The Raising of a Monster

Chapter 7: I've Got Friends On The Other Side

Junior high was… a lot different than primary school.

There were the obvious differences; the way the teachers taught in the classroom, what they taught in the classroom. The uniforms they got were new and unworn, strangely fitting them as they got used to the feeling of the scratchy material. Even the route to school was just a bit different, and of course so were the staff and even some of the kids. But then there were the not-so-obvious-at-first-glance differences that made Izuku frown slightly, and pay even closer attention to his surroundings. 

Izuku called what he saw the ‘Divided Staff Hierarchy’. 

He’d watched from the beginning how all the staff acted, how the teachers, principal, the nurses seemed to rival against the lunch and cleaning staff. The way they seemed to despise one another, how it seemed only one side was actually instigating these strange and silent rounds of battle. But was it really even a battle? Like Izuku said, it was more of a hierarchy where any and all of the powerful were above those who were not. It was all about positions more than about quirks in this case strangely enough. So was it really a battle if it was so one-sided between the staffs? 

Izuku would watch as the teachers purposely left extra garbage, extra spills, extra mess all over their desks and floors. Watched aghast as the adults seemed to encourage the children to do the same in the classroom and at lunch. Watched as the students began to treat the lunch staff harshly at the teachers words of enthusiastic affirmation. All just to make their jobs a little harder, all just to make their lives a little worse. 

Hidden behind corners, in the shadows, underneath the senses of those authoritarian figures, Izuku cataloged all he saw with his emerald eyes, built a map of the pyramid system that Aldera Junior High was inside his mind, and placed all the figures in their assumed spaces. He built it, and then, when no one was any brighter, he began to work his way through the bottom. 

~ Arc 1 - P2: TBOAM -- Ch 7: IGFOTOS ~

Junior high was a lot different than primary school. 

With his graduation from one school to the next came the extended freedom to do and go where he pleased. While he couldn’t stay out too late, nor could he walk too far, he could still accomplish many more goals and tasks that he’d struggled to do with his limited time before. So, with this lengthened freedom, he took the time to stay after school and interact with the staff. 

He’d stay and wander around the building, poke around at the clubs, just looking and waiting for anyone he could approach that was a part of the staff. And when he found them, he’d politely ask if they could talk, if he could ask them some questions about their quirks, about their jobs - hinting that he’d probably be in their place one day with how society was, with how society treated him. Then he’d listen and write and feel himself become animated as he fell deeper and deeper into the analytics of this or that person's amazing, interesting, unique, or creative quirk, rambling and rambling on and on as he followed them around as they listened and cleaned whatever needed to be done. Their expressions would lighten and become warm as they glanced over him, and he’d bask in the positive attention until it was late and he’d have to run off home. Parting with a bashful goodbye and a quick add on that he’d possibly be back tomorrow if he doesn’t run into some of the other staff. 

Other times he’d stay to help an clean with them, telling them it was repayment for all the information they’d given him and for putting up with his rambles, but even so they would insist, and so he’d have to say that it was practice, for if things ever became as such, and even though it lowered the mood, Izuku didn’t let himself mind for too long because it meant he got to help them in some way. Days like this though were spent less with quirks and analytics, less with notebooks and hour long rants about one thing or another, but more about memories and personal lives. This time was spent speaking in low voices filled with pride as they talked about their children and how they were growing up so good, time spent with a more melancholy tones as they talked about why they were stuck like this, about how they just deal with it so they can pay off medical bills, debts they didn’t mean to get into, to feed their kids or grandkids because someone else was incapable of work. These days were filled more with home than with logistics, with more understanding than most other days. Izuku just listened and cleaned until his time to leave came, and he offered his partings.