🌸Before You Read🌸

🌸Warning: Descriptive Scenes of an Anxiety Attack ahead. It may be triggering to some readers. Please tread with caution.

🌸Panic🌸

The moment I overheard Akiba bring up Raiden's internship, I knew it wasn't going to end well, but there was something he said that really threw me off. Akiba said his questions were answered before Raiden even gave him the chance to even listen to his questions. It seemed off for Akiba to ask Raiden something like that, especially since he never seemed to be the kind of person to ask that.

I tried my hardest to tune them out, but Raiden had to bring up a topic I forced myself not to think about in weeks: the Infernal Order. There wasn't much that happened since then, so I figured maybe it was all over, a one time thing. Maybe Kita would say something that would put his mind at ease, so we could just move on because I just wanted to forget about what happened.

Except it was when Akiba gave his answer I realized I had much bigger problems than the Infernal Order to worry about: I had him to worry about. The fork fell from my hand as I slowly started to piece it all together. After all, I had never told anyone about what Hibiki said to me that night. Akiba mentioned it as if I had told him about it.

Being that he was in the Hero Department, that only meant one thing: Akiba could read minds. I mean, I knew he did already, but this whole time, I thought it only happened if he touched someone. That wasn't the case at all. It couldn't have been. I mean, he knew what Raiden meant with that one simple remark he gave. Even I wouldn't have known what he meant by it if he didn't flat out tell me. There was no way Akiba could've just guessed what Hibiki said to me that night about him liking girls with short hair.

He had to have been able to read my mind without touch.

My stomach lurched at the thought as the air started to thin around me.

"Tami? Are you okay?"

I snapped my head up, realizing that Kita, Akiba, and Raiden were all staring at me. They all looked concerned. For Kita and Raiden, they probably figured I was about ready to just explode inside my own thoughts. It was Akiba I couldn't trust.

If he could read my thoughts...that meant he knew. I didn't want anyone to know. He was probably hearing me think all this too, meaning he'd know and—

"Tami," Raiden whispered.

"I-I need some fresh air," I suddenly said as I stood up from my chair. "I-I'll be back. I just—I just need to be alone for a moment."

Before anyone could protest, I grabbed the clutch Sakura gave me and zipped out of the restaurant. If anyone said anything, I had no idea. My only thoughts were to get out of that place. I needed some fresh air.

I needed to get as far away from Akiba as I could.

The moment the cool air touched my skin, I grabbed the collar of my shirt and tried pulling it away from me. I looked around, finding a park bench on the side of the building. Without thinking twice about it, I took a seat and collapsed onto my legs.

Raiden and Kita knew parts of what happened that night. They knew a guy from the Infernal Order, Hibiki, tried kidnapping me to force me into their group. I told Raiden because he was the one who found me. Kita only knew because I called her that night. Both of them knew I fought my way through it, turning into a rat to escape.

None of them knew of how uncomfortable that guy made me feel, especially with that one little comment.

It scared me. No, it terrified me. What else did Akiba know about me? True, I told Kita a little bit about my past before. It took a while, but she needed to know as Ollie was on the verge of telling her anyways. She promised that she'd keep that a secret, and after hanging around Kita long enough, I trusted her. I mean, after all she did for me, she wouldn't tell anyone that.

But, what if Akiba knew everything? Could I trust him? He was so quiet most of the time that I didn't know.

All I knew was that his Quirk reminded me of someone else's. The moment that thought came into my mind, I could feel my body shaking. My hands fell to the tops of my knees as my entire body shook.

At that moment, all I could see was his scarred face and green eyes looking back at me. He twisted memories. He caused so much chaos before.

Couldn't Akiba do the same? Maybe not the twisting memories part, but the whole turning evil thing. He might have been in the Hero Department, but would it always be like that? Could he turn into a villain like him? His Quirk was too invasive like his that it was possible, wasn't it?

Worst part...I don't think Akiba's Quirk needed physical touch like his did. It couldn't have if he knew. Didn't that make him more dangerous?

