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The first time Shouta meets them, he doesn’t even realize they’re vigilantes.
Here’s how it happens: the villain he was fighting, a serial bank-robber with an unknown quirk, manages to slip away and flee into the alleyways. Shouta gives chase, of course, racing along as fast as he can with his scarf one step ahead in an attempt to catch the villain before he can get away.
There’s a distinctly feminine yelp, a crashing bang like a trash can being knocked over, and Shouta thinks he can gather what just happened around that corner. The villain found some civilian, he thinks, and now he’s holding them hostage in hopes it’ll slow me down.
And it probably would, though not by much. It depends on the exact situation, but Shouta can pull a gun away from a head faster than you can say ‘nano-carbon-alloy cloth’. He can deal with a little hostage situation.
Two steps later, he’s skidding sideways to a stop, quirk activated, bracing himself for hearing the same tired words again— don’t move or this girl loses her throat, let me leave or the kid gets a hole in his head. He’s heard it a million times, and he’s ready to hear it again.
He’s more than a little surprised, then, when he instead finds a pair of cosplayers knelt on either side of the unconscious villain.
They look up in unison at the sound of Shouta’s boots scraping the pavement, eyes glinting in the dim light of the street light like cats caught rummaging through garbage, and Shouta blinks.
For a moment, the only movement is Shouta’s hair falling back into place. He takes the moment to take in how they look— a boy and a girl, green and pink, both wearing outfits comprised mainly of frills. The girl looks like she jumped straight out of a magical girl anime, while the boy… some kind of rabbit butler, if Shouta has to guess?
Shouta starts to open his mouth to speak, and this seemingly startles the cosplayers— they leap to their feet and he reflexively steps back. They’re not moving in his direction, though, more the exact opposite. They scramble away with a distinct air of urgency, the girl vanishing over the fence at the end of the alleyway while the boy practically flies up a nearby fire escape. Within seconds, Shouta is alone in the alleyway with only the subdued villain for company, and he isn’t quite sure what to think about all this.
…I’ll just forget about it, he finally decides. The villain groans quietly, coming around, and Shouta idly kicks him back down. Wouldn’t be the strangest thing to happen to me.
He knows a thing or two about discretion.
The second time he meets them, he’s responding to reports of a villain attack in the local mall— normally he’d be happy leaving it to the local heroes, but it just so happens that he’s practically right on top of it, so he figures he should at least lend a hand for a moment.
He’s surprised, though, when he arrives on the scene to find the villain facing off not against trained professionals, but instead a pair of cosplaying teenagers. A familiar pair of cosplaying teenagers, at that, the distinctive green rabbit ears sending him a week back in time to the most surreal evening he’s had yet.
They’re doing remarkably well, too; batting the bombs this villain creates using their quirk right back at them using a similarly cosplayish quarterstaff of some sort (in the case of the girl) and what looks like a folding chair (used by the boy). They’re clearly flagging, though, and so without another thought Shouta leaps in to erase the villain’s quirk and join the battle.
It’s short work after that, the villain rendered practically helpless without their quirk, and minutes later Shouta finds himself standing over their unconscious form as the cosplayers catch their breaths. A flicker of light comes from the girl as she reforms her staff into a more compact wand, and Shouta notes that down as probably being her quirk.
“...I suppose it’s optimistic to think the two of you have any sort of licences,” Shouta says, stooping down to handcuff the villain, and the teens both freeze. “As much as you’ve helped here, I’m quite certain this falls under the definition of vigilantism.”
“W-well I mean!” The boy stutters out, faux-ears falling backwards as he steps away, and Shouta wonders for a moment whether or not the ears are actually fake. “W-we didn’t actually use our quirks, did we— um, did we?”
The girl nods quickly. “Y-yeah! Doesn’t count if we didn’t use our quirks!”
Shouta gives them a level stare. “...I’m quite certain there’s at least one rule in the book including passive quirks in the equation,” he says, standing back up. “Incidentally, do you have to wear those ridiculous outfits while you do it?”
The teens blink, glance at each other, and then look back at Shouta and say with absolute conviction— “Yes, we do.”
And then, before he can question them any further, the press arrive and Shouta beats a hasty retreat. He does pause to hand over the villain to the newly arrived other heroes— their problem to finish cleaning up, and whatever happens happens when it comes to those kids. They’ll probably get hounded by the press, then the police will show up and they get vigilante charges— along with a hearty congratulations, but rules are rules.
