The darkness gave way to images. He stood behind a younger version of himself, watching as his child self sat in awe.
"Hey mom!" he yelled as he got up and ran to his mother who was reading a book in the other room.
"What is it?" she asked, partially closing her book. His adult self could see the infinite patience of his mother at work. He couldn't help but smile as his younger self practically vibrated his excitement.
"I want to be a hero!" he said.
"I saw a hero on tv and he was the coolest guy ever!" he continued, pointing to the tv in the other room.
"You want to be a hero when you grow up?" she asked, smiling.
"Yeah! Heros are the coolest!" he said gleefully.
"Well, you will have to wait until you find out what your quirk is first. Then we can talk about it later," she said.
His younger self nodded then sped back to the tv. His mother laughed and went back to her book, a smile on her face.
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He threw a chair across the room in anger and screamed in rage before he flopped on his bed and stared at the ceiling in brooding anger. More failure, no matter how hard he tried, he just couldn't figure out his quirk. He could feel his quirk, feel its potential to do... something! But it eluded him, as it had ever since he'd first manifested it. The specialists weren't entirely sure what it was supposed to do either.
His older self looked down at his teenage self, and he couldn't help but give a snort of laughter at his immaturity.
The door to his room opened and his father walked in. He saw the chair laying on its side on one side of the room and his son laying on his bed fuming and an annoyed look came over him.
"I told you to stop throwing things," he said sternly.
"Whatever..." said the teenager petulantly.
"I know it's frustrating but you can't throw things whenever it upsets you! Now pick up that chair and put it back in its proper place, then clean up your room." his father barked.
The teenager's petulance only deepened, but he got up and violently righted the chair and put it back in front of his desk which was littered with notes.
"When you are done cleaning your room that you wrecked, come see me in the living room. We need to have a talk." his father said before leaving, closing the door behind him.
The teenager slowly cleaned up his floor until it was in a moderate state of cleanliness before he got to his desk covered in notes. Pages upon pages of trying to theorize his quirk's functionality. His time to figure something out was slipping away, he'd have to try and take the entrance exam to the hero school next year. He snatched up the papers angrily and crumpled them up before throwing them into the trash. Then he left his room to see what his father wanted.
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"Look, it's the two freaks." someone said not so quietly.
Ryu had just walked into his class, and by chance, the small animal person called Nezu had come in at about the same time as him.
They both ignored the jab and sat down next to each other at the front of the class as per usual. This had become a common occurrence in his hero school life. Constantly ridiculed and looked down upon for having such a strange quirk that he struggled to make sense of and even use. He hadn't even used his quirk to get into the school. It had been the sword training his father had given him that had secured his spot in the school. A fact that hadn't escaped notice by quite a few people. He was labeled a freak and many wondered if he even had a quirk. Even the teachers didn't really know how to work with his quirk. He knew that a few of the teachers didn't like him, others pitied him, and only a few genuinely wanted to help him.
Then there was the strange animal person known as Nezu. Not that many bothered to learn his name. Looks aside, he freaked a lot of people out. He had gotten in on a special recommendation, which already made him immediately disliked by many. Then there was the way he looked at people like he could see right through them and read their very thoughts. On the rare occasion where he did interact with people, it was usually in a subtly aggressive manner. Everyone knew that he was the smartest person in the class, maybe the whole school, a lot of students either hated or were intimidated by him. Even the teachers were rather uncomfortable dealing with him and avoided interacting with him entirely.
The twin freaks of year one. Perhaps it was because of this, but he and Nezu had started interacting more and more as the year progressed. Ostracized by their fellow students, they often found themselves isolated together. Halfway through the first school year, they'd gotten to the point where they would talk to each other willingly and not pretend like the other didn't exist.
"I don't know if I'm going to make it into next year..." Ryu said miserably.
Nezu looked at him in mild surprise.
"You are one of the top students in our year, I doubt you need to worry," he said.
"My grades are fine, but I'm not showing results with my quirk. I've been trying to figure it out for ten years, ever since it manifested... whatever my quirk is. I haven't been able to use it properly, I can feel my quirk, but it's like I'm missing something in how it is supposed to work." He said.
There was silence for a time as they continued to eat, then Nezu spoke up.
"I'll help you if you want..." he said, trailing off near the end.
Sasakura looked up, "Really?" he asked hopefully.
"You are the only person I know of in this school with such an interesting quirk, learning how it works would be a fascinating experiment," Nezu said.
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Things moved quickly for Sasakura after that memory, a blur of school years until he graduated as the third highest ranking student in the school, just under Nezu and another classmate he didn't really know.
He saw the first few years of his life as a hero in the city of Niigata until it finally dissolved into one of the most poignant moments of his life.
"Ryu?" Chiasa asked, sitting up groggily in the bed.
Sasakura sat at the window, looking at the stars. It was clear and beautiful out, the breeze flowed through the open window.
He glanced over to his wife, "Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you."
"Well you did..." she mumbled, shuffling out of bed and sitting next to him, before leaning against him.
"What's got you so worked up you can't sleep?" she mumbled.
