Even though this story doesn't do as well as my other ones, I'm actually pretty surprised by how much support I've gotten for this story. Anyway, I really like it too, and that's reason enough to keep going at it. It seems even moreso on this site, so I'm happy to deliver ^^
Izuku forgot lots of things.
Memories of things before his watery, glass prison permeated through a thick fog. There were also things he felt he should know or do, but it was lost on him.
For instance: He knew, on some level, he could read. He should be able to. He saw the shapes and figures lined and configured in certain ways. He knew, at one point, they made sense to him - They conveyed something, put something in his mind, but now he couldn't make sense of the lines and curves.
" W-What does i-it matter…? "
Through the hazy fog of his mind rang the 'other' voice. A voice of contorted, electrified, shattered speech as if it were coming through a half-broken, century-old PA system that spoke to him through the fog.
Izuku couldn't tell what the 'other' voice - Which was a ravaged, broken part of Izuku - Wanted. He agreed with Izuku on a few things; Like becoming a savior, and breaking free. But many things they disagreed on. For example: They both realized there would be people out to get them, and the 'other' Izuku wanted to get rid of them and move on, but Izuku didn't.
"I want to know what it says." Izuku answered, and The Other let out a discordian buzz that sounded like a sigh. "It will help."
The behemoth Izuku was perched over a massive building, looking down on a massive ocean of neon lights and other, smaller buildings. The Other hummed internally. Izuku stood while still looking down.
Moving, at all, was such an odd thing. Izuku and The Other had to, on some subconscious level, agree to the movement. It wasn't as if Izuku went, ' Let's move our left leg ', and The Other said, ' Agreed. ' - And if they agreed, they would.
No, it was more like Izuku would attempt to move his leg, and The Other would either allow him, or assist him. It was like each of them was one half of one brain controlling a body - Where only one of them could make a half-effort, but both of them trying to do the same thing yielded much higher results. So Izuku's full intent resulted in a half effort, while their combined intent resulted in a fully unified force of movement.
" W-We should t-try getting closer, then… " The Other suggested. " If you th-think it will h-help. "
Izuku took his suggestion and looked around for somewhere to perch. Several hours passed since his escape, and now the sun was rising over some of the buildings that weren't being loomed over by others, which illuminated many of the possible spots.
Finally, he bent his legs and felt the thick cords of inhuman muscle flexing and coiling, before allowing him to launch forward, then stuck his arms and feet out to hit the side of the building - The shock of the impact subsided quickly and he didn't leave any marks on the building, and as gravity pulled on him, he spun about and ran downward on all fours, allowing him to safely land on the rooftop below.
Now that he was much closer, it was easier to make up the figures below. People… People who had clear, sharply defined faces. Their chins, cheeks, eyes and lips were clearly defined and all looked so different - A plethora of colors and shapes and sizes, nothing alike the murky, underwater images he had of people he supposed he had known before becoming… This.
He looked down at his hand and back to the people. He remembered the dispair he felt upon seeing his own reflexion in broken glass and compared that to everyone he saw below. No one looked quite like him, nobody had his grotesque, exposed brain, no one had a cheekless, eyelid-less face - Some had odd-looking eyes, strange appendages, or skin that wasn't the common pale pigment of everyone else, but none was the monster he was.
Izuku let out a disheartened whine, making his chest and throat rumble in a creaking, high-pitched garble.
" H-How do we t-tell… Who the villains are…? " The Other asked.
"Anyone who hurts someone else, I think… But I think being able to read would also help." He decided, looking up to another sign. Nothing really changed when he got closer, other than the details of the signs.
It was such an odd, mind-wretching condition. He recognised these symbols, he understood that at one point he could understand them - But couldn't explain why he couldn't now. Izuku was distraught, while The Other was pensive. " Y-You… Want to f-find answers? "
"... Any would do." Izuku replied with another sigh. His hunches relaxed slightly on his perch as he kept looking at the sign. But eventually, he just looked back down to the people walking around.
