Izuku and the others touched down on the ground a few minutes after they'd lifted off, almost all of them falling to the ground immediately. Izuku couldn't speak for the Vanguard members, but he'd been feeling weak since his sprint away from All for One. He'd pushed himself just a little too far there, and Izuku could barely hold onto the Vanguard. It was a struggle to just keep everyone linked with Blackwhip with what was probably Quirk exhaustion creeping up on him, and Izuku knew that if he was in charge of moving himself as well that he'd probably falter somewhere along the way. Luckily, Ochako was doing that for him with her Quirk, making all of the Vanguard weightless. It was an awkward ride though, at least for Izuku, because Ochako wouldn't meet his eyes every time he looked over at her.

As Izuku landed in an oddly spacious alley, along with the Vanguard, Ochako, who was towing Hitoshi and Tsu, and Bakugo, he all but collapsed to his knees, feeling a sort of throb throughout his whole body. It felt like something left him for a moment, but returned right back to where it usually sat in his chest. It felt like Tempest, the sudden rush of energy leaving him making his knees weak for just a split second. Izuku breathed raggedly on the ground, barely supporting himself with his one good arm. Blackwhip dissipated, leaving his bad arm to fall to the ground, making Izuku groan as he picked himself back up and cradled his broken limb.

"Izuku!" Ochako said, rushing to his aid.

"It's fine. I'm fine," Izuku tried, trying to reapply his cast, but finding that his shaking fingers wouldn't mold the Blackwhip into the right shape anymore.

"You're not fine. Of course they never fixed your arm," Ochako said, fixing a glare at the conscious members of the Vanguard, who were just now recovering from the unexpected flight.

"Hey, he did that to himself," Twice said.

"Have you had a broken arm for two days?" Hitoshi asked, looking at the arm in question with wide eyes.

"Yeah, but it's not like I was conscious for the whole time," Izuku said, waving his good hand in dismissal.

"What do you mean you weren't conscious?" Ochako asked, her eyebrows lowering as she looked back at Izuku.

"Ochako, it's fine. I just need to get to a hospital as soon as we drop these guys off," Izuku said, gesturing with his head toward the Vanguard.

Immediately, all of the conscious Vanguard members looked at him with hesitant expressions. It was then that it must have occurred to Izuku's friends that they were in the company of the same Villains that had orchestrated the attack on their summer camp, as they all jumped to attention and positioned themselves between them and Izuku. He sighed, having expected this to be an issue as soon as he'd jumped to Ochako. He met Tenko's eyes, those sad, mistrusting eyes, and did his best to reassure him through the small smile he let grow on his face.

"Guys, it's okay. I brought them for a reason. They're not going to attack us," Izuku said, pushing through the barrier of his friends.

"How can you know that?" Bakugo asked, his hands ready to fire if need be.

"Because they're not the ones who were in control. There was someone else pulling the strings. But, All Might's handling him now. Trust me when I say that these people want to be better. Tenko, tell them," Izuku said, turning to Tenko.

"I … don't know anymore," Tenko said, shifting his gaze away from Izuku.

"What do you mean?" Izuku said, taking a hesitant step back.

"I still want to do all the things you said, but I don't know how I can. I'm a wanted killer. We're all murderers and thieves. They'll lock us up, Midoriya," Tenko said.

Izuku could tell by the expressions on the rest of the Vanguard's faces that they understood that, too. They'd all known this, at least on some level, when they'd agreed to go with him. They didn't want to be Heroes. They didn't want to be better people. They wanted the punishment that was deserved for their actions. Izuku knew it, too, but had tried to be optimistic for them. He'd known that they'd have to serve time, and had convinced them to come with him anyway. He knew that Tenko and Stain would likely catch the biggest sentence, Stain having killed several Heroes, including a child, and Tenko having orchestrated several terrorist attacks over the last months. They were probably being put away for life. The rest probably had a few murder or theft charges between them, and would likely be released on good behavior in a few years. But, they were all still going away.

"You all knew what would need to happen, but came with me anyway. No matter how influenced you were by the views you were brought up to believe in, you still did commit those crimes, and you do have to be punished. But, willingly taking responsibility for them and accepting the consequences is what will prove that you've changed," Izuku said, nodding at each of the Vanguard.

