Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Izuku’s fists clenched as he stared straight onto his computer screen, as if the computer itself offended his mother.

Neko’s words kept repeating in Izuku’s mind, over and over, as if a broken record.

“Your song…it saved me…”

He gritted his teeth, determination taking place in his eyes.

He will save them all.

Izuku yawned as he stared at his computer screen, mouse clicking as his cursor moved around to adjust the melodies for the song he was making. He took a glance at the time at the bottom right of his screen.

03:47.

Ah. It’s almost morning already? Well, it didn’t really matter. Homeroom starts at around eight, and even if Izuku did want to get in some jogging exercise before classes, he still had enough time.

Suddenly, a ‘ding!’ made its sound known through Izuku’s headphone, a notification popping up on his screen. He clicked it, leading to a DM from one of his friends, Neko.

[Neko]

<M.>

<Your nightcord status is online. Are you still awake?>

<Still making that song?>

Izuku chuckled lightly. Even through a message, Izuku could practically feel Neko’s concern for him. But that would make Neko a hypocrite, seeing as the other was also an insomniac.

[M]

<You’re one to talk, you cat-obsessed insomniac>

<Why are you still up?>

[Neko]

<Touche.>

<I’m writing the lyrics for the song>

And that’s enough of an answer for Izuku. So Izuku sent Neko a thumbs-up emoji as a reply, clicked away from nightcord and back to his music composing program, and promptly groaned.

Another ‘ding’ of notification. This time, it came from his band’s server.

[Neinan]

<Hey>

<I know damn well that all of you are still awake>

[Meia]

<No shit Sherlock>

[Neko]

<Wow, who would've guessed.>

[Neinan]

<Shut the fuck up>

<VC?>

Unsurprisingly, the first one to get into the voice-chat room was Meia, and when Izuku got in, Meia practically yelled his greetings, making Izuku take off his headphones for a moment to get rid of the ringing in his ears. When he put them back on, he was greeted with Neinan scolding Meia and telling him to “Be a little quieter, please, it is four in the fucking morning,” .

After that, they continued their work, only this time instead of silence Izuku was accompanied by Meia’s groans about accidently making the timing of the video off, Neinan’s complaints about not getting the proportions and colors of his drawings right, and Neko’s occasional huffs of frustration for not being able to find the right words for the lyrics.

And maybe Izuku does too, slumping in his seat and ranting about his song sounding off-tune and wrong. And maybe he smiled a little when Neko laughed, Neinan combating his rants with his own complaints, and Meia teasing him about how he was supposed to be the musical genius of the group.

Izuku felt at home.

“Have you ever heard of NK25?”

“Oh! It’s that online band that’s been gaining popularity lately, right?”

Izuku almost choked on his own spit. The two girls from the business course don't mind him at all, walking past him while looking at something on one of the girls’ phones. He shook his head, his hold on his notebook tightening.

Izuku has successfully turned away his friends’ offer at joining them at the cafeteria for lunch, saying that he needed to meet Aizawa-sensei to talk about something. Which was a big fat lie, and Izuku would have to do something to either strengthen his alibi or make up another lie.

Either way, he managed to find a secluded hallway, practically empty with only occasional students passing by. He peeked into a classroom, smiling when he realised the classroom was empty and plop himself to sit on one of the dusty chairs.

He put down his backpack and pulled out a small laptop, putting it on a somewhat clean table and turning it on. He clicked his tongue when he realised the battery was half-way down, but couldn’t be bothered to try and find an electric socket to charge it.

Izuku connected a pair of earphones to the laptop, opening his notebook. The notebook turned glorified music book was filled to the brim with musical notations and various notes on the songs itself. He flipped to the latest page he was working on, booting up the music composing program in his laptop.

He sighed.

It was inconvenient, and very risky, to work on his songs while at school. But he promised his bandmates that he’ll finish the song by tomorrow, so they could get a move on the other parts of the music video they were making.

And, well. He promised himself he would never stop composing songs until he could make a song that could save his friends.

So he put on his earphones, and pushed the play button.

Chapter Text

@M’s keyboard

<Hey, have you guys heard NK25’s new song yet?>

@User_zero

<NK25? Who’s that?>

@M’s keyboard

<An online band that makes their own songs and MVs. They’ve been gaining popularity recently after the song they made last year became a hit! You should take a listen to their latest song!>

@User_zero

<Oh wow you’re right! Their song is amazing!>

@All.M_fan

<I just listened to their newest song. I might become a fan after that! But their song was so…>

@M’s keyboard

<Emotional? Gut-wrenching? It’s like the song stabs into you, right?>

@All.M_fan

<Yeah! Exactly!>

@Hawksisamazing

<Their name is a bit weird though. What are they like anyway?>

@M’s keyboard

<The thing is, nobody really knows. They’re an anonymous music group, consisting of four members. Two of them are in charge of the music making, while the other two are in charge of the illustrations and MVs. All of them sings, though, and they all sound amazing!>

@M’s keyboard

<And NK25 isn’t their actual name. It’s just what everyone calls them. Their real name is…>

Izuku quietly creeped back to his bedroom, not wanting to wake his mother up. He avoided the floorboards where he knew would creak when someone stepped on it, and sighed when he finally reached the door of his bedroom. Slowly opening the door, he winced when the click of the door was far too loud for this time of the night.

He shut the door close and locked it, letting out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. The room was dark, the curtains shut and the only light illuminating the room was the light from  the monitors of his computer. Izuku stepped over a couple of piles of books and papers, all related to music, making his way to his desk. He shoved a stack of music sheets beside his computer, wincing when he realised he’ll probably need it later, before setting the cup of instant noodles down onto the desk.

He put on his headphones, taking the cup noodles into his hands once again and started eating the noodles with his chop-sticks.

