"We should head back to everyone. I know you're a nocturnal animal, but you still need to sleep as a human." Todoroki had clearly been studying about the honey badger ever since meeting her. He had never been fascinated by the said animal up until he met her. He was disappointed to find out that honey badgers in real life were nasty mother fuckers that will fight anything that moves, but he was happy to know Yuuki was a good honey badger that will not bite upon being touched.
"Ehh...but I am used to the night."
"Come on, you need sleep just as much as the next person." The hand that was not holding her hand made its own way to her head. He started to scratch the ear on top of her head.
"Hee~." Yuuki loved it whenever he did that, it felt nice and good in a strange way. She wagged her tail happily, enjoying the moment. 'I scratch the ears on my head too, but it feels a hundred times nicer when someone else does it~.'
Todoroki smiled a little as he petted her. When he stopped for a while, he watched her reaction; he wondered if she will do as he predicted.
Yuuki noticed he had stopped scratching her ear. Why did he stop? He didn't even remove his hand from her head. She looked at him and she innocently nudged against his hand with her head, subtly asking him to continue.
"You're cute." He continued to scratch her ear. "Sorry, I just had to see if you will do that."
"Huh?"
"When I was a kid, one of my classmate had a dog that did that; she would scratch the dog's head for a while, stop, and then the dog will nudge her to continue." He then realized he had compared her to a dog. "S-sorry. I don't think you would like to be compared to a dog."
"Dog?"
Todoroki could understand why she was confused; you wouldn't find a domesticated dog in the wild! He got it! "They are wolves, but we keep them as pets."
"You keep wolves as pets at your world?! That's so badass!"
Todoroki wondered if she actually understood him. Either way, he didn't mind explaining to her about their world bit by bit.
Even when they're walking back to camp, their hands remained in one another's hold. She did wonder why he was still holding her hand, but she decided not to say a thing against it since she did not find it annoying.
Yuuki wondered about Todoroki's words with each step she made forward. Was it really okay? Was it really okay for her, someone who had killed many villains and pro heroes, to go to everyone's world?
'Kaminari have told me a lot about their world. I still don't know what a car is or what the latest trends are...will I be happy there?' She was so deep in thoughts that she tripped and fell forward. "Ah-!"
Their hands lost touch for a temporary moment, but the touch returned when he grabbed her by the waist and pulled her back to him. His back hit the tree, but he was not hurt a bit.
"Are you okay?" He asked, a little surprised by her tripping.
Yuuki and Todoroki looked back at what tripped her up. They both stared at the root of a tree that was quite far up from the ground.
"Look."
"Huh?" She looked up and she saw many fireflies flying away from the tree that he had bumped into.
The fireflies gave off a serene green light within the darkness. They illuminated a little bit of light for them, who were in the darkness of the forest.
"Wow~." Yuuki walked away from Todoroki and she tried to catch the fireflies with her hands. When she opened her hands, she caught nothing. "Aww..."
"Yuuki,"
"Hm?" She looked at him to see he had cupped something into his hands. "Huh?" She sniffed his hands to see if she could work out what was inside.
Todoroki chuckled at her attempt to sniff out the identity of the creatures within his hands; do fireflies even have a scent? He opened his hands in front of her and he let the fireflies he had caught to fly up in front of them.
"Wow~." Yuuki was amazed and mesmerized by the beauty of the fireflies. "I didn't know insects have Quirks."
"It's natural for them."
One of the fireflies landed on the bridge of her nose. "You mean their glowing butt isn't a Quirk?"
"No, it's natural for them." He did find it amusing that she would call it like that. 'How cute.'
"I see."
The firefly flew away and it flew with its comrades, way above their reach now.
"You see, light still exists in the dark." Todoroki held her hand again. He looked at her with a small smile and then he looked up at the fireflies with her again. "You don't have to stay in the darkness forever." Just like how a certain someone told him to get out of his own darkness, he wished he could be the one to take Yuuki out of her own darkness.
"Todoroki, why are you so kind to me?" She looked at his hand that held hers yet again.
"You don't like it?"
"I like it. It's just...is this okay?"
"Maybe it's because I feel like I can see myself in you." When he thought he was doing the right thing by denying his own father, he didn't realize he had created a darkness in front of the light. Now when he's in the clear light, he saw her, who was obliviously in her own darkness. Unlike him, she's not suffering in it, she's just living in it. He didn't want to see her live in it, he wanted her to be in the light because that darkness wasn't a place for anyone to be in.
