Chapter Text
Prologue:
True to form, Izuku knew what was coming the moment they’d landed.
“You know you can’t run forever.”
And he almost wanted to laugh at the notion of that comment. He almost wanted to laugh at the idea of what this man was trying to impart to him.
“You think I can’t?” He retorted, voice tipping low, brow quirked almost amused. “Tell me how you think I’m not capable then? Why I couldn’t possibly do just that?”
Ha. Of all the stupidly simplistic notions he’d come across, this one took the top spot. This idea that he, of all the creatures of the vastness of space and time couldn’t do as he pleased?
Who needed to explain anything to him ?
Him? The Doctor?
Who knew better about him than himself? The logicality of the notion was as sound as it ever was to Izuku.
And yet…
Dark, emerald orbs briefly flickered upward towards the sky, searching the stars. Consternation flared brightly as the sky glittered overhead.
No one could know better than him.
“You’d be surprised how much I know about you, kid.”
“I severely doubt that” He muttered his reply instantly, displeasure coloring his tone. Agitation seeped into each syllable as chilled fingers idly flicked against the woolen coat pocket, tapping a tuneless beat into his thigh. It was a familiar drumming that he’d grown used to.
One he’d known from long ago.
“You could only ever scratch the surface when it comes to me, human ,” The Doctor cast a sharp glance towards his companion, his expression neutral, mouth drawn taut. “But you’ll never full grasp what I’ve lived, what I’ve done.”
Not that he’d ever really wanted him too either. No. The idea that anyone should bear the brunt of what he had? The idea that anyone should or could or would share in his misery?
The idea was laughable. Absurd. Obnoxiously ridiculous and uncannily obtuse.
What a lark . He was nearly, nearly laughing aloud himself at the jibe and the supposition that anyone felt it necessary to impart any sort of explanation to him of all beings in the vastness of the universe. Him.
Or to try to claim they understood him on that beyond surface loyalty and love.
Izuku–no. No, not that one. Not that name.
Wait? What?
Wisping green curls gently bounced at the boy stewed and hummed to himself, trying to understand the conflicting thoughts that burst like firecrackers against his skull. Lifetimes lived, memories remembered–and not remembered–at least not by him–reverberated like long and pitchy.
People and faces and words and phrases all his and not his. All known and not known. And he wanted to run and not run away from it.
The Doctor–or was it Izuku? --paused for a moment considering the differences in himself.
That was…that was wrong, wasn’t it? That was…odd. He wasn’t two different people. He wasn’t…he was just the one. The one life-liver. The one and only. No matter how many regenerations he’d gone through.
He was The Doctor.
The boy frowned for a moment, eyes narrowing thoughtful and critical because that still wasn’t true either, was it.
And that was the danger in it all. That was the frustration, the fear, the worry that he carried.
He was both , wasn’t he. Both Doctor and Izuku. One and the same. Intricately interconnected and interdimensionally inextricably interwoven.
Ha. Oddity personified. Strangeness embodied.
Terror given a face and identity crisis renewed within him. He loathed it and it almost terrified him to consider what the implications of such a differentiation and flair of fixed and unfixed being meant and… who might be responsible for it.
Because someone always was.
Someone was always playing a damned game, trying to prove a damned point! The universe just loved to mock him, didn’t they? They loved to chortle and croon and jeer! And for what?
A pittance of a moment of pleasure at his expense? What a lark that was.
And yet…
“You don’t get to tell me you know why I’d choose to run,” The boy’s voice was soft, imperceptibly gentle and biting all in the same breath as his gaze glittered with intensity of starlight that would consume the void. “Why it would matter to someone like you who could never understand…”
He challenged the man’s mortality with his accusation, with the forced perspective of truth that Shouta Aizawa had to consider…
That he could never understand, for all his utter brilliance and wit and tact and experience? This man was utterly clueless. Stupidly blithe and tritely ignorant.
He was morosely simplistic.
And he couldn’t grasp what Izuku meant, what he was trying to say .
It figured–
“You’re afraid of being alone again, kid. And you seem to think that you’re the only one with something to lose again.”
The boy’s thoughts shuttered and slammed to a wearied halt as the languid voice hummed softly overhead, coiling around his ears.
“You’re afraid of your past, as if you’re the only one with a past to fear.”
It was fire.
Starlight and fury and the softest breath of existence blowing gently into his lungs.
Precious sensations of pleasure and pain and he was burning .
And it was fantastic and brilliant and tiresome and torturous and beautifully exhausting .
He wanted it to stop, pleading for the misery and ecstasy to end.
He wanted it to last forever.
His body begged for sleep, as energy streamed through his veins, and pulsed in his lungs choking him. He drowned in it, gulping down the power as it tingled and tripped along every pore and prickled through every pulse and beat. Music of the universe, singing in the stars and screaming in his ears.
The mournful tunes of death and life and being .
Everything and nothing and all and some and none encased him in shadow and light.
Glorious power seeped into every particle that was him , tearing and twisting and undoing his fingers and nails and hair and teeth. OH god his teeth. Would they even be the same? Or would they be so far from the ones he’d known?
And the hair. Dear God… He’d quite liked the hair…well…sort of. He wasn’t always so keen on the choices he’d been given of late. The spindly and flat, muckish mess that it was.
Ugh. They were so difficult to style. And never ginger . He’d never been ginger yet and that was a nuisance all on its own.
He’d always wanted to be a ginger. After Bess? The glorious fiery goddess that she was? Well, before Bess too, really. Ha!
Who wouldn’t want to be a ginger themselves?
Ah well…Not that any of that mattered. Never actually did. None of it. It was all just a pittance of thought. Stupid, really. He…he didn’t…
He didn’t really need to care whatsoever about it either. The Doctor tried to hiss, his voice depleted, his words escaping, drawn into the starlight.
He…he didn’t…he couldn’t rightly care anything about the inconsequential, the meta-physicality of it…the pain or pleasure or…
Sadness perhaps that he felt picking at his bones, making the ache stronger.
‘Goodnight, dear fellow!’
‘I don't want to go.’
‘Off you pop, then!’
Each voice hummed and buzzed through the air, memories zipping and tricking him into sorrow as the last vestiges lingered like shadows against his flesh.
And right. He needed…to stay on task, on track, on the right and upward train of thought that streamed outward towards the expanse of cascades and the universe, towards existence, towards reality. He didn’t need to think of the rest of everything, the thoughts turning to a jumbled mush of distortions and mixings of abstract remembrances and memories.
They couldn’t be real. They couldn’t…They were nothing but figments. Bursts of nothingness that meant…
That meant he was dying ...
Not while he burned and drifted, losing sense of time and place and thought and faces and ideas…
And he was straying, in and out of consciousness, his very capability to coherently speculate and theorize and ponder losing its relevance.
He wasn’t certain what was real anymore, as sense and sleep and existence blurred and blended.
Not when everything was nothing but particles now, dust and fragments of starlight and atoms that whirred and fizzed and sang together as his jumbled mind concocted several memories, stringing them together, pushing ideas and names and faces into the forefront of thought and existence as he raged and screamed and burned silently, the supernova within consuming the smile and light and energy without.
He was being disassembled and unwound and unthreaded, strand by strand and bit by piece by bit. His was a tapestry that’d gotten one too many knots in it and some damned cosmic creators saw it fit to have a laugh and undo all the blasted stitching and work that’d gone into the damned thing just to get those bits of knotting out again.
