Chapter 4: Recovery Begins
Izuku's head had finally cleared. The 3rd stage was unconsciousness. While the 4th and Final Stage was a daze that last for nearly a day, after all the brain had to reorganize itself with new memories.
Of course with everything that happened he was in the hospital.
And Izuku was confused, not only because of the new memories now in his mind.
Memories of an abusive childhood with a madman for a father who had plans to take over an entire ocean. Running away from it thanks to his older sister, ending up stranded on a rock for days nearly starving to death with a pirate who sacrificed so much for him. Eventually working with the man who saved him in a restaurant until meeting a rubber man who recruited him into his rag tag crew. A crew that was his family.
He didn't understand any of it…
And what was stranger was that sometimes he acted like the man from his memories, like flirting with the nurses. Not to mention the sudden urge to start smoking. Among other things.
"What's wrong with me." He muttered to himself.
That was when the door knocked.
"I'm coming in anyways!" said a voice.
It was the hero that Nezu called.
"Izuku Midoriya, right?" asked the hero.
"Yeah, who are you?" asked Izuku.
"My name is Hibiki Kinzoku." Said the hero, "But I'm also the hero Orchestra Rave!"
"No way! I've heard of you!" yelled Izuku going into full fan boy mode, "You're the Music Player Hero! Able to turn music into conclusive blasts that you can use to attack and fly! Not only that but you're a technological genius and sometime about three years ago you became an accomplished inventor."
"Wow! A hero fan boy! Wished someone should have warned me." Joked Hibiki.
"So what of it." Said Izuku suddenly glaring at him.
"Okay… someone has conflicting personalities." Said Hibiki sitting down.
"I'm sorry I don't know what's wrong with me." Said Izuku.
"Let me guess you got a ton of memories from someone from a completely different world stuffed into your head and now you're dealing with the problems that comes with it." He said.
"How… how did you know." Said Izuku.
"You're not the first person to fall victim to that Quirk." Said Hibiki.
"What did she do?" asked Izuku remembering the last thing before everything was a blur after falling victim to Priestess' quirk.
"Made you remember your past life." Said Hibiki.
"Wait… everything that happened…" said Izuku.
"Happened to you in a past life…" said Hibiki nodding.
"What seriously?" asked Izuku.
"It's true." Said Hibiki.
"Everything that happened to Sanji…" said Izuku.
"Happened to you in another life." Said Hibiki, "Which is why your Principal asked me to be a councilor for you and your all other classmates who also fell victim. There's four others. We're going to have a therapy group to talk about everything in about a half an hour."
"Why?" asked Izuku.
"Unless your life was filled to the brim of sunshine and rainbows you have a lot of problems going on inside your head." Said Hibiki.
"No, of course it wasn't." said Izuku.
"Good." Said Hibiki who then stared at Izuku with a sweat drop, "Because if it was that would freak me out! Because one of you classmates did have a life of sunshine rainbows and friendship! And that was would really weird if there were two of you."
"Please tell me you're joking." Said Izuku with a sweat drop.
"I wish!" said Hibiki, "And even if it was… there's still the other emotional baggage… I mean you have friends and family that you will never see again. People who you loved and you loved back… all gone in a snap."
He thought back to his crew and a few other people.
"You're right." Said Izuku.
"So many people are hurting because of her, and I want to help her other victims." Said Hibiki.
Izuku nodded knowing he was right.
"Tick tock! Tick tock! Tick tock!" said Aiko from a device on his belt.
"Seriously…" said Hibiki.
"Come on I'm supposed to give you the same amount of time with each kid and you're only half way done!" said Aiko.
"Sorry…" said Hibiki, "I see you later."
He placed a clock on the nightstand.
"Aiko will tell you when it's time for the session." Said Hibiki, "Don't worry, she'll only enter it when it's time to give you privacy."
"Oh come on! I won't blackmail him with anything." Said Aiko.
"The fact that you keep bringing that up means that you probably will." Muttered Hibiki.
"If I have haven't turned evil yet, doesn't mean Ill suddenly turn evil!" countered Aiko.
Hibiki closed the door to give Izuku privacy.
