Work Text:
The halls and classrooms of U.A. are eerie when dark. Izuku isn’t used to being in the school while the lights are off. He knows that most of the main lighting for the building is on a timer, set to turn off a certain number of hours after classes end and then turn on only a few before classes start the next day, but still, he wishes Nedzu would allow teachers to have just a little more control over the lighting.
At least he has his desk lamp. It’s not the brightest thing, but it gets the job done. Izuku is still able to grade papers as he waits for the sun to finally rise and send light through the windows and illuminate the teachers office.
“I have to get faster at this,” he grumbles to himself, threading his fingers through his hair and gripping it tight in his frustration. He’s setting a horrible example for his students, being as overdue on grading their assignments as he is, but he only takes so long because he wants to give his students the feedback they deserve.
And yet that only leads to him being here, alone in the office, feeling like he isn’t any closer to being finished now than he was when he started grading in the middle of the night.
The black text and red markings begin to blur and swim in front of him. With a groan, Izuku tosses down his pen and drops his head into his hands. He massages his eyes with the heels of his palms for a moment, trying to rub away the migraine that had settled in his temples at least an hour ago.
There are two voices he can hear in his head chastising and lecturing him right now—Aizawa and Kacchan, both of them grumbling and griping about how he needs to take better care of himself.
Izuku sighs.
When he lifts his head and opens his eyes, the room is completely dark.
Izuku stiffens and throws a look to his now dead desk lamp, knowing he didn’t turn it off himself. The lamp sits there innocently, unchanged, with even its switch still flipped in the ON position.
Wait–
Everything happens in the space of a heartbeat. Izuku’s eyes widen. He catches a glint out of the corner of his eye. He doesn’t turn to look, doesn’t have the time, just throws himself to the side and out of the line of fire from–
The crossbow bolt shatters the window, whistling through the air at a dangerous speed to find its home in Izuku’s shoulder with a horrific crack of his collarbone. Izuku cries out, his dodge becomes a freefall, and he hits the ground heavily on his other side. For a moment he can’t breathe, he can only lay in shock against the hard linoleum.
When he finds his breath again, it’s only in short, tight gasps. He pushes himself to his knees, swallows thickly, and then turns to assess the damage.
The crossbow bolt sticks out from his right shoulder at a messy angle, not a clean impact at all. Izuku can’t tell how deeply it managed to sink into him, but the amount of blood already staining his previously white dress shirt is… worrisome. It’s worrisome.
Still, his shoulder is better than his throat.
“If I still had Danger Sense,” he can’t help but whisper with a touch of bitterness, while gritting his teeth to hold back the horrible feeling of helplessness trying to swell up inside his chest as he stares at the bolt. "It wouldn't have hit me at all."
Left hand trembling, Izuku applies some pressure to the wound. He hisses at the hot and throbbing pain that lances through his shoulder blades and down his arm, but he keeps pushing as he adjusts his hand until he is able to both cover the wound and hold the bolt steady between his fingers.
It’s not ideal, but Izuku already knows he has borrowed too much time. He can’t spend another moment in the teachers office trying to find a way to more effectively staunch the bleeding, not when he should have been up on his feet and running already. There would be some time before the person who shot through the window would be on this floor and in this room, but Izuku knows better than to assume the shooter is alone.
One of his attackers must have some kind of technology-related quirk. Something powerful, able to turn off lights, the electronic locks, cameras—and the offensive mechanisms of the security system. It’s the only explanation Izuku can think of for why the school building itself hasn’t fought back yet, or how these people managed to get so far into the core of the school in the first place.
From his knees he shifts his weight and rises to the balls of his feet, legs still bent, falling easily into a familiar crouching position. It has been a few years since he graduated and the embers of One for All faded completely, but his body will always remember the techniques that he trained so hard to hone.
He quiets his breathing, and listens carefully for anything other than the tinkling crackle of glass as pieces still drop occasionally from the frame of the shattered window. There haven’t been any more shots fired since he ducked down under his desk, so Izuku figures if he stays crouched and hidden he should be able to make it to the door safely.
