Archive of Our Own

     Katsuki’s morning is early, cold, and about five levels of shitty. Suitcase in front of him, lined with folded clothes and three pairs of mitts (plus one extra!), pouches stuffed with toiletries and toothbrushes wrapped in plastic —this was not how he’d planned to spend the last day of November when his third year of middle school began.

     Two pairs of shorts as backup, tweed pants no good, too thin, his list tells him, scrawled in a tight, straight-edged script. Three-quarters of the list crossed off, a quarter left to go. It’s 3:48. He’s got time. He’s early even, because he barely slept a lick all night, or yesterday, or the day before that. A pissy, room temperature canned coffee — a drink he’s championed as too unhealthy and cheap for his hero aspirant body since the moment his go— uh, friends, started trudging cups of it around— is today’s morning companion. Unused to drinking it as he is, it offers enough of a kick to get his heart running on an offbeat.

     “Morning,” the old man mumbles and yawns, having stepped out of the master bedroom and into the hallway with sleep in his eyes, glasses-free. Katsuki doesn’t bother with saying anything back, offering a millimeter's worth of a nod and continuing to count folded sweaters instead. “You almost ready?”

     “Nah,” he snaps harshly, fists clenching into the useless sweaters he hasn’t worn and doesn’t want to wear ever. The tone bounces off his father like a dull arrow hitting the side of a metal-plated tank, and the man’s lips tug downward only slightly. He pulls at the right sleeve of his fleece pajamas to take a look at his watch. “We’ve got time. And I know you’re almost done.”

     “Of course I’m almost done. The train leaves at six-thirty. I have to be. You gonna tell me the sky is blue next?”

     That slight downturn morphs into a full-on frown as his father leans on the frame of his bedroom door. If only Katsuki had had the foresight to close it when he’d woken up, then he’d be safe until the hag herself came to scream at him.

     “This could be good for you, Katsuki.” Here we go.

     “I know,” he grits out.

     “You need a change of scenery.”

     “I know.”

     “We’re worried about you—”

     “—Because my grade average dropped and I’ve been ‘distant’ and ‘snappish’ and I made trouble and got myself kicked from school— I know. We’ve talked about it a dozen times already.”

    “You got suspended, not kicked out,” says the old man.

    Katsuki throws balled-up socks in a zipper mesh bag one by one. “Let’s go with that if it makes you feel better.”

    “I—”

    “Can’t be having a disappointment for a son, I get it, alright?”

    His father’s voice is soft but no longer sleep groggy. “I’ve never said that.”

    “You never disagreed when she’s said it either.”

    All his clothes folded and filed and placed in the proper order, he lets the suitcase make a loud thud when it closes and zips it shut. Now, for his knick-knacks. “Gonna get ready yourself or no?” he asks when his father keeps standing at the door in silence, staring at Katsuki with far too much care. “You’re gonna make us miss the train.”

    The question of what to take with him that’s not a bare necessity requires more effort to answer than he’d like to admit. His laptop, e-reader, pencil case, notebooks, and envelopes of school-related printouts are tucked away in their own shoulder hanging bag, and he stashed a few volumes of manga, one action the other seinen drama into the inner lining compartment of his clothes carry-on. Toiletries in his backpack, cash and coins in his wallet, and stashed between folded pants. What else is there to take?

     Something sentimental, surely. Something he’s supposed to paste on the walls of the room he’ll live in for upwards of a month to make it less of a random room and more of a home. But he’s at a loss. He’s got nothing to bring. Save for the paperbacks in the bookcase he can replace with his e-reader, the nicked and scuffed and deckle-edged posters on the walls, and bits of All Might memorabilia (the nice ones displayed, the not so nice ones hidden in a box under his bed only for him to know about), his room is barren.

     In the master bedroom, next door rings an obnoxious alarm followed by an obnoxious curse. His mother stumbles out of her room like a woman possessed, hair perfect despite the rude awakening, eyebags nowhere to be seen. “Morning, brat.” She lets her gaze roam over his packed luggage, face falling somewhere between satisfied at his punctuality and disappointed there’s nothing to gripe about. “What, so you can still be organized! And here I thought my boy had been replaced by a slob.”

     A flicker of irritation. How does she always manage to say the wrong thing, the thing that will surely get Katsuki riled up? She does it on purpose, he swears.

     “Shut the hell up, hag.”

     “I’ll let that one slide because I won’t be seeing you for a while.” She could pass as sad and affectionate for him and that’s absolutely disgusting. The hag is not supposed to do mushy stuff.

     But then, neither is Katsuki supposed to lose focus and start bombing (he got 48/100 in chemistry, his best subject —that should tell you enough) quizzes and mock exams he was acing mere months prior. He’s not supposed to be treated like the villain in schoolyard fights, he’s not supposed to be suspended until the end of winter break —over a month from now— he’s not supposed to have any blemishes UA won’t like on his record. He’s supposed to be able to sleep for more than two hours at a time.

     But he can’t do any of that, can he?

     A month-long winter retreat, they’ve been calling it. His parents were pissed off when he came home some five days ago, with bruises on his face (more under his clothes), a suspension notice in hand, and instructions to bring them along so they could speak to the principal and his homeroom teacher the next day. Said next day his preliminary two-day suspension turned into a month-long shtick, his insistence that he wasn’t the one to even start the fight falling on deaf ears.

