Suddenly Quirkless

The Aftermath of Games and Victories

Izuku's right arm burned with an agonizing pain that he had a sinking feeling he'd suffer through again. It felt like the bone had been set ablaze and left to sizzle and sear the muscles.

With the mind-melting sensation of his limb withering away inside of his glove, Izuku was almost surprised that his clothes weren't singed from the heat. He gritted his teeth and cradled his arm to his side as he tried to mitigate and suppress the pain.

Sweat clung to his face, making his skin sticky and clammy. One of his eyes was screwed shut from the agony of shattering his arm twice-over.

(It was probably only wishful thinking that the second time around, it had felt like the flare was concentrated in his finger, rather than scorching a path through his entire limb. It would've been easier to tell had he used his left, but Mr. Aizawa already thought he was a liability when he was down one limb, never mind two.)

"We were lucky that was all of them," he muttered in order to distract himself from the ache with fruitless anxieties. "I took a huge gamble. Normally they would've kept some people underwater in reserve..."

His lips moved on their own. Izuku didn't even really register what he was saying, but Tsu drew his thoughts back to the current reality. "Midoriya, stop that. It's scary."

The curly-haired boy jolted a bit and looked over at the frog girl in attentive confusion. "Rather than reflecting back, shouldn't you be focusing on what to do next?" she advised. Her even tone felt almost demanding. Izuku felt a pressing weight build on his shoulders, so different from the empowering push he'd felt from inside as he'd launched himself off that ship.

Selfishly, Izuku wondered why it had to be him that made all of the decisions, all of the sacrifices. Kacchan had always said that heroes- leaders- were made choices, and when they did, they were the ones who had to be held responsible for the fallout.

Kacchan was always right in the end, even when he was wrong.

But back to his present company, Izuku shook off the crippling worry and sense of injustice as he tried to formulate a plan of action. For the first time since elementary school, he had friends. He couldn't screw it up by letting them down.

He'd proved himself back there. That was why they were placing their expectations on him. It was his fault, and he should be honored that they believed he could do this.

"Y-you're right," Izuku stuttered, averting his eyes to concentrate without being overly conscious of the eyes drilling into his hunched form.

A bolt of pain shot through his injured arm and Izuku crumpled, mind whiting out briefly as he gave a full-body cringe.

Shoda expressed some concern at Izuku's sudden jerking. "Are you alright?" Izuku brought his bare, uninjured hand to gently steady his burning one. The maneuver was half a soothing gesture and half a pathetic attempt to hide the obvious injury. Izuku's arm smoldered in his light grip.

"Y-yeah." The prospective hero looked his friends in the eyes as he lied. When they appeared to drop the subject, any guilt was overwhelmed by relief. "Anyway, we should make getting help our top priority."

Shoda nodded at him, angling his body away from Izuku and Tsu to point. "In that case, we might want to follow the shore. Anyone that would be available to help us will be either at the entrance or back at U.A.'s main building. We'll need to be as stealthy as possible getting past the central plaza, but it's our best shot.

"Try to crouch down into the water," Shoda suggested. "The extra weight from the water in our clothes might slow our reaction time a bit if there's an altercation, however it'll be harder to see us as we try to make it past the battlefield."