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Izuku crept down the stairs as silently as he could, carefully skirting around the creaky floorboards as he made his way from his dorm room to the kitchen in the common area for a glass of water. He didn’t need to be as meticulous in his movements as he was, but Aizawa had recently given the class a lesson on the merits of not barging into a room and announcing your presence to everyone who may or may not be waiting within.
And, well, Izuku kind of took the lesson to heart.
He took the stairs (because the elevator would ding on each floor both ways) and slipped noiselessly into the kitchen. Since his eyes were already accustomed to the dark, he chose to forgo turning the lights on and instead went straight for the cupboard to pull out a cup. For a second, he contemplated making tea or hot cocoa, but he waved the thought aside. He was just thirsty. He didn’t need to waste the class’s limited supply, even if Yaoyorozu could refill it faster than you could blink.
Izuku filled his glass with tap water and gulped the refreshing liquid down before placing the empty cup in the sink. With his task complete, he began heading back toward the staircase but stopped when he heard a low grunt coming from the dining area. He frowned and waited, stock-still for at least a minute, straining to hear the sound again. Just as he began to move away, another grunt, this time a little louder, came to him and he turned in its direction.
It was a very cloudy night, which meant no starlight could penetrate through the windows for him to see much and Izuku wondered how he’d managed to get his drink when there was so much shadow surrounding him. He took a slow step toward the dining table, eyes flickering left and right for any sign of movement. He didn’t see anything, but now he could swear he heard breathing. It was deep and even–whoever it was, they were probably asleep. Or they were going to great lengths to make him think they were asleep.
He took another step forward, squinting his eyes to see better in the darkness. He looked over at the couches, clustered around the tv after his class’s semi-weekly movie night. That was the most likely place for someone to pass out, he thought. But he saw nothing. He bent low and scanned the floor, crawling on his hands and knees as he searched for the originator of the sounds.
“Ack!” Izuku cursed when he bumped his head against the leg of the dining table. He stopped looking for a moment to rub the spot where his forehead connected with the table and groaned. If Aizawa had been watching him, he’d probably say something like, ‘You’re supposed to sneak up on your enemy. Not let your enemy sneak up on you. Stop blundering around like a chicken with its head cut off, Problem Child’. Izuku let out a soft sigh and stood up. Ever since that first day in class when his teacher had sneaked up behind him in his yellow sleeping bag without making a sound, he’d wanted to learn how to do the same. Judging by his performance tonight, he still had a long way to go.
Just then, he heard the grunting sound again. It was louder this time. Closer. And the teen tensed up reflexively, eyes scanning the area once more. This time, as they skimmed the air around the table, he was able to spot a black mass rising and falling on the table, surrounded by a bunch of thin, off-white rectangles spread around it. Izuku stared at it for a long minute, frowning.
“Did you fall asleep grading again, sensei?” he asked quietly, walking around the table toward the man with more surety and forgoing the pretense of stealth he’d adopted earlier. Aizawa didn’t answer. As he approached, Izuku noted the way his teacher rested his head on one arm while the other lay next to him, covering some of the papers. Izuku contemplated waking him up or grabbing a blanket off the couch to throw over him but decided not to. If Aizawa was cold or uncomfortable, he’d wake up and take care of it himself. It would be illogical for him not to.
Izuku shrugged and started to walk away when he heard a small whimper come from his teacher’s mouth, stopping dead in his tracks. He knew that sound. Knew the terror that went along with it. The moments of the waking world that were so bad you forced yourself to keep your mind off it only for those memories to attack you when you went to bed, forcing you to face them in a place you couldn’t just walk away. Izuku turned back to his teacher and this time he could make out Aizawa’s face twisted in some emotion close to fear, but not quite the same. His hands were clenched tight on the table.
“Sensei?” he said haltingly as he reach his hand out towards Aizawa. He knew from personal experience that it could be difficult for a person to wake themselves from a nightmare.