     “He will lose his direction like this,” his homeroom teacher had said, all pitying and apologetic. “He’s been having a hard time— that villain attack in the spring may have been the trigger— but he can’t go seriously injuring peers without consequences.” With a warning hand tight around his arm, the hag had nodded along.

     Katsuki had hung by the door to the principal’s office while he waited for his parents to finish up some paperwork. “That boy has always been a loose screw,” and “He’s lucky Midoriya-kun hasn’t also come forth to accuse him of bullying,” and “I was expecting something like this to happen, he’s been allowed to run wild for too long.” was the sort of shit they were saying —while being the same people who’d lauded him with praise and let things slide in the first place. He wondered, had he finally toed the line too far and stepped over it, had the praise been empty platitudes only said in his direct line of hearing and vision, or was he but another douche delinquent in the sea of douche delinquents once you stripped away his A-grade academic performance? All three of those options made for a jarring one-eighty to his previous social status.

     His parents apologized profusely to the school and to the haughty mother of the other guy, waited until they were in the car, and screamed Katsuki’s ears off the entire drive.

     Once things had cooled off at home and the customary vase was smashed, his mother had gone from furious to melancholy. “You need help, Katsuki. You’re slipping,” she’d said, running a tired hand through her hair that aged her about ten years. “We have to do something now, or you’ll become your own worst enemy.”

     What flowery bullshit, he’d thought at the time. He was fine. “I’m fine,” he’d said.

     “Yes, because staining your record and performing like a student who hasn’t been able to pass middle school for years is your normal.”

     “So my achievements are all I’m good for? Once those are gone I’m a good for nothing bum?” It sounded pathetic as he said it.

     “That’s the way you’re acting, no?” A level gaze. “Do you want to go to UA or not? They won’t take you like this. At most you’ll be a charity case. You could have even been sent to juvie. Your lack of precedent is the only thing that saved you. I want a winner for a son, not a wannabe criminal.”

     “What about that thing we talked about at the end of summer break— counseling?” chimed in his dad, who’d always sit out of these arguments and let the hag do everything, be that the supporting or insulting.

     “Fuck off. I’m not a lunatic!”

     “Therapy isn’t only for lunatics Katsuki. Mental health issues can be serious, in particular at your age.”

     All he could hear was that he was too far gone to function normally without people holding his hands and listening to his feelings at every turn, without those prescription pills he received after his first and last week of ‘therapy’ late into the summer that he threw behind his shelf and never looked at again.

     “I don’t have mental issues.”

     They’d left the discussion at that for the day, another passed with a terrifying uneventfulness, and the day after that, his hag came into his room first thing in the morning and said, “You’re going to stay with your great uncle in Hoshiyama until you’re supposed to come back to school,“ leaving zero room for arguments.

     A break, a breather, a chance to get fresh air— that’s what they called it, but they all know what it is.

     “Happy you’re sending me to the boonies as punishment?” he mutters, the hag’s fond look slipping off her face.

     “Hoshiyama isn’t the boonies! You’ll be working at an onsen! Plus, it’s for your own good—”

     “Ugh, you too with this—”

     “—you should be grateful—”

     “—that great uncle is taking me in despite my less than ideal guest manners and shitty behavior.” There’s the threat that if this doesn’t help, he’ll be forced into therapy, actually thrown in juvie, or stay too out of it to pass the UA entrance exam and have his dreams run over by an angry car hanging over him too. If this goes wrong, if this makes things worse, life might as well be over for him.

     “Don’t sass me.”

     “Yeah, yeah. Go get dressed hag. Unless you want to miss the train.”

     She tsks. “Did you remember your snow boots?” His brand new snow boots, made of solid black leather and laced with bright red ties. They’re pretty cool, he’ll admit, even if the concept of snow is not one he’s a fan of. They’re in a drawstring canvas bag with a few other pairs of shoes, waiting next to his suitcase.

     “I did.”

     “Okay. I’ll be ready in five.”

     Katsuki adjusts his puffer jacket and tugs on the flaps of his woolen winter cap and wraps his long grey scarf tight. He wears a pair of waterproof sneakers for now— the boots overkill for the few centimeters of rain Musutafu gets most winters. Then he does a final survey of his luggage and the room, swipes a packet of mints and a hand sanitizer from his desk. Looks again, gets closer to his shelves to stare at his favorite All Might plush, his favorite because it looks the way it’s supposed to, without any awkward hair pieces and misaligned stitches. He swipes that too, and as if to taunt him, the baggie of prescription medicine he refuses to touch happened to be behind it.

     Without thinking twice, he takes it and a small picture of him and mom and dad on a hiking trip a few years back where they all look happy, smiling identical grins.

❖❖❖

     The car ride is a boring ordeal —they get caught in a little traffic despite the early hour, and only make it to Tokyo station, an hour’s drive away, scraping 6:20. It’s busy, so so busy, bustling with people of all shapes and sizes, with slowpokes and rushers, travelers, and locals. Katsuki’s train is of the Yamagata line, a newish electric blue shinkansen with tinted windows and white striped designs.

