~O~

The night was cold but it wasn't raining at least so that was a win for someone who had nothing but a worn out costume on to protect himself from the chilling breeze in the back alleys of a sleeping city. Honestly, to call it a costume — a hero costume no less — seemed a bit disrespectful to the idea of hero costumes as a whole. No, what was left of the viridian green clothing shouldn't be called more than a wet rag. It was incredibly uncomfortable, just like everything has been for the past few weeks, but nevertheless he had learnt to deal with it without much complaints. To be fair he shouldn't have made assumptions about the weather so soon, the dark clouds overhead didn't seem to be in his favour. Nothing seemed to be in his favour. Ever.

Midoriya Izuku wasn't one to complain much anyway, but God did this fucking suck.

"Language."

"I didn't say it out loud," 

"I still heard you."

Izuku only rolled his eyes at the edge-less reprimand from Nana's vestige. He was almost seventeen. He should be allowed to swear, he deserved to swear in this situation — at least he should be allowed to swear in his head . 

Izuku's iron soles clanked loudly in the deserted alleyway regardless of how carefully he took each step, not wanting to make a noise and draw prying eyes towards himself. If he wasn't as exhausted as he currently was, he would've used Float to get himself to his destination (which, funny thing, he didn't know where was) without risking to expose himself to a possible enemy. Izuku was tired, incredibly tired. His body swayed with every step he took. It had been nearly four times where he would close his eyes for a bit too long and doze off walking, almost falling to the harsh ground and breaking his nose. 'Almost' because thankfully Nana woke him up before he could hit the ground. The woman's vestige was out and beside him for that exact purpose: making sure Izuku reached safety without hurting himself out of his worn out state of mind and body.

The green haired boy continued to walk aimlessly, hoping to come across at least one place that could fulfil any single one of his needs before he dropped (dead) asleep. Now that he thought about it, back alleys didn't seem like the best way to navigate through a city — was he even in the same city as before? He didn't know. Heck, he didn't even know what time — what month or year it was because what if the guy had a time manipulation quirk? Izuku wasn't very excited to find out what it was though. Not as excited as he thought he should've been. The boy wasn't even sure if he was in a different time or not because all he had to support such a theory was a moment's worth of speculation at best and a single sentence of monologue from an unknown man at worst. It could have been a forged lie to distract his tattered mind, it wouldn't be very hard to accomplish that and it seemed exactly like the kind of thing his enemy would do. His last known location had been Shibuya. A deserted back alley in Shibuya specifically. He would go on a tangent to recount every event that led him here but he could barely keep his eyes open and the wet haggard costume, his injuries and the dirt in his hair making his head feel heavier did little to help.

The boy felt two gloved hands land gently on his shoulders, as if trying not to startle him, and steered him towards his left. "Careful, trashcan," Nana warned softly as she glided behind him. Izuku couldn't stress enough how grateful he was to not be left utterly alone in this situation.

It was not long before he heard metal clink and clatter against the stone hard ground that wasn't from his roughed up iron soles. Nana's hands tensed on the boy's shoulders and Izuku turned around immediately, bright green lightning dancing on his skin and Black Whip summoned and ready to take down any possible opponent. However, Danger Sense remained quiet. Calm as an ocean. There was no real harm, none intended towards him but Izuku had learnt not to take that so easily. Danger Sense could be walked around by anyone, there were a myriad of loopholes to exploit for anyone who knew the quirk's true mechanisms. Which admittedly not many people knew but he wasn't taking any chances. It was the perfect opportunity to get to him. He was tired, unaware and confused — it would be too easy to take him down like this and he'd be damned if he let them take him after all this time.

The trashcan Nana had just helped him evade lied on the ground, its contents spilled and its lid abandoned a few feet away. From the disposed garbage a kitten emerged, just as dark as the night sky above with eyes as bright as the stars. The little thing looked around the trash by using her paw and soon let out a disappointed mewl when she found nothing of interest. Izuku loosened his stance and felt Nana let out a sigh of relief with him. He was well informed that his heart and mind were connected to his predecessors via One For All but to the degree where Nana also felt the same tension upon hearing the sudden noise he did and the same relief when it turned out to be a harmless creature scouring for food was new to him. His fingers itched to write down every little detail he found about his quirk in his notebook but for now he decided otherwise. He didn't have any time to do so. There were more important things to attend to.

Izuku took slow steps to reach the kitten and stopped nearly two feet away from her, crouching down on his knees and extending a hand with a tattered and dirty glove towards the kitten. The small animal stepped back, surprised and scared of the sudden gesture. The boy huffed, cats either wanted to kill him or wanted him to be their bed for the rest of his miserable life but of course neither of those could happen unless he offered them food. Which was what he did, he pushed off the straps of his yellow backpack off his shoulders and searched its contents for the leftovers of the bento Toshinori made him earlier that evening. He hadn't gotten the chance to eat everything his mentor made him as a certain villain got to him with his guard down before he could.

One of All For One's assasins — the man who sent Izuku here.

