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It’s a reflex his co-workers will never understand, and in truth, Yagi barely understands it himself.
He doesn’t blame Mic. The man doesn’t know any better. It’s all in good fun that those playful hands reach forward, fingerless gloves intent on tucking Yagi’s tufts of blond behind his ears to see how it would look. But as the first curve of a fingertip brushes his neck, skin-on-skin, flint-on-flint, sparksfirepain— Yagi’s own hands fling forward in panic. One palm into Yamada’s chest, the other slamming straight into his jaw; Present Mic staggers backwards as the rest of the faculty shoot to their feet, Aizawa’s own desk chair clattering to the floor in his haste. A mortified Yagi covers his mouth, blood and spit speckling his palm as a stunned cough tears through his attempted apology.
“Mic, I’m s—” Yagi rasps, “s-so sorry, please forgive me—”
“Hey, hey, it’s all cool, man!” Yamada says, flashing a wincing smile as he examines his jaw. “Geez, you may not be muscle might anymore, but you still can pack one hell of a wallop!”
“What happened,” Aizawa says, more demand than question.
Yagi’s face flushes, bony fingers weaving at nothing, a web of words that refuse to knit together.
“C’mon, isn’t it obvious?” Yamada says, and Yagi’s anxious eyes dart up. He opens his mouth to defend himself, but Yamada’s piercing voice stops him short. “The Symbol of Peace has one weakness indeed: He’s ticklish!”
Yagi sighs in relief, hugging himself with a quiet chuckle. “Yes, that’s exactly it.”
The rest of the U.A. faculty softens, settling back at their workstations. Cementoss offers Yagi a tissue as the man sinks back into his own chair, and Yagi accepts it with a mouthed “thank you,” which he hopes isn’t twinged with blood-stained teeth.
“Hey, it’s nothing to be ashamed of, mighty man!” Yamada continues as Yagi wipes his mouth. “You should see Shouta when someone tickles his feet.”
Aizawa scowls, easing his chair back upright. “Leave me out of this.”
“Hey, you chose to interrogate the guy!”
“It was one question. Hardly an interrogation.”
Yagi sets aside the tissue with a quiet wheeze. Clears his throat as thin fingers rest back on his keyboard, the chatter fading to static in electrified air. The hairs on his neck still stand on end. Shaky fingers trace the keyboard before him, taking in the ridges between each dust-laced key.
He swallows and feels it all: the salty trickle of blood, the bob of his Adam’s apple, the warm flush of air as his breaths resume yet again. And the touch on his neck still lingers, like whorls of fingerprints seared into his skin, burning so bright the smoke still chokes at him after all these years.
Yagi dips his head in shame. Waits for the smoky memories to rise above his stinging neck, takes a deep breath, and gets back to work.
It’s the night after Kamino, and the dream’s returned. By now, Yagi knows it from its scent alone: the soft breath of fresh rainfall is masked with the heavy rot of damp garbage, back alley dumpster festering in his periphery. And yet he isn’t lucid enough to escape, he never is, not even as those all-too-familiar hands slam into his back full force, sending his skull smashing against the sharp edge of the dumpster. Blood gushes over Yagi’s brow as he’s whirled around. A frightened cry stops short as those deadly hands find his throat.
“Beautiful,” All For One sneers, that piercing grin the only white in an alley swimming with dark. Yagi snatches at the man’s strangling grip, but the fingers only curl tighter into his skin. “Look at you now, All Might. The most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”
Yagi’s heels scrape desperately at the concrete as All For One arches him back over the edge of the dumpster, spine screaming at the cut of metal in his lower back. But it’s the hands at his neck that rattle him most, oxygen in his throat replaced with rising bile, head pounding as All For One constricts tighter, tighter…
“This is how you were always meant to be,” All For One’s grin peels wider with every squeeze of his grip. “Withered skin and broken bones, trapped in my hands like a bug set to be crushed. Begging for this pathetic thing you call a life.”
