Archive of Our Own ^beta

Detective Tsukauchi rearranges his folders and sighs while giving Izuku a tired but polite smile.

Izuku gives him a sympathetic smile back as he sits across from him. What a mood.

"I'll make this as quick as I can. My name is Detective Tsukauchi and I have a lie detector quirk. My quirk tells me if you lie. Do you consent to being recorded?"

"Of course," Izuku says softly.

As the detective turns on the recorder, Izuku wonders how absolutely exhausting it must be to have to go through every student and staff in UA and ask them if they're the traitor. After Bakugou's kidnapping, Nedzu gave the school a full lockdown. No one's been allowed in or out until the Detective gives the A-okay, which is kind of ironic because if the Detective was the traitor then that would just cause chaos . 

Izuku snaps back into focus after seeing the Detective wave in front of his face with a worried frown and a scrunch in his eyebrows.

"O-oh sorry Detective! Just zoned out a second! What'd you say?" Izuku smiles wobbly, waving his hands sporadically.

Tsukauchi's frown softens out into a small professional-looking smile as he automatically restates the obviously repeated speech. "My name is Detective Tsukauchi Naomasa. My quirk is lie detection and I am now beginning interview 406 at UA. I will begin with background questions to confirm your identity before asking about any involvement with the League. To begin, what is your legal name for the recording and your preferred name?"

Well, I guess this time- "My legal name is Midoriya Izuku and Midoriya is fine," he says calmly and with careful words.

" True. What UA course are you in?"

"1-D General education."

The detective looks at his file again and with a blank face continues. " True. What is your quirk status?"

Here he hesitates. And obviously for a second too long if the twitch in the Detective's right eyebrow means anything.

"...well u-um legally I'm quirkless so…"

The older man's face stays blank but his shoulders tighten just enough for Izuku to notice and grimace, vaguely slouching in his chair and trying hard not to look at the movement in the vent he's obviously not supposed to see. Probably a hero for extra protection. If they DID find the traitor being alone wouldn't be very sma-

"... True. What is your quirk status… physically?"

You wanna know what? Fuck it whatever it not like he won't believe me and based on the increasing tenseness I should probably be quick or else shits about to go down.

"Just to be clear I am not the UA traitor nor have I ever worked with or even desired to work with All for One." Izuku hurriedly pushes out realizing too late that they didn't put out the villains' name on the news Izuku what the fuck is wrong with you and great now Eraserhead is out of the vent staring at me with his hair up he should really put his hair up in a bun or something and if Izuku doesn't say what his quirk is soon he's gonna get fucked in the ass and not ina good way oh my god-

"How do you know that name." Eraserhead glares at Izuku with glowing red eyes.

Izuku tenses and starts tapping on the armchairs in a seemingly random pattern.

"Well um- well uh- that's um part of my quirk I suppose?"

Tsukauchi looks at him warily and says "..he hasn't lied about anything yet. 

Eraserhead stays behind the Detective's chair and continues to glare at him. "Explain. Now."

If I wasn't seconds away from being snatched I'd tell him to take a chill pill. Izuku grimaces while continually tapping, "Well um I don't have an actual name for it because well you know it's not registered you know, and um it's not like I hid it maliciously it's more like as part of my quirk no one remembers and oh shit that sounds bad, I don't mean like I can erase memory well I mean I don't erase it but I guess my quirk kinda does but not really and uh it's um-"

Tsukauchi firmly says "Midoriya. What's your quirk exactly?"

"Oh well, it basically lets me uh like I don't know how to explain it well but I can like minimize someone's pain? I suppose?"

The older men relax minutely and Tsukauchi continues more softly, "Like Recovery Girl? Why would you not register a healing quirk? Those are very useful, you know."

Izuku shakes a little with anxiety and ends up trailing off to a mumble, "Well uh it's not like I can heal a broken bone or anything it's more like you know changing someone's past and-"

Eraserhead interrupts and says "Problem child we can't hear you," but honestly based on how the detective just blanched at least he heard me just fine.

"Okay well if I know someone has gone through pain in their life I can change it? And I guess it depends on how much I know and when I was younger I could only do one person a day and I think I can change more now than I could when I was younger but honestly I try not to blame myself for it because I mean yeah I could have helped them more now than before because you know I can only help a person one time but honestly at this point the butterfly effect kicks me in the ass All. The. Fucking. Time. 

And you know how annoying it is to try to figure out what the current timeline is? You would not BELIEVE how many times I had to look in my notebook just to remind myself what my legal name is? Like Good lord, you save an old man one time and then all of a sudden you find out that his pain became an inspiration to become the surgeon who saved your mum during labor! Now that was a weird timeline! Being a baby with all of the memories of previous timelines isn't fun you know! Thank God my quirk refuses to let me not be born no matter the butterfly effects! 

Being taken in by the HPSC due to high IQ was weird enough but honestly, that didn't last long because after I used my quirk on Keigo Tamaki when I was a few years old the HPSC ended up changing so much that a different surgeon saved my mom again and they stopped raising a bunch of child soldiers! Thank God for that one and to my knowledge Hawks was the only one taken this time and he was only abused instead of killed. Wait in this one does Hawks still have his talons? If they were replaced by fake hands again I'm gonna blow a fuse cause that's better than the original death but still terrible!  I mean it’s still weird with butterfly effects affecting each other so they'll even it out in a way so like if one-"

Izuku finally looks up from his rant and his eyes widen at the completely pale faces of the older men who are stock-still.

"Ohhh uhhhh yeah anyways" Izuku awkwardly laughs, "I'm not the traitor."

Eraserhead whispers, "...Tsukauchi?"

Tsukauchi with blank, horrified eyes whispers back, " True."

-------------------------------------------

Izuku continues to tap the arm of his chair with his left hand while awkwardly running his right hand through his hair. 

The detective and hero still haven't moved.

"Sooooooo?" He looks between the two men back and forth. 

