Comfortable Silence (Shinsou Hitoshi x Mute! Gender Neutral Reader)

Chapter 4

It's workshop day, the buzz of the festival shooting adrenaline into the veins of your classmates.  You work quietly in a corner, working on Maiko's mask, along with other items. Among those items was a tracking visor, an energy-absorption suit, and a pair of clawed gauntlets. 

Most of your items often favored both protective function, as well as aiding the quirk. A lot of the kids in the hero course don't always account armor into their suits, which of course was dangerous. You decided to make some that enhanced their ability to serve justice.

Mei peeks over at your desk, flipping her visor up. "Wow Y/N, you work fast! I've never seen so near done babies form so fast! We've only been in since..uhh.."

Since 7 am. It's near lunch now. I haven't been working that fast.

"Still, you've got so much done. This robo-baby is giving me something, that's for sure." She taps the giant robot she's building with a thoughtful look on her face. She ponders her robot for a moment, before watching you work again. Her gaze settles on a draft hidden by the stack of notebooks and papers covering the back of your workstation. You don't notice her looking at it until she pulls it out of the stack.

Woah woah! Wait don't look at that-

"Artificial vocal chords." Mei analyzes at it, then looks at you. "This isn't written in your item line-up, is it? It's not even made."

Your fingers twitch, before you hastily grab the draft out of her hands. It's nothing, okay? It's just a draft sheet. 

"If it's just a draft sheet then why are you being so protective? It shouldn't be anything important if it's still in the drafts."

Drop it, Mei. It's nothing, nothing at all

Your fingers falter as you finish signing. Placing the paper back into the notebook, you sit back in your chair, feeling Mei turn back to her robot. A soft sense of relief washes over you as you believe she's let go of the subject.

"It was designed for you, wasn't it?" She says after a moment.

You tense up, purposely working on the mask to refrain from answering.

"Well? It was made for you?"

You sigh, and turn your head away. Your silence is an answer.

"Y/N..." You feel her reach out, but you brush her hand away.

Someone will put it to better use than me. But for now, it's just a draft.

"If you say so."

_____

You're in the shop late, only stopping for a quick lunch before heading back inside. Mei may spend all her time in here regularly, but you spend the long hours when you're focused. 

The difference in your work flow was the focus on details. Mei loved eccentric, semi-flashy, enhancing support items, you worked with the practical. Mei failed and improved her techniques. You improved failed items. You wouldn't stop on a draft if it could get better. Mei had thousands of projects done and tossed, you had little that you worked on for weeks at a time to finalize the concept. 

You tweak the coding within the visor when you hear the door open. You turn to see Aizawa and the lavender haired boy in the doorway. Aizawa waves hello.

"Is Power-Loader here?" he asks, looking around. 

You shake your head. You pull out a notebook and write. 

He's out setting up the display room for the support items. Should be back later, though.

You bring the notebook up to the hero course teacher, his eyes scanning your writing. The boy stares at the notebook then at you with faint interest.