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Todoroki Shouto's life ends on a Tuesday night with a phone call from Iida Tenya.
Well, not exactly. Maybe that's a little unfair, considering the content of the phone call. Maybe it's a little bit worse than being dead; maybe death is something Shouto would prefer right now instead of the blackness at the edges of his vision, the feeling like his legs are about to give out, the way he thinks his heart has stopped but he's still alive for some reason.
It goes like this:
Are you sitting down? Iida asks, and Shouto is immediately wary. You should be sitting down for this.
Shouto leans against the wall, just in case. "Iida, what's going on?"
It's Midoriya-kun, he says, and Shouto knows .
"What hospital is he in," Shouto asks blankly. As often as it's happened in the last five years, he still doesn't take these phone calls — "Midoriya broke his arms," or "Midoriya has a concussion," or the worst one, "Midoriya was shot during a fight" — in stride as well as he should.
It's not — please, let me finish, Iida presses on, his voice wavering. He was negotiating a hostage crisis downtown. The hostages all escaped safely, thanks to his intervention, but a hidden bomb took out the building supports and- his voice breaks. Shouto can hear the way he bites back tears, and he feels his heart drop. I'm sorry, Todoroki-kun. He didn't make it.
There is silence for a moment. Shouto can hear the anticipation in Iida's breath, the way he waits for a response Shouto can't seem to give. Finally, he answers.
"That's impossible." Once the words start, he can't seem to stop them, pouring over his tongue like an avalanche. "It's not possible, Iida, he can't die, something like that can't kill him, he's too strong. He's still under there. Oh my god, we have to go, he's still under there and he's trapped and he'll suffocate if we don't get him out —"
Another voice cuts him off, a voice he belatedly recognizes as Ochako. Todoroki, they retrieved the body. It's over, he's gone. They're holding a closed wake and funeral for just his family, but there will be a public western-style memorial three days from now so visitors from the hero community around the world can pay their respects.
He barely hears her. He can feel his legs collapse, glad he leaned against the wall earlier. It's the only thing keeping him from pitching headfirst into his dish rack, useless hands knocking his glassware to the floor until it shatters like the reality he'd carefully constructed from the ashes of his father's dojo. At some point, his phone falls to the floor, and he can only faintly hear Ochako saying his name. He thinks he starts crying. He isn't sure.
Time slows down, bit by bit, until Shouto's world feels like molasses. Lifting as much as his index finger feels like a chore; breathing is laborious, taking all his energy. He can't stop imagining the way the building must have collapsed in on Izuku — Midoriya, really; they had never really managed the whole first-name thing, both of them too awkward and formal to let it slip casually — how afraid he must have felt, how dark it must have been. The noise, all at once. Knowing you'd won, then having your whole life literally collapse in on yourself. Did he die instantly, hit by rubble? Or was it slow, suffocating, being crushed by the heavy weight of the debris and rebar and the world's expectations?
The question seems to burn in him like his own fire, enough that he scrambles to shaking feet and grabs his laptop, collapsing onto the couch and frantically logging into the police system. As a pro hero, he has access to any police data that is left unclassified; autopsy reports are part of that. He pulls up the medical examiner's page, typing "Deku" into the search bar, hands trembling the whole time.
He finds a myriad of injury reports, x-ray data, and Izuku's name scattered across autopsies as the arresting officer when a fight got too high-stakes for all parties to walk away unscathed. It takes longer than it should, with his blurred vision, but he finally locates it: "Hosu City Coroner's Report: Midoriya, Izuku."
Shouto has seen autopsy reports before. He's still not prepared for the clinical efficiency, the distant language, the way his best friend and closest confidante is reduced to a case number.
Alias:
DEKU
Coroner's Case #:
20XX-277
Date of Birth:
7/15/XX
Age:
21
Sex:
Male
Date of Death:
5/22/20XX
Body Identified by:
Midoriya Inko, mother of the deceased
There are no pictures attached, and a part of Shouto is grateful. The written report is bad enough. Some of it seems painfully familiar: the detailed descriptions of his scarring, the purple contusions on the right forearm, an internal examination revealing the triple radius and ulna fractures with ligament damage. As much as his brain is screaming at him to leave it alone, to scroll to the opinion and stop torturing himself like this, it's impossible to tear his eyes away as the coroner describes the "multiple penetrating fragment injuries to the anterior thorax and left thigh," "gaping lacerations" across his chest and upper body. Shouto's not a doctor, but he's seen enough injuries to know what the final report will be: he ran out of blood before he ran out of air. Sure enough, the medical examiner labels the cause of death as "pericardial and pleural hemorrhage; massive blood loss due to laceration."
Shouto stares at the report without seeing it, hands pressed to his mouth, the scene playing and replaying itself over in his head. He's seen people caught in building collapses and terrorist attacks die like this. It's slow. If there were good ways to die, hypovolemic shock wasn't one of them. He knew Izuku well enough to know that instead of trying to dig his way out, he probably spent his last conscious moments trying to get to the villain still trapped down there with him, probably died regretting the fact that his own death meant he couldn't save someone else, like his own life didn't even matter.
Shouto can hear his doorbell ringing, but it feels about 700 miles away. He doesn't move even when the rings switch to knocks and then to a tense silence. When the door slams open, he turns his head slowly to see a frightened-looking Uraraka Ochako with Iida behind her, holding a key to his apartment out like a weapon.
She immediately runs over to the couch like if she takes another second, he'll disappear. "Todoroki, are you okay? I mean, of course you're not okay, none of us are, but I got really worried when you stopped responding on the phone so me and Tenya decided to come right over."
