Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Ryuko sits bolt upright from her position on her bed when she hears the front door to the dorms clicking open. Her tail flits from side to side stiffly as she gets up quickly and makes for the door. She checks her corners just to be safe before quietly strutting down the corridor briskly to the stairs.

The door sensors never went off; She was informed when she first moved in here that the door sensors were in working order, so someone knew how to slip by them undetected on regular occurrence.

Ryuko knew why some of the kids would walk outside at the dead of night; She can’t imagine the kinds of horrors and trauma they’ve all witnessed during these last few months, even if she was on the frontlines as well. If they needed a night walk to calm down and clear their head, that was more than fine, but she’d be amiss if she didn’t check up on them.

By the time she reaches the common room, everything has gone back to its previous stillness. Her eyes dilate as she flashes her phone light near the kitchen, no one is sitting in the total darkness on any of the couches or seats in the common room, nor does she feel any vibration through her scales of someone walking nearby, though…

It’s a dull, gentle thrum that reaches her finally that makes her peer outside through the curtain. It was mostly pitch black, the remaining few lampposts lining the promenades not being lit as power hadn’t been fully restored yet and was needed in more critical areas. In the dim moonlight, though, she can make out the faint silhouette of a tall young woman standing alone with her phone’s flashlight on, the outline of unruly, wild curls visible on her head, and holding what looks like… Flowers?

Eventually, another young woman’s silhouette stomps up to her, hair spiky and unruly as she nears, carrying a bag over her shoulder.

‘Midoriya and Bakugo,’ Ryuko’s mind registers.

Both of them were still in injury recovery; Izumi still had nerve problems with all of her limbs and Katsumi could barely even stand up most mornings without her cauterized heart pounding itself out of her chest.

Ryuko disables the alarm and sensor for the door temporarily, long enough for her to slip out of the dorms with a trained silence. She didn’t want to frighten the girl’s, but she could feel the maotherly draconic instincts clawing at her from inside to run over and demand what they were doing up so late and why they were putting themselves at risk knowing their injuries.

They were engrossed in a quiet conversation, dotted frequently with heavy silences; Ryuko didn’t listen, frankly the subject wasn’t her business yet, so that is why she was going to confront them.

She clears her throat gently from the shadows behind them, and Midoriya shoots ten feet off the ground, her arms and legs becoming violently shaky, barely able to hold herself up and eyes almost pure white. Katsumi flinches like she’s been shot, baring her teeth immediately as she crouches and gets ready to lunge, though the strain her chest injuries are putting on her is evident from here.

Ryuko sighs heavily seeing them in such pain, and steps closer as Izumi shakily holds her phone’s light up.

“I’m not here to accuse,” She says gently, attempting to calm them. “Though I would be a terrible guardian if I didn’t at least ask why both of you are out so long after curfew.” Izumi’s limbs keep shaking like twigs as she tries to calm herself down, face drawn between something akin to genuine fright and anxiety, and Katsumi still maintaining her scowl as she scoffs.

“Don’t fuckin’ do that,” She barks, heaving with every breath.

“I did not mean to startle you,” Ryuko states softly. “I apologize, though my question still remains.” Eventually, Izumi breathes out as she looks away briefly, eyes alight with internal debate as Katsumi only deepens her glare and scowl, though her bright crimson eyes give away something deeper that makes Ryuko pause internally.

“We- We dont’ fuckin-”

“We’re- W-We’re visiting someone!” Izumi smiles forcefully, gesturing with the flowers. Ryuko blinks at the green-haired young woman as Katsumi turns to her like she’s stupid. Izumi sweat drops as she goes to elaborate. “I-It’s s-someone important, and we’ve been meaning to see them for a while, b-but never got around to it… Dates never aligned, but… We figured doing it now since R-Reconstruction’s been going great and crime is the lowest it’s been since… E-Everything,” Izumi finally stops talking as she realizes the verbal grave she’s dug herself in, and Katsumi’s face is one of utter disbelief and rage towards the greenette.

“A… Date?” Ryuko's not going to assume anything yet, but she was attempting to make sense of this as quickly as possible as her brain starts catching up to speed. Even if it was, she had nothing against the two sharing a romantic partner with each other. She just… Wished that they’d at least asked her for permission to leave campus, or even arrange something so the other could be here.

Katsumi blinks at her like she was stupid, but Izumi holds her shaky hands up quickly, shaking her head.

“No! No no no no, not that! It’s- I-It’s-”

“IT’S NOT FUCKIN-” Katsumi wheezes as she coughs, wincing both in pain and the realization she just snapped at Ryuko. Katsumi coughs raggedly one last time as she wipes her mouth on her sleeve. “It’s not a fuckin’- ‘S not a date. It’s a friend. From… From when we were younger.” Ryuko just nods thoughtfully.

“I understand… I’ll allow it,” Something in Izumi’s eyes light up bright as tears begin pricking at them, and Katsumi’s shoulders relax ever so slightly as she continues staring pensively. “I do need to escort both of you, though,” That at the very least seemed to be okay with both of them.

Both the girls waited under the streetlight as she requested one of the underground heroes on night patrol to hang around the dorms in her absence. She comes back with her keys eventually, and the walk to the parking garage is filled with anxious tension. Ryuko knew it was probably Izumi’s nerves, and her being around her own personal heroes and mentors, but Katsumi was far more of a mystery. She set it aside for now as the drive was more important in the moment, but it never really left her mind either.

Katsumi jumps in the front passenger seat like she owns it, and stares Izumi down.

“Get in the back, nerd,” The shotgun princess demands. Izumi just huffs as she slips into the back seat behind Ryuko comfortably, relishing in the seat heaters coming to life against her scars and sore muscles.

Katsumi types in the address on the center console, and it pops up as a zig-zagging route to a lonely road on the coast of Mihama Beach. It was… Eye-raising, for several reasons; mainly because bus connections were still dodgy and as far as she knew, it was quite difficult to get there already. Secondly, given their injuries, trauma, and their recovery, it felt almost… Reckless, in a way that, even when considering both of the young women, felt wholly irresponsible.

The entire drive there was on lonely mountain roads overlooking the coast, the occasional car flying by in the opposite direction. Ryuko really wished she could’ve flown there instead, but there was a reason she had a car for situations like this. Izumi would probably be freaking out and fangirling, and Katsumi would be egging her on to go faster.

When they get there, Ryuko finds there’s no house at all, or even an apartment. She blinks, and is about to ask Izumi if she accidentally typed in the wrong address, before she steps out in the black night around them, Katsumi doing the same. Ryuko just blinks worriedly before she puts her car in park but leaves it running, and gets out briefly.

“Midoriya?” She calls. Izumi twirls around, emerald eyes glowing in the car headlights as realization dawns on.

“I-It’s- S-Sorry, I-I should’ve told you… I-It’s not the wrong address, i-it’s just…” Izumi looks away. Katsumi can’t even meet her eyes, and it strikes a long, deep chord of dread in her heart seeing someone so prideful and strong like her not even be able to look her in the eyes.

Ryuko shuts the car off but lets her wings manifest on her back, and they begin a silent walk down from the sandlot onto a small trail towards the coast, Izumi’s phone lighting the way.

The dragoness begins seriously questioning both the girl’s and her own sanity, before Izumi perks up, and runs off forward when she sees someone out in the light.

As they near, Ryuko’s stomach instantly sinks when she sees it’s a memorial.

Katsumi growls as she runs over to Izumi, who’s already kneeled down, and opens the bag full of paint stripper and cloths to clean off the spray paint covering the memorial. Various slurs of “NULL,” “GAIJIN,” “CRIPPLE,” “RETARD,” and other various hateful phrases are plastered all over it. Ryuko just blinks as she watches the girl’s work.

Izumi is mumbling to herself, devoid of the usual intelligent analysis, something far rawer and deeper than Ryuko’s ever heard, and Katsumi is frighteningly silent.

When the defaced memorial is finally cleaned, Ryuko feels her heart shatter into a million pieces.

Akatani Mikumo

March 20th, 2132 - April 11th, 2144

Heaven Needed Another Angel.

He would’ve been barely under a year younger than Katsumi. He… Probably would’ve been one of her kids…

When the stone is nothing less than spotless, Katsumi crouches down to one side in front of the memorial, Izumi kneeling down right next to her right in front of the plaque with her hands folded into her lap.

“Hey Mikumo,” Izumi starts off gently, little more than the wind gently brushing over all of them. “I apologize that it’s been a while… Life’s been kinder to us for the last few months. Reconstruction’s just started. It's a mess right now, everywhere, but it's better than it was before... Crime's been at it's lowest since the end of the W-War, so we thought we'd come visit you again... Just to catch up…” Izumi shakes, a laugh concealing a small whimper. “I'm not sleeping in alleys or safehouses anymore, and I get to eat and shower everyday again, so it's far from bad... Looking back, I don't know how I survived, but... I felt that you were my guardian angel…” It’s silent for a moment afterwards.

Katsumi turns to look at Ryuko, her crimson eyes no longer in a glare but just staring through her, and she gestures with her hand weakly.

“Mikumo, this is Tatsuma Ryuko. She… She was Ryukyu, and she’s a resident at U.A for the time being as Reconstruction goes on.” Katsumi says finally, voice gravelly and raw. “You… Probably would’ve been starstruck when you finally met her…  bet you are now.” Ryuko kneels down slowly and bows her head, hands pressed together in front of her chest.

“It’s an honor to finally meet you, Akatani,” She smiles softly. The wind picks up briefly, a gentle gust blowing through the dead forest around them before it suddenly dies down, and only the sound of the gentle ocean waves from the nearby shore are audible. Izumi goes back to talking again.

"The nightmares are still there, but they rarely come anymore since I've started sharing beds with my 1-B girls. I know you never liked touch at all, but maybe it would've helped you as well... I don't know what the guys do, but it seems to work for them. Itsuka and I started holding hands as part of physical therapy... It's not a crush! But- Her Quirk is acting all weird; I know now her muscles used some form of energy when active otherwise she wouldn't be able to lift them from the weight, but now it's a-almost... A-Almost like Stockpiling, i-in a way... Lightning and everything." She smiles a little. "Eijiro and Tetsu recently got their Rescue Certifications from the W.H.A, so they're the ones going back into line of duty first... Oh! I forgot to mention-! Uh, the Hero Classes are kinda... No longer a thing," Izumi presses her mouth into a thin line. "The W.H.A and UN made Hero Classes a University thing only and you need to be 18+ to qualify, kind of like the military or police force, because of... Child soldiers, and stuff. U.A's just... Regular private school now... Heh, that's so weird to say still... Uhm- we're still allowed to train and stuff, but we're the last high school class here. We can choose to continue here once we graduate or go chase after different things..." Izumi pauses for a moment as she fiddles with her jacket's cuff.

