Okay, so I'm not actually sure how long the work studies are supposed to be. One source said the second work study lasted 3 months but I feel like that's a bit much for the first time, so we'll just go with a month.
Sasuke wakes up, anxious and unsettled like he often is after a nightmare. Thankfully, he has no recollection of this one other than the phantom feeling of hands in places they shouldn't be.
A quick check of the time tells him that it's early, 5:00am early, so there isn't much he can do yet. Aizawa and Yamada are surely still asleep, as is Eri.
Sasuke sighs, exhausted. He just wants to get out of here already. In a few months, it'll be a year since he first got to Japan and in his personal opinion, that's 12 months too many.
Sure, he's appreciative of all the things the people here have done for him, but he'd like it much better if they hadn't had to do them at all.
(He ignores the part in him that's disgustingly grateful for Aizawa and Yamada staying the whole time, despite his... everything. The events of yesterday only confirmed that these people are kind, kind in a way that can't be found in the Elemental Nations, the type of kind that Konoha likes to rip from its citizens. It's different from Naruto because as much as Sasuke knows Naruto cares about him, he's never actually listened to him. Not once. And that's okay because Sasuke knows his decision making skills are god-awful but it's still nice to feel like an actual person instead of something the cat dragged in when speaking to someone.)
The embarrassment and deep self-loathing only begin to settle in when Sasuke thinks of his... for lack of a better term, tantrum yesterday.
The thing is that even if someone like that woman had appeared in the Elemental Nations, Sasuke wouldn't have shut down. There's something about this place that's making him soft and he doesn't know how to fix it. He still exercises the same way he did but that's only physical. Mentally, his mind is beginning to unravel and he'd very much appreciate it if it didn't.
Setting those thoughts aside for now, Sasuke gets to his feet and goes about the motions of starting his day. He brushes his teeth, changes his clothes, and tries to regain some semblance of normalcy.
He feels stilted, like he's a sentence someone couldn't say. It makes him twitchy and a bit more paranoid than he can reasonably justify.
(The cynical part of him, which is most of him, is expecting Aizawa and Yamada to tear into him for what he did yesterday. The softer part is begging him to apologize so that doesn't happen.)
So, he steps into the living room and is relieved to find no one in it. They're all asleep, like he expected.
Coward.
He ambles around the kitchen aimlessly, knowing he should make breakfast but also aware that he would not eat it. Eventually, he settles for a glass of water.
Once the water is drained, which takes far more time than it should, he spends several minutes deciding whether or not to summon Sana.
He does, in the end.
He chokes through an explanation of what happened and is glad to find fierce protectiveness in Sana's eyes, because Sana knows him. Sana knows Sasuke maybe better than he knows himself.
"This place is good for you." Sana says eventually. "They support you in ways you could not find in Konoha."
Sasuke nods. He agrees, but this place isn't his reality. For him, it's an idea of what could be, despite its flaws.
"I can't stay, you know that."
"I know. I would not ask you to. I only ask that you take advantage of what they have here while you can."
Fair enough.
Sasuke inhales, exhales, and squares his shoulders.
It's okay if he takes a little longer, he thinks.
It's okay if he puts himself above the needs of people he can't even reach, just for a little bit. For as long as he can bear it until the guilt sets into his bones like it's always been there.
Just for now.
~~~
"Good morning." Aizawa greets. It's nearly 6am now. Yamada is in the bathroom doing unspeakable things to his hair while Aizawa makes breakfast.
Sasuke opens his mouth to say something but chokes on his words and has to clear his throat. "I... apologize fo-"
"No. None of that. It's okay." Aizawa interrupts with a soft voice that would usually make Sasuke twitch with irritation. "I don't hold it against you, since it wasn't your fault. You have nothing to apologize for."
Sasuke nods slowly and the room lapses into silence. The door to the bathroom clicks open and Yamada enters with a smile on his face.
"Hey, little listener." They wave and thankfully don't ask any questions about yesterday. Instead, he helps set the table and offers mindless chatter until they sit down to eat.
Breakfast is mostly silent, with the exception of a few words exchanged to confirm schedules.
"You'll be okay for the internship?" Aizawa asks, and Sasuke can't find it in him to be annoyed at the lack of faith in his abilities because he knows it's not that. He can't bring himself to harbour ill-will towards the man who stood by him for nearly 4 hours and listened to him speak like the words he was saying mattered.
"I'll be fine." Sasuke replies, his tone softer than he thought possible.
"Alright." Yamada replies, a gentle smile on their face. "We'll be here if you need us."
There's a brief pause where everyone collects their thoughts before Aizawa changes the subject.
"You're going with Tokoyami, right?"
