Unlike Motivation, the plot of this'll move along a bit quicker. Mainly because we're skipping over the entrance exams and Sports Festival arcs, aka two damn seasons, because they would serve no purpose.

Yay.

Oh, and we're gonna skim through the 'moving in' scene. For a family that moves countries every few years, it's nothing special. Basically, their stuff is flown over and left in the house by the time they get there. They unpack everything the second they get in the door, claim rooms, eat some snacks or whatever (they had dinner on the plane) and go to sleep.

End scene.

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"Get out, bèndàn, we're here."

Danny made a face at his brother, considering the car hadn't even stopped yet. It'd slowed down, and he could tell they were about to turn into a driveway, but really? Calling him an idiot in Chinese for no reason, just like any good sibling. "Toi en premier," he replied in French, gesturing grandly towards the window.

"Boys, please restrain yourselves from jumping out of moving vehicles," Rosa teased, only half serious because she knew they weren't actually morons. Well, mostly. That time in France... didn't count.

"Yes, Mamá," they both droned, rolling their eyes sarcastically.

A minute later, the car finally slowed even further and came to a stop.

"Yay, we're here," Danny deadpanned, casually flipping off Ignacio below the sight line of their parents. He heard the tell-tale sound of his brother's lips mouthing the words 'fuck off' in return, and they waited in shared mock offense until the middle row had been vacated before clambering over the seats and out the doors.

Ignacio whistled. "Nice place," he said appreciatively. His footsteps sounded on smooth stone, growing fainter and fainter and signaling that he was moving towards the trunk.

Danny lifted his hands to his blindfold, pausing momentarily. "Anyone who wants to stay sane, you know what to do," he remarked, then realized that the driver did not, in fact, know what to do. Thankfully, his dad took care of it with a quick warning–at least, Danny was pretty sure it was a warning–and he was all set.

He hooked his thumbs under the fabric and lifted it, his eyes squinting blearily at the house directly in front of the setting sun. It was around the same size as the family's old house back in New York, with two stories and space for an attic.

From the looks of it, however, the house was more traditional Japanese-looking, featuring those sliding doors with wooden frames and lighter material covered by a darker latticework. Or something. Danny's areas of expertise didn't include architecture; he had no idea what those doors were called.

Anyway.

The driveway was made up of stone bricks in an arch shape, with the rest of the space between it and the house filled with more smooth stone, only in no specific shapes or patterns. The porch was maybe a foot off the ground, probably less, with a tiled roof awning over it. A couple of wooden support poles helped out, too.

Then came the second floor. Three windows were at the face of the house with wooden safety railings in front: two regular-sized for bedrooms or whatever, and one long-ass one in between that was still the same height. The curtains were closed, so Danny couldn't see inside, but he was guessing that wasn't the bathroom. Probably.

Basically, the house was pretty damn nice.

"Cool," Danny nodded, slipping the blackout fabric back into place. Once again, his vision was obscured by darkness.

And for the thousandth time, he desperately wished that he could control his Quirk.

~-~-~-~

"Hey, get a load of this shit," Ignacio snorted, unceremoniously barging into Danny's room right as he was about to fall asleep.

The younger teen pulled no punches, his eyes snapping wide open and directly at his brother. An angry red glow emanated from his irises, visible in the darkness of the room, but there was no brighter flare. Unfortunately, Ignacio was no idiot. His own eyes were tightly closed, leaving no room for him to be caught.

"What," Danny grunted, averting his gaze to the light from his brother's open laptop. He rolled over on his bed, inviting Ignacio to hop on to show him whatever the hell he wanted to show him.

The bed dipped, and the non-reflective screen took his head's former position on the blue and white patterned pillow. Danny squinted at the name of the paused video, then lifted his head further off the bed with a start. "Oh, damn that was today?" he asked in surprise.

The text beneath the image read 'UA Sports Festival One-On-One Battles, First Years', while the image itself pictured two people his age facing off in an arena. One was a guy with flat red and white hair, and the other guy had a bush of green hair and two wrapped fingers.

"Yeah," Ignacio snorted, finger hovering over the space key to unpause the video. "Meet your future classmates. So glad I'm in the regular course."

With that, the video played. Danny watched as Pokéball—the guy had half red and half white hair, what else was he supposed to call him—swept wave after wave of ice at his opponent. Meanwhile, Truffula Tree was holding his fingers like a glock and flicking the ice into shards.

Then his fingers turned purple.

"Ooookay then," Danny made a 'I'm too tired to deal with this shit' face, then cringed even harder the longer the fight went on. Punches were landed, Pokéball almost got frostbite from his own Quirk, and suddenly Truffula Tree was yelling some shit about 'it's your power, Totodile' or something.

Then Pokéball's other half erupted with fire, and a hero also covered in flames in the audience yelled some shit, and Truffula tree shot towards his opponent like a bobsled in the air. Or a bullet, but the whole stadium setup had Danny thinking back to when the Olympics were huge and his brain was too fried to think straight.