"Several have dropped out. Surprisingly none of the girls, and it's mainly just from the Hero Course but most of them are still at U.A, just... They found a different calling. They still help people, and they still talk to their previous friends, but... I don't really blame them. Most of the students from Beacon are going to be students here indefinitely since Atlas succumbed to the earthquake. Eijiro and Tetsu are gonna be gone for a couple months when they go with the W.H.A Evacuation and Rescue Units... I know I said that Heroes and stuff is university programs now, but they need all the help they can get, those two have the experience, and the line's drawn a little odd since it's related to actual law enforcement compared to emergency service..." A small, fond smile etches itself onto Izumi's face. "I know you would've been right there beside them... It'll get straightened out as time passes- Also-! Uh, theirs a bunch of stuff getting ran through the Diet right now... It's been reorganized completely, it's so much younger on average and all of the lobbying and stuff got cut on the spot when the W.H.A and UN arrived. All of the corporate busting and putting corrupt politicians and executives behind bars is still goin' on, but... It's so much better already. a bunch of mutant rights' stuff got signed into law- Shoji, Tokoyami, Shishida, Pon- Penelope, Setsuna, and Blake and a whole bunch of other students were there giving speeches and stuff." Izumi pauses heavily as she breathes in.

"Uhh, me and Katsumi have been... Working on something, since the War ended and Reconstruction started... Just a... Well, a lot, actually. It's a project similar to Mutant Right's, but... For the Quirkless... Like you, me, Melissa..." A small, shaky smile forms again as she rubs the ground with her thumb gently. The wind is completely still. "It's practically done. We're both obsessing over what to refine, but... I don't know. She wants to submit it right away, I..." Izumi frowns as she deliberates internally. "I want this to be the best it can be. For you. I don't know how much of this is going to be left up to chance, but... I don't want to rush it, I don't want to wait any longer, I don't want it to fall dead on the floor... Maybe we should just do it." Izumi inhales heavily again, and a firm hand lands on her shoulder. She flinches, but doesn't push Ryuko's hand off.

Eventually, Izumi runs out of things to say, and even Katsumi looks winded from how much talking Izumi did. The four of them let the silence settle back over them as the ocean keeps on lapping up at the shores.

“...Who was he?” Ryuko finally asks softly. Izumi doesn’t turn to look at her, but the dragoness doesn’t miss the way her lips tightens after the question.

“He was our childhood friend.” Izumi starts, stars in her eyes. “He was Quirkless like I was, but we didn’t know that when all three of us promised to be heroes together one day. When we did, we thought it didn’t… Matter…” Izumi’s voice tightens even more as Katsumi stays completely still. Ryuko brings a gentle hand up to Izumi’s shoulder, and Izumi leans into it gently. “He was one of the victims in the Shibuya Bombing that happened in 139… The girl who shielded him died instantly and… he lost his left leg and eye and was… just… burned, all over,” Izumi chokes. Ryuko’s hold tightens just a little. “He didn't have a family left, and he was in so much pain constantly, but he just…” Izumi swallows thickly as she pauses. “He took his own life when we were 12… H-He d-d-didn’t even l-leave behind a note or anything…”

Ryuko pulls her into a hug at that point, and wilts with her as Izumi shrinks into a ball on the ground. Katsumi is still crouching, eyes glassed over as she looks at the memorial unblinking. Blood starts seeping between her lips from where she was biting the inside of her mouth hard enough to cause damage.

The dragoness helps ground the young heroine in her arms, until they both feel the small spots of water starting to come down around them. They both look up, and see the thin haze of water droplets starting to pour. Izumi giggles quietly as she wipes her eyes.

“He always does this,” She says quietly, and stands up to spread her arms out as it starts to come down heavier. Ryuko lets her wings sprout to shield herself and Katsumi, who hasn’t moved in the last hour. The rain suddenly kicks up a lot harder, and lightning crashes down in the ocean out on the horizon; briefly, the shadows and branches around them make up the silhouette of a person standing right in front of them, but it disappears just as quickly as it came with the lightning strike.

“Alright, we should leave,” Izumi says uneasily, still shaken from the boom, but still laughing. Ryuko’s wings slide over to cover them, and she attempts several times to get Katsumi’s attention, who’s still blinking wide-eyed at the lightning strike, before her crimson pupils, shrunken to dots, turns to her, and she gets the message that it’s time to go.

They all return to the car soaked and their feet covered in mud. Ryuko sighs heavily at the thought of having to clean the car out next whenever she has time next; This time, Izumi is sitting up front, so much more relaxed and calm, while Katsumi sits in the back, hunched over with her head in her hands. Ryuko taps the address back to U.A, and when she sets off back on the small country road, careful of the rain-slicked asphalt, Izumi’s phone connects to the bluetooth, and suddenly-

“Eh-eheu, eheu

Eh-eheu, eheu

Eh-eheu, eheu

Eh-eheu, eheu

“This was his favorite song,” Izumi says softly, meeting Ryuko’s bewildered look. Ryuko’s eyes soften in understanding as she focuses back on the road, going gently as possible, and all three of them settle back in as it continues playing.

Eh-eheu, eheu

Eh-eheu, eheu

Eh-eheu, eheu

Eh-eheu, eheu”

“I was left to my own devices

Many days fell away with nothing to show

And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love

Grey clouds roll over the hills, bringing darkness from above

But if you close your eyes (Eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu), does it almost feel like nothing changed at all? (Eh-eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu)

And if you close your eyes (Eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu), does it almost feel like you've been here before? (Eh-eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu)

How am I gonna be an optimist about this? (Ah, ah)

How am I gonna be an optimist about this? (Ah, ah)

We were caught up and lost in all of our vices

In your pose as the dust settled around us

And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love

Grey clouds roll over the hills, bringing darkness from above

But if you close your eyes (Eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu), does it almost feel like nothing changed at all? (Eh-eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu)

And if you close your eyes (Eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu), does it almost feel like you've been here before? (Eh-eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu)

How am I gonna be an optimist about this? (Ah, ah)

How am I gonna be an optimist about this? (Ah, ah)

(Eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu)

(Eh-eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu)

Oh, where do we begin, the rubble or our sins?

Oh-oh, where do we begin, the rubble or our sins?

And the walls kept tumbling down in the city that we love (Oh, where do we begin, the rubble or our sins?)

Grey clouds roll over the hills bringing darkness from above (Oh, where do we begin, the rubble or our sins?)

But if you close your eyes (Eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu), does it almost feel like nothing changed at all? (Eh-eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu)

And if you close your eyes (Eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu), does it almost feel like you've been here before? (Eh-eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu)

Oh, how am I going to be an optimist about this? (Ah, ah)

How am I going to be an optimist about this? (Ah, ah)

If you close your eyes (Eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu), does it almost feel like nothing changed at all? (Eh-eheu, eheu, eh-eheu, eheu)”

Deep down, Ryuko feels like she knows why this song spoke to her soul.

–

It’s nearly morning when they get back. The rain subsided once they got back on the freeway, making the drive so much more tolerable even over the rain slicked asphalt and the minor fatigue wearing in. Song after song in Izumi's playlist kept playing; Ryuko could tell some of them were from the Second Renaissance after the Quirk Wars, but a handful of them she had never heard before, likely Pre-Quirk Era Music.

The sedan stops gently in the reserved parking space as the eastern skies start to turn a gentle indigo color, the dark clouds being blown away to the west starting to turn lighter and lighter colors as the sun started appearing. Ryuko lets out an exhausted sigh as Izumi yawns, covering her mouth with her sleeve, and stretches painfully, sore joints cracking and metal plates in her limbs clicking against each other. Katsumi is still looking out the window, not having moved almost the entirety of the ride.

“Thank you… So much,” Izumi says quietly. Ryuko gently lays her hand across Izumi's where it was laid over the center console, surgical and battle scars brushing up against each other.

“It-... It was an honor to,” Ryuko replies softly. “I’m glad I got to meet him.” They sit there for a moment before Izumi makes the first move to get out, opening the door and stepping into a puddle perfectly reflecting the increasingly vibrant sky around them. Ryuko sits there for a moment, eyes closed before she goes to get out, before Katsumi gets out, goes to the passenger side, and sits down next to her.

“Go ahead and go back,” Katsumi says abruptly, not so much a booming command as she normally would shout, but more a trained sentence like she’d been running herself mad over. Izumi stares for a moment before understanding comes across her face and she leaves. “I… I-I need to talk to you. Alone.”

Ryuko felt her wings flare behind her back; not out of fear or anger, but out of genuine concern.

Katsumi swallows again, and her hands begin to shake, surprisingly not smoking, but small flashes of light dance in the shadow of where her hand was in a death grip on her thigh.

…

“I told him to do it.”

Dread. It was instant horror in Ryuko’s soul. Katsumi closes her eyes, not even giving her a moment to respond, before she opens her mouth, struggling for words.

“The- That- T-That same-” Katsumi bites her tongue hard, lips red with blood as she squeezes her eyes shut hard. “The same fucking day his fucking treatment got denied by the hospital, I told him maybe he should go cry to his momma about it, and he- fucking, he fucking went home that night and killed himself,” Katsumi’s voice begins wavering. “I told Izumi to jump off the school roof that same day, but she didn’t go through with it because the roof door was fucking locked.”

It’s dead silent in the car other than Katsumi’s ragged breathing, smoke pouring out of her palms. Ryuko realizes the danger the young woman across from her is in, and rolls the windows down to get the air to dispel the ash of where her hands were gripping her pants.

“Izumi got attacked by that sludge villain later that day, but Mikumo just went straight home and-” Katsumi hiccups abruptly, before she coughs and continues. “Nowhere was willing to spread the ashes of some Quirkless and Mihama Beach was the only place who would let us. Both of his fucking moms were dead and he watched his sister die who- Who I-” Katsumi exhales sharply as she keeps confessing. “I still did it because I was so sick and tired of them because Izumi wouldn’t ever leave me the fuck alone and Mikumo couldn't even get up most days without passing out from the pain, but both of them forgave fucking everyone around him, even- e-even-... even me…”

She doesn’t remember the walk back. She thinks she heard Tatsuma-sensei tell her something and attempt a hug, but if she did Katsumi pushed her away instinctively and limped to her room. Every breath feels like she's drowning, and her head is swimming so bad she misses her floor and has to stumble back down.

Katsumi shuts the door behind her, not even bothering to slam it like she always does, slowly locking it because the paranoia never leaves her, before she falls on her bed. Her room is so barren compared to first year; she doesn’t even bother putting the sheets on anymore. Katsumi lays there, on her back in total darkness, looking up at the ceiling with only the gentle hum of the building's electricity to let her know that maybe she wasn’t dead yet, even though she really should. She was never more alone; It was just her and her own thoughts.

It was penance.

Penance Katsumi would never, ever atone for.

She could lift the world like Atlas in a hundred different lifetimes, and she knew, deep down, she’d never deserve to see Mikumo again.

This was Hell, and she made it herself.

Chapter Text

‘She wanted to start U.A with a bang, literally. She was meant to be here, from the moment her Quirk manifested as bright sparks in her palms; to own every moment she was here and go even further beyond what others believed she was capable of. She vowed on having the greatest start possible and shooting up into the sky from here, leaving all those other extras in the fucking dust.

