Who Would've Thought We Would End Up Like This?

Strawberry Wine

Uggghhh was listening to Strawberry Wine by Deana Carter and yalls Cowboy!AU Bakugou Katsuki has got my mind in a foooooooog.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Just imagining visiting your grandfather for the summer and there's a new helping hand around the farm. A young man about the same age as you, it's also a bonus he's very attractive.

He does all the hard labor your grandfather has gotten a little too old do be doing. The sun beating down on him and making his blonde hair seem like a halo on his head, the golden evening rays making his eyes shine like the brightest ruby.

According to your grandfather he was helping out just for this summer since he was on break from college and wanted to get back to his hometown roots on a nearby farm.

Of course you were caught in a slump, eyes following him everywhere making you clumsy and messing up your own chores making him having to pick up the slack. Okay, maybe it was on purpose so he would be near you and talking to you.

Eventually catching his eye one day while riding a horse and being able to catch a wild hog that had ended up on the farm.

Both of you sneaking around corners and haylofts just for a moment together, before your grandfather came calling.

Him sneaking you out to his truck and just tearing down dirt roads underneath the warm summer moon. Talking about everything and nothing, dreams and goals.

Sharing tender moments and light touches by the pond where he dropped the tough guy act and you both showed your true colors.

Of course nothing can stay the same, as September came calling and he had to leave. The teenage promise to keep in touch and that you'd visit. Him promising he'll see you next summer and that he'd wait if you would.

A few cards, letters and one long distance call over the course of a year you both slowly got preoccupied with other things but never forgot the genuine connection you both had.

Every summer you still go back to see your grandfather, the fields overgrown now as he's gotten too old to maintain it alone but you do your best to help him out.

5 years have passed since you've seen the blonde, eyes always searching for him during the Summer with no luck yet.

Visiting the pond where you both truly bonded, first kiss and first love. A love that still remains sweet in your memory like the Strawberry Wine you had shared together that night.

"Hey there Princess,"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Someone pull my cavity it's too sweet ☺️☺️

Different

Izuku Midoriya x Reader

Summary: You thought he'd be different than the rest, but he proved you wrong.

Warning: Cheating, angst, hurtful words, cussing,

You've known for a while now that you were no longer your boyfriends main priority. For about seven months out of your two year relationship you've known.

It started with the late meetings, the coming home after midnight, hiding his phone, getting random rescue and office calls during your days together.

Soon came him not even trying to hide it. Rumpled clothes, cheap perfume that wasn't yours. Markings on his neck and back that you didn't make, how could you when you haven't been intimate in over three months now.

You thought he'd be different from the past. He promised to be. So why are you crying alone on a Thursday night at 1 o'clock in the morning? You've should've known better? Prepared yourself better? Confront him? Ignore it?

Your heart and chest ached so badly as your thoughts raced. It was almost difficult to breathe.

Hearing the door open and shut you whiped your eyes and took a deep, shaky breath to even your breathing out.

Turning to the man you called your lover, you could only stare at his face as his eyes tried to look elsewhere but you. You could tell he was annoyed. At you? The situation? Why can't he break it off if he's not happy? Why torture you?

"What are you doing awake? You should've been asleep," Izuku grumbled out, hands leaving his pockets to start to undue his tie and button down shirt.

"I missed you, couldn't sleep without you, wanted to make sure you were okay from your meeting,"

He simply nodded, disregarded his clothing and you caught a wiff of that same damn perfume as it hit the ground. Your eyes began to tear up as you could only think of what you had done wrong.

Did you not satisfy him enough? Not cook and clean good? Pretty enough? Sexy enough?

"Look I've had a long day, I'm going to bed. Goodnight,"

He got into his side of the king sized bed, far away from you with his back turned. A lone tear ran down your cheek as you nodded, not that he could see. Not that he even cared at this point.

You laid down too, staring at his back and it seemed he went right to sleep without a care in the world. You slowly reached a hand out to him, your fingertips just close enough to brush him if you wanted too. But you retracted at the last second, not wanting to annoy him more.

You've lost track now on how many nights has been like this. Him so close but so far away. No way of reaching him. Not that you even wanted to anymore. After all, where excitement and love once was, was now sadness and emptiness.

~.~

"Izuku, I know about her,"

This didn't seem the right time, but you were done.

A newspaper article had come out with Izuku and Uraraka at a fancy restaurant together, hands locked together in a lovers gaze. The headline simple, "Does Your Girlfriend Know Deku?"

You had been to many a Gala in your first few months together, Izuku showing you to the press as his girlfriend. His one and only.

"Look I don't want to talk about this right now, I'm late for a conference with Bakugou, Shoto and-" "And her. Right?"

He sighed, turning his head to where you sat at the kitchen table. A mug of tea clasped in your hand as you stared back. (E/C) eyes that now seemed lifeless and dull. The once beautiful shine and glow of life, now gone.

"I've know about her for months now, you didn't exactly try to hide it," you mumbled out, a small sip helping your nerves as you tried to prepare yourself for the end.

"If you've known then why are you still here? Get out then! No one is making you stay,"

His green eyes tried to cut through you, but now you simply blinked back. "I made myself stay because you promised,"

That made him flinch as his eyebrows furrowed together, "You promised to be different. That you'd never hurt me like I was hurt in the past. I guess we're just all bastards who lie then huh?"

You stood up and placed your mug in the sink, Izuku trying to find some logical reasoning,"Well what do you expect!? You never do anything, I do everything! The bill paying, the bread winner, thats all me! Sorry if for once I'm seen as someone who isn't just that,"

You walked closer to him, causing him to shuffle back a little. "I've never once asked you for anything but your heart. I guess I was a dumb idiot for that, maybe I should've used you for gain like she did to rise in the charts,"

You reached for the bag you had packed, sitting next to the hallway closet.

"I thought it would be alright if I ignored it. You promised me love, a friend, a lover. Someone I could confide in and be able to return it on the rough days. I guess I was wrong then,"

You turned sharply to Izuku who flinched back. Your eyes met his as you uttered one final sentence to him before you walked out forever.

"The sad thing is. I actually thought you were different,"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ooof, it's been a rough one you guys. I've lost someone dear to me and it's impacted my wanting to write a little bit. This isn't my best but I'm trying to get back in the game. I hope you like it 🤍

Why am I sobbing 😭💙🖤💙🖤

Antecedent 

tags: AFAB reader (referred to as ‘mama’), established (kinda toxic) relationship, canon divergence: secret family au (post arrest), spoilers for touya backstory and chapters 349 onwards, hurt/comfort, original child character (‘Kaiyo’; he is your shared biological child), parent todoroki touya, mentions of canon attempted suicide and canon child abuse, themes of generational trauma, family feels, todoroki family centric, villain rehabilitation, dealing with trauma and recovery, second chances

wc: 16k+

You shouldn’t have come. 

There are crowds of press, packed so tightly that getting any closer would be futile, all of them a cacophony of questions and accusations. You’re standing atop a small brick wall encasing a flower bed of hyacinths outside of the hospital, a head above the sea of cameras, watching as a group of heroes — Endeavor and Shouto included — slowly lead Touya towards an armoured van. 

Relief floods through your system for a few precious seconds, overwhelming the hopelessness in your stomach. He was alive. 

One little rumour from a patient in your clinic, an unsure whisper of I heard they’re moving that Dabi kid from the ICU to villain corrections had led you here. It’d been two long, devastating weeks since the final battle. Two weeks with no word from him, two weeks of reading every article you could find about the ‘elusive first son of Endeavor’ and learning nothing. 

The media blackout that came thereafter was the only thing that kept you hoping that he was okay. The Todoroki family, though disastrous and complicated, held some influence in Japan. And though Touya would vehemently try to reject it, they could not allow their surviving first son to be fed to the wolves. 

And wolves they were; yelling obscenities and insults with spitting anger. Legal justice was one thing, but the court of public opinion was another thing in its entirety, a fragile and fickle thing that held the power to sway even government policy. 

Kaiyo stirs in your arms at the noise and you soothe him, rubbing your hand along his back until he quietens, then you tuck away the stray red hair that has fallen loose from beneath his hat. Truthfully you never intended to bring him here, but given recent events it has been hard for him to separate from you, cheeks still slightly pink from his earlier tantrum. 

It’d been damn near impossible to prevent the four year old from learning about the broadcast a few months prior, paired with the sudden less than frequent visits from his father, he knew something was deeply wrong and he didn’t understand it. 

Touya is scanning the crowds lazily, expression impassive to everyone but you. You could see was exhausted, more gaunt than you last remember, but his disinterest only fed into everyone’s fury. 

“Villain!” they’re bellowing at him, fingers pointed and words sharp, “don’t you care about the suffering you’ve caused?” 

He cares, you think, more than anyone could ever understand. 

You cannot look away as Shouto lingers by his brother, the other sidekicks giving them a wide berth. Endeavor is tucked away beside the van speaking with an armed officer, his shoulders hunched forwards in an uncharacteristic manner. He appeared to be ashamed. 

Good, the thought bitter and weighing heavily in your chest. 

Touya shuffles along obediently, wrists out and pressed together against his pelvis. Quirk suppressing cuffs, you assumed. They were bulky, and no doubt uncomfortable. You hold Kaiyo a little closer as you ache, distantly wondering if he’s cold without his quirk. 

After today it was entirely possible you’d never see him again, that your son would grow up without his father.

Nobody knew of your connection to him, something both of you doubled down on after your pregnancy came to light. There would be no way for you to visit or contact him now without suspicion being cast upon your little family. Law enforcement will without a doubt assume you were aware of his intentions, and worst case they would believe you to have played a part in them yourself. 

He couldn’t allow that to happen. And yet, here you were. 

You just needed one last look at him to know he was breathing, living flesh and blood, to know that the only thing you would have to mourn was your relationship. More than anything you needed him to be ok. And he does look different – better, in some ways. The new skin grafts hug his jawbone comfortably, and the rings that once kept him together are gone. 

Being alive meant he still had a chance. 

Touya tilts his chin up, squinting against the flare of the sun, and the corner of his mouth crooks into a smile. It’s the irony, you think, as your own lips twitch. The heavens should have opened by now, rain should be soaking your clothes to your skin, influenced by the utter misery flooding throughout your body. Instead, the day is bright.

As if he can feel it, he turns, and his gaze immediately falls on your figure in the distance. You’re close enough to see the abject fury flit across his features, eyes wide and unblinking as they stare back into your own. 

The hand you have rested against Kaiyo’s back slides up over his hat to cradle his head, his small fingers curled tightly into the fabric of your shirt, drawing Touya’s attention to the boy. 

To his son. 

The anger dissolves like sea foam, it washes away to give space for his grief. This was it, the final goodbye. You couldn’t find it in yourself to hate him for his choices, because it was something he had told you he’d do from the start. 

In hindsight, you can only curse your naivety. 

You’d met Touya a few months after your eighteenth birthday while shadowing one of the senior nurses in the clinic. The place was small, run down and barely funded, but it was valuable work and they were kind enough to give you the extra experience.

He’d been brought in unconscious by a concerned passerby. The skin of his arms has been rough, raised and pale pink, inflamed where they’d been burnt. Barely nineteen at the time, it was nothing compared to what he would do to himself years later. 

“Watch him until he wakes up,” they’d told you, and you did so dutifully until his eyes flew open in alarm. 

Back then his identity as Dabi was makeshift, fresh and unrefined. With the glue still wet between the cracks it was unsurprising that he would slip. Touya. That was how he introduced himself to you on that first day, under the hazy influence of painkillers.

The memory stuck with you throughout your relationship. You’d see it now and then — you’d see Touya plainly behind the veil. Sometimes you said his name as if it was a dare, and he’d hated it so much that he loved you. With you there was no need to exert effort in maintaining his bravado, he could just be. And that was dangerous, or so he’d insisted.

He would disappear for weeks at a time. He always had a myriad of excuses, from expressing concern for your safety to spitting that you were nothing but a good fuck. You could no longer count on one hand the amount of times you’d heard the ‘I’m a villain, you shouldn’t be with me’ speech. 

Touya would leave, and yet you’d still come home to a receipt on the counter, or to your clean sheets unmade. It was laughable, and you loved him. 

The pregnancy was… unexpected. Difficult. If his emotions were a switch on the wall, your growing baby was a finger flicking it up and down incessantly. Mornings full of nausea and nights full of reassurance. You offered him an out, a door that would always be left open, and he refused it. 

Stay and be a bad father. Leave and be a bad father. Those were the only options he thought existed for him. And maybe you should’ve believed him when he told you Kaiyo’s birth wouldn’t change a thing about the path he’d set for himself. 

But you couldn’t accept it. Not as he’d held your boy in his arms, not as the apprehension and fear in his eyes softened into love. Not as he’d laughed and told you, “guess I needed to give one good thing to the world before I die”. 

Sometimes the adoration would become overcast with anguish. There were days he couldn’t even look at Kaiyo because of how much he loved him, reminded only of how little he had been loved by his own family — but he never let Kaiyo see it. 

“Just because he’s too young to understand now doesn’t mean he won’t later”.

The only small mercy is that your son remains asleep, blissfully unaware of what he is losing, and unperturbed by the noise around him. His light, shallow breaths against the skin of your neck are a warm comfort. 

Touya can’t say anything for fear it will draw attention to you both, and you think that alone is punishment enough. 

Shouto stands beside him in silence, surveying the surroundings and eventually following Touya’s line of sight to you. Instinctively you step backwards into the soft soil of the flowerbed, your thoughts offering an apology to the hyacinth flattened beneath your shoe. 

With the realisation that his youngest brother has noticed you, Touya turns and lunges in Shouto’s direction with his teeth bared. It could almost be comical if not for the unpleasant murmurings of the crowd. In the short moment that Shouto is distracted, you jump down from the brick wall and slip away. 

You don’t look back. 

A small part of you had hoped your role in the story had ended, that you now might just move forward as best you can. Instead, you were shadowed by an overwhelming sense of dread everywhere you went. There was little to do besides work and walk, yet you couldn’t help but feel watched. The cashier at your local market, your neighbour, Kaiyo’s teacher, the food vendor on the corner; with just one look you can’t help but to think that they must know, that any day now this false peace will collapse onto you like a tonne of bricks. 

The anxiety keeps you up at night, counting the glowing stars stuck to the bedroom ceiling to pass the hours, tension threading itself into your muscle fibres. Kaiyo was warm where he laid curled at your side, but the loneliness — in all its violent emptiness — made the night colder. Despite it all, you missed Touya, your eyes still searching for him across the futon. 

Remnants of him are still scattered throughout the apartment. Should anyone come looking, there would be plenty of him to find. He’d hated having his picture taken, yet always gave in to you quickly, and you never needed to ask him for anything twice. There were photographs of his lips pressed to your hair, of his smile tucked against your neck, of his arms holding the baby; hand cradled around the crown of his head, his purpled scars a stark contrast to Kaiyo’s soft skin. 

He had treated fatherhood like he was a dying man, a clear red flag that you can only now see with hindsight. He had spoiled the two of you with his time and effort, no matter how uncomfortable it made him, because he knew any day might be his last. Touya was born with inherited wounds that were left to fester. To him, his failure was terminal, and no amount of love would undo that. 

The wood panels are cool beneath the soles of your feet as you pad your way through to the bedroom, bending at your knees to pick up stray toys and socks left throughout the hallway. There’s still an ache in your cheeks, the strain of smiling too long through all the tears and questions from your son that morning before school. You wish you had answers. 

Your shared room looks much emptier with the large futon hung over the balcony to dry. You find a small star in the centre of the room that has fallen from the ceiling. Held between your fingers in the daylight it is dull, a pale yellow, much different to the green glow it emits at night. Touya had bought them for Kaiyo after a series of bad dreams, lifting the boy onto his shoulders and letting him stick them wherever he pleased. 

Another piece of him. As you are slipping the star into your pant pocket, you hear a knock on the front door. You weren’t expecting anyone — rent had been paid, Kaiyo was with his sitter and your neighbours were at work. It sounds again, reverberating throughout the apartment, and the soft hair on your arm lifts in anticipation. 

There is a sense of embarrassment somewhere within you as you creep towards the entryway, keeping your body low and your steps light. You can hear muted, muffled voices through the cheap wood, fingertips carefully lifting the peep hole cover to look through. 

You hold your breath, stunned. There are two women just an arms length from you, both of them beautiful and horrifyingly familiar to you. Rei, Touya’s mother, stands with her head held high despite the nervous fiddling of her hands. Fuyumi, his sister, is clasping the strap of her shoulder bag with a white knuckled grip. 

