Chapter Text
“He tried to help me, and it resulted in his death,” Shoto says.
Izuku can’t talk, his throat clogged and his chest constricted. Despite his efforts to hide his reaction, he can tell Shoto notices, by the flicker behind Shoto's eyes.
"Sorry to lay all of that on you," Shoto says, stopping and putting his hands in his pockets. His bag is slung over his shoulder in front of the gates of the house Endeavor had built for his wife. “I shouldn’t get into my past. It’s not a fun conversation.”
"No, no. You can talk to me about anything," Izuku says, waving his hands in front of him and forcing an encouraging smile, even though he’s sick to his stomach and his movements are as jerky as a marionette’s. He knew that Shoto had a bad childhood, but listening to the details feels like having his guts rearranged. He has the urge to give Shoto everything he has of value, and devote his life to forcing the world to be soft and fair to him.
Unfortunately, deep down he knows that he could never scratch the surface of making up for the things that Shoto went through, or missed out on, or even fix the scars that still linger. Izuku can be his friend, and that’s all. It makes him feel small and useless.
"I’m always here for you. Anything you need, big or small,” Izuku says.
“You, too, Izuku. Thank you for walking with me," Shoto says.
“Have a nice visit with your mom.”
Izuku stands there and watches Shoto disappear into the front door.
*Eighteen Years Ago*
-- TOYA --
"Don't let Dad see your quirk.”
Shoto looks up at him, eyes round and startled. One is gray like their mom's, the other blue like their dad's. Shoto’s hand is small inside his, where Toya’s grasp is suffocating the flames that had flickered to life from his little brother's skin. He's so tiny and innocent; imagining Dad training him makes everything in Toya hurt, and he yearns to protect him.
"You're only three. You're not supposed to have your quirk yet."
Shoto's eyes dim, get uneasy, get sorry.
"It's not your fault, but Dad can't see it. Okay?"
Shoto nods.
He helps Shoto change into new clothes, and buries the burned ones in the bottom of the kitchen trash.
-- SHOTO --
Dad is huge and frowny, and whenever he comes around, Toya gets quiet and stiff. Shoto leans more into his mom's leg, hiding half of his face beside her hip, where her shirt hangs like a curtain.
The giant man called Dad crosses his arms and looks straight down at Shoto, eyes narrowed, making him feel cornered. "Still nothing?" Dad asks.
"It's not late, yet. It's only been a month since his birthday," Mom says, cupping the side of Shoto's head with her hand, keeping him next to her and hiding him further. "When it comes, it comes. What difference does a few weeks or months make?"
Dad grunts, but his scowl abates, turns more somber. "If he's another failure, there's no more chances this time. I'll have to make do with what we have."
Shoto can only see half of Toya's body past Dad, but it's enough to catch his brother’s flinch at Dad's words, and that makes Shoto's heart thud.
*
"What did Dad mean — that there's no more chances?" Shoto asks, in the courtyard.
"Mom can't have any more kids," Toya tells him, and passes him the soccer ball.
Images of faceless new brothers and sisters conjure in his head, and he thinks about the idea of being a big brother, and how apparently, this idea that he's never considered before is an impossibility even before he knew it had ever been possible. Mom could have kids before, but now she can't. Shoto doesn't know what to think of that, and Toya doesn't look like he wants to talk about it, so he just goes quiet and plays soccer.
-- TOYA --
"If he's another failure, there's no more chances this time. I'll have to make do with what we have."
It's a verbal slap in the face from his father. His father expects a great deal, and Toya has done everything he could to meet his requirements, even surpassed some of them through sheer stubbornness and physical ordeal. But the mix of his mother and father's quirks hadn't come out right in him, so he is a failure. There is nothing he can do to change that in his father's eyes. The fact that he can send out a blast of flame that can melt an iron door will never make up for not inheriting his mother's ice to be able to regulate his body temperature to use that fire at full power for longer than ten seconds at a time. He faints whenever he tries. Still, he knows he has a strong quirk, and that he can be a powerful hero with his flames.
But his father would only make do with him.
Toya puts away his brief sting of a reaction, burying it and moving on. He's used to his father's criticism. Endeavor’s training has made Toya on par with the pros in skill even at eleven years old, but it can be a harrowing experience and Toya often gets injured. His father has the sympathy level of a bird looking at a worm, and he's not kind in his assessments or his coaching.
Shoto's quirk may be the perfect mix that his father is looking for, but Shoto is fragile. He couldn't handle their father's expectations or the physical and emotional pain that came with training with Endeavor. Shoto cried if someone stepped on a bug in front of him, and he couldn't even carry his own bucket of sand in the sand box. Toya has become accustomed, along with Mom and Fuyumi, to doing things for Shoto and making sure everyone is calm and kind around him, and that no one says anything critical of him, so he won’t cry. Shoto wants to be good and be liked by everyone, and is so sensitive. Being a disappointment to anyone in the family is like the end of the world. If he went into hero training with Endeavor, their father would break him.
