Finally gonna post these drawings LOL. Been working on them on and off for the past year or something crazy. Some snippits illustrated of my absolute favorite Tododeku fic,Sore Must Be the Storm!
I would do a reincarnation!AU story
for that! And I would pick Boku no Hero Academia, and TodoDeku, because it’s
the only fandom I haven’t done Reincarnation!AU for at all (yet).
BONUS FIRST LINES:
Their last ending was a tragic one,
which is something Todoroki can’t stop thinking about this time around.
And it’s different, he knows it’s
different, because it’s a different era entirely. The whole of society is
different now, the hero-system is different now, there is a whole support
network for Heroes that just didn’t exist the last time they were alive.
But he keeps thinking about the
similarities, and he keeps getting caught up in those details.
The last time they were alive, they
were both heroes.
(Will always be heroes, Todoroki
thinks. It’s in Midoriya’s very nature. That won’t change, no matter how many
lifetimes they live.)
But it was when people were just
discovering they had Quirks, and more to the point, it was before Heroes knew
what they were doing. There was a kind of lawlessness in those times, and more
often than not, the villains were the ones with all the power.
They’d both died the last time. But
Midoriya had died first.
Todoroki thinks about that a lot
this time around, especially when Midoriya ends up in the hospital again.
A/N: Woo that turned into a mini-fic. That is
how much I love Reincarnation AUs. Aaand with that, I should be done with all
submitted fic titles! Huzzah!
After the Fall of All Might, it
doesn’t actually seem all that important to worry about his love life.
In fact, at that point, nothing much
seems important. Todoroki just privately decides he’s not going to try to
discuss the matter with Midoriya anymore. Too many other things were occupying
both of them, so it just doesn’t seem like something that even matters anymore.
The world seems different, anyhow.
Now that All Might is no longer the number one hero, now that it was revealed
so publicly that All Might was no longer as strong as he used to be, the world
is a very different place then it was, and everything just seems small in
comparison.
Which is why it comes somewhat as a
surprise when Midoriya seeks him out.
*
Todoroki hadn’t put that much
thought into what it would mean that they all live on campus now. Just another
part of the world that has changed, post-Kamino Ward. All things considered,
it’s a very minor thing compared to all the other changes
But apparently it means that it can
be ten o’clock at night, and Midoriya can knock on his door, and then they can
be alone in Todoroki’s bedroom and that, all of the sudden, feels like a very
big change.
“I, um, know we haven’t talked.
About the whole—” Midoriya starts, and he looks embarrassed and flustered and
maybe like he doesn’t want to be having this discussion.
And if Midoriya doesn’t want to have
this discussion, Todoroki doesn’t want to make him. “It’s alright,”
Todoroki says. “If you don’t want to talk about it, we don’t have
to.”
How is the soulmate conversation supposed to go? In movies or dramas, the
couple realizes they’re soulmates, becomes very teary-eyed, and then they
embrace artfully on screen. In real life, surely it must be more awkward than
that. During one Sports Festival, Midoriya went from rival classmate to
destined soulmate, and that would have been a difficult transition to make
under any situation. Now, Todoroki is thankful for the opening of friendship,
and he’s not sure what else was supposed to happen.
"Or if you’re in love
with someone else—”
“N-no! That’s definitely not
it! I don’t—I mean, I guess I never really thought much about—love or
anything like that,” Midoriya says, flailing his hands and blushing
slightly. “It’s just—” he takes in a deep breath, and Todoroki once
again feels bad.
“You don’t really have to do
this,” Todoroki says, not sure what “this” is but wanting to do
everything he could to make Midoriya feel better, “We can still keep—”
“I might not be your
soulmate,” Midoriya blurts out.
Todoroki blinks. This wasn’t at all
what he expected Midoriya to say. “I am not an expert, having just the
one, but I’m pretty sure you are,” Todoroki says quizzically. “I know
I’m new at this—”
He breaks off, all of the sudden
remembering that he’s only sensed Midoriya’s Quirk since before school started,
and how that’s not usually how it goes, with soulmates, unless Midoriya had
just been born a couple months ago.
Or if he just got a Quirk a couple
months ago.
