Part 2 of 'We Looped Right Back to Rock Bottom'

There are a few reasons why I've posted this part 2 separately and one is that part 1 is way too long and I don't want to subject you guys to scrolling past that monstrosity.

Many thanks to dear Evee (Everlydream ) for editing this for me, you're the best love.

Summary: "You were there too?"

He prays Midoriya will say no. Prays that Midoriya will tell him that it was only Hitoshi who got hit by that stupid quirk and it wasn't him living the life of someone quirkless. Wasn't Midoriya who was beaten down and mocked, told to jump off the roof, told-

"Not in yours."

Hitoshi let's out a breath but then the words register in his head, "Mine?"

"Yeah. We saw-" a shuddering breath. Voice shaky, falling apart, "We saw different things."

-

Hitoshi comes back to the living world with a gasp.

The first thing he notices is that he is most certainly not in his dorm room. There are green curtains drawn on either side of his bed and a faint antiseptic smell in the air, which probably means that he's in the school infirmary right now. His heartbeat slows down a little at the familiar space then, but with his memories starting to fill in Hitoshi's almost desperately confused, because they make no sense.

He was- in middle school? And- Midoriya was there and so was Bakugou but- Hitoshi doesn't know those two from middle school. He doesn't even know where Aldera is. He doesn't know what was happening, and the more he thinks about it, he'd really believed he was fourteen, hadn't he? He was fourteen again but somewhere he's never been, but it hadn't been like that in his memory. Or whatever it was that Hitoshi just woke up from. It was- oh, a time loop, fine, but- that still isn't much better.

So he was in a time loop, with Midoriya and Bakugou as the only two people there that he actually knows now in real life and- then what? Had Bakugou and Midoriya known they were in a time loop? Had they also felt that wrongness creep on them throughout the whole thing- because Hitoshi certainly had. He remembers several instances where he could have sworn something was wrong but hadn't been able to put his finger on it. That was obviously his real memories trying to break through and-

God, it's so confusing. What was the point of the whole thing, anyways? How did he break the loop in the end? What happened?

Hitoshi sits up, then, determined to maybe talk to someone and set his own head straight, because he has way too many questions and little to no answers. He wants to know what happened, how it happened and if he was the only one.

He pulls back the curtain to his left to see that Recovery Girl's desk is empty, which means she's probably stepped out for the moment. Fine then, she'll probably be back soon so he just has to wait-

Behind him, someone else draws back the curtain that was separating the two cots in the infirmary. Hitoshi had a feeling that the other bed was occupied, but what are the chances that a familiar nervous lilt speaks up behind him.

"Shinsou?"

Hitoshi sighs in relief and turns around, "Midoriya. Do you know what's happening?"

But Midoriya is silent. He's staring at the floor and Hitoshi can't see his eyes, body one taught trembling line. "...Midoriya?"

"You're okay." Midoriya sounds... wrecked.

"I am." He can't get a reliable read on Midoriya, so Hitoshi ends up falling back on something that has usually worked in the past. "Do you... want a hug?"

Midoriya nods tightly, and Hitoshi gently rises from his cot and goes to sit beside Midoriya. He raises his arms in an open invite, and holds steady when Midoriya finally curls against him with a desperate half sob.

"Shinsou, "

"Hey," Hitoshi holds onto his friend, feeling as though he could have seen this coming but not knowing how, can only be there for when Midoriya crumbles, "It's okay, you're okay-"

Midoriya is an easy crier, by never like this, desperate and quiet yet still sounding like someone tore his heart out.

His hands reach up to grip tightly at the back of Hitoshi's shirt like Hitoshi is a life line, like Midoriya's afraid Hitoshi will disappear if he lets go. He's crying like they just escaped a life-or-death situation, and Hitoshi doesn't know what to make of it.

"You're fine, you're okay Midoriya." Hitoshi guides Midoriya's head to rest on his shoulder, starting to trace mindless circles onto his back. Like this, Midoriya feels so small somehow, something crushed and hurting. It's a startling contrast to Hitoshi's image of him from their first meeting at the Sports Festival, standing determined and steadfast in a stadium of cheering crowds, desperate to prove himself.

