Archive of Our Own ^beta

Death waits for no one.

It doesn’t discriminate between the sinner and the saint.

It doesn’t care for the wreckage or the storm, or pain and the loss, neither for the young or the old, the good or the evil.

It doesn’t care about legacies or stories or histories being written, neither does it care about what memories are told and passed on from one life to another.

Only that it takes, and it takes, and it takes away.

And isn’t it such a funny thing that out of everything that could’ve killed Midoriya Izuku, it isn’t All for One that brings him to death’s door – neither is it Shigaraki nor Overhaul, not the League of Villains nor the Paranormal Liberation Front, not the bullies that were so intent on stomping the life out of him nor the spider lilies that lay buried and forgotten in the playground behind their house.

No.

What hammers the final nail in Izuku’s coffin is One for All – a legacy that cared naught for the child that bore it, only that it was a torch to be passed on to extinguish the flames of a greater evil for the greater good, and burned it did of the life that held it.

And death may not discriminate but it knows how to be kind – at least, to the boy who had already been discriminated all throughout his life, to the boy who suffered too much, lost too much, had hurt too much.

For Izuku, death starts off as any other day.

It starts during his morning run with Iida on the spring of his third year when all is said and done and the League of Villains had been put in Tartarus, some to rehabilitation, and others buried in a graveyard often visited by friends and families alike.

The feeling of tiredness dawns on him in their second lap around the forest behind Heights Alliance, like a vice gripping on his lungs, a blanket too heavy on his shoulders. His run slows to a stop, his breathing coming out in rasps, and he asks Iida for a quick five-minute break. Iida relents, ever the good friend, hands wiping at the sweat on his own head. He continues to chat with Izuku, taking over the conversation as easily as he breathes while Izuku catches his own, until five minutes, seven minutes, ten minutes, and Izuku still looks a pale as he had when they had stopped.

“Would you like to head back for now, Midoriya?”

They’ve long stopped using honorifics, after everything they’ve been through, but Iida is still reserved in using Izuku’s first name and Izuku, the same.

“I’m fine, Iida. This is nothing,” Izuku waves him off boy, laughing even as his breath comes out as a wheeze. Iida tries, and fails, to smooth out the thinning line that is his mouth but he nods his assent.

“Just promise me that you will tell me if you need to rest. We can always take a break.”

“Of course!”

And Izuku does keep to his promise. Except.

Except.

On normal days, when Midoriya and Iida will run ten laps in the forest, they will take one five-minute break for every two laps but today, today, they had to take a ten-minute break for every one lap and Iida doesn’t want to say anything, doesn’t want to berate Midoriya on his carelessness or whatever it is that is making him more tired today than any other days because they had been together this past week and whatever Midoriya had done, Iida had been there right alongside him – all because they were partnered up together to create a presentation about vigilantes and their contribution to society and they had attacked this topic with a fervor that they had each other’s backs all throughout the week. And Iida had been there in every breakfast, lunch, and dinner. He had been there in every study session with Todoroki and Shinsou, and Tsuyu and Uraraka, and Yaoyorozu and Jirou. He had been there when Eri-chan had visited and when Satou had shared his muffins for everyone to enjoy. And it worries Iida because Midoriya had never been this tired for their morning runs – and it didn’t matter if he only had an hour of sleep or if he’d been up all night studying for an exam, Midoriya was a menace and a workaholic but today, it is Midoriya that asks for them to rest rather than Iida demand that they should.

Which is why when Midoriya promptly passes out in the common room couch as soon as they got back to the dorms, Iida doesn’t stop him. Instead, he helps clean Midoriya up and promptly tucks him in with a blanket so he can have a fitful rest.

And if anyone ever sees their class rep glaring at them for so much as making a squeak, well, no one ever does question him when they see Midoriya asleep right beside him. It reminds them too much of the time the boy had up and left them when he shouldered the world all too much by himself.

If only they had known, then.

But they hadn’t, no, none of them did.

They knew about One for All. And they knew about All for One.

They knew about All Might and Izuku.

What they hadn’t know, what anyone couldn’t have known, was what it would mean for the rest of their lives – and what was left of Izuku’s.

Izuku’s decline continued on from there.

It wasn’t so sudden that every activity felt so strenuous he couldn’t move.

Instead, it came about in short and stilted bursts he’d never really know when to expect it. Overtime, he’d find himself tapping out of hero practice after a spar or two when he’d been fine just last week, or he can’t hold Full Cowl for more than twenty minutes when he had done so well yesterday, or sometimes he’d be walking to class and he’d find himself losing the strength to take one more step as if all energy had been sapped away from him.

