizzy, and his mouth goes dry. He closes his eyes, and he doesn’t know how long it has been before he opens them again, the tingling feeling slowly fading away.

The ground beneath him is solid and unmoving now, but everything feels strange and off. He tries to get up, only to find himself staring at furry paws. Furry paws. Why does he have furry paws? 

Izuku shrieks. He notices that the sound that comes out of his mouth is more of a high-pitched whine, something that cannot be replicated by a human body unless a person had some animal quirk. But Izuku does not have a mutation or a transformation quirk, or any type of quirk for that matter, so what was going on!? 

He shakes his head and then stares at the writhing green limb that is attached to his back. Was that a tail!?

Izuku panics and somehow manages to move around, only to tumble straight back to the ground after bumping into something. He cranes his head, and sees a super tall woman coo at him, as she claps her hands, the small wings on her back fluttering in excitement. 

“Awww!” She squeals. “What an adorable little kitty!”

What. 

He feels the limb (tail) shake around, a response that comes automatically to him. The rational, logical part of his brain calmly tells him that somehow he is a cat now. 

Maybe this is some strange sort of hallucination or dream induced by hitting his head when he was shoved over when the ground started rolling like ocean waves. 

The shrieking, emotional part of his brain is going WHY AM I A CAT WHAT IS HAPPENING AHHHHHHH WHERE THE HECK DID MY CLOTHES GO IS THIS SOME KIND OF QUIRK IT’S ACTUALLY KIND OF COOL BUT HOW LONG DOES THIS LAST AND OH MY GOSH ALL MIGHT ON A STICK, MOM’S GONNA KILL ME!!!

Izuku keeps looking around, his tail swishing back and forth in agitation. He feels his body shiver, the fur quivering against his skin. It is such a strange, foreign feeling, that he can’t help but paw at the fur. For some reason, the motion feels comforting, so he continues to rub his skin. As he does this, he notices that while there is debris and a bunch of red thread around, the Pro Hero Chivalry and the villain he was fighting are nowhere in sight. He wonders if he blacked out after he hit the ground or if it was a quirk that turned him into a cat, which must have also caused him to pass out. 

He also wonders how nobody saw a twelve-year-old middle schooler turn into a cat, but maybe that was a hard thing to spot when everyone was running around like headless chickens.  

He starts to wander around, marveling at how gigantic everyone and everything looked. The world looked a lot sharper too, at least up close. However, he couldn’t see much of anything that was further than thirty or forty meters away from him. 

He remembers reading some facts about feline creatures on the internet since he wanted to learn everything he could about the Wild, Wild Pussycats. There was one fact that he found really interesting. Apparently, during the pre-Quirk era, 1963, a cat had even been sent to space! 

He also recalls that cats love to sleep for long periods of time, on average thirteen hours a day and that they could jump up to six times their height, which was really cool. One other thing he learned while reading up on Yawara Chatora, also known as the Pro-Hero, Tiger, was that cats share 95.6% of their genetic makeup with tigers. 

Izuku bounces up and down excitedly. Though the feeling of being a cat was extremely strange and even a little frightening, he can’t deny that this was probably the coolest thing that has ever happened to him, and plus it was almost like he had his own quirk! 

But there is one nagging question in his mind. How long was he going to stay like this? This most likely was a result of a quirk and was probably touch-based. He didn’t see who bumped into him, but it was likely that person had turned him into a cat. Izuku had no idea where he could find the person who caused this to happen, and he really, really hoped that this effect was not permanent. 

Such quirks were rare, so he most likely would turn back into a human at some point. Touch-based quirks like these usually lasted a couple of seconds or at most a couple of weeks. So, he was probably going to be fine. Still, it would be wonderful if he could find the person and have them explain their quirk. 

It was also unlikely that the person who turned him into a cat knew they activated their quirk on him because he was pretty sure they would have found him by now. Using a quirk on another person on purpose is against the law, and though this law was broken constantly by the kids he went to school with, he’s pretty sure that nobody was just walking around with malicious intent, turning people into cats or other animals. Or at least he hopes that wasn’t the case. 

There is also the fact that he could still communicate as he has all his memories and thoughts intact. His speech was in the form of a cat, but he could probably scratch the ground and write down his predicament and wait for someone to notice. 

Still, Izuku would rather find someone he knows and then explain the situation. The only person who would really care about this is his Mom, but there was one teeny tiny problem with that. Izuku’s mom was extremely allergic to cats, or any furry animal for that matter. 

Huffing, Izuku begins to walk the path to the hospital where his Mom worked. Hopefully, because this was most likely a result of a quirk, and he wasn’t really a real cat, maybe his Mom wouldn’t be allergic. If she did not have any allergic reaction to him, that would be another cool aspect of this quirk, and would also prove that he was no ordinary animal.

Izuku observes that his fur and tail are a bright green, the same shade as his hair and eyes. This causes a lot of people to turn and stare at him, some of them exclaiming about how adorable and pretty he looked as he rushes by. 

He twitches uncomfortably, feeling sort of naked, which he was, and this causes him to wonder again how his clothes could just disappear. Maybe his clothes were disguised as the fur on his back? The whole law of mass action was basically thrown out of the window. Quirks really made no sense a lot of the time, which was one of the reasons why science slowly became a dying subject over the last hundreds of years. Now they practiced quirk theory and medicine, which was one of Izuku’s favorite things to talk about because it was all about quirks and their practical uses. 

Izuku comes to a stop, panting slightly as he lifts up his head to look at the hospital he just reached. His mom worked all the way till late evening and took a lot of night shifts, but Izuku remembers her telling him this morning as she handed him a plate of Dorayaki for breakfast that she was going to be home a bit early today. 

It was starting to get a bit chilly, and though the fur did protect him from the cold, Izuku began shivering. He wonders if anybody would notice if he walked inside. 

Shrugging, he strolls into the revolving doors and quickly runs towards where he’s seen mom working. Surprisingly enough, walking and running in this form comes naturally to him and he has no problem ignoring the yelps of surprise and dodging the hands that try to reach for him. He comes to an abrupt stop when he hears his mom’s voice.

“Here you go sweetie,” she's saying to a young girl, holding out a cup of what looked like green-colored medicine, though the hue is strangely off, and Izuku remembers that cats are color blind to some colors, which probably means the liquid is actually red or a some other similar coloring.

His mom gasps at the sight of him. “A cat?” She murmurs, peering closer at him, before she quickly backs away, probably remembering that she was allergic to feline creatures. 

“Kitty!” The little girl exclaims, reaching out to touch him. Izuku allows it because she’s cute and her tiny pats are very soothing. 

He looks up at his mom who is still a couple of feet away, but she has a confused smile on her face. He still can hear all the commotion around the hospital, people still murmuring and talking about him, which is pretty cool, because he was sure he couldn’t hear nearly half as well as he could now than when he was human. 

Mom starts sneezing and rubbing her eyes. The sound makes him jump, which causes the little girl petting him to startle as well. He whines slightly when mom walks further away from him. She already seems so affected by his presence, so how on Earth was he going to be able to explain the situation to her? 

Another nurse approaches them, crouching down next to Izuku. “Here, come to Hoshi, dear,” the nurse coos softly at him. Izuku stares back at her, eyes wide. Maybe he could try to tell her?

He strolls past the little girl and thankfully spots a small notepad near the desk. He leaps with his hind legs, swiping at the notebook, and thankfully it falls to the ground on his first try. He stares triumphantly at the lined paper before he realizes that he has nothing to write on it with and he starts looking around for a pen. His gaze lands on the nurse, Hoshi, who’s looking back at him in confusion. He runs up to her, standing up to lean his front paws on her chest, and pulls at the pen that is tucked away in her pocket. 

Hoshi laughs slightly, a cool hand reaching to pet his head. “You’re so cute,” she tells him, before scooping him up. Which was not what he wanted, because he still had to write down something! He struggles, trying to get out of her grip, but her hold is pretty secure and he does not want to hurt her by swiping his claws at her. 

Instead, he starts to yell. “Hey, put me down! I’m a human! I’ve been hit by a quirk, my name is Izuku Midoriya, and my Mom’s over there!”

