Kitten

Chapter 2: A Day Out

Izuku woke to his alarm going off. He sat up and silenced it before looking around. He didn’t remember falling asleep, and he especially didn’t remember going into his room the night before. The last thing he remembered was watching the movie with Tomura. He smiled as he thought of his new friend and quickly jumped out of his bed and raced out of his room. He was glad to see that his new friend was still there, fast asleep on the couch.

Izuku turned and rushed to his mother's room easily pushing the door open. "Mom! Mom! Mom!" He called as he climbed up on the bed and shook her gently. "Mooooooom! Wake uuuuup!"

Izuku plopped down on top of her which got a reaction from her. "I'm up sweetie." She said before lifting him up and tickling him causing him to squeal with laughter, trying to roll out of her arms. Eventually she let him go and got out of bed. "You feel like helping with breakfast Izuku?" She asked and Izuku grinned wide.

"YES!"

He said bouncing up and down on the bed before he jumped off and rushed towards the kitchen to get his stool out that he used when he cooked with his mother, he couldn’t quite reach the counter right without it, yet. After he got the stool set up  his mother entered the kitchen. His mother gave him some easy jobs to do to help with the cooking. The whole time she hummed, something Izuku always loved to hear. It was calming and comforting no matter what was happening. Be it a nightmare or just a bad day her humming always made him happy and cheered him up instantly.

Once the food was almost done Izuku put his stool away and went to go wake Tomura. "Tomu!! Tomu time to wake up!" He called before he even reached the couch and once there he moved to shake Tomura only to be stopped when the teen's eyes shot open and gave him an absolute death glare that actually made him pause for a moment before his smile, and energy, returned. "Tomu its time for breakfast! I helped mom cook too!"

~***~

Tomura was absolutely NOT a morning person. It was rare that he was ever awake before at least noon. Though that was probably partly due to his playing video games at all hours of the night instead of actually sleeping. So when this small green ball of energy came shouting to wake him way before he was used to he wanted to kill.

That was the first time he ever saw Izuku hesitate when it came to him and almost instantly he felt bad. Which was unusual for him since he enjoyed scaring the shit out of people, especially when they pissed him off. Kurogiri was the only one who was ever able to wake him early without suffering some kind of pain, he always had a warp gate or two ready when waking him. But before Tomura could even moved to say anything to the boy that, too bright, smile returned and he was just as excited as he was a moment ago.

Tomura wanted to just go back to sleep and probably would have actually just rolled over and done so if it wasn’t for the fact that his brain finally registered the wonderful smell of food that filled the apartment once more. He would be damned if he was going to pass up good food, if it was anything like the food last night was. So with a small grumble he sat up and stretched before he  stood and headed over to the table with Izuku practically bouncing the entire way over in front of him.

The breakfast had been a simple one but just as good as the meal the night before. After everyone was done eating Inko had sent both him and Izuku out to entertain themselves while she cleaned up. Which resulted in another movie that Izuku, who was horrified by the fact that he hadn't seen it  before, turned on. So the two were once again sitting side by side on the couch watching the movie and discussing random and not all that important things about it. Again Tomura was surprised by just how smart Izuku was and part of him still wondered if he didn’t have some hidden quirk that no one found.

Tomura knew that kind of thing happened. Sensei had taught him quite a bit when it came to quirks since it was something that he would need one day. And here he was using that knowledge to argue with a 5 year old. 'Sensei would be proud' he thought to himself with just a small chuckle at the slightly sarcastic thought. Sensei wouldn’t really mind it and would likely be more interested in Izuku, who was able to keep up with him easily. The only time that Izuku had trouble was when Tomura would use a word that he didn’t know causing the older to pause whatever he had been saying and explain the word so the boy could follow along once more.

Tomura wasn’t sure how long the two were at that before Inko came over with a small pile of neatly folded clothes that Tomura soon recognized as his own. She set them on the table smiling and then looked the two over.

"Alright you two time to get dressed for the day." She said and Tomura noticed that she was already dressed.

"Are we going somewhere mom?" Izuku asked already standing up while Inko nodded her conformation.

"Yes. We need to get some shopping done. We are running a bit low on some things that we need." She said and Izuku nodded excitedly and then raced off. "You are welcome to come along as well Tomura."

