Izuku leans over the railing and his body folds above it. The building goes down, down, down, stories upon stories of windows and apartments. The streets below are rampant with people. From all the way up here, they look like little ants to Izuku. He knows that soon he would become an ant too and people would walk all over his tiny body.
A stifling breeze ruffles his hair and its fingers thread through the green locks. The door that leads to the roof of the building rattles behind him, yet he still stays in his position. He knows it isn't a person, it's simply just the wind knocking on the door. Izuku knows this roof like the back of his hand; he comes up here every day, after all.
Every day he treads up his apartment complex's stairs after school, picks the lock, and leans over the railing. Sometimes he imagines himself falling over it(intentional or not, he's daydreamed of both scenarios) and other times he simply just watches the people down below. He likes to play a game where he picks a person and guesses their quirk along with their whole life story. It was fun for him, to create a fantasy life of something he could never have.
He lives vicariously through these people. He'll watch as two teenagers walk down the street hand-in-hand with a bittersweet smile on his face. He'll watch as business men shout in the phone as they walk into a coffee shop. He'll watch as heroes stop villains and save people. He watches everything from up here. No one ever sees him.
The sun sets over a dewey afternoon. It's today, Izuku decides. Izuku would kill himself today. But for just this moment, as he watches the ants crawl all over the ground below, he wants to relish the warmth on his damp skin. He wants to take in the smell of smoke that clings to his uniform and gets carried away with the breeze. He wants to hear the sound of cars turning the corner, of bells ringing as the door of a shop opens, of chatter from teenage mouths. He wants to hear the sounds of people— of life.
The green-haired boy closes his eyes, and though he has always been a crybaby, his face remains dry today. He can't find it in himself to cry. How could he? It's such a beautiful day. He's happy, really, to be dying in an atmosphere of beauty and peace.
He leans back, and his body is on the roof rather than curled over the edge. He looks up at the sky— it's an ocean of soothing colors and the white, foamy clouds are its waves. Sometimes, when he comes up here after school on a particularly nice day like this, he imagines what it would be like to touch those clouds. Would he evaporate into a million little particles, becoming one with the foamy texture? Or would he be able to ride the fluffy waves? If it had been a grueling day with Bakugou, his mind would conjure up images of him falling through the clouds and to his death, splat on the ground.
Today is one of those days. The only difference is that he would actually go through with that scenario. He forces himself to smile, just like he always does. Maybe it's to spite All Might, and how he said Izuku couldn't be a hero because even he, the number one hero, hides fear behind his smile. Izuku would be grinning during his fall, so that if All Might ever saw him, he'd know. He'd know that Izuku had fears too, but he was willing to hide them as well— he already did. How else would his mom be so oblivious to the bullying he goes through?
But maybe it's just because he's happy to go. For a long time, Izuku has thought about ending it all. He couldn't remember a day where the thought hadn't crossed his mind. Sometimes it would happen when he was in the bath, and his brain would shout at him to drown himself. Other times, it was when he was shaving the peach fuzz off of his face. But most of the time, it was when he was on this very roof, repeating Bakugou's words in his head for hours and hours.
It's only today that he came to terms with it. He had been hanging on by a thin thread of hope, and All Might's confirmation of him being nothing but useless snipped it clean. He accepts now that this is his reality and the only way out is to die.
Yes, Izuku is quite alright with this.
He brings his right leg over the railing, and then his left. His toes dangle off the edge. The metal beneath his hands is cool, and he loosens his grip with every second he stands there. He turns around to face the skyline of buildings and towers. He holds onto the railing behind him and leans foward once more. The ants are beckoning him, their queen, to join them down below.
He looks up to the clouds he once wanted to reach. They seem so close now, as if he could just touch them by raising his hand. With a smile, Midoriya Izuku leaps up to the clouds. He touches them, he thinks, as they disappear through his fingers. And then he's falling and falling and all he can feel is the rush of wind as he goes down, down, down.
The ocean above him waves on.
With a smile, Midoriya Izuku becomes an ant as he splatters onto the ground.
-
Izuku knows something is wrong when he doesn't feel his body make contact with the ground. All of his limbs had been bracing themselves for the smashing concrete, but it never came.
"Problem Child, pay attention."
