Souk Eye

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/37088965.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warning: Choose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Category: F/M
Fandom: 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero
Academia
Relationship: Midoriya Izuku/Todoroki Shouto
Character: Todoroki Shouto
Additional Tags: Alternate Universe, Genderbending, Gender or Sex Swap, Female
Todoroki Shouto, Canon Related, Drama & Romance, Teenage Drama,
Teen Romance, First Love, Todoroki Shouto-centric, Yoarashi Inasa
Goes to U.A. High School, Mineta Minoru Doesn't Exist, Bakugou
Katsuki is a Good Friend, Mentioned Hatsume Mei, Hatsume Mei is a
Good Friend, Paranormal Liberation War Arc Spoilers, Post-Paranormal
Liberation War Arc Spoilers
Collections: Boys_get_shook
Stats: Published: 2022-02-14 Completed: 2022-02-15 Chapters: 11/11 Words:
24265

Souk Eye
by kaysmallgirl

Summary

Hikari Todoroki had never witnessed what love was supposed to be.

It was okay.

She didn’t need it, because she knew she'd never be loved ever since her mother burned the
left side of her face only because it reminded her of Endeavor.

On her fifteenth birthday she made some promises to herself, the most important: she’ll
never fall in love.

Then Izuku Midoriya broke all his finger’s bones.

Notes

First of all, the idea of this fic came directly after my brother and I went to see the last
movie and had a discussion, because my brother apparently is a Tododeku shipper and
would really like to see it happening in canon and I explained to him the reasons why this
wouldn't happen... So he said "If Todoroki was a girl, we would have the best power couple
in canon." And he was right, I actually love the Todoroki and Deku relationship in canon
and they are my favorite brOTP, but I had to give that idea a try.
So... I took that and spent a couple of weeks working on this (this was supposed to be a
small oneshot), this is the result inspired heavily by Souk Eye of Gorillaz. I think that's all,
thank you for reading all this.
 Waiting on a lady, come find me, be forgiven
Chapter Notes

See the end of the chapter for notes

Hikari Todoroki had never witnessed what love was supposed to be.

Not when Endeavor hit her mother while she tried to protect her. Nor the way he beat her up just
for training. Even less when she was conceived for the only purpose of surpassing All Might.

Not in the way Touya looked at her every time and how he always tried to get away from her,
almost as if she was hurting him or like she was a plague.

Fuyumi and Natsuo hadn’t bothered to show her what love was after her mother was gone, and she
knew that after Touya died, she would never receive love in her life.

It was okay.

Hikari didn’t need it.

She didn’t need it, because she knew she'd never be loved ever since her mother burned the left
side of her face only because it reminded her of Endeavor.

Hikari accepted the fact that nobody’ll love her, especially being the daughter of Endeavor,
certainly not when the left side of her face had that crimson hair and the turquoise eye, and the
probability of someone loving what was behind that horrible scar was non-existent.

When in Middle School her classmates began to bring shoujo manga, she didn’t care to look at
them. She wasn’t interested in some blue prince who would come save her, she wasn’t interested in
some Romeo, some Dante, some Tuxedo Mask or some Howl Pendragon. Those were only stories,
men created by someone who had never been in her place.

On her fifteenth birthday she made some promises to herself . She’ll get into UA with the Entrance
Exam, get her place without Endeavor’s help, be the number one in her class and the most
important: she’ll never fall in love, never have children, so when she’ll be proclaimed the No. 1
Hero in Japan only using her right side, she’ll look down on her father just for saying “I’m better
than you will ever be”.

And she did.

Well… She almost did it.

But she didn’t know who Bakugō Katsuki was, and in part she wasn’t mad with being second
place, still it wasn’t enough (not for her or Endeavor), she could only momentarily accept being
the number two. And mainly it was because Hikari will get to know Bakugō on their first day at
UA, and she’d recognize if he was really an obstacle.

At that time, it didn’t bother her too much that Endeavor was furious with her for being the second
place, in fact, she was pleased with his discontent, the only downside was that every time he was
looking at her, he said the same thing “You could have been the number one if you had just used
your left side too”.

Like all those years after her mother was gone, Hikari just ignored him, she needed to concentrate
on important things.

When the first day at UA came, she was stoic; Bakugō Katsuki obviously was just an all barking
dog, he could never represent a true obstacle for her, instead, as the Quirk Apprehension Test was
taking place, Hikari watched Yaoyoruzu and Yoarashi as her true rivals.

She could picture herself at the third year's end, between Yoarashi and Yaoyorozu. She could see
Endeavor’s face as she would be the Number 1 with just her ice.

Then Izuku Midoriya broke all his finger’s bones.

There was something suspicious about Izuku Midoriya and apparently, Hikari was the only person
aware of it. She wasn’t sure about what exactly was, but she’ll definitely find out. So she observed
him.

But definitely what was weird about Midoriya wasn’t how his power broke all his bones just in one
use, or the way he muttered when something seemed interesting to him, or how everytime Bakugō
lifted his arm, Midoriya would flinch. No, even if those were really weird stuff, the weirdest thing
of all was how the boy was an All Might fanboy, who completely loses every time the hero was
seen to give them class.

What started in her mind as a silly comment, took force after the incident in USJ. After seeing
Midoriya acting so brave, when she was close enough to feel that energy which only could be
compared with what she felt a couple of days after when she pretended to be All Might’s captive.

The joke wasn’t a joke anymore, and what she had witnessed was the proof. All Might’s power
and Midoriya’s were identical because they were the same power. Because Midoriya was
definitely All Might’s secret love child. In Hikari’s mind, it all made sense.

That boy with green hair and green eyes was her biggest obstacle. She just needed a fight facing
Izuku Midoriya to prove to Endeavor how she was better with only her right side. She waited in the
classes but the expected match never came, no, lucky her because she’ll wait until the Sports
Festival.

If not for the Sports Festival taking place in a few weeks, she would have frozen the whole school
just to fight Midoriya once.

She practiced with her ice, she trained like she had never done before under Endeavor’s exhausting
trainer plan, she pushed herself beyond her limits, she went beyond, she will be all Plus Ultra only
for fighting that boy with green eyes.

She will never forget that day in all her life. But it was for a different reason than the one she had
thought before.

For her it was just winning, proving how wrong Endeavor was, seeing the disappointment settle in
his eyes. But the second round came, and at the end of the Cavalry Battle she lost it.

She only felt the flames like they were a flicker before Midoriya’s wind turned them off.

So she faced him. She told her all her tragic story, maybe she should have figured out how the
things would have gone in the moment a spark light in his eyes. She should have admitted to
herself that she was asking for help.

Hikari Todoroki didn’t expect the blue prince, she knew that.
She never expected how could those kind green eyes be or his astonished face as her left side
finally turned on with the flames. She never saw coming how inside of her, in her chest, just in the
exact place where her heart was supposed to be, the flames would also ignite for the boy with
broken bones in front of her.

It was just seconds, but that view, just Midoriya and her on the platform, with not only the ice
melting around her, just that smile and the way his eyes looked at her fire like it was something
beautiful. That view really hit her.

She wasn’t even thinking when she sent that wave of ice trying to protect him from a bigger hit in
the stadium limits as she said “Thank you, Midoriya”.

Of course the thought of Midoriya running with his broken arms and his eyes and face twirling just
to not look at her bare chest never had crossed her mind before. But there he was with a blush in all
his face, moving his broken arms to take his shred UA shirt and give it to her before Midnight
proclaimed her winner, before she could flash the entire stadium and in her face a pink blush began
to settle because the shirt smelled like him.

And the blush on her face never left, even when she had a new shirt. It barely faded when she was
fighting Iida. It obviously came back when she heard Midoriya screaming for her, inspiring to fight
back fucking Bakugō Katsuki.

So she did.

Her ice never had been so strong like in that moment and even if her flames were tricky, she
managed to dodge Bakugō and he was sent out to the limits.

She won.

She won with the new flames formed by her quirk, no, no formed by her quirk, formed from that
flicker in her chest that only grew stronger every time she found Midoriya’s eyes congratulating
her.

That was one of the many reasons why she’ll remember that day. And the golden medal in her
chest, with the hug All Might gave her (while she obviously didn’t compare how All Might smelled
like dreams and hope, against Midoriya’s smell who reminded her of spring, green grass and earth
after a rain) and that tiny fire in her body.

She used that fire to ignore Endeavor’s speech of how proud he was. She used that strength the fire
gave her to finally visit her mother.

In the hospital. looking at the woman who once she loved so much, she wondered if what her
mother did was an act of love, trying to protect her smallest child from the monster she could
become if Hikari followed Endeavor’s path. She wondered if avoiding her mother all those years
was an act of love because she didn’t want to hurt her more.

She wondered if it was the right moment to talk to her about what she was beginning to feel for that
boy, but if it wasn’t the right moment, the moment when she was just recognizing and trying with
all her sense to not give the tag of “Love” for those feeling, then when will it be the right time?

She held all that she was thinking and for the first time she asked in a whisper barely audible for
her mother. She felt like a child, she felt like when her mother brushed Hikari’s hair ten years ago.
She felt tinier, she totally forgot that promise she made four months ago.

“Mom, what is love?

 A few seconds passed before she lifted her face and looked at her mom, she was smiling quietly to
her, like she hadn’t heard the question.

“Did you just say something, Hikari?”

Hikari took her time to let the air fill her lungs before shaking her head. She didn’t try to say it
again, instead, she pulled out the golden medal from her purse.

“I thought it would be a good idea if you had this… I… I won two rounds using only my ice…”

She wanted to say more, but she couldn’t, she didn’t know how. So she got up and walked to her,
just to let the medal in her open hand.

And after that, she just went back to Endeavor’s house and decided to finally search what love was
supposed to be on the Internet.

Chapter End Notes

Yes, I changed Shouto's name because I really liked the pun on it, so I named his
female version "Hikari" (氷火利), I tried to make the pun "Ice-Fire Interest" (if it's
wrong or is impossible to read, please someone tell me).

Special thanks to the beta readers who helped in the process of the first chapter:
KingK1256, a_distant_story and Arcanielle, I'm so excited to finally publish this and
I'm really thankful for your help.

Thanks for reading and if you want, you're welcome to yell at me on my Tumblr
(kaysmallfeetgirl).
 If loving you is a felony now
Chapter Notes

This chapter contains an extract of the girls conversation in "A+B Slumber Party”, the
fourth part of the second volume of School Briefs, mainly because I can’t really write
about girls talking. Hope you enjoy this chapter.

It's just a crush.

Yeah, because a crush, and a crush as it says in that website was “a brief but intense infatuation for
someone”.

It isn’t love.

No, it’s just a crush, and Hikari keeps it all the time in mind, she repeated to herself during last
week every time that her eyes found Midoriya’s or when he texted asking how she was.

And most importantly, she is repeating it while she runs through Hosu’s street right to the direction
Midoriya sent in the group chat.

She is checking for Midoriya because he may be the real first friend she could ever have in all her
life. Friends aren’t supposed to be your crush, well, maybe they could, as that website says, the
crush is “someone inappropriate”. Midoriya, her friend (and possibly All Might’s secret lovechild
until proving the opposite) is totally inappropriate.

Endeavor would kill her if he finds out about her crush.

Even with that, she is running with all her strength. That’s it until she finds them. She wasn’t
expecting to find him, Iida and Native being on the floor, completely moveless, with The Hero
Killer ready to kill Iida.

She knew this was meant to happen, Iida had the same face that Natsuo and she wear all the time.
He wanted vengeance, he probably felt so much hatred and she didn’t say a thing before.

Hikari fights, but she isn’t the best with her left side and Stain is definitely a fast villain. She sees
her life going through her eyes a couple of times, dead calling for her each time Stain got too much
close with his blades pointing to her neck. Unexpectedly, they win, they win and Stain has burns
and broken ribs, Endeavor scolds her, and it’s just like after the Sports Festival, it doesn’t matter,
because she has all her concentration in a pair of green eyes.

They spent a couple of days at the hospital after the incident. She finally knows how Iida is in a
normal day outside UA classes, Midoriya serving as a canal between them helps and they become
close partners.

One afternoon, while Iida was called for revision, Midoriya sits right by her side in the bed, there’s
no space enough for both of them, so they are pushed together and her left shoulder is touching his
right one. He is explaining his analysis for their fight, Hikari is calm until Midoriya reaches the
point where she almost lost her left arm, unconsciously her right hand goes to her shoulder,
remembering the feeling of the air before the blaze cuts her skin.
“I really thought I was going to lose my arm… Even if it was my left arm, I was so afraid”.

“Yeah, I saw your face, but Iida got you and now we are here, alive”.

She holds her breath when she realizes Midoriya is holding her hand. His hand is full of scars;
scars she provocated. It’s just a second, but he squeezes her hand and then he’s smiling so bright
that she is disorientated.

“Thank you for coming to save us, Todoroki”.

Hikari tries to not look at Midoriya's hand since that moment. Not all the time. But she looks at
him when her hand feels numb and remembers the sensation of holding his hand. She remembers
the warm and scarred hand holding her and internally she yearns for holding his hand again.

She doesn’t think about her feelings, they don’t matter at that moment. Hikari needs to focus on
her finals, she studies day and night, when she feels the memory of his hand coming back she trains
harder. And all those efforts give her a fifth place in the academic test. It also gives Yaoyorozu and
her the victory against Aizawa.

Recovery Girl meets them with a big proud smile. They finished in the first 10 minutes. All thanks
to Yaoyorozu’s plan (and how it was better than the initial plan she had thought). They get to
watch the rest of the different combats, she looks sideways at how All Might destroys Midoriya
and Bakugō, she pretends to watch all her classmates' combats because she is not sure if she wants
to show her preferences in front of Yaoyorozu.

By the way All Might beats Midoriya, she thinks that probably they aren’t related (unless All
Might is as bad a parent as Endeavor), no way All Might treats his own child like that, not when
Midoriya is all bubbly and hopeful, no when Hikari is quite and sometimes feels afraid of
Endeavor’s reactions.

Surprisingly and against what she thought, Midoriya and Bakugō won and she saw them coming to
attend to their injuries.

They don’t talk at that moment, but they do the next morning, while Midoriya asks her if she’s
nervous about the Training Camp. She’s not nervous about training, she’s terrified about sharing a
bed place with more people. And specifically with girls, due she doesn’t have the abilities to talk,
even less gossip.

