I Am a Heart on Fire (and All the World's a Fuse)

by LK713

One for All is a fickle thing. Though the world may be off on its axis, sometimes we can feel the tilt and pull of gravity. Nana Shimura always does her best to protect little Izuku Midoriya and set the world right once more - no matter what it takes. (or: Izumi was taken by All for One at age twelve and became the girl who would be queen)

2. II

We Burn Like Stars Before the Crash (But for You There's Still a Chance, Just Let Go)

"What will it take for you to notice: I am a hand grenade, pin already pulled? So don't let go. As we chase the sun, my shadow slows us down…"

('Methadone' by 'Rise Against')

---

For a long time after that, Ochako did not see Izumi in person again.

She certainly still had a presence in Japan, though. The mission to try and defeat her at Jaku City was largely an unmitigated disaster for the Hero Public Safety Commission, in terms of public opinion. The public was furious that the Hero Public Safety Commission had deliberately picked such a destructive, devastating fight with such a powerful villain instead of trying something less extreme first.

Endeavor survived and retained his quirk by sheer happenstance that Ochako was in the right place but his reputation was in ruins and he promptly dropped to below rank one hundred in the next Hero rankings. Not that anybody cared much about that anymore.

The political fallout from the battle with the MLA was immense and the ruling government was wiped out in the next election. The government that immediately replaced it was made up of a hodgepodge of political parties that could only agree that the previous government had been incompetent and the result, in terms of policy, was a confused disaster for a few years.

The Hero Public Safety Commission was effectively abolished soon after and its replacement was set to run out of the Ministry of Justice. Hawks became the de facto number one Hero and he was many things but a charismatic leader wasn't really one of them. Certainly, he was very popular and photogenic but he was used to following orders and doing his job with little fanfare, not being the one the spotlight focused on.

He was only lucky that Mirio Togata graduated from UA that spring and promptly made a huge splash in the pro scene. The press openly declared him the successor to All Might and his work at Sir Nighteye's agency quickly brought him fame and success. He certainly had 'saving people with a smile' down and Ochako was proud to have gone on one mission with the future 'Symbol of Hope' before he made it big.

Ochako got the distinct sense that Izumi was actively changing her method of operation after the disaster at Jaku City. With no one else to answer to, she was truly the successor to All for One now, though she had no proper 'villain name.' The press simply called her All for One as well, which Ochako didn't like in a really fundamental, visceral way, even if she kept that to herself.

Nobody in the class was really aware of her unusual relationship with the most dangerous villain in the Eastern Hemisphere except for Bakugou and Todoroki. Todoroki was eternally grateful to Ochako that she had saved his dad, even if he still didn't have a good relationship with Endeavor. He had later admitted to her that he didn't really save his dad because of his own feelings but because he knew it would break his sister's heart if she found out he had failed to bring their father home safe when he could've.

Bakugou, on the other hand, flatly told her that he didn't give a shit. He was far too weighed down by his own guilt and anger towards Izumi to really care much what Ochako did. That suited her just fine, and the two avoided each other for the rest of high school.

Izumi's reformed League of Villains bolstered its ranks quickly, though she took a more cerebral, understated approach to villainy in the absence of the original All for One or Shigaraki. She focused on controlling the underground across the Asian Pacific, bringing organized criminal rings to heel over the course of four years. She also went out of her way to buy power in the governments of Japan and its neighbors, slowly installing political parties that were sympathetic to each other and her goals.

Her goals were… difficult to understand, at least for the police. Ochako thought she understood, though she didn't have much of a background for politics. Izumi focused on installing political parties that focused on equality for people without quirks or with mutation quirks and otherwise 'undesirable quirks' and the de-emphasis of Heroes as a means of peacekeeping in favor of traditional police forces, along with broader social reform.

Japan's government was very disorganized for a few years after the Jaku City fiasco but soon it became clear which political parties were succeeding and which ones were falling behind and Ochako had a suspicion of exactly who was responsible for that. In the most recent election, four years after Jaku City, the new government was made up of a unified bloc of parties with consistent ideological agreement.

Still, it wasn't all bad. While Ochako enjoyed a fairly mundane - by comparison, anyway - second and third year of school, the Ministry of Justice began to raise standards for Heroes and systematically weed out Heroes who were underperforming, causing too much collateral damage, or engaging in outright corruption. Ochako didn't worry so much about that last one in her case and she trained hard so she wouldn't have to worry about the first two.

Several large corporations in the Asian Pacific were beset by sudden government investigations, hostile takeovers, or unexpected mergers in the last few years and it signaled the League of Villains' entrance into 'legitimate business.' Soon, open discussions of police investigations into the League were dropped as it became clear that they had become the government in many respects, albeit in a way that was only behind the scenes to most normal civilians. The suffix 'of Villains' was also slowly dropped from their name in official reports, which Ochako found curious, though not unwelcome.

Ochako graduated at about the middle of Class 3-A, in terms of both academics and practical Heroics scores, and she felt pretty good about that. Being a middle-of-the-road student of the hardest Hero course in Japan was a pretty good outcome, by her estimation. She would've been happy to have done better but she also knew that she had not had a normal school experience, either.

She was offered a job by Ryukyu right out of school as a sidekick, which she took to with great enthusiasm. She ended up working alongside Nejire Hado, a girl who'd been in Mirio's class and who Ochako had interned with, and it was going really smoothly overall. Ryukyu was a Hero who split her time pretty evenly between rescue work and fighting villains and Ochako took to both just fine, though she wasn't shy about declaring her intentions to focus on rescue work when asked by the media.

She was good at that and, while she was confident she could fight, she reasoned her quirk was suited to saving people and so was she. She wasn't the most popular sidekick in the country by a long shot but she worked hard to save people and do her job and that was all she really wanted anyway.

Ochako was silently grateful that Izumi had been so kind as to help her parents out while she was in school. They were stable now and no longer had to worry about their rent or keeping their fridge stocked. It wasn't enough help that Ochako didn't have something to work for but it was enough that she didn't feel like she was suffocating in stress trying to race towards being a pro Hero and, if nothing else, Izumi was a Hero to Ochako for her parents at least.

It was kind of strange to have had this personal, almost intimate relationship with the most dangerous person in Japan that was a secret to most people. Ochako sometimes thought about how things could have been different had Izumi chosen a different path and if the world hadn't been so cruel.

She also considered her own sexuality and the honesty with which she could now regard her physical attraction to Izumi. It was… interesting, though that was an internal discussion she tried not to dwell on. She had a few brief relationships with boys - and one with a girl, too - in the four years between Jaku City and where she stood today and, while none had been particularly serious, they were enlightening experiences to have that she had enjoyed.

Ochako was on patrol in Musutafu today. Typically, she patrolled four times a week and rarely did anything super eventful happen. Street crime was unusually low these days and Ochako suspected the sheer centripetal force of the League was to blame. Small-time crooks didn't last long outside of the shadow of the League anymore.

The new government elected recently had also implemented aggressive poverty-alleviation programs, as well as programs to get children with unusual quirks or no quirk adopted and homeless people into homes. That really cut into small-time crime, too, and Ochako was glad for that. It never felt very good to be a pro Hero and deal with poor people on the streets instead of the truly dangerous people who tried bank robberies or hostage-taking in broad daylight. So Ochako's patrols were dreadfully boring and, honestly, she was happy.

Her costume had changed since she was younger: it was made of a bit thicker material, plus she got rid of the heavy faceplate on her helmet and left only the headband. She still had her rocket boots and grappling lines but Mei and Melissa had worked together to make her fancy gloves that could protect her fingers and still retract to use her quirk. Her costume wasn't much in a fight. It did its job during rescue work, though, as the material was resistant to temperature extremes at either end of the spectrum, and that was what really mattered to her.

Ochako was interrupted from her daydreaming by a young girl walking up to her on the sidewalk. She wore summer clothes for the nice June day and had auburn hair done up in pigtails, along with little freckles dusting her face under her gold eyes. She reminded Ochako a lot of Mahoro,and Ochako smiled happily as she leaned over on her knees to address the girl.

"Hey, young lady! Did you need some help today?" She asked in a kind tone, and the little girl smiled up at Ochako in turn.

"I'm okay, Miss Uravity! The nice lady down the street told me you'd be walking by and asked me to give you this, though!" Ochako blinked in confusion as she accepted what looked like a 'get well' card from the girl. It was sealed with tape in a plain pink envelope and Ochako regarded the card carefully for a moment before smiling at the little girl again.

"Oh, that's sweet of you. Can you tell me what the nice lady looked like?" She asked, and the little girl's smile became bashful.

"She had green hair and eyes and she said you were old friends! She was so pretty. You have such nice friends, Miss Uravity! She told me about you and how you save people!"

