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1.
The boy is dangerous.
As August fades into September, Enji watches his youngest son.
Shouto has been avoiding him, unless his presence is explicitly required. He keeps his eyes cast down. He speaks very little, even less than before, almost exclusively when he’s spoken to.
For the most part, Shouto keeps his distance.
And yet, Shouto is everywhere.
When he thinks Enji isn’t paying attention, he’s always looking. He stares, his heterochromatic eyes following Enji’s movements, instantly localizing him in whatever spot Enji is currently occupying.
Shouto keeps shooting him those quick, nervous glances, averting his eyes immediately if Enji gives off any signs of noticing.
He leaves as soon as Enji enters a room, but he lingers by the door, tiptoeing in the shadows of the hallways. The paper doors carry the faint sound of Shouto’s careful breaths, the light creaking of the wooden floors under his steps.
It seems as if he’s trying to make himself at once invisible and deafening.
Enji throws himself into his work. He stays at the agency long hours, long after everyone else has gone home. He leaves before sunrise and doesn’t come back until it’s dark.
His colleagues and subordinates start to notice. They shiver in his presence, despite the lingering traces of summer heat, and they scramble to get out of his way when they see him approach, dramatic idiots that they are.
They know better than to talk where he could hear them, but he sees the stares, the nervous smiles, quickly hidden behind paperwork and computer screens.
He drives an intern to tears after she bumps into him in the corridor and drops a mug, spilling coffee all over the floor. He sends another away for filing a report incorrectly after a patrol, a sixteen year old boy from U.A. who had seemed powerful and promising.
Enji couldn’t care less. He gets little sleep; the food he eats tastes like nothing.
All he sees is the image of Shouto sitting at the table, on the rare mornings when Enji leaves later. The cold, silent fury in the grey and blue of Shouto’s eyes. The stony rigidity in the boy’s features as Shouto sets down the cup a little too forcefully, then murmurs a flat apology.
When they share a meal, they eat in silence.
Shouto stabs through his food and cuts it into tiny pieces. He eats all of it, including the parts he doesn’t like, without a word. He straightens his back when Enji scolds him for his bad posture and rude manners.
Two or three times, after dinner, Enji hears him vomit through the bathroom door.
One morning, Enji finds one of Shouto’s white socks, discarded on the floor. Maybe accidentally forgotten by the maid while she was carrying the laundry basket.
He picks it up, holds it gently in his palm. He inspects it like a foreign object. It’s faintly streaked with grey, the light traces of the dust that clings to the wooden tiles.
He holds onto it for a moment, clenching his jaw until it aches. He crumples the thin fabric into a tightened fist.
He says nothing about it. He quietly slips the sock back where it belongs, among the other clothes to be washed.
2.
When their eyes meet briefly across a room, there’s a hunger that stirs and churns inside Enji’s stomach.
He strangles that feeling, he squashes it down. He looks away.
He pretends not to notice when his son is looking at him.
Whenever he looks around again, more often than not, he finds Shouto still there.
At home, Shouto keeps following him around like a shadow, and Enji wants to snap.
Shouto wanders around the hallways like a pale, feverish vengeful ghost. Rage radiates from him like a distorted vibration, a tangible presence that pervades the room and sweeps away everything in its way.
Shouto’s anger burns, directed at Enji.
Enji recognizes that anger, easily and intimately like an old friend. He knows it; he has nurtured it for years, in himself and in his chosen heir. Now Shouto’s fury is close to exploding, and Enji can’t look away.
Shouto’s long, quiet glances are heavy with a loathing so open, so absolute, that they make Enji’s hands shake, his fingers twitching with the urge to close around the boy’s neck.
One time, he ends up with his hand closing hastily around his swollen cock instead, gritting his teeth with his back against a wall, in the darkness of his own empty bedroom.
He stops himself, but only barely, his blood screaming in his veins. He punches a hole through one of the wooden walls, then kicks the wardrobe hard enough that the splintered imprint remains.
There’s the spark of a fight in Shouto’s eyes, like he’s waiting for something to happen. Like he wants to make it happen, but doesn’t know how.
Yet Shouto refuses to fight.
He trains, with the same schedule as before. He comes to the training hall when Enji calls him.
Shouto obeys then, he doesn’t resist, he doesn’t argue – and all he does is spend hours in a defensive stance, dodging Enji’s attacks, not landing one hit.
Enji can push him to exhaustion, day after day, but he doesn’t manage to pull anything out of Shouto. Nothing more than the weakest little sparks of the amazing powers his son was gifted by nature and by blood.
There’s a sickening satisfaction, then, in slamming him down harder, in hitting him more brutally, for every time Shouto refuses to give him the fight Enji knows he can give. A violent, electric thrill in the rattling of Shouto’s teeth, in the fragility of his bones under the pressure of Enji’s hands.
There’s a memory, raw in its clarity – one time when Shouto was little, Enji had broken Shouto’s left wrist.
