The streets of Musutafu lay uninhabited, wrapped in a silence that seemed suspended over the buildings. The wind barely suggested its presence with a faint murmur among the exhausted streetlights. The stillness was liturgical… until a childlike figure broke through it, advancing with an uneven sway under the yellowish light spat out by a dying lamp.
Izuku Midoriya.
He walked brushing the walls with blood-stained fingers, leaving irregular streaks wherever his hand touched. His arms displayed gashes, his legs a constellation of bruises; his shirt reduced to tatters hanging like remnants of a previously ordered identity.
He breathed like someone trying to ignite a fractured lung. The unsettling part, however, wasn't his physical state, but the smile distorting his face: wide, misaligned, carrying a tranquility that didn't belong to any child his age. His split lips gleamed under the light, moistened by the blood he slid across them with his tongue in a contemplative gesture.
The path behind him was dotted with tiny red drops, like a trail.
He squeezed his left arm with his unharmed hand: a limb swollen to a grotesque size. Even so, he kept moving. When the silhouette of his home appeared at the end of the street, something in the curve of his smile deepened—an ambiguous nuance that could be mistaken for relief… or for another, less definable emotion.
When he reached the door, he stopped for a few seconds, breathing hard. He lifted his trembling hand and knocked.
First softly. Then a little harder. And then, knock after knock, increasingly desperate.
A whole minute passed before footsteps echoed on the other side. The interior lights flicked on like a series of misaligned clocks.
"Who could be knocking at this hour…?" murmured a sleepy voice.
Inko Midoriya appeared in the entryway, her hair tangled, a shirt draped over her shoulders like a garment borrowed from a dream. She leaned to look through the peephole. No one should have been there at three in the morning.
She squinted. Then opened her eyes wide.
"No… it can't be…" The door flew open violently, as if the hinge had yielded to sudden urgency. "IZUKU!"
Tears burst from her uncontrollably as she ran to her son. Her trembling hands touched the battered face of her little boy, as if she needed to confirm he was truly there and not another nightmare.
Izuku looked at her. His smile softened slightly, tilting his head a bit. His sharp eyes—tired but bright—narrowed.
"Mom…" he whispered weakly. "I'm back."
Those simple, soft words pierced Inko like a blade. Her son, barely twelve, was trying to smile at her through his injuries.
"Izuku… sweetheart, what happened to you?! Where have you been all this time?!" she sobbed, her voice shattered by terror and despair. Before she could say anything more, Izuku took a small step… and his body gave out. He fell forward, straight into his mother's arms.
"Izuku… Izuku…" Inko held him against her chest, feeling the warmth and weight of his weakened little body. "IZUKU! IZUKUUU!"
Her tears fell onto his battered face as he, barely conscious, slowly closed his eyes.
The first hint of consciousness was a punctual sound, similar to the artificial beat of a machine determined to remind him he was still alive. Then came the smell: a strict mixture of clinical alcohol, warm plastic, and that metallic scent common to places built to keep people breathing, not to make them comfortable.
When he opened his eyes, the light greeted him without gentleness. It was a white illumination that flattened colors and reduced everything to glossy surfaces. It took him a few seconds to distinguish the adjustable bed, the IV fluid descending through a thin transparent tube, and the personality-less furniture of the hospital room.
The almost aggressive order of the environment struck him as… curious.
The door slid open with a soft sound. The doctor entered first: immaculate coat, neutral expression, a tablet resting against his forearm in a way that suggested habit. Behind him appeared Inko.
Her swollen eyes looked like two wet wounds on an exhausted face.
"Izuku…" Her voice was a thread shrunk by days, perhaps weeks, of poorly managed crying. "You woke up."
He tilted his head toward her. He blinked slowly, letting fragility settle into his features. Then he drew a minimal, transparent smile.
"Mom… What happened? Where am I?"
The doctor intervened with a low, polished voice, stripped of embellishments. "You're at Musutafu General Hospital. You arrived in critical condition, but we've managed to stabilize you. Do you remember anything that happened?"
