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Chapter Text

Being a father was harder than it looked.

Being a single father to a deeply traumatized little girl was much harder. Two years after the great war, Shouta Aizawa was still trying to piece together what was left of his students (and of himself) into something that functioned.

Just six more months until they graduate…

The teacher thought anxiously about his kids who had been forced to become soldiers. Winning the war didn’t erase the scars of battle. No one knew that better than he did. The missing smiles on Kaminari’s and Uraraka’s faces reminded him of it every single day.

Don’t dwell on it. The damage is already done…

All he could do now was patch up the traumas of dozens of children and protect what was left of his own child’s childhood.

Has her anemia improved?

In the waiting room of the only clinic that didn’t trigger his daughter’s anxiety attacks, Shouta sat patiently for her pediatric appointment. At his side, Eri was quietly reading her first book with more words than pictures.

At least she’s making good progress…

More than developing his own combat style or losing parts of his body, re-socializing her had been the hardest thing he had ever done. Dedicating every free and occupied moment of the last years to her, teaching her to read, to trust, and to smile. That was the great battle of the hero.

She looks so… okay.

The sight of the little girl with her long white hair tied up like Princess Leia was cute, at the very least. Letting her watch Star Wars with his best friend had forced him into a Darth Vader costume, and now his daughter only wanted to wear double buns.

Will Dr. Samito take her off the meds?

“Daddy.” Eri’s small voice pulled his attention. His little girl was discreetly glancing at a woman with bluish-black hair. She wore a white blouse with a blue floral print and a long white skirt, smiling as she sipped coffee and chatted with a nurse. “Is that lady a princess?”

Don’t stare.

“No, kid.” The young woman had a sweet smile, and everything about her screamed rich. Extraordinarily proper. The kind of girl his naïve little brother would fall hopelessly in love with, and the kind of girl he himself had saved in dark alleys hundreds of times. Aizawa turned his eyes away from the woman and back to his child. “She’s just a lady…”

Though she does look a bit like that one who pretends to be a man…

“But she’s so pretty!” The way Eri whispered softly was adorable. His child pointed to Mulan on the cover of her Fairy Tales for Brave Girls. “How can she not be a princess?”

“Princess is a title of nobility, Eri…” The adult forced himself not to repeat the same headache he’d had ever since his little girl told the other kids at school that the Tooth Fairy wasn’t real. “It’s a political role—it has nothing to do with beauty…”

Eri closed her book and rested her head on her arm. A smile almost tugged at his lips, but the sad little voice of his daughter caught his attention.“I wish I could marry a princess…”

What did she just say?

“Marry?” Aizawa glanced at the child as she nibbled her snack. Just two years ago, Eri didn’t even know what father, Christmas, or music meant. He tried to slowly process his little girl’s words. “Where did you learn that?”

Don’t look surprised, or she’ll just get confused .

“In Disney movies!” Eri sipped her orange juice and nibbled the fruit slices he secretly sprinkled with strawberry-flavored whey protein. “Princesses always get married at the end of every happy ending.”

Not exactly progressive…

“Eri, sweetheart…” He tried to rationalize, thinking of what more experienced parents said to eight-year-old girls. “People get married when they love each other, when they respect each other, and when they’re adults .” Aizawa tried a small smile and rested his hand on top of her head. “You don’t need to think about that right now, okay?”His daughter crossed her arms and pouted. “But I wanna marry a princess…”

Wait a second…

The adult rewound the entire conversation in his mind, connecting the dots.

Princesses = girls.

“Do you, now?” He brushed a bit of her bangs out of her eyes, and she smiled at him, mouth full of strawberry. “Yes! They’re pretty, kind, and brave. Like Mulan!” He squinted at his little girl and fought back an idiotic grin. Eri pointed to the wallpaper on his emergency phone. “And there’s She-Ra too. I wanna marry Adora…”

Jirou and Momo would love to hear this…

Aizawa thought of his students who had been dating for nearly two years. “Alright then, in about…” He quickly calculated how long it would take Eri to hit at least twenty-five, graduate college, and find a job. “…sixteen years, you can marry a…”His girl looked up at him expectantly with her red eyes. “…a princess.”

At least it’s not a boy…

“Eri Matsuri…” The nurse’s voice calling her name made him exhale deeply. His little girl pouted at hearing the surname from her biological family instead of Aizawa. “That doesn’t mean anything…” He helped her tuck her book and pink bento box into her purple sequined backpack. “Don’t be nervous, we like Dr. Samito, remember?”

“I remember…” she whispered, holding his hand. The nurse in teddy bear scrubs pointed toward the old examination room number 7 as he guided his child to the pediatrician.“Daddy…” Her voice stopped him in front of the door. Her eyes met his, and the adult tried to look reassuring.  “It’s okay, Eri. I’m with you…”His little girl swallowed hard, then gave him a gentle tap on the top of his head. “I’m with you and you’re with me and…” He crouched to her level, locking eyes with her, waiting for her to repeat the promise he’d made years ago. She whispered softly, staring at the doorknob: “And we take care of each other…”

Good girl…

“Exactly.” Aizawa hugged his daughter and tried not to imagine all the things she had been put through at the hands of a monster who called himself a doctor. “You don’t need to be afraid. You’re brave girl and I’m right here with you.”

Chapter Text

Megumi Takatani loved her job.

It wasn’t exactly a surprise that she went into medicine after growing up with Doctor Barbie dolls, sleeping in the back of ER call rooms while her surgeon mother worked, and tagging along to countless neurology wards and conferences with her father.

Girl, 8 years old, -1 percentile. Short stature…

What was a surprise was that the girl whose could manipulate physiological states, who had been the most outstanding student in her entire class, and whose father expected her to inherit his neurorehabilitation clinic - fell in love with the single lowest-paying specialty in medicine.

Delayed growth and iron-deficiency anemia.

The doctor’s eyes skimmed quickly through the history of her newest little patient. Nothing in the world made her happier than a quiet day seeing children who weren’t at risk of dying immediately.

Samito was still treating her with iron sulfate, poor kid…

Her head ached at the thought of her predecessor’s inadequate choices, and she silently prayed that this little girl wasn’t still dealing with stomach pains. Adjusting her stethoscope around her neck, Takatani exhaled slowly.

Better check how I look…

She jogged to the bathroom of her over-the-top-colorful Montessori-style office in the fancy clinic where she’d just been hired, and stared at her reflection.

No dead face- otherwise the moms will take their kids back to the pediatrician who prescribes garbage meds for anemic kids.

Megumi was relieved to see her overnight ER shift hadn’t completely wrecked her. She quickly twisted her nearly black, blue-tinged hair into a bun- enough to look like a specialist pediatrician, not a girl who had just turned twenty-eight last week.

Something’s off… they should’ve been in here already.

It was unusual for a patient to be late. Parents did not skip appointments at these overpriced clinics. Tucking her bangs behind her ear, she was about to head for the door when they finally appeared.

Well, that’s unexpected…

Her eyes immediately landed on a little girl with pale bluish-white hair and ridiculously adorable eyes, clinging to the waist of a man dressed head-to-toe in black. Long dark hair, exhaustion written all over his face- the kind that would make her mother’s surgery residents look like fitness models.

A father…

Fathers almost never came to pediatric appointments - and when they did, it was usually to call their wives for basic info about their kid. Megumi swallowed down her bad experiences with men, sick children, and men caring for sick children, and forced a smile. “Hey! I’m-”

“Papa, is that lady a princess?” The little girl whispered, looking up at her guardian. Princess was about to join the long list of cutesy nicknames kids had given her over the years. Megumi caught the man’s quiet reply: “No, baby girl. What did we talk about?”

That boosted her self-esteem by at least 30%.

“You’re not Dr. Samito.” Before Megumi could even speak, the man turned to face her. He looked at her with narrowed eyes, cold and sharp - the same way her mother looked at pancreatic cancers that would kill her patients, or the way her brother looked at literally anything when he was pissed off.

Okay…

“No…” she answered carefully, stepping aside so they could enter her office. “My name is Takatani. Megumi.” She smiled, watching the man carry the child’s backpack himself. Oddly uncomfortable. “Unfortunately, Dr. Samito no longer works at this clinic…”

He doesn’t even work anymore. God rest his soul…

“We’re not seeing the doctor?” The little girl had a faint strawberry stain on her shirt. The man’s beard was growing in, and Megumi couldn’t ignore the fact that he was wearing combat boots. “No, sweetheart, we’re going home.” He didn’t even bother pretending to be polite - just like her father. “Sorry for your…” His eyes ran over her from head to toe, and he sighed, exhausted. “…time.”

Patients don’t have to like the doctor. But the doctor is always obligated to care for the patient.

Her father’s words echoed in her head. For all the things she disagreed with him about, he hadn’t earned the title “Dr. Takatani” for nothing (and she was still 50% him). Megumi took a step closer, summoning all her diplomatic energy.“Look, I understand you probably liked Dr. Samito…”

“That’s not the point,” the man cut her off, and Megumi bit the inside of her cheek to keep from snapping back. “It’s not about liking him. He knew my daughter’s case, and we trusted him.”

God, why do adults even exist?!

Pediatricians were supposed to be sweet and cuddly. At least that was the general reputation. But what Megumi had learned in her nearly thirty years immersed in medicine was the opposite: pediatricians weren’t saints who loved children. They were doctors who hated dealing with adults. And nothing was harder than dealing with parents.

Okay. He just wants to protect his kid. Be empathetic…

“Sir…” she looked at him expectantly.  “Aizawa.” He said it flatly, calculating her every inch.
“All right. That’s fine.” His expression softened, and she saw the kind of exhaustion that only mirrored her darkest residency nights. “I’ll look for Dr. Samito wherever he’s practicing now…”

Why is he so damn cautious?

She reflected for a moment. Few parents—mother or father - ever came off this protective and distrustful.

Dr. Samito saved my life, and even my dad didn’t really like him…

Maybe Aizawa-san respects him because they operate the same way?

Or maybe he’s just one of those people who only trusts old doctors who haven’t read a single new article in the last fifteen years?

Megumi spiraled into rationalizations until the image of him walking out of her office jolted her back. “Aizawa-san…” She hurried after him as he turned away, holding his daughter’s hand - both of them raising an eyebrow at her at the same time.

Identical…

She blinked hard, her eyes drifting to the little girl for a moment. Then, unwillingly, they slid to her Stanford diploma - the one the clinic’s owner (and her lifelong pediatrician, now retired) had proudly hung in the lobby against her will. Megumi thought carefully about how to phrase it. The man inhaled, and then she heard him say, in English: “He died, didn’t he?”

He’s smart...

“Stroke…” she answered, the child watching them with innocent confusion. “I’m sorry, Aizawa-san.” Megumi felt the weight of her colleague’s death settle again, mirrored in the father’s reaction. Aizawa dragged his hand down over his face, muttering. His sarcasm reminded her of her angriest neurology residents - arrogant, bitter, and at the edge - just like her father. “ Wonderful… ”

Okay… what would Dr. Samito say right now?

“If it helps,” she said, glancing at the girl and noticing her skin looked just a little too pale, “I’ve got free iron samples that won’t upset her stomach…”

Appease anxious parents with supplements. Megumi, this is pediatrics 101.

“Eri, sweetheart.” The man sighed and crouched to his daughter’s level. The change in his tone was startling. How could someone be this cold and this tender at the same time? It was paradoxical. “Would it be all right if Dr. Takatani takes care of you?”

It always works!

At barely 5’2” and forced to wear business clothes just to be taken seriously, Megumi was hardly intimidating. But the way Eri half-hid behind Aizawa’s leg told her more than she wanted to know. “I don’t know, Papa…”

Oh my God, I love kids.

And kids were her patients. Her whole life revolved around them. Megumi stepped back into her office, leaving the door open.
“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” she asked, already bracing for the father’s cold voice. “She doesn’t like doctors.”

Nobody does.

“Ahhh, that’s okay then…” Megumi took off her white coat and hung it by the door. So much for looking serious. “Good thing I’m a different kind of doctor…” She let her dark-blue hair down and leaned against the teddy bear-covered exam table.

“Different?” the little girl asked reluctantly as they walked in. “Yeah, see, people usually go to doctors when they’re sick and stuff…” Megumi smiled as the man quietly closed the door. Eri sat down at the toy tea table, and her father lowered himself onto the floor beside her. “…And doctors do things that hurt them.”

She would absolutely hate meeting the Great Heartless Surgeon, Aya Takatani…

“Sometimes they do,but just when patients need it.” Megumi picked up the chart from her desk and slipped off her Miu Miu heels (her brother had mocked her for being prissy when she bought them). “But I’m a pediatrician.”

“Pediatrician?” Eri tilted her head, pigtails making her look like Pucca. Megumi’s eyes fell on the toy vegetable set she used to teach new moms about nutrition. “Yeah. We’re more like gardeners, really.”

Pediatrics, literally cultivating children…

“Papa, what’s a gardener?” Eri asked, pretending to pour tea into a toy cup, her father pretending to drink. “It’s someone who plants things, Eri.” The little girl beamed, pointing at the bamboo shoot on Megumi’s desk. “Aaaaah, like making little plants grow?!”

Pretend play. Make associations. Rationalize. Psychomotor development: okay.

“Exactly!” Megumi grabbed a framed photo of the first baby she ever delivered during residency and sat beside her tiny unicorn-horned patient. “See? When a baby is born, we’re there for them, and then we keep taking care of them as they grow…”She flipped to another photo, sent to her by the same boy years later - grinning at his first soccer class. “Just like planting bamboo…”

Okay, that could actually go in a med school textbook…

“Like my daddy?” Eri smiled, staring at the baby photo for a long moment. Dr. Takatani glanced at the grumpy man, and he sighed. “I’m a teacher…”

Unexpected again.

“Well, you could say that, yeah.” Megumi felt his intense eyes on her, but she was here to care for the child—pleasing the cranky adult was just collateral. She pulled the burgundy stethoscope from her neck and held it out to the little unicorn-girl. “So, Eri… will you let me be your pediatrician?”

Chapter Text

As a rule, Aizawa didn’t like sweet people.

Especially if the sweet people in question weren’t:

1. Eri.
2. One of his students.
3. His dead best friend, Oboro Shirakumo. 

Being sweet never led anyone anywhere other than straight to imminent death. But apparently, it had led Dr. Takatani to sit barefoot with Eri on the floor of the goddamn clinic where every rich family in the city brought their kids.

Graduated at Brazil. Residency in Stanford…

“Can I be your pediatrician?” The woman with dark blue-black hair and bangs smiled at his daughter and handed her what had to be a ridiculously expensive stethoscope. “Are you gonna give me shots?” The scared tone in his kid’s voice made him tie his hair back. If she lost control and rewound this too-sweet pediatrician, the court would never give him full custody. “Actually, I’m just going to talk to your dad while we have some tea.” Dr. Takatani poured some imaginary tea without taking her eyes off his kid. “And then we’ll play doctor, okay?”

She must’ve read every single one of those boring positive-education books…

“Okay!” Eri smiled, and somehow, God knows from where, the doctor pulled out cookies in jars. Dr. Takatani opened one and glanced at him. “Would you like coffee or tea?”

She’s a doctor. Why is she asking if she can serve me tea?

“No.” His answer made Eri frown at him the same way she always did when he was too blunt without realizing it. He exhaled and tried not to sound so antisocial. “But thank you.”

Great. My kid’s turning me into a pushover…

“Alright, tell me, Aizawa-san…” He watched the woman glance quickly at the chart. She looked far too young to be a doctor—much less a specialist. “Her last appointment was three months ago.” But something in her tone and posture told him she wasn’t clueless. “How has she been these past few months?”

Don’t be prejudiced. People don’t think I look like a hero either…

“She…” He rewound the past few weeks in his mind. “She caught a cold about three weeks ago…” The doctor’s face didn’t shift—just jotting down notes and smiling at his kid. “Did she need the ER or hospitalization?”

Thank God, no…

“No.” He answered and felt Eri squeeze his arm. Just imagining his superpowered little girl terrified in a hospital was enough to send shivers down his spine. “Daddy took care of me at home! He made me drink medicine-tea.”

Shit. Pediatricians always expect there to be a mom.

“It was one of those over-the-counter cold ones…” The doctor looked at him, and for the first time, Aizawa felt a flicker of discomfort. “I see.” Her tone had none of the judgment he was used to. “And do you still feel tired, sweetheart?” Dr. Takatani examined his daughter’s hands and eyes carefully, without scaring her. “Like when you try to run?”

Now that I think about it…

Eri didn’t answer. He saw her biting the inside of her cheek. Aizawa remembered her playing hide-and-seek with Mirio and running from Bakugou. “She tires easily and gets sleepy. Which is frustrating because she’s been on iron therapy for over a year now…”

She should be better by now, shouldn’t she?

“Well…” If Dr. Takatani smiled sweetly at him again, Aizawa was going to tear his own hair out. “Treating kids with ferrous sulfate is complicated . Too many doses, stomach pain, and compliance is difficult.”

I literally watch her take it every morning and night…

“Compliance?” He processed the word slowly, and then the penny dropped. “Eri… are you taking your medicine at school?”

I should’ve caught this.

“It’s okay, we’re here to help…” The doctor casually slid a cookie toward his daughter. Eri looked up at him with those red eyes and made him feel like the shittiest father alive. “No, daddy. It hurts. ”

Great. I’m such a fantastic dad…

“Eri…” Exhaustion weighed on him, but the way she looked at him made it impossible to be mad. “Okay. What matters is that you were honest.” His little girl whispered, “I’m sorry.”

Samito didn’t catch this?

“It’s okay, Eri. No problem. The important thing is telling the truth.” The doctor’s tone said she’d seen this coming. “We’ll switch medications, and I’ll give you a list of iron-rich recipes for her.” Aizawa rubbed his eyes, bone-tired. “Alright, Doc.”

At least now she’ll grow up healthier…

“Perfect! See, Eri, this is the most important part of being a doctor.” The doctor stood and grabbed a brown medical case from her desk. Eri eyed it warily. “Talking is the most important part?”

This woman’s doing more for her than two years of Samito ever did…

“A good conversation solves 80% of diagnoses…” The young woman bit into a cookie. Something told him his daughter would never fear doctors again—not after Megumi Takatani. His kid leaned into him and whispered, “Daddy, is that a high percentage?”

At least she calls me daddy now…

“It’s 4 out of 5, Eri.” He answered, realizing he needed to brush up on her math skills. “We studied fractions, remember?”

Should I get her a tutor?

“Aizawa-san.” The woman pointed to the exam table, and he instantly understood what she meant. “Would you sit there, please?”

Why is she so polite? It’s unsettling…

“Of course.” He obeyed. She gestured toward a stepstool. “Eri, sweetheart, could you bring that over for me?”

Isn’t that heavy?

He watched anxiously, but his girl rolled it over with ease. “It’s important to encourage children’s independence…” The irritating doctor whispered as she observed his daughter. He muttered “ I know .”

Not like it’s easy either…

“Here you go, Doctor…” The way Eri seemed at ease with her was a miracle in itself. She climbed up the stepstool, and Takatani showed her a reflex hammer and a tuning fork. “My dad’s a doctor too. He takes care of this.” She tapped her own forehead. “The brain and the nerves.”

Nepobaby…

“The nerves?” His daughter tilted her head. Aizawa brushed her cheek gently. “Neurologist, baby girl.” Dr. Takatani moved in front of them, her bangs making her look strangely young. He forced his mind blank and observed silently. “My dad taught me to do a physical exam when I was your age. I’ll show you with your dad, and then you’ll let me do it on you, deal?”

Okay, she doesn’t seem incompetent…

Just excessively nice.

“You learned at my age?” Eri toyed with the tools, wide-eyed. The doctor’s hair had that dark blue sheen, almost black like his. Megumi smiled softly. “I started young…” Aizawa brushed Eri’s bangs out of her eyes. “Just like you with your guitar.”

Right. I can’t forget her recital next month…

The doctor’s eyes flicked to him. She held a second stethoscope, cautious. Her gaze darted between the child and him. He knew exactly what she was asking. “You want me to…?” He tugged at his long-sleeve shirt. “If it helps, sure.” He pulled off his black shirt and saw her glance away. “Okay.”

At least I’m getting a free check-up…

“Look, Eri.” He turned to the side as the doctor guided his daughter up the stool. “I’ll put this here on your dad’s back so we can hear his lungs…” Her hand brushed his hair gently aside. “Excuse me.” The cold stethoscope pressed against his skin at several points. He forced himself not to flinch. “All clear, your dad’s lungs are fine!”

Good thing I quit smoking…

“Cool…” Eri still looked cautious but curious. “Your turn.” Aizawa winked at her as the doctor pointed to spots on his back. “We listen up here, in the middle, and down low.” Eri pressed the diaphragm carefully against him. “Like a wind instrument!”

God, this little girl loves music so much…

“Deep breath, please.” The doctor instructed, and he complied. “It’s louder down low!” Eri announced, cheeks red with excitement. “That’s right, you have a good ear.” The doctor’s praise made her beam. “It’s because I go to an Arts school…”

“I’ve never had a patient grow up and turn into a rockstar. Maybe you’ll be the first.” The doctor smiled at his daughter. Eri fidgeted, swinging her little feet. “A rockstar who plays in the Philharmonic?!”

At least now she has dreams…

“The Philharmonic’s cool…” the doctor answered, giving his daughter space. He watched the two interact in silence. “Now, the heart.” Her voice made him turn his head, just in time to see the doctor tuck a bit of her hair behind her ear and avert her gaze from his body. Discreet as hell. Under different circumstances, that might’ve earned her a smirk. “Okay, Eri, we do the same thing, but in the front…”

Why does she act like she’s got all the time in the world?

“We find this little bone right in the middle.” Tiny fingers tapped against his sternum, and Aizawa ignored the fact that the pretty doctor probably found him attractive. “And use it as a guide…”

“And what do we hear, Doctor?” His daughter leaned in with the kiddie stethoscope still hanging around her neck. “tum-ta-tum-ta”

“Like a drum?” Eri asked, while the doctor pressed the stethoscope to her ears and nodded. “Like a drum…” Aizawa sat silently, watching his girls interact.

She’s so damn good at this…

“Excuse me…” Her endless politeness was going to kill him. “Go ahead, Dr. Takatani.” He felt her fingers carefully trace the line of his collarbone, ignoring the shiver that shot down his spine. “Here, sweetheart.” She showed Eri four different points on his chest, letting the child touch him with her own little fingers. “Why four?”

Don’t get distracted by the cute, child-whisperer doctor…

“Each spot lets us hear a different part of the heart, Eri.” The doctor pressed the cold metal to his chest and closed her eyes. Aizawa watched the so-called princess his daughter had pointed out earlier breathe slowly, listening to his heartbeat. Calm face, gentle hands, razor-sharp mind.

Don’t think about it. Don’t look at her.

Dr. Takatani auscultated all four points, while Eri watched her, mesmerized, like the woman was performing magic. For a split second, Aizawa had to fight the urge to brush away the fringe falling into her eyes. 

Don’t think about it…

The intrusive thought shook him, and he forced his focus back to his daughter. “Interesting…” Takatani’s voice snapped him right back into the trap that was this doctor. “Eri, your turn.”

Her little fingers are starting to callus… 

She said interesting? 

“Okay…” His daughter took the stethoscope from her and slipped it into her ears. “Here, sweetheart.” Takatani pointed just below his heart, and Aizawa almost smiled at the way his little girl beamed. Eri pressed the chestpiece against him and squeezed her red eyes shut.

Adorable…

The pediatrician studied his daughter with that intense look. He’d been a teacher long enough to know when someone genuinely loved children, and a hero long enough to know who was harmless.

Definitely harmless.

“It goes tum-tum-ta!” His kid squinted at the doctor suspiciously. “Not tum-ta-tum-ta.”

“You’ve got great ears…” She looked genuinely impressed. Eri’s cheeks flushed red, and Aizawa processed that brand-new bit of intel about his daughter. The doctor glanced at him cautiously. “Your daddy’s heart skips beats sometimes. Extra beats, you know?”

Skips beats? Like an arrhythmia?

“Is that bad?” Aizawa glanced from his daughter to the young doctor. “It’s more common than people think, but I’ll give you a referral to a cardiologist, alright?” She scribbled on a pad, and his head started to pound. “Fine…” Dying was the last thing he needed right now. His students still had to graduate. He had a daughter to raise.

One more damn thing to deal with…

“My turn?” There was almost excitement in his naturally cautious little girl’s voice. “It is, sweetheart.” The doctor smiled and held out her hand to help him down from the exam table. Aizawa gave her a look, and she seemed to remember he was a grown man, not an invalid. “Sorry. Force of habit.”

So gentle…                                                                                                                                                                  Did nobody ever be mean to her?

“No problem.” He slipped his shirt back on, fighting the urge to help Eri up onto the table, watching her climb the stepstool by herself. “Eri, can you take your jacket, please?” The doctor’s voice gave him chills. Aizawa thought about warning her, but the smile on his daughter’s face made him dread dragging that nightmare back up. “Yes, doctor.”

Shit. I should’ve warned her about…

When Eri took off her red jacket, his throat closed. He saw the doctor’s smile vanish the instant she caught sight of the dozens of scars lacing his daughter’s skin. His temples throbbed. “Doctor…”

She might take this the wrong way.

The doctor turned toward him, and time froze. The smile was gone, replaced by a calculated, icy calm meant to hide panic from a child’s eyes. And her eyes—amber-brown, almost golden—were brimming with fear.

Fuck. Of course she’d think that…

“I can explain…” The words came out wrong. “Excuse me, Eri.” The woman interrupted, lifting his daughter’s skirt slightly, revealing more scars across her leg. From across the room, he saw the doctor’s trembling hand close around a tuning fork.

No time for subtlety. Aizawa knew exactly what this looked like. “Dr. Takatani…” He froze as she quickly lifted his kid’s shirt. His stomach lurched violently. Across his daughter’s abdomen was a massive purple bruise. A massive purple bruise that hadn’t been there this morning . “Eri!”

Where the hell did that come from?!

Before he could move, the pediatrician touched her fingers gently to his daughter’s forehead. Eri collapsed instantly into her arms. Aizawa’s chest seized with terror. “What did you do to her?!”

She knocked her out with one touch?

“Doctor. This is a misunderstanding.” His Quirk triggered on instinct, fear flooding his system. The doctor clutched his unconscious daughter to her chest and bolted for the back of the office, trembling as she leveled a metal instrument at him. “STAY BACK!”

Why isn’t my eraser working? 

Chapter Text

There was no time to react.

Before he could take a single step toward his daughter, the pediatrician gently touched her forehead. Eri collapsed in her arms. Unconscious. Aizawa swallowed down the terror clawing at his chest. “What did you do to her?”

She knocked her out with a touch?

“Doctor, this is a misunderstanding.” His Quirk triggered involuntarily, and he felt fear rushing through his body. The doctor scooped his unconscious daughter into her arms and bolted to the back of the office, trembling as she pointed a metal instrument at him.
“Stay back!”

Why the hell isn’t my Quirk working?!

The way her eyes shone, shielding his daughter with her body, was familiar. Far too familiar. Just like he had done a hundred times before. Aizawa raised his hands slowly, cautiously. “I know what this looks like, but you have to trust me.” His tone was firm, and the woman clutching his child to her chest, holding a tuning fork like a weapon, stood her ground. “Doctor, I’m not the one who hurt her.”

If Erasure didn’t activate, then she’s not using her Quirk on Eri right now…

“I said back!” The woman lowered the tuning fork but hugged Eri even tighter, shielding the girl’s head against her neck.“Don’t move!”

If child services misunderstand this, I could lose her.

“This is a misunderstanding. Give me my daughter.” Their eyes locked, hers darting briefly toward the door. “Doctor. Hand her to me, and we can talk this through—”

She’s a civilian. I can’t hurt her…

It didn’t work. The woman sprinted toward the door. Instinctively, Aizawa grabbed her by the waist. “Help!”

Damn it, she’s just doing her job.

“Shit.” He released her immediately, watching her freeze in place, arms locked tight around his child sleeping peacefully against her shoulder. “What did you do to Eri?” His calm, dry tone made her stumble two steps back. Megumi was panting, her brown eyes—sharp, intelligent, brave—filled with terror.

She doesn’t have a defensive Quirk, or she would’ve struck back already…

The door burst open suddenly. The receptionist and a tall nurse rushed in. The man looked between the doctor and Aizawa, horrified.“Aizawa-san! Dr. Takatani?! What—?”

Her Quirk… is it like Kayama-senpai’s? Can she drug people? Why isn’t it working on me?

“It’s okay!” The receptionist, who already knew them, ran toward the doctor. “Dr. Takatani, we can explain! Eri—”

“Undo what you did.” The hero barked at the doctor, but Takatani didn’t look the least bit convinced of his innocence.
“I put her to sleep!” Her sharp, angry voice made his jaw tighten. “What did you do to her!?” Takatani’s tone was the firm edge of someone who had already seen too much.

“I didn’t do anything.” His answer was calm. Rationally, he knew this woman wouldn’t hurt him—or his daughter. There was no way. The way she shook, the way she shielded his daughter, her stance—it was obvious she was no fighter. “Liar!” she yelled.

“Oh doctor, I’m so sorry.” The receptionist rushed to her side and gave Aizawa an apologetic look. “My apologies, Aizawa-san. We forgot to explain the situation to her…”

How the hell do you forget something like that?

His head throbbed as he took a deep breath. He couldn’t even be angry with her. He would’ve done the same. The tall nurse stepped closer to the woman, gently placing a hand on her shoulder. “Doctor, it’s okay. This is a misunderstanding.”

What a disaster.

“What?!” Her eyes darted down to the girl in her arms, hands trembling violently. Aizawa stepped closer. “Eri…” Megumi turned to him, stupidly brave. He swallowed hard and gave her everything he could offer. “My daughter grew up in the Yakuza. She was used as an experiment by villains, and…” His words, each one tearing into his own soul, drained the color from the young doctor’s face. “They hurt her…”The hero focused on the face of his little girl, smiling faintly in her sleep on the woman’s shoulder. “We saved her. Now she lives with me. I take care of her. She’s safe now… ”

Safe and sound.  

“What?” She sobbed, covering her eyes with her hands.“She’s safe now…” He moved toward the doctor cautiously. She didn’t step back, but she also didn’t release his child from her arms. “Takatani.”The hero stepped closer, and her eyes finally met his.  “Eri 's safe now. You can give her back to me.”

What has this woman seen?

“I’m sorry.” The doctor said, looking into his eyes—but something told him those words weren’t meant for him. She hiccupped as she slowly handed his daughter back into his arms. “I’m so sorry.”

Damn…

Shouta wrapped his girl tightly against his chest and felt the immediate relief that only the strong heartbeat of Eri and the faint smell of strawberry shampoo in her white-blue hair could bring. In his arms, his little girl slept, blissfully unaware of everything.

Where the hell did that bruise come from?

“Doctor, it’s okay.” The receptionist handed the woman a glass of water. Megumi stood in silence at the corner of the lobby, her eyes locked, fixed on him. The clinic worker gave him a gentle look and an almost apologetic smile. “Aizawa-san, let’s wait for her to wake up in the infirmary.”

Being an adult woman was hard.

Being an adult woman in a man’s world was hard.

Avoidant and anxious behavior.

Being an adult woman in a man’s world, with a quirk she couldn’t use, was hard.

Scars on limbs.

Being an adult woman in a man’s world, with a quirk she couldn’t use, whose job was to swear to protect and guarantee the physical and psychological integrity of children—was hard as hell.

Ecchymosis on the abdomen…

Megumi wanted to believe the hero who looked just as terrified as she felt. She really did. But ten years of working with people had taught her to hope for the best while expecting the worst.

Avoidant and anxious behavior, scars on limbs, ecchymosis on the abdomen…

Sitting beside the little girl who reminded her of unicorns from fairy tales, the young pediatrician replayed everything she had seen in the last thirty minutes inside her head. Every detail, every judgment, every movement. She tried with all her might to be the responsible doctor who saved children—not a frightened girl acting on impulse. Not again.

Stay calm. She’s okay. She’s safe…

The words  ‘yakuza, used as an experiment, hurt’ spun around her mind. Megumi knew her quirk had only placed the child into a deep sleep, that the little girl next to her was dreaming good dreams.

Deep down she knew the fact that this child had gone through hell at such a young age wasn’t in her control.
That being smaller than most children, the result of the physiological stress she’d been subjected to, wasn’t in her control.
That the father she had just accused of physically abusing the child he had rescued would probably never forgive her for such a gross misjudgment— was also not in her control.

Normal heartbeat. Normal oxygen. Normal blood pressure…

Even if Eri smiled in her sleep, even if nothing was under her control and she told herself over and over it wasn’t her fault—Megumi Takatani couldn’t stop trembling.

She’s okay.

She checked the girl’s pulse once again. Megumi didn’t know everything Eri had suffered. She didn’t need to. The child’s skin told her all of it. Between her and Eri lay a single thread, a twisted mirror of what Megumi herself could have been, if her father hadn’t protected her with his very soul. If people had known about her quirk.

She’s safe.

“Dr. Takatani.” Eraserhead’s cold voice sent chills down her spine. “You can go home now.” Megumi lifted her eyes and saw the hero standing at the foot of the child’s bed. No matter how protective he looked, something still didn’t add up in her mind. She swallowed hard and met his dark gaze. “No.” Aizawa narrowed his eyes. “I’m asking politely.”

What would my father do?

“I’m not leaving.” Megumi stood her ground against the hero, and in the back of her mind she could hear her brother calling her stupid for it. Aizawa took a long breath and looked at her like she was some damn brat. “Tell me exactly what you did to Eri and I’ll consider not reporting you for unlawful use of a quirk.”

Shit…

Megumi felt her breath leave her lungs. He was sharp and intimidating in ways she could never be, twice her size, and he was right. And she was cornered. She had impulsively used her quirk to put a child to sleep—and she could have killed her if it weren’t for the hero’s Erasure and his damn medical ethics.

Did I cross the line?

“I…” Her eyes dropped to his inquisitive face. The doctor tried to channel a Takatani less like herself and prayed she wouldn’t get hit. “What is this?” She lifted the shirt of the little girl sleeping peacefully on the hospital-day bed and pointed to the massive bruise on her abdomen. Megumi locked eyes with him and felt his anger eat at her. “Answer me and I consider not call Child Protective Services.”

Do your job, Megumi. Taking care of kids is your job.

Just her moving closer to Eri made the man tense. “I…” She saw him staring at the girl, and for the first time his voice wavered. The way he looked at her was filled with something Megumi couldn’t pin down. She couldn’t read him. “I don’t know.”

Is he negligent?

“You don’t know?” The pediatrician looked at the child’s guardian in disbelief. “Great.” She felt her damn floating courage come back into her body and pulled her phone out of her pocket. “My friend’s a cop and a detective, and she’s gonna love to find out why this kid has a giant bruise on her stomach.”

This is your job, Megumi. Do your job.

“Wait.” His eyes snapped back to hers, sharp and intense, and Megumi resisted the instinct to run. “Don’t tell me to—” she hissed, but he cut her off. “I take care of kids too.” Aizawa’s voice was brutally honest. He pulled out a UA teacher’s badge. “Eri is my daughter. That bruise wasn’t there this morning. I swear .”

That doesn’t sound very logical…

Her brain tried to be insolent like her brother or brave like her lawyer and cop friends. Megumi’s breath hitched, her hands shaking. Something told her he wasn’t lying, but her history with lying men wasn’t exactly promising. “Prove it.”

Please, don’t prove me right.

“Wake her up.” He looked straight at her. “I’m not going to—” Megumi was cut off by the hero’s voice. “Doctor.” His tone was firm, like an anchor in the middle of a storm. “Wake my daughter up.” His voice was almost begging. “Eri’s a good kid. She’s honest. She doesn’t know how to lie.” Her brown eyes met his dark ones, and something inside told her this guy wasn’t a bad man. “Wake her up and we’ll settle this.”

Chapter Text

The mandatory custody training courses hadn’t prepared him for this.

“Proof.”Megumi’s firmness masked the fear that years as a hero and teacher had trained him to recognize.Aizawa didn’t hesitate before answering: “Wake her up.”

If something happened, Eri will tell me.

“I’m not going to—” Aizawa cut her off.“Doctor, wake my daughter.” He wasn’t the kind of man who asked for things, but he was smart enough to know that Megumi Takatani was obligated to report any suspected child abuse.“Eri is a good girl. She’s honest and she doesn’t know how to lie.”

She’s more rational than emotional. She’ll listen to reason…

“Wake her up and let’s clear this up.”Something told him this woman was the type to throw herself headfirst into battles she couldn’t win. Her eyes flicked from him to his daughter, and he saw her falter. That woman definitely had a weak spot. Right in front of them, Eri slept peacefully. For the first time in two years, her little face wasn’t twisted in nightmares. “Takatani, please .”

God, it’s been so long since I’ve said that word…

“You give your word as a hero, and I’ll give mine as a doctor.” How could a woman who sat on the floor drinking imaginary tea with children be so gentle and yet so imposing at the same time? It was almost paradoxical. “Okay.” He nodded. “You trust that I only put her to sleep so she wouldn’t be scared.” Megumi searched his eyes, and he used the unshakable firmness that was his trademark. “And you trust that I don’t hurt my kid.”

Please, don’t be worse than me…

“…Okay.” The woman finally gave in. Aizawa watched the doctor stroke his girl’s forehead and sat down beside the hospital cot. 

She put her to sleep, gave her a dream, and now she was waking her up…                                                                                                                                                                Some kind of mentalist quirk?

“Daddy…” His little girl blinked sleepily and smiled as she woke. Hearing her voice gave him more relief than a thousand cigarettes ever could. “Hey, sweetheart.” He sat next to her, running a hand through her blue-tinted white hair. “Eri, are you okay?”

She looked normal…

“I dreamed I was marrying a princess…” Eri giggled, little hands stroking his arm.“Don’t dream about weddings, baby girl. Dream about something more…” The words caught in his throat when he saw her expectant red eyes. “Modern?” he heard the doctor whisper from the other side of the bed. “ Age-appropriate. ” he finished, adjusting the collar of her shirt as he checked the monitors. “Like playing in an orchestra?” His little girl sat up on the cot, rubbing her eyes. “That’s a good dream.”

An orchestra…

“Eri, sweetheart, how are you feeling?” The pediatrician asked, checking the little girl’s hands and fingers. “Daddy, she’s the princess doctor…” Eri whispered in his ear, glancing at the doctor. “Yes, Eri. That’s Dr. Takatani…”

God…

“You came to take care of us?” Eri looked at the woman with hopeful eyes, and the adult felt his head pound. The last thing he needed was his child getting too attached to people. “You don’t remember…” Aizawa looked at the doctor, who quickly avoided his eyes. He added another question about Megumi Takatani’s quirk to his mental list, but Eri’s little voice caught his attention again. “I remember us having tea and playing doctor!”

That’s…                                                                                                                                                                 Not so bad.

“Did you like playing doctor, Eri?” The woman sat down next to his little girl on the exam bed. “I liked it.” His daughter smiled and didn’t pull away from Takatani’s closeness. The doctor’s tone grew more cautious, and he watched in silence as she brushed the bangs away from Eri’s eyes. Exactly like he always did. “Eri, do you know what doctor-patient confidentiality means?”

Somebody hurt my kid…

“Confidentiality… isn’t that a secret?” Eri looked at him curiously, just like she always did when she didn’t understand something.“That’s right, kiddo.” Aizawa nodded. “My daddy tells his students’ secrets to my uncles when they drink beer…” Aizawa took a deep breath and caught the doctor suppressing a laugh.“That’s called gossip, sweetheart, and usually we don’t admit we gossip.”

Somebody hurt her right under my nose.

“Exactly.” Megumi chuckled and shook her head. She turned back to the little girl and glanced at him, still carrying that shadow of suspicion in her eyes. “People can tell doctors anything, and we’re obligated to help—and not gossip about it…”

No one at U.A. would ever…                                                                                                                                                                                                                                    Was it at school?

“To no one?” His little girl’s jaw dropped, and Megumi seemed to reflect for a moment. “Well… 99% of the time, no.” He exhaled and knelt down to meet Eri’s eyes. “And you can always tell me anything.”

My students wouldn’t let anyone hurt her…                                                                                                                                                                                                              School is a possibility. 

“I know.” The child looked between them, confused “Why are you two…” Megumi took a deep breath and forced a gentle smile onto her face. “Eri, sweetheart, you’ve got a bruise on your tummy and—” He cut her off. His little girl was hurt, and he didn’t have time for subtleties. “ Who did that?”

Could it have been an older kid? A teacher?

“What?” His little girl looked at him, confused, and his stomach twisted with anxiety. “I…” She looked up with her red eyes, the same way she always did when she was rewinding something in her little head. “I was playing tag with Katsuki, and I got distracted and hit my stomach on the dorm table…”Aizawa and Takatani exchanged glances, and he could almost hear the gears in the doctor’s mind turning. His little girl looked down at her own stomach. “But it didn’t look like this at the time…”

Playing tag. Distracted. Dorm table…

“You hit i t?” He repeated carefully, feeling an invisible weight lift off his shoulders. “I didn’t see, I was running…” Each word made it sound more and more real. “Shou-kun and Kacchan saw—Sho fainted, and Kacchan yelled at him.” Aizawa could picture the scene in his head perfectly. “Eri…”

That bruise was bad. What if she hurt something inside?

“How long ago?” Megumi’s words were always precise, her mind never stopping from calculating potential risks to a child’s safety. His daughter glanced at the clock, trying to count the hours. “Before we came here…”

So Todoroki and Katsuki saw it happen…

“Okay.” The woman stood quickly but without alarming the child, pulling an ultrasound cart over from the other side of the room. “Eri, I’m going to slide this on your tummy, okay?”

Was it really just that?

Aizawa took a deep breath and called one of the only students he knew was responsible enough to always pick up. Always.

Please prove I’m just being paranoid .

“Shut the hell up, losers!” He could hear Bakugou yelling at his classmates like he did every single day for years. “What is it, sensei?” The teacher covered his eyes and sighed.“Did Eri hit her stomach today?”

He never lies.

“Hell yeah, she fucking hit it… Ice-Hot bastard put some ice on it, and I gave her a mochi…” The words lifted a mountain of paternal guilt and fear off his shoulders. “Okay. Thanks.” Aizawa caught the worried tone of his student, who was secretly way more careful than anyone gave him credit for.“The brat’s okay?”

He still calls her that…

“She’s fine, Katsuki. But next time, tell me…” He heard the almost guilty tone of his student.“Fuck, sensei, I—” Aizawa cut him off before his explosive boy could blame himself. “Don’t worry. Get back to what you were doing…”

What a mess.

His eyes shifted back to the blue-haired doctor. “Hepato-renal….” Megumi was moving the ultrasound probe across his daughter’s belly while Eri looked up at her with her bright red eyes.“…Spleno-renal.” Megumi’s gaze stayed fixed on the gray ultrasound image, scanning his daughter like a scanner.“…Pelvic.”

She’s checking for internal bleeding?

“Clear.” The doctor’s voice carried relief, and he dared to hope his day wouldn’t be a complete nightmare. Then he heard her again, this time in English: “No bleeding.”

Thank God…

Eri immediately sat up and gave him her usual ’I did what you asked, now where’s my bribe?’ look she always wore after the doctor or psychologist. “Daddy, can we get milkshakes?” The way she looked at him made him forget every ounce of paralyzing fear he’d felt in the last hour. Aizawa brushed her bangs aside.“Yes, baby girl...”

Damn, hard to believe that just ten minutes ago…

“Aizawa-san.” The doctor’s anxious voice caught his attention. He looked up and saw the young woman standing by the door of a side office. Their eyes met, and he noticed her nervously fidgeting with her hair. “Can I talk to you for a minute?” He turned to his daughter, smiling as she read fairy tales on the infirmary cot. “I’ll be right back.”

She faced me like it was nothing…

The hero walked over to the doctor, and she shut the door of an empty exam room behind them. “Aizawa-san. I…” She stepped in front of him. “I…”

Scans escape routes. Trembles. Stammers…

No matter how irritated he was, the way her eyes flicked quickly toward the door and the window made him sit down in a chair and try not to look intimidating.“Doctor. It’s fine.”

Who hurt this girl?

“I’m so sorry.” Her tone sounded like someone confessing to a heinous crime. “I’m not usually like this, I swear I—” She swallowed hard, and he caught her nervously tugging at her bright blue hair. “We’re trained to recognize signs of child abuse and…” She started pacing back and forth in the small room, making him exhale slowly. “Doctor…” He tried, but she ignored him. The way she looked at him while her hands moved restlessly as she spoke was disturbingly endearing.“I connected the wrong dots. I thought she was in danger…”

Why do women apologize for doing the right thing? Is it systemic?

“ Dr. Takatani. ” Using a harsher tone didn’t pull her back.  “I made an error in judgment…” She stopped right in front of him, and Aizawa locked eyes with her brown ones. “…and I am deeply sorry if I might have offended you in any way.” The way she looked at him carried the same piercing intensity as his Erasure. He swallowed hard, forcing himself not to notice how her long hair fell in waves over her shoulders.“And you’re obviously a wonderful father, and I…”

Don’t look at her, idiot.

“ Megumi .” Her name in his mouth tasted different. Almost forbidden. His daughter’s doctor froze at the sound of his voice, and Aizawa saw her hold her breath for a moment. “ It’s fine .” Somehow, just being in the same room with her felt wrong.Aizawa stood, ignoring her gentle brown eyes, contaminating his mind like a sickness. “You did your job.”

