All men are not created equal.
That was the harsh, unyielding reality Izuku
Midoriya had learned at the tender age of four. It was a lesson taught not
through textbooks or gentle reprimands, but through the sharp, mocking laughter
of his peers and the devastatingly clinical diagnosis of a doctor sitting in a
sterile, white room.
“You should probably give it up.”
Those words had echoed in Izuku’s mind for a
decade, a constant, looping soundtrack to his life. In a world where eighty
percent of the population possessed some sort of uncanny ability—a
"Quirk"—being born without one was akin to being born without a soul.
Society had evolved, reshaping itself around the extraordinary. The
extraordinary had become the ordinary, and dreams that once belonged only in
comic books had spilled out into reality. Heroes patrolled the streets,
villains lurked in the shadows, and the sky was frequently painted with the
spectacular clashes of gods among men.
And yet, Izuku was anchored to the ground.
Quirkless. Defenseless. Ordinary.
The morning sun filtered through the dense
canopy of the city, casting long, golden shadows across the pavement as Izuku
hurried toward Aldera Junior High. His oversized black uniform swallowed his
scrawny frame, and his bright green hair bounced with each hurried step. Despite
the heavy burden of his reality, his emerald eyes were bright, fixated on the
distant rumble of explosions and the sudden, spectacular manifestation of a
massive, tree-like man binding a giant villain near the train station.
Kamui Woods! And Mt. Lady!
Izuku’s hands had moved in a blur, his pencil
scratching frantically against the lined paper of his Hero Analysis for the
Future, Vol. 13. He had documented every move, every tactical advantage, every
flaw in the heroes' techniques. It was his way of participating in a world that
had violently shut its doors to him. If he couldn't fight alongside them, he
would understand them better than anyone else. He would study, he would learn,
and he would prepare.
For what? He didn't entirely know. But the
fire in his chest—the desperate, burning desire to save people with a fearless
smile—refused to be extinguished, no matter how much the world tried to drown
it out.
As he walked through the rusted iron gates of
Aldera Junior High, the vibrant energy of the morning hero fight faded,
replaced by the oppressive, stifling atmosphere of his reality.
The hallways were a cacophony of teenage
exuberance and flaunted Quirks. To Izuku’s left, a boy casually elongated his
fingers to reach a dropped pencil. To his right, a girl laughed, her breath
freezing the moisture in the air into glittering snowflakes. Every display of
power, no matter how mundane, was a glaring reminder of Izuku’s deficiency. He
kept his head down, clutching the straps of his bright yellow backpack like a
lifeline, making himself as small as possible.
Just make it to your desk. Don't make eye
contact. Don't draw attention.
He slipped into Classroom 3-A, exhaling a
quiet breath of relief when he found his seat near the back. The room smelled
of chalk dust, cheap adolescent cologne, and the lingering ozone of minor Quirk
usage. Izuku pulled out his notebook, intending to finish his sketch of Mt.
Lady’s gigantification proportions before homeroom began.
But peace, for Izuku Midoriya, was a rare and
fragile commodity.
"Hey, look what we have here. If it isn't
the Quirkless wonder."
Izuku’s pencil snapped against the paper. His
shoulders tensed.
Three boys loomed over his desk. The leader, a
tall teenager with a Quirk that allowed him to extend his fingers into
whip-like appendages, smirked down at him. Beside him stood a boy who
constantly exhaled a foul-smelling gray smoke, and a third whose skin was
covered in tough, rock-like scales.
They were extras in the grand scheme of the
universe, but in the microcosm of Aldera Junior High, they were Izuku's
personal tormentors.
"Whatcha writing, Deku?" the leader
sneered, the derogatory nickname rolling off his tongue with practiced cruelty.
'Deku'—the one who can't do anything.
"N-Nothing," Izuku stammered,
instinctively slamming his notebook shut and pulling it toward his chest. His
heart hammered against his ribs like a trapped bird. "Just... just notes.
For class."
"Notes for class?" The smoking boy leaned
in, blowing a puff of acrid gray fumes directly into Izuku’s face. Izuku
coughed, his eyes watering. "Bullshit. Let me guess, another one of your
pathetic little hero diaries?"
Before Izuku could react, the leader’s fingers
stretched out like striking snakes, snatching the notebook from Izuku's grip.
"Hey! Give that back!" Izuku
protested, half-rising from his chair, his hands reaching out desperately.
"Hero Analysis for the Future?" the
leader read aloud, his voice dripping with condescension. The trio burst into
raucous laughter, the sound scraping against Izuku’s eardrums. "Are you
kidding me? You're still delusional enough to think you can be a hero? You
don't have a Quirk, Deku! You're nothing!"
"I-I can still try!" Izuku’s voice
trembled, but a spark of defiance flickered in his green eyes. "There's no
rule that says a Quirkless person can't be a hero! If I study hard enough, if
I—"
"If you what?" the scaled boy
interrupted, shoving Izuku hard in the chest. Izuku stumbled backward, his calves
hitting the edge of his chair, sending him crashing to the floor. "You
think taking notes is gonna stop a villain? You think writing in a little diary
is gonna save anyone? You're a liability, Deku. You'd die in five
seconds."
Izuku sat on the cold linoleum floor, looking
up at the three boys. The rest of the classroom had gone quiet, watching the
spectacle with a mixture of amusement and apathy. No one was going to help him.
No one ever helped the Quirkless kid.
The leader tossed the notebook up and caught
it, a cruel smile twisting his features. "You know what we do to useless
trash, Deku? We burn it."
The boy raised his hand, and the smoking boy
began to ignite a small spark at the tip of his thumb, preparing to scorch the
cover of Izuku’s prized possession. Izuku squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for
the inevitable loss, hating himself for his weakness. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry,
I can't even protect a notebook, let alone people.
BOOM!
The explosion was deafening, rocking the very
foundations of Classroom 3-A.
A shockwave of blistering heat swept through
the room, rattling the windows in their frames and sending a cloud of chalk
dust billowing into the air. The smell of burning caramel and volatile cordite
instantly suffocated the scent of the bully's cheap smoke.
The boy holding Izuku's notebook shrieked as a
localized blast of fire and kinetic force detonated inches from his face,
forcing him to drop the book. It hit the floor with a soft thud, completely unharmed.
The entire classroom froze. The temperature in
the room seemed to spike by ten degrees.
Izuku opened his eyes. Standing between him
and the bullies, radiating an aura of absolute, unadulterated lethal intent,
was Katsumi Bakugo.
"Who the hell," a voice growled,
low, raspy, and vibrating with a terrifying, primal fury, "gave you extras
permission to breathe the same air as him?"
Katsumi was a force of nature. Her spiky,
ash-blonde hair practically defied gravity, framing a face that was beautiful
in a sharp, dangerous sort of way. Her modified school uniform—the collar
popped, the top buttons undone to allow for unrestricted movement, the skirt
hiked up slightly—spoke of her rebellious nature. But it was her eyes that
demanded attention. They were a vivid, striking crimson, and right now, they
were practically glowing with murderous rage.
Small, violent explosions crackled like
fireworks across the palms of her hands, illuminating the terrified faces of
the three bullies.
"B-Bakugo!" the leader stammered,
taking a panicked step back, his bravado instantly evaporating. "W-We were
just—"
"Did I ask for an excuse, you elongated
freak?" Katsumi snarled, taking a slow, predatory step forward. The
explosions in her hands grew louder, popping like miniature bombs. She tilted
her head, a feral, terrifying grin stretching across her face. "I asked
who gave you permission to touch my nerd. You think because you have some
parlor-trick Quirk that makes your fingers long, you can lay your hands on him?"
"We didn't hurt him!" the smoking
boy piped up, his voice cracking.
Katsumi moved faster than the eye could track.
In a fraction of a second, she had the smoking boy by the collar of his
uniform, slamming him backward into a desk with enough force to crack the wood.
She raised her right hand, aiming her palm directly between his eyes. The heat
radiating from her skin made the boy sweat profusely.
"You pushed him to the ground,"
Katsumi whispered, her voice deadly quiet—which Izuku knew was infinitely worse
than when she was screaming. "I saw it. You put your filthy hands on him.
If I ever see you look at him again, if I ever catch you within ten feet of his
desk, I will blow your face off and scatter your ashes in the Tokyo Bay. Do you
understand me?"
The boy nodded frantically, tears welling in
his eyes.
Katsumi dropped him in disgust. She turned her
blazing crimson gaze to the other two. "Apologize to him. Now."
The three bullies scrambled into a line,
bowing so deeply their foreheads nearly touched the floor. "We're sorry,
Midoriya! We'll never do it again!"
