Work Text:
Izuku has gotten too used to hiding dead things.
“Oh,” he’s numb, because these things don’t faze him anymore “I fell asleep.” Nothing but cold concrete and brick walls surround him, so Izuku does not try to give the bloated flesh a proper burial. If he were in a forest instead then, maybe, he could’ve bothered in respecting the things left behind.
Izuku does not cringe at the wet, spongy, once-flesh as he scoops it up bit by bit with his bare hands. He does not cry either, even if he thinks he recognises the eyes cupped between his fingers. Emotion is just one more thing to hold advantage over him.
It’s so messy, and despite his best efforts, the blood splatters do not leave the walls or dry from his clothes. It’s all futile in the end. Whatever left behind always ends up leaving permanent stains, whether it be the place where He decided to kill, or in his clothes that seem to be constantly dirty.
Everything is so messy, and Izuku is just so, so tired.
He is sick with waking up after a moments sleep to find things left behind.
The bloated flesh in the dumpster could not be described as a corpse. Izuku finds it better to describe those bloody mounds as things.
(Coward. Call them human, and you cry. Acknowledge what they are, cowardly child.)
Izuku can’t afford to emote, because it’s just one more thing to hold over his head. But, he allows a bit of annoyance leak through once all is left in the alley are pools of blood.
He stares at his own reflection in one puddle of red and viscous blood, his shoes toeing the liquid, soaking up his socks.
“Could you not have at least cleaned up after yourself?”
He waits.
One eye slowly blinks shut, reopening to a slitted pupil, already red in the bloody reflection. The left side of his face goes completely numb, and Izuku watches as a manic grin take over half of his mouth, revealing fanged canines. His right remains wholly blank.
“Hand me the body, and you will never have to see all this blood again.”
“No,” Izuku sighs to the puddle, “I think I prefer seeing the blood.”
“You don’t,” his reflection says. “You hate this. Hand the body and you’ll get the death that you seek.”
“Don’t forget why I want to die. My death means yours.” He smiles thinly, opposing the fanged one on his left. “And I know that scares you more than anything.”
“You will never find a way. Refusing sleep is so futile, do you not see it now?” He is aware of the blood he stares at and the Things hiding in the dumpster. “Wouldn’t it be easier to just give it up? I even promise to leave your mother alone.”
“I am not a fool, Kibutsuji-san. My mother will be the first you would kill.”
“Do not pretend to know me.”
“I am you. Your mind is mine. I know you whether you like it or not.”
“Fool,” his right says, eye manic “many would die whether or not I have this body.”
“Less would,” corrects Izuku, crouching closer to his reflection. “I won’t be giving in anytime soon, Kibutsuji-san. If anything, you should give up. I’ll continue to roam in the sun and refuse rest until I find a way to kill this body.”
“If you weren’t such a coward, then your words could maybe even mean something. Acknowledge those bodies, boy, don’t you recognise them?”
They’re not bodies, Izuku does not say. “I saved them,” he does.
“And look at them now,” Kibutsuji-san mocks. “All your efforts. Futile.”
Izuku almost feels. He stops that.
They must’ve been very confused, Izuku thinks. What did they feel when their rescuer killed them moments after? Were they scared of these red eyes or were they simply confused, because they were green only moments before?
To die confused must be terrible. Izuku would much rather die with surety.
“Did you hear their screams when they begged for mercy, or should I replay it for you myself?”
Izuku nearly cracks. His hand finds a glass shard, broken from a beer bottle. “You. Need to shut up.” Kibutsuji-san does nothing when he stabs through the wrong and red pupil. He hears mocking laughs in his head as red drips from his cheek, sliding down to join the puddle beneath. His blood disturbs the pool, breaking his reflection.
He does not feel relief when his control over his left returns.
This will change nothing, Kibutsuji-san intones loudly in his head. His socks feel disgusting, and he is reminded of the bloodied footprints he leaves behind with each step. Izuku counts the seconds till dawn as he wanders the furthest he can from human life. He doesn’t know where his mother lives anymore. He doesn’t remember the last time he saw her.
His left side remains entirely blindsided, because Izuku stubbornly refuses to remove the glass shard. Walking is even difficult. He should be used to this by now, he chides himself. At some point he removes his socks and shoes, partly so no one follows his bloody footsteps, partly because Izuku cannot stand wet socks. He will miss those. Izuku does not know the next time he will be able to steal a pair that fit his quirkless feet.
Izuku estimates he has another day or two before he completely passes out from exhaustion. When was the last time? He slept? He passes by a window. What reflects is a boy, bloodied by his own doings, and tired by his own self-flagellation. He can’t tell if the purple rimming under his eye is a bruise or just the result of exhaustion. His left socket throbs horribly, like his heartbeats had reached his head.
Kibutsuji-san is silent, disgusted by the human reflection staring back.
