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Kacchan's eyes are so wide and frightened, crying for help Izuku's ungifted body cannot possibly give. He's disappearing into that gaping maw.
"Just die," Izuku thinks suddenly, unbidden.
He shakes the thought, and nothing changes.
***
All Might is everything Izuku wants to be. Strong and kind and brave and worthy.
One for All tears at him. Sometimes Izuku thinks this quirk hates him, and he wonders why he couldn't be satisfied with the body his mother already loved so well. He wonders why to be a doctor or cop or firefighter, these softer heroics, seemed so beneath his notice.
But there is only one way to go, and that way is forward.
***
He dreams of Kannon, who is Mercy, and her thousand arms, reaching, reaching. The Amida Buddha gave her those arms so she might save humankind from samsara, that never-ending hurt.
It is only in retrospect that he thinks it was not Kannon at all, but Shigaraki Tomura.
***
Izuku used to wish to be like Kacchan. Kacchan's so cool! Kacchan, show us your quirk! Kacchan, will you become a hero? He's not sure what changed. An understanding, maybe, of the fundamental difference between them. Izuku doesn't long for greatness. What he wants has no name.
"I'll never be like you, Kacchan," he says.
For a brief moment, Kacchan looks startled. And then he is just Kacchan again, face set in unyielding lines. "Damn straight, you shitty nerd. Glad to hear you finally got your head outta your ass."
Izuku smiles. There is some peace in this.
"Yeah."
***
He stands on a precipice.
Uraraka says, "Don't." Uraraka says, "Please." Uraraka says, "Why?"
"We can't all be heroes," Izuku replies.
He falls. Or maybe, he leaps.
***
"I dreamt of you," Izuku says to Shigaraki Tomura. "Did you dream of me, too?"
Shigaraki Tomura says, "Yes."
***
"I don't know what you want from me," Izuku says, sullen, earnest.
"An apology," says Todoroki. "An explanation."
Izuku doesn't owe anyone anything. This is what he has taught himself, in order to kill the guilt which kept him up for so many nights. Now he sleeps soundly.
"You wanted it," Todoroki presses. "More than anyone else, you wanted it. To become a hero."
"No, I didn't," Izuku says, and realizes it is the truth. "I just wanted to be seen."
***
It's the coldest winter in over a decade when Izuku breaks forty-four of Shigaraki Tomura's bones and says, "Just die."
At first, he thought he and Shigaraki were similar, both of them something genuine all twisted up and made tricksy by misfortune. Now he sees differently. Shigaraki is petty and cruel and greedy, a child in a man's body, with a quirk to match.
"What are you now?" Shigaraki asks as he dies. "Not a villain. Certainly not a hero. You're nothing."
"Good-bye," says Izuku.
Forward. He must go forward.
***
"You beat Shigaraki," says someone or another. All these heroes, with all their good intentions, start to blend together after a while. Izuku wonders if they know about One for All, or if he is just a misguided little boy, another project. Maybe it doesn't matter. "You could still come back to Yuuei."
Izuku thinks of Kacchan.
"No."
***
It was always going to come to this, Izuku thinks. All the parts of him he can still feel hurt and hurt and hurt. His breath comes wet and ragged, but his mouth is dry.
"Kacchan," he says. "Who am I?"
Kacchan's expression is unusually vulnerable, cracked open like an egg, exposing the bloody yolk of his heart. For a last sight, it's not a bad one.
Kacchan says, "Izuku."
***
He dreams of Kannon, who is Mercy, and her thousand arms, reaching, reaching. The Amida Buddha gave her those arms so she might save humankind from samsara, that never-ending hurt.
All at once, Izuku ceases to suffer.