In their third year at UA, a lot of things changed at a really fast pace. First, Mama and papa found out that Mina and Neito were both gay when papa walked in on them sharing a bed and had assumed things, which had Mina yelling that ‘ew, he’s my brother and besides, we’re both gay!’ The only reason they hadn’t been kicked out at that point was because their foster parents wanted to use their hero status for their own benefit. The two hero students knew they had to do something about them sooner or later. Preferably before they graduated.

What was even bigger than that though, was when Eijirou asked to talk to the both of them in private. They settled down in Eijirou’s room, watching him squirm for a while until he gathered himself. “So, you know my mums, right? At least, Mina does, but I know you’ve seen them at like, sports festivals and stuff too” he looked at Neito as he said the last bit, fiddling with his shirt. “They want to adopt another kid, and since I’ve talked so much about Noi, being teeth buddies and all that, they wanted to ask you two if you were okay with them coming over to visit her at the home.”

Mina stared at her best friend in surprise, Neito doing the same in shock. “They want to adopt her?” Neito looked at Eijirou through narrowed eyes. He trusted him, sure, he was Mina’s best friend and now his friend as well, but he cared immensely about the little snake girl and would have no hesitation in telling anyone he didn’t deem good enough off. Mina poked him in the ribs, making him squeak and glare at her. She, instead, was looking at her redheaded friend. “Ei, can you give us a moment to discuss?”

Impressive, how she didn’t think twice about demanding her friend leave his own room for a while, but he understood and nodded. “Yeah, sure, I’ll be in the hall so just come get me later.”

The door shut behind him with a click, and after a couple of seconds, Mina turned to face her brother. “Do you know what this means?”

Neito anxiously bit his thumbnail, staring back at her. “That if this goes wrong I might have to kill Kirishima’s parents?”

“Sure, that too, but if it goes well Noi will be out of that home . You know the likelihood of any kid getting adopted from there is low, and she’s by far the youngest kid there. Issei wants to adopt but he’s still too young, so we need all the help we can get if we want all of us to make it out of there okay when we shut them down.” She took a firm hold of Neito’s shoulders. “Ei’s mums are good people. I’ve known them since middle school and they’ve never looked down on me for my mutations or my quirk. Let’s at least see if Noi likes them before we decide not to give them a chance, okay?”

Her brother stared up into the ceiling for a moment, closing his eyes a while to think before looking her in the eye. “Okay. You can go get him again.”

Mama and Eijirou’s mums decided that they would be coming over to the home Friday afternoon. Mama had tried to schedule it to the day before that, but Eijirou had told them both he as well as Mina and Neito wanted to be there, and since they had school on Fridays it would be harder for them to get permission to leave on a Thursday afternoon. His mums were very understanding and made sure to pick a time and day their son and his friends could be there. It would feel safer for Noi too. Mama was less enthused about it, as she didn’t see why Mina and Neito had to be there.

As soon as school ended, Mina and Neito headed straight to the home after classes ended. Neither class nor teacher had ever seen either of them leave in such a rush before, but a few of their classmates knew what was planned for the day. Eijirou was getting picked up by his mums in half an hour or so, giving the other two enough of a head start to get there. Eijirou had asked if they wanted to get a ride with them, but Neito had resolutely said no for the both of them.

So once Eijirou stepped in through the door, Noi was already prepared for having visitors, though she wasn’t entirely in the loop on what exactly everything entailed, but they had done their best to tell her. Getting her five year old self to pay attention wasn't that easy though.

When Noi spotted Eijirou, who stepped into the common area first as his mothers got the formalities out of the way, she lit up like a sun, Eijirou doing the same in return as he came over to where she was sitting in Neito’s lap where she had been drawing in a colouring book with neon crayons. She slithered around so she could be on both boys laps at once, showing Eijirou what picture she was colouring. Neito looked at them with a thoughtful expression, ignoring the adults who made their way into the room. The redhead and the small girl were signing to each other, both doing it kind of clumsily; Noi due to her young age and Eijirou due to having only started to learn it a few years ago when Mina too was starting to learn it because of Noi. So technically, all three of them had started to learn it for the same reason. It had always been cute seeing her interact with Eijirou, but this time it was bittersweet. But at least, if she was adopted by Eijirou’s family he could still be a part of her life. He wouldn’t have to lose another sister.

