Inko returned home at sunset that Monday thoroughly exhausted, in every sense of the word. Her makeup was ruined, with tearstains running down her face, and her eyes were red and puffy from hours of crying. Oh, and she had a strange man coming in with her, panting and holding his side after the four-story hike up the stairs.

That morning, after Izuku left for school, Inko had spent the morning fretting over the impending counseling session, partly excited that her son would finally be getting the help and support he needed, mostly afraid of learning exactly how much he needed it, learning how deep those scars of his went, learning how badly she had failed him for all these years.

When the phone call startled Inko out of her anxious musings, she answered on reflex without checking the caller I.D. Before the receptionist on the other end finished telling her what had happened to her son, she had already hung up, slung her purse over her shoulder, and sprinted to her car.

Her phone rang again as she ran up to the front desk of Musutafu General, but she ignored it. The receptionist gave her the grisly details, decayed facial tissue and skull, major blood loss, and severe exhaustion. When Inko asked how it happened, the receptionist grimaced and said they couldn't tell her.

Once she got settled in a waiting room, Inko checked her phone. Nezu had left her a message, but instead of playing it, she called him back.

The principal picked up on the first ring. "Midoriya-san, did you get my message?"

"I didn't," she admitted. "What happened?"

"Did you get a call from the hospital?"

"I'm already there."

There was a long pause from the other end. As Inko was wondering if she had somehow lost reception, the principal said, "Sorry about that, it's a mess on my end. Villains attacked the school. Your son is the only one with life-threatening injuries. From what we've learned, he confronted the ringleader of the attack to keep his classmates safe."

"Why didn't your teachers keep him safe?" Inko blurted out.

"They tried. There were over a hundred villains, and only two teachers. They also used a warping Quirk to separate the students." The principal let out an exasperated sigh. "I'm not trying to defend what happened. We messed up. I messed up. This attack quite literally came out of nowhere. Now that I am aware of this threat to the students, I will take whatever measures necessary to make sure this never happens again. In the meantime, all I can do to make it up to you is to offer Japan's finest rehabilitation services and make sure your son suffers no permanent complications from this incident. We will also provide whatever counseling and therapy necessary for him to recover from this in addition to the other problems we have already discussed. Do you have any other immediate concerns that I can address at this time?"

Inko, still trying to process everything Nezu just said, could only say, "No, thank you Nezu-san. I – I'll keep in touch."

"Anytime. I sent a couple teachers over with Izuku to keep an eye on him. I would appreciate it if you refrain from confronting them at this time, as they're both exhausted from what happened."

In hindsight, it wasn't the wisest idea to have half a pitcher of coffee while waiting for news about her son, but having something to periodically sip made the wait more bearable. Between the coffee and the stress of having her son in a coma, her nerves were jittery enough to jump every time footsteps crossed the waiting room's door.

When the door finally opened, she spilled a splash of coffee on the counter. She wiped it up with her sleeve, not even noticing the stain it left. "Is he okay?"

The nurse smiled at her. "The doctors say he'll pull through. He's sleeping right now, and he needs to stay isolated for now, but you can see him if you want to."

As Inko went to her son's room, she passed two doctors carrying Aizawa on a stretcher. Blood stained his tattered clothes, and his face was frighteningly pale. She paused, torn between going to her room and checking on his teacher.

"Is he?" she asked.

A thin hand lightly touched her on the shoulder. When she turned, her eyes met a sad, shrunken pair of blue eyes set in a gaunt face. "Aizawa-san is fine, he just passed out a minute ago. He had a rough day."

Inko looked the stranger over. While she didn't keep up with heroes personally, her son's hobby meant she knew a little bit about quite a few heroes. The scrawny figure before her looked like no hero she had ever heard about.

"I'm sorry, I don't believe we've met," Inko said.

"Oh, right. Yagi Toshinori." He held out his hand. "I presume you are Midoriya-kun's mother?"

"Midoriya Inko," she said, taking his hand. She could feel the bones in his fingers. It made her feel a sense of unease. How could someone so frail be a hero?

"Are you a teacher at U.A.?"

"Ah, yes," he said, fishing an I.D. card out of his pocket. Inko glimpsed a second card that he had hastily put back. The one he showed her had his name and face on it.

"What do you teach?"

"Heroics."