Izuku spares no mercy as he rips the glass shard out of his eyeball. It spills blood first, but quickly seals shut and leaves no scar. Like nothing had happened. Pain is only temporary.
If only he knew how to change that.
Izuku continues walking.
He can’t be near anyone when he loses unconsciousness. Isolation has not worked before, but Izuku does not what else to do when the monster inside him can bound across cities in less than an hours work. He’d messed up once, at some point, and now human lives are the price, because Izuku had fallen asleep at the wrong time, once, and Izuku can never again fall asleep at the right time. He’s stupid, an idiot, a fool, like Kibutsuji-san says, Izuku should not exist, like Kibutsuji-san said. What a disgusting body, the dead Demon Lord said, but what potential it has. Izuku does not agree with it. His body is rare, full of potential, adaptable, but it is not special in the way Kibutsuji-san implies. Special is for those associated with the good type of rarities, and Izuku is in no way good. If there is one thing that Izuku can agree with Kibutsuji-san, it is that this body should not exist.
This body should be dead. And if only he knew how to make that true.
Once he’d been desperate enough. Waking up to a mound of bloated flesh was one thing, waking up to a smaller, lesser, mound of flesh is another. Izuku knew he would not die with losing his head, it had only brought pain when his unexperienced hand wielded a blade to his throat, sawed through his own flesh. He knew this, but he had to try, because if death wasn’t a viable punishment for Izuku then pain can only be the next answer.
Killing a child will never be forgiven, not by Izuku himself or the nonexistent Gods that he prays to. The excruciating pain he forced upon this cursed body is nothing but a raindrop in the oceans worth of retribution waiting for him at Hell’s gate. Sometimes Izuku daydreams of it, death, when Kibutsuji-san is tucked away in the deepest corners of his mind. The death that awaits him, the surety he will feel when he finally does. No one else will ever have to suffer at his hand again, this is the final thought Izuku wants to have when he dies. He wants to be sure of this when he does. That is all this sinned body can wish, when his bloodied hands clasp in prayer, to a God that Izuku does not believe in.
There is another thought Izuku cherishes when Kibutsuji-san is away. When the sun is at its brightest. Izuku replays the images burned into his memory. Tsugikuni Yoriichi, where are you now when the universe begs for you? When the world is in most dire of your formidable strength? I cannot hold the monster off forever, Tsugikuni-san, how many children will I kill before you are born again? Izuku traces the scars he knows is hidden on his skin, treating them with the tenderness of a mother with a newborn. He loves them, in some of sick, twisted way. It’s proof that Kibutsuji-san can be hurt in ways that count. It’s proof that with enough blessing that this body can die.
Tsugikuni-san, will you not defy the laws of the universe again? Kill me, Izuku begs, I wait.
Suicide used to be an uncomfortable notion for him, but Izuku believes if he were to die by his own hands, it would not be a death by suicide. You would not label an animals death as suicide like you would a humans, no? Or a monster’s?
Death would be nothing but a blessing, and suicide, by nature, could not be compared to one
“In all my centuries, I have never met a human who begged for death more than you,” Kibutsuji-san sneers in his head. “Humans live and breed and die. What matters death when there will be another hundred to take the place of the ones you kill?
“They are all individuals, Kibutsuji-san,” says Izuku, counting steps “There is no such thing as replacement with human life.”
“Do you really think death will undo all your misdoings? Nothing awaits you at the end, not the punishment you so pathetically desire. Don’t be a fool, you are a rare being, the potential of becoming the ultimate living creature lies within you.” Kibutsuji-san begs him, “Give in.”
“You disgust me,” Izuku simply says. “Go away. Or do I have to rip off my own head to make you shut up?”
“Fool.”
They’ve had this conversation many times. Kibutsuji-san was wrong to think his thoughts of death would be something vulnerable to pick at. The dead Demon Lord retreats.
Izuku sighs. When will this end? Immortality is the very opposite of what he seeks. Centuries alone, off killing in his sleep, would be a worser punishment on him than on the world, he so selfishly thinks. His eyes are getting dangerously heavy, and Izuku is still in the city. He doesn’t know what city, because Kibutsuji-san was the one who dragged him here after he’d made the mistake of closing his eyes for a moment too long. What can he do to prevent that again? Not even burying himself under a mountain can give him the undisturbed sleep his body desperately asks for.
Izuku slaps himself in the face when he blinks for a split second too long. He cannot. Not in the same night. Would he be able to steal sleeping pills from a pharmacy? Would pills even work on his body, or would it burn out of his system before it could take effect? Pills are a bad idea, he concludes, there is no way in knowing that drug induced sleep would prevent Kibutsuji-san taking over his body.
