Monochromatic Ideals

Episode 30- Monochrome


With a soft sigh, the aged school nurse closed the door to the infirmary behind her and then turned to the man sitting in the waiting chair across from her. All Might, deflated into his thinner form with his yellow teaching suit hanging loosely off of him, had a dour scowl on his face.

Given the current circumstances, nobody could really blame him. But as it was, nobody, including All Might, even knew the full story of those circumstances. He aimed to change that.

"So how is he?" the hero asked after a few moments of silence.

"That boy always always did have an unnaturally high healing factor. I remember there was a point where I thought he had a compound Quirk like Todoroki and had a secondary regeneration Quirk, but then the file concerning his... unique biology made it to me." With a sigh, she shook her head. "The doctors behind writing that file really undersold just how severe the changes his mother's Quirk made on his body, you know."

"I know, Recovery Girl, but how is he?"

The old nurse pursed her lips and turned her head to the door. "I can't tell you why his hair and eye changed colors and why he now seems to possess multiple Quirks. You'll have to ask him how that happened. As for his injuries..." She turned back to All Might. "There was nothing fatal, but he wasn't exactly sporting anything minor, either. I healed everything, but..."

"'But'...?" All Might hedged.

"My Quirk expedites the body's natural healing process to instantly heal wounds at the expense of great energy loss to the patient. If he really fought... that man... and sustained all those injuries, he should be out cold right now."

"But he's not?"

"But he's not," she confirmed. "The only thing he's done since Aizawa dragged him in here and handcuffed him to the bed is give the wall a thousand-yard stare. He wouldn't even speak to me. And I don't know how he's fighting off the exhaustion."

It was All Might's turn to sigh. "I was afraid of that," he said.

"All Might, what happened out there?" Recovery Girl asked. "I'll admit I've had seldom contact with the boy since he began attending this school, but I've never... somebody his age shouldn't have a look like that in their eyes."

"I don't know, Recovery Girl," he admitted. "All I know is that man destroyed his orphanage, and everybody in it died. That a lot of police and heroes died in the process. Somehow, young Kyomu... gained his brother's Quirk in addition to his own. And against all odds, he beat that man. I can't believe it, but he actually beat him." A soft groan left him as he rubbed at his forehead. "And if I was a second too late, he would have killed him. He looked like a rabid animal." He looked back up at the nurse. "Is he okay to talk to?"

"If you can," she said. "He's conscious, but unresponsive. Most likely shock given the situation, but... it wouldn't explain how he's forcing himself to stay awake."

All Might's face turned grim, but he gave the nurse a nod nonetheless. He had every intention of getting to the bottom of it all and talking some sense into the teen yet. Even if he dreaded the conversation that was to come- because, quite honestly, he didn't know what to expect.

But, right as he was about to get out of the chair, there was a commotion outside in the hall next to them, followed by intense shouting. All Might froze to his seat and Recovery Girl just shook her head.

"Midoriya, I understand you're concerned, but-!"

"Mr. Aizawa, please! I need to see-!" The stern, muffled voice outside the door was interrupted by a younger one, which was followed by an exasperated sigh from beyond the door.

"What you need to do is go back to class, Midoriya."

"But-!"

The rest of the argument was tuned out by All Might, who could only rub at his forehead in exhaustion. He'd expected as much from the young boy, he'd likely do the same in his situation, but that didn't change the fact that he was already so tired from all of this.

But he'd already made his choice before he'd even gotten out of the chair and made his way to the door. Not just because he felt Midoriya deserved to know, but because All Might honestly felt like he couldn't do this on his own.

"Mr. Aizawa," he announced as he opened the door and stuck his head out. Indeed, young Midoriya was there, staring up wide-eyed at both him and the teacher blocking the way. "It's... okay, I think. Let him in."


He'd had a lot of time between being taken back to UA and being chained to a bed to reflect on recent events. Namely, everything that had happened since he left for school this morning. All the faces of children he'd seen that were now dead thanks to a monster that had been his brother's corpse. All For One and all the words he'd said during their fight. The fact that All Might stopped him from killing him.

And how tired he was of all of it.

It was an exhaustion on multiple fronts. His body was lethargic to the point he was fighting to stay awake. He felt awful- his entire body still had a dull throb of pain from the power transferred into him. His wounds had at least been treated, but that had only made his exhaustion that much worse. But mentally? He was practically out the door.

"It's all just... this is too much." Languidly, his head rolled to his left wrist, which was attached to the frame of the hospital bed he was in via a pair of handcuffs. He couldn't help but think why they even bothered considering he could just use Void to cut the cuffs away. Or just snap them off with brute strength. He was too tired to care. "What am I even supposed to do after I kill All For One?" he thought. "I don't... Hikari's gone. My 'prospective' future as a hero likely got shot, and if by some miracle it didn't it will when I kill him for real. I can't be a hero. I refuse to be lumped in with degenerate villains. And I don't even... what's the point of it all if Hikari isn't here with me?

"What's the point in any of this?"