Eraserhead sits on Tsukauchi's chair arm and stares at him a little more before making a noise somewhere between a growl, a whine, and dying whale, which while mildly concerning.. is still an improvement from his previous catatonic state.

"What. the. fuck." Oh, that's good! I'm glad the detective is doing better too!

Tsukauchi turns off the recorder and just. Stares at him some more. 

The boy sways back and forth in his chair nervously, "So is the interview over?"

That snaps the men out of the trance they were in and Eraserhead suddenly stands up before pacing back and forth mumbling to himself about free will versus fate of all things while the other man slumps back into his chair and just keeps saying what the fuck over and over again.

Just before Izuku is about to awkwardly stand up and leave to give them some space, he quickly looks over to the vents when he sees movement and is the only one who doesn’t flinch when the principal climbs out and lands on the desk.

Izuku smiles happily and says "Hello Subj- Nedzu!"

Nedzu doesn't flinch but by the way his ear flicks a tiny bit Izuku can tell it he made the Stoat uncomfortable.

"Oh I apologize! I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable! Like I said before- I'm sure you heard while you were in the vents- I get some little things confused sometimes. Things change a little bit each time and for some of the timelines you kept your original name to like stick it to the humans! Which is totally valid but also totally valid that you gave yourself a new name! Both are cool!"

He smiles happily and tries to reassure the Stoat and honestly failing terribly by the looks of his fur sticking up and by the way he ends up standing stock still… which makes the other men in the room stand stock still again too because they've never seen Nedzu look like that before and overall Izuku's smile starts to fade pretty quickly.

Nedzu calmly asks, "...what's my name usually?" But honestly, I don't think he actually wants to hear it based on his body language.

Izuku warily glances at the other men in the room before raising an eyebrow at Nedzu clearly asking whether he really wants the answer to that in front of them.

Nedzu's posture forcefully relaxes and he asks a different question to Izuku. "May I ask how your quirk works and how you know such things about me specifically?"

"Well, the first time was when I was 6 or so! In my original timeline! I saved a dead cat which I saw get hit by a car! I thought it was some sort of healing or rewind or something but of course, nobody believed me because after I saved the cat nobody seemed to remember that it had even died in the first place! They blamed it on an active imagination and I kind of brushed off the little images I got of a cat's life-changing from being kicked and starved and hit by a car to being fed by some nice homeless people and being hugged by some random children. But… it happened again and again. I saved a dog and a bird and at this point, I thought my power was to revive the dead until I saw a boy crying one day. I actually think he's in 1-B this year! Very cool! Anyways he had blonde hair and he was obviously hurt but I was young so I thought I could make it all better which ironically in MY case I actually could!" Izuku laughs while the other three listen to him warily.

"So I wished really hard that this boy wouldn't hurt anymore like I did for those animals and poof! All of a sudden I got these quick images in my head of all these terrible things happening to him because they didn't like his Copy Quirk which is so cool by the way and then I saw a bunch of those images changing to not perfect but like way better images of some people being cold but his family and friends being nice and loving still so I kind of pulled on it and then he was gone! And I passed out of course cause that's a lot of power but later on a few weeks later I ran into the boy at the park and I tried asking him about the things I saw and it turns out he had no memories of crying or being hurt or even of meeting me! But his mother who hurt him before but then turned nice was exactly how I remembered her! So after a lot of experimentation, I learned that I could improve someone's life and erase part of their pain but when I was younger I could only fix their pain partially and so if they died they'd still go through a lot of abuse or pain but they eventually turn out better than being you know, dead?"

The detective whispers another " True ," which barely even registers to the other two especially as Nedzu starts to tense again and asks "...and me?"

Izuku looks at Nedzu happily, "Well I'm assuming they know your basic, basic story of how humans tortured and experimented on you? Well in my original timeline you died."

Everyone in the room was still.

"I think I was around 7 or 8? It was on the news about how a certain branch of the HPSC had gone rogue and were found testing on a lot of animals with quirks. Well the hero they sent was… not great at being a hero and frankly, they did more harm than good considering they ended up killing everyone in the building- human and animal like - quirk or no quirk. It was an atrocity and then, of course, the HPSC was using it as propaganda that it was somehow the animals' fault and that they were the reason it went wrong but I could read between the lines. Anyways they had a picture of the destruction and honestly, that should NOT have been on the news but you know how corruption is," Izuku shrugs and the others look a little green.

"But anyway I was able to read one of the signs! Subject 008!" At the name, Nedzu starts shaking. "I thought with all my heart that they were fine and I got the memories of the terrible things done to them before they died and then I got better memories where instead of amputation they were just cuts and instead of weeks of starvation it was just days but the most important part was that instead of the so-called-hero killing everyone they accidentally only killed the humans! All the animals still ended up being starved to death but Subject 008 was able to escape and even one survivor is better than none I thought so I pulled and next thing you know a few years later a super-smart Stoat was on the news fighting for his rights and calling himself Subject 008! I was so excited for him! I've saved a lot of people since then and so some little things change like every now and then you change your name to Nedzu or to Chaos or whatever and I think in a few Subject 004 lived, too, but that one doesn't happen often I think because that's too happy and it needs to stay balanced out so when she lived I think both of you ended up as Chaos and Doom more often than not since you usually were down a few limbs and hated humanity even more," Izuku says bemusedly. 

"I would have liked to make your life even less painful but I was young and still learning. I can only use it on a person one time you know and while I can now bring a life closer to 93% ish less painful back then I could only do about 50-60% depending on how strong I was feeling. I'm pretty sure you got 60% better though which was pretty good for back then!” He finished happily.

Izuku doesn’t get to talk about his quirk often and even when he does they usually forget the next time he uses it anyway so it felt nice to vent a little

“ ...True. ” The Detective mumbles while staring blankly at the wall.

Nedzu claps his hands slowly before trying to say something before realizing that he had no idea how the fuck he was supposed to respond to that.

