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geminiamethyst · 2 years

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Limitless. Chapter 42: Final Fight

Chapter 1: click HERE

Chapter 41: click HERE Chapter 43: click HERE

No one could believe it. They had a few minutes to get out of the alley. Junko caught up to them within seconds. She had metamorphosis, the ability to change into anyone she chose, fiction and non fiction. She doesn't have speed like Ryoma. She shouldn't do. And yet, here she was, smiling devilishly. Everyone could feel a horrible chill run through them as Junko slowly made her way towards them, her heels loudly clanking on the pavement.

"A nice refreshing smoothie of Limitless blood is nice, don't cha think?" Junko smiled, looking like an overexcited child. "Can't use everyone's but it will do for now." So that's why she consumed everyone's blood. She can somehow acquire different powers from Limitless by drinking blood. No one knows if it's permanent or temporary, but everyone needs to try to think carefully about their next move. Kaito wanted to try to protect his family, but right now he's not sure how to do that yet. He didn't have much time to dwell on that as Gonta suddenly charged towards Junko like a freight train. Just like he had done at the Facility the first time everyone escaped. He charged at Junko, hoping to hinder her or even knock her out. Anything to give everyone time to escape. Unfortunately that plan didn't go so well. Junko smirked as she suddenly gave Gonta a harsh kick in the chest. Gonta's body was suddenly launched backwards. His body shot through the air, causing everyone to leap back or dodge to the side as his body crashed to the ground.

Tenko's strength. That was Tenko's strength Junko had just used.

"I'll show you!" Tenko suddenly shouted. Before anyone could stop her, she started to charge at Junko. Using her fighting skills, she tried to land a punch or a kick on the twisted Limitless. Junko only continued to use Ryoma's speed to dodge each attack. When Tenko started to slow down, tried from her vicious attacks. Junko immediately picked her up and threw her back at the group. Tenko rolled as she hit the pavement, earning scraps along her skin.

"Tenko! Are you okay?!" Himiko exclaimed as she and Angie rushed to her.

"Okay, that wasn't smart..." was the only thing that Tenko groaned as she tried to sit up. When Junko started moving again, Maki decided to try her hand at slowly her down. Bins went flying through the air, directed to hit Junko straight on. Junko only let out an exasperated sigh. Before she could be hit by the offending objects, webs appeared out of nowhere. The webs wrapped around the bins and pinned them to the wall. The sound of the impact almost rattled the air. If the sound of Tenko and Gonta being flown through the air and hitting the ground wasn't enough to wake anyone up, that probably would've. This fight needs to end now before too much attention was drawn to everyone.

"Come on! Don't you have a better challenge than that? I'm bored..." Junko said, her voice slow and sounded like she was depressed. While everyone was distracted, Kokichi used the shadows to try to keep himself hidden. He knows that he can only borrow one power at a time. But he thought that if he touched Junko, maybe that could hinder her in some way. It was a long shot, but anything was worth a try. He crept closer to the Limitless, ready to jump onto her. Just a little more...

"I don't think so, you little bastard!" Junko shouted like a punk as she made a hand gesture at Kokichi. The boy couldn't help but freeze as he was glared at. Webbing suddenly wrapped around him, pinning him to the wall. "You might be fucking mute, but I can hear what you bitches here are thinking." Now she was using Angie's telepathy. This is much worse than everyone thought. They really need to try to get away or slow her down at the very least. With an opening like that, they can find somewhere to regroup and think of a better plan. Knowing that everyone was thinking the same thing, Ryoma suddenly grabbed what looked like a bent golf club. He rushed forward. Before Junko could try to stop him, he swung the golf club at her legs, breaking them both.

"Got her!" Ryoma declared as he rushed bac to the group.

"That's what you think." Junko laughed as she ran a hand over her legs. There was an almost sickening sound of bones mending as she stood up. Did she heal herself? She has Rantaro's ability to heal, but he wasn't capable of healing himself. So injuring her wasn't going to work if she can heal that quick. There's got to be something that they can do to slow her down in some way.

"This is why I exist! A weapon to douse the world in despair!" Junko declared, a pair of glasses appearing on her face as she suddenly put on a professional and smart accent. That's all she was? What could've made her like that? Junko suddenly changed her voice again, sounding like a cute anime girl. "Isn't it the greatest feeling?! Once I get all your powers, I won't be able to be stopped!"

"Haven't you caused enough damage already?! Just leave us alone!" Kaito's grandfather suddenly shouted, shaking his fist towards Junko.

"Shut it, old man!" Junko shrieked, pointing a sharp, scarlet red nail at the elder. Kaito's grandmother held her husband back as Kaito instinctively stood in front of his family. "You two will be the last to go! I can't wait to see you cry as you lose your grandson for good!" Everyone felt a chill run through them. Junko heals fast, and it was almost useless to try to think of a plan in front of her. Kaito tried to think of any options. Unfortunately he only came up with one. Only one. As far as he knew, Junko didn't drink his blood. She shouldn't have his powers. There's only one chance that everyone has to put this nightmare to rest for good. Kaito bit his lip as he glanced at his grandparents quickly. He knows that this was dangerous but...

"Kirumi! Try to hold her down!" He shouted.

...there were no other options.

Kirumi didn't know what Kaito was planning, but she made a hand gesture towards Junko. Webs crawled from the ground and wrapped around Junko's ankles, keeping her rooted to the ground. Junko rolled her eyes. She looked like she was ready to tare herself right of the webs. Kaito didn't hesitate. He suddenly rushed forward as he got off the ground. He barely heard everyone shouting at him as he grabbed Junko under her armpits. His strength caused her to be free from her web prison, but he didn't stop there. He couldn't stop there.

"You idiot! You'll die too!" Junko shrieked as she realised how high they had gotten. The city below, the land below shrunk. Both Limitless went even higher still until they reached the clouds.

"Maybe! But at least you won't harm anyone ever again!" Kaito shouted as they tore through the clouds, heading to the stratosphere. He could've dropped Junko right then and there, but if he did, there was a high chance that she used Kokichi's powers to borrow his, using the power of flight to save herself. This was the only way to stop her, and to make sure she never came back.

Both Limitless reached space in such a short amount of time that Kaito couldn't think much of anything else. As Junko made a scream that Kaito couldn't hear, her form changed again. Her hair went shorter and darker until it turned black. Her face was adorned with freckles as it looked less perfect. Was this her real form? It didn't matter. Kaito used all his strength to toss the body away from him. He didn't care if she was dead, he wanted to make sure no one could find her body. Ever. The body drifted away, eventually vanishing to the darkness of space.

It's over. It's all over.

That was the last thing Kaito could think until the vacuum of space suddenly started taking a toll on him. The immunity that his powers gave him while he flies suddenly vanished. Ice started creeping on his body as he suddenly couldn't breathe. A scream was lodged in his throat, but he couldn't get it out. He felt everything was being sucked right out of him. As he felt his body still, Kaito realised that he really was going to die in space. He wanted to go to space anyway. He looked around at the stars, marvelled at how bright they were compared to how they were on earth. The void of space was cold, but the stars made Kaito feel warm. Kaito thought back to his family and friends. He would be leaving them behind. He didn't want to leave them behind like this, but at least he can leave knowing that they were safe. He felt like frozen tears started to leak out of his eyes as his life flashed before his eyes. All the good and bad memories that happened to him. All the people that he knew and came to see as family. He didn't want to leave them behind, not without saying what he wanted to say and do what he wanted with them.

What he wanted to say to...

Kaito was blacking out. Oh well. Too late to think of anything else now. It didn't matter anymore.

That's what he initially thought until he felt something like arms wrapping around him. He couldn't see what it was, or who it was, as he was pulled back towards Earth. As he felt like he could breathe again all of a sudden, he looked out of the corner of his eye. Keebo? Since when did he have a jet pack function? Did Miu put that all together in a rush? Kaito couldn't dwell on it much as he was gently brought back to the ground. Everyone was waiting o where he had left them. They all looked worried and mad at the same time. Kaito couldn't blame them for that. He didn't share his plan and almost got himself killed because of that. The second Kaito felt the ground under him, he almost collapsed. After being in space like that, it affected him quite a bit. He barely processed his grandparents holding him tightly as the other crowded around him. He couldn't hear anything that anyone was saying. He was just glad to back back on solid ground. As much as he wouldn't have minded dying in space, he wasn't ready to go to the other side yet. As everyone seemed to wait for him to say something, Kaito could only say one thing to try to put their minds to ease:

"It's over....it's...over...."

I'm sorry if I made you guys cry again! I swear that it wasn't my intention! PLEASE TAKE THESE TISSUES IF YOU NEED THEM!

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scary-grace · 3 months

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Enough to Go By -- a Shigaraki x F!reader fic

Your best friend vanished on the same night his family was murdered, and even though the world forgot about him, you never did. When a chance encounter brings you back into contact with Shimura Tenko, you'll do anything to make sure you don't lose him again. Keep his secrets? Sure. Aid the League of Villains? Of course. Sacrifice everything? You would - but as the battle between the League of Villains and hero society unfolds, it becomes clear that everything is far more than you or anyone else imagined it would be. (cross-posted to Ao3)

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7

Chapter 1

You had a best friend when you were little, just like almost everyone, and the two of you were as different as two people could be. He was a boy and you were a girl. You were the oldest of four, and he was the youngest of two. His family was rich because his dad was some kind of business genius, and your family was – not. You and your best friend had exactly two things in common. First, you lived across from each other on the same street, him in a big new house and you in one that had been falling apart since before your parents were born. And second, and maybe most important, neither of you had a quirk.

It was okay for your best friend. He still had time. People in his family got their quirks when they were two or three or four or maybe even six, like they were supposed to. But everyone in your family is born with theirs. Your family’s quirks do different things, but they’re the same type of thing – powering up or watering down or just changing some part of somebody else, and they’re active until the person’s old enough to turn them off.

You hated being home. You had one younger brother who could turn your hearing up and down, one younger sister who could turn your color vision on and off, and twin baby brothers who could make you throw up whenever they wanted to. Going to school, or going across the street to play in front of Tenko’s house with him and his big sister and his dog, was the closest things ever got to normal for you.

Tenko wanted to be a hero. You knew he’d be the best hero, because he was a hero already, even without a quirk. Nobody was every left out when you and Tenko played at school, because Tenko could make everybody feel included, and you spent so much time trying to placate your siblings that you knew how to make sure everybody had fun. But for everybody to have fun, people needed to be there. Tenko was the one everybody believed in, the one who made everybody feel important. When you spent time with Tenko, you felt like you belonged. Tenko was already a hero, even as a kid. You knew he’d be amazing at it when he grew up.

Only he didn’t grow up, your best friend. You walked home from school together one day, said goodbye and crossed to your opposite sides of the street, and when you looked out your window the next morning, Tenko’s house was gone.

A villain did it. That’s what everybody said, and you didn’t know what else it could be, because Tenko’s house was in ruins, like a giant had smashed it with its foot or someone had blown it up from the inside. You raced across the street without your shoes on, right into the middle of what was left, and even though your parents spent money they didn’t have on a specialist whose quirk let them wipe memories right out of your brain, you still have nightmares sometimes about what you saw. Tenko’s big sister Hana was dead. His dog was dead. His mom and his grandparents and his dad were dead. But he wasn’t there, so you made yourself believe he was alive.

And some part of you kept believing, even after the foundations of an apartment building were laid over the spot where Tenko’s house used to be, even after your family moved away. Your youngest younger siblings, a set of triplets born after you moved, thought Tenko was your imaginary friend because of how much you talked about him. And even once you stopped talking about him, you never quite stopped thinking about him. Your best friend, who wanted to be a hero. Who would have been the greatest hero the world had ever seen.

Everyone else forgot him, forgot him so cleanly that you almost wonder if it was a quirk. But you remember your best friend – small things, weird things, like how he’d sometimes get so excited he’d almost cry. His All Might impression, which was so bad it almost worked. His dry skin and the way he’d scratch his neck. You wonder what happened, why he wasn’t found with his family. You wonder a lot of things.

“Everybody loses touch with their neighborhood kids,” Hirono says when you say something about it, while you and your friends are getting drunk in Kazuo’s backyard one weekend. “You’re not special.”

“Don’t be mean,” Yoshimi protests. “Her friend died. That’s different!”

“She just said he didn’t die. She thinks he’s still alive,” Sho says. He whistles and rotates one finger by his ear. “Cuckoo.”

“There should be a podcast about this,” Mitsuru says seriously, and Hirono and Mitsuko laugh at him. “No, there should! Five people confirmed murdered and a kid goes missing – and it’s never solved? That’s podcast material.”

“It’s newsworthy,” Kazuo says, his voice as expressionless as it always is these days. “Have you looked it up?”

“Yes,” you say. Too many times, probably. “The articles don’t say my friend went missing.”

“They said he died?”

“They don’t mention him at all.”

“Ooh. Spooky.” Sho makes a UFO noise, and Yoji, Yoshimi’s on-again, off-again asshole boyfriend, throws in some spiritfingers to go with it. “Maybe he’s imaginary after all.”

“Or maybe you do have a quirk,” Yuichiro, Mitsuko’s latest too-innocent boyfriend says earnestly. “Your family’s all status effects, right? Maybe you made everybody else forget him.”

“Why would I do that?” you ask blankly. You’re a little drunk. “He’s my best friend.”

“I thought I was your best friend,” Kazuo says. Kazuo’s also a little drunk. “You don’t have a quirk. I would know. I know everything.”

The confidence is annoying, or it would be, if it wasn’t true – and if you didn’t know just how badly Kazuo’s quirk has ruined his life. “Maybe not,” Ryuhei says speculatively. “You only know what you know to know, you know?”

You try to parse that for a second, then give up. Mitsuru is wheezing with laughter. “Come on,” Ryuhei says, annoyed. “You know what I mean. Kazuo only knows the answers to questions he knows to ask, right? What if he hasn’t asked the right question?”

Kazuo’s quirk is called Search Engine, and it’s not an overstatement. He can ascertain anything he asks about, and if the questions aren’t hyperspecific, he can take in vast amounts of information. Too much information for even the smartest person to sort through and interpret without going crazy under the strain. He was going to be a hero, but UA High pushed him too hard, and something went wrong in his head. The smartest guy you know, who used to be funny and kind and should be changing the world for the better right now, is instead drunk in his parents’ backyard, still trying to figure out where his emotions went. You haven’t seen Kazuo care about anything in two years.