Ochako kept smiling but inwardly she was panicking a bit. This little girl had met the successor to All for One, Izumi Midoriya, and she didn't have a clue. Realistically, Ochako didn't believe Izumi would deliberately hurt a child but… it was still kind of scary just in the abstract.

"Thank you very much, young lady. Why don't you go find your parents now, okay?" Ochako said, trying to keep her voice even. The little girl smiled brightly and nodded, then she skipped off back down the street. Ochako straightened and looked around, not sure what she was even looking for. Did she expect Izumi Midoriya to just walk off the sidewalk and talk to her in broad daylight?

Well, if she were being honest, that wouldn't exactly be shocking, given their history.

She radioed to the agency to let them know she would be returning early because something urgent came up. The agency was entirely unconcerned, with how low crime had been recently. They had a different sidekick and an intern from UA already prepared to go out a little early to replace her.

---

Izumi sat in her fancy house, at her fancy table, regarding her fancy chessboard, and distantly wondered when her life got so…

Boring.

At least Atsuhiro never learned his lessons when it came to board games. Izumi moved her knight and pulled out a cigarette to light it as the magician thought about his next move.

"You know, those aren't good for you," he said in his usual tone: a little judgmental and a little teasing, perfect for the adoptive uncle he had kind of become. He didn't bother to wear his mask all the time anymore around her and Izumi always thought it was a little funny that he had at all.

He was so damn pretty and the tragedy was that he couldn't really date properly when he was the third-in-command of the League. He brought up his mechanical left arm - Izumi got him a new, better one last year and this one didn't clank or randomly lock up anymore like his original one did - and moved his rook.

"I think I'll be fine," Izumi replied after a noncommittal hum in response to his mother-henning. Atsuhiro grinned at her and she rolled her eyes as she moved her bishop. Four moves left; she was curious if he realized that and was just humoring her.

"Uh huh," Atsuhiro said, and his grin turned into a smirk. "So I hear we're having a guest today, hm?"

Izumi sputtered a bit as Atsuhiro moved his front-most pawn.

Oh, is that how we're playing? He had successfully distracted her, so now he had six moves left and his smirk was intolerably smug.

"We will be, in fact," Izumi responded, trying to sound more confident than she actually felt. She moved her queen. "Check," she added mischievously, and Atsuhiro grumbled and lost his smugness. He moved his own knight to get out of check and Izumi immediately took it with the nearby pawn she had.

"Do you know what you're gonna say?" He asked conversationally, but there was an undertone of worry there. That was fair, Izumi supposed; both he and Kurogiri had been fretting for a month before she extended an invitation to Uravity to visit their home. Uravity wasn't really a threat, in the conventional sense, to the League. She was just a sidekick still and she didn't have any kind of super-powerful combat quirk.

No, they were just worried that Izumi was gonna say or do something really stupid and maybe walk away heartbroken. She didn't disagree with their assessment at all. They really were better father figures than her actual father ever was. Izumi moved her queen again.

"Check," she said quietly. A memory of finding Himiko's body at Curious' feet - before Izumi atomized Curious, repeatedly - flashed before her eyes. She remembered finding Jin, Shuichi, and Chizome, too, and the agony she'd felt looking at their corpses.

Then she settled on remembering what it was like to hold Tomura when he died. How he begged her, even though she could've healed him, to take his quirk instead. He didn't think he deserved it, that she was the true successor to All for One now and she should lead the new generation of villains. It was something she'd always dreamed of hearing from him, in a way. She just never wanted it to be his last words.

She still regretted a lot of things.

"Are you okay there, Izumi?" Atsuhiro asked gently, and Izumi blinked several times in confusion. She'd been lost there in the memories; that was happening more frequently recently.

She'd been having terrible nightmares of Father accosting another figure she couldn't quite make out very well but she wasn't sure what they were on about yet. That was probably a product of All for One and she wasn't very enthused to find out how deep the well went on that aspect of the sinister quirk she now carried. It was quieter now than it used to be but sometimes she still heard the whispered voices in the back of her mind.

"I'm fine, Atsuhiro. Thank you for… being here," Izumi said. She moved her queen. "Checkmate," she added playfully, and Atsuhiro groaned and leaned back to wipe his face theatrically with both of his gloved hands.

"I was sure I had you this time!" He declared dramatically, and Izumi couldn't help but giggle at him.

"You said that the last four times, Uncle Compress. Maybe you just need to brush up on your chess fundamentals," she teased. He grumbled more at the pet name he claimed to dislike yet did not dislike at all, then he began to put the board and pieces away in their little wooden box that was lined with red velvet.

"I have to attend lunch with some dreadful organized crime bosses later today, so I will be taking my leave, dearest Izumi," he said, taking on his favorite stage persona in a tone that was only a little mocking. Izumi gave him a little half-hand wave with her right hand and he rolled his eyes as he smiled. He finished putting the game away, then took the closed box under his arm as he took his leave.

Izumi loved Atsuhiro; Kurogiri, too, truthfully. They were, for the time being, all she really had left, so she resolved to keep them close.

Izumi Midoriya was nineteen years old - for only about another month, at least - and, despite now being the most powerful person in the Eastern Hemisphere, she was terribly alone in many respects. Atsuhiro and Kurogiri were wonderful but they weren't peer family members and she understood and accepted that. What Izumi needed more than anything was friends. She'd only ever had one real friend and she'd pushed that friend away in pursuit of her stupid dream of a better world.

Izumi leaned back in her fancy leather chair and sighed, then she took another drag of her cigarette.

Her fancy house was very traditional as far as fancy houses went. That was mostly because it used to belong to a rising Yakuza boss who fashioned himself to be the next Overhaul. Izumi had demonstrated how Overhaul died to him… a few times, then he suddenly wasn't interested in being Overhaul anymore and pledged loyalty to her instead.

What had been his mansion was all fancy dark wood walls and marble floors and old paintings on the walls, along with the occasional stuffed animal head. Izumi sat near the end of a long, dark-stained hardwood table that was meant for business meetings for organized crime. She mostly used it as a dining room now, though.

She wore a black suit with a white dress shirt and a thin, dark green tie, along with her preferred pair of black dress shoes. Izumi still wore her hair shorter these days, as it was easier to pass it off as 'stylishly curly' instead of 'a disaster' that way. She was very, very glad that Kurogiri taught her how to tie her ties, at least.

There were two large, vertically-oriented windows in the room, one on each side of the fireplace on the far wall to her right, that lit the room up with the mid-afternoon sunlight coming through. She took a drag of her cigarette and hummed with a kind of melancholy contentment.

It was a nice day and things were going as they should. It was her that was the problem, not her goals or plans or ambitions, she decided. It had always been her that had been the problem and that was the part that hurt the most.

"Miss Midoriya." She was startled a bit by the head butler, then she turned to regard the man with a smile. His name was Tanaka and he was a kind, older gentleman who much preferred Izumi to the previous owner of the house, though he did not say so in as many words and she didn't mind that at all. Izumi waved at him politely and he continued, "Your guest has arrived. Would you like me to send her in?"

Izumi blinked twice and felt like there was a rock in her throat the size of her fist.

"Uh… uh, yes. Yes! Please… do that!" She knew she said that like a moron, and Tanaka gave her a sly, knowing smile that made her face heat up. Then he walked back out of the room and she heard some muffled talking.

In the time he was out there, she took a hard drag on the rest of her cigarette and burned the whole remainder down to the filter, stopping just to exhale before she atomized the ash and filter so it would be out of the way. Then Ochako Uraraka walked in and Izumi found she couldn't breathe anymore for a moment.

Time had been kind to her. She was a little taller now and in great shape. She still had her permanent blushmarks on her rosy cheeks, though she was just a touch leaner: the product of years of difficult training and Hero work. She wore a nice, silky pink blouse and black slacks and she had her brown hair tied back in a bun so that only her bangs were free. Her brown eyes locked with Izumi's green and Izumi found she had nothing to say at all.

"You look pretty good in a suit, Izumi," Ochako said, and oh, was she already teasing Izumi? What did the successor to All for One do to deserve that kind of kindness? Izumi promptly blushed from neck to ear and looked away quickly and she heard Ochako giggle openly at her embarrassment. Ah, that would probably be why, then. She was always easy to tease and get a rise out of.

"Uh, Miss Uravity! How nice to see you, er…"

This sounded so much better and smoother in my head, Izumi thought ruefully, then she was more than a little startled when Ochako appeared right in her field of vision. Izumi turned and looked up only to find her breath taken away at their proximity.

"I would like to give you a hug, if that's okay?" Ochako asked quietly. Izumi quickly stood up like the chair had burned her ass, then they were hugging and god Izumi had missed her so much.

"I… It's really nice to see you," Izumi admitted in a whisper, feeling more than a little silly. That statement really didn't encompass the depth of what she had felt for the last four years, deliberately staying away from her first real friend, but… it would do.

