MHA : Shoto Todoroki - Modern-day Terrorist

"He's got cancer"

Sharingan on, I watched the rat squirm in a separate cage, my eyes focusing on him at a molecular level.

His cells were multiplying at a terrifying pace even for a cancer : the chakra in the seal was like corrosive acid, destroying his organs from the inside out.

And, from his little screams, it was painful.

"His body may simply not be strong enough to withstand a seal", my clone said

"Or the chakra input is too large", I said.

The matrice was good – I felt it deep in my bones.

Putting it on someone else was another matter entirely, so I was starting with rats. No one would complain if they died.

There was a knock on my door.

I smoothly rose from my bed, ordering my clone :

"Consider this one a failure and try with a lower amount of clones stored next time"

"Six clones ?", he asked.

"Five", I said. "Maybe lower. And give him something for the pain, too"

"Yes boss"

I opened the door, facing – unsurprisingly – Teka.

Her gaze glided over me to peruse my room-turned lab.

I knew she was getting used to my antics, having seen her fair share of clones wandering around the house to bring me this or that.

Now each time she talked to me she asked me if I was a clone.

"Time for the lesson ?"

"Yes, we-"

Suddenly, her nostrils flared. Her eyes snapped to mine, narrowed.

"Do you want me to showe- oww !"

Teka grabbed me by my ear and dragged me to my bathroom, her long skirts flowing like clouds behind her.

She kicked open the toilet's lid and pushed me on my knees.

"What the-"

Her slender fingers lowered my mask and shot up in my mouth while I was speaking, hitting the back of my throat mercilessly.

I grabbed the toilet bowl and threw up everything I'd eaten that morning.

Teka cleaned her slightly puke-covered fingers on a nearby towel, calm and composed, whereas I was glaring at her.

"Why did-"

"Drugs, Shoto ? Really ?"

She looked both in disbelief as well as sorely disappointed.

"I thought you would be smart enough to never try it, let alone get addicted"

"It's not like that", I said grabbing a hand towel to clean my puke-covered lips, avoiding her gaze. "I don't need it. I can stop if I want. It's just… it helps me a lot for training. I don't need to take as many breaks as I should thanks to it"

"You're reeking, boy" She hadn't called me boy in years. "This is not how a non-addicted individual should smell"

"I'm not addicted", I insisted, growing impatient. "It helps. It's for training"

Teka studied me for a moment, unreadable.

Smoothly, she spun on her heels and stormed out of the bathroom.

I sighed, rubbing my face with my hand.

And now my grandma thought I was a junkie. Great.

At first, I didn't pay any mind to the loud noises coming from my room. It must've been my clones.

Then I realized there was no reason for them to thrash my room.

I stopped at the threshold, my gaze roaming over the chaos.

My closet was open, drawers thrown to the ground, my bed in disarray.

My clones had stopped experimenting, staring in disbelief at Teka who, standing next to my bed, held the stash I'd gotten from one of our warehouses.

She looked me dead in the eyes while it burned to a crisp between her fingers, ashes falling to her feet.

"Don't tell dad"

She cleaned her hands on my bed cover.

"If you are concerned about what your father has to say about the matter, then you know this is not something you should do"

Her skirts brushed my legs as she walked past me.

"I refuse to teach you anything until you're not clean"

"I am-"

She shot me a glance, and I shut up.

*

I heaved, looking at her, tears in my eyes, and cold sweat on my brows.

"Did you- did you poison me ?"

My pounding heart sent thunder through my chest, burning pain flaring and receding, flaring and receding.

"I poisoned until the last crumb of drug available in this country. Your sickness is nothing but the consequences of your actions"

She's insane.

Poisoning that many stacks should've been nothing sort of ludicrous, and it was without considering the millions – if not hundreds of millions – she was losing in unsold, faulty products.

I threw up once more.

"Be glad that I am merely teaching you a lesson. Anyone else who knew of your addiction could've gotten you killed that way, and none of your great abilities would've saved you from dying. Most powerful man in the world or not, we all bleed red. "

She towered over me as, shaking, I couldn't muster the force to get up.

