Chapter Text
Another day, another training to endure.
This time, Izuku wakes up ahead of time. Finding himself unable to sleep, he steps out for a walk in the morning air to freshen himself.
He doesn’t expect to meet Aizawa on the way to the bathroom. Aizawa suddenly appears at the turn in front of Izuku, and the boy yelps the moment they collide. “YIP! S-Sorry!!”
“Don’t make such a big fuss.” Aizawa’s morning voice commands and guh, that voice. Coupled with the unkempt level that is him just waking up too— it’s causing all sorts of circuits inside Izuku’s brain to go haywire. “Why are you awake? It's too early.”
“I uh, I don’t know?” Izuku answers honestly, “Maybe I got used to the alarm, sensei?”
“Hm.”
That short hum is all that Aizawa mutters before he strides over and passes Izuku in the hallway, without elaboration. Izuku feels like he wants to swoon.. but maybe that can wait until he answers nature's call.
—·∞·—
Izuku takes a deep breath and begins to wrangle his thoughts into some semblance of order.
Ok, so— good news first, right? Izuku’s body finally shows signs of getting used to One for All. He can feel it when he spars with Tiger, how his body is no longer lagging behind his mind when he executes certain moves, nor do his knuckles snap and crack when he tries shooting air-bullets any longer.
The bad news, of course, follows in a way that it’s actually good news— Izuku is finally becoming more aware of the amount of energy that One for All has housed in his body– and can safely say that he's impressed that his body is still in one piece. From his last bout going all out with All for One against All Might, Izuku roughly summarizes that he is, in fact, still getting stronger, as if he carried an old character's save file stats back to the beginning of the game.
And that’s bad. At some point, Izuku wouldn’t be able to hold onto all the power and, no matter what he does, he’s going to go ‘pop!’ and disappear into a firework of gore.
Which is why it needs questioning. Why is One for All passively getting stronger? Why now? Does time-travel have anything to do with this (who is he kidding, time-travel must have something to do with this) unprecedented phenomena?
Alas, none of those questions can be answered now, because Izuku is busy trying his best to not get pummeled by Katsuki during their spar session. “Stop fucking dodging you shitty Deku!”
“If I stop dodging you’re going to hit me!”
Well, it’s not as if Izuku can’t parry the boy’s punches at all, he does that from time to time, but right now his priority with this sparring is learning evasion.
Of course initially he was going to ask Shouji for help due to his many arms, which can bring a level of variety to the evasion technique he’s trying out, but Katsuki had cut in line and challenged Izuku to a spar himself, so… welp.
“Of course I’m going to hit you dumbass, that's the point!”
Katsuki uses one of his hands to propel forward and deliver another kick, this time aimed at Izuku’s neck, which he dodges by leaning back and, with one foot steadying him, uses the moment to deliver a well deserved uppercut punch to Katsuki’s stomach.
Unfortunately, the blond had seen that coming and pivoted, digging his heels deep into the ground and lunging up with an elbow to the face, something that would definitely hurt them both if it connects, so Izuku makes a turn, leaping far far to the left to get them some distance as he finally decides to end this with an air bullet to the torso—
“Hai- stop!”
Tiger, who is somehow here, snatches Katsuki from his battle trance, much like a big cat holding a smaller, sopping wet kitten that’s hissing madly from being carried, and faces Izuku with a widely smiling face that doesn’t reach his eyes, “Well, well, well… seems that I need to drill more ways to counterattack in you, Midoriya.”
“I-It’s not that I don’t know any, sir.” Izuku bounces back with a prepared excuse he had kept ready in case he was asked this exact question, “Just.. Kacchan is sca- intimidating when he’s fighting.”
“Hell yeah I am!” Katsuki chirps happily at the praise but soon turns to look at Izuku sourly, “But don’t get me wrong, I still am going to hit you one of these days!”
Izuku puts both hands up as a sign of surrender, and Tiger ends the match saying, “Well, if you’re sure that you have the basics down–”
“I’m sure.”
This time, a third voice cuts in and reveals Izuku’s one weakness to the man and to the hissing blond in his grasp, “He can fight, he just doesn’t like doing it without a good reason.”
“A- AIZAWA SENSEI!” Izuku screeches a high pitched scream from the jumpscare, panting, “I- I was supposed to be doing evasion practice today!”
The man in question lazily glances between Izuku, Katsuki, and Tiger— then sighs, “Yeah, no, this isn’t going to work with Bakugou. Pick someone else, Tiger.”
