I forgot to post this one on here. I did it a while ago.
There are a few things that need to be clarified before you read the chapter. I’ve listed them below.
Kouda’s Quirk, Animal Voice: A common misconception with Kouda’s Quirk is that he can talk to animals. He actually can’t. What his quirk lets him do is forcefully command animals against their will. He doesn’t actually understand animal speech, though it seems that animals can understand humans fairly well.
Yuwai-chan’s POV: Other than Kouda, who Yuwai calls by his first name “Kouji” (甲司) , in the original Japanese he calls everyone in katakana, which is the spoken equivalent to sounding out a foreign word or noise. so instead of Midoriya (緑谷), it’s Mi-do-ri-ya (ミドリヤ). It’s more or less a stylistic choice I went with to emphasize that most of the story is from a rabbit’s point of view.
Time Period: This story takes place after Bakugou and Midoriya have had their big fight and are under three days house arrest together, cleaning the dormitories (around chapters 121-122).
Prior Events: This book goes in chronological order in itself, meaning that since it’s the sixth chapter there will be some references to earlier chapters. I might translate those too, if I have time.
I think that’s everything. So without further ado, please enjoy!
Chapter 6: I Am A Rabbit
My master Kouji didn’t close the door to his room properly because I ran around and made noise last night in our room. Kouji, who is normally an early riser, overslept and rushed out. Taking advantage of that, I quickly jumped out of the room.
I did feel a bit guilty. But I could not resist my natural instincts. It’s something all animals have to deal with.
My name is Yuwai. I am Kouji’s pet rabbit. Kouji always calls me ‘Yuwai-chan.’
In human years I would be about 30 years old. I’m already someone well past his prime. Honestly I don’t think it’s appropriate to call a 30 year old “Yuwai-chan” of all things, but it’s a name that Kouji thought long and hard about, so it can’t be helped. Accepting a name is the first step for all pets.
* * *
The first time I ever met Kouji was at a pet shop.
With my pure white fur and my round, cute eyes, I had great confidence in my appearance. But due to bad timing I remained unsold. One by one all the others were happily taken away, but nobody chose me. I could not put my disappointment in words. My heart felt as if it were torn to pieces. But even so, I didn’t give up.
While I remained unsold, I studied humans together with my other colleagues in the shop, along with my pet seniors who would drop by the animal hospital attached to the shop from time to time. All in preparation for the day I would finally be chosen.
And then, when my price was finally cut down, Kouji bought me with the money he had saved. I will never forget the debt I owe to him for the rest of my years.
However, I have my pride as a pet. No matter who the owner is, I was fully expecting for some forceful hugging against my will, which I would naturally resist to the bitter end. But Kouji wasn’t like that. He always put my feelings first and slowly closed the distance between us. And so I fully acknowledged Kouji as my owner.
What I was most surprised about with Kouji as my owner was his Quirk. His “Animal Voice” could relay his intentions to animals to command them. But Kouji rarely ever uses his Quirk on me. The only time he had used it was when I had an upset stomach and he had to command me to take medicine because I kept refusing. But other than that, he never forced me to do anything. At that time I understood that Kouji, who respected me, was an ideal owner to have.
An owner and pet should be united by a relationship of trust. And so of course, I also have a deep respect for Kouji.
* * *
I am the type who is most active at night, but to match with Kouji’s lifestyle I switched to the afternoons. Since Kouji has a gentle personality, he wakes me up so that we can wake up together.
Because of that, I purposely made noise during the night to create a chance for myself.
That’s right. A chance to explore this new building we had moved into.
Initially I was confused by the sudden move. This too is a pet’s fate. Moving with the owner to a new address is a given. There was some talk about me staying with the main family, but in the end Kouji brought me with him. Such a thing makes a pet feel exhausted.
However, I knew. I knew that Kouji was anxious about how he would fit into his new environment. That’s why what I was doing was necessary.
Kouji has a kind and thoughtful personality, so he had a lot of friends. Of course, I am one of them.
In other words, while he may be my owner, I think of Kouji as my friend as well. And as his senior in rabbit years, I worry over him like I would a little brother.
And to live alongside Kouji, of course I would need to have a deeper understanding of this new building. Besides, as an animal I have a natural need to check around my territory. Hence, creating a chance for myself to do so.
