Archive of Our Own ^beta

“It was a day just like this. Exactly like this. Actually, it was this day. It’s always been this day. It’s been today for a very long time.”

~ Day 913 ~

Izuku curled his legs to his chest, his back resting against the shoulders behind him as he stared up at the sky. He didn’t know the man behind him, but then, he didn’t know most of the people he interacted with these days. This roof, the people on every street and in every building, Izuku knew none of them. But some of them knew him now - not that they’d ever find out.

See - one day, this day, today, yet years ago - the world just…stopped. Nine hundred and thirteen days. Izuku was keeping count. But the funny thing about the world stopping is that everything stopped. Everything, except Izuku. Every person, every object, even the time of day - stopped. For nine hundred and thirteen days it had been ten o’five am on April the fifteenth. Airplanes hovered in the air, birds hung as if on strings above him, the clouds had not moved an inch. Izuku had been trapped on this day for two and a half years. 

Alone.

His first thought was; maybe this is a quirk! Maybe he got trapped in a quirk. But then, three days passed, and he started to worry that it wasn’t just a quirk. What if this was his quirk? What if Izuku wasn’t quirkless, and instead, he was trapped in his own quirk because he had no idea how to use it, or turn it off?

Then two weeks passed. 

He didn’t need to eat, or drink, or even go to the bathroom. He could sleep, but he found he never really felt the need - he only did it to pass time (ha ha). His body was frozen in time, just like everyone else, but he could move. Then - the panic set in. Because what if it’s not just Izuku? What if everyone was trapped like this, but no one could interact with each other?

Then, a year passed. Then eighteen months. Then two years.

Now, two and a half years later, Izuku was fairly sure he was either in a coma, or in Hell. Those were the only two scenarios that made any sense considering his own body didn’t have needs anymore. That realization two years in made the last six months pretty entertaining. He stopped trying to find ways out, or worrying about what he said (or didn’t say) to the people standing or sitting around. 

Because if he was in Hell, or in a coma, then none of this was real. None of it mattered.

“Do you know how I keep track?” Izuku asked while leaning his head back into the stranger behind him. They didn’t reply, and Izuku didn’t expect them to. “The only thing that works in this whole universe, or at least, as far as I’ve explored so far, is this watch.”

Izuku tugged an old pocket watch from his jeans. For some reason, it hadn’t frozen like every other clock he’d come across. There could be an argument made that since this watch was made of gears and not a computer, it didn’t freeze - except that wouldn’t explain why the old well outside the city wouldn’t budge. Izuku had only explored his own city, and a few of the surrounding prefectures. Since cars, trains, buses, and even bicycles were out of commission, he was entirely on foot. While he could certainly walk from one end of Japan to the other in two and a half years - he was too afraid of being on the opposite end of the country when (read: if) the world restarted. 

Not having needs meant he didn’t have to waste time looking for food, or searching for a safe place to sleep. He wandered where he felt the urge to go. Sometimes he would stop by the library, or the bookstore on Main Street, and spend countless hours reading. Two and a half years in and he’d read every single book in the bookstore on Main Street - even the encyclopedias out of sheer boredom. The library was almost exhausted, too, though he had yet to crack into their litany of scientific and medical journals, maybe that would get him through the next six months. 

He spent a whole day last year gorging himself on sweets at a local bakery to the point of getting sick. He ran to the bathroom, purged himself, passed out on the tiles, and woke up to a pristine bakery with every single pastry back in the place he took it from. When he turned back, even his vomit was gone. The world wasn’t just frozen, it was unchanging. No matter how messy Izuku left the library, the books were always back on their proper shelves by the time he returned. 

He liked to visit people he knew but only rarely. His mother stood statuesque in their kitchen, her finger raised and her face contorted in a sneer. They got into an argument that morning about Izuku’s inability to get into a good high school, and his lack of a job as a ‘grown-ass seventeen year old’, as she put it. He wasn’t sure why seventeen meant grown, but apparently, quirkless kids had to grow up fast. She’d been shouting at him when the freeze happened, which is how he noticed it right away. She just…froze. Her body slowed down eerily, and then….nothing. The sound of life ceased all around him, all at once.

The silence was honestly the worst part of the whole ordeal. Radios and phones didn’t work, so he couldn’t play any music, even his mom’s old CD player wouldn’t budge. The sound of his own heartbeat was slowly driving him insane, it often echoed off the buildings and reverberated back into his ears like a haunting bell, screaming at him to do something. 

But what?

What could he do?

He screamed in the street, howled at the birds hanging in the sky. It was the only way he could find relief from the madness, the silence. 

It hurt too much.

~ Day 1461 - 4 years ~

Izuku had taught himself to play every instrument he could find in the music store two prefectures away from his own. He was exploring more, staying away from his home longer and longer. These people didn’t know him, and they never would. He didn’t have to look into his mother’s eyes, or see his bullies on the streets as he went to the bookstore. 

Today was his birthday, if his watch’s count was right. He was twenty one today. Four years had passed since the world stopped. Four years of nothing but silence, loneliness. The watch in his pocket kept moving, kept counting. He didn’t know where the watch came from. It appeared when the world froze, as if it had always been in his pocket. Now, it hung heavy in his pants or around his neck, like an anchor tied to him, dragging him down as the little counter in the corner of the watch’s face kept ticking up.

Izuku stood in the middle of a street he didn’t know. Ten feet in front of him rests an eighteen wheeler truck. By the green light, and the speed limit sign, this truck could easily turn him into a smear on the windshield. But it couldn’t, because it was frozen. Everything was frozen. 

Everything except Izuku.

“COME ON!” He screeched at the sky. “DO IT!” Izuku was begging. Tears streamed down his face, a river of sorrow, his arms spread wide beside him. “DO IT!” He cried again. “I FUCKING DARE YOU!” 

But nothing happened. 

Nothing happened; the truck never moved, the sky didn’t move, the birds didn’t fall from the sky, and time never moved forward.

Izuku collapsed to his knees, choking on his own sobs. Death was the only out he could think of - but death never came. He didn’t need food, he couldn’t starve or dehydrate. Nothing moved, so he couldn’t walk in front of a train. Nothing electric worked and though lights were on, there were no active currents - he’d tried that. Even if he tried stepping off the roof, he just passed out halfway down and woke up standing on the street or laying in the grass. That was the only one he couldn’t explain by the time stop. 

Izuku couldn’t die, but he couldn’t live, either.

His body had not aged a single day. He was still trapped in a seventeen year old’s body with four extra years of knowledge jammed into his brain alongside three bookstores, two libraries, and the entirety of the ancient archive in the Forbidden City. 

The freakiest part?

He remembered all of it, word for word, with perfect recollection. He’d walk the streets and recite information. Sometimes he’d even sit with the kids in a park and teach them all about the trees and critters around them. He’d teach them quantum mathematics and the cellular reproduction process of meiosis and mitosis, and the differences between them. He’d sit on the rooftops and tell the sun his hopes for the future, and ancient stories from scrolls nearly crumbled to dust. Once, he even got up on a concert stage, stole the mic, and cried all his fears and sorrows to the gathered crowd of thousands of people. 

No one heard him.

No one moved. 

The microphone didn’t even carry his voice.

Now, he lay sprawled out in the center of the intersection he’d been trying to die in. The asphalt was cold, which didn't make sense because the sun was still high in the sky at ten am, like always, beating down on the blacktop. Izuku had yet to science out the logic behind the sun being up at all hours and how nothing ever seemed hot or cold. The watch kept ticking away, sending little vibrations through his fingers every time the days ticked over. These days the watch rarely left his hand, he stared at it almost obsessively; for hours, days. 

“Tik-tok. Tik-tok.” Izuku muttered to himself, counting the seconds of his life away. Except, he wasn’t growing older, so was it really counting?

~ 2192 Days - 6 Years ~

Izuku hummed a song to himself. He had climbed to the top of the Tokyo Skytree and kicked his feet over the edge, two thousand feet off the ground. He had a theory that if he got closer to the sky, maybe he could touch the birds, knock them from the air, and maybe that would shock time back into gear. 

It didn’t work, of course. He couldn’t reach the birds. But maybe he could dream of birds the next time he tried to sleep. 

The song he hummed was a lullaby his mother used to sing to him, before she turned against him, like everyone else. He had to wonder if when the world did start again, would they finally listen to him? Would they all finally see that he wasn’t quirkless or useless? 

But what would the world be like when it did start again?

He glanced down at the watch in his hand as it ticked over to another day. Two thousand one hundred and ninety-three days. Would he remember all of this when he woke up? Would he have six years of knowledge and boredom and madness still crammed into his mind when the world began again? Would he still be a child? He didn’t feel like a child anymore.

Izuku tucked the watch into his pocket and kicked himself off the building. The fall had become one of his favorite things to do. At some point, he’d learned how to slow himself down, too, not just the world around him. There was no wind that rushed by his face, no whipping hair or even a whistle whizzing by his ears. Silence held him like a buffer of air, hanging in the sky. This lasted until he got bored, and suddenly he was falling again - and then, after a split second of blackness, Izuku stood on the street looking up at the building he’d just thrown himself off. 

“Maybe next time.” He smiled. 

Maybe next time he’d die. Maybe next time he’d touch the sky, or the birds.

Maybe next time he’d find some meaning behind all of this…wasted time.

~ 3653 Days - 10 Years ~

“Happy birthday to me…happy birthday to me…happy birthday dear…Izuku…” 

The cake he’d pulled from the bakery display case looked amazing. Bright white frosting on two small tiers with pretty rainbow flowers all around the edges. The top said happy birthday without a name, or it had, until Izuku inscribed his name into the frosting with his finger. Lighters didn’t work, so he couldn’t light any candles. He still found some in the back and placed them onto the cake. That didn’t make his body slump any less in the chair as he sang the song to himself. 

“This is the most depressing sight I’ve ever seen. What the hell are you doing?”

Izuku blinked. That wasn’t his voice. Izuku had not spoken. His eyes snapped to the door. There was a person. There was a fucking person standing in the door! Izuku gaped, his lungs unable to catch any proper oxygen at the sudden fear of possibly losing the only other sound he’d heard in 10 years besides his own voice. He scrambled across the bakery, knocking over the table and chair in the process and practically colliding into the stranger. 

