Chapter Text
Day 1: Monday
part i: – I will face the dawn if it’s with you
Aizawa Shouta wakes early.
He turns over, looks at his husband still asleep beside him. Hizashi’s hair fans out across his pillow, yellow like gold, yellow like the sun, and his eyes flicker every so often beneath his lids. Shouta wonders what it is he dreams of.
He sits up, leans over and kisses his husband. Hizashi murmurs, coming awake for a few seconds—just long enough to blink up at Shouta, a soft, sleepy smile curling the edges of his lips.
“Morning,” he says softly, sweetly.
“Morning,” Shouta says, and leans down to kiss his husband again. “Go back to sleep,” he says quietly. “I’ll get Eri ready.”
Hizashi mumbles and rolls back over, and in an instant is fast asleep once more.
Shouta rises, stretching as he gains his feet, his back popping and his muscles straining as he twists first one way, then the other. He rolls his neck, flexes his wrists, leans down to massage his right knee where the prosthetic had been grafted into his flesh. It aches; it will, he thinks, snow before the day is out.
He crosses the bedroom to the bathroom, steps inside and flicks the lights on. The counter is cluttered with Hizashi’s gel and hairspray bottles, with an uncapped tube of toothpaste, with brushes and combs and hair ties. Shouta shakes his head, thinking he’ll have to clean up a bit tonight, and then passes by the sink to the toilet. He relieves himself, turns on the shower—their shower is a large, glass-walled thing, with a nozzle overhead that sprays a steady stream of cool to hot water, depending on which knob he turns—and then sheds his sweatpants and boxers.
The water is warm when he steps beneath the stream, and for a long moment he simply basks in it—in the water sluicing down his shoulders, his back, his legs, easing the ache in his amputated knee. He stands, letting the water drip from his hair, eyes closed, mind lost in memories.
It had been three years since Shigaraki had been killed—three years since All For One had been defeated, and the war had come to an end. The wounds dealt to society were beginning to heal, the scars beginning to turn white and silver with age.
His own scars, of course, were still red, still barely more than fresh cuts dealt to flesh and skin and bone. He still had migraines once or twice a month, just as he had ever since the USJ incident; his leg ached; his mind whirled at night, delivering nightmare upon nightmare—about his students, now graduated, dying, and about his husband and his daughter being wounded in the ways he had been hurt, about the injuries dealt to his body and spirit by Shigaraki and the League of Villains.
Still, life was better now than it ever had been. He had his husband in his bed, his daughter in his life. His students were all graduated—those who had survived the war, that is—and had gone on to become shining stars of hope and heroism.
Yes, life was good, in spite of the darkness that still edged against his mind in the dark watches of the night—and though he still mourned Ashido, still mourned Kaminari, still mourned every other person who had died in the war against All For One, he would not trade this future for anything.
Shouta picks up the shampoo, squirts a palm-full into his right hand, lathers it into his hair. He scrubs it, thinking about the past, the present, the future, just as he does most mornings. He considers his lesson plans for the day; he considers what Hizashi will fix for dinner tonight, before he leaves for a few hours for his radio show; he considers Eri, and what she will be learning in school today, and what she will need help with on her homework. He thinks about the meeting he’s scheduled to have with her teacher later in the week, and about their own, private lessons in the afternoon after both of their classes let out. He thinks about her birthday coming up, and about what kind of dessert she’ll want, and about what to get her as a gift. She is turning 11, and is going through another growth spurt, meaning they are going to have to go shopping for clothes again soon too.
He washes his skin until it turns pink, rinses off, then turns off the water. He opens the sliding door, takes down his towel, and dries his hair, then his body. Wrapping the towel around his waist, Shouta steps off of the bathmat and crosses to the sink. He brushes his hair, careful and meticulous, then runs a comb through the long, silken locks. It is still damp, and so hangs almost straight, but when it dries, it will floof and curl.
After brushing his teeth and toweling off once more, Shouta rewraps the towel around his waist and steps back into the main bedroom. He pads across the carpet, silent like a cat, and opens his dresser, takes out a uniform, pulls it on. It is comforting, soothing, a balm to his nighttime nightmares—a reassurance that not all is lost or wrong with the world. This second skin, this armor, is a comfort to him in a way that nothing else could be—is a reminder that he is still strong, still capable, is not merely a broken husk of that which once was.
Still barefoot, Shouta leaves the bedroom after hanging up his towel, then goes to the kitchen. He begins breakfast: eggs with Furikake, white rice, and grilled salmon. His capture scarf is still hanging on its hook by the front door, an apron replacing its grey with white against his black uniform, a hand towel thrown over his right shoulder.
