You Only Tell The Truth
3.We Two Could Conspire, And Make Them Listen
The next ten months were filled with agony.
Izuku no longer had control of his Sight. It was there, demonstrating multiple pathways like usual, but now his actions had immediate consequences. There was no longer a simple way to meddle with fate and come out of the minute alternations unscathed.
If Izuku chose to rescue an overly adventurous kitten from the tallest tree branches, he'd condemn a family of four to burn in their apartment. If he instead chose to call the emergency services, he'd have to watch the cat plummet to the sidewalk. To save the family from smoke inhalation and halt the spreading fire before it claimed other lives in the surrounding apartment complex, but break a child's heart over the loss of their first pet; this was the path Izuku had to walk now between what was a moral prioritisation or a simple altruistic act.
The visions had presented themselves in this dual manner since his selfish slip; a constant cataclysmic barrage that left a bitter taste in Izuku's mouth no matter the choice he made.
And it was important he made the choice.
Ignoring potential pathways was akin to walking along a type rope made of barbed wire. If you didn't tip either side of the tightly strung wire, you were liable to prick your feet along the way. Wobbling and falling off to the side often felt the safest thing to do, despite the consequence, because the long stretching wire only continued and continued and continued. It waited – wanted – Izuku to fall.
How many children had he seen crying now because of his actions? How many lives had he saved through prioritising multiple lives over another's happiness?
The relief he had felt one day, from knowing that causing a bank robber to slip on a banana peel had halted a hostage situation and several casualties, was negated by the discovery that the second route fate could have taken – a young girl in her first year of middle school sat alone on a park bench – had resulted in horror.
The reports on the case which Izuku had seen on the news specified that the police were struggling to put what little remained of the girl's body into a recognisable shape for identification.
Izuku couldn't eat the curry his mother made that night.
Too chunky.
He managed a mouthful under her watching, worried eyes, and asked her to save the rest as leftovers. Retreating to his room, stomach churning, Izuku waited until his mother had gone to bed. Then he dashed to the bathroom and threw up the heavy weight in his stomach alongside anything else it had to purge.
The curry was undiscernible amongst the bile.
The ten months following the ironically 'fateful' day had taken their toll – a fact that had not gone unnoticed by others. He'd lost weight. While Izuku had always been a slip of a thing, the unnatural display of his ribs, and the manner in which the nubs of his spine jutted out from beneath tight t-shirts were difficult to see in the mirror. Dark shadows hung underneath his lower eyes, like raging storm clouds over the splayed constellations of his freckles.
His mother apprehensively watched all of these changes happen during those ten months, just as he worriedly watched the changes fate made to those around him. They both felt as though something important was slipping from their fingertips, and that no matter what they did to prevent that from happening, whatever it was the two were desperately grasping hold of would eventually evade them.
Izuku had tried to shake off his lack of control; throwing himself into keeping watch over the fates of others with extreme vigilance as though to make amends with his Quirk for his prior selfishness.
The Sight consumed his time. It was distracting, having to figure out an easy method to stop a multi-car pileup on the motorway during double maths. With his Quirk consuming his focus, Izuku's grades had begun to slip. Not enough to irrevocably damage his future, but enough to draw attention from teachers who'd always ignored him before.
The teachers had left him alone, convinced, along with his mother he guessed, that Izuku's insistence that he had a Quirk was just a phase. He didn't lash out. They never caught instances of isolation between him and his peers. But sure enough one step wrong – tumbling grades – was enough to send the 'concerned' teachers into a flurry. All over one little blip.
So why couldn't these concerned teachers have noticed his desperation before? Why now, when he was hurt and stressed, did they have to butt in?
"I thought you wanted to get into Yuuei, Sweetheart," Inko softly placed her hand on his shoulder as they left the school's grounds; she'd been called in to speak with Izuku's homeroom teacher about the blip in his test scores and distractedness. The delicate bones protruded under her palm, and it was then that Inko realised Izuku could be broken.
He was fragile enough to be snapped – always had been – but nothing would break him like having to finally give up on Yuuei. Or rather, having to admit that the great pretence was over.
