I just had this in my docs, almost finished. I might drop this fic, but if somehow, someway, if I get the motivation again I'd prolly pick this up again. But currently, I'm working on the outline of my new story so I'm gonna be held up for a bit—so I grant you this cus it's been staring at me for a long time, threatening me to take my entrails from my rectum.
Inventory: Chapter 3
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—|The Acceptance of a Broken Squire|—
—[The Two Squires' Hidden Clashes]—
PART 1: Awakening
Izuku was floating.
Suspended in the air, the back of his head a centimeter from concrete. He felt like he was there, in that same spot, for billions of years. The time shifted from modern to futuristic, to apocalyptic, to the end. Buildings and the terrain reformed and changed as time passed. When the planet reached its last legs, its core fulminated from the intense heat. Debris as big as countries joined him in the art of floating, while the endless void of space was their backdrop. They spun around him—the remnants of his home—like he was the center of the universe. As the white sun protruded a singular massive stream of light on him.
As he experienced this hell, the building in front of him was still there, undamaged. So was the single piece of asphalt beneath him, his head still a centimeter away. He was in a bubble where time ceased to continue, locked in the moment before he hit the ground. The unreadable face of Bakugo was burned into the banners of his army—an army of his own thoughts, who were holding a long-endless siege against the pit of despair.
They were losing.
He was losing.
Bakugo was the despair, face twisting into a spiral of charcoal, making the point of singularity. The massive little mass of despair warped the flat space around them. It curved the sea of gravity all around into a narrow chasm, slowly sucking all his hopes and dreams in apathetic function, as a black hole wont to do. His legs and midriff unwillingly stretched like noodles as it slithered towards the celestial being.
It stopped.
Everything stopped.
Reverse.
The planet collected itself around him, the skies of red returned as mutated human beings flashed in and out of existence, the bright white buildings of the future rebuilt themselves, then degraded themselves to a more familiar architecture. He was back in his time in mere seconds, his mind's eye undergoing knowledge no man should peek their curious little eyes into.
Bakugo's face unraveled from its blackhole to that same indecipherable, weird expression.
Gravity.
He hit the ground.
"ARGAHHHHHHH!"
He felt his back shoot up. Blinding white. Blurriness. Everything a blur. His arms were noodles soaked in boiling water for far too long, flailing all around for . . . something. No. For someone to get away from him.
"— . . . —sedate— . . . —Bonchi— . . . —NOW!"
Voices. Muddled. Going in and out of his ears with conjunction to the throbbing hot pain at the back of his head. Izuku's eyes adjusted for only a moment, just to see a blue-haired woman wearing white clothes scramble for something, vanishing from his sight and returning with a syringe needle in her hand. His heart hammered against his ribs. What was she doing? What was in that needle? Was she going to inject poison into him?
Izuku struggled against something holding him back, fighting for freedom, away from the needle. It was futile.
"HELP! SOMEBODY! HELP! SHE'S GOING TO KI . . . iill . . . meeeee . . ." it was a cry for help, but no one came, as usual. The woman pierced his vein and spurred the poison into his system. Black crowded the rims of his eyes. He felt weak. Everything slowed down, and as he felt his body slump into something akin to a bed, he saw his mother standing at the threshold of an unknown door.
She looked hurt.
She was in pain.
. . . . . . .
Izuku opened his eyes—tearing his eyelids open from the sticky mucus holding them together with much, much effort.
White.
It was the first thing his green pupils perceived, other than that, he also saw a brown splotch to the left. His head was agonizingly throbbing—like someone was stabbing the back of his skull repeatedly with a white-hot blade. He wanted to reach up with a hand to cease the aggressor, but found his arm unmovable. That inability seemed to travel across his whole body—he couldn't even wiggle his toes.
So, he just stared up—or down, he didn't know—since that was the only thing he could do.
It was long after that he realized he was looking at an—
"Unfamiliar ceiling," Izuku said, subtly hoarse. "Whe—Where am . . . I? This isn't my room . . ."
