Work Text:
Izuku does not know how he found himself in a situation as laughably pathetic as this, sitting on a bench in the mall with a college-aged villain beside him, four fingers on Izuku’s neck and the fifth finger waiting to fall so that Izuku might experience the joys of the afterlife before his mother does.
And Izuku is expecting him to start trying to recruit him to the League, or, worse, threaten his mother (at which point he’s going to be ready to commit murder himself), but —
But —
Shigaraki Tomura starts fucking venting to Izuku .
About the Hero Killer .
And maybe, in some other universe, this would be something to laugh over. Maybe Izuku could say to his friends, later, something about the way Shigaraki seemed so much like a preschooler just then, or maybe he could compare it to internet discourse, or brush it off in some other way to get rid of the traumatic memories he would inevitably retain.
But, with every word Shigaraki says, Izuku’s fear increases.
He complains about people favouring Stain over him, and Izuku…
Izuku makes what is probably the biggest mistake of his life, and opens his big fat mouth, and says, well, he can see where Stain is coming from, to be honest, because both their journeys started from admiring All Might —
And Shigaraki snaps.
“Yeah,” he says. His pupils are fully dilated, now, and Izuku wants nothing more than to run away, run out of Japan, if only Shigaraki weren’t holding him, no, no, he’s going to die, fuck —
“It’s,” Shigaraki says, “all ‘cause of All Might, right?”
His scarlet eyes ( bloodthirst, shit, Izuku’s never been more aware of his mortality ) seem to glow.
And, in an instant, Izuku is not looking up at Shigaraki Tomura but
instead
down
at
himself.
He watches his own face contort into an impossibly gruesome expression, one he’s never seen on himself in all his fifteen years, and, at this moment, Midoriya Izuku has never regretted his childhood wishes more.
Time seems to stop. Izuku thinks about all the times his past self had wished for someone he could switch bodies with, get to know the family of, and be universe-designated best friends with.
Logically, he’s always known he has a soulmate. It’s biologically impossible not to have one.
(Then again, he’s always been an exception, so you can’t blame him for wondering.)
His mother’s soulmate is Aunt Mitsuki. Sometimes, when she gets too emotional, blubbering about his safety during hero training, she’ll abruptly stop talking and perk up, before beginning to talk to Izuku again as if he is a particularly beloved (but reckless) nephew. Then, Izuku knows it’s Mitsuki inhabiting Inko’s body because his mother has never sworn a day in her life.
He did not know Kacchan’s soulmate’s name until the first day of high school, because the two of them had implemented a very strict no-names policy until they actually met — as in face-to-face rather than by body-swapping. And sometimes Izuku wonders just how they managed to maintain it, because he knows Kirishima Eijirou very well, now, and the boy is incapable of keeping secrets. Then again, the most peaceful people have leveled cities for their soulmates, so he supposes it’s not that much of a surprise.
He himself had waited days and days. Then, month after month until they stretched into years. All for the world to change around him until he was seeing through his soulmate’s eyes. His mother had told him, gently, that it wasn’t his fault nothing was happening; you couldn’t start body-swapping with your soulmate until they had accepted the idea of it. It was a telepathic thing, apparently. Not that that made Izuku feel much better.
(But when Inko told him that, she lied.
She remembered putting three-month-old Izuku to bed, going to sleep herself; then, at six in the morning, ear-splitting screams.
Just normal baby things, she’d thought.
But when she walked into Izuku’s room, peered into his crib, there was horror in his little green eyes — and what baby had ever had to experience that kind of fear?
And then, he’d opened his mouth loud, and shouted, in Japanese , “ DAD, PLEASE, NO — ”
And Inko had frozen, because she knew what that was. That was not Izuku.
But it was better to pretend that it had not happened at all.)
In the present, Izuku shakes, because he knows he is an inch from death, less than an inch, even, for Shigaraki’s finger, the fifth one, is slowly coming closer to Izuku’s neck.
And, yes, logically, he knows that even if he dies, he has nothing to worry about, because of —
No. No. He will get out of this alive. He doesn’t have to worry about that for a long, long while. That little girl, with her neon orange hair, and her adorable smile, will remain firmly at the back of his mind till he has reached his seventies — and he will reach them. He is determined to. He will not be disintegrated by Shigaraki Tomura in the middle of a shopping mall — at least, not before he has reduced Japan’s crime rate to zero and lived a long, fulfilling retirement in the countryside.
“You’re All Might’s successor, aren’t you?” says Shigaraki. “And my soulmate , at that.”
Izuku freezes.
“Well, not for much longer,” Shigaraki adds —
— and, without warning, drops his fifth finger onto Izuku’s neck.
Izuku doesn’t feel anything at first, because there’s adrenaline coursing through his veins right alongside the power of One For All, and because it doesn’t register for a minute that, yep, he’s as good as dead now, and because he thinks he still has a chance — he needs to slip out , escape while he still has the chance.
And then he feels it.
Aizawa’s face had reflected the sheer horror that Izuku had felt at seeing his own teacher brush against Death’s cloak at the USJ. But actually undergoing that — Izuku can’t see the front of his neck, but he can feel the skin crack, the blood vessels burst and leak down the front of his shirt. He dares not make a sound, and now he cannot because his voicebox is gone and the decay is spreading down his chest, finishing off his ribcage, and thank God he’s wearing clothes because his heart is beating out of his chest, not figuratively but instead literally —
Then he does not feel anything anymore.
FIVE WEEKS AGO
Izuku and his mother are walking downtown, because there is a sale on a certain piece of hero merchandise that Izuku has had his eye on for ages . He simply must have it: there are only a hundred pieces on sale, and yes, it’s not a very popular kind of merch but just having it increases its worth tenfold. Not that he’s going to sell it. It will have a permanent place on his shelf for the rest of time.
“Are you quite sure that we’ll get there in time?” Inko says. “I know how fast rare merch flies off the shelves.”
“Pretty sure, yeah.” Izuku beams at his mother. “Plus, we’re almost there. Look —” and he points down the footpath at a shop with a large display out front. From here, the shop’s name isn’t visible, but Izuku knows that it says “Heroes-R-Us” in a terrible font on a wooden signboard. It doesn’t look like anything much, but it’s the largest merch store in the prefecture. And that’s saying a lot, because H&V has a three-floor store in Bespin Mall.
Heroes-R-Us’s thing is that most of it is underground . It covers four levels, the lowest one dedicated to actual, real-life underground heroes — the situational pun is highly appreciated all over the city — and that is where Izuku wants to go today.
And this is when he breaks out into a sprint. The sale had started at ten A.M. today, and now it is eleven and only now does the gravity of the situation hit him. He grabs his mother’s hand, pulling her behind him, and runs .
There are people on the street, and Izuku does not give a single shit.
He runs, and runs, until the storefront of Heroes-R-Us is in view.
Just one more step to go.
And he trips.
He faceplants on the concrete footpath, and thankfully, his nose doesn’t break, but he feels blood running down, past his mouth and onto the ground, where it forms little rubies.
His blood seems to glow. Strange.
He looks up for what or who caused him to trip.
It’s a small girl and her mother. Evidently, the bulging shopping bags that they were carrying were what caused him to stumble. They are looking at him, horrified. Behind him, his mother wails, “Izuku, this is why we don’t run on the street !”
“I am… so, so sorry,” the mother tells him.
The girl clutches Izuku’s hand and begins to cry, loud and snotty. She, too, proclaims her apologies, and Izuku, having got up by now, hugs her. “It’s okay, look!” He points at his nose. “I’m all right. I’m not even bleeding anymore.”
She is still crying, but his words seem to calm her down somewhat. “I’m sorry, mister,” she tells him, again, wiping her nose and eyes. Izuku’s shirt is wet now. He doesn’t mind, though.
But then, it goes horribly, horribly wrong.
The girl’s eyes emit some sort of… green light. She blinks, tries to stop it, before she bursts into tears again. “Mommy, help!” she says, and her mother goes to pick her up, out of Izuku’s way, but then Izuku feels an electric shock go through him and the light fades.
The mother chills. “No,” she whispers.
Inko says: “What — I mean, may I ask what your daughter’s Quirk is, ma’am?”
She tells them.
Izuku’s heard of dramatic Quirk triggering events before, but this seemed… normal. Just a second’s worth of green light, with such far-reaching consequences.
And Izuku thinks, maybe this isn’t going to be that bad.
(Remember — he still doesn’t know who his soulmate is.)
The ceiling at the mall had been one of glass, and Izuku could see the sky and the clouds and the sun peeking through as Shigaraki muttered in his ear.
But now it changes to one of concrete, and the walls around him look vaguely like those of a training room. It seems like he is on the floor. Well. At least he’s doing something he enjoys?
Wait — oh! He remembers! He had trained on his fifteenth birthday the last time around as well, with All Might!
Red eyes appear in his field of vision.
Shigaraki Tomura.
He sounds irritated when he speaks, but it is the words that tell Izuku that this is not the Shigaraki he knows. “Get up, Midoriya-kun. And try again, damn it, we don’t have all day.”
And what is Shigaraki doing, training with Izuku? Is Izuku a villain? He knows nothing about what’s going to happen, what has happened already in this version of his life.
This is when the memories flood into his mind.
Izuku doesn’t get a Quirk.
Ten years later, he meets All Might, and is set to get One For All.
All Might says he must train in order to become a worthy vessel. He himself cannot train Izuku during the summer vacations, for this is when crime rates are the highest. Instead, he brings out an actual Pro Hero, his own nephew, who is more than happy to help Izuku with hand-to-hand, and strength training.
All Might’s nephew is the Pro Hero Bios. Izuku calls him this only once before he laughs it off, a grating but somehow pleasant sound, and tells Izuku to call him by his family name. Shimura.
As in, Shimura Tenko.
Or, as Izuku realizes now, Shigaraki Tomura.
Izuku turns his head to make full eye contact with him, and it is then that a wave of intense emotion seems to pass over Shigaraki.
“ Deku ,” he snarls.
He remembers their last life, then. Izuku thinks this whole process is rather akin to installing a new OS in a computer.
“What the fuck are you doing here,” says Shigaraki.
“Now, young Tenko,” and, yes, that’s All Might, “what’s got into you? Young Midoriya has just as much right to be here as you do. Play nice. He needs your help if he is to become a great hero.”
Shigaraki slowly turns to All Might. Izuku tenses, knowing what is about to happen. But Shigaraki cannot kill the Number One Hero, not here, not now, not in this life.
When he manages to see All Might, though, it seems Shigaraki remembers, too. And — impossibly — he reins himself back in.
“My bad,” he grinds out. “That was out of line.”
Then, Shigaraki shoots Izuku a look that says, clearly, As soon as the old man is out of here, you’re fucking dead.
Izuku shoots back a look that he hopes says, Your balls are going to be on the floor before I am.
Soon, All Might declares that it’s time for them to wrap up. Izuku changes back into his normal clothes, leaving his training clothes in the building’s locker. Shigaraki — Shimura? Okay, Shimura — does the same.
All Might bids them a jaunty goodbye, and bounds off, before returning with a confused expression. “Young Tenko?” he says. “Aren’t you supposed to be going home too?”
Shit. Izuku needs to think of an excuse.
Wait.
Today is —
“— my birthday,” he says quickly. “My mom invited Shimura-senpai home to have dinner with us. I asked you too, remember? You said you had work to get to, so…”
“Oh, yes.” All Might winces. “So sorry, my boy. It really is something important, believe me; I wouldn’t ditch your birthday party over something small. I’ll make sure to drop by tomorrow, I have something for you —” His phone rings. “Right, then, I’ll be off. See you!”
Then he’s gone.
Shimura wastes no time. “Listen here, you little shit,” he hisses. “If you don’t give me an explanation for whatever this is in the next five fucking seconds, you’re going to be dust. Again. I don’t know how the hell you’re back, but I will not waste any more opportunities to get you. Sensei wants you gone. I want you gone .”