“I—wasn’t supposed to talk
about this. I promised I wouldn’t. But, the thing is, I did just get my Quirk
recently. It’s not exactly mine. Which made me wonder if, perhaps, that
meant you weren’t my soulmate, either. Not mine, that is.”
There’s a lot not being said with
that statement. But it is perhaps not as confusing as it would have been if
Midoriya had talked to him right after the Sports Festival. Now, Todoroki has a
lot more context for things he didn’t know were possible, previously. Like the
idea that Quirks could be taken away, or that Quirks could be put into
monsters, and he thinks about how he always thought Midoriya’s Quirk was a lot
like All Might and—
“All Might is not my
soulmate,” Todoroki says, closer to hysteria than he’s ever been before.
“No, no, no,” Midoriya
says, “Although, ahh, no, All Might agreed, but he didn’t know—he really
didn’t know what it meant. That I found you, that is. He said he never felt
like he had a soulmate, and that’s not how—how it works. He said the Quirk is
mine, now, but he wasn’t sure how soulmates factored into that, and I thought a
lot about that, and it just seemed like maybe it would be wrong to let you believe I was your soulmate, when we
weren’t sure if that was the case, especially if we couldn’t
prove otherwise. So I wanted you to know that. I didn’t want you feeling—stuck
with me.”
Todoroki still has no idea what is
going on, but he feels like he shouldn’t ask. If Midoriya made a promise to All
Might, then whatever is going on with their Quirks isn’t something Todoroki
should ask about.
But the way Midoriya says that—st
uck with me—his self-deprecating laugh and nervousness, it all makes it
seem like Midoriya is thinking that Todoroki doesn’t want Midoriya
to be his soulmate, and that’s crazy. Our entire class visited you in the
hospital. Not our other three injured classmates, every single person in our
class decided, “I have to visit Midoriya.” You were broken beyond
imagination and Kirishima still thought you could find a solution to save his
friend, and you did, you did. Iida and Yaoyaozuri created an
impossible situation, “rescue Bakugou without using your Quirks” and you found
that solution. You saved me with just three words.
It seems impossible to think anyone
wouldn’t want to be Midoriya’s soulmate.
“It doesn’t matter,”
Todoroki says, causing Midoriya to flinch, and Todoroki knows he’s doing this
wrong. “Whether or not you’re my soulmate, I mean. I still like you. I
would still like you even if we weren’t soulmates.”
“Oh,” Midoriya says,
wide-eyed and unsure.
And since the only thing seems to be
to prove it—and they are alone in Todoroki’s bedroom—Todoroki leans
forward and kisses Midoriya on the lips, since he figures he’s better with
actions then words anyway.
Midoriya promptly turns completely
red and falls to the floor, so Todoroki is not entirely sure he did the right
thing.
“Todoroki-kun!” Midoriya
says.
“I like being friends,”
Todoroki says quickly, if that’s what Midoriya wants then he’s happy with that.
“And if we’re not soulmates, then I still want to date you. But if you
don’t, then being friends was always enough.”
“Oh,” Midoriya says again.
He’s still red (and still on the floor) but he says, “I didn’t know that
was an option. Dating. I’m not entirely sure how to do that.”
“Me neither,” Todoroki
says. “But I think we can figure it out.” Midoriya definitely can, at
any rate. If there’s one thing Todoroki is confident on, it’s that Midoriya
Izuku can figure out anything.
A/N: The end!! I think I’m done =D
Thanks to the readers! It will be up on ao3 in it’s entirety soon!!
Thanks
to everyone reading!
Part One, Two, Three, Four, Five, Six, and Seven! Sorry for the long post, just really wanted to finish it up =)
Absolutely! Sorry for the delay, Anon. I have a cold and am a lot slower at basically everything, writing included, right now. I’m going to try to play catch up a bit today and tomorrow though~
Shouto goes everywhere with Izuku. This isn’t because he doesn’t trust Izuku, it’s just the nature of their lives at this point. Yuuei decided to keep their dorm program even though the war is over. Being neighbors with Izuku, sharing classes with Izuku, having mostly the same friends, and spending time together in the common area. There isn’t much that Shouto and Izuku don’t do together and Shouto has to admit that it’s nice. He feels lighter, somehow, when Izuku is around and Izuku always has this special smile just for him. This is the closest to happy and content that Shouto’s been for a very long time.
