Chapter Text
My Sister’s Keeper: Prologue Part 1
“I don’t like this,” Fuyumi said, wringing her hands together as she watched her sister pull on her jacket and tennis shoes. A dark childish part of her wanted to grab Touya’s ponytail and yank and maybe, just maybe, her sister would listen to her and stop with this clearly dangerous obsession. She was tired of her older sister sneaking out of the house and coming back with new burns just to impress their father. Touya wouldn’t even let her help her dress them, to make sure they weren’t getting infected. No, her sister preferred to pretend they weren’t even there at all.
It was always, “what are you talking about Fuyumi, I’m fine,” and “shut up you don’t know anything.”
Predictable as always, Touya scoffed at her sister’s concern, tying the laces to her shoes with a little more force than was necessary.
“Well good thing it’s not your decision to make,” she snapped, standing up and leveling a glare at Fuyumi. Despite being older by 13 minutes, Touya has always been quite a few centimeters behind her twin. They were fraternal, but both took after their mother moreso than their father in looks, and if they tried hard enough (if Touya had ever been interested in the antics of children) they could have switched places just to see if anyone noticed. At one point, right before Shouto came around and Touya’s hair still had a little bit of red left, Fuyumi had proposed the idea but had quickly been shot down with words that had long since been forgotten but continued to leave the bitter bite of rhime.
No, it wasn’t Fuyumi’s decision to make, but she was getting a little tired and a little fed up with being pushed away simply because her quirk wasn’t what Father had been looking for. She knew, she just knew this wasn’t going to go the way Touya wanted. Father hadn’t looked at her, at any of them in years; why would it change this time? And Father wouldn’t be the one dealing with Touya’s ranting and crying. Father wouldn't be the one ducking as a book came flying past his head, wouldn’t be the one throwing out burned bed sheets and clothing while checking to see if the fire extinguisher still had fuel. Fuyumi didn’t like feeling bitter and did her best to not dwell in it, but it was times like these where Touya got so stuck in her head and Father got so stuck in his head that she knew this wouldn’t have a pretty outcome.
“Will you at least be home for dinner?” she asked, quieter this time. She reached out and poked the pockets sticking out of Touya’s sweats back in. Her sister really had no tact for how she looked and her twin at the barest tolerated this from her.
Touya shrugged, eyes darting at the door as her foot began to tap impatiently as Fuyumi fixed her collar. “That depends on Father. I told him I was going up there so…” She took a deep breath. “I’m hoping to be there, yes. With Father in tow.”
The smile she flashed her sister was wobbly and much too wide. Fuyumi couldn’t help but wrap her sister in a tight hug, knowing that that particular smile was one of fear. She knew Touya didn’t like All Might, but damn if she didn’t try emulating the man’s “smile through everything” style in the worst possible way. There was a feeling deep in her gut that was quickly spreading throughout her entire being. Something was going to go wrong and she should just not let go. Drag Touya back into the house proper and lock her in her room where she’d be safe forever.
But Touya would have hated that.
So Fuyumi let go.
She stepped up out of the gekan, watching warily as Touya bounded out the door with a pep in her step, her pure white hair blinding as the midday winter sun bounced off of it.
The feeling got worse and worse as the day went on. Midday turned to afternoon turned to early evening and Touya still hadn’t returned. Fuyumi took the initiative to loiter in the family room with Natsuo, her little brother amused by colouring pages and word search puzzles as she looked over her winter break homework. Father sometimes came out of his office, but never went out the front door. She suspected he was training Shouto or absorbed in work despite it being his day off.
That always seemed to be the case and yet, Touya never got her hopes down. Never learned.
Natsu was also on edge all day. His eyes kept flitting down the hallway where their Father was holed up, pursing his lips before he went back to meticulously making sure he wasn’t colouring outside the lines.
“Is Touya gonna be okay?” he asked, voice small when Fuyumi stood to go prepare dinner.
“I don’t know…” she said, unable to meet her baby brother’s eyes. “She’s not home yet and dad looks like he forgot.”
Natsuo scoffed and threw down his red crayon with more force than an 8 year old should have had. It left a bright mark against the wood of their table.
“He’s being stupid. Touya asked him to go meet her and he’s not gonna go on purpose. Touya’s being stupid too. She’s blind. Father’s never going to just suddenly change because she asked him something.”
He rubbed at the mark on the table, wax digging up under his fingernails.
“I gotta bad feeling, sis.”
Fuyumi nodded in agreement, wringing her hands as her mind went a mile a minute. There was definitely something sinister in the air that day.
“Would it make you feel better if I went and got her now? We can all work on dinner together when we get back.”
Natsuo nodded, eyes teary as he continued to scratch at crayon wax.
“Okay. I’ll text you when I’ve got her so you can get out everything we need; sound good? I’m going with the salmon recipe from mom’s books. It’s marked with a big fish bookmark. And don’t forget-”
Natsu grinned, cheeky. “I won’t forget the tofu for Touya. She hates fish. But I love it so I’m gonna make sure everything is ready. Don’t worry.”
Fuyumi nodded at him, trusting him to do his chore. Dad never liked the food he actually helped prepare, but this small task was at least something that helped him feel useful.
She slipped her coat on and then her boots. It had snowed recently and she didn’t want to slip and hurt herself. She patted her pocket to make sure her phone was there, pulled on her hat and gloves, then slipped out the front door as quietly as a mouse.
It was only still early evening, but the winter sun liked to disappear and slip behind the treeline still. Christmas had only been last week, and Fuyumi entertained herself with memories of her, Natsu, and Touya fighting over the last drumstick in the chicken bucket. She had written a letter to her mother, unmailed and tucked away in her coat pocket for whenever she mustered the courage to go to the hospital to deliver it, detailing everything they did and how much they missed her and would pray for her swift recovery during New Years shrine visits. Maybe next week would be a good time… give Touya some time to recover from this slight and get her to go with her.
The roads and sidewalks were heavily salted and melted. It was probably her father and his agency’s work at play that explained the absence of large snow mounds inside the neighborhood. After all, Endeavor needed easy access to go to and from the rest of the city in case of an emergency. The neighborhood entrance to the Sekoto Peak trail was almost completely covered in snow still. She could see where enough was melted, just barely, for someone small to get through.
Carefully hopping through the safe spots Touya left, Fuyumi began to climb up the small mountain. This was taking way too long, she grumbled to herself, but she also didn’t want to hurt herself. She wasn’t really iceproof, just like how Touya wasn’t fireproof. They were a perfect mismatched set despite their opposing quirks. Touya was unfortunate in that she never was able to find a cooling system; all Fuyumi had to do was roll on some arm warmers and handheld heat packets and she was good to go. Free to use her quirk without her father’s quick judgemental glances as he skimmed for bandages like he did with Touya.
