Ayyyy we goin 2 for 2 bc I don't want to be studying for exams rn lol

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I cracked open the cupboard, pulling out the old comforter and tossing it on the bed. I dusted the bookshelf and the desk, collecting the handful of old forgotten toys and tossing them in a bag.

My old room was a time capsule into my eleven year-old self. Everything was coated in a fine layer of dust. The "toys" were sad little excuses designed to hide more learning in play – playing cards, chess and checkers, puzzles, flash cards, and VHS tapes of old hero and police raids that I used to have to analyze before bed. The shelves were stocked with textbooks from my "school" lectures and old, out-dated hero autobiographies that I doubted even Midoriya knew about.

The closet was depressing; filled with duplicates of training outfits I'd since grown out of. I pulled them out and tossed them onto the bed, beginning to restock it with my current clothes, which were hardly any less sad. I noticed a small, old cardboard box nudged in the very bottom corner of the dark closet. I crouched and pulled it out gingerly, blowing off a layer of dust. Inside laid a folded pair of very small clothes. A ratty t-shirt and small cargo shorts, barely held together with old, fraying threads. They'd been cleaned once a long time ago, but old blood stains still clung to the fabric here and there.

I could feel those memories rising in my throat again. Unlike the others, these ones had always been within reach, but I'd always avoided touching them. They weren't pleasant. They were distractions. But they were pandoras box — and I was compelled by an insatiable curiosity, a need to glean anything I could about my past.

So I opened the valve and let the memory of that day 9 years ago wash over me.

The air was stuffy and thick with dust. My skin was damp; sticky with sweat and blood. Strangely, nothing hurt. I could hear voices from up above. Through a small crack in the rubble was the sky. It was clear and blue and unassuming.

A shadow passed above the crack, and I grunted. Bits of rubble shifted slightly to make the gap ahead larger, just enough for me to wiggle. I grabbed at my leg and pulled it free of the rocks it was caught between, crying as the rough edge left trails of red upon my skin. I touched the blood with a sickening twist of my stomach, whimpering under a wave of confusion.

The shouts above escalated. "There's someone down there!"

"Alive?"

"We need a hero over here!"

The bustling continued, until a sharp voice called in my head. "Stay put right there! Help is on the way!" The rubble was pulled to the side as though it were liquid. Two women jumped through the hole, with brightly-coloured costumes and puffy white mitts.

"Are you okay, kid? Can you move?" The woman had streaks of pink across her face. I stared at her, unthinking. "Okay!" she smiled kindly. "I'm going to get you out of here, and we'll talk to the paramedics to make sure you're not in pain."

The young woman lifted me into her arms, and with a nod at her blonde-haired partner, sprang up out of the hole. She left me with the paramedics while her group went off to see if they could find and save anybody else.

In retrospect, the strain in her voice should've been enough to tell me how the rescue was going.

My legs dangled out of the back of the ambulance while a paramedic bandaged my leg. Before me spread a horror-scene of wreckage. It looked like a tornado had ripped through the town, upturning buildings and uprooting trees from the ground. The destruction continued in every direction for miles. We were in the centre of it. The smell was awful.

I could hear a distant call on the breeze, coming from the boundary of the destruction, past which only heroes and paramedics could cross. It was an unending chorus of grief from people watching the scene unfold. I was too young to fully understand it, but the sound still haunted me.

"Do you feel okay?" the paramedic asked. I stared at them, uncomprehending. They smiled, kindly. "What's your name?"

I watched the way their eyes crinkled at the corners and their lips pulled upwards. I lowered my chin to my chest. Something lingered in my mind but refused to come forward.

"Okay. Can you tell me what you remember? It will make it easier for me to help you." Over their shoulder, a team of heroes grunted as they pulled a young child out of the rubble. The paramedic moved so they blocked my vision of the limp body, bloated from what I now recognised as internal bleeding. "Right, well... Wait here with me. We'll find someone who can help you."