But you can see him thinking about what Ryuhei said, trying to wrap his mind around a question. “Don’t,” you say, and he looks at you, puzzled. “If I had a quirk, I’d have had it when I was born, just like the rest of my family.”

“Your family has some funky quirks,” Yoji says. You have a feeling you know where he’s going with this, and you’re not wrong. “Isn’t one of your cousins a villainess?”

“She barely counts,” Hirono says. “What could they even charge her with if they caught her? Possession of a video camera and bad taste in men? They could charge Yoshimi with that, too.”

“Hey!”

Sho and Ryuhei join in on the ribbing, and you lean back against the steps. Kazuo rises from his chair a little unsteadily and comes to sit by you. “You never mentioned this friend of yours before.”

“It never came up.” You glance sidelong at him. “Why? Are you jealous?”

“No,” Kazuo says. He hiccups. His alcohol tolerance has always been weirdly low. “I’m surprised you never asked me to find him. Maybe I could.”

“I know.” If Kazuo ever recovers from what UA High did to him, the government will be all over him. He could find anything, anyone – but like Ryuhei said, he has to know what questions to ask. “I think I’m scared of what you’d find. I don’t want him to be dead.”

“Dead might be better.”

You almost choke on the sip of vodka you just took. “Excuse me?”

“If he died, he died,” Kazuo says. No shit. “If he’s still alive, he’s been missing for fifteen years. During my work-study, I assisted in the search for several missing children. Nothing good had happened to the ones we found alive.”

You hadn’t thought about that, what it would actually mean if Tenko is still alive, and your brain supplies you instantly with a list of terrible things that could have happened to your best friend. Your imagination is pretty vivid. Your stomach turns. “I don’t want that,” you say. “I just want him to be okay.”

“Sometimes dead is better,” Kazuo says again. And then he’s quiet.

You try to get back into the mood of the party, but what Kazuo said sticks, and you’re kind of mad at him about it. The old Kazuo wouldn’t have said something like that, or else he would have put it more gently. You miss the old Kazuo. Thanks to a villain fifteen years ago and UA fucking High, you’re now short two best friends.

Kazuo’s a good guy, but you’d be lying if you said you weren’t drawn to him because of who he reminded you of. You have a soft spot for dark-haired boys who want to be heroes. If Tenko hadn’t gone missing and the two of you had gotten to grow up together, you probably would have wound up with a big, stupid crush on him, the supercharged version of how you felt about Kazuo. But a relationship between the two of you wouldn’t have worked out, for the same reason your relationship with Kazuo didn’t work. Being a hero comes first. Being a hero always comes first with guys like them. You probably wouldn’t like them as much if it didn’t.

Getting drunk at Kazuo’s is a typical Friday night pastime among your friends, and usually everybody sleeps over. Everybody usually includes you, but you have to work tomorrow, which means you have to go home. Sometimes you and Kazuo still fool around when you’re both drunk, and you want to avoid that, too. You drink a glass of water and start sobering up while the others are still sorting out places to sleep, and then you tell them all good by and head out, taking three trains in a loop around the city to give yourself even more time to sober up before you have to walk home. You don’t live in the nicest neighborhood. You need to be alert.

When you finally get off the train at your stop, you realize you’ve got another problem. You’re hungry, and you won’t have time to cook when you get home if you want to sleep at all tonight. The all-night convenience store a few blocks up from your apartment is beckoning to you, and you give in without a fight. You’ll pick something to eat, eat it in the store for one last period of sobering-up, and walk the rest of the way home.

You feel a little better with a few bites of food in your stomach, and you’re pretty sure you’re not going to throw it up later. You hang out in the corner of the shop, a good spot to people-watch from if there were any people in here but you and the owner. The TV behind the counter is blaring the news about some villain attack, somewhere – two dumb-ass middle schoolers, one sludge villain, one can of whoop-ass opened by All Might. What else is new.

“Turn that shit off.”

The voice is raspy, and it’s coming from the far corner of the store. So there’s somebody else in here after all. You rise to your tiptoes and peer over the shelves to spot the speaker. They’re wearing a black hoodie with the hood up and browsing for energy drinks, and apparently they have a real problem with what’s on TV – which means the proprietor has a real problem with them. “Got a problem with heroics? Or does seeing real heroes just remind you what a bum you are?”

“Fuck off,” the guy in the hoodie says sharply. “You’ve got more in common with me than you do with them. If you were there, you think you’d run in to help? No. You’d wait for a hero, because you’re useless and pathetic. At least I don’t walk around pretending to be something I’m not.”

Hoodie guy sort of has a point, even if you don’t like how he’s phrasing it. Hoodie guy also sucks at reading the room, because after that little back-and-forth, he yanks an energy drink out of the case and a package of sour candies off a shelf and heads up to the counter. The proprietor laughs in his face. “Get out of here. If you think I’m selling even a stick of gum to you, you’re out of your mind.”

Hoodie guy’s shoulders tense. “You’re so desperate to defend All Might that you won’t take my money? He’s not gonna fuck you.”

You must be a little more drunk than you thought, because you have to clamp your hands over your mouth to stifle a laugh. But there’s nothing funny about the situation that’s unfolding in front of you. The proprietor’s looking increasingly pissed, and Hoodie Guy’s hands are out of his pockets, open and twitching at his sides. You don’t know what either of their quirks are, but you’ve got seven siblings. You know what it looks like when a situation’s about to spiral out of control.

“I said get out,” the proprietor spits. He shoves the drink and the package of candy back across the counter, hard enough that they fall off and roll across the floor. Hoodie Guy’s hands begin to lift from his sides, and you step out of your corner. “You want to start something? Go ahead. The cops will be here so fast –”

“Not fast enough for you,” Hoodie Guy hisses. His hands are all the way up, reaching over the counter.

You scoop the snacks off the floor and duck into the scant space between Hoodie Guy and the counter. You elbow him a bit by accident and he stumbles, swears at you. You ignore him and focus on the proprietor. “Hi. I’m still hungry. Can I get these?”

The proprietor squints at you, nonplussed. Behind you, Hoodie Guy’s gotten his feet under him, and if it’s possible, he’s extra pissed. “Get out of my way.”

“You don’t want this kind of trouble,” you say, ignoring Hoodie Guy. He’s the instigator. You need him to shut up so you can handle this before it escalates. “I know you don’t. You want him out of here and he wants his snacks. If you don’t want his money, mine’s just as good.”

You’re conscious of Hoodie Guy looming over your shoulder. He’s not all that much taller than you, but he’s standing a little too close. You take your wallet out, and that seems to settle the issue. “You’re lucky your girlfriend’s here to help you out. That’ll be ¥1800.”

You pay up and collect the snacks. When you turn away from the counter, Hoodie Guy’s right there, and you get your first good look at his face – or at the life-sized model hand clamped over his face. That’s – weird. You can’t see his expression, but his tone of voice is unmistakable. “If you think –”

“I know, I know,” you interrupt. “You’re not gonna fuck me.”

It’s not a joke you’d make sober, but with the proprietor calmed slightly down, you have to knock Hoodie Guy off his game somehow. It works. He makes a weird, strangled sound, and you grab him by his sleeve and tow him out the door.

He lets you do it, which is a surprise, and you let him go as soon as the doors close behind you. You hold out the snack and the energy drink. “Here.”

You can’t see his face, but you can see one red eye, peering out at you through the fingers of the hand. “It was pretty stupid of you to get in my way.”

“It was pretty stupid of you to go up to the counter. If you’d stormed off he wouldn’t have chased you.” You’ve seen Sho use that tactic before – needle a store owner until they want him gone more than they want to check his pockets. “Just take this, okay?”

He raises one hand and scratches at his neck. There’s something familiar about the motion, and the scarred, scraped-raw patch of skin there. Maybe you’ve seen something similar at work. “Either you used some kind of quirk or you got lucky. Which is it?”

“Neither. I have seven siblings and I’m good at toning things down.” You’ve wished for a quirk that lets you affect others’ moods more than a few times. You had to learn your de-escalation techniques the hard way. “Do you want these or not?”

He’s still scratching, and something’s pulling at the back of your mind, harder and harder. “Seven siblings,” he says slowly. “That’s three more.”

“Three more than what?” you say, puzzled. And then it clicks.

You have seven siblings now. When you lived across the street from your best friend, you only had four. And now you get why the scratching looks so familiar, why there’s so much scar tissue in the place he’s clawing at – because he’s been scratching that same spot for a decade and a half. It doesn’t matter than his hair is grey-blue instead of black, that his eyes are red instead of grey. It doesn’t even matter that he’s got a creepy hand stuck over his face. You know who you’re looking at, and the surge of joy that overtakes you is like nothing you’ve ever felt before.

You’d keep it to yourself, ordinarily. But tonight you’re a little drunk, and you can’t hold it in. “Tenko,” you say, and he freezes like he’s been struck by lightning. “You’re alive!”

Tenko stays frozen until you reach for him, at which point he bolts, and you really shouldn’t follow him – but you’re drunk and it’s your best friend and he’s alive just like you knew he was, so you chase after him. He was a little clumsy when you were kids. You were always a little faster on your feet, but his legs are longer than yours now, and he keeps you at a fair distance until he trips.

It’s sort of your fault he trips. He’s looking back over his shoulder, checking where you are, and he’s not watching his feet. It’s a bad fall. He sprawls out, the hand over his face dislodging and bouncing across the concrete, and you hear him cursing under his breath in a voice that carries a familiar strain. You’ve heard that before. You do what you did back then. You run to his side and drop to your knees, hands outstretched to help. “Tenko –”

“Get away from me! Don’t touch me!” Tenko lashes out with one hand, and instinct tells you to get out of range. The hand he lashes out with looks wrong – hurt, maybe, in the fall. His other hand is up over his face, covering it the same way the model hand was. “Father – I need – where –”

Father. You wonder if Tenko knows what happened to his father – but he’s feeling around on the concrete with the maybe-broken hand, and you realize what he’s looking for. “It’s over here,” you say. “Stay there. I can –”

“No.” Tenko lunges past you, seizes the hand, secures it over his face. Then he turns on you, and the hatred in his eyes sends a bolt of pure terror down your spine.

He knocks you onto your back. You know some self-defense – like any girl, like any person without a quirk – and you kick and thrash, arching your back, trying to throw him off. Some part of your mind is still spinning, because it’s Tenko, your best friend, who wants to be a hero – and it’s Tenko, his forearm coming down across your throat and half his body weight leaning onto it. You cough and sputter, and Tenko raises his other hand, all five fingers outstretched. “Tell me what I want to know and I’ll kill you fast. Lie and it’ll be slow. Who are you?”

You don’t know how he expects you to answer with his arm over your throat. Dark spots are beginning to fill your vision. You shove at his arm, and his hand closes around your wrist. His grip is hot and dry and shaking, and a split second after he’s touched you, the burning starts. It’s like his hand is dipped in acid, like it’s clawing through your skin one layer at a time, and you scream in pain. Or you try to. He increases the pressure on your throat and chokes the sound off. “Don’t touch me,” he snarls. “And don’t scream. Who are you?”

You manage to rasp out your name, and you see Tenko’s expression shift. “We went to school together,” you gasp. “I lived across the street from you. We played together. You were –”

You black out for a second, and the pressure on your throat lifts slightly. “What?” Tenko spits. “I was what?”

“My best friend,” you whisper. Your eyes well up, tears running down your face when you blink. “I missed you so much –”

Tenko stares down at you for a moment longer. Then he recoils away from you, up onto his feet and back five or six steps. He’s cradling his wrist. You roll from your back to your side and gasp for air. There’s a rattle in your breathing that tells you your windpipe’s damaged, and when you blink the tears and spots from your vision to stare at your wrist, you see that your skin is raw, bloody and oozing. There’s the outline of all five of Tenko’s fingers, his thumb and middle finger joined, rotted into your skin.

“Go,” Tenko says. You look numbly up at him and see his face twisted behind the hand. “Now.”

Your wrist – his hair – his eyes – Tenko has a quirk now. An awful quirk. “What happened to you?” you ask helplessly. “Where did you go? Are you –”

“Go!” Tenko snaps at you. “Before I change my mind. Run!”

You scramble backwards and collide with something. The energy drink and the package of candy, which you dropped when you ran to help Tenko after he fell. The sight of them makes you want to burst into tears again. You don’t want to take them with you. You bought them for him. Without looking his way, you pick them up and set them on the ground between the two of you, pushing them towards him so he knows who they’re for. Then you force yourself to your hands and your knees and your feet and run for your life, away from the best friend you now know you’ve lost for good.

You didn’t want Tenko to be dead, and he isn’t. But Kazuo was right, too. Maybe dead would have been better. Anything would have been better than this.

#shigaraki tomura x reader #tomura shigaraki x reader #shigaraki x reader #reader insert #x reader #shigaraki tomura #please hold #a bisquared production

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hitoshiyoshi · 2 years

Text

please save me | shimura tenko

synopsis ↬ you save shimura tenko

warnings ↬ mentions of child abuse/neglect, all for one does not exist in this universe, reader makes references to "maternal/motherly" behavior although it’s gender neutral, mention of death

pairings ↬ young!tenko x parental figure!gn!reader (platonic!parent-son/teacher-student)

word count ↬ 4.9k i'm so sorry

a/n; this came to me after watching his origin story and seeing all those people ignore a helpless child...

A cold gust of wind caused a shiver to run through your spine as you briskly walked towards your destination. Taking care of the students at your elementary school drained your energy for the day; you barely had enough strength to walk. You thought about going home — everything you needed for your quirk was located there — but a loud grumble from your stomach ushered you to find food. As your shoes clicked against the sidewalk pavement, you watched as some students ran toward their parents, grandparents, or guardians.

A warm smile spread across your lips while you watched, reminding you why you loved your job. Overwhelming maternal instincts urged you to care for children, but the work of finding a suitable partner never seemed to end well. You had many offers and confessions, most of which you turned down. The ones you called your 'lover' showed their true sides eventually, and those relationships soon ended. You had a longing desire for a companion, someone that would stay by your side since it was rather lonely. Your work as a teacher seemed to fill that void for a while until you noticed your yearning started to grow.

While walking down the path to the nearest coffee shop, you notice a small figure. The person was a long distance away, and it would take a couple minutes for you to reach them. They seemed so small compared to the adults walking near them. Hunching their back as they stared at the ground, something wasn't right. You wondered if it had been one of your students and quickened your pace toward the mysterious person upon realizing it was a child. Pedestrians stared down at the boy, observing in horror before choosing to ignore him.