(To his surprise— but oddly, not displeasure— he tunes into the news a couple hours later to find them running a report on the mysterious unidentified vigilantes who saved the mall. They’ve already been given names, Magica Rabbit and Magica Infinity, and Shouta doesn’t understand how everyone loves them so fast.)
(He does, however, elect to keep tabs on their sightings. May as well, in case he needs to be the one to bring them in.)
The third time he meets them, he realizes how odd it is that none of the news outlets he’s been following seem to realize that they’re children.
At first, it seems reasonable. The footage captured of them isn’t exactly high quality, and by the time anyone gets close enough to properly see their faces they’re already long gone. But as more sightings go out, more people caught in the middle of their fights with villains, more eyewitnesses getting close enough to describe the exact peculiarities with their eyes— reflective and containing odd symbols instead of pupils, which would have been the final nail in the coffin of their identities if there were a single person in japan matching that description— but not a single one of them thought to consider if the person they were looking at was a child.
So, then, Shouta wonders if it’s some kind of quirk. And if it is, why isn’t he affected by it? It could be because of their first meeting— all the way back in the alleyway, he’d had his quirk active and his first thought had been weird kids cosplaying in an alley not vigilante adults apprehending a villain. Perhaps that had somehow short-circuited part of the quirk, or perhaps it operated on some sort of first-impression type deal.
Whatever the case, when the third time he encounters them is in an ice cream cafe where they’re relaxing in oversized hoodies and holding a lumpy bag presumably containing the missing parts of their costumes, he’s remarkably unfazed.
Oh, he’s a little fazed. Anyone would be startled to recognize someone they half-know when out doing something allegedly unrelated. But under the circumstances, he could’ve gotten away with a little more reaction.
What he does do, though, is order a plain chocolate scoop and sit down at a nearby table, staring intently at them and waiting for them to notice.
The girl notices first, tiredly lifting her head to look in Shouta’s direction. She stares at him for a moment, meeting his eyes dead-on, then lowers them again.
And then she leans over to her companion and says something quietly. He turns to peek at Shouta too, pausing in the eager consumption of his sundae, and then engages in a whispered conversation before standing and picking up the rest of his sundae.
Shouta expects him to leave. It would be a reasonable response, given for all they know Shouta could have called more heroes to help him apprehend them— though he hasn’t, because that’s honestly far too much hassle for what’s supposed to be his day off. The boy doesn’t, though, instead walking over to sit across from Shouta and match his stare.
“...You got a problem?” Shouta asks, after a long moment, and the kid jumps a little like he wasn’t expecting him to talk.
“Um— uh, n-no, I just, um…” The boy looks around nervously, fidgeting in his seat, looking for something to say. “...Wh-why are you here?”
Wordlessly, Shouta gestures to his ice cream.
The boy lights up red, muttering something under his breath and looking away. “Th-that’s, not— well I mean okay that is technically what I was asking, but not what I— I meant, um, no I mean that does...”
The girl stands up and walks over, prodding the boy on the shoulder and earning a wince— Oh, Shouta thinks, finally noticing the stiff way he holds that arm. They must’ve just gotten out of a fight.
Unheeding of Shouta’s internal monologue, the girl speaks. “Pretty sure we still got lots of time to run off before any authorities get here,” she says.
“I haven’t called anyone about seeing you here,” Shouta says, folding his hands neatly. “It’s my day off. As far as I’m concerned, you’re some kids I happened to encounter with no knowledge of who you may or may not be.”
“...Ah,” the girl says, sitting down.
“...S-so, I didn’t think you’d be the type to go get ice cream, um, Eraserhead,” the boy says.
“I didn’t think a kid like you would be the type to dress up in a frilly bunny butler outfit to go do vigilantism, Rabbit,” Shouta replies. “We learn something new every day.”
“I— it’s not like I chose the outfit!” the boy protests, before quickly shutting his mouth and looking around sheepishly to see if anyone’s looking.
“You still wear it, though.” Shouta takes a bite of his ice cream, waiting to see if either of the kids will reply to that, before continuing. “Look, like I said, I haven’t called anyone. But I do suggest you find a better hobby. Fighting villains is dangerous work, it’s better left to the adults with training.”