“Touya!” she called as she passed the sign warning trespassers to turn around. She was on Father’s land now. “Touya come home! It’s almost dinner time!”
She stopped and cocked her head, straining to listen to see if her sister was replying. Touya said nothing, but her muffled sobs were starting to echo louder and louder.
Oh Touya…
Fuyumi trudged on, sighing with relief when she noticed her sister’s stark white hair and outfit through the black trees, curled in on herself and shaking.
“Nee-san, come ho-”
She was interrupted by Touya’s screech.
In the two seconds it took for Fuyumi to register it was a scream of physical pain rather than rage, her sister and the forest around them were completely enveloped in bright blue flames. She stumbled back, landing on her butt as the sheer heat of it all enveloped her. She could feel her skin starting to redden and sweat, something that had never happened before to someone mostly fireproof. If she was getting hurt by this then…
“TOUYA!”
Fuyumi leapt to her feet, slipping only just a little in the sublimating snow.
“TOUYA!” she screamed again, coughing as smoke filled her lungs, but she couldn’t stop screaming her twin’s name. She pushed through the fire, her clothing quickly going alight and crumbling to ash in seconds as she continued to move towards where her sister had been.
There! There was the rock Touya had been curled up on… but where was she?
It was getting harder to see, ash and soot bombarding her eyes as thick black smoke billowed out where bright blue flamed didn’t envelop. Fuyumi pushed through, coughing and hacking when… THERE. Near the evaporated creek. There was a body.
She got closer and closer, feeling her skin just start to blister under the sweltering heat that licked from tree to tree and realized something that shook her to her core.
Touya wasn’t screaming anymore.
A sob escaped her scratched throat as she threw herself at the charcoal-skinned body (corpse, her sister was a corpse now there wasn’t any way she was alive) and began to throw her quirk out as hard as she could.
Touya’s clothes… her skin and hair. It was all completely gone. Everything about her felt brittle, like she'd crumbled into ash at the slightest pressure like the willow charcoal they’d used in art class.
“Touya, wake up,” she screamed, coating her twin’s body in ice that instantly began to melt. It wasn’t cold enough… not cold enough at all to withstand those blazing blue embers. “Wake up, please! Don’t leave me here. Please… TOUYA!”
Touya didn’t move, didn’t answer and her homemade crematorium continued to burn around them.
She felt him before she saw him.
The fear she felt in regards to her sister’s safety felt like it had been slammed by a hammer, instantly turning into fight or flight (take care of yourself, Yumi, run). The flames in front of them flickered and bowed, as if they were struck by the same terror she herself was fighting off.
And then a man appeared.
He was dressed nicely, the flames curving around him and fleeing, leaving his suit and hat intact. On his face was the most serene smile as he looked over the two children. Fuyumi knew All Might smiled to reassure those he rescued. This man’s felt like a snake about to unhinge his jaw and swallow them whole.
But she didn’t have much of a choice, did she?
“Help,” she croaked out, the smoke and cinders finally taking their toll on her windpipes. “My sister…”
“Don’t worry,” the man croned, kneeling next to them. “I’m here now.”
He took her trembling hand and gently placed it on Touya’s chest.
Fuyumi’s eyes widened and she began to wail hysterically. There was a heartbeat. A heartbeat! Weak, almost not noticeable at all, but there! Touya was still alive.
“Please, please,” she begged. “She’s still alive. Help her.”
The man was gentle in scooping her twin into his arms, uncaring of the ugly soot stains on his nice suit.
“Come with me, Todoroki Fuyumi,” he said, offering the large hand not cradling Touya to her. “We will get you and your sister all fixed up. Don’t you fret.”
Fuyumi sniffled and took his hand.
“Are you a hero?” she asked as a black circle began twisting the space in front of them.
The man chuckled and stepped inside of the circle, his feet disappearing inside (a warp gate?) as he tugged Fuyumi in as well.
“No. Not at all.”
+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+
Fuyumi stared down at her shaking bandaged hands. Mr. Shigaraki had handed her sister off to the doctor hours ago and still, she had no word on whether Touya had survived or not. Her savior had been kind enough to get a nurse over to treat her burns; barely second degree but ones that needed some tender loving care nonetheless. Once she’d been treated and given fresh clothes, Mr Shigaraki had left, claiming he was going to get her something to eat as a gracious host wouldn’t let a little girl starve while she waited for news on her sister’s condition.
Maybe, if he offered after he returned, she could ask for a pen and paper. The letter to her mother had been consumed by the fire and she itched to rewrite it. It would at least give her something to do while she waited. Asking for her homework would have been much too weird. Her hands ached with the need to occupy themselves.
It was mostly Touya’s bad stress habit, but she could help the tears bubbling up as her fingers threaded through her dirty ash laden hair and tugged. The pain shouldn’t have been grounding and yet it was. She was here, alive, whole, in one piece. She had to keep it together for when Touya got out of surgery and woke from whatever sleep they put her in to… Fuyumi didn’t know, give her new skin?
Touya was definitely going to need new skin. She didn’t want to think about it but she could still feel the charcoal underneath her fingers. Her hands had been cleaned and bandaged, but it was like there was a permanent black stain that only she could see. Hands that couldn’t save Touya, couldn’t get her ice cold enough, wasn’t fast enough, wasn’t kind enough…
She really was just another failure in her line of siblings.
“Now, now Miss Todoroki,” Mr. Shigaraki said, carrying a tray of food in his (unburned) hands as he walked as calm as could be down the white sterile hallway. “Your sister is receiving the best possible treatment right here. I know no one else as skilled at mending such broken things as my doctor.”
Fuyumi accepted the tray as it was offered and stared down at the bowl of miso soup. She knew she probably couldn’t stomach anything stronger than that and murmured a thanks as she began to sip at it.
Mr. Shigaraki sat down next to her and patted her head softly, the facsimile of a fatherly gesture almost turning her into a crybaby like Touya. “Eat up for now. My… hm… what would you call him…? The man who watches my… son… made it up for dinner and there was some leftover. I fear we might be here for a while so if there’s anything you would like for breakfast, I will let him know what to prepare.”
A smile, just barely, tugged at the edges of Fuyumi’s mouth. Natsuo would have called the cook a ‘manny’. ‘Caretaker’ was probably the right word. But she didn’t want to think about Natsuo right now.
“You have a son?” she asked, taking another slurp of her soup and relishing on how its warmth soothed her scratched throat. “How old is he?”
