A/N: I guess it's about time AFO figures out for good that Yoichi's soul is alive and well within his own son, huh? Be forewarned, this is going to be a tense chapter.

Hisashi clucked his tongue in disappointment at the thermometer's reading. "39 Celsius… You're going to have to be bedridden for a while, Tomura."

Said man blinked blearily up at his mentor. His face was horribly flushed and the frown cracking his chapped lips, as well as his clammy pallor and the weak coughs that periodically shook his skinny frame, made him appear even more ill than he was.

"Rest well." He patted his stringy silver hair with a sigh. "I'll have to see about reworking a few plans until you return to health."

Turning, he wiped the thermometer off with an alcohol-dampened handkerchief before putting it back in its case. While he made his way out of the chilled room, Tomura's eyelids fluttered shut and his lips parted as he fell into a shallow slumber.

As soon as the door closed, Hisashi heaved a deeper sigh, his broad shoulders sinking with the breath. With my chosen out of commission… I wonder. Dabi is likely with the League, but I don't believe interfering with his work would be wise of me. As with Kurogiri; he's still on call, but he should be setting up another quaint little hiding place.

He looked down the hall when he heard clacking coming from the kitchen. I wonder if Izuku has finally begun to warm up to me yet.

Making his way down the stairs, he looked around into the doorway to see his son washing a mug with a stiffness that appeared odd for him. To his disdain, he noticed a cartoonish grin peeking back at him, and he realized it was the All Might mug that he had been protective over as of late.

He took a quiet breath and stepped fully into the harsh lighting of the tiny kitchen. "Izuku, good morning. Since Tomura is sick today, I was wondering if we could-"

Izuku's hand slamming down on the counter, accompanied with a harsh clack of ceramic on metal, were hardly enough to make him flinch - yet he was shocked when his teenage son turned his head to stare at him over his shoulder with a glare that could kill.

"Hisashi," his voice sneered, with an iciness that he hadn't been expecting from the young man.

I suppose that plan will still have to remain on standby. He shook his head in disappointment before opening his arms. "Come now, Izuku. I know you're unhappy that I brought my successor to live with us, but whatever ill feelings you have for him should not be-"

"My ill feelings are not meant for the boy, Hisashi," Izuku interrupted, and as he turned his body fully to face the tall man he set the mug down on the counter before folding his arms across his chest. "I rather pity him for being a pawn in your twisted little mind games."

The silver-haired man blinked, staring openly at his son with an unreadable face. Nobody had dared speak to him that way in a century; not since…

"I can't even begin to comprehend what you have in mind for this boy," 'Izuku' continued, gesturing to his own body as his voice trembled, rippling with anger and fear alike, "but as long as I still remain on this earth I shall now allow it. You will not lay a single finger on Midoriya Izuku."

Hisashi's gaze hardened, and as he stepped forward he noted how the boy pressed himself even further against the counter, his hands coming to rest against the edge of the cool metal, fully prepared to launch himself from his spot in haste to escape should it be necessary.

The image that resurfaced in his mind was all too clear.

"You are… Yoichi, aren't you." It was not even a question.

"And if I am?" Yoichi taunted in Izuku's voice, identical green eyes narrowing right back at him with the simple audacity that all but confirmed his identity. "What will you do? Surely you realize I will not go willingly."

"I should have realized that only one person in this world would speak to me this way," he chuckled, reaching up to brush back his hair from his face. "Should I ask how you managed to remain?"

"I was naïve, not a fool," he shot back. "It would not matter anyway. Izuku would never tell you."

"Is that right." His voice grew flat. "Brother, surely by now you realize-"

"Surely by now you realize that I'm done listening to your attempts at manipulating the truth?" Yoichi interrupted again, and he swore he could feel an irritating headache forming in the back of his skull. "You swore off this child the day you left your wife heartbroken and alone as a single mother."

"I intend to make up for all the pain I've caused," Hisashi countered. "Why else would I have found him again? I missed my wife and my son."

"You hardly knew him!" His younger brother retorted. "You left to foster Tomura when your son was too young to know the difference!"

"Did I not remain long enough for him to intrinsically know the truth?"

"That makes you no father."

"It makes me something," he snapped.

"Yes indeed," Yoichi sarcastically agreed. "It made you a multi-generational menace who just so happens to have sired offspring. I pity your descendants."

"Gods above, were you always this insufferable?" Hisashi heaved a ragged breath, massaging his forehead. "Sometimes I forget just how you used to drive me mad."

"All the better, for how much you made me suffer," the younger spat coldly. "The world would have been better off had you not been your brother's keeper!"

"What happened then is done. What's important is the present." All For One chided. "Really now, Yoichi, mother always chided you for keeping such silly grudges."

The boy's body grew unnaturally still. At that moment, the cool atmosphere of the room suddenly became freezing; had it not been for the frost-resistance Quirk he'd stolen from someone way back when, it would have chilled him in his spot.

"Silly… grudge…?" The boy's voice spoke softly, a deadly calm that threatened to betray the simmering, burning anger he could sense hidden deep within. "Really, brother?"

