Acceptance

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You just kind of accept it.
You blend into the background, only speaking when spoken to and making your voice as small as possible so you don't draw much attention to yourself.
You only interact with Zero and Shigaraki when you have to, and the others kind of just left you to it, too.

It's not the nicest, but it's not totally awful. You struggled more with adjusting to living with Keigo originally.
You're surviving, which is more than you thought you'd be able to do in their care, at least.

You had tried staying holed up in your allocated room, but Zero started to force you outside of your room, making you do the worksheets and workbooks in random rooms around the mansion they occupied.
Like currently, you're sitting in the kitchen, at the table with Zero doing a biology workbook that is several grades lower than where you are in your education outside of the villains base, trying to tune out the sound of Dabi and Star having fun with her work.

That is until Shigaraki returns with two men, one of them being Tanaka who you recognise from the night that Shigaraki took you. Your eyes meet briefly but he looks away again quickly, as though he's embarrassed.
You continue watching warily, taking in the sight of them as they carry large plastic bags and boxes into the room. When your eyes land on the carrier box in one of Shigarakis hands, a little 'meow' comes from it.

Unsurprisingly, Star is on her feet in seconds, yelling 'cat!' like a toddler would, but it gets Shigaraki to smile as he crouches and puts the box on the floor.

"Yes, a cat." He says, opening the metallic door and allowing a long haired calico cat to cautiously get out. "His name is Cloud."

"Like the nerd from your game!?" Dabi asks, sounding exasperated.

"There's another reason behind it too." Shigaraki snorts, watching as Star abandons Dabi and her worksheets to run up to the cat.

She looks like she wants to pet it, but Cloud is taking nervous steps into the room still, taking in his surroundings.

"He's friendly." Shigaraki tells her and then turns back to his underlings to give them orders, which they're more than eager to obey.

"He's so cute!" Star coos, gently scratching the cat's head. "Hakuchō, do you think Shinsou would like him?"

You stare wordlessly at the cat as if it'd spat on your parents grave, its body sinking lower to the ground to avoid Star petting it as it wanders over to you and Zero.
Zero leans down to scratch its head too, but the cat only needs a couple of sniffs of Zeros outstretched hand before arching its back and hissing at him.
Zero doesn't get offended though, just moves his hand away and hums as if the reaction from the cat is interesting.

"That's not nice, Cloud." Star chastises. "That's Uncle Zero! He's a friend."

You watch quietly as Zero explains that the cat's reaction is because he doesn't have a smell, only for Star to then argue the matter with him.
Dabi's uncharacteristically quiet along with you, too.
You only tune back in when Star asks Zero if he can sense what Cloud is feeling.

"He's curious about you." He replies matter-of-factly with a smile.

So that's why Zero always seemed to know when you were far from okay, and needed to do something other than mope in your bedroom. It must be his quirk, but being able to even sense how animals are feeling is... strange.
Zero moves his attention back to you, pointing at the arm of the diagram on the paper in front of you.

"What was this muscle called? Do you remember?" He asks.

You allow your attention to be taken away from Cloud and Star, giving the quiet answer as Star continues petting Cloud and Dabi goes off to follow Shigaraki.
Toga runs into the room after that pretty quickly, looking flushed and excited.

"Aw! Cuute!" She coos, flopping onto the floor alongside Star and Cloud without much care for how short her skirt is. "What's her name?"

"His name is Cloud." Star explains patiently.

You watch them fuss over the cat together, only half listening to Zero and blandly answering his questions as you do so. After a while he himself is quiet, staring at you while still smiling softly.

"Go and pet the cat." He says.

"Huh?"

"I can tell you want to, so go and pet the cat." He repeats. "Just be polite and it'll be okay."

You stare at him for a moment, weighing up the options. You'd been doing well at keeping your head down and not drawing any attention yourself.
But you really wanted to pet that cat, because you couldn't help but feel like it might make you feel a little closer to Hitoshi, even though you're apart right now.
He tilts his head towards the two girls on the floor, as if silently encouraging you to go and join them.

You sit there for a second or two longer, torn between keeping your cool and caving and petting the fluffy cat too..
But eventually you do cave.

You get up slowly, and approach the two cautiously, your wing accidentally brushing against Star's arm.

"Can I sit here?" You ask Star, trying to ignore the glare coming from the blonde opposite her.

"Mhm!" She nods eagerly, moving across the floor a little more to make some extra room for you.

You sit down slowly, hyper aware of Toga's eyes burning into you as you cross your legs and bring your wings as close as possible into your back.
The cat immediately comes up to you, bumping his head against your knee affectionately. This makes you tear up almost instantly, but you refuse to shed them as you carefully pet the purring cat's head, thinking of the trip to the cat café with Hitoshi the entire time.

Star cautiously rubs your arm, and you allow her to do it merely for the fact you didn't want to upset Toga when she's in such close proximity to you.
You don't really know how it happens, but Star suddenly stops rubbing your arm and begins to reach for your wrist, exclaiming that you're hurt.

You yank your arm away instinctively, making Star flinch out of the way and close her eyes as though you're about to hit her.
Cloud hisses at you, a tight grip locks around your wrist, preventing you from lowering your arm, and Toga pulls a knife seemingly out of nowhere, pointing it directly at you.

She puts it away again relatively quickly though, probably realising you can't do anything with Zero holding your arm in place.

"Now, now children." Zero says, sounding a little tired. "Let's not do anything rash."

"Don't touch me." You say simply, looking at Star, but hoping they all take it on board.

"Sorry." Star replies, the word sounding more like a knee-jerk response rather than something she actually meant.

"Come on, Hakuchō." Zero says, back to sounding bored. "Let's clean up the mess you made earlier."

You have no idea what he's even talking about, but if it means getting away from yet another nice situation that you miraculously ruined, you were going to go with it.
You let him pull you up by the arm he's gripping, and he's gentle with it, but it still hurts a little, and you can't help but remember the fact that Keigo had pulled Star by the arm like this before, too. Although it was a lot rougher.

The memory makes your head hang a little, but you don't spare the two other girls or Cloud a second glance as you're dragged away.

You're not even that far away when you hear Toga's high-pitched voice say:

"You don't wanna be friends with her anyway, she's mean. It's not cute to be mean."

And you try so hard to ignore it and tell yourself that you don't care about what a literal murderer has to say about you, but you still let a few tears slip as you walk behind Zero.

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