She tried hard to keep her hands in an appropriate place, settling for halfway up Ochako's back and barely touching her. Maybe she had her own stupid feelings but she wasn't going to let that ruin her one friendship she'd lucked into having.

"It's nice to see you, too. I'm glad to see you're okay," Ochako replied. She broke the hug and stepped away and Izumi stuffed down the urge to make a noise of disappointment. Instead, she slowly sat back down and Ochako sat down in the chair next to her. Izumi was sort of hoping she'd sit on the other side, for the sake of her own composure, but this would simply have to do. Izumi was sure she could act like a normal person for at least a few minutes.

Maybe.

She took out another cigarette anyway and pointedly ignored the disappointed, disapproving look Ochako gave her. She snapped her fingers and a blue flame appeared over her thumb, then she used it to light the cigarette.

"Did you… Are you using Touya's flame to smoke?" Ochako said in absolute, utter disbelief. Izumi took a drag of the cigarette and looked at her with only a bit of mischievousness.

"It's a better use of it than anything he ever did with it," Izumi said matter-of-factly, after she blew the smoke away from Ochako.

"Aren't you worried about things like, cancer and stuff?" Ochako asked, grasping at straws at that point. Izumi took another drag of the cigarette and blew the smoke away from Ochako once more, over and across the table.

"Don't have to, with All for One. It's kind of perfect, as far as the intersection of stress relief and consequence mitigation goes," Izumi said, and Ochako blinked in confusion, so Izumi took the cigarette out of her mouth and, before her courage could leave her, offered it to her.

"I've never… uh," she began, looking a little lost. Izumi smirked; this might be really funny, if she never smoked before. Ochako regarded the silent challenge in Izumi's expression, then took the cigarette.

She, somewhat predictably, took too long of a drag for a first-timer and immediately coughed and sputtered and the cigarette went flying. Izumi caught it deftly from the air - it burned her fingers but that wasn't very important to her - and atomized it so it wouldn't make a mess. Ochako continued to die wheezing for a while before finally working up the composure to glare at Izumi through her tears of pain.

"You… you knew that was gonna happen… didn't you?" She said between coughs, and Izumi couldn't help but laugh a little at her.

"Yup," she replied after a moment, popping the 'P' sound. Ochako reached out and swatted Izumi on the shoulder but Izumi just giggled in response.

Then she reached over and handed her glass of water to Ochako. She'd barely touched it and it was all she had close by anyway. Ochako accepted it gladly, now that she could drink without coughing the water right back up, and Izumi calmly waited for about a minute while Ochako drank the entire glass like it was the last clean water she was ever going to see.

Once she was done, Izumi felt the atmosphere shift a bit and Ochako's expression became serious.

"So… Why did you invite me here today? It's been four years of nothing from you and now I'm… in your house?" Ochako looked around as she said that part, registering for the first time the exact décor of the place they were in. "This place is gaudy as hell, why do you live here? It's worse than Momo's place!"

Izumi snickered at that. She didn't have to take Ochako's word for it because she'd been in Creati's family home. A mob boss tried to have Creati assassinated when she graduated from high school because of a case she'd worked on and Izumi disposed of the assassins before they could. It was mostly a favor to Frostfire, at the time, not that Izumi had anything against the brilliant creation Hero. But she figured she owed him and he'd be sad if his girlfriend died so young into her Hero career at the hands of a bunch of moronic thugs.

Besides, Creati was very brilliant and very Heroic and Izumi was glad she still worked as a Hero.

She realized she was taking too long to respond.

"It, uh, belonged to a mob boss and I haven't had the motivation or time to redecorate." Izumi didn't add that mob bosses inexplicably respected the kind of awful décor that was in the mansion and that was also a reason she had left it but that was true, too.

"I see," Ochako said noncommittally. "You also dodged my important question."

Izumi sighed and looked away, resisting the urge to thread her fingers through her curly green hair. It was mostly behaving today, miraculously so, and she didn't want to ruin it.

"I wanted to make you an offer," Izumi said quietly. From the corner of her eye, she saw Ochako tilt her head in curiosity.

"You've been quite busy reducing the overall Hero count in Japan. The number of Heroes that are active and sanctioned by the government has gone down by thirty-five percent since I graduated due to investigations and rising standards. What use do you have for a simple rescue sidekick like me?" There was a bitterness to her tone that made Izumi sad, as Ochako described herself, and Izumi turned to Ochako with a rather severe expression on her face.

"You're wonderful and you do great work! Better than most of the silly fools the government gives Hero Licenses to, anyway." An image of Katsuki flashed in her mind and she dispelled it just as quickly. Ochako frowned at Izumi but she just looked… disappointed.

"So, what, you want me to work for you? You know I can't do that. I shouldn't even be here and the only reason nobody will notice is because I'm too small-time to be an issue," she observed sadly. Izumi shook her head but she wasn't sure what part of Ochako's words she wanted to disagree with first.

"I… I want you to work with me. I need people on the inside - people who I can trust but who also… will push back if I come up with plans that go too far." Ochako looked just a tad concerned about that but Izumi continued heedlessly, "You're my friend! You're probably my only friend at this point, as crazy as that sounds. And… I just…"

She trailed off, unwilling to say the words that might ruin everything. So Ochako said them for her.

"You're lonely," she whispered, and Izumi nodded as tears stung her eyes. "Have you ever considered just… leaving, Izumi?"

Izumi gave a little shuddering chuckle at that, finding the very idea absurd.

"Right, just 'leave.' All for One, the archvillain of Japan, just quits one day and gets a normal job. Are you crazy?" Izumi said, more than a little bitterly. Ochako looked distinctly unamused and Izumi felt a twisting knife of guilt hit her.

"You could try. Change your name, change your appearance. I bet All for One could do that, can't it?" She was sharp, she always was. Maybe not intellectually brilliant like Momo Yaoyorozu or Melissa Shield or Mei Hatsume were but sharper than anybody ever gave her the credit she deserved for.

"And then what? Society will just backslide into the mire it was in before. I'm building a world where kids like me don't have to… Where people like Katsuki won't…" Ochako had a somewhat blank expression on her face and Izumi trailed off.

"At what cost?" Ochako asked quietly. Izumi felt a tear run down her face.

"What does it matter, Uraraka? Wasn't I… Nobody ever told me I was worth it. That I was worth anything. What cost is too high to build a world where that doesn't happen anymore?" Ochako didn't answer that immediately and, at first, Izumi was moderately concerned she had only thought the words rather than speak them aloud. She jumped when Ochako reached out and gently grasped Izumi's left hand with her own right hand.

"You're worth it, Izumi. I just… I don't want to see you hurt and I don't want to see any other people hurt, either," Ochako said quietly. Izumi sniffled a bit and found herself fixated on their hands.

"I tried really hard to shift away from the big stupid villain schemes with collateral damage, y'know," Izumi whispered a bit defensively.

"I've noticed. And I really appreciate that. But you know it's not too late to just… stop, right?"

"Of course it's too late!" Izumi whispered urgently. "How can… How could I ever just be a normal person? How could I deserve that?"

Ochako looked at her with firm, inescapable brown eyes and Izumi looked up from their hands to make eye contact only to get immediately lost in them.

"You always deserved it. I don't care what… what society says or whatever. I just care about you." It was such a simple and pure statement of honesty and Izumi couldn't help but cry a little more at that as she giggled a bit through sobs.

"So you're making a counter offer then, I guess," Izumi said, more so for herself than for Ochako, as she tried to wipe her face with her free hand. She hadn't really expected this, though in retrospect it was obvious that she should have.

"You could say that. I want… I want you to be safe and to be happy. If you stop doing what you do, I can protect you. If you don't…" She paused for a moment, and Izumi looked at her hopefully through blurry eyes. "I can't promise you I'll stay but I'll do my best to protect you even still."

"You've got better people to save and protect," Izumi said matter-of-factly as she kept working on wiping her face off. "I understand that. It's why I lo- Er, admire you." Izumi went rigid at her near-slip of the tongue, but Ochako was entirely unperturbed. Indeed, she had a bit of a knowing glint in her eyes that made Izumi feel all fluttery inside, though she didn't dare voice that kind of feeling out loud.

Ochako drew her hand away and again Izumi felt an emotional agony at the lack of contact that she stuffed down the urge to verbalize.

"I'm going to go now, alright? But I'll think about it. And you think about it. Then I'll come back another time and we can talk about it over dinner, maybe. How does that sound?" Ochako asked, and Izumi thought a bunch of stupid things in quick succession.

But what if there is no tomorrow? What if you or I die? What if I don't want to think about it? Do you want to have dinner here or at your apartment? I have professional cooks!

"Okay, Uraraka, I… that sounds good," she said out loud, instead.

"You can use my given name, y'know," Ochako replied teasingly. Izumi just shook her head, though.

