For an extended moment, Midoriya was certain he would die from the pain. But now it was almost as if the damage to his body was too great for his mind to process it. There was only this indescribable white hot energy pressing against his skin and filling up every part of him. He felt like he was floating and far too heavy at the same time. His mangled arms hung limp against the ground and no matter how hard he willed it, his body failed to respond. It took all his strength merely to turn his head to view the crushing scene before him.
The battlefield appeared to have come to a heavy stop. The air was thick.
In Midoriya's line of sight was a shaking Endeavor, covered in his own blood; just barely managing to stay on his feet. The man's breath rattled with an ugly wet sound as it left his lips. Next to Endeavor stood Shouto, who was eerily still; his expression one of impossible shock. Such a complete surrender to emotion on a face that usually remained so stoic made Midoriya's stomach turn.
Both hero's eyes stayed fixated on the white haired villain who danced gleefully above them upon a giants' huge arm. That person had just presented a revelation too painful to be true.
"So what do you have to say, pops?" said Dabi, or Touya?, finally bringing his ecstatic dance performance to a close. "What's with that stupid look on your face? I just announced that your abused son is back from the dead to destroy you. Where's the welcome home party?"
"It's not true." Midoriya heard Shouto mutter. The statement appeared to be directed at no one and everything at the same time, irresolute and full of harrowed uncertainty.
"Oh little brother, but it is." Shouto visibly flinched at the term of endearment used by Touya. The laugh that had previously been present in the villain's maniacal tone had given way to a brutal calm. "And now the whole world will know just how unheroic our heroes are capable of being. We can watch them all crumble to the ground together."
From beside Shouto, Endeavor reached out a shaking arm and took a single step towards the slowly descending villain. His legs quickly gave out beneath him and he landed heavy on his knees. He coughed; blood spattered from his mouth. From his lesser perch, his arm stayed outstretched, as if reaching to something from another world. Shouto's swivelled towards Endeavor. Concern for his father's life momentarily overtook everything else, until-
"Touya…" Endeavor choked.
Seeing his father use Touya's name out loud did something strange to the boy next to him. Shouto looked as if he was about to vomit. His fists clenched and he wobbled uncertainly, frozen in place. To no avail, Midoriya once again urged his useless body to move. The sight of the Number One hero so vulnerable was unnatural and terrifying. Not to mention, were those tears in his eyes?
"Touya…" Endeavor gasped once more, his voice full of unspeakable anguish. "Touya… I… I'm sorry. I did this to you. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm so…"
In response to his father's desperate chant, the look on Shouto's face was indescribable. Hearing the man who'd abused him, who'd driven his mother to the brink of mental collapse; who'd then gone on to seek retribution in many ways, but never once said the word 'sorry', say it so willingly now… Seeing his own father, a symbol of strength, fury and force, reduced to such honest, barefaced weakness. It didn't seem real.
It was then that Touya broke out into a loud, uncontrollable laugh, right from his stomach; the kind you only achieve through pure joy.
"That." He said between gleeful gasps for breath. "That is exactly the face I wanted to see. The Number One hero and that beautiful pathetic face. Aha! I can't get enough. And to think, I've barely even started." He hiccupped amidst the laughter. "The apology, I mean, it might've tugged at my heart strings a little if I believed it. But if you were really that sorry, you'd at least have remembered my face, especially considering you're the one who ruined it."
Touya made it down from Gigantomachia's back. Now he stood around twenty feet away from the father-son duo. His belly laughter gradually started to taper off. Endeavor looked totally lost. His arm still reached out as if it would bridge the gap between himself and the ghost that stood before them.
"Really, I'm heartbroken." Continued Touya sardonically. "Although, at the very least, Mom might remember me. By now, she should've received a pretty decent memory jog anyway… along with the rest of the world."
Midorya watched Shouto's whole frame tighten.
"Mom…" There was utter pain and fear in his voice. Midoriya could see it in his eyes: the years of hospital visits, the years of recovery, both in his mother's mind and in their own relationship. There it was, crumbling away to nothing as a result of Touya's return. Rei wouldn't be able to handle this. She was bound to relapse. And just as Shouto had finally come to see happiness as something tangible for them, for their whole family, Natsuo and Fuyumi too…
"What have you done?"
Again, it wasn't clear exactly who Shouto was addressing. Perhaps it was the white-haired villain in front of them, or maybe it was his kneeling father.
Touya smiled.
"I merely told the truth." He said. "But I'm not done yet."
