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(Found on Pinterest - this is the inspiration for what Izuku looks like in this fic.)

Kodoku. 

That was his name now. He once had a real name, one he still used in secret, one that didn’t mean solitude or loneliness. A name that didn’t equate him to a single object in the whole universe. A name that did not single him out as the only remaining figurehead of a race that had once been revered in the universe as one of the most welcoming traders and teachers in the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies. 

What remained of his name was only the sounds he whispered to himself in the darkest moments when everyone else was asleep, when his guards weren’t looking or listening. 

Izuku had spent three decades in captivity. A glorified house arrest similar to that of a zoo animal, according to his research on Terran life. He could not die naturally, he did not age like Terrans, aka Humans, nor did he wither like the Cailith. He did not molt until he was trapped in his carapace like the Syscion. He was bound to this god awful ship that could not operate without his presence on board. He could leave, of course, but the ship would die in short order if he was gone for too long. 

That would be a catastrophe, to the Terrans, anyway. This was their flagship, their largest battleship protecting the Tau system, their home solar system. The engine was bound to the antimatter his body naturally excreted as a byproduct of respiration. It was bound to his soul, just as Izuku was bound to it in return. 

Izuku was the last living survivor of the Antimatter War. He was the last living member of the Nefling race - a sentient race of tall, ethereal ‘space elves’ as the Humans called them. 

Thin, lithe, with long necks, androgynous bodies and beautiful faces - by Terran standards, that is. He stared at his ears in the mirror, pointed like the picture books his guards showed him of fairies and elves, their mythical creatures. Izuku’s ears had a dozen piercings, long dangling earrings hung past his shoulders like miniature lanterns that lit up in the right light. His long white hair floated around his shoulders, kept alight by his body’s natural antigravity. He could float small objects by his head, too.

He wore a long green dress that hugged his body and hung from his neck by only a thin string, made of iridescent green fabric hand-woven by the Nefling themselves. His bare arms were covered in intricate iridescent scales that shone beautifully in the light of his quarters. Izuku never wore shoes. He needed to feel connected to the dying engine groaning beneath him. The Nefling used to fly their own ships this way. Izuku had once flown his mother’s ship, not so long before her death. It was an intimate connection with another living being, a dance between souls. All the Nefling ships were now gone, blown to bits in the war. 

The antimatter engine aboard this ship had been retrofitted from a Nefling ship. 

They’d butchered her.

When Izuku was first brought aboard this ship, he passed out at the sight of it. They believed he’d just been in awe of their talent. Izuku never once told them he’d fainted in horror. This engine was basically dead. It only functioned because Izuku was on board. It only functioned because Izuku’s soul had bonded with it before its true death. 

They’d ripped the engine out of his mother’s ship. Izuku could still hear his mother’s voice in the vents, whispering lullabies in the silence of space. His mother’s ghost walked these hallways. 

But even if it’s full of love, all a ghost can do is haunt.

The Nefling and their ships were a symbiotic species. When this ship is decommissioned, Izuku will finally die. The Nefling could survive without their ships, unbonded. But bound, if one died, the other would not survive. If Izuku unbound himself and left the ship, he would live, but the ship would die. If the ship were destroyed while he still held the bond, he would die with it.

The Terrans do not know this. After all, they’d killed all the Nefling and their ships before ever having learned how they function. They forced him to operate this gasping engine, this choked monstrosity barely clinging to life because Izuku could breathe for the both of them. They did not know he could feel the agony of this moaning whale, how it gasped and coughed and screamed in the back of his mind. Could they imagine having their limbs hacked off, and being forced into a dark box and then made to function as if nothing was wrong? Izuku wanted to end it. He desperately, pitifully, wanted to destroy this ship.

But he was never alone. He’d tried a couple times, in the first months. They locked him up for years after that, only letting him out to service or function the engine as necessary. Eventually, he’d earned his freedom again - freedom to move about the ship, that is. He was never allowed to leave when they were docked. He couldn’t even take space walks or go near any airlock on the ship. 

His quarters were pleasant enough, and kept him occupied most of the time. He had a small entry room/living room, with a kitchen and dining area. He had a mid-size bathroom, though he rarely used it. His body did not process waste like Terrans, nor did he have ‘sweat glands’. His bedroom was off to the side, a separate door, with a large window and bed, as well as a rather large collection of books to keep him occupied. He preferred to watch the stars from there, even if the ship did have an observatory on board. He hated going out and being stared at. 

Everyone stared. 

His door buzzing brought him out of his memories. Izuku waved a hand to the door, releasing the lock with his wrist communicator, and padded over to the couch so he could sit down.

“Kodoku.” Commander Toshinori bowed his head as he entered. 

Izuku bowed his head in reply. It was rare that the ship’s commander came to see him. After all, Toshinori was the commander in chief of the whole Terran fleet. Or well, Earth’s fleet. Izuku was still getting used to their terminology, even three decades later. 

“We will be departing soon.” 

Ah, they’d be leaving the dry dock soon. Right now, outside the windows, Izuku could see Earth, the sun just cresting over the horizon line. What a beautiful sight. Izuku would never see his home planet or double suns again. It was gone. The Terrans, the Humans, killed it. They destroyed it when the Nefling refused to give them the secret of their antimatter production. When the war ended, and they’d captured Izuku, they discovered only a few truths too late. 

“We’ve got a host of new recruits that will be observing take off. I expect you to be on your best behavior. We’re heading into Cailith space. They’ve caused another skirmish and it’s looking like war is on the horizon. The Commission wants a full frontal show of force, to try and dissuade them from trying anything larger.”

“Mmm.” Izuku hummed. He rarely spoke anymore. There was no point. Language wasn’t the issue, the Nefling could process and understand any language, written or spoken, in minutes. Izuku had pretty much taken a vow of silence since his mother’s death, since the death of the very ship that rotted beneath his feet. 

Diadri - she was once called. 

They renamed her JSS Kamimora. Izuku would never utter that name, he refused.

“Your guards will bring you down shortly. We’re set for orbital flight at 0600.”

Izuku glanced at the clock on the wall. Fifteen minutes. That wasn’t much notice. Still, he bowed his head once more to the commander, to be polite, and show he understood. The commander stood up and though he didn’t salute Izuku, he offered one finger to the brim of his hat. This was the most respect Izuku was given among the Terrans.

“You should know - they’re planning a bigger and better flagship. This one’s forty years old now, it’s outdated, and it’s cheaper to make a new one than retrofit this one.” He shrugged. “They’ll be decommissioning this one in two months.”

Two months. Izuku let out a sigh of relief. Two months and he could finally be with his family, his friends, his people. Two months and he could say one final goodbye to Diadri. He could finally-

“They’ll be retrofitting your engine into the new ship.”

What? 

“So, you will be moved. You’ll likely spend a week here on the International Space Station as the process is happening, unless you are needed for the fitting.”

Izuku’s jaw slowly fell open, a withered gasp on his tongue. They’d told him this ship would be decommissioned one day, and when it was, the engine would be destroyed, that it wasn’t needed anymore because they’d mastered antimatter. So why-

“Mmm, it seems your engine is still more efficient than anything we’ve managed to make from studying it. Damn complicated, huh? You could just tell us, and then we could get rid of this old gas bag and you’d be able to live as an international guest to the Human race.”

That offer had been made before. They wanted the secrets of the Nefling race. They wanted to know how to make an engine that processed antimatter as fuel efficiently. But Izuku couldn’t give them a secret he didn’t know. The ships weren’t created by Nefling, not like Terrans made their ships. Nefling ‘ships’ were born on their planet. The Terrans compared them to giant whales, a sea creature from Earth, and they weren’t wrong, really. 

“I cannot help you.” He finally spoke. The commander looked shocked. “Diadri is not what you think.” What more could be done to hurt them? Revealing secrets wouldn’t kill what was already dead. 

“Diadri?” He asked. 

“You call it the engine. Her name is Diadri. She was my mother’s ship.”

“Ahh, you name your ships like us, even female, too!”

“No.” Izuku stood up. “Our ships are not metal. Our ships are not built .” Izuku was not the only ‘last’ one on this flagship. “They’re grown, they’re born. Diadri is alive . Or she was. She has been screaming in my mind for the last thirty years. You have butchered her. You have carved out her heart and thrown it into a metal box. You cannot make an engine like that - because it no longer exists . You erased our planet. You eradicated her species, just like you eradicated mine!”

The commander blinked, his head shaking in shock. This was the most Izuku had spoken in thirty years, and Commander Toshinori had served the last thirty at the helm with Izuku. He’d watched Toshinori grow old. They had an understanding. But Izuku had just thrown that understanding out the damn airlock along with his pride.

“Please …please , let her die. This is torture. She is gasping, a pitiful creature left on life support for far too long. Please, let her die . Let me die.”

Toshinori sighed. “When we return from our run, the engine will be moved. Our post will be shifted to the new flag ship. Orders are orders. I’m sorry, Kodoku.”

“That’s not my name!” He screeched. Izuku grabbed the nearest cup and threw it at the commander. It smacked into his face, split his lip, and clattered to the floor. “You miserable beast! I am not your slave! Diadri does not deserve this massacre! None of us did!”

“You are a guest of the Human race, and you will behave like one, or do we need to revisit your rights outside this room?” The man delicately wiped his split lip with a pocket handkerchief. Not even a hair out of place. He stood on business. Izuku hated it. 

“Murderer.” He spat out, venom bubbling on his lips. “I know what you did in the war. I know what atrocities you committed.”

There was a sudden shift in the room. Toshinori’s usual calm demeanor changed. His aura took up the whole room in an instant. The taller Terran stormed over to Izuku and grabbed the front of his dress. A second later, Izuku was shoved against the wall painfully. His jewelry rattled. A few baubles clanged to the floor while his legs kicked, his toes barely touching the floor.

“Then you should know better than to stir my wrath. We might need you to operate that engine, but you don’t have to be walking, or talking, to do it.”

He dropped Izuku on the floor and stomped out of the room, the door whooshing shut behind him. Izuku slapped his palms on the ground and screamed. For the first time in years, he wailed and howled, and gnashed his teeth. Every second of the last thirty years built up to this moment. He’d prayed and hoped and accepted his inevitable death. But even that was denied. He couldn’t even die in peace. He couldn’t be left to fade into obscurity, forgotten like the rest of his people. 

The door swiped open again. A set of boots came in. He was grabbed by the arms and set him back on his feet. A man’s hand took him by the chin and forced Izuku to look up. This guard, who’d been with Izuku for the whole of his captivity, glared into Izuku’s eyes.

“Do not show them weakness.” 

Shouta Aizawa, the perfect guard, the often lazy guard. He wanted to sleep more than he wanted his job. But he was diligent, and obedient. But even in that obedience, he was kind . Shouta was the closest thing Izuku had to a friend on this ship, even if he’d been forced to be a part of the war. The Nefling straightened his spine and tightened his jaw.

“There you are.” He whispered. “Izuku.”

That single word, his name, a sound he had not heard spoken aloud in decades. It was bliss to his ears, a balm no other healing could produce. Izuku almost broke down again. Instead, he nodded.

“Never show them weakness. You never have before. Don’t you dare give up on me now.”

“Forgive me.” Izuku smoothed his hands down his dress. “I forgot myself for a moment.”

“We need to go.” The guard gestured to the door and stepped out of Izuku’s way. 

“Mm.”

The walk to the bridge sped by. Shouta kept a brisque pace and Izuku didn’t lag behind. He might not be military trained, but he could move fast when he needed to. Spending his young adult life at war, gave him quick feet and a calm head. Well, usually. Today was the first exception to his rather long fuse. 

They passed the central loading area on their way to the bridge, taking one of the balconies over the large docking bay for smaller transport shuttles to board the flagship. The stomp of Shouta’s boots and the jingle of Izuku’s jewelry echoed through the bay. The new recruits, all lined up and waiting for orders, looked up to the balcony. Izuku practically floated down the hallway, barely acknowledging them. 

“The hell are you greens looking at?!” An officer called. “Something pretty catch your eye?! Hop-to! Report to the bridge for departure!”

The ship’s bridge could hold several dozen people, if not more. There were three entry points, all at the back of the room. The first, the main entry point where Izuku and Shouta came in, was on an upper level where Commander Toshinori’s chair sat, along with several curved desk panels that traced the edge of the upper deck. The lower deck, which was largely work stations covered in holo-panels and buttons, housed a workforce of about two dozen lower ranking individuals that Izuku didn’t know, and the other two entry points, one on each side. 

Shouta stayed by the door, as he always did. Izuku approached Toshinori’s chair and took his place; one step behind and just to the left. The Commander glanced over his shoulder but offered no other acknowledgement that the captive Nefling had arrived. 

“JSS Kamimora - this is Commission HQ on the ISS - you are clear for departure. Systems report?”

“All systems nominal.” Toshinori reported. “We are clear for departure.” He swiped away a couple holo screens and stood up. The Commander pressed a button on the panel in front of him, and addressed the whole ship. “All crew, make ready for rail jump. Man your stations, all non-essential crew are to report to quarters until the jump is complete.”

The Terrans had created a travel system they called Solar Rails. The rails were almost like a teleport system in theory, but it functioned more like a worm hole in practice. The ship turned out of the ISS dry dock platform and approached the large Solar Rail checkpoint. These checkpoints were placed all around the solar system and the Milky Way galaxy. There were even a couple in the Andromeda galaxy. The Cailith home planet was in Andromeda, which is where they’d be heading. Izuku’s home planet was at the farthest reach of the Milky Way. Even now, he knew he’d never see it again. 

The new recruits entered into the lower deck, via the secondary doors at the back of the room, making a thundering clatter with their boots as they marched. New recruits were always so stiff. A few of them stole glances at Izuku. They’d trace his floating hair as if they could follow its random path around his head and shoulders, and eventually look away before running into the person in front of them in line.

“Kodoku.” The Commander barked. “Engage the engine.”

Izuku bowed his head. He stepped forward and placed his bare feet on a circular panel at the center front of the bridge. The panel spun and split, revealing a clear inner pane of glass. Beneath it? The engine. Diadri, locked in a horrible metal box. She moaned beneath his feet, begging for death. His mother’s lullabies filled his mind. 

“<Wake up.>” Izuku whispered in his native Nefling tongue. 

The engine roared to life. The ship had an auxiliary engine for all short and local system movements; a Terran-made fusion engine. The Nefling engine was largely just for long distance space travel, and rail jumping. Antimatter engines had the safest travel rating out of any kind of warp jumping. Izuku held his hands out in front of him as if holding a large sphere. Antimatter began pouring out of him with every exhale and gathered in the space between his hands. 

“Prepare for Solar Rail jump. Commission, we are at full power and primed in the checkpoint.”

“You are clear, Commander. You know your mission. Prevent a war with the Cailith. When you return, you’ll have a shiny new ship to play with.”

“Yes, sir.”

Izuku twisted his hands to guide the engine through its startup routine. The ship jerked into place on the Solar Rail checkpoint, loaded like ammo in a weapon. In front of them, a large circular portal began to glow as the posts behind their ship started to power it with long beams of light. The commander once more instructed the whole ship.

“All crew - brace for rail jump.”

Izuku spread his feet to solidify his stance. This wouldn't be fun. Most of the crew knew to prepare for the jolt. The new recruits? Not so much. None of them bothered to brace. They’d probably never traveled via Solar Rail before, and certainly not with a Nefling engine.

“Solar Rail at full power, Commander. Ready for jump.” A crew member called up from the lower bridge deck.

“Initiate Rail jump.”

Izuku spun the sphere of antimatter in his hands, stirring the atoms and sending the engine into hyperdrive. The Solar Rail whirred to life in front of them, a bright light outside their windshield. A second later, the whole ship lurched forward with brutal force. Everyone, not prepared for the jump, landed flat on the ground, flung five feet backwards - in other words, all the recruits. The jump took seconds. It was like throwing yourself forward a few feet, except you were actually jumping thousands of lightyears in one short jolt. 

“Kodoku, power down antimatter engine.” 

The panel at Izuku’s feet closed as he lowered his hands and called, “<sleep.>” quietly. Diadri whirred down, her primary functions shutting down as she fell back into a coma-like slumber beneath the ship’s floor.

“Don’t leave yet.” 

That was strange. Izuku was never kept on the bridge. He stopped by the Commander’s chair and crossed his hands behind his back. Shouta took up a position by his side. His face held just as much anxiety as Izuku felt.

“Lieutenant Ryo - the recruit list, if you would.”

“Of course, Commander.” The Lieutenant Ryo had been on this ship for about ten years. He was one of the chief security officers on board. His nickname was the Hound. “Twenty-four recruits, fresh out of the academy, assigned for this Cailith diplomacy run.” The recruits all picked themselves up, groaning, as the list was passed over. 

“Hmm. Good.” Commander Toshinori read through the data-pad and seemingly selected two random names from the list. “Hitoshi Shinso. Katsuki Bakugo. Come forward.”

“Sir.” They both saluted and stepped forward once they were on their feet. Izuku winced. 

“It’s Commander .” The older man sighed. “You’re assigned to Aizawa’s team.”

Izuku was wondering when he’d be getting more guards. Izuku usually had a three person security team. One of his guards was seriously injured off duty and honorably discharged. The other retired. 

“Commander.” Aizawa stepped forward. “Forgive my boldness, but I have traditionally hand picked my team.”

“That was a courtesy, one which I can’t afford to provide this time. Your little pet proved that today.” He glared at Izuku to make a point. Izuku glared right back, without backing down. Toshinori sighed. “They’re assigned to you. It’s done. See to it they learn the rules quickly, and keep Kodoku in line.”

“Yes, Commander. Shinso, Bakugo - with me.” 

Izuku turned on his heel without waiting for them to follow, or to be dismissed. He was already in a foul mood. He desperately needed something to eat, and maybe a strong drink, before a headache settled in. As he left, he heard the Hound asking about the Commander's split lip. That brought a smile to Izuku’s face. He managed to get halfway to the nearest mess hall before Shouta stopped him.

“Why don’t we take a moment to do introductions?” Izuku stared at him with a blank face. “Okay. Well, I’m Shouta Aizawa, chief security officer in charge of Kodoku’s detail. This is Kodoku, our resident Nefling, err, the only Nefling.”

“It’s…nice to meet you.” Shinso muttered. His hands tucked into his uniform pockets, which looked incredibly weird considering he was wearing the usual light armor of the academy brats fresh out of school. 

“Tch- I can’t believe it, personal security detail, what a joke.”

“Bakugo.” Aizawa warned. “You do realize you’ve been given one of the highest security positions on this ship, no?” The young officer tilted his head. 

“I am one of a kind.” Izuku grumbled. “The last of my species.”

