Midoriya walked to the station in the daylight, his suit jacket slung over one shoulder. It was deserted save for tourists and a few housewives with small children, the rush hour long over. He supposed he should head back to his cheap apartment in Akuto, but what was the point in that? There was no-one waiting for him there, just his TV and his punching bag. He bought a ticket for the train going in the opposite direction- towards Kamino Ward and the All Might memorial.
He stared out of the window most of the way there, too listless to check his phone. Lots of Kamino had been rebuilt in the years since All Might's death, but there were still remnants of the destruction visible from the train. Roads that had once followed a straightforward grid pattern had sharp corners where the earth had shattered, making fault lines through them. The odd building from before the fight still stood, too, drab and decrepit amongst the shining steel and glass of the reconstruction. Above all of that was the tower.
The tower had been Endeavour's pet project. He'd given a press conference when it had opened, and talked about how it would shed the light of hope, and the people of the devastated ward would see it above them, looking over them. It was half a kilometre high, and at night they lit up the tip.
Where All Might had died they had planted a garden. A few dozen cherry trees were on the cusp of maturity, their branches bare and frosty in the winter air. The flowerbeds were bare, the dark earth covered with a thin frost. Midoriya walked through, fingers brushing the simple plaque at the centre of the garden. Someone, maybe a tourist, had left a bouquet of red flowers. He'd never visited the site before, but today that seemed irrational. He seemed unable to feel anything. No grief, no sadness, just white static. It was like he was barely there at all. The base of the tower was unattended, just a box with a suggested donation. Midoriya opened his wallet and put some money in the box before he headed in.
Usually when buildings were this tall, they were used as offices, but the memorial tower was little more than an empty shell, concrete and steel construction visible from the stairwell. Midoriya started climbing the stairs, barely registering the architecture. Every few metres there was a small window, to let in light, and more than once he noticed a strange distortion of the light pass over it.
The ascent was taking too long. Midoriya picked up his pace, his legs moving more rapidly. He'd made sure to stay in good shape, with a mix of sprint-type and long distance running. A few stairs wouldn't kill him. The windows flashed past as he sped up, hitting an easy jog first, and then a full-on run. He breathed hard, taking two stairs at a time until finally he reached the summit, holding his knees to catch his breath.
The top of the tower was a viewing platform, a walkway inside the tower that looked out onto the city on every side through open archways. The lamp, which Endeavour had named the Light of Hope, took up the centre of that level, but it was dormant.
Midoriya frowned. He wasn't sure why exactly, but despite the platform being deserted, he got the sense that someone else was there. Midoriya folded his arms over his chest, leaning against the nearest archway, and waited.
Permafrost rose from the outside of the tower on a pillar of ice. He wasn't wearing his hero gear anymore, and had opted for sportswear instead, the soft grey hood of his jacket covering his two-tone hair and casting the scar on the left side of his face in shadow.
"Permafrost?"
"I'm not in uniform, so it's Todoroki. If you don't mind." Todoroki stepped from the ice pillar onto the viewing platform, dismissing his quirk's manifestation behind him with a twitch of his hand.
"You followed me here."
"I saw you leave the agency." Todoroki paused, and it seemed like he was trying to find the right words. "I heard what happened. You seemed upset."
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to trouble you." Midoriya stared down at the drop- the bare garden half a kilometre below, his stomach sinking. Todoroki had thought he was about to kill himself. "I'm not- you know. I just need to think. About things."
"It's not trouble," said Todoroki. "I'm a hero, so I save people- it's in the job description."
"Why did you follow me yourself? You could have sent someone." Someone less important than Permafrost.
"You might not remember this," said Todoroki, quietly. "But I was in the same cohort as you. For the UA entrance exam."
Midoriya blinked. Of course he remembered Todoroki, coasting to the finish line in his white suit. But he'd never considered that Todoroki might remember him. "Can't Stop Sparkling didn't."
"Aoyama's an idiot," said Todoroki, bluntly. "You were the only kid with no quirk. And everyone said you couldn't do it. But you did it anyway."
"I failed."
Todoroki shrugged. "Does it matter? I wish I was half that brave."
Midoriya looked up at Todoroki, his throat feeling suddenly tight. "You're a hero," he said. "Permafrost. The Ice Prince."
"Is that what they're calling me now?" Todoroki tilted his head, quizzical. "Heh, I hadn't heard that one."
Midoriya flushed. "Sorry."
"No, it's okay." Todoroki gave a small smile. "I just don't really follow the media, that's all."
"But-" Midoriya closed his eyes, collecting his thoughts. "You save people. You risk your life, every day. How can you say I'm braver than you? I'm- I'm nothing." He felt the tears come, and turned his face away, towards Kamino Ward and the memorial garden. "I'm not even an office worker anymore."
Todoroki was quiet, and Midoriya wondered for a moment if he had conjured himself an ice slide and made an exit from the conversation. "I used to think like that," he said, at last. His eyes fixed momentarily to the giant, dormant lamp. "I think my father did, too. That bravery is defined only by risking your life. But really, it's more complicated than that. Going against what people want for you is brave. Risking failure is brave. Sometimes risking your life is the least brave thing you can do."
Midoriya sniffed, pinching off the tears that were streaming down his face with his fingers. "You're a good guy," he managed to say.
