yikes this chapter ended up wayyyy longer than it was supposed to, hence why it also took me long to edit—I literally deleted a bunch of scenes
if you wanna skip this chapter, go ahead 💀 I can barely read through it

Miri's PoV

Not much changed after adding Chieko into our little team. But of course, we couldn't always go charging into battle with her nearby. Whenever we're out and about, one of us has to be on Guard Chieko Duty. And... that kind of became our daily life.

(Yes- out and about. Perhaps we stumbled across a rich neighborhood and claimed a house. It was for sale, anyways, so it's not like we barged in on someone's current home.)

Search for villains all day, goof off at times, relax sometimes. Time flew by like that.

364 Days Later...

My eyes shoot open as soon as I wake up. It's the day. I quickly wash my face and brush my teeth and creep back in to mine and Chieko's shared room. Kneeling by her bedside, I awake her with a, "Happy birthday, Ko!"

She wakes up and rubs her eyes. Her voice comes out quiet and coarse. "Huh...?"

She looks so cute

"You're seven!" I exclaim, lifting her up.

She tries to crawl back to the warmth of her covers, but I pull her out again. She sits in the bed, too tired to realize what's going on. "No... I'm six, Mirrrrr." She yawns, but it turns into a gasp. "It's my birthday!" She realizes, and jumps on her covers.

During the almost-year she has been with us, her hair grew out a little, with uneven bangs and two locks that curled around the side of her face. Her hair was a much darker shade of brown than what it used to me.

"I wanna have hair like Miri!'

She decided she wanted black hair within a week of being with us. And after a failed attempt at trying to dye her hair black, little Ko decided she liked the dark brown result even better.

"It's like chocolate! Yummy"

Once I finish helping her get dressed into somewhat prettier clothes than her typical outfit, I carry her down the stairs into the kitchen. I lean on the island, my elbows propped up on it with my chin resting on my hands. "How do crepes sound? The birthday girl should have her favorite food!" I say.

"I love crepes!" She clasps her hands, bouncing in her seat.

"Crepes? You better not be making this kid eat unhealthy shit!" Katsuki storms down the stairs.

"Fine fine. I'll slip in some fruit." I give in.

"No I want unhealthy shit!" Chieko pleads. She probably has no idea what she even said. Katsuki snorts.

"NO, KO, YOU CAN'T SAY THAT!" I rush over to cover her mouth. "That's a bad word. Do you want to be like Katsuki?"

She turns to the guy leaning against the entrance to the kitchen. She taps her chin, thinking about my question. "Katuksi is strong. I wanna be like Katuksi!" She runs to Katuksi (when he introduced himself, she heard him wrong and has called him by that name ever since).

"Well Katsuki doesn't want you to have a yummy breakfast, even though you're the birthday girl!" I do my best to put on a sad face.

She gasps and runs away from him. "Nevermind!" Chieko sticks her tongue out at him and makes a disgusted face. "It's my birthday," she pouts, trying to cross her arms, but it looks like she's hugging her stomach.

"Good enough logic for me! No fruit!" I slap Katsuki with my tongue.

"Wowow! Miri you have a long tongue!" She says. She seems to always forget how long my tongue is, and each time she sees it, she's surprised all over again. She sticks out her tongue, trying hard to make it reach the length mine did. It reaches her chin.

I applaud her. "Your tongue is very long, too!" She beams with pride, her face practically glowing.

I gather the ingredients to make breakfast, and speak to Chieko at the same time. "You know, our birthdays are very close!" She looks up at me. "Mine is tomorrow. Isn't that cool?"

She claps her hands. "Yay!"

However, the other person in the room isn't as pleased. "YOU DIDN'T TELL US LAST YEAR IT WAS YOUR BIRTHDAY? HOW WERE WE SUP—"

"What is all this noise for?" Zenith groans and walks into the kitchen.

"Please... quiet." Michiko and Yu stumble down the stairs, complaining. They're still in their pajamas and robes, with their eyes half closed.