“What even are you?” Shinso asked. “You’re clearly not Syscion, and the Cailith look more Human. You look…”

Katsuki snorted. “Mutated?”

Shouta rolled his eyes. “I guess they stopped teaching about the antimatter war. Not much of a shock. No one likes admitting to genocide.”

“Mmm.” Izuku agreed. 

“Kodoku is the last living Nefling. This ship is built around the last Nefling engine in existence that only he can operate for long distance space travel.”

“They taught us about the war.” Something in Shinso’s voice pulled Izuku’s attention. “But they told us Nefling were extinct. They didn’t even show us what your race looked like, just a brief description.”

“If they’d let this ship finally die, then it would be true. Until then, know that you’ve been lied to.” Izuku turned once more and started towards the mess hall. His guards were hot on his heels. Aizawa was accustomed to Izuku being a menace, the two new guards would just have to get used to it. 

The mess hall wasn’t too populated. Since they just jumped, most of the crew were at their stations, still working, and the opposite shifts were resting.  Blessedly, Izuku could snag a tray of food and a mug of coffee without much interference, and with minimal glares. Half the crew hated him, the other half were terrified he’d blow them up by destroying the engine. The ship was full of rumors from his early days on board. The officers who’d been around long enough knew Izuku wasn’t going to murder them, or rather, they knew he could, and chose not to.

Of course, it was never as simple as going back to his quarters to rest after a jump. The Terrans didn’t know how much a Solar Rail jump took out of Izuku and Diadri. It was never that simple because something stirred under his feet. The engine groaned in a way that caused Izuku physical pain. His body came to a stumbling halt, clutching his ribs and the wall to his right. The tray of food and mug of coffee (something he’d become quite addicted to, against his better judgement, even if he didn’t need Terran food to survive) clattered to the floor.

“Koh!” Shouta rushed ahead of him to keep him from falling.

“What happened?” Shinso already had a hand on his laser pistol. Bakugo stood guard as if someone had attacked. 

“It’s the ship, isn’t it?”

Izuku nodded to Shouta. “Something’s wrong. The jump shouldn’t have-...ngh- fuck. Take me to her.”

“Hang on tight.” He hefted Izuku up into his arms. “Boys, on my six. We’re taking a trip to the underbelly.”

“Huh?” “What?”

“Move!”

Izuku clutched Shouta’s neck, his bare feet hanging over the man’s arms as they ran through the halls. It would have been easier to grab a transport elevator. Easier, but much slower. So Shouta took the stairs to the lowest deck where the engines lay in the depths of the ship. They rarely went down there, but Izuku had to perform maintenance on Diadri every so often, otherwise, she’d gasp her last breath. The clatter and jingle of Izuku’s jewelry began giving him a headache but it wasn’t worth the time it would take to try and remove any of it while they were running. 

His ribs continued to ache with every slight creak of metal the only Izuku could feel between his bones. He huffed air down. Antimatter plumed around him, more than it should. That shouldn’t be happening. He flinched back. That should only happen when a jump was coming. Wait-

“Shouta stop!” 

They came to a careening halt, knocking into a wall. The two new guards had to fling themselves sideways to avoid crashing into Shouta and Izuku, who was pulling himself out of the older guard’s arms. He grabbed the man’s wrist communicator. It took way too many seconds to find the Commander’s contact. Izuku’s hands shook as he tried to work.

“What are you doing? What’s going on?”

“Commander!” Izuku shouted into the communicator the second it connected, ignoring his guards. “Brace for jump! I have no control of the engine!”

“What?” “Shit!” “Brace!” Shouta grabbed both of the younger guards. Izuku grabbed all three of them. The Commander was shouting over the communicator again, but Izuku shouted at him to brace again and the announcement came over the speakers throughout the ship. It was too late by the time he’d listened. 

The whole ship lurched forward once more. This time, the younger recruits stayed on their feet mostly thanks to Izuku’s rooting and balance, a natural side effect of his body’s antigravity. The ache in his ribs rippled through his whole body. The second they stopped he was on his knees, trying to catch his breath through the pain.

“Shouta!” The older guard stumbled sideways, searching for him. “Get me to her, now.”

“Fuck…come on.” 

Izuku tucked an arm over Shouta’s shoulder. They hobbled forward. They were finally on the lowest deck. Down here, the noise overwhelmed everything. The primary engine, the Terran engine, roared loudly in its housing. The Nefling engine purred softly in the front corner of the ship. Or rather, she should be. Today, the clang and wheeze of the dying engine overtook even the other engine beside her. 

“Boys, get the doors.” Shouta ordered. 

Izuku waved his hand, unlocking the engine bay doors that only he and the Commander had the access rights to. Both younger guards grabbed the doors and hauled them aside. These doors, unlike every other on the ship, were not automatic. Izuku had insisted upon this, since the engine’s energy output would cause them to malfunction. 

Izuku pressed a hand to Shouta’s chest as they approached the doorway. He shook his head. Shouta knew better than to go into the engine room. Nefling antimatter could irradiate Terrans if they were too close to such large amounts. The older guard grabbed the two younger recruits and held them by the door as Izuku turned towards his mother’s companion.

Diadri’s form had been reduced to just her very core. According to the Terrans, Nefling engine cores look much like enlarged hearts. Izuku had once looked up what a whale is. Beautiful giants that swam in their oceans. It was not an incorrect assessment. The Nefling ships propelled themselves forward like giant ethereal fish, with large tails used for propulsion and direction. The engine core, made up of a brain, nervous system, and heart, stood throbbing before Izuku, glowing a dull blue. 

Izuku approached slowly with both hands out. 

“<Diadri>” He called. The ship swayed to the side. “<Please, wake up. It’s only a nightmare.>” In thirty years, she’d never had this kind of reaction. Izuku had never seen her cause a jump in her sleep. But she was close to death now, so close Izuku could see the very edges of the engine starting to blacken. The ship tipped to the side again. The Terran engine down the hall groaned and clanged in opposition to the sudden change in gravity. 

“Diadri!” He cried. “Wake up!” Izuku ran to her, placing both hands on the soft flesh of her beating core. The ship righted in a second, nearly sending them all off their feet the opposite direction. It worked. Diadri woke up. She gasped in Izuku’s mind.

“<I’m here.>” He whispered to the engine. “<Where did you take us?>” But there was no reply. Not from Diadri. Shouta’s wrist communicator whined behind him from the Commander shouting into it.

“What the hell are you doing, Kodoku!? We’ve been jumped to the Cailith home planet!”

What? Why would Diadri bring them here? Izuku stumbled to the side and rebalanced himself. His fingers gently caressed over the engine’s soft walls, trying to soothe it back to sleep.

“Commander, it wasn’t Kodoku. The engine acted without orders.”

“Well, get us the hell out of here, Shouta!”

Izuku turned and shook his head. “Two jumps in an hour? I can’t even get her to respond. There’s no way she can jump for at least twelve hours.”

“Bloody hell - First Officer Todoroki, get us the hell out of her-”

Shouta clicked off his communicator. “What do you need?” He asked. Izuku shook his head. 

“There’s nothing I can do. She’s exhausted, but I don’t know why she brought us here. She’s awake but she’s not responding to me. I don’t know what to do. If she stays awake, she’ll burn herself out, but if I force her back to sleep, I’m not sure if she’ll try to jump in her sleep again.”

“What do you mean awake, asleep? It’s an engine, isn’t it? Can’t you unplug it?”

Izuku stared at Bakugo in abject horror, not shielding the disgust in his eyes. Before he could move towards the recruit, Shouta smacked the blonde recruit on his armored chest. 

“Nefling engines are living creatures. You just suggested killing the last Nefling ship, a ship which leaks antimatter that can kill you with Nag-radiation in seconds. I would advise you to apologize.”

“Jeesh, I didn’t fucking know. Sorry.”

Izuku sighed. “She’s already dead…they butchered her to make this…monstrosity. The Terrans called our ships space whales - and they were, in a way. Similar in appearance, and alive.”

“But that’s-” Shinso looked up to the throbbing heart Izuku caressed gently. “That’s just…”

“It’s only the organs that support function. The brain, the heart, and nervous system. She is nothing more than internal organs, housed in a life support system that relies on my existence to function.”

Shinso pointed to Izuku, then the engine in turn. “So if you die - the engine dies?” 

Izuku nodded to the taller recruit. “And if I step off this ship, she would die shortly after.”

“That’s why you kept trying to escape in the early years.” Shouta gasped.

“Mmm. She doesn’t deserve this kind of suffering.”

“Neither do you.” The older guard pointed out.

“Yes, well, you Terrans have been deciding my fate for three decades, I don’t expect it to stop until you’re all extinct.”

Bakugo gave him a weird look. “Don’t you mean until you’re dead? Or are you planning to kill us all?”

“Unfortunately for him, Bakugo.” Shouta smirked. “He’ll outlive our entire civilization, and he won’t even be middle-age by Nefling standards.” The older guard crossed his arms and leaned onto one of the walls, casually, as if they weren’t currently in an emergency situation. “Tell me what you think of that, eh, boy? What do you think of the renowned Commission keeping the last living member of a race they obliterated captive for thirty years, lying to their recruits after the fact, and conspiring to keep said remaining man captive for eternity to use as fuel for their flagship?”

Shouta was testing them. Izuku had never been one hundred percent sure that Shouta was on his side, but he knew the old guard had no loyalty left for the Commission that took everything from him, forced him to fight and kill in a war he had no business being in, and then made him keep the very thing he’d been made to kill captive. Shouta spent the last thirty years in forced service to the Commission, looking at Izuku’s face, everyday, knowing he’d been one of the hands that murdered Izuku’s people.

Izuku did not blame Shouta, not the way he blamed Toshinori. Shouta was a soldier, a grunt with forced hands, a weapon glued to his palms, fighting only on the threat of death to those he loved. Izuku knew, without even asking, if the Commission had threatened Shouta’s life, he’d have let them kill him before he ever took part in the antimatter war. Even so, he still carried the weight of that guilt around like a stone tied to his neck. 

“I think-” Bakugo squared up to Shouta, even if he was several inches shorter. “You’re a cocky old bastard who’s been stuck on this damn ship for far too long.”

Shinso put himself between the two men. “This is a waste of time, why are we not trying to warp out of Cailith space right now?”

Izuku carefully brushed his hand along the soft outside of Diadri’s core, a glowing blue luminescence spiraled down his fingertips. There was almost nothing left inside of her. Izuku could feel her breaths growing shallower. If Izuku couldn’t get her back to sleep…

“We can’t. She doesn’t have the strength. And the Terran engine would take days to warm up for a jump as its main function is short distance travel.”

The ship came alive around them. Alarms, warning announcements, the rush of boots on the decks above them. They were preparing for a fight. The Cailith likely wanted a war with the Terrans. The Cailith were always allies to the Nefling, trade partners and friends. Izuku had spent the last thirty years wondering why the Cailith never helped or even retaliated for the damage the Terrans had done, but he knew they simply didn’t have the power to face the Terran fleet three decades ago.

“Can you get her back to sleep so she can recover?”

“No, Shouta. This…this was her last jump. I think that’s what she’s trying to tell me.” The sound of his mother’s songs filled his mind, a whisper of Diadri, still clinging on. She was waiting. Diadri was waiting for Izuku to unbind himself from her. He turned back to his guards. “Close the doors.”

“What? What do you mean ‘last jump’?”

“I don’t have time to explain everything, Shouta. Close the doors. Please . Give me this one thing. I know what I’m asking. But if I don’t…if I don’t do something - we both die, her and I, and everyone else on this ship.”

“Is that a threat?” Bakugo snapped. 

“You don’t get it, you infantile beast.” Izuku grabbed one of the doors and threw it shut. Shouta didn’t stop him, but Shinso and Bakugo both tried to jump in front of the engine bay doors. “If this engine dies, while I’m still bound to it, we all die.” He flicked his eyes to Shouta. “Tell them.” He ordered. “TELL THEM.”

Shouta grabbed both younger soldiers, one hand on each of their shoulders to pull them back just an inch. Both recruits paused, if only because of the tone Izuku used. He still held the door shut, glaring at his lifelong guardian, begging him to be honest. Shinso slowly looked back to Shouta, while Bakugo glared at Izuku. The old soldier finally caved. 

“We never told the Commission, we knew they’d use it against the Nefling. Most of us war dogs were forced into service, threatened by the loss of our loved ones to keep us in line. So we did what we could to keep them in the dark about the realities of the war they made us fight for them.” He sighed, deep with shame. “When a Nefling ship dies with a bound pilot - the antimatter in their body, and the ship’s body, implode. It’s a…symbiotic sort of fusion reaction. If he does not unbind himself before this engine dies, this ship, and everyone in it, will be erased from existence inside a miniature black hole. So, unless you’d like to go up in a blaze of glory for no reason, I suggest you remove your hands from the door.”

Both recruits took their hands off the doors as if they might suddenly catch fire. Izuku took only a moment to catch Shouta’s eye before slamming both bay doors shut, and locking them from the inside. 

Unbinding from a Nefling engine was not easy, nor was it pretty or enjoyable. Their souls were bound together in what should be a life-long symbiotic relationship. Izuku had only seen one instance where a Nefling unbound themselves; his mother. She unbound herself from Diadri, so that Izuku could command the ship after his mother was gravely wounded. But Izuku had only just learned how to fly, and Diadri was already wounded. Izuku had never been able to fly a ship properly, and now, he never would. Diadri was the last of her species, and all the breeding fields had been destroyed, there would never be another great Nefling whale. 

Izuku took a deep breath and placed both hands over his chest. He exhaled slowly, building up the antimatter he’d need. Slowly, the bright white glow of the antimatter from his body trailed out between him and the engine, revealing a thin invisible line, a thread connecting them, not visible to the naked eye normally. He turned back, just once. Shouta had his hand pressed to the glass of the door, watching him with worry. 

Izuku held out his hand and splayed his fingers, reaching for the one friend who had cared for him the last thirty years. Shouta had been a father-figure when Izuku had no one on his side. He’d protected Izuku from the worst of the hate and vitriol. He’d brought Izuku his favorite treats and gifts to keep him from spiraling into madness alone in his quarters. If this didn’t go well, he was offering a Nefling farewell. Shouta’s eyes blew wide. He splayed his fingers on the glass, tears already evident on his face. Izuku turned away, hand still outstretched to his guardian. 

“ <Goodbye, Diadri.> ” 

Izuku gripped the iridescent strand bonding himself to the engine with his free hand. The pain was instant, his chest exploded with agony but he fought through it. Every cell in his body screamed at him to stop. It was unnatural for Nefling to unbind from their ships, so much so that their very bodies tried to stop them. He fought this wretched sensation and tugged the string until it snapped. He screamed. White hot, splintering pain arched through his ribcage and up his spine, right into the base of his brain. Diadri howled in his mind, but the sound soon faded as the bond broke. 

Izuku’s body collapsed into a heap on the ground, barely able to hold itself up. He turned his head, finding Shouta and his two recruits banging on the doors. They wouldn’t get in, not until Izuku released the locks. He couldn’t do that just yet. If he did, they would die. All he could do before his head hit the ground was mouth the word ‘ Brace! ’. 

All three faces vanished from the window as Izuku’s vision started flickering. He turned his face to the engine hovering before him in its prison. It pulsated rapidly, antimatter pooling in the central chambers as it began going into meltdown. Izuku’s hand split his vision of the glowing inner body of his mother’s ship, his fingers spread out in that traditional Nefling farewell gesture. The glow grew brighter with every passing second as the ship tipped side to side, unstable from the nuclear explosion buried beneath it beginning to light itself like a torch. 

“ <Sleep, Diadri. One last time. Be at peace. Greet my Mother for me.> ”

Izuku’s vision blanked white to the sound of antimatter colliding into itself, a terrible racket, and the crack of Diadri’s solid inner shell. The explosion threw his body against the far wall, pain blossomed along the back of his head - everything went black. 

~

Izuku rasped air into his chest as he slowly came back to consciousness. The wrench and screech of metal snapped his eyes open and pulled him violently out of whatever darkness he’d been swallowed by. 

“Izuku!” His name, like a prayer, echoed around him. “Izuku! Wake up!”

He searched the destroyed engine bay around him until he found Shouta’s face at the bay doors, the center had been spread open only enough for Izuku to catch a glimpse of his guard. 

“No-” He coughed. “Get back…”

“Izuku! We’re getting you out of there!”

“No!” Finally, his voice. “You can’t! Antimatter…is still…” 

He choked on the dust filling the air. Three walls of the bay had been torn open by the explosion. It was much smaller than if he’d still been bound to the engine, but that didn’t make it any less severe. The whole ship was probably scrambling to get back online before the Cailith boarded the flagship of the Terran fleet. 

“How long?” Shouta called. “How long can I be in there before it kills me?”

“You can’t be serious!” Bakugo shouted. “You’re going in there?!”

“Shut up and back off, or help me. I don’t care which, but pick a damn side, kid. I don’t have fucking time to deal with your black and white bullshit. There’s no good and evil or black and white in war, and there’s certainly none of that here.”

“Forty-five seconds.” Izuku choked out. “Forty-five…”

“Got it. Now move, kid.” 

Shouta shoved the two younger recruits out of the way, neither of them fought his push. They stood back and let their new boss work. Izuku unlocked the doors with a wave of his half-limp arm. The lock clicked, and Shouta moved. He rammed his shoulders into the doors, flinging them sideways into the wall. Izuku started counting. 

One - Shouta ran into the black, soot covered room. 

Seven - The old guard found Izuku on the ground. 

Ten - The Nefling was hauled to his feet, his arm tossed over Shouta’s shoulder. 

Fifteen - They hobbled across the room. 

Thirty-two - Both of them collapsed outside the engine room in the hallway. 

Forty - The recruits closed the doors behind them. 

Izuku threw the lock with a wave of his arm. Everyone breathed a sigh of relief. Izuku was once more on the ground, his face to the ceiling, breathing heavily. Five seconds to spare was not a great buffer. 

“Come here.” Izuku held out his hand. Shouta looked at him weird. “You’re covered in it.”

“What?”

“Antimatter. Put…put your forehead…on mine.”

Shouta looked suspicious for a moment, but eventually he hauled himself back to his hands and knees. It might look weird, but Izuku was too worried his guard would get too much Nag-radiation, and he wouldn’t stand for his guardian dying a horrible death from it. As Shouta leaned over, Izuku grabbed the back of his head and pressed their foreheads together. He quickly absorbed all the radiation from the engine explosion. Shouta carefully pulled Izuku up against the wall so he could slump back when he was done. Izuku’s hand was held out to the recruits when Shouta pulled away. 

“Oh absolutely not. I’m not letting some alien irradiate me or whatever.”

“Bakugo - would you like to die of radiation poisoning? I can guarantee it’s not a pleasant way to go.”

