#happy april fools the joke is i'm posting more than one (old) fic today

[astersatdawn]

Human Trait or Learned Behavior

Relationships: Midoriya Izuku & Sensei | All for One

Rating: G

Sensei | All for One is Midoriya Hisashi, and he keeping the poor boy in a vault

Oneshot | 576 words

Flashes of memories come to mind: locked janitor closets and spider lily decorations and starburst scars. He remembers vandalized desks and notebooks and thinks of deliberately chosen ignorance. 

“But that’s not what I chose to find.” Izuku captures a piece with a rook. 

“Then what do you see, Izuku?” He laughs, curiosity and derision mixed in something that Izuku thought was warm, once.

-

[Or, Izuku and his captor talk during a game of chess.]

ao3 link: here

“You’re naive.”

“And you’re cynical.” Izuku moves his knight. It’s not like he has much better to do right now, besides keeping his budding plans for his next escape attempt quiet. 

“I have over a century’s worth of experiences, Izuku.” The white bishop captures one of Izuku’s pawns. “I have seen the savagery humanity tries to hide—though I suppose it’s no longer a well kept secret.”

“Yet you only see what you interact with, and what you’ve chosen to create.” He moves a pawn one space forward. “Of course you’re only going to see the worst when you only seek that out.”

“I know you’ve seen it too. You may have One for All now, but you were Quirkless before.”

Flashes of memories come to mind: locked janitor closets and spider lily decorations and starburst scars. He remembers vandalized desks and notebooks and thinks of deliberately chosen ignorance. 

“But that’s not what I chose to find.” Izuku captures a piece with a rook. 

“Then what do you see, Izuku?” He laughs, curiosity and derision mixed in something that Izuku thought was warm, once.

And the memories Izuku digs up are fewer in number, but crystal clear in their beauty. He thinks of simple things: a boy getting a cat out of a tree, of an elder beginning to explain the unknown to a curious youth, of a young couple dropping their too many groceries and helped by a small group of teens. 

He remembers these moments with bright summer lights and through cold autumn rains. He remembers a neighbor with a premonition Quirk warning about winter snows and helping craft a garden with dirt-painted hands come spring. 

And closest to his heart, he thinks of quiet nights in the dorms, steaming mugs and comforting whispers in the dark. He thinks of comparing notes, lighthearted banter traded between correct answers and secret smiles as a teacher watches on without admonishment. He remembers a mother’s embrace when he sobbed his heart out, and even now he thinks of the bittersweet hair ruffles from father to son when pride had swelled in Izuku’s chest and it was something to be shared, not stolen or diminished. 

“Kindness,” he says after a long silence. 

His opponent makes the move Izuku had been hoping he’d make, and Izuku fights back the tiny smile that comes with that same little bit of pride—a simple childhood dream finally in reach after years of learning and growth and persevering. Maybe this shouldn’t be the moment for such an expression, for such a feeling, but it’s a memory Izuku will still tuck into that box of those bittersweet moments that will never quite glisten again. 

“Hope.” He moves his rook to the other end of the field. “And checkmate.”

The expression on his father’s face is bewilderment he will actively treasure when Izuku goes back to quietly plotting in his isolated cell. It will give him hope that he can find his way out—if little Izuku’s dream of finally beating his father at chess could come to fruition, then who’s to say Izuku can’t escape his father’s possessiveness too? 

His father laughs, and his expression changes again. It’s not mockery, or sadism, or a manipulative grin, but one he recognizes from moments of pride shared. It is human nature, it is goodness on the face of evil incarnate. It’s familiar, even if the ache that settles in Izuku’s chest is not.

“Checkmate indeed.”