Chapter Text
“You wear guilt
Like shackles on your feet
Like a halo in reverse”
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“Hey halfie.”
Todoroki Shoto turned around, letting the newly risen sun wash over his face as it peeked out from behind the mountains. This kind of peaceful silence was a new feeling, albeit not unpleasant. He fixed his companion with a questioning stare.
“Don’t look at me like that,” Bakugou Katsuki scowled, jumping off of the hood of the beat up, red Corvette as he strolled over to the taller boy, black boots crunching on the gravel. His hair was messed up from the ride.
A hilly metropolis could be seen stretching out for miles from where the boys stood, shrouded in the pink-tinged fog of the morning, birds flitting in and out of the trees which lined the outcrop.
A soft breeze ruffled their hair even more. Todoroki shivered as he pulled his jacket closer around his frame. They stood in silence for a minute, side-by-side, shoulder-to-shoulder.
“Hey.” Todoroki was awoken from his thoughts, “Are we gonna talk about it?” Bakugou faced him pointedly, frowning slightly.
His red eyes were creased in uncharacteristic worry, anger completely absent from his expression. Todoroki was stumped. The other was usually so quick to turn to rage.
“Nah, don’t want to.” Todoroki replied, leaning into the blonde who scoffed as he wound his arms around the taller boy.
“You know we can’t stay here forever.” Bakugou grumbled into his companion’s chest, breathing in the smell of clean clothes and pine trees. The warmth of the morning was seeping into his bones; his sluggish body was waking from its stiff slumber.
Todoroki tightened his hold as if he was going to slip away at any moment.
“But we can for now. Just stay, for now. Please.” He sighed into the touch.
How did they even get here?
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It hadn’t always been like this.
“Todoroki would you care to weigh in.”
Said boy was currently dozing off at the back of the classroom, head pillowed on his desk, thoughts barely meandering in and out of consciousness. The earphones from his walkman were securely plugged in, Depeche Mode’s My Secret Garden blasting away his thoughts.
The literature, which was being discussed, was floating over his head. Macbeth’s tirades had never interested him anyway. The script served much better as a pillow than as a warning to the ambitious anyway.
His teacher, Mr Aizawa sighed and tried again.
“Todoroki—forget it, would someone wake him please.” The man shook his head, turning back to the board.
“Sir, I think he’s out cold.” Midoriya, the curly haired, good-natured boy who sat next to him stammered with a meek smile. Mr Aizawa turned back towards the class, a tired look on his usually blank face.
“Well then do something about it. Set his ass on fire, throw him in a lake, I don’t care. He should be paying attention.” The class snickered and Midoriya blushed abashedly, turning to look at his now snoring classmate.
At the sound of the tittering from his classmates, Todoroki stirred, eyes blinking sleepily as he adjusted to the light around him. Pulling out the earphones, he sat up slowly to the giggles of his classmates.
“T-Todoroki! You shouldn’t sleep in class! Mr Aizawa was kind of pissed…He didn’t look really happy but to be fair he never does so…” Midoriya continued to mumble in a stage whisper as Todoroki chuckled, smiling at his bumbling friend.
“Chill, it’s not that big of a deal, I was just---“ He was cut off immediately.
“Todoroki, nice of you to join us. “ The boy scowled, “If you hadn’t already noticed, we were just discussing Macbeth’s motivations for killing Duncan, his fatal flaw if you will, “ his teacher drawled, “What drove him to perform such a heinous crime etc. Yaoyorozu, you may continue…” The teacher pinned the boy with a pointed stare.
Todoroki sat up straight and tried to pay attention, eyes fixed to the front of the room. Out of all the classes to be caught sleeping in, Aizawa’s was not the worst. The man, while clipped and cold on his worse days, didn’t give enough shit about conduct to properly chew out his students and actually knew what he was talking about most of the time. Todoroki was vaguely aware of the girl, Yaoyorozu speaking, her voice confident, carrying across from the front of the room.
“—So as I was saying Sir, there is lots of evidence for this kind of dangerous ambition to have been the catalyst to Macbeth’s actions.” She continued, “Not only is it referenced both figuratively and literally constantly throughout the play but it also serves as a constant reminder as to what he could have become if he hadn’t succumbed to the dark side of this ambition. His “vaulting ambition’ if you will, could have taken him down many paths but ultimately he was the one who consciously chose to take the wrong one. Banquo was subject to the same treatment from the witches and also had this burning desire within him, yet why did only Macbeth turn tyrant? It shows us as the audience that too much ambition can be harmful, yet it was still his choice.” Yaoyorozu finished and sat down in her seat, hand clasped in her lap. She always knew what to say , Todoroki found himself thinking, How ?
Mr Aizawa nodded approvingly and turned to write something on the board.
