A/N: Asami gets to meet the League in this chapter! I hope you like the story so far and let me know what you think and if you like the direction this is headed!
For this chapter the ages are the following:
Asami - 6
Touya - 8
Fuyumi - 7
Natsuo - 4
Chapter 16
The Todoroki Residence – 16 Years Ago – Age 6
Asami rests her chin on the palm of her hand as she watches Touya kick and dribble the soccer ball as young Natsuo waits for him to pass the ball to the small white-haired boy. Fuyumi sits next to Asami as she hums and sighs at the sight of the dreamy red-haired boy.
Once a month over the course of the year, Asami convinced her father to allow her to join him on his trips to the Todoroki Residence during his appointments with Endeavor. Asami told her father that she enjoyed playing with Fuyumi, but secretly her motivations were more selfish than that.
Asami was irrevocably and cripplingly in love with Touya Todoroki.
She isn't sure where is started, maybe it was the first time the boy sneered at her, or the first time that he chases her and pushed her to the ground, or maybe it was the insistent bullying that made her realize that she was always on his mind.
It didn't matter. All that mattered was that she was in love with him, and her days were spent counting down the days until she saw him again.
Fuyumi glances over at Asami, hearing her hums and sighs as she swoons over the two boys playing soccer before her. Fuyumi tilts her head to the side, curiously examining Asami's lingering gaze.
"What are you staring at?" Fuyumi asks her curiously as she gazes at her purple-haired friend.
"Hum?" Asami swoons as she keeps her eyes and focus on the boys playing soccer.
"What are you staring at?" Fuyumi questions the girl again. "You keep staring and sighing."
"Oh," Asami blushes as she's caught by her best friend. "Nothing, I'm just watching the boys play," she returns innocently as a blush kisses her cheeks and nose.
A wild smile appears on Fuyumi's face as recognition strikes her. "Oh my gosh!" she calls out excitedly. "Do you have a crush on my brother!"
"What?" Asami yells out as she panics at Fuyumi's accusation. "No way! Where'd you…where'd you…" she falters in her resolve as the boys turn to her to see the purple-haired girl panic and turn red as a tomato.
"Keep it down, Fatty!" Touya yells out at her. "I'm tryna concentrate!"
She blushes at his nickname for her. It may not be the best pet name that she would have liked from him, but it is his pet name for her, and it's something special that they share with one another.
Fuyumi stares at her chubby purple-haired friend with wide eyes, seeing the large smile on her face, the blush kissing her cheeks, and the dreamy eyes as she gazes at the red-haired boy.
Fuyumi snatches Asami's wrist and drags the girl out of the courtyard. "Hey what're you doing?" Asami complains as the white-haired girl turns towards her with wide grey eyes.
"You totally have a crush on Touya!" she shrieks and Asami's face drops in dismay.
"What? No, it's not like that!" she says lifting her hands up in defense.
"Why him?" Fuyumi questions, "He's so mean," she grumbles. Asami's heart races as her eyes widen with shock. Her head shakes as she prepares herself to deny the accusation when Fuyumi speaks over her. "You were totally swooning over him. You can't deny it!"
Asami groans as she buries her face in her hands. "Do you hate me?" she cries in her hold.
"Hate you?" Fuyumi blinks. "No way!" she lights up excitedly. "If you marry Touya, we'll be sisters!" she happily adds and Asami's heart races at the idea of her and Touya as husband and wife.
Fuyumi thinks for a moment until a lightbulb ignites in her head. "I've got an idea!"
Hours later, Touya stands in Fuyumi's room with a prominent pout on his lips and his arms crossed over his chest. "No way," he says looking at his sister as she gives him puppy-dog eyes through the brim of her glasses. "No way," he says more assertively with a firm shake of his head, not falling for that look.
"Touya," she whines, "My goal in life is to become a wedding planner and I can't be a good one unless I practice!" she tries to justify.
"Since when! You never mentioned it!"
"Since now!" she snaps at him. "If you don't help me, I'm telling dad that you're sneaking out at night and training on Sekoto Peak," she adds and he growls at her.
He exhales deeply and glances over at the purple-haired girl that stands taller next to him, crudely wrapped in a white sheet to represent a kimono and headdress, with horrid makeup caked onto her face.
"She looks like a clown," Touya complains as he notices the lipstick staining beyond the natural outline of her lips, the eyeshadow reaching past her eyebrows, and the mascara caking under her eyes.
"That's not a nice thing to say about your bride, Touya!" Fuyumi teases him and he scowls at her in return.