The sound of clanging cookware must wake Eri, because she appears in the door to the kitchen a few minutes after Shouta has finished with the salmon, blinking sleepy, red eyes, her hair sleep-tousled.
“Morning, Dad,” she says, yawning.
“Morning, little Bean,” Shouta says, using his nickname for her.
Eri smiles, then hops up on the counter beside the rice cooker. “What’s for breakfast?”
Shouta tells her, then boops her on the nose as he passes by her. Eri laughs, instinctively pulling away, but grinning all the same.
They chat idly while Shouta finishes preparing breakfast and the sun finishes rising, throwing light through the cracks in the curtains hanging in the living room opposite the kitchen. They are dark and heavy, capable of sealing shut when Shouta’s migraines get bad enough, but most days they leave them partly cracked so as to allow the day and night to creep in.
“What are you teaching your class today?” Eri asks.
“Mm,” Shouta says. “We’re going over fight vs. flight vs. freeze today,” he said. “Not only how to overcome and choose which one you are going to use, but also how to address such things in civilians while in dangerous situations.”
“Ooh,” says Eri. “How do you overcome it?”
Shouta turns his head and smiles at her. “Bean,” he says, “I don’t need to teach you that—you do that on instinct.”
“I do?” Eri asks, surprised.
“Your nature is to freeze—or, at least, it used to be—but even from the first day, with Chisaki, you managed to overcome your freeze instincts to run and leap. That time in the convenience store, you handled yourself calmly and logically, and chose which one to do accurately and precisely. Some people are just naturally gifted with the ability to choose fight vs. flight vs. freeze—and I do believe you’re one of them.”
Eri smiles. “I try,” she says, sounding a little shy.
“I know, Bean,” Shouta says.
They talk about Eri’s classes—she is still in elementary school—and about her quirk training, both in school and with Shouta. She is learning about World War II in history class, learning about conjugating verbs in English, learning about the subjunctive in Japanese. They are running through an obstacle course in quirk training today—though, of course, their ability to use their quirks will be limited, as they always are unless in a pre-hero course.
“I don’t like Juba,” Eri adds, as Shouta scoops the rice out of the rice cooker and into bowls.
“Hm,” Shouta says. “Isn’t that the kid who tries to bully you?”
“Yeah,” says Eri. “Except he’s decided to start picking on other people in front of me. And when I tell him to stop, he just laughs and says, “Make me.” Maybe I should… Usually I just go get a teacher, but by the time we get back, he’s stopped, and the other kid won’t ever talk about it. Unless I actually stand up to him, I don’t know that he’s going to stop.”
“I’m not going to tell you what to do,” says Shouta. “But think about this: what would I do? What would Papa do? What would Deku or Mirio do?”
“Oh,” Eri says.
She is silent, thoughtful, while Shouta finishes dishing up breakfast. Once it is all in dishes and bowls, he turns to her, still sitting on the counter, and says, “Why don’t you go wake Papa up?”
Eri hops off of the counter and goes trotting off towards the master bedroom, grinning. Shouta hears the door open, and hesitates for a minute, standing halfway between the table and the stove, head cocked to one side as he listens. He hears a murmur of voices, and after another moment Eri comes back out into the kitchen, smiling.
“He’ll be here soon,” she says, plopping down in her chair at the table.
There are four chairs: one for Shouta, one for Hizashi, one for Eri, and one for Shinsou, who often stops by for dinner. The fourth chair is empty now, of course, but soon enough the other three are filled, Hizashi rubbing sleep out of his eyes as he sits down, his hair in a bun and his glasses propped on his nose.
“Morning,” Hizashi says, far too chipper for someone still half-asleep.
“Hm,” Shouta says.
“Morning!” Eri says brightly, then turns to Shouta. “Can we start.”
He nods, and Eri picks up her chopsticks and begins to dish rice and eggs out of their bowls. The salmon Shouta had already portioned out for each of them, and it sits now steaming gently on their plates.
“This looks good,” Hizashi says, picking up his own chopsticks and beginning to dish himself rice and eggs as well.
“Thanks,” Shouta says, waiting until the other two are done before getting food for himself.
“You’ve come such a long way, babe,” Hizashi teases, turning and grinning at Shouta with an impish light in his eyes.
Shouta rolls his own eyes and begins to dish out rice into his bowl. “If you say so,” he grunts, though he knows Hizashi is right.