“Okay,” says Izuku. “The thing is — so, you know how we’re soulmates, and all….?”
And Shimura says nothing but for a split-second Izuku is once again seeing himself standing there before he’s back in his own body.
“Yeah, that.” He scowls. “I got hit by a Quirk.”
“What. Kind. Of. Quirk.” Shimura whispers this, and the words penetrate Izuku’s skull like bullets.
“Whenever I die, or, I suppose, whenever you die, too, we… loop.” This part is complicated. “Because we’re… soulmates. If you die, we both go back to the moment you turned — wait, how old were you when you killed me?”
“Twenty,” mutters Shigaraki.
“Right, so we both go back to the moment in time when you turned twenty. And if I die, we both go back to the moment I turned fifteen. Did you follow all that?”
“Shut the fuck up. I’m not a bloody grade schooler.” He isn’t threatening murder anymore, Izuku notices. Maybe the threat is dampened by the fact that if Izuku dies, Shimura himself is at risk.
Which is a great boon to Izuku.
“Really?” he says. “I didn’t know All For One bothered to give you a basic education. Tell me, can you add one and two?”
“ Shut up! ” snarls Shimura. “Sensei was good to me. And now he’s dead. Really dead. I remember All Might finishing him. And I — I feel happy about it. I’m thinking about it, and it feels good .” He clenches his fist. “You did this.”
“God, will you stop victim-blaming? I didn’t do anything! I got hit by a Quirk, I’m telling you. And, no —” Izuku needs to nip this in the bud before it comes up — “you can’t find the Quirk user and kill them. If you do, I’ll kill you and then we’re going to have another problem on our hands. So, you know, deal with it.”
This is the point at which Shimura punches Izuku in the stomach. Hard.
Izuku picks himself up off the floor. In this version of events, he may not be very strong yet, but he has all the training of his first life and he is not about to let Shimura take him down.
Before he does, though, there is a knock at the locker room’s door.
“Izuku?” His mother’s voice is muffled through it. “Are you in there? And is Shimura-kun with you?”
Izuku and Shimura exchange glances.
“Yes!” he shouts. “I’m in here. Be out in a moment.”
He goes to the door and opens it. His mother is there, the worry lines on her forehead growing deeper by the second.
“Thank goodness! I was beginning to —” She notices Izuku and Shimura’s stances. “Izuku? Shimura-kun? Did you get into a fight?”
“More than one,” says Shimura. He grins: it’s the fakest smile Izuku has ever seen in his life, but he’s so, so relieved that Shimura has the brains to keep up appearances. He wonders how he managed to get over the immaturity he had shown at the USJ, before he realizes that in this life, Shimura was never a villain. He may have transposed over with Izuku, but he still has this life’s memories and lessons with him. Huh. That definitely had a large effect. Izuku resolves to ask Shimura what went differently in his life this time around.
“Well, of course,” Inko replies hastily, “but what I mean to say is: you seemed tense just now.”
Immediately, Izuku relaxes. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Right,” says his mother. Then, she squints. “Oh, Izuku, what’s that on your neck?”
Confused, Izuku heads over to the mirror.
There is a faint red handprint, four fingers on the front of his neck and the thumb on the side.
“Shimura-senpai hit me in the neck by mistake, when we were training,” he lies.
He knows, somehow, that the handprint will never fade while he’s alive.
“If you say so, Izuku,” says Inko. “Are you and Shimura-kun really all right?”
“We’re fine.” Shimura heads to the door now. “Midoriya-san, you mentioned dinner?”
The next day, the newspaper announces that Pro Hero Bios is taking a leave of absence of two months from his duties, citing that he would like to focus on his mental health. The Mighty Agency sends out a statement wherein they express their regrets for their sidekick (rumoured to be All Might’s heir, and the agency’s next head). People from all over Japan send Bios cards with their wishes — that he might recover, and that he might come back to Pro Hero duties healthier and more vibrant than before.
The Pro Hero in question spends his days (consensually?) beating the shit out of Izuku.
At this point, Izuku is reasonably confident that he’s not in danger of being reduced to dust anymore. All of his and Shimura’s interactions are supervised either by All Might or Inko.
And — though Izuku is almost loath to believe it — it seems as though Shimura is settling.
Izuku has Shimura’s number, now, because All Might insisted that he also be on call for emergencies.
But Shimura seems very happy to call Izuku in non-emergency situations as well, to curse him out for their predicament, and to rant about his days spent helping the old ladies in his apartment building, where he shares a flat with, of all people, Todoroki Touya.
Because, apparently, that’s the villain — though he’s a hero now — Dabi’s real name. Izuku has yet to see him in person but something tells him he’s not going to recognize him this time around.
One night, Shimura calls him up just as he’s about to go to bed. He turns the lights off and pulls the blanket securely around himself before he picks up.
Then, Shimura tells him this:
One, that his Quirk manifested when he was five, and he accidentally killed his whole family except his father.
Two, that he killed his father on purpose.
He wandered the streets, and no one cared to spare him a minute of their time.
This is where the story diverges, because while in his first life, Shimura was exploited by All For One, in this life, All For One barely managed to take him into his arms before Shimura was knocked out of them.
At the age of five, Shimura Tenko watched All Might kill his arch-nemesis on a deserted street. Later, he found out that All For One could take Quirks and use them as he wished; he asked All Might how he managed to evade that .
That was how he found out about One For All.
And that was how All Might discovered that he had just saved his mentor’s grandson.
“So that’s fucking messed up,” Shimura concludes, and Izuku agrees.
Then, he hears sniffling on the other end.
“What the fuck. What the fuck. It’s just —” and this is where Shimura devolves into full-on sobbing. “ This isn’t how it was! I — I saw Sensei die . But he raised me. He gave me a home . Nobody else did.”
“All Might did.”
“THAT’S WHAT’S MESSED UP!” Shimura screams. “ARE YOU FUCKING BLIND? Sensei raised me — and I can’t even call him Sensei anymore, can I, because All Might is Sensei, now. S- All For One —”
“That must feel weird to say,” Izuku whispers.
“It does.” Shimura inhales deeply. “You try being brought up by someone and then moving lives because of your goddamn soulmate and then watching your fucking father-figure die at the hands of his worst enemy and then living with that enemy and then seeing your OWN worst enemy become your new father-figure ’s successor.”
This is all said in the same breath. Finally, Shimura stops, and when he speaks next, his voice breaks.
“I can’t take it. That’s why I took a break from being a — a Pro Hero.” He laughs bitterly. “It’s all mixing up together. I’m going to Decay a civilian by mistake next and then they’ll lock me up.”
“So —” Izuku has no idea how to say this delicately.
“Go ahead, don’t hold back,” Shimura says. “Why the fuck do I — a villain , in your words — care about civilian lives? Well, Deku , it turns out that three years of training at UA followed by two years of active Pro work tend to ingrain some sort of instinct in you. Fuck you,” he adds. “Fuck you and all of your hero friends. It feels so… ugh . It feels so angelic . God.”
“I think what you’re feeling is just you,” says Izuku. “It’s not diluted by fifteen years of emotional abuse from a villain.”
“I wasn’t abused . Abused people are — abuse is when you’re treated badly . Sensei — All For One — fuck —”
“It’s okay,” Izuku tells him. “Take your time.”
“I’m hanging up,” says Shimura. “I can’t deal with this right now.”
And that, Izuku thinks, is fair enough.
But one call turns into another, and another, until Izuku and Shimura’s nightly routine changes to allow an hour-long phone call where Shimura talks and sometimes cries and Izuku is there to reassure him that he’s not alone anymore, All For One isn’t there, and there are people who love him and he’s got nothing to worry about.
“Fuck off,” Shimura says, every time, but day by day the insult sounds more and more like “Thank you.”
It’s very strange, when your soulmate happens to be a villain whose villainous activities nobody remembers except you.
Shimura, apparently, was not very volatile at all. But, having received Shigaraki’s memories, he becomes cagey, liable to explode — whether into anger or tears — at the slightest things.
Izuku will sometimes be studying, when all of a sudden, he is transported from here to the interior of an apartment he does not recognize.
Todoroki Touya has white hair that he dyes black, burn scars all down his arms, and Hawaiian shirts that are louder than Present Mic having an orgasm. (Izuku learnt that one from Kaminari before he died.) He is also prone to bursting into flames when he gets angry, which then fizzle out when he calms down.
When Izuku swaps with Shimura, it’s always extremely obvious because Shimura will just have been yelling — Izuku feels the vibration in his throat — and holding his hands in the air.
Izuku goes quiet, and lets his — Shimura’s — arms drop limply.
“Midoriya,” says Touya into the silence. Izuku calls him Touya rather than Todoroki in his head because there is also Todoroki Shouto . He hasn’t met Shouto yet this time, but it’s easier to differentiate between them. “It is you, isn’t it?”
“Yes, Todoroki-senpai!” he says, and winces. The enthusiastic tone causes the skin at the corners of Shimura’s lips to wrinkle painfully, and Izuku decides to get him some new moisturizer and lip balm.
“That sounds so weird to hear from Tenko — okay, okay, I’m sorry,” Touya says quickly when he sees Izuku using Shimura’s face to scowl. “Were you doing something important?”
“Just maths homework.” Izuku is reminded of something. “Say — you think you could help me with one of the problems?”
“Go for it.” Touya was top of his year at UA, Izuku knows.
Izuku picks up a piece of paper that’s lying on the little coffee table before him. There’s a particularly difficult proof that he’s having trouble doing. It’s about circles, too, so if he just leaves it, he runs the risk of not understanding one of the most important chapters in his syllabus this year.
He does remember the lines and figures, though, so he manages to sketch the diagram on the paper. Then, he tells Touya the question.
It takes exactly forty-five seconds for Touya to pick up a pencil and solve the proof. He spends five minutes more explaining it to Izuku.
Damn it . Now Izuku feels stupid. Todoroki Touya makes anything look easy.
“Listen, Midoriya,” he says. “You need help with maths, you come to me. I’m free in the evenings most days, so just come over whenever.”
Izuku can’t believe this.
He has memories from age ten onwards of watching a boy with blue flames absolutely obliterate his opponents in the Sports Festival. Then, at age thirteen, he remembers cheering while watching the TV as Touya — the Pro Hero Dabi , because that was an edgy-enough choice to go both ways — made his debut.
He’s not been as wary around Touya as he has been around Shimura. That’s mostly because he never had any personal run-ins with Dabi.
He bets none of the other kids at school are tutored by a Pro Hero.
(He bets none of the other kids at school remember Pro Heroes being villains in their past lives.)
Of course, just as he goes to respond, he switches back to his room. It’s always strange to go back, not least because in a very short time, Izuku gets used to Shimura’s larger frame. Going back means being squeezed once again into his own, tragically small body.
He gets back to work. But, as he does, he notices something pencilled into the top corner of his worksheet.
what the fuck they still teach ppl this stuff? fuck this shit i never understood maths. was twentieth in the class on every exam ua ever bothered to take. good luck with this though
— shimura
Izuku snorts.
But, more importantly, it seems as if Shimura is finally getting used to this life. And that’s better than understanding any mathematical proof under the sun.
Izuku goes for the UA entrance exam on a morning that brings with it a chill in the air and a hopeful, fluttering breeze.
He takes the hair All Might offers him (it doesn’t get any better knowing One For All’s transfer mechanism beforehand) and heads off to the train station.
He touches the handprint on his neck, making his fingers coincide with Shimura’s — no , Shigaraki’s prints. It’s comforting. He doesn’t know why he should feel so much warmth from a mark of his death, but he does and it’s inexplicable and he’ll keep doing it.
The written exam goes much better than it did last time; Izuku will have to thank Touya for helping him with the geometry part of the maths syllabus.
