It was raining. Why was it always raining?

It had been raining violently when Izuku first returned to the 'mortal world'. It had been pouring when he'd reached the broken gates of U.A. It had been drizzling when he learned the entire premise of his journey had been a broken one. And now? As he stepped through the loud metal gates of a murky cemetery and into the stale mist. As he walked over the cracked and mossy path to follow Aizawa and All Might. As he slowed to a halt upon reaching their destination, a simple carved stone with water flowing down, that had yet to be weathered like all the others:

'Here lies Izuku Midoriya'

Of course, it was raining.

"So." Aizawa didn't offer anything more. No words of encouragement, accomplishment, anything.

"So." Izuku echoed back, at a complete loss for what else to say.

"So." Cerberus was probably just following on for the sake of it; whether it was simple amusement or her own form of support, Izuku wasn't sure.

"So." though he was pretty sure Modeus was just messing with him.

"S-"

"If anyone else says 'so', this cemetery's about to need another hole." Justice interrupted Uraraka, looking instead to Aizawa and All Might. "You got the shovels?" Aizawa pulled out a pair of fold-up shovels they'd picked up on the way over.

"Surprised you can't use magic or something here." Aizawa deployed the shovels to their full size.

"Oh sure, I could just rip the ground out like that." Justice snapped her fingers, "So could Cerbs- no, she could do it faster. But a demon exhuming a dead body of a soul currently wandering the mortal plane could-"

"Right." Aizawa sighed, "Even the supernatural has to deal with political BS."

"Can I help-"

"""No.""" Justice, Aizawa and All Might answered simultaneously. He could guess the reasoning behind Justice's response being similar to her own inability to help, but Izuku wasn't sure of the other two.

"You are not digging up your own corpse."

"Indeed." All Might agreed with Aizawa, "I may have-" he groaned. "I realise now that I made some mistakes regarding my… approach to both you and your training-"

"Some'?" Aizawa spat.

"-however, while my form may not be as capable as it once was." he lightly put a hand to where the injury lie in his lower chest, "I hope it can at least spare you and young Uraraka this much."

"I can help-"

"No." Aizawa immediately shut down the girl who was practically clinging to Izuku's arm. "Just-" he massaged the bridge of his nose, "We'll handle this. Just stick with Izuku, okay?"

Uraraka nodded surely in response, tightening her grip on Izuku's arm. With little else to do, he gazed out absent-mindedly over the cemetery around him. Over the rows upon rows of deceased souls, of fellow deceased souls, put here for what people would believe to be their final rest. Where would they be though, really? Toiling in one of the Circles of Hell? Thriving in Heaven, or a subdivision thereof? Or were they set to end up in some entirely different destination?

"Does it make a difference?" Izuku muttered absent-mindedly.

"I'm gonna need a bit of elaboration there, bud." Justice replied.

"Where- how we're-" he cut himself off; the terminology was still hard to get a grasp of. "How our… mortal forms are finally put to rest. Does it make any difference?"

"Not in the way you're thinking. The afterlife you're destined for is first-and-foremost based on the beliefs you had while alive and kicking. But if you're unsure, it's a whole different story."

"Rigged Russian roulette, right?" he recalled the analogy she'd given him quite some time ago.

"Yes, but it's a weighted rigged Russian roulette. Take all these folks." she swept an arm in gesture of the cemetery, "These guys are more likely to end up in good ol' Heaven or Hell, as this is a Christian cemetery." Izuku had thought he'd noticed a handful of Shinto symbols here and there as well, but he supposed it did seem that Christianity was the prominent theme; the large cross the main feature of the entrance gate, a number of graves in similar shapes, and the attached church was clearly more inspired by European or American architecture than traditional Japanese.

"If they'd ended up in a more traditional resting place, they'd be more drawn towards the Shinto underworld." Justice knocked him on the shoulder, "Considering you're an atheist, it could've been the deciding factor. Lucky break; Izanami is not as cool as I am."

"Yeah." Izuku sighed, "Kacchan killed me so hard cremation felt like overkill to my grieving mother. Lucky me."

He'd ended up sounding more bitter than he'd meant to, but it was proving difficult to remain optimistic when basically everything around him was pushing in the opposite direction. Justice apparently didn't feel the need to continue on from his remarks, and their group soon relocated to a nearby bench to take what passed for a break at this point while Aizawa and All Might worked. They sat in silence for a good while.

Well, silence except for the rain hammering down on Izuku's grave and the sound of shovels piercing the ground in search of his coffin, of course.

"Hey." Turning his head around, Izuku was greeted by the sight of Cerberus standing over him with a smile full of teeth.

"Hey." he should probably be more concerned at this development, but it was amazing how much several emotional gut-punches could take it out of you.

"What're we gonna do when we get back?"

"Back-?" Izuku cut himself off. Obviously she meant back in Hell. "I'm not sure, really." he turned his attention elsewhere, "Justice?"

"Well." she let out a deep sigh, mulling over the possibilities. "A few ways we could play it… But the best will probably just be getting straight back to work sorting souls."

"That's it?" Izuku replied in astonishment, "No apologising to anyone, no dealing with any issues, no decades-long hiding out as a fugitive while you smooth things over, just… back to work?"

"Harder for them to complain if we're doing our jobs." Justice shrugged, "Without your Quirk suddenly you're not some ridiculous power source that can topple Hell. Thanks to our contract it's basically impossible for you to be coerced into a deal with another demon, and as Mal's got a partial claim on your service, that'll just make it more of a pain for anyone to try stealing you off somehow."

