Utopia (Vigilante Deku) || A Bnha AU Story

Part Two: Brainstorm

He felt the muscles in his arm tense as he held the freshly shut door in place. He moved a hand to cover his mouth as he tried to slowly persuade the other arm to let go. With sore caution, the arm lowered and Deku looked around the dorm entrance to assure that no one else had seen that. His entire body felt fragile and shaken. He hadn't even stuck around long enough to see how his mentor would react and he was already sure that he had made a mistake.

He took in and released a breath in attempts to calm himself down. No one was here. He set his focus on getting to his room while trying to forget what he had just said to the person who had given him almost everything he had. Step by step he made his way down the halls and to his room, not making eye contact with anyone he passed. As he opened the door to his room, he took a short glance down the hall to spot Todoroki about to go into his own room. Though now he was aware that the boy was looking at him. Perhaps suspicious of him, but with that kid, it was hard to tell what he was feeling most of the time. Regardless, it spooked him and he quickly entered and shut the door.

He held his hand on the interior of the wood of the door for a moment longer before walking over to his bed and flopping down, letting the mattress and the messy sheets take him in. He covered his face with his hands. He hadn't even bothered turning the lights on. The only light source was the fleeting hues of the sunset from his window. He immediately plunged into the depths of his stammering thoughts.

"I should have just shut up after what he said. I went too far with it.. Why can't I just stop before I ruin something?" He found himself whispering out loud the thoughts that pounded into his skull. He silenced and took a deep breath. "It's over now." He reminded himself. "I'm sure he won't bring it up. And if he doesn't, neither will I." He tried to assure his panicking mind.

He sat himself up, grabbing to the more thick covers of his bed and lifting them with his hands as he brought them to his chin in a thinking position. 'I wasn't wrong.. Was I? It was rude to bring up, but it was just to prove a point... and it's an important point.' He thought and rested the tip of his chin on his hands. He looked around at all the All Might merchandise he had around his room. He wouldn't have any of this if quirks weren't around. This entire place wouldn't exist. He'd be some normal kid at some normal school, and every other kid would be learning the same things. He wouldn't have been the weak or quirkless kid because they'd all be quirkless. Didn't it seem only right? Heroes were marketable. Just people doing damage control for this widely distributed new wave of abilities, and there were enough of them that people could sell their image. It wasn't really 'what makes a real hero', as he had thought back when he fought Stain, it was 'are heroes really a good thing'. Does the existence and need for heroes signify something about the state of such a society? The fact that the people need to look up to these people born with such strengths to take down other people with the same strengths.

For a moment, Deku put his hands to his head and tried to shake these thoughts. He was questioning what he had always looked so up to. These thoughts felt intrusive and wrong, but he couldn't refute them. He tried to- he really did- but his mind always blanked when he tried to defend his old mindset.

He had seen people removed of their quirks before. A quirkless society would provide so much more for the general population. And he knew it was possible to do. This feeling deep inside of his gut wouldn't settle. He couldn't help but think; if he had seen this done, and he knew this would help the world, would it be right to just ignore it? If he found a way to take a step towards this new, better world, there would be so many tragedies and deaths he could help prevent. It felt.. wrong to ignore that.

He started understanding the train of thought and followed it along, then abruptly stopped. Overhaul and his crew were the only people he had really seen be able to remove quirks, and there was no way he was going to use Eri the way they had. There had to be another way. He knew All for One had been able to take and transfer quirks, which meant it was possible. From a scientific basis there had to be a way for it to happen without causing suffering in innocent people to achieve it. Then again, this information would be easily used by people to do harm to others, so it wouldn't be as easy to access as an internet search.

Most likely, since there weren't many ways for medical quirk removal, and the world seemed to be pretty pro-quirk, there would only be research on it for government use. Perhaps not applied yet- since if it were finalized they would be using it on captured villains and rehabilitating nomus- but it had to be out there. The idea of using quirk deletion against threats was too good for a government to pass up. So it was up to where it was being researched and how to access that information.. He knew of a research lab that focused on quirks in the area, closer to the heart of the city, perhaps something was there about it.. something he could use? But just walking in and asking wasn't really an option. If some teenager walks into a lab and asks for government classified files on quirk removal, just saying he was doing it for the betterment of society wouldn't get him anywhere but jail.

His thought paths were all leading to dead ends. He knew he wanted this to help people, but how? Every path of action he conceived led to failure. The only other ideas he had were.. out of his comfort zone to say the least. His heart knew this would do so much better for the world, so.. wasn't it worth it?

If a few bad things had to be done for the betterment of everyone, was it really that bad? In the end they'd all understand, right? Even All Might didn't seem against his idea, he just couldn't picture a possible way to achieve it. If he could figure it out though, he might support him. He could show people this is real. He could help change everything.

He hurried to his chair and cleared off the notes from his desk, sitting down and grabbing out new, fresh papers. He grabbed a pencil and tapped his temple with the eraser end. He would need to plan this out. The whole concept felt wrong, but he kept telling himself it was for the best as he looked up the research lab he had remembered.

An ordinary looking building a bit away. He could get there rather easily with some sort of vehicle or use of One for All. Most of the buildings on that street looked the same, give or take some coloring choices for the outside. He had seen the interior of buildings nearby, so he had a basic idea of the layout inside, but no concept of the designated rooms. If there were offices, surely there were files there, and that's all he needed. No one needed to get hurt, and if he could, he would avoid damaging any property. He would need to come, go, and disappear. He concluded that even if he had some sort of stealth method he would end up on camera or spotted in some way or another, and something had to be done about that. A costume? He was no good at that. The best he could pull off was some baggy clothes and basic appearance changes. He was fine at designing his own costumes and all, but making them was different; especially when no one else was supposed to know. He dismissed the doubts and began planning a disguise he figured he could achieve.

He spent the next several hours hard at work, sketching and plotting out the perfect combination of paths and clothes and other decisions that would make this go perfectly. He couldn't be sure of anything being successful, but he had planned about as far ahead as he could. There was still a gap in his plot where he had to find where the information would be, but if he was careful enough he could have enough time to find out. At night it would hopefully be less staffed, and without people to catch him, he could get it done smoothly.

He yawned and rubbed an eye, then set the pencil down. He pushed his rolling chair back and examined his work with dreary eyes. It made sense. He had laid out all of the information he had about this into the beginnings of a puzzle. But it was just the beginning. Even if he succeeded at this, he would have to think ahead. Where to put the files, how to avoid suspicion, and even more; what to do with the information after that. He sighed and thought for just a moment that perhaps this was hopeless. He didn't really know what he was doing, did he? But then again, he had never given up on what he thought was right. It was the one thing that had gotten him where he was now. Why ignore that instinct now?

He could ask for help in basic technological design from the support class or Mei, right? Maybe tell them it's for costume design and learn the fundamentals? This had to get done.. Hatsume was always unpredictable in a sense, maybe even if he told her, she'd understand and help. Unlikely though..

People would think this is all some evil plot. They had latched on so tightly to this idea of normalization of quirks. He'd most likely be seen as a threat. He would just have to assure himself. No one else would. He would figure this out; all while attending classes once they started back up.