skin and bone.

this is a nonprofit work of fanfiction. my character and plot belong to me. I do not own the My Hero Academia franchise, nor am I affiliated with Kohei Horikoshi.

chapter two.

stratus

In a meaningless past, "the aunt" was named Sasaki Mori. She was a woman of hard work and strong morals, admired by her peers, who said she would grow to do something great. She enjoyed cold weather and complex math equations. She dyed her hair different colors every month, and never grew it long. She was a woman of subtle beauty, the kind you would only find if you glanced twice.

She and her twin sister where connected at the hip, despite their pronounced differences; Mori had patience where her sister was hot-headed, Mori held grudges while her sister was ever-forgiving. And so, they pranced through life as all teenagers did, tipsy after parties and dancing in the trunk of someone's worn down truck, dreaming about the hero world with starry eyes and snarky grins. Then her sister met Akihisa Daiji, a man with hardened gaze and a heart that could only be warmed by pure kindness at its finest. They were perfect for each other. The wedding was perfect. Everything was perfect.

Then suddenly, it wasn't.

Mori didn't know what had happened. But the birth had sent stern, polite, hard-headed Daiji into a spiraling fit of madness, wasting away on street corners, drunk off his mind, slurring words about bastard children and reminiscing of a woman with long golden hair and seafoam eyes. Mori didn't want to get involved. But it was her sister's child, the woman who wore boot cut jeans like they were still in style, sang awful pop songs at the top of her lungs, half-smiling with lollipops hanging off her tongue—her sister's child. So she had to. She had to.

"Your sister had a hair growth quirk, like you, right?" the police officer inquired, "And the husband could replenish his own bone marrow..shame he wasted away like that. Poor lad."

Mori nodded along.

"She'll be taking your last name," The man stated in uncaring monotone, flipping to a new sheet on his clipboard languidly.

Mori shifted in the metal chair. There wasn't much else to say, so the officer left the room and she sat there, waiting.

When the door creaked open again, a toddler trotted in with a half-lidded stare—the unmistakable patter of tiny feet, followed by a light sigh; A mess of earthy tresses, russet eyes, peering up beneath heavy bangs and angled brows.

(Sorano looks just like her father.)

"You're my aunt?" She asked, face smooth and plain.

"Yes." Mori managed a smile, standing swiftly. The chair squeaked against the flooring when she stood. Sorano watched mutely.

"Are you hungry?" Mori asked carefully, stretching out a hand for the young girl to take. Sorano only stared at her palm with puzzled eyes, so Mori let it drop to her side, a pang of something awful in her heart. "Let's go to the lobby. They have some pastries there."

Sorano followed behind her, tottering weakly on unstable legs, so much so that Mori had to slow her pace in overwhelming pity. The bustle of the police station was a quiet murmur in the background, with the occasional beep ringing from the front desk as the receptionist picked up a call. There were muffins stretched on platters, sugar crusted on the tops, crumbs scattered on the stained tablecloth.. Sorano only watched as Mori took a paper plate, unwrapped the plastic paper in which the muffin was held, and crouched down to hand it to her, only for the toddler to gaze down at it blankly. Mori gestured for her to take it, but Sorano ignored the pastry and lifted her gaze, staring Mori deep in the eyes with tight lips and taunt cheeks.

"Papa didn't like me very much," Sorano mentioned; her expression was carefully mild, subdued. "I don't think you will, either."

Mori froze in place, the paper dishware almost slipping from her grasp.

"Now why would you think that?" she wondered anxiously; her voice trembled near the edges, despite it's facade of soft, child-like innocence.

Sorano took the plate from Mori's shaking fingers with the gentle care only a four year old child could muster.

"You've got rain clouds in your eyes, too."

Sorano's voice was soft, Mori had noticed. Sorano's voice was soft, and it could've been pretty if not for the slight rasp near the edges, as if at one point she had screamed so loud something had been permanently damaged in her throat. Mori didn't like thinking about that.

She didn't like thinking about anything, anymore; she started losing customers, making more mistakes, trimming too much or too little, distracted by the beady eyes peering in through the doorway.

At some point, Mori stopped being able to tell if Sorano was there, watching her every move as the scissors clipped and snipped. That scared her the most—but in being scared, she was also ashamed, guilty, poignant.

(Her sister's killer is a child.) Sorano was a small thing, with lethal weapons inside of her. It was so unfair, Fuck, it was disgusting . But Mori couldn't get angry—no, her sister was the temperamental one. Mori was patient; Mori was the neighborly, rational, easy-going one who cheered from the sidelines, who was always there to help. So the anger was shoved away, and what were left were tears.