Touya clicked his fingers and a small blue flame appeared, dancing happily upon his palm. "Shouto, you appear to be the only hero left here still able to stand. That makes things interesting for me."
Midorya registered that Touya was right. Shouto was the only one left. Endeavor was conscious but unmoving. His own abused body had totally given in. All of the other pro heroes were either dead or gravely injured, or being carted off by a desperate Llida. Their only saving grace was that Shigaraki appeared to be finally down for the count, unconscious in Gigantomachia's grasp. Otherwise, Shouto stood against the whole league, alone.
"Looks like your little doll has been living up to your standards, Endeavor. We're in the middle of a battle and there's barely a scratch on him." Said Touya. "So well sculpted. It would be a shame if I broke him and wasted all that hard work, huh."
"Shouto, run."
Shouto looked down at his father who swayed. The man's outreached arm shot to the ground to steady himself. There was undeniable, tense fear in the man's voice.
"You have to run, Shouto. You can't beat them."
Shouto glanced from Endeavor to Midoriya, to the bodies scattered about them.
"I can't leave you." He said, skin stretching white over his knuckles, voice shaking. "We can't let them win. What am I supposed to do, Dad?"
Midoriya had rarely heard Shouto refer to his father as 'dad', especially not to his face, especially not on the field. The desperate plea for help from a man he'd wanted nothing to do with for so long was awfully telling to his mental state. Touya's eyebrows raised with interest at the interaction.
"You can't leave him, huh? After everything he's done; when the disgusting result of his actions is standing right in front of you, you really can't stop being his puppet, can you? Well, I think this provides the perfect opportunity to cut those strings of yours, Shouto. But first, I have to make sure there's no interference from dear old dad here."
There was an intense flash of light and a wave of sound. Shouto fired a huge blast of protective ice between Endeavor and Touya in response to the blue jet fire that shot the man's way. Pure heat gushed from the villain's hand and Shouto's ice began to melt away far too quickly. Midoriya could feel the murderous intensity of Touya's flames from where he lay. He watched the insane grin return to the villains face.
"Fire trumps ice, little brother."
Then suddenly, Shouto's ice was gone. Poof. Vanished. The flames cascaded over Endeavor's body, briefly but ever so fiercely, and knocked him flat to the ground.
As the blue fire cleared, Midoriya and Todoroki observed in horror that Endeavor's legs were now burned to a crisp. At this point, the man's body was clearly immovable. Agony was painted across his every muscle fibre.
Shouto stared at his own hand, eyes wide, clearly clueless as to what had just happened to his ice. That was when he, himself, vanished completely, just as his ice had.
Midoriya stared in panic as the villain Compress swooped down to catch a little blue pearl in his gloved hand. It took several seconds for Midoriya to process that said pearl must now contain Shouto Todoroki. Another pearl dropped to the ground, assumedly containing Shouto's remaining ice.
"Todoroki!" he cried for his friend. His voice was a broken, strangled, ugly sound. Not again. Not again. Not again. Move, body, move!
"Shouto…" gasped Endeavor.
Compress held up the pearl to the dusty sunlight, as if admiring his handywork, then-
"Your methods may be crude, Dabi. However I simply cannot resist a show with a twist ending. Here."
Compress tossed the pearl containing Shouto to Touya, who caught it with a stylish flare of his wrist.
"Huh." He said, seemingly amused. "That was way easier than I thought it'd be."
Midoriya watched as the Pearl melted away and Shouto fell to the ground at Touya's feet, once more his own size, but totally disorientated. He shot up to his knees, palm outstretched towards his brother, seemingly ready to attack. Shouto caught sight of Touya's face and hesitated. His eyes widened in new recognition and he flinched as if in pain.
"Aw, come on, Shouto. Aren't you gonna attack me? Feeling conflicted cuz' I'm your bro? You're the hero. I'm the villain, remember? What's family got to do with it?"
Midoriya knew Shouto well enough to know exactly what was flashing through his head to stop him from firing: You're my brother. In different circumstances, I could have been in your place. How different are we really?
There was the sound of a loud click. Shouto's face contorted as something sharp sank into his left shoulder. It was enough of an impact to shake him out of his shock and into some semblance of reality. He looked down and saw a strangely shaped gun in Touya's hand. But Shouto didn't have time to register what had just been fired at him or what it meant. He needed to act. He needed to act or they were all dead. He had no plan on how to face such an impossible array of counterparts. But he had to try.
This time he reached out both arms, one directed at Dabi and one at Compress, hoping to take them both out with a dose of ice and fire. But nothing happened. The steam and smoke that would normally tornado around his form remained absent. There was no hot, no cold. Nothing at all. He tried again, and again. Nothing.
