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The first time Izuku sees Shigaraki Tomura he thinks nothing much.
Danger, on loop, mostly. Be on guard. Protect the others. The USJ training ground is in ruins around him and they’re on borrowed time - his classmates are scattered and injured and Shigaraki’s far out of reach. Brand new villain, Japan’s most wanted. He’s nothing special. Attractive, Izuku supposes, in a creepy, spidery way. They make eye contact for a moment. He escapes through a black portal before Izuku can get a good look, and then Izuku doesn’t think about him at all beyond being a new threat they have to subdue.
They second time they meet, though, is the time Izuku really sees him. It happens in a crowded shopping complex and it starts with a hand around Izuku’s throat.
There’s no warmth to Shigaraki’s skin. He smells like smoke and dust, like the aftermath of a collapsed building, as he digs his fingers into Izuku’s jugular. Leaning in far too close. Because he never learnt about personal space, Izuku supposes, or he just enjoys making Izuku more uncomfortable. Probably the second one. The tip of his little finger hovers teasingly over Izuku’s collarbone to remind him not to move. “Hi, Deku,” he says cheerfully. “Thought I’d find you around.”
“What do you want?” Izuku asks through gritted teeth. He barely dares breathe. “If you’re going to kill me then do it. I’m not afraid of you.”
“That’s a lie,” Shigaraki says. Izuku can’t see his face from here but his voice sounds like a smile. “I can smell it on you, but you don’t have to be afraid just yet. I just want to talk.”
“Take your hand off me.”
“No.” A squeeze. The four points of contact on Izuku’s neck tighten until it hurts. “Something’s been bothering me, Deku. I want your opinion. What do you think is the difference between me and Stain?”
The question’s so out of pocket it makes Izuku falter. Shigaraki curls his pinky to press his fingertip into his own palm. His hand’s big enough it spans the whole length of Izuku’s neck without trying. Deceptively thin. But Shigaraki doesn’t have to be strong, not like All Might, not when he could kill Izuku with a careless touch. Izuku lets out a breath. “Why are you asking me?”
“Ideals. You have them.” His voice isn’t deep but it is raspy. Dry linen noises right in Izuku’s ear. “He does too. He hates me and I hate him. We’re different. I just can’t understand why.”
It’s hard to swallow with Shigaraki’s fingers wrapped so tightly around his neck. A child somewhere squeals. None of his classmates are close enough to rescue him, just a throng of civilians in prime position to get themselves killed if this goes south. They don’t notice the stiffness of Izuku’s shoulders or how he keeps trying to lean away. His best bet is to wait for Uraraka to come back. She’s sharp. She’ll know something’s wrong the moment she sees him but he has to warn her to stay back. His phone’s in his pocket. Slowly, he inches his hand towards it, not knowing exactly what he’s going to do but knowing he needs to do it fast.
A hand clamps around his wrist. Izuku freezes. He half expects to be turned to ash but Shigaraki laughs and comes closer to wrap himself around Izuku’s left arm. He’s so wiry. A whole head taller but he probably weighs less than Izuku. “You squirm a lot. You haven’t answered my question, Deku.”
Izuku shuts his eyes, remembers to breathe. It smells like concrete and static. “The difference between you is that Stain has beliefs. He has a goal. You don’t. You have no direction, you’re just a toddler who likes to break things.”
“True,” Shigaraki says, not sounding offended. “I do like to break things.”
“Why?”
“Because I hate them. I hate everything, Deku, but I hate you in particular.” The hand around his neck loosens and shifts; Shigaraki slings his arm around Izuku’s shoulders instead, four fingers clamped around Izuku’s right bicep just to remind him he could die right here. His lips brush the shell of Izuku’s ear. They’re dry and peeling and it tickles him. “You’re too good. I don’t understand it. Nobody’s that good. Nobody wants to throw themselves into the fire the way you do.”
Izuku shivers. If someone turned to look at them now they’d think he and Shigaraki were lovers. “Let me go.”
“Maybe that’s what it is,” Shigaraki muses. He keeps talking right into Izuku’s skin. “I don’t like it because it’s pretend. I don’t want heroes to exist. I see that ivory tower and I want to smash it to pieces because it’s not real.”
“Heroes are real,” Izuku says, trying to squirm free. “Who do you think it is who keeps Japan so safe?“
“Phonies. Liars. If they were real, Deku, they wouldn’t let bad things happen. There wouldn’t be people like me. So maybe I do have a purpose. I want everyone to see what I see.” A pause. A laugh. Shigaraki pulls away just enough to inspect Izuku’s face. “Your pulse is going so fast. Do I frighten you, little rabbit?”
“Screw you,” Izuku spits, terrified. “I’ve met worse.”
“Oh, Deku. I really don’t think you have.”
There’s no heat coming off him. Shigaraki’s like a corpse. He presses their cheeks together, overly intimate. Izuku’s skin prickles, partly from distress, partly just from the dark little thrill that comes from having someone so close. He half-thinks Shigaraki might bite him. He’d be powerless to do anything about it unless he’s willing to risk getting killed. His heart beats in his ears. Shigaraki’s hair tickles his face and Izuku hates himself, just a little, for realising that this is the first time he’s been held.
Someone clears their throat. Izuku opens his eyes. Uraraka has found them but she has the good sense to keep her distance, gaze going from Izuku’s wide eyes to the vice-like hands around his shoulders and wrist. A shop speaker blares. A woman shouts after her kid but Uraraka, brave girl, doesn’t budge. “Deku-kun,” she calls loud enough to make people turn. Loud enough to have witnesses. Eyes on Shigaraki, stock-still. “Is that a friend of yours, or should I go call security?”
“Oh, I was just saying hi,” Shigaraki leers. The grip on Izuku loosens and comes away. Izuku feels like he can finally breathe. “Needed an opinion and I got one. Thank you, Deku. You’ve given me a lot to think about. Look forward to seeing you soon.”
He rises and shuffles off. Somehow he just fades away into the crowd even though Izuku’s watching him. The knot in his chest breaks in half. His watch is gone, he realises dimly. Shigaraki dissolved it just for fun. Uraraka’s hands are on him immediately, squeezing his shoulders. She keeps her pinkies lifted like he did. Izuku flinches, but - but she’s not him. The worst she could do is float him to the ceiling by accident. She’s safe. Izuku’s safe.
“Deku-kun,” she says, low and urgent. “Who was that? What did he do to you?”
“Nothing.” Izuku swallows. “But that was Shigaraki. He knew exactly where to find me. And I think - I think, if I’m not careful, he’s going to find me again.”
He doesn’t want to think about it too hard. He can’t, really, because the memory of Shigaraki’s dry, whispery voice in his ear still makes Izuku tremble. So Izuku buries the fear in a box and focuses on the present. He’s going to be a hero, after all, and near-death experiences are going to keep happening to him whether he likes them or not. He lives his life, and refuses to be afraid, and by the time Kacchan gets kidnapped Izuku doesn’t have to think twice about walking right into the League of Villains’ den.
It’s a stupid plan, really. They all know it is, but that doesn’t stop them because a boy is in danger and heroes always help. The idea’s simple enough. They put on disguises and sneak into the the Kamino area while the pro heroes distract the villains, so Izuku and his friends can swoop in to rescue Kacchan and make a quick, easy getaway. The most surprising thing about the whole operation is that it works. Perfectly, in fact, right up until Mr Compress shoots right past Mount Lady and Izuku, without thinking, leaps off Kirishima’s back to bodily stop him.
The last thing he sees is Kacchan’s wide-eyed face before he falls. No time to think. He meets Compress halfway in the air and kicks hard, sending him flying who-knows-where, then braces himself for a twenty-storey fall and prays he’ll get to go home alive. The impact cracks the asphalt. The distant fighting doesn’t stop, but Izuku does. When he wakes up again his classmates are gone. Good, he thinks, aching, bones broken. His clothes are torn and so is his skin. I did it. I saved him. I did good.
There’s dust in his lungs. He hears footsteps, uneven, like their owner exists with bad posture. He’s too weak to move. But he moves anyway, rolling onto his side so he can force himself up to face whatever comes. A figure, slouched, strolling towards him. Thin and glow-in-the-dark pale. Slightly muffled, through the hand clamped over his face, but loud enough to hear. “It’s always you,” says Shigaraki. “Why is it always you?”
The other heroes are too far away to see him. They must know he fell, but they don’t know where - he can see Gran Torino zipping through the air somewhere to the left, calling his name. Izuku should shout. It would be stupid to try to face Shigaraki alone, but Izuku has never been sensible, or a coward. He fights his way to his feet, breathing heavy. “I could really ask you the same thing.”
Shigaraki’s shirt fits him today. He has muscle, lean and ropey, like someone with a lifetime of work and too little food. His hands are in his pockets but his shoulders are tense. Angry and barely controlling it. “Now, why would you steal my hostage, Deku? Here I thought you two didn’t get along. Or did someone else plan this and rope you in too?”
“It was my idea.”
“Why?”
“He needed saving.” Izuku’s mouth is wet. He wipes it with the back of his hand and winces when it comes away bloody. “He needed help, so I helped.”
“You hate him.”
“So?”
“So you didn’t want to help. You just thought you should.”
“Of course I wanted to.”
“You’re lying to me.” He stops at arms length. His hands are still hidden, which means he won’t attack just yet, but Izuku keeps his guard up. All Izuku can see are his eyes. The awful severed hands he wears cover everything else. “I watched you up there in the sky. When you caught Bakugou. The red one smiled. The big one smiled. Happy to see him. You just looked away.”
“I was looking at Compress - ”
“Liar. You were looking away.”
It’s quiet here. All Might’s battle rages in the background, quiet and sounding far away. Kind of like a movie playing from another room that’s barely audible over the blood rushing through Izuku’s ears. Izuku’s heart rate picks up - he thinks of hands on his throat, an arm around his back, breath on the sensitive skin of his neck. Shigaraki raises a hand. Izuku tenses but all the man does is uncover his face.
The splits all along his lips are brutal. Most are old and healed over but they look like someone stitched his mouth shut with twine. And he’s so young. If Izuku saw him anywhere else he might think he was looking at just another man living his life - but no. No, not with that smile. Shigaraki smiles like a child discovering it can pull the wings off a fly. “It wouldn’t have mattered who I stole, would it? You would have come regardless. But you wouldn’t have missed that one if he’d died. You just went through the motions because that’s what heroes do.”
Izuku takes a slow step back. “Obviously I would have cared if he’d died. He’s my classmate. What’s wrong with you?”
“Lots of things.” He sounds gleeful. No more anger. Izuku wonders if Shigaraki has space inside him for more than one emotion at a time. “Tell the truth, Deku. Would he have had it coming? Didn’t he traumatize you? Didn’t you think he’d fit right in with my friends?
“That doesn’t matter,” Izuku says, trying to keep his voice steady. “Okay. Yes. He’s a bastard and I don’t like him. But he needed help, so I helped. That’s it.”