It hurt and healed and tore and tingled, making him feel almost giddy in the process of it all as fingers and toes and eyelashes and his damned nose etched and reappeared once more.
Power and light and fury and anger and joy and bliss and creation danced at his fingertips and coursed in his blood as he felt the waves of energy roiling off of him, dancing along his fingertips and lighting up the Tardis.
He drank in the emotions, hanging on each moment like they were his last, savoring the high. Mourning the shift.
Almost addicted, starved of that light and those moments of feather touches of warmth that cascaded across his shoulders and dripped through his blood as his hearts started to beat in rhythm with one another, each keeping time.
It was…too bright.
His head was pounding now. Too many thoughts whirring and coiling and cramming together as he bent forward. Energy rumbled and snapped, sparks hissing as his fingers shook, his face glowing, features gone, as the supernova burst erupted around him, and the regeneration amplified as he dropped to his knees.
‘I don't want to go!’
‘Stay back Deku!’
‘Hold on, Nine!’
‘Young Midoriya?’
‘Don’t leave.’
‘I promise I'll protect you.’
The world swirled towards a colored swathed mess of noise and elation and fury and sound and light and energy.
Voices streamed and beat against his ears and temple.
Light cascaded, energy pulsed as he lurched forward.
Then dropped to nothing, as he slammed down to the floor.
‘I promise…’
It was the instant connection that signaled the shift for him, the regeneration and the start of the new era. The drumbeat that pulsed in his mind and reverberated through the connection to reminded him that it was at an end.
The man quirked a smile, peering out towards the stars as the burst of energy ripped through the universe. Waves and pulses touched along the curvature of the seascape of the cosmic streams and rivers.
“It was a success then,” He murmured, almost smug into the dark. “As I knew it would be. A delightful comedy, to say the least.”
He was looking forward to this very much and he had been for quite some time.
It’d always been so predictable with The Doctor and finally, he’d set it all straight again.
His head was pounding.
The concrete sense that his head, his actual, physical head hurt, and an ache rocked against his temples, as the world around him swayed, brought him back to his senses.
The sound of beeping tickled his ears in the most unpleasant way, its incessant chirping grating against every nerve as he groaned, his voice scratchy and gravely, yet light and decidedly cracked. Fingers twitched as The Doctor slowly came back to awareness, his muscles, and senses firing to life, regeneration sparking the energy of alertness of consciousness slowly took hold.
A tired hum rumbled in his chest as he allowed himself to lay there, feeling the cool of the floor, savoring in the sensation of feeling one thing for a moment.
Cold, tangible metal. One, apparent thing.
Tenderly, his hands (his hands!) reached out and quietly skimmed across the smooth, chilled surface of the floor as he drank in the sensation of feeling the ripple of movement across his palms and fingertips.
He could feel.
He could touch .
There was a soft thrumming beat, pulsing hums and beeps in his ears as The Doctor slowly let his eyes slip open and watched the world spin for a moment as his head protested the sudden influx of light and color.
He hissed involuntarily at the jolt, the sudden shine of light and the amplification of sound from opening his eyes (and really who knew that could happen?) made him wince as he took stock of his surroundings as the world bounced and bobbed and jostled.
He’d been sent spinning for a bit, lying on his stomach and unable to move while the regeneration had happened. Colors, shapes, and clarity had vanished as he’d dropped into the darkness.
Yet now…?
The Doctor’s lashes fluttered idly, as he blew out a warm breath, savoring in the sensation of breathing and feeling and being somewhat whole again.
Whole and lying on his stomach, hands smack flat on the floor of the Tardis and fingers trying to dig their way through metal it seemed, as he scritched and scratched against the polished flooring, his smooth hands languidly running along the floor with practiced, yet unsteady movements.
Like he’d done this a thousand times, yet like it was still the first time too.
And here he was.
The Doctor. Once more. Once again.
Everything in its proper place, renewed and reassembled.
Regenerated .
Tilted a bit sideways, yet, lying on his stomach as he was, with his sleeves a bit wonky and…billowish.
Which was odd enough.
But that was a pittance compared to the regeneration business.
He was whole again, every arm and finger and toe and nose!
And ears!
The Doctor bent his elbows and grit his teeth, teetering on dizziness and ecstasy as waves of regeneration still coursed through him, his skin alight with power, golden glows of sunkissed richness cascading around him, like starlight and sundrops dripping from his fingers.
Carefully, he pushed his palms flat on and heaved onto his knees, mindful of the fabric of his clothing that…hadn’t changed much from his previous regeneration. Still the rather posh looking suit shirt…a bit tattered as it had been during the last…skirmish that’d led to this whole damned mess of a business.
And perhaps there was a hole or two there on his sleeve. A singed bit from where Strax had shot his laser.
Had it been Strax? Or had that been…perhaps he was getting his regenerations mixed up…The Doctor hummed softly to himself confused for a moment as a jumbled series of images flashed through his head.
Strax had been the one with the giraffe dancing, hadn’t it?
But then…he also recalled the library and the laughter…and Wilf.
The shirt was there. That was for certain. For both of them? Or neither?
Perhaps he’d worn it on both occasions? The Doctor furrowed his brows.
Eyebrows he’d need to investigate to see if they were as…angry as he’d been once upon a time when he was…very Scottish sounding…as he peered down at the familiar shirt, narrowing his eyes at the object that seemed to have just as much a history as he did.
Except now it was rather…enormous?
Which wasn’t…so normal.
Sleeves that had once fit were now puffing and pooling around his hands, which looked almost comically small in his dress shirt, as he stared down at his hands for a moment in consternation and wonderment, watching as his fingertips still glittered beneath the pillows of fabric that were his shirtsleeves.
Then of course there were the pants! The Doctor didn’t even want to consider…
His nose twitched as he did , in fact consider just how long everything had gotten as he slowly adjusted his glasses and made to stand.
Knees only buckled once as the Tardis gave a soft whine and burble of discontent at the flurry of energy that surrounded The Doctor as he muttered and hummed and cascaded with light, turning his thoughts towards studying the present as he tried to make sense of…
Why the hell was he now barefoot?
Pants that, yes indeed, were too, too long pooled at his ankles as his feet–his bare feet! --freely peeked out from beneath the folds of fabric.
And what’d happened to his shoes? Socks?
His socks too? Those had been some of his favorites too. They’d had little ducks on them. A gift they’d been from Rory for Christmas…
The Doctor…He’d never gone without those before. Not once. Not in any tiny speckle of a thought of time had he ever regenerated without his…his damned shoes!
Not that he was overly attached to his shoes mind you. He could go without any particular shoe and just get a new pair , but to regenerate without any? That was…awkward.
He did mourn the loss of the socks though.
So…
“Where are they…oh my giddy aunt, is that my voice ?”
The Doctor faltered and balked, stiffening. His voice cracked , actually cracked as he floundered and flubbed through his thoughts as they verbalized from his lips.
And oh no.
“Oh, that’s no good. Not good at all,” He murmured, his lips twitching as his voice cracked again, the lightness of the timbre setting him on edge even as it twisted his lips upward into a wry smile.
Because…he hadn’t heard his voice do that in quite a long time. Embarrassingly long, if you wanted to get technical and press far too long in asking him for his age…
And as it was, this voice…and dear god why did he have this voice? What was the point of it, because it made The Doctor…
Entirely too childish to be considered properly Doctorish, which wasn’t entirely him , now was it?
So, with a wearied, and almost resigned, yet curious gait, The Doctor maneuvered towards the mirror that hung haphazardly nearer the door of the Tardis. It wasn’t a large thing. Hardly conspicuous.
