Elena POV
When Elena decided to transfer to UA High School, she envisioned that her days would be full of grueling workouts, intensive hero training, and fierce combative battles. Yet, here she is falling asleep in math class like every other high school student in the world.
Ectoplasm is instructing the class on the various derivative applications in differential calculus, and she is desperately trying to keep her eyelids open. It's a lazy Monday afternoon, and Elena cannot wait to take a long nap after class.
"Does anybody know the answer?" Ectoplasm asks, pointing to an equation on the chalkboard. Midoriya and Yaoyorozu are intensely scribbling away in their notebooks, solving the problem. Elena rubs her eyes, too lazy to make an attempt.
Yaoyorozu beats Midoriya by a few seconds, blurting out the answer with an accomplished smile.
"It appears that you young heroes are not interested in differential calculus," Ectoplasm notes. The entire class stiffens, having been caught slacking off. Tsuyu gently shakes Ashido awake who has already dozed off.
"What good is this going to do when we're fighting villains?" Bakugou complains. The ashy blonde is slouching in his seat, clearly bored out of his mind.
Ectoplasm slightly frowns, genuinely thinking about his question.
"What is the definition of differential calculus?" Ectoplasm asks. Silence. "Elena-chan?"
"The study of the rates at which quantities change. It's one of the two principles of calculus, with integration being the other," she responds, reciting the definition from memory.
While Elena isn't as fast as Yaoyorozu at solving math problems or as knowledgeable as Midoriya about the Hero history, she has a photographic memory and can remember anything with a glance. As a student of medicine, the archives of information stored in her head are endless and she has always relied on this skill to help her excel in school.
"So then how can we determine precisely how fast All Might is accelerating exactly 2 seconds after he begins charging towards a villain? Or how quickly the sound waves emitted by Present Mic are traveling as they pass different objects?" Ectoplasm asks, before launching into a speech about the importance of integrals and derivatives for herowork. Elena quietly sighs, checking the clock.
Ten more minutes.
She taps Todoroki on the shoulder, who is sitting in front of her. She had arrived to class a few minutes late and after being severely reprimanded by Tenya for her tardiness, she wasn't able to ask him how he was feeling since she had last treated him on Friday evening.
"How are you feeling Todoroki-kun?" she whispers after he turns around. She is glad that his face looks less flushed than it did the night before when she had been taking care of him. In fact, he looks perfectly healthy. "You look much better. Did your fever go down?"
"I'm fine. I'm sorry for worrying you. It won't happen again," he responds with an expressionless face, before turning back around just as quickly.
Elena's heart slightly sinks.
Although she refused to admit it, she had hoped that he would say he was still feeling sick and ask her to take care of him again after class.
As much as she had enjoyed walking around the night market with him, taking care of him when he fell sick had probably been the highlight of her week. She loved taking care of people, but taking care of Todoroki felt particularly good. In fact, the entire interaction had almost felt almost intimate to her. She shakes her head, shoving the thought into the imaginary waste basket in her mind for all of her other stupid ideas.
Todoroki clearly sees her as nothing more than a classmate and helping him through a fever isn't going to change that.
Besides, Elena has made zero progress in investigating if there really is a mole on campus. She begins to feel a hot wave of shame, as she realizes how lazy she has been regarding her assignment. While she has been daydreaming about a boy, the League of Villains could be possibly planning a sinister attack on her school!
The bell rings and- hallelujah- classes are over.
She wants to get to her room as quickly as possible to begin brainstorming how she will begin searching for the mole. When she turns out of Class 1-A and into the hallway, she rams into a body, spilling the contents of her backpack all onto the ground.
"Oh gosh, I'm sorry," she apologizes, as he begins picking up her belongings for her.
Elena immediately notices the messy purple hair, flaring out around his head. When he looks up, his eyes are also a deep striking purple, reminding Elena of an amethyst necklace that her mother used to wear. He stands wiry and tall above her, clad in the same school uniform.
"That was my bad, are you okay?" he asks, slightly smiling. She sees white pearly teeth and a handsome face, but something about him leaves Elena feeling incredibly guarded. Her instincts are telling her that something about him is not right.
"I've never met you before. It's probably because I'm so new. My name's Elena Haiba," she says, extending a hand. He shakes it, and his touch is cold against her skin.
"Hitoshi Shinso," he says.
She immediately recognizes his name. This is the Class 1-C student whom Midoriya had fought in the Sports Festival, with the ability to brainwash others. He had suffered a crushing defeat by Midoriya who had managed to break free at the last minute, and some of the faculty members have actually mentioned this boy's name when informing Elena of their suspicions regarding the mole. It seems too perfect that she has run into him.
"You're the brainwasher?" Elena exclaims. His shoulders stiffen, as if she has insulted him. Her eyes light up. "I'm a really big fan of your Quirk!"
His eyes widen with surprise, then narrow with suspicion. His walls are up, noted.
"You're a fan of my Quirk?" he asks, indigo eyes alert with caution. He's searching her face for any hint of sarcasm or dishonesty, but Elena isn't worried because she really means it. When she had heard about his Quirk, she had been amazed by his ability which slightly reminded her of her own.