“Mother, are you sure this is the place?” she asks, her eyes darting anxiously over the surroundings, “maybe Shouto made the wrong assumption”.

Rei is lovely, you think, even with the air of sadness  Her smile is gentle, and her expression softly determined. “The worst outcome to this is that he misunderstood the situation,” she replies, “but if this person is important to Touya then they’re important to me”. 

Fuyumi nods, shifting her weight between each foot. You inhale shakily through your nose, blinking back the dryness in your eye as you continue to watch through the lense. 

“He said… there was a child”. 

Your forehead bumps against the door as you startle, cursing under your breath, lungs tightening as the dread floods your system. The two women freeze alongside you, observing the door cautiously, glancing at one another in silent conversation. 

“If you’re there, we aren’t here to hurt you,” Rei lifts her hand, and rests it against the door in a show of reassurance, “I believe you know my eldest son. We only want to talk”. 

The push and pull of guilt, relief and fear forces the weight of your body to sink forward, drawn to the sincerity in her voice. There is no amount of time or distance that would dilute the loyalty you felt towards Touya. Letting them in would be a betrayal. 

“Please,” Fuyumi’s voice is wet, thickening with tears, “he’s my older brother. He’s refusing to talk about you or— or anything! We just want to—”

Rei turns to soothe her, and you’re reminded of your own parenthood. If something ever happened to Kaiyo you might just scorch the earth in your attempts to find him. It’s hard to swallow the swell in your throat as you watch his sister turn into the touch, seeking that comfort. 

Touya had loved his mother, a difficult thing for him to stomach but true all the same. He’d grieved the attention he never received from her, but you knew he didn’t blame her, and it is that which leads your hand to the door handle. 

Time feels like it’s in suspension. To see them standing so clearly before you without the film of dirt from the glass is still a shock to process. Behind you is a home filled to the brim with evidence of your own criminal involvement, the first photograph they’ll see hung in the hallway is of their grandson.

Kaiyo deserved his chance at having a family. 

“Please come in,” your fingers are trembling where they sit in your pocket, curled around the divots in the star. Please forgive me, you think. 

You step backwards to allow them through, both accepting with a short bow and a quiet thank you. It’s unnerving and tense, their stares lingering along the walls and shelves, the mother and daughter now hand in hand as they take a seat on your couch. 

“Would…” a blunt point of the star sinks into the thickest part of your palm, the sensation acting as your tether, “…can I get you anything to drink?” 

“Some tea would be wonderful,” Rei concedes, her voice full of earnest and so light it’s almost wistful. As you steep the leaves you can’t help but get the feeling she knew you needed more time.

The ceramic cups are old, stained with time and well loved. You fill them with hot water, tendrils of steam billowing warmth across your face, and place them atop the coffee table before kneeling onto the floor. 

Beneath your mug is a clumsily drawn cat, the marker permanently stained into the wood. There are others, too, little marks left by mistake. Faint lines of kanji where the ink had seeped through the paper, hearts and stick figures and stars. Rei reaches her hand out to trace a finger along them, lips pressed thinly in a sad smile. 

“I apologise for our unexpected intrusion,” she tells you, “I’m Himura Rei and this is my daughter, Todoroki Fuyumi".

“Believe it or not I’ve been waiting for someone to find us,” your hands wrap tightly around the hot cup, incognisant of the sting to your skin, “it was beginning to eat away at me a little bit”.

“Then Shouto was right,” Fuyumi mirrors you, keeping her voice soothing and calm as she speaks even as her eyes are tearful. You recall Touya telling you she was a teacher, and you can see why. 

“You did know him,” she says, “it looks like he spent… a lot of time here”.

You hear yourself laugh breathlessly at her tiptoeing of the subject, “he practically lived here until he decided to join the league. After that he stayed away for our safety, I suppose”. 

She nods, seeming to accept your answer, glancing then to her mother in a silent plea for assistance. “Could you tell us what he was like?” there’s a mellow, apologetic tone in Rei’s words, but to whom she was apologising you didn’t know.

“Could you tell us all the things we missed?”

So you sip your drink to smooth the dryness in your throat and it’s scalding against the roof of your tongue, and you tell them everything you know. 

After your first meeting you’d thought about him every day for a week, haunted by the intensity in his eyes and the marks on his skin. You had talked and talked and he had done nothing but listen. While you thought you'd never see him again it wasn’t long at all until he came back to your dingy clinic, this time of his own accord, in need of painkillers and suturing. 

He’d gone straight to you, rudely bypassing the doctors with any qualification in the ward, and shoved some money into the palm of your hand. He was still young, his attempts at carrying himself like a man seemed more like puppetry to you, but still you entertained it and attended to his wounds. 

“Since I’m still not fully trained you’ll need to sign this,” you remember holding out the clipboard to him, your supervisor lingering by the curtains, the impatient tap of her foot echoing in your ears. 

“Touya—” 

Back then his aversion to hearing that name was much greater. Every time it’d passed through your lips was as if you had pressed your thumb on a fresh bruise, and he’d lash out in kind. 

“Don’t call me that here!” 

“Why? Are you running from something?” 

He’d laughed at you with eyes that glittered like he was about to cry, but the tears never came, they never could. “Running implies that someone is looking for me,” his skin pulled uncomfortably taut as he smiled, “there’s no one to run from”.

“He dyed his hair black soon after that,” the mug held between your trembling hands grows cold, your tea mostly untouched and leaving a faint brown ring around the ceramic, “sometimes he would visit me all soaked with rain, and the colour would run down the back of his neck”. 

You pause every so often to offer them a chance to ask questions, but the two women remain quiet, listening raptly to your story. Their genuine trust and willingness to believe you bore a sense of unease, or perhaps guilt that you’d had him to yourself while they’d mourned. 

“Then things eventually progressed to… more,” even with the air of melancholy, you couldn’t help but take refuge in the normalcy of being timid around your partner's family, sheepish as you recount your relationship. 

“Did you love him?” Rei asks, and though not unkind, her question makes you feel unspeakably lonely. 

Loving Touya had felt nothing like a free fall, there was no moment in which you woke up and realised your feelings. It’d been no great feat to love him, no grand prize or climax at the end of a long battle; you saw all the worst parts of him and it didn’t change a thing. Even with all his flaws your feelings only deepened until they hollowed you out. 

Despite it all, you had walked into it knowingly, each step forward towards him a purposeful choice. 

You have only your own hunger to thank. Your eighteen year old self had been fiercely persistent, and however much he denied it, you knew he was drawn to your sympathy. Even though he was never entirely honest you pursued him with the small truths he did offer, motivated by the selfish wish to see him happy. 

“Yes,” in sickness and violence, in struggle and fear; you’d loved him through holidays and birthdays, through time spent apart and nights spent alone, “I love him”. 

“And the little boy, is he your son?”

Kaiyo. An unexpected yet happy accident. Named after forgiveness and the spitting image of his father, a red haired cherub, you both already knew the answer. “You can say it, Ms. Himura,” your smile strained as you run your thumb along the handle of your mug, “he’s our son. Mine and his”. 

Fuyumi exhales shakily, slumping forward like the fight left her body along with it. You can see the moment your confession truly registers, misty eyed and sparing a glance between one another. Turning on your knees, you reach into the shelves of the TV cabinet, grasping the framed photo of your son as an infant. 

Rei takes it from you delicately as you offer it to her with an outstretched hand and traces her fingers across the glass pane, circling the swell of Kaiyo’s pink cheek. It’s a personal favourite of yours — his arms are held above his head in triumph, the lower half slightly blurred from the excited kick of his feet. He’s grinning widely, so much so his eyes are squinted. 

Touya had been the one to take that photo, making ridiculous noises from behind the camera, the ghost of their intermingling laughter still ringing in your ears. 

“His name is Kaiyo and he’ll be turning four soon,” you watch warmly as Fuyumi leans over her mothers shoulder to get a better look, hand clutching at the fabric of her knit sweater, “the pregnancy was unexpected. We didn’t… I told Touya I would raise him myself, but he insisted on taking responsibility”. 

As you recall, the very notion that he wouldn’t stick around had offended him. He loved his son. He’d even cried over the baby scans, dry blood still smeared across black and white where they sit in your bedroom drawer. But you could see how the fear had eaten away at him throughout those nine months, restlessly doting on you and bringing home stolen things for the baby every few days but never being able to touch your growing bump. 

“Then, why did he join the league?” Fuyumi asks, but you were intuitive enough to see the real question between the lines. Why wasn’t any of this enough? Why did he leave this behind, too? 

You’d guessed from the beginning that his relationship with his family was, at best, a strained one. In reality it was worse than you could’ve imagined. The small pieces to his past that he let slip every now and then would always fill you with distress, at a loss for words. 

The reveal of who his father had been all you needed to understand the secrecy, of both his identity and of your relationship. 

“Stain,” you cross your arms over the surface of the coffee table, knees folded beneath it, and resist the urge to hide your face, “he continued to use his quirk so his condition was worsening, and his anger towards Endeavor had been festering for years”.

You ignore their plaintive wince at the mention of the pro, blunt nails curling into your inner wrists as you continue. “Touya felt his death didn’t matter. It didn’t change a thing,” and he had to watch his world move on without acknowledging it, “everything Endeavor did made him susceptible to Stain’s cause”.

Stain’s temporary reign of terror over Japan was the first time he’d ever heard anyone criticise hero society so blatantly. You remember the vengeful kindling in his eyes as he recited the vigilante’s words, your son sound asleep in his arms and none the wiser. 

It was that night, and every night that followed, that the stress had started to gnaw at your chest until you felt your lungs collapse under the weight. Panic gripped you each time he returned home with a new injury, the smell of smoke suffocating and clinging to the futon covers no matter how much you washed them. He carried a feral sense of excitement and restlessness that left you helpless — something had breathed new life into him, and it had not been you. 

Fighting had been pointless, your pleas like water to a ducks back. He loved you, he loved his son, and somehow he had rationalised that burning himself and the world would give rise to a better place.  

“He already died once,” your smile is tight but not as tight as your throat,  “and it did nothing. So this time he’d do it where it couldn’t be hidden, where everyone would have to look right at his self immolation and know their part in causing it”. 

It's then that Rei carefully places the photograph on the table as she lowers herself onto her knees, the frame remaining upright with the support of its stand. With her hands resting one atop the other, she leans forward into a full bow in front of you. 

You’re stunned with arms suspended in the air as you hesitate to reach for her, a swell of tears lining your eyes at her softly spoken apology. Your son watches over the exchange, his presence poignant even through an image. 

“Ms. Himura, please lift your head,” you shift towards her, close enough to thread your fingers over her own, feeling the peaks of her knuckles against your palm. 

“I failed him as his mother,” she says, overturning her hand to hold yours and squeezing, “it was those failures that led to your own suffering. I’m sorry”. 

In your peripheral you see Fuyumi as she moves to mirror her mother, sitting close beside you, fingers ghosting a chill along your forearm where she comes to entangle with the two of you. 

“Please don’t take responsibility for my pain. Besides, it wasn’t always terrible,” you stare at the knot of limbs, comforted by the gentle warmth of their touch, “I don’t think… I’ve ever met anyone who loves as much as your son does”. 

Rei’s eyes fall shut, a faint pinch between her brows, sorrowful as she replies: “I know”.  

Her expression is so full of regret it’s almost contagious, drawing you in and reminding you of your own mistakes. There’d been so many opportunities that you could’ve fought him, could’ve said something, but didn’t for fear of pushing him further away. 

“How did you find me?” 

Your voice cuts through the plaintive silence and you shrink under their gaze as their eyes lift. Fuyumi speaks in place of her mother, her thumb rubbing back and forth over your wrist. 

“Shouto saw you as Touya was being transferred, and in all honesty he didn’t think anything of it until Touya attacked him to keep the attention on himself,” she explains with an amused lilt, “he appeared to be very protective of you”.

Idiot, you think fondly. 

“I assure you he only told my mother,” Fuyumi squeezes your forearm once again as if to comfort you, “he was concerned and wasn’t sure if he just misunderstood. But we wanted to look for you to make sure”. 

“Then, the authorities aren’t aware?” 

“No,” Rei murmurs. 

You’re surprised by just how much you were being upheld by stress, shoulders sagging forward in relief, sinking your teeth into the soft inside of your cheek to withhold a whimper. 

“Thank you,” you say hoarsely, and you repeat it again and again until the two women have swaddled you in their arms, surrounded by the gentle scent of lavender and detergent. 

“You’re family to Touya, therefore you’re family to us,” Fuyumi reassures you, “you don’t have to do this alone anymore if you don’t want to”. 

Family. The prospect almost seemed too good to be true, an enticing offer laid out only to trap you at the end. You couldn’t risk Kaiyo’s safety or wellbeing, but their sincerity is so palpable it’s stifling. 

“How is he?” you ask instead, “is he safe?” 

“This knowledge isn’t available to the public, but he has been moved into a private villain corrections centre,” Rei looks at Kaiyo’s picture as she speaks, and you wonder if she sees Touya looking back.

“He will be undergoing rehabilitation with the hopes of one day joining us for a period of probation,” she continues, turning to you with a soft smile, “rest assured we have no intention of removing his autonomy. Touya consciously chose to carry out his actions and he should take responsibility for it…”

Her voice breaks, “… but we had our own part to play in his creation, and believe he deserves a second chance”. 

It’d sound like a perfect dream if you did not know Touya as intimately as you do. You’re unable to repress the grimace that crosses your expression. 

“He won’t be happy about that,” your eyes fall closed momentarily as you exhale, “he won’t see it your way. You already took his autonomy by removing his choice to die, that’s what he’ll think”. 

“You really do understand him, don’t you?” Fuyumi laughs mournfully, “he’s refusing to cooperate. He was relatively fine in police custody but since the transfer he’s become more hostile”.

The room grows a little smaller with every word. “Do you think it’s because I was there?” 

“Shouto asked twice who you were and Touya attacked him both times. It’s a big part of why he came to me about it, and why we knew we had to find you,” Rei says. 

It would make sense. Touya always smothered his anxiety with anger, a response that allowed him some control or imitation of power, and power meant safety. You knew he found common ground with his youngest brother, that being the reason he ultimately lost to him, but that didn’t mean he trusted Shouto. The thought of him restlessly wondering if you and Kaiyo were in danger causes your chest to tighten. 

“Maybe if you’re able to tell him we’re okay, he’ll start responding to treatment?” 

“Maybe,” Rei nods and then the apartment is veiled in heavy silence. It wasn’t unlike sitting at his wake. You wished he could bear witness to how much love you all felt for him. 

Suddenly, a muted beeping sounds from the thin, mint coloured watch clasped around Rei’s wrist. She sighs and pressed her lips into a thin, displeased line. “I’m sorry but we can’t stay longer. They still get a little nervous if I’m out too long,” she says. 

Right. She too had spent time locked away in a hospital. It must be difficult, you think, to have a mistake follow you wherever you went. A perfect recovery did not mean other people would forgive, or forget. 

Maybe one day, Touya would see that he and his mother are more similar than he realises. 

“That’s fine, Ms. Himura,” you bow forward towards her, and then again while addressing Fuyumi, “I’m grateful to you both for finding us”. 

“And we’re grateful you gave us a chance,” Fuyumi lifts her arms in an aborted motion as if to hug you, but decides against it, “we’d like to leave you with our contact information. If there’s anything you need or… if you’d like Kaiyo to visit, please don’t hesitate to call”. 

Their touch lingers long after they leave. The evening moves on, sun dipping below the seam of the horizon as it always does as if nothing had changed, an unintended reminder of how minuscule your problems really were. Kaiyo is returned home by his sitter, excitedly babbling about his day, rushing throughout the apartment with bare feet padding over the spot where his grandmother had been seated only hours before. 

You’re reminded of how intuitive he is when he curls himself around your thigh, asking you if you’re okay, if you were feeling sick or sad. There’s a guilt there that can only come with parenthood, your depression smothered like a wet blanket as you pull forward a smiling mask to wear, hoping it will placate his worry. 

“I’m okay baby,” you tell him with fingers combing through unkempt red hair, his eyes wide and bright and distinctly your own, “I’m just a little tired”.  

There is an anger that accompanies the insurmountable love you feel when you look at your son. It is difficult to accept his abandonment, to know you will have to be the one imparting that pain into him. So gentle, excitable and considerate of those around him, qualities taught to him by his supposedly villainous parents.