When the door to the infirmary open, he only just barely turned his head so he could see who it was. He wasn't surprised at all to see All Might in his real form walk in, and was only mildly surprised to see Midoriya in tow. Both of them had uncertain looks in their eyes as they approached the side of his bed, and it was only when they stopped next to him did he sigh and look back to the handcuffs.

"You know I can break out of this any time I want, right?" he asked, and accentuated his point by rattling the cuffs. "Hell, we even had a lesson on how to break out of these in the event of a villain capture. You taught that class, All Might."

"You're not going to break out of those," All Might claimed. "All you would end up doing is make things worse for you."

Kyomu rolled his mismatched eyes. "You are grossly underestimating the amount of stupid decisions I'm willing to make today." He looked to Midoriya. "You too, huh?"

"I'm just as involved in this as All Might," he answered in a simple tone.

That earned a scoff from the bedridden teen. "Yeah, I bet. With that Quirk All Might gave you. Speaking of which, is that Quirk named One For All by any chance?"

He knew the answer was yes when they both stiffened upon him mentioning the name. "I... didn't realize Midoriya told you," All Might admitted, and Midoriya coughed to the side besides him. "But where did you learn the name if not from young Midoriya?"

"All Foe One mentioned it, but didn't go into detail. I thought he just mixed his name up, but when I thought back on it, the context it was said in suggested differently," Kyomu explained. "So does one of you wanna explain why the Quirk has almost the same name as All For One?"

Midoriya's facial response was to bite his lower lip and look to All Might for help. All Might's response was a frown followed by a shake of his head. "We're here to question you, not-"

"I'll tell you everything," Kyomu interrupted, "but I wanna know what you have to do with All For One first. I wanna know what the deal with that Quirk is. Because otherwise I'm not telling you anything."

It was a completely unfair choice for him to give them, and they knew based on the looks on their faces, but Kyomu was beyond caring. He didn't have any good reason to conceal anything from them anymore, true, but on the other hand he didn't have that much of a reason to tell them anything, either. But there was still a small piece of the puzzle missing, and he felt it all revolved around that specific Quirk. All For One sure wasn't gonna tell him. All Might would, but likely not for free.

But he knew All Might would tell him. He had a desperate look in those eyes that were so sunken in Kyomu could barely see them. He wanted to know Kyomu's story as much as he wanted to know what the story behind the Quirk was. And even if he didn't go for it, it wasn't any skin off Kyomu's back. Today would end the same regardless.

Fortunately, he went for it.

"Very well," he said. Midoriya looked ready to protest, but was silenced when All Might rose a hand. "After his encounter with that man, he has a right to know, young Midoriya. I just ask that you uphold your word and give us the truth- the full truth- in return, young man."

"Pfft. Sure," he agreed.

"Then... I will start," All Might began. Midoriya went to sit in a nearby chair, and Kyomu shifted to a more comfortable position in his bed. Once they were both settled, the older male continued. "All For One, in the beginning of his reign when he realized the potential of his Quirk, had a brother who, at the time, was though Quirkless. I... can't say for certain what the circumstances surrounding their relationship was, but for whatever reason All For One had decided to use his Quirk to give his brother a Quirk of his own: the power to stockpile power.

"But, as it turned out, the brother wasn't Quirkless after all. He had a Quirk of his own before All For One gifted him his second Quirk. His own, original Quirk was a Quirk that could be passed on to others." He waited for a reaction from Kyomu, but the teen continued to stare at All Might blankly. He cleared his throat awkwardly before speaking once again. "The two Quirks blended together and fused into one, singular Quirk: the ability to stockpile power and then pass that power onto another, who would then continue to stockpile that power and pass it on, and so on, and so on. Ever since the Quirk was conceived, its users have tried and failed to stop All For One and his evil once and for all, each and every one. They would eventually find a successor and pass the Quirk on. I am... was," he corrected, "the eight holder of the Quirk. Young Midoriya is the ninth."

"And you just happened to be the one to get the Quirk when it was powerful enough to take on All For One," Kyomu surmised. "Except you didn't. You dropped the ball and let that thing live."

All Might flinched, and then let out a weary sigh. "It wasn't by choice," he said. "I... it wasn't right, but I... he'd taken my master, the seventh holder," he said. "She had stayed behind to fend him off while I, wounded, was dragged away. All For One, of course, had killed her, and it was only when I had finally mastered One For All and had personally taken down All For One's empire did I finally fight him. But I was a bit reckless, and was blinded in my anger towards what he'd done to my master. What he'd done to all the innocents he'd wronged over the years. My sloppiness combined with his prowess allowed him to land the grievous injury that turned me into what you see today. But, even with my insides spilling out of me, I... I managed to land that hit on him." He grimaced and turned his head to the side. "I wasn't thinking about bringing him in to justice at that moment. I wasn't thinking about being a hero. I was... angry, for both the my wound. For the loss of my master. I hit him with the intent to kill." He exhaled slowly, and then faced Kyomu again. "I thought he died that day. He'd lost his entire face when I punched him. His body had shown no signs of life. I... truly thought he had died that day, young Kyomu."