"I'll use it when I feel like I'm… Like I've earned it," she admitted in a tiny voice. Ochako frowned at that and looked like she wanted to argue but then she thought better of it.

She stood up, then reached out and surprised Izumi with another hug and, with Izumi sitting, Ochako's chin rested on Izumi's hair. Ochako's arms were around Izumi's shoulders as her arms hung limply in the chair. Izumi's brain pretty much shut down at the feeling of Ochako against her, of her beautiful softness and warmth, and of the silk of her blouse.

"You look really pretty in everything you wear." Ochako's whisper into her hair was breathy and had just the hint of teasing to it, and Izumi felt both herself go rigid and her face immediately became molten hot as she stammered incoherently in response. She didn't even have the presence of mind to hug back, then Ochako broke the hug and walked away without waiting for a response.

Ah, Izumi was thoroughly doomed.

---

It was about a week later that Ochako got to see Toshinori Yagi for lunch.

The former Symbol of Peace was doing fairly well for himself, all things considered. His health wasn't the greatest and he still had regular doctor visits because of that but he was able to live on his own and he didn't have any mobility issues. Sure, he looked a bit like a blonde necromancer who learned how to wear gaudy business suits but that was part of the charm.

Class A loved their teacher very much and, indeed, he had gotten much better at teaching once he retired from Hero work and could focus solely on that. He still taught at UA, though he only lectured now since he obviously couldn't do practical exercises.

Ochako was with him in his apartment and he made some kind of American food; he called it 'barbeque ribs' and, while Ochako had never had such a thing, it smelled delicious.

"So, Young Uraraka, what brings you to my humble abode today? I'm sure you have so many better things to be doing!" He said, only a bit teasingly, as he set down a plate of tasty looking food in front of her, then another in front of his place across from her.

He wore relatively speaking casual clothes today: a heavy yellow sweater and some blue pajama bottoms. Even deflated and a bit worse for wear, he still kind of looked like a Hero in his day clothes and Ochako smiled at the thought.

"I just wanted to chat, if that's okay? Can't a girl come see her favorite former teacher?" She replied as she picked up her fork and began to inspect the food and try and figure out how best to approach eating it.

"You'll probably just want to just eat it with your hands," he said matter-of-factly as he watched her struggle. "Also, we taught you not to lie at UA, young lady. You and I both know that Thirteen was your favorite teacher."

Ochako blinked in confusion at her food, then resigned herself to having sauce-covered hands. That was probably why Yagi brought over an entire roll of paper towel with the food, she supposed.

"Okay, Thirteen was my favorite teacher but you're my second favorite, Yagi!" She said defensively, and Yagi laughed heartily. He still had a great laugh even if he didn't boom anymore in his true form.

"Aizawa is your second favorite teacher," he replied with faux indignation. "I'll take third place, though!"

"Good because that's the best you're gonna get," Ochako said mischievously, and Yagi pretended to be scandalized. She took a bite of the food and it was exactly as messy and delicious as she had imagined it would be based on sight and smell. "Dis ith so goof!" Ochako said messily, not bothering to wait until she was done with her bite. Yagi laughed again at her silliness and she finished chewing properly. "Wow, since when can you cook?"

Yagi made a squawk of genuine indignation at that.

"Who says I couldn't cook before?"

"Yagi, you were too busy saving every old lady who needed to cross the street in a hundred kilometer radius to learn how to cook," Ochako replied flatly, and his hair drooped like little bunny ears in response as he sighed.

"I can't argue with that, I suppose," he said, then he started to pick at his own food. He had taken the meat off the ribs and processed it a bit more and he had a bit of soup on the side. David Shield had worked extensively on some kind of fancy artificial stomach for Yagi, so at least he could eat real food again. Not very much at a time but progress was progress.

"So, what troubles you, seriously, Young Uraraka?" He said as he forked a piece of slightly squishy meat and stuck it in his mouth. Ochako waited a moment before responding, considering her words carefully.

"Did you ever meet Izumi Midoriya in person?" Ochako asked quietly, then she took another bite and chewed politely. Yagi also chewed his food, then after he swallowed he brought his right hand to his chin as he thought about it.

"I think so but only once. When I fought the original All for One for the last time, she was there. I suspect she sabotaged her father but I could never prove it and none of the cameras got a good angle on it. Why?" He gave her a toothy expression that wasn't quite a grimace and Ochako frowned in response as she finished chewing.

"I, uh… I have? I just was curious if you had an opinion on her," she said, her tone slightly nervous to be having this conversation at all. Yagi gave a little nod before taking another bite. He chewed quickly and responded.

"I recall you met her a couple times in school," he said, but his tone shifted to the one he used for teaching and Ochako knew she was caught. "I suspect you met her more times than you actually reported, though, didn't you?" He added, and Ochako gave a guilty smile.

"You got me," she said, and Yagi rolled his eyes. "I wanted to ask - you don't think All for One, the original one, could have been redeemed or reformed, do you?"

Yagi quickly shook his head.

"I think people deserve second chances, generally. But All for One was a true monster and I'm glad I put him in the ground," he admitted. Ochako felt pensive at that but didn't argue. If All Might thought somebody deserved to go down permanently, she wasn't about to question it at all.

"What about Izumi?" Ochako asked quietly, and Yagi hummed a bit as he finished chewing his next bite.

"It's hard to say. She took Endeavor's quirk and gave it back…" He trailed off and gave her a knowing look of recognition, and Ochako had the decency to look sheepish in response. "Remarkable. You are utterly remarkable." He raised his fork to point it at her. "Dangerously brave but remarkable. Anyway, it's hard to make that kind of judgement on someone I've never met personally, properly, but… she's definitely not like her father, if her recent activity is any indication."

Ochako worried her bottom lip and thought about what Yagi said.

"Yagi, you told us later on that you had fought All for One before. Who is gonna stop Izumi if… if she goes too far?" She asked, her tone soft and concerned. She didn't know what she wanted his answer to be. He lowered his fork and took another bite before he responded. Then he just smiled when he finished chewing; it was still reassuring, even when he was Yagi and not All Might.

"Successors are a wonderful thing," he said somewhat cryptically, and Ochako tilted her head in confusion. "But, if I'm being honest, while I trust that the new generation - Frostfire, Ground Zero, Lemillion, etcetera - would rise to the challenge, I have my suspicions now that the answer to that question is: you."

Ochako felt her face heat up in response but Yagi just chuckled.

"Not every villain was meant to be fought head on, Young Uraraka. Something I didn't really understand when I was the Symbol of Peace but which I have come to understand as a teacher is that our society is all about little boxes and who fits into those little boxes." He moved a piece of meat around on his plate a bit before looking back at her. "I also used to think that punching solved every problem, too, but now I suspect that was very foolish, in fact."

Ochako hummed affirmatively in response.

"You should've been a rescue-focused Hero, Yagi, you would've learned that a lot sooner." Yagi laughed earnestly, and Ochako joined him.

It was nice to spend that time with her teacher and mentor. She knew most of the class didn't have a lot of time to visit him with their Hero work and some of them were starting families, too. Ochako helped Shouto pick out a ring for Momo last month and Bakugou and Kirishima had a wedding scheduled for the next year. Ochako and Yagi chatted for the rest of the day about nothing much important but Ochako resolved after that that she would visit more often.

She didn't want any of her friends to be lonely anymore.

---

Izumi Midoriya was the successor to All for One, the most dangerous villain on the planet, and probably the single most lethal combatant in superhuman society.

So why didn't anything ever go as she planned?

Well, that isn't fair, she thought as she caught a flying Hero who was trying to punch her and smashed him against the wall with a crash. Most things I do go according to plan, it's just whenever I have to fight that things get hairy.

It was a fairly simple thing in practice. They were planning to sabotage a refinery in the middle of the night so that stocks for the company that owned it would tank. Then Izumi would move in and initiate a hostile takeover. The company was illegally dumping waste into the water and taking advantage of the fact that the communities on the waterline were too poor and inconsequential to the local government for anyone to care, so they deserved it. But mostly, they had the assets that Izumi needed, so she was going to bankrupt them and take their things and maybe, in the process, make a river drinkable again.

She and Mr. Compress had gone in and she made an executive decision early on that Gigantomachia was extremely unnecessary for this mission. He had only been deployed twice since Jaku City because every time she sent him somewhere he destroyed everything. He was content, as long as he stayed in the mansion with Izumi, to do nothing, so that was a small blessing. But she didn't need him crashing through a flammable refinery while she was in it, never mind the civilian community in the area that would get smashed.

Things proceeded as planned at the start. Izumi casually sabotaged some systems there, closed some valves that needed to stay open here, that sort of thing. Mr. Compress made big things small that she needed to be small, then she tossed some of his sky-blue orbs into a vulnerable part of the facility and they got big again with a boom. Controlled demolition was good, more so than Gigantomachia just stepping on everything and calling it a day.

