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starsfadingbutilingeron · 7 years

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Chapter Three: Rule of Thumb

Fic Title: Secondhand Hero Author: @starsfadingbutilingeron Summary: What if All Might had been able to save Shimura Tenko? Read this free fic to find out the results!! Rating: General Audiences Read On AO3: x ----

A few months after Tenko had received his gloves, he wasn’t so afraid to touch things anymore. There was still a slight hesitation when he went to touch something living, like when he went to grab Toshinori’s hand or pet the cat from the shelter he’d adopted; but once he took the time to remind himself his quirk couldn’t activate without his consent now, the fear ebbed and Tenko found solace in the way another remained intact at his touch.

He spent most days out of his room, out about the house or on small trips to the store with Toshinori; and when he did prefer to sit alone in his room, he chose more often than not to leave the door open. He’d grown more confident socially as well, laughing easier than he had in years when Gran Torino would make a joke or something funny happened on the television. And at times when Toshinori had to go out for hours or days at a time to work, Tenko would almost always run to the door to greet him when he came home.

There were still bad days, times when all Tenko could feel was the constricting press of painful memories imprinting themselves on the current moment. Something as small as the feel of the weather or the smell of the air could send Tenko into a spiral of recollection, making him retreat in on himself and turn distant for a spell.

There were stronger triggers, too, that dragged up specific and vivid memories Tenko would’ve rather forgotten. Like the time he’d accidentally knocked over a glass at the kitchen table and had instinctively pulled his arms around his face for protection; it had taken Toshinori a solid fifteen minutes to get Tenko’s breathing to return to normal, and afterwards the boy had quickly excused himself before retreating to his room for the rest of his night.

And then some things that might have been viewed as negatives to other parents often brought Toshinori the most assurance that Tenko was, slowly but surely, starting to heal. Whenever Tenko would yell at Toshinori, for something small like making him go to bed early or for something big like being upset that his guardian was always out working, the pro hero had to force himself to remain the stern adult presence in the room when what he really wanted to do was profess to the world his immense pride. For Toshinori, Tenko feeling like he could oppose the decisions his guardian made was a sign to the hero that the boy’s trust that Toshinori wouldn’t punish him for having an emotional response to what he perceived as an unfair situation was growing stronger.

It wasn’t a hard decision to have Tenko be homeschooled. Even though the child had made a lot of progress towards getting better since he’d first come to live with All Might, both Tenko and Toshinori agreed that he wasn’t ready to be in a classroom with a dozen other kids. Toshinori was hardly surprised to find that Tenko’s father had neglected to look after his son’s education among everything else, and wanted the boy to have a chance to catch up at his own pace in an environment where he wouldn’t feel pressured to compete with others.

“What if the teacher thinks I’m stupid?” Tenko worried as he danced around Toshinori while the pro hero went to let the tutor he’d hired in through the main gate.

“He won’t think you’re stupid, because you’re not stupid,” Toshinori assured Tenko, pressing the security code on the wall panel to open the gate.

“But what if he gets mad if I don’t know an answer?”

“He won’t,” Toshinori shook his head. “The teacher I’ve hired is a pro hero as well; so you can trust he’ll be fair to you.”

“A pro hero can still be mean,” Tenko muttered, grimacing as he thought of the pro hero Endeavor’s obnoxious television ads. He couldn’t quite put all five fingers on it, but something about the flame hero reminded Tenko almost too much of his own father.

“Well, this is not Endeavor,” Toshinori laughed a little bit, knowing exactly who Tenko was referencing. Reaching out to grab the doorknob, Toshinori flashed Tenko a reassuring smile. “I think you and your new teacher will get along famously.”

The first thing Tenko thought of his new teacher as the front door pulled open, was that the man could use a decent night’s rest. The man’s eyes were dry and red, crusted over with fatigue as he peered down at Tenko through his dark scraggly hair. Tenko regarded the man with quiet skepticism, the two of them just staring at each other in silent acknowledgment of the other.

“Tenko, this is Aizawa Shouta,” Toshinori announced, bringing the tired man in with a grand sweep of his arm. “He’s a recent graduate of UA, pro hero, and certified teacher.”

“Not so recent,” Aizawa regarded Toshinori with a lift of his eyebrows. Turning his attention back to Tenko, Aizawa held a hand out to the young boy before him. Hesitant at first, and then relaxing once their fingers met, Tenko reached out and shook Aizawa’s hand. “Shimura Tenko, I’ve heard a lot about y-”

Aizawa cut off when a familiar rubbing against his ankles caught his attention. Pausing mid-handshake, Aizawa looked down to see Tenko’s cat wrapped around the newcomer’s ankles. Tenko caught Aizawa’s long stare down at his cat and immediately took it to mean the man didn’t appreciate getting cat fur all over his pantlegs.

“Sorry,” Tenko murmured, pulling his hand from Aizawa’s to bend down and pick up his cat. “Mii gets excited about meeting new people.”

“No, it’s alright,” Aizawa waved a hand. Pausing for just a moment more, Aizawa crouched down to Tenko’s level and reached out to scratch the cat behind her velvety black ears. “Her name is ‘Mii’ you said?”

“Uh-huh,” Tenko nodded, smiling as he felt Mii begin to purr happily against his chest.

“Original,” Aizawa laughed a little bit through his nose.

“Toshinori thought of it,” Tenko blushed, gesturing to where his guardian was smiling silently to the side.

“Oh yeah?” Aizawa lifted his eyebrows as he stood back up, tossing a look back to Toshinori.

“Guilty as charged!” Toshinori gave a casual salute. “Well, should I stick around any longer or shall I let you two take it from here?”

“It’s up to Shimura,” Aizawa shrugged, looking down to his student for his input.

Tenko thought it over for a minute, but then decided that anyone who was nice to his cat deserved the benefit of the doubt. “I think we’re okay,” Tenko smiled up at Toshinori.