"Todoroki..."
"Promise me, Yuuki. Come to our world with us when it's time to really go."
This again. Why was everyone telling her to go when she had been surviving just fine here?
"Promise me."
"I...promise." Yuuki only said it with half a heart. She just doesn't have the courage to admit she doesn't have the courage to really leave.
"I'm glad. That way, I'm at ease."
'I definitely can't say otherwise now...' Yuuki wondered how long will their days of travelling together will last. She liked it that they were in her world more than anything. She liked being relied on, she liked hanging out with them all. She wished they could stay here with her for a long time.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The next day, some more travelling were needed in order to get to where Present Mic was. Yuuki was leading the way as always, but this time Aizawa was walking with her.
"I actually found the students' camp first. If I want to have a winning chance, I need to have my weapon on me." Aizawa explained how he came to Yuuki and Kirishima's aid with his capture weapon.
"Why are you telling me this, Aizawa?"
"In case someone points out a plot hole. And it's Aizawa-sensei to you."
"But I am not a student."
"You are within the compulsory school age range, when you go back to our world, you are required by law to go to school."
Yuuki was visibly flabbergasted! "Required by law to go to school?! Whoever invented that law needs to be clawed up the ass so bad, they'll be piecing it back together for weeks!"
"Yuuki-san, don't worry! School is a great place to be!" Mina came up to her along with Uraraka.
"Aside from studying and being cooped up in class, there's lunch and break time!" Uraraka happily explain. "Think about it! Eating lunch with everyone, hang out, and talk!"
"Uraraka-kun, studying is also important!" Iida joined in the conversation as well. "As much as you like to play, one must continue to stimulate their brain!"
"That I agree with Iida-san." Yaoyorozu was the smartest in class so she agreed just how important studying was.
"But I can't study with you guys." Yuuki answered almost too immediately.
"Why? You don't want to study with us?" Hagakure piped up, surprising Yuuki a little because there was a touch but there's no one there but floating clothes.
"It's more like I don't know how."
"You don't know how?" Iida didn't understand.
"I can't even write my own name, never mind studying." She giggled a little while scratching the back of her head. "How embarrassing..."
Upon hearing that, Midoriya took out his pocket notebook and pencil and he started to write down her name in katakana. "Yuuki-san! Like this!"
He had written her name as ユウキ. It was very simple and easy to remember.
"Wow...this is my name?"
"Shouldn't it be like this?" Mina grabbed the notebook and she written it in hiragana instead. "This! It looks prettier!" She had written it as ゆうき.
Aoyama made some tutting noises as if judging them all. "How can you be so happy with that when you can write it like this?!" He had written her name but in English.
"I can't read...is this my name too?" Yuuki's cat-like ears drooped in shame.
Dark Shadow pushed Aoyama out of the way while Tokoyami stepped up to her. "How about this?" Tokoyami grabbed a stick and he started to write on the ground. He had written it as 優姫, which meant 'Gentle Princess.' "I think Yuuki is a gentle person. The things she does and say can be a little odd, but I think she still passes as a gentle person."
"And a princess too?" Uraraka teased.
"W-well, she is a girl." He was a little embarrassed by Uraraka's smug stare now. He faked a cough and tried to look composed.
"I see your level of kanji is good enough to not fail." Aizawa looked at the ground with the others too.
"The fuck are you guys doing?"
"Kacchan!"
Bakugou looked at the ground to see 'Yuuki' written with the kanji for gentle princess. He then looked at Midoriya's notebook to see her name written in English, hiragana, and katakana. He instantly knew what everyone was doing here and he hated it; why were these losers trying to write the name he had chosen for Yuuki?
"I want to add one too. May I, Midoriya?" Kaminari asked for permission unlike the others who had already made use of his notebook. Kaminari written one single kanji. "Yuuki-chan's name!" He had written a kanji too, he written it as '雪', which meant snow.
"Yours is even worst than everyone's, you fuck face!" Bakugou wanted to set the blonde boy on fire with his explosions, but he felt his Quirk got erased by a certain teacher. "All you losers, were you dropped head first as a baby? Or were you all born with with your brains so far up your own ass?" he really had no chills with his choice of words. "Fuck face, not only did you get her name wrong, the pronunciation is wrong too. She is 'Yuuki,' not 'Yuki."