An older woman approached the child, whispering something to him before turning around and scurrying away. It was a confusing and strange sight. You couldn't fathom why civilians were ignoring him. Some completely turned around and moved in the opposite direction as the boy watched, stunned and unable to move. Others glanced at him, only to distance themselves and quickly move away as if he carried the plague. A few closed their eyes and pretended that the boy didn't exist.

As a few people walk and clear the street, you see an empty circle surrounding the child. Soon, you two are the only ones on the sidewalk. You can overhear a few loud chatters amongst a group of girls watching the boy and keeping their distance. It doesn't bother you one bit. You've grown accustomed to the whispers of others. The boy looks down the street with his back turned to you as he watches others turn away from him while intensely scratching his neck. Before you know it, you're standing directly behind him, but he doesn't seem to notice — as if he's lost in a trance.

By now, you're the only adult left on the street. You could sense something was wrong as you examined the boy's demeanor. He looked like he could be a student from your school, around five years old. His hair was a faded grayish-blue color. His clothing seemed tattered and dirty as if he had been wandering for a long time before you found him. The pitiful scene reminded you of your childhood traumas; memories of your parents and the orphanages returned after being suppressed for years. The excruciating feeling of abandonment caused you to feel a sense of pain as you watched the boy.

"Excuse me? Little boy..?" You call him in a soft tone. It was the same voice you used to console your students. Welcoming and warm, you tried not to scare the boy.

His head slowly turns around to the voice behind him. Although his expression was blank, you noticed his face contorted oddly at your tone. You reminded him of his mother, who turned to stone before disintegrating into dust before his eyes. He's unsure whether he should smile and seem friendly since it only made the older woman run away.

Still scratching at his neck, you can see dry pink wounds. No blood pours from his skin, although his flesh is nearly visible. The soles of his feet were calloused and covered in soot. He'd been walking alone for what seemed to be days or possibly weeks. His hands were bloody, but you presumed it wasn't his own blood. As he stared up at you, his scratching seemed to slow down.

"Are you okay? What's wrong? Are you hurt?" You inquired to the boy as he stared speechlessly. His expression was still blank. Blinking a few times, he was still too stunned to speak. In your experience, personally and as a teacher, you would've guessed the boy went through something traumatic.

"I... I..." The boy tried to speak, but he didn't know what to say. You watched as his mouth moved to form words. He wanted to say something, anything. The boy was too scared that another person would abandon him again.

His voice was low. You could barely hear his words with the noise of cars passing by. It was dry and hoarse like he hadn't used it in a long time. Maybe he's thirsty, you thought before digging through your purse and taking out a half-empty water bottle. He certainly looked like he needed more than only water. After screwing off the cap, you give it to the boy, whose eyes widen brightly at the gesture. The first sign of help he receives in a long time.

"I'm sorry, it's a bit warm and I drank some on the way here." Shyly smiling down at him, you watched as he carefully held the bottle with only four bloody fingers. The boy grasps the bottle and glances between you and the water in his hands. His expression seems a cross between perplexed and grateful. "Aren't you thirsty? It's okay, you can drink it."

He eagerly sips the water, drinking it until all the contents are gone — down to the last drop. The boy stares at you and the empty bottle as if he expects more of your gifts. Unfortunately, you didn't have anything else for him.

"My name is (Y/N), can you tell me your name?" You say while kneeling down at the boy until you're at eye level with him.

"S- Shim- Shimura... Ten- Tenko." Tenko's voice trembles as he speaks. Another chilly breeze causes the boy to quiver as you watch him. It's getting colder, and the sun is setting faster. You need to hurry.

"Tenko! What a wonderful name..!" Smiling affectionately at the boy, you try to get him to trust you before helping him — which proved easier than you thought. "Tenko, do you know where your parents are? Mama? Papa?"

He knows. The place where he killed them. A pile of stone and ash under the rubble of their home. Tenko's eyes start to water, and soon, tears pour from his dry eyes as his face distorts in a pained expression. He's tired of crying. Memories from that night started to flood his mind. He didn't mean to do it...

"I... ki- killed... them..." He stays silent. Only the sound of his crying comes out of his chest. Tenko expects you to run away, abandon him like everyone else has been doing. As you remain speechless, he feels a burst of guilt through his body. He waits for you to leave him. Your stillness doesn't even give him anxiety.

At first, you thought he was lying, but Tenko wished it was all just a bad dream. Maybe they abandoned him, or he was lost. A small child that seemed too weak to protect himself, could kill his own parents? He stares down at his bloody hands. You were right. It's not his blood. In a world full of people with powerful quirks, children would inevitably hurt themselves or their loved ones. As time passes, his cries become louder and hysterical. His mouth opens as if he wants to scream, but only weak noises and unintelligible words come out of his mouth.

"Tenko..." You whisper to the child to try and soothe him before reaching out to hold his hand. The dried blood sticks to your skin for a brief moment, but you don't mind — after all, it's not the first time. His hysterical crying stops shortly as the flashbacks of his parents' death stop. Tenko's hands recoil from yours, dropping the empty bottle to the concrete as he stares at you in horror.

The tips of your fingers begin to crumble, turning into a lifeless gray color before becoming dust and sprinkling the ground. Suddenly, all his itching comes back. Worsening to nearly every inch of skin on his body. He did it again. All he can do is destroy. The only person that offered to help him would turn to dust, just like his family. He was useless, only harming people close to him. Unworthy and undeserving of love. You weren’t fazed compared to the boy whose traumas were reawakened.

Tenko collapses backward before landing on his bum, scratching his neck as he watches intently. He thinks you'll start screaming, running away, or lifting your hand to strike him, but you don't. You aren't moving, only watching and completely unbothered. Perhaps you are already dead and lifeless. Everything he touches dies. Why did it hurt to see you crumble?

Then, as if it's magic, the decaying stops. Skin and bones that were once gray and hard returned to their original color. The flesh in your hand grows back to normal like nothing happened.

"Is this your quirk, Tenko?" His scratching stops. He stares dumbfoundedly at your hand in disbelief. Although he is still a bit shaken, he answers.

"Y- Yes..." Tenko isn't quite sure what a quirk is, but, after being alone for a few days, he learns about his destructiveness.

You give Tenko a warm smile and offer the boy a helping hand. He's too scared to hold it, afraid he'll kill the only person that has treated him nicely. Upon noticing his demeanor, you decide to reassure him.

"I should've asked about it before scaring you, honey. I'm sorry, don't worry. My quirk is immunity. After I come in contact with a quirk, I am immune to it." Your quirk wasn't the most intriguing, but it came in handy when dealing with children whose quirks were still hard to control. Tenko seemed confused as you spoke, so you changed your wording until he understood. "If you touch me again, I'll be fine." You explained while beaming down at the boy.

Your immunity quirk always seemed difficult to explain to people. It was complex. It only worked with quirk-types that were close-range and didn't cause much damage. To use it, you need the life source from a living being such as plants, animals, and humans. Taking a being's energy usually resulted in their death. You learned this the hard way. It would become lifeless; the last time you used it on a human, they looked almost mummified — dried up like a raisin in the sun. Eventually, they would turn to dust as all the life drained from their bodies. Perhaps you weren't scared of Tenko's quirk because yours was more or less the same.

After taking energy, you could use it for your immunity and even healing. You can regrow limbs and other wounds, just like now with Tenko. When your energy was full, you could even use it on others to heal them, something you did with your students almost every day. However, you could never use it on humans or animals, not anymore. In the past, you would only use it to defend yourself but the overwhelming feeling of guilt eroded your morality as you watched your victims turn to dust.

The boy's trembling hands hold yours, half expecting you to turn into stone like his family and half elated that you were still intact.

"See? I'm okay... You won't hurt me. Don't be scared..." You hold his other hand and lift him up, he stumbles a bit before finding his balance.

Tenko's legs weakly support him from falling, he seems extremely malnourished and weak. His diet consisted of random trash and unfinished food from the garbage of local restaurants. Some days, he would sleep in alleys hungry as his stomach would painfully rumble. His limbs are so frail; without his quirk, he would be utterly defenseless. Another cold gust of wind causes him to shiver, and you realize that the sun had been setting fast. It was almost dark out, there was no way that you would leave him alone.

It would have been wiser to send him to a police station or a hero on patrol. But, if he had been walking alone for days, could you trust them to care for him? You saw them, the passersby who ignored the little boy. He must've encountered a police officer or a hero at some point, but of course, there were more things important than a missing child. What would the police do? Send him to an orphanage when he clearly seemed traumatized and had a strong quirk that could easily harm others. You experienced this first-hand.

You weren't sure why he seemed so traumatized. He didn't look like a murderer — but his bloody fingers say otherwise. He needed help and guidance. You've seen children like him before. Broken and lost souls who have endured unbearable pain and lash out at others because they're scared. Nobody is there to defend them. Nobody wants to protect them.

"W- Will you punish m- me..?" His question breaks you from your long thought. Tenko's still holding your hands and staring up at you with big doe eyes, pleading for you not to abandon him.

"And why would I do that?"

"B- Because I did a bad thing and I hur- hurt my family..." Sniffling, his head hangs low in shame and guilt. Some of his tears hit the dry concrete pavement. Your hands released his. For a second, he thinks he has scared you away. Until he notices your hand reaching for his head. As you watch him flinch, you think he's been beaten before. It was until he felt the pads of your fingers caress the pale blue locks that he finally relaxed.

"I won't punish you, Tenko," He eases into your touch as you move the hair out of his face in a motherly manner. "You must've been through a lot..." His sniffling stops as you finish your sentence. You examine his scars and terribly cracked skin. You're too weak to heal him in your current state. "Do you want to come home with me? We can have dinner and stay warm. It's getting colder now..."

Tenko shyly nodded up at you. He was extremely eager to finally receive help. A home? It's been a long time since he's seen a warm bed and eaten home-cooked meals. His stomach roared a bit, a sign that he was getting hungry. You chuckled softly before responding.

"Alright, let's go... My car should be close by here." You held his tiny hand in your palm as you escorted him to your car. He stuck close to your body like glue.

After walking for some time, you would occasionally glance down at the child who aimlessly followed you. Noticing his bare feet on the pavement of the ground, you were a bit worried that he might scratch his feet while walking on the gravel. You offered to hold him in your arms until you reached the car; you swore, for a brief moment, his eyes lit up excitedly. When you hoisted the boy into your arms bridal style, he snuggled closer to your body, desperately wanting to feel the embrace of another being.

When you reached the car, you quickly unlocked the passenger door and strapped him inside a child car seat — you figured that you needed to buy it after becoming a teacher for emergencies such as this. The drive home was quiet; you tried talking to the boy and becoming familiar with him, but it seemed he trusted you already. A few minutes passed before you noticed him sleeping. His soft snores echoed through the car quietly.

After parking near your apartment complex, you exited the car and tried waking him. After a few attempts, he finally woke up to see your figure looming over his before smiling down at him. Tenko still seemed a bit tired. It had been a long time since he finally had a comfortable place to stay. You decided to carry the child into your building, craddling him in your arms. A few of the other tenants gave you some strange glances as they saw you with the helpless child, but none of them dared to question you. It's not like you minded their behavior too much. The life in your arms was your only priority.

As you led him inside your apartment, you placed him on his feet; you didn't care about the dirt he tracked on your floors. You watched as he marveled at the various house plants that decorated your home, so green and luscious. Snake plants, pothoses, and peace lilies were only some of the greenery that filled your apartment. For as long as you remember, you've had a fondness for plants after deciding to only use your quirk for good. Placing your fingertips on some of your plants, you absorbed all of their life energy since you would need it for your quirk later. Tenko failed to see some of the plants you touched wilt as he was mesmerized by the rich and lively nature in your home.

"Tenko, let's go wash up first, okay? Then we can eat and relax." You say after gaining enough energy to heal some of his wounds and scars.

You grasp his hand and take him to your bathroom. After putting a stool under the sink, you help hoist his body to the counter. Tenko stares at himself in the mirror, not recognizing himself anymore. Cracked skin and deep scars cover his face. His pale blue hair nearly frightens him. At this moment, he realizes he's become a ghost of who he used to be.

"Everything okay, honey?" You ask while holding his shoulder and rubbing smooth circles into his back.

"My skin..." His shaky voice barely allows him to say an audible sentence. He hasn't scratched his sore body in a while, but seeing it in a mirror makes his skin itch again.

"I'll take care of it, don't worry... how about we wash our hands first?" He brings his hands to the sink while you turn on the faucet and pump drops of soap into his palms.

Your hands intertwine as you help him wash the blood until his skin is clean. The red liquid flows down the drain, and memories of his parents' death slowly vanish as well. Somehow, the feeling of sticky blood touching your skin doesn't faze you. Your hands have been soiled by the blood of your victims; it doesn't matter how often you wash them, it still lingers.

When you're done, you turn him around to face you. Your fingertips only graze his skin lightly, but soon, the dry spots on his face begin to heal. Although some of his scarrings are still visible, they begin to fade and blend in with his skin. Some of his skin retains the same texture, and his eyelids and eyebags are still cracked, although most of his face is healed. A few specks of black hair peak through his sky blue hair. Once satisfied, you turn the boy around to face the mirror.

"Do you feel any better?" Tenko's eyes widened in shock. His skin, now soft and supple, was healed. Some dryness remained in some areas and a few scars were still visible, but he didn't complain. You didn't notice the black pigment in his hair too much, he did. Giving you a joyous toothy smile, he was the complete opposite of his quiet demeanor.

"It doesn't itch anymore, y- you fixed it... Thank you..." Turning around, he gave you a big hug and nearly engulfed your body with his slender arms.

"You're welcome, Tenko." You chuckled before hugging him back warmly. When you tried to pull away, he only held you tighter.

"Come on, I'll wash you up and heal the rest of your wounds." Tenko nods as you disappear briefly to a nearby closet. You retrieve an old pajama set you intended to gift one of your students, but you figured Tenko needed it more.

He smiled brightly upon seeing you hold his pajamas, wanting to change out of his old clothes. Tenko enjoyed the warm water against his skin during his bath. His muscles eased into your hold. You needed to change the water a few times as you cleaned him since it quickly turned a murky, brown color.

