Chapter Text
Iida felt he deserved the nightmares. He couldn’t think of a time since his battle against Stain that he hadn’t woken up paralyzed. It was only after he felt the tip of Stain’s knife dig into his throat that he could break out of the nightmare’s hold on him. Drenched in sweat and terrified, his first action was usually to lean over and retch into the trash can he kept beside his bed.
He hadn’t told anyone about the nightmares. How could he? The thought of admitting defeat to something within his own mind left a bitter taste in his mouth. He wanted to be a hero - he wanted to be worthy of the title. His brother - Ingenium - would never complain about something so trivial. And Iida would do the same.
So that was how he found himself night after night, straining against the ghost of a quirk that had long since vacated his body. All he could do was look around the room, wide-eyed and terrified as he felt the tip of Stain’s blade pierce through his shoulder. Only experiencing the nightmare so many times already kept him from crying out from the phantom pain. He swore he could feel blood slipping down his shoulder as the pressure of the blade moved to the crux of his throat.
He whimpered then, just slightly, as bile rose in his mouth. For one horrifying moment he thought he might actually be paralyzed again, that he might actually die there, limbs tangled up uselessly in his sweat-soaked sheets. It wasn’t until he started to hyperventilate that he finally, finally felt his fingers twitch from where they rested against his side.
He was off his bed in less than a second. He felt his quirk roar to life in his hurry to lean over the trash can. He retched until his throat burned from the bile and his knees ached from the awkwardness of the position. Even when there was nothing left to come up, his stomach still swirled as the phantom remnants of Stain’s quirk tingled on the surface of his skin.
He pulled his glasses off the nightstand and wiped at the sweat that had collected on his forehead before he slipped them onto his face. The soft red light of his alarm clock let him know it was just now turning 4 A.M. He closed his eyes for a moment, but opened them just as quickly. Everytime he blinked, all he could see was Stain’s disfigured face smiling down at him, tongue lolling out and dripping with Iida’s own blood. He looked longingly at his bed, but knew that sleeping anymore this morning was out of the question.
“I suppose Aizawa wouldn’t mind too much if I went for my morning run slightly earlier than usual,” he said aloud.
It was a habit he’d quickly grown into, speaking out loud to himself. He wasn’t quite sure when the silence had become too much for him to bear. He supposed it was when it was no longer truly silent, but filled with Stain’s maniacal laughter, of his brother’s pained screams, of his friends fighting to save his life after he so recklessly threw it away.
He stood up and frowned when he noticed the charred edges of his bedding. His engines had singed the sheets again. He would have to replace them himself this time; Aizawa was starting to give him questioning looks when he asked for yet another set. Once or twice might seem normal, but anymore than that was a bit much, he figured.
He quickly stripped the sheets and set them in the corner of the room. He would have to see about going off campus later that afternoon. They weren’t terribly far from a store he knew sold household goods, and as long as he got someone to accompany him, he was sure Aizawa would allow the trip. He nodded to himself, somewhat content now that he had a plan in place.
Getting dressed was a quick affair, so he was down in the kitchens in just a few minutes. Unsurprising to him, Shinsou was sprawled out on the couch playing on some sort of gaming console. He raised an eyebrow when he saw Iida.
“You’re up earlier than usual,” he said in lieu of a greeting. Iida forced a smile onto his face and walked over to his classmate.
“I decided to go for a longer run this morning. Endurance training is just as important as quirk training, you know!”
Also unsurprising to him, Shinsou looked considerably less than convinced by his lie. He always seemed to have a sixth sense when it came to people in distress. Iida thought it was admirable, a good quality for a hero, but he never did enjoy being on the receiving end of that perceptiveness.
“Well your teacher isn’t here, but I’ll give you permission, if that’s what you’re down here for,” Shinsou said. He turned back to his game, signalling that he was done with the conversation.
Iida bristled. Shinsou wasn’t even in Class 1-A yet, how did he think he had the right to give him permission for something like this? He opened his mouth to argue, but stopped at Shinsou’s pointed look. He looked away, unable to meet that knowing gaze.
“Perhaps I can accept that, just this once,” he agreed.
