Tranquility, inner peace and strength. These were things he had come to desire above all others in his life. Anger, frustration and hate were what drove him to be here, but as time went on, as mistakes were made, he slowly let go of his vices and allowed himself to become like water.
Shapeless, formless and ever growing and shifting depending on the winds of fate. That was how he became content, that was how he forgave himself and that is how he prepared himself to die. Breathing in the smoke of the incense, his eyes remained shut, completely unaware of anything other than his sword which lay at his knees. Nothing bothered his mind, not the fear of poverty or death nor the guilt of his failure to his friend. He simply was.
In an instant his blade was bare as his body moved as one to free the weapon and level it at this intruder.
"Hey easy there Lizard, it's just me."
Dabi said as he felt the tip of the sword rest on his neck. Spinner regarded him without surprise, sheathing his weapon as he arose from his sitting position.
"What do you need, another favor or do you have a job for me to do?"
The pyromatic villain rolled his eyes in annoyance at his teammate's attitude.
"More like take the fall for me. The crazy bitch hasn't left her room in three weeks and nobody can get her to answer."
The mutant fixed his blade to his back and approached his overseer.
"And you want me to go because I have the least history with her out of everyone."
"Pretty much, if you don't I'll have to talk to the gimp and frankly I have no clue if he even listens to people anymore."
The reptilian was silent for a moment as he contemplated the idea.
"Alright, but I won't force her to do anything."
"Just make sure she still has a pulse, that's all I ask."
Spinner nodded while he made his way to the second floor of the complex where he soon found his destination, an apartment which had bottles of wine littered all over the entrance. Carefully he navigated to the door and knocked.
"Toga, do you have a minute?"
No answer.
He knocked again, same results.
Realising this was getting him nowhere, he sat by the door with his sword resting on his legs and waited. Hours passed with nothing happening except the passage of time as the mutant allowed his hands to busy themselves with tending to his sword while he cleared his mind once again. Eventually, late at night in the twelfth hour, his patience was rewarded.
Stepping out into the pitch black hallway was Toga, who looked slightly better then Dabi had last described her. A note book was tucked into the crook of her arm, along with a bucket that Spinner's nose detected the faint smell of processed food.
"Glad to see you're about."
The girl flinched at his voice, nearly dropping her items in the process.
"Spinner, what the hell are you doing there, how long did you sit there?"
She said in a hushed whisper.
"Roughly eight hours if I remember correctly."
Himiko's mouth fell open at his statement, then quickly returned to normal as she tried to rush past him.
"That's great, now can you please leave? I gotta get some stuff from the kitchen."
"May I help you?"
Shaking her head in frustration she continued to walk.
"Fine, just don't wake anyone up."
The lizard followed after the vampiric villainess without a word as they descended to the room that acted as the League's emergency pantry where Himiko began to stuff whole bags of rice, canned vegetables, and fruits into her container with a few bags of animal blood they stored just for her. Spinner had not spoken for all the time he watched his disturbed teammate do this, finding it better to wait until she spoke.
"So what are you here to do? Are you going to rub it in my face about how badly I messed up or do you just enjoy being creepy now?"
She said as the bucket reached its capacity of things, weighing her down to an extent while she made the effort to return to her apartment.
"I'm worried about you, we all are."
The floor was suddenly met by the bottom of the bucket when Himiko turned to glare at the mutant.
"No you're not. You're just wondering when I'll snap."
"I never said that."
Her ire didn't lessen as she opened the door to her room, but found Spinner forcing the door open when she tried to close it.
"I'd like to talk if you wouldn't mind."
She put both of her hands on the door and fruitlessly tried to push it shut against the other villain's surprising strength.
"I do mind so screw off before I make you leave!"
Suddenly the force holding the door was gone, making her fall forward as it closed with a slam. However she wasn't alone, Spinner was standing to the side of her dirty room. She stared disbelievingly at the man as he scanned the red stained carpet that had the evidence of more alcohol use in the hardly decorated room.
"Get out, get the fuck out! You have no right to be here!"
Himiko shouted at the lizard villain who remained unmoving in the face of the girl's screaming. Again he waited for her outburst to end which it eventually did as she became practically red once her efforts were extended beyond her body's energy.
Spinner allowed her to glare at him for a bit longer until he spoke.
"What's gotten you so upset lately? Is it about Izu-"
A knife sailed through the air and stuck into the wall behind him.
"Don't you dare say his name!"
"So it is about him. Can't say that I'm surprised though."
Teeth bared towards the mutant as Himiko shook in her fury.
"You don't have a right to say anything about him, he wasn't at fault for any of this. I messed up and drove him away so I have to save him from himself before something hurts him."
"Ironic to say that after all that happened."
An empty bucket was suddenly in the villain's hands that he caught as it was hurled at him like a shot put.
"You don't understand the bond I have with him, how much I bled and hurt to help him become better. I did what I did so that we could have a future together where-"
"Where you could control him because you were terrified of him having the option of leaving."
The girl flinched at what the mutant said as he started to speak in earnest.