She tries to practice talking with Fuyumi about her students, she tries so hard, but she ends up
listening to whatever Fuyumi is saying and watching every facial expression. At the end of the
evening, Hikari is totally tired and thinking seriously about telling Fuyumi all her ticks.

The only hope now is that the trip to I-Island is worth the trouble and she at least develops a few
social abilities to deal with the girls.

I-Island was a failure.

The trip sucks.

First, Bakugō came to her screaming about a worthless record she just broke for fun, his
appearance only brings realizing that more of her classmates are there, including Midoriya, which,
Hikari reminds herself, doesn’t have anything special and shouldn’t make her heart beat faster.

Then, probably due the class luck, they have to face the villains attacking the island, and she’s not
sure about fighting, she agrees with Yaoyorozu, they aren’t allowed to fight; but at the same time
she can’t stand the idea of doing nothing; so she obviously fights along with Midoriya and the
others.

It continues with combat after another and it ends with a jacket flying in the wind because she has
to help Midoriya as much as she can with her fire (because she actually accepts that she worries for
him way more than what she should).

The only reason she didn’t flash all her classmates was that Endeavor was right when he insisted on
her buying fireproof clothes. She hates him for knowing that she was eventually going to use fire
without problems.

The worst of all is realizing she can’t talk with the other girls. She always ends up listening to what
they are saying (just like when she talks to Fuyumi). The only person she can talk to is Midoriya,
and she doubts Aizawa would let her sleep with him.

The thought makes cheeks blush and lets a small fire flick let her face.

She’s definitely lost and she hopes don’t fuck up with the girls in the first night.

Hikari learns in the camp that the worst can always get worse.

And she should have known that by this point. Even though it was easier to deal with 1-A girls
after some girls from 1-B came into the small bedroom. They shared all the candies the girls had
brung.

“I’m sorry Tokage, Komori and Tsunotori aren’t here, they were summoned by Vlad Sensei to
review today’s training session…”

“No worries,” said Yaoyorozu. “We have brought some candies, so that is enough for all of us”.

“Slumber party!” Hikari turned her face to the space where Hagakure’s was supposed to be. “I was
waiting for this so much, we haven’t gossip about anything since we came here.”

Each one took her place, the futons already prepared for the moment, the only necessary thing left
was the drinks, and after they went and got them from the nearby vending machine, all the girls
raised the glasses for a toast. Hikari could feel how she wasn’t the only one really nervous, well,
maybe Yaoyorozu couldn’t be considered nervous, she was thrilled.

“To tell the truth, this is my very first slumber party..” Same thought Hikari, expecting none of the
girls to notice. “Could someone explain how this is meant to go?”

Hikari realized that she was fucked up the moment Hagakure said “amore”; she felt her left side
warm and a blush appering weirdly in both sides of her face. She could fake being expressionless
like most of the time, but she needed to focus on what the others were saying.

She found comfort realizing that Shiozaki wasn’t disposed to talk about love, she was waiting for
Uraraka to be the same, but when her head turned to the left to look at her, her cheeks were more
pink than before. What was making her nervous?

None of them have a boyfriend, of course, but if that was the case, shouldn’t they stop talking
about love?

“But romance! I wanna hear something to tug at the heartstring! How about crushes? Any of you
gals crushing on someone?” said Ashido, taking place at the center of the circle.

“Fuck” Hikari said in just a whisper. Shiozaki definitely looked at her with reprobating eyes.

“Crushes, huh” said Uraraka at her left, turning red this time and relaxing Hikari.

Good, I’m not the only one crushing hard, the thought had made her happy at that moment.

“What’s wrong, Ochaco?” asked Asui.

“I know that look” exclaimed Hagakure, Hikari froze a moment before noticing Hagakure’s finger
was probably pointing at Uraraka.

“Just trying to stop my heart from pounding…”

“Do you need a doctor? That could be a sign of something worse”

Hikari twirled her face to hear Shiozaki, if she could focus on her she probably would stop her
blush, and nobody will realize how her left side was warmer. A silence installed again between the
girls, Hikari was ready to tell them she was going to sleep, but no, definitely not, Ashido was
stubborn and wanted to keep talking about love.

“What I’m trying to say is… use our imagination! Fantasize! Like, is there any boy in class A or B,
you’d wanna date? That kinda thing?”

This is my end, running in Hikari’s mind over and over. I’m going to talk about him. I have no
control over me right now, I can’t do this, I can’t…

If it wasn’t for the distraction that Uraraka gives her while losing her mind, Hikari would be totally
gone, she would probably be as bad as Uraraka. While the others were thinking about which boy to
choose, she realized Uraraka was getting even more anxious than her, way worse.

At least Hikari wasn’t shaking her head on and on.

“None of them really spring to mind as boyfriend material,” said Ashido, totally disappointed.

Not a single word came out of Hikari’s mouth, happy that nobody had a telekinesis quirk. As Jirou
and Yaoyorozu began to talk about Kaminari, and all the girls agreed that he was definitely a
gentleman, Hikari kept thinking why they needed to have that conversation, her middle school
classmates weren’t as insistent as the girls in UA.

“No, no, the real gentleman here is Yoarashi, Kaminari is just a big fat womanizer,” muttered
Jirou, bringing Hikari back from her thoughts.

There was a nod in sync from most of the girls. Even Hikari nodded; at the beginning she and
Yoarashi didn’t get along so well (probably because she was kind of a jerk with her unfriendly
attitude the first weeks), but after they resolve their problems and she began to be more friendly, he
was always smiling to her and trying to make her talk.

“I mean, Yoarashi really has it all,” stated Hagakure. “He’s tall, handsome, strong…”

“But he’s quite intense, isn’t he?” said Asui.

There was a large chorus of “mhm”.

“I could say Monoma is just… worse,” muttered Kendo.

“But… he’s actually not bad looking, it’s a shame he’s such a weirdo” said Hagakure, the clothes
floating in the dark appeared to shake.

“There is also Iida, he’s like the total against Monoma, right?” said Asui.

“Ah, yes, one can tell that Iida would never cheat on a girlfriend…” by that point, Hikari was
incredibly embarrassed, they were talking about her friends, her true friends. If the girls keep
talking about her friends they’ll get to Midoriya and with how tired she was, she doubted if she
could remain calm.

Maybe she could go to the bathroom and stay there until the girls were over.

“How about Midoriya?” said Ashido abruptly.

She should have gone to the bathroom when she could.

She closed her hands in fists and tried to keep them in her tights. But the movement didn’t distract
her from seeing how Uraraka stiffen immediately.

She really should have gone to the bathroom.

“Take the Sports Festival, for instance. He dug up all those landmines during the race, right?
Totally insane strategy, but bold as hell. And then in the tournament, he’s an all out, he broke his
bones again and again just to fight you, right Todoroki?” whoever was talking didn’t really stop to
hear Hikari talk. “But when I spot him in the hall, he gives a different vibe.”

Hikari bit her tongue, trying not to talk about how wonderful a friend Midoriya was, how dedicated
was to his studies and training, how he was always smiling, giving the best of him.

At her left, she watched as Uraraka was opening and closing her mouth several times, until she
stopped.

“Midoriya, right… He’s just about the hardest worker you’ll ever meet. It’s like everything he does
is aimed at getting him one step closer to being a hero.”

The girls in 1-A nodded in agreement.

“Seeing Deku in action just makes me wanna do my best too!” said Uraraka with a smile that lit
her eyes. She had never seen Uraraka like that before.

That’s when it hit Hikari, and she wasn’t relaxed that someone else was crushing hard on a guy.

Because Uraraka was crushing hard on Midoriya.

She also had a crush on Midoriya, the boy with green eyes and scarred hands, the boy who didn’t
give up trying to save her, the same boy that held Hikari’s hand in a hospital a month ago, the boy
she longed for.

Hikari got up from her place at the sudden feeling of her eyes getting wet.

None of the girls noted because they were talking about how much of an otaku Midoriya was. She
left the room in silence going directly to the bathroom, and after she was sure the door was closed
and nobody would get in, she let a few tears fall.

Yeah, she remembered that it was supposed to be just a crush, but it still hurt the idea of knowing
that she wasn’t the only one crushing so hard on Midoriya; the idea that he could choose between
both girls made her sadder.

If someone put it in perspective, it was obvious that Midoriya would choose Uraraka, who was as
happy, bubbly and friendly as him. Uraraka was pretty, with that blush in her cheeks all the time
and the smile on her face.

Hikari couldn’t think of something that could attract Midoriya’s attention to her.

Hikari wasn’t a feminine girl. She was foul-mouthed, her behavior more like a boy, she never wore
a dress or skirt. Her hair was growing long after years of having a Bob cut. She wasn’t a princess or
a cute girl like the one in the shoujo manga that her past classmates talked about.

But Uraraka was totally one of those girls. She looked like a girl out of a comic and Uraraka didn’t
have a big red scar on her left side.

Midoriya would never put an eye on her and the idea was installing a cold sensation on her chest.
She could feel the oppression, how heavy her whole body was for the moment, the scar on her face
pulsing with her heartbeat.

Why did she crush on Midoriya? Why did she think someone as pure and good as Midoriya would
eventually reciprocate her feelings?

He was her friend and he actually never acted like he wanted to be something more. Midoriya was
always concentrated on being a hero, he didn’t have time for love and he probably wouldn’t never
think about it, not when his goal was becoming the next symbol of peace

Hikari let the quiet crying go on, and after a few minutes, it was over. She could deal with her
feelings as she already had done it, she just had to stay focused on her true goal, she had to focus
on becoming a great hero, a better hero than Endeavor; she remembered her own promises.

She cleaned her face and then looked at the small mirror, a girl with puffy red eyes and a
prominent scar on her blue eye looked back. She wasn’t smiling, she had a neutral expression. The
only thing that told she had a bad time was her eyes, but that was it.

She wasn’t the princess who needed to be rescued. She never was. There wasn’t a crown nor a soft
pink dress, not even an all teeth smile. It was just her, a promising student, a future Pro-Hero, the
Best Hero her family will have.

And Midoriya wasn’t the blue prince. Because Hikari never needed one in the first place.

Midoriya was her friend, her first friend and nothing more.

She had a crush on him and that was all.

She didn’t have time for crushes, not anymore.

By the time she came back to the dorm the 1-B girls were gone and her classmates were preparing
for bed.

“Night,” was all she said before falling on her futon, ignoring Uraraka close to her.

She fell asleep before expecting anyone to answer her.

Even after her decision and how she was feeling minutes ago, her left hand itched the whole night
waiting for a scarred hand to hold her.
They look at the boxes placed in the room’s center. There are only three, but they have all that she
is going to need.

“Are you sure you don’t want anything else? We could search for a puff, so you have somewhere
to sit when you are tired of tatami mats.”

Hikari stays there thinking if she should bring at least a single thing to sit.

“Why not?”

She hopes they’ll go and come back in less than two hours. As always, she’s wrong. She watches
as Fuyumi smiles and lets out the puff, the pillows and the dresses she bought (almost all paid with
Endeavor’s credit card, of course).

They are pretty, weirdly pastel and out of the color scheme Hikari is used to. She never wears pink,
but the dresses are pink, purple and a very soft green (the last one a gift from Fuyumi and the only
thing that they didn’t pay with Endeavor’s money, by her older sister's insistence). And two of the
three pillows are a naive blue, the only one left is a blue sky.

“Are you nervous?” asks Fuyumi with true concern.

Hikari shakes her head while looking at her older sister standing on the threshold, her turquoise
eyes filled with tears. “Why would I be nervous?”

Fuyumi bits her lips before answering, the consternation escaping from her mouth easily. “‘Cause
I’ve been worrying so much for you, Hikari, I know this is a bigger step from what you’re used to,
and if you need someone to talk to you can always count on me and Natsuo, and obviously
mom…”

“I’m fine,” that’s all she can answer.

Hikari goes to the pill of empty boxes and takes one new, she begins to put all the things they
bought on one of them.

“No, you’re not, since the training camp you’re off… Is this related to Bakugō Katsuki?”

The comment makes her snort.

“Like I care about Bakugō,” answers her.

But she cares, she cares for him as a classmate should do, that’s why she went on the rescue
mission a week ago.

“It’s fine if you like a boy, there’s nothing wrong about it,” blurts Fuyumi.

For the first time in all day Hikari really stops what she’s doing and stays still. She hasn’t talked
with Fuyumi about her feelings for Midoriya, there wasn’t a reason to do it, there’s even less
motives to talk about it right now, when she is beginning to really accept that he can only be her
friend.

“This doesn’t have to do with any boy.”

“Then what is it? Hikari, you look like someone hit a baby in front of you.” Her sister’s face
negates immediately. “You look sad, without inspiration, and yeah, it’s better than when you were
angry at dad, but this is different. I feel it, talk to me, like sisters.”
“I don’t want to talk about Midoriya with you,” splits and almost shouts Hikari.

Her eyes open wide and she gets up just to hold her sister by her shoulders. It’s the first time she
has admitted her feelings out loud, she feels terrified about how it isn’t her secret anymore.

She doesn’t want her family to know what’s going on, not when her mother is in the hospital, not
when Natsuo feels so far away from them, not when Endeavor destroyed the training room days
ago.

What would he do if he knew about her feelings? Would he attack her? Would he not let her go to
the dorms? Would he forbid her to see Midoriya again?

“Don’t say a thing, don’t talk to the old man about this.” Her voice is just a single whisper full of
fear, full of the insecurities Hikari had started to feel a few moments.

There’s a bih silence. Fuyumi takes her shaky hands with hers and holds them.

She remembers a scarred hand holding her left hand in a hospital… And most recently, a week ago,
in a dark valley, his hold is always special, assuring protection to her. And even if Fuyumi’s is
doing the same, it feels different. It feels more familiar.

“I won’t say it.”

Hikari looks down to meet turquoise eyes and her older sister stretches herself to give a tiny kiss in
her front. They hug for a long moment before they separate and Fuyumi takes her time to clean
her tears.

“Love is such a weird thing, isn’t it?”

Hikari nods and then smiles a little.

“You’re going to pack what is left, you own me that.” Fuyumi snorts and the next moment she’s on
the floor closing the last box.

“Yeah, only ‘cause you're my little sister.”

 Then I'm a renegade
Chapter Notes

See the end of the chapter for notes

She tries to be the best friend she can be.

She tells Midoriya that she likes his room with all the All Might’s figures and posters. She says a
simple “Thanks” after Midoriya congratulates her for her room’s decoration.

“It would be hard to study with you, I mean, we’re almost totally opposite.”