Aizawa whimpered again. Izuku’s hand inched closer to his shoulder.
“Sensei, it’s just a dream. You’re okay. You’re in the dorm.” As he spoke, Izuku leaned closer to Aizawa, keeping his voice low and gentle, like soothing a scared cat. There was no response from the man. “Everything’s okay,” Izuku continued, undeterred. Then he made a mistake. The moment his fingers brushed against his teacher’s shoulder, Aizawa leaped up, sending his chair toppling over and clattering on the ground. One of his arms flew out to the side, catching Izuku in the chest and sending him sprawling on the floor.
Izuku gasped and looked up with startled eyes at his teacher, who now stood before him, eyes open and glowing red with Erasure active. Izuku had enough time to feel very small and very afraid before Aizawa descended upon him, arm outstretched. A large hand wrapped around Izuku’s neck and began squeezing, forcing him to stay down. Immediately, the pressure concentrated on Izuku’e neck set off alarm bells in his brain that he wasn’t getting enough air and he grabbed at the hand holding him down and strained to pull it away. He tried to say something, choked on a vowel, and attempted, unsuccessfully, to draw in several breaths of air. All the while, Aizawa suffocated him, angry red eyes seeing someone who wasn’t even there.
Frustrated tears pricked Izuku’s dimming eyes, blurring his ever-decreasing field of vision. His head throbbed from lack of oxygen. He could feel his arms growing weaker and choked on a sob as a fat tear spilled from his eye and trailed down the side of his face.
“Se-” Izuku tried again, only for the man to squeeze harder. He could barely see the two glowing red spots that were his teacher’s eyes. He had to try again. One last time. He couldn’t let Eraserhead become a murderer! Pulling what remained of his strength together, he tried one last time to get Aizawa to stop.
“Se’sei . . .” he barely managed to rasp out as his vision went fully dark. “Please . . .”
His eyes rolled up in his head and his hands fell uselessly at his sides. Then he lay, unmoving, on the wooden floor of 1-A’s dorm.
~~~
Shouta’s vision swam in and out of focus. One minute he was looking down on Dabi as he took his final breaths. The next, a flicker of familiar green took over. Confused, the man blinked. Dabi looked up at him with determined viridian eyes (his eyes were blue) and opened his mouth to speak. Shouta frowned at his words.
Sesay? No, se’sei. Sensei?
Suddenly, his sight cleared and in the dim light, Shouta saw his student’s unconscious body on the floor with his hand crushing the teen’s neck. With a startled gasp, Shouta jerked himself backward, away from Midoriya, breathing heavily as if trying to compensate for the breaths he’d deprived his student of.
“M-Midoriya?” He said uncertainly. When he didn’t get a response he reached for the boy, only to pull his hands to his chest, afraid that he’d just end up hurting Midoriya more. Shouta didn’t know what to do, so he pulled his phone out of his pocket and called someone who would.
“Aizawa-kun, if you’re injured again, just go-”
“I n-need you at the 1-A dorm,” Shouta’s wavering voice cut the elderly woman off.
There was a second of stunned silence on the other end before Recovery Girl replied, “On my way,” and hung up.
Shouta let the phone slip from his hand and clatter on the floor as he stared, wide-eyed, at his student’s body. He thought he saw the boy’s chest rise and fall with shallow breaths, but that might’ve been his imagination. A trick of the darkness that surrounded them both. He wanted– No. He needed Midoriya to be okay. This boy whom he’d written off before school even started. Who then proceeded to use Shouta’s expectations as fuel for the desperate, determined fire that always shone in his bright, young eyes. Who saved Eri and fought off Overhaul by using their quirks to counter each other–all with a smile on his freckled face. This hero. Midoriya Izuku. He had to be okay. Shouta would never be able to live with himself if he-
If he-
“Sorry,” he breathed out, still staring at Midoriya. Even if his student had been awake, Shouta doubted he would’ve been heard. But, whether it was heard or not, that word was very, very true. Shouta was sorry. He was sorry and scared and all he could do was sit there, trembling, with his hands clenched against his chest as guilt wrapped around his rapidly beating heart like a boa constrictor about to squeeze the life out of him.
