Michi raised his hand to knock on Principal Nezu's office door, taking a deep breath. Before he knocked, there was a ding as a small light on the lock turned green.
"You may come in," he heard Nezu say. He gulped nervously.
"Hey, you wanted to see me?" he asked politely, bowing slightly at the waist.
"Yes, yes. Now, take a seat young Midoriya, I'll be right with you."
Midoriya nodded, walking away to sit down. He made it two steps before he froze, slowly turning around to look at the principal and expertly hiding his shock.
"Ah, it's Hamasaki, sir," he said with a bashful grin, like it was an innocent mistake that he'd just caught. Of course, no amount of acting could fool Nezu at this point.
"No, I don't believe it is," the small mammal disagreed, still smiling calmly like he wasn't flipping Midoriya's world upside down and throwing him in danger. "You are quite the interesting puzzle, Izuku Midoriya." Nezu's smile grew wider, a slightly maniacal gleam in his eyes.
Before Midoriya could say anything else, he continued. "Your disguise, your acting, and even your ability to let slip certain truths to mislead others is quite extraordinary, but you weren't careful enough. Did you know that the style of martial arts you practice is illegal to teach outside of the military?" Nezu said, asked to get visibly excited. "You've also been quite conveniently situated to publicize yourself every time we've had an incident, have you not?"
Midoriya, while inwardly panicking, was actually a bit excited. Nezu was every bit as intelligent as he was rumored to be, and his obsessive information-gathering tendencies were really coming in handy. But not as handy as Shigaraki, HA—bad time for jokes, Midoriya.
Either way, his current orders made it so he couldn't confirm what Nezu was saying, even though he'd like to.
"I'm sorry, but I'm not sure what you're talking about," he said, laughing uncomfortably.
"I've respected your privacy, even, just to add to the challenge!" Nezu went on, cackling. "I have no way to intrude on Todoroki's panic room, so I haven't a clue what transpired inside. However, after that incident, you were much less careful about where you spilled your secrets. You confided to Mina in Gym Gamma that you are in fact the vigilante known as the Savior, and the girl Eri that you refer to as your adoptive sister is the girl you saved from Shie Hassaikai."
Midoriya was dismayed. Don't get him wrong, it was a good thing that all this was coming out, but it was embarrassing how incompetent he was when it came to keeping important secrets.
Nezu still wasn't done. "I worked out your connection with the League of Villains through your interestingly significant involvement wherever they appeared. This was only solidified when Monoma confronted you about your multiple quirks earlier today. From there, it was a simple matter to connect the League's portal quirk to your strange interactions with young Bakugo concerning Izuku Midoriya, which revealed your identity! Just to check, I called you by your name without any warning when you came in, and you responded without question. Now, did I miss anything?"
"Yeah, you missed the part about how badass I am as a vigilante. Can't say I'm involved with the villains, though." That was fully accurate. He physically couldn't admit that he was a part of the League. Nezu sighed.
"Well, I actually expected this somewhat. Come in, Nighteye."
Sir Nighteye, the hero that Midoriya had fought as the Savior, entered the room. He glared down at Midoriya, who shifted uncomfortably.
"Hello, Izuku Midoriya," Sir Nighteye said, taking a seat and steepling his fingers underneath his chin. "Care to explain why my quirk doesn't work on you?"
Midoriya took a second to process the question. Then, "Fuck!" Midoriya buried his head in his hands, feeling frustration well up inside him.
"Watch your language, and answer the question," Nighteye demanded, coolly professional.
"It seriously didn't work?" Midoriya asked, making Sir Nighteye's eyebrows raise slightly. "You didn't look into my future? I thought you let me go after you read my future and saw—"
Midoriya cut himself off with a choke. He scowled. "I guess I can't say his name in front of two pro heroes," he said.
