Archive of Our Own ^beta

Fic Inspiration:

Shame. 

What an inconsequential word. It rolled off the tongue with little effort. What a shame . Oh, how shameful. Damn, that's a shame. Aren't you ashamed of yourself? That's a shame, he was such a nice boy. Izuku had heard all possible thoughts involving shame, but he'd never felt shame. He's never been ashamed of himself . Izuku had never once bothered to let a silly thing like shame sink into his bones. He couldn't afford it. Survival was paramount, and sometimes, one had to do many shameful things to get by when life only handed you heartache and hatred. There was no time to worry about the shame of all he'd had to do just to get through another day, even if Izuku knew in the depths of his aching chest, he was lying to himself . 

Izuku stared at the calendar on the wall opposite the bed. It wasn't his calendar, or his bed, this wasn’t even his house. He still found himself counting down the days until his birthday. Eight days from today, Izuku would turn seventeen. The years had flown by, and also drifted by like a log lodged in tar. He wasn't sure which was worse; looking back and wondering where the time went, or realizing he'd wallowed in the agony of each day for far too long. It didn't really matter, did it? He'd survived it, and in another year, all his efforts wouldn't be so shameful anymore. 

An arm slipped under his and caressed his bare chest. The muffled groan beside him told Izuku he wasn't alone with his thoughts anymore. 

“Did you even sleep?” 

Izuku shrugged. “Sure.” He rarely slept, and good sleep was even more rare these days, so why bother trying? So long as he didn’t collapse during the day, he'd be fine.

“The treaty talks are this morning.”

Izuku nodded. “I know. Good luck.”

“I want you to come.”

Izuku rolled backwards enough to give his bedmate a confused look. Why the hell would he want Izuku there? Izuku might exist in some gray area between the world of heroes and villains, but he was neither. He wasn't even a vigilante. Izuku was a leech. He survived off the scraps he was thrown and the ‘charity’ he was given. Usually that consisted of food and shelter provided after he'd given some piece of himself up first. 

“Why do you want me anywhere near that kind of event?”

A hand caressed his face carefully. Izuku resisted the urge to flinch away or vomit. A second later, three fingers gripped his chin painfully, forcing him to look into harsh golden eyes.

“Because I've decided I'm keeping you. You're perfect, a blank slate, no quirk, no disgusting genes I have to fix. You've made a good addition to my household.” He finally released Izuku’s chin with a flick of his hand and climbed out of bed. 

Kai Chisaki. 

The leader of the last remaining sect of the Japanese Yakuza, a group now called the Shie Hissaikai. Not too long ago, the heroes had tried to capture him and end his experimental work on quirk erasure bullets. They'd managed to steal his prized rewind quirk, and the little girl who held it, but they'd failed to put an end to the Yakuza group themselves. Chisaki still produced the temporary bullets he'd perfected, but there was no chance he'd make a permanent one without Eri's quirk. Silver linings, right?

Izuku knew, one day, he'd likely try to use Izuku for his experiments, he'd just hoped it wouldn't be so soon. Being quirkless, he was one of the only people in the world Chisaki could touch without going into full rage-panic from the germophobia tied to his quirk. It made him believe anyone with a quirk was filled with disease. So Izuku was the exception. A useful one.

They met by chance when Izuku was about fourteen. He'd just saved his ex-best friend and bully from a Sludge Villain that tried to kill them both. Izuku had tried to follow All Might to ask if he could be a hero without a quirk, because he had to know, but Chisaki found him first, when he was alone on a roof, ready to jump off. He asked the kid if he really thought he could be a hero and, well, Izuku said no. Chisaki offered him something Izuku hadn't been given before; comfort, acceptance, love. He offered kindness when Izuku had only ever been given cruelty.

Izuku wasn't stupid, though. He knew this was wrong. He knew a 30-some year old man shouldn’t ‘love’ a seventeen year old teenager. He knew this was obsession, corruption, and probably perversion on top of everything else. But at his very worst moment, on the day Izuku had been told to pray for a quirk in his next life and take a swan dive off a roof - he needed loving arms to embrace him. He’d needed someone to make the darkness disappear. 

He’d needed a reason to live.

So that’s what Chisaki became; Izuku’s reason to live. 

It didn’t start out that way, though. He offered Izuku a hug, and apologies no other human had ever given him. He’d accepted Izuku’s quirklessness, and told him there were so many more things he could do in life, things just as important as being a hero. Izuku had not discovered those things, not yet, anyway. He’d bought Izuku lunch, they talked for hours, and when he finally went home, Izuku was resolved to run away from the life he hated and the people who hated him. 

His mother hardly noticed, and never filed a police report. Izuku finished the last few weeks of school and enrolled in an online high school free to ‘unfortunate youths’, which was easy to prove, all he had to do was give them his quirk registry forms and they’d accepted him. The curriculum wasn’t great, but he audited college courses on the side and decided that was good enough. Izuku drifted for a while, but Chisaki found him only a few weeks after their first meeting, and the rest was sort of just…history. 

It wasn’t until last year that Izuku began living at the Shie Hissaikai HQ. He had his own room, but he rarely slept there. Chisaki preferred Izuku stay in his room, even if just as a warm, ‘healthy’ body to lie next to. 

Izuku rubbed at his neck. It was sore from last night’s roughhousing. Chisaki wasn’t a kind or gentle lover. He preferred to gag Izuku and leave him covered in bruises, but it wasn’t all bad. Free food, a place to live, and the freedom to do anything he wanted (so long as he was back before dark, when Chisaki needed him). Honestly, what teenage runaway could ask for anything more?

“I told Imani to pick out something nice, you’ll stand with Hojo while we talk. Shigaraki will be there, too, for the League, and I think a few of the big name informants and dealers will be there, too.”

A war almost broke out a couple years back, between the heroes and villains. But before it could jumpstart, All Might managed to kill All For One in the Kamino ward raid. The League was almost decimated, but the balance between heroes and villains remained unchanged. Now, two years later, both sides had agreed to treaty talks, to discuss how to maintain the balance. It wouldn’t stop regular crime, that would never end until poverty and quirk discrimination ended, which wasn’t happening anytime soon. The point of the treaty talks was to avoid another big bad coming around who could destroy an entire chunk of the country with his fist like All For One. It was to prevent a consolidation of power on either side. Just as many villains as heroes and civilians died in the miniature nuke that was unleashed at Kamino. Both sides wanted to keep the status quo exactly where it was, so neither side got a chance to destroy the country again. 

The only problem?

Izuku knew Chisaki had ended up with All For One’s medical experiments and data. Dr. Kudai Garaki walked into their facility a couple weeks after the events of the Kamino raid and offered his services to the quirk deletion project so long as he was given full and free access to Chisaki’s state of the art underground medical labs. 

Chisaki was going to these treaty talks with a smoking gun in his pocket, and Izuku wasn’t sure when he’d plan to fire it off, if ever. That’s what scared him. That’s what kept him in line, and kept him trapped in this fucked up cycle of kindness and abuse when Chisaki’s moods flew at the whims of the wind. 

Izuku was powerless, and he knew it.

“Did you hear me?” Izuku twitched at the man’s biting tone. 

“Yes, Chisaki-sama. I’ll find Imani after I get a shower.”

“Good. Go. I don’t want to be late. Meet me by the front door in two hours.”

“Yes, sir.”

Chisaki left the room, deflating the tension by half. Izuku had imagined someday he would want to keep Izuku around full time, not just during nights, but he’d hoped maybe the man would wait another year, when Izuku was eighteen. Of course, even if he was eighteen, it’d only make this legal, not moral or right. A fourteen year age gap would never be moral or right, would it? 

Izuku decided taking a shower and forgetting last night was better than debating the complications of his situation. At least, that was his intention, before he saw himself in the fucking mirror and winced at the awful sight of his own face. 

A black eye and bruises all the way down to his shoulder on the left side stood out in the blank whiteness of Chisaki’s bathroom. His ribcage was worse - a smattering of bruised handprints and claw marks. He didn’t even want to know what his lower half looked like. Izuku opted to get in the shower and not check the rest of his body. He scrubbed himself until his skin ached, nothing else eased the crawling feeling that remained inside his bones most days since he started living here full-time. 

When he walked out with just a towel hanging around his hips, Imani, Chisaki’s personal butler and aid, stood in the bedroom with a pile of clothes folded in his arms. 

“Good morning, Izu-sama.”

“Was he unsure I’d come find you in time, Imani?”

“Mmmm, Chisaki-sama was concerned you would take too long of a shower. I was instructed to make sure you made it to the front door on time.”

Izuku nodded. “Let me dry off. Tell me the news of the day?”

Imani bowed his head while Izuku dried off without much care for the forty-something man watching him from the corner of the room. This was just a normal day in the Shie Hissaikai. Imani didn’t look at him the way Chisaki did. The butler kept his eyes on Izuku’s face if he had to look at him, which Izuku appreciated. He knew what Izuku was, but it was entirely not his business, so he didn’t say anything about the situation and just went about his damn job. Besides, if he did say something, he’d just lose his head, or get ripped apart by Chisaki’s quirk, so there was really no point. Izuku might be given respect from the butler, but he was in the same place as Izuku here; he didn’t have a choice, Chisaki controlled it, just like he controlled Izuku’s wardrobe, and his life. Imani had been butler to the last true Yakuza leader - Chisaki’s adoptive grandfather. When the old man died, Chisaki inherited the butler’s service, and kept him in line the same way he did with Izuku. 

Everyone in this house lived in fear of the quirk their leader held, most of them just disguised their fear as respect to not only Chisaki, but everything he owned. 

“Chisaki-sama is reviewing this week’s experiments before getting ready for the treaty talks. Dr. Garaki has been making progress towards a variant of the quirk deleter bullets which will likely allow for mutation of the victim’s quirk, to either directly nullify, or weaken the quirk permanently. Thus far, complete permanent deletion is not an achievable goal without Eri’s quirk.”

He grabbed his boxers from the top of the pile. “You know what I’m going to ask, Imani.”

“There are no plans to retrieve the young girl at this time. The Eight Bullets are currently focused on maintaining control over local drug distribution for the temp deleter bullets we do have as well as organized crime distribution. The League had made some small intrusions into our territory and those are on Chisaki-sama’s list for discussion today, at some point, after the talks.”

“Does he want a fresh analysis on the League’s members?”

“Ah, yes. I was getting to that. He’d like a full review by next week.”

“Mmm.” Izuku waved it off. “Easy enough. Now, what am I wearing today?” Imani unfolded the top and bottoms with a flourish, holding them by the upper edges and flicking them out. Izuku didn’t have a butler’s skills, but he wondered if he could learn them. 

The outfit Chisaki picked was a bit more traditional than Izuku normally wore. A haori and hakama pants hung from Imani’s hands. The hakama had been thinned down though, so they would sit closer to the leg than real ones might, making them seem more like slacks with perfect pleats on the sides. The haori coat was deep forest green and embroidered with flowering trees, and sat over a plain black silk shirt. Izuku had to admit, he’d look stunning in the outfit, but he knew that was the point. 

Chisaki liked showing off the pretty things he owned. 

“At least he has good taste.”

“Indeed, sir. Chisaki-sama does have good taste, though I may have made a suggestion as to which coat would suit you best. I suggested we avoid his usual preference for fur.” The older man smiled.

“Thanks, Imani. You’re the best. Come on, don’t want to keep him waiting.”

“Indeed.”

Izuku was cleaned and dressed in about an hour. The rest of his time was devoted to covering any visible bruising with makeup. Izuku had a whole vanity in his personal quarters, one of those fancy tables with a giant mirror, lights, and its own matching chair. Chisaki spoiled him, but only so he could use Izuku exactly how he wanted, and Izuku could hide the evidence later. Imani stayed with him, offering quiet side conversations while holding a tray of fruits and breakfast foods for Izuku to snack on while fixing his face. 

When he finished, it would be highly unlikely anyone who didn’t know him would be able to tell he had makeup on. Izuku had spent the better part of his childhood perfecting his makeup artistry skills. His mother used to fuss if he came out covered in bruises, mostly about the idea of her ‘perfect apartment’ having even a drop of blood anywhere. So he bought a basic makeup kit after saving up his meager allowance and she’d stopped complaining when she stopped seeing the problem. 

Chisaki didn’t like seeing the bruises either, not during the day. At night, he’d sometimes poke at them for hours, just watching Izuku twitch and wince while doing other things at the same time. Izuku tried not to think about it during the day, when he didn’t have to, when he could pretend he was a normal teenager…who just so happened to live in a major criminal organization’s HQ.

“I think that’s as good as it’s going to get.” Izuku sighed as he settled back into the vanity chair, his bruised arms tired from being held up while he worked. Thankfully, he was wearing full coverage clothing. Chisaki probably picked it on purpose. Izuku didn’t have to put makeup on his arms or legs or even his chest since he was covered up. Imani probably also considered this when helping pick the outfit out.

“You look perfect. I was just about to say we need to get going.”

“Mmm, right.”

Imani followed Izuku out of his personal quarters and back towards the front of the house. The Shie Hissaikai HQ was a large traditional Japanese mansion on the ground level. Below, they’d built an extensive network of labs, but to any unsuspecting visitor outside, they’d just see a lovely wooden and paper screen house, though heavily guarded. Imani helped him get into tabi socks and geta before they made it to the front door with a few moments to spare before Chisaki arrived.

The Eight Bullets and Chisaki’s personal assistants were already waiting. A couple of them nodded to Izuku, though a few either blatantly ignored him or gave him sour looks. Most of them didn’t see Izuku as ‘part of the household’ the way Chisaki did. Several of them outright hated what Chisaki was doing to Izuku, but they didn’t hate Chisaki for it, they hated Izuku instead. They had to. Chisaki would know if they held any resentment towards him, and the outcome would be…untenable, at best. So they ignored their commander’s atrocities and found disgust only in the shamefulness of what Izuku had become, what he’d done to survive. 

Thankfully, Chisaki arrived pretty quickly, which put everyone in business mode.

“Chrono, Mimic, you’re with me. Hojo, you’re guarding Izuku. Everyone else will hang back outside the meeting. It’s taking place at YujiroForge warehouse.” The largest warehouse in the region. “We’ve confirmed the League will be in attendance, and the Hero Commission is sending their top five. Assume they’ll have their own sidekicks and extra guards, likely some third year hero students on work study.”

“Is there any suspicion of a fight breaking out, sir?” Mimic asked. 

“No. We’re evenly matched in terms of us versus them, I doubt the heroes would want a fight, it’d just be a stalemate.” Unless Chisaki decided to play Overhaul, then it would be a massacre. “Let’s go. The cars are waiting outside.”

Hojo placed a hand on Izuku’s shoulder as they collectively left HQ. Small crystals formed along his fingers as he clutched Izuku’s shoulder painfully. He was warning Izuku to behave. If he wasn’t so accustomed to pain, Izuku might have winced at the agony of a fist gripping his brutalized shoulder. The warning hand was removed a moment later as they walked outside, but Hojo remained his shadow, even so far as sitting beside him in the car. It took four vehicles to carry them all. Chisaki rarely took the whole entourage out since the effort to move them all was exhaustive. 

Izuku debated the meeting while they drove across the prefecture. Chisaki mentioned the heroes would be bringing sidekicks and third year hero students. If Izuku had ever developed a quirk, if he’d traveled another path, or maybe if he’d met All Might instead of Chisaki, he might be a third year hero student himself. Would anyone from his middle school be a hero student? Well, he knew Katsuki would be, but Izuku had never kept up with social media when he dropped into the underground after meeting Chisaki. Izuku didn’t even know which hero school Katsuki had been accepted into, if at all. Though he assumed with a quirk like Explosion, he likely got into UA High.

Izuku was a little apprehensive about the small possibility he might see his former bully, and ex-best friend, but he was in a different place now. He…belonged somewhere, even if that was only because Chisaki saw a use in him, and liked keeping him as some kind of pet. Even if that meant the rest of the Shie Hissaikai hated him for it. Even if he spent the rest of his life being used by someone more powerful. Izuku wasn’t bullied, he wasn’t told he should die, he wasn’t beaten for existing. (He was beaten because Chisaki was a sick fuck in bed, but that wasn’t the same kind of abuse - or so Izuku kept telling himself.)

Chisaki provided for him, gave him a place to call home, and in that way, Izuku told himself he was loved. 

It didn’t matter if Izuku knew he was lying to himself.

The car jerked to a stop outside the YujiroForge warehouse, where they’d agreed to meet. The whole warehouse district they’d driven through was empty outside of a car or a guard placed every few hundred feet. By the main warehouse, a line of cars and even some motorcycles sat parked, which is where they drove up and parked their own vehicles. Izuku knew the League would have arrived via Kurogiri’s warpgate quirk, so the vehicles lined up must have all been heroes and the other big shot villains Izuku heard were coming. 

Hojo got out first and offered him a hand so he could step out carefully. Izuku wasn’t exactly used to wearing geta, but Chisaki controlled Izuku’s wardrobe when he wanted to, so Izuku took the offered aid and straightened his suit once he was back on his feet and out of that cramped car. Hojo was a big guy, he took up so much space. 

“Your haori is wrinkled.”

“I hadn’t noticed, Hojo. Thanks.” 

“Mm.” 

His grunted response was taken as ‘you didn’t need to be rude’. Izuku was becoming a master of Hojo grunt talk; the guy rarely spoke. When he did, it was usually offhanded comments or profound statements that put Izuku at odds with his own mind. Izuku wondered if his verbal sass was part of why the Eight Bullets hated him. Mimic and Chronostasis didn’t seem to have an opinion on Izuku, good or bad, but the rest of the Shie Hissaikai just didn’t take well to him. 

“Fall out.” Chisaki called. “You know your places.” He gestured for Izuku to join him. Hojo made a ‘well go on’ arm wave. Izuku just glared at him as he brushed past on his way to Chisaki’s side. “There you are.” He had his full gear on now, mask and furry coat, he’d become Overhaul. His tone shifted, too, his voice settling in a deeper baritone. “Stay close.”

“Yes, Chisaki-sama.”

The front entrance to the warehouse had armed police officers and a SWAT team standing at attention, with an ever-familiar police detective at the center with a clipboard. Izuku recognized Detective Tsukauchi for his many accolades and accomplishments in their prefecture. He’d been given an award for his efforts in the Kamino raid that ended All For One.

“Overhaul.” The Detective greeted. “Glad you could make it. I’ll mark the Yakuza down as present. Are you just bringing three in with you?” He gestured to Mimic, Chrono, and Hojo. 

“Four.” Chisaki stepped sideways, barely revealing Izuku beside him. “Pretty sure we can find our way from here.”

