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“You’ve never understood how important this is to me.”
Izuku’s hands shake with the weight of unspoken words and burdens piled on his shoulders. One For All thrums beneath his fingertips, like electricity running through wires. It’s numbing, his fingers tingling with the need to release the energy waiting to run its course.
Katsuki scoffs. “Important?” He echoes, staring at Izuku incredulously. “Do you seriously believe carrying everyone’s weight makes you a damn hero?” He points at Izuku briefly. “No one asked you to do that. You’re just breaking yourself!”
Izuku takes a hesitant step backwards towards an old, out-of-use building. They’re in an abandoned part of the city, filled with piles of debris and factories that’d been left unattended too long. The Paranormal Liberation war had changed a lot of things. This is only one of the few things it’d made worse.
“You don’t understand, Kacchan,” he says, and the nickname is almost mocking. There’s nothing pure or innocent about their lives anymore. “I had to. I needed to, to ensure everyone in our class was safe. They weren’t supposed to get involved.”
“So what?” He asks, snickering. “What—were we supposed to just let you lead yourself on a path to your death? You’d rather we didn’t help and you got injured, or trapped, or even killed by one of those escaped convicts?”
“I would’ve been able to handle myself.” Izuku mumbles.
Katsuki scoffs again, striding towards him. “You would’ve been able to handle yourself?” he echoes. “You weren’t even taking care of yourself properly, and I’m supposed to believe you’d be able to handle yourself against dangerous, quirked convicts?”
Izuku hangs his head low. “That’s not fair.”
“It’s true, isn’t it?”
Still staring at the ground, Izuku shakes his head, before lifting it to meet Katsuki’s gaze. “I’m stronger now. I’m not that weak teenager anymore, Kacchan.”
His hand jerks, unsteady, trembling as static crawls across his skin. The tremor gradually becomes a violent spasm, and Blackwhip erupts, a mighty storm of dark tendrils tearing through the air. It lashes outward, wild and writhing as it snaps through the air like broken wires.
Izuku’s breath catches. He hadn’t meant to release it, he never means to release it, but fear’s made the choice for him.
He tries to remember what Banjo told him. He tries his hardest to remember how to keep it in. He tries and tries to control his anger but Blackwhip continues to lash outwards, slamming into a cracked support beam. The sound of splintering concrete echoes like a gunshot.
Its shadow-like thin tendrils wrap around the support beam, latching onto it like a leech. It tugs and tugs, and Izuku begs his emotions to still for a moment, to quiet the war in his head and the quirk that desperately wants out.
The cracks grow on the support beam, spiderwebs blooming until it consumes the pillar of concrete. The beam groaned, giving in to the pressure of cobweb-like patterns and the sharp tug of Blackwhip, before snapping messily in two. Shards rain down like metal shrapnel in war, littering the ground and adding to its surrounding piles of debris. As it lurches sideways, it drags the first floor of the abandoned factory with it in a violent, dusty avalanche.
For a moment, all they can do is stare as the building crumples in on itself in a matter of seconds, following the broken pillar’s path. Every crack of stone and concrete was a heartbeat, every fall of the debris a haunting reminder of what Izuku’d started. It wasn’t on purpose. He never does this on purpose. But ever since the war, it's as if his quirk has a mind of its own.
The Paranormal Liberation War had messed up a lot of things. They’d lost a lot of people, one of which being the first year’s art history teacher, Midnight. Izuku still runs it over in his head at night when he can’t sleep, wondering uselessly if he could’ve changed anything that would ensure she’d live.
Katsuki had almost died. He still remembers watching Katsuki get stabbed by those tendrils—Shigaraki’s wires, a new quirk All For One had given him—and not being able to do anything about it. Well, that’s a lie. He’d taken out some of his anger on Shigaraki, but Katsuki never needs to know that detail.
