Chapter Text
There was nothing Izuku wished for more than the chance to go back to being quirkless. He had thought that getting a quirk would solve all his problems- give him the chance to become a hero- and he believed it because All Might said as much. Ten months of hyping up the power contained in the quirk, power that Izuku would soon wield.
Only for it to kill Izuku in the end.
Or at least, that's what the people living in the quirk said happened to him. Izuku, however, was not entirely convinced that the whole thing wasn't a dream and that the nice girl hadn't really stopped him from knocking his head against the pavement, and he was actually currently sprawled outside of UA unconscious and-
"Pipsqueak, you still with us?"
Izuku turned to look at what was hopefully one of the many figments of his imagination. His face was blank because he was trying very hard not to cry.
The bald man laughed and said, "Hey guys, I think the kid’s mind went to the after-afterlife."
"That's not funny," hissed a woman who pinched the other imaginary person's ear.
Ignoring them, and the other not real people gathered in the similarly not real empty void, Izuku went back to thinking about how he must be lucid dreaming at the moment. Nothing about the Entrance Exams seemed real anyway, like that Zero Pointer? It was totally going to crush the nice girl! UA would obviously never have such a huge liability like that.
After rushing at it, in a probably futile attempt to save the nice girl, Izuku blacked out and woke up- or was it 'transitioned to a new scene' since this was after all a dream- in the void. Surrounded by various adults who in turn also surrounded a giant and glowing green globe that was held up by golden suspensions.
The adults had all looked at him with shock, as though he was the anomaly and not the giant sphere thing. After looking at each other with knowing looks, one stepped forward and asked, "So, Ninth! Would you like to hear the good news or the bad news first?"
Izuku, in his confusion of wondering what on Earth was going on and where he was because it was certainly not UA, had stuttered, "G-good news?"
"The good news is that it turns out you actually have a quirk!" the white-haired adult clapped. "The bad news is we only know this because One for All killed you and because of your quirk we're all still here."
And that was when he stopped listening to them. Because instead of freaking out about allegedly being dead or even demanding to know what his so-called quirk was, Izuku concluded that he was dreaming.
Because that was the only acceptable explanation for anything that was happening.
After pinching the man, the woman came forward and placed a gentle but still solid hand on his shoulder. Which was weird because his dreams were never as detailed when it came to physical sensations.
"I know this must be hard for you to accept," she told him, her voice and face inexplicably kind. "Being told that you're dead by strangers... I don't even think I would trust that as true."
"Because it's not true," Izuku countered. "I'm just asleep and you're not real."
"But you gotta believe us, kid," the bald man said. "Ain't no way we're moving forward until you accept that."
Izuku almost wished there was some sort of clock to look at and point out how distorted it was and thus this was clearly and obviously not real. But he had a feeling that his mind was trying really hard to keep the dream going so he played along, "Sure."
Exasperated, one of the adults addressed the others, "He's not gonna believe us until he just sees for himself."
"It's probably not wise to do, we barely understand his quirk as it is," the white-haired man said, bringing his hand up to his mouth in thought. "In a perfect world our word alone would have been enough but... Fifth, if you would?"
"Sure thing, First," the bald man pushed the lady out of the way, who scowled at him, and grabbed Izuku's upper arm so that he could drag him towards the sphere. "Arms out!"
"What?!" Izuku struggled but the older man overpowered him and shoved his arms into the sphere.
Immediately his body was jolting forward, breathing hard, and he was back in the real world- awake.
Oh, so he was dreaming. Whew, what a relief.
Grabbing his chest, Izuku slumped into his bedsheets, glad that the dream was over. While not the worst one he's ever had, that would have to go to all of the dreams where he fell forever, but it was still strange and disconcerting.
But then he realized that he was in his bed. Not at the UA Entrance Exams or even a nurse’s office.
In fear that he had overslept and just dreamt that he attended the Entrance Exam he scrambled to find his phone, fumbling with it from where it was charging. Turning it on, his eyes immediately went to the date.