Despite his mistakes and doubts, Touya tried to be a good father, he’d wanted to be one. You suspected a lot of it came from a place of wishfulness, parenting his child in a way he’d wanted for himself, as painful as it might’ve been to realise just how little he’d mattered to his own. And you can see it now — Touya’s inherited wounds are steadily present on Kaiyo, a passing of the torch, and all you can do is try to stop the bleeding.

If you truly thought about it, you could say your whole relationship had carried a disquieting dark shadow beneath its skin, something of a spreading blood wheel. You overlooked it anytime he was callous and unruly, you’d cry and ache but it pleased you to know he still cared enough about himself to be angry. 

Soon after joining the league he’d gradually plateaued, urges satisfied, and you should’ve noticed. 

“Mama, look,” Kaiyo appears and lifts a thin sheet towards you, paper wrinkling under his chubby fingers, “I drawed dad!”

“Drew,” you warmly correct, cradling his cheeks as you duck to press a kiss to his forehead. The drawing is that of three stick figures, each one distinct with features. Touya’s figure has his black spiked hair, and across the lower half of its face is a purple shadow. His scars, you assume. 

It was all perfectly normal to Kaiyo; the sutures and rings, the burns, the ever present smell of smoke. From the moment he could open his eyes, they would follow his father with love and excitement. The admiration would sometimes unsettle Touya, too familiar, too much like looking into a reflection. 

“It’s brilliant, baby,” you tell him, gentle as you take it from his grasp, “shall we put it on the pinboard along with the others?”

He huffs, incensed by your request, “but I want to show my friends!”

Therein lies the dilemma. You wonder how often this problem will crop up in the years to come, how quickly you might run out of acceptable excuses as he becomes old enough to understand. Dabi was too easily recognised, even in your son's amateur rendition of him. 

“I really love this one though Kai, it has all of us,” you twist your lips into a cartoonish pout, pulling the sweet sound of a laugh from him, “please can I keep it?”

His childish glare withers as he fights a smile, the restrained happiness plain on his face and entirely contagious. “Ok mama, I guess,” he relents, innocent and forgiving, head tilted and cheeks pink under your praise. In moments like this, you can truly understand a parent's wish to freeze time. 

You recall Touya’s claim of putting good into the world before his death. You too could hardly believe that you’d raised such an unequivocally good little boy. But as you watch your son appraise his art with an excited wiggle, you’re reminded that children are not a tool for redemption. 

“I love you,” I promise I’ll be better for you, “and dad loves you too. How about we draw him another picture? I’ll do one aswell". 

“Okay!” he takes your hand and begins to pull you along the hallway towards his room, your back bent uncomfortably to lessen his reach. Halfway to his destination, Kaiyo pauses, pulling anxiously at the hem of his metallica shirt. 

“When… When is dad coming back from work?” 

That’s right. Work in Okinawa, you’d told him. A terribly flimsy excuse given in a moment of panic. At the time you just wanted him to have a reason to hold onto, to reassure himself with, but it was slowly coming back to bite you. 

“He still has a lot to do baby,” an understatement if you’d ever heard one, “it’ll be a little while. But we can be patient, can’t we?”

His lips purse into a pout, eyes shimmering with unshed tears as he bravely nods, and the thought of Rei’s phone number waiting in your contacts lingers in the forefront of your mind. 

Truthfully it haunts you throughout the rest of your week, stomach lined thickly with guilt. You eat, you work, you walk Kaiyo to school with eyes on every corner. You sleep in Touya’s most recently worn hoodie and pretend it’s his skin, his hands, too attached to his scent to wash it. 

Kaiyo continues to draw, to write and create. He brings graded homework back from school to keep in one of your old folders along with his other keepsakes; just in case Touya comes back, just so he can show him. 

You were looking over some of the old home made cards the night you finally called Rei, reliving another time and wondering if it ever really had been better, or if it’d just been a figment of your imagination. 

It can be difficult to know when a memory has been altered by nostalgia. 

“What’s this?” Touya had said as Kaiyo handed him a Father’s Day card, the inside lined with confetti and star sequins that toppled into his lap when opened. 

“I— I made it for you,” Kaiyo had explained nervously with eyes wide, hands flexing at his sides, “see… that’s you and— and me!” 

“Those potato shaped things are us?” Kaiyo had visibly deflated even with Touya’s playful tone, “this is pretty fuckin’ cool if you ask me”. 

“Freakin’,” you’d gently chided, lacking any heat for it to sound truly scolding at the time, too pleased by Kaiyo’s excited dancing. You recall the relaxed smirk on Touya’s lips and how he’d pressed a kiss to your shoulder, a rare moment of him being truly at ease and present. 

“And the heart, why s’it blue and not red?” 

“Because of your fire, dad!” Kaiyo grinned as he lifted his arms, mimicking the pose of a hero, “I hope I have blue flames, just like you”. 

Fragile. You'd watched on as Touya’s expression became strained, closing the card and setting it on the table, “I guess we better keep it somewhere safe since you worked so hard on it”. 

Into the folder it went. 

You decide to make the leap the following morning, allowing Kaiyo to sleep a little longer while you sift through your shared wardrobe for a suitable outfit. Work had happily allowed you a day off — even though they were chronically short staffed, you didn’t often call in sick so they were glad to give it to you. 

Usually Kaiyo would be dropped off with his sitter, an older woman known in the neighbourhood for fostering children. She’d been around for a long time, had seen and worked with many a criminal, and she understood young people more than you could comprehend. You trusted her with your son, trusted that even if he unknowingly slipped up she wouldn’t say a thing. 

But today that wasn’t necessary. You feel the fabric of the small knitted sweater between your fingers, frowning at the aggravating itch. He wouldn’t wear this, too scratchy, but it was also the closest to nice clothing he had. 

It isn’t like you’re living in poverty, but one mistake and it could very well be a truth for you. Clothes were fine as long as they fit — Kaiyo loved the little band tees his father would bring him more than anything, he didn’t care much for formal wear. 

The unbidden image of Touya’s displeased scowl flashing through your thoughts is enough for you to put the sweater back. Forcing Kaiyo to conform for the sake of his wealthier relatives, indicating that your own reality was something lesser, is something you wouldn’t do. Something Touya would hate you for. 

A small lump curled up beneath the futon covers begins to move. Kaiyo stirs, almost as if he can feel your turmoil, sleep lined eyes searching for you. 

“Ma?” 

“Mornin’, handsome,” a smile pulls naturally at your lips and warmth unfurls in your chest when he reaches for you. Half of his hair is pressed flat to the side of his head where he’d laid. 

He blinks slowly from your lap, his fathers nose wrinkling as he surveys the clothes you’d been mulling over. It’s an unspoken question. 

“I have a surprise for you so I wanted to find something nice for you to wear,” you tell him, hand rubbing along the length of his back. He perks up noticeably, foot kicking out against the sweater you’d just been holding. 

“Don’t like that one,” he says. You laugh, eyes closing for a moment to silently send thanks to Touya, even if he had just been a fleeting piece of your imagination. 

“Thought so,” you murmur, leaning forward to move it aside, “pick something for yourself, then. Make sure it’s something you’ll feel good in, because we’re going to meet some new people today”. 

“Who?” he asks, mouth wet and shaped into an ‘o’ as he fists his hands into another one of his dark coloured t-shirts. 

“You know how a lot of your friends have more than just a mother and father?”

He mumbles a dejected ‘yes’. 

“Well, I know you’ve been missing dad so I thought we might be able to connect with him in a different way,” you explain, helping him lift his pyjama shirt over his head and refraining from pinching his belly. 

“What would you say if I told you… I was going to take you to see your grandma right now?” 

“Grandma?!” he squeaks from behind the clean shirt you loop over his head, frowning then as you help him push his arms through the sleeves, releasing a small noise of complaint. 

“That’s right, your dad's mother,” — your smile dims slightly while he insists on dressing himself, reminded of how quickly the time has passed, how much he was growing — “I guess he didn’t talk about his family a lot did he?”

Kaiyo shakes his head excitedly, bouncing on his toes as he struggles to tug his pants over his clean underwear. He relents and allows you to do up the fiddly top button of his trousers. 

“That’s not all…” 

“More?!”

“You have an auntie and two uncles,” you tell him, and his hands fly to cover his mouth as he begins to dance with excitement. His joy is contagious, you feel it fill you and spill over as you pull him back into your lap, holding him tightly. 

Rei and the siblings, that had been the deal. No Endeavor. Touya may forgive the former, but never the latter. You wouldn’t do that to him.

It isn’t strenuous getting him out the door, but it is taxing to get him to the station, hair once again tucked under a knitted beanie despite the day's warmth. He jumps over the cracks in the pavement, follows the pattern with his feet, stops to greet every stray he sees. 

And you let him. Because his happiness is your own, and you dread to imagine him without it. Maybe it was selfish for you to cover his ears to the cruelty around him. He knew of fear, pain and crime, he knew that people sometimes did bad things to others. But it had never been personal to him, not yet. 

Perhaps the biggest question as a parent was just that — at what point do you expose your children to what may hurt them? 

You had told Rei the cover story ahead of time, embarrassed by your own lies, but she’d been understanding. Gentle. Somehow it only left you more ashamed. 

You wanted to preserve the innocent lense in which he viewed the world, wanted to encase the image he held of his father in amber. Because when you’re a child, the power of those traumas stay with you, chemically alter you; they become the epicentre of your nightmares, they shape your convictions and morals, they fuel your will. Touya knew that more than anyone. 

You observe Kaiyo while he watches the surroundings change, clutching the backrest of his seat as he looks out the train window, propped up on his knees and ignorant of the glare from the elderly woman beside him. Folded on her lap is the morning newspaper, a grainy black and white photo of flames and the words ‘Where is Endeavor’s Villainous Son?’ printed across the front. 

You adjust the hat, his eyes fixed on the moving landscape. He’d never been this far out of the Kanagawa prefecture, Touya’s unease with regards to your safety always taking precedence over the freedom to explore, so you let him press his nose to the glass and laugh as his voice begins to vibrate with the train. 

“Do you remember the names I told you?”

“Yumi!”

“Fuyumi,” you emphasise, tucking the tag by his neck back into the confines of his shirt, “who else?”

He holds out his fist, fingers unfurling one by one as he counts, seeking your praises as he goes. “Fuyumi… Shouto… Natsu…o… Natsuo!”

The two hour journey passes in what feels like a minute. With one blink the train arrives in Shizuoka, slow as it pulls up to the second platform, the anticipation knotting thickly like yarn in your gut. Kaiyo, as perceptive as he can be, is bubbling with too much enthusiasm to notice your inner turmoil. 

You hold him on your hip, arms pressing him close into your chest as the sliding doors part, and step into the throngs of people waiting to board the train. As if you’d been in a soundproof bubble the noise of the city amplifies, a cacophony of voices and cries and whistles echoing uncomfortably in your ears. There are suits everywhere, hats tipped over eyes, too many unknowns in such a crowded space. 

The relief of stepping out onto the clear street almost buckles you. Kaiyo is squirming in complaint, wanting to be put back on the pavement but you hike him up a little higher. You couldn’t let him down, couldn’t let him out of reach, couldn’t let anyone take him. 

“Sorry baby, you can walk soon. I just need to find the car first—”

You’re interrupted then by a low, nasal voice, startling you to pivot on your feet. Behind you stands a large figure, bowler hat held politely to his chest as he bows forward. Kaiyo shrinks into the crook of your neck at the sight of a stranger, sensing your unease. The man repeats your name, the well groomed moustache sitting on his top lip moving as he speaks, curled into spirals at either end. He’s formally dressed, wearing a three piece suit and a large black topcoat. 

“That is you, correct?”

Grappling at your thoughts, you recall the riddle that you had given to Rei after her suggestion of having you picked up. She hadn’t wanted you to make your own way there, adamant that the family staff would drive the two of you to her home, and you gave in only at the promise of a safeword.

You inhale to steady yourself. “What is it that, given one, you’ll have either two or none?”

His eyes soften considerably but it does nothing to soothe the tension, only when he gives you the answer do you let yourself relax. “A choice,” he says, “my apologies. I should have been more considerate of your circumstances”. 

Circumstances. What a kind understatement. 

“My name is Ono Hiroki, I’m under the service of Ms. Himura and will be your driver,” he continues with a well meaning tilt to his head as he leans towards Kaiyo in greeting, “and what is the young master's name?”

You feel your son shift beneath your chin, presumably to look up at Hiroki, but he remains stubbornly quiet. “This is Kaiyo,” the grip he has on your shirt lessens at the sound of your voice, “we appreciate you coming out here to meet us but… please don’t refer to him with that title”. 

Touya would turn his nose up if he heard. You can almost imagine the shiver that may have run down his back just now, wherever he may be, and the thought forces you to hide a smile into Kaiyo’s knitted hat. 

“Of course,” Hiroki assents, and he begins to lead you towards the car. You cringe at how obviously it stands out amongst the more common models, clearly something owned by someone with great wealth and status. Even with having chosen your best outfit, the clothes on your back suddenly felt like straw, cheap and unfit for the occasion. 

The drive is smooth, though your sense of time becomes warped — had someone asked you how long it took to arrive, you wouldn’t have an answer for them. Kaiyo, just as he had done on the train, pressed his nose and fingers to the window; leaving behind murky smudges against the glass. 

As the car pulls to the curb you’re left feeling alienated by the neighbourhood. Worse, Hiroki steps out and speeds around to your door, opening it for you with a reflexive bow. 

It feels… uncomfortable. 

The property itself is walled off from the street and the building is large, though you’re sure that’s only in comparison to your own homes. You’re drawn in by the greenery that surrounds it, though the trees were likely put there for the sake of privacy the garden was clearly a labour of love. 

It appears to be a single story house, the roofs tiled dark brown with broad waves and an exterior hallway that frames around each room. You could picture Rei tending to her garden while her children sat on the veranda in the summer months. 

It was beautiful. 

Hiroki slowly leads you up the path, the gravel between each step crunching beneath your shoes. The pace can be attributed to Kaiyo’s adamance in standing on each individual stone, which the man kindly indulges. 

The entrance is made up of a large sliding door with plaster slitted windows. Hiroki pushes it across and moves aside to allow you into the house. You murmur in wonderment at the width of the genkan, the wall above the shoe cupboard  lined with traditional calligraphy. 

“Yes— it’s fine! I’ll bring them through…”

A sweet, familiar voice echoes throughout the entryway. Kaiyo tucks himself against the back of your knees as Fuyumi rounds the corner, socked feet slipping slightly on the wooden flooring in her excitement. 

Her lips part to greet you, the words caught in her throat as her gaze is drawn to the movement behind your legs. Typically Kaiyo could be quite rambunctious around others, loud and eager to befriend others. Here you can feel his anxiety, how small he must feel in this large, unfamiliar place. 

Fuyumi, too, is at a loss for words. A little pale, teary eyed as she blinks, visibly composing herself in front of you both.  “It’s good to see you again, Fuyumi,” you say as the silence stretches on, taking pity on her. 

Her demeanour lightens, and she appears grateful. Somehow her awkward loss of words and your son's hesitance lent you courage even if you, too, did not have your footing. 

“How about we take off our shoes and make proper introductions?” the question ends with a soft hum, a gentle verbal push, reaching back to pluck the hat from Kaiyo’s head. 

His hair is mussed, cowlicks pointed in all directions after being pressed beneath the yarn. You run your hand through it, wetting the pads of your fingers to flatten some of the more unruly curls down until they’re neat. The red is brighter in the sunlit genkan, and Fuyumi does well to conceal her sharp inhale. 

Kaiyo steps forward, nervously wringing out the material of his t-shirt, and Fuyumi lowers herself to his height as if approaching a cornered animal. Tender with her motions, she reaches out to still his anxious tic, ducking her head to smile where he can see it. A teacher, you remember. 

“It’s so wonderful to meet you Kaiyo. I’m your aunt Fuyumi,” she says. He turns over his wrist and takes three of her fingers into his fist, head nodding forward in what you know to be a bow. 

“Nice to meet you, aunt Fuyumi,” he replies. 

“Don’t worry about formalities, sweetheart,” she uses her free hand to straighten out the hem of the shirt, her eyes flickering over the logo with some recognition, “you can call me ‘Yumi. You are my nephew, after all”. 

Kaiyo straightens his back, overjoyed by the privilege, and looks up to share the feeling with you. If you could read his thoughts you’d guess it was something along the lines of told you her name was ‘Yumi, mama. 

“Natsuo isn’t here yet as he stayed overnight at his girlfriend's dorm,” Fuyumi continues as she rises to her feet, still keeping a firm hold of Kaiyo’s hand, “but mother and Shouto are in the tatami room. She likes having all the doors open on a day like this while we sit together, would you like to meet them?”

