The first word Ochaco Uraraka said was "money".

Even as a child, even before she was aware of her existence in a world infinitely larger than she would ever be, Ochaco was certain of one thing.

Money is power. With money you can buy all the food you want. Money makes you free to do whatever you want.

Money, money, money...

‘If I had the money, I'd go to a restaurant like the one downtown, the big one with the patio, and I'd order everything on the menu and rent out the whole room.’

Bright eyes.

‘If I had the money, I'd go to an island with lots of models and then...’.

Twisted smile.

‘If I had money, I'd be as rotten as all those old billionaires who are ruining the planet’

Hearty laugh.

'... money... money...'

We fought for money, we killed each other for money, we lived for money.

Money makes you happy.

And Ochaco wanted to be happy.

So she set out to find a way to make more money.

She had wandered the streets of bad neighborhoods, shamelessly checked out by men who could have been her father, judging the intensity of their whistles by the amount they would be willing to pay for her.

And then, one day, she had met someone who had offered her a very large sum of money in exchange for a little of her time and energy.

'It'll be a matter of a few months, or maybe a few years. And then you'll be rich. You want to be rich, don't you ? Get out of this godforsaken hole and see what real life is like'

There were other teenagers like her, haggard-eyed and hungry-hearted.

They'd had to fight.

Often.

None of them had flinched.

Ochaco had won because losing had never been an option.

After that, everything had happened very quickly.

And now, she had her back against the wall.

‘If anything happens to Bakugo, I'll kill you’

The look Shoto gave her at that moment spoke for itself : he knew.

But how ?

She had always covered her tracks well.

She was careful when, how and where she used her Quirk.

She had never contacted anyone using her own cell phone.

Aoyama might have been a snitch working for Nezu, but he would never betray Ochaco - not when his brother's life was at stake.

Ochaco bit her thumbnail, her eyebrows furrowed, her leg twitching.

How ?

Or maybe Todoroki didn't know. Maybe he was bluffing. Maybe she was fooling herself. Maybe she was-

Blood, metallic and salty, stained the tip of her tongue.

Ochaco withdrew her thumb from her lips, studied the bite for a second, wiped what was left of it on the cuff of her pants.

What could have given her away ?

She'd been discreet.

She'd never been alone at camp - not even in the showers - so she'd always have a solid alibi.

The trading cards she'd exchanged with other students hadn't all been fake.

Even if she had made a mistake and left some sort of imprint on them, the explosion must have destroyed them all, leaving not a speck of dust.

Hope returned to Ochaco.

Yes, the most incriminating card - Kaminari's detonator - hadn't left any trace of its existence.

How could Todoroki - how could anyone - suspect her ?

She'd covered her tracks, she was more than sure that Aoyama wouldn't say anything, Denki was in a post-operation coma and no one would even know she was there.

Ochaco's breath caught in her throat.

- Uraraka? Are you all right ?

The teenager looked up with frightened eyes at Yaoyorozu, who was sitting on a hospital bed.

- You look pale

Ochaco fluttered her eyelashes, her eyes darting between Kyoka and Yaoyorozu, who stared at her in surprise.

Suddenly, she stood up, ran her tongue over her teeth, tried to speak, then realized how dry her throat was.

- Bathroom. I have to go. Be right back

Her voice was husky and hoarse.

- Och-

She slammed the door behind her and leaned against it for a second, just long enough to collect herself.

Her blood pounded so hard at her ear that for a second she could hear nothing but the sound of her own panic, interspersed with her gasps.

As the boys said, Todoroki saw Kaminari shortly before the explosion. What if they'd had time to talk ? What if he had seen the card ?

She barely noticed that her thumb was bleeding again and that she'd stained the door handle.

She glanced down the hall, her glassy eyes barely registering what she saw.

A couple of nurses with their noses in their pads, an old woman in a wheelchair that had been abandoned next to the seats bolted to the wall.

Ochaco ran a shaking hand over her face, still, then walked slowly.

The chance that Todoroki would return after the boss had taken him away was almost zero, but not impossible.

If he came back... no, he wouldn't.

Kaminari hadn't woken up yet, but when he did, they would ask him questions since he was the closest eyewitness to the explosion.

They'd want to know what he'd been doing there, who he'd been talking to, what he'd been holding in his hands to have his face riddled with shrapnel the way it had-

Ochaco stopped in the middle of the corridor.

