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Izuku is oh-so sure that something is wrong. He's been feeling it for days now, and it's refusing to go away. There's an itch along his spine, spiders trailing up and down and back again, and he knows the feeling of being watched, just as well as he knows the five scars ringing his right hand, every one of their troughs and valleys, so why is he feeling it now?
No matter what he's doing, or where he is, he feels like there are eyes on him. It started several days ago, over the weekend, and hasn't abated since, and Izuku feels like he's fracturing beneath the weight of it.
(The man watches, humming quietly to himself, hand moving without thought across the page. In graphite, a figure begins to form.)
He's tried to be analytical about it. To be logical and sensible and calm. He compiled a list of things that he did on the day that it started (woke up early to do an extra lap of campus, spent the rest of the morning doing homework in the common room with some of the class, had sandwiches he made himself for lunch, went downstairs to do some weight training, had a movie night with his friends, throughout the day only eating things that he usually would and that were pre-packaged, eaten by more people than just himself, or both-), and when that turned up nothing that appeared helpful, he went three days further back. There were a few more things then, mainly focused around a trip to help with the dorm's food shop for the upcoming week. He had eaten some free samples, had touched surfaces and products that other people may have left some sort of Quirk residue on, had met a fan who nervously chatted about the Sports Festival with him, he had choked on nothing at one point which has the possibility to indicate something air-born, then of course he'd paused their walk home to quickly help an old man get his belongings across a busy road.
There are a lot of possibilities, and Izuku doesn't know if any of them are actually possibilities, or if he's just being paranoid.
No, all he knows for sure is that he feels uncomfortable. He's nervous and inside-out shuddering with it, and he keeps having to shove that fact down to actually focus on his classes and training. His friends have been throwing him a few concerned glances, but are all leaving it for now, only being sure to nudge his food at him and arranging extra group study sessions. It's what they always do for each other when someone isn't quite right, yet Izuku can't really bring himself to appreciate it, not truly. He just feels awful.
But he is grateful all the same, even if it's more of a subconscious thing than anything else, and so he goes along with it all, managing to smile and participate. He lets Iida chivvy him to breakfast with plenty of time to spare, sitting in amongst his friends, trying to focus on their early morning chatter rather than how he feels so uncomfortable.
Uraraka, phone in hand and scrolling whilst talking to them all, swallows another mouthful of cereal and then promptly gasps, bouncing in her seat and spilling some of her next spoonful back into the bowl.
“Deku-kun, have you seen the newest Graphite Hero picture?” He frowns a little, trying to register her words on top of the sound of his blood rushing against his bones,
“Huh- Oh, no, uhm, I’ve been a bit busy recently, why?”
”Because it’s of you!” She chirps, smile bright, shoving her phone in Izuku’s face, the freckled teen rearing back for a moment, blinking fiercely against the glare of the screen.
Then he focuses to find a beautifully rendered sketch of himself. He's in his PE uniform, the sleeves and front tattered (some part of him distantly registers that the sleeves are burnt as though he had faced Todoroki's fire like earlier this week, but he never got burnt in the Sports Festival, not until the final move-), and he has a gritted-teeth smile, eyes bright and fierce even in shades of grey, a drawing of shadows and echoes, and it's almost scarily accurate, detailed down to individual curls and every single one of the freckles on his face. And even Izuku, who isn't in the habit of staring into a mirror for any particular length of time, can recognise that much.
It's amazing. Not to mention just a little bit disconcerting.
(A dark-stained hand reaches out to flick on a lamp, the nigh-on metallic sheen of the smudges along the side of his palm and little finger almost seeming to gleam under the fresh light. He pauses, stretching out his hands, twisting his fingers together and pushing out at the palms, rotating his wrists and finally he leans back, yawning. His milky eyes, a contrast to the graphite-smudged skin, blink once, twice, and a slow smile creeps over his face, just a little bit too sharp, hungry, to be anything but cruel.
Then he picks up his pencil once again, and starts to draw once more.)
His spider-waltzing itch doesn't die down in the slightest. No, Izuku just learns to cope with it. Or at least to do so as best he can. It doesn't truly work, but he gets more used to the constant feeling. The festering paranoia. (Honestly, by this point, after a decade of abuse and harassment and plain old cruelty, he should be used to paranoia, but this is different, more and less all at once, because it really, truly never ends, from the minute he wakes up from his fitful sleep to the moment he finally collapses into exhaustion, and it lingers like smog over his dreams-)
People don't completely stop worrying, little side glances and gentle offers of doing things together, but Izuku must get better at hiding it, or everyone else just gets used to it somehow, because the blatant concern begins to die down.
