Infernal Memories

Pinky Promise

Six.

That's how many he could remember.

Six times he had a panic attack. In the span of only two days. It had him wondering if it was separate attacks, or one big one. How could he not wonder?

Six times he had lost his ability to breathe.

Six times he had unintentionally hurt himself using his ice to heal burns that weren't actually there.

Six times he wound up on the floor of the bathroom in the middle of the night, violently retching until someone would wake up.

Six times he had found himself hiding in the small closet. The only place he could hide from his father. His father who he thought was there with him.

His father, who Todoroki was seeing every time the fog came. The fog brought back memories Shoto had forgotten, tormenting him with his past. Making him think he was actually being hurt. He could feel each punch. Every burn.

But when the fog cleared he was okay.

Aizawa was worried, to say the least. Six was a lot. Even one small panic attack was awful. He'd know. He knew. Knew that Todoroki was in pain. So he learned to listen closely to the footsteps. Hearing for when Todoroki would fall, or start breathing irregularly. If he heard it, he would get a glass of water and talk to Todoroki.

He found that the teen responded well to his voice. He had mentioned he wasn't great with touch, so when Aizawa approached Todoroki, he made sure to stay at least three feet away from him. He would sometimes sit in the doorway, and just tell Todoroki where he was, what he was going to do for the day. The longest it had taken so far was forty minutes. Aizawa didn't mind it personally though. Not for reasons like 'it's too time-consuming.' He just wanted Todoroki to be okay. If that meant sitting on the floor with him in the middle of the night, so be it. If that meant trying to coax him out of his trance with the promise that he would be okay, he would do that.

So here he was, sitting in the doorway of Todoroki's room, trying to get him to get his hands away from his face as they clawed into the skin of his scar.

He didn't know what caused it this time. It had been a good week with no panic attacks, and Todoroki had been sleeping better too.

"Shoto," using his first name worked best, "You need to stop clawing at your face like that. You're going to bleed. I don't want to see you hurt."

Todoroki didn't seem to hear him, just sat there shaking with his knees brought up to his chest. There were dark bags under his eyes, and they were half-lidded despite the crazy look in his eyes. He stared at the floorboards as blood trickled down his arm, hailing from his cheek.

"Come on kid, remember you are safe. You're at my house. I'm Aizawa, you're safe here with Eri and Mic." Nothing. "Tomorrow we're going shopping, remember? You did well with Eri's reading so we are buying ingredients for soba."

Outside the room, he heard Eri crying, and Mic doting over her. She probably fell again.

The small whimpers of the little girl seemed to break through to Todoroki. He stood up, walking right past Aizawa, and into the open bathroom, where Hizashi was putting a bandaid on her knee.

His eyes were crazed as if he wasn't seeing Eri. No. He definitely saw something else, because he raised his right hand slowly, frost playing at his fingertips, ready to shoot off an attack at Mic.

Aizawa couldn't let that happen. He broke his own rules and canceled Todoroki's quirk, then took his wrists in his warm hands. "Shoto, come on! Wake the hell up! You're going to hurt someone."