The Stark Cypher

Chapter 3

{ Original and all cred goes to Sunnylover Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34320298/chapters/85393648#workskin }

Waking up the next morning was an adventure all on its own. After staying up most of the night in order to do more research. She had been quite surprised to find that no one had thought to think of it as a language. But instead, they had insisted that it must be a cipher, and even if they had thought of it this way, they hadn't published anything about it.

Getting up she got dressed into her school uniform and brushed through her hair, working only by muscle memory.
Well this was happening, her brain was still on overdrive. 'How could no one have figured it out?' She had spent hours last night (in between working on her homework and copying the notebook), looking over the document and researching how to decode other languages.

It was the weekend tomorrow so she would have time to at least start her attempt to decode it. Knowing that it would take a lot of time and effort to decode she didn't have high hopes. Researchers and historians have been trying for over 100 years so what hope did she have. She was barely passing her classes.

So she didn't think she would be able to solve it but at least it would give her something to do. She had always found her homework too easy, so something that would challenge her would be a welcomed change of pace.

-

As the home bell rang after school Midoriya made a sprint for the door. She hadn't been able to get the cipher out of her head all day. Racing out the front doors of the school and down the street, she couldn't hear any footsteps behind her but that doesn't mean she could stop.

She doesn't stop running until she's a street over from her house. She leans against a wall to catch her breath, usually, she wouldn't run that far or that fast but she really didn't want to take the risk of being slowed down.

After catching her breath she continues to walk home, turning the corner onto her street she sees an ambulance racing past her, 'I hope the person is okay', she thought to herself.

Unlocking the door she enters the house and takes off her shoes and locks the door behind her. The house doesn't feel cold per-say but more empty, it always felt this way coming home from school, her mother usually didn't get home till right before they started cooking dinner.

Entering her rooms she put down her bag and changed out of her uniform, putting it on her bed as a reminder to do her hair laundry. Thinking over the things she needed to do this weekend, Her laundry obviously, finishes her notes, her chores and hopefully starts this cipher project.

She did her laundry first and set a timer on her phone for when it would be done, Then her homework she had been assigned for over the weekend.
Her chores only consisted of washing the dishes, which wasn't done until after dinner. And vacuuming the house which she would do tomorrow.

Sitting down at her desk she opened both the notebooks and continued copying over the notes. She stopped once for a toilet break and to switch her laundry from the washer to the dryer. Once she was finished copying her notebooks completely she looked up at the clock it was just past 7 pm, getting up she looked through the house, usually mum was home by now. 'Maybe she was just working late and forgot to message her, Yes that must be it. I shouldn't bother her if she is busy at work, I'll just eat some leftovers'.

Going to the kitchen she heated up the leftover katsudon and left enough for mum when she got home. After eating she went back to her room and got out her laptop opening up the cipher she began.

And boy was it a mess the cipher had at least 100 different characters some rarer than others but all equally complicated, it was probably safe to same that some of them were like kanji with words attached to the characters in a pose to sounds. But some of them seemed more like they were meant to be grouped with the characters around them to make a word (like hiragana or English).

It was late when the door to the house was finally opened and mum entered. She went down to greet her only to see her tear-stained face "what happened mum," she asked.

"There was a villain attack" she sobbed, Izuku led her to the living room. "It got Katsuki, he's at the hospital" she cried.

"Oh" that explained the crying she must have been comforting Mitsuki at the hospital "don't worry mum I'm sure he will be fine" she could feel tears welling behind her eyes.

"He should be, the doctors said there would be no lasting damage he just has to stay there for a few more days and then he'll be released."

"Well, that's good at least. I'll go heat you up some dinner then."

Getting up Izuku went to the kitchen, Where her tears began to fall wiping them away with the back of her hand, she had no reason to be crying. She heated up her mum's dinner and looked up at the clock in the kitchen it was 11 pm. Brought it to her with her chopsticks then went quickly back to her room before promptly falling asleep.