He began to think about everything. He hated a lot of stuff that happened to his past life but tat the same time it was extremely comforting to know that those memories of that pirate crew were real, the good and the bad times.
However something hit him… a certain thing from his childhood… both childhoods.
"How can that happened twice…" he muttered to himself.
However there was another knock on the door.
"Come in!" he called out wondering if Hibiki forgot something.
Turned out it wasn't Hibiki but rather All Might in his true form.
"Are you feeling?" he asked.
"Better." Said Izuku.
"There's a lot we need to talk about." Said All Might sitting in the chair.
"Yeah." Said Izuku nodding figuring something went down after he was hit by the quirk.
"First off I don't want to burden you with everything if you want to quit being a hero." Said All Might.
"Wait… what?" asked Izuku.
"I guess I have known that you wouldn't want to quit." Said All Might, "About 94 percent of Priestess' victims quit being heroes."
"Why?" asked Izuku.
"Most people didn't have fighting abilities or were anything close to heroes in their past lives." Said All Might, "It quickly got to them and didn't have that drive any more. I have heard of those weren't fighters in their past life counting being heroes, but it's rare."
Before Izuku could explain anything.
"But I already know you were fighter." Said All Might.
"Wait! How did you know about that?" asked Izuku.
"After you were hit the quirk, you entered a sort of flight or fight feral state. Thankfully it allowed you recognize friends and foes. From what I heard you really let loose on many of the villains." Said All Might.
"Wait… if I was fighting why did the hell you think I would quit!" yelled Izuku acting like his past life.
He then started blushing.
"Sorry about that I didn't mean to yell at you like that!" said Izuku.
"It's okay, it's actually very common for people in your situation to switch between the personalities of this life and their past lives." Said All Might.
"Oh okay…" said Izuku.
"Anyways we weren't sure, due to the fact that well… you're the first time she went after teenagers." Said All Might.
"I guess that makes sense." Said Izuku, "But I can't just give up on my dream… I was part of a crew. And each one of that a dream that we each strived for. If I just gave up on my dream in this life, I feel like I would be letting them down."
All Might smiled and nodded.
"I can imagine my captain saying something along the lines of "Go be a hero and share you meat with everyone."" Said Izuku with a sad smile.
There was an awkward silence.
"What?" asked All Might.
"It had to do with his idea on what contuses a hero." Said Izuku going back into Sanji mode, "The shitty idiot had a lot of weird ideas…"
"So a crew?" asked All Might.
"We were pirates." Sighed Izuku knowing it would come eventually.
"Wait… what?" asked All Might.
"Look we were criminals but the government was more often the bad guy! They did a lot of very terrible things all so they could stay in powers." Said Izuku panicking.
"I see…" said All Might.
"Besides we were seen as heroes on so many islands because we saved them." Said Izuku.
"I'm not judging you for being a criminal in a past life, it was a just very surprising." Said All Might.
Izuku breathed a sigh of relief.
"You weren't the captain. So what were you in your past life?" asked All Might, "Considering the fight you put up you were the First Mate at least right."
"I was the cook." Said Izuku.
"Seriously?" asked All Might staring at them.
"What's that supposed to mean?" asked Izuku glaring at him.
"You know there's other stuff we have to talk about." Said All Might changing the subject.
"About what?" asked Izuku.
"I fought at the USJ." Said All Might.
Izuku froze when he said that.
"You saw that news that morning, did you?" asked All Might.
"I did." Said Izuku.
"I'll be lucky if I hold the form for an hour." Explained All Might, "It didn't help after I heard about what Priestess did to you."
"I'm sorry." Said Izuku.
"It's fine." He said, "These things happen."
Both of them sat silent for a few minutes.
Then All Might saw a plate of cupcakes.
"So I guess you've been getting visitors." Said All Might.
Izuku jumped when he saw the cupcakes.
"Not again!" yelled Izuku.
"What do you mean?" asked All Might.
"They keep showing up!" yelled Izuku, "I asked the nurses and they don't know who's giving them to me! Not only that but their my favorite kind too! It's really freaking me out! I'm scared!"
"It's fine! I'm sure someone is just trying to reassure you with their quirk…" said All Might.