Izuku turned back to his friends to see them looking at the Vanguard with mixed feelings. It was clear that Ochako and Hitoshi were seeing them through the lens that Izuku now did, that they were seeking punishment and weren't the exact same people that had troubled them these past months. Tsu and Bakugo, however, looked a little harder to convince. Even then, Izuku could understand where those two were coming from. Tsu was understanding, but they were also pragmatic, and still knew that these people were dangerous criminals in need of detainment. Bakugo was probably just pissed that he didn't get to fight any of them.

When Bakugo let his hands hang, Izuku knew that he could relax. He let himself sigh, but with that sigh came legitimate fatigue. Izuku knew that he'd overexerted himself with One for All, but he'd really done himself in with his use of Blackwhip, as having it constantly doing something wasn't something he'd trained. All this time, Izuku had been using his Quirks that weren't One for All in short bursts when he needed them, but he really should've been training extended and constant use. He'd also awakened a new Quirk that night, and using Smokescreen right had taken up a fair bit of energy and concentration. All that being considered, Izuku needed a doctor and a nap, but he couldn't get either of those until Tenko and the others were under arrest, as bad as that sounded.

"Let's get you to a police station," Izuku said.

"Let's," Stain said.

The walk to the nearest precinct wasn't far. On the way, Izuku learned that he was in Kamino Ward, which was a shock. As the group of them walked, Ochako fretted over his arm. Izuku tried to persuade her to leave him be, but knew that the last time they'd seen each other, he'd been at Dabi's fingertips, being traded for Hitoshi and Bakugo. That mustn't have felt good. Izuku, during their walk, realized that he had to talk to his friends about what he'd done, and apologize for leaving them like that. Even after Ochako had scolded him for abandoning her when they said they'd face the world together, he'd done it again. Stupid Izuku. When the group got to the precinct, Bakugo went to open the front doors.

"Stop!" Izuku said, beginning to walk away from the doors.

"What?" Bakugo quietly screeched at him as he and the others followed.

"You four can't go in there. I don't know how you managed to find us, but it can't have been legal to do what you did. You should go home," Izuku said.

"You can't be serious," Hitoshi said, a prominent frown on his face at the thought.

"I am. You all helped me tremendously, and I'll be grateful forever, but we'll see each other again tonight at the earliest, tomorrow at the latest. These guys are probably going away for a long time, and I don't know if I'll have the ability to visit. Plus, if this is gonna work, it needs to be the Vanguard themselves that hand me and themselves over to the police. So, no credit for you, Bakugo," Izuku said, getting a huff out of the blond.

"Alright, but be careful. Don't do anything stupid … Izuku," Bakugo said, giving him a look that could've held so many meanings, but Izuku just took to mean 'I hate this'.

"C'mon, Katsuki, you know me," Izuku said, beginning to back away from the group toward the doors.

After that, Bakugo — though Izuku really was considering just calling him Katsuki from now on since he was pretty sure that they were fairly close to being friends again — left. Ochako, Hitoshi and Tsu stayed for a while, each giving him the tightest hugs possible before joining him in walking toward wherever the nearest train station was. That left Izuku with the Vanguard, all standing outside a police precinct. He knew it was probably strange to see a bunch of people decked out in equipment that wouldn't be out of place on a Hero and a kid with a bloodied, mangled arm standing outside the police precinct doing nothing, but it needed to be him them that walked through the door first, otherwise it would just seem like Izuku had escaped and those dastardly Villains were chasing him.

"You ready?" Izuku asked, turning to Tenko and his allies.

"No," Tenko said, but started walking toward the door anyway.

Tenko went first, then Stain. Izuku walked in behind them, pushing the half-closed door away from his bad arm with his good one. Toga and Twice flanked him, Dabi and Kurogiri being held by Stain and Twice respectively. The bunch of them entered the police precinct, seeing that it was a chaotic whirlwind of movement and shouting, likely because of the massive battle that could have still been taking place a few kilometers away. Izuku frowned at that, not realizing that the big battles that he'd seen on television during his childhood would cause such a big ruckus in the more mundane offices that dealt with this kind of stuff. The more you know.