Honestly Tomura hadn't been expecting her to invite him along. He had just figured that she would send him off. But once again. This family loved to prove him wrong. He would almost think it was intentional if he didn’t feel that the two were literally way to nice to do something like that. He thought for a moment about his choices and decided that he would go, he would have to return to the bar later in the day but for now he just wasnt ready to be there again.

"I think I will." He said and Inko's smile widened a bit before she left to go get everything that she needed to go. Tomura picked up his clothes and headed back to the bathroom so he could change back into his normal clothes, which he was glad about since they actually fit him and he much preferred wearing black to anything else.

Once he was changed he walked out and went to find Inko. "Where do you want these?" He asked holding up the clothes that he had been given the night before. Inko turned to look at them and smiled. "I will take them." She said moving away from where she seemed to have been writing a list and took the clothes and headed off to deal with them.

It wasn’t long after that he heard the sound of small feet running around and before he could even turn he felt as the small figure, that was Izuku, crashed into him, causing him to stumble a little, and hugged him excitedly. "Tomu. Tomu! Tomu! Are you coming with us?" Izuku asked and Tomura could literally feel the excitement that radiated off of the boy without having to look at him.

"Yeah...Why do you keep calling me that by the way." Tomura asked since it was strange and as far as he could remember no one had ever used a nickname for him.

Izuku's excitement died down a little at the question. "Do you not like it?" the boy asked and Tomura could swear that Izuku was almost pouting at that thought. Tomura shifted a bit and had to look away.

"I didn’t say that I didn’t like it brat. Just wanted to know why you were doing it." He said keeping his voice a  bit colder than needed but that didn’t seem to bother Izuku at all as he grinned and before he could answer the question Inko returned.

"Alright you two lets get going." She said as she went to grab her list and easily put it into her purse. She then moved towards the door with the two boys following. Well Izuku was following, Tomura was practically being dragged by the excited boy. Not that it was needed Tomura had wanted to go anyway.

~***~

To say that Tomura was pissed would be a vast understatement. He was just a step below murderous rampage and even then he was getting closer to that with each second that passed by. The day had been great up until about fifteen or so minutes ago.

The three had been wondering around from shop to shop, mostly window shopping and pointing out things that caught their eyes. Tomura had learned that Inko would make a fun day when she needed to bring Izuku along with her shopping. And this time didn’t seem to be any exception. Every now and then Inko would buy Izuku and him some kind of snack or treat. Ice cream was the one that Izuku had been the most excited for.

Over all Tomura was really enjoying everything about the day. He even restrained himself from destroying the Hero action figure that Inko had bought for Izuku. It was some newer hero and Tomura had rolled his eyes when they had neared the store and blatantly refused to go into the offensive store. He knew that it was normal for the majority of kids to worship 'Heroes' but he knew it was because they didn’t know the truth. He also got the great idea to teach Izuku the truth about it. Not right then since he knew that the change wouldn’t come right away.

Other than that the day went well with even a small stop at a video game store when Inko had caught him looking inside. They all went in and Tomura had probably spent a good half hour or more going on about different games that he played and enjoyed to Izuku. Telling him how good some were, how  some could have been changed to be better. And Izuku listened to it all, asking questions to get more information and always having some kind of input for it. Tomura enjoyed it.

He had never once had anyone to talk to about things like this. Kurogiri had listened when he would talk about then when he was younger but it wasn’t the same. He wouldn’t ever do much more than give small nods or very short replies to let him know he had been listening. But Izuku seemed actually interested in everything that he had to say.

After that they went and got some lunch. It wasn't as good as Inko's cooking but it was still good and it filled them up. It was after they had finished lunch that they finally started to get some of the items on Inko's list. Tomura would help to find things when she gave him and Izuku a task to find something. The two would almost race up and down the isle looking for the item that Inko would say. Tomura had a slightly easier time with some items as he could read the packages where Izuku  was still learning how to read.

The two of them had just gotten back to Inko After one such race when some shouting started in the store. The shouts were soon followed by some screams. It started closer at the front of the little store that they had been in. Not long after there were some armed men that were going down the isles forcing the shoppers out of them and into a more open section of the store where it would be easy to keep an eye on all of them. Normally Tomura wouldn’t have bothered with listening to low life thugs like this. Normally he would just kill a few of them, or all of them if he was in a really bad mood, but the moment that he had started to move towards them Inko grabbed his arm and pulled him behind her along with Izuku before keeping herself between the two of them and the armed men as possible.

