Isle Twixt Dream and Reality is the twenty-fourth chapter for My Hero Academia: Team-Up Missions, written and illustrated by Yoco Akiyama.
Summary#
Izuku, Katsuki, and All Might go to Gran Torino's Apartment for a mission. Gran Torino greets them, sitting atop his microwave, and plays dumb; calling Izuku "Toshinori", "falling asleep", and other shenanigans. Katsuki is annoyed by this, and Torino moves on, announcing the mission's plan: training on a deserted island, a training All Might had done as a teenager. All Might is shocked by this, and states he was traumatized by the training.
The four of them take a rowboat to the island, where Gran Torino states he's leaving the students there. Katsuki is annoyed at the idea of having to stay on an island with Izuku, but Izuku pays him no mind. Meanwhile, All Might is standing off to the side on the beach, trembling in fear from being back on the island. He tries to leave, when Izuku stops him and expresses his joy that All Might will be watching, and All Might reluctantly decides to stay to watch the boys. Gran Torino leaves on the rowboat, and tells them he'll be back "later".
On the island, Katsuki goes on his own to collect resources and build a shelter, expressing his anger about Gran Torino abandoning them on the island. He builds his own shelter, and Izuku decides to follow Katsuki's example, and asks All Might what he did for shelter while training here. Several memories come back to All Might, of the troubles he faced on the island; the shack he build was destroyed in a violent storm. He tells Izuku that he built a small shelter, and tries to avoid remembering more of his traumatic experiences. His plan to avoid recalling memories is thwarted by Izuku, who tells All Might he'd love to hear more about his experiences, and again All Might goes back on his previous decision and agrees to try to remember things to help his students.
Later, Izuku and All Might are exploring the forest to gather food. Izuku spots a patch of mushrooms, and wonders aloud if they're edible. We see young All Might holding the mushrooms, and looking sick after, with several funky drawings of him, as All Might remembers more of what happened. Then, All Might knocks the mushrooms out of Izuku's hands, and tells him that eating those mushrooms killed him. They move on, and All Might's thinking over what happened while he was on the island, and expresses to himself that he feels he's forgetting something important. Suddenly Katsuki storms over to the two of them, and accuses Izuku of stealing his food, which he denies. All Might, knowing he had to remember his time at the island for his students sake, manages to remember the key piece he was forgetting; the presence of a "mysterious entity" that attacked him during his training. He attempts to tell Izuku and Katuski, but they're distracted by rustling in a bush.
The creature All Might remembered appears, and starts running away from the group, bouncing off of the trees. It's a small creature and is cloaked in sticks and leaves. Izuku and Katuski pursue the creature, chasing it through the woods. All Might runs after them, and tries to warn them about it, but it's not needed. The two boys get the creature pinned down on the ground, and it's no longer moving. All Might steps between them and the creature, trying to keep them away. Katsuki asks if it's dead, and Gran Torino pops up from the leaves, announcing he's alive. He says he's there to make sure nobody dies, Katsuki scoffs at that, and All Might expresses that he nearly did anyway.
After some time, the four of them are back on the beach. Gran Torino and All Might sit in the sand, facing the water, watching Izuku and Katsuki attempt to catch fish. All Might tells Gran Torino that he had been hoping to help the boys, but got caught up in his own trauma and wasn't very helpful. While they're having their heart to heart, Izuku calls out to All Might from the water. He's holding a fish above his head, and tells All Might he caught it. Katsuki tells him to get out of his fishing area, and causes Izuku to drop the fish. To Gran Torino, All Might says he has to get over his trauma to help the boys, and Gran Torino tells All Might he knows he'll give it his best shot. While Katsuki and Izuku look angry and disappointed respectively as they lose the fish Izuku had previously caught, All Might says he'll give recovering from his trauma his best shot.