#nothing in the world i hate more than . cellotape noises

[obsob]

i hve a little sale going on in my shop rn!! 10% off some stuff! trying to move some of my older stock i am. running out of room oh dear oh dear

[mintchocolateleaves]

Flare Up (2/5)

Summary: All-Might is not pleased about the teenager that keeps forcing his way past the press and into every villain attack site. Izuku doesn’t care. First-aider!Izuku

A/N: I’m really enjoying writing this. Also - please don’t take all of the medical facts to be 100% accurate, while I’ve been accepted into med-school, I’ve not actually started yet.

[Part One]

He does not go to school that day.

Izuku is pretty sure it’d be impossible to explain the blood.

He waits until the paramedics have tended to the last person, one of which returns a blood-soaked tie to him, following its removal, and then, readies himself to push past the crowd around them.

“Hey kid,” the hero Snatch says, catching his shoulder as he’s about to leave. The battle is over, the villain’s in custody, but the hero does not look pleased. Good, because Izuku hardly feels happy about seeing so many injured people either. “You did a good thing here today, helping all those people.”

Izuku offers him a smile.

The praise, while refreshing, feels like it’s lacking something. Maybe because it’s not All-Might offering the words, maybe because these people should never have been in a situation where they needed help in the first place.

“It was nothing,” Izuku says.

“Maybe it’s not sunk in yet,” the pro-hero says, “but there are people who will live because of what you did today. Don’t play that down.”

Izuku nods his head. “I won’t.”

“Good,” Snatch looks almost pleased at his response, “now, the press are going to attack one way or another for a story, do you want me to shield you from most of the onslaught?”

“What do the media want with me?”

The pro-hero lets out a laugh. A mixture of shock and amusement, with a side of disbelief. He says, “a middle schooler pushes his way past police officers, is the first one to administer any first aid, saves countless of lives, and you wonder why, the media would want to get a story out of him?”

When he says it like that, Izuku can’t help but feel nervous.

“I don’t think I want to speak to the press at all,” Izuku says, “can’t I just, go home?”

“I’ll get a hero to take you home,” Snatch says, “no interview necessary.”

“Thanks,” Izuku mumbles, as the hero pushes him away from the crowd. Within a few seconds, Izuku’s been pushed into a car, asked for his address, and driven home.

His mother, as he’d expected, is terrified.

Izuku steps through the door, and is bombarded with a hug tighter than usual hugs. He doesn’t know how to respond, not at first, until his mother pulls back and wipes at her own tears.

“They were showing videos of the attack on the news,” Inko says, “and then I saw you, on camera, and there was blood all over your shirt, I thought you were dying.”

His mother looks him up and down, offers him a smile now.

“And then they said how there was a courageous boy offering first aid to everyone that he passed, and I thought, that’s my Izuku.” Inko smiles, “I’m so proud of you, even if you did give me a heart attack.”

Izuku offers her a smile back.

“I’m sorry about the heart attack,” Izuku says, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Just don’t give me another,” she shakes her head, “look at your uniform, it’s going to stain. Come on, get changed out of them and I’ll get them washed for school tomorrow.”

Izuku nods.

He decides that maybe he should bring a spare uniform with him in the future, on the off chance that something like this were to happen again.

Water safety is a slower course than first aid, mainly because it involves teaching the class to swim confidently before they can move on to saving people. Perhaps she notices that Izuku is growing impatient, because Kurusu pulls him aside after they finish one of their sessions, and suggests he read up on the mammalian diving reflex.

“You never know whether you’ll need to know something like that,” the instructor says, “and it’s always fascinating to know what our bodies can do.”

Izuku studies it.

Kurusu hasn’t lied, the human body is fascinating.

He spends a lot longer reading health articles online, turns to his mother every time something interesting shows up with a smile. Inko’s smiles grow more enthusiastic as the days pass.

“Oh Izuku,” she calls to him one night, when she’s in the middle of cooking dinner, grabbing his attention from a rather interesting article on developments of vaccines, “come here wouldn’t you?”

Izuku scrolls down on the article to see how much is left, realises it’s too long to finish without coming off as rude and pushes back from his chair. The kitchen is only steps away, and he peeks his head around the door frame.

“Yes?”

“Oh, come in properly Izuku.” His mother chides, shaking her head. Her lips are lifted upwards, the ghost of a smile haunting her face, even if she’s trying to be stern. She’s happier these days, Izuku can see it. She beckons to him, “come on!”

Izuku pushes forward, hovers by the table.

“I’ve got something for you.” Inko says, opening one of the cupboards to pull out a small parcel. It’s wrapped in brown paper, nothing fancy, but the ends are cellotaped down, making it seemingly impossible to open.

Somehow Izuku knows he’ll find a way.

“I know it’s not much,” his mother says as she passes it to him, a shy expression on her face, “but I thought you might like it anyway.”

Izuku scrapes his fingernails against tape, unwraps the present. Inside there are two books, both thin. The top book is a first aid book – the blurb promises details on how to treat various quirk types, and information on how to treat both heroes and villains that might not want assistance.

The bottom book is labelled, ‘so you want to go to medical school?’