She takes a look around his apartment, and Shouto really sees it for the first time: shattered glass scattered on the kitchen floor, his phone laying discarded on the tile, his entire dish rack collapsed on the ground. It looks like a bomb went off; a bomb like the one that took out the concrete supports under the bank building, that blew a million pieces of razor-sharp shrapnel across Izuku's chest until there was more blood than intact skin, his vision going spotty as he struggled to keep the frame from falling in —
"Shouto!" His head shoots up to meet Uraraka's intense gaze. "Hey, come back, don't do that to yourself."
Iida closes the door and comes to sit next to Shouto, looking over his shoulder at his computer screen. He clears his throat. "Todoroki-kun, do you really think it is in your best interests to give such detailed attention to these kinds of things right now?"
Shouto's shoulders curl in and Uraraka bends over so she can see what exactly is on his computer. Her eyes light up with recognition, and she shrieks and closes his laptop, floating it away briefly before grabbing it and putting it on his coffee table. "Why would you look at that?! What's wrong with — why — how could —" She groans, a tight, frustrated sound, choked off with tears, before whirling around and walking toward his kitchen. "I'm going to clean up this glass before somebody gets hurt," she says, snatching his broom from behind the refrigerator, sweeping the broken glasses into a dustpan, and plucking his phone up off the ground. "Todoroki, you have, like, six missed calls."
It takes him a second, but he manages to choke out a "Who." She swipes the power button, grimacing when the bright backlighting interrupts the dark room.
"Jeez, your screen is blown to hell. Two are from me and Iida, the rest are your sister. Do you want me to call her back?"
Words seem impossible right now, so Shouto just nods, and Ochako hits the redial button. He hears it ringing, and his sister pick up.
"Hi. No, this is Uraraka Ochako. …Yes, Uraraka. …Yes, like Uravity. ……..Thank you, everyone worked very hard, but that was really more of a joint effort with the Idaten office so we can't take all the credit. …Shouto is here, we came to check on him. … Yes, he's heard. Iida called as soon as we got the news. …He's alright. He's taking it pretty hard. Can you call back later? I under — I understand, Todoroki-san, but he's not really talking right now. … I'll ask if he wants to speak to you, okay?" She turns to look at Shouto, and he nods slightly, holding out a hand. "Okay, I'm giving him the phone."
As soon as he holds it to his ear, he can hear Fuyumi's nervous rambling. "Shouchan, I'm so sorry. I've been worried sick about you ever since I heard. I know you and Deku-kun loved each other very deeply. I can't imagine what it must be like, losing someone you'd been dating for so long."
Shouto freezes, then lets out a choked noise that sounded a lot more like a sob. "We — I never got to —" he takes a deep breath, goes to try again. "We weren't —" is as far as he gets before trying to bite back more tears.
He hears her even breathing on the other end, tries to remember all the years he centered himself on that sound, the only comforting thing about Endeavor's household he could cling to. "Oh, Shouto," she says, and he can hear his mother's tone wrapped up in hers. "Let yourself feel it."
He breaks.
He can feel the phone slip out of his hand as he curls in on himself, shaking violently, Iida's broad hand on his back the only thing keeping him grounded in a knowable world. He hears Ochako on the phone with Fuyumi again, but he can't bring himself to hear anything outside of his own sobs. The world is too painful, wrapping him in broken glass and keeping him from hearing anything but the shattering noise that's been ringing in his ears since Iida first called him however long ago.
It doesn't seem fair. After all this time, it doesn't seem fair that Izuku, who worked so hard for so long, was the one who got knocked down first. Out of everyone Shouto has ever known, Izuku deserved success the most, and if he couldn't be around to grieve the way that had been snatched out of his hands, Shouto will do it for him. He tries to imagine that all this pain is for Izuku's benefit, that Shouto's just feeling this so deeply because Izuku isn't here to feel it for him, and collapses into tears again. He can feel Iida's hand gripping his, the tension in his fingers shivering up Shouto's arm as they grieve together.
Shouto feels a light touch on his shoulder and startles, meeting Ochako's concerned look. "Hey, it's getting kind of late, and it's been an awful day. We should try to get some sleep," she says, and Shouto moves to wipe his cheeks and straighten up.
"I'm sorry to keep you." His voice was barely recognizable, but he tried not to think too hard about it. "You should both be getting home."
Ochako gives him a look, and only then does he notice that she's spread out his spare futon across his living-room floor. "We're not leaving you. We'll stay until we have to get ready for the memorial, and then we'll come back for you and go together. Me and Tenya can share the spare futon, if you want to take the couch."
"It's my apartment," Shouto says, a defensive edge creeping into his voice. "I am capable of sleeping in my own bed."
"Sure you are. If you'd rather, I can pull the spare futon in your room and we can all sleep in there."
"There's hardly room for me in there. I can sleep alone, I'm an adult."
Ochako's look morphs into one of her determined glares, the one that says I won't back down so you better start running. "I'm not leaving you alone. I came in here and your floor was covered in glass and you were barely conscious, staring at that awful report on your laptop. I won't let you make this any harder on yourself, I won't — I won't lose you —"
She's fighting back tears, and Shouto reaches out to take her hand. "If it'll make you feel better," he says, "I'll sleep out here. We're in this together."
She gives him a watery smile and pulls Iida off the couch, sending him to help Shouto grab pillows and blankets from his bedroom. They set up the makeshift sleep area quickly, Shouto stretching out on his couch while Ochako curls up next to Iida.
It's silent for a while, but surprisingly, it's Iida that speaks first. "Todoroki-kun," he says, "were you in our rescue certification group our last year of high school?"
Shouto shakes his head, then realizes Iida can't see him, and gives a quiet noise of dissent. The certification exam had been a series of stations where the students were instructed to rescue civilians from disaster areas. His group had consisted of Yaoyorozu and Bakugou. It was a miracle they'd passed.