"It's Chieko's seventh birthday!" I remind them.

"Oh!" The other half of their eyes shoot wide open.

"We need to get changed!" They both scramble back upstairs.

"HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MISS CHIEKO SASAKI!" Kirishima yells, and jumps down from the top of the stairs.

"Ooh! I'm gonna jump too!" Chieko squeals, running to the stairs. I sigh, grab her with my tongue, and place her back in her seat.

"Don't do that. You'll hurt yourself." I say.

"For a very special seven-year-old, here are some balloons!" Kirishima hands her a bunch of balloons. Aw, he must have remembered and gotten them beforehand.

"Yay! Thank you! I make more!" She says, and then more and more balloons start appearing in front of her.

"I think that's enough now," Kirishima nervously chuckles.

I continue to make the breakfast. I put fruit in all of the crepes except for Chieko's, who gets whipped cream, strawberries and chocolate syrup in hers. The moment I give the food to her, she dives in.

Yu and Michiko run down the stairs, "Guess what we got you, Chieko!" Michiko exclaims.

"What!" Chieko wipes her face.

Yu opens a bag she's holding and pulls out a book specialized for her quirk that has information for her to make stuff, lots of new clothes, and candy.

"Candy!" She yells running to them. "Thank you!"

"I'll put the clothes away. Can one of you make crepes?" I ask, picking up the clothes, candy and book to put in her room.

"On it!" Yu says, winking.

After I put her clothes and gifts where they belong, I return to the kitchen and see the pan on fire, Yu trying to blow it out with her wings. She ends up blowing everything else away.

"How did you-?!" I say, but then I just ice the pan. I look down at the poor crepe to see it's surprisingly only a bit burned. "Hey, Yu? Do you know how to make crepes?"

"Well, uh...no." She says.

"Well I guess I'll have the burnt one," I sigh and put it aside for when I eat.

Everyone (except for Ko) helps clean up after we eat. Her face is coated with all of the sugary things I put in her crepes. I laugh and help her wipe it off with a napkin.

"Miri?"

"Yes, Chieko?"

"What are we doing today?"

"I didn't think about that... we'll do whatever you want!" I pat her head.

"Yay!"

She dashes up the stairs. She never comes back down. In fact, she's hanging off of the railing from the top of the stairs. Before I can say a word, a trampoline forms on the ground.

"I can jump like Jijiro now!" She yells, and flips herself off of the railing and onto the trampoline, bouncing a few times before she stops. Jijiro is yet another one of the nicknames she uses.

Kirishima winces a bit, "Ha, well you shouldn't..."

"Jump! Jump! Jump!" Chieko cheers, continuing to jump on the trampoline.

After that, those of us that weren't dressed yet got that done. We all piled into the van, Katsuki claiming the driver's seat. Him and Michiko constantly bickered about who would get to drive each time. Somehow, they silently agreed to let him drive today. Miracles exist.

"Where to?" Katsuki turns to look at Ko.

Chieko takes a while to answer, but when she does, she says, "Ice cream!"

Yikes. There's no one around to manage the ice cream shops, so we might end up having to just take them from stores. I hope our driver has the same idea, because without a single question, he begins driving.

The first time he drove us, it was pretty scary because he was fast and reckless. Now he lowered the number of knocked over signs in one drive from fifty to ten.

After a long drive of everyone screaming at him to slow down (besides Chieko, who wanted to go even faster), we arrive at a huge store. Katsuki pushes on the brake so fast, so we're all jerked around.

We jump out of the van, and Chieko runs to the door of the stores immediately. It's a huge store—it has electronics, clothes and groceries. They're automatic doors, but they don't slide open. Katsuki saunters to the doors, notices the problem, and blasts them open. Property damage much?

"So Chieko wanted ice cream, right?" Zenith looks to where she was, but she's not there anymore. She's already exploring the place with glee.

She disappears around the corner, and not even a moment later, we hear her call out, "ZENNY COME HERE!"

"Huh?" He makes his way to where Chieko is, and we all follow him.

