Vents and Spare Pocket Mics
UA High
Shoto was laying on his futon staring at the ceiling. He couldn't get to sleep. The things he had seen and heard earlier that day was playing in a loop in his head. He had, of course, heard of other realities but they were found through rare unique quirks, so there was little chance he ever interacted with one.
However, another student, someone he was beginning to view as a friend, had sent herself to a different universe. She created something to do it. Bringing his left hand up to his face, he can't help but think that even with making this quirk his own, it still created mostly destruction. Bringing up his right, even his ice is devastating. Hopefully, that can start to change soon. Dropping both arms, he thinks again about the projector he watched for hours earlier that day.
“A couple of pieces of hair and we can follow another's alternate realities! Most of the time it's the same things we’re already doing or small career changes but overall the same. She has noted in the sub-journal mentions finding a ‘catalyst’ for best functionality, there are also schematics and another journal started for a handheld catalyst tracker. The projector can do it if their DNA is in the room when it does a scan.”
Reaching up to feel his hair, Shoto wonders why he's kept the same haircut since he was little. Oh.. his fingers trail over his scar. Would he be comfortable displaying it so openly? Shrugging his shoulders, “Our class’s emotional scars will always out way any physical ones.” Pulling out his phone he sent a quick text to Momo asking for some clippers. After hitting send he realized it was almost 3 am, so not expecting a response he goes to set the phone down when the chirp of her ringtone sounded.
‘Rn? I'm down in the common room with Kyoka’
Not bothering to respond he rolls out of bed and heads down the stairs. Momo already had the clippers and a variety of attachments and hair scissors ready for him. Without a word, he grabs it all from the table and leaves a bewildered Momo and Kyoka behind.
~~~~
It had all started as a normal Friday morning as far as Shoto was concerned. It was on his walk to class, however, that he started to hear the whispers. Now, when he says “walk to class” it's more his walk around the school before class. He had started it shortly after beginning at UA and after all the random attacks it's nice to have a habitual morning routine.
Today he was walking near the support department, honestly, he makes a point to walk past here frequently. Sometimes a frantic support student would pull him into a classroom to try on a piece of their gear, or latest suit design or get him to help with something using his quirk. He always leaves those sessions feeling like he did something useful. Especially with the project on thermal suites, he had to blast them with fire at different steady temperatures for specific time periods depending on the test. It ended up such strenuous quirk practice on top of typical heroic work that the support teacher got a pass from the principal for him to use his heroics period to help the 3rd year finish their project.
While his father made him lose sight of his dream of heroics for a while, Izuku helped him find his passion again. But it was these morning walks that made him realize he could also be more than just a hero or a strong quirk. He was appreciated differently in the support hall than in the hero class of 1-A. Sure, Izuku is the light of his world and a couple of others are nice, but it's mostly Zu that has him eating at the lunch table with the group rather than with the support kids who share the same lunch break.
Izuku knows about his adventures to that side of the school and will even go with him sometimes so he can visit Mei.
Bringing it back to this morning. There were whispers. A man named David Shield arrived, who Shoto thinks is the guy from I Island Izuko was talking about. What could he be doing here when he surely has important projects on the island to work on?
More whispers were heard. A team is with him, staying an indefinite amount of time. Closer to the room for 1-H, the whispers change. They're a bit more fearful, he caught snippets about Mei and disappeared in the middle of class. That one makes his concern start to rise, if only for the fact that his best friend would be distraught over Hatsume going missing. His brain was spinning with all the possible theories. Looking at his watch he decided it was time to head to class. There was still about a half hour before the first bell, with luck he could hopefully get some of his theories down on paper.
~~~
During lunch, Shoto excused himself from the table and walked away as fast as he could with slightly wobbly legs. The smile Izuku sent him after he said he was going to be in the support department instantly had his heart racing and knees going weak.
The closer to the classrooms he got, the more he saw adults he didn't recognize milling around with some of Ectoplasms clones. Following a group of 3 down the hall, he watches them enter a nondescript door a little ways off from the 1st year classrooms.
About a month ago he had been helping a 3rd year Suit Designer on an extra mobility design and they had used that room for the testing. It had plenty of space and they didn't need to lug the equipment over to a gym. Because of this, he knows the room has 2 other entrances and an oddly large amount of vent access points. While he may have accidentally stumbled upon the UA tunnels a while back when leaning against a certain trophy case eating soba, he had yet to explore them much. Even when you manage to get inside, there are passcode activation points and puzzle codes all over the place.
For part of the testing the suit needed, he had to crawl in tight places so the 3rd year had him navigate the vents surrounding the room. While doing so, he had taken a wrong left turn at one point that had led him to a hallway entrance point. An entrance point he was currently busy pulling himself into.
Making the same path he had a month ago, Shoto finds himself in an elevated position over the room. There were probably about 7 different scientists milling around the large room that was now filled with various-sized boxes aligned in rows.