The moment he starts to move, another bolt shatters the window and goes straight through the computer monitor on his desk, leaving a quarter-sized hole in the display before embedding itself into the floor. Izuku bites out a swear and frantically ducks lower, but he doesn’t stop moving forward. Getting out of the room is his priority right now.
Aizawa’s monitor is next to be shattered. The bolt goes through its upper left corner, sending it spinning and crashing to the floor just behind Izuku. The next desk takes a bolt at an angle right through its surface, then another bolt hits an office chair pushed out too far.
The entire way, though they’ve missed every time, the shots have been following Izuku’s progress across the room.
Izuku’s head buzzes despite the adrenaline pumping through him. Maybe they have an x-ray quirk and can see where I am, but then why didn’t they shoot while I was stationary behind my own desk? Maybe it’s motion-based then, like I have to be reaching a certain amount of movement for them to see me? Or they can sense kinetic energy maybe? Or perhaps it’s more like–
A bolt cracks into the linoleum, and with one last burst of speed Izuku darts forwards and finally throws himself through the door.
Now, even more so than earlier, the dark hallway takes on an eerie and threatening atmosphere. Izuku straightens from his crouch and immediately starts running, knowing he needs to get out of the school as soon as possible.
Something swings out from the dark towards his head.
Izuku’s body moves without him thinking. He lets go of the wound on his shoulder to instinctively catch whatever is coming towards him, and his bloody hand wraps around the curved belly of an axe handle. He screams out through clenched teeth at both the pain in his shoulder and the new stinging pain on his face, as the axe still manages to swing close enough to bite into his cheek before he pushes it away with all his might.
His attacker stumbles backwards, and Izuku kicks at their legs to get them to actually fall.
As they do, he keeps his grip on the axe and yanks it out of their gloved hands.
From the floor, the Axe Maniac stares up at him through their mask. Then, inexplicably, they begin to chuckle.
“Oh good,” they say, while Izuku breathes heavily. “I was worried this would be too easy, but you've still got some fight in you.”
“Too easy?” Izuku asks.
Axe Maniac stands, and although Izuku can't see their mouth, he can tell that they're grinning. The imprint of their teeth presses against the dark fabric of their mask as it stretches. “The quirkless ones are always too easy.”
Izuku feels himself detach from the scene at those words. He is merely watching now, hovering above and being provided a cinematic view as a quirkless teacher goes up against a maniac with an unknown quirk, who came armed with an axe and partners.
He knows what people have been saying about him. Those who can't do, teach. On track to be No. 1 Hero, now on track to be Teacher of the Year. Tabloids proclaim that he is too weak for the field, but his body and mind too warped by the war for him to leave it entirely. He is quirkless and weak, but clings uselessly to his dream. He saved the world, defeated the final squirming parasitic remnant of the worst supervillain in history, and the world then decided that was enough. He had served his purpose. He had nothing left to offer, no more power or fight in him. He could be left behind.
None of the gossip has ever bothered him. His friends treat him the same as they always have—not as if he is weak without One for All. That is all that matters to Izuku.
So while he knows what people have been saying about him, he forgot that there are some out there who take it as fact.
When Axe Maniac lunges for him, Izuku, still feeling as if he's sitting in front of a movie screen, watches as the hero Deku reminds them who they’re dealing with.
His grip on the axe isn’t great. His bloody palm slips against the wood and his hand is too close to the head. But he still manages to get enough force behind his swing to lodge the axe firmly into the meat of Axe Maniac’s upper thigh.
They howl with both pain and surprise. At the same time, they fold forwards as their knee buckles, leaving their head open for Izuku to fight through his own pain and lift his right arm and bring a fist down hard on the back of their skull. The harsh thunk resounds through the hall, and the screaming stops.
Izuku returns to himself as he stares down at the ragdolled and unconscious body of his attacker. It wasn’t his cleanest takedown—definitely not, with how much more blood he has splattered over him from impulsively hacking into Axe Maniac’s leg—but it was effective. He had dropped the axe, letting it slip from his hand really, when Axe Maniac had begun to collapse, and Izuku steps over them now to stoop down and pick it back up again.
He grimaces at the blood caked on the blade now, and throws a look at the body on the floor again. A pool of blood under their leg is steadily growing.