Todoroki nodded calmly, his expression shifting to annoyance as something in his pocket vibrated. He pulled out a device, and made an annoyed noise as he pressed a button.
"Hero stuff?" Midoriya asked.
"Yeah." Todoroki gave another nod. "Look, I know we don't really know each other at all, but here-" He dug around in his pocket and fished out a business card. It was white, with a holographic ice crystal emblazoned on the back. "This has my number on it. If you need to talk to someone-"
Midoriya took the card, a nameless emotion welling in his chest. "Thank you, Perma- I mean, Todoroki."
Todoroki nodded. "I need to go now. Do you want a slide?" He gestured down, to the memorial gardens.
"No, thank you." Midoriya shook his head, the card still clutched in his hand. "I'll take the stairs."
Todoroki nodded wordlessly, and was gone.
Midoriya rubbed his thumbs across Todoroki's card as he walked down the hundred flights of stairs, heart beating like a trapped bird in his chest. Todoroki had been so kind. It went against a lot of what the media printed about him. That he was stoic, or uncaring. Maybe the man just hated journalists. Midoriya slowed as he neared the base of the stairwell and heard voices.
"It's the same every damn time. No matter what. I take you here, I take you there. It's never good enough." There was a couple in the garden, a man and a woman, and they were arguing. The man was heavyset, a little over six foot and wearing a patterned shirt. The woman was shorter, closer to average japanese height, and looked younger than the guy.
The man's voice was raised, and Midoriya felt a familiar prickle down the back of his neck as he took a position out of sight behind one of the cherry trees. He looked up, hoping to spot Todoroki in the sky nearby, but the Ice Prince was nowhere to be found.
"Bitch!" There was the sound of a slap, and the woman turned away covering her face. Midoriya swallowed. He'd been prepared to let them get on with their argument, but he couldn't stand by and watch the woman get hit.
"Hey." Midoriya emerged from behind the cherry trees, raising his hands peaceably. "Is everything okay here?"
"Don't interfere in what's none of your business," the man growled, and Midoriya took in the scene, the woman's frightened expression. Her face wasn't showing a bruise yet, but her skin was marked and red where her boyfriend had hit her.
Midoriya stepped towards them, his hands still raised. If he talked to them, he might be able to get their identities, maybe talk to the woman alone and convince her to seek help for her situation. "I just don't want to see anyone getting upset," he said, slowly.
"I said," said the man, raising his hand as he activated his quirk and grew a shard of metal from his arm. "Don't interfere."
Midoriya's feet seemed to move on their own as he stepped between the man and his girlfriend. "Please-" he said.
The man's expression hardened, and he sliced down at Midoriya with the blade.
Midoriya might have been quirkless, but that didn't mean defenseless. He raised his arms against the blade, blocking with the outside of his arm with one side and grabbing for a restraint hold with the other. The man grinned, and Midoriya realised his mistake as a second blade erupted from the man's skin and into the palm of his hand. Midoriya screamed, pain erupting white onto his consciousness, barely avoiding the follow-up slash as he staggered back.
"What do you think you are?" the man taunted. "Some kind of hero?"
"No-" Midoriya swayed, still woozy from the pain, and ripped a section from his shirt to staunch the bleeding from his hand. The man was bigger than him, but less skilled. There were a dozen openings Midoriya would have taken, if not for the man's ability to erupt into knives. "I'm just trying to do the right thing."
Midoriya turned to the woman, who had frozen on the spot, her hands at her mouth. "Run!" he shouted. "Get help! I'll slow him down!"
"Like hell you will!" the man growled, turning after the woman, who had listened to Midoriya and started to run.
Midoriya flung himself after him, tackling him to the floor, and they rolled on the frozen ground, Midoriya struck for the man's head, hoping to incapacitate him, but the man twisted in his grasp.
"You don't learn, do you?" he grated, and Midoriya gasped as he felt pain in his legs. Blades from the man's legs jutted through the meat of Midoriya's thighs, like they were his own quirk. The man lunged for him with an arm blade again, and Midoriya twisted away, but his impaled legs were pinning him, limiting his motion. He watched in horror as the man's bladed arm slipped between his defenses, stabbing him in the chest
The man scrambled out from beneath Midoriya, swearing, and Midoriya tasted blood in his mouth. He could see blood just about everywhere, actually, his arterial spray hitting the All Might plaque. He tried to speak, but blood poured from his mouth.
So this was it? This was how he died? At least it was trying to save someone. With his dying thoughts he hoped the woman would be okay, that she would find a policeman. The blackness enveloped him, each of his senses snuffing out, until he stood in all darkness and silence and cold.
And then there was the fire. A red fire, a gold fire, burning up from his feet, to his core, to his head. It erased the blackness, brought each of his senses back to him with excruciating acuity. His own heartbeat was thunderous, the sunlight burning his retina.
He breathed in. Fire. Fire in his lungs. Fire danced over his skin, which glowed from within like coals. Midoriya screamed fire.
"The fuck?" His killer stared at him, eyes wide as he stumbled backwards. "Fuck!"
Midoriya stood in the All Might memorial garden, naked in a circle of ash. Reborn.
A/N- thank you everyone for your support and comments! You're all wonderful! With regards to story length, we're at point 4/14 on my outline currently, at about 5k words, so I expect this to be about novella length, 20-30k total, to tell the story I want to tell.