Eight months, that's how much time had passed.
Eight grueling months, without sleep, without food.
Just because I knew, I could do much more, be much more.
And even if I was just able to save one more person, if I was just able to cheer up one person, if I was able to ease someone's worries. Then it was all worth it, every sacrifice I had done and would continue to do.
Every single one was worth it.
Yet right now I couldn't sacrifice this, for it was a road, the road to do the most good.
The weight of those eight months pressed against my shoulders, taking their toll however small it was.
I had crossed Japan more times than I could count, from the northern peaks of Hokkaido to the southern islands of Kyushu.
Every prefecture, every major city, countless smaller towns. The numbers kept growing in my head, eighteen thousand three hundred and forty three people saved. Each face burned into my memory, each grateful smile, each tearful thank you.
The old woman in Hiroshima who had clutched my hand after I pulled her from the wreckage of her collapsed home.
The construction worker in Sendai whose legs I'd freed from under a fallen beam. The child in Fukuoka who had been trapped in a villain's ice quirk for hours before I arrived.
All of them mattered.
All of them had lives to return to, families to embrace, dreams to pursue.
And I would save them, simply because it was right.
Right now, I was wearing a suit similar to Nezu's, Excalibur hung on my waist and Nezu's scarf was circling my neck. I had just finished eating, showering, doing my due diligence to look... presentable as Nezu had called it. I honestly didn't understand it.
I pulled at my pants, suddenly feeling them pressing against my thighs, which were starting to sweat, probably from nerves.
I stood at Nezu's side, Nezu himself was on his desk chair looking at the monitor, licking his paws and grooming his fur, probably to look the best it could. It seems even he felt nervous every once in a while.
And today was that once in a while.
Not a great sign if I was being honest.
"Nezu," I said quietly, adjusting the collar of the suit, "what if they say no?"
His grooming stopped entirely. For a long moment, the only sound in the office was.. actually there wasn't a sound in the office, there were sounds outside the office, mainly the training grounds below but I digress.
"They won't say no."
"But what if they do say no."
"Arthur." His voice was firmer now. "For science's sake, you save people's lives on the daily could you not be so pessimistic."
I laughed at that.
He laughed too.
Yet in an instant he stopped and I followed. Nezu released a long a sigh and said in a mutter, "Here we go."
The monitor turned on by itself and there on the screen was a table filled with men in suits.
The office wasn't much of anything, mainly because it was incredibly dark, maybe one of these bureaucrats had a quirk that could hide the faces of everyone, or maybe they just liked the dim lighting but the only thing I could see where the silhouettes of twelve men.
"Principal Nezu," the one at the head of the table said, his voice gruff, not rough, gruff. The only thing that was distinguishable about him was his thinning hair, because of the whole only being able to see their silhouttes deal.
"Chief Seo, board of the Hero Public Safety Commission," Nezu greeted. "I'd like you all to meet, the topic of our discussions, Aki Tadashi otherwise known as Arthur."
The men seemingly in unison, turned their heads slightly, their gazes falling on me. They were all judging me, one of them was even scowling.
I was a bit nervous, mainly because there wasn't much I could do in this situation except to do what Nezu had told me.
Be yourself.
Which was good advice for most things, but weirdly it didn't feel like good advice for this situation. After all it was being myself that had driven me to this exact spot in space and time. Being myself in front of these men felt like signing my own arrest warrant.
But I had promised Nezu I would try, just as I had promised myself I would see this through to the end.
It was at that moment I realized I had been silent for way too long.
Awkward.
"Hello sirs, it's a pleasure to meet you," I finally managed, trying to inject some of the confidence I felt when facing down villains into my voice.
"Well at least the kid is respectful," one of the men said, again no distinguishable features aside from the fact he had a small afro, may I repeat the silhouette thing was a drag.
"Bah, he's a vigilante, he doesn't have any respect for anyone," another added unabashed.
"Calm yourself Mr. Fujio," Chief Seo said, his voice still as gruff as before, the man could silence a room, if anything, maybe that was his quirk.
"I just can't believe we are actually doing this. We didn't even receive the report on the kid's life like Nezu said he would provide," Mr. Fujio's voice carried a note of frustration that went beyond this meeting, as if he'd been fighting this decision for months.
Report?
A chill ran down my spine. I had known Nezu would need to provide some information about me to make this arrangement work, but I had assumed it would be limited to my vigilante activities. The thought of these men knowing about my life before, about what had driven me to pick up Excalibur in the first place...
"I gave you the essentials, the rest is private for a reason," Nezu argued back.
"You gave us nothing we didn't already know." Mr. Fujio's scowl deepened, and I could see him flipping through a folder that looked disappointingly thin.
"Really?"
"Yes really," Mr. Fujio answered, slamming the folder shut with more force than necessary.
"Calm yourself, Mr. Fujio," Chief Seo repeated, this time with a warning note in his voice.
"But..."
"I said calm yourself."
And at that he quieted down, though his displeasure was written clearly across his face, not that I could see his face, but I could see his scowl.