He feels like he’s set on one, endless path. One he can’t escape, because apparently the path is just a big circle. And would you look at that? The path is coated in red, and with every step the hands of the damned try to drag him down to their afterlife. If only, thinks Izuku, if only. Given the choice, Izuku would readily let himself be dragged. Hands, or what were once hands, Izuku feels them, clinging onto cursed flesh at every moment.
A hand lands on his shoulder.
This one he feels.
I’m a child murderer, Izuku almost blurts to get the offending hand away because it’s simply not safe— Stay away.
“My boy,” kind, why is this voice so kind? Are they talking to the right person? “Are you alright?”
What?
“What?” He turns. He’s numb. He’s numb.
“I asked if you were alright,” the stranger says kindly, why is he so kind? “You seem lost.”
“Yes,” Izuku does not choke. “I’m fine.” His skin crawls, and his body begs for the man to release his shoulder. His heart, quiet as it is, tells his limbs to stay put. “I am not lost.”
“It’s very late, my boy.” Eyes so concerned. Why is that? “The streets aren’t very safe at this time.”
Because of me. Because of me, the streets are not safe.
“I’m—“ A murderer. A killer. A monster. A-thing-that-should-not-exist.
“You’re injured!” The stranger says, panicked. Panicked…for him? Haha…? “Your eye—“
“Is fine. It’s just blood.”
“Just blood.”
“I heal,” explains Izuku.
“You’re tired?”
The stranger looks just as tired as he. Izuku has never seen cheeks so hollow, and a body so skinny.
“Nothing that sleep would not fix.” Why is Izuku still here? He should leave. He has to leave. The hand is still there.
Izuku does not leave.
“What caused the injury?” Izuku hesitates. Me. “Oh,” the stranger seems guilty “I shouldn’t have asked— you don’t have to—“
“It’s okay,” Izuku stops him, somewhat awkward. He hasn’t talked to anyone beside the Demon living in his head in…he doesn’t know how long. “I…have to go.”
“Home?” The stranger asks, a small determination hidden underneath the shadows of his eyes.
“Yes,” he says, stilted. “Home.”
The hand lifts. Izuku does not mourn the loss of contact. Neither does he feel anything when it comes back down with renewed warmth.
“My boy, do you not have anywhere to go?”
No.
“No.”
What?
“Would you like to rest at my place for the night? If you’re comfortable with that,” the stranger adds hastily “of course, you don’t have to—“
“I can’t,” Izuku says, numb “I can’t rest.”
“Oh.” And the stranger looks so sad—
Warmth. Izuku does not miss the warmth.
“But…I’d appreciate…a cup of tea?”
“Then tea it is, my boy,” the stranger smiles. Izuku knows he doesn’t deserve it. “My name is Yagi Toshinori.”
“Izuku,” says Izuku.
“Izuku.” Yagi-san says his name so kindly. He does not deserve it. “What tea do you like?”
Yagi begins to walk. Izuku follows, self-aware of his bare and bloody feet. A lump forms at the base of his throat. He swallows it down, along with the beginnings of any emotion threatening to rise. “Green,” he replies, because that’s what his mother liked.
“A good choice,” hums Yagi-san, casual in way a person would be when they are unaware they’re walking beside a child murderer. “I like green tea, too.”
“Oh. Same.”
Yagi laughs.
“So you’ve said, my boy.” He would feel embarrassed, blush even, but Izuku does not dare. Kibutsuji-san cannot be seen now. “I was trained in tea ceremony,” Yagi suddenly informs “a long time ago.”
“Oh.”
“You don’t talk much, do you?”
“Sorry.”
“It’s alright my boy. There is nothing wrong with being a little quiet.”
He knows his face is unsightly, and knows of the blood crusted on his cheek, dried in streams stemmed from his left eye like he had cried blood. Izuku doesn’t understand why Yagi keeps looking at him with those kind eyes, like he were anything less of a monster.
The door to Yagi-san’s apartment is oak. What lies on the other side is almost what Izuku remembers of his mother’s apartment. Clean, but well-lived in. Not big, not small. Modest.
Izuku hesitates at the doorway.
“I can’t,” he says.
Yagi-san blinks like he doesn’t understand. Izuku is very bloody. What is there to not understand?
“I’m dirty,” explains Izuku, slowly. In all ways possible, he is dirty.
“Oh. I don’t have any carpet. It’s fine, my boy.”
“It’s not,” Izuku protests. He should leave. Why is he still here? Monsters don’t deserve tea.
Is that All-Might merch?
Izuku is sitting at Yagi-san’s dining table, hands and feet newly washed of crusted blood. A brew of tea warms his cold fingers. It sits below his line of sight. Izuku has not drank any yet. Would Yagi-san judge if he drank with his eyes closed? He doesn’t want see, even for a moment, what will reflect on the liquid’s surface.
“Is it not to your liking, my boy?”