     A porter greets them by the entrance and takes the luggage that isn’t carry-on to load into the storage compartment of the train. Katsuki labeled all his bags with waterproof red stickers. He tries not to think about how much money having everything shipped cost on top of his train ticket as he watches suitcases roll away and disappear, about how much money his mom spent on the shiny boots weighing down his carry on, about how much trouble she went through to contact this somewhat estranged great uncle, how much shit she must’ve gotten because of him.

     Maybe a few months ago he might not have cared, might have deemed these little things the duty of a parent, these careful choices an obligation. But this isn’t a few months ago, and the Katsuki of a few months ago wasn’t acutely aware of how much of a burden he could be.

     “Passengers, please board the train. Passengers, please board the train,” rings out the metallic voice of the announcer.  Katsuki breathes in.

     His mom ruffles his hair as he scowls and tries to jerk away. His dad, the bastard, straight up hugs him. “We love you,” he says. “Be safe and call a lot, yeah?”

     “I want my son back when I see you again in January— and not just the old one, someone better.” She sighs. “Don’t get all grouchy and waste this chance away. I want you to be happy, Katsuki.”

     Blegh. More mushy bullcrap. He nods regardless and steps into the train, giving a brief wave for goodbye and strutting into the cart with his seat. A-24, it’s a window seat. Nice. The pervasive scent of cabbage and worn leather, that’s not so nice. He pops a mint, gets comfortable, and leans his head against the window, allowing his cheek to be smushed on the cool glass. Mom and dad are still there, outside, waiting even though they can’t see him, going back and forth. He looks away from them, tries to remember if he made sure to tell the hag to cancel his gym membership payment for December.

     What use is the gym, what use is gymnastics class, and his weekends of parkour instruction if he’s some nine-hundred kilometers away, drowning in snow two meters deep? He’s going to be behind, in everything, in school, in physical conditioning, in quirk training. Say this makeshift sabbatical does get his head back in the game, what use is it if he doesn’t have the prep to back it up. He’ll fail the UA entrance exam anyway, and that big-ass month-long suspension won’t do his resume any favors.

     This kind of shit, it’s not supposed to happen to him. He’s supposed to go to UA without a hitch, wipe the floor with and be worshipped by everyone there, then graduate, become the greatest hero in at most two years and stay in that number one spot for the rest of eternity.

     He plugs in his headphones and lets his favorite playlist run, hoping to drown out the sounds of a toddler throwing a tantrum a couple of rows down without having to get up and blow the brat up.

❖❖❖

     When the announcer says they’ll be arriving in ten minutes, Katsuki slips his boots out of the drawstring bag, takes off his sneakers, and puts them on. They’re clunky and still hard and not broken into, but he does feel like a hyped little kid wearing them. They’re kinda badass.

     The train shrieks to a stop and he has some trouble wrangling all his luggage when he steps outside, begrudgingly accepting help from one of the porters. The air here is cold, so much colder than in Musutafu, while the iced ground almost makes him slip. A warm drink from the vending machine and two pairs of mittens worn later, he’s making his way off the train platform and to the bus stop. Said bus stop is buzzing when he arrives, with people piled over people. His nose is so numb from the cold he can’t smell the air. His boots dig into his heels.

     10:15 to Hoshiyama, says the framed paper timetable, peeled and wet at the corners. When it starts to snow and the various travelers pull out umbrellas, Katsuki feels wholly inadequate and very much jealous next to his pile of belongings. He meanmugs anyone who dares look at him wrong, and pretends not to hear with gritted teeth when two women whisper to each other about him.

      Most of the crowd disappears once the bus to Ginzan, painted with cartoon characters, arrives. Another bus, this one to some big city further down south, picks up the rest. By the time the Hoshiyama bus arrives ten minutes late, this run-down, washed out, sewer green wreck, the only people from the first batch of arrivals left waiting are Katsuki, an older woman, and a group of men.

      The bus driver asks for an extra thousand yen for all his luggage. Katsuki coughs it up and makes as much of a ruckus as possible on the way to his seat. It smells much worse than the train did, nothing unclean so much as stale. He can’t even open a window lest he get a mouthful of snow.

      Hoshiyama itself though? It ain’t half bad. The bus stops at the town’s entrance, a welcome sign with a thin layer of ice right by the small station. It’s already warmer, humid thanks to the steam escaping from cracks in the rock and forgotten open windows. If Ginzan is the famous onsen town crowded with tourists, Hoshiyama is its quaint, shittier neighbor, wrought with plenty of hot springs, but also with standard housing complexes and cheap corner stores. It’s the locals who come here, though there is a fair share of tourists, he’s heard.

     A river runs down the center of town, its deep banks piled with snow as high as Katsuki. Roofs are snowed over, covering three to four-story wood and glass houses hanging on the hillside. It’s so white, the snow. So reflective Katsuki could get a sunburn. He lowers his scarf and lets out a breath, watching the bits of condensation. That never happens in Musutafu. He breathes in again and coughs, overwhelmed. Somewhere a few meters away, someone is cooking curry bread. For the first time in quite a bit, Katsuki actually feels hungry.

     Dragging his bags behind him, he walks up to the small street stand, surveying the offerings.

     “How much’s the curry bread?”

     The vendor squints at him. “Two hundred-fifty.”

     “A little steep, don’t ya think?” It’s quite a small bread, about the size of Katsuki’s palm.