“I—I won’t—” Yagi chokes out, but All For One shoves him back further, rancid garbage soaking into his hair and the throbbing wound in his head. The snatching has grown to frantic scratching now, Yagi’s nails raking down the undying grip on his neck. Thumbs bury straight into his windpipe, and it’s as if his organs are cracking, crumbling in the fragile cage of his throat.
A monstrous splintering noise and an even more monstrous grin, and Yagi’s swimming vision takes in the black tendril twisting from All For One’s spine. The spike winds into a red-laced claw, slinking towards Yagi’s trembling body. Yagi jolts as the claw finds its way beneath his shirt, dagger-tipped fingers resting on the pink blossom of his scar.
“Beg.”
And they dig in deep, a searing sun colliding with the galaxy of his body, and Yagi lets out a strangled shriek. Bloodied and brutalized and burning, Yagi writhes madly, pleading with pinprick eyes. Every touch against his skin just crushes deeper in response, All For One’s laughter echoing across the tear-blurred stars overhead.
And he begs. Shame choking him as much as All For One’s merciless grip, like every other damned time he’s been here, he begs.
The black hole in Yagi’s throat smothers it all.
“Hm. Is it supposed to be this tight?”
“Don’t tell me the world-famous All Might has never worn a necktie before,” Midnight says, giving the fabric one last tug. Yagi feels his lungs hitch inside his massive chest, but the man musters a smile as always. Despite knowing the pro by name for a year or so—Nemuri Kayama—he hasn’t known her long enough to feel comfortable objecting. Besides, it’s true; he’s worn a tie to plenty, be it press conferences, award ceremonies, or everything in between. But for the longest time he’s gotten by with cleverly crafted clip-on ties, not whatever formalwear this interview was sponsored by. Desperate to focus on something other than the pressure on his neck, he rifles through the selection in his head: Burgundy, navy-striped, one patterned with his signature hairstyle. All way more merciful than winding olive boa coiled tight around his throat.
“All Might,” the familiar voice to his left steals his attention, and he glances to Sir Nighteye, seated stiffly in the chair neighboring his. His sidekick’s eyes swim with concern, vivid even behind the glare of his glasses, and Yagi can’t decide if it’s a blessing or a curse that Nighteye knows him so well.
“I suppose I can be a bit rough,” Midnight ponders suddenly, and Yagi tenses as her sharp nails graze the skin of his neck, loosening the tie slightly. “Is that better?”
Yagi doesn’t relax until her hands drop from him, sweat pasting the hair at the nape of his neck. He clears his throat, summoning his broadest smile. “Very much so. Thank you, Midnight!”
“My pleasure,” Midnight says, though the man in Yagi’s periphery is still unconvinced. Yagi glances away from Nighteye and into the camera, his sweat-speckled face reflected in its inky black eye.
Midnight’s hand meets his cheek, redirecting his vision to the interviewer settling across from them. “Come on, let’s keep those wandering eyes under control. You’ve done this before, haven’t you? Just pretend the camera isn’t even there.”
“Right,” Yagi nods, fingers climbing to his neck to tug at the still-strangling necktie. He watches Midnight out of the corner of his eye, wiping her sweaty palm upon her tights. “Sorry.”
“All Might,” Nighteye says again, though Yagi tries to smile past the pressing tone of his partner’s voice. “What’s bothering you?”
“Bothering me?” Yagi’s artificial smile starts to sting at his cheeks. “What do you mean? It was just a minor wardrobe malfunction, Nighteye—wouldn’t even call it bothersome!”
“Well, for one, you’re sweating up a storm,” Midnight says. “Not getting stage fright already, are we?”
“Ha!” The laugh bursts loud, too loud, forcing through the noose at his neck. “Wouldn’t dream of it!”
Nighteye furrows his brows, but settles back in his chair without objection. Yagi looks to the interviewer, smile still plastered above his aching throat. Questions and notes shuffle in the woman’s hands, and Yagi studies them, desperate to busy his mind. The voices are muted as the interviewer thanks Midnight, as Midnight responds in turn, as the set director readies for action. Yagi’s eyes don’t leave the interviewer’s hands. There’s stray makeup powdered between her fingers.