She nods and thanks Aizawa in silence for putting her in the last floor and Midoriya in the first one,
they won’t be in touch so much and I’ll be good for her stay away from Midoriya. Hikari will
eliminate all her feelings, her crush will be reduced to a simple friendship. She’ll be the best friend
Midoriya let’s her be.

The training also gives her excuses to not meet him or the girls.

She is always training, always practicing her new moves, her fire; so when the Test for the
Provisional License comes, she aprobes with a 81. From her license it can read big blue letters
“Hiyuki”.

She sent a photo to her siblings, she will be showing it to her mom the next Sunday, and everyone
that she cared about would know about how she really was becoming a hero.

A moment later her phone vibrate and she immediately sees the text from Natsuo

“What is next?” It says.

For the first time after all that training, she didn’t know what was supposed to do.

She wasn’t planning on interning with Endeavor, and couldn’t see herself trying to talk with him.

So she waited for an answer. And the only thing that came was Midoriya smiling, congratulating
her, and then she was smiling with Midoriya because he wanted a photo for his mother.

She thinks, if she can be a friend, maybe she could be a better daughter or at least a person trying
no to hate that bastard for the father she had.

She begins to answer with the best efforts she has when Endeavor sends a message.

She also gives her notes to Midoriya when he is grounded. She suffers with him after Togata
kicked their asses on the “Interning probe”. And she sees how Midoriya is suffering to help
someone (because for Midoriya, there is always someone to save).

In mid September, she sends a message for the first time asking the old man what happened in the
raid planned by Sir Nighteye, and also for the first time, Endeavor doesn’t answer immediately. It
doesn’t matter, actually, because a couple hours later, Midoriya calls her.

“Hi,” it’s all that he says once she has picked the call.

“Are you alright, Midoriya?” manages Hikari to say.

“Y-yeah, I’m just going to spend the night here just for checking.”

“Did you break your bones again, Midoriya?” asks Hikari half smiling.

“N-no…Well, yeah, I broke my bones, but they are fine now.”

“I’m happy to hear that.” She wants to say something more, she melts by the idea of talking with
him more time, just hearing his voice, knowing that her friend is really fine. “I saw you on the
news, I was a little worried for… all of you, guys.”

“We hadn’t had it so bad… The worst part was…”

“Yeah, I know that, I’m sorry for that.” Midoriya doesn’t answer, but Hikari hears him crying.
“Maybe I should hang up the call, Midoriya, I can call you later.”

“N-no… It’s just…” She knows it, she knows that Midoriya is probably shaking while crying, and
guilt installs in her chest, because she’s the reason he’s crying, she made him remember about
what happened. “I wanna talk with a friend, if that doesn’t bother you, Todoroki.”

“You know you can always trust me.”

I’m your friend.

“Thanks.”

She listens to Izuku’s muttering until they fall asleep. In her dreams that night, she pictures herself
just looking at Midoriya while he talks, it’s just so vivid that she can’t realize the next day when
he’s talking to her if she’s still in the dream.

As the days go on, as their friendship goes on, Hikari realizes that it isn’t a crush anymore, she
realizes that her effort to kill her feelings didn’t do anything.

She feels anxious whenever he’s not there, her hand is constantly aching, she remembers the
moments when their hands hold everyday and she finds herself looking for him in the class more
and more. She worries for him when he is late for the School Festival and she feels her heart
beating again once he is there on the stage dancing with the others.

She feels confused all the time, because it wasn’t supposed to go like this, her feelings weren't
supposed to be stronger, she should have let that illusion die months ago because there is no way it
is going to have a good ending.

But then comes the hug.

Because Endeavor is fighting a nomu by himself and she worries too much for a person she can
barely think of as a father. Hikari holds on to the couch in the common room, instantly regretting it
because she could burn and freeze it at the same time; she ends up putting her hands by her sides
while trying not to shake anymore.

A pair of hands take hers and begin to give soft strokes, she recognizes the scarred hands and tries
to regulate her temperature, she focuses on Endeavor in the television, she doesn’t think in her
hands with Midoriya’s.

When the fight it’s over, she lets herself fall on the mat, Midoriya’s holding her the next moment
and stroking all her hair.
“It’s okay, It’s okay, Todoroki, he won, he did it…” He whispers again and again.

She sees more classmates coming to her, but none of them says a thing about her holding on
Midoriya. Hikari stays there until Aizawa comes to see her and asks how she feels, she gets up, but
Midoriya doesn’t let her go until she walks entirely by herself.

She doesn’t want to spend her time thinking about the sweet Midoriya’s touch, his smell or the way
his arms also feel full of scars even if he was wearing sleeves. She thinks about how to talk with
Endeavor with at least more respect, she tries to see her father as the No. 1 Hero instead of a big
bag full of shit.

Hikari is successful on both goals (incredibly). Except when she acted supporting Natsuo when her
sibling and her faced her father. Even though she is actually fulfilling her goals for the first time in
months, that makes her feel satisfied with her life.

Until the joining training with class 1-B.

She knows she wouldn’t have to be angry at Midoriya, even though she can only hear a voice in her
mind saying “Liar,” she runs to the change rooms, she bathes and puts on her uniform so quickly
that Yaoyorozu looks at her with preocupation.

“I’m having my period,” Hikari lies, and the girls look at her with empathy. She is also a liar.

She feels stupid, she shouldn’t have trusted on Midoriya, he lied to her, he made her use her fire
side (the side she hated) but he was hiding his true power. She fell in love with a liar, and she can’t
even hate him, she hates herself for believing in him.

Hikari isn’t even jealous at the sight of Uraraka holding him, or at least that detail is so tiny, she
knows that he sees her as a friend. Yet the image of Uraraka protecting him, breaks her heart more.

She promised not to fall in love, still she didn’t keep her promise. She’s crying in her room, far
away from anybody in the world, far away from the boy who didn’t know had her heart between
his scarred hands.

Her heart freezes as the sun begins to hide in the horizon, she feels how the fire in her chest begins
to fade away slowly.

The night falls and a knock alerts her that somebody is waiting at the other side of the door. She
goes to the small bathroom and cleans her face, just in case they knock again.

“Todoroki, I brought something to eat for you.” Hikari holds her breath as Midoriya begins his
muttering. “Maybe she’s already asleep, the girls said she wasn’t feeling fine after all.”

She opens the door and quickly takes the tray from his hands, “Thanks,” then she closes the door as
quickly as she can, Midoriya groans as his hand gets trapped between the door and its frame and
she stays there without moving, her eyes open at the realization that his hand is still trapped.

“Why would you do that?” Escapes from her mouth before she can fully process what just
happened, she opens the door just enough so he can take his hand out of it, then she closes
immediately and they stay at the opposite sides of the door.

“I-I don’t know.”

There is a few seconds of silence before she decides to speak again.

“You can go now, Midoriya.”

She doesn’t hear footsteps getting away from her room, instead she hears his voice.

“I thought maybe you wanna talk about something.”

It takes her seconds and all her resolution to open the door once again, this time entirely. “You
didn’t tell me you have two quirks, you told me to go with everything I had, but you didn’t do it,
you were hiding your own power… And maybe I had thought that as we were friends you would
have told me about it.”

“B-but, it’s just my quirk, one quirk” explains with his hands. “This is just a misunderstanding,
what happened today was the first time I had experienced it. I think it’s an extension of my quirk’s
original form… I would definitely have told you, Todoroki, you’re my precious friend.”

His hand poses in her right cheek, caressing delicately. The fire in her heart not only comes alive
again, it dances at the rhythm Izuku takes to stroke her cheek with his thumb, “You believe me,
right?”

Hikari can just barely nod. “Sorry.”

“You don’t have to worry about it, Todoroki, I can imagine how you felt at that moment.” His
hand retracts, Hikari already missing the sweet and comforting sensation.

“You’re my best friend,” is what she manages to say.

“It’s good to hear that.”

She eats all her food and then sends a message to her father.

She looks to her surroundings once more before coming closer to them. She has enough luck to
find them both at the same place. She has been waiting all night to ask him, no, ask them if they
would like to take the work study in the old man’s agency.

She can do this.

She is going to help her friends.

“Midoriya, Bakugō, if neither of you have a work study yet, why don’t you both come with me to
the current number one?”

She has been thinking about it a lot, she wants to help Midoriya and by extension Bakugō. Both of
the boys look at her, Midoriya with amazed eyes and Bakugō trying to understand the situation.

She only hopes that her blush wasn’t that obvious.

“I have to say, Hikari, when you told me that you would come to do your work study with me, I
didn’t think you would bring friends with you.”

It’s the first day interning with Endeavor, they just found him on the street and she just wants the
world to eat her. The old man had assured he would accept her friends, they had a deal. She’s about
to say something when Bakugō answers for her.

“What the fuck are you talking about? We’re only classmates.”
 She is grateful with Bakugō, and she actually wants to say that any friend of Midoriya is a friend to
her; she could get along with Iida, Uraraka and Asui before so she can deal with the barking
chihuahua named Bakugō.

“Don’t believe Kacchan, Todoroki, I do think we are friends,” Midoriya says to her quietly while
his father discusses with Bakugō, so none of them notice how she blushed a little by his words.

Later the old man scolds her in privat, because apparently, she should have chosen better friends.
To Hikari it doesn’t matter, because he will know how good Midoriya is in the next few days.

And she expects to see his face regretting what he just said.

Not everything is bad at the work study, because it’s her birthday, and for the first time in her life,
she gets to probe a cake (a proper cake). That’s not even the best, no, because Fuyumi gave her a
pair of mismatched bows (white with red polka dots and red with white polka dots), she has a letter
from her mother and Natsuo has gave her a few ribbons so she can put her hair in a topknot. Yet,
she finds herself anxious about Midoriya’s gift, especially after he said that his gift couldn’t be
given in the presence of her father.

The night when they come back to UA, she finds out why Endeavor should never see the gift in his
entire life.

She eventually will discover how to use her All Might’s hoodie on her house, because there’s no
way Hikari will use it the rest of her life.

That night, Hikari sits alone in her room’s balcony, drinking the hot chocolate calmly. She goes
over and over about the promise she made last year, she thinks how naive she was when she really
thought she would never find love, nevertheless, there she was, hiding her blush with her hair the
first time Midoriya saw her with her hoodie.

After a few hours in the cold she finally decides that the promise isn't worth the pain or the effort.

The exchange between Ashido and Uraraka the next morning only reinforces the idea that she may
give at least one try.

She can love at least once, she can say it out loud again and after that she can live knowing why
Midoriya will reject her (because obviously he will reject her, there’s no time for love in a hero’s
life).

She can have a chance for living happily if he says yes. And she is going to take the risk of
knowing what it will be.

She can do it.

She’s going to do it.

Chapter End Notes

Hikari's hero name uses the kanji's for fire and snow, (I totally blame myself for such
a creative name).
 I wanna stay with you for a long time

She takes two days to plan it.

It’s an easy, simple and not at all complicated plan. They are going to study English together and
before they end, she’s going to tell Midoriya that she likes him.

The day begins as usual. She goes to the showers and bathes herself, Midoriya meets her at the
dining room, they eat together, as all the days before, they walk together to the main building. All
the way there, Midoriya keeps talking about how he really needs her to teach a few more things
about English.

“Would you like to study this afternoon, Midoriya?” She says with a light smile, successfully
hiding her nervousness.

“Sure, Todoroki, I’d really like that.”

She shakes in anticipation and hopes she won’t get shaky or too shy at that moment. She spends the
day trembling a little and thinking what exactly to say, would Midoriya react badly if she
immediately says that she likes him? Should she start with just saying how much he means to her?

She sends a message to Mei, expecting she knows a little about romance. The answer comes
surprisingly quick, yet is disappointing and expected: why do u think i’ll know abt it?

Probably Mei isn’t the best option, but she’s the only one who can talk about it. Hikari doesn’t
want any of the 1-A girls figuring out about what she’s going to do (it would be embarrassing and
Hikari would feel terrible with Uraraka, even if they are not that good friends). Fuyumi isn’t an
option, she will get too nervous about it, only making her more nervous.

The next message from Mei is actually pretty clever: i’ll do it as quickly as I can.

She texts a simple “Thanks”. In her mind, she repeats a simple speech, simple words, not
explaining completely what she feels, if Midoriya rejected her, she would be just a couple weeks
embarrassed (instead of her whole life). Maybe she could use something different, not just her
long-sleeved sweaters.

After dinner, she goes to her room and brushes her hair and then arranges her hair in a half-ponytail
and puts a bow. She decides to use her All Might’s hoodie. It looks casual, definitely not
something someone would use on a date, or a public love declaration, yet it’s what Hikari is, with
an aggregate of Midoriya’s likes.

For a moment, she considers putting make-up on her scar, but it would make her classmate suspect
why she dresses too much. Instead she takes a picture and sends it to Mei. Again the answer is
quick, and she receives another two text messages one after another.

r they an All Might’s fan?

when i gave u my number, i never thought u would send this

but u look hot, girl <3

She takes her book and a notebook to hide her new blush, and goes to Izuku’s room. There are a
few people in the common room that look at her when she passes. Jirou murmurs something in
Yaoyorozu's ear and then she blushes, then both of them give her a thumbs up.

What was that? Hikari wants to stop and think about what just happened, yet she moves on and
tries to control all her nerves while she goes up to Midoriya’s room.

Of course she wasn’t expecting Iida and Uraraka to be there when Midoriya opens the door. She
thinks that it doesn’t matter, she can wait until they’re gone, or maybe she could do it another day.
She explains to all of them their doubts about the class, she gives her examples and tries to practice
with them, she concentrates on it and time passes fast, so fast that it is almost time for the curfew
and they begin to leave.

Iida leaves first (obviously), he thanks Hikari so many times that she loses the count, Uraraka half
expects that Hikari leaves first, and as that doesn’t happen, Uraraka leaves ten minutes before the
curfew.

Hikari takes her stuff as quickly as she can, then breathes trying to relax herself. She holds the book
and the notebooks with her right hand, trying to summon a little ice so she doesn’t feel that hot
right there. It doesn’t work, she can feel her body hotter and shaking, she’s regretting the decision,
she’s almost leaving the room when Midoriya talks.

“I’m happy that you really liked the hoodie.”

Small chuckles are heard in the room, Hikari doesn’t recognize if those are hers. She thinks and
tries to find courage; she doesn’t know why she’s so nervous, she faced the League of Villains in
USJ, she talked to her mother after years, she fought the Hero Killer, she made friends. She can do
it.