That was how they got in their current situation. They were seated on the ground while the men, who had apparently been trying to rob the place,and somehow failing spectacularly, walked around clearly freaking out since there were cops and, Tomura wrinkled his nose at the thought, heroes outside the building looking for a way to solve the situation without anyone being hurt. He thought that they were idiots since they were likely just standing around twiddling their thumbs and not doing anything useful. Tomura knew that he could put an end to it all instantly but there were two problems.

The first being the fact that Inko currently was holding him close along with Izuku. The second was that Izuku was naturally freaking out, as anyone his age would do in a situation like this. He was doing his best to stay quiet as Inko was talking softly to him, telling him that it would be ok. That they would be ok. Tomura knew that if he were to handle the situation like he normally would then Izuku really would be scared of him and as much as he would forever deny it, he didn’t want that. He liked the Midoriyas and he would do anything to keep this little bit of peace that he felt. Peace that he hadn't felt in months, at least. Ever since…

Tomura forced the thoughts out of his head, now wasn’t the time for that. It was at that moment that the pressure of the situation seemed to have started to really get to some of the thugs, because really they weren't good enough for the title of villain, and one of them snapped.

"Shut that damn brat up!" the man who seemed to be able to create small knives from his body snapped glaring at Inko who pulled Tomura and Izuku closer to herself. Izuku started to cry more which only seemed to piss the guy off more as he created a couple blades in his hands and stomped closer threateningly. "I SAID TO SHUT HIM UP!"

Inko was starting to panic. That much Tomura could see right away and it wasn’t acceptable.

"I'm done with this." Tomura said in a bored voice, instantly drawing the man's attention to himself and away from the sobbing child. "Leave. Now." He ordered sitting up straighter and glaring at the man who seemed a bit taken aback by the sudden attitude he was getting from the teen. And likely unnerved as well, Tomura was good at scaring people.

"Who the fuck do you think you are, tellin' me what to do!" He said pointing the knives threateningly once he had recovered a bit. Though there was a shake in the man's voice.

"NPC's like you don’t deserve to know who I am." Tomura said as he stood up now.  He was still a bit smaller than the man in front of him but then again he was still growing and even then it didn’t matter. He was used to taking on bigger and older opponents.

"What the fuck did you say?! I could kill you right now you freaky bastard!" The thug yelled getting the attention of the others of his group, which Tomura could now tell there were five of them. He knew that he could handle this. Sensei trained him well after all.

"You five combined don’t have the right level to be able to take me on." Tomura said his body relaxed but his eyes hard and cold. He could feel And hear Inko trying to get him to sit back down and stop whatever he was doing, likely fearing that he would get himself killed, but Tomura just shrugged her off.

"That’s it  ya brat!" The thug yelled and actually moved to swing the blade at Tomura which he easily dodged and grabbed a hold of the man's arm, middle finger raised just enough that his quirk wasn't active yet.

"You should really be careful of who you attack." Tomura said quietly as he lowered his final finger which instantly began to decay the man's shirt and the man let out a pained yell a moment after as it started on some skin as well. The skin that showed from under the decayed sleeve was cracking and starting to fall away a bit. It wasn’t anything deadly but it would still hurt as hell.

The man jerked away but not before Tomura was able to snatched one of the knives out of his hand. "You NPC's have ruined my fun today and killed my good mood." He gripped the knife tightly and within moments it was nothing more than a pile of dust on the floor. The thug backed away as well as the others that were nearest him.

They were scared and he wondered how Izuku and Inko would react to him once all of this was over. Would they still allow him around or would they finally push him away?

~***~

Izuku was scared and he just wanted to go home. Everything had been going so well during the day and he was having more fun than he had ever since he had been declared quirkless. But now he was being held as close to his mother as she possibly could and Tomura, his new friend, had just left his place almost at his back also in his mother's hold.

As he watched Tomura stand up to the man who had been getting more and more angry Izuku only had one thought. Tomura was really cool. He was almost like a hero! Seeing how calm Tomura was made it so that Izuku wasn’t as scared  as he had been just moments before. After turning the knife to dust Tomura had darted forward faster than Izuku, and the villains apparently, could follow and in less than a second, so it felt, the villain was down unconscious.

The other villains, seeing their buddy down began to rush forward. It terrified Izuku and he could feel his mother's worry as well from how she was holding him. But his fear was proven to be unneeded as Tomura proved that he could take care of himself. It only felt like seconds before most of the villains were down leaving only one of them still standing.

