Don't Bring Politics To The Dinner Table!(This House Is A Fucking Nightmare)
Izuku flexes his fingers, noting the distinct lack of pain or cold or...anything, really. It's disconcerting, to say the least.
So All For One has some sort of pain nullification Quirk.
But wouldn't that be dangerous? Not being aware of the severity of your own injuries could lead to aggravating them to the point of death. That's why going into shock is so dangerous.
He must have a Quirk to detect his injuries or overall body health, then.
"Mrrow?"
He blinks, looking over to see the orange and white cat from yesterday squeezing through the crack in his door. Azuki, though he doesn't remember anyone specifically telling him her name, is fairly nice. He's also pretty sure Jiji and her are All For One's cats, but he has no intention of confirming that with the man.
After he'd proclaimed his apathy towards the two hundred year old man, he'd proceeded to ignore All For One until he left the room, both of his cats in Izuku's lap and a neutral expression on his face. Shigaraki was quick to follow, and Kurogiri disappeared into the kitchen for the rest of the evening. The other League members tried to ask him about it, but he'd changed the subject each time, and they eventually gave up.
A furry head bumps against his head, and Azuki lets out a low purr as he scratches right behind her ear. The kitten in his lap squirms at the sound, poking it's head out of it's nest of blankets to see the older cat.
"Meow?"
His lips twitch, and he starts petting Jiji again, much to Azuki's annoyance.
"I can give you both attention at the same time." He mutters as the cat nips at his fingers.
That confirms the pain nullification theory.
Izuku carefully extracts his hand from the cat, using his dress shirt to wipe away the drops of blood from his already healed finger. It smears a bit, but Azuki doesn't try to bite him when he offers his hand to her again. Instead, she ignores it and curls up right beside him.
He sighs, dropping his hand and looking out the window. Fluffy white clouds drift across the bright blue sky, and bare tree branches stretch upwards.
Eri...
The white haired boy's chest clenches.
He'd left her at UA, with no idea if he was alive or dead. The guilt he'd been suppressing creeps back, gnawing at his heart. He wishes that he'd had time to think things through, to explain things to her—hell, he wishes he could explain things to Shouto and Hitoshi before just...leaving. But he didn't, too consumed by panic and worry that he didn't even say goodbye, or tell her that everything was going to be alright.
And now...
He's sharing a living space with All Might's worst enemy, and said living space is owned by someone who's Quirk he took in a fit of rage and desperation, with two separate people's memories clouding his reasoning. He might be more durable now that he has access to All For One's Quirks, but Eri definitely isn't.
Then again, UA isn't much better. This is his second disappearance this year, and there's bound to be questions if he goes back, especially considering Jirou's hearing and the timing with the destruction of Deika City. But Shouto and Hitoshi could only do so much, and if Eri hasn't already been passed on to one of the staff members, she probably will be soon. Or worse, considering how hard Nezu was pushing to figure out what her Quirk is.
Izuku grimaces, fingers twisting in the covers tightly as he remembers the deal he made to keep Eri on campus.
I can't just leave her there.
But going back would mean questions, and tighter restrictions, and cameras and the horrible sensation of always being watched by that stupid fucking rat —
His stomach rumbles loudly, interrupting his train of thought.
The white haired boy sighs, releasing his grip on the sheets of the nice bed he's been passed out on for a week. Carefully, he wiggles out from under Jiji and over Azuki, hand already resting on the door when he hears their confused meows. He turns around, only to see Azuki leaping off of the bed and walking towards him, her tail held high.
"I'm going to grab food, have either of you been fed yet?" He asks, feeling a little silly talking to the cat like she's a human.
"Mmrrow."
"...Right." Izuku responds, opening the door right as Jiji bounds up to them, then promptly trips and tumbles right towards the older cat.
Azuki gracefully moves out of the way of the ball of fur right before it collides with his ankle. For a moment, he's worried, but the kitten promptly gets to its feet and paws at the hem of his too large sweatpants.
Sighing, he reaches down and scoops the kitten up, then opens the door fully and begins his journey to the kitchen.
"Sweetheart, please just put the knife away. We don't need to cut anything to make cookies, I promise." Magne says, carefully guiding the blonde girl away from the full set of kitchen knives she'd been eyeing.
The machete(which Magne's certain she'd found in the Liberation Army's van) was already enough to almost give her a heart attack when Himiko had first brandished it against their mob of attackers, but adding more knives to that mix was going to give her stress acne. She'd suggested making cookies to keep the girl from going upstairs and harassing Izuku before he woke up, but there was only so much she could do to keep the hyperactive girl busy, especially since she's multi-tasking. Well, trying to.
"But Big Sis Maggss!"
Where is Kurogiri when you need him?
"Oh."
Her head snaps towards the door, hand already reaching for her magnet—only to see a fluffy head of white hair and a faint look of surprise on a freckled face. She relaxes, arm dropping as she gives the boy a smile.
"Hey Bush. Are you hungry? Himiko and I were just making cookies."
He definitely needs some food after being asleep for so long. Come to think of it, did he even eat anything yesterday?
"'Zuku! You're awake!" The blonde girl launches herself at him, wrapping her arms around his neck.
Honestly, she can't remember anything besides the relief of him being awake and the confusing and weirdly tense conversation he had with Shigaraki's Sensei. She has no idea what that was about, and she doesn't want to know. It's none of her business, and prying wouldn't be polite.