Mr. Shigaraki smiled wider. “He’s adopted. But he’s about 10 now. He might wander around the facilities from time to time, he might not. Tomura doesn’t like people, doesn’t react well in their presence, so he’s free to do as he wishes and hide away.”
Something about that sounded off to Fuyumi. Touya didn’t like people either and she had to go out and interact with them everyday. But then again, were Touya’s life choices really the best to compare to someone else at that very moment?
“I’m 13,” Fuyumi said softly. The seaweed in the soup was nice, a high quality nori she liked to buy when doing grocery store runs. She’d settled on it three weeks ago after a lot of trial and error with other brands after mother had been hospitalized in the summer. “So is Touya, but she’s older by a little bit.”
“Todoroki Fuyumi,” Mr. Shigaraki hummed, as if tasting the name on his lips. It was weird. “Age 13. Born January 18th, 2xxx. You and your sister were born a little early but only Touya showed signs of slight underdevelopment and was in the NICU for a few weeks. Quirk: Frostbite. The counterpoint to Touya’s Flashover, you have the potential to create vast amounts of the coldest ice known to man and yet it hurts your skin so you don’t use it often.”
Fuyumi hadn’t used her quirk but she felt a deep aching chill in her bones as the man continued to talk.
“All of this, of course, was easily accessible from an interview with your father, Endeavor, made back when you were infants. I watched it as the soup was heating up.”
She didn’t believe him, but found no footing to stake her claim on. Her soup slurps got quieter. The tofu was also a higher quality brand, but not one she recognized. Mr. Shigaraki probably had money if he dressed as nicely as he did in fireproof clothes and had his son’s caretaker use such nice ingredients in mundane meals. He probably didn’t need to ransom her and her sister and she felt like he didn’t make his fortune selling kids since the resources she knew that would be needed to fix her sister would be astronomical; there was no way he could make a profit on her, let alone both of them. Sooner or later, their father would know they were missing. Every single hero in Japan and maybe some overseas would be looking for them. Fuyumi was easy enough to recognize with the distinct Todoroki clan red striped through her hair. And Touya…
Well, she didn’t know what Touya would look like at the end of all this.
Maybe Mr. Shigaraki was just a kind person going out of his way to help two kids in trouble…
It still didn’t sit right with her, but she pushed those feelings to the back of her head as she straightened up and got to her feet.
“Thank you for the meal, Mr. Shigaraki,” she said, stretching her back and shaking out her legs. “I’m feeling a lot better. Is Touya going to be much longer?”
Mr. Shigaraki shrugged, smile never dropping. “It will take as long as it needs to for the doctor to get your sister stable.”
Fuyumi nodded, mostly to herself, mustering everything in her to ask her next question. “Is there a phone I can use? I would like to call my father and let him know what’s going on. He’s probably very worried for us. We’ve been here for hours.”
The smile on her savior’s face twitched just ever so slightly.
“He’s home and probably saw the fire. My little brother knew we were going to be up there too, so there’s probably a search party and everything. You know my father is an important man, Mr. Shigaraki, so there’s gonna be a lot of people looking for us.” Fuyumi carefully put the empty soup bowl on the bench next to her; it was made of porcelain, she could tell, with very expensive indigo painted designs on it.
There was a tense quietness between the two, Fuyumi finding herself growing more and more anxious the more the man’s smile struggled to keep hold.
“I don’t know how to tell you this easily, Miss Todoroki,” he began, speaking slowly as if taking the time to pick exactly what the right words were he needed to say. “Your father, the other heroes, and emergency services were able to put the fire out a few hours ago. At the epicenter, where you and your sister were, there were exorbitant amounts of ash, the outlines of two figures, and your sister’s mandible. I’m afraid they’ve already declared you both dead.”
Fuyumi had never felt colder in her life, not even noticing the bits of frost starting to form on the bench where she clutched.
“But… But then I need to call him even more now!” she sputtered, body rocking back and forth in an attempt to calm all the emotions flooding her mind. “So he knows we aren’t dead! We’re alive! We can’t leave Natsu alone...”
Shigaraki’s large hand slid onto her back, steadying her. “And what good would it do to go through the heartache of trying to reclaim your previous life?” he asked. “There are enough cloning and illusion quirks out there that I doubt your father would believe you. He’s an important man like you said, and there are plenty of villains out there that would not hesitate to misuse your visage. Would you really want to let Touya experience being rejected by her father again? You’re still feeling the effects of the last time. Do you think Touya could survive this again?”
No, no she didn’t. Miracles only came once in a lifetime, and if Touya pulled through then that in and of itself was the Todoroki family’s miracle. And Touya… She’d have to ask Touya when she woke up. She was only minimally hurt by this; father barely paid attention to her anyways, her mother couldn’t look at her, and Shouto was barred from interacting with them. Natsu would be sad though… but Natsu was close to Touya, not Fuyumi. Fuyumi had no one waiting for her back home, only her twin who was in the room right next door having her life saved.
Touya was the one who mattered here, and so Fuyumi would let her decide the next step. She knew her place was to support Touya; it had been that way since birth, and so she would continue to abide by her divine role.
“Okay,” she said, voice small as she steadied her breathing. Mr. Shigaraki’s hand on her back was grounding and helped her calm herself much quicker than she normally could. It was nice, having a touch to help. “I’ll wait, but I want Touya to make the decision. I will be fine if Father rejects me, but… no, I don’t think Touya could survive that again. But I also don’t think I could stop her if she did want to go back, so it’s up to her.”
She didn’t want to think about how Mr. Shigaraki grinned like a shark.
“You can stay as long as you need to. I have a place…”
+~+~+~+~+~+~+~+
“When will she wake up?” Fuyumi asked, refusing to uncurl from a ball despite the chair she was in causing her aches and pains in that position; it was nothing compared to what Touya was going through, she could suck it up.
The portly doctor adjusted his weird googles and looked up from one of Touya’s charts where he’d been going through the various monitors her twin was currently hooked up to.
“I know you ask that every time I come in,” he began, “ and every time I will continue to have the same answer. Whenever her body has healed enough that her mind can process what happened. There’s still a great deal of healing she needs to do and it’s easier when she’s asleep. Tell me, if she were awake, would Miss Touya stay put in bed and not move? Or run around and pick fights, risking sutures breaking and the organ damage the ones I replaced?”
Fuyumi shook her head, the lecture continuing to not stick in her brain despite hearing it over and over again every week. “It’s been three years…”
“Time is what your sister needs to heal,” the Doctor said, huffing and turning his attention back to the charts. “Why don’t I send Sunshine in and you two can give her a haircut? I can see some split ends.”
