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Tokoyami Fumikage was born on October 30, one day before Halloween. He was born into a pitch-black night, the stars muffled by thick blankets of cloud outside the harshly-lit hospital room. Quite a fitting entrance into the world for such a baby as he.
Inside, Tokoyami’s mother yelled in pain as she gave birth. Slowly but surely, Tokoyami left the warm embrace of his mother’s belly and slipped into the cold air of the delivery room. When his dark bird’s head appeared, the attending doctor barely gave a start of surprise before turning her attention back to the screaming woman on the bed. By this time, the doctor had witnessed the birth of too many strange children to be much bothered by such a little thing as a bird’s head where a human one should’ve been.
Tokoyami’s mother kept yelling and screaming, but eventually, finally, at last, it was over. Her child had been born. Her precious son was officially breathing his first breaths, taking his first steps on the twisting, turning path that was life.
The doctor swaddled Tokoyami in a soft blanket and handed him over to his mother. She gently reached out to cradle her son in her arms. His father leaned over the bed to get a better glimpse of his son alongside his wife.
That was when Tokoyami started to cry.
Opening his tiny yellow beak, Tokoyami let out a harsh wail that replaced the earlier screams of his mother. This, the doctor was used to. Crying babies were far from unexpected in a delivery room. What the doctor was not used to, however, was the birdlike shadow that suddenly emerged from the baby’s body, thrashing its body this way and that, seeming to grow larger as Tokoyami’s cries escalated.
“Agh!”
Tokoyami’s mother gave a little yelp as the shadow dug into her hand, causing crimson droplets to well up. Even so, she kept a gentle hold on Tokoyami, rocking him back and forth, cooing and murmuring sweet nothings at him.
“Don’t cry, Fumikage. Mama’s right here. Shh, don’t cry, everything will be alright . . .”
Eventually, Tokoyami’s cries subsided. His arms fell still and his breathing evened out as he sank into the land of dreams. Meanwhile, the shadow had grown calmer and was now receding back into Tokoyami’s body.
Tokoyami’s mother turned a bright gaze on her husband, ignoring the doctor cleaning the wounds left behind by the shadow—the only sign that it had been there at all.
“Well,” Tokoyami’s mother began, “I suppose we’ve already discovered what his Quirk is.”
She was right, but only in a superficial sense. After all, his parents had only barely begun to scratch the surface of his Quirk. They hadn’t yet learned that Dark Shadow was a sentient being, that in fact Dark Shadow lived inside Tokoyami (they wouldn’t learn this until much later, after Tokoyami began speaking and could explain more about Dark Shadow to his parents). They didn’t yet know that Dark Shadow’s strength was influenced by Tokoyami’s emotions, that anger or sadness or pain caused Dark Shadow to surge in size (although this was quickly deduced after a couple of tantrums on Tokoyami’s part). They were still unaware that Dark Shadow’s power was greater at night, that Dark Shadow became weaker in the presence of light. This, however, was realized on Tokoyami’s very first night sleeping at home.
It was the middle of the night, the moon casting a weak, watery light on the shadowy world below, when Tokoyami began crying, as babies are wont to do.
Grudgingly, his father dragged himself out of bed and stumbled his way to Tokoyami’s room in the dark, too tired to turn the lights on.
“I’m coming, I’m coming,” he grumbled as Tokoyami’s wails continued. He hardly noticed the other sounds coming from Tokoyami’s room, thud like something heavy hitting the floor, thwack like something solid crashing into something else just as solid. Rubbing his eyes groggily, he opened the door to Tokoyami’s room. The sight that met his eyes was like a bucket of cold water being splashed on his face.
The railing of Tokoyami’s crib was cracked. The rocking chair in the corner had been pushed onto its side. The children’s books stacked on the table were scattered around the floor while the table itself had been shoved hard enough against the wall to leave a mark.
Dark Shadow towered over Tokoyami’s crib, a vast expanse of blackness that was somehow darker than the surrounding unlit room, broken only by two red spots that seemed to burn the very air around them (they would find out later that Dark Shadow’s eyes only turned red when Tokoyami lost control). An otherworldly cry broke from the shadow’s mouth—beak—maw.
Tokoyami’s father was seized then by an irrational fear of the dark. He had long outgrown such childish phobias, but in that moment, he couldn’t help but wish for light to pierce through the hellish image in front of him, dissipate it and turn it into mist. With an almost desperate lunge, Tokoyami’s father reached for the light switch, flipping it on and flooding the room with harsh fluorescent lighting.
Almost instantly, Dark Shadow shrank, seeming to wilt. His eyes lost their red shine, taking on a much less frightening yellow gleam. Dark Shadow wasn’t completely gone—Tokoyami was still crying—but the shadow had calmed down enough for Tokoyami’s father to approach his son and calm him down.