Above the nonstop wailing from beyond the police tape, I noticed a new sound. Whispers, quiet and horror-stricken, coming from the first-responders working the scene.

"That kid's pretty much unharmed."

"How? They were pulled out from under a building!"

"Their Quirk, probably."

"God... We've been combing this place for hours. We only have one survivor."

"How does this sort of thing happen? It's too unnatural to be an earthquake."

"You think it's a villain?"

"If villains this powerful are out there... Do small-town heroes like us stand a chance?"

My heart pounded and my head ached. Please, just a little more.

Someone pulled the paramedic aside and spoke a few quick words to them. They turned back to me with the same kind smile. "All right! You're all healthy. A police officer is going to take you to the station to make sure we help you the best we can."

The paramedic had done their best to wipe my hands and knees of the rusty brown grit that clung to my skin, reeking of metal. I looked at my feet; barefoot and callused. My clothes hung loosely on my thin frame; a size or two too big. They were dirty with dust, dirt, and blood that seemed to have no wound of origin. They was some sort of plastic bracelet on my wrist, which the paramedic examined and then cut off so they could keep it.

A very young man in crisp navy blues walked over. He had a harsh-looking face, but when he grasped my hand, a gentle touch. I was loaded into the back of a cruiser. The back seats smelled strongly of leather and disinfectant. The police officer closed the trunk and walked over to me. "Here," he said, holding a little stuffed dog dressed in the same clothes as him. "You can have it, if you want. We keep them just in case we have to give rides to little kids."

He watched my blank, uncertain expression, and nudged my arm with the snout of the dog. "For you," he said, slowly, carefully.

I took the plush from his hands and held it delicately. The fur was soft on my calloused hands. I wondered what I was supposed to use it for.

The officer smiled, creasing his dark eyes. We drove out of the wreckage across a makeshift road cleared of rubble. We soon reached the perimeter of the destruction, lined off with bright yellow tape. It was full of people with tear-streaked faces, clutching their friends and family close. Others bowed their heads and did nothing but cry. The crowds were the source of the eerie wailing. The officer rolled up the windows to try to block it out, but it didn't help much.

We pulled up at a big grey building with a bright blue sign. The police officer helped me out of my seat and carried me through the doors as though I weighed nothing. It wasn't very comfortable. There were a lot of tools stuffed in his belt.

He set me down once there was carpet and led me through a bustling office and into a back room. The mat on the floor was squishy and had big block letters. There were toys stacked neatly in the shelves and a small table with tiny plastic chairs. Colouring utensils and paper sat on the little desk.

"You can play in here," the police officer said, before closing the door behind him. A purple-haired woman with a shiny piece of plastic on a long strap hurried in.. She had a kind smile and golden eyes. She took a seat at the little table, and looked out of place because she was obviously too big. I tried to focus on the lanyard but couldn't make out any of the text.

"Do you want to sit with me?" she asked, taking a few markers from the cup. "It's okay if you don't." I sat across from her, picking at the piece of paper in front of me. "What's your name?" the woman asked. Her eyes flashed bright yellow, and I couldn't look away. There was a flash of something in my thoughts, but I couldn't put it into words. The woman's smile brightened.

"Akiharu," she said. "It's nice to meet you."

I sat and watched her warily.

"I'm sorry, you must have had a confusing day. But I promise you're safe here."

Safe?

The woman's eyes twinkled. "Yes," she said.

She continued talking at me for quite some time. She was eager, and nice. It felt like a long while before the door was pried open again. A big woman with sleek black hair and a thick black brow stood beside a little old man with a long, white moustache like a noodle resting on his lip. The purple-haired woman seemed to snort at that thought. "Excuse me for a moment," she said softly, and went over to talk to the new people. She rubbed her eyes as if they were in pain.

"Sosaki," the big woman prodded.