That movement, though, stopped when Izuku and the Vanguard walked in. Everyone stared at them, nobody moving until Tenko spoke up.

"My name is … Tomura Shigaraki. These are my allies. We're the ones that caused the destruction in your city. We're turning ourselves in, and handing over our hostage, Izuku Midoriya," Tenko said. Izuku felt a wave of sympathy for him when he stumbled over his name.

A few officers immediately drew their weapons. Tenko clenched his fists at that, and the other Vanguards each began to up the ante and respond in their own way. Stain and Toga drew their blades and Twice and Tenko prepared to use their Quirks. Izuku went to warn them about fighting back, but was surprised to see Tenko let his hands relax as he raised them, putting his hands up by his head. Stain eyed him before sheathing his sword and doing the same. Then, one by one, all the Vanguards relaxed and surrendered.

It all happened in what felt like two seconds after that. Officers came and put all the Vanguards in handcuffs, informed them of their rights and took them away. The Vanguards let it happen, but the more eccentric members of the group began to talk back and be smart with the officers, which Izuku could tell they were barely tolerating. Izuku and Tenko met eyes one last time before he was taken away, and a different officer approached Izuku.

"Excuse me, is that exposed muscle?" the officer asked.

"Oh, yeah. I need a doctor immediately," Izuku said.

The officers quickly called him an ambulance. While Izuku waited, he tried to ask the officers the results of the fight he'd retreated from, but he found that he was fading from the battle-high wearing off as he was allowed to really relax for the first time in what felt like days. He supposed it had been days. Izuku was anesthetized as soon as he was put in the ambulance, blacking out from the gas they gave him almost immediately.

When Izuku drifted off to sleep, he ended up in the strange in-between world that was the vestiges' realm. He was alone, and his body took the form of himself, in his UA uniform. That was odd, but Izuku accepted it. This place was essentially Izuku's own mind, so he could look however he wanted. It was a realization that his own default mental image of himself was in his school uniform, though, and not as a Hero. En's talk with him those months ago really did wonders for his hero complex. Though, he may have still needed to work on that if the events of the last few days were anything to go by. Izuku's mind was remarkably clear in the vestige realm, and that was what allowed him to hear his name being said behind him.

"Izuku," the voice said, so recognizable as Lariat that he didn't even need to turn around to confirm it.

"You're here," Izuku said, feeling a little choked up. He'd not seen him in months, and he had a feeling why he was talking to him now. He'd been the first vestige to talk to Izuku, so he felt a kind of connection with Lariat that was special to them.

"I'm here. I'm sorry for not letting you know what was happening, or that we'd be gone for so long. Us ghosts were in a bind, and made a decision without your input. I hope you understand," Lariat said, looking down at Izuku with a small, fond smile.

"I do. I just didn't, before. So, you're talking to me right now, does that mean …?" Izuku trailed off hoping that he'd get what he meant.

"The presence of All for One in the vestige realm is gone. It must have retreated on instinct when Yagi started fighting the main body," Lariat said.

Izuku realized something, and facepalmed. He groaned, letting his shoulders sag as he let his frustration at himself out. Lariat laughed at him, a good natured laugh, and he seemed to already understand what he was thinking of.

"All Might! I can't believe I just left him to take on All for One alone!" Izuku exclaimed.

"It's okay. I bet he's thinking the same thing about your own encounter with that Devil," Lariat laughed.

Izuku was sobered by the reminder of what had happened between him and All for One, what he'd learned from him. He looked down at the non-existent ground, trying to figure out if he should tell the vestiges about what he knew. It seemed like they had a link with him at most times, knowing everything that One for All's past and current users knew, but they'd been dormant. Did they know? Did he want them to know? Would they take their Quirks away if they knew what he'd come from?

"If you're worrying about your parentage, don't. To be honest, I think En clocked you the minute you showed up here. Yoichi had a feeling as well, based on your Quirk," Lariat said.

"You knew I had a Quirk? And didn't tell me?" Izuku asked.

"It was just Yoichi at first, 'cause he's got some weird connection with One for All and whoever it's with that we other vestiges don't. Must have something to do with being the oldest, the first. Way back when, as you asked what killed those of us that didn't fight All for One, Hikage was gonna tell you, but we knew that you weren't ready yet. It would've messed you up, and you didn't need that at the time. Now, though, you've grown, so I think you deserve to know. It's just a pity that the truth had to come from that old windbag, though," Lariat explained.