Shouta fought for him. Izuku might not really know or like the new recruits, but he was very much against killing, or even letting someone die if he could prevent it. He’d seen enough death for a lifetime.

Shinso moved first. “Fuck it. I have no desire to die today.”

Just as with Shouta, it was a quick absorption through skin contact between their foreheads. Once he stepped back, Izuku tilted his head to Bakugo. The angry blonde finally, begrudgingly obliged and knelt down in front of him. Izuku carefully dispersed the antimatter and Nag-radiation he absorbed from his guards into the floor through his hands, most of it anyway. The hull of the ship was built to house both, and could absorb and disperse it back into space, so it wouldn’t be hazardous to them. The rest, he kept inside himself, so his body could use it to heal.

Shouta took his gloves out of his pocket and adjusted his capture scarf around his neck.

“Now that that’s done…why haven’t we been hailed or boarded yet?”

“They’ll know.” Everyone looked down at Izuku. “The Cailith were our friends. They’ll have read the spike in antimatter and radiation. They’ll know what just happened-”

“Hailing JSS Kamimora - This is the flagship Mezaran of the Cailith high order.” Izuku recognized that voice hailing their ship over the speakers. He stumbled to his feet with Shouta’s help, his eyes searching for one of the speakers along the wall as if he could find a familiar face there instead. “We first would like to verify that all hands are accounted for - as we just witnessed an engine failure in your ship, which concerns us. But secondly, we’d like to ask why you have Rail Jumped yourself right next to our home planet.”

Even if they were causing skirmishes in the Tau system, the Cailith were known to be a diplomacy first type of race. If they’d be a part of small fights, it was not likely for them to have caused it. Izuku knew that, but he’d never be allowed to make such comments to the Commission or the Commander of this ship. But here they were, proving him right. Commander Toshinori’s voice came across the speakers shortly after the Cailith message.

“Our initial Rail Jump put us to the edge of the Tau system with the directive to head towards your territory in order to end these skirmishes between our peoples - unfortunately, our engine decided to skip jump us directly to your home planet without approval. This is not an incursion. I repeat, this is not an incursion.”

“Your Nefling engine, you mean.”

Izuku grinned. Shouta gave him a knowing look. Of course the Cailith knew, they’d always known that Izuku was held captive by the Terrans. They’d just never done anything about it. The Syscion had not cared as they were not close to the Nefling, so Izuku hardly expected them to bother. They’d scraped the remains of the antimatter war, so Izuku wasn’t sure he wanted to meet one of them, anyway. 

“The type of engine is not up for discussion here. While we had no aim to land directly in your space - we hope to form diplomatic discussions to remedy our conflicts.”

“Your engine, which just exploded, is all we wish to discuss. If you do not provide proof that the Nefling Izuku Midoriya is alive and allow us to speak with him, we shall consider your intrusion into our space a declaration of war - and you are alone, Commander Toshinori. We are not. You have two standard galactic hours to respond.”

“Shouta-”

“Yep. Got it. Let’s move. Boys, help me.”

“What?” Shinso grabbed Izuku’s other arm, confused. “What’s going on?”

“The Cailith want to speak to him. We need to get him to the bridge.”

“This is insane.” Still, Katsuki helped get them all up and they were off down the halls. 

“Shouta!” Toshinori’s voice came over the guard’s communicator. 

“We’re on our way, Commander!”

The communicator clicked off and they were moving at an almost dead run towards the transport elevator. Izuku was absolutely not running up that many flights of stairs after just enduring an engine explosion. The only reason he was even upright was due to his body’s ability to absorb antimatter and utilize it to heal himself. That didn’t mean he wasn’t exhausted from doing two jumps in a row and then unbinding himself from Diadri. He didn’t even have time to process the grief of losing the last of his kin, the last piece of his home planet. Instead, he swallowed it back in the name of preventing a war with the Cailith race. 

When they made it to the bridge, the Commander was leaning over one of the holo-panels which was currently displaying the full presence of the Cailith fleet surrounding them. You are alone, we are not. That’s what they’d said, and damn was that true. Even with all the weapons and shields this flagship carried, it wouldn’t be enough to outgun the entire Cailith armada next to their own home planet - which Izuku could see out the bridge windshield, just to the left of their ship. 

“Hail them Kodoku.” Commander Toshinori’s voice growled. “Tell them you’re fine so we can get the hell out of here. Prep us for a trip back to the Tau system as soon as we’re given leave.”

“Yes, Commander!” Several crew members called out. 

Shouta squeezed his arm. He offered only a warning glance which Izuku knew to take as ‘don’t try anything that could get you killed’. Izuku nodded, Shouta stepped back. The two new recruits looked confused and annoyed, though most of the annoyance was on Bakugo’s side. Shinso watched the whole bridge with rapt attention, but he had no idea what was happening. The cadet academy did not prepare them for war, it only prepared them for grunt work. Officer training, which led to high end jobs like bridge duty, was a whole separate qualification. These recruits were the gun grunts who got dropped onto ships or planets to fight and die like good little soldiers. They didn’t understand politics or diplomacy. Izuku hoped whatever training they had would be enough to keep them alive today.

The Commander gestured harshly towards the panel. Izuku skittered around the Commander’s chair and over to the holo-panel where the hail button sat, bold and blue, pulsing over and over. Izuku pressed it and spoke. 

“This is Izuku Midoriya hailing the flagship Mezaran of the Cailith high order, please respond.”

He stepped back as the Commander shoved him aside. Shouta was there, but he kept to his place just behind Izuku. Most of the crew on the lower bridge deck stared at Izuku. Some were giving him death glares, the older ones were apprehensive but curious, they were probably reliving flashbacks to the antimatter war right now. Izuku couldn’t blame them. 

The large holo-screen covering their windshield flickered to life with the image of the Cailith bridge, just as theirs would be projected into the Cailith flagship. There sat Nedzu, the Commander of the Cailith flagship. Izuku barely recognized him. He’d gotten much older since the last time they’d spoken or seen each other. The Cailith looked almost human, but with thick gray skin, and bold, scar-like lines decorating their faces. Nedzu had been a close friend to his mother. Izuku had grown up visiting the Mezaran flagship so his mother and Nedzu could have tea and talk for hours on end. 

“<It is so good to see you, Izuku>” He spoke in the Nefling native tongue, likely for privacy. The Cailith people were likely some of the only ones left outside of Izuku who even knew the language. Well, Izuku had always assumed Shouta understood it, but he couldn’t prove it. The man had never once confirmed it, but he’d never denied it, either. 

“<It’s been too long, Commander Nedzu. I’m so sorry for this intrusion into your space. It was my fault. Diadri…she jumped on her own. I couldn’t control her. She...she’s gone now.>”

“<I know. As soon as you appeared, the readings told me she was near her end. How are you? Are you injured?>”

Izuku shook his head. “<No, sir. I’m fine. My heart is wounded more than anything. Diadri was…she was…the last piece of my mother, of my people. It is so good to hear my native language, it’s a comfort. Thank you.>”

Nedzu sighed. He placed his hand out, fingers splayed in the traditional goodbye of the Nefling. Izuku bowed and repeated the gesture to him. 

“<Please tell your Commander that the intrusion has been forgiven. But I want you to be aware of what comes next.>”

What did that mean? Izuku looked around. Every single eye turned his way held hope, and fear. They were rightfully terrified of being a single ship in the center of a surrounding force that could easily erase them with very little effort. Nedzu nodded on the screen. 

“The intrusion has been forgiven.” Several sighs of relief sounded. The Commander’s shoulders straightened. Izuku turned back to the screen. 

“<The JSS Kamimora is free to leave. But you, Izuku, you will be coming with us. You have suffered captivity in Terran hands for too long. Forgive our inaction. We did not yet have the force to support a rescue. These skirmishes were only to get the attention of the Commission, to get you here with their flagship. I did not expect them to come knocking on our front door, but perhaps Diadri knew what we needed, and used her last breaths to save you. I’d like to believe that with every cell in my body. So…will you come with us?>”

Rescue? Izuku had hoped and prayed for this for the last three decades. He longed to be free from the Terran’s cruel hand, their needs and the cruelty they showed in butchering his mother’s ship for their own gain. Izuku trusted the Cailith, they had never once betrayed the Nefling, but he didn’t wish to leave Shouta behind. His eyes found his guard. Shouta had a casual grin on his face. Silently, he mouthed his words. 

‘Find where you belong, be free.’

He understood. He could understand what Nedzu and Izuku were saying. Why had he never said anything? Why had he never spoken Izuku’s language with him? Perhaps it was too dangerous. Perhaps he didn’t wish to anger the Commander. Either way, Izuku turned back to the screen, resolved. 

“<Shouta comes with me. He’s as much a captive as I am. He has protected me faithfully for thirty years. Please allow me his company.>”

Nedzu considered this momentarily. Eventually, he waved his hand. “<Granted. Step to the side, we shall transport you. I will speak with your Commander now, and I shall see you momentarily, Izuku.>”

Izuku bowed to Commander Toshinori. “He wishes to speak with you now, Commander.”

“Get out of the way, then.” 

Izuku stumbled back into Shouta’s arms. “Do not make a scene.” The older guard whispered. “Step back with me, quietly.”

They did just that. Both of them stepped off to the side of the bridge as if speaking privately, which was not uncommon for them. They just had to wait for the transport to lock onto their bio-signatures and retrieve them. It would likely take a few minutes as this ship was so large. Izuku hoped Commander Toshinori wouldn’t figure it out until later. They had translation equipment on the bridge, but it wasn’t live-time translation. As most other species could process language quickly, the Terran linguistics were easy to understand - but the Terrans had yet to learn other race languages, so they relied on other races politely communicating with them, usually. 

Izuku squeezed Shouta’s hands. They would be free soon. Thirty years of suffering was coming to an end. Even if the Cailith had not come for Izuku, the moment Diadri died, Izuku became useless to the Terrans. He was nothing but a pretty ornament on their bridge. They could not get their hands on another Nefling engine, and Izuku himself was only useful because he was the only one who could operate the engine while it was still functioning. The small ounce of kindness they provided him would end once they were safely out of Cailith space. 

“What’s going on?” Shinso muttered, walking over to them. The two Commanders continued to speak diplomacy while Izuku tried to focus on Shouta, but his other guards were interrupting their wait for transport. Bakugo followed suit. 

“What language was that?”

“ My language. You two need to move away from us. Right now.”

Shinso shrugged. “Why?” Shouta took over. 

“The Nefling engine is gone. Izuku has no use to them anymore. I have no use to them anymore. You are new recruits, you have purpose. You were not assigned to an enemy detail for thirty years. They have no reason to suspect you, no reason to dispose of you.”

“Are you saying you side with Kodoku?”

“That’s not my name, Bakugo.” Izuku hissed. “It doesn’t matter if he does or doesn’t. Shouta was a soldier in the antimatter war - one of the last alive. Which means both of us are proof of their genocide. Both of us are the last living proof that Terrans are cruel warlords who only want resources.” Their voices stayed low enough to be unheard under the shouts between the two ship Commanders over the holo-screen. “They will not let us live once we are out of Cailith space and safe. I serve no purpose without the engine. Shouta serves no purpose without me. Do not associate yourselves or you will only take the fall with us.”

“Don’t fucking tell me what to do. I was assigned to your detail. For whatever it’s worth, I hold my post, no matter the consequences.”

“Bakugo-”

“Shut up, Shinso. Are you going to abandon your post, or do your damn job and go down with whatever ship they assign us to?”

The taller cadet glared at Bakugo, his lip peeling upwards in a scowl. “I won't abandon my damn post. I’m not a coward.”

“Then you have your answer, Izuku.” Bakugo put both hands behind his head and leaned back with a smirk. “You’re stuck with us.”

Commander Toshinori’s fist slamming on the holo-screen brought all eyes back to the diplomatic talks going on. 

“That is unacceptable! As you’ve said yourself, the intrusion was forgiven, and this was an accidental jump. I can provide you with the logs that will show no one authorized that Jump. I have communicator logs where Kodoku verified it was unauthorized and he had no control of the engine when we jumped here.”

“That does not matter. You still arrived here. The Terran Commission has signed treaties with our people agreeing to fines and charges should planetary space be invaded without permission. Why and how you got here doesn’t matter. So-” Nedzu lifted his hand and gestured to Izuku. “I shall take the Nefling as payment. You have no use of him now that the engine is gone.”

“Impossible. Kodoku is an intergalactic guest of Earth, and he currently stands on a Tau system ship. You have no right.”

“But I do have the power.”

Izuku gasped as the transport began. Bio-signature locked transport was not exactly enjoyable. It was like being squeezed through a straw, or wormhole - since that’s technically what it was. All four of them, Izuku and his guards, landed harshly on the Cailith bridge in a pile, coughing and sputtering for breath. Terrans had not mastered this kind of transport, and it was largely only the Cailith who used it. The system was designed for their hardened bodies, so it wasn’t easy for anyone else, especially not Humans. Izuku’s guards choked and hacked air back into their lungs, likely feeling crushed by the weight of the move. 

“Forgive me. I know that is not easy for you. Oh! It looks like we have guests. Hello. I am Commander Nedzu, it’s a pleasure to meet you. One moment please.”

“Commander! You have no right to take Humans captive! How dare you!”

“Toshinori. Please shut up. No one is being held captive. If your Terrans wish to return to your ship, they most certainly can.” He turned to all four of them. “Would any of you like to return? Or have you had enough Human lies and mistreatment?”

Shouta sat up first, arms on his knees, his words raspy and choked. “I’d be dead if they went back to dry dock. I’m a war criminal who only wants to repay the debt I have to the Nefling. I’ve no reason to go back.”

“Noble of you. Boys?” He asked the younger guards. 

Shinso stood himself up and saluted. “My post is with the Nefling. As much as I don’t agree with whatever madness this is, I don’t abandon my post. Forgive my actions, Commander Toshinori, but you assigned us to protect the Nefling. That assignment does not end until either he, or I, have drawn our last breath.”

“It ends when I say it ends, you miserable brat!”

“Yeah, I’m with Eye Bags. I was assigned a protection detail. Besides, we learned more about the reality of this universe in one day with him than we ever learned at the academy, or even growing up. Humans lie to each other, and it’s very clear they mistreated Izuku for decades. Our place is with him.”

Nedzu turned back to the screen. “Well then, it seems your detractors have made their decisions. I shall include them in your fines and charges, which means our diplomacy ends here. For the record, you have paid your intrusionary fine with one Nefling and three Terrans, who have all willingly boarded my ship in order to free you of debt for your mistaken flight into Cailith home space. You are free to leave, Commander Toshinori, with the lives of your crew and your ship intact. You have two standard galactic hours to initiate a Jump and exit our space.”

“This is not the last you will hear of this, Commander Nedzu, do you hear me?! This is against intergalactic law, and I will see to it you answer for it!”

The transmission cut out as Nedzu ended the call and turned to the four new guests still finding their footing after that miserable transport experience. Izuku was going to need to sleep for sixteen hours to get himself back to normal after the day he had. He was on the verge of collapsing. Thankfully, Shouta noticed and took most of his weight. 

“Forgive me, I know today has been exhausting. But you are all guests on this ship, I shall have my attaché bring you all to guest quarters to rest. I will need to speak with you once you are all feeling better. There is much to discuss, I promise.”

Izuku was more than ready to crash. He wanted to know what Nedzu wished to talk about, but right now, if he didn’t collapse into a bed somewhere, he was going to end up face first, on the ground at his old friend’s feet. Shouta thanked Nedzu for all of them and a crew member led them out of the Mezaran’s bridge. The walk to their guest quarters wasn’t long, but Izuku remembered the way from those days he spent with his mother here. 

As soon as his head hit a pillow, he was out. 

~

Izuku woke up sore and still tired, but at least his head was clear and his body had finished healing itself while he slept. The realization they’d brought him to the same room he’d spent his childhood in brought a smile to his face. He climbed out of bed to wander into the living room, where he could look at the holo-frames on the wall. Dozens of pictures of him and his mother and the crew of the Mezaran covered the wall and tabletops. His mother loved having physical memories, as she called them, it was a callback to the trees back on their planet that they’d tie trinkets to in remembrance of their lost kin. He missed this home away from home. He missed his mother.

One picture was new, or at least, he didn’t remember it. Izuku crouched down by the coffee table to pick up the little holo-frame with a beautiful picture of his mother standing on the ship’s bridge. She wasn’t looking directly at the camera, which means she likely didn’t know it was there. The longing on her face was…painful, but also beautiful. His mother hid her pain well, better than Izuku ever did. The door whooshing open slowly brought his attention up from the photo. 

“Forgive me.” Nedzu gestured to the photo in Izuku’s hands. “I know taking pictures of Nefling without consent is frowned upon…but I just…”

Izuku smiled. “I know, Nedzu. I know how you felt for her, how she felt for you.”

“It was forbidden.”

Izuku nodded. “She would have done it anyway - had you asked.”

The older man settled onto the couch with a heavy sigh. “I suppose I’m a coward. I should have given her everything I had. I should have been there when the Terrans launched their attacks. I should have fought for the Nefling.”

“I’ve never blamed your people, Nedzu. Never. I know the whole war was one big mess, and the Nefling are too peaceful to have the force to defend themselves. The Cailith are diplomatic at heart, and never had the numbers to help us. None of my people blamed yours, I promise.”

The older Commander nodded a few times. Izuku placed the holo-frame back down as he stood up. The kitchen was stocked, so he decided to make tea for everyone. Figuring his guards weren’t far behind Nedzu.

“Shouta!” He called out. “Bring the boys.” The door whooshed open again to reveal Shouta and his recruits. Izuku gestured to the couches while he got out a tea kettle and cups. “I was here many times as a youngling. My mother visited the Cailith often, our people were close friends. That’s my mother there, on the table.” He didn’t check to see if they looked. “I believe Nedzu wanted to talk with us.” Once he had the tea brewing, he placed the kettle and cups on a tray to bring over to the coffee table. “Please, go ahead, Commander.”

“Mmm, yes. There’s a few things I’d like to go over with you. I was not expecting to have Terran guests as well, but so long as you all abide by our laws, you are welcome in our territory. Izuku can fill you in on our culture later. For now-” Nedzu turned to Izuku. His compassionate look almost worried the poor Nefling. “If you’ll allow it, and if you want, I plan to take you home.”

“Home? Nedzu - the Terrans decimated the planet. There’s nothing left.”

“But there is. The planet is healing. Over the last three decades since the war, the Cailith have created a sanctuary space around the planet, and have been slowly terraforming it, back to its original state. It will likely take another three decades before it’s fully inhabitable long-term. But, in the meantime, we’ve made a station in Nefling space, for those who wish to aid in the recovery of the planet. Right now, it houses about a hundred and fifty Cailith base and scientific crew, and seventy-five Syscion terraforming crew. There’s a few Terran defectors as well.”

