The first time he saw her, she was perched on a narrow rooftop, hunched over a small robot no bigger than a loaf of bread. Her fingers moved with precise, nervous grace, adjusting gears and wires as if she could coax life into the tiny machine with sheer focus. She didn’t notice him at first—didn’t notice anyone—but he couldn’t look away.

Katsuki Bakugou had grown up surrounded by the hum of machines. Nights spent peering at his mother Mitsuki’s computer had revealed a world he’d never imagined: brass and steam, cogs and pistons, grand inventors who had shaped everything mechanical. He’d memorized every blueprint, every sketch, every obscure tidbit about steam-powered contraptions. He practiced tirelessly, hands blistered and stained, until he could make a gear spin without touching it wrong. And yet… no matter how much he built, no matter how much he tinkered, he had never seen anything—or anyone—like her.

She looked almost too small for the rooftop. Her black hair fell in uneven strands over pale gray eyes that flickered with nervous calculation, glinting whenever she glanced at her little companion. Tiny beads, gears, and threads of wire were woven into her hair, catching the sunlight. Her shirt hung loose, sleeves frayed; her pants carried the evidence of countless scratches and burns from projects gone wrong. Everything about her whispered solitude—but he could tell she was alive, thinking, observing, living inside her own world.

Bakugou wanted to approach, to say something, anything—but he couldn’t. So he watched. Every movement, every tilt of her head, every delicate adjustment of the robot. Something in her tension, in the way she fidgeted with her tools, mirrored the precision he demanded of himself. She was methodical, careful… brilliant. And utterly, achingly alone.

When he finally entered U.A high school, she became a constant thought in the back of his mind. Her quiet resilience, her fragile focus, the small spark of life she coaxed from metal and wire—he couldn’t shake it. He didn’t know her name yet. Didn’t know how to get close. Hell, she was even in the same school. Nowhere in U.A. But he knew this: one day, he would.

Because someone like her—someone who carried a whole universe in the flicker of her gaze and the hum of her machines—was impossible to forget.

(Request)