Like what he’d tried to do to Midoriya.
Oh, fuck, what if he succeeded?
The creak of the front door opening went unheard to Shouta’s ears, as did the sound of Recovery Girl removing her shoes in the entryway. He did hear her mutter something under her breath before the lights were suddenly flicked on and she gasped at what the light revealed.
“Midoriya-kun!” Recovery Girl exclaimed, rushing to his side. “What happened, Aizawa!?” She didn’t turn to look at the young teacher, but years of hero instinct told her where Shouta was and she directed her words his way. Shouta didn’t answer at first, his body caving in on itself as he saw exactly what he’d done. The woman, kneeling beside Midoriya’s body, began assessing his injuries, muttering her findings out loud. “He’s been strangled,” she stated matter-of-factly. “Did you see who did it, Aizawa-kun?”
Shouta took in a shallow breath and answered softly, “I-I did.” But, like the apology earlier, it went unheard. Recovery Girl gently lifted Midoriya’s head, running her fingers over his scalp, feeling for bumps or cuts that might be oozing blood.
“Aizawa, what happened!?” She demanded, still not looking up from her patient. This time, Shouta didn’t even try to answer. His mind filled with worry for the small body on the floor. Midoriya looked so small and . . . fragile. He was just a kid. So young . . .
Shit, Shouta still didn’t know if he was alive!
“Aizawa!” Recovery Girl snapped angrily, turning to face the teacher with a less-than-friendly quip ready on her tongue. One look at Shouta and she held it back. She saw the guilt that was so evident on his face and the way he pulled away from the kid, rather than toward him–as he would have normally done. And she knew.
“Aizawa-kun,” she said in a low voice, staring into his dark eyes. “Tell me you didn’t . . .” Shouta held her gaze for all of two seconds before lowering his head in silent admission as tears welled up in his eyes. Recovery Girl returned to her work without another word, leaving Shouta to deal with the demons that sprouted inside him in the few minutes since he woke up, whispering things in his ear. Telling him the kid was dead. That he killed him. And Shouta knew Midoriya had been a good kid, so the only way for Shouta to atone was to k̶̫̙̅i̶͔͆l̸̝̊ļ̷̻́̋ ̸̣̊h̸̜̅i̴̹͗m̶̤̊̎s̴̝͗ĕ̸̻l̷̥̺̐͂f̷͇̂.
Shouta shook his head to clear the thought away with minimal success. He frowned. He didn’t really ‘wake up’ to himself strangling Midoriya, did he? He had already been awake, at least a little bit. Shouta shook his head. No, he didn’t wake up. He became aware. Aware of what he was doing. Who he was doing it to. If he closed his eyes he could hear Midoriya speaking. Not just the desperate plea that broke through Shouta’s hazy mind, but words from before that, too. Reassurances that were directed at him in a calm, soothing tone. Midoriya had been trying to comfort him. And in return, Shouta tried to kill him.
Shouta opened his eyes again and looked at his student. He looked at the school nurse. “Is-” his voice broke and it was still too quiet. She didn’t hear him. Shouta took a deep, shaky breath. “Is he-” he swallowed “-is he alive?”
Recovery Girl tensed up, her hands stilling as she looked at the man warily and pursed her lips. “He is,” she answered curtly and Shouta released the breath he’d been holding, squeezing his eyes shut as relief rushed through him. “I’m making sure he doesn’t need surgery before I use my quirk on him.” Shouta nodded his understanding and she went back to work. He didn’t kill him. Midoriya wasn’t dead. Shouta wasn’t a murderer.