She knew he was just trying to placate her, and unfortunately she knew it would work. In the time Touya had been comatose, Fuyumi had learned how to cut her own hair and that of the other children’s at the Sunshine Flower Orphanage, how to bathe her sister with rags and sponges, how to change bandages, clean wounds, change out the catheters and feeding tubes. She was only 16, but was cynically confident she knew just as much as the average nurse. She was learning more what the numbers on the monitors meant every time Doctor Ujiko came in, learning to ask the right questions to get him happily babbling on about whatever was going on with the science of bringing her sister back to life.
Based on the numbers displayed and the barebones knowledge of what she understood, Fuyumi was fairly confident that Touya would wake up soon. Maybe. Hopefully. She could whine and cry about it all she wanted but knew she could never abandon Touya. No, she was the only one who could help her through all this; she would be her sister’s rock whenever she awoke and realized the true tragedy she’d survived.
Touya didn’t have anyone else here, couldn’t rely on anyone else. Mister Sunshine was too adamant about keeping kids in line for whatever Mister Shigaraki wanted them for, and then Doctor Ujiko and Mister Shigaraki himself were too enthralled in… whatever it was they were doing. Fuyumi wasn’t stupid— she was quick to figure out all the adults here were villains of some caliber (Shigaraki being the boss) and that they probably weren’t safe but… She tried not to think about how they saved her, how they saved Touya, how they saved so many of the other kids here.
As she wandered the halls looking for Sunshine’s flowered head, she was reminded of the fact as she passed by Shigaraki’s adopted son.
Tomura sometimes accompanied Doctor Ujiko when he came to check on Touya, but he never seemed interested in learning anything despite the lectures. The kid was only a few years younger than her and Touya (13 if she recalled… the age when…) and his heart seemed to belong to his Nintendo Switch and anti-All Might agenda. He was mean and anti-social, but so had Touya been at that age and thus Fuyumi couldn’t help but greet him politely as she passed him by. Tomura pointedly ignored her, but did accept the candy she slipped him that she’d been saving for whenever they showed up. She knew enough about kids via her younger brothers that the secret way to get into their good graces were sweets and the way Tomura was slipping the little Hello Kitty strawberry sucker into his mouth? He was no different.
“I hope you have a good day,” she whispered, smiling just a bit when Tomura gave her a nod of acknowledgement as he focused on button mashing. Visible progress with something in her life at least gave her hope that one day Touya would awaken.
Mister Sunshine took some time to find in the winding labyrinth that was the orphanage. She finally found him outside with some of the toddlers, enjoying a rare moment of winter sun.
“Mister Sunshine,” she said, weaving her way through the throng of toddlers who mobbed her as she went into the fenced courtyard (younger than Shouto…), “Touya needs a haircut; Doctor Ujiko was mentioning her split ends. Could I please get some help with that?”
“Sure thing! Let’s just get these kiddos set up with something to keep them busy.”
With Fuyumi’s help, the two rounded all the little ones up fairly quickly and ushered them inside with the promise of finger paints. The scissors she needed were locked in the art supply cabinet, Mister Sunshine having the only key. She could have bribed Tomura to help her break them out, but it was too obvious a ploy; they would have been caught easily and Tomura couldn’t control his quirk well yet.
So she would continue to follow all the frankly absurd rules and live in this prison covered in motivational posters and pastel painted walls. Touya needed her.
Out of the corner of her eye as she gathered rolls of paper in her arms to set out for the little kids, she spotted the tell-tale purple flow of the warp in the hallway— the Doctor and Tomura were gone. She had yet to meet whoever had the warp quirk that had whisked her and Touya to safety three years ago, but he sounded like a very caring person if Tomura’s mumbling held any merit. Maybe she could sit with the kids and make a thank you card, sneak away a few extra pieces of candy to bribe Tomura into delivering it…
She had just finished setting up the last art station for a little girl with eyeballs in her hands when she caught movement out of the corner of her eye down the hallway.
Touya came stumbling into the room.
Every muscle in her body tensed, unable to process the fact that it was her sister, her beloved twin, who was standing in the room glancing around with the most terrified look on her face. Her mouth opened and tried to move, but nothing could form; no sounds would come out.
Touya beat her to it, her croaked, “Fuyumi…” shattering her soul into pieces.
Fuyumi may have stepped on a few toes as she lunged across the room to wrap herself around her sister, but she couldn’t bring herself to care. Her throat seemed to regain its ability to work and she heard, but didn’t feel, the loud wail that wormed its way out.
“You’re okay! You’re okay!”
Very quickly words became harder to form, but she couldn’t stop making sound as she blubbered and sobbed. Touya didn’t seem to be in any better condition, burying her face in Fuyumi’s shoulder and bawling as well.
Her twin had always been a hair trigger crybaby, and it was good to see that a three year long coma hadn’t changed that.
“Where were you?!” Touya cried. “I woke up and you weren’t there! Where are we? What’s going on? Everything feels so off I can’t… I can’t… Where’s Father?!”
Fuyumi was distinctly aware of Mister Sunshine leading them down the hallway to his office, shutting the door behind them and going over to his computer, but Touya was her primary focus.
“Did you pull your IV out?!” she gasped, unlatching from her sister as she began to look her over. “What about all the machines you were hooked up to?!”
Touya’s brow furrowed. “Yeah I pulled the IV out, I didn’t know what was being put in me!” she huffed, wiping away snot as it dribbled out of her nose. “But what other machines? There wasn’t anything in there?”
Fuyumi couldn’t help but spare a nasty little thought for Doctor Ujiko. He absolutely anticipated Touya waking up then and there and had the gall to send her out of the room so she wouldn’t be there to greet Touya back in the world of the living.
Fucker.
Next time she saw him, she would have words with him…
“Touya, I need you to sit down, okay? I’ll explain everything.” Fuyumi guided her to a chair and gently helped her settle in. Their hands didn’t break the tight clasp they had on each other as Fuyumi bent down on her knees and looked her sister right in her teary blue eyes.
“Touya, back on Sekoto… You hurt yourself badly,” she started to explain. “Very badly. If Mister Shigaraki hadn’t picked us out of the fire when he did, you would have died probably within minutes and… It was hot enough that I might have burned up too.”
Horror spread on Touya’s face as she tried to comprehend the fact that she’d burned her supposedly fire-proof twin, but Fuyumi kept speaking.
“He knew someone with a teleporting quirk and got you in to see his surgeon right away. They worked on you for hours, Touya, and I couldn’t see you. When they let you out… I don’t even know how long you were in there.”
She cupped her twin’s face with the hand not locked in a vice grip. “They brought us here, and it was touch and go for a while, but you… You pulled through and survived, Touya! I’m so… thankful…”
Words were getting hard again, and she took a moment to re-regulate her breathing and wipe her face with the back of her arm.
