Seeing the hardball approach wasn't cutting it, I softened up. "Alright, what do you want?"
Toga shrugged, flashing a sugar-sweet smile. "You'll agree to my terms?"
"Depends. Nothing too wild…" I wasn't falling for her trap that easy.
She tilted her head, sizing me up with a scheming vibe that screamed trouble. Giggling, she leaned in close, voice a teasing whisper. "Take the uniform, and I'll tell you my terms later."
I squinted, on guard. But if I said no, I'd be stuck digging through her leftover mess for something wearable - no guarantee it'd fit. I sighed, holding out my hand.
"Fine… gimme the uniform..."
Beaming, Toga carefully peeled the tiny uniform off Mini-Ryuga, shielding it like it could blush. Handing it over, she cradled the bear like a mom soothing a freshly stripped kid. "It's okay, Mini-Ryuga, big bro's borrowing your clothes."
I ignored the weird muttering, snagging the uniform and bolting downstairs to prep for post-shower. Toga trailed behind, skipping along as we hit the dorm's first-floor bathrooms - separate for guys and girls.
...
Steam fogged the air, clinging to the damp tiles and wrapping the massive communal bath in a heavy, stifling quiet. I stepped into the hot tub, letting the scalding water bite into my tired muscles. My wounds hadn't fully closed, and soaking them was a massive risk for infection, but at this point, letting the grime and sweat sit on them felt worse.
I leaned my head back against the stone rim, closing my eyes.
Just breathe. Just a moment of absolute silence.
But the silence didn't last. It started as a faint ringing in my ears, thin and high-pitched. Then, the heat of the water began to feel... wrong. It wasn't just warm anymore; it felt thick, viscous, clinging to my skin like syrup. The faint scent of chlorine and soap vanished, replaced instantly by a sharp, suffocating stench of copper and rust.
My eyes snapped open.
The crystal-clear water was gone. In its place, a churning pool of dark, crimson blood lapped against my chest.
My breath caught in my throat. The shadows in the corner of the bathroom seemed to stretch and contort. For a split second, I didn't see the tiled wall—I saw Stain's bloodshot eyes glaring at me, his jagged blade ripping through my gut. I felt the phantom chill of All For One's eyeless, featureless face pressing into my space, his cold fingers tapping my forehead, peeling back my skull.
My heart hammered against my ribs like a jackhammer. I scrambled backward, splashing frantically until my back hit the cold tiles. I gasped for air, but the steam felt like poison.
It wasn't real. I knew it wasn't real. It was just a hallucination, my brain misfiring from the sheer, unadulterated terror of the last few weeks. But knowing it was fake didn't stop the crushing weight on my chest. If this kind of mental glitch happened in the middle of a real fight, I'd be a dead man before I could even blink. This wasn't just fear; it was a deadly liability. I needed it to stop. Now.
The sliding door creaked open, the sound cutting through my panic like a knife.
I blinked hard, and the blood vanished, returning to clear, rippling hot water. Toga Himiko strolled in, her blonde hair damp from the steam. She casually shed her clothes, letting her towel drop to the floor, her eyes locked on me with a dangerous, playful glint.
"You promised," she purred, dipping a toe into the water.
Normally, I would have pushed her away. I would have argued. But right now, my hands were still trembling under the water. The suffocating dread of Stain and All For One was still crawling under my skin, threatening to pull me back into that hallucination. I needed an anchor. I needed something sharp enough to cut through the phantom terror in my head.
She slid into the water, wrapping her arms around my neck, her soft skin pressing against my rigid chest. She leaned in for a kiss, expecting my usual reluctant compliance.
Instead, I grabbed her waist, my grip bruisingly tight, and pulled her in hard.
She let out a surprised gasp as my lips crashed onto hers, rough and desperate. I didn't want romance. I didn't want gentle intimacy. When her sharp canine nicked my lower lip, the sudden, stinging pain flared like a spark in the dark.
It worked. The metallic taste of my own blood grounded me instantly. The ghosts in the shadows disappeared, replaced entirely by the searing, undeniable reality of the pain. It was a twisted, horrifying revelation: physical pain was the only thing loud enough to silence the screaming in my head.
Toga, misreading my sudden aggression completely,'s eyes widened with a wild, hungry thrill. She thought I was finally matching her crazy, that I was just craving something hardcore. She didn't know she was acting as my twisted coping mechanism.
The pace shattered. The slow, quiet steam of the bathroom morphed into a chaotic frenzy.