“Gah!” 

They both went headlong into the street outside. Izuku landed on top of - wait - this guy was a teenager just like him, or maybe in his early twenties.

“Get off me, asshole!”

“I’m imagining this…” Izuku grabbed the guy’s face, shoving his own head down to inspect him. “I’m hallucinating, finally. Ten years. It took ten years to start hallucinating. How did it take that long?”

“What the- what are you talking about, kid?”

“How are you moving? When did you unfreeze? How long have you been here?”

“What the fuck are you talking about, get off me you crazy person!”

“Hey, get off him, you’re going to get hurt.”

Sound thunder clapped into Izuku’s skull. He winced and rolled off to the side, practically screaming from the pain. Car horns, the sound of engines, birds, voices - so many voices - even the sound of a thousand breaths and clothing swishing was all too loud. Every single fiber of Izuku’s body ached suddenly, like his bones didn’t fit into his skin anymore and were all now trying to break free. He screamed and thrashed on the ground until it all stopped. 

Everything stopped.

Izuku

                    Finally

                                             Stopped

~ Day 3653 - Day 1, again ~

Izuku woke up to the annoying hum of fluorescent lights screaming in his ears from above him, and the pounding beep of a heart monitor which was somehow louder than his own heart echoing in his skull. He was in a hospital, that much was obvious. The room reeked of sanitizer and chemical cleaner. The blankets were itchy, and he couldn’t remember how he got here. Actually, that wasn’t surprising. For the last ten years, he’d sometimes appear in random places after trying to kill himself. But that’s not what happened, right?

No. The world was moving again. The heart monitor beside him was moving, beeping. The lights above him were dimmed but still humming loudly. Izuku could hear footsteps in the hallway, and numerous voices all around him. He tried to move and instantly regretted it. 

Izuku’s whole body felt crushed by a truck - maybe that had actually happened. He’d tried to make that happen more than once.

The door to the hospital room opened, revealing a female doctor in a lab coat and scrubs, her hair pulled up into a long blonde ponytail and a set of delicate glasses resting on her nose. She had a soft, kind face. Izuku’s shoulders eased just a little. 

“Good morning, Midoriya-kun. I’m Dr. Nikata. How are you feeling?”

“I-” He tried to move again, only to realize his wrists and ankles were strapped to the bed. “What the-”

“I apologize for the restraints. You destroyed a bakery before attacking a random pedestrian. You also fought the EMTs quite violently.”

“I don’t…remember that. Not after uhh - the guy I tackled. Is he okay?”

“Mhm. He’ll be fine, a few bruises from the fall, but otherwise only a little startled.” She grabbed a chair from the corner and set it beside Izuku’s bed so she could sit down and cross her legs, the clipboard placed on her knee. “Do you feel up to answering some questions?”

“How do you know who I am?”

“We ran your registry, your blood, which brought up some interesting details which we will be going over. So - will you answer some questions?”

Izuku nodded. 

“When you were found, you were screaming about ‘ten years’. It’s all you could say, over and over. Ten years, ten years. What does that mean?”

Izuku knew better than to tell anyone what happened, not right away. Not until he knew what was going on. They’d think he was insane. They’d lock him into a ward in the basement and never unchain him from the bed. 

The mixed bag of emotions at waking up to reality actually sent a shiver down his spine. He was overjoyed that he was no longer alone, that he didn’t have to suffer the madness of silence ever again, but at the same time, he wasn’t sure he could trust this reality. In the last ten years, he had no one to rely on but himself. He’d had no one to talk to or interact with but himself. 

“Midoriya-kun?”

“Hmm? I, uhh-...I don’t really want to talk about that. Not yet. Can you…can we talk about those other details you mentioned first? I changed my mind, I don’t want to answer questions, sorry.”

The doctor sighed, but still nodded. “Very well.” It took her a few moments to flip through the clipboard with his chart on it before she spoke again. “Well, my primary concern is that when I pulled up your chart, it’s got this lovely red bookmark, stating you are quirkless. However, when the blood results came in and we took a few scans to confirm, well, your chart and your tests don’t match. Though rare, a quirk can develop late in life.” She sighed. “But seventeen?”

“Twenty-seven.” Izuku corrected without thinking.

“Excuse me?” 

“If…if I really have a quirk…is it time related?” His subject change wasn’t subtle.

“Yes, actually. Have you figured it out?”

He decided it didn’t matter if they thought he was psychotic or insane. If he didn’t say something, If he didn’t get this off his chest, he was actually going to go insane. It all came out in a rush, one breath.

“I was trapped in it for ten years. I have been trapped, alone, for ten years. I had a theory, once, that maybe it was my quirk - but I didn’t know how to make it stop, or rather, I didn’t know how to make time start again.”

“Are you saying…you’ve been stuck in a frozen time…for ten…” She blinked a few times, apparently taking that in. 

Izuku nodded. “It’s been April fifteenth, ten o’five am, for ten years. That’s what I was in that bakery for, I was celebrating my twenty-seventh birthday.”

“I don’t…have words…”

Neither did Izuku. The world was moving again, and time was progressing, but he had lived ten years in a nightmare. There weren’t words for that. Nothing could make him feel better about himself, or his life now that he simply had to just…go on with it like the last ten years didn’t happen. His fears had come true; he remembered everything. He remembered every book he read, every day and week and month he spent practicing violin, piano, learning to sew, and crochet, and all the other wild things in between.

Izuku remembered every single moment of his slow progression into psychosis.

“It felt like I was in a coma, or maybe in Hell. Where am I?”

“Uhm-...” She checked his chart. “A long way from home, according to your chart. I called the police station in your prefecture. They’re sending a Detective and a hero over to sort this out. We thought this was a case of child abduction at first. It’s not uncommon in the rare case of a child being returned or escaping, for them to have…”

“Mental breakdowns?”

“Acute psychotic episodes, yes. I think your experience qualifies as acute. You are showing no signs of mental distress now.”

“How am I supposed to react to this situation, Doctor?”

“That’s a good question. Midoriya. Why don’t we just take this one day at a time?”

“There are days now…there will be nights, too?”

The woman opened her mouth to speak, closed it, and tried again. “You mentioned ten o’five am. Time froze in the morning…you had no day/night cycle?” Izuku shook his head. “Well, I was already going to request a psychological evaluation but at least now I know what to have them look for.”

Izuku settled back into the bed, only to be reminded of the restraints. “Can these be removed now?”

“Oh. Yes. Though I am required to ask if you feel the desire to harm yourself or others first.”

“I do not.”

The doctor nodded as she moved around the bed, releasing the padded leather restraints. Izuku rubbed his wrists, annoyed at the sensation. She sat herself back down with a sighing groan. He instantly went to search for his pocket watch and found that he didn’t even have pockets, and the watch was missing. 

“Where’s my watch?”

“Hmm?” The doctor looked up from Izuku’s chart.

“The watch. The pocket watch that’s been in my pocket for ten years. The only way I’ve been able to keep time, to keep track of the days and the hours and-”

“Midoriya.” She stopped his spiral. “Take a breath. It’s just there.” 

Izuku turned to the side table where she pointed. He grabbed the watch and clutched it to his chest. The timer had stopped. The hands were still moving, but the little panels with rotating number wheels had stopped. Did those only count up when time stopped? Was this watch actually part of his quirk?

“There is something else we need to speak about.”

Izuku paused. He didn’t like her tone.

“Midoriya…you’re covered in scars. I have to ask where they came from. The scans told us more than enough but we still need to have the conversation.”

“If I tell you the truth will you let me sleep?” Izuku had zero energy to deal with childhood trauma right now. That would require him to actually dive into the nightmares of ten years ago (or was it yesterday?), and that meant he would have to unpack the fact that his physical body was still seventeen, and he simply did not have the mental, emotional, or spiritual energy for that.

Dr. Nikata pinched the bridge of her nose but gave in to his request and nodded.

“Yes, it’s abuse. I was bullied a lot. My mother wasn’t the best parent, either.” He sank into the bed. “Can I please pass out now?”

“Get some rest, Midoriya. I’ll check in on you later. The Musutafu Head Detective should be here soon, I won’t wake you unless I have to.” She flicked the lights off on her way out and left before Izuku could respond. 

The second Izuku was once more alone, he shattered.

Ten years of loneliness, silence, and sorrow swirled around him, a torrential downpour complete with thunder and lightning in the form of his own screams into a pillow crushed his body into the bed. Every bone in his body weighed itself through the mattress until he felt truly buried six feet underground. 

Izuku sobbed himself to sleep. 

~~

“I’m afraid this case has become a little more complicated.”

Shouta sighed himself into one of the chairs in the conference room Dr. Nikata brought them to. They were supposed to be interviewing a kid that had been discovered, quite randomly, several prefectures from home, and possibly in the middle of a psychotic break. The suspicion was human trafficking or a kidnapping. The drive north had taken several hours, but they hoped to bring the kid back home to his family once this was all over. 

Unfortunately, the doctor’s tone suggested this wouldn’t be a simple retrieval and arrest of the ‘bad guys’. It never was, though. Detective Tsukauchi sat down beside Shouta and gestured for the doctor to go on. 

“Please, explain.”

“The boy did indeed have an acute psychotic episode, but it wasn’t brought on by the trauma we had first assumed. The boy’s quirk manifested…quite violently - or perhaps, cruelly is the right word.”

“Cruel?” Shouta asked. “Does he have an ill-fit quirk?” It wasn’t that uncommon these days. After two centuries since the dawn of quirks, genetics were getting weird, and quirks ‘ill-fitted to physical form’ were less rare by the year. 

“Well, no. I’m not sure of that yet. This boy was quirkless until yesterday…for us.”

“Huh?” 

Shouta was right there with Tsuki - what did she mean?

“The boy has a time-based quirk.” Those were incredibly rare, unicorn rare. “He can stop time, completely. It seems that, when his quirk manifested, it stopped time…for him, that was ten years ago.”