Touya’s entire frame trembled as she began to look over herself and her sister with a closer eye, getting worse and worse as reality began to set in. “How long, Fuyumi?” she croaked, her own free hand coming up and running over her scarred neck. “How long was I… What did I…”
Fuyumi slid her hand out of Touya’s grasp as it got painfully tight, placing it on top of her gripped fist instead. “Three years,” she whispered. “They had to replace your jaw and some of your internal organs. And… All of your skin. All of your skin had to be replaced. The, um, lines on your body like right here are where the grafts connected.”
Her touch ghosted over the seam on Touya’s wrist, the scar tissue pulled tight and taut as her sister tensed further.
“They put you in a coma to heal better,” Fuyumi continued. “But now you’re healed, so they let you wake up! You’re okay! I waited for you every single day and I’m so so sorry I wasn’t there right next to you when you woke up.”
Touya’s lip wobbled, but she didn’t say anything, looking at the ground off the side. “We have to go home,” she whispered. “Dad’s going to be so worried. I want Dad.”
Her heart clenching, threatening to shatter into a million pieces, Fuyumi opened her mouth to reply but was interrupted by Mister Sunshine.
“No can do, kiddo,” he said, pushing a final button on the computer before taking a few strides, easy with his large frame, to block the door leading out of the office. “From now on, you live here with everyone! Your very own place under the sun! They’re your new family! You’ll come to love it, just like your sister here, sure as the sun does rise!”
Fuyumi couldn’t bear to make eye contact with Touya as her sister flashed her a devastatingly betrayed look. Her own worse fears were being realized as Mister Sunshine spoke. She’d held onto the slim hope that they’d be let go once Touya woke up but…
How stupidly naive she was.
Touya’s vice grip on her hand returned and her sister flew to her feet. Fuyumi could see the tears threatening to bubble over once again, the salty water tinged red with just the slightest bit of blood.
“Shut the fuck up!” she wailed. “We gotta get home! I bet that Dad was just too busy with work to come up and see me, right? He’s gotta be really worried about me! About us!”
Her poor poor sister choked down a broken sob as an unsteady smile bloomed on her face, the sort of smile that sent shivers down Fuyumi’s spine.
“I said and did some awful things right before and… I should apologize to Mom and everyone else. And… And I still need to show Dad what I can do!”
“Unfortunately, Miss Todoroki, that is not possible.”
Mister Shigaraki’s voice never failed to make Fuyumi feel colder than any frostbite her quirk could give her, especially when it was filtered through the mechanical drone of the computer.
“Restoring your burnt and broken body was a monumental task. Your missing pieces had to be replaced one by one,” Shigaraki continued. “You’re a changed woman with that burned rictus look on your face, and yet, you survived.”
Touya’s free hand instinctively snapped up to her face and felt at the scars and wrinkled grafts.
“What do you mean ‘changed’?” she whispered, voice getting more and more hoarse. Fuyumi made a note to get her some water when they were settled down. “I don’t get what you’re s-saying.”
“You will never exhibit the power you once had.”
Fuyumi rushed to her feet and wrapped herself around her sister as Touya’s hands covered her mouth in horror.
“Every single one of your organs was damaged. Every single one of your senses was dulled, your ability to feel pain fully removed even.”
Shigaraki wouldn’t stop talking, the monitor speakers too loud for Fuyumi to just cover Touya’s ears to block out that terrible dripping poison.
“You are a failure and you will never be the same again. We wanted you at full strength, but alas, we failed at that as well.”
“Don’t listen, don’t listen,” Fuyumi whispered, propping her sister’s body up as her legs gave up under the force of her trembling. “Please, Touya.”
The monitor was silent for a second before it emitted a metallic chuckle. “You must be suffering so much, you poor thing,” Shigaraki crooned. “But! I might just be able to restore your flames to their former glory. With your sister and I at your side, you can become an unstoppable force capable of whatever you want. All you have to do is join our family and let me raise you.”
Touya’s trembling got worse.
“What do you say, Miss Todoroki? Will you join us?”
Fuyumi dug her fingers into Touya’s shoulders, burying her face in her sister’s dirty white hair.
“Shut up.”
She let out a sob of relief, as Touya spoke. Boiling tears dripped onto her bare arm but they left no marks in their wake.
“No one is ever going to train me again,” Touya hissed. Fuyumi couldn’t see her face, but knew what the look of ice cold rage looked like that her sister was giving the monitor.
“Ah, I see.” For some reason, the disappointment in Mister Shigaraki’s voice was more terrifying than seeing her sister burning alive. Fuyumi whimpered into sister’s neck, clinging tighter. “Well then, Sunshine, why don’t you lead these two young ladies to their room and let them think over this decision. Perhaps you’ll have a different answer come morning.”
The monitor shut off remotely and the girls were ripped roughly from one another as Mister Sunshine took each in hand and began to drag them out of the office and down the hall. Touya thrashed in his grip, her shrieking having the other children loitering around looking quite concerned and afraid. Fuyumi just kept her head down and followed as best she could. Struggling was useless; Mister Sunshine was a lot bigger than them and a lot stronger. Her own quirk was so weak and now… Now Touya’s was as well. Brawn would get them nowhere in this situation, so if she had to play at being demure and weak to have some time alone with her sister, then so be it.
“You two can come out tomorrow!” Mister Sunshine said with a gleeful smile before he threw them into their room and slammed the door, the tell-tale click of a lock sounding before loud footsteps padded away.
There was luckily a water dispenser and cups in their room and Fuyumi made good on her promise to get her sister some water; they wouldn’t be getting dinner this evening it looked like, so they would need to hydrate.
But it wasn’t long before Touya took stock of her surroundings in the midst of her rage and rounded on her sister.
“You,” she hissed. “How could you let us get kidnapped?! Why are you working with that horrible man who wants to use us?”
“He wants to use you,” said Fuyumi, passing her sister a glass of nice cold water. “I’m useless. You’re the one with the strong quirk.”
“So you’re trying to sell me to get into what are obviously villains’ good graces?! Fuck you, Fuyumi!”
“No!”
A thin layer of frost erupted over the room as Fuyumi yelled. Her hands clenched at her sides, shivering and blue.
“I stayed to make sure you were going to be okay! So that they couldn’t do anything to you! I hoped… I really hoped they wouldn’t do this. Keep us here by force but.”
Touya looked angry with herself as she crossed the room and took Fuyumi’s freezing hands into her own, rubbing circles into the skin to restart circulation.
Fuyumi couldn’t help but keep talking.