She is smart, kind and Eri liked her…

“I…” she began, but he cut her off. He didn’t want to hear it one more time. “Don’t apologize.”The hero walked toward the door, glancing back at the kind, brave woman behind him. For a moment, his eyes caught on the girl in the white skirt, noticing how the delicate flowers on her blouse matched the blue of her hair.“I would’ve done the same.”

Eri could get hurt.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  T oo young, acts on impulse, puts herself in danger... 

And then Shouta Aizawa returned to his reality.

Too sweet for me. 

Chapter Text

Yuuta Takatani, 27.

- Orthopedic surgeon.
- Likes: Fixing compound fractures; treating kids (but don’t tell his sister); and girls with daddy issues.
- Dislikes: 1) His perfect little sister. 2) Spineless men. 3) Anesthesiologists.
- Really fucking hates: His perfect little sister’s anesthesiologist boyfriend—the most spineless man in history.

One year ago...

Nothing made Yuuta’s day better than an afternoon spent bolting bones together.

The OR would always be Yuuta Takatani’s favorite place. Maybe all the “good parts” of his parents went to his sister—sweet as fuck, nerdy as fuck—and he got stuck with his dad’s arrogance and his mom’s cold pragmatism. Or maybe it was just the simple fact that anesthetized people didn’t feel shit.

These interns should take a fucking benzo. Nervous as…

“Alright, family,” Yuuta flaunted the intramedullary nail to the last-year ortho residents. “This is how you fix up the femur of some asshole criminal—so a hero can come along and break it again in five years!”

Good fixation, clean margins, x-ray looked fine.

He looked at his work and saw that it was good.

“Hey, Armin from Attack on Titan.” He pointed at the blond, jittery intern who’d spent five fucking hours holding a clamp without doing a thing. “You’re suturing.” Yuuta stepped back from the piece-of-shit thief he’d already operated on twice since residency began.

The intern—whose name Yuuta didn’t even know—looked up, eyes shining. “Seriously, Dr. Takatani?”

I fucking love people who do what I say…

“Serious.” Yuuta stretched his back as he peeled off his bloodied gloves. He glanced at the ortho resident he was sure had a secret crush on his sister. “Help Armin before he turns that guy into something that looks like Mahito…”

Then again, a nasty scar would be a good reminder to stop being an idiot…

“Don’t call the intern that, you asshole.” His favorite grumpy resident always made his day. “Didn’t you tell me to stop calling them by numbers, Miwa?” The insanely talented woman rolled her eyes, and he made a mental note to try to convince her to work with his dad at the rehab clinic. “You’re supposed to learn their names!”

They’re only here two weeks — not worth the brain power.

“All right, young padawans.” He backed toward the OR exit, fully trusting his residents to tell a leg from an elbow. “Close everything up, watch the postop, and don’t call me over the weekend or I’ll make every one of you do rounds at 5:00 AM until the end of the interns’ rotation.”

Lie. 

There’s no way I’m coming in at that hour…

“Yes, Dr. Takatani.” Obedient people were extremely satisfying. The young orthopedist peeled off his gown in the decon area and scrubbed his arms with antiseptic and water, mentally timing the scrub to tiktok music so he could leave the field without seeing his mother’s disappointed surgeon’s eyes in his head.

But she’s so nice, but she’s so nice, but she’s so nice.

Yeah, treat her like a bitch.

I fuck her in the—

Yuuta had penciled in a quickie in thirty minutes. Either way, he didn’t want to carry any bacteria from his patient’s blood—some guy who seemed to enjoy having his bones smashed—onto the nice physiotherapist’s perfect breasts he saw on alternate Fridays.

Wonder if her low back pain’s better…

Maybe she should get an injection.

He was about to find out. For one reason only—his damn phone wouldn’t stop buzzing in his pocket.

For fuck’s sake! Someone’s desperate…

Yuuta dried his hands quickly and pulled his phone from his pocket. The second he saw his moderately likable little sister’s number on the screen, a pit of dread dropped into his stomach.

Her car broke down again?

“Megumi, I’m not giving a consult on some dumbass brat who fell out of a tree…” His irritated voice was cut off by a sob. “Brother?”

“What the fuck happened?” Yuuta immediately pinched the bridge of his nose. Meg never cried—not even after burying little kids. “Yuuta, I…” The sound of her voice alone gave him a headache. “Spit it out, Megumi.”

Of all the things that the girl who babysat snot-nosed babies and loud children could say, this was the last he expected: “I’m at the police station, I need you to come get me…”

The police station?

Yuuta took a deep breath and tried to imagine what the hell could land Megumi in a police station.

Kidnapping a child? Maybe, but unlikely. 

Beating up a negligent dad? Probably…

Then he heard his sister crying again, and his whole body went tight. He remembered every fucking time he’d been in the same room as Megumi’s shitty boyfriend and felt his chest lock up.  “That fucker hurt you?”  Yuuta exhaled sharply. Her sobs came through the line.“I crashed his’s car…”

The Mercedes?

“Crashed his’s car…” He repeated slowly, trying to process his twin’s words. Yuuta forced every bit of logic he had to make sense of what Meg was saying. “You crashed his car?”

“I smashed the windows and dented the body…” his sister whispered. “No fucking way. You get stuck in your own goddamn seatbelt and now you’re telling me you totaled a car. How the hell did you…” His voice was cut off by hers. “With a baseball bat…” 

“What did I give you?!” He laughed. Megumi trashing that asshole’s Mercedes—the guy he’d always known was a piece of shit—was the most satisfying thing that had happened to him all week. “Are you insane?”

Did she finally have her psychotic break?

Like Pearl… or Carrie…

“He reeked of Chanel No. 5! And had lipstick on his neck” Her words made Yuuta cover his eyes with one hand. His sister’s sobs cracked through the phone. “He was lying to me this whole time!” The sound of her voice, her ugly crying, wiped the grin off his face. “He even called me a whore and…” Her words dissolved into sobs.

He did what?

He processed what his sister had said. His gut instincts never failed. Yuuta had cheated on enough women to recognize another cheater when he saw one.

“Where are you?” The orthopedist ignored the fact that his stuff was still in the locker room and practically sprinted toward the hospital parking lot. “At the 99th precinct…” She hiccuped through the phone. He slammed his car door and typed the address into his GPS. “Don’t say a word to anyone. I’ll be there in fifteen minutes…”

Fuck…

“Yuuta.” Megumi didn’t finish whatever she was going to say. She never did. But the tone in her voice reminded him of the little girl who used to sneak into his room at night when their parents were working late, terrified of ghosts. “Stay calm, Meg. I’m on my way.”

She really could’ve dated that boring religious guy from the ICU instead…

The doctor swore every curse word he knew. He tightened his belt and shot a message to his best friend (who was just as much of a piece of shit as he was—and, conveniently, also a damn good lawyer).

Yuuta: My sister just got arrested for smashing up an insanely expensive car.

Hel: You gonna pay my fee?

Yuuta: I’ll cover your fiancée’s insulin for a month.

Hel: Three months.

Yuuta: Deal. 99th precinct.

Hel: I’ll be there in 10.

Helena Álvares, 28. 

Quirk: Blow-dry hair with a touch. (Practically useless.)

Likes: Rin, justice, fashion, and going to mass. (In that order.)

- Yuuta’s best friend since high school; they went to the same university in Tokyo.

- She was by Yuuta’s side when Megumi took refuge in Brazil.

- Yuuta was by her side when Helena had leukemia.

- Lesbian and Catholic. (One does not cancel out the other.)

Reality always had a way of disappointing.

Yuuta ignored whatever-the-fuck that was—a man with a long white scarf standing on a pole at the corner of the precinct—and forced himself to be the responsible sibling for five minutes.

She really made those goddamn Pinterest boards delusional girls use to plan weddings…

He parked the car and felt the weight of being the asshole brother of someone stupidly good. He didn’t even need to focus his eyes to sense the suffocating love radiating from Helena and Rin. Outside the precinct, he spotted his best friend wrapped up in the arms of her ridiculously sexy girlfriend.

Blessed be lesbian lawyers.

Leaning against a black, smoke-belching, no-airbag Chevy Opala, the brunette lawyer clung to her ridiculously tall, cotton-candy–haired homicide detective girlfriend. Yuuta would forever be grateful to Cuba for inventing Cuba Libre—and to his best friend Helena Álvares.

Lawyers and cops aren’t supposed to hate each other?

“Hey, gay men.” He waved at his favorite couple as he walked toward them. Hel flashed him a mischievous grin. “Hey, playboy.”

Is she really gonna call me that forever?

“Courtesy of the Takatani Neuroscience & Rehab Clinic…” Yuuta handed over basal and rapid insulin pens and sensors to the cop. He tried not to stare at her before Helena smacked him with the reminder of the commandment about coveting your neighbor’s wife. “Let’s go. My sister’s inside…”

“And here I thought Meg was the sweet Takatani…” The super-intelligent, coldly intimidating detective with type 1 diabetes gave him a sly smile.

Sweet as fuck, smashing up her boyfriend’s car and ruining my easy fuck.

“I’m super kind and generous, Detective.” Yuuta said as he climbed the station steps.  His eyes landed on the two women in front of him. If there was one thing he loved about those two, it was how cold they could be. “You two are the assholes here…”

He hadn’t even entered the building yet and already felt that familiar wave of shame and dread.

This is coming from Meg?

“Don’t talk about my woman like that or I’ll cut your balls off.” The fiery 5’1” lawyer smacked his arm and pushed open the precinct doors. “Who’s in charge of this division?” Helena’s serious voice made a blond officer look at her suspiciously. “Me?”

What a fucking coward.

He watched his friend slip into her skin: mouthy kid who grew up, wears tailored suits and marsala Adidas Sambas, and now defends women mode. “Attorney Helena Álvares, Tokyo Public Defender’s Office. I’m here to release my client, Dr. Megumi Takatani, from this…” She glanced around at the sad excuse for a precinct. “…place.”

Fuck it, she’s so toxic.

“The girl with the Mercedes?” The officer raised a brow at the three of them. “She won’t be arrested.” His tone didn’t ease their nerves. He pointed to a little door at the back of the station. “Doctor’s in the forensics room.”

Why would she be in…

“Forensics?” Yuuta narrowed his eyes at the blond cop, making the man swallow hard. “You’re…” Yuuta flashed his ID. His eyes flicked over the old polaroid of him and his twin asleep in the same incubator when Megumi had almost died. “I’m her brother.”

“Okay, you can wait here.” The cop gestured toward the chairs in reception.

“Detective Rin Nishimura, Homicide Division.” Yuuta saw the pink-haired woman flash her badge. “I want access to the incident report and—” Helena stepped right in front of the desk, standing on her toes to look taller. “And what about the charge of destruction of private property?”

“The chief didn’t file it after watching the footage…”

“Why wouldn’t he?” The lawyer’s voice was polite, almost incredulous.

“Given the nature of the crime, we considered she was in shock. Self-defense.” The officer’s nervous words hit Yuuta’s ears. Helena’s voice turned into white noise.

Girl with the Mercedes…

Forensics…

Self-defense.

“Brother?” Megumi’s voice snapped him back. Her sadness and humiliation hit like a physical force. He turned sharply, heart pounding as he saw her. “What the fuck happened to your face?” He rushed toward his sister. His eyes locked on her injured nose and the red mark on her cheek. “I…” Megumi’s gaze dropped to the floor, hiding her face from him.

Unbelievable.

Suddenly, the eldest Takatani felt a surge of hateful rage and contempt. A surge of hateful rage and contempt that wasn’t even his.

No fucking way…

“Megumi’s just a hysterical slut, this was all a misunderstanding…” Anesthesiologist’s voice instantly made his night better. Yuuta’s eyes locked on the perfect brown-haired guy being led in handcuffs by a blond cop. His sister flinched and hid behind him. “You saw the footage!”

Footage…

The orthopedist rushed to the reception desk and caught a frame of the recording. A goddamn still shot of the 1.85m bastard gripping his little sister by the neck in his condo parking lot. Yelling at her. In his life, Yuuta had done plenty of impulsive things—but this wasn’t one of them. “You hit her?!”

“Yuuta, don’t!” He heard Rin shout as he yanked Megumi’s boyfriend out of the chief’s grip by the tie. “Takatani, this is a misunderstanding! We’ve operated together, I can—” For a fraction of a second, he locked eyes with the cop in front of him before dropping Oikawa to the floor.

“You saw this coming.” he heard the chief mutter. “That woman doesn’t even weigh sixty kilos…”

“You idiot, you’re gonna get arrested!” Helena’s voice rang in his ears. Yuuta punched Oikawa’s face three times. He heard the crack and felt the sharp pain shoot through his right hand. Still, regret hadn’t caught up to him yet.

“Yuuta, stop!” His sister’s sobs froze him. Their parents—the supposedly “kinder” Takatani—were off giving lectures at some fancy hotel in France. “Please…” Blood streamed from the anesthesiologist’s nose, but there were plenty of plastic surgeons in town. “Don’t do this.” The orthopedist turned toward her voice and saw her sobbing in Rin Nishimura’s arms.

“It’s over, Meg.” The heartless cop held his sister as Helena gripped her shoulders. “He won’t get near you again, alright?”

Yuuta felt his eternally optimistic sister shattered to pieces.

“Please…” Megumi sobbed. His right hand trembled. Boxer’s fracture for sure. Yuuta Takatani fixed bones, not broken hearts. His brown eyes met hers brown eyes. “Please, brother. Don’t tell anyone about this…”

Chapter Text

Aizawa’s day hadn’t been a total nightmare (at least not yet).

Going home with his daughter was a good sign. He took the dorm elevators up with Eri humming some Disney song in English she was learning from her best friend, Kota.

Damn. Hizashi and Nemuri-senpai have probably been waiting forever.

Bringing Eri out to eat with his students always gave him a headache—and secretly fun moments of his almost-heroes playing older siblings to his almost-official kid.

She’s getting sleepy…

Aizawa noticed Eri rubbing her little eyes as the elevator doors slid open on the faculty dorm floor. He held her hand and forced himself not to offer to carry her, almost hearing the sweet voice of a certain doctor lecturing him about the importance of stimulating a child’s autonomy .

Pediatricians…

The image of the pretty, smiling woman flashed across his mind. Blue hair, soft smile, gentle hands. A chill ran down his spine and he focused on guiding his daughter down the hall. Before he could grab his keys, the door swung open and his loud, disproportionally blond best friend filled the space.
“I was about to send out a search party for you two.”

Sweet, Hizashi.

“We were having dinner with the class…” Aizawa stepped inside and immediately spotted the letter from family court sitting on the hall table, ice settling in his stomach. Hizashi and Nemuri exchanged a look and quickly changed the subject. His senpai smiled at Eri, slipping into her “I’m more affectionate than all of you combined ” tone. “How was the pediatrician, sweetheart?”

That letter wasn’t supposed to come for two more months… Did my petition get accepted?

“My new doctor’s a princess! She taught me how to listen with a stethoscope…” The words perked Eri up as she flopped onto their sofa, smiling at her unofficial aunt and uncle. The phrase new doctor made them both glance at him, worry in their eyes.“Daddy’s heart goes tum-tum-ta instead of tum-TA-tum-TA!”

Better not kill me.

“Dr. Samito went to the same place Eri’s fish did…” Aizawa tugged off his shoes, exhaustion digging into his bones after the endless day. “And apparently my heart’s out of rhythm.”

Do cardiologists even work weekends? This’ll mess with my teaching schedule…

“Dad liked Dr. Takatani.” His daughter’s words froze him mid-step. His chronically loud friends went silent. Hizashi’s jaw dropped, Nemuri’s smirk turned wicked. Aizawa inhaled deeply and sat beside his kid.“Eri, I said she was a good doctor. That doesn’t mean I—”

Her liking Megumi isn’t a good sign.

“They went into a room alone and talked…” Her little voice made him cover his eyes with his hand, bracing for the incoming storm.“What?!” Hizashi stared, grinning like an idiot, while Nemuri practically sprinted over to scoop Eri into her lap.
“Eri, honey, what was she like?” the veteran cooed, while Hizashi plopped down next to her, offering a mochi. “Tell us all about your pediatrician, baby girl.”

Gossiping like unemployed teenagers…

“She has blue hair like Iida!” Eri’s grin widened at the memory of the woman who had caused him the worst migraine in weeks. “And Daddy smiled at her when she listened to his heart.”

What?!

“Smiled?!” Hizashi clapped his hands over his mouth. “I did not smile.” Aizawa squinted at his daughter. “I saw. You smiled real quick.” Eri brushed her bangs from her eyes, making him rewind the entire afternoon in his head.“Eri, sweetheart, I’m sure I—” Nemuri’s laughter and the gleam in her blue eyes cut him off.“No way! Zashi, it’s a miracle.”

The real miracle is that Takatani didn’t call the cops today…

“Check Instagram, Nemuri!” Hizashi slapped her thigh excitedly. “ No. ” Aizawa shot back, immediately ignored. “Takatani… doctor…” Nemuri muttered, scrolling, before shoving her phone in Eri’s face. A photo of Megumi at what looked like a football stadium during some random concert—loose wavy hair, retro sunglasses, a glittery silver skirt. “Is this your doctor, princess?”

Olivia Rodrigo? Seriously?

“She’s my doctor!” Eri beamed at the screen. “Her account’s private…” Hizashi sighed, disappointed. “But wow, she’s gorgeous !” His gay best friend’s words made him narrow his eyes. “How old is she?” Nemuri looked at him like he’d just blasphemed.“Oh, Shouta, that’s so—!”

Ridiculous.

His senpai spelled it out so Eri wouldn’t understand. “S-E-X-Y.” His social battery hit critical levels. “For God’s sake, you’re adults.” Aizawa got up, tugging his daughter gently by the hand. “Come on, bedtime.”

Before she cries more unrealistic expectations about...

“Are we brushing teeth?” Eri followed him toward the bathroom, the apartment dotted with colorful jelly stickers on the shower glass. “And sleeping,” he nodded, glancing back at his friends. “You can back to –” Anxiety crawled at the edges of his voice. “We’re staying,” Nemuri declared flatly, the perfect pseudo–big sister.“Why…?” His question was cut short by the blond idiot waving the family court letter.“Because we’ve been your best friends for eighteen years.”

Drama queens…

“Alright. Eri, brush your teeth and bed.” He turned back to his girl. Ashido had loosened her hair, the white-blue strands falling over her shoulders. She looked up at him with those wide red eyes. “What about my iron?”

Damn, I almost forgot…

“Thanks for reminding me.” He dug through her backpack, pulling out a red paper bag with a medicine box inside. He pulled out what looked like a dark syrup bottle.

Weird. It’s liquid…

“Look, Daddy, a note!” His daughter handed him a yellow post-it, the hero instantly recognizing the neat handwriting.“Must be from Dr. Takatani…”

Aizawa-san,

I’m sorry again about what happened.
The iron syrup is one drop per kilo. Don’t spill it on her clothes (it’ll never come out.)
If you’d like to find another pediatrician, I understand. Either way, you can pick up more from me at the clinic when this runs out.

Sincerely, Dr. Megumi Takatani.

“What does it say, Daddy?” Eri asked curiously, climbing up the little stool she used to reach the bathroom mirror.“It says if you spill it on your clothes, it’ll never come out.” Aizawa measured out thirty drops into the plastic spoon from the box and handed it to his child. “Drink.”

It smells like blood…

“It tastes like chocolate!” His little girl looked up at him, wide-eyed with wonder. Of course it would taste good. In the back of his mind, he imagined the doctor experimenting with flavors of supplements in her free time.“That’s good, baby girl,” he said while squeezing toothpaste onto both of their brushes. “Don’t forget the back teeth."  Aizawa caught his daughter’s reflection in the mirror—happy, brushing her teeth in front of him. The hole Oboro’s death had left in his soul was still the same size, but for the first time in years, life didn’t feel like a complete void.

Don’t think about him. He’s at peace now…

The taste of toothpaste lingered, and his stomach twisted faintly. Maybe he really did need to see a doctor. The old lady was more missed than he’d ever admit. When they finished, he wiped a streak of toothpaste off Eri’s cheek with the back of his hand. “Daddy, can I play guitar for a little bit?”

Don’t give in to the cute eyes.

Having a kid was making him too soft.“No, Eri, it’s late.” He helped her down from the stool. She gave him her involuntary little pout. “Pleaaaase?” He exhaled, trying not to be the kind of commanding parent his own mother would’ve scolded him for.“Tomorrow you can play with Jirou, okay?”

A solid argument…

“Okay…” Eri’s diplomacy was his greatest triumph as a father. He walked to her pastel-colored bedroom—pink and purple shades he hadn’t even known existed—and watched her run her tiny fingers across the guitar next to her study desk. Aizawa pulled a kitten pajama set from the dresser. “I’ll be working, but if you wake up in the night, call Hizashi or me, alright?”

Still have to check that letter…

“Alright…” The faint sadness in her tone made him reconsider his patrols for the thousandth time. He crouched, tapped her nose lightly. “Good night, Eri.” She wrapped her arms around his neck, and he inhaled her vanilla-scented hair. “Good night, daddy.”

They have to have given me custody of her…

Aizawa drew in a steadying breath and left his child safe in her world of music, drawings of superhero princesses who saved the world with love, and guitars bigger than she was.

If they haven’t, she’ll be so heartbroken. Again;

Back in the living room, his two best friends sat with crossed arms and smirks, watching him like he was about to do something reckless with his daughter’s pediatrician. “Don’t look at me like that.”

“Doctor, Shouta?” Nemuri bit her lip, and he rolled his eyes. “He’s always liked the sweet ones.” Hizashi teased, venomously cheerful. “She’s not sweet .” He remembered Takatani’s sharp mind. The blond narrowed his eyes, elbowing their senpai. “So he admits that—”

“No.” Aizawa cut him off, grabbing the family court letter from the table. “Let’s just get this over with.”

“Shou…” Nemuri’s tone made his head throb. “Are you sure you want to see it without Eri here?”

Last time, she cried for three days…

“Yes.” His reply came instantly. “Shouta, we…” Hizashi’s voice faltered, concern clouding his usually sunny green eyes. “What?” Aizawa asked. Mic laid a hand on his shoulder. “You and Eri are a family. This is just a piece of paper.”

The same little lie I tell her…

“That’s all it is.” His gaze fell on the slip of paper in his hand, memories of war and temporary custody hearings pressing on him.“If I die, she goes to an orphanage? With nothing?”

“We’d take care of—” Hizashi started, but Nemuri’s late-bloomed maturity cut him off. “He’s right.” Her words didn’t ease the ache in his gut. She stepped closer. “It’s about Eri’s civil rights—and yours. Open it.”

You’re not an anxious, insecure teenager anymore, Shouta.

Aizawa was Eraserhead, a hero. He was almost thirty-four, had survived a war, and had a little girl who called him daddy . Shouta opened the letter and read it silently.

 Permanent Custody Request (Second Attempt).

Applicant: Shouta Aizawa

Status of legal adoption request for Eri Matsuri: Temporarily denied/postponed.

Justification: Single marital status, no concrete family support network, and unstable occupation (professional hero with no affiliation to any agency).

Note: Due to the absence of other temporary guardians willing to take custody of the child, given her history with incidents related to her Quirk, temporary custody shall remain with the applicant until a more suitable family is willing to assume guardianship of Eri Matsuri. Otherwise, the current request may be re-evaluated in 12 months.

Family Court of Minors.

“Until a more suitable family…”

“A wonderful father.” he muttered bitterly, repeating the pediatrician’s words. “Shouta…” Nemuri’s fraternal tone was the last thing he wanted to hear. “Look, we can talk to Toshinori and maybe—” Hizashi began, but Shouta cut him off, wrapping his capture scarf around his neck and grabbing his goggles.“I’m going to work.”

Eri rewinding me while I slept wasn’t so bad after all…

Their silence was almost a gift. Aizawa ignored the pained looks on his friends’ faces as they read the damn letter and pressed down the ache in his chest. “If she wakes up, let me know.”

Again…

He swallowed the fact that someone who had never spent more than a few hours with his daughter had decided they weren’t a proper family.
And that almost no proper family would ever adopt a nearly ten-year-old superpowered girl who had accidentally killed her own father.

This is not under your control…

Aizawa ignored his cursed frustration and the shadow of fear that they might take Eri from him, leaving his apartment at 9:35 p.m. to face another lonely night as Eraserhead. In his apartment, his daughter slept in a building filled with the young heroes he had raised. Safe, sound, and happy. Out in the streets, someone else trying to get home wouldn’t be so fortunate.

Stop being so emotional, idiot.

There’s always next year…

Chapter Text

That definitely hadn’t been Megumi Takatani’s day.

Or week.

Or month.

If she thought about it, it hadn’t been her year.

Should I just go to that nightclub the residents like so much?

Sitting alone on the endless sofa in her parents’ living room, she stared at the blank television screen on the wall—used exclusively for clinical case discussions her parents insisted on hosting monthly. Megumi got up from the couch and felt her night improve by at least 20% when her eyes landed on the bar at the far end of the room.

Did Yuta buy Corona?
I could just watch Howl’s Moving Castle…

Spending her youth years in Brazil and the U.S. had taught her to drink anything .                                                                                                                                                    Having her heart shattered into pieces had taught her that some nights were allowed to end with beer and Brazilian music at home. The young doctor walked to the Takatani residence’s bar, running her fingers over her mother’s endless wine collection and her Father’s whiskeys.

What you did today, stupid girl, calls for something stronger than beer…

She almost grabbed one of her Father’s whiskeys, but her eyes caught on the expensive sake pushed to the back of the cabinet—the one gifted by the parents of a little boy she had diagnosed early with lymphoma months ago. Maybe she was doomed to become one of those doctors whose only personality trait was doctor , good at her job, but with nothing else going on.

A good doctor who never has sex.

Megumi poured herself a delicate porcelain cup of gratitude sake—the same porcelain she had gifted her mother on her birthday. The moment the drink hit her tongue, her body warmed. Her mind, of course, betrayed her. A black-haired man with a sharp body and dark, intense eyes intruded like an intrusive thought.

Oh my God?!

Just the memory scandalized her. Her face immediately flushed remembering him sitting shirtless on her exam table. Megumi Takatani was not the type of woman who fell for brooding older men. And she was definitely not the shameless, immoral doctor who replayed the image of hot patients in her head.

Don’t think about his eyes, Megumi.
Don’t think about the dad of cute little girls with  sharp eyes.

Against her will, images of Eri’s countless scars replayed in her mind—and so did those black, piercing eyes of the hero. A shiver ran down her spine.

Focus on what you can control, Megumi.

You heal people. You don’t turn back time.

The doctor grabbed her tablet and searched for updated scientific papers on how to treat children exposed to extreme stress or violence. Closing her eyes, she could still see those red eyes staring back at her with the innocent sweetness only children had. If by some miracle Aizawa-san came back for the next appointment, she would be ready to mend what couldn’t truly be mended.

Brazilian studies. Palestinian studies. American studies…

She forced herself to focus on her reading while sipping her sake. Words like toxic stress, malnutrition, psychological damage spun around her brain.

Stay focused, Megumi. Aizawa-san may never come back to your office. But the next child—you’ll know how to help…

Her flow was interrupted by a hand on her shoulder and a kiss to her head. Unlike her Father’s neurology residents, who suffered full-on breakdowns, or his med students who sobbed through his exams, Jirou Takatani had taught her everything she knew about caring for people. “A hard day’s night, little princess?”

Only he and Eri get away with calling me that.

“Father. Two years.” She turned toward the man with black hair streaked in gray, dressed in a white button-up and a blue tie. “ Two years and I’ll be thirty.” The words could have triggered an existential crisis on the spot. “I’ve got two degrees, three jobs. Stop calling me princess .”

Two years and I’ll be thirty…

“I am sixty years old. Four degrees. Two private clinics. And one daughter .” Jirou Takatani sat beside her on the sofa, placing a plate of rice with tuna and vegetable furikake in front of her. “You live in my house . You drink my sake. You eat the food I cook.” He wrapped an arm around her shoulders, and Megumi poured him a bit of her sake. “ I’ll call you princess if I want to. ”

Awful personality…

“Then I’ll move out!” Megumi crossed her arms, pouting at her favorite neurologist. “Then I won’t have to live in your house or eat your food anymore.” She snatched the porcelain cup of sake from his hands. “And I was the one gifted this sake! Diagnose your own little kids with Linfomas!”

God, is Rintaro doing okay with the chemo? I need to give his parents a call later…

“Move out ? Don’t be ridiculous. You spent nine years abroad!” His face paled, and she suppressed a smile when he tugged nervously at his shirt. “This house is close to your hospital, you don’t pay rent, and I cook for you.” Megumi slipped his glasses off and cleaned them with her cotton handkerchief. “So no complaints, Dr. Takatani.” Her Father loosened his royal blue tie and scrolled something about baseball on his phone. “Move out? Absolutely not. You just came back. You only move out when you marry.”

He could at least tell Yuta to marry first…

“Dad…” Unconsciously, she clung to the arm of the man who had taught her everything about medicine. “I did something terrible today…” Her eyes burned, though she was far too old to cry on Jirou’s shoulder. Her Father immediately looked at her, pouring her another cup of sake. “Every time you’ve told me you’ve done something terrible , my dear, it’s never been truly terrible .”

“I accused a single father of mistreating a beautiful little girl.” She stifled a sob and felt her cheeks burning red. The sharp, clinical gaze of the neurologist returned to her face. “And was he?” Megumi swallowed her guilt along with her sake. “No… But I assumed he was because she had scars all over her body, a massive bruise on her stomach, and her attachment style was clearly anxious…”

And what if he really had been a bad guy? Aizawa-san was huge! What the hell was I thinking?!

“Megumi, my child, the day you see a patient who might be in danger and you do nothing …” He took a long breath and pointed at her untouched bowl of gohan, making her feel even worse. Jirou switched into cold, unflinching Dr. Takatani mode—the same one who laughed at panicked med students. “…take my name off your white coat and put aside the fact that you are my daughter.” He rested a hand on her shoulder and gave her the kind of look that screamed your problem wouldn’t even make it to my desk—or your brother’s. “You did the right thing. Now eat your dinner.”

The right thing…

For some reason, her Father’s words made her think of the black-haired man. For a moment, she remembered Aizawa-san’s intense stare and almost felt her sanity turning to smoke.

Snap out of it. 

“Heartless…” Megumi muttered as she tasted her Father’s cooking, something she’d missed more than she cared to admit. “I still have ears. ” His voice, calm as ever, came from behind the glow of his phone screen. Then he looked at her with a rare soft smile—rare for a man known as a living wall of arrogance. “Did you see that Nakajima's granddaughter was born?”

Surgeons should be forbidden from reproducing…

“Yes, Father.” Megumi exhaled, watching his pride-tinted face morph into full-blown baby fever. “I was in the delivery room. I’m her pediatrician…”

Her mother had preeclampsia, and the baby came out blue…

“They wanted a baby girl so badly!” His brown eyes shone with joy as he spoke. Megumi sipped her sake and tried to block out the sound of the Nakajimas’ desperate cries when she told them their newborn was headed to the NICU. “Izumi is an adorable baby...” She said.

Adorable, with an Apgar score of 5…

“When are you going to have a child?” His words almost made her spit out her drink. She stared at him in disbelief, searching his face for irony. “At this rate, I’ll die before I ever have a grandchild…”

What?!

“Father…” Megumi gave him an incredulous smile. In the back of her mind, she remembered the first boyfriend she brought home, and how her Father had gently asked if her astronomy club crush had muscular dystrophy or if he was just malnourished. “Generally, in this country, people MARRY before they have kids.”

And I’m closer to being arrested by an offended hero-dad than I am to getting married…

“Would you not like to have dinner with Masanobu?” Her Father showed her a photo of him and the dullest man alive at the Japanese Neuropathy Congress. “Stop offering me your residents, please.” Megumi drained her sake, which seemed weaker with every passing minute in Jirou’s presence. “Daughter, soon you’ll be thirty and then…”

“And then what, Father!?” The color drained from her face, and Megumi nearly spilled tuna with mayo all over her brand-new blouse. “…I’m still young!”

Do my American friends go through this too?

“Five minutes ago, you were an adult.” He threw a reverse Uno card at her face. "You're already a pediatrician, dear. It's time to get married. "The young woman felt the betrayal in her bones and tried not to lose it with a man for the second time in eight hours. “All of my female residents are already engaged.”

Good for them!

Megumi was about to snap back something rude when the sound of her twin brother’s keys hitting the coffee table immediately ruined her night. “Leave my lil' sister alone, old man.” Yuta appeared in the living room still in his red scrub top, his dark-blue hair slightly damp. The idiot orthopedist dropped onto the couch next to her and stole her sake cup. “Nobody marries boring nerds, Father.”

Doesn’t he have elderly patients to push into acute kidney injury?

“Asshole.” Megumi snatched her gifted sake back from her evil twin. “Get your dirty hands off Mom’s porcelain!” Their Father sighed, already tired. “Yuta, don’t call your sister boring. ”

“She’s so interesting that her best boyfriend was that shady lawyer from Brazil.” Yuta smirked at their Father before leaning in, invading Megumi’s personal space like he’d been doing since the womb. “I always knew you liked men with questionable morals .” Megumi slapped her twin’s annoyingly tall bicep—ridiculous, considering how premature he’d been at birth. “ You have questionable morals!”

At least Felipe was against cheating…
Or paid his taxes.

“The only woman you’ve ever been faithful to is the one you cheated on your last three girlfriends with.” Their father muttered as he left the room, as if his eldest son’s promiscuity might actually kill him. “At least he always goes to the same barber…”

“Monogamy is just a capitalist invention, Father.” Yuta threw an arm around her shoulders and messed up her dark-blue hair (the exact same shade as her). “Rough day with your snot-goblins, lil’ sis?”

Impertinent.

“We’re the same age!” Megumi jabbed a finger at her twin’s face, forcing her voice into that responsible Adult Tone she reserved for her residents. “And don’t call my kids snot-goblins. ”

Why couldn’t he have been a girl?

“I felt your guilt all the way from the garage, Megumi. You’re haunting this house with your toxic aura. Spill .” Her brother, the worst man alive, being hypersensitive was almost a paradox. Megumi drank the sake straight from the bottle and pretended she hadn’t missed him for years. “Maybe try feeling your own guilt, Yuta, and redeem half of your sins.”

Why is he so good at reading people?!

“Guilt’s for Christians.” He shoved his phone in her face, showing the Instagram profile of some Puerto Rican bar his best friend’s fiancée always dragged him to. “Wanna hit up Nuevayol? Rin and Helena always get excited when you’re around…”

Should I go?

She thought about it for a moment, then realized the last thing she wanted after working 24 hours was to third-wheel a pair of happily-engaged women — one, the gorgeous lawyer who’d once bailed her out of a police station on the worst day of her life, and the other, the toughest cop in town. “Isn’t it a little weird that you’ve got a crush on your best friend’s fiancée?”

People in love. Fun. Interesting. Unattainable…

“Rin’s a hot 5’9 bisexual detective with a great ass.” The orthopedic idiot — who had never read a research paper in his life — said this while glancing at the Portuguese article open on her tablet. “What’s weird is you studying childhood trauma while drinking, sis.”

This isn’t how I pictured my youth…

“Scientific papers don’t cheat on you with tall, hot, redheaded surgeons…” Megumi muttered, thinking about the talented OB-GYN she couldn’t even dislike, since the woman sent her every mother she operated on. 

Even my ex-tax evader looks better than...

“That guy was a scoundrel and a son of a bitch, Megumi. I told you. ” Her brother’s words salted the still-raw wound in her chest. “I thought he was the love of my life…” She covered her face with both hands, fighting not to be the crying sister again.

What an endless day…

“Meg, doesn’t exist...” That unusual gentle tone in her brother’s voice was the worst sound she could ever hear. She felt his hand on her shoulder and peeked at him through her fingers — the boy who had once saved her life. “And if it did, I’m pretty sure the love of your life wouldn’t…” Yuta’s voice was cut off by their father’s worried one. “Megumi!?”

Shit…

“Hi, Father!” She lifted her head and forced a smile at her old man. “You okay, dear?” The worry etched in his face made her swallow down her broken heart and her restraining order, locking both deep inside their little boxes inside her soul. “Super okay.” Yuta grinned at their father, proving once again why he was her best friend. “Megumi-chan was just telling us how the highlight of her life was handing out ferrous sulfate to some anemic brat.”

How did he get into residency?

“We don’t give ferrous sulfate to kids...” She grumbled as she watched her father bring out a plate of rice with tuna and set it in front of her brother. “Eat, deadbeat .”

Okay, the alcohol’s definitely kicking in…

“Thanks, old lovely man.” Her brother’s reply earned a classic eye-roll from their father. The young doctor felt the weight of a night shift and a full clinic day in her bones. “It’s so good to be back…” Megumi got up and kissed her father’s cheek. “Goodnight, Father.” Jirou hugged her, and she caught a whiff of her mother’s perfume on his shirt. “Goodnight, princess.”

At least I can make up for lost time with them now…

“You’re going to bed already?! It’s like 9 p.m.!” Her brother’s disappointed tone was the same one he’d used when she once told him her ex was an anesthesiologist. “Yes, Yuta. Safe and sound, away from nightlife dangers.” She didn’t get over relationships in six hours, and she definitely didn’t spend Friday nights at bars anymore. Her evil twin yelled from the couch. “Snap out of it, Meg!”

“Going out drinking again, Yuta?” Their father’s hyper-severe voice rang out, the same scolding for the thousandth time. “Soon you will be out of my inheritance...”

Great! More money for me and my hypothetical kids…

Megumi Takatani climbed the stairs of the home she’d missed for almost a decade. The hard day’s night ended at 9:35 p.m., with her father and brother arguing downstairs while she finally crawled into her bed.

Chapter Text

When twenty-three-year-old Aizawa accepted a temporary teaching position at U.A. (thanks to Yamada Hizashi), he hadn’t exactly planned on:

1. Teaching actually being fulfilling.
2. Still having that same job ten years later.
3. Ending up with: chronic insomnia, dozens of superpowered teenagers directly under his care, generalized anxiety (which he refuses to admit he has), and a child.
   
   

He also hadn’t planned on having a daughter.
But things happen. Supervillains try to destroy society. And somehow he ends up thirty-three, a single father, buying groceries in an overpriced supermarket that just happens to be within walking distance of the school.

He walked down the hygiene aisle. Toothbrushes for his kid, and emergency pads to stash in his desk drawer for his chaotic teenage girls, were on his list.

Uraraka always grabs them anyway…

His eyes landed on Eri running her little fingers across shampoo and conditioner bottles.

Did she grow more?

Yeah. She definitely had. Two years raising that child had gone by faster than he wanted to admit. He watched her sniffing the bottles with her eyes closed and tried not to think about the damn paper in his desk drawer telling him she wasn’t legally his.

Don’t be irrational. They won’t take her...

At least, that’s what he told himself on the nights he couldn’t sleep. He forced his focus back onto finding soft toothbrushes that didn’t cost a kidney, and pads for his broke teenage students.

I still have to write those recommendation letters for Momo and Izuku…

“Daddy, this one smells like strawberries!” His daughter’s cheerful voice pulled him back. Aizawa turned to the little girl grinning as she sniffed a bottle. The pro hero blinked at his superpowered child. “Does it?”

She really loves it…

“It smells so yummy!” Eri shoved the bottle into his hands, and he caught a whiff of the nauseatingly sweet, artificial scent. “Can we get this one?”

What’s in this shampoo, gold?

“Uh…” He glanced at the price tag and realized it cost as much as both his and her old shampoo combined. Her hopeful little eyes locked onto his, and he remembered her dead goldfish and how guilty that had made him feel. “Fine.” He swapped the cheap bottles for the redemption shampoo.

Maybe she’ll forget about the fish…

“Yay!” She cheered while he searched for the pads to stash in the dorms. “Stay close, Eri.” Sticking packs in strategic spots had saved him from a lot of hormonal panic tears.

Better make sure Denki doesn’t use them as nose plugs again…

He sighed, grabbing a few packs, trying to ignore the fact that his favorite disaster-prone teens were about to graduate into actual pro heroes.

Will they survive their first years on the job?

For a moment, his broken brain dragged him back to his own miserable post-graduation days. Endless patrols. Endless paperwork. Too much money. Too many cigarettes. Not enough sleep. The crushing grind of being a promising young hero who almost bled out in a back alley.

Will they end up like me after…

After the world fell apart on his shoulders, when the big brother he never had—and the boy stronger than Shouta ever was—believed with all his soul that they could be heroes.

“Daddy, are you sad?” The question from his daughter—who the government still didn’t legally recognize as his—snapped him back to the supermarket. “Of course not, baby girl.” He ruffled her hair. “It’s fine.” He lied, ignoring the gnawing fear of losing her and trying to act like the adult he was. “Everything’s fine…”

Adult men don’t let little girls worry.

“Uhmmm…” He looked at the half-full cart: food for the next ten days, ingredients for Eri’s cultural fair project, where he apparently had to cook something European. He pointed to the list in her small hands. “What’s left?”

Like cooking from this country isn’t enough? 

“Aunt Muri wrote something called… Suntory Haku Vodka on here.” Eri squinted at the list. Aizawa processed the words and, for the millionth time, regretted leaving his kid unsupervised with a thirty-something woman who never acted her age. “Seriously?”

And it’s expensive as hell…

“She said to give you this note.” Eri pulled a folded paper from her candy-shaped purse. “Thanks, Eri.”

I wired you the money earlier and forgot to mention it :)
You should invite Eri’s pediatrician to drink with us…

Love, your favorite senpai <3

Goddammit, Nemuri.

He checked his bank account, now a few thousand yen fuller. Maybe if he just stayed quiet long enough, his two functional-alcoholic best friends would forget Megumi Takatani even existed.

They’ve been at this for days...

“Fine.” He took Eri’s hand, doing the exact thing his father would cry over and his mother would call proof he was never meant to have kids: dragging a nine-year-old to the liquor aisle to hunt down overpriced vodka. “Come on, Eri. Don’t touch the bottles…”

Explaining this to child services would be fun…

“Can I drink vodka when I grow up?” she asked, tugging at her rainbow sweater Inko had knitted. “No.” His head throbbed. She gave him a raised brow and a confused look. “But Aunt Muri and Uncle Zashi—”

God. No.

“Sweetheart, your uncles are not role models…” She cut him off, whispering as she glanced down the aisle. “Daddy, is that the princess doctor?”

Oh, great.

His eyes fell on the woman standing in the liquor aisle. Megumi was wearing brown slacks, a black knit vest embroidered with roses at the collar. Red kitten heels that looked like something out of an old American movie. “Yeah, kiddo…”

Why is she staring at that shelf like it’s treasure instead of booze?

“Should we go talk to her?” Eri’s hopeful, excited tone made Aizawa rethink every decision involving pretty, too-young doctors who were far too kind—and who definitely didn’t sleep with men who broke villain bones for a living. “People don’t like being bothered at the grocery store, Eri.”

At least I don’t…

He turned away, focusing what little energy he had left on finding cheap booze homeless people wouldn’t drink—and absolutely not on how nice her blue hair looked half tied back.

“Daddy…” Eri tugged his shirt like she always did when confused. “What’s she doing?” He looked again and saw the young woman reaching for a bottle on the top shelf. “Shopping?”

God…

The hero watched his daughter’s pediatrician stretch for a cheap tequila, her fingers still a few inches short. 

She can’t reach even with those shoes?

“Is that why you make me eat vegetables?” Eri asked curiously. “Exactly.” He muttered, watching Megumi scowl at the shelf. “Shit!” He clamped his hands over Eri’s ears as Megumi cursed, biting back a laugh when she eyed the step stool at the aisle’s end.

She’s gonna break her neck…

“Come on, kid.” Before his daughter’s doctor could kill herself making questionable decisions, Aizawa walked over and plucked the damn bottle off the shelf nearly two meters up. “Here’s your…” His voice made Dr. Takatani spin toward him. For a split second, she looked breathless as her brown eyes met his. “…tequila.”

Chapter Text

Finding the pediatrician who once tried to intimidate him with a tuning fork now buying cheap booze wasn’t exactly what he had expected.

“Come on, kid.” Before his daughter’s doctor could make a questionable decision that would get her killed (and leave him having to buy Eri’s supplements himself), the hero walked over and grabbed the damn bottle of liquor from the shelf nearly two meters up. “Here’s your…” His voice made Dr. Takatani turn in his direction. For a split second, she seemed to lose her breath when her brown eyes locked with his. “…tequila.”

It tastes like nail polish remover…

“Haha…” The girl smiled awkwardly at the sight of him standing there (at a respectful distance) and hugged her bottle like a lifeline. “Thanks, Aizawa-san.”

She almost looks cute when she’s not trying to threaten me with a medical instrument.

His hand instinctively rested on Eri’s shoulder as he observed the doctor whose first meeting with him had been one of the most disastrous interactions of his recent history.
“You’re welcome, doctor.”

As if nothing had ever happened…

“You can just call me Takatani. We’re outside the hospital…” she said gently. Something about the way she always looked cheerful was disarming. He ignored the way her ears turned slightly red. “Alright. Takatani.” Aizawa was about to say goodbye, but his daughter’s curious little voice pulled Megumi’s full attention back to the child. “Daddy, what’s tequila?” She struggled with the last word.

Great. 
Perfect conversation to have in front of a doctor.