"I've been awake for a while now. Where's Kurogiri?"
Far enough away that he couldn't sense that Himiko is in the kitchen, which is both good and bad. Good, because he would probably lose it if someone permanently banned from every kitchen he laid eyes on was in here, but bad because he couldn't stop the disaster that was Himiko picking up any cooking utensil.
""Giri's gone! He left after making breakfast this morning. So's Shiggy's boss, but Shiggy is lurking around his bedroom! Boring. Is that Jiji?"
"Mhm. He and Azuki just came in and made themselves comfortable this morning." The white haired boy explains, shifting and beginning to walk over to the kitchen island, carrying Himiko with ease.
Magne smiles at the sight. She's still not used to the white hair, but it suits him. Though, even with the color change, he'll always be her Bush. Nothing would change that.
The smell of warm sugar and butter wafts through the air, and Izuku grabs an apple out of the fruit basket to satisfy his hunger while he waits.
"Have you eaten anything since you woke up?" Magne asks, shutting off the sink and drying off her hands with a dishcloth.
He gives her a sheepish smile as Himiko tugs at his hair, entirely preoccupied by his tangled white locks.
"Not really. Eating didn't really occur to me, just making sure everyone wasn't dead after I passed out in the middle of a fight."
The auburn haired woman frowns.
"Sweetie, you didn't do anything wrong. You were at your limit, and it's not like you could've forced yourself to stay awake any longer." She reaches over the counter, letting the orange and black kitten in his arms sniff her hand. "Besides, we all got out safely, and no one was permanently injured or died. That was a miracle, considering our circumstances."
"I still could've done more." Izuku insists as Magne gently rubs Jiji's head.
"Nope!" Himiko pipes up, giving his hair a hard yank that physically forces his head backwards.
"Wha—"
"Nope! I saw your blood, it was all dark and sticky, like when I stab people too hard and they don't wake up except I didn't actually stab you." She announces, then a more somber look passes across her face. "I don't think you were supposed to wake up at all, 'Zuku. That would've been sad. I like your blood, but blood stops coming if you don't wake up."
The white haired boy blinks, slowly processing her words.
Considering my hair turned white from the stress of accepting two different Quirks and sets of memories, I probably bled a lot. Plus, I was fighting and sustaining injuries from Re-Destro, so...
He grimaces.
Yeah, that definitely looked bad.
Something chimes, and the smell of warm food drifts to his nose.
"Eat this, then you can have sugar." Magne instructs as she sets a plate of steaming breakfast food in front of him.
Izuku looks down at the food for a moment, then grabs the fork and starts eating.
"Aren't the cookies done yet?" Himiko half-whines, her tone much lighter than moments before.
Magne sighs and looks over to the oven.
"Ten more minutes."
"Ugh, that's forever!"
"It'll be over before you know it."
"No it won't!"
"If you're so bored, why don't you go and take a dip into the hot springs behind the house?" Magne finally suggests, a hint of exasperation in her tone.
"I don't wanna! Giga is there, and he always stares at me when I look out the window!"
Giga?
The auburn haired woman frowns.
"I'm surprised he's still lurking around, but he listens to Shigaraki's Sensei, so you should be safe."
A pause, and the hands threading through his hair slow.
"...It's not about being safe. He's weird." Himiko mutters, and it finally dawns on him.
They're talking about Gigantomachia.
Yeah, that's definitely weird. Having someone you fought for several weeks just...stop fighting you, and hell, even help you, must've been strange for the League, even if the rocky man was technically on their side. Still, he's pretty loyal, so they don't have anything to worry about intentional physical attacks.
Izuku frowns, then remembers All For One's memories got crammed in his head. He can't recall things on command, but information that he definitely didn't know before creeps into his thoughts, like Azuki's name and the knowledge of government files on All For One.
How does he even know about that stuff?
"He probably snooped around to make sure they didn't have anything substantial on him and left it alone because he thought it was harmless."
The white haired boy twitches at Second's voice, but continues to eat. He's hungry, and the ghosts in his head aren't going to stop him from eating for the first time in a week.
…I sound psychotic.
"Izuku?"
The white haired boy looks up from the notebook he'd scrounged up, hand tight around his pen.
Kurogiri is standing in the doorway, looking somewhat hesitant.
"Yeah?"
They hadn't really gotten to talk properly yesterday, and the misty man was long gone when he'd entered the kitchen earlier this afternoon. Otherwise Himiko wouldn't have been allowed within twenty feet of the kitchen, much less sat on the island.
"Would you help me prepare dinner?"
A smile spreads across his face.
"Sure!" He chirps, carefully removing Jiji and Azuki from his lap and onto the bed.
Izuku carefully chops the vegetables like Kurogiri instructed him, humming under his breath as oil sizzles on the stove behind him. He's not too worried. His hair is still up in a braided bun thing, courtesy of Himiko's earlier fiddling. It's nice to not have to push his hair out of his face constantly.
They work in a comfortable silence.
Once he's done with the vegetables, he sets the knife down and turns around, cutting board in hand. The misty man takes it from him, brushing the vegetables into the pan and then handing the cutting board back with several slices of meat on them.
He walks over to the sink, using a tendril of Black Whip to turn on the sink and rinsing off the meat.
"Izuku, what happened to your back?"