"But-" he couldn't help but feel it was going to be more complicated than that. "But won't your superiors be angry with you? Judgement, 'Loremaster'-"

"Judgement is a colleague." Justice made that point sternly. "Not a superior. She has more control within Limbo, but that's it. Once we're back at my office in Gluttony's depths, there's nothing she can do but cry to Lucy about it."

"Speaking of which-"

"And yes, she'll be pissed." she admitted with a placating tone, "But when she realises the damage is done and there's nothing to be gained, she'll back off. It'll be fine." she turned to face Izuku more directly, "You'll be fine."

"But what if-"

"All hurting you would accomplish is giving me a reason to get back at her, giving Mal a reason to get back at her, probably pissing of Cerberus-"

"Definitely." Cerberus nodded regally.

"And me." Modeus contributed.

"There's way too many downsides. I mean, sure, she's a vindictive, judgemental, callous, controlling, sadistic-"

"This isn't making me feel better."

"-petty, self-aggrandizing bitch, but she's not an idiot."

"S-sorry," Urarka interrupted in a small voice, "but, who are you-"

"The devil." Izuku replied with defeated acceptance. "Lucy is a nickname; we're literally talking about the devil."

"Not quite, actually." Justice commented with what sounded like smugness in her voice, "That's more of a title. 'The Beast', 'The Devil', 'Satan', 'CEO'; they're all names adopted by the current ruler of Hell. As Lucy was in power from a little under a couple millennia ago until pretty recently," Izuku assumed 'recently' meant 'within the last few centuries', "she's still what most people associate the older titles with; more in the public conscious. But for around two or three centuries now," there it is, "that title now belongs to-"

"Loremaster?" Izuku tried to recall their conversation.

"Close." Justice nodded, "That's the 'name' Azazel chose when they became the new ruler of Hell."

'Azazel'?

"Isn't she another fallen angel?" Izuku asked cautiously. He'd never been the best at theology, but the name still rung a bell, and Justice's nod confirmed his question. "Are all rulers of Hell fallen angels or something?" he followed up in exasperation.

"Two out of three." Justice ran a hand over her face, stopping at her sunglasses to pinch the bridge of her nose. "It's a long and convoluted explanation; divine rights of rulership and all that crap."

"Right." Izuku took a breath once again, reminded of just how little he knew of the world he'd stumbled into. Looking around, catching sight of the tired form of a defeated All Might and irritated Aizawa digging through his grave, he was reminded of how little he knew of this one.

I hope the others are doing better…

He made it.

It took over a dozen trains, three hours, and who-knows how much whining from Cerberus, but Shouto had made it. He was finally somewhere he could actually recognise; just a few minutes walk from his home.

Home.

The word, the concept sounded almost foreign. His time in Hell hadn't been long, but it hadn't been nothing. The days, week, two- however long it had been, all blended together in Shouto's mind. Use his Quirk as a cheap and effective air conditioner, get paid in food and somewhere to stay, try to respond to Toru whenever she tried to start a conversation despite the insane circumstances, repeat. The more he thought about it, the less sure he was of how long they'd been down there – surely they should've found out more after being down there so long. But then he remembered how long it had felt, trapped in his own mind as he went over everything he wished he'd done in life. And now?

Now he was a few minutes walk from achieving one of those wishes. Assuming his father was home. Which he probably wasn't.

"Damn."

"Your lies already pollute this Earth." Shiozaki was making Shouto wish he was less vocal about his thoughts. "Must your oration continue to flaunt our Lord's will?"

"Indeed!" and Iida was still as irritating as he'd remembered, "While I know many employ such vulgar language nowadays, we must still endeavour-" Shouto suppressed a growl, "-to set more appropriate standards!"

"Yeah, watch your fucking language." if Cerberus wasn't an active threat to Shouto's life, happiness, and sanity, he might have let out a small snort of laughter.

He did not.

"So-" Present Mic cleared his throat, "just to check the tempo: What exactly are you hoping to find here?"

"Find my father." Shouto replied simply. "Tell him where to shove it. And make him tell me what actually happened to my sister." because obviously the public story was a blatant lie. Fuyumi was the only member of their family who could be called a well-adjusted, functioning member of society. Obviously Shouto would've become the second such member once he'd become a Hero on his own terms and proved that everything his father had ever worked towards was pointless, but unfortunately U.A. didn't invest in anti-warping technology. Which… Shouto wasn't actually sure existed. That'd probably explain it.

All that was to say that there was no conceivable way Fuyumi could be dead, assuming teleportation wasn't involved. No, even if it was, she'd be able to come up with some defence. Because despite not having the more 'intensive' training Shouto had been forced through, she'd still been trained. Because despite not actually being a Hero, Shouto was confident that she had the skill of one. Because she was the one member of their family that could balance their father's demands and her own fulfilling life, the one who'd given Shouto something in his life besides constant pain and neglect, because she was the one who definitely, absolutely, could not be dead. She was fine. Meaning it's a cover-up, meaning the rest of his family was probably also fine, meaning Shouto had nothing to worry about save for finding his father and forcing him to reveal the truth.

"Ok." Present Mic answered slowly, "Just-" he paused, "If you don't like what you find… Maybe think back to what your friend Hagakure said, yeah?"

Shouto almost stopped at the question. The worst he was going to find was nothing of value, so maybe Toru saying he 'wouldn't be alone', she meant consider his still-living former classmates and teacher potential sources of information? But he didn't think that was exactly what Present Mic was trying to hint at.

