Archive of Our Own

When Pyre entered the scene, he did so with flair. It was his style, in his long black overcoat with the skin-tight suit underneath, blue accents and big boots. His hair was jet black, an unruly mess, and his ears were adorned with glinting silver piercings – his nose was too, but the public never saw that beyond the black mask that covered the lower half of his face and concealed his identity.

He landed on the scene with blue flames that melted the ice villain’s fortress to the ground. It should’ve been an even fight between them, but Pyre burned brutally hot, and the villain fell within a mere minute.

Pyre appeared on the news that night, and the three nights after as he fought again and again, appearing out of nowhere and vanishing right back to it afterwards. He was not a Pro Hero – he had never taken the licensing exam – so he was a vigilante, ducking in and out of danger, saving the day, and leaving with barely a word to anyone.

The internet loved him. They loved the mystery of him, and so did the kids in Yuuei, theorising over the mystery.

Pyre only knew about this because his little brother told him so.

“Iida thinks you’re a rapscallion,” Todoroki Shouto said over the phone four days after his debut.

Todoroki Touya, the eldest Todoroki child – though that was only a technicality, since he was believed to be dead and left the role of eldest sibling to his sister Fuyumi – snorted. “What the fuck is a rapscallion?”

“If you had finished high school you would know,” Shouto replied. “I think it’s like a hooligan.”

“Oh, I’m a hooligan, am I?” Touya kicked his feet up on the coffee table and watched Sako make himself a drink in their shitty cramped kitchen. His roommate – one of several – who wore a mask eighty percent of the time and called himself Mr Compress, as if that was a good hero name, villain name, or anything in between name, was the mastermind behind his grand escapes. Sako was an escape artist, the ultimate getaway driver – he merely compressed Touya into a marble when they were done, and walked away as if nothing had ever happened.

“You’re a criminal, technically,” Shouto responded in that bland way of his. “And you use your quirk to commit the crimes, which by default makes you a villain.”

“What a stupid system of law we have,” Touya replied. “I saved people. I’m gonna be beloved, just you wait and see.”

Shouto hummed in agreement, then proceeded to tell Touya about his entire day, from the moment he got up that morning, until now, as he walked home from school. He’d started at Yuuei only a few months before and was already making waves. Touya and his roommates had watched the Sports Festival, and afterwards Shouto had been offered hundreds of internships.

His little brother was going to be the greatest hero in the world one day and take over from All Might; it was his destiny, if their father was to be believed at all. Which meant that Touya had to be great too, had to be a hero too, so he could be right there beside him in those rankings, ready to save his little brother’s life should anything bad happen to him.

It didn’t matter that he dreamed of being number one, that it had once been his destiny – that ship had firmly sailed.

And he hadn’t been allowed on board.

*

Bubaigawara Jin had a split personality, though Touya didn’t know why or how or if he was being medicated for it. He only knew that this particular roommate had to wear something over his face to keep himself together. Usually, this was a paper bag, but sometimes it was a ski mask or a balaclava or on one particular occasion, an upside-down waste paper basket.

Touya didn’t pretend to understand it, but Bubaigawara – or Twice, as he preferred to be called due to his insistence that his former life of crime would no doubt turn to outright villainy one day and so his branding needed to be cemented in advance – paid his rent on time and cleaned the kitchen and only occasionally was an outright nuisance.

They’d met when Touya had needed to meet him.

He’d been fifteen, and Twice had been twenty and already suffering from multiple personalities trying to steer his body around.

At that time, Touya was running low on cash and even lower on friends. He’d burned through every connection he had, no matter how loose, and was coming close to the end of his rope. He would have to go home again, back to the Todoroki household, back to Endeavour, back to the fire and the anger and the shattering of their family.

He couldn’t do that, he couldn’t go back.

Then he’d stumbled upon Giran, a C-rank villain who functioned mostly as a broker and fence for other villains, who had introduced him to Twice. Twice, too, was lonely, and in need of a friend. A friend who wasn’t a copy of himself, anyway.

So Touya had started crashing on Twice’s couch, and Twice had eventually found a place with another bedroom, and the two of them did odd jobs for Giran to make enough cash to afford to place with another bedroom. It was strange, committing crimes, when Touya had wanted nothing more in his life than to be a hero – when he had thought his whole life he was going to be the hero – but he knew he had to do what kept him going, what kept him alive, and that was running messages or acting as muscle, no matter how much of a beanpole he was.

