Author's Note: Happy birthday to Star and Stripe! Apparently her birthday is on July 4, the "birthday" of the United States of America. Kinda uncreative but anyway Happy Fourth of July.

Thank you to pocketramblr for this idea based on the tumblr post at post/712667885800243200/stars-and-stripes-as-a-dfo-victim and Gfan97 for adding additional ideas to the tumblr post at gojifan97/712726727724498944/your-stars-and-stripes-dfo-idea-would-make-her.

A pilot in Cathleen's squadron used to joke about how it seemed strange that New Order could impose only two rules. In fairy tales, wishes always came in threes.

Cathleen shrugged and said, "You're right. I guess I'm just not strong enough to maintain more than two rules at once."

Her friend fell all over himself to reassure her that he'd been only kidding, and it wasn't a fault of hers, just a fault in the quirk.

He had no idea how the question had nearly given her a heart attack. Because New Order was allowed three rules. Cathleen had only been able to activate two rules at once for her entire hero career because one had been in use ever since she'd been a young girl, the day All Might had saved her. Cathleen often spoke of her admiration for her favorite hero, telling people that All Might had rescued her from a villain attack. It was true, from a certain point of view. All Might had saved Cathleen from a villain when he'd busted open a bank vault and extended his hand to her. He'd protected her during the horrible days afterward when All for One had taken hostages to get his daughter back and the government had wanted to hand her over. Her quirk had manifested at that precise moment, probably from the terror and shock. Her hysterical wish had saved the hostages, mostly by accident. She'd resolved to never let such a terrible situation happen again.

Ever since the day her power had appeared, Cathleen had always kept one rule in place: that she was not All for One's daughter.

All for One laughed as he gripped Star and Stripe's forehead and started to decay her. What a foolish woman! She could have beaten him, if she hadn't tried to save the pilots he'd attacked and used against her. It would have been a disaster if One for All and New Order had colluded against him. She'd driven him to the brink of destruction. He might have admired her a little for that, if only she hadn't cited that fool All Might as her inspiration. Star and Stripe had more strategy and ruthlessness than All Might, in All for One's opinion. But like all heroes, her softness had gotten her in the end. All for One had won.

As her body started to vanish, Star and Stripe screamed, "Cathleen Bate won't decay!"

But it failed to work, because All for One in Tomura's body had already stolen her quirk. He laughed manically with a voice not his own.

Yoichi, this is where it truly begins.

So many years ago, Yoichi had told All for One that villains always lost. All for One had tried to break his little brother's stubbornness in the vault. But those thieves had stolen his brother away from him. After escaping, Yoichi had passed along his quirk, the gift his older brother had given him, to an enemy. Even so, All for One had forgiven his foolish little brother and tried to take him back to the vault where he would be safe and protected.

All for One would never forget that cold winter day when he'd found his little brother holed up on the top story of an abandoned building.

The corpses of those who had dared oppose him lay at All for One's feet. He extended his hand to his silly little brother. "There's nowhere left to go."

Yoichi kept backing away until his back hit the window. Tears streamed down his cheeks. "Y-you killed my friends! I'll never forgive you! Someday, my power will destroy you."

It had seemed like a joke back then, the notion of a meager stockpiling quirk ever becoming something that would defeat All for One. He'd laughed. He would later come to regret that mockery in more ways than one. Because while he'd been laughing, Yoichi had opened the window.

"You have nowhere to run," All for One said. "Give up already and return with me. Your room is still waiting for you." A little more time in the vault, and Yoichi would break. He'd been close to broken when the thieves had arrived. They both knew it. All for One could see the fear in his little brother's eyes.

"I'd rather die than go back to the vault," Yoichi said, then flung himself out the window. At the same time, he pressed a detonator in his hand, triggering a bomb hidden in the wall.

