Daisuke had been stuck in a hospital room for over two days when he broke, sick and tired of sleeping and watching mindless TV. He broke and started thinking again.

Honestly, after getting out of the hellhole that was All For One's care ('Sensei', an icy voice reminded him, and he shivered), he'd been relieved beyond anything he could have imagined. He was out of the dank underground room, seeing the sun for the first time in days, breathing fresh air for the first time in just as long-

And he was free.

He was free of All For One's words, his voice, his stupid convincing arguments, and he was free of trying to protect Quirky.

At least that was one thing he was glad for. He hadn't given up Quirky. He had been a bloody hero for the kid.

And the kid wasn't here to know it.

A sharp pain raced through his legs as he shifted. The muscles had lost part of their mass and strength over the days he'd been confined to a chair, forced to remain unmoving and yielding. He wondered how long-term patients coped, then realized that there were probably doctors with muscle movement quirks who helped. Quirky would love theorizing with such an ability-

And he was back.

Quirky.

Midoriya Izuku.

Daisuke swallowed and moved again, hoping the pain would be overwhelming enough to shut down his brain.

It was not.

Rather, it restarted the entire bloody process for him, playing out in HD in his mind, even better quality than the hospital room TV.

And the most vivid of those memories? His quirk.

He swallowed the nth time, the rush of tears momentarily obscuring his vision.

He'd told Ingenium everything he remembered, though he'd only briefly mentioned that All For One had taken his quirk away - and only after the paramedic had arrived to ask him a few routine concussion-checking questions, including 'What is your quirk? Can you activate it for me?'

Fuck.

He reached up to rub his eyes.

He had no quirk now. And with All For One in the wind, he was probably never going to get it back, anyway. Pro Heroes were on the lookout for him day and night, and police officers at every door in the hospital.

Daisuke didn't know who all knew about All For One, but the results spoke for themselves. A villain who had escaped even All Might.

Daisuke swallowed bitterly and tried to bury the raging monster who wanted to blame anyone and everyone (but was scared of blaming-).

No quirk, his mind reminded him, rather viciously.

"Shut up," Daisuke snarled.

The door creaked. "No one was speaking," A young, familiar voice said, and Daisuke startled, which brought another hiss of pain. Mirio winced. "Sorry about that."

"Idiot," Nejire said cheerfully from behind him, then pushed through into the room, Tamaki trailing at her side. He looked gaunt and pale, weaker than Daisuke had ever seen him.

"Seems like my captivity affected you more than me," Daisuke remarked, and Tamaki flinched.

Nejire raised her eyes. "Jokes already? Thought you'd at least say hello first."

Daisuke couldn't help a small smile. "Hello."

Mirio laughed. "Hi!" He greeted back, slightly over enthusiastic, but that was understandable.

Daisuke smiled, and for the first time in over a week (two? How long had it been, anyway?), his smile was genuine.

Tamaki walked over to stand at his side, just inches away from him and looked over his entire body, even as his fist clenched. Mirio, biting his lips, tried not to hover but totally failed at that. Nejire was the only one who gave a simple shrug and positioned herself on the chair in the corner of the room.

And yet - and it was especially obvious to Daisuke, who had known these idiots for a while - their bodies were all laced with tension, ready to pounce at the slightest hint of danger.

Daisuke sighed. Might as well get it over with. "I don't have a quirk anymore," He announced.

Nejire straightened in her seat and her eyes flared, Tamaki grunted in certain surprise, and Mirio- Well, Mirio just frowned, which was weird, since Daisuke had expected the most astonishment out of him.

Maybe Ingenium had talked to him?

But why would he? Daisuke had asked him to keep it on the down low.

"How?" Tamaki croaked, and his voice was heavy and different, and Daisuke realized, with a warm, sinking heart, that his friend had been crying.

He swallowed. "The… villain who kidnapped me has a quirk which can take away other quirks."

Nejire's nose flared. "That's impossible," She said quietly, rage and fear simmering in her eyes.

A bitter laugh echoed in the room. "Sure, let's go with that."

Mirio rubbed the back of his neck, pity and sorrow for Daisuke oozing out of his every crevice. "That… sucks," He muttered, pointlessly, as if he couldn't find the words.

Daisuke wanted to hate him for that, tell him that he couldn't know what not having a quirk felt like, that he couldn't bear it and neither could anyone else!

But this was Togata Mirio - the one person Daisuke felt could probably survive losing his quirk and come out a better person despite it.

… Not all of them could be Togata Mirio.

Eyes turning cold, he shifted his gaze to the floor. The atmosphere in the room darkened.

After a bout of silence that none of them appreciated, Nejire cleared her throat. "Wh- What are you going to do?" She asked, and it was the slight stutter that gave away the extreme anxiety she must have been feeling, because she never stuttered. "Without- well, now."

Tamaki and Mirio held their breaths in anticipation.

Daisuke wished he could throw them out of the room, suddenly. It had all been well and good in the beginning, but now he was starting to think wallowing in his thoughts might be a more preferable option. "You mean, what happens to my position in the hero course," He corrected, refusing to let inflection color his voice, because he knew it would otherwise break. "Without a quirk."

Nejire hesitated. "Yeah."

Tamaki looked down at his feet, unable to meet his eyes. Mirio just stood there, in the peripheral of his vision, but expression unchanging. His eyes, though… Daisuke wondered why he was getting that foreboding feeling. And no, it wasn't his stupid quirk - that thing was gone. Forever.

Daisuke shrugged and turned to look at the window. The sun was glaring, outside, and yet the light seemed almost harsh. "I don't know," He said. "Probably..." He hesitated.

