Fanfic / Apex Predator (MHA)

Apex Predator is a My Hero Academia fanfic written by silver jackdaw (cizzi) on Archive of Our Own.

Midoriya Izuku believes that in every single school, there's an Apex Predator - a person who can control all the rules, the top, the one who can get away with everything and anything. And since he has no reason to believe Yuuei will be any different and is inherently mistrustful of authority figures, he decides to use any means necessary to ensure that nobody in the school will suffer from bullies.

Then it escalates from bullies. To put it mildly.

The author updated in March 2024 to say that the story is officially on hiatus, but they hope to return to it in the future.

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Apex Predator provides examples of:

• Abled in the Adaptation:
  • Izuku uses his healing quirk to cure Ingenium's spine, allowing him to walk again.
  • He also accidentally heals All Might. At first he wanted to heal a new injury left by being impaled, but he accidentally restored his lung too. Izuku wants to heal all his injuries, but everyone including the person he healed turn him down hard citing the drawbacks of his quirk.
  • Aizawa is not badly injured and his quirk is not damaged during the USJ attack because Izuku distracts Shigaraki long enough for All Might to arrive.
• Abusive Parents:
  • Endeavor, to the point that Dabi is able to obtain legal custody of Shouto under his legal name without anyone really questioning it.
  • Izuku's father Hisashi used to beat him and Inko before he left them. However, he manages to outdo Endeavor when he places a hit on his own son.
  • Toga's parents were verbally abusive and neglectful before finally escalating to physical violence, after which she ran away and joined the League.
• Achievements in Ignorance: As the official summary of the fic points out, in his efforts to protect his classmates from any potential Apex Predators, Izuku becomes the Apex Predator without realizing it. He only seems to realize it when Shigaraki corners him at the mall to ask him about the concept.
• Adaptational Badass:
  • Thanks to meditation, Izuku starts unlocking the other quirks hidden within One For All shortly after the USJ attack, starting with Float.
  • Ochako gets her martial arts training before the sports festival from Aizawa, so she wins against Katsuki and routinely beats him in later spars.
• Adaptational Name Change: Izuku chooses "Versatile" as his hero name instead of "Deku".
• Adaptational Relationship Overhaul:
  • Due to his anti-bullying campaign, Izuku has a far closer relationship with the girls in his class. He also befriends Shinsou far earlier than in canon, and even managed to befriend Monoma. He's also very close to Hawks (having chosen him for his internship) and is on decent to friendly term with the League of Villains.
  • Izuku has a far more negative relationship with Katsuki as he is terrified of just being near him and flinches at loud noises because of his past bullying. In canon Izuku is nowhere near as scared of Katsuki, preferring to confront him head-on.
  • He befriends Tokoyami before the Sports Festival when he asks to team up in preparation for the team challenge.
  • Present Mic and Aizawa are married.
• Adaptational Sexuality: Most characters in this fic are attracted to people of the same sex while in the source material, they are either straight or the subject is never brought up. Notably, Present Mic and Aizawa are married.
• Adaptational Superpower Change:
  • The Quirks stored within One For All are different than in-canon. While Float, Blackwhip, and the standard strength enhancement remain the same, there are two other ones. One is a healing quirk that allows Izuku to heal the currently unhealed injuries of anyone he touches (himself included) while absorbing and doubling the pain, and another quirk that allows him to enhance the abilities of other quirks, including other people.
  • In the manga, Shimura Hana's quirk was Float. Here, her quirk is a five-point activation quirk that destroys electronic devices.
• Affectionate Gesture to the Head: Aizawa occasionally ruffles Izuku's hair. He also does it to Hitoshi.
• Affectionate Nickname: Hana calls Izuku "munchkin kid".
• Anti-Hero: Izuku genuinely wants the best for everyone, but in order to help people he frequently resorts to unethical and/or illegal means in order to achieve it. Examples include stalking people or hacking databases to access his classmate's school records.
• Aroused by Their Voice: The sound of Dabi's voice sends shivers straight through Hawks's spine - and quite possibly his groin too.
• Awesomeness by Analysis: Izuku correctly figures out how each and every match in the Sports Festival would go just by being observant, and also figured out what kind of challenges would be in the festival by analysing the previous ones. This of course makes his reputation as a mastermind spread even further.
