CHAPTER 39: PROPHECY

"So tell me again." Shigaraki took off the hand covering his face. "Which of us is the leader now?" Sneering down at Chisaki who laid strapped down to a prison gurney. Both of his arms were in a cast as a result of his injuries at the hands of Midoriya. "Looks like Apotheosis really roughed you up." He mocked. He looked at the blue case in his hands. As much as he would have loved to get the completed bullets, those were apparently destroyed during the earlier battle. So he'd have to settle for these prototype bullets.

"I'll make sure to put these to good use." He continued to try and get a rise out of Overhaul, but the man just continued to stare off into space blankly. Not even Compress taking his left arm for revenge got a reaction. Tomura wondered what Midoriya did to break him so badly. "Really nothing to say?"

"Shigaraki, the police and heroes will be here soon. We need to cut this short." Compress tried to hurry this along.

"In a moment." Shigaraki scowled at his underling. He noticed Chisaki was mumbling something under his breath. "I'm sorry, what was that?"

"You can't beat him. No one can." The defeated man whispered quietly. Those words seemed to piss Shigaraki off even more.

"You know what I think." He said as he started decaying his remaining arm. "Maybe someone who goes around preaching his hatred for quirks shouldn't have one." Smirking at the man's pained grimace Tomura decided he'd rather this guy live and suffer than see him decay into dust, so he cut off the rest of the arm before his quirk could destroy him.

"Alright let's go." Putting his father's hand back over his face he turned to leave.

"Too late." The masked magician pointed off into the distance where a group of squad cars were fast approaching. Suddenly from out of nowhere a wall of blue fire was erected along the highway, obstructing their path.

"Miss me?" Looking off to the left they spotted a familiar figure making his way towards them. Dabi dressed in his normal outfit with a few new additions. He was now wearing black metallic gauntlets that went up to his biceps with metal plating shaped like scales and finger tips ending in sharp points resembling claws.

"Like itchy skin." Tomura replied. "What are you doing here?"

"The kid sent me to make sure you get away." Dabi answered.

"What game is he playing at?" Shigaraki snapped at him.

"No game. He still considers you a friend for reasons that are beyond my understanding." Dabi chuckled. "Get out of here. I'll cover your escape." Tomura stared at him for a moment before getting back into the truck, followed by Mr. Compress. Dabi watched them drive off with a pleased smirk on his face before turning to look down at Overhaul.

"Ouch that has to hurt." The scarred man created a blue flame in the palm of his gauntlet covered hands. These nifty little support devices were something Midoriya came up with to prevent his quirk from burning him anymore. "This is going to hurt even more. Trust me I know a thing or two about severe burns." Pressing his fire to the man's bleeding stump he seared the wound closed.

"GAAAHHHH!" Chisaki hollered in pain.

"AHHH! It hurts so much!" Dabi mocked him. "Suck it up. We don't want you bleeding to death now do we?" Seeing the man passed out from the pain he pressed a finger to his communicator. "Dragon here…No Tomura didn't kill him…I have him right now." Reporting his success he received new orders from his boss. "Got it." A portal appeared on the ground close to them. Dabi burned through the restraints holding Chisaki down and picked him up before tossing him roughly into the portal. Making sure no one was looking again he followed, jumping into the very same portal.

LATER-HOSPITAL

Izuku sat in the waiting room. His eyes were closed, while his hands were clasped together. It almost looked like he was meditating. The teen's right index finger was absent mindedly tracing the power stone on his gauntlet as he thought about his latest battle.

'A glitch? Something I missed perhaps? Why now?' His mind wondered to why one for all was experiencing issues. Was something wrong with the quirk? It didn't behave like this before. He didn't understand. None of the other stones did this. All for one didn't glitch out on him and those two quirks were quite literally cut from the same cloth. Putting these queries aside for later he decided to focus on the eyes he felt were watching him.

"I see that Lemillion was able to successfully rescue you." Opening his eyes he spotted Aizawa, underground hero and teacher of U.A staring at him. "Where is he?" The gruff looking man just silently stared at him for a few more seconds before answering.