She pushed me back, her hands tangling in my hair as she dragged me underwater with her. The heat of the bath swallowed us. My lungs burned as we thrashed beneath the surface. She bit hard into the sensitive skin of my neck, right over my pulse, her teeth sinking deep enough to draw fresh blood. The agonizing sting radiated through my nervous system, and I pulled her closer, actively chasing the pain. It was an addiction taking root in real-time. Every scratch, every breathless second under the water chased the anxiety further away.
We were a tangle of desperate limbs, slipping and slamming against the hard tiles. The line between euphoria and survival blurred into nothing. She choked me, her hands pressing into my throat as the oxygen in my lungs depleted. My vision started to spot black—not from a panic attack, but from actual, physical hypoxia. We were pushing it too far. She was lost in the thrill, and I was too reliant on the agony to tell her to stop.
My chest convulsed. We were genuinely going to drown right here in the U.A. bathhouse.
With a final, desperate surge of survival instinct, I gripped her hips and shoved us upward. We broke the surface in an explosion of water, both of us coughing violently, gasping for the humid air as water sloshed violently over the edges of the tub.
Himiko clung to me, her chest heaving, a manic, satisfied grin plastered across her flushed face. She traced the bleeding bite mark on my neck, completely oblivious to the fact that we had just danced on the edge of actual death.
I leaned my forehead against the cold tile, panting, my mind completely clear of the hallucinations, but replaced by a chilling realization. I was using her violence to medicate my own fractured mind. And the scariest part? It felt too damn good to stop.
...
Dressed up and hauling a limp Himiko - too wrecked to stand - back upstairs in just a towel, I disinfected and bandaged the wound, took a mountain of painkillers and fever reducers, then tapped my last reserves to tackle Aizawa's deadline. She wanted to help, but after burning everything on each other, she was toast, sprawled on the bed.
I sank into the chair, fired up the laptop, grabbed pen and paper, and opened the doc. 2,000 handwritten tactical words sounded brutal, but compared to Nomu scraps or surviving Stain? Cake.
Still, 2,000 words in six night hours, and Japanese only? Torture.
Above all, my mind is completely blank right now.
The pain from the tear in my stomach combined with the bite on my neck makes my hands tremble. My handwriting is messy, like garbage, but I grit my teeth and keep writing.
This pain... it reminds me that I'm still alive.
Himiko lazed on the bed, face in pillow, voice a drowsy purr. "Ryuu-chan… lemme sleep a bit…"
"Go for it," I said, no pause, starting to write.
Unlike 1-A's type-or-write options, Aizawa demanded pure handwriting this time for me.
Sucked? Yep. But it's solid review, so I sucked it up.
"You really doing all 2,000 now?" she mumbled, half-asleep.
"What, save it for morning?"
"…Write some, sleep, finish at dawn?"
"Nah. Aizawa hates late shit. Plus, you need a reference to do your own too, right?"
She buried her face deeper, fingers clinging to my sleeve. "That toilet-paper-neck asshole's the worst."
I smirked, pen moving.
Handwriting's a beast compared to typing - I'd knock this out in an hour on keys, pen's slow, precise - no typos, no scribbles. Japanese flows from this body's memory, but my real tongue's elsewhere, so I go careful, not scratching like a chicken on speed.
Eyes shut, deep breath, I dumped my brain onto paper. Started with tactics - Aizawa'd eat up practical over flashy. Detailed reacting to bad odds, using terrain, reading foes, adapting mid-fight.
Words flowed, stacking into clean paragraphs. Took an hour for the basics, then I hit real-world examples to make associations - Sports Festival stuff. Izuku's evolving style, Todoroki's fire compensating weaknesses, Bakugo's speed and brutality crushing opposition.
Himiko went quiet, probably out. But at 1,500 words, she stirred, rolling to the bed's edge.
"…Ryuu-kun…"
"Yeah?" I kept writing.
"Can I hug you a sec?"
Pausing, I set the pen down, spun the chair, and opened my arms. "Fine, quick one."
She grinned, crawling over and latching on, head on my shoulder, warm breath on my neck. Her skin prickled - chilly air, no clothes post-towel. Even after our romp, her scent lingered - vague, intoxicating, helped me to calm down before another mental breakdown started again.
"Ryuu-chan's always so warm…"
I didn't reply, letting her soak it in, then eased her off. "Alright, back to sleep. Gotta finish."
She didn't fight, giggling as she flopped back. "Sleep when you're done, 'kay?"
I nodded, grabbed the pen, and powered through, crashing beside her at 4 a.m.