What comes out is a garbled mess of growls and hisses. Izuku groans loudly, struggling even harder against Hoshi’s embrace, but before he can do anything drastic, he’s placed outside, back into the chilly August air. He tries to walk back in, but Hoshi just shakes her head, smiling, and pushes him away. 

“I’m sorry little one, but some of the other nurses and patients are allergic, so you have to stay out here, okay?”

Izuku sighs. Even if he could get back into the hospital, he still may not be able to write anything down. He perks up, wondering if he could just go find some paper and a writing utensil and then come back to the hospital. 

With this mission in mind, he darts away, scanning his surroundings. He notices a nearby store, and those would probably have some pen and paper in hand, right? It would technically be stealing, but he promises himself that he would pay them back as soon as he is able to. 

Izuku dashes inside, once again ignoring the startled shout of a customer browsing an aisle nearby. 

“Hey man, I just saw a green cat run past me!” The guy exclaims to the owner of the shop. Izuku hurriedly looks for something that can be written down on. Sadly, all he can see are just rows and rows of junk food. He lets out another sigh of frustration and grabs a bag of chips with his maw and then rushes out of the store. 

He would have giggled if not for the bag in his mouth when he hears the owner question in disbelief, “was I just robbed by a little kitten?”

The customer chuckles. “Yeah, that just happened. Hey, what if it’s like that villain Snatcher, who trained animals with his quirks to rob konbinis?”

Izuku does not hear the owner’s reply, but he does recall reading about that villain who had an animal whisperer quirk and was able to get them to do his bidding. He had gotten a bit infamous because of how expertly he was able to evade the authorities. It was the Pro-Hero Kamui Woods who eventually caught him, and Izuku remembers watching the video. It was the first time he saw that particular Pro-Hero in action, as he was rather new to the scene. His quirk was extremely cool, and Izuku dedicated a whole five pages to him in his hero analysis notebook # 9. 

He stops in front of the hospital again, and breaks open the bag of chips. Then he painstakingly aligns each chip to spell out:

I’VE BEEN HIT BY A QUIRK. NOT CAT. AM HUMAN. CALL INKO MIDOR-

He runs out of usable chips, and the rest just crumbles under his paws. Then he waits. He jumps excitedly when he sees a young couple walk out. He chirps loudly, trying to catch their attention. The man with bright orange hair looks at him and points excitedly. 

“Look Ichi, it’s the green cat from earlier!”

“Aw,” Ichi puts her hands to her chest, her eyes looking at him with so much adoration that it wouldn’t feel out of place if hearts started floating out of her eyes. The orange-haired man smiles widely at him. He steps towards him, and Izuku quickly points out at the chips, making more trilling sounds. 

“Look!” He yells at them. “Look at what I’ve written!”

Crunch. 

Izuku’s jaw falls open as the orange-haired man completely ignores his frantic waves and steps directly on the message Izuku spent so long working on. 

“Seriously!?” He shrieks, swiping angrily at the air. “You idiot!” He doesn’t care about cursing the man, it’s not as if anyone could understand him anyways. He glares and shouts every curse he knows, including all the All Might ones, pouring all his anger and frustration onto this stupid, stupid, brainless man. 

The stupid man ignores all of this, probably because of how stupid he was, and tries to stroke his head. Izuku scowls and scratches him. The man howls, jumping back, and Izuku instantly feels guilty.

“I’m sorry!” He exclaims, waving his arm around, his tail swishing along. 

“Oh, no!” Ichi cries. “Chikao, are you alright?”

“Yeah,” Chikao whimpers, obviously not alright, but he tries to give her a reassuring smile. Ichi glowers at Izuku, leading her partner away from him. “Honestly, some cats are absolute menaces. You really shouldn’t have tried to pet it, Chikao, it’s probably a street cat.”

Izuku flops to the ground dejectedly, watching them walk away. He didn’t realize how hard this task would be. Now he feels exhausted, and he wishes nothing more than to fall asleep then and there. 

He scampers towards the less-lit streets. It’s starting to get dark and he’s too tired to walk back to his home. Maybe he could find someplace to rest for a while and then go back to trying to get his Mom’s attention. Or maybe the quirk would wear off, and he would be free from this mess. 

Izuku finds the closest ally to the hospital. There are some crumbled-up plastic sheets ahead, so he circles around them, patting them so he could comfortably lie down on them. As soon as he curls up and closes his eyes, he falls asleep. 

He wakes up to muffled shouts and screams. He scrambles up from his nest of plastic bags, nearly tripping over them. To his disappointment, he’s still in the form of a cat. 

Tail swishing, he feels much more refreshed and awake now, and he peeks out to see what all the commotion was. Several feet deeper into the ally, two thuggish-looking men beat up a skinny guy, who is pleading with them to stop.

Izuku feels a pang of something in his chest at the sight before he is leaping at them without a thought. He strikes the man fighting closest to him, clawing at the thug’s legs. He leaves deep scratches, and he digs harder, surprised at how sharp his claws are.

He absently wonders if it’s just a cat thing, to have such long, pointed talons, or if the reason they are so sharp was because he hadn’t cut his nails in a month, despite his Mom’s constant badgering that he had to have better hygiene. 

The thug screams loudly, tumbling away. He keeps screaming as he falls to the ground and grabs at his bleeding ankles. Izuku wastes no time in leaping up to reach the other thug’s face and leaving deep gashes on the guy’s cheeks and forehead. More screams fill the air before the thugs begin cursing so vulgarly that Izuku feels like covering his ears. 

Thug one looks down at him, and Izuku hisses threateningly, raising his claws at the man, and the man quickly pales before muttering, “whatever, I’m outta here,” and then dashing away. His other thug friend stumbles after him. 

Izuku stretches his back, feeling quite proud of himself. He just fought two bad guys! He turns to the skinny, beat-up man, who stares back with his jaw open in astonishment. 

“What?” The guy blinks at him. Blood from the wound on his forehead pours sluggishly down his face. “Did- did a cat just save me?” He asks himself, looking quite dazed. 

Izuku moves closer to him, eyeing the man with concern. “Are you okay?” He tries to speak, but it just comes out as one long meow. 

The man then smiles at him, reaching out blindly to give him a rough pat. “Thanks, kitty, you’re the best! I thought for sure they were gonna kill me,” he winces as he puts a hand to his side. That kind of beating probably had his ribs feeling bruised and sore. Izuku hopes they aren't broken. 

The man gets up slowly, moaning and whimpering as he leans against the alley wall for support. Izuku circles around him, making worried, trilling noises. He feels kind of useless, just staring up at the man, unable to help. 

He perks up when the man begins speaking again. “You seem kind of thin, kitty, how ‘bout I get us some food to eat?”

At the mention of food, Izuku’s stomach rumbles embarrassingly loud. The man laughs, and then groans, clutching at his chest and ribs. “Kay, kay,” he mutters, limping slowly out of the alleyway. Izuku follows him along, stopping when the injured man walks into a different konbini than the one Izuku stole from today. He can hear someone asking in concern if the skinny man was okay, to which the man just replies that he was ‘“just peachy.”

The man walks out not a minute later, dropping a tin of opened cat food at Izuku’s feet. He sniffs it a little suspiciously, but he’s so hungry that he immediately starts gobbling it. It was tuna, and it was surprisingly really tasty. The man takes out his own wrap of food and bites into it. He carefully crouches next to Izuku, and pets his head and back. Izuku instantly leans into it, the touch so soothing and warm. 

Even after they’re done eating, the man keeps patting him. Finally, after several long, blissful minutes, the man straightens up, giving him one last tap. “Thanks again, little kitty. You really saved my ass back there.”

Then he limps away, giving Izuku a wave before he disappears from sight.  

Izuku bounces on his front toes. He just saved a person. Like a hero! He lets out a huff of happiness before he trots back towards the hospital.

Only to blink at the bright moon overhead the night sky. Izuku’s eyes widen as he realizes that his mom must be home by now, panicking over where he was. He starts running in the direction that would take him to his house. 