"Upstairs getting checked out by the medical staff." Aizawa walked over and sat down a few chairs away from him.

"Good." Izuku stared at him for a few moments before changing the topic. There was always something he wanted to ask this man after learning about him from Uraraka. "You're class 1-A's homeroom teacher. Your former students had…mixed things to say about you."

"Is that so?" Aizawa's expression didn't change. "What did they say?"

"That you were overall a good teacher, though your deceptive methods could be frustrating at times." The gauntlet wearer smirked at him.

"Sometimes a logical deception was necessary to bring out their best and push them to their highest potential." The underground hero justified.

"Personally I prefer the more honest approach. I told Iida, Uraraka and Todoroki the truth about my goals and how my department operates." Izuku explained to him.

"I doubt you told them everything." Aizawa like others suspected that he had a few villains working for him behind the scenes. They were almost certain that the masked agent that worked for Midoriya was the Hero Killer.

"Well there are some aspects of my department they aren't permitted to know about." The green haired teen shrugged. "It's mostly just a bunch of classified government stuff. They need not concern themselves with that." He was purposely vague as to not give away any information that could be used against him. "Can I you ask you something Mister Aizawa?"

"Yes." The underground hero nodded while side eyeing him.

"I'm not sure if Allmight told you, but originally I was planning on using my infinity gauntlet to become a hero." Izuku told him. "I was going to try out for U.A and show the world that I could be a hero using science and imagination to surpass any and every quirk. To show everyone who grew up like me that the world doesn't have to be unfair. So I was wondering. Had I gone down that path and had I been accepted into the school would you have allowed me to be in your class?"

"I'm not going to lie. If you had potential and the drive I think you would have excelled in the hero course." The underground hero said honestly. "Now though. After some of the things you've done, you don't belong in the hero course."

"Because I'm still technically quirkless?" Izuku inquired with amusement.

"No because you took the easy way." Aizawa said making the boy pause and really look at him. "You didn't even try to be a hero. You could have gotten what you wanted if you became a hero, it would have been much harder to change society, but you choose the easier path instead."

"I can assure you, my path was anything but easy." He glared at the hero. "I had to do what I did, it was the only way to make everyone see what I saw.

"What did you see?" Aizawa asked him.

"When I became a criminal consultant, I got to see the ugly side of our hero based society." He turned his head away from the man and looked off into space. "Do you know what I witnessed out there?" Rather than answer him Shouta Aizawa let him continue, having a pretty could idea what he was talking about. "Pro Heroes taking bribes, ignoring crimes that wouldn't boost their popularity, people with quirks they couldn't properly control which led them to being labelled as villains, and worst of all the way quirkless people are treated as something less than human."

"How could Allmight the great symbol of peace allow such things to happen? Why is it only someone with power that can change anything? It's just not…fair. That's when I came to the realization of how broken our society really is. How our pillar of justice was nothing more than a lie." Izuku glared at the wall. "Allmight didn't hold the world together. He held his ideal fantasy world together by a lie he created of a hero that never truly existed in the first place."

"So your new goal was to correct this?" Aizawa sounded skeptical. "I still don't understand how what you've done will lead to a better society."

"That's because you're not thinking in the long term." Izuku explained. "By purging all the fake heroes, by exposing Allmight for the fraud that he was, by nearly bringing the system on the brink of collapse, I've opened the door for everyone to finally ask questions. By making them take a good look at their heroes they can now see what I see. The discontent of the people will lead to inevitable improvement. Things will become fair now. The whole reason it was never fixed in the first place is because Allmight and the other heroes kept everyone blissfully compliant."

'Break everything, then let the people see how wrecked the system is and they'll beg you to fix it.' Aizawa summed up the kid's plan in his own head. He could admire the boy for his understanding of how the system worked and where the flaws that he could exploit were. However Midoriya's way of thinking was problematic. His unhealthy obsessive compulsion to improve everything and make it fair as he called it will only lead to ruin. One thing that Izuku Midoriya had yet to understand was that he would eventually reach a dead end. A society would only tolerate his so called 'improvements' for so long before it starts to feel like tyrannical control. What happens when they are no longer compliant with what he does? What will happen when the people turn on Midoriya? That's the part that scared Aizawa. All that power in the hands of an obsessed boy spurned and hurt by the world. What would he do when everything falls apart? Probably something terrible.