He tried holding some of the toys you placed in the bath for him, but, when he wasn't careful, the toy would turn to stone before falling into the water. Every time it happened, he would become saddened; his puppy eyes always made you tear up. You would quickly distract him by giving him a few tickles on his sides until the bathroom walls filled with his laughter. After his bath, you healed his scars and itchy skin with your quirk and some moisturizer created by your friend, Mitsuki, with her Glycerin quirk.

Dinner was quite stressful when deciding what to feed the boy. You wanted to make him a big hearty meal since he desperately needed nutrition. But as you watch the hungry boy follow you closely, you decide to make a simple chicken soup. Adding carrots, onions, pasta, potatoes, and chicken to your flavorful stock, the aroma filled your apartment. After you filled his bowl with dinner, he eagerly ate and drank all of its contents; you gladly gave him more servings and observed as he indulged before eating.

After eating, you excuse yourself to clean up and let the boy explore your apartment more. However, Tenko seemed adamant about staying close to you, clinging to your legs and hips as he watched you wash the plates and stack them to dry.

"Do you... need help?" He offered while watching you meticulously clean up the mess from dinner. Of course, you declined.

"No, I'm fine, Tenko. Besides, you need to rest soon." You didn't want to tire him out, although his meal gave him more energy. You also couldn't risk him disintegrating some of your expensive porcelain plates.

As you fiddled with the plates on your counter, you felt him release his hold on your leg and move elsewhere in your kitchen. He stopped at a bouquet of red roses and eyed up the flowers. They were a gift from someone who tried to court you recently. The relationship eventually fizzled out. You completely forgot about the flowers that were surprisingly still in good shape. A brief vision of Tenko playing in a backyard crosses your mind; he's carefree, running around and smiling without worrying about his quirk.

Tenko tries to carefully pull a rose from your bouquet. He releases a wince as thorns prick his dainty fingers. Trying to feel the petals of the rose, all five of his fingers accidentally touched the rose at once. Soon, the flower begins to wilt and decay, turning into gray dust in his palms until a few petals and parts of its stem remain. His whimpers break you from your daydreams as you rush over to him and leave the rest of the plates to dry.

"Tenko... What happened?" You whisper to him after seeing the dead flower in his hands. Kneeling down and wrapping your arm around his waist, he finally responds.

"I'm sorry... I just wanted to look... I didn't mean to break it..." While he speaks, more tears swell up in his glossy eyes.

"Tenko..." You whisper while holding another rose from the bouquet. "I realized something. You and I are the same." As you touch the flower, it begins to wilt as well. You take all of its meager life energy while Tenko watches you repeat the same action he does.

"T- The same?"

"Yes, our quirks..." His gaze shifts from the dead plant in your hand to your face. "I grow flowers because I don't want to use my quirk to hurt people anymore. I know you feel guilty, but it's not your fault... I'm not mad."

Your words only cause a fraction of his pains to disappear. You notice that he still feels horrible about ruining your roses. Standing up, you reach for an old box in the corner of your kitchen. He watches you open the lid and pull out a pair of gloves and a wooden beaded necklace. You kneel down to his height before handing him the items.

"When I was your age, I used to have problems with my quirk too. These helped me." The gloves block contact with living things you didn't want to take energy from. While the necklace canceled out your quirk from appearing whenever you did not want to use it.

Tenko slips the gloves around his hands while you put the necklace around his neck. They both fit perfectly. You wonder if this encounter was fate or luck.

"They can stop you from using your quirk until you learn to control it." He tries to touch a random cup in the room and is amazed to see that the object is still intact. You decide to take the gloves from him and keep him wearing the necklace. "Look at the time... I think it's time for you to head to sleep now."

Placing the gloves on the counter, you take him to your bedroom. His eyes examined the whole apartment as you walked with him. Full of curiosity, he glanced over every detail. Once you stopped in front of your door, Tenko stopped.

"This is my room. You can come in here whenever you'd like." You say before pointing to a room adjacent to yours. You unlocked the door and tried showing him inside. "This is your room. My friends usually sleep here, but you can have it if you'd like." The boy started shaking his head and clinging to your hips again before speaking.

"N- No... Can I sleep in your bed... with you..?" He sheepishly asked while peering up at you; Tenko's eyes pleaded; he wouldn't take no for an answer.

You give in and carry him to your bedroom. Perhaps he should stay with you, just in case something happens while you're away. As you sit on the end of your bed, he climbs into your lap and refuses to move. Tenko's mouth moves as he tries to find the words to complete a sentence. You brush some of his hair away from his face while staring into his crimson eyes.

"What's wrong? Do you need something, sweetie..?"

"Why d- did you rescue me?" For a moment, his eyes become glossy again. Regardless of the happiness he's shown you today, his emotional state was as fragile as glass.

"You know... there was a time when I was scared and alone." His ears perked up as he listened. Your childhood pains flooded into your mind again. "I used my quirk for bad things. I even hurt people I cared about. I was confused and didn't have anyone to guide me..."

His head rests on your chest, just above your beating heart — a reminder that you were a living human who didn't succumb to his quirk. After pausing for a second, you continue once seeing the boy become intrigued by your story.

"You were alone for a long time, right? You thought nobody would save you and wondered why the world forgot about you? I know that feeling too..." His eyes brimmed with tears before they cascaded down his cheeks and dampened his shirt. "I'm sorry the heroes were too busy, and others ignored you..."

A few drops of his tears spilled onto your shirt, but you didn't mind too much. Deciding to let him release his emotions instead of keeping them inside, you allowed him to cry out all of his pain. While kneading his shoulder, you thought about what would happen next. Thankfully tomorrow was the weekend, but you had to call in soon and take some vacation days.

Tenko needed clothes and other things for him to use, but you two could share for the time being. Although you were a bit wary, you would have to take him to a nearby police station soon. He seemed really attached to you; sending him to an orphanage would be extremely dangerous. You were the only one who could handle his quirk.

"I can take care of you if you'd like." For a long time, you've always had a soft spot for children who endured a similar upbringing. There were always a few in the classes you taught. You couldn't help but give them extra attention. "Will you let me raise you? I can help you control your quirk and learn to master it..."

Tenko eagerly nods as he wraps his arms around your neck. You hear him mumble a few words as you gently caress his back. The boy melts into your touch; again, he doesn't want to release you from his hold.

As a few seconds pass, you feel him tug at your shirt and whisper your name.

"...thank you for saving me."

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codenamesazanka · 5 days

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Will wait for the official translation but this is crap. In fact, it feels like another continuation of Deku's absolute refusal to engage and respond to Shigaraki.

Shigaraki's admitting here that Deku was right that he's just a crying brat, and Deku just doesn't respond to that??? After all those declarations about saving the Crying Child? No 'I'm sorry you were in pain and no one saved you back then', or. idk. bringing up what Tenko had told him during the Crying Child Saving Moment and addressing those things. 'You exist. That's enough.' or even 'You felt rejected and rejected back.' 'You asked what was the point of having these hands. You helped defeat AFO.'

Instead Deku only goes on to say basically 'you're unforgivable. you create misery and you know it so i'm stopping it here.'

If I squint, in a way, Deku is responding to the crying child thing? 'I was a crying brat' 'which is why I wanted to stop your sadness'.

But any comfort in that is ruined by the following 'because your sadness makes other people sad.'

Honestly the 'i wanted you to stop and you wanted to be stopped, so the sadness won't continue' sounds like the stuff Tenko's grandparents tried to do to dry his tears.

'I want you to stop crying, you also want to stop crying, so it's you creating this awkward sadness that's involves us troubling us.'

So we're back to making sure the victim suffers in silence and not bother other people? Yay.

#idk man #ungenerous reading I know #nalslastworkingbraincell

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barid-bel-medar · 9 months

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Tenko and Toga are heroes in A World Turned Upside Down? Who else is a hero (that was villain in canon)?

And am I correct in that Fuyumi is Endurance?

Tenko and Toga are indeed heroes here!

Toga got adopted by Vlad King when she was a kid after he followed up rumors on parents abusing their daughter due to her blood-based Quirks and discovered what was going on. He broke the nose of Mr. Toga. I decided to give her the hero name of 'Persephone' since I wanted to use something unusual (commonly Carmilla is used for a hero name for her when she gets given one), and it relates to how her favorite food is pomegranates.

Tenko here got raised by his mother Nao and his grandparents following his father's mysterious disappearance when he was five. Nao was a lot more willing to support her son's desire to be a hero, having reason to suspect it was her husband's loathing of heroes that lead to his disappearance.

She's more right then she realizes.

Also yes, Endurance is indeed Fuyumi! She is the 'successor' child here, with Touya having 'died' (yep, he still went Dabi of a sorts), and Shouto running away and eventually becoming Nogitsune.

#a world turned upside down

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fractiflos · 6 months

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awww poor Yoichi :(

Hmm, do you have any immortal headcanons?

I felt so sorry for him the whole time I was writing that AU. But yes, I do have some immortal OFA users headcanons.

Note: This time, an immortality quirk got mixed in with stockpile, so the users all had to fake their deaths. The headcanons go from there.

Yoichi had fun writing the books he always wanted to write, but under a pseudonym of course. His brother hates his books of course and vows to hunt down the author. (Yoichi does change pseudonyms and stuff every few years)

Also, once every few years, Yoichi will get HOOKED on some trend. It lasts about twice as long as it takes for the trend to die down.

Second married Yoichi and while he wanted to just steal what they needed; Yoichi convinced him to get money in a more ethical way. So, he became a mechanic. The only bad thing is they have to move every few years as they look the same age they were when they passed on OFA. Like the vampires in Twilight.

I headcanon Third as aro/ace, so this is a duoholders universe.

Also, Third becomes a therapist. He figured he would be qualified after so many years being the therapist friend. And he is good at it, but he also runs into the Twilight issue. Even so, the 3 are never far apart from each other. Third does have his own place, but he's always there if the other two need anything and vice versa.

(I have a weird version of trioholders where, while the first two holders are romantically involved, their friendship with Third runs so deep, that if he died, they would be destroyed. Same with Yoichi and Second. They all need and understand each other in a way so deeply, it goes beyond any normal intimacy. Like, platonic soulmates I guess is the best word for that.)

Hikage lives in the woods. After 18 years of being chased around, he decided to fake his death and give OFA to Banjo. So, now he lives with the forest creatures in peace. Third still drags him out for the occasional family dinner though.

Banjo uses his extra immortal time to become talented at, not just normal hobbies, but really weird stuff like peeling a banana with his feet like a monkey. In addition to bothering Hikage, he decided to try his hand at a childhood dream and become a cowboy. That didn't work out, so he travels the world instead.

My headcanon for En is that he had 5 siblings, so immortality would give him a lot of grieving to do. However, I also headcanon him as a lover of reptiles and technology, so he used his immortal time to get acquainted with all the new tech coming out each year and finally get a pet chameleon. He also got a degree in Graphic Art. However, he chooses to make his money by doing commissions.

Nana did give away her son after her husband died, but only until she faked her death. Then she got him back, so Kotaro doesn't end up being as bad, but there's definitely still some tension between them as she didn't tell him about her plan. She hides away, with Gran Torino helping her try to raise Kotaro as normally as possible. Meaning his last name does end up changed because Torino adopts him, but he co-parents with Nana. It's complicated. At least Hana and Tenko are happy children with grandparents who spoil them and a better dad. Nobody wants to be on the bad side of both Nana and Gran Torino.

Toshinori did not know about the immortality thing. Nana forgot to tell him, and he just thought his master had really good genes. So, he has the same knowledge in canon. In fact, his life is pretty much like canon, as they figured it was best that he goes to America for a bit to keep AFO away from Nana's hiding place. He also gets into the same fight with AFO, but sustains the same damage. You see, the immortality quirk doesn't keep them from getting hurt, it just keeps them from dying.

Oh yeah, remember the family dinners Hikage gets dragged to? Those are between every OFA user. Toshinori just thinks they're historians who love to joke around. He has to believe it at this point. At least they only happen once a year, unless there's an emergency, like a new user or a faked death. Or, AFO dying (is he dead?)

Then Toshinori brings Izuku to OFA family dinner. Cue the awing over the new user (who looks oddly familiar). There was some worry over how Izuku would adjust to the quirk, but they all assumed All Might had it figured out. That man was taught by someone who beat the crap out of him daily. All Might did not have it figured out.

(After the AFO fight, the other users convinced All Might to get a hobby or something, so he decided to try and get the credentials to become a teacher, because he always loved children. The credits to become a kindergarten teacher that is, so the jump to high school is still going to take some adjustment. Not to mention training a middle school boy to handle a quirk you gave them. I don't think there's a book on that.)

After the entrance exams, out of worry for their new user, all the vestiges move to the Musutafu area around UA to help with Izuku's training. The users get along great with Inko (who was told about OFA.) And Yoichi's brother and Inko's husband sure have a lot of similarities. What a coincidence...

From here they get upto all sorts of school-themed hijinks, but I'll let you imagine them. (The eventual meeting with Aizawa is always a fun one to imagine)

Uh... this did not turn out how I thought it would. It was supposed to be random headcanons and not a story outline. I did keep some stuff vague on purpose. Anyway, I hope you liked it :)

#hw ask game #jane's asks #my hero academia #yoichi shigaraki #second one for all holder #third one for all holder #hikage shinomori #daigoro banjo #en mha #nana shimura

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doodlegirl1998 · 8 months

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No one talked or wants to talk about it is how Tenko had more good stuff than Izu. I'm talking about his two faceless friends when Tenchan was a cute baby. No they aren't important and granted Hori can't bakugoufied them any minute

My point is so far

Compared to Izuku's childhood...Tenko was better. He had a lovely corgi,his big sis loved him and he had friends.

"but Kotaro" yes Hori is a coward to go to the laziest option but even so...Tenko the soon to be Le villain had a better childhood than the mc (not forgetting his pain here but it's not as if he was abused 24/7. Hori went to a coward route but we only see one bad day on Kotaro. To be clear not excuse the abuse just saying Tenko had people on his side even if it wasn't perfect)

Now compared to Izuku's past and ....wow.

Izu doesn't have good friends

Never had a fluffy corgi (bk would have killed I know he would)

His mom is just existing.