When he was seventeen, they met Sako, the escape artist, and got the third bedroom.

When he was twenty-one, Shigaraki Tomura wandered into their lives; an itchy, angry, bitchy guy with major daddy issues, who had recently left his A-rank villain father after discovering some long-term plan to take over Shigaraki’s body, or some shit like that. Touya wasn’t sure what the deal was, even years later.

All he knew was that Shigaraki was lonely, too, and that was really the only criteria for becoming their friend.

*

Pyre appeared at the Shie Hassaikai base right on time, which meant it was the worst possible time for everyone involved, because Pyre was a firestarter by nature.

He was actually there early, technically, because Giran knew a guy who knew a guy, and had booked Pyre a meeting with the bargain basement Yazuka head. So he was in the building, had been led through a maze of corridors and into a bland meeting room, with the bare minimum furniture, and when the fighting had started outside, had said, “Oh, don’t bother,” and burned everyone in the room to death.

Potentially, he thought, heroes weren’t supposed to kill.

But what no one knew wouldn’t hurt him, and beside, that guy with the Overhaul quirk hadn’t even made it to the meeting, so he was still alive out there, somewhere, even if his minions were just wet flesh on the floor now.

Perhaps training to be a hero by committing crimes with his friends hadn’t been the best of routes.

He wandered through the building, down to the underground floors, where he slipped around the tunnels, hearing how they shifted and changed in the distance. Giran had set the maze changing man up with the yakuza; he’d told Pyre all about the quirk, about how he could only move the ground so far, and in the places he could see.

As long as Pyre stayed away from the heroes, he would be just fine.

So he slipped around the labyrinth and kept away, even when he heard a voice that sounded suspiciously like Eraserhead’s (Shigaraki’s favourite hero, whom Pyre should endeavour to get the autograph of as a birthday gift). Eventually, he ended up in a room with a bed and a floor littered with toys. A girl with long silver hair sat atop the sheets, eyes wide as he opened her door.

His eyes landed on the bandage on her wrist.

Memories flashed through him of all the damage his body had taken by that age, of the way his skin burned as he grew older, until now, when 20% of his body skin had burned through to the muscle. He hit those bits under the suit, of course, with all its special compression materials – but it was still under there; evidence of the hurt that had happened to him.

“Hello,” he said.

“Hello,” the girl whispered. “Are you a superhero?”

“Almost,” he replied. “Are you a superhero?”

The little girl giggled, and Pyre smiled, although this was hidden behind the mask. He was wrong; she didn’t remind him of himself at all, but of his youngest brother. With the bandage over his eye and his little laugh that faded over the years.

He’d made so many mistakes with him. Even if Shouto wasn’t angry about them, Pyre always would be.

This girl in her underground prison deserved the life he couldn’t give his brother.

“I’m here to take you somewhere safe,” he said. “Will you come with me?”

*

Her name was Eri, and she stayed in their apartment for three days.

His roommates had been watching the news when they arrived, Eri nervously entering the apartment with Touya following behind, long out of his costume and now carrying several shopping bags with new clothes for her to wear. On the TV, the anchor stood outside the Shie Hassaikai base, while the heroes talked in the background with each other. The girl the heroes had been looking to save had not been at the base.

When they saw Touya and Eri in the doorway, Shigaraki had laughed uproariously, and Sako had said, “This is not a daycare.”

“She’s adorable,” Twice told him, as Touya shut the door and encouraged Eri to look around. “I hate her,” he added.

The three days she spent there, however, were some of the best any of them had experienced in a while. Eri was shy and nervous, with a horn that glowed sometimes, but she was also curious and funny and liked to watch them make dinner and play video games and vacuum the living room (which was somehow a particular favourite of hers, to make the noise and try to avoid getting sucked up).

The fifth roommate of the apartment, who had moved in several months before but no one ever saw because if he left his room it was a certified miracle, Iguchi, took one look at Eri on the sofa with her colouring on that first night, said, “No,” and walked back into his room for another five days.

Eri had said, “Was that Godzilla?” and Touya had replied, “Yes, it was.”

