CH8 – All the reveals! All of them!!!!!!!!
“Tell me the exact wording.” Hallie had demanded, an expression he’s only seen in veteran heroes donned on her face.
“What? Why?” Toshinori had asked confused.
When he woke up that day, he hadn’t expected to have his identity revealed. AGAIN. But he’d seen his successor in danger and could NOT let anything happen to him. He just couldn’t. So, he stepped in, only to realize there was no weight to the avalanche of trash threatening to bury his mentee. So, he’d revealed his identity to both Hallie and their attacker for nothing. Not that he would ever regret doing whatever he could to save young Midoriya. But still.
The witch did make sure the villainess didn’t remember any of that, though. It was a big relief for him to not have that to worry about. And like she had done so far, Hallie kept surprising him.
He still wasn’t quite sure what he’d expected out of her. Most people fell into two categories when it came to finding out that he was All Might or that All Might was chronically injured. They either acted like Nighteye and tried to convince (or even force) him to give up his heroics. Or they didn’t mention any of it ever again out of respect unless it became relevant again, like young Midoriya and Tsukauchi do.
Hallie didn’t come across as a particularly dominant person like Nighteye, but she did have a tendency of wanting to take care of everyone around her, so it could have gone either way.
What he didn’t expect was for her to completely ignore the issue of his right to continue his work and go straight into scolding him for not using his influence to make sure he could continue being a hero in a safer manner.
What he’d never have guessed in a million years, however, was her observing his reply and immediately deducing that if he wasn’t invested in that in the first place was because something else was amiss. Something he hadn’t talked about to anyone outside of Nighteye himself. Or for Izuku to take a clue over what she’d just deduced and start crying.
He’s such a sweet and empathetic kid, but it still hit differently to see him cry over his approaching death. This wasn’t a talk he’d wanted to have with his student anytime soon. Heck, he probably wouldn’t have ever talked to him in advance if he could have it his way. It was better for him to be caught by surprise with it rather than suffer by anticipation as well as the aftermath.
Still, Toshinori couldn’t help cuddle his successor into his chest, his heart warming up at this display of emotion for him.
It saddened him that he would be leaving his successor behind, much like he himself had been left. He’s came to terms with his fate long ago. He had years upon years for it. He’d made the minimal effort of signing himself up for an organ transplant, fully aware he would likely be passed over. And if he hadn’t been? Well… he had more than enough money to donate to an organization that was above quirk discrimination, especially after his eventual death. Unfortunately, such organization did not exist.
Hallie’s offer had been a good alternative. He wouldn’t feel guilty about someone else missing out on a transplant because these organs were tailor made for him. It was the biggest reason he chose to go through with it. And if it helped him being able to use One for All for longer periods of time, then that was a good way for him to save as many people as possible before he passed on his quirk completely.
Hallie’s grim expression at his confirmation as she demanded exact wording was off-putting to say the least, but he was more confused than anything over why she was asking for that in the first place. She didn’t hesitate in her reply.
“There are a few things you need to know about prophecies: 1) They only become valid if the conditions are met; 2) If the conditions are met, they will definitely come into effect; and 3) Only the rules of a Prophecy are absolute, anything outside of them is malleable.”
Upon being inquired over the last one she explained that is perfectly possible for a prophecy to predict a death and the person still being alive after. She herself was an example of that. Apparently, she’d had a prophecy pitting her against the guy behind the blood wars that required the death of one of them and she died first. For all intents and purposes one of them was dead. The prophecy dictated that she was the one designated to defeat him, meaning that once she was gone, no one would be able to. But her school’s headmaster was apparently a masterful chess player and placed everything before his death in a way that she wouldn’t stay dead.
He was gutted (metaphorically, though he was literally too) to learn that she always had to die. Apparently, she had a perversion of a soul link way worse than the one from the Welled Glass with Voldemort that would only disappear after she died but, so long as she remained alive, he could come back over and over again using it. The headmaster then learned of a specific fact that meant that so long as she was the first of the two to die, she could come back to life exactly once and finally be able to defeat him for good because for all intents and purposes, she was still the designated Voldemort vanquisher and still very much alive. So, the man placed all the clues so that she did just that.
