Articulation

Boku no Hero Academia oneshot.

Summary: Weeks after the Sports Festival, Hitoshi Shinso didn't even receive so much as a glance from the hero course. Despite doing so well, he wasn't asked to transfer, leaving his future of being a hero foggy and uncertain. What if one, seemingly meaningless event, could change it all?

Warning: Rated T for heavy topics. Also, I hate Mineta. Like a lot. And I will not apologize for my portrayal or treatment of him in this fanfic. To me, this is my canon.

The heart is such a nuisance.

It acts as a singular body, articulating its own thoughts and wishes independent of the brain and the rationalism it possesses. It speaks in emotions, raw and corresponding to the topic of the conversation—but Hitoshi Shinso didn't necessarily want to feel anything as his pen produced kanji on the half completely notebook page.

Such is life, isn't it? To have these nuisances like plagues invading the daily life.

He paused for a moment, the word left unfinished in his sloppy handwriting, half because he didn't care and half because his hand dragged through the freshly made ink. What was he doing anymore? Why should he care?

He had arrived every day, on time, without fail; and yet here he was, in the same classroom, taking notes on the history of heroes. The Sports Festival had come and gone, and he waited and waited and waited until he got tired of waiting, and the reality slapped him hard. His hand, the one clutching the pen, trembled.

He had finished in the top 16—an impressive accomplishment years after the last general studies student made it into the final round (although, he actually won the whole festival)—and he heard nothing of it. He still watched 1-A from across the cafeteria as they laughed and gossiped and joked around like they didn't understand. They didn't. Or rather, not all of them did.

Sometimes, Shinso thought about Izuku Midoriya. His face would surface at random times in the day, like a bottle lost to the waves only to reemerge unharmed on the sand. He thought about his words in the shower. He thought about his strength as he read a book. He thought about his selfless personality as he ate dinner in an empty house. And he thought about him now, as his homeroom teacher prattled on about the first heroes, before All Might, before Midoriya was around to be inspired by him.

He tried to focus on his half-written sentence, but he could no longer remember the point he had been trying to make. When he looked back at the board, the writing had changed, and now they were on All Might and Endeavor's era, and years of events had been lost in the blank lines of his notes.

He gave up then, sitting his pen to the side, tracing over the ink stain that blotted the side of his left hand like an infection. The other students feverishly tracked the lecture, and he looked towards the window as he listened to their pens scratch and pages turn.

He was in the second to last row, third seat from the window. He hated the spot, and he hated the words he thought the first day of class.

"This is only temporary. I can deal with it until then."

Only he couldn't deal with it, not anymore. He turned his head back to the teacher, who had erased the last topic, and now was writing something about the top ten best-rated heroes as rated by some popular magazine, and the chalk scratch scratch scratch left a deep imprint on his heart. He wanted to scold himself for thinking so emotionally, but he felt marked like he was in a body that others decided to stuff a demon in.

He averted his eyes to the door again. If he closed his eyes, he could see class 1-A's door, the slouch of Katsuki Bakugo in the doorframe or the way his veins bulged from his temples when he told them exactly what they weren't expecting to hear.

"This is a declaration of war."

It had been a declaration of war, and he did what any stupid, cocky, and young general would do; he succumbed to his pride and was forced to eat his words in front of everyone. He realized what those kids meant when they said he could be a villain. His words tasted like acid.

"Shinso," his teacher called, and he didn't hear him at first, but then suddenly the pens stopped scratching and the pages stopped turning and everyone was staring at him in his seat, second to last row, third seat from the window.

He wanted to curl up. He wanted to disappear.

He wanted to be a hero.

But he wouldn't get any of that.

He had to stand up and apologize at the front of the classroom, to his sensei for not paying attention, to his classmates for being a distraction, and everything burned.

He ground his teeth for the remaining lecture, keeping his pen pressed too hard to the paper that the spot bled through the next three pages. They were dismissed for lunch, and he wandered the halls, expecting to run into someone from the hero course, half hoping he wouldn't, and half hoping he would.

I can't help the things my heart longs for, he bitterly told himself as he passed by the massive door that constituted the entrance to his future. It was locked, and the lights were out. He saw no difference between the two.

Such is life.

He went to the cafeteria twenty minutes late. Most of the school had already passed through the lunch line, but he didn't feel hungry. He just slunk to a seat somewhere in the corner and pulled out his notes, rereading them. He already knew the information, but anything was better than nothing.