“Yes!”. In his excitement he pushes up onto the tip of his toes, shedding his timid attitude and grinning so wide his cheeks begin to pinken. It’s infectious, Fuyumi brightening considerably at his sudden comfort in her presence, and she begins to guide you both through the house. 

Soft spoken murmurings become louder as you approach the open sliding door into what you presume is the tatami room. Kaiyo pauses a few steps before, hidden behind the panel, waiting until you’re close enough for him to wrap an arm around your thigh. 

“You’re ok, baby,” you whisper warmly, “let’s go in together”. 

You enter the room with an awkward gait, slowed by the weight of your son against your leg, the matts firm beneath your feet. Immediately you are embraced by the scent of earth and autumn bellflower. Rei is seated on a pale green cushion across from Shouto, cross legged and holding a steaming cup of tea with both hands, on the table between them is a vase blooming purples and blues. You garner their attention, self-consciousness twisting uncomfortably in your chest as they appraise you and Kaiyo, a part of you always ready to jump to his defences. 

But the two, despite the cool air and unreadable expressions, only seem to thaw as their eyes fall to your son. 

The light knock of Shouto’s mug levelling atop the table surface brings you above water. “Greet your grandmother properly, sweetheart,” you step further into the space and lower to your knees, Kaiyo mirroring your actions with caution, facing Rei with his hands resting politely on his knees. 

You bow forward, thank you for having us Ms. Himura, and watch with fond exasperation as Kaiyo leans until his forehead is touching the tatami in your peripheral. “It’s nice to meet you, grandmother. It’s— it’s nice to meet you, uncle Shouto,” he recites, “my name is Kaiyo!”

You smile at the force behind the words, as if he’d practised them in his mind repeatedly before arriving. Rei appears to come to the same conclusion, returning the words and beckoning him to sit beside her, and Fuyumi ushers you to take a seat by Shouto.

In closing the distance Rei appears mystified, eyeline wet as she blinks back the tears, hands lifting to cradle your son's face in her palms. Kaiyo tenses for a moment on contact, shoulders relaxing as her thumbs graze over the swell of his cheeks. You wonder who she was truly seeing as she looked at Kaiyo, a little boy almost identical to her own. “My hands are a little cold, aren’t they?” her voice is soft, weak. There’s an intonation of grief, of regret, and an apology in her eyes. 

And your son, ever loving and perceptive, covers them with his own as if to tell her it doesn’t bother him in the slightest. Then he shifts closer on his knees until he’s tucked against her chest, her chilled touch running along the length of his back as she holds him. At your side you feel Shouto exhale a short, hot breath of emotion. 

“Tea?”

You look to see Fuyumi has set out more cups, now with a pale cream teapot in her grip, unphased by the temperature as tendrils of steam wisp and dance from the spout. Along the curve of her jaw is a single tear, and she tilts to wipe it on her shoulder with a weak sniffle. You feel it too, pulling the sleeves of your shirt over your wrists to conceal the trembling, lifting your chin to keep the emotions behind your eyelids.

“That’d be great,” you nod, accepting the cup that Shouto slides towards you, “thank you”. 

You’re tempted to thank Fuyumi again as you bring the ceramic to your lips, a slight sting to the skin of your palms and your lower lip, breathing in the potent scent of green tea. This family must enjoy it a little stronger, steeping the leaves for longer, the bitterness heavy on your tongue. There is at least some respite in the distraction it provides — you could not talk if your mouth was busy. 

Kaiyo ignores the silences, leaving his grandmother's lap to squeeze himself next to Shouto. You try not to laugh, the youngest at a loss for what to do as your son looks up at him in wonderment and admiration, though it is hard to restrain yourself at the barrage of questions Kaiyo targets him with. 

“Are you really going to be a pro hero, uncle Shouto?”

“I am,” he replies solemnly, “I’ll be a hero that my family can rely on. Do you want to be a hero?”

“Hell no!” 

“Kaiyo—”

“I’m going to go to space,” he barrels on without a care, too wrapped up in his own passion to recognise the informality, but with Rei’s quiet laugh you realise there was no need to worry. As Kaiyo stumbles over his words about asteroids and comets, about how the sunset on mars is blue and isn’t that so cool, Shouto seems to relax even further. 

“He doesn’t think he’s good at talking to children,” Fuyumi whispers at your side, “believe me, Kaiyo is doing him a favour”. 

Even as the time passes Shouto’s tea remains steaming in his left hand while yours begins to cool, and Rei observes their back and forth with an autumn bellflower petal between her fingers, gently as she handles it like it were something precious. There’s no tension, any growing pains soothed as Kaiyo soaks up the attention, the beating heart of the room. 

“I’m gonna go to space an’ clean up all the junk,” he announces. A goal that you’d heard many a time, manifested in his fathers arms one evening as they’d sat together watching a pre-quirk era documentary about space travel. 

“Pro heroes came along and suddenly we forgot everything that used to be important to us,” Touya muttered, “going to space is—”

“—a hero's job in its own right,” Shouto says. 

You do well not to drop your drink as Kaiyo launches himself into Shouto’s lap, one of his arms outstretched to not spill his own while the other steadies the boy to his chest. Gleeful, childish laughter wells throughout the room, paired with the balmy sun and the whistle of a Japanese tit flitting through the gardens. 

“Dad told me that too,” you feel as the mother, the sister and the brother all hold their breath at the mention of Touya, the one topic they weren’t sure if they could even touch upon, “do you really think so, uncle Shouto?” 

“I do…” he shifts, hugging Kaiyo only after glancing at you for permission, “...and you don’t need to prefix my name with ‘uncle’ every time. You can be casual”. 

“Prefix?” 

“A word that comes before another,” you interject gently, “he means you can just call him Shouto, baby”. 

In that instance your back straightens at the sound of another voice ringing throughout the house, low and distant. “I’m home,” they shout with familiarity, “sorry I’m late!”.

Fuyumi jumps to her feet, leaving to meet the new arrival, and Kaiyo watches her go with a chubby fist curled into Shouto’s sweater. He pats his hand awkwardly to Kaiyo’s thigh in reassurance, “don’t worry, it’s just Natsuo. He’s my other older brother”. 

Kaiyo lessens his grip, tentative as he watches the open doorway, and you can’t help but to reflexively reach out to pinch his cheek. “It’ll be fine,” you murmur. 

Your first impression of Natsuo is that he’s much bigger than his siblings. He must’ve inherited his build from his father and his demeanour in spite of him, because even with the chill that he brings, his grin is refreshing. The type of person that sets you at ease and wordlessly invites you in, that actively wants you to feel welcomed. 

“Wow, you’re really here. You’re really…” Natsuo's throat bobs as he swallows his next words, silenced by Fuyumi’s encouraging touch. Rather, he hastily greets his mother with a kiss to the cheek, and then he settles down at the table facing Kaiyo. 

A litany of emotions flicker through his face, like he wasn’t sure how he was supposed to feel. Even so, his smile doesn’t waver as he introduces himself to you, nervously rubbing his neck as he bows. 

“And you must be Kaiyo. I’m Natsuo, I guess that makes me your uncle,” he inhales deeply, chest expanding and falling, “you… you really do look like your dad”. 

He sounds mournful. Kaiyo senses the change in atmosphere, though he doesn’t understand it, and the anxiety settles into his restless fingers as they pick a thread loose from Shouto’s sweater. 

Fuyumi lightly swats at him: “Natsuo, you’re freaking them out!” 

He gives a wounded complaint, dramatic only in a way you can find with siblings as he clutches at his bicep, and Kaiyo laughs. Like it was called upon, the sun moves from behind a cloud and brightens the room. 

“Sorry, buddy. I didn’t mean to be awkward, I was just surprised,” he says. 

Kaiyo slides down from Shouto’s lap, the youngest briefly forlorn at the loss before schooling his expression once more. “It’s ok, mama said I look like dad too. That’s why I’m so handsome,” he grins triumphantly. 

Your chest knots tightly at the spotlight it shines on your relationship with Touya, thoughts running amok with assumptions of what they must think of you, whether they approve of how you have raised Kaiyo. But despite your inner conflict the family don’t flinch, in fact — they smile with him. 

“Touya was indeed a beautiful little boy,” Rei briefly looks at the purple petal still held between her fingers, “I have a lot of pictures here. Would you like to see?” 

Kaiyo scrambles, almost knocking the table as he stands, “yes please, grandmother!”

There’s an air of nostalgia as she leans down to take his smaller hand into her own, in the way he looks up with love, height falling just short of her hip. The last time she had seen her children this size had been before she was sent away. You can’t even begin to comprehend such a loss.

“Just 'grandma' is fine,” she assures, and Kaiyo bounces with each step as they leave to find the photographs. 

You realise, then, that you are left alone with the siblings. Fuyumi pours more tea, the sound of running water loud in your ears, Natsuo’s words barely audible to you. 

“I wanted to thank you,” he says, cup in hand with his thumb anxiously tapping the rim, “for being there for Touya when we couldn’t be. For bringing Kaiyo here even when you have every right to distrust us”. 

The words pick away at the composure you’d maintained throughout the morning, their gratitude, while completely genuine, feels undeserved. In the grand scheme of things your relationship to Touya had not changed much at all, perhaps he’d staved off his mission for a while to play house with you, but the outcome was the same. 

“It isn’t you that I distrust,” the ‘Endeavor’ goes unspoken, “I wanted Kaiyo to keep his connection to his father. And you don’t need to thank me, I didn’t…”

Didn’t help him. Didn’t save him. Didn’t stop him. You only loved him. You laid with him in darkness and thought if you held him tight enough that something might crack, that the light might get in. 

“What I did wasn’t enough,” you tell them, the words broken with your wet exhale, “it was your actions, your dedication to understanding him. It’s… it’s you I should thank, Shouto”.

“Still,” Fuyumi is tender as she speaks, her hand resting between your shoulder blades, “knowing that all that time he wasn’t alone, knowing that he had you, it means a great deal to us all”. 

Even if he hadn’t been alone for those few years, there was still a rotten past from before he met you that he wouldn’t touch. Touya, stone faced and eyes narrowed, watching you from beneath the sheets of his hospital bed as if he were a wounded animal. Your slow, telegraphed actions, promising respite. That’s why despite wanting to stay away from you, he couldn’t — because you saw who he was, and you still loved him. The burning flesh, the distended skin, the smoke and the blood. You saw the bodies on the news, you saw the flames across the city, and you still loved him. 

Maybe that was the only thing you got right; because there isn’t much else worse than someone loving the potential of who you could be, or loving someone you’re not. In the end, you think, we all want to be seen first and loved second. 

“I do think he’s worried about you,” Shouto interjects plainly, “ he’s not directly asking about your wellbeing because he doesn’t want to reveal your identity, but the staff say he’s restless”. 

“You can be quite perceptive, Shouto,” Fuyumi says. 

“A friend of mine has told me that before,” there’s a flicker of a smile pulling at his lips and it warms his expression. If you needed to attach a word to it you’d pick fond. 

“Though he also said I make all the wrong assumptions about what I’m seeing,” he exhales through his nose in what you think might be a laugh, “that’s why I went to my mother first. This seemed… too important to be wrong about”.

“I’m truly grateful for your discretion,” you wipe a tear along the heel of your hand, ignoring the sting in your sinuses, “and for your acceptance of us”.

“You’re our family now,” Natsuo’s grin widens, “and I can’t say I wasn’t curious ‘bout the kind of person my brother fell in love with”.

You knew what Touya would say to that. You're too good for me, I don’t want to hurt you. You should’ve seen through it then, with every premature apology. People only say those things when they know they’re going to hurt you. 

Over your thoughts you hear the siblings begin to talk again with affection, your eyes drawn to the empty end of the table. You should be here, you think, I wish you were here. 

Kaiyo returns excitedly with a large picture frame held to his chest, the paint worn and flaking, encasing an old school photograph of Touya. His uniform is buttoned to the top, face youthful and pale, not a scar to be seen. You recall his discomfort with high collared clothing, always irritable against his sutures. 

Following behind is Rei with an album of family pictures. Some of them have been awkwardly cut, some burnt along the edges, some faces notably scribbled over with a pen almost out of ink.

“Mama look, he really does look like me. And dad’s hair was white! Did he colour it like that, too?”

“No sweetheart,” you murmur with gaze fixed to the page as it turns in Rei’s lap, the siblings all gathered around to look, “remember, he told you he had red hair like yours, but it changed like magic”. 

“So cool,” he mumbles in awe under his breath, “dad is so cool”. 

Rei stiffens minutely. Maybe that, too, was uncomfortably familiar. 

The conversation continues into the late afternoon, moving only to sit beneath the clear skies and stretch your legs, Rei guiding you along her well loved flowerbeds. They tell Kaiyo stories of his father, diluted but true for the most part, their smiles tightening with the memories. It feels odd, wrong, mourning a man that is very much alive. You give them a piece of him and in exchange, they offer one back as the hours pass. You come to know another Touya — their Touya — and when you line him up aside your own you find that they aren’t all that different.  

As Kaiyo’s confidence grows with his newfound family he begins to wander. Natsuo lifts him into the air and he laughs joyfully, a sound you wish you could solidify and keep by your breast, and they take off to hide in the house with Fuyumi close behind. 

“Are you sure it’s ok for him to play indoors? I’d hate to leave any mess—”

Rei smiles. The light reflects against the crown of her head forming something of a white halo and Shouto is at her side, eyes softening at his mothers happiness. 

“I assure you it’s alright,” she says, “truthfully I think I’ve missed the mess”. 

You think of toys left astray, crayon smudging cheap wallpaper, juice rings staining the coffee table. Marks of your little boy left all around the apartment. Touya cursing as he steps on a building block, hopping on one leg theatrically to make Kaiyo laugh. Touya spilling the warm bottle of milk as he falls asleep and Kaiyo on his chest, exhausted from a day without rest. 

“I know what you mean,” you reply. 

Shouto only blinks. You couldn’t imagine that he was allowed to make much of a mess at all, and that thought alone makes you ache. His brow furrows then, and anticipation settles in your gut. 

“There was something we wanted to ask of you now Kaiyo is distracted,” he seeks Rei’s support as he talks, and she nods gently before turning to face you. 

“As we’ve told you… Touya is not being cooperative to treatment. In all honesty, we are getting anxious that he will be removed from the programme,” she says with regret, “you are free to refuse. But as you suggested when we first met, I thought he might benefit from knowing you’re safe”.

It feels as if the ground beneath your feet has steepened, a weightlessness flooding through your chest, and you reach for the closest pillar on the veranda to steady yourself. 

“You’ll let me visit him?” 

“Strings can be pulled to get you a visitor's pass,” Shouto confirms sagely, “typically it is for professionals or family. Which you now are”.

You hadn’t even let yourself entertain the idea of being able to see him again. The possibility of hearing his voice, of holding him again, felt too good to be true. 

“And Kaiyo? Where will he stay?” you ask, “I can’t take him with me, I don’t want him to see his father like that—” 

Approaching you from the house is the soft, pitter patter of socked feet. You feel a weight fall on your back, Kaiyo interrupting to wrap his limbs around your waist and neck, giggling into your nape. Natsuo lands unceremoniously on the tatami matts, leaning himself against the inside of the sliding door panels with pink blossoming on his cheeks, “damn, kid. You’ve got too much energy”.

“Your house is so big, grandma,” the words carrying a little embarrassment as Kaiyo says “ours is a lot smaller”.

“Sometimes houses are too big,” Natsuo reassures as he slumps forward to rest his chin against his fist, “you can get lost and feel lonely in a big house. I bet at your place, you can always find your mama, huh?” 

He nods, bouncing on the balls of his feet and rocking your body forward with the motions, “does that mean dad was lonely in the big house?” 

Rei’s hands wring tightly in her lap, the question pulling a forlorn atmosphere over the three, and you’re quick to try and rectify it. “Even if he was, he won’t be anymore because he has you,” you say as you twist your body to pull him into your arms, squirming as your touch curls against his ticklish stomach, “isn’t that right?” 

“Yes,” he stammers between deep inhales, giggles tumbling from his lips and ringing across the garden. Rei reaches to thread her fingers through his hair, the red stark against her skin.

“You are both free to sleep in my guestroom tonight,” she offers warmly in response to your earlier concern, “we will watch him while you’re busy tomorrow”. 

“We can have a sleepover!” Natsuo shouts, the excitement forcing him to sit straight and eyes gleaming. Kaiyo gasps, mirroring his uncles enthusiasm as he clings to your shoulders. Shouto, however, remains plain faced as his gaze flickers between the two. 