Eraserhead on the other hand had a lot of questions and wasn’t afraid to start asking.

“Have you used it on me?”

Izuku looks up at him and without hesitation says, “Not quite but you HAVE been very affected by it.” The hero blinks confusedly while Izuku continues, 

“You see when Nedzu was dead and HPSC were raising child soldiers I’m pretty sure you were one of the kids with villainous quirks who got rounded up and killed, so luckily when those things changed you were treated much better,” Aizawa flinches at Izuku’s nonchalant tone.

“And then-- I don’t remember what timeline --but I ran into your biological mother and I remember she had another kid after you who died when they were a few months old and I can’t use my quirk on children only a few months old because their situation doesn't change much and they end up just getting hurt later on anyway which sucks but after her second child died she ended up having a mental breakdown and killing her girlfriend and you which then turned into an even bigger mental breakdown and long story short I found her trying to kill herself in an alley,” The older paled while the other two looks somehow blank and sympathetic at the same time.

“Anyways I looked at the memories and she actually had a pretty good life until her mental breakdown so I didn’t really have any pain to erase besides the recent pain and the only path it gave me was for her to kill herself before she had her mental breakdown because I was young so I couldn’t take away all the pain just a good amount. Her only real pain was her second child’s death and then the pain of killing her first child-- you --and her love so I actually asked her permission for this one. The only option it gave me was for after her baby died, and instead of giving her a mental breakdown, she would spend a few days with you and her girlfriend before killing herself so she could die in pain and serenity instead of in severe pain and regret. I told her exactly what would happen and nice enough she was one of the only people to believe me without having some sort of lie detection quirk to confirm. She agreed and while I was sad to see the news I was glad she got a happier ending than before!” Aizawa looks like he’s going to puke but honestly, it gets much nicer from here so Izuku kept going.

“Don’t worry it gets nicer! I also saved Present Mic! I won’t go into detail but voice quirks aren’t treated nicely in orphanages and I met him when he was a vigilante-villain! He was super cool and saved a bunch of kids! Personally, I think destroying all those corrupted orphanage owner’s homes was totally valid at that point. But anyways I asked him if I could help him and he also believed me! It was really cool. It's why he’s one of my favorite heroes! Anyways I helped him and his original orphanage got taken down and his new one treated him better and he got adopted by his awesome moms! And he met you which was super cute to see. You guys always become best friends or lovers no matter the butterfly effect which is super cute to see..”

Nedzu has sat down by now just thinking about the repercussions of what this quirk means and the Tsuckachi just keeps staring at the wall. Aizawa is a mix of sadness, happiness and confusion. I’m not sure even he knows what he's feeling right now because it’s a large dump of information.

“I also saved your son!” Izuku smiled brightly, “He’s awesome! He’s been my best friend quite a few timelines! I’d do anything for hi-”

He was cut off by a quick and confused “I don’t have a son?”

Tsukauchi also looks confused while Nedzu’s eyes widen just a fraction.

“Not yet! I’m not sure you and him are there yet but to my knowledge in this timeline you’re training Shinosu Hitoshi are you not?”

His eyes widen impossibly large as he ends up falling to sit on the ground.

“How interesting. If I’m the reason that you adopt Shinsou then that means this might be a fixed point!” Izuku says excitedly. At Nedzu’s look he continues to explain that “that means that as long as I don’t change anything huge then this scene will keep happening for me to keep the balance for the people I’ve helped. Very exciting! I’ve only gotten a few of these.”

Before Nedzu can ask about them Detective Tsukauchi warily asks, “And me?”

“Oh no Detective, don't be absurd,” Izuku begins and Tsukauchi sighs in relief. “If I tried to fix your pain the world would end!” Izuku giggles.

Everyone stiffens up.

“What do you mean?”

“There are certain people I can’t help or the effects will change important events that could cause the end of the world. For example, All Might.” Somehow they tense even more. How tense can someone even be? Good lord, it looks like they’re gonna pull something.

“Chill.” At this point, Izuku was literally just chilling sideways on the chair talking to the ceiling throwing hands around like he’s in a circus. “Okay so I ran into All Might before high school-- It’s actually one of my fixed points. Very fun! Anyways after the Piece of Flaming Trash who can continue to burn in hell--” he does not notice everyone flinch at the hatred in his voice wondering who the fuck this person is and what he did to earn such disgust and hatred, “--I felt cautious about All Might. So I checked his memories to see if I could help or if I needed to find somebody else to help and oh my god the shit I discovered was way above my paygrade!”

Tsukauchi flinches, Aizawa looks weary, and Nedzu just stares.

Izuku just keeps talking. This is the most relaxed he’s felt in a while.

Like Therapy.

“Anyways if I took his pain away he wouldn’t have become All Might and the other dude who gets the-” Izuku finally looks over to Aizawa and asks “Wait do you know the details about his quirk in this one or just his Small Might Version? I know the Detective knows and Nedzu knows all he can about whatever timeline he’s in, but I’m not sure if he told you in this one.”

Tsukauchi snorts at the Small Might comment while Nedzu looks mildly pleased for the compliment. Aizawa just stares at him and says “...I assume just the Small Might?”

Izuku grins before getting comfortable in his chair again, “Okay cool don’t want to give any spoilers. I’ll vague some classified parts up! Okay, so the guy who could have replaced All Might in my nicest words: sucked ass.” Three snorts were heard which only made Izuku smile wider as he continued, “Okay so he didn’t have the best childhood cause he got his quirk later than usual and the quirkless weren’t treated as badly then as now but he still had his own Tragic events. I can relate,” he snorts as the others give him mildly concerned looks. 

“So basically if I took his pain, he wouldn’t uhh,” Izuku paused for a second trying to find a neutral version of ‘he’d stay quirkless and become a very happy principal who fell in love with and got married to a pornstar and had a few kids’, “...become the hero we see him as today.”