"So … what did kill the others?" Izuku asked, remembering that he'd never gotten a complete answer.

"One for All did," another voice said, Izuku whipping around to see Shinomori standing behind him. "Its power was so great that it began to be … incompatible with the users with Quirks, and ate away at their life force. This scar came from that effect," Shinomori said, running his fingers along the two jagged scars that ran like lightning bolts down the left side of his face.

"So, what? One for All kills people with Quirks? Are you saying that I'll have to pass it onto someone who's Quirkless, or not at all?" Izuku asked, feeling like he'd been cheated out of something special, like what he and All Might had, but for someone else to receive the power to save and change lives. After all, Quirkless people were becoming fewer and fewer these days, so who knew where he'd find another who'd want the power?

"Not necessarily," Yoichi's voice came from Izuku's left, and soon he realized that all the vestiges had materialized, each on their own sort of throne in an empty room, with Izuku standing equidistant from them all.

"Do you remember what All for One said your Quirk was?" En asked.

"It's … the power to possess multiple Quirks. You mean to say that if I pass One for All on, my Quirk will be added to the stockpile and protect a Quirked successor from the leech?" Izuku said, his expression brightening at the news.

"Yes. You don't have to worry about killing anyone, or endless searching for a worthy candidate who just happens to be both willing to take One for All and be Quirkless as well," Nana confirmed.

Izuku sighed, relieved that his fears hadn't been validated. As a result of his own Quirk, he'd brought the others to the light and allowed them to manifest. His Quirk would also protect future Quirked users from the life draining effects of One for All. Izuku had rarely thought of his own, given Quirk since he'd learned of it those hours ago, being caught up in fighting and escaping All for One's dungeon, but looking back on it, Izuku was sure that he'd have hated the Quirk. After all, it was what All for One had given him, and even if it was what allowed the use of the dormant Quirks within One for All, every time Izuku would have thought of the Quirk, he would've thought of his 'father' as well. But, with this information in mind, Izuku put his mind forward, and promised that every time he thought of his Quirk, he thought of what it could do for his own successor some day. That feeling, hope, was better than hate. After all, Izuku was supposed to be the Hopeful Hero.

"Thanks. Oh, Yoichi! That makes us family, then," Izuku said.

"Right. My big brother, a father. Or, at least his best approximation of one. I suppose that makes us … what? Uncle and nephew? Or is it technically that I'm your great-uncle, since Rei is both your biological father and grandfather? Technically, he's your mother, too, since they have almost the exact same genetic makeup. Of course, she is her own woman with a personality separate from him, so I wouldn't count her as Rei, but … this has become confusing," Yoichi said, eventually becoming tired of even trying to reason his way through Izuku's complicated family tree.

Izuku laughed it off, even though he found it a little weird to track his family tree back two hundred years with only one generation between then and now. It was also weird to consider two people with extremely similar genetic material reproducing with each other. Izuku decided to put that out of his mind, though, and enjoy the company of the vestiges while he could. This was nice, as he was finally with what he considered his true family, even literally in Yoichi's case.

Looking over at All Might's half-complete vestige hit Izuku with a wave of feeling. It was clear that it couldn't communicate like the others, so resorted to using some sort of empathic forced understanding to get its point across. It was kind of dehumanizing to call the vestige an 'it', Izuku realized, and amended his thoughts of it to as if he really were All Might. The vestige sent a feeling of comfort at Izuku, of welcoming, of acceptance. Izuku appreciated it, and felt that he should talk with the physical All Might when he woke up.

As he thought this, he looked around at the vestiges. He met Sankitsuo's eyes, who was finally meeting his back. Izuku frowned at the vestige, but Sankitsuo held strong, not turning away as the two glared at each other.

"Uh, what's up with you two?" Lariat asked.

"We spoke two days ago. I refused to give him my power for a fight that had already been won," Sankitsuo said.

"He sassed me and was being difficult. I had just lost consciousness in my fight with Muscular, and I thought I was about to die. I had no way of knowing that Ochako had come to help. I asked him for Fa Jin to blow Muscular away, and even offered to let him take it away after I was done, but he was mean about it," Izuku said.