"I made you strong."

"You made me suffer!" His sudden bellow seemed to suck the air from the small room, as an unnatural hush fell across the ancient building. Even the omnipresent creaks and groans of old metal beams grew quiet as if watching on in fear of the wrath of the younger Shigaraki. Even now as Izuku's body heaved with breath, the icy-cold stare the man was affixed with felt all too uncomfortably like the long lost Shigaraki Yoichi.

"You," his voice trembled, "you are a scourge on this earth. A hex. A curse . You would assault your own brother and lock him away if it meant keeping him far away from the chance of toppling your precarious empire."

"It was to keep you safe," Hisashi reminded him.

"It was to keep me complacent!" Izuku's voice raised again, his hands clenching into fists. "It was to keep me mad! You did this to me, Hisashi - YOU DID THIS TO ME!"

"Stop it with your tantrums, Yoichi," the silver-haired man scolded. "You are no child anymore."

"You would know about tantrums, wouldn't you," a mad grin came over his face - so uncanny and disturbing on his son's face - and he pointed at his own chest. "Well how's this for a tantrum? I will take this boy far away - so far you will never find him. Mark my words."

"I can and will take you from him." Hisashi's voice suddenly grew very serious.

Izuku's body flinched the slightest bit, much to his delight - it seemed even in undeath, Yoichi feared him. Yet he didn't back down, and he leaned in and bit back with a slow, deliberate, "Why don't you try?"

Nobody could say he wouldn't rise to a challenge. Hisashi's shoulders squared and he made purposeful, slow strides towards the smaller teen - and even when his body flinched back against the counter, his hands moving to grip the edges again, he didn't move out of the way as the father planted his hand atop Izuku's forehead.

"Doesn't… this… feel… familiar?" Izuku's voice seemed tense, yet there was a dissonant smile on his face as he stared defiantly up at him. "Huh, brother?"

The monochromatic landscape trembled and shook with energy, even as the spirit of All For One stood before the crumbled walls of the bunker. His hand was outstretched, clasped firmly around his son's head - and the souls of seven others held steadfast to his body, steadily trying to yank him back against the dark suction of power emanating from his hand.

The defiant glare of Shigaraki Yoichi was pointed directly into his face, his ex-subordinates at the younger's right and left side. The other four filled in the spaces, the glares and cold stares of the others (and especially the vicious look that one Shimura Nana was sending him as she tightened her grip on Izuku's wrist) did little to cow him away; if anything, it inspired him to attempt harder to rid his son of the ghosts.

A scream tore itself from his son's throat, long-drawn and pained.

"Stop resisting," he hissed, "and come to your senses!"

Suddenly, from below him, Izuku's head moved, and another howl of pain escaped him.

He weakly shook his head, gritting his teeth in pain. "N… no…"

"Izuku!" He tried again. He tightened his grip on his head.

"NO!" His shout rang in his ears, painfully intensifying his headache and echoing around the broken room, sending ripples of energy along the vast emptiness.

A bright light flashed through the area, and the exclamation of the spirits as well as Izuku's screaming knocked him back in its intensity.

The connection was severed in a split-second, sending him crashing back to reality and stumbling away from the boy's limp body.

As he went to brush off his suit, Izuku's laugh weakly escaped his throat, his hands grasping the counter tightly. His fingers shook and his legs seemed to imperceptibly wobble, even as he stood back up straight and looked the man in the eye.

"You saw, did you not? You saw all of us." Izuku's mouth stretched into a mad grin. "We are still here, Hisashi - we are the result of your sins. This boy is the one to destroy you. And I… I will do everything I can to see that through."

Hisashi watched him as he began to laugh, his body folding in on itself as sharp cackles filled the kitchen.

Finally, he asked sadly, "When did you decide to hate me so much, little brother?"

Izuku's body stopped laughing.

Piercing green eyes met his, and he felt his skin crawl.

"When?" He inquired. "When did I decide? I didn't decide, brother - it was never my choice to begin with."

Izuku's body swayed as he lowered his head.

"Ten years," his voice spoke up before the tall man had a chance to reply. "Ten years of isolation. Ten years of paranoia. Ten years of torture." Izuku's finger pointed shakily at him. "From the night you assaulted me, I knew there was no good left inside of you. You expunged it all the night you did the unspeakable."

Suddenly his eyelids fluttered shut - and his body sagged forward, yet he remained on his feet.

Hisashi reached for the boy in caution. "Izuku?"

He came to slowly, straightening back up with an unreadable face. He looked up at Hisashi for the briefest of moments before shaking his head and turning around to grab his mug.

"Izuku," Hisashi tried again.

"No." His voice was quiet, defeated. He wouldn't even meet his gaze. "I… I can't deal with this right now."

He watched as his son left the room, his curly black - not green, black - hair burned into his brain as he disappeared from sight.

I lost my brother, he reflected, a frown settling on his face. …have I lost my wife and son too?

A/N: No physical incest was committed. That's all I will say.