"And what is that circle,
but the shadow of the sun itself."
—Karen Maitland
"I want to be discharged," Yagi Toshinori insisted from his hospital bed, but Recovery Girl merely shook her head.
"Not possible," she answered bluntly as she hopped off her chair to stand. "You aren't going back out tonight. You might as well rest."
"They need me," he countered, but, again, she shook her head.
"Yagi, you have given enough — all that you can. Share the weight of the burden with others now."
But the abscess in his soul was rotting fast within these hospital walls. He was on his back in the hospital bed, an IV in his forearm, and the television set to the news. The volume was down, and he read the subtitles with guilt while he watched the shots of the rescue efforts in Kamino Ward.
So much…destruction. He had done his best to mitigate the damage as he had fought All For One, but the sheer immensity left him feeling broken with failure. The news helicopter flew high over Kamino Ward and the camera panned over the ruins.
How many innocents had died in that rubble? What more could he have done?
Shigaraki was Shimura Nana's grandson.
His hand fisted, squeezing tight, but as his gaze dropped to evaluate himself, his fingers opened in defeat. Recovery Girl saw, and misread it.
"Rest," Recovery Girl chided once more, a warble in her elderly voice. "I have other patients to see, but I will be back for you tomorrow — and you'd better be here."
She left, her walk triumphant, as though she'd won. His sense of defeat was not for her, though he wished with clammy desperation that it was. But the sight of his hand, so small and ordinary, upended him. He had spent years mentally preparing himself for the day that he would have to let the amber of One For All die in his chest. He'd thought he'd said his goodbyes long ago, and that he had nothing left to mourn. Now that the moment was here, the grief felt insurmountable.
All Might was no more.
He felt the loss behind his ribs, twisting and ugly like the scar on his torso. He could feel the hollow place inside him that One For All had left behind as it's light sputtered out into nothing but smoke. And the hole grew with the attention, widening a hairsbreadth. Would this be how he spent the rest of his life? Feeling his shortcomings?
He had been rendered down into nothing. His true form, he thought with snide resentment. Maybe it had been, once upon a time, but not anymore. He had lived as All Might, invincible and dominant, for most of his life. This small, shriveled shell of a man was not who he was anymore…This was not what he'd ever been meant to be.
And he had not realized it before tonight, but he saw now that his greatest battle should never have been with All For One. It should have been for Shigaraki Tomura…the grandson of his mentor, Shimura Nana. And now, with One For All dead in his chest, Toshinori knew he would never have the opportunity to save Shigaraki.
All For One was imprisoned — but the rest of the others were still at large. Perhaps this moment wouldn't feel so vacant if he had succeeded in the thing he'd wanted so badly: to take out the League of Villains before their foothold grew. Toshinori knew how people could flock to dark ideologies to fill voids. It would have been better if the League had been stomped out now. If he could have captured Shigaraki alive, rehabilitated him from the life All For One had groomed him for—
Knuckles rapping on the metal frame of his hospital room door, and Toshinori looked in the direction of the sound — regret for doing so was swift and merciless.
Aizawa Shouta stood between the jambs.
"Come on in," Toshinori invited against his better judgment.
Aizawa Shouta was one of his most vocal critics at UA, and Toshinori knew the man lacked the good will necessary to let him recover in peace. He didn't have the energy it would take for the upcoming conversation he could see on Aizawa's face.
"How is Bakugo?" Toshinori asked.
"He will be okay," Aizawa allowed, putting his hands in his pockets.
Toshinori realized then that Aizawa was still dressed from his press conference earlier — slacks and a button-up. His hair was down, and his clothes were covered in debris. Small rips in the knees of his pants. Dried dirt in the lines of his forehead where sweat had collected and evaporated. He hadn't considered that Aizawa would have been helping with the rescue efforts.
"I'm more worried about Yaoyorozu though," Aizawa said, frankly.
The statement confused Toshinori.
"Yaoyorozu?" he repeated.
He'd had high expectations for Yaoyorozu Momo, the class vice representative for 1-A. She'd been admitted to the school by referral. The potential of her quirk, Creation, would have been squandered on anyone but her — it required significant knowledge to be of any value, and Yaoyorozu had that in spades. But her first year had been rocky. Her confidence in practical studies had steadily waned through the months so far, but he had attributed that to what had happened to her family.
It had been Aizawa, actually, who'd told him that Yaoyorozu's family was being blackmailed and threatened. Yaoyorozu's family was prominently wealthy, even among the highest tiers of the Hero community, and the consequences of her birthright had come to collect their tax. He had personally asked Midnight and Present Mic to discreetly keep an eye on the Yaoyorozu estate until the situation had been resolved, but despite her attempts to keep her head high, Toshinori could see the residual effects of the incident even now.
"Yeah. Yaoyorozu," Aizawa prompted. "It wasn't just Midoriya, Kirishima, Iida, and Todoroki who went to Bakugo's aide tonight."
Toshinori's concern cut to the quick.
"Yaoyorozu was there tonight, too? Is she alright?"
Aizawa's features were stone as he answered, "No."
Toshinori inhaled deep in his chest and closed his eyes, bracing himself for the words that would come next.
"All For One tried to kidnap her before he engaged in his fight with you."
Aizawa had dropped a bomb on Toshinori that he hadn't been at all prepared for. He'd expected injuries — broken bones and injured limbs. Not this. He sat up straight in his hospital bed, wide-eyed with horror, and he could already imagine what horrible fate had been awaiting Yaoyorozo.
Her quirk could not be wielded by just anyone. The sheer amount of knowledge that had to be behind it made it a force to be reckoned with, when applied properly. All For One could not merely take her quirk to redistribute.
He'd need the girl with it.
Then Toshinori thought of what brutality All For One and his compatriots would subject her to, in order to break her and being her quirk under their thumb.
"Is she okay?" Toshinori whispered.
"No. No, she's not okay. She barricaded herself in a freezer of dead bodies that All For One was saving to create more Nomus, and was nearly crushed in it while you and All For One fought it out over her head. She was trapped for hours with dead, mutilated bodies, Yagi. So no, she's not okay, and she's probably never going to be okay again," Aizawa blasted him, brows slanted and mouth turned down with rage. "And you didn't even get Bakugo back — the students did."
The verbal onslaught left cuts, and he kept his eyes down. There had been too many hard truths for him to face in the last few hours and, while the will to fight was there — would always be there — he was worn and needed to pick his battles. This was a fight he couldn't win.
"Your presence has put my students at risk," Aizawa continued. His tone was cool, but a muscle leapt in his jaw. "All of them could have been injured or killed at the training camp. Bakugo was kidnapped. Yaoyorozu will suffer irreparable distress for the rest of her life after tonight. This is all because of you. And I warned you that this would happen when you first showed up at UA. You make a media spectacle of yourself and it puts a target on your back, and on the backs of all around you."
He was turning to leave, mercifully, but not without leaving final words of farewell.
"If you have any self-respect left, you'll leave UA and let the real Heroes finish cleaning up your mess in peace."