"Don't use my first name." He watched the both of them wince at his words, and when they remained silent when he gave them a chance to speak, he opened his mouth again. "So what's going to happen to All For One now?" he asked.

"For now he'll be hauled off to the maximum-security villain prison, Tartarus," All Might answered. "He's likely be held in an isolation cell and connected to life support."

"No death sentence?" Kyomu questioned.

At that, All Might grew uncomfortable both from the question and from Kyomu's scrutinizing glare. "It isn't that simple," he said. "All For One is... meticulous in covering his tracks. The fact we don't even know his true identity alone means the Japanese government can't give him a death sentence, and evidence pinning him to crimes is, well, sparse. But considering what happened at the orphanage, I'm confident he can be locked away for life."

"So you're gonna hook that monster to life support and lock it in a room for the rest of its literally immortal life?" Scoffing, Kyomu shook his head. "Genius move, All Might."

All Might's eyes hardened. "And you would rather take his life, young Shinka?"

"It's the practical thing to do," he reasoned. "It's the smart thing to do. Hell, they've given other villains the death penalty for less things, and I know for a fact it's done stuff to warrant that sentence a hundred times over."

"But you've no physical proof."

"I don't need proof when I know that it did it all, All Might. Proof's for judges."

"And you are neither judge, jury, nor executioner!" All Might snapped at him. "You're a hero in training who upholds the law in the name of justice-!"

"Justice, huh?" Though his tone was subdued, there was a certain ice behind his tone that cause'd All Might's mouth to snap shut at the interruption. "You know, all my life I've been told the justice system is the absolute for determining right and wrong and preserving order in this country. Those claims were hammered even harder into me ever since I started going into this school. But ever since I've lost my brother for the first time, I can't help but feel the system is broken. That it doesn't work. That instead of protecting me, it's ruined my life. Why do I need to listen to a system so broken it's been detrimental to my life, All Might? Midoriya? Why do I need to defend something that hates me, and that I hate in turn?"

Midoriya, who had been silently fuming in his chair, sharply rose up from his seat and rounded to the edge of Kyomu's bed. "How can you say that?" he asked. "What do you mean the justice system doesn't work? Of course it works! The police stop criminals! Heroes stop villains! And, and sure sometimes somebody gets hurt, or even worse killed, but it's the fault of the villains who would commit those acts! The system exists so heroes and police can do their best to protect people!"

A deep sigh from Kyomu. "Then why did the system let a monster like All For One be free for so long?" He didn't get a response from the two. "Why did the system send my brother to prison when he was innocent?"

The silence that followed this statement was almost unnatural. Kyomu's face remained completely blank and emotionless. All Might's eyes and Midoriya's eyes scrunched in confusion, and their reactions afterwards were mainly the same. They'd blinked, tried to focus on Kyomu's face as they processed the statement he'd made, and then they'd slowly reeled back when the full force of what he said finally hit them.

"Young Shinka..." All Might slowly said, "what, exactly, do you mean?"

"Well, I said I'd tell you everything. I'm starting at the beginning." He took a deep breath, and Kyomu fully turned to the pair before he began to explain. "As you probably know, All For One was the one behind creating the Nomu. Him and an accomplice had been stealing people's Quirks to put them inside of dead bodies they'd revived through some obscure process. He was interested in our mother's Quirk, Genetic Hardening, so he'd sent an agent of his to our house to wound my mother and send her to the hospital, where her power was supposed to be stolen. But me and my brother caught the villain in the act of stabbing our parents. The event was traumatic enough to awaken my Quirk, and since I didn't have any control over it at the time, it went wild. Everything was consumed in Void: our house. Our parents, who had been bleeding out on the floor. The villain. The only thing spared was my brother and I.

"When the police found us and questioned us, Hikari had covered for me and lied, saying he'd been the one to kill them to spare me prison. Me, being the coward, had put the blame on him at the same time to try and save myself. So, you see, Hikari was innocent. I killed my parents and that villain."

"But... b-but you..." All Might stuttered, and then shook his head in disbelief at the words he was hearing. His face looked even more gaunt when he looked back to Kyomu to continue to listen to him.

Midoriya was completely silent, stunned in shock. The only other noticeable change was that his eyes were beginning to glisten.

"Some time later, when I was ten, a villain had tried to rob me," Kyomu continued. "I accidentally killed him with Void. It was instinctual. The knife was coming towards me, and subconsciously, I had activated Void and killed him. A hero had come to investigate, and I had lied about there being a villain. A bit later, I did research on the villain who had attempted to abduct our parents, whom at the time I had assumed had just been a random thief. That man, Hirose Kenji, had been arrested multiple times for similar crimes. I learned later it was due to the fact that All For One pulled strings behind the scenes that he was released prematurely so many times, but at that moment I had thought that the hero society was purposefully letting villains back into society to continue to hurt others. I was angry at the justice system for its negligence. I was angry at villains for what they did. I had lost faith in heroes, who could not defend me. So I took matters into my own hands.