“Is it really that fun?” he asks. You hide your abrupt laugh into Kaiyo’s hair as Natsuo’s expression settles into disbelief. 

“What? You’ve never had a sleepover in the dorms?”

“We have a curfew,” Shouto shrugs, and Natsuo guffaws.

“What the f… heck is wrong with your school—”

As they bicker you observe contentment settle around Rei. A gentle breeze passes through the shrubbery and you hear the leaves rustling, light breaking through the canopy above and dancing along the grass. Fuyumi calls everyone back into the house as the scent of curry is coaxed out into the open, and you all make your way to the dining area. 

The night comes sooner than you expect. Kaiyo whines at the full feeling in his stomach, cheeks orange and smattered in sauce. Apparently Rei brought over all the childrens things during her move — everything, from toys to certificates to baby clothes, and you’re offered the hand me downs with a wistful smile. 

Aside from the red sleeves the shirt is white, a flame embroidered into the centre and the word fire written below it. Then you’re given an old blanket, slightly thread bare and clearly well loved. It is a light purple, faded after years of being washed, and dotted with stars. It’d belonged to Touya, she’d said, he always loved stars. Kaiyo clutches it tightly to his chest where he lay across from you on the guest futon. 

“Did you have fun today?”

The covers shift, a tell tale sign that he’s kicking his feet. “Yes mama,” he mumbles, nose wrinkling as he fights to keep his eyes open, “I feel really happy”. 

“I love you baby,” you hum fondly, leaning over to needlessly readjust the covers once more, if only for an excuse to kiss his forehead again, “are you sure you’ll be alright while I’m gone tomorrow?” 

Kaiyo nods, cheek turned against his pillow, jaw already slackening as he succumbs to sleep. It isn’t home, there’s no glowing iridescence on your bedroom ceiling tonight, but the space across from you feels empty as it always does. 

“Watching you two sleep soundly together was the happiest I’d ever been,” he’d said. You have no doubt in your mind that he had been telling you the truth. 

When you're pulled into consciousness it happens gently, the house so quiet that it’s unsettling. You were used to rousing with voices in the streets, car engines spluttering as they passed, thuds from the apartment above your own. Here it’s peaceful, a reality that you never thought you’d come close to, and for a moment you can hardly believe you’re awake. 

The staff offer to make the two of you breakfast but you politely refuse, a possessive twist in your stomach. Accepting help never came easily to you, a deeply buried seed of insecurity in your heart that first leapt to defensiveness. You could feed your son just fine on your own. 

Rei joins you soon after tending to her potted plants, Kaiyo pushing up onto the tip of his toes to kiss her cheek as she holds her dirtied hands away from his clean clothes, passing by you to wash the soil from between her fingers. “Grandma, will you have breakfast with us?”

“Of course,” she smiles. 

The rest of the family slowly trickles into the dining room with slow, sleep leaden movements. A full table, a full heart, a full stomach. Breakfast tastes all the better in their company, even Kaiyo seems to have soaked up the serene atmosphere as he quietly recounts a strange memory he had to Fuyumi. 

Still, the dread begins to settle, your knee bouncing restlessly and concealed by the table cloth. Hiroki enters the house with a deep bow and a lanyard around his wrist, your ID badge clipped securely to the end. “It’s best we leave now to avoid any run-ins with the press,” he tells you apologetically, “the likelihood is low. But I’d like to completely mitigate the chance, if possible”. 

Kaiyo lingers in the genkan, shifting on either foot, fiddling with the strings on his sleep shorts. “I’ll be back later, baby,” you hook your pinky around his and squeeze, “I promise”.

He presses a wet kiss to your cheek and you do not wipe it away, the morning air cooler on the skin where the imprint is left. An off duty officer waits by the curb to follow behind Hiroki’s vehicle — another safety precaution, they say — and he opens the side door on your behalf. 

“What will happen once we get there?” you ask, stare fixed on the streets as they speed past, flocks of people continuing with their days as normal. The thin, plastic card in your hands feels like lead. 

“Upon arrival the officer will escort you to the reception as I am not permitted to enter the building,” he explains while subtly adjusting the rear view mirror to watch you, “you will sign yourself in and then you’ll just have to wait. I’m afraid Master Touya isn’t aware that you are his visitor, so it’s entirely possible he’ll refuse to see you…”

Eventually the words become muffled, a disjointed hum in your ears, and your fingers tighten around the lanyard. You play out every hypothetical in your head, try to script questions in preparation, explanations and excuses. But you come up empty. 

Anything that you think of would be rendered useless as soon as you laid eyes on him. 

Pulling in, you survey the land. The facility is double fenced, double gated, and for all intents and purposes it looks to be a prison. There are patients spread out across the grounds, some lounging in the shade while others gathered under staff supervision. 

Surprisingly you are hesitant to part ways with Hiroki, the man bidding you goodbye with a bow and with promise to pick you up as soon as you’re done. The click of your shoes echoes throughout the building as you walk, the accompanying officer striding ahead of you and silent, beckoning you hastily through the security scanners.

A man stands incredibly tall behind the desktop screen situated atop the main desk, large auburn jackrabbit ears protruding from the crown of his head, paired with two large antlers. As you approach his nose wrinkles. 

“Pass?” he asks, interrupting any chance of you greeting him. You swallow the agitation in your chest and show him the ID card, to which he scans with a handheld device and waits until it beeps. Satisfied, he hands you a clipboard detailing a list of names and tells you to find yours. 

“Write your signature in the arrival slot, and when you leave write it in the departure slot. Wait to be called upon in the seating area”. 

You exhale shakily as you sink into your chair, taking in the room, unable to describe it as anything other than impersonal. You had spent a good deal of adulthood working in a clinical setting, and yet this place only seems to make you uneasy. No colourful posters, no informative leaflets, no magazines for people to read. No stickers by the doors, no colour in the staff uniform, guards posted at every entrance. 

Eventually a red light above the doors to the wards flashes red, a loud buzz cutting through the silence and startling you so harshly your chair scrapes against the tile. A doctor calls your name from the doorway, all eight of her beady eyes observing closely as you get to your feet. 

“The patient is being given forty milligrams of quirk suppressant every four hours while he acclimates to his skin grafts. So rest assured he will not burn you,” — you quickly smother your anger at her insinuation — “since you have a high ranking family pass, contact has been allowed, but if anything goes awry there are guards posted at the door”. 

You’re barely given time to process her explanation or the new information as she abruptly comes to a halt, almost stumbling into her back. All eight of her eyes blink at you expectantly as the door clicks open, inclining you to enter. 

“Thank you,” you mutter as you pass, flinching when the door once again clicks shut. You steel yourself with a deep inhale, lungs ballooning to expend the anxiety spiking throughout your chest, and lift your head. 

The air remains there, held in your mouth so as not to make a sound. Touya stands across the threshold with his back to you, facing the wide barred up windows and observing the other patients. He’s in a loose fitting t–shirt and pants, all white and blending into the rest of the room. Where the collar dips below his nape you can see pink, inflamed skin, and for a moment you are reminded of your first meeting. 

“Finally decided to come look your failure in the eye, did you?” his voice is harsh, like talking through gritted teeth and lilted with sarcasm. You’re frozen in place, muscles tensed as if you were bracing for impact, throat swelling just from hearing him speak again. 

“Hate to say it but there’s no cameras here,” he laughs, a hollow and dry sound as he begins to turn, “so you can drop the fuckin’ act—”

The anger dissipates as soon as he meets your gaze, his seething grin slipping until his jaw slacks in surprise. Even as your eyes sting you cannot blink for fear that he’ll disappear, a wishful figment of your imagination. He’s really here, a few feet from you, flesh and blood and breath. 

Closer now, you can clearly see there are lines of scarring where his previous body had been sutured together. No longer held by staples and rings, the patchwork skin fitting the curve of his cheeks without pulling taut and tearing. He doesn’t wince in discomfort as his expression contorts into disbelief, as his brows pinch and he starts toward you. 

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing here?” 

Even with the obvious ire behind his words you aren’t frightened by him. Your legs carry you to meet him halfway, reflexively reaching out for him in all the ways you had longed to over the past few months, only for him to catch you by your wrists. His grip tightens in warning, answer me he snaps, but his demand goes ignored. You’re focused entirely on how cold he feels, sharp around your forearms, just like his tongue. 

“You’re freezing,” you whisper.

He huffs in exasperation, a sound you never knew you could miss. “I know,” he says, dropping your arms as his hold loosens and you silently mourn the loss, “it’s like this all the fuckin’ time now”. 

“Because you don’t have your quirk?” 

He nods curtly, lips twisting in disdain, the confusion in his eyes sinking through realisation and settling on betrayal. “You’ve been getting cosy with my family, haven't you? It’s the only way you would’ve been able to get in here,” he sneers.

You rub away the chill from your inner wrist, following him further into the room as he walks away from you, pleading with him to listen before he makes any assumptions. “Touya, it isn’t what you’re thinking—”

“Don’t call me that!”

Your own anger steers you then, frustrated by his refusal to hear you.  “Touya. Touya. Touya. Touya,” you repeat childishly until he spins on his heel to glare at you. I’m going to keep your name in my mouth until my last breath, you think.  Arguing, scowling, you’ll take anything in this moment as long as he keeps looking at you. 

“Your mother and sister tracked me down, I didn’t go looking for them—” your own fault, you shouldn’t have been there “—they wanted to help me. They wanted to look out for your son!”

He hums like he doesn't believe it, and the forced amusement in his smirk irritates you, crawling hot through your chest. “I bet you’ve been enjoying all that bastard's money, right? He’s got plenty to throw at you and keep you quiet”.

You almost forget to breathe with how his accusation takes you by the throat, the regret crossing his features being the only thing keeping you in the room. It’s hard to handle his vitriol when it is directed at you, hard to see him like this, so wounded and cornered. In his mind you have gone behind his back, you have sought help from the people who hurt him the most, and you are only here on their orders. 

It’s a cycle he cannot break from. He’s gone again, tethered still to the world, but they are all moving on without him. He’s gone again, tucked away where no one needs to look at him, and they are all better for it. 

“I have not met Endeavor and I have made it clear that Kaiyo will not meet him either,” you tell him firmly, “I have not, and will not, accept financial help from that man. You… I’d never do that to you”. 

He wilts then, partially limbless as he sinks back against the hospital bed frame tucked beneath the barred window, covers still spotless and unused. As you glance up at the star-less ceiling, you wonder if he manages to get any sleep at all. 

“Why are you here?” he asks again, no fight left in his words. Without the bravado to keep him up he looks exhausted, torpid. You join him cautiously, settling yourself on the edge of the mattress. 

“To reassure you that we’re okay. That we aren’t in any danger,” you murmur, splaying your hand out in the space between your bodies, “we’re worried about you, Touya. Why aren’t you talking to them?”

He rests his hand beside yours, stretching out his pinky to hook over your own; the one you’d linked with Kaiyo only two hours before. “What good would that do?” he says, “I’m defective and this is just a waste of taxpayers money. Why let me live in the first place?”

The worst part of it all is the grating monotony in his tone, the total disregard for his own life and wellbeing. “Don’t say things like that,” you rasp, “it isn’t true. You have a real chance to do better now”.

“Fuck you,” he snorts without malice, giving a light shake of his head as he continues, “I was always going to end up here. You knew the path I was going to take from the start”. 

“And so did you, Touya!” 

The words come hoarse as they catch in your throat, heavy where they press against your nerves. Around you the room becomes smaller, stifling, and yet he is still miles from your reach. You’d do anything if only it meant wiping that look of indifference from his face. 

“You knew, and you could have made the effort to change. Don’t act as if this was predestined for you, it was your own choices that led you here—” 

“This wouldn’t be happening if you just hadn’t come looking for me!”

“Of course I looked for you,” you pleaded with him, “what would you have had me tell Kaiyo?”

“That I was dead,” he replies plainly, “he would’ve been better off”.

“You…” fatigue floods your system and you feel yourself sink back against the bed frame “…you truly believe that”. 

You don't sob, don't let yourself whimper, you simply let the salty burn overtake your vision and clog your throat, thick and cloying. “Don’t cry,” he murmurs, “you know I’m bad with crying”. 

“You’re crying too,” and he laughs humourlessly, eyes still dry. Amongst the quiet you can hear people outside talking, the window panel slightly ajar to let in a continuous breeze, carrying in the scent of spring. You shiver, and when his icy touch begins to move away you upturn your hand, interlocking your fingers together to keep him there. 

You can feel him watching you as you appraise his belongings. No character, no personality, everything looks brand new and unused. Compared to your stingy one bedroom apartment tucked away in the sparse Yokohama neighbourhoods, this place was completely lifeless. He must hate it here, waking up in yet another unfamiliar place against his will, treated as if he were something to fix.

Though after everything he’s been through, it must be a relief to do something bad and be punished for it, rather than to be punished for all the things you couldn’t do. 

“How is he?” he asks, ending the drawn out silence. 

“He knows something isn’t right,” you say, feeling the chill along your wet cheeks, “he wants to see you”.

He makes a sound of acknowledgement as he strokes his thumb along the back of your hand. You tighten your grip, still habitually cautious of the sutures that are no longer embedded into his skin. “What a kid wants isn’t always what’s good for them”.

“That’s priceless coming from you,” you huff, and he knocks his shoulder against yours in response. Bittersweet, you recall how you sat beside him on a hospital bed just like this five years ago, IV hooked into his veins to ward off infection. Hair white, skin mottled, growing accustomed to your freely given affections. 

You breathe, the exhale long, and lean your weight into his side. Your hands, still interwoven, rest together in your lap. “We just wanted to be closer to you,” you tell him, your apology unspoken, “Kaiyo misses you. I miss you. Even if I’m angry with you, don’t ever believe that we aren’t thinking of you”. 

The word sorry does not come naturally to Touya, it never has. Remorse was best shown through action, overbearing attention and unnecessary gift giving that only ever left you wondering who he’d stolen from. When he rests his cheek atop your head, nuzzling softly into your hair, you know he’s trying to apologise as well. 

So you recount everything that happened over the past two weeks. Of nightmares and paranoia, of old photographs and starless ceilings, of autumn bellflowers and cultural dissonance. You rush each story, unsure of how much time you would be allowed in this place, nor how often you would be able to visit. And he listens, slowly sagging against you the more you speak, your bodies two beams upheld by the other. 

“Oh, and the driver called him ‘young master’ at first,” a small grin pulls at your lips at his amused snort, the only sign that he was still awake, “I know. I told him right away not… not to call him that. I knew you’d hate that”.

His muscles tense then as an intrusive knock reverberates throughout the room, a white knuckled grip on your hand at the interruption. The doctor from before steps into the threshold and is followed closely by one of the guards, eight eyes blinking simultaneously as she takes in the scene, her expression unreadable. 

“Your allotted time for visitation is up,” she says, her voice softer than before and perhaps even tinted with regret, “I’ll give you a few moments to say goodbye and notify your driver”. 

A part of you wishes that the wordless goodbye you gave back at the hospital by the hyacinth beds had been your last, because this time around it is impossibly harder. If his expression is anything to go by you think, if he could, Touya would freeze your hands together in an eternal block of ice. 

“Touya,” he begrudgingly meets your gaze, “what happened to you was undoubtedly a tragedy. Still you— you hurt people, and you need to accept that. I’m not going to tell you to forgive anyone, you don’t have to, but…”

You lean forward, pressing your forehead to his “…even if others can’t, I want you to forgive yourself”.

“For who I was or for who I wasn’t?” he mutters, so close you can see the stray white stripes in his eyelashes. The doctor clears her throat quietly where she lingers by the door, and so you get to your feet. His throat bobs as he swallows, expression suddenly pleading as you let him go, and you take his face between your hands. 

His cheeks are rough, the sore skin raised under the pads of your thumb. “For all of it,” you say. 

You’d always thought that love didn’t need to be so complicated. Sometimes it was as simple as I see you, and I understand you. Sometimes it was dirtying your hands to make their life a little easier. Sometimes it simply took the form of an illusion, and all you needed was for someone to point out the tangled lines, the true image irreversibly seen. 

“We love you. If that means anything to you, then take advantage of this second chance and let yourself be better”. 

Afraid of testing their patience, you step away from the bed, heading towards the door where your guide awaits. While only four strides, it feels like a lifetime, and you find yourself dragging your feet to stall for time. The thought of leaving him here made your stomach sink, an invisible magnetism tied to your spine and begging you to turn around. 

