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6:45 am (wake up)
The alarm blares. Tenko hits snooze and goes back to sleep.
6:50 am (wake up)
The alarm blares. Tenko hits snooze and goes back to sleep.
6:55 am (wake up)
The alarm blares. Tenko hits snooze and goes back to sleep.
7:00 am (wake up)
The alarm blares. Tenko tries to hit snooze, but someone’s snatched his phone out of reach.
"You're going to be late, Nii-san!" his brother laughs, and half-awake as he is Tenko can vividly imagine Izuku's impish expression, phone dangled between two outstretched fingers.
"Fuck you," he says, and tries to sleep anyway.
7:01 am (yell at your brother)
The light is on. His covers are gone. Izuku is down the hall, giggling madly.
Tenko curses.
"TENKO," Mom shouts from down the hall. "WHAT DID YOU CALL IZUKU?"
Tenko curses, again, but remembers to do it under his breath.
7:05 am (get dressed)
Bright red gloves mechanically replace finger cozies, middle finger covered and palms free in a cleverly constructed application of Mom’s technical skill. Tenko is very good at destroying things, and gloves are harder to shake off than most alternatives.
The uniform comes next, one sleeve after another. He hates it, all clean lines and scratchy starch, but Mom paid good money and even thinking about destroying the thing makes his insides twist. He owes her enough.
They still can’t make him wear the tie.
7:15 am (eat your breakfast)
“So messy, Tenko!” Mom says, leaning forward to wipe a piece of egg off his face. Tenko tilts his chair backwards, out of reach, teetering precariously on the back legs.
Across the table, Izuku sniggers with a mouth full of rice.
Mom comes for him next.
7:18 am (wish your mother goodbye)
Mom’s schedule is carefully arranged. She leaves for the store not long after they leave for school, and returns when they both come home, most days at the same time. She’s already ready for work, uniform on and hair gathered into a neat bun at the nape of her neck.
“I love you,” she says. Hugs him. He hugs her back, stiffly, two fingers lifted up and away.
“Love you too, Mom.”
“Have a nice day at school?”
“I’ll try, Mom.”
7:20 am (listen to your brother lie)
“I’ll be fine, Nii-san,” Izuku mumbles, no longer meeting Tenko’s eyes. “Kaachan’s been nicer, lately.”
There are small burns hidden carefully beneath the sleeves of Izuku’s shirt, and there could be more Tenko doesn’t know about. He thinks: that’s bullshit, little brother.
“I can walk you to school,” is what he says aloud.
Izuku shakes his head. “You’ll be late if you do. You don’t even need to pick me u—”
“I’m picking you up, idiot.” He pokes him for good measure, single digit right between the eyes. “It’s what we do.”
Izuku grins weakly. “Yeah,” he says. “I know.”
Tenko thinks about wringing Bakugou Katsuki’s skinny little neck. About how easy it would be to uncover his hands and one two three four five featherlight touches—
Tenko stops thinking about Bakugou Katsuki.
7:26 am (break the law)
He jumps the station turnstile, rail pass forgotten somewhere back at the house. Fight the power.
7:30 am (ride the train)
It’s all salarymen and students, this time of the morning. Salarymen, students, and that hobo Tenko sees around sometimes.
He nudges a banana yellow sleeping bag with the toe of his rocket red sneaker. Cocooned inside, the hobo opens one bloodshot eye and glares blearily up. Tenko grins toothily, but doesn’t escalate it further. A seat opened up at the other end of the car, and he’ll take that over dicking with sleeping bag man. For now.
7:40 am (pass the time)
Tap tap tap tap, goes the DS. The buttons are stuck, just a little (they’re supposed to be whisper silent when they compress) but Tenko prefers it this way. It’s easier not to think about stuff he doesn’t want to think about when things are real, loud, tangible.
Bulbasaur is knocked out. Go, Raichu!
Tap tap tap.
Raichu, use Thunderbolt!
Tap tap tap.
Pikachu, use Discharge!
Tap tap tap.
Izuku plays too, and can beat him pretty consistently, which Tenko will admit exactly never. He’s learned to (sort of) live with it by taking solace in the fact that Izuku is his baby brother, and probably learned everything from him anyway. Definitely.
Tap tap—
The machine dies. Tenko stares at it incredulously, and shakes it, like that’s going to change anything.
He knew the battery was running low, but honestly. What the fuck.
7:46 am (indulge in teenaged angst)
Tenko’s neck itches. He’s not supposed to, but hands rise of their own accord, dull nails and fabric scratching rhythmically at exposed flesh.
