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This was supposed to be a normal mission.
Just a quick tour to Proxima 3 and back, to explore the weird readings the telescopes back on Earth kept picking up.
The primary hypotheses were a star entering another phase in an unusual way, or perhaps a new civilization developing technology no one had seen before…
But no.
It wasn’t a star, and it wasn’t any kind of technology.
As Izuku stared out of the window at the observation deck, he clutched his notebook until the spine started squeaking.
It made a sound surprisingly similar to that which an Earth seagull made, and Izuku found it hysterically ironical. You know, considering there was a creature, sitting on one of the antennas outside, with an uncanny resemblance to that very same type of a bird.
Seagulls in space. Who would have thought?
“Shoo!” Izuku called, waving his notebook in front of the window. The Space Seagull -- yes, he was going to call it that now -- tilted its head slightly, appearing extremely unimpressed. “Shoo, shoo!”
The creature seemed to decide he was of no importance and posed no threat, turning to preen under the appendage that, for all intents and purposes, appeared to be a wing.
How was it even surviving outside? There was no atmosphere in space! They weren’t close to anything that could create an artificial living sphere, so…
Did the first discovered instance of an organism capable of surviving in deep-space without any assistance have to be a seagull?
Izuku thumped his head against the glass, sighing in temporary defeat. He was going to have to study those. He would have to catch one, and figure out how it was living without breathing.
This was fascinating, of course, but also seagulls.
The doors to the observatory deck swooshed open.
“What are you doing?”
“Contemplating my life choices,” Izuku tells Uraraka as she comes to stand beside him.
“Is that a seagull?” She asks as she comes to stand by him, faint surprise coloring her voice.
“See, it looks very much like a seagull doesn’t it, but it’s in sace and it’s breathing so I’m going to have to go collect it somehow so that we can study it.”
“Oof, you’re gonna be out there for an hour at least,” Uraraka says, patting him on the shoulder in mock sympathy.
“Would you come out with me? Two hands would be better than one,” Izuku suggests, even though he is already confident what Uraraka will say. It never hurts to try, and who knows, maybe he will get lucky and his friend will take mercy on him.
“Not on your life!” She laughs as she walks away from him.
“I could have stayed at home on Earth. I could have had a nice Earth job and known nice Earth people and gotten to see my mom every weekend. But no, I wanted to go out and explore space, discover new frontiers and study new creatures.” Izuku makes his way down to where he knows Iida is working, grumbling all the way.
He has always wanted to be a space explorer and walk in the same footsteps as his hero, Yagi Toshinori, one of the first ever people to set out and come back from a space exploration. Izuku had had a poster of him hanging over his desk and the bright smile and incredible nebulas had driven Izuku to work smarter and harder, driving him to be the best so that he could float amongst the same stars.
Izuku is half regretting that now as he thinks about chasing down a seagull-like creature in the middle of space.
How is this his life?
The bird is uncannily smart, teasing him close before darting off to another perch nearby and cooing at him. For all that it is in space, Izuku can’t actually find any difference from an earth seagull.
Which begs the question of how is it flying in space? There is no air to provide lift and drag, physics say that the obnoxious game of tag is not possible.
Yet here he is, playing tag with a Space Seagull. This is absolutely not what he signed up for when he worked so hard to follow his dreams. Nowhere in those dreams had demonic space creatures existed. Especially not demonic earth-like space creatures.
He’s an hour into his frustrating game of chase when it occurs to him to try befriending it. Earth Gulls are greedy little birds, perhaps the Space Gull will be just as ravenous?
It is worth a try anyways, and he heads back inside to try and find something that a Space Gull might find edible. What would one even eat? The more Izuku thinks about it, the more mentally twisted up and confused he becomes. Space gulls, how did his life end up this way?
Finally, he just grabs a random assortment of things and hopes he gets lucky with at least one of them as he rushes out the door.
