Chapter 1 – Harry invades Japan

…

What does it mean to be a hero?

This was a question the world had been asking since time immemorial, ever since the first caveman slapped paint on a wall and began to tell the first story. However, this question had gained quite a bit more traction in the world's collective consciousness since the arrival of quirks.

The first report came from Qing Qing City, where a child was born that radiated light. However, this supernatural phenomenon did not remain isolated for long. Soon, the entire world began to witness a collective awakening of superhuman abilities across its entire population. Before long, what had once been considered extraordinary became simply ordinary, with 80% of the world possessing some form of supernatural ability.

Unfortunately, with this new wave of power came pure chaos. Criminals suddenly stood immune to the law, the old systems unable to cope with this newly superhuman society.

And so heroes stepped in to meet this new challenge.

Today, the question of what made a hero was no longer just a matter of abstract wondering, but one of practical importance. The profession of hero had long since overtaken movie-star and famous musician as the number one dream of children everywhere. And as the streets flooded with professional heroes, it seemed like more than a few of those children got their wish.

As this flood of heroes continued to swell, the world began to face this question with greater and greater urgency. What does it mean to be a hero? Is it having more power than most? Is it saving lives and stopping crimes? Is it being compassionate, and self-sacrificing? And does it matter if someone becomes a hero for the riches and glory as long as they save lives, or must a hero be humble and selfless to be truly worthy of the name? These questions continued to circle through society's consciousness as people reveled and worried over this fantastical world they had become a part of.

In the mind of the so-called "Number One Hero," however, these questions were of even more immediate importance, tinged as they currently were with self-loathing and regret.

I'm a pathetic fraud, the man thought bitterly, his skeletally thin hand clutching his side in pain and despair as he looked on uselessly from a crowd of bystanders standing at the mouth of a dingy alley in Musutafu, Japan. Before them, the flame-riddled alley was suddenly wracked with yet another riot of explosions and even louder howls of desperate rage. At the center of this chaos, a towering mass of dark, green-black slime coiled, a monstrous grin on its mockery of a face as massive tendrils of its fluid body snaked and whipped through the air in manic pleasure and self-assured victory.

Nearly buried within that horrific mass was a sweat-stained mat of spiky blonde hair, and barely visible below them was a pair of crimson eyes bulging with both horror and rage.

Those eyes belonged to a teenager currently being swallowed up by the ghastly body of the slime villain. But, now matter how the child raged and fought with an almost mindless fury, creating a cascade of explosions quick as gunfire from hands now buried inside the villain's body, the monster's body crept inexorably forward, threatening to subsume the last of the teen's screaming face.

And all the while, the hero known to the world as All Might, the Symbol of Peace and greatest hero in history, remained hidden in the crowd of horrified onlookers, totally anonymous and utterly impotent.

I'm worthless! he condemned, clutching more fiercely at the now long-familiar crippling injury hidden beneath his shirt, and ignoring the waves of agony shooting through his body as a result. What kind of hero can only use his powers for three hours a day? He grimaced in self-loathing. And what kind of Symbol of Peace stands by and watches as a child dies because he's already used up his time limit for the day?

A feeble blue light glared out from deep inside the shadows of the man's bruised, sunken eyes, little more than a mockery of the unparalleled power that once shone from those gleaming irises.

At the moment, though, those eyes rested on what he considered to be the true heroes in this alleyway.

Unfortunately, they … weren't exactly doing all that well themselves, to be honest.

"Fire and wood don't exactly make a good combination!" the rising hero Kamui Woods yelped out in more than a little panic, which was fair, given how the riot of explosions had left fires burning throughout the alley that his body, apparently made out of some type of elastic wood, likely wouldn't respond well to. Fluidly extending his arms, Kamui wrapped up the final stragglers in the alley and pelted for the exit. "One of you will have to stop this guy!" he yelled to the remaining heroes as he hastily cleared the mouth of the alley.

"Don't look at me! I've got my hands full here!" the rescue-specialist Backdraft shouted in response. Wearing a costume like a modified firefighter's outfit, the hydrokinetic was living up to his appearance, firing streams of water from the nozzles at the end of his arms to combat the fires raging through the buildings on either side of the alley.

Battling a rising anxiety at the increasingly hopeless situation, and his own powerlessness to help, the gaunt figure in the crowd only half-noticed as a black-haired teen clutching a shopping bag joined the crowd of onlookers, immediately snaking his way to the front of the muttering press of people.

"This is no good! I can't get a grip on his weird body!" another of the heroes in the alley cried, this one known to the world as Death Arms, a hero with incredible strength. However, this strength seemed utterly useless when faced with a villain such as this, given the creature's fluid, shifting body. Cackling smugly, that villain formed a massive hand out his dark, sludge-like body and swung it the hulking hero, who could do little else but desperately throw himself backwards to avoid it as the pavement in front of him erupted from the force of the blow.

All the while, the teen trapped inside the body of the villain continued to scream and fight, snarling with almost feral rage as explosions continued to wrack the villain's body. Unfortunately, as powerful as the teen's quirk was, it seemed to do little to affect the sludge villain's oozing, greenish-black body. It did, however, make the gathered heroes even more hesitant to approach the pair for fear of being blown away.

"It's no good! None of us have the right quirks to stop a villain like this!" Death Arms shouted in frustration, desperately dodging another of the villain's amorphous swings. The monster's bulging yellow eyes gleamed with smug triumph upon hearing this declaration, knowing just how true it was.

"We'll just have to do damage control until someone with the right powers shows up!" another of the heroes yelled reluctantly. "The kid will just have to hang on a little while longer!"

At these words, the gaunt, useless bystander in the crowd gave a strangled groan of despair, his heart flooding with self-loathing at how utterly worthless he was here.

You're a disgrace, All Might! he practically screamed at himself. You're not a real hero!

