Suicidal Todoroki x Midoriya | What it Means to Love

15 | Meaningless Words

Shoto Todoroki

"What a heart-stopping battle!" Present Mic roars. "Shoto Todoroki now moves on to the next round!"

Once I've heard my victory declared and printed in fine ink by Midnight, the dazzling blue ice lance I'm holding shatters into a cloud of sky-blue dust, returning the accumulated monstrosity of frostbite to my body. I practically look as if I am the product of a snowman being given human genes, but since my eyes were closed the instant my lance was fractured, I could feel only the searing jaws of frost dragging me down under in that moment. With my body legitimately on the verge of being permanently preserved in an eternal frost, I fall to the ground in an unsatisfactory reprieve.

When I finally pull apart my eyelids hanging heavily over my eyes, I'm greeted by nauseating white light being shone in my eyes from above. I tremble uncontrollably with violent chills jerking my body up and down.

After readjusting my eyes to the blinding light, I groggily glance around. Midoriya and Recovery Girl are the only two present in the room, excluding me. I attempt to move my body to free myself from the bed I'm caught in, but it's as if the network of neurons and synapses composing my body have frozen over themselves with a thick layer of ice.

I am able to move the left half of my body with excruciating effort, but I physically cannot move the right half of it.

"Ah! Sh-Shoto, stop!" Midoriya cautions me, waving his hands around and swiftly walking up to me with a limp. He's been mummified in bandages from the neck down, and he too is shivering severely, like a nervous, innocent puppy stumbling towards its littermates. "Th-The frostbite inflicted on you was so s-severe that we needed E-Endeavor to thaw you out." He carefully positions himself at the side of my bed and looks me in the eyes; his emerald-green eyes sparkle vibrantly, despite him having lost his opportunity to advance to the semi-finals due to me. "Open up." Between his thumb and index finger of his left hand is a semi-translucent, red candy bear.

It honestly stupefies me that Midoriya is managing to move either of his arms in the atrocious condition he's currently in.

What transpired in my nightmare? I wonder, parting my lips so Midoriya can place the soft candy bear in my mouth. It is incredibly fuzzy, but I recall a figure with capered movements...and a large figure next to it. I chew slowly on the bear, glancing at the exit to ensure my father is nowhere in sight.

I broke my oath under your influence, Izuku. "Would you mind helping me to my feet? I wish to finish the job." I wish to finish his half-assed job. Izuku bites his lower lip before wrapping an arm around my back and propping me upright in bed. I click my teeth together in pain but nonetheless endure the excruciating process of Midoriya keeping me up on my feet.

"A-Are you sure you've got it?" He steadies my quivering body. "I-If I just hold onto your r-right arm, I won't be burned." Insisting on keeping his hold on me, Midoriya clings tightly to my right arm.

"So be it," I sigh, activating my fire quirk. An emphatic, soothing warmth envelops my body, cradling it with clemency and compassion.

The swirling flames being emitted from my left arm crawl along my scapula and play at my clavicle. My literally chilled blood begins to thaw and regulate itself as I raise the temperature of the flames. I feel foolish for using my quirk like this, but at the moment, the hopeful flames are providing me an almost addictive sense of relief—of sweet, irony reprieve.

With a sullen frown, my abhorrent flames diminish into the light. "Did my father agree easily?" I decide to ask, slowly moving my arms to receive a sharp sensation of tingling pins and needles dancing across my skin.