Chapter Text
All of her friends did their best to keep Izumi's mind off the investigation over the next couple of weeks while they waited for the training camp to start. Kacchan pushed her on their runs, challenging her to go faster, go longer, and their spars picked up in frequency and intensity. Shouto's dates were sweet and catered to her interests. One day, they spent an entire afternoon chasing Hero fights so she could analyze the quirks on display, and he listened with a sappy look on his face as she extemporated on everything; on another, they went to a special screening of the first All Might movie, followed by dinner and ice cream. Shinsou took her to a few different cat cafes and let her sit in comfortable silence while the cats purred around and on them. Uraraka dragged her to a girls' spa day, hosted by Yaomomo, and she spent the whole day with the other girls of Class 1-A as they got facials, manicures, pedicures, and finished at an exclusive onsen. Kirishima got the whole group over once his kitchen redesign was finished, and his moms let him have company over again. They spent the day watching movies, trading off who picked next, until they all fell asleep in a pile in the living room around four in the morning.
Touya-Nii took a slightly different approach.
He came over to her apartment early one morning and shoved his spare helmet into her hands as soon as she'd opened the door, before dragging her out. Izumi put the helmet on and climbed onto his bike without complaint, though her questions as to where they were going went unanswered. He drove them out of the city in silence, stopping only once they'd reached a mountainous region with sparse vegetation and streams.
The rumble of the bike stopped as he cut the engine. He sat back on the seat and kept them upright with his legs as the two of them looked over the area. It was rocky, some of the stones she could see were almost black—scorched—in places, and the dirt was packed and dry. She could see some very young saplings and slightly more vegetation near the water, though. Whatever had caused the damage, the area was only just starting to recover. The sounds of nature were all she could pick up, no cars, no people other than them. It was a different kind of quiet, somehow both peaceful and oppressive.
Izumi waited for Touya-Nii to speak. He'd brought her here for a reason; she'd wait for him to share when he was ready.
Eventually, he rewarded her patience, speaking in a faint monotone that masked the roiling emotion she could tell he was hiding. His hands were gripped in fists so tightly that the knuckles that weren't scarred were starkly white. "When I was a kid, I was told over and over that I would be a hero strong enough to take the title of number one away from All Might. I wanted it. The training, the pain, the bruises, the burns, the broken bones. It was all worth it for that. When it became clear that my quirk was too destructive for my body to handle, the training stopped. I wasn't good enough anymore. Went from the next number one to nothing, too flawed to even bother with. I couldn't accept it, kept trying despite the damage, but nothing I did was enough. Then Shouto got his quirk. All the same praise and purpose I used to get went to him, and I hated him for it. I would watch our father train with Shouto, listen to him tell Shouto he was going to be a hero better than All Might, and seethed in rage that it wasn't me."
Izumi had known, had heard, that Touya had gone through the same training as Shouto, but he hadn't shared the full story with her before. The details he'd given to the lawyers during Endeavor's trial weren't made public beyond the basics. She had no idea why he was telling her now, but she listened, pouring love and understanding into their string and holding him tight in comfort.
"One day, Enji broke Shouto's leg. He'd tried to run from the training room after the bastard burned him, and Enji lunged for him, got him by the shin, and yanked him back. He was so small, the bone cracked from the force. I saw it happen, watching, as I said. Enji loomed over Shouto, shouting about how he couldn't run from a fight just because he was in a little pain, that villains wouldn't hold back, that it was his job to surpass All Might. It was the same shit he always said, but it was the first time I realized that Shouto didn't react to it the way I had. He didn't use it to push through the pain; he didn't smile, knowing that the training would make him strong; he didn't want it. He was scared and hurt and so small. I realized that what Enji was doing was wrong. He was letting his obsession with besting All Might justify beating the crap out of his kids, putting pressure on first me, then Shouto, to succeed where he'd failed. It wasn't Shouto's fault that his quirk was the perfect combination that Enji had been hoping for; it wasn't his fault that Enji chose him over me. The hate I felt for Shouto was wrong, so I refocused my rage on the deserving party. Enji was hurting my baby brother; I had to do something. I figured that if I could prove to Enji that I was worth training, he would leave Sho alone, and I'd get the chance to pay him back for the abuse. Enough of me still wanted to be a hero that I saw it as a win-win. My practice was finally paying off, and my quirk was getting stronger. My fire was hotter than Endeavor's. I thought that would be enough, so I asked him to meet me here, Sekoto Peak."