We see her examining a rack of costumes with a hand on her hip. She turns and sees Zenith. "Aha! Zenny, wear..." she files through the costumes and pulls out the only purple one there. A lovely fairy-like dress. "...this!" She shoves it into him.

He smiles uncertainly. "Ch-chieko, I cant wear this—"

She frowns. "Oh... well I did that one for you because your quirk is purple..."

I gift my brother with a swift kick to the shin and cough. He straightens his posture and rights himself. "I'd love to wear this! Thanks..."

She cheekily smiles and goes on to assign Katsuki and Kirishima matching red princess gowns. She scans the rest of us, then throws a green male elf suit at me, a brown prince suit to Yu, and matching blue puffy gowns to herself and Michiko.

Our dear birthday girl, whose intentions I'm sure are pure, insists we actually change into them and not pull the costumes over our clothes. And so, we headed over to the restrooms.

When we all come out, I almost choke on laughter. The boys try their best to look tough, but their dresses don't make it very easy for them to do so. "YOU GUYS ARE SO PRETTY HAHAH!" I bend over with my hands on my knees, so I don't fall.

Luckily, my elf costume wasn't one of those hideous Christmas elf costumes. Yu was also pulling off her outfit as well as I was, too. Michiko and Chieko had nothing to worry about for themselves.

Yu looks at me. "We're pretty handsome, huh?" I nod in agreement.

All of a sudden, an idea pops into my mind. Looks like I'm about to act on impulse and regret it later! I freeze a large part of my hair. My head is pulled back from the weight of the ice, but I right myself. I send a controlled explosion to the ice and it shatters, taking the frozen part of my hair with it. Uh oh, here comes the regret.

"Miri, did you just give yourself a haircut with you quirk?" Michiko asks the obvious.

I sigh. "Yes, and now I regret it."

Chieko jumps up and down while squeezing Michiko's hand. "Everyone looks beautiful! Now ice cream!"

She leads the way, pausing every time she spots something that piques her interest in the slightest. Which is extremely frequently. The store was gigantic, and it doesn't take long for us to realize it would take a while to find where the ice cream is.

Yu taps her chin. "Let's split up in small groups. Then when someone finds the ice cream, yell super loud or something."

It's not a bad idea, so we let Yu split us into groups. "I'll go with Eijiro and Chieko," she starts. "Michiko and Bakugo, and then the siblings."

Would it have killed her to say our names?

Unsurprisingly, Katsuki isn't satisfied with his match, and he makes that known. "I don't wanna be with the old lady."

Michiko smacks the back of his head. "I'm only twenty-five! Let me be young, you brat."

He growls. "That's almost a decade older than all of us!"

Zenith gives an exaggerated sigh. "Calm down you two. I'll go with Miss Muratagi." He gives Yu a thumbs up, and she winks in return.

"I said not to call me Miss- IT MAKES ME FEEL OLD." She screeches. "I'M M I C H I K O ! MI-CHI-KO!"

If you haven't realized, Michiko is sensitive about her age because she's surrounded by teenagers. My brother puts his hands up in surrender. "Right, sorry, Michiko."

Having settled that, we all split up. It is now that I realize that Zenith offered to go with Michiko and not Katsuki. Which leaves that bomb-of-a-person with me instead.

He tries to put his hands in his pockets, which would have gone smoothly had he not been wearing a dressy costume. I snort. "Nice try, Princess."

"SHUT UP YOU ELF." He raises his hand as if to hit me.

You see, I'd typically retort with something witty, but I can't take him seriously in that dress. I end up in a fit of laughter all over again. Wiping tears from my eyes, I say, "I'm- HAHAH- sorry, you literally cannot look scary in that princess dress."

He clenches his fist. "DAMMIT. TRADE WITH ME THEN."

"As if!" I furrow my eyebrows while smiling and shaking my head. I continue our search for the ice cream, leaving him behind. He stomps, making it known that he's catching up to me.

He grumbles something under his breath about getting this over with and finding the ice cream already.

