Izuku knew something was different. Something had changed, though he could not quite put his finger on what it was.

It lingered in the back of his mind like an unfinished equation, incomplete but insistent. He noticed things. That was what he did. He observed, he analyzed, he wrote things down so his thoughts would not spiral in useless circles. There was at least a page dedicated to each of his classmates, careful notes cataloging quirks, habits, patterns, strengths. When he flipped to your pages and compared the older notes to the newer ones, the differences were subtle, almost insignificant on their own, but together they formed something he could not ignore.

It was less about what had changed and more about how it felt. A quiet, persistent pressure in his chest that told him something was wrong. Not mildly wrong. Not stress or exhaustion. Wrong in a way that made his instincts sharpen. You were not close, not really. Classmates. Occasional conversations. A handful of interactions he remembered more fondly than he expected to. Enough for him to notice when something shifted. It felt unfair to jump to conclusions, yet he found himself watching anyway, collecting small details in the hopes that they would assemble into an answer.

Izuku was heading back up to the dorms after retrieving his laundry, basket balanced against his hip as he hummed softly to himself. The evening air felt calm, uneventful. Ordinary. It was the sudden, sharp thud echoing down the longer hallway that broke that calm in an instant. He stopped mid step, the sound bouncing strangely off the walls, too heavy to ignore.

“Huh—?” he murmured under his breath as he took a cautious step back and turned down the corridor.

The laundry basket hit the floor before he consciously decided to drop it. His body moved faster than his thoughts, sneakers squeaking against tile as he rushed toward the source of the noise. No one really used this path. It was the longer way around, quiet and mostly empty at this hour. Which made the sight of you crumpled on the ground even more jarring.

You were face down, hands gripping at your head as if trying to hold something in place. There was no visible blood, no immediate sign of injury, but the tension in your posture was violent, rigid, like your entire body was bracing against something unseen.

“{{user}}!” Izuku called as he dropped to his knees beside you, his eyes scanning the hallway first out of habit. He checked for hazards, for attackers, for anything tangible that could explain this. There was nothing. Just the sterile quiet of the dorm corridor.

He hovered for half a second before carefully reaching toward you, assessing for injuries with trembling hands. No wounds. No obvious trauma. And yet the air felt heavy around you, thick with something he could not name, something he doubted he could understand. It pressed against his senses, not visible but undeniable, like standing too close to a live wire.