However, as the professional heroes all stepped back, clearly hating themselves for it, but still seeing no alternative but to stand by and wait for reinforcements, someone else had enough.

Without skipping a beat, the black-haired teen tore free of the crown and leaped into the fray.

Dammit, Harry! This is such a bad idea!

However, no matter how the teen yelled at himself, it was still the only idea he had. So …

"Hey! Water Boy!" the black-haired teen yelled, ignoring the horrified looks on the heroes' faces as he ran full pelt towards the living pile of goo, and the teen still trapped inside it. "I want you to douse that bastard with everything you've got!"

"What are you doing?! Get out of there! We're pros! We'll handle it!" the firefighter-looking hero yelled, panicked at seeing a kid stepping into a fight that even pros found themselves helpless in.

"I don't care if you're the bloody pope! Just douse the guy and don't let up!" Harry shouted, nimbly ducking out of the way of Death Arms' desperate grab as he continued to charge straight at the villain.

This move would be considered less than wise by most. And Harry wouldn't exactly be inclined to disagree with them, either. But he didn't stop, even when the bulging yellow eyes of the monster fell upon him.

"Ah, a wannabe hero, huh?" the villain goaded, a warbling, gargling voice sounding from behind massive, craggy teeth that split the face-like mass in a twisted parody of amusement and contempt. "Well, I've already got one skin-suit I'm working on! I don't really need another!"

As the villain raised a massive, arm-like tendril high overhead, the shadows moved enough for the still-burning fires to cast a ruddy light on the face of the victim still half-buried in its murky body. Those crimson eyes still burned with fury and fear, but as they fell on Harry, they widened in shock and confusion.

"Good night, kid!" the monster yelled, bringing its arm-like mass down in a crushing overhead strike.

As the dust cleared, however, it revealed an untouched teen standing next to an empty crater.

"I think you missed," he goaded the villain without thinking.

As the monster's bulging yellow eyes tightened in anger, the teen quietly groaned to himself.

Good job. Irritating the bad guy is clearly a smart move here, he self-criticized. Unfortunately, he didn't have time for more reflection, as the sludge villain began winding up for another attack.

Once again, that giant, amorphous limb crashed into the pavement with monstrous force, crushing the asphalt and sending debris flying. And also once again, the dust cleared to reveal the teen's untouched form crouched beside the new crater.

"How we coming on that water?!" Harry yelled back to the heroes just standing around watching in shock.

"Oh, uh, right!" the rescue hero responded, stepping away from the now mostly contained fires and taking aim at the villain, so taken aback at what he was seeing that he found himself falling in line with the kid's plan almost without realizing.

Harry couldn't afford to pay him much mind, though. From all the snarling and glaring coming from the monster in front of him, he was starting to suspect that the villain was becoming somewhat cross with him, and given the countless dark, looping tendrils now waving in the air, he was clearly through playing around, too.

I swear to God, if I make it through this, I will never curse Oliver Wood's name ever again, Harry desperately bargained as he prepared to make damn good use of every last ounce of the quidditch training obsessively drilled into him over long, long hours by his fanatical former captain.

From behind him, several streams of water began arcing overhead to lightly crash against the sludge villain's slimy body, but neither Harry nor the villain paid this any attention. For the villain, his focus was purely on crushing this annoying little pest, while for Harry, his focus was solely on staying alive.

This is fine! I've totally got this! he thought with only mild panic as he ducked one massive whipping tendril only to dance out of the way of another. They're just bludgers! His quick, seeker's eyes tracked the veritable thicket of tendrils as he continued his desperate maneuvers, jumping and rolling and diving and sidestepping with lightning-fast reflexes and panic-fueled adrenaline. They're just massive, slimy, foul-smelling bludgers! he continued to try and psych himself up, only to pause as a thought occurred to him. It's just like dodging Marcus Flint!

From that point on, the ringing crashes and frustrated roars of the villain were undercut with amused laughter as the suddenly more relaxed teen remembered his long-standing experience dodging the great ugly troll on a broom that was the Slytherin team captain, and found confidence in the deeply ingrained reflexes he had developed as a result.

However, this newfound confidence didn't last for long. While he may not have known why he was told to do it, the rescue-hero Backdraft was thankfully continuing to fire heavy streams of water at the body of the sludge villain. Unfortunately, as he did, the monster's fluid body continuously absorbed all that water, making the villain steadily grow larger.

And larger.

"Don't let up!" Harry yelled, practically feeling the growing uncertainty from the heroes behind him, even as he himself began making more and more desperate maneuvers to avoid the massive, watery limbs, not even his wealth of experience dodging bludgers from the Weasley twins helping him much at this point due to their size.

"This is only making things worse!" Backdraft shouted, watching as the villain's body continued to swell and grow, much to the villain's own manic delight.

"He's right, kid!" the villain gloated in its warbling voice, swatting at the nimble teen with utterly gigantic limbs, forcing the teen's reflexes into overdrive in a desperate attempt to stay alive for just a few seconds longer. "You may be quick, but this is your plan? You're going to beat me by making me bigger?" Broken pieces of asphalt tore through the kid's shirt as he only barely avoided one of the now practically colossal tendrils when it slammed into the ground an inch from him, sending small shards of crushed pavement flying and causing faint red patches of blood to blossom on the teen's ragged garment.

However, even as the teen staggered, a smile spread across his face, making the villain pause in confusion and uncertainty.

"Oh, I'm not the one who's going to beat you," he told the monster, sweat dripping down his grinning face. "I'm just the distraction."

The stunned silence that gripped the alleyway was abruptly shattered by a bellow of herculean effort as the blonde teen finally broke free of the villain's now pale, watery green body.

"What? Impossible! I had you!" the villain cried, bulging eyes widening in confusion and alarm.

"That water isn't just making you bigger," an exhausted but triumphant Harry explained with a grin. "It's diluting you." He made eye contact with the panting former hostage. "And you can't hold your body together all that well when it's been thinned out like this, can you? Which means you're vulnerable."