"Get out of my sight before I decide I
want target practice," Katsumi barked. The trio didn't need to be told
twice; they scrambled over their own feet, rushing out into the hallway to
escape the wrath of Aldera's resident apex predator.
The classroom remained dead silent. The other
students quickly averted their eyes, burying their noses in their phones or
books, terrified of drawing the blonde girl's attention.
Katsumi stood there for a moment, her chest
heaving as she let the explosions in her palms die down to a faint, smoking
sizzle. Slowly, the feral anger melted from her posture, replaced by a rigid,
awkward tension.
She turned around, her crimson eyes finding
Izuku, who was still sitting on the floor, staring up at her with wide,
awe-struck emerald eyes.
Katsumi clicked her tongue, a faint dusting of
pink appearing on her cheeks, though her fierce scowl remained firmly in place.
She bent down, picking up the fallen Hero Analysis notebook. She brushed a
speck of dust off the cover with surprising gentleness, then thrust it toward
Izuku’s chest.
"Get up, Deku," she grumbled, her
voice losing its murderous edge, returning to its usual gruff cadence.
"You look pathetic sitting on the dirty floor."
Izuku scrambled to his feet, quickly taking
the notebook and clutching it to his chest. He could feel the residual heat
from her hands lingering on the cardboard cover. "T-Thank you, Kacchan.
You... you didn't have to do that."
"Like hell I didn't," Katsumi
snapped, crossing her arms over her chest and looking away, stubbornly staring
at the chalkboard. "If I didn't step in, those extras would have ruined
your stupid notebook. You spent all night crying over that Mt. Lady drawing,
didn't you?"
Izuku flushed bright red. "I-I wasn't
crying! I was just... having trouble getting the proportions right!"
"Whatever, nerd," Katsumi huffed,
though the corner of her mouth twitched upward in a microscopic smile. She
glanced back at him, her eyes softening just a fraction as she scanned him for
injuries. Finding none, she let out a sharp exhale. "You need to stop
letting them walk all over you. You're smarter than every single one of these
brain-dead idiots combined. Act like it."
Izuku looked down at his bright red sneakers,
guilt pooling heavily in his stomach. "It's hard, Kacchan. They have
Quirks. I'm just... me. I'm defenseless."
Katsumi’s jaw clenched. The word defenseless
grated against her ears like rusted metal. In a sudden, aggressive burst of
motion, she stepped into his personal space, grabbing the lapels of his uniform
jacket. She didn't shove him; instead, she pulled him slightly closer, forcing
him to look up into her intense red eyes.
Izuku’s breath hitched. He could smell the
burnt sugar scent of her nitroglycerin sweat, mixed with a hint of the vanilla
shampoo she used. Her face was entirely too close to his, and he could see the
faint smattering of freckles across the bridge of her nose that she tried so
hard to cover up.
"Listen to me, Izuku," she said, and
the use of his actual name sent a jolt of electricity down his spine. "You
are not defenseless. Not as long as I'm breathing. You hear me? I have the
firepower. I have the Quirk. You don't need one, because you have me."
Izuku stared at her, utterly paralyzed. His
heart was beating so loudly he was certain she could hear it.
"K-Kacchan..."
Realizing what she had just said, and how
intimately she was holding him in the middle of the classroom, Katsumi’s face exploded
in a brilliant shade of crimson. She forcefully shoved him back, though she
made sure he was perfectly balanced so he wouldn't fall.
"I-I just mean!" she stuttered
loudly, her explosive temper returning as a defense mechanism against her own
embarrassment. "I mean I'm not gonna let some low-tier extras trash my
childhood friend! It makes me look bad! Yeah! So don't get the wrong idea, you
damn nerd!"
She practically threw herself into the desk
beside his, throwing her feet up onto the desk in front of her and crossing her
arms, pouting furiously out the window.
Izuku blinked, a small, genuine smile finally
breaking through his anxiety. He walked over to his desk and sat down, sliding
his notebook into his bag. He knew Katsumi better than anyone else in the
world. He knew her anger, her pride, her explosive nature. But underneath the
ash and the fire, he knew there was a fiercely loyal heart. He just wished he
didn't feel so useless standing next to her. He didn't want to be a treasure
hoarded by a dragon; he wanted to stand beside the dragon and fight the knights
together.
One day, Izuku promised himself silently. One
day, I won't need to be saved. I'll be the one saving you.
[Katsumi’s POV]
Katsumi stared out the window, watching a
stray cat walk along the brick wall of the schoolyard, but she wasn't really
seeing it. Her pulse was still hammering in her throat, a toxic mixture of
adrenaline, rage, and profound embarrassment.
God, I'm an idiot. 'You don't need a Quirk
because you have me'? What is this, a cheap romance manga? I practically
confessed to the damn nerd in front of the whole class!
She risked a sideways glance out of the corner
of her eye. Izuku was sitting at his desk, carefully organizing his pencils.
The morning sunlight caught the wild curls of his green hair, illuminating the
soft, gentle curves of his face and the constellation of freckles dusted across
his cheeks.
Katsumi’s chest tightened, a familiar, aching
warmth blooming in her chest.
She hated it. She hated how much she loved
him.
It hadn't always been this way. When they were
kids, Katsumi had been arrogant. She had manifested a flashy, powerful
explosion Quirk, and everyone—teachers, parents, peers—had treated her like a
goddess. She had let it go to her head, parading around like she owned the
world, with Izuku trailing behind her like a loyal puppy. She had thought of
him as weak, as someone beneath her.
But then came the day at the river.
They had been playing in the woods, and
Katsumi, overconfident as always, had slipped on a mossy log and tumbled down a
steep embankment into the shallow river below. It hadn't hurt much, but her
pride was bruised. Her 'friends' had stood at the top of the hill, looking down
at her, too scared to climb down.
But not Izuku.
Quirkless, fragile, terrified Izuku had
scrambled down that muddy bank, scraping his knees and hands, to offer her a
hand.
"Are you okay, Kacchan? Can you
stand?"
The look in his eyes that day had shattered
Katsumi’s entire worldview. He hadn't looked at her with pity, or mockery. He
had looked at her with pure, unadulterated concern. He, who had nothing, was
willing to throw himself into danger to save her, who had everything.
It was the most heroic thing she had ever seen.
From that day on, something inside Katsumi had
shifted. The realization that Izuku was Quirkless didn't fill her with disdain;
it filled her with a terrifying, agonizing fear.
The world was not kind to the weak. Hero
society was a meat grinder, chewing up the fragile and spitting them out.
Villains didn't care if you had a good heart. Bullies didn't care if you were
smart. The world would see Izuku’s gentle, heroic soul, and it would tear him
apart.
Katsumi couldn't let that happen. She wouldn't
let that happen.
If Izuku was too soft for this world, then
Katsumi would be hard enough for the both of them. If he couldn't grow claws,
she would bare her fangs at anyone who dared to look at him the wrong way. She
appointed herself his shield, his sword, his personal guard dog.
As they grew older, her protective instinct
had mutated into something deeper. Something romantic. She noticed the way his
eyes lit up when he talked about heroes. She noticed how hard he worked,
analyzing Quirks with a tactical brilliance that rivaled pro-hero tacticians.
She noticed how his shoulders had gotten a little broader lately, how his voice
had dropped an octave.
She was deeply, hopelessly, fiercely in love
with Izuku Midoriya.
But she could never tell him.
Izuku was entirely too pure. If she told him
she loved him, he would probably short-circuit, apologize for existing, and
then feel obligated to return her feelings out of sheer politeness. Worse, he
might distance himself, feeling unworthy of her because of his Quirkless
status.
So, she loved him the only way Katsumi Bakugo
knew how: with explosions, aggression, and an iron grip on anyone who tried to
hurt him. She pushed him, she yelled at him, she made sure no one else could
touch him. She was toxic, maybe. Overbearing, definitely. But when she saw him
cornered by those three extras today, the blind, suffocating panic that had
gripped her heart was entirely too real.
I won't let them break you, Deku, she thought
fiercely, clenching her hands into fists until her blunt fingernails dug into
her palms. You're going to keep smiling. And I'm going to blast away anything
that tries to take that smile away.
[Normal POV]
The jarring ring of the school bell broke the
lingering tension in the room. Students scrambled to their desks as the homeroom
teacher, a balding man with a perpetually tired expression, shuffled into the
room carrying a thick stack of papers.
"Alright, settle down," the teacher
sighed, slamming the papers onto his podium. "As third-year students, it's
time to start thinking seriously about your futures and what you want to do
with your lives."
