CHAPTER 7: Darker Stains
The Todoroki family's youngest knew, logically, that he'd barely met Midoriya Izuku. But it already felt like they'd known each other for years.
In just one ephemeral exchange Midoriya had done what no-one else had been able to do. He hadn't forced an opinion on Shouto, hadn't forced him to explain himself; didn't belittle, scold, or pity him. And he didn't pretend to understand his feelings.
After the Sport's Festival he'd been metaphorically– and almost literally –torn into. After speaking with Bakugou about his tantrum, Aizawa-sensei had reminded him that he couldn't be 'choosey' about his powers in the field. "There will come a day when you will have to choose between your spite and someone's life," he'd said. All Might had been much more encouraging but his concern had still been obvious.
And then there'd been Shouto's father.
It'd seemed like everyone had been disappointed with him. He'd felt lost, torn between his future and his past but somehow still not in the present. Izuku had just appeared to him like some kind of human psychopomp that passed out bits of wisdom to strangers instead of guiding souls to the afterlife.
"Todoroki-kun, sorry for waking you up. Did you eat? Here, have some of my bento." Midoriya was already grabbing a plate and some chopsticks before he'd finished speaking. "I really didn't think you'd be so quiet, it's amazing. I actually forgot you were here!"
"That was the point. And you gave me cup ramen for dinner," the older boy reminded him as he sat down, "it's you who hasn't eaten." Hearing this seemed to surprise Midoriya because he suddenly flinched and looked guilty. "Is there something wrong with the bento Aizawa-sensei bought for you?" Shouto asked, blissfully unaware of his own tone.
Midoriya flushed and shook his head, quickly shoving a few bites into his mouth. Unsure of what he was meant to do Shouto just watched and waited. He didn't think his friend ate particularly quickly but shortly after his finished he started hiccupping.
The green haired student apologized and took his dishes away to clean them.
"Ah. I'll wash them for you," Shouto offered and stood up. It was the least he could do after seeing Midoriya's empty home and deciding to invite himself inside for the night.
"What?" –hic– "ah, no you don'–" –hic– "–hang on–"
"Why not?" he asked his friend, gently taking the dish from his hand, "you're hiccupping."
Midoriya pursed his lips together tightly and stared up at Shouto.
Shouto stared back and waited for something to happen.
…
–hic–
Midoriya let him wash the dishes.
Later that night, as he lay wedged on the futon between his friend and a wall, Todoroki's mind wandered to the scars on Izuku's hands and the old compression sleeve on his arm. He knew better than most what lay beneath, knew how to read the stories told in gnarls of skin scarred so deeply the body would never heal.
Looking from his friend's wounds to the way he unconsciously gravitated towards Shouto's left side while he slept, he couldn't help but compare their situations and marvel at how differently they'd turned out.
Whatever Midoriya had been through, he did not let scar tissue define him. He'd never forgotten how to smile.
Shouto wanted to be like that too.
"This meeting concerns the creature you were called upon to assist with during the Sports Festival," Naomasa told All Might and sat down in a chair across the coffee table. A heavy sense of unease filled the atmosphere around them and Toshinori prepared himself for bad news.
"You mean the Nomu from the Shie Hassaikai's former lab?" he asked. His friend nodded. It was remarkable that they were able to have this meeting only a week after his vicious battle with the strong but cognitively challenged villain.
"One of Nighteye's undercover agents was able to confirm the Shie Hassaikai were not the ones that made it." Naomasa placed a folder on the table between them.
Opening it and beginning to scan the photos and documents inside, Toshinori asked, "did Nomu tell you anything about his origins?"
"No – and we've tried everything. It has a mouth, vocal chords, tongue, and teeth but it won't speak no matter what happens to it." All Might cringed at the image that invoked. For all that he'd seen, he was still rather squeamish when it came to the darker forms of interrogation. Thankfully, Naomasa moved on quickly. "Initially, we'd feared it was the result of another anti-quirkless extremist group conducting illegal human experimentation, like the ABPE unit."
"'ABPE unit?'" Toshi echoed, uttering the unfamiliar name like saying it out loud might jog his memory. He could swear he'd heard that from somewhere before…
"Anidiotropic Body Processing and Experimentation Unit," Tsukauchi explained grimly, "they're part of something bigger but we know very little about their origins. We think they're the main contender for who's been kidnapping quirkless people all over Japan lately." All Might clenched his fists, the color washing out of his knuckles. He'd seen a lot of human experimentation labs while fighting All For One over the years. The experiments tended to be hidden in plain sight, meaning they often occurred in and operated like hospitals. The things Toshi had seen in those morgues and autopsy rooms still haunted him to his core even now and would continue to haunt him to the day he died.