And then there was panic. Shouto stared at his hands, willing them to do something. Anything.
"Todoroki. No…"
All hope seeped from Midoriya as realisation dawned on him first.
Touya laughed again.
"And just like that, the masterpiece is painted over."
Shouto's expression became unreadable as it finally struck him. He reached to his shoulder and pulled out the capsule embedded there. He proceeded to stare at it in disbelief, knowing exactly what it was. The quirk-destroying drug. Still, his brain refused to accept it.
"How does it feel Endeavor? This is what it all amounted to. All that pain. All that anger. For yet another failure."
That was when Touya lurched out with a steal tipped foot. In the midst of processing what had been done to him, Shouto was too slow to react. Touya's foot smashed hard into the side of his face. Touya didn't have super strength, but nor did Shouto, and with no quirk to defend himself, he collapse to the ground, nursing a newly bloodied cheek.
Despite his battered and burnt body, Endeavor made an attempt to drag himself forward.
"Shouto…" There was so much pain in the man's voice. Too much pain.
"I said, how does it feel, Enji Todoroki?"
Touya tossed out another brutal kick, this time into Shouto's exposed stomach. Shouto let out a gasp and hunched in on himself for protection. In response to Shouto's new position, Touya began stomping down on the newly powerless boy. It didn't matter where he planted his foot as long as it made contact. And it was relentless: one after the other, thud after sickening thud.
Everything in Midoriya's entire being was screaming to move, help, anything. It was unbearable.
"That's the expression I was looking for, Endeavor. That's the sweet stuff." Said Touya as he continued to wreck his younger brother. "See, I don't just want to destroy the Number One's hero career. I want to destroy his everything; to expose him for the pathetic, snivelling, scared little creature that he is. And I guess after your spot at the top, which I've already taken, there's nothing more important to you than your little pet project here. In that sense, I've already broken him by destroying his quirk, so you can give up on him now, the same way you gave up on me."
Another stomp. A snap. Another strangled sound of pain from Shouto.
"SHOUTO… Please. Stop this." Exclaimed Endeavor, and Touya frowned in response.
"I have to say…" the villain continued. "To see you care about him still, even though he's no longer useful to you. To see you suddenly care about Fuyumi and Natsuo too, even with their shitty little quirks… You know, it really pisses me off." He enunciated the last three words with three hard kicks to Shouto's exposed back, who bit down on his lip until it bled.
Following several consecutive heavy stomps to Shouto's left ankle, there came a nasty crunching sound. Shouto let out a restrained scream, more like a grunt, which grew in volume and distress as Touya proceeded to cruelly grind his foot down on the same broken area. The villain's focus glinted between the other two Todorokis with derisive intent.
With only the ability to watch uselessly, Midoriya seethed with rage. Tears of anger and frustration tumbled down his face.
"Please, Touya…" Endeavor gasped, Like Midoriya, he desperately clawed at the ground in any attempt at movement. "Please. Son. I did this. You hate me, not Shouto. It was me. It was me."
"Oh, I'm very aware of that." Said Touya. "It's not Shouto's fault you built him so perfect. Perfect enough to replace me. I actually feel sorry for the kid. I have to wonder, did you train him like you trained me?"
After two more decisive stomps to Shouto's face, Touya bent down and grabbed a handful of his brother's hair, dragging him upwards. Shouto's eyes were glazed over. Blood poured from his nose. His forehead was creased with pain.
"I still remember the words our father said to me during training." Said Touya. "I wonder if he said them to you too, brother. Get hotter, he said. Hotter. Hotter. Bare the pain. Bare it. The only difference between you and I, Shouto, is that your body bore it a little better than mine. But not anymore."
Touya let go of Shouto's hair and reached for his left arm instead. Upon grasping his forearm, Touya's hand lit up with blue flames. A second went by before the pain registered in Shouto, and then he was crying out as Touya burned him viciously.
"Shouto! LET HIM GO." Endeavor was practically vibrating on the ground, as was Midoriya. "SHOUTO…"
"There's that concern again." Said Touya, not letting up. "Who are you to care about your children now? Disgusting."
Shouto desperately tried to thrash away from the blue heat as it began to travel up his arm, charring the skin and burning through nerve endings. His mind wanted nothing else than to escape from the onslaught of pain but his battered body and Touya's firm grasp would not allow it. So the pain went on, until he saw nothing but white.
"Hey, don't be sad, little brother." Said Touya, and the words only just broke through his consciousness. "This way you can look more like me."