Chapter Text
Zevran had never had much interest in heroes.
To him, they were loud. Loud uniforms that burned the retinas, loud morals that simplified the world into a binary of good and evil, loud quirks designed for the spotlight, and the deafening, heavy weight of expectations. People talked about them like they were the only reason society could stand, as if heroes were the only thin thread keeping the world from unraveling.
Every kid in his neighborhood grew up playing "Hero and Villain," and he was expected to fall into that group.
His quirk scared his parents the first time it manifested, smoke bleeding off his skin as he calmly inspected the somewhat hand shaped cloud that had now replaced where his hand was. Their fear didn't last though, instead shifting to excitement, plans, and hero school brochures that were left outside Zevran’s door. As he got closer to high school age, every conversation started with “You know, if you just tried—”
And try he did
He just made sure to not succeed.
Entrance exams were easy to sabotage if you knew what you were doing. A missed timing in one trial, a slight misstep in another, maybe a lapse in judgment earned him a few points accidentally but nothing that could make him stand out. The few he did pass, he made sure the acceptance letters never reached his parents.
It worked. But only for a while.
Two years into high-school, his parents started up again, now shifting their hero aspirations for him onto private schools. Late training. Guaranteed license. They treated it like a compromise, as if forcing him into a slightly different golden cage was meeting him halfway. Zevran felt cornered, the walls of his life closing in with the suffocating weight of a future he never asked for.
So he did what he did best—he disappeared.
He didn’t plan the attack; he simply got lucky—or unlucky, depending on who was telling the story. The outing was a half-assed attempt at a “family day,” but it was really just another one of his parents’ pitches to try and convince Zevran to rethink his choices.
A plume of smoke erupted in the building across the street, people were scared, running and screaming were the only things Zevran could hear. His mom grabbed his arm, but he didn't budge as her grip slipped, and she was carried off with the mob.
He didn't move, his icy eyes flickering gold as he stared at the fire. Someone slammed into him, snapping him out of his trance, just as a second blast leveled the storefront he was right beside. To any bystander, the boy standing in the path of the glass and flame would have been incinerated instantly. But as the shockwave tore through the asphalt, Zevran’s physical body was already gone. He was a swirling, gray-black mist, an entity of soot and shadow that was indistinguishable from the toxic plumes pouring out of the wreckage.
He drifted through the chaos, an invisible ghost in the smog. He didn't reform until he was four miles away, tucked into the damp shadow of an alleyway. He exhaled deeply, a final cloud of smoke escaping his lungs as he solidified. He patted his pockets: his phone, three thousand yen, and a lighter.
He clicked his tongue in annoyance. Three thousand yen wouldn't even buy him a week of anonymity.
“I figure they think I’m dead…” He muttered, clicking his phone on, only to see he had barely any battery left.
Re-pocketing his phone, he made his way to the end of the alley, looking both ways till he was sure there were no heroes or anyone else who would spot him. He pulled his hood over his head as he walked down the street.
The sun was already setting by the time he had gotten onto the train to the next city—he really didn't want to stay where he could be recognized so easily.
He let his head fall back against the window of the train, letting out a sigh as he did so.
‘What the hell am I supposed to do now?’ he thought, rubbing his face with his palms before sitting upright. He was free, but freedom felt remarkably like being hollow.
The train hissed to a stop at the station. He moved with the crowd, his eyes scanning the overhead signs for the exit. He felt a small, insistent tug on the hem of his hoodie. Looking down, he found a little girl, no older than six, staring up at him with wide, watery eyes.
She startled a bit, her teddy bear falling from her hand, “Oh I’m sorry mister, I thought you were my mommy”
He raised an eyebrow at her before crouching down and picking up the bear, handing it back to her.
“Can you not find her? I’ll help you look,” he said. His voice was quiet, lacking the tone of a hero, but still steady. She nodded, and he hoisted her up onto his shoulders.
From that height, she was a lookout. It took less than a minute for her to point out a woman near the turnstiles, frantically pacing in circles. Zevran wove through the crowd, setting the girl down as soon as the mother spotted them.
“Mommy! This mister helped me!” the girl cried, launching herself into her mother's arms.
Zevran didn't wait for a conversation. He began to walk past, heading for the exit stairs, but a hand caught his shoulder. He glanced back, his ice-blue eyes meeting the mother’s tearful gaze.
“Thank you so much for helping my daughter, I'm very grateful!” She said, bowing her head before allowing him to continue up the stairs.
He took a deep breath as he walked out of the subway into the street, his eyes reflecting the bright city lights of Kamino Ward. He stuffed his hands into his pockets, his fingers brushing against his now dead phone before he made his way into the street, dissolving into the crowd.