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Izuku had been shot.
This would have been bad enough without the threat of the bullet having been the infamous quirk erasing one that’s been circulating around nowadays.
Now, Izuku has been shot, is bleeding, the culprit has gotten away and he might have permanently lost OFA.
Joy.
He just had to find Mirio-senpai -- they got separated in the commotion -- and they could get back to the agency, figure it all out.
…Izuku really wasn’t looking forward to seeing Sir Nighteye’s expression when Izuku told him he might or might not have lost One For All.
What if the quirk wouldn’t return, even if Izuku had been shot with the temporary version of the serum? Maybe because he didn’t have the quirk factor to begin with, it would be lost forever?
Logically, he knew that was very unlikely to happen. OFA worked for him, even if it did break his bones for a long while. The lack of a quirk factor didn’t prevent it from doing that, so it hopefully wouldn’t prevent it from coming back once the serum wore off.
If it was the temporary one, that is. That was still in question.
All Might would be devastated if Izuku had managed to lose the legacy quirk after nine generations of keeping it out of All For One’s hands…
If it was a permanent serum, Izuku would very much not show his face in Musutafu ever again. He’d become a vigilante and come out exclusively at night.
Or, no, better yet: In the middle of the day. He didn’t want to stumble upon Aizawa-sensei, either.
Speaking of vigilantism…
Izuku’s keen ears caught the sounds of a scuffle, somewhere in a nearby alley.
He hesitated.
On one hand, his quirk might be gone. His arm was still bleeding sluggishly.
On the other hand, he had a provisional license, he was technically still out on patrol, and he had done more with worse injuries in the past.
“Deku!” Lemillion called, waving at him from the other end of the street.
Izuku, having already taken off towards the noise, didn’t hear him.
There was a girl in a long, flowy skirt -- hospital gown? -- running down the alleyway, the noise Izuku had heard was her bare feet kicking the cans scattered over the ground.
…Why was she running bare-footed?
“Are you alright?” Izuku asked, causing the girl to look at him, her eyes terrified.
She crashed into Izuku’s knees, clutching at him tightly. “Please don’t let him take me,” she whispered. “Please!”
“Of course not!” Izuku assured her.
That was as much as he managed to say before the man appeared, stepping out of a door at the end of the alley.
Straightening up, Izuku stepped in front of the girl.
“Ah, you’ve found my daughter,” the man said, his eyes cold. “Return her.”
It wasn’t a hard decision to make.
“No,” Izuku said. He didn’t think; he just called One For All forth.
***
When Izuku came back to consciousness, he seemed to be standing somewhere far away from the alley he remembered. The girl wasn’t anywhere near him.
The man who claimed to have been her father was lying collapsed on the ground, his mask thrown askew, supporting himself with one arm, the other pointing a gun at Izuku.
His suit was way dirtier than before, torn and bloodied. Looking down at himself, Izuku could see his own hero costume was in almost as bad a condition, pieces of black gunk sticking to the edges.
Behind himself, there was a clear path of destruction, bulldozing through the buildings and any obstructions indiscriminately.
Izuku looked back at the man, powering up One For All just in case.
“What happened?” He asked, baffled.
The man’s eyes were focused on the sparks flying over Izuku’s skin, the hand holding the gun trembling lightly.
“Who are you?” He whispered. “Why doesn’t the serum work on you?”
Izuku blinked. Then shrugged.
“I’m just built differently.”