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Abandoned: Humanity's Driftshansome

This fic was going to keep buzzing in my head until I wrote it, so here we are.

This is my first fic, so feedback is appreciated!

Chapter Text

The first few months were a blur.

Aurora visited once a week, always appearing at the park. She brought him a week's worth of food as well as ingredients. Izuku wasn't an amazing cook, but he knew enough from the times his mother had worked late. 

He ignored the pang in his heart at the thought of Inko Midoriya.

Izuku practiced making Katsudon the most, the meal holding a special place in his heart. Aurora supplied him with pork, definitely not opposed to tastier meals. 

He had small chats with Aurora, though lasting long from lack of common ground. Aurora was a goddess after all, and Izuku didn't exactly have the most social life even before humanity was whisked away. 

Some days she spent the meeting ranting about the latest issue in her world. Aurora was really expressive when she got into things. Izuku chuckled softly as she waved her hands around wildly("-and then she blew up my dress. Why? Is not having a battle in it that hard?"), her eyes wide.

Izuku appreciated her company a lot.

He threw himself into books. There was no one to stop him from walking into the library and laying there all day. 

It almost felt like a crime when he yelled out after stubbing his toe and nobody shushed him. Reading helped get his mind of the feeling of loneliness and his current situation.

While Izuku would usually be studying all the new heroes, keeping up his perfect trivia knowledge, what was the point? It wasn't like he was going to see a hero nowadays anyway. Instead, armed with a pillow and blanket, he started studying. 

Izuku didn't realize just how much the term "nerd" applied to him until he was given all the time in the world and picked up a medical textbook. Healing would definitely be useful when monsters were running around he figured. He wanted to be a hero, not a doctor, so he focused on the basics and how to help someone immediately. Learning medicine was hard without an actual teacher. Izuku had practice dummies from med schools(Izuku was quickly learning that it really didn't matter if he broke into places) but no living thing to help him. 

When he told Aurora about his roadblock, she stared at him a moment before lifting her hand, purple light illuminating the park as a blade of light rose out of it until the handle rested in her grip. She then made a decent sized cut in her other palm before holding the injured hand out to him, waiting.

Naturally, Izuku immediately panicked at her thoughtless self harm. He barely noticed how Aurora's blood wasn't red, more of a gold color as it leaked from the wound.

Then the medical knowledge crammed in his brain over months took over, and he cleaned the wound. She hid it well, but Izuku noticed her tiny flinch from the water. 

He wrapped her hand back at his house. Izuku had plenty of bandages from how much he had to deal with his own cuts and burns. 

Really, the only people Izuku missed were his mother and heroes. Almost everyone else he saw treated him as trash. 

He hid his frown as an angry blonde came to mind, along with all the adults who didn't care about his behavior.

Izuku would be happy if he never had to see Bakugou again.

"You didn't h-have to do that." He muttered under his breath when he finished with the injury.

Aurora still heard him however, her hand squeezing his before she responded.

"It's because of us you're left alone. Humanity wasn't even kind to you, and you still prepare for their return. The least I could do is help."

They sat there, a nice silence lasting between them.

His empty house didn't feel too lonely right now.

She spoke up again a few minutes later.

"Not that I mind, but how long are you going to hold my hand?"

Izuku made a sound akin to a distressed cat before letting go, his face red.

Aurora's laugh sounded like bells as it filled the room.

2241

Izuku pushed the fridge with all his might, finally getting it into the truck. His arms felt like they were going to fall off, so he would probably stop here for today. He looked around at the various trash piled up, everything from kitchen appliances to cars. Izuku even found guns there. 

He had started cleaning up Dagobah Beach while exploring the city. Even after over a year, strolling through a city completely devoid of people felt strange. It was also impossible to ignore the giant heap of trash, especially after seeing pictures of the beach in its glory.

He had used a truck nearby to move his piles. Knowing how to drive didn't really matter when there was nothing to crash into.

While residents might love it being restored once they returned, he was also doing it for himself. The feeling of needing to accomplish something was powerful.

Izuku figured it also doubled as strength training. Aurora didn't question his methods, although she did tell him to try going to a gym as well. He did, being able to freely use expensive gym equipment was definitely nice after all.

Since he only saw Aurora on Saturdays, he spent the rest of the time training.

His body felt like it was dying, but he felt happy at the thought of getting stronger.

Izuku wanted to keep up his reading time as well, but Aurora had caught on to the bags under his eyes and made him stop. There was no one else left to tell him to mind his health after all. 

If..no, when the rest of humanity came back, they would be even stronger from their adventures, with more developed quirks. According to Aurora, they could learn magic based on their quirks as well. Izuku didn't grill her on magic too much though. 

