Colors in the Dark

[4] Honing It

After a few minutes of lecture from Aizawa, they were dismissed to lunch, where Mina dragged Ayami after her. They seemed to have a well-defined group, being herself, Kaminari, Sero, Kirishima, Bakugou, and apparently Jirou.

However, Ayami was soon out of it, not able to pay attention to their fast-paced conversation consisting of jokes, jabs, a few insults, and Bakugou constantly screaming "DIE!"

She thanked Mina for the invite but told her it was a little much for her first day, walking over to find an empty seat, which happened to be next to Tokoyami. The boy's bird head turned at the sound of her sitting down. She winced, looking apologetically at him. "Sorry, mind if I sit?"

"Go ahead," he said. "Those guys too rowdy?"

Ayami's cheeks turned a pale red. "I'm not used to many people, and the only yelling I really grew up with was angry yelling so it's not exactly comforting to be around so much at once," she explained, shuddering as she remembered one of the other orphans she grew up with a particularly nasty temper. (At least she knew he had been pretty nice when he wasn't pissed off, definitely not to the point of blowing someone up like this Bakugou kid seemed to.)

"From what Aizawa told us, I take it you never really had a home, especially as a kid, hmm? That's what prompted me to say what I did earlier, since you're obviously skilled enough to get into UA," he asked.

"Uh, yeah... That's the 'fun' of being an orphan with a quirk that makes people think you're a demon in disguise," she sighed. "Plus, having my name always misspoken as 'Ayami,' stressing the word for darkness, which I noticed... yours has the same..."

"My quirk is a sentient being made entirely of darkness, Ayami. You're certainly not alone in that aspect," he said softly, allowing Dark Shadow to appear beside him. "Revelry in the dark, instead of cowering in it."

Ayami covered her mouth, trying to hide her small gasp, before nodding. "Then I guess you should hear about mine..."

~

After explaining her quirk, she and Tokoyami had begun talking about their lives, their pasts, some of which were quite similar, shared sentient quirks and all. He was friendly but quiet and solemn, just like she was, which made it pretty easy to talk without feeling like she wasn't contributing enough to the conversation.

By the time they were dismissed, she sent the bird boy and his shadow a smile and a wave before leaving. She had told him about her training with Ectoplasm and how she was working on merging with her spirits so she could utilize their power, which came with the side effect of allowing them to speak with other people through her voice.

...So maybe one day Dark Shadow and Ayami's spirits would be able to speak with one another the same way their hosts could, more or less. She made her way through her classes, not getting too deep into a lesson in any, until she found herself staring at the clock.

"One more minute, then we have more training, and then we should probably work alone," Prometheus murmured with the same bored tone she knew she would have if she was speaking.

"Not to mention they said the Sports Festival is soon! We really need to work hard if we expect to even get past the qualifiers!" Ansaluia agreed, her indigo almost blending with Prometheus' blue had it not been for the subtle excitement in her voice and the twinge of violet that Ayami heard when the Formation spirit hit a high note.

Once the bell rang, she picked up her things and hurried toward the training ground like she had multiple times previously, though from different locations in the school. However, when she was passing her homeroom, 1-A's classroom, she noticed a huge crowd spread around outside.