There’s no time to waste… but…
I can’t just leave them here to bleed out, Izuku thinks. He kneels with a grunt of pain beside the Maniac’s sluggishly bleeding thigh, and out of a lack of anything else, tugs off his own tie to wrap around the wound.
Izuku’s subpar knotting job becomes soaked through almost immediately, and his grimace gets deeper. At least it will keep them from bleeding out… too fast?
That is what he reassures himself with when he stands and begins to shuffle hurriedly—he won’t make the mistake of running again—down the hall, resuming his escape. He shifts the axe to his right hand, gripping it tightly despite the pain while he puts his left back over the bolt still sticking out of his shoulder. With the adrenaline fading slightly, the burning sting in his cheek reminds him of his new cut there too.
At least it had been on the side of his face already scarred. Once it heals, it will blend right in.
He turns the corner at the end of the hall, and sees both the dead elevator and the entrance to the stairs. Izuku wastes no time in shouldering open the door with his good side, but he puts probably too much force into the shove, and the door slams against the wall inside the stairway as it swings wide open.
Izuku hops through, lets the door fall shut behind him with another unavoidable slam, and then stands very, very still.
All he can hear is the lingering echoes of the door slam. They bounce up and down the stairway for a rather long amount of time, before they eventually fade away.
Straining his ears, Izuku listens for any movement other than his own. Then, carefully and quietly, he tiptoes over to the stair railing, and peers down through the hollow center.
Two floors below him, a black-masked face stares back up at him.
“Shit!” he swears under his breath at the same time the masked person lets out their own expletive. They probably expect him to run upwards—away—because they quickly start running up the stairs themselves at a thunderous pace, as if trying to catch up to him.
Izuku stands his ground. He has fought enemies with worse weapons than crossbows and axes in tight stairways before.
Then the person rounds the corner and comes into full view, and they’re clutching a machete in their gloved hands.
“You’ve got to be kidding,” Izuku says flatly.
Machete Guy charges up the stairs towards him with the blade held at an angle, like he is intending to cut Izuku from shoulder to hip across his chest.
With a longing thought towards his old steel-lined red boots, Izuku gives a mental apology to his nice new work shoes before he raises a leg and blocks the sharp edge of the blade with the bottom of his shoe. But before he can push off and send Machete Guy back down the stairs with a hard kick, the man lets go of the machete completely.
It stays in the air, a fixed point that only digs into the rubber of Izuku’s shoe before he can pull his weight back. Machete Guy then ducks around it, pulling another knife from somewhere that he aims at Izuku’s gut.
Izuku twists on instinct, bringing his right hand and the axe around just in time to knock Machete Guy in the side of the head with the flat of the blade. His twist combined with the fact that his shoe was still somewhat stuck on the floating machete work against him though, sending Izuku stumbling back as he yanks his shoe free and tries to regain his footing before he can trip and topple down the stairs.
Machete Guy recovers from getting knocked in the head quickly, and leaps at Izuku again with the knife outstretched. This one isn’t as big as the machete, but now that Izuku can get a good look at it, he can tell that it is still a lot bigger than a normal knife.
As he passes the hovering machete, he grabs its handle, and the weapon becomes dislodged from the air. Izuku tries not to marvel too much at that. Kacchan has told him time and time again that during a fight is not the time to start oogling someone’s quirk.
It makes you sloppy, Kacchan had said. And when you get sloppy, you get desperate, and when you’re desperate is when you hurt yourself the most, you idiot.
He blocks another swing from Machete Guy's smaller knife with the handle of the axe held in both his hands now, then ducks to avoid the machete swung towards his head. The edge of the stairs is dangerously close, far too close for Izuku’s comfort, so he tries to retreat towards the door.
Machete Guy doesn’t let him go far. He spins the non-machete knife in his grip and advances towards Izuku, clearly intending to stab him and then drive the blade deep through his chest. Izuku finds himself being herded away from the door and towards the other side of the stairway—the stairs leading up.
The moment Izuku realizes this, a rush of anger explodes through him, like coal being thrown into a fire.
With a growl, Izuku shifts his weight and swings the axe in a wide arc, forcing Machete Guy to stumble back, if only for a moment. His heart is racing, fury surging in his veins like molten lava. He hates being cornered—he's not prey.