• Beneath the Mask: One of the many things that clue Izuku in that something's wrong with Hawks is that he's faking part of the cheery attitude; like he is genuinely a well-meaning person, but he's also deliberately choosing to appear cheerful. He's also Obfuscating Stupidity and isn't as social as he pretends to be.
• The Bet: Kurogiri and Mr. Compress bet on whether Dabi is related to Endeavor or not. Compress wins.
• Blackmail: Izuku wears a body cam and frequently asks Armament to hack into police and school archives, all so that he can blackmail bullies.
• Blanket Fort: Some students of 1-A make one in the classroom. Aizawa lets them.
• Break Them by Talking: This is Izuku's go-to method of dealing with bullies. His friends are used to these "chats" ending in tears, even though Izuku is perfectly polite and never raises his voice. It's even effective on Shigaraki. It's even effective over text message.
• Canon Character All Along: Armament is revealed to be Hana Shimura.
• The Chessmaster: Izuku calls this kind of person a "chess player". He also quickly figures out that for all Shigaraki acts as the leader of the League, he is not this trope.
• Cool and Unusual Punishment: When Izuku was younger, he kept a notebook of various ways he could take revenge on Katsuki for his bullying, with potential ideas ranging from "riping his limbs out" to "sending him spiders in the mail".
• Cool Teacher: Aizawa becomes this after it really hits him how traumatized his entire class is. He is more lax with regulations, allows them free periods or sessions where they all just talk, lets them sit in groups, personally teaches or coaches anyone who asks, and is more or less a Parental Substitute for his class. When he's away from class due to the Todoroki custody case for a week, everyone in the class is depressed and they cite how Aizawa pays all of them individual attention.
• Cover-Blowing Superpower: Izuku had to tell Aizawa what was actually going on with his quirk after he got a third quirk in the middle of training because he got really suspicious.
• Declaration of Protection:
  • At first Izuku starts gathering information on the other students of Yuuei for his own protection, but as time goes on he extends that sphere to the few friends he starts to make, to his classmates, to anyone at school.
  • When Aizawa is apprehending the hero team who tried to kill Izuku, he explicitly says that this should be the point of heroes, in particular that they should always try to protect children at all costs.
• Didn't See That Coming: When Aizawa asks Izuku why he's not using his quirk, Izuku explains that he can't really control it yet because he's a late-bloomer. Aizawa assumes that he got it before he turned ten years old, so he's absolutely shocked when Izuku tells him he got it on the day of the entrance exam.
• Dirty Cop: Some pro-heroes decided to take the assassination contract place on Izuku for the money. Overlaps with Would Hurt a Child.
• Disabled in the Adaptation:
  • The chronic anxiety that Shinsou suffered before being adopted now means that he's constantly falling asleep in various places because of the brain damage he suffered while being in foster care and under stress. He is under medication and therapy for this. In the source material, his issues with sleep were mostly implied by his deep dark circles but never addressed, and this tendency to fall asleep at random places was never present.
  • Koda was quiet in canon but here he is selectively mute for undisclosed reasons.
• Dissonant Serenity: Izuku always puts on his most polite smile and uses his sweetest voice when threatening people. Sometimes his smile turns into a Slasher Smile.
• Do Wrong, Right: When the USJ attack happens, Izuku is more baffled by the leader's (Shigaraki's) total incompetence than the attack itself, and starts ranting to him about how poorly organized his attack is and how they won't get their point across by attacking children.
• The Dreaded: Izuku quickly becomes this among Yuuei, between his anti-bullying campaign, expelling a student, accurately predicting all Sports Festival outcomes, having multiple quirks, beating Stain, having insane pain tolerance... He's terrifying and doesn't even realize it.
• Easy Amnesia:
  • Downplayed. When he was young, shortly after Touya's death, Shouto received a concussion during training that was never properly treated. As a result, he lost a good chunk of his memories from before the incident but never realized because due to his isolation, the subject was never brought up. This is the reason why Shouto barely recognized Fuyumi and Natsuo when he started talking to them again.
  • This is Touya's cover story for his years-long absence and why he reappeared just in time to take custody of Shouto.