You startle as the guard suddenly steps forward, recounting Touya’s patient number with warning, but the doctor holds her hand out to settle him. You’re tugged back against a firm chest, familiar if not for the deathly temperature, arms circling firmly around your waist. 

Their presence falls away as he kisses you, and the sensation is new. No awkward angle, no need to be aware of his sutures, no copper tang left on your tongue as you pull back. Once, twice, and thrice — Touya kisses you without regard for time he was wasting, for the people who were waiting to take you home, and you give him every extra second you have. 

“Tell Kaiyo I’ll be out by the time he starts his training at JAXA,” he murmurs. You laugh wetly, finally forced to take your leave. 

“Better make that ten years sooner, you hear me?” 

The door begins to shut behind you and he’s crying again, eyes dry as he calls out to you.

“No promises!”

I need more 🥺❤️😭

RETURN - PT 1

summary: five years ago he left you. left you alone with nothing but memories of your love. so how dare he come back now?

contents: 1.5k words, fem!omaticaya reader, angst, swearing

authors note: AHHHH first chapter i'm so excited to post this guys!! thankuu to all my mooties that helped me brew this series

Nothing could ever surmount to the despair you felt that day. The day he looked into your weeping eyes, looked right into your aching soul, and told you he was leaving.

Leaving. You begged him to take you with him. Pleaded with his pained expression to let you stay with him. To take you with him. To walk every journey together.

But he didn’t. He shook his head, pursing his lips that have kissed you for the last time. Crossing his arms that embraced you for the last time. He said no. One simple word that crushed your entire self.

“It won’t be safe, I can’t take you from the forest, this is your home.” No. No he was your home! He was your everything. The last face you look at when you say goodnight to the day left behind you. The one you would run to, so you could tell him everything good and bad. The man you imagined your entire life to be with.

That same man who was running from his home, to never return back to you.

You pleaded with him, crashing onto your knees, wrapping your arms around his torso. Crying into him as you begged to accompany him. How could he leave you? How could he have the heart to tear out yours.

“Y/N…let go.” His deep voice ring deep in your ears. You knew he was talking about your physical grip on him. But it felt so much deeper. Let go. Let go of us. Let go of everything we ever were. Let go of me.

You shook your head desperately, hands still clinging to his body. The rough soil beneath you cutting into your knees but no cut would ever be as deep as the one he had laid into your soul.

It was as if the hands he took to pry your frail body off him were the daggers that were slicing up your heart. Leaving wounds so deep they would never heal. How could you ever heal from this?

You looked up at him, tears letting his cheeks dampen, his face showing nothing but grief as he met your hurt eyes.

“I have to go…Y/N you know I have to.” You did. You knew you had no say in this. Your words were insignificant to begin with.

His figure crouched down in front of you. Wiping the salty tears that stained your cheeks. He saw the way your chin quivered as he caressed your beautiful face.

A salty, sweet kiss was the last one you ever shared with him. A kiss you both cried into, gripping onto each other knowing it was the last time. It was bittersweet. To share a moment so close together only to be ripped apart.

All that connected you both was memories. Memories that now serve you nothing but hurt.

Five years had passed. Five dreadful years.

You were now a 20 year old woman. Adorned with your Hometree bow and the physique of a fit warrior. Though no amount of time could ever heal the cuts he left so deep in you.

For the first year, you were nothing but a shell. Never eating, never sleeping. You simply existed. Which was a chore to do without him.

You wished nothing but to stop existing. To stop experiencing every bit of sadness, every bit of grief. To stop mourning the loss of the only man you could ever love.

Tears were your most worn accessory, no one ever daring to tell you they looked bad. Too scared to send you spiralling even more than you already had.

Though, those times you spent rocking in your hammock. Looking at the stars that lit up the night sky, those cuts that ran deep within you, the cuts that caused so pain. They started to seep.

Started to seep blood red rage.

How could he ever have left you? Was he so selfish to not think of the effect this would have on you? Did he simply not care?

How was the one time he decided to act selfishly be the time wounded the one who loved him most? To be so selfish, to claim he would be keeping you safe.

Safe to what? The sky-people that reigned free through your planet. Constantly on the verge of war to aliens that had no consideration for your people. Just like he had no consideration for your heart.

You wanted to hate him. You wanted to hate him so bad, that every memory of him would fade into a blood red image of evil. That every memory would turn into a disgusting thought of a disgusting man.

You wanted to hate him with every fibre in your body. But you couldn’t.

Maybe that’s when everything stopped looking so blood red. When everything dulled out. Nothing mattered, he would never come back.

So with a tainted heart and an aching soul, you accepted that you would never experience the love of your mate every again. Never feel his touch, hear his voice, smell his scent, taste his kisses. You would never be with him.

That’s were Va’tep entered into your life. Barging into your knocked down walls and building a crappy foundation.

Va’tep, Tarsem’s younger brother. One year your elder. A fierce warrior, a man who refused to lose, a man who claimed what was his. And to him, you were his.

Your parents always longed for status. To be high up in the clan. You were their golden ticket, finding your way into the heart of Toruk Makto’s eldest son. They rejoiced in your heart’s residence, rejoiced in the fact that you fulfilled their one wish. They were your number one advocate. Pushing you to train for your rite of passage ever since you became closer with the boy. They worked every inch of their being towards the union between the pair of you.

But the hard work washed away as fast as the waterfall plunged.

Washing away all your dreams, your happiness, your meaning. It washed away your parent’s status, Va’tep being the life guard that pulls them out of the strong currents.

Nothing could ever amount to him though. Your heart resided with someone else as your body laid with his. You felt yourself fill with shame every time you shared a touch. A shiver of disgust running down your entire body. Breaking the vow of your love towards the boy who broke you.

“Where’s your head at beautiful?” That was what he called you. Beautiful. His voice would never be as sweet as his. Never send the right shivers through you.

Va’tep’s calloused hands caressed your cheek, so rough it felt as if he was dragging you with his touch. Everything he did was rough. Rough like the soil you pleaded on.

Maybe this was Eywa laughing in your face. Giving you a man so opposite to the man you craved so desperately. Even after 5 years, Eywa would never let you forget those memories.

Shrugging his hands off your body, he let out a low hiss. One that showed his offence towards your actions. A hiss so quiet, it would only be heard if you cared. But you didn’t. Something else was clouding your mind, taking your attention away from him. And it wasn’t just your past lover.

You made your way towards the growing crowd of people that formed around the entrance of Hometree. Va’tep’s calls after you were silenced by the gasps and whispers of your people that were creating confusion that bubbled in your stomach.

Pushing yourself to the front of the crowd, definitely stepping on the feet of others. You looked for the source of the commotion. Ears perking up and eyes squinting to find the one thing people were gawking at.

Though now as you look towards the source, you wish you minded your business. Everything was coming back. Every emotion, every curse, every thought, every tear. They all fell on top of you, crushing your soul as you let out a small whimper in fear.

The source was making its way towards you. No. No. NO. This can’t happen. This cannot be happening. Feet stumbling as you paced backwards, avoiding looking straight ahead.

Dread filled your entire being. Filling it from your toes until it felt as if it would spill out of you, gurgling in the pits of your stomach. No. No. NO.

Crashing into the back of a person, you were forced to halt your escape. Frozen in shock as you looked at the man who had broken your heart and given it back to you.

Lips quivering, tears pooling in your eyes. He reached his hands towards you. How could he come back? Why was he back? This is all some sort of sick dream. A nightmare.

“My beautiful girl.” His voice was deeper, still so sweet it would cause a cavity. It enticed you. You had been without his voice for so long.

So long…because he left you. Because he was cruel and selfish.

Shaking your head profusely, just like you did that dreaded day. Your hands shook as you pointed at him, an accusatory finger aimed at him as your mind swirled.

“I’m here now.” He should have never left, he should have NEVER left. What a sick fuck. To come back expecting open arms when all you wanted was to never have your arms leave him. “Beautiful? What is it?”

“I am not your beautiful, Neteyam.”

tags: @8resa @ilovejakesullysdick @neteyamsblog @live-laugh-neteyam @reyalvr @trashfox @darkacademictrash @scntfrhs @dreamyescapesfromreality @fanboyluvr @neteyamzmate @oceanstar19 @sharkybabe9

thankyou sm for reading lovelies!! reblogs + replies sososososo appreciated ilysm ily ily

Dating Me Positives!

Other Girls

I'm skinny!

I'm beautiful!

I'm popular!

I've only had ten boyfriends!

I'll stalk your txt messages!

Me:

I won't judge

I give you space

I just need a hug and a good morning to make my day.

I take things slow

I'm curvy and pretty

I'll share food with you

This is basically how the scene went 😂

"From now on, I need you to respect my sister."

Don't mind me, I'm just ascending to Heaven because I've been ✨️ Blessed ✨️

LiSyK: Lesson Two

Fandom: My Hero Academia, Warnings: Prince!Bakugo, Concubine Reader and Kirishima, World Building, Smut, Oral (M - Receiving), Sharing Cum, Cum Eating, Thigh Riding, Helping Hand Jobs, The start of of angst to come... Word Count: 6.3k.

A/N: This shit is not proofread read at your own peril - Idek if it's good.

'I didn't hurt you?' Kirishima's eyes are trained on your thighs. In his hand is a small parcel of herbs, lavender and verbena with small slices of fresh lemon bound in a hessian sack the size of his palm. Swiping the parcel across your skin, he draws circles on the muscle of your thigh diligently.

Reaching down towards him, you cover his hand with yours stopping his ministrations. 'No. You didn't hurt me.'

'You're sure?' He lifts his eyes to yours, showing you the ponds that linger in his lash line. With the heat of the moment now faded and replaced with the intimacy of the baths, his nerves have returned. He can still feel it, the warmth of your cunt as you came around him, a string of moans leaking from your mouth as he worked to please you. It makes his stomach swoop and his cock pulse, but it isn't any of that he focuses on now. 'You can tell me.'

You curl your body, lifting your other hand to cup his cheek. His skin is rough, the first showings of stubble peaking through his pores. It tickles your skin, itching as you smooth your thumb back and forth. 'You didn't hurt me...' Tilting your head, you smile. 'I could have done a lot worse for my first time... And I guarantee none of them would have washed me afterwards.'

A smile breaks out on Kirishima's face, the pointed edges of his teeth locking together perfectly.

'Can I ask you a question?' Slipping the small parcel of herbs from his hand, you take your turn in washing him. You draw large circles on his shoulder, taking heed to notice how his muscle ripples and relaxes under your touch.

'Of course.'

'It's personal.'

'I've just felt your pleasure around my cock' He raises his eyebrows, a thin blush coating his cheeks. 'I think we're past worrying about personal now. Besides...' Laying his hand over yours, he pauses until he knows you'll hold his eye. 'We belong to each other. There's no such thing as secrets any more.'

His words form a lump in your throat, one that won't budge even as you try to swallow it down. 'Your teeth -.'

Kirishima grimaces.

'I've only ever seen them -.'

That's as far as he lets you get. Hauling a deep breath into his lungs, he lets his eyes fall shut for a moment before baring his soul. 'On pit fighters.'

'Yeah.'

'That's the trade I was born into. Mother was a guard, or so we were told – we were taken as soon as we could be weaned, placed into the camps and trained to fight. It's all we knew until we reached 12...' There are tears in his voice, but they don't slip over his eyelids. Not now. Not any more. This is an old story now, one that has already had more than its fair share of tears. 'I failed the trials, couldn't kill the other boy they had tied at the end of the maze. I let him escape and they sentenced me to the wall. It's only by the fate of the Old Mothers that I was allowed into the service... They taught me, trained me, my brother wasn't as lucky.'

You can feel your heart racing beneath the skin of your wrist. The circles you had been drawing on his skin have stilted, paused you digested his story. The pit was teaming with children, most we're lucky to see teenagedom never mind adulthood. Escaping was unheard of. Shuddering you try not to think of the horrors a young Kirishima must have witnessed, the acts he'd been forced to undertake in order to survive. 'Your brother... He's dead?'

The laugh that leaps from Kirishima's throat shocks you making you jolt, but he lays a hand on your thigh to steady you. 'No...'

Relaxing a little, you begin to clean him again.

He chuckles. 'He's master of the pit these days.'

You gasp, despite yourself and twist to show Kirishima just how wide your eyes have grown. 'The Tetsutetsu is your -.'

'Yes.'

'Come to think of it, you do look -.'

'Almost like twins, yes, but we're not, just full blood siblings. Rare in the pits, but it's true enough.' Twisting Kirishima gives you his chest, allowing your scrubbing of him to go on unhindered as your conversation ebbs. He's given you much to think about, he knows that much. Growing up in the pits had meant a lot of things, getting used to the feeling of blood on his hands, sleeping on cold concrete, but it had also hardened him to rejection. Still, the presence of your hands still working at his collarbones is a promising one.

'Oh.'

You hands lift from him, leaving him cold immediately. The absence of you burns, more than he'd expected, but he steadies himself for the blow all the same. 'I -.'

'I'm sorry.'

Kirishima furrows his brow, the softness of your palm over his heart luring him to an unknown fate. 'Sorry?'

'I've wiped it off... I -.' Panic grips you in a vice. It holds the base of your throat, starving you of oxygen as you attempt to claw back an ounce of cognition. It doesn't work. The world dissolves around you, the phantom pain of a thick strip of bark striking the back of your thighs dulling everything that isn't fear.

'Hey.' Wrapping his hands around your shoulders, Kirishima settles you both into the warm water of the bath. He holds you, pressing you close until your back is pressing against his chest and he can curl himself around you. Your legs tangle in a mess beneath the water, the warmth doing much to sooth the tension growing there. 'It's okay... We don't need them any more. There'll be no punishment. We don't need them any more.'

'Oh,' Realisation settles in your bones. It sinks to your stomach and stirs, grounding you until the noise of your laughter is mixing with Kirishima's and filling the large bathroom.

It’s a new sound, this, laughter. Genuine laughter. Holding back onto Kirishima, you let the noise overtake you and burrow deep. For the first time in a long time, you feel warmth and peace resting in the crevices of your chest; only there’s something more there. Something you’re scared to admit might be love.

Bakugo dresses quickly and alone, pausing only to listen to the laughter that leaks from his adjoining bath rooms. It makes something swell in his chest, something he’s not sure he quite likes. His fingers itch, ribs aching as he thinks about the two of your sharing a moment away from his prying eyes.

That is what he is after all… Isn’t it?

A watcher.

A perverse fool who had just squandered his first night with his whores by doing nothing but staring with his cock in his own hand. His friends would laugh - which is exactly why he has no intention of telling them.

Buttoning his shirt, he affixes his battle medallions to his jacket and shrugs into it to the sound of your joy. He could order you to not laugh without his presence he supposes. Force you not to bond together in a way he can already see that you have. It would be his right as prince to selfishly keep you both.

Except, he won’t. He’s man enough to admit that he quite likes the sound of your laughter as it soaks into his walls. And yet, there’s something inside of him that rues its distance and begs for his inclusion.

The thought annoys him.

Lacing his dress shoes, he regards himself quickly in the mirror before taking his leave, the sound of your joy still chasing at his heels.

The rabbit is delightful, sadly the conversation that comes with it is not.

Bakugo pops the joint of the animals leg and sets about slicing from it the meat. He’d refused to let the kitchen prepare it fully, as usual, preparing the butcher the cooked meat himself.

‘Your father is still refusing to abdicate, I assume?’ Mitsuki smiles, cutting her meal into minuscule chunks. She’d eaten earlier. It was never good to host on an empty stomach, especially when there was information to be learned. Sat at the head of the table she overlooks the entire dinner, eyes scanning each of her guests faces.

Todoroki blinks slow, a small smile stretching his lip. ‘He is. Although, I doubt he’ll be able to put up a fight for much longer.’ He pops a helping of fig into his mouth and chews before offering one to his wife, princess Momo, who takes the fruit from his fork with her teeth. ‘My brother returns from the south tomorrow.’

Mitsuki smiles, eyes shining. She’s had dealings with prince Natsuo before. Mild tempered and fair, if she’d had a daughter, it would have been him she’d court to wed her. But, alas, she had been blessed with Katsuki and so her troubles of finding a suitable match never quite end. ‘Ah. You’ll have him visit when he returns? He could attend the tournament. I’m sure Katsuki here, would love to talk strategy - supposing it comes to that of course.’

Bakugo grunts. A combination of disapproval and the blunt force of being kicked in the shin by his mother. 'I'd be honoured' he drawls.