The blonde teen's crimson irises gleamed with sudden understanding before darkening with bloodthirsty rage.

The sudden roar of fury came from the villain, however, as one of its colossal, watery green limbs finally made contact with its target, crashing into the black-haired teen and slamming him against a wall with a pained shout.

"DAMN YOU, KID!" the villain shouted, raising another limb to finish him off.

"Do it!" Harry yelled, ignoring the crackling pain shooting through his body as he turned to the teen with the explosive quirk.

The enraged former hostage, however, needed no encouragement.

"GO TO HEEEEELLLLLL!"

The avalanche of explosions coming from the teen's palms were like nothing before, bombarding the villain's watery, weakened body with a merciless, savage fury, the monster's screams drowned out by the thunder of fiery explosions, and the furious bellows of the teen creating them.

The onlookers at the entrance to the alley shouted in alarm as the alley shook and burned with waves of heat from the almost sun-like explosions, but the teen didn't let up, even as the villain's watered-down body began boiling away to steam.

By the time they finally stopped, the silence in the smoke-filled alley was absolute, broken only by the heaving, panting breaths coming from the blonde teen, and the quiet sizzle of the last, small remnants of the sludge villain's body, now little more than a tiny greenish puddle with closed eyes.

Into that silence, however, wild cheers soon erupted.

Harry almost jumped in alarm upon hearing them, but he was frankly too tired, slumped as he was against the ruined wall cradling his aching ribs.

The next few minutes passed as a blur to him. He was idly aware of people rushing into the alley to help both of them up. He also distantly registered the feel of crimson eyes silently boring into him as his fellow teen was checked over by the heroes. He also faintly noticed his own stubborn refusal to let the heroes bustle him over to a nearby ambulance too.

Frankly, he didn't much care for hospitals and the like.

Unfortunately, he wasn't able to completely tune out the heroes' scolding.

"What were you thinking?! You could have been killed! You had no business getting involved!"

"You really should have left things up to us pros! But … even so, that was some seriously impressive work out there! Man, I wish I had your reflexes!"

"Civilians shouldn't get involved in fights against villains. That's what training and hero licenses are for. You could've gotten yourself and the hostage killed. But still, decent job, kid. With some proper training, I'd say you've got the makings of a decent pro in you."

He also noticed the far more one-sided praises being heaped upon Angry McBlasterson.

"Man, you're tough, kid!"

"Wow, that quirk of yours is something else!"

"Hey, when you go pro, make sure to head over to my agency! I'd love for you to be my sidekick!"

Through it all, however, the spiky-haired blonde never made a sound, simply staring almost sullenly at the ground.

Eventually, however, the press started swarming the alley as well, and they of course weren't going to accept taciturn silence as a valid response.

Unfortunately for them, however, the arrival of what Harry practically considered to be his natural-born nemeses gave a second wind to the exhausted teen, and he forced his shaky legs under him and began slowly heading for the opposite end of the alley, gently shrugging off the almost mother-hen-like hands of the pro heroes in the process.

Of course, the press wasn't just going to let a story walk away without a fight, though.

"What's your name, kid?"

"Have you had any training?"

"What drives a normal kid to jump into the middle of a fight against a villain?"

Harry's brow furrowed as he pondered that last question, even as he increasingly tuned out all the others.

A normal kid … did that really apply to him?

Could it?

What does it mean to be normal? Is it being no more powerful than anyone else? Is it standing by and trusting that someone else will take care of whatever evil things are happening around you? Is it focusing only on your own life, and not others', even when someone is in danger? Is it not making any waves, and never standing out from the crowd around you, even if that crowd is standing still, and your soul is screaming that you need to move? That you need to do something, even if it puts yourself in danger, and makes you stand out?

Can you be normal and still be a good person, if being normal means doing nothing when you have the chance to help someone in need?

Unfortunately, the mob of reporters still hounding him eventually forced him out of his thoughts, until finally, he decided that he needed to throw them at least some semblance of a bone.

"My name is Harry Potter," he finally spoke in fluent yet accented Japanese, one hand twitching in a long-ingrained instinct to smooth his hair over his forehead to hide the vivid red scar like a bolt of lightning branded above his right eye.

But no one reacted to the name. No one's faces lit up in shocked recognition, and nobody's eyes performed that standard flick towards his forehead that he had once grown so used to, and hated so dearly.

Once again, Harry found himself relishing his newfound anonymity.

However, the reporters still buzzing around him weren't going to let him get off with a just a name, whether they recognized it or not. And so they started pestering him once again.

"What is your quirk?"

"Is it enhanced agility?"

"Maybe reflexes?"

"Can you spot a villain's weaknesses?"

"Are you a precog like Sir Nighteye?"

This time, Harry snorted, his lips spreading in a faint, bittersweet smile as his brilliant green eyes flashed with memory.

"I don't have any powers," he answered simply.

Every reporter there stopped dead, stunned by this admission, though their reaction didn't hold a candle to the dumbfounded faces of the pro heroes in the alley, or the gaping astonishment from the blonde-haired teen still sitting on the ground, suddenly being forced to come to grips with having been rescued by somebody quirkless.

Harry paid none of them any mind, however. He simply continued his solitary trek through the alley, mind awash in painful memories.

"… anymore," he finished under his breath, pale fingers gently tracing the scar hidden on his forehead.

Reaching the street, he turned and joined seamlessly with the distant crowd, heading to the place that he now called home.

Back in the alley, however, a supposedly great hero stood reeling at what he had just heard, the perpetual stabbing pain in his side for once completely forgotten.

He didn't have a quirk, he quietly tried to process, watching as the similarly astounded professional heroes started dutifully gathering up the last remnants of the sludge villain's body, a monster none of them, even with all of their power and training, could manage to stand against, but which had still been brought low by the courageous actions of a young, untrained boy without any power at all.

