Try saying hello to a tree, or flower. They make great listeners.

Ridiculously kind and flexible Beta: emplatinum

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My phone buzzed in my skirt pocket right as class ended. Since I was still sitting at my desk, it vibrated loudly enough against the chair to draw attention to it. Shōto, Izuku, and Ochaco glanced over at me as I pulled out my phone.

Nezu had texted me: Are you free to meet with me after school today? I want to introduce you to someone.

I replied back with: Of course. Be with you in one minute.

"I've gotta go meet with Shishō," I apologized to my friends. "He wants to introduce me to someone. I'll have to hang out with you guys later."

"Okay," Izuku said. "See you later, Kiyo-chan."

"Bye-bye."

In between one moment and the next I had teleported directly in front of Nezu. Oddly enough my mentor was not in his office, but in someone else's office. A quick glance around showed me that whoever owned this office was definitely a fan of All Might, albeit with enough professionalism to keep it reigned in.

Eventually my gaze landed on the man that had to own the office. He was tall, lean, and had an unsettlingly sharp eyes. He was well dressed, and steepled his fingers together as he sat behind a large desk.

Nezu patted a chair beside him with his paw. "Come sit, Kiyo-chan. This is Sir Nighteye."

The name sounded familiar, but I couldn't place it. I gave him a smile, reaching over the desk and offering my hand for a handshake. He met it halfway, gripping my hand tightly. "Hello, Sir Nighteye. I'm Marin Kiyomi, but my hero name is Saki."

"A pleasure," he said in a quiet voice. "Nezu has told me a lot about you."

"O-Oh?" I squeaked out, a little nervous at how the man kept staring at me with such intense focus. "I hope good things."

"I may have mentioned a couple of times you called the secretary a sugar mama," Nezu casually slipped in while I spluttered, my face hot.

'Oh, God, damn you habit of flirting with older women!'

"I-I-I—"

"Relax, Kiyo-chan. Sir Nighteye actually has a very good sense of humor," Nezu teased, patting the chair beside him once again. "Come sit."

Still red-faced, I obeyed, brushing out nonexistent wrinkles in my skirt while doing so. Swallowing back my nerves I asked, "How may I help you?"

Sir Nighteye narrowed his eyes. "You know of the hero internship, I take it?"

"Yes, sir. Cac—er—Aizawa-sensei told us today that we had the approval to try for some," I answered. "They're activities to be conducted outside of class at the student's discretion."

He nodded once. "Then I do not have to waste time. I am here to offer you an internship with me."

"You... want to mentor me?" I repeated, stunned, then my eyes lit up. "Oh! Oh, yes, please."

"This will only be temporary," Sir Nighteye stressed. "But I believe you will be well suited for an... upcoming mission."

(M-i-s-s-i-o-n?)

(Shall we hunt?)

"I understand," I agreed. There really was no reason to refuse. Even if I only had the opportunity to work with Sir Nighteye for a small amount of time, the experience would still be invaluable. "Thank you, sir."

"I have one other understudy, Mirio—"

(My friend?)

"—who will be arriving here shortly. Introduce yourself before returning to school."

"Yes, sir," I said, standing back up. "Um—what time—"

"Mirio will fill you in on the details," Sir Nighteye responded. "Dismissed."

"Yes, sir," I said again, taking a small bow and heading out the only door in the office.

'If Mirio is on the way, then I guess I should just wait by the front door?' I figured, heading down the hallway to where the staircase was marked. Barely thirty seconds later I had reached the front door of the building, and with impeccable timing I found that Mirio was approaching the building alongside his two friends.

'Do they all walk together?' I wondered. 'The other two must have internships, too.'

(Hello, hello, do you remember me?)

A surge of affection shot through me and my body moved on its own accord.

Upon seeing Mirio, I automatically stepped forward and hugged him like he was a dear, dear friend. He immediately hugged me back, almost like a reflex.

"Ah—do you two actually know each other?" Hado asked, eyes bright with curiosity.

We both flushed, stepping back and exchanging bewildered glances. I honestly didn't have a good explanation. An instinctual part of me instantly liked Mirio.

It wasn't something I could explain, and the more I thought about it the odder it sounded.

My wand normally took years to bond with an individual before I could teleport them along with me. There were some cases where the bond took less time, and others where the bond dragged out.

But with Mirio?

It bonded with him instantly.

How was that possible?

It shouldn't have been.

My wand had to know the person—know the soul—for years and yet it instantly knew Mirio?

If I didn't know any better, I'd say that my wand—my soul—that I—had known him for a terribly long time.

Mirio sheepishly rubbed the back of his head, giving his friends an awkward smile. "I swear we haven't met before, but I get this crazy déjà vu when I see her. Haha, maybe we were best friends in another life!"

