Chapter Text
Izuku hated heroes. It was a known fact. Yeah, a couple of heroes were okay, were trying, but with a couple of good apples in a barrel of bad ones; the generalization seemed fair. Despite this, he had never outrightly started a fight with a hero.
Well, okay that wasn’t completely true, ‘who started’ any fight could be relative as well as what counted as a fight could, but still, he hadn’t gone on any hero hunting. Plus, Izuku considered his fight with Eraserhead to me more of a high stakes spar.
Either way, the point remained that Akuji may derive joy from screwing over asshole heroes, but he had yet to chase one down and get stabby.
One outcome of this was Akuji, with the exception of Eraserhead, had yet to make an appearance in the flesh. Not much ‘out of the flesh’ anyway; some grainy footage here and there and physical descriptions from whatever losers had enough balls to describe him.
Giving some grand opening sort of introduction of himself to the heroes hadn’t really been on the agenda, or a checklist. He didn’t have either of those. But it’s wasn’t like he had been avoiding crossing paths with one; Izuku guessed their work hours didn’t line up.
But it looked like today was the day!
Izuku didn’t know much about the hero Mercury, she wasn’t on any of the top hero ratings, just enough to recognize who she was. He knew a lot more about Gentle Criminal, the guy was extremely ridiculous but he utilized his quirk fantastically. He was also, admittedly, a little amusing.
And he seemed to be injured; he was holding his right arm closer to his chest, though not against it. His left leg wasn’t moving well. Which was unfortunate for him, but helped Izuku remember the supposed hero. She used poison and tranquilizing darts (albeit low dosages), something that stuck out in Izuku’s memory because she shouldn’t need to; her quirk was powerful. Not that Izuku would ever say that out loud.
Mercury’s quirk made other people’s quirk usage either faster or shorter, which meant she could slow down someone’s quirk and make it easy to dodge or to counterattack, or she could speed up someone’s quirk like a sort of forced activation, making their ‘quirk limit’ come faster. With that kind of quirk, good reaction times, and planning, she’d be a force to recon with.
With not knowing much else about her, Izuku did not have really know if she fell on the ‘decent’ or ‘deceitful’ side of the ‘stupid dumbass heroes’ scale. He’d stab himself in the eye (the good one) if he ever fell in a copycat role of Stain’s. Not that Stain was any good at figuring out which heroes were corrupted. No, Izuku’s MO was more along the lines of: whatever the fuck I feel like.
Which currently was watching and taking in the situation.
Izuku was extremely disappointed to see Mercury’s heavy reliance on her tranq and poison darts. Izuku guessed she had an excessive amount of ammo, and or guns, from the flowing layers in her costume.
How lazy can you get?
Due to the way Gentle Criminal’s injured arm was still moving around while he tried to keep it close to his chest, Izuku would guess it was a poison dart that got him. Obviously, the leg, seized up and useless now, had been paralyzed. Gentle was dealing with that impressively. Izuku wondered if Mercury had used some kind of trick move since, from what Izuku remembered, Gentle Criminal excelled at evasion.
Either way, Izuku wondered if he should bother getting involved. He was hardly Gentle’s caretaker, and he didn’t have any reasons to give a shit about the Mercury chick.
She got another hit in and the (supposedly) gentlemanly criminal went down before he could figure out a way to work around having a total of no legs at his disposal. He still had some control over his quirk but Mercury used her speed side of her quirk to shorten the time he could hold up the protective barriers.
Izuku frowned. He knew he certainly wasn’t one to talk but she seemed excessively aggressive considering Gentle’s track record of hurting people was a big zero. Inconvenienced? Yes. Embarrassed? For sure. Caused messes and mayhem? Check. Hack and slash? Nope.
Gentle blocked his face getting smashed in by the back of her gun which seemed to piss her off.
What the fuck chill out lady. Izuku felt himself reach for Keres’ knife.
Mercury aimed a poison dart (it was now obvious which gun was which) at Gentle Criminal’s sternum, but Gentle managed to get a small shield to guard where it was going to hit.
Which was impressive but ended up not being necessary since she dropped the gun before she could pull the trigger. Also, she screamed. Most likely due to the knife sticking all the way through her wrist.
Oops. Izuku thought, that was Keres knife not one of the throwing knives.
It wasn’t a problem, he wasn’t going to have any trouble getting it back, it just revealed that the scene had irritated him.
