*A few weeks later + Major Cussing Warning*

"Mom?!" Shoto whisper shouted at the frosty-haired woman kneeling at his bedside. Quickly shushing him, Shoto's mother raised her pointer finger and pressed it against her lips as she made a hushing sound.

"Hi honey. I...wasn't able to be there for your first day, so I decided to sneak out and drive you to school today. You just have to get ready quickly because your father will be up soon, and we don't want him to find out I did this, now do we?" A mischievous smirk lifted up the edges of her mouth as she tugged on his arm, signalling for him to get up.

Sighing, and resisting the strong urge to smirk back at his troublesome parent, Shoto quietly climbed out of bed, and waved as Rei Todoroki, his rather cheeky mother, left his room.

'That woman...I swear,' he thought, grabbing a scarlet hoodie with the word, 'Suffer' in big black letters scrawled across the front, black jeans, and red sneakers with black laces, and throwing it all on.

Shoto sneakily made his way from his room with his backpack on his back and down the grand staircase that led from the second floor, where most of the bedrooms were located in his gigantic house, and down to the first, which was where the huge family room, pristine, thousand dollar kitchen, and pool room were.

Rei was standing near the front door in a long, tan coat, a white turtleneck, jeans, and gray boots; way different from the hospital clothes that Shoto last saw her in.

Going up to her and putting his hand on top of hers once it was placed on the handle of the front door, Shoto stopped and started to say,

"Wait mom, before we go, I just want - no, I need to know - how and why did you get out of the facility?"

Rei sighed as she looked at her son, her beautiful, grown up son, and only thought of what she had to say next for a split second.

"You already know why. For you, of course. And you don't need to know how, all that matters is that I'm here...and that I'm sorry I wasn't here sooner." She smiled as her eyes became glassy, memories before the accident flooding her mind and reminding her why she was still alive and breathing. Why she even existed in the first place.

Taken aback by her answer, Shoto stepped back slightly, and looked his mother up and down. He reached up with his right hand and touched the scar that covered his left eye as he stared at her, his own eyes moistening.

Rei slowly walked up to her son, and touched the same red mark that he was and kissed his forehead, resting her face on the red half of Shoto's hair.

The both of them stayed like that, Shoto having no clue as to what he was supposed to do, and Rei just secretly wishing that they could stay like that forever, before the white-haired woman pulled out of their semi-embrace first and went back up to the front door.

"I don't blame you for the first few years that you hated me when you came to visit. In fact, I don't even understand why you don't hate me now. But I'm not going to question your feelings, especially if it means I get to be selfish by hoping that you continue to not hate me for a while," she said, trying to be quiet as she opened the door.

She looked back up at Shoto, and smiled even wider than he had ever seen her smile, and said,

"I love you, Shoto."

Becoming even more stunned that the parent that was supposed to resent him because of his potential, had just confessed her positive feelings for him, Shoto's mouth fell open a bit, his gaping not fazing his mother by the slightest.

"I'll be waiting in the car. We have plenty of time to get there, sweety. So take as much time as you need," said Rei as nodded her head slightly, closing the door behind her and walking out to the car that awaited her out front.

Still feeling lost about the predicament he was in, Shoto shook his head a couple times, trying to get a grip on his emotions and hopefully rein them in. He didn't succeed in the least bit.

He couldn't even get his thoughts together enough to form a coherent enough idea as to how he was supposed to handle everything that was happening.

Sure, his mother was right. Sure, it only took a few years after his mother poured boiling hot water on him that Shoto's hate actually managed to fade away, and be replaced with a certain kind of sadness. Sure, the both of them were on relatively good terms and Shoto didn't hate visiting his mom. But none of that meant Shoto actually knew what he was doing.

I mean, what were the expectations of a kid like him when put in the kind of situations he was?

He loved his mom, and it took him quite a while to realize that fact even after he had started to forgive her, but that didn't necessarily mean that he thought she loved him.

'She just told you she loved you. What else do you need, Shoto?' he asked himself suddenly, surprised at the fact that he had gotten his shit together enough to think something like that.

He didn't have an answer to that question, although. Did he need something more to believe that Rei, who was apparently crazy according to the articles written about her and was supposed to feel nothing towards him, loved him?

He guessed just those simple three words were enough for him, as he realized that he felt no doubt toward her, even with the amount of questioning thoughts he had circling throughout this mind.

Shoto was about to take a step forward, determination clear in his mind, when he felt a small amount of perspiration drip down his chin and onto his neck.

He wiped the wetness from his chin, and studied the salty water present on his fingertips.