Stunned, All Might glanced down at his skeletal arm. When using his power, this weak, atrophied limb, and all the rest of his gaunt, hunched figure, absolutely bulged with muscles and unrivaled strength. At those times, he stood tall and unchallenged, able to face any challenge with a smile as he defended the world from all who would dare threaten it. But ever since his injury, his body had been too weakened to sustain his incredible power for more than a few hours a day. And all the rest of the time, he was stuck like this, thin, weak, and reduced to nothing more than a helpless bystander in moments like this one, lacking the strength to step in, even as his heart begged him to.

But that boy … no power of his own, facing a villain that gave even pro heroes pause, and he still stepped in without a moment's hesitation, while the supposed greatest hero in the world stood idly by.

And he won! He still couldn't believe it! Here he stood, certain that he himself, All Might, the world's Symbol of Peace, couldn't be any kind of real hero without his power, and then this boy stepped in and proved in no uncertain terms that what truly made a hero wasn't their power, but their spirit, and their drive to win no matter the risk.

Though of course, possessing a certain knack for cleverness and some truly astounding reflexes clearly doesn't hurt either! All Might mentally added with an impressed grin. I mean, seriously! That kid was insane!

As the crowd shifted around him, though, he blinked in surprise upon spotting the boy's shopping lying on the ground forgotten.

As he leaned down to pick it up, however, his gaunt, hollow-cheeked face lit up with a slow smile.

Well, I guess I need to find that kid to return this, now don't I? he remarked to himself, looking towards the end of the alley the kid had disappeared through. Wouldn't want him to lose his stuff, after all. That'd be a rather poor thanks for the kind of selfless courage he showed here.

Excuse gathered, he hurried down the alley, bypassing the press and heroes alike.

Unfortunately, upon clearing the mouth of the alley, he realized that the kid was already lost from sight somewhere in the crowd gently streaming up and down the sidewalk, meaning he had something of an ordeal in front of him if he wanted to track this kid down.

"Well … Plus Ultra, I guess," All Might muttered to himself, eyes flashing with resolve as he got started.

Some time later, All Might panted as he slowly jogged down a mostly empty road, sweat beading on his forehead and darkening his scraggly golden hair.

Man, this form is slow! he mentally complained, missing how his full-powered form let him clear city blocks in mere seconds. By contrast, his injured, emaciated form got winded climbing up a few steps, and jogging for just a single block made him feel like he was going to keel over and die, even at a speed that a somewhat less generous person would only really call a slightly quicker dawdle.

But at least he was confident he was on the right track! When he failed to spot the kid in the crowd, he had taken to asking people on the street if they had seen him, finding himself feeling oddly driven to find and speak with this boy.

To his surprise, though, a number of people seemed to recognize his description of the kid.

"Oh, him? Yeah, he started coming around about a month or so ago, I think," a man pushing a food cart told him. "Seems like a good kid, too. Real shame. He tends to come by from somewhere out thataways, if you want to find him."

"That foreign boy with the green eyes and messy black hair?" a motherly-looking woman cleaning the windows of a cheap thrift store answered. "Yes, the poor dear. I think he lives over near the beach now. Just awful. Someone should really do something about that boy. It's not right."

Over and over, All Might heard answers like that. Strange as he found them, though, he didn't have time to stop and ask them to explain. He simply "hurried" on his way once they pointed him in the right direction.

As his attention snapped back to the present, however, a wheezing All Might realized that he could finally spot the boy's gently plodding form farther down the road.

Thank God! I was starting to get worried that this would all just be some wild goose chase! he thought in relief.

"Kid! Hey, kid!" he called out weakly in between heaving breaths. Turning, the boy seemed more than a little surprised to see a skeletally thin man jogging down the road towards him drenched in sweat and panting like he'd just run a marathon.

"Uh … yeah?" the teen responded uncertainly, coming to a halt to allow the tall yet hunched blond man to catch up.

"You … dropped … this," All Might panted when he finally reached him, holding out the shopping bag with an exhausted, trembling hand.

The boy blinked at him. "Did … you just … run all this way to give me back my shopping bag?"

"… um … yeah," All Might answered, suddenly feeling kinda stupid.

The boy's bright green eyes glimmered with uncertain surprise and gratitude. "Wow. Thanks. That's … really nice of you."

Reaching out, the boy took the bag. Upon noting how much the man was sweating and panting, though, he immediately reached into the bag and pulled out a bottle of water he had purchased earlier, holding it out to the stranger.

"Thank you very much," All Might said as he gratefully accepted the bottle before tilting it back and draining half of it in one go.

Stupid weak form, he internally complained for the umpteenth time.

"You know, I saw what you did back there. Impressive stuff," he told the boy after finally lowering the bottle with a satisfied gasp.

"Oh … that," the boy replied, suddenly looking somewhat sheepish as he rubbed the back of his neck. "Yeah, that wasn't exactly the smartest move in the world, I know. But I couldn't just stand by and do nothing. I had to at least try and help."

All Might chuckled. "I'm not too sure many would be able to say the same, especially when facing something like that. For most people, the normal thing to do would be to just trust that someone else will handle things. It takes a lot of courage to step in yourself to protect someone in need, even if doing so could get you killed."

Suddenly, the boy's eyes darkened slightly as a somber, thoughtful look fell over his face.

"Yeah," he muttered quietly before turning and continuing on his way.

All Might blinked at the boy's sudden melancholic turn.

"Oh, hey, I didn't mean anything negative by that," he hastily assured the kid, falling into step with him. "I just meant that you showed some incredible bravery back there, rushing in to help that kid even when the pros themselves were stepping back, and without any powers of your own, even."

"No, I'm not offended or anything," the teen told the tall man, still staring at the ground in front of him, seemingly deep in thought. "It's just … I've been thinking something similar myself ever since the alley."