He once was a deplorable cook, to the point that he had burned everything he tried to fix, and ruined everything he tried to bake. But then Eri had come into his life, and he had been forced to learn how to make basic food, at least. As a traumatized 6-year-old, she had needed a lot of food—and that meant more than the jelly pouches Shouta was used to drinking, or the instant ramen cups he ate.
“Shouta?” Eri asked. Her voice was tiny and meek, just as it always was, barely little more than a murmur.
“Hm?” Shouta asked, looking up from the papers he was grading on the table. It had been another long, sleepless night, and his head buzzed with exhaustion and desperation. Shigaraki had been spotted north of Hosu the day before, but by the time the heroes had arrived he was long gone. Now thoughts of what he was planning spun through Shouta’s mind, catapulting fear and uncertainty through his bones and blood with each beat of his heart.
“What’s for breakfast?”
That single question grounded Shouta better than anything else he had tried all night. He looked up, looked at Eri standing in her pajamas—one of Shouta’s old shirts, grabbed that first night because all she had was the red jumper, and which she had refused to give up for a nightdress ever since—and he had sighed.
“I’ll find something,” he promised, and stood, abandoning the essays on quirk suppressment items that his class had turned in the day before.
He stood, crossed to the small kitchen, puttered around for a few minutes; he opened and closed the fridge, rifled through the cupboards, checked the pantry. It was not quite bare, but he had needed to go to the store earlier that week and had yet to do so.
He sighed.
“Come on,” he said, “let’s go get you dressed, and we’ll go out for breakfast.”
“You won’t cook anything?” Eri asked, sounding plaintive.
Shouta laughed darkly. “Kid,” he said, “you don’t want me to cook you anything.”
“Oh,” Eri said, sounding small again.
Shouta turned, sighed again, and crossed to kneel in front of her. “It’s not you,” he promised. “It’s me. I’m…a terrible cook. I’ve never really had a reason to learn.” His lips pulled into a wry grimace. “I guess I do now, though, huh?”
Eri smiled faintly. “Really?” she whispered.
Shouta lifted a hand and patted her head. He was, he had realized two days before, the only one who could pat her head; she had cried when Kirishima had tried to do it on Monday, and it had taken Shouta nearly half an hour to get her calm again.
“Really,” Shouta said.
For you, kid, Shouta thought distantly, in the quiet corner of his mind he always had his sappiest thoughts, I’d learn anything.
Then Hizashi had moved in, and he had mostly taken over cooking—but had insisted that his boyfriend help him in the kitchen every other night, so that Shouta could actually learn how to cook and bake.
Shouta had agreed reluctantly at first, but soon enough had realized he quite enjoyed the chemistry behind it all—enjoyed making one thing, two things, ten things into something completely different; enjoyed the satisfaction that came of making something delicious; enjoyed the faces of his then-boyfriend and not-yet daughter as they dug in.
Now, he is good enough in the kitchen to accomplish almost anything he sets his attention to, be it breakfast foods, lunch, dinner, or even dessert.
Eri laughs. “You really were bad,” she informs him. “You’re much better now.”
Shouta rolls his eyes but does not argue.
Their conversation turns to their coming day. Hizashi has his radio show right after class, Shinsou is coming over for dinner later, and Eri has flute lessons at 4 o’clock. Shouta had promised to take his class out for lunch that day, rather than them eating in the cafeteria.
God, I’ve gotten soft, he muses as Hizashi smiles, and Shouta suspects he is thinking the same thing.
“Well,” says Hizashi, finishing his breakfast and shoving his chair back, “I’d better get ready. You too, Eri.”
Eri nods and stands, gathering up the empty dishes and balancing them precariously in her arms. She turns and makes her way to the sink in the kitchen.
“Be careful, Eri,” Shouta cautions. “Don’t drop them.”
“I won’t,” Eri promises, and all but disappears around the chest-high counter that separates the kitchen from the rest of the apartment. Only her head is still visible, silver-white hair and the tip of a horn just peering above the counter.
“She’s getting so big,” Hizashi murmurs, and Shouta nods.
“She is,” he agrees.
A crash sounds from the kitchen, sending Shouta and Hizashi both leaping to their feet.
“Eri!” Shouta snaps. “Eri, are you—”
He is already around the corner, Hizashi a step behind him. Eri stands by the sink, tears in her eyes, the rice bowls in shards on the floor.
“I’m sorry,” she gasps. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m so—”
“It’s okay, Eri,” Hizashi says quickly, moving past Shouta who is standing in the entrance to the kitchen and trying to catch his breath. “It’s okay.” He kneels in front of her—she is still small for her age—and forces her to look up at him. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”
Eri shakes her head. “I’m sorry,” she repeats—and her voice is tiny, tiny, tiny, just like it had always been once upon a time.
