A/N - I live! LOL! I am so sorry for the long wait for this chapter. Between bouts of Writer's Block, birthday parties and just general adulting (yuck) I struggled getting this chapter out. Thank you so much for your patience, dear readers! I hope you enjoy!
Love and Light!
Kahelle
Chapter 33 – The Water Diviner
As discussed, All Might was waiting outside her office door the next morning - a thermos in each hand. "Ah! Miss Satterfield! I found this wonderful new coffee blend!" He held up one thermos as she approached, "Thought I would stop by and see if you wanted some. Mind if I come in?"
I can't tell if this is a good cover or evidence of his lack of subtlety. Aine mentally sighed even as she plastered on a smile and played along, "Good morning, All Might! Come on in! I'm glad you stopped by." She unlocked the door, letting it swing open and gesturing for him to enter. "Is this from your own collection or from the new café down the street?"
After checking that no one was waiting to eavesdrop, she let the door close behind them before she turned the lock. He held out one of the thermoses towards her as she walked by, Aine accepted it with an honest smile.
"The café. Between you and me, I never quite got the hang of making coffee that didn't have the consistency of mud." He shook his head as he twisted the cap off of his thermos, pouring the rich velvety liquid into the cup. Aine settled into her desk and followed suite, giving a short salute with the cup before setting it on her desk to cool.
She dug through the drawer in her desk until she found her thermometer, ignoring the quizzical look from All Might as she placed it into the cup. "So, about these lessons…" she swirled the thermometer around a couple time before letting it sit to do its job, "As I said last night, I'm willing to help but as with the secret-keeping I do have a few conditions."
All Might set his coffee on her small table and sat forward with his elbows on his knees, hands clasped together, "I would be surprised if you didn't." the words held no malice behind them just honesty.
Aine leaned back in her chair, "First - as with keeping your secret - the moment I deem that Midoriya is in danger I will come clean to everyone about all of this." She gestured to the empty space between them, "I am agreeing to help for his sake and his sake only." She looked unflinchingly at him as she spoke. He looked down at his clasped hands, nodding in acknowledgment. "Second, Midoriya can't do this alone. Either the lessons or if he ends up needing to leave. Those who will be helping him need to be in on this and learn from my mistakes as well."
"I will be at every lesson; you have my word."
She straightened in her chair, "Bakugou too."
He snapped his head around to look at her, "Bakugou? Surely you aren't suggesting that the both of them might need to…"
"If I had my way, anyone connected to Midoriya – his family, friends, teachers " She ticked each one off on her fingers, "All of them should be sitting in on these quote-unquote lessons." Aine leaned forward, "The biggest mistake I made was not letting those closest to me know what my plans were or what I was facing. If shit hits the fan, pardon the language, he is going to need people around him who know what is going on and what the next steps are. Since the aforementioned are not in the know about One-For-All, Bakugou is the best candidate to ensure that someone on the inside knows where Midoriya is if ever a need arises to bring him home."
Aine stood to walk around the desk, "I will notify Young Bakugou and Young Midoriya as soon as I leave here." All Might's eyes followed Aine as she walked around to the chair directly opposite where he sat on the couch. "Are there any other conditions?"
She sat down in the chair, "Just one." Her eyes kept him frozen in place as she leaned forward, "I want you to tell me everything. About the quirk, about his training, everything."
All Might sat silently for several moments, Aine could almost see the thoughts and questions swirling through his mind before he sighed and sat back in the couch. Any protest he would have made dying behind his eyes, "Alright, where to begin…"
The light from outside was quickly fading as Aine finally made her way to Nemuri's apartment. It had taken a few hours to get her schedule rearranged to put Bakugou and Midoriya in back-to-back slots. As far as anyone else was concerned, it was a paired session to help them work through "conflict resolution".
She had barely raised her hand to knock when the door flew open.
"It's about time you made it! I was beginning to think you were all going to stand me up!" Nemuri was grinning ear-to-ear as she whisked Aine into the apartment. Compared to the bare-bones of her own apartment and the practical functionality of Shouta's, Nemuri's living space seem to almost emit it's own natural warmth that enveloped Aine almost as soon as she entered the room. On the right wall beside the door there hung a large mirror, framed in dark mahogany wood, which reflected the light from two table lamps that flanked it on either side. They sat on a slender matching mahogany table where Nemuri had placed some of her random collection of ceramic dishes to hold her keys and loose change. On the next wall, a large screen TV had been mounted with an entertainment stand of the same length sitting beneath it. Two vases framed the sides of the TV with sprigs of some kind of reddish plant sticking out of the top. A brown sectional couch hugged the wall to the left and created a faux entryway with the chaise-lounge part of the L-shape running parallel to the table leaving plenty of room to walk around. There were 5 throw pillows of various size, all in shades of red, black, and cream. In the middle of the room, Nemuri had an octagonal coffee table. Its mahogany top covered with magazines and an ornately decorated incense burner.