It was hard to breathe. He had iron lungs that were battered flat, unable to pass even a molecule of air through its narrow leeway. Suddenly—as if some asshole deity from a JRPG conducted a combo-move only affecting one's psyche—events of the recent past lunged his mind, pulling cards with images of dark jaded green, a smiling face, fire, and one indecipherable face left and right in front of his eyes. His head pulsed even faster, and burned intensely with each pump. His once haggard breath turned to nothing at all—only the dolorous chokes for air replaced it. Izuku's eyes flicked all over in frantic panic.
Can't . . . breathe . . .
'BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!'
Something started to beep beside him—like an alarm. Izuku quickly remembered that his alarm clock didn't sound like that, as it's ringtone wasn't that of All Might repeatedly exclaiming 'THE MORNING IS HERE! THE MORNING IS HERE!'. He had to change his alarm clock to something more . . . normal (less painful), once he got out of here . . . where ever here is, at least. Oh, yeah, he was losing oxygen and his eyes were blackening over. That was just great.
Over the tedious beeping noises, Izuku heard what sounded like a door being flung open—he really couldn't tell, since his eardrums felt like it had been popped to impaired.
"—Bonchi, get the ventilator! He's losing the ability to breathe! NOW!" an elderly, demanding voice hollered. "Jesus Chirst, I've no clue why they greenlit you to be a nurse if you can't do something as simple as finding a VENTILATOR!"
"Y—Yes! S-s-sorry, sir! I—I'll find it right now!" said a meek, feminine voice.
"Don't apologize to me," the man groused, annoyed. "say that to the patient's mother once he dies of asphyxiation because of your idiocy—why in the hell are you still standing there!? MOVE!"
Izuku heard the fast foot-falls from the woman—Bonchi?—running out of the room.
"Hey," said a soft voice. The man fell in place of his vision, showing Izuku the intricacies of his wrinkles and grayness from old age. He was smiling in reassurance. "it's gonna be okay, just calm down and try to slow your heartbeat—you're safe here with me."
The man seemed sincere, but to Izuku that was a red flag. No one ever tried to reassure him, even his own mother—whoever did try to, they always revealed their true intentions in the form of aggression sooner rather than later. So it was rather justified that his heartbeat started to increase in intensity after the man had said that.
"Hey, hey, it's going to be okay," the man said after lifting his head to look at something out of his peripheral, softening his voice to a whisper, "I'm Dr. Zuko. You're in Musutafu Central Hospital. And have been for a few days now. Not some asylum, so calm down for me, will you?"
He was in the hospital? Why . . . ?
Izuku remembered that weird dream he had of himself falling from a building. And waking up after the fact, screaming in horror, his vision flickering from black and white, the blue-haired woman in what looked to be nurse garbs, and . . . the pained look on his mother's face.
That was . . . real? Izuku thought, his memory becoming clear as his heartbeat started to steady its blood pumps. I . . . Bakugo . . . he really pushed me off a building, then? That's . . .
Izuku really couldn't wrap his head around that. Even after all this time. Even after everything that Bakugo did to him, the burns, the kicks, the punches, the insults, the . . . threats to do what he had just done. It was, honestly, unbelievable. He always had this belief that Bakugo wouldn't really just kill him, because deep down, in some painful opposition to the external actions of the boy, Izuku believed that Bakugo was a kind hearted person beneath all the rage. He was wrong. On so many levels, he was so wrong.
Bakugo was a Villain, not the hero everyone had said he was, but a bonafide fucking Villain.
His heart started to beat even faster than ever, this time it wasn't due to fear or panic.
Bakugo, Izuku thought, his lips pursing into a sneer, I'm gonna end your chances of becoming a hero! I'm gonna end you!
Revenge opens one's path, but it might not be the path one expects.
. . . . . . .
It had been four hours since he awoke in this hospital.
And they didn't believe him.
He told them the truth, the genuine truth as to what inspired him to commit 'suicide', told them that it wasn't his doing, but Katsuki Bakugo's evil actions.
They didn't believe him.