He could still see them beyond the ink smeared notes. He could still hear them.

"Look, look, I saw this on the internet!"

The tamer blond one, the one who fizzled from electrical overloads like shaking a can of soda and trying to open it immediately after was talking, flicking a spoon between his fingers.

There were some snarky comments down the table, and taking a large, deep breath, he exhaled on the round end of the spoon and stuck it to his nose, pulling his hand away to let it dangle on the tip. The table erupted into childish roars of laughter, and older students started shaking their heads.

Tetsutetsu's copy (he could remember his name because honestly, who couldn't?), the one with the red hair, started pounding a fist into the table as he laughed, gasping for air before drowning in them again as the blond one wiggled his eyebrows and grinned like an idiot.

They didn't understand. They couldn't comprehend this gift that had been given to them, the gift to have a heroic quirk. To Hitoshi Shinso, there was nothing heroic about his brainwashing anymore; the luster gained by Midoriya's kind words had evaporated in the overwhelming heat of reality.

He would never be a hero, no matter how great his performance was at the Sports Festival. It all meant nothing without some divine, unlikely intervention.

He tried to focus on his notes, but the lines blurred as he caught himself looking up again, not at the table of idiots, but diverging to the left, where the girls of 1-A calmly sat together, eating their lunches and chatting like old friends.

If I was there, he thought, I'd much rather sit at the girl's table...

He sat his notebook down and rooted in his bag for his pen. He knew he put it back in there… His fingertips brushed the smooth surface, and he tried to grab it at the same time as someone screamed.

His head shot up, his eyes first thinking about all the news reports that filled his screen at night from the USJ—but there was no Nomu, no villain. No reason for a hero, even though, to be frank, he would have been no use then anyway.

Half the 1-A girl's table had scrambled, except for the one with the strange ears, who kept using them to peck at the… thing in her hands. She was shaking whatever it was as her ears stabbed and scratched, and thing's nose started to bleed as he gave a sheepish grin and a thumbs up to the table over.

Oh… it's a boy.

The entire cafeteria had stopped moving and stared until the 1-A girl finally threw the boy on the table top, right on their trays of food, and grumbled as she walked to the creation girl.

"What the hell did you just do, Mineta?" Spoon boy asked; he probably wasn't speaking very loud, but to a room of silent students, it sounded like his voice echoed across the cafeteria.

Mineta. Why does he look like he tried to be a grape in pre-school and never grew out of it?

He folded his notebook shut, and a few people shot a glare at him for making noise. Then Mineta slowly raised his thumbs up to the crowd as he stared dreamily at the ceiling.

"I got… the shot of the lifetime…" he sighed happily and raised his other hand in the air, holding a phone.

Shinso's eyes drifted to the girls. The creation girl was trying to talk down the one with strange ears, who kept pulling at her skirt like it wasn't long enough.

His mind quickly deduced the problem. The idiot probably climbed under the table, hence why the girls scattered, for panty shots; and he couldn't help but clench his fists around his pen. So, this was who U.A. put in a class, in a seat, he could have been in to become a hero.

He must really, really be below their standards.

He slipped from the chair, collecting his notebook before he left. He didn't want to stay, didn't want to get mad for everyone to see him, to have the raw emotions overtake his rationality. He stopped halfway down the hall and sat against the wall next to a plant. He wished he could be like the plant, just perfect to the eyes of those who grew it, to grow and die with no pain, no wishes, no regrets.

He balanced his notebook on his knees as he studied the ceiling. What was he going to do with his life?

He was only sitting in the hallway for a few minutes when he heard the heavy stride of someone walking his direction from the other side of the plant, closer to the entrance of the cafeteria. He knew that stride, and he closed his eyes, listening to it ping off the tile floors like it did in the small collection of videos he had managed to accumulate.

When the footsteps ended, he grabbed his notebook and leaned forward and peered around the potted plant. Eraserhead was waiting in front of the doors to the cafeteria. His posture was slumped, his hands shoved unprofessionally in his pockets, but he was a hero and everything Shinso dreamed to be.

He scooted his notebook to the floor and forgot it there—his eyes slowly focused on Eraserhead as he yawned and stepped back as graceful as a cat as the door swung open and Lunch-Rush dumped grape boy—what was his name again? —on the floor at his feet.