" I-If we found… The who i-imprisioned us… W-Who hurt those others… " The Other brought the image of the underground prison, their conjoined birthplace, to Izuku's mind. And he was right: Someone had to have created that place, brought all of them and trapped them within watery incubators.
"They would have answers." Izuku finished, which only made his muscles tense again. "But I don't want to go back to that place."
"Neither d-do I… But- Wait…"
Izuku's ears twitched as an odd rustle of wind passed him by. He raised his head and sniffed the air. The behemoth rose fully and turned around… Then had to look down.
The person standing before him was very small. Just slightly taller than his waist, but so thin-looking that they could probably hide behind his leg like a tree. Their skin looked to be a more uncommon brown, they were draped in white, and after a moment, he looked away from their red eyes to look at the tall, stalking rabbit ears potruding from their head.
Their ears twitched, and Izuku made his twitch in the same way.
"I was hoping to get the drop on you, good reflexes…" The person greeted. "Mind telling me what you're doing in on this rooftop? I hope you're not planning anything stupid in my city."
They were quick to step forward, leering while looking up at him without a hint of care and full of ferocity. Both halves of Izuku's mind looked down on this person-creature with curiosity. " A-Are we… Related? "
"No…" Izuku replied as he continued looking down, only following the person with his eyes while they turned their head at several angles and reiterated their question. "This person… Her ears are natural. Nothing about us is."
" H-Her? " The Other asked while the woman began shouting at him, but the mental conversation blocking out most of the outside world. " Ah, r-right… Girls… H-Hey, isn't 'Mom'- "
Their conversation was cut short as the woman struck him in the stomach with her foot, making him slip and wobble until he fell forward onto his knees. Even while kneeling he was taller then her, but she forced him lower when she grabbed his ear - Near the top though.
"Hey! You better say something, creep! Even if you're a foreigner you can at least respond!" She lectured him.
" ... S-She's beginning to make me angry."
"She's aggressive… Do you think she's a villain? Does she want something from me?"
'… He's beginning to make me angry.' Rumi thought to herself as she tugged on this… This guy's ear.
She knew better than to judge people with mutation Quirks just like herself, but she had never seen someone whose Quirk made them look like this. Even Ryuko's Quirk at least let her switch to and from an inhuman form.
This guy's sickly green, drawn-out and leather-like skin looked diseased and worn, his lack of cheeks or a cranium made him look like a diagram in a human anatomy textbook, and his vertically aligned eyes lacking brows or lashes further made him look like some kind of victim.
Still, he was hanging out on random rooftops, refused to speak or even react to her talking, and more observed her like he was looking at an ant farm!
"What's your name, huh, tough guy?" She demanded, pulling his ear again… But this time he didn't move. She pulled again and she didn't get an inch out of him.
Before she could make her next move, both of his massive arms grabbed her sides, pinning her arms to her torso and held her out so her legs wouldn't reach, barely reaching his massive elbows as she began kicking.
She bucked and struggled, trying to force her arms out, but each of his fingers felt like her own arms, and went as far up as her shoulders and as low as her wrists, not letting her have an inch of freedom.
"H-Hey! You jackass!" She shouted, raising her legs to his arms and trying to press them away, only making his elbows bend just slightly. His massive jaw was adorned with spade-like teeth, and being forced to look right at it while holding onto her made her adrenaline kick up.
Finally, however, he opened his mouth, showing off his massive maw.
"... Iiichhe…" He hissed, making his chest and throat rumble as he forced out an inhuman snarl.
The hairs on the back of Rumi's neck stood up on end as her ears spiked. There was something wrong with this guy… He wasn't even a guy! This type of instinctual fear that screamed at her to run away couldn't be triggered by any ordinary villain!
The giant, the behemoth demon pulled her closer and opened his maw wider. "IIICCHHHE-EH!" It repeated, this time as a retching squeal while displaying his teeth and tongue.