Finally, when Tokoyami had stopped crying and had gone back to sleep, his father made to exit his room, instinctively reaching to turn off the lights. His hand resting on the switch, he hesitated, considering, indecision playing across his features before finally flipping the lights off. The room was once again drenched in darkness as Tokoyami’s father swung the door shut behind him. His feet padded along the hall, but instead of going back to his bed, he turned and headed for the front door.
Pulling on his shoes, he headed outside into the chilly night air. He returned twenty minutes later with a box purchased from the 24-hour convenience store. Carrying the box, he headed back to Tokoyami’s room, slipping quietly inside.
Opening the box, he pulled the contents out and tiptoed over to the outlet next to Tokoyami’s crib. Bending down, he plugged the newly bought night light into the socket, flipping it on.
For the second time that night, Tokoyami’s father made his way out of his son’s room, casting one final glance back at the crescent moon night light casting its warm protective glow over his precious son.
For much of Tokoyami’s childhood, the night light was a permanent fixture in his bedroom.
Whenever Tokoyami cried in his sleep and Dark Shadow manifested itself, the ever-glowing crescent moon would hold his Quirk at bay, just strong enough to prevent Dark Shadow from going completely berserk, giving his parents a chance to calm him down.
As Tokoyami got older, his sleep became less fitful and his control over Dark Shadow grew until the night light became unnecessary, even if he had nightmares. By the time he entered second grade, the night light (the fifth or sixth one by this point, although they had all been crescent moons) had been removed from the wall socket and stashed away in a bin of old junk that Tokoyami kept in his room.
Which was just how Tokoyami liked it.
Revelry in the dark.
That was what Tokoyami enjoyed, and the night light, however necessary it had been for his parents (his mother liked dramatically telling the story of how Dark Shadow had scarred her hand at Tokoyami’s birth, always making sure to clutch her hand to her chest like the faded, barely-there scar still hurt) was an unwelcome presence in the otherwise uniform blackness of his bedroom at night.
Night—when the sun slipped behind the horizon, leaving silvery moonlight as a sorry substitute for bright sunshine; when the world grew quiet and heavy and muffled, like a veil of shadow had been drawn over everything and everyone; when creatures of all kinds lay wearily down on their beds, in their nests, under their shelters to allow the sweet tendrils of sleep to ensnare their minds; and, for Tokoyami, when Dark Shadow surged inside of him.
Night air was revitalizing to Tokoyami. He breathed it in, through his mouth, down his lungs, all the way down to where Dark Shadow rested inside him. Dark Shadow responded in kind, swelling, expanding, burgeoning , as darkness clamped its hand over the Earth. When the sun was down, Dark Shadow stretched to fit into every part of Tokoyami’s body, from his littlest pinky toe to the jet-black feathers crowning his head to the very edges of his fingernails. He felt full to bursting from Dark Shadow’s presence, could sense the enormous power that wanted to burst from his veins.
It was intoxicating .
At night, Tokoyami was invincible.
Wrapped in a cocoon of silken blackness, Tokoyami slept soundly, with the surety and security that nothing could touch him while the blackness remained unbreached, while no streaks of light rent the cocoon to shreds.
And so, the night light had to go.
Tokoyami was a creature of the night. He was cloaked in black both within and without. He was enchanted by all the mysteries that darkness could hold, all the arcane and fantastical things that could be hidden by shadows. And he knew other kids found his interests strange and knew the reason they couldn’t understand why he was so fascinated by darkness was because they had always been too scared of shadows to explore them while Tokoyami had always been their master.
So Tokoyami never tried to explain to others his enchantment with the night, to try to make them understand, because he knew it was pointless.
It didn’t matter, though, when the day sighed and slipped away, and the moon came out, and Dark Shadow surged inside of him, and Tokoyami fell in love with the night all over again.
Revelry in the dark.
Exactly what the test of courage was, and exactly what Tokoyami liked. The perfect way to rest and recharge after an exhausting day at the training camp. He wasn’t worried in the slightest about being scared by Class 1-B. After all, half the fear was fear of the dark, which Tokoyami had never had to deal with.
As he set off with Shoji into the dark woods, Tokoyami didn’t feel the slightest twinge of nervousness nor the smallest hint of fear. All he felt was excitement and Dark Shadow’s strength coursing through him.
Of course, Tokoyami and Shoji were part of Class 1-A, which meant trouble would inevitably find them.
When Mandalay’s message about the villain attack reached them, they both instantly went on the defensive, moving carefully along the forest path, peering intently into the shadows between trees. Caution colored their every move.
Not that it did them any good when the mummy came—or what seemed like a mummy anyways, wrapped nearly entirely in black cloth and black restraints studded with red, except for the mouth, gaping wide open to clearly show both rows of teeth.
In an instant, those teeth had extended meters beyond the villain’s lips, racing toward the two students at top speed.