"Hm." he simply nodded back with a hum, unsure of what he was supposed to make of it. Thankfully, the Hero (or was he an ex-Hero now? Shouto was finding it hard to keep track) took that as a satisfactory answer, and even got the other two not to hound him any further. Even Cerberus wasn't acting completely unbearable. His day couldn't get any better.

And then he found his old home, a traditional single-storey Japanese abode with a steep blue roof and timber-frame walls, battered and bruised and barely standing in one piece.

Finding his family home in such a state was a shock, at first. But then, he thought it through: If one were to try and fake a series of deaths, what better way to reinforce the lie than to show their place of life as so far gone? It was all part of the illusion. They were fine.

With the house so badly damaged, breaking in through the shattered remains of the front door was child's play. Inside wasn't much better; the first thing Shouto saw was their old shoe cupboard, broken and charred in pieces and strewn across the entrance hall. Pushing inwards, he found more scorch marks around the house, walls broken or crumbling, and floors unevenly warped and stained by a combination of fire and water damage. The air smelt paradoxically burnt yet musty, a noticeable humidity and possible mould mixing in with the scent of charcoal and ash arising with every step Shouto took.

The old man didn't hold back making this look realistic. If he hadn't already realised the true intent behind everything, Shouto would have been convinced the house had been attacked by a Villain with a fire Quirk or half-destroyed in an uncontrolled rage. Clearly, his father had intended to make it look like one of those options. But it wasn't really. They were fine.

Venturing further to his destination, Shouto paused by Natsuo's old bedroom. Unlike most of the house, his older brother's room was largely untouched. Looking inside, he noticed the light reflecting off of something on the bedside table, but couldn't make out what it was at such a distance. Shrugging off the oddity, as well as the odd and unplaceable sweet scent that made its way to his nose for the briefest of moments, he continued on to his destination. He was probably fine.

Arriving at his sister's door, a cold feeling of dread wormed its way up Shouto's spine. He wasn't sure why; he knew this entire place was a mere front to hide the truth. He'd already figured it out; she was fine. In fact, even checking in this room would be pointless – it too would be a facade constructed piece-by-piece to reinforce the lies that were clearly being told to the world. Part of him felt it best to just leave it closed and continue on, pursue another angle to find out what was going on.

But the bigger part of him disagreed. Maybe it was all an act, maybe this was all a lie, but he still needed to know it. He needed to see what was inside this room. He took a deep breath. Steadied his breathing.

He pushed the door open.

…

…

…

He closed the door.

She was fine.

She had to be fine.

She couldn't-

Wouldn't-

She's fine. Shouto steadied his breathing. He stepped away from the room, away from the lie. She was fine. She had to be fine.

Ignoring the pitying stares and concerned words of his clearly duped companions, Shouto stepped back outside. Clearly the house hadn't been lived in for some time; it was a dead-end. He had to find his feather some other way. He needed to hear him say that this was all part of some trick. Maybe Present Mic knew of some way to get in contact with-

"Hey."

That voice. Shouto's planning was interrupted. A frenzy of thought became, but for the briefest of moments, a sea of tranquillity. His next steps were erased, the path cleared. But then his mind was disturbed; the buzzing of irritation forcing his face into a scowl. Because then he looked towards the voice. That voice. That face. That man- That thing.

"Father." Shouto stated the word with a clarity he'd thought impossible. Because, against all rational thought, somehow, the one responsible for so much pain was just- standing there. Not five metres down the street.

Glancing back at the destroyed house, his actions were obvious. He walked over to the one who he'd been searching for ever since he arrived back in this world. He reached up to grab the collar of the unfittingly casual shirt he was wearing. He asked one simple question. Demanded to know one simple thing:

"What. Happened."

The thing blinked at Shouto's touch. "… You have some nerve-" the uncooperative source of information scowled, a beard of flames edging onto his face.

Shouto was having none of it.

"What." he froze the beard. Part of the face. But not anything that was needed to talk.

"Happened." he froze the body to the ground, piling on ice before flames could ever hope to melt it.

"To." against everything he stood for, everything he'd promised, Shouto let a slither of his left side out. A flourish of flames from his head, to show his Quirk. To prove his Quirk. To prove he was him. Because getting an answer to this question was more important than any show of defiance he'd ever made.

"Fuyumi."

After voicing the desire to join her brother and his insane lizard-manchild friend on their quest to screw with the League of Villains, they'd soon been asked why they should be trusted.

"Cerberus could kill you in seconds." if they'd wanted them dead, they would be. A bit aggressive, maybe, but it was the easiest line of logic they could use to prove their- well, not 'trustworthiness', so much as 'we don't actively want you dead-iness'. Throw in the fact Tokoyami and Monoma were recognisable figures, who were very clearly not the League's biggest fans, and they had a compelling argument that they could be trusted to be a part of Doku & Spinner's little gang. The next question had been why the two of them should believe Toru's group could hold their own in a fight.

"Cerberus could kill you in seconds." if it ain't broke, don't fix it. As part of the planning, they all had to give a brief rundown of their Quirks; Monoma being able to copy the Quirks of people he's been in contact with, Tokoyami's Dark Shadow with a far reach, sharp claws and extreme durability, Cerberus being an unstoppable killing machine, and Toru ended up having to show that she could turn invisible. She tried to ignore the pain that flashed through her brother's eyes at the reminder.

But with that sorted, their group were given a run-down on the weapons being used. Unfortunately, that run-down amounted to '1) we have guns 2) point the barrel at the bad guys and 3) good luck figuring out which guns and ammo match'.

