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To Iida Tenya, the world is as simple as black and white. There are standards to follow, rules to obey, laws to keep people in check, and heroes to keep laws in play. There are also the rule-breakers, the delinquents, the vigilantes, the criminals, the villains.
Where does he fit in all of this?
As a hero student, he should be in the white – one who fights for justice and peace, one who aims to be a symbol of hope, one who wants to make the world a better place. And Tenya? Well, Tenya would like to think that he’s in the gray – and it’s such a funny thing, isn’t it, that for someone who views the world as black and white, there should be no such thing as gray, but there is.
There is.
There always is.
Because the rules don’t always make sense. They can be outdated, nonsensical, unfair. They can be conflicting, stuck in a confusing loop of double standards, and really, this is where gray steps in.
Why should you be apprehended for quirk use when it was done in the context of self-defense? Why should it be a crime to step in when someone else is in danger? Why do teachers ignore the students with weak quirks and praise those with flashy ones? Why should there be a hierarchy of power where when all is said and done, at their very core, they were all just humans who happened to have a gift they were uniquely born with?
But Tenya doesn’t voice out these thoughts. He doesn’t have to. Because when he looks at nii-san, he knows that there are good people out there - people who would look at these rules and see them for the sham that they are and work for the better good. So Tenya knows that nii-san works with vigilantes, that he sometimes turns a blind eye when someone else acts out in self-defense, that his brother would volunteer in shelters and hospitals and hide away these small things from the media, because he may be a limelight hero but he is not that kind of hero. And
Tenya appreciates this, he does, truthfully so, because if Tenya wasn’t hell bent on keeping the family legacy and following in his nii-san’s footsteps, he would’ve ended up spitting on hero society and becoming a vigilante instead.
So yeah. Black and white with spots of gray. He is a hero student after all. He has to adhere to some rules, right?
This is the reason why Tenya fears nothing. There are things he doesn’t understand, things he will never know, things he can never follow and make sense of no matter which way he turns it, but as long as he knows that there is at least one person who understands him, one person who knows the truth, one hero who can tell him that he is right in his thoughts, then one way or another, the world can change. There are things he doesn’t understand, things he wouldn’t bother to, but the fact of the matter is that everyone deserves to be saved. That’s his only guiding point and light. That’s the only rule he would adhere to. So yes, he thinks, the world can change. And maybe it would start in their generation.
So there is no room for fear, only for change.
Because he’s seen the way Aizawa-sensei fights. He’s heard stories of how the man stood up against a hoard of villains who wanted to kill his classmates and it didn’t matter that he was at a disadvantage, it didn’t matter if he could’ve died, what mattered was the saving, and that was the kind of hero that Tenya would willingly follow.
There’s also Midoriya-kun who doesn’t care how many bones he breaks to keep people safe. He honestly finds it terrifying and he wants to tell the boy to calm down, to care for himself, to show restraint, but he sees the way he flinches, he sees the way he hides, and Tenya knows that even if he tries to be a stickler for the rules (lest he does go vigilante), he can be not an asshole. So Tenya tones it down around Midoriya-kun, he softens his voice, he lightens his words, and he swears on his forefathers that whoever hurt Midoriya, he will murder them in their sleep. Huh. Okay. So maybe more on the stickler side, just to be safe. Food poisoning still isn’t off the table.
There is Uraraka-kun. She has the desire and the determination to be a hero – more for her family than for herself, and he will not fault her for that. There are different heroes for different reasons but so long as they value the lives of the civilians more than their own personal desires, he could care less what the reasons are. She is in the gray. It doesn’t make her black.
Of course, he couldn’t forget about Todoroki-kun, either. Todoroki-kun who couldn’t care less about hero rankings and power and flashy quirks. Todoroki-kun who doesn’t care about the rules and regulations, who cares only about who he can save and who can beat to death if it means finding justice over following some flimsy useless piece of paper. Todoroki-kun who would come to a friend’s rescue at a drop of a hat – who would risk his life fighting a serial killer just to save someone he had barely spoken a word to.
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Tenya is afraid of one thing.
It’s not death.
It’s not failing his brother.
It’s not being not strong enough to save people.
It’s not even falling into the darker shades of gray.
Tenya has one fear and one fear only.
It’s losing the people he loves.
It’s waking up and realizing that Tenya has failed them and his lack of understanding is what led to their deaths.
It’s rushing to the hospital after receiving a call from his mother, breathless and terrified that the hero, the brother, his nii-san, that he had loved and adored had been attacked and left for dead by a man who shared the same mindset as he did.
It’s being on the receiving end of the reaper’s sword only to be found and fought for by his best friend, to be gripped by the cold hand of fear that he might die because Tenya had been blinded by rage, that he had forgotten to stick by the rules he had ensured would keep him in check.
It’s the feeling of watching someone fight tooth and nail for the life he could’ve lost, to see them sacrifice the future they could’ve lived, just to save his pathetic attempt at a revenge.
Tenya’s fear is to wake up only to find out that he had lost the only ones he had held close.
So when fear grips him, when rage overtakes him, when cold and silence dance inside his heart, Tenya follows the warmth and the love that he has grown to know.
He calls nii-san, and listens to his voice. He listens to his heartbeat, he listens to his laugh, he reaches for his presence, and he revels in his life. And he doesn’t know if nii-san knows, but if Tenya calls at 2am, he doesn’t say a word, instead he rambles and he mumbles, he grabs anecdotes and quiet stories, he shares soft jokes and little theories.
He sits beside Midoriya-kun. He looks at the puffy hair, and the freckled cheeks, and he stares at the scar-littered arms. He watches him train, runs with him in the mornings, and eats dinner with him at night.
He buys Uraraka-kun mochi, enjoys the way she laughs, adores the way she is driven and determined. He watches her grow, chuckles when she tries to copy him, arms failingly doing the chopping motions he had long perfected, and he allows his heart to warm.
He reads books with Todoroki-kun, settles in the comfortable silence that falls between them, he watches the way his shoulder shake sometime, and Tenya never hesitates to offer comfort. He never scolds him when he uses Endeavor’s credit card (that’s one legal way to get back at him after all, Tenya isn’t blind), encourages him to buy things for himself, and he goes with him when he visits his sister, whenever he would have him.
Tenya’s fear is to lose the ones he loves – which is why he would do everything to hold them near.
To hold them close.
So that when the day comes that anything threatens them, that someone would come with the same beliefs as him yet the more terrifying means to follow them, he would make sure to burn the world first before such vile creatures reach his friends.
He would make sure that his weakness will be their strength.
After all, in a world that’s black and white, Tenya doesn’t care if he is gray.
And if he turns black in the process, who’s to say?