Chapter Text
One of the first memories Izuku has is of heat. His tired eyes had opened to a blurry image of a woman and a man holding him so close, and an unnatural warmness surrounded him. That was the only good memory of heat Izuku had for most of his childhood.
A few years later, only being three or four, Izuku knew that heat was painful. It left bright red marks on his skin and it made mommy cry. There’s nothing good about heat or the anger daddy feels that brings it. Heat was painful and bad, and there was nothing else that mattered.
Still five years old, Izuku remembers clearly when Kaachan developed his own quirk at daycare.
“I’m gonna be an awesome hero!” The blonde had yelled, rocketing himself off one of the plastic, blue, student, chairs.
“No doubt about it!”
And then, right as Kaachan had lifted his hand in a signature All-Might Platinum Era pose, hot, hot, explosions popped from his hands– and Izuku cried.
“Zuzu?”
Kaachan, who had begun to shout with glee and excitement of plans with his quirk, had suddenly spoken a lot softer.
“Zuku?”
Because when he turned to his best friend with joy in his eyes ready to ask for one of his super-smart analyses, he wasn’t ready for what he saw.
Midoriya, who always smiled and ranted and cheered when one of their classmates developed their quirk, was shaking. Katsuki watched him shake, clutching around himself so hard he’d leave bruises, and cry. Tears were streaming down his face– which Kaachan was understandably used to by now– but he was silent. Not a sob or cry came from his lips, but tears with no place to go but out. Bakugo knew, he was scared .
“Are you-” he paused, “did I?”
When Midoriya rased out of the classroom after he took a step towards his frozen friend, the teacher had ordered all of them to stay put while she sent another teacher in to watch them. Izuku went home early that day, and their teacher brought him his bag.
Bakugo didn’t know what he did, but he knew he did it. Kaachan glared down at his bright red hands well into the celebratory dinner his parents made for him.
Izuku had come to school the next day with a sheepish grin and kicking the ground lightly during an awkwardly silent reunion, but he also came with his notebook . Bakugo recognized it as his Hero Analysis notebook, which Izuku had stubbornly refused to bring out of his bedroom after a stranger had knocked into them and sent the book onto the floor, where the papers got creased and torn. Never again , Zuku had stubbornly told him.
But he was here and he had his notebook and God Katsuki was excited .
“I’m sorry I freaked out yesterday, but I took some notes on your quirk and I wanted to share them with you!”
Yeah , Katsuki thought, head resting on Izuku’s while he happily read from his notes, we’re gonna be great heroes.
Midoriya’s quirk awakened in what he’d later find out was called a “Forced Qurik Manifestation” despite being the normal age for it to develop. Even if he was six years old, it didn’t awaken naturally, and he’d have to deal with the repercussions that came with all forced manifestation implied.
Izuku didn’t blame his mom– couldn’t really– not after it happened. But it was her that triggered it manifesting. Or rather, her scream that triggered it.
“ Help!” She had cried, “ Save me! ” Obviously not directed at her precious son, cowering in the other side of the room as Hizashi burned her, burned her, burned her past recognition. She hadn’t even noticed it, not for what it was. She only understood the added heat . She had no clue it was her little Izuku who was doing it. Hizashi, for all he could deal out, hadn’t mutated a fire-resilience in his skin.
So no, when future Izuku would talk to his friends about his quirk manifestation at a dorm slumber party sharing funny mishaps and surprised parents, there was nothing natural about his quirk awakening. Nothing natural about the death of Midoirya Hizashi.
“Izuku? Baby?”
The hospital bed Inko laid in was soft. It was soft and nice , in a way that Izuku knew was special. He’d been to this hospital before with burns, with sprains, with a broken arm or wrist. He knew the difference in the sheets.
“Hi, momma.” The bandages wrapped almost her entire body, from head to toe where her skin just couldn’t recover from the abuse it had been put under. “I’m sorry.”
“Oh Hunny,” She’d cried and pulled him against her. He knew that it should have hurt, should have made her flinch or cry or push away, but she just held him tight. Izuku cried, cried because he did something bad , cried because his mom was hurt , cried because he knew what it meant when the heat stopped being painful . He knew, he knew but God he wished he didn’t.
When a man in a trench coat had explained to Izuku that they had to take him to the police station, that they had some questions, that he had to say goodbye to his momma , he didn’t cry.
He let the man guide him through the steps with the gentle hand placed on his back, pushing him towards the next step. He let the man push him away from his still mother, out of the room, around the corner, through the doors, into the elevator, around another corner, through the people, out the door, down the stairs, into the car, he found himself in a weird state of not-quite-living. His only tie to being awake was the hand that guided his every step, and when that hand disappeared in the car all Izuku could do was float .
He floated past today, a bad day, and went to yesterday. He floated through memories of school, of dinner, of Kaachan and his loud voice, of Ms. Kiao and her soft voice and kind smile, floated through the bento him mom had made him, floated through the shows they watched and the toys they played with and the things they’d learned. He floated through some things and by others until he couldn’t quite remember when he was supposed to be.
Today , a bitter voice had reminded him when his hand found a steady rhythm to track. The present , it sneered at him, dragging him back through time and shoving him back into the body of a person he didn’t want to be– wasn’t quite sure he was.
“Are you—---------, kid?”
Words were distorted and far, far, above all the water he’d been crushed under. Far away and he couldn’t hear all of what was said, but the rhythm in his hand was comforting and steady in a way Izuku couldn’t understand.
Izuku didn’t want to be in the present, where things had burned and burned so hot, but he also didn’t want to lose the stability of being back on the ground, back with the rhythm in his hand. Izuku didn’t know what he wanted, and he wasn’t sure he’d ever figure it out.