Using the distraction of their classmates, Yuu and Sora slipped away from the training ground, following the bird's lead. What they didn't expect, however, was for Midoriya to sprint right after them. The green head caught up with them in an instant.
" Midoriya!"
" I heard something... about a classmate being in danger." Midoriya glanced from one to the other as they exited the dorm grounds and headed towards the forest.
Sora and Yuu exchanged a quick look. They had to reveal it sooner or later anyway, Whisper's last words.
" Midoriya, just stay calm, ok..." Sora told him, albeit she didn't have the strength to look in his eyes as she did so.
" You remember the speculation about a traitor being in UA?" Yuu somehow managed to keep his voice from wavering. Midoriya merely gave a short nod.
Yuu bit on his lip. He truly didn't want to believe it. He hoped Whisper was wrong. But alas, the situation didn't leave room for doubt. " The traitor is..."
Midoriya's eyes went wide as Yuu mumbled the name, barely audible. It was clear he seemed to struggle inwardly between accusing his friends of lying or accusing his other friend of treachery.
They skidded to a halt when the bird settled on a branch and motioned its head forward. Closing on quietly, they saw a shaking Hagakure... more like shaking gloves and boots, hiding behind a tree. She seemed nervous, feverish even, as she apparently looked around.
It seemed a twig that Yuu had stepped on startled her and made her take notice of them. Sora held her finger to her mouth, a sign that she should keep quiet as they approached her. From their position, they could see what was causing Hagakure so much worry.
Aoyama stood there, facing his parents with his face streaked with tears, his voice choked with gasps and sobs, so that it was hard to make his words.
Sora's nails dug into her palm as she clutched it tight, and a line of red trickled down to the ground. That pain was the only thing that kept her mind clear, that prevented her from giving up to emotion.
" Aoyama-kun is..."
She stopped on her track, flashing her light in Yuu's face, wanting to badly believe it was a joke. Yet his sullen face didn't allow that to grow past a wish.
" Whisper said he had kept tabs on him, that he knew he was hiding something. And he said to be wary of him."
" Yeah, but he didn't say he was the spy, did he?" She argued back.
" I know Whisper enough, Sora. That was his way of telling me Aoyama is the spy. He knew I wouldn't take it if he said it bluntly to my face."
Whisper knew him well enough, too. He knew Yuu to be a kind and loyal friend. He would refuse to listen to him if he accused Aoyama so blatantly, and he didn't have enough time to convince him. So he planted the seed and waited for Yuu to connect the dots on his own. It took only a few hours for him to understand Whisper's last message. One hour of them was utter denial.
" I can't believe it... Aoyama-kun... he can't possibly..."
" 'Il n'est pire eau que l'eau qui dort'..." Yuu mumbled. Now Aoyama's message made more sense to him. " Beware of calm likable people... like himself..."
" But... why..."
" I don't want to believe it any more than you, Sora. But... Whisper is not a liar."
Neither was Yuu. She looked down, her shoulders slouching as she let the light from her phone fall to the ground. " What to do now? I don't..." Speaking without allowing her tears to fall was proven to be a hard feat.
" I don't want to believe he was willingly working for All For One, not while he left us a message." Yuu clenched his fists as he looked up at Sora. " There is one thing a hero could do now..."
Rescue their friend! Sora steeled herself as they stepped out of the protection of the tree's shadow, making themselves known to the trio out there. Midoriya seemed to have lost his ability to speak as he faced Aoyama and his parents.
Naturally, the two adults tried to shake it off, tried to make it as though they must have misheard them. Aoyama, however, couldn't take it any longer as he spilled everything, from the USJ to the training camp, with a dark look and a broken smile.
Just seeing him in that state made Sora dig her nails further into her palm. He did it. All For One did it again.
" I am a terrible villain."
He took another thing from her, a close friend.
Aoyama's parents couldn't wait for the revelation to settle with Midoriya; they grabbed their son and ran off deeper into the forest. Yuu and Sora were ready to give chase, but Midoriya bolted past them.
Aoyama wrenched his hands from his parents and whirled around. Sora's eyes widened at his aura. He was truly aiming to obliterate them all with his laser. Midoriya's danger sense must have caught on it because he activated his Quirk, albeit he couldn't bring himself to attack, and so waited for the laser to hit. But Hagakure leaped past them, shielding them all with her body and deflecting the sparkling, searing light away from them.
This appeared to have stretched her reflection ability far beyond the limit, as the outline of her body became visible. " We all could've died. All of Japan is in trouble..." She stepped towards Aoyama, her voice cracking and hoarse. " What were you thinking when you were in class?! At the dorms! When you were living with all of us! Well, Aoyama-kun?"
