Recap:

*Koichi House*

He reached there at the same time as Kazuho was opening the door knob.

"Oh, Dante, you disappeared yesterday?"

Dante scratched his head, what could he say.

‘Oh yeah, I just remembered scenes of when I accidentally killed a single mother and her child, and due to trauma and ptsd, I had to leave the apartment and go and kill some more villains to take my mind off it.’

Of course not.

"We-we’ll..umm-"

Kazuho didn’t want to listen to whatever poor excuse he was trying to concoct, especially since it's 9am in the morning.

*Sniff*

After turning around and opening the door she smelled a whiff of Koishi’s house. Trash that was bagged but needed to be taken out lined the hallway, and the sink was loaded full of dishes.

However that wasn’t what she smelled. Turning around she tried to smell Dante but he evaded her and left off to be unbothered.

"Koichi you want some help…with the disheses….Alright."

Dante grabbed a sponge and proceeded to clean up the dishes. He tuned out the world and sung himself a toon, but a certain word caught his attention.

"Mom’s coming to tokyo! She’s already on the train!"

Dante sped up 20 times faster. If there's anything more troublesome than talking to people, it's talking to adults.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

Knuckleduster and Koichi don't have an adult vibe, allowing Dante to expertly avoid confrontation with adults.

But a mother, with years of experience and a knack for dealing with people and detecting emotions.

‘Wouldn’t want to deal with her.’

Dante finished washing and stacking the dishes in the sink, and he dried his hands on the hand towel.

Heading towards the door, he responded to Koichi’s question of where he’s going with 

"I've got to make a quick run."

'Since his mother is coming over, the old man shouldn't mind.'

Dante opened the door while planning to do his own scouting and see if he could find some villains on his own. His pockets haven’t been filled in awhile.

Mentality, rubbing his hands together, opened the door and, without paying attention, walked outside.

*Smack*

Dante ran into a thin, middle-aged woman with short hair who was wearing a brown coat that went below her ankles with a lighter brown shirt and a dress.

‘Koichi’s mom, I presume.’

Shoko Haimawari lowered her gaze to the boy she had smacked into.He backed up and rubbed his blue eyes, and black hair. His clothes were a smelly black jacket, old beaten-up pants, and a pair of dusty shoes. Grabbing the boy, she walked into the house and met face to face with her son. 

She tightened her grip on the boy since her son usually struggled when he realized after a few seconds that she was holding him. She would then have to give him a stern talk to have him stop.

But the boy didn’t struggle. Instead, he stopped moving all together and just laid dead in her grip like a log.

Forgetting about that for a moment, she looked at her 19 year old son, who would turn 20 in a couple of days. 

"Koichi, why is a child at your home?"

Shoko Haimawari gave Koichi a not-so-nice smile. She placed Dante down, and with him still standing there like a log, she investigated his clothes.

'Horrible odor coming from this apartment.' She looked around and smelled cleaning products. ‘Wet spots all around his shirt and top of shoe, from dishes.’

She used her quirk on her son, who had just put drinks down, as she sat in front of the coffee table and looked at him.

[Fly Swatter: Shoko's quirk allows her to send energy waves from her hands and attack from a farther distance than her normal reach.]

"KOICHI, are you involved in child labor. "Even though i’m your mother, I will do the right thing and call the police."

"Ack, Mom, of course not."

"Then how do you explain the dishes and his shirt, or the smell coming from him and the scent of cleaning products."

"He wasn’t the one to do any cleaning. He simply was here, and the stench got on his clothes."

Koichi tried to answer her rapid questions as fast as they came.  He had no doubt that she would really report him to the police. And the last thing he wanted was for "the crawler" and Koichi Haimawari to be connected.

"Hey Koichi, I just finished cleaning the bathroom, which, by the way, stinks. I also put some detergent in the washing machine.

Shoko’s eyes naturally fell on Kazuho, whose sleeves were rolled up and who was still wearing her school uniform.

"Uniforms for Hirosaki Higashi High School?" Now she really wasn’t kidding about her son's involvement with child labor.

"SO IT WAS A HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT HELPING YOU WITH A 10 YEAR OLD BOY." 

She chased Koichi around the apartment, slapping him with her quirk and him attempting to dodge without his because he doesn't want to show her how much he's improved with it.

"It appears that I'll need to take you home with me after we clear up this mess so you don't engage in any illegal activities."

"Just what I feared!."

Kazuho and Dante were worried, partially because neither has a good relationship with their parents. And because they enjoy the time spent as a group.

*Creek*

The door opened, interrupting the conversations Koichi was having as he tried to dispel his mother's worries.

"Oh Koichi, hows the kids treating you. "You're a key part of our program, you know."

"Who's this and what's going on, Koichi?"

‘How can I answer this? I barely know what's happening at the moment.’

So Koichi used his trick called: Put it on another's shoulder."

"Well, mom, I would like to explain, but I believe that we should let my master's (Sensei) company."

"Hi hello, please take this card." He passed out 3 business cards to everyone."

"We provide support to neighborhoods in places like east Naruhata where local government and community organizations are less effective. And volunteer workers like Koichi here are essential to making this process happen.

He accepted a trial run of the program when I pitched it to him 3 months ago. So because of his young age, we gave him the babysitting trial. He had the most affinity with it and became a friend of Kazuho’s here." He gestured toward her.

"So after seeing the fact that the two stayed in contact with each other, we decided to try a full run of the program by introducing this little guy from another elementary school."

‘Damn, I have to worry about being sent into the control of the system again.’