"I didn't think so." Shouto can hear Iida shuffling around on the futon. He's always been a loud thinker. "I was just remembering that day. It was myself, Ochako, and Izuku. We had just finished the landslide rescue, thanks to Ochako, and we had to do the burning building rescue. We were strategizing how to get to the fourth floor without going through the fire and without causing structural damage — I still wasn't quite adept at running up vertical surfaces — and Izuku suggested he could jump through the window and retrieve the injured civilian, with Ochako standing by in case there were any problems. We agreed to it, and he jogged back a few meters, took a running leap, shouted 'No need to worry! I am —' and ran smack-face first into the building. Totally misjudged his own strength, jumped six stories instead of four, Ochako had to catch him before he broke more than his nose."
Ochako's laugh is like Shouto's — choked, like it had to fistfight it's way through the sobs. "I really thought he was going to break his neck! It was okay, though, he got it the next time. That was the day before we all scarred Todoroki with the cuddle pile."
"You didn't — I just didn't expect to see all three of you in Midoriya's bed, laying on top of one another like a group of feral dogs." Shouto can remember it vividly, all three of them asleep, Izuku's head on Iida's shoulder while Ochako laid her feet over both of their laps and hugged a pillow. It had taken Shouto a few weeks after really being inducted into the "Dekusquad" — as Ochako called it, to Izuku's red-faced embarrassment — to get accustomed to how touchy the other three were, but he'd learned to appreciate the way they'd thread him into a hug that started with Ochako's arms around his waist and built to Izuku's head in his shoulders, ending with Iida leaning on all three of them. It felt a little bit like coming home. Shouto can feel the grief swelling back up as he remembers, pressing his face into a throw pillow to hide the tears threatening to burn down his cheek, weak as always when it comes to water.
"Do you guys remember, in second year, that time we had to perform the play about hero history and one of us had to be All Might?" Ochako's voice is quiet, but in the silence of his living room, it might as well be a symphony. "Izuku was trying so hard not to like scream out that he wanted to be All Might, please let him be All Might, that he was practically vibrating out of his seat until Todoroki was like 'Izuku do you want to maybe do All Might since Tenya is going to be Crimson Riot and I should probably play the fire villain'? And Izuku, I swear to god, lept like fifteen feet into the air and then took a full minute to stop hyperventilating before he went 'well what if Ochako wants to be All Might.' I must have died laughing."
Shouto couldn't help the smile that twitches at his mouth when he remembers. "He was so earnest, too. 'Well, what if Ochako wants to be All Might?' and then when I tried to say you didn't he went on that ten minute lecture that I think was supposed to be anti-sexism but ended up being about how girls could be All Might too? It was well-meaning but not quite right."
Ochako's voice is thick with tears. "He was just so good-hearted." She takes a deep breath, but it cuts off in a loud whimper that turns into outright sobbing. A moment later, it's muffled as Iida pulls her into his chest, but it's still the sound Shouto falls asleep to: his closest friends crying in the dark, the sounds of their anguish covering up the way he buries his face in his pillow and tries not to fall apart.
A year ago, on Shouto's 20th birthday, the four of them plus Asui Tsuyu went to a karaoke bar to celebrate. Shouto would have been content having something at home, with just his friends and maybe his mother and sister, or even nothing at all, but Izuku wasn't about to tolerate Shouto's hermit tendencies and dragged him out in a blazer, t-shirt, and incredibly expensive denim to drink ridiculous amounts of alcohol "legally now, Todoroki-kun!" until they either died or threw up.
By 11 PM, Izuku had had at least 20% more alcohol than Shouto courtesy of a drinking game with Ochako that he lost, badly, and seemed to be barely upright judging by the way he was swaying completely out of time with the song "Shinzou wo Sasageyo," which he was currently shouting into the microphone with no attention to petty concerns like "pitch" or "rhythm" or "the right words."
It was, for lack of a better word, adorable. Ochako had been clapping along, shouting "sasageyo" about half a beat too late every time, while Iida was in a heated discussion about the most recent episode of the drama both he and Tsuyu watched. Shouto had claimed the left side of the couch for himself, his discarded blazer, and a lemon sour he'd been nursing for 20 minutes. He couldn't remember the last time he'd felt like something was just pure fun, and it was wonderful. He had just taken another sip of his drink as Izuku had come tumbling off the stage and Ochako ran up to take his place, gesturing for Tsuyu to join her for a duet.
Izuku flopped down on the couch next to Shouto and looked him in the eyes, his sunny grin from the stage schooled into a serious expression. "Shouto-kun, tell me the truth," he said, entirely too sincere for how entirely tipsy he sounded, "was that better than Linked Horizon? I think it was."
Shouto laughed slightly, and Izuku frowned. Absolutely unacceptable, Shouto's brain had shouted, sounding suspiciously like Iida, get that expression off his face at once.
"I think it was great, Midoriya," Shouto had replied, and Izuku's features had lit up again.
"Thanks! I love that song because it's so upbeat! Dedicate your hearts!" He flopped over, laying his head in Shouto's lap, and Shouto's heart did a funny backflip as his face grew heated. "What's your favorite Linked Horizon song?"
Shouto had stuttered for a few seconds, unable to think of anything outside of how Izuku's freckles seemed to light up when he was breathless, and how badly Shouto wanted to see them closer. "I don't, uh," he had managed before Izuku was already moving on to another subject.
"Shouto-kun, your eyes are so nice. Do people tell you that? That you have pretty eyes? They're so nice."
Shouto's heart had stopped in his chest, time freezing as he looked down at Izuku's wild hair, his cheeks flushed from either the loud singing or alcohol, glowing from the inside out with the kind of starlight Izuku brought everywhere he went.