And yet…

Katsumi stares at the memorial in front of her. The spring leaves, small and bright green, dance on their thin tree limbs, mostly still barren, clouds tangoing overhead gently as the wind blows gently. She feels too much all the goddamn time, barely able to keep her heads above the waves to stop her from drowning, but right here, it felt like she finally took in that breath of seawater, and couldn't hold herself above the waves anymore. For once, she can keep her mouth shut and stop shouting.

“I-I got in,” Katsumi says, biting her lip the moment her mouth closes. Mikumo stays respectfully silent. The wind kicks up violently and doesn’t relent, blowing Katsuki’s hair into her face. She scowls and brushes it out of her eyes forcefully, baring her teeth, before she grimaces at herself and sighs. “Through Recommendation… Izu will come in a couple months to tell you…” Katsumi pauses for a moment as she deliberates on even saying what’s on her mind. “I… I thought long and hard, that… Maybe I should reject it. Just… Devote the rest of my life trying to prevent what happened to you from happening again, that I can’t-” Katsumi swallows thickly. “That I can’t hurt another person ever again.”

She ignores the voice in the back of her head, suspiciously sounding like the voice of some bitter, jaded old man, telling her she’s far too young to be feeling like this before it gets drowned out by the memory of Mikumo's perpetual silence.

“The only way I can change anything… I’m going to U.A to be something I’ll never be: A… A hero… I don’t know how else I-I can change this,” Katsumi feels the burn spread to her eyes, and she clenches her teeth hard. It spreads from her eyes to her whole face as it becomes uncomfortable, then to her neck and chest where it became unbearable. Katsumi growls to herself, teeth bared, and head hung as she shakes. The smoke trails from her palms angrily, and, like a volcano, eventually it boils over and explodes. “You gave up, you asshole!” The birds that have returned from their winter holidays fly away from the shout, communicating frantically to each other amid a flurry of beating wings, leaving Katsumi all alone with only the ghost she’s come to see. “You- You were a-always- WHY DID I HAVE TO BE THE ONE TO FUCKING BREAK YOU?!”

Katsumi is ugly sobbing; like a goddamn baby. Like Izumi; who, in all reality, most likely would be cremated and laid to rest right next to Mikumo right now if it wasn’t for the cosmic chance that the roof door at their school had finally been locked that day. And now she’s making it all about herself, holding her head and burning her own skin on accident, tears pouring out of her eyes as she silently wails and sobs to herself pitifully.

Katsumi doesn’t say anything, she just falls to her knees again shakily, convulsing silently as her skin itches and burns.

“I’m sorry,” ‘For always shouting at you. For making this about me. For not helping you. For never standing up for you. For never being your friend like I knew I was supposed to be. For being the one who finally made you take your own life.’

It isn’t enough.

Katsumi knows this isn’t enough.

Maybe this baby step will be big enough to where she can keep climbing and when she becomes Number 1 and tears down every single goddamn person and system that ruined this world out of greed and ego, maybe she can come back again and say sorry with her chest, but she knows it’ll never be enough. She only does this because it makes her feel better, and briefly, she wonders if taking her own life as penance would be enough to finally make herself feel at ease with life.

Katsumi screams, for she does not know.’

–

Her nightmares are the most twisted they’ve ever been.

Rolling hills of dust of what used to be Jaku surround her. Civilians she swore to protect fade away into the wind around her, or bleed out slowly from crush injuries and blunt trauma wounds, crying begging, screaming for someone to help them. Heroes she works alongside get maimed and killed by reanimated monsters, Nomu and Grimm, twisted beasts with the capability of wild animals and the conscience to take pleasure in being so ruthless for sport. She stands there in the dark and watches as her own friends are tortured on tables in assembly lines and warped into something beyond human, reshaped into tools and agents of terror controlled by a madman. All For One is a cruel puppeteer who kept her stringless while he danced and danced with every other soul and made them fight each other for his own sick pleasure and do his bidding because what he already had stolen wasn't enough, a cancer cell growing and growing and growing for the sake of power.

There was a vibrating under her skin, sparks that danced in her bloodstream that she only felt when her Quirk was active, yet all that came out was pitiful pops and flashes and lazily billowing smoke; A far cry from what had kept her alive when her heart had been pierced. And no matter how many times she pinched herself, hit herself, cut herself, broke her own bones, she never woke up again.

Everything around her begins going up in smoke, starting in a sprawl from her feet and continuing outwards, the screams, the cries, the laughter, the emotions and any alive or built with someone else's hands begins turning to ash. Katsumi lunges forward and tries grabbing a handful of what is left of Ashido as she turns to dust in her palms, falling through her fingers, before the air around them is nothing but thick, billowing clouds of smoke, pulsating, alive, illuminated by hidden fires burning whatever was left Katsumi didn't touch. She stares up, eyes as wide as saucers, and sees the small silhouette of a boy with messy, wild hair staring back at her with a shadow-covered face. The ringing in her ears through the sudden silence is overwhelming, and afterimages of the faces of everyone else she’s ever known and loved are warped, disfigured, uncannily shifted into prosopagnosia nightmares that strung along the very depths of her soul as she keeps staring, and all she can hear is her heart in her ears-

She wakes up.

Finally, she blinks up at the ceiling as the afterimage of everything fades away into the darkness around her. Katsumi sits up, and immediately realizes her heart is beating itself out of her chest when she sees the smoke around her still.

The brief panic subsides when she realizes there’s small flashes of sparks and embers emanating from her palms. She looks down, unable to control her hands like every morning after a nightmare due to the multitude of injuries she’s yet to recover from. Katsumi staggers up, lightheaded and legs weak as she cracks the window opening, immediately shivering at the coldness as orange rays stream through.

Katsumi was only asleep for a few hours. 4 at most.

She sighs heavily, sitting on the edge of her bed to wait for her heart to calm down enough to where dying from stepping out into the hall isn’t a high probability. Once the stars leave her vision, she slowly staggers up, and trudges out into the hall. The burning shame has refused to leave her, still sticking horribly uncomfortable in her chest right in her heart, behind the point where All For One’s spike tendril tore her aorta open. In reality, it’s probably just the surgical scars and cauterizations on her heart still being sensitive and healing, but her head is swimming so bad she can’t help but feel like that never-ending remorse might actually do her in.

Katsumi collapses on the common room couch, knees weak and arms heavy. She’s the only one awake, which makes sense considering it’s a Saturday morning. Some of them would leave for therapy- physical, mental, and emotional- soon, others would probably hang around the dorms for a while before heading off around campus. Training wasn’t mandated because of the government reforms running through the country, but Katsumi was one of the few who still did because it was the only thing left in this world that made the burning and pain worth it.

She blinks wearily, and her vision focuses on bright red hair and vermillion eyes blinking down at her worriedly from over the back of the couch. Katsumi blinks again and sighs heavily, covering her face as she rubs the sleep from her eyes.

“Hey, shitface,” Katsumi drawls. Eijiro just huffs in amusement as he kneels down, his giant frame still settled over the back of the couch comfortably.

“...How’d last night go?” He asks gently, voice barely above a whisper. There’s enough distance both physically and spoken for Katsumi to back off if she needs to, but she can’t bring herself to run from this.

“Tatsuma-sensei knows.” She says. Eijiro doesn’t move, but he nods slowly after a few seconds. Something hot and hard bubbles up in Katsumi’s throat, and she swallows thickly as she scowls again, throwing her sore arms up tiredly. “Izumi told him about everything that’s happened over the past couple months… Talked about you some,” Katsumi gestures. Eijiro smiles a little, eyes soft when he hears that, and that burning feeling in her throat comes right back up.

–

‘Mikumo wouldn’t have been friends with everyone, but he definitely would’ve gotten along with everyone.

Him and Kyoka would probably never shut up about their favorite songs, shows, anime, sports, whatever the fuck Mikumo liked because Katsumi never really knew him, but she felt deep down Kyoka would’ve loved him.

He’d probably silently despise Mina on a surface level, but he’d definitely care for her and always at least be an option for help and safety. A silent kind of caring and connection that Mina, for all her buoyancy and liveliness, would understand perfectly.

Yaomomo was probably just a little bit dumber than he was; Lord knows the world would’ve ended when they worked together on something.

Him and Eijiro could’ve gone to Fat Gum with Tetsu and Amajiki-senpai to train to be Rescue Heroes.

Katsumi sees his ghost sometimes.

His presence is never threatening or terrifying; a gentle reminder that he’ll always be there. Sometimes Hanako would tag along, so much taller than him, her wavy curls falling down her back to her chest, and vibrant wings little more than small prismatic outlines highlighted by the rain. They loved rainy days; their silhouettes were in the shade of a tree, attempting to stay dry, and watching her through the shadows over their eyes and face. They never stay for long, they always fade away whenever she goes to look.’

–

Eijiro shifts his form as motion elsewhere in the dorms becomes audible, others waking up from whatever nightmares they ran from in the night.

“Y’know, you tell me a lot about Mikumo, but... He had a twin sister, right? You really only mentioned Hanako a couple of times before.” He says softly. Katsumi blinks as another wave of memories hits her.

–

‘It was a dead winter night, in early December when the holiday fever was starting to rise. Katsumi was laying alone in her room with the gentle glow of Christmas lights strung up around her, scrolling on her phone absent mindedly, when her door swings open slowly. She gets ready to scream at whichever one of her parents barged in without knocking, only to see Hanako, so deathly exhausted, stumble over on her bed, wings wrapping around Katsumi’s back. Katsumi blinked, eyes wide as she turns pink, before she growled and tried kicking her off, only for Hanako to hiss and hold her tighter, purring at the heat from her Quirk, and suddenly Katsumi didn’t have it in her heart to kick her out.

“I still hate you,” Hanako mumbles as she curls up around Katsumi, pajamas baggy and comfortable as she begins making a noise halfway between a purr and a growl, shaking her wings through the special cutouts in the back of the top. Katsumi just glowers right back, crimson meeting campanula.

“I hate you too.” Katsumi affirms. Hanako pouts and snuggles closer. It’s quiet for a moment as Hanako observes her, eyes searching.

“Why don’t you ever stand up for them?” Hanako asks, voice suddenly raw. Katsumi just blinks as the light turns to blue, making her eyes turn indigo and then dark navy blue. She looks so much like her mother it scares her.

“If those nerds aren’t so weak, they can stand up for themselves,” Katsumi justifies, huffing. Hanako glowers as she suddenly lets go, and Katsumi feels a rush of cold run over her as Hanako rolls over, arms crossed.

“Yeah, because Mikumo can stand, right?” Hanako spits, and Katsumi feels something split in her heart that makes her gape for words, making her wilt, before she scowls, not knowing what else to do.

“He’s lived through so fuck- Frickin’ much, he’ll be okay-!”

“How can you say that?!” Hanako whisper-shouts, tears beginning to well up in her eyes as her feathers begin to splay. “Mikumo fights for his life every single day, and Izumi gets treated like she’s dirt! Why don’t you just help them?!”

