#divided-dichotomy

Too slow.

Deku leaps over the attack and lands on the tip before darting down the length of it to close the distance between them, aiming a Quirkless kick square at her temple. Quirkless because he wants to knock her out, not split her skull like a watermelon. The force of it snaps her head to the side-

But she doesn’t go down. In fact, she whips her head back around and bares her teeth up at him in a snarl. Oh, they’re getting tougher, is the last thought Deku has before she digs her fingers into his leg, swings him over her head, and hurls him down the street. He twists in midair to catch himself just as something cold and slippery rises up to meet him halfway, sending him sliding upwards until his momentum runs out.

It’s a ramp. Made of... ice? He blinks in surprise and turns to see which Pro he has to thank for the assist, the words already balanced on the tip of his tongue.

“Hey, thangghkk-?!” Before promptly choking on them as his heart leaps out of his chest straight up into his throat. It’s a reasonable reaction, he’ll argue later, because- standing there innocuously like he’s never been anywhere else? Is none other than Todoroki Shouto.

The same Todoroki Shouto that Izuku hasn’t seen in person for three years. The same Todoroki Shouto who he hasn’t heard from in a month. The same Todoroki Shouto that definitely should not be in the country right now. Izuku would think he’s hallucinating, if it wasn’t for the wicked scar splitting his lip that he doesn’t remember ever seeing there before.

Todoroki is here. Izuku has so many questions to ask, so many things to say to him. His chest feels overcrowded with conflicting emotions all vying for a turn. It’s incredibly distracting. He can’t afford that, not right now when people’s lives are at stake. It’s not fair.

Everything blends together, faded and washed out into varying shades of black and white. It’s easy to unfocus and let everything blend into one massive blob. Sometimes Izuku spends entire days like that, only letting the shades sharpen into defined shapes to murmur the answer to a math problem or process the varying articles he’s taken to reading. 

Some days it’s the worst persistent reminder, because Quirkless kids don’t get soulmates. Quirkless kids see in grey forever because if they have somebody they’re ‘ meant ’ to be with, they either don’t have the affinity to see it biologically or━

Well, he’s heard a lot of things. How a quirkless person can only be soulmates with another quirkless person and there just aren’t that many of those left, and the numbers are dwindling by the day. He’s also heard that soulmates━ and the ability to identify them so clearly━ are passed along with the quirk gene.

(This is the part where he falls into the science end of the wikia; biology, genetics━ is the quirk gene recessive or dominant? Could he have it, recessively, or is he just All Quirkless, All The Way?)

For a few years he latches onto the small accounts he’s seen on the forums, (I’m quirkless and I have a soulmate, her quirk is━) but eventually he settles into unhappy acceptance. He’s quirkless. Even if he has a soulmate, he probably won’t ever meet them. He should really focus on his other unrealistic dream.

Nothing changes, when he meets All Might. Some part of him thought that it would, that━ somehow━ ALL MIGHT would be his platonic soulmate. And why shouldn’t he be? He fixed Izuku. Handed him his dream on a silver platter alongside the training, the mentoring━ All Might was a turning point in his life. THE turning point in his life. But the world was still rigidly grey. Unchanging.

This, Izuku figures, is probably because it’s one-sided. All Might means a lot to him, but he can’t mean as much to All Might. Enough, clearly! Clearly enough for him to continue to train him, to actually give over his quirk rather than ultimately decide that Izuku wasn’t worth it. In some way, Izuku is special to All Might in a way that nobody else is. And that’s enough. It’s just... 

Disappointing.

Where he’d thought the hope of it had completely died out, One For All clearly dug up that something deep inside of Izuku that strives for connection. LONGS for that feeling of rightness that everyone describes. After entering U.A., he thinks he sees flickers of something in the corner of his eye━ something that makes him think there was a change, that maybe he’s seeing something a little different than the monochrome stagnation of day to day (albeit very exciting, path to being a hero!) life━ 

But when he strains his eyes, turns to fix his eyes wherever he thought he saw it, it’s always gone. 

He ignores it. For a while. Maybe it isn’t even happening. Maybe he’s just crazy.

Izuku is in the middle of a very deep conversation when it happens again. He and Todoroki, sitting at the mouth of a tunnel just barely in the shade. Todoroki is telling him a frankly horrifying story about━ well, about him━ when the bi-colored boy shifts into the light and the white hits his scar. Izuku’s fairly sure he can’t even tell, he’s got a few theories about exactly how much Todoroki can actually see out of that eye, but then━

But then Izuku sees something.

The light hits his eye and almost entirely obscures the iris. Maybe Todoroki can see out of that eye, because he moves, and the second that he’s out of the direct sunlight Izuku is SURE━ he’s sure that he sees something different. 

For a split second, Todoroki’s left eye is a vibrant contrast to the grey around it. Izuku doesn’t know what to call it, but he’s pretty sure that it’s a color. A beautiful, beautiful color.

He blinks and it’s gone. 

Izuku’s breath catches and holds and he’s barely paying attention to the last few seconds of what Todoroki’s saying before he walks off. Izuku can’t even muster a response. He’s stunned. He’s shocked still.

By the time their match comes about, Izuku hasn’t quite forgotten about it but he’s made it halfway to convincing himself it was a figment of his fucked up imagination. After his match with Shinsou, he thinks it might have something to do with One For All. Remnants of some other holder’s spirit, maybe, lodged deep inside of him now with the rest of this quirk. He asks All Might━ about the vision he saw, not about the brief flicker of maybe-possibly-color that he saw in Todoroki’s eye━ but All Might doesn’t seem to know anything about it.

Izuku can’t bare to press more on the subject of soulmates. It would be ridiculous. One For All is a borrowed quirk, not his, and underneath that he’s still the same kid he was before. The same quirkless kid.

So by the time he goes up against Todoroki he’s still thinking about it, but he’s already dismissed it. There are more important things to deal with, here, like...

Todoroki, struggling to stand himself up, still saying: “ I will reject my old man’s power━ ”

Oh, he’s had it. “ It’s YOUR power, isn’t it?! ”

All together Todoroki stops, staring━ GAPING at Izuku. And just beneath his split open, vulnerable expression, something blooms. Not just in Todoroki, but... across his skin, through his eyes and his hair, the sky and the stands behind him. Color. Full and vibrant, blinding and indescribable. It flares out from Todoroki, too, in plumes of flames that start as grey-but-not-grey smoke and then the barest licks of flames...

‘Til it’s bursting, vibrantly, brilliantly, beautifully from him. The ice, too, is bright and not quite white but colored too. Just hints and flickers off the curves and points, thousands of colors, all at once...