Rumi kicked him, practically doing a vertical split just to strike his jaw with her heel, instantly making his head snap upward while he flinched backward. She forced her body to turn to the side in his grasp and struck her leg straight for his chest several times as quick as she could, striking several times over his chest until his grip twitched away by a hair - And in that instant she kicked off him with both feet, launching herself backward.
However, his footing wasn't affected in the slightest, even if his head was forced upward. After a moment he looked back down at her with the same expressionless, horrifying face. Except she could feel the intensity rising from him - It could have been experience or plain instinct, but she knew he was going to attack.
She would beat him to the punch, however, by leaping forward with a spinning kick to his dome, maybe rapturing an eardrum to knock him off balance - Or it would, if he didn't catch her leg in his massive paw again.
He looked her right in the eyes while she tried stomping his finger until it broke, increasing the force each time until she felt something give-! But he wouldn't let her have her way so easily. Instead, he turned about while swinging her around like a flail, interrupting her attempt to break free.
"You dirty-!" She yelled, before with a monstrous grunt, he launched her off the roof with such great velocity and violence that it could otherwise be comparible to being shot from a cannon. She went spiraling, her whole world becoming a a confusing tumble of colors and shapes - Leading into a just as sudden ceasura in the form of a blank, wide wall.
Pain and sudden darkness struck her both at once. Then the pull of gravity peeled her away, and what came next would be unknown to her, as she passed out halfway down the fall.
"Did… Did we do the right thing?"
Izuku watched the kicking girl tumble to the ground, crashing atop a small vehicle, instantly making groups of people scream and gasp and swarm around her in shock… Or worry? Izuku looked over the faces, none seemed relieved or glad in the way The Other did.
" H-Haha… Yes… Th-That felt right… She s-struck first, we s-still won. Although… "
Izuku's psyche gave an uncomfortable shift as they watched the people below. "I still think we could have tried harder to talk to her."
" Maybe… But she s-still struck us. " He said, making Izuku feel more conflicted. Due to their internal meeting, their brain naturally let noise of the outside world wash over them, but as it concluded, he finally woke up in reality and noticed the crowds were looking straight at him.
Many were pointing, many yelled or screamed. Most looked… Frightful. Izuku didn't blame them.
"W-What if… What if that was just some lady? Some random woman who didn't want anything to do with this?" Izuku proposed, horrified as said woman woke up, holding her forehead while forcing herself up and back onto her feet. Then, she turned and snarled at him, and even despite the distance, he could make out the violent intent in her red eyes.
" Sh-She's not dressed… like anyone else down there… Besides, y-you felt it too, right? " The Other queried in a lower, rustling tone which resembled more of sharp twigs rustling.
"Felt what? How angry she seems?" He asked, still not moving as she turned around and made her hunches flex.
" No… H-Hehe… " The Other chuckled with an electric cadence that conveyed all the comfort of a ribcage crunching beneath a boot. " H-How much… She was holding back… Y-You felt it, didn't you?"
Izuku's ears twitched as he kept looking down at the woman. The Other was right. His body felt like it was in danger, set in a state of unease as if he were being stalked, only to recognise exactly where the source of danger was coming from.
Before any other discussion could be had, she jumped - First directly up, then spun to place her feet on the wall with her back parralel to the street below, and with another jump, she was rocketting straight towards her.
" ... Seventy-percent. " The Other growled into his conciousness, and for just a split second, Izuku saw the world exactly how his other self saw it: The smell, the look of her muscles flexing and rearing back, the intensity in her expression. He could feel her intent on nothing but instinct alone - And The Other was right. She could put much more force into such a blow, but not an obscene amount more like she could have before.
Izuku also realized something that made whatever abomidable, contorted organ he had for a stomach turn: The Other didn't see this person as a person . In that moment of watching her, he too only saw her as a beast - An animal hunting for his neck, who he was forced to fight for survival.