“I waited for you for three years,” she wailed. “They said Dad had us declared dead. You weren’t in any position to go back home, not when the villains had the medical equipment to keep you alive and I didn’t know how to communicate exactly what you needed if I ran back to the heroes. What if… what if they had disappeared with you while I was gone? So I stayed and I stayed quiet.”
Touya pressed a small kiss to her hand and winced as she tried to up her body temperature now that her sister’s hands were beginning to look less frozen.
“Now you’re awake,” Fuyumi said. “Now… Now we can leave. We can go home, and prove to Dad we aren’t dead. We can go home.”
“We can go home…” Touya echoed softly. “I want Dad…”
“I know, I know.” Fuyumi leaned over and pressed a kiss to Touya’s scared cheek. “We just… need to figure out how to get out of here. I want to go home too. I don’t want to stay and I don’t want to lie about needing to stay or become puppets for villains.”
Touya nodded, releasing her sister and limping over to the bed. She made a face as she sat down on wet sheets.
“We need a plan then.”
She looked around the room, taking into account each and every item she saw. Fuyumi couldn’t help her smile. Her sister was so smart, so tactical; if anyone could figure out a quick escape plan, it would be here.
“Is the window over there locked?” Touya finally settled on.
Fuyumi nodded. “And had big bars over it.”
Touya nodded, taking just a brief moment to think things over one more time before getting to her feet to look at the window closer. “I think… I think I have just enough control over my quirk to keep you warm if you can deep freeze the lock enough to shatter it. We have…”
She wandered over to the now useless IV stand. “I think between both of us, we can lift this and use it to break the frozen stuff.”
Fuyumi nodded along to the plan. “Are you sure you don’t want to wait a few days to recuperate?” she asked, looking at the way her sister’s hands seemed to shake unconsciously. “You just woke up…”
Touya looked tired as she gripped her twin’s shoulders and steered her over to the window with gritted teeth. “What’s the UA motto again? Go Beyond? Yumi we can’t stay here a second longer. I can’t stay here. I need Dad. I just need…”
“Okay.” Fuyumi didn’t want to argue, didn’t need to argue. If Touya said she could keep going, then she was going to trust her sister. Years ago Touya had claimed that she was the only one who knew her body and limits; Fuyumi couldn’t help but remember that moment as warmth enveloped the tops of her hands while freezing cold burst from her palms.
The lock was easily broken with just their own natural strength. There was a brief moment of panic when the window got stuck as they jimmied it open, Touya’s forearm cramping hard as a result. Fuyumi forced her to rest and they sat together sipping water while Fuyumi spoke about the three years she’d spent at Touya’s side.
“That Tomura kid sounds gross,” said Touya as she wrinkled her nose in disgust.
“He’s probably not here by choice either,” Fuyumi chided. “How is your arm? Are you good to go?”
Touya nodded and they got back to work at forcing the window open. The task took way too long and by the time it was done, Touya was an antsy nervous mess.
“Please please, hurry, Yumi,” she groaned, staring out into the distance past the thick iron bars. “They’re gonna catch us.”
“They’re not gonna catch us.” Fuyumi grasped two of the bars with a fierce determination she’d only felt a few times before, the situations not nearly as desperate as the one they were in currently. “Warm me up, I’m going to get started.”
Steeling herself, Fuyumi began to channel her quirk, gripping the iron bars as tightly as she could. Colder, colder… she needed to go colder. The bars were thick and she needed her ice to seep through every imperfection in the metal to break it down. She pushed and pushed, wincing as the temperature dropped past where Touya’s weakened quirk could keep her warm, but she had to keep going. Touya wanted to go home, and by God she was going to get her there where it was safe.
“Yumi, stop,” her sister whispered, warm breaths ticking her neck. “Your hands are blue. I think it’s good enough.”
They pulled back, Touya wrapping her warm body around Fuyumi’s shivering one.
“We don’t have time for you to warm up,” Touya said. “The bars might melt or that fucking sunflower dude might check on us. Help me lift this.”
Fuyumi’s hands trembled and ached as she lifted one end of the IV stand. She bit her lip, refusing to complain. Touya needed her to be strong.
Together, they rammed it into the bars. Fuyumi’s quirk had done its job well; several pieces of the bars shattered. But the noise it made was loud, echoing all over, and they would need to do another strong thrust to make an opening large enough for them to get through. There was no way that noise would go unnoticed.
“Hurry,” said Touya as they banged the stand once more, creating another clatter. From there, they could use their hands to snap off the few remaining pieces sticking out, creating an opening wide enough for one of them to crawl through. “You go first.”
Fuyumi opened her mouth to argue, but Touya was already lifting her up with great effort.
She was almost all the way through when the door to their room slammed open, a terrifyingly angry Mister Sunshine standing in the entrance.
“Now you two aren’t being good sunny kids at all!” he snapped, stalking into the room.
Fuyumi slipped through the window and reached her hand through for Touya. Her sister spring up into the sill as quickly as she could, getting a little ways through before Mister Sunshine grabbed her leg and began to pull her back in. Touya yelped and activated her quirk, sending searing heat through her leg.
But it wasn’t enough. Mister Sunshine hissed as his hands began to burn but still held on. Touya was stuck in a tug of war between Shigaraki’s completely stacked minion and her twin, one that would be over in an instant if she didn’t act quickly. The hand not gripped by Yumi floundered about, trying to grab onto one of the bars still jutting up. Her body was heating rapidly as fear gripped her, Fuyumi only able to fight Mister Sunshine’s pull as long as she could thanks to her heat resistance.
Then Touya’s hand brushed the curtain.
It instantly ignited.
Mister Sunshine instinctively loosened his grip and jumped back, the twins using the brief second of fear to clear the window and start booking it across the yard and into the street.
The block was completely devoid of people, desolate and condemned buildings littering the area. But it was still part of a city, and they knew if they kept running, eventually they would run into people. And people meant witnesses. Witnesses meant heroes. And heroes meant the villain’s reach would be halted. Heroes meant they could get back home.
All they had to do was find out where exactly they were.
Eventually, one alleyway opened up onto a busy street. The area didn’t look nice per say, the buildings upkeep minimal and flora still mildly overgrown, but there were people bustling about. High schoolers in their uniforms and backpacks loitering on street corners happily chatting away and typing on their phones, a few haggard salary men and women getting off a nearby bus. A small gaggle of young children were bouncing a ball outside one of the apartment buildings, their parents watching closely nearby.
The two wandered down the street, Touya wheezing as she tried to catch her breath. A few people spared glances for the haggard girls, feet freshly cut up from sprinting barefoot over concrete and broken glass bottles while dressed in tattered clothing. Touya’s leg sprouted a new minor burn on her leg from where Mister Sunshine had been gripping her; it was likely to bruise later too.