He didn't have answers. Only tears of regret.
" It's not like that!"
" Yuga's not-" His parents rushed to his defense, only to be tackled by both Yuu and Sora, forcing them to their knees with their arms twisted behind their backs.
" Please, don't make this any harder," Yuu begged them. " It's all for Aoyama-san's sake."
Midoriya had bound Aoyama with his black whips and pushed him to the ground, holding him there with his weight. " Aoyama-kun... Hagakure-san made it so you don't have to hurt others anymore. So, stop this. Stop doing this already..." It wasn't only Aoyama who was crying at that moment. Midoriya, too, had his own tears to contribute...
________________
The walk back to the grounds was utterly uncomfortable and awkward. It was worsened when they were greeted at the gates by their worried friends and their shocked expressions at seeing Midoriya tugging along a tied Aoyama and his parents.
Thankfully, before any of them had to explain, the Principal came around, along with a couple of teachers and Tsukauchi, who had a couple of officers following after him as well.
Tengu had already informed the Principal the moment Aoyama was captured, and the police were quick to answer the call.
They took the matter from there, put the whole family in maidens, and borrowed a classroom for the investigation. During the fuss, all of the adults failed to take notice of class 1A following them into the classroom.
It was Nezu who managed to realize they were present there at last. " If possible. I'd like you kids to leave..."
That was a blunt insult to them. They might as well have been ordered to up and off Aoyama themselves. None of them, not even Hagakure, who was crying her eyes out, or Jiro and Ashido, who were barely holding themselves together, budged.
Their reaction ranged from utter shock to ardently denying what they were told. They all wished it were a misunderstanding or that Aoyama was being tricked.
The boy did nothing to disclose the accusations pointed against him, merely tied to his seat and crying silently, not able to even raise his face to confront them.
He was desperate. That much was obvious. His aura had told Sora everything, disturbed, disoriented, and furiously attacking him.
He felt guilty, and he loathed himself.
Needless to say, his parents tried to turn all attention to them, to incur all the blame on them, and only them. In their eyes, Aoyama was innocent; he was just following orders that he didn't know would eventually lead to his classmates being thrown into danger time and again.
Not knowing could not be taken as enough of an excuse, however.
The whole family had a glum air over them, not out of fear of what might become of them now that they had been captured, Sora and Yuu noticed, rather, fearing for what might happen once All For One knew of their failure.
" Ruling by fear," Yuu whispered in Sora's ear. " He ensured they would never go against him, no matter how desperate they felt. Taking them back would be a challenge."
" All For One... That man alone, I won't forgive him..." Sora's rage was palpable. Yuu could have sworn the air around her had heated up.
" With the people I could've killed..." Aoyama's voice snapped all of them to attention. It was the first words he said since he was caught. " I smiled and laughed like we were friends. I couldn't help it. Finding out that he used to be Quirkless like me, and that he bore the pressure of fighting against All For One, I despaired at how miserable I was. And I despaired at myself, who despaired before worrying about whether or not he was okay. I'm rotten to the core... Aoyama Yuga is a villain through and through."
Sora clenched her shirt right over her chest, feeling her heart aching at the sight of their friend, at the way he thought himself nothing but a vile villain. She disagreed vehemently. However, before she could open her mouth, it was Midoriya who took it upon himself to shout some sense back into Aoyama.
" Then why did you try to save Kacchan and Tokoyami-kun at the training camp? Did you leave the cheese that night because All For One told you to? That's not it, is it?"
Yuu put a hand on Midoriya's shoulder and stepped forward, his eyes leveling with Aoyama's. He tried to keep his expression calm and soft. " The message you left for Midoriya-san on that block of cement; it was what prompted us to take action. You wanted to be saved, didn't you? Else, I can't think of another reason for you to leave such a message for Midoriya-san."
" And I failed to notice..." Midoriya felt as much guilt hearing that as Aoyama did. " I mean.. you're crying right now without a thought for decorum, not because you hate that you wouldn't do what All For One told you to do, right? I know a hero who didn't give All For One everything, even when he was using her. It was just that her spirit was crushed."
" Young Midoriya..."
Gathering her own thoughts and feelings, Sora wore a determined look as she, as well, faced Aoyama. " ' Like we were friends'? Don't joke around like this. We are friends. Why do you think we wanted to stop you?"
Even though I am a villain... Despite not giving voice to those words, everyone could hear them. They were conveyed through his eyes.
" Just because you commit a crime doesn't make you a villain for life! Take my hand, Aoyama-kun, because you can still be a hero!"....