Carnival Prize - Dekusquad

[vedisesenwein]

Carnival Prize

 

Rating - Mature

 

Pairing - Shoto Todoroki & Ochako Uraraka

 

Characters - Shoto Todoroki, Ochako Uraraka, Tenya Iida, Izuku Midoriya

 

Tags - Febuwhump, Febuwhump 2024, Febuwhump 2024 Day 16, Whump, Came Back Wrong, Death, Resurrection, Accidents, Violence, Injuries, Medical Malpractice, Screaming, Crying

 

Summary

Prompt: Came Back Wrong

“But that was because Shoto had been so young then, and so used to bad things happening. Now Shoto had become soft. He’d learned to let his guard down around his friends, and now Ochako was dead.”

 

Author’s Note

Hey y'all, my mental health hasn't been the best lately, but I'm going to do my best to finish Febuwhump!
A big thanks to everyone who has been encouraging my writing lately, it means the world to me. <3
Enjoy!

-0-


She hit the ground, and Shoto couldn’t stop screaming. He couldn’t remember ever screaming like this before, not even when they’d taken his mother away or when she’d poured boiling water over his face. But that was because Shoto had been so young then, and so used to bad things happening. Now Shoto had become soft. He’d learned to let his guard down around his friends, and now Ochako was dead.

There was blood everywhere, bones protruding from her skin, her skin which had been so soft when she had grabbed Shoto’s hand and dragged him to the carnival only a few hours ago. He wished now more than anything that they’d just stayed home. He hadn’t wanted to go, he’d wanted to stay at the dorms and work on his jigsaw puzzle with Tenya, but she’d said you haven’t really lived until you’d been to at least one carnival, so he’d let her drag him away.

Izuku was on his knees sobbing by her broken, twisted form, and Shoto was screaming. He’d finally found his voice after all these years of silence, of only speaking when spoken to, but he wished he hadn’t. He tried to stop, to be quiet and think of a plan to save her, but it was too late for that, and he couldn’t stop, even as he forced his hands over his mouth and tried to muffle the sound.

“Both of you stop!” Tenya scolded them, appearing suddenly by Ochako’s body. Izuku and Shoto did, both staring up at him in surprise. “I’m sorry, I came as fast as I could.”

“It’s too late, she’s dead,” Izuku told him, his lower lip trembling as he held back another round of tears. The air was loud with the sound of sirens and people calling for a doctor, but Shoto felt like he was drowning in silence now that he wasn’t contributing to it. His jaw was clenched shut like a vice, and he thought he might never speak again.

“Don’t say that, I know someone who can fix this,” Tenya said, his eyes darting around nervously. “I can take her there, I just need you two to cause a distraction and call our teachers.” So they did. Shoto set a nearby tent on fire, and Izuku called for backup.

When the news reported on what had happened later that day, only an accidental fire, probably caused by a faulty food truck grill, was mentioned. The girl who had fallen off a roller coaster was just a sick, horrible rumor that someone with a dark, twisted mind had made up as a part of their own warped fantasy. No teenage girls had fallen off any roller coasters, because the carnival’s roller coasters were incredibly safe, the best in Japan.

Shoto couldn’t bring himself to speak, no matter how hard he tried to force the words out, so he had to watch whatever this monster was impersonate his friend. He watched as it lumbered aimlessly around the dorms and school, hurting anyone who tried to hold it still or make it stop. He watched it throw Izuku across the room for trying to make it eat something, and snap Tenya’s arm in half for trying to get it to sit down and rest.

Now there was a monster loose in their school, and no one was willing to face it. They all just said it was the shock of dying and being brought back to life or possibly some sort of head trauma, which the doctor – a strange, eccentric recluse, whose name Tenya didn’t know despite the fact that she had patched up their family for years – had said would heal on its own if given time.

But Shoto knew better. He looked into that creature’s eyes, and he didn’t see Ochako anymore – only a deep, never ending hunger like that in his father’s eyes, except somehow darker. All he knew was that Ochako had died from that fall, and whatever that unknown doctor had brought back – it wasn’t her. It was something else entirely. Some carnival prize this was.