It's Saturday morning, and Izuku is curled up on the sofa, his friends around him, attempting to type on the laptop he's balanced on the arm of the furniture, the inside of his cheek raw with worry. And the front door opens, attracting the attention of every person in the common spaces, eyes drawn to the wall separating out the genkan for all that only one or two of the conversations pause.
"Midoriya, there's a package for you, but it's not from a registered contact." Aizawa is leaning around the genkan wall, hair his usual mess and expression as dead as ever, for all that there's a glint of what might be concern in his eyes.
"Oh, uhm, okay? Has it passed through security?"
"It has. Come and confirm that you want it, or we can scrap it."
"Yes, sensei," he murmurs, nodding to his friends in a brief apology before scrambling to follow his teacher. They all wave him off, not minding at all, and he can be glad for that much at least.
What he can't and won't be glad for is how he has to scurry along beside his ambling teacher as they head towards the visitor's centre, and the mailroom attached to it. Being out here, exposed, even when beside one of the people that seem safest out of everyone he knows, grates and burns. His heart double-thumps every so often, fingers trembling and joints sparking, aching, grinding into dust.
Except he's fine, and logically he knows that. There- there isn't anyone else here, because if there was then his teacher would be far more wary and less relaxed.
It doesn't actually make Izuku feel better though, because logic can only go so far against the spiders waltzing upon his bones and back and heart. All he can do is breathe, the just-steadiness of his steps keeping it almost regular, and follow his teacher into the building, taking one side door and then a second, finally moving into the big mailroom, one where everything that has passed through security is stored, both for students, teachers and for the school itself. And there's an unopened box, not particularly large but big enough for something like a few mugs or notebooks to be comfortably padded within it. But Izuku wasn't expecting anything, and he doesn't recognise the handwriting upon the label.
"You can open it, kid, it's safe." The teacher offers, gesturing at the letter-opener upon the table,
"You have the option of taking it back to the dorms before you open it, but if you're comfortable then I would prefer you to open it here for now, given the unknown sender." Izuku bites his lip, forcing down a shudder, and manages to link words together upon his tongue, a clanking chain too heavy for his heart,
"Have- Do security know what it might be?" Aizawa doesn't hesitate to answer, and that in itself is almost enough to reassure Izuku,
"It seems like papers, apparently, ones in protective slips."
"I- Uhm, okay," Izuku manages, forcing himself to breathe, and keeping his fingers as steady as he can as he reaches forward, taking the letter-opener from the table, and starts undoing the tape keeping the otherwise nondescript box closed, the rasp of the half-dull blade scraping against his ears, shuddering through his shoulders, and then he's flipping the box open, and freezes.
It's full of pictures. Not camera-taken photos, but hand-drawn sketches, every single one a graphite thing, greyscale, drawn to an incredible level of detail, from moments in training or class or the dorms. From his private daily life.
Izuku's dread surges through him, and he nearly collapses with the force of it, bile pressing up through his throat, acidic and biting upon his tongue.
"Kid, these-" Izuku wavers on his feet, dread only swelling further, a tidal surge that eats away at his spine, and reaches out to stop himself from falling entirely; he grabs onto the edge of the box. It tilts over at his weight, the base of his palm slamming painfully into the tabletop, and pictures cascade out, sliding out over his hand and the table and onto the floor, their protective slips feeling almost oily against his skin.
Izuku wants to throw up.
(A man, in his room, snickers, a thing that would grate on anyone to hear it, rich in nothing but sick satisfaction.)
His teacher is already moving closer, looping an arm around Izuku's waist and hoisting him up against himself, the steady warmth and solid heat finally allowing Izuku's shoulders to relax slightly.
"Kid, these aren't right." Aizawa sounds genuinely upset, arm tight around the teen, something caught between distressed and concerned with a rather thin veneer of his usual stoicism, and it both hurts and reassures Izuku.
"N-no," he shrugs, shifting to stand fully on his own feet, because what else can he do?
But Aizawa doesn't seem satisfied by that, though he doesn't necessarily seem upset with Izuku either, as he tilts his head slightly then beckons him, hair shifting,
"Come and sit somewhere with me. Someone can clear these up later."
They move to another room, one of the small offices in the building, and take a seat upon a sofa each, the teacher very intentionally nudging Izuku away from sitting across the desk from each other. He doesn't slump back though. No, instead he stays sitting, leaning forwards with his elbows upon his knees, hands lax and visible, capture weapon shifted just enough to reveal his full expression.
Somehow it's enough to abate just a tiny bit of his damnable wrongness.