It was strange. Izuku loved talking about quirks. But thinking about magic, something that sounded so incredible and foreign, something he would never have, Izuku felt bitter. This was probably the way quirkless people had thought about quirks, back when others existed. 

He still had at least a few pages filled with Aurora's light magic; how she could use it directly in offensive bursts or form tools and enhance herself. Izuku still didn't know how the teleportation that she used to get to the god's realm and back functioned. 

How weird would it be when everyone came back with stronger quirks and magic? The heroes would be stronger, but so would the villains.

Civilian casualties would probably increase. Izuku winced as he thought of the typical hero fight. A villain fighting a hero or several heroes, all with flashy, dangerous quirks. Despite this, civilians crowded around, enjoying the show from far too close. People brought their children, excited to see their heroes risk their lives in person. 

Many limelight heroes were into heroism for fame or money after all. Fights were drawn out, risking lives for the thrill of a climatic "Ultimate Move".

Now that Izuku had time to actually think about it, completely separated from the hero media he had been dedicated to before, society seemed pretty bad. That was even ignoring how bad his life had been for being quirkless.

Maybe he would ask Aurora how exactly magic fit into quirks later. If he was still going to be a hero he would need to fight them after all.

The gap between the quirked and quirkless would only grow wider when humanity returned. In comparison, the only thing Izuku had was his body and mind.

All he could do was prepare as much as possible.

2243

They had moved their weekly meetings to Dagobah Beach.

It had taken almost a year of hard work. Once cleaned however, the view was absolutely beautiful. Izuku sometimes wondered how people could ruin something like this.

His physical training was definitely yielding results. Izuku had a decent base to start learning technique. 

"Hey Aurora?"

Eventually, she had gotten him to drop honorifics. Really, she was the only friend Izuku had since he was four.

"Yes Izuku?"

He still wasn't used to her doing the same though.

"C-Can you train me?" Izuku asked.

Aurora turned towards him, the sunlight reflecting in her hair. Would it be rude to take a hair to study? Izuku has been getting into chemistry lately. On second thought, that would definitely be creepy. He shouldn't do that.

Oh gods, his social skills were getting even worse.

"I can't make you my student." she answered. 

His thoughts must have shown on his face, because she explained. 

"I fight almost completely using magic. Most of my fighting style wouldn't be useful to you. However, I can show you the basics of the god's style." She took a stance, her legs bent and spread apart, hands at her side.

The gods were humanoid, so their techniques could technically be learned by humans. However, Divinity was a style usually refined over decades. Aurora said this like it was nothing, but to Izuku that sounded incredibly complicated.

Gods possessed incredible amounts of physical strength, even ones who didn't focus on hand to hand combat such as Aurora. Divinity was simple to learn but incredibly hard to master, focused on combining overwhelming power with perfect precision and technique.

They spent the rest of the day going through the basic stances, as well as how to punch and kick correctly.

Izuku practiced them until they started to feel natural.

2250

Izuku had started incorporating human styles, mainly Karate into his combat. He had seen fun forms of combat such as Capoeira in various books and media, but decided it wouldn't fit him.

That hadn't stopped him from learning to breakdance though. 

Sparring had been a spur of the moment decision from her after deciding he was finally strong enough. Aurora didn't use her magic, but her natural strength still felt like getting hit by a truck despite how much she held back.

He forgot sometimes, but she really was a goddess. Aurora could probably easily take down the heroes in his world. Izuku could feel himself slowly reaching her in terms of technique after relentless practice. 

On some days(where he was sure that the world of gods had been stressing her out) they worked on his reflexes and dodging.

This consisted of bombarding the beach with giant beams of violet light, sending sand into the air and making the beach shake. The most terrifying however, was her spears of light.

On those days he wasn't sure Aurora noticed how much power she was putting in.

It took all of his concentration not to get vaporized. 

How powerful was she when she went all out?

Izuku resolved himself to one day be strong enough to find out.

2274

Izuku decided to choose a weapon. 

He would need something to kill monsters. He was confident in his hand to hand combat, but he would definitely be more effective with a tool. 

Punching a dragon in the face wouldn't work very well after all.

He had asked Aurora for advice, but he'd merely gotten a "Use what feels right." before she went back to her shoujo manga.

Izuku regretted letting her know about manga sometimes. Aurora had gotten addicted instantly. 

She turned out to be right about weapons. After a short period of trial and error in the dojo, he picked up a quarterstaff. With the extremely helpful martial arts book, Izuku followed the instructions.