"We're kind of similar! I can access and to a certain extent manipulate people's emotions, but for you to actually be able to control movements is just incredible," Elena says. "I would love to hear more about how your Quirk works. I bet there's probably a lot I could learn from you!"
Before he can respond, Midoriya and Todoroki suddenly walk out of the classroom. Elena can feel an uneasy tension break out between the two former opponents and she curses the poor timing.
"Sh-Shinso! Uh.. hi again! I-is everything okay Elena?" Midoriya asks, awkwardly. Shinso stiffens up again, clearly intelligent enough to pick up on what Midoriya is implying.
"Everything's fine. She just ran into me and I was helping her pick up her stuff, that's all. I was leaving anyways," he mumbles, before starting to walk off. Elena can hear Todoroki asking her something, but she is too busy trying to decide what to do.
Elena has been spending too much time casually getting to know her classmates, it's time to take a risk. This boy, Shinso, is on her list of potential suspects and she is going to find out whether he belongs there.
"Shinso- wait up!" Elena says, chasing after him and leaving Todoroki behind.
Shouto POV
Todoroki is starting to become accustomed to all of the new emotions that he had developed after Elena had suddenly appeared in his life. They are altogether strange and abnormal, but have become slightly familiar.
He is becoming used to the warm, tingling sensation that he can feel running up his spine when she looks at him.
He is becoming used to the feeling of a deep hunger within his stomach that seems to long for the feeling of her hand against his skin as she worriedly checks his temperature.
He is becoming used to his inability to focus on anything except her warm presence behind him during classes and how she smells like roses.
But watching Elena chase after that purple-haired kid was causing another new feeling to rise in Todoroki's chest.
His blood feels like it is boiling underneath his skin, the heat spreading along his right side which usually remains cool to the touch. He has to hold his breath behind pursed lips to steel himself against the rising sensation surging through his body. His eyes are locked only on Elena, how she gently reaches out to tap the shoulder of that slimy mind control kid when she catches up to him with those soft hands of hers. Todoroki's fists are curling up.
He imagines how easily he could send a wall of ice, as high as the ceiling, between them.
"Todoroki-kun? Are you.. Okay?" he hears Midoriya say.
Todoroki looks at Midoriya, and realizes that the floor around his feet has slowly begun freezing over into a web of ice.
"Midoriya-kun.. I need your help."
Thirty minutes later, they are standing in the courtyard outside of their dorm building. Todoroki has just finished explaining his predicament to Midoriya who is listening with his mouth ajar and eyes wide. He tells him about their first conversation and their interaction on Friday, when he had pretended to be sick to be close to her.
"So? What do you think, Midoriya-kun?" Todoroki asks, after a few seconds of silence have passed. Midoriya is standing across from him, his eyes uncomfortably darting side to side without meeting Todoroki's intense gaze.
"W-well, it s-sounds like.. You have feelings for.. Elena-chan?" Midoriya squeaks.
Todoroki blinks.
"What does that mean?" he asks, completely dumbfoundead. "Doesn't everybody have feelings for everybody?"
"W-well, no. When you have feelings for somebody, it means that only they make you feel that way. Personally, I don't have the most experience with this, by any means, but I think that's what it sounds like."
He blinks again, still not understanding. What could that possibly mean?
"So I am correct in my assessment that she is the one who is causing me to feel this way, right? Is it possibly due to her Quirk that she has this effect on me?"
"Well, it's possible, but I don't think she is activating her Quirk to cause you to do this. Besides, she can only alter emotions through physical touch, so that wouldn't explain all of your feelings."
Midoriya notices his confusion, and pauses to think before asking questions.
"Is it hard to focus when she's nearby?"
"Yes."
"Do you find yourself staring at her often?"
"Yes."
"Do you think about her when she isn't there?"
"Yes."
"Then I think you have a crush on her."
Todoroki has a crush on Elena? The idea of attraction has always been strange to Todoroki. While he has noticed beauty in women around him, he has never been enamored enough with one girl to consider it a crush. In fact, he has never even genuinely considered the notion of being in a relationship with a girl. Sure, it sounds nice to have a girlfriend and spend time with her. It sounds pleasant and interesting and maybe even a little fun. But it sounds everything except useful, and he doesn't see the purpose in gaining a liability on his quest to becoming the Number One hero.
"So what do I do?" Todoroki asks, furrowing his eyebrows. "How do I make the feeling go away? Should I just go tell her right now?"
"NO! OF COURSE NOT! NOT YET!" Midoriya exclaims, frantically waving his arms. He pauses and gulps before he utters his next sentences, as if he is afraid of what he is about to say. "Todoroki-kun, to be honest, I don't think that I will be the most helpful when it comes to having a crush on a girl. But I think I know somebody who might be."
They find themselves standing before one of the dorms. Todoroki and Midoriya simultaneously gulp, their bodies trembling with fear. Todoroki never thought that he would be in this situation, asking this person for help.
Midoriya's trembling hand rises up to the door, knocking shakily.
The door swings open.
A pair of black eyes with yellow, sparkling irises are staring back at them. Two pale yellow horns protrude out of her head which is covered in short, pink hair.
"I knew this day would come," she says. "Which one of you has the crush?"