Death

by tmb1112

Death is a Quirk that can only kill. A perfect Quirk for a villain, but what if the boy who manifested that power just wanted to be a hero? Enrolling in U.A. might not be enough when all your Quirk can do is kill people. Follow Zach Sazaki from his first day in Class A on a story that spans years, as he learns to be a hero, finds out more about his Quirk, and too much to summarize!

190. Chapter 190

Disclaimer: I don't own Boku no Hero Academia

Chapter 190:

"And what about you Kasami?" Rashi wondered. "Our resident Lifebringer supporter's been pretty quiet today."

"I'm not going to retract previous statements based off what I saw last night," Kasami said. He glanced towards Bob too and added to the older man speaking a lot more harshly on Zach Sazaki than usual, which was already a lot, "And I'm not refuting everything you were saying either though. Don't go ahead and use some unsettling moments from last night as a sign that Lifebringer's 'showing his true colors' though. He's got a lot on his plate, and seeing this kind of reaction to him bringing someone back to life last night, I figure he knew it was coming in that moment he showed us that look."

"Except, half of this is all because of that look," Rashi countered.

"You say that because we saw it and can make that argument," Kasami said. "But you two would find any reason to hate on the kid, and you'd still be talking about how terrible it is he brought back Cayman's daughter even if he had been smiling while he did it."

"You're calling him a 'kid' again?" Bob wondered. "Thought he was the 'Hero of the People?'"

"I stand by that, but I mean, he's still just an eighteen year old kid-"

Bob cut in again while leaning over the long table and shaking his head at his younger colleague, "You were saying that when he was a seventeen year old, and a sixteen year old, and back when he was fifteen too. Yet you've also said on this very program that there's no way we could consider Sazaki as just a 'kid' anymore, not after all he's been through. So which is it? Is he a kid who is under too much pressure, who definitely shouldn't be looked at as all of 'our hero,' or is he this amazing pro who when he makes these mistakes should be called out on them by us? You can't have it both ways and just use whichever one works better at the time to push a pro-Lifebringer narrative."

"I don't have any narrative," Kasami said, sounding offended by the criticism. "But I see Lifebringer getting pissed because Kipper lied to him about what that interview was going to hold, and I get why he was pissed!" Rashi nodded his head in agreement with a tilt to the side and a turn to Bob to see how the older man would react. Kasami continued, "We all saw Kipper literally say that he was paid 200 million yen not to tell Lifebringer about what was coming. And that was just how much he was paid not to say anything to him, which Lifebringer specified in his question. Kipper could have been paid so much more in the first place just for Cayman to sneak his way into that interview, pulling the plug on his daughter beforehand to shove Lifebringer in that corner where he either brings back the girl or lets her die. And what are you supposed to do in his position?! Let the girl stay dead?"

"No one's saying that-" Bob started.

"Oh yeah they are," Kasami argued back with a sarcastic laugh that Bob would say otherwise. "People are outraged by it, but would we be any happier if Lifebringer had just left the girl dead? No! Nobody would even consider him a hero anymore after that. Now he's being ripped apart all over the news because of his decision."

"It's not about his decision last night though," Rashi cut in on Kasami's rant. "It's the fact that he saved that girl in a couple of seconds. I mean, it looked easy."

"Didn't look so easy the other night-"

"But he was bringing back sixteen people at once then, and he had been chewed up in that blast himself too," Rashi argued back like that was a different matter altogether. "Bringing back one person, a girl who died in her sleep which probably attributed to why it didn't look to hurt him much-"

"He tossed his mic to the side," Kasami started off, lifting his right palm to stop Rashi there. "Which to me, as much as it looked like it was in anger back there, feels like he probably did it so we couldn't hear the pain he was in as he revived her." The other two looked at Kasami in surprise at the analysis, and Kasami continued after they showed him they had not thought of it that way, "Lifebringer gets hurt when he brings people back. It's always been that way, from a long time ago we've always seen that on the videos. Him not screaming at the top of his lungs isn't an indicator to me that it was super easy for him to bring that girl back. I still remember those rallies Pinky was at the front of through the fall, where she shouted about how much it hurt him to bring people back and yet he kept doing it for us over and over again. So I'm not judging him for how he acted last night, being ambushed like that."

"You say he was ambushed, like he expected the interview to be a fluff piece to help out his public appearance," Bob said, suggesting Kasami knew something that would taint Lifebringer's reputation even more but was not saying it straight out right there. "Is that what you thought he was doing?"

"Isn't that usually what people do when they go on those sorts of shows?" Kasami asked back, saying it like there was nothing wrong with it even if Lifebringer had gone in for just that reason. "You were being harsh on him for a few days straight after his apartment exploded, and he went out there and tried to reassure us that everything was alright, only for something like that to happen?"

"You're saying he's the victim here?" Rashi wondered.

"Definitely," Kasami replied like that was clear. "Cayman was saying how Lifebringer wouldn't respond to him and how there was no way to get in contact which is what got him using the interview last night as his chance. Lifebringer didn't want this kind of reaction from everyone, didn't want this, and it was forced on him leading to us having this discussion right now."

"Well maybe, this was a conversation we've needed to have for a while," Bob countered strongly, not going to accept that excuse so easily. "Lifebringer might be trying, but he does not appear to have a direction for what he wants to do with that Quirk of his. Going to Romania in the middle of the night and bringing back that child, Andel Novak, confuses me more than clarifies what he's trying to do with his Quirk. And are we supposed to ignore that he did not go through any of the proper channels to travel to another country and use his Quirk, act as a hero despite not having a pro license, or permission from either Japan or the Romanian-"

"Could he have done anything that would have made you happy today?" Rashi wondered, and Kasami bounced his eyebrows in agreement as Rashi took the words right out of his mouth. "To me, what he did there was a better show of fairness than anything he could have done. Had he just brought back another Japanese citizen when we all got mad he brought back that rich American, everyone else in the world could have asked why it is us Japanese are seemingly immortal now!"

"Haha, yeah it seems Lifebringer's not a Japanese resource, as much as we all wish he was," Kasami agreed. "The kid cares about everyone, and he's been outside of the country in America and Europe and all over the world-"

"And apparently, in other worlds too," Bob added, a more annoyed look on his face growing.

"Yeah, I have to see that book for myself," Rashi agreed, though he laughed instead of getting annoyed. "I have no idea what Kipper was talking about there, or what Lifebringer told his jail guards he was up to while he was in Tartaros, but did you catch what they were saying about Faith? It sounds to me like Lifebringer and Faith might have duked it out inside Tartaros, and considering he's still down there and Lifebringer's not, I guess we have our winner…"

At his desk chair, Midoriya Izuku pulled out his phone and sent a text without thinking too hard about it. Things have settled a little, he thought to himself, and he even lifted a tiny smile at the text back that did not take long. He hesitated and thought about sending another text, but he just pocketed his phone instead. It's up to him when to bring people back to life. He knows how focused people are on it right now. If he goes to a hospital around here first, that must be part of his plan to show them something. Maybe that he's not changing up his routine just because of what you all… Except, what was that thing in Europe last night? Ashido got in some trouble today too when Cementoss sensei started class, and All Might made her stay after school for that training she's still doing.

He headed out from his dorm and to the main office, and he got a pass out though Midnight warned him what would happen if he came back late. All of Class A would pay for it next time, having their pass privileges revoked for a week if any one of them were to break the rules again. Wonder what she and Zach talked about last night? I wish I could ask her, before going for this. What do I even want to say? Midoriya pulled out his phone and held back a sigh at Zach's response of how long it would take him to get to Musutafu to meet.

It doesn't matter, Midoriya reminded himself while heading down the streets of Musutafu in a sweatshirt to keep warm in the early March chill. We'd talk a lot more if he lived at U.A., so I don't need an excuse to come out and talk to him. It's more difficult, but it's worth it to do. There's so much more I need to know. So much he can tell me. Guess, that's what I'm going for then.

Fifteen minutes later, Midoriya rose his arm up and waved to his friend who made it to their meeting spot without having to stop for any pictures today.

They'll forget about it in a couple days, Zach reminded himself. He half-waved back to Midoriya and headed towards him in a casual way, pretending not to see the looks of the last two people who saw him and opened their mouths only not to call anything out to him. Midoriya did not notice because Zach ignored them, but the darker-haired boy could not help but keep thinking about them, They're not afraid. Just, unsettled. Not like Himazuri. She's afraid. Kipper was afraid. Terrified, when he looked into my soul. Zach smiled and approached his friend at the gazebo in the park that had been a solid meet-up place so far. After this one though, I'll have to pick a new place. People might bug this place, and considering the kind of shit I talk about under it I'd be an idiot to come back here again.