     “Depends. Never seen you around these parts. You on a trip?”

     Telling this stranger his life story is not on his wishlist, but whatever, fuck it.

     “Nah. I’m staying for a bit. At—” he digs in into his pocket, pulls out a folded-up slip of paper. “Hirai Akihito’s. Himawari Springs.”

     The stranger brightens like a watered flower. “Ah, you know Akkun?” Akkun? Pfft. “We went to school together, you know. Me and him go way back. He ain’t ever talk about you though. How d’you know him?”

     “Great uncle, mom’s side. He’s my grandma’s brother.”

     “What, so you’re family!” The man picks two curry breads and all but shoves them at Katsuki. “Here, a hundred yen for both of ‘em. Akkun’s kids get discounts.”

     Having no need for two curry breads but wishing only for this interaction to be over, he pays quick, leaves one of the steaming breads in the bag, and takes a big bite out of the other.

     “Need help with your things, son?” asks the vendor and he receives a glare in reply. “Alright, got it, sheesh, nasty mug you got there. Akkun’s just down the street. Take a left at the flower shop.”

     Himawari Springs, with its sunflower patterned front sign and dark wood traditional exterior, makes for the typical image of a ryokan. Katsuki steps inside, and a chime sings with the open door. “Welcome—!” says a girl at the front counter (reddish hair tied up in a curly ponytail, too big charcoal eyes), only to do a double-take upon seeing him. “Oh, are you... Bakugou-kun?”

     He grunts.

     “I’ll take that as a yes. Hirai-san is out right now, but he said your room’s in the back— in the detached house. You should use the side entrance. Need me to show you?”

     “I don’t need you to show me shit,” he says too loudly, taking her aback.

     “Hirai-san wasn’t lying, huh…” she mutters to herself. “Suit yourself, then. And keep your voice down. Guests are sleeping.”

     “Fuck your guests—” Her face reddens as she stands up and powerwalks to him with unexpected speed, tugging at the long side of his scarf until it’s too tight. He coughs and tries to spark off, but the combination of absorbent gloves and too humid air makes it difficult.

     “No way you’re working here with that attitude. Since you’re so confident, find the way yourself.” She hmphs and physically pushes him outside, locking the sliding glass door in his face. What the fuck?! How dare she! Katsuki gives her the middle finger through the glass and she sticks out her tongue in return, getting even redder. Part of him wants to break the door down, the other part wants to prove her wrong. How hard could getting through a side entrance be?

     Very hard, as it turns out. Because with snow piled two meters high, he doesn’t fucking know where it is. A lattice fence packed with iceberg-like frozen snow surrounds the whole compound, and two of his bags are too big to fit in the narrowest alley between Himawari and the neighbor. He’s taking off his gloves to attempt using his quirk when the girl from the reception, dressed in a heavy coat, comes up behind him.

     “See, you’re about to use your quirk aren’t you?” she says, and dodges when Katsuki tries to swat at her “accidentally”. “The side entrance is on the other side, stupid.” She grabs two of his bags and drags them away, easily maneuvering on the icy street.  It’s obvious, in hindsight. The little indent in the fence, inset two or three millimeters. She pushes and snow falls out of the way as the door opens, revealing a plowed path to a secondary building.

     “You coming or not?” she asks, when Katsuki stands there seething as she takes his bags inside one by one without a lick of permission. He rips his backpack out of her hands. “What do you think you’re doing?” he demands, pulling his bag close.

     “Taking your stuff inside, since you’re too busy nursing your ego to do it.”

     “Bitch, you look like a tomato.”

     She reddens again. “Big talk from someone shaking in their boots. City boy not used to the cold?”

     “I’ll show you used to the cold—”

     His feet are off the ground before he can do a thing, and he soon realizes, so are hers.

     An old man, the ghost of his mother’s face on his, shakes his head and drags them across the fence. “What are you doing, making a commotion outside the place… you’re making us look bad!” Red hair looks down like a scolded puppy, while Katsuki glares. She was the one who made a mess.

     “You’re Katsuki-kun, yes?” He’s dropped down and rough hands smelling of lavender and gasoline come up to pinch and tug at his cheeks. He scowls. “Mitsuki-chan’s clone… and here I thought they’d been joking when they said that.”

     He’s about to yell that he’s not anyone’s clone, when this red-eyed old man he assumes is his great uncle as good as manhandles him along the cleared path. “Settle down. And you—Atsuko, did I not warn you he’d be difficult—”

     “I’m not fucking difficult—!”

     “—He’s fourteen—”

     “Fifteen, you brainless fuck!”

     “—You gotta be the mature one here.” Red hair, apparently Atsuko, sputters.

     “I’m sorry, gramps— he’s just so…”

     “Stop pushing me you ancient sack of bones—!”

     Atsuko’s face falls into a grimace. “…blegh.”

     Katsuki sparks through his gloves, making fabric explode and forcing Atsuko to flinch back in surprise. The hand pushing his back snakes around to his face before he can further react, and a suffocating yet pleasant scent of lavender makes his nose tingle. Suddenly, he can’t remember why he was even so pissed off, well, except for the fact that a blown-up mitten means no mitten and he’s very fucking cold in the right hand.