And he is stuck with his abuser (in the begin Izu didn't had a good view on bk which hori couldn't let stand)

It's just...Izu had a sad backstory but no one gives a shit. Is it sadder than shig? The point it's not this... The point is how the mc has a bad childhood and his villain had a decent one (again I KNOW IT WASNT PERFECT)

Hi @mikeellee 👋,

You do have a good point here, while Tenko had an abusive father in Kotaro (which Hori went super lazy with making him abusive and failed to expand on his abuse), in his childhood he's shown to have more good things in his life than Izuku has had.

Tenko had in his backstory prior to the accident:

A good pet in Mon-chan

A big sister who loved him (although I am mixed on Hana, her lying to save herself from Kotaro as another part of her main appearance doesn't do her any favours. Although that sits more on Kotaro making his daughter that afraid of him.)

A mum and Grandparents who loved him** (although they too are not without fault, they should have acted sooner to stand up to Kotaro but no one can deny they loved Tenko.)

And his two faceless nameless friends who seemed nice from what little we are told.

Whereas Izu in his backstory;

Has never had any pet to our knowledge.

Has no cool big brother or sister.

His Dad is MIA ( apparently abroad working but he's never shown to call Izuku or come home.)

He has no sweet loving grandparents from his mum or dads side.

His Mum* doesn't stand up for him and cries on him about his being born quirkless.

Izuku is never shown to have any friend prior to U.A.

Izuku is chronically bullied (abused) from the ages of 4 - 14 by Bakugou and his cronies. (I'd argue this is actually still ongoing in UA the tone in the narrative has just shifted to be more in Bkg's favour now than Izu's.) And Izuku is still STUCK with Bakugou as a member of the 'wonder duo'... (that whole concept can fuck right off.)

So Shig, other than Kotaro being an abusive POS, actually had more nice things in his backstory than Izu did whereas Izu's backstory (prior to meeting All Might) is just PAIN.

*- it could be argued that Inko is a good thing in Izuku's backstory and while I'm not denying she loves him I'm saying that in their relationship is not all that great... He has to comfort her a lot of the time she's on screen and Hori never shows Inko confronting Aldera or the Bakugou's about her son's bullying. So she's failing as a parent there.

** - While Nao and her parents are actually shown standing up to Kotaro which is leaps and bounds ahead of anything Inko is shown to do for Izu (sorry it's true.)

#mha critical #bnha critical #izuku deserves better #Midoriya Inko critical #anti bakugou #anti bakugou katsuki

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aimportantdragoncollector · 2 years

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For the ask game, AU where Izuku lives with the Shimurs (Kotaro, Nao, Tenko, Nana and the grandparents), please.

Thank you for so many interesting AUs! I've got seeds of ideas for all of them that I will grow over the next couple days. To start with:

This is an "Inko is Nana's daughter" AU. Nana defeated AFO during their canon battle because he tripped on a rock while monologuing. He accidentally blew himself up.

AFO crawled away to lick his wounds, then later courted Inko Shimura as part of a subtle revenge plan. He did not plan on accidentally getting Inko pregnant. He definitely didn't plan for Inko to find out, then run away and live with her brother's family.

Because Nana is alive, Kotaro does not financially control his family and definitely never lays a hand on any of them. Kotaro is still a bit of a jerk because I don't agree with him blaming Nana for all his issues in canon. However, Kotaro knows that if he ever hit a child, then Nana would make him regret it.

Izuku, Tenko, and Hana grow up like siblings. Their mom and maternal grandparents also adopt Izuku. With two overprotective older siblings, Izuku has fewer bullying issues and grows up more confident.

In the opposite of canon, Kotaro brags a lot about having a famous hero for a mother and he wants his children to become heroes. This backfires because Tenko hates the pressure and decides to become a video game designer instead. However, Hana and Izuku attend U.A.

Tenko is quirkless because I'm firmly convinced that All for One gave him Decay, and that never happened in this AU. All Might was torn between giving One for All to Tenko or Izuku, who both lacked their own quirk. He was secretly relieved when Tenko decided not to become a hero so he didn't have to choose between his nephews. Hana already has her grandmother's Float.

Izuku grew up with All Might as his adopted uncle. He's still a huge fanboy but he keeps most of his merch at home. He'd be embarrassed if his Uncle Toshinori ever saw the extent of his collection.

Tenko is a huge Eraserhead fanboy. Tenko and Izuku compete to see who can collect the most Eraserhead and All Might merch respectively.

Izuku and Shouto became childhood friends because they attended the same events with their hero relatives. All Might asked Endeavor for advice on schools because All Might is convinced that Endeavor is his friend. As a result, Izuku and Shouto attended the same elementary and middle school. Izuku noticed Shouto's family issues much sooner, with ripple effects for the entire Todoroki family.

Phew, this was such a great idea that I had way more than five headcanons!

#5 headcanons game

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a-student-out-of-time · 1 month

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So everyone in season 53 had connections to someone from our time that helped prevent the tragedy minus Rantaro and Omigawa since they were the survivors from last season? That means Himiko must be related to one of us one way or another

So, wait, you don't know who all their relatives are?

No, and that's the frustrating part. We know most of them, but a few others are missing.

________________________________________________

Time travel analysis also isn't omniscient. We can't just zoom in and find someone, we need data. We need an idea of who we're looking for.

Might help to refresh everyone's memories as well. Here's who we've got:

________________________________________________

KNOWN RELATIVES:

Akamatsu Kaede and Erika- Grandchildren of Hinata Hajime and Otonokoji Hibiki; Kuzuryu Natsumi

Saihara Shuichi- Grandson of Kurosaki Taro and Kamii Tsubasa; Kobayashi Eito and Kimura Tomoe

Momota Kaito- Grandchild of Inoue Sunako

Chabashira Tenko- Grandchild of Deguchi Estu and Tamon Mayumi

Ouma Kokichi- Grandson of Ouma Hirota and Naegi Komaru

Shinguji Korekiyo- Grandson of Kutsuki Kikue

Yonaga Angie- Great-Granddaughter of Yonaga Mio

Iruma Miu- Granddaughter of Mori Miwa and Fujimori Fumio

Hoshi Ryoma- Grandson of Hanamura Kojikoji

Tojo Kiurmi- Granddaughter of Yomiuri Nikei and Taira Akane

Harukawa Maki- Granddaughter of Esumi Masa and Harukawa Naoyuki

Gokuhara Gonta- Grandson of Owari Teruko; Ibarazaki Ai

K1-B0- Third-generation model created by Souda Kazuichi, Fujisaki Chihiro and Arima Ayumi

UNKNOWN:

Amami Rantaro

Omigawa Kiko

Yumeno Himiko

________________________________________________

So nothing much has changed...although I do see some new names.

Ai-san too, huh?

________________________________________________

I'm afraid so.

________________________________________________

Seems like a lot of people we know, huh?

Hmmm...

The list is incomplete either way. You've got just a few listed here, not both sets of grandparents.

________________________________________________

As I've said, we can only extrapolate so much without any clear data. We're relying a lot of them from you all.

#danganronpa #nwpm #neo world program monitor #sdr2 #super danganronpa 2 #chiaki nanami #masa esumi #kyoji nakamura #keiko hinata #a student out of time #DR #Dianthus Memory arc

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itsnothingofinterest · 2 years

Text

You know what, I’m gonna do something fun. You remember that theory I had about AFO stealing the Shimuras quirks and those quirks & corresponding vestiges being in Tomura? Well I’m thinking I’m gonna take a crack at guessing what those quirks could be (/making up whatever sounds cool & might work because there’s not much to build off of), under the assumption that Tomura will get and use them like Deku and the OFA vestige quirks. Because I’ve grown really attached to this theory*.

Kotaro Shimura:

Starting off is everyone’s...at least 2nd least hated abusive parental figure of MHA and Nana’s son; Kotaro.

My guess for him is one I had since his last appearance alive, when a pair of hedge trimmers seemed like they flew to his hand to help him strike his son. Not that that’s how it happened in the anime, but I’m still attached to the idea regardless. I think he had a form of Psychokinesis, similar to Inko Midoriya (if you’d like, feel free to insert an Inko Shimura theory here). It seems a natural child quirk to Float, and would be useful to Tomura.

A telepathy quirk would, for example, allow Tomura to fight at range in a way he (and most of his allies) otherwise can’t; which opponents have tried to use against him in the past.

Chizuo:

Now, because of that fact that quirks build of their parent quirks, we’re gonna be a bit unconventional and do the grandparents next and move down the family tree; starting with the father-in-law because his cooking gives him one (1) actual character trait to base some assumptions off of. So I’m only mostly making something up from thin air.

Of course it probably wouldn’t be anything too impressive, being a civilian, so I’m gonna go with something really basic but potentially useful. Namely, a heightened sense of taste and smell that allowed him to become a fairly decent cook in life; mostly for his family.

Still as I said, basic can be useful, and a heightened sense of small could provide Shigaraki numerous advantages like it does Gigantomachia; such as tracking opponents or sniffing out traps.

Mako:

The grandmother, and sadly the one who we know the least about and has no parents I can speculate on; meaning I’m just making something up from scratch. If there’s anything to build on, it’s that she was a caring person, and I kinda get the impression she was the bread-winner of the pair back in her day. Hmm...

How’s about a Magic Hand quirk. Like the DnD cantrip. The ability to conjure some energy hands for when you need an extra pair or some extra reach. ...It’s the best I got.

Now Magic Hand might not seem too useful for Tomura; what with them likely to not be able to kill people or steal quirks like his normal hands, and also he can conjure all the hands he wants now. But idk, I think a pair of ghostly grabbers could prove useful.

Nao Shimura:

The penultimate family memeber; it’s time for Tenko’s kinder parent, Nao Shimura. Sadly, she is also someone without much of a developed personality outside her familial role to take power ideas from; but we did just came up with ideas for her parents to combine & build off of. Better than nothing.

Magic Hand & Enhanced Taste shall combine to form Body Double. The idea is that she conjures up an assistant made from a mist she exhales to, like her mom’s quirk, act as an extra pair of hands. Except it’s better because it’s a whole body. Still relatively short range though, if just to give room for her daughter.

This would be useful to Tomura as a distraction and something to take a hit for him when he’s in danger. Because it feels fitting for his mother’s quirk to be the one to best protect his life. (especially since I keep theorizing he’ll give Regen to Dabi.)

Hana Shimura:

Last but only technically least, one of the first Shimuras we ever saw, and the one I assume has the best quirk after Decay in the Shimura family since she had ambitions of being a hero; it’s Hana’s turn.

Factoring that with her free spirit, and combining Psychokinesis with Body Double, I’m guessing she had an Astral Projection quirk. The ability to create a solid double of herself which can be remote controlled. Unlike her mother’s quirk, which was more like an extra set of limbs, Astral Projection allows the user to see and hear through it and use it from any distance; and had Hana grown proficient with it, she even would have been able to change it’s shape in a variety of useful ways.

When combined with the AFO quirk in Tomura’s hands though, it allows for an even greater application. As by allowing a quirk vestige to inhabit the Astral Projection; Tomura could effectively bring back to life anyone who’s quirk was stolen, including anyone in his family. With enough control, perhaps his entire family! Now the catch is that any Projection may not be able to use their own quirk, as that would still be in Tomura’s body. But since the form could shape shift, the vestige may be able to replicate their quirk by simply shaping their body the way it should do with their quirk.

Such an awesome ability would surely become one of Tomura’s headliner powers, thus making the duo they always wanted to be...probably minus the ‘hero’ part, depending on when all this happens. (And honestly I don’t think he could ever be a hero with how the word has been soured for him.) But the important part is, they’d be working together. And with the rest of the family to boot.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

* Incidentally, because I am so attached t this theory, I happily welcome others to share their own ideas for the Shimuras’ quirks if you have any and are interested in sharing (which I presume you are if you’ve read this far into this theory post).

#bnha #shimura tenko #kotaro shimura #tenko's grandparents #nao shimura #hana shimura #shigaraki tomura #gigantomachia #league of villains #lov #paranormal liberation front #PLF #all for one #nana shimura #inko midoriya #quirk analysis

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geminiamethyst · 2 years

Text

Limitless. Chapter 41: Still In Danger

Chapter 1: click HERE

Chapter 40: click HERE

Chapter 42: click HERE

As soon as Kaito woke up, the how house was filled with nothing, but happiness. Almost everyone was crying as soon as they saw Kaito walking down the stairs, albeit a bit wobbly after being in a catatonic state for so long. The second he was downstairs, Kaito was bombarded with hugs and kind words from those that he now called family. They brought him up to speed as to what had happened and how they all escaped. They asked him once if he knew what was happening the whole time he was unconscious, but he only said that his memory was fuzzy and he couldn't remember that much. He wasn't even sure if he remembered how he woke up in the first place. Maybe it was for the best. As much as it hurt for Maki to stay silent about what she said and did, she didn't want to seem selfish or become too emotional again. Besides, there were more important things to deal with.

No one realised how hungry they were until Kaito's grandmother started making a feast for them, with Kirumi assisting her. As much as the elder tried to convince Kirumi to rest, the Limitless insisted on helping out. The air was rich with fresh food being cooked. Everyone else spoke amongst themselves, sharing stories and telling jokes. Anything to pass the time and to finally leave behind the nightmares that have plagued them for far too long. It only helped a little, but at this point anything will do. Once the food was ready and laid out, no one hesitated with eating. They hadn't eaten anything since the Exisals kidnapped most of their group. They were so concerned with everything else, that eating was not something that came to mind.

"A toast to Kaito's miraculous recovery!" Rantaro declared lifting his glass of grape juice. Kaito couldn't avoid the attention as everyone agreed to Rantaro's words. He didn't see it as necessary but then again, he didn't know how much he truly scared everyone. Besides he wants to try to forget what happened if he can.

"That reminds me. Kaito, before you went unconscious, did White extract blood from you?" Ryoma suddenly asked. The room suddenly went silent. Kaito almost gagged as he remembered the lab and what had happened. He started shaking a little as the sound of the electro shocks rang in his ears. He barely heard someone asking him if he was okay. He felt like he was going to pass out. The only thing that snapped him out of it was when Maki gently placed a hand on his shoulder. He looked at her concerned face before giving her hand a reassuring squeeze.

"Not that I'm aware of. Why?" He spoke, surprised that his voice didn't waver as he spoke.

"After we were...you know...White extracted some of our blood. He put it in a vial or glass or something and Junko drank it." Kaede answered, shuddering as she remembered the needle pricking her skin and how it filled up so easily with her blood.

"Yeah! Like she was some kind of vampire or some shit!" Miu chimed in, becoming paler as she recalled what had happened, with Kokichi nodding his head vigorously to agree with her.

