Play Nice (Tomura Shigaraki x Reader)

Chapter 11: Game Over

It was a well-known fact among his peers that Tomura Shigaraki hated just about everything.

He hated this city. He hated his school. He hated the other students that had seen his freshman representative address and last name and immediately tried to buddy up with him. He hated even more how quickly they gave up on him.

He hated the way people looked at him, with disgust and warriness. Like he was the scum of the earth. He hated when people didn't look at him.

Like he wasn't worth their time.

He hated himself. Hated the scars and scabs that permanently gnarled his skin and how, most days, he couldn't clearly remember how they got there. He hated the nightmares that often kept him awake for days at a time. That no amount of prazosin and antidepressants could get rid of.

He hated the path that was currently laid out for him and hated even more how much he still wanted to follow it.

To follow him.

He hated the Doctor. He hated Kurogiri. He tolerated Iguchi. He really hated Dabi.

And he hated Mirio. More and more he was realizing how much he hated Mirio Togata. It used to be the standard baseline of hatred he held for all of the beautiful, popular people that dared to live their lives without a care in the world. But that hatred now was starting to become painfully personal.

She made it personal.

At one point he'd hated her like that too. More so even. At least the Mirios of the world were stupid enough to just genuinely be that happy and optimistic, to have that much faith in the goodness of the world.

But he'd seen her truth. He'd seen the genuine exhaustion and misanthropy in her eyes when she thought nobody was looking. He'd seen the cynical kindred spirit within her. And then he'd seen her ditzy, popular girl mask pulled back on tight as soon as someone else looked her way. And suddenly he hated her more than anyone. Not only was she a self-righteous little high school hero, but she was a fake one. A stuck-up bitch that no doubt thought she was better than him because she actually managed to keep her bitterness with the world under wraps — could shove it under the rug as quickly and easily as it took her to reapply her lip gloss.

She'd only proven him right the day she knocked on his bedroom door. Her disgust with him had been palpable. She didn't even try to hide it the second she was alone with him. He hadn't been worthy of that same mask that the adults had been, not anywhere close. She was looking down on him the way she and her gossipy little clique always had.

And he wanted to destroy her for that.

Then she turned out to be a virgin. And it made everything a thousand times better. Not only did he get to conquer a paragon of everything he hated — and of everything that hated him — but he got to completely and utterly ruin her. For the rest of her wonderful, fake little life, she would have to look back and remember him as her first. She'd never be able to pretend anything was perfect again. He would always be that dark, undeniable stain in her life. And at the very least, from herself, she'd never be able to hide that hatred again. He couldn't have bought a better personal revenge.

...

But then she'd held him.

Came for him.

Asked him for help.

She had reached for him. Clung to his sleeve and silently begged him not to leave. Grabbed his hand and pulled him to an oasis. Taught him. Trusted him.

And even smiled at him.

Being on the receiving end of that had felt better than he could've ever imagined. He didn't know when it happened, but all of a sudden, Shigaraki was acutely aware that when it came to her, he wasn't feeling hatred anymore. Nothing close to it. He couldn't put a name to the feeling, not as he was feeling it anyway.