On the second day, Eri had accidentally touched Touya’s arm while her horn was hurting, and his burned skin had sewn itself back up. Sako spent an hour picking out all the staples left in his body.

On the third day, Shigaraki had found him in the kitchen and said, “You know this is kidnapping, right?”

“I’m aware, I’ve done it before.”

Eri was watching some cartoon with Twice, the two of them bobbing to the theme jingle.

“You can’t keep her.”

“You don’t know that.”

Shigaraki rolled his eyes. “You make minimum wage at a DVD rental store,” he said. “No one even goes to DVD rental stores anymore. You can’t afford this. And we don’t have enough rooms for her. This place costs a fortune as it is—”

“Giran said he had a potential sixth for us.”

“No.”

“Some teenage runaway.”

Shigaraki rolled his eyes. “No.”

“You’ll change your mind.”

Shigaraki huffed and scratched absently at his neck. The skin there was coming to pieces, and Touya frowned. He would hold Shigaraki down later and force his skin cream on him while pinning him in some sort of chokehold probably; it looked painful with how red the skin was.

“The kid deserves a home, Todoroki.”

“She could have a home here.”

“And trap her in all this? She’s young enough to have a second chance and never meet Giran or commit a crime or know what it feels like to see someone die.”

Touya stared at the back of Eri’s head. He’d heard all those words before, almost a decade earlier. It hadn’t been Shigaraki saying them; it had been himself. He had known that a child that young deserved better, that they could have better.

That evening, they all said their goodbyes and Touya donned his Pyre costume. Eri pinky promised to never tell anyone his name, and then he dropped her off at the gates of Yuuei, and left her to her better life.

*

Sometimes, as himself, he followed Endeavour.

He couldn’t do it for long; the number two hero was fast, always on the move. He shot from crime to crime, burning a line in the sky.

Touya couldn’t help himself; he had to see him in action. Had to see what he could have been; what Endeavour had expected him to become.

*

On the phone, Shouto said, “The teachers said Pyre is not a good role model because he won’t get his Pro Hero license.”

Touya replied, “I am not a good role model for way better reasons than that.”

Shouto breathed out a soft laugh; it felt like a victory.

*

The teenage runaway was called Toga Himiko and she liked to drink blood.

“Any blood,” she said, “all blood. But especially the blood of people I love. Then I become them and I love becoming them, because what better way to show someone how much you love them than to exist inside their body?”

She had crazy eyes and a cheshire grin that made Touya uncomfortable. They let her crash on the couch for a trial period.

A few nights in, Touya crept into the kitchen for a glass of water in the middle of the night. As he went, he noticed Iguchi’s light under his doorway, and the matching one under Shigaraki’s; could hear them both talking, likely to each other, playing some video game Touya no doubt hated.

Once in the kitchen, he filled his glass with water, and then promptly spilt half of it when he turned and found Toga directly behind him.

“Fuck,” he hissed. “Don’t do that, what the fuck—”

“Sorry,” Toga said, obviously not sorry.

Touya looked past her, to the living room, where Twice was asleep on the sofa. The TV was paused on the final shot of 10 Things I Hate About You, and popcorn was everywhere but inside the bowl it was served in.

“Can I ask you something?”

Touya sighed, grabbing a tea towel to clean up the water. “What?”

“Why don’t you like me?”

He rolled his eyes, dropping the tea towel on the floor and using his foot to push it around and mop up the puddle. “Who said I didn’t like you?”

“Well, no one, but you never talk to me or spend time with me or—”

“I doubt we’d have much in common.”

In the dim light, she pursed her lips in thought. “Nah, that’s not it.”

“Toga, it’s late—”

“Shigaraki and I don’t have much in common, but we still talk about all the things we want to do in the world, and how we don’t want anyone to stop us from doing them.”

“Sounds riveting.” He kicked the tea towel towards the washing machine, where it would sit until Sako did another round of laundry.

“If we spent some time together—”

“I’m busy, Toga. I have a job—”

“—and your vigilante stuff, of course.”

Touya narrowed his eyes at her and she giggled.

“Twice told me.”

“Snitch.”

“To be fair, he also told himself off,” she replied. “But then he told me that you ran away from home when you were my age too. Which is like, a totally massive thing that we would have in common!”

Touya swallowed. “I was younger than you, actually.”

“Oh?”

