On April 14th, 21XX, five thousand children, between the ages of thirteen and fourteen, have disappeared throughout Japan. Investigators are baffled by how or why it happened and there were no traces of where the children disappeared to until the cybercrimes division discovered the horrifying answer. Each and every victim are all trapped in a horror game that they need to beat in order to escape and survive.
Linger is a My Hero Academia fanfic by littlemissoyashirou
. It was inspired by Locked In Digital. It can be read on Archive of Our Own here.
This fic contains examples of the following:
- Adaptational Angst Upgrade: The entire future 1-A class, some of the future 1-B class, and Mei from UA will be suffering from the trauma of being sent into horror games where they can die repeatedly.
- Adults Are Useless: Played with. The adults are doing the best they can in the face of an unprecedented act of Villainy where thousands of children are kidnapped and forced to go through horrible things where anyone can watch them, but without any means of actually helping them, this causes the adults to feel useless about themselves.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: In-Universe. Ruvic realizes that Izuku isn't the detective and calls him out on it.
- Brought Down to Normal: Being brought into the game world has temporarily taken away the kids' ability to use their quirks.
- Caught on Tape: Several digitalized disappearances were caught on camera. Tsuyu disappeared while right next to Habuko in a shop, Mei disappeared in a workshop and described how she felt like she was being transported, and Izuku panics while talking on a web video chat.
- Content Warnings: Chapter 4 has a trigger warning for "Acts of extreme violence, description of injuries and death in this chapter."
- Explain, Explain... Oh, Crap!: The reporters who receive footage of what is happening quickly realize that they're basically watching Red Rooms.
- Ironic Hell: Tensei thinks Tenya is trapped in Outlast because he would be forced to do something that is simply anathema to not just Tenya, but any Iida, sneaking and hiding in shadows when they were born and bred for speed and Tenya specifically tends to be overt, brash and outspoken.
- Massive Multiplayer Crossover: With many different Horror Games. Izuku is in The Evil Within. Katsuki is in Silent Hill. Iida is in Outlast. Momo is in Resident Evil. Ochako is in Dead Space. Mineta is in Doki Doki Literature Club!. Shoto is in Fatal Frame. Kendo is in Dark Souls.
- The Many Deaths of You: Each time a trapped kid dies in a game, it is not final and their death counter goes up by one. Even veteran Heroes are nauseous at the idea that they're going to keep seeing the kids die until they either escape or the death becomes permanent.
- Missing Child: The parents of 5000 kids have to handle the fact that their kids are trapped in horror video games with the possibility of dying repeatedly. The reactions seen so far include Inko, Denki's mother, Tensei, Endeavour (mostly shows rage, but we haven't seen his inner thoughts), and Asui's Parents.
- My Greatest Failure: All Might believes All for One is behind the kidnapping of five-thousand children in a single night, not believing anyone else is capable of such a feat, which causes him a lot of guilt in not making absolutely sure his arch-nemesis is dead.
- Oh, Crap!: The kids upon realizing how bad of a situation they're trapped in.
- Izuku when faced with Ruvic's supernatural powers and trapped in the basement with a sadistic butcher that he has to outmaneuver. A second one when Ruvic reveals he knows he isn't the detective, followed by hearing a chainsaw behind him.
- Momo when she sees Joseph Frost die and can't use her quirk to the point she has to get dragged off by the others to survive.
- Shouto as he is exploring the mansion gets a terrible feeling that something's wrong.
- Reasonable Authority Figure: Joseph Oda is this for Izuku in the game by quickly believing some of his claims about not being Sebastian and giving him advice on what to do.
- Skewed Priorities: Mineta is in a weird situation where there a bunch of hot girls, and he decides to just go along with it enthusiastically.
- Tempting Fate: Mineta thinks he died and went to heaven at the start of his game, Doki Doki Literature Club. What he doesn't know is that the main villain of that game is a terrifying Reality Warper.
- Timed Mission: There is a countdown for each trapped child on how long they have to free themselves before they are terminated. What actually happens when time runs out is not clear, but it clearly isn't good.
- That Was Not a Dream: Ochako after getting thrown around in a spaceship crash and being unable to use her quirk quickly realizes this is not just a nightmare.
- Trauma Button: Everything Shouto is going through in his death game brings up horrible memories of Endeavour losing Touya.