“I’m sorry?” Shouta sat up straighter. “Say that again?”

“That boy has been trapped at ten o’five am on April fifteenth for ten years. Physically, he’s retained his seventeen year old form, but mentally, he’s lived another ten years while the world around him stood still, and he was trapped - alone.”

“Ten…ten years.” Tsuki groaned. “Why do I always get the complicated cases? I’m blaming you, Eraser.”

“How is this my fault? He’s not even one of my problem children.”

“Look, doc-” Tsukauchi offered his hand out for the chart. She handed it over with a nod. “What’s his mental state at this point? We need to know if he can be transported back home, and returned to his mother. She’s a panicked wreck and came running into the police station the moment his image popped up on the news, just before you called us with his name.”

Dr. Nikata winced. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“Is he unstable?” Shouta asked.

“No. But during our intake, the scans revealed years of abuse on his bones and skin. He’s covered in scars. I asked him - and he was honest, if only out of exhaustion. His classmates and his mother abused him. My bet is it’s a result of his quirkless diagnosis. I’ve updated his record already to remove the mark, but when you return to Musutafu, he will need to file an official quirk registration adjustment.”

“Great.” Tsuki groaned. “Forgive me, I don’t mean to sound annoyed - I just…I’m so tired of these dwindling minorities being abused. The law is designed to keep them oppressed. I can’t even guarantee we can get him away from his mother considering the abuse was done while he was registered as quirkless.”

“We could file for negligence and medical ignorance. She didn’t have him properly screened, which led to a violent manifestation which has severely impacted him.” Shouta suggested. The doctor agreed. 

“Actually, there are no records showing the mother ever had him formally tested outside of just the initial screening that all children get at age three. Medically speaking, if a child doesn’t show signs of quirk development by five, they should be sent for additional screening and a quirk diffusion scan. That’s supposed to happen every six months until the age of eight, when a quirkless diagnosis should be formalized. Izuku’s was formalized at four, and there’s no record of who signed off on that diagnosis.”

“That…might work. Thank you both. Dr. Nikata - can we speak with the boy?”

“Of course, Detective, but I should warn you - he’s…well, he speaks and holds himself like he’s in his twenties. To him, ten years have passed, and I don’t think he will take kindly to being treated with kid gloves.”

“Noted.” Shouta groused. “Any idea what he did for ten years stuck in a frozen world?”

“I don’t know. He was exhausted when he woke up and we only talked for a short time. That was a few hours ago. The boy has had no day/night cycle for a decade, he will likely need medication to regulate his sleeping habits until he gains a normal circadian rhythm again. I will be doing a full work up tomorrow, so at the very least, he can’t leave until tomorrow evening, he also has a psychological eval tomorrow. You are both welcome to stay in our staff quarters for the night.”

“Thank you. We’ll probably swap shifts watching over him. Officially, he’s in law enforcement custody, so we will have to keep an eye on him.”

“I understand, thank you, Detective. Follow me.”

Shouta wasn’t sure how to prepare himself to face a teenager who’d gone through as much trauma as this boy had - and all of it was seconds, minutes, for them - while being years for him. What a nightmare that must have been. As they walked, the doctor told them he was found in a half destroyed bakery, singing happy birthday to himself. He tackled the first person who spoke to him and passed out after fighting off the EMTs. He’d been celebrating his own twenty-seventh birthday, alone, in a world that could not celebrate with him. What a cruel fate.

“I haven’t told him, but he’s on quirk suppressants for the time being as we have no idea what the activation requirements of his quirk are, and I have no intention of risking him being trapped in another time stop.”

“Understandable. I can clarify that to him.” Shouta offered. “I don’t think he’ll have much to say about it if it prevents another decade of solitude.”

“I agree.” 

Dr. Nikata opened the door to the kid’s room and led them in. The boy, Izuku Midoriya, was already sitting up in bed when they arrived. For such a small seventeen year old, he looked…

He looked like he'd witnessed the end of the world, like he’d seen the sky fall, and somehow, he was still in one piece, all that loneliness stuffed into such a frail and scarred body didn’t match. 

A shiver ran down Shouta’s back.  

~~

Izuku didn’t sleep long, and sadly, he hadn’t expected to. After spending so long without a night cycle, there was no way he’d be able to sleep normally. It was late at night when he woke up. He didn't exactly expect to be disturbed this late. So while he was staring out the window opposite his bed, the door opened, much to his surprise. He didn’t recognize either of the men, but Dr. Nikata brought them in. 

Both men looked around the same age. One looked like a police officer, or well, a detective. He wore a long brown trench coat instead of a police uniform and Izuku could see the edge of a badge on his belt, as well as a gun. The man next to him looked vaguely familiar, but Izuku couldn’t place his face. When he moved into the room, Izuku got a glimpse of a set of yellow goggles behind the large gray scarf - wait - was that Eraserhead? Why was he here?

“Hello, Midoriya, you look a little better, how are you feeling?” Dr. Nikata asked, a pleasant smile on her face. 

“I’m fine. Still exhausted. This is who you mentioned?”

“Oh, yes. This is Detective Tsukauchi from the Musutafu police department, and Eraserhead - they’re both in charge of your prefecture’s human trafficking department.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Midoriya. Your doctor did explain to us that this turned out not to be a case of trafficking, but we are still concerned about the abuse you admitted to. Eraserhead and I also lead up most investigations into crimes against children.”

“I’m not-”

Eraserhead cut him off. “You’re not a child. We know about your situation. You’ll have to forgive us while getting used to this situation - it’s a bit unorthodox, and you are, legally, still a minor.”

“Fair enough.” Izuku nodded.

“The Detective has some questions for you, I’ll be running my evening rounds. If you need me, press the call button and a nurse can fetch me, alright?”

“Thank you, Dr. Nikata.” Izuku muttered as she left. 

The detective found himself a chair beside the bed while Eraserhead took a leaning stance against the wall by the window at the foot of the bed. He looked pensive, or perhaps unsure of how to act around Izuku. The detective cleared his throat to get Izuku’s attention, so he put his worries about the hero in the room away for now. 

“I do have to disclose that my quirk is called ‘lie detector’, so I’ll be able to tell if you lie. Would you be willing to answer some questions for us?”

“Okay.”

“So, Midoriya-”

“Please just call me Izuku…I haven’t heard my name in a long time.”

The men shared a look but Tsukauchi nodded. “Of course, Izuku.”

“Thank you.”

“Can you tell me what happened when your quirk manifested - what happened when everything first froze for you?”

“Uhm…my mother and I were arguing as usual, either over my inability to get accepted into a decent high school or my lack of job, or a ruined uniform - whatever. I remember feeling funny, like…heavy, like something was trying to claw itself up my throat. Then she just…stopped. Everything stopped.”

“What did you do when it first happened?”

“What do you think, Detective? I tried to get a reaction out of her. When I realized it wasn’t just her, but the clocks and the birds outside the window, I freaked out. The first few days were the worst. I thought I’d been hit with a quirk, or maybe that I was hallucinating. I don’t know. The beginning is all a blur right now. I spent weeks trying to find someone who wasn’t frozen. Then I spent months trying to fill the empty space and time. I read every book I could find. I didn’t need to eat, or drink, or even sleep. I was frozen, too, in a way. Eventually, I decided it had to be Hell, or maybe a coma.”

“Then what?” Tsukauchi prompted. 

Izuku shrugged. “I gave up, I guess. That was…a few years in? I just tried to fill the silence, the emptiness. Eventually, I started trying to kill myself.” That got a reaction out of both men. Eraserhead shifted uncomfortably and Tsukauchi leaned his elbows on his knees.

“I’m assuming it failed since we’re talking.”

Izuku had to hand it to the detective, at least he had a good sense of humor.

“Yeah. I’d step off a roof, black out halfway down, and wake up standing in the middle of the street. I eventually figured out how to slow my own body down, but only for a few minutes, so I could enjoy the fall before I woke up on the ground. Nothing moved so I couldn’t walk into traffic. I actually laid down in front of trucks a few times, in case time started up. I just wanted it to end.”

“I get that, and I am so sorry you had to experience this, especially alone.” Eraserhead pushed off the wall to walk over to the bed and settle into the extra chair across from his partner. “Late manifestations are often violent.” The man brushed some long black hair from his face and sighed. He had something else to say. “We are generally legally obligated to handle this with your mother but your doctor informed us they found evidence of abuse. We need to know if it’s safe to return you to your mother or not.”

“She’ll likely be happy I manifested a quirk, but it’s doubtful her attitude towards me will change since my quirk isn’t exactly…useful, or even controllable at this point.”

“You’re telling the truth but you’re avoiding the question.” Tsukauchi pointed out.

“Then ask a direct question, Detective.”

“If you return home to your mother, would your mother or others harm you?”

“Yes.” There was no point in lying about it.

The Detective sighed. He seemed frustrated, and clearly sad. Eraserhead was staring out the window with his arms crossed over his chest, completely closed off. Izuku read a book on body language once or twice. However, the underground hero was infamous for his unreadable expressions, so Izuku didn’t know what was on his mind. 

“When you were stuck in your quirk, how did you keep track?” Eraserhead asked, startling both Izuku and Tsukauchi.

Izuku opened his hand to reveal his pocket watch. “It appeared in my pocket when time stopped. The numbers ticked up as the days went on. When I woke up earlier, I realized it stopped. I think it only counts when my quirk is active, but it still functions as a watch, I guess?”

“Huh.” The hero stepped over to inspect the watch without touching it.

Izuku glanced back at the detective and wondered if the man was questioning his own quirk. Izuku didn’t actually know if the watch was part of his quirk or not, so there was no real way to know if what he said was honest. Or maybe the man’s quirk told him that Izuku believed it was true, or that it was as true as he could be. Could his quirk differentiate between those states-

“What did you do all this time?”

“Hmm?” Izuku shook his head and pulled himself out of his quirk analysis spiral. “Oh. Uhm…everything? Anything. Pretty much anything I could think of that wouldn’t require the movement of time. I read every book I could find. I taught myself any handcraft I could think of. I learned every instrument I could get my hands on. Ten years is a lot of fucking time when you don’t have to go to school or work, or sleep or eat or drink or even go to the bathroom.”