A colossal explosion momentarily whited out the screen, causing both brothers to wince at the sudden brightness, before gradually fading to reveal whoever the hell could survive something like that.

Truffula Tree was slammed against the far wall for a long second before collapsing in a heap. Ow. Meanwhile, Pokéball was standing, chest heaving, with the left half of his gym uniform's shirt burned off as his opponent was declared out of bounds and himself the winner.

"Deadass?" Danny asked after a long second, ignoring the announcer's commentary as a break between matches. "They're in 1-A?"

"Yup," Ignacio replied in a dead tone, skipping ahead to a different fight. "Fire 'n ice guy's name is Todoroki Shōto, and the discount All Might is Midoriya Izuku. Or Shōto Todoroki and Izuku Midoriya, but we're in Japan now, so... yeah."

Fuck.

"Are they all that flashy?" the younger Hayashi queried next, hoping that it wasn't the case. His own Quirk wasn't particularly visible in comparison to those two, but, then again, he wouldn't have needed to make such a big scene. Just make eye contact with the other guy and be done with it.

Ignacio considered the question for a second, then grunted. "Nope. Three main ones, the rest vary. These two, and a guy who can make explosions from his hands. I'm not counting the guy who can shoot a sparkle laser out of his stomach, or the guy who electrocuted himself."

A sparkle laser—you know what, never mind. Danny had both seen and heard of weirder Quirks, and he himself was no exception. "Ooh, let's see The Human Creeper. Who's he fighting?"

"Three people," Ignacio answered, skimming through the video's frames. "A girl who can make anything she touches tell gravity to fuck off, a bird guy with a shadow form that can come out of him, and Fire 'n Ice."

Okay, all of those sounded interesting, Danny wasn't gonna lie. He sighed, then mentally wished adiós to a good night's sleep before orientation. "Ah, fuck it, just play the whole thing."

Ignacio obliged.

Long story short, they were both fucked come morning, and they each owed the swear jar some cash. Big time. Because when Rosa woke them up that morning, asleep in the same bed and the computer still open, she just raised an eyebrow and held out her hand.

~-~-~-~

"Looks like you boys had a fun night," Akira observed wryly from the head of the table, lifting a spoon with cereal to his mouth. "Are you going to get through orientation alright?"

Danny blinked slowly at the question, his eyelids heavy and brain moving at half-speed. The feeling of opening his eyes under his blindfold only added to the feeling, so he was quick to close them again.

"Huh?" he managed, screwing his face up in confusion.

Oh. Wait. Orientation, yeah, him and Ignacio were supposed to go to Yūei that morning to be given a tour and whatnot since the rest of the students didn't have class. A short break after the Sports Festival and all that. Normally, he and Ignacio'd be given a day or two to sleep off the jet lag and get settled in, but right now was apparently the perfect time.

Bullshit logic, but whatever.

Honestly, he'd forgotten that the Japanese school system was different. For one, they started back in April, and now it was early May, only a week or so after his fifteenth birthday. He'd kind of just thought of it as summer already, since he'd left Carmine before he'd officially finished his freshman year.

Well, technically he had finished. Since he knew that he'd be moving soon, he'd requested to speed through the rest of the material. The teachers were more than happy to oblige, and boom. Early freshman year graduation.

So now he was going into the equivalent of his sophomore year with no break between grades. Maravilloso.

Plus, also... Danny couldn't exactly speak Japanese yet. He knew he got a little bit of leeway as a transfer, and then some because of what school he was transferring from, but, well... It was going to be hell catching up to everyone else.

"Yeah, sure," he finally sighed, absently smacking the back of Ignacio's head. His brother sat up straight with a start, and Danny could only imagine his 'what the fuck, I was sleeping' offended face. "We got this."

"Mm," Ignacio agreed, more of a grunt than anything. The sound of his elbow thudding down on the table followed, and he slumped forward. Probably to rest his chin on his palm, since sitting up straight for longer than a second wasn't in the cards for either of them at the moment.

Akira chuckled, his chair creaking as he leaned to the side and planted a soft kiss on his wife's cheek. Or forehead, or nose, it was hard to tell with vague sounds and the obvious possible locations. "Right. Well, have fun."

"Yay," Danny tipped his head back with a tired groan, a hand reaching up to rub his eyes beneath the blackout fabric. Watching a screen for so long at night had done him no favors, especially considering the fact that he hardly ever used his eyes to begin with. "This is gonna be great, right, Nacho?"

"Definitely," his brother grumbled out, followed by a heavy sigh. "I love using Google Translate to hold conversations."

"Nah, didn't the e-mail say our guide would be someone fluent in English?" the younger Hayashi asked, sincerely hoping that whatever staff member that'd been assigned to them actually did speak what tended to be the family's main language. It was either that or Spanish, but Danny was guessing that the language wasn't nearly as popular in Japan compared to English.

"Probably. I dunno," Ignacio mumbled, then stood up with a huff. He grabbed both his and Danny's dishes, retreated to the kitchen to dump them in the dishwasher, and returned. "We gotta go now, though, if we wanna make the train."