But then again he loves talking shit.

“He actually never realized he had a quirk, fell in love with a pornstar-- which he didn’t even notice was a popular pornstar, the pure man --got married and had a few kids.”

Izuku had to hide his huge smile while the others three caught their breaths.

“ How the fuck do you not realize you’re dating a pornstar,” Aizawa wheezed in the background as Tsukauchi slaps his back trying to hold back his own giggles while Nedzu hides his mouth in his hands.

“Unfortunately, that also meant that without being there to fight the big bad thottie of the past two centuries--” he got a few small laughs at that one “--and with the other dude who ended up being his replacement sucking, All for One ended up winning and took control of a lot of shit.”

The older men give him small somber looks while Nedzu just looks even more curious at this point.

Aizawa continues to frown and asks, “So what happened? How did you fix it?”

“Oh no that was all hypothetical! I got all of that in the preview on what I would do if I fixed All Might’s happiness. I took a step back and decided that All Might defeating the big bad thottie was more important than marrying the most famous pornstar in America without even realizing it.”

They relaxed at least partially, “So yeah that’s why I try not to mess with anyone involved in All Might’s life unless I can make sure it won’t affect anything too bad.”

Luckily they seem to be much calmer now than they were at the beginning of the conversation.

“So do you always ask permission like you did with my mother?” the scarfed man asks.

“Oh god no.” At Tsukauchi’s vaguely confused face, he further explained, “It’s such an impossible quirk and no proof without a quirk like the Detectives. Imagine the scenario: a young boy comes up to you and tells you your worst and most traumatic moments and that they can fix them but that they won’t remember that their life improved or who the boy even was? Yeah no. That’s how you get sent to the loony bin. Been there done that--” he ignores the others concerned faces once again, “--because without proof either they think I have a strong imagination, am insane, or that I’m a stalker or making fun of them. It can get very messy honestly this is the first time I’ve talked about it in a long time. I could probably count on my hands the number of people I’ve told who actually believed me without proof and unfortunately, Nedzu and Aizawa are not on that list. If the Detective wasn’t here? Nedzu usually thinks I have a mind-reading quirk and Eraserhead ends up brushing me off or taking me in,” they look mildly abashed but also partially confident because yeah it makes sense.

Izuku laughs, “It’s a hard thing to believe without proof. I get it! The only people who’ve belie-”

Everyone jumps as the bell rings.

“Oops! I’m supposed to be in English right now with Present Mic! I mean it doesn’t really matter cause I’m fluent but still! Did you guys have any questions that are really important that I need to answer right now? Because I haven’t done anything wrong except like illegal quirk usage but no proof soo..?”

They look like they want to keep him there but honestly what could they do? All he’d have to do is think of someone and everything could change.

Tsukauchi sighs, “....I guess do you know who the traitor is?”

Izuku smiles, “I’m not sure. But if you give me a list of everybody I can cross off all the people I’ve helped since I’ve seen their memories!” He pauses, “Oh and I suppose I can check the memories of those I haven’t helped to see if their memories share any traitorism within them,” Izuku tilts his head while he thinks, “Huh I guess I could find information about the villains, too. How interesting.”

He hands out his hands so someone could hand him a list as they look at him in part awe and part fear at what he could do if he weren’t such a good person.

Once he’s handed the list of everybody he starts crossing out names, and more names, and more names, and after a few pages it’s clear that he has helped… a lot of people. Like a lot . Like he’s almost halfway done and there’s only been a handful of people he hasn’t helped in each class.

“ Let’s see, now to go back and see the memories of the people I haven’t helped ,” he mumbles to himself while the other three at this point just watch in fascination.

“ 3-G and 3-H are clean ,” he mumbles, “ 2-G... clean, 2-H... clean, 1-G… clean, 1-H, clean! Support course is clean! Awesome, I love those guys. Now onto business, ” he continues to mumble.

“ 3-E… 3-F… 2-E… 2-F… 1-E… 1-F… Business Course is clean. 3-C… 3-D… 2-C… 2-D… hmm,” Izuku pauses at one student. The others hold their breath.

“Hey what can you tell me about Nise Pojitibu from class 2-D?”

Nedzu quickly looks them up and reads off information. “Nise Pojitibu. Only child. Slightly below-average grades, but has many friendships with the different courses in her year. You think she could be the traitor?”

Tsukauchi and Eraserhead look over to see a picture of her.

“No, I needed more information to get more detail in her memories. She’s not the traitor though I just think she’s going to kill herself soon,” he said nonchalantly as the others freeze.

Izuku hums under his breath while he looks at the preview again.

“Hmm yeah I’d definitely get her diagnosed with something. She doesn’t have any events I can change and it looks like a recent thing. Might be a thyroid issue. They can cause depression sometimes,” he starts to mumble as he keeps going down the list.

Aizawa just puts his hands to his face and whispers what the fuck again as Nedzu connects his phone to the intercom somehow to send Nise-chan to Recovery Girl. Does he have a special phone? Do animal paws work on normal screens? Whatever-

“...1-C, clean, better be losers…. 1-D….. Clean, ” Izuku looks up. The others straighten up. “Can I have a piece of paper really quick?”

Tzukauchi hands him his legal notepad and a pen.

Izuku immediately starts writing a list of names ranging from different students in the General Education course with a handful of students from Business and even fewer from Support.

“...Are these possible suspects?” Nedzu asks.

“No. These are students who need help in one way or another. Some need proper career counseling. Some are in bad home situations-- newer ones that I wouldn’t be able to help much --or they’re bullies or being bullied. I labeled what they need next to their name,” Izuku says with a yawn as he hands it back.

Aizawa looks at him in surprise while Nedzu starts looking over the list. If he starts texting with a little more anger at some of the bad situations and bullies under his school then no one here would say.

The Detective just keeps watching Izuku as he’s back to paying sole attention to the list.