All Might gave him a querying look.

"That what I did was unusual," the boy explained, seemingly as much to himself as to the man, appearing to be puzzling through something that had been eating at him. "That most people wouldn't have done what I did. That the normal thing to do there would have been to just wait in the crowd and let someone else handle things." He frowned. "But I just don't understand why."

All Might's brow furrowed. "You mean, you don't understand why you stepped in?" he asked, still idly walking beside the boy.

"No," the boy answered. "I don't understand why others didn't."

All Might's eyebrows raised at that, but he simply remained quiet as the boy thought aloud, almost seeming to forget he was even there.

"That crowd of people," the boy continued, "something like 80% of them had some kind of superpower, right? That's what I keep hearing, anyway."

All Might found the boy's phrasing rather curious, but didn't interrupt.

"And still … they just stood by," the lost-in-thought teen kept speaking. "Even if they haven't been trained like the pros were, they still chose to stand there and do nothing, even after seeing what that villain was doing to that kid. None of them made any attempt to step in, even though almost all of them had some kind of power. Any one of them could have probably done what I did, and they could have done it better, since they had powers and I … don't."

The boy's fist tightened at that admission, but he simply kept going.

"When I stepped in, it was something unusual. Abnormal. People say it was brave, because it's not something a normal person would do. But why isn't it? Why is it some rare, grand thing when a person steps forward to help someone in need, while the normal thing is to just stand by and watch?"

All Might nodded slowly in understanding. "You're angry with everyone who stood by and didn't get involved?" he prompted.

The boy paused, but shook his head. "No. I'm not angry with them." His eyes widened slightly in realization. "I pity them."

All Might was taken aback by that statement.

"I've always wanted to be normal," the boy continued, still almost thinking aloud. "I never wanted to stand out, never wanted to be anything other than 'just Harry', a boring, ordinary kid." He snorted. "But I'm not."

The faint clack of their footsteps suddenly grew muffled as their path moved from pavement to sand, but neither paid it any mind. All Might simply listened raptly to the boy, as the latter continued venting with the kind of unrestrained honesty and self-reflection you can only really manage when speaking to an absolute stranger that you never expect to see again.

"I really tried, you know," he continued. "When I first got here, I had lost … well, I was suddenly about as normal as someone could be. So I tried to live up to that. I did my best to live a quiet, anonymous life. I thought I could be happy like that. But … that's not who I am." He looked down at the back of his hand, which All Might noticed was marked with some strange-looking scar, though the light was too dim to see it properly. "When I see someone in trouble, I don't even really think about it. I just step in and try to help. I've always been like that. It's only afterwards that I realize that what I did may have been stupid or dangerous, or that most normal people wouldn't have bothered."

All Might smiled. "It sounds like you've got the heart of a hero," he said quietly, more than a little familiar with that particular feeling, and with the look in the boy's eyes.

The teen gave a sudden, bittersweet chuckle. "A friend of mine called it my 'saving-people thing'." His frown returned. "When I was younger, I always hated the attention this got me. I thought it was just because I hated being in the spotlight. But now … I think that what truly bothered me was that what I did was considered worthy of the spotlight at all. It frustrated me when people praised me for what I did, because I was always sure that what I did was nothing special, and that anyone would have done the same if they had been there instead of me. But when everyone obsessed over what I did, and cheered me on for doing it … they were all saying otherwise."

"Yeah," All Might responded quietly, understanding the kind of disappointment the boy felt. "But what can you do, you know?" he absently commiserated.

For several quiet seconds, the boy seemed to process his words, the only sound between them being the soft crunch of sand under their feet. All of a sudden, however, his head jerked and he came to an abrupt stop as he seemed to be struck by a revelation, his eyes widening in understanding even as they lit up with purpose. "I don't want to be special," he reaffirmed slowly, almost tasting his words. "I don't want to be considered brave, or heroic, or unusual. I just want to be normal, like I always have. But …"

As the teen hesitated to say it, All Might's eyes gleamed, realizing where he was going with this. "You want to change what it means to be normal," he finished for the boy, a broad smile spreading across his face.

The boy snorted. "God, that sounds arrogant, but … yeah," he answered firmly. "I want to help make a world where stepping forward to help someone in need isn't considered heroic; it's just considered … normal. I want to see a world where standing back and doing nothing when someone is in trouble is what's considered unusual." He smiled. "I want to see a world where the word 'hero' is redundant."

As they walked, All Might stared at the boy, astonished at hearing this kind of dream from a teenager, something he hadn't experienced since he himself was a boy speaking to his master.

Even now, as he watched, the teen began walking with a newfound drive, limbs held with the kind of casual ease that only comes from truly finding and accepting one's purpose in the world. As he stared, the boy's eyes flashed with a soft yet determined light in the afternoon sun, no longer lowered to the ground, but now raised towards the horizon.

"You know," All Might began softly, causing the boy to blink as he seemed to remember he was there, "a dream like that … it'll be hard to pull off without any power of your own. Maybe impossible."

The boy chuckled. "That's the whole point, though, isn't it? Encouraging people to do what's right, not just what's easy? It'd be pretty pathetic if I couldn't live up to that ideal myself." He smiled. "This world has so much potential, especially with so many people having powers. If there's even the slightest chance I can do something to help inspire them to use that power for good, not as some grand, heroic gesture on their part, but just as part of their new standard of normal … isn't that worth a little difficulty? Or a little sacrifice?"

All Might stared at the teen in wonder, amazed at this kid's unwavering strength of character.

It looks like I've found him, he noted with a satisfied smile.

"Well, then, I have just one thing to ask you," All Might began, drawing himself up to his full, albeit thin, height. "What … is that smell?!"

As the teen looked on in surprised confusion, All Might began gagging and choking on the horrifying scent of rotting seaweed and over-warm garbage that came drifting by on an errant gust.