Instead of retreating further up the stairs like Machete Guy expects, Izuku charges forward with the axe raised high. He brings it down with all his strength, aiming for the hand holding the machete. Sparks fly as steel meets steel, and the force of the impact reverberates up Izuku’s arms, making them tremble. But it works—Machete Guy falters, his grip loosening on the weapon.
Izuku doesn’t waste the opening. He swings again, knocking the machete completely out of Machete Guy’s grasp. But before he can press his advantage, Machete Guy slashes at him with the smaller knife, grazing Izuku’s side.
Pain flashes across Izuku’s face, but it is nothing compared to the heat of the anger fueling him now. He grits his teeth and spins, aiming a brutal kick at Machete Guy’s knee. The man grunts in pain, his leg buckling under him as he collapses onto the stairs.
Izuku grips the axe tighter, raising it high for a final deciding blow.
But something stops him. He stands there, breathing hard, the axe still poised and held above his head by his trembling arms.
In his moment of hesitation, Machete Guy strikes from his place on the floor.
The smaller knife goes through Izuku’s ankle from the front, scraping his bones as it forces its way between them and emerges out the other side with a spray of blood. His ragged cry tears through the stairway.
A red haze of pain covers his vision, and he brings down the axe on instinct now. A wounded animal striking out, aiming blindly for what hurt him—for the arm still holding the knife.
Blood splatters up onto his arms and face. Wet and warm.
The axe doesn’t go all the way through, but it goes deep enough that Izuku can’t pull it out in good conscience, so he leaves it behind when he trips and stumbles his way down the stairs.
Or—when he tries to trip and stumble down the stairs.
The knife through his leg won’t budge, staying stuck in the air the way the machete had earlier. It yanks him back like a dog on a chain, and the sharp edges cut into him with an even more vicious bite. Izuku groans through his teeth and grabs at his leg, as if his bloodstained shivering hands can do anything to stabilize it.
Unlike the bolt—which is somehow still stuck in his shoulder—it seems that Izuku can’t just leave this knife in his leg and continue on his way. Any amazement Izuku would have had for how Machete Guy’s quirk can stay active after the man has fallen unconscious from shock is washed away by the anger and pain that are taking turns ping-ponging through his body.
He knows what he’ll have to do if he wants to get away.
Izuku used to be able to break himself without hesitation, but now, looking down at his bloodsoaked pants and the torn edge of his skin where it meets steel, he feels sick.
Bending over, he takes hold of his calf a little closer to where the knife goes in. His entire body is trembling now, but he forces himself through the tremors and keeps his grip. Takes one deep, barely controlled breath.
Then he yanks his leg backwards, pulling it off the knife.
Blood immediately begins to run from the wound, and Izuku finds himself thinking, selfishly, that he wishes he still had his tie to wrap it with. He holds his hands to both sides of his ankle to cover the holes, and looks frantically around for anything else that he could use instead of his tie.
Oh, he still has his suit jacket on.
After wrestling his suit jacket off and wrapping it around his leg, Izuku tentatively straightens up and tests if it can hold his weight. The ache that spreads up his leg feels the way a falling tree sounds—a spiraling series of creaks and cracks, that spread from his ankle all the way into his hip as his leg crumples beneath him.
Pathetic, Izuku can’t help but think as he catches himself hard on the stair railing.
He tries to keep them away, but thoughts of Black Whip come and force down the door of his mind with brutal force. If only he still had it, then he could wrap both his shoulder and ankle with it, support the injuries and pull his leg along if it started to falter while he walked.
Instead he is limping down the stairs at a snail’s pace, trailing thick smears of blood on the steps behind him and on the railing. Izuku will have to apologize to whichever janitor gets stuck cleaning up his mess.
The yearning ache for One for All that Izuku usually keeps locked and condensed in a tight ball just beside his heart, suddenly expands, as if thinking about Black Whip had been all the permission it needed to break free.
With One for All, he could’ve jumped out a window and been safe. With One for All, he could’ve avoided having to fight these strange attackers completely. With One for All…
Izuku recalls what Axe Maniac had said.
“I was worried this would be too easy. The quirkless ones are always too easy.”
With One for All, this might not have happened at all.