"How's it going?" Zach wondered as he stepped up towards his friend. Midoriya smiled at the look on Zach's face much more relaxed and calm than he thought Zach might be after the events of the night before.

"Good, you?" Midoriya asked back.

"All good," Zach assured, knowing what Midoriya really meant while asking that back. "Can't believe that asshole Kipper though. Thought I picked the right program," he said, then he sighed and leaned back on the railing in front of Midoriya. His curlier-haired friend stared at Zach in surprise, while the boy who did his black hair up spiky like usual continued, "Though, I bet Cayman could've paid off whoever I went to. Kipper's just the unlucky one whose credibility I shredded. Don't know how unlucky I'd call him though with as big a bonus as he got."

"You brought that girl back, Cherry, so quickly," Midoriya started. "I thought something must have been wrong when you lowered your hand like that-"

"I've gotten a lot better," Zach replied with a lift of the corners of his lips. "And Death's gotten stronger too, to be able to bring people back that quickly."

"Death? Not, you?" Midoriya asked, wondering if there was a reason Zach specified it.

"I mean," Zach started slowly. "When you get stronger, it's always been because you've been able to control more of One For All, right?" Zach asked. Midoriya nodded, and Zach continued, "But once you can use 100 percent all the time, and then you keep getting stronger on top of that? It's One For All getting stronger isn't it?"

Midoriya paused and he thought about that for a second, before responding, "At that point, it would be, but I'd still be getting stronger too."

"Yeah, I suppose," Zach replied. "But with Death, the, potency, of it doesn't necessarily correlate with strength to me. Whether or not I could bring people back quicker or kill with a smaller amount of Death, I don't consider that as me getting stronger. That's just Death powering up."

"Yeah, I get that too," Midoriya agreed with a nod at the way Zach was speaking of it. But, "Then, what do you consider as you getting stronger? If not your Quirk strengthening?"

Stronger? Zach wondered to himself. I don't want to be any- that's not a good way to look at it. I might need to be stronger next time I face Eziano! Or All For One… Right? "Studying fighting techniques I haven't seen before, and preparing myself against them. Being able to look another move ahead of what I can currently plan for during a fight," Zach started replying. "Stuff like that, I suppose."

It's not like Bakugo, Midoriya thought at Zach's response. Bakugo's a natural. His combat sense is crazy, but it's always been so good. Zach's been training nonstop since he was a kid, and he never stops even now. That kind of response from the best fighter I know, explains why you're the best fighter I know. "That's," Midoriya started, though he frowned as he did not actually have a way to finish the statement. "I consider that, as me getting stronger too." But I also think of my actual strength increasing as much more. Is that even important to you anymore? With Death, when one touch could already knock people out or kill them, I guess at a certain point making it get any stronger loses meaning. It was already so strong back when you first started using it, not that One For All at five percent wasn't.

"So what's up?" Zach wondered. "Is Ashido good?" Midoriya rose his eyebrows, wondering why Zach referred to her by her last name and why he was asking him and not the girl herself. "Don't want her knowing that I know she got in trouble for last night," Zach added to explain one of those reasons to Midoriya, while he really just referred to her by her last name since it was how Midoriya knew her, and since they were talking about her here and not to her face where he'd rather use Mina to make her happier.

"She got scolded, by Cementoss sensei," Midoriya replied, and Zach nodded in a relieved way which made Midoriya sweatdrop though nod in agreement there. If there's anyone to scold you, Midoriya thought, wondering if Cementoss ever could have an actual mean look on his face from what he had seen so far. "And she had some extra training after school… but she also seemed a little off today."

I shouldn't have put that kid's life in her hands. That's a feeling, no one should ever have to feel besides me. I don't know why I pushed that on her. "Yeah, that's my bad," Zach replied. "I let her choose whether or not I went and saved that Romanian boy," he admitted, then frowned as he wondered why he told Midoriya about it. Midoriya stared at Zach with his eyes opened huge at that statement though, and Zach rose his eyes back up and said to his friend, "Let the life of someone else be determined by someone else's 'whim' for a change. Was a shit thing to do," he finished in a darker way though he sighed afterwards and shook his head at his own actions.

Is he, criticizing how I've called him out on doing it just on his "whims?" Or, is it because that's what the news is talking about today? He put that decision in Ashido's hands… How did he even do that? He's still the one who had to go save the kid at the end of the day. He might say she told him to go, but the decision was ultimately his own. Saving another kid, and all I can wonder now is why he stopped there? Midoriya shook his head of those thoughts, I didn't come to argue about this again. He doesn't look like he wants to talk about it either, despite just bringing it up? Well it's all anyone's talking about today. I bet it's all he's heard from his Shiketsu friends too, and he suspects it's why I want to talk to him.

"I want to know more about what you were up to," Midoriya started, and Zach looked at him in mild surprise at the conversation shift. "Leading your army. Stuff, I don't know about already. I know there's a lot you've been keeping from me, though I also know a lot is just because we don't have the time to go through every last thing."

"Yeah, don't have five months to sit around telling you every story," Zach replied with a chuckle. "Like Oda-"

"I don't want the stories that guy put in his book," Midoriya cut his former classmate off. Zach lowered his small smile, and Midoriya specified, "Full truth. No stories. No lies, okay?"

Transition back. The reality. One day! Just one, Zach's lips curled into a frown and his expression shifted in a way Midoriya was all too used to now. "Alright," Zach replied, and he leaned back on the railing with a deep breath in. "Let's see." Zach turned his head to the side and looked up around the edge of the gazebo, up at really dark clouds telling him it might storm soon. They could be up there right now. Maybe they found the League of Villains. They could be getting massacred by Shigaraki right now. Or crushing the League without me. "There was this one fight," Zach started as he lowered his eyes up from the dark clouds to his friend before him.

"I was over the water in the middle of a thunderstorm not of my own creation-"

"Your own creation?" Midoriya asked with his eyes confused, though he had heard something like this said before.

"I brought the storm," Zach replied, in a tone that was so serious that it did not make Midoriya think of it as cheesy in the least. Zach just continued after that like it was all the explanation he needed, "My ride was bumpy and the pilot needed to pull off to get to safety, so I jumped with three others from thirty thousand feet. We dropped from the sky towards this ship we knew some enemies to be on. Villains," Zach specified, rather than using 'enemies' as a broader term for better use in recounting stories. "Bad guys who I had information on. I knew they were trafficking lots of deadly weapons and dirty bombs, because I had just destroyed one such factory that they picked up shipments from. All-in-all, they were just up to no good. They were perpetuating the war."

Zach paused and then continued as there was no interruption there, "So I dropped onto their ship. The first guy I saw came out of a door thinking he heard something, and I knew I landed pretty hard because I wasn't using my wings, and I wasn't all that used to my suit's flying functions yet though I was training with them during that drop."

"You practiced with your equipment in actual combat-"

"There wasn't enough time to stop and train between every mission," Zach replied. Midoriya closed his mouth, and then after a couple seconds he nodded at Zach to continue as Zach was waiting to see if he had any other questions before going on. "Anyway, I had my grappling gun out already as I was going to try and shoot up to the bridge, but instead I brought it down and fired at the villain who came out. The guy adapted fast to seeing me though. Even in my dark uniform with a menacing appearance and covered in weapons, the man tried fighting and dodged the hook. I did not slow down though, and I shot forward when the hook pierced the wall on his other side and retracted in. The man had just dodged, but now that I used where the hook actually hit to pull myself in, I made the guy hesitate as I put the thought in his head that where my hook hit was where I always intended it to go based on that lack of hesitation in my reaction to missing."

A villain able to react instantly to a sudden noise in the middle of a storm, see it was the Army of Death and still dodge the first attack, and you-

"I grabbed my own wire and slid my feet to the side over the wet steel as I approached him. As my opponent rose a gun to fire at me, I clotheslined the man with the thin but very strong wire. And as I was passing on the man's side though opposite the side my wire went past on, I swung my arm and twisted my wrist, wrapping the wire around the back of the man's neck too and around his front again where he had been clotheslined to double wrap it." Midoriya got anxious as Zach continued speaking here, no hesitation in what he was saying even though it sounded like it could potentially get very bad. "Now there were two thin wires pressing into the man's throat and tightening as I grabbed both sides and choked him, telling him in his ear to lower the gun or I would have to snap his neck to keep him silent. So he started to lower the gun, I took it, and the man struggled in that second to get out knowing that only one hand was holding the wires around his neck. I twisted again while dropping the pistol and pulling back to avoid the man's knife he swung around with his free hand."