The white haired boy nearly jumps at the sound of Kurogiri's voice, dropping the last piece of meat onto the cutting board with a wet slap.
"Um."
Why is he asking about this now?
"I don't mean to alarm you, but the amount of scarring, in addition to the variety...Some of them don't look like they properly healed, either. Have you had any sort of health complications, aside from your hands?"
He blinks, looking over his shoulder to see the misty man's back.
...Did anyone tell him what I told them?
Since he's asking these things, probably not. The League probably just wanted to respect his privacy, which is nice, but now he has to explain...stuff, again.
"I don't think so? I haven't actually ever been to a doctor to check, so." He shrugs, turning off the water and walking back to the counter he'd been at previously.
Better to go the vague route.
There's a moment of silence.
"...What."
"Recovery Girl was the first medical professional I've seen since I was four." Izuku clarifies, carefully cutting into the first piece of meat.
Another moment of silence, punctuated only by the sizzling of the food on the stove.
"...Who dealt with your wounds? Some of them looked severe enough to need stitches, and definitely warranted a trip to the hospital."
"I fixed them myself." He answers offhandedly, most of his concentration on the meat he's cutting.
The pressure in the kitchen drops, and Izuku's skin prickles as he turns to look at Kurogiri, who's smoke is so dark that it's almost black. He's gripping the wooden utensil in his hand so tightly that it's starting to bend, and the white haired boy belatedly realizes that he's messed up.
I shouldn't have said that.
"Kurogiri—"
"How does your mother still have custody of you? Hasn't someone called Child Services? Did they ignore the issues because of her Quirk or status?"
...Yeah I definitely shouldn't have said that.
The white haired boy hesitates, searching for an answer that might calm the man down.
"She's no longer my legal guardian." He begins, carefully setting the knife down beside the cutting board. "And, at the time, no one cared about my situation enough to do anything. I wasn't—I'm not allowed in hospitals. It's a waste of resources, anyway."
CRACK.
Izuku winces as the spoon in the misty man's hand snaps in half.
"It's fine. I'm alive now, and I—" Don't tell him you have a healing Quirk, just reassure him everything is fine. "I don't have to live with her anymore, since I'm in the dorms."
Though they're not much better.
"Is your new guardian aware of your lack of medical treatment over the years?"
Despite his dark smoke, Kurogiri's voice is level, which might be the most nerve-wracking part of this. Staying that calm while being upset is kind of terrifying.
Focus. Think of an answer.
"...Yes?"
Technically, since I'm my own legal guardian it's true.
Another longer pause.
"Have they tried taking you to a hospital, or a private doctor?"
The white haired boy grimaces, silently wondering how to answer this without worrying Kurogiri more.
Unfortunately, this seems to equate an answer for the misty man, and he sets the broken utensil down with carefully controlled movements that Izuku recognizes a little too well.
"I promise, it's not as bad as it sounds! I just really can't go to hospitals, and I don't have enough money to go to a private doctor since I'm still in school and we don't actually start getting paid until the end of our third year—"
"You done fucked up!"
Izuku frowns, trying to make sense of Fifth's weird wording.
"I don't understand. Did you get an emancipation? You're speaking as if you're...you're your own guardian."
Understanding dawns in Kurogiri's eyes, and the white haired boy finally realizes that being vague has been pointless. The misty man is smart, and Izuku can't keep his stupid mouth shut.
"...How do you think I got Eri?" He mutters, turning away from Kurogiri, who's smoke is rapidly lightening.
"Izuku, do you even have a place to live aside from UA's dorms?"
The white haired boy twitches, but pointedly ignores the man, starting to cut the meat again.
"What if you get suspended, or expelled? Where would you go? Your mother is obviously neglectful, and you and Eri would be left on the streets, unless you have relatives you can stay with." Kurogiri pushes, and he flinches at the mention of Eri.
"...I'll figure it out."
People have always had uses for powerful Quirks. If all else fails, he'll just become a vigilante and rob a bank. He'd already be a criminal for using a Quirk in public illegally, and adding another crime to the list would mean nothing if it kept Eri safe and warm.
"Izuku."
The misty man moves towards him, and he tenses as he feels a hand rest on his shoulder. Slowly, he turns to look at the man, fighting to keep his expression neutral.
"You're always welcome at the bar."
Kurogiri's words hover in the air, and the white haired boy stares up at him, the sentence echoing through his head.
His eyes blur, and he sniffs, swiping a hand over his face and looking away from the misty man.
"Really?"
The idea of being welcome in the place he'd considered home for so long despite his position as a hero student and his clear conflict with Kurogiri's boss is just...overwhelming and kind of hard to believe after months and months of dreaming of going back to the dimly lit hallways and dark wooden floors and the people he'd come to care about so much.
"Really."
The white haired boy sets down the final plate, eyes still slightly puffy from his talk with Kurogiri.
No one is in the dining room yet, but it looks like it's been used before. There's no dust, and the chairs are a hodgepodge of armchairs, stools, rolling chairs, and one side even has an entire couch that's elevated by several stacks of books. All of the chairs that match the carving on the table are stacked in a corner, abandoned in favor of more comfortable seating.
As he finishes setting out silverware, Danger Sense flares strongly, sending colors flashing around him. He ignores their warning, setting the final utensil down a little too hard as All For One enters the periphery of his vision.