“I think you need to sit and rest,” said Fuyumi, glancing around for any street benches. “Let me go find a conbini and check the newspapers.”
Touya knew she was in position to argue as she struggled to bring air into her borrowed lungs. Luckily, they spotted a conbini not but a block away with benches outside. Fuyumi got Touya settled in one, glancing nervously as the passed out drunk on the opposite end, the scent of alcohol foul in the air, before scurrying in.
She bee-lined to the newspapers and magazines, relief flooding her when she spotted the local Shizuoka Shimbun prominently displayed over the more prominent national papers. They could do Shizuoka; it wasn’t far at all from Musutafu. Simply a bus ride over.
It then dawned on her that they didn’t have any money for a bus ride.
They didn’t have money for anything.
She relayed as such to Touya back outside. Her sister wrinkled her nose as she thought, hand absently minded reaching up to tug on her tangled hair. Then she glanced over at the sleeping drunk man.
Fuyumi instantly knew what she was thinking and moved to object, but Touya lashed out, quick as a snake strike. Her hand darted into the man’s pocket and pulled out his wallet. All Fuyumi could do was block Touya’s actions from the outside street with her own body. As Touya rifled through the wallet and pulled out the cash, Fuyumi noted the man’s name, mentally promising to give his name to her father once they were reunited so they could pay him back.
The two wandered back into the store. Fuyumi, looking less unkempt than her twin, approached the cashier, thankful that he seemed to be either a high schooler or college student. She could use that.
Her flirting was awkward, but she managed to convince him to look up bus time and fares for the nearby stop for them, batting her eyelashes and tucking hair behind her ear while he blushed as red as a lobster just like in all the dramas and soaps she liked to watch before Touya’s accident. She did the math in her head as she wandered back over to Touya, quickly allotting what money they had could be used for fare and what they could spend on food, drinks, and whatever else they needed.
Her hands were still shaking from pushing her quirk earlier, tips still slightly blue. Touya didn’t say anything after she dropped the shopping basket the third time, picking up herself and grabbing whatever Fuyumi told her to grab. In between items her free hand snaked around Fuyumi’s, sending pulses of warmth through her arm.
“Thank you, for earlier,” Touya murmured as she threw in a cheap first aid kit. “You’re wincing a lot and shaking. I can’t feel the cuts on my feet, but you’re walking gingerly and your hands are still so cold. I might be broken, but that doesn’t mean you have to be.”
Touya left her with the basket to go put away the two bags of konpeito, their tight budget allowing either those or the kit.
They paid, both instantly slipping into their fake flirting role and laying out syrup sweet gratefulness to the boy manning the register. He didn’t notice Touya slip two candy bars into her scrubs and waved jovially at them as they exited.
The next bus to Musutafu was set to arrive in two hours. They sat curled up with one another at the stop, each munching on a candy bar, Touya insisting Fuyumi nap since she’d “been sleeping for three years she didn’t need any more shut eye for a while.” The nap was not restful in the slightest, Fuyumi feeling even more groggy than before when Touya roused her as the bus pulled out.
The bus driver raised an eyebrow at the dirty girls, one dressed in hospital scrubs, as they boarded, but said nothing as they paid the full fare for Musutafu and sat down in an unoccupied corner.
They spent the long drive alternating between trying to sleep and treating their wounds. There wasn’t a lot they could do for Fuyumi’s shaking hands or the burn on Touya’s leg, but they cleaned their feet and the other miscellaneous scrapes they’d acquired while escaping, slapping band-aids where they could spare. Sometimes they would huddle together, Touya massaging the feeling back into Fuyumi’s hands as they finally began to cooperate while Fuyumi kept a chilled touch on Touya’s burn.
“I want to brush your hair when we get home,” Fuyumi mumbled, squirming against the cracking fake leather of the seats and watching the sunset over Touya’s shoulder. “It’s so tangled right now.”
“My hair can wait until after I’ve seen Dad.” Touya stared out the window her cheek was plastered against, eyes half lidded as exhaustion began to take its hold on her.
“We’ll still be a ways away from home when the bus gets there,” said Fuyumi. “Maybe we should go to the nearest hero agency by the bus stop. Just… get an escort to home. There will be plenty of agencies in Musutafu. Even if they don’t believe our identities, they should at least take that orphanage situation seriously.
Touya closed her eyes, her head shaking just slightly as she began to drift off. “No. I just want Dad.”
Despite knowing her sister couldn’t see it, Fuyumi nodded stiffly, accepting the statement without question. If Touya would feel safer going straight to their father, then so it would be.
People came and went as the bus loaded and unloaded at each stop, a few glancing over at the two tired girls hiding in a back aisle. No one made a move to bother them though, and for that Fuyumi was grateful. They’d been through enough and didn’t need anyone poking their nose where it didn’t belong.
It was long after nightfall when they reached their stop, the March air brisk but still manageable as Touya wrapped her arms around her sister to keep her warm. Buildings quickly got familiar and their feet fell into the familiar pattern of stop, turn left, go straight for five blocks, and so on and so forth. Musutafu hadn’t really changed much at all in three years, thankfully. There were obvious patches on towers as the result of villain attacks, and some stores had changed hands, but there wasn’t anything that hindered their navigation home.
Still a long walk, despite the muscle memory guiding them back to the estate. An hour and a half quickly passed before they reached the outskirts of their neighborhood. Fuyumi’s legs and feet hurt by that point but Touya was readily gaining speed, her gait brisk and quick as she barely restrained herself from sprinting down the road.
“Slow down, Touya,” Fuyumi gasped. “I can’t keep up!”
“And I can’t wait any longer, Yumi,” said Touya in return, her tone borderline manic. “I want Dad, I just want Dad.”
“So do I!” Fuyumi pushed herself to jog the distance and catch up to her twin. “But please! I’m hurting. I need a break.”
“Then take a break.” Touya didn’t even spare her a glance, eyes fixed firmly ahead. “I can’t stop. I’m going.”
Fuyumi took a deep breath, then shoved all the sensations her nerves were screaming at her down and pressed forward at her sister’s side.
Soon enough they were at the front door.
Fuyumi tried not to be disappointed when Touya shoved at the locked door and muttered curses under her breath.
“We always left our bedroom window open,” she gently reminded her sister, taking her by the shoulders and leading her around to the side of the house. “Maybe dad didn’t notice.”
For once Fuyumi was grateful her father paid them little to no heed as the window was in fact unlocked. Unlike the window at the orphanage, theirs slid up smooth as butter and they climbed through with no issues at all.
