Those five weeks passed more slowly than Rei had hoped.
The days blended together, each one bleeding into the next like ink on paper left out in the rain. Morning, afternoon, lights out—none of it felt distinct. Just a rhythm, steady and dull, that stretched endlessly forward. No colors. No sounds that weren't mechanical. Just a soft hum in the walls, muffled footsteps in distant corridors, and the quiet shuffle of his own movements.
Every hallway looked the same. Every task felt like a repeat of the last. He scrubbed, lifted, hauled, stacked. The tools changed, the rooms changed, but the feeling didn't. Each moment bled into the next with the same numb weight.
It wasn't the labor that tired him. Not really.
The work wasn't difficult. The wooden supply crates, the chemical bins, even the industrial mops—they should've been heavy, awkward, too much for someone his size. But Rei had been trained for worse. Conditioned. Turned into something that didn't struggle with that kind of strain.
So no, the work didn't hurt his body.
But it wore him down in quieter, deeper places.
Mentally. Emotionally. Slowly.
Like a river carving into stone—not with force, but with time.
The repetition hollowed things out. His thoughts dulled, blunted by the monotony. It wasn't pain, exactly. It was just… a heaviness he carried with him from morning to night. A weight he couldn't set down.
But he didn't complain.
He didn't ask questions.
When someone told him to move something, he moved it. When someone gestured down a hallway, he followed. If they told him to stand still, he did—without looking away, without making noise, without protest.
That part was familiar. That part was easy.
Being obedient was something he knew how to do.
In the beginning, the people around him didn't know what to make of him. The guards stiffened when he passed. Some of the workers muttered under their breath. A few avoided him entirely—turning down side corridors, finding excuses to be busy elsewhere.
He didn't resent them.
He understood.
They weren't afraid of Rei—they were afraid of the shadow of what he'd been. Of the stories they'd heard. Of the armor and the name and the destruction left behind in the wake of a brainwashed child with a weapon for a soul.
But over time, that fear changed.
It didn't vanish. Not fully.
But it softened.
The longer he remained—quiet, compliant, restrained—the more those looks faded. The suspicion gave way to neutrality. The guarded silence turned into the occasional nod. Brief acknowledgments. Small ones.
A "thanks" here and there. A muttered "not bad" after a job well done. Someone even offered him water once after a long task, without being told to. Rei hadn't known whether to accept it or not, but he did. The cup had trembled a little in his hands.
He didn't know what to do with kindness. Not yet.
Even the guards began to relax around him.
They still cuffed him. Still watched his hands. But they didn't flinch when he walked past. They didn't treat him like a bomb about to go off.
That was something.
Not much. But it mattered.
And through it all, Rei kept his head down. Kept his eyes on the ground. Kept moving, like clockwork. Like wind through empty halls. His body worked. His mind floated somewhere far behind, tethered by routine.
The slowness didn't break him.
The silence didn't undo him.
He simply endured it.
Like he always had.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
(Aizawa POV)
After about thirty minutes of security scans, identity checks, and being ushered through the winding steel arteries of Tartarus—retinal locks, voice verifications, triple-redundant gates—I was here again.
Tartarus.
A place built to cage monsters. Or at least, what society called monsters.
I never liked it here. I didn't come unless I had to. And this visit wasn't just professional—it was personal. I'd been tasked with observing Rei. Monitoring his progress. Evaluating not just his behavior, but the deeper things: the state of his mind, the shape of his recovery. If recovery was even the right word.
It had been nearly five weeks.
Five weeks since that night on the rooftop. Since the boy who had called himself Eidolon crumbled in the hands of the people trying to save him. Since we pulled a child out of a weapon's husk.
Today marked a checkpoint.
They'd run a basic test earlier this morning. Standard procedure. Controlled environment. A simple display of his quirk—Ghost Hands—without incident. No panic. No aggression. No involuntary flashes of the persona All For One had forced onto him.
No resistance.
He hadn't fought the request. He hadn't seemed afraid of it. That didn't mean he was healed, not by any stretch. But it meant something.
A step forward, however small.
Because he passed, the restrictions were changing. Slightly. Carefully.
He would be allowed to use his quirk again.
Not at will. Not without boundaries. Only under watch. Only under the strictest supervision.
My supervision.
And that responsibility—deciding when, how, if he could use it again—wasn't one I took lightly.
Rei was still a kid. Barely. Young enough to have a future, but old enough to carry memories that should never belong to someone his age. He'd been shaped, molded, by a man who understood exactly how to break people and turn the pieces into something useful.
And now I had to make sure those pieces didn't turn sharp again.
I stood outside his cell.
Like every other cell in Tartarus, it was designed to strip identity down to nothing. Reinforced alloy. Gray walls. No windows. No color. Just a matte, impersonal box with a number stenciled into the frame. It looked like it had never been touched by a human hand.