Yagi flinched, a nervous gesture that Inko noticed and shelved for later consideration. "I see. Sorry if I come across as skeptical, it's just that…"

A broad smile crossed Yagi's grin. "I get it. I don't exactly get out in public much like this."

"Oh, you're an underground hero, like Eraserhead?"

"Yeah, like Eraserhead," he repeated, his words uncertain. He glanced back at the operating room and said, "I'd hate to keep you from seeing your son."

At the reminder, Inko's attention snapped back to her son hard enough to give her whiplash. "Yes, thank you, can't believe I forgot."

Hearing herself say those words, hearing herself admit to having failed him yet again, set off another round of sobbing. As her legs gave out from under her, she staggered over to the bench across the hallway.

Alarmed by her behavior, Yagi went up to her and asked, "Are you feeling alright? Is there something wrong?"

"How could I be such a horrible mother?" she asked between sobs. "First the scars, then this? I'm supposed to be there for him, but I – I don't know what to do!"

Yagi sat next to her and patted her shoulder. "He will be fine. The doctors say he should wake up tomorrow, and you can be there for him then."

Too distraught to think about her actions, Inko wrapped her arms around Yagi and buried her face in his shoulder. He froze up at first, but as she kept crying, he put his hand on her back and patted her gently.

As the time crept by, Toshinori found himself increasingly unnerved by the sensation of having a woman, and a stranger no less, pressed so closely against him. In the back of his mind, he imagined her husband coming down the hall, seeing them like this, and getting angry at him for being this close to her. He wanted to push her away, or tell her to back off, but hearing her heartbroken sobs made him afraid to hurt her even more.

After what felt like an eternity, Inko sat up and wiped her eyes. "I – I'm sorry," she stammered. "I shouldn't have, that was rude of me, I don't know what came over me."

"It's alright," Toshinori said, trying not to let his relief show on his face. "I understand this isn't easy for you."

He saw a tear rolling down her cheek. On impulse, he took his t-shirt and wiped it away. As Inko stared at him in shock, Toshinori cursed his hero instincts. All Might wiped away women's tears, especially after a villain attack, but Yagi Toshinori had no business touching another woman, not when her husband might rush down the hall any minute. He glanced over his shoulder. Doctors and nurses hurried by, but there was no one watching.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have–"

"Your t-shirt's all dirty," Inko said at the same time.

He looked down. A cream-colored smear stained his white t-shirt where he had dried her tears. "Don't worry, I was going to throw away this t-shirt anyway." He showed the stretch marks where he had torn the t-shirt punching the villain. Looking back at her face, Toshinori winced and said, "I ruined your makeup."

Inko touched at the streaking makeup. "It was ruined anyways." She chuckled mirthlessly and said, "I should invest in waterproof concealer."

Desperate to change the topic, Toshinori said, "Do you feel up to seeing your son now?"

For a terrifying moment, Toshinori thought she was going to start crying in his shoulder again, but Inko took a deep, shaky breath and stood. "Thank you, I think I'm ready now." She looked hesitantly at the door and asked, "Would you mind coming in with me? I – I don't think I want to do this alone."

Toshinori looked up and down the hall. No husband, no family, no one. Maybe they were all busy? He looked back at Inko, who was staring at him with exhausted, red eyes, and felt his heart break.

"I don't mind," he said, feeling completely out of his depth.

Inko smiled gratefully at him as she opened the door. When she saw her son, breathing through a mask and wrapped in bandages, she raced forward. Toshinori caught her shoulder.

"The doctors said we shouldn't get too close to him."

The nurse, who was monitoring Izuku's vitals from a nearby computer, watched them for a moment before returning her attention to the screen. Inko stared at the bed, feeling helpless as her son lay pale and unmoving like a corpse. The silence of the room was punctuated by the slow, feeble beating of Izuku's heart on the monitor.

"This is going to keep happening, isn't it?" Inko asked.

Toshinori was at a loss of words. His first impulse was to reassure her, to tell her that being a hero wouldn't come with frequent trips to the hospitals, debilitating injuries, and quite possibly, a grisly death. Maybe All Might could've said that with confidence, but Toshinori Yagi, shrunken, tired, and coping with the dull, constant ache of his impaled chest, didn't have the strength to tell her that lie.

