Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Aizawa POV

Aizawa Shouta prided himself on noticing things.

He noticed when Midoriya’s hands trembled before a test. He noticed when Bakugo was two seconds away from detonating something. He noticed when Todoroki’s expression tightened — the only sign he was stressed. He noticed when a student was slipping, struggling, or hiding something.

He noticed everything.

Or at least, he used to believe he did. He wouldn’t realize the truth until much later.

The morning light slanted across the desks in 1-A, catching dust motes in the air. Aizawa scanned the room with the same habitual precision he always used — posture, eye contact, energy levels, injuries, mood shifts. A teacher’s mental checklist.

Midoriya: tired, but focused.
Uraraka: cheerful, but distracted.
Todoroki: unreadable.
Bakugo: vibrating with aggression.
Kirishima: bright, steady.
Kaminari: whispering to Sero.
Yaoyorozu: prepared, anxious.
Jirou: alert.
Tokoyami: brooding.
Asui: calm.

His gaze passed over an empty desk.

He didn’t pause. He didn’t think about it. He didn’t even register whose desk it was.

Just another empty seat. Just another student running late. Just another morning.

He continued taking attendance, calling names, marking responses. When he reached the end of the list, he frowned faintly. One name didn’t answer. He marked it absent without a second thought.

He didn’t say the name aloud. He didn’t look at the empty desk again. He didn’t ask the class if anyone had seen him.

He simply moved on.

“Heroes see people,” he said, beginning the day’s lecture. “That’s the foundation of rescue work. Awareness. Observation. Understanding.”

Kirishima nodded earnestly. Midoriya scribbled notes. Uraraka raised her hand. Someone in the back shifted, uncomfortable — Aizawa didn’t notice.

He continued speaking, unaware of the irony threading through every word.

Heroes see people.

He believed that. He taught that. He lived by that.

And yet—

He didn’t notice the absence. He didn’t notice the silence. He didn’t notice the student who had slipped so quietly out of their world that no one even asked where he’d gone.

He didn’t notice Mineta Minoru at all.

Not today. Not yesterday. Not for a long time.

Aizawa finished the lecture, assigned exercises, and moved on with his day. He never once looked at the empty desk again.

He didn’t know this was the first crack in a story that would one day break him. He didn’t know he’d already failed someone who needed him most. He didn’t know anything at all.

Not yet.

Chapter Text

Stain POV

Hosu burned.

Smoke curled through the alleys, thick and oily, carrying the metallic tang of blood. In the distance, something roared — a Nomu — followed by the crackling blast of fire. Endeavor’s voice barked orders, drowned out by the screeching of creatures that refused to die.

Another explosion shook the street. Another Nomu shrieked. Another blast of fire roared.

But none of them went silent.

Not yet.

Stain paused.

The heroes were struggling. The Nomu were still standing.

But he didn’t have time to dwell on it.

Native was already down.

The so‑called hero lay slumped against a wall, clutching his leg, breath ragged. He spat curses between gasps, voice cracking with pain and indignation.

“You— you freak— you think you can judge me?!” Native snarled. “You’re nothing! You’re—”

Stain tuned him out.

He was listening to something else.

A soft, sticky pop.

Then another.

Something small hit the pavement with a faint thup — bounced once, twice — then skittered off in the wrong direction, rolling unevenly across the cracked concrete before disappearing into the shadows.

Stain frowned.

That wasn’t a sound he recognized. Not a weapon. Not debris. Not anything natural.

Another distant screech echoed through the city — a Nomu in pain, but not dead.

Footsteps followed — light, uneven, almost… bouncing in rhythm with the earlier sound.

Stain turned.

A small figure stood at the mouth of the alley.

A boy.

Or— no. Not a boy. A teenager. Eighteen, maybe. But small. Child‑sized. Round cheeks, wide eyes, and a head dotted with glossy purple spheres that reflected the firelight.

He looked like a child who’d wandered into a warzone.

But his eyes—

His eyes were wrong.

Flat. Cold. Unmoved.

Native noticed him too and barked, “Don’t just stand there! Help me, you useless brat!”

The kid didn’t move.

Didn’t flinch.

Didn’t even blink.

Stain felt something tighten in his chest.

He’d seen killers. He’d seen cowards. He’d seen heroes.

This boy was none of those.

This boy was empty.

Native kept ranting, spitting insults, demanding help. The kid didn’t react. He just watched — like he was observing a stranger drop a cup of coffee, not a hero bleeding out.

Stain stepped between them, blade angled low.

“Why aren’t you running?” he asked.

The kid finally looked at him.

Not up — at him. Direct. Unblinking.

Stain’s breath stuttered.