“I was fourteen. I had been out on the streets for a year before I met Twice.”

“Whoa,” Toga breathed. “I only managed a few months before Giran scooped me up. I can’t imagine a year.”

“I stole a lot of cash to get me going,” Touya replied, the memories coming back so vivid it was like it was only a few days before that he was leaving his father’s house, swearing to never return.

Toga rolled back on her heels. “Todoroki,” she said. “Like, you know.”

Touya had considered changing his name a hundred times over the last ten years, but he’d never gone through with it. Why? Because he wanted to be found out? Because he didn’t want to be unrecognisable when he was? He didn’t know.

“Yeah,” he said. “Like him.”

She hummed, nodding. “You got siblings, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“I’m an only child,” she said. “Easy to run away when you have no one to keep you around. Did you want them to come with?”

The memories flashed, brutally pristine in their clarity.

“I’m going back to bed,” he said, fingers clenched around his glass.

“Oh, but—”

“I’m going back to bed,” he repeated. When he walked away, she didn’t stop him.

*

Minutes later, in the middle of the night, Touya asked, “Are you mad at me for leaving you behind?”

Shouto breathed down the phoneline. “You know I’m not.”

“I would be mad.”

“It was for the best, Touya. We both know you did what you thought was right.”

*

Ten years before Pyre came onto the scene, Todoroki Touya ran away from home. With him, he took a backpack stuffed with clothes, as much money as he could steal from his father’s office, and his littlest brother Shouto.

His other siblings got along in the house a lot better. Neither Fuyumi nor Natsuo had any sort of fire ability, except Fuyumi’s left hand being totally heat resistant, which meant that there had never been any sort of pressure on them to be great. To be the greatest. And while they were somewhat ignored by their father because of this, it also meant that they got to be kids.

And Touya didn’t want to steal that from them.

So instead, he just took Shouto, on whom all the hopes of the Todoroki household were pinned since the day his hair grew in a perfect white and red split. He was only five and yet he was already in training every day, running on the treadmill until he threw up, perfecting his fire until his body broke out into sweats.

For a year, they bounced around between motels; whatever Touya could afford. The news played their disappearance at first as Endeavour’s children devastatingly missing—the police are investigating to see if nefarious intent is behind it—but after a few weeks, it turned to a story of a teenage boy kidnapping his little brother out of jealousy.

To be fair to his family, they never said a bad word against him.

In every interview and press conference, Endeavour pleaded with Touya to come home, to bring Shouto with him. He wanted his sons back, they weren’t in trouble—but the media felt differently, especially after some classmates from Touya’s middle school blabbed to a reporter about Touya always being a bit of a nervous wreck, desperate to please daddy, sidelined by a five-year-old.

He became a villain, in all senses but legal, and he kept the news shut off for the most part. He dyed Shouto’s recognisable hair, scraped for money wherever he could, and tried to make every day exciting and positive for his little brother, even if he was falling apart on the inside.

To Shouto, that time spent living in hotels wasn’t a kidnapping, it was an adventure with his big brother. It was ice cream and trips to the park, watching movies and making pillow forts and chasing dogs on the street. Touya worked to keep it that way.

But as the money began to dwindle, he started to doubt his choices.

Touya swore Shouto couldn’t read as well as he could the year before, and he wasn’t very good at interacting with other kids at the park. He didn’t know his two times tables, and Touya didn’t know if that was even something he was supposed to know by the time he turned six. There was too much Touya didn’t know, especially about raising a child—would living with Touya hold Shouto back from his potential?

How would he ever become the hero he wanted to be if he couldn’t fucking read?

If he was legally a missing person?

He remembered his father’s kindness from when he was young, remembered being trained with patience, not vitriol. Was Endeavour still capable of that? He wasn’t sure, but he knew that wherever he took Shouto, it would send him right back to their family home anyway, so he might as well go directly there.

He wrote a letter and placed it in Shouto’s backpack before they left. Then they took the long way home, getting ice cream on the way and watching the pigeons crowd around an old man and his breadcrumbs. Shouto ran into the flock and laughed as they flew away, before returning seconds later to keep eating.

On the train ride home, Touya said, “I’m always going to be here for you, you know that, right Shouto?”

“Yeah, ‘course,” Shouto replied, looking out the window at the passing city.