It was almost like being on that island again, trapped in pure darkness and forced to sit entirely alone, except the stream he stared into was diseased with blood and gore: Skulls of animals who were too weak to fight, entrails of prey too slow to run, arms of injured beasts too dumb to hide. It was how The Other saw this world, saw themselves… And it was horrifying. And yet, because that other Izuku was still himself, it was rational. It made sense. There was some security knowing he was strong, while others were weak.
His mind was forced to process so much in so little time, but in an instant he was back - He threw his arm up, blocking with the back of his arm as she came within range. It was too close for her to change direction, so he was sure of his counterplay after she stopped dead from his block.
Or at least, that's how they wished it would go.
Her leg, so relatively small yet solid, slammed into the side of his arm - Her powerful leg instantly dented into his flesh and flayed his skin, and before that instant was over, it condemned half of his bone.
He roared with an inhuman, ear-wrenching screech as he went flying - Mostly on his own volition. The Other's instincts made him turn with the kick and leap backward, allowing him to twist around and land atop a small raising.
His arm went limp at his side. From his crouched position, the limb appendage hung with its knuckle against the ground. He could feel blood cascading over it, almost painting along the ridges of muscle and bone until driving between the valley of his knuckles.
The woman didn't leap directly after him and instead turned to look at him. "Either give up and go to a hospital-!" She threatened him by punching her fist into her other gloved hand. "Or I'll knock your ugly ass out and you'll wake up in one!"
Izuku's mind was racing in two ways, looking over the short, powerful woman for any small detail… Until he noticed something: There was blood on her brow, going down over her forehead, over her white eyebrows and staining it red. The puddle of Izuku's blood right by her foot was jet black like crude oil.
"W-What do we do…" Izuku asked. He was panicking internally, but their monstrous body barely dilated for breath.
" ... Give it. " The Other hissed. The sharp, broken voice didn't just sound like electricity, Izuku actually felt as if his side of his mind was being jabbed and electrocuted by the sheer intensity of it. " G-Give me control… L-Let me fight… Without y-you hindering m-me…"
"But y-you'll try killing her!" Izuku protested as the woman in question huffed like a bull and stomped forward. "We should run…!"
" And s-she won't…!? " Izuku felt The Other's influence on their body, forcing their broken and unbroken arms up with great, grasping claws, opening their jaw to lash out with his grotesque tongue. " Predators… V-Villains… They're th-the same word!"
Izuku screeched threateningly, giving one last warning to her. But instead of running away, she leaned forward and made a furious, taunting roar back at him. "They will be h-hunted, and punished!"
Izuku knew if she went to attack, he wouldn't have the resistance to stop The Other from swinging for her head, or trying to chomp at her leg. "We need to run away! You said seventy-percent or something, right?"
" ... "
"You know that means she can break our arm without even giving it her all, right?!" Izuku argued his case further while the woman crouched down again while looking at him. "If we didn't dodge, she could have kicked clean through it too!"
Both bodies tensed up while staring the other down, Izuku's tension rose as he watched her, begging she would stand down. She didn't, but he noticed her gaze slipped down slightly and she seemed offput.
Neither he nor The Other could help themselves but to look down. Jet black-blood still covered his arm, but the wound was entirely closed. The entire time he could feel his wound burning less and feeling come back to it, but to think of such a thing…
"What the hell are you?" The woman finally asked as he looked over his own arm, turning it to see how perfectly it replinationed to Izuku's half-yet-full terror, and half-yet-full admiration.
" N-Not… 'who'. What am I, she a-asked… " The Other Izuku hissed as his chest rumbled threateningly.
The monster continued to loom over the woman as they faced off. Until finally, Izuku answered: Their great, now-uninjured claw went over his chest, then pointed towards his center as the rest of his hand formed a massive fist.
"We'll try this again…" Izuku said, although this time it was devoid of hope for success. "Izuku."
His gigantic beartrap of a jaw opened again with a gust of breath like the exhaust of a tank. "... Iiiiiiccccchhhe… " The monster's deep growl of a voice rung like a horn in response.