"I'm sorry," Sorano murmured, her eyes downcast. "I dropped it."

She handed the picture frame over, its edges dented, the glass cracked. There were fingerprints on the glass, like little rabbit prints in snow.

"I tried to fix it. I'm sorry."

Over the crack was a haphazardly placed band-aid, a little crinkled, as if it had been stuck and peeled off multiple times in different spots in an indecisive manner. The fingerprints around it were smeared, but lighter than the rest, tumbled together with tender care.

(Her sister's killer is a child.)

Her tears had overflowed that day, and as always, Sorano only watched.

The creature in her shoe locker does not stir.

Wings mangled and broken, covered in dirt, once shimmery silver hues now unrecognizable. Its feathers are bent and broken at hazardous angles, as if it had been driven into the earth at alarming velocity. Dried blood clumps on its beak; it is silent, marble eyes unseeing.

Sorano cups the bird in her palms, brings it to her chest. When she exhales, her breath causes minute shifts in its feathers, as if teasing her. The quiet chatter of students mingling in the hallways around her is distant, little flickers of jokes and laughter, off and on. The gentle daylight sweeps in through the open doors, waiting.

Sorano presses a gentle finger to its rust-stained breast, noting the dirt clumped in her nails. There is no heartbeat to be felt, no pulse of blood beneath her fingertips.

"I'm sorry." Sorano whispers, but it's carried away by the breeze drifting in through the windows. She watches the creature with half-lidded eyes, suddenly overtaken by a brief, inconsolable misery. The scarf around her neck feels like a noose.

She buries the robin next to a mouse, a beetle, and a few earthworms that had come to a similar fate in the confinement they had been trapped in. She kneels in the grass, not bothering to adjust her skirt, digging with misshapen nails, dirt staining her woolen socks and clumping damply on her palms. Above, like clockwork, dainty heads shift, and wings flicker.

In the courtyard, songbirds chirp and chatter, singing sweet little tunes. Their companion lays dead, but they are none the wiser.

There's someone in the doorway. Pale, pearly skin, narrowed, mascara-coated lashes, magenta eyes gleaming under the strip light's gaze, their neon color swirling with crimson.

Sorano has seen this someone many times before—she recognizes her classmate's curly pink hair—though Sorano has never known the girl's name. Her followers and laughing behind her, soprano voices only rising in a steady hum, filling the cramped school bathroom.

They see her, standing there. The pinkette's lips split in a wicked, lipstick-stained grin.

She approaches Sorano silently, tensely, and stops just before the brunette, her glaring so wrathful that Sorano struggles to stay standing. There's something burning in her eyes, ruthless, commanding.

"Did you like your present this morning?" She begins, her voice overpowering as her followers fall silent. "Imagine my surprise when I saw you on the news—I simply had to congratulate you, you know."

One of the girls behind her muffles a giggle behind her hand. Sorano only watches, ignoring the buzz of her phone in her coat pocket.

"I hoped I'd find you here." The pinkette murmurs, in a syrupy, sugar-coated way, "I couldn't catch you on the roof."

The low rumble of the air vent is heavy in the silence. Sorano waits, eyes half lidded, staring, staring, staring. She knows what is going to happen, but she can't do anything about it. Sorano is the one with a villain's quirk, not the pinkette. Sorano is the one with the death on her record, not the bully in front of her; so the brunette stands in absentminded patience, gaze never wavering, watching, staring, waiting. The air vent breaths behind her, sending chills down her spine when it exhales, and stagnant, quivering air when it inhales, like a creature waiting to strike.

Suddenly, a hand with perfectly filed nails lifts and rockets against Sorano's cheek. The palm cracks like a whip across her face, snapping her neck back with the force of the blow and causing her head to reel sickeningly as it slams into the wall behind it.

Sorano staggers, gasping, clutching her face as her skull pounds in pain, her russet eyes watering. The lankys let out pitchy jeers.

Sorano is lifted by her uniform collar and shoved into the wall once more.

"You bitch!" The pinkette spits as Sorano struggles in her grip, tearing at the white-knuckled fist, "You don't deserve any of this! You don't deserve shit !"

Sorano is jostled in the merciless grasp and she sputters, choking on a breath.

"Why do you get to be on the news? Why do you get to be so popular?" The pinkette cries, her fists loosening; the assaulted teen sinks lifelessly, back scraping the wall, down onto the stained tiles below.