“So, first of all, I’d like to thank you both for being here today,” the interviewer starts. “You two are busy guys, so I’ll jump right into the question on everyone’s mind…”
The words ebb and flow through the waves of heartbeat in his ears. Every hair on his neck would be standing, were it not for the fabric smothering them now. He focuses on her nails, rose-red with polish, bold as the blood straining to pulse through his jugular.
“…All Might, you just broke the record for the most consecutive years as Number One Hero, an unprecedented streak…”
He attempts to subtly adjust the tie, but the fabric just cuts deeper, burrowing into his skin like an animal refusing to relinquish its prey. A thick swallow struggles against the knot, and he almost can’t get the saliva down. He chokes back a stifled cough, the film in his constricted throat bubbling denser, and he fights the urge to claw himself free—fingers fumbling, lungs jolting, no no dammit he needs this off he needs this off right now—
“…How on earth are you feeling about all this?”
“I’m sorry—” Yagi gasps out, bolting up so quickly his interview chair topples to the floor. He fumbles it back upright with trembling hands, mumbling out another apology before rushing out the door and into the studio hall.
The tile below him spins as he worms a finger into the loop of the tie, wriggling the digit until he eases just a bit of slack against his burning neck. One deep breath. Two. He hears the door creep open mid-wheeze, and he whirls around with a prepared smile, only to relax at the sight of Nighteye in the doorway, shooing back any curious crew members.
“Please, let me,” Nighteye insists to the last of the staff tailing him, and Yagi watches over his shoulder as the stragglers finally disperse. Nighteye doesn’t say a word until the door shuts in full, and then his attention turns entirely to Yagi.
“All Might,” he starts.
“It’s nothing!” Yagi says quickly, tugging the fabric a bit more with his snaked-in finger. “It’s just—th—the tie.”
“Ah,” Nighteye says, visibly relieved. “Were you bothered by it too? Honestly, I don’t know who thought green would be a good color for you, you obviously look best in primary c—"
Yagi’s knuckle slips against his Adam’s apple, a pressure he was far from prepared for. The breaths surge quick from him again, and Nighteye stops mid-sentence, looking to All Might as realization floods his features. He swoops to Yagi almost instantly.
“Off,” Nighteye demands, starting immediately on removing the tie. “We’re taking it off.”
“No, I shouldn’t—” Yagi says, jolting as Nighteye’s cold fingers meet his neck. Nighteye pulls back quickly, pausing to allow his partner a moment to calm, and then returns to his task with a focused effort to avoid Yagi’s skin. “It’s a paid sponsorship.”
“You’re already wearing their suit and their undershirt,” Nighteye says, working carefully at the knot. “You’ll look just as good without this, if not better.”
“Mirai.”
Nighteye pauses at the sound of his name, eyes flitting up to Yagi’s. Yagi can see his own aching stare reflected in the man’s glasses, and the sight floods him with shame.
“They’ll ask,” he says quietly, “and I…don’t know how to answer.”
He needn’t say more. Nighteye knows the story behind it all, revealed over a late-shift office dinner that felt private under the cover of midnight. It’s a secret meant to be shared intimately, over a desk covered in takeout boxes and the quiet of window-hazed starlight, not in an overcrowded studio booth under the glare of spotlights and strangers.
“Then,” Nighteye ponders for a moment, eyes drifting back down to the stubborn tie, “put the blame on me. Tell them I made you take it off. It’s not a lie, after all.”
“Nighteye, I’m not going to force that on your shoulders—”
“Well, I’m not going to force this around your neck.”
The stern sentence hangs in the air, and both men fall silent as Nighteye finally gets the knot loosened.
“Hold still,” Nighteye says quietly, “I’ll try not to touch your neck, I only want you to be prepared just in case.”