His strength stutters much like his words did when he was younger.

He tires out much like an old man who’d been wearied by age and time.

And sometimes Uraraka is there to save his falling notebooks, Todoroki to steady him when he stumbles, Shinsou to sit with him when he needs to catch his breath. And all of them are worried because no one understands why this is happening. There have been investigations and talks about targeted villain attacks but with All for One dead and Shigaraki in rehab, no villain strong enough comes to mind. Nothing in the database brings about such a powerful quirk and not even Nezu can pinpoint a lead strong enough to point to them in the right direction.

Izuku is put on bed rest every now and then, with a stricter and healthier diet to keep his strength up, and lesser trainings to ensure his body will not fail on them – none of which the boy protests to. He could, of course he could, but with each painful breath that escapes his lungs, each hacking cough, each throbbing ache in his head, and every worried glance his loved ones throw his way, Izuku can’t say otherwise.

He wants to. Every fiber in his being wants to – he doesn’t want to feel like this, to feel so useless and helpless, and a burden. He’s going to graduate soon – going to be a hero with all his friends like they all wanted to be. This is the story of how they all became the greatest heroes and he hates how he’s being left out of it.

But sometimes opening his eyes feels like the hardest thing he’s ever done.

Sometimes he feels his body burning from the inside, like flames wreathing under his skin, licking at every part of him, consuming every waking thought that all he wants to do is succumb to the call of sleep.

Sometimes he feels cold, so, so cold that his body shivers with no amount of heat can ever make him feel warm. This cold seeps through his bones, his lungs, his heart, and he feels numb and empty and every breath aches and it rattles and it makes him shake to his very core.

Sometimes it hurts just to breathe.

But what hurts the most isn’t when he can’t take one more step forward.

It’s not when writing on his analysis notebook feels like a chore and talking feels as if he’s underwater.

It’s not when he has to ask for five more minutes before he can start running again or he has to mumble another apology to Tokoyami and Dark Shadow for having to walk with him or thank Todoroki for letting him share his body heat or sitting in the kitchen with Tsu as they drink tea to help him soothe the ache in his body.

What hurts the most is when he looks at each of them in the eye and see the worry that he has put in there again, especially when he has promised himself not to do it again, but this time it isn’t his fault.

This time, it is beyond his control.

It’s One for All.

“We’re sorry, kid,” Yoichi tells him one night when they meet in a dream.

But Izuku doesn’t need an apology.

He doesn’t want an apology.

He wants to live.

He wants to train again and get bruises and receive explosions and get thrown through buildings and be hit by tails and rock solid hands. He wants to bench press his classmates and practice floating and eat cold soba and have movie nights and pet cats in parks and not worry about dying.

Izuku wants to graduate and be the best hero with his friends – just like they all promised.

And Izuku is tired of apologies taking over every little thing that matters to him.

But it’s apology after apology after apology and Izuku can’t help but cry and drown.

And Izuku – first year student Izuku, wouldn’t have told anyone about the burden he carries on his shoulder but third year student Izuku, this Izuku who had learned through pain and sorrow that he is loved – tells Class A the truth.

One day, in autumn, when the leaves begin to fall and the cold begins to seep through his bones and everything feels tired and lonely and he knows he won’t make it further, perhaps not even through graduation (not that it matters anyway considering how much Izuku has missed out on when some days are harder than others), Izuku gathers his friends in the common room. His mom already knows – she’s the first one he’d told, the first one to find him collapsed at home, the first one to bring him to the hospital. Aizawa-sensei already knows – he was there when it happened, because they were discussing what to do with Izuku considering his failing health. All Might already knows and gods that had been a conversation Izuku doesn’t want to re-live, to watch his mentor shake and crumble before him, muttering apology after apology and begging him to return One for All, but Izuku won’t do it, can’t do it, because he refuses to burden anyone else with this.

It is his.

Above all else, if not a life well-lived… then at least a life that will cause no more deaths.

But he owes his friends this.

He owes them this much.

So, so much more than he can ever say.

And they gather around him, all of Class A in the common room, looking at him with supportive smiles and Izuku’s heart aches because he knows what he’d do to them, what he’d always done to them, and with every word that passes his lips, he watches each smile drop, each face crumple, and the only thing left in his mind is the irony of his legacy.