“Okay!” Toshinori gave a thumbs up, reaching down to ruffle Tenko’s hair. “If there’s any trouble, just holler for me!”

With that, Toshinori vanished up the stairs and around the corner, leaving Tenko and Aizawa alone.

“Well, should we get to it?” Aizawa asked, gesturing to the table set up in the living room. Tenko gave a nod, setting Mii down and following close behind his new teacher. As Aizawa set his bag down on the table and pulled out papers and workbooks, Tenko took the seat opposite him and watched the set-up with intrigue.

“Do you have your own classroom?” Tenko asked when the silence became too much for him to handle from a brand new person. “Like, in a school?”

“Not yet,” Aizawa said. “Working on gaining some experience before I try my hand at full-time teaching. Part of the reason I’m here teaching you.”

“This isn’t full-time?” Tenko tilted his head to the side.

“Well, it is,” Aizawa sat down, smiling a little at the question. “But it’s not as heavy a workload as doing this for, say, twenty or so kids all at the same time.”

“You went to UA,” Tenko said, pulling at a loose thread at the hem of his shirt. “Did you like it?”

“It was the best place I could have gone to study Heroics,” Aizawa said matter-of-factly, shuffling a stapled set of papers in front of him before holding it out to Tenko. “Now then, to begin, I’m going to have you take this aptitude test. Just to see what areas we need to work on most. It’s not graded, so don’t worry if you don’t know an answer.”

“Okay,” Tenko nodded, already feeling his nerves vibrating in his fingertips as he picked up his pencil. Looking at the first question, Tenko scrunched his nose up and squinted at the letters on the page. He picked up the paper and pulled it as close as he could, then pushed back a little bit trying to make the letters focus.

“Stop,” Aizawa said suddenly, reaching out and putting the test down onto the table so he could point at the first question. “Can you even see what that says?”

“I can read,” Tenko bristled, setting a defensive glare against Aizawa.

“No, that’s not what I’m asking,” Aizawa shook his head and tapped on the paper again so Tenko would look at it. “Can you see the words? Or are they all blurry?”

“What do you mean?” Tenko furrowed his brow. “Yeah, they’re blurry. Are they not supposed to be...?”

Aizawa leaned back in his seat, fingers still on the paper, eyes widening with a lift of his eyebrows. “No,” he shook his head slowly. “They’re not.”

Tenko pursed his lips, picking up the paper and looking at it with renewed concentration. “But that’s what...my dad…” Tenko trailed off, letting the paper fall to the tabletop as he reached up to pick at his lip.

“Did your father tell you that it was normal for words to be blurry all the time?” Aizawa asked, crossing his arms.

Tenko shrank back a little bit when he noticed the change in Aizawa’s voice and the angry set of his jaw. “Are you mad?” Tenko whispered, fingers gripping the edge of the chair so tightly it felt like he would break his skin open.

“No, I’m not mad,” Aizawa said, shoving his chair back and walking across the room. “At least, not at you.”

Sticking his head out into the main hallway, Aizawa called for Toshinori to come downstairs. There was the sound of heavy lumbering footsteps, and then Toshinori was breaching the entrance of the living room; glancing confusedly between Tenko and Aizawa. Motioning for Toshinori to lean in closer, Aizawa spoke to the pro hero in a low voice so Tenko wouldn’t be able to hear.

Tenko watched as the two adults conversed, Aizawa and Toshinori taking turns flitting glances at the kid waiting patiently for them to tell him what the heck was going on. When the two heroes were done speaking, Toshinori let go of a heavy breath and put his hands on his hips and Aizawa leaned back against the doorframe, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Looks like we have no choice but to take immediate action,” Toshinori reached up to rub at his chin.

“Um,” Tenko hopped down off his chair and moved towards the two adults. “What’s going on?”

“Tenko, my boy,” Toshinori walked forward to meet him, crouching down to put his hands on the young child’s shoulders. “There is something we must do.”

----

“Eugh! These are the ugliest things I’ve ever seen!” Tenko exclaimed, shoving the glasses back into Toshinori’s hands.

“But they’re red. You like red,” Toshinori insisted from where he was crouched in the optometrist’s office, helping Tenko try on potential glasses styles.

“No. You like red,” Tenko corrected, shoving against Toshinori’s hands to get the scarlet frames further away from him. “I already have red eyes, it would look stupid!”

“Okay then, what about these?” Toshinori reached for another pair, placing them onto Tenko’s face and then turning him towards the mirror.

“Nooo,” Tenko whined, reaching up and taking the glasses off. “I look a nerd!”

“Aw, I think you look cute,” Toshinori moped, putting the glasses back.

“I don’t think that’s helping,” Aizawa commented from where he was looking at the racks of sample frames. “Remind me again how I got roped into this escapade?”

“You were in the house when we wanted to go,” Tenko pointed out helpfully, pushing a pair of lime green glasses away before Toshinori could even put them on his face.

“Right, right,” Aizawa nodded, picking up a pair of glasses and walking over to his student. “Not exactly in my job description, but here. Try these ones on.”

Tenko slipped the glasses on and looked in the mirror, pursing his lips thoughtfully. The frames were plain black, shiny under the fluorescent lighting. The lens were just regular rectangles, small enough in size that they wouldn’t be a constant pressure on Tenko’s cheeks.

“Hmm,” Tenko tapped his chin; then, pulling away from the mirror, put his hands on his hips and nodded. “Yeah, I like these ones.”

Toshinori gave a dejected glance at the sparkly pair of glow in the dark frames he had been planning on suggesting next, but quickly shook himself out of it and gave Tenko a smile. “If that’s what you like, Tenko, then those are the ones we’ll get.”

“Cool. Except…” Tenko turned and picked up a pamphlet from a nearby table and squinted at it. “The letters are still blurry.”