Izuku's eyes snap open at the gruff voice. The sudden infiltration of light is way too bright, and he has to close them again.
"Midoriya?" The same voice asked again.
Squinting his eyes instead, Izuku simply nods. It's when his vision finally clears that he's able to look around the room. He's in a classroom, if the desks occupied by students in uniform were anything to go by. Next to him is a boy with shoulder-length black hair and odd elbows(most likely his quirk, Izuku's brain supplies). As his gaze flits from person to person, Izuku realizes he doesn't know any of these people. Where is he? And why isn't he dead?
"I thought I told you to pay attention, Problem Child. I'd love to hear all about your quirk analysis ramblings, but preferably after class." The teacher, a disheveled man with rather dark eye bags, calls him out.
"Uh, y-yes, sir!" Izuku squeaks out because what the fuck? In what universe does a teacher want to hear his mumbling?
A snort from in front of him catches his attention. It's then that Izuku realizes that the student who sits in the desk right in front of him is an spiky-headed ash-blond. His mind blanks.
"B-Bakugou?" Izuku's voice rings out and all heads snap towards him. The quiet whispers of teenagers seize, and even the teacher stops talking.
Bakugou turns around, a scowl already on his face. "The fuck did you just call me?"
Izuku squirms underneath all of the attention. He isn't sure why Bakugou is so mad. He always told Izuku to stop calling him by the childish nickname of Kacchan. Plus, Izuku stopped referring him to it the day he killed himself anyway. Which is today. Today was the day he killed himself. Yet here he is, very much alive and breathing. Maybe he's in the afterlife now? If so, why would he be in a classroom with Bakugou of all people? Shit, did he go to hell instead of heaven?
"Ah, nothing! Um, sorry." Izuku replies, and he hopes it good enough because he really doesn't know what else to say but he also doesn't want to get burned again. Could he even get hurt in this unknown realm?
"Tch, whatever," Bakugou scowls and turns back toward the board.
The bell rings and the teacher sighs. "And on that note, the school day is over. Don't forget that the Provisional Liscening Exams are coming up. If you want to pass, you better start studying and training."
"Training?" Izuku murmurs, but it's drowned out by the sound of groans from a pink-toned girl and yellow-haired boy.
"It's alright guys, Bakubro will help us study!" A red-head throws his arm over Bakugou's shoulder. Izuku tenses up and prepares himself for the sound of an explosion and yelling.
"Like hell I will, Shitty Hair," Bakugou says and rolls his eyes. Izuku couldn't believe his ears. He said the words. Said them. He didn't yell or scream, he just retorted sarcastically. He didn't even shrug off the boy's arm! Something isn't right.
"Deku!"
The sound of a sweet, high-pitched voice breaks his stare on Bakugou's back. He flinches. It goes unnoticed by the girl who called him. She's quite small, and her cheeks are flushed pink. "You still gonna join Iida and I for our study session?"
Izuku doesn't even know who this girl or Iida is and he wants to scream that fact at the top of his lungs. Instead, he bites his lip and rocks nervously on his feet. "Yeah."
"Cool! Tomorrow still sound good?" The girl asks as they head for the door.
Izuku nods mutely. "Great, do you want to-"
"Midoriya, stay back for a moment," the teacher interrupts the girl. Izuku winces at being called out once more. Being told to stay behind after class was never a good sign. He was a liar, they'd say, a cheater. A quirkless kid like him could never get such good scores with such a defective mind.
"Aww, too bad. I'll see you at the dorms then, Deku!" The girl exits the room, leaving behind only Izuku and a teacher who looks like he hates everyone. Izuku wishes he died.
"Um, what is it you wanted to talk to me about, sir?" Izuku questions anxiously and plays with his fingers.
The man raises his eyebrows, "since when have you ever called me anything other than Mr. Aizawa?"
Izuku freezes. He actually called this teacher by his title? And not the honorific of sir or ma'am? Had he lost his mind in whatever universe this was? The lack of respect towards teachers would leave him in detention for two weeks!
"Anyway, I just wanted to ask if everything was okay. You don't usually space out during class. I know I'm not... a sentimental person, but if something was going on, you'd tell me, right?"
