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The greenette’s hands shook as he stared downwards at his bandaged arms and torsos. He knew that multiple scars littered his body underneath them. He slowly curled his fingers inward, forming two fists with his hands as he looked at his reflection of himself. He carefully lifted his arms upwards, wincing in pain as he tried to flex his muscles.
“I-I am h-here.” He says before hissing out in pain. Tears pricked in the corners of his eyes as he shakes his head. Would he still be able to become a hero like this? Broken… battered, all after saving someone from being crushed by the zero-pointer. He saved that brunette, but she didn’t even think to try and help him in his time of need. His shoulders slump as he places his hands against the armrests of his wheelchair. Once he sat in the wheelchair, he felt instant relief from pain, both in his upper body and in his left leg… the only leg that he still had intact.
The fifteen-year-old looked at his leg before he leaned back. Just flexing his arms had sapped all the strength from them. He tilted his head back, his viridian curls cascading away from his face. Sweat beaded his forehead as he wiped it away.
“Tenseiiiiiiii!” Izuku calls out, his voice reverberating off of the walls of the bathroom. He didn’t get a response. A frown pulled at the corners of his lips now as he remains silent for a few moments. He inhales once more, channeling his inner All Might. “INGENIUM!” Izuku’s voice reverberated once more, but this time the soundwaves reached the ventilation system, hopefully carrying his voice to where in the world his fatherly figure could be.
Tensei had previously been engrossed in the many notebooks Izuku had written. Some even being written in crayon with newer notes penciled in. He had been cleaning up the guest room that Izuku had been staying in since there wasn’t a way for Izuku to make it up three flights of stairs in an old apartment complex. Was it so hard to purchase elevators? Apparently so. And as he was cleaning up, he had happened to stumble upon Izuku’s collection of quirk analyses. His ears soon picked up the sound of Izuku’s yelling ricocheting through the metal tunnels of the vents.
That sounded like a shout in need of help, so he quickly closed the notebook, slipping it back into the small box. He approaches the vent before calling back through the vents.
“Where are you?!” Tensei calls back through the vents.
“BATHROOM!” Izuku responds. “I SAPPED THE STRENGTH IN MY ARMS!” Tensei chuckled sadly as he hurried to the bathroom, knocking on the wall just outside.
“Are you decent?” Tensei jokes a bit with a slight chuckle. Izuku only groaned in response. Tensei chuckled again before he slides open the door and enters the bathroom.
“Why are you such a dad? You’re supposed to be my friend’s older brother.” Izuku complains with a gentle smile resting on his lips.
“Watch it, young man. I am your fatherly figure right now, and your legal guardian until you can return home.” Tensei responds as he narrows his eyes at the greenette.
“God! You don’t let me say anything.” Izuku groans out in exasperation. “Oh…when are we heading out for the appointment?”
“Oh shoot!” Tensei exclaims as he looks at his phone before grabbing onto the handlebars of the wheelchair. “We gotta go, we’re getting you fashioned for your prosthetic today.”
“My what-now?” Izuku inquires. He heard nothing about getting a prosthetic, when was this planned?
“Your prosthetic… All Might specifically requested we get you back to walking as soon as possible. Something about keeping your dream alive.”
“Y-you mean, I can still be a hero like this?”
“Of course you can, Izuku. Whoever told you that you couldn’t is about to get their ass handed to them.” Tensei responds as he speeds out of the house while rolling Izuku along. “Now are you wanting us to be ten minutes late by walking, or three minutes early by running?”
“So, you’re going to kick my own ass if I told myself I could no longer be a hero?”
“I will when you’re able to fight again. You’d better believe that I’m going to come and spar with you guys in the future.”
“Okay, okay, no run Tensei! We don’t want to be late.” Izuku looks up at the blunette. Tensei nodded in response as he channels his quirk, the exhaust piped in his arms warming up before he takes off running in the streets, obeying traffic laws as he waved at a few people as he passed, calling out quick greetings as he went.
Izuku could feel the wind blasting through his bushel of curls, his emerald eyes clenched tightly so that he didn’t lose an eye from any free-flying shrapnel. He could feel the rush building up within him. The rush seemed to fill him with hope.
After a few more moments they arrived at the hospital, walking into the brightly lit building and up to the front desk.
“Ah, Tensei Iida, what may I help you with today?” The lady behind the front desk inquired.
“I’m here for an appointment with my son?” He questions. “We’re getting him into his prosthetic a couple weeks early.” The lady nods gently in response as her lilac colored eyes look at the greenette whose hair just went through the spin cycle at a laundromat.
“Alright, I’ll inform the doctor that you’re here and he’ll be right with you.” The lady says with a smile as she checks the young teen in.
The two were in the waiting room for ten minutes before the doctor came out to get the two.
“Right this way, Iida family.” The doctor smiles as he holds the door open for them. “I hope you didn’t mind but All Might requested to sit in on our appointment today, saying something about moral support.”
“He could’ve had Tsukauchi reach out beforehand so this wouldn’t have been a surprise.” Tensei mumbles quietly, earning a haphazard smack to the forearm from Izuku.
“Don’t shit-talk All Might.” Izuku says in a serious voice.
