Another Kind of Hero

2

I stared down at the card Tsukauchi had given me. It was the middle of the night, almost midnight, but I couldn't sleep. So instead I asked all the questions I couldn't ask in daylight. Do I want to become a hero? It was a question I had never really thought about. There had always been an easy answer waiting. Yes of course, more than anything. If I asked myelf why, it was because I wanted to be like AllMight, and to prove Kachan wrong. Saving people was noble, and it had always been what I wanted to do, since I was small. But now, in the dark of my bedroom, with breezy moonlight filtering through the curtains and music playing softly from my phone, I was unsure. 

I had talked to Mom over dinner about becoming a detective. She had been all for it, If that was what I decided to do. She thought it was a good alternitive to being a superhero, since I had no quirk. She thought I would be good at it. She'd always been  gung-ho about whatever it was I wanted to do with my future. She was the best.

(Being a superhero might put her in harms way.)

I got up from my bed and paced around my room. Staying still was making me feel sick. I picked up one of my notebooks, the one Kachan had burned and ruined, and flipped through the pages. The powers and abilities of heroes. Villains too, every once in a while. Pages and pages of notes that I've poured my heart into. They're detailed, every page covered in sketches and facts and theories about the people who protect the world I live in. I had tried to replicate their powers, asking my cousin Ninami to prototype tools to copy quirks. They never worked, but Ninami worked in support anyways. She helped boost quirks, not fake them.

It isn't until a tear drops onto the page I'm looking at that I realize I'm crying. 

I drop the notebook and nearly follow it to the floor. When I've cried before about Ninami's prototypes, it was because it didn't work. Now, I cry because I should've known it wouldn't work all along. I cry because I was blind to that. Forcing myself to stand up, I  look at all my hero merchandise. 

How will this make me a hero? How will this make me something I'm not, and never could be. I'm not stupid, I know I can't be a hero, I've always known. But what was I gonna do? Let him win? Let Kachan's words and barbs and hits hurt me more by listening to the rational part of me that knows he's right, he was right this whole time, that I've been clinging to lost hope? That I can't be a hero?

Tears hit the carpet again, and suddenly I'm shaking, every sob hitting my chest like waves against a cliffside, eroding the last of my will until I crumble to the floor.

Eventually, I dry my eyes and set the notebook back on my desk. I turn to the card on my bed again, searching for answers. Give me a call if you change your mind about heroism. And then my phone is in my hand, with the number entered and ready to dial. What the hell am I doing? Its fucking 2 am, and the man probably doesn't sleep enough as it is. I set down my phone and flop onto my bed. Tomorrow. I'll call him tomorrow. Superheroism may have never been an option, but that doesn't mean I can't follow another path to being what I've always wanted to be.

...

I hold my breath as the phone rings. I hope I'm not bothering him by doing this. Maybe it's early and he's not awake. Maybe I'm bothering him and being rude. Maybe

"Iwate Prefecture Detective Force. Tsukauchi Naomasa speaking."

"Umm hi! It's me, the kid you met yesterday? My name is Izuku Midoriya, and I want to talk to you about your offer. The one about calling you if I wanted to become a detective?"

"Oh yeah! I didn't think you'd take me up on that, since you seemed so dead set on being a superhero. But I'm glad you think you could also be a detective!"

"So how would it work? I mean, I'm just out of middle school. How would I study to be a detective when I still have to go to highschool in a few months?"

"A very good question... that I don't have an answer to right now. I'll figure something out though! Just give me some time. Call again in like, two weeks and something will be ready for you. Bye kid!"

"Bye Mr. Tsukauchi" I hung up the phone. Two weeks.

(800 words)