(Sunday)

Last day of the week. Last day to show improvement.

Friday and Saturday were uneventful, if a little disheartening. No improvement to speak of. Not to mention that with the broken bike, Shinsou had to wake up even earlier in order to jog all the way to the school, as well as back home.

The last day of the week, and Shinso didn't believe he could improve.

Every day, he just got worse and worse, and even the intensifying pain turned into a dull backdrop compared to the connotations of what this meant.

Aizawa would stop training him. A nightmare becoming reality. A cracked dream fully broken.

But Shinsou, like always, whether he believed he could do it or not, tried.

So, during the final jog of the day, Shinsou tried.

"Alright, that's enough."

But Shinsou kept running.

Aizawa looked up from where he'd been writing in his clipboard, and frowned.

"I said you could stop."

He didn't.

Even though his legs, and chest, and everything, burned. Even though he wanted to throw up. Even though it hurt to keep trying and being met with the same failure. He kept jogging.

…for about sixty seconds.

At which point he ended up flat on his face, gasping for the breath that had been knocked out of him.

He hadn't done better. He hadn't improved. Even his last-ditch effort to save face and impress had been met with a mouthful of mat.

This picture seemed to be a perfect metaphor for Shinsou's life up to this point. Effort met with his face in the metaphorical dirt.

But, deep down, Shinsou knew from the first day that this would be how he would end up; a pathetic sack of dead weight, miserably fallen onto the floor trying to achieve the same result that seemed to come to others so easily.

And so, he cried as Aizawa's light footsteps slowly padded over to him.

"I can't do it. I can't," said Shinsou, sadly, muffled by the floor beneath his face.

"I tried, but I just can't…"

Then, after several moments passed of Shinsou's ragged breathing filling the air, a hand went under his armpit.

Aizawa, over the entire week, had never once helped Shinsou up. And yet, in that moment, the only effort Shinsou had to make was to stabilize himself as he was ushered over to a wall.

"Oh great, pity."

Aizawa propped him against the wall, and wordlessly handed him another water bottle. Shinsou drank sullenly, sure that Aizawa would any moment let him know how he had let him down. How he had once again failed.

"Shinsou Hitoshi… I have to say I'm impressed," Aizawa said, finishing it with an unsettling toothy grin.

Shinsou felt a sudden surge of adrenaline fill his tired and numb body. He looked up, confused, into the bloodshot eyes of the Pro-Hero.

"Impressed? I did terribly. I didn't improve at all. I couldn't improve. I failed!" Shinsou said, thoroughly flabbergasted.

"Fail? No. I wasn't expecting you to improve in such a short amount of time. That would be illogical."

Aizawa sat against the wall next to Shinsou.

"Call it curiosity, but I wanted to see if you would crack when faced with unfavourable conditions. I fully expected you to. I had an entire chastising speech and everything. But, you didn't. You stuck it through, even when you believed you would fail."

Aizawa pointedly looked at Shinsou. "I don't train people who are simply going to quit when things get tough."

Shinsou had finally caught his breath, and was wholly focused on what he'd just heard. He almost couldn't believe his ears.

"So… you're still going to train me?"

"Oh, I was never planning to quit training you. If you had given up, I'd have simply drilled into your head how you can't give up just because things don't look good."

Shinsou looked, wide eyed at this man who had put his mind and body through proverbial hell, all for a test.

Maybe on a better day Shinsou would have seen the point; the purpose of such an argument. The clearly defined reasoning.

After the week that Shinsou had though, he was just plain angry. Anger overrided any semblance of a, "respect for authority" filter he may have had.

"Are you kidding me?!"

Aizawa's blinked at the outburst in mild surprise.

"Do you have any idea about the week that I've had? I broke my fucking bike because I kept falling off it over how tired I was! That was three days ago, and I've had to run here every day since. Not to mention running back, after I've been put through the stupid training course of workouts that make no sense whatsoever!

"I could barely sleep because when I did, I just kept waking up! I've got a blister on the bottom of my foot from running too much," Shinsou said, pointing at his extended leg, "not mentioning the one that I accidentally popped, and has been hurting like a BITCH ever since! And to top all of that off, I'm pretty sure I'm getting a rash on the inside of my thigh! All for a stupid initiation into the actual training, that I didn't even know about?!"

Shinsou fell against the wall again after exerting himself into gesticulating through his verbal outburst.

After taking a few gasps of air to recover, Shinsou went pale.

He had just yelled at the only person willing to train him.

Also, pushing himself to run further hadn't done him any favours.

So, Shinsou leaned to the side and heaved, throwing up his stomach contents.

After a few seconds of discharge, Shinsou looked down at the puddle he had made with damp eyes. Bits of granola and half digested egg in the watery sick, strings of saliva and mucus still connecting to his mouth before a quick spit severed it.