"Well this was a nice talk." Rather than sit with the man in awkward silence Izuku decided to get up and check on Todoroki. He needed to make a quick stop to the restroom first and wash the blood off his gauntlet. Aizawa watched him get up and leave. When he was gone around the corner, he reached into one of his pouches and felt the small metal object that was still there. The reason he was momentarily caught off guard, the reason he was hit and captured was because of this bullet that he successfully pick pocketed from Midoriya while he was right next to him mid battle.

He honestly didn't know why he took it. Aizawa had no plans to use it. He doubted it would do anything if it were to hit Midoriya, but intuition told him it might be useful later down the road. You could never know when you might need to permantly erase someone's quirk.

RESTROOM

Using some water and a cloth Izuku cleaned the blood of Sir Nighteye off his device. He wasn't adverse to blood. After all he worked with the stuff before, but he would rather keep his hands as clean as possible. Looking down at the soul stone in his palm he thought about the two quirks he acquired during this whole thing. Crystal and Overhaul. That latter of which he was already thinking about all the practical applications that could be made with it.

Looking in the mirror he examined his still ripped open shirt. Touching it with his bare hand his curiosity over this quirk got the better of him. 'Overhaul' In an instant his black button down shirt was destroyed and reassembled back into an undamaged state, albeit missing a few buttons.

Leaving the restroom he walked down the halls until he made it to the room that held his loyal knights. Izuku walked in without knocking. Shoto Todoroki was sitting up in the bed with a few bandages around his temple. Uraraka and Iida were sitting in chairs off to the side of the bed still in their gear from the earlier battle.

"Alright, how did this happen?" Izuku ordered. He wasn't mad, but he was a little tired.

"It was my own fault." Shoto said without hesitation. "I let my guard down. I thought my opponent was beaten." He clenched his fists in frustration at having made a similar mistake when he fought Katsuki Bakugou.

"Failure is our greatest teacher. I'm not going to point out what you did wrong and chastise you for it when you've already done that yourself." The gauntlet user explained. "Even I make mistakes. I don't expect you three to be a perfect cohesive unit overnight." He looked over to Uraraka next. "Have you got anything to add?"

"Well our combination move worked pretty well." She beamed.

"Mega Hail? That's good." Izuku smiled back at her then turned to Iida.

"I was able to successfully retrieve all the injured police and heroes." The glasses wearing boy summed up. Part of him was paranoid that Midoriya somehow knew about the message he passed on to Asui. He just didn't know and that was always the scariest part about dealing with Izuku Midoriya.

"With your speed I imagine that went quickly and efficiently." He nodded. "Just file everything into the computer when we get back to base." Izuku seemed more dismissive than normal almost like his thoughts were elsewhere. Without another word he turned around to leave.

"Izuku." Ochako used his first name. "Is everything alright?" Midoriya slowly turned to face her.

"Yeah." He finally said. "Everything is fine." Well that wasn't entirely true, he had a lot on his mind, so much that needed to be done, but he didn't want to worry her with his problems. Izuku left the hospital room with Iida and Shoto both watching him go now. They too noticed something off about him.

Izuku after leaving the room made his way to where Eri was being treated. Unfortunately he couldn't visit her as she was being kept in quarantine due to the high fever and the unknown status of her quirk. However he was able to watch her rest through the window. The gauntlet user wasn't fully paying attention to the doctor speaking until he mentioned something about Sir Nighteye's condition.

"What was that?" Izuku asked turning his eyes away from the unconscious child.

"The hero Sir Nighteye. His injuries are too severe." The doctor explained. "We did all we could, but he won't make it." If Midoriya felt anything he certainly didn't show it on his blank emotionless face.

