I wasn't able to sleep a wink. All night I  listened to any sound in the house. I was able to hear the kid move the bed. Hitoshi on the other hand was fast asleep. He was finally making those eye bags less black.

Shanks left my room a while ago. He normally slept but he snuck out when Ren got here. He was the only cat I had. I wanted more cats, but Shanks was getting old. I don't want him to think I'm replacing him.

It was 3:30 in the morning. I would rather stay up this late than ever wake up this early. It's just a crime that I haven't been able to sleep. Maybe I'll have my class write a two-hour essay and I can sleep then.

I inwardly sighed. 

I would have to correct all those papers and that would take me far longer than two hours. I am too lazy for that. Plus today I already planned something.

I wonder if the kid has traits of a bird? Hawks was a Hawk so he loved to eat chicken. Birds are light sleepers so maybe that's why the kid always looks tired? What if the kid can't eat certain things?

I've only seen the kid do one birdy thing. 

One day when Denki accidentally got too excited and let out a bolt of electricity. Everyone jumped away but Ren caught my attention because you could visibly see a chill run down him. His feathers puffed out and to be honest it looked ridiculous. I almost laughed out loud except for the expression on his face. Pure fear. I couldn't get his terrified face out of my mind.

Giving up on life I rolled out of bed taking my blanket with me. I crawled to the kid's room poking my head around the corner. I was surprised he left the door open Hitoshi always closes his. 

I poked my head in and erased my presence trying my darn hardest not to wake up the bird. 

I looked into the corner of the room where the bed blocked it off. So he did move it. Sure enough, I saw the kid laying on the floor with his cat pillow. 

As it has happened once before I looked at his face in pure terror. The kid was trembling in his sleep. Whole-body in a tight ball.  My whole body jolted towards him before I could even register what I was doing. One-step and his eyes slammed open. He jumped up and looked at me one tear falling out of an eye. 

I approached him slowly, "Bad dream?" 

He looked around the room realizing where he was. Eyes widening ashamed, "Yah, bad dream."

I walked up to the kid. His shaking seem to have vanished but on closer inspection, it was still there. Not thinking twice I picked him up in my arms and walked to my room.  I was getting déjà vu. I did this years ago with Hitoshi, but Hitoshi gladly came with me. This time I was carrying Ren. I placed the kid down on my bed and threw the blanket on him.

"It's fine." A squeak came out of his throat. "Sorry if, if I woke you." He was laying on his side facing away from me. 

"I was already awake." I laid next to him on top of the blanket. "Do you want to talk about it?"

He stayed there still, "It was just a nightmare." 

We both heard a loud groan and a thumb from down the hall. I inwardly cursed at the bad timing.

A purple worm came inching into my room, "Daddddddd my nock out meds wore out! I need morrre."

I cursed out loud making Hitoshi freeze and look up at me. "Come on it's only 4 am. You are..."  he saw Ren "ahhh heyyyyy there." I watched as my idiot son still on the ground inched around in a circle and started inch worming himself out the door.

I walked overstepping on his back. I could hear him wheezing under my foot as I added pressure. "Since we are all awake there is no point in going back to bed." Hitoshi shrank under my anger. 

I was proud of Hitoshi. He took seeing Ren in stride, but still drastically failed at the same time. 

"If you guys own the ingredients I can make some coffee?" Ren could see the greedy faces we were wearing when he asked. 

Any trace of his nightmare was gone. 

"Dad? Can we keep him?" 

This time I hit him over the head. 

_________________

I didn't know what to say to Ren so the first that came out of my mouth was probably not the right thing. "Ren?"

He looked at me until he realized I wanted a verbal response, "Do you want another cup?" As he handed Hitoshi his fourth cup.

"You know you don't need to work anymore." The kid flinched at those words. 

"I like working."

It was a short answer but seemed to ring true. 

"I know this is not what you want to hear, but I've looked up how many hours you work at both jobs." I sighed as I watched his body turn from tense to fidgeting. "you are breaking a lot of labor laws." He stood there like a deer in headlights. 

"Please don't tell anyone. I swear it's the only law I've broken."

"How in the world are you working that much?" Hitoshi blew on his coffee. 

Ignoring Hitoshi I spoke to Ren. "That's not the problem. You work 5-hour shifts with both jobs for six days a week. That is seventy hours a week. On top of that, you go to school for seven hours a day. I don't know how you did it when you were 'homeschooled' but you are now going to school at 7:30 and getting home at midnight. Legally I don't know how you even got these two jobs at such a young age."