The planet wasn’t dead? It wasn’t blown to space dust? Izuku’s mind reeled sideways. He had to sit himself down on the floor to regain his balance before he fell. His home wasn’t gone. Izuku had a home to go back to . 

“You’re serious?” Shouta asked. “The planet is recovering…after everything we threw at it? I walked the barren breeding fields, the cities reduced to rubble. The ground was almost ash. We…we destroyed it.”

“No. You wounded it. But one thing you must know about the Nefling, is that they have an amazing capability for healing, so much so that even their planet itself can heal as it absorbs the natural radiation from space. We’ve also been feeding it with terraforming. Izuku?” The confused Nefling looked up to his mother’s dear friend. “If you returned, I think the planet would respond. I think it would heal faster with your antimatter.”

“But…” Izuku took a few quick breaths. “But I’m just one person. I’m the last…I’m alone. I can’t heal a whole planet.”

“You won’t be alone. The Cailith crew working the station there have been diligently studying the flora and fauna to help bring life back, and the terraforming team is doing their best to preserve the natural atmosphere as well as the natural landscape.”

“I- I can go home?”

“Yes. If that’s what you want. But you are always welcome to stay here, as well, or on the Cailith home planet or any planet or station in our system. You are an honored guest among our kind. We know we failed you, and we’ve pledged ourselves to restoring the Nefling race, or at the very least, restoring the planet so you have a sanctuary to remember them.”

What more could Izuku want out of this? What more could he ever ask for? A place to call home once more, his planet, restored. Even if his people were gone, maybe his planet could stand as a testament to their existence and achievements. His mother would be proud of the Cailith for their efforts, and that brought a smile to his face. 

“I’d very much like to go home. I want to help rebuild my planet.”

Nedzu bowed his head for a moment before turning to the Terrans in the room. They’d all been mostly silent. Izuku assumed they understood that they lacked any authority or ‘say’ in what was going on. Izuku was thankful they had the forethought to politely hold their tongues. 

“And you, Terrans? Now that you’ve slept on this situation, will you keep your vow to protect the last living Nefling, or will you return to your people?” 

Shouta didn’t seem to bother thinking it over. Izuku already knew his answer the moment he proved he understood the Nefling language and chose to help Izuku escape. He was Izuku’s guardian, his protector, and in some lights, a father-figure. Honestly, Izuku would probably be quite lost without him. 

“My life is in service to the Nefling race. Izuku knows my debts from the war.”

“Shouta, I’ve already forgiven that, you know that. Please don’t wallow on the past. You were forced to fight.” And then his family was killed anyway, or so Izuku assumed, when they discovered Shouta had ordered a retreat during one of the last battles on the ground, on the Nefling planet. He lost almost as much as Izuku in that war. 

“It doesn’t matter why I fought. Only that I did. I want to see you return home. I know you will outlive me, but I hope to see your home rebuilt before I die.” Izuku offered him a hand, and Shouta squeezed it gently. “I’ll make sure you get home. I promise.”

“Thank you.”

“Honestly, this has been far more fun than anything I’ve ever done in the Terran armada. I never fit in there, anyway. If you need guard detail, or even just a grunt to lift and haul, I’m in.”

Nedzu chuckled. “Very well, Shinso. Bakugo?”

“Fuck it - I’m in. That Commander Toshinori was a rat bastard, and I could use a vacation. I don’t like being lied to, pet peeve of mine, really. So yeah, sure - let’s rebuild a fucking planet, or whatever.”

Izuku chuckled. “You’re really crass, aren’t you?”

“Tch - if you say so, pretty boy.” Izuku rolled his eyes. 

“Alright. I’ll have our course set for the Nefling home planet. You are all free to wander, please ask for anything you may need, and I’m sure Izuku can show you around if you’d like to experience the ship’s offerings. We have several amenities. If you’ll excuse me, I need to return to my station on the bridge. It should take us about four standard galactic days to arrive. Rest and enjoy your time with us.”

“He’s awfully polite.” Katsuki muttered after the Commander left. “Not sure if I buy it.”

“That’s how the Cailith are. Did they not teach you that in the academy?”

Shinso leaned over to pour himself a cup of tea while shaking his head. “Nope! They teach us all alien races are the enemy, and while we may be on favorable terms with some currently, they are all to be seen with suspicion and we should expect war on every horizon.”

“That’s…horrible. I can’t imagine living on that kind of razor’s edge at all times. The Cailith are a diplomacy-first race. Their entire culture is full of etiquette, formality, and ritual. They’ve only recently joined the galactic stage as a superpower like the Terrans. They never had the need to fight prior to the Terrans leaving the Tau system.”

“Yeah, blame us for everything-”

“I do, Bakugo.” Izuku stood up with a sudden jingle of jewelry. “I blame your kind for the massacre and genocide of my entire race, and all subspecies on our planet. I blame you for slaughtering my mother, butchering her ship, capturing me, and forcing me to listen to her wailing in agony for thirty years. I blame you for absolutely everything horrible that has happened to me.” Izuku let out a long sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose. “But you, personally, were not alive to have caused me any offense. Please forgive me if I confuse your race with you individually. It is very hard to separate you when you speak like that. You have no idea what they did.”

“So tell us.” Shinso suggested. “We won’t understand if we never learn. The academy lied to us, omitted everything important from the antimatter war. It’s very clear we know nothing. Teach us.”

Izuku collapsed onto the couch across from his three guards. Shouta was giving him one of those ‘well, go on’ looks. He knew just as much as Izuku did about the war, and he could give the Terran perspective. But this was Izuku’s story to tell, after all. Ultimately, it was up to Izuku to share the nightmare of the antimatter war. Shouta could share his experiences, too, but perhaps it was better if Izuku told the losing side’s story first. After all, until the lion learns to write, all tales will always glorify the hunter. Shouta taught him that phrase many years ago, perhaps for this very reason. 

“Okay. But I will only tell this story once, so pay attention. This is incredibly painful for me to relive.”

The Nefling were a peaceful race. We lived symbiotically with not only the planet but all other species that existed on it. The planet itself had a core formed out of antimatter, which fed and sustained every living thing on the planet. The Nefling people had peaceful dealings with every race they came in contact with. We traded textiles, jewelry, handmade goods, and rare minerals from our planet with other races throughout the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies. At first, we even had peaceful relations with the Terrans. They wanted the minerals we mined on our planet as they were rare or non-existent on Earth, and they were integral to the creation of antimatter and warp engines, as well as incredibly useful for ship hulls. Again, at first, we had amicable trade and communication. It wasn’t until they found out that our ships functioned completely off antimatter, and far more efficiently than their warp engines, that they became hostile. 

We didn’t realize just how…horrifying the Terrans could be. They asked for a ship to study, so they could better their own engines. We agreed. They tore it apart. Kamara, the first ship to be butchered like meat, cut up as if she weren’t a living creature. They could not understand how she functioned, so they asked for another ship. That is how we found out. The Terrans did not take the refusal of the high council lightly. They believed they had a right to pull apart any technology or creature they did not understand.

The war started as small fights over territory and resources. They fought to capture ships, leaving our people stranded or forced to watch as they tore our ships apart. All because we said no. We were a peaceful race, and perhaps that meant we were naive and gullible. Perhaps we were easy to take advantage of. We’d never had a need for weapons, or defense, we were fair in our trade and did not start trouble. The galactic stage left us to our peaceful way of life, or at least, everyone but the Terrans did. 

So for the first time in our history, we created weapons. We chose to defend ourselves, our planet, and every living creature that lived with us. But…we didn’t know Terrans understood this as a declaration of war. The Nefling never wanted war. We never wanted to fight and kill other people, of any race. We only wanted to defend what we believed had a right to exist peacefully. 

The small fights turned to battles, we began losing ships and people in droves from their weapons of mass destruction. They invaded our planet, fought us in our own homes, captured our docks - left us pillaged, raped and murdered in the streets.

We were left with no choice. The Nefling and their ships chose to die, to prevent the Terrans from uncovering the technology they longed for. We used our own bodies as weapons, destroyed ourselves from the inside out - just as you saw with the engine I just unbound from, only…five times the size. It wasn’t enough. They bombed our planet as a punishment for trying to outsmart them. Their soldiers razed the breeding fields with fire, unaware that they had ruined their own chances of getting more antimatter engines.

My mother’s fleet was the last to stand against them. We watched our planet burn from orbit. My mother held me as I screamed. She told me to run. She ordered me to bond with her ship, with Diadri. She tore her own heart out and broke the bond with the ship who’d been her other half her whole life, to try and save me. But I was still so young, I was scared. I did not want to leave my mother. 

My hesitation led to my capture. They were seconds from killing me when the order came to hold me. Weeks of life in an empty cell passed, I was alone. I didn’t know I was the last of my kind. I didn’t know they’d slaughtered every captive Nefling they had, and ashed the lush fields and mountains of my home. When I was shown what they had done to Diadri…I passed out in horror.

I’ve been captive to the Terrans and locked on their flagship for the last thirty years since the war ended. 

At some point in the story, Shouta had stood up to pace around the room until he ended up at the large bay window on the far wall between the little kitchenette and the living room where they all sat. Izuku knew the guilt he carried over the crimes he committed against the Nefling. It didn’t matter if Izuku had forgiven it years ago, or that he didn’t blame Shouta himself for his actions under duress. What mattered was Shouta blamed himself. Izuku couldn’t change that, and he couldn’t force the old guard to forgive himself. 

Meanwhile, the two younger guards were alternating between staring at their knees or staring at the wall. Bakugo seemed rather thoughtful about the whole thing, considering his previous objection to Izuku’s anger. Shinso was doing an excellent job of trying not to show how much pain he felt after imagining all the war crimes Izuku described. Unfortunately, his eyes betrayed him. It was actually Shinso who broke the silence. 

“Humans have a long history of covering up the crimes they commit. They erase them from history and fail to include them in history books or lessons. They lie . The antimatter war was made out to be the Nefling’s fault in our lessons. Supposedly, you attacked us after our ‘attempts at peaceful trade of knowledge and resources’ failed. I’ve learned more in two days with you than I ever did in more than a dozen years of education. I feel…somehow betrayed by my own race.”

Izuku poured himself a second cup of tea and pulled his legs up onto the couch. He watched Shouta at the window for a moment. The old guard looked ready for retirement. Actually, he was supposed to have retired five years ago. Most Terran soldiers retire from service after a maximum of fifteen years on duty. Shouta had served more than thirty years. He was in his fifties now, and one of the oldest Terran soldiers still on duty. Or, well, he had been, before he went AWOL yesterday. They wouldn’t let him retire. Izuku had always assumed it was because they knew he’d hid information about the Nefling from them. No one else could manage to get Izuku to cooperate, and keeping him with Izuku meant he couldn’t tell anyone the secrets he knew. They were killing two birds with one stone…literally. 

“How do we know you’re even telling the truth?” Bakugo asked. 

Izuku sighed, finally looking away from Shouta. “As Commander Nedzu said; four days. If you don’t believe me, maybe the sight of my still uninhabited planet will convince you.”

“Maybe. Eye Bags here is right. Humans are damn good at erasing their crimes. I’m not sure I want to believe it, that’s the problem.”

“Hey, my dark circles are a fashion choice.”

“Never said they weren’t.”

Shinso rolled his eyes. “Well, whatever we believe, we’ve both already gone AWOL, so we might as well see it through.”

“Mmm.” Katsuki agreed. 

Izuku once more looked towards Shouta, this time, for an answer. The older guard placed a hand over his heart and bowed. Izuku smiled into his teacup. 

“Thank you, all of you. I can’t wait to show you my home.”

~

2 Days Later

The observatory was one of Izuku’s favorite places to spend his time. Most ships had some kind of observation room these days. Something about freeing the mind and meditation, that’s what he’d heard the Terrans say. For Izuku, it was a way to reconnect to the galaxies around him, a way to remember home. The observatory was at the top of the Mezaran, towards the front, so one could look out at the direction of travel and see almost a 360 degree field of view of space. 

They’d been traveling for two days. Izuku had settled into a routine of resting to finish recovering from everything they’d been through before arriving in Cailith territory, making friends with his new guard recruits, and re-exploring the ship he once called a home away from home. Nedzu had come to speak with him yesterday to offer a photo album he’d made from Izuku’s childhood. The holo-frames in there were all pictures he knew his mother approved of. They were all good memories. Izuku promised to take good care of it and return it before he left. 

Today, however, he just wanted to watch the stars burning as they traveled past. They were halfway to his home, and he couldn’t be more excited, or terrified. The door behind him whooshed open, startling his calm for only a moment. 

“Nedzu said you’d probably be hiding in here.” Shouta smirked behind his scarf. “Something on your mind, Izuku?”

He sighed. “I’m scared, Shouta.”

“Of what?” 

The old guard sat down with him on the bench at the center of the room. They had their backs to each other, and all of the Andromeda galaxy around them. Izuku slumped against Shouta’s back. The older guard slid his hand behind himself to squeeze one of Izuku’s, a silent plea for him to go on. 

“What if it’s worse than I think, worse than we left it? What if there’s nothing left, and the Cailith efforts are for nothing? What if my antimatter doesn’t help?”

“What if it does?” Shouta countered. “What if it’s everything you’ve been hoping for, everything you need?” He tilted his head to the side so his cheek rested on Izuku’s head. “It can’t be worse than the way we left, Izuku. Nothing can be worse than that. You have absolutely nothing to lose by going back and trying .”

Izuku considered his words for a while. It was a comfort just to sit with his guard and observe the vastness around them. Izuku liked feeling small in terms of planetary bodies. It reminded him there was so much more out here than he could have ever imagined, so much more to see and do.

“Izuku?”

“Mmm?”

“Can I tell you something my husband once told me, right before I went off to war?”

Izuku’s heart clenched. He hadn’t known Shouta had a husband, a husband he assumed was murdered for Shouta’s perceived betrayals in the war. Slowly, he nodded without speaking. Shouta sighed softly. 

“A house is only that, a building that houses us. A home is a house you fill with love, but love doesn’t require four walls and a roof. Home is where you are loved, where you are wanted and missed. Home is sometimes the first place we learn to run from, but it’s also the place we know we can always return to, the place we know we will always be welcomed with open arms. A home is the place we willingly fill with love. It doesn’t have to be the place where you grew up, or where you learned to walk and talk, it doesn’t have to be a place at all. It can be anything or anyone that brings us joy and light in the darkness of the universe.”

A sob choked Izuku’s throat. Shouta placed a hand on the side of his head but he didn’t try to soothe away Izuku’s tears. Izuku had not felt loved or wanted in thirty years, not by anyone. Well, maybe Shouta, but there had always been an imbalance between them. Shouta was his guard, his captor. It didn’t matter if the old soldier agreed with Izuku and wanted to free him, they were still dancing on this brick wall built to keep them apart. 

But that wall had shattered the moment they were transported to the Mezaran. Shouta cared for Izuku, he knew that without a shred of doubt. He’d protected Izuku all these years, likely more than the Nefling knew. He’d been there to pick him up when he sobbed himself into the floor when Diadri wailed in his mind. He’d been there to hold Izuku through nightmares and beatings when he disobeyed orders. Shouta had been there through everything.

“Shouta?” Izuku rasped out. The old guard tilted his head towards Izuku. “You’re my home.”

Shouta chuckled. “Yeah? You’re my home, too, kiddo.”

~

Day 4

Izuku and his guards stood on the bridge as the Nefling home planet came into view after a short warp jump back into the Milky Way galaxy. The last time Izuku saw this planet, the whole surface had been made of fire and ash, the horizon looked red and black. But as they rounded the orbiting moon, Izuku’s heart skipped a beat inside his chest. The golden glow of the planet was restored. The whole surface shone with its usual amber mountains and bright cyan oceans. It might not be inhabited, but the planet looked healthy again! It looked alive again!

“This is Commander Nedzu of the Mezaran, requesting permission to dock. We have honored guests aboard, the Nefling Izuku Midoriya has been rescued and freed from Terran captivity.”

“Permission granted, Commander! We welcome the Nefling home, and hope he finds our efforts to restore the planet worthwhile.”

Izuku practically ran to the holo-panel in front of Nedzu so he could get a better look through the front of the bridge. Just before planetary approach, a large station came into view as it followed its path of orbit around the planet. The station itself appeared to be divided into four towers connected with several tunnel bridges and transport tracks. Izuku had never seen a station this large. Actually, the only station he’d seen in his life had been the ISS in Earth orbit. While that station had been augmented many times and expanded, it wasn’t half the size of this station. However, comparatively, the Nefling home planet was also twice the size of Earth, so perhaps it was proportional. 

“You’ll be home, soon, Izuku.”

“I- I don’t think I can ever repay this, Nedzu. This is…I don’t have words.”

The old Cailith laughed happily. “You have repaid me with the joy I see in your eyes. This whole operation was to repay the kindness and friendship the Nefling offered us, and to atone for our lack of aid in the war. I am more than happy to see you return home, and know that your mother is smiling down on you now.”

Izuku dove at the Commander and wrapped himself around the man. Nedzu hugged him tightly and brushed his hands over Izuku’s floating locks. 

“Thank you.” Izuku whispered into the man’s chest. “Thank you.”

Izuku paced the airlock throughout the whole docking process. Shouta might not show it, but he was excited, too. He was likely excited to see the planet he left covered in ash full of life once more. Bakugo and Shinso seemed curious about the whole thing, though that didn’t mean they weren’t also excited by the prospect of being on a large space station. A station of this size likely had lots of work, good food, and maybe decent quarters. 

Nedzu had already arranged everything for them. They’d each have personal quarters in a wing to themselves, with access to pretty much everything on the station. Izuku was an ‘honored guest’, after all, and his guards apparently got to reap the benefits, too. 

The ship rocked as it locked into place. The airlock hissed, equalizing pressure slowly before opening. 

“Ready to go home?” Shouta smirked. 

“More than anything else in my whole life.”

Nedzu entered the airlock with a few members of his crew. “Welcome home, Izuku.”

The airlock whooshed open to the din of a thousand crew hands moving and talking, working and moving, almost all of them Cailith - though Izuku did spot a couple Terrans and Syscion in between. Several stopped to clap or cheer the moment they spotted Izuku. Izuku stood, almost frozen, pride swelling in his chest. They were all here for this once destroyed planet, this extinct species, to rise it up once more. 

The next few hours were a blur and flurry of action and movement. Izuku and his guards were ushered to the registration office to get their station ID bands and communicators, shown the important things like the main transport hub that had maps and directions to everything on the station, given lunch in one of the dining halls, and shown to their quarters. By the time Izuku got back to his room, he was exhausted. 