The room was dark and dusty, but Fuyumi took a moment to just breathe. The scent and feel of the tatami against her skin soothed the hypervigilance she didn’t know she’d been keeping up. It was like a weight fell off her shoulder as every muscle in her body turned into liquid. She could hear her sister sniffling next to her, almost bringing tears to her own eyes as well.
But then Touya whispered, “Everything’s gone,” in the most broken tone Fuyumi had ever heard. She sat up and blinked rapidly, her eyes quickly adjusting to the darkness in the room. Her sister was right. Their futons were gone, as were their desks and computers. Toys and decorations seemed to be boxed up in bins, shoved off into the corner near their closet where none of their clothes hung.
And then there was the shrine on the other end of the room.
Objectively, Fuyumi was very well aware that she and Touya had been declared dead three years ago after Sekoto. Touya was too, but she herself had had all three of those years to sit on that fact and ruminate in it. The pictures and incense on the altar covered in a thin layer of dust still stung though.
Touya was still crying, her face scrunched up as snot dribbled out of her nose, but quiet in her . blubbering.
“He forgot about me,” she choked out, wet eyes completely focused on her middle school picture.
“No, no,” Fuyumi cooed, keeping her voice down as she hugged her sister. “They thought we were dead. He’s going to be so excited to see it’s not the case. Okay?”
“Then why are our pictures covered in dust?”
Fuyumi didn’t have an answer for that, words catching in her throat as Touya shoved off of her and moved to the sliding paper door of their bedroom. Her eyes narrowed into that familiar cold glare as she carefully slid the door open, quiet as a mouse as muscle memory continued to lead her actions before slipping out into the hall.
Fuyumi followed, instinctively stepping over spots she knew would make noise; if Natsu was home he was probably sleeping and she didn’t want to wake him up. It was a school night after all.
Dread gripped her heart as she quickly realized where Touya was headed.
She herself hadn’t gone to the dojo often, but had often lurked in the vicinity to pull Touya into the bathroom after she inevitably pushed herself too far without their father’s supervision before she’d been banned altogether as the burns worsened.
The closer they got, the louder the noises got. She found herself unconsciously tensing as her father’s harsh reprimands echoed through the paper thin walls followed often by what were most likely Shouto’s screams. Heat grew more and more the closer they got, the area specifically fireproofed so she knew she didn’t have to worry about stray embers setting the house ablaze. But the worry and fear only grew in the pit of her stomach, especially at the way Touya started shaking, her steps faltering into a hesitant gait ahead of her.
Fuyumi stood back as Touya approached the dojo doors. Her sister trembled and slid the door open just enough for her to peak in. All too quickly, the door was closed, actions quiet as a mouse, and Fuyumi felt a tight grip on her wrist as she was suddenly pulled back down the hall. There was a dark broken look on Touya’s face as she threw her back into their room and closed the door. It scared Fuyumi, especially since the tears seemed to be unable to flow any longer. She hadn’t seen an expression as haunted as that since her mother had thrown boiling water on Shouto’s face.
Touya slumped to the ground and stared at the set of photos on the shrine. Neither made a sound for the longest time. They heard the eventual end of Shouto’s training, their youngest brother sent to bed as their father stomped over to his own room and slammed the door close. It was hours before either of them made even the slightest noise.
It was Touya who broke the mournful silence.
“He didn’t fucking change,” she croaked out. “We were dead for three fucking years and he didn’t… Didn’t see how poorly he treated us. Didn’t stop at all from focusing on that stupid obsesion with All Might. Didn’t stop to look at me… to look at us. He just fucking kept pouring all that attention onto Shouto. He never stopped Yumi, he left us.
“He left us behind.”
Fuyumi couldn’t find any way to argue or justify their father’s actions. She curled tight into a ball and buried her face in her knees as the truth sunk into her.
They’d been miserable in this house before Sekoto Peak, they’d been miserable at the orphanage, and if they stayed here, they would continue to be miserable. Her heart broke for Natsuo, who was probably sleeping peacefully a few rooms down. He’d been stuck with this the entire time, alone this time. There was no way he would forgive them for leaving him. No way in hell.
“We… we can’t stay here,” Touya whispered. She looked over at her twin with a desperate manic look in her eyes before she hurriedly crawled over on her hands and knees to latch onto her twin. “He doesn’t love us. He never did. We’re dead and we can’t be alive again.”
Fuyumi's heart and head hurt too much to think of anything she could say to soothe her sister. All she could do was lean into the embrace until they were close enough to become one being. Her own emotions were run ragged from the day’s events, unable to feel; cold as the ice that encompassed her quirk. Touya took everything she should have felt and multiplied it by the thousands.
But even now, her sister sounded as dead as the trees in the middle of the winter-swept tundra.
The fire that had been lit, that had kept them going, that flame of hope was extinguished, leaving behind only the bitter frostbite of despair and deep disappointment.
Endeavor wouldn’t help them.
A quiet understanding passed between the two of them. They’d never believed the rumors of twin telepathy that only seemed possible with quirks but somehow, in that moment, when they knew the only people they could on were each other, they realized exactly what they had to do.
Fuyumi dug their old school bags out of the closet. They’d both grown during the three years away so none of the old boxed clothing fit, so Fuyumi raided the laundry for things that wouldn’t be missed while Touya snatched medical supplies from one of the bathrooms. Shouto could always get more burn cream— Endeavor certainly had the money to burn on them.
Their old pillows and sleeping bags were dusty, but they could be cleaned once they got settled wherever they decided to go. Shoes would be a problem, but there were some sandals that would work in the meantime thrown in a closet. Fuyumi didn’t know to whom they once belonged to, and couldn't care enough to think too hard on it. Touya began rummaging through their father’s wallet, left on the kitchen counter like aways, for cash as Fuyumi carefully picked out non perishable foods and water bottles that wouldn’t be too terribly missed. At most, if there was a housekeeper still, they would notice things just slightly off, but they knew their father wouldn’t care about it unless it was a frequent thing. There was also a small sewing kit, as forgotten as themselves based on the layers of dust coating it that Fuyumi threw in just to be safe.
Fuyumi and Touya were adamant in it not becoming so.
They snuck back out their window, quiet as they came. Midnight coated the neighborhood as they crept away from the estate, the moon shining full and bright right over Sekoto Peak.
Touya’s hand grasped Fuyumi’s as they took off down the street, no real destination in mind.
“You’ll never leave me, right?” she said, lips wobbling and cheeks twitching. She had that same unnerving smile as she always did whenever she was truly upset. “You won’t leave me alone ever?”
Fuyumi gave her sister’s hand a tight squeeze, once again ignoring the ache in her soles and thighs. “As long as you never leave me.”