He’s thinking.
Mom tells Tenko she loves him every day, and he knows she’s telling the truth, because Midoriya Inko is the best person in the whole world and would never lie to him.
That doesn’t mean he understands why.
7:50 am (chew gum)
The hobo is eyeing him murderously. So is everyone else in the car.
Tenko pops another bubble, machine gun loud in the enclosed space.
It’s a talent.
8:00 am (get off the train)
Finally.
8:04 am (walk to school)
Tenko shivers and draws his jacket tighter, hands plunged snugly into deep pockets. The weather would be seasonably brisk even without the wind chill, and in a vague sort of way he regrets not taking a scarf when he left the house. Mom would have preferred it, because it’s cold, and because the thick woolen things they’d made last week would deter twitchy fingers.
His red-raw neck throbs in the open air. Too late now.
The walk between the station and Tipoca High School isn’t long-- 15 minutes at most, if the streets and sidewalks are clogged, but they aren’t. Tipoca isn’t fucking Yuuei; or close enough to get saddled with notoriously hellish baby hero traffic.
He keeps to the sidewalks, half-hopping around the odd puddle or fellow pedestrian. A splash of color catches his eye and he stops, curious; plastered on the side of a laundromat is an obnoxiously technicolor poster: HEROES DON’T DO DRUGS superimposed over All Might’s smug face. Tenko rolls his eyes. Izu-tan’s hobby is enough of that, thanks.
He tears it down in one go and sprints away, laughing, while a little old lady shrieks at him from one of the apartments overhanging the street.
8:12 am (bring home the bacon)
“Last week you said ￥1000!”
“I told you ￥1000 unless it took me longer then I thought it would. Senpai.” Saito’s in his space, like he thinks he can intimidate him. Tenko unbends from his perpetual slouch and across from him the upperclassman blue-screens, gears visibly whirring at whatever passed for full capacity.
Tenko's skinny, all sharp angles and lanky proportions, but he’s also tall. Really tall. Taller than most people notice.
Saito backs up.
“Look, man,” he says. “I don’t even have the extra yen.”
“Then you don’t have your homework.”
“It’s due today, asshole! Come on, you already wrote it--”
Tenko shakes the essay between them, just out of reach. “You think I give a shit about THIS?” He snaps the paper’s spine for emphasis, quick and loud. Pauses. Shifts into an exaggerated thinking gesture, thumb and forefinger framing his chin. “You know what my quirk is… right? All I’d have to do is—” he moves as if to take off a glove and Saito blanches.
He gets his ￥1500.
8:35 am (antagonize your homeroom teacher)
“Midoriya,” and boy does Suzuki-sensei sound like he needs a nap, “Sit on the chair, if you please.”
Tenko blinks owlishly. “I am sitting on it,” he points out, because it’s true. Some of his classmate’s snicker, but most of them are too used to these exchanges to pay much attention. From the corner of his eye he can make out Nishimura glaring daggers: he and the class president do not traditionally get along, and she’s no exception.
Suzuki-sensei looks pinched. “The word you’re looking for is ‘crouching’, Midoriya. Feet off the chair.”
8:50 am (answer a stupid question)
It’s very hard to pay attention in class when you already know the material, and he doesn’t give enough of a shit to try. The back of his neck prickles. Tenko turns in place, eyes narrowed—it’s Ueda, seat #20, blatantly ogling his notebook.
“What.”
Ueda scoots back all at once, nearly losing their balance. If Kato-sensei has bothered to notice, she isn’t doing anything about it. “Uh,” they say, keeping their voice low. “You like to draw? Is that…practice?”
Tenko’s notebook is full of hands; messy sketches to more serious attempts. “No,” he replies, not trying half as hard as Ueda to keep it down. “I just like them.”
10:45 am (tell the truth)
“The state,” he says, “has a monopoly on violence, and heroes are just the--”
“Midoriya,” Nakamura-sensei begs. “We’re talking about art history today.”
12: 15 pm (eat your lunch)
Tenko eats alone, which suits him just fine.
His lunchbox is gently extracted from its schoolbag prison. Prying off the lid yields Katsudon Mom must have made while he was sleeping, pork cutlets carefully arranged in the shape of a heart. She’s so cheesy, Tenko thinks, mildly reluctant to disturb the food.
His stomach grumbles. Not that reluctant.
“Thankyou,” he tells her, and digs in.