"Please tell me you're joking." Monoma massaged one of his temples.

"I mean we only stole this stuff recently." Spinner tried to defend himself, taking out what looked to be some kind of pistol from one of the crates.

"Also, we can't exactly practice." Doku continued, "These things are loud, and we don't know any spots in the city that'd be able to mask the noise enough not to draw attention. Plus, we've got quite a bit of ammo, but the stuff's still limited." Spinner nodded along to his words and waved the gun around andohgodit'spointingatus-

"Careful!" Monoma hissed at the careless idiot, slowly approaching with his arms outstretched before carefully pointing the gun downwards to the floor and away from anyone who wouldn't appreciate a hole in the head. "Even if the safety's on, you don't point these at anyone you want alive. Understood?"

"… Noted." Spinner surrendered the armament to the person who wasn't treating it like a toy. To his credit, at least Spinner had the self-awareness to look guilty.

"And is it-" Monoma kept the weapon pointed down and looked at the side, "At least the safety's on." he pressed something to eject the thing which holds ammunition (was it a clip or a mag? Toru had absolutely zero clue). "Wait a sec-" so apparently Monoma was good with guns for some reason because within five seconds seconds he'd popped off the upper segment of the barrel. When he looked back up to Spinner, he wasn't impressed.

"Did you recently try to fire this gun, by chance?"

"Y-yes-"

"I see, and did it fail to fire?"

"W-well I mean it made a bang- I just figured I missed so-"

Apparently, Spinner had somehow managed to load the wrong 'calibre' of bullets. Monoma said something about points and millimetres; all Toru really managed to retain was that the gun was called an M9 and was apparently some kind of machine-gun/pistol thing. After realising how woefully ill-prepared these two were to handle anything more potent than a party popper, Monoma soon set himself the task of sorting through their haul of stolen firearms with the intent of essentially idiot-proofing them as much as he could manage.

No one argued with him.

Instead, while Monoma began going through the weapons crate with the assistance of Spinner and (after a small, non-verbal request) Tokoyami, Toru was able to drift naturally towards her brother while he checked over some other kind of supplies – what seemed to be some medical stuff in case they were injured. But that led to a pressing question:

What on Earth was she supposed to say?

Every passing minute she was less and less sure that the whole 'don't say who you are' plan was the way to go, and she was supremely unsure to begin with. Her general plan was to make sure he didn't die, but that was less of a solid plan and more of a vague goal. Maybe the best plan to keep him alive was to make sure he had a solid plan and wasn't just going in guns blazing?

Considering they didn't actually know how to use said guns, she didn't hold out much hope.

"Hey." When you weren't sure exactly how to broach a conversation, Toru felt it was best to go with the basics.

"Hey." Doku nodded back, "You don't want to help out with-" he gestured vaguely at the other three.

"Oh yeah." she nodded seriously, "Good point. Who wouldn't want to listen to technical jargon and help sort through dangerous weapons you don't know how to use."

"Fair point." he nodded in understanding. "So. Uh, can I help you with something or…?"

Despite already feeling like this was one of the most awkward conversations of her existence (because, all things considered, it probably was), Toru pushed on. "I mean-" an idea, "any idea what we're gonna be walking into?" keep things focused on the current situation, that was probably a good was to ensure it didn't involve imminent death.

"Not much." but apparently every idea Toru had today was cursed or something. "It took us a while and a lot of effortto even find this place. We're, like.Seventy percentsure it's related to the LoV in some way."

"Seventy percent?" Toru deadpanned.

"Sixty, minimum." she honestly wasn't sure whether that was genuinely impressive in this world or her brother was just overconfident oh wait they were planning to fight the League of Villains with two people and some guns it's the latter. "We questioned a whole bunch of criminals; vandals, drug-dealers, pick-pockets, you name it. Thought casting a wider net would give us a decent chance of finding someone who knew something."

"Huh." Toru nodded thoughtfully. "That's actually-" then she thought of a methodology that could fit that description. She suppressed a sigh. "You went around beating up any shifty-looking people you could find and asking if they knew anything about the League of Villains, didn't you?"

"P-pretty much." so evidently Spinner wasn't the only one with enough self-awareness to look embarrassed at that. But a moment later, he looked at Toru with no small amount of suspicion. "How do you know so much?"

"Well from your terrible handling of the weapons it seemed pretty unlikely-"

"Not that." he tried to wave off the embarrassment, coughing to regain a more serious ad suspicous composure. "I meant from earlier. You- you seemed to know everything about me."

"Oh-" Toru coughed to think of a decent response. "Well-" the truth was essentially off the table right now so, hurray, time for more lies. "I was- like, a friend of Toru's."

Her brother's suspicion sharpened, "Alright then, keep your secrets."

"W-What?" Toru tried to sound affronted. "It's not- I knew her really well!" not technically a lie. Yet he continued to look at her disbelievingly. "What makes you think I didn't- that is, wasn't a friend of hers?"

"Easy." she had no idea how Doku was this confident. "She never mentioned you. There's no way she wouldn't have mentioned you."

"Oh." Toru wasn't really sure how to respond to that. "I- you think she talked about her friends a lot?" sure, she talked about her friends sometimes, but not an unusual amount or anything. Her brother knew most of her friends in middle-school, heck, her brother was friends with most of them, so there wasn't much need to tell him much beyond things he missed or general gossip.

"Not really." ok so why- "But you seem able to control your invisibility?" Toru gave a small nod in response. "Yeah, same Quirk but you can also turn it off?" he shook his head, "No way she wouldn't have said something."