Neither adult in the room commented on his foul language. He felt he was entitled to a few curses. Hell, Izuku felt like he was entitled to a LOT of curses. Izuku stared down at his hands for a moment. They were so…small. Even hours after he woke up, Izuku still felt his skin stretching too tightly over his bones. He swore he could feel his fingernails growing from his nail beds. When he looked up, both men were staring at him, expectantly. 

“Sorry, did you ask another question?”

The detective shifted awkwardly in his seat. “Uhh, yes. I asked if you had any idea how you deactivated your quirk.”

“No. I’m sorry. I was in that bakery and that guy just spoke to me. I didn’t even realize it was deactivated. I passed out shortly after it happened.”

“Let’s switch gears.” 

Izuku turned to Eraserhead. “In what way?”

“You are currently on quirk suppressants to prevent you from activating your quirk. I’m curious if you’d like to learn how to control your quirk. It’s powerful, that’s for sure. It’d be a good quirk for heroics.”

Izuku hadn’t even considered that. Trapped in his own world, away from quirks, Izuku honestly forgot the world of heroics even existed. There was no crime when time stopped. There were no heroes and villains. 

“I…I spent the last ten years…in peace.”

“What?” Shouta leaned forward, confused.

“Time…when it stopped - everything stopped. The birds, the breeze, the sun in the sky. I didn’t need to eat or drink, and sleeping was just to pass the unmovable time; a distraction. There were no quirks, no crime, no good or evil. No heroes. No villains. I spent my days learning or screaming at the universe. I…haven’t seen a quirk in a decade.”

“That’s revolutionary. That would be a nice break, actually. I’m almost jealous.”

Izuku gave the hero an annoyed glare. The hero shrugged and gave him a gentle smirk which was half hidden in his signature capture scarf. He couldn’t really blame the hero for saying it. After all, a world without quirks or even villains might be nice. That part of this whole ordeal had actually been a good break. No bullies, no explosions snapping on his skin. He hadn’t even realized how much madness he’d been missing out on with all the other madness that he had to endure.

“So…what now?” Izuku expected them to ship him back to his mother. He’d begged for this, didn’t he? He wanted to go back to a regular life, to his life. But was that really what he wanted? “When can I go home?”

“Well, about that...” Tsukauchi rubbed his hands across his thighs. “Right now, we’re investigating this as a case of medical neglect. Dr. Nikata confirmed that you did not receive proper quirk analysis before your manifestation, which could be why it manifested so violently. You were never quirkless, and had you been given proper treatment, that would have been discovered. Add the evidence of abuse Dr. Nikata found, and we’ve got a pretty good case to have you removed from your mother’s custody.”

“So I’ll go into state care? An orphanage? A boy’s home?” Izuku sighed. “How does this even…work? Can’t I just emancipate myself and take a college equivalency test to finish school or something?”

“I’m going to make some calls.” Eraserhead interjected. “But yes, you are effectively in state custody. A boy’s home isn’t the only option, and it’s far from my first pick, but it’s a bit late to make official calls right now. Why don’t you get some more rest and we should have some more to talk about in the morning.”

“Right - rest.” Izuku sighed. “Could you see if Dr. Nikata would give me some sleeping pills? I don’t think sleep will find me without it.”

“Of course.”

Both men left quietly. Eraserhead turned the lights out on his way through the door, as well. A nurse came in only moments later with a little cup holding two pills which she told him was to help him sleep. Izuku took them without question, if only because his body was starting to collapse again. It didn’t matter if he was already in a bed, he felt ready to fall through the floor. 

Sleep was easy to find once the drugs kicked in. Izuku didn’t have to spend much time thinking about the years he was left alone, or the loss of half his life, or the fact that he just got it back without warning. A free do-over, something no one was even given in this world, yet here he lay, seventeen years old, ten years younger than when he woke up this morning - or was it yesterday already?

~

“I’ll take the first watch, Shouta. Why don’t you try and get some rest?”

“Tsuki - you know that’s not happening anytime soon. Nedzu should be getting up soon. It’s almost four. He won’t mind if I call early.”

“UA is your first choice, huh?”

Shouta sighed deeply. “I think it’s his only choice of receiving adequate assistance.” 

He leaned himself on the wall across from Izuku’s hospital room door. Tsukauchi joined him by sliding down to his butt along the wall so he could rub his hands through scraggly hair. They were both exhausted from their travel, and more than emotional over this boy’s struggle. Tsukauchi didn’t respond so Shouta decided to go on.

“He’ll need to be evaluated to see if his quirk is ill-fit to physical form, and currently, I’m the only thing that could likely turn off his quirk, if he can’t. Otherwise, he’ll be on quirk suppressants the rest of his life. On top of that, he needs somewhere to put all the anger and sadness I can see in his eyes. I’m not sure what that means for him, but a punching bag wouldn’t be a half bad starting place.”

It was the detective’s turn to sigh. “I know you’re right. I just wish this had been caught sooner, so he didn’t have to suffer alone for so long.”

“Me, too.”

“How do you handle a twenty-seven year old trapped in the body of a seventeen year old? I mean, he’s spent a decade learning everything he could get his hands on, and you want to throw him into a high school? He’s almost our age - mentally.”

“Nedzu can challenge him. That’s not really my biggest concern, surprisingly.”

“Then what is?”

“His adaptability.” 

“In what way?” Tsuki looked up, confused.

“He’s been by himself for the last decade. He hasn’t had anyone to tell him what to do, when to do it, why, or how. He has had to survive on his own, without any help. But it’s not just that he managed to go that long by himself…it’s that he managed to do it while retaining his sanity. Sure, he almost broke at the end, but…ten years, Tsuki.”

“Right - he adapted.”

“Exactly. He adapted to the madness to survive it. The issue is…can he adapt to this new reality where everything he did to survive turned out to be pointless?” Shouta paused to brush some long black hair from his face and swallow back his emotions. “When we woke up this morning, he was at home, it was ten am, and he was arguing with his mother. By ten o’five am-” Shouta pointed to the teen’s hospital room. “-he showed up here, four hours away, in Hosu. For us, it was a blink, a second. For him? It was an eternity. But now, the world he built to survive losing the one he had is gone.”

“Do you think he’ll be okay?”

“I don’t know, Tsuki. But I’ll do my best to help him.” He kicked off the wall and took out his phone. “I’ll try and get some rest after I talk to Nedzu.”

“I’ll relieve you in a few hours. The nurse said the sleeping meds should knock him out for a solid eight to ten.”

“Sounds good. I only need three or four to survive.” But he knew Tsuki would give him five, if he could. Shouta likely wouldn’t sleep that long, though. He never did, or rarely did. If Hizashi held him through the night, he’d sometimes get a solid six, which was a wonder. 

Shouta walked until he found an empty waiting room and shut the door behind himself. His phone was already dialing Nedzu and the old rat picked up before the phone even got to Shouta’s ear. 

“It must be bad if you’ve called me before my alarm goes off.”

“It’s unique, Nedzu. The doctors updated the file - Izuku Midoriya.”

“I’m just pulling it up…now…” There was a brief pause where the chimera speed read the documents in Izuku’s file. “Oh my. That is unique.”

“Mhm.”

“Well, I could reinstate our quirk rehabilitation program. It hasn’t been used in several years, but this boy may need it. We could place him with your third-year students. Don’t you have an extra dorm room since you expelled that perverse boy?”

“Yeah. That could work. I’m not sure how well he’ll take to a rehabilitation program, but it’ll have to do. Besides, if the Commission finds out too much and gets their hands on him…”

“I would like to avoid that outcome. If this boy can learn to control his power, he could be a great asset, but if the hero commission or the villains got a hold of him, there would be hell to pay.”

Nedzu was right. As much as Shouta loved to disagree with his mentor and boss, he couldn’t. This boy controlled the time around himself. If he learned how to control his power, there was no limit to what he could do with it. Considering he already spent a decade purely educating himself, where most people would have gone mad with boredom, Shouta could hardly imagine the miracles he could do if actually commanded the power inside himself. 

“Then we’ll just have to do our best to prevent that from happening.”

“Agreed, Shouta. I’ll start the paperwork on my end, talk to Tsukauchi and have him activate your emergency guardianship license.”

“I’ll probably be back tomorr- tonight. He has to get more evals and tests before he can leave.”

“Understood, I’ll have Hizashi and Snipe cover your classes for the day and plan for tomorrow’s covering just in case.”

“Thanks, boss.”

~

Izuku slowly climbed out of the sheets after he woke up. According to the clock, it was almost noon, but what day was it? Even if it was the same day, the clock was ticking, time was moving. That small truth soothed the ache in the back of Izuku’s mind. He took a quick shower in his adjoining bathroom and found clean scrubs on the chair by the door when he finished. When his police watchdogs finally returned, they found Izuku reading the day’s newspaper at a small table by the window in his room.

“It’s really weird to read the follow-up article to the one I read this morning…ten years ago.”

Eraserhead and the Detective shared a weird look but neither man said anything about Izuku’s comment. Tsukauchi leaned on the end of the bed while Eraserhead sat down across from him at the table. Izuku shrugged and gestured for him to say whatever he clearly had on his mind. 

“While the police work on the case against your mother, the current plan - the best plan, really - is to enroll you into an emergency program at UA High. We used to have a quirk rehabilitation program for troubled students that functioned as an emergency assistance program.” He held up a hand to pause any arguments Izuku might have. “I’m not calling you a troubled student. Principal Nedzu offered to reopen the program, so we can help you figure out your quirk, and hopefully control it, under the emergency assistance program.”

“So I’d be, what, an interim student?”

“Basically. Though you’d function a bit more like an adjunct student, mainly training under Nedzu and I, since I’m the only person within several thousand miles who can cancel or stop quirks, which is something you need, unless you want to be on quirk suppressants for the rest of your life.”

“I really don’t.” Izuku sighed. “Will I also be required to finish high school, since I’m technically still in my last year…”

Tsukauchi snorted. “I have a feeling Nedzu will let you test out so he can focus on your quirk.”

