Disclaimer: I do not own Boku No Hero Academia.

CHAPTER XIII – DON'T LEAVE ME – PART I

Around two weeks earlier

"–that various big fishes of the villainous underground could be caught thanks to the Japanese Criminal Investigation–", the channel was changed to a publicity about a Japanese drama.

"Put that back, I wanted to see that!", Kirishima shouted over to Kaminari Denki, who was sitting on the other end of the sofa and dribbling over the cute high school girls appearing on the screen.

"Don't you dare changing the channel, Kaminari!", Mineta called but Iida had already taken the remote from Kaminari's hand, changing back to the news.

"What is wrong with all of you?!", Mineta cried but was ignored by his classmates, who's focus was now fully on the news.

Iida raised the volume:"–ur responsible colleague has tried to get in touch with the people involved in the case, asking if there is any evidence supporting the rumour that a villain may have helped the police in their investigation. We will cut to him now."

They cut from the news studio to the journalist, who was standing in front of what looked like a building of a police office.

"According to some of the witnesses in the multiple cases of these past days, the police squads seem to always have appeared at the right place on the right time. This apparently with the help of a nebula portal, a quirk that's suspiciously similar to one of the former members of the League of Villains. Unfortunately, we were not able to talk to anyone of the JCID, but expect to hear more from us soon. Back to the studio."

"Thank you for this clarification. We will stay on the case. Now to the weather. Tokyo pref–"

While the others speculated about a possible cooperation between the police and the League of Villains, Bakugou Katsuki turned to look at Midoriya, who was sitting alone at one of the tables, not listening to the reporter or Mineta but chatting with someone on the phone. Bakugou wrinkled his nose; something wasn't right. The idiot Deku was usually very attentive of his surroundings but this past week, he had only had eyes for his phone or that crappy notebook he still brought with him every day since they were children.

"Yo, Bakugou! What are you looking at?" Hadn't Kirishima just been watching TV? Why couldn't this guy ever leave him alone?

Might as well just ask him what he thinks about it.

"Do you think Deku has been acting strange those past days?"
Kirishima furrowed his eyebrows at the question and looked over to Midoriya. The dark-haired teen was too focused with what he was doing to notice that both of them were openly staring at him.

"Not really,", he looked back at Bakugou and grinned, baring his sharp teeth, "but he sure spends a lot of time working on that project of his!"

"The semester project?", Bakugou could smell that he was getting closer to something. He didn't know what exactly he was looking for, and this only made him more eager to find out: "Do you know what his project is?"

"Why the hell do you care?", Kirishima answered his question with a question.

"None of your business, just answer me.", Bakugou tried to be patient but his friend had that bad habit to unnecessarily drag out everything.

"If you say so.", he didn't look offended by Bakugou not telling him why and crossed his arms behind his head before continuing, "Iida told me it's something about prisoners and rehabilitation. Apparently, he's even allowed to visit some guy."

JACKPOT!
"Oh really?", Bakugou's surprise wasn't staged. Neither was his anger.

I FUCKING KNEW IT! These stupid motherfuckers are planning something and are leaving me out again!

He noticed his clenched fists starting to emit smoke.

Calm down. I have no proof yet.

"Weird, right? I didn't know Midoriya was interested in that specific part of the hero-job. How is his quirk even suited for that? But I guess broaden your field of interests can never hurt."

Bad Hair sure likes to hear himself talk. But Kirishima was right; Midoriya's quirk wasn't suited and as far as he knew, Midoriya had never shown interested in the topic of rehabilitation ever before.

He only cared because this whole project was about that Shigaraki-ass!

I fucking knew that idiot was acting weird! But now that he knew, what was he going to do about it? Was he just going to walk up to Freckles and force him to speak up?
He briefly thought about snatching his phone, but Midoriya wasn't the weakling he used to be and though Bakugou was convinced, that he was still fairly stronger than his childhood friend, what was he going to do if he (though most unlikely) happened to be wrong? Embarrass himself in front of the whole class?
And what if he found out that he had been right? He still wasn't going to be involved.

But if they were sharing secrets about One for All and whatnot, he wanted to be part of this too.

I will catch them on the spot. That will show them not to mess with me.

Bakugou would keep quiet and wait for the right opportunity. If Midoriya really was going to visit Shigaraki, he would too. Neither All Might nor stupid Deku had a say in this.

"Uhm..Bakugou?", Kirishima looked at him with a concerned face, "You have some evil on your face."