"Since we couldn't get Nomu to talk we looked at his–" the detective paused, as if unsure the pronoun was appropriate, "–DNA and used it to look into his background, where we found a criminal record." Toshinori's blue eyes narrowed in concern when his friend sighed. He looked tired, like he'd been up all night on this.
"The Nomu isn't human– not anymore, as far as we can tell. It has the DNA of four different people spliced to the original. According to our forensics team it's like the genetic equivalent of the Chimera in Greek mythology. Physically, the original human test subject had his body modified to withstand incredible amounts of damage from multiple quirks, most prominently strength quirks." Naomasa pinched the bridge of his nose and rubbed his eyes before he continued, "even after all of that there was still significant brain activity."
"What?!" Alarm and horror filled Toshinori's mind with gruesome possibilities, "was the original still conscious?"
"It's not clear. The frequencies on the EEG were fairly erratic but when stable they were consistent with sleep. Shortly after our tests Nomu died, so we'll never know for sure. They said it had something to do with incomplete integration. But right now the DNA is our primary concern. The chromosomes contained each individual's quirk gene and the cells themselves contained the specializations only expressed in idiotropic people. But none of them are related to each other. The Nomu couldn't have acquired multiple quirks unless it was through advanced familial permeation genetics." Naomasa met his eyes from across the coffee table, "not sure about you, Yagi-san, but I know of only one organization with a villain who would be interested in this stuff."
All Might's frown deepened, the air thickening around them with the weight of what Naomasa was implying. "What's your theory, Naomasa? What are you trying to say?" Toshi asked, though he already knew the answer.
"That someone with a quirk that can transfer and manipulate other quirks is responsible for Nomu's creation." The look on his friend's face was serious.
All For One was still alive. Their war was not over.
On Monday night Izuku found Stain's hiding place in Hosu. Because he was only active after the sun went down, it was easy to sneak into the dilapidated building from below and do a little snooping. Though, there wasn't much here.
Izuku crept across the creaky floor and took a mental stock of what was where and in what position before he started touching anything. Wherever Stain had gone it must not have been far because he'd left his katana behind. The analyst's original plan had been to sabotage one of the hero killer's tonfa-length tactical knives but this was a unique opportunity. This weapon was the reason Izuku had fashioned arm guards out of old magazines and wore them under his hoodie when he'd started looking for him.
It was tempting, very tempting, but too risky to try and take it with him. Using the flat edge of a small tension wrench from his lockpick set he slid the sword out of its saya just enough to expose the habaki and cover both it and the koiguchi with a few dots of metal weld epoxy. If nothing else, it would at least be enough to slow Stain's initial strike and give his next victim just a little more time.
The glue's strong smell might have tipped anyone else off, but Stain didn't appear to be equipped with a working nose. He didn't actually look like he even had a nose. Drugging the man would have been preferable but there wasn't anything here he could lace. No nose meant no taste so it was unfortunate Stain didn't keep any snacks around.
Fully sheathing the blade Izuku put his tools back into his sling back and turned to leave when his eyes fell upon an old paperback book.
On the cover, a portrait of two people could be seen. One was a man and the other a woman. Their faces stood out from what had once been a black background but had gone gray with age, white veins from years of folds striking through it. It was obviously a well-read novel, judging by the wrinkled cover, evidence of dog eared pages, and the curl of its spine. Its title read: The Red and the Black.
A faint sound set Izuku back in motion and he decided to take it with him. Slipping it into his bag, he ensured that everything else was left exactly as he'd found it before making his escape back the way he'd come.
Over the next few days of his friends' internships he prioritized keeping track of Stain and reading as much of his book as possible. From the look of the notes inside, someone he obviously cared about had given it to him — or, at least, someone who had cared about him when he was Akaguro Chizome, anyway.
On the evening of the third day, Stain moved before Izuku could check on him.
It wasn't entirely unexpected. The man was the most successful villain in terms of highest kill count and he wouldn't have managed to stay that way for so long if he were sedentary.
Izuku looked at the space he'd previously occupied with a worried frown. Stain would be meeting the League for the second time today, according to what he'd overheard, and though no doubt incredibly reckless, Izuku had hoped he be able to follow.