* * *
It was already time for all the humans to be at school so I wasn’t expecting anyone to be around.
Even so, I cautiously slipped through the door. Dazzling sunlight poured in through the hallway windows. There wasn’t a sound to be heard, not a presence to be sensed. Alright. I calmly moved from one end of the hall to the other, sniffing whatever scents there were along the way. I also looked out at the courtyard from the window. Straining, I could barely see the lush green grass of the lawn. I knew it was there since I had gone down to the first floor with Kouji before.
I felt the drool building in my mouth. One of the biggest reasons I had slipped out of the room was because of that green grass. I wanted to wildly run around that wide lawn and eat the grass to my heart’s content. I wanted to dig all the holes I wanted. All animals have the primary need to live their life in nature. As a pet I sometimes feel the suffering need to be out in a natural habitat.
And now there was nothing holding me back from making my wild fantasies about romping around that lawn come true. I had to get down to the first floor and find a way to get out there.
Hoping that someone left a door open somewhere like Kouji did this morning, I headed towards the elevator.
I had a vague understanding of the building’s structure. Kouji had brought me out several times before this. Plus I had slipped out again the other day when there was some sort of power outage fiasco.
I jumped up and pressed the elevator button. After seeing it used so many times, of course I would know how it worked. With just a press of a button you could go to any floor you pleased. What a convenient thing to have. After a short moment, the doors slid open and I hopped aboard. And with another good jump, I hit the button for the first floor. My body felt strangely weightless on the way down, but I endured it. Gradually I could hear some sort of sound growing louder and louder the further down I went. And then the moment the elevator doors opened again…
Vroooooooom! Vroooooooooom!
W-What on earth was that hideous noise?!
For a moment I gave into my panic, but then I reminded myself that another chance like this may not ever come. Steeling myself, I hopped off the elevator. I lurked in the background, waiting, but the sound showed no signs of stopping. If I lingered here to contemplate the mystery identity of the noise, it would probably be more difficult to get outside to the courtyard later.
As I thought that, the mysterious sound started to get closer and closer to where I was hiding.
Seriously though, this noise was hard on my ears. Was this… a vacuum? At Kouji’s house, everyday his mother would run the vacuum. I hated how loud it was, but it was a machine that kept the rooms clean. Even if I did have to dive under the futon and hide myself from time to time. This time though there was no futon to hide under.
Slowly the general noise of the vacuum divided into two. There were two of them… even as I grew angry at the noise, I suddenly realized something. If there were two separate sounds, then that meant that there were two vacuums. And if there were two vacuums, then that meant that there were two humans still in the building.
Slowly I approached and peeked out from behind a pillar. There was one human vacuuming the carpet around the sofas, and another one a little further away doing the same thing.
One human had big eyes and fluffy hair. The other one had sharp eyes and a standoffish expression. These two must be the ones called Mi-do-ri-ya and Ba-ku-gou.
If I remembered correctly, Kouji, along with his floormates Ka-mi-na-ri, I-i-da, and O-ji-ro, were talking about these two last night. I was there too, and I heard the whole thing.
* * *
“I wonder if it’ll be okay to leave the two of them alone here.”
The one who spoke was Ka-mi-na-ri, the human who always had a frivolous attitude. Compared to Kouji, he has a very open personality and could carry conversations easily with other humans.
“Are you worried that they’ll start fighting again, Kaminari-kun? They should have learned their lesson already. That’s the purpose of their house arrest.”
The one who answered him was I-i-da, the one with the glasses. He got along well with Kouji because of his serious personality. It seems that he was elected Class Representative because of his seriousness as well.
“Well, it seemed that they were fine today.”
The one named O-ji-ro pointed out. Personality-wise he’s not as shy as Kouji, but he’s not very social either. If anything, he was a reserved person who kept a firm emotional distance from others. But he did have the most splendid tail I have ever seen, so of course his heart must be just as splendid. I want to sniff at his tail to confirm that it’s real sometime.
“Well yeah, but that’s only one day. There’s still two more to go. Chances are that they’ll probably have another fight again. Kouda, you agree with me right?”
“Y-Yeah…”
Kouji timidly answered Ka-mi-na-ri’s question. I think that he wanted to bring a positive spin to the conversation, but his personality wasn’t the type that could do that easily…
* * *
That being said, I couldn’t remember what else they had said about Mi-do-ri-ya and Ba-ku-gou. I think I had zoned out by then.