He closes his eyes, drinking. “No. It’s great.” But he can’t take another sip, his eyes felt far too heavy when he closed them. “Sorry. I’m just tired.”
“When was the last time you slept?”
Izuku can only shrug. Yagi-san looks so worried. He shouldn’t.
“I apologise if I’m overstepping here, but, is there truly nowhere for you to go?”
“I don’t know. I’m.” Izuku holds the cup tighter. “Trying. It’s difficult.”
“I’m sorry, it must be difficult.”
“Don’t. It’s fine.” He holds his palm overtop now lukewarm tea. His skin looks like a corpse’s under the cool white light. Sickly, like how Kibutsuji-san hates. Izuku curls in on himself. He should leave.
“Can you tell me about tea ceremony, Yagi-san?”
But he is selfish.
“Of course,” Yagi-san smiles. It makes him look healthier than he is. “My…teacher was an exuberant woman, I’d never expected her to know the art, and I definitely did not expect her to offer to teach it to me.”
Yagi-san tells him a very mild story, and explains the steps to a tea ceremony just as such. He’s very fond of his teacher, Izuku can tell as much, his smile gets a lot warmer when he talks about her. Izuku cannot not think that he may recognise it. That smile is kind in ways he’s seen before. It’s comforting in ways he does not deserve.
Izuku feels exhaustion lay on him like a weighted blanket. The only hand he is aware of now is the one that left a lingering warmth on his shoulder. Yagi-san does not have a nice voice, but it is nicest he’s heard in a very long time.
(His eyes close. He is so exhausted. This body yearns for rest.)
(Izuku is so, so tired.)
He slaps himself before he even dares. The tea cup shatters.
Yagi-san looks horrified.
(Finally. The reaction he deserves.)
Apologies fall from his lips like an endless stream. Shame fills him dangerously, he should’ve left, instead of selfishly staying where he shouldn’t be staying. Izuku pushes himself out of his chair, falling to his knees like he’s beginning a prayer, picking up the shattered porcelain with his bare hands. Blood beads on his palms. It is not even painful.
(“Izuku,” someone calls “Izuku, stop it. You’re hurting yourself.”
“It doesn’t. It doesn’t hurt.”)
Izuku tries.
The spilled tea stares back.
His left goes numb.
“Fool,” Kibutsuji-san greets, veins bulging from pale skin. Red eye narrowed in vehement disgust. “Get off your knees. This body should not kneel.”
He is exhausted. Izuku tries but cannot stop the leg as it jerks his body into a forced stand. His right remains limp, body left leaning heavily on one side like a broken stringed puppet.
“My boy, what is wrong?”
Kibutsuji-san.
“Yagi-san,” says his right. “And who. Is this,” his left. The red and wrong eye slides towards Yagi-san. His heart pounds, forgetting that it should remain quiet. Yagi-san’s kindness is gone.
“Yagi-san,” strains Izuku, heartbeat jackhammering. His bones crack and shift, joints popping as Kibutsuji-san bares the sharpening claws growing from his fingertips. “Please turn away.” Violent intent seethes, bubbling up like magma erupting from a volcano. So potent, that Izuku feels it affect him when this body is supposed to be his.
There is already blood on his hands, he does not want to add more. Not Yagi-san’s, who’d shown kindness to a monster like him.
Steam rolls off the feeble man. Izuku finds that Yagi-san’s eyes glow a crystal blue where they are hidden underneath shadow. His will makes Izuku uncomfortable.
“Do not try,” pleads Izuku, bleeding from the palm “do not try to fight.”
Kibutsuji-san is not as fast as he thinks, because this cursed, wretched body, is still Izuku’s. Before the claws reach Yagi-san crystalline eyes, Izuku stabs through his first, the porcelain shard he’d kept parting deep into his crimson orb.
Blood, his own, splatters across Yagi-san’s horrified face. They are that close. Yagi-san was that close to death.
“You should’ve turned away,” Izuku says, forcefully hollow. He doesn’t allow himself to be hurt by the twisted expression Yagi-san wears. His hand drops from where he were a hairs width away from gouging out Yagi-san’s eye. “I’m leaving,” he blinks, porcelain still shoved in deep. Pain. But Izuku deserves it. “Don’t follow me. I’ll kill you.”
Kibutsuji-san mocks him as he runs away, like the coward Izuku knows he is.
Blood streams from his eye like tears.
But he doesn’t cry. Not even monsters deserve to cry.
Izuku remembers warmth. How dare he. Be so selfish. Drinking tea, seeing smiles that should not be aimed at something like him.
Look what you’ve done. The blood on dripping down his cheek may as well be Yagi-san’s. How could you let yourself pretend that you were deserving of someone kind?
Kibutsuji-san scoffs. Pathetic, he sneers.
Yes, agrees Izuku, pathetic.
He does not stop running.