Maybe his emotional fragility will make it easier for Dad to let go of the idea of Shoto being hero material.
-- SHOTO --
Dad is only home in the evenings, and Shoto doesn't see him for most of that time, except at dinner. Dinner times are silent, because, 'Dad deals with a lot of noise at work, he wants quiet at home,' his mom says. The rule of silence only applies to kids, though, not adults. Sometimes Mom asks a quiet question or makes a comment and Dad answers gruffly, but most of the time the only sound is chewing and the light scrape of chopsticks on bowls. Shoto's knees are uncomfortable under him, but when he shifts, his dad's eyes slide his way, so he tries to stay still and keeps close to his mom. She's the only one that makes him feel safe, the only one allowed to talk freely to Dad and make suggestions or ask questions, and she lets him hide behind her.
Toya would let Shoto hide behind him, but Toya is too small and authority-less to make Shoto feel safe. His big brother should hide behind Mom, too, sometimes, but Toya never does. Shoto asked Toya why he wouldn't, once, and he said it was because he was a 'big boy’ and couldn’t cause trouble for Mom. Shoto thought he wanted to be a big boy until that moment. Now, he wants to stay little, and shuns any comments on him getting bigger and whoever makes those comments.
Shoto leans his cheek on his mom's arm, eating slowly so he doesn't spill any on her, lest he be forced away. He doesn't care if he gets to finish. As soon as everyone else is done, he puts his chopsticks down and whispers into her shoulder that he's full.
Dinner is the most stressful part of the day.
*
"Your children are so well behaved!" the woman with the long black hair says. She's kneeling at the table with Mom, having tea. Shoto follows her gaze to his siblings to see what she’s talking about, but they're not doing anything special that he can tell. Fuyumi is doing homework and Toya is helping Natsuo color a picture. He wonders what makes them better behaved than others. He doesn't know any other children except his siblings. His older brothers and sister go to school during the daytime, and they tell him that there are lots of children there, but Shoto gets to stay home with Mom. When he's five he'll have to go on the bus, too, but Mom says that's a long time away, and that if he really doesn't want to go, they'll get him a teacher at home, and that made him stop crying. He doesn't want to leave his mom. He doesn’t want to go anywhere that she doesn’t go.
*
He's five today. Mom makes him a cake and Toya lights his candles with flames from his hand. When he goes to blow them out, Fuyumi claps his cheeks and makes him spit all over the cake, and Natsuo giggles. His dad stands at the side, in the kitchen archway, with his arms crossed, but Mom says they're allowed to talk and play at birthdays, even though Shoto still doesn't like to talk with Dad there. Dad hands Shoto a gift, silently, and refuses to have any cake.
*
"I can't tell you why he's not manifesting yet. He could be quirkless. These things are rare, but they happen," the doctor in the long white coat says.
"Quirkless," Dad repeats, and then is silent and fuming.
Shoto ducks his head, afraid his dad will see right through him to the fire and ice inside him. His body is getting hot and tingly and he's scared that it will start escaping out of his skin, terrified that Dad will see that he's been hiding it all of this time.
Dad finally turns away and brings him back to the car, and his quirk stays hidden inside him.
*
When they get home, Dad's attention goes to Toya. He doesn't say anything to him, but Toya tilts his head down more than usual under the gaze and his shoulders are stiff as he eats dinner.
"What did the doctor say?" Mom asks.
"Quirkless," Dad says, the one-word answer dour.
Toya glances up quickly, then drops his gaze and goes back to eating with even more concentration.
When Toya's bowl is empty, Dad stands. "Come, Toya. We have work to do."
*
After his bath, Shoto leaves his mom and goes outside to meet his siblings.
“Where’s Toya?” Shoto asks, twisting to scan around the courtyard, but doesn’t find any sign of the bigger, red-haired boy.
Fuyumi sits on the edge of one of the raised flower beds with her hands in her lap, rolling a soccer ball forward and backward with her foot, spacing out and sad. Natsuo makes a pile of dirt and arranges sticks in it.
“He’s training. He’ll be back later,” Fuyumi says, monotone.
“Training?”
“It’s how you get stronger and become a hero.”
Shoto perks up. "Cool!”
Toya would be an awesome hero!
Fuyumi looks at him more scowly and annoyed than Shoto expected, then looks away. She’s probably sad that she didn’t get to train, too. She’s Toya’s twin, and sometimes she gets moody about being left out of things that involve her brother.
“Wanna play school?” he offers, trying to cheer her up with her favorite game, even if it's really just work for him, while she plays teacher and makes him do stuff.
