Archive of Our Own ^beta

"You were taking too long."

"Please let me handle it, sensei." Genos looked affronted.

"I made lunch," Saitama said, definitely not pouting. "And it got cold."

"I've got this under control."

The monster shouted something, and they were showered with falling bricks.

Saitama peeked through the new hole above their heads. It wasn't very intimidating, more like a zombie in an old Harry Potter costume than the giant beasts he usually fought. It was clutching an old-fashioned oil lamp to its chest with one desiccated arm, while the other brandished a wooden staff taller than it was. As Saitama watched, it pointed the staff at another half-building, shouted nonsense, and the wall burst into pieces.

"Huh."

"Whatever he points his staff at explodes," Genos explained. "I've mostly been dodging."

"Well I'm glad about that," Saitama said, and watched Genos preen at the implied concern. "Why's a wizard zombie blowing up buildings?"

"He was saying something about ruling the world."

"Don't they all," Saitama sighed. "Do you still want to handle it?"

"No, sensei, that's okay." Apparently mollified, Genos sunk lower beneath cover. "I'll come home with you once you're done and eat lunch."

Saitama jumped up on top of the wall (not wondering whether it was strong enough to hold him until he was up there, but luckily it held). "Hey! Dumbledore's ghost!"

The zombie turned toward him. "Insolence! I will show you my power! The laws of nature bend to my whim!"

He jabbed the staff in Saitama's direction, who didn't bother dodging. He couldn't feel any danger from the attack, so letting it hit him would show the zombie how powerful he was.

The blast hit like a gentle breeze. For a second Saitama thought it hadn't done anything, but something just out of his field of vision seemed off, and he glanced down.

The colors of his costume had changed, swapped, so the jumpsuit was red and his gloves and boots were yellow. Saitama exclaimed in dismay, while the zombie laughed.

"Sensei!" Genos leapt to his feet, head poking through the hole. Saitama hopped back down to join him.

"I look like Anpanman!"

"You do," Genos confirmed.

"Don't agree with me!"

The zombie was striding toward them, staff raised in the air. "All that's important to you, I can take away. From your very lives, to the source of your powers!"

Saitama tackled Genos to the ground a second before the staff was pointed at them. He felt another light breeze, and then his head got suddenly hot and the hard metal of Genos beneath him melted into something soft and giving.

"Genos!" Terrified, Saitama looked down, but the familiar (and intact) face of his disciple looked back up at him.

"Sensei?" His voice sounded weird, softer and higher, his hair had turned black, and his eyes...

His eyes...

"Sensei, your hair!"

"What hair?" Saitama raised a hand to his head, so used to finding nothing that the sensation under his fingers seemed utterly alien. "My hair's back? Was that supposed to be threatening?"

The zombie was laughing, maniacally, in the way of his type. These world-conquering ones loved the sound of their own voice. But he wasn't coming closer, apparently enjoying the idea of Saitama and Genos reacting to their changes.

"Sensei," Genos' voice still sounded too high, and a note of panic had entered it. "Can you get off me please?"

"Oh, sorry." Saitama scrambled off to the side, leaning against the wall and running his fingers through his new hair. Genos did the same, but pulled his knees up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them.

His thin, pale, human arms.

"Genos? Did he- Are you-"

"Please don't look at me," Genos whispered harshly.

"What?"

The zombie shouted another spell, and they had to dodge the whole wall coming down this time. Somehow, Saitama wasn't quite fast enough, and a brick bounced off the ground to hit his leg, nearly knocking him down from pain.

Genos grabbed his arm and supported him as they ran, something strange about him nagging at the back of Saitama's mind, but he couldn't focus beyond getting out of immediate danger. He felt slow, even aside from his injured leg, which in itself was a mystery. He'd gotten used to being functionally invulnerable.

They made it to the next street, where there were still intact buildings to hide between. There, Saitama could finally take stock.

"He said 'the source of our powers,' didn't he?"

"He did," Genos confirmed. He was hugging his arms to his chest, and hunched in on himself. His clothes were too baggy now, the arm holes on his shirt gapping around the smooth skin of his sides. Saitama could even see the faint outline of thoroughly human ribs.

But there was still something off. Genos looked so uncomfortable, and his voice was wrong, and even though his face was the same, the shape of his body under his clothes was...

"Oh! You're a-" Saitama clamped his mouth shut as a voice in his head that sounded very like his own screamed at him to stop.