Hitoshi wonders, abruptly, if this has anything to do with the loops. It could make sense, but Hitoshi has a feeling that that's not it. He imagines that if it really was Midoriya back there, and not just echo of something not all real, then Midoriya wouldn't have- things wouldn't have happened like they did. Midoriya has never struck Hitoshi as a pushover, or someone who'd let himself be walked all over. It just- doesn't fit? Not with how many times Hitoshi has seen Midoriya stand up to Bakugou, refusing to take his shit.

And besides, in the loops, or whatever they were, Midoriya was quirkless. There's no way they were real.

So here, Hitoshi has no idea what could be wrong, but he's determined to help once Midoriya has calmed down enough to tell him.

-

"You okay?"

They've moved in the past few minutes. Hitoshi managed to coax Midoriya into letting him shift backwards so he could lean against the headboard and not have to support all of Midoriya's upper body weight. Midoriya's breathing is still heavy, but at least the tears have dried up. His head tucked against his chest, head resting against Hitoshi's collar, but Hitoshi doesn't care. He's ended up resting his own head against the side of Midoriya's, and they're sitting close enough that they don't have to look at each other to have this conversation.

"Midoriya?"

Midoriya hums, listless, and Hitoshi wants to make it easier, somehow. "What happened?"

There's silence. Hitoshi thinks maybe Midoriya isn't ready to talk about this, whatever this is, or maybe he's too afraid and-

Midoriya shifts slightly, hand twisting in the hem of his shirt, "Do you remember what happened?"

"... I don't?"

"Before you were- asleep, do you remember what we were doing before that?"

Hitoshi racks his brain, trying to think past the time loops, the questions that burn on his tongue, desperately wanting answers. Instead, he moves past them, to before, when it was just a normal evening and-

"Our patrol routes crossed."

Midoriya nods, "They did. Both our supervisors were called in to resolve a conflict-"

"-but we got hit by that- by that guy's quirk."

Midoriya stills, getting quieter by the second. "We did."

It... makes sense, but doesn't explain the loops, the missing memories and hallucinations and- "What happened then?"

"They still aren't sure yet." Midoriya breathes out a shaky sigh, "Aizawa-sensei was there when they questioned the man on the specifics of his quirk, but he... refused to say. Unless they find his file on the database, no one can be really sure of what exactly happened after we went unconscious."

"I was-"

"-stuck in a loop?"

Hitoshi flinches. He goes to move back, wants to see what expression it is that Midoriya's making, but Midoriya doesn't let him. He just clings tighter, head still tilted low, like he's afraid of Hitoshi seeing him. Hitoshi sighs, and curls his arm tighter around Midoriya's shoulders, "You were there too?"

He prays Midoriya will say no. Prays that Midoriya will tell him that it was only Hitoshi who got hit by that stupid quirk and it wasn't him living the life of someone quirkless. Wasn't Midoriya who was beaten down and mocked, told to jump off the roof, told-

"Not in yours."

Hitoshi let's out a breath but then the words register in his head, "Mine?"

"Yeah. We saw-" a shuddering breath. Voice shaky, falling apart, "We saw different things."

It's just then that the door to the infirmary opens, revealing a steely eyed Recovery Girl who marches into the room knowing damn well she owns the place. Aizawa slinks in after her, but it's the file tucked under his arm that draws Hitoshi's eye.

-

"I don't understand why me and Midoriya have to be briefed separately."

All Might had shown up a little while ago and taken Midoriya with him, while Aizawa had sat down in front of Hitoshi.

(He hadn't been able to meet All Might's eye right then, memory of a forgotten rooftop still fresh in his mind. A young voice, asking, "Is it possible to become a hero without a-)

"It's better this way, trust me."

Hitoshi runs a tired hand over his face, "You're scaring me Sensei."

It's supposed to come off light hearted, something to cut through the tension. But Aizawa doesn't deign him with a response, just looks at him before passing the file to him. It's open on a quirk profile, and Hitoshi immediately places the man as the one who they ran into yesterday (yesterday? It seems like so long ago when him and Aizawa had answered that call for backup).

He runs a hand over the page, noting details like height and age before finding his way down to the quirk description.

