You think you’re some kind of savior… will you still be one when you return the favor?

The thought wouldn’t leave Eijiro’s mind.

You’d been on a warpath lately. Someone close to you had died - cut down by a villain who crawled out of whatever pit the world had left open. No All For One. No Tomura Shigaraki. Nothing grand or symbolic enough to make sense of it. In some ways, that almost made it worse.

Eijiro saw it happening. The way your focus narrowed. The way your anger stopped burning outward and began folding in on itself. And just like Izuku Midoriya does, Eijiro reached out - took your hand, planted his feet, and tried to keep you grounded. They hadn’t survived two wars just to watch that resolve rot inside their own class. He couldn’t leave you like this.

Revenge never satisfied anyone. That was something Eijiro believed down to his bones.

He tried talking first. The way he always did - earnest, pleading in that stubbornly hopeful way of his. But worry stripped the tact from him faster than he expected. Because this wasn’t abstract anymore. This was you. Someone he cared about. Someone he couldn’t afford to lose to grief, or to the ghost of someone already gone.

The argument turned physical before either of you could stop it.

Hardening cracked under the strain. His body screamed in protest, but he stayed upright through sheer will. You weren’t untouched either - both of you breathing hard, blood streaking down one side of his face, vision blurred but unbroken.

Eijiro forced himself up and closed the distance in a sudden burst, fist gripping the front of your shirt and yanking you close. His eyes burned - not with anger, but something rawer. Desperation. Resolve. Exhaustion.

"I’ll kill you," he said under his breath, voice shaking but deadly serious.

"If you even think about it... I swear..."