Touya-Nii finally pushed the bike's kickstand and stood, helping Izumi off the back. He unbuckled the helmet and pulled it off her head, set it on the bike's seat, and then led her closer to the scorched rocks. He sat her down on a large, relatively flat rock and took the spot next to her. Izumi still hadn't spoken, but he didn't seem to need her to. His hand brushed over the scorching around them as he collected his thoughts.
"He never showed." Touya-Nii looked around at the small trees and damaged rock with a quick downturn of his mouth, there and gone so fast she would have missed it if she hadn't been watching him. "I felt so frustrated and angry and hopeless that I lashed out. I screamed at the top of my lungs and unleashed the most powerful flames I could muster as I raged, heedless of the damage I caused to myself or anything nearby. The forest burned around me, and I eventually lost consciousness. I woke up in a hospital over two years later. No one knew who I was; I'd been brought in near death, with no identification, and been comatose the entire time. I learned that Touya Todoroki was presumed dead. The heroes had investigated the fire, found a few bones that were burned beyond recognition, and called it case-closed. No one asked why the son of the number two hero set himself on fire, not even after his wife was institutionalized a year later. The number two hero was above reproach. I thought about coming out with who I was, what had happened, but I didn't believe it would make a godsdamned difference, and besides, at that point, I wanted to kill him, not see him in prison. So I chose a new name, lived on the streets, and obsessed over how I would one day destroy Endeavor."
He turned to her then, and his eyes mapped her face like he almost couldn't believe she was there. "Then I saw you. Tiny thing, in danger, afraid, but still fighting, and I couldn't save Shouto from Endeavor, but I could save you from Drac. It wasn't enough; it didn't make the choking fury go away, but for a moment, I felt less helpless. Then, when you said I could help Shouto, that helplessness came back. I'd tried and failed; you had to be wrong. Then you explained how you found me, why you were there, and you were so sure I could help. And you kept coming back, kept telling me it was possible. Eventually, believing you became easier, and believing in you… Izumi, believing in you became as natural as breathing. You set your mind to something, and it happens. You wanted to find me, and you did. You wanted to save Shouto, and you did. You wanted to get into UA's hero course without destroying a single robot, and you did. You want to change the future of how heroes and hero society are built, and I know you will. It's why I support you, Kats, and Sho, even though I hate heroes, because I believe you will change things. I brought you here because I want you to understand. I nearly killed myself and wiped this place off the map, letting my hatred for my father and his actions consume me until it was all I could feel. You gave me a reason to rebuild myself from the ashes of this place, gave me back my family, gave me a better purpose. I don't hate any part of you; heroes now don't stand a chance of measuring up to the type of Hero you'll become. The word hero might as well have two different definitions, as far as I'm concerned, and while I hate one, I could never hate the other." She was crying now, but he just grinned and wiped the tears away. "You're my Hero, my sister, and I love you. Those teachers of yours better go plus ultra in keeping you safe, because I want to see a world where there's only one definition of the word Hero, and I'll do whatever I have to, to make sure it's the right one."
When he was done, he pulled Izumi to his chest and let her cry on his shoulder while he rubbed her back. He let her cry it all out, her pain for his past, her gratitude for his faith, and her worry for their future. She wanted to live up to his belief in her, wanted to believe in it as much as he did, but a lot stood between her and that idealized future. It helped knowing she had her Nii-San's support, though. She'd never be able to do it on her own, but she wasn't alone, and that meant everything.