I nervously laughed at that. "Maybe. I—I kind of feel the same."

"How neat! How fascinating! What's it like? What do you feel? Do you think maybe you two met a long time ago when you were kids? Oooh, Mirio-kun, do you like her?"

The two of us fidgeted under her barrage of questions. I tried to answer them—more so because I was curious if Mirio felt the same way.

"It's like seeing someone dear to you that you thought you had lost," I tried to explain. "Happy, sad, and relieved, I guess?"

Mirio nodded firmly at that, his eyes shining like the milky way. "Yeah! Exactly. Man, I'm glad you feel the same, I thought I was going crazy."

"Me, too. Gosh how weird! But, I guess this just means we were destined to be best friends," I joked.

He flashed me a dazzling grin and a thumbs up. "Yep! It's decided, you're officially one of my best friends. Here, let's exchange numbers."

I grinned. "Sure."

"So what are you doing here?" Mirio asked as he plugged his number into my phone.

"Oh... um... I guess I just accepted an internship with Sir Nighteye."

Mirio stared at me for a moment, his eyes widening, then he burst out into infectious laughter. "AHAHAHAHA! We really are, hahaha, destined to be friends, pffft. Jeepers!"

"I guess we're platonic soulmates," I joked.

Mirio's grin was brighter than the sun.

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A couple days later, that Thursday, I sat at lunch with my friends. We were chatting about homework when Izuku recalled something. His eyes lit up with remembrance and he tapped his forehead.

"I almost forgot, I need to get a hold of Togata-senpai," Izuku said.

"Oh, I can give him a call," I offered.

"You have his number?" Ochaco asked in surprise. "How?"

"We ran into each other and it was decided that we were destined to be good friends," I explained. "My wand instantly bonded with him."

"WHAT!" Ochaco shrieked while Izuku shouted, Shōto even paused mid bite of his soba noodles to give me a look of clear disbelief.

"What kind of unfairness is that?!" Ochaco demanded. "Your wand hasn't even bonded with me yet, but he gets the free transportation already?!"

"How is that possible? Magi Quirks takes months, at minimum, to bond with a stranger. That's not possible. That has never happened before. How? How?" Izuku began to mutter to himself, eyes wide as he tried to process the sheer impossibility of that.

Shōto slowly lowered his chopsticks, frowning thoughtfully. "Did you meet him when you were younger, maybe?"

"I, uh, I don't think so? But that's really the only explanation, right? But still... bonding requires repeated exposures." I shrugged. "Honestly? I have no clue what happened, but I'm just going with it."

Shōto nodded. "Okay. I'm glad you made another friend."

I beamed. "Thanks! I love making friends."

He smiled. "I know."

"You listen here, Kiyo-chan's wand," Ochaco whispered, glaring at my chest. "You better bond with me ASAP or we're going to have issues."

"My wand says it'll work on it," I deadpanned.

"Good."

Izuku shook his head. "Um... since you have senpai's number, can you ask him what time we start the internship?"

"Internship... wait... Izu-chan did you start an internship with Sir Nighteye, too?!"

Izuku gaped at me. "You—ugh. Of course you were able to make him laugh easily, weren't you?"

"Laugh?" I repeated, confused. "Shishō just introduced us and Sir Nighteye offered me a temporary internship."

Izuku rubbed the back of his head. "O-Oh? Is that right? Ahaha, I see..."

"Izu-chan, what happened?"

"Nothing," Izuku insisted. "Nothing at all—um—hey, would you mind making more of Baba's sugar cookies tonight?"

"Wha—sure," I said, blinking in surprise at the abrupt change in conversation.

"Did I hear the name of heaven's cookies?" Mina called out from across the cafeteria.

"Yep! Kiyo-chan's gonna make more tonight," Ochaco chirped.

This was met with applause from various students of 1A, and confused looks from those of 1B.

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Friday evening after class Izuku, Mirio, and I switched over into our hero costumes and I teleported all three of us to Sir Nighteye's office.

It was a gorgeous day with soft clouds painted overhead. The warm colors of the sunset set the whole city aglow, and the white noise produced by the city merrily went on in the background.

We met with Sir Nighteye and Bubble Girl-one of Sir Nighteye's sidekicks with a bubbly personality-and the stoic man immediately said, "Today we'll be conducting both patrol and surveillance work. Bubble Girl will stay with me, while you three will form your own group."

"Surveillance?" Izuku repeated.

Bubble Girl's lips stretched wide over her face, a twinkle in her eye as she gave Izuku a thumbs up. "Night Eye Offices are in the middle of a secret investigation."