Still, despite the Holder's strong feelings towards the man, he would stick by what he said. Unless All For One provoked him, he'd be ignoring the man's existence entirely, as promised. He hadn't been lying when he'd said he could kill All For One, but that would mean the League would get caught in the crossfire. None of them would survive, even if they stayed on the sidelines, especially given All For One's callous disregard for his subordinate's lives.
He sighs, straightening and turning back towards the kitchen.
"Do you need anything else, Kurogiri?" He calls, ignoring the man and Azuki, who'd found her way into his lap.
"Could you carry out the dishes and utensils to serve them? Also, remove the chair at the head of the table and put it in the corner."
So he invited All For One.
Well, he is Kurogiri's boss, it would be weird if he didn't invite him. Whatever, he'll just sit far away and enjoy Kurogiri's cooking.
Yawning, he walks to the head of the table and grabs the chair with one hand, nearly hitting All For One as he turns around and drops the chair in the corner with a THUD .
"Damn, he was so close..."
He doesn't acknowledge First or All For One, simply brushing his hands off and breezing past the two hundred year old man and back into the warmth of the kitchen.
The dishes of food are already laid out, and he pulls open a drawer and drops serving spoons into things, then grabs three bowls and walks back out into the dining room. He sets them on the table, completely ignoring the man in the wheelchair. This continues until he doesn't have any more dishes to set out, so he wanders back to the kitchen, half-wondering if any of the League members can smell the food yet.
"Do you need anything else?" Izuku asks, rolling up his sleeves a bit higher as he leans against the doorway.
"Well—"
"IS IT DINNER TIME?" Himiko bursts through the doors, a huge grin on her face and Magne at her heels. Dabi isn't far behind, but he at least makes the effort to look like he didn't rush here at the first whiff of food.
"Yeah, everything is already on the table." He replies, gesturing towards the door that leads to the kitchen.
"What are you doing?"
Sixth hisses, and Izuku wrinkles his nose, wishing anyone else had asked him that.
All For One hasn't shown any signs of aggression towards them, and even healed Tomura's arm fully.
"But he's All For One!"
Exactly. They're a long term investment for him, and if he makes an investment in something, it's sure as hell not going to die by his hand until he deems it fit to do so.
They're silent.
He sighs, turning around and grabbing a glass from one of the cupboards and filling it up with water. The Holders have a right to be angry, but they really need to start thinking things through more logically.
"I don't need help with anything else, so go eat." Kurogiri ushers him out of the kitchen, and when he doesn't move fast enough, mist tickles his feet. He's promptly dropped into an armchair hard enough to make it creak, startling Spinner, who's right next to him.
"Geez, man."
"'Zuku!" Himiko cheers, waving a pair of tongs at him while balancing two different plates of meat in her other hand.
He snorts.
"The bloodiest pieces are at the bottom."
"Thanks!"
"Do you want some of this?" Spinner offers him the plate he was holding.
"Sure!" He chirps, taking the plate. Before he even finishes putting the last of the serving he wanted on his plate, Dabi shoves another plate in front of his face.
"Eat this, it's better for you."
"Says the person who goes out of his way to buy spicy American chips and downs them like they're water." Izuku retorts, though he takes the bowl, handing the one he'd been using to Dabi.
"I finished growing a long time ago, and it's not like the chips will make me shrink." The burned man scoffs, piling half of the bowl onto the mountain of food that obscures his original plate.
"I dunno, American food has some weird chemicals in it." Spinner joins in, offering a new bowl to Izuku.
He trades with the man, a thoughtful expression on his face.
"Yeah, but it's not as bad as it used to be. They started passing a lot of bills that had been backed up for years after the internal conflicts got so bad that they nearly had another Civil War. I think they actually banned an entire brand of chips because it caused cancer or something."
"You mean the ones that killed that guy in the spicy chip eating contest back in 2XXX?" Tomura pipes up, leaning over and snatching one of the plates away from Himiko while she isn't eating.
"I've always wanted to try them, they looked good. Too bad they're banned, since the guy basically choked on the dust or something." Dabi shrugs, guiding a massive fork full of food to his mouth.
He must be really hungry. Could it be due to Quirk exhaustion? Do it's effects last this long? Well, Shouto said that after the Sports Festival he passed out in a hallway trying to get to Recovery Girl and ate twice as much as usual, so maybe it just runs in the family.
"—on dust, actually the lining of his stomach—"
"Don't talk about that shit when I'm eating!" Tomura complains from his spot right beside All For One. Kurogiri is up there too, and is attempting to get Himiko to hand over one of the plates of meat.
She refuses, clutching them to her chest and hissing at the misty man. Fortunately, her attention is on Kurogiri, so he takes the opportunity to dart forwards and stabs two pieces of meat, then quickly retreats as a knife lands right where his hand was.
"'Zuku! That was mean!"
"Sorry, I just wanted some meat." The white haired boy gives her an apologetic shrug as he puts the stolen food on his plate.
Kurogiri takes her lapse in focus to warp one of the plates of meat right out of her hands, and she wails in protest, lunging for the man—but her entire body goes through a conveniently placed warp gate and she ends up with a face full of chair.
"There's plenty of meat to go around, but it'll get cold if you don't share." Kurogiri says as he calmly picks out pieces of meat for himself and Tomura, then hands the bowl to All For One.