“You didn’t want to. Why would you do something you didn’t want to?”
He’s not sure how to answer this. It’s like talking to an animal with only a surface understanding of how humans work. Shigaraki circles him like Izuku’s an art piece, eyes roving up and down his disguise with ill-concealed fascination. Lingering over the rips in his shirt, over his exposed stomach and chest. “Take the beard off,” he says suddenly. “It covers your face. Don’t like it.”
Izuku’s jaw slackens. Shigaraki doesn’t blink much, he’s starting to notice. It’s unsettling. It feels like Shigaraki’s trying to peel layers of Izuku’s skin back to take a look inside, as if there’s something in there worth inspecting and maybe stealing to take home. He’s not smiling anymore. A hundred percent serious because he wants to see Izuku’s face. Too intense. And still, somehow, Izuku doesn’t make a sound. The heroes are looking for him. He hears them tear through half-ruined buildings, hears them fight the other villains far away. Shigaraki ignores everything. He’s so close now he could reach out and turn Izuku to dust, but he doesn’t.
“Deku,” he says again, soft and rasping. “Take it off.”
It’s some kind of hypnotism. A fear response. That’s the only explanation Izuku will be able to come up with when he replays this in his head. He pulls off the fake beard. The glue stings but the disguise comes off, the broken glasses, the clip holding back his hair. The air smells like spilled gasoline. It’s cold and Izuku shivers through the tears in his shirt.
Shigaraki stares him down. Enchanted, even though Izuku knows for a fact his face is nothing much. “You’re not so sugary sweet,” Shigaraki says. “Your little friends like to pretend they’re in love with the world but you know better, don’t you? Quirkless. You’ll save them all but you hate them. They hurt you and you resent them still.”
Izuku swallows. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. You don’t even know me.”
“No. But I’m going to,” Shigaraki says, leaning over him to stare right into Izuku’s face. He’s a lot taller up close. “Contradictions. I can’t wrap my brain around you but you’re so fun. It makes me want to pull you apart, piece by piece, and take a look inside that pretty head.”
The tension between them stretches like frayed wire. If he leaned forward their noses would brush. Slowly, like he’s trying not to scare him, Shigaraki raises one bony hand and puts a finger on Izuku’s lower lip. It comes away bloody. “Look, Izuku,” he beams. “Your lip’s split. I think red suits you.”
A crash. Shouting coming closer. Izuku takes a step back just in time. The fine webs of anticipation between them snap as Iida, of all people, comes barreling into fray. He’s shouting for Izuku to get behind him, to stay safe. But Shigaraki doesn’t try to fight. He only snaps his fingers. One of Kurogiri’s portals swallow him - he holds Izuku’s eyes as he fades away. Izuku shivers, and he’s horrified to find he can’t tell how much of that comes from fear. Shigaraki had said his name. Izuku. A dusty little whisper that sticks in his ears like sand.
Iida clutches him, obviously near tears. “Midoriya, thank god. I thought we’d lost you. Why would you do that?”
Izuku falters. Did Iida see him just stand there, letting Shigaraki come so close? Did he hear Shigaraki’s murmuring, notice him touch Izuku’s face? “Iida, I- .”
“Why would you try stop Compress on your own?” Iida cuts him off. He hugs Izuku tight enough to hurt. “Even if he’d collided with us we could have dealt with it together. We came running back but nobody could find you. The neighbourhood’s so ruined it’s impossible to make anything out in this rubble. I’ll never forgive myself for this. If I’d been even a second later Shigaraki would have gotten to you.”
Oh. Of course. Slowly, Izuku puts a reassuring hand on Iida’s back. He’s solid and warm. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. But I’m okay.”
“Are you really?”
“Yeah. Besides a couple of broken ribs, I think.”
Iida releases him at once. “Sorry! Oh my god, sorry. Let’s get you to the ambulances. I’ll tell the others you’re alright. You poor thing. He got so close to you. You must have been terrified.”
Izuku touches his lip, tasting metal. “Terrified. Yeah.”
Hospital. Home. It’s weird, the thought of moving into UA’s new dorms, but his poor mother looks so alarmed at All Might in their house that Izuku can’t help but laugh. And the rooms are nice even if everyone teases Izuku about his posters five minutes in. He thinks he might be happy here. The undercurrent of dread as to why they’re here still remains, but, well. Izuku is slowly getting good at packing fear away.
Kacchan corners him late in the evening as Izuku trudges outside to dispose of his cardboard boxes now he’s all unpacked. “Just so you know,” he says without lead-up. “I didn’t need your dweeb squad’s help. I would have gotten out of that fine on my own.”
The day’s excited chatter has settled and now 1A lounges around their common room getting used to each other. It’s long been dark out. Izuku’d been hoping to hurry up and get back inside - the school looks eerily big at night. “You know could just say thank you.”
“For?” Kacchan says, pushing himself off the wall he’d been leaning against. Like he’d been hanging around outside waiting to ambush him like he used to. “It was a fucking ridiculous thing to do. The pros had a plan. You’re lucky you didn’t get in the way.”
Izuku is tired. There’s still a scar on his lip from the fall that might never go away, the doctor had said. Izuku’d shrugged it off. Add it to the tally, there are going to be more. “I only did what I thought was right. You would’ve done the same.”
“No I wouldn’t.”
Not for you, is the implicit layer underneath. Izuku breathes, very deeply, through his nose. “Okay, Kacchan. Noted. I wasn’t really expecting gratitude. Can I go back inside now?”
“Are you listening to me, Deku?” Kacchan says, blocking him bodily. “You are a moron. You dumbasses could have gotten yourselves killed. Especially you.”
“I’m not quirkless anymore.”
“You can barely control the quirk you do have.”
“Why did I bother?” Izuku says, mostly to himself. Kacchan’s frown deepens. Izuku used to think he was so handsome back when they were little kids. “You act like you’d rather die than accept my help. Why do I care so much about someone who hates me? What was the point?”
Kacchan blanches. “Look, I wasn’t saying -”
“Okay,” Izuku says. It isn’t, really. He tries not to relive breathy laughter ghosting against his cheek. “Okay, Kacchan. It doesn’t matter. It’s just… it’s what heroes do.”
Izuku’s happy, probably.
He has no reason not to be. Training is hard but satisfying and his friends are kind and Izuku can ignore Kacchan hovering in his periphery as if he wants to say something but doesn’t know how. He doesn’t think about Shigaraki again.
Alright. That’s a lie. He doesn’t think about Shigaraki… a lot.
He finds a little girl named Eri who needs him. Fighting for her is the easiest thing he’s ever done. He comes out of it with chunks torn from skin but he feels so, so whole - he wanted to save her, he realises as she clings to his chest. The thing that makes a real hero is still inside him. Regardless of what Shigaraki says, Izuku’s still here. He’s still good.
When the dust settles Izuku watches Overhaul get arrested. He feels like he’s been through a fire; warped and damaged but burned clean. Aizawa has Eri. Chisaki Kai is safely contained in an armoured truck and the police will take the rest from here, so Izuku allows himself to accept that Overhaul’s engineered apocalypse will never come to pass. It’s over. No death, no loose ends, no lingering regret. The only blood shed was Izuku’s. Worth it. Worth it a hundred times over.
The police officer who’d been interviewing him caps her pen. “You saved a lot of people,” she tells him gently and pats his shoulder. “I’m sorry you got hurt. But thank you. You did wonderfully. Get home safe and rest up, okay?”
“I will,” Izuku says. “And thank you too for your hard work.”
She bows and leaves. The sirens come on. The police cars leave one by one to join the emergency team’s on their patrol, just to make sure there are no helpless civilians out there that they missed. Overhaul’s tiny convoy takes off in the other direction. Izuku watches them go. There’s nothing left to do. He can go back to the dorms and hopefully put this whole nightmare behind him.
But he doesn’t account for Shigaraki. Of course he doesn’t. A clean ending was too good to be true, so the truck barely makes it down the street before its driver is dead.
It’s an ambush. The League of Villains arrive seemingly out of nowhere, bursting of the unassuming, unmarked lorry that was parked at the end of the street. They were watching the whole time. A jet of blue fire shoots out the back and makes Kai’s truck driver swerve - he crashes into a divider at top speed and the front of the truck crumples with an awful metal shriek. The amount of blood is alarming. Izuku dully thinks he should be used to the sight by now. But it freezes him two seconds too long and he can do nothing but wonder how they were stupid enough to escort Overhaul’s transport with one measly cop car. The hero inside it doesn’t last very long. He tries to fight but Dabi and Compress get to him before Izuku can even launch his battered body back into the fray - they kill him quickly, with no fanfare. There isn’t even a body left to mourn.
At least it was swift. Izuku arrives to eerie stillness, silent besides his own ragged breath. He’s in no shape for a fight. But he’s the only one left, and he doesn’t get a choice, so he puts his fists up and waits. Two assailants, both aware of him. Both in prime position to attack. But they don’t move. Dabi lights a cigarette and Mr Compress opens the back of Overhaul’s truck; they don’t care that he’s watching, Izuku realises. They’re here for Chisaki and they don’t see Izuku as a threat.
Footsteps. Uneven but clear against the ruined asphalt road. Izuku’s breath catches. He sees a languid figure step out of the back of the lorry Dabi and Compress must have hijacked; it’s wrapped in a coat, this time, that flutters around Shigaraki along with the breeze. There’s no severed hand on his face so Izuku clearly sees him smile when their eyes meet as if they’re old friends. “Hey, Deku. Aren’t I lucky? I keep catching you all alone.”
Cruel bastard. Izuku wasn’t alone until Shigaraki murdered everyone on this street. The adrenaline that’s been carrying him so far struggles to keep him upright. “What are you - why?”
“For him,” Shigaraki says and jerks a thumb over his shoulder. Mr Compress has rolled Overhaul out on his stretcher. The police had strapped him down like a corpse. Izuku hadn’t even noticed he’d been freed from the truck. Now he’s just lying there, exposed among enemies, looking like he’s waiting to die. Compress removes Chisaki’s arm, saying something charming about payback. He uses his quirk to do it. The arm compacts into a pretty little marble that Compress takes away. There’s no blood. No pain, either - Chisaki doesn’t make a sound.
Shigaraki ambles closer. Izuku steps between them, angling his body so he doesn’t turn his back to Dabi. He won’t be able to defend himself if all three attack but at least he won’t be taken by surprise. “Stay back, Shigaraki. You can’t take him. Don’t you dare.”
“Don’t want to take him,” Shigaraki says, still coming closer. Strolling. He’s not worried at all. “I’m only here to settle a grudge. He killed a friend of mine. Nothing to do with you, Deku. Why don’t you stand aside?”
“He was already going to jail,” Izuku says. He doesn’t lower his fists. “He hurt a lot of people, not just your friend. You didn’t need to get involved. He was already going to pay for what he did. ”
“Not enough.”
“You can’t kill him.”
“Why not? He’s a murderer.”
“You don’t have to be one too!”