"Why?" Shuichi asked before anyone else could.

"Good question." Kiyo muttered.

"Junko wasn't in the lab when I was there." Maki said just loud enough for everyone to hear. Junko wasn't there? She left with her tail between her legs it seemed. The only problem was is that she could be anywhere right now. And goodness knows if she is causing any problems for somebody else in Japan. If she was wise, she should stay under the radar and maybe even leave the country all together. But why would she need to consume blood? There was no reason for it, was there? It didn't make any sense.

Kaito didn't have much time to process his concern about Junko any further. There was suddenly a high pitched shriek that rattled the house. Everyone looked at Angie as she held her head in agony.

"Angie?! What's wrong?!" Himiko exclaimed as she and almost everyone else stood up in surprise. Angie didn't answer for a moment, whimpering as she felt a sharp pain in her head. It only took a few seconds until she heard someone's voice. Someone that was connecting to her through telepathy without mercy.

"She's coming!" Angie whimpered, her body shaking from the pain and fright she suddenly felt.

"What?! Who?!" Kaito's grandfather asked, his voice suddenly stronger than ever.

"Atua says that Junko is coming! She's just down the street!" Angie shrieked, her head feeling like it was going to split in half. Kaito didn't hesitate in running to the front of the house. He ignored how wobbly his body still was as he approached the window. He looked down the dimly lit street as best he could. He strained his eyes to look at his surroundings on the street. He could hear his heart pounding heavily in his chest, threatening to break out of his rib cage. His eyes focused to the end of the street where it was just light enough to see outlines of objects. And the outline of a person walking towards the direction of his house. Kaito desperately wanted to be a neighbour out on a walk, but it was quite late. No one should be out at this time. So that could only mean...

"Out! Out the back! Everyone out now!" Kaito barked, panic slowly building up inside him. Everyone leapt from where they sat and stood, instantly feeling more panic than they already had been. Ryoma had already rushed to the back and ran on ahead, wanting to make sure that there wasn't anything else that they need to be worried about.

"Mr and Mrs Momota? Please excuse Gonta." Gonta said, bowing apologetically. Before either elder could react, the giant scooped them both up in his arms to help them with running away. It was too dangerous to try to hide somewhere in the house. As soon as Kirumi reenforced the door with her webbing, she and Kaito followed everyone else out of the house. They abandoned everything in a desperate attempt to escape. The back door led out to a back alley that was mainly used to throw trash out and for it to be collected. Not that many people used it at night so it seemed to be a good enough escape route for now. Now everyone just needs to find somewhere safer to hide and plan everything out.

"I'll go on ahead. See if I can find somewhere safe to hide until we come up with a strategy." Ryoma declared, thinking the same thing as everyone else, before he ran on ahead. As Kaito checked over his grandparents when Gonta put them down, he couldn't help but wonder how on Earth Junko had found them. Before they abandoned the apartment building, Kaito did say that this was his home city, but he never gave away his address. Junko must have looked up his file at some post and instantly knew that this is where everyone would try to go to first. Trying not to dwell on that too much, Kaito gestured everyone to start following him to the end of the alley. With any luck, Junko will be trying to break into the front door of his house. If not, she'll be trying to find her way out the back. It'll give them a couple of minutes at least. Not that much time, but anything will do at this point.

"Okay. There's-" Ryoma started as he rushed back to the group. However, before he could finish-

"SURPRISE BITCHES!"

Everyone's attention snapped towards the end of the alley. And standing right there, was Junko.

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scary-grace · 2 months

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Enough to Go By (Chapter 4) - a Shigaraki x f!Reader fic

Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7

Chapter 4

You think about Tenko more now, but you’re allowed to – he’s your patient, and if he was your patient at the clinic, you’d expect to see him for a follow-up on the four gunshot wounds you cleaned and dressed. You’re allowed to think about him, so you think about him. You think about him a lot.

The thoughts take two directions. One is just wondering about him – how he’s feeling, how he spends his days, what he’s thinking about, what he thinks of you, whether he’s thought about you at all. The other is thinking about the situation he’s in. His parents and grandparents and his sister are dead. He’s been missing for fifteen years. He’s got a quirk and he’s a villain, ambitious and strategic enough to target UA High and escape alive, albeit badly injured. His guardian is a cloud of mist in a suit with some kind of split personality. And there’s someone else in his world – two someone elses. The doctor he referenced, who wouldn’t help him, and the one he calls Sensei, who gave him his new name and a hand to wear over his face and set him up to fail.

You think about Tenko a lot, but you can’t think about him all the time, because now that you’re a nurse, you’re twice as busy as you were before. The doctors expect more of you, and so do the other nurses – and so do the MAs and CNAs and high school students who are starting their apprenticeships, since you now have three years’ experience to go with your reputation for smoothing things over with difficult patients. Your friends keep you busy, too. They might call Kazuo to find out if something’s wrong with them, but they call you to find out what to do about it.

“You need to get a scan,” you say to Yoshimi for probably the fifth time. “I know you don’t want to –”

“It’s weird!”

“Not any weirder than whatever Yoji does when the two of you are at second base,” you say, and in the background of the call, someone snickers. If you had to guess, you’d say it’s Mitsuko – she has the guts to bully Yoshimi into making the call, combined with the brass balls to feel comfortable eavesdropping. “It’s called a mammogram. You’d have to start getting them at some point anyway, just like we all do. It’s just to make sure there’s nothing weird going on.”

“Stop it. You’re freaking her out for no reason.” Yoji’s there, too. “It’s probably just an STD.”

You’re stunned into silence for a second by the sheer classlessness of saying that about one’s own girlfriend, but you bounce back fast. “First of all, they’re called STIs, genius. Secondly, there’s not an STI on the planet that gives you nipple discharge. Yoshimi, get the scan. I’ll go with you if you want. Just get it done.”

“Can I do it at your clinic?”

“Uh –” You glance at the Imaging queue. Things look quiet, but you can’t count on that to last – but if you report Yoshimi’s symptoms, which include soreness, nipple discharge, and what she describes as a weird rash, you’re pretty sure the doctor on call will bump her to the head of the line. “Yeah, come in now. I can’t stick around after my shift, though. I have stuff to do tonight.”

“Ooh, stuff. Let me see –” There’s some rustling, which you can only assume is Mitsuko grabbing the phone. “Is stuff tall, dark, handsome, way too serious, and currently working as a sidekick?”

“That would be stuff,” you admit. “It’s not a big deal. We’re just grabbing a drink after our shifts.”

For the first time since you and Kazuo broke up, you have a date, and it’s Kazuo’s fault. Or maybe it’s you and your friends’ fault, because you decided to throw Kazuo a twentieth birthday party and invited a few of his friends from UA. One of those friends is Sugimura Hiroki, who fits perfectly with your type of dark-haired boys who want to be heroes and who’s so painfully shy that it took him six beers and the entire party to talk to you. You were sort of weirded out by that. You’re not very intimidating, and you spent the first half of the conversation trying to figure out if he knew you were quirkless, since you learned the hard way that it’s something you need to disclose up front. But the two of you eventually worked your way around to the point, which was that Sugimura wants to get to know you better, and he tripped over his tongue so badly that you finally just asked him out to end the suspense.

It’s taken you a while to actually schedule the date, but tonight’s the night, and you’re sort of anxious about it. Luckily, work is busy enough to keep you distracted. Your lunch break ends while Mitsuko is still going into increasingly nasty speculations about Sugimura’s physical attributes, and you hang up the phone without saying goodbye.

There’s a message waiting for you on your computer, from the front desk. FOF. Can you take him?

It’s not Tenko. You know Tenko wouldn’t come here again. You send the same message you did when it was him. How F are we talking?

Jumpy, talking to himself, chainsmoking. He’s in costume.

“In costume” could literally mean that the patient’s wearing a costume, but it’s also code for when the front desk thinks the patient’s a villain. You’re used to dealing with villains by now. Send him back.

When the knock on the door comes, you’re ready and waiting, and the CNA ushers in a tall man in a black-and-grey bodysuit – so “in costume” was literal this time around – and a paper bag over his head. You’re momentarily transfixed by the paper bag, and more so when you realize that he’s bringing a lighted cigarette to his mouth while wearing something highly flammable on his face. The CNA shuts the door and bolts. You face your patient and introduce yourself. “Have a seat if you feel comfortable doing so. What brings you in today?”

“I’m not – whole.”

That’s concerning. “Are you injured?” Your concern grows when he gestures at his face. “It would really help if I could see the injury. Can you take the bag off?”

He shakes his head. Instead he reaches into his pocket and produces a torn full-face mask. You look at him, then at him, putting the pieces together. “How do you feel right now?”

He doesn’t answer – maybe can’t answer – so you default to the face chart you use when little kids aren’t able to express how they feel in words. Your patient points to scared, stressed, anxious, angry. Then he throws in happy, possibly to mess with you, or to distract you from the fact that the first four emotions indicate that he’s ready to snap at any second. “How about this?” you ask, after thinking it over. “I can ask the doctor to give you something that will help you calm down –”

“Please!” The patient bursts out. Drug-seeking? “No, I don’t need it, sister! I’m so calm it’s hard to believe.”

“Okay, then we’ll just have it here in case you decide you want it. As an option,” you say, keeping your voice smooth and calm. “Either way, this is a quiet place to wait. You’re safe in here with me. And if you want, I can sew up your mask for you. Would that help?”

“You can do that?”

“Easily,” you say. “Can I see it for a second? I need to make sure I grab the right thread.”

The patient hands the mask over, which is a good sign. You’ve established at least a little bit of trust. You examine the mask and decide that you’ll need the thinnest-gauge needle and thread you have. “I can definitely fix this,” you tell the patient. “It might look a little rough, but it’ll cover you up like it did before. And it should last until you get where you’re going.”

The patient nods. You stand up. “I’m going to get some supplies, and a little anxiety medication if you decide you want it. I’ll be right back, okay? Just wait here.”

The patient nods again. Given how labile his mood is, you need to be fast about this, and get back before he gets upset or decides to leave. You step out the door and shut it behind you, heading for the supply closet, but you’re waylaid on the way there by one of the doctors. “We need you up front. Now.”

“I can’t. I have a patient, and he’s –”

“I don’t care. We’ve got a hero coming to visit, and we need somebody to keep things calm,” the doctor says. Shit. “Figure out what they want, get them as little of it as you can get away with, and get them out of here.”

“Which hero?”

The doctor shakes his head. Great. “Just hurry.”

You can’t go just yet. “My patient’s got a lot of anxiety and he’s in costume. I need him to stay calm. Can you –”

“2mg diazepam. I’ll put it in the chart.” The doctor unlocks one of the medicine cabinets, extracts a prefilled dosage cup, and hands it to you. “Go.”

Diazepam is long-acting. Hopefully long-acting enough to keep your patient quiet while you get rid of the hero. You skitter back down the hall with the dosage cup and hand it over to the patient, along with a tiny bottle of water to wash it down. “I’ll be right back. Just finding the right thread.”

The patient downs the pill dry, which is both good and bad for you. You shut the door again and head for the lobby. You don’t make it there. A cloud of black mist boils up around you, swallowing you whole.

By the time your feet hit the familiar wooden floor of the bar, you’re already out of patience. “No. Send me back right now.”

“Shigaraki Tomura has need of you. You will assist him.”

“Not right now I won’t. You snatched me from work,” you say. You’re facing the wall and the All Might poster again, and you don’t want to turn around. If you see Tenko, it’ll make it harder to say no. “If I go missing, people will notice. Is he dying?”

“No,” Kurogiri says.

“Is he in imminent danger of dying?”

“No.”

“Then send me back,” you say. If Tenko’s asked Kurogiri to get you, it means he needs medical assistance – or follow-up. You’ve needed to follow up anyway. “I can come back later.”

“No, I need you right now!”

“How much later?” Kurogiri asks, ignoring Tenko’s protest.

You think it over. You can dispense with the hero situation quickly, stitch your patient’s mask, and sneak out of work early. They’ll have to give you the emergency time off. You’ve never asked before in three years of working there. “Ninety minutes.”

“That’s too long. Kurogiri, don’t let her leave!”

“Ninety minutes. I’ll be in the alley behind the clinic.” You ignore Tenko, too, in favor of focusing on Kurogiri. He’s the one who decides if you leave or not. “All right?”

The mist wells up around you again, which counts as a yes. You land on your feet in the hallway, reorient yourself, and head for the lobby again. Tenko wants you again – needs you, your stupid brain corrects – but he’s going to have to wait for you to sort this out.

The hero in the lobby is Uwabami, the Snake Hero, and she’s got two sidekicks with her. No, students. You recognize one of them from your limited viewing of the UA Sports Festival and feel a spike of guilt run through you. She’s from Class 1-A. The same class Tenko tried to kill.

You don’t need to think about that, and you don’t need to feel guilty, because you didn’t do anything to her. You force yourself to focus. Uwabami wouldn’t have brought high school students here if she was doing any kind of investigating, which means your patient and any others who might be nervous around law enforcement are probably safe. The question of why she’s here still remains. You step forward. “Welcome to Yokohama Free Clinic South. What can we help you with today?”

“We’re on patrol,” Uwabami says. “My interns gave some feedback that our patrol involved a little too much publicity –”

The students look unrepentant. Good for them. “So we’re engaging in some down-to-earth patrolling,” Uwabami continues. “Tell us about how heroes support your clinic.”

Heroes don’t support your clinic. Most heroes strongly dislike the free clinic network, and the feeling is mutual, for a bunch of reasons you’re more than willing to articulate. Then you think better of it. Picking a fight with a hero in front of hero students is a bad move if you want to get out of here any time soon, and if you’re going to keep helping Tenko, you need to stay completely off the heroic radar. You focus on the students instead. “You’re on internships, right? They’re supposed to show you what life will be like as a hero.”

“Yes,” the girl who’s not from 1-A says. “They’re supposed to.”

“We have a program like that here, too,” you say. You gesture for them to come forward, and they desert their supervising hero at high speed. “A lot of our nurses and techs started working here in high school. Let me introduce you.”

You’re on much more solid ground talking about this. This clinic and this program saved your ass – without their sponsorship, you’d never have been able to get around your quirklessness as a barrier to nursing school, and you started getting on-the-job clinical training while most other nursing students were stuck in the classroom. You catch yourself evangelizing a little bit, but you don’t think it’s the worst thing in the world to do. You’re proud of the work you do as part of the clinic. It’s nice to get to talk about it.