They’d given him a room similar to any other ship or station room; a simple living room with a kitchenette, an adjoined bathroom, and a bedroom. This room, however, had a large bay window with a window seat big enough to lounge or even sleep on. Right now, Izuku could see the whole surface of his home planet. It was beautiful. The Terrans had once called his planet ‘Autumnal’. He wasn’t sure what that meant until Shouta had shown him a picture of Earth in the Autumn season, covered in oranges, browns, and yellows. The planet glowed softly through the window; Izuku didn’t realize just how much he’d missed the way it looked from afar. 

He’d been so lost staring at the planet, he almost missed the knock on his door. 

“Come in!”

The Cailith woman who entered bowed politely. Izuku didn’t recognize her. Still, he smiled and turned so she could join him on the window seat, which she did. She wore a crew uniform, but Izuku didn’t know enough about Cailith ranking to understand what the symbols meant, or what her rank might be on the station. 

“It’s such an honor to meet you, Izuku. I’m Nemuri Kayama, the Station Master here on the Nefling home base, as we’ve come to call it. I hope that’s alright.” 

“Oh! Of course. I...well, I don’t really think I’ve processed everything. I’m just in shock about it all?”

“That’s alright. I don’t mean to bother you while you’re settling in. I just wanted to talk with you as soon as possible, and my schedule is quite busy.”

“I can imagine so.” The Station Master was the commander of the whole station, they were the highest ranking official on board, and everyone ultimately answered to them. Izuku was a little startled that the Station Master was here on day one, but really, he should have expected it. He’d file away what those bars on her shoulder meant to help decipher the other crew members’ ranks.

“I wanted to make it clear that we’re here to see this planet flourish again. We believe that with your help, the antimatter in your body may be able to awaken the planet’s core. If so, it would be able to sustain itself. It might even wake the breeding fields. I don’t know if we could ever repopulate the Nefling themselves - but we may be able to bring back your ships, the star whales.”

Izuku tilted his head. “Is that what the Cailith called them, too?”

She nodded. “The Terrans mentioned whales once, showed us what they were, and well, it stuck. Anyway, our next terraforming mission isn’t until next week. You can rest and recuperate from your travel as we prepare. We don’t know if bringing you back will awaken the planet, but it’s our deepest hope. The planet has been made an intergalactic sanctuary, and cannot be disturbed without permission of the Cailith - and now you.”

“M- me?”

“You are the last living Nefling. This planet’s care will be remanded to you once our restoration efforts are complete. When that happens, you’ll be made Station Master here, with a crew that can teach and assist you until the planet is habitable. At that point, you may choose to appoint a new Station Master if you prefer to live down there.” She gestured to the planet outside his window. “But ultimately, you will decide who can travel to and from it, and who can access resources and trade. It’s a big responsibility, but it’s one that you alone have the right to, don’t you think?”

Izuku sighed. “I guess so. This is all just a lot at once. I think I might need rest before thinking about being in charge of a whole planet.”

“That’s perfectly reasonable. My only other topic of discussion is your Terran companions. As I understand it, they are AWOL from their service to the Terran Commission.” Izuku nodded slowly. “Mmm, well, that may cause problems in the future, but Commander Nedzu did explain that he claimed all of you under the trespass treaty, so the Terrans may not have any legal ground to stand on if they choose to try and retrieve them. Plus, as this station and planet are a sanctuary, they are basically on intergalactic limbo, which means no one can forcibly remove them. They should be safe here-” She pointed to the planet once more. “-and there as well.”

“Thank you, Station Master Kayama. I cannot express my gratitude for everything the Cailith have done.”

“Oh, please, call me Auntie Nem. And you are most welcome. No one deserved what happened here, especially not such a kind and caring race as yours. Please, call me if you need absolutely anything. I shall leave you to rest, I believe one of your guards was outside when I came in, they might need to speak with you.”

“Thank you, Auntie Nem. You can send them in.”

Izuku was expecting Shouta to walk into the room after the Station Master left, but it wasn’t. Instead, Bakugo wandered into Izuku’s quarters in casual clothes and his hands in his pockets. Izuku pulled his legs up onto the window seat so he could lean back and look out the window, but still pay attention. 

“Bakugo?”

The younger blonde stopped short of the window seat and rubbed the back of his head in what appeared to be a thinking pose. “I uhh, I don’t do this often, so listen up, yeah?”

“Okay? Do what?”

“Apologize. I’m sorry. I wasn’t sure I really believed humans could do any of this.”

“What convinced you? The planet looks…almost normal again.”

“There’s a whole hall dedicated to the history of the planet, and another devoted to the antimatter war. The old bastard guard forced Eye Bags and I to go through it while they were getting you settled in. I saw …I saw what they did.”

“Ah.” There weren’t any words to respond to that, none at all. What did one say to an apology for a war? Izuku didn’t blame Bakugo, not personally. He hadn’t even been alive when it happened. But he did blame the Terrans. Unfortunately, Bakugo couldn’t beg forgiveness for his entire race, that’s simply not how it works. 

“They’re going to find us work on the station, since you don’t really need three full-time guards. I don’t think they could pry Aizawa away from you, but, yeah, EyeBags and I will probably be doing grunt work unless you need us.”

“Is that what you want, Bakugo?”

“Ka-...it’s Katsuki. You can just-” He sighed. “Look, it’s pretty damn clear you don’t like me. You were my assignment, but you’re safe now. If you don’t want me around, that’s fine.”

Izuku patted the window seat to try and encourage the blonde to sit down. He didn’t. Izuku shook his head and went on anyway. “Look, it’s not you I dislike. It’s just…your attitude, really. You’re dismissive at best, and downright cruel otherwise. You don’t seem to care about much, and though it’s obvious you hold a grudge against the Terrans for lying to you about genocide - I can’t say you’ve done much to prove why you even want to be here. Shinso didn’t seem to actually fit into the service, I think he’d be much happier here, doing hard labor and sleeping his nights away or sitting with a good book. But you-” Izuku shrugged. “Why are you here?”

Katsuki’s usual anger came first, and he almost exploded on Izuku halfway through the Nefling’s little speech. But the moment he asked that last question, all the fight just fizzled out of the blonde’s bones. He leaned himself against the couch across from Izuku and gave one of the biggest shrugs the Nefling had ever seen. Perhaps even he didn’t know why he was here. Izuku turned back to the window for a while, letting Katsuki have a moment to gather his thoughts. 

“Getting on the Kamimora, on Diadri’s ship, that was the first time I’d been off world. This is my first exploration into the depths of space. I’ve spent my life staring up at the stars, longing to be a part of…something…bigger? I pushed myself to be the best at everything, so I could get accepted into UA Academy and graduate into the service.” Katsuki sighed. “When I saw you walk across that hangar bay when we were loaded, I thought: ‘that’s where I belong. That is something I’ve never seen, something more than Human, more than I understand.’ Then Toshinori put me on guard detail and I thought it was some kind of punishment. Guarding you wasn’t what I had in mind.”

“What did you have in mind, then?”

“Honestly, I don’t know. I thought maybe you were a diplomat. I wanted to work out trade or debate politics. I’d taken the diplomacy officer’s track back at the Academy, but due to the Cailith skirmishes, they rushed our graduation, so I didn’t get to complete the training.”

Izuku considered having Katsuki as an angry blonde diplomat. It might be unconventional, but Izuku thought there might be some benefit to a brash, no-nonsense, blunt type of diplomacy. Tilting his head, Izuku squinted at Katsuki for a moment. 

“Well, the Station Master has just told me that I’m to take her job once their terraforming project is complete, and once the planet is habitable again - I’ll have full control over who has access to this sanctuary. I’ll need diplomats who can negotiate on my behalf, or who can tell everyone-”

“To fuck off?”

Izuku chuckled. “Effectively, yes. This is my home, and I do not plan to see it abused or taken advantage of ever again. But I don’t think I have the…” He waved his hand while trying to find the word. “The energy that it would take to see that through. Not without help. Is that something you’d be interested in, Katsuki?”

“Absolutely.” The blonde crossed his arms and grinned deviously.

“Then I shall see it done.”

Izuku stood up and stretched his arms above his head. He rolled his neck to try and ease the stress that kept building up over the last several days and weeks. He didn’t miss the blonde Terran across from him eyeing up his form as he stretched out. Izuku wasn’t sure what to think about that. Was it casual and meaningless, was he trying to inspect Izuku…or was that dark look in Katsuki’s eyes something else entirely?

“Goodnight, Boss.” 

Katsuki waved over his shoulder without looking back. Izuku stood in the middle of his living room, a touch speechless and more than a little confused. Truth be told, Izuku was too tired to think about it. Besides, it was probably nothing, and even if it wasn’t, Izuku didn’t want to worry about it. Right now, he needed sleep. 

~

The amber glow of the Nefling planet above his head is what woke Izuku the next morning. His bedroom was extended from the side of the station, like a few of the other personal quarters on the top of the residential tower. They’d really given him the best room in the whole station, hadn’t they? It all felt too…pampered. But guilt can make people go overboard. He didn’t want the Cailith to feel guilty for their inaction. There’s no way to know if their help would have done any good, or if it would have just gotten them killed as well. Though perhaps dead they wouldn’t feel guilty, but dead wasn’t helpful at all, was it?

Izuku sighed up at the glass ceiling. He lifted one hand to splay his fingers out and cast shadows over his own face. This planet was Izuku’s home, a living representation of all he’d lost. Thirty years had gone by since he last laid eyes on this beautiful world he once called home. Three decades in captivity had been a lifetime, and also just a tiny blip on his own timeline, all at once. Now he lay here, hair floating around him across the pillows, hands reaching out towards everything he’d longed for, and somehow, it all felt just as far away now as it had two weeks ago. 

“Do you sleep all damn day or-” The bedroom door slid open. 

Izuku screeched, scooping the blankets up into his arms to cover his naked form. “Do you know how to knock, Baku- Ka-cchan!?”

“The hell did you just call me?” The blonde threw the door closed. “What idiot sleeps naked when they have personal guards who have to take care of him?!”

“What guard thinks they have the right to walk into my room without knocking?! What could you possibly need first thing in the morning?”

“The old hobo told me to wake you.”

“This is how you wake someone, by storming into their room?!” Izuku threw a bedside clock at the door. It crashed into the metal surface with a loud thump before shattering into pieces. “Do you have no semblance of privacy?”

“I just spent the last eight years in a co-ed dorm. Privacy didn’t exist between cadets. So no. I’ve walked in on a lot more than just a naked guy in bed, lazing around like he had no plans to get his ass out of bed all day.”

Izuku huffed. “Ugggh, you’re impossible! Why did I ever agree to let you be a diplomat? You can’t even knock!”

“Well knocking isn’t necessary to tell people to fuck off the planet, is it?”

“Vicious beast!” Izuku hated that Katsuki was right. His crass attitude would actually be perfect for Izuku’s future needs. “I’m not something to gawk at, you know.” He grabbed his dress off the wall hanger and slipped it on over his head quickly.

“Well you can’t expect us not to-” Izuku threw the door open. “Gawk…” Katsuki shook his head. “You’re not exactly the usual fare that Humans get to see on a daily basis. You’re, quite literally, one of a kind. Besides, do people not gawk in your culture? Do they not admire pretty things?”

Izuku leaned his shoulder against the door frame. “Are you calling me pretty, Kacchan?” 

The blonde made a face. “Not if you’re going to call me by that name.”

“Oh then I most certainly will be calling you Kacchan from here on out.” He stepped up to the taller guard, his chin tilted up to put them eye to eye. “I’m not a pretty thing to admire. Not for you, not for anyone.”

“Mhm.” Katsuki drug his eyes down Izuku’s neck, directly into the front of his dress. “If you say so, Pretty Thing.”

“Insufferable.” Izuku muttered with an eye roll as he shoved past Katsuki. “Where’s Shouta?”

“On some security debrief with the bigwigs about the station and your time here. You’re stuck with me today. Shinso has already been assigned to the bridge. Turns out he’s a wiz with calculations or something…and he might have been in the officer’s training as well.”

“Ahhh, I see. You don’t like it when other people do better than you, do you?”

Katsuki scoffed. “That’s ridiculous. He’s not doing better than me. I’m the personal guard to the last living Nefling. What’s better than that? Certainly not light speed calculations of incoming space debris on some station bridge.” He flopped himself on the couch and threw his feet up onto the coffee table. Izuku quickly kicked his feet off as he walked through to the kitchenette to make himself some coffee. 

“You already told me all your secrets, Kacchan. You don’t have to sulk.”

“Stop calling me that. We’re not six years old. And I’m not sulking.”

“Mhm.” Izuku set a cup of coffee in front of Katsuki. “Whatever you say. Ka- cchan .”

“Now who’s insufferable?” Katsuki muttered.

Izuku laughed openly as he settled onto the couch gracefully. The fun of having minor control over gravity around one’s body meant he never once spilled a drop of his coffee as he collapsed into the chair across from his blonde guard. 

“I don’t know much about Terran culture, but from what little the Nefling had witnessed, the looks you were giving me are usually the kind you’d reserve for the female of your race, no?” Katsuki choked on his coffee. “My apologies, is it not acceptable to speak of courting and mating in your culture?”

“Ah well, no - but uhm, not usually so bluntly. Uhm…” Katsuki had to clear his throat before going on.

“Well you’re the one who called me pretty. Do you have a word for this kind of admiration between two men? Forgive my bluntness. Nefling don’t have a concept of specialized or focal mating. It’s not necessary.”

“What does that mean? Specialized or focal mating?”

“Humans are created through cellular division after the copulation of a male and a female of your race, yes?” Katsuki nodded slowly. “That is what I mean. You have specific requirements needed for breeding, two halves create a new whole. Specialized mating.”

“Hold up.” Katsuki put his feet back down and set his coffee aside. “How are Nefling born, then?”

Izuku tilted his head. Ah, right, Terrans didn’t teach their young anything about intergalactic education or exterior species culture or science. Hadn’t Shouta called this the ‘birds and bees’ talk when they’d been discussing Nefling anatomy after Izuku was wounded once? He certainly didn’t expect to have this conversation with one of his younger guards. 

“The last time I spoke with Shouta about Nefling anatomy, he suggested my species is similar to your…fish?”

Katsuki blinked. “Fish?”

“Whatever I may appear as to you externally doesn’t matter. We can, at will or by necessity, create the environment for breeding. This can be done individually, or through copulation as your race does, though our external anatomy doesn’t matter in that case.”

“So you can choose who carries the baby, or just… what? Impregnate yourself? Isn’t that like…isn’t that weird to you, at all?”

Izuku snorted, nearly inhaling his coffee. “Why would it be? Continuation of the species is a necessity of life.”

“So - wait, hold on. If you can do that, then you don’t have to be the last of your kind, right?”

Izuku smirked. “Correct. However.” The younger guard arched his brows like ‘really?’. “Yes, however-” Izuku repeated while gesturing out the window towards the planet. “We do need the antimatter the core of that planet provides in order to supplement procreation, especially if it’s done through parthenogenesis.” Katsuki gave him a confused look. “Self impregnation as you called it. Until that planet is brought back, there’s nothing I can do to continue my species. If they manage to bring it back to life completely, then there may indeed be hope that my species could revive. But until then - I’m all there is, and all there will be.”

“Oh.” 

Katsuki leaned back. His eyes slowly widened. He was finally starting to understand the truth behind all that Izuku lost, and all the hopes he had buried deep in his chest. Katsuki understood, finally, that Izuku was utterly alone, without a home, and without anything he needed in order to bring life back to what Katsuki’s race once destroyed. Izuku curled his legs up beneath himself and sipped his coffee casually. 

“I can’t imagine what that…feels like.”

No, he couldn’t. Izuku had the ability to save his entire species, but he lacked the proper environment. He had to stare out at space for decades, waiting only to outlive his captors in hopes that one day, he might get back to a planet he could maybe salvage in order to hopefully bring the Nefling back to life. It was a heavy burden for one man to bear. A burden Izuku couldn’t ever be rid of until the right conditions were met. So he’d wait, and hope, instead. He had to watch the stars grow older around him without anyone to watch them with. What a horrible fate. 

“Sometimes, I call myself a black hole. I will outlast everything around me, I steal life from even the stars around me, and can never give it back. Do you remember what they called me on the ship?”

“Kodoku?”

Izuku nodded. “Mmm. It means solitude, loneliness, it means ‘last one’. It was beyond fitting, but I hated it. I hated it because it reminded me of the truth of what I am while also taking away my personhood. But more than that…it reminded me that I am the loneliest creature in the universe, and isn’t that just a tragedy?”

Katsuki leaned forward until his arms were resting on his thighs. His face was a mask of thought, no true emotion showing just yet. The blonde guard wiped a hand over his mouth and sniffled, forcing what might have been tears back into his chest. 

“You know what I think?” Izuku gestured for him to go on. “I think we’re only as tragic as we allow ourselves to be.” Katsuki put on one of his signature smirks. “And you’re not tragic. See that planet out there?” The guard pointed past Izuku at the window behind him. “That proves you won’t be alone forever. That’s what we’re here to do, right?” Izuku didn’t respond. “Right?”

Izuku nodded. “If the terraforming works.”

“ If the terraforming works.” Katsuki repeated. 

“I guess you’ll be the first to tell me if I’m a tragedy or not, hmm, once it’s all over?”

“Yeah, I’ll tell you. Loudly, and - what was it? - insufferably?”

Izuku snorted. “Mhm.”

The front door to Izuku’s quarters opened up after a short knock. Shouta poked his head around the door, shocked to find Izuku and his new guard sitting quietly in the living room sharing coffee. Izuku gestured for him to come in but the old Terran seemed a bit too startled to move. 

“Come on, Shouta. We’re having coffee. What time is it? Kacchan came in barking that I was sleeping all day.”

“Uhh, it’s lunchtime. Just took a break from my security sweep to check on you two. I figured I’d find you at each other’s throats, not having coffee. What did I miss?” He finally came into the room. 

Izuku tossed his legs over the chair edge and crossed them. He’d left an extra mug on the counter next to the coffee pot, which Shouta was quick to snatch up to pour himself a cup. He’d hoped Shouta would stop in, mostly just to ensure the old Terran was okay. This whole situation was unknown, new, terrifying almost. Izuku might be a touch worried that if Shouta got lost on this big new station, he wouldn’t see the old man again.

“No wonder I’m starving. You didn’t miss much, Shouta, just a heart to heart about my singleness in the universe. Nothing monumental.”

“Oh? Nothing monumental, huh? Bakugo?”

“You said keep an eye on him, Sir. That’s what I’m doing.”