"Which room is he in?" He said solemnly.

"Sir!" Mirio kneeled down next to the bed. It was so hard seeing his teacher, his mentor laying weak and dying. Tubes going in and out of him, bandages wrapped around the stump where his arm used to be. These wounds were fatal and there was nothing that could save him. The staff told him so to prepare him for what he was going to see.

"Mirio." Nighteye whispered as his tired eyes landed on his pupil. "I'm glad you're safe."

"I'm sorry. I failed." The blonde was crying now. "This happened to you because I wasn't strong enough."

"You were amazing." The dying man smiled. "You tried to save Eri even at the cost of your own body. You're a true hero Mirio." He coughed lightly in pain. He didn't want the young man thinking it was his fault when in reality it wasn't. Nighteye's legs moved on their own, just like Allmight would have wanted. His thought's then drifted back to what he saw in Midoriya's future when he got a chance to use his quirk on him. He had to tell Mirio before he died. "Mirio. I don't know if the future can be changed or if it is set in stone. My vision of Allmight's future was distorted, so maybe things can end differently."

"What are you saying Sir?" Togata asked.

"I need to tell you what I saw in Izuku Midoriya's future." Nighteye reached his hand out and gently pulled his pupil closer so no one else could hear what was said. The blonde's eyes widened when Sir explained his vision. Much of it he didn't even understand. When he finished Mirio pulled away to look at his teacher. "Now that you know, maybe you can stop it. Just head my warning."

"I don't know how I'm supposed to stop that. I don't even know what happened, you said everything just went blank." Mirio said.

"Everything went blank because there was no future that I could see past that point." Nighteye wheezed. "It was like everything just stopped."

"Sir? What do I do?" Mirio pleaded.

"I don't know, but you need to keep Eri away from him." The slowly fading hero told him. "Whatever Midoriya does in the future has something to do with her."

The former sidekick glanced over at the window. Mirio followed his gaze to the see Izuku Midoriya himself walking into the observation room. The director took one apathetic look at the hero on his death bed before turning around and leaving without a word. Mirio glared at his back at how cold and indifferent he was acting and mentally vowed to have a word with him later. For now he had to be here with Sir in his last moments. He owed it to the man.

ANOTHER ROOM

"Oh wow!" Izuku's eyes widened at the state of Kirishima. Since there was nothing he could do for Nighteye he went to check on the other injured parties. The red headed boy was nearly completely covered in bandages. "You brought new meaning to being a human shield."

"You can't blame a man for trying." Kirishima shrugged with a toothy smile.

"Your right." Izuku smiled back. "In the end that's all I ask. For the heroes to try and do the best they possibly can, while constantly striving to improve and perfect." Reaching into the inside pocket of his suit he pulled out a small white card. He also took out a pen that he got from the doctor's clip board and scribbled something on the card. "As of right now I only have three volunteers in my hero training program. Your former classmates, I'm sure you remember them." He handed the injured boy the card.

"Knights of Balance?" Kirishima read the titled aloud.

"That's the official name of the H.R.D's hero training program. Should you be interested, you'd be immediately transferred from U.A into the program." Izuku began listing off all the benefits that Eijiro would gain. The red head on the other hand was barely listening while he looked at the written words scribbled at the bottom of the card.

Codename: Aegis: Shield of the gods.

'Aegis?' He didn't hate the name, but honestly Kirishima preferred his own hero name to this. He also couldn't deny the enticing offer Midoriya was presenting. However.

Izuku suddenly stopped talking when Kirishima handed him back his card. Green eyes curiously staring at him.

"Thanks for the offer. I really appreciate the director of the H.R.D showing an interest in my career, but I'm going to have to politely refuse." The bandage covered teen said as confidently as possible as to not offend the other.

"May I ask why?" Izuku looked at him oddly. The three former U.A students that he offered this opportunity to didn't turn it down. Well Iida didn't take it immediately, but after a bit of coxing he saw the benefits and joined of his own free will.

"Look I'm sure your program is great and all, but as a man I need to walk my own path to being a hero." He said proudly. Izuku smiled, fully understanding his reasoning.

