Chapter Text
It does not go poorly. Not a first. Izuku is practically bouncing in his seat while the pros go through every single notebook of his. They keep making positive comments and giving him little changes to make where he either had outdated information, or was wrong. Some of them are very old, and he was pretty young back when he started. They have less and less changes to make when they make it to the more recent volumes.
They pause when they get to number 13 and spot the damage.
“What happened to this one?” Shouta looks a little concerned about it, eyeing up the burn marks and water damage.
“Oh! W-well, one of my b-bullies used his quirk on m-my notebook b-before throwing it into a p-pond. Th-then one of h-his friends told m-me to-” Izuku cuts himself off, unable to finish.
“To kill yourself?” Shouta is blunt, and he sounds upset, so Izuku can’t meet their gazes as he nods slowly, tears welling in his eyes.
“I have to know listener. How many of those scars are from him?” Izuku looks up in shock at that, and his tears make their way down his face. He raises shaking hands to answer, not trusting his voice.
‘When did you see those?’
“In the hospital, when they had to fix your arm. I’m guessing there are more than what we saw.”
‘He only gave me a few of them. My back is worse. The other bullies used to push me from behind a lot while using their quirks. Mom was always extra mad those days because I went home with ruined uniforms that she had to replace. She decided to add to the marks while they were still fresh. She just used a knife instead of a quirk. That came later.’ Izuku doesn’t know if his hands are even legible with how much they’re shaking now. He can hardly see them through his tears anyways.
His hands are still raised to sign, but he has nothing else to say. He didn’t mean to say that much in the first place.
Warm hands close around his and holds them steady. Izuku blinks away some tears so that he can see a little more clearly, and he finds Hizashi crouched in front of his chair. He’s got a sad look on his face, and looks close to crying. Izuku hates that he put that look there.
He starts crying harder when Hizashi tugs him forward by the hands into his chest, wrapping his arms tightly around him. Izuku grips the back of his jacket as tightly as he can, almost afraid to let go.
He has to eventually, so he pulls back reluctantly, scrubbing at his eyes to try and stop the crying.
‘Sorry.’
“Hey. Nothing to be sorry for, problem child.” Shouta gives him a smile from his position on the floor next to Hizashi. When did he get there?
“Why don’t we take a little break from all this serious stuff and watch a movie or something?”
“J-just a short one. W-we can’t be slacking off w-when my c-classmates are all w-working hard, Zashi.” Hizashi grins, clearly pleased that Izuku used his nickname. He doesn’t know why he did. It just felt right.
“Of course listener! You know Shou here wouldn’t let us slack off.”
“C-can we w-watch the one with T-toothless in it? You n-never told me the n-name.” The cat chirps at the sound of her name, and plunks herself in the middle of their huddle on the floor.
“Well now we have to. It’s called How To Train Your Dragon. Get ready to watch Shou cryyyyy.” Izuku laughs at the blush on Shouta’s face.
“I don’t cry, Zashi.”
Izuku speaks before Hizashi has the chance to.
“S-sure, Shou.” Shouta raises his eyebrows at him before speaking again.
“How could you Hizashi. You’ve turned my own son against me.” Izuku almost starts crying again when Shouta calls him that.
His son. It sounds so nice.
They sit through the movie and Shouta makes fun of Izuku and Hizashi for crying. They don’t mention that they noticed how close he got to tearing up near the end.
They don’t get back to work afterwards.
They decide to work on something other than quirk training on the second day of internships. They start the morning focusing on quirkless fighting, trying to find what he’s good at. It’s hard work, but Izuku finds himself having fun. He’s already learning so much, and its only the second day of internships! They find he’s a natural at evasive maneuvers and say it’s because he’s so small.
What Izuku doesn’t tell them is that it’s because he’s had years of practice evading bullies. However, his guardians both have a look in their eyes that tells him they already know.
Shouta focuses on teaching him every evasive move he can until he’s got them drilled into his memory.
After a break for lunch, Shouta brings out a small bag he’d brought with them to school.
“I’ve got a little surprise for you. It’s something I want to train you how to use. It won’t be easy.” Shouta pulls something awfully familiar out of his bag.
“Is that what I think it is?!” Shouta just nods as he hands him a cream coloured scarf, only a few shades darker than his capture weapon. He helps Izuku drape it around his neck and gives him a few demonstrations of the proper arm movements before he let him try, without the scarf at first. When he’s satisfied he lets Izuku try it out, and he somehow manages to trip himself within four seconds.
“Don’t worry about it. It took me a long time to get the hang of it. You’ll get it much faster because I’m here to teach you.” Izuku nods before trying, feeling extra determined. He wants to make Shouta proud.
An hour later finds him completely tangled up, unsure of how it happened. It takes both Shouta and Hizashi to free him. Once he’s freed they take a short break before moving on to quirk training. It goes a little better than yesterday did, and he doesn’t break any training rooms.
It’s late afternoon before they wrap it up. Hizashi decides he should see what a real patrol is like, so he tags along with the hero.
They leave, just the two of them, while Shouta goes to nap somewhere before he has his own patrol tonight. They walk down the streets in their hero costumes, keeping an eye out for anything and waving at people who recognize Present Mic.
“Now. My patrols are much different than Eraserhead’s. Do you know why?”
“Well, he’s an underground hero. So he works mostly at night, and he finds crimes as they’re taking place and stops them. You, as a more recognizable hero, act more as a deterrent to crime because you patrol so visibly, but you still stop crimes as they take place?”
“Correct listener! Although today I chose one of the safer routes that doesn’t see much crime, so we shouldn’t run into anything today.” Izuku nods and returns his focus to the world around them.
They keep at it for a few hours before heading home, and thankfully they don’t run into any crime. Izuku is grateful for that. He doesn’t think he’s ready to face another villain so soon.
They continue the next day much in the same fashion, Izuku training with Hizashi and Shouta for a few hours in the morning then going out and patrolling for the afternoon. Present Mic has him stay back and watch him stop a few petty criminals, then asks him his observations on the situations and how they were handled.
Only once does Izuku have to get involved, and that’s when someone decided to go after a hero in training while Present Mic was busy with his buddy. Izuku evaded him and tripped him up, and by that time Hizashi was done with his criminal and he yelled at the man until his ears bled.