By the time he reaches the front door, he’s panting, his four legs shaking in absolute exhaustion. He somehow finds the energy to scratch at the door, howling loudly, hoping his mom would come out. He scrambles back in surprise when the door opens abruptly, blinking in confusion when a police officer steps out, his mom following suit, wringing her wrists, clearly stressed out of her mind.

“Oh!” The officer stares down at Izuku, a somber look on his face slowly fading away as he bends down to face him. “Is this your cat, Ma’am?”

While his mom shakes her head, obviously confused about why the cat that appeared at the hospital she worked at was at her front doorstep, Izuku darts past the officer and between her legs, hurrying to the kitchen table when he knows the spare paper would be. He leaps up, grabs at a stray envelope of unopened mail, and then sprints towards the coffee table near the sofa so he could reach for his pens. Uncapping the pen, he starts scribbling away, using his mouth to hold the writing utensil. 

MOM, I AM A CAT. I’M IZUKU

He writes in shaky letters. He quickly shoves the paper towards the footsteps approaching and points his paw down for his mom to look at. To his immense disappointment, his mom does not even seem to notice his message. Instead, she gestures at the officer. 

“I am sorry, I am incredibly allergic to cats,” she starts to cough, “do you mind getting it out of the house?”

The officer nods. “Sure, no problem Ma’am.” Izuku protests loudly as he is picked up by the man, yowling and shrieking. 

“Mom! Look at the envelope!” He yells, pointing down. “Look at the paper!” 

“Aw,” the officer strokes his head. “Seems like the little guy wanted to play here.”

“I am not a cat!” Izuku shrieks. “Mom, please!”

His cries are all ignored, but as he is deposited back outside, Izuku sees his mom lifting up the envelope. He raises his head in excitement, only to let out a frustrated yell as watches his Mom place the paper back on the dining table, his message turned upside down.

Seriously, the world had to be against him or something.

“Please,” he hears mom plead. “Please find my baby.”

The officer gives her a low bow. “We will do our best. I am sure we will find your son in no time, Mrs. Midoriya.”

Izuku groans. “You’ve already found him. I’m right here!”

The officer starts to head back to his car, giving mom one last bow, and waves bye to Izuku, who just glares back, annoyed. 

He hears a loud sneeze and a sniffle, and then his mom closes the door on him. Izuku just flops dramatically onto the concrete floor. Turn human, he thinks, concentrating hard on his green paw, but all that happens is a sudden breeze passing over him, and he curls up, shivering. 

Being a cat was cool, and saving that skinny man today was even cooler, but now Izuku wants to just go back to normal, have his mom give him a big hug, and then go lay down on his comfy, warm bed. Instead, he resigns himself to sleeping on the cold concrete in front of his home.

The next morning, he is still, unfortunately, a cat. His mom comes outside, still in her pajamas, her eyes all red and puffy, a clear indication that she had been up crying all night. 

“Oh, Izuku, where are you?” She mutters, tears trailing down her cheeks. Izuku feels his own eyes water up at the sight of how miserable she looked. Mom looks around as if Izuku would appear out of nowhere, but her gaze only falls upon his cat form. 

“Mom, it’s me,” he tries again, but only a small, pathetic whimper breaks the silence. Mom sniffs and then tries to shoo him away. She starts coughing and scratching at her neck, and Izuku quickly hurries away, not wanting to cause her any more distress than he already did. It’s clear that nobody was going to take him seriously anyway. He just had to wait it out, until the quirk would wear off, and he could go back home. 

Izuku wanders around for a bit, unsure about where to go. Usually, if he wasn’t at school, he would head straight back home. There was always too much of a chance that he would run into someone from school and get made fun of or beaten up. He hunches down, heading towards the emptier streets, wondering if anyone at school would even care that he was absent, even though he had perfect attendance until now. Would the police even post a notice that he had gone missing? It’s not as if anyone would care about the quirkless kid, he thinks bitterly. 

Mom cares, he reminds himself. She looked so distraught and worried. And maybe even that officer who was at his home last night cared too. 

He’s jolted out of his thoughts when he comes across a woman with some sort of crocodile quirk, shakily pointing a knife at a boy who looks a couple of years older than him. 

“Come on,” she says. “I know that’s not all of the change you have. Where’s your wallet?”

“Please,” the boy whimpers. “That’s all I have. I promise!”

The mugger narrows her eyes. “You’re lying,” she hisses, her hand growing more steady, bringing the knife near the boy’s neck.  

Izuku, by this point, is behind her, and somehow they both don’t notice him. He takes a deep breath, before leaping up, curling his front legs around the woman’s shoulders, his claws piercing into her arms. He tries to get her to drop the knife as she cries out loud, her green, spiky tail swishing sideways, out of control. 

The boy stares in shock for a moment, before sprinting away, shouting for help. Izuku continues to leave deep scratches on the woman before she crumbles onto the ground, her knife clattering down from her grasp. 

She tries to sweep her tail at him, but Izuku’s quick reflexes save him, and he nimbly jumps out of the way. The woman gives up, cursing and curling up in pain. Izuku bounces up and down in exhilaration, grinning slightly. His cat’s form is in great shape, and he already fought three villains in less than a span of a day! 

He hears police sirens in the distance, and he looks at the woman, who, by all the groaning she was doing, seemed in no condition to get up and escape. He flicks his tail at her, trotting away. 

“You shouldn’t rob people, you know,” he tells her seriously, even though he knows she can’t understand him. “And you shouldn’t hurt someone just for money.” 

He picks up the cash that has fallen to the ground with his mouth, and he grimaces slightly, wondering how unsanitary this was. But his mom had always told him that stealing was an awful thing to do, especially when you are directly hurting a person when doing it. He doesn’t want the boy to lose his money, so he heads in the direction he saw the older kid run off. 

Luckily, he doesn’t have to walk too far. The boy was leading some officers to the alleyway, gesturing and loudly exclaiming, “I swear, the cat protected me!”

The officers’ are the first ones who notice Izuku. “Is that the cat?” The one with ironically a cat quirk himself, asks curiously. 

The boy turns around excitedly. “Yeah!” He gasps in surprise when Izuku sets the cash next to his feet. “Thank you!” He yells, squatting down to scoop up his money, and then strokes Izuku's head.

The boy peers at him with light brown eyes. “You probably saved my life,” he tells Izuku, and Izuku, who has never seen so much kindness other than from his mom directed all at him, bows his head, feeling his eyes water. Soft whimpers escape unbidden from his lips and doesn’t understand why he feels so emotional all of a sudden. Though, it’s not really a surprise, because Izuku knows that he cries at the smallest of things. 

“Aw,” the boy says, scooping Izuku up into his arms. It reminds him of the other guy Izuku sort of saved last night, who also looked at him so gently, and though he feels embarrassed, he also feels warmth spreading throughout his whole body. He leans into the boy’s soft pats, letting the boy wipe at his bloodied claws with a paper tissue he pulls out of his pocket. 

“It's okay,” the boy whispers, rocking him up and down. Izuku can feel his cheeks heat up, and he knew if he was a human right now, his entire face would have turned bright red. Still, he doesn’t pull away. His mom’s affectionate hugs had greatly decreased over the years, due to Izuku growing up, but deep inside, he misses them. With mom often taking night shifts and generally being busy and tired all the time trying to take care of both of them, Izuku stopped asking her to read him bedtime stories and to spend time with him. He didn’t want a burden anymore than he already did, but it did mean he got to see her a lot less, and in the last couple of years, he barely interacted with anyone at all. Most of the time he was ignored by everybody, and though it hurt him greatly every time, it was something he had grown used to. 

Now, he already had several people looking at and paying him constant attention, and it makes him feel uncertain, but also a little happy? Izuku shakes his head. This is all happening because he is a cat now, and it makes him wriggle in shame because he knows that if this older kid knew he was cuddling a human boy, he would probably get really angry or run away screaming. 

Izuku starts to squirm away, and after a few moments of struggling, the boy places him back on the floor. “Guess you don’t like being carried, huh?” The boy laughs, rubbing his neck. They watch as the mugger is taken into custody, and led to the cruiser. 

The cat officer approaches them, sniffing the air. “Hey there, little kit,” he smiles down at Izuku. He looks at the boy, “it seems you’ve been saved by an animal with an intelligence quirk. Those are pretty rare, you know.”

