Middle of Nowhere [TodoIiDeku Oneshot]

Middle of Nowhere

Well, Todoroki thought, at least the scenery's nice.

The trip had been all his own idea. We're moving across the country, his father had said. Come fly first class with me. And as an extremely strange act of rebellion, Todoroki had decided against taking a plane there: he would come, but at his own pace, in his own car. I like driving, and it will save money. It wasn't as if his father could argue with that. For a while, Todoroki could feel smug about himself, as if he'd outsmarted his father in some tiny way.

It would be an eighteen-hour drive, two days of driving planned it right. And now, eight hours into the first day, he could barely stop his head from spinning. He saw lines when he closed his eyes. It wasn't even dark out, but he could go no further, not without risking a crash.

The landscape was beautiful - all rolling, pine tree-covered hills and distant mountains, the deep green fading into blue-gray - but whatever town he'd crawled into gave Todoroki a deep sense of sadness. Everything was run down; the architecture felt 70s at best. The shops had lopsided, hand-painted signs, and the Tourist Info center looked like it was run out of someone's shoddy little house. He pulled into a hotel - no, a motel - just off the main road and parked. There was only one other car in the parking lot.

I'm stopping for the day, Todoroki began to text his father. Then he paused. He didn't even know what city he was in. (City? Was that even the right word?) Only by checking Maps on his phone did he find the name: Black Rock, population 8,137.

I'm stopping for the day and spending the night in Black Rock. Sent.

The reply came before he even had the car door open. Why are you stopping already? You're less than halfway to Kessel.

Todoroki shut his phone off.

---

The motel itself, despite its dated architecture, was nicer inside than Todoroki had expected. It was clean, at least, and quiet. A boy about Todoroki's own age looked up sharply when he entered, his eyes widening. "Good afternoon! Welcome to the Black Rock Inn!"

"I want a room for the night," Todoroki said. "Do you have any vacancies?"

Maybe a sharper, less sincere employee might have caught the jab, but this one only nodded earnestly. Todoroki could have rolled his eyes. "Yes, I'm sure we do! Let me take a look."

A moment later, as Todoroki was handing over his credit card, he saw the employee's soul mark, and froze.

The boy's right hand was a dark gray-black, almost as if the thumb and all fingers had been dipped in ink. The mark stopped about halfway up the palm. Even his fingernails grew in black.

In his nineteen years old living, Todoroki Shouto had never once seen anyone with a soul mark even remotely resembling his. And this boy's - this motel employee's - was identical.

"Excuse me," Todoroki said, looking quickly at the employee's badge. "Midoriya?"

The boy looked up from the computer, where he'd been inputting Todoroki's card info. "Yes?"

"I've had a change of plans. Can I book a room for eight weeks instead?"

Midoriya blinked, and his mouth fell open. It took him a moment to regain his composure and stutter out an affirmative.

Trust me, Todoroki thought, I'm just as surprised as you.

---

Todoroki called up his father later that night. It wasn't a conversation he was looking forward to having, but the sooner he got it over with, he figured, the better.