The break took way too long, but I'm back and better than ever. Your comments gave me life - infinite love to everyone. I hope you don't hate me by the end of the chapter.

Offputting as it was to see Rei and Enji Todoroki in their early twenties, it served Touya a great reminder: the future wasn't set in stone. Showing prodigious intellect and being a loving child wasn't difficult in the slightest, but the greater obstacles had yet to be crossed.

Endeavor was already the Number Two Hero. It was inevitable that he wouldn't have as much of a presence compared to Rei before her Quirk developed. The Siblings of Before wouldn't have been able to understand the true burden of his title, and if she were correct, would've been rather bitter in Endeavor's presence to respond to his seemingly surface-level lack of care. Endeavor, seeing his children respond negatively to his presence, became all the more determined to force their maturity.

She wasn't a child.

Touya saw the pride flare in his eyes after solving a particularly delicate case; it was easy to tell the good days from his bad ones. Endeavor was a man with infinite ambition and an unyielding passion for strength - not only of body but also of character - and it was impossible to call the feeling in her chest anything but pure respect.

As aforesaid, it was no mystery that Endeavor held strength in the highest regard.

Such was why no matter how much he strove to convince himself, Endeavor could never truly despise All Might - because it wasn't The Symbol of Peace that he despised in the end.

It was himself.

There must've been a reason Todoroki Touya became Dabi, no?

Endeavor - named after how he embraced the path to power - had the Quirk and the body to raise him to the top of Japan. For a man who preached about the value of the journey of strength, he did not have the vision of a man who could inherit the crown of Japan.

Endeavor didn't give up on being strong, but he knew that he could never be the strongest.

Which is why I exist.

Learning a new language was admittedly easier than expected; Mother loved to read and chat by her bedside. Combining her discipline, Touya's talent, and the learning properties of a toddler's brain...

Well.

Becoming known as a prodigy in the early stages wasn't difficult. The next few months would be a true challenge.

She was almost four years old - it wouldn't be long before her quirk would develop.

(She remembers flames that burned through hearts and a body made of ash; she remembers being held together by staples and enmity enough for lifetimes.

Her first promise was to never take the name of Dabi.)

꧁꧂

"Touya?" Rei frowned, staring down at the mess of papers strewn across her daughter's room. "What is all of this?"

Pictures and paper and scraps of where did she even get that were bundled together. Touya's face was pulled together in her thinking face - she leaned over the mess of scrawls as if she hadn't even noticed Rei walk into the room in the first place.

"I don't know," she answered, glaring at a crudely drawn picture of her husband.

Rei hummed. From what she could see, there was a lot of scrawled energy? heat? and power? as well as arrows crossing every paper in every direction.

"You don't know?"

Because if Rei was correct, her three-year-old was writing a -

"I don't know enough words," she admitted softly, tracing a line connecting heat and power. "Quirks are... weird."

- Quirk analysis.

"Weird?" Rei repeated.

Touya leaned into her side. After a moment of hesitation, she muttered, "...fire has to come from somewhere." She placed a finger on energy. "Otou-san can't just... ka-boom."

"Ka-boom?"

"...I don't know enough words," Touya repeated, tugging on a strand of her hair. "I'm going to get a fire Quirk like Tou-san, so -"

Rei raised a brow. Encouraging... this... wouldn't be a bad thing. "Awfully confident of that, hm? What's wrong with ice?"

Touya huffed, taking a moment to gather her words. "People... people look like their Quirks. Right? And I look like Otou-san, so -"

"You think too much, Touya-chan."

"I -"

She set Touya in her lap and started running a hand through her hair. Her daughter hadn't gotten Enji's impossible spikes, and the white-haired woman took it as a personal victory that it was as soft as her own.

And, while she hadn't planned to become a mother at twenty -

"Oka-san?"

"Hm?"

"I want to be a hero."

Rei froze.

(Her second promise was to be strong.)

꧁꧂

Father took great pride in his Hero Agency.

The Endeavor Agency consisted of, in his words - composed professionals - that he would trust to bear his name in full. The majority of his sidekicks were working neatly at their desk; a scattered few were quite obviously slacking off, but the rest -

"Endeavor, you've got a brat!?"

The floor went silent.

Touya swallowed.

The temperature in the room spiked.

While Father hadn't exactly kept it a secret - the situation of her birth hadn't been subtle in the slightest - all that the public had known were rumors of Endeavor having a little kid. Touya didn't know what he was expecting when he wanted her to tag along with him. Maybe he was planning to make an official announcement? Why were his flames burning hotter than usual?

"Good morning," Touya bowed; she wasn't about to make a fool of herself in front of her Father's colleagues and potential allies. Her voice echoed across the floor. "My name is Touya. Please take care of me."

The woman in front of her gasped and leaned down to meet her eye. Her veins and eyes looked like they were made of molten lava - her Quirk, perhaps? - and were only amplified by the glow of her golden-brown skin. "Kiddo is awfully polite. You sure she's yours, Boss?"

Endeavor seethed. "Morning, Ember. Still haven't found your inside voice?"

"Buzzkill," Ember sighed, not taking her eyes off Touya - probably to distract the girl from the not-so-subtle pictures being taken by the rest of the Agency. "How old are you, Little Miss?"

"Almost four," Touya smiled, wishing to jump out of the twentieth-story skyscraper window and never return. If Ember had been able to get away with banter with Endeavor, she had to have been a close ally of Father, so she added, "your eyes are really pretty."

Ember's jaw dropped. "Can I adopt you?"

"I -"

"No," Father cut in, placing a hand on Touya's head. "We've got things to do. I do hope that the rest of you will get back to work!" He called out; sidekicks panicked and scrambled around to find their seats. Well disciplined, indeed.

But -

"...We?" Touya muttered.

"Agh. You're no fun, Boss. See ya later, Little Miss!" Ember gave her a two-fingered salute on the way back to her desk. Father gave her a nudge to move forward.

The elevator took them up to the top floor. Endeavor's office had a rather traditional esthetic - beige, soft gold, and crème colored with a rather large oriental rug and Eastern-style chandelier - but Touya's favorite part had to be the landscape windows that took up the entirety of the South wall.

The light of the sunrise poured through the glass, giving the horizon below a serene light compared to the usual chaos of city life. Touya had never been afraid of heights, and in a world of Quirks, the once impossible concept of human flight had become commonplace. She makes a mental note on figuring out how to fly.

"That's my favorite part as well," Father added quietly. "There's something special about looking down on a city of peace and prosperity that you had a hand in protecting."

What?

"A hand?" Touya shifted her gaze to the man beside her. His eyes were locked onto the sunrise.

"It is impossible to place the safety of the world onto one man's shoulders. They would crumble under the weight of the burden... so why do I want to bear it myself?"

Touya blinked. She'd never seen him this... mellow.

"It seems that no matter what I do," he began, "I will never be seen on the same level as the Symbol of Peace. My flames could burn the brightest... my fans could cheer the loudest... but I will only be seen as the second-best."

...

(She remembers watching All Might crumble after decades of pressure. She remembers Endeavor's rage and resentment caving in after years of failure. She remembers staples and scars and burned wings and the piercing whistle of a tea kettle -)

Touya clenched her fist. "You can do it, y'know? I believe in you."

"He's strong."

"We'll be stronger."

(We don't have a choice.)

Father turned away from the window and looked down at Touya's sun-lit form. She turned away from the window, looked up, and smiled.

It felt like he finally looked at her for the first time.

(Her third promise -)