It’s the practical exam, though.
It’s the practical exam that really changes.
Because Izuku had barely escaped with his life last time.
But now, he sees a hulking one-pointer, and he knows how to use One For All .
He calls it to life under his skin, and he can tell that even the Quirk is confused how he knows it so well. But it crackles, green lightning on his skin and in his hair and lighting up his eyes, and he jumps .
The one-pointer doesn’t stand a chance.
Nor do the two-pointers, or the three-pointers.
But then the zero-pointer comes up, and there! There is Uraraka, trapped under it, and Izuku stops thinking because he knows that he can’t use Full Cowl for this, he needs to finish the robot and that means concentrating all the power in his arm.
So he does just that.
The robot crumbles into pieces, and he’s fairly sure his arm does the same. His legs, thankfully, are intact.
He feels himself about to swap, knows that the pushing at the back of his mind is from Shimura’s mind.
No, no no no no no NO I can’t swap I’ll die I and then, just for a second, he sees the inside of his own house (?!) and then he’s back but One For All is switched off and he tries to activate it again but he can’t and the ground is coming closer with every passing millisecond.
He feels a slap on his face.
Just like last time, Uraraka saves him from falling.
He floats to the ground with his heart racing and his arm dangling.
“What have you done ?” says a little old lady. It’s Recovery Girl. There is horror written all over her face. “What has happened to your arm , young man?”
Izuku says nothing, passes out with a smile on his face and an assurance that he’s getting into the Heroics Course, come April.
When he finally gets home, it’s with fog filling his head. His mother lets him stumble in. He sees that Shimura is lounging on their couch (why?!) and inhaling chocolate cookies. Izuku, too, is handed a full plate after he gets changed into more comfortable clothes.
The cookies help him think straighter: the sugar hitting his brain helps provide some clarity.
“So, how was it?” questions Shimura.
“I broke my arm and Recovery Girl told me off!” says Izuku, delighted. “She says she’s never seen someone get a fracture in more than thirty places on the same bone — but I was the first!”
There is silence, after that.
Then, Inko lets out a loud, keening noise and falls to her knees.
“What the fuck,” says Shimura. “Are you fucking crazy?”
“A bit, maybe,” says Izuku.
On the first day of school, Izuku is accosted by a girl with twin blonde buns and a lethal-looking knife in her belt, wearing the UA Support uniform and having a manic grin stretching ear to ear.
“Welcome to UA, firstie!” she says, and grabs him in a hug that definitely is invading his personal space.
He finally gets a good look at her.
He barely manages to stop himself from screaming.
Because this is Toga Himiko . And she is a student . At UA .
He racks his brain for past memories. Was Toga on the news, ever? As a villain? Had she killed anyone?
Wait: she had .
Izuku is suddenly struck by something that happened five years ago in this life. He would have been ten then, and Toga eleven; and he remembers —
Toga had killed a boy in a craze, fueled on by her own traitorous Quirk, before she’d turned the knife on herself.
It had been all over the news: why had this young girl been neglected by the medical system? Why had she not been helped out with the issues she so clearly had, and which were obviously caused by her Quirk? Several Pros had come up to give speeches about the perception of “villainous” Quirks and how their users were cast aside at best and mobbed at worst.
Yes, this was Toga. But, in the end, she’d found people who cared for her.
“Why are you just standing there?” she says. “You gotta be excited! Show some energy ! This is UA! What’s your name?”
“It’s — it’s Midoriya,” he stammers.
“Midoriya what?”
“Midoriya Izuku.”
“OMG, that’s so cute!” she gushes. “We’re going to be best friends, Izuku-chan. My name’s Toga Himiko, and I’m in the second year.” She holds up two fingers to illustrate this. Then she gets distracted. “What’s that on your neck?”
“Oh.” Izuku rubs the handprint self-consciously. “It’s nothing. Just a scar.”
“That’s all right,” she says dismissively. “Heroes get scars all the time. You are in the Heroics Course, aren’t you?”
“I — yes,” says Izuku, disconcerted.
“ Yay! I’m so totally going to be your costume support person. And Mei-chan, of course, because we’re a team forever and ever —”
Izuku has no idea who this Mei-chan is, but he’s getting late for homeroom, so he excuses himself from the conversation and runs off.
Well. That was a rollercoaster and a half. Though, he supposes, if Dabi and Shimura are heroes now, and All For One is dead, it stands to reason that Toga should be on their side, too.
He finds he doesn’t mind this life very much.
It turns out that there are so many things that are different, here, that Izuku needs to start noting them down or he’ll go crazy. He pulls out a new notebook, spiral-bound, and a new Parker pen, and begins to write.
Later, he will tell Shimura to do the same, but Shimura swears up and down that he’s terrible at tracking things. It’s a pointless argument, so Izuku lets it go.
He continues on his own endeavour. He titles the notebook Interesting Things because he’s not stupid enough to leave that kind of a secret out in the open.
And so it begins.
When Izuku walks into homeroom the first day, he is told to sit not in seat number eighteen, but instead nineteen, which means that Mineta isn’t there, but someone else is . He lets his eyes rove over the people before him, so that he can catch the new person in 1-A.
Kacchan — oh, look, he’s exploding things again , thinks Izuku, rolling his eyes. Kacchan is followed by Hagakure, Todoroki Shouto, Tokoyami, Sero, Jirou, Shouji, and —
Shinsou .
Izuku is dying to know how Shinsou got in. But then, he mentally kicks himself. This kind of attitude from everyone else is exactly what kept Shinsou out the first time around.
He will admit, though, Shinsou’s defeating enough robots from the practical exam to net him a spot in 1-A must mean that he has immense physical strength this time. Maybe even more than Kirishima, Kacchan or Izuku himself.
But Shinsou doesn’t look very bulky to Izuku. He’s just as lithe and lanky as ever.
And Izuku knows for a fact that support weapons weren’t allowed except for physically-dangerous Quirks.
This is when Aizawa begins to drone. Izuku gets to his seat as quickly as he can.
And what Aizawa tells the class is rather surprising. He can’t get his notebook out of his bag fast enough.
- Shinsou was recommended to the Heroics Course by Present Mic — and, apparently Todoroki cleared the practical exam himself! Wow! I bet those robots were totally finished.
- After a conversation with Shinsou, it turns out Present Mic is his half-brother. I… can’t say I’m surprised, actually.
- Present Mic and Aizawa are married. Okay, now I’m surprised.
- Endeavour is in jail. Shouto — I get to call him that now! — lives with his mother.
- Oh, Dabi and Shimura and Toga aren’t villains anymore, of course. And Toga’s additions to the costume Mom made for me are so useful! I told her about the trouble I still had with regulating One For All’s power, and she made these conductor things that help me spread it all over my body. (I suppose One For All really is like electricity.)
The USJ incident doesn’t happen, which Izuku is absolutely ecstatic about.
Instead, when they get to the simulation areas, they are treated to a very enjoyable lesson on rescue tactics with Thirteen. They, along with Aizawa, teach 1-A to deal with rubble, avoid injuring civilians more than villains already have, and secure evacuation areas.
There are several rescue dummies that need saving, and by the end, they have managed to salvage all of them but for one or two.
“One or two deaths is still one or two more than you should aim for,” Aizawa tells them when they’re done. “Even just one death is one person less in this world, one family that has lost a member, perhaps one child who has lost a parent.”
It sounds like he has personal experience with that. Izuku decides against asking.
They make it back safe and sound, without any sign of villains trying to attack their class. Aizawa sends them home with a wave of his hand and a nod of his head.
Izuku calls Shimura right after.
“No USJ attack,” he reports. “We managed to get out of there alive.”
“Of course there was no USJ attack,” Shimura says darkly. “I’ve been at home knitting the whole day.”
It strikes Izuku now that the memories of this life have changed Shimura’s entire personality, somehow. He’s less unhinged and more of an asshole in general. He is, surprisingly, nice sometimes. (Reluctantly.)
“What are you knitting, Shimura-senpai?” says Izuku.
“Why do you call me that?” asks Shimura, abruptly. “Why the hell do you call me Shimura-senpai? You’ve only ever known me as Shigaraki Tomura. That’s — that’s who I am to you.”
“That’s not true.”
“Of course it’s true.”
“No. And even if you’re Shigaraki to me, who are you to you ?”
“Shimura, of course,” he snaps. “But that doesn’t change what you call me.” His voice takes on a suspicious edge. “Unless you’ve looped before last time.”
“No, no, of course not. I’m just — I mean to say that I don’t just know you as Shigaraki. It’s been months , Shimura-senpai. If you wanted to start being a villain again, you could.”
“No, I fucking could not. I may have taken a break but the bloody HPSC’s still on my ass all the time. Didn’t you see me in that PSA they made me do about Quirk manifestations? Horrible to shoot. I’m never gonna be on TV again.”
“You kind of signed a lifetime contract for TV time when you decided to be a daylight hero,” Izuku points out.
“It doesn’t change that I couldn’t be a villain even if I wanted to.”
“Do you want to?” Izuku grins at his phone though he knows Shimura can’t see it. He knows what the answer will be.
Shimura waits for a moment before admitting, “Okay, yeah, no.”
“There you go, then.”
- The USJ attack didn’t happen, yay! And Shimura’s not a complete bitch anymore. He’s having trouble accepting that fact himself.
“I have upgrades for you!” Toga announces.
“Oh!” Izuku exclaims. “Oh, but Toga-senpai —”
“I told you to call me Himiko, Izuku-chan! We’re friends !”
“Himiko-senpai,” Izuku hedges, “I don’t really have the time to try them out right now. Maybe I could come by some time later?”
“You don’t need to,” she says, beaming. “My Quirk helps with that! You’re wearing your costume now, so all I need to do is take some of your blood.”
She pulls a syringe from somewhere, and a bottle of rubbing-alcohol from somewhere else, and bounds towards him.
Instinctively, Izuku takes a step back. He realizes his mistake when her face falls.
“Oh,” says Toga. “I’m sorry. I — Maijima-sensei told me I should be less overbearing when it comes to asking people for stuff like this, I’m — I didn’t realize I would scare you. I’m so sorry, Izuku-chan.”
Izuku feels terrible.
“It’s all right!” he says. “Don’t worry, I just… get nervous when people approach me too quickly. It’s not a personal thing. I’m sorry too.” He laughs, and the sound is high-pitched and bizarre but at least Toga doesn’t look on the verge of tears anymore.
She steps slowly towards him. He takes off one of the gloves from his hero costume, and allows her to sterilize the skin on the back of his hand before she carefully inserts the syringe into his vein and pulls the piston back.
Once she’s done, she pushes the blood into a vial on her desk and throws the syringe away. Izuku’s glad she’s following good phlebotomy practices. The Toga from his last life certainly didn’t — he’s afraid to think of how many blood-borne diseases she could have caught.
“One last thing,” says Toga. “As you, I’ll try on all the upgrades and send you a video — but I need your number to do that!” And so she holds out a notebook and a pen, and Izuku takes it and scribbles it down for her benefit.
She grabs him in a hug again, and runs to the back of the workshop, leaving him to wander out of it alone.
That was a not-entirely-unwelcome experience.
He may actually have one more friend now.
- Toga is one of the best Support mechanics the school has to offer.
Shimura returns to hero work (though can it really be called returning if you, the you from your first life, are doing something for the first time?) on a cold day in September, starting with a mission where he and the Mighty Agency are supposed to take down some sort of yakuza — the Shie Hassaikai. Coincidentally enough, this is the same gang that Izuku’s work-study agency is going up against.
Shimura texts him to let him know that it can’t be just a brawl between the heroes and the villains. There’s a hostage, a little girl, who’s being exploited by the Hassaikai, and Shimura, Izuku and Izuku’s senior, Toogata, encounter her on a joint patrol.