"—Look, Midoriya, this time I want to know the truth, okay?" the police officer said from the chair placed at the end of his hospital bed. He had a small notebook in one hand, while his other was in possession of a pencil. He tapped the tip of it against the paperback's upper rim. Impatient. "What really happened? I want to know why you attempted, so I can send the information to the PMHNs division and let them offer you a Psychiatrist to better your treatment."
"I told you," Izuku said, almost a whisper. He had said this exact phrase over a dozen times now, but they still didn't believe him. "I didn't do it on purpose, I was blown off of the building by Katsuki Bakugo! My classmate!"
The officer sighed, tapping his pencil harder against the paperback in frustration.
"There's no point in lying, Midoriya," he said, tone slow and firm. "Why do you need to pin this on another boy's innocent name? Witnesses at the time of your fall said they saw no one else on the rooftop—even one of them inspected the roof for proof of crime, but when they arrived, all they saw was nothing but a small depression in the gravel with dried up blood soaking it. Forensics reported that it was yours, and no one else's—that part of the investigation solidified when we saw your injured hands. If you're embarrassed about it, just say so."
"No, I keep telling you, it's not my fault, it's Katsu—"
"Enough of this!" the man barked. "I'll just tell them you're mentally stressed, because you are. You've hit your head hard, boy, so you can't tell the differences between reality and illusions. That boy, Katsuki Bakugo, already has an alibi that's been proven right by the school's administration staff."
Izuku couldn't utter a word. He was shocked.
I was . . . too late . . .
The man must've noticed his shock, as he confirmed Izuku's inner question.
"Yes, we've already interviewed your school's student body, because bullying is the most common factor for attempts—they all said you were always unperturbed, that no one bothered you. That only leaves home situations, so tell me, is that the reason?"
He wanted to say no to that, but his mouth didn't have the same feeling. He said nothing. His eyes went blank. The outside was blue, vivid with life. Birds flew past the large window of his room, tweeting and chirping happily. The sun was out and about, gleaming its light onto the city. Flowers gathered it, photosynthesizing. Clouds . . . the most beautiful that they've ever been, streamed all over the skylines.
Ironic.
That's the word he found that accurately described the outside world.
The world was alive with life, and he was empty of it.
As he looked out the window—the officer had left a long while ago—Izuku's thoughts took a dark turn.
If no one believed him . . .
. . . why did he survive the fall at all?
PART 2: Breakdowns & Acceptances
"Hey, brat," his mother said as soon as he set foot in his doorway.
Katsuki looked up lazily. He was exhausted. He just wanted to sleep. For a week. Maybe a good's night's rest will get rid of his flinches.
Katsuki didn't know what to do. Under the stairwell at school, he had come to the horrific realization that he was afraid of his own explosions. His own Quirk. Whenever he set off even a single krack, he'd flinch, his eyes completely shutting to darkness for a full second—a second too much if he was to be a hero. He had to get rid of this . . . phenomenon quickly, before the Entrance exams. He'd embarrass himself if he placed fifth or fourth in the barracks because he was flinching from his own Quirk. He had to be first. It was his rightful place. Above the extras.
Mitsuki stood leaning her shoulder against the edge of the entrance hall's wall, a grim expression on her fair face. She looked to be in contemplation. Contradictions clashing in her mind, fighting for the right words.
Katsuki growled in annoyance.
The hag . . . he thought. He shot past her, turning towards the stairs for his room.
"I'm tired, hag, I'm sleep—"
"Izuku's awake."
He froze.
Katsuki's eyes widened. His heart went haywire. Whipping his head to the hag, he looked for any signs that Deku had told them, told her. She would be the worst person to know. If she did. He . . . he couldn't look at her without feeling ashamed. He didn't want to see the disappointment in the eyes of the only person he unconditionally loved—it . . . it'd break him.
Mitsuki weakly smiled at him.
That gave him great relief. He relaxed, his shoulders slumping.
"Let's go visit him. I bet he'd be happy to see his best friend!"
He shouldn't have gotten comfortable.