"No chance of that now, then," he muttered, using his English to quietly curse himself for choosing to attend high school and college at the same time. He shifted his shoulder bag, unconsciously tightening the strap, and dipped his index finger into the elastic band of his face mask to get at an itch.
A handful of concrete stairs behind a supply closet lead to a water heater and the little door to his chute. He'd turned towards the closet when a strange shuffling sound stopped him.
Going stone still, Izuku focused on listening. It came again barely a minute later, a bit like sheets sliding together but with a more leathery quality to it. Whatever it was, it was big, and it made the hair on the back of his neck rise.
Without moving his head, the analyst looked up, peaking through the fringe of his curly green hair, and felt his heart lurch to a dead stop at what he saw pushed into a corner of the ceiling, watching him.
(1) Ectomorph body type: more streamlined for aerodynamic but leaning towards mesomorph with more balanced body structure. Adds drag. Offsets ballast. (2) No eyelids: vulnerable to dust and sand.
It shifted on its perch, feet clutching pipes that stuck out of the drywall, wings whispering as they moved.
(3) Zygodactyl feet: can't walk or run well. (4) At least fourteen-foot wingspan: cumbersome but strong. (5) Metal mouth-piece: unknown if detachable or useful. (6) Brain-like organ exposed on head: possible weak point. (7) Human body: human weaknesses. (8) Multiple quirks likely.
It's head cocked at him curiously, unblinking eyes latched onto Izuku as if it was just as surprised to see him as he was to see it. Then the creature made a disturbingly human-sounding warble, muffled but recognizable, behind its mask and Izuku's heart came back to life. But he didn't move, and neither did the thing above him.
Without warning it suddenly dove for him, reaching out with a separate set of arms not attached to its wings. But in the space there wasn't enough room to fight Izuku, who likewise dove for the door. He was prepared to lead it around in circles until he could get the storage closet open and scurry to the safety of the underground but the creature grabbed him by the ankle and shot upwards into the darkening sky, breaking through a few thin wood panels to do so.
A terrified scream wrenched out of Izuku's throat and stole the wind from his lungs. It was all he could do just to protect his head for the first few seconds of their uncontrolled flight. As expected of something that amounted to having four arms and the build of a human with a mesomorphic body type, it was hardly as elegant in the sky as it was on the ground – particularly with the way Izuku dangled below it and threw off its weight.
With a screech, Izuku was dumped and he somersaulted over himself enough times to make anyone else too dizzy to stand. Gravel ripped across his shoulder and streaked through his shirt like Road Rage's quirk sloughing off his skin. He didn't have time to react or even register the pain before he tumbled out into open air again. This time he was able to orient himself to control his own flight, sliding down the angle of one roof and onto another slanting below.
The analyst dropped into a corkscrewing staircase and slid along the handrail until he landed safely on the ground. There, he took off, headless of the burning in his chest and shoulder and ankle. The creature screamed and shot towards him but to Izuku it had already become another moving part of the changing landscape.
Being chased was familiar territory, after all.
He pushed off surfaces to add force to his momentum, lunged at a wall and used it to get his feet over a corner and onto the next. Kicking off the narrow sliver of space at the top of the concrete wall he leapt onto the handrail of the stairs just below with an enormous clang that reverberated all the way down to the subway below.
Pedestrians screamed around him, a flood of people scrambling down in a blind bid to get away from Izuku and the creature swooping down to grab him again. Had this happened at a later time he could have used one of his subway chutes to get away. It was too crowded now.
"Get back! Move!" he shouted, dodging people and jumping to the ground again. Thankfully, he knew where he was and took off across the courtyard, blazing over benches and tables, twisting quarter spins pushed off raised curbs and potted plants as the creature followed.
Izuku hardly touched the traffic barriers as he swept over them with a few clean leaps, using their cover when the winged monster dove for him.
"Hey! Kid, stop!"
The thought of doing so was so ridiculous Izuku didn't even process the hero's command — actually, maybe it wasn't a hero. Maybe it was a police officer. No, no, it didn't matter. If there was someone who could help him they wouldn't have waited. He had to get somewhere narrow with compact space. If he could get to a place tight enough the villain chasing him wouldn't even have enough room to use his wings, for flying or for punching.
Hopefully.
One of its claws snagged his bag as he walked along the top of a metal fence and sent him flailing, arms pinwheeling in a desperate bid to stay on his feet. Someone shouted but he knew better than to stop and dropped from his perch.