It feels like forever before Izuku finally makes it to the first floor. He opens the door slowly, and cautiously peers around it before he enters the hallway. All he needs to do is make it outside, get out of range of whatever electrical quirk is keeping everything shut down, and then he can call–
Izuku freezes, eyes wide. Then he frantically pats at his pockets. He finds nothing but hollow spaces.
All too clearly he can picture the exact place on his desk where he left his phone sitting. In the initial rush of getting shot and then dodging more crossbow bolts, he had completely forgotten to grab it.
His heart races as reality sinks in. No phone. No way to call for help. He swallows thickly and forces down the rising panic, then glances around the hallway. If he goes back now, he’ll risk running into whoever shot him, or either of his other two attackers if they’ve woken up, but without his phone…
For a split second, he considers it—turning around, limping and staggering as he rushes back up all the stairs to the teachers office. His feet even shift slightly in the direction of the stairway door he just came from. But the ache in his ankle and the feeling of blood dripping down his face make his decision for him. He’s hurt, and there’s still someone out there.
He hurries down the hallway, towards where he knows the front entrance of the building is, each step measured and careful. The air feels thick, suffocating, like the entire structure of UA around him is holding its breath, waiting for him to make another mistake. His shoulder still aches from the crossbow wound, and his ankle feels as if it will give out beneath him any second, but he pushes the pain aside. He can’t afford to be slow, especially not now, in the final stretch of his escape.
Just as he nears the large glass double doors leading outside, a crackle of static breaks the air that had previously only been filled by his heavy breathing. Izuku’s heart skips a beat. He freezes in place, looking up as the back-up lights overhead abruptly flicker on—then off again. Something is wrong. It’s not just that all the electronics in the building have been taken out completely, they’re being suppressed. It’s the quirk, and judging from the flicker, the person wielding it is reaching the end of their endurance.
So they must have decided to come and handle Izuku themselves.
“Damnit,” he whispers under his breath, gripping the door handle tight. He pulls, but the door doesn’t budge. The lock mechanism seems dead, unresponsive to his frantic jerks.
Izuku’s eyes dart around. He’s on the ground floor now, so there has to be another way out. A window, a garage for the school’s robots— something.
Then a sound—footsteps. Slow, deliberate footsteps, approaching from behind him.
Two pairs of them.
Izuku doesn’t dare breathe. He spins around, pressing his back against the door, only to find himself face-to-face with two more masked figures.
The one on the right has the crossbow—now all too familiar to Izuku—braced in their arms. They're wearing bulky goggles that remind him of Hatsume’s, the kind she uses to enhance her already impressive zoom quirk. The figure on the left grips a large mallet, its head seemingly made of solid, dark steel.
At least it’s not something sharp, Izuku thinks, hating the flicker of relief.
“Stay back!” he shouts. “Don’t come any closer!”
But they ignore him, advancing with slow, indifferent strides.
“I said stay away!” Izuku’s voice cracks.
This time, they stop.
Then—laughter.
Izuku's breath comes in ragged gasps, his eyes wide as the chuckles grow louder.
They’re laughing.
It’s terrible. Cruel and mocking—grating like a knife’s serrated edge along bone. If they’re trying to get inside Izuku’s head, it’s working.
One of the figures—the one with the mallet—speaks, their voice distorted behind the mask. “You’re scared, aren’t you? Knew you would be.”
“Japan’s hero,” mocks the one with the crossbow. “You’re not very heroic without that quirk you had, are you?”
The laughter stops abruptly, and before Izuku can react, the figure with the crossbow fires a bolt straight at him. He barely dodges in time, but the force of the impact against the door rattles him. The mallet-wielder charges forward, swinging the heavy weapon with surprising speed. Izuku scrambles to shake off the fear paralyzing him and think, his mind racing for a strategy as the two close in on him.
No, there’s no time to think.
Izuku turns to look at the single crack left in the door by the crossbow bolt, then throws himself against it with all his strength.
The glass shatters far more easily than he expected. Izuku crashes through the door, landing hard on the other side, glass scattering around him. His entire body aches from the impact and his head is spinning, but Izuku knows he has no time to recover. He pushes himself to his feet just as the two masked figures leap through the shattered doorway after him.