“ 3-A… clean, 3-B… clean… let’s see… 2-A… clean, 2-B clean… 1-A… hmm, ” Tsukauchi saw him Pause at a Kendo Itsuka but keep going. “ 1-B… hmmm,” Izuku tries to flip the page again and looks confused, “Where’s the list of staff?”

Tsukauchi says, “I already talked to them.”

Izuku looks at him with an eyebrow raised in a very unimpressed fashion.

“Detective, do me a favor: I’m going to say a lot of statements and you tell me if I lie about any of them, yes?” The Detective nods unsurely.

“My name is Midoriya Izuku. My name is Deku. My name is Genius. My name is Hana Izuku. My name is Aizawa-Yamada Izuku--” Izuku does not hold back a smirk at Mr. Dad’s blush at that one despite the fact that he was actually their son-in- law , “--My name is Hatsume Izuku. I am over 100 years old. I am 15 years old. I am old. I am young. I have a quirk. I am quirkless. I-”

Mr. Dad cuts him off, “What’s the point of this?”

Izuku simply looks at the Detective and asks, “What’s the verdict Detective?”

The Detective seems vaguely offended at his own quirk but mostly confused, “Everything said was True .”

There’s a moment before Izuku pulls out his hand for the list of Staff that Nedzu was printing out.

“Your quirk can only determine what the person you are asking deems as truth. My quirk does not. My previews are not what the person believes, but I see it as a third-person point of view. Completely objective. Which helps so I don’t make any big mistakes like help a mentally insane person have a happy life when their happy life could fully well involve their hallucinations of having tea with friends actually being them slaughtering innocents at a bank,” which I have unfortunately come across.

Izuku looks back down at the list of staff as they wince. He goes through them slowly since most of them he hasn’t helped. “ Hmmm… mostly clean.”

They straighten up for the thousandth time today when Izuku asks for the legal pad back. He adds a few names to the already there categories from the first-year hero classes before flipping it over to a blank page. 

“I know most of them. What are the names of those you know that are affiliated with the League of Villains?”

The Detective hesitates for just a second but after no disapproval, he starts listing the names that they know.

“All for One. Shigaraki Tomura. Kurogiri. Dabi. Toga Himiko. Twice. Mr. Compress. Spinner. Magne. Those already in custody are Muscular, Mustard and Moonfish. We don’t have real names.” 

“That’s okay. If that’s what they call themselves it works fine.”

They watch as Izuku writes them all down with spaces between them. Then they watch him close his eyes for each person and write information that they’d never be able to get without capturing them and even then .

“All for One. Shigaraki Saiko. Born in the first generation of quirks. Faced harsh quirk discrimination and honestly if it didn’t take place so long ago I probably would have used my quirk on him,” he does not open his eyes at the others even though he’s sure they’re wearing bewildered looks, “Hey everyone is partially a product of their environment. The only official thing that will never change is myself being born so at this point I’m just making sure I’m not being born in a completely different world because looking at the preview? It looks like a bad anime since he ends up taking every single person’s quirk so they can’t be passed on and so the world can continue being a quirkless world. Fascinating if you ask me. But it still sounds like a strange world to live in and no one out of my lineage would probably be born so I’ll avoid that one,” Izuku laughs a little when he squints his eyes open to see their varied faces of interest, nauseated, and exasperated.

“Moving on! Shigaraki Tomura. Real Name: Shimura Tenko,” Tsukauchi immediately starts looking up information he can get on him. “Evidence of his existence will probably be erased from all records completely but in case it’s not he was born quirkless.” Everyone freezes as he hums. “Looks like when he was five, Shigaraki gave young Shimura the disintegration quirk, then after young Shimura accidentally killed his parents he showed up and played Saviour. Told him that he would keep him safe from everyone else who would blame him. The psychological abuse kept going and he not only doesn’t know who he is, but the backlash of his forced quirk will probably end up killing him by the time he’s twenty-five. Unless Shigaraki gives him his own quirk I suppose since I’m sure he’s got some longevity quirks in there,” the others shiver at the information while Izuku stars Shimura’s name to go back to and see the preview of what could be.

“Kurogiri. Real Name: oh.” Izuku looks up at Aizawa and blinks. Only getting a blink back he continues with a “This may or may not be emotionally compromising to Aizawa. It is up to him if he wishes to continue before and/or after I share the name.” He again only gets a confused blink from Aizawa which isn’t a no so he goes through with it and says “Real Name: Shirakumo Oboro,” and waits to see Aizawa suck in a breath and nod before continuing, “He had a decent childhood. Some low-grade bullying that didn’t bother him much through primary and junior high. Seemingly very happy before he was killed in an accident. Looks like his… corpse was stolen and experimented on to become a Nomu of sorts with sentience. Does not remember who he was, but seems to center around taking care of Shimura the best he is allowed with the limited range of emotions he was given.” Izuku gives Aizawa a few moments to breathe. Nedzu watched Izuku put a star next to Shirakumo’s name.

“Dabi. Real Name: mother FUCKER.” The other men flinch at his tone. Nedzu leans forwards in interest while trying to decipher his angry mumbling as he scribbles what he’s found before making a huge star next to him. “ Piece of shit. Fuck you. I thought I already dealt with you. Rotten bitch. ” Nedzu wisely leans back a little like the other men next to him after hearing the malice the insults were spoken of. After a few moments to calm down, Izuku finally looks up to see them all leaning away from him warily.

Izuku sits up straight. “Dabi. Real Name: Todoroki Touya. You may know his youngest brother Todoroki Shouto who is in fact in 1-A. Not the traitor nor would he ever--” he says when he spots them all ready to jump up and get ready, “--I am upset because I thought I fixed this family before but I in fact did not.” They sat back down in intrigue at what could make the bubbly and/or nonchalant student so angry.