Before he could think of something not-moronic to say, a chunk of the alley buckled and cracked. He grabbed Genos' arm and pulled him through a (thankfully unlocked) door.

"Sensei, this isn't safer," Genos hissed.

"We're both regular unpowered humans right now. And that means we need to use strategy." Saitama considered for a moment. "How good are you at strategy?"

"Uh..."

"Me too." There was a window, covered in dust now but still sheer enough to see through. Saitama squinted through the panes until he saw the zombie.

It was such a strange combination. A walking corpse, in wizard robes, casting spells with a staff and...

"Oh, of course! He's a lich!"

"A what?" Genos asked.

"See, this is why you need to play more video games." Saitama pointed at the blurry figure. "That lamp he's holding? That's his life, basically. If we can steal that away from him, we can force him to change you back."

Genos' face lit up. It was probably an optical illusion that his eyes looked bigger now that they were dark brown.

"What do we do, sensei?"

"I'm working on that part."

The lich really didn't seem to be able to find them, even in as obvious a hiding place as this. He was walking around in the street, pointing his staff at random and casting the destruction spell. Genos had been right, inside a building wasn't very safe, not if it came down on their vulnerable human heads.

"First things first, we've got to get that staff away from him. Let's see what we can find to make a trap with."

As they were digging around looking for rope, Saitama heard a new voice shouting outside. A familiar one. He ran out just in time to see Fubuki marching through the destruction with her army of goons.

"Nice try," she sneered. "But you're nothing compared to the Blizzard Group."

"Fubuki!" Saitama shouted. "Don't!"

At the same time, the lich proclaimed, "Foolish woman! I can break you as easily as your compatriots!"

He pointed the staff at Saitama, but before he could finish the spell Fubuki snapped her arms open and, to Saitama's horror, the lamp in the lich's hand shattered.

He screamed, a sound like a dozen voices being dragged to hell, and his body dissolved into a pile of dust, leaving only the broken lamp and his staff.

"God dammit Fubuki!" Saitama picked his way through the mess in the street so he could yell at her to her face. "We needed him alive!"

One of her goons stepped in front of Saitama as he got close, glaring down at him. "You can't talk to Miss Blizzard like that."

"I can when she just screwed me!"

"I just saved you," Fubuki countered. "That lamp was obviously a weak point, so I-"

"I had a plan! Sort of. And anyway, you can't barge in and steal someone else's kill!"

"Who do you think you are?" Fubuki demanded, and Saitama realized belatedly that she really didn't recognize him. With hair, and his costume still the wrong colors, he looked different enough to throw her off.

"It's me, Saitama."

She blinked. "Saitama? What- Is that a wig?" She reached out and tugged his hair, and he tried to slap her hand away. It felt limp and weak, and he had no idea how much strength to use.

"We needed him alive," Saitama repeated. "He did something to me and Genos, and..." What happened to Genos was none of her business, and he was reluctant to admit vulnerability anyway.

The staff was still intact. Now that he was closer, Saitama could see it was carved all over with random words. The spells, maybe?

"That thing. I'm taking it."

Fubuki ignored him and yanked a hunk of his hair again. "Are you sure this is real?"

"Yes! Or, well, it's magic or something. So?"

"I just didn't think you'd look so good with it."

"Are you trying to compliment me? Because you're really failing."

A stifled exclamation behind him drew Saitama's attention, and he turned to see Genos staring at them in dismay. His footsteps were so light now, Saitama hadn't heard his approach.

"Shit, uh." He poked the broken lamp with his toe. "We'll take the staff, Genos. We'll find somebody who knows about magic. It'll be okay."

Genos nodded, miserably.

"What happened to you guys?" Fubuki, along with her entourage, were glancing between them like spectators at a tennis match. "You got your hair back, and Genos got turned into a girl?"

"That lich you prematurely killed was throwing magic around to show off," Saitama said, not correcting her assessment of the situation. "Now we're stuck like this, so thanks, great leadership."

"It's not so bad for you," she protested weakly. She looked at Genos, who was hugging his chest again, trying to hide the shape of it maybe. "I'm sorry," Fubuki said. "I'm sure someone can fix it."

"Do you know anyone who knows about magic?" Saitama asked.

"I didn't think magic was real," she admitted.

"You're a psychic."

"That doesn't mean I believe in everything! Did you believe in magic yesterday?"

"No, but I accepted it and took it into account in my battle plan, unlike someone."