On the right by the door the 3 others had entered from the hallway, was a board that had a few projects written on it that he recognized from Mei's book she showed off a week or two ago. Are they stealing her designs? Did she get kidnapped? All he heard was that she disappeared, not how. Fishing out the little journal he keeps in his pants pockets, he starts writing all his observations and subtly taking photos on his phone. Knowing lunch was nearing its end, but also knowing he can't leave his post, he sends a group message to sensei, Principle Nezu, and Izuku simply stating,
'I will not return to class today, should be back by curfew. Please excuse my absence, espionage is in progress.'
Making sure his phone was on silent, then ignored the messages from Aizawa demanding more information and Nezu’s gif of someone wiggling in a vent followed by confirmation that he’ll be excused from classes. Seems the principal also ignored Aizawas messages, interesting. He’ll have to ask him about that later.
A quick web search showed that David Shield is the guy in the chair reading out of Mei’s Mega Log. His face was jammed in it so tight he was amazed the man could even see the words and diagrams. Not that Shoto would understand much of it himself. Despite the amount of time he’s spent in these Halls of Invention, he mostly does practical and hands-on things or follows directly what the student tells him to. However, one did teach him to solder, a 2nd-year student soldering iron broke right as they were about to finish and they realized he can use his quirk to heat the metal hot enough to get it to work.
Staring at his notebook, Theory 1 is looking like they kidnapped Mei to steal her inventions. He knows very well that some of them are pretty revolutionary. Like the soba cooker and cooler, she designed just for him.
Theory 2, someone else kidnapped Mei; And Shields' team is either taking advantage and stealing her tech OR using it to find her. Hmm, may need to set up a microphone in a vent closer to them. Shimmying backward, then following the path to the left, Shoto made his way around the room to the various vent ports. He had a bag of these small microphones that were already paired to his phone. They activated after being pressed and held in place for 3 seconds.
Making the loop back to his original viewing place, he props his phone up to the side so that he can switch between the separate mic channels. Phone set, he turned his attention to setting up his notes on the team so he could research them further tonight. He turned into mic 4 as one of the scientists approached David Shield and pointed over to where others were starting to open up boxes.
“We’re ready to start setting up the projector, sir.”
“Wonderful! I’ll call the principal and let him know.”
“No need! Am I a dog -- Or a mouse -- Or a Bear? Who knows! -- But I am the Principal!”
“It's great to see you, Nedzu,” Shield said with a smile as bent down for the small Principle to hop on his shoulder. “They should have this assembled pretty fast, it's a simple click-in design.”
“Do you think it’ll work?” Shoto was shocked to hear the worry in the small man's voice. What kind of situation could this be that even Nezu is uncertain of the outcome? He hurries to hit the record button before he misses anything else.
“If we can base it on her prototype notes, then I’m hopeful we’ll find her. She couldn't test this feature herself but the other ones worked flawlessly.” Shield started walking them over to the main group. Switching to Mic 3 so that he didn't lose them. Nezu’s sensitive hearing must have picked up his shuffling because when the principal went to smile at the group, he was looking directly up at Shoto. The angle he was standing at made it appear like he was only looking just slightly over their heads. Not knowing what to do, he just gives him a small wave and holds up the microphone feed. He doesn't think the principal's eyes are good enough to see, but he knows he'd understand what Shoto was doing.
He watched enraptured as Shield dropped a bright pink lock of hair into a side compartment of a large round screen. Is it some type of tracker? He sat there listening and watching as the team theorized when an image of the globe came up. The street zoomed onto was unlike any shopping district Shoto had ever seen before. The citizens in bizarre bright clothing and Items flashing and moving about their stalls as if they had a mind of their own. Magic, Mei had somehow found herself in a world of fucking magic.
Taking a deep breath, Shoto resumes his notes on the other reality Meis found herself in. And isn't that insane, he wonders if she's in an entirely new world or if it's a universe branched from their own. Making a diagram in his journal to compare notes on later.
He watched for hours as they did what appeared to be school shopping, and wrote down the names of each school book he saw the titles. Shoto was curious if they could reproduce the ‘potions’ if they followed the same steps. He knows it's a possibility they exist in this world since he recognized a lot of the ingredients out of this old How To Survive book his father had in the family library.
The adults she had guiding her were very interesting individuals. There was also an amusing number of times when the dark-haired teacher said or did something rather ominous and Shoto couldn't for the life of him keep his mouth from saying, “Aizawa's secret lovechild.”
He quietly watched her in the wand bonding, retrieving her clothes from the flustered Madam Malkins, and her last adventure in the Menagerie. He stayed there revising his notes and switching between feeds to listen in to the team below as they broke apart to discuss what had happened over the last couple of hours, as well as their next steps. He paused briefly when Nezu’s voice filtered over mic 4, it was quiet enough that Shoto knew he was talking to just him.
“Good work, Shoto. Come by my office in a couple of hours, I'd like you to stay long enough to watch over the dinner feast. They had mentioned Sorting her somewhere and I'm very curious about what this sorting is.” With that, the Principle left the room to head, most likely back to his office.