Both boys looked up when a woman crouched in front of them, another standing a few steps away. The woman in front of them was almost identical to Eijirou. Her long hair was black, which Neito knew was Eijirou’s original hair colour by now, and their eyes were the same. She even had the same sharp teeth that made Noi gasp and stare in awe. So far, the only other person she’d met who had the same teeth as hers (though hers were thinner than the regular human width the Kirishimas had, like nails) was the redhead whose lap she was occupying, so this was really exciting. Eagerly she signed the word ‘touch’ over and over until Eijirou’s mum opened her mouth and allowed the little girl to feel them. Neito eyed Mama out of the corner of his eye, seeing the expression on her face she definitely wanted to tell Noi off for behaving the way she did. He could see the other of Eijirou’s mums with a phone in hand, snapping a picture at the little gathering on the couch.

Eijirou’s identical mum introduced herself as Nuriko, sitting down on the floor to be level with the little girl after shaking hands with Neito, who looked at her with apprehension. He wanted this to go well, but he was also scared of what could happen if it didn’t.

Once Nuriko was properly situated, Noi slithered over into her lap, leaving Neito and Eijirou to show the woman her colouring book. Nuriko asked if Noi wanted to meet Eijirou’s other mum, and the girl looked confused for a while before nodding. Two mums wasn’t something that she’d encountered before, but she was a small child and didn’t have any prejudices forced upon her yet, so she just accepted it and moved on. Not like she had much experience with parents either way.

The second woman came over, introducing herself as Hina. She had buzzed, bright orange hair and green eyes, and to Noi’s disappointment, no pointy teeth. Hina explained that while she was Eijirou’s mum, she wasn’t related to him by blood. It took a bit of explaining how that worked for her to understand, but what Neito now knew was that she had gotten together with Eijirou’s mum when he’d been very young, and was much more of a parent than his biological dad had ever been, as he’d been out of the picture before he’d even been born.

After Hina showed Noi her quirk, where she could make plants grow faster, Noi was glued to her side, wrapping her body around her waist and signing away happily. Nuriko sat down next to her son as Mina bounced over to Noi and Hina to play with them. Mama had left the room for now, letting them know she’d be back to check in on them in two hours, when it was time for dinner.

It seemed like Nuriko had noticed Neito’s mood, and she took the time to talk to him. She told him about how she worked as a kindergarten teacher, specialising on quirks that were harder to manage. The longer Neito talked to her, the more he felt like if there had been even one teacher like her, maybe everything wouldn’t have gone to hell for his original family. Or maybe they were too fucked up even for people with the patience of a saint. He would never know. But he was relieved to find that he got along with her really well.

Once dinner rolled around it was time for the Kirishima family to go, making Noi grumpy. Neito could see that Mama wanted to tell her off again, but she didn’t want to leave a bad impression on the possible parents. She cared about image, even though she had looked disgusted by the familiarity between the two grown women. Neito knew what she was thinking. She’d said exactly what she thought about same sex relationships back when she’d found out about him and Mina’s sexualities. They hadn’t even brought up the existence of gender as a spectrum to her, that would make her lose her mind.

The only way Noi had allowed Eijirou and his parents to leave was that they agreed to come again tomorrow. That hadn’t been the plan originally, but that’s how things ended. They were going to take Noi to the playground nearby, so the girl could spend time with them alone, and then they would sleep over. It was bizarre to see anyone actually have a shot at being adopted from this place, as it had only happened once before during the time Neito had been there. Mina too hadn’t seen it very often, and could count the successful adoptions she’d seen on one hand.