"Nezu and I already reached an agreement," Chief Seo continued, his gruff voice cutting through the silence. "Arthur's life before he was a vigilante is and will be kept private."
Relief flooded through me, but it was quickly followed by a new worry. Nezu knew about my life before Excalibur? How much did he know? I honestly didn't know how I felt about it. When I told him my name I kind of guessed he would do research on me, but it still felt like a twist in my stomach.
The memories I kept locked away, the reasons I had been alone on those streets six years ago, the day that had changed everything, did he know about all of that? Had he seen the police reports, the medical files, the social services documentation that I had hoped was buried forever?
"So, the plan," Mr. Fujio said, clearly eager to move past the topic of my privacy.
"Yes the plan. As we have agreed, Arthur will enter U.A. and will stop all his vigilante activities once he enrolls. He will also declare a formal apology for his illegal use of quirk in public along with his vigilantism, however he will not do so on live television," Nezu said, his voice taking on the practiced cadence of someone who had rehearsed this speech multiple times.
"All who agree?" Chief Seo asked.
Ten men raised their hands while two kept them down.
"Ten to two, motion passed."
"Wait," I interrupted, my brain finally catching up to everything, my voice stronger than I had expected it to be. "I won't apologize for my vigilantism."
The men quietened down, the sudden silence in the room deafening.
Nezu sighed beside me, but it didn't sound disappointed, more like resigned, as if he had expected this moment would come.
I was expecting outrage, from Mr. Fujio most likely, but instead the man who spoke was the chief, his voice carefully changing from it's gruffness to a monotone tone.
"May I ask why?"
"Because I did good things as a vigilante," I replied back, my voice confident, simply because I knew I was right. "I won't say I was perfect because I'm not, no one is, but I did good and I won't apologize for the good I do. I've saved eighteen thousand people over the past four years. I've stopped villains who were hurting innocents. I've prevented tragedies that would have destroyed families. I've given hope to people who had lost it entirely."
I paused, thinking of Miss Takamura, of all the others whose faces flashed through my memory.
"If using my quirk without a license to save lives is wrong, then I'll apologize for breaking the law. But I will never apologize for choosing to help people when they needed it most. That's not something I can or will regret."
Again I was expecting outrage, but instead the chief's gruff voice went monotone and he said in a low rumble, "Fine then, you won't apologize for your vigilantism acts only your unauthorized public use of your quirk."
The concession stunned me into silence.
Again I had expected outrage. I had expected this to be the end of the negotiation, the moment when they decided I was too difficult to work with and sent me away.
Instead, Chief Seo had just given me exactly what I wanted.
Then finally the outrage came.
"CHIEF!" Mr. Fujio's voice exploded through the speakers, his face probably turning red from indignation.
The call got cut at that moment, the screen going black as suddenly as it had illuminated.
"Well that went better than I thought it would," Nezu said as he poured a cup of his green tea, the scent filling the room with its calming aroma. "Especially that last bit. I mean not apologizing for the vigilantism charges, don't know how you made that good of an impression on Chief Seo but it's good for us nevertheless."
"Nezu," I said cutting him off, the question that had been eating at me finally bursting free. "How much do you know about me, how much did you give them?"
Nezu smiled, that creepy, eerie smile I had slowly gotten used to, not fully though.
"I know nothing."
"You don't?"
"No, I don't."
"I don't believe you."
"Well then don't believe me, but I promise I didn't fish out any information from your past before your vigilante work, which is already public knowledge, began six years ago instead of four. Before that, any information about Aki Tadashi has been automatically blocked. Believe it or not, I don't like people being invasive, me included. When you want to tell me about your past before whatever actually turned you into this, I'll be glad to listen and who knows maybe I'll tell you about my own past sometime."
I released a sigh of relief I didn't realize I had been holding. The knot of anxiety that had formed gone just as quickly.
I really didn't want anyone to know about...
My thoughts got interrupted by Nezu's squeaky voice.
"Now come on, get out of that suit, which I'm sure is killing you, and put on some sport clothes and head back to your vigilante work, however it is you do it."
He jumped off his seat, gave me a pat on my back and walked out of his office.
I grabbed Nezu's scarf that hung on my neck and felt a smile spread across my cheeks.
Then a creak.
The door opened as Nezu got back in.
"Why did I get out, this is my office, you get out."
A/N: Sup ladies and gents. I know, I know, I'm kind of speeding through his last year as a vigilante but I honestly don't want to drag it too long, especially since things will slow down a bit once U.A. starts, it won't slow down a lot but it will slow down a bit.
Also I've seen the powerstones, we are close to two hundred and we will most likely reach the goal today (I honestly expected the five reviews to be the thing that gave you a bonus chap but I guess I was wrong). So since I'm morally bankrupt unlike Arthur, I've decided to up the ante for the next bonus chapter, ten reviews for a bonus chap or getting into the top 100 for powerstones.
Yeah I'm a greedy fucker. I will start writing the bonus chap for 200 powerstones as soon as possible. That is all, thx for reading, I hope you enjoyed it. Author out.