[COMPLETED] MHA : Shoto Todoroki - Modern-day Terrorist

FIVE YEARS LATER

"Careful here, it's slippery. Move slowly, yes, just like that"

"Do not talk to me as if I were a dog, boy", Grandma snapped

I finished helping her down the jet's stairs, though slightly amused.

"You're old and half the bones in your body are crumbling to dust. Talking to you like I would my pet is the least I can do"

Fire burst from Teka's mouth – as though she were a roaring dragon – and hit me straight in the face, forcing me to squint. I shook my hand and the fire dispersed.

"Your breath stink"

"Haven't brushed my teeth in a week"

"Sickness is one thing, hygiene is another, Grandma"

Teka clicked her tongue and moved forward, her stilettos clicking rhythmically on the floor.

Despite trying my best I couldn't make her give up her high heels.

"Stop whining and follow me", she said, walking to a black-slicked car

I paused, looking at the streets I hadn't walked in in half a decade.

Most of the country – for the unsubmerged parts – was still in shambles.

They said it was cursed.

"Well ? Are you coming ?"

"Why are we here, Grandma ?"

She paused, considering.

She knew if the answer didn't satisfy me I would bolt out of here the next second.

It was uncomfortable about coming back. She'd had to argue her case for a month and played the sick woman so well I thought she was relapsing, telling me coming here was her dying wish.

Silly me to fall for her tricks - again.

"We have found...", she passed her hand on her face, grim. "When the water receded our men did provide relief to the surviving population, just as you wished, but they found something else"

She paused.

"Well ?", I insisted.

"It seems that hidden in the North near Aomori there is an underground base, something that nobody cared to investigate. It is All for One's"

"A Nomus base ?"

Wasn't the Commission supposed to have found and wiped them all out ?

She shook her head.

"They're not Nomus – at least not exactly. Our men found… There's something - someone - there. You need to see it for yourself"

*

I stopped short, breath catching in my throat and eyes widening.

For a while, I thought my father's death had been the cause of my downfall.

Yet here I stood, watching him, realizing that his death had been a catalyseur, merely an effect, not even a cause, and that even if he'd stayed alive I would have become the one I now was, for even before I was reborn I was meant to be the one who would put back the fear of gods in the heart of men.

The child was bent over a wingless Nomu, feeding from his torso like a dog, mouth and hands covered in blood.

He stopped when he spotted me, didn't bother wiping his lips.

He was a child raised in a basement, a being who'd never learned about love or hate, a blank slate for anybody to write on.

"Who are you ?", he croaked, and the sound was as hoarse as if a crocodile had tried speaking.

He was frail.

Breakable.

Skin hung tight on his knotty bones.

I crouched, holding my hand forward, and the boy flinched.

A deep rumble came from his chest, a guttural sound proving he wasn't fully human.

"Can I ?"

His blue eyes watched me warily, though he made no assenting nor threatening sound.

Ever so slowly I gently brushed away the red hair falling on his dirty face.

His stomach was bloated from hunger and his throat so thin I could've wrapped my whole hand twice around it.

I wondered if that was how dad felt when he watched me then, if he also had the painful sensation that without him the child I was would lack life and rot and die and that he was needed for him to survive.

"Why is your hand green ?"

I smiled.

"Because I am healing you"

He frowned as though healing was a concept so foreign to him he couldn't wrap his head around it.

He leaned in my palm, his cheek in the crook of my hand, though his slit eyes observed me quietly.

I wondered if I liked the idea of being needed, if the fact that someone else's sole existence depended on me made me feel more legitimate to live even if everyone always ultimately died around me.

"Why do you look like me ?", the child asked quietly

I wondered if Dad had felt this possessiveness for me the first time he met my gaze, if he felt the need to guide and nurture and protect the child I'd been every day for ever and ever.

I wondered if, in his last moments, he felt at peace knowing he did everything he could to protect me.

I brushed his cheek with my thumb.

"What's your name ?"

He looked startled at the gesture, and I knew he was carefully considering if he liked it or didn't.

"Enzo"

He looked at me naively, fearlessly, and I felt as if the blood on my hands never existed, as if my hands too were clean, smooth, and pure.

"Are you my dad ?", he asked.

I looked back over my shoulder to where Grandma was standing, and suddenly I knew what she'd brought me here.

This child was a purpose.

"I could try if you want"

He seemed to ponder.

"Will you be a nice father ?"

"I'll be as gentle as mine was"

"Will you give me everything I want ?"

"There's nothing you'll be able to wish for I won't give you"

"Will you love me like a real dad loves his real son ?"

I stayed silent, pondering, wondering if I could- if I would ever be able to be the kind of father to lie down his life for his son without a second thought if I would ever be able to feel again such selfless love for someone else.

"I think I could, with time"

The child squeezed my fingers gently, lightly, as if his hand was a ghost's.

I seized him up, holding his head in the crook of my neck where he could feel my pulse and on which I could feel his sharp teeth grazing my skin.

He was shaking and I only held him closer.

For the first time in a while, I decided to give something to someone without expecting anything in return.

And it felt nice.

 ACCEPTANCE