Himiko is promptly returned to her seat, and Magne gives her a comforting pat on the arm, then offers her a new plate of meat. The blonde girl lights up and snatches it from Magne's grasp, picking through the pile of meat to find the piece closest to raw.
The burned man drops half of a bowl of vegetables onto his plate, and Izuku throws the man an annoyed look, but doesn't protest. Something tickles his nose, and he covers his mouth just in time to muffle a sneeze.
"Bless you."
"Fuck off and die you—"
"Shut up Akane." He snaps, using a tendril of Black Whip to yank the Sixth Holder back into the void mid-response to All For One.
You're almost as bad as Bakugou.
Izuku sighs and takes the bowl out of Dabi's hand, offering it to Spinner. The scaly man takes it without a word, visible confusion written across his features.
"Dabi, could you pass me the one over there?"
"The buns?"
"Yes please."
The bowl changes hands, and he ignores the feeling of All For One's nonexistent eyes on him.
"'Zuku, I want some of that too!" Himiko pipes up, gesturing towards the bowl in his hands.
"Here."
"I must say, you did a wonderful job on dinner tonight Kurogiri." All For One speaks up, and Izuku ignores the urge to strangle the man for daring to speak. The Holders are louder than ever, but thankfully, their insults don't spill out into the real world.
"Thank you, Sensei." Kurogiri dips his head to the man at the head of the table.
The white haired boy ignores their conversation and grabs another bowl sitting in the middle of the table. Dabi nudges him, a questioning look in his eyes. He offers the man the bowl with no verbal explanation.
"—and Izuku helped with the preparation."
"I see. Did he do anything else?" All For One inquires, and Izuku's fingers are starting to get pins and needles from how intensely One For All is thrumming. It wants to activate, to protect him from the man's prying eyes.
"Kurogiri, could you pass me the meat?" He asks, gesturing towards the plate of meat he'd stolen from Himiko.
A warp opens beside his hand, and he reaches in, quickly grabbing the plate and retracting his hand.
"Thanks!"
"Izuku is a good party member." Tomura mumbles through a mouthful of food, eyes cast downwards.
The white haired boy's lips twitch, and he looks down at his plate, resisting the urge to tell Tomura that it's useless. Defending him, a hero student, the successor of All Might and the Ninth is pointless in the face of a two hundred year old man with a grudge, even though his anger towards the Holders as a whole has dimmed over the years.
Instead, he starts eating.
"Are you calling a hero student your party member?" The questioning tone in All For One's voice makes Tomura visibly wince and shrink backwards. Of course it would. All For One had picked him up, raised him like his own—
Izuku chokes.
What the actual hell.
"God, it just keeps getting worse. How does it keep getting worse?"
Fourth mutters, and the white haired boy swallows his bite of food with a little difficulty.
"At least I was there to help Tomura instead of in Okinawa spending millions on an immortal kitten because I was bored."
"...Holy shit."
Kurogiri flickers violently, and Tomura stiffens as he takes a sip of his water, avoiding direct eye contact with All For One. It's still technically ignoring the man, he silently convinces himself.
"I was testing Tomura, and millions are a drop in the bucket compared to the money I've collected over the years." All For One's lips curl upwards, and amusement seeps into his tone.
"Again, I was there. And all I got was a phone call and a number. I didn't have a monitoring Quirk that allowed me to see people's overall health, and I certainly didn't see the moment that Tomura's vitals started going haywire and decide that it was nothing to worry about." He responds, stabbing his fork into a piece of meat a little too hard. "I didn't ignore their call for help. I showed up, and if Tomura wants me as a party member, no one has the final say on that aside from him. This is his organization."
"HOLY FUCKING SHIT YES— "
"TELL HIM!"
"I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS FOR YEARS!" Fifth howls.
Several Holders turn to him, confusion written all over their faces.
"I mean for the bastard to get verbally beat up." He clarifies.
"Yeah, it's almost as good as an actual fight, plus, there's no injuries!" Third calls, a feral grin on her face.
Fourth lets out a sigh, though a smile is growing on his face as he turns to see—
"Yoichi, where did you get that?"
The First Holder turns around, the tiny skirt and crop top of a...cheerleading uniform?...hiking up higher as he moves to grin at Fourth, wild excitement in his green eyes.
"I've been waiting for someone to do this for two centuries. Ko?"
"I got it!"
Second pushes in a chalkboard, then brandishes a piece of chalk with an equally wild grin on their face. His Danger Sense flares, and he begins to back away slowly, holding his hands up in a non-threatening way.
"Where did you even get those things?"
Their grins grow wider, almost shark-like.
"The void." They respond, eerily in sync, and a pair of cheerleading pom-poms appear in First's hands.
The white haired man takes a deep breath.
"GOOOOOO NINE! GET HIM!" He bellows at the top of his lungs, jumping high in the air as he screams out encouragement to the Ninth Holder of One For All. Fourth slowly backs away, taking refuge behind a chair as other Holders stand on their thrones and begin to join in on the white haired man's chant.
Sometimes, he wonders if he's the only one who managed to retain his sanity.
The white haired boy ignores the silence, taking another bite of his food as the Holders scream encouragement in his mind.
It's almost an exact replica of yesterday, except this time Kurogiri and Tomura look like they've just had his dead body delivered to their doorstep. Honestly, he doesn't blame them. He's mildly surprised he isn't dead right now, but then again, he wasn't supposed to live past thirteen, so...