There were suddenly too many eyes on Izuku. Hojo once more placed a hand on his shoulder as Chisaki almost knocked Tsukauchi out of the way, though he never quite got close enough to fear physical contact. The Detective stared at Izuku with unbridled horror seeing a teenager accompanying a pack of villains. 

This was the attention Chisaki wanted. This was the whole reason Izuku was here. Izuku knew he’d be paraded around as some model of perfection for Chisaki’s efforts. The quirk deleter bullets would likely be a topic of discussion during the treaty talks, so Chisaki would hold him up as a picture of the human prime; a quirkless boy without fault. Izuku had faults, of course. But from a medical perspective - he was Chisaki’s magnum opus. 

Izuku rarely, if ever, got sick. He didn't carry any genetic markers for cancer or major inherited disease. Garaki had proven his genetics were effectively ‘rinsed’ thanks to being born without a quirk factor. Eri’s quirk might have been useful to Chisaki’s objective, but Izuku was the end goal, and with Izuku at his side, Chisaki believed he could achieve it - while enjoying the benefits of having something he could safely touch in the meantime. 

Izuku kept his eyes down. His curls had grown out so Imani put the top half up into a knot at the back of his head, leaving the back half to drape down and cover the bruises around his shoulder. Sadly, he couldn’t hide behind his hair as they entered the warehouse. His wooden geta clacked loudly with each step into the gaping warehouse that echoed like a wind tunnel. 

They were the last to arrive, it seemed. 

The warehouse had been converted into a makeshift meeting hall. Four long tables lay at forty-five degree angles in a loose circle with a podium between two of the far tables. The League took up one table on the near side, with a few extra seats left for the unnamed big shot dealers and smugglers Izuku didn’t know. The other table on this side was the same, though there were empty seats for the Shie Hissaikai. The far side of the tables held the top Hero Commission brass at one table and the top five heroes at the other; All Might, Endeavor, Hawks, Best Jeanist, and Edgeshot - though Miruko was in the background as well, as number six. Hero sidekicks, hero students, and police officers stood around the tables on the far side, while several stray villains milled about on this side behind the tables. 

Chisaki took his place along with Mimic and Chrono. Izuku stood where he was always to stand, just behind Chisaki to the right, with Hojo in the same place behind Izuku. Again, several eyes stared at Chisaki and his accompanying minor. Izuku was small for his age, and barely looked fifteen, despite being seventeen next week. He was also the only member of the Shie Hissaikai who didn’t wear a mask. Someone finally moved after they arrived, a flash of black and orange. Izuku’s eyes flicked up. 

Katsuki Bakugo stared at Izuku with unbridled rage as Endeavor grabbed his arm to hold him in place behind the table. A sidekick, Burnin’, took Katsuki’s shoulders and hauled him backwards, but he never once took his eyes off Izuku. If he was saying something, Izuku didn’t hear it from across the tables but his mouth was moving, that much was obvious. 

Chisaki curled his finger in a ‘come here’ motion. Izuku leaned down to listen to him whisper. “Do you know that hero brat?” Izuku nodded. “Who is he to you?”

“When we were toddlers we were best friends. When I was diagnosed as quirkless, he became my main bully. The day I met you, he told me to pray for a quirk in my next life and take a swan dive off a roof.”

Chisaki didn’t respond verbally, he just waved Izuku off and focused back on the room as the Hero Commission president stood up to speak. Izuku didn’t even know her name, and she didn’t introduce herself, either. He supposed she didn’t really need to, everyone knew her position, and her face. 

“Welcome to the anti-consolidation of power treaty discussion. You’ve all been provided an agenda at your places. We tried to keep this as…unbiased as possible, so we’ll be taking turns speaking. The order was picked by drawing lots, so I hope no one has any qualms with random selection. That being said, our first order of business will be addressing the issue of the rather unstable underground that All For One left as his power vacuum was destroyed. We’d like to ask the League and the Yakuza to speak on how this issue is being addressed. Would either of you like to go first?”

Chisaki bowed his head faintly to Tomura Shigaraki, the leader of the League, as he stood up. An aide nearby handed the scraggly villain a mic hooked up to the miniature sound system they’d set up. Izuku focused on the League itself while Shigaraki spoke as Chisaki wanted updated analysis on all of them.

Dabi looked worse for wear. His scars were progressing, and far faster than Izuku had estimated some months ago when he’d last seen the man in person. Magne had lost a lot of weight, though what she lost in weight, she made up for in muscle. Izuku wondered if their brief stint as defunct had caused them to go hungry for a while. Toga and Twice were standing behind the table, playing, of all things, patty-cake. At least they were being quiet. Mr. Compress and Kurogiri were off to the side, talking quietly. Izuku could only tell they were talking because Mr. Compress’s hands were moving. Spinner was nowhere to be seen, he was likely outside doing recon, or on the roof. He liked roofs. Izuku hadn’t figured out why. Was it a lizard thing?

“The power vacuum in the underground is mostly fixed. The League and the Yakuza have split territory, north and south of Musutafu prefecture, Kamino ward, and Hosu city. The surrounding prefectures are keeping to themselves. The Shie Hissaikai takes the south while the League holds the north. Our friends in the drug and smuggling rings work within both territories with no loyalties to either.”

Several villains nodded, agreeing. The president looked towards Chisaki but he waved his hand instead of speaking. Shigaraki did explain things pretty succinctly, after all. 

“Very well. I don’t need to remind you all we’re here as a shared neutral ground, and territory disputes won’t be discussed at this time.” She picked up the agenda and squinted at it, frowning. “The first official matter of business is actually an update regarding the death of All for One.”

The whole room went silent. No one really spoke about the once-boogyman of the underground anymore, not usually aloud anyway. It was one of those ‘he who shall not be named’ situations since he’d caused so much damage and death. No one wanted to bring up the trauma of a couple years ago, in case it also brought bad luck. Izuku held his breath. 

“It seems most of the stolen quirks have returned to their owners - the ones we can track, anyway. The ones he stole from people he killed or who have already died seem to have been destroyed, but those who are still alive, such as Ragdoll, have regained their quirks with no ill effects.”

Izuku watched Chisaki’s jaw tighten in anger and forced himself to remain still and not back away. Hojo noticed, too. His hands went into his pockets as if he might comfort himself from the fear of whatever storm boiled in their leader’s brain from the news. A second later, Chisaki stood up, palms flat on the table in front of him. Izuku flinched without meaning to. Hojo’s hand returned to his shoulder in an instant to keep him still. 

“Are you sure there’s no ill effects? We all know that bastard could alter quirks, who knows what he did to them before they magically flew back to their original holders. He could have put some virus inside them. Have you done comprehensive medical testing on these individuals?”

The Commission president sighed dramatically. “Yes, Overhaul. We have. I can assure you, there are no quirk viruses to worry about.”

“Yeah, just the quirks themselves.” He muttered back. She heard him anyway.

“We’re all aware of your distaste for quirks, don’t worry, we’ll get to that. But before that. I’d like to invite Endeavor to speak on our second matter of business.”

Chisaki sat back down as the Commission president left the podium. Izuku found Katsuki’s eyes again when Endeavor stood up. The blonde hero student was still caught in Burnin’s tight grip holding him steady but his fiery eyes never left Izuku. Had he seen the flinch? No, his eyes weren’t directly on Izuku…they were on Hojo’s hand on Izuku’s shoulder. Izuku brushed the hand off gently. It was only a warning hand anyway, it’s not like Izuku needed ‘tending’. He wasn’t an ill-behaved miscreant, nor was he a child, not anymore.

He stopped being a child the first time Chisaki left bruises on his hips, or maybe the first time Katsuki scarred him. Izuku wasn’t sure which was worse. Did intent matter? If so, the scars Katsuki left were worse, they were given in hate, with the intent to harm. Chisaki’s bruises were offered in adoration, obsession; the only form of love Izuku had come to understand. 

Endeavor cleared his throat as he made it to the podium. Ever since Kamino, the old fire hero had gained some composure. Izuku actually thought it was more so the encounter he had with a Nomu in Hosu that tempered his rage. The number two had almost lost, and suffered a nasty scar on his face as a reminder. But he’d contributed to All For One’s death by fighting side by side with All Might, so most of the country believed that experience had left him reserved. 

“As you all know, our prison system was all but destroyed right before the Kamino raid, and it took us almost two years to restore it to its former functions. Now that it’s up and running again, the general populace of heroes will be focusing back on everyday crimes while police focus on small crimes and vandalism. We also have juvenile systems again.” He actually looked at Izuku for a split second when he said that. “So we’ll be trying reform programs for those who don’t want a life of crime. I know this likely doesn’t affect your organizations as you…” Again, a glance at Izuku, then a look at Toga in the background. “As you don’t generally onboard underage criminals. However, keeping the children of this country safe is something we can all agree on, yes?”

Many heads around the room nodded. Most criminals and villains had families or at least people they cared about. A lot of them had kids, too. Izuku wasn’t sure anyone in this room, the villains at least, had kids - but for the most part, none of them wanted kids to lack choice in life. Izuku knew Toga hadn’t been given a choice, her fall from grace was just quirkism and quirk discrimination. She’d been starved because of her parents’ hatred of her quirk, and it drove her to the brink of insanity, and homicidal rage. Someone had made her a villain, she didn’t choose this life. 

Izuku had been offered a hand, the first one that helped him stand up instead of pushing him down. Izuku had been offered a choice. It’s just that the better choice had led him to Chisaki’s bed, instead of hero school. 

Katsuki was burning a hole in the side of his head. Izuku wondered if he was thinking about all the times he’d tried to ‘keep Izuku safe’. That’s what all the adults in their lives said as a way to brush off the abuse and neglect. They were doing this to keep him safe, so he wouldn’t get himself killed trying to be a hero when he clearly wasn’t capable or powerful enough. 

“I will add.” Endeavor’s voice snapped Izuku out of his thoughts on the past. “Tartarus Prison does have warm beds for all of you, should you ever get tired of running organized crime.”

That actually got laughter and a few cracked smiles from the crowd. Izuku had never once heard Endeavor tell a joke, and one that was actually funny, too. Maybe this wouldn’t turn into a bloodbath, after all. The older hero checked the agenda with a squint before gesturing to Chisaki. Here we go.

“I believe we wished to discuss the quirk deleter bullets next, Madam President?”

“Yes. Thank you, Endeavor.” She returned to the podium and waited for Chisaki to stand up and be handed a mic before going on. “While I’d like to ask you to stop your experiments, I know that is not likely without a full scale raid of your facilities - which we all know would be a bloodbath - so, instead, the point of this discussion is to ask you to…temper your production rates. As I’m sure you’re aware, this is affecting villains as much as heroes, and there've been many civilians hit in crossfire in recent months, as well. It’s getting as out of hand as the Trigger epidemic.” She shot a nasty glance at the dealers across the room who all rolled their eyes back at her. 

“If I may, Madam President?” She nodded to the Yakuza leader. “We haven’t ramped up production or distribution in several months. I’m focusing in a new direction.” Yeah, quirk mutation and permanent weakening, something easier to accomplish than deletion since Eri was now in hero custody. “This path isn’t as…dramatic as quirk deletion, but I’m sure you’ll still hate it.” 

Chisaki laughed. Izuku twitched. Katsuki jerked forward. What the fuck was his problem?

“The point is - we’ve been using volunteers for our study. I actually brought my newest volunteer as proof that our work is much more…tolerable to society.” He turned to Izuku and the teen knew he was wearing a wicked grin behind his plague mask. “This is Izuku Midoriya. He was born quirkless.” Several people gasped around the room, shocked that a quirkless person survived to almost adulthood these days. “And he’s going to help me find a way to cure the disease of our society. But! To your point, we’ve been ramping down production of the temporary quirk deleter bullets as they aren’t our primary focus anymore. So, unless you wish to discuss this further, we’ve met your request.”

“Tsukauchi.” The president gestured the detective forward. He handed over a tablet, which Izuku assumed already had his quirk registry pulled up. “Hmm…” She muttered through his registry. Izuku heard a few familiar words from his own file that he’d hacked into a few times. “I see. Midoriya.” The teen looked up. “You have volunteered to be a part of Overhaul’s research?”

Izuku didn’t need the side glance Chisaki gave him, or the grunt from Hojo. He knew exactly what he was supposed to say, even if this was a complete (red: not at all) surprise to him. 

“Of course, Ma’am.”

“And it seems your parents have both sacrificed parental rights. As you are quirkless, that makes you your own agent in the eyes of the government at fourteen, you’re seventeen now, is that correct?” He nodded. “Then I have no issue with it-”

“What?!” Katsuki barked from the back. 

“Excuse me, young man-”

Katsuki cut her off again. “He’s a teenager, you can’t let that fucking freak experiment on him!”

“Have you not studied civil law, boy? Teenager or not, he’s quirkless. If quirkless individuals have no parental claim after the age of fourteen, they are considered legal agents of their own authority - effectively, adults. If he wants to volunteer for some medical experiment I’m sure will be a problem later, there’s no legal reason to stop him until the legalities of that experiment itself come into question.”

“Then question it! You know what he did to Eri, why do you think it will be any different with a regular kid?”

“He’s quirkless.” She sighed. “From what I’ve been told, that’s what Overhaul wants us all to be, so why would he harm someone who's already his ideal citizen?”

Katsuki didn’t have an argument for that. That’s exactly why Chisaki had done this, why he brought Izuku. They all knew Overhaul’s distaste for quirks, his desire to end the ‘quirk plague’ as he called it. Izuku was his ideal, his goal. There was obviously no reason for Izuku to be harmed, right? Of course. Honestly, Izuku wasn’t sure if Chisaki would experiment on him or not, or he hadn’t been, right up until he felt that nasty smile behind the man’s mask a moment ago. 

Did Katsuki forget how the government viewed quirkless people? Sure, they were bully and victim, but did he honestly not think the whole country felt the same way? Or…maybe…had he…changed? No, no of course not. That wasn’t possible. Katsuki Bakugo would never change his perspective on quirks. He didn’t have enough emotional intelligence to try.

Izuku sort of tuned out for the rest of the talks, letting himself dissociate on a sea of thought and regret. They talked about the crime rates, the drug epidemics, and even the crime localization by type. It was all things Izuku didn’t really need to concern himself with, things the real heroes and villains needed to discuss in an effort to keep the balance of this country from toppling over. As a child, he’d stupidly believed heroes could lock away all the villains and solve crime completely. But he knew that without poverty and crime, without a ‘bad’, the good wouldn’t have a place in the world. The Hero Commission would be out of a job if crime was erased. There was no way they were letting that happen. They needed a balance to keep order among the vast majority who were just civilians, to keep them in line, to keep them comfortable, complacent . 

Izuku watched the hero sidekicks for a while. Katsuki wasn’t the only hero student over there, he was just the only one pacing and muttering angrily while Burnin’ and Miruko stared on in annoyance. Off to the side stood two other hero students. One of them, a guy with split red and white hair, was well known as Shouto - Endeavor’s youngest son. His eldest son was sitting across from him at the League’s table, not that Endeavor knew that, but Izuku did. The other was a tall guy with deep purple hair and a weird mask on his face that looked more like a speaker with fins or something, what was that? On top of that, Izuku had never in his life seen someone so exhausted, the guy’s eye bags were darker than Izuku’s black eye under his makeup. 

The meeting went on for about three hours. By the time they finally came to agreements about crime concentration and hero patrol saturation, Izuku was ready to collapse. Geta weren’t exactly comfortable when you weren’t accustomed to wearing them, they took time to get used to, and he was most certainly not used to them. Villains and heroes began filtering out slowly as the meeting came to an end. Izuku hoped they could get out of here without incident. 

Unfortunately, that hope was dashed the moment he saw Katsuki marching towards him from across the room, with his hero student partners right at his heels, as if trying to stop the explosive blonde. 

“Hojo, let’s go to the car, please.”

“When Chisaki-sama is ready.”

“No, now, please-”

He tried to push his way around the table, but it was too late. Chisaki was reviewing paperwork at the table. Mimic and Chrono were leaning over it, not paying any mind to the world around them, while Hojo was left to mind Izuku. He’d grabbed Izuku's shoulders to stop him from moving, but it was too late . Katsuki snatched his wrist to try and stop him. Izuku bit into his tongue but it didn’t stop the yelp he let out from the hard pull on his rather bruised arm. That sound alone was enough to put the entirety of the Shie Hissaikai in the room on high alert. 

Chisaki stood up, and not slowly. “What the hell do you think you’re doing, hero brat?” 

“Trying to talk to my friend! Get out of the way, asshole.”

“He’s not your friend, and he doesn’t want to speak with you.”

“Don’t speak for him, you don’t know anything about Deku.”

That was the wrong thing to say, the absolute wrong thing to say. Izuku had no way of knowing if Katsuki would still call him Deku, but he’d just sealed his fate in some way. Izuku could almost taste the rage rolling off Chisaki at the very sound of that slur. The room was suddenly in motion. Heroes and villains alike, all looking towards the argument, several police officers put their hands on their weapons. Endeavor started to move towards them while Katsuki’s hero student friends backed up. 

Izuku grabbed Chisaki’s wrist just as he moved to take off his glove. Everyone froze. Every single person in this room knew about Overhaul’s germaphobia and his hatred of physical contact. They’d all seen what happened when he lost his temper, when he wa touched by something ‘tainted’. Every single person in this room expected Izuku’s touch to send him into a rage. Instead, the man let out a sigh and placed his other gloved hand on Izuku’s head. 

“I lost my temper. Forgive me, Izu-chan.”

“I want to go home, Chisaki-sama.”

“Of course. Do you want to speak with him first?”

“I have nothing to say to the boy who told me to jump off a roof.” The whole room heard him. Izuku never once looked at Katsuki, not once he had Chisaki calmed down. That would only counter his goal, and make the man angry again. But the villain turned to Katsuki with a blank face and a growling voice. 

“Release him.”

Katsuki did exactly that, but not without glimpsing the bruising along Izuku’s wrist and arm, which had caused his initial yelp. The look of horror he gave Izuku, which the teen only caught out of the corner of his eye, almost startled Izuku - had he not expected it. Even if Katsuki was a cruel bully, Izuku could tell now that he believed the adults in Izuku’s life hadn’t been as cruel. His earlier refusal to accept the President’s decision had proved that. Katsuki simply didn’t understand the realities for a quirkless person outside of the microcosm of their schoolyard lives. 

What a shame.

“What the hell Bakugo, you told him what?” The teen with the speaker mask pulled Katuski back. “Is that true?”

“What? Fuck off! Izuku, this isn’t like you! What are you doing with him?!”

Chisaki had wrapped an arm around Izuku’s shoulder and led them all towards the entrance once more. Izuku curled into himself and didn’t respond. 

“You wanted to be a hero! You wanted to be the greatest hero! Where’s that dream now?!”