Izuku couldn’t believe what he was seeing as the last villain actually bolted away from Tomura and Tomura made his way back towards his mother and himself and instantly Izuku jumped from his mother's arms and hugged Tomura tightly.

"Tomu that was dangerous there were so many of them." He said looking up at the older boy happy that he was ok and that he wasn’t hurt. He didn’t seem to have a scratch on him, at least not that he could see.

"Of course I am ok. Those NPCs could never take me down." Tomura said confidently and Izuku grinned before he heard as the police and heroes entered the store. Tomura pulled him back towards Inko and almost looked like he was trying to not draw attention to himself with the way he was standing and the fact he put his hood up. Which Izuku thought was strange but he wasn't going to question his new friend about it right then.

The police began moving around and making sure that everyone was ok and that no one was hurt. The villains were all handcuffed and removed from the store and eventually they were allowed to leave and go home.

Izuku was a exhausted after everything that had happened. They didn’t bother trying to finish shopping. After everything that had just happened his mother just wanted to get home and wound up carrying him the entire way. He wasn’t sure when exactly he fell asleep.

~***~

The walk back to the Midoriya household was quiet. Inko seemed to be a ball of nerves and Izuku had fallen asleep in her arms. Tomura was mostly just following at this point. Still angry at those thugs for ruining the day but he had nothing that he could take that anger out on. He found himself scratching again though Inko always stopped him when she saw it, her eyes full of worry and eventually she just held onto his wrist gently as they walked. He was fine with that since he didn’t trust that he wouldn’t accidentally hurt her if she were to hold his hand.

Once inside Inko took Izuku to his room and Tomura just moved to sit on the couch. He knew that he would need to go back to the bar. He had already been gone for too long as it was. When Inko returned he looked over at her. "I need to go now." He said as he stood up which seemed to surprise her a little but she also seemed to understand.

"Alright. If you ever need a place to escape whatever was troubling you, you are always welcome here. I know Izuku would like to see you more." She said which surprised Tomura a lot. He hadn't expected her to actually say that he could return. He expected her to tell him to never come back and to stay away from her son. Especially after seeing his quirk.

Tomura just nodded and started for the door before he heard a small gasp from behind him. "Oh hold on!" Inko called as she rushed to where she had set the few bags of items they had bought and her purse. After a few moments she had returned holding a smaller gift like bag and held it out to him.

"Izuku picked this out for you." She said as he took the bag with a questioning look. Tomura stared at the bag for a minute before he started off again. He wondered when the boy would have been able to do something like that since they all had been pretty close together  most of the time.

"Tell Izuku I will see him again as soon as I can." He said before he closed the door behind him. Tomura didn’t look in the bag right away. He was honestly a bit worried about doing it and he had no idea why he was so worried about it. Sensei gave him things all the time so why was he so worried about this little gift? He was a few blocks away from the Midoriya residence when he stepped into an alley and pulled out his phone and sent Kurogiri a text to pick him up. Not bothering to read the texts that were from the night before.

While he waited Tomura looked down at the gift once more and sighed before he opened it and looked inside. He was honestly shocked at what he saw. It was a game that he had been talking to Izuku about. One that he didn’t have yet but had played the other games in the series and just hadn't had the time to purchase the game yet. A smile pulled at his lips but it fell a moment later as  he felt a shift in the air that signaled that Kurogiri was making a portal for him.

Sure enough the swirling black mist appeared beside him a few moments later and Tomura stepped through the warp gate. It was always a weird sensation, going through the warp gates but he had, more or less, gotten used to it now. After all he went through them a lot. 

"Young Tomura where exactly have you been all this time?" Kurogiri asked, concern clear in his voice, as soon as he was in the bar and Tomura just glared at him.

"That isn't any of your business. I don't HAVE to tell you where I go and what I do." He said and started for the stairs intending to go to his room but paused on the first step.

"Oh yeah. We have a quest tonight. So you better be ready to go. We are leaving at 11:45 sharp." He said and then headed up. He knew that Kurogiri would have asked a lot of questions if he had stayed down there.  After all, Kurogiri always knew the jobs that they went on before Tomura did. So being told that they would be going on one, that he had no idea about, would likely worry him. But Tomura didn’t care.

He was going to make sure that those thugs, that ruined his day, would never get a chance to do it again for him or anyone else. They would learn their last and most important lesson.