As more of the liquid came running down his cheeks, Shoto slightly smiled, silently marveling at how remarkable it was that the people around him were finally getting him to smile so much, at least for him it was a lot, and not stopping the tears from flowing.

'I..love you too, mom.'

^^^^^^^^^^

"Alright class. Today, and only half of it, is your last day to train before you all go on your first official mission. This is no prank, this is no test, it is anything but fake. Prepare yourselves, because we are going to wear you thin today," Aizawa-sensei said, examining each and every one of his students' expressions as he explained.

There were four people that caught his eye, of whom did not seem nervous at all.

Izuku Midoriya. Oh how surprising. Shoto Todoroki. Even more surprising. Katsuki Bakugo. That-that was so unsurprising, Aizawa couldn't even be sarcastic. And Eijirou Kirishima.

Wait...Kirishima wasn't nervous?!

'I'll look into that later,' Mr. Aizawa thought, slamming his hand onto the chalkboard behind him in order to get his bustling class' attention once again.

"Listen up, brats. This is what we're doing today..."

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Izuku sat down heavily on one of the benches inside of the boy's locker room, sweat drenching the training outfit the school gave to him on the first day.

"What? Tired already, Deku?" Bakugo taunted, also plopping down on a bench not that far from where Izuku sat, breathing just as heavily as him with the same amount of sweat, if not more, staining the front and back of his shirt.

"Oh, shut it Katsuki. We all know everyone's tired, not just Midoriya," Shoto defended, sitting on the same seat as Izuku, but with his back facing Izuku's own.

Bakugo scoffed at that, and turned towards his locker that was closer to the ground than the others', opening it and pulling his clothes out so he could go shower.

Shoto shook his head at Katsuki, and went to go wash first, only to turn around and ask if Izuku wanted to go instead.

"Oh no, that okay, Todoroki-kun! You go on ahead!" Shoto hesitated at Izuku's answer, but went to the baths just as told in the end.

As Shoto went to clean himself up, Izuku and Katsuki sat and waited. There were several showers in the locker room, but none of the boys wanted to go at the same time for some unknown reason.

Gulping down his rising anxiety, Izuku decided to break the crushing silence with a shky question.

"So, do you mind telling me why?"

Katsuki stiffly looked up from where he was staring at the floor, and snapped his eyes to Izuku, cocking a brow with a questioning look on his face.

"The fuck you ask me, Deku?!" the ash blonde said, his intense gaze that was lain upon Izuku not letting up.

Izuku squirmed in his spot, but stood his ground in spite of the way he felt.

"I would very much like to know what I did wrong, Kacchan. You hate me and insult me, relentlessly, and I haven't even done anything to deserve it! Please, I...ugh, I just want to know what I did wrong!" Izuku whined, throwing his hands up in frustration as he talked.

Bakugo raises his other brow at this, and his look of curiosity was replaced with one of anger.

"Are you kidding me? Deserve? Do you not hear what you said to me sometimes-"

"You're really going to pull that with me? C'mon, Kacchan. You know that every time I've sassed you or said some sarcastic comment was in response of something rude or mean you said!" Izuku reasoned, waving his right hand in a zigzag like motion to annunciate his point.

Bakugo opened his mouth while his face reddened from rage, but after a few seconds of letting his mouth hang as he thought, he shut it closed with more force than necessary and turned away from Izuku; kind of similar to if a small child were to throw a fit.

The both of them sat in silence as Bakugo carefully thought about what he should say next.

"Why should I tell you what you want to know, huh, nerd?" he asked of Izuku, still refusing to look at him.

Izuku sighed as he turned away from Katsuki as well, opening his mouth, then closing it.

"I just want to know why. That's it. I'll leave you alone, and we don't even have to talk about it ever again if you don't want to! I just...want to know why you treat me like shit," he ended up saying, leaving out all of the disappointment he clearly had out of his voice.

Katsuki hesitated in his response to Izuku's honesty, becoming even more cautious than before.

"So...you won't bring this up if I  tell you what you want to know, Deku?" he asked, the malice that his voice always held when he talked to Izuku slowly draining away as he spoke until there was only a little bit left.

"No. Just tell me why, and I won't bother you anymore," Izuku said, shaking his head in the form of a promise.

Katsuki considered his options at this. He of course, could just turn down Midoriya, as he didn't owe him anything, not even an explanation, but he found himself compelled to tell Izuku what he wanted to know.

Gaining a far away, wistful sort of look within his spelling crimson orbs, Bakugo sighed, and the smallest smirk known to man plasters itself upon his face.