"It... I..." he said haltingly, before just speaking his mind as best he could.
"I don't know if I can be a father..." he finally said.
Chiasa sighed and wrapped her arms around him. Then she pulled him into her breast. She just held him and stroked his head affectionately.
"You'd be a wonderful father to anyone. You've shouldered your fair share of abuse and pain, yet you never let it stop you. You've learned your lessons from your parents, and you'll do a fine job passing those lessons on to our child." she said, before continuing in a whisper.
"I know it's scary, I'm terrified that I won't be a good mother, that I'll fail our child. but... that's just what it means to become a parent. We need to trust in ourselves and in each other, that's why we're married, isn't it? To lift the other up when they falter and help make the other into the best version of themselves possible." she whispered into his hair.
Then she started to get up and she dragged Ryu with her. "Now come back to bed, I'm too tired to continue talking..."
As she dragged him to bed and tried sleeping, he reaffirmed his determination to be a hero. He would become the best hero he could, protect his family, raise his child right, and by the end, he would look back and be proud of the work he had done.
__________________________________________________________
Sasakura opened the door and walked into the meeting room. It had been a while since Nezu had called him for anything outside a social call, let alone attend some secretive meeting.
What he immediately noticed upon entering was that there were several other people in the room. There was Nezu of course, but there was also Hawks, his student Tsukuyomi, the police chief of all people, and a woman he didn't recognize.
"Ah, Ryu, now that you are here we can begin!" Nezu said happily, gesturing for Ryu to sit down.
He took a seat and gave Nezu a questioning look.
"Allow me to introduce you to Dr. Okimi, she runs the main hospital here in Mufustafu," Nezu said.
Sasakura gave her a bow of his head and she did the same.
"Now I'm sure you're all curious as to why I brought you here, the reason is simple. We need more heroes to compensate for our losses, and both the government and the H.A. have refused my proposed solution. Vigilantism is on the rise across the country, while we won the war, we now find ourselves short-staffed and desperate for aid. So the people have taken matters into their own hands, forming militia groups or else becoming vigilantes to help keep their communities safe. Some of these vigilantes are quite adept, with some being failed hero students, ex-police, ex-military, or else gifted individuals." Nezu said.
"More recently, however, a key player has just emerged. A vigilante known as the Hunter has come to our city and based on Hawks' observations, he may be Stains equal in skill. This is not someone we can let slip through our fingers. Even if my proposal to recruit vigilantes has been rejected, I have no intention of listening. So I have for each of you, instructions on how we might get the Hunter to work with us, whether he realizes it or not." Nezu said darkly, a hint of his well-buried manipulativeness coming to the surface.
___________________________________________________________
And then the stream of memories faded until he found himself within a new memory, one he had yet to experience.
He found himself studiously wiping the glass in his hand, when it was dry put it in its cabinet, and went to wash the next glass. It was a process he could do blindfolded, he knew every inch of his bar like he knew the back of his hand. The bar had closed, and all that was left until he went to sleep was to clean up. He'd had about a half dozen patrons, which was about average. He'd gotten the latest news, heard their complaints, and gave his opinion when asked.
The list of people who could go to the private bar was actually much larger than one would think. Many had been friends with his parents, and they had a lot of friends. Others had been referred to the establishment by trusted people like Nezu. The only person he'd invited that he'd had an ulterior motive for inviting had been Uraraka Ochako.
All because Nezu had some convoluted plan.
He sighed and shook his head.
The little guy always had some kind of plan going on, and he was sure that he had been unknowingly roped into several of them over the years. Nezu kept his cards close to his chest, which, while understandable, also meant he had a bad habit of consciously or unconsciously manipulating people to suit his ends.
The door to the bar opened as he continued to muse about Nezu and his machinations. He didn't look up, he just continued his process of cleaning his glasses and countertop. The figure sat down on one of the bar stools. He could smell her perfume, light and painfully familiar.
"Ryu?" she asked.
He stopped cleaning and for a while he just stood there, staring at the glass in his hand.
"Ryu..." she said again.
"I... failed you," he said, staring at his reflection in the glass.
"No, you didn't. You are as human and as flawed as anyone else. You couldn't have done anything, and even if you could have gone back and changed things, we both know what that would have cost you. And that I would never have wanted that," She said, echoing thoughts he had had numerous times over the years.
"I know you wish things could have been different, so do I... But there's still something you have left to do, don't you?" she asked expectantly.
He looked up at her and she had a sad but expectant smile on her face.
"Izuku... and the students..." he whispered.
She smiled and nodded.
He smiled tiredly in turn and despite desperately wanting to join his wife, he turned to face the rows of bottles. Only there were no bottles, as he had turned away from the apparition of his wife the world had changed into pure darkness.
He reached out a hand and light coalesced in it until a brush of light formed in his hand. So began the process of writing out his final contract. With what he formed a contract with he didn't know, was it nature itself? a god? a demon? the source of quirks itself? He had never been sure, but he knew that strength like this was never free.
When he finished the contract it flashed, then like ribbons of light it spiraled apart and then flowed into him.
