It was dark.

He felt light as if he were floating as if gravity had decided to ignore him. Was that what was happening? Was he so useless even gravity was letting him go now? He wouldn't put it past his luck.

Why was it so dark?

He couldn't feel anything.

Why was this happening?

What was going on?

Where was he?

Who was he?


Deku.

'Deku' was the only thing he could remember about who he was. Or at least, all he could remember name-wise. It was burned into his memory, alongside the image of bright flashes and red eyes.

But he had green eyes. Didn't he? He remembered himself being green. Like, really green. He thought that he had green hair as well. Was his skin green? No, that'd be way too much green.

Deku.

Was that his name? It felt hollow when he said it to himself, not that he could actually hear himself speaking. He still couldn't hear anything yet, but he was patient. Or at least he was now. He didn't know if he was before all this.

Having your memory all wishy-washy really sucked.


All Might.

He was important. Someone that Deku should remember. He was… very big? And strong. And yellow. And he was there when whatever was happening now began.

But… he couldn't remember much else. All Might… he was a good person. Someone Deku liked very much. He helped people? Deku wanted to help people. When whatever was going on now was over.

All Might was there when this started! Maybe if Deku was patient, he would come to save him!

Yes, that was a good plan. He would wait for All Might to come to save him.


Warmth.

He couldn't feel it before, but something had changed. The warmth was travelling towards him slowly. It looked like it was a big block of it? It was weird as if he could see the warmth itself.

Purely on instinct, he called out to the warmth, wanting to have it for himself. He felt it accept his call, flowing towards him like water.

It felt amazing as it reached Deku. He felt himself start to move, wriggling about as energy filled his body. He still couldn't see, hear, smell, taste, or feel anything, but he felt his strength grow.

He wanted more. The block of warmth that he had grabbed was gone now, completely drained by him. He needed to find more. He needed to take more warmth so he could grow stronger.

Maybe if he did he'd get to see again.


He had found more.

Another block of warmth, but it felt different this time. The last block was small and was gone fairly quickly. Whatever he had found this time was much bigger.

It was so potent that Deku could feel the warmth radiating off of it, small wisps coming towards him of their own accord, even without him calling to them.

He couldn't resist, and he didn't want to. He immediately called out towards the reservoir of warmth, watching as it rushed towards him, slamming into him and filling him with power.

He smiled to himself as the warmth settled down, merging with the small pool of power that he had gathered already, effectively doubling his total with the amount he had drained.

His smile only grew when he heard rustling around him. He was starting to hear things again! Maybe he wouldn't have to wait for All Might to save him!

He followed the small noises around for a little while, smiling to himself as he heard birds chirping at the edge of his hearing.

This was a good sign.


His sense of taste returned to him next.

He had followed the sound of static towards a line of small blocks of heat, and when he had called upon them, he was pleasantly surprised to find that they each had their own unique 'taste' to them!

The small boxes tasted. Well, they tasted fairly bland. The bigger boxes were kinda the same, but they had tinges of something spicy to them.

As his sense of taste returned to him, he also seemed to be able to see the pools of warmth from further away. It wasn't anything concrete, it was just sort of a general sense where the pools of warmth were.

Concrete or not, Deku appreciated it, as it made it easier to find more and grow faster.


Deku's hearing and sense of taste kept growing, but he still hadn't gotten his sight back.

It was frustrating. He could hear people talking around him now as he moved, but it was like they were whispering while facing away from him. He could hear the occasional word, but for the most part, it was like white-noise in his mind.

His sense of taste had gotten a lot better in the time that he had been awake… how long had it been since he had woken up? He couldn't really tell.

He was distracted from his thinking as a small pool of warmth entered his senses, he was about to ignore it in favour of a larger pool when it suddenly flared, growing denser and denser as it became full of warmth.

He rushed towards it and latched onto it, watching in amazement as it kept growing even as he drained it as quickly as he could. He hadn't seen anything like this yet! Usually, things were all used up when he drained them!

He must have eventually caught up to the pool of energy's growth, as it slowed down, eventually coming to a stop, and Deku greedily absorbed the last of the energy. He smiled in contentment as the energy settled into himself again.

And then there was light.


His sight coming back was an odd experience.

He felt like he had grown considerably after draining whatever he had drained beforehand, and he felt as if he had reached some sort of threshold. He still couldn't see himself, or really anything with great detail, but he could see shapes and colours.

There were a lot fewer colours then he had been expecting. Below him was a line of black with white stripes on it, and all around him were white and grey blocks. Wait… he was on a road. He remembered what this was!

Moving to the side he got off of the road, smiling to himself as knowledge flooded into his brain as he looked around his surroundings. The tall blocks of various colours were buildings, and people lived in them!

The black and white stripe on the floor was a road! Cars travelled down them! Cars were very interesting too, all of the different colours and shapes and the warmth they gave off were all different tastes as well.

They also were able to make a bunch of warmth for him to absorb as they moved! They were the perfect snack! He still didn't really remember much about who or where he was, but the area he found himself in seemed fairly familiar.

