Only a few weeks later, Izuku was yet again searching for a crime he knew would be taking place. He had a drive to give to Eraserhead, who he knew by now would be sent everytime he called in a crime taking place at night.

He eventually found the fight shortly before Eraserhead finished the altercation with a roundhouse kick to the head. The hero spotted him after calling in the criminal to the station. The man used his capture weapon to swing up to the roof. Izuku was quick to make himself unseen as he did so, in fear of capture.

But, the hero made no motion to follow him and instead sat down on the rooftop. After he deduced that Eraserhead wasn't going to try and capture him, Izuku popped his head up from the fire escape to look at the man. Eraserhead turned to show that he had seen him, and Izuku walked onto the roof apprehensively.

"Truce?" The hero asked, pulling out a sandwich and taking off his capture weapon. After a moment of deliberation, Izuku nodded and took the sandwich. However, he paused, unsure of the hero's motives. What if it was a trap?

"We can sit back to back if you want to hide your face." Izuku decided to give it a shot, nodded, and sat down with his back to the hero. The man then took out a small notepad and pen from his pocket and handed it over his shoulder to the kid.

"I know I won't get your name or anything like that, but I was hoping to discuss some things with you." Izuku swallowed, and gave him a thumbs up.

"Why did you decide to become a vigilante? You have the skills to be very talented private investigator, and seem to be the age of some of my first years. If you took the entrance exam, I am sure you would pass easily."

Izuku took a moment to think. How much was he willing to tell? What won't get him caught? Soon, the sound of pen scratching on paper filled the air. The notebook was handed back to the hero.

'I'm too dangerous to be anything else. This is just my way of giving back for what I took. I can't be a hero. It's not possible.'

Eraserhead handed the notebook back after reading it. His concern for the boy behind him was growing. "Is your living space safe?"

The notebook was handed back much quicker. 'It's safe for me.'

When Eraserhead tried to hand the notebook back, he realized no one was there. The only thing remaining was another hardrive. With the flashing red and blue lights from responding police vehicles causing an eerie glow, the man sighed and put the drive in his pocket before heading to the station.

----

Aizawa sat across from Tsukauchi with his head in his hands. Tsukauchi was browsing through the harddrive Aizawa had just got from the kid.

"He is definitely getting more ambitious." Tsukauchi said, clicking a file.

"I know. It's making me worry. I mean, look at this." Aizawa hands the notebook to the detective. The detective read the two short responses. He leaned back in his chair with a stress filled sigh. "We have to catch him, if not for his own good, then for the potential danger of him interfering with a discrete takedown."

"Agreed. However, we need to proceed with caution. I will try my best to capture him, and maybe we'll have more of these chats."

Tsukauchi nodded. "You know, we should probably give him a name. We can't keep calling him 'the kid'."

The two thought for a moment. Tsukauchi was the first to speak. "Well, his main gimmick is the harddrives. He's also become a rumor with the locals. So, what about Crypted?"

Aizawa nodded in agreement. "That's clever, mixing Cryptid and Encrypted. I think he'll like it."

----

About 2 days after that first meeting with Eraserhead, Izuku found someone.

She was his age, skinny, had shoulder length blonde hair, and was covered in blood. She also happened to be sleeping amongst the beach's trash heaps. Izuku discovered her during his daily morning clean up.

At first, Izuku thought she might be dead. But he wanted to be sure, so he nudged the body with his shoe. She woke with a start, and slashed at Izuku. She telegraphed her movements so much that Izuku was able to catch her arm easily. He clenched her wrist to make her drop the knife. She struggled in his grip like a wild animal before deeming it fruitless and relaxing in his grip. She looked up at him, tears welling in her eyes. "Are you going to turn me in?"

Izuku stared at her, before picking her up. "Hey! What are you doing?!" She exclaimed.

He navigated the mountains of trash before setting her down in his clearing by the fire circle. She looked at him, confused, as he rummaged around in one of his bins. Eventually, he pulled out a water bottle, a pot, some packets of oatmeal, and a hoodie. He picked up the items and brang them over to where she sat.

Ignoring her questioning gaze, Izuku started heating the water. Once he got the fire going, he turned to her and offered the hoodie.

She apprehensively took it. "Why are you giving this to me?" She asked him.

He didn't answer her question immediately. Instead, he went back to his makeshift tent and grabbed a pencil and notebook. He scribbled something on it before giving it to her.

Your clothes are dirty. You'll grab attention walking around covered in blood.

"True." She said after reading it. "Why did you take me here? Shouldn't you turn me in?"

He scribbled again in the notebook before handing back to her.

I have the feeling that it would make me a hypocrite.

He added the oatmeal to the pot as she pondered what that meant. "My name is Toga. What's your name?"

He stirred the pot for a moment, in silence. He took a while before scribbling in the notebook.

I can't tell. I might be caught. You can call me anything you want.

Toga thought for a moment. "What about...Pyua-Chan!"

Izuku gave her a small smile as he took the pot off the flame.

----

The first order of business for the two was showers. Toga needed to wash the blood off without being recognized. Izuku lent her his soap, clothes, and a facemask. They only had to suffer through a last minute doubletake from the employee stationed at the front desk of the gym, but they managed to act naturally enough that they were waved off.

Izuku took the opportunity to check his hair. It had steadily been becoming more and more white as time progressed. There was nothing that he could do about it, so he decided not to bother.

The next thing he did was have Toga help him bring the scrap he collected to the mechanic shop. The lady running the recycling unit was very nice and paid them extra.