Yagi nods wordlessly, holding his breath as Nighteye undoes the cloth with careful fingers. The strangling fabric relents in his sidekick’s hands, and Yagi pulls in a heavenly inhale as Nighteye removes the tie in full.
“As for why you left the room, tell them you sensed someone in danger, but everything’s handled now,” Nighteye rolls the olive cloth and Yagi watches, a residual tingle still buzzing against his neck. “Again, not a lie, and you don’t have to disclose that the person was you.”
“So, I left to save someone…and then you made me remove my tie?” Yagi rubs the back of his neck, cringing at the sweat sticking his hair. “Seems a bit out of nowhere…”
“Is it that far-fetched? You know my attention to detail, and this is one I wouldn’t overlook.” Nighteye brandishes the rolled-up tie between two disgusted fingers before tucking it in his pocket. “Look at it, it belongs in your office shredder.”
“No, no, it makes enough sense,” Yagi concedes with a heavy sigh. “I just…hate to disappoint anyone—”
“All Might.”
Yagi looks to his partner, the buzz finally starting to fade from his throat. He knows what’s coming, but the sincerity in Nighteye’s tone makes the words sink in deeper.
“You don’t owe anyone an explanation. Not for taking care of yourself.”
A swallow. A breath. Then finally a true smile from the Symbol of Peace, subtle but genuine.
“Thank you.” Yagi’s whisper is so quiet he’s worried for a second that Nighteye missed it, but regardless, his partner’s now lost in studying Yagi’s collar.
“Unbutton the first few buttons,” he suggests.
“Oh—” Yagi fumbles at the buttons with massive fingers, finally getting a couple undone after a bit of effort. “Like this? Why?”
“A lot less pressure on your neck,” Nighteye says, reaching forward to perfect the dip of the collar. “And with a bit of adjustment, the press will be so distracted they won’t even remember the tie.”
“O—Oh!” Yagi says again, cheeks flushing pink.
“If you’re comfortable with that.”
“More comfortable with that then, well, that,” Yagi gestures loosely to the necktie pocketed away. “But yes! This is fine. More than fine.”
“Good,” Nighteye sighs, offering one last adjustment to the collar. “Now then. Are you ready to go back in there?”
“Hm? Oh, yes, of course!”
Yagi starts for the door, but Nighteye stops him with a gentle hand against his chest. It’s warm. Caring. Just brushing his bare skin, where the hero’s heartbeat is finally starting to slow.
“I know All Might is ready,” Nighteye looks at him, words quiet. “Is Yagi ready?”
Yagi sighs, another grateful smile flickering across his lips. Wordless, Yagi places his hand over Nighteye’s, the slender fingers practically disappearing under the hero’s own. A moment of silence, only the steady heartbeat pulsing deep under their palms.
“…Maybe a minute more,” Yagi says finally.
When the nightmares chase him to America, he attempts, just once, to run. He flees with burning calves past the putrid dumpster, pools of rainwater erupting around each slam of his feet. The last sprinkles of rainfall stab at his face: a face youthful, pink-cheeked, and dripping with sweat and fear.
Rain-slicked ground against too-new shoes, and Yagi slips with a yelp, concrete smashing against his forehead and tearing open his brow. Blood mingles with rainwater on the pavement as the young man rises to shaky limbs, blinking the stream of red from his lashes.
That cursed hand snatches a fistful of his hair.
“No—” Yagi whirls on his aggressor, fists flying at any body part he can hit. He feels his knuckles meet skin, muscle, bone—but the man does not flinch. The concrete bites at Yagi’s legs as he’s dragged ruthlessly across, snatching madly for the grip burning at his scalp. The sour scent of garbage floods his senses, and he digs his heels into the pavement as the filthy dumpster fills his periphery—
A release on his hair. He scrabbles at the ground. Too slow, always too slow—the hands grip his broad shoulders and spin him against the dumpster, before shooting to the soft skin of his neck.