If One for All is meant to save, why can’t he save those he cares about when it matters the most?

And that was the first and only year in the history of UA that the students of Class A had stopped asking to come home.

It was also the first and only year that UA had open its gates for anyone who wished to say their goodbyes – not that there were many, no, because the news of Izuku’s body failing him never left UA. It never reached the public nor the media nor the hero scene – but it had reached everyone that he had ever cared for.

It had reached Kouta and the Wild Wild Pussycats.

It had reached Eri and Mirio.

It had reached Auntie Mitsuki and Uncle Masaru.

It had even reached Melissa Shield who flew her way to Japan as soon as she knew.

But Izuku’s last days, the days that lead up to their class’s graduation, these were reserved for much quieter goodbyes – for those who were much, much closer to his heart.

And it starts, like any other day, the way it had started that one fateful spring.

His last goodbyes start with Iida.

And it starts with Iida chatting with him jovially, just like he would on their morning runs, talking about anything and everything he can think of as Midroiya listens. It starts with Iida pushing Midoriya’s wheelchair in their familiar path in the forest, taking in the sights, and Midoriya answers him back just as happily, voice soft and quiet and shaking in all the wrong places, and it takes everything Iida has not to choke on a sob or a cry and keep everything as normal as possible.

It starts with one lap, and another, followed by a break where Iida stretches his muscles and Midoriya talks about quirks, Iida’s most especially, and what very little else he can tell him to improve it. What he can avoid, what he can work on, which moves he can focus on, which he can work without. Iida takes it all in just as he will dutifully take in any other lesson – and he ignores the nagging voice in his head that tells him it could be his last.

On the third lap, Midoriya talks about how he thought Iida had hated him that first day they met in the UA entrance exams and Iida, furiously, blushes in embarrassment.

“I do not hate you, Midoriya!” he exclaims, arms chopping wildly and Midoriya laughs, laughs at him, and he feels his face heating up even more. “I simply thought that you were a trouble-maker-!”

“A problem child,” Midoriya corrects, a hint of fondness in his voice, but he’s still laughing and soon so is Iida and the fourth lap comes and passes and they take another break. He drinks some water by the clearing but Midoriya drinks tea, a special brew made by Yaoyorozu for mornings like this when the air seems harsher on his lungs and each breath a stabbing pain, not that Midoriya will admit to it, but Iida has learned to read him these past years, has learned to read the signs that come unsaid.

On the fifth and the sixth, they stay quiet, both lost in thought, but the silence is companionable, comfortable, the way it had always been between them. The lull of chatter had never been a bother because that is what Midoriya had been to Iida – a steady rock, a source of comfort, a pillar that guides him on where he should go. Iida wonders if he had been the same for Midoriya, if he had been as much of a friend to the boy as he is to him, if he had helped made Midoriya’s life easier or comfortable or better, if he had been enough.

“Promise me you’d never go after a villain on your own,” Midoriya finally says when they finish their seventh lap. It stuns Iida for a moment but when he sees Midoriya’s shaking hands, he remembers how angry he had been, how worried, and he nods, and he hums, and he pushes the wheelchair at a steadier pace.

“I won’t.”

“And that you’d be class rep even after we graduate?”

“Of course. I need to keep our classmates in line.”

Midoriya laughs again. He wishes he can keep on hearing that laugh long after today is over.

“I can’t imagine a better person more suited for it than you, Iida.”

He wonders if Midoriya will murder him if he suggests going after a villain just to make him stay.

“I can imagine you,” Iida admits. “It was supposed to be you, after all, Izuku-kun.”

Izuku-kun is silent after that and Iida doesn’t mind, only half-worried that Izuku-kun had taken offense that he had been so front in using his given name without any permission.

The thought is dispelled, however, when Izuku-kun reaches out for his hand with his own trembling one and Iida doesn’t hesitate to meet him halfway, engulfing Izuku-kun’s smaller hand in his and keeps it there, ignoring how his hand hadn’t always been this small, how thin and bony it had now become. He ignores the strain he feels building on his arm as they keep to their path, finishing the eighth lap. He ignores how harder it gets to keep the wheelchair steady with only his right arm and half his body to guide it just as he ignores the silent tears that Izuku-kun sheds.

Ninth.

If forever existed, Iida wishes it would stop right here, right before he crosses the bend, right where they marked the beginning and end of each lap. Iida doesn’t want to cross over– doesn’t want any of this to end, but it has to, it will, like all things should.