'Memory Scape only comes into effect on two or more people. When two people are affected by this quirk, both are sent into one of the other person's 'memories'-'

'-the person who the memory belongs to believes it to be the 'lowest moment in their life'. Both parties fall into a coma like state-'

'-only comes to an end when each person lives out the memory almost exactly as it occurred in real life-'

Hitoshi can't breathe.

It doesn't- this doesn't make any sense because-

"What you saw, was something that happened to Midoriya sometime in his past."

His breathing is- Hitoshi can't feel the air reach his lungs properly. It's like if he breathes too loud everything will-

'-lives out the memory almost exactly as it occurred-'

("Is it possible to become a hero even though I don't have a quirk?!")

"Kid?"

("-Swan dive off the roof-")

Hitoshi stays very very still because-

("This will only take 45 seconds!")

Because-

("No, I honestly don't think you can become a hero without a quirk-")

Because-

First by the lockers. Again. At lunch. Again. Last period. Again. After school. Again. In the underpass. On the rooftop. Walking home.

Again and again and again.

("Is it possible to become a hero even though I don't have a quirk?"

"No, I honestly don't think-")

"Shinsou." Aizawa's voice cuts through the silence like a knife through butter. Hitoshi flinches. His breathing is still shallow, and his hands are shaking. Aizawa is crouched in front of him, in the space between the two cots. His eyes are dark, pitch black like something to hold onto. "Kid. Talk to me."

Hitoshi opens his mouth, and a pained hiss is the only thing he can manage. He shakes his head.

"Do you want me to call Midoriya back in?"

Hitoshi nods and Aizawa stands up. A hand lands on his shoulder, but Hitoshi's hands are shaking where they hold the file, "Stay here."

He doesn't know how long Aizawa is gone for, just that he is, just that Hitoshi's thoughts feel like they might crush him.

Real, all of it was-

"Shinsou?"

The words on the file are blurred, shapeless and flowing into something unreadable. His own breathing feels like it's grating against his throat, lungs pumping in and out but there's no air.

(All of it was-)

"Hey, can you look at me Shinsou? Please?"

Hands, trembling as the file is pulled out of them. Midoriya gets up, slowly, carefully, maybe so Shinsou could tell him no if he needed to. Say, I don't need this, I need to be left alone.

But he does need this.

Arms, around him and Midoriya is warm. He's warm and sturdy and there, not small and shaking and beaten, not ragged breathed and drowned. Not teary eyed and a cobbled smile, on the last few wisps of a broken dream, grateful for the one person there to maybe help him up from where he'd fallen.

Here, complete and whole. A hero.

Hitoshi gasps as the first few tears slip and now, he's the one who feels like he can't let go. Like if he does then the nightmare will come back, and he'll be fourteen again, trying to look out for a kid who the world seemed determined to crush under its heel.

It's- two U.A students, in the hero course and out of a nightmare, trying to steady each other as they weather through the storm.

When Hitoshi's breathing feels steady enough to risk words, even as unsteady as they might be, he asks, "Is it true?"

Midoriya hums quietly, always steady, "What is?"

"That you were quirkless," Hitoshi breathes in a ragged whisper, "In middle school, you didn't have a-"

"Yes." Quiet, but Midoriya wouldn't lie about this.

"Fuck." Hitoshi breathes that truth in, an experience he doesn't want to impress on Midoriya. Being quirkless is- well, Hitoshi saw it first hand, didn't he? He saw first fucking hand what being quirkless might look like. Did look like.

A drop of heavy silence, and more question well on Hitoshi's tongue. He wants Midoriya to tell him that the rest of it isn't true, that the meeting on the rooftop-

"Were you alone?" Hitoshi's hands scrabble against Midoriya's back, desperate to look at Midoriya when Midoriya gives him an answer, "Were you alone, on that rooftop, when All Might said- said-" Hitoshi cuts himself off. He can't even say it, can't imagine not being there as the horror mounts into something very real.

Because Midoriya pulls back and his eyes are blank, lifeless and shaded as he looks at Hitoshi and says, "Yes. I was."

Hitoshi stares back at Midoriya, lost for words.

Alone.

Alone, as Bakugou picked on him in that classroom. Alone, as he walked home. Alone, as he was drowned by that villain. Alone, on that rooftop, asking his favorite hero-

("Is it possible to become a hero even though I don't have a quirk?"