Thank God for the little victories; he hadn't puked on the side that Aizawa was on.

Aizawa was looking intently at the boy he had offered to train. He pulled a rag out of his seemingly endless array of pockets, and dampened it with a spare water bottle before handing it to Shinsou, who took it after a moment's hesitation.

Wiping his face and mouth with it, Shinsou scooted over to avoid the spreading pile of puke, Aizawa following suite to allow Shinsou to move.

"Sorry… I'll clean that up."

After a minute of tense silence filled with nothing but Shinsou's labored breathing and sniffs, Aizawa spoke.

"There was a point to this beyond just testing you, or seeing whether you would quit."

Aizawa looked up at the ceiling, face partially obscured by his scarf bindings.

"As I'm sure you're aware. The Hero-Killer was captured a few days ago."

Yes, Shinsou had been aware of that. It was everywhere. All over the news. Stain apprehended by the Number Two Hero.

Where was he going with this?

"You might not know, but someone recorded the event, and right now, hundreds upon thousands of people are watching it.

"His philosophy of false heroes, and purification… it's a load of bull, but like any twisted belief, it'll gain followers, and it'll spread, and fester, and ingrain so deep into the recesses of the world that the heroes of now will never be able to fully stop it."

Shinsou's breathing had finally calmed down, and he stared at Aizawa, holding onto every word, thoroughly transfixed.

"I think there comes a time in every hero's career where they begin to sense a great darkness approaching. A darkness they know they can't stop. In those times, the best they can possibly hope for is that they've done what they can to ensure that when that darkness comes, others will rise up in their stead."

Aizawa stood up.

"I don't know what this darkness will entail. But I do know, when it comes, the world may need new heroes. A new All Might… a new Eraserhead."

Aizawa looked at Shinsou, who had gone still. Aizawa helped him up.

"Your job will come to expect much of you. So, there will be days like this. Where you simply wonder whether you've done enough. Whether you're good enough to fit the role you've been given.

"I don't know that answer for you, but for me, I just think about what would happen if I wasn't there. If I let someone else take my place. It boils down to this; I'm the only one I trust to do my job."

Shinsou felt numb, looking down at the ground.

"Shinsou."

Shinsou looked up into Aizawa's eyes.

"You could've quit at any point and you know it. Why didn't you?"

Shinsou was silent for a few moments.

"…I want to be a hero."

"Why? There are plenty of professions out there, much less dangerous. Much easier paths for you to take."

"I don't want easy… nothing has ever been easy. Being a hero is all I have left, it's the only thing I've held onto… it's what I need to be. Nothing else matters."

Aizawa's smirk returned. He ushered Shinsou out of the gym, and talked as they walked.

"There are two types of heroes. Those who become heroes because it suits them, and those that become heroes because it suits their desires. Money, fame, whatever. You came here, and one of the first things you asked was whether you'd save people.

"You've got that drive. Some just want to be a hero. You? You said it yourself. You need to be one. It would be illogical for me to let the world miss out on such a promising student."

After Shinsou make a quick glance back towards where they had been sitting, Aizawa followed up.

"Don't worry about the puke. We've got custodians for that.

"Also, I've been shadowing you home for the past week."

Shinsou's eyes widened at that.

"Wait. So, you saw…?"

"Saw you crash into every tree possible? Yeah; and about the bike."

Aizawa reached into his pocket and pulled out his wallet.

"Consider this an investment into your continued training."

Aizawa pulled out some money and handed it to Shinsou.

Shinsou stared wide-eyed at the yen in his hands.

"Sensei, I can't accept this," he sputtered.

"Trust me, I make plenty of money. Just buy yourself a new bike. I was getting annoyed at seeing how slow that old one was."

Aizawa walked out of the gym with Shinsou.

"I suggest the first place you go after you leave here is the bike shop."

Aizawa turned and began walking away.

"We'll resume our training when you've rested up a bit. Show up to school tomorrow and go visit Recovery Girl. I'd imagine you're pretty sick of being sore, and of your… rash."

Shinsou smirked a bit.

"Eh, I've gotten use to it," he said as he shrugged, wincing and hissing as he did.

Aizawa snorted, and that was the last noise out of him before he left audible range.

Shinsou walked home, with a weird satisfied smile on his face.

Holy. Fucking. Shit.

So, I kind of sat down and powered this out because I felt the need to, and I'm honestly really proud of it. Then again, I wrote it while in a groggy insomnia induced haze, which may have warped my perceptions of it. Also, new record, the longest thing I have ever written in a single word document. This is two chapters, but in actuality I've just done that because I really don't want a chapter to be super long unless I'm positive I can have the other chapters be of similar length. So, split into two chapters it is.