Juggling all the food in his hands as he gets back into his suit and then as the door opens is not the hardest thing he has ever done, but it is not the easiest either. It’s worth it though because as soon as he holds up the first slice of jerky, the Space Seagull instantly stops playing hard to get, flying right up to him to snatch it from his fingertips.
Izuku is not fast enough to catch it the first few times he feeds it, but he isn’t really trying to catch it either. He is more trying to get it used to the idea of him, the possibility of him catching it.
And eventually he succeeds, although he has to give up all his borrowed food in the pursuit of catching it. Hopefully it can be written off as a research cost and Sato won’t be too upset with him.
“I can’t believe you actually managed to grab it,” Uraraka says as Izuku carries it to the research lab. In his arms, the Space Seagull tries to eat first his uniform, then his ear, before settling for mouthing at his hair.
“Our mission out here is to study creatures from space, this is a creature from space,” Izuku points out, doing his best to maintain his dignity with a beak-like appendage doing its best to bite his skull.
“Yeah but like, you were out there for hours trying to grab that thing, I thought for sure you were gonna come back empty handed.”
“Were you watching me try to catch it the whole time?”
“You looked like you were having fun!” Which isn’t an answer and also a complete admission of guilt as far as Izuku is concerned.
“If fun makes it so we might have to stop at a checkpoint sooner than planned to restock on food, then sure.” He’s almost to the research lab, which means it’s a perfect time for the space seagull to bite him directly on the nose.
Izuku yelps, reflexively moving his arms to defend his facial extremities and, in the process, letting a very distressed creature free in a very unfamiliar place.
“Shoot!” he shouts, immediately scrambling after it, but its physics-defying wings work just as well in the ship as they did outside of it, leaving him falling behind faster than he expected.
It almost slams into the first wall it runs into, but manages to turn just in time, Izuku skidding around the corner to chase after it and almost slamming directly into an already-confused Kaminari and Ashido.
“Sorry!” he calls behind him, not letting his eyes off the creature for longer than he needs to. Catch bird now, explain later.
By the time it’s flown up through two hatches, two levels Izuku has to climb after it, Izuku is officially ready to get off at the next checkpoint and find transport back to Earth, chest heaving as he finally sees the Space Seagull flying itself into a corner.
“Aha!” He declares, rooting his position firmly as he outstretches his arms.
The Space Gull seemed to refuse to believe it was trapped. Its head swirled wildly, as if an exit was going to materialize in the smooth walls.
Izuku took a step closer.
Freezing, the Space Gull very slowly turned around, its eyes glinting in the sharp light of the corridor’s lighting.
For a moment, neither of them moved, which made Izuku understand, on a fundamental level, what “calm before a storm” meant.
The Space Gull launched itself straight at his face, deciding that, if it had to fight for its freedom, it wasn’t going to halfass it.
He managed to get a grab of the Space Gull’s body, but it did nothing about his wings, and damn, but the way they smacked Izuku really hurt.
Thankfully, Izuku’s arms were slightly longer than the Space Gull’s wings.
Doors whooshed somewhere down in the corridor behind Izuku.
“Oh!” Koda said, sweeping in to grab the Space Gull out of Izuku’s hand. Izuku was very thankful for the assist, and he was just about to say that- “You found Crumble!”
…Of course Koda knew about the Space Gull.
“Yeah, it was floating out in space,” Izuku nodded. “It’s incredible, really-”
That was when Koda pressed his fingers around the Space Gull’s neck, taking off a bracelet Izuku was very familiar with.
“That’s Kacchan’s tech,” he said, slightly flabbergasted. “That’s Kacchan’s one-of-a-kind atmospheric self-molding suit, and you put it on a Space Gull?!”
“It’s… Just a seagull,” Koda tilted his head, puzzled.
…So Izuku spent the better part of his day chasing a perfectly normal earthly seagull wearing Kacchan’s pride and joy.
Oh, this was going to be fun to put on a report.
Not.
Wait a second…
“Koda?” Izuku asked, his voice pleasantly mild. Koda had the good sense to freeze at that. “Why is there an Earth Seagull on the ship?”
Koda started running.