Chapter Text
The apocalypse is not as fun as Himiko thought it would be.
Himiko had always sort of thought that without the rules of society, she would be able to authentically be herself. And to some degree, that was definitely true. Himiko had hated the nebulous idea of society for so long due to how she didn't fit into it, but she never truly absorbed how much even someone like her relied on society.
Without society, food was harder to get; harder to grow; harder to distribute. Without society, the cute trinkets she liked, the hair dye Dabi liked, even their weapons like knives were harder to get, too. The cute things she indulged in, and the things they genuinely needed—all of it was harder to produce, harder to distribute.
Of course, the society they had also had flaws with this. Homeless people weren't getting their basic needs met, either. They should be, in an ideal society, but they weren't. Why do you think Himiko resorted to stealing when she ran away? Society was for the privileged, even before it collasped.
But it was still inconvenient to have no society. In truth, Himiko is starting to think she was wrong; that the idea of society wasn't the problem, but how we approached it, what we cultivated our society to be. Society, at its core, is the idea that we should help each other. We should lift each other up. But, in truth, the society they had before it collasped—it was barely functioning.
The elites didn't want a society. The elites were the enemy of society—selfish people who screwed others over, people like Endeavor who only ever want to be the best, for themselves and no one else.
Society wasn't the problem—wasn't the disease. It was how we were trying to kill it. The moment we stopped valuing every human life, the moment we stopped helping—we started to kill it, right then.
Himiko wanted to help in her own way. That's what she always claimed. She wanted to create a kinder world, to people like her, to people who were rejected by society. She sought to destroy society entirely to do so.
She thinks she was wrong.
Because society has collasped, has rotted to dust—and yet here she is, choking on her blood once more.
"You killed my Satoru!"
"You killed my Haruhi!"
"You killed my Fuka!"
Angry voices, they remind her of her parents. In those days where she only acted, pretending to be normal, rejecting the evil inside her—those were the voices that spurred her on. She is starting to hate those voices.
Stop. Monster. Evil. Creepy. Stop.
They just keep coming. In a world where no one has power, people will be dragged down from the pedestals they once sat upon. Himiko didn't realize she was looking at the world from above, with the league—didn't truly internalize that she clawed her way up. Villains had power in society, even if they were condemned for it—they had the power to go against society. What power did they have now that society was no more? What was their rebellion for when there was nothing to rebel against?
Himiko is powerless. She has been stripped of her power, in a world where even the powerless can kill.
Demon, demon, demon child!
She grits her teeth. She is not a pitiful girl; she refuses to be. She is not a tragedy. She is a girl who smiles when she's happy, who frowns when she's sad, who loves and loves and loves.
You are not my daughter.
She is a girl who fights for a world who could accept her.
It was like she was possessed.
Her knife breaks against one of the mothers hardening quirk. She grunts as it does, biting down onto nothing, knashing her teeth. She just wants to be accepted. She just wants to be accepted. She just wants to be accepted.
You can call me big sis, Toga. We're like a family.
The league accepted her, but where are they now? Shigaraki is dead—and Magne and Jin had died even sooner than that, before society even collasped. Who is left that could accept her? Without Shigaraki, they all fell apart.
How could you?
Himiko Toga is a girl who has committed many sins. That much, even she is aware of. A string of murders when she was on the street, allying herself with villains, hating society and trying to tear it apart. She knows she has committed sins people would say are unforgivable. She knows that.
Why do you get to decide who lives and dies? Why do you get to kill? How can you say you deserve to be yourself when being yourself makes others unable to be them?
Himiko knows that.
Still, despite it all, she wanted to live.
Please, please, just let me live-!
(Her victims wanted to live, too.)
She is seventeen, and dying.
(The remnants get redeemed. Izuku gets redemption. Someone holds a hand out to them. Yet, no one holds one out to Himiko. No one saves her. No one saves Shigaraki, or Magne, or Spinner, or Dabi, or Twice. No one ever has; that's why they became villains in the first place—because they were always taught they had to save themselves.)
(Just how is that fair, exactly?)
"This is justice!" The mothers and fathers and siblings and lovers that have swarmed Himiko say, "This is justice!"
Is it really?
"Please," she whispers.
All she gets is hard eyes. "Did you listen to your victims when they pleded for their lives?"
She didn't, because she never heard over the roar in her ears and the desire to consume.
Himiko cries. She cries like she never has before, helpless and weak, because she wanted to live. She cries because she is afraid. It's ugly and messy and broken, the cries she's held in her heart ever since she got her quirk and her parents called her creepy. She cries for her life. She cries because she does not want it to be a tragedy, and yet here she is, ending tragic. She cries because she is a girl who smiles when she's happy and frowns when she's sad and she has never cried for as long as she's remembered. She cries because she is a girl who loved, and was rejected for it, and she never wanted to be a tragedy.
But she is.
And then the bat comes down on Himiko's head.