Izuku groaned as he once again woke up from a rough nap. Not as rough as last time, however. What was he sleeping on? He reached a hand over and felt a couch. Wait a minute... how did I get here?
"Oh good, you're awake." A strangely familiar voice called to him. He immediately shot up and activated One For All. "Woah woah, relax. I'm not gonna hurt you kid." He faced the voice. It was that older looking him from before. He was wearing a strikingly similar costume to his own, except there were all these extra technological enhancements littering the suit. "I just wanna talk. I've got food?" He offered, holding out a box of pizza. Izuku slowly reached for it, not taking his eyes off of the older doppelgänger. His danger sense wasn't going off, and it hadn't been wrong before. He slowly let go of his full cowl, and sat back down. Against his better judgement, he snatched the box away and scarfed down a slice.
"Finally, I was worried we were never going to get through." The older him sighed as he sat back in his own couch. Izuku got a chance to look around during his chow down. He was in an office of some kind. There were couches around a coffee table, a desk near the window, filing cabinets lining the windowed wall, and a nice green rug that really tied the room together. "Listen kid. Actually, lets start with a name. Calling you kid feels... condescending."
Izuku hesitated for a second. The older him was being really nice, but there was definitely a bit of an interrogative tone hidden in there. No danger sense going off, though. "...Midoriya. Izuku Midoriya." He responded before scarfing down another slice of pizza. Normally he wouldn't eat this junk but not eating for days changes one's mind.
"Funny, that's my name." The older him said with a not-so-convinced tone of voice. "Alright, Midoriya, where are you from?"
Again, another question he wasn't sure he should answer. Whatever. He had an escape plan if he really needed one. "Musutafu, but I'm staying in the dorms at UA."
"A hero student, huh? And you grew up where I'm from..." The older him looked like he was trying to piece together what exactly was going on. "Fine. Listen, Midoriya, I'm gonna ask you if these words mean anything to you. One For All." Izuku wasn't too bothered by this question. The public already knew about it, the cat was already out of the bag.
"It's my quirk." He answered plainly, never taking his eyes off the older him. "Though I'm not sure why you'd ask about that specifically. Everyone already knows about it." This did it. It's like the older him was on the verge of a breakthrough. He didn't know if that excited look meant it was time to go, or if he should stay to hear more. Then the muttering began. Was this what he looked like when he did it? He made a mental note to not do that.
"I think I've got it. If you'll indulge me for a second, I'd like to explain what I think happened." He said. Izuku motioned for him to continue. He was ready to get the heck out of there, but he would at least let him finish. "So, Izuku, you and I are two different versions of ourselves. You seem to be a younger me from what I can tell, and it seems you are still dealing with All For One in your, uh, universe? Is that the right word? Whatever, I think somehow you were sent here to my universe via some sort of multiversal quirk powers. Am I close?"
"...You really got all that from a few questions?" Izuku asked with a quirked eyebrow.
"Oh no. I've had a couple days to mull it over. I just needed to ask you to see if I could confirm it." Izuku's eyes went wide at that.
"A couple days!? Have I been out that long!?" He asked, panic setting in. "This is bad. This is really really bad! I need to get back! I need to find Kacchan!" He jumped to his feet,
"Woah woah woah, calm down, alright? If your looking for Ka- Bakugo, you aren't gonna find him here." He said, trying to calm him down.
"Wha- Why not?" Izuku asked. The confusion mixed with panic was not a good combination.
"Because my Bakugo has been gone for years." He explained. Izuku was mortified. He was a bout to freak out when the older him continued. "My Bakugo was killed four years ago when the sludge villain attacked. I wasn't there to save him, and I ended up hunting the villain down for a year to avenge his death. It's why I became a hero in the first place. But you need to understand that my Bakugo isn't yours. So lets slow down for a second and think this through, okay?" He asked, calming him down.
Izuku slowly sank back to his seat, his breathing slowing back down."...Okay...Okay...I'm okay..." He said.
"Okay good, now, lets get back to how you got here. Are they any details you can share with me that might help me figure out how you got here? Maybe a strange occurrence that could help us piece together your current situation?" The older him asked.
"Well, I was dealing with a villain who had strange powers, and he was talking about some crazy things. He said that I was the main character, and that I was also the villain? He rambled about some stuff that I didn't quite understand, and then he launched me into a strange portal, and I ended up here." Izuku explained. "I wish I could tell you more but it all happened so fast and he was kind of crazy."
"Wow, okay. So a villain sent you through the multiverse, huh?" The older him asked.
"Mul-ti-verse?" Izuku asked, confused.
"Oh you've never heard of that before, have you? Well lets see, how best to explain it." He tried to figure out a good metaphor for it. He jumped up from his couch and went over to a filing cabinet, pulling out a stack of papers. "Okay, see this piece of paper?" He slid out a piece slightly to show it him.