When Izuku doesn't speak up, only shuddering into himself upon the plush cushions, and after several, stretched-long moments, the teacher seems to resist the urge to sigh,
"These are only questions, kid, not me blaming or accusing you, so if you're worried or debating lying or not saying something to try and protect yourself and others, then you don't need to. It would be illogical." He waits long enough for Izuku to nod, albeit it's as much a duck into his rising shoulders as anything else, and eventually the hero takes that for what it is, and he continues to speak:
"Have you been posting any pictures on social media? Any of your friends? Or have you sent them to anyone?" Izuku doesn't reply, biting on his lip for a moment, and Aizawa shifts slightly, speaking up once more,
"Look, kiddo, you're not going to be in trouble. You'll probably have to go through an extracurricular training course, but you're a kid, you're going to make mistakes."
"I didn't, Sensei."
The hero pauses, and hunches just enough to meet Izuku's eyes, not intimidating but rather assessing, trying to affirm that the teen means it, that he isn't just saying it because he fears the repercussions otherwise.
But Izuku is telling the truth, Aizawa is sure, so he straightens a little once more, for all that he keeps the relaxed appearance, nodding,
"Alright. Nedzu and I will look into this then, and I'll walk you back to the dorms first. I don't want you going anywhere alone until we've ascertained how this breach has happened, understood? No reckless heroics or walks by yourself."
"Okay, Aizawa-sensei." There's a pause to follow, as though Aizawa doesn't know whether he can quite trust that easy agreement, but he simply stares at Izuku (somehow it grates both more and less than the scratching, scraping, of his nerves and paranoia-) before finally nodding, expression softening,
"Good on you kid. You have my number if you ever need me, got it?" Izuku nods more easily in return to that,
"Yessir."
"Alright." He still doesn't seem completely satisfied somehow, but Izuku is frankly too overwhelmed to care right now.
(Graphite smudges, pages rustling, and milky eyes blink once, twice, thrice. Milky teeth glint as well, too sharp but technically still natural. Being just the right side of natural doesn't stop the smile from being utterly disconcerting to anyone who might have seen it, were they to be in the dim room with him.
If they were with him, then it’s not like he would be able to see them anyway. Oh no, his gaze is somewhere else.)
The class have planned an outing.
Izuku, frankly, is dreading it. He hasn’t left UA since before he started feeling like this. (Even now, three weeks later, he has iron rusting in bands upon his skin, the crawl of bugs and worms and the fall of dirt along his spine, creasing along his knuckles and the curve of his ear. Every waking moment is a coffin, one carved of being watched by nothing but a spectre that nobody else can sense, and it verges on an agony. He's being buried deeper by the day.)
However, he keeps his dread to himself as best as he can. He smiles when the base plans are proposed, nods along and helps to choose the time that's collectively best for the class as a whole. He puts in his vote for where they'll go and what they'll do, and he doesn't complain when an afternoon in a large shopping centre is chosen despite how much that is not what he wants to do.
They manage to get Aizawa's permission for going out the next weekend, and he meets the class out by the bus, glaring half-heartedly at them all as the majority of the class chatter and bounce and tap on phones to check lists and shops and maps, planning routes and groups up already. Their teacher gets their attention with a simple, quiet clap, standing slightly straighter, and it's enough for all of the class to silence, turning to pay attention to the man. With that attention granted, the hero runs through warnings and procedures that are not much different to usual. He watches all of them during this, ensuring that they're actually paying attention despite their hellspawn tendencies. Towards the end, Aizawa's gaze pauses over Izuku very briefly, eyebrows twitching, and the teen forces himself to steady his expression and nod, just once, sharp, in acknowledgement.
That seems to be enough, because the teacher only gives them all one final reminder to stick together and be sensible, before he lets them all load up onto the bus, ready to leave.
And things really do go fine, at first.
It doesn't last however, not truly so, because why would it? They get to the shopping centre (and part of Izuku is distantly, strongly, relieved for the fact that they're not going back to Kiyashi shopping centre because he doesn't need thoughts of more vicious attention on him, of choking-thick malignance and choking-ready fingers-) without incident, for all that Izuku's paranoia doesn't abate or falter, sickening and tar-cloying. He aches with it. But he attempts to push that away, to think past it as he's tried for all of the last weeks, and must manage well enough because none of his friends seem to blink twice. Well, maybe this is just is normal now. It feels like it, at this point, and it's an awful sort of status quo.
Getting used to such awful things can't be healthy, Izuku knows, but it's not like he can change it or control it. No, his own stupid head is just messing him up. (It has to be, because if it isn't just his own mind, then... well, the alternative of a possible threat, something real and tangible, it doesn't even bear thinking about. So, quite simply, he doesn't.)