"I would sneak out of my orphanage at night and kill villains. I would hide their bodies and any evidence in Void to avoid it ever tying back to me. One time, I was forced to kill a hero who had seen me."

They were shaking now, the both of them. All Might in, based on the look on his face, abject horror mixed with shock. Midoriya was harder to read. His head had bowed down, and his hair had shadowed over his eyes, but the streams of tears running down his cheeks were plain to see. His mouth wasn't open and gaping like All Might's, though. It was fully clenched with all his teeth bared, and the hands at his side were tightly balled into fists.

"Young Shinka..." All Might croaked, "say it isn't so." Eyes widened in disbelief, he looked down at his own knees and shook his head. "Just... just tell me you're lying for whatever reason, that you're being coerced into saying all this. Just don't... please don't tell me all of this is true, young Shinka."

"Of course it's true," Kyomu said. "What do you think happened to Stain?"

A choked gasp left All Might, and he began to shake again. Midoriya just started to breath harder.

"Anyways, I wound up on the hero path since I figured getting access to villains would be easier as a hero. Hikari, after escaping prison, wound up with the League of Villains out of mere circumstance more than anything else, and pretty much just rolled with it," he continued. "He legitimately did want to change society so that a situation like ours never happened again. Eventually he became sympathetic with them, because apparently their leader, Shigaraki, had nearly the same problem we had in that his Quirk accidentally killed his family. For the most part, at least," he added after a short pause. "But over time he began to become disillusioned with their goals. I began to question my own... villain crusade, if you want to call it that, and wondered if there was even a point anymore. Then Akame happened.

"That incident last week with the mass amnesia everybody had for a day? That was Hirose Kenji's brother, Hirose Akame. He knew everything and used his mass mind control Quirk to try and get his revenge on us. He blamed us for his brother's death, you see. We stopped him, and we dragged some truths out of him. It was him who told us of All For One's existence and revealed to us that it was all his fault that our parents were dead and that we were thrust into this situation. We killed him after and agreed that, after Hikari cut ties with the League and killed All For One, we would leave Japan. He gave up on reforming society. I gave up on killing villains, as I wasn't seeing noticeable results. We just wanted to leave it all behind and start new somewhere else. We just wanted to be a family again."

He stop, and a shallow breath rattled our from his throat. Kyomu had to swallow a large lump in his throat and sighed out loud before he resumed.

"But All For One killed him when he tried," he explained. "It killed him and turned his body into a Nomu. It sicced it on my orphanage to lure me. I killed my brother's Nomu. All For One approached me, it made a big speech, we fought." He stopped himself and flashed his Light Quirk on his left side briefly, which caused the pair to jolt slightly. "It grabbed me and tried to steal Void, but I tricked it into grabbing onto a arm I severed from Hikari. That surprised it enough that I wounded it and managed to get away, but doing so caused some... unexpected feedback. It accidentally stole Light from the corpse, but didn't fully absorb it, so when I broke free the Quirk got into me. It might have been more than just Light now that I think about it, because I got a lot stronger and faster, but, well, it doesn't really matter all that much in the grand scheme of things. I was only able to beat All For One because it accidentally transferred those powers into me. You know the rest." He exhaled, and leaned his head back into the pillow on his bed as he stared ahead. "That's the general gist of it all, anyways," he finished. "So now you know everything."

Their reactions were largely different between one another. All Might seemed to be at a loss for words. Shoulders were slumped, his head was hung, and his eyes had a far-off, distant look to them. A few times a low hum sounded in the back of his throat, almost as if he was attempting to speak, but he just couldn't find the words.

Midoriya threw his chair hard enough against the wall it shattered completely. It was enough to jolt All Might from his stupor, and Midoriya, with green sparks arcing off him, almost viciously turned to Kyomu with a face of sheer rage.

"So that's it, huh?" The bitterness to his tone was enough to make even Kyomu do a double take. He'd seen Midoriya upset, but this was something else. This was a kind of anger he'd never expected the other teen to ever muster up, let alone direct at him. He was practically a different person. "You find out your Quirk lets you get away with crimes, so you decide to be selfish with it and murder other people? Murder a hero? Shinka, what were you thinking!?"

"I was thinking I was doing a better job than the other heroes."

Midoriya almost hit him for that. His closed fist came within centimeters of Kyomu's face, and he felt wind rush past his face. But Kyomu didn't budge an inch from the act, and that only seemed to make Midoriya angrier.

"You're no better than All For One," Midoriya claimed.

This time Kyomu did react, and his eyes darkened. "Say that again, Midoriya," he dared. "Compare me to that thing once more time. See what happens."

"I don't need to say it again to believe it." The green-haired teen pulled his fist back and gave Kyomu a scathing glare. "If it was just the thing about lying about the circumstances of your parents' deaths, I could understand. It was a terrible, unprecedented incident. It should never have happened. I'm truly sorry you had to go through all of that." He grit his teeth and flung his hand to the side. "But you don't get to... you don't get to murder other villains just because you feel terrible about it, Shinka! You don't get to murder a hero just to protect yourself! Nothing in your past justifies taking any one of those lives! You... y-you...!" He let out a frustrated noise, clutched at his hair, and turned his back to Kyomu.