“Little late for that.” He gestures vaguely to the pool of blood slowly leaking out of the crushed truck. He walks right past Izuku, close enough to touch. Confident Izuku will do nothing, and he’s right. Izuku’s injured and surrounded. They waited until the right moment to show up. Shigaraki planned this knowing Izuku would have no choice but to stand there and watch. “This is just business, so I’ll make it quick. Ready, Chisaki? You’ve been promoted to death row.”
“Wait,” Izuku says, lowering his fists. His pulse is going so fast he can’t breathe. There’s a knife strapped to Shigaraki’s belt. “Shigaraki, please. Please don’t do this. Don’t kill him. He’ll go to jail, just - just let that be the end.”
Overhaul says nothing. Shigaraki leans over him, running two fingers idly down the man’s chest. He doesn’t look up but Izuku can tell he’s listening. “This man tried to kill you, Deku. Don’t you want him to suffer? Don’t you want him to die?”
“No! We don’t get to decide that. Heroes don’t want anyone to die, not even villains. Not him, not you.”
Distant sirens. Grey sky. Someone must have heard the crash and called for help but the police are too far away to make a difference. Izuku is alone here. Balanced on a tightrope, and if he falters a man will be dead. Shigaraki straightens up. He tilts his head, thoughtful, like some overgrown bird of prey sizing up its next hunt.
Izuku’s palms sweat. Shigaraki perches on the edge of Overhaul’s stretcher. The severed hands around his neck choke him as if to say this man is already gone. He wears them easily. “Would you like me to show mercy instead, then? I will, if that’s what you want.”
The cold weight in Izuku’s chest lightens, just a bit. “Yes. Yes, Shigaraki. That’s what I want.”
He smiles. “Okay, Deku. I’ll be nice, just for you.”
Izuku is too slow. The cut is not clean. Shigaraki could have used his quirk for this, quick and painless, but he’s trying to make a point. He wants it to hurt. He wants Chisaki to watch his own arm get sawn off, and he wants Izuku to stand frozen in fear while the blood spills. There’s so much the air smells of rust. The smell, more than anything, is what makes Izuku want to throw up.
Chisaki’s arm flops out of the stretcher and onto the road. He’s screaming. It’s rough and manic and pitches higher when Dabi cauterizes the wound. The flesh sizzles. It smells like cooked meat and Izuku barely hears anything over his own nausea. “Why?” he asks, feeling his voice crack in the middle. “I don’t - you said - you said -”
“I said I’d do exactly what you asked.” Shigaraki does a little flourish as he stands. A glob of viscera comes off his machete and hits Chisaki in the face. “I didn’t kill him. I just took his quirk away. See? He can’t hurt anyone now. I did you a favour.”
Izuku’s knees tremble. Danger and high stakes, he’s seen them, but not this - not mutilation just for the fun of it. Shigaraki drifts over. He’s still smiling, still holding the knife, as if he wouldn’t be a hundred times more dangerous without it. The gleam in his eye is half-manic. He has blood on his face. He wipes it off with the back of his wrist and it leaves a red stain. That’s the only colour on his cheeks. He’s so pale and washed-out that Overhaul’s leftover blood is the thing that makes him look alive.
“I’ll tell you a secret,” Shigaraki says. He leans close to whisper in Izuku’s ear. Izuku should hit him. He should run, but he’s frozen, like a startled deer in front of a car. “I lied. It’s not just Magne I’m mad about. He was going to kill you before I was done with you. Hate that. I don’t like other people breaking my toys.”
Something brushes against Izuku’s cheek that might be a kiss or might just be Izuku’s adrenaline-fueled hypersensitivity. There’s a sharp slap somewhere to his left - Dabi telling Chisaki will you shut the fuck up, then silence. Izuku swallows. “I don’t - I don’t understand what are you talking about.”
“Sure you do.” A finger touches his stomach and traces up his chest. Stops to investigate a small rip under his right pec, pressing against Izuku’s bare skin. It leaves goosebumps. “Your little jumpsuit’s not very durable, is it, Deku? I like it.”
“Don’t.” Izuku tries to back away. He can’t breathe. His chest is working but oxygen’s not getting into him because his jack-rabbit heartbeat’s stealing it all. Everything looks grey. If one of the others tried to attack him Izuku wouldn’t even be able to dodge. “I’m not yours.”
Shigaraki stops him. One hand on his arm, vice-like, with the pinky finger lifted. He toys with Izuku’s zipper. “Has anyone done this? Defended you?”
“This isn’t defending.”
“Why not? He tries to kill you, I try to kill him. Except I don’t, because you asked nicely.” The zipper moves slowly downwards. Izuku’s exposed collarbones prickle in the cold. “Wasn’t that sweet of me, Deku? Aren’t I good?”
There’s a breeze against his chest. Izuku shivers but doesn’t dare try to cover himself up. He doesn’t dare look away from Shigaraki, who’s standing so close their noses almost brush. His throat feels like dry paper. “You’re not good,” Izuku whispers. “You’re awful. You’re insane.”
“Yes.” It’s agonizingly slow but he thinks the sirens are getting closer. Backup will arrive. The police will come and they’ll see Shigaraki slowly undressing Izuku where he stands. He still doesn’t pull away. A bead of sweat drips between his pectorals and into his navel. Shigaraki follows it with his eyes. And then with a finger, dry and cool against Izuku’s itchy-hot skin.
The sound of Izuku swallowing is loud to his own ears. A finger lifts his chin. “I hate that your little friends keep interrupting us,” Shigaraki whispers into the corner of Izuku’s mouth. “Let’s try it this way, pretty rabbit. You come find me. Promise we’ll get a moment alone.”
A whispered address. Tires screeching not far away. Shigaraki takes a step back and Izuku sways without another body to hold him up. The eyes on him still feel so heavy. A new truck comes tearing down the road - it’s Twice driving, leaning half out the window to demand they hurry up and hop in. Shigaraki holds Izuku’s gaze. As he finally leaves he blows Izuku a kiss, which fills him with such shame he wants to cry.
The police come too late. It’s the same officer from earlier who spills out of the car and comes running to check on him. She gasps at his half-undone costume and stops short, alarmed. “What happened? Who did this to you? Where - Jesus Christ. Overhaul. I’ll - I’ll call an ambulance. Do you need one too? Are you hurt?”
“I… no,” Izuku says, zipping himself back up with unsteady hands. He’s going to faint. “No, I - please just help Chisaki. Shigaraki showed up. But I’m okay.”
“You’re shaking.”
“They didn’t hurt me.” His stomach roils and he burns where Shigaraki’s fingers touched him, even through his clothes. “He wanted Overhaul. Revenge, he said. They didn’t care about me.”
“Shit. Okay. But if you need anything…”
“Yeah,” Izuku says, mouth dry, face hot. His cheek tingles from the rasp of dry, thin lips. “I know. I’ll live. But now I think - I think I just need to be alone.”
There are hands in Izuku’s dreams.
They cover him, soft and deliberate, memorizing his skin. Slow and sweet. Breaking him down piece by piece until there’s nothing but his core left. He never resists. He couldn’t if he tried - they’re gentle but they feel like steel wrapped in silk, unrelenting as they fasten around his throat, move down his chest, caress between his legs. He’s helpless. He breathes in cold, prickling dust, and it chokes him until he can’t breathe. He doesn’t need to breathe. It’s so much easier to just give in, to let his toes curl and back arch around a peak that almost, but never quite comes. To the hands he is a plaything. They don’t care what he’s feeling; they just want to take him, unmake him, pull him apart.
Sometimes there is blood. On those nights there is screaming and the pleasure blends into pain and Izuku cries in fear, cries for more. Most nights he dreams in shades of grey. Never quite black, never quite white. There’s raspy laughter but it evaporates before he can chase it. Words that don’t make sense, fading like smoke. Izuku tries to ask why. Fingers rest against his lips. Izuku opens his mouth and swallows them in.
And then he wakes up aching. His chest is hollow and his bedroom is dark and silent and he is alone. No hands on his body. And, under the covers, Izuku shuts his eyes and, silently, tries to breathe.
“Your phone is buzzing,” Todoroki points out.
Izuku offers him a weak smile. “It’s probably just spam. They’ll stop soon.”
His phone vibrates against the table. Not a phone call - a barrage of text messages, all from random unknown numbers. He sets it to silent. The noise stops but he he knows they’ll keep coming. They will for a while, like they’ve been doing for weeks. Most are borderline nonsense. Disjointed non-sequiturs like time moves too slow and the sky is so red. He doesn’t reply. He doesn’t ask how Shigaraki found his phone number either. He doesn’t want to know.
He’d blocked the first few. It hadn’t made a difference. Shigaraki’s using some kind of scrambler so the identity of the sender seems to change every time. Now Izuku reads them in his bedroom, alone. It’s eerie. Feels like he’s being surrounded by whispering mouths demanding his attention from all sides. It could almost be flattering. Shigaraki’s not trying to hide how badly he wants Izuku to talk to him - he keeps asking Izuku to come see him, clearly losing patience the longer Izuku makes him wait.
Answer me.
I want you here.
How much longer?
Let me keep you.
When will you come?
Izuku holds his phone to his chest. He should report this. He should ask for help. Shigaraki will keep contacting him until Izuku does something about it. Until Izuku makes him stop. He types with shaky hands. I am never coming to you.
There’s a long pause. The last message Izuku receives is short. Okay, little rabbit. I’ll catch you myself.
It takes six days for Shigaraki to try to break into Izuku’s dorm.
He sets off the alarms on UA’s outer grounds first. Hound Dog is the first to respond. He prowls the perimeter, silent and fast, but something interferes with his sense of smell. Smoke, all around him - the forest is on fire, blinding and blue, which must mean Dabi setting the flames. He doesn’t show himself. The light and sound and soot are overwhelming, so Hound Dog can do nothing to stop the shadows that slip past as he fights through pain.
The barrier is laughably easy for Shigaraki to break through. He just disintegrates it. A little part of it, enough for him to walk right through while UA’s night watch deploys its security. The response is subtle, swift. Heroes patrol UA grounds, trying to track her intruders, but none of the students wake. It’s an ingenious system, really. The whole school is built on separate grids, independently operated so Shigaraki can’t break through them all at once. The problem this time is he doesn’t want to. He knows where he’s going. To the heart of the campus, where the hero classes sleep, flitting between buildings with Kurogiri’s portals. He destroys what he needs to and nothing more. All he wants is to reach 1A’s dorm. And then he just disappears, a wisp of smoke in the wind, and leaves the heroes to scramble in his wake.
They’re safe. Nobody was injured. Someone tames the fire and Cementoss rebuilds the rubble overnight. Class 1A is quarantined and Izuku is summoned to see Principal Nedzu, escorted by Aizawa and All Might on either side. He walks to the office with his heart heavy. The school’s abuzz. People stare as he passes but all he can do is keep his head down and try to breathe.
