"Iz?" Hanta asked in blatant shock, not even trying to hide how confused he was at the villain's presence in his office. He quickly shut the door after he checked the hall to make sure no one else had caught sight of the other man. "What the hell are you doing here?" 

Izuku kicked his feet off the desk and pushed himself out of the extremely uncomfortable desk chair (he made a mental note to get Hanta a better one soon). "I got bored. Shiggy and Chisaki are still plotting on their own and keeping me far from it. Himiko is constantly busy with your sisters, and there's only so many times I can bother Aizawa before he starts activating his quirk," he said with a huff, walking to the front of the desk and propping himself up on it. 

Hanta looked him up and down with an amused smile, walking over to his desk and letting his hands rest on either side of the other man. "So, I'm your last choice?" he asked with one raised brow. 

"No, that's Kacchan," Izuku stated, tilting his head to look up at the taller hero, seemingly unaffected by their proximity. "You were my second to last." 

"Stop, I'm blushing," Hanta teased, bumping his nose into Izuku's before backing off to walk around his desk and taking a seat. "Unfortunately, I am at work and can't drop everything to entertain you." 

"Please, your work is way more entertaining than you on your own," Izuku said with a dark chuckle, whirling around to lean over Hanta's desk and scan the paperwork scattered across it. He'd already read everything that had caught his interest and now waited to see what the hero would reach for. 

Hanta completely disregarded the case files and reports littering his desk in favor of a new file he pulled from a drawer. "Keep sweet-talking me, and I might have to clock out early," he chided, handing the folder over to Izuku without any sort of prodding. 

The villain raised a brow at the action but didn't object, flicking through the file quickly. "What is this?" 

"You said her name was Eri, right?" Hanta asked, leaning back in his chair. "It's everything Aizawa could dig up on her, which is unsurprisingly almost nothing. Her parents had suspected ties to the yakuza and died a few years back. She's been off the radar ever since." 

Izuku shut the file and let it fall onto the desk. "Why're you showing me this?" 

"You said you were bored. I know you wouldn't have shown up here if you weren't looking for something to analyze and pull apart," Hanta said with a shrug. For as much fuss as Izuku kicked up about being unreadable and unknowable, Hanta almost had him down to a science. 

It unsettled the villain more than he cared to admit. 

"And what the hell am I supposed to do with that?" Izuku asked, his arms crossing over his chest. "Her background won't help me get her out of there, and I can't do anything until I hear back from Chisaki anyway." 

"You want to work on something that has nothing to do with Shigaraki or Chisaki?" Hanta asked, caught off guard by the request. He'd figured Izuku would want to put everything into getting the girl back and tearing down the villains' enterprise. 

"I want you to work on something that has nothing to do with them," Izuku corrected, his jaw clenching for a moment before he caught himself. "I can handle those two on my own, and I need you as far away from it as possible." 

"Sorry, lightning bug," Hanta said, but there was no sympathy in his voice, "but you're not my boss. I do what Aizawa assigns me to." 

"I knocked that guy on his ass in two seconds and you're gonna listen to him over me?" 

"He writes my checks." 

"Quit your job and I'll make sure you never run out of cash." 

"What?" Hanta couldn't stop the question from leaving his mouth. He'd always known that Izuku wasn't particularly fond of his profession, of course, he knew that, but he'd never outright told him to quit. Not only had the villain just told him to quit his job, but he'd essentially just offered to be his sugar daddy. 

Izuku was tinkering with a Rubix cube that had sat untouched on Hanta's desk for years, refusing to meet the hero's eyes. "You're the one that wanted me to stick around. Seems stupid for you to be out risking your life when I have enough money to support an entire community for a few decades." 

Dark eyes squeezed shut as Hanta tried to wrap his mind around everything leaving Izuku's mouth. "I'm sorry, I'm just trying to figure out how you went from being dead set on leaving and never speaking to me again two days ago, to staying and wanting me to be your housewife." 

Izuku rolled his eyes, finally setting the now completed rubex cube down. "I don't want you to be my housewife; I already have Himiko for that. I'm just saying that if I stay, you don't need to keep working. Well, you can if you want, just not here. Or, like, any hero agency anywhere. You know, just quit this profession entirely. I know you only got into it for the money, to take care of your family, but I can do that. You can have an early retirement and-" 

The villain had started rambling, something he didn't do frequently, but enough for Hanta to recognize it. "Iz," he cut in before the conversation got entirely derailed, "I like my job." 

Izuku looked at him like he didn't understand the words coming out of his mouth. "And I like knowing you're not in mortal danger every twenty seconds."

Hanta shook his head before running a hand through his hair. "I'm not quitting my job just because you're worried about me. I can take care of myself, you know." 

"But you don't have to," Izuku said again, his voice turning more urgent. "I can afford-" 

"It's not just about money," Hanta said with a sigh. "That might have been why I got into heroics, but I genuinely enjoy helping people, Iz. I'm not going to quit." 

Izuku straightened his spine, not expecting that answer. "Then I can't stay." 

"An ultimatum? Seriously? I quit my job, or you're leaving?" 

"Don't make it into something it's not," Izuku snapped, taking a step back and beginning to pace the length of Hanta's office. "My security comes from my position in the underground, okay? The only way to keep the people I care about safe is to keep the rest of the world terrified of me. I can't do that if I have a hero sleeping in my bed. It would ruin your career and public image, and topple my entire empire. The hero, villain thing was cute in high school, but it will never work in the real world, do you understand that?" His pacing came to a halt as he stared Hanta down, waiting for his response. 

Hanta held his gaze for a moment before he spoke. "Then stop being a villain." 

"Do not start this shit again," Izuku warned as he started pacing once more. 

"Come on," Hanta pleaded. "You're more hero than half the pros on the streets these days. You could-"

"I have murdered dozens of people," Izuku said in a cold tone, his feet freezing in place with his back to the hero. "You can keep pretending that all of them deserved it, but the truth is that a lot of them were innocent. I'm a monster, Hanta, and just because you can live with that, doesn't mean the entire world can." 

Hanta sat back in his chair, defeated after having the same argument countless times. "Then leave, if that's what you want-" 

"I don't want that!" Izuku shouted as he whirled around. "I've never wanted that. I want to stay here, where I was born and raised, where my mom is buried, where you are, but I want doesn't matter, it never fucking has, okay?" 

Before either of them could say something else, Izuku's phone pinged. On instinct, the villain pulled it out to check the notification. He didn't get them often, only when something was very, very wrong. It couldn't wait. 

"What's wrong?" Hanta asked, their argument entirely forgotten as he watched Izuku's brows knit together. 

"It's Chisaki," Izuku mumbled, clicking on the message and reading it fully. 

Hanta rose to his feet, ready to do whatever Izuku needed him to. "Is he gonna let you take Eri's quirk?" 

"I have to go," Izuku said instead of answering, already heading for the open window (how he snuck into the office in the first place). 

"Wait, Iz-" Hanta sighed as green sparks surrounded the villain and he was gone with a whoosh of air. He let his head hit the side of the window and rest there. "God damn it." 

pov I finally figured out what I'm doing next with this fic and I am very excited for the shenanigans that are about to ensue.