It seemed like the more warmth he gathered, the more he would remember! So he had a goal now! Gather enough warmth to remember who he was! And what happened to him!

Because while he couldn't remember much from before, something was definitely different about him now, and it was an odd feeling.

Ignoring the odd feeling, for now, he chased after another car as it passed him, slowing down slightly as Deku drained some of the warmth it was generating from it.


His hearing had been getting better all the time, and now his sight was starting to improve as well.

So it wasn't really a surprise to Deku when he heard his first conversation. He had just finished chasing down a car and draining it when he heard two people talking louder than he had heard before.

He followed the noise and went down one of the narrow paths between buildings, which he remembered were called 'alleyways' and saw two people seemingly arguing. Or at least one of them was.

He moved closer and saw that the one to the right, who was much bigger, was the one talking loudly, and they were scaring the smaller person. The big one was also holding some sort of tool in their hand, pointing it at the small one.

Gun.

The big one was holding a gun. Guns hurt people! The big one was trying to hurt the little one! Whatever it was that the big one was telling the little one to do didn't seem to be working, as the little one back away very slowly.

Deku was worried. Guns hurt people and he couldn't remember if there was a way to make them not hurt people. The big one yelled again and seemed to click something on the gun, and Deku's instincts took over.

The sudden flash of warmth that came from inside the gun was absorbed into himself instantly, leaving the two people in the alleyway to look at it confused when nothing happened. A second later, the small one was running away as fast as they could.

Good! He didn't want the small one to be hurt!

A few seconds later Deku sensed more cars coming towards the Alleyway, this time with flashing pools of warmth on top! As much as he wanted to, something was telling him that he shouldn't drain these cars.

Wait, didn't the flashy cars mean helper people were coming? That was great! Maybe they would help the small one and punish the big one for trying to hurt the small one!

He floated around for a while watching as the blue helper people seemed to wait for a very colourful person to attack the big guy with the gun, before putting him in one of the flashy-cars.

He smiled to himself as he saw that the blue helper people had found the small one and were helping her. He wasn't sure exactly how he had done it, but taking the warmth from the gun had saved the small one! He had helped someone!

Maybe there were others he could help now that his senses were coming back!


"Naomasa, may I… may I borrow a bit of your time?"

The detective looked up from his desk and winced slightly as he saw the new form that his friend seemed to exist in now. It had been a fortnight since Gran Torino had called him down to the hospital to visit Toshinori, but it still hurt to see him so injured.

"Of course you can, come on in and have a seat." Naomasa stood up and pulled a chair out for Toshinori watching silently as the man slowly made his way over, leaning heavily on the cane he had been given.

He looked terrible. Naomasa had seen people with injuries as severe or worse than Toshinori's before, but even then they usually looked like they were on the mend. But that might have been because they stopped whatever they had been doing and rested.

Toshinori hadn't stopped. He had walked out of the hospital the night after his surgery and had thrown himself back into his hero work immediately. Naomasa couldn't help but frown as Toshinori adjusted himself to be more comfortable in the chair.

"What's up, Toshi? Do you need anything?"

Toshinori's shoulders dropped immediately, his head dipping, and Naomasa suddenly knew what was coming. Silently pushing the button on his desk that locked his office's door, he moved over to Toshinori and felt him shaking.

"I can still see them, Naomasa. I can't get them out of my head. I've lost people on the job before, and they've affected me, but I can't get those people out of my mind."

Tsukauchi rubbed Toshinori's back as he continued. "I know I beat him. I know that I took All for One out with that hit. But the fact that those people had to die for him to be defeated… it feels like I've lost something, Naomasa."

Tsukauchi could see the man openly crying at this point. "And that kid. I never even found out his name. There wasn't enough of him left after what that bastard did for us to identify him. But I still see him in my nightmares."

Tsukauchi wrapped Toshinori up in a hug, rocking back and forth as his old friend cried out the stress he had been bottling up for the last two weeks. "It's alright Toshi. It's not your fault, you know that, right? All for One is as evil as they come. The blame lies entirely upon him, ok?"

Toshinori was silent for a moment as he wiped away the tears on his face, his body shaking as he nodded slowly in Tsukauchi's embrace. "I know it's not my fault. That I did everything I could for those hostages. I know that. But I can't stop it from haunting me."

Toshinori shook himself, making Tsukauchi let go, watching worriedly as Toshinori stood up quickly, grabbing his cane. "Shit, I… I'm so sorry, I shouldn't be dropping this on you… you're busy enough as it is. I'm sorry. I'll just go."

"Good luck with your cases, Naomasa."


Toshinori didn't look his friend in the eyes as he left the office in a hurry.

He left the station quickly and ducked into an alleyway to buff up before sprinting back to his apartment as fast as One for All would let him. Venting to the man had helped a bit, but he couldn't just burden his friends with this.

He was the Symbol of Peace, protector of the innocent, the number 1 hero in all of Japan. He could handle this. Even if he knew that the memory of his fight with All for One would haunt his dreams and nightmares for many years to come.

And the memory of All for One making a small, green-haired hostage explode before his very eyes would be the star of the show.