"You were supposed to be a hero!" Midoriya screamed, and then turned back to Kyomu while tearing his hands back down to his side. "You were supposed to help people! You wanted to help people! And everybody else- we were your friends! Everyone in 1-A! You weren't alone!"

"I know I wasn't," Kyomu muttered. "But my actions by the time I met you had gone too far. What would have had me do? Turn myself in?"

"Yes!" he yelled. "And I know it wouldn't have been easy! I know you would have forever lost your opportunity to become a hero! I know you would have been classified as a villain and imprisoned! But it would have been the right thing to do, Shinka! You should have known that when you were training to be a hero!"

"But I was never a hero, Midoriya," he said. "I was a fraud through-and-through the whole time. I told you. I just wanted an easier time killing villains."

The words hung in the air between them for a few seconds, and like All Might, Midoriya's shoulder slumped and a heavy breath left him. It was almost as if all the anger left his body along with that breath, as the only thing left in his expression after his exhale was exhaustion and raw disappointment. So much disappointment that it somehow made Kyomu uncomfortable.

"And your friends?" he quietly asked. "Me? Eikyo? Everyone in 1-A? Was all that fake?"

The teen with the black and white hair shook his head. "You may be surprised to hear this, but no. It wasn't." Evidently it was surprising based on the way Midoriya's head perked up just the slightest bit. "The people in that class were the first people to ever accept me, Midoriya. Everybody else always treated me like a freak because of my natural abilities. My brother and parents loved me because I was family. The orphans loved me because I was one of them. But you all were the first people to accept me for who I was, not what I was." Kyomu paused, and he averted his gaze from Midoriya's. "I... truly valued the relationship I shared with everybody in 1-A, Midoriya. That was never a lie."

"But protecting the real lies mattered more than our bond."

"I guess it did."

A disappointed sigh from Midoriya. "Okay." He turned towards the door, walked towards it, and opened it halfway before stopping. "I need to go tell everybody," he said. "But just... just tell me one thing, Shinka. Do you at least regret any of it?"

"I regret that the person I loved more than anybody else in the world died," Kyomu answered. "I don't regret anything else."

The hand of the shorter teen tightened around the door handle momentarily, and when he pulled it away the handle was noticeably dented. "That's too bad," he said, and then disappeared from sight as he left and closed the door behind him.

Silence continued to hang in the air well after Midoriya left. Minutes seemed to pass as Kyomu rested his head on the pillow and stared up at the ceiling. He didn't even acknowledge All Might, who continued to stand in sheer shock next to him. But, just when Kyomu felt his eyelids become too heavy to keep open, the number one hero decided to speak.

"I'm sorry, young Shinka." He honestly sounded like he'd aged a decade in that one sentence alone. There was so much remorse and regret packed into that once sentence that it didn't even sound like the same person he'd been talking to previously. "I've truly failed you as hero and as a teacher. I should have noticed before it was too late. I could have done something to prevent all this. It was my duty as the number one hero."

"I know. This really is all your fault." As he said this, Kyomu didn't bother to tear his eyes off the ceiling. He did, however, see All Might freeze in his peripheral vision. "You and that Quirk. Dragging everybody into the crossfire between All For One and One For All's feud. You failing to kill that thing. You actively preventing its death now that it's captured. It's all your fault." Kyomu continued to stare up at the ceiling, even as All Might reached a hand out for him. "Just get out of my sight," he said, giving All Might paused. "You failed, I failed, everybody failed everybody. Just leave. I don't have anything else to say to you."

He truly did mean all the words he said, but he was just too tired to argue any further with anybody. He just didn't have the energy anymore. He just wanted a little more time of peace.

"... Very well, young Shinka." The sound of light footsteps retreated towards the door leading out of the room, and like Midoriya, paused right at the room's threshold. "I hope you can eventually find peace with what you've done, young Shinka."

There was a pause as he waited for a response, but when none came from Kyomu, he sighed, left, and closed the door behind him. Kyomu had barely heard the door close before hid eyes finally shut and he drifted off.


Black and white in a sea of gray, stretching out infinitely at either side and separated by a just-as-infinite divide of gray.

There, in the distance. At the edge of the gray. There's a shape.

Black and white began to grow closer.


Once again, he heard the door open and was roused awake. The sun was still shining into his room. Not much time had passed, if any at all. Either that or it was the next day.

Kyomu turned his head. Not to his surprise, he found some of his classmates there. Sen at the forefront. Kaminari and Kirishima was behind him. Further back, near the door, were others. Todoroki, Ashido, and Iida. There may have been more in the room beyond, but Kyomu could see that far.

What he could see were the tears flowing down freely from Sen's orange eyes and rolling down his cheeks.

"I'll save you some time," Kyomu said, voice weak and tired. He must have only been out for an hour or so if he was still this tired and their reactions were this intense. "Yeah, everything Midoriya told you is true. What do you want?"

"... I don't even know what to say," Sen mumbled. "Kyomu, I... just, why?"