"So, what are you," low, quiet, whisper, dejected—none of those meanings could be used for Izuku's voice. If a man with bat-like ears were in the adjacent room, even they couldn't place the emotions in his voice. It was not sad, nor happy. Just . . . weird. Eerie, even. "a Therapist?"
A bespectacled man with a white coat sat at his desk, papers scattered all about in a frenzy, frames of his family that Izuku gave no wits about, and a goddamn bottle of rum. That gave Izuku a spin when he walked into his office nearly ten minutes ago, only to realize its purpose for being there at all once he saw the one who occupied such a cramped, dirty room—the man was in a midlife crisis . . . well, by his understanding, at least.
The man did look like shit. Hair in a craze and soaked in sebum, while snowflakes of dandruff covered the crossways of his hairless skin in between the miniscule distances of his—almost balding—threads of dark-blue locks. Face pale, teeth stained yellow by the result of an obscene amount of coffee-mixed-with-rum intake—the latter conspicuously placed for display at his side, not even bothering to hide his unprofessionalism. It was hard to believe the man was even twenty-eight.
Well, again, all of that was based on his brief observation of the state of the man—maybe he was just sick. Izuku wouldn't believe it, either way.
"No," the guy said, if Izuku could believe his ears and eyes, he definitely picked up the slobbered drawl of his vocals. He wasn't sober, that's for sure. Not dunked in alcohol, either. "a Psychiatrist."
"Basically the same thing," Izuku said, again, with no emotion.
"Yeaaaaah," the Psychiatrist/Therapist seemed to agree. ". . . what differentiates us, however, is that I actually diagnose the patient's mental illness and don't talk and reassure them with sweet, little meaningless words and speeches. We do this for that phat yearly salary, anyways. That's the only thing we have in common—" the man reached for the rum, popped the cork, and poured it into his coffee. He pointed the cup to Izuku. With boredom, and not caring for his reputation as a professional, he proudly declared: "Hurray to all mentally troubled people! For giving us Psychology Majors a way to live in luxury!" He took a sip. "Worst decision of my life."
"You're pretty blunt," Izuku said. "how'd they let a guy like you to ministrate an individual's mental stability, while also being mentally unstable yourself? Alcoholism is an addiction fueled by past psychological trauma."
"You're pretty smart, for a brat," the man growled, "and an asshole. A little wit in your mind, you have. And using it to its maximum potential. Maybe you should take over here, huh? Since you just know everything about me and my addiction. You already have the honest, apathetic tone in which to give patients their diagnosis down to a T."
Oddly, the man sounded sincere.
"Nah," Izuku said, and after a while of silence, he asked another question, "aren't Psychologists supposed to do the diagnosis and the Psychiatrists to do the medical assessments after?"
The man looked at him. His gaze showed slight irritation by Izuku's question. He sighed.
"Yeah, yeah," he replied with another sip. "but I can do what they do just as easily—I just need your medical history and ask you a couple questions, simple, done and done. And comes my part of granting you the most effective treatment. I've already read your file, and a single thing explains all of why you attempted the 'S'," sip, "You're Quirkless."
"Am I gonna be the first person to be diagnosed with the same thing two times?" Izuku said, indifferent. "That's peachy."
"No, you're not," the man placed his cup down and looked at him for a while. He rolled his eyes, for some reason. "I know what you're thinking. I'm not pointing out your Quirklessness just to point, I'm saying that it's a factor of why you did what you did. Not that it's the sole reason why. I'm not like those Quirkist monsters."
Silence.
Izuku didn't care—even if it was the first time someone had said that.
"You know how many patients I've worked with who were Quirkless?" the man said, in a somewhat serious tone. Izuku didn't answer. He continued, "too many to count. This is an easy case, since I've been through this before—you have AVPD."
". . . what's that?"
"I thought you were smart," the man smirked. But it quickly faded. "'Avoidant Personality Disorder', it's called. Tell me—" he leaned forward, grim, "do you feel like you don't belong? Do you feel inadequate in this one time life that you've been blessed with? Do you feel hopeless in yourself as a human being?"
