Work Text:
-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-
Monoma Neito felt awful for looking at the disaster folding out in front of him.
Typically he liked a little drama in life. A lot, actually. Who wouldn't? Life was far too boring without a rival to challenge, a test to conquer, or a rule to bend just close enough to breaking, changing both the hearts and minds of those around you that witnessed your unique and daring methods.
Love, however, was not a piece of life he had yet to feel the tumultuous conflict of.
He had imagined it differently.
Meeting someone he finally thought was a worthy competitor for his heart, sweeping them off their feet by taking them on the kind of date that made them question how their expectations had been beyond fulfilled, then slowly realizing that they were just as dastardly at plotting perfect romantic entanglements, until he admitted his love in the middle of a wild battle against a villain and against their heart.
That was drama.
That was what love was supposed to be.
Not this ache in his chest that wound itself through his ribs, pushing against his lungs until breathing was a luxury.
He hadn't even met the girl, but she'd looked so beautiful.
So horribly, tragically gorgeous as she leaned against a tree at the edge of an expansive front quad to a massive government building that has just housed hero hopefuls from all across Japan. So divinely dispirited below the leaves as she pulled off her gloves finger by finger, lifting a palm to wipe under her eyes.
His gut twisted as her shoulders slumped toward her hand. She hid herself further behind the tree, away from the main student bodies who awaited transportation back to heroic schools far and wide.
When he watched one of his rivals shed a tear, he felt validated. He wasn't crying. He was made of sterner stuff and knew the consequences of being less than adequate.
Humiliation.
And he still didn't cry. The crocodile tears of defeat were a mere performance to throw his opponents off. A strategy.
Their tears were not.
He didn't care, because anyone challenging him from the other hero course section at UA, or in a battlefield scenario for testing purposes, needed to find their own strength and conquer their weaknesses.
He couldn't worry about every other hero course student, save those from Class B who had become his family.
He couldn't take on the weight of their inadequacies.
Hers weren't a premeditated strike either.
Yet he felt a churning in his body that tossed his heart in his throat and made him care.
No one who looked like the oncoming twilight in the sunset, with glimmering slivers and purples running through her hair, deserved to appear so sad.
Monoma looked away temporarily to find his class. He saw bright orange hair waving in the breeze, Kendou Itsuka nodding enthusiastically as a few of his other classmates posed for a camera, pro hero preliminary licences held out in victory. They struck poses that looked like the battle they'd just fought.
They would be fine without him for a few moments.
He couldn't let this twisting feeling lie.
This fluttering that threatened to burst its way out of his chest if he didn't do something.
As he strode over to the girl, he fretted over what to say.
His words were always purposeful.
Perfection.
He trusted himself implicitly.
Except for now.
Did he tell her about her radiance? Inquire about her quirk? Make sure that she knew how stunning she was in whites and golds against the closing light of day?
Five minutes.
He just wanted five minutes.
He needed five minutes.
This was kind of ridiculous.
This inexorable draw of something deep within that made it impossible for him to look back at his classmates, remaining solely focused on the girl only a few feet away.
He ran a hand through his hair, hoping that it fell in all the places it was supposed to.
“Monoma!” A hand slapped his back. His eyes widened as the girl jolted, glancing around the tree trunk. Their eyes met and Monoma thought that he might actually lose the ability to form coherent sentences.
That may also have been due in part to his classmate, Honenuki Juzo, shaking his shoulders with the force of a famished man with the world's stickiest vending machine.
“We're all—”
Monoma spun around, grabbing Honenuki’s wrist, twisting his arm down, “What?!” He hissed, trying to remain quiet.
“Ow! Man, you're fast.” Honenuki pulled his wrist back, smiling as he rubbed where Monoma had grabbed him. “We're over there.” The lanky boy with ash blonde hair threw his thumb over his shoulder at the group of students that Monoma had already noticed.
“I know,” Monoma flitted his hand at his hero coursemate to go on without him, “I'm just… taking a walk.”
Honenuki’s eyebrows furrowed, “Are you sure you're not lost? Kendou said your sense of direction was a little whacked after she got you last time.” The genial boy mocked Kendou’s hand flying down, whacking his hand. It was a running gag, Kendou giving Monoma a swift hit to his head, neck, or shoulders when he was particularly blunt with someone. Monoma thought it was ridiculous. She said he was just ‘too much’ sometimes, but he thought that smacking your classmate was a little more over the top than anything he had to say.
“I'm fine. I'm allowed a moment to bask in the glory of victory alone, aren't I?” That's when Monoma saw Honenuki look over his shoulder, toward the tree and the impossibly exquisite girl.
“Riiight,” Honenuki's eyes moved back down to Monoma, giving him a wink.
Monoma suddenly felt incredibly warm, like he'd been shoved into a bathhouse. Honenuki chuckled as he patted Monoma's shoulder and took a step back, holding up a few fingers, “Three minutes, man. I think that's all I can give you before…” and he made another chopping motion.
Rolling his eyes, Monoma turned back around. The girl quickly slipped back behind the tree.
“Sorry about that,” Monoma called out as he closed another foot behind the trunk the girl rested on. He internally yelled at Honenuki for causing his first few words to be an apology. “I saw you here and, uh… wanted to make sure you were all right.” He gripped the knot of his tie, adjusting it, pressing it down as he fiddled with every aspect of his appearance for someone he didn't know, yet he wanted to appear perfect for. “Hero’s duty, right?”
