Chapter Text
One stumbled on the side-walk, exhaustion running through his body. Just because the tiredness was planned it did not mean that it did not bother him, and he had to struggle to keep his eyes open. For a moment he allowed himself to lean on the railing, the distance down to the ground far below still not enough. One chance. One chance was all he had.
But it wouldn’t be long now.
He only had to this, and then all would be over. All for One would be over.
Like called by its name echoing through One’s head, he heard the murmuring in the back of his mind, tired after One had allowed him to control his body for much longer than usual. The quirk had taken to the opportunity like a shark sensing blood, and One still felt bile thinking what All for One had done with the time. The years.
God. He hoped that All Might, that his legacy, would forgive him for this.
Now awoken again, One had hoped that the quirk would have kept itself dormant for longer, but a petty side of his that had never fully disappeared was happy that All for One would be forced to experience this together with him.
”What are you doing?”
”Shut up.” One whispered, pushing himself along the railing further up on the bridge as he felt the reaching embers of his quirk trying to push him back into the space that he had made in his mind. For the first time in years he had the strength to push back.
”...little brother.” The voice came back sharper, warning, and One brought his fingers, his nails into his skin as he continued to walk, finally ending up at the peak of the bridge, leaning over the railing towards where the walkway below stretched out.
One shuddered, just barely managing to shake of the shock as the quirk’s presence started creep like a fog into his consciousness. Suffocating.
“You’re not my brother.” He said instead, closing shaking fists around the bars to pull himself up, pull himself over, the wind tousling his hair. It was warm. A beautiful day to die really.
He’d been an idiot for so long. Whispers among the others who had found themselves blessed and cursed alongside him, how their quirks guided them, affected them and their descions. It had taken him much too long to realize that they had not been meaning actual words, had unlike him not had a voice in their head that cooed and talked to him. Convinced him. Don’t you see how unhappy she is? Free her from it. Don’t you want to save him? He will be grateful to us.
A guide that his childish self, desperate for any kind of familiar stability in a world that was breaking itself because of the emergence of quirks, had started to call brother. A term the quirk had gleefully adopted, designating himself as the older not by age, but how he was the one taking care of him. His frail, little holder. His One and Only.
Care, that One now felt almost burning. He could never get the energy to fight back like this more than a couple of time every century. Eight times before. But this time it was not to try to sneak a little bit of strength, a quirk, to someone who wanted to help him, who promised they would save him and died for that pledge.
“My One,” All for One continued, more angry than persuading, clawing to get the control back and One laughed almost surprised himself of how genuine the laugh was. Filled with spite, but genuine none the less.
“Not my name either.” He breathed out, looking down, body slightly swaying and feeling the rush of the height. The dizziness. “You made me forget even that.”
He didn’t want to die. Forgotten by all that had once known him, dead for so many years now. But he had no choice and before doubt could settle in, before All for One could find some way to take control once again, One let go of the railing that held him steady.
He fell.
Seeing the ground rush towards him.
He let his guard down.
And All for One slipped through.
Izuku was rubbing the skin where the new burn-mark was starting to show, redden and itching, and he hoped that his mom wouldn’t be home so that he could wrap it up before she noticed anything wrong. He couldn’t stand seeing her cry again, not because of what his quirkless, useless, self had to live through.
For a moment it was like something shifted, and Izuku looked up without really knowing why. Maybe there was a shadow, maybe the echo of a laugh, but he stared up towards the bridge high above him just in time to see the man drop, soundlessly.
For a moment it was like the world paused, everything slowing down as his mind was forced into a stillness, a feeling of unreality as the man fell. I can’t save him, was the only thing that flew through his mind, even as he took a useless step forward like catching him would change anything,right before something around the man’s body sparked.
Thin and sharp spears spread out, crackling with a burst of uncontrollable red and black and before Izuku even knew why he couldn’t breathe any more, they had pierced through his chest, through the black uniform that he wore, through his skull and there was a heart-stopping hum, a wave of pressure like he was suddenly miles under the ocean.
There was a crack, a terrible horrible resounding thud coupled with a splatter of blood that Izuku could not draw his eyes from. His head screaming, ringing, before a sudden feeling like numb nothingness pushed through. Wrapping around him.
A voice drifted through his mind, deep and dark, as the presence filled every room in his mind with smoke. Heavy. Stifling.
“Now, don’t look.”
His eyes closed without his input.
He felt like he couldn’t move.
Drowning.
Within moments, Izuku started to push back, to force himself to reach above the surface and he forced his eyes open, forced himself to take a step back. Saw the broken body lying on the ground before him and dropped to the ground, feeling the impact on his knees as his eyes blurred with tears and his throat burned with bile.
“Do not worry, Midoriya Izuku, I will take care of you.” The voice echoed, rumbling like it was laughing, just as he felt the smoke settle, almost burrow through him, digging through everything in his head, and enveloping and entwining into him. Touching on his name, his memories, and the voice took on a different tone, the pressure shifting from painful to cotton, as black spots gathered in his sight.
The asphalt cold under his chin, a growing pool of blood from the man seeping towards him as he was pulled into darkness.
“All for You, My Second.”