He wonders if he’s in trouble. He gets the feeling he’s caused this, just by responding to Shigaraki’s taunts. Nedzu offers him a biscuit and tells him to sit down. “I’d like to show you last night’s security footage, Midoriya,” he says gently. “It’s… somewhat alarming. Please be prepared.”
The footage is grainy. It’s in black and white, of Izuku’s balcony, a zoomed-in shot taken from somewhere outside. The camera’s at an odd angle. It’s placed so the students’ bedrooms aren’t visible, Izuku thinks, just the public areas outside. Unexpectedly thoughtful of Nedzu to give them their privacy. Lights flicker in the distance - the fire, maybe, but it’s too far to make out.
Someone climbs up. There is someone standing on his balcony, wearing a tattered sweatshirt and jeans. He’s holding spray paint. His movements are jerky and awkward and he stands with a slouch, but Izuku watches him lift his arm, slow and relaxed. He’s leaving graffiti. Taking his sweet time to scrawl a drippy, untidy message on Izuku’s window because he knows he won’t get caught. As he leaves he looks straight into the camera. Smiles like a skull, and blows them a kiss.
Shigaraki did all this just to deliver a message while Izuku slept. Bright red and almost illegible - I am here.
Izuku swallows. His stomach flips from hot to cold to hot again. He’d dreamt of him last night. He’d called for Shigaraki in his dreams and Shigaraki had come. He’d been within speaking distance, probably watching while Izuku writhed in bed and felt phantom hands in his sleep. Had he made a sound? Did he talk? Could Shigaraki tell, from the other side of the door, that Izuku had spent all night desperate for some kind of touch? He must have, because he just stood there watching. A hot lick of fire flickers up Izuku’s spine. There was nothing stopping Shigaraki from coming in. He could have slipped into his bedroom and made a meal of Izuku right there. He didn’t. All of this was a demonstration. To show he wants Izuku and can take him, at any moment, and Izuku never really had a choice.
Shameful. He should be ashamed. He shuts his eyes and takes a deep breath, shivering hard enough for the adults in the room to mistake it for fear. A hand touches his shoulder. It’s not as strong as it used to be but it’s still solid enough to be comforting. “We had a drone clean the paint off while we were fixing up the rest of campus,” All Might says quietly. “We thought the other students might panic. And, well. It was upsetting to look at. I’m sorry, Izuku. But you don’t have to be afraid. We will keep you safe.”
“How?” Izuku asks quietly. “Shigaraki just walked in. He could have done anything to me last night.”
“Security will be tightened and we’ll extend surveillance to cover all of East Mustafu,” says Nedzu. “UA will do everything in her not inconsiderable power to protect you. But you’re an intelligent young man. You understand the gravity of this, don’t you?”
All Might’s hand squeezes his shoulder. Aizawa clears his throat. He always looks tired, but this morning in particular he looks dead on his feet. “Midoriya. Can you think of any reason at all Shigaraki might be targeting you?”
Izuku looks up. He thinks of the phone he left buried in bedding with its barrage of text messages demanding they meet. He thinks of Shigaraki’s lips against his ear. He thinks of fingers playing with the zipper of his costume, pulling it down, unwrapping him right there in public just for Shigaraki to see.
Izuku shakes his head. “No,” he murmurs. “No, sir. I’m sorry. I have no idea what he wants. That’s the truth.”
Izuku keeps thinking about it.
Not about the break-in, specifically (although he imagines it, some nights - he pictures Shigaraki sliding his door open and inviting himself in and he hates himself for how uncomfortable his boxers get) but about Overhaul. He’s replayed that interaction over and over again in his head. The touching, for one thing, and Shigaraki’s mouth so close to his. But the conversation itself sticks out to him now. I defended you. Aren’t I good?
On paper Shigaraki is a monster but underneath it he’s still only a man. Izuku wants to believe that means something. That maybe even the worst wounds can be fixed. There has to be something inside Shigaraki, some part of him Izuku can save - some little boy buried deep who just needs someone to to show him how to be human. Shigaraki might listen. He’s imprinted on Izuku, for whatever reason, so maybe he can be swayed if Izuku faces him as a boy instead of as a hero.
UA’s security is tight. Since the last break-in attempt Nedzu has turned it into a fortress, but its obvious flaw is that all its defenses face outward, not in. There’s nothing to stop Izuku from sneaking out. He jumps from his balcony, hood up to hide his face, and goes to Shigaraki’s address on foot. He leaves his phone behind. It’s safely locked in his suitcase. Just in case anyone thinks to look at it - Shigaraki hasn’t stopped texting him, after all, and they’re all incriminating. Want you. Crave you. Did you like my love note? Do you want more?
It’s dangerous, what he’s doing. Downright suicidal. But there’s a chance he might settle this without a fight; avoiding an all out hero-villain war versus losing his measly life. Those are good odds. And, if his gut instinct is right, Shigaraki will want to keep him alive.
The night sky looks like tar. Izuku ends up in a the skeleton of a building on the edge of Mustafu, half-constructed and then abandoned so it disrupts the city skyline. His footsteps against the concrete are loud. He’s exposed. Nobody else seems to be here but he feels eyes on him, allowing him to get close as long as he agrees to play by the rules. He takes his hands out of his pockets. Unarmed, not a threat. “Shigaraki?” he calls out, loud as he dares. His voice echoes. “It’s me. Midoriya. You wanted me here, so I’m here.”
The inside of the building looks like the parody of a living space. There are sofas and a table, all obviously broken or pilfered, and trash on the floor which flutters in the wind that blows through the holes in the walls. It smells like smoke. He thinks he sees a glowing ember in the dark that might be the tip of a cigarette. “Hello?”
Scarred hands. Glinting jewellery. Dabi’s just standing there, one hand in his pocket, leaning against a damaged door frame. He looks Izuku up and down, no real expression besides mild curiosity. “Hell of a stupid decision, coming here.”
Izuku knows. He watches Dabi, unflinching. Motes of ash float off the end of his cigarette and scatter in the night breeze. “Where’s Shigaraki?”
“Inside.” A deep inhale, then a puff of smoke. It would be hypnotising if Izuku weren’t so on edge. “He’ll devour you, you know. He devours everything. He doesn’t know how to do anything else.”
“I just want to talk to him,” Izuku says. “I’m going to convince him to stop this. That’s all.”
Dabi laughs, low and rumbly. “Are you, now? Alright, then. Go on. Through two doors, then make a left. Good luck.”
Izuku goes. Turning his back on Dabi seems stupid but he makes it down the corridor safely, shoes crunching over bits of debris and exposed metal. They’re easy things to clean up. But he gets the feeling the League keeps it that way to make a point - we’re broken, we’re all wrong, this city is ugly underneath. He ends up in what could be a bedroom. There’s a mattress on one end and a game console in front of a TV. Its screen is glitchy. There’s an obvious pixelated line down the middle disrupting some shooter game’s home screen. “Shigaraki,” Izuku calls again, sounding braver than he feels. “Look, I did what you wanted. I came. Will you stop this insanity now?”
Shuffling footsteps behind him. Shigaraki has an unnerving talent for just popping up out of the corner of Izuku’s eye. He’s not wearing his disembodied hands. The TV’s light casts ugly shadows on his face and make him look like a sculpture. “Hello, bunny.”
Izuku turns to face him. “Don’t call me that.”
“Why?”
“Because - because I don’t like being made fun of.”
“I’m not making fun,” Shigaraki says, coming closer. He does it slowly, like he’s waiting for Izuku to shy away, but Izuku stands his ground. “You’re here. I almost stole you away myself. The others made me wait.”
The others. Of course the rest of the League knows he’s here. He’s surrounded and none of the heroes know where he is. For the first time in a long while Izuku feels well and truly alone. His heart thuds in his chest, fast and hard. Anticipating. Afraid. “Listen. You don’t - you don’t have to do what All for One tells you to. You don’t have to be a villain just because that’s what he wants.”
Shigaraki hums. He puts a hand on Izuku’s stomach, over his clothes, pinky curled safely into his palm. “I like being a villain.”
“That’s because you don’t know anything else.” Izuku catches his forearm. It’s the first time he’s touched Shigaraki willingly; his wrist is thin and frail and Izuku knows he could snap the bone in an instant. Just like Shigaraki could turn him to dust if he just reached further. Izuku’s skin prickles. He pitches his voice non-threatening and sincere. “Don’t you want to be better, Shigaraki? Look around you. This is no way to live.”
The arm in his grip shifts. Shigaraki slowly turns his wrist so their palms are pressed together, fingers interlaced. So close. So close to killing him. If this were anyone else the gesture would be unbearably sweet. “Stay here,” Shigaraki says instead, equally quiet. “Don’t be a hero anymore. Stay with me.”
“You know I can’t.”
“But you want to.” His other hand grazes Izuku’s neck. He runs a finger slowly up his throat. He pauses over Izuku’s pulse-point; it’s going fast, obviously, but Shigaraki doesn’t linger. He slides his hand further up. Cool, dry skin. The pad of his thumb is deceptively gently against Izuku’s mouth.
Izuku breathes deep. He can feel himself going red and warm but he won’t let himself lean into the touch. That’s not why he’s here. Shigaraki is solid and Izuku’s ribs feel too tight and he’s teetering on a tight rope with no safety net underneath, but somehow Izuku is still here. These hands haven’t destroyed him. The one holding Izuku’s face cups his jaw like he’s something precious, like he’s made of spun glass. “Shigaraki,” Izuku tries again, holding his gaze. “Tenko. I can help you. I can save you. You just have to let me in.”
God, but he looks different up close. Shigaraki’s features are fine and slender where they’re not warped by years of scars and picked skin. In another life he’d be pretty. Carefully, he runs his thumb along Izuku’s lower lip. “Say it again.”
“Tenko,” Izuku says. He doesn’t look away. Shigaraki smells like soap and dust and ruin. “Tenko. Listen to me, please.”
He presses against the seam of Izuku’s mouth. Izuku parts his lips. Shigaraki’s skin tastes salty but it’s not unpleasant. He should - he should bite. He should pull away. But he stands there, pliant and quivering, while Shigaraki pushes his thumb into his mouth. Over his tongue, inspecting his teeth. Eyes focused, mouth slack, as if Izuku has him hypnotised. Transfixed.
Izuku’s skin is molten. He might burn up everywhere he’s not touching Shigaraki’s frigid skin. At those points of contact the warmth seeps right out of him - Shigaraki’s stealing it, maybe, because he can’t make any heat of his own. He keeps leaning in. His hair tickles and his breath ghosts across Izuku’s cheek. It’s cologne. Izuku had come and Shigaraki had put on cologne, and for some reason that’s the thing that makes Izuku’s stomach twist and his eyes shut tight.