"...I suppose it is Tomura's decision, in the end. I did entrust him with the title of the League of Villains, after all." All For One muses, propping his chin on a hand.
Izuku blinks.
He's...agreeing with me?
The table collectively relaxes, and he fully realizes that the man actually agreed with him. Weird. If this was some sort of tactic to make him trust All For One, it isn't going to work. Between the Holder's collective memories and the haunting scream that chased Fifth into death's arms...
Yeah, no.
We're All Casualties(In This War Of Attrition)
Izuku perches on the ledge of his bedroom window, feet solid against the sun-warmed walls as he stares out at the mass of bare trees rattling under each strong gust of wind. He'd taken a shower and removed the bandages from his body, revealing the new divot in his wrist from Hatsume's bracelet exploding, and the spider web scar that stretches from his lower jaw to the corner of his lip. Both, along with most of the markings on his body, are faded. Like they've seen years of sun, despite only one week passing.
Even the tattoo on his left arm faded, though thankfully not enough to completely mess up Dabi's work.
The wind hits his face with all of its usual force, but none of the cold. Despite the open window and the time of year, he feels perfectly warm. His hands, which are sensitive to every little environmental change, are perfectly fine. Pain free, easy to move, and the scars are faded as well, enough to not be glaringly obvious anymore.
It's only more confirmation to his theory that he has some level of access to All For One's Quirks. Whether just the passive Quirks, or the more physical ones lurking beneath the surface waiting to be unleashed under the right circumstances, the shadowy copy of All For One that had resided within One For All for centuries provided a link. A thread, giving Izuku access to his many Quirks despite the years that had passed between his genetic snapshot and the person he is now.
Whether or not they could be accessed on command remained to be seen, but the threat alone is enough to keep All For One away...for now. Honestly, he wasn't too eager to test out any of the man's Quirks. One For All had already done enough damage to his body, and randomly fishing around in a metaphorical jar full of unknown, potentially volatile Quirks doesn't seem like a good idea, especially considering his shitty luck. It's already clear that an unknown amount of passive Quirks have been at work for a while now, and documenting them would be a much better use of his time.
He sighs, running a hand through his clipped back white curls. The League had disappeared into the depths of the mansion again, and as much as he wanted to go and talk to them...well, they'd just survived a cult attacking them. They probably need time to process everything. It would be rude to hunt them down just to talk, especially when he still hasn't figured out how to get Eri back.
On one hand, he could go back. But that would bring on prying eyes, and Nezu would probably make the correlation between him disappearing and the cult being destroyed. An attack that large wouldn't go uncovered by the media, and neither would the fact that a hero student with a strength Quirk disappeared on the same day under mysterious circumstances.
On the other hand, he could always ask Kurogiri to just...make a warp gate there. It might set off alarms that an unauthorized Quirk was being used, but he'd be gone before anyone had time to react. But...Shouto and Hitoshi...they were there too. And they probably wanted answers; closure. He couldn't exactly give that to them if he snuck in, and if Eri went missing, things might escalate, maybe even get pushed to the media.
As much as he'd like to see Nezu burn, he couldn't do that to Shouto and Hitoshi. Couldn't let them wait on someone who was never coming back. It seemed unnecessarily cruel, especially since they were the ones who stood by him when his world crumbled in his hands. They couldn't fix it—couldn't fix him—but they sat down beside him and helped him pick up the fragments of what was and could have been, even though they cut their own hands in the process.
His fingers twitch, and he grips the windowsill a little harder.
No. There has to be a better way. A way to tell them I'm alright without returning to UA, a way to get Eri and avoid Nezu, a way to—to have it all.
Izuku sighs.
That's just the issue, isn't it?
He wants everything, free of consequences. He'd wanted to be friends with Bakugou and intentionally ignored red flags for years, resulting in simmering, bitter resentment on both sides. He'd wanted to help people, but he hadn't considered his own lack of Quirk and how to work around it in modern day society. He'd dreamed of magically sprouting a Quirk, but hadn't thought about the consequences that came with getting one. And now, he wants what he has with the League, but is still clinging to his dream of being a hero.
Why? The industry is corrupt to its core, and All Might's delusions have only further solidified this.
Just...why?
For a long moment, he wracks his brain for answers, for anything other than the memory of a small child clinging to delusion instilled by the awe of the heroes he'd seen on television and he sat on the couch, stomach achingly empty as bright colors and catchy slogans filled the empty apartment.
Something flashes in the corner of his eye. His eyes sharpen, and Izuku looks down—only to see All For One, rolling along the paved path ringing the mansion and following it to the edges of the forest.
Huh.
Weird, but none of his business. As long as All For One wasn't attacking him, he considers it a win. The man slows right before he disappears into the treeline, and he watches as the man turns around, an endlessly amused smile on his face—well, what's left of it—as he stares directly at Izuku.
And damn if it isn't creepy. Who knew someone with scarred over eye sockets could make you feel like you're under a magnifying glass? No one, but somehow All For One found a way to maintain his expression despite being down half a face. If the white haired boy wasn't so creeped out, he'd be impressed.
The two hundred year old makes a gesture, signalling him to follow—and then rolls into the forest without a backwards glance.
"Does that asshat think you're a dog or some shit? What even was that?"
Third scoffs incredulously, and he can almost hear her arms crossing and her lips peeling back with aggression.
