Chapter Text
Shouto had always known he was going to U.A. Endeavor would never allow for anything but. All the famous heroes went to U.A., so of course Shouto had to go there too if he was going to be the number one hero and surpass All Might. U.A. was just about as inevitable as training. It was going to happen.
He had just never predicted it would be so loud.
Class 1-A had not stopped talking since they arrived. Someone had always been whispering or nudging their friend or communicating or moving. Sound and movement and contact and smells had surrounded him all day long, and now he wanted nothing more than to lie down in his dark, quiet room.
But first he had to get on the train.
Shouto had always disliked trains. There were too many people, crowding and blocking places, standing too close, random accidental touches everywhere. Shouto usually retreated into the labyrinthine sanctuary of his head during train rides, and normally it didn't bother him too much. Today, however, he had been in a train-like situation for so long he felt like he would ice the next person who brushed past him just to keep them from touching him.
Even if he walked, there would still be crowds of noise and endless flutterings. The train was faster, not to mention quieter, and he desperately wanted to be alone in the dark. He would just have to deal with it. He had learned that a long time ago.
Shouto reached home. Fuyumi was home because she taught at an elementary school, and those let out earlier than high schools did.
"How was school?" she asked cheerfully.
Pause. "Fine." That was the expected response, the one that wouldn't worry her. Besides, it had actually been easier than homeschool or training. He just wasn't used to being constantly surrounded by strangers. He would adapt, just as he always had.
"I'm going to my room now," he added.
Shouto wasn't aware he had fallen asleep in the dark and quiet until he was thrown back to reality by the enormous burning hands around his throat. He reacted on instinct, two fingers pressing on Endeavor's hand, another on the inside of his elbow where the nerves ran and pressing in too many places would result in helpless pain.
Endeavor twitched and loosened his grip. Shouto slipped away in just enough time to throw up an ice wall and grant himself two seconds to think. Endeavor simply burned it down, then grabbed Shouto as he tried to retreat further and used the same trick the boy had just used on him. He had taught Shouto everything he knew, after all. Instead of keeping pressure for a few seconds, though, he kept pressing harder and harder, sending Shouto into spasms and blurring his world into nothing but agony. Then he let go and shoved, slamming Shouto's head and back against the wall. He tried to get up, but his body was still twitching and refused to listen to him. Endeavor seized him around the neck again, dragged him to the dojo, and dumped him on the floor where he lay gasping and choking and trying to get himself together again.
"Pathetic," Endeavor scoffed. "A real villain would have killed you."
Endeavor always said that at least three times every training session because Shouto died every single damn time he fought that man. He never accepted excuses, like "I was asleep," or "I feel sick today," or "You are ten times better than I am, I can't possibly beat you." Eventually Shouto had stopped voicing them. He had gotten used to that. He could get used to this.
The next day of school, they did battle trials with All Might. They were divided into hero and villain teams, the heroes having to retrieve a (likely fake) bomb and the villains having to defend it. It was stupidly easy. His partner was Shouji, the boy with lots of arms, but he barely did anything because Shouto just froze the building and walked in. He wondered vaguely how angry Ojirou's and Hagakure's trainers would be when they found out they had failed this badly. Endeavor would have given him about six hours of hell, but he had the suspicion that other people's trainers had low standards.
Despite being easy, school was still tiring. He went home and laid down, though he made sure to set an alarm for ten minutes before that man got home. He didn't want a repeat of yesterday. Part of adapting was figuring out what not to do.
Shouto let his mind drift aimlessly in a pleasant haze until the calming silence was shattered by the irritating buzzing of his phone. He checked the time, even though he already knew what it was, then got up and went and sat in the dojo to wait for his father, just as he usually did.
Endeavor swept through the door in a whirl of flame. Shouto stood from his cross-legged position and faced his father across the room.
"Tell me what you did today," Endeavor demanded. Shouto told him as many details as he could remember about the battle trials, everyone else's as well as his own. Endeavor had done this yesterday, too, so it would probably become routine.
