Frost Chapter 4
Todoroki slid his eyes open, arm curled around a child that wasn't his. And to an empty bed. "Uraraka?" He glanced around the room, she hadn't shown any signs of attempting to dart and wouldn't make it too far in this storm. He glanced at the child, she wouldn't have left it. He hoped at least. But he did know how easy it was for a mother to turn on their own child. Even if not entirely their intention. He had reconciled with his own mother, but that didn't mean the trauma was gone. Todoroki moved, shuffling the child still incapable of holding its own head up in his arms. If he was being quite honest with himself, he was afraid that one of them would squish it in their sleep. It had kept him up for half the night.
Todoroki shuffled, carefully picking up the child, he began exploring his house. It was rather similar to the one he had grown up in. Meaning that if he wasn't sure where someone was at it was nearly impossible to find them. The house was quiet, his workers had off the weekends, therefore, the usual noise of the house had been shushed. There was a total of four people in the house. He shuffled towards the kitchen wondering if Air-Lock had managed to help themselves to breakfast. Or if Uraraka was somewhere within the house. Todoroki flinched, swinging towards the training room door. The house had shaken as though an earthquake erupted through the place. With the weather lately he wouldn't have been surprised, but with his intern's quirk, he was sure of something entirely different. Todoroki slid the door open to find Air-Lock sliding down a wall and several rocks floating in the air, Uraraka's back to him.
"You've got to have more of a plan, you can't just lunge in hoping the force will help. Sure, your quirk is great for dealing with villains, but what if you kill them or a bystander?"
Air-Lock wiped the sweat off their face, nodding more intently than they had in any of their other training sessions. He wondered if it was because Uraraka was facing them down with a similar style to their own quirk. Todoroki considered sliding the door shut before either of them noticed. Air-Lock stood up on shaking legs, "Todoroki-san, I have a question."
Uraraka lit up within seconds, "Well, I, uhh-"
Air-Lock darted towards her, knocking her off her balance. Uraraka braced herself on the floor spinning her legs to hook Air-Lock's. It ended with Air-Lock on their backs, Uraraka standing over them triumphantly. Uraraka nodded, "Don't leave yourself so open, so many people have gotten hurt from basic carelessness. You never turn your back on your opponent."
The phone began ringing, Todoroki glanced towards the phone quickly going to hush it. He had located it near the training hall during a particularly busy week and never thought to move it afterward due to its sudden convivence. "Hello?"
"Ah Todoroki, it's Borealis." The doctor's voice resounded from the other line.
"What's the matter?"
"Everything's okay, I'm calling to schedule a check-up on that girl. What is she doing right now? Can she come to the phone?"
Todoroki glanced towards the training hall and back to the phone. He knew he should've stopped her already, but he wasn't up to it. Uraraka's eyes were just glowing, he had almost forgotten how alive she looked when she was in the middle of combat. Some probably would've thought she was adrenaline junky out for the high versus the truth when she was learning to be a hero. But it was the first time that the spark returned to her eyes since he saw her yesterday in the park.
"Todoroki." The doctor clicked her tongue at him. She already knew something was up by his silence. Probably thought that he was in the middle of making some excuse, or that Uraraka had darted long ago without him noticing. "Todoroki, ten seconds, or I'm walking my butt over to your house and busting down that lovely front door."
"You know I like my front door, I might need a few more seconds than that."
"Todoroki, now."
He glanced towards the training hall, Air-Lock lunging for their counter-attack. He doubted it, but if Air-Lock did manage to overpower Uraraka they'd probably be proud of their hard-earned triumph. He didn't want to steal this time from either of them.
"Todoroki, is she in the training room? Todoroki if you answer 'yes' I'm going to come over and kick your ass, her fricken stitches. Stop them now! I should've known. I know you, I know your old classmates. Get her ass out of there."
"What's that? I think the storms cutting the power." Todoroki reached down clicking the button. Dr. Borealis would probably burn his company down for that. Or schedule triple shifts for him in the next week. Todoroki sighed. Dr. Borealis was right. And they were in the middle of a deadly storm that he would probably be working overtime for soon. That also mean hospitals and emergency personnel would be hard to get ahold of. Todoroki paused walking into the training hall, the baby in his hands drawing their attention before he could say anything to. Uraraka flushed reaching for her child as Air-Lock glanced back and forth between the three of them.
"This is your guy's child? I always thought that Todoroki-Sensei would have the dominant hair trait. I guess you're the alpha in the relationship." Air-Lock laughed.
Uraraka flushed, reaching for her child, Todoroki carefully handed it over. She glanced at him apologetically, opening her mouth, "I-"
"I'm going to make breakfast." He paused as she glanced at the floor, "And you can call yourself Todoroki as long as you plan to stay here."
"Todoroki, I-" Uraraka paused, her face lit, "Thank you"
Air-Lock glanced towards Uraraka, "I'm surprised, it's unusual for someone with a strong quirk and background to marry someone with a quirk that isn't exactly similar."
"How so?" Uraraka glanced at them.