The livid girl stands above the brunette like an executioner, rambling with dilating pupils, "I've worked so hard for so long , I've been the one trying to get myself out there, trying to get people to notice , trying to be the perfect daughter, the perfect student, a hero ," she kicks Sorano's shin with bone-shattering force, continuing with, "but you get to be recognized?"

Sorano peers up at the girl through wide red-rimmed eyes, mouth slightly open, a glisten of snot shimmering above her cracked lips.

"It's a bad world, out there."

The pinkette wails, tearing at her dainty curls and weeping and screaming , her voice rising and rising above in the silence, a hurricane of harsh and hoarse insults whirling from her lips, every word pronounced in sharp syllables, slicing rather than tumbling through the dry air; Sorano curls in on herself, laying on her side, dirtying her white knee-highs on the bathroom floor.

"Why is it you ? Why does it have to be you ?" the girl hisses, her voice cracking with every word, and Sorano, shaking, begins to sob, her frail body quivering and lungs constricting and heart booming pound pound pound pound.

"YOU don't get to cry!" Dainty snaps, slamming her sneaker's sole into Sorano's gut, in a perfectly synchronized pattern with the pounding of Sorano's heart, again and again and again.

Bile and spit spills from Sorano's lips and onto the mud-covered tiles, her vision blurs as she endures hit after hit—Sorano says nothing as one of her ribs cracks, says nothing as blood mixes with the bile, says nothing when the pinkette's screaming blends with the frantic yelling of the other two girls, rising and rising in crescendo, a discord of pounding and shrieking and heaving breaths as everything fades into—

"The only people who have a say in it all are the heroes, of course."

Sorano is glad her bones heal so quickly. She wishes her bruises could heal that fast too, because if she had come home spotless—albeit later than usual—she wouldn't've had to see that pitying, regretful, harrowing look on her aunt's face, silent and present, accepting yet knowing, she wouldn't've heard the her aunt's muffled cries, when the night was worn and the salon long since closed, she wouldn't've had bandages bound around her stomach on the day of her junior high graduation.

Her graduation is today. And she can't turn side to side without pain shooting through her stomach like fiery shocks and making her want to empty her breakfast all over he polished podium flooring.

Her classmates shuffle around her, like a massive being on many limbs, speaking with many voices. There are whispers, snickers, tugs on her uniform skirt, and Sorano shrinks away—don't touch me, don't look at me, please —

"Corpse," they tease; Sorano is not a corpse. She's not a corpse, she wishes people would stop calling her one, because she's not, she's not, she's not—

— yet sometimes she wishes she was, because if she was, her classmates wouldn't shove her anymore, her aunt wouldn't cry anymore, she wouldn't struggle with money anymore; someone would brush her pretty hair and dress her in flowing garments and shut the lid and she wouldn't have to see anyone anymore. But the thought is banished with everything else, and her face is twisted into something blank, something apathetic.

Somehow, when stepping forward to receive her diploma, she doesn't keel over and wail, somehow, after walking off stage, she manages to smile, heart thumping unsteadily—she manages to wave at the clicking cameras, manages to nod at those who give her polite applause. A corpse, the voices whisper, slinking past her mental block and onto the creases of her face, a corpse.

The students, slowly but surely, each take their worthless certificates and hobble away to re-group with their family members, before leaving the building with relieved laughs and anticipating expressions. Sorano watches them noiselessly as she hobbles next to her aunt, observing their carefree eyes and prideful grins.

The boy near the buffet table pulled down her skirt in the fourth grade. The girls crowded in the back drew zombie-like images of her on the blackboard the first year of junior high. In elementary, the group of kids clumped in the aisles teamed up to get her publicly humiliated by dumping a bucket of red paint down her uniform shirt.

(A corpse, the voices scream.)

Sorano wonders if they'll remember.

There is a whisper of a breath, the endless song of the clock, the creak of an empty chair, a sigh. Damp, flushed cheeks, quivering fingers, a letter, unopened on the counter. Her aunt watches it in haunting silence, forewarning looming in the air, eyes never leaving the small package teetering on the edge of the table, the neatly printed symbols glaring back. Sorano approaches, timidly, hesitantly, and takes it in her palms, under her aunt's burning gaze.

Their house number is lined up in an orderly manner, and the return address is boxed in the top corner. Yuui Academy , it states, 12 Mau Square, Masutafu Prefecture, Shizuoka, Japan 81540 . She tears the parcel open slowly, tentatively. She scans past the polite greetings near the beginning and reads into the body of the paragraph.