Zach paused and frowned a little deeper before continuing, "The blade brushed against the front of my uniform, but my gear was too strong for it to pass through. Then I grabbed the wire and twisted one last time, making my opponent black-out in a couple seconds while the guy flailed desperately trying to hit me. When the knife dropped, unlike the pistol that I managed to slip my foot under in time, the knife made noise clanking on the steel that drew attention from someone else inside. I expected it though, and as I lowered my first opponent down to the floor quietly, I pointed a gun inside and fired into the neck of the guy who came to the hall and asked his friend's name near the open door-"

"You killed him?" Midoriya whispered, more confused than anything else. "Why, after going through the trouble of knocking the other one out?"

"The gun had darts with quick-acting tranquilizers to knock out enemies," Zach countered with a single shake of his head, assuring Midoriya he just misunderstood which made more sense to Midoriya anyway. Midoriya nodded though with an interested look too, and instead of continuing on right away Zach explained more thoroughly, "They became the primary weapon of my soldiers in most fights, not that real firearms were not also on hand for villains who needles would not break through the skin and who needed to be damaged more."

Zach paused and then continued back on track, "I dropped the second man with the needle to the neck, and I darted inside and down the hall to catch the guy right before he hit the ground. I almost was not fast enough, but I lowered him with a hand over his mouth as the guy closing his eyes looked like he was trying to call out to someone." He nodded at Midoriya in a way checking if this way of fighting sounded satisfactory, and Midoriya gave a slow nod back showing he was not judging here. Zach went on, "I had my comrades speaking softly in my ears about their infiltration too, but so far no alarms were going off and I had not heard any gunshots so I figured things were fine."

"What was the purpose of the secrecy?" Midoriya wondered. "Why did you have to dive in from the sky instead of just, attacking? Or waiting at a port if you knew where the ship was and where it was going?"

Zach replied with his answer ready, "Because we captured someone who explained to us beforehand how that shipping worked. There was one final check the cautious villains purchasing the guns, who would then distribute the weapons across that certain country, made with the in-betweens running that shipping route. Those guys were very cautious too, Turbo's men getting even more paranoid and harder to catch after Bolivar took over. Those League guys were much smarter than someone like Spade," Zach added as a reference that Midoriya nodded along with, trying not to think of how Zach was saying how easily he had snuffed out something just like this more recently.

Midoriya tried, but he still found himself frowning deeper before Zach continued, Like the villains of today don't match up with the ones he was fighting last year. Zach continued though, snapping Midoriya out of those thoughts, "The final check-in was to make sure the goods were on their way, so that the villain group only could show up at the port for the pick-up if it was really coming and there were no complications, and so they would only have to be there for a short window of time. We landed when they were 30 minutes from the shore, just around the time that the final message would have been sent. So now the villains on shore are getting ready to receive the ship on the dock they only told the shippers the number of in that final check, and in the meantime me and my friends are taking down the ship's crew quietly and quickly."

Zach started speaking in the present tense, and Midoriya wondered if he noticed or if Zach had just gotten so into the story that he was seeing it vividly in front of him right now. The detail he described in that fight certainly sounded like Zach remembered every moment from it, though Zach only really went into those first two he took down which Midoriya realized was not a lot of them as he continued. "We don't have a lot of time to take down a crew of around ninety people, and worse we need to do it silently or the ship could relay to their allies on shore not to be there when they arrived. Any message after the final message would be enough to spook their partners, so I couldn't even risk having them start saying something only to be cut off and for me to take the place and use voice-modification tech to try and bluff it. I needed it to be perfect, so I brought Seraphim, Darling, and Mark."

He paused for a second, then he continued without dwelling on those names he just mentioned, "It was high-risk, very high-reward. If we could get the elusive distributors at the port who no one up until then had been able to track down, no one had been able to find their bases or find them with how careful they were with their meetings, I figured I could get every big villain group in the nation as they had only sold to the best since they were the best."

"Did it work?" Midoriya asked, and his eyes widened more as Zach nodded his head.

"We caught the group waiting on the docks off-guard. I figured that group was likely susceptible to talking to heroes even, by the amount they panicked upon seeing me." He continued in a serious voice with his expression looking as Death's, "How quickly they gave up every villain they knew and the codes they used to set up meetings with them, just for the promise of lighter punishments."

Zach smirked and he added to his friend staring at him in shock, "I got more out of that one than the international hero community got from Spade. The villains we tracked down afterwards were worse, and I got them by pretending to be the distributors and offering them trials of new top-of-the-line weaponry just developed in America that all those villains were excited to try out. I got all of them, made them talk about their lower subsidiary groups and gangs that terrorized towns and cities in each region of the nation they ran, which public figures they had extorted for cash and which officials they had bribed to ignore their actions or send heroes on goose chases away from the actual illegal activities going down just below their noses. Stopped drug trafficking through their borders and rooted out corruption at border crossings and city offices and waste treatment facilities. Revealed the cops who had been taking money on the side or working with villains-"

"How-" Midoriya stopped, but Zach had stopped already and he could not hold it back. It was something he thought so frequently but felt he needed to ask right here. "How could you do," he started to whisper. "All of that, in a single year?"

"All of…" Zach looked at Midoriya in confusion. Midoriya was referring to all Zach just listed off, but Zach shook his head and replied, "I did that over the next two days."

"Wh-" Midoriya could not finish the word. He was beyond shocked in disbelief, and Zach could see that look on Midoriya's face clearly as Midoriya could not hide it with it this intense.

Zach shook his head, and he explained in a casual tone, "What I was doing was very simple. The simple truth is that it was never about torturing people. Getting information from villains was never hard. Because, villains are all cowards." Zach said it like he was just explaining something to Midoriya, but Midoriya stared at Zach with his eyes going even wider as this sounded like something Zach truly believed. Zach shrugged his shoulders at Midoriya's disbelieving look that Zach would really group them all like that, and he continued, "The only reason they don't talk to heroes, is because heroes can't do anything to them once they're captured. Villains know they can't, because they see heroes who have done even minor infractions getting arrested themselves or put on blast by the media. They get abandoned and turned-on by everyone they love. But, Death's already a terrorist. Death's already condemned by the international community and people everywhere, and yet no one's stopping him from what he's doing in the shadows."

Zach paused and his voice got lower with a small smirk on his face, "And boy did I spread rumors through the underworld of what I did to villains I captured." He laughed darkly though Midoriya tried hard to ignore it and just focus on the substance of what Zach was saying and not how he looked while saying it, "The villains afraid that I might do something to them gave up other villains with barely a push most of the time. Because they're cowards. They all feared me. So each time I caught one villain, I learned the location of ten others, and just like that I had a list stretching too long to handle on my own or by myself. So I got some more help. And that made me capture more people quicker, get even more names faster, more locations, more tips and hints and corrupt leaders and villains and secret bases and underground lairs… there was so much." Zach took in a deep breath and then sighed out before continuing back in his normal tone, "Over 9 billion people in the world, 8 billion or so with Quirks, but everyone could be dangerous with firearms or Activate."

"Activate?" Midoriya wondered, having a bad feeling about the name though he was interested too at what it implied.

"A drug to activate latent Quirks that usually backfired but occasionally worked in horrible ways," Zach replied. "It's all destroyed now," he added, and Midoriya nodded slowly though amazed that he had never even heard of this drug which sounded like it could have been a huge deal. Zach spoke lower, "There were millions of villains in that population," he referred back to the billions he was just talking about. "Millions out free doing as they pleased, and a sudden shortage of heroes as they'd been killed and forced into retirement, or they just gave up. Scores of them over the past couple years. And the more heroes who fell, the more villains arose because they felt it was safer to act with heroes more spread out, which ultimately led to even fewer heroes as more were killed or maimed, others were coaxed into accepting money from villains who wanted to be looked over, and others just found it getting too dangerous and left the business. And the fewer heroes, the more horrible things they were unable to prevent or stop in time, creating-"

"Not many heroes accept money-" Midoriya spoke up, not going to let that just pass by him as the way Zach was speaking sounded like he was talking down to heroes compared to what he had been himself.