Hot tears started to stream down my face as I found it hard to breathe at that moment. I thought fresh air would help me, but it was only making things worse as I still couldn't get the man's face out of my head. It was as if he was standing right in front of me. His dark green hair hanging around his face while the scar that was marred on his face stuck out more than usual.

What if he was still alive? What if...what if...

A hand gently brushed against my shoulder, causing me to jump. The moment I did, the hand flew off of mine, while my hands flung in front of my face, afraid of who I would see.

Instead of his voice, it was someone else's.

"You don't look too good," a masculine voice claimed. "Is there anything I can do?"

Do? I-I didn't know. For a while, I had been doing well. I didn't think about carrying anything in my clutch to help. Sakura gave it to me. She thought it'd look cute with the outfit she pulled together for me. If I'd known, I would've brought some of my medicine or some lavender to help calm me down, but I had nothing.

Besides, all I could think about was that man. His Quirk...it was so invasive. Just like Akiba's. I-I couldn't—

"Breathe," the person beside me slowly instructed. "Take a deep breath in, come on."

His face...I covered my own with my hands, noticing the stench of my sweaty palms. I couldn't do it. I couldn't—

Hands wrapped around my wrists and tore them away. I turned to look at the person sitting beside me. The only reason I could tell he was a guy was because of his masculine voice, but I couldn't make out anything else.

"Focus for a bit," the boy said. "Take a deep breath with me. Inhale." I inhaled. "Exhale." I did as I was told.

For a while, the two of us breathed. I wasn't exactly sure how much time had passed. All I knew was that by the end of it, the guy was no longer holding my wrists, giving me a chance to wipe the tears out of my eyes. My hands—no, my entire body seemed to have stopped shaking at that moment as I realized I was back to my normal self.

I looked up to see the person who helped me through it, only to realize it was the one person I was trying to avoid in there. My hands dropped onto the clutch, rubbing the smooth surface of it as I dropped my head.

Embarrassment washed over me.

"Are you feeling better?" Akiba asked.

I shook my head. Everything ached, and while the streets seemed empty, I still felt very embarrassed. There was nothing I could do to hide the fear I had felt. Even if that wasn't the case, this guy could probably read my mind.

He probably knew how uncomfortable I was about him once I figured it all out, yet, for some odd reason, he helped.

Before I could answer, I closed my eyes. "I'm sorry," I apologized. "I—your Quirk. I know you can...without...and it—it freaked me out."

"Yeah, I get that a lot," Akiba muttered. "Sometimes people's thoughts just jump out at me. I can't turn it off. Trust me, reading other people's mind isn't something I do for fun."

Again, guilt washed inside of me. He couldn't turn off his Quirk. At least I could with mine. If anything, I could very well not use my Quirk, making it seem like I was Quirkless. Being Quirkless wasn't exactly a good thing to most people, but there were some situations where being Quirkless was better than having certain Quirks.

"So, I-I take it you know then, don't you?" I asked, not verbalizing what I was hinting at. Part of me wished I could get it out, but I couldn't.

Guess that was because there was so much I was referring to. First and foremost, I was thinking about what I had thought just moments ago. It was unfair for me to push those thoughts onto him. Obviously, after what he did, Akiba wasn't like him. He could control who he used his Quirk on. Akiba couldn't. Judging him so quickly just because of the information he pulled from my mind, it wasn't right. I felt awful for pushing those thoughts onto him.

Then, there was my past. I really didn't want anyone to know about what happened. I-I hated being pitied. I could tell by their faces earlier that was how they were feeling when Akiba blurted about what Hibiki had to say to me.

I might not be a hero, nor would I ever want to be a Pro Hero, but I wish I could just be strong enough to make them all worry less.

"Yeah," Akiba confirmed. "Before you worry, just know I don't plan on sharing any of that with anyone. The only reason I brought up the thing with Hibiki earlier was because I thought Yamamoto knew. He seemed pretty worried about whatever happened to you."