Then, like Izuku has done everyday, they went to the library. Izuku explained to her through the notebook what he usually does.

"So you do schoolwork and investigate bad guys...as a hobby?"

Izuku nods.

Toga leans back dramatically in her desk chair. "But Pyua-chan, that's so boring!"

Izuku just shrugged. He wrote in his notebook and handed it to her.

There must be something here that interests you.

Toga just crosses her arms. "Well, yeah....but most things that interest me aren't typically...socially acceptable."

Izuku hands her the notebook again.

Who said it had to be socially acceptable? I won't judge.

Toga considers this. "Ok...."

She hesitantly made her way into the depths of the library. Izuku continued to work on teaching himself how to set up a circuit board. He had been working for several minutes, almost an hour, when Toga came back. She dropped a decent stack of books onto the table.

The books mostly fell into the graphic horror genre, though there were a couple cookbooks and anatomy guides. The most important, however, was the one Toga was pulling off the stack to show Izuku.

"Pyua-chan! Look!"

Izuku drew his eyes off of the notes he was taking to read the title of the book, Japanese sign language for beginners. Toga was beaming.

"If we learn this, we don't need to talk through the notebook anymore!"

By now, Izuku was smiling as well. He gives her a thumbs up. She slides into the chair next to his, and they start chapter one.

----

Eventually, Izuku's alarm goes off. It startles Toga, who was practicing the sign for 'more'. "What's the alarm for?"

Using his newly acquired language, Izuku signs 'Lunch.'

He and Toga leave the books in an area they know people won't bother. In a moment of bravery, Izuku takes Toga's hand to guide her to the soup kitchen. The kitchen is serving his new favorite, vegetable dumplings and red bean onigiri. Katsudon reminded him too much of his mother for it to be his favorite any longer.

He and Toga ate and volunteered for a while in the pantry to put things away. Shortly after they were leaving, Toga's stomach growled. She tried to brush it off, but it growled again a few moments later. At this point, Izuku had caught onto Toga's delema.

He handed the notebook to her.

Blood is a dietary need for you, isn't it?

"How did you know?" Toga said, taking a step back.

Izuku jotted down in the notebook again.

Your fangs. Typically, fangs are a result of someone's quirk, which can hint to dietary restrictions like a meat based diet or a daily blood intake depending on the quirk.

"Oh..." Toga looks almost ashamed. "Yeah. If I don't drink blood I start feeling really hungry and I start craving it to the point that it's unbearable. That's why....."

Izuku's notebook said it all.

That's why I found you on the beach this morning, covered in blood?

"Yeah." Toga said, pointedly not looking Izuku in the face.

Izuku tapped her shoulder before handing her the notebook again.

You can drink some of my blood. I don't mind. It's better to prevent something bad from happening than to not do something because some people think it's creepy or gross.

"You'd really let me do that?"

This time, Izuku didn't respond using the notebook. Instead, he signed, 'You're my friend.'

----

Soon enough, they got back to the beach. Izuku sat down on the sand next to the fire circle and patted the ground next to him. Toga took his lead and sat down as well.

Izuku held out his arm to her.

"Are you sure you want me to do this?"

He nodded. Toga bit down. It didn't hurt nearly as bad as he expected it to be. As she drank, he considered the existence of numbing components in her saliva. When she had drank a sufficient amount, she let go.

They didn't speak about it except for a small "thank you" from Toga. Izuku just patted her on the shoulder. He explained to her his beach routine for before dinner, and she was glad to occupy herself with finding scrap as he went through his workout routine. Eventually, they settled down on the sand in front of the homemade tent.

She and Izuku watched the sun go down for a while before starting to make dinner.

----

Later, after Izuku told Toga what he was doing, Izuku went on patrol. His next hardrive was not complete, so he had nothing to deliver. However, Izuku was a caring person more than anything else, so if he could guide at least one person away from committing a crime to make a buck or stop innocent people from being hurt he was going to do so.

He came across Eraserhead again, and the hero handed him a bento box before agreeing to not try and capture Izuku as long as he didn't get into trouble that night. Eraserhead also told Izuku his new name amongst the hero and the detective. He asked the teen if he approved of the name and got a nod in return. With all current bases covered, Eraserhead left silently.

Izuku continued his patrol closer to the beach. He stopped a robbery and gave directions to the homeless shelter to two people. He bought more food at the corner-store and brought the groceries and the bento box back to the beach after searching it for trackers.

There were none. Izuku saw it as a sign of trust. The food was nothing to scoff at either. Half of the box was tuna rice topped with Bonito flakes. The other half was stuffed with a fried ham & cheese with vegetables sandwich cut into halves. There was more than enough for both he and Toga to eat for breakfast.

Izuku could feel his quirk crawling on his chest again, except this time it didn't feel like it was strangling him. It felt....bubbly...and light. Izuku desensitized himself to the feeling of his quirk very quickly after discovering it. His fear and anxiety seemed to fuel it at all moments and any semblance of a panic attack caused it to start forming. Izuku wasn't even sure what it was.

Just that he hurt someone while using it.

This new version of manifestation was different not only in feeling but also in appearance. Instead of thick dark black fog and distortion, it briefly manifested as bright white fog that made the effected areas appear slightly transparent. The moment Izuku's attention was diverted from the bento box and the meaning behind it, however, the fog and transparency disappeared.

Izuku closed the box and headed back to the tent. He put the food away in the bins and climbed into the tarp & thrift store sheets bed. Toga was fast asleep with the blanket on the other side. With an internal sigh, Izuku fell asleep.