Izuku looks up and there’s tears in his mother’s eyes.

“It’s just an idea,” Inko starts, “but I thought it was an option you might want to look in to. You just seem so passionate about this, and… Izuku, have I mentioned recently how proud I am of you?”

Izuku can’t help but smile.

A doctor – yeah, that’s a job to aspire for. He enjoys first aid, and helping those people had been amazing. Even if he does want to become a hero – and he will, in one way or another – he thinks being a doctor is also a nice idea.

“I’ve got a while until then,” Izuku says, around a smile, “but I think this book will be useful.”

His mother beams.

His next disaster is not nearly as busy as the first had been.

Most disaster’s involving All-Might have less casualties. The fighting is normally finished within minutes, and the number one hero doesn’t rack up any damages to the local building.

(Not usually at least.)

Izuku is walking home from school, a half day, when he notices a shrill call for help. Instinct drives his hand into his pocket for the red cross badge, as he races towards the voice.

It’s still difficult to push past the police, especially with the media present wanting to see All-Might, but Izuku manages to get past quickly enough. There are three victims in total. Two are civilians, the third a villain which All-Might has knocked down.

The civilians are making noise. One’s bleeding out, a gash in their arm. It’s not a heavy flow, so Izuku passes and leaves them for in a moment. The other has what looks like a broken wrist. Painful, but not worth seeing to first.

Prioritising always leaves a guilty ache in his stomach. If Izuku could help all three simultaneously, then he would.

Instead, he goes to the villain. He’s unconscious, having been thrown backwards by one of All-Might’s punches. Except… there’s red seeping through his shirt.

If the rumours spreading through the crowds were correct, then this villain had been using knives alongside a speed quirk to attack civilians. He must have landed on one of the knives when he’s fallen…

Only… that’d include a back wound, and this is very clearly a stab through the stomach. The realisation shoots through him almost immediately, as he’s leaning into his backpack for his sports uniform, using it as a cloth and applying pressure to the wound.

Suicide.

Some villains can’t stand the thought of prison. And yet, Izuku can’t stand the thought of even one person dying on his watch.

He presses just hard enough to stem the bleeding. It’ll be difficult to keep the villain alive – it’s not like they’re in the movies, where there’s a high likelihood of people surviving internal bleeding – not when he knows the paramedics will see to the care of civilians first.

Which… is something Izuku hates about this quirk ridden world. That villains are seen as almost lesser in terms of medical care than everyone else… Surely the most wounded should be seen to first…?

Izuku sighs.

And meets the eyes of a villain staring up at him.

“I know you’ve broken some rules,” Izuku mutters to the man, “but don’t break the most important one: Don’t die on me. Okay?”

The villain blinks back at him. Offers what might be a ghost of a smile, and shakes his head.

It’s at this moment, that Izuku knows the man will not survive.

He doesn’t have to wait until the paramedics arrive, expressions almost hopeless at the ghostly pallor of the villain’s face. Nor at the glassy sheen to his eyes seconds after they lift him up onto a stretcher.

There is no saving a person who does not wish to be saved. Not this time.

Izuku has blood on his shirt, and hands when he finally stands up. He glances at the ambulances, then towards All-Might giving a report to the police. And he grits his teeth.

He almost doesn’t register the fact that he’s moving forwards until he’s a few steps away from the number one hero. He hovers waiting for the conversation to end. It fades, almost unnaturally as both the hero and police officer take notice of him.

And by him, Izuku’s pretty sure they notice the blood.

“Are you alright, young man?” All-Might’s voice seems to boom, intense in it’s volume. Then, almost as an afterthought, he adds, much more quietly, “you’re the boy that asked me about being a hero.”

Izuku isn’t sure whether he should be glad that he’s memorable. That probably just shows how little the number of people All-Might’s told cannot be heroes is.

He doesn’t respond to the question. Instead, he steels himself and looks his most favoured hero in the eye, voice low as he says, “you should have made sure that he was fully unarmed.”

The number one hero does not respond. Izuku does not give him the time.

“The villain, I mean,” Izuku says. He lifts his hands up, “this is his blood, by the way. Because he thought killing himself was the best option following this fight. You should have made sure he had no weapons.”

And now that he’s thinking about it – no other first-aiders had come to see if he needed help with the first aid. It’s almost as if no one had cared what ended up to the villain, as long as he’d been beaten by a hero.

All-Might opens his mouth, then closes it. While he’ll willingly smile towards all the cameras and for the sake of others, now, his expression is serious, contemplative almost. He says, “sometimes even us heroes make mistakes. I was certain I’d unarmed the man.”

Izuku looks down at his hands, stained in red. He says, “yeah, well… you didn’t.”

The next scene is almost… horrific compared to the first two.

All-Might is there, alongside multiple others, struggling to fight against a league of villains. Izuku hears about it on the radio, through his headphones, and glances towards the street sign.

The disaster isn’t far away at all.

So, he sprints. Izuku makes his way towards the scene and practically dives past the cordoned off sections of the crime scene, making his way towards the injured. There are heroes laying bloodied, alongside villains. Civilians caught in the crossfire between the two, many having been hit by the debris.