"I'll try harder from now on," Izuku whispered back. His teeth ground together; brow drawing sullenly underneath the mop of his fringe. "I just… didn't see the point of applying anymore if I can't…"
If I can't do anything without a Quirk, Inko's mind supplied.
If I can't openly help anyone with my Quirk, had been Izuku's train of thought.
Their walk home is silent.
Inko had bought him books on mythology for birthdays and Christmases – each recounting of ancient tales intensifying as he grew and matured. With the latest edition she had purchased, Inko now understood that the Cassandra Izuku idolised was beaten, and broken, but tenacious. Inko knew her son – beaten and broken and desperate to fit in even though he assured her daily that he already did – would continue this great scheme.
"They're understanding," Inko continued, threading her fingers through the limp green curls atop his head before removing her hand. She kept her housekeys in her bag and needs the hand to dig them out. Izuku waits patiently as she opens the front door to their apartment, but his body is tense.
Inko hated seeing him like this. "I'm sure they'll allow Quirkless students onto some of their courses – in fact, let's check their credentials!"
Izuku feels sick as she utters those words. 'I'm not Quirless!' he want to scream at her, but he doesn't. It's not his mother's fault that no one believes him. At this point, Izuku is beginning to suspect it was the Quirk itself.
He heads towards the kitchen, hoping that swilling iced tea in his mouth with distract him from the acrid peremptory taste of bile in his throat.
Before he'd ripped his own fate apart by clinging to All Might, Fate had assured Izuku a nice cushy place in Yuuei's General Education Department and a chance to graduate from a prestigious school with little to no disruption. During that timeline, if he'd been smart and manipulated minor events to his will, he could have avoided Bakugou for all three years of schooling.
However, he now only saw many dancing images of himself. Some span out of his control and bled away into nothingness. Others hurt for him to look at – let alone follow – such as the possible pathway that involved him becoming All Might's successor of all things.
He Sees himself sat on the same pleather desk chair as he had when he was four. A hologram lights up the room. His tears are happy –
The vision explodes into sepia and bubbles and distortion, like a reel of old film burning up in a cinema. Izuku's small form is dwarfed by All Might's size and the Hero's beaming smile in the vision, and now they are grotesquely melted beyond all recognition.
Izuku snorts. He'd blown that one possibility big time. Now it'd never be on the cards.
While his mother booted up the computer in his room – presumably to check Yuuei's policies and relevant inquiries into how they accepted students – he's struck with white-hot anger. His fingers grip at the kitchen worktop; knuckled popping and turning white from the pressure.
He should expect to be ignored and dismissed over his Quirk, because he always has been – but what use is knowing the future if you can't say anything? Can't tell anyone? What use is it if you can't use what you See to your advantage.
All he'd wanted to do was ask the Number One Hero if a presumed liar could do said Hero's job. Wanted to know if it was possible that one day, someone would believe. How had wanting to know something – wanting reassurance and approval – messed up his, and everyone else's whole lives?
Izuku already knew. Fate is fickle and apart from Izuku's minor meddling, about as easy to herd as cats are. You danced to the feline's – Fate's – tune, not the other way around, and occasionally it would award you with the honour of petting its appealingly fluffy tummy.
Izuku was still so angry though. Something that he'd wanted for so long was now being denied. But then he realised it wasn't as though it had never been promised or an established outcome in the first place. Fate could be manipulated – there were dire consequences, yes, but it could happen. So far though, Izuku had only been scratching the surface of what his Quirk could do. Maybe it was time to do things his own way?
"Izuku! Sweetheart, they accept Quirkless students into other departments – just not Heroics!" Inko bursts into the kitchen, waving a piece of paper before her. It's an application form, he notes.
"Oh…" Izuku replies lamely. "Oh."
Something selfish curls in his gut; the writhing sensation outweighing how his Quirk pricks at his skin and the space behind his eyes in warning. He'd already done something very stupid before, according to Fate, so why not destroy these fractured pathways even further?