And then he was off. Ever since they had moved into the dorms, he had gone on an early morning run around campus. It was a habit he had gotten into while he still lived at home. Tensei would often join him and they would run until he was sure his lungs would burst if he took even one more step. They always ended their time together by going to Iida’s favorite cafe where they would refuel on orange and grapefruit juice. The memory used to be a happy one.
He tried to push the thought out of his mind and focus on the way his feet pounded against the pavement. Usually on days like these, where no amount of coffee would lessen the sleeplessness pulling at him, he would partially activate his quirk and speed through his usual route so he could be sure he did not overdo it before training later that day. Not today, though. Today he wanted it to burn .
He sped up as Stain’s image passed through his mind again. He couldn’t deny that he had gotten faster since his fight with the Hero Killer. He knew that he should be proud of himself for this accomplishment; he knew that he should be happy he had gained at least something from the fight. But he could only bring himself to wonder what might have happened if he had been as fast then as he was now. Maybe if he had the speed then that he had now, Todoroki and Midoriya wouldn’t have gotten hurt. He blinked against the memories and forced himself to go faster.
As he passed by the halfway point of his route, he could almost hear his brother’s voice asking him to take on the name Ingenium. He almost laughed at the thought. What exactly had he done to be worthy of that honor? What had he done to prove that he was worthy enough to even hold the Iida family quirk, let alone the name they had coveted for generations? If he was worthy, shouldn’t he have been able to avenge his brother?
Even against the booming thud of his footfalls, he could still hear Stain cackling in his ear. He could hear that maniacal voice disparaging his brother’s name, calling him weak and useless and unworthy. He blinked against the tears pooling in his eyes.
No matter how fast he ran, no matter how far he pushed himself, he could still hear Stain’s voice in his head. He could only see blood and carnage and his brother lying broken in his hospital bed. His lungs were burning. He wasn’t sure if his face was wet from sweat or from the tears that were flowing freely down his face. His body was on fire. His engines were heating up, warning him to slow down. He knew he needed to stop, but he forced himself to keep going, relishing in the searing pain coursing through his calves. At least he could feel it.
And then he was falling, skidding across the pavement as his engines sputtered to life just long enough to give him one last burst of speed before he stalled. He didn’t bother catching himself as legs gave out. He hit the ground hard, wincing as the gravel raked across his skin and tore him open. As he finally slid to a stop, delirious and giddy and exhausted, he felt a smile at the corner of his mouth.
He was too exhausted to move from his spot on the ground. Distantly, he was reminded of how similar this feeling of utter exhaustion was to Stain’s quirk, but he couldn’t seem to bring himself to care about the similarities there. The sharp stinging from the scrape high on his cheek and the throbbing in his leg from where his knee had connected with the pavement kept him aware enough to know that he wasn’t paralyzed. As he heaved in lungful after lungful of air, he almost laughed at the realization that the pain had brought him an odd, but not unwelcome, sense of clarity. For the first time in months, his mind was quiet.
He wasn’t sure how long he laid there. It wasn’t until his phone chimed to let him know that it was nearly time for class that he made any attempt to move. The wounds on his face and legs were still bleeding sluggishly. He moved so that he was kneeling and winced as the gravel dug even further into the wounds on his legs. Instead of moving, he slowly settled his weight down even further. A sick sense of satisfaction flooded through him as the pain doubled.
He looked down and noticed the small puddles of blood that had formed where he had fallen. He slipped his fingers through the blood and dirt and swirled it around until all of the bright crimson turned muddied and dark. He curled his fingers into the ground until the mixture was caked underneath his fingernails. Finally, he wiped his hands off against his shorts and forced himself to his feet. He scraped his foot against the small puddles. It was a careless attempt to cover the evidence of his fall - but he couldn’t bring himself to care.
He started up a slow jog back towards the dorms, ignoring the way that his body screamed at him to stop. He stared down at the pavement and forced himself to keep going, to focus on taking step after step, just one after another, over and over and over. He could feel the rivulets of blood sliding down his knees, winding down the backs of his calves before it soaked into his socks.
He had always enjoyed running. It was his entire life, after all. Truthfully, he wasn’t sure he knew who he was without it. As he rounded the corner, he briefly wondered what it said about him that the only reason he was still running was because of how badly it was hurting him to do so.
“Iida! Are you okay?”