1:51 pm (defend your rights)
Higashi-sensei appears in the room with a flash-bang and a puff of sulfurous smoke, brushing off his pants and eyeing the smoke alarm warily. Satisfied that he hadn’t accidentally rained them out (again), he turns toward the classroom, needle sharp teeth bared cheerfully.
“Lunch is over, Midoriya. Bag it or bin it.”
Tenko snaps the kit-kat. “No rule against eating during passing period,” he points out. “We’ve still got—” he squints at the wall clock “–-four minutes to go.”
“I’m in the room!”
“Rules,” Tenko says, mouth full of chocolate, “are rules.”
President Nishimura’s face is blue, then purple, then red, then—chartreuse? Tenko didn’t know chameleon-form could do that. He finishes the kit-kat and gives her a second to dial back the camouflage before, in the interest of scientific curiosity, pulling out a jumbo bag of lemon sours.
She repeats it.
…Cool.
2:46 pm (avoid responsibility)
Fifteen minutes to final bell, more or less, which means:
“No.”
“Yessssssss,” Nishimura hisses, forked tongue catching on the ‘s’.
2:47 pm (fail to avoid responsibility)
Suzuki-sensei threatens to keep him after school if he doesn’t, so he cleans the blackboard like someone who actually cares.
Nishimura, he thinks bitterly, is a tyrant.
3:00 pm (bounce)
The bell rings and Tenko is out the door like a shot from a cannon, slipping between, around, and over students and teachers alike. Higashi-sensei pops out of view with a startled squawk and a puff of smoke and somewhere in the school, the fire alarm begins to wail.
He’d laugh, if he had the time.
3:10 pm (ride the train)
Tenko is a lifelong member of the “going home club”. That doesn’t mean he’s going home exactly yet. The route he’s taking heads roughly the same direction, but in a more lateral path: not convenient for their apartment but as close as he can get to Izuku’s school before it’s faster just to walk.
He digs absentmindedly into the soft flesh of his arms before catching himself, fiddling with a pencil instead. Tenko doesn’t like making his brother wait. Waiting is time he can’t keep that Katsuki shit off Izuku’s back, as much as he’s tried to impress onto the brat to step off.
Not for the first time, he wishes the school administration was competent, or that Izuku would admit to Mom how bad it’s gotten. All this shit, and for what. Because Izuku’s quirkless? Tenko’s got death hands. How is that supposed to be better?
The pencil snaps.
3:32 pm (bully your brothers bully)
He sees Katsuki and his little gang before they see him. All four of the brats are leaning on a side wall near the school entrance, laughing to themselves and waiting for…something. Or someone.
Tenko stops a fair distance away. The kids continue to fail perception checks. A few seconds cursory examination reveals a rock near the heel of a red sneaker, not too large but clearly not a pebble. He picks it up. Hefts it. It’ll do.
All that’s left is to wind up the pitch and—
The rock makes contact square above Katsuki, hitting the brick hard and fast before ricocheting into his head. He explodes reflexively, cursing up a storm and catching the kid with wings off guard enough that he tried jumping up and into the wall. Direct hit.
The kids mill in undirected rage, a kicked hornet’s nest angry and eager to find a culprit to pound on with their tiny baby fists.
Tenko waves.
Katsuki’s eyes widen fractionally. It’s barely perceivable, but Tenko can tell. Boy Wonder’s always been a few batteries short of a pack (if he weren’t he would have left Izuku alone years ago) but he’s smart enough to be afraid.
“Kaachan~,” Tenko sing-songs, nothing less than sugar-sweet. A vein in Katsuki’s forehead begins to throb—how cute-- and the hornet’s nest changes formation, a solid wall of barely suppressed anger lined up behind their brave leader.
“Fuck off, old man,” Katsuki says. Tenko rolls his eyes.
“Is that any way to talk to your Senpai?” He steps closer, teeth bared in a gnashing parody of a smile Izuku has (on multiple occasions) told him looks ‘creepy’. Katsuki holds his ground. “What are you kids kicking around for? You join a club? Waiting,” his voice takes on a dangerous lilt, “for another little friend?”
One of Katsuki’s cronies’ fidgets, quirky fingers extending like feelers.
You could cut the tension in the air with a knife, and Tenko’s close enough to touch the brat. He tilts his head sideways, white-blue hair feathering out at odd angles. “I’m looking for my little brother,” he says. “You kids seen him around?”