"Very well then." Using the quirk Overhaul for the second time the gauntlet user shredded the card into tiny bits. "I wish you the best on your path…Red Riot." He really wanted a fourth member for his knights and someone with a good defensive quirk would have been a great addition to the team. Oh well. Some people had their own desired path to walk like Kirishima. Turning around he made to leave, with a wave goodbye and walked out of the hero in training's hospital room.

'I need to check my list. Find the next possible member.' Walking down the main hall of the hospital he mentally went through the other possible candidates.

"Hey!" His thoughts were halted at the sound of a voice calling his attention. Turning to the left he spotted Mirio Togata coming towards him at a rather aggressive pace.

"Ah Lemillion! I take it Sir Nighteye has finally passed." Izuku said nonchalantly. His mind was still other places when he spoke and wasn't fully paying attention to the other teen. Mirio silently fumed. Something about the way he so carelessly said that really got under his skin.

"Why didn't you save him?" Mirio finally asked what was bothering him.

"Pardon?" He didn't understand the question being asked.

"You could have saved Sir. I've seen the power you wield." Mirio said. "So why didn't you save him?"

"I couldn't." Izuku said with a shrug like it wasn't a big deal.

"Yes you could have." The blonde student argued.

"No. I couldn't have." The gauntlet user brandished his device. "The time stone can't heal something if there are too many missing pieces. When he took that blow for you his fate was sealed. Honestly with a quirk like his he should have stuck to being a sidekick. If that idiot planned on going into combat he should have been wearing armor or used a proper offensive support device." Izuku went off on all the things that he perceived that the now deceased hero did wrong. "He had no business being there anyway if you want my opinion. I could have handled it better alone." Mirio's hand gripped the front of his shirt and slammed his body against the wall behind him, finally having enough of Midoriya's cold heartless assessment of his master.

"Shut up!" The young hero shouted. Izuku didn't even flinch as he was forcefully pushed into the wall. He kept his emerald eyes locked with the other's blue orbs.

"Careful I just repaired my shirt." Izuku told him. "I'll assume this outburst is part of your grieving for Sir Nighteye. Were you two closer than I originally assessed? What exactly is your problem with me?"

"My problem is that he's dead and you don't even care!" Mirio was close to tears now.

"I do care, but as I said there's nothing I could have done for him." Izuku tried to explain. "I wish there was something I could do, but I can't. So there's no point in getting upset about things I can't change when I could focus on things I can." Mirio finally let go of his shirt. "For example. How do you think Eri is going to feel when she finds out that one of the heroes that tried to save her was killed in the process?" He paused seeing the older teen's eyes widened in realization. "Exactly. For her sake its best not to tell her for now. She can find out later when she's mentally ready." Still seeing a look of despair Izuku reached out and placed a hand on Mirio's shoulder. "Despite what I said about him being foolish, I do think Sir Nighteye was a brave man for what he did. It may seem cold to you, but I just prefer not to dwell on things I can't help and would rather look forward to the future."

'He's got a good control of that temper.' Izuku thought as he walked away. 'I honestly expected him to hit me.' Mentally adding him to the list of potential candidates.

Mirio watched him leave with a solemn expression on his face. He came to confront Midoriya while angry and ready to give a piece of his mind. However he found himself somewhat agreeing with the younger teen's logic. There really was nothing he could do when Sir willingly shielded Mirio and Eri with his own body and was fatally wounded because of it. Plus Midoriya had no personally connection to the future seeing hero so of course he wouldn't be broken up over it. Midoriya has even been quoted several times on the news that he views heroes as nothing more than public servants and that if they want to be true heroes then they should start acting like them. That could explain his cold attitude.

Still though. It wasn't right to view human life like that. Heroes were people too after all. Midoriya had obviously failed to realize that.

LATER-H.Q.

"Remind me why we're keeping this trash alive again?" Dabi asked Stain who stood beside him as they looked down at the body of Kai Chisaki. The man was bandaged and healed the best they could, placed on the bed in one of the many prison cells they had here at the base. The first ever prisoner they ever had actually.