Present

"Are you alright, Tomura?", All for One was standing in front of him, his scarred face concealed and a mask helping him breath. Tomura had never seen the man dressed so casually and completely in white and it bothered him just like with Kurogiri. All for One looked like he had just come out of a hospital. Or out of a prison. The latter was a fact.

"Sensei..", Tomura managed to say through his heavy breathing, "What.. the hell.. was that?"

"A quirk. They have tried to torture me with it multiple times – in vain, of course. And now they have used it on you. I could stop it by breaking the cameras – apparently it only works if they quirk-holder is looking directly at someone."

Tomura brushed the strains of hair away from his sweating face. A quirk? What kind of dreadful quirk was that?!

They haven't used it on me before. Why? Was it so inhuman that they had not been allowed to use it, not even on him?
He felt the memories and the physical pain of this horror trip disappearing like the remains of a dream, but he was still shaking.

Why was it that after all these years, he could still not leave the hurt behind that his father had caused him? It was as if he could never let go; as if he was addicted to an abuser and his cruelty. Tomura still craved for Father to hold his face, to remember all the things that man had done to him, only to forget the pain again and to forgive him once more. It was a never ending vicious circle, part of why he had become who he was.

Because negative attention was still better than no attention, right? You're almost twenty-two years old and you're still thinking like a child.

"I assume you saw your biggest fears. What did you see?"

Tomura's lips parted, but he didn't speak and looked away in shame, instead looking around the cell, he almost choked: Midoriya was lying unconsciously on the floor, bruises all across his skin and he was bleeding out from his side.

"Wha–"

"He won't die right now, not if they manage to get an ambulance within the next half hour.", All for One interrupted him and waved his hand. The gloves on Tomura's hands fell off. Another quirk in All for One's collection?
It didn't matter to Tomura in that moment: He raised his hands and stared at them like he had never seen them before.

Freedom. Freedom was so much closer now, ready for him to take it! There was no bigger desire inside his heart; he just wanted to get out of here for good.

"Kill him."

Tomura looked back at All for One, shock written across his face: "Please Sensei, we need to leave!"

The man didn't answer but stepped towards the younger villain, stopping less than three feet from his apprentice. Tomura was tall, but like with All Might, he had to look up to meet All for One's face when the man was so close.

"I am afraid I can't trust you right now."

"What?", Tomura's heartbeat sped up and that cold feeling of anxiety crawled over the skin of his bare arms and down his back.

"Your comrades are waiting outside for you to lead them again.", All for One grabbed the lad's shoulders and pulled him into a tight embrace, something he had not done in a long time. It should have felt warm and familiar, not cold and foreign and deep down Tomura knew that he had distanced himself too much from All for One to appreciate it, but he just told himself that was simply being too anxious to enjoy it.

"The League is here..?", he whispered into All for One's shoulder.

"Yes. Tomura, I want nothing more than for you to be my successor.", All for One softly pushed the young man away, "I want you to redeem yourself."

Again with this? Had he not done enough?! Surely his Sensei had seen (or rather sensed) him attack the boy?

"Kill him. Then we can all go home."

Home.
What even was home to him?
Tomura turned to look at the U.A. student who was lying there, unconscious and not able to defend himself – completely at his mercy. He had wanted to kill him; he had wanted him to disappear, even going as far as to risk getting strapped onto a chair for the rest of his life just so he could get his revenge. Just so he could hit this society once again, this society that had made him this rotten.

"Why did you do it, Tomura?" A shiver went down his spine at that snippet of his horror trip.

Tomura closed his eyes.

Home.
What was he going to see in that darkness of his mind when thinking of that word?

Father hitting him again? – No, that wasn't home.

Kurogiri pouring him a drink at the bar hideout and bringing him back into his room, when he was too drunk to do it himself? Kurogiri accommodating him, when he was too hung over to do anything? Sensei putting a blanket around his fragile little body, while he was playing on the console? – Yes, that felt partly like home, but something was missing..

What about All Might bringing him books and brushing his hair? Or when he started playing those board games with him?

"Why did you do it, Tomura? Why did you kill him?", he then remembered the hallucinated All Might that had been so hurt, as well as himself, screaming that he had not done it.
"Why did you do it, Tomura?"
"Why did you do it, Tomura?", the words echoed through his head, again and again and every time they did, it felt like someone punching his stomach and taking the wind out of his sails, robbing him of every goal and every purpose his life had (as if there were any left).