You clear the hero students out in half an hour, hoping you’ve impressed them even a little bit, then hurry back to your patient. The diazepam’s kicked in nicely, and he chatters away to you while you stitch the tear in his mask. You learn that his name is Jin, or Bubaigawara, or Twice, which you’d guess are his first name, his family name, and his villain name, in that order. He doesn’t say how his mask got torn and you don’t ask, but you send him on his way in a better mood than before. “Thanks, sister,” he says on his way out the door. “You could be worse. You’re a saint!”

Different tone, different pitch, completely different meaning between the first sentence and the second. It reminds you of Kurogiri. You know enough villains now that you can compare them to one another. You shake your head, bemused, then head back inside. Time to guilt-trip your boss into letting you leave two hours early.

Your guilt-trip is successful, mostly because of how you handled the hero situation, but as you’re trying to sneak out, Yoshimi arrives for her scan. After you cajoled her into the office, you can’t abandon her to some random tech. You do abandon Mitsuko in the waiting room, though – she says the words “nipple discharge” as loudly as possible, then starts picking on the scant amount of makeup you did for your date. You don’t feel bad at all for leaving her behind.

Yoshimi’s scan goes quickly, and just like you feared, it nets her a follow-up appointment at the main branch of the free clinic tomorrow. Tomorrow’s your day off. You promise her you’ll go with her – you, and not Mitsuko or Yoji – then talk the doctor into sending her home with a dose of a different anti-anxiety medication than the one you got for Twice. Then you check your phone for the time. Almost ninety minutes exactly. You race out to the alley.

The mist engulfs you almost the instant you set foot in the alley, and you’re in the bar a moment later, facing Kurogiri. Tenko’s nowhere to be found, and before you can ask the question, Kurogiri turns and sets off through a doorway, deeper into the recesses of the building. You follow him, wondering if this counts as being taken to a secondary location. Or maybe the bar counts as the secondary location, even though you’ve been here before. Either way, you’ve listened to way too many of Mitsuru’s true-crime podcasts.

Kurogiri leads you into an absolutely filthy room. The floor is covered – empty wrappers, empty cans, old newspapers and magazines, plastic cases for game disks and chips. You have a bad feeling about who lives here, and when Kurogiri clears his throat and speaks up, you’re proven right. “Shigaraki Tomura. I have brought the girl.”

The only semi-organized spot in the room is a desk with two monitors on it, a keyboard in front of it, and Tenko slumped down with his head pillowed on one arm. He looks up, and for a split second, you can see that he’s happy even behind the hand. Then his face turns bright red and his expression twists into a snarl. “I told you not to bring her in here! Get out!”

You don’t need to be told twice. You duck out the door and retreat about twenty feet down the hallway, listening as Kurogiri tries to placate Tenko. “You asked for her to be brought to you immediately, not for me to summon you when she arrived. I followed your orders to the letter.”

“I didn’t want –” Tenko breaks off, swears. Then he mumbles something, and Kurogiri chuckles. “Don’t laugh at me!”

You check your phone. You aren’t supposed to meet Sugimura until eight, but you’ve got no idea how long this particular encounter is going to run. You might need to tell him you’re running late. You’ve just sent the text and tucked your phone away when Kurogiri reappears. “We will return to the bar,” he says. “Shigaraki Tomura awaits you there.”

So Kurogiri warped him to the bar. You wonder what that was all about. Was Tenko embarrassed that you saw how filthy his room was, or just embarrassed that you saw his room at all? Or did he change his mind about wanting you here? The last thought upsets you. You follow Kurogiri back into the bar and find Tenko sitting at the counter. It’s an improvement from the last time you saw him, when he was sprawled out and bleeding from four gunshot wounds, but this time he’s got his arms crossed, clearly pissed about something. His face is still red behind the hand. There’s a bloodstained bandage taped to his right shoulder.

A pile of supplies appears on the bar as you come closer. “What happened this time?”

“It wouldn’t stop bleeding.” Tenko uncrosses his left arm to gesture at the wound. “This is the fourth one I’ve used.”

If he’s gone through four bandages, it must be pretty deep. “How long ago did it happen?”

“Two hours,” Kurogiri says. “Shigaraki Tomura sent me to retrieve you immediately.”

“Can you fix it or not?” Tenko snaps.

“I need to see it first,” you say. You come a few steps closer, sit down facing Tenko on the barstool next to his, and reach for the bandage. He doesn’t stop you from unwrapping it, and you detour to glove up before you start peeling the fabric of his shirt back from the wound. It’s oozing blood rapidly. It’s jagged at the edges, and deep – if you suctioned the blood away, you’d be looking at exposed muscle, and you’re so horrified by the fact that Tenko’s been badly hurt again that you ask a question you shouldn’t. “How did this happen?”

“Hero Killer,” Tenko says, and your stomach lurches. “I thought he might be useful, but he’s just like the rest of them. Obsessed with the precious Symbol of Peace.”

You don’t know very much about the Hero Killer, except that he kills or cripples heroes and he’s not in Yokohama any longer. Tenko’s still ranting. “Why can’t anybody shut up about All Might? Don’t they know –”

“That he’s not gonna fuck them?” you interrupt, and Tenko nearly chokes. “I guess they can dream.”

Tenko’s expression is contorting behind the hand. You’re pretty sure it’s not the result of your explorations of the wound, because you’re not touching it. You watch, concerned, as his shoulders shake and his mouth twitches, until awkward, rusty laughter finally issues from his mouth.

You always try to make people laugh. You’ve been in the habit since you were little. It’s an effective strategy for defusing tension, whether the joke is funny or not, and your jokes are usually at least kind of funny. But you always liked making Tenko laugh when you were kids. You were always just a little prouder of that than you were with other people. Tenko made people smile all the time. He deserved for somebody to make him laugh, too.

Tenko’s laughter is brief and uneven, because he’s trying to get it under control. “Stop it,” he finally snaps at you. His mouth is still twitching. “It’s serious.”

“Right,” you agree. But you can’t resist another joke. “It would be a novel strategy. If you can’t beat the Symbol of Peace, make him unfuckable instead.”

“I can beat him,” Tenko says, but his voice is strained to the point of snapping, and his shoulders are shaking again. “Can you fix my arm or not?”

“I can fix it,” you say, “but I’ll need a suture kit. And I’ll either need to cut your sleeve or you’ll need to take your shirt off.”

“I’m not taking my shirt off.” Tenko’s face is red again. “It’s ruined anyway. Just cut it.”

You cut his sleeve open from the neckline and peel it back, then go looking through the medical supplies. Kurogiri took your advice about additions to their supplies, and nothing turned up missing at work, which means they honored your request to steal from someone else. You’ve got local anesthetic this time, which is good, because you need it. You start numbing the edges of the wound, asking every so often if Tenko can feel what you’re doing. When he stops saying yes, you open the suture kit.

It’s a bit weird, but putting stitches in is one of your favorite parts of the job. You can get in the zone with it, even when the patient wants to talk. Tenko wants to talk. “People talk about the League of Villains out there. Don’t they?” he asks. You nod. “What do they say?”

“Um –” You’re not sure this is an answer Tenko wants to hear. “They’re wondering why the attack on UA happened.”

“What do you mean, why?”

“Like, if there was a message behind it,” you elaborate. You need to be careful, with the stitches and with this line of thought. “More than just killing All Might, because lots of villains want to do that. If there was a message, it didn’t get out. The police and UA haven’t shared much information – not even how the breach happened in the first place.”

Tenko scoffs. “They don’t have a clue. They won’t see it coming the next time we hit them, either.”

He’s planning something else. Your blood runs cold, and for a moment you’re torn about whether or not to ask. Tenko makes the decision for you. “What else do they say about the League?”

“Not very much, otherwise,” you say, and Tenko swears. “There are a lot of villains, just like there are a lot of heroes. People talk about the ones they see the most of.”

“Which heroes do you talk about?”

“I don’t really talk about heroes.” You tie off a stitch, trim the thread to the appropriate length, and take another. “One of my friends has this nasty crush on Endeavor, so we talk about him sometimes, but otherwise – no.”

“Your friend has a crush on Endeavor,” Tenko repeats.

“Like I said. Nasty.”

You’re conscious of Tenko staring at you, and you will your face not to heat up under his gaze. You don’t even know why he’s staring, and you’ve got stitches to do, so it doesn’t matter. Your phone buzzes in your pocket – probably Sugimura, probably confirming your date. A date you’re not sure you want to go on anymore. Did you ever really want to go on it? Or did you just say yes because –

“You look weird.”

You look up from the stitches, startled. “Huh?”

“You look weird,” Tenko repeats. “Your clothes are different and you’ve got stuff on your face.”

Tenko and Mitsuko feel the same about your makeup skills, apparently. “Sorry.”

“Why do you look like that?” Tenko presses. You tie off his next stitch. “Are you going on a date or something?”

You answer without thinking about whether it’s the smart thing to do. “Yes.”

It’s quiet for a long stretch of seconds. “Go on your date, then,” Tenko says. His voice is flat. “I don’t need you.”

It stings. You don’t want it to, but it does, and you look down at the cut on his shoulder so he won’t see it on your face. “You still need a few more stitches. At least let me finish them.”

“No. Get out.” Tenko jerks out of your grip. You barely have enough time to cut the hanging thread on your last stitch. “I don’t want you here. Kurogiri –”

“Shigaraki Tomura, I’m not sure that’s wise.”

“I didn’t ask you!” Tenko swats at you open-handed and you leap backwards. “Get out! I don’t –”

You don’t hear the end of that sentence. Kurogiri warps you away too fast, and possibly saves your life. He drops you back in the alley behind the clinic, holding half a suture kit and still wearing bloodstained gloves. You peel them off and dump them into the garbage, furious with yourself. You shouldn’t have said that. You shouldn’t have talked about your life at all, and above all else, you should have remembered that you were talking to a villain, not your best friend – that whatever’s left of your best friend isn’t enough. He’s angry with you, and he’s been having you followed. Just how angry is he? Angry enough to hurt you? Or angry enough to never talk to you again?

You’re sickened and more than a little scared to realize that you’re more frightened of the latter possibility than the former. It’s entirely possible that you’ve never been in less of a mood to go on a date.

But you do go on the date, because you said you would, and it’s – fine. There’s nothing to complain about, but there’s nothing to be excited about, either. You and Sugimura hug to say goodbye, and you promise to text each other about setting up another one, and then you walk home. Mitsuko texts you, wanting details, or DETAILS, but you’ve got nothing to share. It was just a date, and no matter how many times you try to tell yourself otherwise, you’re angry about it.

Not because of Sugimura asking you out, not because you agreed, not because you went. Because you told Tenko and gave him a reason to get rid of you. Why does this keep happening? Why do you keep finding him and losing him, over and over again? What is it going to take for you to hold on?

“So how was the date?”

The voice emanates from the alleyway on your right and you nearly jump out of your skin. Tenko’s there, hand down from over his face, leaning against the wall with his arms crossed over his chest. He hasn’t changed his shirt. “I didn’t think heroes were your type.”

“They aren’t.”

“Then why were you on a date with one?”

“He asked.”

“And you just go with whoever asks?” Tenko looks half-incredulous, half-disgusted. You shake your head. “Forget it. Come with me.”

You shake your head again and take a step back – away from the alley, closer to the street. Tenko looks frustrated. “Come with me,” he repeats.

“What, so you can kill me?” You take another step back, well into the glow of a streetlight. You see shock flicker across Tenko’s face. “I don’t have a death wish.”

“Well, I don’t want to kill you,” Tenko fires back. He looks surprised at himself for saying it, but only for a moment – then he repeats himself, with more conviction. “I don’t want to kill you. You’re supposed to be my sidekick.”

Your jaw drops. “You remember?”

“I don’t remember everything.” Tenko takes the hand called Father out of the back pocket of his pants and studies it for a moment. Then he puts it away. “I remember that.”

Some kids played a different game every day. You and Tenko always played the same one, with a rotating cast of classmates at your side. All the heroes in the world were working together to fight one big villain, the worst villain the world had ever seen, and Tenko could never decide which hero he liked best, so he played a different one every day. But no matter which hero he played, no matter who else was playing with the two of you, you were always his sidekick. You reminded him every day that you didn’t have a quirk, and he always said the same thing in response, no matter which hero he was pretending to be that day, even though he didn’t have a quirk, either: You don’t need a quirk to be on my side. My quirk’s enough for both of us.

“Come on,” Tenko says again. He holds out his hand, three fingers and his thumb folded down, his pinky finger extended towards you. “Are you coming or what?”

You’ve never seen the world in black and white, but some things are unmistakable: There’s a line here, not visible to others but clear as day to you. On one side of it is Tenko and the darkness that’s swallowed him, the evil that surrounds him, the terrible things he’s done and is planning to do. On the other side is everything else – your dreams, your friends, your family that’s always loved you but used you anyway, a world that’s punished you time and time again for being born without a quirk, the knowledge that the world is so much crueler to so many others. You don’t think Tenko’s planning to kidnap you, to never let you leave. You’ll come back here, physically. You’ll go home and go to sleep and wake up early on your day off to take Yoshimi to her appointment at the main clinic, but you know instinctively that if you cross this line within yourself, there’s no coming back. Tenko was your best friend when you were five years old. Is he worth it?

You hate yourself for asking the question. You leave the light behind and link your finger with Tenko’s. “Where are we going?”

The black mist rises and wells up around you both. “You’ll see,” Tenko says, and for the first time since you found him again, he smiles.

#shigaraki tomura x reader #tomura shigaraki x reader #shigaraki x reader #shigaraki x you #x reader #reader insert #shigaraki tomura #please hold

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veg-hotwings · 2 years

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Hawks, Shigaraki and their abuse

I was thinking about Hawks (what a surprise!) and how much people tend to mischaracterise him and minimise the abuse he went through at the HPSC since he was fucking six years old.

He was literally groomed to be a weapon, grew up alone with no friends, forced to use his quirk in an unnatural way (you can't tell me this picture is not disturbing, that this is not abuse), ripped of his own name and identity, guilt tripped into being ashamed because his father was a villain so much he apologised for it like it was his fault, and probably do some pretty dark shit too.

