The Wise Child (BNHA x OC)

11. Fool

Shoto

My father knew cruelty better than he did humanity. At times I would picture him as the monsters in Yae’s games. A venomous snake. A starved lion. An Angry leopard. But on days like this, he remained a crazed tiger. His face was covered in dancing flames, his arms a steaming, burning, monstrosity. He stared at me like meat.

And Yae stood next to him. A falcon. A cougar. Maybe a cunning fox. She knew how to lie like one. 

My arms hung limply at my side as I stared at what was left of the straw dummy, burn marks covered in ice. There were ten more just like it. My exhaustion ran high just looking at them. My blood was running thin and the air not enough.  

“It’s not enough.” My father growled. He scratched or perhaps tore, at his chin with his nails before looking down at Yae. 

“You’ll fight with each other now.”

She looked up at him with something in her eyes. Maybe it was gratitude. Yes, that was it. She reveled in the opportunity to hurt people. Like mom. Like Fuyumi. Like anyone foolish enough to enter her gravity. 

“Maybe we-”

My father shoved her forwards, not letting her finish the thought. What was she going to say? Maybe we should hurt each other? Burn each other? Maybe I should pound him into dust and present him to you on a silver platter. 

“Go.” He demanded. 

She didn’t move, looking from me to him. 

Waiting to defend? Cowardly. She simply wanted to hurt me and make me look like a fool. Of course she did. 

I ran forwards, shooting my fist towards her face as she moved to the side. I moved the other one after it, aiming a shard of ice towards her cheek. This time it skimmed her jaw before she ducked under my arm, kicked my back leg. 

Why wasn’t she using her quirk? 

She wanted to prove she could win without it, didn’t she? Make me train ten times harder to fulfill my father’s insatiable need for violence. 

I spun around, shooting ice towards her footing this time. She jumped at the last moment. I froze the ground underneath her, so when she landed she fell back harshly on the ground. 

Her head hit it with a cracking sound, and blood stained the white. Her eyes slowly opened, and she looked from me, to the man behind me, and then back at me. 

She looked scared. But why was she scared? Why was she - no it couldn’t be because I- no she wanted this. She wanted to hurt me. Didn’t she? She attacked me. She kicked me. And she wanted this because that’s what villains want. 

But why did she look so scared?

Yae was hurt. Yae was hurt badly. I saw her, after the other’s came, the heroes. And a little longer after that. I wanted to avoid her, I sought out ways to not see her. But then I saw the faces of her friends. Those fools. 

My stomach ached as I sat in the cold hospital waiting room. White walls my only company. 

“Just leave me alone!” 

I recoiled at the ugly feeling the memory left me. The stabbing sensation in my stomach, the same one I had carried around for years every time Yae was mentioned. Only now it was eating me. 

“Shoto? Is that you?” One of the nurses came to me while I was thinking. She had chapped lips and crooked teeth, and looked at me like I was familiar. I couldn’t remember her. There were so many nurses over the years.