Izuku took out his phone, scrolling through social media while he ate his noodles.

“Hmm…our fans seem to love our newest song that we released last week. There’s a lot of new fans as well…” Izuku’s eyes widened a bit as he clicked on another post. “Oh, someone made a fanart based on our song. It looks really pretty,”

“Some people already started making covers of our song as well,” Izuku squawked in surprise from the voice that suddenly talked through his headphones, surprised and holding for dear life onto his instant noodles cup that almost fell from his lap.

“Gah-?! Neko-kun!” Neko laughed at Izuku’s distraught voice, very much enjoying his misery.

“Hahahaha-! Sorry, M,” Neko’s voice doesn’t sound sorry at all. Izuku grumbled. “Also, sorry for taking so long to log in. I gotta finish up some of my school work,”

“Yeah, yeah. Don’t worry about it,” Izuku dismissed him, clearly still annoyed.

Another ping was heard. A second later, another voice joined in.

“Neko! You’re back! How’s school?” Meia’s cheerful voice—far too cheerful for this time of the night—was heard.

“Shitty. Nothing’s new,” Izuku could practically feel Neko shrugging his shoulders. Meia let out a sharp laugh.

“No surprise in that!”

Another ping. A tired yawn made itself known.

“God I am tired- Oh, Neko’s back. How are you?” Neinan asked, another yawn coming out of him.

“Not good.”

“Mood.”

A comfortable silence fell over the voice-chat, all of them resuming their own work. Izuku ate the last bits of his instant noodles, debating whether he should go back to the kitchen to get an egg and microwave it with the noodle broth, before Neinan spoke up.

“Hey, M, I finished the rough sketch for the thumbnail illustration. Could you take a look?” Izuku nodded before he remembered that his friends couldn’t see him, giving a hum of agreement as a notification popped up on his screen, a message and a file from Neinan in their shared nightcord server.

“Oh yeah, I also finished the draft for the MV animations itself. Dunno if it’ll fit your song really well, since your song is still half-way finished,” Another notification from Meia, a video file attached to his message.

“I also have a couple of arrangements you could maybe add to the song, M,” Neko sent a couple of audio files on the server, and a couple more of text files. “And also a rough look of what the lyrics may sound like,”

“Thank you, everyone. I’ll take a look once I finish the song draft,” Izuku said, smiling at how hard his friends were working. “You guys should get some rest. You have classes too, right?”

“I’m not tired yet so- Wait, shit, I still need to finish up my support gadget project! See you guys tomorrow night!” Meia suddenly logged off, sending the rest into quiet chuckles.

“Well, now that Meia said that I just remembered I have a practical test tomorrow so I should probably rest. Good night guys!” Neinan said his farewell before logging off.

“What about you, Neko-kun?” Izuku asked the only other person in the voice chat.

“Fortunately, I don’t have any sudden tests or due projects, so I’ll stay up a bit longer,” Neko replied, “I’ll go mute though,”

“Yeah go ahead. I’m gonna sneak into the kitchen to get an egg,” Ignoring Neko’s sounds of confusion, Izuku muted himself, before taking a deep breath and sneaking out of his room once more.

Microwaved instant noodles broth with an egg is a pretty good midnight snack, in Izuku’s humble opinion. On another note, the apartment was peaceful at night. While his mother isn’t home often because of her work in the hospital, the apartment was never this quiet. There were always sounds, whether it’s from the television, the kitchen when his mother was home and cooking, or even from outside when the windows were opened wide.

He shoved another spoonful of the egg-broth-custard-thing into his mouth, listening to the arrangements made by Neko from his phone, his fingers tapping against the dining table with the rhythm. As the soft melodies of the song went through his earphones, his mind started to wander, eyes passively gazing out the window where you could see the dark starry sky.

Izuku couldn’t really remember when music started to become something he’s actively pursuing. Maybe it started after he met Neko and the others? Maybe it was when he first uploaded his song to Herotube? Was it when he was re-introduced to the world of music at middle school, or was his passion for music never died out ever since he was little?

Bittersweet memories of faint piano tunes and soft singing voices flashed through his mind, the familiar yet unfamiliar voice of his father singing to him while quiet giggles of his mother accompanied them, Izuku’s own joyful laughter adding to the supposedly cheerful atmosphere.

And yet, Izuku could only grit his teeth.

“Dad…are you going to come back?”

Hitoshi blindly reached for his phone that was noisily ringing, pressing the stop button to stop the alarm. He straightened up on his bed, yawning as he stretched his arms up.

“Good morning shitty world,” He murmured to himself, throwing his blanket away.

Hitoshi got up, dragging himself to the bathroom. He slowly goes through his morning routine, not really eager to get to class early. Washing his face, brushing his teeth, attempting to tame his wild hair before giving up, before changing out of the clothes he used to sleep into his UA uniform.

Looking at himself in the mirror, he noticed that his eyebags—somehow—got even worse. He groaned. He has to deal with his insomnia one day, lest this bitch of an insomnia got in the way with him becoming a hero.

Not today though.

Walking out of the bathroom, his feet touched a piece of paper on the floor. Raising an eyebrow, he grabbed the paper, eyes briefly scanning the contents.

Oh, right, he thought. The lyrics for our song.

He gently put the piece of paper on his desk, sitting alongside his other music sheets where words upon words of lyrics and notes upon notes of song arrangements were written on.

Hitoshi spent countless nights upon those papers, pouring out words he never got to say before.

But now?

Now he will sing.

He sighed and grabbed his bookbag, almost tripping over his guitar case where it was laying on the ground. With a grumble, he shoved it under his bed. He’ll tidy up his room later.

Carefully opening the door, he noticed how there were sounds coming from the kitchen downstairs. Huh. Seems like he’s not getting breakfast today.