For once, it isn’t about speed.

For once, it isn’t about saving someone with how fast he can force himself to run.

For once, Iida slows down so he doesn’t have to lose Izuku-kun.

He slows down his steps to try.

If he doesn’t make it to ten, he wonders if it will change a thing.

“I’m glad that it’s you, Tenya-kun,” Izuku says.

Tenya ignores the way his own tears fell.

It continues on with Uraraka, who says her goodbye in the gym where she and Deku-kun used to train with Bakugou and Sero and everyone who had been willing to help him master Float, as if they weren’t preparing for a war that was too big than any of them combined, as if playing tag in the air wasn’t a training to keep them alive, as if they weren’t only just kids.

It continues with her making him weightless, taking her with him up in the air as she holds on to the rope tied to the ceiling, ignoring the whisper in the back of her mind that Deku-kun lost more weight from the last time they were there.

 “You’ve gotten better,” he says absent-mindedly as they walk across the walls of the gym, his hand in hers. She never lets Deku-kun’s feet hit the walls, supporting each step with her own, and Uraraka keeps him there beside her, never letting go. She doesn’t want to think about the day that she finally would.

“I’ve been training,” she cheerfully tells him. “Thirteen says their agency has an opening if I want to pursue being a rescue hero but I’m still thinking about whether or not I want that or if I’ll stay with Ryukyu. What do you think, Deku-kun?”

He is quiet at that, obviously thinking. Uraraka doesn’t mind talking about the future. It hurts to talk about, when she thinks about a future without her best friend, but she thinks that Deku-kun hates it more when they walk on eggshells around him. He already knows there is no future waiting for them together, what was the point in excluding him in the only way he can be a part of it? So she talks and he listens.  And when he talks back, she lets her heart soar and imagine what it could be like, what it should’ve been like, and she lets herself cry to sleep with no one else to know but her. Deku-kun doesn’t need to know how she wakes up on certain nights just to come down to the kitchen to get herself a cup of hot coco to help her sleep, or how she downs a mug of black coffee to stay awake to keep the nightmares at bay. He doesn’t need to know how she meets some of her classmates like that, in various states of wakefulness, rummaging in the cupboards or the fridge to fight of sleep or how she sometimes sees Shouji-kun standing near Deku-kun’s new room in the first floor, right beside Aizawa-sensei’s, listening for a heartbeat that may or may not still be there. He doesn’t need to know how she trains herself to exhaustion, to work out until every part of her body aches and moving feels sluggish and heavy and good just so she can get past her own bad days when it hurts too much to just be.

She doesn’t want to think about a future without Deku-kun in it.

She knows it’s par for the course. They’re heroes. It’s bound to happen sooner or later. She just… didn’t expect it to happen so soon. Not like this. She’s grateful, in a way, because she gets moments like this with Deku-kun. She is grateful because not everyone is given a chance to say goodbye.

She remembers Nighteye and Midnight-sensei and wonders if they were able to say goodbye to those that ever mattered to them, if they knew then that it would’ve been their last. She wonders about those they left behind.

But there’s also a part of her, a bigger but quieter part of her, that is so, so angry and bitter at the unfairness of it all. Deku-kun deserves so much better. He deserves to live a full life! He deserves to graduate alongside all of them, to climb the hero rankings with them however trashy the rankings may be, deserves to save people with them, to grow up and grow old and have fun! To go to parties and drink and celebrate! But no! Deku-kun has to be a hero even up to his last breath and gods, they’re just kids! They’re just about to graduate! They’re lives are just about to begin and Deku-kun’s about to end and-!

It’s Deku-kun.

Deku-kun has always been a hero.

And Deku-kun will die a hero.

She doesn’t know if she hates it or not. She doesn’t know if she hates him for it.

 “I think it depends on what kind of hero you want to be, Uraraka,” Deku-kun says. “Thirteen-sensei focuses on rescue because that’s what their quirk specializes in, Ryukyu focuses on raids and patrols because she’s a limelight hero and so is Gunhead but he’s half a limelight hero, half a teacher. The Wild Wild Pussycats specialize in rescue but they’re also pretty good in fighting. They get called on raids but only when they need to be.”

“I want to be a hero you can be proud of,” Uraraka says softly, then, with a grin that will put Miruko’s to shame, she adds, “someone who takes names and kicks ass.”