H̸̭́e̷͓̔̔ ̴̛̘̕s̷͚͊̓ḫ̶̰̆o̵̧͓̅u̴̪͙̓l̷̺̑ḍ̶͊ ̶͎̿s̵̮͒ẗ̷͚i̶͓͔̒l̷̟̺͛l̸̹͂ ̴̪̞͘k̶͇̎î̴̩̞͝l̴̻̰̚l̴͉̳̾̚ ̷͓̈̔ḧ̶̻́i̵͎̍͛m̸̬͕̌͝s̸̽́͜e̶̯̳l̸̟͂f̵̦̽ͅ
Recovery Girl exhaled, satisfied that it was safe to heal the boy, and pressed a kiss to Midoriya’s forehead. His breathing had been scarily shallow when she arrived and his neck was already bruising. But when she applied her quirk, the bruises disappeared almost at once and he gasped and coughed harshly. His viridian eyes fluttered open and darted around as he tried to get his bearings. When he focused on the school nurse, he asked in a strained voice,
“Se’sei? Where se’sei?”
Recovery Girl frowned down at him and unconsciously turned her head in Shouta’s direction. Midoriya lifted his head and followed the action until his gaze found his teacher. Shouta stared back, not knowing what to do or expect. Obviously, he’d be mad. He’d probably demand to be switched to a different class at the very least, or get Shouta sent to Tartarus. The teacher knew the kid was close with All Might and even if he wasn’t as strong as he once was, his word held a lot of weight.
Midoriya literally had Shouta’s life in his hand and Shouta had no idea what he might do with it. So he stared back into those viridian eyes and waited for his sentencing.
Midoriya smiled softly, his face flooding with relief.
“‘M gla’ you’re o-kay.”
Shouta broke. One hand clutched his chest while the other clamped hard over his mouth in a feeble attempt to stop the sob that was trying to force its way past his lips. Tears welled up in his eyes as he was reminded of how selfless Midoriya was. The only time the kid thought about himself was when he was trying to get better to help more people. To save more lives. As if to prove Shouta's thought, the teen's smile fell away and he scrambled up onto his hands and knees, brushing aside Recovery Girl when she attempted to push him back down.
"Se’sei?" he croaked out, a concerned look taking over his features. Shouta closed his eyes again and shook his head. Nothing about their situation justified Midoriya showing so much care for his teacher. He should be yelling angrily at Shouta! Or trying to get away from him! There should be fear in his eyes! Shouta had tried to kill him, for pity’s sake!
"I-I'm sorry!" Shouta cried, his voice muffled by his hand. "I am so, so sorry!"
"It's okay!" Midoriya responded quickly before delving into a coughing fit that had Recovery Girl demand he let her nurse-bots take him to the infirmary. Shouta, keeping his eyes shut tight, heard some shuffling and for a second he thought Midoriya was going along with her suggestion. Then he felt a hand on his arm and his eyes opened to see that Midoriya had crawled up next to him and was giving him the most distressed look Shouta had ever seen. And as Shouta stared into his student’s eyes, he couldn’t help but think about how he didn’t deserve to have Midoriya in his life. Not anymore.
Shouta tried to apologize again, but his heart had lodged itself in his throat and nothing came out. The tears that had pooled in his eyes earlier threatened to spill over as new ones joined them and a panicked look flashed across Midoriya’s face.
“N-no!” The teen said hurriedly, gripping Shouta’s arm a little tighter. “Please don’t cry, sensei! Everyth-everything’s fine! I’m fine! Really!” As he said this, Midoriya tried to give a reassuring smile, but that only made Shouta feel worse. Midoriya sniffed, his bottom lip trembling. “Sensei, You m-might not know this, but I’m a-a sympathetic crier, so if you start crying, then I’m gonna-”
A tear slipped down Shouta’s cheek, opening the floodgates for them both.
