Chapter Text
Izuku was struggling to breathe. Slime was in his ears, nose, mouth... He was going to die.
He was going to die.
Izuku blacked out for a second, but when he woke up, a hand was gently slapping him awake.
Izuku blearily blinked his eyes open just in time to see a familiar smile beaming down on him.
"ALL MIGHT?!" Izuku squeaked, leaping to his feet with a sudden surge of energy that hadn't been there a second ago. "Please, you have to sign my-!"
"Not to worry, young man!" All Might laughed heartily. "I've already autographed your notebook!"
Izuku looked down and realized that he was right. All Might's name was scribbled across two pages of volume thirteen in large, capital letters.
"Thank you, I-"
When Izuku looked up, All Might was already preparing to jump away. No! He couldn't leave so soon! Izuku had so much to ask him!
Without really thinking about it Izuku reached forward and grabbed into All Might's leg just as he took off.
"What the- hey, kid, let go!"
"If I let go now I'll die!"
"Oh, right, sorry."
It took all of Izuku's willpower to hold onto his leg, but a minute or two later, they landed on an abandoned rooftop.
"Now, what were you thinking, young man?! You could've died!"
"I'm sorry, All Might, I had to ask you if a quirkless person could be a hero..." Izuku trailed off as he suddenly realized the roof was obscured in mist. Where did that come from? Was it someone's quirk?
A few seconds later, the mist cleared and All Might was gone. The only other person on the roof was a scrawny zombie-looking guy wearing baggy clothes.
"Ah! Who are you?! Where's All Might?!" Izuku exclaimed.
"I am All Might." The stranger said wearily.
"You're what?!"
And so All Might explained to Izuku how he had fought a really strong supervillain five years ago and though he'd won, he'd come out of the battle with permanent scars. He'd lost a lung and half of his stomach, and worst of all, he could only save people for three hours everyday or risk losing his power even more.
But then came the words that would shake Izuku's world to the core.
"And so that's why quirkless people can't be heroes, because if a strong quirk like mine was barely enough to save me, how can quirkless people fare in this dangerous work?"
Izuku just stood there, shellshocked, as All Might quietly walked down the stairs and left him alone. If Izuku was in a better state of mind, he would have pointed out that All Might's logic excluded everyone who had a quirk weaker than his, not just quirkless people. Or Izuku would have mentioned that it probably wasn't a good idea to leave a teenager who had just been through a traumatic experience and whom you'd just shattered the dreams of on a rooftop.
Izuku stared down at the ground down below. How high up was he? Four stories? Five?
Would the fall kill him?
Izuku didn't know what to do with his life anymore. Being a hero was the only worthwhile job, everyone knew that. It was all Izuku had left.
But now he was just a useless kid with shattered dreams alone on the roof.
Kacchan's words echoed through his head. Pray you'll have a quirk in your next life and take a swan dive off the roof of a building!
What if I actually did it?
It didn't sound that unreasonable. Izuku had been dragging himself through middle school, telling himself that if he'd get good enough grades he'd be able to be a hero and finally find some worth in his life.
But that was no longer an option, so Izuku didn't really see a point to staying around anymore.
He looked down at the ground again. There was no one in sight. It wasn't a road that was used much.
Good. No one would get traumatized if they saw him falling.
Izuku stepped forward onto empty air and let gravity take him.
Izuku, for some reason, woke up.
His first thought was, ...Am I really that incompetent that I can even mess up committing suicide when gravity does most of the work?
Eventually his mind worked out that there was no way he could've survived the fall unless someone saved him. And there was no one around, so that was ruled out. And Izuku was pretty sure that this wasn't the afterlife.
He blearily opened his eyes and sat up. Izuku noted that he was covered in blood and that nothing hurt.
That was weird.
Then Izuku finally noticed the bone sticking out of his leg.
For a long moment, he just stared at it in shock, not comprehending what he was seeing.
The white material stuck out of his shin, glossy with blood, having roughly torn through his flesh and pants like wrapping paper. The blood glistened as it dripped out of Izuku and pooled onto the dark, splattered ground, finally snapping him out of it.
Before Izuku belatedly started screaming, the bone slowly snapped back into place on its own and the skin began to knit itself over the wound, the flesh smoothing itself out like ripples fading from a pond. Soon, it wasn't long before the only proof that Izuku had ever been hurt were the bloodstains and torn clothing.
Izuku's mouth dropped open. Unless he was hallucinating, there was only one possibility to explain what was going on.
I have a quirk.
=
Katsuki was extremely annoyed. First he'd gotten attacked by some stupid sludge villain and had to be rescued. He'd almost died and the stupid heroes weren't doing their &$#@( jobs. Then the paramedics kept on asking questions and not leaving Katsuki alone, and when they asked for his parents' number so they could be informed, Katsuki just up and left.
There was no way he was letting them tell the old hag what had just happened. Course, she'd probably see it on the news later, but Katsuki was going to make sure that he told her about it first. Make sure she understood what had actually happened and not whatever the news was going to churn out this time.
As Katsuki marched down an empty alleyway he heard the unmistakable sound of footsteps chasing after him.
"Kacchan! Kacchan! You've got to see this!"
It was the nerd. Katsuki whirled around, his hands popping with tiny explosions.
"What the %)$# do you-"
Katsuki stopped short, his hands falling limply to his sides.
Deku was covered in blood. So, so, so much blood.
And the nerd was just smiling widely like it was his birthday.
"Kacchan, you won't believe it! I followed your advice and it worked! I got a quirk!"
He followed Katsuki's advice.
He'd followed Katsuki's #@&)* 'advice'.
Izuku finally noticed how pale Katsuki was. "Kacchan, are you okay?"
Katsuki threw up.