“You’ll likely ‘graduate’.” He used air quotes. “With my third year hero class. Since you’re my student, you’ll be living in the class A dorms, I have a guest room. You won’t need to attend basic classes, but foundational heroics is a good place to figure out your quirk and get some training in, so you can learn to control it, and not get trapped in it again.”

Izuku had to admit, it was a good plan. If anyone could figure out his fucked up quirk, Nedzu would be at the top of the list. Plus, having Eraserhead around to stop his quirk and prevent him from getting stuck again was actually what helped Izuku easily agree. The thought of being trapped in his quirk, alone, for another ten years…absolutely not, that sounded terrifying. He set the newspaper down after slowly folding it up.

“I wanted to be a hero…I wanted it so bad, for so long…then I spent half my life, half…half of someone’s life, in a world without quirks or heroes or villains or…anyone else. The noise is still unnerving. The sound of voices, breathing, the sound of my own teeth chewing. It’s miserable. I can’t imagine fighting in crowds of screaming civilians.” Izuku shivered. “I have a quirk now, a really amazing quirk, but…the idea of being a pro-hero horrifies me.”

“That’s okay. You won’t be expected to become a pro-hero. You may need a provisional license since your quirk technically falls under the umbrella of ‘active at all times’, but you wouldn’t have to take the test, it'd be more medical than physical.”

Tsukauchi shifted as he cleared his throat. Izuku turned slightly to give the Detective his attention. 

“You will be getting a social worker. I’ve already made the calls regarding the case against your mother. She was arrested this morning. Your social worker will work with Eraserhead and Nedzu for your provisional license and they’ll work with me on the case. Eraserhead will be your official guardian. Once you’ve finished up a few tests your doctor needs to complete, you’ll be released this afternoon and we’ll be heading back to Musutafu.”

“You’re efficient. I appreciate that. I don’t really expect you to win the case against my mother, though. I think I’d like to pursue a career mentoring kids like me, you know? The quirkless, and those born with ill-fit quirks. I think that would be a good use of my…acquired skills.”

“Well, since we’re going after her for medical neglect, there’s a good chance we’ll get somewhere. You’re right, a direct attack on her actions towards you as a formerly quirkless person would likely fail. But you weren’t quirkless, and she neglected to get you tested properly, which led to a very unpleasant late manifestation. The courts don’t take lightly to actions that lead to violent or destructive manifestations, it’s a serious offense under the quirk compassion act.”

Izuku sighed. “I’m aware. I read most of the law books in the Hosu library…I read most of the books in several libraries.” He waved a hand. “Anyway. It’s not like I’ve got any other options here. I can’t master a quirk like this alone, obviously, and even if I don’t really want to go into hero school, you’re right, Eraserhead’s quirk is the only one that could bring me out if I got stuck again.” Then…Izuku suddenly realized something. “Wait…what happens to my body when I’m stuck in time?”

Both men seemed to realize the exact same thing Izuku had, but he watched them come to it in real time. Their eyes widened, and something like horror crossed Eraserhead’s face. 

“That’s a really good question. Uhm, from what little we know of time quirks, you might freeze, or you might vanish. We’ll have to experiment under a much safer environment. UA has special quirk gyms and rooms we can use to test your quirk, when you’re ready.”

Izuku wasn’t sure he’d ever actually be ready to use his quirk again. There were plenty of practical applications, sure. He could spend years in his quirk doing degree programs and schooling, and then come back and pass the tests in days, achieving in weeks or months what normally took years. He could read endlessly, and he seemed to retain all of what he read with relatively perfect recall. The research applications alone are staggering. But since he couldn’t affect or change the world around him inside his quirk, he couldn’t do things like run tests or cook or write novels. 

So, it had limits. But, ultimately, Izuku didn’t want to be alone again. The idea terrified him. Frankly, he’d gone a little insane, and he was certain he’d have long-term consequences as a result that they’d have to figure out once he was outside of the stable, small environment that made up his hospital room. 

“I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.” Izuku shrugged. 

“Alright, you’ll be discharged once they run some final tests. I’m going to grab us some lunch for the road. Tsuki, let me know if you need anything else.”

“Mmm, right. I’ll stick with our new student.”

Izuku zoned out while they did the final tests to ensure he was healthy and ready to be discharged. The psych eval was the hardest and basically boiled down to; Izuku was going to need regular therapy, and there was a fairly good chance he was not going to have an easy time reacclimating to normal life. They took more blood, ran a couple scans, and told him nothing had changed since his last annual check-up, which had been three months ago…and also ten years and three months ago.

Izuku’s body had frozen in time. Physically, he hadn’t changed at all, he hadn’t aged a day, so now he was trapped in a body he didn’t feel comfortable in, and had to go on with a life he’d long forgotten and lost hope of even having again. Some part of him had even forgotten the details of his mother’s face, or the exact shade of blonde his childhood best friend once had. His eyes were…were they dark brown, or had they been red? Izuku had stared into the eyes of so many frozen strangers that he couldn’t remember what shade his own were. He’d avoided looking in windows and mirrors too often, and even when he had, there was some kind of blurred quality to them while he was inside his quirk, so they didn’t work well to begin with. 

When Eraserhead and Tsukauchi came back to fetch him and the small bag the hospital had given him for his belongings and some extra gear like sunglasses, earplugs, and a few free fidget toys they had on hand for anxiety disorders, Izuku decided to ask something that had been eating at him during the tests.

“Do I…still have freckles?”

The two men stopped in the hallway on their way out to look back at Izuku. Eraserhead squinted at him for a moment before nodding. 

“You do. Do you…uhh- not see them?”

“No, I mean, I don’t know. I haven’t looked in the mirror yet. Reflective surfaces didn’t work right in my quirk. I’m not sure I remember my face all that well, and I barely remember my mother’s face. It’s like, I can picture her form, her green hair like mine, and her chubby cheeks. But the rest, the details?” He shook his head. “I don’t know.”

Tsukauchi opened the file folder from under his arm and showed Izuku his own file, a picture of him sat in the top left of the first page. 

“You look identical to your photo here. It’s a recent one, supposedly. I’d wager you might be a little taller. You look…well, your eyes are…older, but you do look the same otherwise.”

Izuku ran a few fingers across the picture. The face was so…young. That’s what struck him the most. The shape was off, too, less square and softer than he believed himself to be. He did not feel that young or soft. He didn’t feel like a seventeen year old teenager anymore. The freckles and features didn’t seem right in the picture. Or maybe, Izuku didn’t remember them right. 

“The psychiatrist said I’ll likely have a form of body dysmorphia tied to PTSD. We talked about how I feel versus how I look. I didn’t realize how drastic it would be.”

“What do you mean?” Eraserhead asked. 

“I don’t…really recognize that boy, not completely. I know it’s me, logically, but the features seem off, the freckles don’t sit the way I-…the way I remember them.” He handed back the file and sighed. “I guess it doesn’t really matter. At least, not until I see myself in a mirror.”

“You’ll be seeing our staff therapist while at UA, I’m sure he’ll want to talk to you about this body dysmorphia you feel.”

“Thanks, Eraserhead.”

“You can call me Shouta.”

“And everyone calls me Tsuki.”

“Thank you both. I’m ready to head…home.”

Shouta gestured for them to continue walking. “We can stop by your apartment to pick up anything you need once we get back. The drive’s about 3 hours at this time of day without traffic.”

“Sure.”

Thankfully, the hospital was relatively quiet as they exited, and Izuku’s little mental breakdown didn’t make the news so there were no reporters waiting on them by the doors, which was the greatest blessing. 

He stopped the second his feet crossed the threshold to the outside. 

The sound struck him first, but the smells are what overwhelmed him. He hadn’t realized that a frozen world had no smell, or perhaps it was this…static sterile smell, which would explain why the hospital hadn’t been strange. But out here, he caught so many mixed scents he couldn’t separate them all at once. Voices filtered in the background, passing nurses and patients chattering, the smell of cigarette smoke from a nearby smoking area, trash from around the side of the building, the harsh, sour bite of asphalt from a nearby repair job being done on the road.

“Izuku?”

He shook his head. “Sorry, I uhh- I didn’t realize I haven’t smelled anything in a long time. It’s weird. I forgot how bad asphalt smells.”

Tsuki leaned to the side, towards the sound of the truck dropping it on the road. “Huh. I hadn’t noticed it was that awful.”

“Maybe you’ve got super senses now.” 

Izuku snorted. “That wouldn’t make sense for a time-based quirk. Heightened IQ and- oh…that makes sense.”

“What?” Tsuki stopped at the curb, confused. 

“I used to analyze quirks and heroes as a kid…sorry, when I was in middle school. Everyone thought it was stupid, invasive. Maybe it was. But I was good at it. I could rip quirks apart and piece them back like computer scrap. I took one of those IQ tests once, never believed the results. How could I? I was quirkless, stupid, useless-”

“Izuku-”

“-but it makes sense now. A lot makes sense now. Mom used to ask me all the time how I got my homework done so fast. I was in all the advanced courses, even took a few high school and college level audits for fun. But I never really understood how I had so much time on my hands to get all that studying done…”

Tsuki crouched down in front of him with an encouraging smile. “We know now. Nedzu can help foster and master your quirk, so you can control it. He’ll help you understand it so when you are ready, you can help other kids who struggled like you.”

He offered out his hand but Izuku flinched away without really meaning to. They both stared down at the offered hand for a few silent moments. Shouta tipped his head back to look at the sky, patiently waiting for Izuku to make some decision he wasn’t sure he had laid out before him. What he saw instead was the new reality he had to accept, one he didn’t want to accept. 

“I’d rather be a child again…in a way.”

“What?” Shouta turned back.

“I’d rather go back to seeing the world through the eyes of a child. It’s safer, quieter, brighter. But I haven’t been a child in a very long time, even before this happened. You don’t get to go back from the things I’ve seen. You can’t take back walking off buildings and laying in front of trucks, hoping they’ll run you over. All that time I had, 3,653 days, 87,672 hours, 5,260,320 minutes. All that time, and I only saw the worst of the world, and the worst of myself.”

