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Chapter 17: Alleviating Truths
🕑 Added 2024-03-01 16:13:05 +0000 UTCOkay, so I noticed last week that I've burnt through most of what I wrote for this, as when I started the planning for this last year, I thought I could get through everything for season 1 before that break I took. Now I have an egg on my face, so I'll soon be working off very sparse notes. I'm unsure if I should take a break sometime in April to give myself time to get more ideas and plot points out.
As for this chapter, it wasn't action-filled, but at this point, I've come to accept that most chapters are about something other than character 1 beating character 2. Still, after keeping his secret from the first day, it seems he finally has to come clean…or does he? Anyway, if you liked this chapter, please follow the story and me, and leave a comment at the end.
Chapter 17: Alleviating Truths
(Previously)
"I want to talk about your quirk,” Midoriya's brow creased at that; did he want to make a guess? Instead, Monoma leaned in, wrapping a hand around him like a hug to mask him, shutting off Midoriya's earpiece in a move that could quickly come off as accidental. Now, with a moment of privacy. “Or lack of one.” Once he said it, he turned them back on, hoping that Vlad would assume it was an error. As Midoriya looked at him, he just grew a second hard.
“When?” He broke from his victorious foe.
"Later, right now, I'm just gonna let this end so I can see Recovery Girl," Monoma replied as he made his way out, hoping there was a path he hadn't sealed off. Leaving Midoriya to look at his back as he went, wondering what he'd do if Monoma asked too many questions or threatened to out him as Izuku liked his friends; he really did, but he wasn't sure he could trust them with them. He didn't want to look at him with hate, disgust, or pity.
Line Break
After that, they quickly finished their match, but Izuku didn't focus too much on it, even when he heard that Kodai had finally managed to trick Shiozaki into putting herself in a position where she could be trapped. Monoma didn't say anything else after that, walking off to see Recovery Girl, which meant that Izuku was left to stew in his thoughts and worries. He barely paid attention to the second match, even if it was the shortest, nor did he really talk with Kodai or Kuroiro when they approached him.
Both realised that he had something on his mind but didn't push it, which he appreciated as he had no clue how to tell them what he was worrying about in the first place. Still, when the third match started, he took a breath and tried to focus on that. That match was between Tsunotori and Honenuki against Rin and Tsuburaba, which proved to be almost as short as the second match as Honenuki merely used his quirk on the building floors, allowing Tsunotori to attack from the room below the bomb, catching the defenders off guard long enough for the bomb to fall through enough for Honenuki to touch it, willing the match.
Tokage and Komori were next, up against Awase and Bondo, with it turning into a brawl in favour of the villains till halfway through when Komori distracted them with her mushrooms, allowing Tokage to send out a hand to touch the bomb. It was only after the match that Monoma returned, and while they shared a glance, he didn't say a word, though Izuku was confused by the look he had. He had been expected hate, disgust or even some sense of smug superiority over the 'unevolved quirkless boy', but he saw none of them,
He merely looked confused but…also open. He had only seen that look on people from the sanctuary and Raxus.
Again, he had to turn his attention from trying to solve that mystery to the 5th and final fight of the class, which pitted Tetsutetsu and Kaibara against Fukidashi and Kamakiri. It was the longest of the fights, as Kamakiri and Tetsutestu essentially cancelled each other out as Tetsutetsu was too durable to be cut. At the same time, Kamakiri was too fast to be hit. Kaibara wasn't as limited, but he was the slowest of the group. In contrast, Fukidashi had to hold back lest he damage the building too much. Ultimately, the villains barely scratched out a victory by running out the clock.
When it was all said and done, Vlad led them outside back to the entrance into the area. Looking them over, the man held his hands to the waist, a glint of pride in his eyes. "Excellent work, students. If I haven't seen one, a productive first class, with injuries kept to a minimum."
Shiozaki, worried, raised her hand. “Was someone badly hurt in class A?”
Vlad nodded, impressed that Shiozaki managed to get the double meaning in his statement. "Correct, which makes me all the happier to see that you could all excuse a far greater level of restraint as, while an exercise, this was still a battle between you. But to be clear," He’ll have to speak with All Might about that, among other things.