Izuku . . . felt caught. Like a fish biting a hook. These past few days here in this hospital, he felt nothing, but felt everything, if that were even possible. Every emotion that a human can produce surged through him like a tide wave—anger, sadness, disgust, calmness, envy, stress, shame, contentment, fear, disappointment, apathy, everything—rose and descended, all taking turns to show themselves one way or another. It was unbearable.
Today, apathy took its turn, and now, after the words of the man, sadness took its place with a slash of a sword. It fermented in him for the next five minutes as they didn't utter a word. That sadness became depression on a dime.
His bottom lip quivered, sockets became moist, arms trembled, the throb behind his head burned.
"N—no . . . I d—don't feel t—that way . . ." the words came out on their own. Disagreement was an emotion of its own, and he felt it creep its way to stand beside the depression.
". . . Midoriya . . . there's no need to lie to me . . ." he said softly. Izuku wanted to point out the man's contradiction in using 'reassurance'. He couldn't, though, his throat felt lodged with something . . . something horrible.
"I—I'm n-n—not . . ."
The man sighed.
It wasn't that of irritation, but of empathy.
". . . there are numerous roots for AVPD, one of them is bullying," he started. "I gathered that when I overheard you talking to the officer a few days back."
Izuku curled in on himself.
I—I want to go . . . Izuku thought.
"I believe you, y'know?" Izuku shook his head. He wanted to leave. He didn't want to hear that after . . . after . . . "Why would someone lie about being pushed off a building? And with so much confidence? That injury you got, Linear Skull Fracture, isn't something that makes you forget. And I'm so fucking sorry, Midoriya, truly. That they didn't believe you. It's wrong, and on so many levels."
Tears soaked his gown's chest area.
". . . This world . . . it's filled with so much unnecessary hatred for the Quirkless," the man said, looking to the ceiling, mouth a frown. "At first, I hated them too. I'm not proud of it, not one fucking bit. But after getting into this line of work, I've noticed how monstrous this world can be. You guys are human beings, not rabid dogs to be hunted."
When Izuku looked up, his eyes widened.
The man was . . . was crying.
"My son . . . was just seven years old when he got murdered," Izuku looked at the picture frames on his desk. He gave a wit about it this time. A boy, happily sitting on the shoulders of the man. ". . . my wife was walking down the bad neighborhood with him—when all of a sudden, the residents attacked him for no reason at all. Apparently, they mistook him for a Quirkless kid that lived in one of the Gutter's shelters, said they looked identical. My wife made it out alive, fortunately. Unfortunately, she witnessed my boy getting h—hanged . . ."
Izuku didn't say anything. How could he?
"We pressed charges, but the police said it was just a 'gang-ruffle', and didn't matter . . ." the man's frown turned into subdued anger. "They killed my boy! My child! An innocent boy! A wonderful . . . little boy . . ."
He slammed a hand down on the desk, fluttering the papers.
Silence.
"His name was Ishi Yamoto," he said after a while. "but they called him 'waste' in the articles! He wasn't a waste! He was an angel!"
". . ."
A long pause permeated the air, almost fifteen minutes of just the man's little sobs of unimaginable loss. Wiping his eyes, he looked Izuku in the eyes.
"It's okay to feel inadequate, Midoriya . . ." he got up and kneeled in front of him. A warm smile. Izuku wanted to leave . . . because he knew what he would feel if the man started to speak. He couldn't. Locked in place.
Maybe . . . maybe he didn't want to leave . . . maybe he needed to hear . . . something that would . . .
". . . it's because you're human. You shouldn't look at your Quirklessness as a curse, but a blessing that you didn't become like those monsters. I̶ ̸w̵i̶s̵h̵ ̵I̸ ̸c̷o̴u̶l̶d̷ ̴s̵a̸y̸ ̷t̷h̷a̴t̵ ̸t̵o̵ ̶t̴w̴e̷n̶t̴y̶-̸p̷e̸r̷c̸e̴n̴t̷ ̸o̶f̴ ̷t̵h̷e̵ ̶p̵o̵p̴u̵l̷a̴c̶e̸—̶b̸u̸t̷ ̷a̵s̸ ̸o̸f̴ ̸n̷o̵w̴,̸ ̵y̸o̴u̶'̵r̷e̵ ̸t̸h̸e̶ ̷o̷n̷e̷ ̷p̴e̷r̸s̴o̸n̴ ̷w̶h̷o̸ ̵n̴e̵e̷d̵s̵ ̵i̷t̶ ̷t̴h̷e̵ ̸m̴o̴s̷t̷.̶"
Izuku didn't hear anything after the word 'monsters', as his ears were bombarded with the throbbing pulse of his head. That lodge in his throat dashed out of his mouth, in a sob.