She has bandages all down her arms and legs, and she looks like there’s someone after her, and she seems as if she knows more pain than Izuku ever will in his entire life.
Izuku looks over Toogata’s shoulder at Shimura.
Because Shimura, too, knows.
Shimura’s staring at the girl — Eri , her name is Eri — with an expression that covers everything from shock, to horror, to outright despair —
— but, most importantly, empathy.
He looks back at Izuku.
“I’m taking them down,” he says.
Izuku agrees.
Izuku doesn’t expect the all-out battle that begins there.
He doesn’t expect the leader of the yakuza to fight Shimura , of all people.
They’re face to face and one of them has the power to change the landscape, with the other one able to destroy it as soon as it’s made.
Shimura is bleeding. He’s standing on one leg, the other one gone at the knee, a splatter on the ground.
Chisaki, Overhaul, is also bleeding. His arm has long crumbled into dust.
Izuku clutches Eri to his chest. She is trying to run, to go to Shimura, to bring his leg back, but Izuku cannot, will not , let her hand herself over to Overhaul.
Because that is what Overhaul wants. He’s doing all this, killing heroes, damaging the city’s structural integrity, all to get Eri back.
No, not Eri.
Eri’s blood.
And that’s what Shimura is defending.
He dodges a tendril of dirt that Overhaul makes, slaps his hand down on the floor, which disintegrates in a wide line towards the villain.
But Overhaul’s advantage is that he still has both of his legs. He jumps aside, and creates a bump in the ground.
It’s barely a centimeter above the surface. Not enough for anyone to trip. But Shimura is exhausted, has used his Quirk too much, has only one functioning leg to let him move around.
So he trips and falls.
Overhaul practically bounds over, falls to his knees with one over Shimura’s chest. Shimura coughs.
From here, Izuku can’t hear what Overhaul whispers to Shimura. But he can well imagine.
Overhaul raises his hand. Izuku closes his eyes.
He hears only Shimura’s croak as he is finished.
But when Izuku opens his eyes, he sees something Overhaul does not.
Because Shimura’s hand, too, is on Overhaul’s back, all five fingers freed from his protective gloves.
So as Overhaul reduces Shimura to liquid, he himself turns to a pile on the ground.
Izuku’s last thought is that Eri is free . He shouts at Toogata: “Get her to safety!”
He can’t do it himself. He knows what comes next.
So he lets the void take him, too.
The last thing Tenko feels before he dies is the satisfaction at managing to kill Overhaul.
He knows that, at least, he’s managed to save one child in this world from the clutches of a human trafficker.
When Tenko opens his eyes again, it is to a room full of people wearing masks and a smell of disinfectant in the air.
And, on the table in front of him is a person .
Their face is uncovered, but most of their upper and lower body is covered by a cloth. Only a small sliver of their abdomen is exposed, and it is cut open .
Tenko knows that he is back .
Any moment now, his Sensei — his old Sensei — will emerge out of the shadows.
Because this is his birthday present, isn’t it?
He remembers being eight and Sensei handing him a still-beating heart to call his own. Tenko had kept it in a jar and called it his most prized possession.
He remembers being ten, and handing a slippery, tubular human brain.
Then he is twelve and being taught to cut off swathes of skin.
Fifteen and dissecting someone’s abdomen.
Seventeen and learning to implant a new Quirk Factor.
Twenty and seeing a Nomu be born.
That was his first life .
And maybe, just maybe, this one is the same.
He breathes in the scent of sanitizer.
And he falls to his knees.
The operation stops and suddenly people are milling around him, Shimura-kun are you okay and get him some water and take him outside he needs some air and he’s confused because surely his Sensei hasn’t hired medical professionals who care this much about Tenko’s wellbeing.
But then a firm hand grips his, a voice tells him to breathe, and he is pulled to his feet and gently led outside the operation theatre —
— and into a hallway carpeted in indigo, with glass windows along one wall showing a magnificent view of… a parking lot.
This is a hospital .
Tenko is a doctor .
A medical student, really.
The fog around him clears.
Then it’s all less terrible, because there in his memories he sees:
A nice social worker drives him in her jalopy of a car to a beautiful house in the suburbs, and he is welcomed in by an incredibly rough but kind woman, a meek man, and a child who has just manifested an explosion Quirk.
“We’ll help you get your Quirk under control!” declares Bakugou Mitsuki. She has an aura that makes you want to believe anything she says.
Tenko is bought gloves that leave only one finger free, a bunch of books that are written for children with dangerous Quirks, and a year’s worth of sessions with a Quirk therapist in Hamamatsu.
He tells Mitsuki, in confidence, that when his father had hit him, just before he’d manifested Decay, he’d… left his body.
And he remembers that so well, being trapped in the body of a child who cannot yet walk, but has functioning vocal chords, and yelling for his father to stop.
He remembers a kind woman with green hair rushing over, and then turning so white from horror that she may as well have been made of paper.
Mitsuki says nothing, but takes him to a children’s soulmate counsellor the very next day.
Tenko turns fifteen, takes UA Gen Ed as his first-choice high school track, and decides that he wants to be a doctor.
He graduates second in his class, beaten only by a kid from the Heroics Course. Endeavour’s kid, people around him whisper, is one of this generation’s brightest-shining stars.
(Tenko thinks this is fitting, because by God, does this boy burn.
When he hears people speak, he thinks only of the fleeting moments spent studying with him in the quietness of the library, exchanging numbers, meeting up at cafés, watching him get his hero licence.
He doesn’t think of Endeavour’s son. To him, he is only Touya. No need for a qualifier.
But he never hears any word of, or from, Todoroki Touya again.)
Tenko is admitted with a full scholarship to Musutafu National University’s medical program, and he knows his life is set.
“I’m… I’m sorry for the trouble,” he mutters, to which the nurse who escorted him out smiles. Nurse Tokugawa , his mind supplies.
“No worries,” she replies. “Are you fine to go back in? Or do you need some more time outside? It’s fine if you do.”
“I’m good. I just — got fucked up for a second.”
“Language,” she chides. Then she frowns. “What’s up with your face?”
“Huh?”
“It looks… cracked. I don’t know. That definitely wasn’t there a few minutes ago.”
Tenko freezes, because he does know why the cracks are there. Fuck you, you bitch, Overhaul , he curses internally. You just had to destroy my face, huh?
Outwardly, he says, “I’ll get it looked at later.”
Nurse Tokugawa shrugs, and they enter the OT together — walking directly into a crisis.
“Shit, shit, shit,” one of the other nurses is singing, while the doctor and a third nurse try to stem what is definitely a stream of blood-and-other-fluids-and-perhaps-organs coming from the person’s abdomen.
“Tokugawa!” the doctor says — Doctor Hadanui. “We need you to freeze the patient’s body.”
Tenko remembers Tokugawa’s Quirk: Freeze Dome. And just as he does, she places her hand on the patient’s neck and closes her eyes.
A solid dome is formed around the patient, pushing Tenko, the doctor and the other two nurses out. Tokugawa steps through it like it’s air, and inside, the patient is frozen in time, the blood that was flowing out now suspended in midair.
“Get the Quirk analyst boy,” says Doctor Hadanui. “ Right now . We can’t waste any time or this patient is as good as dead.”
“But!” protests the second nurse. “He’s in school right now. It’s one p.m. on a Friday. We can’t just pull him out like that —”
“He is legally an employee of this hospital!” snaps Hadanui. “He has the right to come to work whenever he pleases, and we have the right to pull him out of school during an emergency. So. Get him now .”
What Quirk analyst boy? wonders Tenko. He’s never been in a situation as bad as this before. His heart is still racing. But he doesn’t recall a Quirk analyst this young coming to help out at any surgery.
Tokugawa makes a quick call from the intercom in the OT.
They all wait for fifteen long minutes.
Then the OT’s doors slam open and there, in the doorway, stands a boy wearing scrubs, with determined green eyes and extremely curly hair to match.
Then, Tenko looks down at his neck, and sure enough, the handprint is still there .
Of course. Of course .
When Midoriya notices Tenko, his eyes go so wide, and his pupils are so blown, that he almost looks like he’s on cocaine.
“Sh-shimura?” he whispers. “I didn’t know you —”
“Midoriya-kun, please , catch up later,” sighs Doctor Hadanui. “We need your help to get this man to safety.”
“O-oh, of course!” says Midoriya. “Okay, so could you brief me about the situation first?”
It’s Tenko who responds, the words coming from instinct. “Patient with a Quirk that can change their body parts into liquid. Appendicitis operation, but I’m fairly sure it ruptured mid-surgery —” He looks to Tokugawa for support, and she nods. “It’s common for patients to lose their control over their Quirks when under anaesthesia. And that’s what’s happened now.”
“Is that so,” says Midoriya faintly. He looks over at the patient and blanches. But then, he steels himself. “We need someone who has a blood manipulation Quirk.”
“And if we don’t have one?” says the doctor.
“We do,” interjects the third nurse. “I’ll get him here immediately.” He, too, heads towards the intercom, and after a short conversation with the reception, turns back with a satisfied look. “He’ll be here soon.”
When they arrive, they are ordered immediately, by Midoriya, to get into position. Tokugawa lets go of her Quirk, and in the blink of an eye, the patient starts liquefying again.
It is almost fascinating in its horror. Tenko watches, detached, as the blood-manipulation guy does, indeed, manipulate blood, and holds the patient’s insides still as the doctor immediately begins to sever the appendix.
But it’s harder than expected.
There’s something stopping the doctor from safely cutting the appendix off.
Tenko doesn’t know what it is. But he steps in anyway.
“Let me,” he says. “Please.”
“Let you what ?” says Hadanui. “Remove the appendix? I’m sorry, Shimura, but —”
“No. I want to Decay it. It’ll be quick.”
The doctor looks flabbergasted.
“What if you end up Decaying his intestine by mistake?” she says. “His pelvis. His whole body . Shimura, you can’t take this risk.”
“I can,” Tenko says quietly. “I have sense enough to localize my Quirk.”
Midoriya says, “It’ll be quicker than anything you can try, Doctor. And — ” he points at one of the nurses — ”you have a cauterizing Quirk, so that’ll come in handy, too.” The nurse in question is one that Tenko has always been slightly wary of, not least because of the rather unconventional piercings that make him look as if he stepped out of a punk magazine and into Musutafu National. He’s never been mean, though, so Tenko supposes he trusts him.
The man has blue eyes and blue hair and wears a face mask all the time, so Tenko doesn’t really know what his face looks like. There’s something eerily familiar about him, though.
“Do it quick, then!” says the blood-manipulator, snapping Tenko out of his thoughts. “I can’t hold this much longer. Whatever happens, needs to happen now .”
So Tenko steps forward, and takes off one glove, which he puts in the pocket of his scrubs. He winces as the doctor moves aside the mess of insides, revealing only a small, burst worm-like thing that must be the man’s appendix.
Tenko stretches his hand out, puts his fingers as close to each other as he can, and wraps them around the appendix.
It disintegrates within seconds, and this is going to be hard for the doctor to clean up but at least now there’s one less task to do.
The nurse immediately puts one finger into the patient's gut, then on top of his caecum, scrunching up his face as he does so, and, with a single spark, seals it up.
The blood guy lets his Quirk go.
And — miraculously — there is no more fluid coming out.
“Maybe it was the trauma of the rupture that caused the patient to lose control?” he can hear Midoriya mumbling from behind him. “I’d love to know what else he can do with that Quirk when he wakes up, it has so many cool applications for hero work, but he needs to heal for that first, ohmygod I hope he’s going to be fine —”
“He’s going to be fine, Midoriya.” Hadanui smiles wanly at him. “As soon as I clean up this infection and stitch him back up, he’ll be fine.”
Midoriya grins, and Tenko feels as if the sun itself has entered their little theatre.
“I’m still Quirkless,” Midoriya admits. “No One For All for me this time — I refused it just a week ago.”