Midoriya made a strangled noise that was somewhere between a sob and an alarmed cry as his body dove into Shouta’s chest. Shouta pulled his hands away from the teen, unsure of what he was supposed to do next. The fear that he would hurt Midoriya more if he touched him was warring with the part of him that wanted to comfort and be comforted. Shouta’s heart ached as Midoriya shook against his chest, wetting the man’s shirt with his tears. Shouta stared wide-eyed down at him and slowly, hesitatingly, he put his arms around the kid. He kept his palms out and away which made the hug a little awkward, but Midoriya either didn’t notice or didn’t care because he relaxed into it immediately.
Shouta’s breathing was shallow and his body was tense. Then the desire to console won the war and he let himself embrace Midoriya properly, holding him close as he buried his face in his student’s neck.
“I’m s-sorry,” he whimpered, his breath coming out in hot bursts. “I am s-so sorry.”
Midoriya made no answer apart from grasping onto the fabric of Shouta’s shirt and trying to bury himself in it.
Unnoticed by either of them, as they cried into each other, Recovery Girl had stepped away to call Nedzu to alert him to what had happened. Upon learning of the situation, UA’s principal asked Yagi and Yamada to head over to the 1-A dorm to assist and called Tsukauchi for help. The detective arrived a few minutes later and all parties were somber as they entered the building and Recovery Girl told them all that transpired in a quiet voice so as not to disturb the teacher and his student. When she finished, they all had a look of shocked sorrow on their faces and they turned to the two members of class 1-A, still embracing on the floor.
Tsukauchi waited until the sobbing died down before nodding at Present Mic, who sighed softly and approached them. He knelt a little to the left of Midoriya and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder.
“Hey, bud,” he said softly. Midoriya, who had his face pressed against Shouta’s chest, sniffed and turned his head to look at the English teacher. Hizashi smiled reassuringly. “We gotta take Sho away now. Do you think you could let him go?”
Midoriya’s eyes grew wide and he fiercely wrapped his arms around Shouta as if he could keep the man there all by himself. Which he probably could. Shouta took in his kid’s action and felt something warm blossom in his chest.
“No!” Midoriya exclaimed. “You c-can’t! I won’t let you! H-he didn’t do anything wrong!”
Shouta frowned and forced the teen to let go, holding him a little closer than an arm’s length away. “Midoriya,” he said, fixing Midoriya with a harsh look. “I-I tried to kill you.”
“But you didn’t! You stopped! It’s okay!”
“It’s not okay!” Shouta yelled, resisting the urge to shake the boy to get his point across. “Do you even understand what I’ve done!? Do you know what ‘attempted murder’ means!?”
“Yes!” Midoriya answered. “But it’s just me, so it’s fine!”
Midoriya was facing away from the other people in the room, so he didn’t see the stricken looks that took over the faces of the grown-ups when he said that. But Shouta saw, and he could sympathize with them.
‘Just me.’
Shouta didn’t even want to think about what those words implied.
“Midoriya,” he said after a minute, his voice soft again, but this time he didn’t know what to say. He couldn’t think of a way to convey how and why what his student said was extremely wrong. Thankfully, Hizashi was there to help.
“Little Listener,” the blond said, his hand still on Midoriya’s shoulder. “We’re not taking him away forever. We just want to make sure this doesn’t happen again. And in order to do that, we have to take him to someone who can help him.”
“Why can’t you help him here?” Midoriya demanded as he glared at Hizashi. Shouta closed his eyes for a moment and sighed in near defeat. What would it take to get through to this kid? What could he say to make Midoriya see how awful what Shouta had done was?
“He doesn’t work here,” Hizashi answered calmly. There was a small bit of humor in his voice that Shouta barely managed to identify. “And Sho will probably have to stay with him for a while. But then he’ll come back and everything will go back to normal.”
Midoriya frowned, thinking Hizashi’s words over carefully in his mind. “He’ll be gone how long? And you promise he’ll come back? He’ll still be our teacher?”
You still want me to be your teacher? Shouta bit his tongue to keep that thought from leaving his mouth.
