Goldberg

Chapter 4

≡3rd Person POV≡

◃15 Years Old▸

"You sure Izu?" Katsuki turned around to walk backwards down the middle school halls with his best friend.

"I'm sure Kacchan. Think about it, I may be able to pass the entrance exams without a quirk, but," the greenette smirked at the ash blond as they walked out of the school doors, "I would rather spend some time in the support course to sharpen my skills and show off at the sports festival."

"Wow, Izu, sometimes, you scare me with how much you plan ahead," Bakugo chuckled as they started walking home.

"Why, thank you," Izuku smiled brightly.

"Not sure if that was really a compliment. You still are going to become my sidekick right?"

"Partner, not sidekick," he corrected.

"Yeah, yeah, sure. We'll be the number 1 hero duo and kick a bunch of villain ass!"

"Hell yeah!" The two boys continued talking about random things from prepping for the exams, to different heroes.

"Hey, want to go to this new cafe tomorrow? I heard they have really good coffee," Izuku asked as they approached his apartment complex.

"Of course you'd know. Maybe instead of staying up working on inventions and drinking coffee, you should try sleeping."

"Yeah, I'm not going to sleep at 8:30 like some people."

"Shut up! You should try it some time! Your sleep schedule is so fucked up that it'd probably be good for you to sleep early."

"And it'd probably be good for you to try going to sleep at normal times."

"You literally texted me 'good night' at 4am last night! And then you text me 'good morning' at 6am!"

"Ok ok ok. First of all, I was finishing an invention last night, and second of all, I had to get ready for the day so I woke up early?" Izuku shrugged his shoulders.

"Wow, anyway, sure I'll go with you. If you're going to survive off caffeine, you should at least have good caffeine," Katsuki sighed.

"Thanks Kacchan! I'll see you tomorrow!" He ran up the stairs and into his apartment.

"Tch, damn nerd always acting like he's got things to do," Bakugo left to go home with a small smile on his face.

Meanwhile...

≡Izuku POV≡

I walk into my house and quickly and silently put my things away. What can I say? Old habits die hard.

I then walk over to my mom's room and open the door.

"Hey Mom, I'm home!" I plastered on a sweet smile as I walked into the room. It was a decent sized room, and the biggest in the apartment. She was sitting on a queen sized bed with an oxygen tank hooked up to her nose.

The far side of the room had a metal box with wheels that I made her after I broke the bedside table. It's connected to a remote that she can use to give her different things to keep her busy during the day.

There were quite a few different things around the room, including a sort of vending machine, making the room look like something you'd see in a time traveling movie when they go into the future.

"Zuzu! Welcome home! How was school?" She placed her sketch pad down, revealing half finished guide lines to a person.

"It was good. We talked about high-school a bit. I still want to go to UA, but I'm going to apply for the support course and then after the sports festival get into the hero course with Kacchan."

"Look at my smart little boy. All grown up and already going into highschool," her large, emerald eyes began to fill with tears and her lip began to quiver.

"Come on Mom, don't cry. You're going to make me cry," I sniffle and let out a breathy laugh at how cheesy this scene must look.

"Sorry Zuzu. I'm so proud of you. I still can't believe you got a job so young and are able to pay for all the bills. I wish I could be a better mother and take care of you. Not the other way around," she smiled sadly and wiped away more tears.

I never really know what to say when she mentions this. For starters, I mostly lied about the job. I told her I'm an online tutor for a bunch of rich kids. When in reality, I'm a support gear dealer in the underground for rich people. Also, while it's true I completely take care of her, she will never know how much she has helped me throughout my life.

After a little more small talk, I leave her to her drawing to go to work.

In the past few years, my room has changed quite a bit. All of my hero merch got sold when I was getting desperate for money to buy my mom a birthday present and make her a good meal.

You may see the amount of money I get paid for my inventions and think we're rich, but business can sometimes be slow and then when I get a client, I have to pay debt and buy food and materials first, this usually leaves us with little to no savings or fun money. We really are living paycheck to paycheck.

Since my mom is physically incapable of leaving her bed, I rarely clean. My room is a complete mess with random half finished inventions and scrap parts everywhere. There's a bunch of blueprints fully covering 3 of my walls and a bunch of stacks of notebooks with notes on different things.

I sit down at my work bench and put the little finishing touches on my latest order.
__________
I look up at the clock and see that it's already 12am.

Kacchan would be pissed if he knew my night was just starting.

I walk over to my mom's room to see her sleeping with a finished self portrait beside her. I walk back to my room and pack my bag with the gadget and get dressed.

As an extra precaution, I made a disguise for myself. It's pretty simple. Just a hoodie, cargo pants, and a bunny mask with a black wig attached.

I'm quite proud of my mask. I put in a voice modifier, an untraceable phone with the police department on speed dial, and my eyes look like staticed computer screens when really it allows me to get a run down on the person I look at including quirk, age, criminal record, fighting style, and more.

Of course, this may seem extra, but it has happened more than once when someone tries to scam me and kill me for my creations. Besides, when working in the underground, you can never be too careful.

I climbed out my window and up to the roof. I then began to jump from rooftop to rooftop getting to my rendezvous point.

I always arrive about 30 minutes before to scout out the area to make sure it's safe.

As I jump around in the moonlight and finally settle on a rooftop waiting for my client to show, I begin to think about my bills and how much this job will cover.

Right at the scheduled time, a slim man walks into the alleyway.

Time to get paid.