A month after the initial visit to the Might Tower, things have gone back to a relatively normal pace. With the temperature rising the last bits of snow melted off the streets and the winter officially came to an end. The first light colored buds appeared on the bare branches of the cherry trees scattered in the streets, gardens and parks. And soon enough they had opened, announcing the coming of spring. A tall, blond, and slightly awkward man started visiting his cold and sometimes almost brutally honest doctor once more. Those visits were most often in the afternoon and took both professional and friendly notes to them. One day in the middle of the week, in her office then, one day on the weekend, at her garden. The routine was simple and comfortable allowing the two to attempt to fix what was broken.

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Every good thing will at some point come to an end. Every good deed will not go unpunished. This simple, bizarre and sad truth hit Toshinori Yagi out of the blue. A sneak attack one might call it. He was not sure what was going on or what kind of situation he just found himself in but Mori - san was definitely a good person. She was a woman who went out of her way to make sure sure people recovered beyond their normal capabilities, she was a woman who was willing to help a man that was closely involved with someone she clearly disliked and feared, she was willing to face her fears and tell the Japan's best hero he was a shitty boss, right to his face and then send him to a doctor.

He remembered how earlier in the month, she scolded him after an incident. He had to hold up some structure until the people were removed. He had no choice but to stand in his place and got hit on the head with a sharp piece of debris. So the great hero ended up bleeding and the only person with an injury that required treatment. He tried brushing it off claiming it was just a small cut and he was perfectly fine. A very familiar doctor called his bull as her voice trembled. Understanding that her fear of him, and her duty and the doctor on scene were clashing. He gave up, and followed her command to sit down and let her do her work. He remembered how she jumped after he thanked her before she even took a step back. The expression she had back then was filled with both confusion and wonder. It was kinda cute, both her face and her berating him over taking injuries lightly, no matter how minor.

So now, he was very confused. It was a lovely morning and with the both of them being free, Toshi decided to take her out for a light meal. It was nice, the food was great and their conversation was flowing. He was glad things were back to how they were before New Year's Eve, even if only on the most part. While walking her back, Things have gone sour.

"To-Chan! Found ya!" from behind them came a voice of man. The only reasons Toshi ever noticed it, were because how loud and close it was and due to Mori's reaction. She nearly jumped out of her own skin, mistyped but caught herself and was cut off in the middle of a sentence with a sound similar to a hiccup. The look on her face, which was peaceful so far, turned dark, grim and then cold. There was no mistaking her cold empty and highly professional gaze. She did not turn around and just continued walking. Toshi noticed that the distance between her and himself grew smaller.

A man rushed in front of them and turned to face them with a displeased look. Tall, with short dark hair, well built, well dressed and with facial features that made it partially obvious that this man and his companion were at least somehow blood related to each other. There was a moment of silence. The man and woman were just looking at each other, he was wearing his heart on his sleeve, ticked, angry, confident and possible somehow, desperate. She was a blank page with no information to give out. No sign of recognition but the blond knew better. He saw her reaction, he heard it and the resemblance made left little room to wonder.

Then he remembered, 'Then in spring, as I turned 15, there was an incident. After that, nothing was the same anymore. My family, I haven't seen them after that…' the words he heard so long ago hit him out of nowhere. A family member came to find her after all those years and yet, there was nothing warm, not even apologetic or even awkward in the air around him. Something was clearly wrong.

Then the silence broke, the man, going from zero to a hundred and above, started berating the slightly younger woman, insulting her and calling her rude, disrespectful and ungrateful. In all of it, Mori didn't say a single word and just kept staring, frozen in space. Toshi had to later admit, he was shocked by the amount of poison that came out of this man at such a fast pace. There were very few things that he could clearly take out of this whole situation.

This man accused Mori-san of all the evil in the world.

He was completely convinced that she owed him and his family everything she even had or achieved.

Something was wrong with his mother and he demanded she fix it immediately.

He was calling her by a different name, To-chan at first and then just Tokei. This part made Toshinori highly uncomfortable.

As it all began, Mori got closer to him and grabbed his hand. She held it like her life depended on it and squeezed it until it hurt. Even with all the applied force, he could still notice that her hand was trembling. This worried him more than anything else.

So he acted. Taking a step to the side and pulling the woman behind himself, he chose to speak. Cutting into the younger man's words, he made sure to stay polite but after years and years of action, he knew perfectly well how to speak in order to be heard. In the spur of the moment, he allowed his voice to rise and the boom to come out. Sure, it wasn't a full All Might booming voice and all that, but it was enough for the man to stop and stare at him, acknowledging his existence for the first time in the 2 minutes since he made his appearance. Toshinori could feel Mori holding his upper arm with her free hand now and the shaking of the hand he held reducing. There was another second of silence and the dark haired man took a moment to process the fact that he was just spoken back to. The rage gauge filling was almost comically visible on his face. Before it all blew up, Mori took a step aside, leaving her cover and spoke.

"Sir, I believe you are mistaken. Isago Tokei had died 17 years ago. If your mother is sick, take her to a hospital. Maybe she will be assigned to me, maybe she will not. Approach me like that again and I'll be calling the police. Good bye sir."

The words came out at an even tone and pace, as if read from a textbook by a machine with a pleasant voice. After that, she just started walking, not letting go of Toshinori's hand for a moment. He watched silently as her mask was cracking and falling off with every other step after the stranger was left behind. At a small alley, hidden from the main street, she let go, shaking leaned against a wall and like in a movie started sliding down to the floor. He didn't let her drop. Holding her against himself, he called for a cab to take them to her place. He had more than enough new information to think about.

A new name to run in the database, a lot of questions to ask but all of this will wait. Right now, he had to bring her home and back to safety. The temptation to muscle up and just bring her there immediately himself was great but… No, nothing good will come of it. It's far better to use a cab.


Note:
The chapter's name is based on the name "Isago Tokei".

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