That’s what stopped him. That’s what finally hit a nerve. Chisaki stopped a step ahead of him and looked down. He arched an eyebrow and jerked his head - permission. Izuku turned back to the warehouse. Heroes and the Commission agents all stood in varying states of preparedness in case of violence. But Izuku never raised his voice, he never drew a weapon, and he sure as hell didn’t activate a quirk he didn’t have. 

“You crushed that dream, Kacchan. You crushed it the day you burned your handprint onto my shoulder. You crushed that dream when you made me realize that without a quirk, I have no value to people like you - to heroes. But I have a place with the Yakuza, they value me, Chisaki-sama values me for my perfect genetics, so maybe I can help heal this world from people like you .”

“You- he- he’s brainwashed you! Hey- get off me, Insomniac, let me go!”

“Stop it, Bakugo, this isn’t your fight.”

“Yes it is! Izuku! Izuku!!”

But they’d already left the warehouse. Chisaki had handed Izuku off to Hojo so they could return to their respective cars. The look he got from Detective Tsukauchi on the way out was worse than the one he’d received on the way in. This look was full of shame, but it wasn’t Izuku’s shame, it was shame for the way this world had failed Izuku. That was a look he’d never seen from anyone in his life. Maybe there were still some people left in this world who weren’t quirkist.

It’s just a shame Izuku had never met them before he met Chisaki. 

~

The sun warming Izuku’s face is what woke him the next morning after the treaty talks. Chisaki had told him to rest in his own room last night. He wasn’t good with emotions, he didn’t understand them, and Izuku was so emotional by the time they got back to the Yakuza HQ that he’d practically been vibrating. So he climbed into his own bed and screamed his sobs into his pillows until he passed out. The whole ordeal had destroyed whatever confidence Izuku had found since the last time he saw Katsuki three years ago. 

Chisaki sat on the end of Izuku’s bed scrolling through his phone. Izuku hadn’t expected him to be there when he woke up, but a part of him knew that if he missed a night in the man’s bed, Chisaki would come find him later. 

“Feeling better?”

“Mhm.” Izuku didn’t get days off. He knew better than to expect compassion from a man who didn’t have the ability to empathize with others. Izuku sat up and scooted across the bed. Chisaki grabbed his chin and kissed him, hard. He didn’t care that Izuku never kissed him back and tensed under his touch. So long as Izuku didn’t pull away, he was safe.

“You did so well. I’m so proud of how you handled that hero brat.” 

He tilted Izuku's head up and kissed down his neck, along the line of bruises he’d left last night. They’d healed slightly, but Chisaki never allowed him to use bruise cream or quirk medicine because that would fill him with germs and quirk plague. Izuku sighed in an effort to fake pleasure. He didn’t enjoy being used like this, but it was useful to him. Besides, he didn’t have a choice anymore. If he tried to leave, tried to say no, tried to stop any of this…Chisaki would just turn him into a puddle in a bucket, a petri dish of perfect cells he could use. So long as they had his genetic material, it didn’t matter if Izuku could walk, talk or even breathe. 

Izuku wasn’t brainwashed like Katsuki suggested. He knew his place in this world was stuck under someone’s boot. He might have changed the boot, but he’d never truly claw his way out from under it, no matter how hard he tried. There would always be someone to stand on his neck, and he was powerless to change it. The best he could do was find the most comfortable position to lay his head, and hope he lived another day, another week, another year. 

“Lay down.”

Izuku rolled onto his stomach and stuffed a pillow under his head and chest. He closed his eyes as Chisaki striped Izuku’s sweatpants off his body and pressed a hand to the small of his back. Izuku’s mind slowly floated out of his body as the pain struck the base of his spine. Sometimes, he could listen to the birds outside on the veranda around the house and pretend he was being warmed by the sun instead of the growing pain throughout his body. Some nights, he could stare at the moon and the tears spilling down his face would blur his vision enough that he could almost make himself believe he couldn’t see his own blood on the sheets. 

Izuku came back to his body when the room went silent and Chisaki had stood up. He squinted past his tears and watched the man above him zip his own pants up. He loomed over Izuku with that awful smile and kissed the teen’s forehead. 

“You’re perfect.”

Izuku was alone the next time he blinked back to reality. His body ached and every bruise on his body was sore again. His jaw was sore, too, which meant one of two things, and neither were pleasant ideas, so Izuku chose not to think about it. Instead, he pulled on some sweatpants and an oversized t-shirt and wandered into the kitchen to grab an ice pack from the freezer. Imani kept a steady supply of them ever since Izuku moved in. But Imani wasn’t in the kitchen this morning. Instead, he found Hojo making himself a cup of coffee. 

They shared a look before going back to their individual tasks. Izuku searched the fridge for breakfast after grabbing an ice pack but nothing looked appetizing. Actually, he wasn’t even hungry, he felt ready to puke up whatever he’d eaten last night. Hojo mixed his cream and sugar with a clattering spoon in his coffee mug, which was giving Izuku a headache. 

“Do you like it?”

Izuku blinked. “Mmm?” He asked, without opening his aching jaw. 

“What he does to you…you never complain, never…you never scream. That’s what we’ve all found so…awful. You just take it, like you want it.”

Izuku sighed. He knew at some point, someone in the house was going to ask, but he’d really wished they’d all keep their thoughts to themselves. Apparently, Hojo had been chosen as the one to voice the concerns of the other Yakuza members. 

“You speak as if I have a choice, Hojo.” Izuku muttered into the still open fridge. 

“You could leave.”

“Have you tried that?” Silence . Yeah, exactly. Where the fuck would he go now that Chisaki made up his mind? “It didn’t start like this. He helped me at my lowest. It just… slowly spiraled. It doesn’t matter what I think of it, I can’t overpower him. I can’t say no. None of us can say no to him. None of us have a choice.”

“The Eight Bullets don’t fuck him.”

“ Neither do I .” Izuku slammed the fridge shut. “Just because I don’t scream doesn’t mean I like it. The first and only time I screamed, he Overhauled my mouth shut until he was finished. I learned to bite my tongue.”

Hojo shivered, still turned away from Izuku while mixing his coffee. The damn drink was probably mixed five minutes ago. At this point, he was using the coffee as a distraction, or maybe it was self-soothing. Izuku pressed the ice pack to his cheek while waiting for the older man to speak up.

“Do you want to leave?”

“What I want doesn’t matter. Chisaki has decided to keep me, that’s what he said yesterday. But honestly? His obsessive, abusive love is better than the cruelty of my own mother and former friends. I don’t want him to touch me, but being valued for my lack of quirk is the only value I’ve ever had . So I’ll do whatever I have to, because otherwise, I’d probably just be dead in an alley right now.” Izuku sighed. “That’s a lie. I probably would have killed myself by now. Some days, I still think I might.”

The stirring finally stopped. The kitchen fell silent but for the soft slosh of the ice pack as Izuku adjusted it on his cheek. The tall villain took his first sip of coffee and turned to face Izuku with a blank face. Of all the Shie Hissaikai, Hojo was the best at hiding his emotions. He could even hide them from his eyes, which was a rarity, or so Izuku had found. 

“If you did, Chisaki would lose his mind. You’re practically one of a kind these days.”

“If I did, that wouldn’t be my problem anymore, would it?”

“I guess not. It’d be mine.”

Izuku crossed his arms over his chest, letting the ice pack hang beside him. “Would you prefer I don’t kill myself?”

“I don’t think any of us want to see you dead.” Hojo shrugged. 

“Because you want me alive, or because you don’t want to deal with the aftermath?”

“Both.”

“That’s fair.”

Hojo sipped his coffee quietly. Izuku placed the ice pack back on his face. They hung out in quiet understanding for a while. There was nothing else to say. Hojo was Izuku’s guard, his keeper on a bad day. When Chisaki wasn’t around, Hojo had the right and the permission to keep Izuku in line. He’d never needed to use that power, but Izuku knew he had it. Asking if Izuku enjoyed Chisaki’s obsession was just his way of figuring out how to treat Izuku going forward. 

Izuku wasn’t complicit in this, he was complacent - there was a difference. No matter how smart he was, or how good at quirk analysis, Izuku knew he had no way to beat Chisaki’s quirk. There was nothing he could do to say no. Even if he ran, the Yakuza would find him, drag him back, or reduce him to a compliant pile of mush on the ground that could be used for Chisaki’s fucked up experiments. So he did what he could; he dissociated and made the best of his shitty situation. 

“Good morning, Izu-sama.” Imani greeted as he walked in with a tray full of breakfast dishes. “Can I make you something for breakfast?”

“No, thank you. I’m not hungry.”

Hojo moved out of the way so Imani could get to the sink to start washing up the dishes he just brought back. Izuku opened the freezer and tossed the bag of ice he’d been using back in so he could grab a fresh one before leaving the kitchen. 

“Chisaki-sama is in a good mood today.” Imani called. Izuku stopped in the doorway. “The treaty talks went well, I take it?”

Hojo grunted his agreement. 

“Yeah. It went well, Imani. Can you bring me some tea? I’m going back to bed.”

“Of course, Izu-sama. Hojo, Chisaki-sama wants to see you when you’ve finished your coffee.” Not even the Yakuza leader disrupted Hojo’s morning caffeine. He muttered something before leaving that Izuku didn’t hear as he went back to his room to pass out for a short while. Or at least, that had been the plan. 

For the first time in ages, he took out his phone and logged into his personal HeroBlade account, the all encompassing modern-day social media. There used to be dozens of social media apps, but one company bought them out years ago as some global conglomerate and shoved everything into one app. It worked out well, and made life easier. Izuku didn’t really bother with social media - he didn’t have friends. Well, some of his old classmates were still on his ‘friends list’, but that was only because they’d never blocked Izuku. If Izuku wanted to check on the people in his old life, he had a dozen fake accounts to snoop and hack on.

Katsuki’s post from last night was the first thing to show up on his recommended tab, along with several interesting replies. 

@ExplosionGod - @AlderaGrads - Anybody heard from Izuku Midoriya recently? I just saw him with the Yakuza, and I swear I’m seeing shit. That can’t be him, but he answered to his name. It can’t be him, right? He has to be brainwashed or kidnapped or something.

-@ExplosionGod - Last I heard he vanished after we graduated.

-@ExplosionGod - I saw him a few months ago on the street, he looked rough. I thought I was seeing things, too, then some dude in a beak mask appeared out of nowhere and they vanished.

-@ExplosionGod - I mean, what else did you expect? He’s quirkless. He’s probably selling his body for drugs just to get by.

-@ExplosionGod - Why do you care? Weren’t you his worst bully, Bakugo?

-@ExplosionGod - Why do we care about some quirkless Deku becoming a villain like we all knew he would?

It went on like that for several pages. Half the students made remarks about Izuku’s possible situation, the other half didn’t care or asked why the hell Katsuki even gave a shit. Izuku thought about replying. He could. Chisaki had never told him he couldn’t do what he wanted online. Hell, half the work he did for the Yakuza involved collecting intel from social media, so he had to have access to it. But even if he did answer this post, what would he say? And if he knew what to say, what would everyone else say in reply? Still, he wanted to defend himself. He wasn’t a villain, he wasn’t…he wasn’t doing this because he wanted to.

The world gave him a choice, and Izuku chose the lesser of two evils at the time, or so he thought.

A private message popped up in the corner of his screen, from Katsuki.

ExplosionGod: I don’t know if you’ll see this. Your profile says you haven’t been active in like two years. But I can’t believe that was you at the warehouse yesterday. You had vowed to become a hero, quirk or not. I know I crushed that dream but…I thought…I thought it was better than watching you kill yourself for a dream you couldn’t achieve.

Izuku stared at the message for several long minutes. He knew Katsuki would see that he’d read the message, that his activity status had changed to ‘online’. But he couldn’t bring himself to reply right away. Izuku didn’t believe there was any defense for what his classmates did to him, but a part of him never fully blamed them. His compassionate side knew they’d been taught that what they did was right, and justified. They were told that if Izuku tried to be a hero, he’d get himself and others hurt, so the teachers told the class to bully him, to shove him down so he didn’t think he had any chance of becoming a hero. They told Izuku’s classmates to prove Izuku was powerless so he’d stop thinking he had a future.

Well, they’d accomplished their goal. They won the fight. Izuku sighed to himself and finally found the nerve to reply.

Izuku: It was me.

There was a hell of a lot more he should be addressing in Katsuki’s message, but instead, he just confirmed the blonde’s fears. He wasn’t sure where this would go, but he didn’t want to say too much, just in case. 

ExplosionGod: …So, you’re a villain.

Izuku: No. I’m not anything.

ExplosionGod: You’re an experiment, apparently.

Izuku: Look, I analyze quirks, and sometimes I give blood samples. It’s not a big deal. In exchange, I get a place to put my head and food.

ExplosionGod: Did you like run away or something? Why aren’t you with Auntie?

Izuku: She didn’t report me missing. Instead, she abdicated her parental rights. Shouldn't that speak for itself, Kacchan?

Katsuki typed and re-typed his message for a while, the three little dots kept appearing and vanishing. Eventually, Izuku got tired of waiting and threw his locked phone on the bed. Thankfully, Imani came in with a mug of steaming tea and a fresh ice pack. Izuku had completely forgotten his aching body for a moment - what a nice distraction. 

“I’ve had Chrono order some soft gel ice packs for the freezer so we don’t burn through ice cubes so fast. They should be here tomorrow. Do you need anything else, Izu-sama?”

“No, thank you.” 

Izuku swapped the ice pack out and settled it onto his shoulder so he could take the mug with both hands and sip it quietly. His phone buzzed while Imani adjusted the messy blankets. He paused when he found blood on the sheets but neither of them commented on it. Imani shucked the dirty top sheet and folded it over his arm, then pulled the blanket up over Izuku’s legs. 

“Get some rest.”

“Mmm, thank you.” When he left with the dirty sheets, Izuku grabbed his phone again. 

ExplosionGod: So you’re really not brainwashed?

That’s what he settled on? Izuku rolled his eyes to himself. 

Izuku: If anyone brainwashed me, Kacchan, it’s the staff at our middle school.

ExplosionGod: You…didn’t deserve what they- what we did to you.

Izuku: That’s not an apology.

Explosion God: I fucking know that. I’m trying to explain that I’m sorry, that I didn’t…I didn’t realize how fucked up it all was. I thought we-

Izuku: They told you it was justified.

ExplosionGod: Yeah…But that’s not an excuse. I just…I couldn’t stand how confident you were in becoming a hero. I didn’t think you deserved it without a powerful quirk, without a quirk at all. You were always…better than me. You were the heroic one. You stopped that villain from suffocating me. I never did say thank you. So…thanks, for that. I’m sorry, Izuku.

Izuku read the message six times before locking his phone and chugging half the mug of tea in his hands. He was so tired. The apology of one cruel bastard who hurt him just wasn’t enough, was it? Izuku wanted to forgive Katsuki. He really did. The truth was, he missed his former best friend. They grew up together, like brothers. Brothers did have arguments. 

But was this apology enough to forgive everything Katsuki did? Was this enough for Izuku to trust the boy who once told him to throw himself off a roof?

Izuku: I don’t know if I can forgive you, Kacchan, but I accept your apology, though I’d prefer to have one in person.

ExplosionGod: Do you want to meet up? Somewhere public, in the afternoon, like at the mall near our old neighborhood. I’m out of classes at three, no training today.

Izuku: Today? 

ExplosionGod: Is tomorrow better?

Izuku: Today’s fine. Three-thirty, the food court, by the fountain.

ExplosionGod: Got it.

Was this the worst decision Izuku had ever made? Probably. But the promise of a real apology was almost too hard to resist. He wanted his friend back, no matter how badly he’d hurt Izuku. He wanted a piece of his childhood back so badly it cracked open his chest and left his heart throbbing. Izuku wanted to heal the broken piece of him that grew up sour. He knew that the source of healing should never come from the source of the pain, but there was no other source he could go to; what a fucking shame . 

It took a few hours before Izuku was able to get a second of Chisaki’s time, but he was finally able to check if he could spend the afternoon at the mall. Since he started living here full time, Chisaki preferred if he asked before leaving the building, so he knew where Izuku was. Today, he insisted that Hojo go with him. Chisaki was probably on edge after the treaty talks, even though the Commission apparently didn’t give a shit about Izuku’s situation. But eventually, Izuku found himself on the train towards his old neighborhood with his personal guard in tow. 

Hojo read a book as they traveled. He stood with an arm on the balance rail above him while Izuku sat on one of the benches. His guard might seem distracted, but he was intimidating enough without even focusing on his task. Several people gave him a wide berth and shot Izuku weird looks for sitting so close. Izuku had chosen casual wear today, just skinny jeans and an oversized t-shirt. Hojo looked just as casual with jeans, a t-shirt, and a letterman jacket. So yeah, they looked pretty normal, except for the fact that Izuku was some random teenager with what looked to be(and was) a body guard. 

They made it to the mall but Izuku stopped them at the entrance and put a hand up to Hojo’s chest.

“Give me some space, please.”

“Why?”

“Because I’m meeting someone and I’m fairly sure he won’t be excited to see you.” Hojo stared at him, unblinking. Izuku sighed. “He’s a hero student.”

“The boy from yesterday.”

“Yes. He wants to apologize.”

“For beating you or making you suicidal?”

“You really don’t know what tact is, do you, Hojo?” The older man glared at him. “Right, villain. I forgot. Anyway - I’d like to heal even the smallest piece of my childhood, and frankly, I deserve this. So - give me some space. So long as I’m in your field of vision, we’re not breaking any rules, right?”

Hojo sighed. “Fine.”

“Thank you.”

Izuku shook out his arms and tried to push away the fear, anxiety, and aching muscles so he could handle this confrontation, or conversation. He hoped this wouldn't end in a fight, Izuku couldn’t fight, but if Katsuki tried anything… Hojo would make a mess. Izuku checked that all his bruises were covered before going into the mall. He’d washed up and put fresh makeup on, but he shifted his t-shirt to the side a little so it covered his wounded shoulder a bit more. 

Hojo followed at a distance, and actually managed to look inconspicuous, if a giant guy in a mask could ever look inconspicuous. 

Izuku was so tired. Seventeen years of discrimination, hatred, abuse, and helplessness had really driven Izuku to some crazy ledges. Somehow, he still found himself on a cliff of some kind. What he told Hojo this morning in the kitchen wasn’t a lie. Some days, Izuku actually wanted to die. 

Why?

Was there really anything meaningful in his stupid life? His family abandoned him, his friends turned on him, society forgot him, and the small piece of safety he once thought he found now used him for the only thing he had to offer; his body and his genetics. Was there some relief that someone wanted Izuku for his quirklessness? Yes. But was he stupid enough to not realize that he was basically now a prisoner? No.

