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Izuku sits at the edge of the River Styx, watching the water rush by, echoing in the cavernous ceiling. Charon had stopped to ruffle his hair before meandering back down the banks to ferry the next batch of souls. Distantly, Izuku understands that he perceives in mortal concepts—that while he sees a boat and indiscernible light, Charon is simultaneously ferrying thousands of souls across at a time.
This is the nature of mortality, but Izuku has never liked thinking about death as taking. People take. Sickness takes. Death is. It is more an aftermath, a consequence, a symptom of mortality, than it ever is a cause. Maybe it’s an ending—he doesn’t quite know and he’s long learned that none of the chthonic deities will tell him. He’ll find out like all people do.
He’s content with that.
Hugging his knees a little closer, he rests his head on top of them, curling into a ball. Behind him, he feels a presence approaching more than he sees or hears them. The air charges with static and the hairs on his arms raise.
Izuku’s eyes blink lazily, unbothered. The static is normal for any of the gods. Charon doesn’t quite feel the same, but Izuku has since learned to distinguish the differences between chthonic deities and chthonic gods, and he doesn’t care much either way. The Styx is a place only the entities of the Underworld feel comfortable around, and he feels quite safe around most of them.
A warm hand settles on his shoulder as a comforting weight. Izuku lifts his head to peer up at Thanatos, the deity he secretly looks at like some weird cross between an older brother and favorite uncle. Charon is more of a fatherly figure to him—especially since Thanatos’ form tends to appear much younger.
“Hello, Izuku,” the smile he gives is gentle and warm.
Izuku leans against the arm on his shoulder, sighing softly, “Hi to you too, Thanatos.”
The laughter is fond in reply as Thanatos lifts Izuku’s head gently off his arm before sitting down, wings flaring wide to cocoon Izuku and tug the boy back into his side. “Why’re you down here again, baby bird?”
“Hey!” Izuku pouts jokingly, “I’m not feathery like you! Not a bird.” He doesn’t even fight against his title as baby. After all, what is 13 years to a god thousands upon thousands of years old?
“Maybe so, but you’re still so little. Who knows? You could grow feathers,” Thanatos has smile lines despite his youthful appearance, and Izuku thinks it makes him look beautiful. Thanatos is the god of nonviolent death, the one who welcomes you into his arms and prays you get to him before Keres. Like Hypnos, his embrace is gentle and soft and filled to the brim with dreams of peace. Izuku loves him, loves the way that his love is returned, that he can have this softness. Touch, sitting at the Styx, has only ever been soothing and gentle.
“You know I don’t have control over these dreams,” Izuku says, circling back to the original question.
“Hmm…birdie, what happened today?” Thanatos knows that not having control doesn’t necessarily mean that Izuku doesn’t know what caused it. He can’t stop himself from showing up, but he usually only shows up after a bad day—like a subconscious defense mechanism.
Something still unknown to all of them, says that the Underworld is safe and secure for Izuku to retreat to. And while certainly true now, none of them are sure how he subconsciously first decided on the banks of the River Styx. He had just appeared one day. They are all grateful. Izuku is grateful.
He’s so lucky to be loved like this. To be secure in knowing that the hearth of home still burns, even long after your heart stops beating. Death does not hide. It’s not always kind or gentle, but it is honest, and they try so hard to be soft for Izuku. Who they can tell is a little fragile, and yet stronger than they can fathom at times.
“It’s stupid,” Izuku huffs, stubborn, “It’s fine now. And I get to see you guys, so it doesn’t matter.”
“Fledgling,” Thanatos chides.
Izuku tries to gnaw at his fingernails, but the wing covering him rustles. In his distraction, Thanatos grabs his hand, cradling it in his own palms like it’s something precious.
There’s a few more beats of silence but Death is patient and Izuku gives in first. “It wasn’t a big deal, seriously, Mom just couldn’t pick me up from school, and forgot to let me know.”
Thanatos stares at him, calm and waiting, eyes as black as the void and as still as deep waters.
Izuku tentatively continues, “I just decided to walk. It started raining though.”
“How long were you waiting, baby bird?”
“…an hour and half before I left to walk.”
“Sweetheart,” Thanatos sounds heartbroken, “That’s not okay. Especially if it was raining out.”
Thinking about the rain, Izuku shivers. He hadn’t had an umbrella or anything—and it was thunderstorming. The rain had felt like tiny pellets burrowing into his skin, and the thunder and flashing lightning had made him want to cry. Even worse, the cloud cover had made it dark. The hour walk had felt like desolation on a scale he never understood before.