"It's never easy," he said, faltering for a way to make it all seem right, to make it okay for a fifteen-year-old to lay in a hospital bed because there are people in the world sick and twisted enough to make it happen. "The job takes a toll on everyone. I've seen heroes come and go. A lot leave after their first serious injury. Maybe it's a broken arm, or a missing eye. Sometimes, it's someone they failed to save, or a mistake they made, knowing that someone died because they weren't good enough. Sometimes, it's just the long hours, or the constant pressure of the job. The ones that push through all that, the ones that keep saving people no matter how hopeless it seems, they do it because saving people matters that much to them."

With a deep breath, he said, "Knowing what happened back there, that he fought this Shigaraki person himself, I think your son is one of those who won't quit no matter how hard it gets."

Toshinori looked back and felt horrified at the stricken, grieving expression on her face. He hastily added, "I'm sorry, I wish I knew what to say."

"More than anything else," Inko said, "I want him to be happy." She wiped away a fresh batch of tears. "When he was diagnosed, I told him he couldn't be a hero. I was so scared that he'd get hurt. He was Quirkless, he didn't have a way to protect himself. That's what I thought. I – I broke his heart that day. If I had just told him he could, if I had found him someone who could teach him, if I had just supported him like I was supposed to… but now, looking at him like this, I don't know if I can take it. I don't want him to die." She looked at Toshinori with teary eyes and asked in a hysterical voice, "Why couldn't he just be happy as a normal kid?"

Toshinori knew why. There was a time where he was Quirkless and filled with a burning desire to matter, to be someone important, to be a hero. He wanted it so badly it hurt, and when Nana finally gave him the power he needed to be that hero, he threw himself into it.

"Because nothing hurts worse than knowing that you don't matter," he muttered to himself.

"He matters to me!"

Toshinori didn't have anything to say to that. He barely remembered his own parents, indifferent, murky figures in a past he didn't care to think about these days. Anytime he tried to picture his mother, all he saw was Nana's smile.

As the silence stretched out between them, Inko talked about Izuku. She spoke fondly of the days when he was an excitable toddler who gushed about heroes and dreamed of being one, pointedly skipped over the day of his diagnosis, and spoke calmly, but with no less pride, about the quiet teen who hardly made a splash at school, but had art that every teacher of his had complimented. As the hours wore on, she told Toshinori about his favorite food, the clothes he liked to wear, what heroes he liked talking about. It was with no small embarrassment that Toshinori learned that All Might was Izuku's favorite.

Inko abruptly stopped and let out a loud, jaw-popping yawn. She glanced at her phone, and her eyes went wide. "Gosh, I can't believe it's that late already."

Toshinori glanced at the time and winced. He had missed his evening nutrient shot. Maybe the hospital had his dose on hand.

Before he could think of asking for his supplements, the nurse, who had been replaced during a shift change without their knowing, approached them and said, "I'm sorry, but visiting hours are over in five minutes. I have to ask you to leave."

Inko stared at Izuku, face set as if she were about to argue, but another yawn burst out of her. "Is there any way I could stay?"

"If he was in critical condition, we might allow it, but Izuku's vitals have been stable all day. He'll be fine, he's just sleeping. You can visit him first thing in the morning."

Inko teetered on the edge, and Toshinori decided to give her a final push. "It'll be better for him if you're feeling well when he needs you."

For a moment, Toshinori feared he had pushed too hard. Inko frowned at him a moment, then she nodded. "Thank you. You're right, I should sleep."

Another yawn slipped past her, and she teetered to the side, holding herself up against a wall. Toshinori rushed forward, ready to catch her, but a twinge of pain from his side stopped him.

"Will you be fine getting home?"

When he said that, it sunk in that Inko was still alone. No husband, no family, no friends, no one. Wouldn't the hospital have called them too?

"I–" another yawn, "Wouldn't want to be any trouble."

Which was as good as admitting she couldn't. All Might had heard that line too many times before to ignore it.

"It's no trouble at all," he said with a reflexive smile. "It would be my pleasure to make sure you get home safely."

Alarm bells were going off in Toshinori's head. That was All Might's line. All Might helped people get home all the time. Right now, he wasn't All Might, it wasn't appropriate for him to escort someone home, what would her husband think?

"Okay then. I – thank you, you're right, I shouldn't be driving like this." Her eyes widened. "Crap, my car."

"I can drive, that is, if you don't mind." Toshinori cursed himself for digging himself deeper.

More tears pooled in her eyes, and for a frightening moment, Toshinori thought he had gone too far. "I – I'm sorry, it's nice of you to offer. You don't have to."