There was no fear in those eyes. No anger. No righteousness.

Just a quiet, chilling indifference.

The kind that didn’t come from innocence. The kind that came from experience.

Native screamed something else — Stain didn’t hear it.

A wet, choking sound cut him off.

Native gagged — violently — and something small and purple spilled from his mouth, slick with blood.

The same object that had rolled away earlier.

The kid hadn’t moved.

Native flailed in panic, boot striking the sphere with a splat. The ball skittered across the ground, wobbling, then rolled toward the alley exit — propelled by the force of the kick.

It followed the kid.

Stain stared.

He hadn’t touched Native’s throat. He hadn’t moved. He hadn’t blinked.

But Native’s vocal cords were shredded. Cleanly. Silently.

Stain knew his own work.

This wasn’t his.

The kid turned away.

Just… turned. And walked off.

Like none of this mattered. Like Native’s life or death was beneath his notice.

Stain stared after him, unsettled in a way he hadn’t felt in years.

The bloody sphere rolled after the kid, as if returning to its owner.

Four spheres on the boy’s head. Then three.

Stain felt a chill crawl down his spine.

He didn’t know who that kid was. He didn’t know what he was. But he knew one thing:

That boy was dangerous.

More dangerous than any hero in this city. More dangerous than any villain Stain had ever met.

And he had walked away without a word.

Stain exhaled slowly, forcing the tension from his shoulders.

Then he heard it — footsteps pounding down the street, fast and reckless. A young voice shouting his name, full of fury and grief.

Another fool. Another fake hero. Another one who didn’t see what was right in front of him.

Stain turned toward the sound, blade lifting.

The night wasn’t done with him yet.

Chapter Text

Mineta POV

The alley was quiet.

Too quiet.

Mineta stepped out of the chaos of Hosu and into the narrow strip of shadow between two buildings, the sounds of fire and screaming muffled behind him. His heart didn’t race. His hands didn’t shake. His breathing didn’t change.

He felt nothing.

He always felt nothing.

He pressed a hand to the place just beneath his collarbone — warm, humming faintly under the skin, something shifting there that shouldn’t. Hidden, just like he was. Forgotten unless he forced himself into view. (Not that he wanted to.)

Whatever it was under his skin didn’t keep him alive. It just kept him small. Kept him harmless. Kept him blendable.

A mask, not a lifeline.

“Alright,” he muttered. “Let’s get this over with.”

He triggered the shift.

Pain lanced through him — familiar, sharp, almost comforting. His bones stretched, skin tightening, muscles pulling into new shapes. His spine cracked, lengthening. His vision blurred, then sharpened.

His real form settled over him — the body he should’ve had all along. Strong. Fast. Efficient. The one the hidden mechanism fought to suppress.

Then—

A pain that shouldn’t have been there.

A deep, tearing pressure in the center of his chest.

Mineta hissed and pressed his palm hard against the spot, trying to squish the pain flat, force it back down, make it stop. But something under his hand pushed back — something moving.

He froze.

Slowly, he lifted his hand.

Flesh split.

Bone shifted.

And an eye — lidless, blind, wet — opened in the center of his chest.

“What the hell—”

He staggered, bracing himself against the wall. The eye twitched, unfocused, useless.

He forced himself back into grape form — the small, childlike shape the mechanism restricted him to.

The eye remained.

He shifted again — back to his real form.

The eye blinked.

And saw.

Mineta gasped as a flood of sensory input slammed into his brain — a new neural pathway forcing itself into existence, raw and unfiltered. He clamped a hand over the eye, squeezing it shut.

“Not now,” he growled. “Not now, damn it.”

A spark flickered beneath his skin.

Then a crack.

A sharp, metallic snap echoed through the alley as the hidden plates buckled inward, pressing into the reinforced tissue beneath. Painful, but not dangerous. Mineta froze, staring down at the fractured shape beneath his skin.

“…shit.”

Another sputter. Then silence.

He stood there for a long moment, breathing slowly, letting the numbness settle back over him like a blanket.

“Fine,” he muttered. “Fine. I’ll deal with it later.”

He stepped out of the alley.

And into the warzone.

Nomu shrieked in the distance — high‑pitched, animalistic, desperate. Endeavor’s flames roared, but the creatures didn’t fall. Not the mid‑tier ones. Not the high‑tier ones.

Mineta rolled his shoulders.

He needed an outlet.

He found one.

He moved through the streets like a shadow, silent and efficient. A Nomu lunged — he tore through its throat. Another charged — he crushed its skull. A third screeched — he silenced it with a twist of his wrist.

He didn’t think. He didn’t hesitate. He didn’t feel.