"Oh." Kaminari didn't even realize he had done it wrong.
"Kaminari," Aizawa started.
"A-Aizawa-sensei, you don't have to comfort poor little old me."
"I just wanted to say the mistake you just made is of kindergarten level. How do you get something wrong like that at your age?"
Jirou was laughing in the background along with Sero.
Kirishima shook his head and he pat Yuuki on the head, "Bakugou of all people should know how her name is written. After all, he's the one who gave her the name."
"Tch." Bakugou grabbed a pen and he written her name on the notebook. His writing took up one whole page. He tore it out of the book and he hand it over to her. "Take it, you'll need it."
Yuuki held the small sheet and she looked at it to see how he had written it. "Bakugou..."
"That there is your name, your real name. You better live up to it before I kick your ass."
While Kirishima and Sero teased Bakugou for being such a tsundere, Yuuki stared at the piece of paper and she smiled at the sight of the kanji. It's her name, her name! So this was what her name look like. The feeling in her heart felt fuzzy and warm; was it her own feelings? Or was it because she held his pet's memories?
"What the fuck are you looking at? Are you coming or not?" Bakugou rudely asked her when he looked over his shoulder.
Yuuki could see that Class 1-A were all ahead of her.
"Let's go, Yuuki-san." Midoriya called out to her, "With you guiding us, we'll be home before you know it!"
She smiled shyly and she took a step forward to them-
With hands stained with blood, can you really leave this place and give yourself a restart that you don't deserve? Who do you think you are to run away from your sins?
Present Mic was running away from something. He saw Aizawa and the kids.
"Hizashi?" Aizawa wondered why he was running.
"Run! This place is NOT OKAY!" He was running away from what looked like fungal covered corpses. They were all wearing costumes that once belonged to heroes and villains.
Yuuki felt a rotten hand grabbing her by the ankle. She looked down to see a blackish purple hand had grabbed her.
A rotten corpse rose up from the ground. Covered in dirt, maggots, and dried blood, the moving corpse opened its mouth to try and bite Yuuki.
Yuuki wasn't going down without a fight though. She transformed and she stomped the head of the reanimated corpse to death. 'Ah. I recognize them.'
The students prepared to fight, but then they realized the running corpses all ran past them.
"Yuuki...!" Aizawa saw the girl smile sadly and she got on all fours, her bangs shadowing her blue eyes. "You couldn't be...!"
"Yuuki-san!" Midoriya shouted her name out because Yuuki had chosen to run away from the swarm.
She vaguely remember them. She killed them. They were the heroes and villains she had killed that accumulated the 10,000,000 points in this damned world that she was used to. These things were after her, she had to run away from everyone and take these things with her!
"Yuuki!" Todoroki shouted out her name.
"Don't follow her!" Aizawa grabbed as much students as possible with his capture weapon. However, he failed to catch some of them and those stubborn students stupidly chased after Yuuki along with the running corpses.
Midoriya, Kirishima and Kaminari grabbed onto a huge and bulky hero that ran with the same speed as the others. They knew they couldn't catch up by foot, but they wanted to make sure Yuuki was okay.
Iida, Tokoyami, Bakugou, and Todoroki made use of their Quirk's natural ability to catch up with Yuuki.
They chased after her with the speed of an athlete. Yuuki was grabbed a few times, but she was able to break free from being grappled. It was only a matter of time when they will catch her when she's at her limits.
Yuuki glanced up at the light between the leaves of the thick trees. She wondered why this world was merciless to her.
"Yuuki, come back!" Tokoyami shouted, "You can't outrun this swarm!"
'I know that!' She thought to herself as she continued to run. At the same time, she knew these zombies were an endless swarm; she killed far too much people; even if the others fight, it will not be a one day battle. She only had one chance.
"Yuuki-kun!"
Yuuki glanced at him for a good while, she forced herself to ignore him.
"If you carry on running, you will end up...!"
"Stop following me!" Yuuki shouted at them.
Unknown to Yuuki, a certain someone was watching her every movement. He laughed as if he was watching an entertaining show through a crystal ball.
"Wow, Who would have thought my ratel would end up like this." He pulled out another potato chip to eat, eyes never leaving the crystal ball. "I made this story for you, you can't just leave just because you want to. Besides, if you leave, you will have nothing."
The door to his room was knocked. "Kami-sama, the next customer have paid up.