“You’re a dedicated one,” All For One sneers, slowly easing Yagi up the side of the dumpster. The man’s grip buries into the crook of his chin as it lifts, and Yagi’s strained throat gasps fruitlessly, oily stains dampening the arc of his back. “Crossing entire oceans to escape me. In truth, you should thank me for the opportunity. Seeing the world already, at such a wonderfully young age.”
“Stop—” It’s all Yagi can manage before All For One twists him over the edge of the dumpster, heavy garbage bag toppling straight against his head, wet filth trickling into his pounding ears. The hands clench tighter, and Yagi lets out a soundless cry, kicking at nothing.
“So young,” All For One says again, the trash bag beginning to leak a stinging liquid into Yagi’s wound. “So full of life. It’s almost bittersweet to see it end like this; those terrified eyes won’t be the same without that brightness screaming behind them.”
Yagi grits his teeth, chest heaving as All For One wrings every ounce of air from his body. A wandering thumb finds his jugular. Presses deep, until Yagi can feel All For One’s pulse thrumming against his own.
"But there is one moment that makes the loss worth it,” All For One says, curling those merciless hands tighter. “Watching those helpless eyes as the last drop of light drains away.”
Yagi shuts his eyes in protest, mouth flying open with a sharp choke as his assailant squeezes harder than ever before. Tears bubble from screwed-shut eyelids, mingling with the gummy filth now staining his cheekbones.
“Open your eyes, you pathetic child,” The voice hisses in his fluttering skull. “Let me see it.”
Yagi whimpers, shaking his head in stifled jerks under the crushing hands. His body spasms. His kicks are weakening, and it takes him a second to notice the concrete scraping his heel—he’s peeled back the sole of his shoe in his panic. And he feels the hands grasp tighter, the man ease closer…until hot breath brushes between the fingers at Yagi’s neck.
“Unless you’d rather hear me reminisce on how I killed her,” All For One whispers. “How you let me kill her.”
All For One eases back. Yagi’s eyes slip open. Only a sliver, hidden under lashes, the last dying breaths of defiance.
"Where I can see them, All Might.”
Lungs hitching, head stinging, that excruciating grip…It’s all nothing compared to losing her again, even in the blurring lens of his mind. So Yagi opens his eyes, pink from blown blood vessels and still-flowing tears, and stares helplessly at the man choking the life out of him.
“So obedient for me,” All For One croons. “Shimura would be proud.”
Yagi feels his blood thundering in the strangest places: the crooks of his thighs, the curves of his wrists, and in the drying wound matting his brow. It burns. Every inch of him, writhing, searing, burning like hell, wide eyes unblinking, fogged with liquid garbage and pleading sobs.
One last squeeze molds the bruised clay of his throat, and Yagi prays the light fades fast.
Something in the breeze smells like blossoms. Mingling with the taiyaki still lingering on his tongue, Yagi’s senses are flooded with sugar, a sherbet sunset melting into dusky plum as his patrol draws to a close. These milk-and-honey days are what he lives for, a nice reminder among the rigor of hero work that there is, indeed, some good in the world.
The afternoon’s been a productive one: Following lunch with Gran Torino and Nana Shimura, Yagi’s bounced from odd job to odd job, reuniting a lost child with his mother and rescuing a kitten that had squirmed into a car engine. Aside from some sporadic rainfall that afternoon, the most high-stakes event was a purse snatching at a bus stop—and Yagi had it resolved before the robber had even fled two steps. While a bit dull, Yagi prefers the slower patrols; the fewer civilians in danger the better, even if he has to resort to people-watching and daydreaming to fill the gaps.
The boy drinks in the sunset glow scattered across diamond skyscrapers and lingering puddles, mentally noting the sign at the crosswalk—he doesn’t even need to look away to know she’s here. Indeed, his master fills his periphery moments later, raven locks and dove-white cape both aflutter as she crosses the street and stops at his side.
“We meet again, young Might,” Shimura greets him dramatically.