A sob of pain.
He didn't feel what the man had expected him to feel.
He felt the opposite.
The worst emotion was acceptance, it may either be for the right reason or the bad.
Izuku Midoriya accepted himself . . . to be inadequate and inferior to even dogs . . . he wasn't meant to be here . . .
. . . but here he was anyway . . .
. . . suffering . . .
He's never been scared of a door—a door—before now.
Katsuki had first relented going, but her punches were harder than even All Might's wind pressure. So, in reluctant resignation, he let himself be dragged by the ear over to the hospital.
I don't . . . Katsuki thought, thumbing his trousers, I don't . . . want to see him . . .
"I—I can't, hag!" he said. Spinning around, he started stomping his way down the hall towards the exit.
"Oh, no, you don't, young man!" Mitsuki grabbed his bicep, and pulled him back a step, stopping him in place. He glared over his shoulder, scowling. She scowled back. "I've never, never, seen both of my favorite boys hang out anymore! So you're going, no matter how many tantrums you throw! Stop being a lil' shit and open the damn door and say hi to Izuku! The poor boy is going through a lot right now! He needs his best friend!"
Katsuki's glare softened, eyes squinting shut for a moment. His scowl faded away. He lowered his face the moment it did, not wanting to show his mother . . . whatever expression it was showing on his face.
"M—Mom, I . . . I can't," he whispered, his voice cracking. This was fucking pitiable. ". . . do you understand!? I just . . . can't!"
From behind his lashes, Katsuki saw the surprised face of Mitsuki.
". . . Katsuki, are you okay?"
What a great question, because he himself doesn't even know the answer to it. Looking away, he feigned ignorance.
"Yeah, I'm great . . . amazing, actually . . ." he mumbled half-heartedly.
Pick up the fucking pace, Katsuki! he cursed to himself. He wanted to blow something up. Oh, yeah, I fucking FLINCH TO THAT SHIT NOW! What's next? I flinch at my own farts!? What . . . what the actual fuck is wrong with me!? Is someone playing me with their Quirk, or some shit!? Why the fuck do I feel so—!
"Yeah, right," Mitsuki scoffed. "I've changed your diapers, brat. I've seen your little man until you were old enough to piss on your own, and wiped your ass free of musky shit for eight years of my life." She leaned down, frowning. "Do you really think you can lie to me?"
He didn't have any counter to that.
Mitsuki's face softened.
"Sparks, tell me what's going on?" she said in that soothing voice—the one that he knew he couldn't lie to, even if he tried.
But this time . . . was different. This time, it wasn't stealing money from her purse or sneaking in a box of ice cream at three AM. Those were tiny things. The only punishment for those was getting grounded for a few days. If he told her the truth about his current problems, it won't be a slap on the wrist, but a pair of cuffs. He refused to open his mouth.
Mitsuki's hand that was on his bicep started to move up and down in a motherly show of reassurance.
"C'mon, you can tell me anything, y'know that, right?" she said, softly, "I'll try to help as best I can. So, y'know, spit—why don't you wanna see Izuku? Are you afraid he's not gonna remember you? You don't need to worry about that. The injury he got was mild. Actually, he didn't even get a concussion. It's a miracle that Inko and I are glad it happened. So don't worry, he didn't lose his memories of his best friend."
"Stop . . .!" he whispered, brows scrunching together in . . . disgust? "Please, m—mom, s-stop saying that word . . ."