Ren was avoiding eye contact at this point. His fidgeting getting worse. His hand was rubbing his neck. 

"Kid I'm not mad at you. It's just that I hope you won't be mad at me..." 

"Why would I ever be mad at you?" His voice was so borderline untrustful. 

"Yesterday I called up both of your managers and told them about the hours you are working. The library agreed to let you 'quit'. That place," I gestured at the coffee "put up quite a fight, but they relented. They are letting you 'quit' too, but said whenever you needed extra cash you could come in and work. Official both places will have one less worker."

I felt like the meanest person in the world but doing this will make him dependent on me, which needs to happen.  

"What about,"

"You don't need to worry about your mom, Nezu is taking care of everything. Now that you are officially an Aizawa I will pay for anything you need."

"Does this apply to all Aizawa's?" Hitoshi was smirking. 

"I'm not buying you more socks."

"But I keep losing the left ones!"

"No."

"Please!"

"NO."

Ren took a breath in making both of us quiet down, "I need some socks."

Hitoshi eye's started shining, "Oh yeah, he does! Those at the store that reach your knees. Ren you know, one side is green with blue strips the other blue with green stripes. Don't you also need about 20 more pairs of white and black socks?"

I could see a slight grin on both of their faces. "Oh? And why would he want your favorite colors on a sock? Plus the number of socks you have lost?"

"Oh no he really needs them, don't yah?"

"Think about this. You lost the left pair to 20 socks combine them and you have 10 socks."

"That is not how it works." 

"I need 21 pairs of socks."  Rens face serious.

I was completely caught off guard. It's not because he said something it was because he said it jokingly. "Well, you are an Aizawa now. I guess I have no choice." I pinched the bridge of my nose.

Hitoshi grinned ear to ear with triumph. 

"We are going to the UJS today. I need to gear up on coffee. Can I have two more?"

Skillfully Ren made enough for three more cups taking one for himself.

We were walking to the school seeing we had time, waking up so early after all. 

I was worried at how well Ren was taking everything in. He lost both jobs and didn't even complain. He's been living with the Vigilante and the Vigilante said he has trust issues. The fact he's been taking it so well made me disable it even more.

I saw the fidgeting, twitching, the nervous rubbing of his neck. The kid was way too okay with this to be okay with it.

I could feel that Hitoshi felt the same way. Even so, the kid was growing on us. It might have been boosted by his fantastic coffee, but we both felt like we needed to find out why he twitches. Why does he rub his neck? Why he is so quiet? 

We were all lost in our thoughts as we walked to UA. Until my phone started buzzing and the collar ID read Nezu. 

_________________

The UJS. It was a pretty cool place. I hope I don't have to go near the lake they have in there. I had a bad feeling in my gut as Aizawa answered his phone. 

"Are you sure about this information?"

Eraser glanced at me. 

"I see you've been keeping yourself up to date. Yes, the kid knows him. Yes, the kid knows where he lives." Eraserhead listened to the person on the other side, "No I can tell we won't do that. "

I figured it was Nezu. 

"How long?"

I looked at Hitoshi. He glanced at me.

"You still want to continue with today's plans?"  He listened, "Ok I understand."

The bad feeling tripled when I saw Eraserhead's face.  

Did he know? Why was he looking at me? What did Nezu know? 

"What's happening?" I asked. 

"Phantom is in danger. Can you tell us anything? Anything at all about him?" Eraserhead begged.

My gaze hardened and I took a step back, "I'm not saying a word." 

Inwardly I was relieved this had nothing to do with linking me to my other-self.  

"Please Ren," Hitoshi begged, never once hearing his dad beg like this. 

I looked down avoiding their eyes'. "No."

We stood there in silence. 

"Are we the only people who know you know Phantom?"

"No, you're not."

"Who else."

"Hawks. No one else knows." I still couldn't look at him. "I will never tell you anything about him."

My mind was wracking itself. What could make him act this way?

Throughout the time of getting everyone on the bus to the USJ Eraserhead had called a lot of people asking them to join the class for the day. I was told All Might was running late. The other calls he made all showed up. Best jeans, Orcha, woods, Fat gum, mnt. Lady, and snipe. 

The class was buzzing when they saw all the Heroes. When they first saw me they yelled and talked about how much they missed me. I told them it was a family issue along with the horrible cold I had. They believed and dropped the subject. The excitement of the USJ overcoming their minds.

Was this LOV? What was their gain to show up here? What did they want? How did the heroes find out about it?

_____________

The start of USJ.

What did Nezu Call about?