“It’s alcohol, Eri. I think it’s from Mexico…” he explained patiently, noticing how the pediatrician seemed utterly charmed just watching his little girl. Eri grinned at the young doctor, who looked as though she melted under those red eyes. “Is it tasty?” Megumi smiled at his daughter. “Ah, this one is actually pret—”

She loses herself in character…

“Takatani…” he cut her off softly. The woman’s enthusiasm vanished instantly. She blinked at the child, returning to Dr. Takatani. “Alcohol is bad for you, sweetheart. It hurts your health. Never drink it. Never.” Aizawa nodded firmly at Eri, backing up Takatani’s mini health PSA. “Yeah, kid, it tastes like nail polish remover…”

Excellent. Positive education.

“Did you like the iron?” Dr. Takatani changed the subject, brushing her hand over his daughter’s head. Normally, he didn’t like people touching Eri, but for some reason, Takatani seemed oddly trustworthy despite everything. Eri looked at her hopefully, and he pretended not to notice that lavender scent of hers again. “It tastes like chocolate!”

Anyone willing to put herself at risk for my daughter wouldn’t hurt her…

“Good, right? That one used to be my favorite…” the doctor said, and Aizawa almost smiled to himself. So she really did sample kids’ supplements, just like he suspected. “Daddy didn’t like it, though…” his kid chimed in, turning those big eyes toward him.

Of course not.
Smelled like blood, sweet as honey, tasted like chocolate…

“You tried it?!” Takatani looked at him in disbelief, her front teeth just a bit too big—rabbit-like. Weirdly cute. “Seriously!?”

Ignore her cute rodent teeth.

“Eri made me.” He glanced at his daughter. This supermarket conversation was getting strangely long. “Daddy hates yummy things…”

“I don’t like sweet stuff, Eri.” He corrected her gently. Teaching his little girl that “hate” was too strong a word had been a long project. “We don’t hate, remember?”

Who would’ve thought I’d ever say that…

“It’s just too sweet...” He explained to the adult beside him. “I get it…” Something in her smile and eyes told him instantly that she was lying.  “At least he’ll never get diabetes. Or cavities…” Takatani adjusted the heavy grocery basket in her hands. The way she held it with both arms told him more than enough about her lack of gym habits. “…or endorphins,” she muttered, eyeing the chocolate, tequila and pads in her basket.

Someone’s had a long day…

“Do you want help with that?” he offered, noticing her hands turning a bit red. Eri glanced up at him quietly as Megumi’s voice grew tighter. “No, Aizawa, thanks, I—” She laughed nervously. “No need…”

That rice sack weighs five kilos…

“Look, Daddy, only ten items!” his little girl grinned, flashing him her I’m smarter than you thought smile before turning it on her favorite doctor. “Can we use the express checkout?”

Eri’s getting way too clever…

“Hmm…” The woman looked at him, clearly desperate for backup. He pointed to an empty space in his own cart and used his tone that brooked no argument. “Put it here. Takatani.”

“Okay. It was kind of heavy anyway…” she admitted. The hero silently took the basket from her and set it in his cart. “Thanks…” Takatani said softly, stepping closer to Eri. "Daddy says helping people is a hero’s job…” his daughter piped up, making him mutter, “It’s everybody’s job…”

Safe distances?

The way this woman always kept herself just slightly far from him bothered him. And it wasn’t because of the lavender scent he grudgingly admitted was nice. He’d seen that pattern of behavior too many times before. The three of them headed toward the registers on the other side of the store, and he caught her absentmindedly twisting a ring on her finger.

She’s married?

The fact that their first meeting had ended with both of them accusing each other of terrible things might’ve clouded his observation skills. It would make sense if she was married.

She’s the successful, kind one, and—

“Why are you short?” Eri’s voice cut through his thoughts just as he was staring at the ring on the doctor’s finger. Megumi patted the girl’s head, and he realized the ring—a slim band with a tiny emerald— a graduation ring. “Nobody’s short when they wear heels, sweetheart…”

Wait...

What did Eri just say?

“Doctor, she—” he tried to step in while pushing the cart, but his kid was quicker. “Were your parents short?” He shot the doctor a look, hoping she’d read the subtext of I’m raising a kid who grew up in captivity and has no social filters. “She’s in a very curious phase…”

I failed at teaching subtlety…

“It’s alright.” Megumi winked at his daughter and pointed at Aizawa. “No, sweetheart. My parents are tall, like your dad. My mom even played volleyball…” He pushed the cart forward, listening quietly as the two of them continued. “Daddy says if I don’t eat my veggies and meat, I won’t grow. Is that why you didn’t grow much?”

God..

“Eri…” Aizawa rested his hands on his daughter’s shoulders, but his lecture on we don’t ask potentially offensive questions was interrupted by Takatani’s laugh. “No, princess. I’ll tell you a secret…”

At least she’s patient.

“A secret?” Eri glanced curiously between them. Takatani picked up a can of cherries from the shelf and studied the label. “Some babies are born earlier than they should be, and we pediatricians have to take extra care of them…” She never underestimated his daughter’s intelligence. Somehow, just listening to the two of them talk was more pleasant than he wanted to admit. “…because they need more help to grow up healthy.”

Pedagogical...
She’d make a good teacher.

“It’s called being premature, Eri...” He murmured to the child at his side. Watching Takatani win his daughter’s trust to the point of asking silly questions was a minor miracle in itself. “I was one of those babies. Spent a few months in a super-magical box called an incubator…” He glanced at the woman standing next to his daughter. Maybe Megumi was another kind of fighter. “…and I crushed my grandmother’s dream of having a grandson on Japan’s national volleyball team.”

Her words almost made him smile. He’d always had a very specific type. Smart-alecks would be the death of him.

They make you laugh, distract you, and before you know it, you’re in their bed…

“Is that why you take care of kids?” his daughter asked as they neared the express checkout. The way Megumi smiled didn’t even need words. “I really liked my pediatrician, Dr. Samito. I grew up and stole his job!” Megumi high-fived Eri, who beamed, and for a second he felt his heart beat just a little too fast. “He was a boy... And never gave me cookies. You’re nicer than he was.”

Adorable.

Every moment around her felt dangerously pleasant. The three of them reached the express line. “Thanks, for the tequila and for the help…” Megumi looked up at his face and smiled. “You’re welcome,” he muttered, helping unload her groceries from the basket.

Don’t get carried away.

“Daddy, look!” Eri’s voice distracted him. To his dismay, he and Takatani both reached for the same damned bottle of tequila. His hand brushed hers. Aizawa felt her soft skin, the cold band of her ring against him. For a moment, red flags went up in his head. “Sorry.” Megumi pulled back instantly, avoiding his eyes, her ears faintly red. “It’s fine,” he answered, watching her turn to the register.

She really can’t hide a thing.

It was almost a test of self-control. His eyes flicked to his daughter, who was watching them with narrowed little eyes. “Eri, say goodbye to the—” His voice was cut off by the cashier’s cheerful voice. “What a cute family!”

Perfect…

Aizawa saw Megumi’s panicked look and drew in a breath as the bright-smiled cashier, nails painted purple and blue shadow across his eyes, beamed at them. “Kind of an opposites-attract vibe…” His gaze landed on Eri, his eyes lighting up. “And there’s a little girl! God, I love romance…”

Try loving silence.

“We’re not—” Megumi laughed nervously and glanced at him again. Aizawa cut in with a tired sigh. “She’s my daughter’s doctor.”

Or was…
I still need to find another one, damn it!

“Yeah,” Eri agreed, smiling at the cashier. Something sharp and knowing flickered in her eyes, giving him a bad feeling. “I don’t have a mommy because my mom left.” Brutal silence dropped over the adults. Aizawa’s head pounded, color drained from both the cashier’s and Takatani’s faces. “And my daddy can’t adopt me forever because he doesn’t have a girlfriend, and the social worker thinks he can’t be my real dad alone.” She rubbed her eyes with her fingers. Years of therapy and re-socialization with Class 3-A had apparently worked a little too well—his daughter had become a pint-sized version of Todoroki. “Eri. Too much information.”

We are going to have a very long talk about privacy at home…

“What?!” Takatani’s eyes flashed with fury and disbelief. “Why don’t they—” The cashier’s panicked voice cut in, “I’m so, so sorry.” The kid with blue eyeshadow shoved an irrational amount of candy into Eri’s hands. “Here you go, princess—mochi, on me.” Eri smiled sweetly at the traumatized boy as if she hadn’t just ruined him for life. “Thanks!”

Wonderful...

All he needed was his kid sugar-high on candy and a reminder—via brown eyes and blue hair—of just how fragile his family stability really was.

“Aizawa, I…” The look on Megumi’s face said it all. And Aizawa didn’t need another person privy to his chronic paternal frustration. “It’s fine. We’re leaving…” He put a hand on his daughter’s shoulder and nodded at the pediatrician. “Good seeing you again.”

Every second gets worse…

“Already?” Eri’s sad little eyes looked up at him, but their lives were far too complicated for pleasant, embarrassing supermarket chats. “It’s late, kiddo. We still have to eat dinner…”

Still need to pay for groceries, grab Kayama’s damn vodka, and grade papers…

“Okay…” His daughter glanced at her doctor, her eyes carrying the same sadness she wore whenever her best friend had to go home. “Bye, Doctor.” Megumi crouched down just a bit and ruffled the girl’s hair, her smile a little forced. “Bye, baby unicorn. Don’t forget your iron…” Eri pouted. “Alright.”

Fuck.

“Let’s go, baby girl.” Someone always had to be the killjoy. He turned, ignoring the fact that the two of them clearly got along far too well. Before he could leave, he heard her soft voice. “Aizawa…” The hero exhaled, fighting the urge to bolt. He turned back to see the doctor avoiding his gaze, fidgeting with her groceries. “Thanks for…” She gave him a timid smile. Her body language would be his downfall. “You’re welcome.”

The way she seemed physically incapable of hiding anything was almost… adorable. Too adorable. He took Eri’s hand and turned his back on the woman. “Come on, kid.”

You have a daughter. Don’t think about her doctor…

“I could write a letter!” Her voice rang in his ears. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her leaning against the register with a mischievous look. “To the social worker. A medical report, saying how healthy and happy she is and…” Megumi’s eyes flicked to his daughter, then locked with his. Brown, deep, and hopeful. “Maybe it would help.”

Healthy and happy...

“That…” Aizawa drew in a long breath. Takatani believing a medical letter could undo centuries of bureaucracy and conservatism was almost naïve. He felt his daughter nuzzle against his arm, her red eyes peeking up at him. He was running out of cards to play, and pride wasn’t something he could afford. “That would be great, Takatani. Thank you...”

Chapter Text

Megumi Takatani’s body was definitely trying to kill her.

Spending the morning in the NICU with babies the size of soda cans and the afternoon at the fancy clinic that forced her to dress like a real grown woman was exhausting. Doing all of that while her endometrium was slowly and painfully disintegrating—smiling all the while at terrified mothers and exhausted residents—was almost heroic.

“No diabetes, no cavities, no endorphins…”

She repeated bitterly in her mind, using her own quirk to dull the pain as she drove home. Her patient’s dead-serious, truly-adult father running into her at the supermarket while she was buying pads and cheap tequila had certainly not improved her day.

Do I look like a wife? That guy really thought Aizawa would marry me? 

The warmth that spread through her body when his hand brushed hers did nothing to help her get over her inappropriate crush. Being mistaken for his wife and Eri’s mother didn’t make the day any less embarrassing either.

If I had a daughter, would she look like Eri-chan?

She bit into a chocolate-hazelnut bar—packed with enough sugar and saturated fat to kill Eri’s father (who for some reason was the only person in the universe who didn’t like sweets)—and focused on not letting her menstrual cramps be the cause of a traffic accident.

They won’t give him custody just because he’s single…

What a load of crap.

Megumi simmered in her resentment, thinking of the little girl with white hair and red eyes, playfully honest and piercingly curious. Every second in her presence felt like magic for some reason Takatani couldn’t explain. Maybe she had a new favorite patient.

Home.

She saw the hedge that framed her family’s house and felt the relief of making it back, almost whole, after a day of giving very bad news to hopeful parents. The mental exercises she had learned in med school had never really worked; looking other women in the eye and telling them their children would suffer always hurt.

At least I’ve got my tequila…

She could talk to her father about it over a drink that reminded him of his glory days in São Paulo—or his not-so-glorious days in Palo Alto. Megumi parked her car beside her orthopedic brother’s ridiculously expensive, always freshly washed car.

Great, the evil twin is home…

Her tequila automatically became her and Yuta’s tequila. She grabbed her eco-bags with the groceries from her fake little supermarket family—the highlight of her day—and walked toward the front door. Before she could open it, a sound so rare hit her ears.

They are laughing?

The last time her brother and father had fun together was when they were sixteen and Yuta had tried to play soccer instead of baseball. Megumi left the bags in front of the ridiculously easy-to-break-into wooden doors and slipped off her red shoes, the ones that had earned her the nickname “Dorothy from The Wizard of Oz” at the clinic.

Did they get drugged? When my classmates did drugs, they got happy too…

The cheerful “aaaeeeeee” coming from inside the living room made her wonder if it was an auditory hallucination. Maybe little sleep and bad meals had finally driven her insane. She stepped cautiously into her house and felt the old wood under her feet. On the sofa, her father and brother wore white-and-red jerseys of the Japanese national soccer team and were drinking beer.

Is this déjà-vu from Brazil?

“MEGUMI!” Her brother shouted, grinning as soon as he saw her. She was definitely losing it. “Daughter! You’re home!” Her father pulled her toward the living room couch. “Yes…” she answered suspiciously, glancing at the two grown men—famous for their bad tempers and arrogance—now happy. “Did we win the lottery?”

“In the sports lottery!” her shameless brother said, grabbing her tequila and pouring three shots. Her father winked at her and held her by the shoulders. “Even better! You coming back to Japan brought us luck!”

Better? 

“The other doctor who does electromyography died and now you’ll be able to charge whatever you want for the test?” she asked, hoping her father hadn’t done something morally dubious to his neurologist rival. Yuta and her father hugged and pointed at the living room TV. It was on. “Japan tied with Argentina in the World Cup qualifiers!”

Tied with Argentina? No way…

Her Brazilian friends were probably already in an alcohol-induced coma by now. “You’re kidding! Seriously?” she asked, incredulous.“Dead serious!” Her brother put a shot glass in each of their hands and the three downed tequila together.“DAMN!”

“What was the score?!” Megumi smiled at the sight of her father’s smile. “0–0!” Jirou kissed her forehead, and Megumi felt all her excitement drain away “Zero-zero!? You’re happy about zero-zero!? There wasn’t even a goal!” Yuta pointed at her face and grinned. “But we defended!”

They didn’t have the right mindset either…

Well, at least our volleyball team is decent.

“Great, bro!” She put on her don’t ruin the only happy moment my dad and brother have ever shared in their lives smile. “You guys and all the Brazilians must be celebrating right now…”

Rivals, yes. Enemies too…

“There’s someone waiting for you upstairs…” her father said, pointing toward the wooden staircase. “You’re lying.” Megumi looked at them as Yuta poured another shot of tequila. “It’s the Takatani family solar eclipse.”

The solar eclipse is more common.

The young doctor left her things in the living room and hurried up the old wooden stairs of her house. On the second floor, the windows lit the hallway with moonlight.

She’s not working? That’s strange…

Megumi slid her parents’ bedroom door open a few centimeters. Her eyes scanned the room—the futons were stored away, her father’s plants hung by the window, and their wedding photo decorated the wall. No sign of her mother.

She’s probably in the bath, or in the garden…

Megumi walked toward her own room, directly across from her twin brother’s. She stopped at the growth marks on the doorframe, where her parents had proudly measured and celebrated every centimeter she gained when she was little.

What if I had never left?

Standing in front of her door, she imagined what her life might have been like if she hadn’t been born with a so-called “blessed” quirk.

If OFA had never existed.                                                                                                                                       If her father had never sent Megumi away to protect her.                                                                                       If she had never fallen in love with the wrong person.

You wouldn’t be 28 and living with your parents…

Trying to make up for nearly ten years stolen away from Japan, Megumi slid her bedroom door open and stepped inside. Everything looked exactly the same as she had left it at seventeen.

The walls were still cream. There were still little plants on the windowsill. Her trophies and photos still sat forgotten on a shelf.                                                                                                                                 Her bookcase full of biology and physics books still had tiny figures of her favorite anime characters.

Some things never change.

To her surprise, lying in her double bed under the patchwork quilt her Brazilian foster mother had made for her, was Aya Takatani.

She looks older…

“Daughter?” The woman, with pale blue hair and eyes now streaked with gray, wearing a dark red robe, looked at her with her calm smile. “You came back?”

“I came back and found a surgeon lying in my bed.” Megumi said, walking across her room and glancing at the flowers growing on the sill. “Kind of weird, don’t you think?”

“I used to sleep here whenever my husband—also known as your father—annoyed me.” Her mother patted the bed, calling her to her side. Megumi lay down next to her and messed up her short blue hair. “You could always go talk to your favorite child, Yuta, instead of sleeping alone in my room.”

Surgeons…

If I’d been born a boy and picked surgery I’d…

“The kind of advice my favorite child gives about love involves adultery. So yes, I think I have the right to crash in my daughter’s room.” Her mother smiled, tugging at the collar of her chic clinic robe. “You’re working too much, Meg.”

He really did keep telling me to cheat on my ex…

“Look who’s talking!” As comforting as it was to lie beside her, spending all day at the hospital always left Megumi feeling grimy. “You work more than I do.”

I need a shower, now…

“That’s what older women do, sweetheart—we sew. I just prefer sewing intestines.” Her mother’s voice followed her as she stripped down and dropped her clothes in the hamper. “You’re young. You can’t just work.”

Otherwise I’d have to deal with adults…

Or end up alone.

“We could paint wine glasses like white woman…” Megumi muttered, walking toward the bathroom and leaving the door open. “According to Dad, I’m supposed to get pregnant.” She wiped away the thin layer of makeup from her face.

And then nearly die in childbirth like Mom, traumatizing my imaginary husband forever.

“You love babies.” Her mother’s voice floated in, steady and warm. “I’ll never forget when you stole one from the ward when you were eight years old…”

They could definitely forget that…

“I was eight. And we promised never to bring it up again.” Megumi glanced at her reflection in the mirror. Her mismatched underwear looked worn enough to grow legs. “I don’t know why he’s still hung up on it.”

My hypothetical kids wouldn’t want a mom who steals babies…

“Your father is emotionally constipated…” Aya stepped into the bathroom and turned on the bathtub faucet, just like she used to when she wasn’t saving lives. “We sent our cheerful girl across the world and got back a lonely woman working eighty hours a week.”

That’s what happens when villains kidnap people like me for bioengineering experiments and monster-making…

“So I could be a mom who works eighty hours a week.” Megumi wrapped herself in a towel, took bath salts from her mother, and poured them into the water. “You don’t have to do this...” Aya hugged her, running fingers through her dark blue hair. “I can feel your cramps, Meg.”

Can’t hide a thing from them…

“You and Yuuta are the worst.” She grumbled, breathing in the lavender scent of the tough surgeon who’d cried when she left for São Paulo. “I missed you.”

“I missed you too, my girl.” Aya clipped her hair back with a claw clip, then tested the bathwater with practiced fingers. “Perfect temperature.”

“To what do I owe the honor of your presence on such an ordinary night, Dr. Aya?”

“All elective surgeries got canceled…” Aya shook her head with that familiar disgust that always made Megumi laugh. “And you, dear?” Her proud tone always threw Megumi off. “Long day saving children?”

At least she thinks I’m cool…

Megumi scrolled back through her day. Sleep deprivation blurred the edges, but at least she’d managed a few hours of rest.

“I monitored preemies in the NICU this morning. Had lunch with the residents and discovered, apparently, gay men are obsessed with that jeans superhero for some reason.” Her mother frowned at that, but Megumi pressed on. “Then I went to the clinic, then to the supermarket—because someone didn’t buy pads.” She silently cursed her brother and swallowed her protest about the Takatani division of chores. “Apparently coffee’s getting cheaper, I met my new favorite patient, and the cashier thought her dad and I were married.”

“What did you just say?” Her mother’s incredulous tone made her throw an arm over her face.

“Coffee’s getting cheaper…”

Thanks to import tariffs. God bless globalization.

“Why on earth would they think you were married?” Aya laughed. Megumi replayed her own words and cringed. “I don’t know…”

Fuck it, did I really say that out loud?

“What were you two doing?” her mother teased, flashing the same mischievous grin Yuta had inherited. “For them to think you were married with a child…”

Pretending we didn’t almost kill each other the first time we met.

“Nothing major.” Megumi scrubbed at her skin, ignoring her mother’s hopeful eyes. “I was talking to my patient, little Eri-chan, and her dad helped carry my groceries…”

He’s probably just doing that whole lead-by-example thing…

“You’re kidding?” The way her mother’s smile lit up her face and her short blue hair fell across it made Aya look younger. “No…” Megumi denied flatly, ignoring the gossipy gleam in her mother’s eyes. “Your father wouldn’t carry a single book for me until he was hopelessly in love, and this man carries your groceries?”

She’s reaching…

“You and Dad were academic rivals who hated each other in college.” Megumi looked straight ahead, letting the hot water ease her cramps. “He’s just polite.”

“Is he married?” Her mother raised an eyebrow. “This polite father…”

“No.”

“Divorced or widowed?”

“Eri-chan’s adopted. He’s a single dad.” That sent her mother straight into full-gossip mode. Aya dragged a stool over and sat beside the tub. “What’s he like?”

Quiet, honest, gentle with his daughter…

“He’s…” For a moment, Megumi saw him walking beside her again, felt the rough warmth of his hand against hers, and those damn black eyes she couldn’t forget. “Serious…” Aya narrowed her eyes, and Megumi squeezed out another word. “And responsible.”

Definitely serious and responsible. The kind of person who would never steal a baby…

“Is he handsome?” Aya asked, slathering on her skincare. “This serious, responsible man.” Megumi ran a comb through her long hair, carefully avoiding her hyper-perceptive mother. “No.”

Well… 

His eyes are nice.

“You’re such a terrible liar…” Aya laughed, tossing a bottle of lotion at her. Megumi narrowed her eyes back at her. “So you can feel when people lie too, huh?”

Her mother’s words could have triggered a full existential crisis in a girl who lied about her feelings all the time.

“No, my girl.” she said gently, stroking Megumi’s hair. People who could literally feel what others felt often ended up doctors—almost a paradox. “You just can’t lie, Megumi.”

If only I could…

“Aizawa-san has black hair and black eyes.” The young pediatrician stepped out of the bath, wrapping herself in a towel. “He’s tall. Attractive. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

“Tall, dark hair, and attractive? You really are my daughter…” Her mother’s eyes gleamed with the same thrill Aya got from seeing viscera that needed stitching. “So what does this tall and attractive single dad do for a living?”

Next she’ll want his birth chart and his mother’s maiden name…

“He’s…” The words stuck in Megumi’s throat. There had to be a reason Aizawa was the only hero in history who didn’t plaster his identity everywhere. And she would respect that. “A teacher.”

He must be the first hero in history who doesn’t advertise that he’s a hero…

“College?” Her mother’s face pinched with concern.

“High school, Dr. Aya.” The pediatrician rubbed moisturizer into her skin before stress could ruin it completely.

“So you’re telling me a polite, respectful, single man—tall, handsome, and also working with kids—helped you at the supermarket, and people thought you were a couple?” The almost-pedagogical tone of her mother handing her pads made Megumi’s head throb.

She’s taking this all wrong…

“He was just gentle in front of his daughter. He’s older, he’s got way more to worry about than relationships, and…” There’s no doubt the serious, handsome man with an incredible little daughter, heroes to train, and crimes to fight would never see her that way. “…and he’s my patient’s father. That’s unethical.”

Chapter Text

Before Eri, before UA, after Shirakumo.

Eraserhead hated his job as a sidekick.

On the rooftop of the agency, he smoked, taking in the last twenty minutes before his next patrol. Thick clouds blanketed the moon, leaving young Shouta Aizawa in the shadows.

Route 34’s one of the longest…

His hands trembled slightly from exhaustion. The entire day had been spent training other sidekicks. The newer batches were getting worse by the month — it was like capable young heroes just weren’t being made anymore.

I’ll double up on patrol again tomorrow…

His phone buzzed in his pocket. He checked the email faster than he’d like to admit, but it was just a follow-up report from a homicide case that had been closed days ago.

Be realistic. You’re young and inexperienced in the field.

Unlike his best friends, who had graduated and gone off to college, Eraserhead had thrown himself straight into hero work. Now he was 24, employed by the agency of the No. 9 Pro Hero, making better money than 99% of the other support staff.

What if I just quit…

He took a drag from his cigarette, thoughts lingering on the stack of reports waiting for him. A moment of silence was nearly a miracle these days.

“Hey, boss!” His coworker’s cheerful voice was the last thing he wanted to hear.

Dammit, Sam...

“I’m not your boss,” he muttered.His head throbbed. The migraine meds weren’t cutting it anymore. 

“You’re the boss’s right hand. That makes you our boss by extension.”

He turned just enough to glance at the tall girl with long black hair and purple streaks.“I’m just as much of a sidekick as you are, Sam.”

Doesn’t she have something to blow up?

“Well, since you’re not my boss…” Her voice was soft, almost pleasant. Too pleasant. He sighed at the sound of her purple combat boots stepping closer. Sam sat beside him and plucked the cigarette from his fingers. “How about we grab a drink tomorrow?”Her amber eyes sparkled with anticipation. “It’s Friday, and I saw you’re not on patrol.”

Shit. I forgot about Mic’s radio debut…

He stared at her for a moment. “That would be extremely unprofessional.” A sly smile played on her lips. She raised an eyebrow at him. The fact that she was both pretty and likable did not help. “Technically, it doesn’t violate any agency regulations…”

Kayama and Zashi like her…

He hesitated. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he saw the girl they’d found dead in an alley, and could almost hear the desperate wails of her fiancé when they broke the news. “Not gonna happen.”

“Worth a shot…” She said, Aizawa didn’t have to look to know she was still grinning. “If you change your mind, drinks are on me.”

“Sam, we’re friends…” He checked his phone — half his break had already passed. She turned to him with a mock-hurt look.“We are?”

“We’ve worked together for two years…” Tonight she was wearing eyeliner — unusual for her. Beneath the genius support gear designer who could blow a man sky-high with one of her drones, there was just a sweet girl. Too sweet for him. “This is my break. What do you need?”

“You forgot to give me feedback on last week’s combat sim.” Her smile was calm, but her eyes were dimmer than usual.

“Right.”Aizawa felt a stab of guilt. His temple throbbed again. Mistakes like that were becoming more frequent. “I’ll send it to your email in…” He opened his schedule on his phone — an endless scroll of tasks.“…three days.”

“I’m right in front of you, Eraser. Just… say it.” 

He looked at her for a long moment. Training the team was his job — so was giving feedback. Someone had to be the bad guy. Not many were willing to take that role.

“Your offense output is too low. You’re the first to charge in, but you don’t hit hard enough to drop enemies. Depending on your gadgets mid-fight is a liability. If you can’t defend yourself, you become a risk...”

She’s going to get herself killed if she doesn’t get stronger.

“…Ouch.” The smile faded slowly from her face. For a second, guilt scraped at his ribs. “Should’ve just sent the email…”

Damn it…

“You’re good with tactics and teamwork…” How someone so brilliant wanted to be a hero was almost irrational. But he didn’t care about people’s motivations.“Keep working hard in training if you want to stay in this field.”

Without dying on the job.

“Noted.” He saw her swallow hard and force a smile. “We’re on the same patrol tonight.”

She’s been here as long as I have.

“Go home.” Last thing he needed was the agency ending up on the Labor Ministry’s blacklist. “You’ve already hit your overtime quota for the week.”

“Get real, boss.” She walked to the edge of the building, the faintest hint of a smile on her face. “I could do this all night.”

Good for her…

In front of him, his colleague cruised over the dark streets on a flying skateboard of her own invention. Eraserhead pulled on his gloves and double-checked his gear — the knife strapped to his hip felt heavier than usual, and his capture weapon helped warm him up in the spring air.

He descended the fire escape, following her from a distance, into yet another night of work.

Walking is unbearably dull.

He usually patrolled from above—on rooftops and utility poles. As brilliant as Sam was, this particular route was notorious for being treacherous. The explosive brilliance in her eyes reminded him of his own annoying, kind-hearted mad genius.

I should call to check on my brother…

"Did you get the email from U.A.?"Out of all the topics she could bring up, that was the last one he wanted to discuss. She clipped her hoverboard to her back and walked alongside him. “Patrols are usually done in silence."

I told Hizashi not to sign me up for that.

To what remained of Shouta’s heart, the email from the Hero School felt like a distant light at the end of a collapsing tunnel. He wasn’t a teenager anymore. Eraserhead had homicides to investigate, rookies to weed out, and paperwork to finish. Dreaming wasn’t even on the to-do list.

Don’t forget to pay off the loan...

"You know, Eraser, you really should be on antidepressants." 

They patrolled side by side. Early spring wasn’t warm enough to drive off winter’s cold. "I don’t need that..."

"Apathy, insomnia, depressed mood, irritability..." She raised a finger for each symptom. "Classic signs of major depressive disorder. When was the last time you felt happy?"

Never.

"Forty minutes ago, before you crashed my break." He remembered the last time he felt happy precisely—but it felt like another life entirely. "I don’t have depression."

There’s not gonna be any crime tonight. She talks so much the villains are probably avoiding this route...

"I do." He froze in the middle of the street. That was news to him. His eyes narrowed as he glanced at her face—same cheerful expression as always. "I take my meds and I’m happy." Sam looked at him seriously for the first time that night. "All the time."

I’ll have to talk to the finance guy about getting mental health coverage added to her payroll...

"Good for you…"

She kept talking regardless of his reaction. As much as he wouldn’t admit it, listening to her wasn’t as unpleasant as it was with the other senior sidekicks. "At first it ruined my sex life, but after switching, it changed everything."

I don’t get paid enough for this...

"Sam, that’s too much information."Eraser said. She reminded him of his little brother, the one he loved moderately. They’d made it halfway through the patrol perimeter, and it wasn’t even midnight. "Send a report to finance. We might be able to help cover the cost of ther—"

A sharp crack—the sound of a crushed can—cut through the night. They both froze. Eraserhead’s eyes narrowed, and by instinct, he activated his Quirk. Nothing.

Someone’s here...

"Sam."Aizawa’s body stiffened. Not enough to stop him—just enough to slow him down. No one with good intentions attacked patrolling heroes. "Watch out! One of them can paralyze for a few seconds!"

They’re staying out of sight on purpose...

"You guys like playing hide and seek?!" She pulled her board in front of her like a shield and fired two capsules that ricocheted into the dark alley ahead, scanning the area "I usually win."

"Don’t kill anyone." 

She shifted into a defensive stance beside him, her eyes and ears combing the area. "Are you the babysitter for all the other sidekicks, or just the girls?"

"Only the crazy ones."Eraser felt bad feeling. She loaded her stun gun. Things were two steps away from chaos. "Analyze."

He could almost hear the gears in her brain turning. "We’ve got one with short-term paralysis, one quirkless, and something tells me there’s a third..." In a window reflection, he saw a man with shock-yellow and red skin trying to stay hidden. Instantly, Aizawa’s body responded again.

Got you.

He launched himself with his capture weapon, wrapping the cloth tightly around the villain’s body."One down."The man thrashed as they always did. Eraserhead left him tied to a lamppost, waiting for the police, eyes burning from prolonged Quirk usage.
"Son of a bitch! Let me go, motherfucker!"

I can’t take my eyes off him until Sam takes down the other one. If he paralyzes her...

"If I were you, I’d stay quiet." His partner hunted the second villain like a cat. Eraserhead caught her signal from the corner of his eye. He slipped in his earplugs just before she fired her sonic bombs. The second villain dropped to the ground, screaming.

This is worse than Hizashi’s Quirk...

"Sorry, lady..." Keeping his eyes open was becoming unbearable. He shut down the criminal’s Quirk while Sam cuffed her with an electric restraint.  "This thing’s got a sensor. Try to use your Quirk, and it shocks you with 200 joules..."

"If I were you, I’d keep my eyes open..." Aizawa felt a jolt run through his body, paralyzing him again. Before he could react, he felt his back tear open. He looked up—another villain was running, belt lined with knives. "Sam, above!"

"Eraserhead!" Her sky-blue shot hit the villain in the chest. He dropped to his knees, paralyzed. "Aizawa!" Her eyes locked onto his chest—and so did his. A knife was embedded where he was pretty sure his heart should be.

Shit...

"Injured hero!"Sam yelled. He gasped, lungs burning. She stunned the three villains and ran to him. Her support system had already alerted every agency, police unit, and ambulance in the area. "Hang in there, boss."

"Shit." He dropped to his knees, hot blood spilling under his clothes. Her strong, lean arms kept him from hitting the ground face-first, her eyes filled with horror. "Sam..."

Eraser knew this wasn’t right, but every breath hurt worse than the last. He pulled the knife from his chest and saw at least fifteen centimeters of his blood coating the blade. The world dimmed.

Lying on the sidewalk, he heard her voice in full panic. "Why did you do that?!" She pressed on the wound, ripping a scream from him. "I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry..." The way she looked at him said it all—it wasn’t good. "An ambulance is five minutes out."

"Sam, you’re hurting me." He felt her hands in his ribs, fingers inside his body, keeping him from bleeding out."Stay calm. Don't scream…”

They can’t go through this again.

"Shouta! Stay with me!"
Her voice trembled—desperate. The woman who could fix anything apparently couldn’t fix this. "Someone! Help!" He couldn’t see her—only feel her. Drops fell onto his face.

She’ll feel like I did when he...

"You’re so loud." Her screams hurt his head and his conscience. Every breath was agony. Fighting back was fucking agony. His eyes began to close. He wasn’t paid enough for this, and it sure as hell wasn’t worth it. "Sorry..."

That’s what they told me...

He felt like the same eight-year-old Shouta Aizawa. Weak. Small. Unable to protect anyone.
If time hadn’t healed it by now, it never would. 

My brother, Muri and Zashi…

He looked at the cloudless sky one last time. If by some miracle he lived to see the sun rise, Shouta would definitely resign. Everything went dark. All Aizawa could feel were wet drops and the voice that would haunt him for many years. "Shouta. Please, please..."

Chapter Text

Aizawa was secretly proud of his class.

Hand-to-hand combat training had become more interesting over the years. Watching the remaining students grow as heroes was gratifying. Knowing his kids could defend themselves helped him sleep at night. He walked across the training mat. Pairing them up at random gave him the sense his kids could handle any opponent.

“Stronger, Kaminari.” He spoke when the electric boy, nails painted yellow, threw a pathetically executed kick at his opponent.

“That’s the best he can do, Sensei!” Ashido yelled, dodging another clumsy strike with a grin.

Mina’s going to wreck him…

“Don’t underestimate your classmate…” he warned, watching the pink, athletic girl whose biceps would’ve made a fifteen-year-old Shouta cry in the bathroom.

Training with Kirishima’s been good for her…

“It’s Mina! Thanks, Sen—” Aizawa saw Kaminari get distracted and chose not to intervene. The sound of the girl’s foot smacking the human battery’s face made him wrinkle his nose. “Ow!” The boy stared in shock at the smirking pink girl. The adult sighed and hoped he wouldn’t have to drag a teenager to the ER before the night was over. “Focus on your opponent, Denki.”

We need a healer. Urgently…

Recovery Girl was more sorely missed than he’d expected. The teacher’s eyes swept over the students who had volunteered to train at night. His gaze landed on Kirishima taking a wide lead against his opponent.

Smaller and stronger versus taller…

“Todoroki, use your height.” he instructed his nearly two-meter-tall student. “Yes, Sensei.” Shouto looked back at him with mismatched eyes. “Remember not to rely so much on your quirks,” he told the group, pacing across the mat.

“That’s Eraserhead’s motto!” Kirishima’s excited voice reached his ears. “I wouldn’t wanna be a villain and run into him in a dark alley…”

His joy feels so familiar…

“You wouldn’t wanna be a villain. Period.” He glanced at the boy with red hair and eyes. Damn it, he’d secretly miss his students. “Focus on the fight or…”

He heard the familiar crack of kids being slammed hard into the floor.

It happens…

“Oh my God!” Uraraka’s panicked voice snapped his attention back. He saw Sero flat on his back, grimacing in pain. “Uravity, try not to break your classmates’ vertebrae, please…”

She needs to learn to hold back.

“Sorry, Sensei. Sorry, Sero…” The girl—who’d become his best hand-to-hand student in the last year—looked up at him with those soft eyes.

Did training with Bakugou make her like this?

“You okay?” he asked, offering a hand to his usually good-humored student. “All good, Sensei…” Sero grinned, a little dazed, and slung his arms around the shoulders of the strong, brown-haired girl. “Ochako doesn’t know how to play nice.”

She really doesn’t…

“Sorry…” Uraraka said, taking her classmate’s weight on her shoulders. Aizawa looked at the 1.60 girl who could drop opponents his size as easily as breathing. 

“It’s fine. Just—” The words died in his throat when he saw the worst thing a teacher can see in a student’s eyes. “Go easy.”

She’s showing the same patterns I had when…

Seeing himself in his kind, hardworking student would be his worst nightmare. A war, her history with Toga, and Midoriya losing his quirk had scarred her more than any seventeen-year-old deserved.

And she doesn’t talk to anyone.

That alone was enough to keep him up at night.

“That’s it for today,” Aizawa told his students. “I want your career plans on my desk by the end of next week.” Kaminari collapsed onto the floor, panting, while Ashido ran to Kirishima. Aizawa pointed at the golden-retriever-energy trio. “Yes, that’s a special reminder for you three.”

Hopeless…

“Spoiler, Sensei!” Kaminari’s excited voice rang out. “We’re opening an agency together!” Kirishima declared, hugging Ashido and high-fiving Kaminari. “Yeah, that’s our career plan.”

Kids.

Their words might as well have been déjà vu of himself at sixteen.

“Then put it on paper, two thousand words—how, when, where.” He sighed, adjusting the capture scarf at his neck. “Keep an eye on Sero and…” His eyes drifted to Uraraka and Shouto, silently gathering towels, bottles, and weights. “Rest.”

That level of obsession isn’t healthy…

He watched his students collect things like they were gathering pieces of their souls. Adulthood had made him fully aware that the dreams of the kids he once knew had been crushed, leaving behind almost-adults in the shape of exceptional heroes.

Damn, Eri must be having dinner already…

Every second in the life of a father-teacher-hero counted. He turned away from his teenagers and checked his watch. 19:05.

Better get back to put her to bed before heading out again…

Aizawa walked back toward the dorms. A soft breeze tugged at his hair, and he caught the metallic scent of his capture scarf. He looked up at the dark, starry sky, and for some reason, the blue reminded him of his daughter’s doctor.

Snap out of it.

Chapter Text

Eri loved music.

Her only memory of her mother was her singing. Music was what taught her how to smile. Her very first dream was to play guitar. She only went to school like normal girls because her school had a music program.

I still haven’t picked my orchestra instrument. Violin is cooler than cello…

She breathed music and her teachers at school called her a prodigy. A hard word that her dad said was kind of like a superpower. But for the unhappiness of a shy little girl, great power came with great responsibility.

Ms. Utahime could’ve picked another kid…

She liked playing instruments. Singing was for cool kids like Jiro, who could get on stage and not care what anyone thought. With so many singers in the choir, soon she’d have to sing in English at her school recital.

Uncle Zashi makes it look so easy…

“There is a castle on a cloud. I like to go there in my sleep…” She tried to sing from the sheet music she was learning. “Aren’t any floors for me to sweep. Not in my castle on a cloud.”

Is my pitch right?

“There is a…” She squeezed her little eyes shut, trying to remember the rhythm. “…lady all in white…” Every word felt harder than the last. “Holds me and sings a lullaby.”

That word’s too hard…

“She’s nice to see…” If her dad was better with music, he would definitely help her rehearse more, but Shouta absolutely couldn’t sing. “And she’s soft to touch…”

I should’ve practiced this before.

Eri tried to read the rest of the music she’d be singing at the recital, but the sound of her dad opening the door caught her attention.

He’s home early…

“I’m back.”He said. She closing her sheet and hurrying to hug her favorite hero’s waist. “Daddy!” Eri shut her eyes and pressed her cheek against his stomach. 

He was always warm.

“Hey, baby girl.” He rested his hand on her hair. “Have you eaten?” She nodded and pointed at the little plate she’d left wrapped in foil for him. “The salmon was really good, and I already took my iron!”

Like chocolate for dessert.

“You’re getting really responsible.” He took off his magic scarf and his special glasses, setting them on the little table by the door. “What were you doing?”

Is being responsible a good thing? Daddy hates irresponsible people…

“Practicing…” The child sat down on their couch and showed him her sheet music. “Will you help me with the lyrics?”

Why do I have to sing in English and learn European songs if we’re in Japan?

“Eri, dear.” The exhaustion in his voice made her regret it right away. “You know I can’t sing.” He sat down beside her on the couch. Shouta ruffled her dark hair quickly and picked up the sheet. “Still that same song?”

Daddy’s not gonna eat dinner?

“Yeah…” The little girl rested her head on her pretend pillow—his arm—and felt his hand stroking her hair. “Daddy, why do they want me to sing? Couldn’t I just play guitar like my classmates?”

Choir and orchestra are really different…

“Isn’t singing fun?” her dad asked, covering his eyes with one arm. “You liked watching Frozen and Mulan last time.”

“Singing’s for the theater kids.” She murmured, remembering the students at her school who were always dressed like clowns and pirates, smiling in the hallways, making noise. “They’re so…” Her dad interrupted with a tiny smile. “Extroverted?”

Brave and funny.

“They’re always happy and never embarrassed.” she said, pouting and crossing her arms.

“Your uncles would’ve made great theater kids.” His calm voice was as comforting as his hand stroking her hair. “They’re always making noise…”

“They’d be the ones in musicals!” Eri giggled, and her dad muttered, shaking his head. “Weird people…” His voice always made her laugh. “Which part are you struggling with?”

I knew he’d help! He always helps after complaining.

“The last part.” She pointed at the sheet. Her dad took the booklet in his hands and gave her that go on look. “These words are hard…”

Why can’t regular classes be as easy as music class?

“Which ones?” He squinted at the paper. Her dad always denied he needed glasses. “These ones.” She pointed at the little letters. “Pay attention, Eri. The words are: Place.”

“Place…” she repeated.

“Crying.”

“Crying.” Eri definitely knew she’d have to practice the pronunciation better.

“And not allowed.”

“What does that mean again?” she asked, trying to recall her English lessons with Zashi. “It’s like…” He scratched his eyebrow and sighed. “A place where you can’t cry or be sad, you know?”

Like here? Daddy’s students never let me stay sad…

“I know!” she said with a tiny smile. “Then start from the beginning,” her dad said, handing her the sheet. She took a deep breath and did the breathing exercises she’d learned in music class.

Just flow…

“There is a castle on a cloud. I like to go there in my sleep…” The little girl remembered the pitch and the height of the song. “Aren’t any floors for me to sweep. Not in my castle on a cloud…”

It would be so cool to have a cloud… like Yoshi from Izuku’s videogame…

“There is a lady all in…” She squinted her little eyes, trying to recall what the word meant. “White,” her dad muttered beside her. “Holds me and sings a lullaby…”

The hard word again…

“She’s nice to see, and she’s soft to touch.” No matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t remember a single time her mom had hugged her. “She says, ‘I love you very much.’”

Isn’t “I love you” that made-up thing from American movies?

“I know a place where no one’s lost.” Keeping the pitch was harder than playing fast chords on her guitar. “I know a place where no one cries…”

“Crying at all is…” She squinted again, trying to read. “Not allowed.” Her dad helped her pronounce it. “Not in my castle on a cloud.”

I almost got everything!

The child smiled to herself, and out of the corner of her eye, she could swear she saw her dad smiling too.

“You’re going to sing.” he said, closing the sheet and standing from the couch. The girl felt her last hopes of him bailing her out slipping away. “But it’s in English!” Eri pouted.

He could be like Uncle Yagi and never say no to people…

“You worked for this.” His tone was the same one he used with his funny students. He held out his hand and gestured toward her room. “You practiced a lot. You’re not quitting now.”

He’s shy too. Shouldn’t he understand?

“But…” She looked down as he pulled her up by the hands. “No more,” he said, fixing the collar of his shirt. “I’ll be there. With you.” She pouted at her hero. “You’ll be in the audience, I’ll be on stage…” Her dad narrowed his eyes and gave her that sly little smile. “I’ll let the Midoriyas take you to Tokyo Disney.”

Disney?! He always said kids get cavities there…

“Can I eat all the candy I want?” Eri grinned up at Aizawa. For some reason, her almost-godparents Inko and Yagi always gave her way more mochi than her dad ever did. “No.” He looked at her firmly. The little girl pulled the face she’d learned to use on Kacchan to make him share mochi, and her dad sighed, exhausted. “Okay. A little more than usual. Now brush your teeth and get to bed.”

I better brush them, so the cavities aren’t too ugly…

“Okay!” Eri hopped up and ran to the bathroom, where jelly stickers covered her tub and shower wall. Music notes, lots of them. Yellow, purple, red, blue. If she got more, she could start arranging them into her favorite symphonies during bath time.

When will I be tall enough to reach the mirror?

She hoped not too long. The girl climbed onto her step stool, squeezed strawberry toothpaste onto her brush, and brushed the way her dad had taught her. Front teeth first, then the back. Growing up was making some things easy: brushing her teeth was natural now, just like sleeping through the night without nightmares and going to school like other kids.