“I met his brother Natsuo at a quirkless support meeting. We became close friends and after learning about the abuse he faced I decided to do a preview of his life to see if I could help. You guys may not have heard of him for a long time but Endeavor the Flame Hero who abused his family may ring a bell if you search in your mind hard enough? I think it’s been around ten years for you guys.” Everyone had a vague recollection of him with Nedzu having the sharpest memory of him.

“Anyways he was the number two hero back in my day,” he definitely snickers when Nedzu looks amused and the others grimace at the same time at his vocabulary, “ and he was a piece of shit. Absolute shit bag. Had a special hatred for him because when I was a hero,” he does not miss the intrigue at that statement but chooses to ignore it, “I became really close friends with Shouto. I didn’t know about it until a few timelines later because of Natsuo so not only was that a surprise, but I’m upset that he never got to share that with me before I ended up restarting the timeline helping someone else. But everything has an order I suppose. Anyways! When Natsuo told me what happened I checked his memories but I couldn’t change his events without Shouto not being born since the neglect towards Natsuo happened so early since Trash Bag ordered an x-ray for his foot even before he was four. Neglect or abuse is all he remembered and I couldn’t do that to Shouto even if nobody would remember anyway. So I checked everyone in the family, even Shitbag. If I did Shitbag, he’d become number one and he never had a family. If I did Rei, their mom, then none of them would be born because she never got illegally married off to Shitbarf and so she had kids, but not the kids I know. And before you ask, I asked all the siblings and they wanted to give their mom a happier life but Rei wouldn’t have it and she said that if I ever did such a thing she would never forgive me--”

Nobody was going to ask him that.

“--Fuyumi and Touya, the oldest twins, were like Natsuo where if I helped them Shouto wouldn’t be born so the only person I could help was Shouto! In the original change, Rei snapped and almost hurt Touya since he looked like Shatbitch in the corner of her eye but instead she froze and decided that almost hurting her own child was her tipping point. She took all the kids and ran away while she gathered people to collect evidence and after a few years she succeeded in getting his license revoked and put in jail for abuse. This timeline should be pretty similar to that even with small changes. But! It looks like Endeavor has an inside man in the prison that let him send threatening messages to Touya making him slowly go insane trying to meet the demands written in the letters. He was only a young teen so when the letters said to do certain things or his family would die? Of course he put his all into keeping them safe. It looks like it only got worse and worse and even with support he ended up snapping and at some point faking his death so he could be free from being under constant control. His mental state only deteriorated after that without his family and I guess now he blames the government for not protecting them which is honestly kind of valid. Shit.” Izuku grumbles to himself while the others try to process that dump of information.

“Fucking whatever. Toga Himiko. Real Name: Monoma Himiko. Minor. Sister of Monoma Neito. He’s clean, but I guess that even though my quirk could help his mom be a better human being after he was born, it didn’t help much from before. Abused and kicked her out for her ‘villain’ quirk. She needs to drink blood or her mental state goes downhill and enters a manic state the more she’s starved.” He adds a star. “You should tell Monoma. He’d appreciate it I’m sure.”

Izuku twists around to sit upside down with his legs bouncing on the top of the chair and keeps writing as he talks. The others also got comfortable with Nedzu pulling out a him sized chair to put on the desk out of nowhere, Tsukauchi sitting criss-cross applesauce on his chair and Mr. Dad sitting in his sleeping bag while leaning against the wall. Where did he get it? Izuku is going to say out of thin air like Nedzu’s mysteriously appearing chair.

“Twice. Real Name: Bubaigawara Jin. Grew up poor but with a happy, small family. Standard bullying. Oof Parents died during a hero fight when a hero threw the villain into their building. Orphanage didn’t treat him well. He ended up trying to get a job after school but nobody would take him due to his quirk,” He hears a faint “lame” coming from Mr. Dad and he nods his head, “You said it Mr. Dad.” Completely ignoring the older man choking on his own spit he continues nonplussed while the other two snicker, “Had to do some thievery to get some money to live. Got betrayed by a partner, and after a bad cop tried to take advantage of him, he finally snapped and killed the cop before fleeing. He got worse and couldn’t stand other people touching him so he--”

The door slams open. All from their various spaces, they all slowly turn their heads to their visitor.

Present Mic looks around to see Nedzu on a throne on a desk drinking what looks like Gatorade out of a teacup, Mr. Professional Detective sitting criss-cross applesauce while balancing a pencil like a mustache on his lip, his husband on the ground in his sleeping bag while trying to braid his own hair in boredom, while a seemingly random kid from 1-D is sitting upside down in a chair with his legs crossed on top of the chair and his hands in the air like he was in the middle of talking while a legal pad was on his stomach.

He kind of just stares at them.

“...I was just here to see if Sho was done? School is almost over?”

Nedzu checks his phone to see the time. The Detective puts the pencil down but stays criss-cross because there is only so much he can hide and Mr. Dad holds the partial braid he has done out to mutely tell his husband to finish it while also looking like a toddler trying to show their parents their creation.

Izuku just hums. “It’s not like I’m doing anything. Just make sure Mr. Pops closes the door.”

Mic stares confused while Mr. Dad groans with his hands in his face and the other two don’t even try to hide their smiles.

With his hands still covering his face, he says, “He means you Zashi.”

“Okaayy?” Mic says as he closes the door and grabs a cushion from the couch on the other side of the room before laying it next to his husband on the ground so he can be comfortable.

Finally taking his hands off his face Mr. Dad looks up into Izuku’s eyes and asks, “Why am I Mr. Dad? Did we adopt you during one of the times you were an orphan or some other way? Is your mother abusive or something? Do you need us to adopt you right now?”

Izuku cracks a smile, “Nah you guys never adopted me. I just always marry the fuck out of your son. God, he’s so pretty. I love him. I could marry him a thousand times and then marry him a thousand more. He’s like the sun to my--”

While Izuku waxes poetic about his apparently future husband, Mic whispers to his husband, “I’m so confused, we don’t have a son?”