"... Iche." The woman repeated, her mouth barely twitching as she continued looking up at him.
"Izuku..." He repeated, attempting to correct her.
" Iiiiccche-eh… "
"Izuku." He put more firmly.
" Iiiiccche. "
"Izuku!" He shouted, forcing his body to roar and declare his name.
" Iiiiccche-eh! "
"Izuku!"
" Iiiiccche-eh! "
Izuku's mind felt like it was flexing and straining tight. The more he forced himself to speak, the harder it became to move or focus any other part of his body. His talon-like feet gripped the concrete so hard it began to crack, and in his frustration his attempts to speak became great, mighty roars resembling the cries of a dragon.
The woman got tired of his shouting and leapt at him again.
" ... Ninety percent…! " The Other hissed. Izuku felt a surge in frustration as a part of him flinched and his body tensed.
The behemoth leapt towards the woman, the force of his abominable legs sending debris flying from beneath his feet. His body tensed further, preparing on instinct to be struck - Before at the last moment he clenched every muscle in his body and flung himself sideways, sending himself into a mid-air spiral around the woman.
But she was just as fast, if not faster, turning her heel and spinning at the last moment to strike out at him. His chest turned away and her heel marked a cruelly long cut across his chest as if it were from a greatsword, lacerating his muscles and letting blood spill as he kept flying backward and past her.
His heels dug into the rooftop as he landed backward, forcing him to hunch his legs so they wouldn't let him topple over.
She had to use the momentum of her kick to spin around again, positioning herself to land on her feet before immediately rebounding towards him, first at the ground, and from her crouching position launched at his chest.
" Ninety percent! " The Other's garbled, threatened voice bristled, taking the cadence of a cornered beast.
Izuku's body worked on two sets of reflexes - The wild fighting instinct of The Other, and the passive, frightened and conflicted wishes of the whimpering Izuku. It created a complex set of baser instructions for his body to follow, but it obeyed - Allowing Izuku to dodge with deft pants as it continued to move around the rabbit woman's strikes, fear spiking each time it came close to smashing through his ribs, or whacking off his jaw, or destroying his arm even worse than she had before.
But through it all, it was more or less a miracle his body could function in the slightest with the maelstrom his mind had become between his two voices - Although they argued, it was no fight, as The Other's intensity practically bullied Izuku's.
" Fight! "
"Run!"
" Kill! "
"Talk!"
" TEAR! "
"Calm down!"
" WHY!? "
"R-Remember how hard we hurt her just by tossing her around?! W-We could really-!" But his mind halted as she lept and spun around, her leg raised straight into the sky and forcing him to look upon it in the same way a doomed royal would look upon a raised guillotine blade.
With an instant, intense spark like a flash of lightning, his brain resumed thought in the form of The Other's voice shrieking like an animal falling into the jaws of a great predator. " ONE HUNDRED PERCENT! "
Izuku's ears snapped straight upward in panic as the fibers in his being bristled - It felt unnatural and so intense it even pained him, but he forced himself backward as her heel landed in his place a microsecond later, crashing with such a massive force that even the air surrounding the impact shoved his entire body backward.
" Even someone a-as passive as you… h-has to realize… " The Other growled, not only with annoyance but genuine worry pouring through his distorted voice. " I-If that hit us… "
"I know." He said, feeling his resolve wobble beneath him like a shattered tower. "B-But there would have been a better way than what you were planning!"
What Izuku referred to, of course, was the impulsive attack they were about to perform where they would have punched her head in the instant she began turning her body forward for the kick. While gauging how strong her attack was, they created a diagram in that instant, measuring the length of her legs and the rest of her body, as well as predicting exactly how her body would move in order to go through with such an attack.
What they found was that in an instant of such a fierce attack, she was leaving herself open in just the briefest of seconds where it was too late for her to dodge, and caught in so much momentum she couldn't change the course of where her legs or arms were moving - Thus, leaving her exposed.