Small round thing that hung on a string. Bit of twine, actually. If you wanted to be all proper about it.
Didn’t match a single thing in the Tardis. But it was wholly his…picked it out himself…and the old, tarnished gold leafing and battered edging kind of reminded him of himself sometimes, as he peered at it.
Well…
Except now of damned course.
He loved the stars.
Almost as much as he hated himself.
But it wasn't supposed to be that he hated himself so terribly that staring at his own image made him wince and recoil.
But then again, he was not reduced to being a child...a…a child.
He was a child.
The Doctor. Him. He’d regenerated into the form of a teenaged child.
Fucking hell in a hand basket.
The…the boy. ..he wanted to shudder at the thought of referring to himself as such peered down at his hands and feet and cringed because this was all so annoying to consider because here he was, with a universe of knowledge and life and experience...trapped in this body, with this face, almost cherubic and far too unassuming in its looks with these eyes and this pouting expression!
And these strange feelings that made his skin crawl! The boy’s excitement burst just as quickly as his fear and nervousness did, each frothing and pitching and nipping in his veins, coursing through every thought and coloring his view. His emotions, which had always been so present, so profoundly surface-level, were now more apparent, more pronounced, and far harder to control. He was amplified, expanded, feeling and thinking and seeing things through a lens of hyper awareness of his emotional foundation.
Fear. Joy. Pride. Anger .
All the things he'd...most...learned to control, to contain, to lock up tight in the boxes of his mind, containing them within little Tardises of memories and lives that no longer need bother him or make him feel ...and now they were crashing together, coming undone.
Undone because he was...reduced to this form, these fingers, toes, face, and freckles .
“Dear god, I have freckles on my face. I’ve grown spots!”
Freckles. Of all the damned things to have...
“But what a joke.” Izuku retorted after a moment, the thought sneaking through as he leaned closer to the mirror and tugged at his curls. "Still not a ginger even...that's a bit of a lark. I have the freckles now," He chimed into the silence, a roll of his eyes sending his vision into a blur at the speed of the movement. "Freckles but no ginger-ness. That hardly seems fair. You'd think they’d balance…"
And yet... curls were somewhat new. Well...new-ish. Along with the haphazard way they haloed his head with their downy, earthen hue... He’d admit that the green tint was a new look for him. Never been that color before.
Not a bad change.
Though, Izuku would admit that this first peer in the mirror was shocking to say the least. Wide, doe-like eyes stared back, brilliant green gems of fire sparked within the frames of his lashes. And swiftly followed confusion, and a ponderance of consideration as The Doctor mused about the oddity of this flicker of familiarity. Deja vu was hardly a reality of a feeling for him. He'd lived too long to really chalk things up to happenstance. And yet, the unsettling feeling that he knew this child's gaze...would not ease within him. He knew those eyes, that mouth, the hair, even the damned freckles...
Yet he couldn’t place it.
Couldn’t figure out the how of it all. Which bothered Izuku immensely. Because he liked knowing.
Just like he liked knowing where the aura of sadness came from and the downward flicker of light that tempered the fire in his gaze…
The Doctor couldn't distinguish what was his look, his aged wisdom, his experience, his...sorrow. And what was not. Because...there seemed something else there, something wholly his, and wholly not ...two within one…
Him and not.
"What a fascinating consideration," Izuku mused, reaching up on his tiptoes to see better. The boy deliberately ignored the bothersome reality that he was, in fact, too short for much of what he once was, what he once wore , who he once portrayed...and stared at reached up to grasp at the fluttering curls at his forehead, a wry smile of bitter curiosity dripping through his senses as the golden regeneration continued to twist and coil and curl around him, seeping into and out of every pore, illuminating the pale face. Golden hues of renewal and life flared around him.
A new start.
A new face.
A new him .
The oddity of the name he'd felt so familiar in reciting about himself slipping easily off his tongue. "Izuku, huh? Where might that have come from now?" He pondered, his title wavering in favor of the familiar name, the non-formal moniker a pleasing sound that sat astride his official descriptor. The Doctor . He couldn't decide which felt the better coming off his tongue, tripping along his lips. And he couldn't, for the life of him, figure out where he knew that name, where it came from or why it seemed his own...
Because he'd given up names long ago, worlds and lifetimes in the distance, his own nature and sins forbidding him from taking on humanity in such a way. He wasn't deserving of a name, a familiar term, an identity beyond just The Doctor... But now? The snaking feeling of glee and guilt intermixed, making his stomach churn as energy burst at his fingertips. He hated himself, much as he disliked the shadows that misted at the edges of the universe, lonely and dark and waning as the light crept past them. Never towards them. Izuku...The Doctor, he amended quickly...hated the idea that he was darkness and yet gifted, gifted with this light each time, each regeneration. He hated seeing the hope in that gaze--the boy flicked another look into the mirror as his sleeves puddled around his elbows, the suit too big, too overgrown, too...too...
"Too aged...for the likes of me." He scoffed bitterly, wanting to reject his youth, his renewed life, his...inescapable sense of longing and loneliness that seeped into every fiber and feeling within him as this boyishness got the better of him and the wide, caring look he received back from his reflection judged him, and laid bare his own insecurities.
Izuku instantly quashed the honesty and rejected the utter possibility that he was anything other than what he had been.
A lonely traveler.
Singular.
Solitary.
"I'm better off alone,"
He retorted into the stillness, energy seeped out of him like a waterfall, his emotions wavering like a flickering candle. The frustration the boy felt boiled softly beneath his touch, making Izuku...vulnerable, almost too weak and misunderstood.
"I've always been better alone."
'No, you haven't. You're tired of being alone," A familiar tinny hum made Izuku's ears prickle, as he narrowed his gaze on the reflection of the youthfulness that bounced back at him, eager to face a universe of adventures, though something…something seemed to hesitate…something or someone begged him to hold back.
“I don’t need anyone,” he retorted to the thought, his boyish voice making it harder to sound convincing to his own ears, as he tried to laugh and downplay the emotions.
'You've never been good at being alone. You're just a scared little boy--'
"I didn't ask your opinion," He murmured to the memory, the voice, the ghosting face that flickered through his memory, another eye roll erupting as he dropped his hands and pushed back the feelings and memories and...and honesty. Into another box, into another safe, small space that he could close up, lock away and just cast back into the shadows once more. The Doctor grinned and shook his head.
Because no, he didn’t need anyone. Not a single one!
He’d done that. He’d been there. And this was day zero. A new dawn. A new him!
Even if he seemed like a child.
He was still…he was the Doctor!
And this…
Izuku swallowed.
This was absurdly mad.
Beyond mad really.
Positively bananas , if he wanted to get all…old-timey about it and sound somewhat…well somewhat stupid and dim when he said anything, really.
Who called things ‘bananas’? That was just daft. And who decided that calling something ‘bananas’ was a bad thing? When did that ever start?
He rather liked bananas, thank you. They were decidedly delicious…you know, when they weren’t so entirely mushy and somewhat…bland when he bit into them.
And alright , Izuku didn’t like bananas.
But that didn’t make them bad. Quite the contrary, because when he of all creatures in this great, wide universe was bested by something, then that something was rather remarkable.
And in a good way, mind you.
So, yes, bananas were delightful things, even if he didn’t personally like to eat them.
But this situation?
Oh, dear god was this situation the opposite of bananas.
“Huh, I wonder what that would be then?” He murmured, a wry smile, twisting on his face, as his glasses slipped down his nose, and he moved one hand to roll the sleeves of his shirt up.