Izuku frowns, the words animal with an intelligence quirk bringing back unwanted memories. He remembers a couple of years ago when Akio, a kid with a glow quirk, had brought his dog with an intelligence quirk after school to show him off. 

As they all crowded and clambered around for a chance to pet the dog, one of the other students, Kazuko, pushed away Izuku, jeering at him. 

“Look, it’s Midoriya!” He yells loudly. “Even the dog has a quirk, but he doesn’t.” 

Izuku gets shoved again. 

The other students titter at that, glancing his way. Kacchan, hearing that, saunters towards them, his red eyes gleaming cruelly. “Yeah, Deku’s no better than a stupid animal. He’s just a waste of space, really.”

Tsubasa, behind Kacchan, laughs loudly, agreeing with anything the blonde boy said as usual. “Maybe if we put him in a cage at the local animal shelter, nobody would be able to tell the difference,” he sniggers. 

"Nah," Kacchan smirks. "No one would buy a quirkless loser like him, even if he begs them."

Izuku, at that point, already had tears running down his cheeks. “T- That’s not t-true!”

Kacchan punches his shoulder harshly, his palms sparking. “Y-y-yes it is!” He mocks, copying Izuku’s stutter. 

Izuku shrinks away, bringing his shoulders up. His ears turn red and it feels like everyone is looking and laughing at him- and- and he can't breathe- 

He slowly comes out of the painful, embarrassing memory, blinking up at the boy and the officer who are still speaking.  

The boy is saying something. “-you think it’s a street cat? Does that mean I can keep it or something?”

Izuku backs away, alarmed. He doesn’t want to be kept as a pet! You’re no better than a stupid animal! He feels his breath hitch, and suddenly he’s dashing away, his heart beating frantically.

He doesn’t know how long he runs. for, but soon he finds himself curling up under a park bench, his heart still racing, and his chest heaving. He squeezes his eyes shut, feeling incredibly panicked and anxious for some reason. He tries to take a breath, but he chokes on air instead, and he feels his limbs tremble. He doesn’t do anything else, just brings his front legs close to his chest before curling up. Then he stays there, unmoving, as the hours pass by. 

Izuku strolls around in the dark aimlessly. He mutters to himself in frustration, wondering when the heck this damn quirk would just wear off. He hopes his Mom isn’t too worried about him. 

To pass the time, he stops a couple of fights here and there. Surprisingly, there seemed to be a lot of crime in the grimmier back alleyways of Musutafu. He had already turned his claws on five villains, and there was even one instance where he had stumbled upon a particularly horrifying scene where a man with some kind of skin quirk had pushed a frightened, drunk girl into a wall and started groping at her. 

Izuku had stared, frozen for a second, before vaulting over, doling out his sharpest swipe yet, straight into the man’s eyes. The man howled loudly, stumbling away, shrieking loud curses. The woman he had been holding crumbled to the ground, her shoulders shaking. There was mascara running down her eyes and cheeks, and her sight was unfocused. Izuku shook with rage, and he kept scratching away at the man, dodging the squirts of liquid from his skin that sizzled when it touched the floor. It appeared to be just really hot water, and Izuku let out a yelp when some of it landed on his fur. 

The man eventually gives up, fainting from the loss of blood probably, and Izuku examines his claws. They were really quite sharp, and could apparently do a lot of damage. He leaps back toward the woman, who for the most part, looked uninjured, but very intoxicated. Thankfully, her phone was hanging limply from her hand, so Izuku just dialed 119, and then hid when the officers showed up. 

He never knew how busy the police officers could be. They always look unsurprised by everything, their eyes so very tired.

It causes Izuku to yawn, and he stretches out his limbs before curling up in the dust and darkness of the alleyways he had started inhabiting. He closes his eyes and dreams about his Mom and katsudon. 

He wakes up feeling uncomfortably hot and then yelps loudly as bright blue flames singe his fur. 

“Huh?” Comes a confused, deep voice, and then Izuku is staring into blue-green eyes. “Huh,” he hears again, and Izuku stares back at the man who looks like he was in his late teens or early twenties. He was quite a sight to behold, with all the third-degree and deep second-degree burns covering up most of the exposed pieces of skin that Izuku could see. Staples and other various metal piercings also litter his body and Izuku wonders if they are some kind of insane fashion statement or if they were placed there to keep the open injuries from peeling further and to keep the muscle beneath his skin from being exposed. Overall, he looked absolutely horrifying, and the part of Izuku that grew up with a mother as a nurse wants to haul him to the nearest emergency room immediately. Or maybe that would be anyone’s instant response after coming face-to-face with the guy. 

The patched-up, purple man keeps staring at him, and Izuku wonders how much nerve damage he has and if he could feel anything other than numbness around his more affected areas. 

“You’re a very green cat,” the man finally says, and Izuku mentally adds possible brain damage to the man's numerous injuries. 

“You are a very purple human,” Izuku parrots back stupidly, before flushing slightly. He nudges the man’s hand, shivering slightly at how cold it was. Without thinking, he licks at some of the burns, and the man draws his hand back in surprise. Then he huffs, standing back up, casually pocketing his hands into his dark coat. 

“Stupid cat,” he mutters, and Izuku glares, offended. “Where can I practice this fucking move if every alley in this damned city is occupied today?” He asks himself, frustratedly.  

Were those blue flames that woke Izuku up his quirk? Izuku meows loudly, jumping up onto a trash bin. He gestures with his paw when he gets the purple man’s attention. He points at the man and then tries to imitate the swooshing fire of his quirk, and the man stares at him with confused-lidded eyes. 

“Uh," he says. Then one of his brows raises up. “Are you asking me to use my quirk?”

“Yes!” Izuku pumps up his front leg in excitement. “Finally, someone who can understand me!” 

The man stretches his neck, once again muttering to himself. “This is my life. I talk to fucking green kitties now. Pretty sure this is the hundredth sign proving that I’m crazy.” Then he gives a batshit smile to literally thin air, and in an instant, the entire back alley is lit up in blue. 

Izuku watches the man twist the flames, his mind racing. It was such a cool pyrokinetic emitter quirk, and even though usually seeing explosive quirks made Izuku’s heart race fast and get the urge to find a safe place to hide. But this quirk was so different, colorful, and incredibly powerful. 

The flames are intensely hot, and fire this blue meant that the temperature was probably around three thousand degrees celsius, which is also a reason why Izuku should probably not be leaning over the bin in excitement to watch the quirk closer in action. He mumbles to himself. From what he knew about pyrokinetic quirks, the most famous one being Endeavor’s Hellflame, he’s surprised that he’s never heard of the guy in front of him. Usually, quirks as powerful as this one would be relatively known to the public. The flames were so powerful that Izuku wonders if the man could ever control them properly. From the gritted look on his face, it seemed that he was having a hard time. Then there was the possibility that all those burns were a result of his quirk, which meant that this was one of those rare times when the quirk was not compatible with a person’s body. 

Now that Izuku thought about it, he was pretty sure the man’s skin was chillier than an average human’s, which didn’t exactly make sense if he had such a scorching quirk. For pyrokinetic users, their limits tended to be reached due to overheating, and this man’s quirk probably had a worse drawback, since it seemed as if his body was not suited for his quirk. Izuku can already see the man panting, even after using his quirk for just a few minutes. He thinks about Kacchan, who could use his Explosion quirk for up to twenty minutes in small bursts before tiring. 

He watches for a few more moments as the man tries to control his raging quirk; it seemed as if he was trying to push out his flames and thus creating a stronger punch, but instead, his fire trailed out more like a stream of water, which could still seriously injure or even kill someone if directed at them. With the obvious illegal quirk usage and the dark, intense look on the man’s face, Izuku wonders if he is some kind of criminal. He thinks he would remember hearing about someone so distinctive as him, so he pushes that assumption out of his mind. 

Finally, the man deactivates his quirk, panting heavily. Izuku jumps back down to the ground, wincing as he feels the heat underneath his paws, and practically chokes on the smoky air.