Mic flinches when everyone says in various amounts of cheer, “Yet.”

“Anyways I’ll make this quick Mr. Pops. I have a quirk that lets me see a montage of someone’s life, and then also a preview of that life if I took away most of their pain or Traumatic Events. So Nedzu here died in my OG timeline and I saved him, along with a bunch of others. I can’t change the Detective and a few other’s lives-- especially if they’ve involved their lives with All Might’s --or I could end up destroying Japan or even the world depending on how much Shigaraki-- sorry All for One --is feeling. I changed yours, too! You were a very cool villain-vigilante person who fought against quirk discrimination in the foster system and you’re on the very small list of people who believed me without needing some sort of Lie Detection Quirk confirmation. Oh! Anything I change, nobody remembers except myself and I can only change someone’s life once. I already went through all the students in the school as well as the staff. I had a small list of who it could be but I was getting more information first. You came in the middle of me talking about all the villains in the League: who they are and why they became villains. We’re going to then see which ones I should change with my quirk and which ones should be up to you guys. I believe that’s everything?”

Mr. Dad leans over and stage-whispers, “Yagi could have married a famous American pornstar but Midoriya had to deny him that so he could fight All for One and stop Japan from being destroyed.”

Mr. Pops stares straight ahead before going through all the information rather quickly-- his fast mind definitely helped him be a wonderfully efficient villain!

“Cool quirk. Sorry for any quirkless discrimination you suffered. I’m honored that I was one of the people you decided to help and I’m even more honored that I earned some respect for believing you. Me being a vigilante sounds very interesting and I’m interested in hearing about it in the future. I’m glad you’re thinking about ways to help the villains live better lives as well as the students since I assume you’re the reason a bunch of my students were called to do various things today. I wish I remembered our previous experiences together but regardless I’m proud of you for everything you’ve accomplished and while I’m sure to learn more about you in the future I’m glad and excited for you to be my future son-in-law even though I was in fact not even told my future son’s name.”

Everyone else pauses to process, but Izuku just smiles and says, “Love you too, Mr. Pops! Your son is in your class: Shinsou Hitoshi!”

“Thank you,” Mr. Pops smiles back at him, “Please continue!”

“Okay! Where were we?”

Nedzu sips his Gatorade and says, “Mr. Twice doesn’t like being touched”

“Right! Okay so after that piece of shit cop violated him, he’s had troubles with physical contact and so he made his clones for practically everything! Unfortunately after a few years his hatred of touch turned into more of a loss of reality. He feels like he himself is one of his clones and his biggest fear is to discover he’s not himself and to melt away. Very tragic,” They all nod sympathetically as Izuku gives him a star next to his name.

“Next! Mr. Compress. Real Name: Sako Atsuhiro. Hmm. Abusive dad. Wanted to be a hero but his father refused and beat and locked him up the day of the entrance exams. Became depressed and ran away from home. Was a magician for a while until he fell in love with a beautiful fella who ended up slowly turning him to the villains. By the time Sako realized he was being manipulated, he was already too far to stop without repercussions from both sides and just had to deal with his presumed love of his life stealing all his money and leaving him to an organization he never wanted part of. Looks like the League told him he never had to hurt anyone if he didn’t want to, but they too ended up taking that control back and he’s not happy. Looks like he’ll kill himself which is quite the shame. Definitely a star.” Everyone frowns at the idea of him killing himself, but there’s not much they can do at this exact moment so they keep going.

“Spinner. Real Name: Iguchi Shuuichi. Minor. Lived with an Aunt and Uncle. Looks like the Aunt was bad news and hurt him physically, sexually and emotionally growing up to punish him for his mutant quirk. Physical and emotional abuse continued at school. His Uncle would look the other way to both. Accidentally killed his Aunt during a breakdown, and then killed his Uncle in self-defense. Ran away. Homeless for a while. Joined up as the only option to survive. It was a ‘this or starve’.” Everyone murmurs a quiet, “star.”

“Magne. I refuse to say her legal first name because that’s fucked up. Real Name: Hikiishi Magne. She got a lot of shit and discrimination for being trans. It got bad. People tried to fix her. People tried to hurt her in various ways and her quirk didn’t help because they used to call it weak and useless and her along with it. Bad family. Bad school. Runaway. It looks like being with the League is the happiest she’s ever been because they’re the first people to ever respect her pronouns. Definite star.”

We got echoes of “definite star.”

“I assume you know those in custody? I’ll just say their real name and whether they deserve a star and why. Muscular. Real Name: Goto Imasuji. No star. Mentally a sociopath. Should have been diagnosed and wasn’t. Been dissecting kids since age 2, animals since age 4, other kids since age 7, and adults since age 12. Did not care then nor now. Average family. Average school.” He just got nods so he continued.

“Mustard. Real Name: Kiyotaka Mako. Star. He’s a minor. Abused at home, bullied at school. Thought this was his only path.” At the nods, he went to the last one.

“Moonfish. Real Name: Shuhei Matsuda. No Star. Insane since birth. Tried to kill someone at two years old and continued even after extensive therapy. Does not care. Just wants to eat flesh.”

Everyone shivers a little.

“Okay so that’s all the villains. Onto who's the traitor cause I don’t actually remember how we got here?” He laughed softly.

Everyone lets out their own little grins or laughs.

Izuku looks back at the legal pad to see who he circled earlier. Turning back to sit straight in his seat he stretches in his seat before standing up and walking around.

“Okay I’ve got five people in mind that it could be but I’d like more information to dwindle it down,” Izuku yawns once again. 

“Class 1-A: Mineta Minoru. Any family or old classmates I can look at?” 

The Detective says, “Parents are Mineta Meinu and Mineta Oshiri.”

Nedzu looks up from his phone and says, “Look at Tsuyoi Hijo and Yowai Koro.”