Izuku's mind blanches. What? Something really really isn't right. Teachers don't ask questions. Teachers lie. They fabricate stories of him starting fights and make his mom think he's some sort of delinquent. They pretend his voice is nothing but the wind when he cries or yells for help(at one point, he stopped making noise).
"Of course, sir."
Mr. Aizawa still looks unconvinced but he sighs and waved a hand toward the door. "Alright, if you say so. You may go now."
Izuku never scrambled out of a room so quickly. Right before he's about to exit, Mr. Aizawa stops him. "Midoriya."
The green-haired boy turns around, eyes wide with fear. "Yes?"
"...Be safe."
"Um, yes sir."
And with that, Izuku walks through the door. Whatever he was expecting to be on the outside, it wasn't this. Wide, spacious halls range on for at least five meters and they wrap around corners. The floors are polished like fine diamonds and Izuku could see his reflection in them. This school is insane.
Where does he even go from here? That girl had said something about a dorm. Do they all live on campus? Where the hell even is that?
"Ah, Midoriya!"
A young teen with blue hair, glasses, and a rigid posture approaches him. "Uraraka said you agreed to join us for the study session tomorrow night. Just as I would expect from one of U.A's brightest minds!"
Izuku feels his heart stop. U.A. As in... the high school for heroes. The highschool he dreamed of going to since he was four years old. The highschool that All Might, Symbol of Peace, went to.
An alarm beeps from the boy's wrist. He reads the message on the smart watch diligently. "Kaminari is trying to cook a fork in the microwave at the dorms again. As class rep, I cannot allow this behavior!"
And with that, the boy takes off. Izuku barely stands a chance with the boys speed quirk, he knows that, but he still forces himself to run after him. This guy(Iida, Izuku assumes, since that's who Uraraka mentioned being in the study group) is heading for the dorms, the same dorms that Izuku lives in but has no clue where they're located. He just needs to follow him there, lock himself in his room, and figure out what the hell is going on after he promptly has the panic attack he's been fighting off since his jump.
Though it was a struggle, Izuku now finds himself sprawled out on the grass dry heaving in front of the dorms. He rolls onto his back, his chest billowing, and the sky looks down on him. The waves of white clouds are far now, farther than ever, and the ocean strays above him, rather than on top of him.
"Midoriya?"
No, Izuku really can't handle another person. Please go away.
"What are you doing?" The person asks.
"Questioning my existence," Izuku says truthfully. Immediately he wants to shove his foot in his mouth. Stupid, useless Deku. Don't make comments like that. They aren't funny and no one cares. They never have and they never wi-
Someone lays down next to him. "Mind if I join, then?"
Izuku looks over at them. A peppermint swirl of hair is right next to his own, and it smells jarringly of strawberry. A sharp jawline connects his head to his neck, and a burn precedes on the left side of his face. Izuku wishes he were the sky at the moment, because then he would be able to see the strangers full face and not just their right side. He'd be able to detail what color his eyes were, how large the burn was, and if the boy next to him had any strange quirks.
"Sorry, I guess I didn't wait for an answer." The boy says softly.
"I guess not," Izuku whispers in awe. This is yet another person who willingly came to talk to him. He really does have friends in this universe, doesn't he? He can't believe it. Tears well up in his eyes but he wills them away.
Silence falls over the two boys but surprisingly Izuku doesn't feel awkward. He's always been quiet. He's learned that it's better not to talk— talking leads to worse punishments. That's why he was so surprised he mumbled in class earlier. He had curbed that messy habit years ago, after Kuroba, one of his main bullies besides Ka- Bakugou, had used his quirk on him for it. His quirk allows him to use invisible strings that no one but himself and the person he uses it on can feel. He had stitched Izuku's mouth shut for two days. Izuku couldn't speak, eat, or drink anything within that time. The only thing he could do was cry silently at the aching in his mouth and the blood that fell from it. When he returned to school, neither the teachers nor the students questioned the holes in his lips.
Yes, Izuku learned not to speak. It was better that way. Silence is better than being beat.
Izuku wonders if the him here had the scars from that incident. If the him here had even gone through what he did. He hopes not. At least one of him would have been happy.