She bristled. "I said I was sorry! I'll- I'd offer to help you look for someone, but Genos probably has more contacts in the Hero Association than I do."

"No!" It was the first thing Genos had said since Fubuki arrived, and when everyone looked at him he pulled his shoulders almost up to his ears. "I'm not a cyborg right now. If I try to contact anyone in the Association, I might lose my rank."

"Oh, that's true." Fubuki spun around and faced her subordinates. "This doesn't leave this group. Not the Blizzard Group, just the eight of us. No one else can know." She raised a finger, threateningly. "No one."

They all nodded dutifully. Saitama wondered, not for the first time, what the hell these people saw in her.

Then again, Genos was just as devoted, and Saitama was just as confused about it.

Genos had picked up the staff, gingerly, holding it away from his body. There didn't seem to be anything odd about it. Saitama couldn't feel an aura of power or whatever (not that he could, anymore). Looking closely, the carvings were just random characters, no apparent pattern or dialect. Genos glared at it, less intimidating with his big brown puppy eyes, but Saitama still wouldn't want to be the target of it.

"I can ask around," Fubuki said. "But you've got other friends in S-Class, right? King, and Silverfang?"

"Yeah," Saitama said. "Bang might know something, he's been around a long time. Thanks."

"Boss," one of the goons stepped up to Fubuki's shoulder and held out a pager. "Lily says you're needed back at HQ."

Fubuki nodded seriously. "Let's go."

"Wait," Saitama blurted. The thought of the long walk home, when he was already a little winded from arguing, was daunting. "Can we get a ride?"

It was starting to get dark by the time they got home. Genos hadn't spoken once during the ride, not even when one of the goons tried to make conversation by asking if it was "weird to be a girl now." Saitama and Fubuki double-team death-glared at him until the goon peed a little.

Fubuki dropped them off with another promise to look for information, and then Saitama and Genos were alone.

Genos followed Saitama into the apartment, as he usually did. But he was trailing behind this time, shuffling a little in too-big pants and shoes, clutching the magic staff that was even taller compared to him than the lich. His body language practically screamed exhaustion and misery.

Saitama wanted nothing more than to pat his head and assure him they would fix it, but he knew now wasn't the time. Genos would take it as a reaction to his new body, rather than his mood.

Saitama had never seen Genos this unhappy. The closest he came was when Saitama told him about his own emotional struggles, and that wasn't the same at all. After the initial outpouring of sympathy, Genos supported him just by... being there. It helped more than he knew.

All Saitama could do was the same. And listen to the voice in his head constantly yelling at him not to say something stupid.

Once they were inside, Genos stuck the staff in the umbrella stand and made tracks for the bathroom. Saitama got lunch ready while he was in there, pretending he couldn't hear the occasional sob or swear over the sink running.

When he got out, Saitama pressed a cup of tea into his hand and completely ignored how red his eyes were. "You still have to eat the lunch I made you, remember?"

"Yes, sensei," Genos said, quietly. His voice was deeper now, maybe thanks to practice, maybe to the way he'd been growl-whispering swear words as he cried.

He sat down at the table and poked his food exactly twice, before setting down his chopsticks.

"Sensei, please say something."

The voice in Saitama's head yelled harder. "What should I say?"

"Do you... understand? What this means?" He gestured at himself, at the small but undeniable breasts under his shirt.

Saitama thought very carefully about how to answer. "That lich removed our powers. And you don't look fifteen, so this is what you would have looked like, if you never became a cyborg. Right?"

Genos nodded. "I think... if I hadn't become a cyborg, I would have made some changes by now. But..."

"You could have told me." Saitama tried to keep the hurt out of his voice. He hadn't even realized he was feeling it until he said it.

"I didn't want you to know. I didn't want anyone to know. The only person who does- did, was Dr. Kuseno. And that's only because I didn't realize he could tell my physical sex despite how badly my body was damaged, when..." He trailed off. Saitama didn't press. "I wanted you to only know me as a man."

"I do!" Saitama said. "I mean. I guess there's a lot of things I don't know about your past. But it doesn't change anything. I didn't know this part, and now I do, and... you're still the same Genos I've known all this time."

Genos's eyes were brimming with tears, his cheeks flushed pink, his breathing sped up with the force of his emotion. As a cyborg, he hadn't had any of those tell-tale signs of how he felt about the ridiculous things Saitama said. But Saitama had known. He wasn't very subtle.

Now was the absolute worst time to tell Genos he thought he returned what he thought Genos felt, so Saitama waved at the untouched bowl. "It'll get cold again."