Izuku sat up straight, his hands folded neatly
on his desk. Katsumi kept her feet kicked up, looking thoroughly unimpressed.
"I could pass out these career aptitude
tests," the teacher continued, a wry smirk suddenly appearing on his face.
He grabbed the stack of papers and dramatically tossed them into the air,
letting them scatter across the floor. "But why bother? I know you all
want to go to the hero track!"
The classroom erupted into cheers. Students
leaped from their desks, activating their Quirks in a chaotic display of
flashing lights, elongated limbs, and floating objects.
"Yes, yes, you all have wonderful
Quirks," the teacher said, waving his hands to calm them down. "But
remember, using Quirks during school hours is against the rules. Settle
down."
"Sensei! Don't lump me in with these
losers!"
Katsumi’s voice cut through the noise like a
knife. She hadn't moved from her desk, but she was leaning back, an arrogant,
confident smirk playing on her lips. "As if I had anything in common with
these rejects and their crappy Quirks. They'll be lucky to end up as sidekicks
to some busted D-lister. I'm the real deal."
The class erupted in outrage.
"You take that back, Bakugo!"
"Who do you think you are?!"
"I think I'm the only one here who's
actually going to make it," Katsumi shot back, relishing the challenge.
"I aced all the mock tests. I'm the only one at this garbage middle school
who has a chance of getting into UA High."
The name dropped like a bomb. UA High. The
pinnacle of hero education. The alma mater of All Might himself. Its acceptance
rate was notoriously low, less than point-two percent.
"Oh, right," the teacher said,
looking down at his clipboard. "Bakugo, you're aiming for UA, aren't you?"
"That's right," Katsumi said,
standing up on her desk, crossing her arms. "I'm going to surpass All
Might as the top hero, and I'm going to carve my name into the annals of
history! And it all starts with UA!"
The class murmured in awe. As abrasive as she
was, no one could deny Katsumi’s power or her drive.
"Ah, let's see here," the teacher
muttered, scanning the list. "Oh, Midoriya. You also applied for UA,
didn't you?"
Silence. Absolute, pin-drop silence fell over
Classroom 3-A.
Izuku froze. His blood ran cold. He slowly
buried his face in his hands, wishing the floor would swallow him whole.
Sensei, please... why did you have to say it out loud?
For a second, nobody moved. And then, the
classroom exploded into deafening laughter.
"Deku?! You're kidding, right?!"
"There's no way you're getting into the
hero course without a Quirk!"
"They don't even let Quirkless people
take the exam!"
"That's not true!" Izuku protested
weakly, standing up, his face burning. "T-They changed the rule last year!
There's no precedent, but... but I can still try! I could be the first!"
"The first?" someone scoffed.
"You'd die in the practical exam!"
The laughter swelled, a tidal wave of mockery
and condescension crashing down on Izuku. He shrunk in on himself, the familiar
weight of his own inadequacy pressing down on his shoulders. He was an idiot. A
dreamer in a world of realists. Why did he even bother?
"SHUT THE HELL UP!"
The explosion that ripped through the
classroom this time didn't just rattle the windows; it shattered two of the
glass panes at the back of the room.
The laughter died instantly.
Katsumi was standing on her desk, her hands
raised, smoke billowing from her palms. Her eyes were wide, manic, and
completely unhinged. She looked like a demon dragged straight from the depths
of hell.
"I swear to God," Katsumi roared,
her voice echoing down the hallway outside. "The next person who laughs is
getting a face full of nitroglycerin! I will permanently disfigure you! Do you
hear me?!"
The students recoiled in sheer terror,
pressing themselves against the walls. The teacher hid behind his podium,
trembling.
Katsumi turned her furious gaze toward Izuku.
She leaped off her desk, landing gracefully in front of him. She grabbed him by
the wrist, her grip firm and uncompromising, and dragged him out of his chair.
"Class is over for us," Katsumi
snapped at the terrified teacher. "We're leaving."
"B-But Bakugo, school just started—"
Katsumi shot the teacher a look that promised
violence. The man silenced himself, swallowing hard.
Without another word, Katsumi dragged Izuku
out of the classroom, hauling him down the hallway and out the front doors of
the school. She didn't let go of his wrist until they were several blocks away,
safely hidden in a quiet, secluded alleyway near a residential area.
She finally released him, spinning around and
pacing like a caged tiger.
Izuku rubbed his wrist, though it didn't hurt.
He leaned against the brick wall of a house, his head hanging low.
"Kacchan... you shouldn't have done that. You'll get in trouble. What if
they put a black mark on your UA application?"
"Screw them," Katsumi spat, kicking
a stray soda can across the alley. It bounced off a dumpster with a loud
clatter. "They're a bunch of hypocritical, weak-minded extras. I don't
care what they think."
She stopped pacing and stomped over to Izuku,
cornering him against the wall. She placed one hand flat against the bricks
beside his head—a perfect, aggressive kabedon. She leaned in close, her chest
rising and falling rapidly.
"Izuku. Look at me."
Izuku slowly raised his head, meeting her
intense, burning gaze. Her eyes were searching his face, looking for the light
that the class had tried to extinguish.
"Why didn't you tell me you applied to
UA?" she demanded, her voice lower now, devoid of the screaming anger, but
vibrating with a different kind of intensity.
Izuku swallowed hard. "Because... because
I knew how it sounded. I'm Quirkless, Kacchan. The practical exam is basically
a war zone. I was thinking... maybe I'd just apply for General Studies. Or...
or just a normal high school. I'm not strong like you. I'm not a hero."
Katsumi’s breath hitched. Hearing him say
those words—hearing him give up—hurt her more than any physical wound ever
could. It felt like someone had driven a knife through her chest.
"Don't," Katsumi whispered fiercely.
She brought her other hand up, grabbing the front of his shirt. "Don't you
ever say that. Don't you dare give up, Deku."
"But Kacchan—"
"Shut up and listen to me!" she
interrupted, her voice cracking slightly. She pressed her forehead against his
chest, hiding her face, her blonde spikes tickling his chin. Izuku froze, his
hands hovering awkwardly in the air, unsure of what to do.
"You're the most heroic person I
know," Katsumi mumbled into his shirt, her pride momentarily discarded in
the face of his despair. "You analyze fights better than pros. You care
more than anyone. If anyone deserves to be a hero, it's you."
She pulled back, looking up at him, her eyes
shining with an unshed, stubborn tear that she refused to let fall.
"You're applying to the Hero
Course," she declared, her tone leaving zero room for argument. "I
have the brawn. You have the brains. You're going to use that big, nerdy head
of yours to figure out a way to pass that exam, and I'm going to blast anyone
who tries to stop you."
Izuku stared at her, overwhelmed by the
absolute, unwavering conviction in her voice. She believed in him. When his
teachers, his classmates, and even society itself told him he was worthless,
Katsumi Bakugo looked at him and saw a hero.
Tears welled up in Izuku's eyes, hot and fast.
He furiously wiped them away with his sleeve. "K-Kacchan... you really
think I can do it?"
"I know you can, idiot," Katsumi
grumbled, her face flushing again as she took a step back, breaking the
intimate proximity. She crossed her arms, looking away with a classic, haughty
huff. "We're going to be a duo. The explosive powerhouse and her...
tactical nerd. We're taking UA by storm. So don't you dare let me down, you
hear me?"
A slow, wobbly smile spread across Izuku's
face. The heavy chains of doubt that had wrapped around his heart snapped,
shattered by the explosive force of Katsumi's belief.
"Okay," Izuku said, his voice
firming up. He clenched his fists, finding a new resolve. "Okay, Kacchan.
I'll do it. I'll go to UA with you."
Katsumi turned back to him, a genuine,
fiercely proud smile breaking across her face. It was a beautiful expression,
one she rarely showed, and it made Izuku's heart skip a painful beat.
"Good," she said, punching him
lightly on the shoulder. "Now, let's go home. I'm craving spicy ramen, and
you're buying since I saved your ass twice today."
Izuku laughed, a bright, clear sound that made
Katsumi’s chest flutter. "Alright, alright. I'll buy."
They walked out of the alleyway together, the
afternoon sun casting long shadows behind them. The dynamic between them was
strange, a delicate dance of explosive aggression and gentle reliance. But as
they walked shoulder-to-shoulder, Izuku felt a spark of hope ignite in his
soul.
He was Quirkless. He was physically weak. But
he had Katsumi by his side, and with her, he felt like he could take on the
world.
Neither of them knew that their resolve was
about to be violently tested.
As they walked down the street, turning the
corner to pass under a large, concrete bridge, they were too engrossed in their
conversation to notice the subtle, sickening sound of shifting fluid.