He dove into another alleyway, pushing off corners and walls, keeping an eye out for people, and making his way towards a chute in a nearby garage. The unmistakable sound of gunfire and a rush of blazing hot air to his left forced him to adapt his footwork and take a turn so sharp his feet slid across the wet pavement. A fire hydrant had burst open nearby and, pushing his back into a building he took a moment to scan his devastated surroundings.
A bus had been thrown off the road and lay in a heap of mangled metal. Bodies littered the street, people were screaming in terror, confusion, and pain, and it drove a familiar instinct in Izuku when his eyes found a little boy – no more than three – sat on his little bottom and wailing in the street.
"What the fuck are these things made of?" A deep voice growled from farther down, grunting with exertion.
An enormous black, human shaped mass with a brain-like organ sticking out of the top of its head, like the one chasing Izuku, was thrown across the pavement by a fireball. Endeavor's bulky figure was almost surely too far down the street and unable to see the child in its path.
Horror filled Izuku and something inside him sparked, bubbling with an energy that reminded him strangely of a fizzy drink. There was hardly more than four seconds between the moment he'd stopped to survey the scene around him and the moment he lunged for the boy with everything he had. They knocked together, Izuku bringing his hand around to protect the back of the child's head as he used the force of his jump to roll them both away. The very instant he was able to, he laid down on top of his charge and braced himself to get caught in the crossfire of the inhumanly large villain passing by. He was grateful, at least, for the protection his arm guards gave him.
Dust and debris cascaded over them. Something clipped his ear. His face smacked against something sharp. The sound of the ground being torn to pieces, of rebar screaming as it bent, and glass shrieking under intense heat before it shattered and blew out across the gouges in the pavement filled his ears.
"Shit!"
"It's another nomu!"
"Watch out–!"
Garbled roaring and flailing could be heard as the black creature and the winged creature both collided with each other.
Izuku's ears rang and his mind processed things as if in slow motion, like everything was underwater. The adrenaline was quick to take over again, however, clearing his senses like wind through smoke. Looking up to make sure it was safe to move, he grabbed the little boy and took off towards the paramedics and the rescuers digging people free from the crashed bus.
"Oy!" he shouted at them as loud as his body would let him. A familiar figure bounced out of the rubble and landed only a few yards away from him.
"Beansprout?!" Gran Torino exclaimed, seemingly floored by Izuku's sudden, less than glamorous, appearance. There was sweat and dirt on his face, the mask he'd been wearing torn off and left in the street somewhere behind him. His hoodie was torn across one shoulder, his bag scuffed up and a little seared, and judging from the smell, he was lucky his hair wasn't on fire.
"Thank, fuck!" Izuku had never cursed so loud before, but then, nor had he ever been so relieved to see someone he knew. He didn't even know what language he said it in. "Gran Torino! This little one–" he coughed, and passed the boy to the retired hero before he could try to say anything, "I'm not f-fast enough. Please take him. To the parah–medics. I have to– Fucking, really?!"
With a distorted wailing noise the winged creature – nomu – rose from a writhing heap, bones snapping into place and body undergoing accelerated healing even as it galloped towards him. Despite its clumsy, disproportioned strides the nomu remained undeterred even when a splash of ice streaked across it's thigh.
Izuku took off again, desperate to lead the mutant away from Gran and the little boy. The retired pro yelled something after him but he was too preoccupied by then to notice, much less hear.
Scampering through the tight space made between an overturned car and the wall of the next alleyway he then dash vaulted over a chunk of cement and used a flexible dumpster lid like a trampoline just a few paces after. It didn't have nearly as much kick as a real one but it was enough to boost him onto the adjacent building's drain pipe. He scaled up the pipe to the roof, grabbing the eaves just as the nomu below him wrenched it off the wall.
It didn't do him much good, however, as they were attached. Unable to open it's wings enough in the tight alleyway the nomu leapt up to grab Izuku. But before it's claws could do little more than graze the analyst's cheek he was ripped away.
"Damnit, Problem Child!" a familiar voice shouted at him. Izuku was dropped by Eraserhead's capture weapon just a few inches from the ground. It snapped out again to better restrain the winged nomu. A cut under Aizawa-san's eye had sent a ribbon of blood down his cheek, dripping off the stubbled jawline. His hair was up and yellow goggles on but his quirk wasn't enough.