So he trails after his friends, keeps a smile on his face that feels stitched in place, burning and pulling, and he forces himself to keep it up. He chats, he buys an All Might wristband, he drinks a medium order of strawberry-cream milkshake. And, minute by minute, he feels worse and worse. There's frost echoing up from his steps, seeping through to his marrow, a shudder across his shoulders, and he tightens his hands around themselves, fingers tangling and twisting, trying to ignore how it feels like there are footsteps following his own, the ghost of a hand reaching for him. It's the strongest feeling he's had for the last few weeks, and there has to be a reason for that, Izuku is sure; there has to be a person behind it.
Something is wrong. More wrong.
"I'm just going to the bathroom," Izuku rasps, and steps away before his friends can even hear him. He can't let them be in danger. Not for him, because of him, and this person is clearly more interested in him than anyone else. No, he has to protect them. (The spiders in his bones are screaming, so maybe they're birds instead, or the grating buzz of mosquitoes, Izuku doesn't know, but the wrongwrongwrong is only growing, and there are shudders up and down his spine with it, skin itchy, nails rasping over it in a way that's almost worse than the itch in the first place-) And if doing that means isolating himself, then so be it.
(The man has to keep down laughter, a victorious sort of cackle that bubbles in his throat, twitching his lips up to sharp points, fingers shifting.
Milky eyes rove, the misted surface shadow-shifting, the solidity of a distant monster hidden beneath the pallid clouds, and it focuses. Centres. His fingers shift, ready to reach for a pencil or wrist or throat, but he can't. Not right now. No, he needs to be patient, but that's something that he can do. He's been patient for weeks now, after all.)
There's no registering the way that his nails are digging into his own scars, the seams of his body and bones and breath. All Izuku sees is the distant sign for the bathroom that he needs to reach, that he needs to get away from his friends and maybe away from whatever is with him as well.
He stares up at himself in the harsh lights, and he falters. He thought- he thought that he had seen something, something like eyes, deep and light-glinting, darkly silver-shining, except they're not there at all, not when he blinks again. No, it was nothing more than a play of shadows. Now there's only his own pale visage, green eyes red-rimmed, eyelashes clumping on tears that he hadn't even realised were gathering. His nails are rusty where they're clamped around the edge of the sink.
(Milky eyes blink, taking in the details of freckles and curls and too-wide eyes. Of delicious fear. The stains of graphite upon his own skin, caught in wrinkles, gleam like monochrome bloodstains.)
It was just a trick of the light. (It must have been, surely-) Izuku's being stupid. He's a Deku, right? He must just be imagining things, because he's not exactly been sleeping well, and there's fear staccato-stuttering through him, a full-body judder as his heart beats too hard, too fast, all of his body seeming to sway and pulse with it, nothing else even edging into his attention for a long, aching time.
A noise out in the corridor startles him, and he nearly collapses with it, jolted out of the heartbeat trance. There's no more noises except the creak of his fingers flexing around the cracking enamel of the sink, nobody coming into the bathroom or anything, and the teen forces himself to breathe more steadily. More consciously. He- he doesn't feel any less watched, but he feels a little more in control of his own body. It's enough, sort of. Maybe. It will have to be, Izuku decides, because if nobody has come in here in this period of time then nobody will be, surely, and he should just go back to meet his friends. Or even his teacher. First though, he has to unclench his hands from the edge of the sink, glad that whilst he has cracked it, some part of him has been aware enough (too weak, just like he is in everything else-) to not fully break or smash it, and to shrug his shoulders, shaking out his hands, trying to not be so painfully tense. It doesn't really work.
Nothing else is going to get much better though, Izuku can already tell. So he moves away from the counters instead, stepping over to open the bathroom door, only to find that it's dark outside. Well, it isn't entirely dark, because the world around the corner of the corridor is clearly bright still, but that offers only dim light to where he is right now. It's gloomy, doubly so with the bathroom door swinging shut behind him, and with his sunspotted vision it's more than disconcerting.
He still feels like he has someone with him, breaths upon the back of his neck and his footsteps echoing in the corridor (it suddenly seems like the hallway is three times longer than before, something halfway infinite and impossible to take more than two steps down-) but he doesn't quite feel able to move any more, frozen in place, fingers tingling, the spiders nesting along his spine beginning to rouse once more, twitching and uncomfortable and dread-digging. He can't see his own shadow, yet he can almost feel it writhing upon the floor and walls behind him.
Then he hears another noise. Maybe it was a shuffle or breath or scrape, Izuku doesn't know, but it's behind him (something in the back of his mind reminds him of the rasp of graphite-) and he whips around, looking for something, anything, in the darkness, and yet he finds nothing, even though he was so sure that he'd heard-
A hand touches the back of his neck, something pinching, and then Izuku doesn't see anything any more.