Izuku brushed past the still offered hand the Detective was holding out, but Shouta stepped in front of him, blocked him with a stern glare and hands in his pockets, casually holding back the storm Izuku could see behind his eyes. They had a silent stand off until the older man finally dug his hands out and placed one on each of Izuku’s shoulders. Izuku didn’t flinch this time, for whatever reason he couldn’t explain. 

“Childhood isn’t meant to last forever. We all grow up. Some of us grow up a hell of a lot earlier than we deserve to, and that’s the shittiest hand to be dealt. But your circumstances don’t define what kind of adult you’ll be. Good or bad, you get to decide that for yourself. You might not have a choice in the road you travel, but no one else gets to tell you when to take the exit, or when to keep going until you find a better one.”

Izuku didn’t have an intelligent response to such a bold and profound statement. Part of him wanted to laugh it off, or call it a hopeful dream that maybe he’d be in control of his own life someday. He’d never been in control; not a single day in his life had been within Izuku’s control. So to think he had some kind of command over the kind of adult he might be someday, well, that was just preposterous. But Izuku said none of that. He didn’t explain himself, or the desire to tell this hero to eff right off with his idea of adulthood. Izuku wasn’t altogether sure if that was because he desperately wanted Shouta to be right, or because he might actually believe he was right. Either way, it left Izuku silenced for a long moment to gather his words.

“My childhood is gone. I thought my whole life was gone. I don’t want to re-live that nightmare. I don’t want to feel trapped, ever again. I know you can’t promise me that. But if you think I can be whoever I want, then I need you to at least tell me that I won’t be treated like I’m…like I…” Izuku huffed a breath. “Like I’m just some dumb teenager.”

“I can promise you that I will make everyone who needs to know aware of the situation so they understand how to approach you. I can’t say it will be an immediate change, but I’ll correct them if necessary.”

“Thank you.”

The ride back to Musutafu and then to UA in Shouta’s black SUV took several hours. Izuku sat in the back debating what little choice he might have. UA was going to revive some kind of quirk rehabilitation program. Izuku vaguely remembered hearing about it when he was really young. UA took on cases where children had uncontrollable quirks that needed emergent, intensive intervention so the child would be able to thrive without harming themselves or others. Honestly, Izuku could use some emergency, intensive intervention, though he wasn’t sure if that was for his sanity or for his new quirk.

Detective Tsukauchi gave them a gentle goodbye as they dropped him off at the police station before heading to UA. Izuku didn’t swap to the front seat once it was free, he chose to stay put where he was. Except, they weren’t driving towards UA… they were headed to Izuku’s apartment. He sat up straight in the car seat. 

“Shouta.”

“Take a breath kid, we’re just stopping by to grab what you need.”

“But-”

“Your mother is still in police custody.”

“Oh. Okay.”

So, they wouldn’t be having a throwdown over custody. That was good, right? Or rather, it would be quiet. Izuku wasn’t even sure what would be left of his belongings after ten year-...It hasn’t been ten years. Less than two days. It had been less than 48 hours since he vanished from the world. Yesterday morning at ten o’five am, he blinked out of existence and reappeared in Hosu. But Izuku barely even remembered his mother’s face, let alone the details of the argument they were having. What did his room look like? How had he left it ten years agoyesterday?

Shouta pulled into the parking lot and turned the car off. He didn’t get out, though. He leaned back in the seat and sighed deeply. A conversation was coming - a serious one. Great.

“I can’t imagine how strange this must be for you.” Izuku didn’t answer. Shouta went on. “I’m not sure if I have a right to say this… but the shell-shock will wear off, eventually. It’s going to take time, but you’ll find yourself again.”

Izuku sighed. “I’m not sure I want to find the boy I was before I was forced to be the man I’ve become. But you’re right-” Shouta finally turned. “You don’t have the right. I’m not sure anyone can ever understand this kind of…fucking catastrophe.”

Izuku got out of the car before Shouta could respond, the slam of his door became the end of the conversation that Izuku was glad to have at least mostly avoided. He found himself heading up to his mother’s apartment door before even realizing he was acting on muscle memory alone. The door was locked, so he stood there until his hero hip attachment finally meandered up the stairs. 

“The police left a lock box, standard procedure in complex custody cases like this.”

“Uh huh.”

Shouta sighed. “Look, I’m sorry I spoke up, but-”

“I’m not angry with you.” Izuku cut him off. “It’s just weird being back here.”

“I’m sure it is. You walked across Japan, didn’t you?”

Izuku nodded. “Nothing worked. But, I also discovered it’s not just that things don’t ‘work’, it’s actually that the world was unchanging.” Shouta unlocked the keybox and let them in as Izuku rambled on about his quirk. “My best assumption is that my quirk doesn’t actually freeze time. It’s that I’m moving at such a fast pace, the world appears frozen to me. So, trying to change the world isn’t possible since we’re both moving at exponentially different paces. That would explain why I could control my fall rate, and how I ‘blinked’ across the country. If that is the case, your quirk might be useful to me. The second I blink out of existence, if I knew to remain still and you activated your quirk - then I should still be in place and you should be able to catch me.”

“But my quirk only works if I can focus on a target.” 

“I’ll still be there.” Izuku flicked on the lights in his bedroom. “Theoretically, if I haven’t actually moved, I shouldn’t blink out of existence. But even if I did, I would physically still be there, just invisible in a way.”

“Maybe…you’re really good at analyzing quirks. Is that a hobby of yours?” He gestured to the analysis journals lined up on the shelves of his room while Izuku reached for his backpack and a duffel bag inside his closet. 

“I guess it was. I prefer music now. I became rather proficient with a violin, actually. Music and art were my favorite distractions, even if they only lasted until I looked away from what I was using. It helped, enough, anyway.”

“Mmm.”

They were quiet as Izuku packed up his laptop, a few of his favorite books, a couple trinkets, and some clothes. He left all but five of his best or favorite journals that meant the most to him. The rest could burn in a house fire. Izuku was done with his past, even if that past was only a couple days, and not actually ten years. Izuku found his new guardian combing through Izuku’s textbooks when he’d finished packing. 

“What were you planning to study?”

“Uhm-” Izuku hadn’t even given much thought to it in so long that he realized he’d sort of forgotten. “I wanted to be a hero first. You know, like all kids do. But when it became obvious that wouldn’t happen, I thought maybe I could study quirk analytics. But-” He sighed. “It didn’t matter how well I did on the entrance exams, no one would take me. I guess after a couple years, I just figured that was it. I drifted for a couple years, mostly between my mom’s screaming and the few jobs I could get under the table. Then this…”

“You spent almost as much time growing up trapped inside your quirk as you did out here.”

Izuku shook his head. “Shouta, I have more memories of my time in an empty, frozen world than I have of playing with my friends as a child. To me - the last ten years I spent alone were more meaningful than anything I left in this room before that.” 

The older hero was silent for a while. Izuku focused on getting his backpack and duffle bag closed and set by the door. Izuku came back, but only for the keyring he’d left on his desk. Izuku carefully detached the apartment key and tucked the rest of the keychains into his pockets. He knew Shouta saw the Eraserhead goggles, but neither of them commented on it. 

“Do you want to go back?”

“What?” Izuku turned fast enough to stumble into his desk. “Why would you ask me that?”

“Because it seems like the life you created for yourself was better than the one you had here. Solitude can be a great comfort, if one is not maddened by it.” Shouta gestured towards the teen. “You kept your wits, and your will. And- the thing is-” He sighed. “I’m not sure anything in this world you’ve come back to will compete with the solace you found inside your quirk.”

“It wasn’t solace! I was alone! I was- I was- I was so alone but…” But was he really that angry about it? Sure it’d driven him to try and kill himself. But if he was honest, he hadn’t tried all that hard. He even taught himself how to slow time just to enjoy the float downwards, rather than actually trying to hit the pavement. “But it was safe. There were no bullies, or abusers, or screaming mothers. I don’t know how I’m going to face this world of people and noise and sensory overload.”

“That’s what I’m here for - to help. Let’s get you back to UA. I’ll text Recovery Girl and see if she can prescribe you something to help ease any anxiety and stress from the sensory issues. Is that alright? I’m sure she has some other ideas, too.”

Izuku nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.”

“I think it might be best if we place you in the teacher’s dorm until you’ve settled in. That would keep you away from the worst of the racket for a while.”

“I want to go home.” Izuku wasn’t sure why he said it. The words just forced themselves out of his throat. 

“Where’s home?”

“That’s just it, Shouta. I’ve been away so long, I’m not sure I have one anymore. I’m honestly not sure I ever had one to begin with.” Izuku glanced around his bedroom, all of his important belongings fit into two small bags. He picked up one of his older notebooks, one of the many he’d decided to leave, and tossed it into the trash can with a loud thud. “Nothing here ever felt like home.”

“How about we find you a home together?”

Izuku didn’t answer. He wasn’t sure he could. The answer he wanted to say was yes, yes, he wanted to find a home, and he wanted help doing it. But an even deeper part of him wanted to say no, because he didn’t believe anyone could give him a home, or at least, not one where he felt like he belonged. 

Izuku walked into the living room as they made their way out. Shouta stopped to watch him. Walking through a life he’d nearly forgotten was nostalgic in a way he didn’t like. This odd Deja vu sensation crept along the back of his shoulders, and his mind kept trying to supply inaccurate information like wrong colors and shapes of the furniture he moved around. Shouta walked up beside him as he stopped at a side table covered in photo frames. Izuku wasn’t sure why his mother kept any, she always said he photographed horribly, something about his wild curls never looking good on school picture day. 

The photo Izuku had been looking for was one he barely remembered, but there it sat before him. The photo was of Izuku and his childhood best friend; Katsuki Bakugo. They’d lost contact sometime after Izuku was diagnosed quirkless. Katsuki just naturally drifted towards the popular kids. He didn’t ever see the bullying by their classmates. They all knew Katsuki would defend Izuku, so they did their best to separate Izuku and his explosive guard dog. It worked, too well. Several times, Izuku had thought about saying something to Katsuki, but in the end, he realized it didn’t matter. Even if Katsuki tried to defend him, the only outcome would be disastrous. 