Maou Ryuushin is a bit of a snag in Shouto’s otherwise content life. He’s a grade below them, wide eyed and bushy tailed and completely obsessed with Izuku. He’s tall enough to loom, produces water from his mouth that freezes on impact with objects, and he pops up at Izuku’s elbow all the time. Izuku smiles at Maou, because of course he does, and it makes Shouto feel sick and dark whenever he thinks about it for too long.
Maybe Shouto is being ridiculous. He lets it get so bad that he grandstands his power in front of an underclassman, making it quite clear where he and Izuku stand with each other and where Maou stands in relation to that; which is nowhere. He’s embarrassed by his own actions and Izuku forgives him, Izuku always forgives him. Shouto is content to think that now that Maou knows that Izuku is taken that he will be free of the constant irritation that is Maou’s presence.
He, apparently, underestimated Maou.
Shouto cuts back across campus in the fading light of sunset after running some forms to the administration building for Snipe. He spots Izuku a little ways ahead and the warm happiness that usually settles in his chest at the sight of his boyfriend is put on hold because Izuku is talking to Maou. They’re alone, a backdrop of orange-red trees and mood lighting, and Shouto isn’t stupid enough to not recognize the romance of the moment. Kirishima cried last week at a movie that had a scene just like this.
That hot, sick, darkness is back in Shouto’s gut. He’s frozen mid step, watching the scene play out like a horror movie.
Maou leans over Izuku’s shorter frame and says something that makes Izuku laugh. The wind picks up and shakes a few leaves from the trees. Izuku bundles a little deeper into his hoodie. His curls are tousled everywhere by the wind and Maou reaches a long fingered hand towards Izuku’s face, to brush one out of Izuku’s eyes like Shouto does sometimes.
Shouto moves, he has to move. It’s like when he sees a villain about to strike, slow motion with nothing but the sound of Shouto’s heart beating. He barely gets a few steps, he won’t make it in time. He’s not sure why he has to, he just knows that he does. Maybe it’s irrational but some small part of him that sounds like his father still tells him that if Maou touches Izuku in a situation like this that Izuku could fall in love with Maou Ryuushin. Shouto doesn’t know what he’s supposed to do if that happens.
He doesn’t make it. He doesn’t have to.
Izuku moves, fast as green lighting. His hand shoots up and catches Maou’s wrist before Maou can touch him. There’s something hard in Izuku’s expression, hard like when Izuku killed All for One, and Shouto’s body and mind automatically react to the danger that Izuku must be facing. It’s only lasts an instant, barely a glance, before Izuku lets Maou go and steps back. His face is serious but not so serious that Shouto panics.
“-not really interested, sorry Maou-kun.” Izuku is saying as Shouto gets into hearing range.
“I don’t want to accept that,” Maou says.
“Please try,” Izuku says, gentle and yet firm.
Shouto stops only a few meters behind Maou. “Izuku.”
Maou stiffens. Izuku looks at Shouto and smiles that soft smile that’s just for him. “Shouto.”
“Are you ready to go?” Shouto asks, unable to stop himself from glancing at Maou’s back. “Satou and Bakugou are having their bake-off today.”
Izuku’s face goes slack and then brightens in excitement. “That’s right, I forgot.” With that, Izuku walks. He passes Maou right by and walks to Shouto’s side and Shouto’s chest feels warm.
“Midoriya-senpai,” Maou calls, turning quickly. Izuku glances over his shoulder at Maou and Shouto can’t stop his glare. “I’m not going to give up.”
“You really should,” Izuku says. He sounds annoyed. He rarely sounds as annoyed as he sounds now. “I’m not going to change my answer.”
With that Izuku leads the way back to their dorms, muttering the entire time about guys who won’t take no for an answer. With every word Shouto feels himself relax back into contentment.
Ho boy Anon this is a doozy of a prompt, very full of long fic potential. Also tragic as hell. I mean, I’m not gonna go for broke with the angst but I’m not going to shy away from it either. Hopefully this is something like what you were looking for. I’m sorry about this, by the way. It kinda meanders about and reads like a prologue.