As soon as Kaminari woke up, everything would be over for her.

She wouldn't be able to escape - not with Eraser Head around.

But if she caused enough confusion, for example by destroying the whole hospital, then maybe...

If she got caught, they'd turn her over to the law first, then the Heroic Commission would take over.

Ochaco had heard a lot about the Commission, and if there was one place she'd rather die to avoid, it was theirs.

She had no choice.

She had to get rid of Kaminari.

She was shoved aside.

Ochaco tripped over her own foot, but recovered.

A man in a blue coat apologized profusely, and she did the same, half a second too late.

Ochaco scanned the empty corridor again, then retraced her steps.

She passed Yaoyorozu's room, Kirishima's - noisy even at this late hour - and didn't even look into Hagakure's room.

Arriving at Kaminari's door, Ochaco was covered in an icy sweat.

She tucked in her shirt, wiped her dripping nose with the back of her hand and glanced down the corridor.

Then she entered.

The room was bathed in darkness, the pale moonlight barely filtering through the gap between the poorly closed curtains.

The smell of antiseptic and piss wafted through the air.

The steady "beep beep" of the vital signs monitors immediately calmed Ochaco.

Her heart settled into its rhythm.

Lying on the bed, connected by half a dozen intravenous lines to plastic bags and machines, was Kaminari, his face wrapped in gauze.

The silver light shone diagonally down on him, illuminating eyelids covered with pink scars, lighter than his skin.

He was unrecognizable, wrapped up like a mummy about to be buried.

Ochaco paused for a moment, returned to the door, and read the Denki Kaminari again, hastily scribbled on a piece of paper.  

She glanced around the room again, her attention focused on nothing in particular.

Her eyes locked on Kaminari.

It wouldn't be the first time she'd killed to cover up a mistake, but the first time had been in the heat of the moment - so that took some of the responsibility off her shoulders.

This time, however, it would be premeditated murder.

Ochaco thought about the detective shows she'd seen and tried to remember how much she risked if she got caught.

She didn't have any numbers in her head, but she knew that with premeditation, she'd get a lot more.

Ochaco imagined the crime documentaries that would be made about her.

She could see the headlines, could already hear the pseudo-behavioral experts calling her a lunatic, a madwoman, a vampire thirsty for blood and power, a disgrace to all women.

Her case would be politicized and she would be seen only as this monster created by society and its growing hyper-feminism.

Because, of course, when you were a woman, you could only choose between being "gentle and loving" or being a "tyrant without maternal instincts" and too "masculine" for your own good.

Ochaco walked to the bed with the stride of one strolling through a flower garden.

Her soles squeaked with each step, reminding her of a pair of puppies smothered in a bag.

With her back to the moon, her body cast a shadow over Kaminari's face.

He and Ochaco hadn't known each other very well.

She remembered that he'd lent her an eraser once in math class. He had been one of those who had cheered for her at the festival when she was about to face Todoroki, even though they all knew she would lose. In the end, he was just a stranger.

All the better.

Ochaco removed the metal clip from Kaminari's finger and clipped it to her own.

She took one of his pillows and gently put it over his face.

Then she threw all her weight on it and smothered him.

Ochaco stared at the ceiling and counted to 300 in a low voice, refusing to register in her mind Kaminari's startled moan or the way his weak fingers clawed at the white sheet.

The monitor - now connected to Ochaco - continued its regular beeping.

Ochaco finished counting, but didn't get up.

Underneath, it had been a long time since he'd had the strength to struggle.

She added 120 seconds to her countdown to make sure that even if Kaminari miraculously pulled through, he'd become a vegetable incapable of the slightest coherence.

Ochaco straightened up, put the pillow back where she'd found it, fumbled around the machine until she found the plug, pulled it out, tore the wire connecting the clamp to the machine slightly, and plugged it back in.

The monitor showed no vital signs, but it didn't ring. Ochaco put the forceps back on Kaminari's finger without looking at his face.

Nothing.

She wiped everything she'd touched with the tip of her T-shirt, then walked away.

She put a hand on the door handle.

Her eyes scanned the room one last time.

There was nothing to give her away.

She opened the door.

And there she stood face to face with Neito Monoma.

*

Author's note :

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