• Faceless Goons: When the Commision needs somewhat killed, they send hired assassins without agendas and identities who are incredibly loyal to the Commision and wear outfits that fully conceal their features, up to their gender. This way they can blame hero deaths on "villain attacks". The only distinguishing trait is that they obviously all have different quirks. They send such a squad against Hawks and Hana.
• Faking Amnesia:As part of his civilian cover story, Dabi pretends that the fire at Sekoto peak made him lose his memory, and it was only a recent concussion that brought it back.
• Fantastic Drug: The Hero Commision laces Hawks' food with an illegal type of quirk supressing drugs. Hawks only realizes when he stops eating the food the Commission places in his fridge for a while, as he goes through withdrawal symptoms.
• First-Name Basis: Izuku tells Ochako that he's uncomfortable being called "Deku", so the two of them and Iida now call each other by their first names.
• Friendless Background:
  • Izuku hasn't considered Katsuki his friend for a while, so when Iida and Ochako start hanging out with him he wonders if that's what having friends is really like. That said, he has a number of online friends.
  • Shouto was isolated from everybody when he was young, so his first friends are those he makes in Yuuei.
  • Izuku figures out that Hawks has one such background because he talks about making friends in the same way Shouto does.
• Glamour: As part of his civilian disguise, Dabi obtains a ring that returns his hair to its original colour and hides his scarring. However, the disguise is only visual.
• Government Conspiracy: The Hero Public Safety Commission, who have committed murder, torture, child trafficking, quirk trafficking, leave people to suffer due to discrimination and who knows what else.
• Happily Adopted:
  • Tokoyami's biological parents were non-mutants who didn't want him, but he was adopted very young by mutants who love him and care for him, and he is happy in return.
  • After Midoriya Hisashi is jailed for putting a hit out on Izuku, Inko offers to have All Might adopt Izuku and for the two of them to jointly parent him; previously she'd also made him Izuku's godfather.
  • Shinsou Hitoshi is very happy to be adopted by Aizawa and Hizashi.
  • Ditto for Hawks, when he is adopted to remove him from the HPSC.
  • And now Toga has accepted an offer of adoption from them as well, though it's yet to be legally finalized.
• Healing Hands: One of the Quirks in Izuku's arsenal is an unnamed healing quirk. Via physical contact, he can heal any kind of injury that the body still has the capacity to heal (so scars or long-since missing limbs are out of the question), but he experiences twice as much pain as the person healed. This quirk also works on himself.
• Heel–Face Turn:
  • Dabi completely changes his mind about killing Shouto after he overhears him discussing his trauma, abuse, and Survivor's Guilt with Izuku and Tokoyami. He decides to find a way to legally remove Shouto from Endeavor's custody.
  • The League of Villains turns vigilante once Shigaraki realizes that All For One wants to use him as a pawn for something he's kept in the dark about.
• Heroic Self-Deprecation: Aizawa Lampshades this trope when he notices that Izuku second-guesses every compliment he gets.
• If Only You Knew: When Dabi dyes his hair red to undo his death certificate, Twice comments that he "could be a natural redhead". Dabi thinks this trope to himself, as he was a natural redhead before his hair went white.
• I'm Not Here to Make Friends:
  • Hitoshi tries to say this to Izuku when thanking him for saving him from bullies, but Izuku is so excited the other boy is actually talking to him that he doesn't even register what Hitoshi's saying. They become friends.
  • Later Shoto tells the same thing to Izuku in front of Hitoshi while Izuku is trying to make small talk.
    Hitoshi: Boy, that's not the thing to say.
    Izuku: Shut up.
• Improperly Paranoid: Things going well cause such extreme anxiety to Fuyumi that she has to take medication even when she knows that everything's going to be alright. For example, she panics during a school trip because everything is going too well. That said, something does go wrong on that particular trip, but it's implied that this level of anxiety is normal for her.
• Insult of Endearment: Aizawa nicknames Izuku "Problem Child" and realizes that he's gotten attached to him because he gave him a nickname.