Plenty of people argue that Twice was his first kill, but I doubt it. He desperetely tried to save Jin because he thought he was good and he admired him for it, implying that Hawks doesn't think the same of himself. After all Lady Nagant was his mentor, and she was a sniper. It's said multiple times in the manga he was raised, among other things, to be her successor, so he should have been able to take down high profile villains etc. Let's not forget that he freaking aimed for All for One's head as soon as he flew on the battlefield. He wasn't trying to block him, he was trying to kill him. Killing is engraved in him.

He says "If corrupting myself is enough to put everyone else at ease, then I will gladly take on this job" while mockingly bowing to the HPSC President, like he is resigned to this life, to his role.

At the same time, he fails to recognise he was abused, because he just doesn't know any other way to live. He hasn't known anything else apart from the HPSC and violent parents back in Fukuoka.

He didn't even dream of becoming a hero (he didn't know they were real in the first place!), the HPSC just took advantage (again, isn't this abuse?!) of him saving some people from a car crash to mould him in the perfect asset, the golden hero to embody everything Stein and Dabi hate: something fake, a facade.

A proof of this is his actual wish: doing some good while enjoying life around the 20-30th placing in the hero ranks.

The HPSC played so much with his mind he thinks he wasn't alone in this when he was, when his "not being alone" was just holding a fucking stuffed toy of another abuser. Isn't this just fucked up?

Psychological abuse IS abuse as much as physical abuse is.

All of this IS abuse, I won't accept other opinions on this matter.

Now, to Shigaraki.

I realized he and Hawks have a lot in common.

Plenty of people loathe Shigaraki. That's ok, he's a villain and of course did some pretty bad shit.

At the same time, they seem to forget that hasn't even been Tomura himself for plenty of chapters now. That's not him, it's All for One.

This doesn't justify his previous actions, but it's still an important thing to bare in mind (here for a deeper analysis).

Most of all, I think I've never read anywhere that he was abused in the same way Hawks was. And of course, since people fail to see Hawks' abuse (and he's a hero), understanding the same happened to a villain is just too hard.

(It applies to Dabi too, 'cause yes, there are still people thinking he just threw a tantrum because "DaDdY diDn'T GiVe Me AtTeNtiOn!!11!1!". That's concerning, honestly, but I'm not going to talk about him now).

Tenko grew up in a household that hated heroes because his father believed Nana abandoned him. He already had health issues, which piled up with the frustration and fear he felt towards his father, who couldn't accept his dream of becoming a hero, of his grandparents ignoring the fact he was beaten for this, and his mother and older sister who failed to protect him.

When he unleashed his quirk for the first time he was terrified and calm at the same time, but it was such a traumatic experience his mind just closed up on itself and made him forget about it (a typical trauma response).

Then, while roaming alone, ignored by everybody while pleading for anybody to help him, he was found by fucking All for One because life is just that fair, who exploited his fear and anger to mould him in the perfect weapon to use against All Might and the hero society.

Do you see the resemblace? He was ripped from his name and groomed by AfO after escaping somehow a violent household the same way Hawks was ripped from his name and groomed by the HPSC after escaping a violent household, just with a different objctive.

Cherry on top, when he finally got the power to destroy everything he loathed, to give his companions what they wanted too, AfO took over his mind. I'll say it again: isn't it just fucked up?!

Tomura is unable to free himself from his grip yet the same way the HPSC teachings are so engraved in Hawks he believed killing can be accepted if it's for a superior cause, that he believes he is responsible for his father's crimes.

I really really hope Horikoshi will grace these two with some justice.

I hope that Hawks will finally realise what his life really was and get some peace and rest, and that Tomura will free himself from AfO's grip and reunite with his friends before or after the end.

Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.

#thank you for coming to my ted talk #character analysis #ranting #tenko shimura #tomura shigaraki #all for one #league of villains #dabi #touya todoroki #hawks #pro hero hawks #winged hero #keigo takami #hpsc #fuck the commission #fuck afo too

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codenamesazanka · 26 days

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I'm sorry, I'm fixated on The Walk because it has seemed like such a pivotal point in Shigaraki's life, and in the story. And then when it finally came time for Deku to save Shigaraki/Tenko... it gets relegated to two measly panels.

In Chapter 69, Shigaraki reveals his resentment of basically the entire world for being so carefree when they know, logically, someone is out there suffering - "someone, somewhere...is off killing people, for whatever reason... these fools keep smiling and laughing... living their lives."

Later, building on this idea, he realizes - and states out loud to Deku - that All Might annoys him because All Might has created a false sense of peace. Plus, All Might himself smiles so bright and cheerful, as if he's invincible, as if he can and has saved everyone: "The reason these fools can smile and live their lives... is cuz All Might's always got that grin on this face... Smiling wide, as if to say... There's no one he can't save!!"

Paired with a flashback of a severed hand, much like the ones Shigaraki wears, the implication is clear: Shigaraki resents how no one came to save him when he had a quirk accident that killed his dad/family; moreover, specifically, he seems to hate the bystander effect - that tragedy and suffering can happen but the people around such incidents can just not give a single crap. There are people in trouble, but the majority of the world doesn't bother to help, because they think Heroes will take care of it - All Might, especially, has made them feel like it's just not their problem.

This was before Shigaraki regained his memories, but his life since the amnesia hasn't really disproven any of that. He was picked up by AFO, a Villain, first of all; but he would later create the League, all members of who have clearly suffered from something and was never saved - not by Heroes, but also not by people who are supposed to protect them, like parents and family, and not by their fellow humans.

There's a reason Shigaraki targeted Bakugou to kidnap and recruit - he saw someone who seemed to be restricted and suppressed, literally bound and gagged on live television, a thing allowed and even awkwardly laughed at by the people around him. All Might was smiling as he presented a medal to the clearly upset boy. And so he thought Bakugou would understand.

When Shigaraki remembers his past, his memories also don't disprove the bystander effect and his hatred of it either. In the house his father built, everyone saw he was suffering, but did nothing. They never stepped in to stop Kotarou’s harsh punishments; in fact, they only ever come to him in the aftermath to try to coax him to stop crying - essentially telling Tenko that hey, they aren't going to stop the actual problem (Kotarou), but they will try to make Tenko accept it. As if it's not their problem, but rather Tenko's. Tenko says that all he needed was just to hear a word of encouragement from them, but they couldn't even give him that.

All this passivity in the family eventually leads to the moment when Kotarou slaps Tenko hard - twice! - and yet his mom and grandparents only stood by and watched. (Afterwards, they apparently also allowed Tenko to be forced to stay outside, crying, until nightfall.)

Then, of course, is The Walk.

Dozens of people saw a clearly-distressed lost child walk past them, and did nothing. Tenko at that moment is tragedy and suffering made manifest - he's a tiny little boy, alone, scared into silence, bloodstained, barefoot on concrete in a city. He's not hidden away or in some unknown corner of the shadowy edges of society - he's there in front of everyone, in broad daylight.

And no one bothers to give a crap. Or, even if they do, briefly feeling troubled at the sight, they look away. The one lady who did try to help ends up deciding this was above her pay grade and explicitly states never mind, Heroes will take care of it. Everyone at the scene feels it's not their problem.

(And the thing is - Tenko knew he deserved to be saved. There's one line that always stuck out to me: "I thought maybe the reason no one helped me was because I was being punished for killing my family."

Tenko knew he did something bad, he was feeling immense guilt, so much that he was rendered mute, but he wasn't expecting to be punished then and there - he hadn't written himself off. Not being helped wasn't a foregone conclusion yet. He killed his family, but he wanted help - he knew he should be helped. Basically, it wasn't immediately, "I did something bad, so of course a Hero won't be here, now I need to run away and hide" - it was "[I did something bad, but] somebody... anybody, just me tell [what to do]. Someone help me." The idea that he deserved being ignored because of what he did seemed to have only come afterwards.

This is why, I believe, in Chapter 365, Inner Tenko thought, "I wasn't broken back then... but it's not like anybody reached out a helping hand to me. It's not like anybody even looked at me."

Two of the flashbacks are scenes from after he did a Bad Thing - Hana running away after he killed their dog; the old lady turning away, after he wandered into the city post-massacre. He did a Bad Thing, but "I wasn't broken back then..."

There's also the flashbacks of the family pre-massacre. Scenes of his grandparents trying to pacify him, of his mom looking sad, of Kotarou being angry with him - all likely because Tenko was in trouble for talking about Heroes again, which was against the household rules, but wasn't/shouldn't be a strike against him. He was restricted and suppressed and couldn't fit in with the family, but "I wasn't broken back then..."

All those people in his family, on the streets - none of them ever helped.)

The Walk is the ultimate embodiment of his long and ongoing issue of Heroes and regular people doing shit nothing. It's the exact complaint Shigaraki was giving in Chapter 69. It's completely damning.

This is what Shigaraki means when he says "everything I've witnessed..." in Jaku in Chapter 281 (and again in Chapter 379). He's seen it all - how there's all this pain, but Heroes have not done anything about it. And because Heroes are pillars of the community - because Heroes are civil servants, essentially representative of the governing system - the regular masses of citizens both follow their example while also becoming complacent. Now they just smile and laugh, living their lives, as if Heroes will and should take care of everything and all will be and is fine.

Early on, Shigaraki put most of the blame on Heroes and so focused most of his plots on them - the USJ attack and Camp Raid were on Hero students - but he very much disliked the civilians and their bystander apathy too, and was already starting to make plans to destroy the system that enabled that. It’s remembering the Shimura Household Dysfunction and The Walk - the lack of help, the rejection, all civilians that passed him by - that really solidifies his hatred and conviction, causing him to fully embrace destruction - his attacks post MVA doesn't target just Heroes, but everything and basically everyone.

AND YET. Barely any of this shows up when Deku comes to save Tenko in Chapter 418.

In fact, it starts in Chapter 417, when Nana and Deku intervene in Kotarou's slapping of Tenko. The rest of the family is noticeably absent. The only thing Deku and Nana needed to do was stop Kotarou. That Tenko also had an issue with how the family kept taking Kotarou's side and abiding by the abuse? Not relevant anymore, I guess.

(Also, Tenko actually does believe he's broken, been broken from the start for being born with Decay. He even wonders why Deku would come help him. Somehow "I wasn't broken back then... but it's not like anyone even looked at me," has become "I'm broken and who could ever look at me given the way I am?" Note additionally that Deku doesn't actually discourage this notion. He only says "Well, I'm here to take your hand and give you peace.")

Meanwhile, The Walk is no longer part of Tenko's origin - or at least, not significant enough to warrant a Memory Environment. Yes, it's true that stopping and saving Tenko at The Massacre means Tenko wouldn't go on to walk The Walk, and I suppose you can argue that technically the issue of bystander effect has been solved since someone did finally show up to help. Deku didn't have to help, but he did. He made it his problem to figure out why Shigaraki seemed so sad inside, and he reached out a hand.

But like. The Walk is still a thing that happened? It's still a problem? All those people still ignored a five year old? Deku saving Tenko doesn't mean the old lady suddenly gained a backbone and conscience to not walk away. In fact, it just makes it even more 'not her problem' because after all, a Hero did show up! She did exactly what she was supposed to do - nothing.

It’s just not addressed. To quote @stillness-in-green, “Shigaraki gets way more dangerous to the common civilian after he gets his memories back, and it's a real crock that the story doesn't address that specific turn and what causes it, instead retrenching to "The Slap Bad; AFO Bad.””

I don't like Deku much, and I probably would've rolled my eyes at it, but I did really think Deku would get to be at the memory of The Walk, and he was see all these civilians ignoring Tenko, and he would be gutted and horrified, and maybe he’ll hear what the old lady say about “the police or a hero or somebody will help” as she leaves, and he’ll think something like ‘that's right, a Hero should be helping… but that doesn't mean all you civilians can't even ask if Tenko’s okay and walk him to a police box’, and he would chase after Tenko to save him, and maybe even say something like ‘What you said at Jaku about civilians being coddled. I know it too well that they didn’t want to get dirty. They're trying to support Heroes better now, but they should also support each other. We should all help each other. Let’s change things. I’m here now.’ Because it would make sense and provide a conclusion to this whole thing???

But no. Shigaraki wants to destroy because Tenko was sad he was born with an evil quirk and because of that he doesn't know how to love himself and so the source of the problem ultimately lies with himself. Deku is here to validate his existence so Tenko can feel better that someone accepts him so he can learn to love himself and stop all this nonsense. Except wait it turns out AFO gave him Decay and also turns out AFO manipulated his life since even before his conception so who knows what's even real anymore. Maybe the people on the streets really wanted to help Tenko but AFO made a gas leak fill the city with Asshole Gas and so no one helped and Shigaraki has been operating under a gaslit delusion for the past 15 years and his grievance against bystander apathy is completely invalid. Bummer.

The series hasn't ended yet, and it's possible that the Walk will still be addressed. I've seen it theorized that civilians will show up to help stop AFO and finally save Shigaraki/Tenko like he had wanted all those people on the streets to do all those years ago.

However, without the problem explicitly stated or even known - Deku never sees the family passivity, and he seems to have only caught glimpses of The Walk (and of course has no reaction/introspection/opinion on it) - this feels unlikely. Plus, the recent chapter hasn't filled me with hope or inspiration. The best the civilian could do was offer an All Might t-shirt. That's not exactly "I won't assume a Hero will take care of it and I'll take action myself"; it's more "I'll trust in Heroes even more to take care of the problem." I know that's not exactly fair, in that fighting AFO and helping a lost child are problems of very different magnitudes. But the fact the story hasn't given the civilians an opportunity to ‘redeem’ themselves, so to speak, in the latter case kinda proves my point, I think.

So far, the story seems to think that Shigaraki's issue with passivity and complacency is actually irrelevant. Or has been solved by Deku. Who took on the immense task of saving Shigaraki because he possesses a drive to save others that eclipses all common understanding. So Deku is special, and thank god someone so special existed to save Shigaraki. Because otherwise, Shigaraki wouldn't have been saved. Due to the majority of people being passive and complacent. Which isn't a thing that needs to be dealt with.

(Or, I guess you can say that it was All For One who planted the hatred of bystander effect into Shigaraki/Tenko (if he didn't somehow manipulate the people on the streets (and the Shimura family, previously) into ignoring Tenko), since he did say “Everyone just passed by, pretending not to see, thinking some Hero would save the day. Who decided to make the world this way?” when he first found Tenko. So even that hatred and grudge isn't ‘true’ and we can dismiss it. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)

#nalslastworkingbraincell #very long rant #sorry

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