He was wrong. Shigaraki does have fire inside him but it’s buried deep inside his mouth. He kisses with teeth. Izuku’s woefully underprepared but even if he’d had years of experience he doesn’t think it would matter; Shigaraki’s trying to eat him, trying to lick right into the back of Izuku’s throat to steal his voice. He’s still holding Izuku’s hand. The fingers cupping his jaw pinch and grip and force Izuku to crane his neck up. Izuku whimpers. Shigaraki swallows that too, pressing closer until Izuku has to take a step if he doesn’t want to fall. His back touches a wall. His other hand clutches Shigaraki’s sweatshirt in a tight fist.
Wet sounds echo in the night. They kiss for minutes, maybe, or hours, Izuku doesn’t know. At some point his hands end up in Shigaraki’s hair, tight and probably painful, but Shigaraki doesn’t flinch. The skin around his mouth cracks and splits and Izuku tastes metal. He doesn’t flinch either. He just tilts his head back, gasping for breath, trying to force himself back into lucidity. There are lips on his neck. Wet, sucking kisses, working down his jugular to taste his pulse. His skin buzzes. He could shock someone with it but Shigaraki drains the charge before it can sting.
“Wait,” Izuku chokes, squirming. His nipples are hard and rub deliriously against the soft cotton of his shirt. “Wait, Tenko, no. Shiga - I can’t. We can’t. Please.”
There’s a chuckle in his ear. Shigaraki laughs like the creak of a door. “You sure, bunny?” he asks, dipping his tongue into Izuku’s ear. “Because I haven’t been holding you down for a while.”
It’s like being doused in cold water. Shigaraki’s hands are planted on either side of Izuku’s head, flat against the wall and harmless. Izuku’s the one hanging on. He draws his arms away from Shigaraki’s neck and shoves, red-faced and struggling to breathe. He’s a hero. He’s a failure. He wants Shigaraki to unwrap him from his clothes and swallow him in.
No. It’s all wrong. Izuku turns and bolts. He doesn’t know where he’s going - the building is big and everything looks the same but he follows the moonlight shining through holes in the walls. He thinks he sees a lit cigarette outside but he can’t stop to check, he just runs. There’s no destination. Just away, away from his own bad decisions, away from Shigaraki’s den. His quirk lights his path. Sparks dance from his legs as he gathers his strength and leaps clear out of the compound onto one of the side streets.
Shigaraki follows. Izuku can’t spare much brain power to wonder how he’s moving so fast. He darts around a corner and sprints down the sidewalk, tripping over rubble and barely managing to stay on his feet. It looks like it used to be a normal enough neighbourhood until Shigaraki moved in. It’s a ghost town now. Everywhere he looks he sees signs of those hands - concrete and exposed pipes probably broken in bouts of rage, holes in the asphalt, decay in the air. Shigaraki’s turned his hideout into a wasteland. He’s claimed the whole area. He’s at the center of a dust cloud that’s going to spread and destroy everything it touches, and Izuku will be powerless to stop it. He’s helpless and it’s his own fault. He put himself in the eye of the storm.
The road disappears from under him. Izuku stumbles and falls over a pothole, jeans ripping and skin splitting at the knee. There’s a brief starburst of pain. He ignores it. He scrambles to his feet and keeps going, jumping from the ruined road to vault off the side of a building and pivot down a junction. The waxing moon watches, uncaring. It’s the only light here save the distant pinpricks coming from the outer city and the glow of Izuku’s own quirk. He passes an empty florist, a boarded-up cafe, a faded billboard. The destruction follows him as he goes. Shigaraki’s trying dissolve the whole neighbourhood to keep him where he is - Izuku’s lost in a maze of broken city that all looks the same, with no clear path home, no protection, no friends. Going around in circles. Running blindly from Shigaraki until he tires himself out.
He can’t. He can’t, can’t wrangle his brain into strategising any kind of intelligent escape. He’s just some dumb animal being hunted. Shigaraki’s gaining. Izuku grabs a broken street sign and swings it behind him, trying to nail Shigaraki in the head, but Shigaraki holds up a hand and the thing dissolves before it can hurt him. Izuku lets go of the edge before the dust can reach him. Mistake. It costs him a few precious seconds - Shigaraki drops to his knee and touches the sidewalk just behind Izuku, and it comes apart. Explosively, almost, sharp and violent, and the momentum throws Izuku into the air. He flips around and catches himself on his feet. He lands badly. The impact twists his ankle and he goes down again, skidding onto his side with a cry. Up, get up, go. It’s too late. A hand catches his leg, and Izuku freezes.
Silence, pin-drop, besides their harsh breaths and the thundering of Izuku’s heart. “Turn around,” says Shigaraki. His voice is manic and shaky. Izuku feels him crawl up to cage Izuku’s body with his. “I don’t care if you run. I’ll always catch you, Izuku. Turn around.”
Izuku turns. Sweat beads at his temples and drips into his hair. Shigaraki looks ragged. His hair’s askew and his smile is so wide it might split his head open. Izuku makes a quiet noise, high and frightened. “Don’t.”
Shigaraki ignores him. He looms above Izuku, body blocking out the sky. The moon lights him up from behind and makes his white hair glow like a halo. He shifts his weight to rest on one arm. Long fingers, slim wrist. He touches Izuku’s chest, just once. Izuku’s light green hoodie crumbles to dust and disappears.
His t-shirt goes next. Then his jeans, and within two minutes Izuku’s in his underwear, shivering and scraped up, rubble and asphalt digging into his back. Shigaraki giggles through his teeth. His lips are red. From kissing, Izuku realises, because he’s so pale everything Izuku does leaves a mark. His gaze is shameless and hungry. All over Izuku, dragging across his exposed skin like a physical touch. Izuku’s chest heaves. His nipples peak, partly from cold, partly from the stubborn, leftover thrill that comes from Shigaraki being so close.
It’s adrenaline. That’s what he tells himself - his body’s just panicking, stressed, and that’s why he’s half-hard in his boxers even before Shigaraki reaches down to touch. He cries out. There’s a ravenous mouth on his neck again, biting and mean, smiling its way down to his chest. Hot and wet. Shigaraki’s lips clamp over a nipple and Izuku’s back arches, hand scrabbling at nothing until he manages to reach up to tangle one in Shigaraki’s hair. He tries to pull. Shigaraki doesn’t budge - he likes Izuku’s yanking, and as Izuku squirms he feels tell-tale hardness against his hip. It makes his blood sing. This is wrong. He shouldn’t want this, he shouldn’t curl his toes or throw his head back or whine with relief when the very last of his clothes come off. He’s naked in public. Shigaraki’s going to fuck him right here, in the middle of a ruined street, surrounded by filth and broken glass and Izuku aches for it.
A tongue dips into his navel. Shigaraki’s sloppy and uncoordinated but his hand is tight and gorgeous around Izuku’s cock. He could kill him just like this. By accident, even, if Izuku bucks too hard, and the thought sends a jolt of fear-excitement up his spine to tingle all across his skin. Embarrassing. He’s already leaking, unable to fight off either the man on top of him or his own insane, desperate teenaged lust. He grabs Shigaraki’s hair and pulls. Towards him, this time, up for a kiss, which Shigaraki laughs into and shifts to let Izuku wraps his legs around him like vines. He grinds them together. Izuku gasps at the drag of denim against his bare skin and moans something that could be no, could be Tenko.
He doesn’t let go. Shigaraki is dangerous but Izuku is strong and he grips the back of the man’s clothes so hard they might tear. Shigaraki’s zipper is loud in the silence. The sex is fast and hard and unrelenting, and Izuku revels in the debris scratching him up, revels in being stark naked while Shigaraki stays fully dressed. He’s not a hero. He’s a pet, just a plaything, and his cock bobs as Shigaraki forces him to turn over so they can fuck on hands and knees. His voice echoes. Moaning, mostly, almost loud enough to cover Shigaraki’s encouraging whispers and breathy, rasping laugh.
He comes so hard he whites out. When he comes to he realises the sun’s almost come up and he’s trapped against a bare, broken mattress. Shigaraki brought him back. He’s in the League’s hideout and it’s dawn, which means UA must know he’s disappeared by now and he’s going to catch hell. A snow-white head’s on his chest. Shigaraki’s been covering him in hickeys, slow and languid, while Izuku slept.
“Let go.” Izuku shoves at him, sore and filled with dread. “Let me go, I need to get back. “
A quiet growl. Shigaraki bites his chest like Izuku’s some kind of chew toy. “No.”
“Shigaraki -”
A tap against his hip. Izuku looks down. Shigaraki’s resting for fingers against him with his pinky lifted in warning. Izuku swallows. Pinned like a butterfly under a frame. Stupid. He’s so stupid. He’s not going anywhere while Shigaraki’s so close.
The sun rises and falls. They don’t sleep, barely eat, barely think. Shigaraki fucks like an animal, in the most basal sense - he’s mindless and selfish and curious all at once, taking Izuku over and over just because he wants to. He puts his mouth everywhere. Over Izuku’s lips, down his spine, between his legs, no hesitation, no shame. It’s overwhelming. Izuku shivers and squirms and cries and begs him to set me free, let me come. Shigaraki doesn’t listen. He seems to like it, especially when they hear footsteps outside and Izuku has to cover his flushed, hot face out of shame.
Time loses meaning for a while. Izuku opens his eyes to find it’s dark out and Shigaraki’s finally gone still, curled up naked next to him with a possessive hand on Izuku’s chest. He’d put band-aids on both pinkies at some point, Izuku realises distantly. That’s why Izuku’s alive. How oddly thoughtful of Shigaraki not to break his new toy.
He’s so thin. His skin looks nothing like Izuku’s does; most of his scars are on his face, leaving his body pale and smooth. Izuku supposes the rest of the wounds must be inside. He slips out of bed, slow and quiet. Shigaraki doesn’t stir. The night’s warm. Izuku steals away wearing Shigaraki’s clothes, filthy and bloodied and humiliatingly fucked out. Back to school. Back to UA, to face the consequences of his failure.
Aizawa is livid.
Izuku doesn’t blame him. He sits in the quarantine chamber for hours, another safety measure to make sure any new body in UA isn’t just a disguised Himiko Toga. He doesn’t know what time it is when his homeroom teacher finally comes through the door. “We watched the security footage,” Aizawa says without preamble. “Here I thought Shigaraki spirited you away, but you left on your own. Why in god’s name would you sneak out?”
“I’m sorry,” Izuku says, voice hoarse and near tears. His stolen hoodie drowns his hands. “I didn’t think… I guess I just didn’t think.”
“I can see that.” The other chair scrapes across the concrete floor. Aizawa sits opposite him at the table. Jet black clothes in a sterile white room. No greys. “It’s been three days, Midoriya. Three days straight of combing all of Japan for you. The Hero Commission has a red alert out. Where the hell did you go?”
Izuku wonders if he can be trusted to lie. Probably not. He feels only half-alive right now and anyway Aizawa’s unfairly sharp. “I went to see Shigaraki. He told me where to find him, back when he came for Overhaul.”
“He told you outright where to find him? And instead of mentioning this anyone, you just went?”