" Which side… A-Are you on!? " The crackle of The Other's voice boomed.
"The side of good!" Izuku fiercely stated, as the woman again launched from the smoke and towards him. She positioned herself to kick, drawing his eyes there, but her arm cocked back and flexed with the clenching of her fist, telling off her sucker punch by a mile, which was followed by the actual kick - Which was side-stepped, then hopped over respectfully.
"You think you can outlast me!?" She shouted, clearly taunting him as she lashed out with a roundhouse kick, then hopped off her opposite foot for a backward spin kick, leaving her in the perfect position for an overhead strike, which he had to bow and dodge backward to avoid, again putting himself on the ledge of the rooftop.
" Th-This… Is sensless… "
Izuku, despite his best efforts, felt his hands clenching, and saw the unholy vains of his monseterous body bulging. He tried to move them, but could barely feel the faintest connections to his fingers under his command - Yet, another, seething, whirlpool of rage part of him was fully able to. "H-Hey, wait!"
" Let me fight…! Th-This is MY body too! I'll defend it ag-against this… This…! "
Sensing some kind of change in him, she slowed down and began to watch again as he began flexing his hands by opening and closing them.
"... One more time." She insisted, now just walking towards him - And despite that, he could feel her intentions as she came closer to cornering him between herself and the ledge. "What do you want? And who are you, specifically?"
Izuku's frustration was stirred yet again as she approached. He wanted to apologize. He wanted to strike. He wanted to converse. He wanted to shreech. He wanted his words to be validated by another person and prove that he was indeed human like them. He wanted to silence everything in the world.
She moved again, with she shift of her shoulders, leg, and neck telling him to move and counter the exact moment she started, and while she was going for a lunging knee strike, he jabbed his outward to match it. "... Iiiiiicchhh… "
She tried backing away, but by bunting her attack he rocked her entire form and left her wobbling for the exact instant he needed to swing his great paw, striking at her head, smaller than his fist, with the back of his knuckles. " -Zschhuuu…! "
Red blood sprayed her head was knocked to the side, and the rabbit-eared attacker was forced on her back leg. Izuku coiled his body, focusing his entire form and every microscopic movement around his leg's ability to be positioned straight up.
She finally recovered enough to face him and gasped as the gargantuan limb looming over her like an unstoppable war machine, even eclipsing the sun's rays and forcing her to deal with the dark reality that he was about to crush her. " KOUUUUU! "
His leg slammed down, aimed center mass, but she rolled with the attack, barely moving out of the way as his heel struck the rooftop with such a powerful, disasterous boom that it must have matched or even surpassed the heel-drop attack she pulled earlier.
It was truly a shame it was pulled in vain, however, as her leg swept clean through the dust and into his chest. He could feel her foot condemning into his skin and the strain of his bones against whatever infernal workings he had for organs right before the seering pain - His only option was to lean back, turning with the blow to some measure, so really he was only keeping his organs away from by beng gouged out with her foot.
" Ninty P-Percent… "
The blow sent him flying, and with the way he was forced to spin he could only cross his arms over his face and brain to reduce the damage as he struck against the same wall he through her into earlier - He attampted to grab on, but his claws sifted through shattered bricks like sand, letting him fall straight down with a great, bloody grunt of pain.
" I h-hate her… " The Other hissed as their fibers bristled and trembled while Izuku forced himself over, then pushed up enough for his foot to actually step forward and pushing himself up. Black blood continued to pour from open wounds, dripping from his arms, cheek, and from his open jaw like drool. " I'm n-no longer asking… "
"..." Izuku felt his pain quickly subsiding again. His wounds would close, while that lady bled continously regardless. He couldn't bring himself to strike at her again.
He turned his palm and looked at the small pool of jet black blood which poured between the gaps of his claw-like fingers. It couldn't even show his demented refletion.
There was a sudden Thoom of impact as the woman landed again, drawing Izuku to look up. Further past her he could see people being forced a marginal distance back by uniformed blue people, turning this area where civilians were passing not too long ago into an arena.