He has survived worse and fought through fear before—Izuku repeats this to himself as he flees through the dim light of dawn across UA’s large front courtyard. The crossbow wielder reloads quickly, and Izuku can hear the mechanical click of the next bolt being set. Desperation kicks in, adrenaline fueling him despite the pain. Izuku’s chest burns as he races through the courtyard, his mind battling the panic rising within him.
I wish I could fight, he thinks, gritting his teeth. I wish I could do something other than run.
But he had left the axe behind. He hadn’t even touched the machete. He is quirkless and defenseless and there is a horrible knotted feeling in his gut telling him that these people had planned this attack knowing that.
Why me?
Another crossbow bolt whistles through the air over Izuku’s shoulder, nicking his ear as it flies past. He cries out and claps a hand to the bleeding cartilage.
There’s a muffled swear from somewhere far behind him.
“It can’t be that hard to hit him, he’s moving so fucking slow! You’re just wasting–”
“Shut up, I know what I’m doing!”
The pain in Izuku’s ear throbs, but he uses it to sharpen his focus and knock himself from his self-pitying spiral. He’s quirkless, yes, but he’s still Midoriya Izuku. He’s still Deku. He has faced stronger enemies than these. And right now, his survival depends on using every ounce of what he’s learned. He already managed to take out two of them and make it out of the main building with his life, so now he takes a sharp turn, heading toward the training field where he knows the terrain better than his attackers. If he can lead them there, maybe he can outmaneuver them and stay safe until heroes show up.
He ducks low behind a pillar, catching his breath as he hears their frustrated shouts. His mind races. He may not have One for All anymore, but he’s not out of options yet.
The blood on his fingers leaves behind bright smears on the pillar he is pressing himself against.
“I won’t let them win,” he whispers to himself, determination lighting up his eyes.
The moment he leaves the safety of the pillar, he hears a horrible thunk.
Izuku’s entire body goes cold, and he looks down at the crossbow bolt in his calf. The sky is much lighter now, and he can clearly see that the bolt has gone straight through. It’s sitting just above the knife wound in his ankle.
His vision tunnels. His leg buckles and folds beneath him. His knees hit the stone walkway.
No.
“Told you I wouldn’t miss again,” says the crossbow wielder to their partner, smug.
Something hot sparks deep inside of him, chasing away the ice that had been growing over Izuku’s heart. He forces himself to not feel any of the pain. He forces himself to stand and face the two figures approaching him.
“Hey, get back down on the ground,” one of his attackers says.
Of the entire group that attacked him, Izuku would take a guess that these two are probably the last two.
Without breaking his stare, he grabs the crossbow bolt that has been stuck in his shoulder the entire time and pulls. Blood gushes down his chest when it comes free from his flesh with a wet tearing sound. Then he turns it around and brandishes it with its point outwards.
It’s not ideal, but it’s better than nothing.
“I don’t know who you are,” he says, voice trembling. “I don’t know what you want, but I’m not dying here.”
His attackers exchange an amused look, astounded that Izuku is still standing, let alone threatening them with a crossbow bolt. The one holding the crossbow seems to roll their eyes, before they load another bolt and raise their weapon again.
Izuku doesn’t even let their finger touch the trigger.
He lunges forwards despite the way his body screams at him to stop, begging for him to just drop back to the ground. His hands are oddly steady, and the hot spark from earlier surges again, burning through his pain and fear. Faster than his attackers can keep up with, his blood-slick hand thrusts the crossbow bolt towards the closest attacker. The bolt’s jagged tip punches into their hip with a sickening squelch, and they fall with a choked off scream, clutching the wound.
The second attacker takes a step back, stunned, the crossbow involuntarily lowering. Izuku swings towards them and charges before they can regain their composure, bringing his fist up in a devastating punch that slams into their face and knocks their head to the side with a sharp crack. They tip backwards and crash to the ground like a fallen tree, crossbow thrown from their hands.
Izuku staggers back, breathing hard, blood dripping down his leg and chest. The pain is still relentless, but it’s distant now, pushed back by adrenaline and anger until it has become nothing but a dull roar in the background of his mind. All he can focus on is staying alive. His vision is blurring, but he can’t stop, not yet.