Behind them, a manhole cover rattled, then
flew off with a heavy clang.
From the dark, fetid depths of the sewer, a
massive mass of dark green sludge began to seep outward. It bubbled and hissed,
coalescing into a towering, grotesque shape. Two massive, manic eyes opened
within the liquid, locking onto the two teenagers walking away.
"A medium-sized invisibility cloak,"
a gargling, monstrous voice whispered from the sludge. "And a girl with a
very, very powerful Quirk..."
The Sludge Villain reared back, preparing to
strike, as the Dragon and her Treasure walked unknowingly into the abyss.
The ticking of the wall clock in the career
counseling office was deafening. To Izuku Midoriya, each mechanical clack
sounded less like a measurement of time and more like the slamming of a judge’s
gavel, condemning him to a life of mediocrity.
"Midoriya, we need to be realistic
here," Mr. Tanaka said, sighing as he rubbed the bridge of his nose. He
pushed his wire-rimmed glasses up his face, leaving a smudge of ink on his
forehead. Between them sat a cheap wooden desk cluttered with aptitude tests,
university brochures, and the glaring, singular sheet of paper that had caused
this entire meeting.
Izuku’s UA High School application.
"I know what you're going to say,
Sensei," Izuku began, his voice quiet but straining to hold onto the
fragile confidence Katsumi had instilled in him the day before. He kept his
hands tightly clasped in his lap, his knuckles turning white. "I know
they've never accepted a Quirkless student into the Hero Course before. But the
rule against it was lifted last year. It’s not explicitly forbidden anymore. If
I pass the written exam and figure out a way to score points in the
practical—"
"It’s not just about the rules,
Midoriya," the teacher interrupted, his tone devoid of malice but dripping
with a pity that burned worse than Katsumi’s explosions. He leaned forward,
lacing his fingers together. "It’s about survival. Heroics isn't a comic
book. It’s not just saving kittens from trees. It’s facing individuals whose
bodies have mutated into living weapons. It’s fighting psychopaths who can
level city blocks with a thought."
Izuku swallowed hard. The back of his throat
felt like sandpaper. "I know that."
"Do you?" Mr. Tanaka pulled out a
thick manila folder from his drawer and flipped it open. "Last year, the
mortality rate for sidekicks with defensive Quirks rose by four percent.
Professional heroes, adults with years of training and powerful abilities, are
injured and killed every single month. You..." The teacher gestured
vaguely to Izuku’s scrawny, trembling frame. "You have no physical
enhancements. No elemental resistance. No hyper-regeneration. If a villain with
a strength Quirk punches you, your bones will shatter. If you enter that
practical exam, you are going to be nothing more than a liability to the
students who actually have a chance."
The words struck Izuku like physical blows. It
wasn't the aggressive, fiery bullying of his classmates; this was the cold,
sterile logic of the adult world. It was a statistical breakdown of his
worthlessness.
"I don't want to see you get hurt,
Midoriya," the teacher continued softly, tapping the application paper.
"You have excellent grades. Your analytical skills are top-notch. Why not
apply for the General Studies course? Or maybe a support track at a normal high
school? You could be a police officer. They get a lot of flak for having
villains delivered to their doorstep, but it’s an honorable profession. You can
still help people without throwing your life away."
Izuku stared at the wood grain of the desk.
The flickering fluorescent lights overhead buzzed, echoing the sudden, static
emptiness in his head.
Yesterday, in the alleyway, Katsumi had told
him he could do it. She had looked at him with those fierce, burning crimson
eyes and demanded that he stand by her side. But as he sat in the cold reality
of the counseling office, the warmth of her belief felt like a distant, fading
dream. Katsumi was a prodigy. She was born with power practically leaking from
her pores. Of course she thought she could drag him to the top; she was strong
enough to carry the world.
But Izuku couldn't let her carry him. He
couldn't be the dead weight dragging her down. If he went into the exam and got
crushed by a robot, or worse, if he got into UA and was killed by a villain,
Katsumi would blame herself. Her bright, explosive future would be tainted by
his blood.
"I... I understand, Sensei," Izuku
whispered, the fire in his emerald eyes finally dying out, replaced by a
hollow, glossy resignation.
Mr. Tanaka sighed in relief. "I'm glad
you're seeing reason, Midoriya. I'll print out a new career form for you. Take the
weekend to think about alternative high schools. You're a smart kid. Don't
waste your life chasing ghosts."
Izuku stood up, bowed rigidly, and walked out
of the office. The hallway was empty, the afternoon sun casting long, mocking
shadows across the linoleum floor. He felt numb. His legs moved on autopilot,
carrying him back toward Classroom 3-A to grab his bag.
He didn't notice the quiet murmurs as he
approached the door. He didn't notice the snickers.
As he slid the classroom door open, three boys
were gathered around his desk. It was the same trio from yesterday—the boy with
elongated fingers, the smoking boy, and the scaled boy. They were looking at a
crumpled piece of paper.
"Can you believe this guy?" the
leader laughed, tossing the paper onto Izuku's desk. "He actually went in
to defend his UA application to Mr. Tanaka. I heard the whole thing through the
window."
Izuku froze in the doorway, his heart
plummeting to his stomach.
"What an idiot," the smoking boy
sneered, crossing his arms. "Even the teachers know you're useless, Deku.
'I can still help people!'" he mocked, pitching his voice high to mimic
Izuku. "You can't even help yourself!"
"Just give it up," the scaled boy
added, glaring at Izuku. "You're embarrassing the whole school. When
Bakugo gets into UA, they're gonna look at her middle school record and see
that the Quirkless loser thought he could go, too. You're dragging her name
down."
That was the killing blow.
Izuku didn't care what they said about him,
but the thought of being a stain on Katsumi's perfect record—the thought of
hindering the only person who had ever fiercely defended him—broke whatever
resolve he had left. His eyes burned with tears, and he looked down at his
bright red sneakers, his shoulders trembling.
"Leave him alone."
The voice wasn't a roar. It wasn't a scream.
It was a low, terrifyingly calm rumble that seemed to drop the temperature in
the room to absolute zero.
The three bullies stiffened, their heads
whipping toward the back of the room. Katsumi Bakugo was leaning against the
window sill, partially hidden by the curtains. She had been taking a nap,
waiting for Izuku to finish his meeting, but her crimson eyes were wide open
now, and they were fixed on the bullies with the intensity of a sniper’s laser
sight.
"B-Bakugo!" the leader stammered,
instantly taking three large steps away from Izuku's desk. "W-We didn't
know you were here! We were just giving Midoriya some realistic advice!"
Katsumi slowly pushed herself off the wall.
She didn't ignite her hands. There were no sparks. Just a slow, predatory walk
that made her look like a tiger stalking cornered prey.
"Realistic advice," Katsumi echoed,
her voice terrifyingly quiet. She stopped right in front of the leader. She was
an inch shorter than him, but her presence made her seem ten feet tall. "I
thought I made myself perfectly clear yesterday. What part of 'don't look at
him, don't talk to him, don't breathe his air' was too complicated for your
smooth, primate brain to process?"
"W-We were just saying what Mr. Tanaka
said!" the boy defended desperately, sweating under her gaze. "He's
Quirkless! He shouldn't be applying to UA! He's gonna get himself killed!"
Katsumi moved so fast it looked like
teleportation. Her hand shot out, grabbing the boy by the throat of his uniform
collar, lifting him onto his tiptoes. Finally, the telltale crackle of her
Quirk ignited. Small, sharp explosions popped against his collarbone, singing
the fabric and making the boy yelp in pain.
"Let me explain something to you, you
pathetic extra," Katsumi hissed, her breath fanning his terrified face.
"Izuku has more courage in his pinky finger than your entire bloodline. If
you ever—ever—try to speak for me, or tell him he's dragging me down, I won't
just burn your notebooks. I will burn your fucking house down. Get out."
She threw him backward. He crashed into his
friends, and the three of them scrambled out the back door of the classroom
without looking back, terrified for their lives.
Katsumi stood there for a moment, her chest
heaving as she let the sparks die out. She turned around to look at Izuku,
expecting to see his usual, flustered smile—the one he always gave her to
diffuse her anger.
But Izuku wasn't smiling.
He was staring at the floor, tears silently
tracking down his freckled cheeks. He slowly walked to his desk, picked up his
yellow backpack, and slung it over his shoulder. He didn't look at her.
"I'm going home, Kacchan," he
whispered, his voice completely broken.
Katsumi’s heart stuttered in her chest. A cold
knot of panic tightened in her stomach. This was wrong. The bullies were gone.