Ah.

"What makes you say that?"

"Are you kidding?" Doku scoffed, "All the benefits of her Quirk and none of the issues? She'd have been going on about for weeks." he paused, "Well, I say 'going on', sulking would probably be more accurate."

"Someone certainly has a high opinion." Toru pouted, only to be met with a sharp – albeit short – glare.

"That's not-" he took a breath, "I didn't mean it in-" he paused again, trying to find the right phrasing. "The only reason we know the two of us weren't identical twins was a series of scans, tricks, and a lot of flour." Toru still remembered that. Not a fond memory. "Even then, we- she still couldn't know what colour her hair was, her eyes- heck, the only reason we 'know' her skin colour is because our parents are basically identical there." he paused again. "Though she'd probably be a bit paler lacking vitamin D." she had been in the end, though the time down in Hell seemed to have solved that.

"Suffice to say," her brother huffed, "if she knew someone who had her Quirk with none of the downsides? She would've said something."

"Yeah, that-" Toru quickly tried to scramble for an alternative. "That makes sense." so why not throw in a dash of the truth? "I actually only gained this sort of control recently. A bit similar to your whole deal – could only make myself entirely invisible at will about a week ago." it was entirely true, and a bit vague. Something which seemed to leave her brother more-or-less mollified. While he was quiet, Toru chose to try and take the initiative: "Sounds like you two were close." maybe a leading question would get him to open up a bit.

"Are you kidding?" he scoffed. "She's the whole reason I'm here." he looked to the ground, a forlorn frown on his face. For a moment it seemed like he was going to leave it at that, but Toru stayed quiet, silently urging him to continue. "She- we were best friends. Looking back, I'm not sure I even realised it. But the plan had always been for us to try and be Heroes together; we spent whole evenings throwing Hero names around, team names, team attacks, we-" a small blush flashed across his face, "We even wrote this crappy fanfic of us as Heroes."

"Nooooo…" Toru couldn't suppress the moan. She still remembered- no, I refuse to repeat its name.

Her brother just laughed at the reaction, a genuine smile accompanying it. "Yeah, it was terrible, but it was a lot of fun. We pretty much had our whole Hero careers all planned out." the smile turned rueful. "And then reality had to get in the way." he conjured a small collection of tubes in his hand, a criss-crossing lattice of multicoloured cylinders shifting over one another in a mesmerising pattern. "I'm pretty decent with my Quirk now, but back then?" he reduced the complex construct down into a simple, jagged, grey sphere. "And then the exam turned out to be frickin' robots." the sphere vanished from existence. "My Quirk couldn't have helped, even if I'd been good with it."

"Yeah, that's-" she still remembered him not wanting to speak about the exam after the fact. She'd been so caught up in her own nerves to notice, but looking back? He'd barely spoken after that, it had all been Toru venting her own worries. He'd seemed fine, but… "That sucks-"

"Apparently the robots had off switches or something round the back," Doku didn't seem to even register her response, "so invisibility just barely got her in, but not me. But that was fine. I thought I could catch up, we'd just have to take a bit of a longer route." he frowned. "She didn't even get to live the dream a full week. Andwhen she was gone- when she was taken." he corrected with a harsh tone. Toru winced internally, questioning yet again whether the secretive approach was the best. It was supposed to be safer, but the more he said the less she felt able to commit to keeping quiet.

"I didn't keep in touch with anyone from Middle-school. Never clicked with anyone in High School- didn't really have time before I took time off to deal with it all and then everything fell apart. Didn't have any friends outside of school, either. I was just… alone. Every day started to just sort of blend into one; online schoolwork, video games, old TV shows and movies. Months passed and I didn't even notice. The longer time went on…" his eyes took on a vacant look. "The longer I began to think I should've been there. I should've been with her." Toru's breath caught. "I shouldn't be here. But then?" ignoring Toru, he looked over his shoulder, where Monoma was still organising their stash of firearms and lecturing the lizard man about the importance of proper ear protection. "I ran into Spinner. Overheard some fight going on, went to check it out, ended up getting involved after I heard one of them call him a scaly freak. I dunno, I just had a soft spot for people who had it bad thanks to a Quirk changing how they looked, I guess. And then we started- well, this." he gestured broadly round them. "He talked all about the ills of society, and sure, I thought he was a little crazy. But the conviction behind what he was saying, the passion." he adopted a sharp smile, "And he agreed that the League were a root cause of it all that needed dealing with. We got on pretty well after that. Practiced together, crashed some small-time crimes, worked our way up, and now…" he nodded solidly. "Now I've finally got the chance to do something real. Something meaningful. Something- Something Toru would be proud of."

Toru had no idea what to say. She wouldn't have any idea what to say if her presence here wasn't full of supernatural insanity and shrouded in lies, so she certainly didn't know what to say when you had to factor in all of that nonsense. She tried to remember how she felt in situations like this, only to draw a blank because she never had to deal with any situations remotely like this. She had no words which would clearly help, no speeches which would fix his life. So she did what she was able.

She gave him a hug.

It wasn't much, in the grand scheme it was basically nothing. Less than nothing. A brief, seconds-long touch after two years of grief and everything just being terrible. But Toru still remembered all those times she'd dealt with (far, far smaller) difficulties: Bad days, harsh words, hurt feelings. And she remembered that one of the only things which always helped, always, was a simple hug. Hopefully it would apply here.