With trembling hands, he reaches down, grabs the still-loaded crossbow, then turns to aim it at the attacker who is still writhing on the ground with a bolt in their side.
“This is over,” he says. His voice, though strained, rings with a cold note of finality.
The attacker’s eyes widen behind their mask, and they inch themselves backwards on their elbows with their focus on the crossbow pointed in their face. Then, Izuku spins the weapon in his grip and brings the butt of it down on their forehead. Their head smacks backwards into the stone, and they fall limp just as their partner had.
Fingertips tingling with numbness, Izuku lets the crossbow fall from his hands to land in a clatter. He reaches up to wipe salty sweat from his eyes, but only makes his fading vision worse when he adds the blood on his hands to the mix. His breathing is stuttering now, coming out in chopped up pieces.
But it’s all over. It is over.
“... Midoriya-sensei?”
Izuku blinks, and turns to look over his shoulder.
There, standing at the edge of the walkway with the distant dorm buildings and the rising sun behind him, is Kouta, already dressed in his school uniform and clutching his backpack straps with a white knuckled grip. His eyes are wide and horrified as he looks at Izuku.
“Oh,” Izuku says. “G-Good morning Kouta.”
He glances to the two attackers on the ground, then to the blood trail leading from the shattered front door of the school right to his feet. There’s still a bolt stuck through his leg as well. It all adds up to paint a pretty bad picture—no wonder Kouta looks so shaken.
“Uhm,” Izuku begins to sway, suddenly feeling light headed as his adrenaline drains away. “Don’t worry, it’s not my blood.” His vision continues to dim. He gives one more futile scrub at the corner of his eye with the heel of his palm. “At least, not all of it.”
With his last sight being Kouta reaching out to try and catch him, Izuku falls into darkness.
Izuku’s eyelids feel heavy, his body sluggish and warm. A sharp beeping sound punctures the bubble of silence he’d been drifting in, floating in the space between dream and reality. It grows louder with each passing moment and drags him, like a fishing line being reeled in, to awareness, until he blinks his eyes open and the world finally comes into focus.
The ceiling above him is a sterile white that he is all too familiar with, lit by the soft glow of fluorescent lights. The rhythmic beeping that had woken him is coming from his left—monitoring equipment, he realizes, keeping track of his heart rate.
The more his awareness returns, so does the pain. His throat is dry, his leg and shoulder both throb faintly, and his mind still feels trapped in a fog as he tries to piece together how he had gotten here.
I’m in a hospital… he thinks, the memory of Kouta’s wide eyes and pale face flashing through his mind. The blood. His attackers.
His heart seems to seize in his chest at the realization. The beeping quickens as he tries to sit up, but immediately regrets it when a jolt of pain shoots through his leg. Izuku winces and sucks a tight breath in through his teeth, squeezing his eyes shut, before he more gingerly attempts to shift his weight and get off the bed.
“What…? Oh–! Deku, no!”
The sudden but familiar voice from the doorway startles him badly, and the only thing that stops him from toppling off of the bed is the pair of soft, pink-padded hands that catch his shoulders and gently push him back into sitting on the mattress. Ochako’s worried expression swims in his vision when he opens his eyes again.
“You’re not fully healed yet,” Ochako says. She reaches over Izuku’s lap to grab the blanket he had shoved aside, pulling it over his legs and adjusting it to cover them. “Do you know how worried you had us?” she continues. “Lucky for you that Kouta found you in time, or things could’ve been much worse.”
“Kouta… is he okay?” Izuku rasps, wincing as his voice barely breaks above a whisper.
Ochako shoots him an unreadable look, and she sighs. “He’s fine. A bit shaken, but he’s tough. He’s been asking about you a bunch too.”
Izuku slumps, feeling a wave of relief wash over him. Guilt quickly follows in its wake—he hadn’t wanted Kouta to see him like that ever again, covered in blood and on the verge of collapse. It was a sight he had already burdened the boy with once in his lifetime already.
“C’mon, lay back down and get your mandatory rest. I know you’re allergic to it, but you’ll have to suck it up,” Ochako says, patting the pillow encouragingly.