"Fine, let's just get this over with!"
Fuyumi prepares the ceremony, placing three cups of tea in front of the couple as they kneel before her. Touya rolls his eyes as he watches Fuyumi discuss their union. He doesn't dare look at the fatty marshmallow that stands next to him as Fuyumi directs them to drink from the three different sized cups.
Asami glances over at Touya, noticing the white streaks in his hair taking over more of his red hair than the last time she had seen him.
"Your hair's getting white," she sheepishly notices. "Are you getting old or something?" she asks as she reaches up to his hair.
He slaps her hand away, "Don't mess with it!" he grumbles as he turns to Fuyumi. "Wedding planners don't stick around for the ceremony," Touya complains. "They just set everything up and then leave."
"Well, that's what's going to set me apart from the others!" she refutes as she hands him the branches of the sacred tree in which they will offer forward.
Touya furrows his brows at the branch, "Is this from the cherry blossom tree outside our front door?"
"Yes," Fuyumi rolls her eyes.
"This isn't a sacred branch," he complains. If he's going to do this, they have to do it right.
"Well, it's all I had!" she fights back. "Just hurry up so we can get to the party and eat sushi!"
"You know I don't like fish!" Touya whines.
"Ugh whatever, the ceremony is over, kiss your bride!" Fuyumi crosses her arms over her chest from annoyance with her brother.
"No way!" Touya draws the line there as he drops the branch on the table between them while Asami's eyes widen widely. She didn't expect her friend to take this silly game to that level.
Touya lifts himself onto his feet, preparing himself to flee the scene when his sister calls out to him. "Touya! Kiss your bride! Or I'm telling dad!" she says with a stomp of her foot.
Confliction hits Touya's eyes as his brows tangle with annoyance. He glances down at the purple-haired girl that's wrapped in a white sheet, looking up at him with scared lilac eyes.
He doesn't want to do this. She's so weird and annoying, and the last thing he wants to do is kiss the fatty, but he rolls his eyes and decides to get this over with and appease his stupid sister and her stupid friend.
He drops to his knees and looks over at the chubby girl. He takes in a deep breath and with eyes shut tightly, he quickly launches himself at her waxy lips.
Faster than he kisses her does he pull away from her, making a show about how disgusting that was and wiping the germs and waxy lipstick off of his lips.
"There," he snaps, lifting himself to his feet. "I'm not doing that again!"
Present Day – Day 9
It's definitely been a few days since Asami's seen anyone from the League of Villains, and she begins to worry if they've all been arrested and she's been left for death. She doesn't have much food left from the grocery dump that Dabi gave her, so she's not going to last long here.
Asami paces the apartment over and over again, feeling herself slowly drifting into madness. She is bored out of her mind here with nothing to do, and she wonders what she will have to do to get some sort of entertainment here.
She thinks about convincing Dabi to let her have a TV so she can know what's going on in the world, and she wonders what the scarred villain would expect from her to grant her such a privilege. She figures that he'd expect a blowjob for sure and she finds herself mulling it over for a bit to see if it's worth it.
She shakes the contemplation out of her head, sternly reminding herself that she will not let him win.
He is your captor.
He is a murderer.
He is a villain.
He will kill you any chance he gets.
Hours upon hours pass, or maybe it's only been minutes? How long has she been in this god forsaken apartment? She's going nuts and at this point she will do anything to get out of here and see the sun again.
Some days she spends laying on the pullout bed in self-pity, while other days she trains her body with cardio and Yoga workouts to keep her body sharp and prepared for anything.
Today is one of those self-pity days and for hours, she spends her day lying on the bed humming a tune and counting the tiles on the ceiling. She keeps losing her place when she reaches the hundreds.
On days that she's depressed or down, she finds herself also thinking about the white-haired boy from her past. She misses Touya a lot when she has days like these; where she feels like a waste of space. She plays back memories from her past as she fondly remembers the boy that didn't give her the time of day. She definitely has a type when it comes to men.
Staring up at the ceiling, she finds herself smiling at the memories of that little punk and their rocky friendship. She closes her eyes and pictures him for a moment, allowing her mind to remember him.
Her heart jumps when she hears the doorknob to the apartment rattle. She smiles excitedly, lifting herself up from the bed and turning towards the door to see what Dabi's brought her, however, to her shock it's not Dabi at the door, but a short blonde girl.
"Hi!" the blonde sings when she enters the room with a skip in her step. "My name's Toga! Himiko Toga! And I can tell we're going to be best friends!" she excitedly announces as she bends her body to Asami's level with her hands laced behind her back.
