SO WOW. A whole ton of you seemed to really enjoy that first chapter and as such I THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH.

So here's the second chapter. Which had almost 13 different versions because I'm a freakin' perfectionist. Still not completely happy of course, but hey, that's being a writer for you.

ENJOY EVERYONE.


Inko looked to her child with eyes that only a mother could possess. The sense of unquestioning love, devotion and caring that would have her lay down her own life to protect him.

Her son. Her poor Izuku. He sat beside her, eyes staring, unfocused and forward. When he blinked, he blinked slowly. When he moved, if he made any moment at all, it was sluggish, as if he was only half-awake. She reached out a ran a hand through his wild and untamed mess of hair. He looked to her like he was moving through water and gave her a weak smile that almost shattered her heart.

He was in so much pain and she couldn't do a damn thing about it.

This was the worst punishment anyone could have given her and the knowledge of it weighted so greatly on her soul she thought she would break down. Her only son, the only son she could ever and would ever have, was suffering and it was entirely beyond her control to stop.

"Miss Midoriya?" Inko looked up to the doctor who was patiently sitting, fingers linked, at a smart desk with a computer screen to one side and several files to the other.

The office was almost stifling from its clinical nature with its wall-mounted charts, clean plastic examination bed and even down to the uncomfortable chairs the Midoriya's sat in. The doctor had tanned, Indian skin, a balding head and a soft, middle-aged roundness to his features.

He adjusted his thin glasses for a moment and opened a manila folder in front of him. "It seems Izuku has finally begun responding to our treatments, it took a while, but we've managed to control the hallucinations, though I'm afraid they may reoccur should he use his quirk."

Inko nodded, feeling as though if she tried to speak she would simply sob. Instead, she gripped the purse on her lap harder, allowing its firmness to calm her already ruined nerves. She knew that it wouldn't do much. Her hair was already a mess, always falling out of the short bun she tried to keep it in. Her clothes were form-eating, mostly to hide her weight gain and because it was easier to just throw them on than to dress up any nicer.

After all, it wasn't as if she was dressing up for anyone.

"As for the scarring, there is little we can do other than recommend some dermatological oils and products as you said don't wish to subject Izuku to any extensive surgery."

"No, not if they're just going to keep happening," Inko mumbled almost to herself as she gave a weak shake of her head.

"Have you noticed any more flare-ups?" The doctor seemed to continue unabated. She wondered briefly if it was because he had seen so many young children like Izuku, or if it was simply because he was pressed for time and wanted to go for lunch. She had met a fair few of them by now, enough to know when they were simply shoveling the problematic six-year-old off onto someone else for a while.

"No, I don't think he's used it since we were last here." She looked to Izuku and smiled softly to her apparently dreamy child, again running a hand across his head. "Izuku? Sweetheart?" The young boy turned to look at her again. She swore she could see his thoughts drift through his eyes, slowly, like boats moving along a muddy river. "Have you used your quirk at all lately?"

The boy seemed to consider this question before slowly he shook his head.

"Okay, that's fine." Inko blinked back her tears and looked to the doctor again. "He-he's become so quiet. I don't like how the medication is affecting him. He used to be so full of energy and-and now… I don't know…"

"Miss Midoriya, you must understand, your son's quirk, combined with his traumatic experience has caused him to develop these disorders. Without medication he would be far worse off." The doctor paused and then sighed, taking his glasses off for a moment to pinch the bridge between his eyes. For a second, Inko saw there was an actual human there behind the white coat and smart blue tie. "I know this is hard for you, I really do. I have seen many children Izuku's age and some even younger suffer from their first quirk usage being traumatic in nature. Though your son's case is an extreme one he is not the only one to have these symptoms." He paused again for another moment as if wondering if he should go on before adding. "I know of another child, Izuku's age actually, who suffered from something very similar. Schizophrenia brought on by a traumatic quirk usage."

Inko leaned forwards at the news, her eyes growing wide. "C-Can I ask who-"

"I'm sorry but the child's name is confidential," The doctor shut her down swiftly, however, he allowed a smile to grace his lips as he added, "Be assured however that they are making progress, they are healing. I believe that with time and with continued use of the medication Izuku willheal too."

Inko gripped her purse again. She wished for all the world that things could be different, that her son could be the happy, energetic child he used to be. Now he seemed like a shell, hollowed by medication and scarred by a quirk he didn't ask for.

"Can I ask, do you know how he developed this quirk?" The doctor broke Inko out of her thoughts as he again flipped through the manila folder. "My files say that your quirk is to pull small objects towards you, is that correct?"

"Yes," Inko announced with a short nod.

"And his father?"

