Chapter 18
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 single line of gray text on my phone screen that froze my blood faster than any ice villain.
"I can't come today. They are in a bad mood. They say I breathe too loud."
I stared at the phone, sitting at my desk, surrounded by blueprints for stun grenades.
Breathing. They were bothered that she breathed.
In my past life, I had studied basic psychology. I knew that 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 wished their daughter were a piece of furniture.
I gripped the phone so hard the plastic case cracked.
I could go there and blow the door off its hinges. I could yell. I could do what I did with my parents. But the Togas weren't like the Bakugos. If you yelled at them, they would shut down. They would call the police. They would play the victims of a "juvenile delinquent" and isolate Himiko even more.
No. To win this battle, I didn't need explosives. I needed to be something much more terrifying to people like them: an inconvenient guest.
I dialed Izuku's number.
"Izuku. 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 going to study? I thought today was physical training."
"We are studying," I confirmed with a cold, calculating voice. "But not at my house. We're going on a field trip."
"To Toga-chan's house?" There was a brief pause, during which I could hear his tactical mind working. "Is this a rescue mission or an invasion?"
I smirked. The nerd learned fast.
"It's a territorial occupation. See you in ten minutes."
(...)
Toga's house was an insult to life.
Located in an upper-middle-class residential neighborhood, it was a two-story house painted an inoffensive beige, with a garden where the grass looked laser-cut. There were no bikes lying around, no shoes, no personality. It was a magazine model home.
Izuku and I stood in front of the door. Izuku adjusted his backpack, visibly nervous, but there was a steely 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 occupy our space. We don't ask for permission, we ask for forgiveness... and not even that. We are exemplary students worried about our classmate. Be polite, but be clueless. Don't take the hints for us to leave."
"Understood."
I rang the doorbell.
It took them a minute to open. It was the mother. A thin, blonde woman with a very strict bob cut and an expression of contained annoyance that morphed into a forced smile when she saw us.
"Yes?" she asked, blocking the entrance with her body.
"Good afternoon, Mrs. Toga," I said, executing a perfect forty-five-degree bow. My voice was that of a news anchor: clear, powerful, and charmingly fake. "I am Bakugo Katsuki, Himiko's classmate. And this is Midoriya Izuku, the top student in our class."
The woman blinked, surprised by the formality.
"Oh. Bakugo-kun. I've... heard of you." Her gaze landed on Izuku with distrust, probably noticing his worn red sneakers. "Himiko can't go out today. She is... indisposed."
"We know, ma'am," Izuku interjected quickly, using 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 the notes from our study group. We urgently need to review them with her. It's vital for the class average."
"We don't want to bother her if she's sick," I added, taking a firm step forward, which instinctively forced her to step back into the foyer to avoid me touching her, "but as future U.A. Academy candidates, we take academic excellence very seriously. It'll only be an hour. Or three."
The mention of "U.A." and "excellence" was the key. For those obsessed with status and appearances, denying entry to two promising students was a social sin.
Mrs. Toga hesitated, looking into the house as if evaluating whether it was presentable enough.
"Well... I suppose if it's to study..." She stepped aside reluctantly. "Come in. But, please, take off your shoes and keep the noise down. My husband is working in his study."
"Of course. We will maintain absolute silence," I said as I walked 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 right then, her head down, probably sent by her mother to fetch something. When she looked up and saw us in the hallway, her eyes widened. Initial fear gave way to absolute disbelief.
"Katsuki-kun? Izuku-kun?"
"Hello, Toga-san," I said loudly so her mother would hear. "We brought you 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, walking right past the mother and heading to the main sofa like I owned the place.
The invasion had begun.
(...)
Over the next twenty minutes, Izuku and I unleashed meticulously controlled chaos.
We occupied the pristine glass coffee table with a mountain of books, open notebooks, pencil cases, and a bag of noisy snacks that Izuku had "forgotten" to close. Toga sat between us, still stiff, 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 potato chips. "Eat. Make noise."