"...Unresolved case involving a bike thief?"
"Nevermind what's on it. Let's pretend that this piece of paper is your universe. Anything and everything that exists in your universe is all on here. Now, lets look at this one." He slid out another piece higher on the stack.
"...A fine for excessive damage caused in a street fight?"
"Gah! Stop reading what's on them!" He scolded. "Anyways, this paper is my universe. Now, lets pretend that each and every paper in this stack is a different universe. All of these universes exist stacked on top of one another. This is what we call the multiverse. Now somehow that villains powers sent you from your universe..." He pointed at the pulled out piece lower in the stack. "...All the way to mine." He pointed to the other paper.
"I think I get it." Izuku said. "So wait, does that mean there are more me's out there?"
"It's possible. Then again, this has all been a theory until now. You are living proof that it has to be real." He said with excitement.
"I hear excitement coming from over there!" A voice called out from the other side of the office door. "Did my Deku Scrub make a breakthrough?" The door flew open as pink haired woman entered the room. She was wearing a black tank top and baggy grey pants. A pair of red goggles sat atop her long messy pink hair. Her most defining feature had to be her striking yellow eyes with crosshairs across the iris. Izuku knew this person, but she looked older, too. It was Mei Hatsume, the one who had worked on his costume back at UA. "Finish chatting with mini scrub so I can show all the sweet babies we've made!"
Izuku's face immediately turned red as a tomato. "She means inventions, that's just her word for it." Older him clarified. "And mini scrub, really?"
"Hey, I'm not the one who's got a replica of himself to talk to. I need a way to differentiate." She said, crossing her arms.
With a long sigh form the older Midoriya, he turned back to Izuku. "We borrowed your suit and patched it up. We figured you wouldn't mind. I know Mei can't wait to show you all the improvements she's made."
Izuku wasn't sure what to think. He had just gone from panicked mess, to being fed by... well, himself. And what's even weirder, he was really nice. Was this... calmness he was feeling? It had been a while since anything quite this slow had happened to him, but he kind of liked the change of pace. It was nice to not be checking over your shoulder every few minutes. Then his thoughts drifted back to Bakugo. This universe's Bakugo was gone, which worried him. He had to remind himself that this universe's Bakugo also didn't have a chance to actually develop into a hero. He had faith that Kacchan would make it.
He had to.
It was official, he hated this place. Seriously, what deranged sociopath makes a world with so many monsters, then makes it stupid hard to blow them up. Bakugo was struggling with what had to be his 40th giant toad in this never ending hill. He figured it would be easy. Monsters like these were basic enemies in all the games he'd played, so they should be nothing more than cannon fodder, and yet, each explosion he fired made him feel more and more drained. He dodged under another tongue attack. At least they act kind of like frog-face so this isn't that bad. Finally, he felt like he had just enough energy to fire off an explosion that would end the monster. With a blast, the frog was blown to pieces. At least it felt good to mow down these monsters.
He wasn't sure at first if he should even be messing with these things, but they came at him first, so it was fair play. With his last target destroyed, he finished hiking to the top of the hill, and promptly plopped down. He needed a break. He'd been at this for days. His costume was gross. His hair was a mess. And he was damn hungry. He'd tried frying up the toads but they were, quite frankly, not very good. He reached down and pulled off the grenade gauntlet off his arm. He'd been carrying them on his shoulders when not fighting, as they were stupid heavy. Finally, he took a breath and got back to his feet. That town was so close. Surely once he got there he'd find some answers.
Just a little bit more.
"This is where the magic happens, kid." Midoriya, the older one, said. "We've spent a small fortune on a workshop for Mei and I to work on various support items and inventions and the like. Most of it got funded by Mei as I'm sure she'll tell you."
"Dang right." Mei interjected. "Since we decided to open an agency, I've needed to license some of my babies with support companies. Turns out, the boost boots were a hit, and now I'm filthy stinking rich. Or at least I would be if the upkeep with this agency wasn't so pricy. But its all worth it if I get to keep on doing it with my Deku Scrub."
"Hehe, we'll hit our big break soon enough, don't you worry." He said in a sheepish voice. "Ahem. But anyways, we have a vast array of different devices and gizmos that we use for all sorts of things. Of course, all of this is neat and all, but none of it compares too..." He reached for a sheet that was covering a large glass case. He pulled it off with a flourish. "Tada! The mech suit!"
"Hey, I've seen this before." Izuku said.
"You wha?" The older one responded.
"Yeah. When I was falling through the portal, these weird mirror shard things were floating around. It was brief, but I saw you and the suit fighting off Stain, the hero killer." He said. He saw the expressions on older him and Mei dampen. "Sorry. I didn't know it was a touchy subject."