The weekend was intense for Neito, but he kept himself in check. The Kirishimas were nice people, and Noi seemed to really like them, so he didn’t want to fuck things up just because he didn’t know how to behave himself. Eijirou told Neito and Mina about how it had gone on the playground, where they’d all played with Noi and spent some quality time together. Noi seemed to have enjoyed herself a lot.

Still, once night time came, Neito couldn’t sleep. Nuriko and Hina were sleeping in the living room, Eijirou sleeping in what used to be Issei’s room, though he’d said he’d be fine sleeping in Mina’s room. Papa had decided that he’d stay in the room where Issei had lived until he moved out. They didn’t want a boy and a girl to share a room, even though they knew Mina wasn’t interested in boys, and since Neito was , they didn’t want him to sleep in his room either.

Neito had given up on sleeping once the clock struck three in the morning.

He was perched on the windowsill in the staircase, staring out the window into the early fall night. It was dark, frost covering the reddening leaves that were holding on to the trees for dear life. There was a small creak down below, and he locked eyes with Eijirou, his hair down and fluffy from having borrowed the showers earlier. The redhead gave a small wave before climbing the stairs to the second floor. Neito scooted over, making room for the other boy to sit next to him.

“Hey,” Eijirou whispered, so he wouldn’t wake his parents up. “You doing okay? I get that this is super weird for you.”

“It… is. Super weird. But people usually don’t get adopted when they end up here, so I don’t… wanna take that opportunity away from her.”

“That makes sense. Mina’s told me about why kids end up here. And I know you love Noi-chan, so it makes it extra weird, right?”

“Yeah…” Neito leaned his temple against the cold glass, looking out at the garden. “I… but if this goes well she’ll be out of here when…” he eyed Eijirou, who looked at him with gentle attention, head tilted to the side. God, this boy truly was endearing. “...I need to tell you something but I don’t trust that you’ll be able to keep quiet, so follow me.”

Confused, the redhead followed into Neito’s bedroom, where Neito sat down on his bed, crossing his legs. Eijirou sat down next to him. “What’s up?”

“So uh… Mina probably would’ve been better at telling you this, but I thought you should know.” God, it had been a spur of the moment choice to tell him, but now he didn’t know what to say. “Anyway… We’re planning on forcibly shutting down this place. Or maybe more like, the couple that runs it?”

As expected, Eijirou had to struggle to keep it down, but stopped himself in time, voice coming out in a whisper instead. “Why? Is something going on?”

“Yes.” Neito fiddled with the strings on the hoodie he was wearing for a moment before continuing, feeling Eijirou’s concerned eyes on him. “When Mina got accepted to UA they were excited, but not in the way most parents would be. They’re… power hungry, so they planned on using her to get something out of her being a hero. And when I needed to be moved they took me in too as soon as they heard I’d gotten in too. We don’t know how to… deal with them but since we’re closer to graduation we need to do something, and the less kids get impacted by it, the better.”

Eijirou’s mouth gaped open as he took in the information. “I… had no idea. Mina hasn’t said anything about it at all.”

“I know. I think she didn’t know how.” After a moment of consideration he added; “It’s not because she doesn’t trust you, you know she does, it’s just… a hard thing to talk about.”

“I… I think I get it. I think.”

“Good. So, um, I just want you to promise me one thing…” He felt unbearably awkward, but he had to say it. “Please promise that if… when your parents adopt Noi, I still get to be a part of her life. I know- I know I put people off, but I don’t know what I’d-”

Eijirou pulled him into a warm, manly hug, that he answered after a few seconds of hesitation. “Of course you’ll be a part of her life, I know how much you love her. There’s no way I’d let anyone ruin that. You can come see her as much as you want, you’re her family .”

Relieved, Neito melted into the hug.

They could do this. They would handle mama and papa with as few kids getting harmed in the process as possible.

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