Daddy said with Dr. Takatani’s iron I’ll grow tall like Shoto and Momo…

Her little red eyes focused on the mirror. Straight white hair, little horn, bangs, faint lines on her skin. Eri’s heart with holes in it hurt a bit when she saw her reflection. When she thought of her dad, the only picture that came to mind was him—black hair, black eyes, like a moonless night. When she thought of her mom, there was just one memory: a woman singing to her. White hair, red eyes, like her own. But sad eyes. Very sad.

I look so much like her…

Eri didn’t remember much from before she was rescued. Her dad said people forget really bad things so they can sleep better. But her mom’s singing voice never went away.

Why didn’t she hug me? Could she only sing?

No matter how hard she tried, Eri couldn’t remember her mother hugging her, stroking her hair, taking care of her—touching her at all. Maybe she’d just forgotten. Like she’d forgotten so many things.

Does Mama miss me?

“Eri, you okay?” Her dad’s voice pulled her back. She shook her head and tasted the strawberry toothpaste in her mouth. “Yes, Daddy.” She rinsed her mouth and avoided the mirror. “I’m coming.”

Maybe one day she’ll come back. Like Peter Pan…

The child climbed down from her stool and padded toward her little bedroom. Her yellow Christmas lights never let the room go completely dark. Not that she was afraid of the dark—or monsters or bugs—like the kids at her arts school. Her pajamas with colorful kittens were folded neatly on her dresser, just like every night. She put them on and sat at the edge of her bed.

Daddy’s not here yet…

Sometimes he took a little longer. He always washed the dishes and packed his lunch for the next day before heading out to work anyway. Eri’s little eyes landed on her brown guitar, almost chestnut. A gift from Uncle Zashi, also a musician.

Just a little won’t hurt…

She was supposed to lie down and wait for her dad, but her fingers were itching. The girl picked up the guitar that was almost as big as she was and strummed the chords she’d learned that week in music class. Some song in a language that wasn’t English or Japanese. For some reason, guitar teachers really liked something called Bossa Nova.

Which one was the one Uncle Zashi taught me?

Her memory wasn’t great for things like math, but her fingers never forgot chords. It was easier when the songs had words and she could sing along.

“Hey, Jude.” she hummed softly. “Don’t make it bad.” So many English words were hard, but she sang it so often it was already in her little repertoire. “Take a sad song and make it better.” The sound of her guitar would always be one of her favorite sounds. “Remember to let her into your heart…”

“See?” Her dad’s voice pulled her out of her melody. Eri turned to the door and saw him standing there, arms crossed, with almost a smile on his face. “If you can sing at home, you can sing at the recital too.”

Maybe he didn’t know how to smile when he was little, and he’s still learning?

“I’ve known this one forever…” Eri said, putting her guitar back in its case covered in hero stickers. “And no one sees me here in my room.”

“I see you.” He stepped inside and straightened the little mess of her sheet music. “Word is, I’m hard to please.” He picked up her folded red blanket from the edge of the bed and tucked it around her. “And I like it.”

“You’re my dad! Dads like everything their kids do.” At least that’s what she figured out watching her classmates whose parents clapped even when they played badly. “Who told you that?” His serious face made her giggle. He walked over to the chair by her bed and sat down. “I don’t like your math grades.”

“Math is hard!” Eri probably should’ve listened when Katsuki said Denki wasn’t a good teacher. “And your coffee is too sweet,” her dad added, betraying everything she believed about breakfast. “We’re not ants…”

Little ants don't get sad.

“I only put one drop of sweetener.” Eri sighed. Why Daddy hated tasty things was a big mystery. “You like Dr. Princess…”

She makes him laugh. Just like Denki and Kirishima!

“Like is a strong word. She’s just a good doctor.” He narrowed his eyes at her. “Watching too many Western movies is messing with you. I should sell our TV.” She’d heard that a million times. “I’m going to work, but I’ll be back before you wake up. Call me or Hizashi if anything happens.”

Already?Noooo.

“Daddy…” The words caught in her throat. Her eyes dropped to the red blanket, and he noticed. He always noticed. “What is it, baby girl?” For a moment, she looked up at his face. “What’s it like…” The corners of his eyes were starting to wrinkle. “To have a mom?”

Silence fell over the room. Shouta could be really quiet.

“I don’t know.” For a moment, he looked younger, more real than he was used to. “My mom and I weren’t close.” Shouta ran his hand through her hair, the way he always did when he tried to be affectionate. “She wasn’t very warm.”

Is that why he never says how he feels?

“Was she mean?” Eri searched his eyes. He shook his head. “She was just a lot like me.” she mumbled. “But you’re nice, daddy.” 

He feeds stray kittens and takes care of people…

That didn’t make sense. To her, Daddy was the nicest person on the planet. He brushed a strand of hair from her eyes. “Good thing you think so.”

“What do nice moms do?”

“That’s… Very subjective, Eri.” He sighed and rubbed his eyes with his fingers. “I guess they take care of their kids.”

Take care of kids…

Her mind wandered to the kind lady who gave her cookies and chocolate-flavored iron, taught her how to listen to hearts, and made her dad smile. “Like Dr. Takatani?”

It was kinda nice when the guy at the supermarket thought she was my mama for a second.

“Taking care of kids is her job.” Adults were definitely complicated. He always acted weird around her doctor. “Being a dad or mom is different. It’s forever. It doesn’t end when your shift does…”

Then why did my mom leave?

Her chest tightened, but she didn’t like crying. Aizawa was the kind of person Eri liked most. He was honest, above all. Even if it hurt, he always told the truth. She tugged on the sleeve of his uniform and tried to be a brave girl. “Daddy, are we gonna stay together?”

Like in Spy x Family or Howl’s Moving Castle?

“Yes.” He answered. Categorically. No explanation, no hesitation. “I don’t want another father…” She whispered, hugging his arm. His capture scarf always left his work clothes smelling like old coins.“You’re staying with me. Period.”

But it’s not dad who decides…

“I’m scared…” She buried herself in the familiar scent of his clothes, feeling his hand settle on her shoulder. “Don’t be. That’s an adult thing. I’m handling it.” He stroked her hair. “You just focus on school and learning music.”

School and music…

“Daddy…” Before she could say more, he cut her off, pulling back to look at her face. “What do you think about me staying here until you fall asleep?” She blinked, his calm face reminding her of her first days at U.A. “Like when I was little?”

But I’m not six anymore…

“Let me tell you a secret.” He crooked two fingers at her, the same way he did when he gossiped with uncles Zashi and Muri. Eri leaned close, and he whispered in her ear: “You’re not big.” Eri giggled. Sometimes, her dad really could be funny. “I guess that’s okay…”

Doesn’t he have work?

“Great.” He stood, picking up her sheet music from the top of her little white dresser. “I needed a break anyway.” He sat down on her bed, leaning his back against the wall, the way he always had when she was just a little girl afraid of the dark. “I don’t sing.” He handed her the sheets and ran his hand through her hair. “But I’ll help with the English.”

Chapter Text

This wasn’t how Takatani expected to spend her twenties.

Being stuck since 8:00 a.m. in the quietest pediatric ER in history gave her a bad feeling, but her online therapy sessions (usually done in her car) had taught her that she should always expect everything to go wrong.

Only ear infections today…

Quiet shifts meant healthy kids, interns who weren’t messing up, and free time to study, catch up on papers, or listen to podcasts. Sitting at the ER counter, Megumi pretended not to hear her interns’ gossip about their love lives and checked in with her favorite lawyer to make sure her favorite patient’s medical report was legally solid.

Helena 6:55 p.m.: I’d add some neuropsych tests. To prove she’s developing well.
Megumi 6:55 p.m.: Thanks, Lena. Swing by the clinic to pick up insulin for Rin ❤️

Helena 6:56 p.m.: That’s why I’ve put up with Yuta all these years...
Helena 6:56 p.m.: Speaking of which, I heard you’re basically running away from home. 

Megumi 6:56 p.m.: My dad’s trying to marry me off to a neurologist, my mom dragged me to a lunch that turned into a lecture about freezing my eggs, and I walked in on Yuta banging my resident in the bathroom…

Helena 6:57 p.m.: You make me grateful my parents are in ✨Cuba✨.
Helena 6:57 p.m.: Seriously, move out.

Megumi 6:58 p.m.: I don’t have time to hunt for an apartment. 
Megumi 6:58 p.m.: I could just live here—there are beds, bathrooms, and no intergenerational trauma.

Helena 6:59 p.m.: I’ll look for places near your jobs. Rental contracts make me a ton of money.

Megumi 6:59 p.m.: I already lived alone for years, and I’m never home anyway.
Helena 6:59 p.m.: Stop being a nomad! And the egg idea is great. Rin and I froze ours…

Megumi 7:00 p.m.: Did my mom pay you to say that?
Helena 7:00 p.m.: I’m Catholic. God told people to have kids, and chemo was gonna wreck my ovaries. So we froze them. Divine will, babe.🙏🙏

Megumi 7:01 p.m.: I’m glad you’re okay. Don’t forget to send in your routine labs, both of you. 
Megumi 7:01 p.m.: But not everyone gets a fairytale and finds their high school sweetheart who beats leukemia and diabetic ketoacidosis.

Helena 7:02 p.m.: You should try women.
Helena 7:02 p.m.: The first time you feel bare breasts pressed against yours, nipples hardening in your mouth, and wetness dripping down your fingers…
Helena 7:02 p.m.: Eat pussy. It changes lives.

Megumi blinked and reread her friend’s messages, trying to process the words in her head. That was definitely her cue to focus back on her article.

Megumi 7:03 p.m.: Thanks for checking Eri’s report, Hel.❤️
Megumi 7:03 p.m.: And for the reprodutive advice.
Megumi 7:03 p.m.: And for the lesbian porn.

Definitely not how she’d pictured her youth.

Megumi glanced around the ER again. Basically inheriting the legacy of her miraculous but slightly outdated pediatrician-mentor came with a few drawbacks, one of them being her post at the University Hospital. Empty stretchers, tidy supply carts, bored med students chatting.

I swear Samito knew he was gonna have a stroke and dragged me back from Palo Alto just so I could listen to interns gossip instead of him.

“The guy I’m seeing said, quote, I’m not like other girls…” A tall girl with a gentle look said as she bit into a protein bar. “What does that even mean?”

“That he’s a misogynist, babe.” The boy’s answer made Megumi smile into her coffee as she skimmed another random article. “Girls are amazing. Like Midnight and Mirko…”

“He thinks you’re ugly, Aiko.” The dry voice of the third almost made the pediatrician choke on her latte. “And weird.”

God, I hate adults…

Megumi decided to intervene before tears broke out in her ER. “He’s trying to put other women down to compliment you.” She smiled and offered one of the cookies from her bag to the intern. “That’s a red flag, sweetheart.”

“Major red flag, queen.”

“Doctor, when do you finish your residency?” The intern with curly black hair and bayonetta-style glasses made her hate her twenties a little more. Megumi heard the tall, overly-polite boy with equally curly brown hair whisper to his colleague. “Aiko, Dr. Takatani is a pediatrician. She’s the chief resident…”

Are they siblings?

“Oh, I didn’t know…” Aiko’s cheeks went pink. The rude intern didn’t even look up from his phone.
“Think before you open your mouth, idiot.” The tone gave her flashbacks to her own med school battle scars. “It’s fine, I graduated pretty early.” Megumi tried to radiate the strongest sorry for society’s inherent sexism vibe she could. “And usually it’s the residents who cover the ER anyway.”

Do I still look like a resident? Should I be wearing business clothes and coat instead of scrubs?

“With all due respect…” The polite student’s voice was almost soothing. Takatani read his name off his coat—Haruki Ishikawa—and made a mental note to remember it. “Why are you here?”

Existential void? Workaholism? Because the pay is good and I didn’t feel like going home?

She smiled at the trio, already feeling the desperate need for a long shower that would contribute to global water scarcity. “I like the ER. And teaching is fulfilling.”

“Bullshit.” The rude one—apparently named Atsumu—pushed some blonde hair out of his eyes and took a swig of energy drink. “Don’t mind him.” Aiko’s ears went red.  The other two, who weirdly looked alike, exchanged anxious glances. “Yeah, Doctor Takatani. He probably has oppositional defiant disorder,” Ishikawa added.

They’ve been here eleven hours and their curls still look perfect. Is that normal? My hair’s about to fall out…

“Atsumu would love my older brother.” Takatani sighed and glanced at the clock on the wall of the empty ER. “The residents were overloaded, so I gave them a break from babysitting interns.”

7:05 p.m. Only 55 more minutes…

“From us?” The nerdy girl in pink scrubs and glasses looked at her in disbelief. Megumi sipped her latte, trying not to come off like an asshole.
“They hate being stuck with interns…” The polite boy laughed. Megumi noticed his nails—no cuticles, clear coat. “Oh my God, why?!”

How do they have time to get manicures when I don’t even have time to look for an apartment?

Before she could say something less offensive, Atsumu glanced at the trio with a grin worthy of Yuta Takatani in one of his more deranged moods.
“Their loss. We spent 11 hours doing nothing. We’re lucky.”

What did he just say?

“You think you’re lucky?” Takatani laughed in disbelief at the intern wearing ridiculously expensive moss-green scrubs. She heard Nerd Glasses stifle a laugh and bit back her own. “Seriously?”

How is his self-esteem that high? Did his parents’ love language happen to be words of affirmation?

“I think so, yeah.” He looked at her like it was obvious. For some reason, Atsumu even had the same haircut as Yuta.
“For example, this shift’s been pretty chill…”

He didn’t just say that…

“You didn’t just say that.” Megumi dropped her forehead onto the counter. She could feel pre-chaos energy in her bones, praying for the safety of every baby, child, and teen in the city. “Have you never set foot in an ER before?”

Did I check the crash cart? Is there an intraosseous kit here?

“What?” The intern’s clueless tone made her lift her head and stare into his cursed blue eyes.
“Rule number zero in the ER.” Her gaze swept over the three med students, then the wall clock. “Never, ever, under any circumstances say a shift is quiet.”

7:25 p.m.
Stay calm.

“Why not, Doctor?” Ishikawa tilted his head, curious. She felt that creeping sense of imminent chaos, the kind only a childhood spent playing Uno in this same room while her mom ran traumas could teach you.
“It’s… superstition.”

There’s no way things can spiral in 35 minutes.

“No. It’s very real. You jinx it.” Megumi grabbed her phone, glancing at the well-mannered interns in their scrubs-that-didn’t-cost-a-kidney.
“You guys want pizza?”

No negative thoughts…

“Pizza?” Ishikawa looked nervously at Aiko. Megumi saw the girl’s face turn red.
“Doctor, we haven’t even gotten our research stipends yet, and we’re not hungry…”

God, she reminds me of that sweet Stanford intern who ended up in neurosurgery…

“It’s fine. There’s an unspoken rule that attendings buy dinner for the team.” Megumi picked out a decent pizzeria on her phone.
“Seriously?” Ishikawa smiled at Aiko, their fingers fidgeting.
“And I love wasting money on food.” She grinned at them and glanced at the third intern, who was playing Candy Crush on a gurney.
“What toppings do you like?”

So damn cute.

“Doctor, do you like pepperoni?” Ishikawa asked, eyes bright.
“Can we do half margherita?” Megumi and Manicure Boy frowned at Aiko.
“I’m vegetarian. Sorry.”

Damn it, they’re too sweet. I’ll have to beg Mom’s forgiveness after our whole frozen eggs talk.

“No problem, Aiko.” Megumi softened her voice, the same tone she used for teenage patients crying over boyfriends and small breasts.
“Two pizzas, then.”

Her gaze swung back to Gen Z Yuta, already forming contingencies. “Atsumu.” The boy stood with a sour look. “Go to adult trauma and bring back the white-haired nurse, please.”

There can't be only students here when they arrive.

“Why?” The question made her wonder if her ears were working right. Ishikawa and Aiko froze. Megumi tied up her hair and smiled. “Because I’m asking nicely.” He raised his hands and slipped on his Crocs, leaving the ER. “Okay, fine.”

He’d better bring Nurse Florence…

“Help!” The magic word that makes 99% of people snap to attention. A panicked man’s voice and a child’s screams froze the interns, their eyes wide. The adult hadn’t even arrived yet, and Megumi already knew the jinx had kicked in.
“Somebody help my son!”

A screaming child means the airway’s clear…

“Remember the ABCs of trauma.” She guided them calmly, the voice of someone who’d worked chaotic ERs in three different countries. “Don’t show fear in front of the parents.” Her eyes landed on the anxious girl flinching at every cry. “Aiko, stay on the phone. If it rings, answer and shout what’s coming in.”

7:45 p.m.

The baseball game had ended early.
A paramedic with dog ears and nose entered, alongside a father carrying a sobbing little boy in his arms. Both were wearing Tokyo Yakult Swallows jerseys, faces painted blue and white, streaked with tears. “Shin Amanai, four years old. Sudden pain and loss of movement in the right arm, 30 minutes ago.”

Sudden pain? Fracture?

“We were at the stadium. I went straight to the ambulance…” Without needing direction, Ishikawa guided the boy to a bed. “It’s okay, Amanai-san, the doctor’s here.” The child screamed every five seconds, his father’s tears smudging the paint on his face. “He was fine, and then suddenly…”

Doesn’t look like a fracture… no trauma.

“Amanai-san.” Megumi snapped on gloves, calculations already running through her mind. “I’m Dr. Takatani, pediatrician.” The child shrieked between breaths, his face flushed. “Tell me what happened with this champ.”

Having an orthopedic brother wasn’t always a curse. Something about the way the child screamed and held his arm gave her a strong clue.

Poor kid, that hurts like hell.

“We were just playing!” Amanai swallowed hard. “I see. And it happened after…?”Megumi nodded, examining Shin’s arm without touching it. The father sat on the bed, his son crying against him. “I pulled him by the arm to grab him, and he hasn’t stopped crying since.”

Nursemaid’s elbow.

“Okay, Amanai-san. Good thing you brought him in right away—this happens sometimes.” The doctor touched the father’s shoulder and repeated her mantra—be the calm in the chaos—for the thousandth time. “He never cries like this…” The man locked eyes with her. In his arms, the boy hiccuped, quiet for a minute, then screamed again. “He’s usually tough. Never cries.”

“Excuse me, Shin.” Despite already having her hypothesis, Takatani touched the child’s arm and, secretly, used her quirk to feel his bones and dull the pain. Intact. “It’s okay. This is what we call ‘nursemaid’s elbow,’ a dislocation.”

Hope no one notices…

“What?” The man blinked at her, confused. Megumi pointed at the child’s elbow. “The little forearm bones slipped out of place.” The color drained from the father’s face. “Oh my God.”

He stopped! That’s progress...

“But we can fix it quickly, right here.” Megumi smiled reassuringly. “No problem—” The man rolled his eyes back and fainted onto the gurney. Megumi rushed to check his pulse. The boy looked at her, puzzled.“Papa does that when he sees cockroaches.”

God…

“Oh, Megumi…” A familiar voice reached her ears. Her heart warmed at the sight of the woman who always slipped her candy behind her parents’ backs. “Hey, Nurse Florence.” She greeted her while hooking the monitor on the dad and soothing the boy. “Already starting like this?” Her favorite nurse powered on the heart monitor. At least it was normal. “You’re just like your mother.”

God, please let her mean in looks only…

“Should we call ortho?” Atsumu peered at Shin, whose blue face paint was streaked with tears. “No need.” Megumi crouched in front of the boy. “Hi, Shin. I’m gonna fix your arm real quick, okay? Can I see it?”He pouted and yelled, “No!”

Tough crowd.

Megumi glanced at the counter and spotted her forgotten snack. “I’ll give you a mochi!” The boy instantly held out his arm.“Okay!” Takatani performed the maneuver her brother had drilled into her. “Ow!” Shin cried, then the pop of bones sliding back into place. The child lifted his arm overhead, beaming.“Look, mochi lady! It’s all better!”

Kids and their magical ability to forget pain.

“Good boy. Didn’t I say it would pass?” She ruffled his hair and checked his dad. Nurse Florence grabbed Megumi’s mochi from the counter and handed it to the boy. “Here’s your treat. Stay with your papa, and I’ll give you more later.”

7:48 p.m.

“That was cool.” Atsumu looked at her, almost impressed for half a second.

“Never, under any circumstances, pull a child under five by the arm. It’s called radial head subluxation, and it’s easily fixed with a manual maneuver.” Megumi showed them Shin’s arm, then pulled up X-ray images on Google. “If you ever call my brother in for this, he’ll laugh and never show up.”

Okay. Teaching isn’t so bad.

“Doctor, I think…” Ishikawa glanced toward the hall. A young redheaded woman ran in carrying a baby.“My daughter!” Florence and Megumi exchanged a look and yanked the infant stretcher into place. “She wasn’t breathing!”

Shit. Shit. Shit .Shit…

“Lay her here.” Megumi rushed forward and immediately assessed the baby—covered in vomit, cheeks swollen, face red. “My name’s Dr. Takatani. I’m a pediatrician,” she said, already listening to the child’s chest. “What happened?” The young woman looked barely older than her interns. Tears streamed down her face. “She was eating, she vomited, and then—like this.”

Food, vomiting, acute dyspnea…

“What was for dinner? Anything new or different?” Megumi asked, checking the baby’s airway and lungs. “I gave her an omelet…” The woman broke down in sobs, trying to hug her child. On the stretcher, the baby smiled at Takatani’s penlight. “It’s okay. She’s stable,” Megumi reassured, relief in her voice.

Wheezing all over. Thank God she came fast.

“Florence, give IM epinephrine and a bronchodilator.” Megumi removed her stethoscope, locking eyes with her favorite nurse. “What—what does she have?” the young mother asked, voice breaking. Her cheap jacket and tear-stained face made Megumi’s heart ache.

God, she’s so scared.

“Your baby’s probably allergic to eggs. The good news? It’s not severe. We’ll keep her overnight just to be safe.” The baby chewed on a hand-shaped toy, happy as ever. “To… eggs?” the mother whimpered, covering her eyes with her hand as she bent over her daughter. “It’s okay. It’s over now…” Megumi touched her shoulder, silently thanking the gods for interns. “Ishikawa, please. Get her some water, then stay with them.”

Poor thing—no one here with her.

“This kind of thing happens…” Nothing in the world seemed harder than being a mother. Being a mother alone? Practically supernatural. “The important thing is, you brought her fast and she will be fine...”

Her eyes flicked to the dad regaining consciousness, then her mind drifted to another father who kept showing up in her thoughts.

I wonder if Eri’s doing better…

7:52 p.m.

“Dr. Takatani.” Aiko’s voice made Megumi’s skin prickle. “Kotaro Sato, eighteen months old, coming from the Shimura Children’s Shelter with acute respiratory distress.”

Eighteen months old. Acute respiratory distress…

She locked eyes with Florence. Both women immediately grabbed IV kits, lidocaine, endotracheal tubes, and ambu bags. “The ambulance arrives in two minutes.”

He’s an orphan? Did they vaccinate him against pneumonia or meningitis?

“You.” She pointed to the first intern she saw—and of course, it was Atsumu. “Go upstairs, third floor. Find Dr. Nabil in the ICU.” The boy barely looked at her, panicked. “And what do I tell him?”

Respiratory distress…  Sepsis?

“Tell Dr. Nabil a child’s coming up intubated.”

“But what if there’s no bed?!” She turned on him, adrenaline buzzing in her veins. “There are never any ICU beds, you just steal them! Look him in the eyes and take the reserved bed from Dr. Yuuta Takatani.”

Dying babies outrank elective knee surgeries.

“The orthopedist?” He stared, incredulous. “No!” Her jaw nearly dropped, but there was no time for this. “He’ll kill me!”

Stay calm. You’ve done this a million times.

“Kids, take this to heart. Golden rules of the ER and Peds.” Through the glass doors, she saw the ambulance pull in. “Rule number one: you never say no to department chiefs.” Megumi lined up the tubes on her table in ascending size. Her hands trembled slightly—but she shut it down.“Rule number two: you never, under any circumstances, forget to count the respiratory rate of a baby with a cold.”

You’re the one in charge of this ward. Don’t panic.  

“And rule number three?” Aiko asked just as Megumi saw her familiar paramedic bagging the baby through the doors. “There’s a reason nobody says no to pediatricians…”Time always seemed to slow. Megumi’s heart pounded, silently thanking her secret quirk. “Kids in danger outrank everything! Go, Atsumu! Go! Go!”

Please don’t go into cardiac arrest. Please don’t go into cardiac arrest…

7: 55 PM.

Chapter Text

Everything can turn chaotic in an instant.

You’re the one in charge of this ward. Don’t panic.

“There’s a reason nobody says no to pediatricians…” Time always seemed to slow. Megumi’s heart pounded, silently thanking her secret quirk. “Kids in danger outrank everything! Go, Atsumu! Go! Go!”

Please don’t go into cardiac arrest. Please don’t go into cardiac arrest…

7:55 PM

Damn it! There should’ve been an adult with him…

The doctor and her intern pulled the doors open as the ambulance team rushed in with the gurney. “Kotaro Sato, boy, one year and six months, bacterial pneumonia for five days, worsening in the last three hours with respiratory distress…”

Five days. Pneumonia. Respiratory distress. Is he septic? Is he in shock?

“Aiko, put an O₂ catheter on him,” she ordered, listening quickly to the baby’s tiny lungs—congested, struggling. She checked his hands and feet, his skin icy cold. “What are his vitals?”

Not hot. Not septic shock…

“BP 100/70,” Nurse Florence called out as she assessed the child.

Normal. For now.

“Heart rate 140.” A chill shot down Megumi’s spine. On the gurney, baby Kotaro cried, lips turning purple, gasping alone.

Too high. Bad sign.

“Cyanotic, cold extremities.” Takatani knew she shouldn’t. She absolutely shouldn’t. But she had seen babies die of pneumonia within hours. She discreetly touched his chest, focusing her quirk on soothing his lungs and dulling the pain.“Respiratory rate: 50.”

Bad bad bad bad.

“Aiko, what’s his O₂ sat?” Takatani hooked the baby to every monitor she could. Beside her, the intern stared, frozen at the sight of the crying toddler. “Aiko!”

7:57 PM

Two minutes on oxygen.

“Sat 78%!” the nurse shouted, as paramedics rushed in to help. “Starting IV access, Doctor.”

Shit!

“Hold on, Kotaro.” Megumi locked eyes with the boy’s round, tear-streaked face. His little green eyes blinked up at her. “Starting sedation, Doctor.” Florence’s voice snapped her back. The boy’s eyelids fluttered, heavy, then closed. “You’re going to sleep now, and when you wake up, this will be over. You’ll be okay, I promise.” She glanced at the brown-haired student staring at the baby, paralyzed. “Aiko, you’re going to help me intubate!”

Or he’ll stop breathing altogether…

“What?!” The intern looked at her in shock, throat dry, fear wide in her eyes. “Just pass me the instruments. You can do that,” Megumi said firmly, meeting the girl’s gaze. “Okay…”

“Florence, draw a blood gas, please.” The pediatrician positioned the child’s head. The nurse who had practically raised her glanced at her—almost maternal—and Megumi felt time slow around her. “Laryngoscope, Aiko!”

Don’t be a difficult airway. Please, don’t be a difficult airway…

“Here, Doctor.” She slipped the instrument into the baby’s mouth—vocal cords visible right away. “Aiko, the tube.” Thank the spirits, her intern in shock was proving remarkably efficient. “This one?” She held up a tube for teenagers. Takatani pointed while carefully lifting the laryngoscope so as not to cause trauma. “That one!”

Careful with the teeth…

“Here.” Aiko handed her the right-sized tube and Megumi drew a deep breath. “Come on, come on, come on…” Her hands steady, her heartbeat roaring in her ears. In the mirror of the blade, she saw the tube slide perfectly into place. “We’re in!” She pulled the stylet and hooked up the manual bag. “Aiko, ventilate here.”

Is she calmer under pressure?

“How do I do it, Doctor?” The girl stared, still shaken, but her hands already reaching for the ambu. “One, two, squeeze.” Megumi demonstrated, and the student copied her. “One, two, squeeze.” Megumi listened to the baby’s lungs, checking air entry, and brushed his hair gently. “Good job, Aiko.”

He’s ventilating, but he needs mechanical support…

“One, two, squeeze.” From the corner of her eye, the doctor watched the young student bagging steadily. “One, two, squeeze.” Aiko repeated, her gentle eyes fixed on Kotaro. Maybe her dad had been right—maybe teaching was rewarding. “One, two, squeeze.”

It worked. Breathe…

“Dr. Takatani.” The always steady voice of her ICU friend immediately slowed her racing heart.

What—he came down here? Why didn’t he send a resident?

“Dr. Nabil Al-Haddad, hey!” Takatani spotted her friend—short brown curls, green eyes—the man who somehow always did her favors, whom her brother adored despite the doctor’s open disdain for him. “It’s never good when our paths cross…”

Then again, liking Haddad was easy. Not liking Yuta was even easier…

“Never is.” He tapped her with a pen, keeping the careful professional distance he always kept. Being friends with the ICU chief had its perks—like personal escort for every one of her kids. “Where’s the boy?”

“Here.” She led him behind the curtain where Aiko was manually ventilating the baby. “This is Kotaro Sato, 18 months, came in with pneumonia, now acute respiratory failure and… He’s here alone…”

I have to call social services…

“I see. I’ll take it from here.” The doctor gently took the bag from the intern’s hands and hooked the tube to a portable vent. “Three minutes in, no chest X-ray yet,” Aiko whispered to the intensivist, and Megumi saw her trembling slightly.

She’d probably do great in the ICU…

Predictable, controlled, boring silence.

“We’ll finish upstairs.” The intensivist pushed Kotaro’s gurney and jotted something down on his phone. “Residents round at 11:00 PM and 8:00 AM.” He waved to the ER women, and Aiko’s face went bright red. “You can relax now.”

She’s got a crush on Nabil?Cute. 

“Thanks, Dr. Al-Haddad.” She smiled at her usually grumpy Syrian friend. “Remember what I told you! Talk to the kids—it matters. And post-sedation abstinence…”

He better have paid for his nephews’ meningitis vaccines…

He nodded silently, hearing it for the thousandth time in two years. “That intern’s rude,” Al-Haddad muttered, glancing at Atsumu while adjusting the baby’s vent. “You’ve got to knock it out of him, or he’ll end up a terrible doctor. Like your brother.”

His shitty-person scale is always going to be Yuta, isn’t it?

“That’s mean, Nabil!” She shot back at the ICU chief who made his residents work 80-hour weeks.

“You have to learn to be tougher.” The older-brother-of-three tone never left his voice. “Or bad men will walk all over you.”

He would’ve hated grandma Takatani…

“I'm tough, okay?” She sighed, calculating whether she’d have to channel some Takatani-level intimidation herself before Atsumu got expelled from the hospital.“Not everyone’s a natural-born head...”

Or makes people obey  just by looking at them…

“You learn. You have to.” He spoke softly in Arabic to the baby. “I’ll take him up. I’ll call if anything changes.”

“Thanks, icon.” The doctor glanced at the little boy, fingers no longer so blue. “Bye-bye, buddy.”

8:10 PM…

“Okay, young padawans.” Takatani’s voice snapped the three interns back into line. “That was a solid lesson in respiratory disease and pediatric intubation. You did exceptional.” She smiled at the med students, locking eyes with the girl in pink scrubs. “Especially you, Aiko.” Ishikawa patted his friend’s back, but the color drained from the girl’s face. “Next one, you intubate. I’ll assist you…”

Very pedagogical…

Megumi watched her sprint to the trash can and vomit whatever was left in her stomach. Aiko straightened, eyes brimming with tears. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry…”

Oh my God.

“It’s okay.” Megumi scratched her eyebrow, hit by a horrible déjà vu of her med student days in São Paulo. “Come on, sweetheart, let’s get you some fluids…” Florence pulled the girl toward one of the stretchers.

Interns having nervous breakdowns? What am I supposed to do with that?

“That was the worst hour of my life!” Aiko sobbed, her hands trembling violently. “Doctor, I can’t, I—I—”

Okay, just think of what my dad or my brother would do and do the opposite.

“Easy, calm down. It’s over now…” Megumi checked the girl’s pulse while the nurse slipped an IV line into her arm. “Atsumu, go to the pharmacy and grab some clonazepam for your colleague, please.”

“So now I’m the errand boy.” He grumbled. Ishikawa’s look was enough to make the other intern obey. “It’s over, breathe.” Megumi sat beside her student and took the girl’s glasses off her face. Aiko hiccupped. “Pediatrics is awful!”

Damn, after my first intubation I was worse than this…

Maybe it was the post-shift adrenaline or the fact that Aiko’s curls were still somehow perfect, but a laugh slipped out of the pediatrician. “It really is awful sometimes.” She pulled some anti-nausea meds from the emergency drawer and handed them over. “During my first intubation, I nearly fainted right after…”

Better to say “nearly” than admit I actually fainted and called Florence and mom crying.

“Seriously?” The intern looked at her through her bent Bayonetta-style glasses, glucose drip running in her arm.

“Seriously.” Megumi nodded, wiping her glasses with a tissue the same way she used to do for her father. “I was an intern too—it was a seven-months-pregnant woman…” Just the memory sent a shiver down her spine. “That’s how I got traumatized with obstetrics.”

Even now, if I see a pregnant woman, my blood pressure drops…

“Two patients in one,” Aiko muttered through sobs. Megumi thought of what Samito would’ve said, but she still had a good thirty years to go before becoming the wise professor type. “Rest a bit and call someone to come pick you up…”

At least her parents aren’t on another continent, and she won’t have to ride the subway home…

“I’ll go back with my cousin.” Aiko waved to Ishikawa and suddenly everything clicked in Megumi’s head. The intern wiped her tears and smiled at her. “Thanks, prof.”

Aaaaaaaaa they’re almost-siblings… Wait, did she just call me prof?!

“You’re welcome, Aiko.” Megumi smiled sheepishly, left the girl to rest, and walked over to the counter to update charts. Down the hall, she spotted her on-duty resident arriving and felt instant relief wash over her.

God, I’m starving. 

“What a mess. My cousin’s gonna be back on anti-anxiety meds.” Ishikawa’s voice made her smile as she wrapped up her patients’ prescriptions. “You’ll get used to it. Worst case, just grab some from the pharmacy—I’ll leave the script ready.”

I should just spike their water with paroxetine…

“I don’t think I’d ever get used to this…” Ishikawa pulled the prescriptions from the printer and handed them to her to stamp. Megumi thought of her father and how he refused to ever take ER shifts.

“What do you want to be, Ishikawa?” She looked at the curly-haired boy, and his smile spread wide. “Oh, I want to be a dermatologist.”

He’ll never have to take an ER shift and he’ll age gracefully…

“That’s a great specialty! I see so many kids with atopic dermatitis.” She thought of her Brazilian derm friends who’d saved her rebellious skin, and how they always seemed cheerful and studious. “It suits you.” Ishikawa covered his eyes with his hand and smiled. “Aw, thank you, icon.”

Fuck! Now I want a son just like him.

For a moment she realized she was closer in age to them than to most of her attending colleagues.

God, just six years apart…

Megumi stamped his papers and filed them neatly in the charts. Her eyes landed on the young redhead.

Wow, her baby bounced back so quickly…

The girl was nursing her daughter, whose cheeks were no longer flushed or swollen.

Are they on their own too?

Her exhausted expression told Megumi more than she wanted to know. The doctor grabbed one of the endless chocolate bars from her bag and walked over to the young mother.

Naomi Miwa and Sayuri Miwa…

“Hey, little one…” Baby Sayuri turned at the sound of her voice, big bright eyes, before looking back up at Naomi with the kind of adoring gaze all babies give their mothers. “How are you two doing?”

How do such tiny things already love this much?

“Better, Doctor, I’m sorry for the—” Miwa pulled her daughter from her breast and rested her on her shoulder.

“Oh, that’s our job.” Megumi offered her a glass of water and the Brazilian chocolate bar she’d picked up at the airport. “This kind of thing is more common than people think…”

Way too common. Why are immune systems so damn rebellious?

“I didn’t know…” The young woman’s voice overflowed with guilt, her chin trembling. In her lap, her daughter gnawed on a teething toy shaped like a tiny hand.

“Nobody ever knows.” Takatani resisted the urge to play with baby Sayuri’s little feet. “We only find out kids are allergic to something after they’ve eaten a ton of peanut butter.”

And turned into little IgE bombs.

“I thought Say-say was going to die.” The redhead stared at her baby and laid her down in the crib-gurney. The doctor looked at the blissfully unaware child, then back at the young mother, and smiled. “You did the right thing. You acted fast and saved her life.”

Poor Kotaro’s up there all alone with Nabil. 

At least he talks to the kids. Even if it’s in Arabic…

“Doctor…” Her voice pulled Megumi’s attention back. The young mother bit into the chocolate bar and exhaled. “Thank you.”

Okay. Pediatrics is amazing.

“You’re welcome.” Takatani smiled, feeling the weight of a chaotic, disastrous day finally easing off. As a rule, she avoided holding babies of frightened mothers, but this day had been rough. “And this little girl looks super happy.” She pointed at the baby in the crib. “Can I?”The redhead laughed and zipped up her jacket. “Of course, Doctor.”

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.

“Hi, Say-chan!” She lifted the little girl from the crib. For a moment, the baby gave her a you’re not my mom kind of look. “You’re such a good girl.” Megumi breathed in that clean-baby scent, and the child immediately smiled, tugging at the doctor’s hair with her chubby little hands. “Aren’t you, sweetheart?”

How do moms manage to keep their babies smelling so nice with just wet wipes, anywhere, anytime?

“You gave your mama such a scare.” Maybe that was a different kind of superpower—one Megumi didn’t have. The baby rested her head on her shoulder, and the doctor savored the wonderful feeling of having a child in her arms. “But it’s going to be okay, because you’re never eating eggs again.” She rocked her the same way she always did with the lonely babies in her ward. “And a super nice resident will stay with you and your mama all night…”

Okay, maybe I really should freeze my eggs…

Her baby fever was cut short. Sayuri spit up all the milk she’d just had onto Megumi’s neck.

“Oh my God.” Miwa stared in shock as Megumi felt the warm liquid sliding down her blouse. She took a deep breath and decided to take it as a sign. Smiling, she handed the child back to her mother. “Relax, here’s your baby girl.”

At least this one I can hand back…

Megumi thanked God for keeping spare clothes in her locker, car, and bag. She scanned the ER: her residents were talking to the father, now conscious and calm again. Atsumu and Ishikawa were wrapping up tasks at the nurses’ station computers. Florence was checking Aiko’s mental state.

8:30 PM

Okay, solid 12 hours. Could’ve been worse.

Megumi grabbed her bag and waved to her residents. Thankfully, there were locker rooms on that floor—she wouldn’t have to drive home in clothes that reeked of milk. She spotted a security guard entering the ER and silently thanked God she was heading out.

Better not be an assault case.

But for some reason, the uniformed man walked straight toward her and smiled.

“Doctor, there’s a delivery guy cursing you out outside.” His words made her realize she’d forgotten something. She glanced at her phone—five missed calls. “The pizza…”

After showering in the surgeons’ sketchy bathroom, giving instructions to the residents, talking to social services, eating her pizza, listening to Florence’s sex stories at sixty, and spending thirty minutes looking for her car keys, Takatani was finally free from her shift.

I wonder if Yuta ate dinner…

She narrowed her eyes as she walked toward the adult trauma exit, weighing if this was glass child syndrome, twin dynamics, or gender expectations. Either way, her brother would probably do the same for her. Takatani pulled her phone from her pocket, walked down the hospital corridors with Brazilian rap playing in her earbuds, humming softly.

Ouvindo Exalta na quebrada. Gritando “Eu me apaixonei pela pessoa errada…”

(Listening to Exalta at the hood… shouting ‘I fell in love with the wrong person’.)

Megumi 9:59 PM: You at the hospital?

Evil Twin 🦴 10:00 PM: Trauma ward. All night.

Why does he only take night shifts? It’s worse…

Megumi 10:01 PM: I bought pizza…

Megumi 10:01 PM: Left some slices in the peds ER microwave for you.

Evil Twin 🦴 10:02 PM: I’m fixing a femur, I’ll grab it later.

Evil Twin 🦴 10:02 PM: Good to know you love me 😎.

Somebody has to love…

Megumi took a deep breath and slipped her phone back into her pocket. Her feet had carried her instinctively toward the strangely empty exit of the adult ER.

Weird…

She passed by one of the waiting rooms and thought she caught sight of a very familiar figure. Takatani froze, her feet immediately stepping backward, pulling her back toward the doorway so she could silently peek into the adult trauma waiting room.

What the…

Her eyes locked onto a man in a torn black jumpsuit from head to toe, a gray scarf draped around his neck, dried blood in spots across his skin, slumped in the chair, half-asleep or dozing. She would recognize that black hair and those hands anywhere. Sitting all alone in the trauma ward, in one of the saddest chairs possible, was the father of her favorite patient.

He’s hurt? His left arm looks off…

Apparently, no one else followed the hospital rule of patients must have someone with them. And his arm definitely looked wrong. Takatani tucked her earbuds away in her bag and cautiously walked toward him.“Aizawa-san?”

No one’s seen him yet?

 Her voice made the man pull the gray scarf from his face. He cracked one dark, piercing eye open and let out the most exhausted sigh she’d ever heard. Which could very well be a record, since he always seemed exhausted. “Usually, people who got mistaken for my wife at the supermarket just call me Aizawa.”

Chapter Text

Eraserhead became an expert at breaking bones. (His own and other people's).

Starting his career cost him three broken ribs and his best friend's life. Seventeen years as a hero and a war taught him to break arms and legs prophylactically before bad people hurt good people. 

What a drag, I could be sleeping...

He didn't have time for grand philosophies about life. There were only three types of people in the world. Heroes, normal people who need heroes, and dangerous people who make normal people need heroes. Somewhere in that hospital, the boy he had found being beaten on a dark street was having his femur repaired by the orthopedist on duty, so he would swallow his bad mood and wait patiently in the hospital ward. 

How long will I have to go without fighting? 

Having an old lady who healed everything with candy working at the UA taught him that enduring the pain of his injuries was just a side effect of his job. 

Is Chiyo okay at the clinic? 

Thinking of the woman who cared for him like the grandmother he never had left a bitter taste in his mouth. Hizashi, Nemuri, and he knew that putting her in a nice nursing home with well-kept gardens and weekly visits from children and dogs was the best choice when Recovery Girl looked at Eri and asked her if she was Oboro's daughter. 

Damn, I should let Hizashi know that I won't be back anytime soon. 

Maybe being a father had made him too soft, or maybe it was the fact that he had been waiting three hours for someone to come and put a damn cast on his arm, but Shouta Aizawa was beginning to rethink how many bones he had broken without thinking twice. 

Don't regret it. Better a villain with a broken arm than a harmless dead one. 

 He covered his eyes with his capture weapon and tried to nap for the second time. Unfortunately for him, it was already almost 10 p.m., and he had to write reports, grade tests, and wake up early to take Eri to the only school where she didn't cry, which conveniently was on the other side of the district. "Aizawa-san?" 

Unbelievable...

The voice of the pediatrician who made his daughter ask three times when they would return to the fancy clinic where she worked gave him a migraine. His attempts to ignore the image of her that eventually appeared in his mind were completely unsuccessful. "Usually, people who mistake me for my wife at the supermarket call me just Aizawa..."

Damn, why is she so polite?

He uncovered his eyes and saw the dark blue-haired doctor holding a red headset and a surprised expression on her face. "What are you…?" Takatani's voice suddenly disappeared. Her eyes fell on his torn hero uniform and the blood on his arm. "I'm waiting for the orthopedist..." He sighed. 

Is she wearing a Cells at Work shirt? 

Before Aizawa could react, the woman pulled him toward a separate procedure room. "Come here."

"What?" He felt his instincts kick in, but something told him that the doctor wearing a nerdy anime shirt and bear socks wasn't going to hurt him. "You're a pediatrician." He grumbled as he sat down on the stretcher and Dr. Takatani lowered it a little so he wouldn't be too tall for her to examine him. "I went to medical school, you know? And I worked in some pretty chaotic adult emergency rooms back in America..." 

Showing off...

"No one likes know-it-alls." Aizawa took a deep breath and ignored the fact that he was stuck in a room alone with the girl he had intrusive, dirty thoughts about. He watched Dr. Takatani walk over to the counter. "Shouldn't teachers like smart students? My teachers always loved me..."

Of course they do.

"They deceived you." He replied, averting his eyes from her. "Teachers like hard-working and funny students..." 

Did she just take a shower? 

"You're kind of grumpy..." The way she wore baggy jeans that looked as old as his chronic anxiety and her wet dark blue hair dispelled the image of a wealthy pediatrician and made her look like a woman of flesh and blood. Takatani put on a white coat, tying it behind his neck, and gloves. "...there are studies that say this is bad for the heart. It increases the risk of heart attack..."

Don't be silly. She's Eri's doctor. 

"I'm not going to have a heart attack." Too young, too different, and probably too kind as well. Aizawa tried not to look at the girl wetting gauze with saline solution and arranging bandages and disinfectants on a tray. "Dr. Takatani, you..." 

The doctor ignored him completely. She took her phone out of her pocket and he saw her put the cell phone with a flowery case to her ear. "Hey, devil. I need you here in politrauma 07." 

What was her problem with flowery patterns? 

"No, idiot, it's not a green bone fracture." The pediatrician replied calmly, but he saw her cover her eyes with her fingers and take a deep breath. "Yuta, I intubated an orphaned child, a baby vomited on my neck, a father fainted on my shift, and an intern had a nervous breakdown." Her tone on the phone talking to whoever Yuta was could have made Katsuki Bakugou gulp. "Get down to the damn Polytrauma or I'll tell everyone you got syphilis in high school!" 