Eraserhead waited for the door to swing shut, and for the boy to crawl onto his feet before he decided to speak.

"So," He spoke, and Shinso sucked in a breath. He had watched his favorite hero from afar for a long time, in two, ten seconds clips; and although he was not nearly as well known as All Might due to his vigilante work, he idolized him even more, "What were you doing in the cafeteria."

He tried to swallow his bubbling excitement, but he couldn't help it; his heart was reacting against his rationality, and he hated it and loved it all at the same time.

He felt a connection with Eraserhead the first time he found him in a tiny article on the back page of the newspaper, where he was labeled even less than a vigilante then. They both shared powers deemed useless or terrible depending on the crowd they were in, and yet, he was successful.

Then he heard the rumors when he came here; that one of the teachers on the hero staff had been a general studies kid, won the Sports Festival against all odds, and was transferred the following week to the hero course, and he was filled with hope. He knew it was Eraserhead. This villainous quirk he carried with him could be useful when everyone said it couldn't be.

Then two weeks past. And nothing.

He was nothing like Eraserhead—but oh, how bad his heart wanted to be.

"What did you say?"

Shinso collapsed in on himself, back to his bitter reality. The boy was now kneeling at Eraserhead's feet, bowing and profusely apologizing each swing upwards, tears pouring down his face. He had missed some fragment of the conversation to his thoughts like it was his notes from this morning, but he quickly regained his understanding when he saw the phone in the sensei's hand.

He was scrolling, before his thumb stopped dead, and he eyed the picture with disdain. Shinso couldn't see it.

"Did you take this?" He asked.

Must be the panty shot.

"I-I'm sorry!" the boy sputtered. "I-it w-was a dare!"

Eraserhead dropped the phone, and he fumbled to catch it, holding it to his chest like it was the holy grail.

"And I heard last week that you were caught spying on the girls in their locker room. Again."

That gets the boy smiling sheepishly, but it dissolved, and he waved his hands, "But it's natural for the boys my age, right sensei!? I mean, you probably experience this all the time!"

He scratched the back of his head like his naivety could relieve him of the situation, but Eraserhead just stared. His nose had stopped bleeding, but it was smeared down his face and gave the impression it still was. Shinso could see from his side of the plant that he was oh, so screwed.

"You're expelled."

The words were so simple, and yet they were like nukes, and Shinso watched as it absolutely wrecked its intended target with no mercy.

"Huh?" The boy said, slowly comprehending the weight of the words, the destruction they caused. Then his eyes widened, and his mouth dropped, and he realized himself how screwed he was. "What?!"

Eraserhead said nothing, and turned away, walking the way he came. The boy stumbled to his feet.

"Wait!" He shouted, "Sensei, you can't really do that! It was just a stupid joke! The girls are just—"

Eraserhead turned, and the boy screwed his mouth shut as his eyes bled red, and his hair rose like the hairs on a cat, prickling to attack.

"You are expelled," he tossed the words like they were easy, like they meant nothing as his hair flopped back into his face and his eyes lost their luster. "Because I don't tolerate sexual harassment." The boy opened his mouth to say something, anything to dispute. "Leave."

The tears were back again, hot and heavier than before as the boy scurried off past Shinso, crying out and whimpering fearfully as he went. He tripped and didn't move for a while, before he popped back up and ran the rest of the hallway, out of sight, but his sobs still clearly ringing down the hall. He was honestly happy for the girls, even it was an internal happiness, generated from his weary and wounded heart that he would never let rise to the surface.

When he felt like it was safe, he emerged from behind the plant, stretching his legs. The bell rung, and as he turned towards his class, he felt Eraserhead's eyes on him, even for just a moment, before he returned to his class for another round of the General Studies curriculum.

Today was a long day. He was just ready for it to be over.

The weekend was long and boring. He had finished his homework at school, had no tests to study for, and was still getting used to returning to an empty home where his "tadaima" was never answered. When Monday morning came, he thought he was going to die from boredom and forced himself into his school uniform for another round of self-loathing.

It was a bright morning that day, and he flinched at the sunlight. He had the earliest route for the mail, so before he left for school, he checked his mailbox and pulled the sole envelope out, tucking it under his arm.

The short train ride to the station closest to U.A. was uneventful. The old lady next to him sneezed on him, then called him a hooligan for his hair, but honestly, he had heard worst and only apologized that he was in her way and stood up for the rest of the ride.