Not wanting to risk getting caught up with his foster parents early in the morning, Hitoshi quickly walked downstairs and headed straight to the door, mumbling out a half-hearted “Good morning,” and farewell as slid on his shoes, before going out to make his way to school.

He ignored the muzzle sitting on the cabinet near the door.

Neito grumbled, shutting off the alarm of his digital clock. He stared at the ceiling of his bedroom, before kicking off his blanket and jumping off his bed, trying to regain some sort of energy after staying up all night stressing about his drawings.

His feet hit the ground and nearly knocked over a bucket of blue paint, which he slid under his bed so as to not actually get knocked over by him next time. Kicking off some brushes and paints to the side, he made his way to the bathroom, getting ready for the day.

After changing into his UA uniform, he left the bathroom, taking note of his messy room. Paints and art supplies were scattered everywhere, the only somewhat clear space was his desk, where his computer and drawing tablet sat, and his bed. A couple canvasses sat in the corner of his room, some with finished paintings, some only half-finished, and some empty.

His eyes landed on the violin case sitting in another corner of the room, near his desk. Even from here, he could see the dust covering the surface of the case.

Ah, Neito furrowed his eyebrows, Maybe a little cleaning up is long due.

Well, it’s not like he has to anyway. Neito thrived in the chaos that is his bedroom, already memorized where everything and anything is. Really, the only reason he has to clean up his room is so his parents won’t berate him for having such a messy room.

But both of his parents were on a business trip, and very unlikely to be back soon.

So with a sigh, he grabbed his bookbag and left his bedroom. He quickly went to the empty kitchen to grab something as a quick breakfast, before sliding on his shoes and going out the front door.

“I’m off to school!” He yelled to no one, before closing the door.

He ignored the pang of hurt in his heart when no one answered.

“Mei! Dear, c’mon! You’re gonna be late for school!”

“Yeah! Give me a minute!” Mei rolled his eyes as he finally went up from his desk and headed towards the bathroom down the hallway. After quickly showering and changing his clothes, he glanced at the mirror to fix his hair, only to pause.

His UA uniform was still the ones for the female students; the one with the skirt. He hasn’t gotten around to asking Maijima-sensei to exchange his current uniform for the male students, partly because he hasn’t properly come out, partly because he’d rather not deal with the headache he was sure to get from his mother.

He grimaced as he stared at the dark green skirt hugging his waist, before shaking his head and deciding not to dwell on it any further.

Going back to his bedroom, he went to grab his bookbag, noticing how beside his bed, the rest of the room looked like it had seen better days. All sorts of inventions and tools were scattered around and covered part of his room, most of them half-finished, while the other half of his room were filled with costumes and props he was currently working on. One corner of his bedroom was dedicated to a large green screen, where a camera and more boxes filled with props sat. The large continuous desk sitting against one of the walls was covered with his inventions projects, leaving a small room for his computer. A small detachable drum set was pushed beside his desk, put there for easy access.

A shipwreck, as his mother would describe. He huffed.

Swiping the key to his bedroom, he locked it before going downstairs, his parents cheerfully greeting him.

“Well if it isn’t our dearest daughter!” His mother went to hug him, but he easily leaned away and grabbed a piece of toast. His mother frowned, before the awfully sweet smile was back on her face.

“Honey, you should take better care of your hair, you know? Can’t have this beautiful hair get cut off,” His mother ran her fingers through his long hair that he has been trying to get cut, supposedly a soothing and comforting gesture.

“Okay, okay,” Mei gently pulled her hand out of his hair. His father chuckled, looking up from his newspaper.

“You’re off to school already?” He asked, as Mei tied up his hair.

“Yeah, I need to get to the labs early to finish a project,” Finishing his toast, he went out the front door, waving at his parents.

“Have a good day my sweet girl!” His mother waved back.

Mei nodded and ignored how her words left a bitter taste in his mouth.

Izuku sighed.

The clock just struck 6 AM. He would need to begin getting ready for school if he wanted to catch one of the early trains to arrive at school early.

He stared at the empty noodle cup sitting in front of him.

He couldn’t wait for night time to fall.

Chapter Text

“Deku-kun! Good morning!” Izuku jolted as he was startled by Uraraka’s greeting. He grinned shyly and waved.

“Morning, Uraraka-san,” He said, as he made his way to his seat, Uraraka following him.

“Midoriya!” Iida suddenly appeared from behind Izuku, chopping his hand in a reprimanding manner. “Have you gotten enough sleep?! It’s important to have enough rest to become a proper hero!”

Izuku tilted his head in confusion, to which Tsuyu spoke up to answer his silent question. “Your eyebags are pretty dark, kero,” She said, thoughtful, “You’ve always had eyebags but today it looked pretty bad, kero”

“Wait, really?” Kirishima butt-in. “I noticed that Mido-bro has dark eyebags today- but has he always had it??”

“Did you seriously not notice?” Ashido rested her hands on her hips, a smirk on her face. “Even Denki-kun commented about Midori-kun’s eyebags! Not enough to rival Aizawa- sensei’s , though,”

As the class went into a debate of who has the darkest eyebags that could rival Aizawa- sensei’s (“The brainwash guy from the general course! Have you seen his eyebags?!” “That’s obvious!! That’s why we’re looking for other candidates,”), Izuku sat down and lost himself within his thoughts. He took a glance at the window beside him, noting his own reflection who stared back and, yes, his eyebags do look pretty bad.

I never noticed it before, but I guess it got more prominent ever since I started staying awake all night instead of just an hour or two…maybe I should borrow mom’s make-up to cover it up-?

The bell signaling the start of homeroom rang, and with it stood Aizawa- sensei on the podium in front, in all his truthfully horrendous yellow sleeping bag glory.