She didn’t say it and young Midoriya was still too stuck on himself potentially dying and hoping for a way to combat that to notice it either, but Toshinori just knew. The elderly wizard wouldn’t be alive to see to it himself and she hadn’t mentioned being dragged towards Voldemort ever. She did, however, mention facing him of her own accord at some point. That could only mean one thing:
She walked to her own death, fully aware of it and not planning to survive at all. Her coming back to life had been completely unexpected to her, regardless of how planed it had been by others.
She’d also mentioned in a previous conversation that she had been 17 when she got her quirk and that she finished the villain off with it without even knowing she had it. She’d been young enough to be a second year at UA.
The idea of this vibrant, caring woman as a seventeen years old teenager, walking to her death with a hopeless expression on her face, gathering all her courage to face a man several decades her senior while knowing this was her end, gathering all her mental fortitude to not defend herself or dodge from an attack she knew would be the death of her, willing to die for the greater good for just an extra chance to let someone else defeat him, even if it seemed hopeless… It made Toshinori want to hold her to make sure she was still there and to try and comfort the teenager she’d been back then.
She hadn’t even known back then that the wording of the prophecy very specifically pointed her out as the only one who could finish the task. She herself had admitted that her knowledge on prophecy interpretation came much, much later than her actually fulfilling it, to which she was admittedly thankful because she would have hesitated in her actions far more if she’d known. Toshinori knew exactly what she would be hesitating about and suspected the knowledge was kept away from her precisely because of that. He also was of the opinion that no one should ever consider the lack of hesitation in letting themselves be killed for the greater good as something good but she didn’t seem too open to listening to that particular thought.
Regardless, Toshinori had long come to terms with what would happen to him. He didn’t want her to rekindle his hope again. He’d had a hard time accepting it the first time around. He had far more to live for this time compared to when he’d just defeated All for One and had just lost one of his closest friends. Fortunately, there wasn’t much to help her in her endeavor of trying to save him that justified prolonging this conversation:
No, he didn’t have specific words and he was pretty sure Sir Nighteye’s prophecies worked through sight, not words. No, he didn’t know exactly what he saw, he only knew it would be gruesome because he’d told him so. No, he didn’t know if he was the first person he talked about that particular vision or not so he didn’t know if his words to him served as the rules of his prophecy. No, he no longer had contact with his former sidekick since their disagreement.
He assured both of them that he’d come to terms with his death again and that he just wanted to enjoy what time he had left the best way he could, by saving people and teaching young Midoriya and the next generation.
His successor needed another hug but was clearly unsatisfied and depressed with the whole thing. Hallie… was another story. She seemed to understand he wouldn’t be talking about it and respected that. It also helped that she was also unwilling to make young Midoriya sadder than he was. But he could tell.
She wasn’t going to let this go. She was going to leave him alone for now, but she wasn’t going to give up. She would probably try to track down Nighteye’s agency now. Fortunately, the man was very private about its location and only authorized people knew. She was recent enough in Japan that she wouldn’t be invited. The whole HedMight thing worked against her in this case. Mirai was a vehement anti… what was the word? Ship? He was very against it, anyway. And Toshinori remembered zoning out when he started ranting about the HedMight one (his favorite to rant against, for some odd reason).
He just hoped she came to terms with the inevitableness of the situation soon.
It just was too easy to get swept away with her earnestness. It would be so easy to let himself believe her. To look at the determination in her eyes and see her sheer stubbornness and want to struggle to stay alive.
She wasn’t charismatic. Not the way he was, keeping a front to earn the people’s trust. She was smart as a whip, sassy and with a propensity for dark humor that he’d come to appreciate after being in heroics for so long. She was also blunt at times. Neither of those were why it would be so easy to believe her. Not when she had her honesty and earnestness.
She cared.