Getting a little impatient at the lack of an answer the ash blonde teenager was supplying, Izuku queried once more,

"Why do you hate me?"

The both of them waited, each of them for different reasons, as Katsuki held onto the truth just a wee bit longer, until he had no choice but to let it go.

"Because...I don't hate you," he said simply.

Put off by what his partner said, Izuku had no words for what he had just heard. Actually, he did, in fact, have many, many words. But they just couldn't make their way to his mouth, and the longer he struggled to register Katsuki's confession, the harder it became for Izuku unclog his throat.

Once he had finally found his voice again, after some long minutes filled with strain, Izuku found himself staring at the older's back.

"What does tha-"

"Your turn, Midoriya," a familiar voice behind him said. Shoto had a towel around his waist and was drying his hair with another, much smaller towel as he sauntered up to his locker and told Izuku to go next.

Not feeling up to finishing his sentence anymore, and suddenly needing hot water to cascade down his body, Izuku hurriedly gathered up his clothes and ran to a random shower in record time.

^^^^^^^^^^^

"Good luck you three, you're gonna need it," one of the three assassin teachers said to the trio as they hopped into the back of a big, black van.

"See ya later, Aizawa-sensei!" Izuku spoke up for the three of them, waving as the door shut the three of them in.

"This is either gonna turn into an absolute shitshow, which is way more likely, or it's gonna end with fucking unicorns and rainbows, which is most definitely not gonna happen," Katsuki thought aloud, suddenly becoming the group pessimist out of nowhere.

"That is not thinking rationally, Kacchan. Yes, things have more of a chance of turning out wrong than right, considering this is our very first mission, but you never know when good fortune will come your way," Izuku counteracted, stating the obvious in a very matter-of-fact like tone.

"Yeah, good fortune my ass. Let's see who ends up being right, which I can already fucking tell you, will be me."

"Mhm, you wish, Kacchan."

About ten minutes later, the van withholding the three boys inside arrived at an average looking apartment complex, only a couple windows shining light through, as it was very late at night, and only a few people were awake.

"Okay you three. This mission is very simple. You go in, you kill the target, and you come back out with the other target. The original one is defenseless for the most part, so if you take longer than necessary, I will go in there to save your asses and report it to the academy, got it?" the driver threatened the three students, a very serious look possessing his face.

"Yeah yeah, we got it Small Dick. Just let us out already," Katsuki replied to the heated driver, his face being one of boredom as he placed his hand on the handle of the door.

Concealing the anger that formed at the bottom of his stomach and started to climb up inside of him at an alarming rate, the driver unlocked the back doors.

"I will let that slide, but only because this is your fir-"

Both car doors slammed close in the middle of his sentence, only increasing his rage even more, and escalating his blood pressure enough to kill someone that wasn't used to it like the driver was.

The trio walked into the building and climbed the stairs that were nearest to the entrance, searching around for the right door until they found it.

"Okay, so all we have to do is infiltrate the apartment, and kill our target. She should be in the bedroom to the left of the door, if I remember what that driver told us on the way here. And if she's the only one there, and as weak as they informed us, only one of us should go inside," Shoto explained to the other two boys next to him, his hand on the handle leading into the apartment and his body only barely leaning against it.

Moving to stand right next to Shoto, Izuku moved him away from the door, and went into the same position he was previously.

"I'll go," was all said as he got a bobby pin from his left pocket and bent down to pick the lock on the door.

"Hah?! No, I'll do it! I wanna kill her!" Katsuki argued, reaching his hand out to push Izuku out of the way, but was stopped when his wrist was grabbed by his friend.

"Just let him do it, Bakugo."

Shoto's expression was cold and held no emotion in it as he commanded Katsuki, the best kind of face you could possibly put on when going out to murder someone.

By the time Todoroki had finished talking, Izuku had already entered the apartment, and started to navigate through the dark area inside of the apartment with as much ease as an actual nocturnal creature would.

Faintly seeing that the kitchen was to the right of him as soon as he walked a few steps, Izuku turned to the left, and saw quite the daunting hallway before him.

'It's alright, Izuku. All you have to do is shoot her and get out of here. Simple. Easy. The opposite of hard,' he reassured himself as he silently made his way down the hall, searching for master bedroom that he imagined his target to be inside of.

Opening every door that he saw in the hallway, Izuku checked for any sign of life, and hit the jackpot on the third door he opened.

He closed the door behind him, and pressed his back against it as he observed the room he was standing in.