"A-are you okay with General Education?" His mother stutters. The form crumples a little as she tightens her grasp. Her excited grin is morphing into a grimace.
The pain refuses to go away, growing in intensity as a plan solidifies in his mind. He knows he should retreat to his room before his nose starts bleeding from the pressure behind his eyes, but his mother is looking at him with fragile hope in her dimmed smile.
Izuku mentally shakes himself. "I think so? I just didn't expect them to allow you to print forms from their website."
That's a pathetic lie, but Inko – if she notices – doesn't acknowledge it. "I've got to start dinner, but you go ahead and fill it in okay?"
"Sure," he answers breezily. "I think I'm going to print another one out just in case I mess the first one up."
Inko beams at him, and Izuku weakly smiles back.
It doesn't take him long to trace back through his mother's search history to the download page where she sourced the forms. He does not, however, print another application form for the Department of General Education.
"I've finished filling my form in," Izuku proudly tells his mother with a wide smile that she hasn't seen in months. "Do we have any envelopes?"
"I'll find one for you later and post it for you tomorrow," Inko replies. She's still stunned by the sudden improvement in his mood.
(Izuku's just glad she's believing him for now.)
"Thank you," he says, and smiles again. It doesn't reach his eyes.
Bubbling sepia blurs before his eyes. It results in broken legs, happiness, more brokenness, belonging and vomit and – the vision flares once more, and then there's nothing. Fate is not happy with him for trying out for the Heroics Department.
Do I…? Do I go and save her or…?
She'd helped him out earlier, when Bakugou had silently stormed past him and near knocked Izuku to the ground. He hadn't caught her name, and now she was going to be crushed by a giant robot.
WhatdoIdowhatdoIdowhatdoIdo-
Fate was unresponsive. No visions unfold before him. No help will come.
His Quirk is useless and – is it punishing him for doing the wrong thing?! With no other option, all he can do is spectate as the hulking robot jerks and flails and raises is foot once more to stomp at the ground.
Why can't he use his Quirk? What can he use instead of his Quirk?
"It's my Quirk. Sorry for using it on you without asking first."
Izuku's eyes widen. He sprints into the carnage just as the other examinees turn tail and flee.
"Use your Quirk!" He screams, throat hoarse, as he draws closer to the trapped girl. Her lower body is clamped to the asphalt by the concrete exterior of a building the rampaging one-point robot had dislodged. "Use your Quirk to lift it and I'll pull you free!"
Izuku makes his way to Classroom 1-C. He seats himself at the back of the room (out of harm's way and close to the window), hoping that his choice would delay the inevitable.
Introducing yourself is a necessary (tedious) chore at the start of term at a new school. That doesn't mean Izuku is looking forward to it, no matter how much he's intrigued by other's Quirks – because that was the crux of the matter.
Quirks.
It came without saying that new students were expected to introduce themselves by name and to provide a short synopsis of what their power entailed. Izuku, naturally, would try to comply to this format, yet time and time again he'd been denied.
– We're regret to inform you that despite your Heroic actions and assistance in saving one Uraraka Ochako, we cannot at this time knowingly permit a Quirkless student to attend Yuuei's Department of Heroics. Should you choose to accept, the Department of General Education will–
The teachers had access to his records and would undoubtedly be notified if they had a Quirkless child under their tutelage. It wasn't a bad thing. They were also notified about students with 'volatile' powers too.
No, what Izuku was dreading was the reaction of his classmates.
Their homeroom teacher was recognisable enough. Pro-Heroes teaching in the General Education department was off-putting to Izuku though. It just didn't seem like their domain at all.
One by one, in numerical seat order, they introduced themselves. This was GenEd, so nobody stood out Quirk-wise. Their teacher flicked through his register, making a mark beside the last student's name. The teacher also carried with them a few other sheets of paper, from what Izuku could see at the back of the room, they contained a table to organise everyone in the class to make identification easier; images and the student's names to one side, relevant information on the student at the other.