     “Katsuki-kun, I was told you were a bit of a problem child, but this is taking it too far now,” scolds the old man, and Katsuki is so confused by his newfound sense of zen he offers nothing but a blubber in answer. “Atsuko is your cousin, and she’s a good girl. I want you two to get along. And you’re gonna need to lose the manner if you want to make it in the service industry.”

     He doesn’t want to make it in the service industry, is the thing. This place is his makeshift jail. Regardless of what the hag and the old man want, he didn’t come here to make friends and be happy or whatever. Get out of here with that crap.

     “Or—” The old man’s eyes twinkle. “—is it too hard for you? Are you not up to the challenge?”

     He sees red, and it ain’t his annoying cousin’s hair. Damn this old man. “You play dirty, geezer.”

     “Are you, or not? I was looking forward to bragging to the neighbors about my humble hard worker of a great-nephew, but I guess I’ll have to tell them he’s a brutish couch potato who fights with anything that walks instead—”

     Double damn him. “You’re on, old man. You’ll never have a better employee.”

     “Easy to play aren’t you,” deadpans Atsuko, but Katsuki doesn’t register it for longer than two seconds, the prospect of a challenge firing him up more than anything has in months.

     “That’s what I like to hear.” They’ve stopped by the front door of the ryokan’s secondary building, this dark wood-framed, two-story thing. “Help him set up, will you, Akko? I’ll take over at the desk.”

     “Fine…” she says, like Katsuki is the leftover chore no one wants to do, the gunk you have to fish out of the sink drain.

     They wait for the old man to head his merry way, and Atsuko doesn’t speak to him as she unlocks the glass-decorated sliding panel of the little house. It’s a comfortable temperature inside, warm enough that all his layers are too much without the temperature change feeling jarring. Katsuki takes his shoes off by the genkan, leaving them next to a pair of high-top sneakers, and jerks when his socked feet touch the heated floor. It’s a small wood-lined hallway, ornamented with a couple of picture frames and closed off with a narrow set of stairs. In front of said stairs is a small shoe storage chest, behind said stairs is a useless window covered to three-quarters height by snow. To his side, opposite the picture frames, there are two doors. One at the very end, next to the stairs, not so much a door as an opening with a rolling closure, and one next to it, composed of two wide, sliding panels.

     “My room’s on the second floor,” explains Red, “Yours is here.” She slides open the left panel to reveal quite the spacious room, tatami floored and wood-paneled, lit softly thanks to the windows facing the entrance that let in light despite the thin curtain covering them. A log-burning stove sits at the furthest corner, an exhaust tube extending all the way to the ceiling. A futon is folded by the door. A couple of wall-hung shelves, a space on the back wall that looks like a closet, two small, low-rising tables piled on top of each other. It’s a room that’s normal enough, were it not for the fact that a futon is already laid on the floor, belongings are already spread all over, and some bastard with half red half white hair is crouching by the window.

     There are a number of things Katsuki can say at that moment. A number of curses, exclamations, and expletives, and complaints to be made. Yet, the thing that comes out of his mouth is, in the end:

     “Why the fuck is he wearing short sleeves?!”

      When it starts on that late November day, Shouto is limping. He can’t hide his wince as he reaches out to open the training room door and it doesn’t go unnoticed either.

     “Shouto… you alright?” asks Natsuo from the end of the hall, making him stop in his tracks. He keeps his grip on the door handle, his gaze on the wood panel. Breathes in. Says, “Yes.”

     It wasn’t deadpan enough. His brother shuffles closer. In Shouto’s subtle attempts to dodge him, the sleeves of his training shirt hike up to reveal a sprawling map of burns. Natsuo grips his wrist with the strength of an older, much bigger boy, and pulls up Shouto’s sleeve entirely, eyes widening at the untreated injuries.

     “Shouto… take off your shirt.”

     “I’m busy, Natsu—”

     “Please, Shouto. You’ve been in that room twenty-four seven. You can afford to take a little break.”

     He can’t. He needs to get better with his ice. Good enough to make the other part of his quirk obsolete. What else is there to even do?

     “Let me go—”

     “What are you two doing?” Ah, he freezes, getting a foreboding feeling. Fuyumi has turned the corner, and since they know each other way more than Shouto does Natsuo and vice-versa by virtue of having spent more time together, she’s a lot harder to avoid.

     “It’s nothing, nee-san—”

     “Look, he’s all burnt! He’s working himself too hard!” Natsu exclaims immediately as Fuyumi’s eyes land on Shouto’s pink patched arm. She pales— a loopy look crosses her face. With quick strides she’s made it over, nudging Natsu out of the way to take Shouto’s hand. Her skin is comfortably cool. Shouto feels flustered by their joint attention.

     “Did you use your left side? I’ve never seen this happen before…” asks Fuyumi, rubbing circles into his wrist.

     “No,” he’s well aware of how to treat fire-induced burns, used to putting on the proper salves, cooling them down in time, and wrapping them as they should be wrapped. In fact, he hasn’t gotten a fire-induced burn in years, his body resistant by both nature and conditioning. “I haven’t been using my fire at all.” Not in a long long time. “I don’t know why it happened, so I didn’t know how to treat it,” he says honestly.