The refinery went up in flames and they were safely outside it and walking to the designated exit point. Mr. Compress was halfway through a cheeky bow and a theatrical congratulations on a job well done when Ground Zero came flying out of nowhere and snatched him away with an explosion.

"Katsuki Bakugou!" Izumi screamed after him, then she was on the chase. He was fast, with his explosion-assisted jump and leaps. She was faster, as blue flames exploded from her feet like rocket jets. So she hit him like a truck from behind, catching Mr. Compress in the same motion, and Ground Zero went sprawling back down to Earth.

"Kurogiri, get us out of here now!" Izumi hissed into her earpiece. Mr. Compress was out cold and a portal opened behind her in the air as Kurogiri tried to track her GPS locator. She used blue flames from her feet to stay airborne and she turned and first tossed Mr. Compress through the portal.

Then a glacier hit her and she went flying. She broke her fall - and what would've been a nasty impact into a water tower - with Rivet Stab from her back. When she turned, she found Frostfire, Lemillion, and about three dozen other pro Heroes waiting for her.

Delightful.

So she fought. Most of the pros weren't worth much and she didn't fight for lethality anymore even though she could've wiped the board with Decay in a single moment. Lemillion being there complicated things, though: she'd never fought the Ninth Bearer of One for All in direct combat but she'd seen him fight up close once and that was enough to know she didn't want to fight the Ninth Bearer of One for All in direct combat.

A pro with a lycanthropy-like quirk went for a heavy swipe on her face but she ducked it and used Overhaul to hit him with a concrete pillar from the ground. That sent him flying and another pro with a flying quirk intercepted him only for the momentum to send them both away like a tangled rocket. Izumi looked behind her and saw deep claw marks in the wall where he'd missed. Sparks had flown when he connected and that was when she registered that even if she wasn't fighting to kill, the pros were. Thankfully, those were the last two of the inconsequential backup that Frostfire, Lemillion, and Ground Zero had brought with them.

Izumi rolled out of the way of an orange flame lance, then looked up to see Frostfire, standing on a connecting pipe suspended between two industrial towers and looking none too pleased. At least he picked a better Hero name than just his given name after graduation; she wouldn't be able to take him seriously, otherwise.

"You'll surrender, if you know what's good for you," he said matter-of-factly. Izumi grinned back at him and shrugged.

"Tell Endeavor I said 'hello,' when he visits you in the hospital," she retorted with a cheeky little wave. Then she fired off an air blast at him from the same hand and he dove to the side as it shattered the pipe he'd been standing on. Ground Zero landed to her right and Izumi barely ducked his explosive right hook. "Too predictable, Katsuki, gotta play to win now," she said with a huff as she backed away.

She was out of breath; fighting a small army of pro Heroes was no easy feat, All for One or not. He punched forward twice more with explosions and Izumi dodged both attacks less gracefully than she would've liked before launching him backwards with an open-palm strike. He landed from a backflip and a skidding stop on two feet.

"Shut up, Deku," Ground Zero said with immense venom in his voice after he landed. He then launched twin, massive explosions at Izumi and she swiped forward with a lance of brilliant blue flame to counteract the force. There was an explosive meeting of air pressure and heat in the middle and the fire dissipated. She didn't wait, though, instead launching herself through the haze, expecting to catch Ground Zero off-guard with a spinning kick.

Instead, she got punched hard by Lemillion back through the smoke and she only barely was able to shield her back with Rivet Stab as she went through a few buildings from the force. She twirled into a spin and caught herself on a dock of some kind in a half-crouch. The impact still hurt and she felt blood running down her face. She brought up her right hand to wipe off her mouth and the dark red of her blood was lost in the red of her glove.

Lemillion came flying out of the ground from behind her with crackling yellow lightning around him but she could sense him just fine thanks to an enhanced sensory quirk Father had stolen decades ago. She ducked his punch and immediately straightened to try and figure out where the hell he went, but he disappeared into the floor again. He appeared again somewhere on her right and she only just stepped back out of the devastating crash of Blackwhip hitting where she'd been, only for him to disappear again.

Izumi was not content to stay on the ground, though. He needed surfaces to fight properly with Permeation, so she launched herself up into the air and towards a few steel containers about a hundred meters away. Then she used Wolfram's quirk, Metal Manipulation, to rip the metal containers apart and cover herself in makeshift armor.

She was very glad she took that from him. It was always a stupid plan, by her father, to trust such an idiot with such power. It was so much more useful to her.

Lemillion came out of the floor right in front of her, yellow lightning crackling around him, and tried to punch her. He connected with her new metal armor and it dented, then she felt the force reverberate through the metal and her body. But he stepped back and shook out his hand and she smiled from under her new helmet. He wasn't expecting that to hurt and she bet it hurt like a bastard, too.

"I should've stopped you when we fought Overhaul," Lemillion said with a deep sense of conviction and more than a little self-righteousness. Izumi moved forward for an attack, trying for a punch. Her hand went right through his face but he got caught by the Rivet Stab tendril from her back on the spin and sent sprawling. She knew he couldn't see when he became permeable and she suspected he didn't know that she knew that.

"That would've been a mistake, Lemillion. We saved Eri and that was what mattered, wasn't it?" Izumi said as she began to walk in a circle around the Ninth Bearer of One for All. He matched her motion in the other direction, his expression determined and dark and his unusual blue eyes firm.

"No, I saved Eri. You killed Overhaul. There's a difference," he said, though he didn't sound nearly as sure of that one.

"That's sad if that's what you believe. It's hard if the world is complicated, isn't it?" Izumi retorted. She used Overhaul to atomize the metal on her right arm and reform it into a staff, then she twirled it around and made a motion for Lemillion to come with her other arm.

Come he did, as he phased through the floor and used the momentum to launch himself at her. She made a feint swing, then pulled back at the last second to duck his punch; as he hit the ground, she used Rivet Stab from her back to catch him by his feet. She intended to whip him up and over her head into the ground on the other side but he became permeable again and Rivet Stab phased through his body as she pulled.

He reappeared on her right, going for the unarmored part: exactly what she wanted. She spun around with her makeshift staff and used it to pole vault over his attack, then she used an air blast to launch the metal brace on her left arm at him like a missile from the top of her arc, catching him in the back. He tucked forward in a roll and ended on his knees but his back was bloody and he had a pretty deep gash there.

"You're pretty good," he said in a rather noncommittal tone, and Izumi smiled as she atomized the rest of the metal armor off her and let it float away in the wind.

"I feel like I should be proud to hear that from the Ninth Bearer of One for All," she said calmly. The truth was that All for One was simply a dangerously varied weapon. One for All was the most devastating sword in the world but it was ultimately just a sword. All for One was more like a utility knife made of titanium, now in the effective hands of a girl obsessed with quirks and quirk usage theory. Lemillion stood and regarded her with some trepidation. "Oh, tell me now, you didn't think I didn't know, did you?" Izumi said in challenge, but Lemillion just frowned.

"It should've been you," he said cryptically, and Izumi tilted her head in confusion at that. She didn't get a chance to ask what the hell he was on about, though, as she once again got hit by a glacier from Frostfire and sent flying. She caught herself in the air with blue flames from her feet and yelled incoherently at Frostfire as he flew up towards her like an orange comet.

"That's getting really old," she declared as he got close, then she matched his orange flame attack with a spear of beautiful blue and the heat from the fires meeting threatened to boil the air in the middle. It wasn't quite as impressive as when she used 'Prominence Burn' against Endeavor at Jaku City but it wasn't too far off, either.

The flames went away as ice crashed forward into the void that remained and Izumi covered her body in muscle mass to blunt the impact of the explosion that followed as frozen air met superheated air. It still sent her flying, though, and she hit the ground in a painful roll before she was able to correct herself in a skidding stop on her hands and feet. She didn't get a chance to catch her breath, as Lemillion came flying out of the ground towards her from head on.

All of One for All sparked around him in a brilliant yellow lightning storm and Izumi knew he meant to end it.

She barely sidestepped his outstretched right fist but he made one critical error: his chest wasn't permeable anymore because he expected her to try and block the hand instead. So she moved with inhuman speed and stabbed him with five short Rivet Stab tendrils from her right hand's fingers as he flew and he was too stunned to dodge or phase through it. She carried through on the momentum to flip him on his back in the air.

Izumi then forced him to the ground and was faced with a hard decision as time slowed to a crawl for her. She could have simply used Overhaul or Decay to vaporize him but that felt… unfitting. It would be a poor end to the Ninth Bearer of One for All. Lemillion was genuinely Heroic and to just end him with a thought… It felt wrong.

So she decided to take One for All instead, as she placed her left hand on his face; she would leave him with Permeation.

