"If you wanna be a hero so bad, there's actually a really good way. If you believe they're holding your quirk over in the next world…you should just take a dive off the rooftop!"

Bakugou Katsuki is 14 when his world comes crumbling down around him.

Those careless words dripping in sarcasm, tossed over his shoulder with a laugh, will haunt him for perhaps the rest of his life.

To be honest, he's actually almost forgotten them by the time it happens.

First days pass, then weeks, then months, and Deku is the same as always.

He's always there, lurking quietly in the background, his nose buried in his notebooks and whispering quietly to himself about something or other.

He's always there.

Until

quite suddenly

he isn't.

All Might is being interviewed when the news breaks.

He's just saved the day once more from a couple of would-be bank robbers, and he's talking to reporters for a few minutes before he has to take off once more to get back to his heroing.

They're downtown, and there are several giant screens mounted on the buildings around them, flashing colourful advertisements and news reports.

Mostly, they're ignored.

But when the anchor's voice takes on a sombre tone, and he moves onto a story about a junior high school student jumping off the roof of his school, All Might's head turns along with everyone else, and the smile freezes on his face.

An eerie hush falls over the crowd as the image on screen changes to show a reporter on the scene, talking to a shellshocked teacher.

But while everyone else is paying attention to the news report, the interviewer All Might had been talking to is watching the top hero carefully.

His body is shaking, fists clenched tightly at his sides as his ever-present smile slips slowly from his face.

And when the reporter says the child's name, when the world learns that Midoriya Izuku has leapt to his death, All Might rears back as if the words had been a physical blow.

He's gone before the interviewer can even blink.

His mind is a jumbled mess, his blood roaring deafeningly in his ears. He can barely hear himself think - doesn't want to hear himself think.

Midoriya Izuku - a boy he's known for just four months, a boy who's become such an integral part of his life he can barely imagine a future without him - is gone.

The next holder of One for All is gone.

His protégé is gone.

Midoriya Izuku, his boy, his son is GONE.

And for the first time ever, Toshinori Yagi can't muster up a smile.

He doesn't think he'll ever smile again.

All Might lands in the school courtyard with a deafening thud, cracks spiderwebbing out from the pavement beneath his feet.

He's behind police lines, but no one moves to stop him as he walks over to where a dark splatter of red on the pavement shows the point of impact.

The body is long gone.

The world watches silently as their hero, the Symbol of Peace, falls to his knees, a roar like a wounded animal tearing from his throat.

The world watches silently the way his shoulders shake as he cries his grief.

And in that moment, he's not All Might. He's not some untouchable, invincible God of a man.

In that moment, he's just Toshinori Yagi, and he's hurting.

The next morning, the video has been uploaded to youtube.

Splashed across every social network and news channel, it already has billions of views.

And Bakugou Katsuki knows with a certainty he feels in his bones, that more than the poisonous words he spat from his mouth, that image of All Might, broken and grieving, will haunt him to his dying breath.