The threat was neutralized. Why did he look like a ghost?
She didn't say a word. She just grabbed her
bag and followed him out the door.
The walk home was excruciatingly silent.
Usually, this was the part of the day Katsumi
secretly looked forward to the most. Izuku would normally be rambling at a
million miles an hour about whatever hero fight he had seen on the news, his
hands animating his words while Katsumi pretended to be annoyed, occasionally
grunting or tossing a casual insult just to keep up appearances. In truth, she
loved the sound of his voice. She loved the way his eyes lit up with unbridled
passion.
But today, the silence was suffocating.
The sun was beginning to set, casting the city
in a wash of bruised purples and deep oranges. Long shadows stretched across
the pavement as they walked side-by-side. Katsumi kept stealing glances at him.
His shoulders were slumped, his head was down, and his eyes were dull, completely
devoid of the starlight that usually resided there.
What the hell did that teacher say to him?
Katsumi’s mind raced with violent, protective thoughts. I'll blow up the
faculty lounge. I'll turn Tanaka's car into a pile of slag. How dare they break
him? How dare they take his light away?
"Kacchan," Izuku suddenly spoke, his
voice so quiet she almost missed it over the sound of a passing car.
"What?" she replied, trying to keep
her tone neutral, though it came out sounding sharper than she intended.
Izuku stopped walking. They were in a quiet
residential alley, flanked by high brick walls covered in climbing ivy. The
street was completely empty, bathed in the twilight glow.
"I think... I think I'm going to withdraw
my UA application."
The world seemed to stop spinning. The ambient
noise of the city completely vanished from Katsumi's ears, replaced by a loud,
high-pitched ringing.
She turned to face him, her crimson eyes wide
in shock. "What the hell are you talking about?"
"Mr. Tanaka was right," Izuku said,
finally looking up at her. The sheer devastation in his expression made Katsumi
feel physically sick. "And those guys... they were right, too. I'm
Quirkless. I don't have super strength. I don't have explosions. I'm just a
normal, fragile person. If I go to that practical exam, I'm going to get
crushed."
"I told you yesterday!" Katsumi
snapped, her panic manifesting as anger, her hands balling into fists. "I
told you we were going to do this together! I'll protect you!"
"You can't protect me forever,
Kacchan!" Izuku yelled back, his voice finally cracking with emotion. It
was the first time he had raised his voice at her in years. Katsumi flinched,
visibly taken aback.
Tears streamed down Izuku's face, his hands
gripping the straps of his backpack so hard his knuckles ached. "You can't
be by my side twenty-four hours a day! What happens when we get separated? What
happens when a villain attacks and you're not there? I die, Kacchan! I die, and
it will be all my fault for thinking I could play hero!"
He took a step back, putting distance between
them. "I'm a pebble in your path. You're going to be the Number One Hero.
You're going to surpass All Might. You shine so bright... but the brighter you
shine, the darker my shadow gets. I can't stand next to you on that stage. I'll
just hold you back. I'll drag your name down. I'm going to apply for General
Studies... or just go to a normal school."
Katsumi stood frozen. Her mind was a whirlwind
of agonizing emotions.
He thinks he's holding me back? He thinks he's
a burden?
Images flashed through her mind. Izuku, four
years old, offering his scraped hand to her in the river. Izuku, seven years
old, covering her with an umbrella while he got soaked in the rain. Izuku,
yesterday, looking at her with absolute awe.
He didn't understand. He didn't understand
that he was the only thing keeping her tethered to humanity. Her Quirk was
destructive; her personality was abrasive, violent, and off-putting. Everyone
admired her, but no one loved her. No one except Izuku, who looked past the
explosions and the yelling and saw the girl underneath. If she lost him to some
normal high school, if their paths diverged now, she would lose the only piece
of her soul that was truly good.
She couldn't lose him. She wouldn't survive
it.
Snap.
Something inside Katsumi Bakugo broke. The
pride, the hesitation, the fear of vulnerability—it all incinerated in the
blinding heat of her desperation.
Izuku barely had time to blink before Katsumi
crossed the distance between them.
She didn't grab his collar this time. She
grabbed him by the shoulders, spinning him around and slamming him flat against
the brick wall of the alleyway. The impact knocked the breath out of him in a
sharp huff.
Before he could recover, Katsumi planted both
of her hands on the brick wall, one on either side of his head. An incredibly
aggressive, inescapable kabedon.
"K-Kacchan?!" Izuku gasped, his eyes
wide with shock.
She was flush against him. He could feel the
heat radiating from her body, practically scalding through his uniform. Her
face was mere inches from his, her breathing ragged, heavy, and frantic. Her
crimson eyes were blazing, but not with the feral, murderous rage she reserved
for bullies. This fire was different. It was desperate. It was raw. It was
vulnerable.
"Shut up," she breathed, her voice
trembling. "Just... shut up and listen to me, you stupid, self-deprecating
idiot."
Izuku froze, completely paralyzed by her
proximity. He could smell the sharp tang of nitroglycerin, but beneath it was
the sweet scent of vanilla and the clean smell of her skin. Her ash-blonde hair
brushed against his cheeks, and he could see the slight tremor in her hands
where they pressed against the bricks.
"You think you're a pebble in my
path?" Katsumi’s voice cracked, and to Izuku's absolute horror, he saw
tears welling up in the corners of her fierce eyes. "You think you're
dragging me down? You have no idea... you have absolutely no idea what you are
to me."
Izuku's breath hitched. "Kacchan..."
"Don't interrupt me!" she snapped,
though there was no real heat in it. She leaned her forehead against his,
closing her eyes as a single tear escaped, tracking down her cheek and dropping
onto his collar. The sensation of her skin against his sent an electric shock
straight to his heart.
"When we were kids," Katsumi
whispered, her voice incredibly soft now, meant only for him, "everyone
told me I was amazing. Everyone told me I was better than everyone else. And I
believed them. I became arrogant. I became cruel. But you... you never cared
about my Quirk. You cared about me."
She opened her eyes, locking her tear-filled
crimson gaze with his wide, emerald ones. The intensity in her stare pinned him
to the wall far more effectively than her physical strength ever could.
"You're not a burden, Izuku. You're my
anchor. If I didn't have you to look out for, if I didn't have your big,
stupid, pure heart to remind me what an actual hero looks like, I'd just be a
villain with a hero license. You make me want to be better. You make me want to
be someone worthy of standing next to you."
Izuku felt the world tilting on its axis.
Everything he thought he knew about Katsumi, about their dynamic, was being
rewritten in the span of a single heartbeat.
"You don't have a Quirk?" Katsumi
asked, pulling her head back just enough to look at his entire face. "So
what? Do you think a Quirk is what makes a hero? Endeavor has a powerful Quirk,
and he's a raging jackass! Half the pros out there just want fame and money!
But you? You analyze fights, you deduce weaknesses, you formulate strategies
that pros miss! You’re smarter than half the heroes out there."
She moved her right hand from the wall,
bringing it down to press against the center of his chest, right over his
frantically beating heart.
"I have the brawn," Katsumi
declared, her voice steadying, filling with an unshakeable conviction.
"And you have the brains. You say I can't protect you twenty-four hours a
day? Watch me. I will blow apart every robot in that exam. I will clear a path
for you, and you will use that brilliant mind of yours to pass. We are going to
UA together. We are going to be a duo."
She leaned in closer, her lips hovering
agonizingly close to his. Izuku felt his face flush completely crimson, his
brain short-circuiting at the sensory overload of her touch, her scent, and her
profound words.
"Don't you dare give up on me,
nerd," she whispered fiercely. "Because if you walk away from me
now... I don't know what I'll do."
It was the closest Katsumi Bakugo had ever
come to saying 'I love you'. It was a confession wrapped in a threat, a plea
wrapped in a vow.
Izuku stared into her eyes, seeing the
terrifying vulnerability she had hidden from the entire world, laid bare just
for him. She wasn't an invincible dragon looking down on a helpless villager.
She was a girl who was terrified of losing the most important person in her
life.
The heavy, suffocating weight of Mr. Tanaka's
words completely evaporated. The mockery of his classmates faded to white
noise. All that mattered, all that existed in the entire universe at this exact
moment, was the fiery, beautiful girl pressing him against the wall, asking him
to stay with her.
How could he refuse? How could he ever walk
away from her?
Izuku slowly reached up, his trembling hands
gently grasping Katsumi's wrists. He didn't push her away. Instead, he held
onto her, his own tears finally stopping as a new, incredibly powerful fire
ignited in his chest.
"Okay," Izuku said, his voice
completely steady for the first time all day. "Okay, Kacchan."
