Come next morning, Midoriya-kun told his mother about his fusion mark miraculously coming in 'overnight'. Hitoshi politely smiled at his attempts at lying. Good thing Midoriya-san was too overjoyed to analyse his tone, body language and the like. Or maybe she was just that oblivious.

That day they had katsudon for dinner and ate mochi afterwards, as a celebration.

Later they both found themselves on the trashy beach again, this time both smiling giddily.

"Okay, how do we—" they both spoke at the same time and stopped, breaking out into laughter.

"Man, we're in sync today," Hitoshi smiled cheekily and Midoriya-kun reciprocated.

"Let's put it to use then! …but yeah, how do we is an excellent question."

"The most common way of fusing is dancing," Hitoshi recited, then awkwardly held out a hand. "Shall we dance then?"

Midoriya-kun nodded and started rummaging through his phone, presumably for a perfect song. "Gah, I can't choose a song!" Bingo. "Should I just let Spotify choose for us?"

"Worth a try," he laughed, coming a step closer.

Some cheap song about love started playing, and Hitoshi mentally chuckled. Great, the machine was trying to set them up. But the song wasn't half bad, and the rhythm was easy to follow.
Hitoshi extended his hand once again, and Midoriya-kun took it. They started swaying back and forth, and Hitoshi couldn't help but realise how ridiculous they looked. Dancing, or well, trying to dance, among heaps of trash on a beach.

For some reason the thought didn't make him cringe but rather brought a smile to his face. Sure, they might have looked ridiculous, but they were having fun, right?

One look at Midoriya-kun's smiling face confirmed it. At that moment Hitoshi realised something that he wasn't really consciously aware of before. He wanted to keep Midoriya-kun smiling, wanted to shield him from Bakugou and other bullies. He didn't just want to be a part of his family by formality, he wanted to be his true friend.

Their hands started to glow, and before either of them could separate from the shock that this was indeed working, the light encompassed them all and they merged, mixing together.

It might have been a minute or an hour, they wouldn't be able to tell, they just were in a state of not thinking, not existing, mixing together perfectly. And then something started to form.

There was no Izuku. And there was no Hitoshi. She was pretty sure she was neither of them. Wait. She? Since… Since when? She felt weird. Like she wasn't fully a person. Maybe she wasn't fully a person. Yet, at least. She was feeling more and more stable with every second. And she felt strong. Like she could move mountains.

She took a step and—

Suddenly he wasn't her but himself. Just simple, plain Hitoshi. Simple, plain, very confused Hitoshi.

He opened his eyes, realising he was lying on the soft sand, and braced himself on his elbows to see Iz— Midoriya-kun lying down opposite to him.

"Woah," he said, not getting up. Hitoshi fully agreed. That was… something. It was tranquil. It was amazing. "It was."

"It was… what?" Hitoshi asked, confused.

"What you said; tranquil, amazing," Midoriya-kun replied, equally confused.

"I didn't say that." Hitoshi got up from the sand and inhaled sharply as he felt the panic rise. "I thought that!"

"WHAT." Midoriya-kun got up too, but his eyes didn't shine with panic, just with excitement. "Oh my gods do you know what that means!?" He sounded way too chipper. "I don't sound too chipper, anyways! One of us specialises in empathy fusion!"

"In what."

"Empathy fusion! That's where you can feel and hear other's thoughts and emotions after fusing!" he explained, jumping up and down.

"Does that mean you can feel the…" he trailed off not quite knowing what to call his emotions.

"The horrified terror? Yeah." He wouldn't call it that, but… "Come on, it's accurate."

"Okay, maybe it is. But I have a reason! This is a huge violation of privacy." He crossed his arms and puffed his chest out.

"Okay, yeah, you're right but uh… I don't know how to stop."

Hitoshi groaned, this was going to be a long day. If Midoriya-kun heard it, he didn't comment on it.

"You think fusing again would help?" he proposed, knowing the answer.

"Absolutely not, wanna do it anyway?"

"Hell yeah."

They spent the afternoon fusing, or well, trying to fuse, with varying results. Their record of existing as a fusion was something around thirty seconds. Not at all impressive, but good enough for the first try. They hadn't known each other for that long, and they were young, as the standard school fusing pamphlet would say 'yet undeveloped in body, mind and ego'. And to fuse for longer amounts of time you had to be a master at fusing or know each other for years. They were actually doing good.

They also learnt some… rather weird things.

For one their fusion was a she.

"Are you sure you aren't—"

"Yes, I'm sure I'm not trans."

"Or are you?"

They were having this conversation for a while now, as they were walking back home. The consensus so far was that they'd both do some soul searching, but… they were both pretty sure they weren't girls. But their fusion, somehow, inexplicably, was.

Second thing was that their fusion had a name. They didn't quite know what it was yet, but they were sure she had one.

Being unsure what it was sucked, though. It felt like there was a hole in their memories. Like it was on the tip of their tongues but they were unable to call her anything.

She was just their fusion for now.

But she was, she existed, and no matter how short that time was she was a separate being, one of the rarest forms of fusion there was.

Hitoshi kinda wanted to laugh. It looked like life was finally in his favour.

"It's good, isn't it?" Midoriya-kun asked out of the blue, or, well, it probably had something to do with his thoughts but it was said after a longer pause so he had no clue honestly. "Life right now. It's good, is it not?"

Hitoshi gave it a thought. There was a blonde bitch maniac abuser eyeing him suspiciously every day at school, he was pathetically scared of fucking up, and he was realising he wasn't as pure and heroical as he thought he was. He also just tried fusing with a friend, he had a house to come back to, a warm meal on the table every day and pleasant companionship that didn't expect him to just shut up and exist outside of their scope.

Midoriya-kun shot him a horrified look.

Ah. Right. He could hear him. Fuck.

"Can I like… Hug you, or something?" Midoriya-kun asked, voice high-pitched, tears immediately appearing in his eyes.

"I, um… yes?" Instantly Midoriya-kun hung on him like a panda, wailing. "Uhhhhhh…"

"I'm so sorry I hope your life becomes better I promise you you'll keep being in our home and Bakugou will hopefully be in a different class in middle school and I'm sorry for forcing you to force-fuse with me and—" Hitoshi put a hand on his mouth to stop him from saying more and frantically looked around, thankfully not seeing anyone on the street. Midoriya-kun kept mumbling into his palm.

"It's okay, it's okay! Just shut up!" Midoriya-kun did not shut up and moreso kept clinging to him and weeping well until they almost got home.

Hitoshi was, frankly, tired.

"Man, I should start working out," he huffed, putting Midoriya-kun on the ground where he then stood on wobbly legs, still sniffling.

But then he rapidly shook, like a dog trying to get rid of water clinging to its fur, and looked up at him.

"Are you tired?"

"...yeah?"

His eyes twinkled, "Think about a number." Hitoshi thought about his age. "I don't hear you anymore!"

"Oh thank Kami," he exhaled with relief. "I was scared it might be permanent."

"Well duh it isn't," Midoriya-kun raised an eyebrow. "You should read up more about fusion, Shinsou-kun."

"Maybe I should," he sighed thoughtfully, "Maybe I should."