Izuku ran his fingers over the glass of the photo frame. In this one, Izuku and Katsuki were playing in the sand on the beach. They were both leaning towards the camera with huge smiles while covered in sand and holding those cute miniature shovels. Katsuki had a look of determination on his face while very obviously burying Izuku in a rather shoddy sand castle. 

“Is that-”

Izuku looked up.

“Sorry, who is that?”

“My best friend. Or - he was, before my diagnosis. Afterwards…we just drifted apart, I guess. We always said we’d be heroes together. But honestly, I think he’ll make a great one without me.”

“What’s his name?”

“Hmm? Oh, Kacchan-err-Katsuki. Katsuki Bakugo. Actually-” Izuku grabbed another picture from the table. This one depicted the two toddlers with their parents. Inko and the Bakugos had been almost like siblings when their children were young. “Auntie Mitsuki and Uncle Masaru designed our first hero suits.” The two boys were wearing those adorable costumes in the picture. Izuku was sure Mitsuki still had them saved somewhere.

“That’s…Izuku, he’s one of my students.”

“Wait, what?”

“Bakugo. He’s one of my students at UA.”

“Oh.”

Shouta leaned over a bit to try and catch Izuku’s sudden shift in demeanor.

“Is that bad? Was he- did he bully you?”

“No! No. Kacchan and I really did drift apart. He has a powerful quirk, and I didn’t have one at all. I was an outcast and he was on the fast track to heroism. I thought about telling him a couple of times, about what they did to me.” Izuku sighed. “But the thing is…if I had told him, he might not be where he is. I would have drug him down with me.”

Shouta opened his mouth to reply, but nothing came out. He let out a heavy breath instead. It wasn’t quite a sigh, and there was no frustration behind the sound. 

“I haven’t spoken to him in years-err-well, yeah. A few years for you, and a lot for me. It’s been a while. I’m sure he’s forgotten about…” Izuku gestured vaguely to the table of pictures. “-all this.”

“I doubt that.”

“Why?”

Shouta reached over and tapped the picture frame still in Izuku’s hands. “I didn’t want to make assumptions, that’s why I asked.” Izuku just stared at him, confused. “Izuku, he has pictures like this on his dorm room wall. Not this exact one, but, I think he has some from this day. They say if you want to know what someone cares about, look at what they take pictures of. People don’t put pictures on their walls of someone they want to forget.”

Izuku had always secretly wished that Katsuki would one day find him again. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, he’d searched the eyes of every person he came across, looking for that beautiful shade of iris he’d very nearly forgotten. Izuku had tried to look for people he knew, but for some reason, he’d never been able to find Katsuki in the frozen world. Now, it was obvious he’d been at UA, a place Izuku didn’t believe he belonged, and thus, a place he never searched or visited. 

“I keep thinking that everyone will have forgotten me in all the time I was gone.”

Shouta shrugged. “To us, you never vanished.”

“But I’ve forgotten them.”

“You mentioned at the hospital that you didn’t quite recognize your own photo - is that what you mean?”

“Yeah. I couldn’t remember exactly what shade of red Kacchan’s eyes were, or what my mother’s face looked like.” He sighed softly as he placed a couple picture frames into his bag, the ones he wanted to keep. “But if he doesn’t want to forget me, then I’d like to remember him.”

“After we see Recovery Girl, I can have him stop by the teacher’s dorm.”

“I want to stay with you, Shouta. I don’t know anyone else. Is that okay?”

“Yeah, kid-err, sorry. Yes. That’s okay, too.”

Izuku actually smiled. “Maybe it’d be better if Kacchan met me there, with you nearby. I’m really not sure how it will turn out.”

“You and me both. But, we’ll get through it. Come on, let’s head back.”

“Okay.”

~

Meeting Recovery Girl was nothing like Izuku expected. She’d always come off as a friendly older lady in the few select glimpses anyone had ever seen of her on TV or promos about UA high. But in reality, she was crass, grouchy, and damn good at her job. Izuku almost instantly loved her. They bonded over his time-bent suicide attempts. She wanted to know every single detail about his experience. She was the first person to look at Izuku’s quirk and see something worth talking about, not something tragic. Hell, even Izuku thought he had the worst kind of luck to get a quirk like this. But her interest was pretty much identical to the way Izuku’s eyes used to sparkle at the thought of ripping apart a quirk. It might be weird to be on the other end for the first time, but Izuku was actually enjoying it. 

She ran a dozen tests, then told him to come back for more in a few days once he was settled in. Shouta sat in the corner of the room the whole time, twisting back and forth for at least a couple hours while the nurse worked. 

“Alright.” Recovery Girl, or RG as she told Izuku to call her, walked back in with a stack of papers in a folder. “Sit back down, Shouta. This will take a minute.”

He sat down. Izuku put his hands on his knees as if it might offer him some stability. The old nurse pulled up a chair and started flipping through the file. 

“Well, first of all - you’re healthy. Healthier than I think you were two days ago.”

“What does that mean?” Shouta asked. 

“Izuku told me about recent abuse I might find, but the thing is - every injury on his body shows significant healing. If I didn’t know about his quirk, I would say every injury on his body was more than a decade old.”

“Wait…my body healed itself while I-”

“Yes. But I believe it’s because you were actually aging. The samples we took reflect a person who is in their late twenties. Your body might physically appear seventeen, but biologically, you are twenty-seven. This is, unfortunately, likely a result of your rather cruel manifestation.”

“So, if he uses his quirk again, he’ll age physically, too?”

“Yes. And while this might be obvious-” She looked up from the file and gave Izuku a hard glare. “I do not recommend that you spend more than a few days inside your quirk. There’s no way for me to test the repercussions on your body now that it’s out of sync like this. You could develop aging conditions far too young, among a long list of other side effects you likely don’t want to hear.”

“I’m sure I can guess. What else?”

She sighed. “Well, otherwise, I didn’t find anything remarkable, in the medical sense, that is. Time quirks are rare. Yours…I don’t even have a sub-category to put it in. Shouta.” The hero sat up straighter. “I’m going to insist that Izuku’s registry is medically sealed. If the Commission got their hands on it, I’m afraid even Nedzu couldn’t stop them.” She placed a hand on Izuku’s shoulder and smiled at him. “You’ll be safe here. Shouta will help you control your quirk. You need rest, a lot of it. Your doctor at Hosu General already sent notes. Before you leave, stop by the pharmacy up front. I've already had anxiety and sleep medications started, as well as mild quirk suppressants, and they’ll also be giving you some sensory items; special sunglasses, earplugs, that sort of thing.”

“Shouta mentioned therapy, too.”

“Mhm. I’m sure he did. Inui-san will be briefed when we’re done here. You will need treatment for the acute psychosis, solitary confinement, body dysmorphia, sensory issues, and what is likely to develop into cPTSD. You have a long road ahead of you, dear.”

Shouta finally stood up. “But you aren’t walking it alone. Mic texted, the class is finished with dinner but he managed to snag a couple bowls of udon on his way in after the radio show.”

“Is it that late already?”

“Sorry to keep you boys. Go on now, get out of my infirmary.”

“Thanks, RG.”

She patted his head and turned to leave, smacking her cane gently on Shouta’s ankle as she passed.

They walked slowly as they left. Izuku had put all of his prescriptions and sensory items into his bag. The campus was quiet this late, and since the UA campus was so gigantic, they didn’t even get much noise from the city around them. He was quietly thankful for that. Shouta led them to the dorms, hands in his pockets, and his face tucked into his capture scarf. He didn’t speak or ask questions, he just let the sun drifting down past the horizon stand as their only conversation. 

He was going to meet his childhood best friend again. Maybe Shouta thought this would improve Izuku’s mood. Maybe it would. In all reality, Izuku wasn’t sure what his mood was exactly, or what it should be. This whole whirlwind was finally winding down into reality and it actually struck him, as he walked towards what might be a new home, that all of this was now unavoidably rushing towards him. Izuku was back in the real, waking world, and he had to face not only his new reality, but also himself. 

Tomorrow, he’d wake up, and he would be someone else. He wouldn’t be Izuku Midoriya, the teenager with no quirk and a sordid life. He would not be Izuku Midoriya, the young man who’d raised himself in a still, silent world. He would have to look himself in the mirror and figure out who the hell he was.

And it scared him. 

They didn’t go in the front door. Shouta took him around the side of the building to a ground floor patio that opened into an apartment kitchen. Standing at the stove, warning up udon in a pot, stood Present Mic. The blonde hero wore a pleasant smile and actually had his hair down, something Izuku had never seen. It suited him, but maybe that was the point. A hero persona should be just that; a persona, an act or a character. There had to be a line between the hero and the person, right?

“Welcome home, Sho, and you too, listener. Welcome to UA. I hope you’re hungry. I grabbed a couple bowls after the class finished eating. Bakugo always makes too much, but at least he’s learned to tone down the spice.”

Izuku chuckled to himself. “Kacchan always makes everything too spicy.” Both older heroes paused to look at him when he let out a happy moment of nostalgia. “Sorry, he uhh- he cooked a lot when we were young. His father taught him…taught us.”

“Well, I’ll have to ask you to make something for us sometime, how’s that sound?”

“Sure…uhm- what do I-”

Present Mic waved a hand. “Call me Hizashi, or just Zashi like the rest of the teachers. It’s no big deal.”

“Thanks, Zashi.” Izuku hadn’t known Present Mic’s name before that. He usually tried to protect the identities of any heroes he analyzed, so he purposefully never looked up their names. So, it was weird to find out one of his favorite heroes had a name nearly identical to Hisashi Midoriya. 

“Thanks, love. I need to speak with Bakugo. Can you hold down the fort?”

“Of course, Shou. I kind of figured there would be something going on if our newcomer already knew one of the kids. I’ll leave this on low to stay warm.”

“Thanks.”