“Monoma! Did you even sleep last night??” Izuku glanced curiously from where he was looking at today’s lunch menu. It was the class president of class 1-B, Kendou Itsuka, who spoke.

“Hm-? Yeah, don’t worry,” The addressed person, Monoma Neito, replied from where he was standing next to Kendou, buying his own lunch. “Just got caught up in working on a- project,”

Izuku internally winced when he managed to look at Monoma’s face. 

Yeah, it’s no wonder why Kendou got concerned. Those eyebags looked pretty bad.

“Deku-kun, don’t take too long choosing your lunch!” Uraraka whined from behind him. Izuku shook his head and quickly chose something from the menu, paying for it before getting the lunch tray from Lunch-Rush.

They all finally settled down for lunch at one of the few empty cafeteria tables. Mindless chatters started to rise, and Izuku smiled as he joined in the conversation.

“Guys~!” Ashido cheerfully waved at them as she approached their table. “Mind if we join?”

The rest of the so-called ‘Bakusquad’ came, with Kirishima dragging a disgruntled looking Bakugou. When Bakugou looked up, he locked eyes with Izuku. Izuku gulped and glanced away, and, surprisingly, Bakugou also looked away.

“K- Kacchan,” Izuku tried to say. But Bakugou only ripped his arm from Kirishima’s grip and stomped away.

“Don’t worry about him,” Kirishima laughed. “He’s been in a bad mood lately,”

Conversations started back up. Izuku sighed and went back to eating his lunch, eyes sometimes flitting around the cafeteria in hopes of catching a glance of the hot-headed blond.

He never did manage to see Katsuki until the bell signaling the end of lunch rang.

A faint explosion was heard from the general direction of the support course. Izuku eyed a couple of students from the support course running past him to where Izuku knew the teachers’ lounge was located. Izuku stopped one of them, curiosity getting the best of him.

“Hey, excuse me? What happened??” The support course student let out a tired sigh.

“The usual- Hatsume. She's already insane when coherent and awake, but a tired and sleep deprived Hatsume? Absolute hell,” The student shook their head before running off again to help their friends find a teacher.

Still confused and a tad bit concerned, Izuku turned around and went back into his classroom. It was the last period of the day, and supposedly their teacher suddenly got a mission, so Aizawa- sensei just came in to give them the homework for that day and head out, saying if no other teacher came in to replace the period within fifteen minutes, they’re free to go home.

At least half of the class were huddled together, participating in a group prayer, praying that every single teacher for the first-years forgot they got a free period and didn't come in. Iida was scolding them with his signature hand-chopping motion, something about how they all should be responsible students and go fetch a teacher to fill in the period. Yaoyorozu on the other hand was secretly clasping her hands beneath her desk, no doubt also silently praying that they could all just go home.

Izuku himself was counting down the minutes on the clock attached to the wall at the back of the classroom. If he could get back earlier than usual, then that meant that he could work on the song earlier, which meant that he could finish it earlier also.

Which meant that they could release the song earlier, and wouldn’t that be a nice surprise for their fans?

“Ten minutes left!” Kaminari yelled. Some of Izuku’s classmates cheered.

Izuku took out his phone, going into his social media. Using his second account, he went into Night-keys’ account, going through the comments that people left. Some of them were rude, hateful comments, but most of them were encouraging and full of praise. Izuku smiled to himself as warmth bloomed in his heart.

Some people even went as far as to make fanarts of their online personas. Some were cool, some were cute, but all of them were absolutely amazing. A drawing of their personas as if they were in a group picture caught his eye- maybe he could convince his bandmates to ask the artist permissions to use it as their new socials’ profile picture.

Going into Herotube also revealed that a lot of musicians- most small but there were one or two pretty popular musicians- who covered their songs. Izuku still couldn’t believe they’ve gotten popular enough to get this many fanworks.

“Five minutes guys!” This time, Ashido’s the one who yelled. Yaoyorozu’s hands seemed to clasped tighter.

A thread-post about an analysis on them. Izuku clicked on it.

@NK25_ON_TOP

<An analysis on nk25’: songs, themes, and members. A thread>

The first few posts on the thread were about their backgrounds. Personas, what people know of them, and everything else. The first analysis was on Meia, continued with Neinan and Neko, before finally on M, or Izuku himself.

@NK25_ON_TOP

<First member and leader of the group, M: M’s persona centres around a rabbit. Described as kind-hearted by the other members of nk25 themselves, he’s the one who glued the group together. He’s the main composer of the group, and just by listening you could feel how much love and hard-work he put into his songs…>

It was a long text-post. Izuku could feel heat climbing up to color his cheeks. He skipped a bit, before a sentence caught his eye.

@NK25_ON_TOP

<...M himself has once said that the reasons he made songs in the first place was to help people…>

It was true. Izuku remembered one day making a post about it on their main official account. It was around when he was a second year in middle school, so their online band wasn’t really that popular yet.

(That day, Izuku came home with burn scars and bruises all over him. That day, he came home to an empty apartment. That day, nobody logged into their nightcords when the clock struck 1 AM. That day, Meia called him privately in the middle of a panic attack. That day, Neinan sent a picture of his finished painting on a canvas that was ripped. That day, Neko texted him about whether he knew where to buy the cheapest first-aid kits in a hurry. That day, Izuku opened their empty social media page and wrote a post in determination.)

Izuku wants to help people. That was really the only reason he did anything at all. The songs he made were an attempt to help people. Because he wants to help, to save, people that were suffering because the world dealt them a bad hand.

(One day, and he swore to himself that one day he would save his friends.)

“Fifteen minutes are up! You know what that means!” Simultaneously, several people stood up, their bags held ready in their hands. Excited chatters rose around them as one by one they exited the classroom. With a sigh, Izuku grabbed his own bag and went on his way out.