Asami watches as the girl lifts herself and twirls happily around the room, looking at the purple-haired girl with a sharped-tooth grin. "Umm, hi," Asami responds with a hesitant tone. "Uh, where's Dabi?"
"He's busy recruiting people, so he sent me and Jin!" she says and before Asami can ask who Jin is, Twice comes launching himself into the room with animated hand gestures.
"At your service!" he calls out proudly.
"Oh," Asami simply returns as the boisterous duo push their way into the apartment, trying to keep back her disappointment that Dabi is not here.
She lifts herself from the bed as the girl heads towards the table. Asami glances over at Toga when she recognizes the daisy earrings that she's wearing. "I like your earrings," she tells her with a soft smile. "I have a pair just like it," Asami smiles nicely as the sharp-toothed girl looks back at her.
"I know!" she says moving far too close to Asami's face, making the purple-haired girl reel back a bit. "They're yours!"
"Huh?" Asami blinks at the wild look in the girl's eyes.
"I told you, we're going to be best friends, and best friends share things! Silly!" she tells her happily as she skips to the kitchen table.
Asami stands there for a moment, frozen in shock at the girl's chaotic behavior, still spinning from her quick movements.
"How old are you?" Asami asks Toga noticing her childlike behavior and her outfit that looks like a school uniform, and the blonde informs her that she's seventeen.
Asami blinks at her once more, completely confused and stiff from the shock at the characters that she's surrounded by. She didn't expect villains like the League to have any sort of rationality since they are villains, but she did expect some sort of sanity but so far, she's met an obsessive kleptomaniac, an eccentric bipolar, and a pervert with no sense of boundaries.
Asami sighs as she sits at the small kitchen table across from Toga while she pulls out the plastic containers of food. She frowns when she sees they've brought her ramen and not more healthy groceries as Dabi had before.
They begin eating together as they all sit around the table. Toga slurps on some ramen while Twice shovels clumps of sticky rice in his mouth. Neither of them displays any sort of manners while at the table, which is a stark contrast between her meal with Dabi, where the black-haired villain ate quietly and respectively.
Asami swallows down the noodles with a gulp when she thinks about her last interaction with Dabi, wincing back the feeling of electricity shooting up her spine when she remembers the feeling of their kiss.
He is your captor.
He is a murderer.
He is a villain.
He will kill you any chance he gets.
Asami clears her throat and breaks the silence between the three of them when she asks, "How long have I been down here? It feels like weeks," she adds offhandedly.
"Not weeks!" Twice responds excitedly. "Just days! Nine of them to be exact!"
"Nine days!" Asami blurts out with widened eyes. She groans when neither of the villains seems to be disturbed by this as much as she is. "Why am I here?" she asks them with a whine in her tone. "Does Dabi have a real plan with me? Or is he just stashing me here with the hope that he'll break me down so he can do with me what he pleases?"
Toga looks over at Twice who returns with a shrug. She keeps herself from growling in frustration when she sees that neither of them seems willing to tell her why she's down here.
"Is there anything I can give him that will get me out of here? He hasn't given me any demands," she tells them and they just sit there eating and refusing to look at her.
Asami rolls her eyes and leans back in her chair, crossing her arms over her chest and losing her appetite. She chews on her lip thinking about a way to convince them to get her out of here.
She glances over at Toga from across the table and notices the girl humming as she slurps on her ramen. She looks at her earrings and thinks about the girl's comment about her age. She can clearly see it in the girl's eyes; an instability in her being.
She stole Asami's earrings and wore them here, she commented about them being friends, Asami can even smell her perfume lingering on the girl's skin. She isn't sure if the girl is just deprived of friends, or if she literally wants to become Asami, but she does wonder about one thing, and that's if this girl is unstable just enough for her to manipulate.
The idea that this unhinged girl was in her bedroom, touching and taking her things makes Asami feel unsteady, but it's clear that if she's hanging around the likes of the League of Villains, she undoubtedly has no friends, resulting in her to latch onto Asami's things. She can play this to her advantage.
They brought her food, so they have access to this apartment and getting her things from the outside. If she needs to endure sexual favors from Dabi to get anything from him, she can figure a way to go around him and use Twice or Toga. If they are able to get her things then she won't have to endure shit from that perv.
She watches Toga, figuring that she will be easier to manipulate than Twice, since she has no idea what drives Twice, and he seems closer to Dabi. Toga is like a child, a teen girl who doesn't seem to have many friends, and is suffering because of it. Convincing her to bring her the things she needs in this dungeon of hers will be a piece of cake.