Izuku felt a sudden, embarrasing ping of guilt.
"Not too late to apologize." She taunted, cracking her knuckles as she stepped forward. Dealing that blow had clearly done wonders for her mood.
Izuku's body stood straighter, elevating him further above until he finally opened his mouth, but felt something forcing it's way up his throat and shut his mouth again. When the thick liquid made its way to his mouth it instantly began to spray from the corners of his teeth, so he snapped his hands over his mouth too.
The woman seemed startled, and so did the crowd as he tried forcing it all back, but when his throat began to strain to even contain it all, he was forced to uncover his mouth and vomitted no less than a wave of black blood, forcing the woman to dodge at the last second, although it did mark her arm, glove, leg, and that same side of her face along with some of her hair. "Aw, what!?"
Izuku's body heaved forward as blood shot out, until it finally stopped and left a pool of it in his mouth, dripping through the gaps of his teeth which he had to spit out in disgust. It looked like an oil drum had split in front of him.
He looked at his two handfuls of blood, much richer than the viscous red blood she split after being hit, and turned them over onto the ground with two splats .
The woman growled again and stomped towards him before suddenly twitching, her eyes open wide in panic as she suddenly forced her leg back. Even The Other seemed lost for words as the woman's eyes shot open in panic, snapping down at her leg and glove which was covered in his blood.
"H-Hey…!" She yelled. Yes there was anger and the full intent to fight, but there was a panicked, pained edge to her voice that made The Other… shiver in a way that Izuku never wanted to experience again.
"HEY!" The woman screamed as she kicked at nothing - Or rather, it looked like she was trying to kick his blood off. Some flung against a wall, but she was forced to try regaining balance while bucking and kicking.
Izuku continued to watch with a fascinated, startled curiosity… He watched, until he saw the state of her clothes as his black blood was shook away; They had holes burned through them, and the skin beneath was irrate and pink.
His blood was going to melt her down into nothing, and the burning and panic it thus caused made her scream and struggle to remove it from her.
"How awful…" Izuku gasped to himself, watching as steam rose from the black splotches of his blood.
" W-We have… The advantage…! " The Other purred. In his bout of twisted joy, his hold on their unionized body dropped - Izuku seized the opportunity, and while The Other could sense his intentions, it was too late to stop Izuku from bounding upward onto the side of another building. "... Whatever h-happened… To 'no fear'? "
"I'm afraid FOR her!" Izuku clarified to the demented half of his psyche, latching his fingers around the curve of another glowing sign, before his ear twitched and his head snapped to the side to see the woman growling and glaring at him with a raging inferno of intensity.
"Where do you think YOU'RE going!?" She roared, crouching down again - But the moment her legs and thighs twitched to do so, he could already see the next half-second play out in precise, microscopically perfect detail:
She would leap up with one hundred percent of her strength, she would be coiling her body he assumed given the way her shoulder and knee turned inward, all to build up the most momentum possible to drive her heel into the bottom of his chin with much higher than one hundred percent of her actual power - Resulting in him being knocked out cold or decapitation, given her enraged cadence.
All that information was formulated and utilized in the infinitesimal space of time between her declaration and a few singular twitches of muscle.
His gut fleshed uncomfortably, still with blood flooding through systems they should not be and arising again - But instead of coming out uncontrollably as vomit, he forced the accursed blood up his throat and into his closed mouth. Instead of allowing it to flood out, his jaw and tongue shifted around the thick, viscous fluid.
The woman's legs extended, forcing her off the ground with such a great force it erupted around her - In the time it would take a lightning bolt to sear across the sky, she was more than halfway upon him, but it was for naught.
He spat his blood down like a rocket - Not as a flood, but in the concentrated, almost material form of a ball, in the same way a dragon would blast waves of fire on its victims.