“I thought I could get through to him,” Izuku whispers, too ashamed to meet the man’s eye. He’d expected the anger but Aizawa’s obvious disappointment stings. “You said he imprinted on me. And every time I saw him he’d talk about heroes and being good so I just thought - I knew he wouldn’t kill me. And I’d hoped I could talk him down from whatever he’s planning, without having to fight. He wouldn’t have listened if I hadn’t come alone. But he didn’t listen in the end. He trapped me. He just kept me there until he fell asleep and I escaped.”
There’s silence for a long while. Izuku doesn’t dare look up until Aizawa tells him to, voice low and flat. The clock on the wall ticks. Aizawa’s eyes go from Izuku’s face to where his ill-fitting clothes slip to the side to expose his neck. Izuku knows what he must see. Bite marks, hickeys, finger-shaped bruises. He watches all the anger drain from Aizawa’s face to leave only quiet dread.
“Midoriya,” he says, abruptly gentle. It almost makes Izuku laugh. He doesn’t deserve gentleness, especially not after discovering that Shigaraki’s violent streak made his spine turn to jelly. Slowly, carefully, Aizawa reaches across the table to touch the back of his wrist. He stops just short. Seems to think the better of it, although Izuku doesn’t react either way. “What did he do to you, while you were there?”
Izuku stays silent. Cautiously, like he’s trying to tame a spooked animal, Aizawa leans closer. “Midoriya,” he says again. “I promise I’m not going to get angry. This part isn’t your fault. How badly did he hurt you?”
“It wasn’t,” Izuku starts, and then stops. He can’t say it. “He didn’t do what you’re thinking he did.”
“You are covered in injuries.”
“We fought.”
“Are those… are those your clothes you’re wearing?”
“No. He ruined mine.”
Aizawa looks so sad. Izuku can’t stand it. Aizawa thinks he’s some poor innocent kid, because Aizawa is kind; he could never imagine Izuku stooping so low as to like Shigaraki fucking him, to beg for it. He must be imagining something ghastly. In a way he’s right. There’s nothing normal about the way Izuku arched his back into a touch that could have killed him.
“I know Shigaraki’s a murderer,” Izuku says, because this part is true. “But he didn’t - he didn’t force himself on me. He didn’t do that, at least..”
“Okay,” Aizawa says. He doesn’t look like he believes him. “Okay. But will you go to Recovery Girl anyway? Just to get checked up? Anything you discuss with her will be confidential unless you decide otherwise. You have my word on that.”
Izuku nods. Aizawa’s hand on his shoulder is heart-breakingly gentle as he leads him back into the safety of school. People stare. Aizawa shields him even though Izuku doesn’t try to meet anyone’s eye. “Listen to me,” Aizawa says, taking them through an empty corridor. The long way round, just for Izuku’s sake. “We have a counsellor. There’s me, there’s All Might, Recovery Girl, Principal Nedzu - we’re all here if you want to talk to us. But I’d like you to talk to someone. The moment you feel like you need to. Nobody will judge. Okay?”
“Okay,” Izuku whispers, feeling small and stupid. “Am I going to get in trouble?”
He watches Aizawa’s heart break. “No, Midoriya. I won’t let that happen. I promise. You’ve been through enough.”
The news spreads. Of course it does, because nobody at UA is stupid, and it’s not hard to link Shigaraki’s break-in to Izuku’s sudden disappearance. The one blessing is nobody knows any details. Izuku’s heard theories - Shigaraki wants to recruit him, Shigaraki kidnapped and tortured him, Izuku tried to challenge Shigaraki one on one and lost. He supposes the last one’s the most accurate. Everyone thinks he’s either an idiot or an unlucky casualty. They’re being nice to him, at least. His classmates dance around him with big smiles and gentle words. All Might hovers, clearly wanting to check on him, and Aizawa makes it a point to stare down anyone he sees whispering behind Izuku’s back. Izuku examines his hickeys in the mirror and he wonders how long his peers’ kindness would last if they knew he was thinking about fingers scissoring him open. But nobody asks. Izuku sort of hopes they never will.
No such luck. It’s Kacchan, of all people, who breaks that seal.
The others are afraid to approach him, Izuku knows. They’re trained more in practical crisis response than psychological trauma. They’re afraid to say the wrong thing. Whatever they think Izuku’s going through, they don’t want to make it worse. But Kacchan’s never had those reservations. He’s done a lot worse than ask Izuku how he is. So he finds him outside the lobby one night, while Izuku’s counting his bruises. Four on each wrist. He stands by the bench and just waits until Izuku looks up and tells him to speak.
“What did he do to you?” Kacchan asks. Straightforward as always. UA is quiet but for once Kacchan is quieter and his voice doesn’t carry. “You came back all fucked up and quiet. What’s wrong?”
Many things. Lots of them are with Izuku. Izuku hugs his knees to his chest and wonders if he would have done things differently given the chance. Probably not. He still wakes up wanting Shigaraki’s mouth on him. He should want to forget, but he doesn’t.
Kacchan sits down. He keeps his distance, perched on the other end of the bench with his hands deep in his pockets. He doesn’t look at Izuku. Far away some teachers are on patrol. Security’s even tighter just in case Shigaraki decides to come calling. “Did he hurt you, Deku?”
“No.”
“I don’t mean physically. Or, well, I do, but did he force you to … shit. Don’t make me say it. You know what I’m asking.”
Izuku plucks at his own shoelaces, mulling over his words. He tells Kacchan what he told Aizawa. “He didn’t force himself on me.”
“You telling the truth?”
“Yeah. He, uhm. He talked about it. He threatened me. But I think that was mostly to scare me.” He smiles, lopsided and mirthless. “It worked.”
“Christ.” Kacchan looks stricken. This would be funny, maybe, if they were talking about anything else. He’s just a high school bully. Just like any other kid. All bluster and playground insults, but the thought of hurting someone, actually hurting them, makes him balk. “Fucking hell, man. I’m sorry.”
“Thanks?”
“Deku,” Kacchan says, finally turning to look at him. Izuku meets his eye. “I mean it. I’m sorry. All the - everything. You and me, you putting up with my bullshit. It all seems so petty after this. That freak has his eye on you. Nobody deserves that. It won’t happen again, okay? We won’t let it. We won’t.”
We. Kacchan slowly moves closer, holding himself stiffly like he’s half-expecting to get hit. He keeps one hand in his pocket. The other reaches for Izuku, pausing somewhere around his shoulder. He’s waiting for permission. Izuku nods, feeling a tiny bit warmer somewhere inside.
He gets more handsome as he grows, Izuku notes as Kacchan carefully folds Izuku into half a hug. Part of him wants to laugh. Fucked up relationship aside, in Izuku’s mind he’d somehow always imagined Kacchan would be his first. They’d come together in the heat of an argument, maybe, or after a heartfelt apology full of admissions and tears. He smells like burnt sugar. Too soft, Izuku finds himself thinking. Too pampered, too boyish, too sweet.
“You probably don’t wanna talk to me about this,” Kacchan murmurs into Izuku’s hair. “I don’t blame you. I’m no prize. But for what it’s worth, I really am sorry for being such a dick. This was, uhm. Perspective, I guess. If there’s anything I can do for you all you have to do is ask.”
Izuku imagines he’s being held by a man with thin hands and a skull-like smile. “Okay, Kacchan,” he says, and lets his eyes slide shut.
The first time in his life Izuku disobeys All Might, he’s shocked at how easy it turns out to be.
All Might talks to him in the staff room over lunch like he likes to do. Sandwiches and cake. All Izuku’s favourites, because, of course, even Lunch Rush now treats him with kid gloves. “Shigaraki might try to contact you,” All Might says, stirring his tea. “If he does you need to tell us at once. Don’t be afraid, even if he threatens you. You aren’t alone in this, young Midoriya. All of UA and the Hero Commission are behind you.”
Izuku nods. He sees the logic in it. Shigaraki’s dangerous. He’s a villain and nothing good will come of keeping secrets, so he fully intends to obey his teacher like always. Really, he does.
But Shigaraki texts him again the very next day. Izuku knows it’s him. He opens it, reads it, and then doesn’t say a word.
His phone sits heavy in his hand. Shigaraki doesn’t seem all that upset about Izuku’s escape. He clearly thinks it’s a game - Izuku supposes it wasn’t much of an escape to begin with when all he’d done was run right back to UA. All Shigaraki has to do is figure out how to get back in. And he will. He’s making it clear he’s not going to get bored of hunting Izuku anytime soon. Visit me. I want to taste you. I like it when you scream for me. Do it some more.
The faucet in Izuku’s bathroom drips. He stands in his underwear in front of the mirror, ready for bed, red-faced and uncomfortable in his skin. The evidence of Shigaraki’s touch is fading even if the memories aren’t. He still has the dreams. They’re clearer now, more concrete, and more often than not Izuku wakes up with an ache because now he actually knows what he’s missing. His body feels too bare. He still has his scars, sure, but no marks of affection or want decorate his skin. I’m broken, he thinks, both ashamed and aroused. He has to be. He’s lost his mind, otherwise he would report this and move on.
His phone buzzes again. He thinks he can gauge Shigaraki’s mood by the lucidity of his words. In this moment he’s manic. I want you I want you I want you, all in a rush. Izuku’s hands shake. He shouldn’t do this. If it gets out he’ll end his career before it can start. But he finds himself moving to his closet like a puppet on a string. He still has Shigaraki’s hoodie. It’s buried in the back but he hasn’t forgotten its presence or its feel or how it smells like cologne and sin. He pulls it on. He tugs off his underwear and takes a deep breath. There’s not enough skin showing to be obscene, but it’s obvious this is all he has on, just like it’s obvious he’s flushed red even though he makes sure to hide his face. The camera goes click. He turns off the light and hides under the covers, heat thundering as he presses send.
The reply’s instant. A voice message, low and urgent. Another, and another, disjointed praises and step-by-step details of exactly what Shigaraki wants to do. He sounds breathy. His voice hitches, and Izuku listens with hot shock to the faint rustle of clothes in the background and the creak of that worn mattress. He’s touching himself. Shigaraki is touching himself, to Izuku, after nothing but a vaguely naughty photo and no words.
It’s intoxicating. The messages keep coming. Your scars are so pretty. How many of those are from me? Can’t decide if I like you better in my clothes or in nothing. Gonna keep you next time I catch you, and I’m going to eat you to the bone.
Izuku doesn’t reply. But he does hold his phone to his face to hear Shigaraki up close, breathing hard and shaky. The faucet keeps dripping. Shigaraki whispers. Izuku slides a hand between his legs, and keeps the sweatshirt on when he comes.
He’s disgusting.
There’s a specific word for it, Izuku thinks. Traitor. Turncoat. The teachers ask where Izuku found Shigaraki so they can put a stop to the threat once and for all. There’s an entire ambush plan in the works. They get it set up fast and quiet, and evacuating the surrounding town so there are no casualties this time. They trust him completely. When the heroes come back empty-handed, no one suspects Izuku just gave them the wrong address.