Nemuri speaks to me like this...

"I have to expose your arm to examine it..." She came over to him and cut the sleeve of his hero uniform to shreds with scissors. "Sorry about that."

"No problem." Maybe his day wasn't as bad as hers. At least he had Eri waiting for him at home. "This Yuta is..."

"He's an orthopedist." Dr. Takatani rolled her eyes as she muttered something about keeping patients waiting, responsibility, and how she hated surgeons. "Are you in pain?" 

"No." Maybe his body had lost the ability to distinguish painful sensations. Or maybe he just had more things to feel. Like the damn smell of lavender on her skin. 

"Excuse me. Tell me if you feel..." He felt her damn gentle hands on his arm, checking the pulse in his hand. A shiver ran through his skin at her touch, making him take a deep breath. Takatani tried to move his arm. "Can you feel it?"

"Of course I do." Aizawa felt a shock in his member. "But it's not exactly painful." Maybe his face showed something, because the doctor shook her head and looked at him quizzically. "It doesn't look like you've damaged any nerves. And you broke a bone. That hurts. Scientifically proven. How much does it hurt, from 0 to 10. Don't lie to me." 

Why is she so smart? 

"4" he muttered. Aizawa didn't like very smart people. They reminded him of his annoying little brother. "Maybe 3..." 

I didn't remember it bothering me that much... 

He knew enough extroverts to know that the silence in that room wouldn't last long. 

"Are you alone?" She wiped his arm with alcohol swabs. He tried not to look like the guy who had scared her to death a few weeks. "Yes."

"Damn it! There's a rule against unaccompanied patients in the hospital." She muttered as she wiped blood from her arm and examined the integrity of her flesh. "Which apparently everyone ignores..." Dr. Takatani used her arm to brush her bangs out of her eyes. Aizawa resisted the urge to do it for her. Her eyes met his and she frowned. "Why are you here alone?" 

She likes rules… Interesting.

Aizawa looked at the girl in front of him and took a deep breath. "Because I'm an adult. It's what adults do..." 

Pay bills. Take care of children and go to the hospital alone.

"You don't have a family, friends, girlfriend? Whatever!" She didn't give him time to answer. Aizawa felt his body shiver when she removed the black hair from his neck and cleaned it with gauze. "Where did all this blood come from!?" She took a penlight out of God knows where and examined his pupils. "Are you feeling pain, shortness of breath, or disorientation?" 

Is she worried? 

"Takatani." He called her, and the woman looked at him suddenly. "I'm fine." Her eyes were a deep brown. "That blood isn't mine." 

So civil.

"Did you drive here with that arm?" Her face lost color and her voice sounded higher pitched than he was used to hearing. The way she instinctively took a step back told him more than he wanted to know.  "I came by bus..." Aizawa's voice was interrupted by the door opening abruptly.

She has no defensive individuality. Damn broken arm! 

Being a hero has definitely changed the chemistry of his brain. Automatically, Aizawa went on alert, placing himself slightly in front of her, but relaxed almost immediately. 

Twins...

The terror or dream of any bisexual. 

“What the hell, Meg!” The man's voice was interrupted when he saw him next to the doctor.  The guy crossed his arms and stared at him for a long moment, then at Takatani. The other Takatani. “That guy there isn't a child...” 

How wonderful, he has eyes.

“I found him in the trauma ward.” Megumi handed an X-ray to the doctor.

“Great. My residents are useless.” The guy grumbled. He wore tight blue surgical scrubs. Dark blue hair. Brown eyes. Megumi's face. A less attractive version of it, for sure. “Dr. Takatani.” He said cautiously, approaching Megumi, almost involuntarily. “Orthopedist on duty.”

“Eraserhead… Aizawa this… This is my brother...” Megumi's cautious tone made him raise an eyebrow. The orthopedist looked at him as if reading all his sins. “Yuta, this is...”

How weird. 

"Let me guess, Eraserhead?" The guy picked up the X-ray he had taken in the emergency room and examined it. Aizawa narrowed his eyes when he saw a tall, male version of Dr. Takatani. "Do you know me?"

I've never seen this guy before...

"Megumi literally said your name." The doctor smoothed his blue hair and snorted. "But yes, some heroes send me broken bones about three times a week. Dynamite, Red Riot, Eraserhead..." the orthopedist replied. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Megumi's face turning white. He smiled at the hero, causing Aizawa to narrow his eyes at him. "I'm a big fan of heroes who fight. I bought a McLaren by fixing broken arms and legs of criminals..."  

What an unpleasant guy...

"Mercenary." Megumi muttered beside him. Making her idiot brother notice she was there. "This guy isn't 13. Why are you here?"

To torture me...

 "Aizawa is..." Aizawa and Megumi exchanged glances. She swallowed hard and looked at her brother. "He's my friend." 

Friend. Funny. Great way to put it, Takatani, the hero I threatened with a medical instrument.

"You have no friends." The orthopedist said, analyzing his arm without touching it.

So thick...

"I do have friends! Nabil is my friend, Helena and so is Florence..." Megumi also brushed some hair away from her face, and her brother pointed to the door. "Florence raised us. I'm not even going to say what Nabil wants with you in front of your..." The orthopedist looked at him cautiously, then turned to Megumi. "Friend. You've been here for 15 hours. Go home." 

15 hours...

"Dr. You can go..." Aizawa said to his newest friend beside him, even though he didn't like the idea of staying with the less attractive and gentler version of her. "I'm fine."  

"Yeah, sis." The orthopedist nodded toward the door and smiled. "Your friend seems pretty stable..."

Wow. 

"Yuta, I..." Megumi's voice made both men turn to the girl. Someone was definitely not good at asserting themselves. Aizawa saw her eyes discreetly darting over him. "I'm staying. He has no one with him. It's against hospital rules." 

Against hospital rules. Cute. 

"No one follows hospital rules, Megumi. Get out." 

Idiot.

Maybe having a daughter had made him too soft, but the hero felt his patience evaporating. "Are you always this rude?"

This guy is going to fix my arm? 

Yuta narrowed his eyes at him. Aizawa felt a bad feeling coming on. Her brother remained silent and smiled at him. Smug, almost satisfied.

What's his problem? 

"I'm really sorry, Aizawa. My brother is a sociopath, but he's a great surgeon..." Megumi sighed wearily and wiped her arm with cotton wool, still hoping in vain to remove the dried blood from her skin. "Do your job, evil twin."

Evil twin. That suits him. 

An awkward silence fell over the room. The orthopedist narrowed his eyes at Megumi and crossed his arms. 

"Okay..."The less attractive version of Megumi took a deep breath and looked in Aizawa's direction. "You'll have to operate. The good news is that I'm really great and I have an opening tomorrow." The words hit him and the hero calculated how much it would impact his life. A lot. Fucking a lot. "I'll admit you, you call a real friend, and everything will be fine." Megumi took his x-ray and turned against the light. "What?!"

Surgery? Operate? 

 "No." Aizawa took a deep breath and ignored the pain in his arm. Yuta looked at him incredulously. Like a damn brat who had never been told no in his life. "What?"

How am I going to train my students or leave Eri at school? 

"I have to work." Aizawa felt his shoulder ache from immobility. 

Damn Eri's recital next week!

"What a coincidence." The damn orthopedist picked up his medical records and scanned them for a long moment. "Me too." Yuta with a judgmental look in his eyes. "Sir..." 

"Aizawa." He and Megumi answered at the same time. She looked at him with slightly red ears. "Sorry." 

I have to tell her she's not my wife, damn it!

"Look, Eraser." The guy sat down on a bench in front of him. "Your humerus is broken in the middle. Like a stick." The orthopedist brushed some of his straight blue hair out of his eyes and looked at him intently. "You have to have surgery to fix it internally, or it will never heal properly. You'll be invaded. Criminals will run free, and I won't have their bones to fix. Everyone loses." 

Never heal properly.

"How long is the recovery time?" he asked Takatani's evil twin. 

"Man, I guarantee you that the recovery time from surgery is shorter than without it." Yuta took a protractor out of his pocket and glanced at it. "About two months of post-op plus a few more of physical therapy..." 

Does it heal on its own? Okay.

"Too long." Aizawa got up from the stretcher and walked toward the door. "I have a job, a kid and I..." He felt a sharp shock in his shoulder. Maybe that damn bone was messing with his nerves. Maybe his life really was hell. "Hell." 

"Don't move!" He heard both Takatanis yelling at him at the same time. Even the way they moved was similar. Aizawa exchanged glances with Megumi for a millisecond, and she ran out of the room. "I'll get some morphine!" 

She left...

Yuta watched silently as his sister ran out the door while Aizawa reluctantly sat back down on the stretcher. The orthopedist took his X-ray and used a protractor to measure something. "What's yours?" 

What's mine? 

"None of your business." Aizawa narrowed his eyes at the doctor. Yuta pointed at his X-ray without looking at him, as if calculating something. "Are you married?”Gossiping with Megumi's evil twin was the last thing he wanted. "No..."

Why him? 

"Do you have a girlfriend?" Yuta narrowed his eyes at him.

"That's none of your business." Aizawa retorted. 

"Boyfriend?" The boy was as persistent as a flea. 

"No."

"Have you ever cheated on someone?" That was definitely the most personal conversation he had ever had with a stranger in his life. "Tsk." 

"Do you hit women?" Yuta's words made the color drain from the hero's face."Answer me." 

"No."

"I've already fixed about five legs that you broke." Yuta played dirty. "Answer me, or I'll make Meg so afraid of you that you won't even see her in your dreams." 

"I'm a hero. If the woman in question is a villain, it's my job."

"What if she's your girlfriend?"

“Do you have any hearing problems? I am a hero.”Aizawa looked at him in shock. Maybe trauma from violence and caution ran in the Takatani family. Or maybe they were just weird. "And I have a daughter." 

“Endeavor was too…”

At least he's cautious.

“I'm not Endeavor.” Being compared to Shouto Todoroki's damn father definitely won the ranking as the worst thing about his week. “You offend me.” 

What's wrong with this family!?

"People always think I'm a terrible guy because I sleep with married women. But I was dying to fuck one girl in particular. She's tall, smart, and definitely good for me." Yuta touched his biceps and Aizawa looked at him out of the corner of his eye, feeling a jolt of pain in his arm and shoulder. "And she's also my best friend's fiancée. You look at my sister the same way I look at women I want to fuck but can't. “Not without knowing... Taking a beating.” 

What a disgusting guy…

"That's none of my business." Aizawa figured that if he just left, Megumi would drag him back there somehow. "And I don't care about your promiscuity." 

I must be paying for some sin. 

"I'll tell you a secret." The blue-haired guy took off his gloves and narrowed his eyes at him. How Megumi's sweet eyes could be the same as those of the orthopedic devil was inexplicable. "I know this shit here hurts more than you admit. You like my sister, and she's crazy about you."

"I don't."

Did he make that up? 

"Fuck you, denying it doesn't change the fact." Megumi's brother stood in front of him. For a moment, an absurd idea crossed the hero's mind. "I'll give you a hint, my sister is dumb. So you'll have to show her..." 

“Do you always tell people what they feel or don't feel?” Aizawa sighed, feeling all the fatigue of the day eat away at him. “Try becoming a therapist.”

Don't be paranoid. That would be discrimination.

"I felt all your toxic guilt, pain, denial... It's fucking heavy, how can you live like that?" Yuta glanced at the door, looking for Megumi. "Meg is a nice girl, you know? And you two are more alike than you think…" 

Felt all your toxic guilt…

The hero narrowed his eyes, trying not to look uncomfortable. Rewinding every word Megumi's twin had said.

No…

Aizawa tried to remember the last time he read about that type of individuality. All he could remember was that most individuals killed themselves before reaching adulthood. "You don't..."

Weren't these people supposed to be good? Like Megumi? 

"I'm an empath, arrogant hero." Yuta sighed wearily. "I feel everything you feel, all the time. All fucking time." 

What a wonderful day...

Chapter Text

“I’m an empath, arrogant hero.” Yuta sighed, tired. “I know everything you feel, all the time. That’s the shitty part of my quirk.”

The hero took a breath—just one—studying the man in front of him in silence. It was definitely easier to feel empathy for kids, for women, for people who wouldn’t admit their marriages were ending. But Yuta was young, younger than his younger brother. Still, he was a doctor, so there had to be something good in his heart, and he was a dead ringer for her.

“Get out of my head…” Aizawa murmured.

Why did he choose to work in a hospital full of suffering people?

“I’m in your heart, idiot. I read feelings, not minds.” The orthopedist pointed to his arm. “That’s going to hurt more if you don’t treat it. And you might have osteomyelitis, or a fat embolism…”

“You’re unpleasant.”

“You’re not very friendly either.” Yuta grabbed an orthotic splint from a drawer and slipped it around the hero’s neck. “Megumi took all the good parts with her…” He smiled at him, curious. “Got a daughter?”

Great, he’s going to sense my love for Eri and my whole image is ruined…

Aizawa wanted to lie back on the gurney. For some reason, Megumi’s absence seemed to make the pain worse. “None of your business.”

Wait…

The hero concentrated on his body. And the pain did get worse. He opened and closed his hand slowly and felt an unpleasant jolt through his broken arm. Nothing he couldn’t handle. After all, he’d had parts of himself cut off before, but this sudden, numbing dependence on a girl he’d seen three times was not exactly a good sign.

What did she do to me?

“You should be on an antidepressant…” Somehow, no matter how different the twins were, they shared the same cautious brown eyes and careful hands. “Being in the same room as you is suffocating.”

He actually feels everything?

The hero would never know. And he’d never be able to imagine how unpleasant the Evil Twin must be. The discomfort of being around someone who felt his feelings hit him, and the hero forced Yuta’s quirk to fade. “Better?”

He doesn’t need to feel all my shit…

“Forget my sister. Marry me.” The doctor’s face looked relieved for the first time since Aizawa had seen him. Feeling empathy for the arrogant guy was proof he was soft. “Suddenly you’re my favorite hero, Eraser.”

He's not that disgusting.

“Brown-noser.” Eraserhead definitely didn’t have fans—except his daughter, his students, and for some reason Tomura Shigaraki, who always seemed obsessed with him for no clear reason. And he definitely wasn’t going to be attracted to another Takatani. “I don’t like fans.”

“Weird of you.” The orthopedist smiled, but his smile vanished when he saw Megumi through the window of the room.

“If I were a hero I’d sleep with so many people…”

Thank God…

Megumi walked into the room carrying a white bedsheet, a blister pack of meds, and a cup of water. She stopped in front of him and handed him a small white pill.

She’s manipulating my pain, isn’t she? Is that what she does?

“Here, put it under your tongue and let it dissolve.”Aizawa felt the bitter taste spreading across his mouth before she handed him the water.“Thanks.”

Doesn’t make sense.

Not after she basically knocked Eri out that one time…

“You’re welcome.” Megumi smiled, quickly looking away. She took the cup from Aizawa’s hands and turned toward her brother.“Bro, let’s do the thing.”

The thing.

“Absolutely not.” Yuta’s face lost all color. “Are you insane!?”

“He’s not gonna agree to surgery anyway!” She rushed to close the blinds. “What are you—?” the hero started, but his voice was cut off.

“There’s a law against that, Megumi,” the surgeon muttered through his teeth. Quiet. Serious. Definitely not the same Yuta Takatani from earlier. “I’m not going to jail for you again!”

Laws against…Going to jail… Again…

Would be funny if she was committing insurance fraud.

“Technically, the law says I can if I get a hero’s order!” The doctor pointed at Aizawa, flashing the mischievous little-sister smile of a troublemaker. “And he’s a hero!”

She’s talking about quirk control?

“No!” Yuta’s face went red as a tomato. “You can’t do that. End of discussion.”

Civilians can only use combat or support quirks in specific situations.

Yuta definitely had some kind of tiny authority complex. From his gurney, Aizawa watched the siblings’ back-and-forth, and it gave him flashbacks to arguments with his own genius, half-deranged little brother.

Damn it. Am I the Yuta in my family?

“Takatani, do whatever you want…” Aizawa muttered, taking another sip of water, swallowing back the ‘with me’ that almost followed. “If it spares me a surgery…”

She’s like Chiyo…

“My sister’s joking,” Yuta laughed nervously, turning to Aizawa, panic flickering in his eyes. “She gets like this sometimes. Probably sleep-deprived delirium.”

Hiding quirks.

“His bone’s going to rot!” Megumi yelled at the orthopedist, voice way too high-pitched to be intimidating.

Does she always fight for her patients?

“He’s a grown man; I think he understands the consequences of his choices.” Yuta crossed his arms.

That arrogance is a defense mechanism, isn’t it?

“He’s your patient!” She jabbed her finger into her brother’s chest. Aizawa could get used to the sound of her voice when she was angry.

She definitely made my pain better…

“My patients are usually on my table—unconscious.” Yuta’s tone was sharp. “Don’t question my conduct as a surgeon.”

She made Eri dream that time too…

The Takatani twins started arguing in a language Aizawa didn’t recognize. It wasn’t English, and definitely not Mandarin. It sounded like something between Spanish and Italian. Watching them bicker would’ve been funny, if not for the fact that his pain had eased dramatically.

She controls sensations… like a walking anesthetic?

“Dr. Takatani.” His voice didn’t even make her stop glaring at Yuta. Maybe her ears were programmed to tune him out. “What are you trying to do?”

Megumi turned to him, expression flickering between confusion and guilt. Silence fell between the twins. They exchanged a long look—one of those wordless sibling telepathy moments—then both turned to Aizawa at once, studying him carefully. Calculating.

They’re hiding.

The hero didn’t need to be a genius to understand. Until recently, people with strong quirks were being killed—bodies twisted into walking weapons—and his own daughter had been used as a lab rat by disgusting criminals.

Of course they’d be cautious.

“You know what? Screw it!” The orthopedist ran a hand through his shiny blue hair and turned to Megumi. “This guy’s trustworthy.”

Physical hyperactivity must’ve been a family trait.

Aizawa frowned at her brother. “You came to that conclusion fast. I could be a—”

Someone who could hurt Megumi…

“You’re not fooling anyone.” The evil twin cut him off, heading for the door. “Do your weird nerd thing, Meg. I’m out.”

“Where are you going?!” Megumi blinked, confused.“Out of here.” Yuta grumbled. “Your brother can’t stand being around me.” Eraser smirked dryly, glancing at the arrogant empath.

His arrogance must be a defense mechanism...

“Being attacked by a Harry Potter dementor would be more pleasant.” The young orthopedist waved toward the door. “Do your thing. I’ll write in his chart that he refused treatment and pretend I’ve never met you.” He stepped out, looking back once. “I’ll call a real emergency contact, and you’re not leaving until someone comes to pick you up—with a non-compliance form signed.”

Crap. It’s Hizashi. He’s going to see Megumi and I’ll never know peace again.

“Control freak,” Megumi muttered as her brother shut the door. “I’m sorry about him.”Her politeness was mildly irritating—and absolutely attractive. “Again.”

Disarming as hell.

“Don’t apologize for other people’s actions.” the hero grumbled. Sometimes people went looking for bronze and stumbled into gold. That night, Aizawa had gone out to find civilians in danger—and apparently found the third person in Asia with that kind of quirk.“You’re a healer.”

Like Chiyo. Like Eri.

“Tsk.” Megumi laughed lightly, studying his bicep with those delicate hands. “What’s funny?” the hero asked, watching her closely—her face focused in quiet concentration. “I had this ex with a mystical vibe who used that word.”

An ex with a mystical vibe…

“Healer?” The way her touch erased pain almost instantly was impressive. The hero flexed his fingers in front of her, testing his own skepticism. “So what do you call it then, Dr. Takatani?”

“We’re fake friends, so you can just call me Takatani. Or Megumi…” The doctor tied a white cloth tightly around his arm and pulled to realign the bone—a surprisingly primitive method, but her humor never left her voice. “From fake wife to fake friend. I thought we had a whole pretend relationship, Eraser.”

She’s going to kill me.

“Funny.” The hero snorted, studying her for a long moment. She wasn’t wearing gloves—maybe her quirk required skin contact. “Heals things magically. Healer.”

“Magically?” Megumi tugged on the cloth, cheeks flushed from the effort. “Like Clerics in RPGs, Mercy from Overwatch, or Recovery Girl?”

Nerd…

“You’re speaking Greek, Takatani.” Aizawa stared at her, eyes landing on her anime T-shirt—featuring a literal blood cell as a cute character. Ridiculously nerdy. “I only know Recovery Girl.”

“Sorry, the kids in the ward make me play with them sometimes…” She seemed to have realigned his humerus using nothing but a piece of cloth and moderate arm strength. “Video games are a good hobby. You should try it.”

Her hands were red now…

“You’re very good at dodging questions.” He muttered. Having a daughter who healed things without knowing how—but could also kill by accident—had taught him every blessing came with a curse. “How does it work?”

Doesn’t seem like Chiyo’s…

“It’s not as cool as it sounds,” the doctor said. Aizawa was used to students saying irrational things, so he just stared at her in silence, waiting for her to realize how contradictory that sounded. Unfortunately for him, she didn’t even notice his judgmental look. “Seems pretty useful.” He gave up.

“My dad’s a university professor. I figured it out by accident—playing in his microscopy lab.” Megumi sat down beside him on a tall stool and touched his arm gently. “I can control cells, you know?”

Those tiny little things from biology class I used to sleep through?

“Cells?” the hero repeated, listening intently. He felt a strange tingling under his skin—deep, beneath the muscle. “One by one?”

That doesn’t even make sense…

“They kind of work in groups…” Megumi shook her head without looking away from his arm. He’d worked with plenty of quirks that required control, but few that seemed this specific. In the back of his mind, he remembered another rich girl with a very scientific ability.

Like Yaoyorozu?

“And I have to know exactly how every molecular process works so they’ll listen to me.” She pulled her hands back and ran her fingers and eyes along his bicep, checking something invisible. “Each tissue has a different type of cell, and every cell type has its own personality. Sometimes they kill each other, multiply too much, or just decide they don’t want to function right. They’re rebellious and stuff…”

Complex… 

Exactly like Yaoyorozu.

“I have a student like you.” The seventeen-year-old who gave him PTSD with her nesting dolls. Probably not the best comparison.“She creates things out of atoms and stuff…”

Momo and her cursed Russian dolls.

“A kid who makes things from scratch?” A curious—and criminally cute—smile formed on the healer’s face. Her slightly-too-big teeth would be the death of him.“Like God from the Bible?”

If the God from the Bible were a perfectionist lesbian…

“Like a 3D printer,” the hero corrected. Megumi made it far too hard to stay serious. “She has to know the exact chemical composition of things. She’s…” Aizawa didn’t have favorites, but if he did, Momo would absolutely be one of them.“…brilliant.”

Maybe telling Momo that would make her less insecure.

“Wow.” Megumi brushed her bangs from her eyes, glancing at his arm. He watched her gather bloody gauze and cotton into an infectious waste bag. “Anyway, it’s not as useful as it sounds. There’s bioethics, moral issues, and it’s mentally exhausting. And I don’t really talk about it.”

Her hands are shaking…

“I noticed. That’s very smart of you.” His words made her look up, brown eyes locking with his black ones. A silent five-second pact he’d probably remember for the rest of his life. “Does it wear you out physically?” The hero pointed at her trembling hands with his newly fixed arm. “Using your quirk.”

It must drain energy…

“Oh, no…” Megumi hid her hands behind her back, cheeks turning pink. She sighed, looking tired. “Just post-shift tremors. Endless day, you know?”

“You should’ve gone home two hours ago...”

“So, when we see a sad, lonely hero sitting in an ER…” Megumi smirked teasingly and peeled off her disposable gown. “We help. Medical obligation.”

“Medical obligation.” He teased back, remembering the evil twin’s words about her being into him.

Megumi’s ears turned slightly red, and she fidgeted with her blue hair. “Yeah, there’s an oath and everything…” She shrugged and winked. “We’re obligated to help people.”

“Like heroes?” He narrowed his eyes at her.

“Like heroes.” Megumi pointed toward his magically fixed arm. “Except for the part with violence, broken bones, and dangerous villains.”

She seriously doesn’t realize she’s flirting…

“Your need to make jokes must be pathological.” That was why he avoided the funny ones. For the first time, his eyes wandered over her body. Everything about her was subtle and balanced—except her waist and the curve of her hips. Definitely tempting. “Takatani, you—”

Dirty idiot…

Before he could thank the doctor for fixing his arm, the infirmary door opened. Yuta walked in, holding a pile of papers. His eyes went from her to Aizawa. “Weirdos…”

Perfect. Just perfect.

“Shouta!” Hizashi appeared right behind the orthopedist. His loud voice made Megumi flinch slightly, and her head throbbed. “What the hell did you do this time?!”

Even Hizashi scares her? Seriously?

“Work accident…” he muttered. The itch in the back of his mind about the pediatrician and men never quite went away, but he wasn’t a creepy stalker to invade her privacy.

Takatani discreetly moved closer to her brother and smiled at his best friend. “He dislocated his shoulder.”

Smart lie.

“Again?” the blond frowned.

Oh, Hizashi, please don’t ask questions…

“Luckily, I’m an amazing orthopedist and I put it back in place.” Yuta walked over to the hero and handed him a paper labeled “informed consent refusal of medical treatment.” “Sign here and you’re free to go beat up criminals.”

Better do that before…

“Wait a second.”His blond friend, wearing a Madonna shirt, jeans, and Converse, stepped to his side and looked at the Takatani twins with sharp, curious eyes. “Crap! Trauma ward.” Yuta ran to the door and looked over his shoulder. “Meg, can you handle this?!”

How convenient, Yuta…

“I—” Megumi was cut off by him throwing on a ridiculous Bakugou scrub cap and waving to the two men. “Nice meeting you, Mic! Not so much you, Eraser…”

Yamada waved back, confused, as the orthopedist ran off. “Nice to meet you, Dr. Takatani.” A goofy smile spread across Mic’s face, and breaking his arm officially became the second-worst part of Shouta’s night when his best friend turned toward the pediatrician. “You’re…”

Wonderful.

“Ah, my name’s Takatani, Megumi.” She gave a polite little bow—the kind well-mannered people did. Which meant, none of his friends. “I’m…”

He’s never going to let me live this down.

“You’re Eri’s doctor!” Mic’s loud voice could’ve made anyone’s eardrums bleed. “I—” Megumi swallowed hard, smiled, and glanced at Aizawa, slightly panicked. “I am, yes.”

She’s shy?

“Hizashi…” Aizawa exchanged a look with his best friend. The kind of telepathic conversation only seventeen years of friendship could produce. Silent phrases like please shut up and is this THE girl? were traded in a second. The hero begged his friend with his eyes—and, as always, was ignored.

Please don’t let Takatani have social anxiety or Hizashi will destroy her.

“Eri talks about you all the time!” Hizashi stepped closer to the pediatrician, and Aizawa prayed she wouldn’t have a panic attack. “She’s totally obsessed with your cookies or whatever magic you pulled off…” Megumi’s nervous smile turned into a soft “Awww.” Hizashi narrowed his eyes curiously. “What are you doing here?!”

So much information at once…

Takatani froze for a second. Paradoxically, the witty, miracle-worker with kids didn’t seem half as confident with adults. Aizawa stepped in. “Pretending to be my friend.”

He gave her a faintly encouraging look.

Megumi seemed to snap out of her mini social-anxiety episode and smiled at Mic. “It’s true. Patients can’t be left alone—it’s against hospital policy.”

He’s going to put this in the faculty newsletter.

A painfully genuine laugh escaped Hizashi. “Shouta doesn’t make friends.” He grinned, eyes lighting up toward the pediatrician. “But I love making new ones! I can be all kinds of friends—the Phoebe, the Chandler, the Monica… except Ross. He’s kind of a jerk.”

What are they even talking about?

“He’s totally a jerk.” Takatani agreed with a laugh. “You’re funny…” A laugh so cute it stuck in his mind like unwanted background noise. Aizawa grumbled. “Too much so.”

Great. Now she’s actually friends with Mic.

“Everyone calls me Mic, but you can call me Yamada or Hizashi...” He offered her his hand, American-style. “Pleasure to finally meet you in person.”

Please don’t say anything embarrassing…

“The pleasure’s all mine!” She shook his hand naturally, reminding Aizawa she’d spent a third of her life in America. “So that’s that.” She brushed her bangs aside. “Safe, sound, and in one piece. I’ll just—”

“Takatani.” Aizawa cut her anxious ramble short before she could bolt without him properly thanking her for manipulating his bone cells. She looked at him with those soft eyes, and he took a deep breath. “Thank you.”

“No thank yous.” She wagged a finger at him while grabbing her bag and tidying the room. “Medical obligation, remember?”

Obligation…

The silence—and the look from his chronically loud best friend—were very bad signs.

Aizawa scratched his unshaven jaw, trying to calculate what to say.

It’s late, and she’s exhausted…

“You…” Unfortunately, Hizashi was the one speaking. “Want a ride home, Doctor?” He asked with his usual charismatic tone, the kind that had probably gotten half the men in Japan into his bed. “A little thank-you for pretending to be Shouta’s friend…”

He never misses a chance.

“No need.” Takatani laughed—almost in panic. “I appreciate the offer. Really, absolutely.” She took two small steps back, smiling and fidgeting nervously with her fingers. “It’s already 2 A.M., so I think I’ll stay here.” Her eyes met his. “Until the next unplanned, unexpected encounter.”

Lightning really does strike twice…

“Eri’s appointment’s next month…” He waved at her, praying for the night to finally end.

“Perfect! Eri’s appointment…” Megumi waved back from the ER doorway, holding her papers. “Next month,” she said with a smile before leaving. “Nice meeting you, Mic!”

Great. Now it’s not just Eri in love with her…

“It was a pleasure!” Hizashi shouted after her, waving. Megumi disappeared through the door, and an awkward silence fell over the room.

Aizawa flexed his hand, testing his mobility—almost feeling the memory of her touch on his skin. Something nagged at him, and he looked up. Across from him, his best friend was grinning like the devil.

“Shouta…” Hizashi’s voice was a mix of pride, lust, and you’re so screwed. The hero groaned and ignored the man who was far too romantic for his own good. “Shut up.”

Chapter Text

Jirou Takatani, 35 years old. No individuality.

- Neurologist, husband of Aya, father (more or less) and a screw-up (for sure).

- First and only person in his family to go to college.

- Always the best student in his class (and the poorest too), at least until he met his wife. 

- Likes: Soccer (supports Arsenal), neuroscience, publishing scientific articles, teaching, and Aya.

- Dislikes: Mediocre students, pediatricians, and surgeons (except Aya).

Families were blessed with sons and cursed with daughters.

Boys carried on their family names, got good jobs, and had better opportunities in a society made up of men, for men. Girls brought love, joy, and worry to their families only to be willingly given away to their husbands' families when they grew up. At least, that's what Jirou Takatani heard from his family while growing up.

Not that he felt he blessed the Takatanis. Far from it.

What am I going to do without her? 

"He has gained 100 grams in the last few days..." Jirou said as he used his flashlight to check his wife's pupil reflex. "He's strong, brave and angry. Very angry. Just cries all the time in the incubator..." To the neurologist's relief, the brain of the love of his life and mother of his children had not died in the last 6 hours. "The girl remains the same. She doesn't breathe well. Her lungs aren't developing..." The words hurt his chest. He glanced at the mechanical ventilator and adjusted the machine's plateau pressure. "I know I should have chosen a name for them, but she stopped breathing again last night..." 

Dr. Samito doesn't even know what to do with the baby girl anymore.

Aya always seemed like the most beautiful woman in the world, with her light blue hair and her miraculous hands. The light of his life. The only person Jirou knew who was smarter than him. More talented than him. Better than him. In everything. How a rich, brilliant, and courageous girl left everything behind to marry a poor guy whose kindest nickname he ever received was arrogant son of a bitch, which Jirou didn't understand. 

It's been too long...

The neurologist sat down next to his wife and rested his head in the surgeon's hands. 

Will Aya ever be who she was again? 

"You have to wake up, dear." Jirou felt her almost cold fingers on his cheek. "You have to wake up, my love." He never learned to cry or say nice things, all he knew was to analyze facts and tell the truth. "Because our daughter is dying and she doesn't even have a name…" 

Perhaps the spirits were punishing him for being too arrogant, a doctor with a God complex.

"The girl can't die without ever having known you. You love her much better than I do, and she can't die without ever having felt your love. So wake up, please." Or maybe it was just a great irony of the universe that the woman he loved as his own soul had her brain fried by eclampsia. "I can't do this alone. I can't bury our daughter alone. I need you, and so does she." 

Don't cry, you idiot. Crying never got anyone anywhere. 

His head hurt. Weeks in that hospital between the neonatal ICU and Aya's room had taken a toll on his brain. He took his broken heart and rested his eyes, feeling his wife's skin. Pretending she was still there. 

I promise I'll be a better person. I'll treat people for free. I'll stop yelling at the students. Just let my Aya meet the girl...

The neurologist prayed to any spirit or gods who might hear him. And he didn't even believe in religion. All he wanted was to hear his best friend's voice again, calling him a stupid man. Of love. Of annoyance. All he needed was her. Alive. With her children. Alive. 

Don't cry. Crying won't make Aya any less comatose. Nor the girl any less fragile.

He felt his phone ring. The only ring he hadn't silenced. He felt a chill run down his spine when he saw the contact Dr. Samito on his cell phone screen. A text message. A few words from his children's pediatrician.

“Dr. Takatani, come down here! Quickly.”

For a moment, everything around him seemed suspended. His eyes fell on the serene face of his comatose wife. Oblivious to all the chaos in which they were immersed. And Jirou ran through the corridors of the hospital where he had learned to be a doctor. Praying not to find his baby girls dead downstairs.

高 (taka) -  high, elevated, noble, superior. // 谷 (tani) - valley, gorge, ravine, depth.

His eyes stopped at the window of the pediatric ICU. The same one where he had spent hours standing paralyzed, watching his small and fragile children. Before he could think of anything, Jirou seemed to forget how to breathe. His daughter's incubator, always in the left corner, was gone. 

No...

He counted again. Four incubators instead of five. The one missing was exactly that of his nameless daughter. The world fell silent. His mind fell silent for the first time in many years. The neurologist focused his eyes on the empty space there. It wasn't rational how the absence of someone he had known for six weeks could hurt so much. He hadn't even held her in his arms or seen her eyes. 

It didn't make sense.

None of it made sense. Nothing was logical. Clinical or relatable. For some reason, his colleague and his children's pediatrician smiled at one of the incubators. His son's incubator. How Samito could smile was irrational.  How there could still be warmth in a world without his little girl was irrational.  That's why Takatani hated pediatricians. 

Did she die? 

He definitely loses track of time. Of space and reality. An annoying white noise lingered in his mind as he tried to breathe. Pressure on his shoulder bothered him, but not enough. Words were heard by his ears but were not processed by his cortex. Maybe he had had a stroke. 

"Takatani!" He felt a hammer blow to his elbow. From his own neurological examination hammer. "Have you gone deaf?" Dr. Samito's voice snapped him out of his trance. His lost eyes focused on the face of his veteran from college days. "I told you! I was right!" For some inexplicable reason, the damn pediatrician was still smiling. "Come on, you have to see them."

"What!?" He felt panic consume him, but was interrupted by the doctor practically dressing him in gowns and disposable caps and pushing him inside. "You have to see them!" The skinny guy's hands pushed him toward his son's incubator. "They have your eyes!"

They have my eyes...

In the plural. They. 

"They?" The man took a few steps toward the plastic box that kept his son alive. The most difficult and frightening steps of his life. His eyes focused on the inside of the acrylic and he felt his heart beat faster.

She is...

"Her blood pressure was very low in the early hours and the boy wouldn't stop crying. You know how temperamental he is. He takes after you!" The pediatrician's voice permeated what could very well have been a dream. In the box, his angry son slept peacefully with his little hand closed around his twin sister's little finger. "I put them together, like in those old articles, and she stopped having dyspnea!" 

She's so beautiful. 

Alive and with her eyes open. His little baby girl was alive and her eyes were open. She followed sounds, reacted to light, and followed their voices with her beautiful eyes. Brown, like his.

She listens and seems to see...

"He stopped crying and has been sleeping for two hours holding her little finger." Samito laughed and took a deep breath. Takatani looked at his colleague and felt the weight of the world lift from his shoulders. "You have a fierce and very kind baby boy. He saved his sister's life!"

Very kind...

Samito's words made him look at the incubator again. Involuntarily, Jirou picked up his pen and opened the acrylic box. His eyes met his daughter's brown eyes. Tiny, with a tube in her nose. Wires everywhere. Hair as blue as his wife's, only darker. Like the ocean. The starry sky. His little girl yawned and moved her little arms. 

She looks like Aya...

Just like his wife. Both of them. It could very well be a dream. The neurologist took his pen and firmly pressed the tip against the sole of her foot, which was the smallest foot he had ever seen. Her little toes spread out like a fan. Positive Babinski reflex. Her primitive nervous system is working. 

My daughter is alive...

This was definitely not a dream. Relief flooded his soul like fresh water. Jirou's body gave way. The neurologist bent over the acrylic box that kept his children alive, covering his face with his hands. Hearing his father's damn voice saying that men don't cry. Feeling a new and heart-wrenching feeling that he wasn't smart enough to recognize. For the first time in years, he feels tears streaming from his eyes. Like a damn child. 

"Calm down, my friend." He felt his friend's hand on his back. Kneeling down beside him. "Your daughter isn't going to die. Her little lungs aren't all that great. She's not going to be the next All Might or win an Olympic medal, but..." His words elicited a sob from him. He looked into Samito's eyes and saw the annoyingly cheerful guy handing him a tissue. "See how her little eyes are? So smart and sweet! You've been blessed with a beautiful little girl." 

Yutta (優太) 

優 - kindness, empathy. // 太 - big, lasting.

Megumi was his favorite person.

Of course, he loved his son and his wife as much as his own soul. Both were super practical, enjoyed playing baseball, sewing things, and hanging out together talking about things like video games, sports, and gross things about surgery. Yutta was the kind of boy Jirou's father would have loved to have. His son played baseball and knew everything about sports and heroes. He liked things like nails and screws and solved all of Megumi's problems by kicking other children. For some reason, his boy, who felt everyone's feelings, hated being around him.  But that girl was diferent. 

I shouldn't have a favorite child.

But surely his son had a favorite parent, and it wasn't Jirou. At least his daughter wasn't a handful, always obeying, studying, and seeing him as a good person. Of course, his daughter thought everyone was good. But that was beside the point.

At least she...

Bringing her to his classes had become routine. She read his books on Cell Biology for Children, Kaguya-hime, and fairy tales for Rebellious Girls while he terrorized his students. At least he could take her out for ice cream afterwards while talking about clinical neurology to the smartest little girl in history.

Damn, should I put Megumi in a sport or theater like Yutta so she can interact more? 

His eyes scanned the hospital's histology room and he saw his daughter playing with the microscope at the back of the room. She was wearing a little yellow flowery dress, pink Converse sneakers, and her hair was cut to chin length after some damn brat stuck gum in her hair. Smiling, she watched his super expensive neuron culture intently. 

At least she spends some time with me.

She was happier and safer in the lab than with children who stuck gum on her and made her cry. Jirou looked at his residents with a feeling of disgust that only his country's mediocre medical training could give him. The three privileged men he affectionately called Aphasia, Comatose, and Cognitive Deficit swallowed hard. 

I can't curse at them without scaring her…

Unfortunately, today was not the day he would be reported for bullying. He looked at the three residents and took a deep breath. 

"You are doctors! You passed the residency exam. In my days, Neurology was the most sought-after of the clinics..." His harsh tone made them shrink and look at the floor. He pointed to the histopathology slide, trying not to yell at his  oversensitive daughter in the room. "The least you can do is know what a healthy cell is!" He violently flipped the slide and cursed whoever their histology professor was. "Megumi, dear." His voice made his 7-year-old daughter flinch slightly. He smiled and pointed to the screen. "What happened to this cell, sweetie?" 

She keeps talking about this so Yutta will ignore her...

"It's fatty, Daddy." Megumi hid a chocolate bar under the table, as if there weren't a sign prohibiting food behind her. She frowned. "It took in too much water..."

Great, my daughter is smarter than the residents.

"Why?" He pointed to the green-skinned resident who never seemed to be able to answer a question. "The-the middle..." 

Damn it. What a fearful man. I'm sure I've seen him speaking normally at a conference...

"Why, baby girl?" He interrupted his aphasic resident. There was nothing Jirou hated more than fearful men (except pediatricians, he definitely hated pediatricians) and pointed to the child eating chocolate. The faces of his arrogant residents turned red with shame. Megumi brushed her bangs out of her face and chewed chocolate. "Grumpy cells get fat when they lack salt..."

Great. Accessible language for these three idiots.

"Grumpy cells get fat when they lack salt!" Jirou pointed at his three residents. "The 7-year-old just explained what you privileged boys should have learned in high school! Cell osmolarity KILLS neurons! That's why there are three people in a coma upstairs!" He threw scientific articles on the three's counter. "Why did some intern as smart as you inject them with hypertonic solution and killed their brains! What were you doing?!"

"Doctor..." One of the three tried to answer him. "It's the bare minimum! You studied this in college! A kid knows what hypernatremia does to neurons, and you..." Cognitive deficit interrupted him. "Boss..."

Haven't they learned to keep quiet?!

"I didn't tell you to speak! That's why our hospital is full of people in a vegetative state! How are you going to treat strokes if you can't keep..." He picked up the expensive culture sample of neurons filled with water in their cytoplasm. "Living cells!" 

"Doctor, we..." The voice of his resident Aphasia made him tremble with rage. His single glance silenced the three men. "Does this look alive to you?!"

"What?! No, no, no!" Little footsteps echoed through the room. Jirou immediately regretted it when he saw his daughter running through the lab. Her tearful voice made the three men look at each other in panic. "Did the star cell die?!" One of his residents, a guy much nicer than Jirou would ever be, smiled at his daughter and lied. "No, sweetie, your dad was just joking!" 

Shit...

"Sweetie, come here." His daughter ignored him for the first time in her life. Jirou froze as he watched the girl run toward his doctoral project's neuron culture. "Meg, no!"

Oh, wonderful. I've traumatized my child.

"The star cell can't be dead, Daddy!" Megumi said, crying and hugging his waist. 

"Get out." He said to the residents, and the three of them fled the room immediately. "Honey, I'm sorry for yelling. I..." 

I'm a terrible father. 

"I took good care of them!" His daughter ignored him once again, fiddling with the microscope with her little hands and tears in her eyes. "Daddy, the star cell didn't die..."

"Little princess..." He definitely should have given his daughter something less fragile to play with than stem cell neurons. Like a dog. "Everything that lives dies." He walked over to his little girl standing on a stool watching Meg's culture. "The research went wrong, it happens. That's how science works and..." 

"No, Daddy!" She pulled on his shirt with her little hands full of beaded bracelets. "I took good care of them, look!" 

The logical thing would have been for him to say no and get angry, but Megumi had red cheeks, her mother's face, and his son's eyes, but gentler. Much gentler than either of them.

"Okay." He gave in, hugging his little girl as he leaned over the microscope. "Megumi, you have to learn that everything is alive..." His hands focused the blurry lenses until he saw yellow cells like gold and perfectly healthy black nuclei. "...dies." 

How is that possible?

"I told you I took care of them!" His little girl sobbed. Takatani retraced every step of his failed million-dollar research while listening to his daughter's upset voice. "I told you, Daddy. You didn't believe me!" 

Cytoplasmic structure intact. Membrane intact. No apoptosis, necrosis, or turgidity.

"How…” His eyes turned to hers, perhaps his face wasn't the best because his daughter cringed slightly. "Meg, sweetheart." Jirou tried to be a less intimidating version of himself and picked her up. "Tell Daddy exactly what you did." 

Did she touch the reagents without me seeing?

"I kept them, Daddy." His little girl rested her head on his shoulder as he checked the culture once more. Incredulous. Trying to find a perfect logical explanation for his daughter having made his unsuccessful research come to life. "The little cell-star was sad when she was alone, so I told her a story and she was fine!"

Megumi (恵) - blessing, grace, divine favor, mercy.

The Musutafu miracle: 12 people in a permanent vegetative state wake up from a coma without sequelae at Dr. Hashimoto University Hospital. 

"Yesterday morning, patients between the ages of 16 and 56, including four women and eight men, some of whom had been in a coma for years, inexplicably regained consciousness. The head of the Neurointensive Care Unit, the honorable university professor and doctor Takatani, Jirou, claims that there is no scientific explanation for this fact. All patients are awake and still hospitalized for observation while the clinical research team at Musutafu University and representatives from the Ministry of Health investigate the incident.

The patients' families, including Suna Yaoyorozu, whose wife and mother of his daughter, Rina Yaoyorozu, had been in a coma for four months after a car accident, claim to have been blessed by the mercy of the spirits of spring."

"Reporters are camping out in the parking lot, the Ministry of Health wants a technical report and an investigation, the mayor wants to congratulate you, and the Yaoyorozus want to pay for your children's college tuition!" Dr. Nakajima's voice made Jirou's head throb in five different places. In the room with transparent windows. All the members of the hospital board stared at him in silence. "How did this happen? What did you do?"

How humiliating...

"I don't know." He admitted with a bitter taste in his mouth and averting his eyes from his wife. Jirou's confession made his colleagues laugh. Everyone except the hospital chief. 

Here we go...