     Fuyumi frowns, and Natsu, who’s been typing away at something on his phone, looks at him again and says, “They’re ice burns, Shouto. I used to get them too way back. You’ve been overusing your right side.”

     “Oh.” He didn’t even know ice could cause burns. With Shouto being a natural at using his right, his father hadn’t put in even an eight of the effort he’d put into training his left —neither did he know how to. Under the weight of Fuyumi’s worry, Shouto lets himself get manhandled into her room, takes off his shirt, and lets her patch him up. He figures he might as well show her the burns on his legs too, and her hands shake as she heats them up with a lukewarm towel. He’s given a painkiller and incontestable orders to rest. The dead-like sleep he succumbs to the moment his sister has switched off the lights in his room surprises even him.

     It’s 22:32 when he awakens, his room showered in moonlight. His bones are heavy as steel, his futon sucks him in like quicksand. He’s so tired, even raising his head feels like a chore. So he doesn’t raise it —doesn’t move at all. Lays in the position he woke up and stares at the fan on his ceiling, green in the daylight and a darkish blue at night. The walls in this house are thin, literally paper-thin, and now that Shouto’s room is in the same section as the rest of his siblings’ and not on the leftmost, isolated wing of the house, their conversations often filter through to him.

    It’s a fact that’s neither useful nor annoying. Natsu is rarely home anymore, busy as a first-year university student, and without him there, Fuyumi seldom has anyone to talk to. So the walls being thin, it’s a truth that has no bearing on the order of the house, on most days that is. Sometimes though, he will hear things he’s perhaps not supposed to, like his mom arguing with Endeavor, or maybe, this:

    “-do?” Natsu’s voice. Low and reluctant and seeping with some kind of emotion.

     “Ever since his tutor quit he’s been spiraling,” says Fuyumi, her grounded inflections muffled by paper and wood.

     “Why did he quit anyway? Isn’t Shouto a good student?”

     “Didn’t like the ‘environment’ he said.”

     “Of course, it’s that bastard’s fault,” spits out Natsu with vehemence, and Shouto has been around him enough to understand that bastard said in that particular tone is reserved only for the old man. “I think it was a bad idea to even pull him from school—”

     It clicks. They’re talking about Shouto. Shouto who quit (or rather, was pulled out of) typical middle school for private tutoring at the start of his third and last middle school year. He can’t say there was a particular chain of events that lead to his departure, nor that he’s missed his time in standard classes. From elementary to middle school, he’d never made a single friend and hyperfocused on heroism as he was, and is, he couldn’t relate to any classmate. He can’t say he regrets leaving. He has more time to train, and his tutor created a study program much more suited to him, his interests, and his academic level. Shouto liked Nakamura-san. He wonders if he did something wrong that the man quit after barely a few months on the job.

     “He wasn’t talking to anyone there too and didn’t fit in at all. Plus, dad said it was a waste of time—”

     “That good for nothing—”

     “But I agree. At least school forced him to change scenery at least a few times a day. He’s been cooped up in here since dad had him drop out. He only goes outside for his morning run and that’s it. And those ice burns… he refuses to use his left side at all and it’s letting his right hurt him.”

     A stretch of silence. Shouto thinks of all the bandages littering his body —of Fuyumi’s creased brow as she tended to them. The moon has been covered by a puff of clouds, making the dark room even darker.

     “He needs out of this place,” says Natsu suddenly. “Like… completely out. For a long time. A month or two at least.”

     “That’s—”

     “Think about it, nee-san. I generally don’t buy into this sort of thing, but this place has bad energy. All Shouto remembers doing here is training and studying and sleeping and shitting. He’s never had fun. And with that piece of shit around he never will without having to measure his steps. Enough of that nonstop hero training crap. What does it matter if he’s running himself so thin he’ll let burns go untreated? It’ll be Touya all over again—”

     “Natsu—” Fuyumi hisses, while Shouto freezes further at his dead brother’s name.

     “I’m right, aren’t I? Shouto needs a chance to do something for himself and only for himself, somewhere where he doesn’t have to think about him or UA or getting better with his quirk. I for one know how much better I started feeling once I moved out of this shithole and stopped having to feel like an outsider in my own house.”

     “But how are we supposed to make that happen? We’d need permission from dad, and I don’t know where we could send him either. Exam season is soon for you, and I can’t take time off work this close to the end of the year…”

     Shouto can hear his heartbeat. Being sent away? A part of him is annoyed that he’ll miss out on training for something so pointless, the other, smaller part of him, is rearing its head in interest. Shuffling from the other side of the wall. He holds his breath and waits to hear the next cut of conversation.

     “Leave that last part to me, I’ll handle it. I’ve barely ever done anything for Shouto anyway. I owe it to him to figure a place out.”

     “And dad?”

     “Fuck that guy! He doesn’t even need to know—” Interests further stirs at the idea of a secret. Said interest soon mixes with anxiety. What if the old man takes it out on the two of them and forces Shouto back home? He can’t have them getting hurt.

     “I’ll convince him,” says Fuyumi.

     “Nee-san—”

     “No, I will. He owes it to Shouto way more than you or I do. Maybe he doesn’t care, but we can’t have a repeat of that—”

     A noise rings down the hall and his siblings quiet. Shouto waits to hear them again, waits until the moon is visible anew, but the discussion never restarts, or if it does, he can no longer hear it.

