Age: 13
The message arrived at 5:45 PM on a Sunday.
It wasn't a dramatic cry for help. There were no knife emojis or capital letters. Just a line of gray text on my phone screen that froze the blood in my veins faster than any ice villain.
«Can't come today. They're in a bad mood. They say I breathe too loud.»
I stared at the phone, sitting at my desk, surrounded by schematics for stun grenades.
Breathing. It bothered them that she breathed.
In my previous life, I had studied basic psychology. I knew abuse doesn't always leave purple bruises. Sometimes, abuse is silence. It's making you feel like you take up space you don't deserve, that your mere existence is an offense to the environment. Himiko Toga's parents didn't hit her with their fists; they hit her with the clinical indifference of someone who wishes their daughter were a piece of furniture.
I gripped the phone so hard the case creaked.
I could go there and blow the door off. I could scream. I could do what I did with my parents: use "Dynamite Diplomacy." But the Togas weren't like the Bakugous. If you yelled at them, they would shut down. They'd call the police. They'd play the victims of a "delinquent youth" and isolate Himiko even more.
No. To win this battle, I didn't need explosives. I needed to be something much more terrifying for people like them: an inconvenient guest.
I dialed Izuku's number.
"Deku. Put on your school uniform. The clean one. And bring all your math, English, and science notebooks. The thickest ones you have."
"Kacchan?" Izuku's voice sounded confused. "Are we studying? I thought today was physical training."
"We are studying," I confirmed, with a cold, calculated voice. "But not at my house. We're going on a field trip."
"To Toga-chan's house?" There was a brief pause, where I could hear the gears of his brain turning. "Is this a rescue mission or an invasion?"
I smiled. The nerd learned fast.
"It's a territorial occupation, Deku. Meet me in ten minutes."
(...)
The Toga house was an insult to life.
Located in an upper-middle-class residential neighborhood, it was a two-story structure painted a harmless beige, with a garden where the grass looked like it had been laser-cut. There were no bikes lying around, no toys, no personality. It was a model home.
Izuku and I stood in front of the door. Izuku adjusted his backpack, visibly nervous, but there was a determination in his green eyes that I liked. He no longer trembled before authority; he only calculated how to dismantle it.
"The plan?" he whispered.
"We go in. We take up space. We don't ask for permission, we ask for forgiveness... and not even that. We are model students worried about our classmate. Be polite, but be dense. Don't catch the hints for us to leave."
"Understood. Operation Barnacle."
I rang the doorbell.
It took a minute for them to open. It was the mother. A thin woman, with blonde hair in a severe bob cut and an expression of contained annoyance that transformed into a plastic smile upon seeing us.
"Yes?" she asked, blocking the entrance with her body.
"Good afternoon, Mrs. Toga," I said, giving a perfect 45-degree bow. My voice was that of a news anchor: clear, projected, and charming. "I am Bakugou Katsuki, a fellow student of Himiko's. And this is Midoriya Izuku, the top student in our class."
The woman blinked, surprised by the formality.
"Oh. Bakugou-kun. I've... heard of you." Her gaze drifted to Izuku with distrust, probably noticing his worn red sneakers. "Himiko can't come out today. She is... indisposed."
"We know, ma'am," Izuku intervened quickly, with that innocent, rushed voice he used when he wanted to seem harmless. "That's why we came. We have midterms next week and Himiko-chan has our study group's notes. We need to review them with her urgently. It is vital for the class average."
"We don't want to bother her if she's sick," I added, taking a step forward, forcing her to instinctively step back to avoid being touched, "but as future U.A. candidates, we take academic excellence very seriously. It will only be an hour. Or three."
The mention of "U.A." and "excellence" was the skeleton key. For people obsessed with status, denying entry to two promising students was a social sin.
Mrs. Toga hesitated, looking into the house as if evaluating if it was presentable enough.
"Well... I suppose if it's for studying..." She stepped aside, reluctantly. "Come in. But please, take off your shoes and don't make noise. My husband is working in his study."
"Of course. We'll be quiet as graves," I said, walking in.
The interior smelled of chemical lemon and emptiness. The silence was oppressive. It was the kind of house where you were afraid to sit on the sofa in case you wrinkled the cushion.
Himiko was coming down the stairs at that moment, head bowed, probably sent by her mother to fetch something. When she looked up and saw us in her hallway, her eyes went wide. Initial fear gave way to absolute disbelief.
"Katsuki-kun? Izuku-kun?"
"Hello, Toga-san," I said loudly, so her mother would hear me. "We brought the history books you asked for."
I winked at her. She blinked, and then a small, trembling smile appeared on her lips.
"Ah... yes. Thank you."
"Let's go to the living room," I ordered, bypassing the mother and heading to the main sofa as if I owned the place.
The invasion had begun.
(...)
For the next twenty minutes, Izuku and I deployed controlled chaos.
We occupied the glass coffee table with a mountain of books, open notebooks, pencil cases, and a bag of loud snacks that Izuku had "forgotten" to close. Toga sat between us, still rigid, looking toward the kitchen door where her mother pretended to make tea while watching us.
"Relax," I whispered to Toga, passing her a bag of chips. "Eat. Make noise."
"Dad is going to be mad," she whispered, eyes full of terror. "He doesn't like mess in the living room."