The cold soaked deep into his bones, maybe sinking somewhere deeper, as he thinks about the ache, the hurt sitting on his tongue when Mom had come home, hours later, frazzled. Pressing a kiss to his forehead, giving a quick apology, before moving on, unconcerned. It was ok, because he got home at the end, right? The dismissal isn’t meant to hurt him but he is, he is, he is . He feels stupid that he’s mad his mom didn’t ask more questions, didn’t pay him more attention. And it’s such a small thing, but the list is so long. It compounds and hurts, hurts, hurts.
Izuku finally admits, “I was scared. And I was alone. I just missed you all, a lot. I went to sleep as soon as Mom got home.” It’s all but a confession that he had hoped he’d show up here in his dreams.
Thanatos cups his face with both hands. “Oh, baby bird, why do you keep pushing yourself like this,” Thanatos looks at him with mourning eyes, “You could stay here. We love you.”
“I know,” he smiles, “I love you all so much.” His heart feels like it’s overflowing with it.
“I promise, we want you here. Hypnos would put you to sleep, and I’d come guide you. And then Charon would carry you across, and you would be ours forever,” Thanatos is almost wistful at the end, longing for when he could hold Izuku for a small eternity.
“I know,” Izuku says, eyes watering as reaches forward, falling into a hug. “But not yet. Not now. I’ve still got to live.”
“Why do you always insist?” Thanatos huffs, laughter colored with both affection and sadness.
Izuku looks up at him, “Because I’m human. And that means we keep trying.” His smile is tremulous, “It means I have hope that there’s something else for me, and I have to hold onto that. It means we get good at facing impossible odds and hoping anyways. It means that my continued survival is hope in itself. I owe it to myself to try. To get to that second parentheses and live. I want to have loved being alive before I come to stay with all of you.”
A sigh pulls itself from his chest. “Baby bird, you are a miracle.” Thanatos is a god. He can’t understand life in the context of mortality. But he sees the shine in Izuku’s eyes and thinks that if life has taught Izuku to love like this, with generosity and warmth and excitement, maybe, just maybe, it will have been worth it.
“Living isn’t easy. It hurts a lot. But we do it nonetheless, because we learn to love wider with our eyes open. And when we grieve, we ache and love and there is pain, but aren’t we lucky to have loved at all? To have known how lucky we were to know someone? I don’t like wasting my chances,” Izuku goes quiet, “I don’t always remember it, but… how rare it is to live. How lucky we are.”
How lucky we must be that enough went right to bring us here today.
Thanatos tucks Izuku under his chin. “We’ll wait for you, then. And hold you closer when we do see you.”
Izuku smiles, “We live in spite of Pandora’s box, in honor of it. In spite of its horrors but with the endless help of hope. I think my transience is a gift, in some ways. And meeting you, how could that not be a gift?”
The wings curl tighter around Izuku, silently saying IloveyouIloveyouIdoIdo. Whispering, sounding almost wounded, “I don’t want to let you go, baby bird. I can feel your ache, it’s so much, and you’re still so little. So tired,” the words are tearing him apart. “You shouldn’t be so tired. You’re so small.”
The tears fall out of Izuku’s eyes, “That’s the secret, aniki. I choose to live anyways. Leaving you is the hardest decision I’ve ever had to make. And it never gets easier to decide . But I’ll come back to you, every time too. I choose to come back to you.”
“I feel like I’m losing you. The Above takes so much of you, I just want you to be safe and home.” With me. With us. Let us shelter you, Thanatos begs.
“You’ll always have me. You’ve always had me. And if I lose any parts of myself, you’ll catch them for me. I love you, aniki.”
Thanatos can only stare at Izuku in astonished awe, feeling his trust and unwavering faith.
Izuku watches a tear drip onto his lap from above, speaking again, “Death is patient, and infinite. These years will pass quickly. You can wait for me. I’ll always come home eventually. After all, what is time to eternity? You’ll have forever with me.”
The hold Thanatos has on Izuku tightens before gentling again. “I love you, Izuku. I’ll have eternity to tell you that.”
Izuku smiles, soft and wistful, “You will.” So let me live first.
Thanatos lets Izuku go because he loves his little brother like the Styx loves the night. To the ends of all darkness and peace. To even the quietest corners of the universe.
How lucky we are, to love out loud.