❖❖❖

     The following days Shouto plays at spy, sneaking around corners and pretending to spend time in training rooms as he eavesdrops on his siblings and their quickly shaping plans. He watches Fuyumi steal thoughtful glances at the old man during dinner, and often presses his ear against the wall splitting his room from Natsu’s when his brother rushes inside with a phone glued to his ear. Maybe this isn’t the most ethical thing to do, but his siblings have been concocting things with him at their center for days now without betraying a thing, so it’s even.

     “Really? Yeah… of course. I’ll tell her… Grandfather says it’s good?” Hearing Natsu speaking in such a formal tone is one odd occurrence. It must be their grandparents on his mother’s side —Shouto remembers meeting them once or twice before mom was sent away, and he’s pretty sure the old man’s parents are dead and have been for a while. Shouto sticks by the wall, staying hidden as Natsu uses the ancient landline phone.

     “So he agreed? Mhm… right, and where is this place…?” Natsu’s walking back and forth, and if he walks far enough, he’ll catch Shouto glued to the wall, ears perked up. An odd thrill rushes through him at the childish and non-existent sense of danger that entails. Sneaking around like this makes him feel like a little kid.

     “Yeah, that’s great! Oh… yes… how long are we looking for?” His brother pauses, letting out a little contemplative hum. Shouto fixes a few bits of décor on top of the shoe cabinet he’s next to. “As long as possible. A month, two— maybe more. Did grandfather give you a date?”

     He sounds dejected after his next pause. “No… no… it’s okay. We can wait. Please have him ask soon— as soon as you can… Tomorrow? Yeah, please try that… Right… Mhm… Got it, of course… Love you too.”

     Shouto hears the click of the phone being put back in place and it startles him enough to make him jump and drop a decorative porcelain catch-all he’d had in his hands. It makes a thudding noise when it hits the ground but luckily doesn’t break. Natsu peeks from the corner to find Shouto crouched as he picks up the plate.

     “I dropped it,” he says, trying to appear unsuspicious. “I’m picking it up.”

     It’s hard to guess by Natsuo’s face if he’s bought the bait or seen right through it. “I think you need to go back to bed Shouto.”

❖❖❖

     A week passes and when Fuyumi says she’s got something to tell him and leads him to Natsuo’s room a day before his brother is supposed to depart again for university, the mysterious plans he’d spent a few days investigating have almost slipped his mind.

     Keyword almost.

     “You’re sending me away, aren’t you?” he says the moment Fuyumi has closed the door. Both of his siblings gape.

     “Don’t make it sound as if we’re kicking you out—!” says Natsuo mock-accusatory. “You’ve been eave stopping on us haven’t you?”

     He says nothing. He’s making a guilty expression, but it’s so similar to his usual flat facial expression Natsuo probably doesn’t even notice the difference.

     “See, I told you he was acting all weird, nee-san!”

    Shouto feels irritation lick at his skin. He wants to know their plan and he wants to know it now. He’d like to think he should’ve been in on it from the start— if this is about Shouto making his own decisions and getting time to himself like they’d claimed it was that night.

     “Could you just tell me what’s up? You two were the ones who went behind my back…”

     It’s their turn to look guilty. Fuyumi shakes herself off fast and claps her hands to calm herself down.

     “We thought it would be a good idea to get you out of the house a little, you’ve been cramped in here for so long and it’s been even worse since Nakamura-san left.” This part, he’d already known. He waits, interest peaked.

     “Natsu managed to set up a month or so worth’s of a stay— until the end of January’s next week, at this inn a family friend of grandmother’s and grandfather’s own. A little town called Hoshiyama up in Tohoku. Grandmother and grandfather often stayed at this inn over holidays when they first got married and they’ve been friends with the man running it since.”

     The idea goes from a curiosity-inducing secret to simple truth. Having what’s going to happen laid out seems to remove the mystique, and the childish cloud that’s been hazing Shouto’s eyes this entire week clears, giving him a better view of what’s in reality, lackluster scenery. All the issues seem to have grown glaring. “But what about training?”

     “You won’t be doing any— that’s the point. You’ve been working way too hard ever since Nakamura-san quit.”

     “I’d be behind on schoolwork…”

     “It’s not that long a time. I think it’ll be worth it. This place Hoshiyama looks so nice. Super snowy, and the inn has hot springs.”

     A million excuses sit at the tip of his tongue, waste of time itching to slip out. His excitement is washed out by swirling thoughts of unfamiliar places and unfamiliar people and no training. “What about the old man?” he asks, because that’s the real money question.

    Instead of the expected sombering of mood, Fuyumi seems to perk up, reaching behind her for a document of a good three pages, stapled at the corner and placed in a clear pocket for safekeeping. “Dad agreed. I had him sign legal permission and everything.”

     “I don’t know how she did it.” Natsuo scowls, crossing his arms. “But even that bastard said you needed a break.”

    It’s probably another ploy to get Shouto to give up his self-imposed anti-flame diet and “accept” Endeavor or whatever crap rather than genuine care, but Shouto doesn’t bother with the explanations. He looks at the pleading eyes of his siblings, thinks about how hard they worked to make this possible, and how quietly excited he’d been following the mystery all week.