"Screw dad," I said, opening my chemistry book. "We are studying."
And then, the father appeared.
Mr. Toga was a gray man. Gray suit, gray hair, gray aura. He came down the stairs frowning upon hearing the crunch of a chip bag.
"What is the meaning of this?" he asked, his voice a sharp whisper. "Himiko, I told you I wanted silence."
Toga shrank, making herself small between her shoulders. It was a painful conditioned reflex to watch.
Izuku jumped up, "accidentally" dropping a pencil on the floor.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Toga!" Izuku exclaimed with nervous, loud cheerfulness. "Sorry for the intrusion! We are explaining the theory of thermodynamics applied to Quirks. It's fascinating, right? Himiko-chan has a very unique perspective on biological energy transfer."
The father looked at Izuku with disgust, then at me.
"Bakugou." He nodded stiffly at me. "I thought you were a more... orderly boy."
"Knowledge is messy, sir," I retorted, without getting up. I maintained my relaxed posture, taking up two cushions. "We are helping your daughter secure her future. You should be proud. She understands concepts that escape most adults."
"Himiko?" The father let out a dry, cruel laugh. "Himiko doesn't even understand how to behave at the table. Don't waste your time. She has no academic future."
There was silence. Toga lowered her gaze, her hands clutching her skirt.
I felt my body temperature rising. My palms started to itch. I wanted to blow his face off. I wanted to explode that glass table and shove the shards down his throat.
But that's what he wanted. He wanted to prove we were savages, like her.
I took a deep breath.
"Izuku," I said calmly. "Show Mr. Toga Himiko's essay on biology."
Izuku, catching the signal on the fly, pulled out a notebook (which was actually his) and practically shoved it in the father's face.
"Look! Here she explains the relationship between caloric intake and mutant receptor activation! It's brilliant!" Izuku started muttering at Mach 5, a torrent of technical words and praise. "Toga-chan's analytical capacity is 15% above the national average, according to my calculations, and if we consider her adaptability..."
The father stepped back, overwhelmed by the wall of sound and Izuku's aggressive positivity.
"Alright, alright... I get it," the man mumbled, trying to regain control.
"It's a shame," I intervened, with a bored voice. "It's a shame that talent isn't appreciated in this house. In mine, my parents celebrate potential. I guess every family has... different priorities."
I looked Mr. Toga in the eye. I didn't blink. I let a small spark, tiny and imperceptible to others, shine in my red iris. It was an alpha male challenge in his own territory.
Your daughter isn't the problem. You are the problem. And I am stronger than you.
Mr. Toga looked away. He was a coward. A bureaucrat who could only intimidate a little girl, but who shrank before someone who didn't fear him.
"Just... don't make too much noise," he muttered, turning around to return to his study.
"Thank you, sir!" Izuku shouted at his back, cheerfully. "We'll make sure to study very hard!"
When the study door closed, the air in the room changed.
The mother, who had been watching from the kitchen, decided it wasn't worth confronting two loud teenagers and retreated to the garden "to tend to the roses."
We were alone.
Toga let out the air she had been holding. She looked at the study door, then at us. Her yellow eyes filled with tears, but this time they weren't from fear.
"He left..." she whispered. "He never leaves. He always makes me leave."
"He left because he couldn't control the situation," I said, opening a soda can with a loud, satisfying crack. "We took his power, Toga. The moment Izuku and I walked in, this stopped being his living room. Now it's our base."
Izuku passed her a tissue.
"You're safe, Toga-chan," he said softly. "As long as we're here, no one is going to tell you you're weird or stupid."
Toga took the tissue, but instead of wiping her tears, she launched herself at Izuku and hugged him, knocking him to the floor on the pristine carpet.
"You're my heroes!" she whimpered, burying her face in Izuku's chest. "You're the best, the best, the best!"
"T-Toga-chan! You're crushing my spleen!" Izuku squeaked, red as a tomato, but hugging her back awkwardly.
I stayed on the sofa, watching them.
The "Territorial Invasion" had been a total success. We hadn't needed violence. We had only needed presence. We had filled the sterile void of that house with noise, mess, and loyalty.
"Hey, vampire," I said, gently kicking her leg. "Stop suffocating the nerd and come eat. Your mother makes terrible tea, but these cookies aren't bad."
Toga got up, hair messy and wearing a radiant, fanged smile.
"Coming!"
We spent the next three hours there. We ate, laughed (too loudly), and left crumbs on the carpet. When we left at sunset, the Toga house was still a cold and hostile place. But Himiko no longer looked small in the doorway.
We waved goodbye.
"See you tomorrow," she said. She didn't ask "can I?". She said "see you."
"Tomorrow," I confirmed.
As we walked back under the orange streetlights, Izuku sighed, exhausted but happy.
"Kacchan... that was intense. I thought the dad was going to call the police."
"He didn't," I said, looking ahead. "Because deep down, he knows that if the police come, they'll see a depressed daughter and two worried friends. And he'll look like the bad guy."
I clenched my fist.
"We won a battle today, Deku. But the war continues. That house is still toxic."
"I know," Izuku said, his gaze hardening. "But now she knows she has an army."
Yeah. An army of three. And woe betide anyone who tried to mess with us.