His father. His father. Inko's rage roared into life at the very thought of that, that… man wasn't even the right word. There was no word for someone like him. Her grip on her purse grew tighter, though this time out of fury, not anxiety. Her eyes grew hard as she simply, sharply, and with more venom than an angry cobra answered. "He breathed fire."

The doctor got the message. "I see." He quickly closed the file

"Well, that does slightly explain the flames, though it could be possible that Izuku's quirk is a mutation. A rare occurrence but not entirely unheard of." He pushed the folder slightly to one side and looked to Inko with a short, professional smile. "We'll continue monitoring him and, when the time comes, I believe we should recommend him for quirk counseling."

Inko nodded, seeing no reason to disagree despite feeling like every decision about her son was being taken from her own hands. But she knew, inside, that this was going to help him. She had cried herself to sleep enough nights on a chair beside Izuku's bed, watching her child sleep only because she had forced sleeping pills into him. She had been pulled out of work more than once because Izuku had been shrieking about monsters in class and she had rushed him to the doctors again and again when his quirk had become too much to handle and he had screamed bloody murder from the pain caused by his scars.

All while his father did nothing.

She felt like the world's greatest failure of a mother, utterly alone and without aid while he did as he pleased, never lifting a finger to help his son. If she ever saw him again…

"Thank you, Doctor Puranam." Inko announced without meeting his gaze as she stood up and gave the doctor a bow in thanks, who returned it without standing, then she held out a hand to her child. Izuku didn't seem to understand what was happening for a few moments before slow eyes spotted his mother's outstretched palm. He took it with a turtles grace, only for Inko to suddenly rush him off his feet and into her arms.

He was getting just a little big to keep picking up for a woman of her size and frame but that didn't matter to Inko. No matter how old Izuku got, she would always be there to help her child.


The villain hit Izuku with the force of a tidal wave. Instantly the teenager was knocked off his feet, the breath was torn from his lungs and the world span around him as slime, wet and thick and greasy, grabbed his body in a bear hug embrace.

The cold, mocking tone of the villain suddenly hit his ears, "Don't try and fight, kid, you're fucked."

His bag had been thrown from his shoulders, as had his phone, both now laying somewhere on the cold concrete. He knew that because he could feel the ice-cold wetness of the creature across his entire torso, crushing his ribs and pinning his arms to his sides. Instantly panic, hot and raw, set into his mind and body as he began trying to struggle out of the villain's bind.

However, he didn't even have time to scream in protest. Tendrils of clammy sludge wrapped themselves around his mouth and nose and he could feel the insidious creature pushing its horrific body into his nostrils, trying to force its way into his very body. Fear rose inside him like an unchecked wildfire, hammering in his chest and rushing through his limbs, causing him to try and thrash wildly in the kind of horror only the drowned know.

A memory flashed before his eyes. A child, tiny and helpless in the arms of a stinking, obese man. His panic went into utter overdrive, drowning out whatever thoughts he had of a rational plan of escape. Now there was only the drive to get out, to fight back, to live. His sobbing reached hysterical levels, aided by the lack of oxygen getting to his acid-filled lungs, and he could hardly see thanks to the blurriness of his vision.

"Just let it happen, in a few moments you'll be brain dead and I'll be walking in your corpse free and easy."

Izuku barely heard the mocking tone of the monster, he could only hear the rushing sound of waves in his ears as his whole body started to lose feeling. His arms were weakening, his legs slowly stopping their fight as the tingling sensation of blood loss began moving through his limbs. Death was creeping over him like a shadow, slow and careful and all-consuming. His eyes drifted closed.

"Maybe I'll dump your body somewhere public, so your mom can have an open funeral."

The thing woke up.

His eyes burst open and his body jolted as if struck by lightning. Suddenly his scars were warm, hot, boiling. Izuku's vision was sharpening, colors contrasting, every sense going into overdrive as the thing took more and more of his consciousness, more and more of his body. It was dizzying and maddening. There was something different this time, however, it was reaching deeper into him, drawing out more power than he'd ever felt it summon before. Cold darkness swept over him like a tsunami flood. First his limbs, then his chest, then his brain, then his heart.

"Hey kid, why yah gettin' so-" The villain didn't get to finish his sentence because his body was torn in two.

Izuku screamed with the sound of a million tortured souls, of madness and fire, of pain and suffering unimaginable. The sound instantly filling the underpass to the point of crushing oppression.

The villain was not just thrown from Izuku but practically ripped from him by the sheer force of the awakening power. He hit the wall with enough strength to crack the concrete, the parts large enough of him to do so anyway, bouncing off it and colliding with the floor with a heavy gelatinous slap.

The monster reeled in shock and he dizzily cried out, "What the hell is happening?"

The air around him was rising, the temperature going from shadow-cool to almost boiling. Parts of his body had calcified and hardened from the furnace-like heat emanating from the teenager and as the sludge villain tried to gather his face back together he turned his eyes back to the boy who seconds ago had been nothing but a helpless victim.