• Jade-Colored Glasses: Years of being bullied and not a single adult figure in his life helping him (except his mother) made Izuku always assume the worst possible scenario for any situation. For example, he literally starts stalking Yuuei students so they don't get the jump on him and bully him, his first impression of Iida is that he's authoritarian and tyrannical, and assumes that Aizawa will expel him when he tells him that he's such a "late bloomer". Aizawa Lampshades this trope when Izuku asks him the last bit.
  Aizawa (thinking): [Izuku] always assumes the worst, but especially if it's from me.
• Kindhearted Cat Lover: Shouto, who takes the time to feed stray cats on the street.
• Literal-Minded: Due to his lack of interaction with other people, Shouto takes many sayings and expressions literally; for example, his initial response to being asked "what's up" was "the ceiling?"
• Mad Scientist: Hatsume Mei, as usual. When she's talking about how Izuku's power can blow up his body, she sounds thrilled. Izuku later calls her "that insane girl".
• Major Injury Underreaction: When Aizawa tells Power Loader that Izuku's quirk breaks his bones so they can't really test his new support items, his response is "well, that's inconvenient". Granted, they have Recovery Girl on staff.
• Make It Look Like an Accident: A few of the assassination attempts against Izuku are staged to look like accidents, such as when he falls into the enclosure of a quirked lion while on a school trip. In those cases, people realize they are assassination attempts because there are security measures taken precisely to avoid fatal accidents.
• My Suit Is Also Super: The new costume Mei and Power Loader design for Izuku more or less emulates the effect of Full Cowling (distributing the effects of One For All on Izuku's entire body) to compensate for how he can't do that on his own yet.
• Nervous Tics:
  • Izukus starts rambling and ranting whenever he's on the spot (usually when he thinks someone who's not a villain thinks badly of him).
  • Shigaraki and Hana scratch their necks when under pressure.
• Never Be Hurt Again: Izuku decides that starting from Yuuei, he will make sure that absolutely no bullies or "Apex Predators" will hurt anyone under his watch, and he starts stalking and gathering information (illegally) on anyone who seems even slightly suspicious. This of course stems from his past as a bullying victim and the teachers' indifference towards it.
• Not Me This Time: After the assassination attempt on Izuku, Dabi asks the league if any of them was responsible for it. Nobody in the league even knows what he's talking about.
• "Not So Different" Remark:
  • Izuku points out many similarities between Hawks and Shouto's behavior right into the pro-hero's face and asks him if they come from similar backgrounds.
  • Hawks constantly calls Izuku "mini-Nedzu" because of that terrifying grin and ability to see through all lies and fish information. Shouto agrees with him and wonders if it's possible for an animal and a human to be related.
• Offing the Offspring: Izuku's biological father Hisashi gets so angry at his existence that he posts a contract to kill him.
• Papa Wolf: Aizawa soon becomes violently protective of class 1-A, because he realizes that literally everyone in there has been bullied, has a troubled home life, or both. Even Katsuki, who is the sole bully in a class full of victims, has severe issues that he's working on. Later this attitude extends towards all underage kids, such as Toga. His belief is that Heroes should prioritize children no matter what.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: Some people think Dabi's Glamour is this, as it changes his coloration instead of his overall features.
• Parental Substitute:
  • All Might more or less becomes a foster father to Izuku, especially after Hisashi's abuse comes to light.
  • The entire class 1-A treats Aizawa as their dad, which other teachers find hilarious and/or terrifying.
  • Some characters like Himiko and Hawks note that Dabi treats Mr. Compress like a dad even if he would never admit it. And then Mr. Compress is seen on a date with Dabi's mom.
• Point of Divergence:
  • Because of Izuku's more negative relationship with Katsuki and the additional training Aizawa puts some of his students through, Ochako wins her fight against Katsuki because she was determined not to force Izuku to fight him.
  • The above nail lands Ochako an internship with Miruko.
• Related in the Adaptation: Inko is one of Shimura Nana's biological children, which in turn makes Izuku Shigaraki's cousin. They are unaware of this.
• Sadist Teacher: Izuku's teachers prior to meeting All Might were almost exclusively this, meaning that when Izuku goes to Yuuei he's incredibly suspicious of the teachers despite them all being pro-heroes, and makes a secret ranking system for them for how trustworthy they are. All Might has one star, and Aizawa soon gets five stars, the highest score which means "completely trustworthy". Aizawa wonders if Izuku got every shitty teacher out there prior to coming to Yuuei.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Connections!: A rare benevolent version is All Might abusing his Number 1 Hero status in order to protect people from the Hero Commission by keeping in contact with potential persons of interest.