Izuku didn’t overthink it and instead graced Mercury with a knife (the correct ones this time) in each shoulder. She gasped and stumbled backwards, during which Akuji was already had her in reach and sharp knuckles connected with her face.
There were a couple cracks there and it helped satisfy Izuku. Helped. Izuku sliced her forehead, more superficial than anything, which was fine; the purpose was just to obstruct her vision with blood.
While she was being a big baby about that and the other scratches, Akuji tore four dart guns off her, as well as the two she had been holding, and started crushing them with his boot. He made quick work of it.
Akuji looked down at Gentle Criminal, who gaped at him with wide eyes. He was sitting on the ground, or trying to anyway. His arm was obviously swollen and the paralysis in his legs was still keeping his movements limited.
Akuji tilted his head, “did the first dart hit your forearm? It seems to be spreading.”
“Ah, indeed it is. I’m not sure the full effect but it is concerning.” Gentle spoke smoothly as if this was a normal inconvenience.
“Here,” Izuku stepped closer and focused on Gentle Criminal’s shoulder.
Just a small blockage
Izuku tried to harden the smallest amount of blood in his upper arm that would keep the poison at bay. Gentle’s eyes darted to his shoulder surprised. Oops probablt should’ve asked first.
“Sorry, it feels weird.” Izuku said, “It’ll hurt if you move it a lot, but it’ll vastly slow down the poison from spreading.”
“It is greatly apricated.”
Izuku sensed something behind him and twisted to deliver a powerful kick.
His boot hit Mercury in her shoulder, which definitely was broken now, and she fell back to the ground gasping.
Pathetic.
Izuku gave her a kick to the head which ended any further potential interactions.
Izuku turned to the sound of rushed footsteps to see and pink haired girl running towards Gentle Criminal. She looked scared out of her mind and like she was about to cry.
Not scared for herself. Obviously.
“La Brava I assume?” Izuku asked when she had clasped to her knees beside the strange criminal even though she had yet to spare him a glance.
She looked at Izuku, “thank you! Oh thank you, that nasty woman should be-“
“La Brava.” Gentle interrupted, “we’ve talked about you coming onto the scene.”
Apparently, whatever had been discussed was not mutually agreed upon because La Brava karate chopped the top of his head. Small, no real damage afflicted, but hard enough to at least hurt a little.
Izuku watched as Gentle gasped dramatically and pouted.
La Brava scurried off without a word and Izuku turned to see her frisking Mercury.
Izuku turned away when La Brava lifted the asshole’s shirt and Gentle met his gaze.
He gave Izuku a nod, “a fellow gentleman I see.”
Izuku had absolutely no idea what to say to that.
“Ah ha!” La Brava came back around holding two vials and a needle.
When Gentle saw them he grimaced, “I’m sure there’s no need to try those, surely a hero wouldn’t need that many guns if a only a couple shots did any long term damage.”
Izuku scoffed, “heroes have no mercy.”
“Exactly,” La Brava agreed and then stabbed her partner’s poisoned arm with a needle. Gentle protested with a whine but didn’t move away. Izuku unhardened Gentle’s blood.
Izuku watched amused, “how did you know which antidote was in each vial?”
She pulled some liquid for the other vial and said, “I don’t,” and stabbed gentle in the same arm.
Not expecting that Izuku started laughing, “I like you,” he said as she continued injecting the liquids into his other limbs.
“The sentiment is returned,” she said business-like, “you really helped us out there.”
“I don’t hear that every day,” Izuku grinned easily.
---
Gentle Criminal also agreed with the ‘sentiments’ and La Brava demanded Izuku give her his phone so she could put her number in. She told him to contact her if he needed anything, though didn’t expound on what she could help with, too busy getting her partner to stand (which was more encouragement than lifting considering the height difference). She almost forgot to ask his name and Izuku smiled, ‘I’m Akuji’ he told her, and then Gentle Criminal complimented his fangs, calling them suave.
Which really didn’t make sense, but Izuku appreciated the compliment, nonetheless.
Izuku wasn’t sure how many third parties were involved in this group of five’s purchase of the quirk enhancing drug, but it probably was a lot. It didn’t really matter though, Izuku was more interested in the drug itself than the yazuka group it was coming from. ‘Trigger’, it was called, and it had produced some pretty impressive results.