He felt weird whenever she said it. His stomach would knot in seconds. Bile would crawl up his throat, ready to be spewed all over the floor.
"What word?" she asked.
". . ."
"Katsuki, you're actually starting to freak me out here," Mitsuki said, worriedly. "Why are you being so . . . not you? I knew you'd put up a fight . . . but not this kind."
"W—What k-k-kind . . .?" he stuttered.
Why . . . fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! What's happening to me!?
"The kind where you're timorous. Anxious. Scared," Mitsuki listed off while looking at him with pursed lips. Behind her misty-red eyes, a battle between words raged. She was hosting a duel, seeking for the champion and to give it a speech, "almost cowardly."
His eyes widened.
". . . cowardly . . .?" he mumbled. His mouth twisted into a nasty snarl, pointing it towards Mitsuki. "Who the fuck are you calling a coward, hag!?"
He shrugged her hand off his shoulder harshly. He wobbled in place, clenching his hands into tense fists. He glared at her. She returned it with the same intensity.
"Watch it, brat!" she seethed, her luscious brow twitching, "who told you to talk to your mother that—"
"Coward!? Coward!? Me!? I'll show you 'cowardice'!" He yelled, straightening his shoulders and shoving past her. Momentarily, he faltered as he returned in front of the door. Two decipherable emotions came forth: guilt and terror.
He finally understood what he has been feeling for the past few days since the incident. It came to him, rushing and dashing, then slicing his heart open to force their way inside. They made themselves at home in his always-raging heart. It was unbearable to experience these unknown things deep within him for the first time since he was a child. His mind had already dismissed these feelings as useless when his Quirk first manifested.
As his body froze in front of that damnable door, his breath hitched.
Oh . . . he thought, the world turning into a tunnel, this is regret. This is what . . . regret feels like . . .
He read in English the following definition of "regret" once: a feeling of sadness, repentance, or disappointment over something that has happened or been done. He understood it not, what was there to regret? He asked the universe, but now thinking back, he was asking himself that question. A lot. A lot to regret.
He regretted slapping Izuku's hand away that time when he was in shallow water. He regretted punching him for the first time. He regretted using his Quirk on his thin, skinny, and weak body. He regretted laughing at him. Most importantly, though, he regretted that he let every praise that was thrown at him get to his head.
The praise inflated his ego like a hot-air balloon. He thought he was better than anyone, better than Izuku. He was not. Not at all. Izuku's ego was wrinkled by the cold harsh words of the world's people—but his heart? That thing that's keeping him on his feet? It was humongous. It was filled with a kindness that he had never once seen. It wouldn't be a stretch to say that it was bigger and fatter than All Might's. It pissed him off, not for the fact he couldn't do shit with his Quirkless body, but it was the fact that Izuku was equal to All Might in mentality; in kindness.
Because he was not.
Katsuki wasn't kind, wasn't gentle like Izuku—he was harsh, mean, and violent.
It angered him. He was angry that he didn't have what Izuku had. It was unfair.
Maybe that's why he saw him as a rival. Not in terms of physical or genetic strength, but in ponds of mindsets formed near each other, though not at the same water level. His was shallow and polluted with corruption, while Izuku's was deep and full of life.
Even so . . . even so . . . even so . . .!
Why did the world give so much humility to someone as useless as a snail? Why not give it to someone like him, who can do all the things he wanted with a mere wave of his hand; like the king he was? Someone with a powerful Quirk? Why? Why Izuku!? And not him!?
Because you're more useless than him. All you can do is destroy. That's what you're good for. You can destroy the fundamental structures of worldly things like floors, walls, and ceilings with a singular drop of sweat . . . but you're useless in that regard, too, huh? What, with you flinching at every crackle of your explosions.
You're fucking hilarious.
The tunnel became thinner and thinner until it became only a speckle of white. Every bad thing he'd done played at the corners of the black-barriers that stretched towards the tiny dot. A wall of snickers and explosions slid from the back of his peripheral to the front. He flinched every time his Quirk's sound was played—it was playing so much that he had to squeeze his eyes shut and bite down on his molars, creating a buzz in his ears by the force, rippling the sounds away from him.
