Chaos & Confusion

Midoriya Izuku sat, slumped against the wall beside the roof access door, staring blankly at the unfamiliar skyline as it changed from robin's egg blue to the golds and oranges of sunset before finally giving way to the few stars that could still be seen through the neon lights of the city.

Would anyone notice

If tonight I disappeared?

Blinking slowly, Izuku pulled an older model cell phone from his pocket. It was dented and scratched, and Izuku had been putting off telling his mother it was broken. For the third time that year.

Tapping the power button to bring it out of sleep mode, Izuku squinted through the spider webbing of cracks in the screen.

11pm.

No missed calls.

No new texts.

Would anyone chase me

And say the words that I need to hear?

Putting the phone away, Izuku reached into the open backpack sitting beside him and pulled out the charred, waterlogged remains of his newest notebook, Hero Analysis for the Future - Volume 13.

Running a finger over the blast marks that rendered the title nearly illegible, Izuku flipped it open, staring at the newest entry: a two page spread of All Might's signature.

Clenching his teeth, Izuku fisted one hand in already disheveled curls as memories, both old and new, whirled through his mind.

That I'm no burden

Not so worthless

Bent so much that I just might break

A toe joint where there shouldn't be one.

The quirk that should be there missing.

A childish nickname given new, hurtful meaning to go with new, hurtful actions.

Dad leaving overseas. Mom taking more and more overtime shifts. Chasing hero fights just to get away from the silence.

Spider lilies on his school desk.

Trying to pretend everything is fine while he's got funeral flowers hidden in his backpack. Again.

All-consuming

So confusing

The questions that keep me awake

Looking up at his mom after that shattering diagnosis, trying not to cry.

'Can I still be a hero?'

His mom is the one who starts crying instead.

'I'm so sorry, Izuku!'

Kacchan sneering after Izuku says he wants to be a hero.

'Yeah? And how are you gunna do that with no quirk, you useless Deku?'

Meeting All Might. The #1 Hero who saves people with a smile. His personal idol and inspiration.

'Can someone without a quirk be a hero?'

'You need to be realistic.'

Would anyone care, would anyone cry

If I finally stepped off of this ledge tonight?

Tearing his eyes away from what, just a few hours before, would have been his most prized possession, Izuku's focus caught and held on the waist-high safety rails running along the edge of the roof.

Unbidden, Kacchan's parting words as he and his cronies left Izuku behind in their classroom earlier that day seemed to echo in the still air.

'Do us all a favor, pray you'll be born with a quirk in your next life and take a swan dive off the roof of the building.'

Would anything change, would you all be just fine?

Izuku wasn't stupid. He knew the statistics. Most quirkless born in the last 25 years died before the age of 16. From suicide, quirk 'accidents', or disappearing all together. The quirkless were a prime target for human trafficking.

Of those in the older generations, before quirklessness became the overwhelming minority, most struggled to gain and keep employment, especially in cities. Usually choosing to retire to smaller countryside communities.

'Cause I need a reason to not throw the fight

It just might save my life

His most likely future featured either death or disappearance. In which case, if it was investigated or reported on at all, he would be reduced to yet another headline of 'quirkless child found dead'. His name and humanity erased into a growing statistical average no one seemed to care about.

And if not that, then he could look forward to applying to one of maybe three high schools that claimed to accept quirkless students. Graduate with poor grades, as quirkless were, of course, unable to achieve good grades on their own merit and therefore had to be cheating, and try to eke out a living in whatever low level employment he could find.

Would anyone want me

If they knew what was inside my head?

Sometimes, in the insomnia ridden hours between the end of one day and the beginning of the next, Izuku could admit that he understood the urge to go villian.

Why some people turned to it out of rage or desperation at a system that cared nothing for those that were different. Those that didn't or couldn't cut themselves down to fit the stylized molds of modern society.

His notebook titles became a sort of morbid, personal in-joke. Hero Analysis could be used in all sorts of ways, after all.

Would anyone see me

For the person that I really am?

For all of that, though, it was never something he'd thought about seriously in the light of day. It wasn't who he wanted to be. He wanted to be a hero!

To lend a hand to those in need. To save whoever needed saving, whether that be by physical rescue or otherwise.

To be for others what his own beloved heros could not be for him.

Were not interested in being, apparently.

I won't lie

So hard to hide

I've never felt worthy of love

Izuku was just... so tired. Of trying so hard to keep going in the face of everything. To keep smiling, just like his idol, All Might!

Except All Might didn't seem to have a smile for Izuku, either.

Did being quirkless really make him so different? Somehow ineligible for something shown to even the villians All Might fought? The assertion that had been replayed in so many news interview sound bites?

'Anyone can be a hero!'

Anyone, that was, except for quirkless, worthless, Midoriya Izuku.

I would give up

Everything I have

Just to feel good enough

Izuku's vision went blurry as silent tears started making their way down his cheeks, splashing across the notebook still open on his lap and warping All Might's autograph even more than the waterlogged pages, still drying out from being tossed into the pond, already had.

Just one person. He just needed one person to tell him his dream wasn't an impossibility. To believe in him. To tell him that if he just worked hard enough, he could make it.

Would anyone care, would anyone cry

If I finally stepped off of this ledge tonight?

Izuku left the notebook to lay where it fell as he levered himself up off the ground and made his way over to the edge of the roof, staring out into the darkness below.

Izuku wasn't sure where exactly he was. He hadn't been able to tell which direction they'd ended up going in when he grabbed hold of All Might as he jumped away. Everything looked different up high and in the dark.