What was the opposite of a banana?
The damned sleeves were hanging over his fingertips, making it hard to simply maneuver let alone attempt to appear even remotely capable or polished or…
“Tall. That's the word I'm looking for,” he hummed somewhat sardonically, feeling his brow twitch as the history of his humorous preferences tried to seep through this new form. “Why am I so damned short this time ‘round?”
He lifted his hand and stared at the overlong sleeve that easily drooped down and scrunched about his elbow, noting with a critical scan that everything was billowy and floppy and just too weird to be comfortable now.
New bodies, right?
Oddities and paradoxes in and of themselves. Not that Izuku ever had anyone to really talk to about the whole, you know, new body thing, but still .
He frowned, staring back at his hand.
“Not older this time so back to the spry type.” Izuku quirked his head. “I can work with that at least–”
The boy stumbled once, a warning that he couldn’t, in face work with what he was wearing.
But that was only a minor inconvenience and one he’d change as soon as they were back in the sky and on a course to a safer, brighter destination than where they were.
The boy’s fingers tingled in anticipation, as his legs burned with the ache of unused energy.
"Besides," He chirped, too cheerful, too giddy. Too forced . But for whom he was forcing it was a mystery. Izuku didn’t need to act. He didn’t need to try to pretend "I can't let this deter me from getting on with things, now, can I?” He was speaking aloud, to whom or what, he wasn’t so sure as he adjusted his pants, once again. Best be off on settling things and traveling and whatnot. Can't waste my time moping and mumbling about the...the trivialities of life."
Or the people.
Life .
Ha.
Shaking fingers tapped almost impatiently against the counter, as Izuku fell back flat onto his feet, his pants catching beneath his heels at the control panel, anxiousness eating at him as he considered the possibilities of where and when he could go.
A wavering sense of longing flickering briefly again, before he pushed it down again, forcing the bile back into his stomach, the ache away from his chest as he hummed a familiarly unfamiliar tune. The Tardis hummed back, whirring and chirping in response to his trembling notes. "Can't go getting soft again, now, can we?" He retorted to himself, the buzzing in his ears continuing to mock.
But no, this time Izuku wouldn't let himself fall prey to those ideas, those thoughts, those...lingering hopes. Nothing but trouble that was. A whole mess of trouble that caused him nothing but…
“Well, nothing but trouble , and that’s a terrible use of language, Izuku,” The Doctor muttered to himself, peering down on the screen carefully, his thoughts straying to study the possible trajectories he could choose, as he perused the controls carefully, his fingers alight with power, still unfinished in its regeneration process.
No, he wasn't worth that much.
He needed to focus on the others, the rest of the universe.
The worlds and faces and creatures that existed and deserved to exist. Because Izuku? The Doctor?
He was... "Nothing important," The boy whispered, "Just a passerby. A blip. A flickering speck of..." Nothing.
And yet…for all the nothingness, and non-being, Izuku–The Doctor, was utterly foolish in his assumptions that his lack of worth would excuse his coordination from causing a…flurry of issues.
Izuku was clearly and totally wrong in assuming that he had any total understanding of his own skills or ability to work his new body. That is, he was far too hasty in trying to get this whole new body to work and in his eagerness to run away from the growing shadows that edged around this new moment, this new regeneration, this face, this life, and his new persona, and name , Izuku…miscalculated several things.
That is, he rather forgot about several things.
Rather rather, he neglected to consider his own lack of height and tripped and tipped into the Tardis control panel, hands splayed out and smacking into too many knobs and bobbles with a loud ‘oomph’ and a groan as the wind rushed from his lungs.
And oh, fucking hell.
He was cursed.
“Damned height gods, whoever you are.”
The Tardis lurched and burbled uncomfortably as Izuku (Izuku?) was tossed back and smacked his head against the railing, scrambling to grab onto something to keep steady as the Tardis went into a tailspin, the control panel giving a whine before an electrical spark shot upward like a firecracker and burst, sending a spray out.
Another lurching, jerking toss, had the boy jumbled and whipped backwards and then to the side as his grip loosened on the control panel before he was knocked backwards, a stupidly wry smile on his face.
His back rammed into the railing that separated the controls from the rest of the main cabin area of the Tardis’ wide expansive roominess, as the world twisted and spun and toyed with his vision. Blurring and blending and deviating from clarity, the boy recalled a ginger hellion who did the exact same thing not so long ago…
“Oh, Donna Noble,” He murmured, his voice too youthful and too foreign in his mouth to fit with the words. “You’re a bad influence!”
‘Steady nine! Don’t go getting distracted now…’
His fingers twitched, golden light still swirling as the regeneration remained active, green eyes blurring for a moment as the double beat of hearts thundered in Izuku's chest.
Well, it hadn't been so long for him , anyway…
They spun outwards and onwards into the space for a moment, rocketing
Shouta was tired .
Grousing to himself, the underground hero nursed an overly large cup of coffee and made his way down the long stretch of tree-lined sidewalk near the waterway about a mile or so away from the outskirts of campus.
It was close enough to be within calling distance, able to respond should danger arise–though Shouta hoped that would never happen (though he wasn’t so stupid as to suppose that it *wouldn’t)--but far enough away that it afforded the man a bit of peace and quiet and solitude from the overly eager would-be heroes in training that he had to deal with on the daily. And a good escape after the shitty night he’d had dealing with his more active than usual patrol.
It seemed the usual rabble were more than a little eager to get into more than one fight the night before and Shouta was fortunate enough to be on the receiving end of several punches and attempted escapes.
Heists gone awry.
Carjackings.
Attempted robberies.
You name it and Shouta was there, in the middle of it, trying to prevent it.
Damn near ended up in the water at one point thanks to an impossibly stupid cop with a water gun quirk who thought they’d be a bit…quick to help put out a fire that one of the assailants had started and they’d misjudged their own firing power and ended up spraying him into the fence and over the railing.
He’d almost fallen off the pier and into the ocean, but grabbed onto the railing at the last second, using his damned capture weapon as a backup anchor to hold him secure while the blasted newbie officer regulated their nerves enough to keep their power under control after Shouta had used Erasure to stifle the other’s quirk long enough to prevent any more casualties.
He’d pointedly ignored anyone who’d laughed under their breath at his expense, too tired to care about the bullshit, but definitely eager for that cup of coffee that he was now nursing right now as he strolled slowly back from the bakery, ignoring the fact that he should have gotten Hizashi a cinnamon roll and would, in fact, be chastised for that later…or guilt tripped into buying one at the earliest convenience.
But Shouta couldn’t be too bothered to care. He’d been too tired from his late night and long day ahead to really think too long about the implications of what his lack of thought towards the cinnamon roll would mean. Nor could he really think too hard on what Haru, the bakery owner had said as she fussed over the long red mark on his cheek from where he’d been struck by the whip that the female quirker had used, as she’d extended her hair as her weapon during one of his first fights of the night, catching his cheek as he’d fended off four other assailants all in one go.
Tsukauchi had been at that one. It’d been a raid, actually…long haul of a plan that they’d worked hard to take down to lead to the league–
“Watch out!” There was a somewhat frantic call, from above us. A child’s voice echoed through the air as Shouta turned with a quizzical narrowing of his pitch-colored gaze to watch a flash of blue splash and zip across the sky as a ‘whoom-whoom-whoom’ bellowed in the air.
