When she was first reborn into this strange new world, she had taken it in stride. She had been through too much in her past life to really do more than say "meh" at being reincarnated...thankfully into the same gender.

That was before she got a better idea of her new birth father's character and the rather broken homelife she would be dealing with.

Above all, she had a particular hatred towards domestic abuse.

Todoroki Sakura was a rather unusual girl. She could have handled any number of abuse heaped on her by her bastard of a father, who was unlikely to be found out due to his status as the second most popular/powerful pro hero, but she drew the line when he targeted her mother in front of her.

Sakura hadn't thought twice about jumping in front of her mother, of taking the hit in her place. She had been pissed enough that the act would have been entirely unconcious.

She hadn't expected Endeavor to not even remotely try to moderate his blow...he had to have realized he was about to hit his youngest rather than his unfortunate wife before it would hit.

The punch sent her flying into the stove, where she got a solid knock to the head from the metal. As if fate was mocking her, the kettle that her mother had been heating up for tea began to fall, the spout pointed downwards and the scalding hot water pouring out and directly onto the unprotected left side of her face.

She screamed, as her current body hadn't built up quite the same pain tolerance of her last life. Then again she had never been burned so badly in her last life either.

The next thing she remembered was waking up in her room, and learning that while she would have a scar over her left eye she would still be able to see. Her mother had been charged and sent to a 'special' hospital, with the claim that she had suffered a psychotic break and had caused the devastating injury to her daughter because 'she was too much like her father'.

Sakura was pissed. Endeavor had spun the entire story into an utter lie, and was even divorcing her poor mother over it citing that she was a danger to her children...Sakura in particular.

Touya, furious over the incident, left the first chance he could and never came back. Fuyumi tried her best to keep the house together, but it had been broken long before the incident and was now little more than a massive powder keg about to blow up.

Once she was back up to what she considered acceptable standards, which took about two years...Sakura knew her time had come. As much as she loved Fuyumi, who honestly did try her best, she could not stand Endeavor's tyranny and complete bullshit any longer.

And honestly, his so-called training would have her stagnate by the next year in terms of where she wanted to go anyway.

She disappeared into the darkness, while Endeavor was off on some big hero conference and Fuyumi would be crashed out in her room from a hard day cramming for her teaching license.

It would be almost two days before anyone noticed she was missing, and by that point she was long gone from the prefecture and had a disguise that would be incredibly difficult to notice.

Cosplay was such a useful excuse for odd and unusual outfits.

Three years later...

"Happy Sun Couriers! Open up if you don't want your door destroyed!" said the overly chipper and far too irritating voice.

Dabi practically stormed to the front door, pissed at having been woken up at seven in the morning when he only got to sleep three hours ago.

"What?!"

The courier was a brat. Barely twelve or thirteen at most. She had medium length black hair that went down in a ponytail that was threaded through a simple ball cap with the company logo imprinted on the front. She wore worn, but well loved clothing that had seen better days, and was somewhat skinny.

"Your package, sir. Sign here," she said crisply.

He vaguely noticed the skates on her shoes and wondered how exactly she managed to get down up the stairs of his safe-house wearing those.

He idly signed it with a fake name, and then took the package. There was something hauntingly familiar in those green eyes, and if he didn't know any better he'd swear she looked at him with odd recognition in her own eyes. Like she knew him, and not just as a client.

It wasn't until a month later when the same brat tracked him down...and then he found out who she really was.

"Brat. How did you find me again?"

"If you know what to look for, the signs are easy enough to follow...Touya," she said evenly.

Rage and more than a slight hint of fear took over. He slammed the girl into the wall, uncaring of any witnesses. No one should know his real name, not after he left that so-called 'family' behind.

He might tolerate his siblings, should he ever run into them, but his father would be a dead man if he had any say about the matter.

"Who told you that name?" he demanded, angry. She was a dead girl if she gave the wrong answer.

"I knew it. I had a feeling it was you," she said relieved.

"What?"

As if the day couldn't get any more surreal, the girl used her quirk. Her right hand iced the wall behind her, while her left became ablaze in an all too familiar fire.

Dabi...or rather Touya...dropped her in shock. To insure there was no doubt as to her identity, she took out both the colored contacts, revealing a pair of heterochromatic eyes and removed the cap, showing off some rather distinct roots of a badly done dye job.