“Don’t you want to be a hero?” says Tenko, annoyed. “What kind of individualist bullshit is that?”
“I don’t, actually. This time around, I decided years ago that even if I’m Quirkless, I’ll make damn sure that the hero industry won’t function without me.” Midoriya flashes his teeth in a feral smile.
“What the fuck?” says Tenko, mostly because he has nothing else to say.
“I’m going for Gen Ed,” says Midoriya. “So did you, didn’t you?”
“The Gen Ed exam is harder than most normal college entrance exams,” Tenko informs him. He feels this is an answer in itself.
“I have a job in the prefecture’s biggest hospital as a Quirk analyst,” Midoriya counters.
But Tenko — for some reason — doesn’t want Midoriya to fail by any means.
So he gives him his address, rattles it off —
And Midoriya squeaks, loudly.
“ What ?” says Tenko, irritated. “What’s wrong with my goddamn house?”
“I know your address, remember?” says Midoriya. “You’re —” he sighs. “You’re Kacchan’s brother. And Kacchan hates me.”
Tenko is about to retort with something snappy, but then he remembers that Katsuki does have some kid at school that he vents about at home.
Deku.
Wait. Deku .
Wait. DEKU. Deku, the little kid who’d followed Katsuki and Tenko around like anything ten years ago, up until Katsuki had got his Quirk and Deku had not and then they’d fallen out.
Deku, as in Midoriya Izuku.
Why the fuck is his life so complicated?
“So,” says Midoriya, “would you mind coming to my house to tutor me, instead?”
“No,” says Tenko, letting out a breath. “No, I guess I wouldn’t.”
The UA General Education exam is suuuuuuuuch a bitch. Look, on some level, Tenko knows that Heroics kids have it easier off. They have their practicals to consider, after all, and so their written exams are merely to ensure that they’re at the required skill level to ostensibly be allowed to function as adults three years later.
Gen Ed has two compulsory subjects, Japanese and English, and the rest are all electives. Which means that the first thing Tenko and Midoriya have to do is sit down and bang their skulls against the wall trying to select subjects that Midoriya can take in order to have a practical kind of education to prepare for his future university.
In the end, Midoriya goes for Quirk studies (“You’re a nerd,” says Tenko), chemistry (“You’ll need that for any kind of science degree,” says Tenko), biology (“Else you won’t be able to understand anything that goes on in a Quirk lab,” says Tenko), mathematics (“Don’t give me that look, you fucker! I hate it, too, but it’s important ,” says Tenko) and sociology (“It sounds very important and official,” says Tenko).
Midoriya will need to write five exams, then. Tenko remembers the experience all too well; five exams over eleven hours, only fifteen minutes’ break between two consecutive papers. He’d arrived there at seven a.m., started writing at eight and left at seven in the evening with his eyes drooping. He’d proceeded to drop into Bakugou Masaru’s arms, while Katsuki, by his side, called Tenko weak and Mitsuki slapped her son upside the head.
But still, Midoriya perseveres.
He goes to school, comes to work when he’s needed (and sometimes when he’s not), and in the evenings, Tenko visits his house to help him prepare for UA.
When Katsuki finds out, he explodes a dinner plate (“That was from my Corelle Asia Collection!” says Mitsuki in horror) and threatens to make Tenko Decay himself.
Tenko laughs it off. “What, threatened?”
“ No , the fuck ? Me? Threatened? By Deku ? A bitch like that doesn’t deserve to go to UA as a janitor .”
“Janitors do important work,” says Masaru sharply. “I’m sure you wouldn’t be able to do it.”
“I’ll show you —”
“You sound pretty threatened,” hums Tenko.
Katsuki’s eyes are bloodshot and there’s a vein pulsing at his temple. He clenches his fist. “A Quirkless , worthless bastard like Deku doesn’t have the right to go to any high school at all. And he’s got a job as a fucking Quirk analyst .”
“That’s because he’s smart,” says Tenko. He loves Katsuki (or, at least, the version of him in this particular life does), but the boy has issues and they need to be dealt with. “Smart enough to top the whole goddamn Gen Ed exam, I’d bet.”
“I’ll show him,” snarls Katsuki.
“No, you won’t. Gen Ed applications are closed already, so you don’t have a chance at that anymore.”
“I’m not applying to fucking Gen Ed ! What I mean is, once I see that cum-bucket —”
“ Katsuki .”
“—when classes begin at UA, he’s going down .”
“So you agree that he’ll get into UA,” says Tenko.
“ I never said that! ”
“Katsuki, you should focus on your own exam,” Masaru says, while Mitsuki nods in agreement. “It’s not going to be of any use if you gripe about Izuku getting into UA, and then you’re rejected.”
“I can get into UA without studying a single day,” Katsuki says.
Tenko hates to admit it, but he’s right.
As expected, Midoriya gets into UA with top marks. So does Katsuki, but their paths never cross; General Education and Heroics have their exams on separate days, so that people can apply to both.
Tenko’s life goes on.
It takes two more months for him to stop breaking down every time he enters an OT.
Within those two months, he starts and stops seeing a therapist who deals with medical trauma. He tells her only certain details, such as that he was abused by a doctor (technically true) and had been forced to see experimentation in childhood (also true). The doctor does not judge him, but only listens to him calmly.
She helps him forget his first life. Not that she knows she’s doing that in particular.
But Tenko recovers, and he is allowed to return to work.
In March, he’s allowed to disintegrate a rather large stomach tumour that a woman with a growth Quirk brings in. This surgery, too, is conducted under Doctor Hadanui.
Three months later, he takes part in an amputation. The nurse with the cauterization Quirk is there. They exchange smiles and get to work.
His sparks are beautiful. Tenko has seen fireworks before, but never in such a localized form and never so close up.
The amputation takes five minutes, fifteen seconds in all. Tenko is awarded the Student of the Month award.
The attending physician advises him to take a particular Quirk biology course in the next semester of university. Tenko does so, and, finally, finally , is able to freely practice his Quirk without an emergency needing to come up, because the professor teaching the course selects him as an example of a five-point Quirk user and, as it turns out, the course is a practical one.
For his final, Tenko writes a five-thousand-word essay on “villainous” Quirks. On result day, he opens the university portal, and right next to the course’s name (Study of Quirks Centered in the Appendicular Skeletal System), there is a large, bold S .
Tenko grins viciously.
His nurse friend is the first one to congratulate him.
And, finally, after months of wondering, assuming , Tenko asks, “What’s your name?”
There’s uncertainty in the guy’s expression but he responds: “Sekotoyama Aohi.” A mouthful of a name, indeed. Tenko doubts it’s his real name, but he won’t judge. “Just call me Ao.”
“Call me Tenko, then,” says Tenko.
They shake hands.
“Your scars…” says Ao quietly. “They look bloody amazing on you.”
“That’s a first.”
Ao laughs bitterly. “It shouldn’t be.”
There’s something more to what he says. Tenko can’t put his finger on it.
“How’d you get them?” asks Ao. No subtlety, notices Tenko. No matter. He doesn’t like subtlety.
“Villain attack.” He’s not, technically, lying.
“What kind of villain leaves that kind of mark on a civilian?”
“A bad one,” Tenko says without missing a beat, and they both laugh.
That laugh. It’s not a new one.
The laugh reminds him of light and darkness at the same time.
It’s the dusty smell of old books, and the ashes from corpses.
A determined yell and a derisive snort.
And, above all —
— the sun.
This man’s identity remains just out of reach. But Tenko doesn’t push it. It’ll come to him eventually.
In August, Katsuki is kidnapped. Tenko racks his brain for why this has happened, because there’s no All For One and so logically there should be no League, because it was because of him that this whole thing started —
But , he realizes. Toga and Spinner became villains because of their Quirks. Stain became a villain to rid the world of heroes.
He spares a moment for the Toga from his last life. She’d been wonderful.
Now, less so.
When Mitsuki hears the news, she drops to her knees, blankness in her eyes.
She gets up almost immediately, and pastes a smile on her face.
“Oh — what’s the matter?” she asks. Then she sees Tenko. “Oh, Tenko-chan, hello! It’s been a while hasn’t it? Izuku says he misses you.”
Inko, then. Tenko isn’t entirely surprised.
Without wasting time on niceties, he says, “Katsuki’s been taken by some villains.”
Inko’s lips go very thin. “Is he alive?”
“I goddamn hope so,” says Tenko.
“He is alive,” decides Inko. “Katsuki wouldn’t let himself be taken easily.”
But if that’s true, then it means Katsuki’s seriously injured, having sustained all his damage from trying to fight back.
Tenko can’t do anything about this. At all.
But he’ll pray, and hope his prayers reach his brother.
Two days later, Inko is over at Tenko and the Bakugous’ house.
The news is on. It’s six p.m. and they are sitting in front of the television, watching intently as the heroes’ preparations are shown live.
Katsuki has still not been rescued.
Tenko runs his fingers along the thick mark on his cheek. He’d got it checked out, and the dermatologist had said there was nothing he could do. These kinds of scars are, apparently, irreversible.
But Tenko doesn’t mind. His scars seem to light up as he touches them. He wonders how Midoriya is doing. They haven’t swapped in ages — months, really.
He reaches into the back of his mind. Everyone sees their soulbonds differently, even pairs of soulmates, and Tenko’s is a travelator. At one end is his own mind, and at the other end is Midoriya’s.
Midoriya ? he calls. Can’t be bothered to talk to your fucking soulmate once in a while? I see how it is.
He’s not expecting a response.
OMG! and that’s definitely Midoriya’s voice. Tenko’s ears aren’t hearing it, but it resonates within his brain and he’s fucking elated . I’m so sorry, Shimura-senpai! But I’ve been busy! And I’ve become better at keeping my emotions under control, because I didn’t want to annoy you by swapping when you might be busy.
I need you to swap with me right now , Tenko orders.
I — I can’t do that, actually . Midoriya laughs within Tenko’s mind, nervously. Like he has something to hide. I swear I’ll tell you later, but — but not right now. It’s… something important.
I don’t give a fuck. Midoriya. What are you doing and why are you hiding it?
I can’t tell you just now. There’s a note of pleading in Midoriya’s… soul-voice? Just soul? Tenko’s not sure.
Midoriya, swap with me right now, Tenko says.
No. Please, Shimura-senpai.
Right. The. Fuck. Now. Tenko pauses. Or you’re fucking fired from your job at the hospital.
You wouldn’t do that, says Midoriya.
I would, if it meant you’re not going to die because obviously you can’t take care of yourself.
Okay. Okay, fine, sighs Midoriya.
Tenko gets on the travelator. Another, identical one appears right next to his travelator, but it’s travelling in the opposite direction.
He finally sees Midoriya. The kid looks almost ghostly, travelling in the space between their two mindspaces. As they pass each other, Midoriya looks up and gives him a look of deepest regret.
Tenko gets off the travelator at the other end.
He opens his — Midoriya’s — eyes.
There are four kids he sees that he doesn’t immediately recognize. But on looking closer, he realizes he does know them. At least, three of them.
The Yaoyorozu heir. Tenko knows her family by the huge donations they make to his hospital. The doctors speak highly of them: apparently, they’re not just rich, but also very learned.
The Iida family’s younger son. He’s taken up his brother’s mantle, now. Tenko knows this because Iida Tensei — Ingenium the first — still comes in for his weekly physiotherapy appointments in the department below Tenko’s.
Then there’s Todoroki Shouto . Tenko had watched him absolutely destroy Midoriya at the Sports Festival’s third round. He’d been a bit disappointed, but Midoriya was also the first Quirkless person and the second General Education student to make it that far, so he couldn’t really complain.
The fourth kid, he doesn’t recognize, but he has hair the same red as Tenko's eyes, a determined look on his face, and is rattling off what sounds suspiciously like…
… the beginnings of a rescue plan.