"It got hard," Zach cut in though before Midoriya could argue with him. He did not even say it like he was talking down about heroes, but the exact opposite which had Midoriya freezing and closing his mouth. Zach lowered his voice and said sympathetically, "Much harder than it ever was for all heroes around the world. Many of them went into the business never thinking that they would actually be risking their lives every single day. They just accepted it might happen occasionally, as an occupational hazard. But this had become nearly a war for some of them in the most dangerous places in the world where villains were not even afraid of heroes anymore, where heroes were more afraid to go into a town run by villains than villains were afraid to go into a town with multiple heroes in it. Even low-tier villains were ready to fight and kill heroes instead of run, and the heroes' jobs had become so much more dangerous, and they were still making the same pay as they always did?"

Midoriya stared at Zach hesitantly, feeling uncertain about what Zach was saying like it was leading to something obvious, yet something he did not accept at the moment nor wanted to in a minute. Am I the one who's wrong though? The question made Midoriya hesitate to counter again, going to let Zach explain his perspective before arguing based on what he believed himself.

Zach continued on, "And at the same time, they had lost popularity and were being shunned by the public because of an increase in the amount of villain incidents? Why were they trying so hard for people who don't appreciate them? Why is it that there are dozens of other jobs out there that make more money even though those people could never do their jobs if heroes weren't there protecting them?"

"Not all heroes think like that," Midoriya said, unable to just listen to this any longer.

"I know," Zach agreed. "But it makes sense though, right? That some, or even most heroes would get frustrated by that? For most of them it's not enough to turn and work with villains, but if someone comes to a hero and offers them a large sum of money to just stay off the case of some lowly drug dealers, or to just back off a city official they were thinking about investigating? If the hero doesn't see any harm coming from it then why not accept? Why not just let something like that get past them, if they're busy enough with other things already? If the people are offering him or her this much money to stay out of it, then they're probably willing to fight and or kill them too if they don't play along. Maybe go after their family too?" Zach offered it up and shook his head, adding without any judgement, "It's easier to just accept the money and say that there was no harm in it, or that there was no choice because the alternative could have been terrible!"

Midoriya stared at Zach in partial confusion and part dread that Zach sounded so sympathetic here and like he was defending the corrupt heroes even. Zach saw that look though and shook his head at Midoriya's more judging way of looking at it. "9 times out of 10, Midoriya," Zach started. "When I rooted out corruption, the person I found who was corrupt used the same excuse. They were scared. They felt they had no choice. Whether it was true or not, and I didn't care really and put a stop to every corrupt thing I found, but even the ones who might have just been using it as an excuse were able to say it so quickly because they had been thinking about it. Somewhere in their heads they thought that they were in this because there was no other option for them. We always have a choice though. But as I said earlier, villains are cowards. And the corrupt are villains. And the ones who say they didn't have a choice, are cowards too for buckling under that pressure. And if they folded to some other villain threatening them, then when faced against me they always folded even quicker because I'm much more terrifying than any villain."

Zach said it without hesitation but paused afterwards. He paused after what he just said, and he grimaced and looked away from his friend in front of him who did not have an interruption or counter for him this time. He did not expect Midoriya to anyway, though he thought Deku would probably at least look upset because of it. He stayed quiet for a couple seconds and then continued softly, "As afraid as those people were of the villains breaking their words and coming for them, or what would happen to their families if they went to heroes. As afraid as they were of heroes catching on to what they were doing and throwing them in jail… The second they started breaking the law there was one thing they feared more than anything else." Midoriya stared at Zach with his eyes growing wider this time as Zach faced away and stared darkly off the gazebo into nowhere in the distance. "Even the ones who had never heard the rumors about me, and most people in the light wouldn't hear those rumors, they still knew."

His voice lowered and he said in a low voice, "An instinctual fear from the first time they saw me on the walls of Hatto making my declaration to the world. I was coming for all villains." Midoriya's eyes shook at the statement Zach made while glaring off, thinking back on the moment and the conviction he had in those words that showed on his face again now. "It didn't matter how small the crime," he continued. "It didn't matter where they were, whose borders they were inside of, how safe they felt they were, I was coming. I had taken down an entire government and army in a day. It may have been a dictatorship built on a lie, but it was getting stronger and establishing as the truest power in the country, and I crushed it under my feet." Zach's eyes got angrier, narrowing as he glared out into the park that seemed even darker now as the clouds about had gotten blacker gray. "Then I rooted out the worst criminal organization in the world, and I got heroes to help me do it then got let go by those same heroes whose job was specifically to catch me."

Zach even cracked a smirk while he stared away so darkly, and he continued in a horrible whisper, "Showing villains all over the world that heroes really weren't going to stop me from going after them and doing things to them-"

"What you were doing," Midoriya finally cut in, not wanting Zach to continue any farther with every word sounding darker than the last. "It was terrorism," he said. He did not care if Zach tried to push that name on himself now, because after hearing what Zach was saying he knew it was not just his manipulation that pushed the label. Midoriya glared at Zach who looked back into his eyes, and he continued, "Using fear for your attacks in such a way. The fear you're talking about, that they must have felt of you, it's so intense and yet you're so proud-"

"It's good for there to exist a fear of doing the wrong thing," Zach countered back with as dark a look as Midoriya was giving him. "It keeps people near the edge from stepping over the line. It makes people on the other side of it want to get back on the right side."

"Like the Italian mafia?" Midoriya questioned harshly.

Zach nodded his head though. "Some people did bad things because they were not afraid of what would happen to them if they did. Not enough heroes, or not enough proof to convict them when they did things that way, that there was no point in worrying. But what if they did have to worry? Then fuck it, let's just stop doing those bad things. I'd rather live in freedom than in jail, even if I can't break someone's legs every once and a while." Zach kept his voice flat even as Midoriya looked at him disgustedly that he would defend guys like this if that was their thought processes. Zach glared harder at him though and wiped that look from Midoriya's face, "Maybe they didn't change because of their consciences," he started. "Maybe I was too lenient on some people I didn't send to prison, but if they don't commit any more crimes then isn't it better that way? Over twice the number of people I got arrested, I found doing illegal activities. Over two times as many so-called 'villains' that I just ignored than the ones I actually 'stopped' your way."

"What do you mean?" Midoriya asked, his voice harsh as Zach was speaking as unheroically as possible here.

"People watching illegal cage matches," Zach started his list. "People using drugs or peddling them at the lowest levels. I was always after bigger fish," he explained with a shrug when Midoriya looked at him angrier as he mentioned even letting drug dealers go. Zach continued, "Because taking down the bigger fish makes it harder for smaller fish to even get started let alone get any larger than they already are. Most of them will just turn back to something legitimate without that outlet there waiting for them. I removed the systems that allowed people to easily become villains. I fought not to stop individual villains but to rupture supply chains and cripple organizations holding the villain world together in every part of this world."

Midoriya's judging expression started to lift, as Zach continued without pause, "I had seen it back when I was a villain. How me and Dabi needed to outsource to China for help, how Kurogiri had recruited some Korean mercs to fight with us back when our numbers were small. How did he find them so quickly? Guys like Giran find villains easily, but that's because the villain brokers are in contact with each other all over the place. They're in contact with corrupt officials and cops who can hand evil people off to them. Doctors at insane asylums can hand out tips about their most unstable patients' whereabouts so the League could get there first before heroes…"

Zach trailed off as Midoriya looked apologetic for a moment and then down at his feet in frustration. Midoriya looked back up with a frown at what Zach was saying, and yet it became more just an upset and frustrated look after a couple seconds. Midoriya shook his head as Zach was waiting for him to explain what he was feeling to look like that, and then he said in a low voice, "You have so much experience." Zach looked at Midoriya in some surprise, but Midoriya shook his head again and continued while looking into Zach's eyes, "In just, every way. A vast knowledge of the villain world and how it operates- and you used that knowledge to cripple the underworld in every country. Everywhere you went," Midoriya said, half amazed and yet sounding upset even as he did, his frown directed at Zach who nodded in a darker way at the way Midoriya was shifting his own expression back.

Izuku continued in a lower voice, "You did it in a horrible way though. The wrong way."

Zach nodded again, and he agreed, "Yeah." He looked away then back for a second as he said in a low voice of his own, "That's why it's a secret. That's why it always has to be a secret." The explanation made as much sense to Midoriya as it did to Zach, as did how he continued, "No one can know how much good came out of doing so much wrong."