That was her last thought as the world went black and she was pulled into the dream of One for All as All for One.

---

The dream world of One for All is an ethereal, bizarre space and Izumi knows she is an interloper here as All for One.

Phantom memories crash through the infinite night of stars and nebulae like runaway trains, making holes in the fabric of reality itself.

She sees little Mirio, encouraging little Tamaki to be social and become a Hero.

She sees Mirio and Tamaki's first kiss on a ferris wheel in their second year of high school.

She sees Mirio defeat his first villain but, in the memory, he only pays attention to the little girl and her mother that he had saved, to make sure they are safe. The villain is secondary, an afterthought. He bears no ill-will towards the villain and only views them as a tragic figure.

She sees Mirio see her as they fought Overhaul together. She feels what he felt, the awe at her power and presence but also the sorrow and longing, the wish she could have been a Hero, too.

She sees All Might, the Symbol of Peace, offer Mirio the blade of One for All as Tamaki holds his hand to offer his own encouragement now.

She sees Mirio as a child, asking his mom if he can really be a Hero with a weak quirk.

She sees everything.

For just the briefest of moments, Izumi reconsiders. She will not take the Ninth Bearer of One for All away from the world. He is too good a person to lose like that.

He deserves better.

Then she is stopped by a hand on her shoulder: a hand she dreamed about but could never place in the murky nightmares of All for One. Izumi looks over to her right and sees her properly for the first time ever.

It is Nana Shimura, the Seventh Bearer of One for All. The raven-haired woman is smiling so kindly at Izumi, her white cape billowing in a silent wind as the stars fade away and leave only black around them, and Izumi finds that she cannot do anything at all in the face of her warmth and kindness. Here in the dream world of One for All, Nana might be powerful enough to end Izumi, to leave her an empty husk, to destroy her mind and leave only her body behind.

To end All for One, once and for all.

But she doesn't. Izumi feels that Nana loves her, a thought conveyed in pure emotion and the power of expression, where words would not do, provided by the dream itself in the voice of One for All, her uncle. Izumi can't understand why Nana loves her, but the love is so utterly overwhelming all the same, and the only thing Izumi could ever hope to compare it to is the memories she cherishes of her mother from before the accident.

"I'm sorry I couldn't get to you, little Izumi. But I want you to know that you are important. I needed you… and I miss you."

The sheer force of Nana's presence is suffocating but not in a bad way. It's like being wrapped up in a hug that Izumi can't bring herself to break, even if it's closing off her air. It wouldn't be such a bad way to go, like this.

"You can change the world, little Izumi. You can still be a Hero in your own way. I believe in you."

The words are so perfectly pure and devoid of any deceit or sarcasm and Izumi cannot help but begin to cry. It's all she ever wanted to hear. It's all she ever wanted anyone to tell her.

Then she wakes up.

---

Izumi gasped for air as she broke physical contact with Lemillion, Rivet Stab retracting as she stepped backwards.

She only barely prevented herself from falling over, then she quickly moved forward again to heal the wounded Hero. He was out: the combination of being wounded and the strain of mentally defending himself in the dream world of One for All were too much. But he wouldn't die and his wounds closed nicely with the power of All for One, even if they'd probably scar. Izumi quickly double-checked her work and made sure he would be fine, then stood to try and flee.

That was when Ground Zero and Frostfire finally caught up to her, both landing off to her right. They were among several ruined warehouses, with destroyed containers and equipment all around them, not too far from the dock Lemillion had first challenged her on. Ground Zero moved into a fighting stance as explosions popped in his hands and flames burned in Frostfire's hand. Izumi just raised her hands in surrender, trying to convey that she was done fighting.

"Did you take it?" Frostfire asked urgently, and his gaze flicked to Lemillion for a moment. Izumi just smiled softly.

"No, I didn't. He earned it," she said meaningfully, and there was a flash of understanding on Frostfire's face before the flame in his hand flickered out. "Tell him I said that, would you, Frostfire?"

Frostfire nodded and Izumi nodded back.

"We're not done here, Deku," Ground Zero snarled in interruption. Izumi just chuckled at him.

"Yeah. Yeah we are, Katsuki. Thanks for stopping by to say hello, though. I hope your wedding is nice and congratulations, by the way," Izumi said, and the softness of her tone surprised herself. She found she didn't mind, though. His expression spoiled and he looked like he was ready to rush her but Frostfire just held out an arm to stop him and he deflated.

Then a portal opened behind Izumi and she stopped only to give a two-fingered salute with her right hand to her Hero rivals before stepping through.

---

It was the next day that Ochako went back to where Izumi lived.

The rather gaudy mansion was located in the countryside of Japan, well outside of any major metropolitan areas, and there weren't really any other houses or buildings around for miles. Izumi's staff - who were all remarkably polite, Ochako noted somewhat dryly; she suspected they got paid a ton of money to work in such an unusual position - had been kind enough to give her a phone number to reach the mansion when she was ready to go back. She had given them a call that morning and let them know she planned to come back, so they sent a car out to pick her up.

It was… nice. Kind of weird, that Izumi was now fabulously wealthy, but nice. Ochako didn't have to worry about the train or the crowds or weird people recognizing her from her Hero work and making things awkward. She wouldn't want to be driven everywhere all the time but doing it occasionally? It was fun.

The car pulled through the fancy gates and down the long driveway and, when it stopped near the front door, a butler came out to open it for her. He had introduced himself to her the first time she came as Tanaka and he was a kind elderly man who was in charge of staff at the mansion.

He had chatted with her a bit before she went in to see Izumi the first time. Izumi was a much better employer than their previous employer had been and Tanaka spoke with great appreciation for her. He spoke of her, in fact, like one would of their grandchild, and Ochako had a little smile on her face the whole time she spoke to him.

He led her in and stopped near the steps this time.

"Miss Midoriya is upstairs, in her room. You will find it in the first hallway on your right and it is the second door on the left." Ochako stared blankly at him and he gave a cheeky little smile that only kind old men could give. "She requested that you go up without me," he added by way of explanation, and Ochako felt her face grow hot at the glint in his eye.

"Right. Uh, right, thank you!" She said quickly and gave a little bow, her hair bouncing with the motion, then he bowed back and left her.

Ochako was a little less dressy today: she wore a black polo shirt she rather liked and some khaki slacks, along with some white tennis shoes she'd bought recently. It was wild to have money now; not a ton of money but enough that she had decorations on her walls and she could buy Christmas and birthday presents for her parents without feeling awkward about it.

Izumi used to just directly deposit money into her parents' bank accounts and they didn't ask so many questions when Ochako mentioned having made a 'Hero friend' who wanted to support her as she trained to be a Hero herself as an excuse. Once she graduated, things changed; she noticed that her parents never went long without contracts at their business anymore and certain businesses that Ochako knew Izumi had taken over suddenly wanted her parents to do all their construction work.

They were very successful now and, if they ever wondered about Ochako's Hero friend, they didn't bring it up. Ochako felt a little bad about it but… her parents were happy now and didn't work so hard anymore and that was what was important to her, more than anything else.

Izumi did questionable things for questionable reasons but she had also indisputably made parts of the world better. Ochako knew it because she had made Ochako's world better despite no real gain to herself and that experience was enlightening.

Ochako stopped only to tie her hair back. It was getting a bit longer and she intended to get it cut soon. She used to only grow it out for winter but she'd been busy as a sidekick and hadn't had time to attend to it. She suppressed a strong urge to look herself over in the bathroom; however she looked, it would have to do. Izumi would be a mess either way if their last encounter was anything to go by and Ochako smiled a bit at that.

It was funny, in a way, that she always used to doubt if Izumi would ever feel the same way about her that she did about Izumi. But she strongly suspected that was a silly thought, now.

She ascended the stairs and briefly took stock of the second floor. There was still all the same kind of décor: dark wood walls and floors, old paintings of people in weird clothes, slightly tacky stuffed animal heads, that sort of thing. But she was drawn to one small photo and Ochako couldn't help the huff of amusement she made when she saw it.

It was little Izumi, probably around five or six, in an All Might onesie. She was posing with the real Symbol of Peace for a photo and it looked like it was at some kind of convention. Izumi's mom - or, at least, Ochako assumed it was her mom, since she was a spitting image of Izumi or, perhaps, the other way around - was on the other side of Izumi, gently gripping her daughter's shoulders as she smiled for the camera.

Part of Ochako was a little sad that Yagi didn't remember this, though she figured that she didn't remember all the young fans she'd taken a picture with at this point and she had barely any fans. But part of her was glad to see that it was a memory Izumi cherished enough to save, a little piece of Hero society that she still clung to.

She moved on, following Tanaka's directions, and found the door she'd been directed to was open. She stood by the side and poked her head in, catching the tail end of a conversation.