Somehow, Shouto's sarcasm reflex kicked in before he could form a coherent thought, and he answered "I've heard it once or twice."
"Good. I hope you hear it every day." Izuku reached up and brushed something off Shouto's cheek, mouth drawn into a lazy grin. In the moment, with the neon lights glowing around them, Shouto had felt like he was the only person meant to see it.
Oh, he thought. I love him.
It was the same thought Shouto had when Ochako was telling him the details of the memorial, quiet voice a mile away from his discarded cell phone. But I loved him, he'd thought. I loved him, and he's gone.
It's deceptively bright out on the day of Izuku's memorial. The sun beats down on Shouto's shoulders as he steps out of the black car the agency sent for him, Iida (and his brother), and Ochako, and he fights back the urge to ice his body over to escape the oppressive heat.
He doesn't want to be here. He's drowning in all the grief that surrounds him, fighting back the urge to yell at the strangers crowding the grass to leave this for him and his friends, the people who really knew Izuku. The whole thing feels artificial. But this is Shouto's last chance to say goodbye, even if it is to an empty casket, and he won't give it up.
From the minute the car pulls away, they're crowded by reporters from all sorts of news outlets: local, national, international, serious, trashy — you name it, they were there. All around Shouto, people are shoving cameras and microphones into his face, getting in his way as he tries to catch up to the other 1A students who have already arrived. A few feet away, Tsuyu and Kirishima are talking while Bakugou fends off any reporters with a glare.
Shouto pushes past, carving a path for Iida Tensei's wheelchair, flanked by Ochako and Iida. Even once they reach Bakugou's rage bubble, the allure of Izuku's closest friends seems to pull the media closer and closer, even as it takes everything in Shouto's power not to throw up a wall of ice spikes to keep them back. He can feel his power flickering at his fingertips every time a boom mic jostles him into Tsuyu, and he takes a deep breath to calm his temper before fixing the offending technician with an icy glare that gets him to back up a few feet.
No such luck for the newscaster to his left. She shoves a handheld microphone in his face, shouting, "Tanaka Kaori, Tokyo Star. Equilibrium, what was your reaction when you heard Hero Deku's last words were asking for you?"
Shouto feels his heart stop, mouth open, eyes wide, frost creeping up his right side. To his right, Iida flinches, and Ochako gasps. Even the other reporters shy back, but Tanaka holds fast, microphone inches away from Shouto's face.
It's Bakugou that reacts first. His hands are pop-popping with tiny explosions as he lunges for the reporter, yelling, "What the fuck is wrong with you? Goddamn vultures jumping down people's throats at a memorial, get your camera out of my face before I send the both of you straight to hell!" Tanaka runs backward as Kirishima grabs Bakugou by the arm and pulls him back, the latter still shouting curses.
"Everyone, please, there's a media area behind the seating, if you'd please respect the mourners by remaining there and refraining from soliciting statements, we would greatly appreciate it." Momo is practically running down the walkway, her calm tone broken by how out-of-breath she sounds. "Please, this is a very hard day for most of us and we'd appreciate it if you would submit requests for statements on Deku's passing to our respective agencies. Our media teams will gladly communicate with you."
As the camera crews recede, she places a steadying hand on Shouto's shoulder, and he covers it with one of his own, taking a deep breath. "I've got to go talk to the event team and see about getting security sorted better," she murmurs, "but you take care of yourself. I know this is tough for you. I'll be there in just a couple minutes."
He's hurried along up the hill to where the mourners are in line to pay their respects, sandwiched in a line between Iida and Ochako to the back, the latter crying into the former's chest, and Kirishima and Bakugou to the front. Shouto takes his chances, and faces forward.
It's not really a chance, per se. Bakugou is already on edge, and there's power itching under Shouto's skin that wants to take a bite out of something, to make it hurt as badly as he does. Bakugou's as good an option as any, an easy target, well within Shouto's power to rile up enough to take a swing at him even here. He and Bakugou have never been on good terms, but Shouto had kept his distaste for "Ground Zero" under wraps for Izuku's sake.
Once, Izuku came back to the office teary-eyed after a lunch out with Bakugou. Shouto immediately offered to kill Bakugou and make it look like an accident, but Izuku had just laughed and said that "Kacchan" had apologized for being a "bit of a jerk" — or a "major fucking asshole" as Shouto would put it — and was really trying to do better, and it made him "so happy, you don't even know, because I just want to be his friend and not fight with him all the time and I think that might happen!" and Shouto remembers feeling a little irrationally jealous that Bakugou could make Izuku this happy just by being a decent person when Shouto had been decent the whole time.
So he fixes his stare dead into Bakugou's blood-red eyes and says, "Why are you even here?"
"Because I grew up with the damn kid," Bakugou snarls at him, and Kirishima gives them both a warning look. "What, now there's a tax to pay on being mad some kid you knew when you were five died? I didn't make the cut? Fuck on out of here, Icyhot, I'm not trying it with you today."
Shouto knows it's too far, that Bakugou's giving him an out, but he pushes anyway. "Not here to gloat on beating him in the rankings? Now that he's gone, there's nothing between you and number one, after all. You're like my shitty old man, climbing the ladder because someone else got pushed off."
Bakugou steps forward, shoulders drawn up, quirk starting to spark in his palms. "Now you listen to me, you goddamn piece-of-shit hot-and-cold sports pack —"
Kirishima grabs Bakugou again, hauling him to the side while he uses his other hand to push Shouto back. "Really, guys? At a funeral? Come on, you don't want to do this."
"You don't know what I want," Shouto mutters, shrugging Kirishima's hand off his chest.