“Yeah, I do, I really like it,” she poses a little and extends her free arm to show him how the
oversized hoodie looks on her. She can do it, she thinks for the last time and she says, “I like it
almost as much as I like you.”

It 's burning.

The room is burning.

She is burning. Her cheeks are bright red, she's trembling a little and she wants to scream. That fire
that began to flicker last year is consuming her fast, at the pace there won’t be any of her left to get
out of this room.

Midoriya is looking at her, with even brighter cheeks and mouth half open.

Neither of them say anything.

She misses the cold that freezed her chest before seeing Midoriya’s eyes, before the Sports
Festival, before even meeting him. It’s just for a moment, but the fire is gone and she feels the cold
just enough to dedicate him a smile before looking at the carpet.

“I know you don’t feel the same, I just… I think I needed to say it at least once,” she waves her
hand and proceeds to walk out of the room. “See you tomorrow, Midoriya.”

Maybe she dreams of what happens next.

She isn’t sure, because there is no way in the world Midoriya would put a hand on her left side and
talk for minutes about how he thinks she is beautiful. There is no way Midoriya stands on tiptoes
just to give her a kiss on her front… And then on her hair… And another near her left eye… And
both of them are just smiling.

Maybe it’s just a dream, yeah.

Because the next day he’s giving her the biggest of his smiles again and while they go to the
classroom he takes her hand with his, all while nobody looks at them. There’s no way that after
classes they spend the evening in his room, with nobody else, just watching a movie sitting in the
bed, pressed against the wall with their shoulders touching each other and hands folded.

Yet, it is. It is real.

And Hikari is surprised that before the curfew he smiles and says in her ear “I really like you too.”

Obviously she has to blurt “Not like a friend, right?” And she hears Midoriya laugh, and she could
swear that it is the most beautiful sound in the whole world.

“No, not like friends, Todoroki,” his face makes a funny face. “Can I call you Hikari? It’s just…
That really, really sounded strange now.”

She bites her lip before saying “Yeah, that would be nice, Izuku.”

Life comes easy, as awkward as it sounds to Hikari, her days are going to school walking while
their hands are together, accepting every brief touch of hands with Izuku at the classroom, turning
red every time she caught him looking at her, enjoy every sparring match with him (more than
before), spend her evenings in his room or in hers doing homeworks, watching movies or just
talking.

The evenings in which she can train with him are better. But the best evenings are when they sit in
the common room and she hears him talking with their classmates or just giving her a new hero
analysis, when they can be together in front of everyone.

No holding hands, no kisses, no more than brief touches.

Once they fall asleep in her room and when they wake up he’s holding her waist against him. He
asks her for forgiveness with his face completely red.

She says it is okay. He would never do something she wouldn't want to do.

They take their time. They don’t have any hurry, that’s what Hikari repeats to herself.

It’s not like a war is coming.

 I wanna be your stone, love
Chapter Notes

See the end of the chapter for notes

The first kiss comes at the end of January.

That friday evening was cold, so Hikari is trying with all her strength to produce only warmth from
her left side. It’s a little bit hard considering how lovely her boyfriend is looking with that hat
covering all his hair and how she can’t really just touch him.

The whole class decides to make a small fire in the courtyard’s dorm, they assign Yoarashi to look
in case the fire goes out of control, they sit in a tiny circle to stay warm; most of the girls stay by
her left side, but none of them notice how Izuku and she are just looking at each other the whole
night.

Of course she hears all the stories they’re telling. She even hears the last one and after that she
hears how they begin to leave, she hears how each one wishes for a calm night so they can be
ready for school tomorrow and how Iida comes back after an hour to scold everyone who’s left
because “We, as heroes, should rest and be prepared for our next training”.

Eventually, there’s only five people left outside. It is just them, Yoarashi, Jirou and Kaminari.
None of them are watching, they keep talking about music, nobody notices when she takes Izuku’s
hand and puts it between hers. They also don’t notice when she kisses the knuckles gently with a
warm kiss.

They aren’t watching as they get up and walk inside the building chuckling with their hands
intertwined and they don’t realize how they stay in the dark dining room to hide. She’s sure
nobody is watching them when she presses her body against his, she knows it is probably the heat
of the moment, but she can’t stop herself from putting her hand in the hat and taking it off.

Hikari laughs hard, like she had never done before. Izuku may have expected another thing,
because his face is the exact opposite to hers.

He puts his scarred hands on her hair, caressing it and putting every streak in place as soft as he
can. He kisses her front gently, like he always does, then kisses her nose and Hikari stays there, not
daring to move because she wants to know what is he going to do, the reason why he stares at her
with so much intensity.

She can’t help closing her eyes as his face comes closer to hers. His breath smells like mint, thinks
Hikari as she feels his breath on her lips.

Even with that, his last kiss is a surprise.

It’s a weird sensation at the beginning, she had never kissed someone before and she’s not sure of
what she wants to do now that Izuku is so close. She lets her body react by itself, and does what is
necessary, she’s not ashamed of it.

Why would she be ashamed if Izuku won’t judge her ever? Why would she be ashamed if there
isn’t someone to judge what she’s doing?

It’s just them and the few strokes of light that come from outside.
Her lips move a little and her arms go to his neck, embracing him. His arms are now on her waist.
There’s a small moment when they separate to catch air, but she doesn’t open her eyes because
she’s sure their faces are becoming red. He pressed his front with hers and…

She doesn’t know how, but that fire in her just grows up and extends to her core.

Hikari takes the initiative and kisses him again. She’s moving by pure nature, not really
understanding how her body knows what to do. But she likes it, she likes the way his hair feels
tangled in her fingers.

He likes it too, because he’s humming, one of his hands is holding her waist harder and the other is
on her neck, putting her even closer.

She loves this sensation, the fire in her heart expanding even more all over her body; she thought
that she would have been consumed by that fire two weeks ago in his room, but that is nothing
compared to now, flames brazing alive as she pulls him impossibly closer.

It’s full of pleasure and at the same time contradictive, she feels every pore in her body but she gets
more numb as the kiss grows bigger. She has never tasted liquor or done drugs before, but she’s
sure they would never be as good as having Izuku kissing her in the dark.

Kaminari’s noisy laugh makes them jump and look to the place where the sound comes from, and
after a second he comes right into the dining room and is looking at them with surprised eyes, it’s a
confused look, because clearly he can think of what a mess they are; it takes him effort, but finally
Kaminari knows why they are tangled and his eyes widen more.

They try to separate a little, but the damage is already done and Kaminari opens his mouth big and
tries to say something, Hikari thinks that is the first time she sees Kaminari unable to really talk
(besides all the times he had gone short circuit by using his quirk). “Guys, what?”

“I was just helping Midoriya with something…” Tries to say Hikari immediately, but Kaminari
talks back quickly, almost laughing.

“Unless you were helping to find something in his mouth with your tongue I would believe it.”

Well, now she’s sure she had never heard Kaminari talking this sharply, not even with Bakugō or
Jirou.

“No, Kaminari, I think you’re just tired, we were just talking,” says Izuku, going away from her.

“Dude, I know what someone who just had the best kiss of their life looks like and, guys, you
weren’t even listening to yourselves, the only reason why I came here was to know what the fuck
was doing that kind of noises… And, Midoriya, please, I can’t even look at your face right now,
what were you even doing to get…?”

The question is never completed, but Kaminari looks to the floor like it could eat him, and Hikari
is sure her face is completely red, maybe as red as Izuku’s face, which hasn’t said a word in
seconds. She could say that the space is filled with silence, but she still hears Jirou and Yoarashi
talk outside.

“Hey, Denki, are you already dead?” Shouts Jirou after a few minutes.

The three of them look at each other before Kaminari says anything. “Yeah, I’m fine, thanks for
asking.”
“What was that noise?” Screams Jirou again.

And then all of them hear Yoarshi saying “Maybe I should go check him.”

Hikari panics and tries to find a spot where to hide, Izuku hides his face with his hands, an action
she recognizes, he only does when he is really ashamed. She feels horrible when she hides under
the table where she was pressed before.

“Just… Don’t say it was us,” whispers Hikari from under a table.

“Yeah, I can… I can try,” says Kaminari half blushed. “It was nothing.” He shouts again, he claps
his hand against Izuku's shoulder, she’s not sure Kaminari is talking to both of them because the
next thing he says it’s less than a whisper, “Maybe you can try in a room the next time.”

He’s gOne after seconds and she hears Jirou asking him what took him so long, she doesn’t hear
what he answers because she is coming out of the table and going to Izuku, who doesn’t raise his
face from the floor.

This time she waits a little more to talk.

“Do you think Shinsou could make him forget about that?”

She expects a chuckle or his smile, but Izuku stays in the same space, doesn’t even try to make a
move or look at her eyes the next time he talks to her, “No, I don’t remember his quirk working
like that,” he answered dryly.

Human sensations are funny, because minutes ago she felt like she had set herself on fire while
kissing Izuku, but now she thinks that maybe she shouldn’t have done any of it. She was intense,
more intense than she had been in her entire life and it has consequences.

The fire is gone, and she’s confused, cold and feeling incredibly monstrous about something
(something she can’t figure out right now), but she tries to get closer to her boyfriend, she tries to
give his hat and he flinches.

“I'm sorry, Izuku, I just panicked and I…” She says, completely panicked.

“No, it’s okay, I mean, I knew that you didn’t want our friends to know about us… I should have
been more discreet.”

“It’s not that, I just got nervous… It was my first kiss and… I never expected Kaminari to catch us
at that moment because…” She tries to explain, yet, she’s interrupted.

“Because you are ashamed of me, right?”

“What?”

“Yeah, we’re always hiding, you have never shown affection when we have people around or
when someone is near us, you move away from me. I don’t know what it is besides you are
ashamed of me.”

“I’m not ashamed of you,” she gets closer and embraces Izuku, this time he doesn’t flinch, but he
hides his face on her shoulder, “I’ve never been ashamed of you, okay?”

“Fine,” he holds her a little more and then he just leaves.

She has felt the cold after she made an iceberg, she felt the cold for years because she hated
Endeavor, she felt the cold of realizing Uraraka’s feelings, but none of those colds was as bad as
the new one she feels after Izuku doesn’t say a word to her, doesn’t even text a message.

She waits in silence in her room, until it’s midnight, and then later. She can’t sleep, when Hikari
closes her eyes all she can sense is the cold and how she stood there without reaching him.

What if he leaves her? She didn’t expect to have an opportunity with him and having a few weeks
of happiness is so much better than having nothing, right? Love does not mean to stay forever, does
it?

She really tries to sleep, but new thoughts surge and she only thinks about Izuku leaving her
because she acts like she’s ashamed of him… But she’s not, she didn’t have someone to look up to
as a reference for a relationship.

She was the cold, private, unfriendly and rude Endeavor’s child.

She didn’t want them to be some Romeo and Juliet, she didn’t want to follow the relationships in
the shoujo mangas that she saw, she wanted to do the things in new ways; a way that could work
for both of them, for heroes in training.

It’s 2:08 a.m. when she checks her phone and just starts writing on her phone a big apology in
Izuku’s chat. By 2:30 a.m., almost twenty minutes after she’s just about sending the message when
he is online.

The message is erased in less than fifteen seconds and she closes their chat faster than Iida runs.
Her curiosity wins and she checks her phone again, she enters their chat just a second, but she can
see how it marks writing for a few seconds after disappear and then again.

It takes a few minutes, but that writing goes dead and Izuku goes offline. Not a single message
received.

With all her strength, she puts on her All Might’s hoodie and then she goes out of her room. She
goes down quietly and then she directs to Izuku’s room as fast as she can, the least she’s expecting
is having to deal with Aizawa.

Once she’s in front of his room’s door she doubts about what she’s going to do, maybe he’s already
asleep, maybe she’s going to look like a completely intense girlfriend, maybe Izuku would think
we should never have dated her, maybe… She stops thinking because she is now in front of his
door and she needs to do something.

She knocks on the door and waits.

Surprisingly he opens immediately and looks at her a little surprised, before she overthink even
more, she begins to talk.

“I’m a private person and before UA, before the Sports Festival I had never had a friend, less a
boyfriend, I’m socially awkward, I was ice, cold, frozen and I was full of hatred. Then something
changed and I wanted to change, to be better, I can only describe that I began to be warm.”

“Uh, Hikari…”

“Just let me finish this, Izuku, after that you can break up with me or send me to fly away, but let
me finish.”

“I-I’m not going to break up with you… I… It’s just that Tokoyami or Aoyama could hear you
and…”

“Fine, I’m fine with them hearing, I just wanted to tell you, that I’m not ashamed of you, I’m
completely proud of you, I never expected you liked me too or looking me in that way, I thought
you were going to say that you could never be with someone like me because you’re wonderful,
amazing, pure, gentle and compassionate, and come on, Izuku, just look at me.”

“You’re beautiful.”

“No, I’m not, I have a…”

“You have a scar, yes, but it’s nothing, like, have you ever looked at my hands?”

He extends his arms and with the few light that comes out of this room all the scars are visible.

“I caused most of those…”

“No, you didn’t… I did those to myself when I was trying to save someone.”

She comes closer and then passes her fingers through his arms, shaping every one of the scars,
mostly the ones in his hands.

“It must be a very stupid person.”

He takes his hand to her left side and then gives her a small kiss on the top of her nose.

“No, she is not, she is also an amazing, loving and very kind person, I really like her.”

“Even if she isn’t able to show public affection?” Hikari asks.

“I think it just makes her very lovely and shy.”

He gives her another kiss on her forehead and then he totally embraces her.

“I would like to say the same, but that kiss, you hear Kaminari…”

He laughs a little and then whispers in her ear, “It actually was my first kiss, so I was very
nervous”

She’s about to contradict him but then he says, “Maybe you should leave, Aizawa could come and
then nag us…”

She looks at the dark hall, if she’s honest with herself, she doesn’t want to leave. She looks at him
and for the first time in her life, she tries to make puppy eyes to get something, “Couldn’t I just
stay here with you tonight?”

He blushes and mutters incomprehensible stuff.

“I promise I’m not going to make you produce those sounds like before”, after that he lets her in
completely in his room and closes the door.

She lays down on the bed after she puts off her hoodie and waits for him while he turns off the
light. When everything goes dark, only a few sounds are heard, she distinguishes his breath, her
own breath and the bed sheets as he gets comfortable.

She’s finally falling asleep happily, only smelling to him when he whispers a little.
 “It really was your first kiss?”

“Yes, it really was, why do you ask?”