"Oh, yeah, that," the boy replied as he caught the scent himself. "Yeah, that takes a bit of getting used to around here. Thankfully, the breeze usually tends to take the smell outwards towards the sea, so it kind of comes and goes."

As All Might regained control of his burning sinuses, however, he finally started taking note of where they were.

"Is this a dump?" he asked in astonishment, staring at mounds and mounds of broken-down appliances, decayed bags of refuse, and every other piece of junk or garbage one could reasonably dream up piled high on the sand all around them.

"Well, kinda," the boy replied, stepping around a gutted washing machine to reveal a distinctly clear and garbage-free niche dug out between towering walls of broken-down cars and shattered television sets.

Upon opening the mangled door to one of the cars, the boy revealed a neat stack of blankets, shirts, and personal hygiene products. Opening another door revealed a small stack of canned food, bottled water, and other meal odds and ends.

With casual, practiced movements, the boy then began unloading his shopping bag and putting things away in their proper places.

Stunned silent, All Might simply stood there.

'Seems like a good kid, too. Real shame. He tends to come by from somewhere out thataways, if you want to find him.'

'That foreign boy with the green eyes and messy black hair? Yes, the poor dear. I think he lives over near the beach now. Just awful. Someone should really do something about that boy. It's not right.'

This is what they meant, All Might realized, watching the boy place a newly purchased bar of soap on a ragged car cushion. This … is his home.

"From what I can tell, the tides bring a lot of garbage in here," the boy explained over his shoulder as he continued putting his things away. "And the locals tend to use this place as an unofficial dumping ground because of it. Over time, this made the place … well, what it is now."

Finishing by unloading a new supply of water bottles, sans the one clutched limply in All Might's hand, the boy closed the mangled doors to his makeshift cupboard with what looked like a washcloth and an older, nearly vanished bar of soap in hand.

"I hope you don't mind, but fighting that sludge villain felt like rolling around in a sewer, so …," he held up the washcloth.

All Might nodded numbly as the boy turned and trekked down a clean-swept stretch of sand leading from his hidey-hole to the lapping edge of the ocean, where he rolled up his pants and waded out before removing his filth-crusted shirt and violently swirling it around in the water to get the worst of it out.

All the while, All Might stared at the patch of sand the boy seemed to call home.

He has nothing, he thought in astonishment, looking down at the water bottle the boy had freely gifted him from his own meager stores. And still … the only thing he thinks about is helping others.

He was stunned.

"No good," the boy's voice intruded on his thoughts as the teen returned from the water's edge. "The shirt's a goner. Figured it would be, but I at least had to try." Mouth twisted, he laid the sodden garment on the hood of the mangled car.

All Might barely noticed, though. The boy hadn't put the clean shirt on yet after scrubbing his skin clean in the ocean, and what All Might could see was … horrifying.

On the whole, the teen seemed to be in excellent shape, admittedly, with the tightly corded muscles of a dedicated athlete, but one that focused on speed and agility as opposed to just raw strength. Maybe a runner? Or a swimmer?

But what really pulled focus, and disturbed him deeply to see on someone so young, was the boy's scars.

The boy's right shoulder was marked by a disturbingly wide, ropy white scar, as if someone had taken a swipe at him with something heavy and pointed. And the inside of that arm's elbow bore a large, teardrop-shaped scar that almost looked like the mark of some utterly monstrous fang having dug deep into the boy's flesh, though All Might couldn't imagine what type of creature could have left a mark like that.

The boy's other side wasn't any better, with a long, jagged scar marring his left forearm in almost a mirror to the other, though this one bore the distinct appearance of a knife wound, albeit one wielded by someone with none too steady a hand.

After a few decades as a professional hero, All Might had become depressingly familiar with knife wounds, after all.

Even the boy's ribs weren't unmarred, bearing a series of large, circular scars like some large snake had bitten deep into his side and refused to let go, though at least those marks were smaller than the one dominating the inside of his right elbow.

As the boy's weight shifted on the sand, All Might even saw that one of his calves bore a set of odd-shaped marks like he had been mauled by something with massive pincers.

But the worst mark he saw was the same one he had noticed earlier on the back of the boy's hand. The lighting and angle hadn't been right for him to realize it before, but the looping, stark-white marks on the back of the boy's hand … were words.

There, looking like it had be carved with a scalpel, rested the phrase "I must not tell lies" written in English in an untidy scrawl, a clear and nauseating sign of torture having been inflicted on this boy at some point in his past.

By the end, All Might barely even flinched when the boy scratched at his hairline and shifted his bangs enough to uncover a bone-white scar shaped like a bolt of lightning branded on his forehead.

"Sorry about that back there, by the way," the boy's voice once more intruded on All Might's thoughts, this time as the boy rustled around in the backseat of his cabinet-car and pulled out a clean shirt. "For ranting at you like that, I mean," the boy explained, pulling the long-sleeved shirt over his head and finally hiding the majority of his scars from view once more, even as the act seemed to mess up his hair even further, hard as it was to believe. "I was just … sorting through some thoughts that've been kind of brewing under the surface for a while now, and they all just seemed to come to a head after that whole alley thing, you know? But putting them all into words finally helped me make sense of what I was feeling and what I want to do. So thanks for listening, even if I didn't mean to unload on you like that. I know it probably all seemed like just a bunch of weird rambling."

"No, it's … it's fine," All Might answered quietly, still processing … well, everything. "So this … is where you live?"

"Hmm?" The boy looked around. "Oh, yeah. For now, at least. It's a long story, but I kinda just got … well, dumped here without much beyond the shirt on my back, and it's been kinda slow going to get my feet under me around here. For some reason, not too many places seem all that keen on hiring a fifteen-year-old kid who doesn't even have any papers or anything." He shrugged, visibly unconcerned. "Still beats my old cupboard, though," he added half under his breath, tilting back his head and staring at the clear, golden afternoon sky overhead.

