22XX
Heroism… Izuku didn't know what it meant, as a child he'd seen heroes everywhere and as a byproduct of that, he'd always had this immutable feeling and yearning call to be one; this feeling to do something, to carry someone out of a burning building, it was intoxicating. But… A quirkless could never be a hero, that's what they told him time after time without mercy, without reason… Well there was a reason of course, always was.
He was weak.
And that's why he could never stand up for himself
"If you go to UA, we'll be having some issues…" A crackling flash heated the greenettes face, his eyes closing to protect from the heat.
He shrunk into himself, "B-but… I don't even want to compete with you! I just want to try to have closure!" Izuku begged.
"Then stay! Out! You're wasting your time!" The rest of the class laughed at his ideals, every last one of them echoing one another mindlessly to satiate their own sense of insecurity.
But that was final, if it came from Katsuki. Someone who was higher than him on the social hierarchy… He couldn't disagree without being ridiculed.
Izuku never argued much, what could he do? His words didn't matter, his wants. All he could do was stutter out a half assed contention, he was... powerless. Powerless to change anything, powerless to take what he wanted.
There was no light in this world, not a single person had ever justified his belief, to be a hero despite having no power. There was no light in the world, no inspiration to be someone better. He did not know in his mind, but he knew it in his soul that everything he did would only lead to disappointment.
"You look dead! Hardly a good disguise hehehe, in a few years I bet you'll turn to our side… I'll just find another body in that case. Do me a favor when you kill someone, just let em know I supported you first heheheh!" The slime creature slithered away, Izuku at that point was ready to accept death and yet… Even a villain couldn't manage to put him out of this suffering.
The mass of sludge went around the corner, leaving the pale shadow of a quirkless to his woes, alone in the underpass.
A hand laid on his shoulder, Izuku stood at the front of the crowd with his eyes laced and worried.
"Don't worry kid, a hero will come soon to help, a hero who fits the villain." Ironically, a hero told him with a straight face.
The sludge villain had taken a random person off the street with a powerful wind quirk, the heroes were unable to get close and damage him. All the while the sludge villain snuffed out the life of a person.
And so they waited.
That person died.
Curling with 10 pound dumbbells, Izuku strained against his fifth rep, his face red. He'd barely started his regime and he was already out of energy. He let down the weight to the ground and sat on his bed, frustrated at the lack of progress over the last two months.
Eating 3000 calories a day did nothing to help, he just wanted to be strong…
But instead of getting strong, he just felt weak, tired, worthless all the time.
He quit his regimen 3 months in.
The lead up to the entrance exams weren't exhilarating, he'd aced the tests of course, but his quirkless nature…
The robot army they'd employed against the students knocked him out in the middle of the street, he'd frozen up. He'd only managed to get one point from the entire thing, and that was a fluke.
"What did I tell you!" Idiot.
"You told me not to go…" A whisper.
"Right, you better realize soon that you'll never amount to anything NEAR to my greatness, you failed after all."
"Yea." Izuku spoke without a hint of emotion.
"Whatever Katsuki."
"Don't call me that."
"Whatever Katsuki."
"Don't fucking call me that Deku!"
He held up the smaller boy by the collar, his face contorted into pure rage.
"WHATEVER KATSUKI!"
"DUMBASS DEKU!"
Izuku spit on his face, tired of it all and in a small ineffective way of rebellion...
Katsuki did a double take, his face burning beet red in anger.
The taller teen punched him in the gut, tripping him and then stomping on his stomach again for good measure.
"Just give up." The blonde teen spoke, calmly. And for the last time in four years, Izuku saw his former best friend, walking away and into a
brighter future that had no place for him.
Izuku didn't move from that spot for several hours, confused as to how a world prefaced by the idea of heroism was… So cruel. Heroes hiding like civilians, power mongers being praised and heralded like gold, it didn't add up, it hurt to think about it.
The pain of a heroic heart in a world where heroism was a farce. Izuku didn't know what a hero could possibly be anymore, because none lifted him up to be something greater.
Not a single one.
It took a while before he learned to live like this, like an empty fruitless idea left by the expanse of a greater mind. But eventually.
Life became a bit more tolerable.