"That name being All For One?" Sir Nighteye filled in for him. Midoriya's head snapped up, and Sir took that as confirmation. "As expected, you're under a mind control quirk, or possibly more than one. It's impressive that you've retained as much freedom as you have, but you obviously can't disobey direct orders such as being forbidden to give away information. Although I failed to use my quirk on you as you intended, I've pieced together enough from your intentions to find out what you tried to tell me."
Midoriya sulked, slumping in his seat. "But you still don't know where the headquarters are," he sighed. "And I'll be obligated to keep you from finding out will all my power."
"All of your power isn't nearly enough," Nezu finally spoke up, sounding apologetic. "Your acceptance letter showed us exactly where you live."
Midoriya just shook his head. "He never actually comes there," he said. "He stays with the lab. I went there directly after talking with Nighteye, but I haven't been since."
"Hmm," Nezu said, his eyes lighting up. "Well, it appears another challenge has arisen!"
Midoriya just nodded, clutching the fabric of his uniform pants in his clenched fists. "Yeah... Uh, I don't know what you're planning, but if you try to make a move or expose me right now, I'm going to die," he said bluntly. Sir Nighteye's eyes widened slightly, and Nezu just chuckled.
"We've decided to keep this between us for various reasons," Nezu said, sipping his tea. "Until we can guarantee yours and Eri's safety, we won't make our move. However—"
Nezu cut himself off, looking quite annoyed. "Ah, it appears we have a visitor. This conversation will need to take a quick break."
Just as he finished talking, the door flew open and Hawks slid into the room dramatically, wind rushing around him. "Hey," he said with a smirk.
"Welcome, Keigo. I see you are as polite as ever," Nezu said, taking another sip from his teacup. To Hawks' credit, he didn't piss his pants and run from the passive-aggressive aura Nezu was projecting at him. Midoriya wasn't sure if it was further to his credit or just because he was stupid, but the hero didn't actually react at all. He either had impressive self-control, or he was impressively stupid. Considering this was Hawks, he'd go with the second one.
No, he was just kidding. Hawks was awesome.
"Oh, hey kid! I just got done talking to you a second ago. How's it going?" Hawks said once he spotted him. Falling firmly into his Michi persona, he raised his eyebrows coolly.
"Oh, did you?"
Hawks winked at him. "No need to be so cool, bro. The other you already told me that you're a huge fan of mine. Actually, it's a good thing I saw you; the reason I found the other you and Eri was because I overheard some guy in the audience make a call and say to tell Overhaul that he found Eri, and I wanted to check it out."
"Fuck," Michi said in front of multiple heroes for the second time in five minutes.
"Yeah, I'm starting an investigation and you already told me everything you know, so if you could let me speak with Nezu for a minute, I have another challenge for him," Hawks said, looking meaningfully at the principal. Nezu looked like a kid on Christmas.
"Oh, it must be my lucky day! Hawks, this challenge better be as good as the last one you brought me..."
Michi didn't hear anything else as he was ushered out of the room. He sighed, feeling like he was about to explode. Maybe he should take a nap? Yeah, that sounded nice.
* * *
Kaminari was hanging out with Shoto and Kacchan after the sports festival was over, and the atmosphere was surprisingly friendly. Kirishima was there as well, of course, as well as Momo, Ochako, Mina, Kyoka, and Sero.
"Yo, we should go find Mei and Shinso, and we can all go out for some food or something!" Kaminari suggested.
"Yeah, let's celebrate!" Mina agreed enthusiastically, jumping up and pumping her fist. "I'll ask the rest of our classmates too, but they seemed like they already had plans."
Kaminari agreed, and soon they had Hatsume, Shinso, and Toru joining them. "Any ideas on where to go?" Jiro asked. "We've got a group of..." she counted quickly, "twelve, so it has to be somewhere that can fit all of us. Preferably at the same table."
After a minute of discussing, Shinso spoke up reluctantly. "I know a place, but I don't know if it'll really be your guys' style. It's a cat cafe a couple miles away, and it has a huge booth in one of the corners that could fit all of us. Depends on if you're into that kind of thing, though."
"I like it," Kaminari and Mina said at the same time. They glared at each other playfully before turning to the rest of the class.