Anyways, it seemed that Mi-do-ri-ya and Ba-ku-gou had secretly left the dormitories to have a big fight and then were placed under house arrest as a result. Somehow their relationship was quite bad, despite being childhood friends.
Personally, I don’t think it’s a bad thing for a man to be a bit mischievous every now and again. Kouji has always avoided fights so I’m worried that when push comes to shove, he’ll only ever back down instead of asserting himself. With rabbits, fighting is always a matter of life and death. I haven’t actually been in one myself, but that was my philosophy on it.
But what should I do if these humans broke into a fight in front of me right now?
Other than them, it seemed that no other humans were around. If there was no one to stop them, then one of them would probably die if they started fighting. If one rabbit killed another rabbit, then the dead rabbit would simply return to nature and that would be that. But if a human killed another human, it would become a huge scandal. And if that situation really happened here, then Kouji would probably be caught up in the mess too. That would be troubling—
* * *
“Huh?”
Hm?
Ba-ku-gou had looked up from his work and our eyes met. Damn, I hadn’t noticed the sound of the vacuum stopping.
“What the… Why is there…?”
“Kacchan, what’s wro—AH! Yuwai-chan!”
Mi-do-ri-ya had noticed me too. This is bad. Now what do I do…?
“What the hell is ‘yuwai-chan’?”
Ba-ku-gou asked with a contemptuous tone and expression. Mi-do-ri-ya tried to answer despite his clear panic.
“That’s what his name is.”
“Hmph. This is that rock-face guy’s pet, isn’t it?”
“How did he get out? I wonder if Kouda-kun forget to close his door today. Anyways, we should probably try to catch him… Yuwai-chan~”
Mi-do-ri-ya softly called my name as he slowly approached me. I backed away to keep distance between us.
“It’s okay, nothing to be scared of~ Come here~”
Only an idiot would approach someone trying to catch them. I backed away even more.
“Hey, just leave it alone. It’s not like it can get outside anyway.”
“We can’t do that. Kouda-kun once told me that rabbits have delicate bones. What if he gets hurt when we take our eyes off him?”
“It’s Rock-face’s own fault for leaving the door open, that dumbass.”
I bristled at those words. He was wrong. I was the one who made Kouji forget to close the door. Calling my owner a dumbass was unforgivable. As a means of protest, I used my hind legs to kick off the floor and headbutt Ba-ku-gou in the leg.
“The hell?”
“Is he angry?”
Ba-ku-gou looked at me with eyebrows quizzically raised. Mi-do-ri-ya tilted his head in confusion. This was justice, Mi-do-ri-ya.
“What a cheeky rabbit.”
A brat like you has no right to call me that. I gave Ba-ku-gou another headbutt on the leg.
Ba-ku-gou’s eyebrows changed from quizzical to irritated. Mi-do-ri-ya worriedly cut in.
“Anyways, it’s best if we catch him. If something else happens during our house arrest period, Aizawa-sensei will get angry again…”
“…… Tch. Adding onto my workload…”
And with that, Ba-ku-gou suddenly dashed towards me, closing the distance between us in an instant. I swiftly dodged his grasp.
“Oh?” Ba-ku-gou let out a surprised noise as my speed exceeded his expectations. There was the saying ‘ran like a scared rabbit’. Never underestimate the legs of us rabbits. Ba-ku-gou’s reaction left me with a good feeling, and I peeked over my shoulder hoping to see a tearful, defeated expression. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
“Wai—Kacchan?!”
“Heh, in that case!”
Suddenly explosions burst forth from Ba-ku-gou’s palms and he came at me with amazing speed. What was with this guy?! Was that his Quirk?
It happened so suddenly that my body froze in place. Speaking honestly, I was frightened. The scent and sounds of Ba-ku-gou’s explosions made my instincts scream in fear. This human had the smell of a predator. No matter what, I couldn’t let myself be caught by this one.
“Huh?”
But in misfortune, an opportunity shined through. The correct solution was to suddenly hit the brakes. Unable to stop his momentum, Bakugou passed by me. Now! I dashed away in the opposite direction from him with all my strength.
“Hey, get back here!”
“Kacchan, don’t use your Quirk! You’ll hurt him!”