• Second Place Is for Winners: Izuku correctly guesses based on past Sports Festivals that coming in first place in the first round will net a heavy handicap in the second. He deliberately drops back at the finish line and allows Bakugou to come in first.
• Secret Identity Vocal Shift: Todoroki Touya is implied to have a bit of a Smoky Voice from his old smoking habit (which he has since dropped). Therefore, when he's out as a civilian he speaks with a "normal" voice while covering the Smoky Voice as much as possible, while when he's out as "Dabi" he purposefully exaggerates his rasp to sound like a chainsmoker.
• Secret-Keeper: Quite a few people realize that Dabi is the recently resurfaced Todoroki Touya, but instead of sharing it they roll their eyes at anyone who hasn't figured it out. Occasionally overlaps with Secret Secret-Keeper if Dabi doesn't know that they know.
• She Is the King: Discussed when Katsuki yells that "girls can be kings too". He and Eijirou were talking about a female lion with a mane.
• Ship Tease: Primarily Izuku/Shoto and Shinsou/Monoma, with a bit of Dabi/Hawkes. None of the ships have come to fruition yet, and one of the occasionally seen group chats is called "2 am crush posting" and apparently exists so that Izuku, Ochako, Momo, Shinsou, and Tokoyami can commiserate (and tease each other) over their crushes.
• So Proud of You: Aizawa tells this to Izuku because he has made leaps and bounds with controlling his quirk and the work he puts into it. Izuku bursts into tears.
• Spared by the Adaptation: Hana is revealed to be Shimura Hana, Shigaraki's older sister.
• Strong Family Resemblance: Hana and Tenko both have red eyes, five point contact quirks with destructive properties, and a tendency to scratch their necks when stressed out (Hana attributes this to psoriasis). When The Reveal that they're related comes out, Hawks wonders how did he not notice the similarity earlier.
• Survivor's Guilt: Shouto reveals that he feels guilty that he survived Endeavor's abuse when his brother Touya died under the same treatment.
• Tampering with Food and Drink: The Commision-aproved food that Hawks eats turns out to be laced with illegal quirk supressing drugs to keep his mutant traits at bay without him knowing.
• A Taste of Their Own Medicine: Mineta always makes the girls paranoid when he's stalking them so Izuku feels perfectly justified by stalking Mineta and making him paranoid in return.
• Title Drop: Izuku uses the term "apex predator" to describe the person in each societal structure that "controls the social game" instead of being just a "player". A person who doesn't play by the rules but sets them and controls them. A person who can get away with anything, and not be doubted for a second. He is used to that person being a bully.
• Took a Level in Badass: After he stops taking the quirk supressing drugs, Hawks undergoes a quirk evolution which gives him even more abilities, such as Innate Night Vision, a second eyelid for protection against the wind, and gives his feathers golden flakes that can be manipulated to reflect light as desired.
• Took a Level in Kindness: After the Sports Festival (in particular, the Ochako vs Bakugou match), Izuku and Katsuki come clean to the teachers about their relationship (bully and victim). After some discussion, Nedzu makes Katsuki attend therapy sessions, and Katsuki slowly realizes how much he and people like him tormented his classmates. Eventually he apologizes to Izuku, though Izuku hasn't forgiven him yet.
• Two-Person Love Triangle: Hawks has a crush on both Dabi and Touya, without knowing they're the same person. Said person has no intention of clearing things up and instead relentlessly flirts with Hawks.
• Verbal Judo: Via his "Do Wrong, Right" speech to Shigaraki, Izuku manages to convince him to withdraw from the UJS attack (though this doesn't stop All Might from attacking the Nomu). Immediately afterwards, the fact that Izuku managed to talk down the villains spreads through Yuuei like wildfire, adding even more fuel to Izuku's already fearsome reputation.
• Would Hurt a Child: Aizawa lampshades this trope when he expresses in dismay that he feels the world is made up of hurt children and those who hurt them.

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