MHA : Shoto Todoroki - Modern-day Terrorist

It was pouring.

Kneeling next to his father, Shoto looked as dead as the body he stood watch over.

He hadn't moved an inch in hours, still as a statue, ass on his heels and palms up on his thighs, head down, water trickling from the tip of his hair.

He'd stopped crying a long time ago. His face had morphed into a carefully carved mask of nothing, eyes dull and apathetic.

It had reassured them. The kid wouldn't lash out. He was too caught up in his grief.

Katsuki knew Shoto. His reaction unnerved him.

Yet despite everything that had happened between them, Katsuki wouldn't abandon him.

Chisaki had been- it didn't matter.

What mattered was that his closest friend's father had been killed on live TV and that Shoto had spent close to two hours, hands glowing an eerie green, trying to bring back to life a dead man.

They'd watched him wipe his tears with bloodied, shaking hands, smearing red across his cheek.

They'd witnessed how desperately he hung onto him, refusing to let go, frightened and confused, fragile and human.

Katsuki's mother had been sitting next to him when it happened.

She'd brought her hand to her mouth, unshed tears shining in her eyes.

Katsuki had torn himself from their couch and flew in one go to Nemuro.

The Commission had already been there, trucks and cars haphazardly parked on the road overlooking the charred beach, yet none had dared to get down.

The smell – awful rotten eggs which meant sulfur – had hit him first.

The titanic hands looked more monstrous than they did on screen. Crevasses littered the ground here and there, vapor, thickened by rain, rising and billowing.

A few people had spotted him as soon as he'd arrived; Katsuki had flown over them, capitalizing on their hesitation, and landed on the burning beach.

The ground had been so hot he'd barely brushed it before he decided floating was the best course of action.

Commission employees had screamed at him to get back with them, that he shouldn't be here, that what he was doing was illegal, and yet Katsuki had stood his ground.

He'd held himself between Shoto and the world, defiant, daring anyone to come closer and see what would happen to them.

Shoto was still a traitor, a 'terrorist', and they'd send him to Tartarus – if they didn't kill him here and then first.

Katsuki was the Peace Symbol; he wouldn't let anyone or anything get within twenty meters of him.

Shoto had lost his father.

They'd seen his muted crying on live TV, face undiscovered, and they'd felt his pain despite not hearing him.

Now Katsuki could hear his soul-wrenching sobs, his muttered pleas for his father to stay, just stay-

Tears had welled up in Katsuki's eyes. He ground his teeth, gaze hardening, channeling his energy on the disapproving Commission employees.

He shot a glance at the helicopter that was circling high above them.

Shoto's grief was personal. It shouldn't be disclosed on live TV.

He'd raised his hand, and a black whip had shot from his arm, wrapping the outdated camera. He brought his hand down sharply: the camera fell and broke on the rocks below, the journalist leaving a shocked scream.

Half an hour after he'd arrived, it'd started raining.

Soon the military arrived.

There were tanks, fighter aircraft, and squads of soldiers lining up on the road overlooking the beach.

Katsuki had watched everything with cold eyes. Shoto was still kneeling.

Thank god Sung was somewhere overseas, because if they'd tried catching Shoto right now…

They didn't understand that as much as Katsuki was protecting Shoto from them, he was also protecting them from Shoto.

Shoto had always been a wild, wild card in his sanest moments. He could barely fathom what he'd do now.

After the military came the civilians.

People had died in the nearby village, choked to death by the acrid smoke while they were still sleeping.

Civilians had gathered, a small but quickly growing crowd, in a field that overlooked the beach.

Then came the cameras and the live streams. Half an hour later the tanks were gone.

Despite the wind, thick vapor still hovered over the beach.

Shoto's figure went in and out of the fog, momentarily seen before white steam swallowed him.

His eyes were locked on his father's dull, icy eyes. He hadn't found the strength to close them.

Between his clenched fingers, his father's hand had turned slightly violet.

Rain rolled in his hair, dripped on his forehead, and beaded at the corner of his lashes.

The smell of shit and piss permeated the air, yet it wasn't strong enough to be smelt from far away.

The sun rose, barely seen through the fog and rainy clouds, and soon it was midday.

Shoto hadn't moved, hadn't looked away.

He was soaked to the bones, hair plastered on his face.

His eyes were dull, two windows that opened on nothing, as if Enji had taken of piece of his son with him when he'd died.

He'd stopped crying long ago.

There was a buzzing sound, like a swarm of bees. He blinked.