"It's no trouble," Toshinori said, struggling in futility against his hero instincts. "I wouldn't feel right letting you go home alone."

When they left the hospital, Inko handed him her keys and showed him to her car. He had almost gone to the passenger side before remembering that cars in Japan had the steering wheel on the right. His driver's license, long expired, was American. He prayed he wouldn't get pulled over as he pulled the rusting mini van out of the parking lot.

The drive was mercifully short, and Inko had stayed awake enough to supply directions. Her apartment was on the fourth floor. Toshinori felt his chest throbbing by the time they made it up. His agent always made sure he had ground floor lodgings. The thought of leaving her at the bottom floor didn't even cross his mind.

When she unlocked the door, he took in the unfamiliar apartment with open fascination. It was much like his own, bare and plain, but that made the few differences stand out. The counter was cluttered with canned vegetables, onions, and packs of instant ramen. On the fridge hung a colored sketch of Inko, which depicted her watering a potted tomato plant. He stopped to admire the picture, drawn in by her gentle smile.

"Thank you so much for this," Inko said, startling him out of his reverie.

"Ah, it's no trouble at all. I should get going."

As he headed to the door, his ailing body betrayed him. He felt the cough creeping in the back of his throat and hastened to the door, but before he could slip outside, it burst out of him. Blood dribbled out of the corner of his mouth and dripped on the linoleum floor.

Inko saw the blood and gasped. "Oh my god, you're hurt! I'll drive you back to the hospital."

"I'm fine, it's just an old injury," he said hastily. He wiped the blood away and smiled. "Really, I'm fine."

She watched him with a raised eyebrow. "You definitely don't look fine."

"Trust me, I'm tougher than I look."

As if to contradict himself, he coughed again, though he managed to keep the blood in his mouth.

Inko looked nervously around her apartment. "I – I can't let you go home like this. I don't have a sofa or anything, but you could take Izuku's bed for the night."

"I'll have someone pick me up, it's fine."

Toshinori dug into his pocket and found nothing. Panic flashed through him as he checked his pants. He still had his keys, but his phone and wallet were long gone. The memory of checking his pockets for the bottles of slime villain came back to him, and sure enough, they were the exact same pair of pants. He could have sworn that he had thrown them away.

"I'm so sorry, I must've lost my phone. Would you mind if I borrowed yours?"

"Oh, of course."

As he took it, he realized that he didn't know any of his colleagues' numbers. Luckily, Inko had Nezu's contact info. He called, praying he'd pick up.

"Inko, is something the matter?"

With no small embarrassment, Toshinori explained his predicament. When he mentioned that Inko offered to put him up, Nezu immediately said, "Yes, perfect, sounds good. That way, you can bring her to the hospital in the morning and pick up Aizawa-san. Have a good night, Yagi-san."

Before Toshinori could protest, Nezu hung up. He held the phone to his ear a moment longer, stressing about being left alone in a strange woman's house with no way to leave. He thought about calling a taxi, but he had no money on him, and he couldn't possibly put the burden on a grieving mother. To his shame, he realized that Nezu and the other heroes were probably too busy in the wake of the villain attack to pick him up anyways.

"I, uh," he began nervously, "Guess I don't have a ride."

"Oh."

"So, I guess I, well, need a place to stay."

"Oh. Okay."

"O – okay?"

"Yes. Izuku's room is on the left. I just washed the sheets yesterday."

"Oh. Thanks."

He was not prepared for what he found when he opened Izuku's room and turned on the light. All Might posters, an All Might calendar, All Might figurines still in their original cases, an All Might calendar, unmarked, an All Might alarm clock, All Might lamp, All Might wherever he looked. Sure, there were signs of other heroes, other figurines with their own shelf, an autographed and framed Best Jeanist photograph, and a Present Mic radio host schedule, but Toshinori found himself looking at All Might's dazzling grin wherever he looked. There was even an autograph of his hanging on the wall across the bed. Something about the crinkled, half-scorched paper tickled his memory.

"My son's quite the fanboy," Inko said with a fond smile. "He got most of these on his own, makes money selling art on the internet somehow."

"I – I see." Toshinori grimaced at the All Might sheets and All Might bedframe. "It's fine, I wouldn't want to intrude. I could just sleep on the floor."

