Voices echoing within the recesses of a spacious darkness, each of them as unintelligible as they are distant, are what slowly returns Izuku to a sense of consciousness. He strains himself to focus on hearing whatever it is that keeps channeling through one ear and out of his other. It's a cruel nickname from his childhood when kids would bully or tease him. Not Deku. "Toxic Chainsaw", a mock term of ridicule for his quirk that compares him to a villain with a similar powerset. He grimaces at the memory. Gradually, the voices morph into one. When he opens his eyes and light hits them, he realizes the dark setting hadn't been a room but one of his own accord.
"Wakey, wakey … Toxic Chainsaw", Shigaraki sits across from him with a snide smirk. He jumps forward with an intent to carve the villain in half. Izuku winds up thrashing in restraints instead; he tilts his head down to see that he's confined to a chair. When he looks back up, the setting of a tidy bar with the warping villain behind it polishing a shot glass makes him reevaluate his situation. There's some movement behind him too, a girlish giggle making him try to turn and see who or what. "Look at me when I'm talking to you", Shigaraki snatches Izuku by the jaw with one finger raised to avoid activating his quirk. He forces the boy's gaze to hold on him and him alone as he hisses again, "Toxic Chainsaw…"
"Stop calling me that", Izuku growls back with just as much of a bitter bite to his tone. Ever defiant, he twists and jerks his head away from the villain's hand to escape Shigaraki's grip on him. The two glare at one another with vicious vigor. After a moment of seething in silence, Izuku dares to ask a question. Or rather, demand an answer. "Tell me why I'm here", he tries pulling his wrists apart behind his back but the ropes keeping them together dig deep into his skin when he does, "Why are you keeping me captive and not killing me?"
"Oh, believe me, I thought about just killing you already" Shigaraki's smile shifts into a sneer as he leans back in his own chair. He waves a hand around as he talks, "You tampered with my plans and killed my pet project", before using that same hand to catch a drink that the bartender slides him. "But even so… There's something different about you that made me reconsider", Shigaraki pauses to take a sip and then sets the glass down to lean forward. A rough poke to Izuku's chest makes the boy flinch back, "I've had a change of heart.."
"And what spurred that on?", Izuku raises a single eyebrow. The sinking feeling in his stomach that slowly starts to churn and rise back up into his chest tells him he doesn't want to know the answer, or that he may very well already know deep inside his heart, but he waits for a response anyways. Shigaraki takes another sip from his drink, this one much more drawn out. Izuku narrows his eyes, knowing that the prolonged period is being done on purpose. The movement behind him returns again and he finds himself again trying to look back to see what it's all about.
"For starters, somebody vouched for you.." Shigaraki waves a hand and whatever was staying out of Izuku's sight starts to step into it. Izuku's eyes follow the movement and widen from their narrowed state. A girl with her hair tied into messy blonde buns and a pointy toothed grin waves to him while working her away around his containment chair. "She shared with me some details about your past and I began to realize that you and I may be kindred spirits of a sort", Shigaraki keeps talking but the words don't fully register as Izuku stares at Himiko Toga's slightly aged but still familiar face.
"Somebody..", Izuku mutters under his breath what Shigaraki said. Saying aloud anything but Himiko's name is a testament to the boy's disbelief. And yet… "That's what you were doing at the forest camp", he remembers her presence and the memory of a finger bite distinctly. She became a villain and found him all these years later. He hangs his head, looking away. Part of him thinks it's some sort of trick. The other part of him knows better. This is the harsh reality of the situation. He raises his head back up to face it fully.
"Hiii Izukuuunn~", Himiko hops between Shigaraki and his captive to reunite with her old friend. It's not exactly the way that she imagined it to go though. His arms are bound so he can't hug her. Shigaraki is present so it's not like they can do anything too raunchy with the bondage either. The girl pouts a little. Especially when she sees Izuku pouting as well. She thought that he'd be happier to see her. She chalks it up as a matter of circumstance; he likely feels the same way as her about everything sullying the moment, she figures.
"I thought I told you to be quiet", Shigaraki squeezes the glass in his hand. It'd shatter from the applied pressure if not for disintegrating first due to his quirk. Instead of dusting his only remaining member to his party along with the cup, he uses his other hand to scratch at the annoying itch on his neck. Pardoning the disruption as Kurogiri had taught him to do, he waves for another drink to replace the one he lost.
"Oh, right!" Himiko bonks herself gently on the head, indicating that she forgot momentarily what her boss ordered of her. She mimes an invisible zipper across her mouth before plopping her rear on Izuku's lap and throwing away the key, "Pretend I'm not even here", but keeps talking despite that. Izuku squirms beneath her, uncomfortable and surprised, which makes the femme fatale surprisingly comfortable.
"Whatever", Shigaraki tsks. He does his best to ignore the girl nestling into Izuku and returns to addressing his prisoner, "The other point of the matter is that you're no longer a U.A student – you run errands like a lapdog for the HPSC instead – and you don't shy away from spilling blood because of that distinct little difference" The villain wets his chapped lips with the brim of his glass, half sipping alcohol and half talking into the cup, "That makes me believe there may be hope for you yet.."
"Hear that, Izukun?" Himiko nuzzles her head into the crook of Izuku's neck despite his reflexive recoil from the close proximity. "We could be on the same team together!", her voice is of a dreamy tone that drifts off. The way she closes her eyes while leaning against the boy makes Shigaraki believe the looney girl may actually be dozing to sleep. He hopes for her and his own sake that she does take a nap since he doesn't foresee himself tolerating another interruption in his conversation.