“That’s because the lens aren’t made for your eyes yet,” Toshinori said. “Your actual glasses should be ready in a few days.”

“Oh, okay,” Tenko said, pulling the glasses off and handing them to Toshinori. While his guardian went to wrap up the order, Tenko turned to Aizawa who was leaning tiredly against the wall near the exit. “If I still can’t see words, how am I going to learn?”

“We’ll figure something out, don’t worry,” Aizawa said, not seeming to consider Tenko’s temporary vision problem to be an insurmountable obstacle in the least.

As it turned out, Tenko still sees words in blurs and smudges really wasn’t that much of a hindrance. Instead of having the boy read the questions for himself, Aizawa would just read what was on the page for Tenko and wait for his response. Neither Aizawa nor Toshinori were particularly surprised that Tenko was a few grades behind where he should have been placing on the aptitude test; likewise, neither of them would let on how much it made them want to clobber Tenko’s father for themselves.

When Tenko’s glasses did finally come, he was dazzled beyond words by how different everything looked in crystal clear focus. It wasn’t uncommon for Toshinori to find the child outside staring up at the individual leaves on the trees in wonder, or staring into Mii’s bright yellow eyes with hypnotic amazement at the detail of them. Tutoring sessions with Aizawa became easier as well; being able to read and learn what each word was and looked like for himself was much less confusing than having them read aloud.

“Can heroes wear glasses?” Tenko asked Aizawa. It was a rainy day for schoolwork, and Tenko was having trouble focusing on the set of math problems Aizawa had given him.

“Yes, they can,” Aizawa nodded, barely looking up from his laptop.

“What about face scars?” Tenko pressed a finger to the scar on his eye and another to the one on his lips. “Can heroes have those?”

“Yes,” Aizawa nodded again. “Lots of heroes have lots of scars,” shutting his laptop, Aizawa finally turned all of his attention to his student. “Now, what is it that you actually want to ask me?”

Tenko bit his lip and averted his gaze to the drizzly scene out the window. “Uhm,” he hesitated. “I know that it doesn’t matter what quirk you have so long as you do the right thing...and I know that Toshinori thinks I can be a hero, but...Do you think that I can be one with my quirk?”

Aizawa exhaled through his nose, giving Tenko a long stare. “Doesn’t matter what me or anyone else thinks. What do you think?”

“Well,” Tenko reached up to scratch at his neck. “My quirk only hurts things. Aren’t heroes supposed to make things better?”

“How do you know that’s all your quirk does?” Aizawa asked. “Have you ever tried to think of ways it could help people?”

“No…” Tenko admitted sheepishly.

“Tell you what,” Aizawa said, taking out a blank piece of paper and passing it to Tenko. “Instead of doing those math problems, I want you to make a list of five good things your quirk could do for others.”

Tenko looked down at the paper and then back up at Aizawa. “But what if-”

“Did I give you an assignment or did I give you an assignment?” Aizawa cut him off. “Get to it.”

Tenko blew a strand of his hair out of his face, frustrated. Setting his pencil to the paper, Tenko searched for a single thing to list. After a solid two minutes of trying to find some incredible, groundbreaking answer, Tenko rolled his eyes and gave up trying to sound cool; he scrawled the first thing that came to his mind.

Once there was one item on the paper though, Tenko found it got easier to continue the list. He reached five in no time and triumphantly handed the paper off to Aizawa, who regarded the list with a neutral lift of his eyebrows. As he read down the paper, the corner of Aizawa’s mouth lifted into an amused smirk; handing the paper back to Tenko, he leaned back in his seat and gave his student a half-smile.

“See?” Aizawa said. “There are probably a ton more things you can think of to do with your quirk that just what you wrote. So, stop relying on other people to tell you that you can be a hero and start proving it to yourself.”

Tenko nodded, running a thumb up along the edge of the paper. “Thank you, Mister Aizawa,” he mused.

----

Two years later, Tenko had almost too much energy for even Toshinori to keep up with. His tutoring with Aizawa had paid off and the ten year old was able to catch up enough to enroll at the elementary school. Toshinori had picked a school that other pro heroes with children had recommended; he wanted Tenko to feel like he was part of a normal classroom, but also wanted to ensure his kid would have the proper protection from any villains or media that took an interest in him.

Tenko still met with Aizawa for private tutoring some nights, to go over new concepts that his teachers at school hadn’t gone over in enough detail for him. Over the years, the young boy had grown to greatly admire the pro hero who tutored him; none of his classmates seemed to know who the hero “Eraserhead” really was, having maybe heard the name in passing or in a list on the news at some point. Tenko only thought that made Aizawa an even better hero.

Whenever the alert system would sound to announce that Aizawa had arrived at the front gate, Tenko would immediately fall in line at the door; excited to see his teacher again, even if it did come with grammar lessons.

“Don’t run in the house! You’ll break your glasses again !” Toshinori called up to the pounding sound of Tenko’s footsteps as he ran across the upper floor to get to the staircase.

“I will not!!” Tenko shouted, running down the stairs with his glasses held defiantly to his face. He bounded down the stairs, a piece of paper clutched excitedly in one hand. However, Tenko’s excitement distracted him from his own footing, and his toe caught on the edge of the bottom stair; sending him hurtling forward.

Toshinori swooped in, immediately catching Tenko under the arms and holding him up to his eye level. “You were saying?” he laughed a little.

“My glasses are not broken, if you noticed,” Tenko pointed at his glasses, which were knocked slightly askew but otherwise undamaged.

“Uh-huh, I’m very proud of y-” Toshinori broke off mid sentence. Still holding Tenko up by the underarms, the pro hero wrinkled his eyebrows at what his kid was wearing. “Where did you get that shirt?”

Tenko looked down at the black T-shirt he had on, the decal proudly displaying the hero name “Eraserhead” in a charcoal gray almost dark enough to blend into the fabric if you weren’t looking for it.