Iida looked up to the frantic voice of Midoriya. He had only just reentered the dorms. Somehow it had slipped his mind that Midoriya would be getting back from his own workout around this time and that he would surely notice his injuries.
“Ah, Midoriya! Yes, I assure you that I am alright. The ground is quite slippery, though, so watch your step!” He said. He continued walking towards the stairs, efficiently cutting off his friend’s worried muttering as he slipped into the stairwell.
He felt guilt swirl in his stomach. He knew that he should just confide in Midoriya. After all that they had been through together, he knew that his friend would not judge him for his emotions. He knew that if anyone would have any idea of what he was feeling, it would be Midoriya. Even so, he could not bring himself to speak up. Perhaps it was guilt at further burdening his friend, or shame at being unable to handle his problems on his own.
“What the hell happened to you?”
Iida was pulled from his thoughts as yet another voice rang out. He looked up to see Bakugou entering the stairwell from the landing just above his own. Iida plastered a smile on his face and raised his hands in a placating gesture.
“The ground outside was still slippery this morning and I didn’t take that into account when I calculated the speed of my run. I appreciate the concern, Bakugou!”
“I’m not concerned,” Bakugou snapped, clicking his teeth as he stomped down the stairs towards Iida.
“Right,” Iida conceded, nodding his head at Bakugou. If he hurried, he might be able to clean himself up before classes started. As he slipped down the hall towards his bedroom, he was unaware of the blood-red eyes tracking his movements.
The pattern was becoming all too familiar, now. Once he discovered that any level of pain brought a brief sense of clarity to his mind, Iida had quickly risen in the ranks of 1-A students that found themselves nearly constantly injured. Although he supposed he was on the list in his mind only, considering that unlike the others, he never went to Recovery Girl. The first day, shortly after his fall, Aizawa had forced him to go see the retired Pro so that the cut on his eye didn’t leave a scar. The moment his wounds were healed, Iida found himself back where he had started, exhausted and terrified and unable to shut out the voices swirling around in his mind.
He became increasingly cautious, then. He knew he would have to hide the injuries littering his skin if he wanted to keep Stain out of his mind. His skin was mottled with fading yellows and purples, with constellations of scrapes and cuts. He had taken to raking his fingernails over his skin, relishing in the flood of relief that followed the pain.
He knew that what he was doing was reckless, dangerous even, but he couldn’t bring himself to stop. The quiet numbness that enveloped his mind in lieu of Stain’s maniacal voice was addicting. And he was willing to do anything if it meant he got to keep his mind free of the Hero Killer.
So when Tensei approached him with a well-kept family secret, one each generation’s Ingenium put themselves through in order to grow even faster, even stronger, Iida hadn’t hesitated to accept. Tensei had spoken of anesthesia and painkillers, of doctors and hospitals, but Iida had assured him he would handle the preparations on his own. He had waved off his brothers concerns and told him that he should focus on his own journey to recovery. The conversation had ended shortly after, but it stayed in the forefront of Iida’s mind for weeks after the fact.
All this time, he had been putting his body through hell week after week with barely any results to show for it. With a quick glance at his surroundings to ensure he was alone, he settled down onto a fallen tree trunk and grabbed the pliers from his bag. He had made sure to choose a location that he knew was far away from campus and completely hidden by the surrounding foliage. He wanted to be sure that no one would be able to find him unless they had been following him from the start. He hadn’t even started, but his mind was already racing. He was fast, he knew that much. He was faster than he had ever been before, but he still wasn’t anywhere near the speed he needed to be at if they wanted to have any chance at taking down the League. He glanced up at the sky, attempting to calm his growing nerves.
After a moment, he sighed and reached for the rest of his materials. There was no point in waiting any further. With a grimace, he placed the leather strap he’d purchased in between his teeth and bit down down. Even now, his classmates were working as hard as they possibly could to ensure they had any remote chance in taking down the villains. He ground his teeth down into the leather as he fit the pliers around the sensitive metal of his engines. It was going to make him stronger, he told himself, hands already slick with sweat and shaking with anticipation. He sucked in a deep breath. Then another. And another. His glasses slipped down the bridge of his nose as he tightened his grip. He would have ripped out his engines weeks ago if he had known it would make him faster.