“Well, I can’t say for certain,” Hizashi smiled. “But if everything goes well, he’ll be back within a week. Of course, you’ll have to ask him to promise he’ll come back. It’s not really up to me.”
“But he’s a liar. I can’t trust his promises.”
Tsukauchi, who had been standing silently several feet away, snorted at the deadpan way Midoriya spoke. Shouta didn’t have the heart to scowl at him. And besides, the kid was right.
“I’ll come back,” Shouta vowed. Because he had to. Apparently, he needed to teach this kid how to identify abuse when it’s directed at him. And although he could trust Hizashi and Nemuri to teach Midoriya for him, Shouta wanted to see that the lesson sank in with his own eyes. Hizashi eyed his friend for a minute, studying his face to try and see if he was lying before nodding and turning back to Midoriya.
“He’ll be back, kiddo,” Hizashi promised. “You can trust me.”
“Mmm. Okay.” Midoriya said after analyzing the two men. He didn’t sound convinced. But after a bit, he let Hizashi pull him away from Shouta and bring him to stand with Yagi. Shouta noticed the two of them share a look before the former Symbol of Peace spread his arms and Midoriya stepped into the hug. Tsukauchi approached Shouta and cleared his throat, offering a hand to help the other man to his feet.
“Don’t worry, Eraser,” he whispered. “This won’t happen again.” Shouta didn’t know how to respond, so he just stayed silent and followed behind the police detective as he and Hizashi headed for the door.
“Wait!” Midoriya suddenly cried as they were heading out. The three men turned to him and Shouta felt Midoriya’s small body crash into his and give him a bear hug. “G-get well soon, sensei!”
Shouta bit his lip and looked up at Yagi and Recovery Girl for permission. Only when they both gave him the o-kay did he bend down to return the embrace. “I’ll do my best, kid,” he said. Then he pushed Midoriya back to Yagi and quickly walked with his best friend out the door.
He was crying again.
~~~ TWO WEEKS LATER ~~~
“Alright, let’s try this again,” Shouta said, after taking several breaths to calm down. Midoriya sighed, leaning back in his chair and gesturing for him to start. “You’re visiting your cousins-”
“-I don’t have any cousins-” Midoriya interjected.
“-Just pretend that you do,” Shouta snapped back. Sometimes he couldn’t believe how dense the kid could be. “You have cousins and you’re visiting them. And one of them accidentally bumps into their dad–your uncle. And in response, he slaps them. What do you do?”
Midoriya frowned as he imagined the scene. “Restrain him and call the cops.”
Shouta nodded approvingly. “Okay, now let’s say you go home and your dad is there. You accidentally break a plate and he gets mad, so he takes off his belt and uses it to whip you-”
“-He wouldn’t do that.”
“Pretend that he would.”
“But he wouldn’t .”
“Just pretend that he would !” Shouta grabbed the stress ball off of his desk and began squeezing in rhythmically. “In that scenario, what would you do?”
Midoriya frowned again as he thought. Then he shrugged. “I probably deserved it.”
“Why would you deserve it?” Shouta asked, exasperated.
“Plates cost money,” Midoriya responded with another shrug. “I can’t just go around smashing them willy-nilly.”
Shouta slumped forward in defeat, banging his head on the desk. Midoriya waited silently for a minute or two. Then he asked, “Are we done for today?”
Shouta didn’t bother to suppress the heavy sigh that forced its way out of his mouth. He shook his head sadly and answered, “Yes.” They both rose from their seats and the teacher stepped around the desk to walk Midoriya to the door. Before parting, they turned to each other and Shouta enveloped his student in a hug. They had become accustomed to embracing each other after each of their sessions and Shouta saw little logic in stopping the practice since Midoriya seemed to enjoy it, judging by the small smile he’d always give afterward.
“I’ll see you tomorrow, kid,” Shouta murmured into the teen’s hair. He wondered if Midoriya knew how much he cared about him.
“Yeah,” Midoriya nodded, wondering the same thing.