UNO the Movie: Aro Edition

UNO the Movie: Aro Edition

Mina puts down a red three. Todoroki puts down a red seven. Tokoyami, across from him, sets down his red five. Tsu, beside him, sighs and picks up a card. Uraraka also lets out a groan of frustration and picks up a card. Kaminari puts down a wild draw 4 and makes it yellow. Mineta puts down a wild draw 4 and makes it blue, laughing heartily. Kirishima picks up eight cards, mumbling something that makes Midoriya laugh. Still laughing, he puts down his own blue five, and across from him Aoyama puts down a green five. Mina takes a moment out of the time she was spending peering at her fellow players to look down at her stack of cards. She had a wild draw 4 card she could use since she doesn’t have a five, but the thing is, she has a lot of cards, and she does have a green, but it’s a reverse card and she wants to save her green reverse so that she can hit Aoyama with the draw 4. She wants to win, and Aoyama has the least amount of cards right now. She doesn’t know what all cards he has, and if someone challenged her on having a green when she drew a card, then she’d be out of luck!

 If Aoyama also had a reverse card, which had yet to turn up so far in the game, then her plan would be for naught. She was almost positive he had one. She'd accidentally caught a peak when she was dealing the cards. Best case scenario, Midoriya had a draw 4 he was holding out on, or Todoroki had the reverse and Mina could save hers for later. But for now she needed to get past her turn. Hopefully they can keep it green before getting back to her. She just needed one more round to make sure. 

The best point of action now would be to distract. Mina smiles evilly behind her cards and quickly poker faces when she lifts her head and opens . “Tokoyami!” She draws a card, watching as Tokoyami lifts his head from the stack on the table to look at her. Todoroki’s lips part. “Tell us about your internship with Hawks. I’m curious after, you know, what happened today.”

Todoroki’s mouth shuts, just on cue. Mina giggles internally, but keeps her nice smiling face on the outside. 

Tokoyami speaks up for the first time since he opened up his Uber Dark room to his eager classmates. He wasn’t very fond of so many people being in his room, but when Mina and Midoriya took him to the side to convince him that it was to get Todoroki’s spirits up, he caved. “There’s not much to say about it.”

“Well, what do you know about him? Surely you got something out of spending so much time with the Number Three hero,” Mina’s eyes follow Todoroki’s hand to the table as he sets down a green one, then Tokoyami’s as he sets down a green four. 

“You’d think so..” He says, eyebrows furrowing. “He’s quite the joker. All he wanted from me is information about the attacks on UA.”

That grabs everyone’s attention, even Mina’s. Uraraka speaks up, “What? He’s not a jerk, is he?” She puts down a card. A green six.

“No, not especially. But I wasn’t told to do much. I was more an errand boy than anything. He was quite enamored with the fact that we were both bird-like.” Tokoyami says with a bothered look in his eyes. 

“That ..” Kaminari responds as he puts down a card. A yellow six. Mina notices Midoriya’s hand miming writing in a journal. He stops for a second only to put down a card. A yellow one. 

Mineta, who had picked up a card before Midoriya, questions, “He seems like a lady’s man. Did he have any women around?”

The room goes quiet as Aoyama searches through his deck of cards for one to use. He’s sweating, and his ever-present smile is wobbling. Finally, he puts down his second to last card. A yellow reverse. “UNO!” 

The group groans, except for Mina who lets out a knowing laugh. Kirishima glares down at his cards. “You’ve killed me, Aoyama!” 

Midoriya puts down a card and looks at him shocked. “You have, like, sixteen cards, Kirishima!”

“Would you believe none of them are yellow?” He picks up a card. 

Mineta screams, “Hey, are you guys ignoring me?”

“Oh, were you talking?” Mina sticks her tongue out and looks to the side as Mineta seethes. 

“Ashido…!”

“Do you have blue?” Uraraka asks Tsu. When Tsu nods, she puts down a blue two. 

“Oh, what? You two are teaming up?” Kaminari whines. He had the least amount of cards besides Aoyama. What was he complaining about?

“Sometimes that’s what it takes to win!” She defended, pouting. 

Tokoyami puts down a card. “Speaking of team ups..”

A quick glance at Todoroki, whose face is emotionless as he puts down a card. Tokoyami doesn’t say anything more, and the entire room feels stiff. Everyone wants to talk about it but no one wants to say anything. It had obviously taken a toll on Todoroki earlier. It had taken a lot just to convince him to play the game! 

Still, they were mighty curious. Mina and Tokoyami especially. 

Midoriya opened his mouth to say something but was interrupted. “Ashido.” Todoroki speaks up. 

Mina startles, then looks back at her stack. “Oh! Right!” And she quickly puts down the wild 4 card. “Uh, green.”

Aoyama makes a sound as he picks up four cards and the others either sigh in relief or let out exclamations of good job! and nice!  

A second later, everyone’s eyes are on Kaminari, gazes dark and filled with threatening auras. He yelps, “Whoa, whoa! What are these evil stares I’m getting?”

Midoriya smacks down a green three on the table. Kirishima puts down a green two. Mineta, knowing Kaminari was out of red, puts down a red two. 

“Wha-?” Kaminari takes up a card. 

“Sorry, friend.”

Uraraka sets a red skip on the table, and Tokoyami a green skip. It’s the shot Mina has been waiting for. She sets her green reverse down for everyone to see, astonishing them as the game literally turns around. Todoroki sets down a green seven, then Tokoyami puts down a blue seven. Tsu puts down a blue three, then looks at her friend expectantly. Everything’s riding on her right now and she knows it. But Ochako Uraraka was a nifty one, Mina knew, and she always had something up her sleeve. 