Nemuri shut the door behind her before disappearing around the corner into the kitchen.
"Make yourself at home! Hopefully, the boys get here soon!"
The final wall of the living room was covered in picture frames of various sizes and frames. Aine absentmindedly ran her hand over the back of the couch as she walked over to the wall of images. Most of them were pictures she expected as some were ones she remembered seeing in Nemuri's room at their old apartment. Among the pictures, she found one that was in a simple black frame. Worn and wrinkled like the idea to put it in the frame was a last-ditch effort to preserve the picture. Three familiar faces peaked out at her. A much younger Nemuri was winking at the camera and holding up a peace sign by her closed eye. Behind her, a baby-faced Hizashi stood with his arm slung around the shoulders of a very unamused Shouta his other hand holding up the universal "rock on" symbol. On the other side of Shouta, with his arm also thrown around the unimpressed teenager's shoulders, was an unfamiliar face.
"Hey Nem?" Aine turned her face slightly while she still looked at the picture.
"Hm?" Nemuri hummed as she emerged around the corner; a bowl of popcorn in one hand and a bottle of wine and three glasses balanced in the other.
"I don't think I remember seeing this picture before, who is that?"
Nemuri set her burden down on the coffee table, dusting her hands she joined Aine at the picture wall. "Oh, that…well…" her voice was softer, a tinge of melancholy in her tone, "That's Shirakumo… Oboro. You remember us talking about him, right?"
Aine nodded in recognition, "I don't think you ever showed me his picture though."
Nemuri reached up and gently pretended to straighten the picture, "We barely even talked about him after he died. I was surprised when I heard they had told you about him." She smiled sadly. Aine remembered that morning. Shouta had been patrolling the night before when a building collapsed. Between the heroes and first responders, they had been able to get everyone out of the building Shouta had come home and couldn't even take off his gear because of how badly his hands were shaking.
"I've got a couple more things to grab in the kitchen. I'll be right back."
"Need a hand?"
Nemuri turned back from where she had started towards the kitchen, "Nope! Just keep an ear out for the guys." She smiled broadly before stepping around the corner and disappearing. Aine kept looking at the pictures. Images of various students through the years, Nemuri and her parents at her UA graduation, and then…
Four very familiar faces beamed through the picture frame at her. Well, three of the faces were beaming while the fourth was at least smiling. In the center between them, they held a magazine with Nemuri pointing to the bold headline on the cover that read "NEW TOP 20 HERO RANKINGS RELEASED!".
Aine couldn't help but smile. That had been the day Nemuri broke into the top 20 for the first and only time in her career.
"Hey-O! Anybody in the studio?" Hizashi strolled into the room like he was walking through his own front door followed by Shouta. Nemuri popped around the corner with a tray of finger foods held between her hands.
"About time you got here!" she set the tray down on the coffee table, grabbing the remote she tossed it to Shouta. "You all ready?"
In short order, the entire group had claimed their places – Hizashi had claimed the very middle of the couch, Nemuri was curled up on the left hand end of the couch and Shouta was reclining on the chaise lounge with Aine comfortably resting her head on his shoulder stretched out beside him. As the movie started, a warm silence fell over the quad of friends while snacks and drinks were passed around.
It wasn't long into the movie, before Shouta's head gently leaned against her own and his breathing deepened. Not long afterwards, she noticed that the chatting between Nemuri and Hizashi had stilled. Looking over, she saw Hizashi sound asleep with his head leaned back and arms splayed across the back of the couch. His feet propped up on the coffee table, crossed at the ankles. Nemuri had fallen asleep curled into the corner of the couch with one of the multitudes of throw-pillows wrapped in her arms.
Aine felt her entire body start to relax in the safety of the evening. She fought against the heaviness pulling her eyes closed. The warmth of her body against Shouta's combined with the warmth in her veins from the wine quickly lulled her into a soothing darkness where she swore she heard the softest humming of a familiar tune.