The station was crowded, and he heard the crinkle of paper when a particularly rushed businessman clipped him.

The letter.

He figured it was a letter intended for someone else, from a distant relative that lately had been popping out of the woodwork. But the letter was too neat and pristine, and it was addressed to himself. Hitoshi Shinso was written in thick letters, in a handwriting he almost couldn't distinguish. He jabbed a thumb in the corner of the letter and swiped up, tearing it open as he emerged from the station. U.A. was only a few blocks away, and he walked as he unfolded the letter.

Congratulations Hitoshi Shinso, it read, and he almost snorted. But then the other letters came flying at him, like villains, striking weak places in his façade that almost made him crumble on the sidewalk. His hand trembled as he tightly clutched the paper in both hands, as he came to a stop, rereading the second to the last line of the first paragraph again.

We have considered your outstanding performance and consider you the perfect candidate to fill the vacant spot in classroom 1-A of our hero course.

He almost forgot about the incident, about the panty shot in the cafeteria or Eraserhead's "you're expelled" in the torrent of his own thoughts; but then it came rushing back, and his heart throbbed, and he wanted to cry out and thank the boy for having one perverted thought too many.

There's no way this could be true, the rationality in his brain, coated in pessimism, thought, this must be a joke. Why would they choose you to be in the hero course?

But his heart was crying. And right now, that's all the mattered to him.

The heart wants what it wants.

He stood on the sidewalk as an obstacle impedding others for a while, close to balling his eyes out but tamed enough where it never came to that. He clutched the letter to his chest like it was his holy grail.

The letter explained that he was to check in with his new teacher, Shouta Aizawa, in his new classroom, 1-A. And when his feet finally found the courage to move, he started walking, folding the letter up and slipping into his bag. As he walked, he thought about a lot of things.

It didn't really matter why they chose him, did it? Because now he could accomplish his dream, and he could prove to everyone he wasn't a villain. He could be a true hero, a hero he could be proud of. And a small part of him smiled at that, and his lips quirked a little and reflected just a fraction of his heart.

Maybe it wasn't fair, that a kid got kicked out. Maybe it wasn't fair, that he got picked over the other brilliant, creative minds of General Studies. But right now, his heart wanted to be a little selfish—he wanted this for himself, something to hold on to in his vast and endless world. He tried not to dwindle too long on the things that tried to stand in his way because that mindset is what sent him down a dark path to begin with. What's done is done, and he should leave it at that.

Such is life, he thought, and for once, it didn't have a negative connotation. He was finally listening to a good rationality.

U.A. towered over him, as a beacon, a hope he had let dwindle inside himself. He was wrong, to let go of the hope he had to become a hero.

He didn't care if it was luck or divine intervention that gave him his moment. And then he thought about the Sports Festival.

He remembered the words Midoriya yelled at him, to never give up, and his response to beat him.

He remembered his declaration to 1-A, that he would take one of their seats and join the hero course.

And now here he was, standing before the door to his future. The lights were on, and when he pulled the handle, the door opened. When it closed behind him, the pain, the anxiety, the self-doubt and the worthlessness was left behind with the boy who sat in the second to last row, third from the window.

The class was already seated—his class—and Eraserhead—his instructor—was waiting for him at the front of the room. He gave Shinso a nod, and Shinso nodded back, his stoicism fading away to the childhood giddiness he always had, watching those ten-second clips of Eraserhead.

It dawned on him. Maybe someday, someone would be watching clips of him and dreaming to be a hero.

"This is Hitoshi Shinso, from General Studies," Eraserhead introduced, and Shinso stood tall and proud up front. "This is his first day in the hero course. Don't scare him off."

He saw the grins from his future competitors, the thumbs up from Midoriya towards the far end of the classroom. For some reason, he felt more at home right now then he did at the empty house he always came home to.

He walked to his new seat, soaking it all in, the dream, the accomplishment. He would have to come up with a new dream, but as he sat down, it didn't matter at that moment, at that time.

His new seat was second to the last row, the one closest to the window.

Now, he could look out it and see the reflection of his own smile.

A portion of this fanfiction was actually lost to my shitty laptop which will shut down with no warning and refuses to save my progress. Recreating it was a nightmare. Most of the Aizawa-Mineta exchange was lost, so I apologize if it isn't as good as the original.

Hope you enjoyed reading.

Soul Spirit