The Past 2

~~~1 month prior to UA~~~

Hitoshi Shinso took a steadying breath before knocking gently on the apartment door, lightly announcing in a bored tone, "You know who it is Olive, let us in."

A moment passed.

Hitoshi sighed and exchanged a look with Ojiro as they heard shuffling on the other side, followed by silence. Ojiro nodded, and Hitoshi kept knocking and knocking and knocking and kno-

The door swung open, and Hitoshi almost fell forward until Ojiro shot a hand out and steadied him. Hitoshi lazily recovered and glanced up at the pajama clad, small statured, annoyingly childish young adult. She had been attempting to stand on her tippy toes in order to glare at him, before losing her own balance, Ojiro again stepping in and steadying her.

Hitoshi frowned. There stood 'Olivia', who he originally knew as Star, with her now dyed bright red hair in a messy bun and a bottle of wine in her hand.

She studied the two of them, and they allowed her to, letting her figure out on her own their intentions for visiting her for the 10th time this month. She scowled at what she probably found, but stumbled aside to let them in anyway.

All her stuff was still in boxes, Hitoshi noticed. This didn't surprise him, Ojiro informed him on the way over that she moved often to avoid the press when they found out who she was.

Ojiro lifted his tail onto his shoulder, and Hitoshi understood why as they stepped over bottles and red cups littering the ground. Olivia made her way into the small kitchen, and took a swing from the wine bottle before facing the two men who towered over the only piece of furniture.

"Fancy a drink?" Her question came out slightly slurred, her lips turning up in a lazy smile.

Hitoshi saw Ojiro's nose wrinkle in the corner of his eye, and felt his own eyes roll at the question.

"I would have to decline, thank you for the offer." Ojiro very politely refused. He then continued, ignoring her snort. "You can't live like this you know."

He paused, studying her as she started to take another swing from the bottle, "Your parents will find out."

Now it was her turn to pause.

"And I can't keep puppeting you either." Hitoshi added quietly, frowning at her. "You know that I've had problems ending the control I have over people with my quirk. I can't keep risking using it on you until I learn to manage it."

"Suuure you can, I don't mind." Olivia smiled, finishing the swing that Ojiro's words had interrupted.

He frowned at this response, knowing better than anyone why she has relied on him for the past month to put her under. But this wasn't a game he was willing to play with her anymore. With the extended use of his quirk during the incident, it evolved to a level he has no idea how to control. Despite his good intentions and his desire to stand with her through this, they both needed help, and he knew that.

Hitoshi sadly shook his head and replied with a quiet, "Sorry, Star."

She looked at him for a moment, following his unspoken logic, and took a shaky breath before looking away.

"But, you know, there's someone at UA with a similar quirk."

This at least brings her clouded blue gaze back to his own tired purple one. She finally put down the bottle, but kept it close to her, as if it's a lifeline. Hitoshi glanced away, pretending not to notice.

"One of the teachers has the ability to remove your quirk when looking at you." He continued, "Admit it Olivia, the best place for you and I to get this under control-"

"And before your parents and all of America finds out." Ojiro added, staring pointedly at her as he paused in his surprisingly stealthy clean up of her floor.

"-is UA." Hitoshi finished, nodding in agreement with Ojiro's contribution.

Olivia instinctively reached for the wine bottle, turning away from them. "I have this under control already."

She started to walk -well- stumble to, Hitoshi assumed her couch, but Ojiro put a gentle hand on her shoulder. Her eyes snapped to his instinctively at the touch, already reading whatever Ojiro wasn't saying.

"I know this helps dull what you hear, as well as what you feel." He gestured to the bottle before placing his second hand on her other shoulder, fully turning her small frame around to face him. "But this is only a temporary solution that will never lead to a permanent one."

She looked away, his eyes too heavy with unspoken words for her to handle.

Hitoshi spoke up again as Ojiro leaned away, straightening. "We already took the test, Olive." Her eyes moved to his now, and he allowed himself to remember the details for her, perhaps a bit bitterly, and the results. "We'll be there with you, and be able to help you. You wouldn't have to do this alone. None of us will."

Her nose scrunched at what he purposely tried to leave out.

"It's on-campus living?" Olivia laughed incredulously at this, "I can barely handle being around just you and him while sober, what makes you think I can handle a dorm full of who knows how many loud headed idiots?!"

She glanced and raised her eyebrow at something Ojiro left for only her to hear, before he spoke out loud. "Native already recommended you as well-" She looked up, startled, and cut Ojiro off.