Izuku found an empty table by the fountain. The noise of the water should keep their conversation relatively private, and the other tables weren’t close enough to be bothersome. Izuku had no idea if Hojo could read lips, but he’d kept his hair down today, so he could hide behind his curls, at least a little. Thankfully, Izuku didn’t have to wait too long. Katsuki arrived on time, hands in his jeans, and a UA sports jacket over his black shirt. 

“Hey.” He greeted. 

Izuku tried to smile. “Hey, Kacchan.”

And then shit got awkward. The space between them became physical, a weight on the table larger than both of them. Izuku didn’t know how to break it, or push it away. It sat there, bleeding all over them as if to prove their sordid past. It was Katsuki who finally broke the silence, but the tension remained. 

“So you work for- you uhh, you work with him .” Izuku imagined he meant Chisaki, or well, Overhaul. He nodded slowly.

“I guess, yeah. Sort of. I do analysis for him sometimes, mostly on the League since they’re his main competitors. But I’ve also done some other work…” He was going to say hacking, but that was a crime, and Katsuki had a hero license now. “Ya know, just uhh, research mostly. It keeps me fed, and safe.”

“But you’re…you’re working with a villain. Do you know what he did to Eri?”

Izuku turned his hands over in his lap and stared at the smooth skin hiding bruises and scrapes. Yes. He knew what Overhaul did to Eri. He knew because he’d seen it. Chisaki had made him watch once from outside the lab, through a two-way mirror. Izuku had never met Eri in person. The very first time he pinned Izuku to a bed and-. The first time Izuku screamed, he’d Overhauled Izuku’s mouth shut, and when he was satisfied, he drug Izuku by his hair down to the basement to show him the ‘wonder’ of his experiments. That’s when Izuku first suspected he would eventually use Izuku for his tests, but it hadn’t happened yet, not like that, not like Eri.

“Y-yes. I know. Most of the-...most of the people in that house have seen what his quirk can do. I’m not…” Izuku cleared his throat. “I don’t support it.”

“But you’re working for him.”

Izuku finally looked up and caught Katsuki’s eyes. “Do I really have to say it, Kacchan?” The blonde squinted, confused. “I’d be dead. I’d be on the streets, begging or addicted to drugs, or selling my body because that’s all the value people see in quirkless people. Or - I would have taken your advice and thrown myself off a roof. Chisaki found me the day I saved you from the Sludge Villain. I was at my lowest. I was…I was on that fucking roof, Kacchan. I almost stepped off.” He still might. “I’m so tired . But this is the hand I’ve been dealt. This is the best life for someone like me.”

“You’re lying to yourself.”

Yes, he was. “He treats me well.” Izuku lied, again. “He treats me like everyone else.” Izuku lied, again . “This is the best place for someone like me.” Izuku could feel his tongue shriveling inside his mouth as he continued to lie. No one could save him from this fate. He’d made his bed, and now he had to lay in it - and he wasn’t alone, he’d never be alone in that bed again. 

“I saw the bruises, Izuku. I can tell you’re covered in makeup right now. How well is he treating you, huh? Better than our classmates? Better than your mother? Better than me ?”

Izuku clenched his teeth and set his jaw. Izuku had always been a crybaby when he was younger. Katsuki knew that. He wore his heart on his sleeve, or he used to. Izuku only cried in the dark now, when hands pressed into his skin and quiet sobbing was the only outlet he had since he couldn’t scream. 

“At least Chisaki’s love isn’t full of hate.”

“Obsession and hatred are two sides of the same coin. Both originate from envy.”

“This was supposed to be an apology!” Izuku winced at his own volume. Katsuki barely flinched. There was no one near them and the fountain drowned out his voice. The blonde hero student sighed. 

“You’re right. I really have no place to judge you.” He waited for Izuku to look up from his hands again before he spoke. “I’m sorry, Izuku, for every horrible thing I did to you. I can’t erase the past, but I take responsibility for all the cruelty I offered you. I’ve been in therapy for a couple years now, thanks to UA. I’ve changed, I think, I hope. My…brashness is just my hero persona, for the most part. I’m not that villainous brat anymore.”

“I accept your apology.” 

But Izuku didn’t need to tell Katsuki that he couldn’t forgive him. How could he, after everything? Izuku wanted to, he desperately wanted to heal the past, and the broken bridge burned between them. But Izuku wasn’t the one who set it on fire, and he couldn’t fix it alone. 

“Can we go for a walk?”

“What?” Izuku clutched at the hem of his shirt. “Why?”

“I just want to get up, stretch my legs. They added a wishing fountain to the upper level. Come on, I’ll show you.”

Something felt…off. Katsuki had never been this calm their entire lives. Even as a child he barked orders and threw cuss words around like adjectives. 

This wasn’t Katsuki Bakugo.

This was an undercover hero trying to pull Izuku to a secondary location. 

Oh. This was a sting operation, likely to get information on Overhaul and the Yakuza, the Shie Hissaikai. The apology felt genuine, and Izuku didn’t regret accepting it. But he might regret coming to the mall entirely pretty soon. Hojo was nowhere to be seen, which was kind of the point in asking for space, but now he wasn’t sure what to do.

“Whatever you think I am to him - you’re wrong.”

“What are you talking about, Izuku?”

“Come on, Kacchan. We both know I’m smarter than you. Your apology might have been genuine, but the rest is an act. I’ve known you since we were born. Did you really think this would fool me once you asked to change location?”

Katsuki sighed. “Yeah. I guess I was fucking relying on your tender heart to win you over. I didn’t have a choice after they saw us at the warehouse yesterday. It was this - or an immediate raid, and I’m fairly sure we both know this is a better first step.”

“They think he’s still trying to make permanent deletion serum.” 

Katsuki nodded. “Can you tell me I’m wrong?”

“Yes, actually. Without Eri, that reality is impossible. He wasn’t lying at the meeting yesterday, which I know is a shock, but even villains can tell the truth.” 

Katsuki glanced off to the side for a moment, focusing on something Izuku couldn't see - likely a voice in his ear. The blonde sighed again and nodded to himself. 

“They want to talk to you. It’ll only take a few minutes. They need to have Tsukauchi test you to know if you’re lying.”

“I- I can’t. Kacchan…do you really think he’d let me come here without a guard?”

“I thought you were a volunteer.”

Izuku roamed over Katsuki’s attire once more, searching for something…which he found clipped to the edge of his black t-shirt. It was small, almost too small to notice, but Izuku knew a button camera/mic when he saw it. Wherever Hojo was, he wasn’t in Izuku’s field of view, which meant he couldn’t see Izuku’s face. He didn’t need to in order to guard the teen. 

So, in hopes that his guard wouldn’t see him, Izuku lifted a hand to the left side of his face and rubbed the makeup off from his eye, and cheek, then down his neck and over his wrist and hand. The whole of his left side was one big bruise. Katsuki sucked in a breath but kept his composure otherwise.

“He was kind.” Izuku finally stopped lying. “He pulled me off the roof and he fed me, and let me talk. He listened . He became the reason I lived. Everyone needs a place, Kacchan. But it should never be inside of someone else. I was right, he valued me for my genetics. But…it’s more than that.”

“More?” Katsuki muttered, his jaw clenched in anger. 

“I’m the only thing he can touch without gloves on.” Izuku pulled his curls down over the left side of his face when a stranger walked by and almost caught a glimpse of the mess Izuku’s body had become. 

“Please - come with me, Izuku.”

“I can’t.”

“Yes. You can. You need to get away from-”

“ I can’t leave. Listen to me, Kacchan. I cannot leave him.” He wanted to. Oh he wanted to, so horribly. On the days he woke up and had to pretend he was in another country, floating in space, singing to the birds. On the days he had to soak in cold water to keep the swelling down. If Izuku left, there would be hell to pay.

“Two minutes. Please, Izuku. They’re upstairs. They need something verifiable. The raid is happening, one way or another. But they need verifiable evidence of his experiments. They just want to stop the experiments, they don’t care about the organization, or the crime. But his work could overthrow the country’s hard-won stability, that was the whole point of that damn meeting.”

Hojo walked past the far end of Izuku’s vision, on the left side. He didn’t seem suspicious at all, he wasn’t even really watching Izuku, his eyes were on his book, but Izuku knew better than to think Hojo wasn’t giving at least half his attention to their body language. 

This might be Izuku’s only chance to do something heroic. Sure, he’d saved Katsuki from the sludge Villain - but that wasn’t heroism, that was panic and frustration. Izuku had been ready to kill himself, so he threw his body at a villain in hopes that it’d kill him, and maybe, he’d rescue his bully in the process and die with a good name. This. This was different. This was a chance to unleash heroes on the man who’d become his nightmare. This was a chance to escape that might not lead to death. 

Izuku stood up slowly and flicked his eyes a few times to the left, where Hojo had gone. Katsuki nodded once and offered his arm. Izuku tucked his wounded side against Katsuki to hide it as they walked. Katsuki pressed his face into Izuku’s curls and whispered a soft ‘thank you’ where no one could see it, and maybe no one would hear it, either. 

They walked slowly, seemingly aimless, pointing at stores and talking about the last time they came here as children. They talked about all the things they’d done since the last time they saw each other. Katsuki told Izuku about anger management courses, and Izuku told Katsuki about how he taught himself to hack and research. They walked upstairs casually and even stopped by a few store windows to pick out things they thought the other would like. In truth, even with a false pretense, this was the best afternoon Izuku had spent with someone in several years. 

Eventually, they came to the hallway that all malls have, that leads to the security offices and dozens of tunnels and twisting hallways behind the scenes. They changed their pace, matching a crowd of tourists laughing loudly and snapping pictures. Katsuki waited for the moment they got set up to take a group shot, and the two of them bolted down the hallway with a throng of bodies for cover. Izuku was breathless in seconds, but he pumped his legs as fast as they’d go. Katsuki ushered him through hallway after hallway; left, right, right, right, left. Izuku tried to keep up with all the turns they took, even a few sets of stairs, but he was lost by the time they finally came to a stop after bursting through a nondescript door which was quickly shut behind them. 

Izuku collapsed into the wall by the door so he could slide down to the ground and catch his breath. Katsuki leaned over with his hands on his knees, panting. That’s when Izuku realized they weren’t alone. When he looked up, he found several people in the room. Detective Tsukauchi, Eraserhead, an officer with a cat head that Izuku didn’t recognize, and two other plain clothes officers that didn’t bear any noticeable quirks.

“I’m so fucking dead.” Izuku groaned. 

The Detective crouched down in front of Izuku and offered a hand. “We’ll keep you safe.”

Izuku slapped the hand away. “You don’t get it! That failed raid where you captured Eri, when he Overhauled the fucking five blocks around his HQ and merged with three of his own men? That’s just a fucking Tuesday compared to what he’s going to do if I don’t come home tonight. If I’m not-” Izuku’s teeth clacked as he snapped his jaw shut. His sneakers were suddenly incredibly interesting. 

“If you’re not what?” Eraserhead asked.

“Izuku.”

Katsuki sat down on the floor beside him. Izuku again refused to meet his eyes. There was nothing he could do but hope they’d let him go before Chisaki found out. Hojo wouldn’t call this in until the last minute, Izuku knew that. The whole of the Shie Hissaikai was terrified of Chisaki’s rage. So he’d try to find Izuku first. He’d start tearing the mall apart if he had to. But he wouldn’t tell Chisaki until he absolutely had to. So Izuku had time…but not much. 

“You said two minutes. You’ve got about fifteen before my guard calls this in when he can’t find me, and that’s only because he’s as terrified of Overhaul as the rest of us are. Ask me what you want to ask me.”

A few of the heroes and police shared glances. Katsuki kept trying to get his attention, but Izuku was too busy trying to keep his meager breakfast of one mug of tea down to bother giving his former best friend any attention. It was Eraserhead who took over, but Tsukauchi had a notepad at the ready.

“What is Overhaul working on?”

“Quirk mutation, weakening. He can’t erase shit without Eri’s quirk so he’s switched gears.”

“How is he doing that without a viable genetic mapping? Is he using you?”

“No. He hasn’t started experimenting on me yet.” Izuku huffed a sigh. “Dr. Kudai Garaki found us after Kamino. He’s been working with Overhaul since then.”

“Fuck.” Izuku wasn’t sure who said it, but he agreed. 

Tsukauchi froze the room with his next question. “Wait- if he’s not using you for experiments, why are you being guarded? Why are you with him?”

“I told you - I’m the only thing he can touch without gloves on, because I’m quirkless.”

“Yes, we saw you contain his anger at the meeting, what does that have to do with anything?”

“Eraserhead…I’m the only thing he can touch without gloves on.”

No one seemed to get it. They didn’t understand what Izuku was saying. Probably because they were heroes. They were supposed to be law abiding citizens. They were supposed to be morally correct. They didn’t understand depravity the way Izuku did. Carefully, Izuku pulled himself back up the wall. His hands shook, but he had to make them understand what he meant to Chisaki. Izuku had to make them understand that this wasn’t just losing an experiment like when they took Eri. If they took Izuku, they’d be taking the only thing Chisaki had convinced himself he could love, and that he’d convinced himself loved him back. 

Izuku tucked a thumb into his jeans as his other hand grabbed the edge of his shirt. He pulled his shirt up and his pants down enough to show his hip and the whole of his ribcage. Izuku’s body was one giant bruise on the left side in the shape of Chisaki’s handprints, red lines from his nails. The bruises dipped down his legs, too, but he didn't show them more than he had to. 

Eraserhead put both hands on his head and turned around. One of the police officers stood up to hold back a gag and pace the room. Tsukauchi stumbled to the side and had to grab the wall while Katsuki stared at him the same way he’d done in the warehouse; unbridled rage mixed with confusion. 

“I’m not his experiment. I’m his fucking bedmate. You just kidnapped the one thing Overhaul can pretend he loves. My only value to him is that I’m the only clean thing he can keep in his bed. I’m cleaner than his fucking sheets in his mind.”

“I think I’m going to be sick.” One of the unnamed officers muttered. 

Izuku covered up and wrapped his arms around himself. He was exposed now, for all the awfulness he’d become, all his shame laid on display for the heroes to see. It was Katsuki that finally got Izuku’s eyes to pull up from the floor. The blonde was crying. Silent tears poured down his face. He’d finally realized what Izuku meant when he spoke about Chisaki earlier. He’d been kind, and then he decided to use Izuku. It was more than just valuing him for his genetics. It was an obsession. Izuku had tried to convince himself it was love, or at least kindness. But it wasn’t, and it was time he faced that reality. 

“If I’m not home in time for him to call me to his bed - Overhaul will tear this country apart to find me. I’m not an experiment. I’m a prisoner and you’re running out of time.”

“This changes everything.” Eraserhead grabbed Tsukauchi’s notepad. The detective nodded his agreement. “Midoriya.” The teen looked up to him. “I have a sworn statement from Mitsuki Bakugo, your legal Godmother, that she has claimed parental rights over you. You’re no longer a legal adult. You’re a minor.”

Izuku blinked. Auntie Mitsuki was his godmother? Inko had actually done that before Izuku was diagnosed quirkless, and then never changed it? Had she forgotten?

“Kid.” 

Izuku hugged himself tighter. “Yeah?”

“Do you need our help?”

A piece of Izuku’s heart snapped off inside his chest. A hero, a real hero, was asking if Izuku needed help. He was asking if Izuku needed to be saved, and he meant it. 

“Yes. Please. I can’t…I can’t convince myself it doesn’t hurt anymore.” 

He’d been having a calm conversation about killing himself in the kitchen this morning. That was pretty ‘at the end of his rope’ in Izuku’s mind. He knew he wanted to die. He wanted to end this…agony. He wanted to make it stop, but he’d believed this was his only option in life. And because it wasn’t as bad as being outwardly hated, he thought he could tolerate it. 

“I have to go. I have to go back. I can’t keep him waiting. We’ll all be dead.”

“Mmm, yes. Go. Bakugo - take him back, do your best to make it look like his guard just lost you both for a while. Kid - Izuku. Hang in there. We’ll get you out as fast as we can.”

Katsuki grabbed his arm and they were running again, back down the hallways towards the surface. Izuku didn’t have time to process what he’d been told, what he’d said. He told them the truth. He told them everything. He’d exposed himself to the heroes and this time, they were going to help him. They were going to save him. Right?

“Does he have access to your phone?” Izuku shook his head. “I’ll text you when we’re coming. I don’t know when- how long it will take to prep. They want to try stealth, to prevent another Overhaul disaster.”

“He’ll kill everyone if-”

“Yeah, we got it.” Katsuki slowed them to a walk when they got back to the second floor hallway. “Just do what you can to hang on while we get this planned out. It might take a few days.”

“Okay.”

Hojo came running up to them a few moments later when they were walking past one of Izuku’s favorite hero merch stores. The older man panted for breath, panic in his eyes. Izuku swallowed back his emotions and put on a mask of concern. 

“Hojo? What’s wrong?”

“Where the fuck have you been?” He grabbed Izuku’s wrist and jerked him away from Katsuki. 

“Hey, what the fuck, asshole?”

“What did you do to him, hero brat?”

“Fucking nothing, we’ve been in the damn store looking for All Might merch. The nerd’s a hero buff, or are you just an inept bodyguard who knows nothing about him?”

Hojo looked down at Izuku and silently asked for the truth. Izuku shrugged. 

“We were just looking for the silver age All Might action figure. They didn’t have it. It’s rare, from like twenty years ago. I used to have a collection.” Always be specific when you lie. Izuku really wished he didn’t have to be such a good liar. “Maybe Chisaki-sama can order it for me?”

“Yeah. Fine. We’re leaving. You’re lucky I didn’t call this in. Move.”

“Hey, what the hell?!”

“Bye Kacchan!”

Hojo pulled him close as they left, anxiety clear on his features. Izuku half stumbled behind him since they were going at a rather clipped pace and he was already exhausted from his two earlier runs. Thankfully, Hojo didn’t seem bothered by this, he likely discounted it as Izuku’s weaker nature. They didn’t stop moving until they got to the train station and boarded a mostly empty train car. 

“I don’t know what you did, but I’m not an idiot. Just tell me the truth and you won’t be in trouble.”

“What are you talking about, Hojo? We were window shopping. We talked about our lives, what we’ve missed in the last three years apart, and what we’ve been up to since. I didn’t tell him any state secrets if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“That’s it ?”

“Yes. That’s it. I swear. What happened, did you lose us in one of the shops?”

“Yeah.” He sighed. “I guess I did. Don’t scare me like that, ever again.”

“Sorry. I didn’t intend to. I figured you followed us.”