The boy breathed deeply with a faint, relaxed smile on his face as he did.

"And … how do you … survive, then?" All Might asked hesitantly, glancing at the grocery bag still resting on the sand.

"Salvage, mostly," Harry answered, lowering his gaze to the piles of refuse around them. "A lot of stuff around here is worth at least a few bucks at the recycling plant. Scrap metal, electronics, glass … you name it, this place has it. It's enough to get by, at least."

All Might blinked. "Wait, isn't the recycling plant on the other side of the district?"

The boy gave a dismissive shrug. "It keeps me in shape," he said simply.

For several moments, All Might simply stared at this astounding kid, utterly beyond words, even as his hand tightened on the bottle of water the boy had given him.

Those scars of his spoke of some unfathomably hard life for someone his age, somehow culminating in him living homeless on a beach surrounded by piles of garbage, without a real home or apparently even a family of his own, even if he didn't ask about the latter, fearing it would likely be a tragic and painful subject for the boy, given his situation. And yet here this kid stood, brave beyond words and willing to do whatever it took to save a perfect stranger even at a risk to his own life, utterly selfless enough to share what little he had without any prompting, willing to work hard for what scraps he did have without a single word of complaint, and somehow still idealistic enough to want to change the world, even without any power of his own.

Any reasonable person would be utterly crushed and broken if they had been subjected to even a fraction of what this kid seemed to have shouldered, but not him. Somehow, miraculously, this young man managed to retain his hero's spirit, constantly thinking of others, and just quietly refusing to let the world break him.

This boy …, All Might thought in amazement. Even without any power, I somehow don't have any doubt that he'll manage to become a hero the likes of which this world has never seen before. His sunken eyes shined with pure admiration. His is the kind of soul that legends are made from.

To be honest, his decision had been made quite some time ago. But even still, he found himself smiling in unwavering confidence at his choice, everything he learned about this kid simply hammering home again and again that he had made the right decision.

As for the kid in question, he gave the suddenly silent stranger an uncertain look. "Are you okay, Mr. … I just realized I never asked your name," the boy admitted with surprise. "I'm Harry Potter. Who are you?"

The gaunt man's smile grew into a toothy grin as he prepared to have a little fun. "Me?" he asked happily, his body starting to swell as muscles filled out and power raced through his veins, causing more than a little alarm to flash across the face of the astonished teen watching. "I am the Symbol of Peace in a world beset by a war against justice and decency! I am the light that shines in the darkness to bring hope to all those who look upon it! I am ALL MIGHT!"

The boy's mouth hung open as he stared at him. Reasonable, considering the extent of the change this stranger had just undergone.

Once bony limbs now bulged with muscle even as the man's spine straightened, turning a hunched, sickly looking man into a towering giant whose clothes strained over his sudden body-builder physique. Even the man's hair had changed, his shaggy blonde locks slicking back perfectly as the two long bangs that had once limply framed his face now stood tall like a pair of wings rising over his forehead. Even the man's face had changed, his sunken cheeks filling out and a wide, beaming grin taking root on his previously almost dour face.

The boy simply blinked at him.

"Alarming, isn't it?" the grinning superhero asked before belting out a booming laugh. "But have no fear! This is no impostor! It is truly I, All Might, the world's top hero, in the flesh! Exciting, I know! And don't worry! I'm sure I can get you an autograph before all is said and done! But right now, we need to focus! There is a matter of grave import at hand that we must discuss!"

For several long moments, Harry continued to silently stare at the perpetually beaming, boisterous superhero.

"… My God, he's like Superman and Gilderoy Lockheart had some kind of horrible love child," he finally whispered in almost horrified fascination.

"Err …," an off-balance All Might uttered, his signature smile wavering slightly as he struggled to respond to the boy's words, and the utter lack of recognition in his eyes. "Right, well … the truth is, I didn't come all this way just to return your things to you, young man. In fact, I was deeply impressed by what I saw you do in that alley, even more so when I heard you admit that you lacked any power of your own. I wanted a chance to meet you in person, and to find out more about this remarkable boy who would put his life on the line to save a complete stranger."

The boy blinked as he processed the booming hero's words, but after a moment, his eyes widened and he gave the blond giant a confused, almost accusatory look. "Wait, you said you were the world's top hero. If that's true, then why didn't you step in when all that was happening?"

All Might's perpetual smile became more of a grimace at those words. "Why indeed," he muttered, reaching down and lifting up the left side of his shirt.

Harry took a reflexive step back upon seeing what it had been covering up.

"Not very pretty, is it?" the hero asked, fairly redundantly, for as bad as some of the teen's scars were, the one this hero just revealed blew them all away. The hero's whole side was a mass of reddened, puckered scar tissue radiating out from a palm-sized circle of thin-stretched skin resting over his ribs.

"I received this injury from a particularly nasty villain five years ago," the hero informed him, his booming voice actually growing relatively quiet and somber as memory passed through the eyes nearly hidden in the shadows of his face. "Its consequences have been … severe," the man continued. "I lost a portion of my lungs, and the entirety of my stomach. Worse than that, however, is that my body has now become too weak and frail to truly handle my immense power." The hero's grin turned bitter. "What was once my natural state is now simply a mask that I'm lucky if I can wear for a few hours each day before my body gives out."

As if on cue, the man's hulking body suddenly began smoking before snapping back to his weakened, emaciated form, the man hunching in on himself as he coughed blood.

Alarmed, Harry rushed to the man's side, supporting his shoulders and keeping him from collapsing into the sand as he hacked and coughed.

After a few moments, however, the fit subsided and the man began weakly patting the concerned teen's hand on his shoulder. "I'm alright … I'm alright," the man assured him tiredly, wiping blood from his lips with a shaky hand that once more resembled little more than skin stretched tightly over bones.