"Midoriya didn't tell you?"

"Yeah, he did, but is seemed like such a shallow reason for somebody as great as you that I didn't believe it," the bald teen said. "Guess I was mistaken."

"Mm. Guess so." Kyomu's head rolled away from Sen and looked back up to the ceiling. "For what it's worth, you were a really great friend. The best one I ever had," he added. "I'm sorry you had to find out this way. You didn't deserve to hear it from Midoriya. It should have been from me."

There was a deep sigh from Sen as he wiped away the tears from his eyes. "And you're not sorry for anything else? The lies, the-the murders? Any of that?"

"No."

Once again, stunned silence from everybody involved. Sen just stared at him wide-eyed. Kaminari honestly looked heartbroken and had his own set of tears. Kirishima reaction looked similar to Midoriya's, in that his teeth were grit and he was shaking in anger, and yet he, too, was crying. Ashido and Tsuyu couldn't even look at him and turned away. The sorrow in Todoroki's widened eyes was the most emotion Kyomu had ever seen the other teen display.

Finally, Sen turned around. "Alright, we're done here. Come on, guys. I can't... I can't do this right now."

Kyomu didn't even wait for them to leave the room before his eyes closed again.


The object in the distance was growing closer.

The gray sea dividing black and white shrunk ever smaller.

Black and white began roiling on either side like the sea in an angry storm.


He groaned this time when he opened his eyes once again. Still tired. Still bright sunlight pouring in through the window. Not much time had passed.

This time when he looked to his right, he saw a strange sight. A small, white, anthropomorphic bear-mouse... thing, wearing a suit with a scar over his eye. He was calmly sitting in a chair so that the two were at eye level. Looking past him, Kyomu could see the door was open, and he could see Aizawa just outside the door.

"Mr. Principal," Kyomu greeted, voice low and raspy as he turned back to the sitting thing. "I've heard you make announcements and I saw you at the exams we took a bit back, but I don't think I've ever had the pleasure of speaking with you."

"Though I try my best to maintain a good repertoire with my students, I try not to get involved with their day-to-day lives," the principal responded, his voice high and calm. "I don't suppose I need to tell you why I'm here, then?"

"Based on the dour frown you've had ever since I woke up, I'd assume that you're here to tell me I'm expelled from UA," Kyomu guessed, his voice equally as calm if not rough.

Mr. Principal's muzzle lowered. "I'm afraid so," he confirmed. "Charging off on your own to face off against an incredibly dangerous villain without so much as a provisional hero license is one thing. We could have made a case for emotional turmoil due to the unfortunate loss of your orphanage. But..."

"But you can't have a student who confessed to murdering villains," Kyomu finished. "And a hero. And it wouldn't be a stretch to say that my chances of ever becoming a hero anywhere are completely shot."

"I'm afraid so," he said with a nod of his furred head. "All Might says that you were planning on leaving regardless of how your plans involving that man turned out. I suppose that's why you don't sound too surprised." He turned his head to the side. "My condolences for your brother."

"Mm-hm." Kyomu nodded to the door. "You have heroes here to guard me until the police come to collect me for a formal inquiry?"

The principal nodded. "You... did claim to take that villain's life right before Eraser Head escorted you away."

"And I aim to make good on that promise, Mr. Principal," Kyomu claimed. He rose his right hand for emphasis, and a few black lines briefly appeared. "Just give me a bit more time to recover and both me and that villain will be out of your fur."

"And this is why I was forced to post guards," the principal said, voice morose and form slumped. "Please do not try to make things more difficult than they are, Shinka. The students are already extremely rattled by everything you've revealed today. All Might went so far as to request some time off to reflect on current affairs. We had to go as far as to restrain you as a safety precaution."

Kyomu snorted. "My safety, or All For One's?"

The animal sitting next to him didn't so much as flinch. "All For One is to be processed at the closest police station before an armored carrier transports him to Tartarus," the principal informed him. "Justice will decide his fate, Mr. Shinka. And I'm afraid that, as the principal of this institution and a law-abiding citizen, I cannot allow you to leave." He blinked his black, beady eyes and sent Kyomu a pleading look. "So I implore you to not make this any more difficult than is needed. Please."

But he received no response. Kyomu had already laid his head back and closed his eyes.


The object was finally right there. A house.

The line of gray separating black and white was almost completely gone.

Black and white began crashing against one another.

The door to the house-


- Opened, and Kyomu, dazed, stepped inside. After stepping past the inviting welcome mat, he looked back at the outside- at the turmoil of black an white colors that filled the entire void of nothingness outside- and promptly shut the door behind him.

"Where am I?" he wondered to himself. It certainly couldn't be reality; last he checked, the world wasn't... whatever was happening outside. And when he looked at a mirror, he saw himself before he'd absorbed Light. Hair all black and eyes all blue. He was even wearing black clothing and not the shredded remains of his school uniform.

He didn't even know what that was outside. Only that he'd seen a house in the distance, and he decided to go to it because there was quite literally nothing else but opposing colors outside. But as opposed to the utter chaos outside, the inside of this house was completely normal. Silent. Well furnished, too.