Not that it would particularly matter where he was, he supposed.

Would anything change, would you all be just fine?

It would be a long walk in the dark regardless. Back to an equally dark apartment to pretend nothing had changed in the morning.

And, honestly, had anything changed? He was the same person he had been yesterday. The same person he would be tomorrow. Getting the same answers he'd always gotten.

Would always get.

Cause I need a reason to not throw the fight

It just might save my life

Wasn't that the definition of insanity? Izuku mused to himself as he climbed the short barrier. Doing something over and over and over again, while expecting different results?

Turning his face to the sky, Izuku stared upwards with unseeing eyes as tears kept streaming down his face unchecked.

If nothing was ever going to change... If there was never going to be a different answer... If it was always going to hurt so much, then... maybe...

Izuku closed his eyes.

And tilted forward.

If you're dying inside

Sick of being alive

Let me in, let me share in your pain

Aizawa Shouta paused in his usual patrol route as movement in the periphery of his vision caught his attention. Someone was on the rooftop a few buildings away.

Shouta began making his way over, then cursed and ran as the small figure started to climb.

Rolling onto the roof, Shouta's heart skipped a beat as he saw the kid, they couldn't be older than 15, start to tilt forward. Throwing his capture weapon around the kid's chest, Shouta pulled them away from the edge and into his arms, holding them close as adrenaline rushed through his system. "Hey kid, it's gunna be ok, I've got you."

From my lungs through the dark

Spoken straight from the heart

Let me give you a reason to stay

The kid went limp and started sobbing in his arms, choked voice cutting through Shouta's reassurances, "I can't! I can't keep doing this! Please, just. Just l-let me-"

Shouta tightened his grip and eased them both to the ground, cradling the kid in his lap as his heart broke for whatever had happened to make a lonely rooftop in the middle of the night seem like the best option the kid had left. "Can't do that, kid. I don't know what happened to push you to this, but I promise this isn't your only option. It will get better. Let me help you."

The kid jolted like he'd been electrocuted, head coming up to pin Shouta in place with a watery gaze filled with rage before despair quickly drowned it out. "Better? Better?! I'm quirkless! It's never going to get better, Hero-san! So now you k-know, you can j-just leave m-me here like e-everyone else!"

If you're out there still lying awake

If you're out there still wondering

Shouta knew the quirkless statistics. The growing intolerance and sharply rising death toll in just the years he had been active as a hero were a staggering failure that most of the hero community seemed to be turning a blind eye to.

As an Underground Hero, Shouta had come across more than his fair share of red, Q-branded shoes lined up neatly on rooftops, too late to save the owners from that final choice.

The thought that he'd almost been too late once again sent a cold shiver down his spine and leant a vicious snarl to his voice that startled the boy still in his arms.

"Never. I would never leave you to here. Your quirk status doesn't give anyone the right to hurt you, or decide your worth. Your future is yours, and I swear I will help you get there if you'll let me."

Would anyone care, would anyone cry

If you finally gave up and turned out the light?

Izuku stared at the hero holding him, their eyes blazing with a fierce, determined sincerity Izuku didn't think had been directed his way in... ever, probably.

Izuku wasn't sure he could trust it. He'd had his worldview shattered twice already today between his childhood friend telling him to take a swan dive and his childhood hero crushing his dreams and leaving him in the perfect place to take that advice, but...

A small, tiny ember of hope flickered in his chest like the last, choking gasp of a drowning man lost at sea. If... if he asked the same question, just one, final time... would he get a different answer?

"Can a quirkless person be a hero?"

Izuku could barely hear his own voice as he said it, but watched in fascination as an almost unsettlingly wide grin made it's way across the hero's face, that fragile ember of hope igniting like a bonfire as he replied, "Oh, kid. You are going to be the greatest hero."

The world would be changed if you left it behind

You can't be replaced, no, tonight is the night

You take back your life

Izuku could hardly believe it had only been three months since he'd started training with Shouta Aizawa, underground pro-hero Eraserhead.

It felt like a lifetime of change already, of getting stronger, of having gotten to go inside UA itself to use training facilities Aizawa-Sensei had access to as the class 1-A homeroom teacher and meeting other heros that also worked at the school.

Izuku took a deep breath as Aizawa-Sensei clapped him on the shoulder after the cool down of their last training session. Next up, the UA entrance exam!

Take back your life

Izuku had made it! He was part of class 1-A, he was in Aizawa-Sensei's class, he was going to be a hero!

He had made some really good friends in class and they ate lunch together and trained together and even hung out after!

Izuku still caught himself sometimes, just staring around in awe that he was here, that this was his life now, before one of his friends would nudge him back to the present and he couldn't help but smile, a huge Plus Ultra smile, before rejoining whatever they had been doing.

Take back your life

It was graduation day, and the whole of class 1-A lined up to receive their diplomas from principal Nedzu one by one, friends and family all cheering them on as they walked across the auditorium floor.

Looking out at the virtual sea of people all gathered to cheer them on, Izuku teared up a little as he locked eyes with Aizawa-Sensei, who gave him a small smile and proud nod.

Take back your life

A small explosion of confetti went off as Izuku walked through the door of his office, startling him as his friends all started shouting at once, "Congratulations, #1 hero!"

Izuku laughed and couldn't keep the grin off his face as he accepted rounds of congratulatory hugs and hair ruffles, eventually coming face to face with Erasurehead, who smiled and also gave him a small hug.