Todoroki smiles, amusement shining in his eyes. ‘Oh, yes.' Dipping his fork into one of the central pies, he fishes around for a piece of fruit. 'I'm assuming dinner will be provided? The food here is far better than at home and my messengers have said he’s looking a bit thin.’

Turning her attention to the other guests, Mitsuki survey's her collection. It's taken years to establish the connections she has, ensuring that both her son and her kingdom would prosper long after her, but it's only as she sits digging through a tart she has no intention of eating that she truly has time to appreciate how far she has come.

Opposite Prince Todoroki and his wife sits Lord Tenya Iida, a bored looking Countess Ochako Uraraka sitting across from him in turn. Mitsuki had been attempting to broker a marriage between the two for months to no avail. Iida already owed her a favour, if she were to solve his seemingly endless bachelorhood he'd owe her a lot more.

Mitsuki hums, mind whirring.

'Will you be staying in the manor tonight, Sho – Prince Todoroki?' Hanta Sero, smirks, eyebrows raised.

If all of Queen Mitsuki's guests were renowned, she was reluctant to admit that the

miscreant viscount held the most power. She'd tried and failed to set him up, his courtships ending in tears and scandal; since then, she'd given up trying to lead him from his strayed ways.

Ignoring Sero, she sparks conversation with Lord Tenya Iida. ‘I suppose you’ll wish to room with us this evening? It’s a long way back after all and I think Ochako may have some things to discuss with -‘

‘Oh, no, no. No discussions to be had just yet.’ Ochako looks radiant and far younger than her twenty-something years. Her cheeks warm, making her glow as she lets a smile rest against her lips.

‘No.’ Iida has the decency to look embarrassed. The colour runs high in his cheeks spoiling his cool complexion. ‘Uraraka assures me that the answer would still be no should I ask too soon. Although I'm not quite sure what too soon entails.’

Bakugo glances up, eyes narrowed. There's a tightness in Ochako's jaw, one he's sure going to ask her about later when they retire to the smoking room. If she didn't want to marry that old fool, she'd be better off just coming out with it – at least then his mother would leave well enough alone. Shifting in his seat, Bakugo's stomach coils when he feels the toe of a shoe brush against his inner thigh.

'Sorry, old chap.' Sero chuckles. 'Damn my long legs and all that. Guess I got my distances wrong.'

On the opposite side of the table, Todoroki's face flames.

'A woman always knows the right time.' Masaru speaks up at last. His posture is relaxed, but regal. Proper without being stiff. As he speaks he looks to his wife, the stars of their young still twinkling in his eyes.

Mitsuki softens and inclines her head, allowing the King to press his lips to her forehead.

'See...' Ochako sighs, a palm cupping her cheek. 'That is what I want: love. I don't wish to marry for convenience or to broker an alliance, I want to be cherished.'

Iida manages to blanch further.

'Everyone...' Sero locks eyes with Todoroki across the table. 'Deserves to be desired. Wouldn't you agree, Katsuki?' He turns his attention to the prince at the last moment, a grin tugging at his lip making him look positively shit eating.

Bakugo chokes.

'Ah, that's right. You wouldn't know about desire -.'

'You're wrong.' Bakugo snaps. The tips of his ears are burning, the edges of his cheek bones following suit. Yesterday, he wouldn't have had a leg to stand on, would have sat there and endured Sero's teasing like he always had done, but he was no longer yesterday's man. No. Now he had experienced desire as it ate away at him through his stomach. He thinks to you, your parted lips and arced back. Of Kirishima's powerful thighs and gravelled moans.

His pants grow tighter.

'Katsuki has chosen his first concubines.' Mitsuki blinks. 'Inko provided the finest selection we've seen yet.'

'Lucky bastard.' Sero chuckles. 'So...' He leans on the table, elbows creaking as he leers at the prince. 'What're they like? Big -.'

Mitsuki downs her fork. 'I think we both know that is not dinner conversation.' She scolds Sero while still managing to shoot a sympathetic glance at Todoroki's wife who has grown to resemble a freshly-ripened tomato. 'How about desert? We've had the cooks prepare a lovely selection.

'So...' Sero pours a quart of whiskey into a glass and swirls it beneath his nose. He inhales, winks at Todoroki over the rim and then, downs the entire glass whole. He pours another. 'Concubines, huh?'

Bakugo stews. He's reclined in a chair, legs spread wide as he slouches back against the worn leather. 'I thought we were going to discuss Cheek's cold feet.'

'I haven't got cold feet.' Ochako is the only woman in the smoking room. She perches on the writing desk, her skirts hiked up around her knees and the laces on the front of her corset undone. If anyone else were to see her, it would cause a scandal, but the boys have learned the hard way not to attempt to impose the rules of socialite culture onto her. She had argued her way into their little boys club quite thoroughly and they had little choice but to acknowledge her prowess.

'Oh, but you do.' Sero taunts.

'I will take criticism about my courting from anyone in this room, but you.' Ochako glares.

A smile fractures Sero's lips. 'Ah... So you are under the impression that nobody saw you sneak out of Count Toshinori's mannor with that stable boy.'

'I did no such thing!'

From the corner of the room, Todoroki loosens himself from his trance. He had been staring at the Viscount behind, but with his moving, the view is now blocked. 'You did.' Clearning his throat, Todoroki stands. 'I don't see the problem though. Marriages are merely contracts, affairs are common place – expected, even.'

'Whatever helps you sleep at night.' Bakugo chuffs.

'Ah, perfect. Let's discuss Bakugo's new found sex life... Do we get to see these new concubines of yours or are you keeping them hidden away?' Setting back on the desk, Ochako takes the contents of one champagne flute and tips it straight into another, content that the interrogation has now turned on someone else.

'Oh, he has to show us them.' Sero supplies, this time handing Todoroki a too full glass. The other man takes it and attempts not to shiver when their fingers brush.

'He has to show me, yes.' Todoroki sips his drink. 'Not you two.'

Ochako's mouth falls open. 'And why is that?'

'Because we're best friends. We share everything.'

'Not everything.' Sero snorts.

'Can we not.' Bakugo's voice is like gravel when he speaks. He's caught, stuck between fighting the thoughts that threaten to have him stretching his breeches and just giving in. He could dismiss himself, storm back to his rooms and demand the pair of you be brought to him – could demand you open yourself up and allow him to sink into your heat or that Kirishima use his fingers, his mouth.

'Oh, no we have to.' Ochako wiggles her eyebrows. 'You all made me explain in graphic detail when I was first courting.'

Todoroki snorts. 'You weren't courting, you were fucking the general's son and we could all hear you moaning from the garden.'

Throwing up her hands, Ochako sighs. 'Forbid a woman enjoy herself, I swear.'

'We're getting off topic.' Sero slips across the room, his long legs carrying him gracefully to the seat beside Bakugo. He sits, slipping back and folding his leg at the knee. 'Male or female?'

'One of each.' Bakugo scowls.

'Just two.'

'Just two.'

'Both young?'

'Yes.'

'Taught by the mothers?'

'Yes.'

Have you made her cum yet?' Sero's eyes shine, his lips twitching as he feeds of each detail.

The room descends into a hush so quiet Bakugo can hear his own heartbeat thrumming in his ears.

'Him? Given the right treatment, a man's liable to cum on his own stomach with stimulation – have you -.'

Todoroki coughs.

Sero glances to him and shrinks, but quickly returns his attention to a squirming Bakugo. 'Oh, come on. You've had them long enough. Give us something.'

'Of course I've made both of them cum.' Bakugo grinds his teeth. Embarrassment and shame coil in his cut and threaten to make him sick. He didn't even know what your cunt felt like, had only tasted your essence, mixed, as it dried on his own sheets. Should he have had both of you already? So soon.

'Tell us then.' Sero presses.

'I'd rather not.' His hands are shaking, he can feel it. The tremors start in his fingertips and slosh the whiskey in his grip. He breathes, steadies himself. Divulging the inner workings of his rooms makes him feel hot.

'Oh, go on.'

Bakugo breaks.

Downing his fourth whiskey of the night, he slams it against the wooden arm of his chair. 'I've had both of them.' The lie slips off his tongue all too easily. He licks his lips. 'On their knees is my favourite. The woman, she has the most amazing mouth – pretty lips too. I've cum on them more times than I can count.' As he speaks, he pictures it. You, on your knees before him, hands clasped in your lap as you wait. Your tongue hangs over your lips, eyes half closed through arousal as Kirishima brings him to his end. The strings he leaves on your features are messy and indiscriminate, making your skin glow in the low light. He makes Kirishima clean you up with his tongue.

Sero whistles low breaking Bakugo's runaway speech. 'Well that was certainly more detail than I expected.'

'You should have her touch her while you suck her tits...' Ochako snorts into her champagne. 'Might solve those mummy issues you've got.'

'I doesn't work.' Todoroki sighs.

The muscle in Sero's jaw twitches.

Burning, Bakugo snaps. 'Are we done now? Have you satisfied your perversions?'

'Oh, yes.' Ochako chuckles. 'Perversions fully satisfied.'

'Agreed.' Sero agrees. 'Although, I would still very much like to meet them.' He smirks, the edge of his lip kicking up as he refuses to look at anyone, but Bakugo. 'Bring them to the tournament, isn't it tradition to bring a date?'

A gentle, but persistent hand on your shoulder wakes you. You blink. The lights are still extinguished, the hulking visage of your waker blocking out the distant flickering of a candle has it seems to float in the doorway. Sleep clings to you, your limbs heavy as you allow yourself to be sat up and manoeuvred half out of bed.

'We've been called on.' Kirishima's voice is soft, his hands too as he slips the chains of your clothing over your shoulders. He fastens the clasps and smooths the silk before offering his hand.

You take it, almost being hauled to your feet by Kirishima's heft. 'What time is it?'

'Sometime after sundown.'

The maid at the door switches her weight and chews at the inside of her cheek. 'I don't mean to rush, but...' She swallows. 'The lord is not in the brightest of moods. I fear hast might be your best option.'

You nod and shake out the last evidences of sleep in your limbs, you're sure to be just as numb in a few moments, but at least that sensation is a tiredness you can look forward to. 'Lead the way.'

The maid nods, glad to be moving again. She, herself, had been summoned by one of Lord Bakugo's smoking party and she'd had to endure the lashings of his tongue as he demanded to have his whores brought to him. She steals a glance behind her to the beautiful couple following on her trail... At least at the end of this she'd be able to retire to bed.

Reaching Bakugo's rooms, the maid knocks twice on the door and clears her throat. 'My Lord, your concubines -.'

'Let them in.'

With a large step backwards, the maid allows both of you to pass. She lowers her eyes, mouthing a small 'Good luck' under her breath as Kirishima finally pushes the door open.

Bakugo is splayed out on his bed when you enter. His face is flushed and red, his jaw clenched tight, the deep rise and falls of his chest the only evidence of his wakefulness as he glares head long at the ceiling. What you can see of his skin glistens. The high collar of his tunic is open, allowing only a slither of throat to be visible; but its enough to see the gulp he takes before he speaks.

'Service me.' He growls, the noise gravel in the back of his throat. 'On your knees.'

You pause.

So preoccupied had you been staring at the creases of emotion on his face, you had failed to properly assess his state of undress. He's still wearing his tunic, the material covering the entirety of his chest until his navel where it has ridden up, exposing a thick strip of milky flesh. The muscle there twitches, predominant despite the large evening banquet. Letting your eyes roam lower, you lock a gasp in your throat.

The lower half of his body is entirely bare. Strong legs hang limp over the edge of the bed, the muscle there thick and relaxed as he lays still. His cock is hard, standing to attention and dripping. Pre-cum coats his length, providing the skin with a sinful gleam that promises a heavenly taste. It twitches, rose petal head shimmering as another pearl of pre-cum leaks from him.

Matching your movements with Kirishima, you sink to your knees side by side, each of you straddling one of Bakugo's shins. You reach out, a soft palm covering his knee as you gently slip your hand up, up, up to the crease of his thigh.

'Get on with -.' Bakugo's voice breaks. His sour mood evaporates, the heckling of his friends drowned out and quiet as he loses himself to the sensation of you. Although, his demand had been summoned by a curling resentment that had curled in his stomach, now safe behind the walls of his rooms with the two of you beside him all evidences of it have evaporate. The wet muscle of your tongue strokes up the curve of his cock and his words stick in his throat, eye rolling back as he attempts not to embarrass himself.

He was right. Your mouth is pure sin.

And, he thinks it might just be his end.

Hollowing your cheeks, you take him in your mouth a suck. Using the flat of your tongue, you collect every evidence of pre-cum you can and swallow him down, revelling in his taste. You'd been trained for this, given a selection of fruits and ornaments while the other girls had been allowed to practice on the eunuchs – all in an effort to preserve your purity. You had never understood their teasing, or why they took pity on you and your soft wooden stakes, but now... Now it all makes sense.

A moan bubbles up your throat as a heat starts up in your stomach. You can feel your cunt clenching, the faint memory of what the last cock inside of you had felt like. Loosing yourself, you let yourself slip lower down his shaft, nestling his head against the roof of you mouth.

Bakugo thinks he might die.

Even your most subtle movements have him tip-toeing on the edge. His fists bunch white in the sheets, his neck tensed as he forces his head into the mattress. He can feel it, the tell tale pull of his balls, the tension in his groin as he -

Screwing his eyes shut, he prepares an excuse for his eagerness.

But, the excuse isn't needed.

Wrapping two thick fingers around his base, Kirishima squeezes: hard. Unlike his counterpart with your eyes squeezes shut, lost to the musk coating your tongue and the heft of a cock in your mouth for the first time, Kirishima has been watching.

Each twitch of Bakugo's cock, the hitches in his chest and knot forming between his brows - he's seen it all, and more importantly, he knows what it means.

Bakugo whines as his body rebels. With the pleasure dissipating violently across his groin and stomach, he's left panting, trying to reorient himself from the accidental, but welcomed edging. He can still feel the tension in his cock as it twitches, trying to shake its new confines – his head spinning, as a distant fog infects him and threatens to steal all coherent thought. With his hips tilting from the bed, he's forced to push himself up onto his elbows, spurned on by a desperate desire to see.

Kirishima lifts his eyes, letting his gaze settle on Bakugo's. His Lord's eyes are molten, simmering with a desire that ignites his own. Shifting his posture, he lifts his second hand and slips it up the exposed stretch of your back.

The touch makes you shiver, illiciting a sinful moan that struggles to find air around the cock still nestled in your mouth. In response, Bakugo's hips lift, a moan of his own ricochetting around his chest. You choke, forced to take more of him than you had been expecting, but before you can back away, shying from the deeper intrusion Kirishima's hand is skimming higher up your back.

Gripping the base of your neck, Kirishima rubs a calm circle in the flesh of your throat with his thumb before easing you back down onto Bakugo's cock. You obey perfectly under his pressure, swallowing down another inch as he releases you to slip back off over the head before repeating the action. Urging you down again and again, he encourages you to set an aching pace that already has Bakugo's cock kicking against the tight ring his fingers have created around the base.

Still, he keeps his eyes trained on Bakugo, stoking the fire he knows lingering within. His pupils have blown out now, his fists tight in his bedsheets as he tries to fight the urge to give in. With his mouth dropping open, he locks a call of your names behind his lips despite them echoing frantically in his head.

Your throat is full. You can feel him against your tongue, heavy and sweet, slipping down your throat with every swallow. The pace you've set yourself in eager, challenging as you urge more of him inside with each down stroke. A trickle of moans leave your mouth freely, tickling his length and making him leak more. He answers with his own, his pleasure sinking through your skin and creating a heat in your cunt that continues to grow.

Its hard to sit still. Hard to deliver all of this while settling in your own wetness as it begins to drip from your cunt. You long for attention, would beg for it had your mouth not been full and yet, you adhere to your obedience. At least until it's proven impossible.

Bakugo's hips lift from the bed, his cock slipping further down your throat. He hears you choke, hears the muffled sound of your swallowing as you try repeatedly to get your throat to relax. It makes his stomach tight. It makes him want to do it more.

'Don't stop...' Kirishima urges Bakugo's hips back from the bed with a firm stroke of his cock, the newly found friction drawing Bakugo's body after it eagerly. He locks eyes with the prince, his pupils blown to lust. A product of the moans he's drip-fed from your lips, he tries to remain somewhat focused, but its a battle he's losing and quickly. 'She likes it.'

Kirishima's words spark a match inside of Bakugo. The muscles of his stomach tighten, his footing on the floor renewed and then, he's openly fucking up and into your mouth. His thrusts are slopping, almost circular with the pleasure spreading through his hips, but he keeps going. He's not sure he could stop, even if he tried. Your mouth is hot, your throat tight as he feels you struggle to take him – a cacophony of gurgles proving just how deep he is.