“Shut up! Out of my way!”
“Rabbits are weak to stress! It’s said that they’ll probably die in a day if they don’t get to eat! You heard about that too, right?!”
“… What a fucking annoying animal……!!”
You humans are the ones who are damn annoying! All you need to live is to breathe, eat, defecate, and sleep! That’s all you need! I screamed those words out in my heart as I ran from my inevitable death. And then at that moment, something appeared in front of my eyes.
Bump! Whump! Squish! W-What the hell was this?! I crashed into something! It smelled horrible!
“AHH! You shitty rabbit! I just got that trash into a pile and you ruined it!”
SHUT UP! It’s your fault for leaving trash in a place like this!
“Kacchan, calm down…”
“Shut your damn mouth! All you’ve been doing is bossing me around!”
* * *
While the two of them argued, I hopped my way to the elevator and quickly jumped to press a button.
I wasn’t sure which floor I had arrived on. I couldn’t smell Kouji’s scent anywhere, so it definitely wasn’t the third floor.
Anyways, I had to find a place to hide myself. Desperately, I stretched upwards and sniffed at the air to try to gather more information. Then a unique smell drifted towards my direction. It smelled like a great deal of paper. I followed the smell and found the door to a room slightly ajar.
Alright. I stealthily entered the room. There was little room to move due to all the stacked magazines. There was also a wide array of posters hanging on the walls.
In this case I could hide myself between the narrow cracks of the magazine stacks. I’ll just stay here for a while. I stretch up again and strain my ears to listen. No sounds of two people approaching. They were probably sweeping up the trash into a pile again.
I hid myself behind a magazine stack in the back of the room. The drawn curtains made the room dimly lit, allowing me to calm down.
Oh, right. I should probably clean out the stink and whatever else in my fur. As I carefully groomed myself, I remembered how Ba-ku-gou was earlier.
The smell of a predator. Wild and with a bad mouth. To think I had to live in the same building as that violent human.
I felt a horrible anxiety attack coming on. He was probably the type that would grab and carry a poor rabbit by the ears. Our ears are very important to us and filled with delicate nerve endings. The only ones who would hold innocent bunnies like that were hunters!
There was no way that he could get along with someone as gentle as Kouji. I had to make sure that they didn’t interact. Just that much would be fine. I could think of many ways to interfere.
I had to protect Kouji from that violent human. I had to break out of the fear that Ba-ku-gou had over me.
At that exact moment, I heard the elevator doors slide open from down the hall.
“Then I’ll go up and look around the fifth floor.”
“Just shut up and go.”
I heard the elevator doors shut and the sound of the elevator going up. I heard the sound of approaching feet along with somebody muttering “Tch.” No mistake, it was Ba-ku-gou.
Once more my fear paralyzed me. Even so, I could hear Ba-ku-gou coming closer and closer, until finally he was right outside of the door.
“Each and every one of them is just a goddamn dumbass…”
Ba-ku-gou roughly shoved the door open and barged in. My heart leapt up to my throat.
I thought for sure that he would find me right away, that he would haul me up by the ears and I would see his horrible, smug face.
But to my surprise, Ba-ku-gou had frozen in place at the sight of the room we were in.
“…… Ugh, that disgusting little shit and this disgusting room can just go and fucking die…!!”
Ba-ku-gou furiously hissed out while his face looked as if he had just seen a revolting bug.
Certainly, this room’s posters and magazine covers depicted only naked women. But it was natural for boys of this age to have at least a healthy interest in these sorts of things. That was their own natural instinct. Although judging by Ba-ku-gou’s unsettled reaction, it seemed that this room’s interior was outside the norm.
And then I realized! Ba-ku-gou was distracted and there was time for me to escape! I leapt out from between the magazine cracks and dashed out of the room.
“Whoa?! Hey, wait—Argh!”
Slip! Thud! Ba-ku-gou slid and fell and the stacks of magazines came down like an avalanche. Once more I hit the button for the elevator and hopped aboard.
* * *
“Kacchan? Is Yuwai-chan around?”
“Like I’d know!”
Izuku had heard the ruckus down below from the third floor and had come running. Bakugou stomped out of the Mineta’s room with a livid expression.
Bakugou realized that Izuku was out of breath and grunted a hostile “Ah?” when the latter said nothing.