All for One moved, but too slow, he didn't have as many quirks back then. He'd barely been able to protect himself. (Oh, how it stung that his younger brother had been trying to kill him right to the very end. He'd only ever tried to protect Yoichi. They were family.) He'd landed on the ground in time to see his little brother's body broken on the snow, a sight that would haunt his nightmares for the rest of his very long life.

As he felt New Order's power fill him, All for One laughed hard enough to chase away that horrible memory. He finally had the cure for his nightmare. He would use New Order to bring Yoichi back to life (shut up about your stupid dog, Tomura!) Then All for One would seal Yoichi away in a vault so deep under the earth that no one would ever be able to steal him again. (Why did he have a vault hidden away in a location only accessible by quirks? He could no longer remember. He'd built it around the same time Cathleen Bates had developed her quirk, maybe he'd been planning to resurrect Yoichi since then—but no, he'd only learned about her power later, it didn't make sense.)

Then, just as All for One tried to use his first order, an explosion rocked his stolen body. His quirks were exploding inside of him!

Before she'd died, Star and Stripe had set up a second order. New Order was revolting against him. To the very end, she'd prioritized destroying him over saving herself. (It almost reminded him of someone.)

He had to get rid of this cursed New Order right away! Full of hatred, All for One gazed at Star and Stripe's decaying corpse. She saluted at her friends and smiled as her face broke apart. (Her hair was turning white, why was it turning white? Her facial features were changing, yet that cursed smile remained.) With one last soft sigh, she died. And memory came flooding back to him.

A little baby girl cradled in his massive hands.

A toddler sitting on his lap as he showed her family pictures.

The crying and screaming as he left her in the vault when he went off to work. He told himself that she was too young to understand. She was safe in the vault.

Returning home to find yet another One for All user, that cursed blonde buffoon, had stolen away his precious daughter.

The hunt. The hostages. The sudden moment when he'd realized that he had no idea who he'd been looking for, but he'd thrown aside valuable plans for this nonsense. So he'd discarded his madness and gone back to manipulating and infiltrating Japan from the shadows.

A boiling anger toward All Might that he'd never fully been able to explain, since it ran far hotter than his rage at the previous One for All holders. He'd kidnapped Tomura for revenge, because All Might had taken something important to him. Even though he hadn't remembered the real reason. All for One had destroyed the Shimura family because subconsciously he'd known that All Might had taken his only living family member away from him.

In his returning memories, his daughter had white hair and brown eyes. She must have dyed it. Or perhaps her quirk had transformed her? She'd been so tiny as a baby, small enough to cradle in one hand, but she'd grown up tall and muscular just like her father.

Star and Stripe had been his daughter. All for One screamed, ravaged by the pain of exploding quirks, the pilots shooting at him, and his own emotions. She'd erased her very existence from his mind. (Even Yoichi had never done something so horrible.) She'd died with a smile on her face. At the very end, she could have saved herself by letting him remember her. Surely she must have known that he'd never kill her, or at least that she could have used the extra order to save herself. But instead she'd tried to kill him one last time. She'd preferred death to returning to his tender care. And she'd dedicated her destruction to chasing the foolish path of heroism. The abandonment was incomprehensible and total.

He hadn't named her Cathleen Bate. He'd named her Yoshimi Shigaraki, a female variant on Yoichi's name. Fitting, because she'd died her uncle's niece.

All for One threw back his head and screamed. He barely even felt Tomura retaking control of their body as the physical and emotional pain overwhelmed his senses. All for One knew he had to get rid of New Order before it ripped them both to pieces. But in that moment, the most selfish man in the world couldn't bring himself to care about his own death.

OMAKE TIME!

All for One: Okay, I spent five minutes blaming myself and now I've concluded it's all Tomura's fault that my daughter died.

Tomura: Me? You were in control! It was your plan to kill her!

All for One: Lalalala, I can't hear you.

#

All for One: You tricked me into killing you and you cost me so many quirks! Even Yoichi never hurt me as much as you.

Star and Stripe: I know, quirks and family are the two things you value the most. That's why I did it.

All for One: I'd be proud if you'd done this to someone else.