It takes a moment, a second of blinding pleasure before he's begging. 'Release me... Let me, I – Want. Want to...'

He doesn't even know where it comes from.

He only knows that it feels right when it trips from his tongue.

'Let me cum: please...'

Releasing his grip around Bakugo's cock, Kirishima uses his grip to shift you backwards – just in time for thick strips of cum to coat your face.

With your tongue laying flat over your lips, you manage to catch some of Bakugo's spend in your mouth. It coats your lips, a deep musk spreading to the back of your throat as you resist the urge to swallow him down. Instead, you wait, letting the final lashes of his spend to cover your skin.

There's a warmth that spreads through your body when you let your eyes flutter open to see him. He's almost sitting up entirely now, his arms behind him, propping him up as his chest heaves. His jaw has dropped open, much like your own and you watch as his tongue licks over his lips. Whether the gesture is an excited tick or an attempt to imagine his own taste from your awaiting mouth, you don't know. A whine bubbles in your throat. It's needy and high pitched, desperate as you try and comprehend the violent pulse in your cunt.

Kirishima feels his pulse jump. His shoulders are tense, heart beating strong, trying to break through his ribs. The scene before him is pure sin, but his distance from it hurts. He watches the moment from the outside, locked beyond the connection of your eyes. Tentatively he reaches up, taking hold of you by the jaw this time. His arm has bent, fingers digging into your flesh as he stalls, waiting to be let in.

Your entire body feels weightless as Kirishima once again begins to guide you. His touch turns your head and before you can really comprehend what is going to come next: he's kissing you. The wet of his tongue grazes yours, collecting the cum that had puddled there.

He moans with the taste. He can't help it. Everything Bakugo spreads through his mouth and he's forced to kiss you deeper to earn more.

You dissolve together, lost with hands that reach for each other and a rise of moans shared in your throats.

Bakugo groans. He can already feel his cock, exhausted and attempting to harden again. Cum dribbles down his thighs, his head a mess of you and Kirishima and a million sins. Still, under it all, he can feel the faint twist of jealousy flare. Your tongue slips into Kirishima's mouth, a transfer of white – of him – evident on your lips and yet, Bakugo still has to fight the urge to reduce himself to his knees. To be between you. Now that, that is what he truly wants.

Cracking an eye open, Kirishima only has to peer at Bakugo for a moment before a plan forms. He stands, slowly, leading you with kisses until he can position himself behind you. From there, he makes you bend, encouraging you lower and lower until you're straddling Bakugo's thigh.

The muscle of Bakugo's thigh is thick, a perfect perch as you wait for Kirishima's hand to reach it's resting place. It does so at the small of your back. His thumb draws an absent circle in your skin, a gentle note of approval and then, he's pressing down, down, down. Your hips are forced forward, your cunt dragging along the tension of Bakugo's leg. You whine, arm shooting out immediately to steady yourself.

Once you realise what you've done, you freeze.

Bakugo's lips have parted. His eyebrows lifted into his hairline.

Your fingers flex against the rounded muscle of his shoulder.

Unperturbed, Kirishima still moves your hips. A thumb digging into your hip shoves you back, scraping your clit right across quickly dampening flesh. Your cunt gushes, slick coating your ride as you lose yourself to the rhythm set by your companion. The promise of pleasure keeps you going, despite your faux-par. Already you can feel the familiar build in your stomach. It tightens, spreading until you can feel the beginning of the end near...

You moan, head thrown back as you continue to use your Lord to please yourself.

Bakugo's dizzy.

His cock hardened so fast he thought he might faint. If the feel of your cunt across his thigh feels this divine, he's not sure he would last if you were to sit on his cock. Tensing his thigh, he delights in the soft mewls it gifts him.

He did that, he thinks.

He pleased you.

Made you moan.

Writhe.

And yet, he glances at Kirishima.

Lifting your hand from his shoulder, he takes you by the wrist and encourages you to take hold of Kirishima's cock. He's hard, too. He'd be worried if he wasn't with the performance you're currently laying out. Beneath the fabric of his cloth, he looks improbably huge. There's a stain on the silk, a darkening that betrays the want pooling in his stomach.

Kirishima gasps when you take hold of him. His eyes snap to his cock, watching as your hand, wrapped in Bakugo's begin to stroke him. The pace set is aching, a slow start that increases to nothing short of feverish.

He wonders if this is how Bakugo likes to be touched. Heavy and hurried, with a soft turn of his wrist that has Kirishima almost seeing stars. He's not going to last long, not like this. 'I'm -.' He croaks, but already you've beaten him to it. Your grip around him tightens, drawing his attention back to you.

The tension in Bakugo's leg has formed an almost too perfect ridge for you to rut against. The muscle catches your clit sending sparks of paradise through your body. Reaching your limit, you let your eyes roll back – the strain as welcome as the release that bursts inside of you. Your whole body shudders, an endless parade of pleasure running rampant through you that is only prolonged by Kirishima's continued manipulations of your body. You can feel both of them staring at you, feel their eyes glued to your body as you ride out the end of your high.

It's in the moments after that Kirishima loses. You can feel it, the jump of his cock, so familiar as he groans into his orgasm. Cum bursts from him in thick ropes, an endless spray that soaks both you and most of Bakugo's thigh. He pants, chest heaving as you both release him and let him breathe.

The air is hot, filled with nothing, but the steady breaths and absent whines as you come down from your highs. Yet, despite Kirishima's cum still being warm against your skin and your slick still dripping down Bakugo's shins, it's Bakugo who collapses first. He tilts back, body bowing until he bounces softly against his sheets.

Once again, there's a storm alive in his chest, but the comfort of this moment steals it's sharp edge. His eyes flutter shut, head already clouding. 'The baths...' He mumbles. 'Bathe... If you wish.' The conversation of earlier repeats on him, circling like a carrion crow in his mind. It is a shame, he thinks as he feels you lift from him. He misses the sensation already. The warmth of Kirishima's body beside him already making him want to reach out and draw him back to the bed. A shame to hide you two from the world, to hoard you as he wants.

You deserve to be shown off. To shine.

And seeing the look of jealousy on the viscounts face wouldn't be too bad either.

Maybe even Todoroki will feel envy.

He should.

Bakugo sighs. 'The tournament tomorrow.'

Kirishima freezes.

'Both of you will attend. I wish to show the kingdom my finest possessions.'

His blood runs cold. 'Yes, my Lord.'

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My heart ❤️

Sharing a love with Bakugou that’s absolute.

Imagine being the one to mend Bakugou’s broken heart.

Maybe you didn’t manage to get to Bakugou in time, so he’s already experienced his firsts with someone else. It was a case of wrong time, wrong place but fate was finally aligning to try and bring you together.

And it’s hard enough to get close to Bakugou Katsuki at the best of times, but it’s even more difficult when he’s had his heart broken.

He’s closed off, guarded and doesn’t want to get hurt again. He tells himself it’s better this way, that the pain felt experiencing a break up wasn’t worth the love he felt in the relationship. That there’s no point trying to find love again or letting it happen, so he cuts everyone off.

That’s why he ignores the way his heart pangs for you, the heavy flutter of it against his ribcage like petals blowing in the wind. Convincing himself that the love he would experience with you isn’t worth it, because love never lasts. So every time you feel yourself getting close to him, he pulls back. That same voice in the back of his head telling him that he’s not worthy, that he’s not good enough.

It brings him back to that feeling that he was never worthy of love, so of course he continues to believe he doesn’t deserve it. And if he opened himself up to you, you’d realise it and leave him just like the rest. So keeping you at a distance is easier than convincing himself that you’ll love him the same way back.

Of course, his friends don’t want him to get hurt again either. After experiencing the aftermath of his breakup first hand. Bakugou reverting to the angry teenage boy who handled his feelings through anger, shouting at his interns and burying himself in his job. Running himself into the ground to try and mask the hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach, because if he’s too tired to think maybe he’ll be too tired to feel.

But there’s something about you that they see, something they can tell is just perfect for Bakugou. So as fiercely protective Kirishima is, and how much he doesn’t want his friend to get hurt anymore, he encourages you to try.

Because that’s all you can do— try.

So you do. You try, and you manage to pull Bakugou out of the darkness. To show him that he can feel a love again that’s honest, pure and real. But there’s something different as he begins to find himself falling for you, it’s not the same love that he experienced before. It’s different—

Absolute.

And now he’s wondering whether he was ever really in love before? Whether he’d wanted something to work so badly that he’d framed the perfect picture of his relationship in his mind, but that moment had lead him to find you.

It takes time to heal a broken heart, but the repair gives space to love again, and to be loved again. So you’ll take his broken heart and mend it, wondering how his ex could have ever wanted to fracture it because there’s absolutely no way you’re throwing Bakugou away.

It’s like you were the missing pieces of the puzzle that each other needed, and now Bakugou’s convinced he’s never been in love before. Because being in love with you is like nothing he’s ever experienced before, and he hates that he made himself wait so long to experience it.

YALL HELP. I WANT TO FIND A SMALL READ TITLED "VOICE" I BELIEVE AND IT WAS A BAKUGOU KATSUKI ONE. I CANT FIND IT AGAIN AND MY PHONE RESTARTED BEFORE I CAN HEART IT. YALL HELP ME S.O.S THE READER ADORES HIM AND HE CANT STAND HOW MUCH SHE TALKS AND SHE HAS A SKETCH BOOK FULL OF SKETCHES OF HIM S.O.S

GOT ME KICKING MY FEET AND WANTING A WHOLE 3 SEASON 23 EPISODE SERIES

b.katsuki + lava Quirk!wife (both Pro Heroes)

☆—a.n; i woke up today feeling feisty lol not really xd just wanted some "i'm crazy as you are" type of love today lmao✌🏼🖤

Bakugou Katsuki is obsessed with you.

And he doesn't even try to hide it.

You're his sidekick. You had trained in his Agency since you were a mere brat doing your internship your first year at UA. Of course, there were literally counted the times you had encountered him in person. The other Heroes that joined his Agency were the ones in charge of the kids. They had told you how Dynamight hated when babysitting time came every year, he wouldn't even participate in those actually. So they would advice to not cross his path.

From time to time, Dynamight would watch their sparrings sessions, gave them a bit of advice–more like mean criticism yell at them. But he had better things to do, people to save, villains to get their asses destroyed by him. He was not going to waste his time with annoying brats like you.

He had heard of you, of course. The one brat that could control and handle freaking lava like it was fucking nothing. Of course when he saw you, he thought his sidekick had pulled a prank on him, joking to see if would be excited about the idea of having someone with that type of Quirk in his Agency. You couldn't be the one with the lava quirk. You looked... normal. Quirkless even–if this were other times and if he would judge people about it. He had changed, okay? Thank you very fucking much. But he did think it was impossible that you were that amazing brat the other heroes were talking about. They had even compared you to him, in witty and determination to become the number one Pro Hero on the ranks, in strength and no mercy against villains, or other heroes and classmates.

When he stood right in front of you one day, towering almost three heads over you and almost one more person's size to the side, Dynamight laughed. You looked like a little bunny caught red-handed, terrified by everyone around you–especially by the size of him–and skittish, almost like what Deku had been as a kid.

That should have been a first warning for Bakugou–never judge a book by its cover.

You have trained in his Agency the three years you had been in UA, and he has never once seen you nor your Quirk on display, nevertheless in real action. He had only heard how good you were in trainings from the other heroes. But he didn't care enough to actually sought-after. He was already fighting Deku for the number one spot on the rankings, he didn't have time for brats like you.

Until one day, a dangerous villain, that created enormous monsters of metal almost to the size of a ten flour building, was causing too much disaster appeared. It was more than chaos, it had been a destruction like no other.

Dynamight nor Deku could contain the motherfucker.

He was bruised, his hands beat with agony at the amount of times he had used his blasts and the push to keep going, his body muscles were screaming for him to stop. A quick glance to his side where Deku was, and the guy wasn't better than him, breathing like his lungs couldn’t no more. Every other hero in the scene was in the same shape.

They were fucking losing.

And then, like an angel sent from heaven–or better said, a demon sent from the deepest hell for the way you fucking looked, you appeared in all your majestic glory, lava making you slide in between them, surrounding you like it was nothing, like strings coming from inside your body, and began a new fight with that fucking villain's monsters.

Bakugou saw –an enamored expression on his face– how you your whole demeanor changed, your skin, your eyes, everything in you became so menacingly, so evil looking, so freaking scary, that if you weren't training to be a Hero, he thought you would be one the most terrifying villains of all times –even more than that piece of shit AFO.

The lava was visible in all your body, and you fought, a crazed smile and eyes opened wide, enjoying the damage you were doing to the metal monsters; your joy was shining bright for everyone to see, as you yelled, "DIE, YOU FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT!" as the monster melted under your hands and body.

He was captivated, fucking spellbound, by the sight in front of him. He fell to his knees, watching you melt every single one of the monster in one more movement of your hand, as lava flowed towards them, capturing and melting them as you stand straight, the expression on your face serious and deadly. You then walked towards the source, the main villain who was creating this chaos, and the guy literally fell to the floor in fear, trying to crawl away from you in tears. When you stood before him, you crouched to his level, and smiled devilishly.

The villain pissed his pants.

And Bakugou's cock twitched.

He then murmured, "I'm gonna marry the shit out that woman."

Deku chuckled, shaking his head and letting his body fall to ground in tiredness. Everything was okay now.

From then on, you were by Dynamight's side all the time. The second you graduated –Bakugou Katsuki of fucking course attended the graduation ceremony– he offered a job on his Agency for you. And you said yes, even though you had options like Deku's Agency, or Hawk's, and even Endeavor had offered you a big place on his, trying to win you by saying that most of his sidekicks were fire-like Quirks and that his mother had a Quirk similar to yours, he could ask her for advice for you. Bakugou's stomach turned thinking he might had won you over that. But before he could finish the sentence, "Would you like a spot on my Ag–", you exclaimed a big YES, smiling warmly and eyes shining in excitement.

He had to clear his throat and look away at your expression, making something tingle in his chest. Was that his heart?

You became his partner then, in missions, in interviews, in meetings with other Agencies when some big villain appeared and they had to join forces. You were always there, not behind him but next to him.

In interviews he would always let you speak about how everything went and thank every body who helped. But Katsuki would look at you. Look as the lava started to dissipate from your skin, slowly turning down the temperature and going back to your normal color. Your hair that became liquid lava slowly became the color of greyish-black rock and then smoothed its way to your normal texture and color. He always felt mesmerized watching the process, and he would look at it any opportunity he got.

It wasn't until one night out with his old friends that Pikachu said, "Dude, tone down your thirst a lil' bit," in between laughs with Raccoon Eyes and Shitty Hair.

"What the fuck are you talking about?"

Kirishima patted his back, shaking his head, "Your sidekick, man. The lava girl?"

"What?"

"What we are trying to say," Mina smirked, "is that everytime you look at her, its almost palpable the way you want to eat her."

Bakugou gulped. "Shut the fuck up. I don't look at her like that."

Mina winked at him, "If you say so..."

That night he searched on the internet in his phone for interviews, desperately. Fuck, his friends were right. He did look at you with a fascination and hunger he had never saw himself do. He remembered thinking about marrying you back in the days, but that had been the heat of the moment, right? This annoyed the shit out of him. But watching you again in those videos, as you smiled so kindly to the reporters or other Hero friends or to even civilians while looking so freaking scary when your Quirk was activated, made something stir inside his belly.

Fuck, you're gorgeous. You're everything he didn't know he wanted.

And that's when he decided he would not hide his feelings for you anymore.

So now, a few years after, when you are married to number two Pro Hero Dynamight, people always talk about how your husband always looks at you. How he always encourages you in your fights to "kill those fucking piece of shits, baby!!" as he is very close to you fighting his own set of shitty villains and you encourage him saying "show them who is the number two hero, love!" He looses it then, a blast that ends it all.

They talk about how he would always kiss you after a fight, even after all that adrenaline that makes him want to bury himself deep inside your warmth, he only holds your face gently, gloved thumbs caressing your cheeks lovingly, eyes locked onto each other like the world doesn't exist outside that moment, and he kisses you softly, a simple touch, a cute press of lips that lasts a millisecond so he doesn't burn the skin of his face and lips. And then he pulls one of your hands with his up in victory.

He didn't only win the battles, he won you each and every time he got to simply look at you, be next to you, kiss you.

He is obsessed with you, and he doesn't want to fucking hide it from the world.