Chương 2295: 37
Chapter Text
"Alright, Spurt. What do you think? This one," Izuku held up his cloak — the one most well known for his persona as Snitch, "or this one?" In his other hand was the clawed, dull toned costume he'd only used once before, on the night when he first met Toga.
Izuku held out the two costumes in front of his crustacean friend, eagerly waiting for his answer. Spurt tilted his head to the side, making small noises as he contemplated between the two choices.
A minute or so passed before Spurt made a decision, chittering as he pointed towards the more intimidating, black and grey costume.
"Thanks!" Izuku beamed with joy, quickly moving to his closet to hide his cloak away. When he came back out, he moved to pet Spurt, an action of which the coconut crab tenderly leaned into.
"I'll be gone for the night, so watch my room for me, yeah?"
Spurt chittered in response, clicking his claws to show his understanding.
Izuku went to change into his costume. While doing so, he utilized his bugs to ensure that his dorm mates were asleep. A quick check made from everyone's balconies made quick work in easing his worries, and thus Izuku went to enact his plans.
Over the past few days, a few of his rhinoceros beetles had finally reached full maturity. They were now currently outside of their box, and had been relocated to the area around the entrance to the control room.
A quick thought from Izuku made the beetles get right to work. With the aid of a few fliers, they quickly traveled through the ventilation shaft and into the control room. Once they were inside, they were planted in front of the main console and atop the keyboard, where they set off in rewriting a few things.
The changes that were being made would get rid of a few limitations to Izuku's profile, allowing his I.D. to go unhindered past the school's gates without a digital footprint. He'd be granted easy access in and out, with the staff being none the wiser.
Then there were the cameras, which would be looped to ensure his actions remained unrecorded.
However, there was one snag, and that was that the process would take time. After all, Izuku still needed to wait for the beetles that were slowly tapping away at the computer's keyboard to complete their part of the plan. And so, for now, all Izuku had to do was wait.
"You ready?" QA asked .
Izuku looked at the clock on his desk. 11:35 p.m. It was late, and another quick survey revealed that everybody in the building was still asleep. There was still training the next day, after all. Izuku would just have to deal with the fatigue that he'd no doubt feel from his nightly actions in the morning.
"I think so," Izuku replied. He was fully equipped and in costume, with a few minor additions having been added since the last time. A few utilities were in his belt, to aid both in and out of combat. However, he still wore civilian clothes overtop; a simple hoodie and baggy pants. He'd change out further off from the school.
"Good," QA said. "Good. Have the rope ready?"
Izuku had the spiders retrieve it. The aforementioned rope was a wonderful creation given form by QA's guidance. The rope was made entirely out of spider silk, woven and tightly bound together over the course of the past few days.
It was made alongside some other, smaller strings that were hidden among his costume. Those strings could be used to restrain and/or trip criminals up.
However, while the smaller strings would be carried with Izuku, the rope's use would end on his balcony. After securing the rope, Izuku threw it over the balcony's edge and quietly rappelled down the side of the building. As he reached the ground, he had his bugs lift the rope back up, their efforts bringing it back to his balcony to hide its existence.
"Nice." QA said.
Izuku slowly made his way to one of the school's more discrete — but just as heavily monitored — side entrances.
"No offense," QA began, " but what exactly are you planning to do tonight? The yakuza population fell down years ago, and all you've been doing since then is watching for offshoot branches of them, taking out random petty criminals, and resolving domestic disputes."
"What's wrong with all of that?" Izuku asked. "Besides, I'll be doing the same thing I've been doing for awhile now: patrol."
QA sighed. "If that's what you really want. We aren't going off by train again, are we? I don't exactly want to run in with that stranger-chang— The shapeshifter, I mean."
Izuku had reached the gate by now. Looking around at the various cameras and the thick steel gate, Izuku was still nervous. Taking out his I.D., Izuku placed the piece of plastic over the scanner. It was the moment of truth.
There was a small ding, and the locks of the gate released. Izuku walked through the gate, still tense and ready to run as if he was expecting a teacher to suddenly turn the corner. However, as he walked through without interruption and closed the gate with the same success, he relaxed. He was through.