As the boy untied the bunny patterned cloth softly from the bento box, he recalled the eye-catching attributes of the assassin. Izuku hadn't had the time to fully analyze his appearance, he only managed to capture a few details before he was warped away to wherever he was now; he didn't think any of them could prove to be helpful in his case anyway. Izuku placed the bento box on his thighs and picked up a piece of now cold breaded pork, extended his hand and offered it to the kitten. The creature in question was wary as expected. She slowly took a step forth and sniffed the food for a while, poking around it with its paw before grabbing it with her sharp canines.  

Izuku sighed, closing his eyes as the kitten feasted on the piece of pork. He wasn't sure where exactly he was supposed to go from here. Things were already hard on him but he wasn't fully prepared to navigate his way through this. For now, he just needed a safe place to rest at. Maybe. Could he rest in this state? Wouldn't it be a bit too stupid to wander every alley of some city in hopes to hide from your possible enemy but call it a day on a random place by the end of it? No, he couldn't 'rest' but he still needed a place. Wandering about all confused wasn't going to do any good either. The problem was just that he hadn't managed to find a safe spot in the few hours he had spent here. Granted he wasn't at the peak of his searching ability given just how tired he was but that didn't change things for how they were.

Him being tired was no excuse for that.

"Come on, you're doing it again now…" Nana huffed beside him.

Izuku sighed in apology, not even bothering to look at her, "I started muttering out loud again, didn't I? Sorry..."

"Not that exactly,"

"... Then what?"

"You know precisely what."

"Was it the telling myself that being tired isn't an excuse?"

"Bingo!"

"I'm not wrong though."

"You are, though. Being tired is a completely understandable excuse to not perform your best." Nana raised a brow and asked, "What do you think breaks are for?"

Izuku tilted his head up to meet the woman's gaze. He replied with all the enthusiasm of a walking corpse, "Food fights? Getting bullied? Embarrassing yourself by tripping over shoelaces and dropping your tray?"

Nana raised a brow at his vapid reply, "I wasn't talking about school breaks but damn, are you okay?"

"Peachy." His voice came out so stoic it would put Shouto to shame. He needed rest okay. He hasn't slept in like what? Twenty days? He wasn't keeping count.

The kitten finished the piece of pork and licked its remnants off of Izuku's tattered glove. Evidently, she liked a bit of dirt and blood that had become a second layer to the boy's clothing by now and stepped back with a clear distaste blooming on her taste buds. The kitten hissed at Izuku's still outstretched hand and took one more look at the boy who had fed her, her eyes glowing in the dark not unlike the boy's bright emerald ones, and she ran away without turning her back on him. 

Huh, strange one.

And Nana heard that again apparently because then came her comment on the matter, "Don't know about that, human eyes usually don't glow in the dark you know?"

Izuku rolled his very glowing eyes as he stood up from his position on the ground, "Yeah? Think about the first human who saw a cat at night. Poor guy. He must've screamed." He said, gesturing his hand to where the kitten previously was.

"Well, now that you've mentioned it, I wanna see that happening." Nana chuckled as Izuku put his bento back into his bag and the both of them started walking again in hopes to find anything. Previously, Izuku had tried to contact his mentor using the phone Enji got for him but unfortunately, he couldn't get a hold of the man. Or anyone else who knew of his little vigilante phase for that matter. So, communication was off the table. He couldn't simply ask anyone for backup for this one. As for where he was, Izuku supposed it wouldn't hurt to take a peek at the city now that he was certain no one would be able to catch sight of him at this hour, especially if he used Smokescreen to increase his chances of not being seen but unleashing such an amount of smoke as to cover himself entirely in such a tranquil city where no wreckage told stories of any villain's tyranny seemed irrational. 

Right. Izuku would just take a look from the next turn where the alleyway joined the road. Nobody would see him. No big deal. Shut up, anxious mind, let him do things.

And so, Izuku did just that. As soon as he found a path that connected directly to the road, he took his chance and eyed the city that rested outside this alley, Nana following behind him. 

Unlike the cities Izuku had been to in the past twenty days or so, this one rested perfectly fine. Just an everyday Japanese city. Nothing screamed the fall of Japan or multiple jailbreakers wrecking havoc from place to place. It was just… a normal city after midnight. 

Very suspicious. 

"Should we check this place out?" He asked his predecessor, his voice barely above a whisper.

"Better than wandering in back alleys." Nana smirked, giving the boy a slight nudge in the direction of the road. For some reason it turned out to be much more of a stronger push than intended, seeing as it left Izuku stumbling out towards the road. The onyx haired woman managed to catch him again, just in time before he could break his nose. He had almost done that nineteen times now. There was only so much Nana could save his clumsy ass from.

Once the green haired boy was stable on his feet again, he thanked the vestige again and took a good look at his surroundings. Upon a second look, Izuku still found nothing that could possibly raise any concerns. Although, he did find a small store at the corner — it being the only place with the lights still on inside. On the top of its entrance, a neon sign flickered, saying the place's name in big kanji letters. Izuku knew about this place, he had heard about it in passing but he had never gotten the chance to visit it. He could easily find a few things to help himself there. The way Nana's posture shifted confidently behind him told him that she thought so too.