The purple haired guy sat beside Izuku looks about as done with the whole situation as Izuku feels. Izuku can feel the boy's sigh deep in his bones; the expulsion of are is expressive of the boy's irritation. He's not impressed with this whole ordeal either then. Izuku watches distractedly as his purple-haired classmate looks to the window inquisitively. They're not too high up, and there are trees and shrubs below their classroom window. It'd be a soft enough landing and a broken leg at worst.
Perhaps Izuku should jump for it before he ends up as the social pariah for three schools on the run?
"-number nineteen? Seat number nineteen!"
Startled, Izuku rises from his seat, legs trembling. He wills himself to calm down as he sucks in a breath and says,"M-Midoriya Izuku… um… I can see the future?"
Silence. Then the subtle sound of their teacher shuffling his papers. The class begins to murmur: 'Why did that sound like a question?', 'Even Sensei looks confused…', 'Hey look he's shaking!'
The teacher is scanning his papers with laser-focus; the near-inaudible mutters as he checks the student information over are dissolving into grumbles and growls.
Izuku swallows; sweat is beginning to bead on his forehead, his fingers are twitching, and no one believes him.
"K-kidding!" He blurts, and instantly wants to slap his hands over his mouth. He didn't mean to say that – he wasn't going to say that. He wasn't in control just then. "Just kidding. I'm… Quirkless, actually."
A few of his bolshier classmates break into peals of laughter, congratulating Izuku on his joke about 'seeing the future'. He'd had the fooled, or so they admitted. There are no demanding comments about his status, yet Izuku still wants the ground to swallow him up and spit him out somewhere that isn't Classroom 1-C.
Tears are not the only thing to prick at his eyes. Fate is providing another cautionary notice.
"Sit down Midoriya. For a moment I thought there had been an admin error. I'm glad to see it was all just a joke," says their teacher – and can you hear that? That is the sound of Izuku's hopes dashing to pieces once more.
That was that. That was the latest chance of anyone believing him about his Quirk gone. Squandered. If only he'd kept his mouth shut, then he wouldn't have to live with the label – the pretence – but the best thing about this whole disaster is that he's brought it upon himself.
"And finally, seat number twenty?"
"Shinso Hitoshi. My Quirk is called Brainwashing," the purple haired bo- Shinso, states, and promptly slouches back into his seat. More frantic whispers ensue, with one noticeable word cutting through the hisses and worried mumbles.
Villain.
Izuku glances over to Shinso's desk. The boy's eyes are narrowed and fiercely trained to those who'd spoken against him. There's a spark of something – resentment? – inside those eyes, but more importantly Izuku knows that look.
Izuku wears it himself often.
He knows why Shinso's hands are curled into frustrated fists beneath his desk. Knows the downward curl of his lip and the scrunch of his eyebrows – because Izuku has worn the expression before, when he's trying not to cry. Izuku has had his own hands curl up tightly in much the same manner, because as much as Izuku doesn't want to hurt people (Heroes don't – shouldn't – hurt people) he's sick and tired of not being listened to.
Ultimately, wanting to hit someone for their inability to hear you out was a common – if frowned upon – feeling for Izuku, and now it seemed Shinso shared in his suffering too.
Established stereotypes were enough to jeopardise your whole life and social worth. Lashing out only serves to reaffirm what people think about you. 'Villain' is Shinso's label, just as 'Quirkless' is Izuku's, and to shake off those terms is no easy feat.
Fate splits into a forked pathway before Izuku's eyes – each individual eye is filled with potentiality and risk, but the portrayal of the future within his left eye is the one Izuku chooses to pursue. He rubs at his temples, partly because his head hurts (and it's only nine in the morning) and partly to hide his smile.
If Izuku plays his cards right, he may finally have a friend – and more importantly, an ally.
I have no idea who 1-C's homeroom teacher is. I can't remember it from canon(/fanon), and I sure as hell can't find anything online, so chose to leave them, well, blank. Less personal that way I guess; the only other important character to factor in is Shinso.
If anyone can dredge up any information, or even suggest a suitable candidate, don't hesitate to PM me. I was thinking Hound Dog, but again, chose not to specify.