Izuku was tempted to start a fight and give the idiots enough time to use the drug just to see it in real time, but ultimately decided he would rather collect a sample of it. He wasn’t going to waste time asking these guys questions; they obviously weren’t a part of the yakuza, so he was sure they knew nothing about how it worked.
Besides he didn’t want to get tangled up with them; yazuka’s, in general, could be a big pain in the ass. Didn’t mean Izuku didn’t keep track of them. Half the time their disputes with other crime organizations were really due to them wanting to prove they have the bigger dick. Still, some of them had higher standards - if you call it that - than others. Which is why Izuku had taken notice of the Shei Hassaikai’s ‘after school club’. It wasn’t that their belief systems changed, because Izuku was not about to waste time making lists of the different dumbass yazuka’s preferences but he he did keep track of their movements and Shei’s had started moving differently. And that was only interesting because the time and area coincided with the release of Trigger.
Izuku was far from the ground keeper of all things illegal in the neighboring cities, but he was curious by nature.
He sniffed around and found out that the leader had become bedridden and had been unconscious for some time. Izuku snorted, that answered that question. His next one was how were the members naive enough not to suspect foul play by this new Kai Chisaki fucker, but he didn’t expect to get that answer in this lifetime.
But, again, much more interesting than who was top dog in the nth self-proclaimed big shot competition was how the hell did trigger work? It was a fascinating question, and he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
Maybe that’s why he had gotten distracted?
Why he fucked up?
Maybe because it was five guys, five opponents, were, objectively, a lot to keep track of. After all, blood looked the same no matter the type.
Izuku was type O negative which meant he could give blood to anyone but could only receive blood from others who also have O negative (it was nice to feel wanted, even if it was only at blood donation centers). Straight forward and not really applicable to anything in his life.
Until now. Via his fuck up.
There were five. Izuku had used the same finishing move for all but one. The one that smelled like Endeavors armpit (Izuku was guessing; he had never, thankfully been there) was being so annoying that Izuku had to knock him out with brute force. The method the other four shared was suffocation. Simple trick of filling someone’s nose and mouth with blood and then solidifying it. Then you just waited until they blacked out.
Izuku used his own blood to do so with two of the four and then the blood from the guy he kicked it the back of his head (head wounds bleed so nicely) for the other two.
Sometimes slashing and all out beating the crap out of complete assholes was cathartic but other times he didn’t feel like putting in the effort, and there was just something so satisfying about taking the group down in seconds without them (except one this time) seeming to have sustained any injuries. Like an empty canvas.
None of this was a problem, Izuku softened and pulled the blood back so they wouldn’t have the merciful sweet relief of death and pulled his blood that he had used back into his body via the cut he made on the side of his neck that he had used to take it out. It was all fine and dandy until Izuku realized he had put the wrong blood inside himself.
Which was unideal as Izuku was not looking to deal with a hemolytic reaction and possibly dying. Not with that fancy sushi coupon unused (you didn’t even need to be in person to use it!). Izuku skipped the ‘panicking’ step in finding himself in this situation and pulled off a glove with his teeth. In retrospect that wasn’t a great idea since he almost punctured holes in it with his modified canines but the gloves (and fingers) survived and he pulled out his phone. His phone wasn’t the beast that his laptop was, but it was still homemade and it capable of many things; it wasn’t hard to hack into things (though having to work on a smaller screen was annoying).
He took a picture of the man whose blood was likely gearing up to play dodgeball with his own and it only took a minute to have all of his information up. O- wasn’t uncommon so maybe they were a match, and things wound be hunky dory.
AB+
That mother fucker. The fucking audacity.
Again, skipping the panic that wanted to hop around in his chest, Izuku quickly typed into his phone and started searching.
Trying to break into a hospital and treating himself and then escaping wasn’t possible, his symptoms would incapacitate him before he’d be able to succeed. Going to a hospital to actually get help was also off the table. The closest reasonable underground doctor was not reasonable enough for Izuku to feel comfortable just showing up – probably – on his way towards death. He liked to have a lot of information before letting anyone touch his body. Unfortunately, people didn’t have yelp reviews for this kinda a thing and even if they did Izuku doubted there’d be enough reviews for the averaged stars to be statically trustworthy.
In the end, Izuku didn’t have the luxury of being picky, not with his blood about to have a turf war, so he ran.