The recommended stance was simple. His feet were set wider than he was used to with the god's style, probably to compensate for the length of the weapon. The dominant foot was in front, with the dominant hand placed near the middle. Going through the rest of the attacks felt smooth.

Izuku knew that he had quite a long time to train. It was easy to dismiss something not sharp, but blunt weapons could do quite a lot of damage with enough strength behind them.

His mind flashed back to Aurora's fist knocking him out for 5 hours, making him shudder. 

The staff would hurt a lot, but if he held back he wouldn't have to worry about killing villains or giving them brain damage. At the same time, with enough force he could deal with monsters.

Izuku could work with this. 

The next two months was spent practicing the basics and ingraining them into his muscle memory.

Aurora raised an eyebrow when he brought a staff to the next session. He had... borrowed a durable metal staff to use. The green haired man took his shoes off, and got into stance. Getting sand into his shoes would suck.

He gripped his staff tightly, waiting.

Aurora made the first move, shooting forward, as her feet left imprints on the sand. Her magic curled around her like a coat, violet light emitting outward as she stabbed forward with a light spear. 

Izuku diverted the blade with the top of his staff before swinging the bottom at her chin. She was already moving though, ducking under the attack before rising up towards him. His eyes widened as her palm lit up.

He was too slow to dodge the light blast, and the blow sent him tumbling away in the sand. The breath was knocked out of him for a moment. Even while she was holding back, he wasn't fast enough.

Yet.

Recovering, Izuku stood up with the aid of his staff in time to see Aurora charging up both hands, the energy condensing in her palms.

This was usually the part where Izuku would run around screaming as light destroyed everything around him.

But this time he was ready. He carefully controlled the staff with all of his focus, blocking the bursts. Izuku winced as a particularly strong bolt of energy made the metal crack.

Izuku needed a better staff.

Whatever he couldn't block, he dodged as he broke into a sprint, closing the distance before making a downward feint with the staff.

Aurora fell for it, raising up a blade of light to block the blow. Izuku focused all of his speed into his next movement, transitioning the downward strike into a straight punch to her stomach. It landed, the blow sending Aurora skidding back.

Izuku felt a wide grin start to appear on his face. The strike probably did nothing to her, but he had landed a hit. 

This was progress.

They stopped by a restaurant to cool down after a few more spars. The day was almost up, and after they ate Aurora would need to go back to the god's realm.

While there was no one there to actually make food for them, they could bring food to replicate the experience. Somehow, the atmosphere was still there.

The cold night air didn't feel lonely when Izuku sat there with her.

They ate a bento Izuku had made that morning; his cooking had certainly gotten better years of practice. Aurora closed her eyes in bliss as she took another bite of the katsudon. Izuku felt a small smile form at her reaction. She had been slowly giving him his confidence back these years, something he could never thank her enough for. 

Something as simple as a compliment on something he worked hard on or a new skill he learned. Things Izuku rarely got when Quirkless. He had even stopped stuttering.

Aurora asked him about a hero she had seen a poster of earlier. The hero caught her attention by being known as the Youngest Pro Hero, yet still so high up in the rankings. The poster was filled with his bright smile and large red wings.

Izuku opened his mouth to answer, then froze. 

Who was that again?

As much as he racked his brain, he just couldn't remember who it was.

According to the poster, the hero was ranked third. Izuku definitely had notes on him, so why couldn't he recall who they were?

"Your forgetting, aren't you." 

Izuku looked up at her concerned face, eyes narrowing in...sorrow? Aurora set the paper face down on the table.

"Decades have passed by so fast. However, your mind is still human. You haven't seen a hero in years, so you are slowly forgetting them." she explained.

He was forgetting. 

In hindsight, it was strange it had taken him so long to realize. Of course he wouldn't remember someone he hadn't heard of in years. His brain would think of it as unused knowledge. That didn't mean forgetting what life was like before didn't worry him.

Suddenly, another thought struck him.

Izuku hastily searched his memories, before breathing out in relief.

He could still remember a short woman with green hair, her smile as she saw the All Might video yet again with him. 

Aurora knew him well enough to not say anything.

They ate the rest of the meal in peaceful silence. 

The deserted restaurant was starting to feel more natural than one filled with people.

When he got home, he set up a reminder on his phone.

Every week, videos of his mother would play.

Every week, so he could repay everything she did when she came back.

Every week, so he never forgot her.

After a moment's thought, Izuku also set a counter to track the years. 

It had been 34 years. By human standards, he wasn't even considered a teenager anymore. That was definitely a shock. 

Would he need to act like a teenager when everyone came back? People would change after five years. How much would he change after far more than that?

Izuku guessed he would need to wait another few decades.

If only he knew how wrong he was.