"You mean Toga?" Izuku asked QA. "She wasn't that bad. She had to run away, after all."
Izuku split his attention, immersing himself with his surroundings as he talked to QA. It was only when he had spread his bugs out that he noticed that he was moving in the opposite direction of where he wanted to go, no doubt a mistake he made due to his conversation with QA. He immediately turned, of course, and set himself back to his bugs, where he caught a glimpse of the few people still out this late, at a time nearing midnight.
There was a diner a mere block away, decently filled despite the late hour. A few individuals were inside, laughing and eating to their hearts' desires.
There was what Izuku presumed was a couple on a nearby rooftop, the two talking as they laid on their backs gazed at the night sky — something that would have been impossible with all the light pollution, if not for the recent actions of some heroes and inventors.
There was a middle aged lady sitting on her balcony, listening to the music of her radio as she stroked her cat.
Some more invasive observations revealed a van filled with young looking adults; there wasn't any smell of drugs in the van, but instead the greasy and familiar smell of fast food. Izuku let them be.
All in all, it was just a usual night in Japan.
"Yeah. But only after that sniper intervened," QA argued. "I'm not saying that you couldn't have beaten her, I'm just saying that you should have seen the sniper." The words brought Izuku back to the present. " They wouldn't have gone unnoticed if you were paying more attention with your bugs."
"That wasn't entirely my fault. The urges that time didn't exactly want me to use bugs." Izuku reminisced over the event, remembering the feeling easily. "It isn't like it matters anymore. Whoever they were, they were just outside my range. And it was dark. And they haven't come back since."
QA sighed. "That's not an excuse, you know. You still could have noticed them long before they shot. Visually, at least. With bugs looking for nearby threats."
"Okay, but still—" There was a click.
Izuku stopped in place, suddenly tense. The faint click of metal shot out just on the edge of his range. And then there was another, originating in a completely different location. If he wasn't being paranoid, and if he was hearing things right…
His thoughts came out as words, slow and steady. "That… It sounded just like—" And then he heard it again. And if it wasn't obvious before, it was now: it was the signature sound of a gun.
"Shit."
Izuku was suddenly all the more aware, and much more motivated to see his surroundings. .
There was a sniper out on the rooftop, the one he had checked out just a moment ago. As it turned out, there wasn't an actual couple stargazing, but a ready sniper and his partner with a scope and the barrel of a sniper aimed right at him.
The same went for the lady on the balcony, who was now speaking into her radio, calmly barking orders to whoever she was speaking to, and pointing her own sniper down at Izuku herself.
And then the bugs picked up similar movements to Izuku's right. Izuku had been walking past the diner as well, and he realized then that they had probably waited until he was just outside it before they had made their move.
The place was almost the same as before, the only difference being how two separate groups had simultaneously stood up and left at the same time, meeting up outside and cautiously gazing in his direction. A quick discrete check revealed badges and guns hidden out of sight and under the first layers of their clothes.
The bugs revealed more. The occupants in the van weren't simple joyriders. Masks were now concealing their faces and protecting their airways, with protective gear becoming a completed set as they reached down under their seats and unfolded their rifles. The driver was slowly making his way towards Izuku, being a simple turn away before he was on the same street as the diner and Izuku.
There were other things as well: a duo of people blocking the next two alleys front and back of Izuku, having come out of the buildings moments prior. And the same for the buildings behind and in front of him, individuals waiting to burst out from the front entrances if he made any sudden movements.
Izuku took a deep breath.
They had set it up perfectly, waiting patiently and as unsuspiciously as possible until he had made it to where he was now, a convergence point to where their trap would be sprung.
A feeling of dread filled Izuku's stomach. It wasn't that he couldn't escape — he was fairly confident that he could, actually. Rather, it was the fact that he didn't want to escape, if doing so meant he would have to enact the few plans that he had. And so, there was only one thing that he could do. And so he did.
"Yeah… Shit."