Izuku feels vindicated from the comment, while Katsuki starts to sulk about losing his one chance to beat up Izuku in public without any repercussions coming his way. Tiger, thankfully, listens to Aizawa and changes him to his initial opponent, Shouji.
For a little while, Izuku watches as Aizawa walks away, no doubt going to give his advice to the rest of the pussycats as to how to deal with the other students like him and… Izuku can’t help but smile. Deep down, this Aizawa is still the same man he knows good and well, someone who cares.
—·∞·—
Aizawa feels the stare on his back burn a little longer than it should have, trying his best to ignore how heavily it settles on his shoulders.
He doesn’t know why he had jumped firsthand to stop the spar. He only had an inkling of a feeling that it’ll end up bad for the both parties and the next thing he knew, he had already opened his big, stupid mouth to have Tiger stop the match.
On one hand, he knew well that Midoriya was well-versed with basic counterattack points that would be useful during spars, but for some reason he knew that if said spar involved Bakugou, all of those well-awareness would be rendered mute, as good as gone.
Aizawa is aware that the two shared some unknown past. Something that makes Izuku hesitant in dealing with Bakugou whenever the chance is presented. Aizawa can even presume confidently that, if given the chance, Izuku might be the one to come out on—
Wait a minute. Izuku?? No, it’s Midoriya, why is he calling the kid by his first name…
For a moment, the sight of the dream once again flashes clear for Aizawa. The sight of an empty house, filled with foggy memorabilia and paintings that he doesn’t recognize, and how helpless he feels when inside— of trying and trying again to reach outside, but can’t ever escape the endlessly-stretching halls.
The house of his nightmares once again blips into existence, right in front of Aizawa’s eyes during the daytime and he wonders if this is it. The stress has finally won over if he’s hallucinating in broad daylight.
But another blink of an eye and it’s gone— as if it had never existed in the first place, the sight of the empty house disappearing like a phantom, and Aizawa finds himself back at the training camp with a gaggle of children that he needs to babysit.
‘I’m losing it’, Aizawa thinks to himself as he makes his way to the shade of the treetops, ‘I’m definitely losing sanity.’
“Sensei?”
Asui’s voice calls to him, forcing him to calm down and answer, “What?”
“Your quirk… it’s activated.” The girl says. “Is there something wrong-kero?” She asks, when she means 'Did I do something wrong that you had to stop me?’
And damn, she’s right. Aizawa’s quirk is active, and he feels the static that accompanies his quirk buzz in both ears, his hair not hindering his sight, floating up like a seaweed in the space above and cutting him a somewhat menacing figure.
It takes him counting to three before he manages to de-activate his quirk, and another count to three as he feels the strands of his hair falling back down into place, covering both of his eyes and ears, before he finally faces Asui and Uraraka who are eyeing him with worry. He clears his throat, “Nothing, I was just being too cautious.”
The two girls share a look, Uraraka then nods, seemingly convinced that he is talking about her, and nods. “Alright Sensei, I’ll be a little more careful during this spar, then.”
“Mhm- kero.”
Aizawa thanks god that the two take the flimsy excuses at face value and allow him to move away from them to another, safer area. That area turns out to be the camp building itself.
Aizawa needs to figure his shit out. Since his quirk is active, then this means that he’s not under the influence of someone else. Which means this is, deeply, a personal issue of his and nothing more of the sort.
The nightmare. Why does it affect him so much?! Aizawa would rather hear that he’s going insane than endanger his students and colleagues.
Clearly, it’s not safe with him being outside at this moment, which is fine for him. Tonight onwards, it would be the time where he has to stay inside with the remedial class, allowing him to be in control of himself in contrast to outside– where there’s too much stuff that can go wrong.
Aizawa takes a seat by the genkan of the entryway, taking deep, measured breaths.
When he opens his eyes again, he sees a little kid walking over the hallway. That must be Kota, Mandalay’s nephew and the current obsession of I- Midoriya.
There is a feeling of dissatisfaction as he calls the boy’s name in his mind, like it’s somehow not meant to be called with such distance, but Aizawa couldn’t bother correcting it. He needs to figure out whether this means that he should keep a closer look at the greenet, or he should distance himself from the situation that’s brewing inside of his mind.
Ultimately, it is an easy answer to choose, isn’t it? Aizawa sighs. Starting from now he will try his best to let go of Midoriya from his line of sight to see if it causes anything more than a mild discomfort.
After all, even if he is the traitor to UA, what can a single boy do?
—·∞·—
“Are you sure this is the place?”
“My radar says so.”
“Then this must be the place~! I’m so excited!”
“Curb your enthusiasm, people. The show has yet to begun.”