I understand, Midoriya thought back though he could not even nod at Zach saying something like that. The reason for all this secrecy. As much as it hurts Zach to lie to us, he's that afraid of our hero natures. The fear of my need to tell the truth and let everyone know what he had done. He isn't worried about getting thrown back in jail though, he's made that clear. Midoriya lowered his gaze from Zach's face as his friend looked away again, and he stared down at Zach's feet and kept thinking to himself. What he's most afraid of is everyone around the world seeing the way he had done things. He's afraid of them deciding that he was correct in doing so, which they would if they knew, and it would turn the world into a much bloodier and crueler place as Zach had treated it in the shadows. Zach knows the world isn't like that, or it doesn't have to be at least, and he worked desperately to keep it from turning into that!

Midoriya rose his gaze back up to his friend staring so far away yet not darkly this time but just in a thoughtful way. He stared at his friend who he had thought for so long he would one day need to fight, and his fingers started to curl but he straightened them out to prevent from curling up fists. I know, I can never tell anyone what you did. Can't repeat what you tell me to anyone. Even if I decide to go after you for being Death one day. Even if I'm forced to do so and we fight and you're arrested. I will never tell the world what you did. Because you're right. And you were right not to be Zach Sazaki while you did all that. I was already worried about your popularity, but I know after what you just told me that you know just as well how popular you are and how dangerous it would be for you to tell the world what you just told me. You weren't acting as a hero, Zach. You became the action star of a gritty war movie. A super secret agent infiltrating and destroying criminal organizations. A villain with a conscience who people could look to. Committing crimes for the benefit of common people while at the same time murdering other villains…

Killing some and bringing others back to life. Determining on your own who got to live, and who had to die. Zach, you had really become… Death. Midoriya let out a breath that had his friend turning back to look him in the eyes again. And when he saw that look from Zach Sazaki he reminded himself, I know you were most dangerous as Death, but I also believe you when you say you're trying hard to be Zach Sazaki again. I know that Zach is not as dangerous, but it's what you do and say and appear like in public that matter so much more now. And you're so careful about not letting anything slip so as not to distort reality… by telling the truth? The thought Midoriya had frustrated him but more-so in the fact that he understood the crazy thought he just had. Reality, isn't necessarily the truth, he thought in realization.

Our belief of how the world exists, what structures made it this way, they might all be wrong. Midoriya stared at Zach in silence for a few more seconds, thinking during it, Zach understands though. He's lived in the shadows and spend his life fighting them. Sometimes going too far, killing people, breaking every law in the book. And despite all of this, Zach is still my friend. Midoriya nodded at his friend in front of him who nodded back in a way Midoriya understood as well as Zach understood that nod he just received. Somehow. We're still friends. I don't think I could ever stop… Midoriya realized it in a pained way but smiled back when Zach smiled at him. If ever a time comes where I do have to arrest him, I know we'll still be friends.

It hurt Midoriya to think about it, but he shook his head of that feeling. "Zach," Midoriya started again. I've always been one to think that there is right, and there is wrong, and you should always do what is right. I still believe it too, and I know that killing for any reason is wrong. But I also know, that what you do, you do for the benefit of other people alone. "Is it hard?" Midoriya questioned. "For you to kill people?" He asked, and he waited to see Zach look hurt because of the question, or to pause and then say in a low voice how it was. They were the responses he wanted, and he grimaced at the thoughtful look on Zach's dark face there. You do it for innocents. You believe that they'll be saved if you kill, and a lot of the time you're right. The problem you don't see though, is that when I'm wrong about a hunch, if I've only acted doing what's right, then there is no issue. But when you're wrong, you've now done something horrible and there wasn't any benefit from it. You hurt someone, or terrified someone, or killed someone… and what if you were wrong?

Even if you're right! What's the cost? Midoriya thought it at the flat look that spread on Zach's face a couple seconds after the question still with no response. Does your soul feel it anymore? Or has too much already broken it down? If it had though, I don't see why you would still fight for us. So you must believe in something. Your soul must be strong enough to handle all of that and keep fighting.

"It hurts," Zach replied. "It always hurts. No matter how much I hated them, I… I hate killing people more than anything in the world." Zach said it to the relief of Midoriya, and yet he turned away after saying it and glared so darkly away from that gazebo. Oh how I wish that was true.

After a few seconds, Midoriya shook his head and gained an awkward look on his face as he started regretting his last question. He backtracked only a little bit though instead of changing the subject altogether, "I know you got results out of that wrong way." Zach looked back into Midoriya's eyes in a questioning way at how he was starting here. "But it wasn't just wrong because of the moral ramifications. The actual methods you were using, they were not the right- not the correct way to combat villains."

"I stopped more villains than you can count-"

"I know," Midoriya replied, but he said it fast and not in a way impressed but more like that was the point he was getting at. Zach looked back at him in confusion and Midoriya said, "You've told me how fast you were moving. That you fought so many fights in one day, that even the most important fights you let only occupy a certain amount of your focus." Midoriya paused and then said in a more stern voice, "And the speed at which you were moving, that you told yourself was imperative to your fight, it put the innocent people you were trying to save at more risk too."

Zach frowned back at Midoriya and shook his head in disagreement. Midoriya spoke up faster than Zach could start to counter though, "When you go after villains haphazardly, you risk letting them slip through your fingers. If you move too fast you won't see something that you could have if you had waited a little longer, and it could make the difference between a victory and a defeat. Haste makes waste."

Zach humphed at what Midoriya just said and looked to his former classmate like he was scoffing at that statement. "Where'd you hear that?"

Midoriya's expression hardened more and he replied sternly, "Sir Nighteye." Zach paused, and his expression shifted back to a regular one though did not get apologetic. He just stared at Midoriya and could see why he looked defensive himself over this. Midoriya scolded his friend who did not say anything in response there, "He told me, that we must first predict what the enemy is planning. Only after extensive analysis do we make a plan, and only with a plan do we take action."

"All of that sounds like it would take a long time," Zach replied. "I condensed all the steps and-"

"That's just being arrogant," Midoriya countered strongly, shaking his head at Zach again. "Because the cleverest villains who lurk in the shadows won't be stopped by a hastily put-together plan."

"There aren't that many villains like that," Zach countered. "Or at least, not to the level that I couldn't still handle it-"

"'Not many,' but there were some?" Midoriya retorted. Then as Zach's expression darkened, Midoriya took that moment and said in a more frustrated way, "Whatever you're thinking about, it's because you were moving so fast that you weren't able to do the proper scouting on those villains. The ones who turned out to be worse than you thought they would be, who fought back harder than you believed they could, if you had taken more time with each and every villain group you went after then you could have avoided… whatever bad things happened because you rushed."

Zach started shaking his head, and Midoriya continued with his momentum, "That's the whole point of the proper channels we have. They're not just to make sure that we really know the villains we're going after are doing illegal activities, which I bet you sometimes busted in on innocent people on accident, but it's also because going through the proper channels necessitates that we take every precaution before-"

"Does that mean," Zach cut in. "You let Eri get hurt for a single extra day instead of saving her in that moment?"

Midoriya froze and he stared at Zach with his eyes growing wider at the question. Zach glared at Midoriya and wondered, "Did you let Overhaul kill her and pull her back together over and over, so you could go through the proper channels? So you could get him in the act, arrest him for his crimes with more proof that you 'needed?' Midoriya, that's not a victory." Zach said it firmly and with all the confidence that Midoriya had been speaking with a moment ago. Zach lifted his darker look a little at the angered but pained one he saw on Midoriya's face, and he said softer but still as assured of himself, "The only way to win is with haste. For me at least, but I do believe that my way of winning saves more people than the way you're describing."

"Sure, going through the proper methods may seem better in hindsight," he continued. "When a villain is let back on the streets because the proper protocols weren't carried out by heroes, when heroes act using methods that aren't by the book causing a mistrial because it would otherwise create precedent that they can go against procedure, that is treated as a miscarriage of justice. People hate it, and yet it needs to happen because case-by-case bases don't work in a society ruled by law." Zach paused and then said in an even lower voice, "But if that hero went against protocol because they needed to save someone in that moment, then good on them. Because saving someone doesn't just mean that in the end result, that person is alive."