Tokoyami reacted almost instinctively, flinging himself just out of reach of the strange tooth-blade, which slammed into the ground just in front of his feet.
“Shoji!” Tokoyami called, casting his gaze towards his friend.
His eyes widened in horror as he saw the razor-edge of the tooth-blade slice through one of Shoji’s arms.
With a sickening thud , the limb fell to the ground, nearly lost in shadows. Blood ran in rivulets down Shoji’s skin. Tokoyami’s eyes were glued to the remnant of Shoji’s arm. He couldn’t tear them away.
Tokoyami thought to himself that the stump was unnatural . It shouldn’t exist. It shouldn’t be that way. Shoji’s arm shouldn’t end like that, so abrupt, the cut so straight, so—so—so wrong . There shouldn’t be crimson liquid flowing over his skin either. Blood had to stay in the body . It was wrong, just plain wrong for it to exist outside it.
Even as Shoji tackled him into the underbrush to hide, Tokoyami couldn’t focus on anything besides that stump ( wrong, wrong, wrong ). There was a burning sensation in his chest that was working its way through the rest of his body, like being set on fire, every inch of his skin aflame with it, only there was another feeling too, this one leaden and heavy and dragging him down, down, down into the ground, making him sink into the hard earth, and it was strange to feel both at once, the scorching flames and the insurmountable weight, and they twisted together in his gut, tangling, mixing, forming something new, or maybe it wasn’t new, maybe it had always been there, but he couldn’t really be sure, he wasn’t sure about a lot at this point, and the only thing he did know for sure was that they had hurt his friend , and that fact was unequivocally wrong, wrong, wrong—!
Dark Shadow burst forth from his body, giving form to the tempest swirling within. All of Tokoyami’s anger and grief were being channeled to Dark Shadow, fueling it, feeding it, urging it on.
They hurt him!
The thought repeated itself inside Tokoyami’s head like a mantra. He felt Dark Shadow’s desire to rage, to rampage through the forest, to tear trees and rend the earth, to destroy anything it could get its hands on.
They hurt him!
It felt like Tokoyami was standing at the edge of the dark cesspool of his emotions, teetering on the precipice overlooking the frothing, foaming waters below. Dark Shadow pulled at him, tugging him closer to the edge, closer to the fall, closer to the swirling water.
With a roar, Tokoyami dug his heels in, refusing to edge closer, refusing to give in.
“Get away from me!” Tokoyami yelled, doubling over as he fought to keep Dark Shadow in check. He was right there, right there at the edge of the precipice, and it would be so easy to give up, fall in, surrender to Dark Shadow and his emotions.
With another cry, Tokoyami fought Dark Shadow for control.
“Get away!” he repeated, hoping Shoji had run far, far away.
He struggled on, perpetually in danger of falling over into the teeming waters below, perpetually trying to rein Dark Shadow in without much success.
He didn’t know how long he struggled like this, trying and failing to exert control over his own Quirk. He didn’t know how much longer he could keep fighting before he finally lost, careening over the edge of the precipice. He only knew that he had to keep going, had to push through and keep fighting, to keep his friends safe.
There was a blur of movement out of the corner of his eye. Dark Shadow reacted instinctively, lunging after the moving figure. Tokoyami tried in vain to pull the shadow back. With a start, he realized Dark Shadow was chasing after Shoji and Midoriya (when had he showed up?), who was riding on Shoji’s back and looked like he’d already been through a hell of a fight.
Screaming with defiance, he fought Dark Shadow, will clashing against will, before he realized Midoriya was yelling something at him.
“Don’t fight it!” Midoriya screamed, face bruised, arms broken. “Surrender to Dark Shadow!”
The words were entirely unexpected, hitting Tokoyami like an electric shock. Why was his friend telling him to give up? Surely he realized nothing good could come of giving Dark Shadow free rein.
If it were anyone else, Tokoyami might’ve continued fighting against Dark Shadow a while longer, but this was Midoriya he was talking about. Midoriya, who always had a plan. Midoriya, who was shy and timid but had a talent for analysis. Midoriya, who he’d worked with during the cavalry battle because he’d believed that Midoriya wouldn’t lose. Midoriya, who he trusted.
Without further delay, Tokoyami let himself fall into the cesspool, let himself be consumed by Dark Shadow.
It was the most intoxicating thing Tokoyami had ever experienced.
Wrapped in Dark Shadow’s embrace, everything around him was nothing more than mere playthings. The trees seemed tiny beneath Dark Shadow’s giant fists, his friends little more than rodents running from a powerful eagle. Without needing to look, Tokoyami knew Dark Shadow’s eyes were red, a shining red that was brighter than blood but not quite dancing like fire.