The lumpy hospital pillow looks like the height of comfort to his weary eyes, but he doesn’t want to rest yet. His head is still spinning, there are still things he needs answers to.
“When did you get here?” he asks.
Once again, Ochako’s expression is unreadable. “Well there are only so many times you can dodge our dinner invites to grade papers, y’know. So Tenya and I wanted to surprise you with a quick visit. We were already on our way to UA when Kouta called for help and we got the alert of a villain attack there. We’ve been by your side pretty much this whole time. You’ve been out for a while, Deku.”
“You were going to visit me? Wait– where’s Tenya?”
Ochako gently takes Izuku’s hands in hers, calming him before his heart can race too fast again. “He’s getting coffee,” she says softly, smiling. “Figured we would all need some. I mean, if the doctors let you have any. I don’t know how they’ll feel about mixing caffeine with the pain meds you’re on.”
“Doesn’t feel like I’m on anything,” Izuku admits honestly, though he starts to reconsider. Maybe his head isn’t spinning for no reason.
“It’s probably wearing off,” Ochako reassures him. “I’m sure you’ll get another dose soon.”
Izuku nods, then shrugs off Ochako’s gentle attempts to get him to lay back down. He isn’t finished. “What happened to the guys who attacked? Did anyone learn why they even…?”
Ochako’s expression sours, lips pursing. “No, they’ve been tight-lipped. We don’t know if anyone hired them or not. The only thing we managed to get out of them is that…” she hesitates, glances at Izuku, then continues carefully. “That they thought, well, since you’re quirkless, you’d be an easy target.”
Izuku stares at her, mind reeling. He can keenly feel the empty cavern inside himself that One for All once called home, aching as if he’s been freshly cored out, and the weight of the situation settles heavily on his chest.
The fact that the villains had thought he would be easy to fight now that he doesn’t have a quirk anymore… it strikes something deep inside of him. All the training, the war, the sacrifices he had made to protect everyone… none of it mattered to those attackers. They only saw his lack of power and how it could be a weakness, something to be used against him.
“So they thought I was weak,” he mutters, bitterness creeping into his tone.
“And they were super wrong,” Ochako says firmly, almost laughing. Her grip on his hands tightens. “Deku, you took out all four of them. I think the one you got in the thigh is never gonna walk right again. Not to talk about the guy in the stairwell’s hand!” She leans in close, making sure they make eye contact. “Only one person is crazy enough to do that, and that is you. They underestimated you, and you kicked their asses.”
Izuku swallows thickly, trying to find comfort in her words, but the knot in his throat remains. “But why now? Why come after me now? It’s been a few years since we graduated, they could’ve attacked at any point since then if they just needed me quirkless. I just… I feel like there’s more to this. Villains don’t just plan an attack like this for no reason.”
Ochako hesitates, glancing towards the door. She takes a deep breath and starts to speak, but is interrupted by the door opening at that very moment. Tenya strides in, holding a cup holder with three cups of coffee in it, and his eyes brighten when he sees Izuku sitting up.
“You’re awake!” Tenya exclaims, setting the cups down on the bedside table. He looks between Izuku and Ochako, taking in the way their hands are clasped and sensing the tension. “What did I miss?”
Izuku takes a shuddering breath and forces a smile. “Just catching up,” he says. “And I was asking Ochako about… about what happened.”
Ochako lets go of his hand, and Izuku tries not to feel cold in the absence of her reassuring warmth against his scars. She stands from the bed, and exchanges a heavy glance with Tenya before addressing Izuku again. “We’ll get more answers soon, Deku. For now, you really do just need to rest.”
“Good thing I got you decaf,” Tenya says, and the hot paper to-go cup that he passes to Izuku quickly warms Izuku’s hands again.
Izuku nods, and he can’t help but smile genuinely at the gesture, pushing down the unease that he can still feel gnawing at his insides. But the thought of being targeted—seemingly just for who he is—haunts the edges of his mind. It leaves him restless even as the hospital room falls into easy and comfortable conversation between the three of them.
There's no knowing when their schedules will align again—Ochako and Tenya are busy Pro Heroes, and Izuku has his hands full with teaching every day. So, he sips his coffee, trying to savor the moment and push aside everything that led them to having it in a hospital room.