“Gran Torino gave it to me,” Tenko smiled. “There’s not a lot of stuff made for Mister Aizawa, so he had it made specially for me.”

“Ah, I see!” Toshinori nodded, setting Tenko down on the ground. “When did I become the least impressive pro hero in my own house?”

“Around the first time I caught you singing in the shower,” Tenko laughed.

“Okay, funny guy,” Toshinori put a hand on Tenko’s shoulder and turned them both towards the front door. “Let’s go let Aizawa in, huh?”

“Alright,” Tenko nodded, bouncing on his feet in anticipation.

When Aizawa saw Tenko’s shirt, he had to physically restrain himself from smiling; instead, he gave an unassuming blink in Tenko’s direction before talking to Toshinori about this or that. After a few minutes of the two adults conversing, Aizawa and Tenko broke off to start their tutoring session. But as they sat down at the living room table together, Aizawa noticed the paper Tenko had been puttering his fingers against in excitement since he walked in the house.

“Is there something you’d like to show me, Tenko?” Aizawa asked, figuring he was never going to be able to get one stitch of schoolwork done until he let Tenko talk about whatever had him so excited.

“I designed my hero costume!” Tenko cheered, holding out the piece of paper with a hand drawn marker picture on it. “What do you think?”

“Hmm,” Aizawa rubbed his chin down at the drawing. “Is that it? Just hands all over you?”

“Well, yeah,” Tenko bit his lip. “Doesn’t it look cool?”

“A hero costume shouldn’t just be ‘cool’,” Aizawa said, taking a pen out of his bag and gesturing to the drawing. “Mind if I add some adjustments.”

“No, go ahead,” Tenko said, twiddling his thumbs nervously.

“First of all,” Aizawa said, scribbling on the paper. “You don’t want a big hand obscuring your face in battle. You won’t be able to breathe, and you can’t exactly wear your glasses with that. How about some protective goggles instead?”

“Okay,” Tenko nodded, leaning over the table to watch Aizawa work.

“Then, underneath all those hands, you’re gonna want some sort of protective suit,” Aizawa said. “Something lightweight but still strong enough so you don’t get riddled with bullet holes.”

“Oh yeah,” Tenko murmured, blushing at having forgotten heroes can get injured too. “I should’ve known that.”

“And your hands,” Aizawa continued. “They can’t just be bare all the time, but you can’t be fiddling with your gloves in a tight moment. When you actually get this made, put in a request for sensor-activated gauntlets of some sort that’ll keep at least some of your fingers covered until you need to use your quirk.”

“But don’t heroes always need their quirk?” Tenko asked.

“Don’t need a quirk to punch a villain in the face,” Aizawa said, handing the revised drawing back to Tenko.

Tenko smiled, feeling even more excited about his future costume now that Aizawa had put his seal of approval on it. Setting the paper down and putting his hands on top of it, Tenko’s face turned a touch more serious.

“Toshinori said you got a job at UA?”

“That’s right, I did,” Aizawa nodded.

“Does that mean…” Tenko bit his lip. “...Does that mean you won’t be my teacher anymore?”

“I’m still going to come tutor you, Tenko,” Aizawa said. “Although, you’re doing pretty well on your own.”

“I am?” Tenko was a little surprised to hear that.

“Yeah,” Aizawa nodded.

“Wow,” Tenko murmured, looking down at his hands and blushing. Looking back up, Tenko took a deep breath before asking Aizawa, “Do you think I could get into UA?”

Aizawa looked up from the lesson plan he’d been glancing at during Tenko’s brief quiet, face contemplative for a moment before he gave a breathy laugh.

“I’m your teacher, you’d better get into UA,” he said, shaking his head a little before turning back to his lesson plan. Tenko smiled to himself, pleased with his teacher’s response, and went to get his homework to go over.

----

“Get away from me with that thing!” Tenko swatted at Toshinori as his guardian chased him around the entryway of their home.

“You’re not leaving this house until you try it on at least!!” Toshinori called, easily catching and picking up the skinny teenager.

“I’m fourteen years old, you can’t pick me up!!” Tenko cried out in protest, struggling to be put down.

“What was that? You’re four? Four years old?” Toshinori asked, cupping an ear with his free hand. “You’re four and you want to be picked up? Okay, I happily oblige!”

“You are the worst, stop it!” Tenko shouted, trying so damn hard not to start laughing. “I’m wearing a uniform, I’ve got glasses, and fingerless gloves; please, do not make me look like even more of a nerd with that stupid hairclip.”

“Your hair is always in your face and you refuse to get it cut,” Toshinori said, setting Tenko down on his feet but keeping a firm grip on his shoulder. “Now, if you’d just try it on so I can see how it looks…” Toshinori reached up with the hairclip, carefully pinning back Tenko’s messy hair as his son stood absolutely still with a dead expression on his face. “Oh my goodness, that is adorable.”

“Yeah, because that’s the look I’m aiming for on my first day at UA,” Tenko rolled his eyes, turning to the mirror in the hall and half-laughing half-crying at his reflection. “Where did you even get a hand-shaped hairclip?”

“I definitely did not have it custom made, if that’s what you’re asking,” Toshinori came up to stand by Tenko. “It matches the hero costume you designed. And you already wear headbands and clips around the house, why is this any different?”

Tenko rolled his eyes, throwing Toshinori an annoyed smile. “If I wear it will you just take me to school already?”

“Absolutely!” Toshinori gave a big thumbs up.

“Alright then, I surrender! Let’s go,” Tenko held his hands up and starting walking towards the door.

“Wait, just a second, young man,” Toshinori said in a stern voice.

Tenko groaned and turned back around. “Please, don’t tell me-”

“Let me get the camera,” Toshinori said, zipping off up the stairs before Tenko could even finish his sentence.