“It makes sense that Shigaraki would have changed his location,” All Might muses while Aizawa unwinds his capture weapon from around his neck. The staff room is full but quiet. The post-mission atmosphere weighs heavy. “Shigaraki must have known this was what we’d do. It’s not your fault, young Midoriya.”
“It was worth a shot,” Aizawa says. He’s unhurt but obviously tired. “I guess it’s back to the drawing board. At least now we know we need to look into woodland areas as well, since you said they’d been camping.”
Izuku fiddles with a loose thread on his uniform. “You seem upset.”
Aizawa pats his shoulder, just once. “Not at you, kid. At him. I only want to make him pay for what he’s done. And we will. No matter how long it takes. If we can’t go to him, we’ll figure out how to bring him to us.”
Hound Dog clears his throat from the other side of the room. He’d been pretending to give them privacy but of course all the staff are listening in. “We could set up a sting,” he offers. His fur’s still singed from the break-in. “He obviously wants Midoriya, yeah? We already have our bait.”
Aizawa opens his mouth. But All Might cuts in first, heavy brows drawn low. It’s remarkable how unfriendly the man can look when he doesn’t smile. He’s all angles and age. “That is not an option. He is not bait. And this is not something to be discussed in front of a student, so I’d suggest you drop it.”
Hound Dog puts his hands up in apology. Izuku fiddles with the hem of his blazer. They all care about him so much. “All Might,” he asks quietly. “Do you still… am I still worthy of being your successor?”
The world abruptly goes dark. All Might hugs him hard enough to hurt. He’s bony and thin but he’s still big, big enough to envelop Izuku completely and make him feel young and soft. “You will always be worthy,” he says, quiet but fierce. “I picked you for a reason. You’re a hero. No matter what happens, that inherent goodness will always belong to you.”
Izuku cries. He buries his face in All Might’s shirt and clings to his front and he just cries.
A hero. He’s a hero. All of this needs to stop.
He gets a new number. Shigaraki eventually figures this one too but Izuku ignores every text, every call, even when they lose their angry edge and start to sound lost and unhappy instead. Will I need to come get you again? Need you. Bad without you. Why does time move so slow?
Izuku’s heart hurts. He’s an idiot, he thinks, trying to feel empathy for a psychopath. He understands what Shigaraki means. The days pass like molasses, autumn gradually freezing over into a soulless winter. The world moves on. Nedzu throws himself into making UA impenetrable with a kind of savage pleasure - nothing gets in or out, and the landscape sometimes changes overnight, and sometimes the alarms go off and Izuku’s pulse stutters but nothing ever makes it past the walls. The teachers don’t tell him how many times Shigaraki tries to get in. Izuku, on his part, decides he doesn’t want to know.
A week. Two. Izuku’s jittery and distracted but he can’t tell anyone why. They all think he’s scared, and he is, but not the way they think. A chasm’s opened inside him. Izuku fills it with work and chatter and old videos of All Might, but the maw swallows everything and cries for more. He knows what it wants. He won’t give in. He won’t, he won’t, not even when he wakes up gasping Shigaraki’s name.
I hear the heroes are looking for me, Shigaraki tells him one day. But you haven’t told them where I am. You don’t want them to find me. You want me still, don’t you, Izuku? Just as much as I want you.
Izuku shuts his eyes. He’s out after curfew; not outside UA, because he’s still being closely watched, but sitting on the rooftop of his dorm. It’s cold out. Izuku doesn’t have a jacket but he enjoys the chill. It’s refreshing. Around him the trees are shedding their leaves and making themselves barren. Decaying. No, he thinks to himself. Not decaying. Just changing. They’ll come back someday.
His feet dangle over the building’s edge. He’ll be clearly visible on the security cameras, probably, and more likely than not he’ll get in trouble tomorrow. He doesn’t care. His perch is comfortably high up and Mustafu’s pretty at night. He feels wrung out. His phone buzzes next to him, and Izuku takes a deep breath before he can drum up the courage to unlock the screen.
It’s just one message. Short and abrupt, but it makes Izuku’s insides flutter. Look down.
Izuku looks. The garden outside their dorm is quiet and empty, but as he watches he thinks he sees the mulch start to swirl. It darkens and spreads. The tulips disappear into a black whirlpool that yawns open like some extinct creature’s mouth; a portal, Izuku realises with dull terror. A pale hand emerges. It slams onto solid ground and Shigaraki pulls himself up bit by bit, a corpse fighting its way out of a grave. He’s struggling. Kurogiri’s managed to fine-tune his quirk so acutely that he’s brought Shigaraki right to Izuku feet, but something in UA’s security is trying to push him back out. Shigaraki looks up. He sees Izuku and smiles, and something inside Izuku wakes up.
He came back. Shigaraki came back for him, is defying UA’s defenses for him, is openly challenging the hero world to try to stop him from claiming his prize. His movements are jerky. He wrestles to keep the portal open around him as the alarms start blaring. UA stirs to life and Izuku hears crunching stone-sounds when his dorm building shakes; the grid’s activating, ready to be rearranged like chess pieces to keep Shigaraki away. Shigaraki grits his teeth and reaches up. Palm up, fingers outstretched. Come with me. They make eye contact and Izuku stays frozen, heart thumping, awake, alive. He could go. He could reach back. He could tip himself off the edge and let himself fall, and Shigaraki would catch him, and Izuku might not even get in trouble for it if he said he couldn’t escape so there’s nothing stopping him from just letting Tenko take him, just letting himself go -
Hands grab his arm. Izuku yelps but the voice in his ear is familiar, soothing. “I’m taking you to a safe room,” says Aizawa. “It’s fortified, you should be safe. Come on, Midoriya, let’s go.”
Izuku goes. Aizawa spirits him away before he can speak but Izuku catches Shigaraki’s face twist into something ugly and furious. He hyperventilates. Aizawa half-carries him like he weighs nothing, bringing him to some tiny basement that manages somehow to make Izuku feel nauseous. It’s moving, he realises. Probably in random patterns underground so nobody can track him.
All Might’s waiting for him. Aizawa leaves to handle the threat while All Might puts both hands on Izuku’s shoulders and tells him to breathe, eyes so bright blue in the gloom they look like they’re glowing. “You’re safe,” he says while Izuku tries to focus. “He can’t get to you in here. You’ll be okay.”
Izuku nods. Shigaraki’s face swims in his head, his smile, the hunger in his eyes. So much want. Borderline obsession the way Izuku’s never seen in his fifteen years. It’s scary. Exhilarating. All of Shigaraki’s intensity, all his cavernous madness, concentrated into an arrow that points straight to Izuku. There’s no stopping it. Shigaraki will chase Izuku until one of them dies.
All Might’s hands are warm on either side of his face. Bony and calloused but kind, not like Tenko’s. “Look at me,” he says. Izuku opens his eyes. “He will not get to you. He will try as much as he can, but it will not work.”
“Okay,” Izuku says. He can’t hear anything from the panic room but he imagines chaos outside. He leans into All Might’s touch and tries to ground himself, tries not to think about falling into Shigaraki’s waiting arms. “Okay.”
He’s trying to be normal. More than anything, Izuku wants to be normal.
He doesn’t talk about what happened. He can’t, partly because he doesn’t trust himself not to say something incriminating, but mostly because he thinks people will wonder why Izuku’s not more afraid. He is, obviously. But it’s polluted. It’s a fucked-up game of hide and seek where he both does and doesn’t want to be found.
His friends hover. Uraraka and Iida install themselves on either side of him and never let him be alone with his thoughts. Todoroki gives him things, little silly presents like stickers and sweets, and sometimes Kacchan finds Izuku outside and just sits with him in pleasant silence. Izuku clings to it. To the mundanity. The dreams don’t stop but Shigaraki’s words finally do. His phone stops its incessant buzzing and the dust storm in his head settles into a drifting cloud, and he thinks with time he might stop feeling quite so hollow.
He never gets around to telling anyone where Shigaraki’s base was, in the end. It’s fine. All Might was right. They’ve probably moved by now anyway. He can let it go.
Life goes on.
He goes to class. He talks to his friends. He doesn’t talk about Shigaraki, but that’s fine. Everything’s stable. Safe and sane, and by the time the next internship rolls around Izuku finds he’s actually relieved. This is the kind of life he’s supposed to be living. The teenaged hero’s dream. Roaming around Japan with his provisional license, fighting bad guys, trying to be a regular kid. It starts to feel doable. It’s even easier with Kacchan and Todoroki around. They get ramen and fast food under Endeavours’ sidekick’s watchful eye, and sometimes Kacchan’s knee touches Izuku’s under the table and neither of them pulls away.
It’s nice. He plays the hero part well. Maybe he can put his indiscretions behind him. Maybe he can be someone All Might will be proud of. This is just another kind of mask, after all - he’s ruined, inside, but nobody has to know.
So he keeps pretending. He keeps his head down and does his work and smiles when he’s supposed to, until Shigaraki finds him again, and Izuku can’t even bring himself to be surprised.
The Nomu is brutal. It mauls Endeavour and they can’t do much to help. Izuku knows why it’s here. Shigaraki’s controlling it and he will keep attacking and killing and destroying until he gets what he wants. Izuku has two choices. He can stay with his allies and try to overwhelm the monsters by brute force, but there’s no telling what else the villains will throw at them or who else could be waiting to swoop in. Or, he thinks, running on adrenaline and cold dread. He could stop the carnage. If he runs Shigaraki will chase him and ignore the others, and he should be safe because he’s the one hero Shigaraki won’t kill. He hopes so, anyway. Shigaraki might well hate his guts now, but Izuku figures those are odds he can take.
He bolts. Kacchan shouts after him but Izuku doesn’t stop. He doesn’t know where he’s going. Sparks dance around him as he uses his quirk; he leaps, high above the rooftops, turning himself into a zipping green beacon for his hunters to follow. Wind whistles in his ears. They’re in one of the bustling parts of Tokyo that’s all tall buildings and neon lights. High density, high risk - the civilians are canny enough to scatter once the city sirens sound, but there are too many of them in too small an area and they’ll have nowhere to run if Shigaraki decides he wants human casualties. But Shigaraki only wants Izuku. It’ll be okay - he just needs to lead him away from the civilians. Endeavour and the others will handle the rest.
He sprints down the street, skirting around terrified pedestrians, fast enough not to get caught but not so fast that Shigaraki loses him. His quirk glows. The ground rumbles. Debris flies. He doesn’t dare turn to look but he knows as the road breaks down around him that Shigaraki’s not far behind. Patches of asphalt disappear just as Izuku leaves them but he doesn’t stumble. His head is clearer, this time, and he’s scared but he’ll be okay as long as he stays out of range. Shigaraki should be a couple of streets away. Izuku runs up the side of a building and spins to look back. He sees a blur of white hair and a black cloak. Right behind him. Shigaraki’s almost caught up to him and Izuku’s heart tries to crawl out of his chest.