An inadmissible loss of control. One he never should have allowed to happen. Not with that side.
There had been a rush to the hospital.
(another one.)
Shouto hadn’t cried, not that he can remember.
The possibility of having maimed him irreparably.
Shouto had healed fine.
Days turn into weeks. Enji keeps pushing and Shouto doesn’t yield, no matter how many bruises and burn marks Enji leaves on his body. Not even when Enji makes him bleed.
At the end of each training session, Shouto stands up on unsteady legs, he bows his head, and he stumbles out of the room, leaving Enji panting and covered in sweat, angrier than when they started.
You’re not even trying, boy.
It’s the truth, Shouto is not.
He’s doing this on purpose. A deliberate act of defiance. He’s doing this to resist him. To spite him.
Shouto provokes him. His stubborn silences are louder than any sharp word that would send him upstairs with an empty stomach, with the pulsing of a backhanded slap on his cheek.
Shouto stares at him and avoids him and hides. From his father and from the anger he refuses to release.
The sounds – gods, the sounds Shouto made when Enji held him against a wall. When he felt the tender skin of the inside of Shouto’s thighs, littered with ugly, self-inflicted burn marks.
The way Shouto trembled when Enji burned him.
Enji doesn’t think about it. He doesn’t.
He wakes up at the crack of dawn in a cold sweat, and he strides past his youngest son’s bedroom, and he goes to work on black coffee and two, three hours of sleep.
It’s the boy’s fault.
Shouto is mocking him. Taunting him.
Images haunt Enji at night when he’s alone, during the day while he’s at work.
Flashes of Shouto’s sunburned skin. The way his son’s mouth feels, soft and freezing and burning, his tender split lip wet with blood beneath Enji’s knuckles.
3.
The night is dark and humid. It’s been raining the entire day.
In his bedroom, Enji is working out.
He put weighted bands around his ankles and around his wrists. He does push-ups, in groups of twenty or fifty. He does bicep curls with the heaviest weights in his set.
Sweat drips down his back and he doesn’t stop. When he loses count he starts all over again and he keeps going, senselessly repeating series of exercises with no end point and no aim.
He left the lights turned off. The house around him is quiet, but noises still travel through the walls and the floors from time to time. Steps, the clattering of dishes. Muffled voices here and there.
Enji shuts his eyes.
He grunts in effort and savors the tension and release of every muscle. He’s going to have to wake up early in the morning, but he’s not yet near the point of exhaustion that would allow him to sleep.
Steps coming up the stairs.
Enji stops. Light fills the hallway, and a shadow appears against the paper door.
There’s silence, a moment of hesitation.
Then:
“… Father.”
Enji sits up, with the dumbbell still in his clenched right fist.
“Come in, Shouto.”
The door slides open and Shouto stands in the doorway, framed by the yellow-orange light. It’s blinding, after the darkness.
Enji exhales.
“Are you done tidying up the gym?”
Shouto remains there where he is, without taking another step. He’s wearing a large, baggy t-shirt; strands of his hair curl around his temples, likely still damp from the shower he must have taken.
“Yes.”
Enji nods. “Did you clean the bathroom?”
Shouto’s eyes flicker around the room; they never stop on Enji’s face. He’s leaning with his right hand against the door frame, gripping it, in a gesture that seems unintentional.
“Yes. Everything’s in order.”
Enji sets down the dumbbell. There’s a subtle flinching in Shouto’s body, in the way he curves his shoulders for a moment, when the metal hits the floor. He rubs his bare feet together, shifting his weight from side to side, without moving.
Shouto’s smell is fresh. Clean.
It would be stronger, if Enji got closer.
Enji tightens the weighted band around his wrist.
“You can go to bed, then.”
Shouto’s hand retreats from the door jamb, his fingers gliding against the wood.
He doesn’t turn around. He recedes slowly, stalling for a moment longer before closing the door.
After the room goes dark again, Enji listens to his son’s steps as they fade.
4.
This needs to end. Now. It will end.
Enji will put a stop to it.
He should discipline Shouto. He should punish him once and for all. He should have done it a long time ago.
He has entertained the idea, two or three times, cradled it inside his head.
He would summon Shouto to his room. And Shouto would go, and if he didn’t, Enji would drag him anyway by force, if he had to. But in his mind, he envisions his son walking up the stairs, step after step, on his own.
He would use the wooden cane.
He would order Shouto to undress, to get down on all fours, or to bend down over Enji’s knees.
A similar occurrence had happened, once, when Shouto was small; punishment for a dish that Shouto had dropped on the floor as he refused to eat dinner. He had used one of his belts, then, the only time he had punished Shouto like that.
He could do it.
And then what?
He’d put his son back in his place. Teach him a lesson, so that the disrespectful brat would learn to never challenge him again.
The hunger inside of him bares its teeth and growls and howls at that thought.