A ‘ding’ was heard. Izuku looked back to his phone. A notification from Nightcord- specifically, from his and his friends’ server. He clicked on it, leading to the app he had come to spend so much time on.

It was a message from Neinan, all capslock and panicked.

[Neinan]

<GUYS>

<HAVE ANY OF YOU BEEN ABLE TO CONTACT NEKO??>

Concerning, but not really surprising. Neko’s the kind of person who would take at least half an hour to respond to a message, unless it was something important. No offense to that- Izuku himself was sometimes a slow responder. But Neinan’s notorious in annoying every single one of them at least once a day, and at this point only Neko was able to annoy him back (Izuku usually couldn’t come up with a good response. Meia usually replied with something so unhinged that made Neinan himself put down his phone).

So yes, a bit concerning.

[Meia]

<???>

<Why? What’s wrong??>

[Neinan]

<I’VE BEEN TRYING TO TEXT HIM SINCE AFTER LUNCH>

<AND HE NEVER REPLIED>

To be honest, even Izuku doesn’t see the problem.

[M]

<It’s still school hours right>

<Maybe he’s still in class?>

[Neinan]

<No you don’t understand>

<I sent him cat videos.>

<He never NOT reply to those!>

Okay, now Izuku is a bit more concerned. He was about to reply back when muffled voices were heard. He looked around. The hallways were empty, since technically it was still school hours, and the others were still having classes. Turns out, he managed to make his way to the front of the teacher’s lounge without realising it.

The door was slightly open, and a glance inside, Izuku could see Aizawa talking with a concerned face to Kan. Looking around once more, Izuku shuffled a little to get closer to the open door to eavesdrop a little.

“-I just have a bad feeling, Sekijiro. I mean, even Hizashi was concerned,” Aizawa sipped on a mug of coffee. Kan crossed his arms, tilting his head in thought.

“I think all of us know something concerning is happening to him, Shouta. But we can’t exactly do anything about it, either,” Kan sighed.

“I know, but- have you seen the kid’s face?” Aizawa waved his free hand around. “There’s a scar on his face, Sekijiro. A muzzle shaped scar.”

“I know you’re worried about Shinsou, Shouta, but also we can’t do anything unless the kid said something was wrong himself or we somehow gained enough evidence to launch an investigation!”

Izuku leaned in a bit more. Were they talking about Shinsou Hitoshi? What happened that made the both of them so worried?

“Hizashi said that his foster parents just- called out of nowhere, and demanded Shinsou to go back home because of a, quote unquote emergency,” Aizawa huffed, “They didn’t even elaborate what happened! Just yelled at Hizashi to get the kid go back home! He just started to eat lunch for fucks sake-”

“Look, both you and I are pissed and worried, but like I said, there’s not much we could do other than to ask Shinsou about it tomorrow-” Izuku’s phone rang again from another notification. Both of the teachers inside froze, and Izuku took that as a cue to run.

As he tried to run as quietly as possible, he could hear the click of the door shut behind him.

It has been an entire week, and there were still no signs of Neko.

“Where the hell is he?”

It was already 2 AM. Usually, all of them would’ve logged in by now in their call to discuss their song, but the fact that Neko hasn’t logged in for an entire week made everyone tense.

Izuku could hear Neinan anxiously tapping a pen against his desk, and Meia was so unusually quiet that he almost forgot he was there. Izuku himself was wringing his hands, desperate to continue making his song but also hesitating because Neko wasn’t there.

“Today really is a bad day, huh,” Meia said absentmindedly. Neinan could be heard slamming both of his hands against his desk.

“Oh you can’t even begin to imagine!” Izuku held back a groan when Neinan went into a full-long spiel.

“Not only did my class lose to that damned class A and Neko not responding to any of my messages, my parents also came home! And the first thing they did was scold me!” He continued to complain about his bad, very not good, super horrible day.

Izuku let his head rest on his arms as he listened to his friend. He dragged his eyes around, wondering if he should just go to sleep if he won’t get anything done anyway, when his eyes landed on a new message in their server that he didn’t realise was sent.

It was an untitled audio file. What was weird, was that no one sent it at all. It was just there.

He dragged his cursor to the file, wondering aloud.

“Hey, did any of you send this file?”

Neinan’s sputtering as he has to stop his long rant and Meia’s confused questions was the last thing he heard before he clicked on it and blinding white filled his vision.

Chapter Text

“What the fuck.” A familiar voice said. Izuku bleary opened his eyes, blinking rapidly at how dry his eyes were.

“Oh? Ten million -kun! You're awake!” A familiar nickname. Izuku finally took in his surroundings. The first thing he noticed was a certain pink-haired girl from the U.A support course, looking down at him with mild concern. The second he noticed was the resident blond class 1-A bully from class 1-B, a hand on his hip as he looked around. The third thing he noticed, was that he was in an unfamiliar place.

The place they're in was…empty. That's the first thing that came to mind. But another glance around confirmed that there were weird metal towers that were on the verge of falling apart, and triangle shaped hills scattered around. There was a stage nearby, a plain circular white stage, with only a measly ladder to climb up to it. Looking into the horizon, Izuku could see nothing but an endless void. Then he looked up.

A gasp was ripped out of him. The sky was also a void, but there were…mirrors? paintings? windows? floating all over. All of them had different colored frames, all dull and muted. He squinted as he tried to see what's inside the floating rectangular frames, but could see nothing but fog.

“W- where are we?” He asked. Monoma turned his head towards him, a slight scowl on his face.

“No clue, 1-A golden boy,” He said, “Whatever happened, we need to get out of here,” It seemed like even he wasn't in the mood to mock Izuku and his class to kingdom come.