Tokoyami heard Dark Shadow give a great, terrible roar. The very earth seemed to shake from the sound. It seemed right, in Tokoyami’s mind, that the earth should tremble before this vast behemoth, that everything should bow before this shadowy monstrosity bearing down on the world. Who was this little mouse, this strange little creature wrapped in black and protruding shiny white sticks from its mouth, to stand in Dark Shadow’s way? In the space of a heartbeat, the creature was crushed in one of Dark Shadow’s giant fists, and that was right, just as it should be.
Tokoyami was consumed by power, full to the brim with power, he was power incarnate. Nothing could stop Dark Shadow. Tokoyami was the master of the night, he was invincible —
Tokoyami could feel Dark Shadow recoil in shock as two bright sources of light suddenly flared up next to him. He felt Dark Shadow weaken, and Tokoyami seized his chance. With more effort than he knew he had, he forced Dark Shadow back in, pulled the shadow back into his body.
On the forest path, he fell on his knees before the twin lights of Bakugo and Todoroki, once again in control of himself and his Quirk.
Long after the training camp was over, long after Bakugo had been kidnapped then rescued, long after All Might’s retirement, the memory of losing control of Dark Shadow stayed with him. He had apologized to his classmates for putting them in danger, Shoji especially, and they had all waved his apology off. Still, Tokoyami couldn’t let it go.
He wasn’t exactly sure why, but he began thinking more and more about his mother’s story of his birth and about the scar on his mother’s hand. He had never really paid it much attention before—it was thin and quite pale and practically nonexistent if you didn’t know where to look for it. But Tokoyami did know.
He had never felt much guilt over the incident. After all, he had only been a baby at the time. No one would’ve expected him to be able to control his Quirk at such a young age. (Also, his mother had already used the scar to guilt-trip Tokoyami into doing her favors too many times for him to feel anything but annoyance toward the old injury.) Besides, Tokoyami would never hurt his family or anyone he cared about. Except that—
Tokoyami crushed that train of thought ruthlessly.
As he packed the belongings he wanted to take with him to the UA dorms, he couldn’t stop himself from mulling things over. He was just about to zip his duffel bag shut when something made him stop. Slowly, he walked over to the bin of junk lying forgotten in the corner of his room. The lid was covered in a layer of dust. Almost not realizing what he was doing, Tokoyami opened the bin. He rummaged through, hands searching, grasping for that familiar object.
Suddenly, Tokoyami’s fingers closed around the hard edges of his old crescent moon night light. Pulling it out of the bin for the first time in years—what was it, eight years now?—he placed it into his bag and zipped it shut.
“Why do I have to have a night light?” Tokoyami remembered asking his father, at an age when his parents still forced him to sleep with one.
“Because you can’t control Dark Shadow yet,” his father had replied before mussing his feathers. “Don’t worry, you’ll be able to control it eventually, and then you won’t need that night light anymore.”
The night light, although only the size of his hand, seemed to weigh his bag down as he lugged his luggage up to his dorm room. He placed the duffel bag on his bed and set to work unpacking. He saved the duffel bag for last.
Taking the night light out, he held it up, gazing at it, the curves of the crescent moon, the sharp corners where the curves met, the serene face given to it by the manufacturing company. He knew there was an outlet right next to his bed, the perfect spot for a night light to go. He walked over to the outlet, still holding the night light, and stood there. For a long time, that was all he did: stare at the outlet while holding a crescent moon in his hand.
Finally, Tokoyami seemed to jerk himself back to action. He turned away from the outlet and headed toward his desk. He opened a drawer, placed the night light inside, and slid it shut, hiding it from sight. Then he went to unpack the rest of the duffel bag.
And that was where the night light came to stay. Sometimes, Tokoyami would open the drawer and look at it, but he never moved it from its place. The night light had found its new home, although this new home did not allow it to fulfill its original purpose of lighting up a room. That wasn’t why Tokoyami had brought it. He didn’t need a night light to rein in Dark Shadow. He was perfectly capable of controlling his Quirk at night in the dorms, even when nightmares struck (and these days, there seemed to be an uptick in the number of those).
No, Tokoyami had brought the night light to remind himself.
To remind himself that he was only fifteen years old, still a hero-in-training, with so much more to learn.
To remind himself that he needed more training, that he needed to improve his Quirk, that he was still so far away from being a pro.
To remind himself that he was not Dark Shadow and Dark Shadow was not him, that they were two separate beings sharing the same body but not the same mind.
But, mostly, the night light was a promise.
A promise to work hard, get better, become stronger, until the day Tokoyami felt he could take the night light from its place in the drawer and throw it in the trash. Until the day he could erase the night light—and all it represented—from his life. There was a nagging feeling at the back of his mind that told him he’d never reach that day—and maybe he wouldn’t. Maybe the night light would follow him around for the rest of his life, always hovering at the edge of his thoughts, hidden just out of sight. Maybe.
But as long as Tokoyami kept going, kept persevering, kept moving forward —he could live with that maybe.