The bright-eyed young woman looked between them and spoke quietly. "She speaks the language – the thoughts are very small and confused, but they're in Japanese." She rubbed her neck, lips pulling into a weary smile. "But... You see it sometimes with trauma patients. I can't get any deeper. Usually, with children, they're a bit more malleable, but... This kid might as well have been born today. Does she have some kind of mental Quirk?"

"We're about to find that out."

The little old man walked toward me. His eyes were coloured a milky white, but I knew that he could see me, somehow. He reached for my hand, and I snatched it close to myself.

"May I?" he asked. I looked fervently around the room.

"It won't hurt," said the purple-haired woman, and there was an undeniable air of truth to her voice. It put me to rest. Reluctantly, I allowed the old nan to clasp my hand in his wrinkled fingers. Something crawled beneath my skin. The old man yanked his hand away as if he'd been burned. "Chief..." He spoke lowly, yet intensely. "You'd better contact the Safety Commission."

"What? Why?" The chief followed the man as he hurried out of the room. "Sorry, Sosaki! Wait there!"

Ms. Sosaki smiled at me, a deep, tired crease beneath her golden eyes. "Don't worry, they're always like that." Her voice wavered and she cast an uncertain glance toward the door.

I sat in the quiet and watched the office through the big windows of the room. Workers whirled about without rest, taking calls and trading stacks of paper for shiny white mugs dribbling coffee. My heart pounded in my chest and my throat tightened. Sub-consciously, my fingers found their way to my wrist, to feel my fluttering heartbeat.

"Alive," I spoke weakly, to myself.

Eventually, I saw the chief and the little old man return. The chief spoke hastily into a phone, casting glances toward me. They listened to the other line, and the old man snatched the phone away. "I know what I felt, Madam President!" he snapped. He listened to the other side with a pinched, sour expression. "It's disguised itself. I'm certain of it."

After a few moments, he handed the phone back to the chief. A few quiet words were murmured and the door popped open. "We're going," said the cheif. She looked to me. "You, too."

I followed out of the little room and the chaos of the office washed over me. People shouted at each-other, typing furiously at their computer, speaking quietly into phones and rushing out of the door in uniform.

"Went down?" A teary-eyed man asked an officer, grasping his shoulders. "What do you mean, Yavin Elementary went down?"A woman sobbed, dropping to her knees, wailing the name of her child.

"Yuuske!"

I snapped awake as if from a dream, my breathing hitched and erratic. Cold sweat trailed down my neck and slipped beneath my collar. I lunged for the desk and grabbed a notebook and a pen, scrawling down a few garbled notes.

- Plastic bracelet?

- Sosaki, mind-reader with violet hair & yellow eyes. Worked for police/volunteer?

- Old man, Quirk detector? Blind.

- "It's Disguised" – what, who?

- Where did the blood come from?

My face felt hot and tears filled my eyes. I groaned, pushing my palms into my face. God, I was so sick of crying. Every time searched for answers, I only came out of it confused, frustrated, and spiralling toward an anxiety attack. I felt like a tumbleweed, blowing aimlessly through a desert. At any given moment, I was only who I was in the present – yet still, haunted by an accident I refused to remember, and couldn't leave behind.

Why couldn't I have been born somewhere in a small city, to a normal family with a normal history and a normal Quirk? I would be attending a normal high school, training to– I don't know– own a botanical garden, or some shit. I'd never have seen a villain up close, or felt the pain of being crushed alive, or lived with the knowledge that I crushed 8,432 people alive. I'd know my parents name, and my last name, and I'd spend my Sunday afternoons meeting up with friends in the quaint little cafe around the corner... I'd eat junk food and play video games and scroll aimlessly on social media like a normal teenager, I'd be studying to get into a good university, I'd go on walks in the park and travel. Yeah, I'd travel to the mountains and the beach, I'd travel overseas, I'd go wherever I wanted because nobody cared what I did with my life, because nobody needed me to be great.

I quite liked this imaginary world, until I tried to fill it with people. I could only come up with faces I knew. My friends and my classmates. Mina, Kaminari, Kirishima, Sero, Uraraka, Midoriya... Aizawa. Keigo.