She feels how he covers his face before talking, “Now I’m feeling worse, I never thought I would
be like that in my first kiss.”

She’s falling asleep, she’s probably almost gone, but she gives him a really soft kiss before saying
the next thing.

“Don’t worry, I really enjoyed it.” She’s not sure if she says it out loud the next time, but probably
she does because Izuku stiffens in his place. “And I’m looking forward to kissing you more.”

The next morning, when she goes out of his room, Tokoyami is in the hall, ready to go down and
looks at her a little surprised. She just waves at him with a big bright smile before coming again to
Izuku’s room and kissing him more.

She can’t wait to tell her mom about her boyfriend the next day.

Chapter End Notes

I actually pictured Hikari smaller than Izuku by just an inch, so every time I wrote that
he kissed her forehead I giggled because I could see Izuku stretching to do it.
 I wanna see it lay in your eyes

The pack of chocolates rests in her closet. It's a special set inspired by a couple of All Might’s
movies, the problem is that it doesn’t even have a ribbon to make it look prettier or fancier, and
Hikari wonders if it is enough for a Valentine's present.

There’s even a chance that Izuku won’t like, because it isn’t as romantic as he could have
expected.

Should she buy another thing?

She can, she could do it with her father’s money, yet she isn’t sure about what is necessary to buy
for her boyfriend. Well, maybe he would be surprised enough if she wears that dress.

Frankly, Izuku was a bunch of nerves that rarely stopped overthinking. But now, and with
Valentine’s coming closer and closer, he was totally lost; he was incapable of thinking of a gift for
his girlfriend.

Chocolates? So conventional.

A date? He didn’t know places to take her out.

Watching a movie? They did that most of the evenings.

All Might’s merch wasn’t even a question.

Hikari deserved something as special as hers, and a week before Valentine’s day he was running
out of ideas.

“For fucking god sake, stop muttering, Deku, you’re getting on my nerves” screamed Bakugō as he
closed his locker in the locker room. All the boys turned their eyes to look at them.

“Come on, Bakugō, maybe he’s nervous,” intervened Kirishima. “Ya know, it's almost Valentine’s
day.”

“And? Deku has always been a lonely loser.”

“Haven’t you realized that he’s amoureux ?” Answering back Aoyama, winking his eye to all of
them, Izuku looked at how Kaminari and Tokoyami flinched at the comment and began to dress up
faster. “Wouldn’t that be the mademoiselle that visited you a couple nights ago?”

The locker room exploded with screams, most of them asking Izuku if what Aoyama said was true,
he felt his face going red and his voice disappearing as all of the boys went closer to him.

“Guys, guys, stop!” Began Iida chopping with his arms, the noise shutting up almost immediately.
“First of all, Midoriya-kun, you must not let girls come inside your room at night, that’s
inappropriate.”

“Y-yeah…”

“But she stayed the whole night, right, Tokoyami?” said Aoyama, looking for his floormate, Izuku
sighed, completely grateful that Tokoyami and Kaminari had already slipped away from the locker
room.
A new series of screams began again, this time asking Izuku who the girl was and why they had
spent the whole night together. He wanted to say that Hikari didn’t stay the whole night, that she
came when it was already late and that they only slept.

Instead he stayed with his mouth closed and hoped that Iida would control all the gossip that the
boys were making. Eventually they realized any word would slip from his mouth and they began to
leave the locker room; he heard how Sero asked where Kaminari was (with anybody answering)
and Aoyama saying he was going to ask Mina about the whole issue.

Only Iida and Bakugō stayed.

Iida was reprimanding him hard, but Izuku wasn’t even hearing after Iida threaded him with telling
Aizawa. After he left, Izuku finished dressing up as fast as he could with Bakugō looking at him.

“I’m not going to say sorry.”

“Fine, I wasn’t expecting it from you,” Izuku said back.

“But you and Icy-hot should be more careful, if you don’t want to be caught up,” and before Izuku
could talk again, Bakugō answered, “You have bite marks all over your collar bone, Deku, and her
costume doesn’t cover that fucking hickeys.”

“The most observant of us saw that, dammit, you two are always together, don’t let me talk about
how she sees you when you left to train with me and the other guys. Like someone killed a puppy
in front of her.”

He wishes he had an invisibility quirk like Hagakure, because there’s no way he is coming back to
the dorms completely blushed and embarrassed.

“S-sorry, Kachan.”

“Don’t fucking say “sorry”, stupid nerd! Just stop being so fucking obvious, I swear Endeavor
really wanted to kill you in the work-study.”

“Oh, god.”

He takes all his stuff and then begins to walk outside the locker room, he doesn’t want to still have
that conversation with Bakugō.

“Don’t leave me here, Deku,” screams Bakugō before catching him up. “Don’t you dare stop
training for stupid love business.”

“I’m not doing that,” he mutters.

He feels anxious as they walk to the dorms, thinking of how all may know about Hikari and him,
it’s not that he doesn’t want them to know, he just wanted it to be private.

“Did you tell her about One for All?”

“Huh?”

“If you two are going to stay together for a long time, you must tell her.” Says Bakugō louder this
time.

A memory floats in his mind. All Might scolded him for almost telling Bakugō about One for All
in the first week of classes. He hadn’t told anyone about it since then, not considering that the
secret could be exposed and All for One could attack the ones who know.

“All Might said…”

“It’s not All Might’s power anymore, stupid Deku.” Bakugō interrupts him, “It’s yours, you decide
what to do with it, wasn’t it the thing you scream to Icy-hot when you fight at the Sports Festival?”

It was and it made her use her left side. Would he be a hypocrite if he sees One for All as All
Might’s?

“R-right, Kacchan, thanks.”

“Don’t thank me, Deku,” he interrupts him again. “And you don’t need her to kick your ass to tell
her, right?”

“I almost won that fight.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.”

They almost get to the Heights Alliance.

He wonders if Hikari would be angry at him when everyone knows about them. He could explain
what happened and maybe she wouldn’t be so angry, so he begins to prepare his speech.

“You can take a walk with her, then take her to eat and watch a movie when you come back.”

Izuku reprimands his desire to see his childhood friend’s face, so he doesn’t turn to look at him,
still he wonders how Kacchan can give him romantic advice…

“Wouldn’t it be so simple?” He remembers thinking about it for a few days, but he was sure Hikari
needed more.

“For fucking sake, Deku, she looks at you like every stupid word coming from your mouth is a
good omen.”

“T-thanks, Kacchan.”

Bakugō opens his mouth thinking to tell Izuku to stop thanking him, it takes the look of happiness
in his face to don’t say it. “You two are so romantically disgusting.”

Izuku smiles and reprimands him again from saying thank you.

Perhaps the dress was a bad idea.

Or maybe she should have asked Izuku where they were going.

Because a beach in a February’s evening isn’t the best place to wear a dress.

She excuses herself because she didn’t know there was a beach this amazing in Musutafu, besides
Izuku wasn’t wearing clothes according to the weather when they saw each other in the morning.

The good side of the dress is that her mother really liked it and she also made her two perfect
braids using the ribbons Natsuo gave to her. Her mother said that she looked beautiful, pretending
not to see the last pink marks in her neck.
There are a few people on the beach, a couple is swimming in the sea, so Hikari doesn’t think the
water is as cold as the air. She helps Izuku set all the things he brought for the late picnic.

They sit and she hears him talking about how the day was with his mom, how they spent all the
morning and noon thinking about what food to bring to the date. He blushes a little when he admits
that her mother knows about them.

“It’s okay, I also told my mother.”

Izuku opens his eyes wide.

“Did you really tell her?”

“Yes, I talk with my mother about you, obviously not immediately,” lies Hikari, because she did
talk about Izuku since she realized she had a big ass crush on him. But they don’t talk only about
that, they also talk about her friends and the school.

“Oh, I thought you would wait more, so, your father also knows?”

She stops biting her sandwich and then tries to choke before talking.

“No, I don’t think the old man needs to know.”

“Huh, I think he may suspect it, at least that’s my guess after what Kacchan told me.”

She looks at the waves as she asks, “Does your father know?”

“No, I haven’t said it to him and I don’t think mom would tell him.”

She hums and they stay quiet for a long time, the people begin to leave as the last sunshines touch
the sky. She enjoys the view and holds Izuku’s hand discreetly.

“Actually, I have to tell you something very important.” Hikari looks at his face and waits until he
says something. “Huh, I didn’t plan this at my best.”

“It is okay,” she smiles, behind him all the sky turns violet, “Just hurry up a little because we don’t
have too much time left.”

“Right, so… This is about my quirk and from where it comes.”

“Oh.”

“Y-yeah, so, All Might told me once that this power it’s a torch that goes from one generation to
another…”

“I’m sorry, but…” She interrupts him and takes his face with both hands. “Is this your way of
telling me that you’re actually All Might’s secret lovechild and that I was right at the Sports
Festival?”

“What? No! I swear, I’m not All Might’s son, just…” Izuku takes her hands from his face with his
own, he looks at them and then starts talking again “Listen and after that you can ask, okay?”

She does.

It feels like all of it is a story coming from a comic or the ones which parents tell to their children
so they would go to sleep. In what concerns Hikari, it could be, before she heard the legend of the
Merchant of Quirks, but she never thought it could be real.

But all the signs have been there: the nomus, Nine and she remembers an incident in Naruhata
where her father fought. Villains with multiple quirks, great Heroes losing their quirks and retiring
too quickly.

He continues to tell her while they save all their picnic stuff in the basket he brought, he doesn’t
talk when they see his mother for a few minutes, but he keeps talking on their way back to UA, just
merely whispers in her ears so nobody could hear what he’s saying.

Midnight finds them in the train station, she opens her eyes when she spots them together and
holding their hands, even so she doesn’t say a word while she escorts them back to the campus.

Once they are in UA and Midnight says goodbye, Hikari dares to ask the question she has been
holding the whole trip.

“Why are you telling me this, Izuku? If it is as big and important as you say…”

She keeps her left hand holding his right one, she’s trying to warm both of them while nobody is
seen as they walk to the dorms.

“I trust you and I know you won’t tell anybody else.”

She stops and lifts her head just enough to look directly at his green eyes.

“What if one day you break up with me?” She states, his eyes opening wide as she continues. “Will
you be afraid of me telling your secret to the whole world?”

Izuku takes his left hand behind her neck and caresses her, he kisses all around her face before
laughing and giving her a quick kiss on her lips.

“Hikari, there’s no way in this world that I could possibly leave you.”

Probably it’s the way he holds her or how she takes time to kiss each freckle in his face, and in his
shoulders later when they are in her room; it could also be the way he kisses her scars. It could be
the way her lips meet scarred skin and wet lips.

Perhaps it is everything he makes her feel.

She believes every word he said, she believes in that promise, she believes that they won’t be
separate in a long, long time.

She believes in him, in his love and in his promise.

 When I'm leaving with your love

("I'll be a regular guy for you"...)

She grasps around him, assuring he’s alright, he moans a little when she pressures more. Hikari
buries her face in his shoulder; the smell is different, even more like nature.

“How many bones did you break this time?”

“This is going to impress you a lot, but none.” Izuku snorts.

She hears Bakugō and Rody talking in the small cabin, she knows she has the time counted, so she
just stays there as long as she can.

“Hey, Icy-hot, stop being so clingy.”

“Or what?”

“I’m going to tell Endeavor what you do with the nerd when you’re alone."

“Try it.”

Bakugō doesn’t talk to her father about the hickeys during the rest of the work-study.

Better to say, the four of them stay in bed. She takes all that time to think about what kind of
danger Izuku could get all the time; she remembers nomus, Stain, the Shie Hassakai; for the first
time she’s genuinely worried for Izuku, but most of all, she’s afraid of Shigaraki.

When they lay in his bed, they are involved in so many blanks that she doesn’t need to use her
quirk. Her head lays on his chest, different to other times, hearing his heartbeat doesn’t relax her.
So she asks him.

“Could you promise me something?”

He pauses the video before giving a kiss in her head. “What is it?”

She moves so she can look at his face as the words leave her mouth, “Promise me, that you aren’t
going to face Shigaraki and All for One by yourself.”

He hesitates for minutes, his eyes going from one place to another. “Why are you asking for this?”

“Because I’m afraid that something bad will happen to you, I’m not asking to be there with you,
I’m just asking that you won’t repeat the same mistake the other users did.”

He doesn’t answer at that moment, nor in the next few days. He doesn’t say it out loud, but Hikari
recognizes what he is going to do.

And she’s regretting how she believed him a month ago.

In her insides, she actually regrets loving him so much, but even if she does, she doesn’t know how
to stop doing it.

And she is terrified about the fact of how her love for him only gets bigger.
(I never said I'd do that)

Love she has discovered, means more than stolen kisses. Her love is more than talking in the
middle of the night and caresses hidden in the dark. His love means more than hearing all you need
to say and bright eyes looking at you like you were the eight wonders of the world.

Love is a fire which extends to every corner of her body when he kisses her deeply and the warmth
she feels in her stomach when he holds her hand.

Loving him is smiling when she wakes up before he does and just stares at his face and tries to
count every visible freckle.

Loving him is asking him nervously if he wants to go with her for a few things at the old man’s
house before he sells it.

Loving him is wanting more than wet kisses, long caresses, pink skins and bites. Hikari wants more
of him, wants to try for more that they have done until now and wants to go beyond.

She wants it more after she’s conscious of how small is the amount of time they could have if
Shigaraki and All For One are waiting for the right moment to attack.

Loving him is accepting the fear that in any moment he will leave, just to follow the role his quirk
gave him. Loving him is smiling every time she goes to her room and says goodbye to Izuku.

They go to her house the last Saturday before the new work-studys begin; in the evening, with her
class finished and with a purse prepared for the night; they leave the dorms with their hands
holding. She heard a few of her classmates muttering about where they could go together, and she
saw how Kaminari winked his eye to Izuku.

She wasn’t scared of what could happen when they arrived at her father’s house, she trusted Izuku,
they have gone through a lot, they had slept together before, they have been alone together and
nothing had happened before.

The rain started falling before they got there, as soon as they got inside the house, she gave him a
towel. She went to the room which once belonged to her only to realize that Fuyumi had already
packed what was left.

Hikari took more towels to go downstairs. Izuku was in the lobby, trying to clean every puddle he
could find.

“Want some help?” She asked, offering one of the towels.

He stopped to look at the towel, “Yeah, I just need to dry my hair.”

They stay quiet while she cleans.