At a glance, there are over thirty injured. And with the sound of glass shattering and debris continuing to fall, Izuku’s certain there will be more.

“You can’t go past this point,” a police officer yells, “it’s too dangerous.”

His words are easily ignored.

There’s are multiple civilian’s in shock. They can’t all stay near the building, not with the area as volatile and with so much debris going around. It’s only asking for more risk, so Izuku talks to those that are conscious and able to walk, pointing towards the police tape.

Most to go that way are those with minor injuries, bleeds on the upper half of the body that he can get people to apply pressure to while they walk for more professional help.

Then, he heads towards more of the injured. One hero has a rather serious head wound, words slurred with a concussion. Izuku knows trying to get the woman to walk by herself will lead to further injuries from clumsiness, so he throws one of her arms over his shoulder and half carries her away from the danger.

“your jus’ a kid,” the woman slurs, and Izuku, tired of hearing the same words repeated over and over, simply reaches up to wipe the blood away from her forehead.

Next, he stops by a villain; The injury is a broken leg. An open break, with the bone protruding from the skin. It’s almost ghastly, how it looks, and Izuku realises they won’t be able to walk properly without damaging his ears from the screams.

He glances around, finds a long pole, and picks it up. After that, he grabs what looks like a small block of wood.

“You’re going to have to walk with me,” Izuku says, staring the man down. “Bite down on this, because it’s going to be painful.”

The villain takes the wood without a second thought. Instead of making him lash out, the pain has made him more complacent. He puts it in his mouth, as Izuku lifts him up.

“Use this as a crutch,” Izuku says, passing him the pole, “I can’t cover the break, since I don’t have any dressings, but once you’re over there, paramedics should see to you then, okay?”

It feels almost wrong to move the man. Kurusu had drilled it in to him not to move people, and while he knows it’s more dangerous to leave the villain there, he feels almost guilty asking the man to move.

“You… why’re you helping me?”

Izuku says, “why do I need a reason to save someone?”

There’s a civilian with what looks like a puncture wound through the chest next. They’re coughing blood, something that spooks Izuku into freezing for a few seconds, until he sees a long metal piece of debris and a blanket inside one of the buildings.

One of the buildings which looks like it could fall apart at any moment.

“…shit,” Izuku mutters, and climbs towards the building, hands grabbing out for the blanket. It snags, rips in half, but it’s still salvageable. Is still big enough.

He folds part of it over the debris and moves the civilian onto the blanket, uses the debris to pull the blanket forwards. He can’t move quickly, not without adding more risk, so he pulls slowly, until he’s moved near enough to the paramedics to get their attention.

Izuku shouts, “over here, come help,” waves his hand to grab their attention. Then, once they’re racing towards the victim, he races back towards the onslaught of casualties.

“This isn’t good,” Izuku finds himself muttering, as he’s dragging more people from the wreck, ensuring they make their way to the paramedics, ripping at people’s shirts to make temporary bandages.

He’s racing towards another victim – he’s not sure if this one is a villain or a hero, all he knows it that they’re injured – when something black comes into his sight. It’s a black fog, something that Izuku doesn’t quite register as a person until it speaks.

“You,” it says, “you’re healing people, yes?”

Izuku doesn’t register him as a villain until he’s answered yes, trying to rush forwards even further.

“well, it’d be a lot more favourable if you stopped.”

There is a vortex of black, almost as if the mist is grabbing at his body. One moment, Izuku is struggling, and then, he’s pulled down through some sort of black hole which opens up thirty feet above the ground.

He’s falling, and for a moment, all Izuku can wonder is whether helping all those people will be enough.

Then, there’s an arm around his waist, and he’s moving sideways, caught in the grasp of one of the heroes. He’s deposited on the ground seconds later, in one piece, and Izuku can’t help but feel a wave of relief rush through him.

His legs feel too wobbly to properly stand, and they collapse beneath him as soon at the hero lets him go.

“You shouldn’t be around here,” All-Might says from beside him, “villains will attack you, and we might not be able to save you next time.”

Izuku pushes himself up, glances towards the man. He says, “people need urgent medical care. They need first aid, and no one else seems willing to offer it.”

Because they hadn’t been.

Izuku’s watched enough villain attacks online and in person to know that when things get serious like this, with such danger around them, only the bravest will offer help. And when he’d shown up – there had been no first aiders rushing in to help others.

“You’re going to get yourself injured,” All-Might says, and the ‘or killed’ goes unspoken but known. The hero isn’t smiling anymore, stern worry spreading across his face. Maybe he wouldn’t be so worried if he knew Izuku could protect himself, that he wasn’t quirkless, but Izuku knows he remembers the conversation.

“Well it’s a good thing I know first aid, right?” Izuku mutters. He moves to step forwards, only slightly uneasy on his feet.

“A young man shouldn’t have to worry about this,” All-Might says, “Midoriya, you should head home.”

Maybe he shouldn’t be surprised that All-Might knows his name. It’d made it’s way into the media against his will the first time he’d been present at a disaster. And he’d probably been curious over who’d scolded him over the death of a villain.

And yet, Izuku is still shocked nonetheless.

“No. I’m staying.”

[Chapter Three]