Everyone stared at Nedzu for a second. The Detective leans over to see his phone and makes a ‘ should have expected this ’ kind of look before just saying “Middle School Feeds.”

Everyone shrugged their shoulders, while Izuku thought about the people.

“Not a traitor,” but as everyone sighed in relief he continued, “but he should still be in jail. Montage tries to focus on bad points over good points. Ms. Tsuyoi did not have the luxury of seeing that day as a good one. Looks like Mineta Minoru attempted to rape her with the help of his friend Yowai. Everyone blamed her and Mineta senior paid off the school to keep it off his record.”

“ Fuck ,” Mr. Dad said emphatically. 

Everyone else nodded their heads in agreement.

“Next. Class 1-B: Kendo Itsuka.”

“Kendo Poppusu, Kendo Chibusa, and a younger brother Kendo Sai.”

“Hm. Clean. Saw her hacking but it looks like it was just to change a gender marker for a family member. Valid.” Everyone nodded at that.

“Next. Class 1-B: Tsunotori Pony.”

“Tsunotori Gizo and Tsunotori Furiosura.”

Izuku paused. Tilted his head and then paused again.

“Those people do not and have never existed.”

The other people sit up from their relaxed positions and look at him as he’s still just standing, swaying back and forth since he was sitting for so long.

“Hmmm. I wanted to check her because I saw her speak fluent Japanese to someone on the phone and that doesn’t align with what I remember when I was in class 1-B.”

Mic makes a ‘what? ’ face but everyone pretty much ignores him as they either do some more research or think about possibilities.

Nedzu pipes up, “Try Uma Hon?”

“Hmmm. Nothing.”

“Uma Kana?”

“Hmmm. Looks like Uma is Pony’s biological mother, but Pony was kidnapped when she was 8. Uma didn’t have any other contact with her after that and doesn’t know who took her. Pony’s birth name was Uma Ponya.”

Everyone looked more jittery than before.

“Okay while Nedzu keeps looking for what Uma Ponya experienced to get here, let’s look at more information for the last two. I know that when I was a vigilante I’d never leave only one spy in a place when I could have 2.”

Mr. Pops once again make a ‘ what? ’ face at the vigilante comment even while obviously agreeing with the spy comment.

“Next. UA Staff: I don’t actually need family for this one but what’s Inui Ryō’s hero name again? Some people become so lost they don’t really connect to them as much and I need more detail on something.”

“He’s the Hound Hero: Hound Dog,” Mr. Dad grumbles.

“Oh… No… He’s not the traitor at all.”

Everyone hears the somber tone for that one and decides it’s none of their business what their peer went through.

“Finally. UA Staff: Lunch Rush: Ranchi Rasshu.”

They give him weird looks for that one.

“He has a mother Ranchi Rozu, a deceased father Swasshu Rikon, and two younger siblings Ranchi Aka and Ranchi Ki,” the Detective says slowly so Izuku could go through them.

“That gives me motivation but I don’t have proof for him just like I don’t know for sure about Ponya. I’d say both of them are prime suspects. To get any more information I’d need more personal information about them and that’d need to come from them themselves.”

Nedzu, not looking up from his phone, “Try Doro Jemini?”

Izuku finally sits back down in his chair and tries to get comfortable again. “His quirk lets him alter memories. I saw him interact with both Ponya and Ranchi at different points in time. Nothing substantial but more than before. I’ll try the suspects again and try to focus on bad memories that might be trying to hide. 

Closing his eyes and leaning back against his chair, “Yeah it’s them. Both against their will. Ponya is in a Mother Gothel kind of situation and Ranchi was trying to make an almost illegal but still legal deal to get some more money for his younger sister’s medical expenses that are only getting higher and higher due to the terminal diagnosis. It looks like they make them forget about every meeting. Hard to show up as a bad memory if there’s no emotion connected to the hidden memory at all. 

Everyone lets out a sigh of relief that they know who it is and that they might be able to help them.

“Mr. Dad?”

“Yeah, kid?”

“You should probably take me to Recovery Girl’s for quirk exhaustion. Try to keep it on the DL though, I’m still allegedly quirkless.”

Aizawa snorts and everyone else looks at Izuku with concerned looks… and then also snorts when he just gives them a lazy grin back.

Mr. Dad stops in front of him to let him get on his back. Izuku wraps around him like a baby koala and stuffs his face into his future father-in-law's neck-- quite comfy if you ask him.

“Bye fam see ya soon!” Izuku slurredly waves to everyone, half-asleep already.

Everyone waves back and says farewell with a “Bye, Midoriya-Kun!” “Sleep well, kid!” and a very cheerful “See you soon, future son-in-law!” Izuku gives them a sleepy thumbs up before putting his face back into the warm neck in front of him.

Mr. Dad grumbles fondly with a “Problem Child” under his breath.

Izuku leans against him some more and whispers under his breath, “...I missed that name….”

Shouta hides his smile in his scarf. 

Almost to Recovery Girl’s they pass by someone with purple hair and like a second instinct Izuku’s eyes blearily open up to see Hitoshi’s pretty, concerned eyes and says with very sleepy confidence, “Mr. Dad, that’s Toshi…. the love of my life… the sun to my stars… I can’t wait to marry him again… he’s so pretty… and smart… and every time I see him I fall in love all over again… just like the first time… “ he falls into a mumble as he cuddles even closer to Aizawa’s torso and neck with his eyes closed still waving poetic about the love of his life.

Shinsou just stands there very confused but also with a very heavy blush on his cheeks.

“Um. I just wanted to know if we were still training today or if we were pushing that back a few days until things could calm down? Either way is totally fine I just didn’t want to assume either way an-”

Shouta looks at him, tilts his head, and says with a small smile, “I’m married to Present Mic and we want to adopt you.”

His blush that had vaguely calmed down comes back in full force as he covers his face with his hands and groans.

With his future son-in-law sleeping on his back, and his future son in front of him, Shouta grins.