#Vigilante Midoriya Izuku | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

thatforgottenbasilisk · 4 months

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Two Quirkless Teens Commit Plagiarism and Vigilantism!

Words: 4705

(AO3 link)

(here's hoping the readmore works)

Izuku knows that this is a really stupid idea.

Being a vigilante is very dangerous business, he knows that, especially when considering that most people who go into it are full adults with quirks, while he's thirteen and quirkless. He doesn't know what other choice he has, though, because he's thirteen and quirkless and he wants to be a hero more than anything. He figures a few years of experience being a vigilante will at least get him past the UA Entrance Exam since his 'quirk' won't, that is, if he doesn't get himself killed in the process.

It's not like he has any better ideas on how to get into UA. The use of support items is so controlled in the Hero Course entrance exam rules that he's surprised that anybody could get through with so much as an extra thread on their clothes; the weight of the academic portion of the exam is small enough that he's seen multiple posts circulating that boast perfect scores on this part met with rejection due to poor physical performance; he doesn't know any current or retired Pros, so a recommendation is functionally impossible; all in all, he's out of luck on anything that doesn't involve blatant, straight-up cheating- which is technically allowed, as long as the applicant in question can get it past all the observing staff and Principal Nedzu before acceptance letters are sent out- so since he's not taking any chances with that, he has to get a leg up somehow.

Thus, technically-not-illegal vigilantism. Vigilante laws don't apply to the quirkless, so he can't be charged for it, but he can still very much get murdered by any criminal that feels like he's a little too annoying.

Izuku weighed all the pros and cons a million times before tonight, and every time, the pros came out on top. That's why he's decked out in all black but for the shoes, standing on the roof of his apartment building, trying to gather the courage to jump to the next roof over. He actually practiced this kind of jump in the school gym, but that was a maximum of ten feet in the air with mats under him, while this is multiple stories above solid concrete.

When he finally gathers his courage, backs up, and takes a running leap off his building, it feels like a grand victory. He makes it to the other side easier than he thought he would, easier even than in the gym, and he only stumbles a little on the landing. He heaves a few big breaths, puts his hands on his knees, and promptly realizes that he's going to have to do this another dozen times tonight if he doesn't want to just be running around on the ground.

The thought is almost enough to make him turn around and jump back to his own apartment building, or else climb down the fire escape and start running around alleyways, but he decides against both of those options. The rooftops are one of the few things that can give him an advantage out here, considering how small he is compared to even others his own age, he needs the element of surprise or something to keep himself from getting stabbed immediately. Izuku remembers that, and holds the thought in his head for a moment before he decides to jump to the next building over.

With every jump, it gets easier, and with every jump he gets further and further away from home. He can still see the general area where his apartment building is, but he can't see the building itself clearly anymore, which he supposes is a good thing; it means that he's less likely to be identified as "the quirkless kid from that building over there."

He's just made another jump when he hears a crash coming from an alleyway below. He runs over towards it and looks down over the lip of the building he's on, to see a big man in a makeshift costume beating up another, smaller man, while the distant clicking of high heels on concrete fades away in the opposite direction.

Izuku wonders if he should wait for the other vigilante to finish doing his thing and then introduce himself, or just run away and look for more he could be doing. It's clear that the other vigilante has it covered, judging by the zipties on the now-unconscious man as well as the phone call on the man's own cell phone, but Izuku's problem now is whether or not to alert the other vigilante to his presence. He's heard of violence happening between vigilantes, it's on the news all the time, but that could easily be exaggerated or outright lies because of the push to discourage this sort of thing.

The big man drops the guy's phone and starts walking off, and that's when Izuku spots his shoes- bright, quirkless red, just like his own. Decision made, Izuku bangs on the fire escape exactly once, making a big metal sound that catches the man's attention easily. He looks up at Izuku, who meets his eyes and waves. While he can't quite hear what the man's saying, he's pretty sure that it's something that Mom wouldn't want said in the house, because it's an indecipherable hiss just before he starts climbing up the fire escape.

"Why the hell are you out here, kid?" Asks the man the moment he gets up onto the roof. Technically, he isn't even on the roof yet, still standing on the metal of the fire escape, but he's still towering over Izuku, which is what counts at the moment.

Izuku shrugs. "I want to be a vigilante."

The man sighs in clear exasperation, and asks with more force, "And why the hell do you want to do that?"

Izuku shrugs again. "I want to help people. Can't exactly do that as a Pro." He kicks his foot out aimlessly for emphasis, and the man seems to get it immediately.

