Forest

‘They are villains,’ Izuku panics. ‘My only two friends. They are villains. I’m going to be a hero! I can’t be friends with villains! What if they do something terrible. What if they already have done something terrible. What if-’

“Forest!” 

Izuku is jolted out of his thoughts by Himiko, who is looking at him in concern. He looks from Himiko to Dabi, and then back to Himiko and he sees red.

“You!” Izuku growls, voice low and threatening. 

Dabi and Himiko both flinch, they have heard him speak like that before of course, but it was never directed at them.

“Why would you do this? You are villains! I can’t hang out with villains, I’m going to be a hero!” Izuku practically snarls, voice rising into a yell. “You are my friends! You guys are my only friends! I hate you!”

Izuku notes Kurogiri in his peripheral vision who is slowly retreating back into the bar. ‘That’s fine. If I need to I’ll deal with you eventually.’

“Forest-” Dabi begins hesitantly, looking slightly nervous under Izuku’s harsh gaze.

“No! I hate you! I hate you! I hate-” Izuku’s voice breaks and the fight in him seeps out as he allows himself to do something he hasn’t done in a very long time. Cry.

Himiko and Dabi watch in shock as Izuku slowly collapses to the ground, body shaking with silent sobs. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that while Izuku may be well known, he may be strong, and he may be powerful, he is still a kid. After a moment Himiko slowly inches closer to Izuku, hoping he chooses not to lash out again. As she gets closer she hears the green haired boy muttering something under his breath. Once she gets close enough to hear the words, she gasps.

“Just like mom. Just like mom. Just like mom,” Izuku is repeating under his break, the words coming out broken and emotional every time.

“Forest?” Dabi asks carefully, also having approached the boy at this point. “What do you mean ‘just like mom.’”

Izuku’s gaze snaps up again and the other two flinch, preparing for another round of enraged yelling, but are instead met with an absolutely broken look.

“You are just like my mom. She forced me out of her life. Forced me out, abandoned me. Now you are doing the same. Why would you do this to me?”

“Oh my god, Forest. That’s why you are in the streets? Your mom kicked you out?” Himiko breathed, not wanting to cause any more distress to the teen seated before her but she was shocked and appalled. 

“She didn’t want me. I was six and quirkless. So she pushed me away. And now you guys are pushing me away too!”

“No we aren’t,” Dabi says, looking at Izuku with pity.

“Bullshit.” Izuku says, his anger returning. He hates that look on Dabi’s face, he used to get it all the time because he was just a poor quirkless kid, nothing of worth. Just something to be pitied. 

“No really, he means it. We haven’t even done anything illegal!” Himiko promises. “We just needed a place to stay, and they provided given that we join them.”

“You could have come to me!” Izuku exclaims. “I would have helped!”

“We know that Forest, but you are just a kid. We didn’t need to give you the pressure of finding us a place to stay. You had other things to worry about.” Dabi states, the pitying look gone from his face, much to Izuku’s relief.

“Himiko is a teenager too,” Izuku points out, and he know he sounds stupid but he can’t help but point it out.

“Yeah, but I helped her out. Seriously, we haven’t done anything illegal. We promise not to get you mixed up in anything, and we promise we aren’t leaving you. We aren’t pushing you away.”

“Yeah! Exactly!” Himiko agrees, her signature crazy grin returning to her face. “I really do want to watch you become a hero, Forest! Don’t worry we won’t interfere! Except maybe a little teasing!”

“Okay.”

“Okay?”

“Yeah, I believe you. You do know that if something happens though, I am going to have to tell the heroes about you? I can’t protect you. It will jeopardize my future as a pro hero. I promise I won’t say anything unless it comes up but I’m also not going to hide it.”

“We understand.” 

“Okay then,” Izuku says, standing up and straightening his clothes out again. Now that the situation is over, he’s embarrassed by his breakdown. It’s been years since he last cried, he had a reputation after all. He’s normally very good at keeping his emotions under control. “If you tell anyone about my… loss of composure, I will destroy you.”

“No doubt in my mind you will,” Dabi laughs. “Don’t worry kid. After all, who would we tell?”

Izuku just rolls his eyes, knowing damn well there were plenty of people he could tell. Together, they head back into the bar and reclaim their seats. Which, shockingly, hadn’t been occupied by anyone else.

“I saved your seats for you,” Kurogiri explains, before setting drinks in front of Himiko and Dabi.

They both look briefly surprised, having forgotten they ordered them in the first place, before taking their drinks with a brief ‘thank you’ to Kurogiri. Kurogiri nods and then grabs another drink, sliding it to Izuku.

