Guidance, or To Help (those in need) by orionchildofhades / shwwmf

14. (not edited)

"Give me one good reason not to kill you, kid."

Izuku was standing in an alleyway, between a pile of cardboard and trash. His back was firmly put against the wall, his hood up and his eyes covered by too long black bangs.

"You don't know what I'm going to say, at least wait 'till I'm done," he told Stain.

He had waited a few days before the villain finally reached out. They hadn't said much, only agreed on a time and a place to meet up again, alone this time.

The villain stood tall above Izuku, his shadow cast from the fire escape on the floor a few meters away. The moon was almost full, casting enough light for the teen to see the man's posture. Stiff, careful, no weapon drawn but hand on the hilt of his sword. Stain's face was still covered by his mask but his eyes shone with silver light, observing and attentive.

"We both know that our society is flawed. I don't know when or how, or even who made you come to this harsh realization, and quite honestly I don't care. We agree on one thing : it needs to be changed. The question is how? Do you truly think that killing heroes left and right is going to change anything?"

"I'm killing fake heroes!"

"They're almost all fake! I can count on my hand the heroes that I consider actually worth the title! And not a single one of them is a broadlight hero. You cannot spend your entire life trying to kill every single one of them. It's too slow!"

Stain stared at him harshly. In a blurry of movement he got down and went right up Izuku's face.

"Name them. Name your heroes."

"Thirteen, rescue hero, EraserHead, underground hero, P-"

"And where is All Might in all of this?"

Stain was now right into Izuku's space, looking down harshly, his hand gripping the weapon.

Anger filled Izuku and he let a humorless chuckle escape him.

"All Might? You want to talk about All Might? This has to be a joke." Izuku's eyes met Stain's, hard green against furious red.

The villain raised a knife, rage shimmering underneath his mask.

"If you touch a single hair of mine, you'll be no better than those heroes you pretend to clean the world from. You'll be just another joke, a guy thinking too big of himself. And what a disappointment, Stendhal ."

That got him to stop.

"You want to hear a story? About your so-called true hero? Open your ears, you're going to love this."

Anger, cold and violent, made breathing hard. He took a step off his wall, entering Stain's space just as the man had done before, almost too angry to realize it might be a wrong idea; but the villain seemed stunned and Izuku didn't do much more.

"It's the story of a child, barely a teenager. One of those people that society discarded as useless, I let you have the freedom to imagine what the child looks like, why they are hated, mutant, weak quirk, strange one, not one at all. Your choice. This child's dream was to help. And this child's true idol was All Might, because he is powerful, and strong, he always smiles, never breaks a sweat and always saves the day. The child couldn't imagine a better hero. But one day, as he was trying to run from his life, the bullies from school, the judgmental looks of the teachers, he got attacked by a villain. Alone, scared, he almost died; but no one would have cared would they? That's when his idol arrived. Tall, strong, just like the pictures, his voice booming. He saved the kid, merely but he did it. He didn't get a statement from the child about the villain attack, didn't try to make sure he was okay. The one thing he did was to tell the child that he couldn't be a hero. That he was too weak to help like he wanted to. And he left. The child was left behind, scared and hurt from the villain, his dream shattered. Now tell me. Forget I told you the idol was All Might. What would you do, what would you call the kind of hero who came to 'save' that child?"