Mystic

Chapter Ten

        Did he just want another punching bag? That looks like it really hurts. How can she not say anything about it? I swear, next time I see him I'm gonna—

        "Todoroki? You can stop freaking out," I told him, already latched onto his mind. "I said I was fine. Can we please just work on the exercise your father has assigned us?"

        He glared at me. "Get out of my head!"

        "Um, first of all, I wasn't even reading your mind. You were practically yelling those thoughts out, I'm not good at ignoring stuff like that. Secondly, that's literally the point of what we're doing. So, just, do your part.

        I sighed. "If you're actually gonna manage to block my Quirk, you have to realize when I've gone into your mind. It takes a bit of practice, but my brain waves are unique and should be differentiable from your own. Once you can sense my presence, you can follow the trail back to the source by visualizing a sort of connection between my mind and yours.

        "Now, I'm gonna keep jumping in and out of your head until you think you can tell when I'm using my Quirk on you and when I'm not. Got it?"

        Todoroki nodded and I closed my eyes.

        To begin with, I'd form a connection for ten seconds on and then leave for the next ten. I did my best not to count out loud or even mouth the numbers in case he caught on to the pattern. When I felt as though he'd had enough of that, I started swapping things up. I might latch on for thirty seconds and break off for only five before heading back in again. This random switching on and off of my Quirk even confused me sometimes and I'd have to try skimming some surface thoughts to figure out whether I was using it or not.

        After what was probably twenty minutes of this ordeal, Todoroki finally spoke up.

        "I think I've got it," he said. "My brain feels a little fuzzy whenever you're messing around with it. It's as if someone was intercepting a transmission and in turn causing a few words to be lost in translation. I can still think, but I almost don't feel as though I'm the one who should be doing so."

        "Hmm. Interesting. I'm not gonna lie, I've never actually had to train anyone to do this, so I'm sorta spitballing as to how this all works, but that sounds reasonable enough. Kurogiri was the only one who could ever communicate back with me telepathically. I never thought to ask him how he learned to do it. I'm just going off of how I imagine it." I bit my lip. "Alright, I'll test you. Raise your hand when you think I'm interfering, and lower it when I'm not. Ready? Go."

        I bounced back and forth between his mind and my own for about a minute, keeping my eyes open this time so I could watch his hand. His reactions were almost instantaneous. Whatever he'd discovered about my Quirk worked well. I couldn't help but frown a little knowing I'd already lost a bit of my edge.

        His brows furrowed. "Was I wrong?"

        I realized he was misinterpreting my disappointment as something pertaining to his guesses. I shook my head.

        "No, no, you were great. Spot on, in fact. With that, I suppose we step things up." I slipped into his head. Now, you've gotta envision the whole connection thing, mmkay? If you can find the source, you can send thoughts back. Take your time.

        Todoroki had flinched a little at the sound of my voice coming from inside his mind. I wasn't surprised. It threw most people off. As a general rule of thumb, most folks didn't like others in their brain. Not when that was supposed to be a safe place. A place where you could think whatever you wanted to without any consequence. My Quirk broke that boundary and wasn't popular because of it.