Katsuki looks like he’s five seconds away from blowing up on him, and Tenko almost wishes he would. Mom might not be as disappointed if it’s self-defense. Technically. But—no. Katsuki’s chilling out, breathing deep, getting himself under control.
“Inside,” he spits. Not that chill. “Saw Deku—around.” He turns, addressing his…friends? No, groupies. Kids like Bakugou Katsuki don’t have friends, not really. “Let’s go,” he says. “He’s not worth it.”
For once, Katsuki isn’t wrong.
3:36 pm (shake down the bathroom)
Tenko wanders through the halls with purpose, undisturbed. None of the students care, and the teachers know who he is by this point. It’s hardly the first time he’s collected Izuku. Consequently, he knows where to look: there are only so many places on campus Izuku would hole up.
The second-floor boy’s restroom looms. Tenko pushes past the door, and— yeah, there he is. The sniffling is distinctive, though Izuku tried to cut himself off when the door swung open.
Tenko leans against a sink that’s seen better days, glancing under the stall doors, but Izuku’s too smart to let his tell-tale red kicks touch the floor. It doesn’t matter.
“I wonder,” he says, voice bouncing oddly against the tiled walls, “where my widdlest baby bwovers gone off too.”
Dead silence.
“Whomst I wuv wiv all my-- ”
The last stall to the right bursts open with a bang and Izuku appears, eyes red but face alight with an expression of comical disgust.
“Stop it!”
“Izu-tan!”
“Shut up!”
His brother pauses to rub the last of the tears from his eyes, and Tenko really can’t help himself. “H-hewwo,” he begins, and Izuku kicks him in the shin.
“Only villains do that!”
3:39 pm (vacate the premises)
“It’s fine, Nii-san.”
Tenko gives him a kit-kat.
4:05 pm (make a mistake)
Izuku walks to school, and the two of them head home along the same meandering route. They used to go in the morning, too, but high school got in the way. Tenko hates it, but he couldn’t get into the one school worth bothering with close enough to still escort his brother. Too many ‘behavioral issues’.
Izuku stops.
It takes Tenko a few seconds to register he’s the only one still moving, and he stops too, turning around to face the kid.
“What,” he asks, “are you looking at.”
Izuku’s got his eyes glued to his phone, bright as anything. He mouths something indistinct.
“What?”
Izuku looks up. “All Might,” he breaths.
“What??”
“ALL MIGHT,” Izuku shouts, taking off down the road at a dead sprint.
Tenko stares, bewildered, at the green blur receding into the distance. What the hell, he thinks. That kid is dead.
Exit, Izuku: pursued by angry teenager.
4:20 pm (deal with your brother)
Tenko leans into his brother, arm locked congenially around a skinny neck, ruffling curly green hair too hard and too long. Izuku yelps, squirms, and fails to break Tenko’s grip, as usual. Like any good sibling, Tenko is gonna hold on until he’s deemed the brat suffered enough Brotherly Affection to compensate for effort expended.
Izuku stops wiggling so hard. That's probably enough.
"Tenkooooo-"
Or, not quite, but Izuku’s already been released. Tenko raises a hand threateningly at Izuku's mop, but the kids onto him and dances out of reach. Tenko rolls his eyes and gestures to their surroundings. “Izu-chaaaaaaaan,” he mimics. “Look around. Tell me where we are.”
Izuku bristles at the nickname, but at least he has the sense to look mildly embarrassed.
The two of them are parked at the outermost edge of a crowd of rabid fanboys, a roiling mass of sweaty nerds perpetually fighting for spot at the front of the pack. Further progress down the narrow one-lane street is stymied by yards of police tape (and police), the last line of defense between some genius in the crowd and certain death. There’s smoke in the air, hazy, emanating from the fight— thick enough at the source that he can’t make out much beyond loud, metallic crashes and the occasional gout of flame.
“I didn’t know All Might could breath fire,” Tenko stage whispers.
“Shut up,” Izuku replies, squinting through the smoke. “I think that’s… Endeavor?” Another flash of flame through the smoke: bright blue, a feat few fire emitters could dream of matching. “Yeah, Endeavor. What’s he doing over here? He patrols closer to his agency unless he’s been called in, and whoever he’s fighting down there is really giving him a hard time, he’d usually have it wrapped up by now… somebody who’s quirk is naturally suited for fighting his, maybe, like pyrokinesis or something with water or air, yeah…”
Izuku digs Hero Analysis for The Future (No. 6) out of his school bag, pen at the ready and muttering something about wind conditions. Tenko considers dragging him out of the line of fire but leaves him to it: he’s only willing to humor so much Hero Nonsense at once, but as dumb as his brother is it’s his…Thing.