"Okay then. Guess there's no convincing you otherwise, is there? We're the stubbornest bunch of people anyone's ever met."

Izuku nods in agreement, glad that no real argument has taken place. He'd been getting kind of worried, that the vigilante would make him stop this or else make him go home, but he gave up pretty quick once he noticed the shoes.

"Anyway, you thought of a name yet? I'm Frozone, like the guy in that old movie. Pros have a bunch of restrictions on what they can name themselves, but we don't have those problems." The man- Frozone- says conspiratorially, like he's encouraging Izuku to break some kind of hidden rule.

"Isn't that an ice-related name, though? You're quirkless, so why would you go with a themed name like that when you could be Mr. Incredible, or Mr. Fantastic, or- or even Captain Hero, if you want a historical character with a vague name." Izuku lets himself ramble a little, now that he's got someone friendly listening. Frozone laughs in response, and makes an exaggerated movement that might be an attempt to convey a wink through a completely opaque mask.

"That's where the psychological warfare comes in. If someone hears my name is Frozone, then they're gonna come at me with fire quirks and shit, right? But guess what! I'm fireproof!" Frozone then rolls up a sleeve to proudly show off a bunch of massive, puckered burn scars taking up most of his arm. Izuku barely has time to notice that one of them is shaped suspiciously similarly to a hand before Frozone pulls his sleeve back down.

"Scar tissue's thicker than regular skin, so the more burns, the more fireproofing." Frozone concludes, and Izuku's only a little bit horrified.

"That's all from this?" He asks incredulously, and Frozone seems to balk for a moment before he recovers.

He sighs, and tells Izuku soberly, "Most of it? No. I'm not going to lie to try and scare you off like most others would. I do have some fun scars from the job, but a lot of this is from the other side of the mask. I'm sure there are others who are the same, but they'll all tell you it's all from this. They tell me that it's all from this, because they think I'm too young for this job." He says it in a way that brokers no questions, not even to ask for clarification on how old Frozone really is. He seems like an adult, but he's also got his face covered, so Izuku can only guess based on height and build- Frozone's a giant, but that doesn't mean he's an adult, just heavily implies that he's beyond middle school and thus older than Izuku.

There's silence, for a moment, before Frozone laughs loudly and says, "Don't look so serious about it! Shit happens, that's all. I used to work in a kitchen, and one time a whole pot of boiling water got spilled all over me, you can still see it on my chest. It's not all bad, kid, sometimes accidents happen. I'm just... accident-prone." Frozone says accident-prone in the same way that Izuku sometimes says that Kacchan is his best friend. Sometimes Kacchan is his best friend, and sometimes accidents do happen, but that can't be all there is to it. That's never all there is to it.

"I'm accident-prone too, sometimes. Not like that, though. I don't have any scars." Izuku says plainly, and it's not really a lie. He's got scars on his knees from running too fast too many times and hitting too many different parts of the pavement or the road, but that's not what either of them are actually talking about. They're both quirkless, though. They both get it.

Frozone nods in what seems to be approval. "Good. Now, considering you're probably, like, twelve- "

"Thirteen." Izuku interrupts. Frozone waves his hand in the air like he's physically batting Izuku's correction away.

"Whatever. Considering that you're a fetus, do you even know how to throw a punch?" Izuku's a little insulted, but he's short for his age and his voice hasn't cracked a whole lot yet, so he can't blame Frozone for calling him young.

"No." Izuku answers, and Frozone sighs.

"Why'd you even come out here, then? You even pick a name before cutting holes in that sock on your head?" Izuku's mask is not a sock he cut holes out of, thank you very much, it's a balaclava that the store said was one-size-fits-all and apparently wasn't.

He didn't pick a name before coming out here, though. He shrugs sheepishly, and Frozone sighs again. Izuku's beginning to sense a pattern here.

"Okay, that's your homework. If you come back out here, you better have ideas. You will not let the heroes or cops name you, got it? That's how people get stuck with stupid shit." Izuku nods sharply, as though he's a soldier nodding to a drill sergeant, and Frozone crosses his arms, still looking disappointed.

"Cool. Now, I'm not going to let you run around and get the crap beat out of you because you don't know what the hell you're doing, and if you're dumb enough to be out here in the first place, you're probably dumb enough to keep coming back. I'll teach you how to fight, and trust me, it's going to suck. You're a little twig right now, so building that muscle memory's going to hurt like a bitch. I won't blame you if you decide to quit because of this, alright? You're gonna get more banged up out here by me than you will by most criminals later on, so if you're going to back out because of injuries, I suggest you do it now."