Todoroki Shouto met Midoriya Izuku at the tail end of spring during the heart of the decade where magic became a myth. When they first met Shouto was older than Izuku. Not by a lot, just by a few years. That didn’t stop Shouto from falling for Izuku, for his smile and his bravery and his selflessness. For Shouto, Izuku is the brightest star.
Time, though, has no hold on witches. Izuku had understood from the beginning. The world of magic was dying out from public memory but Izuku accepted it as part of Shouto anyway. For a while, life was wonderful. Shouto would make sculptures of living ice in the summer for Izuku to marvel at and in the winter the fires would dance at his word. In their house the dishes do themselves, mirrors double as secret passageways, and the basement gives you whatever you ask for as long as you’re polite. Izuku never lost his childlike wonder at all things magical, at all things Shouto, even as his hair streaked gray and his freckles became harder to see thought the wrinkles.
Izuku grows old and Shouto stays a young man, forever twenty-three. Izuku calls him a miracle.
Magic is still as thick in the air as ever but with few and fewer people attuned to it Shouto finds himself unique where he was once one of many. Izuku’s right knee becomes weak, sometimes giving Izuku so much trouble he struggles to walk. Shouto watches Izuku deteriorate and he wishes that he had the skills to fix it, to make it painless. Shouto is not that kind of witch and once upon a time he knew someone who was but they were burned away. Izuku starts to age, starts to say things like “when I die you should get a pet so you’re not lonely”, and Shouto is gripped by fear. He starts looking for a witch that can turn back time on Izuku, that can make him young again.
He finds no such witch. He keeps looking away.
“Have you talked to your mortal about this?” Asks Nedzu when Shouto finds him. He’s an old man, tiny and wrinkled, but Shouto knows better. As old as he looks Nedzu is actually much older and much more powerful.
“I did,” Shouto admits.
“And what did he say?”
Shouto wrings his hands. “He said that he doesn’t want to live forever, that cheating death will do more harm than good to him in the long run.”
Nedzu chuckles. “He’s right, you know. Mortal bodies can’t take the strain.”
“Then what am I supposed to do?” Shouto demands.
Nedzu eyes him, tiny black eyes under large white eyebrows. “You could try letting him go.”
Shouto looks away. “That’s not possible.”
Nedzu sighs. “Young love is so earth-shattering. What are you, two hundred years old? You’ll fall in love many more times, young Todoroki.”
“I’d burn myself away without Izuku,” Shouto says and Nedzu falls quiet enough that Shouto looks back at him. The old man looks serious.
“There is a way. It’s not very wise, though, and completely irreversible.”
“Anything,” Shouto says.
“You’d even kill your mortal?” Nedzu asks and Shouto is taken aback.
“What?”
“The process will kill him,” Nedzu says, “but I can help you link his soul to yours. He will always return to you, across time and space and death itself. I cannot guarantee that he will love you, only that you will share your fate with him.”
Shouto hesitates, but only for a second. Killing Izuku once pales in comparison to the horror of existing in a universe without him. Shouto imagines Izuku, strong and passionate and kind, disappearing for good from the world and finds the strength to say, “Okay.”
Nedzu sighs. “Young love is so earth-shattering. Let me draw up a list of supplies and you can return to me when you’ve gathered them all, but you must return before your mortal dies. If he dies on his own there’s nothing I can do.”
Shouto nods, Nedzu grows a list from the bamboo plant in his living room, and then it’s a race against the clock. Some ingredients are easy, Shouto is a witch after all. His garden already has a lot of the herbs and his basement can conjure up some of the creature parts. Other things, though, are hard. Izuku’s blood is probably the hardest, not because it’s hard to get but because it’s hard to get without Izuku asking any questions. Shouto doesn’t want to tell him what he’s doing, doesn’t want to hear Izuku’s objections. He doesn’t want Izuku to change his mind.