And... familiar.

"Wait... this is..." He felt waves of nostalgia begin to hit him as he navigated the halls of this house and made his way through a kitchen. For e brief moment, the spotless tiles he stood on flashed with blood, and there were two bodies lying on top of it. He blinked, and the floor was immaculate. He moved on and found more thing that struck familiarity with him. Random knickknacks and household objects. Family photos. Family photos of him. His brother. His parents.

This was his home. The one he'd spent the first four years of his life in.

So confused was he at this that he'd wandered right into the central living room in a stupor, looking around in stunned amazement at the environment. It couldn't have been real, but everything looked clear. Tangible. The sofa in the living room, the drawers that were half-open and spilling out with odds and ends, the TV...

The teenager with white hair and red eyes sitting on the sofa staring right at Kyomu.

"Hey, man." Hikari didn't even seem to acknowledge the bewildered look that flashed onto Kyomu's face, and merely gave him a small smile and waved. "So I, uh... kinda died. Sorry about that."

That was as far as he got before a black blur crashed right into him. It was Hikari's turn to be stunned when he looked down to see Kyomu pressing his face against his chest with his arms wrapped tightly around his torso.

"I'm sorry! I'm so sorry for everything!" He was openly sobbing against Hikari, who emitted a low sigh and wrapped his own arms around his crying brother that was shaking against him. "I shouldn't have... told them you did it! It should have been me! You wouldn't have had to go to the League! You wouldn't have died! It's all... I-I'm so sorry, Hikari..."

"Shhh, sh-sh-sh." Quietly shushing his sobbing brother, Hikari stroked his hair lightly while leaning back into the sofa. "I know. It's alright. I made the choice for you. None of it was your fault."

"I shouldn't have... I should have just went to All For One instead of-"

"You wouldn't have won," Hikari stated. "I'm glad it was me. You pulled off something impossible and managed to beat him." A small laugh left him. "You always were such a cheater, little brother."

The only response he got to this was louder crying out of Kyomu. Silent tears of his own fell out from Hikari's crimson eyes, but he merely leaned back and let his brother let all his sorrow out.


It was hard to say how long they lasted like that, but eventually it had ended with Hikari sitting on the couch while Kyomu laid on it with his head in his brother's lap. Hikari, leaning back with his arms slung over the top of the sofa, looked out the window at the crashing colors outside. Kyomu was content with looking up at his brother's face.

"Hikari. What is this?" Kyomu asked. "Where are we?"

"In your head?" The tone the white-haired teen used was unsure, but he didn't sound overly concerned as he gave a shrug. "I dunno, somewhere in you. I wound up here right after All For One accidentally gave you my Quirk." He frowned and scratched at his chin. "There were a couple others, too. You got more Quirks than just mine, but they were... blank? I dunno. They didn't talk or anything. Dunno what their deal was. Maybe that doctor friend of All For One's managed to clone Quirks. It'd explain where he gets all the things. He couldn't possibly have kidnapped that many people without gaining attention."

Kyomu's face scrunched up in confusion. "So, what, your... soul wound up with me or whatever?"

Once again, Hikari shrugged. "I dunno. Quirks are weird, man." He looked at his left and, and a film of white light crawled up it. "Could be some facsimile of Hikari got transferred with Light. Could be you're finally losing it. Does it really matter?"

"No," Kyomu mumbled. "I don't care. I... you're here. That's all I care about."

"Mm." Hikari hummed. "So you told the others," he said. "How'd that go?"

"To be honest? Underwhelming. But I guess I can't really blame them. How many bombs did I drop on them in a single afternoon?" He knew he couldn't have possibly processed all that information so quickly. Not if it was that shocking. "I still hurt them, though," he said, "and it... didn't feel good. I think they've lost all their faith and trust in me."

"Can you really blame them?" Hikari asked.

"Not really." Blue eyes flashed to the window. "What's going on outside? All the black and white?"

Another hum. "Our Quirks are merging." He said it with such simplicity that it took Kyomu for a turn, and he looked back up to Hikari with confusion in his eyes for clarification. "I don't really know why," Hikari elaborated. "It's happening on its own. Void and Light are melding together into something else. It seems that the other Quirks are Mutation-types that improved your physical abilities, so you don't have to worry about those, but..."

He trailed off, and he brought his left hand into Kyomu's field of view. Kyomu didn't show much reaction to the fact that the tip of the hand and all the fingers were slowly disintegrating, but he did let a pained breath out from his throat.

"All Might said that the One For All Quirk was made when two Quirks fused into one," Kyomu mumbled in a toneless breath. "Maybe it's just something that happens."

"Maybe," Hikari agreed, "but whatever the case, I'm only here because of Light. I'll be gone once the Quirks finish fusing."

"Oh." The message behind his words were clear. They didn't have much time.

It was a sobering thought. There was so much he wanted to say to Hikari, but for the life of him, he just couldn't think of what to say. He wanted to talk, but couldn't. He wanted to just stay here with Hikari, but the knowledge that he was slowly disappeared destroyed any calm he had lying in his brother's lap.