"It has multiple quirks!" Izuku shouted back, "on top of flight it has speed, regeneration, and thermal resistance quirks! It doesn't have any eyelids and its wings are fragile––"
"I got it, kid! Get out of here, now!" Aizawa grunted and pushed him away, releasing the ribbon manipulation to dodge the car another nomu threw at them. Wet hands dragged Izuku away and he found himself facing the hero Manual.
"Have you seen a kid your age with glasses and blue hair?!" he yelled and continued herding the quirkless analyst away from the fray. Izuku's eyes widened in terror, his stomach lurching sickly as he realized Iida wasn't with his hero intern.
"Manual!" another hero shouted, ripping open a fire hydrant farther down the street, "there are still people in this damn building!"
Manual cursed and shoved Izuku down the only quiet alleyway left on the block with an order to run. Needing no encouragement, the analyst did as he was told, racing away to climb the nearest fire-escape and search for his friend.
Native was the only regular patrol hero in this part of Hosu so wherever he was, Stain probably was too. That would be the first place Izuku checked.
I'm sorry, mom, he thought, winding some fishing line around his fist and checking his flare gun as he ran, I might not be able to do what you asked.
Grief wasn't something that went away with a good cry and a pep-talk. Izuku knew that. But it didn't make him any less disappointed to see Iida sprawled out on the ground at Stain's mercy.
"–you are still the villain that hurt my brother!"
Izuku arrived just in time to hear the tail end of Iida's scream, dropping down from the roof above and landing on Stain's back like a spider monkey. He pushed back as Stain dove forward, throwing off the villain's balance further and forcing him to retreat.
Panting like he'd run the length of the entire continent, Izuku stood over Iida with his fists raised and ready to block. He glared at Stain with blood, sweat, and smudges of ash on his face, hair singed and wild, shadows under his eyes, and shirt ripped at the shoulder. The blood had begun to crust around the edges of his freckled face and he reached up to wipe it away, flicking the excess of coagulating mush at the ground. Headwounds being headwounds, it didn't do him much good.
"Midoriya, don't get involved." Izuku didn't need to look at Iida to know what he'd see. He ignored him and tried to focus on strategizing. "You have nothing to do with this!" the other boy continued, "are you lis–"
"Shut up, Iida." Izuku had more important things to worry about than how cold he sounded. Stain straightened and looked the quirkless analyst over with a vague sort of interest.
"You're not a hero," his voice was deep and somewhat gravely, fitting, "not even a hero student." At roughly six-foot-seven he towered over Izuku and was a comparative brickhouse in weight. His steel toed boots were armed with sharp studs and his torso was protected by a Kevlar vest. He had metal knee pads guards, wrist braces, and, of course, the obsessive number of knives. His almost completely white eyes and lack of nose made him look like a boogieman.
As scary as the Hero Killer was, Izuku lived on the dirty heel of society's boot. His father had taught him how to fight, how to sniff out danger and bury his roots in the dark unknowns of Tokyo's subterranean city and grow where no-one else could. Stain at least had morals, twisted and arrogant as they were.
The orphan lifted his chin challengingly, blood between his teeth, "so?" Izuku wasn't immune to fear by any means. He'd just gotten used to it.
"You show more heroism than either of them," Stain said, nodding to where Native lay against the wall behind Izuku. He looked the analyst over once more, recognition flashing in his eyes, before coming to a decision, "do as the maggot says. I'm not in the business of killing children. Only fake heroes."
"What about Iida?"
"Hmm," the villain acknowledged Izuku's point, "you're friend has promised to take revenge for his brother and could not be reasoned with. He wants to be a hero but fights only for his own interests. With such weak conviction he's destined to die by my blade anyway."
It dawned on the analyst, then, how Iida had purposely twisted Izuku's words to justify his selfishness. He had deliberately taken the analyst's personal advice, listened to the intimate hurt Izuku had dared to share only to then use him. In no way had Izuku encouraged revenge. Iida was smart. He'd known that when he decided to pretend otherwise.
How much of Izuku's other advice had he done that to? "You're practically quirkless now!" Iida had shouted at him. He hadn't been talking about Izuku but you could tell a lot about a person's opinion by the way they said a certain word.
"I'll let you live if you leave now."
"I'm afraid there's not much point of that," Izuku replied, angling one side of his body forward to cover the movement of his right hand. He turned on the location sharing app and sent it to his contacts, "I don't think I've got much time left to live anyway."
"What?" Iida said, soft at first, and then, "stop pretending to be a hero and get out of here! The fear and anger in his voice was almost palpable.