Once Toshinori was out of sight, Tenko snuck another glance at himself in the mirror. The hairclip was the stupidest thing he’d ever seen; but hell if it didn’t bring a begrudging smile to Tenko’s face to think of Toshinori paying real money to have the thing made just for him. Snapping his eyes front as he heard Toshinori begin to descend the stairs, Tenko silently decided he’d make the clip a part of his every day look.

----

Tenko would never tell Toshinori, but that stupid hairclip helped him make a lot of friends at UA. Everyone in his class had been initially in awe that All Might’s kid was going to be in their class, but quickly got over being starstruck when they saw Tenko’s hair accessory. After that, it was like he was just another member of the class.

Aizawa wasn’t his homeroom teacher, but he did see him in hallways and have him to teach a few subjects. Tenko got a kick out of the way how much more stern Aizawa was in the setting of a larger classroom, and tried his best not to get too casual around him during school hours for fear of wrecking his teacher’s reputation.

No one seemed frightened of his quirk either; only slightly intimidated by its power in comparison to other powers. When it came time for the UA Sports Festival, the proof of that sentiment came back in full force. Tenko didn’t win as a first year, but he did impress a good number of sponsors with his performance; although, he wasn’t entirely sure if that was due to his actual skills or to the fact that he was All Might’s son.

For the most part, aside from the occasional bully and difficult assignments, life at UA was good. Life in general was good for Tenko; something resembling stable that he felt at peace with.

And then one day, a few weeks into his second year, Tenko approached a group of students all huddled around one person’s phone screen. They all seemed engrossed by whatever was on the screen, even though it just sounded like a plain old newscast from where Tenko stood at the skirts of the group.

“Hey, what’s going on?” Tenko poked the shoulder of one of the girl’s from his homeroom.

“Shimura!” she jumped when she realized who was beside her.

The name coursed through the group like an electric shock, and everyone fell silent and broke into a looser circle. The boy whose phone had been being used as the viewing screen stood back against the lockers with his phone pressed to his chest to hide the screen.

“Uh,” Tenko furrowed his brow, looking around at his classmates. “Okay, seriously, what’s going on?”

Everyone stood in complete silence, looking at each other but avoiding Tenko’s gaze.

“It’s All Might,” one girl spoke up at last.

“What about him?” Tenko asked.

“He’s in battle with some villain,” another student spoke up. “Some guy no one’s ever heard of.”

“Yeah?” Tenko felt a lump rise in his throat as he realized who it probably was.

“News crews just got to the battle site,” the boy with the phone spoke up, at last relenting the screen to Tenko’s view. “All Might didn’t even call for back-up.”

Tenko felt the blood drain from his face as he looked down at the screen. The shots were gritty and filmed from a distance, but Tenko would recognize the shape of his guardian through a blindfold. What he didn’t recognize was the opponent. Some incoherent, murky mass of black swirls around the vague indication of a man’s body. From what Toshinori had told him, which wasn’t much, Tenko could only conclude that this villain was All for One.

As he watched the news feed, the footage suddenly cut out and switched to a different story. Something about a two-bit villain that was desperately trying to make a comeback even though he’d been incarcerated over twenty times. Tenko wrinkled his nose in confusion.

“What?” he murmured.

“That’s weird,” one kid said, taking their phone out as well. “The story’s not being covered on any other stations either.”

“Police must’ve ordered a media blackout,” an older student said.

“Why would they do that?” Tenko turned to look at the upperclassman.

“My guess?” she lifted her eyebrows and winced. “All Might’s probably losing.”

The group of students dissolved into a low murmur of disbelief, some of them breaking into debates about whether or not All Might was in fact losing. Their chatter was cut short by the bell though, sending them all off in separate directions while Tenko remained standing still against the lockers.

He stood there for a good long while, just staring down at the linoleum tile in disbelief. The more he thought about Toshinori facing his greatest enemy all alone while he sat in school conjugating verbs and picking hero names, the more pissed off he became. Glancing around at the empty hallways, Tenko turned for the nearest exit and started running.

Aizawa was scrawling on the chalkboard when he saw a flash of silvery hair bolt past his open classroom door. Setting the chalk down with a clatter, he crossed quickly to the doorway and stuck his head out to see Tenko running down the hallway at his top speed. Shoving off the doorframe, Aizawa spun back around to gives his students a stern glare.

“You all get started on your homework assignment for tomorrow,” he said, raising a threatening finger and sweeping his arm over the room. “If I hear so much as one peep coming from any of you, I’m writing up the entire class.”

With that, Aizawa whipped out of the classroom and zeroed in on Tenko’s quickly diminishing form. Shooting his scarf out in front of him, Aizawa easily wrapped the young boy up and hauled him back up the hallway.

“And just where do you think you’re going?” Aizawa demanded, already having a pretty good idea of what the response would be.

“Let go of me!” Tenko snarled, struggling against the tight cloths wrapped around his chest and arms. “Toshinori’s in trouble and I- I have to help!!”

“And do what exactly?” Aizawa raised his eyebrows. “You’re only a second year, Shimura, you don’t even have your provisional license yet.”

“Agh, I don’t care!!” Tenko shouted, hands twitching out in frustration.

“You’d better start caring if you want to be a hero,” Aizawa said, leaning in so his face was just inches from Tenko’s. “Those laws mean something and if you want to uphold them for others, you’ve gotta follow them.”

“Save the lesson for your next class,” Tenko scoffed. “Put me down now!”

“I am not letting you go after All Might,” Aizawa said, taking a deep breath and drawing his shoulders up. “You’re coming with me to the principal’s office.”

“No!” Tenko screamed, growing angrier as he felt the hot press of tears brim in his eyes. He kicked his legs out from where they dangled off the ground, trying and failing to land a hit on Aizawa. “Let me go! I have to go help him!!”