“Even when I’m not around.”

“Why wouldn’t you be around?” His eyebrows drew together.

“Because sometimes things happen that take us in different directions.”

“What does that mean?”

Touya placed his hand in Shouto’s hair. His white and red roots were showing through the black.

“It means I love you, Shouto. Even when I’m far away.”

An hour later, he positioned Shouto outside the front gates of their family home. He knew the camera would catch sight of him as he crouched down and pulled his little brother into a tight hug, but he didn’t care. He wouldn’t come back, even if Endeavour shared a thousand pictures of his dark hair dye.

This was best for Shouto. It had to be.

The letter sat in Shouto’s backpack, the threat to his father about his treatment of his brother – that he would take him away again if he continued the way he had been, that he wouldn’t bring him back next time.

He would stay close by for a while to keep an eye, knew the ways in and out of the house without the cameras catching sight. Over the years that followed, he didn’t know if Endeavour was oblivious to his comings and goings, to his leaving birthday gifts for his siblings and his phone number for Shouto, or if he knew and simply never stopped him – but the back gate’s lock never got fixed, nor did the route over the back wall ever become harder to climb.

Every few years, the disappearance of Todoroki Touya would resurface. There were a few unofficial documentaries on the subject, several online conspiracies about his whereabouts. They all mentioned the day he brought his brother home, fifteen years old and a year missing. Endeavour’s press conference on the subject was the first in nine months:

“My family and I are deeply relieved and grateful for the return of our youngest, Shouto,” he said in all the recordings, his eyes scanning the pre-written speech in front of the flashes of cameras and swarm of reporters. “However, we continue to grieve the disappearance of our oldest, Touya, without whom our family is not complete.” Endeavour paused, then placed the paper down, looking directly into the camera. “Touya,” he continued, “if you are listening – thank you for bringing him home. I am sorry. From the bottom of my heart, I am sorry, and I intend to redeem myself for the sakes of you both. Please, please. Come home.”

Todoroki Touya never did.

*

“I saw you on the news,” Touya said, phone pressed between his ear and his shoulder as he crouched on the wall of his family home.

“I saw you on the news,” Shouto shot back. “You were saving a kitten or something.”

“It was three kittens. And a little girl. And also a Toyota Corolla, but I’m not too interested in that part. I saw you with Dad.” He took the phone in his hand and dropped to the ground in the garden, careful to avoid Fuyumi’s flowers.

“Yeah, I’m doing my work study with him and two classmates.”

“The angry one and the happy one.”

“Bakugou and Midoriya, yes. They are very talented students and future heroes.”

“I’m sure.” The house was lit up yellow from the inside.

“Bakugou completed the remedial hero licensing course with me.”

“So he’s not that good.”

“He has rage, is all.”

Touya crept through the garden, slipping onto the porch and ducking under the windows.

“I should go, they’re waiting on me,” Shouto said after a beat. “Fuyumi made dinner.”

“I know. I can smell it.”

Shouto paused, and Touya wondered what he was considering, and then declining, to ask. Do you want to come inside? Should I save you a plate? Are you here?

Instead, he said, “Mapo tofu, I think.”

“Sounds good. I’ll let you go then.”

“Alright. Don’t get caught.”

“I never do.”

Shouto hung up the phone, and Touya shoved his in his pocket before continuing his creep around the porch. The dining room was in the centre of the house with no windows, but the kitchen looked out onto the side of the property, so he sat himself under that and listened to the ambient noise of his sister clinking dishes together as she took them away into the dining room. He could hear the low murmur of voices as they spoke; his brother’s drone, a classmate’s chipper offer of help.

He closed his eyes, pulling his jacket tighter around him to keep out the winter’s cold, and listened. When all went quiet, he went on the move once more, to the backdoor, and sneaked inside, to the living space beside the dining room where the altar still sat, his white-haired fourteen-year-old self smiling on the shelf behind the incense. On the other side of the wall, the sounds of conversation were muffled but comforting, and he sat against the joining wall until dinner was over, and the movement started up again.

He stretched, relishing in the feeling of all skin, no exposed muscle, and the ability to actually stretch, courtesy of Eri, before sneaking back outside again, into the garden, where he waited in the tree that careened out over the side wall as his father washed dishes by the kitchen window, and his brother’s guests carried plates in.