He still wasn't breathing, he noticed. He was self-aware of it, and it made his stomach turn into a mangle-knot of his innards. Anxiety was its core, and he was suffocating, literally. He needed to breathe.
No, no, no, no—he needed to get the fuck out of this hospital. His mind was ablazed with nausea, caused by the lack of oxygen. No, it wasn't caused by the lack of air. Instead, it was the substantial revelations waving amongst the nausea. The revelations showed that he was not better than anyone, not even better than a worm . . . he was simply . . .
. . . nothing.
'SLAM!'
In a lash, the tunnel wisped away to reveal that the door had been opened.
"C'mon, ya little shit," he heard the voice of his mother, laced with anger still, "I want to see him, too."
What? See who?
She pushed him past the door, making him able to breathe again.
He lost it the second he saw him.
A gauze wrapped around his head tightly secured his green-locks from the world. Only the occasional rebellious locks poked out from the spaces between the bandages. He was looking out the window, gazing a gazeless stare at the red-orange clouds behind the window. At the back, Katsuki saw a splotch of red, dried within the white fabric.
"Hey!" Mitsuki greeted cheerfully.
His head turned, green met red. Izuku's face was indifferent and downtrodden. After a second that didn't feel like a mere tick of the clock, it turned horrific. Like he'd seen a monster. An evil deity so disgusting, so vile, so repulsive that it short-circuited his mind for a brief moment, until the terror reached his face. His mouth slightly opened, lips quivering, spittle spurred out. His eyes pulsed, so did his entire body.
He screamed.
His body lurched back, completely dropping off his bed and onto the ground. Katsuki heard skin slapping the ground as Izuku crawled towards the overbed table at the foot of the bed. The table held food that looked withered, cold, and clearly un-eaten. His right arm reached up, the IV now snaked around his forearm, to the knife that was beside the plate of food. He clutched it in his hand, pointing the tip right to him as he crawled back to the wall, pressing his back to it.
"G-G-G-GET T—THE F-F-F-F-FUCK AWAY FROM ME!" Katsuki stood there, unmoving. What he was seeing now—the horrible state of his former best friend—was not the same as before. The kindness in his eyes had been usurped by sadness and anger, directed not at the world, but only at him. Izuku's eyes shot a phantom lance to his ego, cracking it. Katsuki's endless pit of disdain toward the boy had been tearing itself at a snail's pace for a while. But, when he saw Izuku's hand shaking, the dull blade's loose handle clinking, that slow pace turned to a jog, then a sprint.
It was all his fault.
"I—I S-S-SAID GET O-O-OUT, Y-Y-Y-Y-YOU MONSTER!" it cracked further, "O-O-OUT! S-S-S-SOMEBODY, H-H-H-HELP!" further, "G-G-GET O-O-OUT! Y-Y-Y-YOU F-F-FUCKING . . . F—FUCKING . . . FUCKING VILLAIN!"
It shattered.
His surroundings were a blur as he bolted out the door and ran down the corridor. The blur turned black and blinded him. He felt his fingers dig into his scalp, but also not at the same time. He felt exiled from reality, kicked out into the desolate place known as dissociation; the world was so close, but as far as the space between Earth and Sun.
"It's not my fault."
Those echoed words were wrong. They were filled with irony and a massive layer of contradictions. But he said it anyway. . .
. . . as if it could save him from the guilt, as if those words could come true if chanted persistently . . .
. . . it would not, and he knew it—
"—It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault—"
—he still blabbered on anyway; because if he did not, his sanity would leave him.
"—It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault, It's not my fault—"
". . . Katsuki . . .?"
He looked up, the face of the one person he could rely on appearing; his salvation, or so he wishes . . .
"M—Mom . . . It's not my fault . . . you have to believe me . . . please . . .!"
. . .
. . .
. . .
". . . Of course I believe you, c'mere . . ."
The only warmth that he loved was the ones his Quirk produced, but the other was the warmth of his mother's embrace.
To be continued . . . . . . . . . . prolly, idfk :3