Sasaki Sorano showed promise in combat, the letter reads, crinkling in her tightened palms, so she does not need to take the practical exam. She will take UA's entrance exam on theory on the following date: August 20, 21XX at 8:30 on UA campus. Sasaki has been recommended by the following pro hero(es): Chinami Haruka, alias Thunderbolt, the stormbringer hero; license of four years. The rest is requirements, to send in report cards, sign forms and park in assigned garages on the date of the test. Most her aunt can fulfill, and Sorano will be taking the train, anyways.

The paper's edges are sharp, but they do not pierce her palms. Sorano's decision is final. Certainty flickers behind her clenched fists and half-lidded eyes. She ignores the voices in her head and the pounding behind her skull and waits.

There is nothing to say, yet Sorano still worries, waiting, waiting. Her aunt's eyes never leave the letter in Sorano's grasp. The teen stands in silence, two more minutes of heavy desolation, before her aunt turns away, no longer able to contain herself, and fall, to the click of the clock, trailing in familiar waves. Her aunt doesn't even muster up the courage to fake it. No stuttered congratulations, no false grins, no words leave the woman's mouth. Just hiccups and withheld sobs, little exhales and inhales that are so breathy they seem notional. She doesn't act on her anger, of course, as she so rarely does—no accusations, no stifled screams, no shrieks, no nails digging through patterned sleeves, just tears.

She weeps, and weeps, and weeps. Sorano wonders if that is all she can do.

The chair is cool, even after hours of sitting in the same spot. The soles of Sorano's sneakers scrape against the floor in a repetitive fashion, too faint a sound to be reprimanded for, but noticeable all the same. The theory exam's final page is full of blank horizontal lines, an essay to assess her skills. The prompt is printed black letters on the top of the page, brief, bland, simple.

Why do you want to be a hero? The text states, bold and glaring against the stark white paper behind it. Why do you want to be a hero? Sorano reads it through, then reads it again, and again, and again, until the words start to jumble in her mind and she can't make sense of them anymore.

Sorano breaths, in, then out. In, then out. She thinks of the cuts on her hands, the wounds scattered around her knees, the cries of young children in the streets, the rumbling in the distance as the heroes scream and buildings burn. She thinks of the insults on her desk, scribbled over crude drawings in haphazardous strokes, the mocking jeers behind her back, the graveyard of creatures in the school's courtyard, the faint smell of rot in her locker. She thinks of her father, weeping over broken picture frames and empty cans, she thinks of her aunt's eyes, dull and flitting about, never meeting her gaze, she thinks of the boy in the store—matted hair, pupils dilated and fearful, bruises of purple and indigo scattered about like gruesome galaxies on his sunken cheeks.

I don't want anyone to get hurt anymore , She writes, but her hands shake minutely and it trails off into unintelligible scrawl.

The room is small and lined with cream-colored couches. On each couch sits a different student, each spot claimed as their own. Sorano feels uneasy, shifting on both feet. All the couches are taken.

After taking the written exam she felt confident, but now that she is surrounded by well-dressed examinees—some the sons and daughters of famous pro heroes—she wants to run away.

The room for recommended students is small. There isn't a table, there isn't a single chair. Just couches. And they are all taken.

"Um," someone supplies, their voice ringing in the silence, velvety and soft, "You can sit here,"

Sorano finds herself locking eyes with the most beautiful girl she has ever seen.

The owner of the musical voice sits in the corner, her navy pencil skirt contrasting with the cream slipcovers. Her ebony hair is neatly pulled back, her indigo eyes are polished and bright, her cheeks are dusted with a hint of makeup, pale and spotless and prepossessing.

Speechless, Sorano doesn't move for a second—when she does, it's a jerky movement that leaves her slightly flushed and sends the beautiful girl into a short fit of giggles.

Sorano plops down next to her, scrunching up her knee-length skirt in her fists and looking down at her worn sneakers.

After an eternity of awkward silence on the cream colored couch, the raven-haired teen speaks again.

"What's your name?" She questions, tucking her fringe behind her ear, "I'm Yaoyorozu Momo."

Sorano glances at her out of the corner of her eye, then fiddles with her baby blue blouse. "Sasaki Sorano."

"You're nervous, aren't you?" Yaoyorozu states the obvious, her lips pulled in an entrancing smile.

"Yeah." Sorano states evenly, embarrassed.

"It's alright," Yaoyorozu reassures, "I am, too."

Sorano's gaze, which had been previously trained on the floor, shoots immediately at Yaoyorozu's face, searching for the hint of paranoia that the brunette shares. Sorano finds it, in the sweat on the ravenette's brow and the fingers that tap against each other in a jittery pattern.