"I'm so sorry. I … had no idea," Harry apologized quietly, rubbing the hunched man's back as the latter hacked and spit up the last of the blood that had pooled in his lungs.

The man simply chuckled in response. "It's not your fault," he assured the boy, standing up straighter as the boy released his shoulders. "We all have to deal with the hands that fate has dealt us, no matter how kind or cruel. That's just life." Lifting his hand, the man stared at the blood staining the back of his knobbly hand. "However," he continued, "the fact of the matter is, I can't remain the world's Symbol of Peace for much longer in my condition." Lowering his hand, his blue-gleaming eyes fell on the startled face of the boy. "And so, for the past several months, I have dedicated myself to finding a successor, someone worthy of inheriting my great power and taking my place as the pillar that supports this wondrous, fragile world of ours." The man's thin lips stretched in a pleased grin. "And today, I found him."

The boy's jaw dropped as his eyebrows lifted almost into his hairline. "Me?"

"No, the sludge villain," the gaunt man answered dryly. "Of course, you! Geez, and here I was thinking you were smart!"

The teen's eyes widened further. "But … I'm just–"

"Brave enough to risk your life for others," the man cut him off curtly, "selfless enough to share what you have freely even when you have almost nothing yourself, clever enough to defeat a villain that made pro heroes back down, and idealistic enough to want to change the world even after living a life that I think I'm safe in assuming wasn't exactly filled with sunshine and bunnies. Do I really need to go on, or have I made my point?"

The boy's face flushed crimson, and his expression said he was struggling to hold his tongue to keep from arguing with the things the man had said about him.

Once more, the man chuckled, a fond look in his eye. "That dream of yours … it's admirable. Noble. But if you want to truly have a shot at pulling it off, you're going to need to become more than just a hero. You're going to have to become a symbol, the greatest hero this world has ever seen. Only then will you be capable of inspiring others the way you dream of doing. And to do that, you're going to need power. My power. So, I guess the question really is, do you want to keep telling me how unworthy you are, and watch your dream die a stillborn, or do you want to accept my praise, and my power, and seize your chance to make that dream of yours flourish?"

The boy stared at him, an almost indignant look in his eye at how the older man had outmaneuvered him, making the man chuckle once again.

"… Can you really just pass on your power like that?" the teen finally asked quietly.

All Might nodded. "I can," he said simply.

In response, Harry looked down at his own hand.

"I actually used to have power of my own, you know," he said, more quietly than ever.

All Might's eyes widened in shock at the admission, but the teen wasn't done.

"I lost it, though … doing what I thought was right." The boy turned his hand over, and stared deeply at the words carved into the back of his fist. "I lost everything that day," he continued, immense but unreadable emotion passing through his eyes. "But I accepted it as just the price I needed to pay." His fist tightened. "In fact … a part of me was even relieved," he admitted. "I had done what I needed to. My fight was over, and suddenly, I was given a chance to start over, free of everything that had once made me stand out, everything that I thought had cursed me. I could finally just live a normal life." A slow smile spread across his face. "But who am I kidding? Helping others, and saving people in need … that's always just been a part of who I am, power or no power. And if I want to help make it a part of others as well, then you're right. I need power. That's the only way I'm going to be able to inspire that kind of change … and it's the only way I'll be able to keep myself alive long enough to pull it off, too."

The eyes that met All Might's were no longer shadowed in memory and uncertainty. The gleamed in certainty, and a determination that would shake the world to its foundations.

"I accept."

All Might grinned. "That's the spirit, kid!" he praised, more sure of his choice than ever.

Harry smiled back. "So … how does this work?"

"Well, luckily, you seem like you're already in excellent shape," All Might answered, "which is good, because this is an extraordinarily powerful quirk, and an unprepared body would likely explode if it tried to use it."

Harry suddenly felt somewhat less sure of his choice.

"But your body appears strong, and if your spirit can match it, then …," All Might reached up and plucked one long, golden hair from his head, proffering it to the teen, "eat this!"

"…"

"…"

"…"

"To inherit my power, you've got to swallow some of my DNA. That's how it works!"

"…"

"…"

"… I NEED AN ADULT!"

Author's note: Now, before I say anything else, if any previous readers of mine are seeing this, I'd like it to be known that this is all my sister's fault. She loved this show and absolutely insisted that I watch it, and now, here we are. So yup, completely and undeniably her fault. All you guys who are ticked about how long it's taking me to update my other stories should totally blame her. I just work here.

On the plus side, though, I've finally had enough of my crippling ADD and have started taking medication for it again, so I might actually be able to start being productive and efficient with my time now.

The madness!

As for this story, though, you should know that I'm shooting for a more generally upbeat, humorous tone, but with some angst and drama sprinkled here and there for seasoning. I mention this because I've gotten some flack for these brief, darker turns in other stories of mine, so I thought I'd make sure you guys got a heads up beforehand. Even if things end up more zany and fun on the whole, they aren't going to stay that way in every single chapter throughout the whole thing. That would make for a pretty flat, one-note story to me. Conversely, however, even if things take a darker or more painful turn from time to time, they aren't going to stay there, either. That would make for a pretty joyless suckfest that I certainly wouldn't want to write.

So basically, you can expect a little bit of everything as you deal with a writer who's still trying to find his niche. Hopefully, it'll make for a fun and interesting ride!

Also, this story is going to be a multi-pairing, because that's still just who I am. I've settled on some of the members, but not all of them, so let me know your thoughts. Beyond that, the make-up of class 1-A is going to be changed up a bit compared to canon, too, with me replacing some of the (to me, at least) more boring or forgettable characters with others I find more interesting or fun, but the final cast isn't quite set in stone yet, so let me know your thoughts on that, too, if you're interested.

Oh, and there'll be some genderbent characters as well. Because why not, right? It's fanfiction. Might as well go a bit nuts.

Beyond that, I hope you enjoy the story, and I'll see you next time! Toodles!