"I know. That was why I didn't tell him about that," I mumbled. "I mean he—I hate seeing him worry. He...he was bad enough when he found out, so I just thought it'd be easier if he didn't know what Hibiki said to me. Then again, I-I didn't want anyone to know about that."

Despite my last comment, Akiba didn't seem to miss a beat. "You know, Yamamoto hated it even more that you didn't tell him about what really happened," he said.

My eyes shot open as he said that. I hated knowing that he went into my mind. Akiba probably knew more about me than I would care to tell other people. The fact that he went into Raiden's brain was even worse. It wasn't because of how Raiden would feel about someone going into his head, but I was certain there were some pretty frightening thoughts in his head. I didn't want to know what went on inside there. The fact that Akiba got a glimpse of it was a bit shocking.

Still, I had to remind myself Akiba couldn't control it. He said so himself. It wasn't his fault. He couldn't control it. Despite that, it still disgusted me a bit that Akiba went into Raiden's mind and told me about it.

But...

"Raiden...what?" I asked, looking over at Akiba.

The boy leaned back on the bench and looked at me. His dark hair seemed a bit messier than it was inside, but with the wind brushing against us, I guess it made sense.

"I said Yamamoto hated that you didn't mention what Hibiki said to you," Akiba explained. "He cares about you a lot, you know. I mean, there's not many people that will try and find different ways to comfort you when you're going through a tough time."

Hearing Akiba say that, I could feel the heat rushing to my cheeks. Even though the guy could probably read my thoughts, I still turned my head away and hid it inside my hands. Raiden would do that for anyone though. He might be cold and harsh at times, but he wasn't always like that.

As if he wanted to prove a point, Akiba continued talking. "I'm sorry for looking inside your mind, I am, but if I didn't look inside your mind when I saw you out here and saw how Yamamoto has handled it in the past, I don't think I would have known what to do. I don't think a normal person would just hang around someone if they didn't care."

I took a couple of deep breaths when he said that. There was someone else Raiden cared about that he'd do the same thing. From what I've heard from him, his sister, Luz, had anxiety much longer than I had, or at least, she knew about hers longer than I did mine. I just realized I had it a few months ago. Before then, I had suspected it. Even Sakura thought I had it and wondered why I never dared to try and get it checked out. Raiden only knew how to handle those stressful situations because he helped his sister through it a few times before.

Besides, he was just being a friend. Before he dealt with it, Sakura would help me through those stressful events. At least now I was getting better at handling it. It probably made things a bit easier on Raiden.

I just felt bad I had to push that onto Akiba.

Even worse, I felt bad about what I had thought when he was right there. This probably wasn't the first time Akiba had to go through something like that.

"Guess I'm just lucky," I told him, dropping my hands back into my lap. "Hey, I'm sorry about what happened, that you had to witness all that. I-I don't think there's really much I can do to make up for it, but I can keep your Quirk a secret if you want. I mean, I don't want people to know what's going on in my head—I mean, I know you can't control that or anything, but—"

"Thanks," Akiba cut me off. "I'd appreciate that."

Once again, I lifted my head, seeing the guy giving a bit of a smirk. I might not have been able to have read his mind—which I was more than okay with—but for the first time, I think I could tell what he was thinking. Then again, maybe that was because he could reach into my brain and could tell what I was thinking about without me having to explain it. He knew what I was getting at, and if he appreciated it, then I knew he didn't want people knowing about it.

I didn't blame him.

Before I could open my mouth to say something to Akiba, I saw both Kita and Raiden rushing out of the front doors of the restaurant. It didn't take long for them to see us and walk over. Once again, I could see it written all over their faces that they were worried. Seeing that, I grabbed the edge of my skirt and started messing with it.

"Hey, are you two doing okay?" Kita asked.

Akiba and I looked at each other for a moment. I didn't say anything as I realized what happened. I glanced over at Raiden and Kita, whose eyes were both staring at me. Guess it made sense as to why they were concerned. I left that place without saying a single word. They had no idea I had found out what Akiba's Quirk could do. Even more so, I couldn't say anything like that because Raiden didn't know.