Izuku stays standing where he is. He and Frozone stare at each other for a moment or two, before Frozone nods.

"Alright. Here's how you throw a punch."

---

"Oh, fuck."

Izuku's been doing this for three months, now, and he'd like to say that he's pretty okay at throwing punches, jumping around rooftops, and getting out of fights he can't handle. He can even hold his own when Kacchan doesn't feel like being his best friend, which is nice, especially considering that Kacchan seems to respect him a lot more now that Izuku's given him a black eye that one time.

They exchange nods in the hallways now. Kacchan is acknowledging his existence. In public. Willingly. Izuku feels like he's living in a dream.

Frozone is a constant, and though Izuku's pretty sure he hasn't figured out where he lives, he's consistently in the same areas of town at the same times of night, even though before Izuku started being a vigilante he never saw Frozone around these parts of town at these times of night. He still hasn't thought of a name for himself, but that's not for lack of trying- his current favorite is the one that was stuck on him by another vigilante, a woman called Electrode with very intense mom energy, who had actually seen the movie that Frozone stole his name from, and summarily dubbed Izuku as 'Mr. Incredible.' He likes it, especially since it makes him and Frozone more obviously a unit, and because it's vague and gives no hints about his quirk or lack thereof.

All that said, he has never heard the sheer panic and dread come from Frozone that he just heard in that single utterance alone. Izuku looks around worriedly, but he doesn't see anyone around them; before he has the chance to look up, however, Frozone places a single huge hand on top of Izuku's head.

"Do not look up, kid. That's how he'll know we've noticed him." Frozone's voice is quiet and serious, and Izuku's growing more and more confused as Frozone starts looking for an exit to the alleyway that they are currently in.

"That's how who will notice? Who are we running from?" Izuku whispers urgently, and Frozone just shushes him.

"Eraserhead," he hisses in a half-reverent whisper. Izuku's never heard of the name before, but it must belong to someone pretty important on the vigilante scene for his presence to cause this kind of reaction in the up-to-now cool and unbothered Frozone. He removes his hand from the top of Izuku's head and immediately places it on Izuku's shoulder, in order to steer them both out of the alleyway in a way that is obviously pretending to be casual, at a pace that can best be described as the closest a powerwalk can possibly come to a dead sprint.

"Is he a criminal? A vigilante? A hero? Who exactly are we avoiding, here?" Izuku mumbles under his breath, knowing that Frozone is just close enough to be able to hear him. A name offers only questions and no real answers, and Izuku would like to know exactly how scared he should be- is he running away from a night in jail, or from getting decapitated?

"He's one of those underground heroes, the kind that's chill with people like us. Thing is, he's a teacher, so he's real protective of kids and I do not want him trying to arrest me for child endangerment." Frozone hurriedly explains as they continue their powerwalk through the back alleys behind what's a popular shopping district in the daytime, and criminal hotspot at night. There are a few soft noises above them, quiet enough that Izuku wouldn't have noticed if he weren't specifically paying attention to anything coming from the rooftops, and he'd bet good money that Frozone's glancing up every so often through his mask.

"How would he arrest you for child endangerment? I'm not your responsibility, you're not my real dad." Izuku asks, and then quips, hoping to lighten the mood at least a little. Frozone doesn't respond for a moment, and then Izuku suddenly notices the homeless-looking guy who just dropped in front of them from the fucking sky.

... He's been spending too much time with Frozone lately.

"Hello, Frozone. Long time no see." The man says cordially, and Frozone's grip on Izuku's shoulder grows marginally tighter. He's got the same icy faux-polite tone as a teacher that's about to assign him several detentions, and Izuku knows that this must be Eraserhead. Nobody could pull off that tone without several years' worth of interactions in teaching children.

"Evening, Eraser. Changed my routes, you know how it is." Frozone says conversationally, in the tone of a child who's just been caught with his hand in the teacher's desk drawer. Eraserhead narrows his eyes at Izuku, who is doing a really quite admirable job of standing still and not shaking in fear. Eraserhead seems like a scary teacher. He probably doesn't teach kindergarten.

"Right. And who would your associate be? I haven't seen you around before." Eraserhead directs the last statement directly at Izuku, as though he's giving him the benefit of the doubt and giving him the chance to prove that he's just a really short adult. Izuku cannot prove this, though, and discretely kicks Frozone in the shin in lieu of answering. Frozone seems to understand the message immediately, and after a moment's hesitation, he and Izuku both start running at full speed in opposite directions.