For a moment, Stain considered Izuku as if weighing his worth. Then he tightened his grip on his jagged katana, "I have a duty to kill these men but if a weakling like you gets in my way then you shall be culled–"
"–'The idea which tyrants find most useful is the idea of God.' — Stendhal, The Red and the Black, 1830." Izuku's recitation thankfully stopped Stain in his tracks. "I figure that book has something to do with why Akaguro Chizome became Stendhal."
"So you're the thieving rat in the walls that put glue in my sword," the Hero Killer realized, his malefic aura drifting up and down the alley like a nimbus. It almost sounded funny, put like that.
Izuku stepped forward to put more space between himself and Iida, preparing for the inevitable fight, "as Stendhal the vigilante, you killed eleven people. As Stain the villain, you've killed seventeen pro heroes and crippled twenty-four others, including Iida-kun's brother. At twenty-eight people you've taken more lives than any other villain since All Might's debut. Your quirk is called Blood Clot. You have to ingest your opponent's blood before it can be activated, at which point they become paralyzed. By your behavior I'd say the effect isn't permanent." Izuku of course had an entire QA written about Blood Clot and within it was a curious hypothesis about quirk immunity that he'd no doubt be testing tonight. "I've been a rat in your walls for longer than you think."
"Stop!" Iida screamed, "run away! Didn't I tell you this has nothing to do with you?! It's not your fight!"
Izuku clenched his fists, working his jaw angrily, "bullshit 'it isn't my fight,' Iida. I'm not leaving. You don't have to be a hero to save someone or butt your nose in. That's just human decency."
"Not bad, kid," Stain rumbled, a toothy smile on his face. The man lunged, "but still not good enough."
Izuku's dad had taught him how to throw a punch, but the world had taught him how to take one.
And Izuku was getting a little tired of letting it.
Snatching a steel pipe off the ground he parried Stain's initial strike and ducked his second, aiming a low swipe at his knees only for his weapon to bounce off the villain's metal knee guards. But he hit hard enough to widen Stain's stance, lowering his torso enough for Izuku to steal a knife and tuck it into his hoodie.
For the most part he kept himself behind the range of the villain's blade, too close to get cut with it. The small student had learned early on that if you stayed well within your opponent's bubble you could limit their movement.
Stain was of course highly skilled. He knew exactly what Izuku was doing and, when the analyst tried to tip his balance forward again, yanked a large tactical knife from its leather sleeve with his free hand.
"No! Don't let him slash you–!"
The analyst dove between Stain's legs before he could use it to cut him open, but pulled back and to the side to take cover behind the villain's shoulder when he swung his katana in a long, downwards swipe that would have severed Izuku's arm. The QA didn't give his opponent a chance to so much as wonder where he'd gone before taking the knife he'd stolen and plunging it into Stain's back.
The villain grunted in surprise. Moving faster than Izuku's tired eyes could track him, he punched the hilt of his katana into the quirkless boy's stomach. The strength of the blow threw him back into a wall. An immense pain filled his chest where his heart was supposed to be and as he coughed and retched and gasped for air he wondered if it had finally exploded.
Distantly he heard Stain say something about how 'most people were all talk' and that, with Izuku, 'there is worth in keeping you alive.' Watching the villain approach Iida through fuzzy vision, bring the tip of his katana up to Iida's wide eye. The QA choked on a shout and heaved himself to his hands and knees.
A column of ice and fire led a scorching path through the air towards Stain, who jumped to avoid it. He looked to the mouth of the alley with a frustrated scowl, "it's just one maggot after another."
"I finally caught up to you, Midoriya. Thanks for the text," Todoroki-kun said coolly, putting his phone away. A ball of fire clenched in one fist bathed the dark, cramped battleground with light and heat. Masts of flame unfurled from the left side of his body as he set his eyes on Stain.
"Not you too, Todoroki," Iida moaned. Despite the situation Izuku couldn't help but be proud of his friend for being so unafraid of his left side.
"The pro heroes will be here soon." A wave of ice shot across the ground, growing under Izuku and Native to carry them away. The analyst yelped as another blast of fire surged down the center of the alley towards Stain, it's heat melting the edges of his icy platform. They joined Iida on the ground behind Todoroki. "Midoriya–"
"Quirk is blood clot. Once he ingests your blood you become paralyzed. Duration of paralysis probably depends on blood type. Not sure what the order is–"
"I'm type B," Native rasped suddenly, surprising Izuku. He wondered when the hero had woken up.