He wishes he could talk, so he could tell the man that he was probably focusing too much on the direction of control of his quirk. The man practiced more with the fire he pushed out of his palms, and Izuku theorizes that perhaps if he allowed his quirk to build up a bit more, particularly right before he pushed out the flames from his hands, he may get the results he was looking for. Which, from what he could conclude, was punching out the flames with more force and power. Izuku got the idea from Kacchan’s quirk, which also needed some time to build up in order for him to get stronger thrusts.  

Izuku pouts slightly. It was not as if he could tell the man in human form anyway either. Besides, nobody ever wanted to listen to him, and he’s not sure if could have gathered up the courage to tell the man in the first place. 

The man smirks down at him, nudging Izuku with the tip of his boots. “Good thing that I heard you before I could release all of my flames. I don’t make a practice of making kindling out of little kitties.” 

Izuku gulps slightly, feeling tense all of a sudden, as the man leans closer, a leer crossing his lips. 

“No,” he says quieter. “I’m saving my fire for the ones that deserve to burn.” 

They stare at each other for a moment, and there’s a heavy charge in the air, full of unsaid promises. The look in the man’s eyes is something that Izuku will never forget, so terribly dark and cruel.

And maybe. A part of Izuku thinks that the man’s expression also looks a bit brittle too as if he was just on the precipice of keeping a mental breakdown at bay. This man was clearly haunted by something, and his eyes were screaming, like those canvases, Izuku saw on his last visit to the art gallery. It was as if he was trapped in a portrait, face open in an endless scream. The look in his eyes was the same as the paintings. 

Izuku wants to pull the man somewhere where his wounds can be further treated, he wants to make all that haunted hurt go away, but he can’t do anything but just stand there helplessly, chest aching, as he watches the man saunter away. 

In the end, no matter how much he wanted to help, Izuku was just a quirkless nobody, stuck in the form of a cat, so useless that he couldn’t even help himself. 

After the sixth day of just wandering the streets and clawing out countless amount of people, Izuku finds a poster.

Specifically, a poster of himself. 

He had been flicking his tail around, it was sort of fun to play around with when his gaze had landed on the stapled paper across the wall from him. He gapes, his sharp eyes taking in the drawing of a cat that looked suspiciously similar to him, along with being completely shaded in green. 

On the top, it said that they were looking for a Vigilante Cat. Izuku blinks. He feels his mouth twitch, and suddenly he’s on the floor, rolling around in mirth. It was just so funny. He can’t help but laugh helplessly before the usual tears spring from his eyes and he starts hiccuping sobs. 

He just. He just wanted to be Izuku again. He wants his Mom. He feels so tired and alone, and most of all, he’s just scared. He doesn’t know when this quirk will wear off, and he’s beginning to think that it never will. But he firmly pushes those thoughts away. If he starts thinking that this is going to be his life permanently, he is going to break down and never stop. 

It is the third day after he finds his poster when he’s scratching at a trio group of criminals who had just robbed a local store with their quirks, and another man swoops in to join the fight. Izuku had just taken a hit to the ribs, before he’s scrambling up again, then dropped his jaw as he takes in the sight of three men unconscious on the floor. 

The unknown man has a strange-looking floating white capture cloth that folds back over his shoulders and neck. Izuku observes the man’s glowing red eyes roaming over the three thieves and then he remembers. 

He bounces on his toes excitedly. This- this was Eraserhead! Izuku had read every article he could find on the elusive man. He had first heard about him from an interview of Ms. Joke's, who was Izuku’s favorite Underground Hero. Izuku had been a fan of the Smile Hero: Ms. Joke since he first saw her on TV. She was a young teacher at Ketsubutsu Academy High School and she had been explaining a bit of her quirk to an interviewer and had casually mentioned that she was an Underground Hero when the man had asked her why she was not on the Hero Billboard Chart JP. 

She winked and giggled at the interviewer and said, “it means I’m not a big fan of the media, so you’re lucky that you’re even getting a statement from me.” Then she gave a bright smile, and it reminded Izuku instantly of All Might. Which meant that he sequently liked her as well. 

He had then searched her up and her quirk was so cool, and what Izuku most admired about her was her hero-persona and how she kept catching villains off guard with her jokes, even though she didn’t even need to with the quirk she had, which was releasing an invisible gas from her skin that caused people to laugh uncontrollably and impair her opponent’s cognitive abilities. It was a quirk similar to the R-Rated Hero: Midnight. 

Izuku had also learned that Ms. Joke was infatuated with another Underground Hero named Eraserhead and constantly made jokes about how she was going to marry him someday. 

Izuku vibrates in excitement, seeing the very same man he read about in action was just so cool. Even though Eraserhead had ended the fight in a matter of a second, which honestly made him seem cooler. 

Now the hero turns towards Izuku, the glow in his eyes fading, and Izuku comes to a dawning realization. Eraserhead could erase quirks. Izuku could absolutely not waste this opportunity. He needed to get Eraserhead to use his quirk on him. 

He darts towards the man, pawing at his legs. Eraserhead pauses, tilting his head down at him. Then he crouches, placing a gentle hand on his head and Izuku couldn't help but lean into it.

“Hello,” Eraserhead says, his voice rough, but very soft at the same time. “You must be the little imp that Tsukauchi and Tamakawa have been making such a ruckus about.” He frowns at Izuku, noticing the bruises and cuts received this past week. He had been trying to keep himself clean though because he didn’t want to look like a dirty, crazy-looking vagrant when he turned back into a human. He’s not sure if the injuries he received as a cat would stay on his human body, but all his soreness and wounds he had as a human had shown up in this cat form. 

Eraserhead carefully lifts him up, and Izuku stares at a small nursing bottle that appears in his hand, seemingly out of nowhere. He doesn’t hesitate though, when the man puts the bottle to his lips, instantly smacking at the warm, soothing liquid. He’s quite thirsty and hungry, and it’s kind of hard to find food on the streets, especially as he didn’t really know what he was doing. 

He squirms a bit as he drinks, feeling a bit uncomfortable under Eraserhead’s intense stare. It sort of reminds him of Kacchan's intense stare, which is not reassuring. 

“Nedzu is also interested in you,” Eraserhead drawls as Izuku laps up the milk. Nedzu!? As in UA’s principle?? Izuku stops drinking, feeling his hunger abate slightly. His appetite vanishes completely when Eraserhead scratches him behind his ears and chin and says, “you must have some type of intelligence quirk.” 

Izuku pushes away from him, before remembering his mission. He lets out a frustrated huff and hopes this would work. He uses his front paws to cover his eyes, and then he points at Eraserhead’s eyes. Then he waves his paws around, pointing at the Hero’s capture scarf, trying to imitate the motion it makes when his quirk was activated. He pulls at his fur and then tugs at Eraserhead’s curly, knotted-up dark hair. 

“Come on,” he cajoles. “Use your quirk.” 

Eraserhead just stares at him blankly, but Izuku can feel the man’s chest rumble in amusement.

He lets out a loud groan and slumps his head against Eraserhead’s shoulder. The man’s capture scarf feels so warm and cozy, and suddenly he’s weighed down by how exhausted he feels. Maybe it wouldn’t hurt if he closed his eyes for just a moment? He's been feeling tired constantly this past week. The moment he does shut his eyes, Izuku falls asleep instantaneously. 

Aizawa feels his lips quirk up. There were only a few things he lived for in this world, and this was one of those things. A cute, little kitten curled up against his chest, snoring slightly, absolutely conked out? Yes, please. He would die for this creature. 

He lets the police handle the unconscious men, waving them in. His patrol was almost over anyway, so he decides to head back to his apartment. His hold on the kitten tightens before he’s leaping away, hopping up on the rooftops, using his capture weapon to haul himself up and about. In less than ten minutes, he slips through his unlocked window and then carefully places the injured cat down on his couch. 

After a moment of deliberation, he slips out his phone and takes a few quick snaps of the sleeping furball. He really was a cute little thing, with wide, glowing, and expressive green eyes. His coat was such a pretty, unique color as well. 