“How?!” Katsumi barks back, her eyes suddenly stinging. “Just go around beating the stupid shits that pick on them and kick those stupid grown adults in the nuts?!”

“Yes!”

“You do it then!”

“I will!”

“Hmpph!” Katsumi huffs at the end, both the girls panting as they lay back down. Hanako growls as she grabs Katsumi possessively and nuzzles into her, claws in her back, before she goes back to purring, wings curled up around them. Katsumi just rolls her eyes and throws the comforter over both of them.

“I’m not letting them slow me down. You better keep up with me, then.” Katsumi demands quietly. Hanako’s wings bristle.

“I won’t keep up. I’ll surpass you.” She declares. Katsumi just blinks before shaking her head, rolling her eyes again,and flops over top of Hanako to pin her. Hanako huffs before she curls up again and almost immediately falls asleep.

“Why do you do this to yourself?” Katsumi thinks quietly to herself. She slowly lays her head down next to Hanako’s and closes her eyes, letting the warmth overcome her.’

–

“She was my first real friend,” Katsumi says quietly, and Eijiro’s eyebrows raise. “She hated my guts because I picked on her twin brother, and I hated her guts because she’d rather spend her time protecting rather than fighting… I was fucking awful.” Katsumi admits quietly; nothing new to Eijiro as he frowns slightly, hands coming down the back cushion next to hers.

“When she came to live with us when her mother got priced out of her own home because of shitty landlords and fucking private equity in the healthcare industry raising Mikumo's treatment cost,” Katsumi scoffs again, burning with rage, before she settles down, swallowing to prevent herself from going on a tangent again. “It got a little better. We were the ighest performers academically and practically in our entire district, did stupid 'Hero Training Exercises for Kids,' we found online, fell asleep cuddling to funny videos we'd find after stealing our phones back from our- my mom, at night , and then fought each other in the morning ‘cause we were little shitheads.” There’s a small fondness in her voice that’s unmistakable, and makes Eijiro smile simply from hearing it.

“She was also my first kiss.”

–

‘Katsumi’s first kiss was a fever dream.

Her parents had taken her and Hanako along on a ride out to the countryside one Friday evening when they Katsumi just turned 13 and Hanako had turned 12 two weeks prior; Something about a sponsored photoshoot. Izumi was away with her father in America, and Mikumo was still knocked out undergoing treatment, so it was just them.

It was a cherry tree sitting on the edge of a field of flowers, rolling hills of nothing but vibrant, bright colors. Her parents were mulling over the camera, trying to get it to work, her mother barking at the technical issues while her incompetent father read an online tech manual with a  furrowed brow.

Katsumi scowls again,and she could feel her mother’s glare rise up to her face before going back down to the camera’s screen. Hanako glances over at her briefly, campanula irises glowing curiously, before they shift to pure mischief. Katsumi just scowls at her in confusion, before she leans over quickly, and steals a kiss right on her lips.

By the time her parents get the camera working, Hanako has retreated back to her perfect little self, and Katsumi’s scowl and glare was wiped away, bright red as she stares down at the flower in her hands.

The car ride back was full of praise from her mother for not scowling like she always does, but Katsumi was left with a completely dumbfounded expression, still a bright shade of pink, while Hanako preens at the attention and affection from both her parents.

That was the last time Katsumi ever saw Hanako.’

–

Eijiro is suppressing a grin, and Katsumi’s eyes promise death if he mentions anything at all to Mina or Toru.

Katsumi sighs heavily as the smile disappears, and that strange blankness that makes Eijiro feel so uneasy comes back.

“She died when she was 11.” Eijiro’s smile disappears. “She was with Mikumo helping him walk on his prosthetic when some shit went down next to them, and…” Katsumi gestures hollowly, trailing off as her scarred hand takes Eijiro’s calloused one.

–

‘Katsumi knew before she was told.

The news was covering everything that happened, and reported at least 1 death and several others in critical condition. A crowd of emergency personnell were present in a wall between the dmaged pillars of a now shattered canopy above as an ambulance slowly backs up, it's lights off. Through a small gap as they part to let the rear of the ambulance get acess, a covered gurney with a silhouette far, far too small wheels past, the jagged shapes of broken and torn wings with translucent feathers spilling out underneath.

The district sheriff and coroner showed up at their door when Mitsuki was in the middle of a panic attack trying to contact Hanako when she'd been told. She collapsed on the front porch like a puppet with it's string cut, and just screamed. It was the first time she had heard such panic in her father's voice, pleading for them that it wasn't true, that somehow they'd been wrong and that Hanako was actually in the hospital ready for them to pick her up.

After an hour, Masaru came back, face set in stone but eyes saying so, so much, telling Katsumi that they needed a moment and to be patient, and for once, Katsumi just… Couldn’t shout and argue. That horrible, churning feeling of dread in her stomach got worse every second. At first, she thought Mikumo finally kicked the bucket somehow, but the image of the injured wings didn’t leave her.

They had a grief counsellor come and tell her that Hanako was dead.

She stormed out of the living room, up to her bedroom, and destroyed everything she could touch, Quirk and bare hands. ‘That BASTARD LIED TO ME!!!’ She’d said she’d be right there above her, shooting higher and higher! and then she just… Katsumi is laying on her stomach amidst a storm of debris, everything that wasn't bolted down having been blown to pieces, torn apart in the maelstrom of incomprehensible thoughts screaming through her head. There was a small, small premonition that Hanako would eventually crack open the door, and see her lying on the ground with everything she owned completely destroyed, and just tell her off with a faux-smugness thinly veiling worry, before picking her up and laying her down on the mattress and cuddling her until she felt better. But she never showed up. 

Katsumi doesn't remember the funeral.

Izumi doesn’t talk to her anymore. Whenever they saw each other in the small window of time they were given off from school, she never followed her around like a lost puppy, she never even mumbled about her Quirk or some other Meta Ability she saw. She was just mute. Silent. There was a stark difference between the usual crybaby Izumi and whatever this grief-stricken husk of a girl wore her skin. Katsumi could tell, even if she couldn't look her in the eyes anymore.

The moment they came back, the entire class just stared her down. Stared her down like she was something fragile. Katsumi snarls and shouts at all of them.

"WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU STARING AT?!?!" Her voice was so raw, it hurt her own throat. The pitiful excuse of a teacher just looks at her with sadness that made something inside Katsumi bend like superheated steel.

"Bakugo, honey, I know this is a lot to process right now, but I promise you every single one of us is here for you-"

"SHUT THE HELL UP!" Katsumi feels the tears stinging her eyes as the teacher looks at her like she bit them. Whatever this was, it was far removed from Katsumi's usual outbursts, and she could feel it in her own burns how terrifying it was because she had no clue what was happening to herself. "I DON'T WANT YOU TO FUCKING BE THERE FOR ME!!! YOU ALL FUCKING SUCK! EVERY SINGLE FUCKING DAY YOU LOSERS TRY CODDLING ME AND I CAN'T F-FUCKING TELL WHAT'S REAL ANYMORE!" Katsumi dry heaves as her shoulders rise and fall, clutching her face as the immediate shame is overwhelming, and she runs out of the hall.

She bumps past Izumi as the other girl limps in, and leaves her to the cruel peanut gallery as Katsumi goes to hide in the bathroom like a coward.

Katsumi blinks, and suddenly several days have past and she's sitting next to Izumi in a therapist's office with her parents. They're talking about placing Katsumi in a new homeroom with another den of terrible shitheads and some other cunty teacher she doesn't recognize. Izumi has her head hung and shoulder still, messy green curls falling over her face as she idly picks at the fabric seat cushion below her. Katsumi just stares out the window as the therapist begins talking again, about regular visits and what they'll talk about, and the realization that she's going to have to work through whatever she's feeling hit her like a freight train.

The one thing Katsumi wasn’t stellar at was her emotions, and it wouldn’t just stop at taking her peace of mind or her dignity.

It’d take Mikumo.’

–

“It should've been me instead. I fucking deserve it.”

"Don't say things like that," Eijiro says quietly. He knows shouting and being forceful with her will get both of them nowhere, but he can't... But he just can't sit around and her her say that. It reminds him a lot of his own mother's, and makes him cringe internally, before a fond smile comes over his face. Katsumi just blinks at him, before she sees the look in his eyes and the smile, and she just huffs, muscles relaxing slightly as she stares glassy-eyed up at the ceiling, brow quivering.

–

‘Eijiro was terrified.

For the first time since he entered U.A, he was terrified.

Not because of All For One’s presence, as disturbing as his mere aura was, or the near death situations all of them faced so young, because yeah he was scared but he’d always move to protect everyone; no, it was because Katsumi was gone.

She just got back onto campus after being released from hospital, and she just… ran off silently in the middle of the night, through the dormitory doors when no one was looking.

“Katsumi?!” Momo shouts into the night air, shining her flashlight around. Eijiro sucks in a deep breath to calm himself down. Panicking is the worst thing he can do right now, but he can’t stop it building and rising like steam pressure in his chest around his heart. He feels his Quirk beginning to crackle, his ribs turned as hard as stone and resulting in a stabbing sensation in his chest like his lungs were cramping.

Eijiro just swallows and keeps shining his light everywhere. Up into trees, bushes, down the seemingly never-ending wide promenade through the pitch blackness-

“There!”

He sees her finally; a small, convulsing silhouette with washed out colors in the dim glow of a lamppost. Yaomomo and Mina run forward towards her, and the moment they try to touch her, all Hell breaks loose.

“DON’T FUCKING TOUCH ME!” She screeches. Eijiro stops immediately as bright flashes soar up from her palms, smoke billowing as she shakes violently. Her eyes are genuinely terrified, like… Like she was afraid they were going to hurt her. Yaomomo and Mina are crying as well as Eijiro steps a little closer, trying to make himself seem smaller because the last thing he wants is to set Katsumi off. He can still see the pale red marks on her skin from the muzzle and the chains, and it makes him so viscerally ill, but he swallows and opens his dry mouth anyways.

“Dude- Why did you just run off like that!?” He says desperately. Katsumi stares at him like he’s insane. “You’re still injured, man-! That’s no-”

“I’M NOT FUCKING HURT!” Katsumi screams. It echoes through the forest around them and into the night sky above. “I can’t fucking BE HURT!”

“...What?” Eijiro’s voice is barely above a whisper at this point, and feels his eyes begin to sting. Katsumi had tears rolling down her face as she shakes, Quirk flaring even more violently as she grimaces, before snarling again.

“I can’t fucking be hurt! After everything I’ve fucking done, I haven’t-” Katsumi chokes on her own sobs. Mina is silently crying, Momo’s hand over her own mouth as they both can’t do anything but watch. “I haven’t earned the fucking right to be! I promised! I promised I’d fucking be a hero to him finally and then I was so fucking weak I got fucking taken!” Eijiro is blinking as the full weight of the situation hits him, ‘Oh-’

“Kats-” Mina chokes out. “M-Mikumo would n-never think that of you!”