Yagi chuckles, shaking his head. “Why do you say that every time we cross here?”
“Because it’s accurate, isn’t it?” she says. “This is where our patrols intersect, so we meet again. And again, and again, and again.”
She pokes him gently with each word, motherly as always, finishing with a sneaky tickle at Yagi’s neck. Yagi shrinks with a crinkle-nosed snort—despite a physique on the cusp of adulthood, his laugh still rings with the warmth of a child.
“Hrk—Hey! We’re still on duty, you know!”
“What, it’s unprofessional to say hi to my apprentice?” Shimura musses his hair, and Yagi chuckles again. “But I’ve got to hand it to you, Toshinori, you don’t like wasting a second of these patrols. So I won’t distract you anymore, alright? Let’s get back to it.”
“No, wait,” Yagi says, face falling. “I mean—I’m not trying to rush you off or offend you—”
“No offense taken,” Shimura reassures him, and Yagi lets himself relax. “Your work ethic’s a good trait to have. Just holler if you need me, okay? You know I’m never far.”
“Yes ma’am,” Yagi nods, “I will!”
Shimura takes three steps before whirling on her heel and returning to him, digging in the pocket of her hero outfit. “Oh, before I go—” she unveils a cleanly-folded flyer, offering it to Yagi with a flourish. “Guess who’s favorite mochi shop has a hero’s discount going tonight?”
“Wh—really?” Yagi’s eyes widen, and he accepts the flyer, unfolding it eagerly. “And I qualify with just my provisional license?”
“Sure do,” Shimura says. “Though it’d be my treat anyway, you’ve earned it.”
“And you said it’s…” Yagi looks over the flyer, then furrows his brow. “Wait, mochi? We—We had taiyaki at lunch!”
“Exactly, so don’t tell Sorahiko,” Shimura winks. “Either he’ll eat himself sick or train you ‘til you’re sick for ‘overeating’.”
“Sounds a little hypocritical…” Yagi muses, before realizing he’s thinking out loud. “Oop! I—er—don’t tell him I said that? Please?”
“So long as I see you there after patrol,” Shimura says, “your secret’s safe with me.”
Yagi can barely suppress his smile. “Absolutely,” he beams. “I’ll be there.”
With one last chuckle and ruffle of his hair, his master starts off down the sidewalk, easing into a slight jog.
“O-oh, and thank you!” Yagi calls, bowing quickly in gratitude as Shimura glances over her shoulder. “Thank you so much!”
A smile, a nod, and then his master’s onwards once more; distant, turning, gone.
Yagi glances over the flyer one last time before tucking it into his pocket, smile still warm on his cheeks. These are still work hours, and patrol’s to be at the forefront of his mind for just a bit longer. But as he starts back down the sidewalk, he can already taste the irresistible sweetness yet to come, and he finds himself eager as a child for some quality time with his master—with his mother—and the beautiful mundanity of evening streetlights and pastel treats on their tongues.
“Please…”
The wavering voice stops him in his tracks. Yagi’s breath stills, the familiar buzz in his scalp alerting him to something—someone—crying out for aid.
“Someone please…help me…”
The boy’s eyes dart leftward. The mouth of an alley snarls back at him, dark under the shadow of the looming night, but the electricity in his skull tells him that this is the way he needs to go. So he starts. A step, a jog, a sprint—past a festering dumpster, through lingering puddles from the earlier rainfall, towards a sole man’s voice at the end of the passage—
“It’s alright now,” Yagi calls out, the most familiar consolation he knows, “I am here—”
A pair of pale hands lunge from the dark.
One at his neck, the other meeting his jaw. Yagi yelps in surprise, swinging a blind punch at his assailant, but as soon as his fist makes impact, the force erupts back into his arm. The limb recoils in a massive wave of pain, and Yagi cries out again—the mere seconds are long enough for the hand at his jaw to join the other at his throat.