While sleep always was a welcome pastime for Shouta, he had an uncanny ability to wake up at the perfect times no matter the location or event occurring. He had woken up just in time to see the credits for the movie scrolling on the TV screen. Aine's body was cuddled into his side, her head gently tucked into the curve of his neck. Shouta listened to her steady breathing, feeling it flutter against his neck as he watched the names tick by one by one.
As the screen finally went dark, he decided it was time . Gently, he kissed Aine on the forehead and gently stroked her arm to wake her. She softly groaned before stretching her body like a cat when it first wakes up from a nap in the sun. Her eyes slowly opened before she smiled, "Hi."
Shouta gave her a soft kiss, "Hi. The movie just ended." He looked towards where Hizashi and Nemuri still slept. "We should probably wake them up."
"Or…" she stretched again and curled even closer in to him, "we could go back to sleep until Nem wakes up and kicks us out." She leaned back to look up at him with her head still resting on his shoulder, her eyes a deep blend of honey, sapphire and chocolate.
As much as he liked the idea of just returning to unconsciousness, he knew that he needed to get back to his apartment soon. Although Togata was a great helper with Eri, she became incredibly anxious when he was gone for longer than expected. That night he had carried Aine home drunk, Hizashi had to sleep on the floor next to the couch for her to rest. The little girl had nearly knocked him over when he arrived at Hizashi's the next morning to pick her up.
He shook his head, "Another time, maybe." Aine threw a very unconvincing pout his way but slid her legs to the side to slowly stand up before heading to wake Nemuri as he headed towards Hizashi.
"Hey Mic, time to wake up." He gently nudged Hizashi's crossed feet off of the table, earning a curse word and a very pointed angry scowl from the loud blonde as the momentum involuntarily shook him awake.
Nemuri was a much different story. Because her hero suit covered large portions of her body, her quirk's effects were essentially absorbed back into her body all day long. While she had built a resistance to it over the years to where she wasn't falling asleep at random times, it still took someone physically coming to her apartment to wake her in the mornings.
After several attempts, they were finally able to wake Nemuri up just enough to let her know they would clean up and send her to her bed. As Nemuri trudged off to bed, the rest of them made quick work of putting everything away and washing the dishes.
"I think that should do it. Just need to finish putting dishes away now." Hizashi whispered as he put another plate back in the cupboard.
Shouta nodded,
"If you can handle that, I think I'm going to go ahead and make my way back home." Aine yawned as she carefully folded the towel she had been using to dry dishes and set it on the counter, "My bed is calling me."
"I'll walk you back." Shouta wrung out the washcloth he had been using and hung it on the drying rack to dry.
"I can lock up before I leave, see you two in the morning." Hizashi waved them off as he returned to the stack of dishes.
Aine and Shouta softly walked down the hallway towards the elevator, there was some light chatter drifting up from the common room. With the relaxation of duties, it appeared several of their colleagues were taking advantage of the free time to unwind. No one was in the hallways, though, which felt slightly off to Shouta.
As they stepped off the elevator, something in the air felt….wrong. He couldn't put his finger on it but his mind instantly snapped into vigilance as they walked down the hallway towards Aine's apartment. Instinctively, he moved slightly closer to her side as they walked, still keeping the façade of nonchalance but using his peripheral to scan their surroundings.
Aine must have felt it too as he felt her body stiffen slightly as though ready to pounce at the first sign of a threat. The tense feeling in the air seemed to vibrate as they reached the door to her apartment. Shouta immediately noticed that the door was not completely shut but had simply been closed just enough to appear as though it had been shut. Silently, he pointed to the door and indicated to her that it was slightly open.
They both stood on either side of the door with their backs pressed against the wall.
Shouta motioned to Aine - Use quirk. See inside. She nodded and he saw the faint purple glow around her eyes as she activated her quirk to see if she could sense any minds inside. After a few short seconds, the purple faded as she motioned – Minds none inside. Traps?
Maybe. I door open. Slowly. He motioned back. Aine nodded. While keeping his back against the wall, he used his hand to push the door until it slowly swung open. They both held their breath waiting to see what was awaiting them, but nothing happened. The two of them looked at each other before cautiously stepping into the doorway.
Aine was first through the doorway, flicking on the light to a scene of utter chaos. The entire apartment had been ransacked. Books had been thrown and scattered all over the floor, her couch and been completely torn apart and coffee table toppled over. Lamps had been toppled over and broken, the drawers on her small side tables had been opened and dumped out. Shouta's eyes were scanning over the disaster when he heard a sharp intake of breath from Aine. Looking up, he saw writing in huge red letters across the wall of the living room. The paint was fresh and dripping like blood from each letter.
"We know, Blink."