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There's a table in the middle of the room with a woman strapped to it. It's not like a bed in a hospital designed for practicality and comfort like Izuku's seen pictures of, but rather a metal slab from a coroner's lab that was made with containing biological mess in mind. Under her body-tight costume—her hero costume—, the woman has smooth, tan skin and a slender body with subtle muscles. Her bright blue eyes are filled with defiant fear, and her long black hair is splayed across the cold metal table. She looks beautiful. Izuku wonders how long his father will allow that to last.
Without noticeable hesitation, Izuku continues walking across the room toward the table, the woman, and him. Father would only be angered if Izuku stalled. It would only make things worse than they already are.
Izuku finally stops across from his father. He looks him in the eyes, just like he'd been taught. "You called, father," he greets perfectly.
Father gives a single nod and steps up to the table. Then, the man smirks and pulls something out of his pocket that makes Izuku freeze. "You have a choice, Izuku. Either you take off this hero's arm," he commands and nods to the small table of menacing tools beside him. Then he cocks the gun in his hand, the gun chosen specifically to make a statement to Izuku, he's sure, and presses it against the hero's temple. "Or I put a bullet in her head."
Izuku knows, Father isn't lying.
The room begins to blur, but Izuku refuses to let it stop him from reaching out a trembling hand and picking up a saw. For the first time, the hero turns her fearful eyes toward Izuku. For a second, Izuku meets those eyes, his own just as scared, but he can't take it; he looks away and focuses on the hero's unmarred arm. It won't be unmarred for long.
"I'm sorry," he whispers tearfully, but he can't be responsible for someone's death.
Tomura had never liked how Sensei treated Izuku. Sure, his little brother was naive in his love for heroes—which admittedly even annoyed Tomura at times—but the way Sensei went about punishing that love often went too far. The closet was fine; After all, a little alone time never hurt anyone. The no food was okay; Tomura could just sneak Izuku some leftovers after meals. However, as the time approaches for Tomura to begin enacting his plans, Sensei has taken more drastic measures. Lately, he'd been calling Izuku down to the lab.
Izuku was always so strong and defiant, had been ever since he came to live with them, but after he'd come back from the labs, he'd always be a little distant and a little quieter, like a small piece of him had been lost, never to return. But ever since that last punishment, where Izuku came back from the lab with one arm longer and more tan than the other, he'd been completely silent.
They may not be close, but Tomura knows his brother. He can see how Izuku is one wrong move away from breaking completely but not in the way Sensei wants. No, Izuku is on the verge of becoming a husk, dead in every way that matters, but Tomura will not let that happen. No matter what he has to do.
Izuku stands nervously at his side, standing still but his hands unconsciously twitch at his sides. His bright green eyes, which have been so dull lately, quickly flit around, filled with emotion, largely fear and resignation. Fear of the scene in front of him and resignation in his inability to stop it. So he watches on as the scene turns to chaos. Eraserhead had thrown himself down the stairs and straight into the fray, now fighting off dozens of Tomura’s cannon fodder at once. The hero students are attempting to evacuate with the help of Thirteen, and his initial goal—though now his second priority—is nowhere to be found.
It hadn’t been difficult to convince Sensei to allow Tomura to take Izuku along to the USJ. All he had to do was mention how Izuku would have a first row seat to the death of All Might—his little brother’s favorite hero—and Sensei was intrigued. Tomura knew that Sensei believed this would be the final push Izuku needed to become the complacent villain he wanted the boy to be. However, Tomura has other plans, plans in Izuku’s best interest.
Tomura anxiously waits—though he gives off no tells of it—until the time he’d been counting on arrives. Kurogiri disappears into one of his own portals to confront and separate the hero students, as is his role in the plan, Sensei’s plan, not Tomura’s.
With him gone, Tomura only waits a moment, not knowing how long Kurogiri would stay away, before snapping. “What the hell did you say?” Tomura snarls without provocation and glowers at Izuku.
Izuku flinches at his angry words but doesn’t react otherwise for a long moment. After all, he hadn’t spoken since his surgery. Finally, he slowly looks up to Tomura with those wide green eyes but they aren’t full of that same fear, not towards Tomura, never towards Tomura. Not yet, at least. Instead, he looks at Tomura in hesitant confusion.
With a thin finger, Izuku points to himself. “M-me?” He asks.
Tomura takes a threatening step forward and Izuku steps back in surprise. “Who else would I be talking to, Deku?” Tomura spits.