He'd never expected to be able to outrun or even escape a pro hero, and for a fleeting moment, he imagines that he could defy his own beliefs about himself, and have another wild story that he wishes he could tell Kacchan. Unfortunately, this hope is brutally murdered in a matter of seconds, when he and Frozone are both tangled in what appears to be a bright white scarf, but feels like the stuff that rope climbing harnesses are made of mixed with some kind of metal.

"So it seems the rumors are true. It's not enough that you're out here running around and trying to get killed, you had to bring a kid into this, too. Trying to look cool for your brother or something, Frozone?" Eraserhead asks coldly, mostly just addressing Frozone, who was also caught up in Eraserhead's scarf-thing in the same matter of seconds as Izuku. No wonder this guy's a pro, he's got his own unique weapon and mastery of it, too.

"Hey! He didn't tell me to do anything, I'm a feral gremlin child! I don't even know who he is under the mask!" Izuku shouts in Frozone's defense, echoing Frozone's own exasperated nicknames for him to boot. The both of them stare incredulously over at him- Eraserhead's got it written all over his face, and he's learned to read Frozone's expressions even without seeing his actual face.

"... Yeah. What he said." Frozone echoes in a mystified voice, and Eraserhead glares at the both of them.

"Kid, I hate to do this to you, but I'm going to have to call your parents. At least wait until middle school to get into vigilantism." Eraserhead says drily, finally actually addressing Izuku himself. Izuku, for his part, is mostly insulted about the extreme lowball on his age- he is not that short- and nearly reveals personal information before thinking better of it. Of course, he's still going to reveal personal information, but he's not about to go blurting out his year or age to a guy that's about to arrest Frozone for something he's not actually responsible for. Izuku can make his own decisions, thank you.

"I'm in middle school, for your information, so by your own words I'm all clear. Also, my mom's on night shift and good luck getting a hold of my dad, so I honestly think it would be easier for everyone involved if you'd let me go." Yeah, he's definitely spending way too much time with Frozone. He would not have been this mouthy three months ago, but it's kind of late and he's not taking any of it back.

Eraserhead pinches the bridge of his nose, while Frozone quietly snickers beside him. If Izuku could free one of his hands, he'd give him a fist bump.

"Be that as it may," Eraserhead begins, obviously aggravated, "I'm still going to have to arrest you, Frozone. You've been letting him hang around you while actively getting into dangerous situations. That constitutes a violation of child endangerment laws. You know I can't control what you do with your own life, but there is a line, and you were supposed to respect that."

Frozone is silent, for a moment, before he sighs in seeming defeat. "Here goes my trump card and all semblance of peace..." he mutters to himself, just barely loud enough for Izuku to hear him, and clears his throat to speak.

"Unfortunately, Eraser, you cannot arrest a minor for child endangerment." Frozone solemnly intones, and Izuku and Eraserhead both stare at him in naked disbelief. It's so silent that Izuku swears he can hear the rats scurrying away a few buildings over, and after a moment, Frozone clearly sees the need to continue.

"I'm seventeen," he clarifies, as if that makes it any better.

"You're a child." Eraserhead echoes in obvious shock. They've clearly known each other for a while, so Izuku supposes that Eraserhead's caught off guard by this development far more than Izuku is.

"Technically speaking." Frozone replies.

"... For how long?" Eraserhead asks, before making a face like he's just realized exactly what he's asked.

"My whole life." Frozone shoots back, because he, too, is a smart-ass. Izuku definitely picked it up from somewhere.

"You know what I mean. How long have you been hiding it from me? We met two years ago!" Eraserhead looks like he's about two seconds away from pulling at his own hair in frustration, the same way that Izuku sometimes does when it gets too long and a little too easy to grab.

"Well I'm sorry that I was a particularly tall fifteen-year-old! I didn't exactly hide anything, I thought everyone knew!" Frozone shouts back in increasing exasperation, and Izuku fights the growing urge to laugh. It seems like Frozone had the opposite problem to Izuku, and simply used- is still using- it to his advantage.

"Well, this certainly is a situation! Personally, I think we could all process this development a lot better if nobody was tied up! Don't you agree, Frozone?" Izuku exclaims cheerfully, and Frozone starts nodding along.

"... I have to call both your parents." Eraserhead says, with no small amount of dread in his voice, and Frozone immediately starts shouting in protest.

"Hey! No! Fuck that, no way in hell, you're not gonna get me killed because I go out and do the same shit you do!" Frozone straight out starts screaming, and Izuku knows he's not the only one taken aback. "Most of those 'kitchen accidents' aren't from that restaurant job I talked about, you know! I only worked there for a couple months, and my only real injury was the boiling water thing! You think my old man would have a problem putting me in the ground permanently? News flash, he fucking won't! Let me the fuck out, Eraserhead!"