“If only I have my gadgets here…” Hatsume muttered miserably.

The sounds of echoing footsteps and faint conversations were heard coming closer, and both Izuku and Monoma stood on guard, Izuku slightly pulling Hatsume to stand behind him. Lifting his arm, he activated his quirk only…it didn't work?

No time to be confused and worried about it, two people came into view as they rounded around one of the triangle hills. A familiar indigo-haired boy, and…

“Hatsune Miku?!” Izuku blurted out. All of them froze.

“Wha…Midoriya? Monoma?” Shinsou lightly jogged towards him. Monoma lowered his stance, relaxing and crossing his arms.

“Shinsou? What are you doing here?” Monoma asked.

Shinsou looked like he had seen better days. There was a still purple bruise on one of his cheeks, and a lined scar that crossed over his nose. His already dark eyebags somehow looked even darker, and Izuku could see just how tired he was.

“You’d think I’ll know,” Shinsou sighed.

“Oh, good.” A monotone and robotic voice said. Izuku once again stared at what was supposed to be the world-famous virtual singer. “All of you are here,”

Miku looked…different, from what Izuku remembered. Izuku was sure she had bright turquoise hair, but this Miku has wavy white hair that faded into faint turquoise at the end, tied into asymmetrical twin ponytails. She's wearing a white frilly dress with black suspenders and a red ribbon tied around her collar. Dark mismatched stockings wrapped around her legs, and just now Izuku realized she was barefoot. For a moment, Izuku wondered if she was cold, before he mentally slapped himself, because how would a literal virtual idol feel anything.

“...What.” Izuku couldn't agree more with Monoma's wise words.

“Welcome to the Endless SEKAI, everyone. I have been waiting for you,” Miku said, her face as blank as ever. The three of them simultaneously looked at Shinsou, who shrugged.

“What's…what?” This time it's Hatsume’s turn to be confused. Miku nodded knowingly.

“You all must be confused,” She said. Izuku didn't miss the way Shinsou muttered “Damn right we are,” under his breath.

“Wait, hold on-” Monoma waved his hands around. “How did we get here??”

“Apparently,” Shinsou said, “It has something to do with an…untitled audio file?”

“Oh right!” Hatsume clapped her hands. “It’s the one M asked about, right?” She paused. “Wait.”

Realization slowly dawned onto them all.

“Oh, oh,” Monoma scoffed. “I can't believe I’ve been making music with the golden boy of 1-A this whole time!”

“Oh wow,” Shinsou raised an eyebrow. “Couldn't believe our first meeting would be in this weird creepy place,”

“I was expecting us to meet up at a cafe or something,” Hatsume said, who sat on the ground at some point.

“So then…” Izuku mumbled to himself, before pointing a finger at Shinsou. “Neko,” He moved the finger to Monoma. “Neinan,” His finger finally landed on Hatsume. “Meia,”

Hatsume nodded. Shinsou hummed in confirmation. Monoma looked away.

“You’re M then?” Hatsume asked. “Yeah,” He grinned sheepishly. “Nice to meet you all,”

“But wait,” Izuku tilted his head. “Meia? I thought you’re a…” Guy. Izuku remembered clearly when Meia first joined them, being oddly passionate about them calling and referring to him as a guy. 

But Hatsume was a girl.

It seemed like both Monoma and Shinsou were also questioning this. Meia shook her- his- their head quickly.

“Long story,” They said. “I would prefer it if you guys refer to me as a guy when we're not at school, though,”

Monoma hummed. “Alright then,” He shrugged, before turning back to Miku. “So? Explanation please?”

“This is a SEKAI,” She said. “A world born from your combined feelings,” Concerning, considering most of this place is empty and void.

“...so we got isekai’d.” Shinsou summed up. Hatsume nodded sagely at him.

“Basically.” Miku also nodded.

“Our feelings, huh…” Monoma looked around once more. “Our ‘feelings’ are quite empty,”

“That’s why I am here,” Miku said again. “I am here to help you all find your true feelings. Then, when you all finally found your true feelings, a song could be borned from them,”

She turned towards Izuku. “Izuku,” she said, “Do you remember your true feelings?”

“I…” What were his true feelings? What does that even mean? Did she mean his dream to become a hero?

“...I want to become a hero,” Izuku finally said. Miku’s face was still blank, but somehow, her face became sadder.

“...What about you, Neito? Mei?” She turned towards Monoma and Hatsume.

Monoma shrugged. “I want to become a hero as well,”. Hatsume tilted his head. “I want to become the best inventor and inherit the Hatsume industries!”

Miku looked even sadder, if that was even possible with her blank expression. Izuku was starting to feel anxious.

“What about you, Hitoshi?” She asked again. Shinsou shoved his hands into his pockets. “I want to become a hero also, and prove everyone wrong,” He then shrugged. “I guess,”

Miku looked away. “None of you have found your true feelings yet,”

Confusion and anxiety were all Izuku could feel. He looked around; the others were in a similar predicament.

Hatsume scrunched his eyes shut, thinking hard, before he perked up. “Oh! I want to build one of the robots for U.A that Nedzu’s gonna use for next year’s entrance exam!”

Monoma shook his head. “I want to beat class 1-A!”

Shinsou looked up in thought. “I want to transfer into the hero course?”

Izuku put a hand under his chin. “I…want to collect all the rare collectibles All Might merch that was produced a few years ago and discontinued?”

They all looked at him. Izuku turned beet red. “What?” He exclaimed, “That’s my true feelings!”

A couple more minutes passed as they all tried to guess what their true feelings were, Miku shaking her head as the guesses got more random and absurd.

“Everyone,” Miku looked overwhelmed. “This feeling is something all of you shared…”

Everyone once again got deep in thought. Izuku noticed how Shinsou looked up at the void sky with the floating rectangular frames, his eyes suddenly faraway.