Their ride back to the HQ was silent. Hojo wasn’t an idiot, there was a very high chance he knew Izuku had done something. But without proof, there was no way he’d tell Chisaki anything. Getting that man anxious over nothing was dangerous, deadly on a bad day. So this would just be reported as a fun little mall outing where Izuku met with an old friend, nothing more. Small blessings came in unexpected ways, apparently. 

When they got back to HQ, the place was quiet. Hojo really hadn’t called anything in. A couple of the Eight Bullets nodded in greeting as they walked inside. Imani greeted him with an ushering arm. Chisaki wanted him cleaned up and waiting once their leader finished dinner…which meant Izuku wasn’t getting dinner until late into the evening. 

That was another issue he’d had over the last few years, even if he had a roof over his head and access to food, Izuku struggled with eating in general. A lot of it came from his perpetual disgusted nausea making it hard to eat, but his schedule was also another problem. Chisaki didn’t exactly keep normal business hours, not many villains did. So Izuku’s life was organized around that chaos, and sometimes…like today, all he had the whole day was a mug of tea. He hadn’t really been paying attention, but he’d lost a lot of weight recently, and it suddenly struck Izuku that he’d just shown his hollowed ribs to the heroes this afternoon and great - the nausea was back. 

Imani gave him a concerned look when he came out of the shower in Chisaki’s room after getting all the remaining makeup off. It was a wonder Hojo didn’t comment on the splotchy makeup. He probably noticed, but he kept his thoughts to himself. 

“Oh, dear, are you alright, Izu-sama?”

“I’m fine, Imani. Can I have some more tea, please?”

“Of course. Do you want something to snack on before dinner?”

Izuku shook his head and lied through his teeth. “I ate at the mall. I’ll eat later.”

Chisaki walked into the room and dismissed the butler with a wave of his hand. Imani scampered out with a quiet promise to bring him tea later. Izuku was still standing in the middle of the room with just a towel around his hips. The older villain grabbed his shoulders and stared down at him with this…hunger. Izuku knew he’d be fighting to wait for the heroes who told him they’d come. 

“How was dinner, Chisaki-sama?”

“It would have been made better if you were there. But, I understand wanting to spend time with people your age.” Did he, actually? “Anyway. Put on your sweatpants. We’re going down to the lab.”

Oh.

       oh… 

He waited for Izuku to stumble into a pair of sweatpants so he could lead them back into the hallway and down towards the secret door in a wall panel that opened up to their (not so) secret underground lab. The tunnels had been extended since the last raid. After they cleaned up and repaired, everything got an overhaul - literally. The useful thing about his quirk was that it was so utilitarian. He could remodel the whole street in seconds, or create an underground network of tunnels and labs that somehow didn’t interfere with the sewer system or the subway. 

Chisaki talked as they walked. Izuku focused on the wall, tracing his finger along the random wallpaper patterns. He was listening, but he didn’t want to focus on the reality of his coming doom. He’d imagined Chisaki just wanted to let off steam after a busy day, like always. Apparently not.

“I wasn’t going to bring you down here for another few days…actually, I was waiting for your birthday. I wanted to celebrate with some good news. Garaki’s close to a breakthrough.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. I think we’re going in the right direction. I can see this being the next greatest step towards purity - and you are going to help us get there.”

Izuku’s bare feet padded softly on the concrete floor. The sound echoed back at him over and over like the pounding of his own heart, which he was somehow not hearing right now. Chisaki practically skipped down the hallway with his arms up as he described his master plan. 

“The gene mutation has successfully worked on test subjects, though, as expected, the effects are temporary. However - Garaki has managed to double the half life, so the effects last almost twenty-four hours. It’s a wonder! Can you imagine if we took out the top five heroes at the same time? There’d be no stopping us! We could have this mass produced and handed off to every criminal and villain in the prefecture and launch an attack on the- eh- Izuku, are you listening?”

“Of course, Chisaki-sama. I can coordinate plans for distribution and attack.”

“Excellent. I expect that in a couple weeks. I would like to have this plan take off within the month, if not next month. I don’t want to rush. I learned from my mistakes last time.”

“So, are you showing me the product?” Oh how he hoped.

The villain stopped in the middle of the hallway. They’d reached the genetics lab, the only one with an exam chair instead of a morgue slab. This was Chisaki’s lab, the one where he used to Overhaul Eri. 

“I had…something else in mind. Forgive me, Izuku. Like I said, I wasn’t going to bring you down here for another week. But plans change, right?”

“Of course.”

He opened the door and ushered Izuku inside. The door closed with a click of the lock but Izuku chose not to look at the man behind him. Izuku did not want to see the greedy glint in his eye. One of the things Izuku had learned about people with powerful quirks, specific quirks; it gave them joy to use it. They received an almost euphoric sense of satisfaction out of activating and using their quirks. Chisaki was no exception. 

“Take off your clothes.”

Izuku flinched at the warm breath grazing his neck. His heartbeat finally struck his ears, thundering away in the back of his skull. His blood purged through his veins in overdrive, but he tried to resist the urge to run. Running would only make this more unpleasant. Izuku stepped out of his sweatpants and carefully folded them up so he could place them neatly on a chair. The good thing about being quirkless was everything he touched wasn’t dirty to Chisaki, so he didn’t need to panic over touching anything, but the villain would still fuss if he didn’t clean up after himself.

Izuku didn’t need to be told to sit in the exam chair, he knew. He knew this day would come. The treaty talks had sped up his timeline, and Garaki’s breakthroughs only made things worse. Izuku had spent a year in and out of this house expecting his doom, and hoping the day wouldn’t come. But here it was - and Izuku wouldn’t be saved in time, just like last time, just like every time .

“I’ll fix the bruises when I’m done, promise.”

You’ll just put more on me later . Izuku couldn’t find his voice. It was buried somewhere halfway between his spleen and his liver, and every so often it would twist itself around his heart and choke him. Chisaki didn’t seem to notice he wasn’t responding. 

“I just need a few brain samples from the area near where your quirk factor would be. It shouldn’t affect you. I’ll rebuild them from your hair, so you might lose an inch or two in length, but you won’t notice it. If I need more samples I may need to take a molar if your hair doesn’t grow fast enough. We’ll see how it goes. Let’s just start small, right?”

Izuku nodded. His body sunk into the chair. Despite the whiteness of this room and how Izuku swam in the size of this chair, there were no restraints. Izuku could try to run, if he wanted to. But right now, he wasn’t sure he had enough energy to get back out of the chair he’d just climbed into. Izuku tilted his head back and let the bright white fluorescent lights on the ceiling burn into his eye sockets and pretended this was anesthesia. But no numbing agent would cure the agony of being Overhauled. 

“Close your eyes, Izu-chan. I’ll be quick.”

Izuku closed his eyes. He watched the speckled lights flicker around behind his eyelids. The waiting was almost worse. Chisaki liked to take his time with Izuku, no matter what it was he chose to do. A part of him was glad Chisaki only found him interesting. No one else had to suffer like he did. Eri had endured this man’s quirk, but she hadn’t endured the man’s obsessions.

Each of Chisaki’s five fingers tapped onto Izuku’s skull one by one. Izuku took a deep breath and held it in as the whole world vanished. 

Every single nerve ending inside his body was suddenly flayed alive like he’d touched his tongue to an open transformer. Izuku was aware of his consciousness, but it floated above him in an undefined space with no vision, no sound, only the knowledge that he was alive, and every single second of this living was a screaming, searing agony. He couldn’t even scream, he had no voice, he had no throat, he wasn’t a body anymore. He wasn’t human anymore. Izuku had become an idea, a thought existing somewhere in the microcosm of space within the white room he knew he was somehow still in but also not. 

Then he was back with a gasping breath. The light in the room blinded him but it was white again, it existed again. Izuku collapsed back into the chair but his head kept falling to his chest. Everything blurred in front of him each time he opened his eyes for a few seconds. The colored flashes of someone came into view with a warbling voice that slowly cleared. 

“Izu-chan…Izzzzuuuu-chan - there you are. All pieced back together and with perfect skin, too. I even got rid of those silly freckles on your cheeks.” 

Izuku flinched away from the volume. His vision finally cleared but everything was too loud, too crystal perfect. Did he change Izuku’s hearing and vision, too?”

“Ohhh, I’m sorry.” He lowered his voice. “I’m sorry. I just wanted you to be perfect. Twenty-twenty vision, decibel perfect hearing. Ohhh, your eyes are the clearest emeralds now. I love them. I want to play with them…maybe another time.”

Izuku gagged. He rolled to the side and tossed his head over the chair arm. Nothing productive came out as his body heaved, just saliva and stomach bile. Chisaki held his hair back and softly shushed him. 

“It’s okay, you’re okay. Breathe, there you go. I’ll get you some sunglasses and earplugs, you’ll get used to it. I promise.” 

“Wha-” Izuku brushed his hands through his hair, confused. His voice came out croaked, harsh like he’s just gargled gravel, it hurt.

“Oh, sorry. I straightened your hair, too. Gave me more length to play with. Is that okay?” 

He was already trying to scoot Izuku’s sweatpants up over his hips while he spoke, not giving Izuku any time to understand his new world. A second later, he was lifted into Chisaki’s arms, draped over them with little ability to hold himself upwards. The villain held one arm behind his shoulders to keep him upright and smiled down at Izuku. 

“It’s alright. You’ll feel pretty lethargic and limp for a while. Let’s get you to bed. I got everything I needed.”

“Mmmm…”

Izuku didn’t hear anything on the walk back to his room. Chisaki talked but it was too loud, so it all just blurred and scrambled in his mind. The hallways moved too slow and too fast, somehow all at once. He’d blink and they’d be in a different part of the tunnels, and then the house. By the time his head touched the pillow, Izuku was barely conscious, and immediately fell into the blackness of sleep. 

~

Waking up was a screaming nightmare. The world was too loud, too bright. He felt every single molecule of air passing over his skin, the sheets were like razor blades on his body. When he tried to cry out, his body revolted against the noise of his own voice inside his skull. Why did everything hurt?! Why couldn’t he make it stop?!

“Izuku!” Imani ran into the room. Izuku heard every single footstep. They vibrated inside his body. 

“Make it stop!”

“Izuku, please, what’s wrong?!”

“Stop shouting, please, it hurts!”

“Step back, Imani.”

Izuku gasped for breath when everyone quit screaming around him. His breath kept vibrating inside his chest and he didn’t know how to make it stop other than to stop breathing. Chisaki came into view, grabbed both sides of his face. Izuku wanted to gag at the sensation of skin on skin, needles on every hair follicle. 

“I’m so sorry. I went too far. Take a breath, Izuku. I’ll fix it.”

Izuku gasped in a ragged breath. Pain struck his neck for a solid five seconds and then- it stopped. The world stopped. The pain stopped. The screaming and razor blades and needles - it all…stopped. His body went limp in the villain’s arms as relief washed over him. 

“There you go. Just a couple ticks too far up the scale. Go back to sleep. Imani will bring you something to eat when you’ve rested more. You’ve only been out for twelve hours, you need a lot more after your first complete Overhaul.”

Twelve hours??! Izuku shook his head. He wanted to check his phone. He needed to know if Katsuki was coming, if the heroes were coming. He needed to know what fucking day it was, and if he’d missed anything important. 

“Nn-no…mm thirsty…”

“Okay. Imani, bring him soup and water. He shouldn’t have anything heavy until he’s rested.”

“Of course, Chisaki-sama. You can leave him to me, I took good care of Eri-chan after her sessions.”

“That is true. I have a lot of work to do today. I’ll come check on him tonight. Make sure he rests.”

“Yes, sir.”

Izuku still felt the vibrations of Chisaki’s footsteps as the man left, but they didn’t ache in his bones anymore. All noises were just a touch too loud, almost painful, but Izuku could breathe, and his head wasn’t splitting open anymore. He dropped his arm to the side and Imani was there a second later, holding his hand. 

“I’ll be right back with some soup and water, okay?”

“No. Phone. Please.”

“Izuku, you should be resting. He adjusted your eyes. It will be difficult.”

“Imani.”

The older man sighed. “I’ll turn your brightness down. Hold on.”

Izuku listened to the man fumble with Izuku’s phone for a moment before it was placed in his hand. Thankfully, he didn’t have to unlock the phone to change the brightness, so he wouldn’t see anything. Izuku had notifications off so they wouldn’t appear on the lock screen. 

He still had to squint when he looked at the screen and unlocked it with his pin number. Several texts from Katsuki showed up. He was worried, he hadn’t heard from Izuku since their meeting. There were a few notifications from his alert tags on news and online forums but nothing pressing. Instead, he forced himself to focus on Katsuki’s messages.

ExplosionGod: Izuku? You’ve been radio silent for twenty-four hours.

ExplosionGod: You better not be dead, Nerd. I swear. We’re working as fast as we can.

ExplosionGod: Please answer me when you can.

Chisaki said he’d been asleep for twelve hours but… that couldn’t be right unless… How long had he been Overhauling Izuku? According to the date on his phone, there’s no way he was missing this much time.

“Imani?”

“Hmm?”

“How long…how long was I in the lab?”

“Oh…” The butler sat down on the bed, the weight change caused a ripple of pain across Izuku’s skin. He waited, patiently, without screaming. “All night. He brought you back up at around nine am. You’ve been asleep since.” 

That…tracked. It was nine at night on the day after he’d gone down there. How did he…why did he need to spend so long Overhauling Izuku? Why didn’t Izuku remember anything but this emptiness of pain?

Izuku: I’m alive. I think. Barely. 

The reply was immediate.

ExplosionGod: What the fuck happened????

Izuku: His timeline sped up. He needed samples.

ExplosionGod: …of you?

Izuku: Yeah.

ExplosionGod: Fuck.

ExplosionGod: Are you able to move? Walk?

Izuku: I can barely see. He fucked with my senses, turned everything up to 11. Why?

ExplosionGod: Rest. I’ll see you tomorrow night, okay?

Izuku: Fuck. Okay.

Izuku locked his phone and tucked it under his body for the time being. Imani was back with a tray of instant soup and a big glass of water. The older man actually sat down and fed Izuku once he’d helped prop Izuku up on a pile of pillows. Imani talked while Izuku tried to focus on ignoring his senses that were still going haywire. 

The butler told him about Eri and all the things she liked to snack on after her ‘treatments’. Izuku wished he’d call it what it was, but maybe it was better they played pretend and acted like this wasn’t atrocious. Imani had become the only kindness in this dark hole Izuku found himself in. He could tell that Imani was the same for Eri when she’d been here. He was the grandfather they needed watching over them, even if he was just as trapped as Izuku and Eri. As they talked, Izuku downed the whole bowl of soup and three glasses of water before he actually felt somewhat like himself again. He was still exhausted, and would likely be promptly passing back out, but at least he had some food in him, and water, which was good. He wouldn’t dehydrate in his sleep. 

Izuku fell asleep to the sound of Imani’s stories about the Shie Hissaikai in a better time, when the Yakuza actually meant family.

~

His phone told him it was noon when he woke up again. Just under half a day until the raid. He had time to kill, and he was sure the universe wasn’t going to let him get the easy way out. If he stayed in his bed, and played sick, maybe the world would let him rest and he could forget that the sheets were still dragging over his skin in a miserable way. 

Imani came to check on him a little while later, and brought another tray of soup and water which Izuku devoured. Hojo came to check on him sometime in the afternoon and told him about his new modifications courtesy of Overhaul. 

Advanced hearing, and sight, with amplified touch sensation and minor edits to his senses of smell and taste. Chisaki wanted him to experience the world in a richer way, or whatever. He’d also straightened Izuku’s hair and removed all his freckles, everywhere. It was really weird to see himself like this, without spots everywhere. His skin was so…perfect. His nails were also tidy and nicely oval. The weird part was those small changes like his nails and skin weren’t even that noticeable if you didn’t know him well. The straight hair was freaky, though. Izuku decided to leave it tied up to keep it out of his face now that it fell past his shoulders. 

After dinner, where Izuku actually ate his first solid meal in days, Chisaki finally came to see him. Two whole fucking days. Izuku lost two days to being Overhauled and sleeping off the after effects. 

“You look better.”

“Mmm, I feel better. Everything’s just…sharper? Louder.”

“You’ll get used to it.” 

He shed his coat and shirt as he walked over to the bed. His boots and gloves were next. Izuku was still just wearing sweatpants, he didn’t have the strength to change into anything more, and honestly, the idea of clothing sounded horrible against his skin. 

“I want to test your sense of touch now that it’s enhanced.”

Izuku forced himself to smile. He could say no, and maybe this time, Chisaki would listen because he was still recovering from his first full Overhaul. Except, if the raid was really happening tonight, Izuku wanted Chisaki distracted. Izuku was the only thing that distracted him from the world effectively. Maybe this time, they could capture him. 

“Okay.”

Chisaki didn’t care about permission, he never had. But he preferred when Izuku said yes. He preferred when Izuku seemed eager, or at least willing. So Izuku would play his captor’s game, and hope to win this time, even if he got hurt. 

Izuku tried to stay focused this time. He had to. There was too much risk in letting himself float away when the raid was so close. No matter how much this hurt, no matter how much he wanted to run away, he had hope the heroes would come this time. There was no real reason he should believe they would come, but he wanted to, so desperately. So he’d have faith this one time, and he’d play his part. 

Chisaki flicked the sheet off and crawled over Izuku’s body. He kissed his way up every few inches. Each touch of his lips felt like the zing of a car battery touching him, Izuku hated it. Every muscle in his body wanted to shove the man atop him off. Instead, a shaking hand caressed through brown hair, pulling him closer. The tears came, as they always did, in the dying light of an outside world Izuku was slowly forgetting. 

“What do you feel?” Chisaki asked, still kissing along his neck and shoulder. “Tell me everything.”

“It-” Izuku gasped. “It’s sharp, like…like knives on my skin. It- it hurts, Chisaki-sama.”

“Good.” Izuku whined but a hand clamped over his mouth to muffle the noise. The older villain hated when he made noise, when he screamed. Izuku didn't scream when his mind floated away and forgot his existence.

A hand slid under his pants. Izuku sobbed into the hand covering his mouth. He grabbed Chisaki’s wrist with both hands, holding it against his face. Every single cell across his stomach boiled like lava. He wanted this man, this creature, off of him. Izuku was absolutely sure he’d never wanted anything more. He resisted the urge at every touch, every screeching burn across his body, he resisted when his body became a tool for someone else’s pleasure. Izuku resisted.

Until he couldn’t resist anymore, and his mind vanished against his wishes. He felt his body go limp, tossed sideways by Chisaki until he hung off the end of the bed. His eyes and ears and skin stayed stuck in reality while his mind floated away to the sound of crickets outside. He felt every single bruise Chisaki left on his body, every push of the man’s hips against him, every drop of blood that left his body. 