“So, this is who she chose,” the man says with a chilling calm, smile aglow in the cryptic dark. He starts to lift Yagi by the neck, but the hero refuses to back down, kicking fruitlessly at his attacker. “Even with all that gallant muscle, there’s still that unmistakable innocence in those eyes of yours. Why, you’re practically a child.”
A squeeze, a gasp, sparksfirepain—Yagi scratches desperately at the hands around his neck, scraping ruts into the crushing fingers that refuse to loosen their grip. His entire neck is straining; blood in arteries, air in windpipe, screaming and throbbing and clotting fire-hot in his chest—
“It’s quite good then,” the man continues through the blood sloshing in Yagi’s ears, “that I’m not above smothering you before you learn to walk. Before you learn to crawl, even.”
Yagi pictures his spine crushed to grit, his jugular burst beneath his skin, his windpipe crumpled like tinfoil in the mangled mess of his throat. He thrashes through the pain, one hand scratching, the other fist flying with his kicks, ignoring every recoil in a manic rush of adrenaline as he fights like hell for just a single gasp of air.
“You’re just a fragile little newborn, aren’t you?” the voice intensifies over the flurry of strikes, and Yagi feels his body lurching as the man starts towards the dumpster. “A skull rife with soft spots. One I could shatter like glass.”
He chokes down half a breath as the hands release—then a grip in his hair, a rush downwards, and a deafening crash of metal against bone. Searing pain erupts from Yagi’s forehead as he slumps to the pavement, and his head spins as hot blood pours across his brow. Crimson’s spattered across the struck edge of the dumpster, and mottled along his gasping lips, but Yagi’s already scrambling to all fours on the wet concrete, dizzily trying to plan out his next heroic defense—
The hand sinks into his hair again, and a scream tears through him for his master.
“Come on now, let’s not throw a fit.” The grin is still plastered across the man’s face as he yanks Yagi up, locking his free hand once again around his throat. Yagi’s spine pops loudly as he’s shoved backwards over the dumpster’s edge, cushioned by leaking garbage bags as the second hand finds his neck, squeezing tight. “You’re supposed to be a hero.”
The boy’s vision is a mess: maroon blood, rancid yellow liquid, and a vicious white grin, all ablaze behind the black dots dancing in his eyes. Yet still, he fights, chest hitching with each empty breath, even as the colors begin to blur with frightened tears. And his neck—God, his neck—wrung tighter by the second as he kicks and punches and wails those soundless screams—
"There’s nothing quite like a hero's experience, is there?” the man sneers, clenching so tight that his own hands are shaking. “When a real villain leaves bruises on that darling little throat. Squeezes the innocence from those eyes until it all drains out in tears.”
Yagi does not know it yet, but she is on her way to save him. To wrench him free from hands that have molded centuries of death, the same now squeezing fingerprints into the curve of his quivering neck. He will scarcely have time to follow her from the alley, to mop the blood from his wound before she pushes him away. And he will be strangled again, this time by grief, crying himself to sleep for nights on end with empty lungs and bruises on his neck.
“Heroism, my boy, is pain. Suffering.”
He will try to move on. Presume himself recovered. Won’t expect the panic that stabs him when Gran Torino once strikes his neck during training: the reflexive assault from a terrified Yagi that leaves them both rattled, pale, and ending practice early. He will have to learn; learn to smile through the years of vice-tight neckties and workplace misunderstandings and jolting from nightmares with a pounding heart and aching neck. And finally, he will grow old (but not old enough), and every time he feathers those thin fingers down his throat, he will find more crescent nail marks; tiny moons orbiting the sun of his windpipe, catching and snuffing every solar flare of breath.
“Nameless martyrdom in an alleyway dumpster, left to rot like the filth you truly are.”
He does not know that in minutes, he will lose her. He will lose everything. Everything but the smell of a rotten dumpster and the breathless cry buried deep in his throat; an ever-present noose of a memory, just waiting for Yagi’s trapdoor to fall.
“Let me show you, All Might,” the voice echoes—and will echo, again, and again, and again— “what it means to be a hero."