It was the day after the exams.
Confused, his hand lowered his phone away from his face. Did he really blackout and not remember coming home from UA? Maybe his mother picked him up from-
The tips of his fingers went cold at the same rate that the colors of the world blurred together until they created a miasma and he found himself right back in the void.
Fingers gripped his shoulder tightly as he had been jerked away from the sphere, his arms- which had been previously submerged into the globe as though it were a liquid and not a solid- hanging limply from his side. In shock from the switch in environments, he watched as a man with a high collar moved to his side and submerged his arms into the globe.
The previous empty void burst to life as though it were a TV screen and Izuku's bedroom came into view. A hand that must have been Izuku's hand rose up, still holding the phone, and unlocked it. One-handed, the thumb opened up a notes app and started to type.
'This is not a dream.'
The hand dropped and the man removed himself from the sphere.
"Believe us now?" the bald man asked.
Instead of responding, Izuku really burst into tears this time.
"So I'm dead?" he sniffled after crying for what felt like hours. The woman was rubbing circles into his back and saying 'there, there, you're ok' the entire time. "Really?"
"Must be," the white-haired man said. "You wouldn't be here in the void so fully if you weren't. The Eighth isn't dead yet," he jerked his head towards the man made of flames- which Izuku hadn't used as evidence that he was dreaming, because if he could be attacked by a man made of sludge who was to say that there wasn't a man made of fire?- and continued, "That's why he appears like that. Whereas the rest of us have been dead for a while."
Izuku felt as though he should address the whole him dying in an attempt to save a life thing, but he was putting a pin in that because that would just start up the waterworks again, so instead, he asked, "Who are all of you anyway?"
"We're the past holders of One for All," the woman told him. "My name is Shimura Nana, and I'm the Seventh Holder."
Oh, great. Now he could finally use names instead of descriptors. Focus on that Izuku and not on being dead.
"Should we line up in numerical order?" the bald man asked. "That way we don't have to say our numbers."
Shimura-san looked pensive but the white-haired man shrugged, "It would be easier since he already knows the Seventh."
Izuku waited patiently as the adults reorganized themselves, although two men who followed after the first in line faced away from him.
"I'm the First," the white-haired man identified himself. "Obviously since I'm first in line. I'm not much for my original name."
Nodding, Izuku could understand that. If he was the First then he also must be the oldest. And since he was dead it had probably been a long time since anyone has addressed him by-
"Because I hate my brother, who killed me, and therefore I'm refusing to tie myself to him any longer by way of a family name."
What?
"Anyway, these two are the Second and the Third," First continued as though he didn't admit to being murdered by his brother. "They don't really like you at the moment, not because of anything you did, so don't worry about them."
What?! Why?! Izuku just died and already the people he's gonna have to spend eternity with were shunning him just- just because!
"My name is Shinomori Hikage," and they were just continuing on as though the First hadn't made that comment! "Besides the Eighth, I'm the only one who has lived the longest with One for All, which tends to kill its users if they have a quirk; it growing stronger since my time is why you died instantly upon its activation."
None of these people knew how to speak like real human beings. Why were they just saying things like that and expecting Izuku to not sputter and need a moment to process?! It must be because of how long they were dead. He refused to believe that they were just like that.
Thankfully the more recent vestiges were normal, introducing themselves with their names- Banjou-san, En-san, and Shimura-san- without any commentary that made Izuku want to collapse to the ground. The only one that couldn't speak was the man on fire, but considering the line-up, and how Izuku was the latest holder…
"So this is All Might?" Izuku asked, looking up at his mentor.
"Yes," Shimura-san said, a fond but sad gaze on her face as she looked at the vestige. "As much as I miss him, I'm glad he hasn't joined us yet."
"Does he..." Izuku tried to swallow past the lump in his throat. "Does he know that I'm..."