He also doesn’t need to know that his injury is one of the many reasons he left U.A. in the first place. The thought of risking the rest of his classmates getting hurt like that, or worse, getting targeted further by the League of Villains, was enough to convince him to leave. Being a vigilante and helping rid the street of villains was much better than staying at U.A. where his classmates could easily become targets for attack once more.
There are many things that the Paranormal Liberation War messed up. Shigaraki had tried to take Aizawa-Sensei’s quirk. Instead, he lost a leg, cutting the limb off to make sure the drug didn’t take his quirk at all. He’d lost an eye, too, after Shigaraki attacked him directly.
There must’ve been something Izuku could’ve done to stop all that from happening. Surely.
The building groans behind him. Maybe, if he let it take him—
No. No. He needs to live.
“Izuku, move!” Katsuki shouts, rushing forward and using his explosions as a light boost. His arm reaches out, begging for Izuku to take it.
Shakily, Izuku reaches for it. Katsuki closes the distance, grabbing his hand firmly and squeezing it surely. Before Izuku can say another word, he pulls them away from the crumbling building, the shadows of Blackwhip dissipating as he does so. The force of the collapse vibrates through the asphalt ground, reverberating underneath their soles.
They fall harshly on the asphalt. Their skin scrapes on the rough ground. No doubt they brandish scrapes and bruises now.
Katsuki pants on the ground, staring at Izuku, who’s fixated on the remains of the abandoned factory. Dust clouds the air, covering the debris in a veil of brown and grey. Steel pipes and beams twist over piles and lay mangled in others. Broken, jagged slabs of concrete stack on top of each other like a deadly game of jenga. Shards of metal and glass litter the ground, thin and almost unnoticeable in the mess of debris. Dust coats their throats, forming a temporary layer of sandpaper that cracks every word and sound.
Izuku stares at his hands. Blackwhip had long since disappeared into the shadows, yet he can’t help but wonder how he could’ve prevented this.
“Are you okay?” Katsuki asks, and the gentleness in his voice throws Izuku off his game.
“Am I—” He stammers, staring at Katsuki dumbfounded. “Are you okay?”
He furrows his brow. “I’m fine.” He gestures to his body. “Don’t you see? Or, do you need glasses now?”
“You could’ve been, well, not fine. Don’t you see?” Izuku scrambles to stand. “Blackwhip is dangerous. I can’t trust myself at U.A. until it’s under control. It would’ve been better if you hadn't dragged me back there.”
Katsuki rolls his eyes. “We didn’t drag you.”
“Todoroki made an ice mountain to trap me in.”
“It wasn’t an ice mount—”
“It was an ice mountain.” Izuku argues. “Or, just a really large and thick ice structure. That’s not the point!” He gestures his hands wildly. “The point is it would’ve been safer for me to stay a vigilante, away from all of you and U.A. itself.”
Katsuki stands, brushing dirt off his knees before striding towards Izuku. “You could just ask for help. Quit acting like you’ve gotta save everyone by yourself. You’re still a child.” His eyes soften. “We’re not grown-ups yet, so stop acting like you’ve gotta be. Damn nerd, just ask for help already. You’re not All Might.”
Izuku huffs an amused laugh. “You’re being awfully soft today, Kacchan. I might mistake you for Toga, you know.”
Katsuki crosses his arms, scoffing. “Shut up. Don’t ruin the moment.”
Katsuki huffs, dust still clinging to his hair. Without looking at him, he slings an arm around Izuku’s shoulder, more like a shove than a hug. Then, he begins to smirk, despite the blood on his lip. “God, you look like hell. Good thing I’m here to keep your dumb ass standing.”
Izuku blinks, startled by the weight of his grip. It’s firm, grounding, not quite gentle but enough that it keeps him standing. He swallows against the grit coating his throat, the words caught somewhere between an awkward apology and relief.
Katsuki tightens his hold, staring at the debris field with him. “You don’t get it, do you? You’re not alone, Deku. So stop acting like you are.”
The ruins groan behind them, but for the first time since the collapse, Izuku lets himself breathe.