“I’m not quite sure about how we’re going to get high enough to get Bakugou,” he admits. “We obviously can’t do it at ground level, because the actual fight will be going on there, but, well… Midoriya, any ideas?”
And Tenko freezes up.
This is what Midoriya has been doing?
How does he even know these kids?
But then, he supposes, they all met at the Sports Festival. Midoriya got through to the quarter-finals. They must at least be acquaintances.
He needs to answer. He can’t let these kids know he’s not Midoriya.
What would Midoriya do?
Tenko answers slowly. “I think — get Todoroki to make an ice slide. A glacier, of sorts, with an upward slope.” Like the ones from the Sports Festival. Tenko shudders. “Yaoyorozu — make some ice skates for Iida; and Iida, power up your engines so you can carry all of us up the slope.”
Wonderful. He’s almost proud of himself, before he remembers that these children might die .
“But what about Kirishima?” says Yaoyorozu.
“I’ll catch Bakugou!” proudly says the boy that must be Kirishima. “I can harden my hands so when he flies up with his explosions, I won’t get hurt!”
He is hit by a sudden headache. He hasn’t got one of those in ages.
He still remembers attacking the class at the USJ the first time. Why wouldn’t he?
Tenko remembers the urge to finish them off. He remembers dissolving Aizawa’s elbow and his face, the man crying out in pain as Tenko went for the killing blow, only to be interrupted.
The sheer dissonance of that attack when compared to what he’s doing now…
He lets go of the thoughts. He can’t afford to waste time.
“Our plan is perfect,” says Kirishima. He flashes a thumbs-up and an almost ethereally-beautiful — though terrifying — smile. “Let’s go, then.”
Tenko switches back at this moment.
Then he’s back in his house, with Inko looking worriedly at him and the Bakugous still watching TV.
“You switched, didn’t you?” says Inko. “You switched with Izuku. He didn’t say anything while he was here, but I know you switched.”
“Um — yes,” says Tenko.
“What’s he doing? I know he said he was out with friends, but, you know, I do get worried sometimes.” Inko chuckles. “And that was the first time in months you two have switched. I thought something bad must have happened.”
“God, no, can you imagine?” lies Tenko. “Your brat just laughed hard enough at a joke that he lost control over himself.”
It’s the best he can do to keep Inko from actively breaking down. She’s going to see her son on the news soon enough, and that’s going to be seriously bad.
Soon enough turns out to be five minutes later.
“The base of the League of Villains has, as of three minutes ago, been destroyed completely,” a man reports. From the view of the city below him, it’s obvious that he’s on a news helicopter. “This can be credited to All Might, who —”
His eyes widen.
“Oh, my God,” the reporter says. He sounds stricken. “Matsu, are you getting this on air? If not —” The camera quickly turns to show the city below them more clearly. “It appears four teenagers have come to rescue the UA hostage, Bakugou Katsuki, and one of them is Todoroki Shouto, son of the Number Two Hero, if that glacier is any indication; and there is Iida Tenya, the brother of Ingenium, and both are currently students at UA, for the information of the public, and — oh, God — !”
Sure enough, a huge ice slope is on screen, and there’s Iida racing up it. On his back are Todoroki, Yaoyorozu, Kirishima, and —
As a familiar head of green hair appears on screen, Inko screams.
“That,” she says, “is my son !”
A day and a half later and Inko still hasn’t forgiven Tenko entirely for lying to her.
Luckily, he doesn’t have to spend any more time with her than is required, and so Monday finds him working his normal shift at the hospital following the end of his classes.
What he doesn’t expect is Ao running in, looking more harried than Tenko has ever seen him.
Even through the face mask, Tenko can tell that Ao’s mouth is stretched in a frown. He’s sweating, sparks coming off his hands.
“What’s up?” Tenko says.
“My brother ,” says Ao.
“Didn’t know you had one.”
“I have two, but that’s not the point.” Ao is trying to hurry this conversation along, Tenko can tell. “My brother is here . He’s injured, I have to go see him —”
“Let me come with you.”
Ao turns green. Ironic. “You can’t.”
At this, Tenko scowls. “And why the fuck can’t I?”
“None of your business,” says Ao, face darkening. “Just — I have to go.”
He barrels forward. Tenko sticks out an arm to stop him.
“I’m coming with you,” he says, mulishly. “Your brother is hurt. You might not be able to handle the sight alone —”
“I’m plenty stable,” snaps Ao. “And, I’m telling you, you can’t come with me.”
“ Why not?! ”
At this, Ao sighs. “You just… can’t, okay?”
“Give me one good reason why I can’t. One reason.”
Ao stays silent.
“I’m coming with you, then,” says Tenko decisively. “Try and fucking stop me.”
He steps forward and then, all of a sudden, there is a hand at his throat —
(— his own arm at Midoriya’s throat two lives ago and God is this what it feels like to be this helpless he’s about to die was Midoriya feeling this same way about his life Tenko is going to die die die die —)
“Don’t even try to come after me,” snarls Ao, “or you’ll regret it.”
“Is that a threat,” whispers Tenko.
“No,” Ao says simply. “Just a fact.”
“Then I’ll regret it,” Tenko says. “But I am, in fact, coming with you.”
Ao drops his hand. He stares.
“Why do you care this much?” he says.
“Why do you care that I care?”
It’s a non-answer, but only because Tenko doesn’t know what to say. He finds that this is happening a lot to him these days.
“Okay. Okay, fine.” Ao shrugs. “Don’t come at me afterwards, though.”
So they get into the lift, stand in silence till they reach the sixth floor — Quirk Exhaustion Ward — and get out.
Ao leads Tenko past rows and rows of patients with IVs giving them water and electrolytes, some with oxygen masks, some with full-body casts, until they reach the part of the ward with private cabins. Here, Ao’s pace slows.
Tenko counts the cabin numbers as they pass: one, two, three, five… There's no four , because the hospital is one of those superstitious types still.
They stop at room number seventeen. Tenko cranes his neck to look at the name-plate beside it, but it’s blank. Probably because the hospital staff know that whoever is in there won’t be here for long, one way or another. Tenko hopes it’s not another .
Ao opens the door slowly. “Hey,” he says to its occupant, who Tenko still can’t see.
Tenko hears a “Hey,” in response. He stiffens.
He knows this voice.
Not because he’s very familiar with its user, but because he’d heard it just the day before yesterday.
This is — this is Todoroki Shouto .
So why…?
Ao steps aside, giving Tenko a good view of the kid sprawled on the hospital bed. He doesn’t look too bad, just dehydrated, and there’s an IV remedying that as they speak. He is exhausted, though, and looks like he also has a headache. There are pills and a glass of water on a tray beside his bed.
“It’s been a while, Touya,” murmurs Todoroki. “How’s the new job?”
Touya .
As in Todoroki Touya.
UA’s star .
Until today, he’d been forgotten.
Todoroki Touya had graduated from UA with a guaranteed job at Endeavour’s, All Might’s, Edgeshot’s, Best Jeanist’s, and Miruko’s agencies.
People had asked Endeavour, later, why Touya had not become his best sidekick. Endeavour had evaded the questions with a grace he did not possess on the field.
Or, apparently, in real life. Tenko had heard tell of the brutal training Endeavour had put his children through, all to vicariously achieve his own goal of becoming the Number One.
Tenko can’t imagine what he would have done if one of his kids outright refused to become a hero.
Sekotoyama Aohi. Aohi – blue fire.
“Your cauterization?” says Tenko quietly. He realizes too late that he has only responded to his own thoughts, and to the other two he probably sounds crazy.
Ao — Touya — turns back quickly, as if shocked. “UA didn’t just teach me combat, you know. It taught me control. Something that’s important in the medical field.”
“Why not be a hero, then?” says Shouto. It’s the first he’s spoken, apart from greeting Touya.
“That life wasn’t for me.” Touya’s response is almost too easy. As if there’s something he doesn’t want to remind himself of. Tenko’s sure he knows what that is. “But it’s whatever. How are you holding up?”
“Better,” says Shouto. He’s hesitant to say anything , Tenko observes.
“You were a nine on the GCS,” says Touya. “ Nine . That’s two points above being comatose. I need a more detailed response than better .”
“I still have a headache. And my eyes hurt. Could you turn the lights off?”
Tenko obliges. The room is shrouded in darkness, but he can make out the vague shapes of the Todoroki brothers before him.
“And I’d also like to sleep,” Shouto adds. “So could you please leave?” Rude, but understandable.
Touya isn’t budging, though. “We just got here!”
Shouto sighs. “Please.”
“Okay, fine!” huffs Touya. He grabs Shouto by the arm and leads him out. “Bye, Shouto. Rest well.”
“Rest well,” Tenko echoes.
They shut the door and then they are back outside, the invisible question still hovering in the white hallway and threatening to choke them.
“I’m sorry,” Tenko hears Touya say.
“What for?”
“For lying to everyone.”
“I’m still angry.”
“Good. You should be.”
“I’m not… God, I can’t fucking say what I mean. I’m not angry at you for hiding your identity. I’m just — pissed that you hid it from me .” Tenko glares at Touya. “You just dipped after UA and didn’t bother to get in touch, and then we actually started working together and you didn’t say anything.”
A moment passes. Then another. Tenko waits as Touya looks more and more desperate.
Then, in the space between one breath and the next, Touya whispers, “My father’s after me.”
“ What?! Still?”
“Still. It’s a miracle he hasn’t found me yet.”
“Is he pissed you didn’t go into Heroics?”
“That,” says Touya, “and that I used all my inheritance from my grandmother to free my mother from the mental ward here.”
“Oh, God,” says Tenko.
“He’s close.” Tenko closes his eyes. “I only have, what, three-four months before he finds me, and then —” Tears gather at the corners of his eyes. “It’s over, then.” Then he opens his eyes, and lets his tears and voice flow freely. “ Fuck this life! ”
“Fuck this life,” Tenko says, and takes Touya’s hand in his own. “But I don’t think anyone here would let Endeavour get to you.”
“They can’t stop him.”
“They can. I’m sure.”
They can’t stop him.
As soon as Tenko hears the news, he dashes down to the lobby. He hasn’t seen Touya yet, today, and he hopes his friend hasn’t come in to work yet.
Endeavour, Todoroki Enji, is a blazing, towering presence and nobody, not the hardest doctors in the entire institution, not the battle-ready nurses wielding syringes, not Touya, not Tenko, not anyone dares to stand in his path.
The receptionist certainly tries, though.
“Endeavour, unless you are a family member of any patient here, I cannot let you pass,” they say bravely. However, they wilt like a balsam plant in summer once faced with Enji’s glare. It has weakened mightier opponents than Musutafu National’s admin staff.
“You will let me pass,” he growls. “My son works here.”
“May—may I know his name?” whispers the receptionist.
“Todoroki Touya,” he answers, but before they can express their confusion, he adds, “He is going by the name of Sekotoyama Aohi.”
“Oh,” says the receptionist blankly. “I’ll… call him down, then?”
“You will do this, yes.”
The nurse says into the PA system, “ Nurse Sekotoyama, you are wanted in the lobby. Please come ASAP. ” Their eye — and Tenko’s — does not miss the way Enji’s lip curls at “Nurse Sekotoyama”.
Within minutes, Touya is hurrying down, blue spiky hair unkempt, his face mask almost coming undone.
When he sees Enji, something in him shuts down, and something else — something primeval and frightening — opens up.
“Get out,” he says, and there is nothing loud about the words but they seem to burn in the air of the lobby.
“I will not,” says Enji.
“Nurse Sekotoyama?” says the receptionist uncertainly.
Touya looks at her. “Please tell him to leave. He can’t be here.”
The receptionist’s face sets. “Please leave, Endeavour. It’s clear you’re making my colleague uncomfortable, and that is unacceptable. Please leave, and have this conversation when Nurse Sekotoyama gets out of work.”