But before that, there was something else he wanted to tell his students. “Always remember that heroes fight to subdue and protect, not to destroy or kill. So always be mindful of your surroundings; the amount of force you use as quirks can be dangerous in the wrong hands." He looked them over as he said that, making sure they all heard and understood it as Monoma raised his hand next.
"Will you be handling our next hero class, Vlad-sensei?" The blond copy quirk user asked, while he wasn't as upset as he was in the beginning, he hoped this wasn't a forewarning of a pattern.
Vlad shared his sentiments as he replied. "Not if things don't go sideways, as All Might was hired to handle first-year hero classes." Nodding, Monoma lowered his hand, ignoring how Midoriya was eyeing him out of the corner of his eye.
“Well then, any further questions?” Vlad asked again, and when no one came forward, he turned to leave. “Well then, class dismissed. I have to start reviewing your purposes to give appropriate grades.” Vlad finished as he left the students, the class breaking into a discussion over the events of their first class, which fell further into the distance as he moved. A little while later, he entered the teacher's lounge, closing the door behind him and seeing someone who wasn't his favourite.
"I would have thought you would still be in the principal's office, All Might," Vlad stated, looking towards the corner of the room where the weakened form of All Might sat on the couch, out of immediate sight from the door. Even then, the odds that a student would realise who he was were slim, to say the least.
Coughing into his hand, All Might turned to Vlad with a grimace as he suspected that his missing class B wasn't appreciated by the blood hero. "I wanted to speak with you first to apologise for missing their first class. I hope they weren't too disappointed."
“You can guess how disappointed they were. And you can make it up to me and them by not flaking on them." All Might flinched at that statement, but he couldn't deny it as he spent too much time with class A, and before All Might realised it, he had burnt through most of his remaining time. That was a mistake he wasn't looking to repeat.
"I'll keep that in mind. I don't want to make this a pattern." He answered, Vlad, looking him over for a moment, a frown on his face before he nodded, having detected nothing but honesty and slight remorse from the symbol of peace.
"It's not me you need to apologise to. I know you don't have all the time in the day, but they don't." Vlad sighed, as this would have been easier if the number one wasn't near crippled by an injury he and the rest of the staff hadn't even known about till 6 months ago. They noticed he had not been as active over the last 5 years. Still, they had chalked it up to age as the man was over 20 years his senior, and hero work was one of the most physically demanding professions.
Still, while he didn't take it too personally that the man ran out of time, he wished he had managed it better as Vlad went over to his desk and pulled up a chair. "Anything else?" He asked as All Might had got up to speak with him.
“I wished to ask about their performance. Any issues on that front?” Vlad hummed, happy that the man was at least trying to keep himself involved in teaching.
"Nothing of importance. They handled themselves well, made some mistakes, but that is to be expected from first years." Vlad replied that he was impressed with them, but compared to students who had just a semester or two under their belts, they were as raw as sushi. Even Midoriya, the anomaly he was, had some gaps in his techniques.
Handing over a flash drive with the recordings of the matches, he made sure to look All Might in the eye as he reminded him. "Remember that you'll be handling their next class. I'll be there if you need help, but you should be directing the ship." Matching his gaze, even in his weakened form, the symbol of peace had a fire to his eyes that was something to be awed.
“Understood, but it’s a far cry from what happened with class A.” All Might replied, taking a breath as he wished that things had gone better with them, as they had all managed to survive the gauntlet that was Aizawa, a man he heard was infamous for expelling students he deemed ill-suited for hero work. But he should have known his luck wasn’t that good.
“That bad? I only heard from Aizawa that he was considering expelling some childish behaviours." Vlad asked as the perpetually sleepy underground hero hadn't looked pleased when he last saw him.
"For the most part, things went well, but the first match proved the most troublesome. Young Bakugo and Iida were the villains and went up against young Kendo and Uraraka." All Might started as Vlad took a moment to try and recall the names. He was familiar with Iida, as he and his brother had been classmates back in the day. It was the others that escaped him for a moment.
