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He doesn't know how many of the others are there with him. He knows a few for certain, but the others….
It should be a good thing that he can't recognize them by their screams. It should be. But not knowing, not being able to tell… it's killing him.
And it's not the only thing. It's nothing short of a miracle that he isn't dead yet, and he knows that. He's no stranger to pain, but this is something else.
This isn't the snap of his bones or rough hands on his chest. This is something hatching from inside of him, clawing its way through his ragged, bloody skin.
With every burst of blue flame and swish of that ever-present knife, it screams and he screams and he feels that something inside of him is burning.
They ask him questions. At first he doesn't answer, but then they play a new game.
(That's what she called it, anyway.)
It's his fault that Kacchan is dead. That he died, slowly and painfully, just out of reach in the darkest corner of his room.
He looked away, at the end. He could still hear him, choking on his own blood. But he didn't watch.
After that, he started answering some questions: just the small ones, or the ones that he could give a deceptive answer to. He knew that if he was caught lying, the pain would be worse for everyone.
(He wonders, on the sleepless nights, if he's the only one who's caved. He thinks of the others in the silence, thinks of their resolve, their heroism. He hopes that they're okay.)
It takes them a while to get tired of his bullshit answers. He thinks it's about three days before they finally call him out on it.
"You're holding out on us," Toga says, tapping the dull side of her knife against her lip. "Shiggy is getting impatient! If you don't start talking soon, we'll have to kill another one…"
And she laughs, laughs like a monster, like some sort of demon. He knows that she will enjoy it no matter who it is.
She asks him some more questions. He gives more half-assed answers.
She tortures him, he screams.
"Tell me the truth," she says. He doesn't answer.
They bring in Ochako. He turns on himself, begging them to leave her be.
"I'll tell you," he says frantically, pulling at his restraints. "Please, please, just don't hurt her! I'll tell you, just leave her alone!"
And Toga just laughs again. Pulls out her knife.
Izuku looks away, but no matter what he tries, he can't block out the sound of her voice. She screams, and begs them to stop. She pleads for Izuku to save her.
He can't save her. He can't save any of them.
One by one, they die in front of him. And no matter what answers he gives, what information he surrenders, they don't stop.
It takes them a month to get through the entire class. "So it was everyone," he says aloud to himself one night.
There's no blood on the floor but his own. They must have mopped it up while he was asleep, cleaned it away when they took the bodies.
He thinks of the bodies. He never watched any of them actually die, but he got close.
(Kacchan choking on his own blood. Todoroki twitching on the floor. Tokoyami gasping for breath. Tsu reaching out for him, terror in her eyes.)
At the end, he would always look away.
Until the final one.
They drag Aizawa-sensei into the room, already beaten bloody, and Izuku feels his stomach drop.
"No," he croaks. Something rushes through him and he slams his body away from the restraints, which barely budge. "No! Sensei!"
Aizawa barely looks at him, his pupils dilated and expression blank.
"We'll give you one chance to save his life," Toga says, and this is a change. A welcome one, since Izuku will do anything to save a life. After all the blood he's collected on his hands…
"Anything," he rasps. "Whatever it is, I'll do it."
And he doesn't catch the glint in Toga's eye until later when he's replaying the scene in his head, wondering if there was anything he could've done to change the outcome.
"Cut your own arm off."
And she's working on his restraints, handing him a knife before stepping back and holding another to his sensei's throat.
He wraps his fingers around the handle, wrist shaking from the exertion.
(He realizes very suddenly how little he's moved in the past month. He is weak again, and in more ways than the one.)
"Any arm will do," Toga adds.
Izuku takes a deep breath, eyeing the knife at Aizawa's throat. Aizawa, who is struggling to breathe, who is struggling to look at him.
"Go on," she encourages.
He takes a deep breath, and brings the knife up to his elbow.
"Higher," she instructs. "From the shoulder. And be quick about it, Izu-kun, we don't have all day!"
With shaking hands he adjusts his hold.
(You're going to be fine. It's your non-dominant hand anyway. You can grow it back if you find someone with the right quirk. Maybe Eri. Or you could get a prosthetic. You'll be fine. Just do it. It's your arm over his life.)
He summons every ounce of strength he has left in him, including what little of One for All he can manage to access, and pulls the knife through skin, muscle, bone, muscle, skin.
He's on the floor, and he can't move. His arm is on fire, it's hot and wet and burning like hell itself.
He thinks he's crying, or probably sobbing, but he can't get the air in for it.
He looks down and sees it on the floor, one finger twitching. It's thin, and soaked with red, and he screams at it, pushes himself away with his legs and arms and arm, just the one, oh fuck oh god-
There are voices swimming in his ears, and he sees Dabi, staring at him in awe, hands alight with fire. The villain reaches towards him and he writhes away, but it isn't enough.
He finally passes out.