𝐋𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐧 𝐭𝐨 𝐌𝐞

Ch11

Izuku couldn't fall asleep. He'd been staring at his ceiling in complete silence for the better part of a half-hour.

His body was tired, yet his mind kept him awake.
Like a running film that only aired once, so he was forced to stay conscious of it--curious to see how it would unfold.

For the two years that Katsuki has been gone, the world has since moved on as if he didn't exist in the first place.
Of course, it impacted different persons in a variety of ways, and even struck panic and fear into the hearts of the hopeless.
But the sun still rose, tomorrow still came. Eventually, he was just another casualty that sacrificed himself for the greater good.

Many people, citizens and public figures alike, blamed Izuku for his loss.

If Izuku had just held his own, then he wouldn't have been impersonated, and Katsuki would still be here.

Many were shocked by the cruelty and brutality of the League's plan, because of the depth and lengths they were willing to reach simply to put an end to their two main threats.

It was long debunked, that it was their intention from the very beginning to find Katsuki's weakness, since they'd speculated that he'd likely be their main obstacle in adulthood--they were only half-right, however.

The invasion of UA was revealed to be a ploy, for the villains to snuff out students with ideal quirks, as well as uncover Katsuki's reason for wanting to be a hero
--thus, what he was willing to sacrifice his life for.

Himiko was the one who'd realized his backwards admiration for Izuku, using that to their advantage.

While their strategy was indeed cruel, it was rather over-thought. Why not just kill the both of them at once when they got the chance?

Well, for one thing, they didn't really take Izuku into consideration as anything more than an unsuspecting pawn.

And Izuku often pondered a deeper significance behind it, as if they knew as long as either he or Katsuki was alive, beside one another and fighting, that they would push their very limit, ensuring their opponent's demise.

"Hic..."
Izuku sniffed subconsciously, before acknowledging the warm tears streaming off the side of his cheek and onto his pillow.

"Fuckin'...Tears..."
He mumbled through trembled lips.

He gasped when he heard his phone start ringing, an almost sobering feeling of responsibility quickly preventing him from allowing his emotions to dictate him.

He picked up his cell from the nightstand, drying his eyes as he spoke,
"H-Hello?...W-Wait, slow down, I can't--"

Izuku sat up, kicking his legs over the side of his bed.
He could tell by the concern in the agency-worker's voice that it was urgent, and was gearing up to leave, until he froze completely at the sound of one word.
Or rather, one name.

"What?"
...

"Where is Hero Deku?"

Golden, almost electric flecks sparked from angry eyes like a lit fuse.

Civilians were scattering around the block like ants, seeking shelter and shrieking for help.

He'd struck a vital support beam from within the hospital, which was causing the building to fall sideways.

However, with Ochako's quick-thinking, she managed to use her quirk on the entire structure from the third floor up.
She was still in her room, unable to escape without evacuating all of the patients and staff first.

She didn't have much time left.

"You took them...You took them away from me! The only people who cared about me!"
He yelled, making a spectacle of slowly raising his arms for the final blow on the structure, so that everyone would see just how far he was willing to go to get Izuku's attention.
"Now I'm going to do the same."

A sudden surge of green lightning barely missed the side of Kagayaki's face, zipping past him as he heard something land behind him.

'He's here? When did he-'

Kagayaki felt the tight grip on his arm as he was thrown over Izuku's shoulder.

Izuku remained silent as he restrained him with nothing but strength, since heroes of his agency weren't equipped with any quirk suppressants--meaning he needed to wait until another agency arrived at the scene.

His efforts weren't in vain, since it granted nearby lower rank safety-heroes to now enter the hospital building without fear of intervention.

The people were evacuated, and Izuku even saw the building start to fall apart faster as Ochako was carried out.

He hadn't even noticed that she was using her quirk on the fragments of the building to keep it secure, but it also meant that hear quirk was now terribly strained.

The city was less chaotic than before, as the civilians even began to notice that Izuku was there.

Beyond the guarded point, hundreds of people had begun to gather around the interaction, a wide array of reactions and emotions plastered across various faces.

"Please stay back! It isn't safe!-"
The crowd-control pro was struggling to keep the people at bay, as Izuku only grew all the more conscious of how dangerous the situation was becoming.

"Hero Deku!"
Izuku whipped his head around in time to see three young pros approach them, one of them waving a quirk- cancelling pair of handcuffs.

Izuku always had an issue with those; seeing as when he was wrongfully convicted he'd sported his own pair.

At the time, Katsuki's safety was his immediate priority, whilst the possibility of his quirk being gone etched at the back of his brain as well.

He hadn't felt that feeling in years--the feeling of absolute inferiority, that he was of no use to anyone.

But here he was, assigning that feeling to someone who may have just as well been born powerless like him.

The big difference, would not only be how their morals did not align, but what path they decided to choose from what was set out in front of them.

Izuku, despite not knowing what lifestyle this man had come from, had no intention of making excuses to pity him anymore than he already did.

Two of the pros restrained him as Izuku backed away, allowing them to take responsibility of him from there on out.

He was barely a couple feet away from this man, but he couldn't even see the expression on his face, nor the look in his eyes since they both hung low.

"You...Really are the worst kind of good there is."
He mumbled hoarsely.

Before Izuku could even process what he'd barely made out, Kagayaki managed to slide one of his arms out of the sleeve of his trenchcoat, facing his palm to the open crowd of civilians a few hundred feet away.

"This, is true agony, Hero Deku."

A single, thin beam of light burst into a shining ray from his palm, set straight unto the crowd of people.

Izuku had to act fast.
Irrational, thoughtless strides with the use of his quirk, brought him right before the impact of the ray in a fraction of a second.

The pros regained their grip on the captive, immediately cuffing him and rendering him quirkless.

In a state of panic, one of the three looked up to behold their damage; expecting a life- endangering wound, or the gory remains of what was once the number one pro hero.

What they did witness, however, was far more perplexing.

Nothing.

Pro Hero Deku, was nowhere in sight.