"No-")

Hitoshi doesn't know how to reconcile the differences. He doesn't know how to make it better.

-

"You okay?"

Hitoshi feels... drained out, having told the last of his story. He feels like someone washed all the color out of him, leaving him muted and grey.

"I'm fine." His voice feels too loud, in this too-small interrogation room, with only Aizawa and the guy they called down from the police station as company. He'd been told that Midoriya had already given his statement, given that he'd woken up first. Hitoshi doesn't even want to think about what Midoriya might have seen, what might look like 'the lowest moment' in Hitoshi's life. He doesn't have the emotional energy left to deal with anymore of this, and just... wants to go back to the dorms. Go back to his room and sleep.

Aizawa is watching him like he knows Hitoshi isn't 'fine' but also understands that pushing will make it worse. So he walks with him to the front of the building where they meet All Might and Midoriya in the midst of a goodbye. Specifically, All Might with a hand on Midoriya's shoulder and parting words, "-take care of yourself my boy. It would do no good to burn out."

Something ugly wells up in Hitoshi at the sight. He knows it's probably been a long time since the rooftop, and Midoriya and All Might have clearly moved past it. But for Hitoshi it was only a scant few hours ago that he woke up from the loops, and a bitter part of him can't help but ask, what right does this man have, to speak to him that way? When he broke his dreams, left him on a rooftop, alone-

"Let's go Midoriya."

Midoriya flinches under All Might's grip, surprised. "R-right! Let's go."

The walk back is silent, save for Midoriya trying and failing to start a conversation. Eventually, Hitoshi takes pity on him and says, "It's fine. I'm just tired right now."

"R-right." Midoriya twists his fingers in that bad habit of his that all of his friends have been trying to get him to break for a while now, "W-will you be alright?"

"Yeah." The dorms are right there, like nothing ever changed, waiting for them to come back, "I'll be fine."

-

The first thing that Hitoshi hears on stepping into the common room is a loud grating voice that says, "You fucking dumbass. You just had to get hit by a quirk, didn't you nerd?"

And, oh boy, Hitoshi feels angry.

One moment a clamor rises up, worried voices calling out for assurances of their recovery. Worried and too-nosy-for-their-good classmates grouping around them, asking if they need anything, and to never scare them like that again, and Midoriya, you didn't break a bone again, did you?

But everything is washed out by the dull roar of anger in Hitoshi's ears, a voice that said ("Take a swan dive off the roof-!") burning words followed by burning hands, and nobody is able to stop Hitoshi from pushing through the crowd and decking Bakugou right in the face.

He doesn't think he's ever seen Bakugou startled into inaction, not when it's about a fight coming his way. He doesn't think anyone's ever had the gall to just walk over and sock him right in the face either. But Hitoshi's done both of those things and doesn't feel even a smudge better for it because in the end, it changes nothing.

Before anyone can react, he's already dropped to his haunches and pulled Bakugou up with a hand twisted into the front of his shirt, leaning his face in dangerously close so that's it's only the two of them who hear his next words.

"If you ever treat Midoriya like you treated him back in middle school, I'll string you up from the dorm roof myself."

Bakugou's hands reach up to tear off Hitoshi's grip from his shirt, already popping with explosions. But: his eyes are wide, surprised and caught completely off guard. Hitoshi shoves him back and gets to his feet, and before everyone starts fussing again, walks away.

He walks away, and refuses to look back.

-

For the wonderful luminou_lily12 on AO3 who absolutely made my day by commenting on the first part, here's the full quirk description for 'Memory Scape':

'Memory Scape only comes into affect on two or more people. When two people are affected by the quirk, both are sent into one of the other person's 'memories'. The memory the quirk uses, as described by people who have been previously influenced by this quirk, is one that the person who the memory belongs to believes to be the 'lowest moment in their life'. Both parties fall into a coma like state until they can navigate the memory they have been put in, which can only be successfully done when they live out the memory almost exactly as it occurred in real life. Persons reliving the memory are made into spectators that can interact with the memory as if it were real, and they will have false assumptions planted into their brain to make it so that they do not realize they are under the affects of this quirk while inside the memory.'
{Told you you were close Lily ;)}

I hope this clears things up! Thank you so much for reading!

Your Captain, Lynda