"You want to fight." Bakugou's body is angled toward Kirishima, but he's looking right at Shouto. "I get it; you feel bad, you want to fight. It doesn't feel right, the two of us even being near each other when he's not here, and you want to hit something until it does. Won't fix it, dumbass."
"Are you actually capable of speaking without swearing or calling names? I didn't like being around you when Izuku was ali —" Shouto chokes on the words, and grimaces. His mouth refuses to acknowledge it, like speaking it makes all of this more real than it has to be. "… when Midoriya was there. You were nothing but cruel to him."
Bakugou bristles, but Kirishima holds him back. "We made up on that shit, you cold-on-the-inside-hot-on-the-outside piece of hot pocket garbage, and it isn't any of your business anyway, so —"
"I'm sure he forgave you. He was always too good for you." Shouto holds Bakugou's stare, lets the anger burn away the choked-up feeling in his throat.
"He was always better than either one of us, shithead." When Shouto doesn't answer, Bakugou opens his mouth to say something else, but a wail from further up the line silences them both.
A few feet forward, Midoriya Inko stands near her son's casket. A hero — Shouto thinks it's Manual, but without the mask, he can't be sure — had handed her a piece of Izuku's uniform that had been retrieved from the site. He reaches out to try and comfort her, saying "Midoriya-san, your son died saving many people from a horrible threat. He was truly a hero."
She brushes his hand off, clutching the green fabric in a white-knuckled grip. "I don't want your platitudes; I don't care how many people he saved!" Her voice is raw, and the emotion of it sends a fresh roll of tears down Shouto's cheeks. "I want my son back! I want to know why all those people are allowed to live and my son had to die!"
Manual flinches back, but a woman Shouto recognizes as Bakugou's mother steps forward and pulls Midoriya-san into an embrace. "Inko-chan, I'm so sorry. I can't imagine what you're going through right now, but our family is here for you."
Bakugou and Kirishima go toward the casket as Izuku's mother sobs into her friend's arms. Shouto can see his former classmates murmuring to the casket, watches as Bakugou places an unsteady hand on the lacquered wood before drawing it back quickly and storming off, rubbing at his eyes like he's embarrassed to be experiencing an emotion at a funeral. Kirishima lingers a second longer, leaving a small flower behind as he goes to sit with Bakugou.
As Bakugou's mother drifts away from Izuku's, Shouto quietly follows, but a hand on his arm stops him.
"Oh no, mister, you can't get out of a hug this time," Inko says, voice still painful to hear. She wraps her arms around him, barely making it up to his chest, and he awkwardly returns the gesture as she pats his back comfortingly. "I know you and Izuku are very close. It means a lot to him that you're here."
"Midoriya-san, I'm sorry —" Shouto feels his voice catching in his throat and a few more tears slip past his defenses. "I'm sorry for your loss. Your son was a great friend of mine. We're all feeling his loss deeply."
"I know. It's going to be alright. We'll get through this." She grips his hand tightly and he can feel his shoulders shaking. It feels wrong, that she's the one comforting him. His own grief feels so overwhelming, threatening to choke him at any moment. He can't imagine how much worse it must be for her. She pulls him down so her arms are around his shoulders, and he grips her tightly, trying to remember how Izuku would hug his mother even when he'd just seen her ten minutes ago, clinging to her like she was something so precious he couldn't imagine letting go of her. Shouto doesn't have the strength for it, isn't the right kind of person to love anyone like Izuku did, but he can try.
Inko pats him on the head and pulls away, giving him a weak smile. "You go say your goodbyes. I'll see you and the other two soon. Don't stay away, okay?"
He nods, afraid words would betray him, and walks toward the casket. He's holding a red rose, leaves as green as Izuku's hair was, mindlessly thumbing over the thorns as he lays a hand on the wood. Shouto feels stupid, standing here, staring at a box he knows is empty, unable to choke out any of the words that have laid heavy under his tongue the last two days. The actual funeral was yesterday, after all — Shouto had sat at home trying desperately to suppress the nausea as he envisioned Izuku's body sliding into the fire, each tongue of flame licking away another part of him until he was nothing but bones for his family to carefully lift into an urn. Shouto knows something about ash, about fire, and he hates it, wants to swallow every bit of the embers down until they're nothing but ice again, to beat back his own inferno until it cries for mercy he isn't ready to give. Fire is the feeling of cotton underneath his tongue, of iron lodged in his trachea, bitter lemon caught at the back of his throat. Fire is threatening the structural integrity of his ribs and making his shoulders bend inward, and Shouto won't forgive it a second time.
If Izuku, alive, flesh-and-blood, body-not-consumed-by-the-furnace Izuku were here, he'd be elbowing Shouto in the ribs, trying to get him to spit out the phrases stuck in his throat. "Hey," he attempts, talking to no one, to nothing, unable to mold his thoughts into something his tongue can articulate. He can feel everything they'd left unsaid chomping at the bit of his teeth, trying to work its way loose and failing. He places his hand flat against the casket, and takes a deep breath. "Izuku," he breathes, his voice barely his, "why did you have to leave me?"
There's no answer, of course, and Shouto lets his hand fall to his side. He takes the rose and lets it lay on top of the casket, surrounded by other gifts and mementos. Among the various items laid there, his is the only one covered in frost.
He takes his seat near the front, in a space where there's enough room for the Iidas and Ochako to sit with him before the memorial service starts. They file in a few moments later, and Ochako grips his knee, face still red and tear-covered. He covers her hand with his as the last of the mourners pay their respects. There are a lot of people; people Shouto doesn't know, like a man in a white hat and mirrored sunglasses whispering to the casket before placing something on it and going to move away. It's incredible how many people Izuku affected in only three full years of professional hero work after school.
There's a loud crack of almost-thunder behind them. Good, Shouto thinks. I hope it starts pouring. It'd be the only thing about this day that felt right.
