Todoroki stopped trying to finish the match safely.
The next ice wave was enormous, not broad like the opening one but focused, layered, several rising formations converging on Midoriya at once to block lateral movement while another sheet raced directly beneath his feet. Midoriya blasted the center apart. The left formation held. He jumped, a pillar rising to meet him mid-air, another Smash spinning his whole body sideways with the recoil. Todoroki was already beneath him when he landed. Ice caught the back of his leg. He smashed downward anyway, and the recoil blew both of them apart at once.
Todoroki skidded across the ground. Midoriya landed hard on one knee. Both of them were breathing raggedly now.
The crowd's mood had changed somewhere in the middle of it. At the start they'd been waiting to see how long Midoriya could survive. Now they were watching to see who actually won. Megumi noticed the shift. So did Bakugo. So did Todoroki, and it irritated him more than he wanted to admit. Midoriya had dragged the fight into a place where Todoroki could genuinely lose it.
...
Todoroki attacked again. Midoriya stopped meeting every wave head-on, moving between them instead, a narrow blast through one opening, a leap over another, sacrificing less and closing distance more with every exchange. Todoroki raised a wall. Midoriya smashed through the side of it instead of the center, and Todoroki's eyes went wide as he came through the flying shards, shoulder slamming straight into his chest. They hit the ground together. The crowd erupted.
Midoriya tried forcing him toward the boundary. Todoroki planted his right palm, ice spreading out behind him, and Midoriya's shoes lost traction on it entirely. Todoroki twisted, and suddenly Midoriya was the one being thrown. He planted his damaged hand to catch himself, pain exploding up through his arm, and used the momentum to roll through it instead of fighting it. Both of them scrambled back up with no space left between them.
Todoroki punched. Midoriya blocked it, and the impact actually hurt less than the ice had. He answered with his shoulder. Todoroki staggered. Another fist came in, and Todoroki caught it this time, freezing the sleeve and the forearm underneath it in the same motion. Midoriya ripped himself free before the ice could spread all the way through, fabric tearing, skin burning from the cold. He kicked. Todoroki blocked it. Midoriya hopped back out of range.
For several seconds there was no huge spectacle left in it at all. Just two exhausted boys fighting, and Midoriya was better at that particular fight than Todoroki had expected. Not stronger. Not faster. But desperate in a way that made every single opening genuinely dangerous.
...
Up in the booth, Aizawa watched closely. "He's changed the match."
Present Mic glanced over. "Midoriya?"
"He couldn't keep trading power evenly, so he stopped trying to." Midoriya ducked beneath another ice formation on the screen. "Now he's using the damage he's already caused."
"To Todoroki?"
"To his temperature." Todoroki's movements had visibly slowed. Midoriya had fewer resources left than he did, but for the first time all match their physical speed had closed enough for Midoriya's reads to actually matter. Aizawa's eyes narrowed. "This is dangerous for Todoroki now."
...
Midoriya heard nothing except his own breathing. One opening. That's all I need.
He didn't need to overpower Todoroki outright. He needed the boundary, and Todoroki knew that too, ice forming behind himself every single time Midoriya closed in, an anchor against exactly this. Midoriya remembered the very start of the fight. That's how he stops the shockwaves. His eyes widened. An idea.
Todoroki attacked again. Midoriya didn't destroy the ice directly this time. He blasted the ground beside it instead, the shockwave changing the angle of the whole formation, cracking it sideways under Todoroki's own feet. His footing shifted. Midoriya rushed him. Todoroki's eye went wide. Midoriya hit him, not with One For All this time, just his own shoulder, and Todoroki stumbled backward.
The boundary was close. Very close.
The crowd rose. Uraraka grabbed the railing. "Deku!" Bakugo's eyes sharpened. Megumi leaned forward without meaning to.
Todoroki looked behind himself. Less than two meters. Midoriya came again. Todoroki threw ice. Midoriya destroyed only enough of it to pass through. One meter. Todoroki tried anchoring again. Midoriya smashed the anchor apart before it could set. Half a meter.