When Izuku came back to himself, he was staring at the paper screens along the back wall of his room that led to the veranda around the mansion. As he looked down, he found his own arm hanging off the bed. Every few seconds, blood dripped down his middle finger and hit the floor with a soft pat . He didn’t know why his arm was bleeding. Blood drooled from his mouth, too. Every single exhale left his lungs jagged. 

A sleeping body lay draped over Izuku’s shoulders; Chisaki. Izuku was trapped under him, and still too tired to move. Every inch of his skin tingled with electricity from the other man’s skin touching him, but he couldn’t move. He couldn’t force his body to move. Izuku couldn’t even lift his head. He was supposed to do something. He knew that. He remembered he’d told himself he had a job to do…but he couldn’t remember what it was.

The door slid open quietly, but too loud in Izuku’s new ears. He tried to hold his breath and pretend he was asleep but it wasn’t Imani, or even Hojo. The footsteps walked…tentatively? A head of black hair appeared in his vision. 

“Midoriya? Are you awake?” Izuku blinked. Eraserhead? He was whispering, holding Izuku’s face. The teen groaned, or tried to groan, it came out more like a cracked grumble. “I’m so sorry it took us so long. Breathe for me. We’re going to get you out.” 

Another set of footsteps entered the room. Eraserhead vanished and Katsuki was there, with a stern face and gentle hands to hold Izuku’s head like the hero had. Two loud clank-clicks sounded from behind him, one right after the other. When Eraserhead spoke again, it was at a normal volume. 

“Tranq dart and temp eraser bullet deployed. Overhaul is down for the count. All agents; take your targets, capture the building.”

The weight on his shoulders came off. Izuku sucked in a weak breath while Katsuki pressed their foreheads together. Now he remembered what he’d been doing. 

“I- I-...just…tried to…”

“Izuku-”

“Distract…him. Sorry.”

“You-” Katsuki’s breath shuddered. “Why would you do that?”

Izuku tried to answer, but the thoughts just slipped away. His eyes drooped. He didn’t pass out, but he couldn’t respond anymore. That took far more strength than he had left. So he listened to the world around him and floated on the drunken sensation of the pain filling every joint and bone in his body. 

The heroes were here. Katsuki was here, holding him. They’d actually come, they’d captured Overhaul. Izuku was actually being saved for the first time in his life. Someone was holding his face softly. 

He trusted, just this once, that he wouldn’t be hurt anymore. 

~

“I think he’s out.” Katsuki reported. “He’s conscious but unresponsive.”

Eraserhead was busy locking Overhaul down into a miniature iron maiden with quirk canceling encapsulating cuffs around both hands so he couldn’t hurt anyone once the quirk deleter bullet wore off. The irony of using his own ammunition against him did not go over Katsuki’s head. 

“The kid’s in shock, which isn’t much of a surprise after the beating he took. Actually, the surprise is that he’s conscious at all.” The older hero tapped his comm. “Hey, speed up that medic, Midoriya is going into shock and he’s lost a lot of blood.”

Tsukauchi replied over their comm line a moment later. “Double time, got it!” 

Once Overhaul was secure, Eraserhead helped Katsuki get Izuku back onto the bed but they didn’t roll him onto his back before the medics had a chance to inspect his injuries. How was he still alive? That’s all Katsuki kept asking himself. 

“He was Overhauled.”

“What?” 

“I was texting him last night, to give him the heads up. He said their timeline sped up, Overhaul needed samples. He was radio silent for almost a full day. He said Overhaul fucked with his senses. Said he turned everything up to 11.”

Eraserhead sighed. “This kid is going to need so much fucking therapy. I’m assigning you to his personal detail until we get this sorted. The kid needs someone he can trust, and ironically, somehow, that’s you.”

“He hasn’t forgiven the shit I did. I don’t know if he trusts me. But this…this is the first time he’s been saved, and we were late. I don’t know if he’ll trust me after this.”

“Just be there, whatever he needs.”

“I can do that.” Katsuki nodded. “I can, yeah. I can do that.”

The medics burst into the room in a flurry. Izuku’s body was moved like some lifeless doll after one of them checked his internal wounds with a quirk. They bandaged the bleeds and strapped him to a backboard in record time. Katsuki stumbled backwards to get out of the way. Eraserhead tossed the unconscious and locked up Overhaul over his shoulder and they were all moving. 

“This kid’s got some contusions to a few organs, a couple broken bones, and a whole mess of bruising.” The medic winced at his notes. “Most of it’s to the pelvic region and his face. He’s going to need a couple bags of blood on the way over, we have some O-neg in the ambulance. His temp is really low, which is concerning, but it helped slow his bleeding. Right now, he needs his bones set and several scans to ensure the internal wounds don’t burst or cause further damage. He’s being treated like a glass house until he’s stable. He’ll be in the ICU until then.”

Eraser nodded. “Thanks. Dynamight is on his detail, he’s glued to that glass house until I say otherwise.”

“Understood, Eraser.”

“Go, kid.”

“Sensei?”

“Go, stay with your friend. I’ve gotta handle the captured villains with Tsuki. Do not let that boy out of your sight. If anyone has a problem with it, you call me, okay?” 

“Yeah. I got it.”

The walk out was a practice in patience for Katsuki. Every single pair of eyes stared at them, and Izuku's mostly exposed body. The medics had put his sweatpants back on, and a sheet over his legs, but that didn’t stop everyone from staring at the Nerd’s busted up face and scarred chest (some of those scars Katsuki had caused). He was still fucking conscious, that’s what hurt so much. He never once took his eyes off Katsuki. In the split second where they loaded him up and he lost line of sight, he let out this agonized whine until Katsuki loaded up into the ambulance and was back beside him. 

They rode mostly in silence while the medics continued working to stabilize Izuku. They hooked him up to an IV and a blood transfusion. Katsuki just watched everything as if in a dream. 

He never imagined finding Izuku again, let alone getting the chance to apologize to him. Then, he’d been forced into an undercover mission after the treaty talks because the Commission knew Overhaul’s experiments weren’t stopping. They thought taking Eri would be enough. Had they known Dr. Garaki joined after the Kamino raid, they likely would have put an end to the Yakuza years ago. It took this long for them to finally say ‘balance be damned’ and get into gear, and all the while, another kid got fucked up for their failures.

Katsuki had never expected he’d find Izuku with them. The Commission brushed it off so plainly, Katsuki wanted to punch the President in the face, and he almost had after the treaty talks, until she made it clear they weren’t letting it go, and their passivity had been an act. If Overhaul had a quirkless person on hand, he’d still be trying to make quirk deletion ammo. When Katsuki told his mother what he’d seen, she immediately went to the police to pull rank over Izuku’s registry, and it worked. The Commission got the legal right to rescue Izuku and once he told them about the Yakuza’s experiments, they had a reason to raid the hideout. 

Katsuki’s mother texted him earlier, she was already waiting at the hospital. Aizawa had warned them there was a high chance Izuku would need medical care after what they saw on his body during the mall interview. Katsuki anxiously waited for the raid in hopes they’d get to Izuku before he was wounded again. They’d relied on the fact that Overhaul needed Izuku in good health for his experiments, but Katsuki wished they’d worked faster. He didn’t deserve this kind of abuse. 

Katsuki wasn’t sure the world could ever apologize to Izuku enough.

~

Sleep never came, even while the doctors worked on Izuku’s wounds, even while they ran scan after scan and hooked him up to every machine they could think of. Izuku stayed conscious the entire time, against his own fucking will. His own life had become a horror movie that he couldn't look away from. But Katsuki never left his side, not for a second. He watched everything they did and he held Izuku’s hand through all of it.

When the treatments finally paused and they promised to let Izuku rest, he wanted to argue with the doctors. There was no way he could rest in a place this loud and noisy. Every monitor in every nearby room buzzed and rang in Izuku’s ears. The stench of chemicals and cleaners irritated his nose. The lights made his eyes burn. There was zero chance he was getting any rest.

Katsuki eventually closed the door, turned the lights off, and started talking quietly. Objectively, he was talking to Izuku, but Izuku had lost his voice somewhere around his liver this time, and he couldn’t even feel it right now, so he didn’t bother trying to speak.

“I don't know if you heard them talking.” Of course he had, Izuku just wasn't listening. “You're in the ICU while they make sure your internal injuries are stable. You'll be moved once the scans come back and they know you're not in danger.” 

Izuku didn't feel like he was in danger. He wasn't even in pain anymore. They'd given him pain medication, or so he assumed.

“The old hag is here, once you're moved to a regular room, she'll be with us.” 

Katsuki was stating facts, avoiding asking questions that needed answers. Izuku managed to force his eyes open just a bit more so he seemed more alert. Katsuki squeezed his hand and smiled softly.

“The raid went off without a hitch. The whole Shie Hissaikai has been captured. I'm sure there'll be a big trial and everything. You might have to testify. We captured Garaki, too, finally.”

That wasn't as much of a relief as when he felt Eraserhead pull Chisaki’s body off him, but it meant Izuku would hopefully be safe in the future. He tried to offer a thankful smile and Katsuki's face did light up so he must have done it right.

“I'm so sorry we didn’t get there sooner, Izuku. You deserved better. You deserved to be saved a long time ago.” Izuku squeezed his friend's hand. “You should try to rest, do you want me to ask them for something to help?” Izuku shook his head faintly. “Okay. I’m not going anywhere.”

Maybe he should try to sleep. Katsuki was there, and he promised not to leave. This was the first time anyone actually kept a promise to Izuku. Eraserhead told him they’d get him out - and they did. Katsuki promised he’d come, and he did. 

Izuku felt safe for the first time in his life. 

Izuku blinked, or opened his eyes, and the world had changed. Oh, had he blacked out or maybe lost consciousness? He wasn’t in the same room anymore, and he wasn’t hooked up to a thousand machines, either, just a heart monitor, a basic IV, and oxygen. Standard fair. At first, he thought he was alone. The room was dark and it was hard to tell much of anything when he didn’t have the energy to move his head. This room had a window, he could tell it was dark outside, too, or maybe very early morning. That’s when he noticed Katsuki curled up in a chair by the window. 

Mitsuki sat next to him with a book and a mini light clipped to it. Her free hand gently combed through Katsuki’s hair. She used to do that when Katsuki was sick in bed. Izuku once got sick when he stayed over at their place, and Mitsuki comforted him that way after he’d emptied his stomach into the toilet. She must have noticed his head moving, or just felt his eyes, because she looked up and sucked in a breath. 

“Hi.” She whispered. 

Izuku swallowed harshly with a dry mouth and forced himself to speak. “Hi Auntie.”

“Oh, sweetie.”

The book was forgotten on the chair as she quietly rushed to his side to take his hands. Izuku actually lifted both to greet her. His left hand was in a brace from the wrist down three fingers, but his thumb was free, so she gripped her hand as much as he could with his right. She kissed his fingers over and over, tears already in her eyes. 

“I’m so sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

“Why?” Mitsuki had never once hurt him. 

“I should have taken you away from her when you were young. But I- I didn’t know. I didn’t know what she’d done, what Katsuki had done. I’m so sorry I didn’t see it.”

“Auntie.” Izuku carefully brushed the tears from her eyes with his good hand. “This wasn’t your fault. You can’t blame yourself. You didn’t know.”

“But I should have. That was my duty as your Godmother, to keep you safe, and I failed.”

Izuku sighed. “You’re here now, that’s what counts.” Mitsuki carefully hugged him. It was warm, and wanted. Izuku had forgotten what this kind of familial love could feel like. “Thank you.”

“Ohhh, don’t thank me yet. We need to talk.”

“Uh oh.”

She pulled back so she could grab a chair and pull it over. “Katsuki’s out like a light, he’s been on guard duty for two days since you arrived.”

“Two days?”

“Ahh, yes. Well, your body refused to rest. The doctors said you were in a state of pseudo shock, or high alert, as if you’d be attacked. They sedated you so you could rest and they could heal you. I’m sorry. I should have asked.”

“No, it’s fine…They were right, I wasn’t going to rest on my own.”

Mitsuki leaned over to brush her fingers through his hair. Izuku closed his eyes and sunk back into the pillows to try and relax. He stayed awake, since Mitsuki said they needed to talk. 

“You’re out of the woods, kiddo. They used quirk healing to repair the internal damage you sustained. Your minor wounds will heal up quickly, but they didn’t want to stress your body so they tried to focus on just the serious injuries so the rest could heal naturally.”

“Mmm.”

“They’re a little worried about your weight, some of your organs are showing malnutrition damage. The other main concern is…well, the alterations that Overhaul made to you recently.”

Izuku rubbed his face to try and wake up a bit more. He pushed the button on the bed railing to wind it up so he wasn’t lying down while speaking with his Godmother. 

“He messed with my senses. It’s better now, though I can still hear the monitors in the next room.”

“It wasn’t just your senses, sweetie. He changed your whole body.”

“Huh?”

“He modified you to be more…durable.” She said this with a clenched jaw. “For…obvious reasons.”

“Ah. Durable. So he could…” Izuku shook his head. “Okay, so…what does that mean?”

“It just means you’re going to have to be careful as you get accustomed to it. Your body will be heavier. The doctors said there’s some misfiring between your nerves because of the hypersensitivity. You might need nerve therapy.”

“The sheets…” Mitsuki tilted her head. “When I woke up after he Overhauled me. The sheets were like razor blades on my skin. I woke up screaming until he turned everything down.”

“How do you feel right now?”

“Uhm…uncomfortable, but not in pain.”

“Okay. Well, I’ll have the doctors come in on first rounds and give you the whole spiel since I’m sure I didn’t do it justice. They said you’re safe to be released once you were awake and they’d seen you eat and drink now that you’ve had two days of IV nutrition.”

“I feel better, like, more energy but still tired. Just…no pain. Better.”

Mitsuki smiled at him softly. She clutched his good hand and brought it up so she could kiss his knuckles.

“Aizawa-err Eraserhead is going to stop by today and speak about all the police stuff. You’re currently in protective custody while they ensure they got everyone. That’s the first thing they need to speak with you about. They need to go over the arrest records with you and ensure they captured the entire Yakuza cell. When you’re ready.”

“Mmm, yeah. Okay.”

“Are you okay, sweetie?”

“Uhm-” Izuku squinted at his lap. “Yeah, I uhh, this just all feels so surreal.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I think I’ve given you enough to think about. Why don’t you relax for a while?”

“Mmm, thanks, Auntie.”

In truth, he was struggling to process everything, and by everything, he meant the whole of the Shie Hissaikai being captured and likely imprisoned. Izuku was terribly conflicted. He shouldn’t be. He knew he absolutely should not be conflicted over this, at all. And yet, he was. Because no matter how much Chisaki hurt him, ultimately, he was the first person to show Izuku any signs of affection of any kind since his quirkless diagnosis. 

Did Izuku know that affection was wrong and abusive? Yes, obviously. He knew that objectively. But (and there shouldn’t be a but) Izuku was so used to the pain, and burns and bruises were already such a normal part of his life, the corrupted love that Chisaki offered, the obsession over his genetics, it felt like rain in the desert. 

So a part of him was relieved to be safe and away from the Yakuza, the other part was terrified he’d never know even the faintest bit of kindness. Mitsuki was quickly proving that fear wrong, though, which was helping. But that didn’t stop the anxiety eating away at the back of his brain. 

As the sun began peeking out from behind the horizon in their still dark room, Izuku truly felt shameful for the first time. It ate at his stomach lining and threatened to force itself up through his throat. 

Mitsuki’s book closed in her lap again. Oh, Izuku had been staring out the window for a while as his mind spiraled out. She must have noticed. 

“If you want to talk about anything…I’m here.”

And suddenly he crumbled. This was the first time someone offered a shoulder with genuine care, and his entire house of glass shattered. He had to say it all before it ate him alive. “I know it was…it wasn’t right, what he did. I know that. I know that. ”

“But?” She asked hesitantly. 

“But being around him…he was the first person to make me feel like I had a reason to be alive, like anyone valued my existence in this world. He talked me off a roof the day I met him, and I clung to that. And I don’t know what that makes me.”

“Izuku, you were hurt so much more than any child, any teenager, should ever experience - before you met him. You needed a parent, or a friend, and he abused that need. That doesn’t mean you are at fault in any way, nor does that make you bad. You’re not a villain like him. You’re not even seventeen. He hurt you, he took advantage of you. None of that is your fault. Absolutely none of that, and none of this, is your fault.”

He nodded. “Yeah…yeah okay.”

“Oh, sweetie.” She was on her feet in an instant, rushing over to wrap her arms around him as Izuku finally fell apart. 

He’d tried to keep everything locked away for so long, he didn’t think he remembered how to let it out. But it was still dark out, so it was okay to cry, right? It was okay because he was in the dark and only Mitsuki could see him. She wrapped her arms around his head and shoulders and settled on the bed so she could rock them back and forth while soothing him with quiet reassuring words. 

Eventually, she picked Izuku up and set him next to her on the bed. He curled into his Godmother’s arms and watched the sunrise over her shoulder. She hummed a soft lullaby as she braided his now pin straight hair. He really wished Chisaki hadn’t changed it. Izuku’s curls were one of his favorite defining features. Maybe Mitsuki could teach him how to curl his hair, or braid it every night so it’d be wavy in the morning. Eventually, the day’s light filled the room but it was soft enough that it didn’t bother his eyes much. 

When he finally looked away from the windows, he found Katsuki’s eyes sparkling in the sunlight next to the window. They were so full of hope, and happiness to see Izuku. Mitsuki was lightly snoozing beside him, finally at peace that both her sons were safe and finally home. The shame slipped from Izuku’s shoulders. A smile settled onto his face.

“Hey, Kacchan.”

“Welcome back, Izuku.”

~ 2 Weeks Later ~

Izuku stepped out of the shower and grabbed a towel to dry off with. Lately, he’d started feeling clean after showers. The grime didn’t settle into his bones like it used to, he didn’t have to scrub his skin raw just to feel like he’d washed himself. Two weeks had passed since the Shie Hissaikai raid, since Izuku’s rescue. So much had happened and his head still spun some days. Today, though, he was relatively somber. He was meeting someone today, someone who was struggling like him, someone who no one else could understand. 

After the raid, Izuku spent a few days in the hospital. He spent his birthday in the hospital. But even in the hero ward under protective custody, it was still the best birthday he’d ever had because his Godmother was there, and his best friend, and the hero who promised to save him - and did. Once he was healed up and they confirmed there were no more threats, he was allowed to go home with the Baklugo family. The reunion with his uncle Masaru was honestly such a relief. He’d been a strong father figure when Izuku was young, after his own father left, and he’d honestly not realized just how much he missed having Masaru around. 