Midoriya had offered him his hand in friendship and he had rejected it.
Rightfully so, he still didn't believe the kid to have been honest with him. But seeing All Might's disappointment, even if it had just been one of his own projections – hearing All Might's real voice shout his name through the speakers, demanding him to stop–

With my actions, I have hurt you more than society, All Might. Isn't that exactly what he had always wanted?
He weakly shook his head smiled to himself. I am truly an idiot.

"You promised me, Tomura. Do it and I will make sure that you will never see the inside of any cell ever again.", All for One was standing behind him and Tomura couldn't help but feel like the man was a devil on his shoulder, persuading him to do the things he didn't want to do. The apprentice took a step forwards, then another and another, all of them slowly and careful as if he was hoping for someone or something to storm the cell and to stop him from committing another crime, another sin, another thing that made him lose himself even more.

He stopped about a step away from the teen and looked down at him: Midoriya Izuku looked devastated.

"I was angry with you at first.", his master gently patted his back, "I was sure you were ready to betray me, but I have done a lot of thinking."

I have never betrayed you, Sensei. Not even in his secrets thoughts when he imagined living under All Might's wings, had he ever thought about selling out his teacher or his comrades. It wasn't in his nature.

"Everyone in your position would have done the same. They have isolated you, they have drugged and humiliated you. You would have been stupid not to take All Might's help."

"Why do you know all this?", Tomura asked without leaving Midoriya out of his sight.

"Haven't you ever asked yourself, who your lawyer was?" Why did his whole situation look like his master was pulling the strings again?
Tomura frowned and started to think about the people that were always prowling around All for One like hungry cats. Someone from the Union? No, not close enough to entrust them with his 'Golden Boy', as the League would call him. But who else could it be? It must have been someone that wasn't known to the public. Someone with at least some kind of diploma in legal studies.

"The doctor.", it was so obvious now that he knew.

"Very well, Tomura.", All for One was pleased and wrapped Tomura's pale hair around his fingers, "I have prepared for everything. I am not immortal and as everyone could see, not invincible either."

He let go of his student's hair and started to walk around Tomura and Midoriya: "How foolish would I have been, had I not taken care of the problem on how to get any valuable information, should I ever get imprisoned here. You know Tomura, they have all kinds of techniques to check on the people getting in and out, but they are so fixated on details, they don't even see the forest for the trees."

"It was an easy task for the doctor to give all needed information to my lawyer, who just used his own quirk to inform me about everything. I didn't even need to use my own and no scanner would every notice."

Of course All for One had taken care of everything and it showed Tomura once again, that Sensei was just on another level, one he could never reach.

"And who do you think approved of the documents for a hero in training to visit someone in Tartarus?"

"The lawyers of the Union."

All for One stopped behind him: "Such a good child. My followers are everywhere, Tomura. And soon, they are all to be yours. But enough talk, my quirk won't hold them away much longer. Let's get this over with."

"Why did you do it, Tomura?", All Might speaking again. Why couldn't he just shut up?! All of this would be so much easier if had just stayed away!

"Kill him now."

You knew this day would come, Tomura! Do it! It's the only way to survive! Tomura clenched his fists and bit his lip, delving inside of his mind and his heart, searching for that anger that had always been his only friend throughout his life. He let himself fall on his knees and reached for Midoriya's arm.

The boy wasn't even going to feel it, so why did he care so much?

This is not about him, this is about All Might.

He could feel Midoriya's long skin already, his middle finger touching the arms first, followed by his ring and pointing finger.

As master said, just get this over with. You will never be one of them. Tomura felt a sting in his heart at that thought. His pinkie was now feeling the cold skin too; one finger left.

Then, a blinding light.

"So, your name is Tenko?", a female voice asked him.

A wave of memories washed over Tomura and he saw her, a grown woman with long black hair tied into a bun and grey eyes, long lashes and a mark on her chin, the same spot like Tomura's. She was tall and she looked confident and strong.

And she was beautiful, at least in Tomura's eyes.

First it was her standing on a building and watching the sunset with another man, a guy reminding him of that old one that had attacked him at Kamino and had even visited him once.

Then it was her on a winter day, talking to a blonde teen clothed in black. Tomura couldn't see his face but the hair gave it all away; All Might, years younger than Tomura was, probably more than twenty years ago.

The next moment it was her, fighting with All for One on a battlefield that looked even worse than Kamino.
"I leave the rest to you!"

"My name is Nana. It feels like my heart is about to burst, knowing that you exist, Tenko."