There was only one person he knew who fit the description of what his eyes were telling him.

"Sakura?" he said in complete shock and disbelief.

If things weren't weird enough, Sakura dropped her quirk and promptly hugged him tight.

"Touya-nii-san."

Dabi, or rather Touya, felt the strong desire to make a very stiff drink.

Some time later...

Dabi looked at his youngest sister with no little amount of amazement and respect.

He never thought the youngest of that man's children would have the balls to ditch that caustic household on her own at the tender age of nine, let alone know enough to successfully hide on the streets without getting killed or worse for three full years.

Sakura had always been so quiet, so mature... however he had always known there was a barely hidden cold rage towards that bastard hidden in her. It was a more advanced version of the hatred he had for that man in his own soul.

Dabi discreetly walked his little sister to the complex she was squatting in. Most of the people who lived there welcomed her presence gladly, as she provided a safe source of water and kept them comfortable during the harsher weather conditions of the summer and winter. Her dual quirk was quite useful in that regard.

An older beggar woman spotted them, and quietly called Sakura over for some 'change'.

Dabi's respect for his sister grew, because it quickly became apparent the woman was passing along vital information to his sister which had her scowling.

"Damn do-gooder heroes..." she muttered in annoyance.

"What's wrong?" asked Dabi.

"Some idiot hero decided that they would help the 'homeless children' squatting in the complex and is attempting to relocate them to 'better' homes without giving any regard of their opinion. And if they happen to have useful quirks, the better since they would remember them for his 'kindness' later once they were older," spat Sakura. "And considering how certain quirks run in families, odds are they might be relocated back to the same homes they ran away from."

Dabi grimaced. No wonder she was pissed...the second they found out they had discovered the missing daughter of Endeavor, the press would have a field day and would happily eat up the 'reunion'.

"What do you plan to do?" asked Dabi.

"The others have a set place to meet up in case we're ever raided by the cops, so we're going there first. I'll help relocate them to an area they can lay low until this nonsense dies down, then vacate the district entirely. If any measure of my actual description gets out, that bastard is sure to make an appearance."

Dabi thought over the situation. It wasn't until he saw how his baby sister organized the other runaways into discreetly hiding until the nonsense and publicity died down that he came to a decision.

She was surviving yes, but not thriving like she should. Seeing her mother hen the others into obeying reminded him of the difficulty he had starting out on his own. He had cut all ties with his family for a reason...but perhaps here was a reason to reforge one.

If Dabi had been thrown by the fact his youngest sibling was surviving better than he had when he first struck out on his own, it was nothing compared to the fact he found himself following orders from his youngest sibling.

Sakura had a rather realistic view of the world and a no-nonsense attitude that he could appreciate. She wasn't overly caught up in the morals that society instilled in the masses and was perfectly capable of being rather ruthless if the occasion called for it.

Like when they were running very low on funds and she literally robbed a villain in a dark alley. The idiot didn't even see her coming, and he was still left hogtied for the pathetic example of heroes in the area to arrest.

Dabi had a loose idea of how he wanted to shape his life, but he found it much more entertaining acting as his sister's back-up. Sakura was driven in ways he couldn't contemplate...not without a proper goal in mind.

She would make a terrifying hero, in his personal opinion.

Perhaps it was fortunate that Endeavor had made that particular career path as distasteful as it had for him.

Still, there were limits to the level of weirdness he was willing to tolerate.

Why in the name of all things sane and holy did his sister have to bring her back to their safe house?

Her being one Himiko Toga, a bloodthirsty little sadist that Dabi had run into more than a few times in the underground fighting rinks. She was a sadist who got off on drinking blood and would happily gut anyone who looked at her funny.

And he had walked into the apartment one night after a job to find her happily listening to an amused Sakura who was teaching her gods knew what while holding a far too sharp knife for his liking.

He had no idea what Sakura had done to win the complete and absolute loyalty of that bloodthirsty nutcase, or how the hell she was able to reign her in so effortlessly...but having her around gave Dabi headaches just thinking about it.

"Sakura...why?" asked Dabi, twitching as he unconsciously avoided another playful stab from Toga.

"Better to have the sadist on our side, then to deal with her later. Besides, can you imagine the chaos we could spread using her quirk? We could screw up that man's hero office so badly it'll take them weeks, if not months to fix," said Sakura.