Finally Shouto brings the ingredients to Nedzu and the old witch gets to work. Shouto hovers anxiously, doing everything he’s asked promptly. In the end, Shouto sits in Nedzu’s back yard in front of a dish of water, still and reflective as glass, within which Izuku sleeps. His hair is nearly white now and his chest rattles with snores he didn’t used to make. Shouto watches him, perfectly still as Nedzu paints a script on Shouto’s chest in Izuku’s blood and runs the herb mixture down from it to the wedding ring on Shouto’s finger. Shouto breathes slowly and Nedzu pulls a spike made of moonstone and jade from the earth. He positions the point of it carefully over Shouto’s heart.
“Ready?” Nedzu asks. “Once this is done we can’t take it back.”
Shouto breathes out and watches Izuku sleep in their bed through the scry. “Yeah.”
Nedzu starts the chant. Izuku blinks awake as though he can hear it.
“Forgive me,” Shouto whispers to him and Nedzu drives the spike into his heart.
It hurts, of course it hurts. It burns through his blood vessels, curling around inside him until he thinks he might die from it, and someone screams. It might be Shouto, it might be Izuku, and the sound of it knocks Shouto out.
He comes to only a few minutes later, slumped over on the grass. Nedzu drinks tea under the setting moon ten feet away, completely unconcerned.
“Did it work?” Shouto croaks.
“I would call it a success, yes,” Nedzu says, eyes falling to Shouto’s left hand.
Shouto looks down to his ring to see it sparkling unnaturally in the moonlight, as if it’s been dusted in a very fine glitter.
“Izuku?”
“Is being born again somewhere as we speak,” Nedzu says. “Congratulations.”
goes to her knees in the mud of Pelennor Fields, and rises up a Queen—split lip and still reeling, blinking up at
Eldwyn
as though it will somehow change what she has become.
He touches the crown of her head with his hands, and says, “I am sorry. I pray it is enough.”
It is. It isn’t. It is both. Théoden is dead and Éomer lost, never to wake from the feverish sleep of a Black blade, there is only her. She is all Rohan has left, and Éowyn wonders if they are glad of it, her decision to ride for Minas Tirith instead of throwing in her lot with the other women.
(At the very least, it makes the coronation easier. She is there, in the mud, already. No need to send for a man, her hair falls over her shoulders in a cascade of Rohirric
gold.)
Still—Aragorn looks at her oddly when she strides into the Merethrond wearing the shield and helm of
Eorl, the Horse-lords’ sigil painted in flaking gold on her breast.
“You called,” she says, taking her place at the Council-table without so much as a by-your-leave. “And the Oath of Eorl is fulfilled in me.”
In Gondor, they call her names after some creature of their mythological past—Health, or something like. They have a tendency to do that, she’s learned, Gondor is so in love with its own stories.
In Rohan she is only Éowyn, Queen,
daughter of Éomund.
(It also keeps her from becoming too proud, the knowledge that most of Edoras remembers her running shiftless through the Meduseld, shrieking at Éomer to give her back her poppet.)
She becomes close with Faramir, son of Denethor, in wake of Pelennor—they are both thrust, an ill-prepared, into a role they had not expected to play. After all, she was three persons removed from Rohan’s crown, and he was the younger brother of the immortal, burning Warden of the White Tower; neither of them had ever imagined being here.
“I will miss you most,” she says stiffly, once it all has calmed, and the Men of Rohan are free to return to their plains and stables. Faramir, son of Denethor, smiles in a way that makes the light of him shine through. Her chest aches. “I as well,” he says, and she is grateful for the pace Winfrith sets as they ride for the border after, the wind dashing her tears away.
They greet her with—only slightly less joy than they might have greeted her uncle, and Éowyn rides through the streets she knows well, touching hands and murmuring thanks and thinking, you are Rohan’s now, you are King of the Mark, earn it. Deserve it.
Being King is slightly less tedious than being the King’s niece, if only because they must listen to her now. She holds counsel, so when they mutter to one another and complain about her unwomanliness, she is already there. She may glare at them, pointedly, until they stop.
The news from Minas Tirith comes late, and piecemeal—she doesn’t hear about Aragorn riding for the North until they are on her doorstep.
“King Dernhelm,” Aragorn says, embracing her like a king instead of bowing to a queen. Éowyn laughs and kisses his hands, calling him Royal Elf-fucker in Rohirric. (She’s not sure he understands, but more than one of her men suddenly erupt into coughing fits, so that’s enough.)