"…you really shouldn't just let it sit like that, Izumi," a man who sounded awfully familiar said. He had rather wild black hair, from behind, and he wore an orangish-red dress shirt under a black dress vest, with black dress slacks and weird white boots. He heard her, so he turned and smiled when he saw her. He was quite attractive, though much too old for her tastes, and he had a familiar looking green jewel tied to his neck…

Wait.

"Mr. Compress?" Ochako said incredulously, and his smile turned into a grin.

"I'm impressed you were able to recognize me!" He said playfully. Then he turned back to someone farther into the room and gave a little wave with his gloved hand. "I'll leave you two to it. Don't have too much fun, now," he added, in that tone that uncles use to tease the cousins at a family dinner. Ochako had a suspicion he was teasing the both of them, though she wasn't sure why. Then he smirked at her as he turned and briskly left.

That let her walk further into the room and Ochako bit her lip in confusion and curiosity at the sight that greeted her. Izumi was there and the first thing that struck Ochako was that she was incredibly red in the face. That was probably Mr. Compress' doing. She was also bandaged up pretty severely, with some gauze taped to her right cheek, and she wore a hospital gown that showed the bandages on her upper body.

Lastly, she had a cigarette in her mouth and Ochako felt both irritation and amusement at the sight and at the memory of trying it herself. Izumi looked more attractive than she had any right to be with the cigarette hanging out of her mouth and Ochako smiled in spite of how she otherwise looked a bit worse for wear.

"Did Lemillion kick your ass?" Ochako asked teasingly. She heard about the previous night and she was just glad there were no fatalities or permanent injuries on the Hero team. She would've assumed Izumi got out unscathed and was surprised to be proven wrong.

"Something like that," Izumi muttered, looking away in embarrassment. She took the cigarette out of her mouth and blew out a big puff of smoke. Then the cigarette burned away to less than ash in her fingers and floated away, too.

"Why don't you just heal yourself with your… uh," Ochako gestured vaguely in Izumi's direction and Izumi looked back to her in bemusement, "Well, All for One, I guess," she finished, feeling very silly as she did so. Izumi just shrugged at her.

"Don't wanna," she said, and she wasn't a very good liar, so Ochako frowned and immediately walked forward to sit down on the bed next to Izumi.

"Is this okay?" Ochako asked cautiously. Izumi got a bit redder again but nodded shyly and looked away. Ochako took that as permission and she worked her shoes off so she could get a bit farther on the bed and face Izumi, with her legs halfway under her and facing to the right. "Why don't you want to heal yourself?" Ochako asked quietly, but sternly, once she was settled.

"I just… Uh, it's complicated," Izumi said, and Ochako raised an eyebrow in confusion.

"Like 'weird self-worth and identity issues' complicated?" Ochako asked, taking a stab at what she thought might be the problem, and Izumi cracked a smile in response.

"No, like 'All for One is a stupid quirk' complicated," she replied simply, and Ochako couldn't help but snicker.

Izumi had her hands limply on top of the blankets that sat on her lap and she had what looked like five or more pillows to prop herself upright with. Ochako deftly reached out and captured Izumi's left hand and, though Izumi jumped a bit and looked at their hands together like Ochako was a ghost, she did not pull her hand away.

"So," Ochako began, and her tone took on a bit of sarcasm. Izumi raised an eyebrow in preparation for a coming joke. "Mr. Compress is much too attractive to always be wearing a mask, isn't he?"

Izumi openly snorted at that, though she grumbled something under her breath that Ochako didn't hear.

"I keep telling him but he doesn't believe me. He thinks he's 'past his prime' and it's nonsense!" She said with faux despair, and Ochako giggled.

"He'd be a hit at the Hero gala if he could avoid anybody figuring out who he was. I bet he'd get all the dances he wanted from the lovely Hero ladies; maybe even the boys, too, if he played his cards right."

"Well, I'll let him know you gave him feedback. He's hopeless, I swear." Izumi's tone was mockingly irritated but she was grinning and so was Ochako.

"I heard what happened last night. Thanks for not… For making sure everything went okay, yeah?" Ochako said quietly after a moment, and her grin fell. Izumi's grin turned into a small smile but she sighed a bit wistfully.

"It could've gone better. I was not expecting to get ambushed but poor Katsuki is still too predictable and Frostfire and Lemillion, uh, well… They gave me a run for my money, I'll admit," she said, and she fiddled with the blanket using her free hand. Ochako looked down and started tracing the lines of scars on her hand with her gaze but she saw Izumi grimace out of the corner of her eye.

"I never got to get a good look at these," Ochako said quietly, and she reached her other hand out to take Izumi's other hand. Izumi flinched but didn't pull away as Ochako gently ran her thumb across a long, painful-looking scar on the back of Izumi's hand, across where the thumb and index finger met. "They're beautiful, you know?" Ochako whispered, and she looked at Izumi to find her both blushing and frowning.

"I don't… really think so," Izumi admitted in a soft, almost inaudible tone. Ochako just smiled in response.

"They tell the story of where you've been. It's like a little map of all the things you overcame."

"What if I'm not proud of that?" Izumi asked, breathing out the words barely loud enough to hear. Ochako shook her head firmly.

"You should be because you survived, Izumi. That's what counts, I think. I'm glad you're here and… these scars tell me what you had to fight to be here." Ochako gripped Izumi's hands firmly with both of hers, keeping her pinkies raised, and looked at Izumi with a smile and slightly playful expression.

"You are… too much," Izumi said after a moment's hesitation. Ochako raised an eyebrow, inviting her to clarify. "In a good way. I, uh, I'm glad I met you, Uraraka. Thanks for coming back."

Ochako nodded, then released Izumi's hands. Izumi dropped her hands with a slight flop to the bed and pouted only a little bit. Ochako suspected that Izumi did not realize she was pouting, as she quickly tried to fix her face to be more neutral, and that was absolutely adorable. Then Ochako got up and walked back over the door to close it.

"What's wrong?" Izumi asked, a little louder now since Ochako was across the room. Ochako made sure the door was shut properly, then she returned to her position on the bed.

"I just want to chat, the two of us? And whatever happens after, we'll still be friends, okay? The best we can be, anyway," Ochako said simply. Izumi nodded cautiously, then shifted a bit in her position to get more comfortable.

"Did you think about my offer?" Izumi asked, in a tone that betrayed that she suspected Ochako had not thought very hard about her offer.

"I did," Ochako said simply. "I thought about it a lot. And I think… I want to know 'why.'"

"'Why' what?" Izumi asked, her tone pure confusion.

"Why do you act like you aren't worth anything, when you're so good at so many things? Why… would you not heal yourself and sit in bed like a dork healing the normal way when you don't have to? Why do you act like all this is the only thing you could be doing?" Izumi looked utterly stunned, gaping like a fish. "You deserve it, regardless of what anybody said."

Izumi collected herself, though she was getting redder by the second, then she closed her mouth and looked away.

"It's hard when 'you're useless' is the only thing anyone ever told you your whole life," she said quietly, and Ochako couldn't help the sorrow she felt for Izumi.

"Do you really think you could never stop? That you couldn't just… be normal and live a normal life?"

"I doubt I could," Izumi replied quickly. "I tried that and all I learned is that this is where everyone expects me to be, if not useless."

"What if it was with me?" Ochako countered, and Izumi snapped her head back to Ochako.

"What… How do… Never mind, I'm afraid to ask that question," Izumi said much too fast, and Ochako just grinned at her.

"I like you, Izumi. I like you quite a bit, in fact." Ochako couldn't help the huffing laugh that escaped her at the expression Izumi made when she spoke. Izumi looked, a little bit, like Ochako had told her that Ochako was secretly the reincarnation of her father and that it was not a very funny joke.

"I'm… Er, well," Izumi said, at a loss for words. "That's… good. Yeah. Yeah, that's, uh, good." Her voice cracked and she looked both elated and ashamed. Ochako shimmied forward to get closer and Izumi made an audible little yelp of surprise as Ochako hugged her.

"Do you like me, Izumi?" Ochako asked quietly, right into Izumi's ear, and she heard Izumi stop breathing.

"Ahem, uh… y-yes?" It came out more like a question than a statement and Ochako giggled at her. "I mean… I didn't really expect you to ever… like me. This is unusual, I just wish I could be normal…"

"You could be normal," Ochako countered simply, and she squeezed a bit. Izumi made a small sound of pain and Ochako remembered that she was hurt, so she jumped back. "Sorry! I forgot, oh I'm super sorry!"

Izumi coughed once, awkwardly, and was absolutely crimson from neck to ear.

"I think… I'll heal myself now, yeah…" Izumi shuffled forward a bit out from under the covers and got herself into a kneeling position on the bed. "Can you… This is, well…" Izumi trailed off and took a deep breath. "Can you help me take my bandages and stuff off?"