After the touch, Doku stopped. He remained motionless for several second, before eventually sinking into the familiar feeling of warmth. After seeing how 'normal' things seemed at home, baring in mind how distant-at-best her siblings could be, and considering that it looked as if he was cutting himself off, she wondered how long it had been since he'd had one. He turned his head, but his relieved yet breaking visage quickly broke into surprise. He blinked, as if he was just seeing Toru for the first time- oh goddammit the soul thing-

"I don't know why I just said all that." he blinked again, looking away from Toru, "I mean- uh, sorry to dump all that on you-"

"No no, that's fine! I-" she paused for a moment, trying to think of a decent response instead of just fumbling for words and giving a basic show of affection. Despite only a few seconds passing, the heaviness in the air had passed. Whether because some part knew it was her, or because he just really needed all that off his chest, he'd given Toru the opportunity to say something meaningful. "I think it'd mean a lot to her that you were willing to do all this in her memory."

"Maybe-"

"She would." she insisted because Toru was quite a leading authority on what meant a lot to Toru. "And I know she'd be happy that you've not been alone through this." she glanced at Spinner, getting lectured about safety rules after trying to stare down the barrel of a gun for maintenance checks. "Even if your partner is a bit of an idiot."

Because she was. Sure, she could get mad at the evil lizard man for corrupting her innocent brother or whatever, but the fact was Spinner had given him something to do. Someone to do it with. Maybe it wasn't the healthiest coping mechanism, but it was probably better than drifting through life aimlessly. And it was definitely better than the… other option he'd hinted at.

But while a dangerous and destructive outlet was probably better than no outlet, it was still dangerous and destructive. He was still hiding in an abandoned warehouse with some serial-killer obsessed lunatic packing heat he didn't know how to use and planning on storming the base of a faction not even professional Heroes could handle and the more she thought about it the more Toru thought that maybe this was just a terrible idea in general.

"But I also know that-" she bit her tongue; if she phrased this wrong she could just make his well-intentioned but ill-aimed crusade worse. "I mean, you meant a lot to her too, so-" if he stormed off in a huff or suddenly refused her help for not being 'committed' or something, he could end up even worse than if Toru had never come. "I just think that-"

*CRASH*

Suddenly, they were interrupted by an almighty explosion of glass as one of the nearby windows caved in. Spinning around, Toru soon found the source: A towering, brick wall of a man whose face was hidden by a black mask tied around the top of his head. A tight, black shirt was visible under the man's open, dark green trench-coat, dripping with glass shards of the window he'd just jumped through. Dark boots were planted firmly on the ground, while the legs under his white jeans had already adopted an aggressive stance poised to strike.

"Glad I got your attention." the man's face adopted a savage grin, "Now show me your tongues!"

Toru looked towards Cerberus. At the similarly perplexed look on her face. For what was quite possibly the first time in their entire journey, this ancient, violent, voracious dog-demon was thinking the exact same thing as a deceased High School student:

""What?""

Izuku had expected some silence to be a good thing. A moment to stop and collect himself after the insanity which had been going on for the last few days. Unfortunately, the rain falling on the headstones proved a constant reminder of where he was. The sound of shovels hitting the ground reminded him of what they were there for. At least the thickening fog almost seemed to mute the sounds just that smallest amount.

"So-" Uraraka made to speak, before cutting herself off. Izuku looked towards her; she hadn't been speaking much with everything going on, and her hands had seemed practically stuck clinging around Izuku's right arm. Ordinarily he would've been embarrassed, but with everything that had happened he was honestly just glad. The feeling of touch helped to ground him while everything he'd believed floated off into the ether. Maybe there was some irony to that statement considering Uraraka's Quirk, but right now he really wasn't in the mood to appreciate it. After a moment's pause, she decided to continue.

"I mean- I don't want to distract you or anything, but…" he nodded for her to go on, "How- How does it all… work. Exactly? Like you-" she gestured towards Justice, "said something about belief being important, and where you- or I mean where your body ends up is, so like- Are you still connected to your body after death? Is donating your body to science a terrible afterlife choice? Or does it get you brownie points? Or-"

After some hesitation, Justice quickly went over the basics of how your position in the afterlife was decided, as she had with Izuku. It felt a little concerning how hearing some basics of how the afterlife functioned was rehashing old news for him now.

"So- you're saying I should find out which religion has the best afterlife, and just believe really hard?"

"Unfortunately…" Justice trailed off for a moment, "encounters with the supernatural are something of a deciding factor. Now that you guys have had run-ins with demons, you'll end up in the Abrahamic pipeline short of exceptional circumstances."

"Oh." Uraraka blinked in surprise. "Well." she nodded a few times, face neutral, before eventually dropping into a dejected frown. "Shit."

"I-I mean, Heaven's supposed to be pretty nice, right?" just because Izuku had been deemed undeserving of anything but the worst of punishments, reserved for the most heinous of sinners, it didn't mean the entire afterlife system was rotten from the ground-up. Right?

Right?

"Preeetty sure I'm not getting in there." Uraraka groaned. "I mean, what did Hagakure even do to be denied entry?"

"Public indecency." Justice provided. It took a moment for Uraraka to put two-and-two together.

"Yeah, I straight-up killed someone. I'm not getting in."

"I mean- considering the circumstances I'm sure-"

"Circumstances better than necessary for invisibility?" Izuku tried to think of a retort to that point. After about half a minute, he realised he wouldn't be able to think of one, sinking deeper into his seat with that knowledge.