The kids get a look on their faces, like they want to argue but don’t know what to say. Shouta doesn’t give them the opportunity to collect their thoughts, though, as he stuffs the remainder of his ice cream directly in his face and stands up.
“It’s just a suggestion,” he says, swallowing the ice cream pushing his chair back in. “Though I should note that if we should happen to meet again in the field, I will have no such illusions about not bothering to apprehend you. It won’t be my day off, after all.”
They nod, visibly intimidated, as Shouta turns and leaves. And then, just as he’s at the door, he hears their voices right at the edge of his hearing whispering— “Did you see how he just ate that ice cream like it was nothing?! Didn’t even flinch! He’s not human, Bunny!”
Externally, he acts like he heard nothing. As he steps out onto the sidewalk, though, he hums to himself. I should try doing that in front of class, he muses. Maybe that’ll finally scare them into line.
The fourth and fifth times he meets them are unremarkable— well, as unremarkable as running into a pair of masked vigilantes can get. True to his word, he does try to apprehend them after each fight, but his unwillingness to get caught by the press makes it remarkably easy for them to slip away. They just make a beeline directly for the reporters, slip through them and into the crowds, and somehow manage to go from the flashiest outfits he’s ever seen to effectively invisible. It’s like witchcraft.
By the sixth time, he’s resigned himself to never understanding how any part of these children works. Their minds, their quirks, their outfits— whatever they are, they’re just oddities that have somehow burrowed into his night job and refuse to get out.
He thinks he knows them well enough to not be surprised anymore, though— right up until the sixth encounter, while he’s wandering the streets in search of a stray cat he’d seen around here, and he catches sight of a distinctive mop of curly forest-green hair.
He turns, backtracks a couple steps to see if he’s right, and finds to his frustration that he is— Magica Rabbit, Magica Infinity, and some new kid in a red and blue outfit are all gathered around in an alleyway, the kids he recognizes seemingly explaining something while the new one… it’s hard to tell what expression he’s making, from this distance, but Shouta think it’s thoughtful.
And then, with absolutely no warning, the new kid turns on a dime and leaps right for the nearby wall. He clambers up, ignoring his companions’ surprised yells, and vanishes onto the rooftops in much the same way they always do to escape confrontations.
Infinity and Rabbit give chase within seconds, and Shouta shrugs it off— none of them are the cat he’s looking for, so he finds he just can’t be bothered. And so he turns away and resumes strolling, figuring if they’re up to anything important he’ll hear about it in the news soon enough.
He’s right about it being something he’d hear about in the news, though the jury’s still out on whether or not it qualifies as important.
He’s not sure what possessed that kid— who the media has tentatively named Magica Frost— to go rushing into an interview with the #2 Hero just to bean him upside the head with a goofy wand before vanishing back the way he came. Whatever it may have been, Shouta thinks it was a fool’s play when the other two Magicas had spent all their time trying to give off the impression of being friendly and charismatic— more like unofficial Heroes than vigilantes. A third one popping up simply to assault one of the actual heroes doesn’t quite line up with that impression.
And so it goes, on his seventh encounter with them, that Infinity is busy explaining something to Frost as Rabbit ties up the villain they’ve just defeated.
“...No, it’s—” Infinity cuts herself off with a sigh, pushing her visor up to rub at the bridge of her nose. “It was just a bad pun, Frost. I didn’t actually plan on throwing him out the window.”
“Oh,” Frost says, looking down a little. “Um... Sorry?”
“No, it’s alright, we beat him anyway,” Infinity says, turning around and flicking her wand through the air to turn it into a cell phone— and then she pauses as her eyes land on Shouta.
She blinks. Shouta blinks. Frost looks between them, confused, and after a moment Rabbit looks up too at the sudden silence.
And then, not breaking eye contact, Infinity dials a number and puts the phone up to her ear. “Ah, hello?” she says, pitching her voice up and giving herself a faint accent. “Um, there was a villain rampaging down Nabu Street— yes, that one, um, I think I saw those vigilantes going after him but I didn’t see any heroes? Yes, the um, the Magicas. No, sorry, I’m— I have somewhere I gotta be, sorry.”