But the sky doesn't darken. Instead, Shouto hears a booming voice call out "Stop!" behind him — Izuku's, he thinks, even though that's impossible. All around him, the crowd stirs: Iida and Ochako look at each other in confusion, Bakugou lets out a muttered "what the hell?" and the man in the mirrored sunglasses flinches. Shouto whips his head around to see who is causing the commotion.
He's dressed in his sage green hero suit, white cape attached at his shoulders, mask pulled up to cover his eyes and nose. "You said the next time you saw me, it would be at my funeral, Saito. Well —" he crouches into his leap position, green lightning crackling over his body, "— here we are!"
Later, Shouto will be able to catalog and label the emotions that go through his head as Izuku leaps overhead: shock and confusion at his sudden appearance; joy and relief that he wasn't gone; betrayal and anger at his apparent decision to keep that information from the people who most cared about him. At the moment, however, all he can think of is the way the man in the mirrored sunglasses — Saito? — is dashing toward him, down the aisle, away from Izuku's onslaught. Purely on instinct and sixteen years of hero training, Shouto steps forward with his right foot, sending a rush of ice toward the man and stopping him dead in his tracks.
When he moves to assist with restraints he runs right into Izuku.
Up close, Izuku's eyes are a dazzling green, his look of determination enough to make even Shouto want to bend to his will. Words fail him, his every limb completely frozen, and he's stuck wondering whether it's the glow of Izuku's power that makes his eyes so captivating or if they've always been that way.
"Uh. I gotta — that guy, and I have to arrest him." Izuku's voice is awkward, stuttered like he's still 15 and deceptively strong for his small build. He clears his throat, says, "I'll talk to you later, Equilibrium-san, bye now," and dashes past Shouto toward his quarry.
Shouto stands still, stunned, until a uniformed officer pulls him away and toward a squad car. He's shaking worse now than he was when he arrived, barely listening as he's told it's just a formality, he has to fill out a quirk use report, would he mind coming down to the station for a few minutes. He only manages to get out a "Deku-san —" before he's folded into the back of a squad car, looking away across the cemetery at Izuku as he works with Naomasa to set Saito into a quirk suppressing holding unit.
As the car pulls away, Shouto is once again left staring.
It takes forty minutes to reach the police station and five to fill out the quirk use report. That's a grand total of forty-five minutes spent doing absolutely anything of value, which means the remaining one hour and fifteen minutes of Shouto's time at the station is spent pacing around an empty interrogation room, getting increasingly more incensed at Izuku's decision to let his closest friends believe he was dead.
Shouto knows the life of a hero means making complicated choices, and sometimes those choices hurt people. That was exactly why he should have been the person Izuku trusted with this decision. Shouto knew how to keep his mouth shut better than anyone, he'd done it for years, and Izuku knew that better than almost any other person in his life. He couldn't get his mind off of who Izuku had told, if not him — Ochako and Iida? Was that why they'd been the first to call, the reason they'd come in when Shouto hadn't answered? It made him livid, the idea that Ochako — that Iida had lied to his face about something this important.
He immediately dismisses it as unrealistic — Iida can't hide his emotions from Shouto that well, not after all this time — but the heat of anger remained. In retrospect, his mother had certainly known; Shouto was sure she'd referred to him in the present tense, and he had to shove back the tears of betrayal that still threatened to prick at the corners of his eyes. Was she the only one? Who else had seen the shell of himself that he'd been at that funeral and said nothing?
Just as Shouto resolves to storm out and personally lay waste to the entire Tokyo metropolitan area until he is important enough for Izuku to give a fuck about, the man himself quietly slips through the door.
"Hey, Todoroki-kun," is all he manages before Shouto's fist, completely independent of his brain, connects solidly with Izuku's face.
Izuku stumbles backward into the wall, and Shouto rushes forward, gasping out a hurried apology as Izuku waves him off. "No, no, it's okay. I deserved that." He pulls his hand away from his face, and it's covered in blood. "Nice hit, Todoroki-kun; geez, I think you broke my nose."
Shouto heaves an exasperated sigh. "Christ, Midoriya, you don't deserve to get hit," he starts, before his anger comes rushing back in. "Actually, no, you did deserve that. How — how could you let me think you were dead? Do you have any idea — did you even think about how you would make people feel? It's the responsibility of a hero to make the public smile, make them feel better, not worse! You're the one that told me that, and you just — you were so irresponsible, what if someone had reacted really badly, or hurt themselves!"
Izuku's face goes white and he drops his hands to his sides. "Todoroki-kun, you didn't —"
"That isn't the point, the point is that people care about you and you made them go through some awful shit because — I don't know why, to catch some villain because you got it in your head that you were the only one that could do it, or it was your responsibility as the new symbol of peace and hope in the world, or whatever —"
"I had to! Saito had killed something like eighty, ninety heroes across the world and nobody was even getting close! We couldn't get the drop on him; he'd just tell us where he was going to be and what he was going to do and he'd get away every time because of his quirk — Prophesy, it's called, he can make pronouncements that change the future, but we're pretty sure they're limited to only affecting him, and that's why! Last time I faced off with him I couldn't get to him in time, and he pronounced that 'the next time we meet, it'll be at your funeral'! It was the only chance to get him, Todoroki-kun, you have to understand —"
"But could have told me, you could have told Iida or Uraraka or the other people who matter in your life and worry about you and want to know you're safe! Iida and Uraraka came over immediately after calling me because they were so worried, because they wanted to be with someone who understood how painful it was to lose you —"
"No, but that's good, because you spent time together and reconnected! Don't give me that look, Todoroki-kun, you know why I couldn't tell you. The more people who knew, the more likely it was it would get back to Saito." Izuku folds his arms across his chest, broad shoulders so much more distracting in his hero uniform. It's cut to accentuate his arms, the slope of his torso, and from the way he's facing, Shouto has a full view of the way the seams connect at his belt and highlight the angles of his waist.