“I FUCKING TOLD HIM TO KILL HIMSELF!”

Everything is silent as Katsumi falls to her knees quietly, hands brought into fists up to her face as they keep sparking. Eijiro is going to be ill.

“I fucking told him to do it! Every single fucking day I wake up and think about what I did! It’s Hanako and his fucking memory that I’m still here, and I can’t even fucking do that right!” Katsumi confesses. The skin on her hands is bright red and flaking from the pressure and heat building up.

A small bang sounds out as she releases it, and Katsumi flinches as the raw skin on her hands comes into contact with the air. Momo is the first to be by her side, followed by Mina. Eijiro is left standing before he walks over slowly and kneels down next to her. It’s so overwhelming his Quirk activates on its own, starting around his heart and lungs.

He just sits down painfully in front of Katsumi to shield her as she keeps brokenly sobbing, Momo shakily treating the burns on her hands, Mina refusing to let go as she nuzzles into the taller girl’s neck, stroking her back as gently as possible, soaking the taller girl's shirt in tears.

“You… Y-You told him to?”

He was lied to this entire time. If not, he’d never been told the full truth.

That the one person he thought would be the greatest hero out of all of them was a monster who’d driven someone to take their own life.

Eijiro keeps blinking stupidly at Katsumi, tears falling out of his eyes, because he knows he’s stupid. He always wasn’t the brightest tool in the shed, but he feels disgusted with himself; an ugly, roiling hot shame that boils inside of him, yet…

Katsumi finally looks up at him. It was pure, broken, grief-stricken guilt in her crimson eyes, spilling over with tears that made Eijiro's blood run cold. In that moment, she didn't look like the monster that would tell someone to kill themselves; She looked like someone who was bearing an unimaginable amount of guilt far too young. Someone who hadn't even learned how to process grief and weight of sin yet. Someone who looked utterly lost and just wanted a way home.

Eijiro can't ignore the screaming in the back of his head that what Katsumi is feeling doesn't matter; She took a life through her words alone. But Eijiro can't ignore what his eyes see right in front of him, unless he's gone mad.

Katsumi is desperately asking the same question as him:

If the shame and the guilt and the grief she’d carry for the rest of her life was enough for what she did.’

–

‘“Kiri?” Mina tilts her head to one side, her horns bouncing with her curls as her golden irises and black sclera look up at him curiously.

“I… It’s about Bakugo,” He immediately regrets bringing it up. The name alone makes his tongue feel dirty, and the tension in the room immediately shifts. “I’m sorry, I-”

“No no, it’s…” Kyoka gestures hollowly, his voice quiet as he looks around.

“I don’t know what to think…” Eijiro says quietly. “...Like... She told someone to kill themselves, and they did it. But... There's no ''but,' about this at all, actually... I-I just-... I saw her face and I thought... She looked so terrified. Like All For One was still there... Like she was terrified of herself... Is there really even an acceptable metric for forgiveness or atonement for that where they can finally be accepted again? I don't think... I don't think I can trust my own judgement anymore..." Mina looks like she’s about to cry again, and then dives to nuzzle up against Eijiro’s arm. “Maybe I just need to give it time to think about it, with… Everything that’s going on,” The room left behind that sentence is endless given the state of affairs in Japan, and all the other girls in the room know it.

The following week was nothing but observation. ‘Not stalking-!’ He wasn’t being weird about it; he didn’t go out of his way to talk to Katsumi much anymore, but... He left the invitation open to her.

She looked awful. Like she aged decades from confessing her sins. All she did was study and train, and she kept being at the very top of the class, even through her self-imposed torture. All Mi- Toshinori’s usual smile began faltering every time he congratulated her, obviously sensing something was wrong. Kaoruko-sensei told her to stay behind several times, clearly not for grades, but Kyoka had listened in one time when it became frighteningly often, and realized she was just talking with Katsumi about her day and how things were, though it was more often than not a one-sided conversation.

He turned to the internet; He looked up telltale signs of grief and guilt and what people who felt remorse and guilt for horrible things they committed who actually wanted to see change and not get out of consequences. A lot of them fit Katsumi; she buried herself in her work and her training, and cut everyone off from her, and the more he thinks about it, it wasn’t because she thought she was better than them, she was scared she’d do the same thing she did to Mikumo to them.

The statistics were a horror story told in numbers: That 20% Quirkless rate is just worldwide. In Japan, that falls to 2%, mostly comprised of the elder population in their 80's to 90's. Of the small percent that are born today, 38% make it to 15, and of that 28%, only 15% are actually able to find any kind of education or employment. 4% make it to adulthood. The leading causes of death were suicide, homicide, and neglect. He went the other direction instead. Found articles from foreign institutions that did studies on demographics and sociology in Japan. The discrepancy in how Quirks were viewed as 'Heroic,' and 'Villainous were just as alarming. 72% of those with Quirks viewed with qualities generally considered 'Heroic,' i.e flashy, powerful, versatile, ended up in the Heroics Field, one way or another. 35% of those with 'Villainous' Quirks, i.e, undesirable traits, taboo, harmful if not careful, ended up dead by 18. Suicide, homicide, and neglect were listed as the leading causes.

Realization hits Eijiro like a bullet: 'Katsumi was fucking enabled.'

There was a horrible back-and-forth in his head: That Katsumi was a victim of the system of who was manipulated by the adults she was supposed to trust and that she clearly, clearly realized now the weight of what she did, and the other saying she still drove someone to suicide and that she was no better than a villain and that he's a dumbass for even considering otherwise.

It drives him mad. He's not sure he should talk to Hound Dog about it; Maybe it'll clear his head just a bit, even if it doesn't give him a direct, objective answer, because what even is objective anymore in their world???

Eijiro doesn't really get the downtime to go to Hound Dog; Between classes and training and the upcoming internships, the only form of comfort he gets is passing out face down on his mattress and sleeping until the moment he has to wake up. He still has his friends! Kat-... Bakugo, stopped hanging out with them, so they weren't the 'Bakusquad,' any longer; None of them really had a name in mind. At least in terms of hero training, jumping during exams to prevent his classmates from getting harmed and passing with some of the highest marks in the practical section in history, the Shie Hassaikai Raid where he proved his mettle alongside Fat Gum, and his friend group growing and just generally being the best he could ever ask for, he realizes he was right about something.

He eventually confides in Izumi about it, the green-haired girl from 1-B who grew up with Bakugou and Akatani.

"Yeah, she..." Izumi swallows a little as she looks away, before she sighs. "She has been going to therapy, both before and after Kamino..." She trails off quietly. She glances over across the training grounds over the din of sparring and training, and sees Katsumi reviewing with Kaoruko-sensei on the sidelines, the bags under her eyes evident from here.

"...Has she gotten any better? Since, y'know-" Eijiro puts his hands up quickly. "Actually, I-I'm sorry, I didn't-:"

"It's okay, I promise," Izumi consoles quickly, a small yet kind smile on her face. She pauses for a moment. "...She isn't the same person she was just a few years ago... It's a long story, but..." She looks back up. "What's done is done. I forgave what she did to me but I didn't forget. We're friends again... I still love and care for her, and I don't think I'll ever not be able to... She needs someone like you in her life." Eijiro just blinks. "I-I'm not- Saying you have to be her friend, but..." She looks down. "I think a lot of that change was having someone as, y'know, solid and dependable as you."

Eijiro just blinks again.

"Oh."

It's silent for a few minutes as they stand there, pretending to look busy so they don't get in trouble. Eijiro's heart was going to explode; Pride, honor, guilt, confusion- everything, basically. Yet his mind kept trailing back to what Katsumi did- Not the weight of it, but... The person who she said it to. Mikumo.

"So..." he pauses as Izumi's emerald eyes turn to look up at him curiously. "If I can ask about Mikumo... What was he like? He was obviously really important to both of you... He sounds pretty cool," Izumi's eyes light up like the stars when he finishes.

"Oh, yeah! He was born in Australia with his twin sister before they moved her because both of his mom- He had two- had better job opportunities here. He was Quirkless like I was- Well, actually, We thought I was Quirkless back then, wholedifferentstorybut, yeah, we promised to be heroes together when were young!" She pauses for a moment as the light in her eyes dim. "We didn't realize at the time what the label 'Quirkless,' actually meant, and we thought it didn't matter when we did. He survived that terrorist attack in Shibuya," Eijiro's eyes widen. He still remembers exactly where he was on that day. "He lost his left leg and eye, but he was able to walk and run again not too long after! He was super kind, and strong, and caring- He was like I am with Heroes but with engineering, like with cars, planes, trains- He loved Rescue Heroes like Crimson Riot and Crust, kind of like Ryukyu when she debuted. He made all sorts of sketches and designs with my help about what his outfit would look like, and-"

He’s only heard a little about Mikumo, but the more he learns, the more he feels like they would’ve been great friends.’

–

‘Hound Dog’s office had just recently been rebuilt. He’d been inundated with the hundreds of students going to therapy as Reconstruction just started, but he’d remained patient and kind with everyone like a saint.

“I…” Eijiro starts, gripping his pants. “I don’t know why I thought becoming a hero was a good idea.” He swallows right afterwards, seeing Hound Dog’s form shift slightly, eyes soft with understanding.

“Where do you want to start?” He asks gently, so, so kind it makes Eijiro feel safer than he’s ever felt. His muscles loosen just a bit.

“Just… All the things the HPSC did, and the corruption that ran through every industry because we had no real problems and forgot everything before All Might,” Eijiro swallows again. “I-It’s just… I can’t help but ask why I wanted to ever be a part of this? I mean, I know things are getting better,” he gestures, “But… It just keeps me up at night knowing I… I fell right into it.”

“You told me your motivations for becoming a hero,” Hound Dog says softly, his tone matter-of-factly. “You wanted to be an unshakeable rock who kept everyone safe.”

“Yeah, like…” Eijiro looks away again. “Like Crimson Riot.” Crimson Riot was one of the few who actually remained faithful to the core values of being a Hero, which was probably why he was no longer around and almost all the others who thrived in corruption and absolute power were still here. Alive.

“Do you believe you could stand up in the vacuum we find today and live up to those values? I believe you can.” He says finally. Eijiro blinks for a moment, before looking away. He genuinely hated himself for the fact he became part of such an awful system and machine, but… What other way did he have? Become a villain and fall in with the wrong people and just be erased? Or try some other route and probably be silenced?

Why not try changing it from the inside?

“To redefine everything and show there still is objective good in this world?” Eijiro looks up and sees Hound Dog’s eyes light up as he nods. “Yeah… Yeah!” Eijiro shouts a little too loudly. “I could…” He wilts again, but something inside of him got lit on fire, even if it was almost smothered by the weight of everything around him. “Stand up in their place and make sure something like this never happens again… Make sure no one ever forgets… I don’t know how to do it, yet…”

“And I will be there with you every step of the way. And so will your friends. This isn’t a road that can be walked alone, and there is no shame in that.”

Eijiro smiles again.’

