Being a Hero was just a Side Job (Shinsou x OC)

Polaroid Photos

Spinel felt so pathetic. She couldn't sleep that night. Her bloodshot and puffy red eyes were proof of her tears. "God, I look like shit." She grumbled as she slipped on her bear onesie. She flipped up the hood and put on sunglasses. "Now I look like an idiot" She sighed as she stared into the mirror. She chose the lesser of the two evils before she went down to eat breakfast. She wasn't usually a breakfast eater, but she needed to eat after yesterday.

"Uh, you alright?" Iida asked, concerned. He noticed that she wasn't in class yesterday and thought it was just a light cold.

"You look like shit." Bakugo deadpanned. He was surprisingly one of the earlier risers of the class.

Spinel simply nodded as she went to pour herself some cereal. Her food tasted like cardboard. No amount of chewing made it easier to swallow. Iida and Bakugo were stunned at the lack of response whereas Shouto immediately went to see what was wrong. "What happened?" Concern was etched on his features as he sat beside her. "You really don't look ok."

She nodded once more and abandoned her cereal. She didn't have the appetite for anything. Spinel thought for a moment. Should she tell Shouto? He did have a right to know about what happened to Touya. They are were biological brothers. She corrected herself. But if she told him, then he would know that Touya was Dabi. Could she really ruin Shouto's image of Touya like that?

------

"Pro hero: Snatch and twelve other officers died in the explosion along with Dabi himself." Detective Tsukauchi sighed and rubbed his forehead. They weren't able to get any information from him. Their last hope would be to see if there was anything left in the apartment, though, in its current state it was hard to find anything other than ashes.

Eraserhead watched as the cleanup crew did their work. He got off easy when it came to injuries, while only his hands were burned, Endeavor had burns scattered around his body. A fireproof man burned. Eraserhead stretched and went around to check the perimeter one last time. A charred piece of paper flew into his face as it started to rain.

"A photo?" He ran to the nearest covered area to get out of the rain but before he got there, he had found two more photos drenched and on the ground. He carefully picked them up so they wouldn't rip and finally reached the covered area.

He examined the pictures. The first picture was of Dabi asleep with marker doodles on his face. Whoever had taken the photo was in it too, but much to his dismay that portion of the picture was burned off so he couldn't see who the other person was.

He flipped over to the second photo. It was a photo of Dabi giving a piggyback to who -from what Eraserhead gathered- was very important to the patchwork villain. A playful expression was on his face as he carried the mystery person. Eraserhead hated looking through old belongings from a villain. As a hero, he only ever got to see the hostile side of the villain, but it was photos like these where he felt a pang of pain. He cursed again as the identity of the mysterious second person was obscured by water damage from the rain.

Eraserhead turned to the last photo hoping for something better. He was rewarded. The last photo had a date, it was taken a few days ago. His eyes widened when he saw the image. No way. He wasn't sure what to think. He wasn't sure what to do. Obviously, he needed to report his findings. In the last photo Dabi was laughing innocently alongside a girl as something in the kitchen behind them was smoking. If it wasn't for Dabi's very distinct appearance he would have thought the picture was of a normal pair of happy siblings. Unfortunately, the most unsettling of all was the other person in the photo was someone he knew. Rosenthal. It was Spinel, troublemaker one.

Dabi was Spinel's brother.

If this photo were to be legit -which Eraser knew it was- Spinel would be accused of withholding information, hiding and protecting a villain. She would be accused of being an accessory to his crimes. Spinel would end up in jail.

"Ah! Eraser! I found you" Tsukauchi's voice yanked Aizawa out of his thoughts. "Were you able to find anything useful?"

Eraserhead turned to the detective with a pained look on his face. "Yeah, I did. But you aren't going to like it either." He handed over the photos to Tsukauchi.

"Oh..."

"Yeah. I know."

The detective sighed and dragged a hand down his face. He had seen this person before. She was a student. A UA student in the hero course. "These are real, aren't they?"

"Unfortunately,"

"She will have to be brought in for questioning." The detective thought for a moment. "But we have to go about this very carefully or we could scare her away."

------

"Do you mind if I tell you later?" Spinel asked. She really didn't want to talk about it, and she needed time to think about if she even wanted to tell Shouto or not.

He nodded. "I'm assuming you won't be in class today?"

Spinel confirmed his assumption. She had other things she needed to do, that were not privy to her classmates. She gave the few people in the dining room a quick goodbye wave and made her way back up to her room. She began rearranging her stuff in the small space, call it paranoia but she needed to have everything ready. If they found Dabi, who's to say they wouldn't find her? Spinel stuffed her laptop into her bag and hid it behind the large unicorn. Spinel tied a contraption to the unicorn zipper and her bag. If she were to pull on the bag hard enough it would set off her gas bombs. She then moved her bed so the side would be pressed up against the balcony door -which she now kept open no matter what. Spinel hung the coat on the outside wall and hidden from view. If she needed to run all she had to do was jump on the bed, pull her bag and jacket then hop off the balcony. One straight line. Easy peasy.

She heard a knock on the door. She wasn't expecting anyone. Spinel cautiously opened the door only to be greeted by a tired looking Shinsou. "Hey." He said lamely. "I just wanted to see if you were alright."

Spinel smiled at him, "Yeah, I'm good." She sighed and furrowed her eyebrows.

Shinsou looked at her skeptically, he had stayed up all night by her door with a mixture of regret and sorrow. He knew that she had been crying all night. "I don't believe you. You look like shit."

She sighed and nodded. Spinel was so tired at this point. She didn't feel like doing anything. She let out a small sniffle, "Sorry, I just. I need a moment."

The twinge of guilt twisted in Shinsou's gut as he hugged her downtrodden figure.

"I'm just so tired" Her sniffles slowed as she relaxed in his arms.

She was so small in his arms. He put his chin on her head and closed his eyes. It was all his fault that she was crying. It was his fault that she was in so much pain. "It's alright. Let it out." He pursed his lips. "I know you were really close to him but cheer up. I'm sure he'd want you to be happy."

Spinel frowned. What? She didn't tell him what happened. How did he know? "What was that?" Spinel wriggled out of his arms playing like she didn't hear him. He repeated his sentence. Once more her mind made a horrible click. She hadn't told anyone what happened, at least not yet. The only people who knew about the raid were the heroes. But the only people who knew that her brother was a criminal were, Shinsou, Mei and Shouto. Mei didn't seem like she cared all too much -she was considerably more concerned with her projects. Shouto wouldn't rat his own brother out -he had known the longest too. Which left Shinsou. "How do you know? She demanded.

"What do you mean?"

Spinel crossed her arms over her chest. "I didn't tell you what happened. So how do you know?" Her voice was hard as she eyed Shinsou suspiciously now that her tears had dried. This was the second time in a few hours she wished she was wrong.

Shinsou opted not to reply but instead looked down guiltily. What he had done was something he could not undo. The guilt never left him but instead haunted him with every breath.

One second passed.

Two seconds passed.

Three seconds passed.

Shinsou could feel the daggers aimed at him from Spinel's eyes as the dreaded realization sunk in.