Izuku Midoriya did not have pleasant memories of his mother. All of the happiness from his early childhood was soon overridden by his quirklessness and the consequences thereof. While, yes, Inko Midoriya was an extremely caring and doting woman with a heart of gold, she wasn't strong enough for her child. The quirkless diagnosis was one of the worst things to happen to her, due to the chain reaction it set off. Her husband was furious when he found out, and ended up leaving in the heat of the moment. The bills went up when her landlord found out, charging her extra for letting a null live in their building, and worst of all, her friends had pitied her. Her friends had been so backhanded, claiming that Izuku would never survive out in the real world, and telling her they were sorry she got stuck with him, as he would never amount to anything.

Inko Midoriya loved her son, yes, but not for long. The burdens of his quirklessness had quickly broken into her mindset, resent trickling in with each passing day.

And for young Izuku, his memories were filled with tears and burns and bandages.

He was young when declared quirkless, of course, so he wasn't old enough to remember his family when it was whole. All he knew was his mother with her teary eyes and condescending words. All he knew was hurt and pain and loneliness, because he hadn't even started grade school when his life got flipped upside down. All he had now were the heroes in the screen of his computer and his notebooks to go along with it. He had his favorite All Might video bookmarked, the video that he had probably watched a hundred times over by now.

But, one day, he asked his mother a question. A question he desperately wanted - needed - an answer to, because all of the kids at school had told him otherwise. He needed his mom to support him, to tell him she loves him and that she's there for him. He needed to be told that he wasn't completely useless because he lacked a quirk, that he could follow his dreams and save people like he's always wanted to do.

"Mommy, can I still be a hero?"

His voice had wavered and his eyes had teared up, anxiety pooling in his gut as he watched his mom in the doorway. She had her hand clasped over her mouth as she ran over to him, hugging him tightly and shaking with sobs. He hadn't been crying, his eyes wide and unseeing as he heard his mother sob into his ear.

"I'm so sorry, Izuku!"

And Izuku Midoriya knew he was unlucky, he knew it very well. The past few years have made it obvious, how could he not? He knew not to trust, to find salvation in heroes and his notebooks that were hidden away in his room. He knew where to hide at school to avoid being a target, knew to keep his head down and not answer the teacher or raise his hand. He was only 7, but he knew all of this. He was only 7, but this was how he had to survive in a superpowered world with overpowered children and neglectful adults.

He's only 7, but he can tell his mom is getting tired.

He thinks she was tired only a few months after his diagnosis, but he knows she's tired now. She seems worn thin and he never sees her anymore. There are bags under her droopy eyes and she never smiles, her cheeks sunken in slightly and movements robotic. He can hear her sobs behind closed doors and see her eyes when he walks into his home with new burns or scraped knees. It's a look of pity, of dread, he would be able to recognize it anywhere. Because he knows that everything is much more expensive now, now that he's known to be quirkless. His mother had made sure that he knew.

"Izuku, I can't keep doing this," she had said when bandaging a cut on his knee one day, "I know the quirkless are weak, but you need to try harder. I can't afford to keep up with this. They've started adding extra charges, you know. They've added extra charges and upped our rent because of your condition, Izuku."

Her voice had been soft yet stern at the same time, and Izuku would never forget those conversations. His mother would always claim he was 'too expensive' and she 'can't do it anymore'. It would fill him to the brim with fear and anxiety as he awaited her harsh words, and the possibility of her walking out on him one day. He had heard her talk about it in passing with her friends, claiming it was so hard being the mother of a quirkless - of a null. His teachers would talk about a hypothetical quirkless kid, how they would leave them or kill them, how they can't imagine having a child that would never amount to anything.

His mother keeps getting harsher with the bandaging, despite how much more he needs her gentleness. She would tell him to be more careful, but the kids at school had gotten harsher as years went by and their quirks developed, and Izuku highly doubted they would care about his mother's wishes.

He learnt how to bandage himself later that year, too scared to ask his mother in fear of another lecture about being careful. He could still see her exhaustion when she saw his clothes with holes in them or a burn mark on his cheek. She would never ask where they came from, never had, actually. If she didn't know, she didn't have to confront the troubles he would face in the world and burden her further. So long as Izuku never asked her to bandage him, she would ignore it, and remain purposefully ignorant.

And now, Inko believes herself to be a good mom. So she will steadily ignore the guilt chipping away at her mind when she can't find it in herself to care that Izuku is being hurt, only dread at having to go to the store and buy more first aid supplies. She believes herself to be a good mom, because she loves her son, truly, she does, but he's so tiring. It's so tiring tending to those who are weaker than herself, unable to fend for themselves.

(She ignores her job as a nurse when that particular point is brought up. She ignores how it's her job to care for those injured severely and sickly, unlike herself.)

Izuku discovered his salvation at age 8.

Analysis.

He had been doing something somewhat similar, yes, but never purposefully. He had read that many heroes need to analyze their opponents and surroundings to correctly deduce how much power they can safely use. Once he knows that they're doing this - analyzing - he can spot it from a mile away. He can tell when they're analyzing their opponent, looking for weak spots and backlash. He's started to do it, too. He starts seeing where the villains leave openings or make a mistake. When he realizes this, he upgrades his notebooks.