He's filled out quite a bit from the scrawny fifteen-year-old he was when Shouto met him, but Shouto is still quite a bit taller, and he uses that fact to his advantage, stepping close and leaning into Izuku's space. "Are you telling me," he hisses, driving the distracting thoughts of Izuku's uniform designs out, "that you think I would go running my mouth about something you told me in confidence? Do you really think so little of me, Izuku?"
Izuku's eyes go wide, and Shouto frowns. He opens his mouth to speak, but his expression must say enough as Izuku takes to waving his hands frantically and mumbling, "You never really called me Izuku before, is all."
Shouto recoils, shaking himself off and willing back the blush he's sure is spreading across his face. "That's — it's not — that is irrelevant, Izu — Midoriya, stop changing the subject. You didn't consider anyone's feelings when you made your decision, and that's what we're talking about."
Izuku slumps against the wall, closing his eyes with a sigh. "I understand that you're angry, and that you were hurt, but I did think this through, and I made my decision based on what was best in the long run. I spent two days locked in a basement with no windows and no contact with the outside world, beside Detective Naomasa and Aizawa-sensei, to keep this all a secret. Besides them, I told the people who needed to know it would have really affected badly: my mom, All Might, the people who might have been irreparably hurt by my death. We're close, Todoroki, but you — you're young and strong, and you would have been fine, and I knew that."
Shouto practically sees red. He can feel the frost crawling over his right side as he stammers, "I — and you think — I would be fine , and I'm young, like that has anything — no! You lied to me —"
"I didn't lie to you! I never said anything to you, and lying is — "
"Lying by omission is still lying. If we're going to do this, we're going to do it right, and that means no lying, not technically and not actually." Shouto shrugs off his jacket and lays it over the back of the chair. Grabbing Izuku by the arm, he sits him on the table, taking the pocket square of his suit to dab at Izuku's face. "What you did was inconsiderate at best."
"I did what I needed to, you know that. And it turned out fine, right?"
Shouto gives him a deadpan glare, then flicks him in the nose. Izuku yelps and gives Shouto a wounded look, but Shouto continues with, "You need to think about how your actions make the people in your life feel, not just the people you're saving. You hurt everyone with this action."
"I know I hurt you. I'm sorry. I was thinking about what the world needed, but I didn't consider your feelings." Izuku looks at his hands, downcast face interrupted periodically as Shouto jostles his nose. "I really didn’t think you’d be this upset; I mean, I knew it wasn’t going to be awesome for you, but I figured you’d understand most of all that our jobs come with an assumption of the risk."
"I’m not just talking about me." Shouto smudges at a spot of dirt on Izuku’s face. "Ochako and Iida were heartbroken. All of your other friends — Tsuyu, Tokoyami, Kirishima; hell, even Bakugou seemed torn up by losing you. We’re the people you’re supposed to trust with this stuff, the people who care about you as a hero and a friend."
"I already spoke to Ochako and Tenya earlier. Heard you wanted to fight Kacchan too. They all told me you were more upset than they expected. Ochako was worried sick about you, apparently. You keep talking about everyone, but you’re not upset over everyone." Izuku looks at Shouto, and the eye contact at such a short distance is too much. Shouto quickly refocuses at cleaning the blood off of Izuku’s cheek, nearly flash-frying his freckles when he says, "You’re angry that I abandoned you."
Everything he’d shoved down before the funeral comes back in full force and Shouto stands frozen, one hand still on Izuku’s face. He wants to yell "of course I’m angry you would leave me," spill every anxiety and moment of despair he’d lived through as he tried to come to terms with Izuku’s death as much as he wants to vehemently deny the claim, that Ochako had been worried for him and that this had affected him any more than it had anyone else. He opens his mouth to say anything, but before any words have time to form, a tear rolls down his cheek, followed by a second, until anything he could have said is swallowed by the deluge. He drops his hands from Izuku’s face to cover his own, as if that could offer him privacy in an open room, with Izuku only inches away.
Izuku grabs his wrists and pulls them away, wrapping his arms around Shouto’s middle and pulling him into a tight embrace. Shouto lets his arms fall over Izuku’s shoulders, burying his head in Izuku’s hair as he tries to get ahold of himself.
"I’m sorry," Izuku murmurs, and Shouto pulls back and wipes delicately at his eyes, pale fingers contrasting with how red his cheeks have gotten. "I hurt you, and I’m sorry."
Shouto takes a deep breath in, releasing it in a shaky sigh. "You’re one of the smartest people I know, Izuku, but also one of the most absolutely idiotic sometimes. God, I can't believe I'm in love with you."
He realizes a second too late. Izuku looks like Shouto's punched him a second time, mouth dropped open in shock. Shouto doesn't bother trying to take it back, just collapses against the nearest wall and tips his head back.
When Izuku finally speaks, his voice is tight. "Todoroki-kun, I'm sure Ochako told you some stuff, but please don't feel like you have to say you're in love with me because of it. You might feel that way now, but we can talk about it later and I'm sure you'll realize it's just — oh man, I don't want to say 'a phase,' because that makes it sound like an angry dad, but — it's just a feeling because you're upset and you were worried. You aren't in love with me."
"Izuku, what the hell." His voice is flat, but Shouto can feel more tears starting to form at the corners of his eyes, and he scrubs them away with the cuff of his suit. "Of course I'm in love with you. I've been in love with you since high school."