Horror filled him as his eyes beheld the thing.


Izuku wasn't sure how long he was out. It could have been minutes, hours, maybe even days. All he knew was that it was the first time in years he had slept without nightmares, without voices whispering terrors to him, without demons crawling at the corners of his vision.

He slept. That was all. Dreamless and empty.

He wanted to stay there, in the peace and quiet of nothingness. To simply floating forever in the dark. No pain, no sorrow, no thoughts. Just empty oneness with the void.

"Hey, hey kid, are you alright?" Of course, hearing the voice of his idol was a pretty damn tempting pull from the peace of the abyss.

As always, the boy jolted right into a waking consciousness with a sharp gasp. Izuku's body ached like it hadn't done in a long, long time. He felt as though he'd been stretched and pulled in every direction, his muscles feeling as though they were filled with battery acid and his mouth tasted like copper. And yet he wasn't burning. It was odd how that thought seeped into his brain as he groaned in soft pain and flexed his fingers, the cool touch of gravel grounding his senses.

Usually, once he'd used his quirk, his body felt like it had been scored by fire, every line of scarring on his body feeling like it was being pressed with a hot poker. This time, however, the only part of his body that really hurt was his mouth, oddly enough.

Once his fuzzy vision came into some semblance of focus they instantly widened. "Wha- OH MY GOD IT'S ALL MIGHT!"

The first thing he saw was the grin, brilliant and white, then the pointed yellow hair and then the piercing blue eyes. It's often said that people seem smaller from the screen to real life, but Izuku couldn't say that about All Might. If anything, he somehow seemed bigger, taller, stronger and more imposing.

Somehow, he just seemed so heroic, and he wasn't even doing anything. He was just standing there, grinning his famous grin with his fists on his hips. His white t-shirt and green cargo pants somehow didn't take from the overall striking power of the man, though it did give him an oddly casual feel.

The boy scrambled backward, all aches and pains momentarily forgotten because, 'holy crap that's All Might'.

The giant of a man straightened up, raising a hand in greeting, "Ah! Good! You're awake! And by the looks of things you seem fine, thank goodness, I'm afraid I might have, well, accidentally knocked you out when I showed up." He pointed a thumb over to the manhole from which the sludge villain had first appeared.

Well, it wasn't a manhole anymore. Instead it was something of a big gaping wound in the pathway, enough to fit at least two full-grown men into.

Izuku's eyes widened as he looked around the scene. He had been stood there a minute before, when he had… oh no.

"Sorry about that!" He gave Izuku another quick look over. "You must have a pretty powerful quirk to survive that impact though." With a quick glance behind him, Izuku could see a sizable crater now punched into the concrete wall leading into the underpass and his stomach flipped. Had he really survived that? Shouldn't his back be broken and blood pooling from his head? More and more his stomach was twisting, more and more panic was creeping into his lungs and he started to breathe rapidly.

The thing crawled through his aching limbs, heat snaking down his jagged scars.

All Might didn't seem to notice. "Heck, by the looks of things you practically beat the villain all on your own." The hero ran a hand through his golden hair and laughed loudly, "He was literally begging me to capture him, see!" And as if to prove his point he held up an empty cola bottle which seemed filled with green slime, another sat empty in a pocket at his side. It wasn't until Izuku saw a pair of eyes drift through it, focus on him, then suddenly vanish again that he realized what All Might was talking about.

His eyes grew wider still and his heart began hammering in his chest. Over and over a single thought rushed through his mind. 'Did he see?Did he see the thing?' The very idea that his all-time favorite hero had witnessed the thing first hand almost made him empty his stomach. Instead, he curled himself up into a ball, his face paling more with each second. "I-I-I-"

He could feel it, the monster within him waking up once more, apparently unsatisfied at its already unprecedented usage in the fight with the villain. His scars, however, warmed slowly, perhaps simply because of his already exhausted state. Izuku's fingers curled into his skin, digging in as much as he dared in front of his idol.

"Though I'm not sure I fully approve of the burning." All Might's tone became somewhat stern as he looked to the underpass. Izuku glanced out from over folded arms. What he saw caused a cold sweat to break out over his skin. There were fire marks everywhere and charcoaled, almost calcified pieces of sludge which littered the underpass, leading outwards towards the now ruined manhole like a trail of black and green blood.

He suddenly realized why the villain had only filled one bottle.

Now he emptied his stomach.

The moment he did so he felt it, the thing rushing to the surface, threatening to drown out all other senses, colors around him began sharpening and contrasting, it could still fight, still kill-

"Woah there! Maybe you're more shaken up than I thought!" All Might's hand was suddenly on his shoulder and Izuku felt as though he had been touched by the sun. Warmth rushed through him and the thing was, quite simply, forced to a halt. One strong hand on his shoulder, one show of kindness, was that all it truly took to stop it from boiling through his scars and into his body?