"Most likely you'll end up in Wrath." Justice casually dropped Uraraka's eternal fate on them like she was talking about the weather, "If you repent for the rest of your life, you could improve your standing, but after consorting with demons," she gestured to herself, Cerberus, and Modeus in turn, "the best you can hope for is probably Greed."

"Guess that's appropriate for me." Uraraka turned towards Justice, "What're they like?"

"Well, Wrath is an endless, roiling black ocean filled with pirate roleplayers." Justice shrugged, "Getting out is basically a crapshoot. You have to sail to deserted waters, accept why you were wrong, fight a great sea monster serving as a physical manifestation as your wrath, bla bla bla, but if you commit any violence, including self-defence, your voyage is deemed null and you're barred from attempting the journey for a month." she turned towards Uraraka, "Considering the current population, getting out without getting into a fight is basically impossible. And if you're sunk or thrown overboard, you get to enjoy the crushing weight of humanity's wrath crashing down on you until you're rescued or crawl back to the centre." she glanced back over the graveyard, "The latter usually takes a year or two."

So, in other words, sinners had to refuse to engage in violence in order to escape, but also had to engage in violence if anyone else was engaging in violence and they didn't want to suffer for potentially years before getting another go.

Izuku looked at Justice with a mixture of horror, disgust, and complete 'I am so done with this crap' energy. "So it's like the prisoner's dilemma but on steroids infused with demonic energy and pain?" Justice nodded at the assessment. Izuku took a breath. "Did I ever mention how much I hate your workplace?"

"Our workplace." Izuku groaned into his hands at Justice's tragically true statement.

A thunk sounded from Aizawa and All Might's direction. Evidently they were nearly finished.

"Not long now." Justice took a breath, "And then we can leave and try to deal with the fallout of this little adventure."

"W-what about the other place?" Uraraka had an urgency in her eyes, "Greed, or whatever? Is that nice at least?"

"Well, it's nicer than Wrath. There's a lot of demons in Greed, but they're not there to make nice. The entire Circle is basically a gigantic office complex, dedicated to sorting through paperwork deemed too low priority and harmless enough that it can be trusted to sinners."

"That just sounds like what you want me to do with extra steps." Justice let out a small laugh at Izuku's note.

"Yeah but the difference, oh little intern of mine, is that I'll be the one providing for you." she turned to look at him, "We can iron out the specifics later, whether you'd rather I sort out accommodation and food and that, or give you resources and you do it yourself, or maybe you'll move in with me, whatever. But the point is that working under me, I will make sure you've got the essentials."

"Is that a requirement demon's have?" Izuku asked, "To provide for those serving them?"

"More pragmatism; you can't work as effectively if you're exhausted from sleeping in the gutter or something."

"Your generosity is a sight to behold." Uraraka deadpanned.

"Hey that's in general, I didn't mean me-" Justice paused, "We're getting off-topic. The point is that you'll work for me, sure, but you'll be protected and provided for, and I'm not about to work you into the ground. Sinners in Greed though?" she shook her head, "Brutal hours, slave wages, mind-numbing work, horrible conditions, no OSHA regs, it's a nightmare."

"What if the sinners don't work?" Izuku asked.

"Then they can't pay rent."

"Mood." Uraraka moaned.

"Fail to pay your rent, or make too many mistakes while working? Incarceration, buried under all the money you made while in Greed, plus a fraction of when you were alive, and forced to climb through that pile back to the surface. Fail to climb back up? Sink down to Wrath."

"Is there any way to get out- well, reach Gluttony?"

"Climb a mountain representative of all the wealth you ever possessed while alive, whether cash, credit or physical objects."

"… That doesn't sound so-"

"A mountain formed purely of yen coins representing the value of your cumulative wealth, but each coin is- well, I think about 4 metres in diameter. Europeans get theirs made of Euros 6.66 metres in diameter, so that's the conversion baseline."

"Ah." Izuku nodded. Why would he ever think it was something simple, or god-forbid something which was in any way reasonable? Nope; climb the mega-money mountain or suffer.

"Plus you also have to face golden spectres representing the damage you dealt in life by hoarding wealth, or stealing it, or unethically exploiting others to gain it, etc." Izuku simply nodded along because, yeah, at this point of course there were ghosts of some description.

"Huh." Uraraka didn't grow angry at the unfairness of the fates which likely awaited her. She seemingly just accepted it with a distant look. "Well then. Guess I better live my life to the fullest." I mean that's not a bad sentiment- "Because my afterlife's gonna be an eternity of suffering." -but that's a more questionable motivation-

"If it helps, the workers in Greed usually become mindless drones after working their first few centuries." -and that's not helping.

"Guess that's the best I can hope for." Uraraka looked down, "My parents work in construction. My Dad came home most days exhausted. Each injury takes longer to heal than the last, no matter how small. My Mom isn't much better. I've seen what a single lifetime of hard work can do to people- good people. But they did all that to build a better life for themselves- for me, so that I wouldn't have to work myself to the bone until those bones started to break." she let go of Izuku's arm, crossing her own around herself instead. "Guess two lifetimes worth of work will be for nothing."

Izuku went to reach for her, but hesitated. He wanted to tell her that it would be ok, that they'd find a way to make sure that didn't happen. But he still had no idea how any of this worked, he didn't know he could help.

"We'll-" he made to reassure her anyway. Did he know they could make sure that fate didn't befall her? No. did he know he could prove her wrong? Of course not. But even if it was outside his jurisdiction? Even if it was against 'the rules' or theoretically impossible to make sure his friend wasn't ground into a husk of her former self?

He'd do it anyway.