When he got to his destination and started explaining the problem to the doc he realized that he felt… perfectly fine. The doc (who said to call him ‘Hermy’ but there was no way Izuku was going to do so) asked Izuku to confirm how long it had been and Izuku checked his phone. Yup, he was right.
They paused, looking at each other, before the doc shrugged and said he’d check if everything was alright just in case.
Izuku was somewhat flabbergasted that he was and both he and the doc shared a look again. Izuku hated to be on the same wavelength as crazy doctors, but Izuku found himself already agreeing before the doctor could finish suggesting experimenting with other blood types.
Izuku wondered when being naturally curious was going to come back to bite him in the ass.
Izuku was surprised to get the text, ‘How was your week?’ from Shoto.
The arrangement had strongly alluded to only Izuku being the one to reach out, for multiple reasons, but it had hardly been a contract, and Shoto, well he did kinda do whatever he wanted. If he cared enough.
To be fair, Izuku hadn’t said anything for over two weeks, so he couldn’t really feel justified in scolding the other. It’s not that he wanted to avoid Shoto, he just hated when all he could think about was the hero in training’s little – almost shy – smirk. And his two-colored eyes, and his lips and yeah then he’d get really distracted, and he didn’t have a lot of faith in his personal control. Which would’ve been fine if a fuck up from himself didn’t have the potential to fuck up Shoto’s life. But he didn’t agree not to let go of the other boy to, well, let go of him. Which probably explained the little happy feeling he got and his quick response.
‘Can’t complain though I did have a scare with getting an incompatible blood type in me’
‘you are okay though, right? Did it end up being the right type after all?’
‘It didn’t, but I guess my body accepts all blood types’ Izuku paused than added, ‘it’s probably a quirk thing’
‘I’ve never asked, what is your quirk? If you feel okay telling me on text or at all. It’s okay if you don’t.’
Izuku knew Shoto was being genuine, that he wouldn’t hold anything against Izuku if Izuku didn’t want to share but…
He didn’t want to make Shoto sad, plus it wasn’t a big deal. Probably. His mind wasn’t being annoying at the moment by screaming at him otherwise.
And it made Izuku a little sad that his actions with Shoto made Shoto feel like he had to add on the disclaimer.
‘I can manipulate blood, but I haven’t started using it until recently, that’s kinda complicated.’
It may have been the weed Izuku was using to lessen the physical pain (not from any new injuries; just remnants of old injuries that never seemed to fully go away) that made him less cagey about sharing information. He didn’t want to get high, he knew people did stupid things while high and Izuku recognized, with his way of life, getting stupid was getting dead. But he still appreciated the pleasant feeling. Though he figured that was a bit hypocritical since he was all for sight-seeing when tipsy.
Weed or not, Izuku thought, it’s Shoto and he deserves to know anything he wants. Or, at least, whatever won’t put him in danger or extra danger? Extra not cool danger? Whatever.
As far as the Akuji persona was concerned, Izuku had ultimately decided against telling Shoto about his new identity because there was no way his (boy?)friend wouldn’t get in trouble if he was found out keeping information about Akuji from the police. But Izuku felt that telling Shoto his quirk wasn’t damning him.
‘Wow, that’s cool.’ Shoto responded. ‘The hero teacher of 1-B has a quirk like that too.’
Vlad King, Izuku knew. He snorted into the quiet space of his basement home.
‘Yeah, mine is better than his, like I do all sorts of cool shit with it. But I do wish I had his resistance to blood loss’ He may have been a bit salty about that.
Izuku sent a follow up text, ‘but its just a quirk, quirks aren’t important.’
After sending it he re-read it. He frowned.
Hopefully that doesn’t offend Shoto, since his quirk actually is fantastic
‘I agree. Quirks are used as much as an excuse than they are used to help people.’ Shoto sent another text, ‘And hurt people’
Izuku felt his chest warm, of course Shoto fuckin gets it, shouldn’t have doubted otherwise
‘Exactly, damn one of my favorite things about you is how easily you see through bullshit you’re the most refreshing person I know’
‘I appreciate the compliment, but it’s not hard to see through when you were born for the purpose of having a certain quirk.’
Izuku smiled, ‘sure but you were born as deep into hero culture as you could get, don’t sell yourself sort.’
‘Can we meet up soon?’