"We discussed it, yes." But they didn't actually end up going over any of the specifics, so Sasuke will probably end up hanging around in the common room in the dorms, which he doesn't mind as much as he did before. He hasn't had much time to interact with his classmates and while he doesn't really mind, he is somewhat interested to see how different their mindsets are from someone the same age in The Elemental Nations.
Yamada hands him a bento, which Sasuke puts in his bag, feeling very much like he did during his first year at the Academy when his mother was still alive enough to make his lunches.
With that, he teleports into the dorms.
He doesn't spend a lot of time there, not when the soundproofing in the teacher's dorms is so much better.
(–and he doesn't have to come home to an empty room, but he's used to that by now so it doesn't matter.
It doesn't.)
There's one other person in the common room, Bakugou Katsuki, if Sasuke's memory serves him correctly which it usually does.
"Jesus fucking-" Bakugou visibly startles, nearly falling out of his chair with shock. "When the fuck did you get there?"
"4 seconds ago." Sasuke replies, trying not to relish in the irritation that takes over Bakugou's face.
"And you couldn't use the stairs like a normal damn extra?"
"No." Sasuke moves to sit on the couch and Bakugou scoffs.
Sasuke is abruptly reminded of Deidara and has to push that thought away before he can think on it for any longer.
They are remarkably similar, though.
It's around 7am now. Students begin to trickle in, yawning and stretching. All of them startle when they see Sasuke, which is fair enough since he's never around. They don't pester him or do much, though, which is nice.
Tokoyami is the 6th person to come down, excluding Bakugou and Sasuke.
"I realized we had not formalized a meeting spot or time, I apologize if you waited long." Tokoyami says politely.
"It's as much my fault as it is yours." Which is true. He wasn't planning on ditching Tokoyami so he really should've made a bit more of an effort to get the details. It worked out fine, in the end. He was... occupied, anyway.
Tokoyami nods slightly before grabbing a glass of water from the kitchen. "I won't need much longer to get ready. I need only get my bags."
Sasuke notes that Tokoyami says nothing about Sasuke's very obvious lack of luggage, despite his curiosity on the subject.
Sasuke inclines his head and Tokoyami disappears back up the stairs.
Some of his classmates glance at him, but don't ask questions. Clearly they've gained some tact since Sasuke was originally here as Hatake Kakashi.
"So, you're going with Tokoyami to Fukuoka?" Kirishima asks with a smile, having none of the reservations that the rest of his classmates have.
"I am." Sasuke replies, before somewhat awkwardly adding, "I hope that the experience is educational."
"That's cool!" Kirishima says, bulldozing past Sasuke's social awkwardness. "I'm going to Fat Gum's Agency in Esuha. He's super manly and one of the third years here is going there too!"
Esuha and Fukuoka are both south west, but Esuha is in the Kansai region so it's further along than Fukuoka is.
Fat Gum is 58 on the hero ranking chart, not that it really matters. The charts are mostly based on who's most popular and which of them fits the most widely accepted definition of "hero".
Kirishima continues to talk, clearly used to somewhat one-sided conversations. He tells Sasuke who's going where and doing what with which hero, which is informative since Sasuke hadn't really cared enough to listen when his classmates were talking about it previously.
Tokoyami returns 10 minutes after he left, pulling a suitcase and carrying a backpack on his shoulders.
Aizawa and All Might briefly appear to see the students off and verify their methods of travel, and then they're off.
They end up walking to a train station to take the bullet train. The trip is roughly 6 hours, so Sasuke ended up packing a few books.
Tokoyami is the more social of the two of them, but not by very much. He spends the walk there occasionally filling the silence with his own experiences, having worked with Hawks before, and telling Sasuke what to expect.
It's around 8am when they get on the train, and the train ride passes in a similar manner to the walk to the station. Sasuke listens as Tokoyami gives him a brief summary of everything he missed, being a transfer student. Sasuke knows all of this but he listens anyway. Tokoyami doesn't speak much, clearly used to summarizing long-winded stories into a few short sentences.
They have lunch on the train and Sasuke orders fish with rice while Tokoyami orders meat that looks nearly uncooked. Dietary restrictions, Tokoyami explains. Sasuke is eating fish over red meat for similar reasons.
It's late in the morning when they step off the train in Fukuoka. They get off at Tenjin station, which isn't too far from the Agency building. Tokoyami explained on the way over that the Agency has 3 main buildings with several smaller ones. The office, the gymnasium, and the sleeping quarters. The office building is exactly what it sounds like. A 15 storey building equipped with state of the art computers and known as one of the most efficient dispatch systems in Japan. The gymnasium has everything from a swimming pool to a spot for high ropes. The sleeping quarters are pretty bare bones. A bed, bathroom, mini fridge, and microwave. The sleeping quarters also have a cafeteria, so the residents don't end up doing much cooking.