Shouta sighed. “Uh huh. Well, I’ve got enough time for a cup of coffee. Shall I give you both the rundown?” Izuku and Katsuki both nodded. “Alright, well - it’s largely a civilian operation commanded and funded by the Cailith government. There are a few Syscion, and even fewer Humans on board. The Humans that are here are largely defectors disillusioned from or abused by the Commission - like me. They do have a security force but since this is primarily a volunteer operation consisting mostly of scientists, the most crime they see here is petty theft graffiti by stupid children. Ultimately, I don’t see a huge concern over your safety here. If anything, that concern would come from outside.”

Katsuki clicked his tongue. “If Commander Toshinori keeps his promise.” 

“Yes, that would be my worry, but unless they want to instigate intergalactic war, again, we should be safe. They know the Cailith now have enough power to pose a threat, one they would have a hard time winning against. Plus, we’re now in sanctuary space.”

“So basically, as long as we’re here, we’re safe. Step one foot off this station or that planet and we’re doomed.”

“You don’t need to be so blunt, Kacchan.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“Did you just-” Shouta sighed. “Look, the point is, we’re safe.”

None of them bothered to mention they were also stuck. Well, for Izuku this was home. Stuck wasn’t the issue for him. Shouta and Katsuki on the other hand…they didn’t have much choice but to stay. Shouta was here with a purpose. He’d already dedicated his life to protecting Izuku and this planet. Katsuki had a life back on Earth, did he leave friends? What about Shinso?

“Hey, Kacchan said Shinso was already reassigned to the bridge?” Shouta nodded once. “If I want him back…can I have him? I mean, if he wants it. Mmm!” Izuku gestured to Katsuki. “I’m making him my head diplomat. I think Shinso could help out in that department. They’re both… opinionated.”

Shouta grunted. “There’s an idea. Put the two most volatile brats in the universe together guarding this sector’s only sanctuary space. That’ll go over well.”

Katsuki grunted. “Hey, I’m not-” 

“Oh come on, Shouta. If I’m meant to be this planet’s new guardian. I have to come up with some way to keep all the riff-raff away. You can’t honestly tell me there’s a better way to scare off intruders.”

“Hmph, maybe not.” Shouta stood up to put his mug in the sink. “I’ll get Shinso back on your detail. For now, just try not to get lost on the station, and stay out of trouble. They have a rather large observatory, and it will be planet-side tomorrow. I’ll take you up.”

“Thank you, Shouta. I look forward to it.” 

Izuku stood up as the old guard left to clean up the mugs. Katsuki handed his mug over as Izuku walked past on his way to the kitchen. He started humming to himself as he washed out the mugs, his mother’s favorite lullaby, the one that played through his mind every time he woke Diadri from her slumber.

The coffee mug shattered on impact as it fell from his hands into the sink. Of course it was always going to come crashing down at some point; the realization that Diadri was gone. The very last part of his mother was gone forever. The open wound inside his chest split open and wailed. No, that was his throat, his own voice, screaming as the true weight of that loss came down like a star collapsing around him. Katsuki was there, only a second later, wrapping himself around Izuku like a warm blanket, holding his shoulders so the Nefling could sob into his own hands on the floor of his kitchen. 

“I got you.” Katsuki soothed. “Get it out. Jus- just get it out.”

Izuku clutched his own chest and let the pain tangle around his heart. Even with the amber glow of his home through the window, it all felt like a loss. He was standing on a precipice between losing everything forever and restoring everything he’d already lost. The risks involved with making an attempt at saving his people, his planet, and everything the Terrans destroyed seemed daunting. Izuku was just handed a whole planet to care for, and he wasn’t sure he could take care of himself. 

Katsuki held him until he calmed down. They didn’t move from the kitchen floor for probably a couple hours. Izuku managed to find his voice eventually, though it rasped out of his throat. 

“She’s gone. Diadri was the last piece of my mother, and she’s gone. I ripped her out of my heart and let her die. How could I do that?”

“She’s at peace now, Izuku. She’s not suffering in that horrible box anymore. You set her free.”

“But…but she, she was all I had left. I can’t…I don’t know if I can do this, if I can save all of that.” He threw his hand towards the window. “What if I can’t?!”

Katsuki leaned down to press his lips to Izuku’s ear. “What if you can?” He whispered.

Izuku pulled his face away to glare at Katsuki. Where did he find the audacity to suggest something so…true? What if it all worked out? What if Izuku could do everything they wanted him to? What if he saved everything he lost? 

What  if  he  could ?

~

Thirty years spent on ships and stations, Izuku just wanted to walk on a planet again. He wanted to feel dirt between his toes and smell flowers. When he was a youngling, the Starvaile flowers bloomed; they only bloomed once every five hundred years. He ran through the fields of bright orange and white flowers with his friends. They’d search the fields for hours to find the tallest stalks that stretched almost shoulder height on young Nefling so they could make flower crowns. 

The smallest blooms were picked to float on handmade wreaths down the river. When young Nefling came of age, they could make their own wreath and float it down the river on the solstice ritual. Or, they could stand at the bottom of the river and catch the wreaths. It was often considered a type of fate. While the pairings made by wreath makers and wreath catchers wasn’t an assurance of a mating pair, it was a well-loved tradition. 

Izuku had been too young when the Starvaile flowers last bloomed to participate.

He traced his finger along the wall as they walked to the station observatory. He made the star shaped pattern of the flowers on the wall of the transport elevator with his finger as they rode it up to the top of the station. 

It occurred to him that he may never see the Starvaile flowers bloom again. 

“Izuku?”

“Hm?”

“We’re here.”

They stepped off the elevator to what could only be described as some kind of outdoor patio. Except it wasn’t outside, but the only thing denoting it as indoors was the thin metal lines between the panes of glass. But all around him were living trees, stretching fifteen feet into the air. Paved stone paths snaked their way between flower beds and trees. A circular patio sat in the very center with a wide variety of plush couches and patio chairs. The stars that stretched out around them drowned out the idea that they were trapped on a station.

Izuku stopped at the edge of the cold metal entrance, his perpetually bare feet not yet touching stone or grass, almost out of fear. 

“Is this…real?”

Shouta chuckled. “Mhm. It’s real grass - Earth grass, anyway. Everything here is from Earth, so I’m not sure if you recognize any of it.”

“I just wasn't sure if it was real grass or not. It looks…plastic.”

“Some people like that kind of grass, but it’s usually reserved for the rich these days. Most of the population has only ever seen wild forests or barren metal-scapes.” The old guard sighed. “I asked the Station Master why they picked Earth landscaping for the observatory. She said it’s the closest to Nefling landscaping. Is that accurate?”

“Well, if it wasn’t so manicured, they might be right. I’m almost scared to touch it. The trees are…sort of similar, though the colors are wrong, but the flowers look miniscule in comparison to ours.” Shouta knelt down to take off his boots and set them aside on a slotted shelf with a few other pairs of shoes already. “Why do you wear shoes? All these years, I never bothered to ask.”

Shouta tilted his head. “What do you mean? Shoes are-” He scrunched up his eyebrows. “Well, our feet aren’t exactly tough. Despite having walked upright for several millennia, we spent most of that in shelters and covering our bodies. The Nefling preferred the outdoors, right?”

Izuku gestured to the gigantic image of his planet outside the observatory. “You say that like you didn’t experience it yourself when you were down there. But I suppose it made sense, how we lived. The plant didn't exactly have bad weather like Earth. We lived in harmony with the core of our planet, and with that came a physical connection. We absorbed antimatter through our feet and the air around us.”

“Wait, the planet had antimatter in the air? The Commission gave it the all clear. If there’s antimatter in the air…Humans can’t-”

“Survive there, no. I’ve no intention of ever letting another Terran set foot on that planet. That ban doesn’t include my personal guard, of course.” Izuku squinted. “Have they never given you treatment for antimatter exposure?”

“No.”

“You should go to the medical wing. Soon. You were down there for weeks during the war, weren’t you?” Shouta nodded. “Please don’t let me worry about you. I’m already going to outlive you. I don’t want to lose you anytime soon.”

“There’s no need for worry. I’ll get checked out. Come - just enjoy the observatory with me?”

Izuku smiled and took Shouta’s hand. The first step on the grass was accompanied by a sigh of relief. Izuku splayed his toes and dug them into the dirt beneath the grass. It took him a few moments to finally move on. He walked in the grass while Shouta took the pathway towards the center. When they arrived, Izuku let go of his guard’s hand and spun around a few times, brushing his fingers through the bushes and flowers around him. 

“Do you miss Earth?” Izuku asked suddenly. He stopped spinning in time to catch his guard sporting a shocked expression. “Sorry, should I not ask?”

“No, no, it’s fine. I just haven’t thought about Earth in a long time.”

“You don’t think about home, Shouta?”

“Earth isn’t home. I told you that the other night.” When Izuku gave him a sigh, the old Terran scoffed. “It’s not a bad thing, kiddo. I just don’t think about a planet that betrayed me. Did I ever tell you what happened when I came back from the war - before I was assigned to you?”

“No. I made my own assumptions. I had no right to ask.”

Shouta found himself a seat while Izuku tiptoed around the circular patio, never leaving the grass. He couldn’t bring himself to go back to walking on metal, not yet. The old guard leaned back against a picnic table and stared up at the sky. Izuku spun until he was dizzy, his dress sparkling on the starlight and the jewels hanging from his ears jingling with every spin. He danced to a song no one else could hear while Shouta told his sordid tale. 

“I did my duty, served my planet. I did everything they ordered, and hated myself for every second of it. But I came home, and I expected to come home to my husband…and our daughter.”

Izuku skipped a step, nearly tripping over his own feet, but he didn’t stop. 

“I made it back to the ISS but they never allowed me to set foot back on planet Earth. Instead, I was handed a report of my husband and daughter’s deaths in a vague accident, and told I’d be reassigned, retained in service. I wouldn’t be able to bury my family. I wouldn’t be able to collect their things or talk to my family or my small list of friends. I wouldn’t be leaving the station. I wasn’t allowed to leave my room, not until they assigned me to you.”

Slowly, Izuku came to a stop in front of his guardian; the man who had stood by his side when every single Terran in the universe betrayed him. He hadn’t realized it, but at some point, Shouta had become the missing piece of family Izuku lost. Maybe Izuku had filled a hole in Shouta’s heart, too. 

“A few years into it they decommissioned me, formally. Dishonorable discharge due disobedience and cowardice.”

“The retreat.”

“Mmm.” Shouta gave one of those sad sort of smiles that held no joy, only pain and nostalgia. “Were you there?” Izuku shook his head. “It was the breeding fields for the ships. I know you think we razed them but…We didn’t get the chance to.” He wouldn’t lift his head to look at Izuku when he spoke. “The Elders…they didn’t want us getting our hands on the source of your engines. I’m fairly sure I’m the only one who put it together, and most of my platoon died anyway. So I ordered the retreat, and kept the secret of the Nefling star whales…until today.”

Izuku’s legs gave out beneath him. He landed in the plastic-like grass with a thump of knees and clattering of jewels as a few earrings finally came loose and fell from his ear. One shattered when it hit the stone patio. A sparkle of green light spilled across the stones as the glass tinkled around him. 

Irreplaceable is the word that came to mind. That earring was irreplaceable now. Izuku did not know the craftsmanship to create it. He’d been raised to take his mother’s council position, he didn’t know how to make jewelry. His whole life had become one long train of irreplaceable things and watching them fall apart. 

Izuku lifted his eyes as Shouta finally found the strength to look at him. 

“They killed themselves to stop you. They blew themselves up to keep you from-…I can’t do this.”

Shouta shook his head. “What?”

“I can’t do this. I won’t do this.”

“Do what, Izuku?”

“Fix the planet. I won’t do it. I want this to stop. I want them to stop .” Izuku hauled himself up with an incredible effort that took every ounce of his soul. He stumbled, stepped on the broken earring and hissed at the piercing pain in his foot.

“Where are you going? Shit - your foot.”

“The Station Master’s quarters. I need to make them stop.”

“Izuku-”

“I won’t do it, Shouta. I can’t.”

“You’re not making any sense, Izuku, please stop.” He grabbed Izuku’s arm without warning, jerking him to stop. 

“Don’t touch me!” Shouta stumbled back from his barking voice. “Don’t you get it? The Elders killed themselves to keep our secrets. They didn’t just fight you, they razed their own planet just to prevent the Terrans from abusing what didn’t belong to them. I spent the last thirty fucking years wishing and hoping to find my way back to this planet, in the vain hope I could maybe find one last flower to say goodbye with. Then they hand me all this hope that maybe, I could see it all alive again. Maybe, one day, the star whales of the Nefling might once more fly free over our forests and oceans. But if I do that, I’m wasting their efforts. I’m throwing it all away! They gave their lives to- to- to stop Humans from putting our beautiful creatures in boxes.”

“Izuku…”

“They put me in a box, Shouta! If I bring this planet back to life, it doesn’t matter how much antimatter is in the air. It won’t matter if this is a sanctuary. They won’t stop. They’ll come for me. They’ll come for this planet, for all its secrets.” He gasped air into his lungs to keep himself from sobbing. “I won’t do it, Shouta. I won’t let them put everything I ever loved back into tiny fucking metal boxes.”

Shouta looked down at the small puddle of pale green blood oozing out of Izuku’s foot from the broken glass. He sat back down and gestured to Izuku, to his foot. He didn’t speak yet. He didn’t respond to Izuku’s rage, or his fears. Because he couldn’t. Izuku knew he couldn’t. So instead, he did what he could, he took care of his charge. Izuku huffed a sigh and sat down next to the only loyal person he’d had for the last several decades, handed over his bleeding foot, and let the Terran pick out the glass. 

“I am often reminded that I know so very little about you, Izuku. I know the Commission won’t stop. I had hoped the sanctuary space would give them pause but you’re right. They won’t stop.” He took a little first aid kit out of his pocket and started wrapping Izuku’s foot once he finished picking out the glass. “But I will never allow anyone to put you in a box, ever again. I swear that on my life. If you don’t want to revive the planet, you don’t have to.”

“But everyone just expects it of me, Shouta.” He sighed. “All these people on this whole station. They’re here because they want to bring the planet back to life. And they do it out of guilt disguised as kindness, and I don’t want them here. I don’t want any of them here. None of them were here when my whole world blew apart. None of them helped when we needed it. Now…now I’m all that’s left, and they think showing up now will make it all better? Make it all go away?”

“They all think this is what you’d want.”

“No one ever asked what I wanted! No one, in the last forty fucking years, has asked what I, Izuku Midoriya, the last Nefling alive, wants .”

Shouta placed his foot down carefully. Izuku curled his legs up to his chest and wrapped his arms around them to play with the bandage on his wounded foot. He should have been paying attention. It was stupid to step on his own broken earring by accident. It was stupid to think anyone would ask him what he wanted. Izuku had been a caged bird his entire life. No one asked if caged birds wanted to sing, they just expected them to do it, and the bird would sing regardless. 

“What do you want, Izuku?”

“I don’t know. But I don’t want this . I won’t give them what my Elders sacrificed their lives to protect.”

“I’ll set up a meeting with the Station Master.”

“Thank you, Shouta.”

~

The meeting was set for the next morning. Shouta worked fast. Izuku also knew the Cailith government wanted a solid answer when it came to Izuku’s involvement on the project, and that’s what Shouta told them; Izuku was going to give them an answer. He didn’t tell them what the answer would be ahead of time, though. That would ruin the point of the meeting, wouldn’t it? Plus, Izuku wanted it to come from his own mouth, not through his guard. 

He’d already rolled out of bed and had a cup of coffee before anyone came banging on the door to his quarters. A headache started brewing behind his eyes the second he opened the door and found Katsuki there, looking half horrified, half confused. Oh, great, Shouta told him. The older guard stood leaning against the opposite wall with a shrug already ready the second Izuku looked past the blonde.

“He’s on your detail, he had a right to know.”

“I know, Shouta. Come in, Kacchan.”

The blonde brushed past his shoulder with a huff but stopped before going any further than the kitchen to make himself a cup of coffee as well. 

“Okay, talk - before I assume anything. Because yesterday you were all gung-ho about reviving your whole planet because you literally can’t continue your species without it, and now it seems like you want them to just die off.”

Shouta followed Katsuki in and the door whooshed shut before the blonde started in on his rant. Izuku was thankful he’d at least asked before getting angry or assuming things. But that also meant Shouta had only told him the short version of the story, which was fair. Izuku still sighed.

“I learned the truth behind the burning of the star whale breeding fields.” Katsuki’s eyes slid over to Shouta but the older Terran kept a hard look on his face and remained silent. “It wasn’t your people who burned it all. It was mine. The Nefling Elders sacrificed themselves to prevent the Terrans from learning the secret to our antimatter engines.”

“Okay, why did that change your mind?”

“Kacchan…my people gave their lives to protect the star whales. They razed the breeding fields so no other ship was subjected to torture and butchering. I cannot, in good conscience, revive them when I know the Terrans would stop at nothing to get those secrets. Actually, if they found out that I was here to do it, I bet they’d patiently wait until I completed my job reviving the planet just so they could get their hands on it all. Even if the Cailith decree this as sanctuary space, can you tell me the Terran Commission would stop to consider it?”

Katsuki set down his half drunk coffee. “No…I can’t.” His fist slammed onto the counter. “Fuck!” Izuku twitched. “Sorry, it’s just bullshit. You shouldn’t have to live the rest of eternity alone like this.”

Shouta’s hard expression finally broke into a smirk. “Didn’t know you had that kind of compassion in you, brat.”

“Shut up, old man.”

“Yeah, yeah. Where’s Shinso, anyway?” Shouta had excellent timing. A knock came to the door as soon as he asked. Izuku waved the door open and the other perpetually exhausted guard appeared with a casually bored salute. “Oh, nevermind.”

“What’d I miss? Must be important if you insisted on having me back on your service.”

Izuku blushed. “Well, I figured you and Kacchan would work well together helping me out once…well, whatever happens after the Cailith are done here.”

“What did he just call you, Kat?”

“Don’t ask. Look, we’re on guard duty and then on ‘tell everyone to fuck off the planet’ duty. Think you can handle that?”

“Sounds fun. I’m in. What's this meeting about?”

Izuku lifted a hand shyly. “I’m giving them my final answer about the planet revival project.”

Shinso squinted at Izuku for a moment and sucked his teeth. “You’re telling them no, huh?” Izuku nodded. “You should work on your confidence. You’re highly respected here. They’ll take it well if you explain why, and I’m sure you have a valid reason for refusing them.”

“I- I do. I have very good reasons.”

Confidence. 