He squeezes Katsumi’s hand again. Eijiro hardens his palm, and Katsumi lets her Quirk loose, sparks flicking up against rock, and creating a gentle warmth against his hardened skin.

‘“Try to slip past her defense
Without granting innocence
Lay down a list of what is wrong
The things you've told her all along
Pray to God she hears you
And pray to God she hears you,”’

Chapter Text

'The rain gently streams down outside, pitter-pattering against the window and dripping down the tree right outside the apartment window. The gentle hum of the aircon does little to disrupt the calming downpour outside as Izumi flips through her notebook. Her eyes drift over to Mikumo again, laying on his back, and sprawled out on her bed, gently breathing. His face is screwed up in tension as he rests, and Izumi frowns as she puts her notebook down and leans closer, her laptop going completely ignored.

He still had his arms and leg in the cheap compression sleeves, but small rips in them expose the myriads of injuries and horror beneath. The burn scars were spread like dark kettle lakes all over his body, wild and errant, mostly concentrated on his left side. Small surgical scars, long, thin, and pink, were laced with precision amongst most of the unharmed skin and visibly over some of the burn scars. The giant eyepatch on the left side of his face covers the hollow where his left eye used to be, as well as the giant burn scar Izumi's never seen. Where he was resting, his windswept hair was fallen back to reveal a long, curling scar around the right side of his head under his scalp.

Izumi frowns as she keeps staring, feeling tears starting to well up in her eyes. Mikumo's face is still twisted up what looks like pain, but he doesn't stir or writhe in his sleep; He just lays there, breathing. The air-conditioning and the humidity outside, plus the baggy, thin clothes he was wearing was probably making it the most comfortable for him as it could be.

She lays down next to him, keeping a respectful distance between them. Mikumo hates touch- Actually, he despises it. It's no wonder; given what she's seen of the scars and burns, she can't imagine any kind of contact with much of anything would be pleasant at all. A constant itching, scratching, boiling, and searing sensation she's lived through that makes her writhe and wither just thinking about it, all over his body, into his bones held together with plates and rods. Yet Mikumo was just... He looks so exhausted, even in his sleep.

Maybe one day, when he's healed more, after more surgeries and more advanced treatments, maybe Mikumo could finally let Izumi hug and cuddle the pain and darkness away, but for now, she's than content laying her next to him, with the rain still coming down outside, and knowing that he's finally getting some form of sleep.

-

"DO ME A FUCKING FAVOR THEN!" Katsumi barks, sparks dancing under her palms as Izumi stares up at her, mouth twisted into a terrified squiggle. "I ALREADY TOLD THE OTHER USELESS FUCK TO DO THIS, SO YOU BETTER FUCKING LISTEN TO ME! IF YOU WANNA BE SO FUCKING USELESS, GO PRAY FOR A QUIRK IN YOUR NEXT LIFE AND TAKE A SWAN DIVE OFF THE ROOF!"

Izumi's heart breaks.

The tears are instant as it becomes deathly quiet around them. Katsumi's eyes are still lit up in total anger, genuine rage as she heaves, smoke billowing from her clenched palms as she stared Izumi down. Something in her eyes flashes, and her shoulders relax as her snarl fades away into one of genuine confusion, and the sparks become smoke pouring from her palms, but Izumi... Izumi doesn't care anymore. She swallows thickly as the tears keep streaming, and someone behind Katsumi laughs awkwardly before Izumi turns around and flees as fast possible.

Mikumo would be at the station by now, she knows. Waiting for her on the same train eastbound, where she could easily walk home but it wasn't safe any longer, before Mikumo continued his journey on home to his lonely, lonely apartment. At least Izumi had Mei to split the bills with her; to keep her company on nights where it was too terrifying to be alone any longer. Her heart fills with sadness and hurt every time she thinks of how suffocatingly isolating it must be for Mikumo having to make that same journey by himself everyday knowing what he's lived through and what he's currently going through.

Eventually, she finds him, waiting on the platform, head tilted down towards the rails below. The one silver eye had left was so clearly distraught in a way she'd never seen; brow furrowed in deep thought, nothing but total anger and... And, just, betrayal, on his face. Izumi stumbles up next to him, and he turns to look at her worriedly, silver eye scanning her.

"I-I'm sorry..." Izumi chokes out, covering her mouth. Some people turn to look at her, but she wipes angrily at her eyes, the two teens turned towards the windows as the train begins rolling. "I didn't think s-she'd... She'd g-go that far..." Izumi chokes again, hiccupping as her chest burns and burns with hurt and betrayal. It was just... Utter disbelief. Not even Katsumi looked like she believed what she said herself either. Mikumo... Mikumo doesn't react. He gently brings a heavily scarred, bruised hand up to her face, and wipes the tears away, his own grey eye hollow of its usual light, but still a soft, comforting feeling emanating from his gaze. Izumi blushes slightly as she looks away back out the window towards the skyline.

Izumi keeps the eye contact as the last of her tears are dried, and she can't help the total dread starting to overwhelm her to the more she looks into Mikumo's eye. Her mouth goes to move on its own, to say something, but nothing comes out. Mikumo just blinks at her in silent confusion before looking out the window. Izumi feels the burn in her face starting to become unbearable, before she finally forces herself to speak amidst the cluttered, claustrophobic thoughts running through her head too fast to make any sense of.

"I-I don't know what to say..." Izumi whispers. She swallows thickly, attempting to swallow the hurt and agony rising up through her airways- In the form of a cry or a scream, she doesn't want to find out. Not yet, at least. Katsumi's crimson eyes are still burned into her vision as the train comes to a halt at their stop. They both disembark and stand off to the side. Mikumo goes to go board again since his stop was later down the line outside the city proper, but Izumi grabs his sleeve gently. "Wait! Please, just- D-Don't go y-yet..." Mikumo blinks at her again, head tilting slightly with a soft metallic click. "J-Just... S-Stay for a moment... Please."

Mikumo just nods, and they both sit in shared silence as people bustle about at the station. There was a delay further up the line, something about a villain attack, but Izumi doesn't care; She can't shake the horrible sensation of dread and fear beginning to boil over. She keeps playing with Mikumo's sleeve, Mikumo looking down at her thin, scrawny fingers as she keeps nervously wringing them.

"Don't listen to what K-Ka... Katsumi said..."  Izumi says gently. Mikumo just blinks at the use of Katsumi's first name instead of ''Kacchan.' Izumi frowns again as she meets Mikumo's eye fully, emerald eyes shining. "What she said was wrong. For both of us. I-I know you gotta go, but... P-Please. Please be there tomorrow morning at the beach. L-Like always?" Izumi pleads. Mikumo just blinks at her, overcast grey staring for a moment before looking away, face completely blank as he let's go. Something inside Izumi tears as Mikumo pulls away. She wants nothing more to just pull him into a hug forcefully, make him miss his train, and demand he stay, but... Mikumo hates touch. She's the only person he's let in, and she doesn't know what else to do. Her body acts before her mind, making her stumble after him, but she stops herself just as the doors close.

Izumi stands there on the platform, shaking, before looking down at her bright red shoes, a constant, mocking reminder of her place in this world, and lets the tears spill again.

The walk back to their apartment was hazy. She doesn't remember any of it; If she got harassed as per usual, she doesn't notice. She doesn't sleep that night, either; It's spent researching, drawing, writing, watching every video essay and research article she can find to fill her brain and drown out the dread staving off her exhaustion like a levee against flood waters.

Izumi curls up into a ball on her bed, crying into her hands quietly, not knowing what else to do, and it's only then does she finally understands that this is what it truly means to be useless.

-

She can't sleep.

Izumi has spent hours in her bed tossing and turning, unable to get out of her own head. Mei has been gone forever, like she usually is one Fridays for her tech assessments and likely forgetting to come home, but Izumi's mind is racing with the horrible thoughts of what could be, and she can't bring herself to think about it any longer without acting. She throws herself out of bed with a huff and starts pacing around her room like a caged animal. Something is wrong. Mikumo... 'Oh God, what have I done?!?' Izumi sprints over to her bathroom to dry heave into the toilet, her heart pounding itself out of her chest as fear begins gripping every single inch of her body, ice crawling up her skin, inbetween the scars and into her nerves and bones. When she goes to try and throw up again, she becomes acutely aware that she isn't breathing anymore, pain swelling in her chest like she might explode as her head becomes lighter and lighter. It's touch and go for several minutes, but Izumi finally manages to force a shaky, excruciating inhale as she sits up, stars in her vision and shaking like a twig.

Her body is moving on its own before she can even react, this time with zero hesitation like she's been possessed. She's grabbing her laptop and stuffing it inside of her bag, and throwing an oversized hoodie over herself before she's stumbling out of her door frantically. It's only then does she realize it's pouring outside, the streetlights doing little to illuminate much past the haze of rain. Izumi doesn't stop to catch her breath once as she sprints to the train station on her street, every inhale and exhale ragged as she runs and runs and runs, the dread and guilt pooling in her core threatening to drag her under the dark puddles she runs on. She's on the train the next moment she blinks, and is frantically lighting up Mikumo's phone as fast as her shaking fingers can type.

11:43

Izu: Hey

Izu: I'm coming over

Izu: Sorry if this imprmtuor whatever

Izu: I just can't fbe alone right now

Izu: Please pick up

Izu: kumo???

Izu: im almost there

Izu: next stop

Izu: i'm sorry

Izu: i'm so sorry

The moment the doors open with a soft hum, she runs like a madwoman out of the train, brushing past several people; One of them tries grabbing her with a shout, but she shakes them off her sleeve and keeps sprinting out into the raining darkness. She slips on the wet, cracked asphalt beneath her before staggering herself back up and taking off again. She's memorized the route towards Mikumo's apartment; The road under the railway overpass covered with foliage, the public library on the same road with a small park, the decades-old memorial to a long-forgotten villain attack. Izumi feels tears starting to sting her eyes as she sprints.

Then...

She sees the flashing blue and red lights dancing in the haze of the rain in front of her.

Izumi slows to a crawl, her breathing stopping yet heart pounding as she nears, and suddenly the thousands thoughts streaming through her heads stop dead in their tracks.

She sees it, and feels her heart stop.

Izumi stands there in the darkness, just out of reach of the lights, and just stares as she feels herself run colder and colder.

Her eyes never leave the scene in front of her, edges of her vision blurring with the flashing blue and red lights as the distant city noise becomes faded and muffled, background noise of the rest of the world still turning behind her. She's drenched head-to-toe in rainwater, like she's just staggered out of the sea and her lungs full of saltwater.

Izumi falls to her knees shakily, slowly, tears spilling out of her eyes and mixing with the rainwater as they fall, the light reflecting off the puddles in the street, her lips parted as she shakes, pulled between absolute confusion and horrible realization. She can't breathe again, but there's no stabbing pain like before; The reflex is just gone. If she is breathing, she's feeling too, too much to be aware of it, and her mind is going a million miles a minute and everything is just too much, she can't actually make out what she's thinking herself, every single sense too sharp to not be nauseating yet too dull to be useful.