"You are," Sorano confirms.

Yaoyorozu nods. "Well, every moment from now on defines our futures. We have a right, don't we?"

A silence falls between them, comforting and peaceful. They listen to the ticking of the clock and the tapping of Yaoyorozu's tap in a gentle pattern, one that almost seems mechanical, in a graceful sort of way.

"Do you play piano?"

Yaoyorozu jumps a little at the sudden question, but soon smiles, locking eyes Sorano, who watches her movements blankly.

"Yes," she replies, "I enjoy it."

"Do you play jazz music?" Sorano inquires.

Yaoyorozu shakes her head. "Mostly classical."

"That's wonderful," Sorano states, and though her voice is as monotone as always, there's sincerity to her words. "You should play some jazz, too. You look like you would enjoy it."

"Do I?" Yaoyorozu's eyes crinkle as she smiles.

Sorano nods, "Very much."

Yaoyorozu's grin shakes, as if she is trying not to laugh. Sorano cocks her head, questioning, but that only seems to make Momo's grin quiver more.

"Sasaki-san," Yaoyorozu blurts, "may we be friends?"

Sorano makes a strangled noise and chokes on air; hiding the spastic movement by coughing into her fist. She meets eyes with Yaoyorozu once more and stares, unblinking.

"Ah—are you alright, Sasaki-san?"

Caught in the act, Sorano stumbles for an answer, racking her head for an excuse so she can escape this now horribly awkward situation. Sorano opens her mouth and closes it, brain on overdrive, because there is a whole room full of examinees who are listening to her humiliating responses.

"You're very pretty." Sorano adds. "Sorry. It makes me nervous."

Yaoyorozu is momentarily taken aback, her lips parting in a perfect o . Then the ravenette bursts into a ringing, warm sort of laughter, that makes the room seem less like a cage and more like a home.

Sorano finds her lips perking near the edges; she can't understand why she's never met a girl this nice before.

"Hey, let's be friends, too!" A stranger exclaims, and Yaoyorozu's giggling falls abruptly silent; they turn to face a boy with hair as blonde as Sorano's aunt's.

"I'm Monoma Neito," he introduces, a confident grin causing his eyes to crinkle near the edges, "I'm not nervous, because I'm guaranteed a spot at this place—but hey, it's cool if you two are."

His arrogance, though a bit of a bad first impression, is somewhat reassuring to Sorano. He's got that sort of snarky look to him that can make people aggravated and take others by surprise.

Yaoyorozu frowns at his words. "How do you know you're guaranteed?" She interrogates, "they haven't released the results, we just took the test."

"It's because of my quirk," he reasons, giving her a cheeky grin, "it's the most heroic quirk in here, I bet. Cooler than yours, probably. I mean, I won't know until I haveyours, though."

Monoma winks in an unusual way, and Yaoyorozu raises a brow, puzzled.

"I'm sure it's really cool." Sorano states.

Both teens gaze curiously at her, and Sorano fidgets, startled by her own commentary. "I mean, I'm sure you both have powerful quirks. Since you're recommended."

Yaoyorozu hides her flush behind her palm, and Monoma shoots her a cocky grin.

"Hey," the blonde continues, "You guys gotta let me borrow your quirks sometime! That's what I can do, borrow quirks."

"Really?" Yaoyorozu wonders curiously.

Sorano feels just as intrigued.

"Yeah!" Monoma affirms. "Only for five minutes, though. But that's how I know I'm getting in—along with my top-notch strategizing."

"Well," Yaoyorozu adds, "I can create anything—non-living—that I'd like from my fat cells, if I know its molecular structure and the way it's made."

Monoma gasps dramatically, grey eyes widening, "You have to let me try that sometime!"

Yaoyorozu shakes her head bashfully, her ponytail shifting with the movement, "We'll see."

The loudspeaker crackles to life, and the teens are notified that they're allowed to leave. Yaoyorozu and Sorano stand due to this announcement, and Monoma quickly follows, scampering with them out into the hallway with the crowd of examinees.

The moment they separate from the chaotic mess of people, Monoma rushes for the exit.

"See you guys in high school!" the blonde yells, racing out the glass doors in a flurry of sunshine-yellow locks and blinding white grins.

"I'm glad we met," Yaoyorozu mentions, waving, "it's good to know that I'll be starting out with a friend."

Sorano watches her go, until she too slips into the shifting crowds. The brunette brings her fingers to her lips, tracing the upturned corners with something warm shifting inside.