“What’s this?” He asks suspiciously, not recognizing the drink.

“I call it the Forest,” Kurogiri states, sounding slightly amused. “I’ve heard a lot about you from Himiko.”

At the confused look on Forest’s face, Kurogiri lets out a light laugh. “It’s just lemonade dyed green. Himiko says it’s your favorite drink.”

“Ah, green lemonade, because Forest,” Izuku sighs. “Very funny.”

He does take the drink though and downs it pretty quickly, so Kurogiri assumes he appreciates it more than he lets on.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

At around 10pm Izuku leaves the bar, heading to the mostly empty apartment complex he found just outside of the main part of Musutafu. He’s ready to rest after that emotionally exhausting day, but wants to go check his mailbox. He may have received acceptance letters from some of the places he applies to, and if he’s lucky even his UA letter. Though it’s unlikely given it’s only been a few days since the entrance exams. 

“Hello ma’am,” Izuku greets the lady lounging at the desk when he arrives.

“Hello Forest, here to check your mail again? Also, stop calling me ma’am, I’m only barely 20, not some old lady. Call me Aki.”

“Of course Aki, and yep, I am. Thank you again for letting me use the apartment complex’s mailbox and address. Since I don’t technically have an address that would have created some difficulties.”

“Of course, we clearly have more than we need anyways. People don’t tend to want to live around here anymore. I’m sorry that we couldn’t just give you a place to stay. A mailbox I can get away with, but I don’t think my superiors would take kindly to me just giving you a free apartment.”

“I totally understand that, no worries! I have a place anyways, it just isn’t exactly a place I can register on my entrance exams,” Izuku explains, pulling his mail out of the box.

“Ah okay, well I’m glad you have a place to stay!”

“Yeah me too,” Izuku laughs lightly, shifting through the mail. “Ugh so much junk. Oh!”

“Something good in that stack?”

“Yeah! I have two letters from schools I applied to!”

“How many schools did you apply to?”

“Uh, around 15?” Izuku says, throwing away the junk mail and then pocketing the two letters. He will open them at home.

“Wow! That’s a lot!”

“Yeah well, I wanted to cover all my bases,” Izuku shrugs. “I should head out now! It was good to see you again Aki!”

“You too! Stay safe!”

And with that the door shut behind Izuku, making his way home. 

‘I’m so glad I built a home, it would be terrible if I was still sleeping on park benches every night.’

Arriving at Dagobah beach he slowly moves his way to the center of the trash. There was much less trash than when Izuku initially arrived, as he had been slowly using up the materials, but there was still quite a lot. At the center of the maze of thrown out junk, is Izuku’s home. He built it himself out of wood, metal, and other scraps he found lying around on the beach. It may be garbage, but a lot of it was very useful. ‘One man’s trash is another man’s treasure, after all.’ He’s rather proud of his home. It blends in, so unless you know it’s there you would just think it was another pile of garbage. Once you get inside though, it’s a whole other story. The inside is nicely built with supports made from wood he found around the beach, it even has a place for him to build a fire. Made of non-flammable materials and with proper ventilation of course, he isn’t trying to die.

It’s not a large place, but Izuku likes it. It’s home. In the corner is a cot he bought on sale, and the rest of the space is filled with his desk and some shelves. The shelves he found in the junk and he simply stabilized them with supports, the desk he made entirely himself though. There is only one other section of Izuku’s home, which is the small back area where there is a shower and sink that was also, of course, constructed entirely by Izuku. He simply ran some pipes through the sand as a drainage system. The water comes from the ocean and he has to grab it himself, but there is a filtering system so that the water is perfectly clean. It’s not heated, but that’s simply because he is too lazy to make a heating system. He’s sure he could if he wanted.

In terms of a restroom and other items, there is a cheap corner store not too far from the beach that he walks to. Overall, Izuku knows it’s kind of rough around the edges but he’s been living there for four years now, making additions and tweaking things as necessary, and he is doing just fine.

Izuku removes his letters from his jacket and sets them down before removing all his gear and placing it in the large drawer under his desk. He then changes into a different t-shirt and some sweatpants, and sighs as lays down in his cot. He grabs his phone and does a little bit of catching up with the news to make sure he didn’t miss anything important. ‘Just a few new villain fights, nothing worth my time,’ Izuku determines, and he’s about to set his phone down to turn to the letters when an article catches his eye. His favorite hero Eraserhead ended up in a daylight villain fight today alongside Present Mic! 

‘Wow! Eraserhead never fights in public, he’s an underground hero! That’s crazy!’ 