The proposition made him giddy and Izuku, though he knew he shouldn’t, responded, ‘fuck yes’
I wonder what he’ll think about the fangs.
Shoto liked the fangs.
It took Izuku four days straight (not bothering to sleep) to certify himself as a professional chemist. In theory anyway, despite how many textbooks and other information he was able to consume he had yet to pick up a beaker. Or, really, move much in general; an unfortunate side affect of becoming absorbed so deeply into something.
He had the motivation to do it with the five trigger-filled syringes in his possession begging to have their secrets uncovered.
All he needed now was a lab to do his thing. Izuku went to type on the keyboard again, but his hands missed the correct keys. He lifted them to give them a good look and saw them shaking.
Or right, food. Izuku looked down at the three granola bar wrappers at his feet and the empty plastic water bottle. He was pretty sure that was what he had been running on for the last forty-eight plus hours. Water would also be a good idea.
After eating (nothing all that nutritious, he would have to hit the connivence store again) and drinking some water, Izuku took a sharpie to a concrete wall and drew a master’s in chemistry diploma. He grinned at his own joke and patted the drawing fondly before plopping down back on his chair in front of his laptop.
Next step; find a lab to ‘rent’
He didn’t think that there was much customer demand for said lab renting, but he wasn’t looking for such a strait laced (and traceable) hypothetical service. It was much easier to pick a place, show up, and use whatever persuasion method fit best for the situation.
So, after a rejuvenating rest of eleven hours of sleep, he did just that.
The lovely place Izuku invited himself over was the home of a successful chemist. All research and experimental work, he wasn’t a part of the applied setting. Which is probably why he had his personal little lab connected to his house. Izuku thought it was pretty cool. When he showed up at 2:00 am he decided to knock on the door. Which felt really weird.
No one answered so Izuku felt that was his cue to come in. He broke the lock and opened the door, shutting it behind himself and turning on the light. Just as Izuku was going to go hunt down the lab by himself, an alarmed looking middle-aged man in sleep clothes entered the room. Saburou Murata. He had his phone clutched in his hand and Izuku figured it was already on the call screen.
“Who are you, what are you doing in my house?” His voice wasn’t commanding but at least he wasn’t stuttering or anything. Not that he should have been; Izuku had dressed free of knives (that you could see) and of anything else that screamed ‘I will eat you.’ Maybe the thin medical mask covering the bottom half of his face and the thick square white eye patch painted a strange picture but there was only so much you can do.
“My name isn’t relevant, and I’ve come to make a deal.”
Unsurprisingly Saburou chose deal, or, rather, the option number one which included Saburou not being knocked out (Izuku had brought some chloroform in case Saburou wanted to avoid head trauma), and instead swore on his life to pretend this never happened, or at least to never speak of it to anyone.
Izuku told Saburou he could join him in the lab if he wanted but was surprised when the chemist actually did so, albeit at the other side of the room. Izuku supposed that the lab must mean a lot to him. Or maybe the guy felt he wasn’t going to get any sleep anyway.
To his credit Izuku made sure to be very careful and clean with the man’s things; he wasn’t an animal.
When the quirk destroying drug hit the streets Izuku didn’t even try to stop himself from delving into the dangerous mystery. If he had been curious how trigger worked, Izuku was absolutely foaming at the mouth to know how to make something that could do that. And how did someone discover a compound that could do it? Izuku didn’t give much attention to the niggling thought that whoever was making it might be trying to create one that would have permanent quirk cancelling effect, but he did acknowledge that that could be unideal. Depending on how it would be used, of course. If nothing else there was a reality that could create the kind of anarchy that Izuku did not prefer. After all, what was the point of mayhem if it was monopolized?
That was getting a little too close to philosophy than Izuku was tolerable of, besides he didn’t have it in him to care about ‘what if’s’. Crossing the bridge when he came to it hadn’t failed him yet. Sort of. So, he decided to simply indulge in his curiosity.
He would’ve preferred to go straight to the streets like he had with trigger but decided against it since these bullets weren’t exactly being distributed in the dozens like trigger, in fact only a few had been fired, and Izuku didn’t want to attract attention for something potentially bigger than he was willing to take on. The first thing he needed to do was find out where the bullets were coming from. Going out and asking would likely draw attention to himself, and if he decided to take offensive action for some reason in the future, he’d need the element of surprise. So, fighting sitting down in front of his computer in his basement home, it was.