"No you haven't , Todoroki-kun," Izuku says, and Shouto can hear the desperate edge in his voice. "Please, can we just talk about this later? I'll take all the blame for not considering your feelings more, but please, just let this go."
On any other day, Shouto would back down at the first sign that Izuku was getting uncomfortable, but today, despite the crying jag, that itch to start a fight hasn't yet vacated the premises, and the fire Izuku awoke so many years ago burns hot in Shouto's throat. "Fine," he says, crossing his arms. "Since you know my feelings so much better than I do, explain to me why I couldn't possibly be in love with you."
"Because I've been giving you a thousand chances to say something for almost three years, and you've ignored me! Which is fine, don't worry, I understand, and maybe you're not really into guys or whatever and it doesn't matter but you didn't ever say anything to me before or give me the slightest hint that you even liked me as, like, more than a friend —" Izuku's voice is getting frantic, wet, like it does whenever he gets worked up, "— and I made my peace with that a while ago but Ochako knew how I felt and so she told you when she thought I was dead and I guess that's what I deserve but you never said or did anything before so it doesn't make sense because mmf —"
As far as first kisses go, this one is pretty much the worst. Shouto more or less threw his face in Izuku's direction, which meant their collision was harsh and bony, teeth clacking together, the whole affair tasting of sweat and copper from Izuku's broken nose.
It's also pretty much the best, because just as Shouto starts to think he's made a terrible mistake, Izuku leans into him like he's the air and Izuku is drowning, pressing their bodies together until they're one heartbeat joined by their hands, Shouto rubbing soft circles into the scar tissue.
When they break, they keep their foreheads pressed together for a while, breathing like they've run a marathon, hearts going a mile a minute.
"Wow," Izuku whispers, and Shouto can't help but feel the same.
Shouto pulls back to look at him, green eyes lit up with more stars than Shouto has ever seen. "I told you," he says, and Izuku smiles that sheepish grin he always get when he's been caught doing something he shouldn't.
"I —well, I really didn't think — this whole time, Todoroki-kun? And you didn't say anything, why not? I was so obvious for so long, oh man, I totally miscalculated, I'm sorry —"
"By the way," Shouto interrupts, "Ochako didn't say anything , because your friends know how to keep your confidence. I realized last year, when you made me go to that awful karaoke club and we got so drunk and you kept laying in my lap."
"Oh man, I'm actually surprised you remember that. You were pretty toasted, Todoroki-kun." Izuku tries to wipe his cheeks and only succeeds in smearing the blood worse than it was. "If you remember, why didn't you say anything then? I was practically throwing myself at you."
"Izuku, you lay on everyone. You're like a body heat goblin when you're drunk." Shouto folds his arms, unimpressed. "Why didn't you say something?"
"I didn't want to make you uncomfortable!"
Shouto pauses before responding. "I guess we're both pretty dense when it comes to things like this."
"Yeah, I guess we are." Izuku goes to dab at his nose and winces. "Ow, Recovery Girl is going to be so mad at me."
"Put some ice on it, she's going to make you handle that one yourself." Shouto pulls a small piece of ice from the air and hands it to him. "I'm still angry, you know. That was a stupid stunt, and you should have told me. You're in boyfriend jail for a week."
Izuku's head shoots up and he winces again at the sudden movement. "We're boyfriends? For real?! Oh wow, Todoroki-kun — although I guess that means you should be Shouto now — Shouto-kun? No, just Shouto — I didn't realize, and is it that easy? Are you sure?"
"What, do you want me to fill out an 'Intent to Pursue a Romantic Relationship' form? Yes, Izuku, if you want to date me and I want to date you, we can just date. I think that's how it works, and if not, who's going to know otherwise?" Shouto pulls his shoulders in, wiping his hand on his slacks. His voice is soft when he speaks again. "Unless you don't want to? It's okay, if you're not ready."
Izuku waves his hands frantically, shaking his head harder than he should. "No no no, I want to! I just wasn't sure if you were just saying that because you felt bad, or —"
"I kissed you."
"Yeah, but it could have been like… a friend kiss…"
Shouto narrows his eyes as Izuku attempts to hide behind the piece of ice he's applying to his face. "Do you kiss your friends very often, Deku-san?"
"Shut up. It's. Well. Okay. We can be boyfriends, we're dating now, are you happy?"
"Hmm." Shouto leans against the wall, schools his face into an unimpressed look. "Try me in a week, Deku-san."
"Will you stop?" Izuku whines. His face really is a sight: soot from the fight, barely-dried blood from his nose, and now a blush making its way from beneath the collar of his suit. "I said I was sorry."
"I accept apologies in the form of dinner dates from people whose dumb stunts kept me in a police interrogation room for over an hour and made me too sick to my stomach to eat for two days. Deku-san."
"Oh my god, you haven’t eaten?" Izuku’s eyes go wide and he makes for the door immediately. "We’re going now. There’s a Korean place not far from here that makes incredible noodles and we can get them while I fill out the arrest report."
"So we are having a dinner date." Shouto is not excited, no matter how excited he absolutely is. "You’re asking me out, Deku-san?"
Izuku goes completely scarlet with his hand on the doorknob. "Well, if you want to, we can definitely — but I’ll be doing paperwork, but if that’s not okay I can do it later, but I don’t want to move too quickly but you definitely need to eat, and I mean we did already confess and you said I was your boyfriend so I think it’s okay? Yes? If you want?"
Shouto goes to flick him in the nose again. Izuku dodges just in time.
The Korean place really isn’t far — just a few blocks, most of which they spend sneaking looks at each other — and the noodles really are incredible. Izuku finishes his paperwork in record time, and if they hold hands under the table? Well, that’s between Shouto, Izuku, and Tanaka Kaori, Tokyo Star, reporting live from downtown Tokyo.