Shouta pecked Hizashi on the cheek and left after a quick nod to Izuku. At this point, he just assumed the pair of pro heroes were married. He’d made assumptions of it before. They had matching rings they wore on their necks, there were ‘cryptid sightings’ of them together in civilian clothes on the street, and a couple times, before they could hide it, they’d been holding hands and the like. Izuku wondered if Hizashi only put his hair down when he was ready to go to bed. It had to be a pain in the ass to manage that bird-like mohawk, right?

“So!” Izuku practically jumped at the sudden call of Zashi’s voice. “Sorry. Are you hungry?”

“Starving, actually.”

“Let’s fix that.”

~

Shouta stopped on the stairs to sit and put his head between his knees. As much as he loved his husband and cared about their new charge - he just needed to take a few breaths, alone. So far, he’d managed to fuck things up several times. Somehow, he pulled it all back with the photos, and managed to get through to Izuku. Shouta had seen those pictures by accident. The kids had been doing a ‘dorm tour’ after a break recently, where they’d all redesigned their rooms. He’d walked past right as Bakugo was telling the class to fuck off. Observation skills that Nedzu drilled into him as a teenager meant he’d cataloged the whole room in less than ten seconds. 

The look in his new student’s eyes hadn’t changed much at all since meeting him yesterday. The only time his mood seemed to improve or when his eyes actually came to life…well, it was when he spoke about Bakugo. It’s why he’d suggested this rather rushed meeting. Izuku was floating on an ocean of unknowns. But the one anchor that seemed to pull him back to shore was a friend he hadn’t spoken to in years (over a decade in Izuku’s reality). So, Shouta was throwing all his eggs in this one explosive basket, and hoping it would help pull this poor kid (not a kid) back from the edge. 

Eventually, he scraped himself off the stairs and made it to Bakugo’s door. The rowdy teen was an early sleeper. He’d be winding down for the evening right about now. Hopefully, Shouta wouldn’t be waking him up. Much to his surprise, Shouta didn’t even have to knock, the student yanked his door open right as Shouta raised his hand to knock. 

“Shitty-hair, I swear to- …Sensei?”

“Bakugo. Sorry to disappoint. Were you expecting Kirishima?”

The kid rolled his eyes. “He keeps asking for help with math. He needs to talk to Ponytail or Engines. I only know trigonometry, they’re numbers people, I’ll keep to my letters, thanks.”

Shouta snorted at the half-hearted math joke. “Right. Well, sorry to disappoint, but I’m not here about math.”

“Then why the fuck are you here at-” He leaned back into the room to check his clock. “It’s nine-thirty. I should be in bed. Can’t this wait until class on Monday?”

“No. I need you to come with me. There’s someone here who I believe you might want to meet.”

“Well that’s not ominous as hell.” He stretched his arms up over his head and stepped into his slippers by the door. “Sure, why not? I can’t sit here waiting for Shitty-hair to ruin my sleep. Might as well ruin it myself.”

Shouta didn’t reply, mostly because he didn’t have a reply. Trying to explain any of this without context (aka the living unicorn currently eating udon with Shouta’s husband) would be impossible. So the context would come in a rather unconventional way, though it might very well be effective. They walked down to the ground floor without any fuss. Most of the other students were already in their rooms studying or finishing up their weekly work, the rest were moving through the halls quietly, getting ready for bed. Shouta stopped with his hand on the doorhandle. Bakugo leaned on the wall beside the door so he could see his teacher’s face. 

“You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Sensei.”

“Mmm, that’s not a bad guess. But if it is a ghost, he’s not here for me.”

~

Izuku paced the living room while waiting for Shouta to come back with Katsuki in tow. Hizashi was working at the kitchen table, grading, Izuku assumed. He’d shown Izuku to their guest room and they already left his bags in there, but Izuku didn’t have the energy or focus to unpack anything right now. He wrung out his hands a few times to stretch the aching digits. One of his teachers used to enjoy smacking his fingers, but only during detention after school (when the cameras were turned off), so no one would see him do it. His knuckles were scarred and his fingers were slightly misshapen after healing…not quite right.

Izuku’s breath caught in his throat when the handle on the front door twisted. He couldn’t decide if he wanted to look away or search for Katsuki’s eyes. They must have changed, right? No, no, they hadn’t changed. They couldn’t have changed. Izuku had only been gone for… he’d just seen Katsuki at graduation, three years prior. Three, not thirteen. Does a person change much in only three years?

Shouta walked in and offered a reassuring smile. Katsuki appeared from behind him, seeming hesitant about following his teacher into his apartment. The second his eyes landed on Izuku, the whole room froze. Time froze (but only in Izuku’s imagination, his quirk didn’t activate). They stared at each other without breathing, without speaking. Izuku didn’t even blink until his eyes were burning from the strain of staying open. As soon as he blinked, Katsuki was moving towards him. He nearly shoved Shouta out of the way, but he stopped just out of arms reach of the shorter teen.

“Izuku? What- what are you doing here?”

“I-” his voice failed him for a moment. He kept wringing out his fingers, even though it was starting to hurt. After a hard swallow, he forced out the words. “I’ve been placed in UA’s quirk rehabilitation program.”

“That’s not possible. You’re quirkless?” But the statement came out more like a question, because yeah, why would UA put him in a rehab program for quirks if he didn’t have one?

“Uhm…It manifested late. Very late. Less than forty eight hours ago - for all of you.”

Katsuki squinted at him and finally took one more step, putting them close but not touching. “For us? What does that mean, two days for us?”

Izuku gave Shouta a pleading look and the older hero nodded. Katsuki turned to try and get some kind of explanation to what was happening. 

“Izuku has an extremely rare time quirk. His manifestation was brutal, as most late appearances are. His quirk was stuck in an ‘on’ state. He can freeze time. He was stuck inside his quirk, the world frozen around him, for a long time.”

“How long?”

Shouta looked away. Even he didn’t want to explain this to someone already with an edge of anger in their voice. The blonde flipped back to Izuku. He didn’t reach out, but it was obvious he wanted to. He wanted to shake Izuku and beg for an answer, Izuku could see it in his eyes. It was so easy to read his best friend, even after all this time…

“How. Long.”

“Ten years.” Izuku finally answered.

“Ten…ten fucking years?!”

Izuku winced, hands clutching his ears as the howl of his best friend’s voice abused his eardrums. The blonde stepped back, his mouth moving but his words unheard beneath the ringing, at least for a moment. Wen it faded back in, he caught the shift in conversation halfway through.

“No, it’s not you. He spent ten years in a silent world. His senses are struggling to keep up now that he’s back in a world full of noise.”

Katsuki must have noticed Izuku’s hands had come down. “Izuku, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“I’m okay, Kacchan. It’s just…weird. Everything feels strange. My memory of people is foggy, at best, and inaccurate at worst. I’m here because until we can figure out how to control my quirk, there’s a risk I could get stuck again. It’s why I was put here, with Shouta and his Erasure quirk.”

“What did you do…for ten years?”

“A lot. Mostly reading, learning, exploring. I ended up in Hosu when my quirk finally deactivated. We just came back earlier.”

“Wait, where’s Auntie Inko? Shouldn’t you be home with her?”

“Kacchan…” He once again asked Shouta for some silent aid. 

“Inko Midoriya has been arrested for medical negligence, she’s still being processed, but it’s likely she will receive some kind of sentence for that charge. The other charges…probably not.”

“Other charges?” Katsuki looked between them, confused. 

“Kacchan…everyone was so careful around you. They all knew you’d defend me if you saw it. They all let us drift apart and kept the abuse away from you. I’m sorry, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. I just didn’t want you to get dragged down with me.”

Slowly, the blonde sat himself on the couch arm beside him. “Abuse?” His voice was frail, wafer thin. Izuku could have missed it if he’d not been watching Katsuki’s mouth move. “Everyone? Izuku - I don’t…I don’t understand. I thought you just…didn’t want to be friends because we couldn’t be heroes together. I thought you were upset, maybe angry. I understood your resentment, I accepted it. Hell, maybe I deserved it but, but you’re saying that us drifting is what allowed people to abuse you behind my back?”

“Not…directly. It just made things easier.”

“And you didn’t come to me because you thought I’d get dragged down with you? Izuku, I would never have let them touch a hair on your head. You know that. Why- I don’t-” He sighed heavily. “You’ve been alone for ten years?”

Izuku nodded. “Yeah. It was ten o’five am for ten years. The birds were frozen in the sky, the people couldn’t hear or see me. I was…in a world without sound, or smell, or sleep, or quirks. I couldn’t die, either, I-” Izuku realized his mistake the instant the words left his tongue. Katsuki stood up, his face a mask of confusion and unadulterated horror. Shouta stepped closer, his capture scarf already half unwound. “Please, Kacchan, it’s not like that. I’m not- I’m not-”

“But you were. You tried, is that what you’re saying? You tried and it failed and that’s how you know you can’t die while frozen in time.”

“Yes. I tried. But I’m not suicidal. I was alone, Kacchan. I was the only person in the whole world, I just wanted it to stop, or start. I was scared, and tired, and even if that was better than being abused by my mom and classmates, I just wanted a life back, even if it had to be my life.”

Izuku stared at their feet. Katsuki must have been speechless. Izuku felt like he’d taken a rusted knife and shoved it right into his own side. He wasn’t really sure if his former best friend was trying to stop the bleed, or shove the knife deeper, and he was nearly too scared to ask. The gentle touch of a warm hand on his arm is what finally gave him an answer. 

“Izu? Look at me, please?” Slowly, Izuku found himself captured by bright red eyes already full of tears. “Your life will never be like that again. Never. Do you hear me?”

Izuku nodded. “Yeah.”

“Can I hug you?”

Again, he nodded. “Please.”

The hug was warm, and for maybe the first time since he was freed from his quirk, the touch of something or someone else didn’t make his skin crawl. Katsuki wrapped a hand behind Izuku’s head and cradled it to his chest while Izuku clutched at the back of Katsuki’s school uniform shirt. It was the best hug he’d ever received, and healed something inside of him that Izuku hadn’t even been aware of, something integral that had been broken for far too long. 

He was home, a home that he didn’t even know he had. Maybe those ten years away hadn’t been a waste of time, and maybe he didn’t need to go back just to find somewhere better than where he’d been before.