“It’s okay, Eri,” Hizashi says, and looks over his shoulder at Shouta. “Right, Sho?” he asks.
Shouta blinks, drags in a shuddering breath, tries to force his heart to calm. For a second—an instant—a beat of his heart—he had thought, had thought, had thought…
Had thought what? He wonders. That Shigaraki was back from the dead and had broken in through the window over the sink? That a villain had found their sanctuary and grabbed Eri, forcing her to drop the dishes? That Eri had fallen and slit her own throat on shards of glass?
He smiles. “It’s fine, Eri,” he says. “In fact,” he adds, coming forward, “this is a good chance to work on your quirk control.”
Eri looks up at him with watery eyes. “You think so?”
Shouta nods. “They’re already broken, so you won’t be able to do anything worse to them. But if you can succeed, you might be able to turn them back into bowls.”
Eri nods, a determined set to her jaw. “Okay,” she says, and crouches down where she stands, careful not to step on any broken shards of porcelain.
Shouta approaches, crouches down as well, mindful of the sharp pieces. Hizashi moves back against a counter, then stands and watches his husband and daughter work.
“Breathe,” Shouta instructs.
Eri breathes, in and out, in and out, in and out in counts of seven.
“Good,” Shouta says. “Now, look at the shards.”
Eri looks at the shards.
“Imagine them being whole,” Shouta instructs.
Eri closes her eyes for a second, opens them, concentrates. Shouta can see it in her eyes, in the tension in her shoulders, in the way her fingers tremble as she holds them out, over the broken bowls.
“Now touch them,” Shouta murmurs.
Eri reaches down and touches one of the shards.
Her horn glows. The shards shiver, tremble, shake—and then, with a barely audible pop, with a sudden dance of glittering blue in the early morning sunlight, in a spinning dervish of once-broken shards, the three bowls appear sitting on the ground, as good as new.
Then, abruptly, they reshape again, turning into a lump of wet porcelain.
Eri snatches her hand back—but she cannot stop it. Her horn glows, and her eyes are wide with desperation and fear, and the bowls relinquish their holds on form and disappear into atoms.
Shouta activates Erasure. Eri’s horn goes dull, and tears fill her eyes.
“I’msorry,” she gasps, and shrinks in on herself.
“It’s okay, Eri,” Shouta murmurs, and closes the gap between them. There are, at least, no more shards on the ground. He gathers his daughter into his arms, and Eri sinks into his hold, crying softly. “It’s okay, Bean,” Shouta whispers, stroking her head. “You’ll get there. You will.”
“How do you know?” Eri asks.
“Because you’re smart, and tenacious, and strong,” Shouta replies.
“You’re also stubborn,” Hizashi adds from his place by the counter. He draws near now, however, and kneels down beside Eri and his husband. He rests a hand on Eri’s back, and rubs soothing circles against her spine. “You’re stubborn, and you won’t let something like a quirk beat you.”
Eri nods against Shouta’s shirt.
“You promise you’re not angry?” she asks, once more in that tiny, tiny, tiny voice.
“Promise,” Shouta says.
“We promise,” Hizashi says.
“Now,” Shouta says, relinquishing his hold on his daughter and sitting back on his heels, “you’d better go get ready for school. Don’t want you to be late.”
Eri nods, smearing tears away from her cheeks, and then standing unsteadily. She turns and walks quietly out of the kitchen, heading toward her room.
“You sure that was a good idea?” Hizashi asks, helping Shouta to his feet. It is far easier to get down than to get up with his prosthetic.
“No,” Shouta admits. “But if she had gotten it right this time, it would have been a major step, and would have made her day so much better.” He hesitates, then says, “Juba is giving her grief again. I was hoping this could be the push she needs to give her enough self-confidence to stand up to that bully.”
“Ah,” says Hizashi. “I see.” He pauses, then says, “You realize this might have backfired, right?”
Shouta sighs. “I do,” he says. “We’ll just have to figure something else out.”
“Her birthday is on Sunday,” Hizashi adds. “Maybe that will help.”
Shouta nods, then checks the clock hanging on the wall. “You’d better hurry,” he says, and shoos his husband out of the kitchen. “Otherwise you won’t have time to fix your hair into its ridiculous concoction.”
“It’s a cockatiel, not a concoction,” Hizashi protests, but allows himself to be shooed.
Shouta laughs.