She loves making Deku-kun laugh, even when it sounds breathless. And he doesn’t hesitate in telling her that he had always been proud of her, awe and joy always coloring his eyes whenever he looks at her – and it becomes a contest of who’s proud of who more. And they talk like that for hours, just going round and round and flying over the gym, waiting for the time to pass until it’s time for dinner. There’s always a lot to take in when she’s around him, when he’s always so full life and warmth even when he flickers like her old nightlight, so she files away her feelings to a later time where she doesn’t feel so conflicted and angry and sad. Instead she smiles at him and listens, to keep herself steady and grounded, to banter and throw funny and witty remarks and crazy misadventures because – “Deku-kun! You were the vent cryptid and denial will get you punted to the sun!” – so, so few are given a chance to say goodbye.

Uraraka doesn’t want to waste the chance she’d been given.

Todoroki’s goodbyes are quiet, just as the boy always is, and it is done in the Todoroki family graveyard.

They sit together in silence, shoulder to shoulder, hand in hand, with Midoriya by Todoroki’s left side where the air is warmer and less frigid, and the January wind isn’t as harsh to Midoriya’s body as it had been the past few days. Shouto’s arm is wrapped around him, regulating both of their temperatures, to ensure that Midoriya doesn’t get sick, doesn’t fall ill, the way his body did just last Christmas, the way they almost lost him to a fever of all things. Those nights had been cruel, the silence and the waiting, the uncertainty of it all. His body had been so weak it was such a close call.

But today is Touya’s birthday and Midoriya had asked to visit, wanting to pay his respects, and Todoroki did not have the heart to deny him of anything, least of all this.

So they sit in silence, staring at the smooth stone etched with Touya’s name, ignoring the way their breaths come out in puffs of smoke.

There are things that Todoroki wants to say to him, things he’d never had the chance to say even after three years of friendship. He wants to thank Midoriya for being his first friend, for reaching out to him – but he also wants to be angry at him and tell him that he’s being stupid for refusing to give up One for All when it’s killing him. Todoroki would rather have Midoriya quirkless than have him dead, would rather destroy the world if they judge him for it, would rather not be a hero if it comes down to it but it’s not his decision to make – the same way it wasn’t his decision to watch Touya burn his body than forgive Endeavor, to watch him laugh amidst his flames as fire licks away at his skin as Todoroki stood helpless on the other side.

It leaves a bitter taste in his mouth.

Todoroki doesn’t say anything – but it’s a close thing.

It’s not his choice.

It’s not his life.

It doesn’t make that burning anger pit in his stomach go away though.

It doesn’t make him any less angry at the world, at All Might, at Midoriya.

“Todoroki?”

“Yeah?”

“Will you visit me like this when I die?”

It doesn’t make him any less angry at himself, for being so powerless in all of this.

“I’ll always come running for you, you know that, right?”

He can feel Midoriya’s smile against his shoulder.

This is something Todoroki chooses, even in his anger, even in his silence.

He chooses to stay.

The first lesson Aizawa had taught Shinsou when he started training him for his entrance to the hero course was to learn how to read a room, to be aware at all times, and to know a person’s tells. As an underground hero, his greatest asset is in reading the subtleties in everyone’s actions. And this is how Shinsou knows that everyone in Class A haven’t been getting much sleep, with some worse than others. He knows that ever since Midoriya’s announcement, things have never been the same no matter how much everyone else tried to play things off as normal. He doesn’t blame them.

Shinsou’s goodbye isn’t much of a goodbye as it is of watching everyone else show theirs.

Shinsou refuses to say goodbye, not when everyone already is.

Midoriya doesn’t deserve this. He isn’t UA’s golden boy, he didn’t have a happy childhood, hell he didn’t even have a fucking quirk until the UA entrance exam and life kept on throwing shit his way and now it’s taking him?

No, Shinsou is livid.

And Shinsou refuses to say goodbye.

Midoriya doesn’t say it, he’s too stubborn to say it, but everything is wearing thin on him – he’s tired, he’s tired and it’s not getting better, and everyone aside from the dekusquad is treating him with kiddie gloves and it’s annoying. But Midoriya’s not saying anything and Shinsou wants to but he knows he’d be treating Midoriya with the same kiddie gloves if he doesn’t let him speak for himself.

Everyone is grieving as if he’s already gone but he’s still here, Midoriya is alive and still alive and everyone is acting as if he’s already dead.

Midoriya is dying, not dead yet.

There’s a difference.