The students in the classroom all leaned over their desks in awe, none of them had ever heard a student talking to Aizawa like Tenko was just then.

“No, you have to calm down,” Aizawa said, unfazed by the young teenager’s outburst.

“If you won’t let me go, I’ll destroy your stupid fucking scarf myself!!” Tenko snarled, fumbling to reach for the clasps on his gloves. The students in the classroom gasped, some of them whispering bets on what Tenko’s punishment would be.

“You will not,” Aizawa said matter-of-factly, his own hands snapping out and grabbing a hold of Tenko’s. Unfurling the wraps of his scarf from the boy’s body, Aizawa set Tenko’s feet down on the floor and kneeled down in front of him.

“Let me go…” Tenko whined, tugging uselessly against the teacher’s iron grip. The tears he’d been trying to hold in were beginning to seep down his face from under his glasses, and the fight was going out of how Tenko pulled against Aizawa’s hold. “ Please , Aizawa…”

Aizawa shook his head. “All Might will be fine,” he said. “He always is. He wouldn’t want you to put yourself in danger for him.”

“I don’t care what he wants,” Tenko cried, his breaths beginning to hyperventilate. “He needs help. He’s so stupid to try and fight that guy on his own!!”

“Well, you’re not wrong,” Aizawa shrugged. “But look, you can’t be the one to help him. You’re still a student, he’d be worrying about you the whole time you were there. And up against a villain like that? You’d either end up his hostage or dead.”

Tenko’s lower lip quivered and he bit down on it to try and stop the motion. More tears broke down his face, running over the scars on his lip and eye. Letting the tension in his shoulders drop, Tenko finally stopped fighting. Rushing forward, he buried his face in Aizawa’s neck; and, when Aizawa let go of his hands, threw his arms around his teacher’s waist.

Aizawa didn’t react at first, frozen in shock at a child turning to him for comfort; they usually went rigid with terror at his very presence. But after a moment, Aizawa brought his own arms around the sobbing teenager and held him tightly as his thin frame shook.

“Okay, okay,” Aizawa said in a low voice, rubbing Tenko’s back. “It’s alright, just take some deep breaths.”

To his side, Aizawa heard whisperings and shiftings of desk chairs; flashing a glare out of the corner of his eyes, Aizawa saw his class all piled on top of each other trying to get the best view of the scene going down in the hallway.

“And just what are all of you rubbernecking for!?” Aizawa said through clenched teeth. Pulling away so just one arm remained around Tenko, Aizawa pointed at his class in warning. “I thought I told you to shut up and do your homework. Get to it before I give you all a week’s detention!”

The students scrambled back into their seats, pulling out their homework and putting their noses to their textbooks. Once satisfied with the state of his classroom, Aizawa turned back to Tenko.

“Alright, come on,” Aizawa said, standing up and keeping an arm around the young boy. “Let’s get you home.”

“But what about your class?” Tenko asked, voice much calmer than before.

“I’ll send a substitute,” Aizawa replied, loud enough for his students to hear. “Now, let’s stop by the office and let ‘em know I’m taking you home.”

“Are they just gonna let you walk out of the school with a student?” Tenko almost laughed, reaching up to wipe his tears on the sleeve of his jacket.

“Well, they should,” Aizawa said, leading Tenko down the hall with his arm still around his shoulders. “All Might put me down as one of your emergency contacts.”

----

Tenko hated the sterile smell of hospitals; he had nothing but memories of panic and pain and uncertainty attached to the blinding frozen hunks of cement. It wasn’t often he had occasion to be in a hospital anymore, only really for doctor’s appointments and when his stupid guardian pulled some reckless shit to land him in the ER. Reckless shit like facing the fabled villain All for One completely by himself in the middle of nowhere.

Keeping his hands jammed in his pockets, Tenko followed Aizawa down the hallways of one of the designated “hero wings” of the hospital. Growing up with the Number One Hero as his guardian, Tenko lost the sense of wonder at seeing other pro heroes and now just saw them as a bunch of bumbling distant relatives who needed a collective ego check.

He could tell they were getting closer to Toshinori’s hospital room when he heard the yelling barreling down the hall; it would appear Tenko wasn’t the only one angry at Toshinori for being so careless.

“...stupidest pupil I ever had the misfortune to teach!” Gran Torino’s infuriated voice poured out of one of the hospital rooms up ahead. “If you can’t bring yourself to care about your life, think about Tenko! That kid needs you to take care of him, and you can’t do that if you’re dead , ya damn moron!!”

Aizawa and Tenko came to Toshinori’s door right as Gran Torino whirled out in a huff; he and Tenko shared an enraged nod of solidarity before the retired pro was storming away down the hallway.

“You wanna go in by yourself first?” Aizawa lifted his eyebrows.

“Yeah,” Tenko nodded, angry scowl creasing his forehead up.

“Hey, do me a favor?” Aizawa asked. Tenko looked over to his teacher, who in turn let a half-smile crack across his face. “Don’t go easy on him.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Tenko said, reaching out and pushing the door open with a twist of the knob.

Toshinori still looked like All Might, and that pissed Tenko off. He was still muscular and larger than life, even in a hospital gown with tubes and wires sticking out of him. His face was a touch more visibly bedraggled than normal, but that was about it. When he turned his head to see Tenko enter the room, he lit up with his usual too-big-for-a-normal-human-face smile as if nothing were wrong. Tenko’s fingers itched desperately to smack the stupid out of place grin from his guardian’s face.

“Ah, Tenko, my boy!” he called, waving him over. “Come in, come in! I’m glad to see y-”

Smack!

Tenko, for lack of a better projectile, had plucked the visitor’s ID from his shirt and chucked it directly at Toshinori’s smiling face, landing a direct hit between the hero’s eyes.

“Ouch,” Toshinori reached up and rubbed his forehead dramatically. “You shouldn’t throw things at a man who just underwent surgery, you know.”