As long as Izuku doesn’t get himself incinerated, he doesn’t care. Mom’d kill them both dead for that.
Tenko blows an uneven chunk of hair from his eyes, rocking back on his heels. Izuku can have all the fun he wants, but there’s shit-all here for him to do that doesn’t involve squinting at distant smoke. All the stores that aren’t smashed up are closed, and his DS is still dead. He glances at the crowd.
Here’s a nerd, there’s a nerd, there’s a-- hot guy on a car?
4:27 pm (question hot guy’s existence)
Hot Guy’s sitting pretty on the roof of a yellow pickup truck, slightly to the left of the main nerd-throng. He’s ginger. Gangly. Wearing overalls of all things. Tenko thinks it’s more than a little unfair he can pull it off without looking like an idiot.
Hot Guy lazily raises a pastel pink camera and snaps a picture of the distant battle. Nothing out of place, here, except that Hot Guy looks…bored. About as bored as Tenko is.
What…is he doing here.
4:28 pm (continue questioning hot guy’s existence)
No, really. What’s he doing here.
4:29 pm (approach the hot guy)
Tenko saunters up to the truck, slow and steady. He considers jamming his hands in his pockets—that’s cool, right?—but long-ingrained instinct keeps all five fingers well away from his pants.
Hot Guy isn’t looking at him when he reaches the truck. That’s cool. Tenko is just gonna, lean on the tailgate a littoH MOTHERFUCK
4:30 pm (die)
The tailgate fell off.
Onto his fucking foot.
While he was leaning on it.
Shit isn’t supposed to fall apart when he’s wearing the goddamned gloves, what the FUCK. Tenko stares blankly at the sky, flat on his back, secure in the fact that this literally can’t get worse.
“Holy shit.” Hot Guy is leaning over the side of the roof, looking down on him with an expression of bemused incredulity. The camera flashes, once: the bastard snapped a photo.
“Shut the hell up.”
Hot Guy slides down the side of the car. He doesn’t even jump off the truck bed, which, honestly. Douchebag. Tenko wheezes and kicks the tailgate off his feet. Rolls to a sitting position. He blinks and Hot Guy’s standing there, hand in Tenko’s face. An invitation to—what. Help him up? Tenko glares at the appendage, and then up at Hot Guy, except that Hot Guy also has freckles? What the fuck.
He takes the hand.
Hot Guy swings him up to his feet and Tenko only stumbles a little, which is a win on a day where he broke an entire fucking car by leaning on it. Or the car broke him. His foot throbs. “Your car,” he says, “is a piece of shit.”
Hot Guy rolls his eyes. “Don’t insult the pussy wagon.”
Tenko stares.
Hot Guy rolls his eyes again, the insufferable prick. “Side of the truck.” Yeah. There it is. PUSSY WAGON, lettered bright pink on the side of the piss yellow car. What the fuck. “It’s not mine,” Hot Guy elaborates.
…This truck is possibly the most heterosexual thing he’s seen in his entire life. Good.
“You got a name?”
Hot Guy rubs the back of his neck, thinking—“Dabi,” he says, which is fake. Super fake.
“Yeah,” Tenko snorts. “I’m Shigaraki.”
Dabi narrows his eyes. “Really.”
“Fuck, no. Tell me your real name.”
Dabi curls his lips back to reply, which is a shame, because Endeavor chooses this exact moment to get launched through a nearby storefront.
Everything goes to shit.
4:38 pm (find your brother)
It’s hard to breathe. Smoke’s choking him, smothering his lungs. He needs
“IZUKU,” it burns to yell but
“IZUKU, YOU STUPID BRAT,” stupid stupid stupid where did he
A flash of light. To his right: Dabi, laughing, snapping another picture of—Endeavor, snuffed, lying prone in the remains of a glass window.
The winds picking up, too strong and localized to be natural. Quirk, probably, Izuku’s usually right, but where
Green, somewhere in the panicked mob. Tenko turns, stumbles, loses his balance. Somewhere behind him Endeavor has woken up and reignited his stupid asshole costume. Tenko has a moment to think: fuck, again? before someone catches him by the arm.
Dabi?
They race forward, away from the fight and towards the crowd. “What’s he look like,” Dabi asks, voice tight. Oh.
“Green.”