And then she hangs up, turns the phone back into her wand, and walks over to Rabbit. “Alright, that’s settled, let’s get going before the press shows up.”
Rabbit blinks. “Not the police?”
“Nah, I figure he’s got that covered,” Infinity says, jerking her head in Shouta’s direction and twirling her wand around her wrist before vanishing it in a puff of glitter. “So, let’s get going.”
The three of them go to make their escape in the typical manner, scaling straight up the side of the nearest building— but Shouta is faster, whipping out his scarf to catch around their bodies and drag them back. “Now hold on a moment—”
They do not hold on a moment. Frost whips out the same wand he’d used to give Endeavor a concussion and— Shouta isn’t sure what happens, exactly, only that his visor gets encased in a block of ice and by the time he manages to get it off his face all three of the Magicas have vanished from his grasp.
He sighs and gathers his scarf back up again. That’s a very strong quirk, he muses, hearing sirens start to grow nearer. It should make potentially identifying him easier, at least. How many pink-haired teenagers with ice quirks can there be, after all?
(The answer is none, at least not in Tokyo. He discovers this very quickly— the person closest matching the description, Endeavor’s very own fourteen-year-old son Shouto Todoroki, has not only a completely different hair color but a rock-solid alibi when the amount of time it would take to get home and change his outfit is taken into account.)
(It frustrates Shouta to no end.)
The eighth time he meets them, Infinity has spontaneously started using her quirk— what theorists had previously thought was a matter manipulation quirk evidently being a feature of the wand rather than her own ability— and it’s as if she previously simply hadn’t considered the possibility of using it in the course of her vigilantism, or thought she couldn’t.
For the record, it appears to be some sort of telekinesis— she points that silly wand at whatever she wants to manipulate, in this case the villain attempting to retreat, and simply cancels all gravity affecting her target. Then she moves the target around by moving the wand around, or she simply leaves them to hover in the air.
It’s a powerful quirk too, Shouta has to admit. She’d make an excellent hero, if she could somehow manage to get through training without being discovered as a vigilante. He’d even be proud to teach her, should that be how the dice land.
...Though perhaps that’s too charitable, he thinks, twisting in the air and attempting to reach something to pull himself back to the ground with. Still, leaving her opponent suspended in the air is an excellent tactic— but also quite frustrating to deal with. But also commendable. But also a huge dick move.
As it just so happens, the source of his frustration is standing roughly twenty feet away in front of a crowd of reporters, politely answering questions as her companions make sure the villain is well and truly down for the count. Most of the questions are probes into her personal life, which she always responds to with simply, “I’m not going to answer that.” A couple she does answer though.
“What are your motivations in becoming a vigilante?” gets a thoughtful look, a moment’s consideration, and then, “I frequently noticed crimes occurring while no heroes were around, and felt like I was the only person able to do anything about it.”
“So you feel like the professional heroes aren’t doing their jobs well enough?” the reporter asks.
Infinity hums, shrugs a little. “They’re doing what they can, but just a couple extra hands and eyes can make a world of difference?”
Another reporter shoves their microphone in Infinity’s face. “I take from his presence here that Magica Frost is indeed one of you?”
Infinity takes a small step back. “He has joined our team, yes.”
“Why did he attack Endeavor? What was your motivation in wearing those frilly outfits instead of something more classically heroic?”
“I’m not going to answer either of those.”
The approaching sound of a siren heralds the end of her impromptu interview, Infinity looking up at the sound before smiling sheepishly and taking a step back. “Sorry,” she says, taking a step back. “It sounds like it’s time for us to go.”
“Wait—” one of the reporters starts to say, making a grab for Infinity’s arms, but she’s already darted over to her companions and said something. The trio scatters, vanishing into different storefronts— what is it about this mall that leads to those kids fighting so many villains in it, Shouta wonders— and then gravity reasserts its hold on Shouta, sending him toppling to the ground.
He beats a hasty retreat out of the way of the cameras, breathing a sigh of relief as he hears the police arrive. He spares a moment to glance around in case the Magicas want to poke their heads out again, but all he sees are civilians starting to come out of hiding now that the danger has passed.
This isn’t the first time the Magicas have ended up distracting reporters like this, though it is the first time Shouta’s been present for it. Most of the time it’s Infinity doing the answering, patiently fielding questions she’s been asked a dozen times before, though Rabbit has occasionally taken over the role.