Aizawa sighs, feeling a small smile flit across his face. He could tell that he was already smitten with the little creature. The cat was so huffy and elaborative too, with all the cute little gestures he was making. It almost looked like the kitten was imitating him when he was using his quirk and that made him almost laugh. He wonders how intelligent the creature really was. He can already imagine Nedzu rubbing his furry paws together, cackling in glee.

He turns the cat over, pulling out his first aid kit. The poor thing was matted with cuts and various bruises. He cleans and patches up the most recent ones, glowering severely at the sight of the older wounds, some of them suspiciously looking like burns. He dabs away at the kitten’s claws, raising an eyebrow at how sharp they were and at all the dried-up blood around them. 

Yup. Aizawa has truly struck gold this time. He has found a vigilante cat. His mouth twitches again. Hizashi would probably break down laughing if he heard about this. So would Nemuri. There was no way he was going to let those two find out. He smirks slightly as he gets up from the floor, imagining different scenarios of how he could get them to scram out of his apartment the next time they tried to barge in. 

He hums lightly as he rummages through his pantry, bringing out some of the feline food he keeps for his other cats. He hears Akuma mewling curiously near the sofa, peeking up at the sleeping kitten. Aizawa goes to lift her up, settling her down on the couch. She was the youngest, but now he brought in an even tinier cat than her, and she was bound to be interested in the newest member of the apartment.  

“Don’t disturb him,” he warns her, but as usual, Akuma completely ignores him, tail swishing imperiously, and nudges the other kitten with her face. The cat wakes up instantly, his paws lashing out, eyes wary. Aizawa stares in surprise as Akuma lets out a loud yelp, swiping at the green cat, and then bouncing off the couch and scampering away. 

As Aizawa moves to calm the kitten down, he notices that the cat isn’t breathing properly, and he looks disoriented. He wonders if the cat has a concussion, which is probable from the way he went sprawling when that earlier criminal had kicked at him.  

“Sh, sh,” he says, stroking the cat’s head and back. “You’re okay. I am not going to hurt you.” 

The cat finally focuses his eyes on Aizawa, and though he shouldn’t be, he is still a little shocked at how much intelligence gleams from within their depths. It’s actually a little frightening, how much this creature reminds him of the UA principal. 

The kitten then looks down at himself, staring intently at his now groomed paws, before sprawling dramatically over the couch. Aizawa snorts, and the creature shoots him a questioning look. 

“You are the most expressive animal I have ever had the pleasure of meeting,” he explains. The kitten seems to roll his eyes. Both of Aizawa’s eyebrows raise up. 

“Hold on,” he says slowly, feeling a bit foolish, “do you understand me?”

The cat seems to still for a second, before nodding his head rapidly. Suddenly, he’s full of energy, bouncing on his toes, probably aggravating every single one of his injuries that Aizawa had painstakingly bandaged. 

The cat scratches at his couch, then seems frustrated by something. He leaps down from the couch and Aizawa quickly follows after him. 

“Wait,” he calls. This creature was a lot more intelligent than he had previously thought. The little cat spins around to face him, gesturing rapidly. Once again, Aizawa stares blankly. Then he leans in closer. It seemed… like the cat was trying to act out like he was writing something. 

Aizawa narrows his eyes. It takes him one stride to reach his desk table, and he swiftly grabs a pen and a notepad. Then he hands it to the kitten. This was probably one of the strangest things he has ever done, but hey, it was not too out of his realm of weird, for one, his boss was a bear-mouse-rat creature thing who regularly tried to poison him from the amount of tea he was always offering on hand. 

Still, Aizawa watches in disbelief as the kitten sticks part of his tongue out, and neatly starts to write in the notebook. He notes that the cat’s tail is pointed upward, twitching slightly, clearly meaning that he was very happy at that moment. Then the creature slides the notebook towards him, looking up at Aizawa expectantly. 

The words read:

HELLO. I AM NOT A CAT. I AM SORRY FOR DECEIVING YOU. I AM ACTUALLY A HUMAN AND WAS TURNED INTO A CAT BY SOME QUIRK. CAN YOU PLEASE USE ERASURE ON ME SO I CAN TURN BACK INTO A HUMAN? 

Aizawa stills. Then he's unwrapping his capture weapon and activating his quirk. He stares at the green kitten and watches the creature turn into a crouching, grubby human child. He deactivates Erasure and much to his hidden relief, the now-turned boy in front of him does not instantly shrink back into a cat. 

The kid gazes at him with wide, watery green eyes, looking at him as if he had hung the moon and the stars. The coloring of his eyes and hair was just as bright and distinctive as they were in his cat form. Then the poor kid bursts into tears. 

“T-thank you! Thank you s-so much, Eraserhead,” he gasps out, and Aizawa briefly wonders how the kid knows his hero name.

He kneels down to be at eye level with the kid. His eyes flicker over all of the boy’s wounds, and thankfully the bandages seem to be remaining in place. The kid is still shaking, and he looks so painfully thin and small that Aizawa feels a pang in his chest. 

Evenly, he asks, “how long have you been a cat, kid?”

The boy reaches up to curl a finger around his hair. “I b-believe around nine days? I- I lost track f-for a bit. U-um, sir? I ne- need to go home. M-my Mom, she mu- must be really, really worried.” 

“Of course,” Aizawa nods. “I’m going to take you to the local police station, okay? We will contact your mom from there.” He pauses. “Do you know who hit you with this quirk?”

“N-no,” the boy rapidly shakes his head. “I- I,” he flushes, looking away. “It w-was a hero fight. A-and then the gr- ground started m-moving, and some- someone bumped into me. Then I bl-blacked out.”

“Were you watching a Hero fight? That’s dangerous, you know.” 

The kid flushes again but does not say anything. Aizawa sighs, and then notices the kid flinching a bit, then stilling completely. He was a really nervous child, and Aizawa wishes he could see more of that impertinence and dramatics he displayed as a cat. 

They also needed to talk about the activities the kid got into this past week. He inwardly sighs again, placing a hand on his capture weapon. He could already tell this was a problem child. Seriously, what kind of kid immediately starts acting like a vigilante after being hit by an unknown quirk? And get into about thirty-nine recorded skirmishes in the last eight days?

He gets up, moving to the sink to fill up a glass of water for the kid. He discreetly observes the boy looking around his apartment, his bright eyes suddenly full of curiosity and wonder. Aizawa huffs. Nosy brat. And he still does not know how the hell the boy knew his hero name. 

He passes the boy the drink, to which the boy stutters a soft thanks, before gulping it down. 

“Do you want something to eat?” Aizawa asks as the boy’s stomach makes a slight rumbling noise. 

The boy quickly shakes his head, flushing again. “I-It’s al-alright. I’m not v-very hungry,” he whispers.

Aizawa frowns at him. “You don’t have to lie. It’s no problem on my part. You must have barely got any food this past week.”

The boy just shakes his head and he has to withhold another sigh. He walks back into his kitchen, opening up the fridge. He grabs a couple of grape-flavored jelly pouches and some cheese sticks. It was nothing substantial really, but this would have to do for now. 

When he gets back, the kid is in the same spot, now biting his lips and wringing the cup in his hands. 

“Don’t do that,” Aizawa winces as he watches the boy’s lip start to bleed. He reaches out to stop him and take the cup out of his hands, but the boy flinches again. 

The kid looks at him in confusion when his hand just stays in the air, but at least he stopped cutting into his lip. “Here,” he gestures at the cup, and the boy passes it over to him sheepishly. He raises his eyes to look at Aizawa uncertainly when he holds out the cheese sticks for the boy to take. Aizawa just grabs his hand, this time ignoring the kid’s knee-jerk response, and places the cheese and jelly pouches onto his palm. 

The kid’s hand is so small compared to his, and he wonders how old the boy is. “How old are you, kid?”

“I-I’m twelve. I t-turn thirteen ne-next summer.” 

Aizawa frowns. He had thought the boy was around eight or nine years old. He hopes it’s not malnutrition and that it’s just the kid’s genetics or his quirk. 

“Well, eat up. We’ll head to the station soon, and call your mom.” 

The kid nods again, slowly unwrapping the cheese stick with shaky hands. Though he seems shy under Aizawa’s attention, he quickly gulps down all three cheese sticks in such a hurry that Aizawa activates his quirk in alarm. 