Todoroki's eyes went wide. For the first time all match: I'm going out.
Midoriya saw it land on his face. I can win.
That thought nearly stopped his own heart. He could win. Against Todoroki. Here. Now.
Midoriya lunged. Todoroki slammed both feet down at once, ice exploding upward between them. Midoriya crossed his arms in front of himself, and the impact hurled him backward, but his left foot caught the ground at the last possible second. He stayed inside the line.
Todoroki stared at him. Midoriya looked back up. Both of them smiled differently, Todoroki's edging closer to disbelief, Midoriya's landing somewhere in exhausted determination.
They were still here.
...
The next exchange would end it. Everyone in the stadium understood that at the same time. Cementoss stood up from his seat. Midnight's posture changed. All Might's hands tightened at his sides.
Todoroki's entire right side trembled openly now. Midoriya could barely close his right hand at all anymore. One functional arm between them. Damaged legs on both sides.
Enough.
Todoroki raised his right hand, ice gathering, more of it than he'd summoned at any other point in the match, a final concentration of everything he still had left to spend. Midoriya watched it grow. If I take that one normally, it's over.
He lowered himself, power surging through his left side hard enough that his own muscles screamed under it. One shot.
Todoroki's eyes stayed locked on him. He's coming straight through it.
Neither of them looked toward the boundary anymore. Midoriya thought of his mother. Uraraka. Iida. All Might. The notebooks filled with someone else's dreams. The rooftop. The beach. The entrance exam. Every earlier version of himself that had believed this exact moment was impossible.
'I don't have to be Kacchan.'
Power climbed.
'I don't have to be Fushiguro.'
His left hand clenched.
'I don't have to be Todoroki.'
The ice around Todoroki kept expanding.
'I don't have to be All Might.'
'I have to be me.'
Midoriya launched forward. "I'M HERE!"
Todoroki's eyes went wide. Then the ice moved.
Midoriya drew back his fist. "SMASH!"
The collision ripped straight through the arena. Air pressure detonated against the wall of ice. Ice fragments filled the air completely. The whole audience disappeared behind a wall of frozen mist and dust.
For several seconds, nobody could see anything at all.
Then the dust started to settle, and neither of them was still standing.
Midoriya went down first, flat on his back several feet from where he'd last been on his feet, everything he'd already spent finally catching up to him at once. His chest kept rising and falling. His eyes had already rolled shut somewhere in that last exchange, pain outrunning whatever had been keeping him upright until now.
Todoroki went down a moment after him, knees buckling, the rest of his weight following without any say in the matter. Ice spread out flat beneath him where he landed. Frost crawled visibly across what was left of his right side. His whole body shook, teeth audibly chattering even from several rows up. He didn't get back up either.
Present Mic's voice cracked across the silence. "BOTH OF THEM ARE DOWN!"
Recovery Girl reached Midoriya first. Two medical robots closed in on Todoroki right behind her.
Midnight looked between the two of them for a long moment, waiting to see if either would move. Neither did.
"Both competitors are unable to continue!" Her voice carried out over the whole stadium. "Winner determined by position at the time of collapse! Todoroki advances to the semifinals!"
The stadium erupted anyway, uncertain applause finding its footing the longer it went on.
Todoroki let his head fall back against the concrete. He didn't stand. He couldn't. He just breathed, and every single inhale hurt. His right side had gone numb. His vision blurred at the edges.
He'd won. He couldn't remember the last few seconds of it clearly enough to say how.
Megumi stared at the arena. That had been close, far closer than almost anyone watching had expected going into it.
Todoroki had entered the fight stronger. There was no real question about that, better control, more experience with his own quirk, a body built to survive the strain of its own power. Midoriya had nearly beaten him anyway, and not because the actual gap between them had disappeared. Because Midoriya had understood exactly where that gap existed and kept forcing the fight into places where it mattered less and less.