Izuku directed his gaze toward the blanket covering his legs. His fingers stayed still, as if they belonged to someone else. Then he lifted his eyes again.
"I don't remember well. Everything feels… distant."
The nuance was slight, just enough to sound sincere.
Inko had a spasm of anguish, a sob muffled behind her hands. The doctor checked the tablet screen before continuing.
"I need to give you important information." A brief pause. "You disappeared two years ago."
The room remained silent for a moment.
Izuku opened his eyes just a bit wider.
"Two years?" The confusion emerged in his voice like a fine crack. "But… I was at home. I don't understand. I don't remember anything."
Inko stepped toward him with emotional clumsiness, as if each step required courage. She leaned to hug him without touching the bandages.
"My boy… You don't remember anything? Not who took you after the last time you played at the park? I… I didn't know what else to do…"
He rested his forehead on her shoulder with a gentle motion.
"I don't know, Mom. Truly."
The doctor wrote something down, frowning slightly.
"You'll need to rest. Later we'll conduct cognitive exams and therapeutic sessions. Memory can return irregularly, but we shouldn't pressure you."
Izuku nodded calmly. "I'll do whatever is necessary."
The heart monitor continued marking his rhythm with absolute indifference: a green line advancing with flawless regularity. He watched it for a few seconds, attentive to the order, the pattern, the almost hypnotic precision. While his mother kept sobbing onto his shoulder.
Suddenly, the door opened.
A man crossed the threshold unhurriedly and without the timidity of those who ask for permission. His dark suit was pressed; his tie perfectly aligned; his shoes polished enough to reflect the cold ceiling lights. He carried the bearing of someone accustomed to entering rooms where the news is never good.
"Forgive the intrusion," he announced with a voice that demanded no forgiveness.
He stopped at the foot of the bed, examining Izuku with a gaze that dissected details: the bandages, the paleness, the posture, the dull shine of the eyes. Each observation seemed to slide into his mind.
Only after that preliminary evaluation did he speak:
"Detective Naomasa Tsukauchi, Special Investigation Department."
The badge appeared for an instant, a metallic flash, before disappearing back into his jacket.
"I know the situation is delicate," he continued, "but I need some answers, however minimal."
Inko stepped forward, her tremor not fully hiding her indignation.
"My son just regained consciousness. You can't interrogate him like this!"
Tsukauchi nodded solemnly, though he didn't retreat even a centimeter.
"I won't ask aggressive questions, Mrs. Midoriya. I only want orientation. Any fragment he remembers could be crucial."
Izuku lifted his gaze to him. His expression carried an almost ethereal serenity: eyes dulled by fatigue, measured breathing, dry lips barely curved in an attempt at calm. The heart monitor marked a slight rise in his rhythm, enough to suggest tension without fully revealing it.
"I… I don't have clear memories," he murmured softly.
The detective held his notebook, though he did not open it. His thumb traced the edge of the pages like someone activating a habitual reflex.
"Try, Izuku Midoriya. Sometimes the mind preserves remnants—an aroma, a texture, a distant sound. Two years don't vanish without leaving traces."
The boy briefly shifted his gaze toward the window, as if seeking in nothingness a point of anchor.
"I feel… cold. And a very dense darkness. Nothing else."
Tsukauchi didn't blink, but a slight change crossed his expression; an almost imperceptible movement, as if he had detected a faint fissure in the vague words spoken by a 12-year-old.
"And upon waking? Did you see anyone? Any recognizable object? A closed space?"
Izuku shook his head in a slow gesture.
"I was just on the street."
The silence that followed was more eloquent than any response. The detective observed him with studied stillness, as if scrutinizing the internal structure of each word.
Finally, he closed the notebook without having written a single line.
"I won't insist further today."
He stepped back with composed elegance, inclining his head slightly, and added:
"I'll return when you're more stable. We need to reconstruct those two years, and I hope that, with time, you'll be able to give us some hint."
His final look was long and deeply evaluative, without hostility but full of professional intention. Then he left. The door closed with a discreet click.