"Let's see how you would have fared against an opponent who could weaken your ice attacks. Start stretching," Endeavor growled. Shouto translated that to "use your goddamn fire for once."
They finished stretching, and Shouto froze the room, just as he had done in the battle trials. Predictably, Endeavor vaporized the ice binding his feet to the floor. Shouto sent more ice his way, trying to freeze him faster than he could melt. He had never managed that yet, even though he had tried over and over. In theory, if Endeavor got cold enough, he wouldn't be able to produce fire, just as Shouto couldn't. It would be much easier, though, to raise the temperature past what he could stand and let him get hotter and hotter and burn to death in his own flames, how satisfying it would be to watch that face glaze over with heat and curl into ash...
Shouto focused his energy on freezing. He would never use his fire, especially not to hurt someone, because then he would be just like the shithead he called a father, even if the person he wanted to hurt was said shithead.
Endeavor took no heed of Shouto's ice and slammed him to the floor, his hand pressing over the boy's face, smashing his nose and covering his mouth so he could only suck in small trickles of breath. Shouto grabbed his wrist and stabbed it through with icicles, but it didn't help. Blood ran down into Shouto's mouth as he tried to inhale. The hand pressed him harder into the ground, so hard it felt like his head would burst from the pressure.
Ice erupted from Shouto's side, slamming into Endeavor and throwing him across the room. Shouto scrambled to his feet, wiping his father's blood out of his mouth as he did so. He was immediately hit by a wall of fire. It danced along his skin and burned in his eyes, drying them out and blinding him with swirling orange. Endeavor was behind him then, pinning the boy against him and smothering him in fire. Shouto couldn't move in more than a futile wiggle, so he tried to concentrate on cooling himself. He was resistant to fire, but even so, he was burning.
Okay. He accepted the burning. He didn't care that he was on fire. He could just burn. It didn't matter. He was safe in his head.
He started thinking about ice spreading along his arm. He could feel it appear, even if his vision was still full of flames. He launched it backwards at Endeavor and heard the hissing of steam. That man didn't let go of him, so he assumed his ice had been melted. What he was breathing now was very little oxygen and lots of smoke and plasma. His body couldn't stand that much longer. His lungs would burn up and stop working, and then he would die from lack of air. Despite the knowledge of his imminent doom, he was weirdly clear headed.
Endeavor must be suffocating, just as he was. Or maybe he had cleared the space around his head of flames and left himself an oxygen bubble that would last much longer than Shouto could. Either way, this would work.
Shouto shot a pillar of ice from beneath his feet, forcing himself upward and slamming his head into Endeavor's chin. Endeavor grunted in pain, then wrapped one hand over Shouto's face and sent a burst of fire down his throat. Shouto started coughing, gasping desperately when he could only inhale more flames. Damn it,he wasn't ready to die yet. But his body gave him no choice.
Shouto hurt. A lot. The skin on his face was raw and tender from burns. He painfully opened his bleary, weeping eyes.
Oh. He was in the dojo. He had passed out.
"Pathetic. You'll die before you can achieve anything," Endeavor scoffed. He kicked Shouto in the ribs, sending lightning pain up his side. "Get up."
Shouto got up as quickly as his stupid, slow body would let him. Sometimes he wished he had a different body, one that wasn't crippled so easily by pain, one that didn't mirror Endeavor.
"Your left side is unsightly..."
He threw that memory away and resisted the urge to cover his scar. Even if he couldn't see quite as well out of his left eye, he still didn't dare cover it in front of Endeavor during training.
Endeavor made him fight for two and a half hours, and as usual Shouto lost every time. Finally Endeavor released him. They left the dojo and went to go eat dinner, which Fuyumi had been keeping warm for a while. Natsuo wasn't there because he lived in his college's dorms and rarely visited when Endeavor would be home. Mom lived in a psychiatric ward. Fuyumi was more than old enough to move out, but she had chosen to stay. Shouto wanted to leave and live on his own, but even then he suspected he would be doomed to be Endeavor's little puppet forever. Fuyumi didn't have that fate.