"Toga," Asami begins with a soft tone as the blonde looks up at her from her food. "Can you believe the state of my nails?" she says, testing her as she places her hand in front of the girl to show her the chipping nail polish and uneven nailbeds. "I wish I had my nail polish from home; I could paint my nails a totally cute color!" she says with a roll of her eyes.
The blonde looks at her, seeing the chipping of her nails. "I could paint your nails too," Asami says as she reaches for the girl's hand, examining the lack of polish on her nails. "Oh! We could do each other's nails!" she suggests excitedly and the girl lights up at this.
"What color should we do?" Toga hungrily asks.
"Whatever color you want," Asami says with a large pressed smile. "I have dozens."
Got her.
Asami frowns with the most exaggerated way she can. "But they're just at my apartment, so I can't paint my nails here," she says looking at the girl with downturned brows. "But maybe you can bring them the next time you visit me and we can paint each other's nails and gossip?" she asks and the blonde looks at her cautiously. "We could do matching nails!" she continues eagerly.
Toga watches her for a moment and Asami's heart races quickly in her chest, fearing that she might have laid it on a bit too thick with her.
The blonde looks down at her nails, noticing the brittle weakness in them as dirt cakes underneath them. Twice glances over at her nails over the table, noticing the conflicted look in the girl's eyes as she stares down at her hands.
"Your hands are as beautiful as ever!" he encourages her. "Take the hint!" his other half heckles.
Asami worries that Toga will take her comment the wrong way, seeing it as her targeting the blonde's nails and not her own.
"We could do a whole fashion show," Asami smiles at her. "We could do our hair, and makeup, and get dressed really cute."
"Then we can be best friends!" she says more as a command than a question.
"Yeah," Asami laughs with her.
Asami smiles to herself. If Toga is able to deliver on this request and get her anything out of her apartment, she now won't have to rely on sexual favors to get what she wants here. She leans back in her chair with a triumphant smile on her face as she's outsmarted that stupid perv.
Present Day – Day 11
Asami's heart beats heavily in her chest as she jumps in the air doing her cardio routine. Beads of sweat accumulate over her forehead and shoulders as she pants between each jump. Today is a better day for her, as she is not wallowing in self-pity like she was the day before.
Or was it two days before? Maybe it's been the same day?
Asami tries not to think about how many days have passed since she last saw Toga and Twice. The blonde girl has yet to return to her with her nail polish, and she wonders if she laid on the 'let's be best friends' narrative a little too thick.
She tries to figure out ways to get out of doing anything with Dabi. He's far too dangerous to be making deals with, not because of his Quirk or his past villainous behavior, but because of how quickly he had her wanting in his grasp. She can't lose her resolve in staying away from him, and if she has another repeat of her last encounter with him, she can't say that she's strong enough to deny his allure.
He is your captor.
He is a murderer.
He is a villain.
He will kill you any chance he gets.
The front door opens and Asami gasps, not fully expecting anyone to visit her so closely to her last visit, and not to mention that the person who pushes through the door is not a person at all.
Her brows press together when her eyes land on the reptilian looking creature that enters the room. She gulps at the sight of him, only to have another man enter behind that she's also never seen. The man behind him is hidden behind a black and white mask, wearing a top hat and trench coat, along with a robotic right arm.
Asami's eyes are the size of dinner plates when she looks onto the two of them, still in a full sweat from her workout. She suddenly feels self-conscious when the reptilian's eyes fall down the length of her body to see that she is in nothing more than a sports bra and bootie shorts.
"Hello, dear," the masked man responds while the reptile continues to look at her with more shock than lust in his enlarged stare. "My name is Mr. Compress, and this here is my companion, Spinner. We are here to provide you with nourishment and fine company," the man speaks to her with an overly theatrical response.
"Hi," Asami says between labored breaths, heart still beating from her workout. "My name is Asami."
Mr. Compress bows down at her, as if taking a bow after a show, and she simply nods at him, unsure how to respond to the gesture.
So now we have a masked theatrical performer, a crocodile/iguana, an obsessive kleptomaniac, an eccentric bipolar, and a pervert with no sense of boundaries. She wonders who's left, hearing stories of their Leader Shigaraki, but not knowing much about him and his personality. She questions if she will ever meet the man that brought these characters together.
The masked villain places three blue marbles on the dining table. She watches him curiously as from the marbles suddenly appears bags of groceries. "Woah," she lets out with a smile. "That's a cool trick!"