Izuku darted his eyes back and forth within the room. He was currently chained to the table of an interrogation room, deep within the heart of the police station. He had been taken into police custody a mere hour ago, and had been waiting in the room ever since.
Nobody had entered to talk to him yet, something of which Izuku wasn't sure he was grateful for or not. His hands were currently encased in quirk-suppressing handcuffs, which too were bolted to the table. However, just as he had predicted, they had no effect over him. The bugs he had in his range were giving him an extensive layout of the station unhampered, and provided him with the image of the four individuals staring at him from behind the one way mirror.
Of course, he wasn't going to broadcast the fact that he still had a connection to his bugs. Thus, he'd just have to be careful with his usage of them, and make sure none of the bugs within the station exhibited any strange qualities.
"You could have just attacked them," QA chided. "Your suit is bulletproof, you can trust me on that. I've tested it myself."
"I—!" Izuku instantly silenced himself, having remembered that he currently wasn't alone, at least in the physical sense. He noticed the officers in the other room tense, but as the moments went by and they realized that Izuku wasn't doing anything, they relaxed.
They're police officers, QA! I'm not going to kill them!
"Of course not! But you could've just… significantly maimed them."
What?!? No! That's a horrible idea! Their innocents!
QA sighed. "I suppose."
Izuku sighed as well. "Why didn't I notice them?" he asked himself aloud.
"If it makes you feel any better, we had some help in that department."
Izuku jumped in his seat. The sudden voice had come from officer Tsukauchi, who had somehow appeared in the seat in front of Izuku.
"What the— How did you get there?!" Izuku exclaimed.
"Nice to see you too, Midoriya," Tsukauchi greeted with a carefree smile. "As for how I got here, I've been sitting here the whole time. Ever since you were brought in, actually."
"But you weren't!" Izuku argued.
"Don't get too riled up over it," placated Tsukauchi. "I'm about to explain it to you."
Tsukauchi grabbed a small remote from his coat pocket. A projector emerged from the ceiling above and began to show off an image on the wall to Izuku's right. Izuku turned his head slightly, spotting an image that showed a rough looking man with various tattoos running across his neck, and a mouth that was in a scowl.
"This is Aichi Magamo," Tsukauchi said. "You might not recognize him, but you aided in his arrest a couple years ago. Magamo's quirk allows him to choose a target and make them suddenly lose their train of thought, as well as make them ignore a specific thing. Before, all he focused his quirk on was himself. However, he had potential. And the capabilities of his quirk grew."
Izuku blinked. He was still getting over the fact that a criminal that he had taken down was being used by the cops. But when he thought back, he definitely remembered the moment when he had fought Aichi Megamo. Then his eyes widened in alarm.
"Exactly how long have you known?"
Tsukauchi waved the question off with a gesture. "We'll get back to that later, Midoriya. You wanted to know about Megamo, didn't you?"
Izuku didn't really, not now anyway. The implications had been clear. He mostly understood what happened, and when it had began. "He used his quirk on the idea of 'police force,' didn't he?" Izuku questioned. "That's why I turned around and ended up in your direction."
"Indeed," Tsukauchi confirmed. "And you never noticed the change, did you? Well, not then, anyways. He was waiting for you right outside U.A. You never noticed him; he stood right in front of you and you instantly turned the other way and into the city proper. Just as planned."
"Fucking master-strangers."
"By why is he out?" Izuku asked. "He's a criminal! And you're using him and letting him roam free!"
"We aren't doing any such thing, Midoriya," Tsukauchi refuted. "He's still serving his sentence. He's outside of prison and helping us now because we promised a few years off of his sentence for helping us in this case. He was a bit difficult to work with at first, but he turned very eager the moment we told him that it was you that we wanted him to help bring into custody. So you shouldn't worry. He's going straight back behind bars once we're done with you."
Izuku gulped. "And what exactly are you planning on doing to me? Why are you telling me all of this? Aren't you going to arrest me?"
"On the contrary, Midoriya. We're being transparent with you. We aren't holding any information back. The only thing we ask in return is the cessation of your vigilante activities and the refocusing of your efforts under the guidance of the police force."