“Shut up, just shut up!” Tenko seethed, hands balled into fists at his sides as he stood poised to brawl at any instant. “You stupid old man, you could have been killed! What were you thinking facing a villain you have not had any success fighting over the span of multiple lifetimes!? Alone in the middle of fucking nowhere to boot?!? You’re not invincible, you know!”

“Tenko, I understand you’re upset,” Toshinori said. “But this is the duty of the One for All bearer-”

“Bullshit!” Tenko snarled, wrestling down the sobs he felt catch in his throat. “You’re just using that as an excuse for the fact you were being a reckless, vengeful asshole who couldn’t care less that other people might be worried about him while he zoomed off at top speed to his death without so much as a text! I swear to God, if you weren’t already in one, I would put you in the hospital myself! Now, you’d better just- Just lay there and get better or I’ll destroy the rest of your damn stomach - and you know I can!!”

Tenko’s chest was heaving, his rant having taken the wind out of him; collapsing in an ungainly heap into the chair by Toshinori’s bedside, Tenko turned his head sharply away from his guardian and glared daggers at the wall.

Toshinori rolled the thin material of his hospital gown between his fingers, glancing sheepishly up at Tenko every few seconds to see if he would look back at him. As he watched the boy, he noticed Tenko reaching up to pick anxiously at his lip; the visible side of his face relaxing as his glare softened into a worried frown. Clearing his throat as loudly as he dared, Toshinori turned a little so he was facing Tenko.

“I didn’t realize you cared so much,” he said softly.

“Oh, you fucking did too, you asshole,” Tenko’s glare snapped back into place as he whipped his head around to face Toshinori. “You knew how much I care about you and you did this anyways; which is just as bad as you not knowing how much I care, except it’s worse!”

Toshinori couldn’t think of a worthwhile response, so he just stared down at the bedcovers before murmuring, “I’m sorry, Tenko.”

The young teenager shot a glare out of the corner of his eye from where he’d adjusted himself to sit cross-armed in the uncomfortable hospital chair.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t think about you at all,” Toshinori dropped his head in shame. “You’re right. This was about revenge. I should’ve asked for help. I’m sorry.”

Tenko turned his face away, biting down on his tongue to try and keep his tears from falling as he felt them well in his eyes. He was determined to stay pissed at Toshinori; so, he took a deep snuffling breath and, placing his hands on either of the chair’s armrests, pushed himself upwards.

“I’ll tell you one thing, I’m not gonna put up with this anymore,” he said as he stood, letting his hair fall over his face to cover up his weepy expression. Taking another deep breath, Tenko turned towards Toshinori and lifted his face enough to lock eyes with his injured guardian and point a warning finger at him. “So you cut this reckless shit out, you hear me?”

Toshinori’s chest ached with guilt as he saw how broken up Tenko was over his actions; but before he could even move to apologize again, Tenko was picking up the silence for himself.

“Y-You cut this shit out or...or I’ll never speak to you again !” Tenko spat out, his face crumpling up into full on sobbing as soon as he was finished speaking. Turning his back to Toshinori, Tenko sped from the room as the tears finally began to fall; slamming the door behind him and bolting away to the nearest exit.

----

The house was quiet when Toshinori returned home a few days later. Tenko had never been a particularly loud child, but now the silence was obstinate and impossible to ignore. Toshinori had expected something like this when his calls and texts to Tenko had gone pointedly ignored since the teenager had come to see him in the hospital; but it didn’t make it any less distressing.

The silence persisted for days. Tenko would go about his routine without so much as a word to Toshinori; offering only stiff glances of annoyance whenever his guardian tried to initiate a conversation. Toshinori knew that Tenko could keep this up indefinitely, and knew the longer it took to resolve things the more difficult it would be for Toshinori to get Tenko to speak to him again.

So, one day as Tenko came home from school, Toshinori was waiting right by the front door for him. All in all, it took the pro hero as long as a week and a half to work up the courage to talk to his sixteen year old; it hadn’t helped that Tenko was filling up his free time out of school with random extracurriculars. But Toshinori was determined to resolve things that day, unable to stand his kid not speaking to him any longer.

“Tenko,” he said as the angry teenager scowled his way into the house. “We need to talk.”

Tenko grimaced in a way Toshinori knew meant he wanted to talk too, but was feeling stubborn enough to resist the urge. Giving a scoff and an eye roll, Tenko brushed past Toshinori towards the staircase. But before he could even set foot on the bottom step, Toshinori’s hand shot out and took hold of Tenko’s hand to stop him. Looking over his shoulder, Tenko glared at Toshinori’s hand as if he could burn a hole straight through it just with his sheer rage.

“Please,” Toshinori asked, giving Tenko a gentle tug off the stairs. “Just come sit down for a minute. We really need to talk about this.”

Toshinori let go of Tenko’s hand when the teenager gave an irritated yank against the still-iron grip of the Number One Hero. With his right eye twitching, Tenko stalked past Toshinori and dropped himself into a chair at the dining room table. Toshinori followed, sitting down in the chair across from Tenko.

“I just want you to know again how sorry I am,” Toshinori began, feeling anxious as Tenko sat crossed armed and avoiding his gaze at all costs. “I didn’t mean to worry you.”

Tenko kept his gaze downcast, hoping Toshinori couldn’t see the way his lip quivered before he replied with a cold, “Is that everything?”

Toshinori was relieved to hear Tenko’s voice again, but knew he couldn’t take that as a successful resolution yet. Trying to think of what else he could say, Toshinori drew a blank and fell silent.

“Well, if that’s all there is,” Tenko pushed back from his seat, standing up with his hands on the table. “I have some homework to do so I-”

“Wait, no!” Toshinori reached out and grabbed Tenko’s wrists. “Please, sit down. I want to work this out.”