“Hey, hey, slow down kid. The food’s not going anywhere.” 

The kid flushes for what seems to be the hundredth time. “S-sorry,” he mutters, eating at a much slower pace now. 

“So,” Aizawa starts, still curious. “How do you know about my hero name?”

“Oh!” The boy lights up, and that bright look comes back to his face. “I’ve h-heard about you from the Smile Hero: Ms. Joke-”

Aizawa groans. That woman never knew when to shut up. Why were all the people who insisted they were his friends so noisy? 

“-and well, she’s my favorite Underground Hero, and she mentioned you, so I was interested in knowing more about you, so I searched you up. There’s not a whole lot of information about you, though that’s not a surprise due to the nature of an Underground Hero’s work, and you are probably the most elusive hero in Musutafu, so it makes sense why I found so little mention of you, but I was able to find three grainy clips of some of your fights, and your quirk is so cool and interesting, and it’s visual-based too, which means that your eyes are a lot stronger than an average person’s. Also, I was always curious about the whole floating hair thing, because isn’t your quirk, Erasure? It’s interesting how it can also nullify the gravity around your hair and your capture weapon; it could mean you have some secondary aspect to your quirk which is just fascinating. It’s such a useful quirk too, I mean all quirks are useful and amazing of course, but yours could be used for so many various applications, especially for people whose quirks can get out of control and dangerous. It’s actually a good thing that you are not more well-known, I bet there are tons of villains who would love to study the workings of your quirk as a whole. Also, how long can you use Erasure for? And how does your quirk erase other quirks, like, I wonder if yours just cancels them out physically or on a deeper, cellular level, but that would have more disastrous effects on the individuals you use Erasure on and it would also take longer for them to recover? Currently, there are no quirk-suppressing handcuffs, at least none that are effective long enough without side effects like-”

“Wow, kid.” He would have let the boy continue, really, this kid kept surprising him and Aizawa had known him for a total of little more than an hour. One second he was a stuttering mess and the next he was babbling about Aizawa and his quirk of all things. It was all pretty interesting too, though he was a bit unnerved about how the kid could grasp the logistics of his quirk so well, and with such little info too. He was also a bit disgruntled that such information existed out there in the first place. 

“S-sorry!” The boy squeaks, slapping a hand over his mouth, and Aizawa inwardly winces. The kid seemed prone to hurting himself without thought. And now he was back to the flushing and the stammering, all previous passion and brightness disappearing instantly. 

He really was a Problem Child, with the capital p and c. 

Aizawa turns away, grabbing his keys off their hooks. “Don’t worry about it kid, it was pretty interesting to listen to. You seem to have a mind for analysis. Is that your quirk?” The boy was quite unassuming aside from his bright coloring, large eyes, and a smattering of freckles. He had no outward mutation, so he assumes it was some sort of emitter quirk, which was always something to watch out for. People with powerful psychic quirks always had a lot of potential. Aizawa had also noticed that the boy showed no reaction when he used Erasure just a few minutes ago, which lend to his theory that the boy had some kind of acuity quirk. 

He pauses, tilting his head towards the kid when he gets no response. “I-I’m s-s-sorry,” the boy apologizes automatically, staring down at the carpet. 

“It’s not logical to keep apologizing when you have no reason to apologize.” He tries to say it as gently as possible, but the boy still flinches. 

“S-sor-” Again, the boy turns bright red. 

“It’s alright.” A pause. “I won’t judge you for the quirk you have, you know. Having faced discrimination myself and constantly being exposed to people’s prejudice towards quirks due to the nature of my work, I do my best not to make assumptions about a person’s personality based on a factor they cannot control.”

Though it was widely known and proven that a person’s quirk is similar to their character and disposition, a quirk’s value was based on how a person used it, not what it was. 

“I’m quirkless.”

Aizawa has to strain himself to hear the boy’s soft whisper, and then the words hit him. Oh. Oh. 

He tightens his fists for a moment, feeling his fingernails dig into his palms before crouching near the kid. The boy looks so resigned and tired, and Aizawa’s chest clenches again. 

He’s not exactly sure what to say, and he’s pretty sure saying, “sorry, my bad” or something vague like that wouldn’t go over so well. Damn it, he’s always been awful at having emotional conversations. So he does what he knows best. He speaks logically. 

“As I said, I do not make assumptions about a person’s character based on a factor they cannot control. And you shouldn’t either,” Aizawa observes the boy’s drawn face, at how he looks almost ashamed of himself. The boy is gnawing on his lips again, wringing his wrists, and Aizawa’s heart goes out to the boy, a kid whose name he still did not even know. 

“D-d-do you th-think-” the boy takes a deep breath, and when he speaks again, his voice is more loud and firm. “C-can I be a hero without a quirk?”

He looks straight into Aizawa’s eyes, his own shining with deep, swirling emotions, and his shoulders square up, as if he was preparing himself to face a firing squad. 

Careful, Aizawa thinks. I have to be careful. 

The boy’s eyes say this is my dream. This is all I have ever lived for. And his vigilante activities make a lot more sense now. 

“Kid,” Aizawa grabs his shoulders firmly, startling him. He wonders how many others had failed this kid, who crushed his dreams and hopes under their feet. His eyes linger on the boy’s ribs and shoulders, where he knows most of the old burns and wounds litter his skin. He thinks about Tamakawa raving about a little cat who managed to save countless lives in less than a week, he thinks about the accounts he had heard, of the small, green creature that became so vicious and feral when facing villains ten times his size with nothing but his claws and teeth. He then thinks about how the kitten stayed after almost every fight, acting like a guardian to whoever was in need of help. 

“Kid,” he says again, staring intensely into those green eyes. “You already are a hero, quirk or no quirk.”

The boy’s mouth falls open, and Aizawa feels his body shake under his hands. 

“I- I, thank you,” he whispers, big, fat tears rolling out of his eyes. “Thank you. Thank you.”

“Of course,” Aizawa amends quickly because he was never one to encourage reckless pursuits, “you are a hero, but definitely an illegal one.” His hands are still on the boy’s shoulders, so he squeezes them, forcing the boy to pay attention to him. “Do you understand how dangerous your actions were? Today, and the past week? There are so many times where you could have been outright killed or at least severely injured from all the stunts you’ve pulled.” 

He glares at the boy like he is another one of his more bull-headed students, and he might as well be with the shaky smile he gives, and the “s-sorry, sir,” that he stutters. But one look at his face and Aizawa can tell the child does not regret his actions one bit. 

Damn it. What a problem child. 

“Come on now, let’s get you to the station. We have wasted enough time.” 

The boy nods, wiping his eyes with his sleeves. They walk down the stairs of the apartment before Aizawa pulls open the door of the passenger seat for the boy to sit in. 

When he’s turning into the street, he remembers his question. “What’s your name, kid?”

The boy looks up from where he was kicking at the littered newspapers on the car floor. “Oh! I-It’s Izuku Midoriya.”

“Huh. It suits you.”

The boy giggles. “It’s the green, right?”

“Yeah,” Aizawa smirks. 

Once they reach the precinct, Midoriya trails after him, not unlike a lost puppy. His eyes become as wide as saucers when he sees Tamakawa sitting on top of a cluttered desk, shuffling some papers. 

“Hey there, Eraserhead,” Tamakawa calls out. Then he notices the tufts of green hair poking out from behind Aizawa. 

“Hey, who’s that?” He gets off his desk, sniffing the air, and then his tail twitches in surprise. “Is that-”

“Eraser, you never told me you had a kid,” Tsukauchi’s tired voice greets them, and Aizawa remembers that it’s barely half past six in the morning. It looked like the detective was still on his second cup of coffee. 

“No!” Tamakawa exclaims excitedly. “I’m pretty sure he’s the vigilante cat.”

Tsukauchi’s eyes widen and he peers at Midoriya, who’s now not even pretending that he’s not using Aizawa as some sort of shield of protection. 

“This is Izuku Midoriya,” he says blandly. “The former cat that you’ve all been talking about.”

Tsukauchi moves closer to the boy. “How old are you, kid?” He gives the boy a kind smile, and the boy slowly relaxes. 