“Should I start to pack the things in your room?” He asked once his hair was drier.

Hikari snorted before saying “No, it looks like Fuyumi took everything when she left.”

“Oh.”

“I should have texted before coming, sorry.”

“Don’t worry, is okay,” outside it could be heard how it started to pour. “I will wait until the rain is
over to go home.”

He checked his phone, just to look disappointed, “Or maybe I could order a taxi, the Weather App
says it’s going to rain until 10.”

She hesitated before saying what she was thinking, “You could stay the night here,” she hides her
blush, letting her hair fall all over her face, “You could even take a shower while your clothes dry.”

“Mmm…”

“I’m just being polite, you don’t have to accept.”

“No, I guess it’s fine. It’s just that my clothes aren’t that wet.” He stands and turns around to show
it, she points at the new puddle in the steps and how a few drops fall from his shorts, “Fine, you
have a point.”

Izuku takes the bathrobe she gives to him, then he enters the bathroom to change and she waits
outside the bathroom until he takes out the basket with his clothes, she opens the door a little before
speaking. “I’m going to take this to the laundry room and you can go to the full bathroom.”

She takes the basket and begins to walk away from the bath, the door creaks when it is opened and
she listens to the steps Izuku does while going to the other bathroom.

“Hikari?” She turns and looks at how his boyfriend shows all his chest and her mouth totally goes
dry and she needs to gulp. “Where is the full bathroom?”

Hikari thinks that it is nothing, that she actually has seen him half naked before, that she can
control the fire in her stomach; as sane as she can, she gives him the instructions to get to the
common bathroom.

In the laundry she takes off her clothes and puts them on the washing machine. She searches for
another bathrobe before going to her room… She is going to it, Hikari doesn’t pretend to do
something else, yet she stops at the bathroom’s door and hesitates for minutes outside of the room.

But she still thinks that she is ready, that she wants it, she wants him. So she opens the first door
and stands there. On the other side of the door, the sound most recognizable is the water filling the
bathtub and a low noise, that Hikari notices later was Izuku humming a song that she doesn’t know.

She takes off her bathrobe and hangs it. Then she goes in.

He turns his face to look at her, she expects him to blush or maybe start stuttering; but he only
sighs, like half expecting it. He comes closer and then takes her hand. The hot water falls from her
body as he cleans her face, he slowly rubs the soap over her body; the bathtub is already full when
he finishes cleaning her.

They look at the tub in silence, she holds his hand harder.

“We don’t have to make it,” she whispers so softly that for a moment she doesn’t think he listened.

“Yeah, I know,” he answers, immediately depositing a tiny kiss on her nose and just stares at her.

“But?”

His eyes bright with an unknown intensity, his right hand takes her face; she can’t avoid rubbing in
his hand, he smiles before caressing her scar.
“I also wanna try it.”

“Fine,” she nods.

“Alright.”

So they try.

Nemuri waits another 10 minutes in the rain, but the situation is still the same; Midoriya hasn’t
left the Todoroki household, even after dark. There’s a single light on in the whole mansion.

She thinks they should never leave the young couple of heroes to go by themselves to the solitary
house of the Number One Hero, but Hizashi insisted that nothing was going to happen because
Midoriya and Todoroki were just friends .

She doubts about calling Shouta at that moment, and decides to wait for Todoroki to come out of
the house and give her the boxes she was supposed to bring back to UA; but after another 5
minutes she finally calls Shouta.

“What is it?” He answers, obviously annoyed.

“Just to tell you, I don’t think you need to scort Midoriya to his house.”

“Why?”

“Just trust me.” He groans and hangs out, probably he was already going to them but Nemuri
doesn’t think it would be the best idea that his friend finds out about what his students are probably
doing.

She looks to another side while she leaves, she may not look at them even if they are inside but she
still feels like she isn’t respecting their privacy. Nemuri tries to hold her smile for the young couple
so she only lets a small sight leave her mouth before walking again.

“Young love is so vibrant.”

Hikari left her old family house with a big smile on her face and her boyfriend holding her. There’s
not a single regret with the last moment she had spent in the room that belonged to her, she forgets
the hard and difficult moments.

And as Izuku takes her to his house to visit his mother, she gives the house a last gaze before
saying goodbye.

By the time she goes back to the dorms that evening, she’s sure she has never been this happy.

When Enji Todoroki arrives at his house that Sunday’s evening, he wonders why his toothbrush
lays on the bathroom floor and why there are green hairs mixed with white and red in the shower.
 Why you looking so beautiful to me when you’re so sad?
Chapter Notes

This is the reason why "Paranormal Liberation War Arc Spoilers" and "Post
Paranormal Liberation War Arc Spoilers" are a tag.

“One For All?” Are the first words heard from a hero who was at the Hospital when the decaying
wave started.

Hikari freezes the moment she hears the old man’s voice through the communicator. Yet the next
words are the ones who make her turn back to the disaster “He's heading for the evacuees.”

She sees Bakugō coming back, right where Izuku is, they begin to run and she tries to run as fast as
she can to catch them.

“You’ve already made up your mind?” Begins Bakugō while following Izuku.

“I’m coming with you”, Hikari says, none of them apparently hear her.

“Yeah, I gotta prioritize the people’s safety!” He answers already using Full Cowl to run faster.

“First we hear One For All, and then that he’s heading our way, that ain’t exactly solid proof, but
still… You know you’d better start moving.”

“I’m coming with you.” She exclaims this time loud enough for Izuku to catch it.

“Hikari,” he finally realizes that she’s running just a couple meters behind them, she hears his
voice through the wind and she feels so disappointed with his comment, “Help the evacuation.”

“I said I’m coming with you,” she repeats, trying to go as fast as they go.

Bakugō look under his shoulder before saying “You can reach us later, Icy-hot, I won’t let this
stupid Deku get killed.”

She stops and watches how they fly to what was left. Her heart squeezes at the sight and she can
only picture Izuku being decayed or quirkless again. So she hurries with the evacuation to go with
them.

Hikari feels like she’s going to break in two by any moment. Yet she manages to catch Bakugō
before he falls more. She uses as much fire as she can to keep her in the sky, to help with anything
she can.

Can she really make something with the old man in one hand and her friend in the other?

She’s feeling useless and when Shigaraki touches Izuku’s face, she feels like dying.

“Izuku,” those few seconds screaming his name are more than enough for her quirk, she stops
producing flames and begins to fall. A moment later, she sees the explosion of light in the sky and
how Izuku’s stops floating.

Her foot produces enough fire to catch him with her back and do an unsuccessful landing. Hikari
barely has time to check the vitals from the three men laying on the ground, however she feels the
same sensation that she felt in Kamino.

They are going to die.

If it is not Shigaraki killing them, it is the monster who is coming.

She creates a last glacier, hoping it could protect the ones who are unconscious (hoping internally,
that if she dies they don’t have to see it). She actually hopes that Iida would take at least one of
them to save them. But that’s not how this war was planned.

So Hado and she fight together, until her father screams at the same time the glacier is broken with
any effort, like it was just paper. Hikari manages to land at the time Dabi starts talking… No, no
Dabi, Touya starts talking.

Hikari stays right there, just listening to her brother’s hatred, his hunger for revenge, his desire for
killing their father. And she remembers a slim tall boy with white hair, his turquoise eyes always
looking at anything except for her.

She remembers the cold and empty touches he gave (and how she could count those with only one
hand).

She remembers how she tried to reach out for him the few times she walked all over the house
when her father wasn't there, begging for interaction with her sibling and how he avoided her.

Hikari remembers how their father's hot and demanding training became cold and more violent
after Touya burnt to death on Sekoto Peak.

She remembers Natsuo and how all her life he felt hatred, so much hatred to their father to let
Touya die.

And it has to be a lie, because, why would Touya let them suffer for years thinking he was dead?
Why would he send a villain who could have killed Natsuo? Why didn’t he try to reach for at least
one of his siblings?

Hate , she thinks, the same hate I felt for Endeavor.

She tries to make her father get in sense, she tells him to get away with Izuku and the others, but
every try is inquosecuent, Endeavor is lost in all his thoughts.

It doesn’t matter, I can handle him, I can do it.

Her left hand extends by nature, with whiteish flames dancing all over her arm, she advances
without a single idea in her mind to what to do the moment she’s there, but she feels afraid, she
feels pain and she worries for everyone there.

Because she has seen plenty of times the scar in Izuku’s right arm, the scar Touya’s flames did to
him. Nobody should be burned by Todoroki's flames.

So when Touya burns Hado, she sees red.

“Stop it, Touya”, she screams and finally takes him by his clothes.
From all the warmths and fire Hikari had felt recently, none of them compares to Touya’s blue
flames, “Are you fucking insane, Touya? You almost killed Natsuo.”

“Yeah, Hikari, your older brother doesn’t even have feelings, not anymore, and now I get to kill
you after all.”

He 's burning all, how hot he must be if he burned Beast Jeanist’s fibers? She feels that wave after
wave hitting her whole body, her trying to produce ice unsuccessful.

“Touya!” Exclaims before being completely involved by a hug of his flames.

She gets involved in arms full of blue flames, her body trying everything it can to get away from
him, but if she touches, she only gets more burns, she hears all the chaos below them, the same
noises that only can come from a nomu.

“Aw, your friends are having a blast down there, poor little Hikari, no fun for you, just pain.”

The air is full of the fire consuming their bodies, that disgusting smell she recognizes comes from
burning skin, she gazes at him, new red burns forming around the purple scars he already had.

“You’re burning too, asshole.” It’s the only thing she can say before the burn in her throat increases
and the lack of oxygen is making its work, lulling Hikari.

“It’s great that you were raised with love,” the comment brings her consciousness back, the irony
she only knows meeting his words.

She lost all the love in her life when their mother burned her left side, she lost the affection her
siblings had for her the moment he faked his dead, she didn't feel love until last year all thanks to
Izuku.

He's fine, she thinks, it doesn't matter what happens to me now, he's fine.

“I’m fine, I’m really happy now, just look at that face, he’s about to watch his ragdoll burn up and
die from his failed experiment… Can you imagine his face once my fire burns you to ash!”

Black whips involve her body and take her away enough so she doesn’t feel more heat, however
she feels thrilled when she notices Izuku trying to fight her brother with a broken body.

No.

“This is a family affair! None of your business.”

The black whips take her even further and he gets closer to Touya.

No, no, no, no, please, no.

“This is my business, ‘cause I love Hikari and Endeavor’s my mentor, they only made me
stronger!”

The realization hits at the Todoroki siblings at the same time, a pair of heterochromatic eyes and
the pair of turquoise eyes widening in the same expression.

It’s the first time Izuku says that he loves her. She wished it could be said in another place, with
different people around, probably both alone completely exiled from the world.

As the time her father rises to beat Gigantomachia, she puts all her fire in reaching the point where
Touya plans to land his attack. The three Todoroki succeed at their goals, Hikari receives every
braze that was supposed to hit Izuku and Touya smiles satisfied that at least he did hurt her.

“I’m not sorry about this, Hikari, I’ll kill you next time.”

Black whip catches in the middle of the air, Izuku keeps her away; his green eyes thinking of what
he can do to help her, Hikari barely notices how his attention changes its target in just seconds, but
his eyes are searching for a different thing; when she follows his gaze she knows that probably his
mind is only thinking in pursuit of the villains who escape.

With her last strength, her body moves to go after him, flying faster and faster so he won’t leave her
behind this time. “Izuku, please, Izuku, stop it!” She tries to scream, her throat giving up at the
middle of the sentence.

Once they stop, she uses her right side as much as she can before hugging him, she is so afraid of
burning him or hurting him more that she can't think about controlling the fall and they just get to
the ground graceless.

“He looks like he needs saving…”

And those are the last words that hears before she passes out.
 I will always think about you

Hikari follows the direction the nurse gave to her and discovers she is in the right direction the
moment she hears Bakugou screams. She hurries and finds Sato carrying Bakugo back to his room,
with Tsuyu tying him up with her tongue.

She nods at him and he stares at her with intensity. “They won’t let you see him.”

Hikari shrugs before whispering. “Not asking permission,” he smiles and stops forcing.

“See ya later, Icy-hot.”

The door is open when she gets to his room. Hawks and Best Jeanist are talking with All Might,
sushing hardly understandable words for Hikari, she searches for Izuku and she finds him sleeping,
with Uraraka and Iida around him.

She leaves quietly and decides to go with Bakugō instead; she hopes that she would be able to
come back later.

By the night all her classmates and All Might are gone, she goes in without knocking the door and
finds a nurse helping him to eat. The nurse opens her mouth for a second, then she realizes the
gown Hikari’s wearing.

“I’m just taking a few minutes more, then it’s all yours.”

There’s a big possibility that Hikari is blushing below all the bandages she has, the woman smiles
at her while she goes in and closes the door. She sits in the bed at his legs length and waits in
silence as Izuku eats what is left in the tray.

When they are alone he moves and leaves enough space for her. Hikari lays by his side and crosses
her right arm around his chest, too afraid of crushing him if she comes closer.

“You cut your hair,” it’s the first thing he says.

The truth is that her white hair was burnt in the fight with Touya, the “only solution” the nurse
found was cutting the other half of her hair; the last time she had her hair that long they had gone to
rescue Bakugō.

“My brother gave me a nice cut, at least,” is the only thing she answers back.

Izuku doesn’t talk about that, actually, he doesn’t open his mouth to say anything. Hikari realizes
that he fell asleep when his breath is slow and heavy, she hides her face in his hair and tries to
smell as much of him as she can.

She cries in silence, because she knows.

She knows that she loves him deeply and he loves her back.

But it isn’t enough.

He’s going to leave them at the first chance he can walk by himself. He’s going to leave all that he
has. And she is going to lose him.
It feels like hours pass as she cries, as the cold comes back again and takes control over her body.

Izuku wakes up for a moment and feels the wet pillow under him, “Hikari, are you hurt?” He
whispers, trying to turn his body to look at her.

She denies and cleans the trays of tears on her face before finding his face in the dark with her
hand. Hikari passes her hand tenderly, trying to memorize how the skin feels, the way his nose
raises, how soft are his eyelashes and where is the exact point in what his dimple appears when he
smiles.

“I’d love to do the same,” he says and he actually wants to do it, but he can’t while he has his arms
broken and full of bandages, he can’t do it when he is unable to move, he can't do it as he has a
foot already on the threshold to leave.

Izuku hesitates deeply, he wants to stay in that bed, with her, just trying to memorize every inch of
her face as she probably just did.