*
“Is Toya still training?” Shoto asks. It's almost bedtime, and he was hoping Toya would show up before then. He hasn’t seen his brother except at meals for three days now. Toya always looks tired, but he promised Shoto at breakfast that he'd come play again as soon as he could, only Toya didn't know when that would be.
"Go brush your teeth. You'll see him at breakfast," Mom says, pushing him along.
Shoto obeys, but once he's in bed and the lights are off, he can't sleep. He knows where Toya is at night — it's really the only time he knows where Toya is without his dad being there, too, and that Shoto can get there by himself. This is his chance.
He sneaks out of his room and down the dark hall. He carefully opens his brother's door, stepping in and closing it behind him with a click that sounds loud in the silence.
"Shoto?"
Shoto is glad to hear Toya's voice. He finds his way by moonlight to his brother's bed, climbing up where Toya is raising the blanket to let him inside. He crawls into the cave created and Toya wraps it around him, tugging his pillow a little out from under his head so that Shoto can have half. Shoto adjusts himself to lay down, bumping Toya with a knee. Toya emits a grunt, then breathes funny, fast and pained.
"Sorry!" Shoto says, going stock still, worrying at the way Toya sounds.
"It's okay. Just be careful. Lay down."
Shoto moves slowly, focusing on where his limbs are going, careful not to bump Toya this time, curling on his side facing his brother. Toya's breath evens out and blows Shoto's chin and his body heat warms Shoto. Toya has always been warmer than the rest of their family, who mostly have ice quirks. Toya's heat bothers Natsuo and Mom, if he leans against them or hugs them too long. Fuyumi doesn't say anything when Toya crowds her, won't push her twin away even if Shoto sees her sweating, but Shoto is the only one that thinks Toya’s warmth is nice.
"Go to sleep," Toya says, and he sounds exhausted, so Shoto curls his fingers around Toya's wrist in the dark and closes his eyes, staying still so he doesn't bother him.
After not too long, he falls asleep.
*
He wakes up to noises outside the door. It takes a second to recognize his parents' voices; he's never heard them speak in those tones before, Dad's voice a clipped growl and Mom's voice pleading like that.
Toya tenses beside him, then looks at Shoto. "It's alright. They'll stop soon."
Toya sits up, the blanket falling to his waist, and Shoto's eyes widen at the long straight bruise on his torso, like a horizontal purple bar across his ribs.
"It's alright. I'm fine." Toya climbs off the bed and goes to the dresser, slipping into a white tank top and wincing as he pulls it down his chest.
His parents get close enough for their words to be heard, and Shoto looks at the door.
"He needs a rest," Mom says, strained and begging.
"Do you think I'm incompetent? I tailor the training to be consecutive. Get out of my way, Rei, or I'll move you."
"It's Saturday," she says. "The kids miss him. Let him play with them today."
"He'll have plenty of time for that in the afternoon. His morning is for training."
"He'll be too exhausted to play. Enji—"
Dad cuts her off with a snap of his voice. "His entrance exam to UA is in less than fourteen months. Get out of the way."
Mom lets out a little cry and there's a swish-thump and then heavy footsteps take the last few to the door and there's a powerful knock that rattles it.
Shoto jolts and yanks the blanket up to his nose.
"Coming!" Toya says.
Toya pulls on sweatpants and ties the drawstring. He glances at Shoto with an anxious expression, like he wants Shoto to do something, but Shoto doesn't know what he wants from him, so he just stays there frozen.
The door opens, Dad filling the entrance with his huge body. Shoto's eyes slide past him into the crack beside him and land on his mother. She's hunching, her face in her hands, and when she makes a sob noise, it's like a call that echoes through Shoto's chest and vibrates through the cavity, and the dam in Shoto breaks. He bursts into tears.
His eyes are scrunched and blurry as he cries, wailing. It takes a wipe across his eyes with his arm for him to see Toya and Dad staring at him, Toya pale and scared and Dad smiling so wide that he shows teeth. Shoto has never seen Dad happy before, and it stills him for a moment. Then Shoto sees the licks of flame at the edge of his vision. He turns his head, but the flames move. They're coming from his cheek.
His eyes dart to Toya with guilt and fear, meeting Toya's pained gray ones, and he scrunches his face, concentrating on making the flames disappear.
He puts both hands to his face to check his cheeks, and his right hand is ice cold. He looks at it and there's white mist surrounding it, like a breath in winter.
Mom pushes under Dad's arm to get into the room and runs straight to Shoto, scooping him up and hugging him close. She turns to the door and approaches it, glaring at Dad with her red rimmed eyes. Shoto clings to her neck, twisting his fingers in the back of her shirt.
Dad steps back and gestures her by, and something inside of Shoto releases. Mom walks through, Dad's head turning to watch Shoto all the way past and down the hall.
Shoto stares back at him through his tears, his chin on Mom's shoulder, clutching her neck, until they turn the corner and go out of sight.