“Work this out?” Tenko repeated scornfully, feeling the burn of tears as they built up in his eyes. Giving a harsh laugh that felt more like a thinly masked sob, Tenko turned his best glare to Toshinori. “What is there to work out? You’ve made your feelings abundantly clear, and I’m doing the same with mine.”

“What feelings?”

“That you care more about taking All for One down with a flashy solitary bang than you care about your own safety and, by extension, mine,” Tenko said, twisting his wrists uncomfortably in Toshinori’s grasp.

Toshinori let go of Tenko’s wrists. “That is not true,” he said.

“Isn’t it though!?” Tenko challenged, balling his hands into fists at his sides as he remained standing. “You didn’t even tell me you were going to fight him, Toshinori-”

“There wasn’t time-”

“You could have died !” Tenko spat, tears just a blink away from spilling down his cheeks. “Y-You could have died and I would have never heard from you again, and you didn’t have time !?” Tenko was yelling now, voice cracking with restrained sobs. “I’m sorry but if that’s not outlining where your priorities lie in a big bright circle then I don’t know what is.”

“I’m sorry, Tenko. I’m so so sorry,” Toshinori said, reaching out to his son. Tenko recoiled as if he were being threatened with a white hot poker. “I’m still here though,” Toshinori continued, trying to conceal how hurt he was that Tenko didn’t seem to want to be comforted by him. “Please, don’t shut me out. I’m still here. I didn’t die.”

“But you’re going to!” Tenko shot back. “You’re injured and you’re going to die and then what’s going to happen to me!?”

And there it was, out on the table like a suit of cards. What Tenko feared most wasn’t that Toshinori didn’t care about him, he already knew that he did; but the fear of losing the person who’d come to be his family, who’d come to symbolize home to him was what terrified Tenko. At the dawning of this realization, Toshinori could only sit dumbfounded and wait for Tenko to say something more.

“You-You think just because you’re All Might that it’s okay for you to give up your life,” Tenko sniffled loudly, tears gushing freely down his face now. “But what kind of fucking hero abandons his family like that!?”

Pressing an arm against his face, Tenko turned away from Toshinori and began to dissolve into incoherent sobs.

“Hey,” Toshinori said gently, pushing back from the table and crossing over to Tenko’s side. Reaching up slowly, Toshinori took Tenko’s arm away from his eyes and placed a gentle hand on either side of Tenko’s face. “Hey, hey, it’s alright. I’m not going to die.”

“Shut up,” Tenko managed through his tears. “You are too, you big liar.”

“Tenko, listen to me,” Toshinori moved his hands to Tenko’s shoulders and looked directly into his eyes. “I’m not dying anytime soon, okay? You can’t get rid of me that easy, I’m gonna stay right here.”

Tenko’s face crumpled up as he looked up at his guardian; and suddenly he was crashing against Toshinori’s chest, pressing his tearstained face into Toshinori’s white T-shirt while a new bout of sobbing took over. Toshinori’s arms went tightly around his son, rubbing Tenko’s back while the teenager cried into his shirt.

“I’m sorry, Tenko,” Toshinori said again, running a hand through the boy’s messy gray hair. “I should have thought about how this might affect you and I didn’t. I’m so sorry.”

After a few more minutes, Tenko calmed down and pulled back from Toshinori with a loud sniff. Pushing his glasses up, Tenko wiped away what remained of his tears and then brought his glasses down into his hands to clean them off.

“Oh yeah, now that we’re speaking again and everything, I have something I wanna show you,” Tenko said, replacing his glasses on his face and then fumbling through his pockets with still-shaking hands until he found what he was looking for and held it out to Toshinori. “Got this a couple days ago. Figured it might be time for one of us to start picking up the slack around here.”

A tiny piece of plastic had never felt so heavy in Toshinori’s hands since he’d received his first hero’s license so many years ago. Looking down at Tenko’s provisional license though, brought Toshinori such immense pride that the memory of his own achievement of that same milestone paled in comparison.

“You know,” Toshinori said, running his thumb over the shiny new license. “You’re wearing that hairclip I got you in this picture.”

“And just like that, the moment’s ruined,” Tenko said, snatching his license back and heading for the door. “I’m going up to my room.”

“Wait! We have to celebrate!!” Toshinori hauled Tenko up around the waist and swung him in a big circle. “I have to go get the camera and call Torino and Naomasa and - Oooh! Maybe we could brainstorm hero names for you?”

“Uh, I have a hero name,” Tenko pointed to the license for emphasis.

“You’re just sticking with your full name?” Toshinori asked. “Nah. No, you need something catchy! Something with pizazz!! Hmm...How about ‘The Helping Hand’?”

“No,” Tenko said, tucking his license into his pocket.

“Alright,” Toshinori continued. “Then what about...Oh, I got it! ‘The Handyman’!”

“Oh my God,” Tenko dropped his face into his hands. “Why can you never just...I don’t know...not embarrass me?”

“So, that’s a no,” Toshinori kept going, unhindered by Tenko’s mortification. “Wait. Wait, I think I’ve got the winner. How about ‘Five Finger Discount’?”

“You know what? I changed my mind, I’m still not speaking you,” Tenko said, making a break for the exit.

“Aw, come on!” Toshinori reached out and pulled Tenko into another bear hug. “I’m just kidding! You’ll be a great hero no matter what your name is.”

The truth was though, Toshinori’s insistence on the change of a name was only meant half-jokingly. He was happy that Tenko would be carrying Nana’s legacy into a new era of heroism, but he couldn’t shake a gnawing anxiety in his gut. Because, as the hole in his stomach refused to let him forget, there was a villain out there whose potential interest in a hero named ‘Shimura Tenko’ was enough to make the Number One Hero shiver in fear.

#bnha fanfiction #mha fanfiction #bnha fic #mha fic #bnha #secondhand hero #beth writes #im laughing this chapter is literally over 9k

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