There was something sticky in my ear. I brushed it, looking down at my fingers. Blood.

Teka had no outward reaction. Was I hallucinating ?

"Can you..." I dry heaved. "Can you give me the antidote ?"

"No"

She turned on her heels and left me to my agonizing pain.

*

Three days of uncontrollable shitting and throwing up later, I was once more standing in front of Teka, fingers intertwined, chin on her hands, as she surveyed me.

"See ? Wasn't that hard"

I repressed the flare of irritation that shot through me.

She'd been right about the poisoning part, though. Back in Japan, anyone who could've figured I was always going to Léo would've been able to get rid of me easily.

Between my feverish dreams and vivid hallucinations, this had been what had given me a cold sweat.

I had a glaring weakness that I hadn't even accounted for.

"Did you tell Dad ?"

"Why are you always only concerned about what your father has to say ? I am disappointed too"

"Did you ?"

"No"

I deflated.

"Not yet, at least"

I tensed.

"What do you want me to do to make you not tell him ?"

"Isn't that obvious ? I want you to get rid of this addiction. None of our men will respect a leader so weak as to indulge in his own product"

I gritted my teeth.

"I'll do it", I said painfully. "I'll get clean. I won't ever touch drugs, not even with a ten-foot pole. Just… don't tell Dad"

Teka's glare was cold.

"Your body is stronger than the average human, isn't it ?" I nodded. "Good. You've got a week"

*

Was being held captive by an army of clones in my room a good experience ?

No.

Did I regret creating them to keep me inside, with orders to not let me out even if I threatened bloody murder ?

Yes, a lot.

Were chakra suppressant cuffs my greatest invention as of yet ?

It could've been if only I wasn't the only person in this world with chakra – though, despite my sickening headache and feeling as if I should unalive myself, I knew it had a lot of potential if used correctly…

"I swear I'm going to bring a fucking volcano to life if you don't give me a bit of-"

My clone snorted.

"Can we even do that ? I'm pretty sure we'd just make a lava geyser and kill everyone in a hundred-kilometer radius. We don't have Dad's fine control for pulling up volcanoes and making sure they don't blow up in our faces"

I still hadn't figured out how he hadn't blown up Japan accidentally even though he'd woken up every volcano on the island.

I banged my head on the door until I saw stars.

"Let.me.out."

The thin layer of blue chakra covering my room flared to life, intricate seals sparkling to life before disappearing into the walls.

Reverse-engineering a protection seal to make it a bubble prison was my worst idea ever.

"I swear I won't touch it", I said, licking my dry lips. "I just need… fresh air. That's right, fresh air. Let me out"

"No"

I hit the wall and the door rattled.

"Let me out !"

The withdrawal symptoms peaked at 72 hours.

If it weren't for the cuffs, I would've blown up the house.

*

"Are you feeling better ?"

It had been two weeks since I started my express detox, and four days since I'd gotten out of my room.

There'd been times when I was shaking like a leaf, suddenly cold, and others when I got so angry I could've murdered someone.

"Yes"

I still didn't trust myself enough to not suddenly run to get another batch, hence the two clones constantly flanking me, but as I hadn't yet, I felt like I was on the right path.

At least I hadn't tried running off. Yet.

"Can I take your word that you won't ever touch drugs again ?"

The first day, I'd been down so bad I hadn't even had the strength to brush my teeth with how much I was shaking.

"I won't"

A small, satisfied smile quirked Teka's lips up.

"Good"

She clasped her hands.

"Let's proceed with our lessons, shall we ? I'm sure you've had plenty of time to study the material I gave you"

"Indeed"

Only after I'd gotten over the resentment phase.

"As you must've read, Sicily gave the world the term 'mafia'. It became an umbrella term for all of Italy's underworld brotherhoods, including the Camorra and the Ndrangheta"

"They used to be called Cosa Nostra", I added.

Teka nodded.