"Mine's A," Iida reported.
"Watch out–"
"Got yourself some good friends, haven't you, Ingenium?" Stain, apparently done with waiting around, pounced. He hurled a throwing knife at Todoroki so fast the double-quirked student barely dodged in time, it's blade cutting across the his cheek as it sailed by. Stain was on Todoroki an instant later and jumped the remaining distance with his katana raised.
Todoroki blocked it with a wall of ice that was too thin to stop it completely. While watching his friend shield himself with his ice and attack with his fire, Izuku took stock. The knife he'd used to stab Stain in the back with was still there and he'd dropped his pipe when Todoroki's ice lifted him up. He still had his phone, a first aid kit, some fishing line, a flare gun, and Stain's book.
As soon as Izuku caught sight of the throwing knife that had landed up the alley he ran over and snatched it up. He wasn't going to have much time to act, their enemy using an in-and-out technique that brought him closer to Todoroki with every move.
"Why," Iida began, his voice trembling. Izuku glanced at him to make sure he was still ok before tying some of his fishing line to the handle. Unable to move and too heavy for the analyst to carry, Iida had no other choice than to stare at Todoroki's back as he fought for their lives. "Why are you two doing this. I'm the one who inherited my brother's name!" he cried, losing an obvious battle with panic and anger, "I'm the one who has to do this!"
"Inherited it?" Todoroki said. Fire exploded out of him, filling the corridor wall to wall and shattering the windows above them. The QA used the distraction to prepare his second weapon for use. "Doesn't that mean you're supposed be better?" Todoroki grunted, shoving his opponent back again – Izuku was starting to worry about the steam – "The Ingenium I saw would never have been so self-centered."
Stain's voice cut through the noise as if there wasn't any at all, "attempting to block my view of you but staying in the same place. Not as smart as your friend, I see."
"Aagh!"
Horror swept through them all at the sight of a pair of throwing knives sticking out of his left forearm. Like a wraith, Stain appeared between the clouds of steam and lunged, licking the blood off Todoroki's cheek. Todoroki didn't retreat quick enough, collapsing with a grunt when the villain activated his quirk.
"Misguided, corrupted, weak little fakes don't deserve to stand as high as true heroes like All Might. Not even Endeavor's offspring," Stain said, standing over Todoroki's paralyzed body. "I gave you the chance to protect your weak little green friend –" he gestured to Izuku, the one who had literally stabbed him in the back, "instead you chose to stand between me and my goal. I've taken the burden of cleaning up our polluted society. My hands are already permanently stained for the cause." Following this, he dragged his gaze from Todoroki to Izuku and started walking towards him. He belligerently ignored Iida's screams and the loudness of Todoroki's silence, "I will teach you this lesson myself."
"The strong are supposed to protect the weak." To Izuku's surprise the villain sheathed his tactical knife and swiped something off the back of his neck with his fingers.
Iida realized what it was first. "Run!" he shouted at the QA again, "you were already bleeding when you got here, weren't you?!"
Izuku's eyes widened with realization. Stain had never needed to chase him around because Izuku had already bled on him. Instead of running the analyst braced himself. Everything else became white noise as he watched Stain lick his fingers clean.
"Please!"
The issue people with quirks like Stain's often failed to realize was that, in order for it to work, the victim needed to have the appropriate biochemical system to respond. The bodies of people with anidiotropia hadn't 'evolved' enough to even so much as receive the electrochemical signals sent by certain emitter-type quirks.
In other words; Stain's quirk was harmless if you were quirkless.
"Midoriya…?" he heard Todoroki ask when nothing happened. His friend's confusion probably reflected on every face in the alleyway.
At night the city belonged to kids like Izuku: the orphan mutts that nobody wanted, the quirkless urchins with sticky fingers, the grubby little street rats with silver tongues and innocent faces. People in Japan detested their minority because the quirkless did not survive elegantly.
But they did survive.
"I'm quirkless," he explained, voice raised, "but don't misunderstand; we wrote the original book on pain and we've been here a hell of a lot longer than you. There are no martyrs. There is no god. There is only people. And society has never changed for one. You and your quirk are meaningless."
Stain growled and started moving forward, the clouds of his murderous intent thicker than ever.