But before he had a chance to reassure her:

"You know," Modeus suddenly stuck her head between Uraraka and Izuku; despite being turned more towards the former, Izuku could still see her Cheshire grin. "It doesn't have to be…"

"Modeus, no-"

"Wait." Uraraka put a hand up to stop Izuku's incredibly sensible suggestion that Modeus stop talking, even making Cerberus give up her attempt to pull Modeus away again. When the distant look in Uraraka's eyes regained the smallest of sparks, Izuku decided to relent against his better judgement and keep his silence, gesturing for Cerberus to leave it be. Uraraka turned to the demon. "Go on."

"Well, you see…" Modeus trailed off mysteriously, moving around to Uraraka's other side, "We demons have certain… abilities-"

"She's going to try and tempt you to become her peon." Justice decided to head off any air of mystique Modeus was trying to conjure.

"That-" Izuku turned back to Modeus, before snapping his head back to Justice, "wait, you mean like what you did with me?"

"Sorta. But a) you were already dead," fair "and b) I'm cool." also fair.

"So," Uraraka's gaze drifted cautiously towards Modeus, "What would that entail, exactly?"

"Well, first of all, you'll end up with me after you die instead of Wrath or Greed or whatever."

Uraraka leaned closer to the demon. "… Go on."

"Couldn't you offer this?" Izuku turned to Justice while Modeus started rattling off a sales pitch which sounded suspiciously like the premise of a mediocre ecchi harem series.

"Eh." Justice rolled her hand left-and-right, "I've already taken on three new interns recently. Taking on too many at once is a sure-fire way to end up on the back foot against usurpers, tricksters and micromanaging bosses." she shrugged, "Plus, making a deal with a deceased soul is an entirely different ball-game to making one with a living human. If we want to come to a gentledemon's agreement of sorts that we make an actual deal once she's already dead, I'm game. But not even Modeus would be stupid enough to make a deal with a living mortal while we're in a ceme-"

"Deal!" Izuku didn't even need to look to know what had happened. Murphy's law combined with the wisps of red energy at the edge of his vision said more than enough.

"Fucking-" Justice shot up off the bench, glaring angrily at Modeus, "What is wrong with-" she hauled Izuku up in a hurry, "Come on!"

"What-"

"Take a wild guess!" considering the urgency, the context, the dread creeping up his spine, and everything that had happened recently, it didn't take long for Izuku to realise what had happened:

Modeus had done something stupid.

"Oh, hey." despite approaching him at a rate of knots, All Might's emancipated form was remarkably difficult to make out through the fog which was giving Izuku flashbacks to Tentatio. At least All Might's eyes weren't glowing a menacing red or anything. "We've dug around the outline, just need to-"

"Great." Justice dug a hand under the earth and wrenched the muddy, dark wooden coffin- Izuku's coffin, from the pit.

"… Well that's thirty minutes well wasted-"

"Yeah yeah shut up." Justice cut off Aizawa's cynicism, "Modeus just-" she turned to All Might with a huff, "We're out of time. So eat the bloody bones already," she turned to Izuku, "give him permission or whatever, and let's get going now."

"O-Ok!" Izuku nodded at Justice's words, a bit put-off by the suddenness of it all but still enthusiastic to actually finish their journey for real this time. Then he realised what he was about to see. His enthusiasm dampened.

"So I guess I'll-" All Might gestured vaguely at the coffin. Pushed onwards by Justice after a moment's hesitation, Aizawa soon moved to assist him once it became clear All Might couldn't open it alone. It was strange to see his former Hero physically struggle with such a task, but that feeling was overwhelmed by his own emotional struggle watching his own coffin being opened by his former mentor and teacher.

Do they have therapists in Hell? If so, Izuku's was about to discover a new meaning of overworked.

Hitting a chunk of mud off with his elbow, Aizawa managed to find somewhere to grip underneath the lid. With an ominous creaking, the box slowly opened. Izuku couldn't bare to look-

""What?"" All Might and Aizawa reacted in shock. Looking over on instinct, Izuku was similarly shocked by the box, one now with a thin layer of water coating the bottom.

A thin layer of water. And nothing else.

Justice stared at the empty coffin with a blank stare. Izuku stared at the empty coffin with a blank stare.

""You've gotta be fucking kidding me.""

A/N:

And thus Izuku finally reaches the breaking point of swearing. It's been a pretty rough day for him.

Gotta say, I'm still not entirely happy with Toru's segment; I really like how Todoroki's ended up, short but sweet (well, I say 'sweet') which hopefully conveys the intended effects without eating into screentime. Toru's on the other hand just really feels like it drags, and I'm aware of that, but I couldn't find a decent way to restructure it to be shorter while retaining the necessary information. Because it is necessary that she learns more about how much crap her brother's been going through here for later plot. It's one of those things which would be smoothed out in the editing process if this was written like a book (the longer this goes on, the more I wish we'd spent more time in Hell and had met up with Toru and Shouto earlier to give everything a bit more breathing room), but I'm trying to keep to a schedule and if I did it like that this would probably never get published as I'd constantly be correcting things. Which I especially don't want because there's so much stuff in the future I want to get to. Arcs which I would name if they weren't inherently spoilers. Or like the next chapter.

I'm really looking forward to the next chapter. It's been planned for a while, it's had way less foreshadowing than I should've given it, it's going to be ridiculous, it's gonna be great.

Not much else to say, standard 'please feel free to comment with whatever', I hope everyone has a lovely weekend, and hope to see you in a couple of weeks!