"It's okay, its just..." Older him reminisced. "That was a long time ago. And it was a rough fight. He kind of got the better of me for months before I finally took him down. I wonder, you talk about him like you know him. Did you fight a Stain in your universe?"
"Sort of. It's a long story." Izuku said.
"That's okay. You don't need to tell us anything you're not comfortable with." He said. "Let's brighten things back up. Mei, did you finish repairs on his costume?"
"Sort of." She said with a hint of frustration. "I got the costume back in shape again, its just... Well I couldn't really figure out how the gloves worked. They look like really cool babies, especially since I cleaned them up, I just have no clue what their supposed to do." She said, uncharacteristically shamed by her lack of understanding.
"Oh, my shoot-style gloves?" Izuku asked.
"Shoot style?" The older two asked in unison.
"...How do I explain this. So basically, the gloves react to certain hand motions I make and form a shell around my hands. When I flick, it generates intense wind pressure. The shell amplifies and focuses it down to a point and lets me target... uh, why are you guys staring at me like that?"
The older two looked like they had stars in their eyes. Immediately they descended upon him with questions about the details. They seemed very excited to learn more about his gadgets. Unfortunately, they were interrupted by an alarm sounding in the workshop. The two stopped what they were doing and rushed to the computers to find out the reason. Izuku, equally as curious, followed them to computer station.
"Reports of a villain attack downtown. Again. Seriously, they need to find a better place to show up." Midoriya said, jumping back from the computer to suit up. He was half way to the door when a thought crossed his mind. "Hey, Izuku, why don't you come with and take that new suit for a spin? I can vouch for you by saying your my sidekick or something."
"Are you sure I should be interfering with matters here?" Izuku asked. "I'm not even supposed to be here."
"Come on, you're a hero in your universe right? Come show off. It'll be fun."
"...Alright then. I'll follow your lead."
Bakugo groaned loudly as he walked through town. This stupid place just kept getting worse and worse. First, he entered the town to ask for directions, and wouldn't you know it, these guys spoke a different language. He couldn't understand what any of them were saying, and it wasn't just the first guy either. Everyone here couldn't understand him, nor he understand them. He managed to find what looked like some sort of mess hall, and he tried to get some food, but the scantily dressed lady at the counter kept pointing out the door showing him the currency he was trying to use. At least they ended up giving him some food, which he scarfed down as quickly as he could. He tried to ask around the hall about directions, but they all seemed to point out of town.
He ended up having to snatch a map to find his way around, something he was pissed about. It was not heroic to steal things, and he knew it. He kept asking around town until finally someone took his map and marked a certain spot a little ways out of town. So now he was headed there, practically praying he could get some answers. He'd been walking for what felt like hours, and he was so tired. He walked up to the metallic gate that guarded the entrance to what looked like an old manor. Bakugo just hoped whoever was in here could finally give him some answers. He took a breath, and pushed open the gate.
Walking in, he felt an ominous sense. As if something was watching him. He pressed onward, walking down the walkway up to the door. He reached up to knock the door, but it was opened before he could. There stood a tall muscular looking... Gator lady? She had long white hair, and striking red eyes. Her arms and legs were covered with tough looking white scales. She wore simple black clothing, and had a long, white, scaly tail that flicked dangerously from side to side. She had her arms crossed, and was staring down the boy.
Bakugo cleared his throat to speak. "Uh, excuse me miss, people in town have been pointing me to this place, so I was wondering if uh..." He lost his words. He tried again. "This is gonna sound stupid, but I think I'm from another world. Not like an alien or anything, but like, another earth? Do you guys know what that is. This really hard to explain." He searched for more words, but before he could speak them the door was slammed in his face. "Hey! I was talking to you! I just want to know where I am!" He received no comment from the other side.
He stormed a few feet away from the door, and started raging. "AGH! I hate this stupid place! I hate this stupid world with its stupid people! I hate being here!" He wanted to blow something up so badly, but his quirk had been acting weird ever since he got here.
"Join the club." A familiar voice called from the door. He whipped around to see...
"Deku!? Your okay! Why is your head a bush?" He asked.
"How are you here?" Izuku asked.
"It's a long story..." Bakugo said, rubbing the back of his head.
"I've got time." Izuku said flatly. "Come inside, tell me about it."
Something was off about this Midoriya. He didn't seem at all like the one he knew. Bakugo would just have to wait to find out more. At least his luck was finally starting to turn around.
Shorter chapter but I need some time to look back at some more of the source material.
For those wondering, Canon Izuku is currently in Deku The Hunter's universe after the story ended. I really love that story a lot, and wanted a sort of older Midoriya to help Izuku a long with his first universe. Deku The Hunter was one of the first fics I ever read on this site, and I really wanted to do it justice because its one of my favorites.
Hope this'll tide y'all over till the next chapter.