Bakugo came in third on the entrance exam, with Kendo being 1st? If he was recalling things right, Kendo had the quirk that broke her hands.
All Might nodded. "Yup, so they're talented and have exceptional quirks. The problem is personality and mentality. Bakugo's been furious since day one that he wasn't number one on the exam. When he had a chance to face off against Kendo, it was like the actual objectives didn’t matter to him.” All Might continued as he had hoped that Bakugo was merely motivated, but even before he gave a buzz to start, the signs were there from his lack of teamwork and dismissal of young Iida to how dogged he was in just fighting his successor, young Kendo.
Vlad could put the clues together from that. “So, a hothead? Not the first one we've got, and certainly won't be the last." U.A. was the top school in Japan, with only Shiketsu being in any position to call themselves a rival, but that meant that everyone with an ego and a slightly above-average quirk tried to get it. When they did, they tended to act like they were God's gift to humanity or the next All Might.
All Might wished it was that simple as he sat in a chair close to Vlad. "If only, but Kendo saw it fit to engage him, trying to beat him, which led to the building coming down as both went way too far. Luckily, Uraraka and Iida weren't badly hurt, but the trial had to be cancelled for obvious reasons." Never had he seen two people under the name of hero be so violent, nor had he ever seen someone young Bakugo's age look so angry and aggressive.
At that, Vlad turned to him as this sounded serious. "You didn't try to stop things before they went too far?"
All Might wished he had that foresight, or rather, he wished he hadn't let his personal bias cloud his judgement as he had wanted to give young Kendo the chance to get through to him, prove why she was the top on the entrance exam, and young Bakugo wasn't. That was why both were still unconscious in Recovery Girl's office. "I reminded both to focus on the task, but when Bakugo stopped responding, that should have been my warning to step in."
"You're right, it was. But at the end of the day, it's no longer in your hands. Let's hope they only get a month's detention from Aizawa." Vlad replied, as while All Might had screwed up, he couldn't have expected his students, both top scorers with presumable clean middle school records, to be so reckless. He certainly never dealt with a student like that.
"Still, while young Bakugo has the drive, he's far too violent and short-tempered. He sought out Kendo and even went as far as using a support item. I'm not too sure a student his age and temperament should even easily kill someone with that kind of explosive power. If he doesn't change," All Might didn’t finish that sentence.
Vlad did. "He'll be expelled. We've handled students like that before All Might, brats that were the big fish in a small pond with egos that can't accept what was the past, but we can't force them to change. They have to want to get better. I've seen plenty of students with potential squander it, and let me tell you, Aizawa isn't the only one willing to trim the fat with such." He didn't like it, but if the child didn't see the need or couldn't put in the work to better themselves, they were better off as far as being a hero as possible.
The worst case is that they're taken away by law enforcement for a reform program if they were that extreme a case, but that was rare as he, in his 6 years teaching, had never needed to get the police involved. In fact, the last person U.A. had to call the police to take away was the now-death row inmate Moonfish 9 years ago. He had been promising, but his obsession with flesh and blood grew too extreme.
Nezu's choice to expel him came only 3 weeks before he killed a correctional officer and teacher in the juvenile reform facility and escaped. By the time Edgeshot and Yoroi Musha took him down 2 years into his murder spree, he had killed and cannibalised another 22 people.
“Well then, let’s hope we can do enough to get the boy to change, as it’s never a good feeling to see your dreams die.” All Might stated, as while he didn't know of Moonfish's time at U.A., he wished to ensure that they did all they could to ensure that no more students fell to such a dark path.
Line Break
Sometime later, the school day was coming to an end. With the bell having rung, the students were packing their stuff, talking about what they would do that afternoon, whose homework would be the hardest or if they wanted to hang out a little before they went home. In the middle of this, Midoriya was quietly packing away his stuff. This was what Kuroiro found when he approached him.
“Hey, I wanted to ask if you take long because we would like to leave soon," Kuroiro stated, gesturing to the doorway where Shiozaki and Kodai, his friends, were already waiting.