And Shinsou is tired, too, because he doesn’t want to watch this. Everyone’s grief is weighing down on him and he feels guilty because he’s not the one who’s dying, who’s waiting for death, who doesn’t know if tomorrow will come. Guilt eats at him as he watches classmate after classmate interact with Midoriya like it’s the last time. Guilt eats at him because he knows it could be.

Guilt eats at him because he feels so angry when he’s not the one who’s dying, when it’s Midoriya who should be angry but he isn’t, when he shouldn’t feel this way because Midoriya doesn’t.

He doesn’t have it worse, he doesn’t know what it’s like, but he’s angry and it hurts. He’s angry and he’s sad and that is his friend and he doesn’t know what to do about these feelings because he’s never had a friend like Midoriya before, he’s never had a friend who’s dying.

But Shinsou watches, because if Midoriya won’t say anything, then he’ll take it upon himself to be there for him when he needs him to, when it becomes too much to bear.

He watches Aoyama skip to Midoriya, fresh French pancakes on a plate with squeezed lemon, sugar, and whipped cream on top. He watches Satou make the freshest batch of cinnamon rolls, banana loaves, and the kitchen smells like a bakery whenever there’s a certain type of food that he thinks Midoriya can keep down. Jirou hadn’t been holding back in her own music career and she’d been making music with Present Mic to guide her, and she makes the music that helps put Midoriya to sleep. Kouda brings his pet rabbit to class to keep Midoriya company when none of them could and she’d been a helpful little thing to keep them alert and updated whenever something happens to Midoriya, even before Recovery Girl’s medical bracelet can detect it. Kirishima, Kaminari, and Ashido feed him with hero news and memes, and they always talk about the latest trends and heroes, and Ojiro is there to keep them in line, not that he can do much when there’s that brand of chaos. Sero lends him the occasional mangas he has in his collection when there are new releases and even Mineta grows into a decent human being and helps him with notes sometimes, when Iida or Momo can’t provide their own. And apparently, Shouji makes an excellent cuddle buddy when Midoriya needs something to ground him, when the pain becomes too much to bear and pain medication can only do so much to distract him.

It’s a whole lot of mess that Shinsou is tired of watching. But he doesn’t want to be tired, he can’t be, because he’s not the one who’s dying.

“Shinsou?” Ah, that’s Midoriya. Shinsou blinks back into focus and realizes that he’s been in the kitchen for about two hours now, if the unblinking digital 04:00 in the microwave has anything to say about it. He breathes in through his nose, holds it, then chugs down the rest of his cold coffee before he stands up to make a new one.

Shinsou doesn’t look at Midoriya, doesn’t want to see him, not right now when he feels too much.

“Hey, Midoriya. Shouldn’t you be asleep?” a pause, then, “Tea?”

“Chamomile would be nice,” he answers.

Shinsou makes him tea anyway.

It’s when he hears padded foot on tiled floor that he realizes Midoriya is not in his wheelchair.

He forces himself not to spin around, to tell him how dangerous it is, how he shouldn’t be up. He refuses to treat Midoriya with kiddie gloves. Midoriya walks over to him to get his own mug while, an old All Might mug that’s faded and chipped but well-loved. He wonders how long Midoriya had had it.

He wonders how much of All Might did Midoriya have in his life, how much of it is being taken away.

“Why?”

Shinsou didn’t mean to ask, he didn’t want to ask, but there’s a part of him, the honest, hurting, aching part of him that wanted to know the truth. He doesn’t like feeling this way, being angry when he doesn’t have the right to be, being sad when it’s not him who’s dying, hurting like this when he shouldn’t be.

Midoriya doesn’t say anything.

Instead he takes Shinsou’s mug and his own back to the table.

He sits down.

Then he looks up at him.

Shinsou takes it as a sign to keep going.

“I don’t get you, Midoriya.”

And Midoriya smiles at that.

“That’s the same thing you said before I told you about One for All.”

And that’s where it all circles back to, doesn’t it?

“Why won’t you give up One for All?” Shinsou isn’t angry yet. He wants to be. But right now he’s tired, and its quarter past four, and he hasn’t gotten any sleep this past week, and he’s been watching Izuku break without breaking and it hurts him but he’s not the one who’s dying. “Izuku, why?”

It’s quiet.

Izuku does that a lot now.

He takes this pauses that Shinsou doesn’t know if he’s thinking or if he’s slipping away.

“Will you take it, then?”

There’s no accusation in Izuku’s voice – no judgment, or anger, or any emotion. Just a question, curiosity, and Shinsou wants to say yes.

