Secrets [Todoroki]

*Chapter Six*

The next day at school, Miri mostly kept to herself. She kept a patch of gauze around her neck to cover the black and purple bruise left behind from her mother. She hoped that maybe nobody would say anything.

But when lunch came around and Uraraka frantically waved her over to them, Miri knew avoiding the conversation might be hard.

"Hey, Miri!" Uraraka greeted cheerfully. The boys lifted their heads up and greeted her as well.

Miri smiled and whispered hello to them. Midoriya was quick to notice something was wrong.

"Hey, Miri," The boy tilted his head, "What happened to your neck?"

Miri looked down at her tray that was piled high with food. A special exception was made to her regarding portion control because of her quirk relying heavily on energy and food consumption.

"Uh..." Think, Miri. "We got in a crash after school and...the seatbelt messed my neck up. At least I was wearing one though!"

"Oh, I'm glad you're okay! I'm sorry for probing at you." Midoriya gave her a sad look.

Miri shook her head, forcing a slight smile on her face. "It's not a problem...seriously."

Lunch passed by smoothly for a bit, then Midoriya suddenly asked, "Miri, does your quirk need you to eat a lot of food to work?"

Miri's head snapped up from her nearly empty tray. "What? Oh...my quirk takes up a lot of my energy and the school has allowed me to...take extra food to replenish it...they'll do it for almost anybody with...high energy consumption quirks. They don't want me passing out in the middle of the class." She explained.

The boy had a journal out in front of him, scribbling excessively. Miri panicked a little, thinking he was gathering information to beat her, but as she looked over his notes, she saw it was just details about her. An analysis of her quirk. He even had half started drawing of her in the book's corner.

"How does your quirk work?" He looked up at her, excited for more information.

Miri got uncomfortable under all the attention. "Well, uh...it's kind of boring if I'm honest..."

"Come on, Miri!" Uraraka cheered. "Even I want to know how you threw that softball so far!"

Miri turned slightly red. "Okay..." She took a deep breath. "When the quirk first started out, it was a simple super strength quirk. Then, as more quirks were passed down through genetic inheritance, it slowly molded into what it is today. Someone with super speed married the person with super strength and gave birth to a child with both the quirks." She got lost in the description. The others watched her face lit up as she explained the quirk and it warmed their hearts a little to see their friend come out of her shell. "That child then married someone with self-healing. They had a child, and that child married someone with pain nullification, yadda yadda yadda. Finally, one person was married into the family that tied everything together and made the quirk what it is today. That person had the quirk 'Enhance' which could enhance the basic senses. They both had a kid who was my father. Then he met my mom and passed it on to me."

The three of them stared at Miri, having never heard her say so much before.

"Wow," Midoriya muttered. He zoned out, heavily thinking.

"I'm sorry!" Miri rubbed her face. "I know it probably sounded-"

"Your quirk is remarkable!" Iida exclaimed.

The other two nodded in agreement. "It's so cool how you have a quirk this powerful!" Midoriya agreed, writing profusely in his journal. "How does it function? Like, how do you get it to work?"

Miri felt happiness brewing in her. She never had people react this positively to her before. Talking seemed...easier now.

"When I want a specific boost, my body releases the chemicals needed to perform the action. Like with strength, if I wanted to become stronger it releases small amounts of adrenaline. And if I'm injured, my body rapidly can produce cells that move to repair the damage. It works roughly the same for all enhancements to myself, just with different schematics." She smiled.

Midoriya rubbed his chin. "With the release of adrenaline and all these extra boosts to your body, can't they cause more damage to you?"

Miri nodded her head. "Adrenaline is usually my most guilty one. If I get too much of it, I get the same symptoms of an adrenaline rush. You know, shaky legs, irritability, all of it. Which is why I regulate how much I do. As the current standing, I can safely use about fifty percent of my quirk without the worry of drawbacks." She held up a finger. "That being said, I'm still human and I'm susceptible to breaking my bones. That's why having my healing ability is so important to me. I won't be much use if I break my arms all the time in a battle or can't walk with broken legs." She looked at Midoriya. "No offense."

He smiled. "None taken."

"One day, when I'm stronger, I'll be able to use my quirk to its full extent." She smiled at the idea. "However, by the time that comes around, I may be too powerful." She giggled. "I might cause more destruction than the villains do. Which brings me to my last point. I always have to be in control when I'm using my quirk. If I hit things with my maximum, I can easily shatter a bone. Those take a lot longer to heal than breaks do. I've always got to be aware of how much I'm exerting and how much I'm doing to make sure everyone around me is safe."

"Your quirk sounds so serious." Uraraka sighed.

"It is, but it's helpful to others. I can share my quirk with them as long as I'm touching them." Miri was sharing a lot more than what they might have wanted and what she would have been comfortable with previously, but she was having fun discussing it with them.

"Woah! Really?" Midoriya could cause a fire with how fast his pencil was moving. He had a mess of scribbles on his paper.

"If I touch someone, whether I mean to, they get whatever boost I'm using. If I have my strength magnified by forty, then whoever touches me gets it. That being said, they get whatever drawbacks that can come with it, whether they break an arm or something else. If someone punches me while I have my strength boosted, then they get the boost as well in that split second of contact, which would be a very obvious problem for me if my opponent was physically strong. I would have to cancel my quirk out entirely to avoid that happening. I can't downgrade my quirk once I boost it." She finished.

Midoriya had finished writing and looked up at her. "I'm sorry if it seemed like I was digging into you for information, I was just so curious about your quirk. I'm sorry if you shared more information than what you were comfortable with."

"I don't talk about things I'm uncomfortable with." She stated. "I just...trust you won't go sharing that information with just anybody. You seem like you're too nice to use it against me in any serious way." Then she shrugged. "If you use it against me in battle...then it's even more fun. I like challenges."

Midoriya nodded. "I'd like to battle you sometime." He smiled. "When I have better control over my quirk, that is. At the current standing, I don't think I'd get much headway in battle against you."

"Maybe not...but if you ever need quick healing, I'm your girl. I can heal most physical injuries, but internal ones like your organs I can't touch. They're too complex. My quirk will eat your energy up fast though." She smiled.

"What drove you to want to be a hero?" Iida spoke up, out of the blue.
Miri froze then. The smile slid off her face.

Why did she want to be a hero?

"I don't...I don't know." She mumbled. Her mind raced, trying to think of why she wanted to be a hero.

'I just...I just wanted to be a hero my entire life. But why did I want to be a hero? I don't think I have an answer to that.' Miri anxiously twirled the black strands of her hair.

Lost in her own thoughts, Miri unintentionally crawled back into her shell.