Tomura let go of Midoriya's arm as if he had burnt himself on it, falling back against All for One's legs, holding his head and instinctively raising his middle fingers as to not decay himself.
"My master. Shimura Nana. Teacher. One for All. Toshinori. It's your turn. Sorahiko. All Might..", the words followed him back into reality.

WHAT THE FUCK!

"Ah, I can hear my little brother's voice."

Midoriya. Midoriya had inherited All for One.
"–I made a promise to your grandmother-"
All Might's teacher. The woman he had seen in his vision. The seventh holder of One for All.

At that realization, Tomura got on his feet, facing his master with confusion and new rage: "One for All! She was a wielder of One for All! I saw her fighting you! Why didn't you tell me?!"

"My patience is at an end, Shigaraki Tomura. Do what I asked you to do and let's get out of here."

The younger villain began to shake again and took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down.

No. This can't be. This must surely be a coincidence.

All Might had told him his grandmother had been a hero, but..

"Sensei.", his voice was quiet but firm, "Did you target her and.. my family.. did you target them because of One for All?"

All for One did not move or speak and that already was enough answer to Tomura, but he wanted, no, he needed to hear it.

"Did you kill Shimura Nana?"

All for One slapped him across the face so hard it smacked Tomura to the ground. The younger villain touched his pulsating cheek in disbelief and stared at the man who looked visibly furious, even with his face hidden.

"How dare you speak that name in my presence?"

I don't care if I was only a tool to you, Sensei.

You saved me when the heroes didn't.

But if she died because of One for All, if I really was only a tool for you just to get back at All Might, then..
"Then my family had to die because of that too?", Tomura noticed he was bleeding from his gums and the taste of iron was filling his mouth.

"You killed them with your own ha-"

"YOU KNOW WHAT THE FUCK I MEAN!", the younger villain interrupted his master and got back on his feet. It seemed impossible to stay calm and to focus, he was so pissed.

The walls around them vibrated; they needed to get out of here. All for One's quirk (a barrier?) was already weakening and Tomura could hear people trying to break through the door, but the urge to lay those cursed hands of his onto All for One face was stronger than the urge to escape.

"Don't you have anything to say for yourself?!"

"Everything I did was for you, Shigaraki Tomura. I don't mind if you hate me, do it all you want; fuel yourself with anger and become a weapon."

Tomura's eyes became wide, and something in his brain switched: suddenly, all his instincts warned him of a coming danger he would not be able to handle alone and told him to run. He searched for an exit, remembering that his hands were free to use his quirk.
The young man jumped towards the next wall, his fingers spread and ready to decay his way out of here.

But he never reached it, his body stopping midair when All for One's forcible quirk activation spikes pierced his chest.

"Right now however, you have become too dangerous for me to keep around. You were like a son to me and no father takes joy in punishing his children. But this needs to be done."
Tomura couldn't hear his Master speaking, his own screams drowning every other sound. In his mind, he begged his teacher to stop whatever he was doing, not able to take the pain. It wasn't the spikes drilling through his body that hurt him so much; it was something else and it felt like a part of his being was taken away from him.

Tomura bit down on his tongue. PLEASE LET ME PASS OUT!

After what felt like minutes, but had probably only been a few seconds, All for One retrieved his spikes and let his apprentice fall to the ground. The fall hurt but was nothing against the pain in his upper body. He coughed out the blood and moaned because of that piercing feeling that shot through his chest whenever he moved.

"You will come crawling back to me once you realize that they don't want you, Shigaraki Tomura. Until then, I have taken your quirk.", All for One sighed, "I am disappointed with you. The doctor won't take care of you this time; see this as a punishment – or an opportunity to learn."

"Sen..sei.", Tomura tried to speak and coughed. He couldn't see his master, his vision was too blurry. If Tomura had not known what fear was, he definitely knew now.

Warm tears wet his cheeks. Was his master going to leave him here?

I don't want to die here!

"Please..don't leave..I'll be good.", he managed to choke out before the world became black.

A warp gate opened for the Symbol of Evil to disappear.

"Kurogiri."

"What about Shigaraki Tomura, Sensei?", there was concern in Kurogiri's voice.

"We will come back.", assured him and stepped into the gate.

"What about Midoriya Izuku?"

All for One turned to look at the boy: "He is already dead."

Answer to HankFlamion18 (user): There really was something with the car *haha* - and yup, panic attacks and hallucinations but because of quirk. Thank you for sticking with this story! Love every review you leave!

Answer to Galaxy diamond (user): Yes, I want too! But first a bit more hurt and pain! Thank you for another review, dear!