“Why are you riding north, Aragorn?” she asks. The welcome feast is burning itself out, and Meduseld is almost dark; only
Éowyn and Aragorn remain. Two kings—alike in dignity, and equally conflicted about who they are to be now. (Aragorn is a Ranger-king, and she is a Shieldmaiden-queen, they understand one another, this way.)
“My people have suffered,” he said, sounding morose—she could have guessed he’d be graven, once the drink got to him. “The darkness in the East is only one enemy, there is—old darkness, that lingers still in the North. I must protect my people.” “All of Gondor are your people now,”
Éowyn said quietly, murmuring mostly to the mug of beer she lifted to lips. (Aragorn is High King, but in a way she understands him—Rohan is her people, still, no matter how longingly she thinks of the warfront, of Minas Tirith where the news comes from.)
Afterwards, she foists him onto one of his second-lieutenants, or—something like it, a Gondorian soldier with soft grey eyes, who assures her he will get the High King back to his bed. “Take care,” Éowyn says, “he is my friend.”
(She is surprised—lying in bed, staring up at the plaster ceiling, chewing on her lower lip—to find it is true.)
“Do you ever regret it?” Aragorn asked as they departed, his head tipping forward heavily—it might have been the leftover of his drinking, if there hadn’t been so much shame in his eyes.
Regret, that was a better word. So much regret.
And Éowyn thought of Faramir, son of Denethor, who was dark and fair both, and she thought of Eomer, her brother, who might have been king in her place, and she thought of Aragorn, King to Come, who was more a story than anything else. More than a person.
Except where he cared for Northmen above all else, despite himself. That was real, she suspected, if only because it was so inconvenient to his overall political goals.
The Director leans forward over her desk, her face drawn and intent. “So I suppose you’re wondering why I called you three in h–”
“Actually, Madam Director,” Taako interrupts, “I’m wondering how you got this lavender tea so right.”
The Director blinks. “I simmer the lavender blossoms in a saucepan with water and honey, because I’m not a fucking barbarian. Twenty minutes, dash of vanilla, the whole thing. Anyway–”
“It’s good tea,” Merle pipes up.
“Thanks, Merle. So–”
“Hold up, hold up. Holllld up.” Taako actually raises his hand. “How– okay, I mean, what the hell, that’s exactly how I make lavender tea, how’d you know?”
“I know everything, I’m the Director.”
“Are you spying on us?” Magnus says, suddenly interested.
“I can, uh, no, I can’t confirm that, or, deny, that horrific breach of employer-employee confidentiality. I probably just know that stuff because of all the cool superpowers you get when you’re in charge of a secret moon-based operation.”
Merle waves his hand enthusiastically. “Hey, what’s tattooed on my butt!”
“Kenny Chesney, which I know on account of you came into my actual office with your whole entire ass hanging out.”
“It was like three quarters, max,” Magnus says. “Hey, what’s my favorite tea?”
“You think tea is for chumps.”
“I do,” Magnus says, earnestly pleased.
“Does anyone have any non-tea related questions?”
Merle waves his hand again. “Do you know about our secret st—“
“Taped under Magnus’s bed. Yes.”
“Aw,” Magnus says to his tea.
“For someone with such extensive woodworking proficiency, I really thought you’d have, like, a secret drawer somewhere,” the Director says thoughtfully.
“Hey, taped under the mattress is a classic,” Taako says.
“It’s very, mm, very college hijinks, reminiscent, very Animal House.”
“Bullshit, you never watched Animal House,” Merle says.
“I may— I might have. You don’t know.”
“Name one— name one scene! Just one! Gimme a quote!”
“I don’t have to, because I’m your boss. Can I get back to telling you about your new incredibly important mission to save the whole— basically the whole entire world, already, or do you want to waste more time playing Fantasy fucking Trivia?”
The three Reclaimers look at each other, and then Taako uses mage hand to pour himself more lavender tea.
“What’s Merle’s favorite tea?” he asks, grinning, and the Director drops her face into her hands.
“Chamomile,” she says, in the grave, sorrowing tones of one who must bear the unbearable, year after thankless fucking year. “He thinks it’s sexy.”
just moving along like everyone else 