Katsumi let out a shaky breath, her eyes
widening slightly as she searched his face. "Okay?"
"I won't give up," Izuku promised,
squeezing her wrists gently. "I'll apply to the Hero Course. I'll figure
out a way. I'll train my body, I'll study harder than I ever have. I won't hold
you back, Kacchan. I promise you. I will stand by your side."
A beautiful, blindingly bright smile broke
across Katsumi's face, wiping away the tears. It was a smile that made Izuku's
chest ache with an entirely different kind of emotion.
Without thinking, overwhelmed by the rush of
relief and adrenaline, Katsumi threw her arms around his neck, burying her face
into his shoulder in a tight, crushing hug.
Izuku stiffened for a fraction of a second
before slowly wrapping his arms around her waist, holding her close. They stood
there in the quiet alleyway, bathed in the fading light of the sunset, holding
onto each other as if they were the only two people left on earth.
It was a vow sparked not by explosions, but by
the quiet, unyielding strength of a shared dream.
After a long moment, Katsumi abruptly pushed
herself back, her face suddenly burning as red as her eyes as she realized what
she was doing. She coughed into her fist, looking away quickly, her usual gruff
demeanor rushing back in to cover her embarrassment.
"R-Right. Well. Good," she
stammered, kicking a pebble. "Because if you backed out, I would have had
to blow up your All Might poster collection."
Izuku laughed softly, the sound feeling
lighter and freer than it had in years. "I know you would, Kacchan."
"Come on," Katsumi grumbled,
grabbing the strap of her bag and turning to walk down the street, though she
deliberately slowed her pace so he could walk beside her. "We need to
figure out a training plan. Your arms look like noodles. If we're going to get
you ready for the practical, I'm going to have to break you down and build you
back up from scratch."
"I'm ready," Izuku said, walking
proudly beside her. And for the first time in his life, he truly meant it. He
wasn't just dreaming anymore. He was preparing.
They left the alleyway, the tension between
them completely transformed. The heavy dread of the day had been replaced by a
palpable, electric energy. They talked excitedly as they walked, Katsumi
throwing out brutal exercise routines while Izuku happily muttered about diet
plans and muscle isolation techniques.
The sun finally dipped below the horizon, and
the streetlights flickered on, casting pools of yellow light onto the pavement.
"We'll take a shortcut," Katsumi
said, gesturing toward a large concrete overpass that cut under the main
highway. "I want to get home before my old hag throws my dinner out."
"Auntie Mitsuki wouldn't do that,"
Izuku smiled.
"You don't know the hag like I do,"
Katsumi snorted.
They walked under the heavy concrete bridge.
It was dark, the only illumination coming from a flickering streetlamp near the
exit. The air was damp and smelled faintly of stagnant water and mildew from
the nearby storm drains.
Izuku was mid-sentence, explaining the
benefits of plyometric training, when a strange sound echoed through the
tunnel.
Schhhlick. Blub.
It sounded like thick, wet mud shifting
heavily across the concrete.
Katsumi stopped dead in her tracks, her combat
instincts immediately taking over. The hair on the back of her neck stood up.
She threw her arm out in front of Izuku, pushing him behind her protectively.
"Kacchan? What is it?" Izuku asked,
his heart skipping a beat.
"Quiet," she hissed, her palms
already beginning to spark in the darkness.
She narrowed her eyes, peering into the
shadows near the large, iron sewer grate set into the wall of the underpass.
Schhluuuurp.
The sound grew louder. Suddenly, the heavy
iron grate groaned and bent outward with terrifying force, the metal warping
like plastic.
A foul, putrid stench washed over them—the
smell of rotting garbage, raw sewage, and something sickly sweet, like decaying
meat. Izuku gagged, covering his mouth.
From the darkness of the broken grate, a
massive, gelatinous mass of dark green sludge began to pour out. It didn't just
flow; it moved with purpose, piling up on itself until it towered over the two
teenagers, blocking their exit.
Two massive, bulbous eyes suddenly opened
within the viscous liquid, glowing with a manic, unhinged light. A jagged,
uneven mouth formed, lined with makeshift, sludge-like teeth.
"Oh, how incredibly lucky," the
monster gargled, its voice wet and echoing off the concrete walls. "I was
just looking for a new meat-suit to hide in. And look at what we have
here..."
The villain's eyes locked onto Katsumi. He had
seen the sparks in her hands. He could sense the volatile, incredible power
coursing through her veins.
"A girl with a top-tier Quirk," the
sludge villain hissed, a sickeningly eager smile stretching across his form.
"You'll do nicely. With your power, I can blast that blonde bastard right
out of the sky!"
Izuku felt the blood drain from his face. His
legs trembled. He had analyzed villains on TV, he had written about them in his
notebooks, but standing face-to-face with a monster that intended to kill them
was completely different. Fear rooted him to the spot.
But Katsumi didn't step back.
She didn't tremble. She didn't hesitate.
She stood firmly in front of Izuku, her feet
planted wide, her hands raised. The sparks in her palms flared into bright,
illuminating explosions, casting dancing orange shadows against the tunnel
walls. Her crimson eyes locked onto the villain, blazing with absolute,
unyielding defiance.
"Get behind me, Izuku," Katsumi
commanded, her voice steady and lethal.
"A feisty one!" the villain laughed,
extending massive tendrils of sludge toward them. "I love breaking the
feisty ones!"
"You're not touching him," Katsumi
roared, the heat radiating from her body in waves. "I just made a promise,
you slimy bastard. And I don't break my promises!"
With a battle cry that echoed like thunder,
the Dragon unleashed her fire, charging headlong into the darkness to protect
her Quirkless treasure.
The darkness of the concrete underpass was
shattered by a blinding, incandescent flash of orange and yellow.
The concussive force of the explosion hit
Izuku Midoriya a fraction of a second before the deafening roar reached his
ears. The shockwave ruffled his wild green hair and forced him to cross his
arms over his face, shielding his eyes from the blinding light and the searing
wave of heat that instantly baked the damp air of the tunnel.
"DIE, YOU SLIMY BASTARD!" Katsumi
roared, her voice echoing off the curved concrete walls with the ferocity of a
wild beast.
She didn't retreat. She didn't cower. Katsumi
Bakugo launched herself forward, her palms forward, detonating blast after
blast in a relentless, devastating barrage. The confined space of the underpass
magnified the destructive power of her Quirk. Concrete cracked and splintered,
chunks of the ceiling raining down into the murky water below as the air grew
thick with the suffocating scent of burnt caramel and vaporized sewage.
"GAAAH! You little brat!" the Sludge
Villain shrieked, recoiling as the intense heat scorched the outer layers of
his liquid form. The sludge boiled and popped, emitting a noxious, yellow-green
steam.
Izuku stood frozen, his back pressed against
the cold, damp wall of the tunnel. His emerald eyes were wide with terror, but
he couldn't look away. Katsumi was magnificent. She was a tempest of fire and
fury, a singular, indomitable force standing between him and the monster. She
was the Dragon, and she was breathing fire to keep him safe.
But Izuku's analytical mind, trained by years
of obsessively studying hero fights, immediately recognized the flaw in her
strategy.
The confined space, Izuku realized, his breath
catching in his throat. Her explosions are powerful, but the villain is made of
liquid. Kinetic force just scatters him, and the heat is only boiling the
surface. She’s burning up the oxygen in the tunnel. And the smoke...
"Kacchan, wait!" Izuku screamed over
the ringing in his ears. "You can't use massive blasts in here! The
structural integrity—!"
"Shut up, Deku, I've got this!" she
yelled back, her pride and protective instincts completely blinding her to the
tactical reality of the situation.
She pulled her right arm back, feeling the
heavy, slick accumulation of nitroglycerin sweat coating her palm. "Take
this, you freak! STUN GRENADE!"
A massive, concentrated sphere of light and
heat erupted from her hand. It was a brilliant, tactical move meant to blind
and disorient, but in the enclosed space of the underpass, it created a
devastating smokescreen. The intense flash temporarily blinded Katsumi herself,
and the resulting cloud of dust and vaporized sludge plunged the tunnel into
complete opacity.
That was all the villain needed.
"Foolish girl," the gargling, wet
voice echoed from every direction at once, completely masking his true
location.
"Where are you?!" Katsumi snarled,
spinning around blindly, her palms sparking as she tried to peer through the
thick, gray smoke. "Show yourself!"
From the shadows above, the villain struck.
A thick, heavy tendril of sludge whipped down
from the ceiling like a striking viper. It slammed into Katsumi’s side with the
force of a speeding truck. The breath was violently knocked from her lungs in a
sharp gasp.