It was a quicker fight than he expected. Really, he was starting with ruling out Shei’s yazuka since trigger had come from them, and, well, it wasn’t ruling out. To be sure he wasn’t making connections that formed from subconscious bias Izuku proceeded like the yazuka group didn’t exist. But when the trail returned to them again, he guessed he just lucked out.
Not lucked out, Izuku didn’t like that phrase because it seemed like even thinking it was cajoling the luck monster to come down and it make up with a mountain of misfortune. Like Karma for daring to go out of his lane full of potholes.
No, he’d rather calling the fruits of boy scout level preparation (hypothetically, Izuku was pretty sure actual boy scouts forgot to pack underwear when going camping).
Either way, the result was the same, those crazy fuckers were responsible for this too.
Izuku couldn’t find any inklings on where the next bullet would appear so, while he was waiting for a whisper, he decided to see if he could figure it out how the bullets worked by himself. He was a personal renowned chemist after all. He hashed out theories and quickly disproved them or furthered them with his fingers non-stop typing. He didn’t eat for the full first day and only realized it after he threw up his homemade alcoholic cocktail he had drank before bed. He fixed the ‘forgot to eat problem’ by not actually fixing it and going to bed.
He went shopping in the morning after telling himself he could only smoke once he finished. He wore his big white eye patch, and a baseball hat tilted down. He mentally patted himself on the back for getting bread and peanut butter, that was like three food groups, right?
Another two days and Izuku’s frustration on not making progress on the compounds of the quirk cancelling bullet was starting to mount. Being pissy and not getting out wasn’t a great mix so Izuku couldn’t help but consider just going and kidnapping some Hassaikai yakuza guy and make him spill. However, the fact that managing to find anyone high enough on the totem pole to know anything was very unlikely helped Izuku resist the urge.
Plus, these yakuza people were all about ‘not talking’ and Izuku wasn’t interested in torture. Sure some people deserved a painful death, though Izuku was pretty sure he hadn’t administered one yet, he didn’t bother to keep tabs on the few he left to die. Izuku was confident that being locked up like a dumb animal was worse than death, and Izuku wasn’t letting some of the assholes he had come across get the easy way out.
(Don’t get caught)
Izuku didn’t think about why the idea of torture make him sick to his stomach or why he didn’t feel privy to trying his hand at it.
Besides, he had met up with Shoto (the second time since he revealed his fucked up face) a couple days ago and he highly doubted his boyfriend (yes they had fucking confirmed it, hell fucking yeah) would approve. Izuku didn’t think Shoto would judge him or even be disappointed if Izuku went that far for something if it could be justified, but he might be a little put off if Izuku started pulling off fingernails just to sate his curiosity.
It was mute point; Izuku was sure he wouldn’t do it even if he was in the worst of moods. Which was saying something since he knew his moods could get a bit swingy.
Izuku had come to complete dead ends in trying to put together what the hell the bullets were composed of, so he was stuck waiting. It was a horrible thing.
Luckily Izuku picked up some noise before he started chewing on the furniture like a dog (not that he really had much). It was more whispers than anything else, definitely not solid enough for Izuku to know that someone would be showing up and start firing bullets, maybe not even enough evidence to warrant visiting the area but Izuku had a feeling someone would be showing up.
Lady luck must have been preoccupied and not keeping tabs on Izuku (to keep him from touching her luck supply) because people did.
Getting the quirk-cancelling bullets (there ended up being three) was harder than collecting trigger, as the people who had it weren’t run of the mill nobodies. Which wasn’t surprising. Despite that it went much better (no ‘holy shit am I fucked’ moments) than the trigger collection activity and Izuku felt both accomplished and giddy as he brought it back.
Izuku figured that he and Saburou Murata were tight enough that he just come in (break in) to his house and to the lab to get to work. He highly doubted Saburou had forgotten the ‘deal’ Izuku had laid out during his last visit.
Izuku was still there when day light broke, and Saburou opened the door to his lab looking somewhat distressed.
Before he could say anything Izuku spoke, lifting a glass with the smallest amount of liquid in it, “Saburou, you are not going to believe this fucking shit.”