“You heard them,” says Touya. He points a thumb at the door. “Out.”
“ TOUYA! ” shouts Enji, and lets out a jet of flame.
This is when it all goes to shit.
“Endeavour, please stop!” cries the receptionist. “This is a hospital . There are sick people here. You’re going to hurt them —”
Enji turns on her. “Stay out of this, or you’ll regret it.”
Touya says, “You’re not my owner.”
“I am ,” snarls Enji, “if it means I can stop you from utterly wasting your life in this place.”
“I’m not wasting my life,” breathes Touya. “I’m saving people. I’m doing good work.”
“A nurse, Touya. What the fuck is wrong with you?!” As Enji says this, his flames grow higher and higher, till they lick the ceiling itself.
“ Nothing! ” Touya shouts. “ It’s my life! You have no right to ruin it!”
“You are a good-for-nothing, Touya!” roars Enji. “You could have been a hero, but you left that chance alone, came here just to rebel against me —”
Tenko rushes forward, now. “ Fuck you ,” he spits. “Touya’s a nurse because he wants to be a nurse. Don’t make everything about you.”
Enji rears back and punches Tenko so hard he flies into the opposite wall. The paint on it crumbles. He slides to the ground, his head and back throbbing.
The people in the lobby only stare silently.
“Touya, you will come with me now ,” orders Enji. “ Right now .”
“No, I won’t.”
“Then you won’t.”
Touya stands, confused.
Enji says, “Either you come with me, which you won’t, or you don’t come out of this alive.”
A few people gasp. One takes her phone out discreetly. Another already has it out, recording with a terrified look on their face.
Tenko can hear someone calling the police.
“I’m not coming with you.” Touya is shaking like a leaf, but he still stands strong.
“Touya —” says Tenko, his exclamation aborted by Enji’s scream of rage.
Enji charges forward, his flames at full blast, and sends a ball of fire at Touya.
The people yell. Some take cover; others rush out of the hospital entirely. Tenko can only sit at the base of his wall, and watch wordlessly as Endeavour, the Number Two Pro, destroys his own son.
Touya’s scrubs are set alight instantly, and he howls like Tenko’s never seen him do before.
Then he explodes.
Blue fire. Everywhere.
Tenko can’t see Touya anymore.
The fire goes straight up, a column of light, and hits the ceiling, and brick and tile both melt, warp, until one of them — a single one — is loose enough to fall.
“Stop this now, Touya!” says Enji. “ Come with me , or you will regret it.”
Touya is slumped over. He is burnt almost to a crisp, but the slight movement tells Tenko he is still alive.
It seems that it’s over. There are police sirens outside.
But then another brick falls. A girl screams.
And then the whole ceiling comes down.
There are dozens of hundreds of people, sick and dying, above them. Will they all be condemned to this fate together, this fate of dying at the hands of a Pro Hero driven mad?
Tenko certainly will, for he finds himself trapped beneath rubble —
Oh, wait. His Quirk.
He flexes his fingers, lets them all touch the tile and brick and whatever-else-is-around so that it decomposes in about a two-metre-radius around him. A small child, her forehead bleeding badly, is also set free. She is probably the one who screamed earlier.
“Thank you, mister,” she whispers.
There are already nurses scrabbling through the wreckage, though none of them is Touya.
Tenko’s heart clenches painfully.
He hands the little girl off to one of the nurses, who immediately runs out to deposit her safely on the pavement. She’ll be treated better there, which adds to the irony of the situation.
Tenko runs around, then, assisting the nurses any way he can. His fingers are injured, his hand is numb, but still he Decays little patches of rubble, letting patients and employees alike go. They get out shakily, thank him quietly, and are escorted out to safety.
Outside, he can hear a news reporter. He can’t exactly hear what she’s saying, but he catches small snippets: “...Endeavour … gone renegade … son … five hundred patients … cancer ward …”
He can’t bear to hear any more.
This whole situation is so wrong , so utterly unjust , that it boils his blood from his heart to the very tiniest capillaries in his entire body.
What a change.
The Tenko — the Tomura — of earlier wouldn’t have Decayed rubble. He’d have Decayed more people in order to cause more chaos.
The Tenko of today is a good person.
Tenko assures himself of this.
He is on his way to being a doctor.
He has friends, a family.
He has a caring soulmate.
Wait — Midoriya .
Tenko must let him know he’s safe. He needs to switch — now.
Tenko closes his eyes, visualizes their soulbond.
The travelator appears, and it’s already running . Weird.
He gets on it. Hopefully, Midoriya is at school, doing a subject which is nice and easy. He’ll have something to calm himself when he returns, and Tenko will have a surface of paper to write him a note on.
The other travelator is running too, but Midoriya goes by too fast for Tenko to get a good look at him.
He gets off.
Opens Midoriya’s eyes.
Tenko is fully expecting to see a nice little classroom with nice little children doing nice little chemistry model questions.
He expects the noise of a disaster around him to quiet down.
But not only does it not do that, it doesn’t change at all.
It’s almost — it’s almost as if he’s in the same place still.
And now, he feels pain .
There’s dust lying on his chest. A tile with a sharp edge has cut his thigh open, and he’s bleeding freely, waiting for rescuers to come to him.
He can’t look anywhere but up.
And — wait — is a brick coming loose?
Is it?
It certainly seems to be getting bigger.
Now he can’t see it anymore. Huh.
His head hurts a lot, though.
It hurts enough for him to switch back.
Tenko looks around wildly once he’s back in his own body.
He couldn’t see around himself in Izuku’s body, only up.
He hadn’t let himself scream, so he can’t hear anything now.
But — but — there .
In the far corner of the lobby, brightest green.
And red, equally as bright.
He runs over. But he knows it’s finished.
He bends down.
Midoriya looks up with resignation in his eyes, mixed in with all the blood.
“Deku,” says Tenko, because there’s no doubt of the fact that his soulmate is a hero, now. “Why did you come in?”
“Cancer of the wing bones,” Midoriya-Izuku- Deku manages to croak before his voice collapses. “Needed help.”
“And you gave it?”
“Almost… but then… “ Deku nods, slightly. Tenko understands.
“I can’t save you, Deku,” says Tenko. Not this time, he can’t.
“No,” says Deku.
“We’ll meet again,” and Tenko says this quickly because the light is slowly fading out of Deku’s eyes, turning them black.
“We’ll… again.” Deku tries to agree. “Shim…ura-sen —”
He reaches up to Tenko’s face. Gently as possible, he runs his finger over the thickest part of the scars, right over Tenko’s cheek.
Tenko feels the warmth coursing through his blood, once more.
He returns the favour, leaning down and rubbing the blood from Deku’s neck so he can put his hand , one finger raised, over Deku’s scar, matching perfectly with the prints he’d left before.
“Tenko,” says Tenko. “Call me Tenko.”
“Tenko,” says Deku, and closes his eyes.
Izuku opens his eyes to a battle raging around him and himself facing something warped, unrecognizable.
But he knows what it is.
Who it is .
Shimura Tenko — but he’s Shigaraki Tomura this time — hulks before him. He’s… he’s horrid to look at, his whole body covered in hands, real hands that are actually attached to his chest and face and arms and legs.
Just like every time before, the memories hit Izuku first.
At the mall, Shigaraki does not kill Izuku. Uraraka saves him from what would almost certainly have been a painful death — what was a painful death — and he, along with the rest of his class, leave quickly.
Things only spiral from there.
Izuku is hit by thought after thought, recollection after recollection of villain fights, the League, the yakuza, and, finally the Paranormal Liberation Front.
Then, Aoyama is the traitor.
And he switches back to their side.
And finally, just maybe, the Heroes have a fighting chance.
This is how it culminates. Izuku and Shigaraki, Shigaraki and Izuku. Maybe five minutes ago, not having the memories from Izuku’s past lives, he was at a loss. Maybe he thought he would die — again , and have to live another life with a different him, with a different Shigaraki.
But Izuku is tired. So, so tired.
It’s been three years in all, and he’s only grown one year in age.
He can’t do this anymore. He wants to live a full life, and he can’t do that if he keeps going back to the same goddamn age and can’t even graduate from UA.
He can’t die anymore.
He hates the pain of death, the knowledge that he’ll have to do it again, because death is inevitable but the Quirk is forever.
(Unless, of course…)
He’s determined to save himself and Shigaraki.
But why does Shigaraki still look bent on killing him ? Doesn’t he remember anything at all?
“Shimura-senpai,” he calls. “Tenko,” because he remembers the last thing his soulmate had said to him last time. “Please. It’s me, Izuku, don’t you remember?”
Distantly, he remembers that this is not Shimura Tenko or Shigaraki Tomura but instead a more terrible, third thing that is both of them fused with All For One.
“What do you want me to remember, Deku?” says Tenko-Shigaraki-All-For-One and Izuku’s heart stops. “How hero society needs to be destroyed? How you’re just a pathetic fucking bug in my path, waiting to be crushed?”
No.
No.
Izuku shrieks , loudly, the words mixed up in his throat and coming out as a single, twisted, shrill noise.
Because either Shigaraki doesn’t remember, or he does and doesn’t care.
He hopes it’s the first.
(In case it’s the second…
Well, Izuku has a knife in his costume and nobody specified that it had to be used on other people.)
There is a single beat in which both Izuku and Shigaraki wait for the other to strike, and in this beat Izuku wonders if All For One has completely taken over Shigaraki’s mind or if there’s still something of his soulmate — his friend — in there.
If it’s there, it’s quickly being extinguished.
Shigaraki looks pretty damned angry right now.
And Izuku has been only in his own body since the beginning of the war.
Then, there is no time to think — a barrage of fingers (of all things) is quickly heading towards Izuku and no he can’t die, he needs to save Shigaraki and finish All For One because —
This needs to end.
Not with death, but instead with life.
So he leaps around Shigaraki, beckoning at him to follow, and leads him from building to destroyed building, across the rubble that has leveled a city and become their battlefield.
He feels the kinetic energy building up within him. Half mass times velocity squared , he reminds himself, and goes faster and faster and faster, before the world is just a blur around him and he doesn’t even know where he is.
He calls on Fa Jin.
It wells up within him, the Third’s spirit guiding him along, and —
Faux 100 Percent: Manchester Smash! he cries within the confines of his own mind.
He brings his leg down onto Shigaraki.
Shigaraki falls.
He does not die, because, Izuku knows, the form he’s in will protect him from the worst of the damage.
But the air parts for them, and when they fall, the ground breaks into dust, forming a mushroom cloud around them —
Izuku lands on top of Shigaraki, all his hands and fingers surrounding him like a shell. He clambers up to Shigaraki’s head, pulls the fingers away from his face and
looks
him
straight
in
the
eyes.
He feels his brain almost split open from the force of Shigaraki’s mind pulling against his, the whirlwind of what is this and who am I and what am I doing almost forcing his soul from his body and into the monster before him; but Izuku does not yield.
He will never yield.
He breathes, deep and serene, and anchors himself.
Shigaraki’s eyes open.
Within him, there is still All For One, but not for long.
“Who am I?” he rasps.
“I don’t know,” says Izuku. “Who are you, Shimura Tenko?”
Shigaraki howls , and collapses. He begins to seize, and Izuku looks away.
When he stops hearing Shigaraki’s cries, Izuku looks back.
There are no more hands except the ones at the end of Shigaraki’s own arms.
White hair, red eyes, chapped skin, and a thin, withered frame, no sign of All For One in his mind, controlling his actions; if that had been true any longer, Izuku would be dead by now.
Shigaraki Tomura, undoubtedly.
But also — forever and always — Shimura Tenko.
“You’re saying,” says Aizawa, “that Shigaraki should be pardoned.”
“His name is Shimura Tenko.”
“And he almost killed you.”