Because he doesn’t want to leave, but it’s the best for everyone.

After Hikari falls asleep he turns to see what the dim light allows to see of her. He remembers
admiring her face before dawn two days ago, the light going through her curtains, he remembers
pink and white skin and how those bicolor eyes lit when they look at him, he remembers how he
heart beats faster every time they are alone in a room. He thinks about all those wonderful
moments they had shared together and how what started in a hospital bed in Hosu has to end in this
hospital bed.

It's not fair.

But it’s better to have some of it than having nothing.

“I love you” Hikari says in dreams and his heart flinches at those words.

It’s not enough , he thinks as big tears begin to fall for his cheeks, it wouldn’t be alright . He tries
to convince himself.

He falls asleep for the last time in a long time with Hikari Todoroki.

And that’s the last time Hikari felt her boyfriend.

The letter has marks of water and a couple of burnst. Hikari was holding it with both hands as she
began to read it. She hasn’t ended it, only reading a line when she finds the strength enough to read
his writing.

In the balcony she’s able to breathe and stop thinking about what the letter says, the only downside
of staying there is that she’s able to hear the noise that comes from the ground floor.

Probably they have already read the letters.

If she’s honest with herself, she doesn’t plan on leaving her room until the night, the last thing she
wants is her classmates realizing her red puffy eyes. So she spends the whole morning eating the
stuff she had saved, checking on her phone in case he texts her back and sometimes tries to read
more of the letter.

She usually ends up crying when she does it.

After noon, she falls asleep on her futon, holding her phone waiting for his answer.

Bakugō smashing his arm in her door is what awakens her, the light coming from the windows
reveals that it is the golden hour. Hikari stays in her futon while Bakugō shouts outside the room.

“Open the fucking door, Icy-hot, I know you’re there.”

She gets up and takes her phone, headphones and the letter. She sits on the balcony and plays some
music before starting to read the letter again. She first attempts to unfold the folds that already has.

Todoroki,

When I told you there wasn’t anything in this world that could take me away from you I wasn’t
thinking about the consequences One for All could bring and I didn’t realize the implications of a
promise I could never fulfill. I know that if I let you, you would come with me without any
hesitation, but I want you to be safe.

Thanks for every moment and for all the things we went through together, but starting from today I
have to go by myself and I don’t want you to follow me anymore.

Take care of yourself,

Midoriya.

The last words are the hardest to read, tears cloud her vision and she drops the letter inside her
room before burning and freezing it at the same time. Her hand passes over her cheeks to take out
the tears and she gets angry with every touch, because it irritates her burnings and it only angers
her more.

A hand removes the right earpiece and then the other one, Hikari stops her crying and looks how
Bakugō stands in front of her, it is the first time she has seen him with a kind face. From the right
balcony Tsuyu stares at them.

“You weren’t answering at the door,” he says, not screaming, not scolding, just a true calm tone.

Hikari goes inside her bedroom as she cleans the last tears from her cheeks, Bakugō follows her
immediately, he examines the whole room to realize that even with so few things it is a mess.

“What do you want?” She manages to say.

“Have you talked with Endeavor?”

She throws her phone unlocked to him, he only glanzes to all the messages she had already sent,
they are marked as read, yet there’s no answer. He gives her phone right at her hand before getting
his out of his pants pocket.

“I also have tried to reach out with Denim head,” he shows the screen in her face, there are also a
few messages, all seen. “I asked Tokoyami if the chicken would answer his messages…”

Bakugō looks at her face, his mouth twitching once he realizes there’s not a single expression on it.

“He said that Hawks haven't received his texts, you may send a message to Endeavor asking if he
knows about Deku, so we will have to wait to confirm my idea.” A few seconds later, Bakugō’s
little patience is over and he finally snaps at her, “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“I don’t walk to talk about it,” she answers, going to her door and opening it. “You can leave now.”

He goes to her, his red eyes full of anger. It takes him a minute to slam the door, closing it again.
“Why? Are you feeling so bad because your boyfriend left you here? I’m not here to watch you cry
and drag yourself in pity! I’m here because I’m searching for an option to bring him back! Isn’t
that what you want?”

“He left, it doesn’t matter what we want, he’s not going to listen.”

“Oh, so I see, this isn’t because he left, you’re just like this because you realized you ain’t even that
special for him?” Bakugō could have beaten her ass, he could have poured boiling water to her eye,
he could have burnt her like Touya did and none of that would have hurted like his comment. “So
that is, you notice he didn’t really matter for what you had.”

She takes the handle of the door and tries to open the door, Bakugō’s hand is quickly clapping
against the door, making it impossible to open. “Get out of my fucking room, now!”

“No! ‘Cuz I’m done with your shit! Do you think you’re the only one feeling bad? Let me tell ya
there are another seventeen persons here that he also left! Iida and Uraraka, who had been his
friends since the beginning, are suffering…”

For a strange reason hearing Uraraka’s name makes her angrier, she raises her right hand to hit
Bakugō, she realizes what she is doing a second before her hand touches his face, she stops herself
and looks at him shocked. The room is cold now for her quirk and the window opens, the light
coming from it is almost nothing.

Bakugō doesn’t say anything and doesn't even look surprised at what she almost did. She lets her
right arm fall and her left hand clutches hard on the letter.

“Just leave, he has made his decision”.

“That idiot is going to kill himself,” explodes Bakugō. “He doesn’t take care of him, he’s always
thinking the same shit “I can do this by myself”, you fucking saw it, you saw how he broke his
fingers again and again just to save you! And you’re going to let him die!”

“I can’t do anything for him, I tried… I told him to stop and he kept chasing Shigaraki and before
that I told him that I didn’t want him to end like the other users! And he… He couldn’t look me in
the eyes, since that moment, probably before, he already decided he wanted to face it alone, like
All Might.”

“Precisely is why I’m here! We both know that you don’t want him to end like All Might! That and
because I need to tell him a very important shit and I know that you fucking want him back and he
probably wants to be with you now.”

“He broke up with me”, she blurst.

Bakugō’s red eyes open suddenly and she looks at her like she is lying. “He did what?”

“You can read this letter,” her left hand raises to show the letter that has been held there the entire
discussion. His eyes go quickly for each line, when they get to the last lines they open wide again.

“So we should bring him back in order that you can talk, fix up your stuff and be kissy kissy
again.”

“No,” she says.

“You must be fucking kidding, Hikari,” he groans, “I give you the fucking reason, what other shit
you want?”

She hesitates a minute before answering him. She doesn’t want to force Izuku, no, she doesn’t want
to force Midoriya back, but she knows that it is the best option for him and it makes that the best
option for all the country. At the same time she wants him to be happy and feel safe, like she felt
when she was with him, just she doesn’t know how to do it anymore. She can't have both.

A memory of Uraraka in the hospital talking to him comes through her mind.

So she understands it finally.

“We may plan how to get him back, but he won’t come if we reach out for him.”

“So it has to be one of them,” he completes.

“Yes,” she says not a single tone of her resignation coming out of her mouth. “I think we… All of
us can do this.”
 That's why I'm calling you back
Chapter Notes

See the end of the chapter for notes

It’s worse than she anticipated.

He is full of mud and blood, they all saw how he fainted minutes ago, yet now he jumps like he is
stronger, faster and more active.

She watches how they go from one building to another as she creates the best ramp she can do. It’s
better than the one in Kamino, she thinks, the second thought comes unconsciously, because I’m
more worried this time.

The first plans to immobilize him fail, one after another and then it’s Hikari’s turn to stop him. It
takes her less than a second to generate the massive Ice Wall exactly in the place where he is going
to fly.

Midoriya crushes against her Heaven Piercing Ice Wall as he screams that he is fine. She looks at
him from the top of the iceberg how he tries to break it, their gazes connected for a seconds before
she starts talking.

“How can you be fine if you can’t allow yourself to cry?” Hikari doesn’t expect him to stay there
to listen, but the fact that he ignores her so easily hurts more than what she thought, making the
cold in her chest begin to freeze the Ice Wall colder. “Share that burden with us, please.”

“No!” He shouts at the time the ice crackles.

“Don’t you think that maybe he wants this? He’s just waiting for the moment you’ll get even worse
than this! We can help you, Midoriya, don’t give up on us and try to run away again! You’ll only
end like the others did!”

“This is my turn!” Hikari finally feels how the strength he uses begins to shatter all her ice, “This
fight is between One for All and All for One! You can’t keep up!”

She’s not sure if she listened to him wrong, but there’s no time to react to what Midoriya said and
Yoarashi (or is Bakugō?) catches her as she falls just to put her between him and the other. It takes
seconds for Yoarashi to get in the right position at the ramp and nod to the ones who are waiting.

“Now, guys!” Screams Uraraka in the air and she feels the first propulsion.

Just a second later, Yoarashi activates whirlwind and Ashido’s cape of protection begins to fade.
Hikari barely registers how her freeze-heat wave works and how it sends Bakugō and Iida flying
faster.

Yoarashi catches in the middle of the air with his arms, “Can’t believe Midoriya said we can’t keep
up with him,” Hikari looks at his face, Yoarashi passes her massive gauntlet against her head and
cleans all the sweat she already had. The action leaves her confused and she stays in his arms until
they land safely.

“Yoarashi, they are falling,” someone screams and he goes away with a new gale.

Kaminari reaches her shoulder from behind, “Come on, let’s get him,” she waits until Sato and
Yaoyorozu are closer to create a new ice path which takes them to the place where Iida and
Midoriya landed.

The ones who haven’t talked to Midoriya have been placed there, ready to start talking. Hikari
knows that Bakugō will let her say everything she wants once he’s over, however she can’t.

She tries to keep her tears in control and after a few seconds, she doesn’t know if what falls from
her face is raindrops or if it is her crying, it could be both.

She can’t talk to him, she doesn’t want to anymore. What could she say? He’s not going to change
his mind, neither will she. They probably were supposed to be by themselves since the beginning,
the momentary bliss of happiness they had isn’t worth the trouble.

Hikari didn’t really need a love story. She should have done nothing when she felt lost in her
feelings, it would probably be better than the cold in her body. It would be better than the pain she
gets every time a memory of them comes to her mind.

When Midoriya truly faints she moves away, searching for Endeavor.

“Aren’t you going to help your classmates, Hikari?”

With what?

Society hates her, hates every link related to the Todoroki’s Family, nobody is going to pay
attention to whatever she says. Endeavor can’t go in the school because he would be attacked;
she’s already picturing the image in her mind, with all the screams that comes from inside just for a
teen, she can see the hustle that would evoke if Endeavor goes in.

Her heart flinches again and again.

He’s here, you don’t have to worry , she tells herself. He’s here and Uraraka is protecting him.

She remembers how she believed in what Uraraka said in January. She realized how foolish she
had been since then, thinking she could have a pretty love story. She remembers mocking her
middle school classmates and how they pictured a “Happily Ever After”.

She was so naive.

And she does what was supposed to do from the beginning.

Hikari stares at Midoriya without approaching him, she lets Uraraka be the one to save him.

“I’m going to help Touya, father.”

“Hikari…”

“This time I’m not asking, we are going to save him together.”

“Yeah…”

She expects that everyone has gone to sleep by the time she gets out of the showers, instead she
finds half of the class questioning Midoriya.

He has tired eyes and bags under them.

“Go to sleep now, Midoriya, why would we bring you here if not for it?” Hikari says with the most
neutral tone she has.

His head turns back to see her, half surprised she stills talking without sadness or anger.

“I’m okay, I doubt I could fall asleep yet.”

“Why?” She asks without superior motives.

“I treated some people very badly and I wanted to talk with them, just to say I’m sorry.”

“One of them is All Might?”

“Uh, yeah, why do you ask?”

Hikari points to the window with All Might in it. She gets up and goes for a blanket without
anyone noticing it; she is back when Midoriya is asleep on the couch. She tries to put the blanket
on him as she remembers he did when he covered her.

She just did it as a friend.

All of them stay awake a little longer, Jiro and the band planning for the next move, Iida checks
constantly if Midoriya is still there.

“We could try for turns to check he’s not going to escape this time,” suggests Kaminari, all of them
agreeing immediately. “I’ll be second.”

“I’m third,” says Tokoyami.

She doesn’t get it until it’s too late and most of them are gone, Kaminari turns out the lights and
Yaoyorozu makes a tiny lamp to illuminate the common room. Tokoyami brings her another
blanket and she stays on the couch trying to recapitulate what just happened, how many of her
friends did know what happened between her and Midoriya?

Before Kaminari goes up, he whistles and gives her two thumbs up.

It takes a few minutes before she gets comfortable against the couch, she tries to not fall asleep, yet
her eyelids get heavier every time she blinks.

Just a few minutes, she thinks, he’s not going to escape in a few minutes.

Minutes become hours, she dreams of what happened in the afternoon, just that in this time she
stays in the cold rain, which eventually becomes warm and happy; she begin to walk and after
running freely she isn’t standing down the dark clouds anymore, instead she runs through green
valleys full of blue flowers, there’s not a single cloud in the sky and she enjoys the smell of spring,
grass and wet earth.

That’s probably what awakens her.

She finds herself surrounded by scarred arms and blankets, she tries to escape from his grip and he
groans in his sleep. Flustered, she finally says “Midoriya, stop it.”

He mumbles for seconds while he realizes where he is, “Sorry, Hikari, I just got too comfy.”

She gets away as much as she can. “You can call me Todoroki.”
Between them a strange silence settles, it's completely different from the silences they shared
before.

“Oh, right, I forgot about it.” He admits, his voice barely more than a whisper.

I haven’t.

A quick glance at her phone reveals it is time for Kaminari’s round. After five minutes it’s obvious
he’s not coming down.

She sighs as she gets a proper pillow before falling asleep again, completely oblivious of how
Midoriya isn’t planning on falling asleep again.

“I saw you working with Yoarashi, you two make a great team,” he whispers and she doesn’t
realize the implication of his comment, so she answers like before, like when they were friends
(they can still be friends, right?).

“It’s called teamwork, Midoriya, you’d know it if you hadn’t ignored those classes.”

He laughs and she appreciates the sound. It’s fine if they aren’t the same friends or the couple they
were before, it’s better this way, it’s better for both of them.

“Night, Todoroki.”

“Night, Midoriya.”

They can start a new friendship, just like the country is going to start a new era.

Her phone vibrates in her pocket and she immediately takes it out for answering. She’s worried
about her mother, Natsuo and Fuyumi, or even by this point her father could be the one calling.