Izuku gave him a forced smile that soon clouded over into a frown. “But this is troubling. At this rate we’ll never finish our cleaning duties. There’s still more tasks to be done.”
Bakugou said nothing but his grim expression showed that he agreed. Then the corners of his lips curled upwards, just the slightest bit.
“In that case, we always have that.”
* * *
Some time passed after that. I hid myself away in a corner in the shadow of a pillar to catch my breath. If I could I wanted to hide here forever, but I knew that I couldn’t. If I left my hiding place, those two would catch me. So should I or should I not?
There was a certain hierarchy to things. And there was no doubt that I was on the bottom. I knew that there was no way I could ever win a fight against a human, especially not against Ba-ku-gou. Even so, I wanted to retaliate even just a little. If I could keep out of their grasp until Kouji came back, it would be my win. Then at least I would feel that I had some chance of protecting Kouji from Ba-ku-gou…
But then a sweet, fruity smell wafted my way.
… This… This was a banana!
It was a banana! A banana! Where was this banana?! My mind immediately became consumed with thoughts about bananas. One only had to eat that delicious fruit once to become its loyal slave. Banana! Banana! I completely forgot myself at the thought of bananas. Kouji has only let me nibble on them once or twice. It couldn’t be helped. These were my natural instincts. It’s the banana’s fault for being so delicious! Ahh, banana! Banana!
My legs gained their own will and carried me towards the smell. Even one second faster towards the banana! The only word left in my vocabulary was banana! Banana!! BANANA!! BANANA!! BANANA!! BANANA!! BANANA!!
The smell was even closer! The banana was close…!
!! There it was! The banana!!
I sunk my teeth into the banana. As the delicious flavor entered my mouth, I felt a moment of pure bliss. The next thing I knew, there was a hand on my body, holding me in place.
“You’re more trouble than you’re worth, you damn rabbit…”
Then before my eyes, Ba-ku-gou’s triumphant grin appeared. Next to him, Mi-do-ri-ya gave a sigh of relief. “Ahh, thank goodness~” he said as he smiled.
—How foolish of me. They had lured me in with the banana and caught me.
I glared at the two of them. What impudent behavior to use a banana as bait…! ………… No, that wasn’t true. A win was a win. I had lost to both these guys and the banana… I wasn’t qualified to protect Kouji…
“… Hm? Yuwai-chan is being weirdly docile… Don’t tell me he’s in bad health…?!”
“… Seriously?”
* * *
I heard the quick pitter patter of footsteps and scurried myself to the door.
“Y-Yuwai-chan!”
Kouji! Welcome home! We haven’t seen each other for a few hours! I happily jumped up to greet up. But the way that Kouji hugged me will filled with worry, and he carefully examined my face and body to any injuries. After seeing that I was completely unharmed, he let out a sigh of relief.
“Are you okay? Yuwai-chan…”
Mi-do-ri-ya and Ba-ku-gou stood outside the door. While still hugging me, Kouji turned towards the two of them and nodded his head.
“I’m so glad~ For a while I thought that Yuwai-chan was hurt in some way.”
“Hey! Keep that thing under control!”
At Ba-ku-gou’s harsh parting words, Kouji slumped. He probably still believed that it was his own fault that he left the door open. I’m sorry, Kouji. In truth it was my doing. There’s nothing wrong with what you did, Kouji.
“But Yuwai-chan is really smart. I’m surprised that he knew how to work the elevator.”
Perhaps he was only trying to cheer Kouji up, but Mi-do-ri-ya himself sounded very surprised by my intelligence. Kouji perked up a bit and happily nodded.
“Oh, that’s right. We’re going around collecting the trash. So if you have any, leave it outside your door, please.”
Mi-do-ri-ya left and passed by Ka-mi-na-ri and O-ji-ro as they came in. After repeating his message about the trash to them, Mi-do-ri-ya headed towards the elevator. Ka-mi-na-ri had a grin on his face as he spotted me.
“Oh~ So did Yuwai-chan really pull off an escape? Not bad!”
“I guess you won’t ever forget to close the door again.”
O-ji-ro spoke out my thoughts. I wanted to jump up and catch a ride on his tail, but since Kouji was worried enough already I decided to behave. If I made him any more worried, the stress would probably destroy his health.