Izuku stared at the detective, unmoving and unblinking. "You… what?"
"We're willing to ignore any of your illegal vigilante actions that you have committed in the past. All that requires is you signing up to work under us as a sort of... probationary hero in training, if you will."
"How much do they know?"
Izuku's eyes steeled. "And what evidence, actually, do you have on me being a vigilante? What exactly have I done?"
Izuku was still in the dark. He didn't know how much the police knew about his nightly activities, and he didn't want to give them more than they already had. And if they said they were going to be transparent, Izuku was going to use that to the utmost capability that he could.
"There's plenty that we know of you, Snitch."
And there went any hope that they didn't know of Snitch. Still, there was the off chance that they didn't know of his other activities, like the time when he had fought Toga.
Izuku looked back at Tsukauchi. "How—"
"Yes, we also know about your fight with Himiko Toga. It was our sniper on the rooftops, after all."
"Oh." Izuku replied with little tone in his voice.
"We've known about you for years, Izuku Midoriya." It wasn't Tsukauchi that had spoken that time. Instead, the voice came in through the room's speakers from a burly, middle aged man who had suddenly appeared on the other side of the one way mirror — an appearance that was no doubt the work of Magamo.
"You were quite the mystery at first," the man continued. "All you were was an anonymous voice on the phone calling in to report the activities of the criminal underworld. Quite a selfless thing to do. Then there were the sightings; a cloaked form appearing near the scene and disappearing into the shadows. But in the end, there was still someone out there on the streets using their quirk unlicensed. You, Midoriya, were carrying out heroic duties without a license. In the end, you were still a vigilante."
"So you'd rather that I did nothing?" Izuku asked. "You would rather that I let the villains go free?"
Through his bugs, Izuku saw the man shake his head."Don't get me wrong, Midoriya. We were grateful that someone was targeting the already dying flame that is the Yakuza," his deep voice reverberated through the room. "We've had similar cases to yours, of course. Of people who go out on their own and fight crime. Usually, we let them be as long as they don't get carried away. You were a different case, however."
"You were slippery. You always got away. And not even Eraserhead could corner you, even if it was just for a talk." The man chuckled. "Of course, our indifference towards you change when we learned that you were only a child."
"But how did you figure that out?" Izuku asked.
"The answer's simple. Kage Kawabata."
"He did?" Izuku said in disbelief. "He knew?"
"Indeed," the man said. "He was quite worried for your safety, you know. He told us once he pieced it together himself. It was the year that you had just started middle school. Ever since then, I've had a select few individuals assigned to watching over your well-being."
Izuku remained silent, thinking to himself over what the future held for him. What exactly did the police have planned for him, under their jurisdiction?
"At least they don't find you a villain," QA said, interrupting Izuku's thoughts. "Heroes and the police can be pretty cruel to villains when they're captured and under interrogation."
"We aren't stupid, Midoriya," the man interrupted. "The Safety Commission and myself see potential when it's there. You're resourceful, Midoriya. Competent and powerful as long as you have bugs on hand. We'd be idiots to have an asset such as yourself locked away. Especially since you're just a kid who's trying to do the right thing. But even more so now that All Might is no longer able to go around being the Symbol of Peace."
"The decision of placing you under probation has been made between the HPSC and myself. You'll still be able to attend U.A., as well as use your quirk in fighting villains. The only difference will be your role under our jurisdiction, whether it be during our operations of during more discrete infiltrations."
"The H.P.S.C. and yourself?" Izuku muttered. "Then that means… Your the Commissioner General of the Police Force."
"I am."
Izuku sighed. "I don't have much of a choice, do I? You aren't just going to be letting me go, after all. The only other choices I have are going straight to jail or to slaughter all of you so I can escape."
"Don't say stuff like that out loud!"
The officers nearby were tense, their hands near their weapons if need be. Just outside, his bugs noticed Officer Asano become engulfed in flames, ready to burst into the interrogation room if need be.
Izuku sighed, resigned to his fate. "I accept, Commissioner General."