"KACCHAN!" Izuku screamed.
He took a desperate step forward, but a
secondary wave of sludge surged along the floor, sweeping his legs out from
under him. Izuku cried out as he hit the hard concrete, his head bouncing
against the pavement. Stars exploded in his vision, a sharp, ringing pain
piercing through his skull. He rolled, desperately trying to find his footing,
his hands scraping against the rough ground.
Through the clearing smoke, Izuku saw a
nightmare unfolding.
The villain hadn't just struck Katsumi; he had
engulfed her. The dark, gelatinous mass of sludge was rapidly spiraling up her
legs, wrapping around her torso, and binding her arms to her sides. Katsumi
thrashed wildly, her crimson eyes wide with sudden, primal panic.
"Oh, this is perfect," the villain
purred, his voice dripping with sadistic glee. "What a spectacular Quirk!
With this kind of firepower, I can easily lose that blonde buffoon who's been
chasing me!"
"Get... the hell... off me!" Katsumi
choked out, struggling to raise her hands.
She managed to pop off a few small explosions,
but the sludge absorbed the impact, wrapping thicker and tighter around her
wrists, extinguishing the sparks. The villain’s liquid form acted as a perfect
dampener. Every time she tried to blast him, she risked tearing her own limbs
off from the point-blank concussive force inside the liquid vacuum.
The sludge crept higher, slithering over her
collarbone, creeping up her neck.
"Don't fight it, little girl," the
villain coaxed, forcing a thick tendril of foul-smelling slime over her mouth.
"It'll only hurt for about forty-five seconds. Then, I'll take control.
You'll be a hero, in a way! You're saving my life!"
Katsumi couldn't breathe.
The panic, cold and absolute, finally pierced
through her ironclad pride. The sludge forced its way between her lips, tasting
like rotting garbage and death, burning her nose and throat. She couldn't draw
in air. Her lungs burned, screaming for oxygen that wasn't there. Her vision
began to blur around the edges, dark spots dancing across her field of view.
She looked frantically toward the tunnel exit,
hoping, praying for a pro hero to arrive. But there was no one. The street
outside was empty.
And then, her agonizing, suffocating gaze
found Izuku.
He was pushing himself up from the ground,
blood trickling from a scrape on his forehead. He looked so fragile. So small.
No, Katsumi thought, her heart hammering a
frantic, dying rhythm against her ribs. No, Deku. Run. Please, run away.
She tried to scream it, but only bubbles of
air escaped into the sludge. She was failing him. The girl who had sworn just
twenty minutes ago to protect him forever, to clear a path for him, was dying
in a filthy sewer, leaving him defenseless against a monster. The despair was
heavier than the sludge suffocating her.
Izuku saw it.
Through the murky, shifting mass of the
villain, he saw Katsumi’s eyes. The fierce, indomitable crimson fire that had
protected him his entire life was flickering. He saw the tears gathering at the
corners of her eyes. He saw the sheer, unadulterated terror of a girl drowning
on dry land.
“You think you’re a pebble in my path? You’re
my anchor.”
Her voice echoed in his mind, sharp and clear.
Izuku’s intellect, the brilliant tactical mind
that analyzed Quirks and memorized hero laws, was screaming at him. Run. Find a
pro hero. You are Quirkless. You have no weapons. You have no strength. If you
step forward, you will die.
But Izuku didn't listen to his brain.
Before he could consciously process what he
was doing, before his logic could override his heart, his legs moved on their
own.
He didn't run away. He sprinted straight into
the abyss.
"What?!" the Sludge Villain gurgled
in surprise, his massive eyes darting down to the scrawny boy charging at him.
"You want to die too, brat?!"
Time dilated. The world slowed to a crawl. The
sound of his own heartbeat was the only thing Izuku could hear. He saw the
villain raising a massive, club-like arm of sludge to swat him away. He knew
that impact would break his ribs. He knew it could kill him.
He didn't care. He couldn't let her die.
As he ran, Izuku reached back, gripping the
heavy strap of his yellow backpack. He spun on his heel, using the momentum of
his sprint, and hurled the bag with every ounce of strength his un-enhanced,
Quirkless body could muster.
The backpack flew through the air like a
clumsy, unguided missile. The zipper, damaged in the earlier scuffle at school,
finally gave way. The contents exploded outward. Textbooks, a metal pencil
case, and a thick, charred notebook titled Hero Analysis for the Future, Vol.
13 flew through the air.
By sheer, miraculous luck—or perhaps guided by
the universe itself—the sharp, metal corner of his pencil case struck the
Sludge Villain directly in his massive, bulbous left eye.
"GAAAAAAARRRGH!"
The monster shrieked in absolute agony. The
sludge holding Katsumi instantly loosened as the villain instinctively
recoiled, a massive, watery tear forming in his injured eye.
Katsumi gasped, a ragged, desperate intake of
air as the slime receded from her nose and mouth. She coughed violently, her
vision swimming.
Before the villain could recover, Izuku was
there.
He didn't have super strength. He didn't have
explosive palms. He had bare hands and a desperate, burning soul.
Izuku plunged his hands into the thick,
foul-smelling sludge. It was like shoving his arms into wet, freezing concrete.
The friction burned his skin, but he ignored the pain. He dug his fingers into
the slime, searching blindly until his hands found the fabric of Katsumi's
school uniform. He gripped her collar with all his might and pulled, planting
his sneakers against the slippery pavement for leverage.
"Deku?!" Katsumi choked out, her
voice raspy and weak. She looked at him, completely stunned. His face was mere
inches from the villain, twisted into an expression of sheer, terrified
determination. Tears were streaming down his face, completely contradicting the
reckless bravery of his actions.
"Let... her... GO!" Izuku screamed,
his voice cracking as he tore frantically at the sludge, scraping the slime
away from her shoulders with his fingernails.
"YOU LITTLE PEST!" the villain
roared, his one good eye locking onto Izuku with murderous intent. The monster
raised a massive wave of sludge high above them, preparing to crush the boy
into the pavement.
"Deku, what the hell are you
doing?!" Katsumi sobbed, the fear for his life finally overriding her own
panic. "Run! You're going to die!"
Izuku pulled desperately at her, ignoring the
looming shadow of death hanging over him. He looked directly into her eyes,
offering her a trembling, watery, but completely genuine smile.
"I won't let you hurt her!" Izuku
yelled, though whether he was talking to the villain or to himself, Katsumi
couldn't tell. He looked back down at her, his emerald eyes burning with the
very same fire she had sworn to protect. "My legs... they just moved on
their own, Kacchan! You looked like... you looked like you were asking for
help!"
Katsumi’s heart stopped.
The world around them—the roaring villain, the
damp tunnel, the looming threat of death—faded into nothingness. In that
singular moment, looking up at the crying, Quirkless boy who had thrown away
his own life just to give her a breath of air, Katsumi Bakugo felt something
profound and permanent shift within her soul.
He wasn't just her treasure to protect. He
wasn't a fragile glass doll.
He was a hero. The greatest hero she had ever
known.
"DIE!" the villain screamed,
bringing the massive, heavy tendril of sludge crashing down toward Izuku's
back.
Izuku closed his eyes, throwing his body over
Katsumi to shield her from the impact. Katsumi reached up, wrapping her arms
around him, burying his face in her shoulder, ready to take the hit with him.
If they were going to die, they were going to die together.
But the blow never landed.
A sudden, overwhelming pressure filled the
underpass. It was a pressure so intense it made the air vibrate, a localized
drop in barometric pressure that made the sludge tremble.
A hand, large and heavily muscled, gripped the
villain's descending tendril, stopping it dead in its tracks.
"I really am pathetic."
The voice was deep, resonant, and echoed with
an authority that commanded the very elements.
Izuku’s eyes snapped open. Katsumi gasped.
Standing behind them, his massive, imposing
frame completely blocking the exit of the underpass, was a man who looked like
he had been chiseled from granite. He wore a simple white t-shirt and cargo
pants, but his two distinct, golden bangs framed a face that the entire world
recognized. Blood trickled from the corner of his mouth, and a plastic grocery
bag lay dropped on the pavement, but his blue eyes blazed with an unyielding
light.
"All... All Might?!" Izuku
whispered, completely paralyzed by shock.
"I told you the traits that make a great
champion," All Might said, though he wasn't looking at them. He was
staring at his own bloodied fist, his expression a mixture of profound shame
and blazing inspiration. "But I wasn't living up to my own ideals! Pros
are always risking their lives! That is the true test of a hero!"