Raiden couldn't know.

"Yeah," Akiba answered. "It was just getting a bit hot in there, wasn't it?"

I nodded my head. "I-I probably shouldn't have ordered the enchiladas verdes."

It was a long shot that our excuse would have worked, but then again, Akiba would have used a different lie if he knew this one wouldn't have worked. Maybe looking into people's minds wasn't a bad quality for a hero student. After all, he could tell what people needed when they were going through tough times.

That still didn't mean his Quirk still didn't freak me out a bit.

"And here I thought you said you could handle it," Raiden muttered, shaking his head. "I swear, you're going to be the death of me one day."

"Hey, I'm sure Tami isn't that reckless," Kita explained.

"True, if there's anyone we need to worry about being reckless, it's you," Akiba joked.

"Not truuuuue!" Kita bleated before her hands cupped over her mouth and her face started to grow red.

Everyone laughed. As they did, I relaxed a bit, thankful the attention wasn't on me. Akiba stood up and wrapped his arm around Kita, calming her down from her laughter and embarrassment. Maybe not, but I noticed the moment his arm was around her, the girl went from laughing to looking at me with a bit softer of a smile than she normally had.

It was strange seeing her sudden change that I just scratched the back of my neck and looked back at the doors of the restaurant.

"Do you want to head back to the dorms," I heard Raiden softly ask. I snapped my head, noticing he was standing close to me, so that Kita and Akiba couldn't hear. "You seem a bit stressed."

I nodded my head as I stood up, looking over at Kita and Akiba. They seemed to have caught onto our sudden movements and looked back at us. While Kita might not have known what was going on, I knew Akiba did.

"Tami and I are going to head back," Raiden told them. Kita frowned when she heard that, but Raiden kept talking. "Maybe next time we can plan doing something earlier, so it's not so late."

Again, I nodded my head. "Maybe then our friends can join us too," I suggested. "It was too bad they all had homework they forgot about."

Plus, I silently thought to myself, maybe things wouldn't have been so awkward.

Of course, there was one person who did hear that thought. For a moment, I had forgotten about it. The only reason I remembered was because Akiba shook his head. My hands tightened around the clutch, but quickly relaxed when I realized it was just Akiba. If it was Kita who heard those thoughts, or even Raiden, it might have been weird. At least he would understand a little bit.

"Sure thing," Kita said. "Have a safe trip back to the dorms."

Raiden and I nodded our heads before we turned around to walk away. Before we did, I paused, wondering if I should have said something more.

Thank you, I thought, knowing Akiba would have heard me. I realized all too late I didn't say something like that after he had helped calm me down. For the longest time, I was too focused on his Quirk, which I'd admit, I was pretty ashamed about the more I thought about it. The more I thought about it, the more I realized he probably got annoyed with people like me, people who judged him so quickly because of his Quirk.

It wasn't his fault he had an invasive Quirk. It was my fault for comparing him to a full fledged villain, especially when he was in the Hero Department.

What made Akiba want to go into the Hero Department? I thought to myself. Did he want to prove to others that he could become a hero, or that he was good? Maybe someone inspired him to become a hero, despite his Quirk being the way it was. Whatever it was, at least he was doing something good with his Quirk. I don't think many people who'd have a Quirk like that could say the same.

For a while I was wrapped up in my own thoughts that Raiden had to grab my arm to grab my attention. My head shot up at him, noticing that his lips pulled down to a frown as his eyebrows scrunched together. I looked around, realizing we were still walking and were still far away from the dorms. It was just hard to tell how far as the sun had gone down, making us trust the street lights that were turned on.

"Are you doing okay?" Raiden asked.

I nodded my head. "Yeah," I told him, pulling my arm out of his grip. "I'm fine. At least, I am now."