The days slip by and Enji works on autopilot. He signs documents. He consults with the police about suspects. He organizes his files and he goes on patrol, even though he could let one of his subordinates take care of those ordinary duties.
One day, as he’s exiting the headquarters’ building after a long day, he’s greeted by a cheerful, booming voice.
When he raises his eyes, he meets All Might’s shining smile.
“Endeavor! Hello! I was passing by, and I was wondering if…”
All Might has been pestering him with mails from time to time, asking for the two of them to meet for a catch-up talk, inviting Enji to informal events with other heroes. Enji always refuses.
This time, Enji clenches his jaw, walking past the man he grudgingly calls number one.
“I’m in a hurry, All Might. I’m needed elsewhere. We’ll talk another time.”
All Might could certainly stop him, if he wanted, but Enji walks faster and looks straight ahead, doesn’t acknowledge the other hero with even a glance. All Might begins to say something else, of that Enji is almost sure; in the end, though, he seems to relent.
Enji walks away.
He can’t talk to him, to the Symbol of Peace. He can’t.
He looks at his phone. Almost dinner time; Fuyumi has probably cooked for everyone. She might be setting the table right now, trying to get Shouto to sit down and eat. He seems to eat more easily when she’s there.
Enji clenches his fist.
He doesn’t return home, that night. He stays at a motel, working through the dark, silent hours.
He goes against the stern regimen he has set for himself, against the values of discipline and self-control and the standards he’s set a long time ago for himself and everyone else around him.
He orders cheap takeout that he doesn’t like, and a bottle of cheap sake.
He drinks while he’s working, until he falls asleep.
That night, he doesn’t dream.
5.
Enji wonders if Shouto has continued to inflict pain on himself. He could find out, but he doesn’t try to check for traces again. If Shouto is doing it, he’s more careful than before; Enji doesn’t catch him in the act a second time.
Why the heat? Why the fire?
Shouto thinks he knows pain. He takes pleasure in it. Enji doesn’t understand. Hasn’t he had enough? Hasn’t he learned?
Fuyumi and Natsuo, as inadequate and uninteresting to him as they are, they’re not like this. They’re normal.
Shouto is different. Something twisted and rotten is growing inside his youngest son, his perfect creation. Something as rotten as the heat that comes alive under Enji’s skin whenever their eyes meet.
His boy is corrupt. Depraved. His precious boy, his perfect Shouto, who inherited Enji and Rei’s powers. Something is wrong.
Shouto was supposed to be his masterpiece. His successor. The only one worthy of following in his steps and taking down All Might. Why Shouto, then? Why did it have to be Shouto who is like – this?
Shouto, who lets himself be thrown around like a ragdoll. Who shrinks away and shuts his eyes and goes boneless and paralyzed, when Enji’s heat meets his skin.
This will grow out of control. If Enji doesn’t act, if he doesn’t do something, and quickly, something terrible is bound to happen.
Enji wonders what else he doesn’t know about his youngest boy.
Shouto isn’t weak. He’s not helpless, not anymore. He’s no cowering child, crying and tugging at his mother’s skirt. Enji made sure that he wouldn’t be, in order to forge the hero Shouto must become.
No, Shouto is growing stronger by the day under Enji’s eyes. It’s not enough, not yet. Shouto isn’t ready. One day, soon, he will be.
Shouto’s ice is a thing of beauty, a devastating force of nature.
Enji knows, now, the only use Shouto is willing to make of his fire – of Enji’s fire.
Shouto isn’t weak, but he makes a target of himself. With those irreverent eyes, with that lewd body of his. How dare he, Enji’s mind growls, when Shouto shows up early in the morning for their training, dressed in white or light blue in the blinding sunlight.
How dare he, this stubborn, sharp-edged boy of his, who squanders the gifts bestowed upon him by the blood in his veins. What gives him the right to be this defiant and proud and dangerous, impervious to everything Enji does to try to tame him.
Shouto is going to get into trouble. Something bad is going to happen to him and it might be sooner than later. Enji knows the type of criminal scum who would jump at the opportunity to take advantage, if they found out this truth about his son. His son who is young, and reckless, and begging to be hurt.
He knows the kind of things people of that sort would do with this knowledge.
There are villains in this world, and they wouldn’t restrain themselves.
On a cool, crisp September morning, Enji watches Shouto exercise his ice to the point of exhaustion, and he grinds his teeth.
Eventually, Shouto might go searching. Searching for someone who will touch him – who will give him this pain he seems to crave.
He can’t risk this. He can’t allow it. He can’t allow somebody else to put their hands on his son –
Enji doesn’t allow himself to finish that thought.
“Shouto,” he calls.
In the middle of the courtyard, Shouto stops, a few meters away.
He turns, slowly, his chest rising and falling. His hair and his skin glimmer in the golden sunlight.
His eyes are on Enji.
Enji takes a step closer.
“Shouto,” he repeats. His son’s name is fire on his tongue.
Enji clenches his fists.
“Come here.”