He wants to say yes, he’d take it, he’d take One for All if it means having Izuku here.

But Izuku looks at him, really looks at him, and the words die at Shinsou’s throat.

He wants to say yes but he knows his yes means nothing.

He knows his yes means no.

Shinsou doesn’t want to die.

But he doesn’t want Izuku to die either.

“I’m sorry, that’s unfair,” Izuku goes to say. “And it wouldn’t work, anyway,” now there’s resignation. “One for All is too powerful now for any individual to handle. If I give it to someone else, the quirk will just eat at them faster than it’s doing to me, and it’s going to get worse. I can’t do that to anyone.”

“But you-”

“Eri tried, you know? When she came to visit. She tried to use her quirk on me, maybe make it so my body won’t be like this – and it worked, the first few minutes, but One for All saw Eri’s quirk and attacked it. It deemed her quirk a danger to me, something so precious and beautiful, and it attacked it. It’s why I got sick last Christmas.”

“Izuku-”

“If All Might had passed it on to Mirio-senpai just like Sir had wanted, I’m not sure if Mirio-senpai would’ve survived it. The only reason why I lasted this long is because I’m quirkless.”

“Izu-”

“It’s unfair, Toshi, but better me than anyone else,” Izuku laughs and it’s hollow and empty and Toshi hates the sound of it. “It’s funny that when I’m finally useful for something, it’s for something like-”

“Don’t say that!” It comes out louder than Hitoshi wants it to but it snaps Izuku out of whatever spiral he had entered, blinking once, twice, then breathing out.

“I’m so-”

“Don’t talk about it like it’s over. Don’t talk about it like you’re already dead, like there’s no other choice, that you’re not worth choosing over.” Oh. Toshi’s crying.

“Toshi-”

“We don’t want you dead! You don’t want yourself dead! Stop acting like everything is okay because none of this isn’t-!”

“Then what do you want me to say? What do you want me to do? I can’t give up One for All. I won’t get better. I’ll die before this year even ends and I can’t-” his breath hitches.

“Izuku-”

“It’s not fair but the world was never fair anyway.”

Hitoshi doesn’t want to say goodbye.

Every fiber of his being refuses to, because he doesn’t want to say goodbye to Izuku, because at the core of it all, it is unfair.

The world has never been fair.

Never to the boy who’d grown up being called a villain and never to the quirkless freak that everyone was so intent on killing.

He walks towards Izuku and pulls him in a hug.

It’s not a goodbye.

It won’t be until Izuku is truly dead.

They both cry until the sun shines on them.

And Hitoshi keeps on watching.

One of the last to say goodbye is Kacchan, in a room too big for one soul dying too young, with no fanfares or loud noises, no morning jogs or easy banters between them. Instead, there is silence, as Kacchan watches the steady rising and falling of Izuku’s chest, counting each breath and wondering if it will be the last.

Auntie Inko is just outside nerd’s room, maybe fussing over all the other extras, making them katsudon and curry as she is wont to do as the dorm mother ever since she moved in a couple of months ago. Icyhot and Four-eyes is probably helping her cut the vegetables, if Frogface hadn’t kicked them out of the kitchen yet.

He closes the distance between them, sitting by his bedside, and counts the freckles on his pale cheeks, just as he used to do when they were kids. He tries to map out constellation after constellation, ones he didn’t even know the name of, ignoring how his heart clenches at how pale Izuku is, how hollow his cheeks are, how his bones seem to peek through his skin, how it all feels so wrong.

“Kacchan?”

“Hey, nerd.”

Kacchan doesn’t have any words to say, having already said them all those years back when Izuku had gone rogue, and he doesn’t have any words to say now when there’s not much left to do but wait.

Kacchan had never been good at waiting, never been patient for it, but for Izuku, he would’ve waited for the world. But all they have is now, in slow trickling seconds that don’t seem enough, that both seem too fast and too suffocating, like the nerd’s mutter-storm when he analyzes a new quirk, like the scenery outside his train to UA, like sludge down his throat, like muddy waters under his feet, like the sound of flowing water by the creek where Izuku first reached for his hand – like how he’s reaching out to him at this moment.

Kacchan reaches back, like he always does now, like he always failed to do before, like he’ll never have the chance to again.

He squeezes.

Izuku squeezes back.

“Win to save, Kacchan,” Izuku tells him softly, in a voice so quiet it’s barely a whisper.

“And save to win,” Kacchan agrees.