"Well, that's the cranky soldier he was in life," Shinomori said, smiling slightly at his predecessor.

"You wouldn't be smiling if you knew what he said about you," Izuku said, feeling that the vindictive part of him grew just a little bit. Hitoshi would be proud.

Shinomori looked at him with a puzzled expression, but that faded when he looked down at Izuku's body. Izuku followed his gaze to see that he was fading away, returning to consciousness. He looked back out at the vestiges, all assembled and talking to him for the first time in months, and smiled. This was what he'd missed, the dynamic of a real family.

"I ... love you all," Izuku muttered, not entirely a conscious decision on his part. He teared up as he realized that he'd simply said what he'd been wanting to say for a long time now.

"We love you, too, Izuku. We'll be with you forever, always remember that," Nana's voice said.

"See ya, little man. Check back in soon!" Lariat all but yelled.

"Goodbye for now, Izuku. I hope we can talk again soon," Yoichi said.

"Farewell," was the goodbye of both En and Shinomori, short and simple.

Izuku watched them begin talking to each other as he faded. He noticed that Sankitsuo hadn't said goodbye, likely because he still didn't approve of Izuku fully, but he'd come around. All Might's vestige and the second had never truly spoken to him at all, the second never even making an appearance for him like the others had. Izuku would make both the second and third users love him if he had to. He heard his real voice laugh, a good deal scratchier than his voice in the vestige realm, and eventually all became white as he opened his true eyes.

When Izuku's vision cleared, it was to the familiar white ceiling of a hospital room. At least it wasn't Recovery Girl's infirmary this time. He blinked the sleep out of his eyes and turned his head to the side, seeing that there was a nurse fiddling with some kind of checklist as she checked on Izuku's condition. He looked up at her, and must have accidentally startled her, because she took a step back and let out a noise of surprise.

"You're awake! Good. I'll let you rest for a moment before the doctor comes," she said.

"No. Bring him in now," Izuku said, causing the nurse to look at him strangely.

The nurse hesitated for a moment, but gave into his request. She walked out of the room, allowing him to see out into the hall for a moment, and a tinge of disappointment rang out from his heart when he couldn't see anyone he knew. Izuku was well aware that he didn't even know how much time had passed between his last waking memory and that moment, and that he didn't know who among the staff of UA counted as a legal guardian for him and who among the students would be allowed to visit him, and that he had just woken up and not spoken to a doctor yet, so he should suspend all thoughts of others until he knew exactly what was going on with himself. It was just … hard to think about himself, knowing the things he knew. Izuku decided that he wouldn't be like that, and that he'd just learn to think about the good, instead of agonizing over the bad.

The doctor came in after a moment, and Izuku found himself dreading what he'd say based on the grim expression on his face. He walked into the room and met Izuku's eyes, the gray irises dark and serious. Izuku took a deep breath, in and out, and readied himself for bad news.

"Hello, Midoriya. How'd you sleep?" the doctor asked.

"Alright, I guess," Izuku answered.

"Any pain? Discomfort?" he asked again.

"No," Izuku replied.

"Good. My name is Dr Isha, I've been the one overseeing your recovery. You really did a number on yourself, kid. Completely shattered your humerus and radius, tore a lot of the muscles in your legs and you were extremely dehydrated. Not to mention the skin on your broken arm was gone, and the muscles there had slightly melted. Excuse my unprofessionalism, but what the hell happened to you?" the doctor said.

"How much do you know?" Izuku asked in return.

"I know that you're a student at UA, and that you're suffered some injuries like this in the past, but this is far beyond anything your records tell me about. I know that you were recently held by some less than nice people, did they give you those injuries?" Isha asked.

Izuku debated telling him the truth about the Decay. On one hand, he really shouldn't lie to his doctor. On the other, it could get Tenko and the Vanguards a lighter sentence if they could keep torture out of the charges levied against them. Then again, Tenko and the Vanguards wanted to fix all their mistakes, and Izuku lying would rob them of the chance to make everything right. Izuku made a calculated decision, and spoke.