____________________________________________________________
Ares stared at the body of the hero, and he let out a disappointed sigh. He nudged the body but it didn't move, he shrugged and turned toward the students who were staring at their teacher's body in equal parts horror and terror.
He started walking toward them and they started moving backward until they hit the barrier that trapped them within the building. Zeus had been clear in his instructions to capture as many students as possible, and he didn't disobey orders.
As he got closer, the girl stepped forward and threw her hands out at him. Strings of material circled him before wrapping around him. Then one of the boys grabbed the nearest solid object he could find and ran at him. As he swung the object at his face he smiled and teleported backward. The boy stumbled and tripped forward, entangling himself in the girl's string.
He sighed again and walked toward them once more, as he reached out a hand to grab the boy still entangled by the string he froze.
Every hair on his body stood on end and he felt goosebumps run down his spine. Then he noticed the young students weren't looking at him but past him, then he heard one of his soldiers shout an alarm.
He spun around and saw the body of the teacher had become engulfed in a red mist. It flowed outward and pooled like floating water just above the ground. Then an orange light started to shine out from the body until the mist glowed an angry rust color. Then to his surprise and delight, the teacher slowly got to his feet. A burning orange light showed out from his heart, and the red mist poured off his body like slow-running water. His very veins glowed with the same light as his heart did and as he watched, cracks slowly spread outward from the heart following the path of the veins.
The teacher moved his head toward Ares and Ares could see that his eyes had gone a milky white, even his hair had lost what color it remained and shone a startling white and had even grown significantly longer.
It happened in a flash, faster than Ares could comprehend. His reactive teleport kicked in and he found himself closer to his soldiers staring at the back of the hero who was standing where he had been an instant before. He narrowed his eyes, this could be a problem.
______________________________________________________
Sasakura stood, sword extended before him where he had sensed Ares. Noticing he hadn't stabbed him, he turned to face behind him. While his vision had departed from him, something new had taken its place. A sixth sense, all around him was darkness but he could still sense the presence of people around him.
Then a voice came from behind him, shaking his focus and pulling him back to the present for a moment.
"Se- Sensei?" came Kuragari's quavering voice.
"Everything will be fine, I will end this," Sasakura said calmly as he focused once more.
As he focused more, he became aware of other things around him. He could hear the breath of the students behind him and those of Ares and his soldiers. He could hear the sounds beyond the barrier, distant fighting, and screams. Anger stirred within him as he thought of the students who might have already died, and he couldn't help but fear for Nezu who Zeus likely wanted dead very badly.
"This is a hero! Excellent!" Came the voice of Ares, and Sasakura could the excitement behind it.
"Come hero! Let us fight an-" his challenge was cut off when he noticed Sasakura had vanished.
Sasakura stepped past Ares to the soldiers behind him. In one smooth motion, he cut sideways and three of the soldiers were neatly bisected. The force behind the swing was strong enough that the bodies were sent a meter to the side as his blade passed through. There was a pause then a nearby soldier cried in alarm.
He moved again, a quick step forward and thrust. As the body fell backward he turned to the side and took another step. As he moved past another three, he bisected them as well. Then he jumped backward, turning his sword to face behind him he impaled the eighth soldier.
"The barrier had been removed, run to the main school building and seek shelter," Sasakura said, raising his voice so the students were jolted out of their open-mouthed shock.
"Do not worry about me, I will be fine." He said, predicting their response.
There was a pause and then he heard the doors at the far end of the building open and then close.
"Now then, it's time I wrapped this up before I run out of time," Sasakura said as he felt his strength starting to slowly drain away.
"I will kill you for my men." he heard Ares say calmly, but with clear and tempered anger behind it.
"At least he isn't completely heartless," Sasakura thought.
"Your war will fail, you and your men will die here tonight, as will Zeus." He stated, turning to face Ares.
Before Ares could utter another word he stepped forward and stabbed. Only for his sword to hit nothing but air. Then he brought his sword to his side and bracing it with his other hand, blocked the armored fist Ares had retaliated with.
"Your teleportation is very powerful. I can see why Zeus thinks so highly of your abilities." Sasakura said, acknowledging Ares's strength.
Then he turned into Ares and bringing his sword up, cut downward. Again, Ares's teleportation activated and saved his arm from being removed. He blocked another fist with his sword and stepped back, putting several meters between them.
It was clear that even this level of strength could not surpass Ares's powerful teleportation. He breathed in the air and held it. The red mist started to pour out even faster, the orange cracks accelerated and Sasakura lost his sense of sound. Apart from the strange sixth sense, he had lost all his other senses.
If it weren't for his strange sixth sense, he might not have known he had moved despite telling his body to do so. He sensed himself move forward, raise his sword, then bring it down. While he couldn't hear it, an ear-splitting booming crack echoed across most of the city and his swing split the very earth for a short distance in front of him.
He released his held breath and sound returned to him once more as the red mist slowed its output. He took a deep shuddering breath and realized he couldn't move. He listened for a moment, but there was nothing.
He tried to move once more but found he couldn't. He sighed and contented himself with waiting for the end. He had after all, merely delayed the inevitable.