A little Drabble about Shadow Demons Denki, Shinsou, Sero, Kirishima, and Bakugou with Reader (poly)
You don’t know how long they’d been there, but you certainly remembered the night you discovered them.
Like hushed whispers, numerous voices bounced around your dark room, breathy and light despite being so charged.
It was just quiet enough where you couldn’t hope to understand what they were saying, not that your 3am fight or flight response is to listen in on hushed conversations in your room...
Especially when you live alone.
You snuck your phone out and pulled up the camera, pointing it in the direction you thought you heard the voices coming from and clicked the button. The flash lights up the room, but you sigh in relief when you don’t see anyone.
‘it’s all in my head’ you tell yourself, moving to delete the picture.
Only to realize there were several pairs of eyes staring back at you from the shadows.
You refused to stay alone in the house after that, daylight or no. Put out several ads for roommates, but getting absolutely no luck.
There was only so many nights you could spend at a cheap motel.
And as terrified as you were, you missed your bed.... and sheets that didn’t smell like wet mothballs.
So you finally went back home. The air was charged with some sort of tense energy, but you chalked it up to your own nerves.
‘There’s no one here,’ you think, but your brain seems to tell you otherwise; ‘you’re in denial,’ it whispers, ‘you know what you saw.
But you were tired of stiff sheets and soggy, partially frozen waffles; you would sleep in your own bed or die trying.
You start to finally slip under when you hear your name whispered in the dark. You bolt upright, startled, followed my a meek yelp of, “fuck off!”
Then suddenly a sense of overwhelming calm. Your eyes droop some and you take a deep breath, exhaling slowly. You almost forget about the voice that called your name.
“Wh... wha...?” You slur,
“Shhh... relax... we aren’t here to hurt you.” The disembodied voice soothes, echoing around in your own head, “we’d never hurt you.”
“Don’t worry about that now... sleep.”
So you do. You dream about the voice, the voices. It soothes you, somehow
You wake up in a slight haze. There’s a storm outside; the power’s been out for who knows how long. The only light comes from the occasional lighting strike. You note that you don’t hear any thunder following.
You feel a cold hand over your forehead, but no body to match.
“Who are you?” You whisper, almost afraid to startle whoever they are.
“There are... several of us.”
You learn their names; Hitoshi, Hanta, Denki, Eijirou, Katsuki.
The one who’d put you to sleep the night before was Hitoshi, and the one who woke you was Hanta.
You nod, eyes slipping shut again.
Over the next few months, you started to learn about them.
Hitoshi was particularly skilled in light hypnotism. More often than not (and with your explicit permission), he’ll help unwind you from a hard day. Voice soothing and melodic as he gets you to let go of the negativity that plagues you until you’re able to process them on your own.
“You’re okay, kitten. Just let go.”
Denki had the tendency to mess with the electronics in your house. Though not always on purpose, he’s fried a couple of kitchen appliances and a small radio that came with the place. You’re not too bothered, especially since you can hear the way he beats himself up over it.
“It’s ok, Denks. I know you didn’t mean it.”
Katsuki loved messing with your candles and the fireplace. Any time you had an open flame lit, he was certain to be near by, causing it to spark and crack. Sometimes you could see it spin into different colors, betraying what he says by showing you what he really means.
“Suki, I know you’re embarrassed.”
“Shut up, shitty woman! You can’t see me!!”
Eijirou liked toying with some of the things around your house, especially any comics you might have. Though he struggled with anything more than just turning a page, so you started to leave different ones laid around the house for him to pick and choose. He was always careful to make sure he didn’t accidentally tear the pages on accident.
“I see you really like this series. Do you want me to leave it out more?”
Hanta was the most capable out of all of them.
He was able to touch you with more that enough force to lift you, which baffled you at times.
You’d wondered why that was and asked the others about it, but they seemed to know about as much as you do. He implied to know the reason, but refused to share, even after you had begged.
Even so, it confused you, but you knew he would never be affected by blackmail.
A few months after you had grown fairly close with them, they started to show themselves to you; small features like their eyes, shape. Sometimes you’d see Eiji’s sharp-toothed smile glinting in the moon light when you would talk about your shared interest in comics and manga.
Katsuki’s spiked hair certainly threw you into fits of laughter, often calling him a Pomeranian. He always sounded angrier than he really was, making you laugh even harder. “Just like a Pomeranian!”
Though Hitoshi’s fluffy hair certainly wasn’t much different, you definitely couldn’t say he resembled much of a Pomeranian. More like... a Maine Coon. If you squint. Maybe. Possibly.
You noticed a little black lightning bolt in Denki’s otherwise blond hair. “It suits you” you said, smiling affectionately. You’d never seen an entity look so shy before, even in the movies.
Hanta had appeared so strikingly clear to you that it was hard to pick out any sort of feature that really stood out against the smoke-like transparency the others had.
His striking smile, his lanky form. The undercut/mullet (perhaps an undercut that got too long?).
Lanky, but certainly not weak.
Then, one night, the dreams started happening. Short bursts of nightmares before you were shaken awake by several touches and voices coaxing you out of your nightmare. Hitoshi often helped guide you back into a more peaceful slumber, making it hard to remember your terror the next morning.
But soon enough, it started to get harder and harder to pull you out until you were remembering full chunks of terror.
Eventually, you realized it wasn’t just nightmares, but rather memories. Things long since forgotten... or suppressed
After a particularly grueling night, you decided to confront Hanta, which led to a long and emotional talk.
He told you about how he’d known you when you were younger, more vulnerable to “his kind”. Shadow beings, he said. People who— quite literally— live in the shadows of living beings. A symbiotic relationship between creature and host. Most of the time.
Hanta had attached himself to your shadow when you were both very young. You hadn’t been afraid of him; quite the opposite rather. Hanta despised having been born a shadow being; felt it was unfair that he couldn’t walk hand in hand with you like others around you could.
But he never worried, especially when you always came back to him at night, telling him in hushed whispers about your day.
The real problem occurred when you’d met another kid your age with a shadow being less.... benevolent than Hanta. One who was out to maim and hurt.
You would have died if Hanta hadn’t been there, though it was agony, having been sealed away for at least a decade, watching through a glass as you grew up without a single memory of him.
Unfortunately, the spell you’d been put under didn’t quite work the way the priest had expected:
You became a magnet for wandering shadows, especially those who felt lost, leading Hitoshi, Denki, Katsuki, and Eiji to you, inadvertently sucking them into the bind that sealed away Hanta.
“But now you remember, mi amor, and that’s all that matters.”
You start to realize that having these boys were the best thing to happen to you, seeing as you’ve started to take better care of yourself now. Sometimes you find yourself smiling wryly when you start to think about how they start to become clearer and clearer to you (and you alone) in the daylight as much as they are in the dark.