Ah. Right. The train.

Not that Danny wasn't more or less used to trains, considering New York City's subway system, but he was pretty sure they weren't as crowded as Japanese trains. He'd seen the videos of the ones in big cities where it was someone's job to push people further into the train.

It was safe to say that the teen wasn't particularly looking forward to the ride, nor was he fond of the idea of having to actually hold on to someone. With the level of crowding, it was almost a given that Danny would have to grab Ignacio's arm.

His cane and above-average senses wouldn't be nearly enough. And that... that fact was annoying as hell.

~-~-~-~

"Alright, you can fuck off now," Danny smiled wide at his older brother, letting go of his sleeve the second they stepped out of the train station. He didn't want to look like he needed someone else's help any longer than necessary.

Ignacio promptly smacked him upside the head, but took a step away to give him a little space. "I think you pronounced 'thanks' wrong, but whatever," he replied, the roll of his eyes obvious in his tone.

"Nope," the shorter of the two refuted as they started off down the sidewalk, fixing the falling strap of his gym bag. Then he noticed that the path had a slow incline and his face grew skeptical. "Hey, uh, how far is it from here?"

"Uhhh... we have to climb up a hill," Ignacio reported with a huff of breath, probably wishing that the train stopped right at the gates of the school. "I can see it at the top. Don't you remember the pictures?"

"Nope," Danny replied once more with his hands in the pockets of his shorts, trusting in his brother's footsteps to guide him along the path. "All the pics I remember show up top, not the hill leading there."

Seriously. If someone were to look up 'UA high school', then click on the 'images' tab, every last picture would show the buildings and training grounds. None would actually show the topography surrounding the school. Well, maybe if one added 'hill' to the search, then it might show up, but, well... Danny hadn't exactly tried that.

"Ah," was all Ignacio replied, his footsteps increasing in frequency and growing farther away. Before Danny knew it, his brother was running off down the path and lengthening the distance between them at a fast pace.

"Hey!" Danny yelled after him, immediately rushing off into a sprint. He already had the disadvantage of shorter legs, considering his brother had like, a good eight inches on him despite being only two years older. "If I trip and fall, I swear, Nacho-"

"Quit bitching, Danito Pobrecito, if you can parkour around NYC chasing bank robbers you sure as hell can run up a hill!" Ignacio shouted back with a laugh, his voice a little closer but not by much.

Danito Pobrecito what the-

"¡Eso es todo, tu puta madre, es mejor que corras mucho más rápido antes de que te atrape!" Danny bit out in rapidfire Spanish, picking up the pace even further. He followed the curve of the path without hesitation, aided by the footsteps pounding against the pavement higher up.

They were getting closer.

"Ohfuck-" Ignacio jumbled his words together in panic, and his footfalls increased in tempo once more. Seemingly as an afterthought, he yelled back, "By the way, we're almost at the top!"

Danny made a face, continuing in his chase the rest of the way but resolving that he could not, in fact, jump on his brother's back like a deranged monkey. Damn it. "You get off easy this time, Nacho. This time," he warned as he slowed to a stop beside Ignacio, sucking in a few deep breaths as his heart raced.

"I'm shivering in my sneakers," Ignacio deadpanned in between huffs of breath, seemingly unimpressed. However, they both knew that Danny could pretty easily take him down. He was used to fighting people bigger than him, and if his Quirk was brought into play... well, Ignacio would be out like a light the second he made eye contact. "Also, where's our guide? They're supposed to be at the gate."

"Beats me," the younger Hayashi shrugged. He reached out to his right to make sure there was actually a wall there, then leaned against it. "Wait, what time is it?"

"Uh..." Ignacio mumbled, rubbery-plastic sliding against fabric as he pulled out his phone to check. "Eight fifty-seven. We're three minutes early."

Danny was about to reply, but clamped his mouth shut at a distant sound. Footsteps, getting closer, from beyond the border wall. He jabbed a thumb towards the open gate that allowed only those with a pass through. "So are they."

His brother moved forward to peer around the wall, then froze. "Ah, fucking hell," Ignacio swore, ducking back. "I'm not sure whether to be impressed that this man's got some serious drip, or concerned that he's wearing full leather in late spring and looks like his head's a banana."

Danny raised his eyebrows beneath his blindfold at the description.

Well. That was... unexpected.

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Total word count: 2,773.

And, we can already see that my son's got a little issue when it comes to having people help him. Because what kind of protagonist would he be if he didn't have internal conflicts that may or may not turn into a plot point later on?

Also: a chill family ftw? I mean, Kazue's got his 'act like it's business but I secretly wouldn't know what to do without you' relationship with his dad, but like... a lot of the times for fanfics we get these toxic af relationships. Plus, no siblings. Like...c'mon. Give your character a bigger family. Have them talk shit to each other while loving each other all at the same time.

Plus, we can use those close bonds for plot purposes-

I mean, what?