Izuku wavers for a moment, debating with himself as he stares at the treeline for a long moment.
Then, he lets go of the windowsill—and falls.
He walks down the brick road, unaffected by his lack of shoes and the cold weather as he fixes his shirt sleeves. Unfortunately, he'd only been able to find more dress shirts and sweatpants in the fancy dresser in his room, and they were still too large for him.
At least I have clothes.
Though, he does wonder what happened to his hero costume. Was it torn? Ripped to shreds? So covered in dirt and blood that it was unsalvageable? Or maybe it was fine, and someone had just set it aside?
That would be nice, but he doubts it.
Another reason not to go back: Yanagi will kill me if I come back without the brand new suit they made me.
God, he does not want to face their wrath. They'd seemed upset enough when he'd ripped his earlier costume to shreds to save Uraraka and Kirishima and they'd had to fix it on short notice.
Danger Sense flares, and he slows as he looks up, seeing a man in a wheelchair parked on the side of the road. Waiting.
"This has to be the dumbest thing anyone in the history of things has ever done. Do you want to get yourself killed? Because this is the way to do it. You just left the safe zone, and you're going to die."
The white haired boy ignores Fifth, stopping a few feet away from All For One. He's entirely unsurprised, and the bemused smile on his half-face is enough to send several Holders on a tirade that he does his best to ignore. He doesn't sense any sort of hostility or aggression from All For One, just amusement and curiosity, which are arguably more dangerous, but entertaining a misanthrope seems better than contemplating his life choices, so...
"'Sup."
"Has ignoring my existence become too much for you and those fools?"
We're starting off strong.
Izuku quirks an eyebrow at the man, sliding his hands into his pockets and giving him a deadpan stare.
"Not even a 'hello' after I came all the way out here?"
"I didn't think it was necessary, considering your rather bold attitude these past few days. Have the professional martyrs' attitudes rubbed off on you, or are you always this apathetic towards people that could kill you within a fraction of a millisecond?"
Izuku shrugs noncommittally. Despite All For One's words, the man isn't all that interested in killing him right now. The entirety of the Final Exams were more dangerous than his current situation, which is kind of disconcerting, but he's trying not to think too much about it.
The man's lips curl downwards at the non-answer, and it's then that Izuku notices his respirator is nowhere to be seen.
"Can you even breathe right now?" He asks, gesturing towards the place where the respirator had been the past two days. "I get to putting up a strong front and all that, but you don't even have nostrils."
There's a pause, a moment where the white haired boy immediately regrets what just came out of his mouth as All For One exhales sharply.
"Are you always this blunt? I recall you being a lot less..." All For One waves his hand in Izuku's general direction.
The white haired boy twitches.
"You just gestured to all of me."
No response, just a curl of the man's lip and the sound of a bird chirping in the distance.
Izuku sighs, turning to walk back to the mansion. This is, ultimately, a waste of time. Getting any useful information out of All For One directly is like prying a stick out of dry cement.
"Why don't we take a walk?"
He pauses, looking over his shoulder at the supervillain, who looks as amused as ever. Silently, he turns back around and sidles up to All For One, bare feet scraping against the bricks as he walks beside the two hundred year old man.
It's quiet for a long time, and he enjoys the wind brushing his cheeks. He doesn't enjoy it blowing hair into his eyes, but there isn't much he can do about that with a single hairclip on him.
I'll ask Himiko for more later.
"I hunted down Holders for a long time."
Izuku's eyebrows raise, but he doesn't look at the man, simply listening to wheels grind against the ground and the wind knocking tree branches together.
"I've always thought of them as Thieves. I only discovered that they called themselves 'Holders' during my first confrontation with All Might." The man continues. "How that child managed to wound me, I have no idea. He's never been especially bright, but I suppose that One For All had evolved enough that it didn't really matter."
The white haired boy's lips twitch, but he doesn't respond.
"Since you've talked to those fools, I'm sure they told you how they died. They probably also told you about my...interest in getting my brother's Quirk back."
"More like obsession."
He inclines his head, silently agreeing with Second's words. What he'd seen went beyond interest. It was a fixation, a drive to get something back that had been lost for so long that he couldn't even remember what the Quirk looked like.
"After chasing down five generations of people for a century and a half I..."
There's a hint of...hesitance, in All For One's tone. Something that indicates reluctance, which is highly unusual for the man. Every movement, every action is self-assured and confident even through the darkest of actions, belying the type of person he is.
"Well, I realized that I'd been wasting resources on a Quirk that I'd voluntarily given away decades ago. My empire was thriving, but I was stuck in sentimentality. So I did what any normal person would do—"
Please don't confess to murder. I don't think I'm strong enough to contain the past Holders if you openly confessed to murder to solve your internal issues.
"—and went to therapy."
"Huh?"
"What?" He blurts out, head turning to stare at the two hundred year old man incredulously.
All For One's lips curl upwards, and the Holders subconsciously recoil despite their confusion.
"I went to therapy. Of course, I went to multiple therapists to make sure I had the right fit, and I used Oath to make sure they could never tell anyone of my existence, but eventually, I found my current one."
"...Is this a hostage situation? Is he threatening us with a random therapist? What the actual fuck is going on?"
"They're...rather pushy on some subjects, but they're advice has proven useful over the years, so I can overlook their insolence."
"My brain is fucking melting. All For One? Therapy? Those two words do NOT go together in a sentence. They—they repel each other!"