There was another spark of energy, another explosion of light and sound bellowed overhead. The blue blur belched out from a portal, as another call shot out from the opened door.
“Oi! Lazy Lad, move your bones a bit faster or you’ll be pancaked!”
Shouta could only turn his head upward for a moment, watching with some measure of incredulity as a massive…police box? Spun erratically overhead, bashing into a few trees that lined the water way as it made a beeline for the field just across the water, and Shouta’s head.
A flash of green and billowing white caught the man’s eye as branches snapped, as the limbs chock full of cherry blossoms fell and scattered through the air.
“I said move, buster!”
And shit that was a kid’s voice. The underground hero’s ears picked up the pitch and tone as he dropped his coffee, and crouched low, catching the underside of the contraption as it sailed overhead. Some of the wayward blossoms landed in Shouta’s hair, tousled by the jostling of world around him, the air dusting up the branches and leaves and grass as he ducked to get out of the way.
There was a sound ‘crunch’ as said police box smacked into another tree, after trying to seemingly course correct, as Shouta raised himself to stand. He turned on his heel and sprinted to follow, watching as the object careened hard to the left before ricocheting off the base of another tree before flinging into a spiraled turn and tearing a few branches off the other trees that lined the perimeter of the field for good measure, before skidding across the grass and tearing up the soil on its journey to the near center.
Dirt and mud and grass sprayed outward, caking the blue box and sending a shower of green and brown and branch and petal around as Shouta darted towards the box, his fingers threaded through his capture weapon, quirk at the ready.
Fumes were erupting from the box of blue, as it creaked and groaned and beeped unpleasantly. A siren was blaring somewhere inside as Shouta hedged closer, eyes narrowed, and lips pulled thin because he’d been certain that he’d heard a voice…
A groan split the air, low and guttural, as the box shimmied and tipped on its side, fully turning to land was a hard ‘bang’ as more white smoke and steam streamed out. The light atop the damned thing continued to glint as the siren silenced as a ‘clanging’ noise echoed to replace it.
There was a knock and then a bang as the underground hero reached for the door, his quirk alight, hand at the ready.
But then there was another ‘bang’ and an ‘oomph’ and suddenly a tousled head of mussed green curls popped out from the door, as wide, green eyes peered up at Shouta, almost unassuming, almost innocent.
Almost.
A boy. No more than fifteen, stared silently at the underground hero for a moment, the bottle-green orbs studying the man with an intensity that almost had Shouta stepping back in surprise. Golden light danced around the boy’s face, tingling along his skin as his freckled cheeks scrunched and lips puckered in thoughtfulness before he hummed in approval and grinned.
“Hullo!” He retorted, far too casually for the circumstances as he tried to hoist himself upright, his elbow catching on the edge of the doorway.
The boy slipped and nearly fell back into the box, a low ‘oomph’ escaping his lips as he tried to right himself, chin catching on the edge of the door as he glowered downward.
“That’s rude you know,” He murmured to himself.
Shouta frowned, quirk still active as he stared at the child who only shook his head and tried to hoist himself upright and out of the box again. A pint-sized kid…wearing overly large suit clothes perched carefully on the edge of the doorway of the police box. Long black pants extending beyond his bare feet, too baggy to be his own, and dress shirt and vest billowing comically around him as he tried to appear ‘respectable’, it seemed. The boy pushed his glasses up on his nose a bit better before extending his hand, carefully hoisting a few glittering necklaces in his other, as he smiled at Shouta.
“Like I said, I’m The Doctor and I–”
There was another lurching groan as they did a flip to the side, turning one way, as the boy, who stood on the edge of the doorway, was forced into a flip forward going into the opposite direction.
Right over the underground hero’s head.
There was a startled yelp, and a groan before a loud clanging and siren bellowed in the air as light filled Shouta’s eyes, forcing him to blink only briefly, as he watched the blue police box almost…hiss, before it shot upwards and out of sight.
The man only considered the brief oddity of the circumstances as he listened to the boy wheeze behind him.
"Now that's not nice you know!" The boy chortled with a choked gasp, staring up at the sky, as the distinct sound of whirring and buzzing erupted in the air.
"I didn't need you to go off and lob me out the damned door! I could have just walked!"
Izuku rolled his eyes with a sharp smirk as the machine disappeared, fading into the afternoon glint as the clouds lazed and the air of Earth's warm Spring weather tickled his nose. At least, he thought it was Spring. He was always fond of the seasons Earth offered. They were certainly nice enough to distract for a few minutes. Idyllic and quaint in so many respects that it distracted him from the greater expanses of the fire and fumes and stars and swirling and twisting universe that curled and grew around the naive inhabitants of this tiny little blip of a planet.
The boy laughed as he sneezed. The golden hues curling and coiling and twisting around him making everything seem so light . His senses felt on fire , his energy was positively seeping from every pore, cascading off of him as he blinked around him, smile growing as the man stared at him in questioning, brows drawn together in consternation.
Izuku could tell that was a familiar look on this fellow. Seemed to fit his face well enough. The crow ...how amusing that was! "What the hell was that, kid?" Izuku immediately frowned towards the human before him, his own brow lifting in offense.
"Not a kid, need I remind you," He quipped, finger lightly circling in the dirt, before he rolled into a bounce that lifted him to his feet. Perhaps this youthful visage meant a spryer maneuverability at least.
A perk! Izuku bounced on his heels, and leapt a few times to test his flexibility, the flow about him sparking brighter as the regeneration continued to course, giving him a drunken sense of excitement and eagerness.
His nose twitched again, another sneeze coming. How odd ...
"Could have fooled me, kid," The man retorted, nonplussed, eyes narrowed on Izuku. "But that doesn't answer the question about what the hell just happened."
Izuku waved away the man's concerns easily, his smile bright as he cast a sidelong glance briefly towards the man, before flicking his attention towards staring at the trees and the skyline. It was pretty here!
"She was just being finicky is all. Happens each time this sort of...thing well..." The boy gestured to himself, the sleeves of his shirt flapping awkwardly like broken wings as he shook his head.
"But there's really no reasoning with her. She'll do as she pleases and spruce herself up and come back when she's ready."
"What the hell are you talking about?" The man intoned, his voice dipping lower as his frown dripped with annoyance more than confusion. "You're skipping details, kid."
Izuku shook his head. " Not a kid," He repeated.
"Could have fooled me," The man replied again. "Now start over, with more details."
Izuku huffed at the... inconvenience of it all. He'd much rather just explore the area. Or nap. He wasn't quite sure which was more appealing. The tug of sleep was definitely there, but the urge to run was pulling him in ten different directions, his stomach coiling inward and creeping towards his throat as his fingers and toes tingled with excitement.
Or was it worry? He wasn't sure. Maybe they were the same? They'd certainly been combined a number of times that he'd forgotten how to tell them apart at this point. SO, who could say really?
" Kid ."
" Not a kid," He remarked with a clip and a bite that was cheerfully intoned. "But it's the Tardis." He turned more fully towards the man, reaching for one of his sleeves, trying to roll the damned thing so he could at least see his hand. He had to look somewhat refined, distinguished… doctorish or whatever rubbish people–er, humans saw as plausible to rely on as powerful or whatnot.
Seemed his current form didn’t give him much of an aura of…credibility.
Which was absolute rubbish if you asked him.
…Were probably just the clothes though.
"She's...well whenever a regeneration happens, she's gotta go through a sort of transformation too, as it were,” He quipped blinking at the buttons as his fingers shook, too much to unbutton the small shiny bit. The boy’s… Doctor’s stomach rumbled again, signaling that he was, indeed quite hungry.
