Chapter 39 - Nightly Visitations

                                    

                                          
He blinked as he heard the door rattle, as if someone was messing with the lock. He frowned, sitting up on the bed to stare at the door. It's not like he could see it move, even with the nightlight on the little cabinet next to his bed. Yeah, they'd provided him with a nightlight, a cute little blue ghost, to be exact. It reminded him of Dabi's fire, in a weird way. The bed was nice, too. Soft, warm. Shigaraki liked this prison much better than his previous one, even if his wrists were wrapped up in quirk erasure bracelets. Nobody had laid a hand on him, as expected of heroes.
The door opened up after a few seconds, slowly, silently. If Shigaraki hadn't noticed the small sounds before, he might not have noticed it at all. He didn't recognize the new person, not immediately. It wasn't one of the heroes that took him here, but they weren't attacking him either. It was only when they stepped further into the light that Shigaraki recognized their face.
"You."
"Hi," Izuku said with a forced smile. "I brought soup."
What? 
Soup? What kind of interrogation technique was this?! None of the heroes had tried to drag the answers out of him, so he just assumed they either knew what was going on or they were gonna play the long game. Seems like it was the second option this time... But why this kid..? Shigaraki simply stared at him, which Izuku took as an invitation of some sort.
"I thought you might be hungry," Izuku explained as he showed him the thermos he was carrying. "One of my classmates made it, it's really good."
Seriously, why this kid? Shigaraki literally kidnapped him, if he remembered correctly. Was this supposed to be some fucked up reverse psychology shit? He'd heard Kurogiri talk about it a few times, but he never paid attention to it. Well, it didn't matter. No matter what they tried, it wasn't going to have any effect on him. All heroes are manipulative bastards, after all. Selfish and greedy people, living off the worship of those with pathetic quirks who can't take things for themselves. Idiots, really.
"Can I..?" Izuku asked, carefully approaching and motioning to the bed. Shigaraki didn't respond, so Izuku simply sat down on the end of the bed. He was glad the other was doing okay, seeing the circumstances. He was wrapped up in bandages in various places, but that was just a sign his wounds and injuries had finally been treated. Some of the cuts must've gotten infected. It wouldn't surprise Izuku if Shigaraki was on antibiotics right now. He looked so fragile like this... Not at all like the monster Izuku fought in his past life.
"What are you doing here?"
Ah, Izuku had expected that question. He must be here with some ulterior motive, right? Because why else would he show up out of nowhere with a can full of soup? The thing is, he did have a motive: Izuku wanted to save him. That's why he sneaked away from Kacchan, telling him he was getting up to go pee and get a glass of water. That's why he warmed up the soup Sato made and brought it over, because everyone loves food, right? That might be Nana talking, though. She's his grandmother, so maybe Izuku was influenced by her relationship with him.
Because that's another thing, the vestiges agreed with him on this matter. They wanted to see Shigaraki too. Izuku was sure that if push came to shove, they'd even allow him to use One For All for a bit so he could break in here. Luckily that wasn't necessary, since Izuku had more experience sneaking in and out of the dorms than he'd like to admit, so it never came to it. He had to wonder at what point Kacchan would notice he'd been gone for a little too long, though... Maybe he'd already dozed off again, seeing as Izuku disrupted his normal sleeping schedule quite a lot these days.
"I wanted to come talk to you," Izuku admitted. "To see you, after... Well, everything that happened. I wanted to make sure you were okay."
Shigaraki squinted his eyes at him, not trusting it for a second. It was kinda unbelievable too, if Izuku was being honest. If you didn't know about the original timeline, about their past relationship- the relationship they were supposed to have, well... Things were complicated, they always had been, at least that didn't change.