𝐊𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐋𝐢𝐞𝐬 || S. Todoroki x Reader

38 - Off Tempo

Panic was not an emotion Todoroki Shoto was used to.

He hated it, actually.

You were gone. Stollen. Taken. For no good reason, he could see, other than to drive him up the wall.

It was like suffocation, the feeling wrapping around his body and pressing too tight.

He let the infirmary tend to his wounds, stupid surface level things that had nothing on the weight in his chest. No amount of neosporin and bandages could salvage that.

He felt the weakness seeping out of his body, strength and pain the only things left over. Because, really, aren't they the same thing? When all is said and done, weakness makes you pause, pain makes you think, and strength keeps you going. 

Shoto's pain made him remember he was alive. He clung to it and the determination that set his bones on fire.

He would find you.

And he would make those bastards pay for what they'd done.

***

When you dream, you can't tell until it's over. 

Unless you're in the rare state known as lucidity, your consciousness cannot differentiate between what's real and what's an illusion. In this case, you wished you were dreaming. Even a nightmare would be better because at least then you could wake up. 

There was no waking up from whatever this was. 

There was no escape.

The room (the room?) made your lungs seize up, shivering at the amount of dust particles circling the air. With everything else crawling under your skin, however, you hardly even noticed. Something was wrong with the way your senses came back, out of order and far too slowly. 

The blindfold was too tight around your skull, squeezing out the blood vessels until you were light-headed and even more confused. Whatever chair you sat on burned like ice on your skin. Were you shivering? You couldn't tell. Whatever rope they'd used to tie you up dug into your skin until it felt raw and open.

When you tried to lift your head a sharp crack of lightning in the back of your neck sent you reeling. 

Your stomach curled, a mixture of pain and nausea. For a moment the only thing you could concentrate on was resisting the urge to vomit. Bile stung something awful in the back of your throat and you coughed half-heartedly. You couldn't even recognize the sound, your voice a brittle, hoarse thing.

 Whatever contraption that sat snug around your neck was administering some sort of drug into your bloodstream. If the pain had any indication, probably via a set of needles. Your body felt loose, numb, useless. You couldn't feel your fingers, your toes, your tongue. What was next? Inability to breathe?

There was a spot missing in your memory, like someone had come in and sliced out a section and left the wound open. There was the warpgate... Shoto's face... your scream... then there was this.

"Hey there, kid."

Your heart skipped at the sound of a voice. The familiarity singeing the back of your brain. It was like charcoal, thick and hot.

Warp gate, you realized. Shoto. That voice. A hand on your neck.

You tried to move but nothing worked. Your body wouldn't listen to you, no matter how much you screamed. You could barely even open your palm, let alone figure out how to break free of the bonds. It took everything in yourself to bring your mind to the present, get it thinking clearly.