"We're tracking a small group of villains named the Eightfold Cleansers." Sir Nighteye pulled out a picture of a young man in an odd beak-like mask. "The capo in this photo, a man named Chisaki, has begun to display some odd actions. The plague mask is his trademark."

Izuku accepted the photo, and I peered over his shoulder to examine the villain. Izuku frowned as he remarked, "A group of yakuzas... but nowadays those kinds of people are lying low or at least that's their image."

Bubble Girl explained, "Yeah because way back they were pretty much dismantled. But this Chisaki guy started reassembling them for some reason. They even made contact with the Villain Alliance recently. We don't know the details, though."

Izuku and I exchanged alarmed glances at that.

It hadn't been that long ago that the Villain Alliance had kidnapped Katsuki and me for reasons unknown.

"But," Sir Nighteye cooly interjected, "direct evidence of him plotting evil remains elusive. We must treat them cautiously, and appropriately. What my offices are after is proof of criminal activity from them... while never attracting their suspicion."

"Yes, sir!"

And off we went.

The patrol was quiet the first fifteen minutes in.

Izuku and Mirio walked beside each other on the streets, while I hopped from rooftop to rooftop, occasionally using my bubbles as stepping stones.

I half listened to Mirio and Izuku quietly talking to one another, my gaze roaming. There was an itch in my head, a cold needle pricking my stomach. All last night I had dreamed about faceless children running up to me and calling me momma, or papa. It was such a warm and loving dream, in contrast to my usual nightly visions. When I woke up, my heart was lighter than it had been in weeks, and I wore the biggest smile all day.

Until patrol began.

At first I might have dismissed my unease as nerves. Sir was a prestigious hero, and from what I understood Nezu had to call in a favor to get me an internship with him. I was obviously very grateful for my master, and I didn't want to disappoint either hero.

But it wasn't just nerves.

Something important was going to happen.

I knew it, and I knew that I had to be the one to act.

It made my whole body tense, and my mind fought to try and make sense of my feelings. The more I focused on it, the more I kept seeing a vague image of daughter, or child.

The fact that this little girl was surrounded by blood, intestines, and mutilated bits of her own body didn't help with my mounting anxiety.

Then it came.

I stood on the rooftop and just before I was about to hop across it to reach the next one I saw her.

(We saw her.)

Tiny, sweet, covered in bandages from injuries too cruel for a child to have. She ran down the alley, her face contorted in plain fear as her white hair flew behind her.

Everything s-t-o-p-p-e-d.

I moved without thought, without care for consequences.

I threw down a smoke pellet just as Izuku and Mirio turned to notice the girl heading towards them. The smoke filled the entire alleyway and the man pursuing the sweet little girl froze for a millisecond.

But I went down into the smoke, my hands grabbing on to her, onto Eri, and I pulled her into my embrace. She was coughing from the smoke, but I didn't dare stop so soon to soothe her. With Petal Step, I flew up into the air as fast as I could and I carried her far, far away. I kept moving, as she held on tightly to me, wholly focused on going to the one place I could trust.

My phone buzzed from my belt, and since I had already traveled over a kilometer away, I decided to pause in the air to answer. I used a third bubble to wrap around us and shield us from the heavy winds from being up so high.

I answered it, "Hello?"

"K—er—Saki! Was that you? What's going on?" Izuku whispered quietly into the phone. "Did you see a girl?"

"I'm sorry, Izu-chan," I apologized, as bits and pieces of memories that did not belong to me started to surface. "But I have to save someone. Please tell Sir that I'm going back to Nezu's office and I'm sorry for any trouble."

I hung up the phone before he could protest and the girl, Eri, looked up at me with wide, watery eyes. "You... saved me?"

I adjusted her in my arms so I could tenderly brush back a lock of her hair behind her ear. We smiled at her like a mother would a child. "Always, dear. W—I will protect you. I promise."

There was a moment of disbelief on her face, but then it scrunched up as tears started to fall out of her eyes. We—I pulled her in close, gently patting her head and rocking her. With a soothing voice, I cooed sweet things into her ear.

'We'll keep you safe, sweet little girl.'

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Small note: Changed Shōta to Aizawa in all previous chapters, and updated scene break. It was getting increasingly annoying to write Shōto and Shōta since they're only a letter apart. Canonically Kiyomi will still refer to Shōta Aizawa as Shouta in her head, but for the sake of writing I'll use Aizawa.

Also working on a FMA fanfic if anyone is interested called Pride & Humility.

Answer: Ainz-sama. Fella is ridiculously prepared.

Question: You are the monarch of a kingdom. What kind of monarch are you, what is your kingdom known for, and who do you share the throne with?

Reviews are love!