“I…” He started, hands falling limp to his sides.

“...want to disappear.”

Silence fell. Izuku and the others looked at him.

“I mean,” He turned towards them, and threw his arms to gesture to the whole place. “This- SEKAI thing, it’s like- our feelings, right?”

“And look at this place,” He slowly walked around. “Empty. The only thing here that’s worth mentioning were the windows floating in the sky,”

“And we can’t even reach those windows,” Monoma continued, “The windows to our…”

“Hopes. And dreams.” Hatsume said.

“The perfect place to disappear in,” Izuku finished. Hatsume huffed, letting himself fall to lay on the cold floor. “Well, this is depressing,”

“Our ‘true feelings’ is that we want to disappear, huh,” Monoma chuckled humorlessly. “Sounds about right; at least to me,”

The silence was deafening.

Miku kneeled beside Hatsume, and started running her hand through his hair. Hatsume closed his eyes, relaxed.

“...How do we get out?” Izuku asked. Miku pointed towards his pocket where he kept his phone. “You can just pause the Untitled song,” When he pulled out his phone, there was indeed an untitled audio file playing.

It would be best if they got out immediately. So he looked up, mouth open to ask them to take out their phones- but no words came.

Hatsume looked peaceful, which was rare for him. He was comfortable just lying on the floor, letting Miku play with his hair. Monoma was sitting curled up, his arms hugging his legs and head resting on his knees. Shinsou was sitting with his legs out, leaning back on his arms and eyes closed as a faint breeze Izuku didn’t notice was there before played with his messy hair.

“...Do you guys want to stay for a while?” Miku asked. Izuku looked into Miku’s mismatched eyes, and sighed, before lying down on the floor and resting his head on his arm.

“...Yes,” He said, before closing his eyes.

Disappearing doesn’t sound too bad after all.

Morning came. Izuku got ready as usual, bid goodbye to his mom, and rode the train to get to U.A.

Nothing happened.

Monoma mocked class 1-A, as usual. Shinsou was last seen disappearing to an abandoned hallway for lunch, as usual. Hatsume was causing chaos in the support course’s labs, as usual.

Nothing happened. Nothing changed. It was like they all had a silent agreement to not mention anything that happened last night.

Izuku doesn’t mind it. Not really. It just meant that he now knew the true identities of his online friends. And it’s not like they stopped making music.

When the night came, they still talked over the voice chat together, and still made songs together. Neko still teased Neinan until he blew up. Meia still talked all their ears off with his cheerful voice. Izuku still silently listened to his friends while composing his song, occasionally adding his own words.

And yeah, sometimes Neinan asked Izuku about a homework that both class 1-A and 1-B had, or sometimes Meia would warn them all to not come close to the support course labs tomorrow lest they got exploded to pieces, or Neko would asked them if they happened to see a specific stray cat he has been feeding but hasn’t found that day.

The only new thing was that sometimes, they would meet back up with each other in that empty world, and Miku would talk to them with a soft yet monotone voice, urging them to find their true feelings. Sometimes, they would all just lay down on the plain stage under the floating rectangular frames, and just- not exist, for a moment.

It was fine. They were in no hurry to do anything.

The empty feeling within Izuku said otherwise.

Chapter Text

Neito couldn’t sleep.

Well. That shouldn’t come off as much as a surprise, considering his late night activities, but for once, he was actually trying to sleep. A glance at the clock showed that the time was still around 2 AM. If Neito was to log into nightcord now, he bet that all of his friends were still online, working on their next song.

Thing is, Neito said on the server that he won’t be logging in tonight, partly because he was exhausted, partly because he didn’t want to risk it, with his parents being here.

Though the habit of practically not sleeping almost every night could not be extinguished easily, and Neito grumbled before jumping out of bed and grabbing his drawing tablet.

Turning on his computer quickly, he pulled up the art program, and opened a file. It wouldn’t hurt to work a bit more on the thumbnail for their MV right?

Neito tapped his finger against his desk repeatedly, frustration starting to grow inside of him. The draft looked fine- almost perfect, even! But now that he started to get to lineart, it looked all wrong. Coloring it just made it worse. No matter what color palette he tried it still doesn’t fit. It looked all weird.

As he pushed on and continued the coloring, it just kept getting worse. No matter what, the colors were all off, the lineart was messy, the perspective was weird- it was like Neito suddenly forgot how to draw!

Why can’t he make it work?!

He slammed his pen tablet down onto his desk, letting out a breath.

Someone was knocking on the door.

His heart stopped, for a moment. The knocking continued. Once. Twice. A jingle of keys. Neito doesn’t even need to turn around to know that his mother has just broken into his room with the spare keys he knew she had, that she kept ‘just in case of emergencies’.

“Neito,” The stern voice of his mother made Neito took a breath and turned his swivel chair around,

“Mother,” He simply greeted.

“I thought you were sleeping with the light on- what are you doing up this late?” She asked with a soft smile. Neito knew better.

“Just drawing. Nothing new,” He shrugged.

“Honey,” His mother put a hand up her cheek, looking worried. “How many times have I told you? Stop with all those useless art nonsense,”

Neito stayed quiet and still as his mother went on a spiel. “Honestly, you want to be a hero, right? Why not just drop all these…” She gestured to his whole room, eyes squinting as she looked disapprovingly at his art supplies that were scattered around. “...and focus on getting in 1-A and becoming a real hero?”

That’s another thing. His mother was insistent that 1-A was the superior class (Neito tried to defend his classmates when she insulted Kuroiro and Shishida. He was locked up in his room with no food for the rest of the night) and transferred out of 1-B to 1-A. Neito doesn’t want to though- he loves his class, he loves 1-B.