Someone's walking over to her, and saying something, but Izumi can't hear them. Her throat is frozen solid, her entire body stiff, shut off from both instinct and reason, her mind no longer registering anything outside of herself. Eventually, more people show up, blurry silhouette's against the streetlights and flashing sirens, and then she's lifted onto the back bumper of an ambulance with a shock blanket around her shoulders. The doors close, and eventually reopen blurrily to some kind of medical office. She can't make anything out other than vague, shadowy silhouettes moving around, eyes unfocused and unmoving.

There's a young woman in a bright pink nurse's outfit, with pink hair billowing into ponytails behind her, and bright blue eyes near her, but whatever she's doing Izumi can't make out- There's no capacity or ability for her to. The coldness from the rain water settles into her bones like ice, the blanket doing little anything to help her but just put suffocating weight around her shoulders that made her shoulders strain and back feel like it's breaking. Her breathing was heaved, uncontrollable, but she still listens to whatever the deeply concerned nurse in front of her is saying, the edges of her vision blurred and mind snapping like a live wire at every little thing around her yet not at what was in front of her.

None of her thoughts are cohesive, all she can muster is 'Mikumo's gone, Mikumo's gone, Mikumo's gone-' like a mantra, forcing herself to believe the childish part of herself that thought this was all some cruel, sick joke. Her muttering has turned into talking, random screaming whenever she remembers every single little thing that set her off up until the point Katsumi told her to jump off the roof, the itching of them sedating her, the muffled noises of whatever person they had next to her talking because Izumi's long since given up on anything around her.

The first time she's fully cognizant, Mitsuki is running her long, delicate fingers through her hair gently, slowly, mother-like from her bedside. Izumi breathes out, eyes unseeing as her nerves process every singly little stroke on her scalp, the gentle, beautiful tingle against her scalp being the only the only thing grounding her now. It's so, so soft, Izumi never wants to move again. For once, her chest isn't raw with uneven, unmeasured respirations in mockery of normal breathing; It's just the gentle rise and fall of her chest as she lays there, the light in the room changing from dawn to dusk.

-

Izumi has green days, yellow days, and red days.

Green days are when she's able to actually see what's around her, get up with limited permission of what she's able to do, but eat basic food and talk and converse normally. Yellow days were laying in bed all day, unable to move, and sinking into the touch of another person next to her. Red days were when she had to sedated from screaming and clawing at her own skin.

Izumi knows the red days are almost always caused by a lack of touch. It's a craving that isn't able to be fully satisfied anymore, but it's able to be entertained at the very least. Mitsuki is her favorite, but her Nurse Joy rubbing her back also works. The only red day so far that hadn't been triggered by lack of touch was seeing Mitsuki's face, only to be reminded of Katsumi, and triggered a fit of hysterics Izumi doesn't remember, but her skin did from the red scratch marks and dark bruises all over her upper body, and the marks from where she pulled against the railing restraints until her skin almost tore.

Eventually, a tall woman with dark purple, silky smooth hair and kind, understanding eyes behind pretty glasses comes in to talk to her, and tells her what she already knew.

Mikumo committed suicide later that night, at 11:39 P.M on Friday, April 11th.

Every single night is spent staring up at the ceiling of her room, and she wonders if this was the Hell Mikumo had to go through after the bombing. Every night, not being able to move, stuck with nothing but your own thoughts, except her had it so, so much worse, unimaginably so, with so many burns and so much pain. She thinks about him so much, driving herself to tears because, 'How could I fail the one person who thought I was a hero???' Over and over again, it's the same memories of him driving her mad, the few times he talked, the few times he smiled, the few times where it looked like he was free from the weight of his guilt and his pain, where his physical disabilities couldn't keep him grounded any longer, before they all fade away back into the perpetual silence surrounding her.

Izumi thinks long and hard. There's no way she'll be able to be a hero now, with a hospital stay on her record... 'As if I had any chance beforehand,' She mutters to herself. Izumi reminds herself numbly, her previous line of thought dying in it's tracks as the silence and hollowness makes her sink back into the bed. Most nights are the same until she's allowed to leave, holding her dad's hand and holding an ice cream cone in the other. Mitsuki comes over a lot, and Izumi curls up next to her and lets her rub her head gently and stroke her back, turning yellow into green and making her feel like maybe she wasn't going mad. Mei spends a lot more time at their apartment instead of disappearing off into the city like she always does, curling up around Izumi like a space heater and squeezing her until the greenette becomes grounded enough to look her in the eyes. She goes to see Nurse Joy a lot, whose been assigned to her long term; A student under Recovery Girl, whose Quirk let's her do... Izumi doesn't remember; That spark the she had for analyzing Quirks is just... Gone, and all that's written in front of her is the basic format she always uses for her Quirk analyses.

Every single night afterwards is spent looking up ways to deal with grief online, because even though she's already in therapy, that 'heroic' side of her that never leaves tells her she needs to find a way to help with this on her own. To maybe try and seal off that hollow left in her heart where a prismatic silver used to reside. Where a dark crimson she thought she could trust wouldn't leave her heart, either.

She finds something that clicks with her, finally:

"Memories are like nightlights in the darkest rooms. They don’t erase the pain, but they make it bearable." 

Izumi blinks as she stares, and feels the burn come back to her eyes again. She lays back down, sprawled out across her small bed, looking out the window at the vibrant skyline of Musutafu and neighboring Shizuoka.

It feels so incredibly selfish, boiling her entire dream to be a hero down to being in memory of her late friend instead of the inspiration she felt seeing selfless acts in her childhood and the joy she feels serving others, but that wasn't the case. She always wanted to be one, yet she deeply questioned if she still could be given what happened to her. This is... This is a chance to remember him. To try and put her demons to rest and maybe give herself closure that Mikumo could've been one of the greatest heroes in history right alongside her. She wasn't going to only be a Hero out of spite; That would only get her and countless others killed.

Izumi finally lays down on her back, staring up at the galaxy projection on her ceiling, slowly dancing overhead. It was her and Mikumo's dream to be heroes. Right alongside each other. It still mattered if he wasn't here anymore, he'd want her to keep going. Izumi clutches the notebook in her hand tighter, staring up at the stars above her as a small smile crests her face, tears staring to pour again.

All Izumi knew how to do was walk straight into Hell, and she was going to do it with a smile.'

–

"C-Can... Can someone without a Quirk still be a hero...?"

...

"...Yes."

"I-... W-What?"

-

"WHY DID I HAVE TO BE THE ONE TO DESTROY ALL MIGHT?!?!?"

-

Izumi's head is spinning like mad.

Probably from where Katsumi let off a detonation right above her head and singed her curls.

Both of them are laying on their backs on cracked, dusty asphalt, staring up at the sky as it begins lightening from dark blue to green from the sun rising higher up. Neither of them say anything, far too exhausted to even do so much as move. Breathing was already difficult for Katsumi considering she knows for certain several of her ribs were cracked under Izumi's soles. Izumi felt like she was going to throw up, even laying on her back, the world seemed to keep turning on her axis, the faint outline of stars smothered by light pollution fading as the sun rose.

They lay there for what seems like hours, only marked by reality as the sun begins shining into their eyes. Katsumi swallows dryly as Izumi coughs, wincing at the sore pain shooting up throughout her entire body from her muscles. The unhealed burns on Katsumi's hands burn and sting from the dust and exposure to air, but she can't bring herself to move.

"I miss them," She says quietly. Izumi blinks as her brain catches up, lips parting slightly as she registers what Katsumi said. Her eyes become glassy as Katsumi closes hers, gritting her teeth and snarling up at the sky as the burn comes back full force.

"I miss 'em too..." Izumi croaks, whispering, tears beginning to streak paths through the dirt and soot caked onto her face. She sniffles as she looks up at the last of the stars above her, and sees the way they shine against the vibrant colors of the sunrise; For a moment, it almost feels like the prismatic glow from Mikumo's silver iris's. Katsumi looks up as well, and sees the faint purple amid the dying black skies to the west and the rising blues and oranges to the east. The wind streams through the empty streets and promenades of Ground Beta around them, and eventually, the light becomes too much for either of them to bare.

Both of them sit up shakily, both of them hissing at the open wounds and burns on themselves, muscles sore, and some bones and joints thrown out of place. They don't look at each other as they stand up shakily, Izumi limping on her right leg where she misjudged her kick and dug straight into the ground instead, and Katsumi hunched over from the welt sprouting over her chest from the kick that did land, though none of their limbs were exactly cooperating either, with their spasms and soreness.  The walk back was silent, both of them too absent-minded as they left the grounds and walked straight onto the promenade leading back to the dorms. Eventually, both of them stop again to catch their breath on a nearby bench, the walk proving to be far more difficult. It's quiet other than Katsumi's hollowly coughing to try and get her breathing under control, and Izumi sorely yawning.

...

"...I'm tired of this,"

Katsumi looks up at her.

"I just want bygones to be bygones, and move on. We both have bigger things to worry about given... Given everything that's happened in the past few months..." Katsumi just blinks at her.

"I..."

"I-I'm not forgetting what you did, or what happened, but..." Izumi frowns, and looks up at Katsumi's crimson eyes, disbelieving of every word. "I can't keep going like this. It's exhausting. I... I don't want to be friends, but... You don't act like the same Katsumi you did those years ago... And I can't keep living with the weight of this just... Being unsaid," Izumi trails off at the end as she breathes out, playing with her shoe tie. Katsumi keeps staring, before she looks away at the ground as well. She's not apologizing; She can't apologize, not yet, she hasn't earned the right to. Katsumi doesn't know what in this world she that could do might make her be able to apologize to Izumi for what she did to her and Mikumo, but she knows it hasn't happened yet. Maybe finally being her hero like she was meant to be, she can have it mean something finally, but until then...

"...Yeah... Let's... Let's head back."

"Yeah..."

They both get chewed out in unison. Faintly, it reminds both of them of when they were younger, playing heroes and villains, eventually escalating until something got broken, and had to endure the tongue lashing before they cleaned up their mess, and makes Izumi smile just a little, though not visible.

Both of them end up being put on house arrest, but given how classes haven't started back up yet, they get put on cleaning duty instead. It was a smack on the wrist for both of them really, because even though neither of them wasn't really present-minded in the moment, the genuine concern thinly veiled by disappointment on Kaoruko and Sekijiro-sensei's faces said enough.

Cleaning was cathartic for Izumi, at least; That's definitely something else she got from her mother other than her waterworks.

"Oh! Hey, Pars- OH MY GOD, what happened?!?!"

"Dude, did you get hit by a fucking freight train?!"

"WHO HURT IZU?! WHO DID IT?!?!? I'LL-"

Izumi couldn't meet their eyes. As much weight as that conversation with Katsumi removed from her shoulders, it made her feel so weightless that she was just drifting untethered.