     It can’t be that bad.

     “I’ll do it.”

❖❖❖

     Fuyumi eagerly helps him pack, he doesn’t say even half a word to his father before departing, and the family chauffeur, hired on and off, drives first Natsu to his university dorm room, and second Shouto to the Tokyo train station. He takes the train from there, enjoying the newfound freedom, and the cooling of the air is welcome to him who loves the cold.

     At the Yamagata platform, he takes off his scarf and lets a frosty breeze brush over him, keeping his hat on to avoid getting recognized by anyone thanks to his bi-colored hair. Shouto isn’t famous, but there are hero fans out there for some reason obsessed with the families of heroes and especially their kids. As the one forced to sit through the rare parties and events his father attended, he was the Todoroki most well-known of his siblings.

     It’s early enough upon arrival that there’s no one on the bus with him, and he watches Hoshiyama come into view through the spotted horizon of snow, all dark buildings, and glass fronts. He has a paper of a map Fuyumi printed for him, instructions scribbled on with a red marker, and following it takes him and his suitcase to the front of a building. Himawari Springs says the sign at the front, painted or stenciled with cute sunflower designs.

     Upon opening the door a few chimes announce his entrance, and the receptionist, a girl with the reddest hair and pitch black eyes looks up at him.

     “I’m Shouto,” he says, foregoing the Todoroki entirely, in case she’s heard of his father’s real name and judges him based on it. If he’s bothered to come all the way here, he wants to be as far from his father as possible.

     “Ah, nice to meet you Shouto-kun. I’m Hirai Atsuko. Call me Atsuko, or any variation of it. Hirai-san is my grandpa. He said you were staying with us for a while?”

     “Until January twelfth.”

     She nods, closes something on the computer. “Right. I’ll be there in two seconds. Could you wait outside a little? Keeping the door open wastes the AC.”

     Atsuko leads him to a side entrance, and they walk to a smaller outhouse-type building next to the main building. Though Shouto’s new room is smaller than the far too big one he has at the house and the design is not dissimilar, he has no complaints, and immediately begins unpacking his things.

     “Is this all you brought?” Atsuko asks, referencing his single mid-sized suitcase.

     “Yeah.” What’s the need to bring his whole wardrobe. He’ll have access to a washing machine anyway.

     The rest of the day he spends resting, more exhausted than he’d expected from the trip here. In the evening Atsuko calls him to eat at one of the tables of the inn’s dining room, a mid-sized hall with a mixed traditional and modern design, lined with low rising tables and floor seats. It buzzing with a few tourists, old school tunes flowing from a big, vintage radio in the corner. He meets Hirai-san for the first time when the man comes to sit with them to eat. He’s old, a little stern, tall-set, with greyed hair and a sparse beard sprinkled with unfaded red.

     He asks Shouto the standard questions, how’s the family, how was the trip, how are you liking it here, which Shouto responds to with stiff politeness, they’re okay, tiring, it’s pretty.

     “I hope you don’t mind, but there’ll be another boy comin’ tomorrow.” Shouto perks up in both interest and dread. “My great-nephew. Right troublemaker, got suspended from school— You’re fifteen Shouto-kun?”

     “Fourteen,” Shouto corrects. He’s turning fifteen on January eleventh, the day before he’s set to go home.

     “So Katsuki’s a bit older then.” He takes a sip of water. “Sorry for springing it on you, but Mitsuki-chan used to be my favorite niece. I couldn’t say no.”

     “It’s fine.” He says, since he’s technically the one being fed and given board for free. This Katsuki is surely not worse than Endeavor.

     It takes him a bit to fall asleep, keeping on only his T-shirt to properly enjoy the temperature. Here, he can’t train, or read up on training, or plan training. The only training-related thing he can do is think about training, and that gets boring quick. He’ll find some job to do tomorrow.

     He wakes up before dawn, the world outside his window still dark. After stumbling through his morning routine, he dons a light coat and spends the rest of the morning wandering around the ryokan in areas he’s allowed to go. He greets the head cook and two cleaning ladies, greets Hirai-san, walks through the cave in front of which the inn is built. Said cave is a sprawling network of mountain springs, steamy and warm enough to allow for walks without a coat. He keeps away from the main areas where the proper, paying visitors are relaxing, dips a finger into one of the smaller pools, then goes back inside to loiter in the reception area and watch Atsuko work. He marvels at the craftsmanship of the beamed ceiling and the neat seams of the hand-sewn chair cushions.

     When the day’s boarders begin checking in, he retreats to his room, finding the stove lit and the place warm enough to go sleeveless. It helps that the lack of layers makes the bandages on his burns chaff less.

     He gets lost enough in watching the light snowfalls outside that he only notices the movements of other people until a blond boy with the spikiest hair and deepest scowl he’s ever seen has laid a foot and a hand on his doorframe.

     “Why the fuck is he wearing short sleeves?!” he asks, voice a scratchy mess of low tones, and Shouto feels something like irritation.

     “I was hot.”

     The boy gapes, his scowl gets impossibly deeper. He looks to Atsuko as if Shouto doesn’t exist, or is perhaps an alien specimen who doesn’t deserve the time of day, and says: “I hate this fucker.”

     That’s how, on that first December day, Shouto meets Bakugou Katsuki.