Regenerations indeed required food.
Perhaps that’s why he was so focused on bananas–
“You’re speaking about a box --”
“Tardis,” Izuku continued–and why was that name coming up again? Why Izuku?
Why did he agree to that name so quickly? The boy blinked a few times stilling, and staring off towards the tree line, watching as the idle cherry blossoms lazily trailed through the rustled branches as wind tousled the gentle petals. A soft spray of pinks and roses and creams danced through the sky. A blue as brilliant as he’d ever seen it before.
Like oceans of tears.
Had the earth always been like this?
“Kid?”
The boy blinked again and straightened, his curls–curls! --swaying as he turned towards man more fully and grinned, coming back to himself. Golden trails of stardust swirled around his fingertips as he plucked at his sleeves, shuffling his feet and digging his toes into the soft earth.
The grass was marvelous against his bare skin.
“She’s a wickedly temperamental creature. Not just a box , need I remind. That sort of description hardly does her any justice.” Izuku (what a name!) remarked, ignoring the questioning look in the man’s gaze as he tilted his head to the side and hummed, “Whenever this happens, she has to match my personality and it takes her a bit of a time to finagle her way through the mess of it all."
And perhaps that was putting it lightly! He’d never been the Tardis so who was he to say what she went through each and every time this happened? And it’d happened, what? Over a dozen times now?
Dear god was he that old? Eesh…
No wonder the lovely beauty she was would be somewhat…agitated at the prospect of change.
The boy snorted. "But she was a little more...forceful this time ‘round, it seems.” Izuku hummed for a moment, his thoughts straying as he peered back towards the sky and the broken trail of…somewhat destruction that the Tardis had left in its wake of pseudo-landing that she’d tried to do…not that it’d been his fault in the slightest, mind you. There was no reasoning with her when she was in this mood. Hell, she hardly listened to anyone on a good day, when things were going peachy!
Now, here she was in the throes of change and mood-swings and–
The boy blinked, was that because of him? Was she being all…wobbly because of his own mood. Izuku narrowed his eyes on the broken branches and swaying bits of tender tendrils of dewy springtime petals as they brushed against the backdrop of sky and pondered.
“She mimics me, eh? So is that why she’s so…well…” It wasn’t very likely that she was so…finicky and cross because of him and his own nature. He wasn’t…the boy laughed lowly, his voice cracking at the pitch break (and that was a sore spot for him! Even his voice had lost its impact! Doctor persona, indeed).
“You’re lost in that head of yours, kid,” the man–the human–retorted, his shadowed visage edging closer to Izuku who cast a sidelong glance towards the encroaching form. The boy only lifted a brow in questioning, clearly affronted by the supposition that he was anything beneath this mortal, this youth that stood, admittedly, taller than he did.
And that gave the Doctor a moment of pause because when did humans get so incredibly tall ?
‘Perhaps you’re just shorter, nine?’
That was none of whomever was speaking’s business, thank you. The boy immediately dismissed the voice, with a silent wave and a shake of his head.
He wasn’t about to consider his…lack of skill at growing just yet. Or the fact that he was…a teenager pint-sized Doctor. That…that wasn’t a consideration he needed to make. Hardly a jot of a thought! No, indeed!
He was merely just spry and lively and ready to jaunt through the universe…once the Tardis made her return!
“I’ll have you know that I’m not a kid , or a child, or what have you, despite my, er…appearance. And the Tardis just…has a mind of her own, so it’s really nothing to jabber on about and dawdle away our time on.” The boy sniffed again, carefully curling the fabric so that his arm was exposed, the stardust infused in his veins and glowing across his fingers made the world around him appear all the brighter. It was like sunlight coiled and caught in his palm.
And Izuku couldn’t help the giddiness in his chest from fluttering as a burble of enthusiasm trilled along his lips as he whistled merrily at the prospects and thoughts they zipped and danced and tromped through his ever whizzing and whirring mind.
Newly regenerated. So much time, so many things to do and see and places to go and be and experience! So much time, so little time too! The boy grinned, his fingers fluttering as a trail of starlight swirled in the air. He wondered, briefly what his face must look like to this human, this man. Was he an oddity for glowing? Was he strange looking at the glare of the light that the generation caused?
Did it even matter?
Probably not.
Should it even bother Izuku? Should he even care if the man cared? Or should he be worried or concerned?
The Doctor was humming more now as his fingers were tapping a silent tune in the air, a song that only he could hear, music that he’d long ago heard in a time that he’d traveled to many worlds and centuries and companions ago…
“Kid.”
Ah, he loved music! It’s why he tended to collect bits of it wherever he went! Had oodles of it on the Tardis! Whole storage compartment stocked to the brim with it! Records and CDs and even a lute! Which was harder to play than one might suppose. But he’d mastered it thanks to some of the better musicians of the 14th century teaching him to play it during his time as the primary minstrel troupe in France…wasn’t his finest hour, but it had been a hell of a party season…
And then there’d been the softer piano and violin pieces that he’d always stop and listen to when he could spare it. Whenever his timing was just right, he’d traveled to the perfect moment in time.
The moments where he needed to weep for what he was losing, or what he’d already lost.
And there…Izuku’s fingers twitched as the pulsing beat of music and star shine sang in his veins.
There was something straying through his thoughts, something singing at his senses…
And briefly, for a moment…the boy could almost see something else peeking through, something different, something…
Izuku squinted, his bottle-green gaze narrowing as he stared out across the sky, a thoughtful humming turned softer as he glazed through the thoughts that blurred and blended and curled and distorted and twisted and tossed together like a swirl of color and sound and memory…
‘It’s not safe to stay here anymore. We have to go.’
‘You can trust me.’
‘I’ll keep you safe…’
‘...don’t leave me.’
A hand, tentative and overly heavy landed on the boy’s shoulder. Warmth seeped through the connection, precious weight and pressure jolted through The Doctor as images turned to static, thoughts screeching to a halt, memories blurred into forgetfulness and suddenly Izuku was well aware of where he was.
The presence of reality slammed the boy down to earth (earth!) once more as he jerked back in surprise, and reflexively brought his stance into a defensive block, catching the man’s restraining hand with his own…or rather the man caught Izuku’s hand and held it firm as he peered down on the boy with a questioning look, studying the child’s (not a child!) face with a decided frown.
And that was too close, thank you.
Izuku quickly stepped back, the fury of starlight swished and swirled around him.
A beat of humanity flickered in his footsteps, as the boy’s lip trembled of its own accord. But only for a second before the cool demeanor gave way to brightness, and a mask of joviality slipped into place.
"Sometimes I think she gets a bit jealous, ” There was a small giggle, almost drunken as the boy considered the possibility that the Tardi would ever ...”And that's why she acts so finicky and temperamental except there's really nothing to be jealous of…” he paused for a moment, chin lifted as a small hummingbird of a thought flittered by. “Oh, well maybe Bess that one time...but...nah that wouldn't have made her upset, would it? Hmmm...." Izuku narrowed his eyes thoughtfully, movements stilling for a moment as he considered... "Now Madame De Pompadour might have… and oh yes was she the looker you might have thought she was!” He winked at the man who…well who sort of resembled a man who made the habit of sleeping on park benches or sleeping behind dumpsters and drank far too much coffee.
Unkempt and rather scruffy…dark and broody and crow-like, with that overly long grey scarf and scraggle-hair that tousled over his shoulders.
Dark clothes and boots and that scowling face!