“Yes, as Yaoyorozu rightly said, ambition can corrupt and this is definitely what we saw here in this particular instance. It is clearly one of the main overarching themes in the play so make sure to mention it in your essays.“ The teacher scrawled a handful of quotes in a messy hand onto the board, which the students quickly copied down. He turned back to his class.
“Although, I wouldn’t say it was Macbeth’s choice entirely. There were many other extraneous factors to push him to what he did. You briefly touched upon the witches, correct?”
Yaoyorozu nodded quickly, pen in hand. Todoroki stared ahead blankly.
“Well, there were some more aspects of Macbeth’s life that you could say pushed him to perform such an action, it wasn’t just the witches and ambition, Todoroki what do you think?” Mr Aizawa fixed his sleepy student with a look.
“Umm…” The boy looked around the classroom with half lidded eyes. Midoriya gave him a tentative thumbs-up and he looked back to his teacher, who was tapping his heel on the floor impatiently.
He took a deep breath, “Well could you say that it also had something to do with Lady Macbeth?”
Mr Aizawa gave the smallest look of agreement before the student continued.
“I mean she was constantly undermining him, calling him a coward and breathing down his neck. She pushed him to it. She was that voice that told him it would be a good idea.” He quickly looked to Midoriya, who nodded happily. Todoroki smiled and carried on.
“Wasn’t there that one quote, “shame to wear a heart so white” and it’s literally calling him cowardly for not wanting to kill someone. She was this oppressive force that pushed him into it, that wouldn’t leave him alone and twisted something awful like murder into something good.” Todoroki fiddled with the pen in his hand and took another breath.
“We have to realise that the people around us can have a big impact on the way we act. We are, for better or worse, shaped by our interactions with others. Personally, it can really alter the way someone acts; they can treat you differently in the blink of an eye. You think that you know them but then they, they…” He paused, his hand stopped and he looked around at the faces of his bored classmates, his friend and his teacher all staring at him and waiting for him to continue.
An austere face.
A heavy hand.
The burn of a thousand suns.
“—Change.” He whispered hands dropping down into his lap. He stilled.
Mr Aizawa cleared his throat and began to talk as it all washed over Todoroki, once again numb. Numb with the cold feeling that was seeping into his body.
Change .
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“Todoroki!”
The corridor was heaving and the pungent smell of sweat, cheap deodorant and the typical teenage bullshit was starting to give Shoto a headache. A singular voice called out again, carrying over the heads of teens and Shoto turned around.
“Todoroki, cut the shit. What’s going on? Answer me man!” Midoriya’s quiet voice from the classroom was gone as he cheerfully slung his arm around Shoto’s shoulders. The pair pushed further down the hallway, Midoriya pulling out one of Shoto’s earbuds and inserted it in his own ear, grinning through his shock of newly dyed green hair.
“What?” Shoto cleared his throat; reaching their lockers they started to shove tattered notebooks and folders back in. Leaning against his own, Midoriya fixed his silent companion with a stare, fiddling idly with the straps of his fingerless gloves. Shoto pointedly avoided his concerned gaze.
“Dude, I know its like you to shut up up but seriously, what’s up? You’ve been acting even more like a recluse recently…”
“Just tired, that’s all…” Shoto stared absently down the corridor. The crowd was starting to thin out as students went on their way home. Good riddance. He pushed off the graffitied locker door, which was covered in various obscenities, both colourful and creative, and most amusingly to Shoto, a single peeling Guns n’ Roses sticker.
“Anyway,” Midoriya swiftly changed the subject, “, you still listening to that emo crap? I mean, Dave Gahan, really? That guy looks like a manchild.”He laughed, pulling Shoto along as they both fell into step, traipsing along the empty, echoing hallways.
“I’m not taking any advice from a metalhead who still listens to Van Halen on the daily.” Shoto quipped back with a smirk, securing his earphones back into his ears. They clinked against his earrings.
“You know if you just gave it a try, you’d probably like it; all angsty and shit you love that. I still don’t get how you can listen to that pussy ass synthy pop”
“Fuck off , you like the Beatles.”
“Deep meanings, Todoroki! That’s what we need right now, we need some happiness and positivity, what's with the whole country wanting our heads on a stick and all.”
Todoroki shook his head, chuckling. Finally they both pushed open the red double doors, letting the fresh air burst the banks of their sweat heavy high school.
“Raegan can suck my ass, literally and figuratively.”
“Ohhhhh, “ Midoriya gasped, covering his mouth in mock shock, “, big words. Hope you can live up to them.” The green haired boy strolled on ahead, skateboard in hand, and turned back to grin at his friend cheekily. The sun backlit both the boys as Shoto’s friend hopped on his slowly disintegrating deck. That couldn’t be safe..
“Eh, he can do what he want just let me be a dumbass gay disaster in my own time.” Shoto hopped on his own board, letting the cool air whip around his hair as he caught up to Midoriya
‘Isn’t that what we all want, huh?”
“So fucking simple.”