So when it’s the voice of Mei who is talking, she’s a little surprised.

“You’re boyfriend just come here and took his news gauntlets,” Mei says. “Iida also came here and
I gave him his new suit, just like you asked.”

Hikari stays silent for a moment, she remembers asking Hatsume to make a new Full Gauntlet for
Midoriya and a new suit for Iida (in case it was destroyed trying to bring back Midoriya a couple
of days ago), before they went to search him. But she doesn’t remember saying that Midoriya was
her boyfriend.

“I loved to talk again with Melissa, she has the most incredible ideas.” Mei continues talking.

“Uh, Mei, Midoriya's not my boyfriend.”

The noise produced on the other side of the call stops and there’s silence. “You’re kidding, right?
Imma say this clearly, I noticed the first moment you were asking…”

“We are not together anymore, you know, for the war and…”

“Oh, yeah, that makes sense,” Mei interrupts, the noise on her side becomes alive again. “Still I’m
not going to take my baby from him just because you’re not together.”

“Yeah, I wouldn't ask you that.”

 “I’m gonna hang up, you sure have a lotta things to do.”

Hikari returns her phone to her pocket, realizing Midoriya and Iida had already come back.

“Thank you, Todoroki-kun for predicting we would need these,” Iida smiles as show his new suit.
If she was honest, it looks exactly the same as the last one. Maybe she would notice the differences
later, knowing Mei it was impossible that Iida’s suit would come back as simple as the other.

“Yeah, no problem, that’s what friends do.” Hikari says with a soft curve on her lips.

Midoriya is watching her, he puts his hand on her shoulder smiling and then he also says thanks.
His hand stays there for more time than it should, it makes the moment awkward and she has to
move before her classmates notice how she stiffened at the touch.

She still watches how his green eyes look to other side with acceptance, and then how he moves to
talk with Uraraka.

And so, she decides that is the right moment to finally move on.

Chapter End Notes

Happy Valentine's Day, guys! Hope you really enjoyed this day as much as I did!
 On my way through
Chapter Notes

There are two reasons why I'm posting this right now: today it's my birthday and I love
drama.

See the end of the chapter for more notes

Hikari hadn’t known what love was until she saw fire in those green eyes when she was fifteen. By
that time, she had spent ten years of her life only knowing how to feel hate for her father.

Then, she decided that it didn’t matter if she didn’t receive love, she could give it anyway, and the
first step for it was reaching for her mother. Because maybe her mother loved her.

Love wasn’t something she could take without mattering, love was for Hikari a real issue, an issue
that after months became fire in her chest everytime she looked at the boy with green hair and eyes.

That love was flames which became stronger and brighter every time he smiled, flames that danced
with rhythm when he kissed her, flames that were singing every time he held her strong in his
arms, flames that ate her alive in an afternoon of March when she was sixteen.

Sometimes love doesn't mean to stay with the one you love the rest of your life.

With that understanding, it came knowing that love means different things for each person.

Hikari’s love was protecting him, trying to support him and make his lows less heavier. Izuku’s
love was keeping her safe, even if that meant he had to be away from her.

To Rei Himura, her mother, love was trying to get better so she could be with her children again
and show them how she was proud of them.

To Enji Todoroki, her father, love was staying with his first child as they burnt to ashes, just to
prove how he preferred dying before letting his own child feel the same hate for the rest of his
life.

Love evolves, so Hikari’s love accepted and was happy when Midoriya and Uraraka’s love began
to grow up.

Love changes because apparently, you don’t love the same twice. Hikari found with time that her
love can be lustful, funny, kind, brave and terrifying, or all those sensations but in different
quantities for every new person she loves.

To Fuyumi, her love is the great union between sisters, the burden they share with Natsuo and that
makes them understand each other. Loving her siblings is being proud of every achievement they
had.

Loving herself is the best love she feels, it makes her feel stronger, it makes her feel like she won’t
need to fall in love again with any other person. When Hikari loves herself she notices more things,
one of those is how Inasa looks at her.
She discovers later that Inasa’s love means carrying her around every time he has the opportunity,
showing her his love when they are in public, watching movies with her and just being there.

Love sometimes means apologize since you didn’t make it to your best friend's wedding and you
have to hear Katsuki Bakugō for half an hour about how you make Midoriya cry. And that same
love means sending the best gift to the happy couple, expecting that Ochako isn't as sad as her just
married husband.

And like many good things, sometimes love truly ends. She isn’t sure about how it ends, but she is
sure that when you have to fight to keep brazing the last smithereens of your love, you should let it
die.

Inasa and Hikari's love dies as fast as it begins their love for Shōto.

Loving a child is staying late just to assure the baby is alright, is using every moment to appreciate
the mismatched color he has on his eyes and passing her finger through his bicolor hair. Loving
Shōto makes her wonder if her mother felt the same kind of love every time one of her siblings was
born or even when she was born.

That kind of love, the love she feels only could give her to Shōto is the one that maker her think
that she probably won’t feel the same twice.

To the Midoriya’s, love means receiving the twins and naming them after your favorite hero and
your own name. Loving is instantaneous for Midoriya, because the moment he holds Yasae and
Hisae he’s sure he isn’t going to feel that ever again in his life.

Ochako’s love means to hang on the last brazes of love between her and her husband, means
fighting between the perfect wife, the most amazing mom and being a powerful hero. Her love
shatters her and after trying so hard, she has to be the one to give up, because he doesn’t realize
how much it hurts to her being the only one trying.

Love is usually worrying for your friends because their marriage is broken, for both of them.

Katsuki’s love is going to his childhood friend and shaking him until he finally does something
with his life since he signed his divorce. Yet Katsuki’s love doesn’t stop there, maybe because he’s
strong, ambitious and has a heart of gold under all his sweaty skin.

Dynamight’s love is fulfilling an idea from when they were just childs, but making it a reality. His
love is literally the inauguration of their own Hero Agency.

The only thing differentiating the love he feels as a hero and as himself is that the last one can grow
so much, and it is more than enough to adopt a child with his husband.

Yet, love is terrifying, because it isn’t just a feeling, it is a weapon or a strength, for some people it
is their power, metaphorically and literally speaking.

Hikari discovers that once she is hit by “First love” quirk, and what could have been an experience
that should have left her happily dizzy from experiencing the first love again, makes her crawl in
the ground since the pain is not only in her chest, it feels all over her body and takes her breath
away.

The villain is captured, Hikari learns later, by a worried Deku, who has to deal with investigating
the guy’s quirk and try to find a cure for what is happening to her.

“None”, the villain answers after pressure, completely in laugh “It should had lasted a few minutes
and most of the times it makes people happy, impressive that the fucking Ice Queen had suffered a
lot coming from the one that should had loved her...”

So, the current Number One Hero goes to ask forgiveness to Hikari Todoroki, he finds her laying in
the hospital’s bed, Izuku watches her outside the room for minutes as the only thing she does is
frowning at the ceiling. His body is unable to move and even if he wants to do it, he feels like a
high schooler again.

Katsuki is the one who comes inside when he hesitates in the door’s frame. Izuku doesn’t pretend
to eavesdrop, but he does.

“I thought you were over that shit.”

“I am,” she answered, her eyes shutting down. “I guess that’s why it hurts so much now, I didn’t
remember it felt like this.”

“Don’t fuck with me, Hikari, I warned you about it the moment you joined the Agency, our
Agency!”

“I fucking know it,” she snaps, the tears she was holding now falling. “Could you please do this
later? It hurts so much, I can’t stand it.”

Kacchan's love, knows Izuku, is protecting his friends and supporting them, yet it is a surprise
when he sits in the bed with her and cleans her tears. Izuku opens the door and gets in the room,
Kacchan is the only one of them who look at him with wide eyes, Hikari doesn't even try to open
her eyes.

“I- I…” He hadn’t stuttered in years. “I just came to check how you were.”

He expects to hear Kacchan screaming something like “Get the fuck out of here, Deku”, except he
just nods and leaves the room, Hikari opens her eyes when she stops feeling his presence and
barely directs her gaze to him.

“I investigate how much time the effect lasts,” he states, coming closer to her bed. Hikari looks
tired, not exactly like when she has a bad night or when she overworks, it is the tiredness that
makes her look angry and frustrated. “He said that the effect is as intense as your feelings in the
first love…”

Her eyes close again and she nods. “Thanks, Midoriya.”

Izuku stays there just watching her.

“I’m sorry.” He starts.

“Why?”

“‘Cause I never asked you how you were feeling or like… I never told you that I’m sorry.”

“Midoriya, stop it.”

“No, I have to tell you everything about it, we need to talk about it because we never did it and I’m
sorry you are in so much pain and it’s my fault.”

“It isn’t your fault.” She talks louder this time, with her hand up her left eye.

“It is, because what I did to you then…”

“The quirk is called first love, right? The first person I love is my mom, so…”

“Oh.”

“You don’t have to worry about it, Midoriya, I’m over it…”

“But Kacchan said…”

“Oh, god, Midoriya,” she opens her eyes and truly looks to his face for the first time since he
entered the room. “Why are you like this?”

Love is confusing for Izuku, because he feels tons of love for the woman who lays right in front of
him, and at the same time he feels scared because he hasn’t seen that look in her eyes for years.

“Bakugō told me to get therapy so I could join as an associate for the Agency, he said something
like “Get your shit together” and told me that he could also kick my ass if I wanted to recall the old
times.”

“That sounds like Kacchan.”

Izuku sits on the edge of the bed, he notices then how she continually passes her hand over the left
side of her face. “Do you want me to call a nurse for it?”

Hikari looks at him again, this time her gaze is softer. “No, they already gave me something.”

He nods and tries to relax a little, he should go to patrol again at any moment, but every time his
gaze fix at her, he hears a voice in his head saying “It’s time, you can do it”, and he’s not sure if
it’s one of the users or if he is hallucinating.

“Do you ever regret when you broke up with me?”

He stiffens at the question, and remembers how he never let himself cry about it. There wasn’t
time for it, he went from one place to another, from a fight to another, he had convinced himself
that breaking up with her was necessary, it was his turn to fight against All for One.

But he wasn't sure about doing it and by the time he had come back to UA it was obvious that
something was happening between her and Inasa, still, there were a few moments when he asked
himself what would have happened if they had stayed together. So that is what leads him to ask the
next question. “Why did you let me do that, Hikari?”

Hikari thinks about all those things that came after he was gone, but she only thought about
training and saving Touya. There was pain, she’s sure of it (she remembers the letter and the cold
that came once she had accepted that they couldn’t longer be together), but she let him go, because
he wanted to do everything on his terms and she couldn’t force him to stay with her. “I thought that
was what you wanted, so I just kind of accepted it… And it’s not like I regret doing it, that decision
brought us better things, don’t you think?”

To Izuku it brought a wonderful and beautiful marriage which after a couple of years became a
pull-and-push one, it gave him a constant state of fighting between him and Ochako after she
realized that she wanted to protect him more than let him live his dream of being the best hero, but
it also brought Yasae and Hisae. To Hikari it brought her relationship with Inasa, he didn’t know
all the details, but he was sure it was better than his own, at least they could raise Shōto together,
and he knew Hikari went to Inasa's wedding last summer.

Yet the doubt was still there and a new question surged with it, if everything was over between
 them, why did his feelings for her never disappeared truly?

“Yeah, you’re right…” He puts his hand on her leg with a little hesitation and she opens her eyes
wide.

If someone asked Izuku what was love for him, he would say that love was his mother supporting
him or she asking forgiveness when they discovered he didn’t have a quirk. Or the feeling he got
every time he saw two heads of green and brown streaks when he got home.

If someone asked him with a few drinks in, Izuku would answer that love was giving a hoodie of
your favorite hero just because you wish so much to watch them using something you love.

But if you asked the same question to a sixteen years old Izuku, he would totally say with his face
full of red, that love was a March afternoon in Endeavor’s house with his girlfriend in his arms.

“Still, I’m thinking that when Kacchan told me stupid for letting you go, he wasn’t wrong.”

Hikari gives him a tiny smile that he remembers appeared for the first time fifteen years ago when
he told her how beautiful she was… She is, actually. She opens and closes her mouth a couple of
times, after more efforts, she gives her a bigger smile and moves through the bed, to let the space
where he may fit in.

And just like years ago in a hospital in Hosu, he puts his body in that tiny space with fear of
falling, he doesn’t fall, because her right hand takes his left hand and holds it strong. And they just
stay there.

Their love was sleeping together, talking about his analysis, kisses that will eventually turn more
savage and lustful. The true form of their love was when they slept on a tiny hospital bed, it didn’t
matter if he had half of his bones broken or if she had her whole body burnt, that’s how it started,
with two teenagers talking about their first fight together against a serial killer.

It only takes one deep talk from heart to heart to deal with the fact that some loves remain, that
sometimes those feelings stay deep in your heart and evolve, but when it is time to face them you
can not act like that love is gone.

‘Cause their love was never gone.

There are lovers who can set on fire the flames of a past love again with just a smile and holding
hands, or with a whole night looking at each other like there was the first time.

There is love that you can feel twice, like the love they feel when Tenko is born, with her gray and
silver hair, with big green eyes and skin that gets full of freckles as the years go by. That love
extends to others, even if they don’t accept them like Yasae and Hisae do at the beginning.

And then, Hikari Midoriya witnessed all the things that love was supposed to be, and for her, love
was him.

Chapter End Notes

About the names. Yasae is a name written with the next kanjis: 八茶江 (eight as in
Yagi, tea as in Ochako and river) Hisae is wroten with the next kanjis: 久恵 (a long
time as in Izuku, and blessed), Tenko is wroten with the kanjis 天子 (heaven and
 child). In the twins name there are references to OFA users, Tenko's name was
selected because it turns out that it can be an agender name (depending on the kanjis
used) and I really like the reference to the numbers and Shigaraki.

Writing this was an... ironic experience, when I started I had planned a short one shot
(no more than 6k words), but, here we are, far away from the expected. It's funny,
when I was writing this I never played Souk Eye in the background (mostly because I
tend to cry with the song), but still this was totally inspired by the rhythm in the song
and the lyrics.

Again, I'd like to thank to the beta readers who helped me and read Souk Eye, thanks
to KingK1256, a_distant_story and Arcanielle, I was so nervous to publish this and
your words motivated me to post it. If you want to talk with me you can contact me by
my Tumblr (kaysmallfeetgirl) and thank you very much for reading this ang getting
here, you don't know how happy it makes my heart to know that someone reads what I
wrote.

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