He’d had plenty of people wanting to help him with his missing organs before. It wasn’t easy to keep his injuries hidden when the fight had just happened and he’d just been operated one by several full teams of surgeons and nurses. Not even Recovery Girl could be solely in charge of all of them, after all. They all had some suggestion of some sort to help him. They were all very eager to be the ones to save All Might. When he’d realized there was nothing else that could be done aside from transplant, he made sure to let it slip that his problems were solved just so they would stop pestering him and to cut any potential rumor off.
He needed them to believe he was back to full health, after all. It wouldn’t do for the villains to start taking chances.
To sum it up, he knew when people wanted to help him for recognition. That wasn’t why she was doing it. She hadn’t known he was All Might when she first met him. She only knew Yagi Toshinori, the quirkless man with missing organs that was far too skinny. She wanted to help him because she genuinely cared about people.
She’d admitted once that she only chose heroics because all other options felt too restrictive but, in his opinion, she was made for the job. It was in her very nature.
That was the reason why her trying to save him in every possible way didn’t feel like she was trying to coddle him or similar.
She was already going beyond the bare minimum by trying to give him his organs back. Hell, most people wouldn’t even go as far a trying to make sure the people that had been accidentally dragged into the sort of situation they’d been through, a few months back, could defend themselves if they needed to.
It was sad but true. Many heroes left such things up to the police to solve.
So, the fact that she didn’t already spoke volumes about her and he appreciated that she seemed to want to solve all of his problems somehow.
And she didn’t even try to stop him from doing what he loved best, his hero work, unlike literally everyone else in his life aside from young Midoriya.
But this was a bit too much for him to take.
It was weird to have someone willing to have his back outside of heroics.
It wasn’t smothering. Not really. Not when compared to Sir Nighteye. That still didn’t make him any less overwhelmed that she seemed to be ready to take on death itself for him. It really was teetering way too close to giving him hope when he should stay resigned to his fate. Made him want to reach for things that he felt it would be too selfish to reach for when his time was numbered.
The part of him that wanted to see what sort of hero young Midoriya became, that wanted to get to know Hallie better, that wanted more time to enjoy the movies and books he didn’t have time to enjoy because he was so busy, that wanted to find a hobby he liked, that wanted to live. That part of him that he’d learned to squish out for more important things and that he hadn’t considered relevant until he realized how short his time was. That part of him couldn’t help but want to latch onto her words.
Which was why he’d changed the subject as soon as he could that day. He couldn’t allow for that. Not when he’d finally come to terms with it and willing to pass on his quirk, which would be the end of his career. He’d spent way too much time hesitating on that alone and didn’t need to revisit his decision, especially now that he had young Midoriya.
He did notice that she started inviting him and his successor out for several sorts of activities after that day. He guessed she took his comment about wanting to enjoy the time he had left and ran with it and young Midoriya was very much in on it.
It wasn’t very often. The teen had school and both he and Hallie had their jobs. But it was definitely noticeable. Especially since she used to keep more of her distance.
While she was willing to teach the boy and spar with himself, there was always a sense of her trying to not get attached. That lingering sensation was gone for the most part now.
She was still skittish and reluctant to talk about herself, very measured in what she revealed about herself unless she was feeling particularly exasperated or something similar and began running her mouth, but she was present and he learned new snippets about herself daily. She was also pretty insistent that he keep his heroic form for his actual work instead of showing off in front of them which… yeah, fair point. But he couldn’t help but want to look his best instead of the skinny mess he is in front of both of them. Young Midoriya looked up to him so much that letting the kid see him at his weakest felt a bit like he was letting his successor down. As for her, well… it was admittedly him showing off to her, yes.
Teddy still treated him the same way as always so, clearly, she hadn’t told him about either his superhero identity (which he knew she wouldn’t do anyway) nor the prediction of his death. He was thankful for that.
After a full month with the different behavior, he’d accidentally slipped and mentioned that Izuku was almost ready to get his power when she was around. He’d gotten to used to her being there, to being able to let his guard down around her. Izuku had too because he didn’t seem to initially register anything wrong with what he said until both of them noticed how quiet everything was and looked back to see Hallie’s flabbergasted expression.