“He’s — I can vouch for him not doing that anymore,” Izuku pleads. “Please. He’s hurt. He needs help . He has one mind crammed with three lives’ worth of —”
He stops and slaps a hand over his mouth.
“ What was that,” Aizawa says icily.
“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” Izuku murmurs. “It’s… illogical.”
“Midoriya, do not use my words against me,” snaps Aizawa. “Three lives worth of what , Midoriya?”
Izuku stays silent.
“If he really does need help, Midoriya — and, mind, I’m not saying anything for sure — we need to know the whole situation. Top to bottom, left to right. What’s really illogical is you hiding facts and then making up excuses to keep lying .” Aizawa glares at Izuku. “So. Get talking.”
“I’d like Detective Tsukauchi to be there,” says Izuku.
“And so he shall.”
Detective Tsukauchi is promptly summoned from his office to the interrogation room. Upon arrival, he smiles gently at Izuku and nods at Aizawa, before sinking into one of the plush couches.
Aizawa informs him of what has transpired, and with every passing word Detective Tsukauchi’s eyebrows go higher and higher until they practically disappear into his dark hair.
“You can start, Midoriya,” says Tsukauchi. “Don’t leave anything out.”
And so Izuku does not.
“To begin, Aizawa-sensei, I meant three lives’ worth of memories,” he says. “I’ll explain in a minute, Detective,” he adds because Tsukauchi looks like confusion personified.
It is not easy to start at the beginning when the beginning, in this universe, did not even happen.
But the first thing Izuku tells Aizawa and Tsukauchi is that he and Shimura Tenko are soulmates. That, at least, is something that will never change.
Aizawa goes to say something — probably accusing Izuku of only trying to keep Tenko out of jail because they are soulmates — before Tsukauchi cuts in and tells Izuku to go on.
“I was hit by a Quirk at the beginning of the school year. But —” Izuku winces — ”not this school year. Well. This school year but not in this universe —”
“ What?! ” says Aizawa.
By his side, Tsukauchi has gone completely white. “T-true,” says the detective. “What happened next, Midoriya?”
Izuku goes on to explain the effects of the Quirk.
Tsukauchi opens his mouth, and it stays open. He nods, weakly, to indicate Izuku’s statement’s truth.
“That’s one hell of a Quirk,” says Aizawa.
“And you’re saying that Shigaraki Tomura —”
“ Shimura Tenko ,” Izuku says.
“Right, Shimura Tenko, for lack of a better word, looped with you?”
“Yes,” says Izuku. “He was a villain just like this in our original lives. Then, he was a Pro Hero, and then a doctor…”
“But not a villain again, until now,” says Tsukauchi.
“He was,” Izuku says, “a victim of his circumstances . He’s only been a villain twice — the first time, and now. And both times, it was because All For One made him . In between, he was adopted by All Might and um.” He gulps. “The Bakugous.”
This time, Aizawa’s eyebrows shoot up, and Izuku allows himself to smile.
“Will you — will you help him?” he says finally.
Aizawa and Tsukauchi both look contemplative.
“We need to talk to him,” says Tsukauchi, after a moment. “Gauge whether he’s truthful about his motives. And only then can we begin the process of reintegrating him into society — if at all.”
“Where is he?” asks Izuku.
“He’s been detained. He’s in one of the lowest-level prison cells in Tartarus — he’s on Quirk suppressants,” Aizawa tells him.
“But All For One —”
“— is dead,” finishes Aizawa. “Found in his cell, checked for every sign of life, none observed. He’s been cremated and buried deep underground. No one needs his DNA lying around.”
Izuku relaxes, but Tsukauchi frowns.
“How are we going to get Shimura to talk to us?” he says. “Tartarus might not let us in, not after all this. And, with all that Midoriya has told us — which is all true — I’d rather not risk letting Shimura rot in there.”
“I can… I can help there,” Izuku murmurs.
It takes a couple of seconds for his meaning to register in Aizawa and the detective’s minds.
“Are you sure?” Aizawa asks, at last.
“I’ll be fine.”
At the back of his mind, there is a door. Izuku closes his eyes, focuses on that, till he knows nothing but the door, till everything around him is but a black void.
There is only the door.
Tenko! he calls. Come out! You’re wanted!
No answer.
Tenko! He tries to call him louder. TENKOOOO!
A creak. The door cracks open an inch.
What? says Tenko irritably. It’s hard to sleep on this prison floor, you know. And my body’s still healing.
Aizawa and Tsukauchi need to talk to you , says Izuku. They — want to help you.
What for? Don’t they think I’m a villain still?
I told them everything.
Tenko looks at him.
Then, without a word, he steps over the threshold, and into Izuku’s mind. Just as quickly, Izuku runs over and onto the other side of the door.
He opens his eyes.
A blank prison cell greets him. It is impersonal, with a stark white floor and walls that seem to have been freshly disinfected. He looks down at Tenko’s familiar, calloused hands; around the wrists, there are bracelets that Izuku suspects are more than identification cuffs.
He gets up and tries moving a metre to his left. A sharp shock passes through him; he gasps and collapses.
As he suspected. Electric restraints. Clever, though he supposes they’re not much use against, say, a villain with an insulation Quirk.
Now he must wait. He groans. He’s never been good at waiting, especially not in one position, and it looks like that’s the number of positions he can do at the moment.
That’s what she said , says the Kaminari in his brain. He urges it — him? — to shut up.
(At that moment, in an interrogation room, far, far, away, the following conversation takes place.
“Are you Shimura Tenko, inhabiting the body of Midoriya Izuku?”
“I am.”
“True. Are you and Midoriya soulmates?”
“We are.”
“True. Are you, or are you not, the villain known as Shigaraki Tomura?”
“In this life, I am. But I don’t want to use that name any longer than I fucking have to.”
“True. And your saying ‘in this life’ brings me to my next question — did you, or did you not, ‘time-loop’ several times with Midoriya Izuku, each time living a completely different life?”
“Yeah. This is the fourth loop. Or, third, if you don’t count the original one.”
“True — Aizawa, I’m — what are we going to do?”
“Continue with the interrogation, Tsukauchi.”
“Right. Right. Shimura-kun, have you been a villain in any of the loops before this?”
“Only the very first one. The — the original one. The universe Deku and I are from.”
“...True. And… did the villain All For One foster you in any of the loops where you were on our side?”
“None of them.”
“True. Shimura-kun, this next one is going to be a rather heavy question.”
“Shoot.”
“Did… did All For One abuse you?”
Silence.
“Please answer the question, Shimura-kun.”
“I didn’t think he did, at first. But… he did.”
“True.”
“Tsukauchi — he needs help.”
“Shimura-kun, I have one last question.”
“Just… fucking ask it, then.”
“Do you want our help?”
“With what? Use your bloody words.”
“Do you want… to stop being a villain? To try and come back to normal society?”
“I already did. Twice.”
“True. But this time?”
“Yeah. I just. Can’t do this anymore.”
“Well… we certainly have people and facilities that can help you. Aizawa?”
“Shimura Tenko, you’ll be living under my care until the courts declare you fit for reintegration into society as an adult.”
“You seem like you’d be a good parent. And also a hardass.”
“True, funnily enough. But — Aizawa — you already have one child under your care —”
“And I will take another. Don’t tell me what to do, Tsukauchi.”
And that is that.)
Izuku is brought back with a jerk, and he comes to in his own body. Above him, he sees Aizawa staring expressionlessly and Tsukauchi looking horrified. He wonders why before he realizes he and the floor seem to be in a very intimate relationship with each other. He gets up quickly.
“What happened?” he asks Aizawa and Tsukauchi.
“Shimura is being released from prison as we speak,” says Aizawa. “He’ll be living with me, Hizashi — that’s Present Mic — and Eri. Eri will probably be pleased to have an older brother of sorts — which reminds me, I need to give her and Hizashi the news —” He takes his phone out and steps out of the room.
“That’s all?” Izuku knows his eyes are wide, but he can’t control it.
“That’s all,” Tsukauchi tells him. “Shimura’s testimony was all we needed, after yours.” He winks and taps the side of his head. “Benefits of having a lie-detector for a brain.”
Suddenly, the world seems a little brighter.
A weight lifts from Izuku’s chest.
(The rest of his life is about to begin, for real.)
“How’s Aizawa treating you?” Izuku says over the phone.
“He’s teaching me to cook. Apparently, I can’t just order junk over Demae-Can every day. It’s bad for your health, Shimura, ” says Tenko in a crude imitation of Aizawa. “ Neglecting yourself is illogical . Anyway — how’s the old bastard treating you ?”
“I’ll tell him you called him a bastard.”
“No, you won’t.”
“No, I won’t,” agrees Izuku. “He’d kill you and me, and, to be very honest, that’s not something I really look forward to.”
“I thought you had a death wish, the way you treat your own body.”
“I do not have a death wish! One For All is just — volatile.”
“Japan’s political situation is volatile,” says Tenko. “ Nitric acid is volatile. One For All is not fucking volatile.”
“I’m still learning to control it, and six extra Quirks on top of that don’t make the whole process any easier,” Izuku admits.
“There we go.” Tenko snorts, and it sounds comical, coming from Izuku’s phone’s speaker.
“Do your new gloves fit fine?” Izuku is anxious to change the subject. “And the aloe-vera lotion I got you?”
“All good,” says Tenko. “The lotion helps a lot with the scratching.”
“Right? Mom found it at this really obscure natural-remedies place in the mall. Apparently it’s got a lot of other stuff in it, which makes sense because you can get regular aloe-vera lotion pretty much anywhere.”
“I have a feeling you didn’t call me up just to talk about aloe-vera lotion.”
“I didn’t.” Izuku lets out a breath. “I want to know how you… are, in general.”
“As fine as can be,” Tenko says simply.
“Which is?”
Tenko takes some time to answer this question, within which time Izuku pours himself a glass of water and sprawls on the sofa with one arm flopping off of it. His mother shoots him a worried look from where she’s positioned at the dining table, but he waves her off.
“It’s… better, here,” he says. “I know I've been with good people before as well, but this time…”
“All the memories?”
“Yeah. The memories are the same as our original lives, up to the point where I — killed you.” Izuku knows that Tenko is pinching the bridge of his nose at this moment. “Fuck. I really did do that, didn’t I?”
“You did,” says Izuku. He knows that there’s no point in expressing needless sympathy. “But I’m glad you did.”
“ What?! What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“If you hadn’t killed me, you’d have stayed a villain in our original lives, I’d still be a hero, and you’d be under All For One’s control, until the final battle came around and I killed you.” Izuku’s heart is racing. “I wouldn’t have known Shimura Tenko, only Shigaraki Tomura, and you’d have been denied a chance to live a normal life. Think, Tenko, you were a hero, then a doctor, and now you’re gonna be a normal guy, living with a Pro and his daughter, and — you can go to college again. Your — your whole life is before you! Can’t you imagine? You should be grateful, too, that you killed me, because — you saved yourself. Yourself , Tenko.”
“What if you die again?” says Tenko. “What if I die again?”
“Then we just have to make sure neither of us do.”
“We’ll still loop, though.”
“Not if we die natural deaths,” Izuku says. “That was the original Quirk’s breaking condition.”
“I can’t keep you safe. That’s the thing . I can’t keep you from dying, because of the fucking dream career that you decided to pursue. Nobody can keep a hero safe, Deku.”
“Then I’ll have to do it for the both of us.”
He hears Tenko breathing on the other end, before he swallows.
Tenko , it finally registers. Not Shigaraki Tomura. Not the Symbol of Fear. Just Tenko.
Izuku wonders how he got to this point. Not that he regrets it at all.
“I’ll hold you to that,” says Tenko.
The door in Izuku’s mind seems as if it’s been newly painted and varnished, ready to be used whenever Izuku and Tenko wish to.
For the first time in days, Izuku feels himself smile.