"Himiko don't misunderstand, I know you care about Izuku in your own messed up way, but you admitted yourself that what you were doing to him was wrong. Which is why I ask you this, do you truly love him?"
"Yes of course, I'd kill anyone who-"
The lizard held up a hand to silence her.
"I asked if you loved him, now explain why you do."
Feline eyes darted to the sides as Spinner stared at her with an intensity that left no room for fear.
"He's my everything. He was the one who saved me by giving his blood when I felt my quirk start to eat away at my brain. He gave me a reason to fight for what's right in this world and I gave him the strength to keep going when he wanted to quit. Izuku comforted me whenever I needed him to, he made me feel more happy than I ever have because I know deep down he loves me more than even I do him."
Himiko's fists began to ball as the memory of watching her partner flee from their life together played back in her mind.
"That's why I'll never be happy again until he comes back."
Spinner measured the girl's action as he spoke.
"What if he doesn't?"
"Then I'll talk him into it."
"And if that doesn't work?"
"I'll knock him out and drag him back."
The mutant inhaled deeply as he prepared for the next answer he was about to hear.
"And if he hates you for it?"
"I'll just be better to him this time around until he loves me again."
His hands twitched when he said the one thing he knew he shouldn't say if he wanted to avoid danger.
"But what if he's found someone else?"
Himiko didn't say anything for an uncomfortable amount of time.
"I'd kill the bitch and become her until Izuku realised he needs me again."
"...You realise how insane that sounds, right?"
Yellow eyes narrowed at the swordsman who remained unmoving from her gaze.
"He is mine. I took care of him when nobody else did, loved him when everyone hated him, we belong to each other and I'd rather die than see him be tricked by some backstabbing slut."
"That's the kind of thinking that got you into this situation in the first place. Himiko, you can't own another person unless you make them dependent and scared but by then they become nothing more then wastes of human potential. You trying to get him back will just end the same way, if not worse if you don't change your ways."
"I don't need to change, I accept who I am no matter what and I won't hide from it."
"I'm not saying to hide yourself away but think for a second about this, if you were fine the way you were then would he have left? Would you have to lie to him, drug him even to get him to stay?"
The anger dulled in her eyes as guilt slowly sunk in.
"...I...had no other choice. He would leave otherwise, because he's just so perfect, too perfect to willingly stay with a monster like me unless he had no other option."
"Who decided you were a monster?"
Again her teeth were bared in a snarl as she snapped at the lizard.
"Everyone! Every single person I've ever met told me I was a monster, a psychopath just waiting to kill someone and they were right! I hurt everyone I came across and Izuku was the only one who saw me for what I was and still treated me like a person! I have nothing without him, so why the hell should I even go on living if it's not with him!?"
Spinner remained as he was when tears started streaming down the killer's face.
"The only one who can decide if you're a monster or not is you. Himiko, back in my home country my parents were killed because a group of heroes thought they had eaten a bunch of people who had gone missing. They tried to kill me but the only reason I survived was because I was fast enough to get away."
He moved his hand to the hilt of his sword and pulled it free.
"Everyone believed me to be just like that, a monster and a freak, but I swore an oath to never allow myself to prove them right. That's why I followed Stain, to use my life for something that would prove to the world that I'm more than my quirk."
More tears fell from her eyes as she began to try to hold it back.
"You don't know what it's like to be me, to look at people you love and want to slice open their necks so you can become them! I proved that I'm a monster, I can't ever go back and he was the only one to look past it!"
No response came from the villain for a long time as his comrade fell to the floor to sob.
"Perhaps love isn't what drove you to do the things you did."
She looked up while her body trembled in emotional agony.
"W-What?"
"You've never had an episode towards one of us, even to Izuku you never directly tried to outright kill him despite your claims of thinking he's perfect and wanting to be him. Maybe it was something else that made you act that way."
She rose up to meet the concerned eye of the man while tears stained her shirt even more.
"What does it matter? I killed those people and they're never coming back so why should I care? I'm a monster!"
Spinner shrugged as he moved towards the door, convinced it was best to leave her be for now.
"You're still alive so you have the chance for things to get better, you know what you want and what kind of person you want to live life as so you're going to need to go beyond the past and figure out what you need to give up to be better in the future."
With that he was about to leave when a tug on his arm made him stop.
"What..What should I do?"
The mutant shrugged again.
"My best guess would be to surround yourself with the type of people you want to be like so you can grow in a better version of yourself."
Nothing was left except the girl's thoughts when the other villain shut the door behind him as she stood in the darkness of her room. The eerie glow of her inhuman eyes drifting to a picture on her wall that brought back one of the most unpleasant memories she had. It was a photo of Class 1-A posing after the sports festival looking happier than she'd been in a long, long time and there was one face on the picture which made her so angry yet so sad.
It was the person that made her Izu-kun smile in a way she never could make him, the same girl who saw her for what she was and forgave her.
"Surround yourself with the types of people you want to be like."
She repeated to herself as Ururaka's pretty face became the only thing she saw as a strange pain filled her soul.