Her reflexes were much more impressive than he anticipated. Her eyes widened in the last instant before she turned fully, and instead of following through with her attack, she was forced to perform an odd cartwheel, using the force of her attack to create a gale that cut through his blood-ball.
It was unfortunate to her, however, that such an attack which radically contradicted with the movements that led into it forced her to stall in the air for far to long, until it led to her falling. She could turn and catch something on the side of the building, or fall with the split-up attacks to the ground and jump back, but it wouldn't matter. Izuku would already be gone.
He didn't leap across buildings, instead, he lept down into the dark alleys with the softest landing he could manage. He dashed quickly and precisely, dodging obstacles with a surreal finesse which a creature his size should never have been able to manage.
"That was… That was a good idea." Izuku admitted as the dashed away from the commotion. Loud, blaring alarms ran past him and towards where he and the woman faced off, but they went far past him. "Using our blood like that, and all."
" ... I do w-want to live, you do know that, r-right? " The Other asked, in an agitated grievance with resembled a growl.
"I do." Izuku replied as their escape continued.
" Then allow me… T-To fight… Trust in… My instinct. " He insisted, his voice both exasperated and bitter. " H-Hesitation… M-Means death. "
Izuku couldn't disagree. The Other's instinct for movement and using his acidic blood as a weapon is likely the only reason they continued to breathe.
"... No killing. Not even on accident. If we need to eat… M-Maybe, but we'll figure it out. Together." Izuku set forth his demands, finally facing and offering his hand to the goliath who shared his hell with him - The man who he had his back to on the island all this time.
The beast was quick to take it - Allowing his blood-soaked hand to take the child's uniting them as partners. " H-Haha… R-Remember that… I will always ch-chose life… Over th-this agreement. "
Izuku had no complaints.
Their trail would run thin, leaving him with the option to only go up again, leading him further into the light of day while crawling with his massive back scraping against the wall of another building.
He heaved himself over the edge with ease - Using the arm that should have still been splintered and broken from earlier. Now, it felt no different, yet no more familiar than it would have much earlier in the day. "... The way we look is a problem."
" ... " Izuku and the Other walked the same body in silence over a ledge again. This new vantage point let him see much more, more blurs of people incomprehensiable language, and towering structures.
" … I-Is this… Information n-new to you, perhaps? " The Other asked, almost with amusement ringing in his distorted and electrified voice.
"If we looked different, that lady wouldn't have been so freaked out by us, right?" Izuku replied simply. The weight of it pushed down on his chest while his monstrous chord of a throat hummed slightly.
" D-Does it… Does it r-really matter… Th-That much to y-you..? " The Other, of course, felt on some level comfortable with this form. It was just as curious and angry as Izuku at whatever maleviolent villain did this to them - But for all intent and purposes, it was his body.
"Yeah… I don't want people to attack us on sight like we're the villain." Izuku said, to which his other half had to agree to, on principal. "We need to look like a hero… We need to look… Like that guy!"
While looking over the massive, man-made landscape, their attention was grasped - Commanded and taken by an image on a massive, electronic banner.
He was a titanic man of muscle just like Izuku himself and his bird-beaked comrade - Except he was fully human: Healthy skin unlike the leathery one Izuku was in, blonde hair with two protruding antennae not totally unlike Izuku's ears, and a massive, cheerful smile that almost mocked Izuku - As his own smile was the result of his cheeks being done away with.
The was dressed in bright colors that displayed a certain kind of warmth and sanctuary, while Izuku was nearly bare, only wearing pants that went to his knees and white skulls over his kneecaps. It was like the man's image was some kind of twisted, pure mirror that showed every one of Izuku's horrid flaws into something kind… Something heroic. Someone who wasn't just everything Izuku could be, but something he should be.
"Yeah… Like that guy!"
" ... I like… H-His hair… "
This story was released a week ago on my |?, There's also this month's upcoming exclusive fic. You can find the link to my and those stories on my Twitter account, ( BitchBrypops) Plus, I like having easier ways to communicate with my community anyway.