"I may not like my present employer but I don't think I'd get along too well with you either", Izuku shifts in his seat as he makes another attempt to get himself loose from his bindings. The struggle only makes Himiko lay on him more, adding weight to hold him down. If only he could reach the starter string on his chest, he thinks. But again, Himiko is hindering him by covering it up so that it'd be difficult to manage even if his arms weren't tied together.
"We have a lot of things to work through in our relationship", Shigaraki nods in agreement, "I still haven't entirely forgiven you for taking what's mine from me" The villain's red eyes thrum with the intensity of a heartbeat. "But that's why we'd keep things strictly professional in the beginning", he holds his shot glass up before downing the last of what's inside and slamming it down on the bar counter, "So.. Carefully reconsider letting that get in the way of a life or death decision."
Himiko starts toying with Izuku's hair, twirling one of his many green curls on a finger. He pulls his head away from her. "I think I'm gonna still have to pass", he flexes his wrists in an effort to snap his restraints but the effort goes to waste, "You got the wrong guy if you think I'm anything like Toxic Chainsaw" He tries again. And again. When Shigaraki stands up, he tries even harder. Himiko looks between them with a growing grin.
She swiftly turns herself around in Izuku's lap, craning her neck out to whisper in his ear. "I know what you're trying to do", she makes him suddenly cease struggling against his bonds when he feels something sharp slip in between his hands, "If you don't wanna be part of Shiggy's squad then I'll let you go" Himiko cuts the rope with her trusty boxcutter. Then she springs off of Izuku to give him some space.
Released, Izuku jumps up and pulls the starter string on his sternum. Shigaraki startles, surprised. Himiko hysterically laughs. Blood splatters across the recently mopped floor and spills along the polished bar counter, making Kurogiri's purple smog for a body fluctuate. Chainsaws protrude from Izuku as he undergoes his usual transformation. The buzzing of the ceiling fan is drowned out by the buzzing of his revving & rotating blades.
"I've been wanting to do this for quite a while!", Izuku swings a chainsaw down at Shigaraki. The villain ducks and throws himself sideways so that his chair gets chopped up instead of him. Splinters sprinkle along the floor and bounce off of Shigaraki as he slides some distance away.
"Kurogiri!", Shigaraki calls for his partner in crime to lend him support. A warpgate appears between he and Izuku to block the path of the next chainsaw swing. When Izuku passes through the portal and tumbles out onto a table, Shigaraki swivels to signal for Himiko to also aid him. "You too!", he shrieks with fury, "Kill him!"
"Let's not be so quick to backpedal on our decisions, Tomura" A new voice that envelopes the room completely enters the fray. It stills Shigaraki. It makes Himiko halt. Kurogiri pauses. Even Izuku freezes, his blood within as frozen as his body. "Perhaps our guest can still be swayed to our side", Izuku follows the disembodied voice to a wireless television set with its screen shut off, "Allow me to have a frank discussion with him and we shall see."
"Sensei..", Shigaraki falters but refrains from arguing or fighting further. He resigns himself and gestures for Kurogiri to open a new warpgate. Izuku tries to evade it but it swallows him up from underneath and he finds himself falling out from the floor into what seems like a dark pit of hell. Shigaraki stares into the abyss until the portal closes.
Izuku winds up separated from Shigaraki, Himiko, and Kurogiri. He's been relocated, he knows that much. It's just the where that he has a hard time figuring out. It's as dark as the place he thought he was when he had his eyes closed. He blinks them to test if that's the case now. Still lost in a black void, he swallows a lump in his throat. The place is eerie and quiet. It's not until his eyes start to adjust that he dares venture into it.
Izuku stops short. In front of him is a man hooked to machines. He appears on death's door. Or maybe the man is death himself. A marred visage of a face stares at Izuku despite having socketless eyes. When the man speaks, he recognizes the voice as the same chilling voice he heard a moment ago back in the bar. "You're quite the conundrum of a character, Izuku Midoriya" It hits the boy like a cold wave.
Izuku shivers and shakes but bites down on his fear to retort, "I could say the same about you."
The man chuckles, mildly amused. "Yes", he folds his hands over one another and Izuku can almost picture a persian cat on the guy's lap, "Perhaps."
"You're not gonna convince me to link up with you guys", Izuku works up the nerve to walk forward. He figures that while this villain is creepier than all the rest, the guy is hooked up to a bunch of machines and can't be too much trouble.
"And why not?", but then Izuku finds himself walking through a familiar forest instead of in a dark basement dwelling. He stops to see Bakugo and his posse when they were kids. "Ever since you were a child, all anyone ever compared you to was that of a villain" The bullies call him names like Toxic Chainsaw and Deku. It's a memory in real time somehow. "Even now, The Commission you work for uses you for dirty deeds like such", and then there's a jump in time and Izuku sees Makima along with Hawks covering up the Yakuza incident.
"What the hell is this.. ?", he looks around the strange shifting dreamscape as he tries to figure out what's real and what's not.
"Do you even know where your quirk originated from?", Izuku nearly trips over something by his foot. He looks down to see Pochita. When he looks back up, there's a mass collection of doors above him filling the sky. "Do you know what you're destined to become?", they open and down drops darkness. Izuku can't see anything but he can hear the brattle of a chainsaw.
That's it! Izuku uses his chainsaws to saw at his brain. The metal skull he has when he transforms screeches as it's grinded into and emits sparks. Blood spurts out and it recolors his world to how it should be. "The best way to avoid psychic attacks! Not too shabby, eh?!" He cackles a little at his own absurdity.
The villain opposing him hums, no longer amused.