Chapter Text
Heartbreak, abandonment, cruel upbringings, hatred, all things that Sero knew too well. Nothing was perfect in the small world he'd barely built for himself. Manageable but not perfect—never perfect. Each day dragged him down and he was surprised he wasn't six feet under yet—courtesy of his horrible family, not his grandparents, they can stay loved for giving his younger brother somewhere to stay until Sero could start earning money as a pro hero. If he could become a pro hero, no one would want someone with an almost useless quirk as a hero. Would they? Sero wasn't entirely sure but unless he knew, his head would control what he felt—a small part of him was hopeful though. If he had made it this far and got his provisional hero's license, surely he could get his actual license. Sure he can, for his brother but more importantly for himself—for closure he so desperately needs.
The hallway outside Class 1-A’s dorms was quiet—one of the only things that let Sero breathe properly some days. He liked it like this: dim lights, no yelling, no footsteps slapping too close together. Just stillness.
Quiet.
Safe.
At least… safer than home.
He let the sleeve of his hoodie fall over his fingers as he dug through his pockets for his keycard. Oversized clothes were grounding, like a shield—soft cotton muffling the edges of the world. Days like today, when his skin felt too thin and every noise scraped raw across the inside of his skull, he needed that shield more than anything.
He finally found the key wedged behind an old folded doodle—something he’d scribbled during English class when his brain had fuzzed out into inattentive static. He slid the key through the lock, opening the door with a calm that contrasted the storm brewing in his head.
Inside, his dorm room smelled faintly like paper and pen ink, the lingering trace of pencil graphite, and the soft musk of laundry detergent. He let the door shut behind him and exhaled, shoulders dropping.
He pulled off his shoes, plugged in his headphones, and hit shuffle on his playlist.
Pierce the Veil’s guitar line kicked in. Heavy. Familiar. Safe.
He didn’t like silence. Silence left space for memories.
And noise—controlled noise, hand-picked noise—was easier than the other kind.
He walked to his desk, switching on his warm desk lamp instead of the overhead light. Bright lights made his vision stab, made the room feel too big and too sharp. He didn’t need sharp right now. His hands were still trembling from class.
Combat training had been loud today. Too loud. And crowded.
And—
Acid.
He hadn’t expected Mina to blast a wide wave of it across the simulation floor. She hadn’t meant anything by it—she was laughing, excited, hyped on adrenaline—but the second he saw the pale sizzling across the cement, his chest had locked up.
His ribs had closed like metal doors.
His lungs forgot how to open.
His knees almost buckled, and he’d had to swallow a rising wave of nausea before ducking behind a barrier. Aizawa had noticed—of course he had—but Sero had forced a thumb-up, pretending he was fine. Pretending he wasn’t about three seconds from an aphasia episode.
He hated when the words got stuck.
He hated the look on people’s faces when he opened his mouth and nothing came out.
He hated that his brain sometimes locked down like a shutting elevator door and refused to cooperate.
He sat at his desk, pulled a sketchbook onto his lap, and let his pencil wander. Scribbles first. Shapes. The stuff that didn’t have to make sense. His breathing slowly evened out.
Drawing meant his thoughts were allowed to be messy. He liked messy on paper. Not messy in his head.
A knock startled him so hard the pencil jerked, leaving a dark slash across the page.
His heart spiked. The room tilted. His fingers tingled—the beginnings of that too-familiar neurological static under his skin.
Functional Neurological Disorder episodes always started like that.
Not again. Please not again.
“Hey, Sero?” came a quiet voice. Not loud. Not sharp. Not dangerous.
He recognized the tone before the voice.
Aizawa-sensei.
Sero stood, wiped his hands on his hoodie, and cracked open the door.
Aizawa was in his usual capture weapon scarf, hair half-tucked lazily behind one ear, an unreadable expression on his face.
“You left class quickly,” Aizawa said, eyes scanning him in that soft but surgical way. “Just checking in.”
Sero nodded. Quick. Easy. Safe.
But Aizawa’s gaze flicked to the stiff way Sero held his fingers. “Hand tingling?”
Sero swallowed. Then nodded again.
Aizawa stepped inside like it was an unspoken routine. Because… well, it was. Aizawa understood. Too well, sometimes. It was eerie, how accurately he recognized the early signs of overload, of panic, of a shutdown coming.
Because he’d lived all of it, once.
“Sit,” Aizawa said quietly.
Sero did.
Aizawa crouched to eye level. “You’re not in trouble. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
Sero’s throat tightened. Wrong. That was exactly how he had felt since training. Since the acid. Since…since forever, honestly.
His dad’s voice whispered in the back of his skull.
Useless, stupid, why can’t you do anything right—
He blinked hard.
Aizawa gently tapped two fingers on the desk. “Grounding?”
Sero nodded.
Aizawa tapped again—slow rhythm, then pointed. Your turn.
Sero tapped once.
Aizawa tapped twice. Sero followed. They kept going for a minute, the steady repetition pulling him out of the static fog.
When the tingling eased, Sero exhaled shakily. “Sorry,” he whispered, because the words finally loosened.
“You don’t need to apologise for having a nervous system,” Aizawa said dryly.
Sero managed a weak smile.
Aizawa’s expression softened. “You handled yourself well today. You recognized your limit and stepped back. That's not failure.”
Sero’s stomach twisted. “Still felt like it.”
Aizawa stood, ruffling his hair lightly—something he only ever did with Sero and maybe once with Midoriya when the kid had been crying at 3 a.m.
“You’re training your body and your mind,” he said. “Both take time. And you’re doing fine.”
Sero’s throat stung.
No one had ever told him he was doing fine just by existing.
Certainly not his dad.
Certainly not his mom.
Sure as hell not the step-household full of slamming doors and unpredictable nights.
Aizawa reached the doorway but paused. “If you need anything tonight, you know where my room is.”
Sero nodded. “Thank you, sensei.”
Aizawa left without another word. Sero waited until the footsteps faded before sinking onto his bed.
He turned his head toward the window.
Rain.
Of course.
The distant patter made his spine crawl. He hated rain. Rain meant cold, wet clothes. Rain meant thunder. Rain meant days in his childhood when his dad had gotten drunk and mean and—
His breath hitched.
He curled around his pillow and tried to listen to Mitski instead. Something soft, slow, quiet enough to fill the spaces without shaking anything loose inside him.
He wasn’t okay. Not really.
He wasn’t sure he ever had been.
But at least here—here in these four walls, with his pencils and books and music and his teacher who actually cared—he wasn’t alone in the dark.
For now… that was enough.
He closed his eyes.
Tomorrow would be harder. Combat training again. Mina again. Crowds and noise and overstimulation again.
But tonight, he had a moment where nothing hurt.
He held onto that as tightly as he held onto his pillow, letting the music pull him somewhere gentler.
Somewhere safe.
Somewhere he could breathe.
Somewhere where nothing is perfect but where most things are manageable—that was enough for today.