"What did you tell him?" Olivia hissed, pointing the bottle in her hand at him. "What did he tell my parents?!" She had backed him into the wall threateningly by the time Hitoshi had looked up from the bottles displaced by their sudden movements. He felt his face unconsciously settle into a smirk at the scene.

Olivia seemed to have forgotten that the bottle she was pointing at Ojiro was open, causing wine to spill onto the floor and leave a dark trail behind her. Not noticing this, the tiny girl holding a -now empty- bottle of wine as a weapon, had threatened the 5'7 blonde man who was trained in literally every form of martial art in existence. Ojiro had both his hands and his literal quirk, which he literally uses to attack people, in the air as a surrender and was backed into the wall.

Hitoshi let air pass through his lips as he realized this overly polite guard dog he had reluctantly come to call a friend, somehow got into Class 1-A and he didn't. He returned to his mission to clean the place, continuing the work Ojiro had started.

Olivia pinched Ojiro's side and he twitched, unhappy with the undignified position she put him in. She didn't release him, and instead she seemed to grill him for information with just her glare.

Hitoshi continued his task for a few moments as she read, noticing more hard liquor bottles than anything, and looked tiredly at the sight. She was captured a few days before he had been during the incident, they had informed him eventually. He wasn't sure if he would ever know what had happened before he arrived. He wasn't even sure he wanted to know.

Hitoshi redirected his attention as she loosened her grip on Ojiro, and lowered the bottle as the two silently stared at each other.

"Fine," She sent one final poke towards Ojiro's side before backing up and bringing the bottle to her lips. She 'humph'ed as she found it empty, and turned back to the blond who was straightening his blazer after her assault on it. "I guuuuuess Native getting me into Class 1-A for college could maybe be an okay solution." The empty bottle moved with her exasperated arm gestures. Hitoshi's eyes followed the bottle cautiously.

Ojiro nodded at what she said, resuming his calm stance. "I apologize Olivia, it was the condition my parents asked in order to agree to cover for you. You know how close our parents are and how long they have been working together. You already got taken because we foolishly said it was okay if you wanted to live alone, we will not make that mistake again. I will not make that mistake again."

He bowed his head, and Hitoshi didn't need Olivia's quirk to know what the man was thinking at that moment.

"It wasn't your fault, Mashirao." Olivia frowned, gently trying to raise his chin up, even though he was now at her eye level as he bowed down.

Taking this moment of distraction, Hitoshi plucked the bottle out of her hand without her noticing, and added it to the growing trash bag.

"It was. You were entrusted to my family, to me, for protection. I should have trained you more, I should have insisted you stayed with us, I-"

Olivia cut him off, probably hearing the direction his thoughts were heading before they spilled out of his mouth. She hurriedly started responding to what Hitoshi would never be able to hear, rapidly trying to stop her oldest friend's downward spiral.

"Okay okay- stop we've talked about this- no!- Stop, I promise it's not! Ugh, stop it's okay- I promise- ...fine! If that'll make you feel better about it, I'll go to the school!" She frowned as she hugged him tightly, and Ojiro sighed in relief, finally relaxing his posture.

"You two are not leaving my sight again." He vowed, and Hitoshi jerked back into the conversation, dropping the trash bag he had finally started tying up. The cans and bottles spilled out on the floor, and Hitoshi looked down with silent horror at the new mess before frowning at Ojiro in confusion.

"Why me? I'll be in General Education, All-Star. There's not much we can do about that." Hitoshi sighed, defeated. Unlike Olivia, Hitoshi didn't have parents that were the number one and number 2 Pro Heroes in America. Nor did he have the connections they had in Japan, even though Ojiro said they haven't stepped foot there in 19 years.

Ojiro eyed all their hard sneaky work now back in its home on Olivia's floor, and smirked dangerously at Hitoshi before crouching.

He suddenly noticed how overwhelming of a presence Ojiro had, as the man easily sank into a fighting stance. Hitoshi felt a bead of sweat roll down his neck, but his face didn't change as he lazily surveyed the man in front of him.

"Then I'll just have to teach you everything I taught Olivia." The blond man said simply, tail twitching.

"NOT IN MY APARTMENT, YOU MONKEY!" Olivia shrieked as she leapt onto Ojiro's back, probably picking up on what his intention was before he could even begin to move toward Hitoshi.

Hitoshi put his hands up in surrender, and smirked as Ojiro tried to keep his balance while also dealing with Olivia's drunken movements on his back. "I'll be looking forward to it then, All-Star."