"Dai?" Nejire nudged softly.

It was just the push he didn't need.

He filled up with fury, his hands shaking and his feet burning, but he didn't care. All he wanted to do (and all he was doing, really) was to glare at the three people in the room who had their quirks. How dare they even try to interfere in something so stupid and confusing and downright shitty? They couldn't imagine quirklessness! They couldn't imagine quirklessness after having a quirk their entire life, depending on it to help them succeed in a profession almost impossible to get into even with a quirk! "SHUT UP!" He shouted, and his friends flinched. But at that point, he was too wired up to care. "I'm not staying in the damn hero course because I don't have a bloody quirk anymore, okay?! I'm powerless - why the hell would the hero course even want me? Fuck All For One, I won't be able to save a single civilian let alone fight against a stupid supervillain even All Might-"

"Stop."

Daisuke heaved, his eyes wide and glaring to hold back the tears, his hands clutching at the side of the hospital bed. He snapped his neck around to look at Mirio, and lo and behold, the perpetually cheerful boy looked positively murderous.

A small part of Daisuke wanted to crow at the achievement, but the rest of him was still angry. "Why?" He spat. "Can't hear the truth? I can't fucking do it, Togata, and you bloody well know it."

But Mirio didn't waver. Instead, his face turned even stonier. "So you're saying Izuku can't do it either."

Daisuke's breath seemed to leave his lungs in a flash, taking the rage with it, and leaving behind what seemed to be… (shame?) "I didn't-" He began, turning to look at Nejire and Tamaki. Their eyes were filled with confusion, but from the way they backed up a step or two, he knew they had no intention of interfering.

"You did, though," Mirio rebutted, barrelling on. "You said you couldn't be a hero anymore because you lost your quirk." He shuffled closer, and Daisuke could hear the undertone of pure unadulterated anger in his voice. "That means you don't believe quirkless people can be heroes."

"I-"

"Let me just call Izuku here, then," He taunted. "Tell him that. Why let him delude himself, right? He doesn't have a quirk, hasn't had one ever, so let's just throw his dreams down the damn drain and flush away the lies you fed him!"

Daisuke swallowed. He… Mirio knew about that?

But of course he did. Ingenium probably did, too. And everyone who was searching for him. Izuku probably had to tell the entire story to-

He probably had to tell people he was quirkless, again and again and again just so they could save him.

And they did save him - they just couldn't save his quirk.

Not that he blamed them, logically. Logically, they were lucky to even discover him alive. They were lucky to rescue him before he finally spilled the beans on Izuku and god knows how the kid would have protected himself then. He didn't even have a-

Daisuke's lips trembled because here was the crux of it; quirklessness.

"He can't protect himself," Daisuke said weakly. "Not without a- I can't protect myself."

Mirio scoffed, and the sound was so violently not-Mirio-like that all of them had to flinch, even those that the scoff was not directed at. "Bastard," He said. "You have no right to pity yourself and pretend you can't be a bloody hero when you've made someone else believe they can! A single hiccup and you've given up? Why the hell did you even want to be a hero in the first place, then?! Heroes never give up, and they damn well fall down again and again and fucking again!" He heaved, his voice breaking right there at the end. "If you can't take responsibility for your actions, then forget about Izuku because you don't deserve him, anyway."

His eyes glistened, but holding the obvious tears in, Mirio spun on his feet and walked out, leaving Diasuke wide eyed and afraid.

After a few minutes of unbreakable silence, Tamaki cleared his throat. "Izuku is… Quirky?" He asked, and Daisuke flinched because realization was dawning of Nejire's face and she- well, she had practically been his biggest supporter.

But even as the tense reaction stretched, halted, and calmed down into a frown, she didn't move, and she didn't say a word. Her eyes flickered to the slightly ajar door, and Daisuke figured that was thinking maybe Mirio had covered it all.

Daisuke swallowed. "... Yes," He said, even though the answer had been obvious and didn't really need to be reiterated.

Tamaki grimaced.

Nejire sighed. "Are you really going to quit?" She asked, her voice the slightest bit cold and her eyes practically calling him out with an 'I thought better of you.'

Daisuke didn't reply.

Nejire pursed her lips and leaned back.

"... I don't know," he said, finally, and there was something much more true about this that there would be about a yes or a no. "I can't-" He inhaled sharply then rubbed his eyes.

His friends exchanged a look, then they straightened, and Nejire got up from her seat. "I suggest you figure it out, Dai," She said, though this time, her voice was soft, again. "I don't really mind what you choose," Lie. "As long as you're happy with it. But you do need to choose."

Tamaki nodded, reached over to give Daisuke's hand a squeeze, and stepped towards the door. "I'll talk to Mirio," He assured him. "He's just probably…" He shrugged. "Frustrated. He was pretty keyed up while you were gone. Wishing he had a provisional license." He smiled grimly. "We were all wishing that."

Daisuke couldn't find a reply to that.

Tamaki sighed. "Bye, Dai. Ingenium said we couldn't stay here long, but… we'll come back."

Daisuke wondered if the 'We' included Mirio, but Tamaki was gone before he could ask.

Alone in his room again, he was left to stare at the ceiling, wondering how he was getting out of this mess.

Okay, so I may have forgotten to cross-post before this but better late than never! Have fun.

… Or not. As some people have rightfully pointed out, Mirio may or may not have been a slight dick about ignoring Dai's trauma. Or maybe Dai's more messed up than he has right to be-

Yeah, no. The misappropriation of that quote Does Not Work™.