"Our boss wants him alive for information." Stain said as they left the cell, it automatically locked behind them on the way out. "In case the blood sucker failed in her mission. He'll have to get what he wants out of Chisaki the old fashioned way."

"Torture." Dabi confirmed as he followed his teacher. "What happens after that? Kill him?"

"No." Stain sounded disappointed. "Midoriya doesn't kill. He'll probably have me do it for him."

"Why doesn't he kill?" The scarred man asked.

"The truth is I think he's squeamish when it comes to killing." Stain said. "He helped me kill and maim several heroes, but he never made the killing blow himself. That's the kind of person Midoriya is." They stepped through the main door leaving the prison area of the base.

"So that's why he didn't kill Endeavor." Dabi said to himself.

"Well he also felt that it is far greater punishment for that sorry excuse of a man to live in the ruins of his old life." The hero killer could somewhat agree with that at least. The two of them continued to talk as they made their way to the Midoriya's office.

There the boy they were discussing was already waiting for them. Leaning against the front of his desk with his arms crossed.

"Guillotine. Dragon." Izuku greeted them. "Where's Chameleon?"

"Right here!" Himiko waltzed into the office. Her most recent disguise already melting off her body into white sludge.

"Put some clothes on." Izuku demanded coldly. "Did you get it?"

"I did." She smiled and showed him the portable drive in her hand, ignoring his request to get dressed. Using the reality stone Izuku yanked the drive out of her hand and into his.

"Good work everyone." He smiled at what he liked to think of as the shadows of his knights. He walked around to his computer and plugged the device in.

"Sooo…can we kill our guest then?" Dabi asked eagerly.

"No. I need to confirm something before I make a decision as to what will be done with Kai Chisaki." That seemed to confirm what Stain told him about how Midoriya doesn't like killing. "Dismissed." Without even looking at the three he waved them off. "Oh, one more thing. Dabi." He stopped the dark haired man on the way out.

"Yeah?" Dabi paused at the door wondering what his boss wanted.

"I'm an assigning you and Todoroki to training together from now on." Izuku said still looking at his computer.

"I don't think that's a good idea." Dabi warned.

"And why is that?" Izuku finally looked up from the screen, meeting the other's piercing gaze with his own. After a short staring contest Dabi finally blinked and turned away.

"It's nothing. Never mind." With that the former villain left him alone.

'Alright let's see what Chisaki was up to.' Izuku wanted to know how the man was using Eri to make these bullets. He had a good idea, but he wanted to know for sure.

I decided to split the aftermath into two chapters. I was going to try and crank out a couple chapters during my holiday break. Its just that 2020 was such a shit year that I just wanted to relax and really enjoy Christmas for once. That also meant taking a break from my hobby of writing this story. I was drinking most of the time too, so I wouldn't have gotten anything done either way.

I started reading Berserk recently. Been looking for a new manga now that Attack on Titan is close to ending. My friend has been suggesting Berserk for a few years so I finally sat down and started reading. Got all the way to the eclipse where Griffith becomes Femto and stuff…happens. Boy that was something. So yeah that's been taking up some of my time as well.

I'm excited for the next chapter. An important moment for Izuku's character is coming up. Also for those of you who wanted Kirishima to join him let me be clear. I never said that he would join. I was just curious to see what you people would want his codename to be if he did. I liked Aegis the most by the way.

Another reason this chapter took so long is because I'm writing a oneshot story right now. Villain Izuku with Doc Oc tentacle arms. I'm not expanding it into a full length story until Apotheosis is finished, but I just want to give people a taste of what the story would be like and see what they think of it. So look for in the future.

Gentle is going to be introduced soon and after him Apotheosis is going to slow down a bit. I mean nothing major is going to happen for a while, so I might do a few more oneshots of my other ideas.

This is now officially the longest story I've written on this site. I didn't even notice that the follows and favorites had reached over 9000! Thank you and I hope 2021 is better for everyone than 2020 was.