Therapy was a roller coaster, but he’d been making small progress every day. He still had awful nightmares, and usually had to wear earplugs and sunglasses when he went outside during the day due to his Overhaul side effects. His medical team were trying to find a way to reduce his senses back to normal range, but it wasn’t likely to happen any time soon unless they found someone with a sense editing quirk. He’d floated around the idea of having Present Mic shout him half deaf, but Eraserhead shot that down real quick - mainly because Present mic, his husband, would absolutely feel awful doing it. Izuku thought that was entirely fair. 

He currently lived in the spare room of his Godparents' house, but he also spent a lot of time at UA in the last week. It’s where Eraserhead worked, and since Katsuki was a student, it was easy to have Detective Tsukauchi come there to question all three of them about the raid and Izuku’s former living situation. The police called it captivity, but Izuku knew it would only make him feel worse if he called it that. The case went to trial in record time with all the evidence they had stacked up. Izuku had told them how to find the new lab so they didn’t have to excavate the whole house, and gave them what codes he’d memorized by sound alone when Chisaki typed them in. Garaki was already a wanted man with a death sentence hanging over his head. Chisaki was given life times three. Most of the Yakuza were given decades long sentences or more, depending on their list of known and proven crimes. 

Imani was acquitted, which made Izuku happy. He was just as much a prisoner of the Yakuza as Izuku had been. He’d been the former head’s butler, Chisaki’s adopted grandfather’s butler, that is. Chisaki kept him in line on threat of Overhauling, just like he did with most people. Izuku had never blamed Imani for his choice to comply, Izuku had done the same for similar reasons. Sadly, Imani earned a nasty reputation from his time serving the Shie Hissaikai, the news ripped him apart for his compliance. Izuku hoped to someday repair that by speaking out, when he was ready. In the meantime, Detective Tsukauchi and UA’s principal, Nedzu, found him some quiet work at the high school behind the scenes where he could make a good living, and be protected from the outside world. 

A knock on the bathroom door brought Izuku back to the present, looking at himself in the mirror. He’d already braided his long green hair into two dutch braids that came together at the crown of his head and became a messy bun. This had become his signature hair style, and it suited him pretty well. 

“Can I come in?”

“Yeah.” Izuku called. 

Katsuki slid the door open and shouldered around him to grab his deodorant stick. He’d showered first. Izuku pulled his shirt over his head and hip checked his best friend turned roommate. 

“You ready, Nerd?”

Izuku shrugged. “As I’ll ever be. Does Eraser really think I can help her?”

“No one understands her like you do. I don’t think there’s anyone else alive who would, except maybe those lackeys Over-bitch glued to himself on the first raid.”

“Chrono and Mimic? I’m not sure they remember it. Chisaki saw to that.”

Izuku tossed the deodorant stick back on the shelf, he gave Izuku a weird look. Izuku shrugged, asking ‘what?’ without saying it. 

“He could do that?”

“Kacchan, didn’t I tell you what kind of samples he took from me?” The blonde shook his head. “Ah…well, he took brain samples, from the tissue around where my quirk factor would be. That’s why he changed my hair, he used some of it to replace the brain tissue he took. If he wanted to, he could just…remove someone’s brain and make other stuff with it. He could literally do anything with anything to anything. His quirk was…honestly, probably one of the most powerful quirks in existence.”

“More than All For One?”

“Yeah. All For One couldn’t control the very nature of matter - Overhaul could.”

Katsuki sighed. “One more thing to add to the file, I guess. Or maybe it doesn’t matter anymore.”

“I guess not.”

After the raid and subsequent criminal trials, along with his three life sentences, Chisaki was sentenced to a quirk lobotomy. It wasn’t something the Hero Commission wanted to talk about, or brought up in polite conversation. Most people didn’t even know it was on the list of capital punishments, but in this case, it was a necessity. 

A quirk lobotomy was developed as an ultimate punishment in cases where the death sentence wasn’t punishment enough . Lobotomies had been around for centuries, and though they were basically defunct as a medical practice, the Commission had medical professionals alter it. Now, they took a long probe, and shoved it into the back of the skull after drilling through the bone. It was done under surgical procedures, so no other tissue was damaged. The probe is driven through the quirk factor, destroying it. The result is either an unusable quirk, or one that actively harms the user as it misfires back on them. Chisaki is serving out his time in Tartarus Prison, where he’d be on constant quirk suppressants anyway, but this was an added layer of punishment and protection. The irony of Chisaki, the man obsessed with ridding the world of quirks, being quirkless now had not gone over Izuku’s head, but he chose not to think about it too deeply. 

Izuku heard on his first day in prison, there was an accident. Another prisoner crushed Chisaki’s hands when he found out what Chisaki had done to ‘some kid’ - aka Izuku. Even criminals took crimes against children very seriously. So, the good news was Overhaul, as a quirk, and a villain, would never hurt anyone again. 

Izuku leaned his backside against the sink when Katsuki sat down on the tub across from him. They stared at each other for a while, silently reading each other’s minds. Izuku was anxious, Katsuki was thoughtful, but curious. 

“As far as I know, he only Overhauled her. He didn’t…” Izuku cleared his throat. “Imani told me a lot about her. I think it would be good for her to see him. He was…a light in a dark place, for both of us. But uhm, yeah, I’m ready.” Katsuki wiped a stray tear from Izuku’s face as he walked out. 

“I’ll be swapping back to the dorms next week, since you no longer need a full-time guard, until graduation in a few months.”

“The house will be quiet without you.”

“Fuck off!”

Izuku kicked off the sink and followed Katsuki out. He stopped by his room to grab his little case with his hero-gear grade earplugs and sunglasses before following Katsuki down the stairs. 

“Bye, hag! Bye dad!”

“Bye auntie! Bye uncle!”

Mitsuki peeked her head out of the kitchen. “Katsuki Bakugo, you best get both of you back in one piece or so help me!” She said that every time they left the house.

“Shut up, old woman!”

“Bye boys!” Masaru called after them. 

Katsuki tossed Izuku’s backpack at him and his own over his shoulder. Izuku stumbled into his shoes on the way out the door. They were already barely on time to catch the train, hopefully they wouldn’t be late. It was mostly Izuku’s fault. He had a bad nightmare last night. Katsuki had to hold him through the panic attack that made Izuku want to (and try to) rip his own skin off. Izuku’s therapist said the nightmares would fade with time, but for now, they were mostly just a major annoyance, and it delayed him getting ready this morning. 

The train ride to UA went by in a blur, but it was a relatively short ride since the Bakugo household was only two stops away. Izuku’s old apartment, where he lived with his mother, was only a few blocks from Katsuki’s house. They hadn’t once walked that direction since Izuku got out of the hospital. Mitsuki said Inko moved to Beijing to be with Hisashi, and honestly, that was probably for the best, anyway. 

Izuku put his earplugs in before they made it to the train, but he didn’t take them out until they were on the UA campus, where the world faded out past the triple high walls and he felt safe. The sunglasses came off once they made it into the 3-A dorm common room. 

Izuku was getting used to the weirdness of his senses, but it still sometimes took him out of his body if Mitsuki dropped a pan while cooking. And though she’d tried it once, the second Mitsuki called him ‘Izu-chan’ like when he was a child, Izuku had dropped a stack of dishes and nearly fainted when she tried to take his hands right after. There were triggers, things that made him fall apart, but they were learning to live with Izuku’s new jumpiness. 

Izuku was learning to live without the shame of not belonging that had once been a deep part of who he was, the shame he’d finally clawed from his gut, even if it still tried to cling to his lungs on the best of days. 

Katsuki opened the door and ushered him in first. The dorm common room was pretty simple; a large TV with several couches, a section for eating and studying with tables and chairs, a bookshelf with books and board games, and an open plan kitchen in the back. A few students milled about. Most of them knew Izuku now. Several of them had participated in the first Shie Hissaikai raid so they knew a good bit about the Yakuza, and the court case had been filling the news for weeks, too. 

Hitoshi reclined on the couch with a thick manga in hand and ignored their entry. Iida was in the kitchen making Saturday morning brunch with Tsu’s help. Kirishima and Momo sat on the floor around one of the coffee tables, working on some kind of rock craft. As Katsuki led him in, Aizawa came out of his apartment at the back of the common room, holding the hand of a six year old girl Izuku had not met face to face, but recognized immediately. 

The second she spotted Katsuki, the girl bolted from her guardian and the blonde hero student grabbed her right out of her run and spun her around as she giggled happily. Izuku wanted to have that kind of freedom someday, once he got over his own experiences. 

“Eri-chan. There’s someone I want you to meet.”

“Huh?” She peeked around Katsuki’s head and stared right at Izuku. 

That’s when the common room noticed him. Izuku waved to the other students. Eraser gave him an encouraging smile as he settled his shoulder onto a corner of the nearby wall. 

“Hi, Eri. I’m Izuku.”

She ducked down a little. Katsuki had mentioned she wasn’t great with strangers. 

“Eri-chan. Izuku is my best friend. I’ve known him since I was smaller than you.”

“Really, Kat?”

“Mhm. I wanted you to meet him because…well-”

Izuku cleared his throat. “Imani told me about you.” Her eyes lit up. Izuku’s knees almost gave out. “He took care of me, like he took care of you.”

“Ohhh!” She wriggled out of Katsuki’s arms and scurried over to Izuku. It sort of startled him when she took his hand and just pulled him to the coffee table where Kiri and Momo were working. She pointed to the little rock statue that Kirishima had been making. “I told them that Imani-san used to make me origami and Kiri made me one. Can he make you one?”

Izuku crouched down to her level and tried to offer a supportive smile. “If he wants to, sure. But I came to talk to you.”

“Why?”

“Uhm-” Izuku glanced at Eraser for advice. Katsuki was leaning on the couch behind Izuku, sharing an almost identical grin to what his teacher was wearing a few feet away. That wasn’t helping at all. “Because…” Izuku frowned. How did he tell a little girl he understood her pain without complex adult words and ideas? Ah! Izuku carefully parted the hair on the left side of his head, to show her the five point scar from Chisaki’s touch after he fixed his fuck up with Izuku’s senses. 

“Ohhhh. Chisaki-sama hurt you too.”

Izuku nodded. “He took things from me.”

“He wanted to use your curse, too?”

“No. Quirks aren’t curses.” But he knew she’d been told that a lot, and it wasn’t yet sticking. “I don’t have one.” 

The understanding that flashed in her eyes was something no child should ever hold. She shouldn’t understand that Chisaki wanted to erase quirks from the world, and that he’d do it with what he took from her. She carefully reached out to touch the little scars on the side of his head. Izuku sat very still and let her work her fingers into his hair as she scrunched up her face. 

“Did he use me to make you?”

“Oh, no, no. I was born this way. I never had one.” Again, she understood far too well. What an awful burden to bear at such a young age. “Kacchan wanted me to talk to you because…because we all wanted you to know you aren’t alone. Chisaki-sama was wrong. He was the cursed one.” Most of the students in the room were looking on with apprehensive worry, or just open curiosity. They all wanted their adopted little sister to heal, but healing wasn’t linear. It was often messy, and Izuku knew that all too well. “If you ever need to talk about the things he took from you, I want you to know that you can come to me, and I’ll understand.”

“Did you feel it, too?” She asked without warning. Izuku tilted his head. “The buzzing. We saw bees in the garden yesterday. They make the sound like it felt, when he took from me.”

Izuku swallowed hard and nodded. “Yes.”

“Okay. I’ll talk to you. Kiri?”

“Hmm?”

“Can you make Izuku a bunny?”

“Sure thing, Peblet. Why don’t you help me?”

“Sure!”

Izuku stood up but held himself together by wrapping himself up in his arms. Katsuki was quick to wrap his arms around Izuku in a protective way, as if the added layer of arms might keep him from falling apart. Eri might have needed this, but Izuku was suddenly unsure if he was ready for it. She was so…open. But at that age, everything is just a fact, it’s not some amorphous thing that can attack you, it just is or it isn’t. 

Eraser offered him a mug of coffee, which Izuku took to warm his aching hands. The last three fingers on his left hand had been crushed before the raid. They assumed Chisaki had stepped on them at some point while Izuku was out of it, which left them to heal crooked despite the doctors’ best efforts. They ached sometimes. Eraser always saw his hand shake before Izuku noticed it, and offered him warm tea or coffee to help. 

“What did she mean?” He finally asked. “The buzzing?”

Izuku sipped his coffee before answering the older hero. They kept their voices low off to the side so Eri wouldn’t hear them. “When he’s Overhauling you, you’re still…conscious? It’s hard to explain. Everything’s on fire at once, but you can’t see, can’t hear, can’t feel or speak. But yet…it’s like sticking your tongue to a live electrical wire. Your whole being no longer exists and yet you burn, and you scream in a void. It’s…I think buzzing is the only way a child could understand it.”

“Fuck.” Katsuki muttered. 

“It’s only like that when he completely- when he ‘fixed’ my senses, he just touched my head, that’s what the scars are from. That didn’t really hurt much.”

Eraser clicked his tongue. “His quirk could have been used for so many amazing applications. Quirks are tools, nothing more - and he chose to use his to cause pain and suffering.”

“No, it’s not like that.” Izuku watched Eri play with the little bunny Kiri had made, smiling when she held it up to show off. “He truly believed that he was saving the world. In his mind - I was the only perfect thing to ever exist.” He gestured to Eri. “And she was the next closest thing. He saw Eri like he saw himself, a tainted savior.”

“Yeah, but that’s not an excuse to do what he did.”

“I know that, Kacchan. I wasn’t making excuses for him. I would never defend his actions. I just want you to know that he didn’t think he was causing harm. I don’t think he even knows what pain feels like.”

“What do you mean?” Eraser made a face. “How could he not?”

“He was so obsessed with what I felt, and my experiences. I’d bet money he asked Eri what she felt, too, after he’d Overhauled her. But he hated the sound of screaming. The first time he-” Izuku choked on his own coffee. “The first time I screamed, he Overhauled my mouth shut. I don’t think he has the capacity to feel pain, and I know he lacked empathy completely.”

“Huh. So he really was just…a monster.”

“Or maybe he was just too human, and that’s why he’s scary.”

Katsuki grunted in Izuku’s ear. “No human can hurt a child like that.”

Eri ran over and they all went silent so she wasn’t bothered by their quiet conversation. She offered Izuku the origami rabbit made out of stone, which he happily accepted with a quiet thank you.

“Eraser?”

“Yes, Eri?”

“When I’m bigger, can I fix what he took from Izuku?”

Izuku was going to die from this child’s kindness. He’d never once thought of asking her for her quirk to rewind himself to a time before he’d met Chisaki. It wouldn't affect his memories or the pain he’d already experienced, but it would fix the issue of his overactive senses, and he’d get his curls back. But that wasn’t his decision - it was Eri’s. And here she was, offering when she barely knew Izuku, or how to control her own quirk.

Katsuki hugged him tighter and Izuku managed to keep his sobs held inside his chest.

“If he wants you to, yes. You’re a bit of a ways from mastering your quirk. When it’s safe, you can ask him if he wants that, okay?”

“Okay, thank you.”

As she ran off, Momo lifted the toddler onto her hip as they made their way to the kitchen to help out making brunch with Iida and Tsu. Kirishima stood up and tucked his hands into his pockets. He stopped in front of Izuku with this kind smile on his face. After a moment, he offered out a fist. Izuku hesitantly offered his own in response and Kirishima bumped them together. 

“I haven’t seen her smile like that very often. Thanks. I think she really needed to meet you, and - maybe Nedzu can have Imani stop by. He…he was a captive, too, right?”

Izuku nodded. “He was old man Chisaki’s butler originally, back when the Yakuza was…well, just Yakuza. He was kind, and he cared. Overhaul kept us all in line with this…unspoken threat. But Imani still smiled through it, he talked about Eri often, she was the old man’s granddaughter but she was too young when her family died to remember them. So Imani kind of became her grandfather. Mine, too.”

“I’ll talk with Nedzu.” Eraser interjected. “She needs a caretaker during the days anyway, until she can start school again. Maybe he’d be better suited there, if you think he’d help her.”

“I do. I might understand her, but earning her trust is something I think will be hard-won for everyone. But she already trusts Imani, and that means something. He’s the only one in her life, before she was rescued, who didn’t hurt her.”

“Thank you, Izuku.”

The hero wandered off to make a call. Izuku buried himself into Katsuki’s arms, trying to keep himself from breaking down again. His tears were a lot freer these days, easier to fall. That was both good and bad. Izuku still felt bothersome when he got panic attacks or cried in public or outside the darkness of his own bedroom in the middle of the night, but Katsuki kept reassuring him he wasn’t a burden, and his tears weren’t shameful . 

Even if he hadn’t been completely ready to meet Eri, Izuku realized that he’d needed it. Because while this was supposed to be a meeting where Eri would learn she wasn’t alone - Izuku had also learned that he wasn’t healing by himself. 

He might not be able to talk about the complexities of his emotions with a six year old, but he could take comfort in knowing someone else could nod their head and mean it when he expressed he was struggling, or scared. Eri was scared of a lot, that much was easy to tell. Izuku hoped they could help her get over those fears, and by extension, maybe Izuku would grow out of his, too. 

~ 2 Years Later ~

“What do you feel?” “Tell me everything.”

“...like knives on my skin. It- it hurts, Chisaki-sama.”

“Good.” 

Body tangled, arms flailing, Izuku woke up screaming as Chisaki’s voice filled his mind on repeat. It hurts. Good. It hurts. It hurts. It hurts! Good. Tell me everything. What do you feel? It hurts! IT HURTS! IT HURTS! Arms grabbed him, pulled him back into the bed he was trying to escape, stopped him from clawing his own skin off. Warm hands wrapped around him, brushed fingers through his hair. Izuku finally gasped air back into his lungs and forced his eyes open. 

“-uku! Izuku!” Katsuki. That was Katsuki’s voice. “It’s not real. He’s not real. Come back to me, please.”

“I’m here.” He choked out, breathing and thrashing both finally dying down as he slowly recognized where he was. This was his bedroom, their bedroom, in the apartment he shared with Katsuki. He was awake, and safe in his boyfriend’s arms. Izuku took a slow breath and allowed himself to go limp in the blonde hero’s arms.

“Shhh, I got you. You’re safe. He’s not real. You’re safe.”

“I know.” Izuku muttered sleepily. 

He wasn’t trapped in the Shie Hissaikai house anymore. He was safe in his own apartment, two years after he’d been rescued. The nightmares weren’t every night anymore, or even all that often. But every once in a while, something would strike Izuku and his mind would reach into the depths of his past trauma and pry out his pain with a crowbar, to remind him that it still existed. 