"How can you not know?" The chief looked at him in disbelief. "You control every breath of every intern who has the misfortune of being your student. Every clinical decision, and you're telling me you don't know?!" The surgeon who had been his professor in college and was the best man at his wedding took off his glasses and covered his face with his hands. "People think we perform miracles!" Nakajima shouted.

This shouldn't have been disclosed until everything was clarified. 

"Maybe it is." The voice of Aya Takatani, head of the Surgery Department and his wife, made all the damn men in the room look at her as if she weren't the best doctor among them. "A miracle." 

Oh Aya, no...

"Are you delirious?" Dr. Álvares looked at her incredulously. The tone with which the head of pathology spoke to his wife earned him a murderous look from Jirou. "Don't talk to my wife like that," he warned. Immediately, his colleagues fell silent.  

That's why Helena is so disrespectful. What a terrible example he sets...

"For God's sake, gentlemen." Aya snorted, honest and practical as always. The surgeon who worked longer hours than any of them, was considered the best in Southeast Asia, and hated arguments, snorted. "A dozen scientifically dead people are talking downstairs with their children, parents, and spouses. Until one of you arrogant men has a medical explanation for this, it's a miracle."

Scientifically dead people… Was their condition reversible and I didn't realize it?

"There's a Catholic bishop down there." The head of pediatrics, Dr. Samito, spoke as he fiddled with his LGBT+ bracelet on his wrist. "They're going to canonize you as a saint, Jirou."

Was it my mistake? Did I miss something?

"Miracles don't exist..." The words escaped his mouth. Jirou shook his head. His wife narrowed her eyes at him. Having a wife who cut people open and sewed them back together wasn't for everyone. His colleagues twisted their mouths and gave him looks that said, "Shut up, you idiot, before she rips your guts out. “There has to be some explanation for this."

Something logical. Medical and rational.

"Then find an explanation, know-it-all." Aya challenged him. A brutal silence fell over the room. Nakajima, the head of the hospital and probably the closest thing he had to a father figure, sighed. "Sometimes, dear colleagues." He rose from the conference table and walked over to the glass wall where they had spent the last five hours discussing the cases. "We have to humble ourselves and admit that we don't have the answers. The PR people are writing a statement. You will read it today on the National News at 1:00 p.m."

Why do they care about public opinion? The more attention, the worse...

"I don't think..." Before Jirou could refuse. His eyes fell on the windowpane. In Nakajima's fancy living room, his son was playing something on his Nintendo Switch upside down on the sofa. And his daughter wasn't there. "Excuse me." 

What the hell! Where did she go this time!? 

He left the room ignoring his colleagues' protests and his wife's judgmental look, silently calling him controlling. Jirou practically ran to his son. He couldn't help it; his daughter almost dying before his eyes while growing up with dysplastic lungs changed his brain forever. 

She better not be with some kid with bronchiolitis...

 "Where's your sister?" Jirou said from the living room door. His son didn't answer. Headphones in his ears. Surely listening to English songs with horrible lyrics. He walked over to the child, literally upside down on the couch playing some sports game, and gestured for him to take off his headphones. "Yutta, you're going to ruin your ears!"

"Cool! Then I won't have to listen to your voice!" Ten-year-old Yutta was almost 5'5" and more petulant than all of them put together. The boy smiled at him. His wife's damn defiant smile. "What do you want, old man?"

God, who did he learn that from?! Was it from Álvares' daughter? 

"Respect me, I'm your father!" Every interaction with his eldest son reminded Jirou of the time when he and his wife were students who hated each other. "Where's your sister?!" The boy snorted. His blue baseball shirt was getting too short. Not even for him to like soccer too. "I don't know, put a GPS on her."

My parents would have beaten me if I had spoken to them like that...

"I know you know, you insolent brat." His words made his son, who felt all his frustration, mutter something. Jirou took his video game and looked him up and down. "Where."

Damn it, don't be like your father, Jirou. 

"Pediatric ward." His son muttered, crossing his arms. "And with that screwed-up nerd on top of that." Yutta rolled his eyes in frustration. "I told her not to go, but she ignored me. As usual..."

Screwed-up nerd?

"You have to be a more responsible older brother!" The neurologist weighed his son's words. His day immediately got worse; apparently telling his daughter not to play or befriend patients with incurable diseases was the same as telling his son not to be a jerk. Fruitless. "And don't call dying children screwed up, Yutta! How shameful!" 

He's so cruel for an empath...

"Blah blah blah..." The boy took a baseball out of his backpack and looked at Aya on the other side of the glass. "Good thing you remembered that annoying girl exists. Go annoy Gumi for a change." And he walked out the door, running towards his wife. 

Jirou took a deep breath and saw Yutta hugging Aya and sitting next to her. Something his son never did with him. Without a doubt, he was to blame for the boy's behavior. His wife took a suture kit out of her designer bag, a needle holder, a banana, and handed them to her boy. 

Where did I go wrong with this brat?

For what seemed like an eternity, Jirou watched them smiling together as his wife's quick, talented hands taught his son how to suture banana peel.

At least Aya and his sister know how to handle him...

Seeing Yuta calm with his mother was strangely good. A smile appeared on his face and his son's words echoed in his mind. I'm glad you remembered that annoying girl exists. They should definitely pay more attention to your daughter...

Damn it, Megumi!

Jirou rushed to the pediatric nurse. Apparently, his long conversations with the damn super-smiling head of Pediatrics about not letting his daughter in there had been ignored once again. 

Samito, you'll pay for this. She better not be in isolation...

Just the thought gave him chills. The long, painful years of his little girl's hospitalizations, bronchodilators, and febrile seizures because of her bad lungs still gave him nightmares. The last thing he needed was his daughter nearly dying again. 

At least she never had meningitis...

His eyes fixed on the room of his only pediatric patient. Inside, an extremely thin red-haired boy laughed with his daughter. Megumi had her blue hair in braids and wore her expensive school uniform as she read Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief to him. 

Damn it! 

He knocked on the door with a disapproving look. His eyes met those of his daughter and his patient, Hinata. Megumi's face turned pale as she waved goodbye to her colleague. Jirou mentally prepared his speech about not befriending children who would soon die once again.

She'll cry again and call me a nonbeliever...

All of this was on the tip of his tongue. But his words died. The boy sat up in bed and gave him a pleading look. "Doctor, let Megumi-chan stay a little longer! Please!" 

What? He sat up? 

The 12-year-old boy with duchenne muscular dystrophy who, until three days ago, couldn't lift his head because of his incurable disease that destroyed his muscles. Jirou blinked and stared at him. In panic. 

He regressed? How?

Jirou replayed the last few days in search of an explanation, and all he could remember was the previous day when he had forgotten his daughter in the ward with the comatose patients. 

No, no, no...

His eyes met his daughter's. His daughter, who lacked individuality just like him. She looked away from him. Just like she did when her brother screwed up and she tried to cover it up. 

Did she heal them all?

His heart raced as all the pieces fell into place in his head. He felt his head throbbing and immediately realized there were hundreds of people in the hospital parking lot. Praying for miracles. Desperately longing to get their hands on the irrational and frightening power of his blessed little girl.

Chapter Text

Going back to dating was definitely a step forward.

Compared to driving home crying for three months listening to Vampire and Traitor, her months of celibacy due to emotional blockage, and a year of therapy to stop her heart from racing in the presence of men who didn't have the surname Takatani or whom she knew very well. Incredibly, the only exception to that rule was the father of her favourite patient.

Has his arm gotten better?

In the back of her mind, she could still feel his muscles in her fingers. The look in his eyes was definitely something that haunted her. Megumi shook her head and drank a shot of tequila.

Don't think about Aizawa-san like that, you idiot woman. 

She definitely didn't want to think about the secretly funny grumpy guy who made her feel things she couldn't name. Especially when she was on her date with a definitely acceptable bloke she didn't know how to turn down. 

Are we going to have sex? Should I have sex with this guy? 

Her life would be much easier if she were like her brother, who had sex even with people he didn't like, claiming that 'one thing has nothing to do with the other'. Even the idea of kissing someone she had no feelings for seemed pointless. Having sex with someone she didn't like? Irrational. 

Although it had been so long since the last time...

Over a year, to be exact. Her emotional block had ruined her sex life. 

Megumi could smell the citrus scent of lemon and the man's cologne as he talked for what seemed like an eternity about something she had heard her father say a million times. It definitely wasn't very sexy.

Damn, I didn't have time to shave my legs... 

Megumi narrowed her eyes and rewound her mind. Maybe she had forgotten to shave several other places. Spending the morning in the infirmary, choosing to sleep instead of having lunch, getting ready in the car, and the fact that she hadn't spent a moment at home in two days clouded her mind. 

Is Kotaro ventilating better? 

All the young woman could think about while listening to her father's resident, whom she didn't have the courage to refuse a date with, was her little baby in the ICU. 

What am I going to do with him afterwards? He has no parents to take care of him and...

"And we spend so much time doing electroneuromyography." She heard the man's very acceptable voice as white noise. She tried to focus on the short-haired brown-haired guy wearing a tie in a bar. "... anyway, I think I've said enough about polyradiculopathies." He smiled kindly at Megumi and she almost gulped, thinking about how her father would traumatise the nerdy, polite resident in the coming months. "What do you like most about paediatrics?"

"Babies," Megumi said as she drank a shot of tequila and sucked on a lemon. "And little kids..." 

"But that's obvious." He laughed and drank some of his non-alcoholic beer. "Your father told me you loved children."

Damn, shouldn't Dad be focusing on training new neurologists?

"I love children." Megumi saw Massanabu's eyes light up and predicted his thoughts of "I've found the perfect wife" that guys always had when she said she was a pediatrician. "But it's deeper than that..." His words made her narrow her eyes at the neurologist. "Don't all girls love children?" 

I'm going to kill him.

"Children are whole lives of potential, you know. All of our formation as individuals happens in childhood and..." Megumi took a deep breath and suppressed  a smile on her face. The last thing she wanted was to reinforce the damn gender stereotypes that haunted her. "When we follow a child, we see them developing over the years. Learning to walk, going to school, developing hobbies! Did you know that there are countless religions that worship children as symbols of honesty, joy, and pure love..."

Okay, I said too much. 

"That's lovely." He smiled as he fiddled with a pen-torch. Maybe it was a tic... "Do you want to have children?" He asked, looking at her curiously, as if he hadn't heard a word about her passion in life.

Unbelievable. 

"Well..." She held back from answering 'not with you' and feeling her grandmother turning in her grave. For some reason, her mind reminded her of her patient with little horns and red eyes. Megumi swallowed her sexual frustration and the fact that she felt like she was in a job interview. "It depends..."

I would like a little girl like Eri...

Or a baby boy like Kotaro...

He's alone in the ICU. 

Damn it! I could be there with him instead of Nabil reading books in Arabic...

 "My dream is to be a father," he said as he drank his NON-ALCOHOLIC beer, and she felt her night getting worse. "Okay..." She smiled awkwardly. In the back of her mind, she heard the voice of her slightly nihilistic friend saying that 'men whose dream is to be a father are equivalent to children whose dream is to have a dog.' 

Red flag. Definitely.  

Rin was so right...

"My dream is for bacterial pneumonia to disappear from the world." She smiled and tried not to talk about compulsory motherhood. "...and tax evasion." Megumi remembered her thief ex-boyfriend and bitterly realised that he had been her best ex-boyfriend. "And that being anti-vaccine should be criminalised..." 

They could normalise beating parents who don't vaccinate their children...

"You're funny, Megumi..." The man laughed, contrary to her expectations. "Tell me something, sweetheart." He looked at her hopefully. "What's your individuality?" Growing up with her parents making her hide her power like Elsa from Frozen had forever changed her brain chemistry. "I don't have one." She lied.

Here we go...

 "Oh..." He laughed, but when he noticed the paediatrician's silence, the young neurologist fell quiet. "You don't have one?" He looked at her incredulously, the sparkle in his eyes fading. "Nothing?" 

Great morality filter...

"No individuality." A brutal silence fell over them, and she felt grateful for it. Megumi saw Massanabu look at his mobile phone. 

Few men risk their hypothetical children being intelligent, loved, and normal.

"Wow, it looks like one of my patients is having a stroke..." He looked at her anxiously. The young woman smiled kindly at the man, fleeing from her pseudo-powerlessness. "You'd better go before the thrombolysis time passes..." 

At least this meeting was over...

"It was a pleasure to meet you in person, Megumi." He bowed respectfully and looked at her shyly. "I..." He picked up his bill and tried to redeem himself. "I'll pay for this." 

I'm in profit...

"That's very kind of you." She saw the resident her brother had described as the most boring guy in history giving her the brush-off. He waved as he headed for the cashier. "See you next time..."

How I love being a woman...

She took a deep breath and calculated how much money she would have earned if she had accepted the nursing shift instead of this. 

At least he paid the bill. 

Megumi drank another shot of tequila and thanked her lucky stars for being blessed with the super individuality of not letting her hepatocytes commit suicide and for inheriting her father's alcohol resistance. 

Cirrhosis won't kill me...

"Dr Takatani?" Megumi looked up and saw the man with long blond hair tied in a low bun. "What are you doing here alone?" The hero of the microphones smiled incredulously at her. 

Paying for my sins.

I knew that smoking weed once would mark me forever...

"I spent the last 90 minutes listening to a guy talk about peripheral nerve diseases." She looked at the guy wearing ripped jeans, a semi-transparent black shirt, and a red leather jacket. "I doubt anyone could get a woman into bed with that kind of talk..." He looked at her in horror as he curiously examined her desk. "He rejected me and didn't even try to get me into bed first..." Megumi laughed.

Okay, that was one of the top 10 most DEPRESSING things I've ever said in my life. 

The hero made a face like, oh my God, and Megumi sucked on a lemon with salt. "Actually, I kind of scared him off..." She relaxed and tried not to make her favourite patient's father's best friend uncomfortable. "On purpose."

"You know what?" He took the snack plates from in front of him and waved towards the back of the bar. "You're not going to stay here alone eating..." The hero looked over his glasses at her super-sour bombs and salt. "Lemons," she added. "Lemons." He looked at her cautiously with a grimace. "Look, it's not as sad as it seems." Megumi tried to defend herself, and Mic wrinkled his nose with a smile. "It looks pretty sad, sweetheart."

Damn, he's funny like Helena...

"It reminds me of my youth in São Paulo!" Megumi said, getting up, and in her mind she calculated whether she should go home and sleep or do something that young adults who weren't addicted to work would do on a Saturday night. "You're young, darling." 

He could  say that to my parents... 

Megumi scanned the half-empty bar. Sleep was definitely winning out. "Mic, it was good to see you again..." She said goodbye with a wave to the charismatic hero. "Are you leaving already?" He looked at her incredulously. Sleeping three full nights in seven days hadn't exactly been a wise choice on Megumi's part. "It's kind of late, isn't it?" 

 If I sleep now, I'll recover 5% of my lost sleep for the month. 

"It's 9:45 p.m., Doctor." He pointed to his watch. A classic silver Casio. Vintage. Megumi felt his hand gently pushing her towards the booths separated from the rest of the bar. "Come on, there's a friend here who would love to meet you..." His words made her look at him in slight panic. "What?!" Mic took the bag from the doctor's hands and slung it over his shoulder, a chaotic smile on his face. "...And Shouta will love to see you."  

Chapter Text

All Aizawa wanted was a quiet, solitary evening. 

Every month, without fail, Inko and Toshinori took Eri away for the weekend.   'We're married and we pretend we don't want Izuko to have a sibling.'

It's best if the Inko and Yagi don't give her too many sweets...

And his two best friends forced him to leave the house. 85% of the time, he and Hizashi ended up in some bar gossiping about their students while Nemuri slept with women in the most random places possible. 

I could be sleeping…

The old traditional bar with booths was his old haunt and the only place he could spend more than an hour without getting absolutely unbearably irritated. Aizawa drank some of his beer while listening to his veteran. "And after that I started buying padded handcuffs..."

I'm not listening to that...

Having loyal friends was something he certainly never dreamed he would have as a child, but it came with certain costs. One of them was listening to the sexual adventures of his lesbian best friend with slight BDSM tendencies. He took a deep breath and drank some of his beer. "Why don't you just..." Her smile made him immediately regret not keeping quiet. "Now finish it, Shouta." Kayama's eyes turned curiously to him. "...tie them up." 

Where did Hizashi go?! 

"What?!" She looked at him in surprise. "Forget it..." Aizawa felt his head throbbing and wished with all his might that he could go back in time and keep his mouth shut. "No, now you're going to stay here and tell me all about it." Nemuri pointed a chopstick towards his eyes.   He took a sip of his beer and prayed for the physical integrity of the wrists of the women his best friend slept with. "Tying them up is more practical and doesn't hurt..."

I’m too old for this...

"You tie people up? Sexually?" Nemuri blinked at him in disbelief and covered her mouth with her hands. "No..." He ate a peanut from the table and his senior narrowed her eyes at him. "Don't lie to me. You do it, don't you?" 

"You handcuff girls." He accused her back. The last thing he needed was his friend meddling in his currently non-existent sex life. "Don't change the subject, Shouta..."

Before he could deny it and avoid Nemuri trying to meddle in his life for the thousandth time, he heard his best friend's disproportionately loud voice. "Hey listeners!" Hearing Hizashi had never brought him so much relief. The relief disappeared when he saw him holding his daughter's paediatrician's bag. "Look who I found wandering around..." 

She's everywhere. It's not possible. 

"Ah..." He saw Takatani waving at them. "Hi." 

The girl wore a long black skirt with a discreet slit up to her knees, a black knitted coat, and high heels. Black with red soles. It might well have seemed out of place with the style of a girl too young for him, were it not for the fact that her coat was cropped above her waist, giving him a very privileged view of her waist and hips, and her pink shoulder bag with rhinestones.

Damn...

His friend guided her to their table and waved to Kayama. "Takatani, this is..." Megumi interrupted him with a fan girl smile. "Midnight, the heroine who drugs men!”

This isn't going to be good for Nemuri's ego. 

Aizawa silently watched his senior give him the most idiotic and satisfied smile in history. She turned to Takatani with her irritating confidence. 

"Beautiful women can call me Kayama..." The words made him want to roll his eyes, and he could almost feel Nemuri's horniness. Megumi smiled eagerly, and her senior pointed to the seat next to Aizawa. "Sit here in front of us, Doctor..."

Of course she would do that. 

"We want to know everything about you..." Hizashi said, leaving her standing next to him and sitting down next to Nemuri. "Hi, Aizawa..." She said, holding her bag on her shoulder. "Hi, Takatani." He said, moving away from the bench, leaving room for her to sit next to him. 

She's so…

For some reason, her pink bag, which could very well be designer, had at least six key rings: Lego, Hot Wheels, and random heroes. 

Cute.

Aizawa watched her fidget anxiously with her graduation ring. "How did you..." Hizashi interrupted her with his silly pride. "I saved her from a depressing night..." Megumi agreed and adjusted her fringe. "A date that went wrong..." 

A date.

"Oh, dear." Nemuri's tone was so fake that he glanced at her. "What a shame..." His senior gave her a look of sympathy and Hizashi shook his head. "So sad."

Clowns. 

"What do you like to drink?" Her senior smiled curiously at the girl next to her. "Here, have a beer." Mic handed her a Heineken. "Thanks." She took the bottle from Mic's hands and opened it with the hem of her skirt. "I'll drink anything." 

She smells like acetone and lemon. Tequila.

"Anything?" Her best friend, who only drank beer and sweet drinks, looked at her in surprise. 

"Especially cheap tequilas..." Aizawa commented as he took a sip of his own beer and saw her face turning red out of the corner of his eye.

"Out of context." She said, looking surprised.  In the back of his mind, he still remembered the fateful day at the market when they thought she was his wife. 

"What were you drinking?" He asked, knowing the answer. The smell of acetone and lemon mixed with lavender was unmistakable. 

"Tequila..." She admitted. "But that was just a coincidence." He crossed his arms and glanced at her. "Of course it was." 

Amused. 

Megumi laughed, and Aizawa saw his friends watching him silently. Too silent for two chronic loudmouths. He withdrew into his silence and focused on not staring at Takatani's anxious hands.

"But then, Dr..." Mic's voice caught her attention and Nemuri passed pieces of cheese and peanuts to the young woman. "Tell us about your date..." 

Wonderful.

"Oh..." Megumi brought her hands to her face. For some reason, he felt something strange, as if his mood had instantly worsened.  "It was awful." The woman next to her uncovered her face and took a sip of beer. "He talked for 90 minutes about his work and only asked me why I was a paediatrician and if I wanted to have children..." 

What a lovely guy...

"Wow," he commented. "Scary..." Nemuri wrinkled her nose and Hizashi took a deep breath. Megumi drank some more and complained. "And he said his dream was to be a father." Her words elicited a collective gasp of disgust from her friends. 

How old was this guy? 12? 

Megumi turned to him, her gaze intense. For some reason, the way her hair was half pinned up with clips didn't seem exactly comfortable. "Was being a father your dream?"

"My dream was to retire and evade taxes," he replied immediately. He answered almost smiling, thinking of the little girl with red eyes who taught him what love was. "Eri happened..." 

"It's a good thing." The paediatrician smiled at him. Something about the way she talked about her daughter was suspiciously affectionate. His friends proudly clinked their beer bottles against his. "The best."

Idiots…

"Why are you a paediatrician?" asked Hizashi, eliciting laughter from Megumi and Nemuri. Perhaps what separated him from the misogynistic paediatrician was a few less brain cells and too much curiosity. "I woke up one fine day and realised I loved receiving calls in the middle of the night from mothers crying desperately." His best friend looked at his daughter's doctor in shock. "Does that happen a lot?" Takatani replied, eating a piece of cheese. "About three times a week." 

"Was it because of your paediatrician?" Aizawa asked, thinking  about how being premature had left her too short to reach alcoholic drinks on high shelves.  "Dr Samito?"

Her words made her look at her in surprise. Certainly, her standards for relationships were low, given how Megumi Takatani always seemed happy to have someone to listen to her. "60% Dr. Samito's fault," she said with a wistful smile. "30% me not being exactly good with adults, and 10% because children are nicer..." 

Not good with adults...

"You're not good with adults?" Nemuri laughed and looked at her incredulously. "You seem great..."

I understand you...

"It's a matter of patience, you know?" Megumi replied, drinking her beer. Somehow, that woman drank alcohol at an alarming rate. "It's easier to be patient with children..." 

Much easier. 

"Do you know who isn't good with adults?" Nemuri's tone lit up all the yellow, red, and black warning lights in her head. "And patient with children?" Hizashi added, approaching Nemuri and looking at Megumi as if they wanted to sell her health insurance. "Excellent..."  

Oh, no…

"No..." Aizawa interrupted his friends and was ignored. As usual.  "The professional hero, Eraserhead." "Teacher of young heroes..." Hizashi winked at Megumi and Nemuri showed a photo of Eri on his mobile phone. "Adopts cute little girls..." 

Slutty. 

He took a deep breath and cursed his friends' cognitive ability to articulate words. "Don't use my daughter as bait." His gaze made Nemuri frown at him. "Don't mind them," he said to the doctor and tried not to look extremely annoyed. 

"I know..." Megumi smiled at the two goofballs in front of her and opened another beer. "I know the professional hero Eraserhead." She said in her I'm funnier than I look tone. Hizashi pointed at the two. "You guys have a lot in common..."

"Us?!" The doctor laughed nervously and he felt his head throb. "I don't..." Aizawa was interrupted by Nemuri. "He's a great teacher..."

 "He takes care of his students as if they were his own." Hizashi placed a bowl of sunomono in front of her.

"It's my job." 

"He read a bunch of articles because one of his students is a trans boy..." Kayama said.

"To know how to deal with..."

"And he buys sanitary pads for the girls in his class." 

"That's cute." The way Megumi smiled made him take a deep breath. 

"He gives love advice to children who have problems with their fathers." 

"It wasn't advice." Aizawa felt a strange urge for his friends to lose the ability to form words. "Shouto was going to do something stupid, and I told him not to." 

"You love children!" The paediatrician looked at him with her cute little smile and a cheerful tone in her voice. "I don't love children..." Aizawa muttered, drinking beer and thinking about how much of a headache his class gave him. "I just..." And how he couldn't sleep thinking about his students. "I care about them."

"Okay, fine." Megumi gave him a mischievous smile, unconvinced, and raised her hands as if surrendering. "Mr Eraserhead definitely doesn't like children."

"Extroverts." That was definitely more social interaction than he could handle in one night. Luckily for him, his friends and Megumi seemed to notice and let him drink in peace. 

In what felt like the fastest and strangely most enjoyable 90 minutes of his week, his friends dug up everything they could find out about Megumi while he pretended to be too focused on his beer and not on her damn lavender scent.

Apparently, Dr Takatani had lived a ridiculously ordinary youth. Playing volleyball in college, having incredibly boring sexual experiences, and considering the worst thing she ever did in her life to be trying MD. "I thought it was a sweet!" Megumi covered her face with her hands. 

"A sweet?" Hizashi laughed. Aizawa covered her eyes with her fingers and heard Kayama's incredulous voice. "You thought hard drugs were candy?" 

"In Brazil they call it Bala, which is the same thing as candy. My Portuguese wasn't that good and..." She shook her head with her ears red after making her friends laugh for the thousandth time that night. "It was my first party ever, a friend offered me some candy and I ate two at once..."

"My God."

"It's a miracle you're over 25," Aizawa muttered, earning him a dirty look from Megumi, and continued listening to them for another 20 minutes. His friends managed to sidestep every attempt the doctor made to talk about anything other than herself. 

The way Takatani averted his eyes, fidgeted with his fingers under the table, and swung his leg was excruciatingly recognisable to someone who had grown up anxious. She also moved closer to him. Not voluntarily, of course. Aizawa watched everything with his arms crossed, observing every glance she gave him when his friends asked a more profound question. 

You're just the most familiar figure around here. No big deal. 

At least, that's what he told himself. In the back of his mind, Yuuta's voice saying that the paediatrician had a crush on him seemed like a dangerous lie. Even so, knowing that she no longer saw him as a possible threat and her unconscious trust in him was driving him crazy. Really crazy.

Do not touch her. 

Megumi's phone rang. She immediately looked at the screen. A text message. "Damn, my resident..." The doctor pointed to the door leading to the bathroom. "Do you mind if I..."

"No, dear. Don't worry about it..." Nemuri smiled at the girl.

"Go do your thing as the world's youngest chief..." Hizashi waved. 

"Thanks." Megumi got up, typing something anxiously on her mobile phone. She took a lip gloss out of her bag and left it next to the hero. "I'll be back in a minute..."

I could be a criminal stealing her card, but anyway…

Aizawa wasn't going to pretend that Megumi felt safe enough to leave her expensive bag next to him or that touching it three times without noticing would make him angry. The hero noticed her key chains, and given their randomness, he could bet she had received them from her patients.

Ferrari's Formula 1 car. Lego Spider-Man. Lego Miruku. Is that a Uravity keyring? 

"Take her home." Nemuri patted his hand, taking advantage of the doctor's absence. "I'm not going to do that." He refused, praying that his veteran would control herself.

 "Why not?!" 

"She's my daughter's doctor." 

"She's funny, beautiful, her CV is longer than your arm, and she's in love with your daughter." 

"That's because she's kind." He whispered, hoping Megumi wouldn't appear at the door.

"Marry her." Kayama, Japan's biggest womaniser and the number one enemy of committed relationships, glared at him fiercely. "Marry her immediately."

"Nemuri." He covered his eyes with his fingers and pretended to be asleep.

"She's good for you!" His older sister's high-pitched, unsolicited voice irritated his ears. 

"You don't even know what's good for you," he retorted. 

"How come she's not drunk?" Mic looked at the empty beer bottles next to the table. He looked worriedly at Kayama. "Is she going to drive home?"

It must be because of her individuality…

"You're not going to let a drunk girl go home alone." His senior looked at him intently. "She's more sober than the three of us put together." Aizawa muttered. 

Very helpful, Megumi. 

"Shouta." Nemuri's seriousness was something he didn't usually hear. His eyes met his senior's, and he felt Midnight-senpai's frightening aura. "Take her or I will." The second to last thing he wanted was to be alone with the incredibly attractive woman any longer, and the last thing he wanted was his daughter's doctor handcuffed to Kayama's bed.

"Good luck with that," he replied. 

Damn. 

"You're on," his senior waved a handcuff in front of him. 

"Nemuri..." His voice was interrupted by the sound of the sliding door opening. 

Megumi re-entered the cabin with her lip gloss  retouched. "I think I'll be off now." She smiled at her best friend. "That was really fun. Thank you, Yamada. Nice to meet you, Kayama and…

"Come back and drink with us next month." Nemuri smiled enchantedly at Takatani and Hizashi pointed in his direction. "Shouta never talks, at least there's one person to talk to..." Her words brought a smile to Megumi's face. "Thanks, Yamada." He ignored her cute little teeth for the seventh time that night. "Ah..." She turned towards him and he noticed how her face was actually a little red. "I had to send you Eri's report, but I couldn't find your email..." 

Is she really a little upset or is she just like that?  

"Oh, I can..." He reached for his phone, but her voice interrupted him. "It's in my car, I printed it to get it stamped..." Her words made his two friends exchange silent glances. "Okay..." He agreed, calculating what to say. Megumi picked up her grown woman's handbag with a million key rings and slung it over her shoulder. "I'll go get it quickly..." 

She really did make the document for the juvenile court...

She got up and her friends signalled to her with their hands. "Go, go, go." Aizawa weighed his desire to avoid doing immoral things with his daughter's doctor against his desire not to let Megumi walk alone at night while possibly drunk. 

And his guilty anxiety won out. As it always does. 

"Takatani.” His voice made the girl look at him confused. Aizawa got up and reached her in a few steps. "I'll walk with you…”  

Chapter Text

"Takatani..." Aizawa's voice reached her ears. Something about the way his tone of voice never changed was strangely comforting. Megumi turned towards him. With every passing minute, she understood him less and less. "I'll come with you."  

My God in heaven.

"A..." She felt the damn butterflies in her stomach that she hadn't felt in years. "Okay..." 

I must have drunk too much...

Which didn't make sense, since she was physiologically incapable of getting drunk. Controlling every cell in her body. He accompanied her silently as she walked towards the exit. For some reason, Aizawa didn't walk beside her, but slightly behind her. Distant and present. They passed the bar, where all kinds of couples imaginable drank and existed in love. 

Maybe it's just not for you...

For a moment, she thought about how her first boyfriend made her want silly things like getting married, having children, and growing old with someone. And how her last boyfriend made her sure that she wasn't lovable enough. Maybe people only lived great love stories once. And her great love story was a doomed, short romance from her youth. 

Focus on your work, you idiot. 

Don't think about...

"Careful." He said, grabbing her arm. Firmly, but not hard enough to hurt her. For a split second, she was startled, but Megumi remembered where she was when she saw the steps in front of her and the black-haired guy preventing her from twisting her ankle on the way out of the bar. "Sorry..."

Stupid girl, what are you thinking?

"Dreamers..." She heard him mutter softly. Almost a grumble. Someone who ventured to become a hero calling her a dreamer was almost ironic. "My biggest dream in life is to only work five days a week," she grumbled to the hero. 

"Then we dream alike." He said as they walked through the tree-lined car park. Megumi seriously hoped that the alcohol in her blood had already been metabolised. One step behind her, Aizawa seemed to blend into the darkness. 

God, shouldn't I be like... scared?

She threw her brain away. For sure. Becoming an adult had made her stupid, and now she was walking alone with guys in dark places.

Nah... it's just Eri's father...

That guy wore bracelets that students made for him. Megumi's brain focused on being afraid of losing her car key again and not on the hero who just looked scary. Her eyes focused on the only white car in the car park. "It's this one, I'll just look for a moment..."

If I've lost it, he'll think I'm irresponsible...

"It's okay." He leaned against the back door of her car with his arms crossed. Megumi opened the boot and ignored how much bigger his arms were than his usual clothes made them look. 

Damn, I really shouldn't leave this car such a mess... 

Her eyes scanned the functional chaos. Reversed bags of clothes. Dozens of samples of medicines and children's supplements and random toys. To her relief, the hero seemed too busy looking at the sky than at her hoarder's car. Her fingers ran through a folder of papers and she pulled a brown envelope out of it. "Found it!"

If I had lost it...

Her words brought the hero back. He uncrossed his arms and walked towards her, his eyes on the paper in her hand. "Takatani, was that..." 

Am I forgetting something?

"Oh, wait a minute." She interrupted him, remembering exactly what she had forgotten. Megumi walked past him and opened the passenger door. "I bought something for Eri..." 

Will he think this is weird?

"Did you buy something..." His tone definitely confirmed that he thought it was strange. But she decided to ignore grown men for the thousandth time that week as she rummaged through junk in the back seat of the car. "Actually, I saw the ad and remembered her."

Silly, silly, silly...

"Do you buy gifts for all your patients?" He looked at her impassively. Damn, he was so hard to read. It definitely made her nervous. "Only the ones I fought with their fathers..." Megumi smiled and tried not to look like a silly girl. "Very funny." His exhausted tone always made her want to laugh. Maybe his grumpiness was his charm. 

Damn, is that attractive? 

 "I'm a little more financially irresponsible than I'd like to be." She admitted, finding the bag from the bookshop near the hospital that more cultured people than her went to drink coffee and read books. "But there's always one or two children that we tend to like more, you know..." She got out of her car and smiled, thinking of the unicorn girl with almost magical powers. "That leave their mark..." 

Shut up, Megumi! 

"I see." As economical as he was, something in his dark eyes seemed strangely sincere. Maybe teachers and paediatricians weren't so different after all.

I wonder if he has a favourite student too? 

In the moonlight, his face seemed less grumpy. Less intimidating. As if the tension intrinsic to the hero had magically disappeared. He was definitely handsome, maybe it was his dark eyes or his long hair...

The doctor realised she might be too close to him and offered him the envelope.

Focus, Megumi. 

"Here's your scientifically based technical report..." She said, avoiding his intense black eyes and handing him Eri's gift bag. "And here's financial irresponsibility." 

I hope she likes it as much as I did...

"Thank you, Takatani." She saw the hero bow slightly to her. Megumi took a deep breath and tried not to blush. Aizawa looked at her for a moment before turning his attention to the gift bag. "Kaguya-hime?" He almost smiled at the little book. "It's the illustrated version..." Megumi looked away from him. "She seems to like princesses..."

Oh, how stupid...

 "She does." He focused his eyes on her. For some reason, Megumi felt strangely comfortable. I liked them too, when I was just a little girl..." She smiled, remembering how her dream was to be like Elsa. "But the only Disney princess who looked like me was Mulan, and she's not even Japanese..." Her words made the hero frown at her and look at her with his whole-life-long-I've-told-you-so look. "And I wasn't brave enough to identify with her anyway." 

Damn it, Megumi, shut up. 

"Kaguya-hime is a good story." He said, running his fingers through the pages of the book. Aizawa put the book back in the bag and looked at her. "Thank you, Megumi."

Damn, he's so...

Overwhelming. Constant.

"You're welcome." She felt her heart beat a little faster. "So..." The way he looked at her silently was more attractive than she could admit. Megumi took two steps back, towards her car door. "... See you next time."

 Get out of here before you say something else stupid...

Before she couldn't contain her desire to run away from him. Ignore the strange heat in her body. Before the way he looked at her, his constancy and honesty, threw her into a whirlwind of confusing feelings that she would surely lose again. 

"Wait." His voice made her freeze with her hand on the door handle. "Are you driving back?" The almost judgemental tone made her turn towards the tall man a few metres away from her. "Yes?" She looked at him, slightly confused.

Didn't he realise that alcohol doesn't affect me? 

"You drank..." He pointed slightly in her direction. "I make my metabolism ignore it with my secret superpower." Megumi smiled, but Aizawa didn't seem to find it funny. He crossed his arms and sighed. "If I erase your individuality..." 

Is he playing the hero with me? 

"I'll fall drunk in front of you." Megumi joked. The hero just looked at her for a long moment. A tired and sexy look.

"Call an Uber." He said in a tone that left no room for discussion and handed her his mobile phone. His phone. "What?" She felt a chill down her spine, refusing to take the device. "Don't be irresponsible, Takatani." His tone made her feel a twinge of anger at the handsome, humorous guy who was slightly too cautious. "I'm more sober than all of you," she argued. 

Damn, does he want me to explain all the stages of ethanol metabolism here in the car park?

"If a police officer with a breathalyser stops you, you'll go to jail," he grumbled. That guy would definitely never participate in a clandestine car race in his life. "No, I won't, trust me," she said, returning his mobile phone. "I'm a hero." His words made her cross her arms. What appeared to be a sarcastic and defiant smile appeared on his face. "I can arrest you, you know?" 

He's bluffing...

"You wouldn't do that." Megumi laughed. His serious expression made her smile disappear. "You wouldn't, Aizawa!" 

"Want to bet?" He smiled. An amused and somewhat frightening smile. Certainly more intimidating than his intimidating looks. "I healed your arm!" She looked at him incredulously and slightly offended. "You ungrateful..." He shook his head and crossed his arms. "You're a doctor. Are you going to put people's lives at risk?" His words made her jaw drop. This guy was definitely smarter with words than he looked. "Seriously, Takatani?"

Low! How dirty he plays.

"Damn, you're so annoying!" She felt her frustration consume her and remembered all the times her grandmother told her that arguing was something foolish men did. Years of therapy couldn't erase the damage the Old Woman had done to her mind, and the way he looked at her didn't help either. "Okay, you win..."

Damn, do I still have my pass? 

"I'll wait for you." He said it in the most Aizawa way possible. "Wait for what?" She looked at him confused. "Your Uber." His answer made her let out the most anxious/nervous/desperate laugh in history. Megumi said, returning the phone to the hero. "I'll take the tube..." 

At least I can read Gina update.

"The tube?" He looked at her as if she had said she stole a baby from a nurse when she was eight and got chicken pox for it. "The station is right there and close to my house..." She was interrupted by his voice. "It's almost midnight, Megumi."

Damn...

Of course she was coming across as a stubborn girl rather than someone who needed to have a few things under control. Of course the professional hero would find it unreasonable that she felt more comfortable in a perfectly predictable public place than in a car with a guy she didn't know. "I'm afraid to take an Uber..." 

How embarrassing...

He didn't express any emotion. Which was much more pleasant than her brother laughing at her. "Would you rather take the tube?"

Is he doing that thing Aristotle did to make his students realise for themselves that they were idiots? 

 "I'd rather drive my car." Megumi crossed her arms, slightly defensive, and felt her face turning red. "Yes, I'm afraid of being kidnapped and becoming one of those True Crime victims."

"True crime?" He repeated slowly. 

"Yes..." Megumi looked away from the guy who must never have felt fear from anyone in his life. "You have no idea what spending years in America does to someone's psyche!" She accused the hero. Aizawa agreed with a frown, and Megumi tried not to look like someone who was really anxious. "And we have the safest subway system in Asia. Which must be the safest in the world... Unless there's a subway in Norway where no one has committed a crime in a thousand years and..." Megumi realised she was talking too much. 

"I'll drop you off." He took a step towards her. "Uber, subway, whatever..." 

"You..." She froze. Replaying his words in her head, trying to figure out if it wasn't an auditory hallucination, a sexual delusion or something like that. "You don't have to do that."

"I was going to patrol anyway..."

"My house is like 45 minutes from here and..." And all the guys who ever walked her home became her boyfriends. Without exception. She narrowed her eyes at the hero. "Are you sure?"

He surely has something more important to do than walk me home. Like fighting crime. Or fight villains. Or teach teenagers how to fight villains...

That was so stupidly pathetic. 

Her thoughts were interrupted by his voice. "Subway, Takatani." Aizawa stated, nodding towards the moonlit path. No room for discussion. "Okay, subway." She agreed. 

Chapter Text

Aizawa hadn't expected her night of social torture to end with her meeting his friends. 

Or with his friends playing annoying cupids.

And she definitely expected to be alone on the subway with Takatani at almost dawn. Megumi saying she was afraid of becoming the protagonist of a true crime story was definitely the fault of her emotionally irrational decisions. 

Is she studying? 

His treacherous eyes and mind were lost on the girl sitting on a bench in front of him, reading something on her phone with a flowery case. In silence. A good silence. 

Don't look at her too much.

There was no one else in the car, but his ears seemed to never turn off. Too many years as a professional hero had changed his brain chemistry. The hero leaned his back against the subway wall and focused on leafing through the little book with watercolor illustrations and a hard cover. 

She's so kind...

That was definitely the most attractive thing about her. The hero imagined Eri reading books about Japanese princesses whose happy ending was not getting married. If the silence they were in wasn't so comfortable, he would talk about how he was secretly addicted to Princess Mononoke as a child. 

Exactly 00:00 a.m....

"They're pretty outgoing, aren't they?" Her voice made him shift his attention from his book to the woman sitting on the subway seat. "Your friends..." 

"Excessively." He agreed. Yamada and Kayama had given him more headaches than a thousand troubled teenagers. "I used to be more shy too..." Takatani's awkward attempt at small talk wasn't annoying to him. "At school, you know?"

Does she think I'm shy?

Her extremely limited ability to interact with 98% of people over the age of 17 years and 11 months being mistaken for shyness and not chronic bad mood was very Megumi Takatani of her. 

Naive...

"Really?" He said, closing Kaguya-Hime and putting the book inside the bag she gave him. The girl took a chocolate bar out of her bag and took a bite. "I think I was more insecure than shy..." 

Just like I was before him...

"Tsk..." He let out a reaction and Megumi looked at him with a hurt expression. "What?" She asked in an extremely cute tone. "I used to think that beautiful people weren't insecure." 

Like Shirakumo...

"I think growing up too nerdy changes people's brain chemistry." Megumi stared out the moving subway window. Long blue hair fell over her shoulders. "How nerdy?" He looked at her curiously. Being bullied his whole life had taught him more about cruelty than he wanted to know. "I was in the molecular biology club at school and liked to participate in science competitions." 

Molecular biology... 

Aizawa narrowed his eyes. He wasn't a guy who laughed, or even smiled. But maintaining his composure with her was difficult. "Punk, Takatani." He said it just to see how she would react. 

"It was super cool!" She defended herself quickly. Her overly long bangs fell over her eyes, and she smiled proudly. "Of course it was." He looked at her out of the corner of his eye, pretending that listening to her wasn't fun. "We had microscopes and once a week we discussed scientific articles..." Her words made him narrow his eyes at the pretty, slightly too intelligent girl. "Wait." She gestured with her little fingers and smiled incredulously at him. "Do you think I'm pretty?"

Did I say that?

"Appearance doesn't matter..." Those certainly hadn't been good choices of words, considering her pout. His eyes scanned the subway map and he hoped her station would magically appear. "My daughter thinks you're a Disney princess."

"Oh my God, really? Eri cured all my insecurities forever." She looked away from him. "Yuta is to blame for my low self-esteem. He used to say I was the ugliest girl in the world. But when someone at school called me ugly, he got really offended..."

Everything I know about her brother makes him seem worse, how is that possible?

"Megumi." He said, looking straight into her brown eyes, just because he knew her reaction would be funny. "You're twins." He lied. "You and your brother are the same." 

She's going to freak out.

His face turned white, making a comical expression that was a mixture of crying, offense, and anger. "Don't ever say that again, Aizawa!" He could really get used to his stressed little voice. He looked at her impassively and saw her bite her chocolate bar. "What did you do in high school, Mr. Eraserhead? I bet you did cooler things than science projects..."

I wish...

Surely the cute girl wouldn't like to hear that he killed villains who threatened to destroy entire cities or about his very dark days after the fateful day of his best friend's death. "I trained," he replied simply. "A lot."

Which was true. 

"They had a class at UA that taught you how to fight villains, be intimidating, and become a bodyguard for fearful doctors?"

"Fundamentals of Heroism," he said impassively. His gaze made her ears turn red and she crossed her legs under her skirt. God, she was going to drive him crazy. "I'll put 'being a bodyguard' on the lesson plan. My students will enjoy it..."  

The next stop is UA…

A nefarious idea crossed the hero's mind. Aizawa could be a dirty and irresponsible man. He could take the sexy, nerdy, sweet girl to his house; his daughter wasn't there anyway. 

He could do it. What was stopping him besides his gray morals, his fear of loving someone, and his terror of losing everything again? He could take Megumi to his bed and listen to her talk for hours and hours and hours about things he didn't understand. After all, he wanted to know more about her.

Why was she anxious? Why did she always seem so scared?  Who made her afraid of men? 

He wanted to know everything. 

Aizawa wanted to know what it was like to hold her in his arms. The shape of her body. The color of her panties. The taste of her lips. He definitely wanted to know what all she tasted like on his tongue. What was her favorite position? Was she more affectionate or did she like it when they were rough with her? 

He could be both anyway. He could do whatever she wanted. However she wanted. As many times as she wanted. 

Aizawa could take her to his house, rip those clothes off her, and kill his desire. 

Maybe that would make his intrusive thoughts about the doctor disappear. Maybe kissing her until she was breathless, feeling her under his hands, leaving marks on her skin as he made her moan. Maybe that was necessary for him to finally get that woman out of his head. 

He had nothing against making her forget her millions of problems for one night.  Aizawa could lie to himself and Megumi and call her ‘mine’ while he made her come again and again and again. 

Control yourself, idiot. Don't be a disgusting man…

"Do you like being a teacher?" Her voice snapped him out of his delirium. The hero looked at the woman in front of him, completely ashamed of the things he had thought of doing to her. Megumi looked up at him and shook her head as she always did when she was about to speak. So expressive. "I'm not very good with teenagers, they can be..."