Air-Lock lifted their hand to their neck, heat running along it, "I would think he would marry someone with fire elemental powers or ice ones, but yours are similar to mine."
Uraraka smiled, not bothering to fix Air-Lock's mistake, they likely had been making it most the morning. "Well, mine aren't exactly like yours, sure it looks similar when put on display and I'm sure once your quirk develops more you'll be able to use different Earth elements, but…" Uraraka paused reaching over and giving Air-Lock a pat on the shoulder.
Air-Lock gasped, Todoroki glanced over his shoulder at the sound of panic. Air-Lock was struggling to get their balance in midair.
"Oh, no ops." Uraraka reached up pulling the child back into her arms, she glanced towards Air-Lock, "I'm letting you down, release."
"I'll find some gloves." Air-Lock darted past him.
Todoroki glanced back towards Uraraka re-swaddling the child's blanket. "I don't know how my parents did it with me." She whispered adjusting her grip on the child. He glanced down towards her bare hands, he shifted reaching to take the child back.
He paused letting her slide the child into his arms. "I don't feel safe while cooking, so if you don't mind waiting until Air-Lock comes back."
"it's alright I can cook. I'll probably have breakfast done by the time Air-Lock comes back. Pinky up and all." Uraraka explained. Todoroki nodded, moving to the kitchen chair, he was tempted to bounce her. Uraraka moved shuffling out several pans without instructions and moving for the eggs, "Don't bounce her, she's only a couple days old. She doesn't have the muscles in her neck."
Todoroki nodded glancing down towards her. He had never considered a family, but if he were to walk into this room and see this situation right now he probably would've thought he had it all figured out.
"About Air-Lock's training, have you been focusing on actual movements of self-defense versus quirk training?"
Todoroki glanced towards her. It was hard to admit, but she was alright. Somewhere deep inside he had already had this conversation with himself. He knew restraint. He had taught it to himself vigorously, it was something he had to practice yet throughout high school. But he knew how to restrain himself. But that didn't make the feeling that he would turn out like his father leave. How was he supposed to admit that he was afraid of teaching Air-Lock to control their quirk?
She glanced at him, "I just kind of figured, they move better than most people for their age, but the way they looked at my quirk I could tell. Also, when they get upset the house shakes."
Todoroki nodded. The house shaking probably wouldn't go anywhere any time soon, but neither would the house. Many adults still had trouble with controlling their quirks during nightmares or when they were extremely upset, but the ability to control the emotional outbursts was likely one of the things that he needed to teach Air-Lock yet. How was Air-Lock supposed to save anybody if they just made an earthquake instead? Todoroki nodded, moving the child in his hands.
"Yuki's a fine name, I think that's what I'll call her."
Todoroki nodded glancing at Yuki, "What are your plans from here?"
Uraraka shuffled, moving for the rest of the supplies, "Oh. Right. Sorry I wasn't thinking that far ahead. It's not like I'm your wife." She cracked an egg, letting the shell rest on the pan for a quick second, "I should probably go back." She whispered.
"No."
She glanced over her shoulder, a slight flinch she was probably trying to hide with the movement. She was always intelligent, she likely didn't want him to see her weakness. It didn't help that he had been especially working on his ability to handle victims. He had been given special attention for taking care of the victims at crime scenes and on the battleground.
"I meant it when I said that you can stay as long as you like. You don't need to go back to him." Todoroki paused glancing down at Yuki. "It's okay to stay here. As long as you like."
Uraraka turned back to the stove, "Are you sure? It'll probably be a while. I'll need to find a job, I've never had one in mind other than helping my parents. And it's not like I can start on my hero's license now, and a babysitter, and I'll probably have to start looking for a place to move to."
"Uraraka."
She paused.
"Have you seen my house? I'm sure I won't mind an extra person or two. It's all silence on the weekends." Todoroki glanced towards the empty hall. It'd be quite a change to have the pitter-patter of other's people feet on the weekends. At first, when he had the house, the silence on the weekend was a relief, but then it filled him with the thoughts of his childhood. Had Fuyumi dealt with a house of silence after everything went down? And other intrusive thoughts that plagued his head. A simple head shake wasn't always enough to make intrusive thoughts from his childhood scamper away. Sometimes the silence was worse than the noise, and sometimes it was the other way around. Todoroki shifted his attention back to Uraraka, she was almost done with the food. "I'm going to check what's taking Air-Lock so long."
She nodded, not making a comment about how he carried Yuki with him. He glanced down at the child rustling closer to his warmer side the way a cat would. Todoroki rounded the corner to the front door, where likely gloves would be if there really were any in this house. Who knows, maybe Air-Lock was taking so long because they decided to make the gloves themselves.
"Air-Lock, breakfast is almost done. Hurry-" The house rumbled, "Air-Lock?" Todoroki moved around the corner: his front door was busted down, snow piling in, and Air-Lock was being held up by the throat by an unknown villain.
Author's Note: I keep calling Air-Lock they cuz I haven't really decided yet & also I haven't decided on a civilian name either.