He smiled, but his eye moved towards someone else as he got up. “Why don’t you head out without me? There’s something I need to do.”
“Okay, what would that be?” Kuroiro asked him, but he didn’t answer as he stepped past him to Monoma’s desk.
He placed a hand on the desk and looked the blonde in the eye. "Monoma. We need to talk."
Contrary to what people would have expected from him, maybe a smug look, he would ask a follow-up on why they needed to talk. But he didn't do any of them as he collected his stuff and got up. "I believe we do." With that, the two left the class and their confused classmates.
"Okay, am I the only one that thought that was weird?" Kaibara asked, with the rest nodding their heads, but this went unseen by the two in question. Instead, they walked down the halls away from other students and staff, heading towards a more secluded part of campus as they used one of the alternative entrances to leave the main building. Even when they entered the forested area, they continued for a couple minutes.
When they finally reached a clearing, Midoriya closed his eyes and listened for anyone nearby, tried to feel out any tenet in the area and only relaxed when both came up empty. "And what, pray tell, was that just now?" Monoma asked, having witnessed all that.
"Same thing as when a can seems to scan its surroundings. Wanted to make sure we were alone for this." Midoriya replied, which had Monoma rolling his eyes as he was about done with the dumb comparisons to felines.
Deciding that if Midoriya was dancing around it, he wouldn't, he cut to the chase. "Right, but the thing is, you don't have a cat-based quirk; you don't have a quirk at all, do you?" He challenged him, a frown on his face, but again, Midoriya didn't detect any emotion he had come to expect from people who didn't know him.
Still, he wasn't about to give up his secrets unless he was sure there was no way out of it as he crossed his arms. "Hell of a thing to say when you saw what I can do."
That might have worked if he hadn't talked to Neito, who had a way around that little assumption. "Maybe, but my quirk has never been wrong. When I touch someone, even when I'm not copying their quirk, I can feel their quirk factor. Get a read on their quirk, even something as slight as coloured hair."
Neito locked eyes with him, not giving an inch to him in this. "But you? If quirks were like different types of drinks and the body cups, your cup might be in peak condition…but empty." Stepping forward, he kept the heat up.
"I touched your shoulder on our first day, and I managed to touch you again today during our fight." He ignored his annoyance over how he only lasted so long because Izuku wanted him to. “Still empty.”
Midoriya, on the back foot, wanted to counter this as there were quirks he couldn't copy, but Monoma beat him to the punch, raising a hand to cut him off. "And yes, there are quirks which I can't copy, but not because the quirk itself isn't accessible to me. Rather, it's quirks that require stockpiled energy. Those are blanks for me as I can copy the quirk but not the energy it feeds off." If Izuku had a quirk, he would have got something from him.
“Like how a mechanic can build a perfect replica of a type of car based on something he saw, but he can't put in whatever it was in the truck or fuel tank?” Midoriya asked, to which Monoma nodded.
"Correct, so will you continue with this or get serious?" Monoma asked him. The tension in the air between them was thick as this was part of what Izuku was avoiding. He didn't want people to know he didn't have some quirk; he didn't want them to treat him differently, to act like he was inferior, unevolved or fragile, but it would seem he was asking too much of the universe.
He deflated. “No…no, you’re right.” Rubbing his face, he prepared for the worst as he knew he could deny it, but that could mean Monoma kicking the hornet's nest with the rest. “I’m quirkless. I wanted to keep that to myself, didn’t want U.A to be…” He didn’t finish the sentence, his middle and elementary school years flashing in the back of his mind.
“A repeat of middle school?” Monoma finished the statement for him, meeting his confused look with a passive one, not a hint of resentment, ego or disgust as he moved to sit under a tree. “Well, I didn't want to speak with you just to get blackmail material, nor do I want to make your time here difficult. I merely wanted answers." He told him.
"Why? How are you handling this so well? You're not," Again, Monoma cut him off with a smirk.