"Shall we take a taxi or are you okay with walking?" Tokoyami asks. The walk is only 12 minutes, and the drive would probably take longer given the traffic.
"We can walk." Sasuke agrees and they set off.
They walk along the busy street, the city bustles around them. They cross a large, concrete bridge that creates a passage over a river and almost have to shove their way through crowds of tourists taking pictures over the river.
"Fukuoka became an even larger tourist attraction after Hawks debuted." Tokoyami says, a small amount of irritation in his voice.
They approach the second bridge, which is, in Sasuke's opinion, much nicer looking than the first one. Instead of concrete, there's more greenery surrounding the water. The water looks much better maintained, which makes sense because this river is smaller.
After 2 more minutes of walking, they stop in front of the Agency.
The layout of the entire Agency is like a triangle, with the office building being the only access point to civilians.
Sasuke wonders where the heroes get all their money from.
They walk through a revolving door and are immediately greeted by a woman.
"Tokoyami, welcome back!" She smiles at Tokoyami before turning to Sasuke. "You're our new intern, right?"
"Uchiha Sasuke."
"I'm Kaneko Mei. Think of me as your manager for your time here." She bows slightly before motioning for them to follow her.
Kaneko leads them to the end of the building and pushes open a door to reveal the courtyard. It resembles more of a campus than just a space between the other buildings, with benches and rentable bikes, tall trees and other flora, and several smaller buildings scattered between the 3 larger ones. There's even a fountain and a small body of water.
Hawks' Agency, like everything else in this world, is much larger than it needs to be.
They walk through the courtyard and into what Sasuke assumes are the sleeping quarters. They take an elevator 2 floors up, during which Sasuke ignores the claustrophobia threatening to swallow him whole, and Kaneko brings them to a door.
"This is your room, you'll be sharing, but it should be spacious enough for both of you. Inside, there's a half bathroom, missing only a shower, but there are full showers and a sauna on the first floor. Down the hall, there's a room with a black door that has extra pillows, blankets, etc., make use of it if you need it."
She hands them both keys.
"Do not lose these. You have one free replacement before you need to pay for it and they are not cheap to make. Final note, there is an air conditioning unit inside, do not bring it below 19 ºC or it will stop working. Any questions?"
"No, ma'am." Both Sasuke and Tokoyami reply.
"Good. Schedules will be emailed to you first thing tomorrow and then the work study officially starts the following day. Ask for me at the front desk if you need me or call me at this number."
She hands them a business card and leaves. Tokoyami stares at her for a moment and Sasuke unlocks the door.
Sasuke enters the room and Tokoyami follows.
Sasuke's first thought is, this is a bit more than spacious.
The entrance is a hallway, and to the right of it is a door that presumably leads to the bathroom. There's a space for shoes and coats, and it's large enough for Sasuke to be able to stand next to Tokoyami and have about a foot of room.
Both Sasuke and Tokoyami take off their shoes and walk further into the space.
When the hallway ends, there's a small kitchen, though he hesitates to call it such, since it's just a microwave, a mini fridge, a coffee maker, a few hanging cabinets, and one countertop cabinet. Regardless of its size, it's still more than he thought he'd be getting so that's nice.
The hallway and the kitchenette both have tile flooring, but the actual bedroom is carpet. It's set up a bit like a hotel room, now that Sasuke thinks about it.
There are two decently sized beds in either corner of the room, separated by a half wall, a side table each, two desks, a bookshelf, and a dresser. The dresser has 8 drawers, 4 on the first row, and then single drawers for the following 4 rows.
Tokoyami speaks first, "We can each have half of the storage space for clothes."
Sasuke doesn't particularly want to store his clothes in the dresser, but he doesn't really care about these clothes all that much so it doesn't really matter. Besides, he is trying to pretend to be a normal Quirked individual.
"Okay."
The first day isn't over yet and Sasuke is already exhausted.
(He wants to go home. The only problem is that it's getting harder and harder to keep the Elemental Nations at the forefront of his mind when he thinks of home. Not when there's Yamada, with his gentle smiles and continuous optimism, and Aizawa, with his terse personality that is somehow similar and completely different to Sasuke's father. Not when he has people who listen to him for once and neither treat him like a hero or like a sin.
He is human here, and part of him doesn't want to give that up.
Is it okay to be selfish for a little while longer?)
Happy two-year anniversary to this fic! Thank you all so much for the love and support on my writing endeavors. This update took me several months to write despite its relatively small length, so I don't think there will be another update for a while yet.