Someone was talking to him.

"The body," someone softly said. "We have to take it to the morgue."

"No"

Shoto's voice was hoarse and raspy yet categorical. No one would touch his father.

"We can't let it there," someone else argued softly. "It's too hot here. It's already showing signs of decomposition"

It.

Shoto looked up, the distant sky hidden behind a whitish curtain pierced here and there by sun rays.

He cocked his head to the side and stilled, eyes narrowed, as if he were listening to someone murmuring in his ear.

"It means you'll keep him fresh and well until I come back with what's needed, right doc? Only until I come back with what I need..."

The doctor glanced worriedly at Katsuki before answering the young man.

"Yes, of course. We will keep the body – I mean, your father – in perfect condition. The autopsy will not cause any visible damage and for the enti-"

"No"

Shoto's gaze snapped to the forensic.

His eyes were red, black commas spinning dangerously. Katsuki stiffened and protectively pushed the shaking doctor behind him.

It was the first time he'd looked away from his father's rotting corpse.

"The autopsy is necessary," the doctor tried. "To understand-"

"No"

The doctor squeezed the stethoscope hanging around his neck.

He looked everywhere except the young man's face now, stuttering:

"Okay, very well, as you wish."

He bowed respectfully and moved away.

Shoto's malevolent gaze followed him as he walked away and began giving orders to pick up the body.

"Shoto, are you… are you alright?"

Katsuki knew his question was stupid but he couldn't help it.

"Of course I'm alright. Why wouldn't I be?"

Shoto turned to him, looking genuinely surprised.

Katsuki might have believed him if he hadn't witnessed the desperate way Shoto had tried to revive a dead man just a few minutes ago.

Shoto's apathy chilled him.

Was it shock?

Katsuki had trouble understanding what was regular grieving behavior and what was just Shoto.

"You understand that..." Katsuki licked his dry lips, dreading the reaction that would follow "You understand that he's dead, right? They're not bringing him to a hospital to heal him, Shoto. Your father's dead, and there's no coming back from that"

There was a long, very long moment of silence.

Shoto didn't take his eyes off the young man who was gazing at the horizon. The longer he took to react, the more Hawks feared the magnitude of his reaction.

"Of course, he's not"

His tone was casual, almost cheerful, as if he didn't remember being covered in his own father's blood – it made Katsuki even more on edge than he already was.

Shoto smiled, this terrifying smile that made his eyes crinkle.

He hadn't put his mask back on, couldn't be bothered to.

Katsuki looked Shoto in the eye; he was too respectful to look lower.

"Shoto, your father's dead"

Katsuki knew that whatever stage he was going through, it had to be nipped in the bud before he completely lost it.

"No, I already told you he's not"

His eyes were still crescent moons but there was something tense in his expression.

"He wasn't breathing anymore when-"

"If you open your filthy fucking mouth one more time, I'll rip it off with my bare hands"

Katsuki didn't make a sound.

Shoto's eyes had suddenly turned black, like two bottomless pits.

All the features of his face had frozen, like those contemporary sculptures of souls screaming to death. There was something unreal about his expression, something that shouldn't have belonged to a being made of flesh and blood.

Katsuki raised his hands in a gesture of appeasement.

"Sure, don't know what I was saying, sorry"

Shoto's eyes narrowed, and the world seemed to stand still as he judged Katsuki's sincerity.

His eyes crinkled.

"Of course, no problem, of course"

Katsuki smiled but it didn't reach his eyes. His heart was pounding, the back of his head tingling.

"Let me bring you home, alright?"

Katsuki smiled but it didn't reach his eyes. His heart was pounding, the back of his head tingling.

"Let me bring you home, alright ?"

Shoto didn't answer.

They lingered a moment longer, and then Katsuki worked up the courage to help Shoto to his feet and get in a cab.

Shoto, a mindless puppet, let himself be moved around.

They left only once the corpse had been put in an ambulance, their car following quietly behind.

The military begrudgingly let them leave. They didn't want to risk a fight they knew they couldn't win, especially when there were so many civilians - and recording devices - around.

Katsuki sighed quietly, head propped against the cold, rumbling window.

He wondered what was going on inside Shoto's head, if his mind was a tumultuous tempest and his smooth face just a mask, or if he truly was a blank slate, devoid of anything, so numb he could've murdered in cold blood anyone on that beach if they'd dared to take his father away from him.

Katsuki knew one thing for sure : Shoto had snapped, and there would be no coming back from that.

 1 – DENIAL