He watched, too, as his brother himself appeared at the back door with a bowl and chopsticks. He placed them down on the porch, looked around, and although never spotting Touya in the tree, smiled before heading inside.

Fuyumi’s mapo tofu was excellent and tasted of home.

*

About two months after Pyre debuted, he won a popular vote poll, naming him Japan’s favourite vigilante. He also ended up in a fight with Pro Heroes. On their side, not against them.

It was against some weird cult group called the Meta Liberation Army that he wasn’t particularly aware of, but happened to be near to when the fight broke out. He’d thought about staying out of it – there was a clear strategy going on with the heroes – but then he watched the ice dude absolutely tear a new one in Mt Lady and decided to get involved.

His fire burned blue as he melted the whole place down.

He was a human forest fire, a burning light. He’d been working on a lot of Ultimate Moves, stretching back as far as his training with his father. Hell Spider, with streams of fire shooting from his fingertips and recklessly burning a wide swath of city; Jet Burn with the fire blasts, Hell Minefield, with the flames underground and bursting out as pillars of fire.

He beat the ice guy, moved onto the next.

There were thousands of them; an entire town full of people raging and fighting, the Heroes sweeping through and pushing them back. Fat Gum laughed jovially nearby, Present Mic screamed, Endeavour burned a strip of the sky.

There was a guy called Redestro, but Pyre never saw him. He was busy everywhere else. Endeavour’s sidekicks, noting his fire power, had pulled him their way. Then Hawks had called for his aid, then Midnight had flirted with him in a public setting.

It all felt strangely grounding, strangely real. Like he was supposed to be here, like this was where he was meant to be. Not running messages for Giran or burning yazuka minions alive. This, heroics, saving people and fighting the good fight.

When he used Endeavour’s signature Flashfire Fist move – a move he’d taught Pyre when he was still young and they didn’t know his body couldn’t withstand the heat – the heroes hushed, eyes wide and mouths agape. At the end of the fight, Burnin’ said, “Wow, you pulled off Endeavour’s Ultimate Move perfectly,” and Pyre said, “I’ve had a lot of practice.”

-

He was almost gone from the scene when Eraserhead caught up with him. Really, he just yelled and forced Pyre to wait for him to slouch over, but when he did, he levelled his cold glare at Pyre and said, “Thank you for looking after Eri.”

“Oh.” Pyre blinked. “Yeah. Whatever, my pleasure… She’s a good kid.”

Eraserhead nodded. “Mm. She is.”

As Eraserhead turned to go, Pyre said, “Wait.” Eraserhead raised his eyebrows. “Your my roommate’s favourite hero. Can I get your autograph for him?”

It was because it took so long to find a pen and a piece of paper and get Eraserhead’s autograph (Shigaraki’s birthday gift: secured) that Endeavour was able to catch up with them. Because of course he did.

“You there,” he said. “Pyre, is it?”

Pyre hummed. Eraserhead walked away, lucky bastard.

“Burnin’ said you were very impressive on the battlefield today. Said you even managed a Flashfire Fist.”

Pyre said, “Could do Prominence Burn, too, if it wouldn’t have killed someone.”

Endeavour’s face flipped through a series of emotions too quick to name. His giant arms cross over his chest. He was so tall, Pyre still had to look up at him; why had he never grown that tall?

“I would like to see it,” Endeavour said. “In a training scenario, of course. All of my sidekicks were pleased with your work today, as were several other heroes. Thank you for joining us.”

Pyre waved a vague hand. “I was in the neighbourhood.”

“Well, if you ever stop ignoring the law and choose to get a Hero License, I would be interested in you joining me at my agency.”

When Pyre was little and he still went by Touya every day, he had dreamed of working at the Endeavour Agency. Working with the sidekicks, with his father, carving a burning path straight to number one hero in Japan. He would’ve been magnificent, and the two of them would’ve worked together every day, a duo, a unit, father and son, not at odds but perfectly in sync.

Pyre said, “Thanks for the offer, but I don’t think so.” The five-year-old version of himself burned, but the twenty-four-year-old version of himself breathed out a relieved sigh.

Endeavour nodded. “I understand,” he said, turning to go. “Nonetheless, you did well out there today, son.”

Pyre watched Endeavour’s back as he walked away. He did not move for a long time.