A woman was laying in a queen-sized bed to the right of him, while a crib painted white was pushed up against the wall to the left of him, right next to a stained dresser. He could see a sleeping baby occupying said crib, but let his eyes be drawn to the huge bed that took up a lot of the room's space.

He only took one step toward it, when a small voice spoke up.

"I presume you're here to kill me?"

Izuku froze in place, suddenly unable to even breathe because there simply was a voice.

"I have a daughter, y'know. It's not easy being a mother, but I don't regret it one bit. I...don't want my child to grow up without both of her parents, so..." the voice, of which Izuku figured belonged to the woman laying in bed, trailed off.

The woman sat up and blankly stared at Izuku; her puffy, silver locks falling over her shoulders, and seeming to glow in the moon light that shone through the curtains shielding the windows that were surely there, and into her bedroom.

"I understand why you must do it, afterall, I know it's not personal. But I...I-I was hoping you could spare my life for the sake of my daughter, though I am now realizing how stupid that is because you have no choice," she continued, chuckling at the end and moving a strand of her long hair behind her ear.

Izuku decided that it was best for him to stay in place, and, respectfully, wait for her to be ready for him to assassinate her.

The woman flipped the covers off of her, stood up, and walked to the crib that held her precious offspring so that she could pick her up.

She turned to Izuku and waved at him, signaling for him to walk over to her. He did as was told, but still kept a safe distance from her so as not to disturb the now crying baby in her arms further.

She looked at him with her big, beautiful violet eyes, and analyzed Izuku's body and face with a look of kindness on her own, including the weapon that sat snuggly on his hip.

She raised her left hand and softly placed it on his left cheek, rubbing the spot her thumb just so happened to land on over and over again in a motherly fashion.

"You seem like such a kind boy...I almost feel the need to ask why you're in such a horrible position, but I know it's not my place," she murmured, quietly diverting her attention to calming her daughter shortly after she spoke.

Izuku said nothing as he looked back and forth between the mother and daughter that were present before him, and allowed a smile, one filled with remorse and care, onto his face the longer he looked.

The woman looked back at Izuku and stepped a bit closer to him, placing a kiss on his cheek and handing her now content kid to Izuku, him quickly grabbing onto her as if she were a glass vase.

"Please...find her a nice home for her to grow up peacefully in. Please, give her the life she deserves by at least finding the right family...and that'll be enough."

By now, the woman was sobbing quietly, pain being the strongest emotion in her eyes and face.

"I love you...Eri," she whispered to her daughter as she leaned down to place a kiss on her forehead and cheek. Before the woman could sit down on the ground and await her steadily arriving doom, Izuku grabbed her arm, his eyes fleeting across the entire expanse of her face, only to then stare deeply into her hyacinth like orbs with determination.

"Wait...what...before I kill you, what...can you at least tell me what your name is, too?"

The woman smiled, tears still gushing from her eyes at an insane pace, as she gently pulled her arm from Izuku's grip and sat cross legged on the carpeted ground.

"My name is Sabeline Kozuko. But you can call me Sabel. What about you, young man?"

"Izuku. You can just call me Izuku," he says back with zero hesitatance, suddenly getting an idea and leaving the room momentarily.

"Izuku, huh..."

Izuku came back shortly after, having nestled the baby he was given in a small safe haven, where it would be difficult to hear the gunshot.

Setting his hand on the handle of his gun, Izuku took a second to look at the calm woman before him, before taking it out of its holster and pointing it at the middle of her head.

"That baby, my baby...her name, as you heard, is Eri, so in case you ever need to find her..." Sabel informed Izuku, squeezing her eyes closed to help melt her slowly growing nerves away as she talked.

'Eri..'

Izuku nodded his head, and cocked the gun, resting his pointer finger on the trigger as he stared straight at Sabel with the same pain filled eyes she had moments ago.

"It was a pleasure to meet you, miss."

"I could the same about you...Izu."

Izuku pulled the trigger of the gun at that, and it only just registered what Sabeline said to him when her limp body hit the ground, and a piece of Izuku's heart crashed onto the cold floor with her corpse.

Hey guys! Another late and yet long update, how surprising, lol. I hope you guys enjoyed the chap, and I absolutely don't regret all the time skips and sections that my chapters have had so far :D

Also, sorry if it seems like the story is going a bit fast or if things seem rushed at times, it's just how I'm making it to be for the plot, so bare with me please.

Anyways, that's all I have for now, and,
I hope you guys have amazing days/nights/weeks! 🤍❤️🧡💚

-wen_ur_actual_trash
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