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The world swims around him.
Everything has been so strange
Brief flashes of unimaginable pain. Long stretches of no feeling. He can’t decide what’s real and what’s his imagination. There had been rocks, right? Or part of a building. Someone he cared about was nearby. It was loud. Too loud and then too quiet. Children were screaming. Was he screaming?
What was his name? Something to do with a cloud, right? Everything was so fuzzy. Like he was bleeding into the world around him. The confines of his body had been expanded and it’s like he’s being pulled apart.
“Kurogiri,” says a voice.
Kurogiri. Black Mist. Mist was sort of a cloud, wasn’t it? Was that him?
“Kurogiri, wake up,” the voice calls again. The voice is deep. Patient.
He’s afraid of it but he doesn’t know why.
His eyes crack open slowly, letting in the dim light of the room. He’s on a table in the center, two people standing over him. One is tall, imposing. His white hair implies age but his face is young. The other is smaller, wearing a doctor’s coat. The doctor grins at him and a gold tooth flashes at him.
He – Kurogiri? – sits up. There’s something heavy around his neck, or what he thinks is his neck. It’s safe. Secure. That part of his body doesn’t feel like it’s dissolving into the air.
“Sensei,” he says, because that’s the name that comes to mind. He doesn’t know where he learned it. His voice sounds strange. Unfamiliar. He should know his own voice.
“It’s good to see you’re awake,” says the larger man. Sensei. “I have a job for you. I know you must be confused, but I don’t think you will have trouble.”
“Where am I?” Kurogiri asks. Another name flashes through his mind, memories of a cat and three smiling faces. The children’s screams ring through his head.
“Somewhere safe,” Sensei assures him.
The doctor helps Kurogiri to his feet. He can tell they’re his feet because that’s where his shoes are, but there’s a part of him that thinks he may not need them. He can just float – on his clouds? – no just float.
They walk slowly, waiting for Kurogiri to remember how to walk. He’s done this before. He’s seen this doctor and Sensei before, he knows. This is not his first awakening, but the others are so lost he can’t begin to think of the details.
The door at the back of the room leads to a larger room. It looks a bit like a bar, but there’s no alcohol on the shelves. A few books are on the counter, as well as a half-eaten sandwich.
“This is a new location,” Sensei tells him. “You’ll be able to adjust it however you need. It should be safe, though. If we need to meet I can give you coordinates and you can warp to meet me, so there shouldn’t be any reason for you to be under scrutiny”
In the corner of the room, an old tv plays quiet, upbeat music as a video game character runs across screen. In front of it, with his back turned to the three of them, is a child. He can’t be older than five years old, but his skin is cracked and red, and his hair is in disarray. The shirt he’s wearing is too big for him. On the floor around him are several severed hands.
“This is Shigaraki Tomura,” Sensei says, prompting the boy to turn towards them.
The skin on Tomura’s face is even more irritated than the bit on his neck that Kurogiri had seen before. He holds the game controller with four fingers, something dark caked underneath the fingernails. His face is nearly expressionless, as if everything that may have defined who he was had been wiped away.
Kurogiri can understand that.
Sensei gestures Tomura forwards, putting a hand on top of his head. “I want you to watch over Tomura for me. I’ll be teaching him, but he needs someone who can cater to his needs and help him accomplish what he wants. Do you think you can do that?”
Kurogiri looks the boy in his blank, dead eyes. When Sensei had touched the boy, he had broken out into a wide, unnatural smile, and his eyes had glittered with some emotion Kurogiri couldn’t place, but his face had returned to its blank state a moment later.
Memories flash in Kurogiri’s mind. A cat in the rain. Someone catching a child who had fallen. A matching pair of goggles and a loud voice.
The children’s screams loop in his head, mingling with the sound of falling debris. It’s alright if he gets hurt, as long as they’re safe. A snap of his fingers, a familiar voice calls out, and then darkness.
His heart breaks. This boy is so young. Too young to be so empty. It’s a good thing Sensei will teach him. Sensei will teach him good things, something tells him. Sensei can be trusted to fill this boy’s eyes with something right.
“Yes, Sensei,” he replies. “I can care for the boy.”
It’s what he was always meant to do.