"Indeed, though it is only with time that this title came to pass. These Honoured Societies were sworn, an occult sect of gangsters : they were born centuries ago and thrived in a country where the state had a fragile legitimacy and the citizens lacked trust in the government institutions. Blood seeped through the pages of mafia history, though there is a deeply ingrained code of honor among Mafiosi. Have you yet broached upon the various initiations ?"

I nodded.

Mafia bonds are forged in and for violence, only loosened when life ends.

"Then you must know the importance of blood, for blood is perhaps humanity's oldest and most elemental symbol, and mafiosi used to exploit it's every facet"

One of the lent book's quotes flew easily from my mouth :

"Blood as violence, blood as both birth and death, blood as a sign of manhood and courage, blood as kinship and family"

Teka looks agreeably surprised, and only for that, I was glad I broached my reading material late last night when I couldn't fall asleep.

"Though 'manhood ' is a rather outdated term, and not as relevant as it used to be. Depending on which mafia you found yourself in, women used to be treated with more or less contempt : some respected them because they were those that raised mafiosos offspring and could poison their children's minds as well as they could run their mouths and spill their secrets for vengeance. This is exactly what caused the three mafias downfall and what enabled our family to bring them to their knees one by one"

Teka paused, waiting for me to explain what had given us an edge in our war.

"It's the women, isn't it ? Quirks leveled the field, made genders equal in terms of raw strength. We took them in as much as we did men, and that's why we won"

She looked satisfied with my answer.

"It is the women, yes, but it is most importantly these mafia's inability to understand that it was the beginning of a new era : they couldn't keep up. Rather than working together when your late grandfather annihilated the Camorra, they rejoiced. Next was the Ndrangheta and, lastly, the Sicilians, though at some point it came close to mutual destruction"

"But I thought the Camorra were the ones who attacked us first ?"

"They indeed were gauging our abilities, pushing to see if they could disband and then add us to their rank. Your great-grandfather always planned to take over the underworld and unite it under his name, but the Camorra's attack enabled him to look legitimate when he took arms and ruthless enough that no one dared to cross him once he was done with them, killing two birds with one stone"

Teka gave me a book entitled 'Rules and social prescriptions'.

"You shall learn it by heart", she said "As my grandson your criminal apprenticeship will be a short one yet everyone's expectations of you will be higher than if you'd been a decade-old trainee"

I opened the book, my eyes gliding over the content : it held what to do and what not to do, how to address my fellow mafia members, the various positions one could hold among us as well as broaching on a variety of our activities.

Among drug dealings and prostitution (and various other unsavory topics) there was, unsurprisingly, murder.

This last section was the largest of all and yet I believed it was not exhaustive : various sub-sections included murder on our soil as well as foreign.

Surprisingly, members were strictly forbidden from killing anyone they hadn't been ordered to : if they did, they would be judged and 'dealt with accordingly' to precise rules after an inquiry as to who they killed, why they killed, and if it benefited or not our Honoured Society.

"When will be my initiation ?", I asked while perusing the book.

The divergences between our Honoured Society and the old ones were stark enough for me to consider us closer to a Private Military Company yet we were still similar enough to be a mafia.

"Six months, if you're lucky. Three if you show yourself particularly promising"

I nodded.

I hoped Dad would be back for the ceremony.

"Now get to work. There's still a lot for you to study"

*

BONUS :

There was a large board on which was pinned one picture.

Around, he'd written each ability he knew the man to be possessing.

Enhanced senses

Enhanced strength

Enhanced speed

Regeneration (minor ?)

Increased lifespan (immortality ruled out)

Minor telekinesis (need to have you in his visual field)

Black Lightning

Poisonous blood (see Shoto poisoned and captured Summer Camp)

Levitation

Air canon

Red protrusions

Minor teleportation (need to say 'swap')

"Are you really going to murder him ?", asked Kaneki

Enji's eyes settled on All for One's picture around which all cords gathered.

His gaze was cold, resolute.

"I am"

*

A/N :

I am ONE FUCKING CHAPTER from finishing this story.

Oh god I can't believe it's happening. 

I'll update you once I'm through (+ new updates concerning the next FF etc).

Yeah, see you in the next update everyone.