It didn't bother me. That was the point.
I nodded to the guard stationed at the panel. He didn't ask questions—just responded with a small motion and tapped his clearance key.
"Please stand back, Eraserhead," he said, more out of protocol than concern.
I took a step back, my eyes on the door.
There was a hydraulic hiss, then a click, and the door slid open.
The guard stepped inside. I waited.
Thirty seconds passed. No noise. No conflict. Just the faint rustle of fabric, the quiet shuffle of restrained steps.
Then they emerged.
Rei followed the guard into the corridor, his hands cuffed in front of him. Quirk-suppressing steel gleamed faintly under the corridor lights. His hair was slightly longer than last time—messy, white, overgrown near his ears. His face was quiet. Not blank, but quiet.
And then I saw it.
A flicker.
Barely there. A widening of the eyes, a stilling of the breath. Just a moment of surprise, slipping through before he could hide it again.
He hadn't expected this. Hadn't realized five weeks had passed. Or maybe he had, but didn't think they'd let it matter. Maybe he thought the promise was empty. Maybe he thought they'd changed their minds.
I held his gaze for a second longer, then nodded. Slow. Intentional. Not a command—an acknowledgment.
"Come on," I said quietly. "We've got things to talk about."
He didn't speak. Just gave a single nod and stepped forward.
Not hesitant. Not eager.
Just ready.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Their footsteps rang out softly in the long, sterile corridor—sharp taps and dull scuffs bouncing off polished concrete and white walls. Tartarus always had this unnatural quiet to it, like even the air was being watched. The lights above buzzed faintly, casting a sterile glow over everything they passed.
Aizawa walked calmly, his hands resting inside his coat pockets, gait even and deliberate. Next to him, Rei followed a half step behind, his wrists still clasped in front of him by the standard Tartarus-issued quirk-suppressing cuffs. The metal links shifted with every small movement—clink, clink, just under the ambient hum of the hallway. Not loud, but constant. A reminder.
They didn't speak at first. Not out of tension, not exactly. It was more like they both understood the space between them didn't need to be filled yet. The silence wasn't hostile or cold. It simply was—settled in the air like dust, something neither of them minded.
It was Rei who broke it.
"…Didn't think you'd actually come," he muttered, his voice low but steady. Not angry. Just honest.
Aizawa glanced sideways at him, expression unreadable as ever. "I said I would."
Rei kept his eyes on the corridor ahead. Long, white, unchanging. "Figured maybe you'd change your mind."
"I don't make promises I won't keep," Aizawa replied, voice quiet but firm. "Especially not to people who are trying to change."
Rei blinked. He didn't say anything at first. He just walked. But there was a pause in the rhythm of his steps, the kind that came from thinking a little too hard about something.
Then: "…You think I can?"
There was no hesitation in Aizawa's answer.
"I think you already are."
The younger boy didn't stop walking, but something in him shifted. His steps, once cautious and light, gained a little more weight. A little more purpose. Not like someone sneaking through life anymore—like someone learning to stand in it.
They passed a set of guards going the other way. Neither spoke. The guards didn't even glance too long, and Rei didn't flinch or tense like he had during the first few days. He just kept moving forward.
"How's the work been?" Aizawa asked, tone level, as if they were discussing something entirely normal.
Rei gave a half-hearted shrug. "Boring. Cold. One of the bins smelled like rust and… I dunno, something rotten. I scrubbed my hands after but it stuck anyway."
Aizawa let out a quiet grunt of agreement. "Could be worse."
Rei tilted his head, a little curious. "Did you ever get assigned stuff like that?"
"All the time," Aizawa replied, eyes still forward. "Especially early on. Sometimes even now. Nobody skips the dull work."
Rei looked at the floor beneath their feet. "Did it help?"
This time, Aizawa gave a brief pause before answering. "Eventually."
Rei nodded. He didn't follow up. He didn't need to. The silence returned, but it was different now—thinner. Softer. Not a barrier. More like a coat that settled around both of them.
Another hallway. Less foot traffic now. This wing led closer to the monitored checkpoint area. The doors were fewer. The lights, slightly warmer.
Aizawa finally spoke again, quieter now. Not quite stern—but not gentle either.
"Rei."
"…Yeah?"
"You've done what was asked of you," Aizawa said. "What comes next isn't a reward. It's a chance. One that doesn't come easily, and doesn't come often. You understand?"
Rei nodded. It wasn't a timid nod, or a confused one. It was deliberate. Measured. "Yes, sir."
He hesitated. Then added:
"I won't waste it."
Aizawa didn't smile. He rarely did. But his gaze held steady on Rei for a second longer than necessary, and he gave the smallest nod of his own. It was enough. For now.