When the last Nomu in the immediate area fell, he exhaled slowly, wiping blood from his cheek.

The numbness held.

Good.

He ducked into another alley, touching the cracked mechanism beneath his skin, trying to assess the damage. The metal was warped. The core was unstable. He needed a new one.

He needed the Maker.

Footsteps echoed.

Mineta froze, slipping deeper into the shadows.

Voices.

Familiar ones.

Kirishima. Kaminari. Sero. Yaoyorozu.

And then—

Aizawa.

Mineta stayed silent, watching them enter the alley, their faces pale, their clothes torn, their breathing uneven.

Aizawa spoke quietly, assessing injuries, giving orders.

Mineta moved.

He stepped out of the shadows and grabbed Aizawa by the collar.

The class screamed.

Up close, the lie was obvious. Even wearing Aizawa’s face, she didn’t move like him. Didn’t breathe like him. Didn’t feel like him. His real form didn’t miss things like that — her energy was unmistakable, no matter what skin she wore.

Mineta leaned in, smiling with too many teeth.

“Hello~ Toga.”

Aizawa melted.

Literally.

His form shimmered, twisted, collapsed into the shape of a sheepish, knife‑wielding Toga Himiko.

She blinked up at him, confused but delighted.

“Hi~! You’re strong!”

He plucked the knife from her hand and dropped it to the ground.

“Not today,” he said softly.

He lifted her easily, carrying her out of the alley as the class stared, frozen in shock.

No one recognized him.

Good.

He walked until he found a quieter alley — and found Dabi leaning against a wall, flames flickering lazily around his fingers.

Dabi straightened immediately, flames curling up his arm in warning — until Mineta stepped fully into the light. Recognition flickered across Dabi’s face, the tension bleeding out of his posture.

“…you.”

Mineta tilted his head. “This little bat yours?”

Dabi snorted. “Unfortunately.”

Mineta set Toga down. She scampered to Dabi’s side, still giggling.

He smiled at them — a real smile, small and tired.

“Take care of her.”

Then he turned and walked away.

Back in the alley, the real Aizawa stumbled in, finding his students shaken and confused. He regrouped them quickly, guiding them toward safety — only to be cornered by a high‑tier Nomu.

It lunged.

It died.

Instantly.

Mineta stood in its ruins, blood dripping from his fingers, expression unreadable.

Aizawa stared at him — not in fear, but with a faint, nagging sense of familiarity, like a face glimpsed once in passing and half‑remembered.

His students nodded frantically, babbling about how this was the man who carried Toga, who kept her from hurting them, who moved like a ghost.

Mineta gestured for them to pass.

They did.

He followed behind them, silent, killing any Nomu that got too close. Aizawa led. Mineta guarded. Neither spoke.

When the League finally retreated and the Nomu were dead or gone, Mineta looked at the last corpse, then turned away.

“Wait—!” someone called.

He paused.

Looked back once.

Then disappeared behind a wall and into the night.

Gone.

Chapter Text

They made it back to U.A. long after midnight.

Everyone was exhausted — bruised, bandaged, half‑running on adrenaline and half‑running on the relief of simply being alive. Recovery Girl patched them up. Aizawa herded them into a debrief room. The lights buzzed overhead, too bright for how drained they all felt.

The moment they sat down, the room erupted.

Stain. The Nomu. The fire. The chaos. The man who saved them — huge, silent, moving like a guardian spirit through the smoke.

They talked over each other, voices tripping and tangling.

Kirishima slammed his hands on the table. “That guy was insane! He just— he just tore through those Nomu like nothing!”

Sero nodded rapidly. “He carried Toga like she weighed nothing! Who even was that?”

Yaoyorozu frowned. “He protected us. He didn’t attack us. That’s… unusual.”

Aizawa listened, arms crossed, eyes half‑lidded but sharp.

Someone mentioned Native.

Someone else mentioned that Native had… had…

Aizawa’s brow twitched. “Had what?”

Silence.

Blank looks.

Kaminari scratched his cheek. “Uh… didn’t he have an intern? I swear he had an intern.”

Jirō shook her head. “No? I don’t remember anyone.”

Kirishima shrugged. “If he did, they weren’t with us.”

Aizawa’s eyes narrowed — a tiny, almost imperceptible shift.

But the conversation had already moved on.

Back to Stain. Back to the Nomu. Back to the giant who saved them.

The missing piece slipped away, quiet and unnoticed.

Again.

Aizawa dismissed them soon after. They shuffled out of the room, still buzzing, still talking, still forgetting.

By the time they reached there homes, the idea that someone else should have been there wasn’t just forgotten.

It was gone.