"No," the First said, shaking his head. "In fact, nobody knows except for us. When you appeared here, and the sphere as well, we calmly-"
"Panicked," Shinomori-san interrupted.
"-assessed the situation. We then realized that this must be your quirk. It actually took you a bit to mentally arrive here but in that time we tested out how the globe worked-"
"Played around with it," Shimura-san added with a glare at Banjou-san.
"-thus realized what your quirk was and how we can go about from here," First concluded, an annoyed look on his face as his eye twitched at all the additional commentary.
Seeing that it was time for that discussion, Izuku took a deep breath and asked a question he never thought he would have a chance to ask ever again, not since that disastrous appointment so many years ago, "And what is my quirk?"
"You can possess dead bodies!" the First cheered. "So not only do you get to stay 'alive', but that also means that you had a hidden and unusable quirk that had very specific activation requirements like me! We're so alike Ninth, it's almost suspiciously crazy. Anyway, up top!"
The man held out his hand expectedly. Izuku had an unsure look on his face- although to the vestiges it actually looked like a face that insisted 'this person was freaking weird'- and he slowly raised his own hand to lightly press into the First’s palm. It barely made a clapping sound, more of a soft tap.
"Woohoo!" the First accepted it as though it was the first time someone had actually high-fived him back.
In Izuku's opinion, he was way too happy about a circumstance that only happened because he died- pin it. Pin it. Leave those types of trains of thought for later.
"So when I, or anyone," he amended looking at En-san, "Place their hands into the sphere, they can control my corpse."
"Like a mecha," First nodded. "Cool right?"
No, but that was beside the point. Izuku had questions, "Is it really the ability to possess dead bodies then? Or is it only applicable to my own? I guess I won't be able to know until I come into contact with another dead body, maybe contact-to-contact will enable a transfer of some sort... and are you all able to control my body because of my connection to One for All? That must be it because presumably other people have come into contact with my corpse since coming home from the UA exam- which must have been one of you piloting me- the trains are always crowded at that time of day. Will my body start to decay if not constantly in use? What will I do about the smell then- Mom will surely realize and-"
"Woah, woah, motor mouth, I hardly caught a word of that," Banjou-san rubbed his ear. "I'm guessing if you want to answer those questions then we can help ya break into a cemetery. Might be hard to find a non-cremated corpse though."
"We are not doing that!" Shimura-san snapped, "He is not doing that. Izuku-kun, you are not going to go near a corpse not if we can help it."
"Yes ma'am!" he nodded his head rapidly at her. Internally, he was a little disappointed.
Remembering the time that had been displayed on his phone, Izuku fiddled with his hands before going near the sphere again, "I guess I should probably go back in control."
"Not if you don't want to," the First reassured. "We're ready to help you out whenever you need. For anything really! Like dealing with your bullies, or a really hard history test. The Fourth tried to write a book once, I think, when he was being a boring hermit, he could probably help you with book reports. Oh! And Seventh has a keen eye for couponing, she knows how to get all the best deals- your mom will probably love that. And-"
Izuku stopped moving. He slowly turned to face the man.
It was at that moment Izuku realized that he was left with a handful of people that had been dead for quite some time. Dead long enough that they, perhaps, had been missing sensations or experiences that one could only get by being alive. Like eating or feeling the sun on their skin for the first time in a long while.
He was surrounded by ghosts who could also, at any moment, control his own body.
And perhaps dying had made Izuku a tad bit selfish, considering that he too was in the same exact boat as them. But instead of a cruise liner, it was a tiny little lifeboat that was just shy of being a raft, and there was only one blanket.
One could not reasonably share that blanket amongst a group of seven fully formed adults, one flame man who shouldn't need the blanket because he had his own source of heat- being alive- and a small teenager.
His look must have conveyed something, because the First shot him puppy dog eyes and pleaded, "Sharing is caring, right?"
His jaw dropped and Izuku incredulously shouted, "Absolutely not!"