"Brutal..." Aizawa took a deep breath, pretending he hadn't thought all that a few seconds ago. The subway doors closed for the UA station. "But yes, it's good."

Better than just being a hero. 

To his despair, Megumi stood up and leaned against the subway window, right in front of him. Less than a meter separated them. "Do you have a favorite student?"

"No..."

"You lied!" She smiled like a child pointing at his face.

"You have no way to prove it."

"You made an asymmetrical smile and discreetly looked away diagonally."

"You made that up." 

"I didn't make it up, I saw it in a YouTube video..." Her words made him shake his head in disgust. The doctor brushed some hair off her shoulders. "Okay, I'll start. My favorite patients are a little baby in the ICU and Eri. Your turn." 

"I don't have one."

"I know you do." 

"I tolerate all my teenagers equally." He made a point of emphasizing the word tolerate. "I don't have a favorite."

"You liar..." Megumi gave him a defiant look. "I know you're lying." 

Aizawa looked at the woman in front of him for a moment. His eyes narrowed as he studied her expectant face. Trying to figure out if she realized he was flirting with her. Apparently not. He inhaled and looked down at her. "Asui." The hero admitted. "You probably know her as Froppy..."

"A girl?" Megumi looked at him in surprise with a bright, silly smile. As if he had said something revolutionary. "What is she like?" The doctor asked eagerly. "Your favorite student..."

Petulant, sharp-tongued, and brave...

"Responsible..." He remembered the brave child who saved his life years ago in the USJ attack and who was Bakugou's number one hater. "And honest." 

 "I can't even imagine why you like her." Megumi shook her head and looked him in the eyes. Aizawa remembered all the times he heard his student confronting boys twice her weight with her sharp tongue. "She's very rational and hardworking..." 

"I don't know much about heroes..." Megumi's words caught his attention. "I don't know many..." 

"Were you too busy controlling cells and being smart?" He pretended she wasn't strangely sexy.

"Yes, you petulant hero." Megumi fiddled with her keychains in her bag. "I spent 10 years away, I was in California when the war happened, and I was never really into heroes like my brother anyway."

"Were you busy being the archetypal fiction nerd?"

She rolled her eyes, still smiling. "I shouldn't have told you about the molecular biology club..."

"Nerd." Aizawa almost smiled and watched Takatani for a long moment. The way her delicate hands shook roughly gave him flashbacks of his lost years as an auxiliary hero. "Are you cold?" 

Or is it fatigue tremors?

"It's not just..." Megumi hid her hands from him. He was too addicted to work not to pick up another workaholic. "It happens sometimes at the end of the day..." 

The school will never find another healer, and my students will be crippled until graduation...

"I don't understand cells..." His voice made her eyes meet his. "But analyzing individualities is my job. You have a good..." Before he could offer Takatani the UA doctor position, the girl smiled and interrupted him. "Correction. I don't have individuality, and your arm healed itself." 

Oh, right...

"We're short on doctors at UA." Eraser continued. For a moment, his mind wandered to all the things Megumi could have done in secret. How many broken bones and frightened children she must have taken care of. "It's a quiet job, it pays well, and..."

"I fled the country because of it." She turned anxiously to the hero before he could say, No one will exploit you there. The words hit him. "To keep my family safe. People think I have no individuality, and my children, they..." A nervous smile appeared on the woman's face. "I'm not a saint or a hero like you, I don't perform miracles. Being a pediatrician is all I am, and my patients need me. You know what they do with..."

She talks so much when she gets anxious...

"With healers like you and my daughter?" The hero looked at the woman in front of him. Very young, very sweet, and very powerful. Megumi swallowed hard and turned her face away, hiding behind her blue hair. "I'm sorry..." 

"It's okay." There was a reason why Aizawa slept more peacefully knowing that his Eri wanted to be an artist and not a hero. Great powers came with great responsibilities and sacrifices. A burden he wouldn't wish on anyone. "If you change your mind, UA is a pretty good place..." His eyes met hers. Beautiful brown eyes. "Safe..."

"I imagine it is..." She brushed some of her overly long bangs out of her eyes. "Look, I appreciate the super tempting job offer and everything. But I love my office, my residents, and my infirmary..."

So civil…

"I understand." The hero nodded in agreement. The doctor looked past him. The subway map. "My station is next..." 

"Okay." He stood up and put his hands in his pockets to warm his fingers. She looked at him confused for a long moment. Maybe she just had trouble reading between the lines. "I'll drop you off at home..."

What low standards she has...

"Ah..." She shook her head. Before she could protest, the subway doors opened for the station and he nodded. "Let's go."

"You're taking this bodyguard thing pretty seriously..." She glanced at him as they rode the escalator to the surface. Two steps behind, he looked at the woman who had cured Eri's anemia, her arm broken until she realized he was doing the bare minimum that any decent person would do. But she didn't realize it. "Wow, tough audience..." Megumi said with a pout. 

"You might consider a career in comedy." He grumbled with his arms crossed, feeling the cold night air hitting his face. Finally on the surface. "In case you get tired of medicine..."

"Nah, I bet I make more as a pediatrician." Megumi always seemed to have a clever answer at the tip of her tongue. She took a step onto the street and turned toward him. "But you'd be a great doctor. Those emergency ones that make residents cry, you could consider..." 

"God..." The hero frowned. His job was to save people, he couldn't imagine anything worse than not being able to do anything for someone. "No." 

"Seriously, I have a friend, the head of the ICU, who is very similar to you. Quiet and intimidating. Once at a hospital meeting, he spent three hours in absolute silence..." 

"Really?" Aizawa looked at her out of the corner of his eye. He slowed down because each of her steps seemed to be half of his. Her high heels didn't seem to help her either. 

Doesn't that hurt?

"The difference is that he's Muslim, likes football and for some reason never stays less than a meter away from me..." Megumi said as she walked on his left side. "I think he thinks I have lice because of the children..."

At least he's respectful...

In the back of his mind, he remembered Yutta's words saying that she was bad at romance. That made a lot of sense now. He looked at the woman beside him. "He must be in love with you..."

Does she realize it? 

"Don't be silly..." She laughed as she led them down the street in the traditional suburban neighborhood, close to the university and at least three hospitals. Of course she would live in a place like that. 

He shook his head and continued to follow her silently through the streets. Strangely comfortable. Quiet. One step behind her. Maybe he also wanted to keep a safe distance from her. Maybe because he was a hero. Maybe he just liked how her long blue hair looked a little wavy at the ends. 

I could...

In the back of his mind, he calculated how his little girl would feel if he had something with Megumi. What would happen if the child with rejection trauma became attached to his girlfriend. If he would dare to put his daughter's feelings and emotional stability at risk for a woman. Probably, the answer was no.

Don't be irresponsible. You're not a teenager and you have a daughter...

"It's here." She said, standing in front of a large traditional-style house with hedges. Snapping him out of his reverie once again with her shy, silly smile. "No kidnapped pediatricians today!"

So funny...

"One less true crime case to investigate..." he muttered. Her dark blue hair was the same color as the starry sky, and her mouth seemed much more attractive than it had a few hours ago.

Go away before you do something stupid.

"Aizawa..." Her voice made him take a deep breath. Something in him wanted to hear her say his name in other ways. "Takatani." His lips held back the words, please don't stay in front of me another minute. But by some twist of fate, his voice made her look him straight in the eye. "Hi?" She climbed two steps from the entrance and their faces were almost at the same height. So close that he could smell her. Lavender. Megumi looked at him silently pleading. "Shouta..."

And he felt all control slip through his fingers when she closed her brown eyes. 

What a perverse woman…

Her breath close to his. Her scent. The wind making her hair flutter. Everything conspired for it. He let himself be carried away for a moment and his hands almost ran to her hips. Aizawa closed his eyes and felt her breathing become shorter. Almost killing the overwhelming desire to know what she would taste like in his mouth. His lips almost touching hers. 

Don't be irresponsible...

"Please..." She asked, begging. Panting. His control immediately went up in smoke. Her fault. It wasn't slow, much less planned. When the hero noticed, his hands were already on her. One on her lower back and the other holding her face, caressing the skin of her cheek as his lips lost themselves in hers. Feeling her body against his. Their tongues touching, her arms around his neck. She let herself be guided by Aizawa's desires, at his pace, but biting the hero's lips lightly. Passive, but not too much. And sweet. Very sweet. 

Fuck!

His corroded mind showed him flashes of his dark times as a sidekick. Of all the girls he was too late to save. Of his hero friends whose girlfriends mysteriously "disappeared." The tears and desperate crying of the last good girl who fell in love with him years ago and he almost died protecting her. 

I can't...

"You're a nice girl," he murmured, feeling every word hurt his body. "And my daughter's doctor." His words made her pull away immediately. "You don't want this, Megumi..." 

"Aizawa, I..." Her face turned red as blood, and he saw her chest heaving with desire. "It's unethical," she said, resting her head on his shoulder. "Probably..." Aizawa took a deep breath and smelled the refreshing scent of her hair. "Can we pretend this never happened?"

It never happened...

The words hit him as he held himself back from touching her again. Not holding her face. Not feeling her hair in his hands as he lost himself in Megumi's lips. "As you wish..." 

Chapter Text

Father, father, unforgiveable
This is my house, you made it personal
It's always trouble when they go too far

Quitting his job at the hospital so his wife could focus on her career as a surgeon had been the best decision of Jirou's life. Just running a clinic and teaching was great. He could still make dumb college students cry, have dinner with his kids, and make his wife happy. So he was happy.

Damn, I forgot to make an appointment with Meg's pulmonologist! I'd better do that before winter comes and her asthma gets worse...

The neurologist reflected as he sat on the sofa in his living room. Right in the middle of one of many discussions of clinical cases with other professors from the medical school. He took a breath and saw his daughter sneaking out the back door with at least three biology books in her arms, which caught his attention. Avoiding social interaction, as always.

Is that makeup on her eyes?

Jirou studied her for a moment, slightly incredulous. There was definitely black eyeliner on Megumi's eyelids, strangely similar to the makeup Aya wore on their first date 20 years ago. At the bar in front of the hospital, which inevitably ended with him escaping through his wife's second-floor bedroom window a few hours later.

God, she looks just like her mother... 

"May I ask where you're going, young lady?" His voice made his teenage daughter turn to him and his co-workers, bowing politely to each of them and then smiling shyly at him. "To the library, Dad. To work on that Science Olympiad project..." 

Thank goodness she doesn't know how to lie...

"Science Olympiad?!" Her pathologist friend's laughter made Megumi's face flush red. "Leave the girl alone," Samito, the pediatrician, scolded him. "Unlike your daughter, Alvarez, Megumi studies. She'll be taking my place one day..." Jirou decided to ignore his colleague's attempt to alienate his daughter to the dark side of medicine. She shook her head and looked away. The pressure she put on herself would kill her. Jirou took a sip of his whiskey and looked at his little girl. Hair tied back and lip gloss. "Alone?" 

"No..." Megumi looked at the floor for a millisecond and then at him. "Nishida is helping me with the  programming part of the project..." 

Isn't Nishida  that weird little nerd from the robotics team? 

"The Nakajimas' firstborn?" His friends straightened up when they heard the name of the wealthy surgeons' son. As if they were old gossips and not doctors with PhDs. "Oh, sweetheart..." Samito ruffled his gray hair with his indulgent tone and frowned. "That boy is too ugly for you." His gay friend's honesty and aesthetic standards definitely scared him sometimes. "And if you pay attention to ugly men, they start acting like they're handsome..." 

God, he's so mean...

"He's just my friend..." His daughter replied softly. "That's good." Jirou replied, smiling at Meg and trying to maintain the line between being a strict father without being  "I don't want you with playboys without a conscience..."

"Like your son?" Alvarez coughed and received a slap from Samito. "Don't talk about Yutta like that. He's a good boy, deep down..."

Is always seeing the best in people a pediatrician thing? How annoying...

"Funny, Dad..." A smug smile appeared on the teenager's face. Megumi walked over to him, took off his glasses, and cleaned them with the hem of her blue hakama. "Smoking cigars, drinking whiskey, and meeting with friends on a Wednesday afternoon to discuss things." Megumi looked at him with her little eyes that made Aya and Yutta always give their all for her, and her friends laughed softly. "It was like something a playboy would do. What are you guys studying anyway?"

"Medical ethics, sweetheart." Samito showed the Chinese book to be discussed. "From a non-Eurocentric point of view," Álvares added. Megumi smiled and narrowed her brown eyes, like his, full of love, intelligence, and amusement. "Medical ethics from a non-Eurocentric point of view..." She repeated slowly, judging them to the core.

She's going to be a doctor just like her mother...

"Playboy is the one who pays for your expensive school and your Portuguese lessons." Jirou patted her head as Megumi put her glasses back on her face. He smiled at his little girl and waved toward the door. "Go before it gets late, and don't do anything your brother would do!" 

"You guys should include women in this elite intellectual group, huh..." Megumi waved to her classmates as she walked toward the door. "Diversify the discussions..."

"I'm Cuban, dear. A real Latin American..." Álvares smiled at his daughter. "And we already have Samito..."

"He's just queer, but he's still a male and rich. Like all of you..." She said, pointing her little finger with lilac-painted nails at them.

"Your mother didn't want to be part of it." Jirou rolled his eyes, surgery cases would surely make for more interesting sessions than his Cuban friend's autopsies. "But she said that discussing articles is something for idle clinicians..." 

So practical and honest...

"In a few years, you'll join our elite intellectual group, dear, and diversify the debate..." Samito smiled at his daughter with the affection of a guy who never had his own kids to try to turn into pediatricians.

What a pain, why doesn't he invest his cards in someone else... Just because Megumi stole babies doesn't mean that... 

"Oh, no! That's playboy stuff!" His daughter laughed, picking up her expensive biology books again in her little arms and taking a few steps back, smiling at them. She said something in Portuguese before walking out the door. "Bye-bye!"

God, she better not date that ugly boy...

Could this be a self-esteem issue?

He would never know. A deathly silence fell over the room. A silence that always fell when his colleagues saw, talked about, or heard about Megumi. The neurologist took a sip of his whiskey and rolled his Cuban cheroot between his fingers, watching the tip burn and felt Álvares' judgmental gaze burning his face. Samito, who appeared to like Megumi more than his own nephews, broke the silence. "You should send her to Brazil. Doesn't your mother-in-law live in São Paulo?" 

My mother-in-law, that little bitch...

"What do you want me to do?!" The neurologist looked at his colleagues. "Send my only daughter to the other side of the world because of a suspect?" He controlled his voice and felt his face redden with frustration. "What am I going to say to my wife?! Aya would go insane, and my son..." His voice faltered. The last thing he needed was to compromise his tenuous family peace. "Megumi doesn't ride the subway alone!" 

Why do they believe this so hard? What evidence do they have?

"Takatani..." The serious tone of Alvares, a pathologist and medical forensic expert who always joked around, gave him goosebumps. The brown-haired, brunette-skinned man took a dark brown envelope out of his handbag and looked at him with the judgmental gaze of a man who also had a daughter. "Listen to the voice of reason." 

The voice of reason...

Jirou bit the inside of his cheek. In the back of his mind, he heard the annoying voice of his eldest son complaining about how Megumi was healing people and animals on the quiet. He opened the document and read the first line. 

I, Dr. Juan Alvarez, director of the Musutafu District Death Notification Service, formally report the disappearance of the cadaver and mortal remains of 17-year-old Shirakumo Oboro, who died in the attack on 57th Street on...

Jirou's eyes focused on the photo of the dead child. A boy with blue-white hair, blue eyes like his wife's, and a silly smile. His stomach twisted, and he turned another page and read news of disappearances, individuals appearing out of nowhere, and women being sold in what they called quirk marriages. He turned another page with a bitter taste in his mouth. He immediately closed the folder when he saw the photo of the UA student who had survived the attack. The aspiring hero, a thin, short boy with black hair and eyes, was bleeding and semi-conscious.

What kind of parent in their right mind would let their children be professional heroes? 

"It's been six years!" Samito muttered under his breath. "My husband has been investigating this for years. The bodies of powerful people are disappearing. Children accidentally turn their families to ash, then disappear themselves, and..." The blue eyes of the pediatrician who would die for his children, the doctor who was far from being his favorite, met his. "They call us conspiracists. But something is going on, and they're ignoring us..." 

Stay calm, don't let yourself be carried away by irrationality...

"Send her to Cuba." Alvarez's anxious voice made his heart beat fast in his ears. " We send all three of them. Yutta, Helena, and Megumi. My family will be caring for them; we have more than enough money. They can study Medicine there. They can spend their summertime in Miami and..."

"No." Jirou blinked his eyes and tried to stay calm. His son was at home, and the last thing he needed was Yuta feeling the paralyzing terror in his bones. "I'm not sending my children away. They're almost in university! And your daughter doesn't even want to study medicine, Yutta is a chaotic teenager, and Meg..."

The words "would suffer" died in his mouth. Just like my wife will murder me or my son will never look me in the face again.

"Jirou." Samito stubbed out his cigar in the ashtray. "We can sit here and discuss ethics for as long as we want. Pretend that there aren't any doctors practicing bioterrorism and powerful people involved. But you're the one with a child who brings the dead back to life! We keep her secret, but there are still suspicions, and if anything happens to Megumi..."

"It will be your negligence." Álvares' eyes fell on him. "And it won't be for lack of awareness." 

I'll stick around if you will
Getting older looks good on you
But, God, someone make it stop
Nature will ruins its course
I'm left to pawn you off

I will die your daughter
I will, I will die your daughter

Jirou pretended he wasn't terrified. But every day, every second of that last year had been excruciating.

Every morning he feared for his daughter's security and his son's sanity, and every night he waited anxiously to hear them fighting at dinner. He never imagined that experiencing the systematic bullying between the most opposite twins in the story would give him relief and comfort. Every time his phone rang, every message from Yutta or his wife, every damn notification from his co-workers made his heart speed up. Waiting to receive a call from the police informing him that Megumi had gone. Fortunately, on that gray end of autumn day, the call was just from their school after she had become very sick during an organic chemistry test.

Should I give her a sedative?

He reflected as he listened to his daughter's lungs. Wheezing from all sides as she sobbed quietly. If winter didn't kill his daughter, self-blame would. Jirou placed his stethoscope on her neck and glanced at the girl wearing a yellow knitted coat. "You heal everyone but yourself?"

Damn, she hadn't had an asthma attack in years...

"I really tried..." Megumi said, breathing quickly, her shortness of breath cutting off her words. He would definitely have to take her to Dr. Samito to review her treatment for asthma. "But it didn't work. I think..." Her girl smiled as she lay on her bed with a blanket printed with daisies. Suffocating in the air around her. "The cells in my lungs are very uncooperative..."

Great, her pneumocytes took Yutta...

The neurologist could hear her chest wheezing, even without his stethoscope. The effort of breathing was starting to turn her little fingers blue. 

Shit...

Immediately, he walked through the room filled with her books, medals, and collectible figurines. He stopped in front of the commode, listening to her cry because she had missed the damn test she had studied for all week. 

It could be worse, she could be crying for reasons worse than that. 

On top of the dresser, applications for Sophia University were mixed with photos of her and her son at the Regional Baseball Championship finals and the World Math Olympics in Taiwan.

They had spent no more than three days away from each other...

Jirou felt his head throbbing and ignored it, opening the top drawer and looking for one of the many bronchodilator inhalers scattered around the house. To his relief, his daughter was responsible. More than all of them put together. 

Shit! 

Megumi coughed and gasped. Jirou rushed back to her before his daughter died from lack of air. "Calm down, calm down, calm down..." He said, sitting next to her and handing her his rescue inhaler. "Here. Stay still, little girl, and get some sleep." 

"Dad..." She said with her red eyes, gasping for breath. Her shortness of breath was so intense that it interrupted her words. "I'm so sorry. For the test... and for making you..." 

Of course she was going to say something like that...

"None of my patients have ever apologized for having a CVA..." he said, glancing at the girl, who smiled, much to his delight. "I'm sorry, Dr. Takatani, my nerves are destroying me for no reason!" Megumi joked, extending her little arm toward him and pretending to have first motor neuron syndrome. "I'm sorry, my foot just stopped working overnight!" She said with her sickly smile.

Damn, should I ask Samito to hospitalize her until she gets better?

"Very funny," he said, taking the tablet of asthma medicine out of his pocket. "You'll have to take it for..." He was interrupted as he took out a pill for her. "Five days..." She gave him her optimistic little smile. "You know more than the interns this week." He grumbled, handing her the little purple water bottle. "Dad..." She took her potent dose of anti-inflammatory and took a deep breath. "What time's she... coming back?" The girl looked up with her slightly reddened brown eyes. 

What time's she coming back? It was definitely the phrase he heard most often from his daughter during the hardest nights.

"She's just finishing up a surgery, kid." He lied. The last thing he wanted to tell his sick daughter was that his wife wasn't coming back for her. "I think Aya will be here by 11 p.m..." He said, running his fingers through her hair. "Go to sleep, when your mom gets here, she'll come see you..." 

I hope Aya can come back today...

" Okay..." His daughter patted his hand affectionately as she covered herself with her pink comforter. "Good night, Dad." The doctor looked at the little girl, half asleep after hours of struggling to breathe. Jirou brought his hand to her feverish forehead and stroked her hair. "Good night, Meg."

Gods, she Meg not wake up in the middle of the night feeling sick and realize that she isn't here...

He got up and walked toward the wooden sliding door of the house, turning off the lights. Being a doctor with a child who had rebellious lungs would always be one of the great ironies of his life. 

At least Yutta is healthy...

He walked down the hall toward his office, feeling his head throb. Jirou wouldn't tell his daughter, but he had canceled three patients to help her and would have to squeeze them into his always-busy schedule. Not that he cared, after all, doing something for his super-independent kid who never asked for his help with anything was the least he could do. It was even gratifying.

I'd better at least fill the patients' prescriptions...

Through the window, the moonlight shone in, along with the cold wind that was making his daughter sick. Before he could reach his desk, he heard heavy footsteps coming up the stairs.  

He'd left school hours ago.

Jirou didn't need to be a genius to know who it was. "May I ask where you were?" He asked, not really caring about the answer. "It's almost 8:00 p.m. Your sister..." 

"My sister..." Yutta interrupted him, poison in his mouth. His son wore his Somei Academy uniform, without a tie, his white shirt several buttons open,  giving him an unpleasant view of the hickeys on his neck. "You realised Meg exists and left me alone for one afternoon. I had to enjoy it..."

"Your sister spent three hours in the emergency room, you jerk." He said, approaching his son and turning his face with his hands. "Did Helena do that?!"

"Get real, old man. Lena is gay as hell." His boy said with more contempt than usual in his voice. "She's eaten more pussy than you and me together in our entire lives..."

Gosh...

"You better not get syphilis, I'm not treating you..." He definitely wasn't very interested in knowing the details of their sexual lives. Not that day. "Go have dinner and take a shower. Tomorrow I'll deal with your..." He looked his son up and down and hoped he wasn't drunk.  "Promiscuity."

He'll end up getting someone pregnant or sick…

"No." Yutta barged into his office, with his damn bully attitude. Having a child who felt everything they felt taught him that the best way to hide something from him was to simply feel nothing. Suppressing every ounce of emotion around him. Jirou ran his hands through his hair and took a deep breath. "Yutta, now!

I don't have time for this...

"What the hell is this?!" His son shoved envelopes of letters against his chest. Brown envelopes with the Brazilian embassy's letterhead. His angry face too close to his. "Explain."

The process was expected to take 12 months, and they've already approved it?

"This..." Jirou cautiously took a step back, took the papers from his hands and analyzed them under his merciless brown eyes. "It's none of your business."

The Brazilian Embassy is pleased to inform you that the application for Refuge and Citizenship of the Japanese-Brazilian teenager Megumi Takatani has been accepted. We request that the documents listed in the Annex be sent for the preparation of the South American Identity Card and Passport. We kindly invite the minor's guardians to visit the nearest embassy in order to complete the immigration process.

Best regards, High Commission for the Protection of Human Rights.

Dos filhos deste solo és mãe gentil. Pátria Amada Brasil. 

(You are a kind mother to the children of this land. Beloved homeland, Brazil.)

It’s too soon…

He reread the words slowly, biting the inside of his cheek until he tasted blood in his mouth. Suddenly, the monsters that haunted him in his sleep became very real. His worst nightmares had materialized in the form of paper with government letterheads. 

"Stupid Megumi keeps healing every dying motherfucker she sees." Yutta's low voice brought him back to reality. "A fucking homeless guy tried to attack her last week." Jirou slowly processed his words. "What..."

Attacked? What do that mean?

"She ran away..." His son spoke in a calm tone that was scarier than his usual shouting. "Citizenship. Immigration process. Political asylum. What the fuck is that?"

"Yutta..." Jirou squeezed his eyes shut with his fingers, feeling the weight of a terrible day getting worse. "We'll talk about it later..."

"There's no way to hide her shitty individuality." His son interrupted him, his eyes glazed over. His voice was fast, low, and terrified. "Helena's father said that..." 

Damn it, why couldn't he have a less invasive quirk?

"Your sister wants to be a doctor." The neurologist spoke calmly. "Brazil has excellent research centers and public universities..." His son snatched the paper from his hand. Screaming. Furious. "'Liar!'"

"Shut up!" Jirou shouted back, holding himself back from slapping him like his parents would have done to him. Trying not to look panicked. "Your sister is sleeping." He whispered through clenched teeth, his hand inches from his face. "So just shut up for once in your life." 

Stay calm, idiot. If you get scared, he'll sense it...

"What the hell are you doing?" His boy looked at him in panic, more man than he would ever be. "Does Mom know about this shit? Did she agree to this?" Yutta pushed him with his arms, but he knew his son well enough to know that he wasn't using half his strength. "Meg thinks we're going to college in Tokyo!" Jirou tried to comfort him. "Yutta..."

Their codependency is unhealthy...

"You can't do this!" He was interrupted as the boy grabbed him by the shoulders. "Megumi is fucking stupid and needy!" His son. His only son looked him in the eyes. Panicked. "You can't do this to her! 

"She can't stay here," the doctor said, breaking free from his boy. "Or they'll murder her," he declared. "Do you want your sister dead?"

He's unstable, but he's not stupid and he loves her...

"You want to send her to the other side of the world?! Meg doesn't know how to take the bus!"

"Your sister is responsible and smart. I'm sure she can learn... Your grandmother will be there and..."

"You can't do this to us!" Yutta interrupted him, her voice breaking and her eyes filled with tears too stubborn to fall. "She's my sister! My twin sister! You can't..." His voice faltered. The boy walked toward him and looked at him with his proud brown eyes. Begging. "Let me go with her. Please, father. Let me go with Meg..."

Jirou took a deep breath, glancing at the kid who was surely divine punishment for all the bad things he had ever done in his life. His firstborn looked at him with a vulnerable gaze he had never seen in the quarrelsome boy's eyes. "No," he said bitterly. Yutta looked at him in shock. Betrayed. With pure hate in his eyes. "What?"

"You don't speak Portuguese. You'd have to learn it almost from scratch," the neurologist tried to argue. "Your grandmother barely agreed to take Megumi in, and you practically already have a place at the university of..." He was interrupted. "Fuck that! I'll learn..."

"Yutta, no!" he shouted. "It was a miracle that a university accepted you with your background. You're not going to throw your future away..."  

"If you do that, I'll never forgive you." His son took steps toward him,  practically touching his forehead to his. Imposing and terrifying. "If you send my little sister away, I'll never forgive you."

"That's not up to me. Nor you." He said, stepping away from his son. "There's no undoing what's already been done." Jirou poured himself a shot of whiskey and drank it. Feeling the bitterness burn in his throat as he looked away from Yutta. "Your sister is leaving for São Paulo, where she will be safe and sound. You are going to the University of Tokyo. That's final." 

Silence fell between them. The neurologist's eyes focused on the wooden floor of his house. Trying to keep his nerves under control. In the back of his mind, he imagined his sweet daughter all alone in the grayest city in Brazil, and his heart ached. A sob reached his ears. For a moment, he asked himself if he was hearing things, but a tearful gasp gave him the answer. Jirou swallowed hard, gathered all his courage, and slowly looked at his son. In the corner of his office, the toughest, most confrontational kid in the world was crying with his back against the wall.

No, no, no...

"You're a cowardly motherfucker," Yutta spat, venom and pain in every word. His son shot him a look of contempt that would haunt Jirou until his dying day. "I fucking hate you..."

You teach me how to behave
I felt you question the way
I was brought up as a baby
Well, you don't know fuck about my family

Could never tell you what happened
The day I turned seventeen

Jirou would remember that day forever as the darkest day of his life. 

"Are you sure about that?" His wife crossed her fingers and looked at him anxiously. Her blue hair was starting to turn gray, a sign of her approaching 50th birthday. "Brazil is so far away, and São Paulo is so big and brutal. My mother is so critical and..." 

"And a bitch?" He raised his eyebrow at his wife as he set the dinner table. Aya covered her face with her hands. "She refused to stay with me. She's going to destroy our girl..." 

God, she must be the worst person in the world.

"Don't cry, my dear." Jirou took a deep breath, placing the bowl of his daughter's favorite sashimi on the table and going to hug his wife. "Megumi is anti-hater. Our girl is so nice that no one can be mean to her."

"My mother can. She's a professional hater." Aya sniffed and adjusted the collar of her dress shirt. "She's so beautiful." His wife sobbed and bit her lip. "All the boys fall in love with her."

"And she doesn't even notice." Jirou wasn't going to pretend that didn't make him slightly happy. Aya buried her face in his neck and hugged him. The neurologist caressed the back of the tall, tough surgeon crying on his shoulder. "We'll visit her during the holidays, my love." He promised as he kissed the forehead of his wife, who was too good for him. "And call her every day..." 

"Mom?!" The almost shocked voice of his eldest son made him take a deep breath and control his nerves. "What..."...

"Yutta..." His eyes turned to the tall boy wearing a dark blue baseball shirt with white letters. "Go upstairs and call your sister for lunch." His boy stared at him for a long moment. Silent. Resigned. empty eyes. The kid turned his back and disappeared up the stairs. 

Jirou bit the inside of his cheek. For what felt like the longest two minutes of his life, his hands reached for his wife's miraculous hands, and he tried to comfort her somehow. 

"Mom!" Megumi ran to Aya and hugged her. Like the good daughter who never even complained about spending her birthdays in hospitals and whose teachers never complained. "Are you coming to eat lunch with us?" Aya silently brushed Megumi's bangs out of her eyes. "Yes, honey. They canceled my surgery..."

God, she looks so much like Aya at the beginning of college…

"That's so great!" Megumi was wearing a shirt from the Asian math tournament. She smiled at them and sat down. "I hope your patient is... okay. Alive with all his organs still inside his body..." She shook her head and smiled at her favorite dish. "Tuna!"

""Sweetheart, where's your brother?" Aya asked, noticing the empty space where Yutta should have been.

"He said, 'their toxic energy is suffocating me.'" She gestured with her little fingers and served a plate for her brother to eat later. Kind as always. They watched silently as their daughter put her little hands together and said her thanks. "Thank you for the lunch!"

"You're welcome..." He replied. 

"How's your Portuguese, my love?" Aya struck up a conversation. "Ruim, como sempre." Their daughter said something in her wife's Latin American language. "Eu não sei porque eu tentei aprender. A gente nem é Brasileiro de verdade…" 

"What did she say?" Jiro whispered in his wife's ear. "That we're not real Brazilians..." His wife whispered back, rolling her eyes. "You're 25% Brazilian, Meg. Your grandmother..."

The closest we've ever been to Brazil was that barbecue restaurant…

"We've never seen Grandma, Mommy. She's as real as the ghosts Grandpa said exist in the underground of the hospital." His daughter said as she ate the sliced pieces of fish with hashis. "And anyway, she was only born there, but her parents are also Japanese, which means..." 

Her words hit them both. He felt his wife's hand involuntarily squeeze his knee, as she always did when she was nervous. 

"Dear." His wife began, trying to hide the sadness in her voice. "We need to talk to you about something..."

"Yutta didn't do anything!" The girl immediately dropped her chopsticks and looked him straight in the eye. "It was all Helena's idea. If he made a mistake, it was trying to do the right thing!" Her words made him take a deep breath and his wife cover her mouth to keep from laughing. Their little girl looked at them both for a long moment and blinked her little red ears. "You have no idea what I'm talking about, do you?"

Great, I'll have to find out what shit he's done this time…

"You'd be a terrible lawyer," Jirou muttered. Damn, he would miss her lapses of innocence so much. "You'd better never commit a crime in your life, darling." Aya said with weariness in her voice. "That would be the easiest interrogation in police history." 

"Ah..." Her cheeks turned red. She looked at them with her 'I said too much' face and smiled. "What was it about? "

"Megumi, you know that everything your father and I have done throughout your life has been so that you and your brother would grow up well, happy, and safe..." Aya began, using the same tone she used to give bad news to her patients and making his hands sweat. His girl looked at him without her usual smile. "Yes..." 

Damn, she got it. 

"We did our best to keep your power hidden as best we could." Jirou continued, looking into her brown eyes and trying not to look terrified. "But we don't know how far our secret has spread and..." The words died in his mouth as he saw the fear in his daughter's eyes. "There are things happening in the country."

Don't scare her, or her life will turn into a horror movie…

"What kind of things?" Megumi asked cautiously, fidgeting anxiously with her little fingers. "Crimes, my love." His wife said. Direct as always. He added. "Trust me, you don't want to know the details." 

"But..." The girl frowned, her little face wearing an expression that broke his heart a little more. "Why are you telling me this?"

"Megumi, honey..." His wife said in a firm voice that was on the verge of breaking. "Japan is no longer a safe place for you..." His child said nothing, just stared at them silently, processing terrible things in her child's mind. "Dear." Jirou got up from his chair and walked towards his child, sitting down next to her. "You can't stay here," he said, holding her thin shoulder as he watched her eyes fill with tears. "'So you're going to Brazil.' Her usually serene and smiling face was marked by confusion. 'What?' His daughter looked at him in panic. 

Don't cry, please don't cry. 

“You're going to live with your grandmother in São Paulo. Quickly as possible...' He continued, squeezing her shoulder lightly as his daughter shook her head. "You'll finish your last year of high school and go to college there..."

"But..." Her chin trembled, her little voice flowing quickly, as did her breathing. "Yutta doesn't even speak Portuguese very well. How is he going to go to college in Brazil?"

“Yutta…” He heard his wife wheeze. On his daughter's face, a silent tear rolled down her red cheek. "Honey..." Jirou tried to comfort her by stroking her hair, but his little girl seemed beyond his reach now. "No, he won't. Your brother has already won a scholarship to the university and..." 

He never finished the sentence. 

"I'll have to leave..." She sobbed and moved away from them. "Without my twin? Alone?" 

"Dear, I know this is... difficult, but it's for your own good." His words surely broke the last thread of trust he had with his daughter. Megumi looked away from him and begged Aya. "Mommy, please..."  

"São Paulo has excellent colleges. Honey, the best ones are even free! You like public health, you can learn a lot in Brazil..." His wife said, kneeling in front of her, with more love in her voice than he could ever muster. "...infectious diseases, plastic surgery, and..." 

The words died between them as their daughter slowly got up from the table. Her eyes were fixed on a spot on the wall. "I'm sorry. Excuse me..." Megumi whispered breathlessly. She ran to the kitchen cabinet, grabbed an asthma inhaler, took a breath, and ran upstairs. 

No...

"Meg!" He shouted, watching her desperately inhale the bronchodilator. They ran after her, toward the second floor. "Damn it!"They watched her pass through the bedroom doors to a specific sliding door. "Honey!" 

She ignored them, or rather, didn't hear them as she threw herself into her twin brother's arms. Crying her little broken heart out. Jirou and Aya froze at the edge of the doorway, watching their eldest son hug his sister, whispering something to her. The boy covered his eyes as stroked her back and took a deep breath. "Just leave Meg alone..." he said, looking directly at Aya. "When she's feeling better, you can talk..." 

His son's eyes fell on him. Jirou stared at the boy for a long moment, and all he saw in Yutta's eyes was pure rage.

Chapter Text

It was a very convenient night to have no one else at home.

They could fuck in every single room in the apartment. The smell of her lavender invaded his nose. Megumi's laughter and voice were definitely freaking him out. His impulses won out. Aizawa took her by the waist, feeling the soft flesh of her hips in his hands, and sat her on the kitchen table. 

"Shouta!" She laughed in surprise and passed her arms around his neck, her pretty brown eyes finally at the same height as his. "What are you doing?"

Damn it, I need to...

He didn't answer. His thoughts were too clouded by lust. He brought his hands to the doctor's face, feeling his thumb on Megumi's cheek. Damn, he just loved touching her. She closed her eyes and breathed shakily.

So anxious...

He stroke her cheek, practically apologizing for all the dirty things he was about to do, and buried his mouth in her soft lips. Kissing her almost desperately. Tasting the overly sweet coffee flavor on her lips, and feeling Megumi's timid tongue invade his mouth. Her teeth biting his lips. 

Perfect.

She wasn't wearing a bra. The only thing preventing him from feeling her breasts against his bare chest was the thin, light fabric of her dress, which showed off every damn curve of her sober body.

Damn...

He needed to know what she tasted like. Aizawa pulled  her soft blue hair into his hand as Megumi lost her breath in his kiss. Calculating his strength, he pulled lightly on the handful of strands and Megumi moaned into his mouth. A dirty, shy, needy sound. 

Control yourself, idiot.

She turned her head slightly, just as he wanted her to. His free hand ran to her neck, feeling her racing pulse, gently enveloping it as he kissed her face over and over. 

Aizawa positioned himself between Megumi's soft legs and whispered in her ear. "Can I? She immediately nodded without even asking what he wanted to do to her. "Please..."

They would definitely have long conversations about acting impulsively and trusting blindly. But that could wait for another time. Over the tissue, his hands ran to her soft boobs. Not big enough to cause attention nor too small to go unnoticed. The perfect size to be sucked on. He unzipped her dress a little and slowly lowered the cream strap.  

This woman can't be real...

"Shouta..." She supported herself with her hands as he uncovered her breasts, letting the dress fall into her lap, exposing her fully. The hero felt his heart race, his eyes lost on the almost naked woman in front of him. Her curves were a great place to get lost. Every inch of her soft skin seemed to scream 'lick me'. Megumi took a deep breath and looked at him intensely. "Honey, I need..." 

She called me honey…

"We have all night..." He interrupted her by bending down and putting one of those boobs in his mouth, holding the other one with his hands. Her nipples hardened under his tongue and fingers as he licked and sucked her, making her speak words he never imagined he would hear from the sweet pediatrician. He took a deep breath and felt his cock pulsing, desire sending him into the anxious behavior of a teenager. 

Damn...

The blood in his brain was definitely not where it should be. It was their first time, it was definitely not the time to pinch or bite her. Something in the way she looked at him and moaned told the man that Megumi was that kind of person. “'Fuck!Shouta…”Her gentle hands wrapped around his hair, pulling him as he worked to circle her nipple with his tongue and gently squeeze the other with his fingers. 

"Babe..." Her voice made him stop for a second, making his beating faster. Aizawa watched her, still holding her nipple between his teeth, seeing her lovely red face. "I really need..."

More.

She didn't need to finish. He knew exactly what she wanted, and he would give it to her until she was completely exhausted. 

"Come." He pulled her by the waist again. " Oh my god!" She laughed as he held her against his body, taking a few steps toward the sofa. "You're so..." He lost his words as he knelt in front of her. The woman looked at him almost in panic, but her heavy breathing and the sparkle in her eyes told him everything. "Nice."

"Are you sure?" Megumi looked up at him, sitting anxiously on the arm of the sofa. "Shouldn't we... Shouldn't I?" The girl looked at him kneeling in front of her and moved closer to him. "Do this?" 

People pleaser. 

The hero suppressed a smile. His girl could be pretty cute sometimes.

"This?!" He slowly ran his hands down her hips. Looking directly into her eyes. Feeling the soft flesh of her sides. So graceful and feminine. He ran his fingers up her legs, getting another moan out of her, pulling her dress up to the top of her thighs. "You're so pretty..."

"Ouch." She laughed, her face turning red. Aizawa looked into her eyes as he hooked his fingers into the side of her panties. "Or this?" His lips kissed and nibbled at the skin of her thigh, her hips, the fabric of her panties. Holding her by the waist with his hands, feeling her wet arousal through the fabric. "Damn, Megumi..."

He definitely hated losing control, but her hands on his face and her horny touch were certainly hard to ignore. He pulled her panties down her legs, making her sob with anticipation. "Shouta, I..."

Before she could say anything else, he finally found what he had desperately wanted. With one movement, he grabbed one of her thighs and supported it on his shoulder. God, he could fucking die like this. The man took a deep breath against her skin before moving his kisses upward. Her muscles tensed under his fingers, and Megumi whispered something in a language he didn't know. 

Finally, he arrived where he wanted so badly to end up. Kissing her lips passionately. Hungry. A small scream of pleasure escaped the woman. Fuck, she was definitely delicious. Aizawa felt a dirty moan escape his throat, his tongue ran over her from top to bottom and side to side, licking her all over. Feeling her addictive taste in his mouth, his tongue. Soaked.

"Que droga, você é tão bom!” Megumi writhed beneath his hands, moaning loudly as he circled her clitoris with his tongue. Unraveling every inch of her like a map. Making time melt away. Surreal. Sweet and conjugal. " Just keep going, Shouta. Please, please don't stop."

Aizawa gave a naughty smile, for a second he considered stopping just to hear her beg for more. But sucking her off was already fucking enjoyable and he didn't want to play with her, at least not this time. 

Her hips danced rhythmically under his hands. Hot, slick excitation trickled down her thighs. Her legs began to tremble and squeeze him, searching for more and more. Eraser could hear his heart beating fast in his ears and the pressure of his member was almost intolerable; at that pace, he would come before she did. 

Aizawa put a finger at her entrance and entered her slowly, feeling her walls contract. Watching his girl's reaction attentively. Megumi's eyebrows furrowed, her eyes closing in an insane expression of joy.

"Porra, porra, porra..." She moved needily, burying her nails into the skin of his shoulder, dancing on his tongue. He held her tighter, feeling his fingers dig into her sides, pulling her closer to him. Swallowing every drop of pleasure from that woman. " Honey, please..." She begged breathlessly. "I'm gonna..."

Suddenly, her image seemed to dissociate itself. Escaping through his fingers. The sensation of her on his lips disappeared, like smoke. As brief as a dreamlike delirium. An intrusive thought. With a start, he woke up in his dark bedroom, the late afternoon light filtering through the curtains. Sweat on his bare chest, breathless. Totally alone. 

What's your problem?

The hero sat on the futon, covering his mouth with his hands as he calmed his nerves. The uncomfortable erection in his sweatpants reminded him of the unwanted and repetitive dream. His head throbbed, he squeezed his eyes shut and regretted for the thousandth time that he had kissed Megumi Takani. Aizawa bit the inside of his cheek, the muscle memory of her in his arms hitting him like a bucket of cold water. 

Get over it, you idiot. You pushed her away yourself...

There was no explanation, let alone excuses, for wanting someone he had only kissed once so badly. Fantasizing about a woman like an obsessed pervert or worse, much worse, a man in love. The mere idea made him shudder. His phone alarm went off.

Damn it! 

The hero picked up the device and saw the time. 3:30 p.m. His afternoon nap to recover 1% of his lost sleep had cost him a late arrival. 

How wonderful.

Aizawa grumbled and walked to the bathroom. A quick, cold shower would surely help him think of something else. After all, he was a grown man, not an obsessed teenager, and on the other side of the district, his little daughter was waiting for him at the school exit to go for ice cream and buy shoes. 

Chapter Text

Aizawa didn't have a favorite day, but if he did, it would be Friday.

His students kind of gave up on doing anything before lunch. He gave up on training them. All he did from 12pm to 4pm was prevent his teenagers from killing each other, committing indecent exposure, or having psychological breakdowns. From 4 p.m. onwards, all he needed to do was be the father of the most easy-going little kid in history. 

She's not out yet?

Aizawa scanned the lawn of the Isao Takahata Academy of Arts, the most nauseatingly good vibes school in Japan. On the field, all kinds of different rich kids ran around in ballet clothes or painting supplies. For a moment, the hero focused his eyes on junior high school students who for some reason were dressed as people from ancient Greece and singing something on top of a table. Theater kids, for sure.

They don't even wear uniforms...

At least he didn't have to do laundry every day. Everything was very colorful, teachers referred to students by their first names, they did all kinds of presentations, and they had super flexible rules. Except for bullying. In a place where all the students looked like they came out of a musical, discrimination was considered intolerable. Perfect for his kid.

Damn, we still haven't chosen what her instrument will be...

A group of children stands out in his view. No theater costumes or ballerina shoes. Boys wearing sweaters with math or knitting jokes. Girls wearing white dress shirts and thick glasses. Quiet, carrying musical instruments bigger than themselves. Calm, a bit outcast and nerdy. The hero feels his day get better when he sees his daughter with her equally introverted and music-loving school friends.

At least they're not eccentric...

Eri could very well be the quietest among her quiet friends. With her little yellow dress and carrying her sheet music. At least she didn't seem uncomfortable. Aizawa watched from afar as a boy with rabbit ears offered her a cookie. He narrowed his eyes. She accepted it with a confused expression. The boy ran off happily, and she gave the cookie to one of her classmates. 

Yeah, dude. It wasn't your day...

His daughter remained oblivious to his presence. Her friends from the choir showed her something extremely nerdy about music in a score. Apparently asking Eri for advice. Impressive, sometimes he forgot how brilliant she was at what she did. Suddenly, a distracted child, a ballerina with curly pink hair, bumped into her, causing her score to fall to the floor. 