"Father will get mad," she whispered, her eyes filled with terror. "He doesn't like messes in the living room."
"To hell with your father," 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 at the crunch of a potato chip bag.
"What is the meaning of this?" he asked in a sharp voice, almost a hissing whisper. "Himiko, I told you I wanted silence."
Toga shrank, making herself small between her shoulders. It was a conditioned reflex, painful to watch.
Izuku jumped up, "accidentally" dropping a pencil on the hardwood floor.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Toga!" Izuku exclaimed with nervous, outrageously loud cheerfulness. "Excuse the interruption! We are explaining the theory of thermodynamics applied to Quirks. It's fascinating, isn't it? Himiko-chan has a very unique perspective on biological energy transfer."
The father looked at Izuku with disgust, and then at me.
"Bakugo." He nodded stiffly. "I thought you were a more... orderly boy."
"Knowledge is complex, sir," I replied without getting up. I maintained my relaxed posture, leaning on two of his pristine cushions. "We are helping your daughter secure her future. You should feel proud. She grasps concepts that elude most adults."
"Himiko?" The father let out a dry, cruel laugh. "Himiko doesn't even know how to behave at the table. Don't waste your time. She has no academic future."
Silence fell. Toga looked down, her hands gripping the fabric of her skirt.
I felt my body temperature rising. My palms were itching. I wanted to blow his face off. I wanted to shatter that glass table and shove the pieces down his throat.
But that was what he wanted. He wanted to prove that we were savages, just like her.
I took a deep breath.
"Izuku," I said with forced calm. "Show Mr. Toga Himiko's essay on biology."
Izuku, catching the cue instantly, pulled out a notebook (which was actually his own) 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 began to mutter at top speed, unleashing a relentless torrent of technical terms and high-pitched praise. "Himiko-chan's analytical capacity is fifteen percent above the national average, according to my calculations, and if we consider her adaptability to environments..."
The father physically stepped back, overwhelmed by the wall of sound and Izuku's aggressive, unwavering positivity.
"Alright, alright... I get it," the man muttered, raising a hand, trying to regain control of his own living room.
"It's a shame," I chimed in with a bored, condescending voice. "It's a shame that real talent isn't valued in this house. In mine, my parents celebrate potential. I suppose 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 the others, flash 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 pathetic bureaucrat who could only bully a little girl behind closed doors, but cowered before someone who didn't fear him.
"Just... keep the noise down," he muttered, turning around to retreat to his study cave.
"Thank you, sir!" Izuku yelled after him happily. "We'll be sure to study 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 teenagers who didn't understand hints and retreated to the backyard "to tend to the roses."
We were alone.
Toga exhaled 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, popping a soda can with a loud, satisfying crack. "We took his power away, Toga. The moment Izuku and I walked through the door, this stopped being his living room. It's our base now."
Izuku handed her a tissue.
"You're safe, Toga-chan," he said in a soft, warm voice. "As long as we're here, nobody will tell you you're weird or stupid."
Toga took the tissue, but instead of drying her tears, she lunged at Izuku and hugged him, tackling him to the pristine white rug.
"You're my heroes!" she wailed, 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 awkwardly returning the hug.
I stayed on the sofa, watching them.
The "Territorial Invasion" had been a resounding success. We hadn't needed violence. We only needed our 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, her hair messy and wearing a radiant, dazzling smile.
"Coming!"
We spent the next three hours there. We ate, laughed (too loudly), and intentionally left some crumbs on the rug. 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 go?". She simply 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 father was going to call the police."
"He didn't," I said, looking straight ahead. "Because deep down he knows if the police arrive, they'll see a depressed daughter studying with two concerned classmates. And he'll look like the bad guy interrupting her education."
I clenched my fist in my pocket, feeling a spark of controlled nitroglycerin.
We set the rules now.