Zach stared intensely into Midoriya's eyes and said without any hesitation in his voice that Midoriya did not think he could match after being confronted by this, "Really saving someone means preventing the horrible things from ever happening to them. I was going to sit by and do nothing but wait for Edgeshot when I showed up at the War Boys' hideout, but Thompson was screaming and about to be raped. It wasn't my place to act. It wasn't my place to move in. I did though," Zach said it firmly and went on after a second's pause. "It wasn't my place to go searching for them anyway, but I did because there was a way I knew I could find them that only I could use to find them. And when I was in that base, when I had 'saved' Thompson, I saw from the look of sheer terror on her face that if she had to live in what was like a nightmare for her, for even one more second! She was never going to recover from it. If I had just left her there to go deal with the other villains and save the other hostages, she wouldn't have been saved. If I had left that naked girl, or yelled at her to just listen to me and do what I say because I was trying to help her- none of it would have been enough."

Zach paused for a moment and then said without regret in his voice, "And in an action that likely killed the people I looked up to the most, I took off my helmet. And only by doing that. In that moment, not any later, because speed was that important! Only by doing it right then did I save her." Zach frowned deeply and stared towards Midoriya in an intense way that had his friend trying to frown back but failing as Zach's points were all fair and made sense to him. "It's like the speed of All Might going around solving all the crimes, except I wasn't waiting for them to begin before stopping them. I'm not waiting for more people to get dragged into it than needed to if I had enough information to act on my own. And All Might could get to every villain, but only as long as they were being villainous at the time and making noise and bringing attention to them that All Might could find."

He shook his head and finished lower, "This is just the way I want to stop villains. Before they commit more crimes, immediately after seeing them. I want villains to know that there is nothing stopping me from destroying them, that I won't be restrained by 'proper methods' and they should know that even considering to keep breaking the law, in secret or without making a scene ever, it still won't be safe for them. I'll always find them and I'll destroy them as soon as I do."

Midoriya finally found his voice and started up back in an argumentative tone, "Proper planning is necessary though to ensure the raid is safe, and learn more about-"

"I do my recon too," Zach cut in. "I always do recon on everything I do, but if there are still unknowns that doesn't mean I can just ignore the villains who will probably hurt someone else while I'm hesitating to, what? Just to make sure it's safe?" Zach asked it incredulously. "I know it'll be dangerous either way, so rushing and stopping anyone else from getting hurt is the way to do it. Always rush. Always run. Every second wasted is a second a villain could be irreparably fucking up someone's life."

But when you don't make sure! Midoriya thought in frustration at his friend before him. When you move this fast, it leaves you so likely to make a mistake! And when you are ready to kill. When you have made those mistakes before and killed people! If you rush to conclusions, rush to the scene, and rush to your judgement then- then what if you're wrong?! Midoriya bit down angrily and glared at Zach, "It's not safe-"

"'Safe?'" Zach asked back harshly. "Since when do we care about safety? Laying down our lives is our job-"

"Safe for the people you're saving!" Midoriya exclaimed back. "You rush in places, and you risk the lives of hostages. You risk the lives of people who get in the way when the villains escape from you using secret escape routes you could have spotted and blocked off if you had done more recon!"

"Or!" Zach countered back louder. "I save the lives of people like Jessica Thompson who would have been raped by Damian of the War Boys. And Kaminari?" Zach asked it with his voice raising in pitch and his eyes getting even angrier at the boy in front of him. Midoriya thought for a second Zach was talking about how Kaminari was about to be executed in there, but Zach continued instead, "Kaminari would have massacred everyone in that building, if I had waited for Edgeshot to arrive. If I had waited any longer, no one would have been saved. It wasn't safe. It wasn't even legal. And yet I saved all those people, stopped all the War Boys without casualties, and as many horrible things ultimately came out of that day I know that my actions during it were the correct ones. And I wasn't the only one who knew."

Zach said it in a voice hinting something while looking even deeper into Midoriya's eyes that got less angry and more confused as he pulled his head back from Zach. "Class A knew it as well," Zach said. "You knew."

"I didn't-" Midoriya started. He did not know though, trying to think back on how he felt back then when Zach apparently remembered him specifically feeling a certain way. He argued it anyway though, "I don't agree with how-"

"You were all the best people I knew," Zach said. He lifted his lips into a smile and ignored how Midoriya started right there, telling his friend straight out, "Making the best and right decisions all the time, and every single one of you backed out of the Sports Festival when I got punished for what I did with the War Boys." Midoriya's eyes shot open huge, and Zach said despite his friend's shocked look at what Zach was using to defend his own mentality here, "And if it really wasn't right of me, you wouldn't have done that. You, Midoriya, thought back then that I had done what was right. You thought it like I had thought so myself but started to doubt when I was losing it after being punished for such a thing, but then because of you all I realized that despite the system, society, having to punish me for it, that it was still the right thing to do. Sometimes, you break the rules. You do something that has to be punished because it can't set a precedent, and yet everyone including the people punishing you know that what you did was right."

The way Zach simplified it right there brought it back again to Stain, and Midoriya hated making the comparison in his head as he saw the police chief who was threatening to punish them, and who also bowed to them in gratitude for stopping Stain. Zach continued to his friend though, "But that only works if you can back up your words and actions with success, because those who fail while trying what I did would be no better than criminals. The way I did things was 'correct' because I succeeded, whereas your way would always be correct whether you won or not. So I knew I could never lose, and I built up my power to make sure that I never did so that every move I made was still the 'correct' one. And if I had failed, I would have been no different than a kid who got in the way and got a bunch of hostages killed by acting foolishly in a serious hostage situation… Which is just as possible an outcome of the War Boys incident that no one ever brings up. I could have easily been the stupid kid who got all the hostages killed while fighting alongside vigilantes in an illegal costume, making everyone question how U.A. could let that happen, would have gotten me arrested and turned me into the biggest joke…"

He paused for a second while Midoriya looked at him in shock again at what sounded like it could have happened had Zach failed. What was more surprising to him though, was how in depth into that potential Zach got, and he wondered if Zach back then knew that all of those things could have happened had he failed at saving Kaminari and the hostages that night. Zach continued though after trailing off, "But I backed up those potentially foolish actions by succeeding. Only through success do the wrong things for the right reasons ever get accepted. People are arrested all the time and use the excuse that they 'had good intentions.' Good intentions mean jack shit though when the results are bad. Good intentions only matter with good results. People will always defend and back up people who always make good results even if the ways they got them were sketchy, but those people would be just as fast to turn on someone who got those good results 99 out of 100 times, if in that one failure things went bad and something real fucked up happened because of it."

Midoriya froze and he lowered his gaze down to the floor. He grit his teeth in pity but also a much bigger conflicted feeling within him, I, agree with that. With them. 1% failure isn't acceptable, especially when you do as much as you do.

"That's what I feel like happens to me all the time," Zach continued, and Midoriya rose his look that was pitying but also harsh back at Zach. "I can be a great person. Give inspiration on the news. Bring people back while smiling. Help a kid being bullied. Teach my classmates new moves and help them be better heroes. Catch a bunch of villains. Save a city… But look a little angry in an interview, or get mad when someone blows up your house and kills your friend, and that's who you are now." Midoriya stared at Zach in less harsh a way as Zach was not actually talking about Death or his time he was gone anymore. And those 'failures' that Midoriya was thinking still needed to be addressed were not as extreme in this circumstance, and yet they were the only things the news was talking about right now despite all that other stuff Zach just mentioned.

"Just as people would only focus on that one failure, they only look at the bad." Zach frowned more at Midoriya too after saying it, and Midoriya knew Zach had seen that he was agreeing with how his few failures were the most important things to look at. Zach stared at him and said in a low tone, "You never look at the millions I saved. You only look at the…" Zach hesitated. He paused and his mouth flinched, his expression getting uncertain about continuing before he whispered in a quiet voice, "The numbers I've killed."

Zach refrained from giving any set number there. What was so ominous to Midoriya though, was that he did not even give a factor or an estimate, but just the word 'numbers.' Deku held back though from opening his mouth and asking the question always on the back of his mind. I don't want to know the answer, Midoriya reminded himself, as it was the reason he had not asked so far. "That is what I look at more," Midoriya admitted. "But it isn't all I look at," he countered what Zach just said to him. I know you've saved those people. You say it's millions and I do believe that. You've done so much, but because of the way you've done it you've done so much wrong inside of that 'so much.'