Damn...

The hero almost goes towards her, but the little ballerina dressed in pink from head to toe picks up the papers from the floor and offers them to his daughter, with a smile worthy of Denki Kaminari in his silliest days on her face. 

No, no, no...

He never imagined that a 10-year-old child would make him want to pull his own hair out. He frowns and watches his daughter stammer something and blush as she looks at the ballerina. Panicked. The pink-haired girl smiles and waves goodbye to Eri before skipping away. 

No, Eri, 

Not the funny ones. Those are the worst...

His daughter looked confused at her classmates, causing Aizawa to cover his eyes with his fingers and shake his head. He hated to interrupt his daughter's first gay experience, but he certainly didn't want to stay out late carrying a guitar back and forth in the commercial district. He waved at the child and saw her run towards him. "Daddy!" 

"Hey, Neko..." The hero felt the child's embrace around his waist and rested his hands on her head. "How was class?"

"It was okay..." The little white-haired girl wore the pink and orange knit shirt Inko had given her. "We practiced and Miss Utahime said my solo is good..." Eri looked up and smiled. "What did you do today, Daddy?"

"Nothing much." Aizawa said as he took the guitar case from her hands. God, it really was too big for such a small child. His little girl walked to his side and he felt her little fingers searching for his hand, as she always did when they walked down the street. He glanced at Eri and tilted his head. "I heard that someone got a good grade in math..."

"Kacchan taught me how to calculate percentages in my head..." She said quietly, looking at her feet. "Really?" He said as they walked toward the subway station.

"Yes." Eri said as she took a few steps ahead of him and looked at him with a serious expression. Stupidly cute. "He said calculators are for losers and that only idiots don't know math..."

God...

I'd better say something before she thinks this is true. 

"No, sweetie..." took a deep breath and hoped that Katsuki Bakugou would keep his influence on Eri limited to math lessons and loud music. "There are many types of intelligence, not knowing math doesn't make someone stupid..." He gently held her by the shoulder and looked straight into her red eyes. "Half of  the kids at art school are bad at math, but that doesn't mean they're not..."

"Like normal kids?" She brushed some of her white hair away from her face, running her fingers over her little horns and making a face. "Kacchan is kind of mean..."

"You are a normal kid and he has a good heart, that's what matters." He bent down to Eri's height, adjusting the collar of her shirt. "You got a good grade, do you know what that means?" He raised his eyebrow. 

"Kitty ice cream!?" Eri looked at him curiously, her eyes sparkling and a shy smile on her face. 

"Kitty ice cream..." The hero nodded, watching her celebrate just like his silliest students did when classes were canceled. "Yeppp!" She shouted, raising her little arms in the air with her fists clenched. "Kitty ice cream!"

Chapter Text

Eri loved Fridays. 

"Which one?" Eri pointed her little finger at a chubby gray kitten. "The short-haired English one," her father replied after looking for a split second. "And that one?" She pointed again at one with pointed ears and long fur sleeping on a table. "Maine Coon." He replied as he petted a black kitten with short fur. "And this one, Daddy?" 

"Oriental Havana..." The hero replied, narrowing his eyes at the nice young man who brought the ice cream. "How do you know so much about cats?" Eri narrowed her eyes at her father. "Is it like a superpower?"

"Ahaaammm..." He made the same sound he always made when he didn't know what to say. "I don't think so, Neko."

"This one looks like you!" She pointed to the black cat on her father's lap, who rubbed against his hands and walked towards her, rubbing his head against her cheek. " Hey, Jiji," she said to the little animal as she stroked its belly, leaving black hairs on her clothes. The girl's eyes met the hero's. "Dad, can we take Jiji home?" 

"Eri, honey..." Her dad's serious tone made her frown. "Having a cat is a lot of responsibility and..." One of the kittens, this time a three-colored one, rubbed its head against their legs. "It takes time, structure, and..."

"But it's so cute!" the little girl argued, stroking the black cat. "And it doesn't have a home..." 

"This is his home." Her daddy nodded toward the cat toys at the coolest ice cream shop in the world. "We can't adopt a kitten just because it's cute," he said softly. 

Can't we take it home just because it's cute?

"But you did that with me..." She crossed her little arms and looked at her daddy. "Eri..." He covered his eyes with his fingers and shook his head. "That's totally different, Neko." 

"Eri-chan!" She heard the voice of the ice cream shop boy. "Kenma-kun!" She waved to the boy with shoulder-length hair that was half black and half yellow. "Aizawa-San..." Kenma smiled at them and her father nodded. "Hey, Kid." 

"One strawberry scoop, one pistachio scoop, and red fruit cheesecake..." The boy with orange kitten ears said as he placed the decorated ice cream and candy in front of her. "That's more sugar than that annoying hero lets you eat in your whole life. Special occasion?"

"It's just that..." The girl looked down and felt her ears turning red. "She got an A on her math test." Her father said, pointing in her direction. "Really!?" Kenma looked at her and smiled. "That's great, Eri-chan!" 

The girl slowly processed this and felt a twinge of warmth in her heart. "The teacher even wrote congratulations on her test..." He said to the waiter, in his usual serious but cool tone. "Show him..." Kenma picked up a cat ear headband and handed it to her. "Let me see!"

 "Okay..." She agreed shyly, taking her test out of her folder of endless sheet music and showing it to her little friend. "Look!" Kenma smiled, taking the paper and analyzing it. "What's this!?" He said, pointing to her teacher's writing. Eri felt her cheeks turn red and smiled. "It's a heart and two little stars..."

"Not one..." Her father said slowly, showing with his fingers. "Two."

" Awesome, Eri!" Kenma ruffled her hair. "You're so smart, high five!" She high-fived the boy wearing a shirt that said Software Engineering with several 101010101s in a row. He tied his hair back and narrowed his eyes at the hero. "Aizawa-san, aren't you going to order anything?"

"Hmm." He always said no. Eri looked at her father with her "eat something sweet just today" face, making him sigh. "Mint ice cream."

"Ah..." The college student said, scratching his cat ears and frowning. "We don't sell mint ice cream anymore, Aizawa-san."

"But it's the only flavor daddy likes..." She protested. Her father shook his head and made the half-upset/half-disappointed face he sometimes made at Uncle Zashi.  "That's absurd..." 

"Customers said it tasted like toothpaste..." Kenma said and smiled. His eyes were just like a cat's. "...but if you want another bad flavor, people say Pitaya is also very insipid..." 

"Very funny..." His papa grumbled with his pout when he was upset. Just like the kitten Jiji. 

"I can bring you a Kakigori with just ice and no syrup..." The boy smiled. 

"Go play video games..." His father said, handing Kenma a bill and pointing to an arcade machine in the back. "I likes toothpaste..." He said quietly, narrowing his eyes as he always did when someone said something really silly. "Don't know what's really good..."

A real good one...

Like Mirio, singing class, and Hello Kitty furikake?

She took another spoonful of her ice cream and felt the sweet taste in her mouth, melting like sugar. Maybe there was nothing tastier in the world than strawberry ice cream. For a moment, between devouring her green and pink treat, her little eyes focused on her favorite hero, looking at her silently. "Daddy, would you like some?"

"Ah..." He blinked and smiled kindly. "No, Neko. Thank you."

"It's yummy." She put some pistachio ice cream on her spoon and pointed it in his direction. 

"It's too..." Her father argued, but her pout, which she used to get Kachan to give her mochi, made him sigh. "...sweet." He frowned. "Okay, just a little."

"Yayyyyy!" The girl cheered as he ate the green cream with pistachio pieces from her spoon. "Daddy, did you like it!?"

"I loved it..." He mumbled and drank some water immediately. Eri smiled as Jiji climbed onto her lap again. Her father capped the water bottle and brushed some hair away from her little horn. "Have you chosen your orchestra instrument yet?" 

"Hmm, no." Eri admitted, lowering her eyes to her melting candy as the sun set through the window. "All my friends chose the flute, but I don't like blowing stuff..."

"You don't have to do everything your friends do. What did your teacher say?"

"Utahime-sensei said I'm very good at singing... but that if I really want to be in an orchestra, I should continue playing string instruments... I like the piano..."

"Aaaaaaa..." He frowned and took a deep breath, just like when they almost burned the apartment down trying to make Red Velvet cookies. Eri tilted her head and ate another spoonful of ice cream. "What is it, Daddy?"

"Neko..." The hero narrowed his eyes and scratched his eyebrow. "There's no place for a piano in our apartment..." He used his boring news voice. "How about a keyboard?" He suggested. Indeed, a piano wouldn't fit in their home. She laughed. "A keyboard isn't an orchestral instrument, Papa."

He doesn't know much about music...

"Are you sure?"

"Very sure." She shook her head. Suddenly an idea crossed her mind. "How about a cello...?"

"It's up to you..." He yawned. She was kind of hoping for a longer answer, but he always gave short answers. So she kept looking at her dad until he said something a little nicer. He noticed and looked in her direction. "... which one is that?" 

"It's that big one you play sitting down..."

"Do you have to take it to and from school every day?" He tilted his head to the side. 

 "Aaaaaaaa" A sound escaped her mouth. That definitely didn't seem like as good an idea as it had 30 seconds ago. 

"Why don't you choose something more..." Her father looked her up and down and stroked her hair. "Easier to get around with?" The girl suggested. "Proportional to your height..." He said, glancing at her big guitar. 

Proportional to my height. 

Definitely a big deal for a girl who couldn't reach the shower head in the bathroom. Maybe when Eri grew up, she would be strong enough to carry her own cello, to not feel sad about her reflection in the mirror, and to be brave like Deku, Jirou, or her father. 

Something more my size...

When I grow up...

Until then, she was still too small to carry her own oversized instruments. Instruments that had strings, were played in orchestras, and weren't too big. "A violin!" She smiled. 

All the coolest musicians played the violin. She could play in a quartet like her super cool teacher, Utahime-sensei, and the characters in the movie she watched with her father. She could grow up to be a violinist who would play in cool theaters and make people happy with her little fingers and her melodies. 

"A violin..." Her father repeated softly, narrowing his eyebrows. Eri looked at him confused, but he just smiled and nodded. "Cool. Violins are cool," he added. "Violin, then?"

"Yes..." She smiled and stretched her little arms up high. That was as cool as eating mochi and playing charades. Music was cooler than any candy or game. "Like Vivaldi!"

"Sure, Vivaldi..." He nodded in agreement. Wrapping his scarf around his neck and adjusting her sweater. "Finish your ice cream, we still have to buy your performance outfit..."

Shopping wasn't exactly fun. 

Her friends were always very happy when it came to going to the mall, buying silly things, and hanging out with their parents and siblings. But Eri wasn't exactly like other children, and buying clothes, shoes, and toys always puzzled her. 

Should she take the white skirt or the pink pants? Why didn't people like to wear orange clothes?Why did girls wear skirts and boys didn't? Should she take rainbow knee-high socks? Or ankle socks with strawberry prints?The possibilities were endless. Confusing, and no answer seemed to be the right one. Eri didn't know, and her father didn't seem to know any more than she did. 

"Off White..." He muttered as he read the school document with instructions for her summer presentation outfits. "Is that a color?" He said quietly. Eri looked at her own little piece of paper with a sample of white that was definitely not the same white as the dress she was looking at. 

"I think it's white that's less white than white," she suggested. 

"White minus white..." He repeated slowly, narrowing his eyes at her, the guide, and the dress, and took a deep breath. Shopping was definitely not fun. "This is all white." She couldn't deny it. Eri definitely didn't know or care much about the difference between the color of sand and the color of snow. Her father didn't seem to care either. He simply picked up the dress she had spent five minutes staring at and analyzing. "Do you like this one?"

"I..." The girl looked at the little white dress with silky fabric and long sleeves. That was definitely a difficult question. "I think so?" She looked at him hopefully. 

"That didn't seem very solid..." He said quietly as he examined the garment. "Don't you want to, I don't know... try it on?" 

"No, Daddy." Eri shook her head, her eyes lost in the intimacy of colorful clothes in the store with brown wooden floors. Her hands were starting to sweat as she watched other girls choosing pink jackets. She approached the hero and tugged at the sleeve of his black suit. "I want to go home..." With luck, they would return without having to choose anything.

Her words made him look in her direction. His black eyes, so different from hers, always seemed to have an answer. Maybe it was a grown-up thing. They always knew the answers to difficult questions. They solved grown-up problems like changing light bulbs and putting band-aids on little fingers with wounds. 

Her father knelt down on his knees and came close to her. His hair smelled like their strawberry shampoo. "Me too."  The way he was a little weird like her was really cool, and he didn't lie either. He put his hand on her hair and looked at the dressing room a little behind them. "But try it? You might like it...." 

I might like it...

Eri glanced at the dressing room at the back of the store and then at the white dress. A little voice in her head told her that it was kind of cute. " Okay..." 

"Go on." He handed her the dress and nodded toward the end of the hallway, walking with his hands in his pockets beside her. She took a few steps toward the dressing room, but halfway there, her little eyes found something that caught her attention. On top of a small table were a pair of boots with laces and high heels the color of grape jelly.

 "Look, Dad, they look like your superhero boots!" Eri felt her eyes widen as she pointed to the pair of shiny purple boots. He slowly walked over to the small table, picking up the pair of shoes with his hands and examining them. Her father turned to her and pointed to the shoes. "Do you want these?"

"I..." That was a difficult question. The boots looked like something cool girls like Jirou would wear, but would the girls in her school's class wear them too? She didn't know. Eri bit the inside of her cheek and did what she always did when she was unsure whether she wanted something or not. Her little eyes focused on the price tag. 4,000 yen. Eri wasn't as good at math as Kachan, but that seemed like a lot of money. "No, Dad."

"Ahaammm..." Before her father could say anything, she looked away, dress in hand, and walked toward the fitting room. For some reason, her cheeks were hot and her eyes stung.  Gee, Eri really wanted a pair of cool purple boots, but she wasn't exactly a cool girl.

Eri was just... Eri. Who played the guitar, had a fake father, and didn't remember much about when she was little. She shook her head and took off her plain black sneakers. Her plain yellow dress and her plain orange and pink jacket that Aunt Inko had made for her. She glanced quickly in the mirror and tried not to see the marks of wounds on her arms or neck, wearing the white dress with silky fabric. The skirt was loose and round and reached her knees. A smile formed on her face. 

So beautiful.

Eri ran her fingers over her sand-colored dress. It was so beautiful that she couldn't even pay attention to the scars on her skin. Her white hair fell over her shoulders and she felt beautiful, like an almost normal girl. 

Her heart beat fast. She looked like those girls who wore white and threw flowers at weddings she saw in movies. Her little fingers opened the shower door and she stepped out. 

"Daddy, look at my..." The words escaped her little mouth. Her feet seemed to be glued to the floor. The air in the world seemed to have disappeared. In front of her, with her back turned, wearing a dark red dress, was a tall woman with long, bluish-white hair. Smooth and silky, just as she remembered. Eri blinked hard, but she didn't disappear like in her dreams. "Mommy?" She said, feeling her throat close up.

Had her mother missed her? Had the white-haired girl been looking for her all this time? Had her mother come back to get her at a shoe store? Like Peter Pan coming back for Wendy and her brothers...

But what about my dad? 

In what seemed like the longest moment of her few years, she heard a loud tum, tum, tum, tum in her ears and felt a warm sensation in her chest. But the woman turned toward her, and Eri's little heart sank. She had black eyes, not red ones, and her face was different. Pretty, but not like her mama's. "Are you lost, dear?"

"I..." She blinked in confusion, her cheeks turned red, and her eyes burned violently as she looked at the beautiful lady in front of her. This was definitely not her mother. Her little heart ached, as if it had little hollows that she couldn't heal on her own, no matter how hard she tried. Eri almost felt tears well up in her little eyes, but then she heard her dad's voice. "Neko, I found one that fits you..."

She turned toward the hero, who was holding the purple booties for cool girls in his hand. Maybe she had been making an ugly face, because his face looked ugly too. Not ugly with anger. Worried ugly. Maybe Eri wasn't such a brave, grown-up, strong girl yet. She ran towards her father and hugged him with all her strength, trying not to cry. The boots fell from his hands. 

Why does she never come back for me?

Eri tried to believe what her cool uncles and her dad said about her being great. That her mom not being with her wasn't her fault, but it all seemed like little lies. Painful little lies.

Why didn't mommy want to stay with me?  

"My honey..." He picked her up like he used to when she was little, and she hugged his neck, pretending that the pain in her heart wasn't much, much bigger than she was. "I know." Her pretend dad said as he held her tight. Stroking her hair. "What do you think about us paying for these things and taking Jiji home?" 

Chapter Text

Megumi recognized that place deep in the most forgotten memories of her hippocampus.

A large room decorated with many green plants, seashells from the beach, and every kind of religious image imaginable. Wooden drums in the background. The familiar smell of incense would bring back painfully good memories. Brightly lit, even though it was nighttime. Colorful candies scattered everywhere. Cakes, candies, chocolates, and sugary soft drinks that made her pediatrician's heart race.

What am I doing here?

Megumi would recognize that place anywhere. If she had dementia and lost all her memories, she still wouldn't forget that place. The religious center on the outskirts where she did volunteer work when she was in college. Brazil. In the grayest and rainiest city in the world. 

It's so hot. 

Of course it would be São Paulo. The air was hot and the sky was gray. From a distance, the approaching storm was the color of her eyes. Brown. Megumi hadn't thought about that place in years. Many years. She had kept that part of her life in a very deep box. The deepest part of her soul. Filed away. Sealed like her many, many secrets. 

Don't think about it, Meg. Don't think you ruined your only good relationship.

She could stand there reliving memories of a lost time in her life. Of when she ran through the streets of the rainy metropolis singing Tokyo Drift in her Audi. All alone. She would do that. If there weren't children around her. Dressed in white, wearing pink and white or blue and white beaded necklaces, eating surreal amounts of candy that would make them diabetic in 40 years. Running. Laughing. Jumping. Playing. 

15 kids? 

"Careful!" The doctor prevented a beautiful little girl with straight brown hair, dressed in a white and baby pink skirt, from falling to the ground. She didn't look older than 7. She laughed as if there were no tomorrow. "Lollipop!?" The child offered her a piece of cake that was half dirty. Her eyes met hers. Honey-colored like amber. Megumi's chest tightened. She would recognize that little girl anywhere. Maitê Rocha. The first child she lost in college. "You..." The lively spirit hugged her neck with her little hands and whispered in her ear as if telling her a secret. "Stay sweet." And she ran after a chocolate cake. 

What?

Megumi wasn't religious. Far from it, she was a doctor. A woman of science. Her parents raised her on facts, scientific articles, and scientific cynicism. The most religious experience she had ever had was dating a lawyer who was very good in bed, but if anyone asked her, she would probably say she was Shinto or Buddhist. Depending on the reference point. Her heart raced. The woman knelt down and looked at the 15 or so boys and girls of all ages around her. Happy. Noisy. Dead. All of them. 

Damn it, why am I here? 

A friend she lost when she was a child. The boy she saw get shot by a police officer.  The patients she cared for in medical school. The lost causes from her residency at Stanford. Her patients she couldn't save. All her children who would never grow up. 

Shit, shit, shit.

Megumi tried not to feel guilty for not arriving earlier, studying a little more, or taking another shift. A tear almost escaped her eyes, but the laughter and cheerful voices of the children prevented her from crying.

Don't disrespect them, selfish woman. 

Contrary to what she remembered of most of them, her mini-patients were no longer suffering. They weren't covered in blood, nor were they crying from pain or fear. Her children played chaotically with each other. They ate candy. They misbehaved. Joyful. True joy. Pure love. 

"Meg, drink this!" Hinata, her father's patient who taught her to like Percy Jackson and volleyball, offered her a glass of pink soda. Walking as healthy as she had ever seen him in her life. Megumi accepted without being able to say a word, her childhood friend smiled and ran off to play soccer. "Thank you for being my friend, Meg-chan!" He smiled, young. Forever. "I'm the one who's grateful..." She drank the syrup, which was practically hot, and felt the sweetness in her mouth. His offer immediately did something to her soul. "Thank you..."

Is this my personal hell?

For what seemed like an eternity, she sat on the ground and felt the sand beneath her feet. Watching each happy child, she felt a strange sensation she hadn't felt in years. Real happiness. Not circumstantial. 

Her eyes fell on one child in particular. The only one not wearing white Western clothes. Her hair stood on end. A boy was wearing the white and blue hakama of his mother's family. About 5 years old, he was playing doctor with a toy stethoscope. Light black skin, like golden brown, and curly hair like angels in Renaissance paintings. Blue curly hair.

No, no, no...

Megumi couldn't see his face, but she didn't remember any patient looking like that. And she remembered all the lost patients. All of them. Her chest heaved. Feeling a void she hadn't felt in years. Megumi took two cautious, instinctive steps toward him. 

"Bento?" The words escaped her mouth. Megumi felt her heart beat fast. Too fast. The boy turned toward her and she swallowed a sob. He was definitely a beautiful little boy. More beautiful than she could have imagined. Bright smile, dimples, and brown eyes. Just like hers. 

"Mamãe!" He ran toward her, his little arms outstretched toward her. Her knees buckled, lowering her to the floor at his height. "Mama, mama, mama!" He repeated happily as Megumi hugged him back. With all her strength, knees on the floor, hands in his curly hair. "I love you." She said the magic words she never heard growing up. "Bento, I love you so much, baby boy. I'm sorry..."

"Don't cry, Mama!" Her little boy whimpered when he heard a sob escape her mouth. "I'll be waiting for you when you..." He spoke in a joyful voice, pulling away from her embrace and looking at her with his big brown eyes. "We can eat mochi and play doctor forever, Mom!"

"Do you like mochi?" Megumi smiled and felt her boy sitting on her lap, and as if by magic, she was once again a 22-year-old girl who acted like she was too grown-up for her age. "And brigadeiro!" Bento handed her chocolate candies with his little hands. "Brigadeiro?" She smiled at the child on her lap, who nodded and realized that his face was just like her best ex-boyfriend's. "Papai too!"

"Do you know Felipe!?"

"Yes!" His hands ran over a necklace of white and red beads around her neck. "Daddy talks to me every day and leaves sweets at home for me! He even asks me to take care of you, mommy..." She looked at Bento in disbelief and realized that he had the same mischievous smile as the guy who taught her that "I love you" weren't just words invented to sell American romance movies. "I gift him two little girls!"

"Are you kidding?!" Megumi laughed, imagining Felipe, the devil's advocate and nightmare of any father-in-law with daughters. "No, no!" Bentinho shook his head and his blue curls danced with his movement. "One day I'll send you a gift too!"

“Não, não, não, meu amor!” Megumi held him on her lap and shook her finger."Oh, I don't want it!"

"You wanted me!" Bento pouted and crossed his arms. 

"I wanted you!" Megumi laughed, but the smile disappeared from her face. Of course she only wanted a baby from Felipe. Her first love. The one who made her want silly things like getting married, having children to teach volleyball and biology, and spending weekends in Rio de Janeiro. All the dreams that her second love made seem so delusional. "I don't want another baby except for you, Bento..." 

"You're lying!" Her baby smiled and pointed his little finger at her face. Laughing. "Mamãe!" He laughed. That little word made her heart race. "You're a bad liar!"

"Your daddy used to tell me that." The doctor shook her head and ran her fingers through his curls. "You look like him." 

"I know! I'ma pretty boy!" Bento smiled and hugged her neck. Megumi wrapped her arms around him and felt nothing of her individuality. Not a single living cell. "I have a little friend who needs you…" Her son rested his little head on her shoulder. Megumi could live that moment forever. She could love her baby like she had never loved anything in the world before. "Eu te amo, mamãe..." But Bento brought one of his little hands to Megumi's face and whispered in her ear. "It's time to go back." 

Like a shock, a start, Megumi awoke. Her eyes scanned the darkness; she wasn't even in her house. Breathing heavily, her body sweaty despite the coldness of the basement room in the hospital that her family used to sleep and hide in. With a feeling of emptiness in her chest.

Damn it. 

Maybe she had dreamed something, but her brain couldn't remember anything. Or almost nothing. She hugged her belly and felt something missing in her bones. In her soul. Her eyes scanned the darkness, feeling the chill that had repeatedly ravaged her since the kiss. But there was no one there. Megumi was alone. Totally alone. 

Should I talk to him? 

Her thought made her bite hard on the inside of her cheek. The Takatanis definitely didn't talk about it. The doctor couldn't even blame him, after all, Aizawa surely already had too many problems. More important things to do, like taking care of his daughter, being a hero, and teaching other humans to be heroes. He definitely had more important things to do than Megumi Takatani. 

Be an adult, you idiot. Focus on what you can control...

She smelled like 24 hours on shift and adult hopelessness, she definitely needed a shower, her fingers ran across the mattress of the bunk bed and found her cell phone. On her wallpaper, dozens of photos of her family and her patients pasted into a poorly made collage reminded her of who she was.

10:00 p.m. Had I slept that long? 

Apparently, her post-shift nap had lasted longer than she would have liked. Megumi wondered if she should go home and sleep alone in her bed. It didn't matter, she would have to return to the hospital in a few hours anyway to check on her hospitalized patients in the morning. 

It's not even worth it...

The hospital had beds anyway, and she had clean clothes at Takatani's hiding place. The pediatrician rubbed her eyes and planned to have coffee after taking a shower. She didn't want to risk another dream that would show her all the things she had lost. The night was young, and somewhere up there, there was someone she would love to pay a clandestine visit to.

Nabil Al-Haddad, 35 years old.

Intensive Care Doctor, Head of the ICU. 

• Fell in love with his childhood best friend, The  number 1 Syria's heroine,  Amira Assad, and the two got engaged at age 22.
• He moved to Japan when his younger sister Yasmin chose the country to study engineering at college.
• Likes: Sugar-free Red Bull, soccer (but only watches European soccer, which drives Megumi crazy), his family, and silence. 
• Dislikes: Yuta Takatani, arrogant doctors, Bayern Munich.
• Currently a widower (but no one outside his family needs to know this).

Megumi hoped that no one would discover her little secret.

Too tired to drive, her brother promised her a ride when he finished screwing a vertebra or having sex with an intern in the parking lot. Unfortunately, the evil twin would still take two hours to finish whatever he was doing.

God, he better get tested for HIV, syphilis, and hepatitis every month...

The pediatrician took a deep breath and tried not to shiver from the cold in the ICU, which was not her neonatal ICU. Her heart was beating faster with a slight adrenaline rush from someone who hated breaking rules but secretly enjoyed a little danger. 

"So Anya plays Loid, who is actually the spy Twilight, noticing Yor, who is actually a professional assassin, and they kind of get married." Megumi said, checking Kotaro's ventilator pressure, his saturation, and the baby's hydration. "They pretend to be a family, but they end up getting lost in character, you know? It's called a found family troupe, it's really cool..."

The best kind of Found Family, reluctant parents...

"Anya also lived in a shelter, you know?" The doctor used her gloved hand to touch the sedated boy's face. Using her individuality, she felt every rebellious cell in his immune system fighting the infection in his lungs. "She's smart, brave, and strong, just like you. I'm sure that if she found a loving family, you will too." She took a deep breath and stroked his hair as she tried to rebuild his destroyed bronchial tubes. "Then you'll grow up, get your vaccines, play soccer or whatever boys like to do, and live a long life and..."

Don't cry, idiot. 

"Happy?" The familiar male voice made her turn toward the door. "I don't remember hiring a pediatrician for my ICU, Dr. Takatani." Dr. Al Haddad entered the isolation room with her. "You're not even on shift."

He's not going to send me away, is he? 

"Kotaro and I are best friends." Megumi moved away from her baby (who was technically his patient) and hoped her colleague wouldn't kick her out of the ICU. "We have a special connection." 

He doesn't have the courage, Nabil never says no to me...

"First." The man with short curly brown hair, a beard, and green eyes walked past her. "He's my best friend." Nabil walked over to the machines that kept the child breathing and worked his intensive care magic. "We have a lot of fun reading the Koran and talking about the Champions League."

Impossible.

"You read the Koran to Kotaro?" Takatani laughed and looked incredulously at his colleague. "And talk about European soccer." He adjusted the pressure of the ventilator and wrote things down in the boy's medical record. "You said talking to children was important." 

He remembered? I said that once...

"Do you talk to him in Japanese?" Megumi adjusted her protective mask and checked the child's extremities. Kotaro was wearing socks with baseball balls on his feet. "I'm sure he's not multilingual yet."

"Of course, Dr. Takatani." Nabil closed the medical record and looked at her with a serious expression. "How will he understand God's great love if it's not in his language?" 

Megumi used her brain, which must have interacted more with other children while growing up, until she realized that he was teasing her with his extremely difficult-to-read sense of humor. She looked at her serious friend, who for some reason had not yet kicked her out of there. "You're funny, sometimes..."

"My mom used to say the same thing before grounding me for two weeks." The intensivist wearing the blue ICU uniform, cape, and mask examined Kotaro, whispering something in Arabic to the child. "What are you doing in my ICU at this hour? There's a reason he's in isolation, you'll catch pneumonia..."

As if pneumococcus would kill me...

"I won't, trust me." Megumi smiled at her colleague, forgetting she was wearing a mask. Her tone made Nabil raise an eyebrow at her. "I..." She certainly didn't want to give a brief sad story of her sad love life to the guy who still respected her as a professional. "...came to see him."

Being sick and alone is so terrible...

Almost dying of dengue fever in Brazil taught her that in the worst possible way. Nabil looked at her for a long moment, as if reading her mind. "Don't worry, I'll order the interns to sing to him." 

"Really?" She smiled at her colleague. The last thing she expected from the man who said no to arrogant surgeons and told them to study was hospital pedagogy.

"I like kids, okay?" He said, adjusting the baby's soccer socks. Obviously, it had been him. "People think I don't like them because..."

"Doctor, you never leave the ICU to see the sun, and I've seen an intern crying before talking to you..." Megumi interrupted him, adjusting the little boy's sheet. "All your patients are unconscious, and you prefer to communicate with other doctors via email!" 

"I communicate with you," Nabil grumbled, pointing to the door. "But if you want to talk to your brother, I ask for an email seven days in advance." 

"You're so lucky. I wish I could turn Yuta into an email and send him to Spam." Megumi caressed the boy one last time and prayed quietly for his recovery. "I'll be back tomorrow and tell you about season 2..." 

"Don't come back." The intensive care doctor opened the glass door to the isolation room and nodded outside.

"But..." Nabil interrupted her, still holding the door, and pushed her gently with a pen as she passed him. "I'll talk to the boss." 

"Good luck with that, Dr. Gossip. The boss is my godfather." Megumi took off her coat, gloves, and mask and smiled at her almost always stoic colleague. "I used to sleep in his office when Mom forgot us here, you know?"

"Dr. Aya forgot you at the hospital when you were a little girl?" He took off his mask and looked at her with a pitying expression. 

"She just worked a lot, okay?" Megumi played her role as a grateful, feminist daughter and defended her mother, who ripped cancer out of human bodies. "Not everyone grows up super happy with a businessman dad, a teacher mom, and nice sisters in some beautiful place in Damascus..."

"My sisters are loud and violent. They would drive you crazy." Her colleague stared at her for a second before turning to one of his residents. "Keep an eye on the urine output, remove the vancomycin from the prescription, and reduce the sedation." The ICU student immediately got up and obeyed without saying a word. Maybe it was an intensive care specialist thing, to stay silent. 

God, does this feel familiar? 

The thought reminded her of her kiss with the silent hero. Of his breath on her face, the smell of his skin, and his voice politely rejecting her. Megumi's night immediately got worse.

Damn, I should have...

"Let's have something to eat," Dr. Nabil said, turning to her.

"What?" She looked at her colleague in slight panic. 

"Dinner, Dr. Takatani." Nabil walked toward the ICU exit and washed his hands in the decontamination sink. "Normal people eat dinner, lunch, and breakfast." 

"But..." Megumi walked to the sink as well. He turned on the tap for her and pointed to the clock on the wall. "There are 24-hour restaurants here at the hospital. Then you can tell me more sad American stories."

"I already told you I'm Latin American. South America. From Brasil." She narrowed her eyes at her friend, something telling her that he only called her American to make her angry, but she couldn't prove it. "It's different." 

"Yes..." He agreed slowly without showing any reaction and pointed to the exit. "Then tell me a sad Latin American story..."  

Chapter Text

Why was talking about feelings always so complex?

Did people really say what they felt? Was this common among families? Or did only the Takatanis die in silence? Megumi definitely didn't know much, after all, she never said what she felt. Well, at least, that wasn't the rule. 

God, am I talking too much? He must think this is ridiculous. Although it is kind of ridiculous...

Maybe she was. Surely she must have been, but it didn't matter because there was absolutely no one in the hall on the top floor of the hospital, with floor-to-ceiling windows offering what she considered the most beautiful view of the metropolis, including the sea. Megumi ate another spoonful of her favorite ice cream and brushed some hair out of her eyes. "And after I said it was without individuality, he made up that a patient was having a stroke..."

Her words made Dr. Al Haddad, who was probably her closest friend in Japan, frown and look up from the article he had been reading while listening to her for the past 20 minutes. "Did he pay the bill?"

God, what's his problem with bills...

"Dude..." She left the spoon on the pathetic little wooden table near the window and felt her self-esteem evaporate. "He didn't even try to get me into bed. But yes, he paid the bill..." Megumi ate some more of her mint ice cream and shook her head. "Which doesn't matter much because the last time I paid a household bill was in California, so my bank account is inversely proportional to my luck in love..."

"Spoiled..." The doctor looked at her with his green eyes half-closed and shook his head. "You're so spoiled." 

"Oh, you son of a bitch! I know you're richer than me!" She smiled at the guy drinking sugar-free Red Bull and wearing simple hospital clothes who probably earned twice as much as she did. "I'm not the one who goes on vacation in Paris." 

"I just went to see the Champions League final with my brother-in-law..."

"Those people with functional families..." 

"Anyway..." He sighed and ate a piece of highly suspicious salmon poke from the hospital. "The neurologist is disrespectful. He wouldn't make a good boyfriend. It's a relief he ran away, and trust me, you wouldn't want to date a neurologist." His words made Megumi frown. Her friend ran his fingers through his beard and spoke in his grumpy doctor tone. "They're critical, arrogant, and think they're smarter than..."

"Dr..." She interrupted her colleague. "You know my dad is a neurologist, right?"

"That explains a lot..."

"But I wasn't going to marry Dr. Masanabu, dude.” Just thinking about kissing her father's resident made her evening a little more depressing. "We had only gone out to get to know each other, Nabil. I only agreed to that date because I couldn't say no at the time and..."

"Oh, that's true." He gestured as he scratched his beard. His green eyes turned in her direction and he smiled mischievously. "You don't know how to impose yourself..."

Her jaw dropped. Megumi controlled her expression so as not to make the face that Yutta called annoyingly offended. "I know how to impose myself on people." Her voice came out higher pitched than Megumi would have liked. "I just don't think it's necessary when everyone can talk and come to a common understanding because..." 

Is he going to repeat that speech about being a worse and stricter boss? 

"Really?" Her friend just sighed and closed his notebook, which probably contained the calculations for the drugs that kept half the hospital's patients alive. "Then why are you here with me now?"

"Because you kicked me out of the ICU and forced me to eat an..." Megumi looked at her empty container that had held a perfectly balanced amount of salmon, rice, crispy kale, and cucumber. "...overpriced bowl of poke. Did you know that's Hawaiian?"

"From my ICU." Dr. Nabil corrected her with his strange jealousy for his department.

"Technically, it belongs to the hospital." Dr. Takatani retorted, hiding the fact that his grandfather had built the place. 

"Technically, it has my name on the door, so it's mine." He raised his eyebrows. "Technically, you don't know how to assert yourself." God, that guy growing up with three girls definitely caused irreversible damage to Nabil Al-Haddad's personality. "If I asked you to marry me right now, you wouldn't have the courage to say no because you don't know how to say no to people..." 

"First, I know how to be assertive. Megumi pointed her little finger at his eyes (something she would never have had the courage to do with her ex-boyfriend for some reason she didn't know). "Second, do you know who would love to have a real wedding with you?"

"No." Nabil cut her off in a low tone. 

"Kind. Anxious. Intelligent." Megumi smiled at her friend, already imagining the wedding of the two most antisocial people in the hospital. 

"No." Dr. Nabil replied curtly. "You're describing yourself..."

"Hey!" She protested. "Anyway, back to the point... Curly hair, highest score at Musutafu University Medical School." Megumi leaned slightly closer to her friend and whispered. "I've already seen her answer 35 consecutive histopathology questions correctly."

"Megumi." For the first time in their conversation, Nabil covered his eyes with his fingers and took a breath. "I'm not going to date your 25-year-old intern!"

"For your information, she's 26. Which is almost my age."

"You're too young," he argued in his unshakably calm tone, causing her to have an instant existential crisis. "And you're a specialist! She's in college!"

Megumi snapped her fingers and smiled at her friend. "So you mean you took enough interest to notice Aiko-san?" The intensivist responded with silence and narrowed eyes in her direction with a different gleam. "You're looking at it from the wrong perspective, Nabil. Where you see your only and best friend's anxious student with her hyperfocus on histology and old books, I see Japan's next great pathologist and the love of your life." 

"You're deluded. You've watched too many soap operas in Brazil." Nabil looked at her for a long moment, crossed his arms, and leaned back in his chair. "I spend 80 hours a week at the hospital and I like it. I hate talking. I'm terrible at relationships." 

"Oh, man..." Megumi looked at the guy who took two years to tell her he had sisters, who for some reason never denied her ICU beds, and who always saved Arabica coffee for her. "You just have this intimidating vibe, but you're good, successful, and super predictable. Totally dateable. I would marry you if..."  

"Did my dad email you with a dinner proposal with ulterior motives?" Her friend frowned and grumbled. "I knew I shouldn't have let you near Yasmin at the spring social. 

"No! A sham marriage to stop them from bothering us, tax evasion with well-defined rules. Everyone wins." She smiled at her friend. Okay, talking to him was definitely fun. Even more so when she said absurd things to shock him. "I made that up, silly! ... Wait, what did your sisters say?" 

"They..." His voice paused and he made his face to talk about his perfectly loving and healthy family. "They thought we were dating." 

"Why!?" 

"No idea…I would also marry you if I were sad and desperate and wanted to evade taxes or get a South American passport." 

"Aaaaaaaaaaa, how sweet, you really know how to win a woman over.” Megumi replied in her playful tone that she only used when she definitely didn't need to sound serious. "House or apartment, Dr. Al Haddad?"

"House. Far from downtown." He replied without thinking, stealing some of her mint ice cream and immediately making a face of disgust. "This tastes like toothpaste. Kids?

Megumi looked at him incredulously, her brain slowly processing whether the most serious guy in the hospital was really making jokes. "Three." She joked without giving it much thought. "Three?!" He looked at her in terror. "Do you want to bankrupt me?" 

"We're rich." She winked. "But children need attention." Her friend practically paraphrased the lecture she gave last month at the multidisciplinary session on neurodevelopment. "Or they grow up like..."

"Say 'like you' and I'll kill you with my adrenaline pen." The pediatrician threatened her coworker, who was 30 centimeters taller and infinitely heavier than her. "Two then, a boy and a girl." Nabil nodded in agreement and looked at her seriously. "Vacation?"

"Brazil."

"Lebanon."

"Lebanon?" 

"Everyone goes on vacation to Lebanon." 

"Where did you get that from?" 

"It's common sense. Like the sky is blue and this..." He pointed to his half-melted mint ice cream with an expression of disgust similar to when Yutta discovered his personal number. "It shouldn't be a flavor. That's awful."

"I can't believe you said that!" Megumi stared at her friend with impassive green eyes. Totally scandalized. "Don't ever talk about mint ice cream like that again. Our fake marriage just ended because..."

"Irreconcilable differences in personality," he said, putting his penlight in his shirt pocket. "It was good while it lasted, Dr. Takatani."

"No Brazilian citizenship for you, Dr. Al-Haddad." Her eyes fell on her phone. 12:00 a.m. Definitely a good time to be asleep if you have to work early the next day. "Okay, I think you've said more words now than you have in the last month..." The doctor said, getting up from the table, glancing at the moonlit sea and then at her friend. "Thanks for dinner and the sad, Latin American conversation." 

Nabil looked at her for a long moment, his lips parting quickly, indicating that he was going to say something, but his eyes fell on her hands collecting the trash from the table into the hospital's plastic tray. "Leave it to me..."

"No need..." She argued as she placed the napkins inside the disposable cups. Nabil gave her his real boss look and silently took the tray from her hands. "Okay, then..." 

Her years of friendship with Al Haddad had taught her that there was no way to discuss certain things with him, such as: The use of vasoactive drugs in critically ill patients. Palliative care or who would pay the bill. Normally, Megumi would insist, but damn it, she had already spent too much energy being exceptionally functional with everything under control in the last few days. 

How exhausting. 

She just accompanied him to the cashier and let her mind wander to all the thousands of things she would have to do in the next three days. Classes. Office. The infirmary and girls' night with Helena to watch the Japanese Volleyball Team destroy the Nations League semifinals. 

I almost forgot about that! 

For a moment, her eyes focused on her friend's hands, placing bills in the hospital box that would be donated to an institution that took in victims of hate crimes. 

Wow. 

Nabil was definitely a really nice guy who had been silent and asked no questions when her ex-boyfriend disappeared from her life. Who had seen some of the worst of who she was. Who listened to everything she said even when she only talked about love. Definitely a really nice guy because Megumi would love to fall in love with him. 

"The disillusioned remain deluded. No heart. No guts. No love."

Maybe only guys with emotional danger written on their foreheads who would kiss her and immediately regret it would make her autonomic nervous system go crazy. Lord, she should definitely go back to therapy. 

"Dr..." Her friend's voice snapped her out of her reverie. He reached out to her and handed her a small bottle of iced tea. "My break is over..."

"Oh, of course. Thanks for the..." Megumi blinked and focused her eyes on the packaging made of biodegradable plastic. "Chamomile iced tea with honey." She murmured as she accompanied him to the elevator and pressed the button. "Let's go, before your residents start feeling something like happiness, hope or joy..."  

He muttered something in Arabic and held the elevator door with a metallic click. Both doctors entered the elevator and Megumi watched the doors close behind them. He pressed the ICU floor, which was the first floor, and they watched the numbers drop from 20, 18, 17...

Her eyes were fixed on the door, but for some reason she felt his gaze discreetly fall on her. "Speak, Takatani." Nabil said, leaning against the back of the elevator and putting his hands in his pockets. "Your silence pains me." 

"What am I supposed to do with him? The doctor sought the knowledge of her colleague, who had been a doctor longer than she had. He had been in the world longer than she had. And he was certainly more rational than she was. "Even if he comes off the ventilator, Kotaro will still have a long recovery, with respiratory physical therapy. And..." The words escaped her mouth as she thought of the little boy abandoned to his fate downstairs. "He doesn't even have parents to take care of him."

"Social hospitalization." He replied a few steps behind her, his tone calm and without a hint of judgment. "You keep him in your infirmary until he is out of danger and 100% recovered." 

"And pray he doesn't catch a hospital infection?" Dr. Takatani retorted, turning to her colleague, her eyes meeting the green eyes of the man who would remain calm even if the world were ending. "And then what?"

A silence fell between them. Long. Heavy. Until it was broken by his footsteps walking to the stop button and pressing it. One floor away from the ICU floor. 

What was he...? 

For a moment, instinctively, her skin prickled and she took a few steps to the back of the elevator. To her relief, Nabil remained where he was, in front of the door. Calm and predictable as the tide. "Do you remember Yasmin?"

"Your super beautiful, tall sister with glowing skin who's a highly successful engineer?" Megumi's words made her friend roll his eyes. "I vaguely remember her, yes..." 

"Kotaro will be out of the ventilator tomorrow. He'll still be here as a precaution, but I think in a few days he'll be down to your infirmary..."

Before she could touch her super respectful colleague, Megumi covered her mouth with her hands and took a deep breath to keep from crying. Feeling weeks of tension leaving her soul. "Are you serious?" 

"My sister always wanted to have a boy, but you know... I mentioned him and Yasmin and my brother-in-law asked for custody of him." He spoke about it as if he were talking about the weather. "She comes to visit him every day and talks to the boy about linear algebra..."

Megumi slowly replayed her friend's words and felt her eyes burning. "Are you kidding?" 

"No." He said, taking tissues from his bad news communication protocol pocket, but her tear ducts were proud. Or retired. Nabil smiled petulantly. "That's why he's my best friend and not yours." 

A laugh escaped her throat. For a moment, Megumi forgot her social boundaries, her problems, her pain. Damn, being a doctor was really wonderful. Her heart filled with joy and she forgot she wasn't in Brazil, taking four steps toward her friend and hugging him. "Thank you."

"You're welcome." Nabil put his hands behind his back and bent down slightly. Without touching her. But also without pushing her away. "You know, I prayed a lot for the boy and he got better. It's strange because his lungs were destroyed when he arrived..." He said in the same tone as always. But something in those words made her mind race. "I've never seen anything like it. I think it was a blessing."

Does he know what my name means? Does he know...

"A blessing..." She murmured softly. The way he said that word told her everything.

Is he going to report me? Damn, how did he notice? I was discreet...

"Whoever saves one person saves all of humanity." Al-Haddad pressed the elevator button, which quickly arrived at the ICU floor. "Be more careful, there are many bad people in the world." The metal doors opened, he stepped out and turned toward her. His stupidly loyal green eyes shining with something she couldn't quite define. "Please. Don't play the hero."