Clicking on the article, he notices it has a video attached of the fight. A civilian must have recorded it nearby. Watching, Izuku is amazed at how well Eraserhead and Present Mic work alongside each other, and it peaks his curiosity. 

‘I don’t think I’ve ever seen them together before,’ Izuku ponders, reaching over to his desk and grabbing his computer. ‘In fact I didn’t even know that they really knew each other. They looked so well practiced in that fight though. They took down that villain easily, with perfect teamwork.’

Izuku knows that technically he could get in trouble for what he is about to do, but he has a feeling that if anyone found out he could get out of it pretty easily. People never tend to take anything he does seriously because he’s quirkless, which is frustrating and he plans to change that when he becomes a hero, but it can be useful sometimes. So Izuku opens his computer, and moments later he has hacked into UA’s database, specifically the files on the UA staff. He reads through all of the files before reading Eraserhead’s or Present Mic’s. He figures if he is going to look at the staff files, he may as well know about all of them.

“Okay, there it is, Eraserhead’s file,” Izuku mutters under his breath. He’s gotten much better, but he never completely got rid of the habit, so especially when he’s alone his muttering tended to make an appearance. 

“Oh! Oh!” Izuku laughs after a moment of reading the file in front of him, he then clicks on Present Mic’s file to double check what he just discovered. 

Still laughing, Izuku erases any evidence of his hacking and closes his computer. Of course, right there was the reason they worked so well together. Eraserhead and Present Mic, otherwise known and Shouta and Hizashi Aizawa-Yamada. They’re married. 

“Of course they are married,” Izuku cackles hysterically. To be quite honest, Izuku isn’t sure why this is such a humorous revelation to him, but it takes a while for him to calm down.

Once he does, Izuku moves on, now having all the information available on the UA staff files stored in his brain. He grabs the letters next to him, takes a deep breath, and opens the first one.

It informs him that he did not make it into the hero course on account of his quirklessness, but that he should try for the general education course. At that Izuku growls lightly, frustrated, and throws the letter away. ‘It’s fine. I didn’t really want to go to that school anyways.’ He then quickly opens the second, scanning it quickly.

“Oh thank god!” Izuku exclaims. He made it into the hero course at Ketsubutsu Academy, it wasn’t his first pick because, of course, that was UA, but it was still a good backup. 

Izuku sets the acceptance letter in his desk, turns off his battery powered lamp, and rolls over, quickly falling asleep.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Oh shoot!” Izuku exclaims, shooting awake. “I have a job interview today!”

For the three years prior Izuku had been working at a small, family owned pizza place on the edge of the downtown area, but recently they had had to shut down. Izuku was upset because not only had he grown to like the staff there, and the regulars, but it also payed very well. The other upside to the job was that most people who would recognize him didn’t go there, so he didn’t have to worry about that. But now he had to find a new job. 

On the hunt for a new job he had noticed that the public library was hiring, and figured he would like working there. He spent a decent amount of time there already, though to be fair most people didn’t know that because he would just grab his books and hide in the corner to read. He liked reading though, and the people there seemed nice, so he called them to set up an interview.

Quickly getting out of bed Izuku checks his phone for the time. He has one hour. He gets out of bed and puts on a pair of regular blue jeans, as per usual, but instead of his normal t-shirt and jacket he puts on a long sleeve black button up. He puts on his normal boots, other than that it is a much less protective outfit than normal but he can’t very well show up for a job interview in his normal clothes and gear. He walks over to the mirror and attempts to tame his hair, but after a few minutes of getting nowhere he sighs and gives up. He grabs his phone and ID and makes his way to the corner store.

After using the restroom and buying a light breakfast, Izuku heads to the library. He arrives five minutes before the technical time of his interview, but figures being punctual would bode well for him, so he walks up to the front desk and introduces himself.

“Oh yes!” The kind looking person at the front desk says to him. “I have you right here, Midoriya Izuku, one o’clock. I am Ikeda Haruki, but you can just call me Haruki! Pronouns are he/him before you ask. Don’t look so surprised, I’m not that old. Now, why don’t we go ahead and get started? If you could follow me to one of the study rooms over here, that would be great!”

“Of course sir,” Izuku says, following obediently behind him.

Taking the seat opposite Haruki, Izuku looks up at him expectantly.

“If I could see a form of ID please, that would be great! Just need to confirm that you are in fact the Midoriya Izuku who called to make an appointment.”

“Of course sir,” Izuku says, echoing his most recent words, and handing over his ID.

“Again, no need for the formalities. Please, call me Haruki,” he reminds Izuku, quickly checking over Izuku’s ID before handing it back. “Wonderful! Now we can begin the interview!”