"I won't let them enter my world yet. I just want to see this next part."
"But Kami-sama, twenty customers are lining up outside."
The young man removed his hood and his long brown hair and beard could be seen when he opened the door to see his butler still there.
"I said the story is just getting to the good part. Don't you go against the rule of god!"
"My apologies, sir!"
The Jesus-like figure watched the crystal ball, eyes stuck to the honey badger. "Only you can entertain me like no other..." He licked the crystal ball because he loved watching Yuuki's moments.
Yuuki courageously leaped away from the ground. She began to free fall down from the edge. She looked back to see the creatures really fell to follow her. She knew they will do that.
Iida and Tokoyami were forced to stop because they were not able to keep going forward; if they go any further, they will plummet all the way down from the edge! "Yuuki!" "Yuuki-kun!"
Yuuki didn't regret a thing though. Why would she regret saving them? In a way, she felt that they have saved her; they all showed her that there was a possibility of a restart from this twisted world where only the strongest animal stood at the top. She was thankful. She was thankful that they wanted to take her to their world, but that was no longer important.
'Whoever made this world, the same person who let the Doctor create me, and the same person who decided the people I killed will come back to get me...I already knew I can't leave. I knew that from the very beginning. I've been forced to kill for survival. I've become a honey badger that stood at the very top of the animal kingdom, I've reached your expectations of me.' She closed her eyes with a satisfied smile, the black fur on her arms and legs were gone. She's now a human and had decided to die as a human.
"What? What is she doing?! She will die if she reaches the ground! What is she doing?!" The man known as Kami did not look pleased. He swiped the potato chips to the floor. "No! No! No! No! If you die, who is going to be interested in coming here again?!" He grabbed the floating crystal ball with both hands and pulled it close to his face, "Ratel, what are you doing?! You will die at this rate!"
Yuuki could hear a voice. Ever since she was born, she could hear Kami's voice. She noted that his voice started off child-like and then become much deeper as she grew up. It's been a while since she heard his voice.
She opened her eyes tiredly, "And what of it? If I do this, I can leave your twisted world, right?"
"You will die!"
"That's fine by me." These corpses will die with her again. She didn't mind dying if it meant she could protect Class 1-A from them; if Kami could make these corpses chase after her, he could easily make them attack Class 1-A. If she fell to her death with them, she could take away the mass number of weapons before they could be used against the class. "I...I actually did a heroic thing." She closed her eyes yet again, preparing for death.
I wonder if I lived up to my name...
勇気
Her name meant courage. It's a fitting name for a fearless girl like her.
But the truth was...she doesn't have the courage to die.
'Shit. why am I thinking about this now. I...I want to be with everyone. I can finally say I want to wholeheartedly go with everyone...!' It's funny. She's no longer hesitating. She actually wanted to go with everyone. To their world. 'I wonder if I can be reborn in their world...'
"Yuuki-san!!!!"
Yuuki opened her eyes to see Midoriya was falling much faster than the corpses around her. How was he falling faster than everything?!
"Deku...?!"
"Take my hand!" Midoriya stretched out his right hand to her, "Hurry!"
She didn't even think twice and she grabbed it. Why? She's supposed to take these corpses to death with her own's!
She looked up and she saw something that shocked her. Her eyes began to water, "You idiots..."
This was Midoriya's rescue plan. He bungee jumped down along with Kirishima with the help of Tokoyami's Dark Shadow. In order to fall fast enough to catch up to Yuuki, Kirishima hardened his entire body to fall faster and faster than the corpses. Iida and the others all grab onto Tokoyami with their all in order for him to support the hardened Kirishima, Yuuki, and Midoriya. It was a plan that took no less than 10 seconds to think up.
"You guys..." She didn't think they will plummet down for her. She didn't think that at all. How could she not go with them now?
Kirishima had his arms around Midoriya's waist the whole time within the fall. He smiled at Yuuki as Dark Shadow slowly retreated back up. "You scared us, Yuuki! Goddamit, don't die on us!"
Yuuki couldn't speak at the moment because she's crying. She's crying because these people reached out to her even when she thought it was futile. They gave her the certainty that she could rewrite her own story now.
"Thank you. Thank you so much...!" She ready to completely leave this world behind and go with them.
Midoriya gave her a strained smile, both hands holding onto her so she will not fall. He will not let her fall. "Once we find All Might, let's leave together!"