"And you're right," Midoriya added. "We look at the bad so much more than we look at the good, because heroes can't do those bad things. They can't get away with it. And if you set yourself up in the position to make more bad decisions, by keeping this same mentality," Midoriya shook his head at his friend. "Then you're only going to make more and more bad things for people to point at and criticize you over."

It's not about my actions though, Zach thought frustratedly and looked away from Deku. It's about my inactions. My way of life, of living. Every step I take. Every face I make. And I don't have any options! You think it's easy to make a good decision here, but I've shown them that I'm willing to bend the rules, so they expect far more from me than from you. Than from anyone! Because they can just point at things I've done in the past and say that 'I've done it before,' so why not for them now? Whereas for the rest of you they'll let you get away with staying within the rules. Because to them, and to you, you're not actively making the choice. The "choice" doesn't exist if it's outside of the rules. Not for any of you. But for me? They think I can do anything. Some of them want me to do anything. They want me to make the choices that don't exist for anyone else, but that they know I consider because they've seen me make those choices time and time again. I can't get away with anything. Not the bad and not the good. Not keeping secrets or telling the truth.

At this point, there is no recovering the popularity I had. I knew I had to keep it perfect from the moment I got out of jail. But by keeping it perfect that long I rose my popularity the last bit higher it could have gotten to the point where it could only go down from there. That doesn't mean I have to fail now. Zach took in a deep breath and then sighed, which made Midoriya frown at him and get an angrier look on his face as he thought Zach was still focused on their conversation.

Continuing on with the argument any longer would not have helped any though. Zach did not want to go on arguing his rationale with Midoriya looking at him the way he was, and instead he just said in a more relaxed voice, "You know, I do miss it." Midoriya looked at Zach in somewhat surprise though continued a harsh look at what his friend just said. "My time out there started off terrible. Everything I had given up was all I could think about, as much as I tried to focus on my goals and the future. Subconsciously my mind always went back to thinking about you guys. About that horrible stuff I had done. And my dreams… every dream was a nightmare. Not that that was much different from when I was still here."

Midoriya stayed quiet and watched Zach closely, listening in without interrupting now as Zach shared this with him. "But even before I stopped thinking about you guys at all. Before I stopped dreaming, before I forced myself to control every part of my mind so I-"

"You stopped dreaming?" Midoriya asked, his voice skeptical at the way Zach said it like it was an active choice on his part to do something impossible.

Zach did not respond right away though. He just lowered the small smile he had as he was starting up about this, realizing that what he just mentioned was not just an aside to bring up mid-conversation. "Yeah," he replied after a minute. "I stopped dreaming." He looked seriously into Midoriya's eyes and continued to his confused friend who was getting so unnerved right here, "To dream means to sleep deeply enough for your mind to wander. It means sleeping deeply enough that you may not wake up instantly if there's a noise of an assassin sneaking up on your bed."

"That's-" Midoriya could not even continue. He just stared at Zach with his eyes wide and his face twisted thinking about what Zach was telling him. "You really don't- why would you do something like-"

"I just told you," Zach grumbled back. Then he continued in a dark voice, "And don't say it's unnecessary. I slept on vehicles for months so that I never stopped moving towards my next fight even while I was resting. And on a truck one day I remember waking from an unnatural feeling, or noise, or whatever coming from outside of the truck. I snapped up ready to fight, right before the truck got ripped apart and most of my friends inside it killed. I defeated the villains who came for my bounty though. Because I was ready in an instant to fight them, I wasn't even hurt from it." Zach ground his teeth and then glared furiously at Midoriya when he was still looking disapprovingly and like what Zach was saying was so far out there. "Last week, I had a dream though."

Midoriya froze and his expression shook. No, he thought, his eyes opening so much wider at the rage that covered Zach's entire face.

"I finally- I must have felt safe enough here. Working things out with you, having Momo take care of me while I was sick, being able to tell the truth to some people and not be put away because of it… I guess I must have felt too safe, to wake up in time. And I stopped filling my body with Death because it had made me sick, even though I knew Darling wasn't around to protect me anymore. And I invited friends over, even though I knew Eziano could target me at home and probably knew where I was." Zach ground his teeth, then he pushed out a sigh through them and inhaled a deep breath to calm down. "It didn't feel great, not dreaming at all. I barely slept back then anyway though, so it didn't really bother me. Besides, when I was awake, things were nice."

Zach smiled again at Midoriya who shook his head around to try and get over what just happened. He had to put it in the back of his mind for now though as Zach did not give him a second to process before continuing, "I didn't stay depressed and dark for long after I left. Ashido told me, after the first Sports Festival when she came to visit my place, that cool guys don't mope around for long." Zach grinned and went on, "So I tried to enjoy myself. I was seeing and doing horrible things. So much of what I saw out there was too horrible to even process." Zach paused for a moment and then continued to his friend who looked to be pitying him over that last sentence, "But it felt great for the first time in forever not hiding anything."

Zach tilted his head back and said nostalgically, "I told everyone what I had done with the villains. I told them what I had done to the anti-heroes. Other anti-heroes who joined me, I never hid from them what I had done to Ganji and Webb and the others. When it came to my comrades, I was an open book. Because I was in a different world and no one really understood or knew what I was talking about, so they didn't judge me before hearing it all out with my reasons and, everything." The dark-haired teen hesitated and lowered his smile, getting a dark and regretful look over his face at the expression Midoriya just had on his face for a second. Not the Arcasia version. Not why I did, because I was in a completely different world.

"Even if they weren't," Zach muttered, though his rose his voice back in the positive tone as he continued. "I didn't hold back. I didn't lie to them all about who I was. They were following me into battle, laying their lives down for me, and they all deserved to know exactly why they were doing it. So I told them my reasons. And I told them the truth. I told everyone everything, because with my army there was no one forcing any of them to stay. If they had something wrong with what my plans were, my reasons for what we were doing, they could leave." Zach spoke in a steady voice while locking eyes with Midoriya, "I didn't force anyone to be there. They all chose it. They chose me. I chose all of them." Midoriya nodded his head in understanding, even as he stared at his friend who said things so confidently about how the Army of Death had been created.

If people knew this-

"We picked each other, and we trusted each other. Fought and died alongside each other." Zach looked seriously at Midoriya and said, "I told you how it's because of them that I became confident in my skills as a leader. I believed in myself because they believed in me." Midoriya started nodding as he remembered Zach saying that in the forest of Inazuma, but Zach continued this time, "During our fight against Killmore I had ideas."

"What do you mean?" Midoriya wondered softly. "Do you not think I-"

"No," Zach shook his head but with a look saying 'no, that's not what I mean.' "I hesitated so much back then, and I knew you were better at coming up with those plans than me. During the obstacle course against Class B we had not too long before that, I let Tsuyu make our plan because I didn't want to lead. My decisions had cost me too much already, and I didn't believe in them anymore. Not enough to lead people I cared about into battles. Those people followed me though. They trusted in my decisions all the time, even after times when I made mistakes. And I understood that's what it meant to be a leader. I could make mistakes, get my comrades killed, but if I was able to get past that and understand my mistakes and learn off of them, I would be an even better leader. More fit to protect my comrades and the people we were trying to save."

He paused and then said in a lower but still steady tone, "I've lost so much. I have lost so many times, more than I can count. And every time I learned. Every time I killed I got stronger, and every time I won I became more confident, and every time I gained more followers or gained the trust of the most amazing people I can think of, I believed in myself more." Zach lifted up his right hand in front of him and Midoriya's eyes darted down to his open palm with his fingers curled up. Zach stared straight at Midoriya's face and said, "I am strong." His fingers curled up into one strong fist, and he said, "I am only this strong though because of the people around me. The villains who defeated me. My friends long passed…"

"It's because of you too," Midoriya said. Zach lifted his head and looked at Midoriya with interest at that response to what he was saying. Midoriya nodded though firmly and said to his friend in front of him, "It's always been you, Zach. Your spirit and determination. The will you have to never give up."

"Thanks, Midoriya," Zach said. He lowered his hand and looked at his friend with a genuine smile on his face, but he shook his head and said, "But I would have given up a long time ago. I did, a couple times. All Might though, and Mr. Akers, Momo…" Other times too, Zach thought to himself with his smile lowering a little. Dabi, and Webb, and Darling. "It would have been over for me a long time ago without these people," Zach finished.