Throughout this entire fight Izuku had watched the man carefully, soaking up information like a dry sponge did with a drop of water. It was beyond obvious that the infamous Hero Killer didn't need his quirk to kill people. His speed and swordsmanship were plenty. At the end of the day Izuku was still just a kid with a failing heart who had run from one side of Hosu to the other and was running out of time. As he was, there was no way Izuku could physically outpace Stain.
But then, as he unearthed the little orange gun from his hoodie, aimed and pulled the trigger, he didn't exactly need to.
Even Stain wasn't quick enough to dodge a flare shot at him from eight and a half yards away. If he were a normal person it would have gone right through him. Unfortunately for the hero killer, reality was neither. The projectile dove deep into Stain's sword arm and, still burning, stayed there.
Unhinged by surprise for more than one reason the villain swore and dropped his katana. Izuku used the chance to throw the knife and fishing line out to pull it out of Stain's reach, but the man caught it with his other hand and yanked him off his feet. Most of the line was still wrapped around Izuku's fist and could not be let go. Instinctively raising his forearms up to protect his face he accidentally hit himself in the nose when Stain's tactical knife landed across his arms harder than he was prepared for.
Izuku could feel his body starting to give up on him and knew that, when it did, he wouldn't get back up again. In one final, last ditch attempt to bring this fucking exhausting battle to an end, the little analyst jumped onto Stain's torso and climbed up his body, over his shoulder, and grabbed the knife still lodged into his back on his way down. Izuku's full weight caused it to twist harshly. Stain shouted in pain but didn't collapse until Iida appeared, kicking the villain in the head so hard the crack echoed in the corridor.
Things went along smoothly after that, it seemed. The paralysis on Native and Todoroki-kun wore off, and Izuku was more than happy to sacrifice the fishing line so his friends could restrain the villain. He helped them find all the knives and remove them with shaking hands.
Izuku was crashing.
His body was a tight ball of pain and it felt like someone was driving a six inch nail between his eyes. Furrowing his brow he tried to keep track of what was going on around him. Todoroki was standing guard but his eyes kept flicking from Stain to Izuku.
The analyst bent forward, hugging his twitching chest and abdomen and marveling at how heavy his body was. Did he really carry all this weight every day? Amazing. Struggling to breathe Izuku gulped what air he could get into his lungs and went limp. A force he had no control of managed to coax his body into a sitting position that took some of the pressure off his lungs but the motion made him so dizzy he couldn't stay that way without support. Eyes fluttering, he looked up to see Native in front of him and Iida hovering behind him with a look on his face that screamed guilt, guilt, guilt.
"Ii…"
Everything was getting kind of hazy but was that really alright when Iida looked like that? Izuku wasn't trying hard enough, he needed to–
He realized someone was speaking to him and became confused. Who was it? They were too quiet. He could barely understand them.
"ටҟ, ҟìժ," they said and Izuku strained to listen, "çąղ վօմ hear me?" It was like listening to a new language you only vaguely knew through a wall. Some of the words made sense but he couldn't catch the others. Every time he thought he recognized them they fled, drifting upward out of his head. He tried to reach for them but something snagged his wrist.
"ₘᵢdₒᵣᵢyₐ₋ₖᵤₙ!"
"–gₑₜ ₕᵢₘ ₒₙ ₘ– bₐcₖ–"
Izuku squirmed, weakly pushing back the hands that grabbed him. His palpating heart thundered in his chest and it hurt and made him twitch and lightheaded and he was just so damn tired. He couldn't fight back anymore.
–Hang on, what was he doing?
He should remember. He needed to think about it. He needed. Someone was touching him. He didn't want–
I'm– he started to think, trying to ground himself, but the thought dissipated before he could finish it. I…? I was. What is that? What is… Can't think. Why? I was pushing the hands away. I pushed…? What did I push again?
Distantly, he could hear some kind of commotion. Someone said something about bean sprouts but, no, Izuku must not have heard correctly. Someone was touching him.
Shouting.
A flapping sound.
Points of a new kind of pressure burst along his sides. The new stimulus helped to drag Izuku out of his spiral long enough to realize he was in the air and a group of heroes he hadn't realized were there were getting farther away.
This final surge of adrenaline did something funny to his chest. Where there had been a thunderstorm there was now stillness, an almost peaceful silence. Izuku's empty head filled with fog and floated away. His final thought was that he wanted to see Eraserhead again.
But Izuku was gone before Stain could lower him to the ground.
CT: heart attack, near death experience of a toddler
X/Os please
After the next chapter you'll have to call a dentist.
Cheers!