(On the surface, he’s a lot more open and friendly about his answers— right up until you actually pay attention to what he’s saying, and realize there’s no way he has a mutant-type quirk that makes him seven feet tall and wreathed in golden flames at all times, his face unknowable, and makes him turn any object he touches into an expertly cooked gourmet banquet at a five-star hotel whether or not he wants to— he says, as he is actively in contact with no less than a dozen separate articles of clothing at any given moment. Nor is it possible that his real name is seventy syllables long, most of which Shouta had previously not believed pronounceable by a human tongue. Or a three-hundred-year-old tortoise in a clever disguise. Or… any of the things he says, really.)
(Some people still somehow manage to believe him, though thankfully they’re few enough in number for Shouta to safely write them off as either supremely stupid or going along with the joke. He’s not sure what he would do if they were the majority.)
He’s not sure why they do it. It would make more sense for them to retreat as soon as the villain is defeated, to give them the most time to escape the police— though they may want to ensure the villains don’t escape while they’re gone? But whatever the case, it’s a reckless disregard for their own wellbeing, and is going to get them caught one of these days.
Shouta refuses to consider why the idea of that happening puts a sour taste in his mouth.
(They’ve grown on him, over the nine months they’ve been active, and he hates it— they’re reckless idiots, they shouldn’t have lasted a day doing any of this but somehow they have and it’s terrifying, they’re children, maybe not even in high school yet—)
But he ignores that thought, and as the police start to rope the scene off he turns and walks away. I still need to find that replacement microwave, he thinks, shoving anything else aside. That’s why you were even here in the first place, Shouta.
The eleventh time Shouta encounters them, it’s three months later and their appearance rates have dropped dramatically. Sure, they still crop up to take down another villain here and there— but it’s much less frequent. Like their own lives have finally brought themselves to the forefront.
Good, Shouta had thought when he realized. You’re children. You have exams you need to pass, and none of them require active battlefield experience.
It’s the middle of the night and Shouta is patrolling some shopping district. He’s just paused for a moment on a roof when he notices a trio of figures gathered at the edge of the railing. They don’t seem to have noticed anything, and Shouta creeps a little closer curiously— and he blinks, as the light shining up from the streets below illuminate them as all three Magicas casually enjoying some crepes.
They’re talking, Shouta realizes, and he strains his ears to listen in— this could be vitally important.
“...never really planning for this to last forever, anyway,” Infinity is saying, taking a small bite of her crepe, and when neither of her companions continue. “I— I mean, the whole actively seeking out villains was your idea anyway, Bunny? I just— before I met you, and— even before the mall, I didn’t exactly go out fighting crime in the dead of night. And I’m not saying I hate what we’ve done, you know?”
“No, I get it,” Rabbit says, staring down at his crepe and sounding like he’s doing his best to keep his voice from crumbling. “I— I mean, I really do— it hadn’t… occurred to me, but you’re right, I can’t exactly… have the time to become a hero if all my free time is spent out fighting villains.”
“Doesn’t that kind of already make us heroes?” Frost asks.
“Not without licenses, it doesn’t,” Infinity says. “Do you even watch the news? We’re not heroes, we’re vigilantes. We don’t work with the police, we run from them.”
Frost hums a little. “...Still more heroic than some actual heroes,” he mutters, barely loud enough for Shouta to pick up.
“One of these days, we’re going to get it out of you just why you had to smack Endeavor like that,” Infinity says, crossing her arms. “Mark my words, Frost. You can’t hide it forever.”
“Let’s— let’s just set that aside for now!” Rabbit says quickly, waving his free hand to distract them. “Um— we’re all going to UA anyway, aren’t we? S-so it’s not like we’re never going to see each other ever again!”
Shouta blinks. The entrance exams are coming up, he thinks. Not too surprising that they might be interested.
“...That’s assuming we all get in,” Frost says, and Rabbit shifts back a little. “That’s not a guarantee.”
“S-still!” Rabbit says. “It’s not the end of the world if we… if we stop this. There’s nothing stopping us from just being normal friends who do normal things together.”
“Yeah!” Infinity says, pumping her fists. “Besides, you said it yourself, Bunny! You don’t really need a quirk that’s good for fighting to be a hero. You just need to get strong on your own!”