After an animated explanation of the components of the quirk nullifying serum (which had the actual owner of the lab looking concerned for a different reason) Izuku efficiently cleaned up, gave Saburou a polite bow of thanks for renting out his lab again (the man didn’t accept the cash, which was fair), and Izuku decided someone else should know about what he found.
***
My dear hardworking Eraserhead,
I appreciate you accepting my invitation to meet the other night and enjoyed getting to know you better. I hope my enthusiasm did not come off too strong. It is this appreciation that I’m sending this message which is, what the fuck are you guys doing? I swear to all things good and holy I’d expect you to be making more progress with the quirk enhancing AND erasing bullets. I ran into some bullet carrying clowns and they donated some to me - or at least I’m sure they would’ve if they were conscious, anyway I was curious so I took a look and, I’ll admit I was a little tiny surprised. So I checked in to y’all’s progress and well I think you can infer what I did, or rather didn’t, find, since I’m having to send this message.
There were a lot of concerning ‘ingredients’ in both trigger and the bullet but the one I wanted to share with you is the human DNA found in the bullets. From the three samples I collected the DNA was from the same person which makes me think this person’s quirk situation has something to do with it. There’s no match to someone with the DNA in the database, or at least in Japan. Anywho, this is just a physical, or verbal?, manifestation of me face palming at your information gathering skills.
At least you know where it’s coming from. Not that that was exactly a brain teaser.
Anyway! You’re welcome, and maybe next time we meet we can lower the energy level and share some tea; I do hate property damage after all.
Also, the bird is going to explode in five, wait four, seconds!”
Not doubting it, Eraserhead grabbed the electronic bird, broke his window, and threw it out as hard as he could. The bird did explode and, despite now having to deal with a broken window, Aizawa was glad to have avoided a doctor visit and having to repair half of the living room.
He was singed, sure, but it was to be expected with Akuji’s compulsive need to ‘leave a mark’ everywhere he went. Maybe they should move.
The window would have to wait, Aizawa had a call to make.
***
Izuku had not been planning any further personal interference with the yazuka’s quirk manipulating extravaganza. His curiosity was sated enough for now and, like all things, it really wasn’t his problem.
The human DNA, blood probably, thing was a little unsettling only because of the itch in the back of his mind that gave an image of someone being tied to a chair in order to get the blood from them. It was annoying because there was no evidence that whoever it was wasn’t voluntarily giving up some blood. It was just blood after all. Boohoo if a dude had to be poked with a needle everyday.
So, the whole thing was put into rest in Izuku’s mind.
For a total of six days.
He hadn’t been looking for information, he hadn’t cared about the shady men walking along the back roads, he wasn’t planning on listening in to their conversation, but as he was passing by (as undetectable as ever) the words he caught made him pause.
“Well, the blood is from a kid you know, kids can’t lose as much blood. She’s what five, six?”
“It doesn’t matter how old she is or how much blood they take because the boss just, you know, explodes her and then brings her back with how much blood she had before they took it.”
Okay what the fuck?
“Well, yeah,” the other man said, “I guess that makes sense. So, it’s probably creating the bullets, putting it all together or something, that takes so much time.”
“Wish it was easier, it’d be fun to go around shutting down people’s quirks.”
The other man rolled his eyes, “what would be the point of that? It honestly has nothing to do with us.” He paused, “doubt the boss would want us discussing it, anyway, only a few of us have even seen the girl.” He sounded a bit smug.
The other man gave him an unimpressed look, “pretty sure being in charge of bringing food to the girl’s cell isn’t a meaningful position.”
“Hey, she’s the boss’s most prized possession right? I don’t know how her quirk works but I get the idea that people would kill to be able to use it. If the boss has me doing things near her, he trusts me enough not to worry that I’d go babbling about what’s going on.”
“And yet here you are.”
“That-”
“Besides,” the other guy interrupted, “with him I feel like it’s less about trust, and more about no one wanting to get slaughtered by one of his bullets.”
Izuku was done listening, he ran back to his home, his thoughts whipping around, teeth clenched, and a burning fire going wild his chest.
Izuku briefly thought about reaching out to Eraserhead again, but he remembered what one of the men had said; “people would kill to be able to use it” use her. Eraserhead was just a hero who saved people, he didn’t get to decide what happened to the people afterwards. No, Izuku was sure that the hero commission would be on top of that like vultures on a carcass and Izuku knew exactly what the commission liked to do with vulnerable kids with shiny quirks.