"Everyone give her space!" Itsuka shouts eventually, arms up and cordoning off the kitchen where Izumi was running her hands under hot water until it started to burn. Everyone backs off eventually, leaving the dorms to go explore what other renovations had been done to U.A, or back to their rooms to get adjusted to life here, until it was just Itsuka and Izumi left. Izumi blinks when she realizes how long she's had the water on for, and shuts it off, staring out the window at the late-August summer breeze ruffling the trees.

Itsuka walks over slowly, and Izumi can see the genuine worry and sadness in her eyes just in her peripherals. The bandages over her arms from the both the camp attack and her intervention at the Kamino Ward rescue are still there, and fills her head with the memory of watching All Might's deflated form billowing steam as that... That... Monster taunted him. Izumi swallows thickly as she looks up, but can't force herself to smile, emerald meeting teal.

Eventually, Itsuka closes the distance, and wraps her arms slowly around Izumi, giving her time to leave, but Izumi melts into the contact instantly, and suddenly her legs can no longer support her. They both fall to the kitchen floor slowly, Izumi's arms shakily coming up to grasp at the other girl's back as she presses herself closer, whimpering quietly as the dams begin to crack and leak. Itsuka begins rubbing circles into Izumi's back, right over she shoulders and spine, that makes Izumi's muscles relax instantly and she melts in the tall girl's hold.

"You're not weak," Itsuka whispers quietly, over Izumi's silent, exhausted sobs as she begins soaking both of them with her tears. "You've just been strong too long,"

-

...

"...I don't expect this to change a thing between this, but I have to speak my truth... I apologize. I'm sorry, Izumi, for everything."

Izumi keeps blinking up at Katsumi, eyes starting to regain their color and shine but face still pulled into shock and terror, before she bites her lip and looks down, and suddenly it becomes too much to stand any longer. She falls to her knees in the deep rain puddle she was standing in, dry heaving silently as she shakes, and suddenly she's back all those years ago that stormy night, staring at the flashing lights ahead of her and overwhelming guilt and dread that drowned her.

Itsuka and Ochako run over first through the deep rain puddles, followed by Himiko and Yang, the rest of 1-A and B standing around solemnly as the last of Izumi's strength leaves her, unable to keep going. Katsumi finally kneels in front of her, crimson eyes no longer pulled into a scowl, but just silent calm, and gently brushes the messy, tangled hair out of Izumi's dirty face.

'"My body just... Moved on it's own,'" The cross-shaped scar on her chest where the tendril meant for Izumi pierced her aorta, and where they performed open-heart surgery on her, burns gently as the freezing rainwater douses it, sparks dancing along its length uncontrollably but gently, finally not enough to hurt anyone around her.'

-

When Izumi comes to, there’s a gentle warmth nuzzling her face, and a soft clicking in her ears. She cracks an eye open, and sees dark, messy, seaweed green hair blocking her vision. Izumi’s cheek squishes as she closes her eyes, and sees Setsuna’s upset face staring up at her from where she was latched around her body tightly. Setsuna whimpers and nuzzles her face again, chirping as her legs gently kick down on Izumi’s.

Izumi brings a scarred, shaky hand up to stroke Setsuna’s hair, and the distressed lizard girl purrs and melts into the contact, her indigo eyes desperately scanning her own. Izumi keeps stroking her hair to calm her down, eyelids still heavy as she realizes she’s far, far too comfortable to even consider moving.

There’s a gentle exhale in her ear, and she cranes her neck to find Itsuka’s sleeping form behind her, cheek squished adorably on the back of her neck as her strong, scarred arms hold her from behind, their legs intertwined. Yang is holding Itsuka in return, prosthetic titanium arm slung around her waist as she snores loudly, mouth hung open. As Izumi’s eyes focus, she realizes the dark mass behind Setsuna is Blake, curled up into a ball around the lizard girl.

Izumi’s eyes soften as she nuzzles into the warmth, letting Setsuna rub up against her in her attempts to drive the sadness away. Setsuna keeps her eyes locked with Izumi’s, indigo staring into emerald, a silent begging to understand what had someone as strong and resilient as her to be so distraught. Izumi doesn't say anything as she let's Setsuna keep nuzzling and cuddling her, sinking into the shared, collective touch around her. Eventually, Setsuna's calmed down enough to go back to simple snuggling, arms and legs wrapped around Izumi's waist, being so much shorter than her, now just purring contently as she slow blinks up at Izumi.

‘He would’ve loved you,’ It’s an idyllic thought that, while forlorn, had nothing but warmth and love behind it. Itsuka would’ve loved him too, no doubt; someone as mature and level-headed as she was, who found strength in themselves to be practically unshakeable, though Itsuka would teach him how to let others in.

Mikumo could probably fit right between them, eclipsed by both the taller young women, and act like a squishmallow much the same way Setsuna does. ‘Oh, he’d be so mad at Setsu,’ Izumi smiles to herself. He can already imagine the silent anguish and major annoyance at Setsuna’s antics and her need for physical intimacy. She’d love being a big spoon for him.

Yang would drive him crazy. Polar opposites in every way, but many niche interests aligned, like motorsports and weird history. She’d tease him every turn for being over a foot shorter than her, but then hold him like a pillow against her chest and refuse to let go. Blake would probably hold silent conversations with him that only they could understand.

Reiko and him would love to talk about ghost stories and horror. Himiko would probably be obsessed with all the horrible motorsports accidents and plane crashes he knew off the top of his head. Yui would build model kits with him every day. Mei and Melissa… Oh God, the world might actually end-

For once, the thoughts about what could’ve been aren’t haunting and terrifying; They’re happy and, if anything, sobering reminders of what Izumi has now and why she’ll never let go.

She squeezes Setsuna again, making her trill, and nuzzles her nose right up against her neck, sinking back into the warmth. She’s fine with laying her for a while longer; None of them have anything else to do this weekend. The warmth and contact helps with the pain, and the shared intimacy lets them know they aren’t alone in their trauma and fear. That they’ll be okay.

Her phone goes off.

Izumu blinks as she quickly grabs it from her pocket, laying her arm back on Setsuna’s side, who clicks as she stares curiously up at her, head cocked to the side. Izumi’s other hand comes up to stroke her hair gently as Itsuka yawns behind her, before whimpering and nuzzling into Izumi’s back again.

Katsumi: We need to talk

Katsumi: It’s about the project

Katsumi: It’s time

Izumi blinks again as Setsuna lets out a high pitched yawn, stretching as she chirps and clicks again, a coy smile on her face.

Izu: Present Mic’s office?

Katsumi: yeha

Katsumi: yeah

Izu: Alright

Izu: Just

Izu: What if this doesn’t work

Katsumi: There’s no choice but for this to work

Izu: Kats…..

Katsumi: I’ll fucking make sure of it

Izu: …

Izu: You’re right.

Izu: Better now than any other time. None of us have anything to do.

Katsumi: ikr? Fucking holed up in the dorms doing stupid shit like gardening

Izu: Don’t let Ibara hear you say that!

Katsumi: JUST HURRY THE FUCK UP

–

Katsumi gave Izumi all of the things she helped with because she didn’t trust herself with it any longer.

The weight of it on Izumi’s shoulders alone was suffocating; Countless weeks of research, planning events and rallies and proposals, and the weight of what all this meant to her. She never even dreamed of a day where this might’ve become a reality, for that point in time where she still dreamed but those same fantasies felt as far away as the stars.

They made copies of everything, and copies of the copies. Katsumi was obsessive about this, and so was Izumi, though for different reasons.

Both of them had talked in length with counselors, as well as Present Mic, about this long before now. Izumi had reached out to so many other Quirkless people, so few and far between; many of them were older, in their late 80’s and early 90’s. The youngest she was able to find was a 35-year old man living on the street who’d been admitted to hospital after being beaten in his sleep by former HPSC agents on the run.

Every night was uneasy. It wasn’t just the unending trauma of going to war as a teenager; it was attempting to be a ‘hero,’ for everybody, and the suffocating weight of how Quirkless people are still treated. The longer she dwelled on it, the worse her thoughts got; she has everything in the world she could’ve asked for: A quirk, already a world-renowned hero, a job analyzing and helping heroes, friends. ‘Haven't I forgotten what it was like? Is there reasonable cause for me to… To… Help?’

She traces over the older scars on her upper body; Bruises that developed into gashes, scratch marks that cut far deeper than just roughhousing, and a star-shaped burn on her left shoulder. Many of them had been traced over by newer scars, ones from battle and training, but they still remained, and whenever she dissociates, running her shaky fingers over the calloused skin, she sees a bright silver eye staring back at with hope, admiration, and love.

Izumi breathes out heavily as she knocks. The wind rustles past them through the open walkway where repairs were still underway, the glass missing and open to the autumn air around them.

‘Those Quirkless kids Melissa, Mikumo and I were… Someone needs to be their Hero. Someone needs to at least try.’

Katsumi stands silently next to her, a frown pulled at her face as she stands there, still.

‘I don’t want someone to repeat what I did and didn’t do. I should’ve told Izumi and Mikumo they could’ve been heroes even without a Quirk, even without becoming a ‘Pro.’ It’s… It’s not too late for someone who can still hear it.’

Present Mic let’s them in. The meeting is brief; he takes the binder, making sure they have everything ready, and begins typing out several emails.

“I’ll pass it up to the WHA and UN reps here, and they’ll pass it to the diet when they can. Both of you will need to be there, but preferably Yaoyorozu and Kendo to go along as well because of their leadership positions.”

They part ways finally, and as they leave, both Katsumi and Izumi stand there in the dying evening light outside the door for a moment.

Both of their sighs are ones of relief and exhaustion. Izumi couldn’t wait to go back and fall back into the cuddlepile her girls were most definitely still in; Katsumi just wanted to go back and fall like a corpse on the couch and let her idiots spend time around her ‘til she falls asleep.

Neither of them look at each other, staring away at the floor as the wind rustles around them. There’s no tension between them, only heavy exhaustion and thousands of other emotions running through them.

“We should really head back.”

“Yeah.”

As they both go to walk away, they freeze when they look up. The figure is almost impossible to make out at first, but it’s a thin outline of a short boy with wild, windswept hair not too far down the corridor, a small prismatic outline through his nearly invisible silhouette, before it disappears just as quickly as it came, followed by a loud boom the moment it’s gone.

Both of them turn, frightened, and see a training jet flying low to the ground, the body panels reflecting the bright sunset light off of it, the light trailing down the corridor lightning fast before disappearing, the jet itself cresting over the trees and the roar of its engine gone.

Neither of them say anything as the wind blows one last time before dying. They turn to look at each other briefly, and continue on.

Izumi lets a small smile come onto her face, her heart just a little bit warmer; Katsumi’s face is still set in its scowl, but the weight that permanently sits across her shoulders becomes just a little bit lighter.

‘“One day, we’re gonna be the world’s greatest heroes together!”

“Yeah, we’re the three musketeers!”’

Mikumo never got the chance during his short time on Earth, an impossibly small blip in human history, but Izumi and Katsumi didn’t forget him.

He was a hero to the two girls simply for the fact he was here with them while he was.