Izuku pockets his ID and starts responding to Haruki’s questions.

Once the interview is over, Haruki and Izuku both stand up, exiting the study room.

“Thank you for this opportunity Haruki!” Izuku says, bowing slightly to the older man.

“Of course! You should get a call not too long from now about whether or not you got the job! I believe our last interview is tomorrow morning. Between you and me, I think you have definitely got the job,” Haruki concludes, sending a wink Izuku’s way.

“Thanks again!” Izuku grins. “I look forward to hearing from you!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next day Izuku gets a call from the public library informing him that he god the job. After asking him how soon he thinks he can start, Izuku lets Haruki know that he is free anytime until the school year starts, so he is scheduled to work Monday through Friday from noon to 5pm, starting the upcoming Monday. 

When Monday comes around, Izuku is strangely nervous. He finds it amusing that he, the boy who has been living on the streets for years, is nervous about beginning a job at the library, but amusement doesn’t make the nerves go away. He arrives at the library ten minutes early for his shift, but he figures that will give him time to speak to Haruki first.

“Hello Haruki!” Izuku greets as he walks into the library.

“Midoriya! Hello! Are you excited for your first day?”

“Sure,” Izuku laughs. “What am I doing?”

“I’m going to have you reshelve some returned books today! I’ll show you to the cart.”

“Fine by me,” Izuku shrugs, following Haruki’s lead over to the books and beginning his job reshelving.

Apparently, after all that time on the streets, Izuku still doesn’t have enough situational awareness to know when someone is coming up behind him. More likely he is simply relaxed and not on alert right now, unlike he has to be at all times otherwise, but when he turns around and comes face to face with another person he lets out a small grunt of surprise.

“Um, hi?” Izuku tries to greet, but it comes out more like a question than he intended.

Izuku doesn’t understand how he can shift from Forest who is confident, strong, and always knows what to do, to a completely awkward and anxious teenager in mere moments but here he is.

“Hello,” the purple haired stranger in front of him responds.

“I’m Midoriya Izuku, but you can just call me Izuku,” the green haired boy says. “Um, pronouns are he/him.”

“Hitoshi. He/him.”

“Okay, it’s nice to meet you Hitoshi,” Izuku says, uncomfortably. The other boy seems just as uncomfortable though, so at least he’s not alone in that.

Izuku looks at Hitoshi for a moment, and the other boy seems to do the same. Hitoshi has dark purple hair that seems to defy gravity, and eyebags to rival his favorite hero, Eraserhead. Actually now that he thinks about it, this kid reminds him a lot of Eraserhead, with the eyebags and hair that sticks straight up.

“Hey, Midoriya, you’re on break now!” Haruki says, turning his head around the corner of the bookshelves. “Oh hey Hitoshi, good to see you again!”

With that, Haruki disappears again. 

“Well it looks like I’m on break now,” Izuku says, finally remembering how social interactions are supposed to work. “I’m gonna go over to the library’s café, you wanna come?”

A quick ‘yeah’ is all Izuku gets in response, but apparently Hitoshi isn’t really the talkative type so Izuku just leads the way to the café. Izuku and Hitoshi order separately and then stand waiting for their drinks in silence. To cover up how awkward he feels, Izuku pulls out his phone pretending to check something. It had been ages since he’d had an actual conversation with someone his age who wasn’t either baffled by him as Forest, trying to hurt him, or his friend Himiko. Both of their drinks are ready at the same time, and they apparently both ordered the exact same drink. A large, plain black coffee.

“Nice order,” Izuku laughs, and Hitoshi snorts in response so he counts that as a win.

“So what are you doing here?” Izuku asks as they sit down.

“My dads are at work, so I came here to hang out,” Hitoshi shrugs.

“Fair enough, why exactly were you, like, two inches from my face though?”

“You seem interesting. You have a certain.. vibe about you.”

“So do you,” Izuku snorts. “One of insomnia. It's a mood, not gonna lie.”

That actually draws a smile from Hitoshi, and Izuku grins back. He may not get very much time to interact with others his age, but he does have plenty of time for the internet.

“So, when did you start working here? I haven’t seen you before and I’m here all the time. My dads are always working during the day so I have nothing better to do. They have two jobs so it’s not their fault, I totally get it. If I stay at home I get bored though.”

“Actually I only just started today-” Izuku stops suddenly as he puts two and two together. How did he not see it immediately. The purple haired kid sitting in front of him who reminds him so much of Eraserhead, and the fact that he said his dads are always working during the day. Izuku recalls from the UA files that Eraserhead and Present Mic have a kid, he just didn’t pry into that because he felt no need to. That’s too personal. Now, sitting with this kid though, his head is spinning. Dads who work two jobs, teaching and being pro heroes. ‘Oh, my, goodness.’