"Freaking out? Rubbing it in your face that I have a quirk and you don't? It's because I get it. I know what you feel." He leaned his head on the tree while Midoriya scoffed at the claim.
“I doubt it.”
Monoma hummed. "Maybe, after all, you're the first confirmed quirkless person I've ever met. But I didn't need to meet one. You understand that trying to break you down would be hypocritical of me and downright shameful." He replied, Midoriya going silent to listen to him as Neito took a break to state his case.
"You know, people value their quirks. Like on the list of things people would say are essential to how they are as people, their unique quirk would be pretty high there. I'm talking top 5." He started, with Midoriya's brow creasing in annoyance as he knew that it was such an important thing that dating apps and shows would have segments based on quirks; even though people decided that marriage based on quirks was pretty bad, it wasn't illegal or gone.
So Monoma kept going. "But that means that they see people like me, people that copy others' quirks, as an attack on what makes them special. Ever since I was little, I wanted to be a hero, just like most kids. But at the same time, once my quirk came in, all I ever heard from people was that ‘you couldn’t be a hero with a quirk like that’, or ‘you only get ahead by copying others’ or ‘there’s nothing special about you.”
Monoma stopped himself before he went too far down that rabbit hole. "I could go on, but you can fill in the blanks."
“I’m…sorry about that, I didn’t realise.” Midoriya, hearing this and knowing that he was being honest, felt like a jackass for just assuming; of course, having a quirk didn't mean a pass; plenty of people he had met had quirks that were seen as inadequate or villainous.
He waved it off. "It's fine; I can only guess that for you, it must have been a grass is greener on the other side thing, but then again, you're the first person outside my family that, without prompt, thinks my quirk is great." That was a surprise, as not even their classmates had said something like that. He even heard Kaibara say that his quirk was creepy but had gotten used to such comments that it didn't even phase him.
"My point is, while you might have been looked down on out of some misplaced pity for lack of a quirk, I was avoided because I was seen as a threat to quirks," Monoma said as Midoriya moved closer and took the spot next to him under the tree. “So, believe me, I get it, wanting to escape that, to start a new with fresh faces in a new place.”
"I guess you could say we're similar on that front," Midoriya relented, as he knew that struggle of trying so hard to be what you wanted even while the world told you otherwise. He understood that for people like them to become heroes, they couldn't act like heroes, or else they'd be left in the dust and that they didn't leave you feeling rosy. “Let me guess, part of why you want to be a hero is to prove that you could and shut up those naysayers?” Monoma gave him a wicked smirk filled with resentment and glee.
“I want them to choke on their words.” Midoriya raised a fist at him, which he met with a fist pump between them as neither felt the need to hide that, to disguise the fact that they were bitter people on some level, close to their cores. They were pissed that they were allowed to ever develop such dreams that soon turned into such heavy burdens.
"But back to the point, I won't give you any trouble because you're quirkless. Just know that if you ever need someone to talk to, you know where to find me." Monoma told him, a smile as genuine as a puppy's affection on his face as Midoriya felt any caution he felt towards him melt away. He chuckled as it would appear that the master was right; maybe he should be a little more trusting.
“I’ll think about it, Mo…Neito. It’s nice to have people you can rely on when things get tough.” Neito didn't seem to mind him using his first name, and he hoped that he would start referring to him by Izuku as well, as they shared a bond, one that the others in class didn't. And because of that, he wanted to do something to celebrate that. "But if we were sharing, I might as well put my cards on the table as well."
“You don’t have to.” Neito frowned, as he didn't want to force him to do anything like that, which only made Izuku wish to do it more because he was being given the choice.
“I know, I want to.” He replied as he took a breath, wondering how he'd word this. "The first thing that I want to do is all based around life force, or tenet, which I learned about from my master, Kenmikoto Teitora.” He started before he explained it all.
Line Break
“Wow….” 30 minutes later, Monoma was glad he was seated, or else he would have fallen over by now.
"Yeah, I figured that would be your reaction," Midoriya stated, as what he had just told him was pretty big, some of which he did not even know the full story of as he didn't even know what to call Shizune and half the stuff they did.