4:41 pm (witness an arrival)
They catch Izuku running towards the danger, because his brother is an idiot. Tenko grabs one arm and Dabi grabs the other and they both ignore Izuku’s agitated squawk. He’ll chew him out later.
“Wait,” Izuku’s trying to say, “I wanna see—”
“Shut uuuupppppp,” Tenko wheezes. They keep hauling ass. Dabi’s grinning, like he thinks it’s funny. “It’s Endeavor! You’ll live!”
Izuku digs his heels in the street. “I’m not talking about Endeavor!”
What…?
“IT’S FINE NOW,” someone yells. There goes his blood pressure. “WHY? BECAUSE I AM HERE!”
All Might’s always loved a good entrance.
4:44 pm (roll your eyes)
“Wait,” Dabi says. He squints at Izuku, and then down at Izuku’s phone, where he’d been posting something to one of his nerd sites. “…mightyboy?”
Izuku flushes bright red to his roots, like the worlds shittiest Christmas ornament. “Heh, heh,” he stammers. “…yes?”
That’s, what, his herobattles usertag? This is…next level, honestly.
“Holy shit,” Dabi says, more animated then Tenko’s seen him the entire night. Fanboys. “You’re like…an infant.” Izuku bristles at the comment, but Dabi continues, “So you put together all those pics of All Might embarrasin’ the hell outta Endeavor—” Or not.
“Ummm,” Izuku says, “You mean…the collaboration stuff...?”
“Yeah, that. Whatever. I got some footage of my own, if you wanna spread it around…”
Tenko tunes out.
4:51 pm (reclaim something lost)
“I still can’t believe we SAW THAT!!”
“The light at the end of the tunnel?”
Tenko has a headache.
“You almost died,” Izuku corrects. “I was fine. Anyway, one punch! All Might took that guy out with one punch!! Did you see how fast he was moving??”
Tenko really has a headache.
They’re heading home, at least. Izuku stopped dragging his feet when All Might left, as abruptly as he’d arrived and pulled Endeavor’s ass from the fire. Dabi wandered off some point after nerding out with brother, which, you know, whatever. Dabi is an asshole. A stupid, hot asshole. With a stupid fake name.
Not that he cares.
“Children!”
He feels gross. The soot’s settling wrong on his skin, thick and itchy and terrible. Izuku’s doing a bit better, lucky little shit. Beat up, sure, but he avoided most of the smoke AND he doesn’t even have a uniform to worry about.
“Excuse me, children!”
Tenko turns around.
A man is speedwalking down the sidewalk behind them. Large. Really large. Like…eight feet, and built, holy shit. Tenko considers scooping Izuku up and walking faster, but nah, that wouldn’t work—the stranger’s moving pretty fast for someone his size and Tenko doubts he could outrun him. Izuku stopped when Tenko stopped, curious, and Tenko settles for standing in front of him.
The stranger catches up, skidding to a halt a stone’s throw away. Up close he looks kind of… sick? Dark circles dominate a hollow face framed by limp blonde bangs, like Yami Yugi if Yami Yugi ran out of hair gel. He’s beefy, but his clothes (white t-shirt, cargo pants) hang awkwardly around places where he might have been larger. Something about him is familiar, aggravatingly familiar, but Tenko can’t quite place it—
“Sorry for intruding, children!” He says, rubbing the back of his neck. “But I found something of yours...?” He rustles around in a pants pocket and pulls out
“That’s my phone!”
Izuku tries to push past Tenko but Tenko grabs the collar of his shirt, pinning him in place. .
“How’d you know it was his?” Tenko’s eyes narrow accusingly.
“Lock screen.” The stranger shifts in place, awkward. At least somebody is picking up on the mood. “I was going to drop it off at a station, but I saw you children walking up ahead and…” He holds the phone up between them to illustrate his point, and there they are: him, Mom, and Izuku, an informal family picture taken maybe last year. The three of them are clustered together center frame while Izuku extends his arm to take the shot, Tenko and Mom making exaggerated smiles with their fingers pressed to the corners of their mouths.
Tenko hadn’t noticed Izuku set it. Sap.
“…Alright.” Tenko drops Izuku and his brother dashes forward, reclaiming the phone and bowing his head in a quick ‘thank you!’.
“I didn’t even notice I’d dropped it, Mister…?”
“Yagi,” Yagi supplies, cheerful as anything. Izuku’s moods are usually infectious. Yagi turns towards Tenko, expression indecipherable—which is annoying, because Tenko is usually pretty good that. “And you children would be…?”