She looked at Ochako and Ochako blinked a few times as she processed both the request and the implication.

"Of course," Ochako said, sounding more confident than she really felt. She moved behind Izumi, guessing Izumi might feel more comfortable that way, and placed her hand flat on Izumi's back, on top of her hospital gown with her pinky raised. She felt as much as she heard the sigh of contentment go through Izumi's body and Izumi turned to look shyly at her.

"I'm going to… take off the gown now, is that alright?"

Ochako just smiled and nodded, realizing that for as relatively inexperienced as she was, Izumi was much, much worse off when it came to romantic interpersonal relationships.

Izumi untied the gown and pulled it off, which left her in some sporty dark gray panties and a dark blue sports bra, with its straps crossed around her neck. She had… She had so many scars on her body; all down her back and midsection, and some of them trailed around to her front. There were definitely more than Ochako remembered in the places she'd already seen and that made her frown.

Ochako took the gown and set it aside, then started peeling off bandages and taped gauze from Izumi's shoulders and arms and back, while Izumi worked on the ones on her front.

Izumi was in incredible shape, too, built kind of like a track runner or professional lightweight boxer, and Ochako's frown slowly turned upwards into a slightly impure grin as she regarded Izumi. She might be a villain and the successor of All for One but she was also hot and Ochako was only human.

Ochako was used to dressing wounds and medical stuff now but the thought of helping her… Well, Ochako wasn't sure what Izumi was to her, now.

"Izumi, would you… Would you ever want to be with me? Romantically?" Ochako asked, gathering her courage and voicing her internal question aloud in a soft tone. She felt Izumi still, so she stopped what she was doing as well.

"I would… like that," Izumi admitted quietly. "But I can't make you stay and I won't ask you to stay if… you're not okay with how I am, as All for One."

Ochako frowned at that and didn't answer at first. She began working again, taking off bandage by bandage until there was none left.

After a moment, there was a little reddish green glow and all of Izumi's visible injuries disappeared, leaving her a few new scars in the process. Izumi rolled her shoulders and Ochako was entranced by the movements of her back muscles. The long scar lines - some bright white, some darker, depending on how deep they'd been - stretched with her movements and Izumi cleared her throat after a moment.

As she watched, Ochako considered her choices carefully and wondered how far she was willing to go to save somebody. She had become a Hero for what she deemed to be selfish reasons but now her parents were secure and Ochako was still a Hero. She still saved people - saved civilians and sometimes even other Heroes when need be - because it was the right thing to do and she enjoyed doing it.

Could she save a villain, though?

Or perhaps the important question, Ochako decided as she slowly moved forward and gently gripped Izumi's hips with four-fingered touches on either side, taking in the smell of her shampoo - a fresh spring smell - as she set her face against her back, was whether or not Izumi was properly a villain at all. Izumi stopped breathing again and Ochako considered her own silent question and squeezed Izumi gently.

Intellectually, Ochako knew the answer was 'yes.' But that answer didn't feel right; it didn't feel satisfactory, like it didn't properly encompass the full depth of who Izumi Midoriya really was and how she got there.

Ochako gently kissed the skin of Izumi's right shoulder and Izumi gasped. Ochako left her left hand where it was and brought her right hand up in between them to firmly, slowly drag her index and middle finger down in a V-shape across Izumi's spine. Izumi was incredibly tense, with her hands resting as fists on her knees, but she leaned back into the touch.

"Do you ever think about how things should have been different?" Ochako asked as her fingers reached the waistband line of Izumi's panties. Then she began to trail her fingers back up and Izumi arched her back in response.

"All the time," Izumi whispered breathily, and Ochako giggled.

"Does it feel nice?" Ochako asked quietly, but a bit mischievously, too.

"Ahem, uh… It does. I'm a little… intimidated," she admitted as Ochako reached the bottom of the line of her bra and went back down. "I feel like you've done this before and I haven't…"

Ochako hummed neutrally in response and squeezed Izumi's left side. Izumi sighed in contentment and Ochako watched with curiosity and satisfaction as a blush crawled up her back and neck once more.

"Maybe I have," Ochako admitted matter-of-factly. "There's something alluring about the most dangerous person in Japan becoming putty for me like this, though. Do you enjoy that? That somebody so… normal has such power over you?"

Ochako reached Izumi's panty line again and hooked her two fingers into the waistband, flicking it against Izumi's skin. The successor to All for One jumped in response and made the quietest little yelp. It was almost too endearing to see this side of her, besides the sex appeal of it. Izumi was attractive, certainly, but she also felt terribly vulnerable in this moment, like she was showing Ochako things no one was allowed or might ever be allowed to see otherwise.

"I… You're not just normal, Ochako," Izumi said, and she turned to look at Ochako with one big green eye. Ochako grinned wolfishly in response, noting that she finally used Ochako's given name, and she saw Izumi hide her mouth a little behind her shoulder. "And… I do. Because I… Well…" She trailed off, but Ochako's smile just softened.

"I do love you, Izumi. I'm not sure how we got here, really, but… I want to protect you, if you'll let me. If I really can offer any real protection to someone like you."

"You shouldn't…" Izumi paused and closed her eyes, her head still turned towards Ochako from over her shoulder. "I love you, too. But… It's not physical protection I really needed, I think. And… I'm so, so glad that you're here, for whatever that's worth."

"That's worth a lot," Ochako said as she began to trail her fingers back up Izumi's spine, this time using her nails. Izumi gasped sharply and looked away and she was so, so very warm. "You're so beautiful. I'm sorry nobody else ever told you the truth before."

Izumi chuckled slightly awkwardly but didn't argue. Ochako counted that as a win.

"Are you sure you can't stop doing what you do?" Ochako asked, in a tone more hopeful than she expected.

"I don't think I can. I'm sorry. If… if I do, everything will get worse again. It's important to me to build a better world… However I can."

Ochako moved her right hand back to Izumi's side and scooted forward so she could rest her face against Izumi's right shoulder and thread her fingers around Izumi's stomach. She felt Izumi's ab muscles against her palms and Izumi immediately became much less tense as Ochako squeezed her.

"Then… I think I'm willing to work with you," Ochako said quietly.

"You're willing to become a villain for me?" Izumi asked, genuinely surprised. Ochako chuckled a bit against Izumi's shoulder, listening to how her breathing slowly leveled out and synchronized with Ochako's own rhythm.

"I think a lot about what you told me, you know. When we first met? You said I would become a Hero who only thinks about upholding the status quo and not about the motives of the villains she faces or something to that effect, right?" Izumi nodded and Ochako memorized how her body moved with the motion. "So… I thought about it and I think I can understand your motives and… I accept them, even if I wish you'd act on those motives differently sometimes."

"I've done a lot of bad things, Ochako," Izumi replied in a slightly glum tone.

"You have. And I'm not proud of those things," Ochako responded frankly. "But I'm proud of you. I'd like to… make your life better and have you make my life better, if that's okay?"

"It's… it would be really dangerous for you… are you sure?" Izumi whispered quietly, pleadingly. She was bargaining more so with herself than Ochako, as Ochako had already made up her mind.

Ochako moved back and pulled on Izumi's shoulder so she would turn around and face Ochako properly. Izumi did and looked utterly embarrassed as she turned scarlet, feeling exposed in the face of Ochako in spite of it all. Ochako just smiled and gently cupped Izumi's face on both sides with her hands, reveling in finally being able to do that after so long of dreaming about it.

"It's okay, sweetie, as long as you're comfortable," Ochako whispered, and Izumi gave a wobbly smile, then looked away.

"I… Alright. I would… Can I kiss you?"

Ochako could only barely hear her but she understood. So she moved forward, gently pressing her lips to Izumi's, and it was beautiful and perfect and right and like no other kiss she'd ever had before, even if it was only the lightest touch. When Ochako pulled away, feeling a bit like a cat that caught the mouse, Izumi looked utterly awestruck.

"That's just the start," Ochako said mischievously, and Izumi closed her eyes and chuckled.

"Can you show me?" She whispered, barely audible. She looked away shyly to the bed and Ochako couldn't help but grin at the bashfulness of her love.

"I thought you'd never ask!" Ochako pulled Izumi forward into a hug. "But tell me if you're ever uncomfortable and we'll stop."

Izumi nodded against Ochako's shoulder, so Ochako did show her and she got to run her fingers across every scar on Izumi's body, enjoying the quiet noises of surprise and pleasure and vulnerability she made as Ochako did so. Distantly, Ochako wondered, as she gave herself to Izumi and Izumi gave herself to Ochako, if she really was making the right choice.

But Ochako decided that there was nowhere else she would rather be, whether or not that made her a Hero or a villain or anything else. It was worth it, to her. She would protect someone who was never protected and she knew Izumi would move heaven and earth to make Ochako happy, too.

So she stayed and decided for herself that this was home.