Izuku had anger in spades from decades spent in captivity and forced engine labor. He thought that was a kind of confidence. At least, until he broke down in his quarters after Toshinori told him he’d be transferred to a new ship like any other piece of equipment. Maybe he needed to think of himself not just as the last Nefling alive, but also as the Nefling Elder. After all, that’s what he was now. He’d taken his mother’s place, just like he was raised to. It didn’t matter if he was the last one left, this planet belonged to him, and the rest of the universe was damn well going to respect that.

Izuku smiled around his coffee mug. Shinso came over and ruffled his floating hair. He offered a wink and wandered back to the door. 

“Shall we?” He asked. 

Izuku nodded, his coffee mug placed in the kitchen on the way out. Shouta and Katsuki were quick to follow. Izuku and his guards headed to the conference room for their meeting with the Cailith command team. 

~

The station was divided into four central towers; Administrative, Medical, Residential, and Entertainment. Pretty much everything related to the Cailith project was handled in the Administrative tower, though some of it spilled into the Medical tower since a lot of their work was sciences and medicine related to the recovery of the planet. The Residential and Entertainment towers held everything else. The conference room was in the Administrative tower, which meant they had to make a decent trek across the station in order to get there. 

The travel wasn’t the issue, it was all the eyes on Izuku while they walked. Everyone wanted to at least greet him, at most they wanted to stop him and ask questions or compliment his appearance. They left early, being well aware the walk would be long, though they didn’t expect all the stops. Once they got out of the transport elevator that crossed them over from the Residential Tower into the Administrative tower, it was a quick jog to the conference room. They just made it on time. 

“Ah, there you are - welcome, come in, come in.” Station Master Kayama greeted them. “Sit anywhere you like. We’ll get down to business in just a moment.” The conference room had only a large table that could fit twenty people easily, and a few consoles around the edges of the room that held food and drinks. 

Izuku, being accustomed to carting around three guards, made his way into the room and found a seat, knowing they’d all find their places around him. Shouta always stood unless they were relaxing or in a private setting like personal quarters, but Izuku expected Katsuki and Shinso to take chairs around him. And that’s exactly what happened. Izuku settled into the end chair opposite the Station Master. Katsuki took his right and Shinso took his left. Shouta, of course, as expected, remained standing behind Izuku. 

An attendant Izuku didn’t recognize (not that he knew anyone here outside of his own company) offered him a small plate of fruits and a glass of what appeared to be wine. Izuku didn’t drink much, or often, but a drink right now sounded reasonable, almost necessary. 

“Thank you.” He muttered as the attendant left. Though he had two men beside him, they sunk into the background professionally, as guards are supposed to. Shouta melted into the damn wall somehow, as he’d trained himself to do over the years. Thankfully, he didn’t sit among ghosts too long. The Station Master and her crew finished chatting privately. 

“Okay. We’re here to discuss the final stages of the planet revitalization project. First, let me provide a report of what’s already been accomplished.” A woman to her right, who wore a name tag with ‘Capt. Yu Takeyama’, handed her a data pad. “Ah, thank you, captain. So, at this point, the planet is habitable for you, Izuku. Roughly speaking, that is. We’ve only just gotten flora to begin growing. At present, we are supplementing the core with antimatter from our terraforming engine exhaust. That’s why we need you - the core isn’t yet producing its own antimatter. So with that being said…”

The Station Master went on about the planet’s needs and all that was still missing from the ecosystem. Izuku tuned out once he found out what stage they were at in the terraforming. He wasn’t exactly an expert in the science, but if they’d managed to get flora started, fauna would be next. That’s what he needed to stop. That’s where it needed to end.

“So!” A loud clap brought Izuku back to the present. Kayama smiled when he looked back up. “Now that we’ve gone over the current stage, we’re looking towards the future. Commander Nedzu was in charge of rescuing you in order to advance the project. We’re at a standstill otherwise. Even so, you do deserve a break to recoup from your long…time away.” Izuku’s right eye twitched. “So right now the schedule is for you to travel down to the planet next week and begin core revival-”

“No.”

“Eh- Excuse me?”

“I said; no. That’s my decision.”

The Captain interrupted. “Are you saying that you’ve decided to take more time or that you won’t be helping at all.”

“The latter. I will not be participating at all. Actually, this meeting was to request that you stop.”

“Stop?” Kayama blinked. “Stop what?”

“Everything. Terraforming, revitalization efforts, restoring the planet. Everything.”

A pin could have dropped and they would have all thought a hull breach happened. The far end of the table seemed stumped, as if Izuku just grew a third head. Katsuki was leaning back with a devious smirk on his face. Shinso, on the other hand, seemed uninterested. Izuku didn’t bother to look behind himself to find out what his old guard might be thinking. 

The chair slid back silently as Izuku stood himself up. Confidence, that’s what Shinso had told him, so that’s what Izuku would try to portray, confidence. He took a deep breath and folded his hands in front of his waist. Never show them weakness. Shouta’s words the day all hell broke loose struck him suddenly. He could do this. No weakness. 

“This planet…this was my home. This is where I grew up, where my mother taught me to follow in her footsteps as an Elder on our council. My mother is gone. My entire race is gone. Everything I have ever loved - is gone. They gave their lives to protect that planet, to prevent the Terrans from abusing it for their gain and the detriment of every other race in existence.” He sighed deeper than he thought himself capable of. “In respect to their sacrifice, I have come to the decision that all efforts to restore the ecosystem will cease. I will give them nothing they can take and tear apart again.”

The Station Master stood up as well. Her slow ascent was more drawn out and deliberate than Izuku’s had been. She loomed over the table with the fingertips of both hands on the surface. When she spoke, she peered at them through her eyebrows. 

“If we stop at this juncture, the core will never revive, the planet will slowly die.” She paused to give him a hard glare. Izuku didn’t budge. The Station Master scoffed. “In the honor of a thousand dead souls, you’ll let that planet die forever. You will die, alone, as the last member of your entire race and all of its subspecies, and for what? Respect? Honor? Selfishness?”

Something inside Izuku’s chest snapped in half like a child with a twig. His hair flew back, whirling around his head angrily. Shisno and Katsuki both had to grab the table when their chairs flew sideways from the immediate change in gravity around the Nefling. 

“How dare you.”

“No, Izuku, how dare you . The Cailith have spent decades restoring this planet, and for the sake of a dead race, you’d throw all the hard work everyone has put in away.”

“I never asked you to do any of this!” His guards barely made it out of the way as several chairs slammed into the wall, flying away from Izuku. Shouta stepped up behind him but he knew better than to touch Izuku in a state like this. “You parade around this station as if this is some kind of charity I should appreciate, but you have no respect for what happened here. Don’t you get it? You weren’t here!” Izuku slapped his hand on the table. “We already died alone!  We screamed and cried. I watched them rip younglings from their mother’s arms. My own mother tore herself apart to save my life and all I got out of that was thirty years locked in a box listening to her beautiful Diadri wail and moan in my mind. And none of you were here. So you’ll have to forgive me if I’m not feeling very thankful for all your efforts .”

“You-”

“ I’m not finished. ” The table shoved sideways by ten degrees. “If you want thanks, if you want gratitude for all your charity -” Izuku threw his hand to the planet-side window. “Go stand on the surface of that planet, among the souls of my entire race, and you ask them if all your hard work is worth it.” Izuku swallowed back his tears. “I will not revive this planet. I am the last Nefling, and I am asking you to let our secrets die with me.”

The Station Master’s crew refused to meet Izuku’s eyes. Kayama herself glared at the table, one hand knuckled and rolling across the surface. This wasn’t an easy conversation, or even an easy decision, so much effort had been put into the project already. Izuku was asking them to just stop, to give it all up, and that wasn’t exactly nice of him to do. 

Eventually, she came to some kind of decision and stood up while folding her hands behind her back. 

“I cannot make any promises until I’ve spoken with the government. Commander Nedzu will probably want to confirm your decision himself. But, regardless of our efforts, the planet will not fully revive without your antimatter to awaken it, and no one here will force you to do it. So - you win. The planet and all the Nefling secrets will die with you.”

Before she got more than a few steps from the table, Izuku stopped her. 

“I want to take a shuttle down, just once, to say goodbye. Then I’m leaving - with Nedzu, if he’ll still have me on his ship.”

“You just got out of captivity on a ship and you want to go back to that? You confuse me, Nefling.” Kayama shook her head. “The shuttles have autopilot and they aren’t locked. Utilize them at your own leisure. I would advise your guards to wear atmo-suits to prevent antimatter exposure.”

Izuku wanted to stay here with every cell in his body, but if he did, he feared his heart might break if he watched the planet die this close. He’d already watched it happen once, he wouldn’t do it again. Instead, he’d let his guards choose what path they wanted, and he’d leave. He’d go somewhere he felt wanted, and maybe that would heal him somehow.

“Thank you, Station Master Kayama.”

“I might be disappointed, but I respect your decision, no matter how hard it may be for me to understand. Commander Nedzu will find you in his own time. I apologize for my outburst.”

The room deflated the moment the station crew left. Izuku understood her anger. This project had been going for three decades. They had put a lot of time, money, effort, and manpower into the project, all for Izuku’s sake. But Izuku never asked for any of this, and they’d never asked him first. 

When Nedzu presented it, Izuku had been so excited because he thought this planet had been destroyed by the Terrans. It wasn’t until Shouta made it clear the Nefling themselves gave their lives to prevent the rest of the universe from abusing their resources that Izuku finally understood what this was all for - what it meant.

 Izuku just about landed on his ass from exhaustion when the room emptied out but Shouta managed to catch him with a chair first. The old guard brushed his hair back and offered a gentle hug. 

“You stood your ground, kiddo. I’m so proud of you. Your mother would be proud.”

“If you’re going down there, you’re not going alone.” Katsuki grumbled.

Shinso scoffed. “Well, I’m not risking my very low radiation level. I think blondie can handle this one.”

“And I have an appointment with the medical tower to check my radiation levels. Can you handle it, Bakugo?”

“Of course, old man. Don’t get your panties in a twist. The planet is empty, right? What is there to guard against?”

~

Izuku wasn’t a hard creature to find, he had habits that were often easy to pattern out. Since Shouta had to attend a full medical exam, Shinso and Bakugo ran off to prepare for their trip to the surface. Izuku decided to take another walk, and ended up back at the observatory where all his dreams fell apart. Instead of dancing around the patio, though, this time he stood in front of one of the large glass panes. He was so close he could almost forget he was on a space station, and instead imagine himself floating in space, in orbit around his home planet. 

Home.

Shouta had told him not so long ago that home didn’t have to be a place. It was anything or anyone that gave you light and joy in the darkness. The few people Izuku had in his life were a sort of home. Maybe he could be happy with just that? Even so, deciding to terminate the revival program wasn’t exactly easy, and it certainly wasn’t a decision Izuku wanted to make. His whole race had given their lives to protect this planet. His own mother, the Elders on the council, they’d all offered themselves to the pyre so the Terrans wouldn’t be able to abuse them. Despite how difficult this choice had been, Izuku was proud of it.

If it meant protecting the sacrifice of all the people he’d lost, Izuku would carry the weight of his decision for the rest of eternity if he had to. 

Soft footsteps announced Nedzu’s arrival. The old Cailith took up a place beside Izuku, his hands casually crossed behind his back. For a while, neither of them spoke. They shared the silence between them while watching their station orbit around the planet outside their window. 

“I figured I’d find you up here. Enjoying the view?” 

Izuku nodded slowly. He placed his hand on the window pane, his finger splayed. He offered the planet a goodbye from a distance. One that might give him the full view of what he was giving up. 

“May I ask why you decided to stop the project, Izuku?”

“Shouta told me the truth. The Terrans never razed the breeding fields. The Nefling did.”

“Ah. I see.”

Izuku imagined he did, but that didn’t stop the Nefling from saying everything on his mind to a man he trusted dearly, who just wanted to know what was eating away at him. Even if Nedzu didn’t say it, Izuku knew he’d ask eventually. Might as well get it over with. 

“If the Terrans got a hold of the star whales, they’d be able to subjugate whole races, instead of just erasing them. The speed and fuel efficiency of our engines would give them every edge they need to reach further into space and claim more territory. We both know the only reason they haven’t tried another genocide is because they know that, right now, the Cailith and Syscion races match them in terms of ship capabilities. If they got a hold of Nefling tech that they could learn from…”

“The damage would be catastrophic, yes. I’m aware. They do not respect differences. They take what benefits them and make it better, so they can take more.”

“I’ve always thought the only reason they couldn’t learn from Diadri was because they’d butchered her to retrofit her into their ship too fast. There was nothing left to study. They need living ships to study and rip apart.”

Nedzu sighed. “Do you think they could create an engine akin to the star whales? They were living creatures the Nefling existed with symbiotically. They weren’t metal or machines. Could they replicate it exactly?”

“Mmm, one of the guards previously on my service had an electric heart. The Terran heart, from what I understand, is effectively a liquid pump. If they could make a machine work inside a living organism, I see no reason they couldn’t get a living organism to work inside a machine. In fact, they did exactly that to Diadri.” Izuku turned to Nedzu finally, his shoulder landing on the glass with a dull thud. “If they were able to tear those engines apart without consequence or material scarceness, they’d be unstoppable.”

“I hate that you’re right.” The Cailith Commander stepped over to one of the nearby rose bushes and picked a flower which he twirled between his fingers. “I believed the Terrans would respect sanctuary space. I still want to believe that. But I don’t have enough confidence to convince you to change your mind.”

Izuku stepped away from the window to pace around the grassy area between the edge of the room and the patio at the center. He was pleased that Nedzu didn’t try to convince him to change his mind. Izuku also wanted to believe the Terrans would respect sanctuary space. But he knew they wouldn’t. He knew because they had never once given the last Nefling any reprieve. As a result, he trusted his Elders’ decision to burn it all to the ground, to let it die. 

Izuku was going to live the rest of his life and die as proof that his people existed. He was going to be the last line of defense to protect the sacrifices that were made.

“I’m going down, just once. I’d like to see the planet one more time, to say goodbye.”

“I think that’s a good idea. I think you deserve closure.”

Izuku smiled hesitantly. He wasn’t sure closure was possible. Even if every single Terran in the universe dropped dead, even if they all apologized to him one by one, Izuku would never feel like the scales had been balanced. But he didn’t tell Nedzu that, of course. 

“I’d like to go with you, Nedzu, if you’ll have me. I’m not sure where I want to settle, if I settle down, but I need to start somewhere.”

“Of course, Izuku. You are always welcome on my ship. Your guards as well.”

“I don’t know if they’ll come. Well, I’m sure Shouta will, but they can choose their own paths in life. They’re free now, too.”

“If they go back, the Commission will crucify them.” 

“Mmm, true. I suppose that’s my fault.”

“Well.” Nedzu smirked. “More so my fault. And since it is, if they wish to return, please let them know I will negotiate for their safe return, if possible.”

Izuku shrugged. “I’ll let them know, but I don’t think they will. They’re disillusioned now, like the Terrans here on the station. They may stay here. I might stay here, after a while.”

“I’ll be here for the next few days, until we’re called back to the planet. I’ll notify you before we leave if I haven’t heard from you.”

“Thank you again, Nedzu, for everything.”

The Commander bowed at the waist before leaving Izuku to his sulking. Katsuki would probably come get him once they were prepped and ready to head down to the planet, so that gave Izuku some time to sit with his thoughts. 

Clouds rolled across the planet’s surface. Izuku remembered the rain, the way wet grass would tickle between his toes as he ran through the fields with his friends. Izuku’s mother, Inko, was a weaver by trade. She’d taught Izuku, but she’d wanted him to follow her into council work. Still, he was reminded of the day they took all the freshly weaved fabrics out to bleach in the sun. The Nefling weaved their fabrics in long bolts, hundreds of yards at a time on looms that took up whole buildings. The fabric was used as curtains around the edge of their open homes made of hand carved and laid stones. They didn’t use doors or windows, though their temples and the council cathedral had incredible stained glass windows. They also used the fabric for the foundation of their clothing, like the dress Izuku still wore.

In the memory that sparked to mind, they’d just run the newest bolt of fabric out across the miles long rows of drying rails over an open field when a snap of summer rain came out of nowhere and dumped water all across the fields and soaked them to the bone. The joyful screams of the younglings helping them filled the air from the rush of cold water. 

Izuku remembered bursting into laughter with his best friend Ochako. They’d been super close growing up and Izuku had always imagined himself finding a lifelong mate in his best friend. She was one of the strongest souls Izuku had ever known, far more bullheaded than Izuku himself, with three times the confidence. When the Terrans finally attacked, she was one of the first Nefling to suggest fighting back over diplomacy. And she fought. Ochako fought back with more nerve than Izuku had ever seen the whole of the Nefling race ever present. 

It wasn’t enough. 

The Nefling might be called immortal by many other races, but they could die. They could sustain wounds, they could suffer and die just like any other race. 

Izuku held her as she bled out in his arms.

“Promise me something, Zuzu?”

“Anything, ‘Chako. Everything.”

“When it’s time…say goodbye for me. I can’t do it. I- I can’t…”

Greetings and partings were an integral part of the Nefling culture. As they lived symbiotically with all the living creatures and the ecosystem on their planet, the cycle of life was a huge part of their day to day lives. Nothing on their planet lived as long as the Nefling. But they still honored its existence. They greeted every newborn of every race and every flower they found, and they said goodbye when it left them, when the summer ended and all the planets died for the winter or when a beloved pet bird passed away. They respected the cycle of life. It brought them companionship, food, resources for building, crafting, and trading. It brought them happiness and friendship. 

But Ochako couldn’t say goodbye before she died. She was in too much pain at the very notion that they might lose their home, their whole ecosystem thrown into chaos from the war long before it died. She didn’t want to say goodbye because she didn’t want the cycle to end. 

Ochako didn’t want to say goodbye because she didn’t want to die.

Maybe that’s part of why Izuku was letting the planet go. Maybe he knew, somewhere deep down, he knew it was time to say goodbye, no matter how badly he wanted to bring his race and the whole planet back to life. 

All cycles end. 

Izuku was ready to say goodbye; for Ochako, for himself, for everyone he lost.

~

Katsuki met him at the entrance of the observatory once the shuttle was prepared to take them down to the surface of the planet. The blonde jerked his head towards the transport elevator, as if asking if the Nefling was ready. Izuku nodded, and they silently traveled back across the station. 

This time, when they traversed the station, Izuku wasn’t constantly stopped for questions or compliments. Everyone still looked, stared, gawked , but they didn’t look eager to talk to him. A few seemed curious, and that was likely due to his recent decision to leave and not revive the planet, but no one came up to say it or ask why he did it. Honestly, he was fine with being stared at, he was used to it, after all. Being stared at was much better than being asked five hundred questions. The only worry was the select few Cailith crew members who glared at Izuku like they might want to set him on fire. Izuku wasn’t sure what to make of those, and he had absolutely no idea what to do about it, if anything.