(He doesn't want to admit the tumultuous wave of jealousy and envy that hits him from that thought. Why would he have to go through that but his counterpart didn't? Shame bubbles and fizzes in his stomach; it's because he's quirkless, of course. This Izuku must have a quirk if he got into U.A. The green foamed clouds rage on).
"It's getting dark." The boy points out.
Indeed it is.
The sun hides behind the walls surronding the campus and the moon is creeping above it. The night breeze swipes across his forehead and he can almost feel himself at the top of the roof, hanging over the railing as he stared at little, crawling ants.
Izuku sits up as does the boy next to him. "Want to head inside?"
Izuku nods and follows the boy through the doors. The dorms, Izuku realizes from the moment he steps foot inside, are chaotic. Pans and drawers clank in the kitchen to his left where the scent of spices and cooking waft from. A group of teenagers huddle on the couch to his right and they scream at each other as they play mario kart. The dining table is being set by a girl with a large ponytail and the speed guy(Iida?) from before is helping a boy that seems drunk to the couch.
"You've got to stop using your quirk to fix the microwave after you break it, Kaminari!" the blue-haired boy scolds and the drunk boy, Kaminari, barely even registers the words.
Izuku isn't sure where to go, and he feels so very out of place all of a sudden. He shifts his weight from one foot to another, and bites his lip hard. The boy from beside him takes his hand and guides him up the stairs. "You might want to get some homework done before dinner. The class is planning on doing a movie night, again."
"Oh."
The boy stops walking for a moment. "Will you be joining?"
Izuku hesitates before answering. He's never really had a movie night before. Well, he has if you count rewatching all the All Might movies on his own or some romcoms with his mom. He almost wants to say yes, just to see what it's like. But he can't get used to this world and it's ways. He doesn't have friends, and a quirkless loser like him would never have any, so he can't pretend like these people are any different. "Ah, no... I'm not feeling too well."
"Oh... well, I hope you feel better," the boy replies. Izuku sighs out of relief that he just took the answer as it was.
"Thanks. I'm gonna head to bed now, so I'll see you tomorrow."
"Should I bring up dinner for you?" The boy asks and it sounds so genuine that Izuku could cry. Why would this boy go out of the way for someone like him? For someone as useless, as stupid, as ugly as him?
"Um... no, that's okay, really. It's my stomach that's bothering me so..." Izuku trails off.
The boy just nods. "Alright then. Goodnight, Midoriya."
"Goodnight."
The boy enters his room and Izuku goes to search for his. Thankfully, there are name plates on them so that saves him a lot of trouble. It takes him a minute before he finds his, Midoriya Izuku 203.
It's unreal, that he has a room here, at the dorms of U.A, the most prestigious hero school in Japan. His dream school. He hand trembles as he opens the door.
The sight that greets him makes his eyes water. His room is filled with All Might memorabilia and it's strikingly similar to his own room back at home. The walls are plastered with posters, his bedsheets and covers have the hero's smile printed out on it, the lamp on his desk is All Might themed, and his curtains have the hero's iconic star scattered along it.
It makes Izuku nauseous, bile rising so far up his throat that he almost misses the garbage pale in the corner of the room before it all comes out. His body racks with sobs as he hunches over the trash can. Everything is finally catching up to him, and oh god, he tried to kill himself and he failed and now he's stuck in some weird dimension where he's at his dream school.
He wishes he just died and stayed dead. He didn't want to be here, not anymore. The sight of All Might makes his brain fuzzy and his anxiety high. The sound of tearing paper is loud throughout his room as he tears down the posters. He yanks the curtains down from the rod and the covers off the bed. He opens the closet and stuffs it all in there. He never wants to see it ever again. The blinding smile. The smile that gave him so much false hope, so much pain.
His body is shaking, and he's sweating though he's not sure why because he feels so damn cold. He curls up into a ball on the top corner of his bed. He tugs at his hair, hard and frantic. When that doesn't help slow down his racing heart, he resorts to scratching his arms, a habit he picked up when he was eight. His nails open up old wounds from past scratches and he can't bring himself to care. Just as long as he can regulate his breathing, and hear something other than his own heartbeat in his ears.
He calms down after thirty minutes.
Midoriya Izuku falls asleep that night on a bare mattress stained with his tears and blood.