"Not all of them. Most of my injuries occurred as results of my own actions. My Quirk allows me to empower my body, and I pushed it too far. That should account for the muscle damage in my legs and my broken bones. My new technique creates smoke, so the overuse of that may be the cause of the dehydration. The … melting, as you put it, and missing skin and muscle was the work of my captors," Izuku explained.

Isha's eyes roamed the wall as he seemed to process this information. It was a lot to take, and Izuku wasn't even sure that he'd properly calmed down from the experience, but the doctor quickly picked himself back up and collected his thoughts. Isha cleared his throat and looked back at Izuku with sharp, intelligent eyes

"Well, all that has caused quite a bit of damage. Stitching the muscles in your legs back together was easy enough for our doctors with healing Quirks, and the dehydration can be solved with a good old IV drip. But, your arm was not so lucky. Because of the way your bones were broken, we had to perform surgery, and couldn't simply heal you. That's why your arm is still in the cast," Isha said, gesturing to the thick plaster wrapped around Izuku's right arm. "How long was it broken before you came here?" he asked.

"Two days," Izuku answered casually.

"Two days? Did you happen to move your arm around in those two days?" Isha asked.

"Uh … yes," Izuku said, recalling all the times his arm had been jostled, as well as him simply bending it to throw another punch when he'd fought Muscular.

"Well, that explains the positioning of the bone fragments. Kid, your bones were practically reduced to a fine dust. This is what we call a comminuted fracture, where the bone has been broken into small pieces that we luckily were able to save and put back together in the right shape. Some of them were jutting into muscle and nerves, though and causing extra damage that we weren't as capable of fixing," Isha said.

"What do you mean?" Izuku asked.

"We mean that, because of the damage caused to your arm by the repeated breaks in your records, and this one exacerbating that, we believe that you have suffered nerve damage that we aren't able to truly do anything for. This can manifest as numbness, pins and needles or a loss of strength in the fingers, and speaking of a loss of muscle strength, that brings me to the muscle damage in your arm," Isha said, flipping the sheet of paper on his clipboard over and looking at something.

"The damage sustained by the muscles in your arm was similar in nature to the kind of decay a dead body experiences. There are five stages to this decay, the stage where the body is fresh, autolysis, where the body bloats, putrefaction, where active decay starts, advanced decay and skeletonization. The skin and muscles on and in your arm were subject to putrefaction, the stage where your body begins to rot away to nothing," Isha continued.

"So … what does that mean?" Izuku asked, feeling his stomach churn at the thought of himself decaying into nothing. His facial scars throbbed at the description, almost as if they knew who'd given them to him.

"It means that, for all the good our doctors could do for you, we could not save the muscle mass that was lost in this process. We were able to stop it before it became advanced decay and you started along the path of necrotizing fasciitis, but we couldn't create new muscle mass for you. That's simply not within the abilities of the Quirks employed at this hospital. The effects of this going forward may be a loss of strength in your right arm, and a stiffness that should fade with time. I'm afraid that, in the context of your courses at UA, your right arm will be weaker than your left for an indeterminate amount of time, possibly forever," Isha explained.

Izuku felt like he was going to throw up. This was the worst possible outcome. His right arm was going to be weaker than his left, maybe for good? That was awful! How would that affect training? How would that affect daily life? He was right handed, would he have to change that? There were so many questions, and Izuku felt like none of them were going to have easy answers. The most important of the many questions to Izuku at that moment, however, needed to be asked.

"Do you know how long I'll have to stay here?" Izuku asked.

"Your teacher got it all worked out. You can leave today when he comes to get you, which should be soon. You'll need to keep that cast on for four to five weeks while your bones heal. We were only able to do it part-way without sapping you of all your energy, but a few visits to Recovery Girl should make up for that. Every week, you should see her. Got it?" Isha asked.

"Yeah. I got it," Izuku said.

Izuku had mixed feelings. He felt like he should be happy, because he'd gotten away from All for One. He realized that the vestiges hadn't told him who had won between All Might and All for One, just that they'd fought, and he suddenly felt the kind of gut sense that something was wrong. He supposed he'd just have to find out, though, when Aizawa, or whatever teacher that UA could spare, came to pick him up.

The next few days were bound to be interesting, that was for sure.

End of Arc 10: Fever Pitch