Megumi's eyes moved toward where Recovery Girl knelt over Midoriya. Then back to Todoroki, still down on the ice he'd made, frost thick across his right side, shivering hard enough to see from the stands.
...
Todoroki stared up at the blurring stadium lights, too worn down to fully process that he'd actually won. Hands lifted him onto something a moment later, a blanket settling over his shoulders that did nothing at all against the cold still radiating out of his own body.
Barely. That word wouldn't leave him alone.
Todoroki turned his head against the stretcher. His left hand lay open at his side, empty, still faintly warm despite everything else. For one second in that fight it had actually caught, real fire instead of a suppressed impulse, and he'd put it out the moment his father's voice reached him. Not because he'd decided to. Because some part of him still flinched at that voice the same way it had at seven years old, and that realization sat worse in his chest than the loss almost had.
He thought about his mother's hands. He thought about the hospital, the version of himself that had learned to be afraid of his own reflection. He thought about a Todoroki who used both sides without flinching at either one, and lying there freezing on his own ice, he genuinely couldn't tell whether that version of himself was someone he was protecting himself from becoming, or someone he simply hadn't let himself become yet.
Megumi's voice surfaced again, quieter this time. Fight your father. Fight me. Pick one.
Todoroki closed his eyes. He'd beaten Midoriya fighting someone who wasn't even standing in the arena with him, and he'd nearly lost specifically because of that. Whoever stood across from him next would already understand exactly what that cost him.
He still didn't know what he'd do about it when the moment actually came. That uncertainty scared him more than the cold did.
...
Midoriya woke to white ceiling panels. His first thought was pain. His second was I lost, and that one hurt worse.
Recovery Girl stood beside the bed. All Might was there too. Midoriya stared upward, and for several seconds nobody said anything at all.
Then his face tightened. "I'm sorry."
All Might looked at him. Midoriya swallowed. "I couldn't do what you asked." His voice shook. "You told me to show everyone. To tell the world..." His eyes burned. "...that I was here." He looked at the bandages covering his hand. "And I lost."
All Might stayed quiet. Midoriya's breathing turned uneven.
"I knew there was a difference." He didn't have to say the names out loud. Bakugo. Todoroki. Fushiguro. "I've always known." His fingers curled weakly. "When I was quirkless-" the word came easier than it once would have, "-I'd look at Kacchan and everyone else and think about how much farther ahead they'd be by the time I ever got a chance." He laughed once, small and bitter. "Except I wasn't supposed to get one at all."
All Might's expression softened.
"Then you gave me One For All." Midoriya's eyes lowered. "And I think part of me thought that meant I had to catch up immediately." He breathed out slowly. "Because if I couldn't..." His throat tightened. "...then maybe you picked the wrong person."
All Might's eyes widened slightly. There it was. The thing Midoriya had been too ashamed to say out loud until now.
"Todoroki can do all of that without destroying himself in the process." His hands trembled. "Kacchan's had years to make Explosion part of how he moves without thinking about it. Fushiguro always looks like he already knows what to do next." His voice cracked. "And I'm still breaking my own fingers just to stay in the fight at all."
Silence. Recovery Girl watched him carefully from across the room.
"I wanted to prove I belonged beside them." He swallowed hard. "I thought if I won..."
"Young Midoriya." All Might waited until he looked up. "Do you think 'I am here' means 'I never lose'?"
Midoriya froze.
"It doesn't." All Might stepped closer. "It means that when the moment actually comes, you stand where people can see you." He held Midoriya's eyes. "You stood. You fought one of the strongest students in this entire tournament with everything you currently have. You watched him, you changed your strategy mid-fight, you found a real weakness, and you nearly beat someone who started that match with every practical advantage stacked in his favor."
Midoriya remembered Todoroki sliding toward the boundary, how close it had actually been.