“YOU HAVE A TRANSFERABLE QUIRK!?!?!?” She gasped out loud as soon as she finished processing what he’d let slip.
Well… too late to deflect. She was too smart for that anyway.
“Yeah.”
“Huh.” She said after calming down. “I only know of one transferable quirk aside from mine. What are the chances it might be the same one?” She commented idly.
He had forgotten she’d mentioned knowing about another transferable quirk when she’d talked about her own. He hadn’t thought much about it since. He’d mostly been focused on the fact that she had a transferable quirk at all and everything that happened after that conversation.
“Normally I would say pretty low. But since I never heard of one aside from mine until you came along? I’m not sure about anything anymore.” He admitted. “Was it something to do with your own quirk?”
“Nah. It was actually to do with a family member. Apparently, my grandfather had a squib brother. One of the rare few that gets a quirk in the same generation right away instead of the usual case of the quirk skipping to the next squib generation after. Something to do with smoke, I think, considering the name. His name used to be Henry Potter but I think he changed it when he left the magical community. They still kept in touch while they were both still alive, which is why my grandfather had a journal my great-uncle insisted he kept safe in case something happened and the bad guy he was trying to defeat ever became a threat to the magical communities or he and the successors of his quirk died out without defeating him.”
“That’s a lot of information.” Young Midoriya commented, probably wondering the same as himself.
Why was she being so open about it now?
“Well, nothing of what I said really tells much about the quirk and he wasn’t that well known, from what I gathered, so I’m not really revealing anything.”
“…true.” The teen admitted.
“What I can tell you, as a hint, is that the naming conventions have something to do with the three musketeers.” She said the last part in english, likely not knowing the translation.
“Three Musketeers?” Both he and his successor asked at the same time.
“It was a pre-quirk era story. From what I looked up, there were quite a few renditions of the story aside from the original book, including an anthropomorphic dog cartoon one at some point. Most of those episodes were lost to time but the song remains and is quite catchy.”
Toshinori did the smart thing and took out his phone to look up the title. The first page was a Wikipedia article in english but he was already halfway through it and couldn’t find any references to his quirk anywhere in the article. It was unlikely he would find it if he continued onwards. He was starting to think it really was a different quirk, especially since he never heard of a holder being from France.
Still, to abate any doubts, he searched again, this time writing ‘one for all’ after the title and… well, that was certainly something. There were a ton of pages and videos with both the name of his quirk as well as All for One. Apparently, it was a motto for the titular characters. And before that it was an unofficial motto for Switzerland too, but it was mostly associated with the musketeers.
The meaning behind the motto was… very different from what those words had come to mean to Toshinori. In a way, he had been the example of the ‘one for all’ part, that meant each individual should act for the benefit of all. But, admittedly, he’d taken on far too many responsabilities on his shoulder for the ‘all for one’ part to apply to him. It meant that everyone should also work for the benefit of each individual and he’d never been much part of the singular part of the equation. Not until recently, when he finally was willing to accept help.
It was sad to see that All for One taking on that name had ruined that meaning for everyone.
Still, this meant Hallie was connected to his quirk, even if only tangentially. He turned back to her, who was focused on his successor’s current mumble storm trying to decipher what she meant, page opened on the same Wikipedia article he’s first opened up.
“Which holder was he?” He asked her, making her focus one him instead. “I’m eight.”
“Sixth. I take this to mean that the quirks are the same?”
“The motto sure is telling.”
“The final part of the motto still living?”
“No. I wouldn’t have considered giving my quirk away to one so young if he was.”
“Good.”
Somehow Young Midoriya was too distracted by his own thoughts to listen to their exchange confirming that it was the same quirk, which was amusing. Hallie promised to bring Henry’s journal with her the next time they met up so that he could read it. Apparently, it featured some thoughts and moments with Nana that he would like to read for sentimental purposes, as well as some of his teaching experiences with her and learning experiences with the Fifth that he could try to apply to his mentee.