All of the people I knew. Knew? L...

Liked. Yep. Can't go any farther. Too much for me right now.

There were still people I liked here, in this real world. There were people who needed me – thousands and millions of people who were in danger now that All Might was...

I pushed myself to my feet and shoved the box back into the closet, covering it with clothes. With the room put back together I moved back into Keigo's old room, where it lay trashed, years of collected merch scattered broken across the floor. My stomach twisted with guilt. I started to collect the figurines into my arms when there was a sudden knock at the door. It creaked open a crack as Keigo poked his head in. I met his widened eyes and I felt mine prickle again with tears of shame. Wordlessly, Keigo walked inside, knelt beside me, and started to clean.

Together, in silence, we worked to clean the room. We pulled the heavy furniture back into place and lined up the textbooks on the shelf. The Endeavor merch salvaged in good condition was put into a little box. The rest, Keigo tied up in a bag of trash. He didn't use his feathers to help, so it took a long time, but I liked that. It gave me time to collect my thoughts. I was upset at myself for losing my shit, and still upset at him for keeping things from me, but at least I knew we would be okay.

When the room was clean, we stood awkwardly across from each-other. Keigo shuffled through his jacket and procured a tan case-file. "Um...Here," he said softly, handing it to me.

The folder was labelled Haru in his chicken scratch penmanship. At his confirming nod, I pulled it open.

"It's what I've been able to find in my free time," explained Keigo, while I scanned over the text. "Don't get your hopes up... there's a lot of dead-ends."

The folder was filled with dozens of profiles. Orphans of people who were declared missing or dead from the accident were tracked through the country and narrowed down. There were pages and pages of missing reports for kids around my age at the time. Most of them were crossed off and labelled as dead ends, fake reports, or eliminated based on likelihood. On top of that, he had compiled lists of all of the missing children with the given name Akiharu, or children with a similar description to me, from all over the world. In my hands was clearly years upon years of research.

"What— Why?" I managed.

He scratched his neck awkwardly. "Well, I've always been a live in the present kinda guy, but I know your past matters to you, so... I didn't want to show you anything before I had a concrete lead, because it wouldn't be fair to get your hopes up. But I've come up empty at every turn! I've been looking so far into these Adamus people and I haven't even made a dent – It's like, am I bad at gathering intel after all?

"How long..." my throat was all choked up. "How long have you been looking?"

"You know, since around the time I left... But I realized recently that in order to get any further I need deeper access into the Commissions database, but I need to gain the Chairwoman's trust to be granted that level of security. She's not making it easy."

I blinked, sending a few tears rolling down my cheeks. They stung my eyes, which were so red and raw from crying so much. This had to be what, the fifth time these few days? "I'm sorry for getting mad," I sniffled. "And for destroying your shit."

"It's alright," he said. He sat on the floor by the bed and patted the spot next to him. He waited until I sat before grinning childishly. "Did Endeavor do something to piss you off, or was that just me?"

I snickered to myself, wiping my tears. "No, just you." It was a lie, but I didn't want to ruin his idol for him. I knew to him Endeavor was far more than just a hero with cheap merch.

Keigo sighed. "I know Endeavor's kinda a piece of shit. If he said something to you... Thats a him problem, not a you problem. I'd rather you tell me than nobody."

I wrapped my arms around my knees and scratched my hair, awkwardly. "Turns out he was there nine years ago. He might have implied it... reflected bad on my character?"

Keigo's pupils dilated and his feathers prickled. "He said this unprompted?"

"Uh... I might've called him flaming trash and insinuated he was a shitty father and bad person beforehand. Which he is."

Keigo's feathers settling and his eyes returning to normal. "The Number Two hero?" he snickered. "I wouldn't expect any less from you."

I cringed at the memory. "I was a little heated. I overheard his son talking about the way he treats him, and it was... triggering."

Keigo remained silent.