“Um, Izuku?” Hitoshi asks. “You okay over there? You kinda spaced out.”

“I’ve connected the two dots!”

“You didn’t connect shit,” Hitoshi mumbles under his breath, almost like reflex.

“I’ve connected them!” Izuku laughs, finding the need to finish the quote before grabbing Hitoshi’s arm and dragging them outside. “Come here!”

“Yo! Dude! What are you doing?” Hitoshi exclaims, confused.

“I have a question,” Izuku says, once they are safely away from others. “I didn’t wanna ask you in front of other people though.”

“Um… should I be scared?” Hitoshi asks, visibly curling in on himself with worry.

“Oh, no no of course not! I’m sorry I didn’t mean to scare you! I was just wondering if you are Eraserhead’s son?”

Hitoshi’s draw dropped and he just stared at the green haired boy, as Izuku slowly retreated in on himself.

‘Wow, great going Izuku. You finally might have made a friend but you had to go and be weird. Why were you so direct? You should have just not asked. Stop ruining things.”

“Hey, hey, Izuku. It’s okay. Sorry, I was just surprised. You didn’t ruin anything.” Hitoshi reassures, but Izuku just looks more shocked.

‘Oh shit, I said that outloud? I’m so stupid, stupid mumbling.’

“Hey Izuku, it’s okay, really.”

“Ugh sorry,” Izuku says. “I’m not very good at… social interaction.”

“Oof, I felt that. So much. In my soul,” Hitoshi responds, as Izuku laughs slightly, relaxing.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable. You don’t need to answer the question.”

“No it’s okay, I was just surprised. I am, but please don’t tell anyone. It don’t go around announcing it.”

“Of course! I would never do that, believe me I know how important secrets can be.”

Hitoshi looks curiously at him when he says that, but seemingly decides not to question it and instead asks how he figured that out.

“Eraserhead is kind of my favorite hero,” Izuku says, blushing lightly because he hasn’t told anyone that before. “I just noticed some similarities between you two.”

“That makes sense. Why is dad your favorite hero?”

At that question, Izuku’s face brightens and splits into a grin before launching into a lengthy explanation of how interesting and impressive Eraserhead is. Hitoshi smirks slightly, but nods along looking genuinely interested in why Izuku’s favorite hero is his dad.

“There you are!” The boys hear a voice call from behind them, turning to find Haruki in the doorway. “Sorry to interrupt, but your break is over now Midoriya.”

“Yes, of course! I’ll be right there Haruki.”

The two teens head back into the library, wrapping up their conversation as Izuku walks back to where he was reshelving books previously.

“I’ll probably see you again soon, considering you work here now.”

“Yes definitely,” Izuku agrees. “I’ll talk to you again soon!”

Hitoshi nods a goodbye and Izuku gives a two fingered salute back, before turning his attention to his job once again.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A few weeks and a ton of anxiety later, Izuku’s letter from UA had finally arrived. He had already received his letters from the others schools and was rejected by every single other one on grounds of his quirklessness, so he was starting to lose hope. Nonetheless, he was excited and nervous as all hell. 

Heading back home, Izuku sits down at his desk and takes a few steadying breaths before ripping his letter open. As soon as he opens the letter, out falls a tiny disk. Izuku only has a moment to be confused before a projection begins playing. 

“All Might!?” Izuku exclaims, baffled at the projection before him. At All Might’s announcement that he is going to be a teacher at UA, Izuku is excited but also concerned. ‘I know that he is the number one hero and everything, but does he have any teaching experience? I’m not sure he would even know how to lead a class. Maybe Eraserhead or the other teachers are helping him. I’m sure Principal Nedzu knows what he is doing. Oh shoot!’

 Izuku quickly jolts back to attention realizing he missed most of what the projection was telling him. ‘Shit.’

“-and 55 total rescue points, you concluded your practical exam with a total of 120 points! That is the second highest score for all of this years examinees! Welcome, Izuku Midoriya, to your hero academia!” All Might concludes the speech that Izuku largely missed, and the projection shuts off before promptly exploding. Izuku concludes that’s probably for security reasons. 

“No way. No way. Oh my god! No way!” Izuku exclaims, a large grin stretching across his face. “I MADE IT INTO UA!!!”

Izuku promptly pulls the letter that accompanied the disk out of the envelope and begins reading it, his ecstatic grin never leaving his face.