“Show them greatest heroes the world will ever see.”

“We’ll be the best. And I’ll be the best among them.”

“You already are.”

Kacchan doesn’t cry. He never does. The only time Izuku had ever seen him cry was when he fought off the sludge villain and when they fought at Ground Beta. It’s a funny thing to Izuku, how Kacchan only cries when he fights, but Izuku had always been crying.

“I’m not, though,” Kacchan answers him, rough hands rubbing scarred ones. “I’m not the best yet.”

He’d always been a crybaby, after all, up until the very the end.

“Kaccha-“

“You’re still here, aren’t you?” Kacchan’s voice comes out rough, raspy, broken – but he doesn’t cry. “So I’ll do my damned best to be the best. To deserve it. Just you watch.”

“I will,” Izuku promises.

And Izuku knows that Kacchan will see it through, just as he had done every other thing. It’s why Kacchan is Izuku’s symbol of victory – his symbol of strength and hope.

If anyone can do it, it’s the boy with fireworks in his hands and explosions in his veins. It’s the boy that doesn’t know when to give up. And there’s something Izuku wants to say, with the way he seems to start to speak but never really having the words to tell, and he struggles, visibly, at how he can’t say what he wants to.

The tremors in his hands grow stronger and Kacchan squeezes back, a quiet reminder that he isn’t going anywhere, never again.

“I’m scared,” Izuku admits in the silence.

 “I know.”  

“I don’t want to die, Kacchan,” Izuku is crying, but not in the way he always does. There’s no fountain of tears to flood the dorms, no rushed scarred hands wiping them away, instead, he weeps, tears falling silently, shoulders trembling, breath hitching with every exhale, and Kacchan doesn’t know what to say.

He never does – he’d never been good with words, after all, only knowing how to fight and scream and blow things up – but Izuku’s hand is still cradled in his, and he does what he should’ve always done. He holds it tighter, squeezes back, and doesn’t let go.

“I know.”

Kacchan never cries – but for Izuku, he does.

Class A was never meant to learn about death like this but the world had never been fair.

It is a lesson Toshinori wishes his students didn’t have to learn so soon, so young.

He sees it in every “hello” and “every see you later”, in every conversation and hang-outs that the class had had with Izuku. And the boy never stopped attending his classes, even when there were days when he was so tired he’d fall asleep on his wheelchair.

He’d been excused from any and all exam, exercise, and hero training but he still participates whenever he could. Toshinori enjoys listening to his analysis, his little quips, and witty remarks, even his quiet jokes and how he looks forward to seeing his classmates become the heroes they were always meant to be.

Neither of them talks about how he should be there, too, not when Toshinori knows just how badly Izuku wants to be there, even when he doesn’t say it. He doesn’t have to say it, because Toshinori has heard him crying one too many times when he had come to visit, had seen the red-rimmed eyes, the tired smile. He wanted to beg Izuku to give his quirk back to him but he knows his boy, how his kid has a heart bigger than Dagobah Beach, how he’ll let One for All die with him, so one else has to.

And he knows how much it will hurt him if Toshinori were to ask again.

“Thank you, All Might,” Izuku mutters from right beside him, voice muffled by a yawn, as they stayed in the corner of Gym Theta where they are safely tucked away from where his classmates spar, “I really wish I could’ve made you proud.”

“My prince of nonsense,” Toshinori starts with a laugh, “I am already proud of you. More than I can ever tell you.”

Izuku hums, a quiet sound, soft, almost melodic, almost sad.

“Really?”

“Always.”

Another hum – much, much softer, more quiet, barely audible even with how close Toshinori is.

He spares a glance at Izuku, at the small smile he has on his face, how his eyes stay closed, how he looks so young, so peaceful, so still.

Toshinori knows.

“Sweet dreams, my boy.”

Izuku doesn’t make it to graduation.

It doesn’t stop Aizawa-sensei from calling out his name as Midoriya Inko walks the length of the stage alone, receiving Izuku’s diploma and hero license with her hands steady, heart swelling with pride even as it breaks. It doesn’t stop her from giving the man a hug and a heartfelt thank you for taking care her of her little hero in the happiest days of his life.

It doesn’t stop Class 3-A in cheering for the boy with the sunshine smile and the golden heart, who always went above and beyond plus ultra.

It doesn’t stop the world from turning its time back into motion.

But it starts something.

And it starts with a hero agency called Deku – because it sounds like you can do it, doesn’t it?