Raiden nodded his head as he pushed his hands into the pockets of his jeans. Looking at him made me realize I had hardly seen him out of sweats. He looked uncomfortable in what he was wearing, even if it was just jeans and a plaid long-sleeved shirt.

Once again, I hated the thoughts that ran through my mind. Raiden did his best to clean up, but the only thing that went through my mind was how similar it looked to what Hibiki wore. It had been a while since I had even thought of him. Even though I couldn't really remember what he looked like or what he wore, I knew it was something similar to what Raiden was wearing.

Somehow, I really needed to get those thoughts out of my head, but I guess there was one reason why I was thinking about him. It had been weeks since I had even thought about the Infernal Order, which meant it had been that long since I had thought about Hibiki.

"Hey, Raiden," I softly said. "I-I'm sorry I didn't tell you about Hibiki. You were just so worried that night when it happened, and it didn't really hit me what he had said to me, or—or what he could've done to me until afterwards, and it freaked me out more than it should've. I—it was petty and ridiculous that I didn't really want to bother anyone with it."

"But bottling things up like that is going to drive you insane in the end," Raiden lectured. "You have friends that can carry parts of the burden for you, and I think I can speak on behalf of Kaito and Sakura that we'd all be willing to help by listening to you."

I shook my head. "But all he said to me was that he—he liked girls with short hair. It wasn't anything exactly mean, I mean, he didn't exactly do anything to me—"

"It still bothered you," Raiden pointed out. "You know, I was wondering why you were growing out your hair lately. It threw me off when you weren't keeping it short, but whatever you do with it, it's your hair. There's always going to be some selfish prick that'll say whatever stupid shit is on their mind. If it bothers you so much, at least come to me, so I can at least know. I'll listen to you vent if you need that."

As soon as he said that, I brushed my left hand through my hair. I didn't think anyone would have noticed that. It had only grown a couple of inches.

I like girls with short hair, his voice echoed inside my head.

My eyes squeezed shut when I heard that.

"What—what do you think?" I asked.

"What do you mean, 'what do I think?"' Raiden asked. "All I'm thinking about is that I wish you could be a bit honest with me and—"

"Not that," I said, cutting him off. "Do you like short hair or long hair?"

I looked over at Raiden who didn't meet my gaze. Instead, he just threw his head back. He was so tall I couldn't tell what his eyes exactly did, but I wouldn't have been surprised if he just rolled them.

"To hell what I think. You'd still be Tami, short haired or not. If that damn prick thinks girls are only worth what they look like, then he can just go to hell," Raiden said, looking down at me. His expression was pretty neutral when he did. "If there's anything else bothering—"

He was cut off by a grumbling noise that was much louder than I would have ever cared to admit. We both look down, quickly realizing where it was coming from. My hands wrapped around my stomach as I felt the heat rising to my cheeks once again.

Guess it only made sense when I only had a couple bites of that enchiladas.

"You know what, let's talk about that later," Raiden suggested as he lifted a take-out bag I didn't notice before. "I ordered you some chicken fingers and rice since the enchiladas verdes was too much for you to handle."

"Was not!" I protested. "I-I just was preoccupied. That's all!"

Raiden chuckled. "Sure, whatever you say. Let's just get back to the dorms before it gets too cold."

As much as I didn't want to, I could feel a smile slip onto my face when he said that. I was sure Kita and Akiba would have fun with whatever they planned on doing, but I was glad Raiden was taking me back to the dorms, so we could talk things through. I might not be able to read minds like Akiba, but I could tell Raiden about what I thought. I was certain that'd give Raiden some peace of mind more than anything.

Honestly, it gave me peace of mind too.

🌸End of Short Story🌸

🌸Chapter Question🌸
What was your favorite part of the Double Date short fic?

🌸Character Spotlight: Hikaru Akiba🌸
Book: Kita's Legacy
Likes: Chess

🌸Character Spotlight: Tami Smith🌸
Book: I'm No Hero Series
Likes: Baking

Song: Lost Skies by Sophie Kazandjian