"I'm sorry sensei!"

He ate it all.

The next day, Genos was already gone when Saitama woke up. He'd slept late, unused to getting tired from everyday tasks. Saitama wanted to believe the spell had made him weaker than he would be even without his training, but he was pretty sure he'd just forgotten what it was like to be normal.

Genos returned home with a few bags. Saitama wasn't surprised when he disappeared into the bathroom again, but this time when he emerged he was dressed in new clothes (that fit, but disguised his slim waist and curvy hips) and he'd done something to his chest that completely eliminated his breasts.

"You look good!" Saitama said.

Genos preened, like he always did at praise. "Really?"

"Yeah. Very cool." It was true. Genos was probably lucky that, even with a body that didn't match his mind, he was still more handsome than pretty. If he practiced sounding deeper and started working out to broaden his shoulders, no one would ever suspect.

"Thank you sensei." He rubbed his arms, but his back was straight and his chin high. "I feel better. I've talked to Dr. Kuseno about medication, but he's not able to get it for me, and he doesn't have any colleagues he can ask. If I'm stuck this way for some time, I may have to find a specialist."

"That's not so bad, is it? I mean, they exist."

Genos gave him a look that made the voice in his head start berating him. "It's complicated. I have to find a supportive doctor. I have to get examined in ways I really don't want to be. I have to find a therapist. I have to 'prove' I really am the way I say."

"You what?"

"And that's just for medication. If I want surgery, it's a much longer process."

Saitama shook his head. "There's gotta be ways around all that."

"Well... some." Genos nodded at the computer. "I can get hormones, if I really need to. But figuring out the dosage can be tricky."

"Huh." Saitama scratched his head. They didn't own shampoo, and he'd washed his hair with body soap. Now his scalp was dry, and it didn't help that his whole head had been too hot since yesterday. "Too bad you can't bully your way through because you're an S-Class."

"Mm." Genos made his subtly-disapproving face, one Saitama was intimately familiar with. "Most of my class does seem to live that way."

Genos sat down at his usual spot at the table, pulling out a notebook and glancing at Saitama before he began to write. Probably something about his horrible bedhead. It was chronic, he'd never been able to tame it.

"I'm thinking we should call Bang before we go all the way over there to talk to him." Saitama made a face. "I don't really want to know how long it will take to get up those stairs like this."

Genos looked up from writing. "Sensei? I have reasons for wanting to go back to my cyborg body. But you've got the chance to feel a challenge again. And you have your hair. Are you sure you want to reverse it?"

It was a question Saitama had been trying not to think about. Genos was right, of course. This should have been a godsend. But it wasn't what Saitama wanted; he'd been hoping for a challenge, something strong enough to make him feel like it was worth the effort to get dressed. Being a normal human again meant being weak. Scared. Unable to help anyone.

And though he didn't care as much as he probably should, Saitama knew he'd saved the world a few times. Not to mention thousands of people. If he stayed like this... If there was no one as strong as him to take his place...

"I'll worry about that when we find the cure spell or whatever. Anyway, maybe to reverse it, it has to be both of us. I'd never ask you to stay like this."

Genos lit up. In a metaphorical way rather than literal. Despite his happier expression, Genos wrapped his arms around his chest for a moment, rubbing his bare shoulders.

"Genos, are you cold?"

Genos blinked. "Oh! I am. I forgot."

Saitama laughed and grabbed one of his hoodies, tossing it (and missing by half the table) across the room.

"There."

"Thank you sensei."

Genos picked it up, just in time for that voice in Saitama's head to began freaking out.

"Oh god no. Not that one." He jumped to his feet and snatched it away. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry, hang on."

He threw the oppai hoodie as hard as he could in the general direction of the laundry, then carefully dug through his clean clothes until he found a plain blue one.

"I'm not smart," Saitama said, handing it over. "You know that."

"You aren't stupid, sensei." Genos said, diplomatically. He swam in the hoodie; it was baggy on Saitama and far too big for a slender teenager. But Saitama couldn't stop the part of himself that thought how cute he looked in it.

"I'm going to say something dumb and offensive. I know it."

"If you do, I'll understand you didn't mean it."

"I want you to tell me, okay? If I'm a jerk."

Genos nodded. He looked so much more pale now that his hair contrasted with his skin. The blue hoodie flattered him, but Saitama kept picturing it on the old Genos instead.

"Thank you, sensei. I will."