“Pardon me,” The girl made no move to come into Monoma's view, “But I think I'll pass on receiving any comfort from a school of do-gooder tricksters,” He could hear her sniffling again. A flash of silver hair. A balled fist extending then retracting, “No matter how talented you UA students might be.”
She already knew where he was from?
“I appreciate the compliment, never having seen my quirk work personally, since I’m unaware of who you are,” Monoma ran through his mind who wasn’t near him when he’d passed. There was Tetsutetsu Tetsutetsu who had run off to get out the aggression that always seemed to be bubbling on the edge of his quirk use, Kamikiri Togaru who was a long wolf most of the time, and Kodai Yui who was so quiet that Monoma honestly hadn’t known where she’d gone off to until the exam had ended, just to name a few.
He folded his hands back and forth in front of his chest, ticking off his fingers as he tried to wager who she had faced and where her malice resided. He couldn’t pinpoint it, and he didn’t have much time, so he aired on the side of caution and generalized an apology, “I’m terribly sorry if any of my classmates offended you with their tactics. All's fair in these exams though, isn’t it?”
He moved forward a few inches, trying to peek around the tree to see her.
She rounded the tree at the same time, eyes pink around the edges, a sheen across her cheeks where tears had clearly been wiped away. She crashed into Monoma, meeting him eye to eye, her hand clutching a white beret and gloves to her chest, mouth open for a retort.
Monoma caught her shoulders.
They stared at one another.
It felt wrong.
Awful.
How could he think that someone looked so incredible in clear defeat?
Yet here she was, steaming full of frustration, determined in her stance, and glowing with the spark of someone who would do it all again, despite the tears.
“My fault—”
“I didn’t—”
Their words met in combat, running into one another just the same.
They closed their mouths.
Both of them barely breathed.
“Hey, Neito… oh… oh! Hey…” Peering out of the shadow of the tree under their feet, Kuroiro Shihai appeared. He waved from within the void, teeth grit, looking for all the world like he was more embarrassed than the two hero hopefuls that had run into one another.
“Shi? What are…” Monoma’s eyes bulged out of his head.
The girl squealed, hopping up, scrambling… directly into Monoma’s arms.
“Did you look up my skirt, you little voyeur?” She threw her gloves toward the boy covered in darkness.
“What? I… no!” Kuroiro ripped the glove that had plastered itself to his face, tossing it on the ground below the girl’s feet. “I’m… Neito! Tell her I would never dane to use the shadows to perform evil and illicit dealings!”
“No, no, that’s just Kuroiro, he’s harmless.” Monoma held onto the girl who had wrapped herself around him, arm across his neck, body pressed to his side, keeping him between her and the boy in the shadows. “He’s a puppy, really. Follows me around hopelessly. Can’t get enough of me.” He smiled, looking at the predicament they were in. Nervous laughter filled the nonexistent space between them when he noticed his arm around her waist, having caught her in her jump to safety, “Call it my irresistible charm.”
Below him, Monoma heard Kuroiro make a dissatisfied grunt.
The girl looked between them, noticing the lack of space, then back up at Monoma.
Her cheeks rouged.
“Well, call him off. My God! You UA students are incorrigible!”
She didn’t move.
Whether she was honestly scared of Kuroiro or not, Monoma was unsure, but he smirked and held onto her a little tighter while waving a fist at his friend, “Go on then, Shi! You’re scaring the woman!”
“I can’t believe…” Kuroiro muttered, reaching into the shadow and pulling out the other glove, tossing it at their feet. “Kendou says you need to meet up with us now. The bus just arrived.” He sank into the inky blackness, mumbling to himself about something regarding the bonds of friendship that Monoma was sure he’d have to pay for later in profuse penitence.
“Well…” The girl loosened her grip, hand sliding to Monoma’s neck. “Thank you, I suppose. You certainly took my mind off of my temporary shortcomings, erm…”
“Monoma. Monoma Neito." He let her waist fall from his arm, lifting his free hand to tap two fingers to his head in a small salute, twirling them down with a head dip flourish. “And you are?”
“Intelli Saiko.”
Her fingers rested on his collar.
Monoma glanced down at the hand. Thin, light, nails violet.
And bare.
He ducked down, out of her grip, picking up her gloves and loose hat.
“Sorry about that. A lot of my classmates aren’t as refined in dealing with others.” He smiled, bundling the gloves in the hat and handing it over.
She took it, fingers touching his hand for a brief moment, looking up at him with a twist to her lips that shone brighter than what Monoma could ever imagine.
“Thank you, Monoma-kun.”
She pulled back, clearing her throat as she placed the hat back on and effortlessly slipped on the gloves like a second skin.
“It was no…” She pulled a monocle out of her pocket, affixing it over her eye. A gold chain dangled down, catching the rays of the setting sun, glinting off of the tear tracks and hues of red smattering her face and the violet that he could now see shining in the depths of her hair. “... no… problem.”
She
Was
Radiant
And before Monoma could open his mouth one last time, he felt two strong arms lift him from behind.
He looked down to see a steel embrace around his ribcage.
“Come on, Phantom Thief. Stop stealing hearts and our time! We gotta go!” Tetsutetsu, arms transformed to a steel lock hold around his chest, picked him up and dragged him away.
“Tetsu! Put — me — down!” Monoma had taken the broad boy’s quirk and turned one hand into a steel fist, pummeling it as best he could against the much more refined version that had him jailed.
Behind him he heard a small giggle erupt into a wild laugh.
Unhinged.
Dramatic.
So this was love.
-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-