“Midoriya,” Izuku says, ignoring Tenko’s pointed glare. What’s he thinking, giving their information up to weird strangers? “I’m Izuku,” he adds, digging the hole deeper. “He’s Tenko.”
Yagi looks—what is that, disappointed? Weird.
“Ah,” Yagi chuckles, but Tenko thinks it sounds stilted. “Sorry, sorry. You just…” He’s looking at Tenko again, scrutinizing him with an uncomfortable level of focus. “…remind me of someone.”
Tenko chews on the inside of his cheek. “If we’re being honest…you seem familiar to me, too,” he says. “Maybe we’ve met before?”
Yagi’s eyes widen in alarm, which is some kind of bullseye. Nice.
“Yes, well,” Yagi stammers, digging himself deeper into the weirdo hole. “I’m afraid it’s time I excused myself -- but it was nice to meet you, young Midoriyas!”
“ARE YOU IMPLYING OUR MOM IS OLD?” Tenko calls after Yagi’s retreating back. Izuku stomps on his foot, and if Tenko cries a little, it’s the Pussy Wagon’s fault.
4:53 pm (walk home)
“You’re right,” Izuku says, thoughtful. “Yagi-san did look familiar.”
Tenko’s little brother is, incidentally, now covered in soot. If this had anything to do with Tenko (who is now slightly less sooty, or at least more smudged) it was Well Deserved, Brat.
“He was weird.”
Izuku frowns. “He was nice! Just…” He chews on his lip. “Familiar.”
“Weird,” Tenko repeats.
“You were rude!”
Tenko was, but that’s not the point. “Whatever,” he allows. Neither of them is going to budge on this, and it’s best not to fight when they’re this close to home. Mom always makes it more of an issue then it actually is. The only downside to that is Izuku’s going to think he won for a few hours, but if nothing else Tenko’s confident in his ability to pop that bubble.
The journey home continues, silence unbroken, until
“Oh!”
Tenko glances sideways at the kid, who’s got his eyes glued to the phone Yagi delivered. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” Izuku glances right back, sly as a fox. “You know that Dabi guy we met? He DM’d me.”
Geek. Except Izuku looks…far too pleased with himself.
“He got some really good stuff of Endeavor…and a picture of you, Nii-san! It’s a great angle. I think I found my new lock-screen, honestly.”
Dabi…didn’t.
Izuku shows him phone. Sure enough, he’s looking at himself: flat on his back, shocked face gaping straight at the camera. The cursed tailgate is still trapping his foot, P U S S Y W A G O N clearly visible in bright pink lettering he’d been too distracted to notice at the time.
He’s going to kill Dabi. And Izuku. But mostly Dabi.
Izuku’s already given himself a head start when Tenko starts running.
5:08 pm (realize your mistake)
“Whatever you do,” Tenko hisses, “Don’t let Mom know we almost died.”
“You. You almost died.” Izuku frowns. “Nii-san, we’re covered in—”
Mom opens the door, eyes red and sniffling loudly. She stares at the two of them. Tenko is suddenly and vividly aware of all the parts of his uniform that were sort of on fire.
She bursts into tears.
5:10 pm (comfort your mother)
“WHY DIDN’T YOU CAAALLLLLLLL,” Mom wails. Tenko pats her back, stiffly, trying to keep the grime off her nice clothes.
“We…forgot?”
Izuku winces, and yeah, that’s. A lame excuse.
“WHY WERE YOU ON FIRE.”
Tenko glares pointedly at Izuku, who winces and steps up to bat.
“We got, um. Held up?”
“Yeah,” Tenko says. “Held up.”
Mom cries harder.
5:19 pm (bathe)
Tenko rubs at his skin until he’s red-raw and still feels gross. It’ll do.
5:26 pm (eat your dinner)
Mom’s eyes are still red and puffy, but she’s done crying. Tenko still feels like an ASSHOLE, and a quick glance across the table more or less confirms that Izuku feels the same. Tenko…is an asshole, but. Mom. Crying. Bad.
“How was school?” Mom asks, spooning herself some stew.
Tenko shrugs. “All right,” he says, which is true. School is usually all right.
“…All right,” Izuku parrots, which is a lie nobody at the table is going to call him on tonight.
5:41 pm (quality time with mom)
Mom and Tenko sit side-by-side on the couch, the only noise in the living room the clack clack clack of knitting needles clicking together. Izuku’s already wandered off, probably to geek out over the fresh material he managed to catch during their near-death experience. Possibly with Dabi (who Tenko is still going to kill).