Dabi twitched at the implications of that. Did not mean he appreciated having to deal with Toga's eccentric behavior patterns.

Sakura shook her head in amusement.

"You're not looking at the bigger picture, nii-san."

"What bigger picture?"

"Think of it this way. You find Toga's attempts to drink your blood a nuisance at this point, correct?"

"Absolutely," said Dabi with irritation.

"So what would happen if you faced a villain or other idiot armed with knives trying to stab you in your blindspot?" asked Sakura.

Dabi blinked, thought that one through before he made a face.

"You have got to be joking."

"Constant paranoia... I mean vigilance... could be the difference between getting knifed in the back by a dumbass with a blade or turning them into ashes," said Sakura flatly.

"...I think I hate you."

"If you find her annoying to deal with, just imagine the fun the heroes are going to have with her later once we've gotten her trained. A natural assassin and spy like her would be a nightmare to deal with," said Sakura gleefully.

Dabi looked at the creepily happy Toga, then at his sister who looked positively evil.

"You're not going villain, are you?" he asked suspiciously.

Sakura rolled her eyes.

"Puh-lease. Villains and heroes are so damn overrated and cliché it's not even worth bothering with. I refuse to go down the path of an overused super villain...that way leads to monologues and idiotic hiring choices, not to mention the annoyance that is the pro heroes coming after you every time you do anything interesting," said Sakura.

Dabi snorted at that.

"No, I have something better in mind. I want to organize the vigilantes."

Dabi looked confused.

"Organize the vigilantes?" he repeated.

Sakura's eyes gleamed. Even Toga was sitting up intently now...she could sense the wheels of history turning, and best of all she had the potential to be remembered for centuries if they did this right.

"With the way the laws are written, the only way anyone is allowed to actually explore the full extent of their quirk is to either become a pro hero, a vigilante, or a villain...depending on the individual's motivations of course. And let's face it, pro heroes are only useful for propaganda purposes at this point because they've allowed themselves to slack off thanks to the shining beacon that is All Might."

Dabi and Toga both nodded in agreement to that. Most pro heroes these days were an absolute joke, with a few glaring exceptions.

"And villains aren't much better. Most of the better ones have the sense to bide their time until something happens to All Might, and then the floodgates are going to open in a wave that will almost certainly wipe out a sizeable chunk of the pro hero class. Hell, odds are it would spark a massive war that would leave untold devastation if it's not handled correctly and with proper timing," said Sakura.

"That makes sense...with how much effort All Might and the decent ones are putting in, most of the smart villains have went underground and focused on building up their forces," said Dabi. "He's got to be at least fifty now, and it wouldn't be that surprising for things to go to hell once he retires or suffers an injury he can't recover from."

"I think he already has. I've been keeping a close eye on him for a while now for that exact reason, and I think he's tangled with someone who caused a pretty serious wound. So much so he might be looking for someone to take his place. Add in his age and the toll of being that active takes on the body..." said Sakura.

Dabi winced.

"What about the third faction?"

"Vigilantes are, for the most part, neither good or evil. They're the neutrals that for one reason or another have failed to gain the legitimacy needed to become a serious player. However if someone were to organize them into a major faction, they could easily tip the scales so that the fallout from losing All Might doesn't completely send the world into a downward spiral," said Sakura flatly. "Look at Toga-chan for example. With her personality and quirk, she could be an excellent villain because her habits would make her an 'unacceptable' hero in the eyes of the public."

Toga nodded at that. Her own parents had thrown her out when the full extent of her quirk became known.

"However once she had a proper direction, she would become a devastating force for whatever side she's on. Especially if we can fix that chemical instability," said Sakura.

"Awww... I thought you liked me the way I was!" pouted Toga.

"I do. However that habit of yours has a bad habit of giving you tunnel vision. What would happen if you were sent to infiltrate a major hero meeting and your desire for blood caused you to reveal yourself prematurely? The information you have would be lost and you would be arrested," said Sakura flatly. "What I want to do is give you a more even keel so that when you come across someone you really want to cut up, you won't be blinded to your surroundings and get taken out."

Toga glomped her, without attempting to cut her. That was the nicest thing anyone had ever said to her after learning her habits.

"So what are you planning to do?" asked Dabi, fully interested now.

Sakura smirked.

"Do you know what the definition of an anti-hero is?"