All Might had been standing at the edge of the
underpass for the last sixty seconds. He had tracked the villain here, but his
time limit had expired. His injury had flared up, leaving him as a skeletal,
useless bystander. He had watched Katsumi get captured, and he had hesitated,
telling himself to wait for another hero with a better Quirk matchup. He had
made excuses.
But then, he had seen the Quirkless boy sprint
into the jaws of death. He had seen the absolute purity of a hero's soul ignite
in the darkness. The boy’s selfless, reckless bravery had reignited the dying
embers of One For All within Toshinori’s chest, pushing him past his limits,
forcing his broken body to expand one last time.
"TEXAS..."
All Might pulled his right arm back. The
muscles in his bicep bulged, tearing the seams of his white t-shirt. The air
around his fist began to warp and distort from sheer kinetic pressure.
The Sludge Villain shrieked in absolute terror,
dropping Izuku and Katsumi as he tried to flee backward.
"...SMASH!!!"
All Might threw the punch.
He didn't make contact with the villain. He
didn't need to. The raw, unadulterated wind pressure generated by the force of
his swing created a localized tornado within the confined space of the
underpass.
Izuku and Katsumi were blown backward, sliding
across the concrete as a deafening hurricane ripped through the tunnel. The
Sludge Villain was caught dead in the center of the vortex. The kinetic force
was so immense that it literally tore the liquid molecules apart. The villain
exploded into a million tiny droplets of foul-smelling rain, splattering
against the concrete walls and ceiling.
The wind pressure didn't stop there. It rushed
out of the tunnel, spiraling up into the sky.
Izuku, lying on his back, looked up in
absolute awe as the shockwave pierced the thick canopy of evening clouds,
parting them instantly and revealing a breathtaking expanse of twilight stars.
He changed the weather... with a single punch.
Silence descended upon the underpass, broken
only by the soft, pattering sound of the sludge dripping from the ceiling.
All Might stood tall, his fist still extended,
steam rising from his incredibly muscled arm. He slowly turned around, wiping
the blood from his mouth, and offered the two teenagers a blinding, reassuring
smile.
"Fear not, young ones," All Might
boomed, his voice vibrating with absolute safety. "For I am here."
Katsumi let out a shaky breath, her head
dropping back against the concrete. She was safe. Izuku was safe. The
adrenaline that had been keeping her conscious suddenly vanished, leaving her
completely drained.
Izuku scrambled over to her, his hands
hovering frantically over her shoulders. "Kacchan! Kacchan, are you okay?
Can you breathe?"
Katsumi looked up at his panicked, freckled
face. She coughed, a small bit of sludge escaping her lips, but a weak,
exhausted smile touched her face. She reached up with a trembling hand,
grabbing the front of his ruined uniform jacket.
"You're an idiot, Deku," she rasped,
her voice affectionate and incredibly soft. "A suicidal, reckless
idiot."
"I'm sorry," Izuku babbled, tears
prickling his eyes again. "I just... I couldn't let him take you."
Katsumi pulled him down slightly, resting her
forehead against his chest, listening to the frantic, strong beating of his
heart. "Thank you," she whispered into the fabric. "My
hero."
Izuku's breath hitched, a deep crimson flush
spreading across his face, but he didn't pull away. He just wrapped his arms
around her, holding her tightly.
Standing a few feet away, All Might watched
the interaction, a profound sense of destiny washing over him. He had spent
months looking for a successor, searching through the ranks of UA's top
students, looking for powerful Quirks and strong bodies.
But watching the boy sitting on the pavement—a
boy with no power, who had rushed a villain bare-handed to save the girl he
cared for—Toshinori Yagi realized how blind he had been.
A hero is not made by the power they possess,
All Might thought, feeling a smile stretch across his face. It is made by the
heart that drives them. He has it. The heart of a true champion.
The aftermath was a chaotic blur of flashing
police lights and overlapping voices.
Several pro heroes, having heard the massive
explosion of the Texas Smash, had finally arrived on the scene. Death Arms,
Kamui Woods, and Mt. Lady had cordoned off the street outside the underpass.
They were currently bagging up the incapacitated, separated droplets of the
Sludge Villain while paramedics checked over the two teenagers.
All Might had slipped away in the chaos,
citing an urgent press conference, though in reality, he had reached his
absolute limit and had hidden in a nearby alleyway, reverting to his skeletal
form.
Izuku sat on the bumper of an ambulance, a
shock blanket draped over his shoulders. A paramedic had cleaned the scrape on
his forehead and applied a bandage, but physically, he was fine. Emotionally,
he was exhausted.
Kamui Woods and Death Arms walked over to him,
their expressions stern and disapproving.
"Listen here, kid," Death Arms
scolded, crossing his massive, muscular arms. "What you did back there was
incredibly foolish. You don't have a Quirk, and you threw yourself at a villain
that even we were having trouble apprehending. You didn't help the situation;
you just gave the villain another hostage."
Izuku shrank under the scolding, his shoulders
slumping. "I... I know. I'm sorry. I just—"
"There's a reason we have licensing
laws," Kamui Woods added, shaking his wooden head. "Leave the heroics
to the professionals. You could have gotten yourself and your friend
killed."
"Hey! Back the hell off him!"
The heroes blinked in surprise, turning
around.
Katsumi marched over, shoving a paramedic out
of her way. She was covered in soot, her uniform was torn, and she smelled like
sewage, but the fierce, blazing glare in her crimson eyes made the pro heroes
unconsciously take a step back.
She stepped in front of Izuku, shielding him
from the heroes just as she always did, though this time, the dynamic felt
entirely different.
"Are you pros actually blind, or just
stupid?" Katsumi snarled, jabbing a finger at Death Arms' chest.
"None of you were here! You were all standing around somewhere else doing
crowd control! I was dying in there. I couldn't breathe. And he..." She
pointed back at Izuku, her voice vibrating with absolute pride. "...he was
the only one who did anything! He saved my life while you 'professionals' were
nowhere to be found!"
Death Arms frowned. "Now listen here,
young lady—"
"No, you listen!" Katsumi
interrupted, her palms letting off a warning crackle of sparks. "He bought
me enough time to breathe. He distracted the villain. If he hadn't jumped in, I
would be dead. So don't you dare stand there and lecture him about heroics,
because he acted more like a hero today than any of you!"
The pros stood in stunned silence. Even Izuku
stared at her in shock. Katsumi Bakugo, the girl who worshipped strength and
admired pro heroes above all else, was fiercely berating them to defend him.
"Now," Katsumi huffed, grabbing
Izuku by the wrist and pulling him off the bumper. "We're going
home."
The heroes didn't stop them. They simply
watched, somewhat chastised, as the explosive blonde dragged the Quirkless boy
away from the crime scene.
They walked in silence for a few blocks, the
adrenaline finally fading from their systems, leaving behind a heavy,
comfortable exhaustion. The night air was cool, a stark contrast to the
suffocating heat of the underpass.
"You didn't have to yell at them,
Kacchan," Izuku said softly, breaking the silence. "They were just
doing their jobs. They were right. I was reckless."
"They were wrong," Katsumi replied
instantly, not looking at him, but her grip on his wrist softened, her fingers
sliding down to loosely clasp his hand. Izuku’s breath hitched at the unexpected,
gentle contact, but he didn't pull away.
"You saved me, Izuku," Katsumi said,
her voice quiet, the gruffness entirely gone. "I was terrified. I
thought... I thought I was never going to see you again. And then you were just
there. Like a stupid, reckless knight in a yellow backpack."
Izuku squeezed her hand gently. "I
couldn't lose you, Kacchan. I promised I'd stand by your side, remember?"
Katsumi finally looked at him. The
streetlights caught the soft, vulnerable curve of her smile. The explosive,
aggressive facade was entirely stripped away, leaving only the girl who loved
him fiercely.
"You better keep that promise,
nerd," she whispered.
"I will," Izuku swore.
As they continued their walk home,
hand-in-hand under the starlit sky, they were entirely unaware of the skeletal,
blonde man watching them from the shadows of an alleyway.
Toshinori Yagi leaned against the brick wall,
coughing a small amount of blood into a handkerchief. He watched the
green-haired boy and his fierce protector disappear around the corner, a
profound sense of hope blooming in his chest for the first time in years.
He had found him.
The boy who had the heart of a hero. The girl
who possessed the unyielding strength to protect him. Together, they were a
force of nature.
Izuku Midoriya, Toshinori thought, committing
the name he had heard the girl say to memory. You have proven yourself worthy.
Now, let us see if your body can handle the weight of the world.
The Symbol of Peace pushed himself off the
wall, turning into the night, ready to change a Quirkless boy's destiny
forever.