"It's all in the slight of hand," he tells her as he fiddles with a marble between his fingertips and she realizes that all these groceries must have been stolen.
She tries not to focus on the crime the villain has committed, reminding herself that he is in fact a villain, and she shouldn't have expected much from them, figuring that Dabi's undoubtedly been burning people to death for the food he's been bringing her. Instead, she smiles down at the assortment of food as he pulls from the bag, and wordlessly assists him in placing them into the refrigerator.
She watches the reptilian man cautiously, noticing that he does not seem at ease with being in the same room as Asami and wonders why he is so abrasive to her when she's the one that's been captured by them.
After Compress and Asami are finished putting away the groceries, the masked villain seats himself at the table and politely asks Asami to join him. She hesitantly does, while Spinner remains lurking in the corner of the room with his arms crossed over his chest and displeased.
"You're part of the League of Villains?" Asami asks with a crack in her voice, unsure how unstable these two might be since everyone else she's come across has been all over the spectrum.
"At your service," he states with a tilt of his hat.
"So do you know what Dabi has planned with me?" she asks him, seeing how pleasant he's been so far and hoping the pleasantries continue.
"Alas, we've been advised against speaking with you on such matters, but would happily convey with you on another topic of choice," he speaks strangely and she looks back at the Reptilian man that watches her carefully.
She sighs, figuring that it was worth a shot, and at least glad that he's given her more than Dabi or the others have.
She turns to the green man and notices his clothes and that he is in what appears to be a Stain uniform. She recognizes the same scarves that masked his face, and the same color scheme with his clothing. He must be a follower of Stain's and that's how he got tangled with the League of Villains.
"I just don't understand what my purpose is in all of this," she begins with a soft innocent tone that they can empathize to.
She doesn't know for sure if she has Toga in her back pocket, and if she can ensure that either of these two can get her things that she needs from here, it will just be her ensuring that she will never need to rely on Dabi for anything, and maybe… just maybe… they might even help her escape from here.
"I guess it just doesn't really make sense in the grand scheme of things," she begins with a shrug. "How does kidnapping a nobody help further the League of Villains into achieving Stain's vision for the world?" she asks and the Reptilian perks up at this.
She tries to keep herself from visibly reacting to his interest in her conversation as she continues, "No demands have been made to prove that the heroes are seeking fame and profit, so quietly skirting me to the side does nothing to show the masses how heroes seeking glory are plaguing our society."
"You know about Stain's ideology?" the green man steps towards her.
"Of course," she responds convincingly. "I've done a lot of research on the League of Villains and their roots with Stain. I figured that's what drove Dabi in kidnapping me," she says and they both look at her for an explanation. "Well wanting to make a statement that aligned with Stain's ideology by holding me for ransom," she explains simply.
"Using Endeavor's response of prioritizing my life over others is the perfect representation of what's wrong with heroes who pick and choose what crimes they decide to focus on, based on what will provide them with the most infamy," she finishes. "But that all seems wasted if he's just going to leave me down here with no repercussions to the heroes and their inability to protect those closest to them."
"That's exactly right!" the villain lights up at her words. "He says he sympathizes with Stain's ideology, but he is a false fanboy, using the traction Stain gathered for his own agenda. He's no better than Shigaraki."
She watches him carefully, realizing that she can push for something far more important than clothes and soap.
"Shigaraki," she begins. "The leader of the League of Villains," she says thinking carefully on how to address this without being too obvious. "I've been doing a lot of research on him too before I was kidnapped, and since Stain's imprisonment, it seems the League is straying farther away from his core philosophy."
"That's what I've been saying!" he grumbles to her as he glances at Mr. Compress.
"Online polls also have the initial favor of the League's activities decreasing with the rise of the Meta Liberation Army's teachings becoming more readily available."
"Tsk, what a joke," he rolls his eyes.
"Well, what could you expect with the lack of a narrative being told?" she questions. "The Meta Liberation Army has a novel that wonderfully outlines their philosophy, but the League has been notoriously tightlipped, that no one feels confident in following their lead."
"Yeah, that explains why we're broke and starving, and that idiot Dabi can't seem to recruit anyone," he grumbles and Asami keeps herself from releasing a humored scoff at why they would let that psychopath be the face of their movement. He turns to her, "Well what do you suggest?"
She shrugs, trying not to sound too eager or manipulative. "I don't know," she dangles them for a moment. "It sounds like the League of Villains are in desperate need for a Public Relations Director."