Ultra Responsibility (My Hero Academia X Spider-Man Reader)

Issue 29 - I'll be Your Hero

The hospital room smelled like antiseptic and stale air conditioning, the kind of clean that didn't feel clean so much as... aggressively honest. Every breath tasted like it had been filtered through a textbook. My ribs ached with the sort of pain that didn't spike so much as simmer, like my body had put a kettle on and forgotten it.

But I was alive.

And I was still wearing my mask.

That part kept hitting me at random, like a delayed punch. The nurses hadn't tried to peel it off. The doctors hadn't demanded it. Even the security guy stationed outside my door, arms folded and expression permanently set to "I have seen some things," didn't look at me like I was a puzzle to solve.

Endeavour kept his word.

I never thought I'd see the day a pro hero's promise could act like a shield.

Outside, though, shields didn't exist. The press were packed like seagulls around a dropped chip, voices muffled through the glass and hallway, camera flashes going off in bursts.

"Why is he not in custody?"

"Is UA harbouring a criminal?"

"Are the pros above the law?"

Every question sounded like an accusation with extra syllables.

Someone had left flowers.

Actual flowers.

They sat in a cheap plastic vase on the little side table, half hidden behind a get-well card with messy handwriting and a doodle of a stick figure in a spider suit. I stared at them way too long, as if I blinked, they'd evaporate. Flowers were for winners. People liked.

Not for... me.

My phone buzzed again, and I nearly dropped it because my hands were still unsteady. I shifted, grimacing as my shoulder complained loudly in my ear.

Peni's name glowed on the screen.

I answered before it could ring a second time. "Tell me you're not calling from inside a volcano."

Her voice crackled through, low and hurried. "No volcano. Library. I'm blending in with the nerds. I have become one with the textbooks."

"You always were."

"Shut up. How are you?"

I leaned back against the pillows, trying to make my body look less like it had been used as a suggestion. "I'm fine."

Peni made a noise that could only be translated as: liar, but I don't have time to argue.

I sighed. "Okay. Not fine. Fine-ish. A few broken bones, but Recovery Girl did her thing. I feel like a patched-up action figure."

"Mask still on?" she asked, and I could hear her trying not to sound too emotional about it.

"Yeah," I muttered. "They... respected it."

A beat of silence.

Then, softer: "Good."

I swallowed, throat suddenly tight for no reason I wanted to examine. "May?"

"Still in one piece," Peni said quickly. "She's suspicious, but I'm feeding her the safest lies money can buy. Told her the students were held for questioning after the incident, and you couldn't leave yet. It's not even a lie. It's just... creatively framed."

I snorted, instantly regretting it as my ribs screamed. "Ow. Stop being funny."

"Can't. It's genetic."