At least they made it to the shuttle bay in record time. Izuku had only been in quick transport shuttles a couple times. He always had to remain close to Diadri in case she needed service - and well, if he got too far away, there was always the chance she’d die. For a long time, Izuku had refused to allow that to happen, but even her cycle had to end.

Izuku settled into one of the chairs in the back of the shuttle. Katsuki came over and strapped him in with a blank face. Was he in a somber mood, too? Did he understand the weight Izuku carried on his chest right now? The guard sat across from Izuku and snapped his own seatbelt across his lap, and finally broke the silence.

“You’re sure about this?”

“Which part, Kacchan?”

Katsuki pressed a large button on the wall and the shuttle jerked to the side as it took off. Izuku grabbed the side of his seat to steady himself, which got a chuckle from his companion. 

“All of it. Letting the planet die, leaving, going down there.” He gestured to the front windshield. Izuku avoided looking at it for now. “I know what you said in that conference room but…that’s your home, isn’t it?”

Izuku sighed. “Home is anything and anyone that fills us with light and joy in the vast darkness of the universe. This place once gave me joy, of course, but everything has a time, and everything has an end.” The blonde gave him a concerning look. “It’s time to say goodbye.”

“Goodbye, huh? So formal. Is it really just to honor the dead? Don’t misunderstand me, I respect your decision. I’m just curious if…if there’s more than you said to the Cailith.”

“I was thinking about a friend this morning, in the observatory.”

“Huh?” The blonde seemed startled by the change of subject. 

“At one point, I thought she was going to be my mate. I thought-” Izuku chewed on the inside of his lip for a moment. “Greetings and partings are important in Nefling culture. We considered ourselves a part of the planet’s ecosystem. We respected every creature that lived and died on our planet.”

“That…that gesture.” Katsuki copied it, weakly, his hand out and waving. “When the ship almost blew. You were saying goodbye to the old man, weren’t you, when you thought you were dying?” Izuku nodded. 

“Ochako was my best friend. She died in the war…in my arms. But she couldn’t say goodbye. She wouldn’t. She made me promise that I’d say goodbye for her, when the time was right.”

Katsuki nodded a few times. “The time is right, hmm?”

“It’s time to put them all to rest, I think. They deserve to rest.”

“Ye-”

A bright light through the shuttle windshield startled them both and interrupted the conversation. Sunlight. They’d landed on the sunny side of the planet. It was still afternoon, anyway. Izuku couldn’t see anything through the sun shining into their eyes but the shuttle had started its landing process. Izuku grabbed the handlebars by his head but Katsuki stood up. He already had an atmo suit on but he’d left the helmet for last. With a hissing click, it snapped onto his head just as the ship landed on a relatively flat surface. He handed Izuku a comm device which was placed into his ear so they could hear each other on opposite sides of the atmo suit.

“Well, let’s say goodbye, then.”

“You didn’t have to come. The ship’s on autopilot, and well, the planet’s empty.”

“If this means something to you, then it means something to me. So, let’s fucking go.”

Izuku smiled. He hadn’t had someone do something for him, just because it mattered to him, in a very long time. 

Katsuki stepped over to the back of the shuttle and pulled the airlock hatch. Light cracked between the hatch doors. A fresh floral scent filled his nose, one that brought back a thousand memories and an aching sense of loss in his soul. Izuku clutched the sides of his dress, stupidly hoping that lovely scent meant exactly what he thought it meant, yet begging it all to be fake so he could let go easier. Katsuki stepped out, blocking his blurred, sunny view. Izuku followed out with one hand on the wall of the shuttle and the other in Katsuki’s gloved hand. 

Careful, unsteady steps in bare feet landed on soft dirt and tall, cool grass, a forever familiar sensation Izuku had longed to feel for years. It wasn’t the plastic-like fake grass from the observatory, it wasn’t cold metal, it wasn’t a dream. This was the long, fluffy grass of his childhood. Izuku blinked up into the sunlight as his guard stepped out of the way. 

“Whoa…”

Izuku’s breath caught in his throat. They’d landed on a small hill overlooking a field Izuku was intimately familiar with. Everywhere, as far as the eye could see, the valley was covered in flowers. Flowers that Izuku hadn’t seen in several centuries. Flowers that bloomed once every five hundred years. Flowers that bloomed when he was too young to appreciate them.

Starvaile flowers. 

“H- how…” He gasped. “It’s not…time…”

“What do you mean, Izuku?”

“These are-” He choked on his own tears. “These are Starvaile flowers. They don’t…they don’t bloom often. They only bloom every half millennia, on the solstice. They bloomed when I was a child. I didn’t…I didn’t think I’d ever see them again.”

“Are they special? I mean, besides rarely blooming.”

Izuku nodded. But he didn’t answer just yet. Instead, he trotted down the hill and right into the stalks of five pointed orange and white blooms. They were already blooming in full, the stalks nearly to his chest and most of the floral heads barely fit into his cupped hands. Some were tiny enough to look like little beads, they’d fit on the end of his earrings. They were beautiful. They were perfect. 

This was the home he left.

This was the home Katsuki had told him he could save.

Maybe saving it didn’t mean bringing it back to life. Maybe saying goodbye was the best way to save everything Izuku loved, and maybe that was okay. 

“Nefling are considered youngling until the Starvaile flowers bloom after the first fifty years. I guess…I guess I’m not a youngling anymore. The last time they bloomed I was barely thirty.”

“How long ago was that?”

“They were due to bloom soon, before the war.”

“So they’re a rite of passage?”

“Sort of. On the solstice, we’d pick them and make wreaths out of them to float down the river, or - we’d stand in the river and catch them. It was a way to show your interest in someone, a sort of…courtship proposal. Before the war I was planning to make a wreath for Ochako.” He chuckled. “I think she was planning the same.” 

Izuku crouched down so he could pluck one of the smallest blooms. Katsuki wandered through the field with his hands out even though he couldn’t feel the flowers through his atmo suit. He stopped beside Izuku with a tilted head; a silent request for the Nefling to go on with his story. When he stared at the flower in his hands instead, Katsuki crouched down beside him.

“You loved her.”

“Yes. I loved her.”

Izuku brushed his fingers across the curled star-shaped petals. Once plucked, the petals would uncurl and reveal the orange inner side of the petals and the white all but vanished on the backside. In his research, he discovered Terran sea creatures called starfish. Izuku liked them because they reminded him of these flowers. They reminded him of all the good things he’d lost. 

“This world meant everything to my people, Kacchan. The way Terrans speak about Earth is so…different. You don’t love your planet, do you?”

“I never thought about it like that.”

“But she gave you everything. She gave you life, and you took everything from her. I watched your planet from the dry docks. You took everything from her. You covered her in metal and smoke, you suffocated her.”

Katsuki sighed over the comm. “It happened long before I was born. It’s all I’ve ever known. This…this is the most green I’ve ever seen in my life. It’s beautiful.” He knocked his knuckles under Izuku’s chin. “And I’m sort of sad this will be the last time I see it.”

“Do you want to see the river?”

“Of course.”

Izuku placed the little flower into the center of another bloom as he stood up. He led Katsuki through the field of flowers further down the hill. He was thankful the bulky Terran eased his way through the flowers, not trampling on a single one, somehow. The ruins of what was once the capital city came into view. Overgrown brick rubble splayed between gravel and dirt paths. It wasn’t a city by anyone else’s terms, that’s for sure. But what remained of their temple stood at the center. A large tree sprouted from the very middle of the building, still alive, despite the whole planet having been burned almost to the ground. The building and its irreplaceable stained glass hadn’t survived, unfortunately. 

“I lived here. This is the capital, or what’s left of it. My mother was a weaver.” He pointed at one of the larger ruins. “We’d make our textiles there, by the thousand yard bolt. We’d spread them along those rails stretching out into the distance so they could bleach in the sun. That’s what gave them the iridescence we’re known for.”

They walked past the drying lines and down to the river not far outside the city. It still ran its same route, surrounded by thick grasses and reeds as it snaked through hills and down towards a cliff to the south of the city. Izuku stumbled a little over the rocks but Katsuki steadied him. 

“There’s so much…space. I’ve never imagined this much openness except on stations. What did you do with it all?”

Izuku chuckled. “We respected it, we enjoyed it. Being trapped on that ship was a horror for me compared to this.” Izuku led them up to a lookout area at the top of another hill where a circle of stones and tree stumps sat around a firepit. What an odd thing to have survived the war, even if it was overgrown by a couple decades. “Have you ever seen a sunset with two suns, Kacchan?”

“Uhh, no - we’ve only got one on Earth.”

“Well, I don’t know if we’ll stay long enough. I’m not sure I want to. That might doom me to saving all this.”

“You still could.” Katsuki plopped down onto one of the tree stumps, next to Izuku on a large rock. “But uhh - can I ask you something?” Izuku nodded. “What the Station Master said in that conference room, that you’ll die alone, is that true, and are you really okay with it?”

The Nefling tilted his head. The question was harmless, but Izuku could sense the concern buried in Katsuki’s voice over the comm device. He just wanted to know if Izuku was fine with letting all of this vanish into the darkness of space. He wanted to know if Izuku was fine with never having another Nefling to share his life with. Katsuki was asking if Izuku was really okay with saying goodbye to everything he could have, everything laid out on a platter in front of him like that lovely field of flowers they walked through, everything he’d hoped and longed for.

Before answering, Izuku turned back to the south and watched the river swirl down towards the cliffside they were overlooking, a waterfall’s edge they couldn't see from this angle. Izuku had dove off that cliff into the giant pool below once, on a reckless dare when he was very young. He knew better than to do stupid things like that now, but damn had that been fun. So he asked himself; was he really okay with never diving off that cliff again? 

“Being alone and being lonely are two very different things. I’ve been lonely for a long time. Dying alone as the last member of my species doesn’t mean I’ll die lonely. I know Nedzu and Shouta will be by my side, no matter what I choose. They’re family. They’re friends.” He turned back to Katsuki with a smile. “I’d like it if you stayed by my side, too. If you want. Shinso, too. I’m not worried about dying alone if it means keeping what my people protected safe.”

Katsuki let out a laughing scoff with a shake of his head and stood back up. He offered a hand to Izuku and the Nefling took it.

They didn’t stay to watch the sunset. Izuku wasn’t sure he could bear that kind of sorrow. Instead, they walked back across the river, bursting into laughter when Izuku stumbled and soaked the bottom of his dress in chilly waters. Izuku danced himself dry as they chased each other through the drying lines and back towards the city. Izuku detoured to the crumbling temple to show Katsuki the tree that survived the war.

They climbed over carved wooden doors, fallen from the lack of support and rubbled stone walls. The tree’s roots broke through the once marbled floor, creating a minefield of broken stone and tripping hazards. The temple itself was relatively plain in terms of design; a large, open, single-room building with large stained glass windows all round its oval-shaped footprint. Broken and askew pews lay amidst debris and large blocks that fell from the ceiling. At the very center stood the large tree that could be seen from quite a distance. It stretched high above what used to be the ceiling - they’d purposefully built the temple around the tree.

This tree, though familiar as a tree, looked little like a Terran tree from Earth. Its large deep purple, leafy boughs looked more like hanging wisteria or a weeping willow than a thick oak, which was actually the closest species in terms of wood. The highest branches hung over the building’s exterior but dozens of smaller branches created a web over the whole interior. They had to brush the branches away from themselves as they explored.

At the very center, most of the large, brownish-purple trunk and the lowest, shortest branches were covered in all manner of decoration. Glass and paper lanterns swung softly, tinkling glass jewelry and pins hung on strings and rope, fabric streamers and paper scrolls tied to the branches crinkled and twisted in the gentle breeze. 

“This is an Icheté tree. It means ‘to remember’.” 

Izuku touched a few ornaments he recognized. He looked for an empty branch and removed one of his own earrings while Katsuki stayed back a few feet and watched in awe of the giant treasure trove he’d just been shown. 

“When a member of our race dies, no matter how far away they are, we bring something here, a piece of them, and we secure it to the tree.” He sighed. “A part of me knew the tree would survive. It’s protected by the core and the natural antimatter in all these trinkets. Whatever was left of the core when the planet was razed, I knew it would protect our memories.”

“Symbiosis. The tree feeds the core and the core feeds the tree.”

Izuku nodded. “There should be millions of trinkets here now, I cannot possibly put one for every life lost. But-” He held up his earring. “I can still place one for all of them.”

Izuku found a piece of thread from a strip of fabric on a lower branch and looped his earring onto it. The earring was tied onto the end of a shorter branch that stuck out towards the center of the room. He had to get on his tiptoes to do it, but once he released it, the earring sparkled in the dying sunlight, casting a thousand green stars on the ground around them. 

“My mother always told me there’s a certain kind of beauty in how we, as people, never stop changing. We don’t always get a chance to say goodbye before our loved ones are gone, but we can remember them for who they were, who they became before their cycle ended.” Izuku tapped the earring so the sparkles danced and spun around the floor. “I think that’s why I’m not afraid to be the last Nefling anymore.”

“What do you mean?”

Izuku wiped a tear from his eye and smiled brightly towards the tree branches above him. “They’re not really gone. They’re still alive here, among the boughs of this tree, and in my heart, in my mind. So long as I’m alive to remember them, to say their names, they’ll never truly be gone.”

The Terran guard finally forced himself forward. He reached a hand out and cupped Izuku’s face in one hand, to get his attention. Izuku found Katsuki staring up at the tree above them as well. When another breeze blew past, every trinket on the tree rattled, jingled, and clattered around them, like a cacophony of voices, all calling out their names to two souls standing among a thousand dead. 

Glittering blue pollen began to fall from the tree’s leaves. It spilled around them like rain and clung to their clothes and bodies. The pollen formed around invisible shapes; an outstretched arm, a small girl’s shoulders and head, an old man’s hunched back, a kind woman’s smile. 

“What…what’s happening?”

“The tree is remembering. The pollen of the Icheté tree is imbued with antimatter, our antimatter. It remembers the forms of the antimatter it absorbs. It’s like…an echo.”

“A memory.” Izuku nodded. 

To his left, where he’d hung the earring, the pollen fell around the shoulders of a woman about his height, with a bright smile, and long hair that fell almost to the ground. Izuku gently pulled Katsuki’s hand from his face and stepped over to his mother’s echo. She’d given him those earrings as a present, but she’d worn them almost all her life. They were a part of her, not Izuku. 

“Mother.” He brushed a hand across the pollen forming her face. It warped from the touch but reformed as soon as his hand was gone. “I’ve missed you so much.” The echo smiled brighter, its head tilting softly the way his mother used to do when she was bending down to offer him a hug or kiss. “I love you. I love you all.”

His mother’s lullaby filtered through his mind, the whisper of a tune on the breeze. Maybe someday, he’d teach someone else that song, so it wouldn’t die with him, so the song of their people never died. For now, he cherished it and hid the music away in his heart.

Izuku splayed his fingers out and placed his hand over the echo of his mother’s chest. “Goodbye, mother. Goodbye, everyone.”

The pollen fell, all around them, all at once. The echoes vanished. The memories faded, like after images trapped behind the eyelids on a sunny day. Izuku turned back to his guard, who walked over with an outstretched hand. Izuku took it once more. 

“Ready to leave?” Katsuki asked. 

“Yes.”

Katsuki helped him over the rubble and tree roots as they left the temple and headed back to their shuttle on the hill. Darkness was beginning to settle in as the suns set behind them. Izuku grabbed Katsuki’s arm. The Terran stopped, slightly startled. That is, until the field of Starvaile flowers released their secondary bloom. Each one opened completely, uncurling their stars-shaped petals to reveal floating orange pollen that drifted up and around the field, like a dance of fireflies on Earth. The flowers glowed faintly in the dim light of dusk and filled the air with a wonderful scent Izuku couldn’t begin to describe to his Terran companion. 

“Do you think the planet is saying goodbye to you?”

“Maybe.” 

Izuku found another small stalk nearby, one with a mid-sized bloom that would fit in his hand, but still spill out. He broke the stalk and cupped the flower. Katsuki had stopped a few feet in front of him and turned back to see what Izuku was doing. The Nefling held the floral bloom out. Katsuki didn’t seem to know what to do with it at first. 

“I know it’s not a wreath floating down the river to greet you, but it carries the same meaning.”

“You…you’re-” Katsuki brushed a few gloves fingers over the petals. More glowing orange pollen spiraled up from the center of the flower. He smiled behind his helmet and took the bloom from Izuku’s hands. “I accept.”

For as brash and crude as Katsuki could be, he was humbled by the smallest gesture of affection. Izuku felt a tinge of color rise to his cheeks. It wasn’t the same as the courtship ritual he’d once hoped to perform, but it still meant just as much. 

Katsuki waited for Izuku to give the planet, and the field around them, one last look. He brushed his floating hair back and held out a hand to the wind once more before offering the traditional Nefling parting gesture; a hand splayed out. He’d never explained the meaning behind this gesture to the Terrans, and maybe someday he would. 

The Nefling goodbye was a symbol of their perpetual promise to cherish every living thing and the cycle of its life. It was a promise to offer out their hand and hold onto the memories of those who came before. It was a way to say ‘I am here to take your hand as you come to rest’. Izuku offered this one more time to the world he’d grown up on, the thousands of lives that had come to an end here, and the endless memories he’d carry with him for the rest of his very long life. 

“This goodbye has been a long time coming, huh?” Katsuki asked as they boarded the shuttle and strapped in. Izuku pulled the handle on the hatch to close it behind them as he climbed in with his guard. 

“I suppose so. A long farewell to a home I never thought I’d see again. I think I’ve been saying goodbye for thirty years, I just didn’t realize it.”

“I’m glad I met you, Izuku.” Katsuki pulled his helmet off once the airlock clicked and the proper air cycled back into the small shuttle. 

“Yeah? Why’s that?”

“I’ve learned more about what it means to find a home than I ever could have on Earth.”

“Even if I’m letting that home vanish into the void of space?”

“Just because it’s leaving, doesn't mean it didn’t bring you joy while it was here.” Katsuki punched the button that started the shuttle up and set them on a return course for the station. He was right, of course. Just like Shouta said, this place had once brought Izuku so much joy, but it wasn’t his home anymore. 

Izuku’s home was waiting for him back on the station, ready to take him off into the vastness of space, where maybe he wouldn’t need to say goodbye to anyone or anything anytime soon. But even if he did, that home wouldn’t truly be gone, not so long as he was alive to remember it. 

He might be the last Nefling alive, but he wasn’t alone, no matter how many goodbyes he had to give. His life might be one long farewell to a past he could never bring back, but he’d always find a place, or a person, to call home.