"If I hadn't seen you pull that wood trick and the vanishing act, I would have thought you crazy." Monoma moaned as he rubbed his face, some of him wishing he had just let sleeping dogs lie. Now, he had this to consider.
"Whoever said I was sane? You gotta miss a few slices of the loaf to just half of what I've done." Midoriya joked, getting a chuckle out of the blonde.
“Oh, that we can agree on.” At least he now knew that their earlier theory that Izuku was getting physically abused was false, but that only made him shudder at the implications of such an intensive training regimen. “So, in theory, anyone could learn this? Bend wood like you?”
Midoriya frowned, his hands raised and lowered like they were scales. "Yes on both counts, but there is a caveat to that. Firstly, having a quirk means you can't pick and choose how you use your tenet as your body is already geared towards one use. You, for example, might be an exception as your quirk lets you copy others, but that's unproven." He wasn't an expert on the issue, so he couldn't speak with any absolute authority.
He felt a little more comfortable with the second one. Reaching his hand onto the tree they leaned on, he shifted some of its bark with his tenet, controlling the wood till it protruded from the trunk, breaking off a part of it and holding it in hand as he explained. "On that second front, wood is my affinity, so much so if I had a quirk, odds are it would be wood-related. So, the odds that you or anyone outside maybe Shiozaki could be the same is low, like really low." He shifted the piece into different shapes, first a road, then a cube, then a prism, before he tossed it aside.
“And then there is the time sink needed for it.” He had also learned that having a quirk, even one like his own, would mean he would need to sink much longer into training to make any actual use. “I think I’ll leave that to you.”
“We all have our talents,” Izuku replied. Truth be told, he wouldn't have minded having something in class join his training. “And for what it’s worth, I think you’ll make a damn good hero one day, in fact,” Getting up, he dusted himself off as he held a hand to Monoma.
"You want to join us for training? With the sports festival in a few weeks, we wanted to ensure we were all in top shape." He offered, which the blonde only laughed at as he reached for the offered hand, pulling himself up.
"Why not? How else are we going to show that class B is the best hero class?" He asked, with Midoriya joining in the laughter as the two walked off, they might have missed their trains, but they could catch another one.
“That’s the spirit!” Midoriya replied as they continued discussing exercise plans and tactics for the festival.
Line Break
The lights were off despite it being past 5PM when he finally made it back to his apartment. Still, he wasn't expecting much as his long talk with Monoma, the idea that he could trust people outside his circle, left him in too good a mood to care about returning to an empty apartment as he flicked on the lights and locked the door behind him. At least, empty of human life, Mario and Peach were waiting for him, as always, as he petted them and got something out of the pantry for them to eat.
As his feline friends enjoyed their dinner, he skipped a shower, having done that after their hero class, and went straight to his homework as he might have got into U.A. Still, he wasn't going to let his grades stay where they were, he was aiming to get into the top half his class by mid-terms in terms of academics after all. When he finished that, he grabbed Mario and Peach's bowls to wash them out and started his dinner, switching the TV on while he worked to give the place some background noise.
He ignored the framed pictures that still hung on the walls as he moved, as while most were landscapes and other pretty sights, mainly meant to add life to a room, there were others. The first of which is a picture of his father, the second of his mother and the last of the 2-year version of himself. There were others, but there wasn’t a single framed picture of the two together as a family. Instead, there were pictures of him and his master, one that he didn't ignore was placed in the centre, where your eye would naturally fall onto.
He was tired and dirty in it, but he was smiling like he was just one. He remembered that day, the day he finally unlocked all his tenet points and learned how to handle the flow of it. It was mere basis, a far cry from what he did now, but he still held that memory as one of his proudest moments.
"I won't let you down, I swear it." He declared before he got back to it.
And we are done! What did you all think of that? I wanted to give him and Monoma a bit of a connection as a lot of times when he's in the story, he's a butt monkey, and to be fair, in canon, he is a butt monkey, but some people like to take it to another level like they think all he does is hate on class A. Remember to leave a comment, as the next chapter will be uploaded on March 15th.