The commissioner had a relieved look on his face. "That's good. I'm glad that we've come to this without doing anything that any of us would regret. However, don't think of this as punishment, Midoriya. In fact, I actually find your determination and devotion to your actions quite remarkable. Something to be rewarded."
"Nonetheless," the commissioner continued, "I can't let your actions continue as be. I've already given you three chances. The first you lost after U.S.J. The second not but a few days later during you fight with Toga. And you used the last one today, when you rewrote U.A.'s internal systems to allow yourself to get off campus undetected."
Izuku gulped. "I… understand, commissioner general."
The man narrowed his eyes. "I don't think you do. The problem isn't you taking out villains and criminals. The problem is that you're a danger to yourself."
"Myself…?"
"It's barely been a few weeks since you got out of the hospital, Midoriya. You did the same thing right after U.S.J. And you got attacked by Himiko Toga as a result. You could have died if it wasn't for our intervention."
"Yeah right. You had that handled."
"We simply want what's best for you. And letting you roam the streets taking down villains isn't that."
"Izuku nodded. "I'll ... consider that. I'll try to be more careful in the future."
"Good. We don't want another incident like your kidnapping, after all. Go ahead and uncuff him, Tsukauchi. Lead him to his debrief."
With the eyes of his bugs, Izuku saw the Commissioner General leaving. A jolt of fear rang through Izuku then and there.
"Wait!!"
Tsukauchi, who was already halfway through removing Izuku's second cuff, paused. The others on the other side of the mirror stopped moving too, as well as did the commissioner general. The middle aged man eventually made his way back to the microphone.
"Yes, Midoriya?" the commissioner asked warily.
"I…" Izuku hesitated. "It's just… You haven't told my mom yet, have you?"
The commissioner paused. "We were going to contact her after this talk. That's where I was going, actually."
"Oh…" Izuku muttered. "I… Can you… not inform her, please?"
Izuku's bugs showed the obvious mix of confusion and suspicion on the commissioner's face.
Izuku didn't waste a second, lest he lose the man's attention. "I promise that I'll follow all your orders without question! Whatever they are, it doesn't matter! It's just…" Izuku sighed. "I don't want to worry her anymore than I already have. She's already all worked up after everything I've been through."
The commissioner's mouth drew into a thin line. He didn't speak a word, and the silence went on for a whole minute. Izuku was just on the edge of losing hope when the man spoke up.
"I suppose we can find some leeway with that." The commissioner then left.
Izuku let out a relieved sigh. Tsukauchi continued uncuffing Izuku, and soon Izuku was free.
"I gotta hand it to you, Midoriya," Tsukauchi said, "you've got quite a backbone on you. I wouldn't even stand up to the Commissioner General like you did. Plus, you didn't even show a hint of fear throughout the entire interrogation.
"I mean, you showed uncertainty and caution, but nothing close to fear or panic. It was unlike what I expected from a kid your age being in this situation." Tsukauchi shrugged his sholders. "Then again, this is you I'm talking about."
Izuku slowly stood up from his chair. He did so while massaging his arms, said limbs being a bit sore after the extended period of time they had spent encased in cuffs. Izuku then looked towards Tsukauchi.
"What's on your mind?" the detective asked.
"Why you?" Izuku asked.
Tsukauchi raised an eyebrow. "Huh?"
"Why were you the one who was in here with me?"
Tsukauchi blinked. And then he laughed. "You're a strange kid, Midoriya. Is that really the first question you're going to ask me?"
Izuku continued to look on.
"Well," Tsukauchi began, "we know each other, don't we? The guys up top thought that I'd be best to talk to you since I know you."
"But I barely even know you."
"Ah," Tsukauchi pointed a finger out," that may be true. But another aspect that influenced who got to be here with you was the amount of officers who didn't really want to be in the same room as you. And I'd like to think understand you, at least a little bit. I don't expect to suddenly turn violent and start attacking me."
Izuku tilted his head. "And is that why officer Asano is currently cloaked in fire and waiting just outside the door?"
Tsukauchi groaned. "Of course she is."
Notes:
And there we are. A bit of a turn in the story's events, but it's one I've been planning for a while. Thoughts?
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