Yellow Petals (Hanahaki)

Something was terribly wrong.

Elly was at a local clinic that specialized with working on heroes with quirk-activated ailments. The nurses asked questions about recent combatants she came into contact with as well as symptoms. Many heroes came here, when they weren't quite sure if they had a common ailment or something more sinister. Elly was pretty sure she had been hit by a villain's quirk, but no clue what it had done to her.

"Did the villain that struck you tell you what they were doing at any time? Any clues at all?"

She frowned, thinking back on the strange way the woman she fought before she had gotten sick had acted. "No, it didn't make any sense at all. She wasn't really acting out. Um, she did ask if I was in a relationship."

"Hmm. And your symptoms are ..?"

The ticklish feeling that had brought her here was back in her chest. It wasn't allergy season and she didn't have any other cold symptoms, so she was unsure why she kept coughing. The tickle grew, and she held a hand to her mouth to stifle the spread of whatever this was. When the coughing tapered off, she stared in horror at the blood-speckled, yellow petals in her hand.

"I guess these are the symptoms," she said quietly, holding the flowers up before the startled tech's eyes.

The prognosis was grim. The villain was a terrifying quirk user that fulfilled the anime fantasy trope of "hanahaki". This was a disease that filled the lungs of a person that was suffering from unrequited love with flowers until they softly choked to death on their own affection. Elly, being raised American, had never heard of such a horrible thing. She sat in the chair with the now wilting daffodil petals in her hand, shocked and frightened.

"It's not as bad as it sounds," the doctor assured her. "According to the lore, if the person you're in love with reciprocates, you'll be cured. With her quirk, it just means you need to receive a kiss from them."

"But..."

"Yes. It means you have to tell them. Oh, and it must be a, uh, passionate kiss." He cleared his throat. "You know."

She struggled for a while at work, but knew she couldn't hide her malady for long. The good thing was she worked in a separate office so could hide when every time she had a coughing fit.

After a few days she could barely breathe and she started to get scared. As she was trying to figure out what to do, she saw a shadow outside her door and knew homeroom 1-A's teacher passed by every day at about this time. She stumbled to the door and opened it.

"Aizawa, may I speak with you for a - " She couldn't get any farther before she began coughing, the flowers forcing their way up her throat to be hacked out into the air with great force. The dark haired man stared blankly at the yellow petals raining down all around her and quickly stepped inside and shut the door.

"How long?" He snapped at her, shaking her shoulder as she floated in and out of conciousness. "Ches! This is important!"

"Few days," she gasped feebly.

"A few days! You're almost out of time! That villain's quirk is easily remedied. What were you thinking?!"

She shook her head, tears running down her cheeks.

"Embarrassment is no excuse," he told her sternly. "It was very illogical to wait this long. Now we have to find the person and hope they're amenable to the cure."

She shook her head again.

"Damn it, you little fool!" He picked her up and sat her on the edge of her desk, hos gray eyes serious and his mouth a thin line in his fury. "Tell me right now who the asshole is you've fallen in love with so you can be healed!"

She suddenly smiled, a very soft, pathetic smile that nearly broke his heart...

...and slowly shook her head before collapsing on her side onto a pile of bloody flowers she had coughed up earlier.

"Ches!" He swore loudly, panic causing his heart to leap into his throat. If she was this far gone, it was probably too late. She would die for the most ridiculous reason he could think of.

It offended him.

It hurt him.

He pushed aside the nagging doubts in his head and pulled her up to him, holding her tight. "You don't deserve this," he told her brokenly. "It's not right."

Aizawa gently kissed her, pressing only lightly and caressing the back of her neck with one hand. He tasted the salt of her tears and faint flavor of coppery blood on her lips and whimpered in anguish.

Not Cheshire. Please, of all the people I've lost along the way - not her. Please!

He deepened the kiss without thinking, adding his tears to her own and praying for the impossible.

Elly drew in a loud, gasping breath, her eyes popping wide open. She blinked, dazed, but with color returning to her pale cheeks. Her breathing was slow and even, with no funny wheezes or hitching.

"It was me," he murmured, unable to believe the sheer luck that she was healed. "You - you didn't want to tell me."

"Yes. But I got too scared at the last minute. I didn't want to be alone."

"Sh - shit, Ches, I..."

"Just hold me," she said weakly. "You're warm, and I love the way you smell and the feel of your arms around me."

"Yes."

"Don't let go," she whispered.

His grip tightened in response.