“I’m t-twelve,” he whispers, and the detective gives Aizawa a curious glance. Before he can say anything else, Midoriya blurts, “p-please. Ca- can you let my Mom k-know I’m here? S-she must be really worried ‘bout me.”

“Sure!” Tsukauchi quickly nods. “Do you know her number?”

Midoriya nods, finally stepping out of Aizawa’s shadow. He quickly blurts out a bunch of digits and Tsukauchi pulls out the precinct’s phone and makes the call. On the other end, Aizawa can hear relieved sobs, and after a few more moments of speaking, Tsukauchi hands over the phone to Midoriya. 

“She wants to speak with you,” he says gently, and Midoriya takes the phone, and yells, “Mom!”

Then he bursts into tears. Tamakawa looks a bit alarmed, and Tsukauchi keeps shooting him looks, but Aizawa just leans against a wall. He’s starting to figure that crying was a norm when it came to Midoriya. 

“So,” Tsukauchi says lowly, “a twelve-year-old kid, who frankly looks like he’s nine, is our vigilante cat? The cat that apprehended forty-three criminals in a week.”

Aizawa nods. The detective looks at his cup of coffee, looking like he wanted something a lot stronger. Aizawa sympathizes. 

Finally, the boy ends the call, before beaming brightly at him. “My Mom’s coming here!”

“Great,” Aizawa drawls. “Then we can all sit down and have a chat about what you have been doing for the past nine days.”

Midoriya winces. “D-do I ha-have to tell my Mom?”

“Yes,” Aizawa says flatly. 

“I’m gonna die,” the kid whispers dramatically, and next to him, Tsukauchi stifles a laugh. Tamakawa joins them as another officer whom Aizawa did not know the name of, guides Midoriya to a chair, while bemusedly trying to answer the boy’s rapid queries about the man’s mutation quirk. 

“So, are we gonna be sending a kid to that vigilante reform school?” Tamakawa chuckles. “That’s definitely gonna send the media into a frenzy.”

Aizawa rolls his eyes. “Tamakawa, I am not sending a twelve-year-old child to a reform school. We’ll just have to keep an eye on him, and make sure he enrolls in a hero school once he is of age.” 

“It’s interesting,” Tsukauchi says thoughtfully, “the kid’s transformation quirk just turns him into a regular cat, but the way he uses it is actually quite resourceful.” The detective frowns. “But why did he just decide to go missing for a week, if he’s so worried about his mother?”

Aizawa sighs. “That’s not the kid’s quirk. Midoriya was hit by some quirk that turned him into a cat. Though, I still don’t know why he started fighting criminals instead of trying to tell someone what happened to him. But he may have had some trouble communicating his situation, and thankfully he was able to get me to use Erasure on him.”

After that, Aizawa waits for Midoriya’s mom to arrive, and Tsukauchi heads back to do some paperwork. When the mom, Inko Midoriya, does arrive, along with a fountain of tears, and hugs and kisses to her equally sobbing son, they all head to one of the smaller interrogation rooms. 

“Midoriya, can you tell me what happened from the beginning, right before you were struck by this quirk?” Tsukauchi asks once they’re all settled down. 

“Uh y-yeah.” He looks at his mom nervously, before plunging in and telling them that he had been observing a hero fight. 

“Izuku,” his mom scowled. Aizawa just decides to call her Inko in his mind, since he already called the kid, Midoriya. “I told you not to go looking for Hero fights. It’s not safe!” 

“I know, Mom,” Midoriya says sullenly, looking down at the metal table. “I’m sorry.”

Inko sighs. “All that matters is that you are safe now,” she declares, and then gives him another smothering hug. The boy has no problem accepting it, a small smile appearing on his face. 

When Midoriya starts explaining that he became a green cat, Aizawa watches as Inko’s face rapidly pales. “Oh, baby,” she cries, sniffling loudly. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t know that was you!” 

They learn that Midoriya tried to tell a few people what happened, but he was ignored each time. He also explains that his Mom was allergic to cats, which is why it was hard to reach out to her. When he gets to explaining some of his more… questionable activities, Aizawa watches the boy hesitate. 

He squirms when Aizawa raises an eyebrow at him and then mutters, “uh, I got lost for a bit, a-and I sorta st-stumbled across p-people getting hurt, and well I couldn’t just stand there, so I h-helped out a little,” he finishes out in a rush. 

Inko blinks at her son. “Izuku, did you get into fights with criminals!?” She fingers the bandages around his face and arms. 

Midoriya bites the tip of his thumb and shrugs, looking down.

“Your son decided to go and play vigilante for these past nine days,” Aizawa informs the woman dryly, and the kid shoots him a betrayed look before letting his eyes fall back on the interrogation table like it was the most fascinating thing he has ever seen. 

“He did what!?” Inko shrieks. Midoriya winces, hunching his shoulders. He’s a lot more sullen now, looking every inch of a petulant pre-teen and Aizawa has to fight back a smirk. It’s good to see some fight in the boy, instead of acting like a lifeless, stuttering doll. He can see Tsukauchi smiling a bit too as Inko Midoriya scolds the boy, before dissolving into tears. 

“Mom,” Midoriya hisses, looking at the two of them sitting silently and then turning back to Inko. His ears and neck turn a bright red. “I’m sorry, Mom. It’s okay, I’m safe, see!”

“Izuku, baby,” Inko sobs. “Why are you always doing this, getting into all these dangerous fights and disregarding your safety? You're going to give me a heart attack one day, Izuku.”

Looking at the kid’s stricken expression, Aizawa decided to take pity on him. “Ms. Midoriya, it is clear your son is headstrong and passionate about saving people. He did, after all, rescue more than thirty people in just the past week. If you will allow me, I can help train him and teach skills so that if he is ever in a perilous situation again, he can use them to keep himself safe.”

Both the Midoriyas gape at him for different reasons. 

“B-but Izuku is quirkless!” Inko blurts out and Midoriya flinches slightly. 

Aizawa nods. “I know that, and so if he gets into fights again, he should know the right skills to defend himself.” 

Inko bites her lip. “I don’t know. I think I’ll feel better if my boy is safe with me. Izuku, I don’t want you to get into any more fights.” 

“Mom, please,” Midoriya whispers. “Y-you know I can’t do that. Wh-when I see someone who needs help, my- my feet just move.” Aizawa notices Tsukauchi’s twitch at that, his eyes widening.

“And no-no dojo takes in quirkles-s people anyway, a-and this is my b-best chance if Era-s-serhead wou-would be willing to train me.” 

Inko’s eyes water. “But why Izuku?”

“Because I-I want to be a hero, Mom,” he whispers, before closing his eyes. “D-do you think I-I c-can be a hero?” 

“Oh, baby,” Inko says softly, her eyes on her son, and Aizawa shifts, feeling uncomfortably like he was intruding on something private. He watches Midoriya squeeze his eyes further and then flutter them open in surprise when his mother flings her arms around him and cries out, “of course, baby. Of course, Izuku. I- I know I hurt you when I said that to you when you were little. But Izuku,” she says, smiling as she wipes a stray tear that falls from Midoriya’s eyes, “you already are a hero in my eyes.”

Midoriya sobs. Inko holds him, tears leaking down her cheeks as well, but she locks eyes with Aizawa. “Thank you,” she whispers. 

He gives her a nod.

After that, Tsukauchi spends another thirty minutes questioning the boy further and then having him fill out the missing person forms and all the signatures needed. 

Then they stand outside the station, and Midoriya keeps staring at Aizawa with wide eyes, so bright and full of hope and gratefulness that it hurts to look at. But there’s also a determined glint in them, intense and full of will and passion, and Aizawa knows he would be one of the best students he would ever get to teach. 

He drops a hand on the kid’s hair, smiling at his shocked expression. “I’ll see you soon, kid.”

Midoriya gives him an excited nod, bowing a few times with his mother, before waving at him as he is pulled away by Inko. 

Aizawa sighs, slouching, and heads back to his apartment. He needs a long nap or five. Then he has to prepare a plan and it’s a good thing that it’s still summer vacation, and he doesn’t have his usual brats from UA badgering him. He has a Problem Child to teach.