Izuku’s eyes flash with pain as Tomura had never called him the insult he’d come to them carrying. Tomura’s hardened heart squeezes, but he has to sell it. “I-I don’t kn-know,” he stutters, “I didn’t say a-anything.”
Without another word, Tomura lunges forward and grabs Izuku’s chin in a four-fingered vice. “Are you lying now?” He demands.
The boy shakes his head violently in Tomura’s grasp. Slow fear begins to show in his eyes. “No, T-Tomura. I pr-promise, I wo-would never lie to y-you.”
Tomura tsks in a mix of faux anger and disappointment. “Maybe I should teach you a lesson, huh? Like sensei would,” he proposes. He feels sick. He never wanted to be to Izuku what Sensei was to him.
Izuku’s eyes fill with tears and terror. “No, please. I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” he begs and tries to pull away but Tomura’s grip is iron.
Slowly he raises his other hand to wrap around Izuku’s single muscled bicep, but this time he doesn’t worry about keeping a finger away, rather the opposite. He makes sure his fingers dig into Izuku’s hoodie until the fabric starts crumbling away and soon after it, skin.
Tomura has never felt guilty for hurting someone before—he’s never felt anything about hurting someone before—but as screams are torn from Izuku’s throat, Tomura can’t help but hate himself.
“I’m sorry, Tomura,” Izuku pleads as he desperately tries and fails to escape Tomura’s grasp that eats into his flesh. “I lied, I talked! I did it, I’m sorry!” Tomura doesn’t care though, he hardens his heart and holds tighter as he steels his resolve. He can feel bone in his hand now. “Please, I’ll be good, I’ll be good!”
Just a little more, Tomura wishes he could tell his baby brother, then you can finally be saved by heroes like you’ve always wanted.
Finally, finally, Tomura’s hand falls with nothing left to hold onto. The little remaining of the tanned arm thuds to the ground with a wet sound and Izuku crumbles down beside it. His hand, his normal hand clutches desperately at the stub at the end of his shoulder. It does little to hold back the onslaught of blood. Tomura worries it’s too much blood but he reminds himself that people have survived worse and Izuku is strong. Not physically but mentally, he wouldn’t have made it so long with Sensei otherwise.
Izuku is a mess. His eyes are red and puffy, his face is covered in tears and snot and, somehow, blood. Suddenly, he lurches forward and vomits, some getting on Tomura’s shoe. Izuku’s breathing somehow quickens. He bows his head down to the ground, his hair falling into the puddle of bile.
“‘M srry, Tomra, please dn’t. ‘M srry,” he sobs, obviously delirious from the pain.
Tomura is glad Father’s hand is there to hide the tears in his eyes as squats down beside Izuku. One more push, he tells himself as he grabs a fist full of Izuku’s hair and wretches the boy’s head up against his will.
“I am Sensei’s successor and you are nothing,” he spits. Izuku nods desperately before his eyes quickly grow wide. He leans as far away from Tomura as Tomura’s grip allows and vomits again before falling back into horrible sobs.
Suddenly, a force slams into Tomura’s cheek, throwing him meters away from Izuku. He hadn’t even gotten the chance to let go of Izuku so strands of detached green hair are still held within his grasp. Tomura quickly opens his eyes but relaxes and stays down when he sees Eraserhead where Tomura had just been. He sighs in relief, this was it. This would make everything worth it.
In the middle of the battleground, the hero kneels down in front of Izuku. His brother weakly tries to get away but he’s stopped by two gentle hands on his shoulders. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m here to help,” the hero says and Izuku’s pained tears turn to relief.
“Ple’se help me,” Izuku cries.
”I will. You’re safe now,” Eraserhead answers as he takes off the weapon around his neck. “They should be able to save some of your arm,” he comforts as he carefully but firmly begins wrapping the fabric around Izuku’s decayed shoulder and across his chest.
Izuku shakes his head slowly and fat tears begin to build again. “I-it’s n-not- It’s not mine,” he cries. “It’s Midnight’s.”
Eraserhead’s eyes widen as he looks at Izuku in horror. Tomura’s eyes widen too. He feels sick. For Sensei to use something Izuku so desperately loved like that, it makes him, for the first time ever, doubt the man. Doubt his intentions and his goals. Doubt his relationship with Tomura himself.
Suddenly, Tomura feels a presence behind himself. “Master Tomura, what have you done?” Kurogiri demands, his always even tone now filled with consternation and Tomura grimaces.
”We’re leaving,” he says darkly instead of addressing the nomu’s demand. “I need to talk to Sensei.”