Today was a big day. He knew that’s why he had a nightmare. Izuku was going with Katsuki to a TV/news interview. He’d just had a huge success leading a raid on the League of Villains two weeks ago, capturing several members, though Dabi and Shigaraki got away and were still at large. The raid allowed them to get the last of Garaki’s research which had been left with them when All For One was killed in Kamino ward several years prior and Garaki swapped to the Yakuza. All those fancy treaty talks and the heroes never kept to their word on balance. Izuku knew they wouldn’t, he wasn’t dumb enough to believe any of their desires for peace were real. Villains could be the biggest optimists, especially ones that truly believed they were changing the world for the better. But a part of Izuku’s understanding also came from growing up quirkless. He’d been betrayed by the Commission and heroes themselves since the day he was diagnosed - so he knew to expect their betrayal. Ironically, the villains didn’t, even after they’d done it to the Yakuza when Izuku was rescued. 

Most of the news stations in the country wanted to talk with Katsuki because he’d been involved with all four major raids in the last decade, two on the Yakuza and two on the League, now that both groups were basically destroyed. They’d asked if Izuku was ready to talk about his time with the Yakuza, and honestly, he was. He’d spent days discussing it with his therapist, and they both agreed this might set him back slightly, but ultimately, it would help him to open up. 

Katsuki wasn’t thrilled. He didn’t want to expose Izuku to this kind of resurfacing pain, this traumatic stress. In the end, he agreed to let Izuku tell his own story. Katsuki was one of the youngest top five heroes in several decades, so that also made him news-worthy, and he expected the news casters would respect his position enough not to embarrass his boyfriend, aka Izuku, on national TV. 

“Good morning. Welcome back.” Katsuki whispered with a kiss to his curls. 

Eri had given him a small dose of her quirk last month, which mostly fixed his senses and reverted his hair, thankfully. He also got his freckles back, much to Katsuki’s relief. Izuku understood, his freckles were a well-loved piece of him that he’d missed for a long time. 

“Morning, Kacchan.”

Izuku climbed out of his boyfriend’s arms carefully. He desperately needed a shower to wash away the nightmare. Katsuki understood without asking. What he said instead was his attempt to comfort Izuku’s worries. 

“You don’t have to do this if you’re not ready, Nerd. No one will think any less of you for wanting to keep your story private.”

“I know. But I think it’s time the world understands how dangerous Chisaki really was. They need to know what he was going to do.”

“The files have been declassified.”

“No one reads Commission files, Kacchan. Well, no one but me.”

Katsuki snorted. “Alright, get cleaned up. I showered last night, gonna get dressed.”

Izuku wandered into their bathroom to get a shower and get ready. They both took the day off from work in order to do this interview, so they got up a bit late. Katsuki was a pro-hero working for Miruko’s agency in Hosu, where they’d moved to, while Izuku worked with Eraserhead’s underground agency as their primary quirk analyst and researcher. He nightlighted for several police stations and did some freelance analysis for a few other pro heroes and agencies. They both had incredibly busy lives now, and they were happy.

Izuku graduated top of his class from the online high school he’d been on and off attending during his time in the underground, which he was able to finish quickly once he’d been rescued. He also graduated with honors from the country’s top quirk analyst program, in record time. So he had his own well-earned respect in the hero world, even as a quirkless person. 

He had more than he could have ever asked for. 

Izuku had achieved the peace he once thought could only be found in the arms of someone who saw the usefulness in his genetic code. He found a pride in his life that he once believed was only found in giving up pieces of himself for others to use. 

He wasn’t ashamed of his survival anymore.

~

“Welcome back to Channel 5 Hero News. This afternoon we have a special segment on our number four hero: Dynamight. He’s joining us as he’s one of the few heroes who has been involved in all four of the most successful big crime raids in the last ten years. Trust us, viewers, we tried to get Eraserhead, but he turned us down.”

The crew behind the cameras laughed quietly. Izuku cracked a grin, knowing Eraser hated being on TV, it kind of ruined the whole underground hero mystery and aesthetic. Though he was sure the older hero was watching right now. The newscaster turned to Izuku and Katsuki sitting across from her at the table in front of a giant green screen which likely showed the weather map or maybe this segment’s title. 

“I’m Kaede Otakawa, and this is our ‘Hero Talk’ segment. Joining me is Pro-Hero Dynamight and his partner, famed Quirk Analyst; Izuku Midoriya. Now, you were both involved in the last Yakuza raid, and we’ll get to that shortly, but I wanted you both to introduce yourselves and talk about the recent League of Villains raid.”

She gestured to them. Katsuki nodded, wearing his usual hero persona scowl behind his mask. He was in full hero gear while Izuku wore one of his corporate style work suits. Izuku smiled at the camera politely. 

“Thank you for having us Otakawa. Well, as you said, I’m Izuku Midoriya. I work as a quirk analyst, mostly for underground agencies and the police, but I also do some freelance work for some of the big names on the hero charts, too. My most recent large-scale work actually helped kick off the League raid.”

“Dynamight?”

“Well you know who I am, what do you need to know about me? My blood type? It’s A-negative, by the way.” Izuku held back a snort as Katsuki went on. “I kick villains in the- and I hope you can bleep me fast enough - ass, and I take names. That’s my job, and I’m damn good at it. Anything else?”

Otakawa chuckled softly. “Well, thank you both for introducing yourself. Midoriya, could you discuss your part in the League raid a couple weeks ago?”

“Oh sure. As most people know, I was…trapped in the underground for several years as a teenager, so I got a close up look at the League and their abilities. So I gave the heroes a full exposé on each member and their quirks and skills. It helped them form a plan of attack and counterattack. I also worked with Nedzu to run mission command during the raid, but that’s just background work, I’m no hero.”

“Well, I beg to differ, but I won’t press. Dynamight, your role was a bit more visible. How did it feel to finally deal a blow to the League after your kidnapping during hero school when the Kamino raid happened?”

“Damn good. The League might not have posed a countrywide threat after All For One was taken out, but organized crime is always a threat. They still had money and resources, more than most small-time groups have, by a long shot. Being able to finally take them out was extremely satisfying.”

“And what about the two villains who escaped; Dabi and Shigaraki?”

“They’ll either turn themselves in or get caught in petty theft. They’ve got nothing left. We seized the League’s assets and resources. While they both have powerful, dangerous quirks, fire and decay won’t save them from starvation on the streets now that they’re broke and cut off.”

Izuku put a hand on Katsuki’s wrist gently. “I think what my partner is trying to say is that the Commission and the heroes take the threat of Dabi and Shigaraki very seriously, but without the money and resources they had before, especially their warp gate quirk, they’re starting from nothing again, and it will be very hard to regain what they lost before they’re finally caught.”

“You have such a way with words, Midoriya.”

“Thank you, Otakawa.” Katsuki winked at him covertly. Izuku knew he was being brash and blunt on purpose since that was his hero persona, but also because he wanted to give Izuku time to shine. The newscaster leaned back in her chair. Her expression dipped into something more somber as she finally addressed the elephant in the room. 

“That brings us to my main subject of discussion, your time in the Shie Hissaikai, the Yakuza. You spent several years with their leader, Overhaul, according to the declassified files the Commission recently released regarding the raid.” So someone else had read them.

“I did, yes. I knew Ch- Overhaul, Kai Chisaki, uhh, I met him when I was fourteen, and I was rescued from the Shie Hissaikai just before my seventeenth birthday.”

“So tell us how you got involved with them. I think I speak for many of our viewers when I say I’m incredibly curious how a fourteen year old got involved with the Yakuza of all things, in this day and age.”

Izuku chuckled. “It’s a bit…shocking, yes. But I’ll tell you what I told Dynamight and the police at the end - At first, Chisaki was kind. That’s how it started.”

“He was kind? I don’t think I can believe that after seeing the destruction he caused during the first raid.”

“I know.” Izuku sighed. “But people, children, aren’t tricked with cruelty. I already understood cruelty intimately. I’m quirkless. I knew cruelty before I had even mastered middle school math class. On my very worst day, when I was literally standing on a roof ledge, someone offered me the first ounce of kindness I had ever known - and I clung to it like a lifeline.”

Otakawa thoughtfully pursed her lips and asked him to go on. Katsuki shifted a bit awkwardly, and the rest of the camera crew could tell this was going to get dark. Izuku tried to smile in a reassuring way, the kind of smile he’d been offered when he needed them. 

“He was obsessive at his best, and outright vile at his worst. But it didn’t start out that way. He talked to me, he bought me food and shoes, things I needed that my own mother refused to spend money on because of my quirklessness. Chisaki was the first kind person I met in my life after being diagnosed as quirkless, and for a long time - I was so ashamed of realizing that I had fallen for it.”

“But you were a child.”

“I was, yes. None of what he did was my fault. I know that now.”

“Now, this might be an intrusive question - and viewers, please be advised, this conversation going forward may not be for young or impressionable ears - but I’d like to know why Overhaul kept you captive in his HQ. What use did you serve to the Yakuza?”

Katsuki grabbed Izuku’s shaking hand and squeezed it tightly. Izuku placed his free hand on top. It took a few moments of breathing through the memories for Izuku to finally answer the question. 

“His quirk came with a very serious drawback. He had severe germaphobia. It led to an obsession with ‘cleansing’ the world of what he called the plague of quirks. Being quirkless in this day and age is so rare, I might as well be one of a kind. To Chisaki, I was the only clean thing in a world of filth. I was…I was the only thing he could touch that wouldn’t send him into a panic, or a rage. But…no adult should rely on human connection like that with a child. I knew, almost the whole time, that eventually he’d want to use me for his attempts to cleanse the world, but it took until just before the raid for him to do that. Instead…I was a comfort item for him. I’ll let everyone use their imagination on that.”

He was damn sure they wouldn’t be able to imagine the worst of it. Hell, they might not be able to imagine the least of what Chisaki did. This might be a weekday segment, when kids would all be in school and away from TVs, but Izuku also didn’t want to be too specific, which might trigger someone observing, or upset them.

“I’m so sorry to dig into this deeper, but I’ve had many viewers write in ahead of time, and a lot of them were asking if you could tell us what Overhaul’s quirk was like, up close, or even first hand.”

“Mmmm, I’m not surprised. Countless people have asked me over the years after they saw what he’d done to the city on the news during the first raid.”

She offered an apologetic glance. “This isn’t easy for you, is it?”

“No.” Izuku sighed. “To be clear, he only used his quirk on me a few times. Chisaki only completely Overhauled me once, and that was more than enough.”

“I assume it’s a terrible experience.” 

Izuku nodded. She was leading him on, but giving him the space and time he needed to get the words out. Katsuki kept squeezing his hand, a calm reassurance that he was there if Izuku needed him. 

“If you stuck your tongue to a live wire or car battery, you might know a tenth of what it felt like. You don’t lose your consciousness, but you lose your connection to the physical world. There’s no sight, no sound, no movement, and yet…you’re in this state of constant agony. Every nerve ending is electrified and flayed. It’s horrific. I blacked out for about twelve hours afterwards.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry. That’s monstrous.”

Izuku twitched, just slightly. He remembered his chat with Eraser and Katsuki just after meeting Eri, when they discussed what Chisaki might be. Izuku’s opinion hadn’t changed since then, and Katsuki knew that. They’d talked about it several times, they’d even argued about it, though not too seriously.

“That’s something I’d like to clarify to everyone watching, Otakawa, if I may?”

“Of course.” She gestured for him to keep speaking.

“Kai Chisaki was human, he is human. He’s unable to feel empathy or understand pain, most likely he’s either a sociopath or a psychopath, medically speaking. I’m not sure. But he’s human. That’s the scariest thing about him, if you ask me. Because he understood how to convince me that the obsessive and cruel kind of love he had to offer was better than the hate-filled abuse the rest of the world threw at me. I wanted to do this interview because I wanted people to understand that villains aren’t monsters that hide in the closet or under the bed. They’re just human .”

“Can I ask what your opinion is of villains in general? I ask this because there’s a lot of propaganda out there about villains and the path to villainy. We can’t get too deep into politics here, but we all know there are many outside factors to it - please, tell me your thoughts.”

Katsuki shifted in his chair. He clearly wanted to say something. Izuku had his guesses, so he nodded to his boyfriend to try and encourage him to speak. The blonde let out a relieved sigh. Otakawa asked Katsuki to give his input as well. Katsuki finally wrestled his own demons down and spoke up. 

“I won’t tell you that there aren’t bastards out there that want to watch the world burn - there very much are. But a lot of the criminals and villains that we heroes face are people who were driven to their lowest and not given a choice in life. They’re broke, or hated for their quirk, or lack of quirk, or they’re uneducated and without resources or family to help them. They’re at their wit's end and they need help, but they don’t get help, so they turn to crime just to survive. Like the Nerd said, they’re human, just like us, and sometimes, life fucking sucks - and kicks us on our ass, and then we’re stuck.”

“That was…surprisingly profound, Dynamight, thank you. Midoriya?”

“I think Dynamight summed it up pretty well. We’re all human. Sometimes, there’s a lot that leads us down the wrong path. But there are heroes out there who are ready and willing to save us, and offer out a helping hand. I’m glad that I found mine.”

“Yeah, Eraserhead.” Katsuki snorted. Izuku swatted his arm.

“Well, I’m glad you have heroes, Midoriya. It’s important to have good role models, even as adults. I think everyone needs a hero in their life.”

“I agree, Otakawa.” Izuku clasped his hands on the desk. “Thank you for having us here.”

“Oh, of course. Thank you both for joining us today.”

~

((I had Unsteady by X Ambassadors playing on repeat while writing this scene))

Katsuki found him on the balcony hallway outside their apartment. They’d taken a nap after their interview and Izuku had desperately needed good sleep. He’d already cracked open a beer which hung from his hand as he watched the sunset through the city skyline. The blonde saddled up beside him and crushed their shoulders together so he could lean in and kiss Izuku on the forehead. 

For a while, they didn’t speak. Actually, silence had become a comfort between them. Izuku lost his mumbling habit after spending time in the Yakuza, and Katsuki had been tempered by years of (still ongoing) anger management and quirk therapy. Sometimes, they’d spend hours sitting across from each other on the bed. Izuku would curl around his legs while Katsuki stretched out and stared at the ceiling, or at Izuku. At night, when neither of them could sleep from whatever horror they’d seen or remembered that day, they’d touch fingertips and pretend they were undressing each other by shedding layers of barbed wire around their hearts. 

There was no feeling quite like the nakedness of baring your soul to another human being when all you wanted to do was shrivel into yourself and forget the world existed. 

Izuku sometimes wondered if the reason he fell in love with Katsuki after coming home was because Katsuki was the opposite of Chisaki. Izuku learned conditional love through Chisaki; that kindness towards his quirklessness had been a ruse, and Izuku fell for it. Katsuki had never lied to Izuku, not once. He’d never faked his emotions or taken advantage of Izuku like Chisaki did. His love - and his hate - were unconditional. 

Izuku had been a shattered doll when he woke up from that last night in Chisaki’s arms. He’d lashed out, he’d screamed and cried once Mitsuki had shown him he could. His path to healing had been uneven, rocky, and confusing. But no matter how many times Izuku woke up screaming and clawing at the very man trying to keep him safe, Katsuki had never once let him down or walked away. Izuku had grown so accustomed to violence that, for a while, he didn’t understand what it meant for someone to just sit with him, and be the steady shoulder he could cry on.

His head fell against Katsuki’s shoulder as he offered the beer. Katsuki took a swig and wrapped his arm around Izuku’s shoulders. He pressed his fingers to the five point scar on Izuku’s head carefully, reminding Izuku that this wasn’t what defined him without ever uttering a single word about it. He never did. Izuku knew he wanted to erase every scar on Izuku’s body, but he’d only ever touched them softly. 

Once, when Izuku was feeling confident, he’d come home from work on Katsuki’s day off and immediately thrown off his jacket and shirt. Katsuki had been startled, to say the least. But Izuku wasn’t trying to come on to his boyfriend. Instead, he grabbed Katsuki’s hands and pressed them to the scars on his body. Katsuki sat there on their couch, a stuttering mess as Izuku cried above him. His tears fell onto Katsuki’s face but he insisted Katsuki touch him, touch every scar, learn them like he knew how many freckles were on Izuku’s face. So he did it, Katsuki stripped him down and touched every scar, every cut and scrape, every broken bone and torn ligament. He’d kissed them, told Izuku what his mother told him as a child; victims have graves, survivors have scars. 

Mitsuki wasn’t known to be soft, she loved loud and biting when she wasn’t comforting Izuku in the hospital. But Izuku needed to hear it. He’d needed to be reminded that he wasn’t a captive. He wasn’t a victim of a villain’s abuse. He wasn’t some pathetic child who lost his way in the woods. He’d done every shameful thing to survive a world that insisted he cease existing, and he’d survived. 

He’d fucking survived , and he had the god damn scars to prove it, and Katsuki had kissed each of them like he could convince Izuku to forgive himself, and Izuku held Katsuki like he was the hope that he could do that one day.

Katsuki ran his hands through Izuku’s curls as the moon rose above them. He passed the beer bottle back so Izuku could take a short swig and set it down on the balcony railing beside them. Izuku wrapped his arms around Katsuki’s waist and whispered into the growing darkness, the only time he felt comfortable baring his soul as if still lost in the world of his own mind while someone hurt him outside his safe space. 

“Sometimes, I feel so ashamed of myself for having believed him, for having thought I loved him, for having thought he loved me. Sometimes, my whole body burns with the shame of not belonging to a world that tried to kill me.”

Katsuki hugged him tighter. He buried his face into Izuku’s curls and let the words sit in the air around them, between them, like someone’s last gasping, dying breath. 

“I think, sometimes, your body forgets it’s not in that house anymore.” Katsuki wiped the tears silently falling from Izuku’s eyes without looking. He never looked away from the stars, his jaw vibrating against Izuku’s scalp as he spoke. “I’ll welcome you home every time you remember.”

It might be a damn shame that Izuku lost pieces of himself to survive a world that had once put a boot to his neck, that now held him with loving hands and an open heart, but Izuku was learning that he didn’t have to lie to himself anymore. He could feel this great shame of his past, and he could love the parts of himself he knew no one would ever be excited to see.

 He could still be held, even on the days when the sheets felt like razor blades, on the days when the lights in their ceiling were too loud and he woke up screaming for relief, even after Eri’s quirk salvaged what was left of the person Izuku was before. He could still be loved, even when his mind fell apart and he couldn’t remember he wasn’t in a dark room with a man wearing a monster’s desire like a tailored suit. 

Katsuki wiped the dust from his shoulders, picked his heart up off the ground, and welcomed him back, every time he woke up to safety. Izuku smiled into the darkness wrapped around them as Katsuki rocked them back and forth to the beat of their hearts.

“I think I’d like to come home again.”

“Okaeri, Izuku.”