Bah.
And oh right! They were talking about the Tardis. And the jealousy. Yes, yes. Back on track!
“But we only snogged...once. But that wasn't enough...was it? Ha! What would I know? She could have been..."
"You're not making sense, kid," That same broody, moody man replied his tone shifting towards contemplative as he seemed to take his turn in studying Izuku–The Doctor . He watched the boy carefully, humming lowly as he quirked a brow in questioning, the silent inquiry only eliciting a shrug from Izuku in reply.
"I rarely do, or so I’ve been told." The boy retorted, "And I'm not meant to. That's the point." He smiled again, feeling the air around him growing warmer, lighting up his skin, making everything feel too light, too airy, too fiery and fierce and incandescently alive .
He was thriving off of it, feeding off it.
He loved it and loathed it.
And feared it all the same and that grin never slipped, though this time, it was a little more forced, his skin stretched a bit more uncomfortably around his mouth as the darker shadows crept around the back of his mind, taunting, voices humming as the super nova energy continued to course through him, begging his frantic muscles to burst into a leap and sprint, dashing outward, onward into the stars, far, and far, and far away.
‘I promise I’ll keep you safe.’
‘You promise?’
That voice…?
There was a searing wince of pain, a harsh ice pick of pressure against his temple that had the boy stumbling for a moment, his vision blurring as a mixture of ideas and memories and thoughts twisted.
But in a flash, it was gone, and the energy that was bright and light and frantic was swirling around his senses and tugging him towards more pleasant things as he leaned a bit closer towards the man who stared incredulous and concerned at him.
Why concerned though?
The notion was absurd as he was. Hardly consequential. Hardly realistic. Hardly even tangible in terms of the plausible things!
Therefore, no one need care about him, worry, fret, or what have you. Can’t be bothered to engage in useless constructs that wasted time.
Too boring, too simplistic, too…too…
Izuku blew out the air in his lungs, feeling his fingers tingling, his ears buzzing, energy crackling around him as the fire burned in his chest and seeped into a golden halo around his head.
"But as it is, I'm stuck here until she decides she's done with her tantrum…costume change…whatever she likes to call it,” The boy retorted, changing the subject, as he tried to ignore the obvious, the tingling, the searing and the way he felt too unsteady and too alive and elated, eager to fly, but dreading the fall that would inevitably happen.
But the flittering of joy that washed and ebbed and carried through him, as the cascading energy of regeneration not yet completed, ensnared his senses and made him feel so…so…
Izuku bounced on the balls of his feet and clapped his hands together.
“So! What've you got to eat?"
The man looked utterly perplexed for a moment, narrowing his eyes on The Doctor as his frown only dipped lower, concern, mixing with suspicion.
"...Excuse me?"
“I’m needing some food, as you can see! Regenerations are a bit of a tricky business, and they leave me somewhat…peckish? Is that the right word? Peckish? Hmm…maybe not a strong enough term. Famished?” Izuku stewed on his thoughts searching for the right word that would amplify just how hungry he appeared.
“Hmm, but what could I possibly be hungry for?” He mused, his thoughts twisting and leafing through memory and idea and wondering what could sound so good. “What might be…not fish fingers and custard…no that won’t do this time. It doesn’t sound so tasty.”
The boy made a bit of a sour face as he considered what might work, what tantalized and enticed.
“And this is Japan. And I’ve been here before naturally. Great time. Lots of night life,” He chattered, considering.
“Now hold on just a minute kid,” The man’s voice dripped with concern and a bit of consternation. “I don’t know who you think you are, but you aren’t going anywhere until you and I figure out what the hell is fully going on with this–”
“Tardis. I told you.” Izuku dismissed. He didn’t want to consider this right now. He wanted lunch.
And his head was aching. Which…was new for him, in truth. Something worth investigating.
“But what sounds like a good bite? I could support some Katsudon…though I don’t think I’ve ever had that particular dish so why–?”
“There! He’s over there! I told you I’d track him.”
Izuku balked for a moment, a half smirk on his face turning bashful as his stomach rumbled again.
Well damn.
“They’re a bit early,” He sighed more than a little regretfully.
He was decidedly hungry.
“I always assume I have more time than I do,” The boy hummed to himself, almost bitter at the joke he’d made, as a series of flames ignited the overturned trees, and the branches. “Seems I never even have enough for lunch! Bah.”
Oh, this was all going to shit. Absolute shit.
And all Shouta had wanted was a coffee.
Shouta rather prided himself on keeping calm under pressure.
But standing beneath, nearly overturned trees, with a growing crowd as a boy continued to mutter in his oversized clothing and his golden, glowing face and bare feet , Shouta couldn’t help but feel that this… this was a rather large…shit show.
One that he’d wasn’t so sure he could get back under control, even if he wanted to.
Especially when this damned kid that’d come riding in on a blue box was fishing in his pocket and pulled out several marked, rare jewels from the royal family from his pocket.
And oh, dear god.
“This one’s mine, Eraserhead.”
And shit.
The underground hero, with fingers still threaded through his capture weapon straightened at the formality of the call, the hero's name falling, almost mockingly from the lips of the current number one hero’s lips.
Double shit.
Shouta narrowed his eyes as he cast a sharp glance behind him, as Endeavor coasted up, a trail of firelight encasing his movements, glare fixed on the boy who was now behind Shouta, still standing there with the fucking…crown jewels of the royal family in his hold…
Oh, fuck him.
“Oh! That’s who you are is it? Eraserhead? That’s an interesting name. Heroes I presume?” The boy’s voice was light and breezy, completely unaffected by the situation, it seemed.
And Shouta wasn’t sure if the kid didn’t know what danger he was in…
Or didn’t care.
Either scenario, however, had him far more wary than he’d started.
“The others were caught at the crime scene, but this brat made an escape in his vehicle. Seems we caused enough damage to the damned thing to bring him down in the park–” Endeavor’s explanation was cut short by the boy’s mild snort of amusement.
“You didn’t hurt the Tardis in the slightest,” The child waved his hand lightly, his sleeves flopping as he moved. He hardly appeared intimidating. “In fact, I think you missed her entirely!”
“Now just a minute you brat, I wasn’t–”
“I’m hardly a brat,” The boy retorted, cutting Endeavor off, “And I’m not an enemy either. I only took these to stop the others from taking them so you’re welcome!”
He tossed the jewels towards Aizawa with a casual flick.
“Hardly worth anything anyway,” The kid remarked lightly. “Considering they’re fake. Real ones were swapped out ages ago by the Lizard People.”
Shouta was caught between balancing the jewels in his hands and giving a hard stare towards the boy who was clearly injured, and clearly needing to shut the hell up at this point because Endeavor’s reaction to his quip was one of mild annoyance, to say the least.
The number one hero peered down his nose at the kid who only grinned lightly in return and lifted his chin to meet Endeavor’s gaze.
“You really think I’m supposed to believe that you’re neither a vigilante nor that those jewels are fake, especially when you aimed a hit at my sidekicks with your little car?” He retorted with a sneer. “Do you think that I’m that stupid?”
“It was the Tardis and yes. I do.” The retort was clipped as the boy nodded, almost like this was stupid question. “Most humans are naturally stupid,” He continued evenly, with a shrug, “But I’d hoped you’d be more self-aware than most and actually consider the truth…” The boy hummed for a moment and tilted his head to the side. “Though judging by your expression, it seems that you’re pretty close-minded. And blind to not see those jewels are decidedly fake. Betcha the royal family knows it too!”