Then he saw Izuku eating them.
"If you're scared why are you eating them?" asked All Might.
"It's a long story…" Izuku sighed as they ate them.
All Might figured out that a past life thing.
After calming down, they both looked at the countdown clock, it had less than 10 minutes on the clock.
"Maybe I should give you some alone time before your therapy session." Said All Might.
"Thanks." Said Izuku.
"Everything's going to change." Said All Might.
"I know you don't have to tell me." Said Izuku in Sanji mode again moving his hands like he was trying to light a cigarette and then caught himself.
All Might looked at him.
"Chain smoker." Sighed Izuku.
"I see…" chucked All Might.
He left leaving Izuku with his thoughts.
"I didn't ask who the other four are." Thought Izuku realizing it, "Oh no… what if one of them… is…"
He paled, he wasn't sure how he could handle Bakugo being one of them, not when he had those memories now.
"Hey! It's time for your therapy session." Said Aiko from the clock.
"Oh…" said Izuku.
"Wait… you have to bring me, I'm the one leading you to the room they set up" said Aiko from the clock.
Izuku held the countdown clock and following her instructions.
"Deku!" called Ochaco.
The breathed a sigh of relief when he heard the voice.
"So you fell victim too." Sighed Ochaco.
"Yeah." Sighed Izuku.
He faced her and his eyes turned to hearts.
"Uh… Deku…" said Ochaco.
"Oh sorry about that… "he said getting out of Sanji mode.
"It's fine." Sighed Ochaco then she began to blush a little.
"Is something wrong?" asked Izuku.
"Oh no! Everything's all right!" she said clearly flustered.
"I'm sure it's just your past life personalities." Said Toru making the two jump due to being invisible expect for her hospital clothes, "Oh sorry about that! Didn't mean to scare you."
He mentally breathed a sigh of relief that it wasn't Bakugo.
"Yeah…" said Izuku.
"I've been dealing with them too… and new weird powers." Said Toru.
"What do you mean new weird powers?" asked Ochaco.
"I don't know." Said Toru with a shrug.
"You know it's rude to leave us hanging." Said Aiko from Toru's countdown clock.
The three headed to the room, right when they got to the room, they saw Momo was there.
"Oh Yaoyorozu." Said Izuku mentally breathing a sigh of relief.
"So it's you three." She said a little nervously.
"Yeah." Said Izuku then his eyes erupted into hearts again.
"Is he all right?" asked Momo.
"Past life personality trait." Said Toru.
"I see." Said Momo with a sweat drop.
They opened the door to find Hibiki there with Ojiro, making Izuku breath a final sigh of relief.
In the room was a small circle of six chairs.
"Good you all made it." Said Hibiki, "I had to bring him in."
"Why?" asked Izuku as he and the girls took seats.
"I'll explain after a few explanations." Said Hibiki, "First off this group will have three rules. The first rule is the most important: What we talk about in the group remains in the group, of course you can tell other people about your own problems, but you can't tell anyone about everyone else's."
Everyone nodded.
"Now the second rule: You have to refer to your past life as if you was you…" said Hibiki, "There have been cases in the past where other victims tried to distance themselves, it didn't end well for them..."
The five teens were concerned by this but agreed to it, it helped for Izuku at least he wasn't trying to distance himself.
"And the final rule…" he said with the upmost seriousness.
The teens were nervous about the rule.
"We refer to each other by either Given names or nicknames." Said Hibiki.
This just made the five teens sweat drop.
"We're going to meeting often, unless you chose to quit the hero course, so we're going to be learning a lot about each other." Said Hibiki, "Also I was American in my past life and it's common to use given names."
"That does make sense." Said Ochaco.
"Just remember the nickname thing." Said Aiko.
"I should also properly introduce you to my assistant Aiko." Said Hibiki.
"Yeah, what is up with that voice any ways." Said Toru.
"Well to be honest I am not human, I am merely an AI." Said Aiko, "In fact my really name is A.I.K.O."
"What does that stand for?" asked Ojiro… well Mashirao.
"It stands for Artificial Intelligence Knows Objectively." Said Aiko.