“Watch your language.” Is all Tensei responds with before the two enter a room where All Might stood in all his buff glory. Slight tendrils of steam flit from the corners of his mouth and towards the ceiling. Seeing this, Izuku internally panics. He doesn’t want All Might’s true form to be revealed because of him, because he had been injured and had to go to the doctor. This wasn’t what a true hero did.
Stuck within his internal monologue, Izuku began to gnaw on his lower lip, causing it to start bleeding. He didn’t realize he had begun muttering to himself as he chewed, or how much time had passed until he felt Tensei poke his freckled cheek, snapping him out of his time of self-deprecation.
“Huh?” Izuku asks in confusion as he frantically looks around, seeing that the doctor was sitting right in front of him, his emerald gaze quickly flits to the corner of the room where All Might still appeared to be steaming, but a lot more than before. He returns his gaze to the doctor in front of him.
“Alright Izuku, the prosthetic is attached. Now we just need you to take a few steps for us and then you can get on your way. You can keep the chair for a while longer when your legs feel like they’re about to give out.” The doctor lightly pats Izuku’s knee before he rolls backwards, stationing himself behind his computer, typing away at the keyboard.
Izuku swallows dryly as he looks downwards, seeing a plastic casing around the nub that was his knee fastened firmly around it. The plastic was connected to a thin but sturdy and wide metal hook that had a rubber sole at the bottom of it as to prevent slipping.
He looks up once more as he nervously eyes Tensei and All Might, the ladder soon being enveloped in a cloud of steam.
“Shit.” All Might curses as he waves away the steam, a skeletal man soon standing by idly and nervously as blood trickled down his chin.
“I’m… going to wait to question that until later.” Tensei comments as he offers Izuku his hand. “Let’s worry about your second time making your first steps.”
Izuku didn’t respond however as he stared at the skeletal form of All Might, tears blurring his vision as they streaked down his freckled cheeks, the droplets forming wet marks on his sweats. He had messed up; All Might’s secret was now out to the doctor and Tensei. The fact that All Might was in fact running out of time, that he wasn’t all muscle like he appeared.
He could never be a hero now. Knowing that he had caused All Might’s first secret to be revealed. He flinched away when he felt a skeletal hand rest on his shoulder.
“Young Midoriya.” All Might, well, Yagi Toshinori says calmly. “It’s quite alright.”
“NO IT ISN’T… HOW CAN I BE A HERO KNOWING I CAN’T SAVE ONE DAMN SECRET FOR YOU! HOW CAN I BE A HERO WITH JUST ONE LEG! I’M STRUGGLING, ALL MIGHT. I FEEL LIKE IF I MAKE ONE WRONG STEP EVERYTHING WILL JUST COLLAPSE, LEAVING ME TO BLAME. I FEEL THAT IF I… that if I were still able to be a hero, then I wouldn’t be able to do anything.” Midoriya yells out, his voice getting quieter as time goes on. “I might end up losing someone or I might be able to help someone when they really need it… I don’t want to fuck anything up like I already have. I can’t do this All Might.”
All Might and Tensei are both taken aback by the yelling of the greenette in the room. Even the doctor took this as a sign to temporarily leave the room.
“Is that… truly how you feel, Midoriya?” All Might asked the teen, earning a teary-eyed nod in response as Izuku tries to scrub the tears away from his eyes. Tensei is still silent as he has his hand over his mouth, his mind racing as he struggles to find something to say.
Izuku’s knuckles turn white as he grips onto his sweats tightly, his gaze unmoving from his hands. He only moves his gaze when Yagi speaks again.
“Young Midoriya, despite your use of vulgar language, I can’t help but disagree with your words. You may be struggling, but everyone has struggles in their life. With all the stress you’ve been going through as of late, I’m not surprised it caused this sudden outburst.” Yagi’s hands gently cover Izuku’s. “My boy, you may not feel that you can be a hero like this, but you still can even when injured. One’s heart simply can’t change after one incident, and I know you still have that heroic heart inside you… it’s just tucked away for now, and you have to walk past it.” The older male spoke. Tensei finally stepped forward as well, gently ruffling Izuku’s hair.
“And you will never be able to get past this current struggle if you stay negative. From what I remember my little brother saying, you never gave up in the entrance exam, even when you had no points. You kept on going despite your anxieties of the potential of not getting into UA. And every time you got knocked down you got back up again. Now is that instance of you getting knocked down, and you’re only halfway through this event. You need to get back up again and believe in yourself.” Tensei said, removing his hand from the curls of viridian before he lightly punches Izuku’s shoulder.
“Now, Young Midoriya, are you ready to get back up again?”
Izuku swallowed nervously as he nods his head, the tears in his eyes no longer being of the sad variety as a wobbly and determined smile stretches across his lips, his hands hesitantly reaching out for the two, his left hand being grabbed firmly by Yagi’s skeletal fingers while the other grabbed onto Tensei’s hand.
“On the count of three—” Tensei starts as he gets ready to help the greenette up.
“Three!” Izuku exclaims as he tries to stand on his own, being pulled upwards. He instantly felt his right knee buckle, almost sending him sprawling onto the ground, but Tensei caught him.
“Alright, get your balance, and when you’re ready we can get you walking again, alright Izuku?” Tensei asks softly.
Izuku offers a half-nod in response.