At this Endeavor took a step forward but Shouta, out of reflex stepped between the man and the boy, a mixture of…mild concern for the kid’s safety weighing on him as he considered the prospect of what an annoyed number one hero could do when riled too far.
Not that he’d outright hurt the boy, but…
The implication was still there.
“Stand down Eraser.”
Shouta’s expression remained neutral as he stood firm.
“I can’t do that, Endeavor,” He remarked simply. “He’s a kid.”
“And a villain. A vigilante,” the hero remarked with a growl. “You know we tracked him here. Our data confirms it.”
“But you don’t know the full details,” The man countered. “And after what I’ve seen,”
‘And the fact that he’s already injured…’
“I’m not going to risk it–”
“That’s not your call to make, Eraser,” Endeavor maneuvered past Shouta with a hard shove, a blast of warm flame–not hot enough to sear, sending a wide berth between them, as the ground gave way.
And then he was off, towards the child, who stood, grinning with head still tilted towards the man.
“That wasn’t very heroic of you, Endeavor,” The boy retorted, as the man pressed his height and weight advantage and made to land a soft blow around the boy, encasing him in a flamed ring to keep him trapped.
The boy, however, only tutted, and brought out a small screwdriver?
And what…?
Shouta leaped at the same time that the light that glinted at the end of the object sparked green as the boy pressed a button towards Endeavor’s suit, his eyes narrowed.
There was a loud ‘hiss’ followed by a ‘sizzle’ as Endeavor pulled back at the last second, his flames sputtering for a moment, steam swirled upward and around the number one hero, covering the man’s vision and creating a screened effect that clouded his ability to effectively glance at the boy who smirked in reply.
“How the hell…what is…” Flames erupted around the man as more steam billowed out. Endeavor’s annoyance only grew. “What did you do?!”
“I reversed the polarity of the configuration on the suit’s mechanics and rerouted what I thought was the heat amplifiers to give… well ...to give you a bit of a steam bath, as it were.”
The child grinned a bit to himself, clearly proud of his joke.
And that was going to get him in a whole shit ton of trouble.
“Seemed you were a bit hotheaded, there hero, and we can’t have that, now, can we?”
That one even more so.
"And what do you intend to actually do about it boy ?" The man sneered, his voice dropping lower as he scowled at the child before him through the steam and the flames. "What do you think you can do against someone like me?"
Angry tendrils of firelight danced around Endeavor's face, his eyes narrowing further as the boy before him only grinned smartly in response to the man's question, his own eyes dancing brightly, as golden light floated around his face and pulsed through his skin.
And Shouta wavered between believing the child wasn’t a vigilante…and seeing that he was as he stood there…outwitting Endeavor rather easily.
Verdant curls waved and fluttered, pushed by an invisible wind as the boy's fingers tapped lightly at his side, tendrils of energy dripping like threads from his fingertips as he shook his head and let out a soft laugh. "It's not really what I can or can't do, you know," He replied jokingly, his tone light but firm, almost biting as he stared back at the pro hero as though he were nothing. The steam veiled the space between them as Shouta hedged closer, trying to get a small opening, because this was going downhill fast, and they just needed…
The man reached into his pocket and hastily pressed the emergency key on his phone.
It’d record and send to Tsukauchi.
Carefully, the underground hero sidestepped and pressed closer to the scalding steam bath that billowed upward, mindful of Endeavor’s sidekicks keeping the perimeter and of the civilians that milled about, watching and recording.
And fucking hell.
Always with the recording. 'Zashi was going to be pissed about more than just the cinnamon rolls after this.
"It's what I won't do that you should be grateful for."
Green eyes flashed, their spark growing in intensity as Izuku lifted his chin towards the man in defiance, challenging Endeavor to strike first if he thought himself a willing opponent.
And shit . Shouta's own fingers curled into his palms as he moved closer, his footfalls silent and heart too loud in his ears as he watched the boy's too-long coat ruffle around his legs as he stood, barefoot on the grass across from the number one pro hero of Japan, without so much as a tremble of conscious awareness of how utterly stupid he was being.
"You damned vigilante brat," Endeavor's retort was gruff and snapping as the flames intensified around his glower and his palms ignited into a fireball of orange and gold and crimson. Steam intensified in kind to his actions, which only seemed to incite the man’s annoyance more.
"I knew you were trouble, but the underground lot are more sympathetic to you vigilante trash than I am. Who the hell do you think you are trying to corrupt this city and take the law into your own hands. You're nothing, kid ."
Shouta's hand was around his throat, loosening the grey of his capture weapon and threading it through his fingers as the boy quirked his head to the side and 'tsk'd' at Endeavor's tone.
And really, this damned Problem Child had a death wish, didn't he?
Dear God, Shouta didn't need this trouble. He leapt towards the nearby awning, making for the lamppost as the child shook his head again.
"I'm not a vigilante, Enji Todoroki," The boy, Izuku retorted with a long-draw sigh, as though he were far older than he looked. Stupid thought, really, but Shouta could swear he saw a flash of exhaustion color the boy's features for a moment before the kid's smile widened again as he wagged that strange screwdriver towards the pro hero again, almost as though he were the adult chastising the child .
"And it's not nice to say that I'm nothing, you know," The boy groused. "No one is nothing. Ha. What a lark that is. Nothing really isn't even nothing in the scope of, well... everything . But then again, the nothing in its nothingness could be NOTHING you know but that makes it something in its nothing and it's really just a matter of the nothing knowing that it's nothing which makes it something-- ah...well anyway. " The boy shook his head again and tapped that same thing pen-like object against his temple, the green piping along the silver edges glinting in the sunlight. "It's perhaps a bit more complicated than you might comprehend there, dear boy."
"What the hell did you just call me?" Endeavor sputtered out a heated retort as Shouta watched the flames grow brighter around the man's mouth, his hands, his feet. "A child? I'm not a child compared to someone like you."
At this the boy, Izuku laughed again, and Shouta could see the way the boy’s curls swayed, revealing a large knot on the child’s head. A gash that’d bled, quite profusely trailed down near the boy’s eye.
Well hell.
"Oh, but you are , you know," The kid retorted cheekily, his tone light, eyes still sparkling too bright as his skin glowed like starlight, the golden halo wrapping around each finger and hand and smile as he stood straighter and pointed the object towards Endeavor again.
"And you know as well as I that good men don't need rules." The boy took a step forward, his glasses slipping down his nose again as his pant legs pooled near his bare feet. The object buzzed in the child's hand. "And you are so good at breaking the rules, aren't you, Enji ..." he hummed quietly. "So many rules broken. So many skeletons in your closet, eh?" The boy quirked a brow and frowned, his gaze shifting into something far more serious, far colder, and far more calculating and precise. "And you don't want to find out why I have so many rules, now do you?"
But that was the wrong thing to say.
And Shouta knew it before Endeavor knew it.
And the kid knew it too but did absolutely nothing to stop what happened as the underground hero stepped forward and cast out his capture weapon, snapping through the fogginess to wrap around the boy’s wrist and yank him to the side as the man’s quirk ignited, as Shouta hoisted the boy by his waist and lugged him like a package into the tree line and away from the flames as Endeavor’s camouflage of anger served as their escape.
“Well, that worked nicely!” The boy chirped over the noise, his voice like a small sparrow, and bare feet dangling as Shouta snorted, unamused and ready to throttle the child.
Dear god, what a shit show.
“What a delightful comedy, indeed, dear Doctor.”
Dear Izuku.