"Objectively what?" asked Momo.
There were was a small silence before Aiko answered, "That I'm better than you."
That was when that repeating air horn sound effect played causing everyone in the room to sweat drop.
"But in all seriousness this guy likes giving his AIs he builds acronym names." Said Aiko, "And that was the best O word he could come up with."
"Yeah…" sighed Hibiki blushing.
"I'm going to be here for most sessions." Said Aiko.
"Anyways for sessions with a set plan like today I'll use myself as a set example and will sometimes use my friend Yuzu as an example as well."
"Yuzu?" asked Ochaco.
"She's another pro hero who was a fellow victim." Said Hibiki, "You might have heard of Crystal Harmony."
"Wait! I've heard her! She has the quirk Crystallization! It allows her to create any crystal she wants to!" said Izuku going to into fan boy mode then started blushing.
"Still the fan boy." Cheered Ochaco.
"Yeah…" said Izuku.
"Wait… why are you best friends with her?" asked Mashirao.
"You see the victims who remained heroes…" said Hibiki.
The four that didn't know this fact was a littlie concerned by that sentence.
"Tend to meet up often in different ways for therapy groups and other littlie get-togethers." Explained Hibiki, "We hit it off and now we consider each other best friends."
"Why?" asked Toru.
"Well it's kind of funny. While we were from different worlds, we were both from America in the same time frame, the late 20th Century/Early 21st century." Said Hibiki.
"Wait… how do you know it was different worlds?" asked Momo.
He thought about the big differences then he remembered a good one to ease them into it.
"Well first off in her world, you know Leap Day?" asked Hibiki.
"Leap Day?" asked Izuku.
"Oh February 29th." Said Toru.
"Yeah, it turns out in her world it's a big deal. There traditions like you eat rhubarb and wear blue and yellow. The holiday figure Leap Day William who comes out of the Mariana trench to turn children's tears into candy. And a 90's holiday movie starring Jim Carrey." Explained Hibiki.
"Who's Jim Carrey?" whispered Ochaco.
"I have no idea." Said Izuku.
"While in my world… well let's just say that I'll get into that later." Said Hibiki, "But she did give me permission to use her sometimes as an example."
He wasn't going to tell everyone thing about Yuzu's past life, the personal stuff was course off limits like the whole about not moving Cleveland to be with a guy and the stuff he really shouldn't talk to teens about like the time she had a three way with James Franco and a body pillow with the picture of an anime girl on it.
It also irked him to no end that she had the better celebrity sex story.
"But yeah she was a comedy writer who worked on some TV shows back in her life." Said Hibiki.
"Shouldn't you be talk about your self?" asked Mashirao.
"I guess you're right." Said Hibiki, "You see another difference between mine and Yuzu's world is something that happened. Heroes not too far off from what happened years ago started appearing. I was the first to go public, although I didn't have anything similar to a quirk. I just had a suit that gave me the power to fight. I had fought many villains in my past life, fought off against a god and alien invaders. Even part of a team… In my past life I was Iron Man."
The five teens were surprised to find out that their we councilor was a Hero in their past life.
After all while they did have interesting abilities from their past life… none of them could be considered heroes in the sense they thought of the word…
Next Time: The Therapy Group counties with the others revealing their past lives. Who were they in their lives. Does one of them have a problem caused by their past lives? And will all of them remain heroes? Find out next time!
A/N: Wow! Someone correctly guessed that he's Iron Man. I guess I shouldn't be too surprised! Also to clear it up MCU Tony... so yeah...
Also Yuzu won't be onscreen for a while (if ever... still unsure) but she is a crossover character. I wont' reveal who until later unless someone correctly guesses the show she's from, as I said before she is a sitcom character... and I'm not kidding about the thing involving Leap Day (it's an awesome episode, they put a lot of work into creating real holyday traditions for Leap Day, even getting Jim Carrey and Andie MacDowell to guest star for clips of the fake movie... if Yo figure out the show I highly recommend the episode Leap Day even though it's season 6) and James Franco (They actually got James Franco for the episode... I won't give too much away about the episode other than it being part of a B plot and the body pillow does factor heavily into it).