Frozone's thrashing around in the scarf-thing, and Eraserhead's grip on it must have slackened just enough in his shock that Frozone manages to get free. Before Eraserhead manages to get the scarf in a grip that would allow him to throw it at Frozone again, he's already gone, leaving Izuku alone with the guilty-looking pro hero.

"... Just go home, kid. Keep yourselves out of trouble." Eraserhead says in the most defeated tone that Izuku's ever heard from an adult, especially one in authority, but he doesn't need to be told twice. Izuku runs home earlier than usual that night, and realizes that while he could technically be angry at Frozone for leaving him there, he really, really isn't.

---

The next time Izuku sees Frozone is two weeks later.

Honestly, he'd thought that Frozone was avoiding him. He still kind of thinks that, considering that he doesn't see him in any of their usual meetup spots, but instead behind a dumpster where Frozone is kind of bleeding out.

He's probably not actually bleeding out, the logical part of Izuku's brain says, but that part is mostly drowned out by his internal screaming. There's a massive piece of glass stuck in Frozone's side, and the broken windows of the restaurant that Frozone is leaning against tell him where it came from. Izuku's not too sure about what to do in case of a stab wound, only that he shouldn't pull out the thing that the person was stabbed with.

"Hey, hey Frozone, can you hear me?" Izuku asks, not touching anywhere near the wound in fear of aggravating it.

"Yeah," Frozone responds quietly, after a moment of coughing. "I hear you, kid. Sorry you had to see me like this."

"No, it's fine, not your fault someone got you." Izuku immediately reassures, hands still hovering around the shard of glass, unsure of what to do.

"Didn't see the bastard coming. It's fine, though. There's, uh, there's a burner phone in my pocket, go ahead and grab that, alright? You're gonna call that number, and you're gonna tell the person on the other end of the line that Natsuo's just escaped another ransom attempt. Then give 'em this address. Got that?" Frozone says, very businesslike, and Izuku hates that Frozone's real name is probably Natsuo, and that he didn't get to tell him on his own terms.

Izuku nods, and grabs the burner phone. He dials the only contact, and Frozone takes his mask off and tosses it into the dumpster above them.

"This is Endeavor Agency's emergency line." A gruff voice immediately picks up on the other end, and Izuku nearly chokes in surprise. How did Frozone get this kind of connection? Why does he have Endeavor's emergency phone line in his pocket?

Still, he's got a job to do. "H- Hi, um, we're on the corner of 5th and Main, in the alleyway behind the dumpster, um. N- Natsuo just escaped another ransom attempt? That's what he told me to tell you, I'm sorry, sir, I just- I just got here, I don't know what's happened- " He cuts himself off as the dial tone drones loudly into his ear, and he snaps the phone shut. His stutter's gotten a lot better recently, but this is an entirely new situation, and he's still sort of reeling from the idea that Frozone isn't as infallible and strong as he's always seemed. Even when he was yelling at Eraserhead, there was a sort of defiance to it, but now he's laying in a pool of his own blood- not dying, Izuku feels like he'd know if Frozone was dying- and looking pretty pale.

"He hung up on you, right?" Frozone asks, and Izuku doesn't like that he can now see the exhaustion in his face, rather than reading it from his mask, voice, and body language.

Izuku nods, and hands the burner back to Frozone.

"I'll tell you the full story at some point. Once I'm medically cleared from this, probably. Sorry to spring all that shit on you with Eraserhead, and now with this..." Frozone huffs to himself. "This isn't how I'd have liked to tell you any of that personal shit. I'll be fine, I don't think this hurt anything vital, it just hurts like a bitch."

There's silence between them, for a moment, before Frozone quietly says, "That is my name, you know. Natsuo. You can call me that if no one's around, I don't really care. You know enough about me already, may as well, right?"

There's silence for another few moments. Natsuo finally says, even quieter than before, just barely above a whisper, "Hey. You're scaring me, kid."

Izuku jolts a little bit, and starts twisting his hands together nervously. "I'm... I'm sorry. I don't- "

Whatever he was about to say- unbeknownst to even himself, really- is drowned out by the approaching roar of fire coming from above the rooftops, followed by sirens off in the distance. Natsuo starts pushing Izuku away, and he gets the message and starts running.

He doesn't want to be caught by Endeavor.

#my writing #mha #mha fic #angst #vigilante midoriya izuku #quirkless midoriya izuku

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