“...It’s not like they’re useful for your career- are you even listening?” Somewhere along the way Neito tuned out his mother and was only tuning back in. His mother sighed. “You know you won’t get anywhere with- with those things you called art,”

“They don’t even look like professional, beautiful paintings, Neito! They’re just straight up mediocre, borderline terrible,” She spat out her words, and Neito would be lying if he said he wasn’t hurt by this. He stayed quiet though, and his face was carefully blank.

His mother pinched the bridge of her nose. “This is why you will never be good enough, Neito,” She finally said, before turning around, not bothering to close the door. Neito got up and shut the door, locking it twice, before walking back and promptly collapsed back into his chair, no longer in the mood to continue drawing.

Neito sighed. “Never good enough, huh…” He glanced back at his unfinished drawing, before deleting the draft never to be seen again. He’ll probably regret it later, but he could always just draw a new one.

After all, his art was mediocre and terrible. How hard would it be to make another one?

He scrolled a bit through his art folder, and a file caught his eye. Huh. He’s been meaning to post this one to his ‘Neinan’ account, but hasn’t gotten around to doing it. Quickly opening his social media on his computer, he uploaded the artwork and didn’t bother much to tag it properly, before posting it.

Just a few minutes in, notifications were already going in. Some were positive, praising comments that brang a small smile on Neito’s face, but others…were rather filled with unsavory comments and words.

Night-keys at 25:00 wasn’t even that popular yet, but with the amount of hate he was getting just for posting an unrelated art to NK25 as Neinan, he might as well call them the most famous music group of them all.

He let out a wet laugh, and belatedly realised he was crying.

“Disappearing…” Neito hummed to himself. “It would be nice, just to disappear forever,”

“Hey, Neinan uploaded a new illustration last night!” Neito glanced up from his phone. Tsunotori was showing her phone screen to a mildly-interested Tokage. The green haired girl clicked her tongue, leaning back against her chair after looking at whatever picture Tsunotori was showing her.

“His drawing is good, but,” Tokage took another look at the picture, before shrugging. “I don’t know. ‘S not anything special I think,”

Not anything special?

Comments like those were nothing new to Neito- he has gotten lots of it in his career as an artist. He was used to it (no he wasn’t. Even if they were only words written on the screen, Neito never got used to it). But hearing those words said by a classmate of his? By his own friend? Even if she doesn’t know she was talking about him? Frankly, it still hurts.

“Right?” Komori suddenly spoke up, approaching the two girls. “His illustrations lately just seemed-” She gestured around, trying to find the right word. “Mediocre?”

Oh.

All Neito could feel was the awful throbbing pain in his heart- his mother was right after all.

“It’s still a really good drawing though!” Tsunotori said, before frowning slightly. “Although, if he kept drawing like this, I don’t think NK25 would get more popular anytime soon…”

His breathing picked up. There were ringing in his ears. If Neito’s assumption was right, then Tsunotori was showing Tokage the illustration he uploaded last night. Which was made a month or two back, and logically it would be different from his drawings now. But still, Neito remembered how he was so excited about the draft concept, sketching and colouring everything. And it took him a week and more to finish it, with how detailed he wanted it to be. But then he uploaded it, and everyone hated it. 

“Monoma?” Kendou was crossing her arms, head tilted. “Are you okay?”

Neito looked up at her, before smiling easily. “I’m fine! What makes you think otherwise?”

Kendou frowned, clearly not buying it, but only sighed in response. “Right, well, have you done the homework Kan-sensei gave us yesterday?”

Neito grinned. “Nope!” It completely slipped his mind, with how busy he was with his late night activities and his parents coming back home.

“Aw man! I was about to ask you if I could copy yours!” Tetsutetsu deflated from where he was standing beside Neito’s desk. Kendou shook her head.

“Honestly, it’s either you already did it a week before the deadline, or you haven’t done it at all,” With a heavy sigh, Kendou pulled out her already done homework sheet and shoved it towards Neito and Tetsutetsu.

“Thanks, Kendou!” Neito’s grin widened as he pulled out his still blank homework sheet, quickly copying down the answers while Tetsutetsu scrambled to his desk to get his own.

Kendou clicked her tongue. “You better finish copying it all in five minutes,” She turned around and pulled out her phone, busying herself with it while Tetsutetsu scrambled back with a beaming “Thanks!” at Kendou.

The rest of the day went by, with Neito only half-focusing in class and busying his hands with doodling in the margins of his notes. At one point he even came up with a new concept sketch for his band’s new album cover. He’ll have to ask M about it later at night.

Speaking about M…. Neito rested his chin on his hand, his other hand still busy with the sketch on a page of his math notebook. I still can’t wrap around the fact that my bandmates go to the same school as me…

Laughable, isn’t it? Midoriya, the resident sunshine and one of the top students from class 1-A, the optimist and always cheering on his friends, the picture perfect of a hero in training- is M, the quiet song composer who chuckled softly when Neito and Neko got into an argument. The composer who could make songs so warm and soft it would be able to hug your heart, yet could also make songs so raw and emotional it’s practically gut-wrenching. M, who saw his flaws and pain, and still smiled kindly at him, offering Neito his hand.

Neito’s hand stopped drawing. It was a sketch of the SEKAI, the world where Neito somehow felt more at home even if it was devoid of life. Miku stood at the centre on the circular stage, expression blank as ever. Leaning against the stage was Neko- Shinsou, crossing his arms and eyes closed, relaxed. Sitting cross-legged on the ground beside him was Me- Hatsume, also leaning back and looking as relaxed as they could be. And beside Miku, sitting on the edge of the stage, legs dangling a bit and kind eyes looking up at Miku, was…Midoriya.

Hah. Neito would never get used to this.