"That doesn't mean it wasn't still you who was able to gather up all those people to follow you," Midoriya said. He was not saying it as a compliment or as praise, but he did feel it was the truth as he stepped forward closer to Zach. "I mean it. You have always been that kind of person. You talked about Killmore before. You treat that day like everyone was following me?" Midoriya asked it and Zach rose his eyebrows up confusedly, looking back at his friend and nodding his head as that was exactly what he thought.

Midoriya shook his head and stated just as firmly back, "We followed you. I made a plan after we arrived, but we never would have gotten there if you didn't rush downstairs and out the door without letting anyone slow you down." Zach's eyes started widening, and Midoriya continued to him, "You found the loophole that only you could think of to go around the rules. You may have been lying to us during those weeks, and hiding all those plans you were making, but even after you had pushed us all away and isolated yourself, we all ran after you. We knew that you knew what you were doing. We followed-" Midoriya cut himself off and grit his teeth, but then he admitted softly, "I, followed you. You got us to that building and we saved over two hundred hostages-"

"Two hundred and twenty eight," Zach said in a soft voice. "Due to a plan you made."

"That you got us there to carry out," Midoriya countered.

Zach did not reply for a few seconds, and then he smiled making Midoriya stare at him with much wider eyes. "I felt pretty stupid afterwards, tackling Killmore out of the building like that." Midoriya's jaw dropped, but Zach chuckled as he remembered the video showing what he had done. Villains saw it though and knew I was near suicidal. It helped me kill Kurogiri, but it also terrified the villains all over the world who thought they knew who I was. They saw me falling from the sky and kicking the shit out of Killmore, and they knew everywhere that I was not playing around. It was the last thing they saw of me before I disappeared in the Lifebringer Incident. They saw me step up to the window and glare out. The villains saw the last of Zach Sazaki that day. They saw what I was about to turn into, and all they could hope for was that I would be stuck in U.A. for another two years before they had to deal with me. And then, I disappeared. To lurk in every shadow. To be their Death.

"It was too risky," Midoriya agreed to his former classmate. At that time you were not the person you are now. You got us there but you're right too, I did come up with that plan while you didn't. Now you have a thousand plans not just for super long-term things like what you were doing with your report, but in every moment. In every fight you have plans for five seconds from now, and a minute past, thirty, an hour, the next day, and every second of every day is just a continuation of every fight. And you're so good at it. So if every moment is part of the fight, is this one too? If this moment is part of the fight then, why are you telling me these things? Why do you bring up the things you do? Why do you direct conversations in this way?! How is it that we went from almost talking about how many people you've killed, to both of us trying to accredit the other with stopping Killmore? I know exactly how we got here. It's because even if you don't know you're doing it, you've admitted that you manipulated even your own mind. You manipulated your mind to avoid thinking about certain things, and to stop dreaming, and if it would hurt you to know that you're manipulating a conversation could you start doing it subconsciously? I- I don't know. You crushed Faith though. You shattered his mind without using your Quirk.

The most dangerous thing about you isn't Death. I know you're still my friend too, but in that head of yours is a manipulative genius. What you do when you leave here will work on getting the public back on your side, and you could do it in a thousand different ways I can't even think of. I don't know how you'll do it, but it's out of my control. I won't stop you as long as you stay in line. I won't get in the way of your plans, as long as your plans keep you on the straight and narrow path. It is not a wide path for you Zach. Not anymore. So don't step off it! Every time we talk I see more and more just how powerful you really are, or how strong you could be. I can never let you go back to what you were. "You should have just knocked him out with Death up there. It was unnecessary to dive through the window with him."

"Yeah, you're right," Zach admitted. "I let my emotions get the best of me when I saw him press the detonator switch. If not for Momo, everyone would have died and I- I lost it for a second." Zach admitted it and both he and Midoriya grimaced so much while making eye contact with each other. I was supposed to be a hero at the time. I lose control of my emotions? That makes me do reckless things? That's not what either of us want to hear right now. He needs to hear about the stable me only making good decisions I've thought out for a long time.

"Like on the interview?" Midoriya asked, his voice just questioning though his eyes looking darker than Zach would have liked.

"Seeing that guy show up, I knew my own plans to ignore him forever were over. He used his power to go around my own choice and force me to see that little girl I was actively choosing to let die beforehand. I had made the choice not to save her when I first saw Cayman's calls for me to save her. I couldn't, look at her though." Zach bit down and looked away, "I couldn't see her dead, so easy for me to bring her back, and just stick to my conviction to let her die based on everything I knew would come from it. Her life wasn't a piece in a game. It wasn't just something I could ignore because of the long-term picture. I brought her back knowing it changed everything, but I couldn't- I didn't want to-" Zach ground his teeth and glared so angrily across the park with Midoriya staring at him in his peripheral vision judging every word he said.

"It wouldn't have been a piece in a game," Midoriya started in a low voice. "Even if you never had to see her. Even if she had just died, in a different building. Even if you were able to ignore it, that doesn't mean it didn't matter. Just because it doesn't affect you…"

Zach shook his head and bowed it, clenching his eyes shut and baring his teeth in frustration. "Just shut up already," Zach growled. Midoriya's eyes snapped open huge at that tone, but Zach glared sideways out the corners of his eyes at his friend next to him. "If I don't think of everyone at least a little like that, then I'm going to lose it when I let them die every day. I can't feel for those people the same way I used to. If I did, I'd hate myself every second of every day." Zach dragged his eyes off of Midoriya's that stared at him in shock at how angrily he was speaking about how he did not see normal people as that important anymore. He glared away and just said lower to his friend who was in disbelief while watching him, "If I still felt like that I never would have come back here. I'd be out there saving them all right now. But, I'm not that great a person, Midoriya."

A small grin formed on Zach's face with relief in it, and he said softer in a more relaxed way, "And at least I know, I won't have trouble convincing you of that."

---

A/N Thanks for reading! Zach and Midoriya get deep with what's the right and 'correct' ways to save people. Zach goes into another of his AoD attacks and how he stopped international weapons' traffickers and saved an entire nation, in a couple days! A big chapter this time for just a talk between these two, but the divide between Midoriya and Zach is a complex issue here and something I love delving deeper into. Anyway, this is a little off topic, but just wanted to mention it. This weekend we had my grandma's funeral (mom's mom, for those of you recalling I said this before this summer, but that was my dad's mom). So Nanny (my mom's mom), was actually an author and an inspiration to me if not a role model even. Her name was Addie Meyer Sanders, and she was a self-made author who would always come into school and read her books to my classes over the years as she did at hundreds/thousands of schools around the nation. My love of writing might never have come without seeing her successfully publishing books, knowing that it was something achievable that I could do. I just wanted to thank her here, and tell her I love you Nanny. Thanks for reading that you guys who did. Anyway, leave a review below telling me what you think of the chapter, comments, predictions, questions for the future. And here're some review responses:

Guest chapter 189 . Oct 10

Alright I'm pretty sure you said you like the whole Shonen happy ending (ish) endings and that this was supposed to have one but jfc I can't wrap my head around this story having a really happy ending? Like I hope it all works out but I'm getting kinda nervous for the end of the story ? There's just so much grey area, internal conflict and rubbish public opinion? I just want Zack and all my kids to be happy and safe by the end of this ;)))

No spoilers but we can all hope for a happy ending can't we? Never give up hope! Lol it's tough to keep believing with all that's going on, but however it ends I promise it'll be satisfying to everyone... (maybe) XD Thanks for the review!

SomeDude chapter 189 . Oct 11

Love your work and the way you've developed your characters. I also really like how you have Zach tackle real-world problems that would arise due to his quirk (Like how someone would pay for Zach to revive). I just have a question: Will we ever see Zach encounter a quirkless suicide who he has to inevitably revive. I mean in the BNHA, the segregation against the quirkless is high, and this may cause some to kill themselves. Will Zach ever have to face a problem regarding quirk segregation, and will he do anything about it?

Thanks a lot! Zach's been tackling those real-world problems for a while, including stuff about the Quirkless too. If you don't remember, the first homeless guys Zach ran into included that one guy who had fallen into depression and was ready to rob someone because of the discrimination he felt there was towards the Quirkless that Zach helped propagate by pushing the use of Quirks even more across the world. Zach didn't deny it but tried to help the man anyway. There's a lot Zach wants to help all over the world, and we'll see if there's more he's going to do specifically about what happens with the Quirkless now that he's pushing for a more Quirk-friendly world. Anyway, hope you enjoyed the chapter, and thanks for the review!