He’s so fast. Faster than anyone has any right to be without a quirk, so Izuku has to scramble to get away from his reach. A car alarm blares. From his vantage point Izuku sees a mostly-empty street and sprints towards it. There’s no strategy, just panic and the clinging mantra of no civilians, no casualties. He keeps running. He doesn’t dare turn around again but in the reflection of a building’s window he sees Shigaraki slow to a stop and kneel - he puts his hand on the road and it crumbles, chunks breaking apart into nothing. And it spreads. The plague spreads, down the street and up the buildings, devouring cars and plants and lights in its wake.
That’s when Izuku falters. Fear grips his heart. Real, animal fear. He tries to keep moving but the world around him is ruined even though Shigaraki’s still nowhere close. The island of asphalt Izuku’s standing on is still whole. But everything beyond it is breaking down and dissolving, from Shigaraki’s figure to the far end of the street. It’s too far to jump. One misstep and Izuku would touch the disease and it would crawl up his body to claim him. It’s like being trapped in an hourglass. He’s the only solid thing in his little oasis of gravel because everything else is coming apart and he can’t touch it or he will too. He can’t see. There’s no air, no sky, just dust and adrenaline and decay. The last thing standing. Shigaraki’s broken his quirk’s restriction just through willpower. He could unmake this whole city if he tried.
Shigaraki’s cloak flutters. In the broken hellscape he’s left himself a thin path to Izuku, which disappears behind him as he closes in. His quirk spreads outward and downward, eating into the earth, exposing foundations and underground piping. The skeletons of buildings groan and collapse. Shigaraki walks slowly. Clearly he already knows Izuku has nowhere to run. Izuku trembles. His eyes sting and blood rushes in his ears, and the most treasonous part of his mind wonders if this will turn out just like last time. They’re out in the open. If Shigaraki chooses to fuck him here there’ll be nowhere to hide. His allies are probably already looking for him. Kacchan might find him stripped, on all fours, begging. Izuku flushes and can’t tell if it’s from arousal or shame.
“There you are,” Shigaraki says, quiet. His voice echoes in the empty street. “Long game of hide and seek you’ve been playing, little bunny. Does this mean I win?”
Izuku’s boots are wet. A pipe’s burst somewhere and water gushes upwards, spraying the ruins and pooling in the cracks of Izuku’s lone platform. He doesn’t know if the quirk is still spreading, trying to drag the whole district underground. He doesn’t dare turn to check. “You can’t do this. You can’t keep hurting people to get to me. You almost killed Endeavour.”
“Your fault.”
“I’m not supposed to - Shigaraki, what we did was - ”
“Don’t call me that.”
“What else am I supposed to call you? That’s your name.”
“You know what I want.” He’s close, now. Close enough for Izuku to touch if he reaches out, but he supposes that doesn’t matter anymore. Distance means nothing. For all Izuku knows Shigaraki might be able to reach him from the other end of the world. “Say it, Izuku.”
There’s a long pause. Dirty water sloshes around their feet. Izuku takes a deep breath. “Tenko.”
A sigh. Shigaraki’s eyes go half-lidded at last. There are explosions in the distance, and fire trucks - the heroes, probably, but the light and sound blends together and fades into dull background noise. Shigaraki touches him. It’s gentle and almost loving and Izuku fights himself so, so hard, but his body’s stopped listening and he can’t stop himself leaning into Shigaraki’s palm. There are callouses. New ones, since the last time they met. Maybe he got them trying to get back to Izuku.
“Come with me.” Shigaraki’s voice is dry and rasping and winds around Izuku like a shroud. He doesn’t try to kiss him. Instead Shigaraki’s hovering just above him, speaking against the skin of Izuku’s cheek. “We’ll go away for a while. No one will find us. No one will see.”
“I can’t,” Izuku whispers back, aching. “It would be wrong. You’re the enemy.”
“Then why aren’t you fighting me?”
“I don’t know.”
“I’m so close. You could break my neck. You could kill me, little bunny, just like I could kill you. So why aren’t you?”
Izuku shuts his eyes. Shigaraki’s hair is longer than it was and falls around them both like a curtain. Deceptively soft, not like the rest of him. “Heroes don’t kill.”
“You’re not a hero.”
“Don’t.” Izuku plants both hands on Shigaraki’s chest. He should shove. He could push Shigaraki hard enough to send him to the other end of the street, but the most he can manage is to give them a little distance so their bodies don’t touch. Shigaraki smiles. Izuku feels it against his cheek. He winds his other arm around Izuku’s waist, slow and lazy and loose. Izuku melts into it. His fingers tangle themselves in Shigaraki’s threadbare shirt. To keep him away or to keep him close, Izuku doesn’t know.
“You’re like me. Just an animal.” His voice is so sweet. “You’re trying to be good but you’re not, because that’s not what you want. You want to take. You keep fighting it. There’s a black hole inside you and it’s screaming because it wants the shiny hero costume and the fame but it wants me too.”
“Stop it.”
“No. You can’t shut it out. You can’t shut me out, Izuku. I know because I’m the same. Greedy. You want to be a good little boy. You want to be praised but you also want me to destroy you. Right? You want me to ruin you. You want me to drag you to hell with me so we crash and burn and fall apart, and then you’ll thank me for it. Am I wrong, Izuku? Can you look me in the eye and tell me that’s not true?”
Izuku kisses him. It’s hard and biting and desperate and Izuku thinks maybe this must be what it feels like to relapse. The relief almost hurts. Shigaraki kisses back instantly, full of tongue and clutching Izuku’s waist so close he’s going to leave bruises. There’s dust in Izuku’s mouth. He doesn’t care. Tenko picks him up. Immune to his own poison, of course, so he leaves the decayed neighbourhood fearlessly - he’s taking Izuku somewhere, tangled together and stumbling through debris to escape prying eyes. Right into a portal. Izuku ends up somewhere foreign but he registers nothing more than that, because Tenko’s wrestling him down onto a bed - a real bed, which shouldn’t be romantic but it is - and trying to climb into his skin. His back hits the mattress. Tenko weighs nothing at all. Izuku could pick him up and toss him through a wall with a flick of his wrist.
He doesn’t. He lies still, heart thumping, chest heaving, as Tenko straddles his lap and sits up. He unzips Izuku slowly. Deliberately, this time, like he’s unwrapping a present, working his way down Izuku’s torso to kiss every new inch of skin. It’s overwhelming. More so even than the first time Tenko exposed him with just a touch - this feels like pieces of Izuku are coming apart and slipping through his fingers. He doesn’t try to chase them. This is better. His uniform slips off his shoulders and Tenko works it off his hips, tossing his boots somewhere unimportant to be forgotten about until who-knows-when. It’s silent save their breathing. Tenko touches a scar he left on Izuku’s stomach, careful and reverent, with the tip of his finger.
They don’t talk. They don’t think. It’s dreamy and instinctive. Animal, just like Tenko said. Izuku watches Tenko press kisses along his hipbones, against his thighs. His mouth’s as hot as Izuku remembers. Wet, too. He works his lips up Izuku’s shaft, runs his tongue under his foreskin, sucks on the head. Izuku spreads his legs. He tangles his hands in Tenko’s hair and pushes, gently guiding him closer, lifting his hips until his cock hits the back of Tenko’s throat. The feeling makes him whimper. It’s plush and soft and yielding and Izuku sighs, wanting more, but Tenko seems content to stay like this for a while yet.
Could be minutes, could be days. Time gets thick and sludgy as Tenko blows him, managing somehow to bring him to the edge over and over but never letting him fall. He works Izuku open. Izuku half-remembers this could destroy him but Tenko’s touch is so intoxicating, so honey-sweet, that he thinks he’d die happy. He cries to be kissed. Needy, embarrassing. Tenko pulls away and huffs a soft laugh into Izuku’s mouth for safe-keeping.
He sinks inside and the mattress creaks. Izuku’s spine unwinds and collapses. Tenko fucks him deep and thorough, trying to imprint himself on Izuku’s insides as if he hasn’t poisoned him already. Izuku clings to him. He kisses Tenko’s neck, bites his shoulder, dips his tongue into the hollow of Tenko’s throat. His toes curl when he comes. Tenko doesn’t let up; he wraps both arms around Izuku and keeps going, whispering praise in his ear, dragging another orgasm out of him right on the tail of the first. Izuku loses track of how many times they both finish. He loses track of how long they have sex (make love, a delirious little part of his brain suggests). Tenko won’t stop touching him. Izuku won’t stop touching back, hoping if he tries hard enough he can fuse them together for a while.
The sky’s dark. Izuku lies on Tenko’s chest and nibbles kisses under his jaw. Tenko holds him. “Again?” he whispers into Izuku’s hair.
Izuku nods. Again and again until one of them breaks. And this time, when Tenko enters him, Izuku keeps his eyes open.
It takes a week.
Izuku wakes up from a doze, sore and hungry, remembering suddenly where he is. His phone’s long-dead. They’re in the same abandoned building as they were before, go figure, and Izuku knows a long time has passed because he half-recalls Dabi whispering something through the door. He hadn’t cared. Tenko hadn’t either, refusing to leave bed except to collect the food someone gives them and drag Izuku into the tub to soak. Izuku wonders when the tub showed up. He imagines Tenko stealing the thing and somehow getting water to run just for Izuku’s sake. The thought makes him smile.
And then it doesn’t. He’d always thought he had stronger willpower than this. Months upon months of near-torture just to get himself ready for All Might’s quirk, all that learning and changing and growing, and now this. He’d lasted three weeks. Three pitiful weeks before he fell for Tenko again. He’s calling the man Tenko. He’s examining his face and touching the scars on his mouth like they’re lovers. Tenko sighs in his sleep. He nudges into Izuku’s hand and Izuku’s heart aches.
His uniform’s still in one piece. Gingerly he slips out of bed to get dressed, admiring the full moon outside and how quiet this part of Tokyo-Mustafu can be. UA’s always buzzing. There’s always someone around, which is nice, but the isolation here is kind of nice too.
Something rustles. Izuku pauses with one foot on the windowsill and looks back. Tenko’s eyes are open. Squares of moonlight fall across the dark bedroom, turning him silver more than grey. His expression’s impassive. He doesn’t try to stop Izuku but he does watch, blinking long and slow like a cat. “Will you come back?”
Izuku imagines it. He can see the rest of his life laid out in muddy detail. Secrecy. Shame. Sneaking out in the middle of the night and having to make best friends with guilt. His mentors will pity him every time they spot a new love bite. He’ll let them think he’s some kind of victim, and then he’ll graduate and become the new symbol of peace and never tell a soul he lets Japan’s most wanted criminal fuck him senseless. A clandestine affair that could kill him. Word could get out and end his career just like that. It’s not worth the risk. Any sane person would end this before it can spiral. Before it can poison him and rot his core.
He steps away from the window. His boots echo against the concrete floor but his mouth is soft as he bends for one last kiss. “Yes,” he says, whisper-quiet. “Yes, Tenko. I will.”