-

On the phone, Shouto said, “Dad texted and said family dinner is this Friday.”

“Gross,” Touya replied, slouched over the cashier’s desk in the empty DVD rental place that paid him minimum wage.

“It’ll be fine. Natsuo’s coming and everything.”

“How’s med school?”

“He says he’s ‘kicking ass’. He asked how’s vigilante work?”

Touya rolled his eyes. Couldn’t keep a secret in this family for the life of them. “I’m kicking ass,” he replied. “Dad offered me a job.”

“Did you say yes?”

“No.” Touya drummed his fingers on the counter. “Hey, serious question.”

“Serious answer.”

“It was… He was better, right? Dad? Like, the family we left behind and the family you went back to – it was different, right? He was different?”

Shouto paused, considering. He said, “It was still hard sometimes. And Natsuo never forgave Dad for you running away. He’s still mad about that, even though he knows you’re fine now. And Fuyumi has been a little obsessed with having the perfect family ever since… and Mom wasn’t really the same even after she got out of hospital. The divorce and her moving back to her parents… and I don’t even remember a lot of what it was like before we left. But, yeah. I think so. I think it’s better, and he’s better. He’s not perfect, and he’s still too hard on us, but…”

“He’s better,” Touya said. He sighed through his nose. “You know, there’s that thing he said in the press conference after you went home. That he would redeem himself. I think about that a lot. Do you think he’s done it?”

“I don’t know what the goal posts are for redemption,” Shouto said. “But he’s still trying, ten years later. That’s got to mean something, right?”

-

He didn’t go to family dinner that weekend. It would be several months before he attended one. Before he showed up at the house at the front door, and walked through it instead of sneaking, and sat at the table and shared a meal and smiled crookedly at his siblings all sat with him.

His Dad would be at the table too, and they would be awkward and stilted around each other, just as they were with his Mom, who sat there too, with big watery eyes as she stared at her once-dead son.

It would be weird, and awkward, and a little too quiet, but the next dinner they held a few weeks later would be a little bit better, and then another, a little bit better than that.

Family was a thing they worked at. It was never all the way perfect or complete. But it found a way to start being good.

-

When April came around, Shigaraki turned twenty-one. There was no party, but they played video games and bought a cake and popped so many party poppers that they would be finding streamers for weeks on the floor.

Shigaraki loved his autograph, and hated his present from Twice and was indifferent to the pack of scrunchies from Toga. He didn’t even get mad when he lost at his games, and sometimes the others let him win because it was his birthday.

Iguchi left his cave to join in and Sako ordered take out, and when seven PM came around, there was a knock at the door and Giran appeared with a tall, muscled woman he called Magne, announcing that she needed a place to crash for a few weeks.

They all sighed, but let her in anyway, and Toga’s eyes lit up at there being another girl, and Magne knew enough about video games to talk about it with Shigaraki but wasn’t good enough at them to threaten his fragile ego, and somehow that all felt right.

It all felt good.

Touya leaned in the doorway where Giran stood, watching the group crowd around their new member as Twice yelled about it being time for cake before announcing cake to be the worst food in the world.

Giran said, “You know, part of me thought you would all kill each other.”

“That wouldn’t be good for business,” Touya replied.

“No, it wouldn’t. But the rest of me knew it would be like this.”

“Like this?”

Giran gestured to the living room, to the party, to Toga cranking up the music and Sako dancing with her and Magne telling a joke that made Iguchi laugh and Shigaraki trying on his newest and best gift of gloves that had a few fingers missing so he would stop accidentally decaying their stuff. Touya felt warm looking at it.

He thought about the criteria for people in this apartment: all lonely, all in need of friends.

Giran said, “Tell Shigaraki happy birthday from me.”

Touya said, “Stick around and tell him yourself.”

-

Several years later, Todoroki Shouto, Pro Hero Shouto, would make it to number three on the hero ranking chart. Pyre wouldn’t make it anywhere near that, as he was a vigilante and not a Pro Hero, but he was nonetheless nearby.

Always nearby. Always there, just a little bit behind – not because he was any worse, or any less talented – but because he was watching, eyes like a hawk, keeping his brother safe.

In all ways, it was more important to him than becoming number one.

In all ways, it was the most important thing of all.