#I have soooooo much dirt and nuance to the whole Nighteye/Mirio/Izuku relationship implosion

[redrobin-detective]

Hey Red, what actually happened with Eri in TLWA?

*platonically kisses your forehead and brushes back your hair* Lox always coming through for me.

Just a general FYI that I have So Much Background Lore on TLWA verse and will gleefully talk about it at anytime to anyone who shows the slightest interest.

Anyway! I made the decision early on in planning that the Raid arc would fail. The Shie Hassaikai arc was maybe hmm 1-2 months following All Might's (at the time not publicly known) death. Only a dozen people know AM is dead and a handful know about OFA and Izuku being its intended successor. Nighteye reacts to the death poorly and takes it out on Izuku who is NOT invited to his agency. Not to get sidetracked but I also really liked how that disagreement unfurled with Mirio finding out that Nighteye had been grooming him to replace AM and was unhappy Mido was chosen instead. This is what leads to Mirio leaving Nighteye's agency and developing a close, almost brotherly bond with Izuku.

Anywayyy, I needed Nighteye to fail to demonstrate the difference btw him and Izuku in Toshinori's life. Thus, Eri and Chisake get away. It's the first of a many unsuccessful jobs by Nighteye who has lost the heart for it but also, he didn't adapt to the loss of AM, couldn't see the world changing beyond his hero. He retired in disgrace not long after Izuku is named Symbol of Peace in Rise Up.

Gosh I keep getting sidetracked, Eri stayed with Chisake a few more, miserable, painful years. It sad and tragic but Eri eventually learns no one is going to save her so she has to save herself. It takes planning and perfect timing but one day, when Chisake was torturing her as always, he slipped and she was able to permanently rewind him. She flees. In the meantime, Chisake was now devoted all of his time to the quirk destroying bullets recognizing it as the game changer they are. There's now thousands of vials but, with the primary ingredient (Eri) gone, its now a limited supply. A bunch of ineffective, temporary knockoffs flood the market.

Eri is probably about 8ish? And lives rough for a while, she is forced to use her quirk just to survive and stay out of enemy hands. She is eventually taken in by a group of runaway/abandoned kids who band together and protect each other. It was there, through trial, error and practice she finally gets her quirk under control. She is used at first to run chores, to being the distraction as the cute kid to full on participating in petty theft and such to stay alive. She still fears the retribution of the 8 Precepts and doesn't want to go public so she stays in the underground.

She grows up, stronger and more confident but also bitter and jaded that no one helped her. She's against heroes, not in a villain way but in a 'they can't really help anyway'. In between her small crimes, she does little acts of vigilantism here and there, bc she can't stand to see someone mistreated in front of her, will not ignore suffering. On one of these bursts, she runs into the hero Deku, who's just opened his own agency. Queue a messy, several year long back and forth where Izuku tries to help her and she refuses it, untrusting of his intentions.

But she pays attention to the work he does, how he treats people. He even encourages her vigilantism by giving her info on things he legally can't meddle with. She doesn't quite trust him but she does respect him. She is an angry stray cat he can occasionally get to take a few scraps of love out of his hand. He offered her numerous times to get her legally in the system, to foster her and she never can never accept. She is happy, acting in her own capacity for herself. Just knowing that there are heroes out there like him, it gives her a bit more faith in people. She is happy and fiercely loyal to her people. Maybe someday, she'll want the stability of a normal life but for now, answering to no one and working through her own anger and grief through saving others is what she needs.

Her reputation grows, quietly and under the radar as a silent but incredibly effective vigilante who works the areas no one else does. The police are baffled, Deku has no comment on the matter but he does know this teen who is really kind and really powerful who wishes he had been able to save. But in the end while it wasn't okay, she survived and saved her. And now she's doing the same to other lost boys and girls.