“Yeah!” Rabbit says, sitting up. “We’ll all— we’ll all make it in! And maybe we’ll even get to be classmates!”
Infinity laughs. “We can hope! Oh, but we should really finish these things...”
Shouta steps away, leaping to the next roof to continue his patrol. Good, he thinks. About time you all acted like sensible people.
The twelfth time he encounters them is in the UA entrance exam. Or rather, he encounters one of them, if you can consider catching sight of her on the camera to be an encounter.
His first thought is that she’s unremarkable— some brunette with rosy cheeks and a hairstyle that seems vaguely familiar, her quirk being something to do with gravity. It’s only when she tugs a broken sign out of the ground and twirls it before tossing it to some green-haired boy that it clicks.
Because he recognizes that movement. Spin once around one arm, move fluidly to spin around the other arm, settle into a battle stance. It’s the exact move Magica Infinity does— and he’d write it off as her just being a fan, but it’s a difficult movement and she barely seemed to realize she was doing it.
And there’s the other boy too— sure, his hair is closer to black than the shimmering forest green of Magica Rabbit, but the curls are the same, and the way he drives the metal pole he was just handed right into the joint of one of the nearby robots brings him back to a particularly wild battle he’d witnessed.
He’s almost expecting to catch a glimpse of cotton-candy pink hair darting around a corner. It never happens, though, and he’s stuck just watching two thirds of the Magica Trio fighting in their civilian identities. They’re a little slow, like they’ve fallen out of shape, but it almost manages to make itself nostalgic for him when Infinity gets herself stuck under a piece of rubble and Rabbit levers it off her using the same broken sign she’d given him.
(He’ll need to look up their names at some point. Otherwise it’ll bug him for the rest of his life.)
Finally, though, the exam ends— and he didn’t count the exact number of points, but Shouta is pretty sure both of them managed to pass. It’s impressive, actually, given Rabbit never even displayed his quirk— if he even has one, which Shouta is starting to doubt.
(Which just makes it even more impressive if it’s true.)
In the end, though, Shouta says nothing. They’re pursuing an honest career now, and they’ve proven their potential. No need to ruin it for them.
Shouta stopped keeping track of how many times he’d encountered Uraraka the moment she ended up in his class.
There’s a hundred questions he’d ask her if he ever made it known that he knows about her secret identity— how could she change the way her quirk works, how could she change her eyes, why did she need to dress up like a magical girl— but he remains silent. Instead, he thinks about everything else about her.
She’s a capable student. She became fast friends with Todoroki, though Shouta is starting to have suspicions that they may have known each other already. She’s resolutely remained friends with Midoriya, despite him landing in class 1-B instead— a bond forged through technically-criminal activity can never be broken.
When the villain alliance attacks at USJ, she vanishes in the confusion and doesn’t reappear until the battle is over. Her quirk does appear, though, in the form of villains getting thrown into the air and suspended there— in all the chaos, everyone is willing enough to believe she’d been in the melee disabling opponents by touch, and she doesn’t correct them, but Shouta knows. He sees the pink and purple pen she tucks into her pocket, the one curiously matching up with Magica Infinity's aesthetic, and he knows.
He doesn’t bring it up.
Still, the thirteenth time he encounters them— not in their true identities, but wearing those ridiculous outfits and twirling fancy wand— the thirteenth time he encounters them is in the summer, when one of his own students is kidnapped from right underneath him.
And when he and the rest of the heroes go to rescue Bakugou, they find a trio of cosplaying vigilantes dragging him through the streets as he spits flaming vitriol and swears the next time he sees them he will kill them, he didn’t need their fucking help.
And Shouta sighs. “It looks to me like you did, actually,” he says.
“You need your fucking eyes checked then,” Bakugou says, shoving some kind of pen into his pocket. “I was just fine on my own.”
“Sure you were.”
.
.
.
(Reports come in that the villain alliance’s headquarters were destroyed in a massive explosion, and that four oddly dressed figures were seen fleeing the scene.)
(Shouta sighs, connects the dots, and says nothing.)
(It’s just a habit at this point.)
(When it finally gets out that I knew the whole time, he resolves, I’m going to ask if they plan on recruiting the entirety of my class into their ranks. Maybe ask them to get done with too.)