"What do you guys think?" Mina asked.
The general consensus was that it sounded good, so they all made their way there. Shoto had to take a minute to tell his father, but after his display earlier with his fire, Endeavor was happy to reward him with a little meal with his class. They all hopped on a train together, following Shinso's lead.
"Jeez, this train is crowded," Jiro grumbled as everyone shifted, trying to give each other some room.
"Uh huh," Kaminari said intelligently as she was pushed against him. His brain was malfunctioning worse than usual, which was impressive with his ADHD combined with probably electrical brain damage.
"Don't talk out loud. You lower the IQ of the whole street," Jiro quipped, and Kaminari's eyes lit up.
"You actually watch Sherlock?" Kaminari asked excitedly. It was really old, now, but it was still a gem.
Jiro grinned. "That's the first time anyone's gotten the reference. Good on you."
Kaminari laughed. Did he get any brownie points for that? He suddenly remembered that the crowd still had Jiro pushed right up against his chest, and his brain shut down again. The train was too loud with all of those people to really have a conversation, which is the only reason that Kaminari wasn't a stuttering mess the whole time. Can't stutter if you don't talk—life hack.
They got off the bus after a few minutes and walked to the cafe, and once they arrived, Kaminari realized that he was going to be coming to this cafe again in the future. It had the perfect blend of chill and lazy but with enough stimulus to keep his brain on track, and the retro, wooden design made him happy.
As soon as he found his seat in the booth that Shinso had been talking about, two cats made themselves at home on his lap and over his shoulders. Kaminari smiled, trying not to disturb them as he ordered himself a coffee.
He only made a fool of himself probably five times during the conversation, and Kacchan only got them almost kicked out twice. He relaxed against the back of his seat as the other students slowly started trickling out. Soon, it was just him, Mina, Shoto, Jiro, and Shinso.
"We should've invited Michi," Denki realized. Mina groaned as realized she'd forgotten, and the others chuckled slightly.
"I was with him just after the festival ended, but he got called in to see Nezu," Mina grumped.
"Oh, I remember that. I heard it on the intercom. What do you think it was about?" Denki mused.
"My guess is Nezu is getting a head start on offering him an internship," Shoto said matter-of-factly. "After organizing that whole training thing, Nezu might have recognized Michi's fighting style in everyone and been impressed."
"Maybe he plagiarized an essay," Shinso offered. Everyone else snorted.
"That would be hilarious," Jiro said, grinning. "He's really going for the top spot, you know? Everything down the drain, gets expelled because he plagiarized a homework assignment."
There was silence for a beat. "Hey, do you guys... ever get super worried about Michi for no reason?" Denki asked, a frown forming on his lips. "Like, you just look at him and his eyes look like his soul has been shattered and duct-taped back together?"
"That was... really poetic, Denki," Jiro said, raising her eyebrows. He flushed slightly but refused to back down.
"I'm not kidding, guys," Kaminari insisted. "We don't know anything about his life at home except that he has a little sister that basically got tortured before getting adopted. Have you guys seen the scars on his upper arms? He avoids the locker room, but I've seen a couple times. How bad does a wound have to be in order to scar with Michi's insane Regeneration?"
"Yeah, I worry about him," Shoto said after a moment. "He can handle himself, but he tends to relentlessly throw himself into danger. It's troublesome."
Mina nodded slowly, and Kaminari got the feeling that those two knew more about the situation than he did. He didn't let himself get hurt by it; he's always been the background friend, after all. It still stung.
"Michi is so mysterious," Jiro said, drumming her fingers against the table absently. Maybe Kaminari was the only one that noticed, but she had perfect rhythm even just fidgeting. It was one of the many awesome things about Kyoka Jiro. "I feel like his personality is... different to how he looks," she admitted. "His face is so pretty in such a harsh way, but his personality is more soft and fluffy. He's still a badass, but do you guys know what I mean?"
Denki noticed that Mina and Shoto kept their expressions very carefully neutral.