He writes down what he can find on the heroes, seeing their fighting styles and what fights they're suited against. It's sloppy and inaccurate, but he has nobody to tell him so. He only has himself, his books, and the internet. Most of it is him gushing about how cool the heroes are, but it gets better with time as he learns to be more neutral.

So, his analysis books venture from fanboying to gushing about quirks to an unrefined analysis. He starts with the quirks first, of course. He can't help his fascination with them, the supernatural powers that seemingly just...appeared out of nowhere. He can't help finding the fact that someone can stretch their bones interesting, or the fact that Bakugo sweats nitroglycerin and can create explosions absolutely mind-boggling. Even the less flashy or extravagant quirks worm a way into his heart, from changing someones hair color to mental quirks of all kinds, he loves them all.

But, analysis stayed with him, even as his determination wilted from peer pressure. His classmates had beaten the mindset that he couldn't be a hero into him, even though logically he knew he could. He could be a hero with just determination alone, even if he did need some support items. He thinks he can't be a hero, but he still analyzes.

He still analyzes because it helps in his day to day life. He learns how to analyze emotions and figure out a person's triggers. Though some of it was figured out through trial and error, and not just his analysis, he thinks the point still stands. He knows how to angle his body to discreetly protect his ribs and head when getting beat up, he knows how much pressure to put on his feet and where to put it when he walks so he stays silent, he knows how to breathe silently so as to not give away his hiding spot.

He's learnt Bakugo's tells, the way he angles his body and shifts his stance when he wants to punch with his right hand, or the way he puts all of his weight on his back foot when he kicks. He's learnt how to lessen the beatings, playing the broken toy so they go easier, because he's learnt it's not fun to kick someone who's already down. He's learnt the way his fingers twitch when he's going to use his quirk and observed the way his sweat glistens and layers thickly on his palms.

Soon, Izuku Midoriya has a complete book of analysis on his classmates. He's written down their height and how they start fights as well as their temperament. He writes anything and everything he can think of, to what brand of shoe they wear to their after school activities, it's all there. He finds use in all of the things he writes down and observes, storing away the information for later.

Izuku soon learns to leave these books at home after they are destroyed one too many times. His classmates find it creepy, and he thinks he would, too, but he needs them. He needs to remember the smallest tidbits of information and double check, because he's gotten people mixed up from time to time and that just makes beatings worse. But, when kids find something creepy or abnormal, they go to the greatest lengths to eliminate it. So, they make it a game, applying their quirks in arguably creative ways to destroy the books and beat him down all the while.

He stores the books under his mattress, where he knows nobody will find them. His mother doesn't go through his room anymore, wanting almost nothing to do with him, and he doesn't have friends to bring over. He thinks his analysis books are safe under his mattress, and he's fairly confident in it.

And as the years go by, his mother keeps getting more distant. He doesn't have a loving memory of her at 9 years old, for the memories are old and have been outweighed by the bad. He cannot remember the days they went out for dinner on those few special occasions as a family, because all he remembers is his mother's cold glance. He doesn't remember playing heroes with his mother and father because he doesn't see her anymore, only the lock on her door. He doesn't pack lunch for school, but neither does his mother. He desperately hopes that she's just forgetful, but he knows better. He knows better than to hope, especially with such desperation he does, and he knows better than to hope that his mother has simply forgotten.

The house is empty most of the time, his mother working longer hours, and Izuku finds the silence of it suffocating. The kitchen tiles are white and pristine, shiny and cold because nobody has been in the kitchen for at least a few hours. There are no pictures on the walls or drawings on the fridge, the house unnaturally tidy for a place a kid lives in. There are no toys in the house, no more All Might or Endeavor action figures. He doesn't have anyone to play with, anyways. The couch is neat and the cushions are lined up with a folded blanket on top, the remote for the television on the side table next to the couch.

The atmosphere is so, so cold and unfriendly, and Izuku wishes he had friends to invite over, to get rid of the sadness that seems trapped in the walls of the house. He wishes he had the power to change it, to put pictures that don't exist on the walls and fill the living room with his and his mothers laughter instead of this deafening silence.

His mother hasn't been coming home as often as he gets older. He can't tell if it's so she doesn't have to be around him or to make up for the extra expenses. Either is plausible, and he understands both. He wouldn't want to be around him, either, he thinks.

He doesn't want to be around himself, but he doesn't want to be left alone in the house that is far too cold for a nine year old boy. He looks out of his window to see kids playing in the street and wants nothing more than to run out and join them.

He sits at his dining room table all alone, watching the door and wanting his mother to come home tonight. The house is once again cold and he doesn't know how to turn up the heat, doesn't know if it would even help. Because the coldness of the Midoriya household is more mental than physical, the coldness one would get from a murder scene or even moving out of an ex-lover's house.

Izuku Midoriya knows he's not God's favorite, but he wants one thing - one thing that is so far out of reach when it shouldn't be that it's laughable - and that is for his mother to love him. He knows he's unlucky, but he craves for a mothers comforting touch that all the other kids have, he wants his mother to hug him and tell him he did good. And he knows he's unlucky, unlucky enough to be undeserving of all of that kindness, because if he deserved it he would have at least the smallest part of it. Right? Right?

But what he gets is an empty household. An empty household with blank walls and empty fridge, a household lacking in the warmth that makes it a home.