He didn't know what to do.

"So what happens when you wake up?" It was almost as if Hikari had read his thoughts, and almost absentmindedly he began stroking Kyomu's hair with the hand that wasn't slowly disappearing. "You got any idea?"

"Go after All For One, I guess. I don't know." There wasn't any energy to Kyomu's voice, and his body had grown so slack that he could move if he wanted to. "They say they're sending it to Tartarus in an armored car. Place is a fortress, so... I gotta get it before they bring it there."

"Makes sense." Hikari glanced down at Kyomu's body, and a sad laugh left him as he looked back up at the window. "You haven't eaten or drunken a single thing since Sunday, have you?"

Kyomu could barely muster the will to shake his head. "Was too worried," he answered.

"Of course." Red eyes rolled as Hikari's pale hand ruffled his brother's hair. "Dehydrated, under nourished, completely exhausted, your body being torn apart from the inside from all these Quirks... our bodies are tough, Kyomu, but we're still human." His mouth flattened out, and he took away his hand. "I'm not saying you can't do it," he added. "I'm just saying that... you might not make it past doing it. You're past your limit already."

He shook his head. "I don't care," Kyomu mumbled.

"You could just stay in the hospital bed, you know. Let your body recover. You'd live."

"There's no point in living without you," Kyomu responded. "I... no longer have a future. I don't want to live in a world without you." He looked up, and a wry grin spread across his mouth. "Besides. I might make it. It's not a sure thing I'll die if I go for it."

Hikari sighed. "Sure, Kyomu." He leaned back into the sofa. His arms had disappeared by this point. "Sure. Do whatever you want. It's fine."

They both went silence, and both pairs of eyes looked out the window of their house to the world outside. Black and white was still crashing and warping around each other.

"Hey, Hikari?"

"Yeah?"

"You know I love you, right?"

"I know. I love you too, Kyomu."

Kyomu hummed, and then waited a few moments. "Hikari?"

"Mm-hm?"

"Do you think mom and dad would be disappointed in us?"

"I dunno. Maybe mom."

"Yeah, maybe," Kyomu agreed. "Are you still there, Hikari?"

Silence.

"Hikari?"


Kyomu's eyes snapped open, and he found himself back in the hospital bed.

His body once again had the sensation of being on fire, but by now he was so numbed he couldn't feel the pain.

Sitting straight up on the bed, the colors of Kyomu's hair began to swirl around, and the black and white halves began to mash and blend together. His blue and red eyes began to flicker, and silver sparks began to arc around his body. Even as items in the room began to shake and fall down, and his hair began to wave uncontrollably around him, all Kyomu could do is close his eyes and let a single, pain-wracked sob escape him.

And then he opened his eyes again.


To an outside observer, it would appear as if a massive, silver pillar of light shot straight up into the sky from where the infirmary in the UA school building was. To those inside, it would just feel as if a earthquake rocked the building, but then quickly subsided after around five seconds.

To those near the infirmary, it was as if a bomb had went off.

Nurses and other staff were coughing and yelling questions and orders at one another. Recovery Girl was at the forefront, a large, bleeding gash on her forehead that another teacher was trying to treat. Aizawa, who had been right outside the infirmary, was forced to push a piece of debris off of him after a section of wall had fallen on him. He stood to his feet and, after gritting his teeth and holding a bleeding spot on his side, turned around to the infirmary that had just exploded behind him.

Except there wasn't an infirmary there. No wall, no ceiling, no nothing. Just a barely stable floor and a single human form standing amidst the rubble.

The form in question was, of course, Kyomu, though Aizawa couldn't recognize him anymore aside from his face. He was completely bare, save for a pair of dark pants and shoes that had once been part of a school uniform. His hair, once split between black and white, was now a solid, dark gray color that reflected light with a silver sheen and had lengthened all the way from his shoulders to his lower back. His eyes, now both softly glowing a deep purple, were affixed to his right arm. That very arm was emitting sparks of silver electricity, and a flowing, liquid-like silver substance was moving up and down the arm.

"Hey, Aizawa." Kyomu's voice, toneless and without emotion, was quiet enough that it was barely heard by the homeroom teacher. "Get outta the way, would you? I'm on a tight schedule."

There wasn't enough time to form a response, as by the time the electrical signals in the teacher's brain could have made a response, Kyomu was already behind him and calmly walking away. Before his eyes decoded the light messages telling him Kyomu had moved, dozens of silver lines streaked across his body, leaving deep, bloody gashes all over him. Before Kyomu had even walked out of the remains of the infirmary, Aizawa had already collapsed onto the ground.

"Can you please see to him, Recovery Girl?" Kyomu asked as he walked by a stunned nurse. "I gotta go."

He didn't wait for a response. The teen with the silver hair just continued to walk forwards, even as those he left behind stared after him. Even when an alarm began to ring out throughout the school's PA system, his gait didn't slow a single step.

Even as heroes that were once his teachers began running around corners and down the halls towards him, all he did was stare as more silvery energy sparked around him.