Or perhaps it was simply that the thing was a little more exhausted than it was letting on. The hate, the fury, was still there, Izuku could feel it, but the physical presence of the hero was pushing into retreat.

"I-I-I'm sorry." Izuku stammered out as he wiped his mouth on his sleeve before slowly bringing himself unsteadily to his feet. "I didn't mean to-"

"What's your name, kid?"

Izuku almost had a heart attack. All Might was asking for his name! "I-I-Izuku Midoriya."

"Alright Young Midoriya, take some deep breaths and calm down. You've had a tough experience." All Might's tone was surprisingly soft and naturally Izuku followed his advice, feeling just a bit better from doing so, though he kept his eyes fixed firmly on the ground. "You acted in self-defense, and besides, the villain will live to see trial and a hopefully a jail cell. If anything, I'm willing to bet that you simply need a better handle on your quirk."

He didn't know. He couldn't have known. Izuku's anxiety, along with the thing, was calmed but not squashed completely. It lingered deep within him, as it always had.

Still, Izuku had so many questions for the hero, so many thoughts he needed to spill from his overloaded heart. He was right here with All Might, this was his golden opportunity! He forced a soft, hopefully friendly smile, to his face and turned to look at his hero. "Mr. All Might I- AGH!"

"Well I gotta go, kid." All Might wasn't in front of him anymore. He was several steps away stretching his legs and getting ready to jump. How the hell had he done that without Izuku noticing? Then again, Izuku could kick himself for the number of things he missed thanks to the medication in his system. "I assume you can get home safely from here. When you do try to lay down and relax, drink some water, watch some T.V."

"W-wait you can't go yet!" Izuku cried out as All Might finally finished stretching out. "I've so many things to ask you!"

"Sorry, kid, but time waits for no man! And neither does justice!" He crouched low, about to leap and Izuku saw his one chance to ask his burning, heart-wrenching question to his idol about to vanish.

Bottling up his fear and anxiety he shoved all his remaining strength into his voice as he called out, "Can someone become a hero, even if their quirk is evil?!" He paused his arm held out towards All Might, who seemed to freeze in place. Seeing his opportunity widen, he quickly pushed forwards. "I-I-I've always suffered from my… from the thing I can do." He couldn't force himself to use the term quirk for what he had, it wouldn't be right after all. "It's a curse. All it's ever done is cause pain and misery, especially to me." He looked down, his hand curling into a fist on his chest. "B-But I thought, maybe if I become a hero, maybe I can use it for something good. So no one would ever have to be hurt by it anymore. But it's so terrible I- I have to know. Please. Can someone like me be a hero like you?"

His eyes moved back to his idol and his breath caught in his throat, tears welling once more in his eyes. All Might was standing tall, strong, a mountain of strength and power. There was a pause which seemed to stretch on longer than it had any right to before finally the hero looked over his shoulder to the boy. There was something in his opal blue eyes, usually so dark and piercing. A flash of someone else, the person behind the smile.

"Young Midoriya, listen to me." He half-turned to look at Izuku better and the teenager found himself forgetting to breathe for a moment. "There are no such things as good or evil quirks, only good or evil hearts." He held out a massive open palm. "What you have is yours and it is up to you to forge it into something great, something heroic." The mid-afternoon sun cast a light onto the man while consuming Izuku in shadow, and yet, despite their distance Izuku felt as though he could step out right at that moment and take his side.

He could be there, in the light.

Tears fell thick and strong down Izuku's cheeks as the weight of All Might's words hit him, though they were not the usual hammer blow of insults he was so used to. This was something else, encouragement, wisdom, words he had needed to hear all his life. A breeze ruffled past them, almost masking the sobs coming from the boy.

All Might's fist suddenly clenched tight and his smile widened, not into a grin of humor but one of vast, impossible determination. A bravery which Izuku had only ever dreamed of was right there, right in front of his eyes. Proof that it existed, proof that maybe he could be brave too. The rush of emotion within him was too much and Izuku fell to his knees as he wept tears mixed with all the self-hatred he had kept in so long. Cathartic and cleansing they flowed, finally, as the light of true hope reached his core.

"If you have a heroic heart than I believe that you too can become a hero!"


SO ABOUT THEM IZUKU'S HUH. Poor baby Deku, all drugged up and whatnot. I got sad writing that because poor Inko and Deku and just. Poor them.
Also to those hoping to see the thing's true form here, NOPE. You think I'd drop something as juicy as that in the second chapter? PLEASE. Though there were some hints...

Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed reading and I hope to see you again next chapter!