“But just imagining it makes me laugh~”
Ka-mi-na-ri said to O-ji-ro with an amused grin.
“What does?”
“I mean, the two of them actually going around to chase a rabbit? They were probably fighting the whole time too.”
O-ji-ro imagined it and gave a wry smile. “Hmmm… It’s possible, certainly.”
Thinking that he was the cause of the whole mess, Kouji seemed to shrink into himself. I turned to Kouji to talk to him.
It’s alright, Kouji. Those two don’t have as bad a relationship as everyone thinks. After they had caught me, they had worried about my health. Well, Ba-ku-gou does have a bad mouth. But you know, surprisingly… Ba-ku-gou, he didn’t grab me by my ears or anything. The hands that he held me with were unexpectedly gentle.
This was something that we animals could tell by our natural instincts. Whether it’s from their scent or from the first time that we touch. We could tell for ourselves whether someone is a good person or a bad person. No matter how they may nice they may look on the outside, no matter how kind they may act, a bad person is bad. On the same note, no matter how ill-mannered someone seems, no matter how crude their behavior, a good person is a good person. Well, calling Ba-ku-gou a good person was a bit of a stretch, but he definitely wasn’t a bad person either. … Speaking of which, even though I had feigned wariness at first, I knew what kind of person you were from the beginning, Kouji. An extremely virtuous person.
Anyways, Ba-ku-gou had carefully held me in his arms when he and Mi-do-ri-ya returned me to our room, Kouji. He had even brought along the banana for me and let me live my dream of eating one.
“Since he’s gobbling the thing up means that he can eat it, right.”
“I guess so.”
As he spoke, Mi-do-ri-ya seemed to be remembering something.
“A long time ago, we used to try to lure in stray cats with dry sardines. We always failed back then, but we succeeded this time, huh?”
Mi-do-ri-ya gave a wistfully nostalgic smile. Ba-ku-gou merely muttered a short “Tch,” but somehow he seemed to be lost in nostalgia as well. His back was to me so I couldn’t see his face, but with my animal sixth sense, I could just tell.
Isn’t there a saying that “Adversity builds character”? When compared to how fighting is so head-on and allows emotions to clash outright, their softer, subdued reactions were a little disappointing to me. Well, though their relationship still isn’t on firm footing, I suppose they’ll be slowly muddling through and make mistakes along the way.
Afterwards, Mi-do-ri-ya swiftly continued his cleaning duties and would come to check on me every now and again. What a kind human he is. Ba-ku-gou also came to check on me once.
So that’s why, Kouji. You don’t have to worry. I might not able to protect you the way I want to, but this place is safe. You should let yourself have some peace of mind and study your schoolwork. You need to study to become a cool Hero. And I’ll always be here waiting to welcome you back to our room.
“Hm? Yuwai-chan seems to be squeaking a lot.”
“That’s really cute.”
Oh, damn it. Somebody hurry and make a human language to animal language translator! And here I was spilling my heart to Kouji when he still can’t actually understand me.
“Yuwai-chan, can it be that you want to go outside…?”
You’re wrong but you’re not wrong either! As expected of my Kouji!
“It should be alright to let him out in the courtyard, right?”
Nicely said, O-ji-ro! Kouji immediately took me downstairs.
On the first floor, Mi-do-ri-ya and Ba-ku-gou were gathering everyone’s trash together. Nearby them, the one called Mi-ne-ta started to tease Ba-ku-gou.
“You made the floor all nice and clean! Maybe you should shoot for being the world’s number one cleaner instead!”
“Everything in your filthy-ass room needs to be cleansed with fucking holy fire!”
A-shi-do and U-ra-ra-ka, who had returned with everyone else, seemed happy to see me. They always try to pet me right away, but I’m not so childish as to resist anymore. After all, they’re not bad people, so I’ll go easy on them.
“Awww~ His fluffy fur is so healing~”
“Oh, were you taking him outside? Sounds fun!”
That’s right, Kouji! Hurry, hurry!
Kouji opened the door to the grassy lawn of my dreams. I took a deep breath to smell the fresh scent of the grass.
Somewhere behind us, somebody else swung open the door into the entryway.
“I’m back!”
Many voices chorused “Welcome back!” in reply. In my heart, I said it along with them.
This is where I will live from now on, together with my new family.
young-il-long-kiyoshi 