Chapter one - His Solitude

"Hey, are you sure this is the kid? I mean, he's a kid, a literal baby. Surely there's someone else!"

"Take it or leave it, sir. Do you doubt my expertise?"

The man frowned and walked back to where he had arrived from, frustrated.

"I'm leavin' it."

As the cold air clung to the walking man's thick, rough skin, the strange doctor stole a glance once more before turning back to look at dream-ridden child that lay bare on the ground. The doctor raised his clothed hands and stroked the child's white matted hair, causing a small twitch to arise within him. Time had not yet gifted him lines of age or silver silk to sprout from his scalp, though his blank mop ceased nonetheless.

"And if I were to awake him right now, this strange boy…" the doctor thought, slouched on the slippery, damp ground. The wind picked up again slowly and sent a chill to the tree beside him whilst sending the birds aflight to be caught up in the troubles of the skies. Up there, things were simpler and supposedly better. That's why the birds liked it up there. A green, lush leaf fell upon the doctor's clothed hand. Plainly, he lifted it up by the stem before removing his glove.

When the glove had been stripped from his finger, the leaf hardened to dull stone with little to no texture and depth. It's life had been snatched. The once intricate and elaborate patterns that once intimately embraced and veined the leaf so, had been banished. The friction had been lost. That warm compassionate had gone and it wasn't coming back. Unfixable and miraculous. He let go of this leaf and when it shattered on the ground, it could barely be seen. It had been forgotten.

The doctors dryly hummed in wonder and thought.

"It was alive, then it was not." he said to himself, looking at the child as if he were conversing with someone of great importance. "Who is it, I ask, that wields such judgement that they are able to choose who and what and how and when and why something stops being gifted with life? Who decided this? I ask."

"That person is the real villain, I say."

The child lay bare and still like a corpse, for his chest did not rise and his eyes fluttered not. But eternal rest had not yet consumed him. Not yet. The doctor looked down at his own lower-body and saw that his white cloak had gotten soaked in mud by the sleeves and the rear end. In one swift move, the cloak had been removed from his shoulders and was now on top of the bare, still boy.

The doctor stood up, dusted himself and walked on ahead quietly.

"Strange boy, answer me."

"I've answered it - look."

A slim lady with shoulder-length locks of green hair enthusiastically bent down to the white-haired boy's level to pick the book from his palms. Looking at the answer he had produced, she beamed at the page and then with sparkling eyes, planted a kiss on his cheek.

"Is it right?" the boy asked impatiently twirling his thumbs. The woman sat down on the brown chair beside her, setting the book on her lap.

"I don't know, Izuku. Is it right?"

Izuku's face contorted into one of confusion and disappointment.

"You can't answer a question with a question..!" he declared. "And what's more, what do you mean? Why give me a question that can't be answered? All questions can be answered. There will always be a right or wrong."

She shook her head and leaned in, wrinkling her yellow apron.

"The question said: 'If Abel stole the apple for his family because the king no longer permitted his father to work in the city so they have little food, should he be punished?'."

"Yes, mother. I remember the question." Izuku's cloud bobbed as he nodded. "And I said yes. Stealing is bad, that's what the teachers tell me alllll the time. So it's right."

"It is not right, Izuku." this earned her a tilted head. "But it is not wrong. It goes either way, don't you think? Abel wants to provide for his family - this is good, but it is bad to steal, everyone knows that. Not everything is so easy and cleanly cut that things can be decided this easily. In some places, people get their limbs cut off for theft, Izuku. That's bad isn't it?"

"Uh..then what's the answer.." he asked finally.

"There is no answer." she smiled and tucked a small piece of hair behind her ear. "Answers aren't always necessary because an answer doesn't benefit you. The answer you get isn't really an answer, when you think about it. It's just a reply from that person alone. But..Izuku, who has the power to decide what's good and bad? Who gets to choose the answer, who decides this, Izuku?"

Baffled and silenced in confusion, Izuku could not fumble up an appropriate answer, or an answer in general. His mother saw this and chuckled softly.

"I...don't know the answer anymore. Am I stupid, mom?"

"My, no! Far from it, Izuku. You're smart and caring and you love your mother, don't you? In fact," she stood erect and put on a hard face before smiling goofily. "You get to go to the mall!"

Izuku's eyes lit up and his pupils danced in the ray of light that shone on the left side of his face. The mall! The mall! Izuku speedily put on his shoes and ran to the door awaiting his mother.

"You're happy aren't you, Izuku?"

"Yes! I am super happy."

Izuku's mother unlocked the door, letting Izuku step out first.

"Then, so am I."

Equilibrium.