All Might smiled faintly. "You were there, Young Midoriya." His eyes burned again. "The world saw you."
Silence stretched between them. Then All Might sat down beside the bed. "And there's something else I should have told you a long time ago."
Midoriya blinked. All Might scratched his cheek.
"I was quirkless too."
Midoriya stopped breathing entirely.
"What?"
Recovery Girl sighed quietly from her side of the room. All Might nodded once. "I wasn't born with a quirk at all."
Midoriya just stared. The room seemed to disappear around the edges. "You..." His mouth opened, closed, tried again. "You were quirkless?"
"Yes."
"The Symbol of Peace?"
"Once, a quirkless boy. Nothing more than that." Something cracked open in Midoriya's chest at the words. "My master had a quirk. Even so, she believed in me anyway. She entrusted One For All to me, and raised me until I became a hero worth the name."
Midoriya couldn't speak.
"At first," All Might said, "I saw the old version of myself in you." Midoriya's breath caught. "But you've gone past what I originally imagined, over and over again, time after time."
Midoriya looked down at his own bandaged hands. Hands that used to have nothing at all in them. Now carrying a power he still hadn't fully learned how to hold.
All Might's voice softened further. "You aren't behind because you were quirkless." Midoriya looked up. "You simply started from somewhere different."
That landed somewhere real. Different. Not lesser. Not wrong. Different.
Midoriya thought about all those years watching other children discover their quirks. Four years old. Five. Six. While he stayed exactly the same the whole time. Of course Kacchan knew how Explosion felt in his own palms better than Midoriya knew One For All. Of course Todoroki understood ice on some instinctive level Midoriya hadn't earned yet. Of course people who'd spent years training their bodies around their quirks had things he simply didn't have.
One For All had given him power. It hadn't given him their years of experience along with it. That was something he'd still have to earn on his own.
And for the first time, that thought actually felt comforting instead of crushing.
'Then I can earn it.'
The distance still existed. But distance wasn't a verdict. It was only something measured between where he currently stood and where he actually wanted to go.
Midoriya smiled weakly. "I really do have a long way to go."
All Might grinned. "Then you'd better get moving!"
Recovery Girl smacked his leg with her cane. "He'll get moving once I'm finished with him!"
"Yes, ma'am!"
Midoriya laughed. It hurt. He laughed anyway.
...
Todoroki walked through the stadium corridor slowly, treated enough to keep moving even though his right side still felt mostly numb. The next matches were being prepared somewhere beyond the walls around him.
His left hand opened. Closed. No fire. Good. That should have reassured him. It didn't.
He turned a corner and found Megumi already standing against the wall, waiting.
Todoroki stopped. Neither of them spoke for a moment. Megumi looked him over, the frost damage, the stiff movement, the exhaustion sitting visibly under all of it.
Todoroki's hand clenched. That tiny flame flickered back through his memory. Midoriya had nearly forced it out of him without ever knowing why it mattered so much. Then he remembered the final exchange, the boundary passing beneath his own shoulder, his hand slamming desperately into the ground, ice catching him before the rest of his body went over with it. One more moment. One more inch. He would have lost.
Todoroki looked at Megumi. "I almost lost."
"Yeah."
No reassurance in it. No pretending otherwise either.
"Fushiguro."
Megumi glanced back. Todoroki's expression had gone quieter now, still guarded, but less certain than it had been a minute ago.
"Don't lose."
Megumi looked at him for another second. "Wasn't planning to."
Then he walked away.
Todoroki stayed where he was, eyes dropping to his own left hand. Midoriya had failed to make him actually use the fire. But he'd done something Todoroki hadn't expected going in. He'd made refusing it nearly cost him everything anyway.
And that left Todoroki with a question he could no longer just dismiss out of hand.
'How much of this choice is actually mine?'
His fingers slowly closed.
The tournament wasn't finished yet.
...
Join my Patreon for access to more chapters!
https://www.patreon.com/ZimaBlue29