Eventually, we come across a row of aisles where there are lots of frozen goods. I go into the first one. "Well, the ice cream's got to be somewhere in this area, right?"

I expect a response, but when I look back at the princess, he's zoned out. I stare at him until he shakes himself out of it. "Are you okay, or...?" I ask, trailing off.

"OF COURSE I'M OK! WHAT DO YOU THINK I AM, WEAK?" He screams. Well, a quieter response would have been appreciated. He slows down, then walks up to me again. "You look... good in that costume."

I jerk back. A compliment from Katsuki? What is this world coming to? "Thanks. But the ice cream is most likely near here, so let's look for it and not at me."

I hold a giggle when his face turns a light shade of red. I turn to check the next aisle. Katsuki trails behind me and speaks again. "You know, we haven't been alone in a while."

"Yeah, I realize that."

"Don't you want to talk to me."

I open one of the freezer doors, thinking I might have found the treat. "Not particularly, but if you want to, then sure." I close it. It wasn't what I was looking for.

"Nevermind, then." He walks up and down the aisle, aggressively pulling open and shutting the freezer doors. At this point, I don't know if he's actually searching or just trying to make noise.

I finally spot a row of ice cream in the next aisle. "Katsuki, look, I think this is it!" I open the door. "Let's call them."

Bakugo's PoV

Miri skips around the aisle until a row catches her eye. She calls out, "Katsuki, I think this is it!" She opens the door and nods gleefully. "Let's call them!"

I should just tell her now, before everyone else gets here. But... she doesn't seem to have a care in the world for that sort of stuff. She doesn't even seem to be interested in me as a friend. I hold out my hand, palm facing her. "Miri."

She turns abruptly. "Huh?"

"Are we friends?" Might as well find out for sure, first.

She looks at me confused, then makes her way over to me. She slings an arm around me. "What do you mean, friends? You're, like, my second best friend!"

I let out a deep breath. Well, that's a relief.

"Why do you ask?"

I freeze. "Well—uh—I was just wondering because we've known each other for a while."

She laughs. "Okay, then, Princess. Let's call them now!"

I try to think of a snarky remark to her Princess comment, but nothing comes to mind. She cups her hands around her mouth and yells. "WE FOUND THE ICE CREAM. AISLE FOURTEEN!"

She's loud.

Miri's PoV

I bring my hands down and wait for them to start coming. Why would Bakugo ask if we're friends? Of course we are, that's a no-brainer. After a few seconds, everyone appears in the aisle with a splash of purple. Ah, right. I forgot Zenith can just teleport everyone.

Chieko gasps and presses her hands against the glass. She squeals and yanks the door open. "I want all of them!! ALL OF THEM!"

After we manage to calm her tiny self down, we give her the ice cream she wants and some for ourselves, too. We make our way outside to enjoy our ice cream in the nice weather we've been blessed with.

Chieko hops in front of us, leading the the way to wherever. Katsuki, besides me, mutters grumpily, "Good thing there's no one to see me in this..."

I place a hand on his exposed shoulder. "Ok, but you pull off that dress better than I would."

He doesn't respond immediately, but a blush makes its way onto his face after what I said. We walk on for about a minute, but then Katsuki sticks his spoon into his ice cream and holds the container in his right hand. I shift my ice cream to my left hand so I can use my right one to reason with him. I warn him, "If you don't eat it now, it will mel—"

We're walking side-by-side, so it doesn't take long for him to grab onto my hand. "—t. Huh?" I look at our hands. "Why are you—"

"Shut up." He says quietly

I widen my eyes but silence myself.

His hand is sweaty, but I don't mind. "Heh, you're so unpredictable," I snicker and intertwine my fingers with his. Holding hands with a friend. It's not something I typically do (with the exception of Yu), but maybe he does. It wasn't very expected of him, though. What's up with him?

He's scowling at the ground as we all walk. He turns to look at me, and we make eye contact. I feel my heart jump.

What?

I shrug it off, and enjoy the rest of the day with my team.