"You were coughing blood a few minutes ago. I couldn't let you sleep on the floor. What if it made you worse?"

The thought of spending the night on the floor made Toshinori wince. His mattress was the best that money could buy, and he still woke up in agony some mornings.

"Thank you. I'm sorry for all the trouble."

Inko gave him a nervous smile. "It's no trouble at all, it's just the right thing to do." She pointed to the other door and said, "That's my room. If you need anything, please knock."

As she turned to leave, his gaze went back to the autograph. He put his hands in his pockets and felt the hole that the bottle of slime villain had slipped through. A recollection of a boy, half-smothered by a slime-Quirk, and his scorched notebook flashed in his mind. "I thought I recognized him!"

Inko paused at the doorway. "Pardon?"

"I remember that," Toshinori said, pointing at the autograph. "The slime-Quirk that day, took forever to track that guy down again."

Inko's eyes narrowed. "How do you know about that?"

Toshinori hastily rewound the conversation, praying that he hadn't accidentally let anything slip. "I work for the All Might agency as a secretary," he said, falling back on his habitual cover-up. "Worked on the press coverage for that day."

"I wish I could thank him for it. It feels like that day's the reason Izuku became a hero. After that, he started working out and cleaned a whole beach by himself. Still feels like it's not real, somehow, like it came out of nowhere." Inko shook herself and said, "I shouldn't say that. He worked hard to get where he is, and I couldn't be more proud."

Not for the first time, Toshinori felt guilty about hiding his alter-ego. Part of him wanted to flex his hero form and tell the grieving mother that he was proud of how far his son had come, but his secret had to be kept for everyone's sake. He had already screwed up with that student, he couldn't screw up again.

Another slip of paper, sticking out from under a laptop, caught his roaming eye. Numbers were scrawled on it in bright red ink. One glance showed him it was a bank deposit receipt.

Averting his eyes, All Might said, "I think you should check the room, make sure there isn't anything in there I should see."

Inko blushed and said, "I know he's a teenager, but he doesn't do anything like that, I swear."

As much as Toshinori wanted to scoff at that, remembering his days as a rowdy teenager, that wasn't the point he was trying to make. "I mean the desk. I think that has his bank account on it."

Inko followed his pointed finger and saw the receipt Izuku had left on his desk. When she saw the balance on his bank account, which held five times her own yearly income, her eyes widened.

"T-thank you for catching that," she stammered. A quick search yielded nothing else out of the ordinary. "I'll let you sleep now, I bet you're tired after what happened today." A yawn of her own reminded her that she was running on stranger-induced anxiety at this point. "Good night, Yagi-san."

"Good night, and thank you, Midoriya-san. I'll try not to trouble you too much."

Toshinori, in an unfamiliar bed, in a stranger's house for the first time in decades and surrounded by his own dazzling grins, and Inko, with a strange man in her home, sleeping in her son's bed, and with her own son in the hospital and a bank balance in his account that made her question her own sanity, both failed to get much sleep that night.

A/N: I am extremely curious about the reaction to this chapter. This whole thing basically started off with me wondering how I could spice up Inko's visit to the hospital and remembering that All Might happened to be there. Then I thought of how awkward it would be for All Might to have to sleep in Izuku's room and decided I wanted to make it happen.

I'll admit, I'm a bit of a sucker for a good All Might/Inko ship. Whether that actually will come to pass in this story remains to be seen. I'm not one to spoil anything.

To Yamajiji, one of the things that bothers me in canon is All Might's reason for not picking Mirio. Mirio showed himself just as capable of self-sacrifice and moving without thinking – just look at what happened with Eri – yet he's somehow "missing something." With his health waning and time running out to find a successor, he doesn't take the promising up-and-coming hero literally handpicked for the job by his former sidekick? I feel that having the Quirk itself reject Mirio is not only more logically consistent, but also more interesting.

To Elpis21, and that is why I'm a chemist, and not a physicist. Can't wrap my head around neutrally charged particles experiencing electrostatic attraction to positive charges when the resulting induced positive charge would repel other protons, but maybe it has to do with their quarks? Just did a bit of light reading on the strong force and felt a mild migraine coming on. Colour? Gluons? What the hell have I missed in my physics courses? I'll stop playing Einstein and leave that stuff to the pros.

In any event, good to know that Uraraka's Quirk isn't in any danger of ripping apart matter at the subatomic level.