Therefore, taking another precautionary look at his surroundings to check if anyone gad showed up, once the contrary was confirmed Izuku took a step forward, his metal soles once again clanking against the cement below no matter how quietly he wanted to go. He cringed at each loud clunk and resorted to biting his lower lip as he quickly crossed the road. He couldn't be more thankful that there were no houses in sight or he would have to worry about accidentally waking an innocent family up from the noise of his footsteps alone. If (when) he returned to UA, he would have to ask Mei to come up with an alternative to these very obnoxiously loud metal soles. They helped him a lot, sure but there was a line and that line was called stealth and it was crossed as soon as he took a step back in the alley which was very long ago. Not that long ago actually. It couldn't have been more than two hours, three at the very most but it felt like a long time to him.

Izuku put down the ragged hood of his costume as he reached for the door, the last thing he wanted to do was scare the poor late night shift workers in there with how downright horrendous he looked. Maybe Hawks was right, maybe he should take a bath but Hawks wasn't the one entrusted with a legacy and the destiny to bring an end to the greatest supervillain of all times so he didn't get to have an impactful opinion — if someone like Toshinori said it then maybe he would listen but these days, he didn't stay around long enough for the man to say anything at all.

Izuku entered the store, a small bell chimed as the door opened and closed behind him. The place was bigger than it looked like from the outside or Izuku really badly needed to sleep. There was only one person sitting by the checkout counter, a young girl clearly a good few years older than him. She didn't pay any mind to her customer, however, too engrossed in her phone to notice him. Izuku didn't bother it either and decided to go through the aisles quickly — by quickly he meant as quickly as he could without these metal soles waking up the entire neighbourhood. He needed to put them off. 

As he treaded through the aisles, the green haired boy found a poster that he had definitely, absolutely, a hundred percent seen before and he had seen quite a long time ago and there was no reason for all of its likes to be in such a fresh shape given how old the event it was advertising was but the poster looked as if it was just put up there yesterday. The public opening of Tokyo's Might Museum happened when Izuku was in his second year of middle school why on earth was this poster still looked so new? Instead of having a whole crisis about it and delving into an inner debate on the matter that would most likely result in him looking like a madman planning humanity's inevitable doom — heck, he even looked like some very scary villain too, maybe Hawks wasn't wrong after all — he decided to ask the lady at the counter.

"Um, excuse me, ma'am?" He peeked out his head from behind a shelf.

"Yeah?" The addressed lady didn't look up from her phone's screen for which Izuku was sort if thankful for.

"When's the Night Museum's opening? I saw a poster and I was wondering if you could clear me up on that,"

She continued typing on her phone as she replied with the least bit of interest, "Friday night."

"... This Friday?" Izuku asked again, just to be sure.

"Mhm."

After that he made a beeline towards whatever strongest brand of canned coffee these guys had because apparently he was two years in the past now. Unless he was being trolled. All For One really liked doing that didn't he? What an asshole. Either way, he was going to extremely caffeinated for this.

Nana shot him a glare, Izuku could tell she was really tempted to tell him to watch his fucking language but apparently she decided to not say it out loud this time, perhaps to save his grace in front of that indifferent cashier or because it was aimed at their shared scourge of existence. He would thank her for the umpteenth time but she really needed to let him swear. At least sometimes. It was good to know he could definitely cuss out All For One though.

Izuku returned to the cashier again, this time arms full of eleven cans of double expresso. The lady finally put down her phone to checkout his stuff, she shot him a judgemental look but decided not to comment on the haggard look or the immense amounts of caffeine. She began putting the cans in a bag while Izuku paid the bill. She added as she handed over the bag to Izuku, "Anything for you, miss?"

"Ah, wha— Who?" Izuku stumbled, he thought maybe he didn't hear her right. Nana too, went rigid behind him.

"Her?" The cashier asked, very obviously pointing her finger at Nana's vestige — the vestige she should not be able to see.

Izuku looked at Nana, horrified. She did the same.

The cashier put on her headphones, calling that they were both going to shriek any moment now.

Huh, crazy night.

~O~

Elsewhere, Shigaraki Yoichi found himself in a dark room. 

A room which was definitely not the vestige realm he and his fellow dead successors had been inhabiting for the last few months. No, it was literally just some dark room. It was cold, there were no windows or lights. Yoichi couldn't tell where the exit was and on top of all that, he couldn't feel the presence of any of his successors. The white haired man's lips curved up, not in a smile that could indicate he was amused but in a way a defeated kind of way. 

"Oh this," He breathed out, his claustrophobia kicking in already, "This cannot end well."

~O~

imagine getting separated from ur successors in a different time and ending up in a locked room. couldn't be me

also funky author server i joined recently if you wanna drop by;; https://discord.gg/ysMKFmnq8e