"Are you fucking with me right now?" Izuku asks, having come fully to a stop to just...try to comprehend what's going on. Because, despite the Holder's overwhelming confusion and the chaos inside his head, there are memories flashing through his head.
A comfortable couch. A sign in sheet with a pen attached by a worn piece of pink string. Light filtering through a window, revealing each individual dust mote. A vase, filled with fresh flowers each week. The sound of a pen against paper, and a warm, reassuring voice speaking.
"...Oh shit, you aren't kidding are you? You actually did it." He mutters, blinking a couple of times before focusing on All For One, who's smile has settled into something more sedate.
"Indeed."
The white haired boy pinches the bridge of his nose, forcibly muffling the Holders to prevent his oncoming headache. He feels like he's stepped into the twilight zone, and nothing makes sense, despite everything making sense. The information is all there. Hell, he could fly to All For One's therapist's office right now if he wanted to, though he wouldn't be able to get any information out of them.
This is so fucking weird.
"Okay. So? Therapy doesn't necessarily mean that you're a better person, and it could've been a one time thing." It wasn't, but Izuku is going to try to retain what little is left of his sanity and pretend like All For One hasn't shown more inclination towards change than All Might himself has. "Besides, you still killed Nana, and you fought All Might on multiple occasions."
All For One's face settles into a more neutral expression, and the white haired boy mirrors him, trying not to give anything away.
"...I was content to...wait. To watch from the sidelines. After all, I did give One For All away freely, and it was ultimately my brother's choice to give it to Ko. As sentimental as the Quirk is to me, I don't think that Yoichi would've wanted to end up in my hands again. He was...stubborn, once he made up his mind."
Izuku's lips twitch, remembering that time when—
Nope, we're not going down not-my-memory-lane, don't get sidetracked.
"However...Nana Shimura had a friend who had a rather useful Quirk that allowed her to gather information. She bided her time, waited until the moment was right, and then cornered me. Of course, I got out, but she was rather persistent in her attempts to kill me." All For One recalls. "Finally, after a solid five years of playing hide-and-seek with her, I asked her why she was so dead set on killing me. After all, I'd stopped hunting down Holders. There was no reason to attack someone so far beyond her skillset."
The white haired boy knows where this is going. He'd known it since the moment he'd taken both hands on that battlefield in a desperate attempt to save Mr. Compress and Tomura. Both sides of the story, shoved into his head at once. The reason for Nana Shimura's death and All Might's eventual maiming...
"Imagine my surprise when she told me that it was the last wish of her Master to obliterate me from the face of the earth. I'd never even met Six, and yet their hatred was enough to set Shimura on the warpath."
One For All grows quiet, and the silence stretches out. He doesn't really have anything to say to that. There's no way to defend the Sixth Holder's actions, no way to justify their hatred of a person they'd never met. They'd chosen Nana because they thought One For All would build upon her base Quirk enough that she'd be able to defeat All For One, and the woman was more than happy to accept the extra help to become a hero that could make the general population feel safe.
So when her Quirk felt insignificant in the face of a century old monster, she'd turned to Yagi. To a hope-filled boy, chasing his impossible dream of peace with a smile despite the quiet scorn of his peers. She saw herself in him, and she'd given the Quirk to him despite knowing the dangers now that she'd poked the beehive. Yagi watched her die because Sixth's self-hatred had found a target in All For One. Because to them, Fifth's choice had never been anything more than a desperate, last attempt at keeping One For All away from supervillain, rather than Fifth seeing the potential in their Quirk that they never could.
"I thought that once I killed her, her protege would be scared off. That he would run for the hills, and that my existence would merely lurk in the dark corners of his mind for the remainder of his life." All For One continues, with a hint of bitterness lurking beneath his neutral tones.
"But the pattern started again, and this time, I was fighting someone with a cause. Someone who actually had a personal reason to kill me. 'All Might' and his sidekick found me everywhere I went, and he skyrocketed in popularity due to his 'hard work'." The old man scoffs, but continues. "He was really only ever after me. His dream of being a symbol may have come true along the way, but he lost sight of that goal years ago, as much as he tries to convince himself otherwise."
There's Izuku, and there's All For One. In the middle of a forest in winter, with wind brushing their faces and the far away chirping of a lone bird.
He doesn't sympathize with the man. How could he? All For One has been ruining people's lives for centuries, and Izuku doubts that therapy has stopped that. But something about the man...in comparison to the merciless monster he'd seen in the Holder's memories, he's nothing more than a shadow of his younger self. Age and time tended to mellow people out, to soften memories and personalities. Injuries, too.
Though, considering he has eight different people in his head now, his opinions might be tainted. Eight different personalities and experiences was...a lot, but he's only seen bits and pieces, and most of the things that they once knew came naturally to him. Which could mean that their subconscious, strong opinions of others could be interfering with his usual thought process. But considering he'd had little to no changes on firm opinions that he'd held for a while when they started coming in, he could just be reading too much into it?
The issue is that every opinion and experience he has with All For One is biased, and his thoughts on this can't not contain influence from past Holders, even All For One himself.
How can I even think without their thoughts bleeding into mine?
"I am still content to watch from the sidelines, Izuku." His deep voice makes the white haired boy jump. "You may be All Might's successor, but that doesn't mean you have to walk the same path he did. So..."
"Let's make a deal."