"Do you ever feel..." I began, my voice raw, "Like every time you're happy, it won't last long? Like it will disappear? So... it's better to not be happy in the first place?"

Keigo watched me carefully, then flicked his eyes forward. "Not really," he said. "Because I've got good memories to rely on when I'm down."

The thought made me smile wryly. "I don't really have good memories."

"Really?" he said. "I've got a good one for you. Shortly after you showed up, you had to get a haircut. Your hair wasn't salvageable, matted and stuff, so it ended up pretty short. I was worried you'd be upset, but when I got to you, you were grinning from ear to ear. You said 'Now we match!' and I think my heart just about stopped. You used to be so cute..." He sighed a long, drawn-out sigh, shaking his head with mock dismay. "What happened?"

I knew he was joking around, but I couldn't bring myself to smile. I picked at the lint on my socks, and mumbled in a voice soft as a whisper. "You moved out."

It felt like a weight off my chest, and one I felt guilty for dumping on him. I rested my hands on my neck, avoiding his gaze. Gently, he pulled me into a hug. "I'm sorry," he said. "I had to get out."

"I know."

"I wanted to take you with me, but... You were still so young," he said. "It wouldn't have been allowed, plus, I was freshly on the hero market and I wasn't sure if I could give you a better life. But I'm sorry I didn't try."

"It's okay." I grinned weakly, grabbing my earlobes. "I got pierced ears out of it."

He laughed, getting a closer look at the little red earrings that matched his. "I'm glad they healed better than when I did my own – Oh, the Chairwoman was so angry... She ranted at me for hours about what a bad influence I was!"

"Any piercing is a bad idea for a hero," I copied one of her many lectures, "They can easily be used against you."

"Ah, what a wet blanket," Keigo snickered. "As if any villain could ever get close to either of us. We're way too strong."

I smiled. "We've gotta be the strongest hero sibling duo out there."

It took him a moment to process what I'd said. A massive grin broke out over his face. "Right!" he laughed, ruffling my hair. "I couldn't ask for a cooler younger sister."

I rolled my eyes and shrugged my shoulders. "You're pretty okay, I guess."

He scoffed, giving my shoulder a playful nudge. "You have school tomorrow, right? It's too late for this. You should go to bed."

I nodded, wiping my eyes one last time, and stood up from the floor to retreat to my room.

"Haru." I turned, just in time for his arms to wrap around me. The fur of his coat tickled my nose, as his jacket radiated warmth. "Congrats on second place. All the pros are gossiping about how cool you are. Every time I want to butt in and say, she's my sister! It's been a real challenge, holding back."

I rested my chin on his shoulder. "You don't have to hold back," I grumbled. "I don't mind."

"Really? I'm gonna hold you to that!" He pulled away and led the way down the hall. "Your internship requests should be coming in tomorrow, too. I'd better be the first person you tell who you pick!"

"Maybe..."

"Rude!"

We ducked through the halls together, avoiding any passing agents. (If he was seen, Keigo'd definitely be roped into some kind of new assignment.) It reminded me of when we were younger. Eight and fifteen – the age-gap was pretty big, but he was always a bit more childish than I was. He always broke the rules way more than I did, yet always seemed to talk his way out of trouble. If anything, his influence was the only reason I was rebellious at all.

When we stopped at my room, Keigo pulled open my door with an apologetic smile. "I have to get back, now."

"I know."

"There's been some talk of me going undercover lately," he warned. "I'll update you, but there's a chance I might go off the radar soon."

"Okay."

"Hang in there, Haru. One day you'll get to a place where you'll feel safe being happy. And I'll be with you the whole journey, no matter what. Siblings forever, okay?"

"Okay."

With a final ruffle of my hair, and a hug, he set off down the hall. Not long after, I got a text.

Hawks
Chairwoman caught meeeeee
Now I have a night shiftttt
I'm gonna dieeeeee

Haru:
L loser

Hawks
you're so mean :'(

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