It’s fine. This’s been Tenko and Mom’s thing since Mom first showed Tenko how to hold the needles, years and years ago.
“You know you can tell me anything?”
Tenko pauses. “Yeah.” The next few purls are possibly a bit more stabby then necessarily. “I know.” Mom sighs, which is (honestly) totally unfair. “It’s not me,” he says, because it’s true. Tenko is fine! Izuku…
This isn’t his conversation to have. Mom gets it, anyway. “I’m not talking about Katsuki,” Mom says. “I’m talking about you.”
What? “No. Nothing.”
Clack clack clack.
“Okay.” Mom sounds tired. “Okay, honey.”
6:02 pm (acknowledge the flake)
Izuku’s bedroom is… kind of creepy, honestly. There isn’t a single centimeter free from All Might’s vacant, empty gaze; slapped onto everything from bedsheets to posters to rows and rows of probably priceless collectables.
He’s never understood how Izuku sleeps in here, and most of the time actively refuses to cross the threshold. Tonight? An exception. Tenko might spend the whole time hyperaware he’s being stared at from like, eight million angles, but oppressing Izuku makes braving Big Smiley worth it.
Which he’d be doing, if not for the fact that Izuku is…not geeking out on his hero forum site. Or doing his homework. Or much of anything, except sit on his bed, knees tucked to his chest.
...that’s not right.
“He’s not picking up,” Izuku tells him, disaffected. His phone lies abandoned some a few inches to his left, face down on the bedspread.
Tenko purses his lips, trying to think of the best way to phrase this without sounding like a dumbass. “Who’s not picking up?”
“Hisashi,” he says.
Oh. Shit.
Tenko crosses the room and sits next to his brother, bedsprings squeaking loudly in protest. There’s not much to say, except, “Yeah, well. Your dad is a jackass.”
“Hisashi,” Izuku corrects. He looks up, face schooled into an expression of aggressive indifference. “He said he wasn’t gonna miss the call this time.”
Midoriya Hisashi is…such a flake.
Tenko breaths, in and out, and releases the chunk of comforter he’d been half-aware he was clutching, scooting closer to his brother.
Not much else to say at all.
6:20 pm (do your homework)
Tenko’s bedroom is significantly smaller then Izuku’s. Mom and Hisashi used it for storage, until Mom dragged him into their lives and decided the situation was going to be more permanent than a futon in the living room. There isn’t much space to stretch out before hitting a shelf (they take up most the walls) and the only possible way to stick a desk in there is, maybe, in his dreams. He likes it anyway. It’s safe.
He also managed to jam a small television onto one of the shelves, eventually. With some finagling.
Tenko sits comfortably on the center of his bed, laptop cradled in his lap. There’s homework to finish: some calculus, an essay and a half. Nothing difficult, but school hasn’t been difficult for a while now.
He gets to work.
6:52 pm (do everyone else’s homework)
The funny thing is, Tenko saves his best stuff for other people’s essays. It was a calculated decision, made years ago to throw any inquiring teachers off the scent of a very profitable side-business.
To be perfectly honest? Tenko also just…kind of prefers it when nobody expects that much from him.
Anyway.
Tomorrow? Pay-dirt.
9:00 pm (suck at dark souls)
Wait for it.
Wait for it.
Dodgeroll. Dodgeroll. DodgerOHSHIT OH HELL FUCK SHIT GOD DAMMIT HE ALMOST HAD IT THAT TIME FUCK
There’s a bang, loud, someone’s thrown something at one of the walls bordering his room—
“SUCK AT VIDEO GAMES QUIETER,” Izuku yells.
“SHUT UP,” Tenko shouts back. “YOU’RE BUGGING MOM.”
“Please don’t yell,” Mom says from the living room.
“Yeah, Tenko,” Izuku sniggers through the wall. “Don’t yell.”
“I’m talking to both of you.”
The thing about this apartment is: sound carries.
Tenko is great at video games, also, fuck you Izuku.
11:40 pm (pass out)
Normally, Tenko wouldn’t fall asleep until, what, one at the earliest? Something about it taking a near-death-experience to unfuck his sleep schedule is…hilarious, honestly, but by the time Tenko sort of realizes this his eyes flutter shut and he’s out like a light.
Sweet dreams.
(it’s been a long time since he had one of those)
12:00 am (live to see another day)
Midoriya Tenko is asleep when one day rolls quietly into the next, unremarkable and unremarked.
Nothing strange about that.