Uraraka’s hand slowly slides a card out of her stack and slaps it on the riddled mess of a table, smack in the middle of all the other disposed cards. Everyone leans over to get a look at it. It’s the last wild 4. 

“Ughh!” Kaminari tilts his head back and groans as everyone cheers. Aoyama gives him a pitying look as he picks up four more cards. 

Mina, Mineta, Kirishima, and Uraraka all chant: “More! Rounds! More! Rounds! More! Rounds!”

“You guys~ this is gonna take all night..!” Kaminari whines. Tsu stacks all the discarded cards on the table into a neat pile and combines it with the stack he just pulled from. 

“I don’t mind staying up,” Midoriya says with a smile as Mineta and Kirishima take their turns. 

“Me either!” Mina grins, furrowing her eyebrows pointedly at Kaminari so as to give him a hint. 

He doesn’t get it. “Kirishima, don’t you always go to sleep early, anyway?”

Kirishima keeps his eyes on his stack, trying not to look up at a special ice and fire quirk user. “I don't got anything to do."

“You guys..” Todoroki speaks and everyone listens. Again, the room goes dangerously silent. “don’t have to worry about me…”

Midoriya’s lips tighten into a line and Kaminari looks down at his lap, looking a little conflicted. Todoroki’s face is blank as usual as he picks up a card. When no one says anything, he continues. “I know you probably have questions.. I have questions too.”

Hell yeah, they have questions! Mina was struggling just to keep all of her attention on the game and not on the raging elephant in the room. She was trying to be conscious of his feelings by not flat out saying Endeavor’s name, but that wasn’t working either. The fight earlier was a disaster, and even if he said he wasn’t bothered by it, it was hard to take him at his word. Tsu and Uraraka looked at each other with concerned faces, and Tokoyami closed his eyes with his beak bowed and his brows furrowed. 

“Really, it doesn’t both-“

“Why do you think Hawks and Endeavor were together when the attack happened?” 

Mina stares wide-eyed at Midoriya, as well as almost everyone else. But of course he would be the first to speak up about it. He had no qualms with getting into others’ business. “The first time they’ve ever publicly interacted was at the Billboard Chart ceremony, and neither of them are very known for their team ups!”

“I was curious about that too,” Mina says and turns to Todoroki, as if he'd have an answer. 

"He looks like he got hurt really bad," Mineta mentioned. "This was his first major battle since the Kamino incident. Kinda lame, if you ask me."

"It does set a bad precedent." Kaminari agrees. At this point no one knew whose turn it was to play a card. 

"The Nomu are getting stronger.." Midoriya's face screwed up as he chewed on his thumbnail and glared down at the stack of cards. 

As the room filled with nervous mumbling, Uraraka was the first to finally ask, "Who put down the blue skip?"

Aoyama raised his hand, also looking quite nervous with that emoticon-like smile on his face. "I- I think it was mwah.."

With Mina skipped, Todoroki goes next. "They are a surprising duo. I doubt they were prepared for a battle at all..”

“It did seem a little too convenient.” Tokoyami sets a card down. Tsu hums, eyebrows furrowed and wide-eyed as always as she plays her card. 

“Oh no! Tsu…” Uraraka moans as she draws from the stack. 

Having just realized what she’d done, she hurriedly apologizes. “I’m sorry, Ochako-chan! I hadn’t realized..”

Kaminari seems to realize something. “You know, I was surprised about the chart this year. I thought Mt. Lady definitely would have been higher.” 

Mineta scowls at the name and places down a draw 2. 

“Do you have something against me, Mineta?” Kirishima frowns down at him at the same time that Midoriya responds to Kaminari in agreement. Luckily he had a draw 2 as well, his being red. 

“Yeah, I thought Rock Lock would have been way higher!” He says, eyes going wide in thought. Looking down the red draw 2 card, he says, “Oh!” And puts down a blue draw 2.   

“Rock Lock? Why him?” Aoyama, across from him, asks as he picks up 6 cards. 

“Whoa, we’re just going to go past that play?” Kaminari interrupts, amused. 

“I don’t think there’s enough draw 2 cards to keep it going,” Midoriya replies and scratches his cheek. 

“You can’t stack a draw 4 on draw 2s?” He asks. 

“I don’t know—“

“No, you can't.” Mina shakes her head, sets down a blue three. 

“Anyway, after what happened with Eri I thought for sure he’d be in the top eight.” Midoriya replies to the initial question, pausing, like there was something else he’d wanted to say. His eyes droop and he frowns, suddenly downtrodden. Mina, who noticed it immediately, shares a look with Aoyama, who also looks concerned. The whole class—no, all of Japan had heard about Sir Nighteye. Surely he would have been incredibly high on the charts if he were still alive. 

Aoyama looks back at Midoriya and stutters, “I always thought Rock Lock had a nice flare..! What was he like when you guys met him?”

Tsu and Uraraka look at each other and smile awkwardly. “He was..intense.” Uraraka says, scratching the back of her head. 

“He has a good heart.” Midoriya looks down at his stack, face relaxing. Good, they were able to get his mind off of Nighteye, for now. “He told us how it was. It was all things we needed to hear.” He tightens his grip on his cards and looks down at them with a determined face. 

Mina laughs aloud, grabbing his attention. “You really keep your heart on your sleeve, huh?”

Midoriya blushes and looks back down at his cards. “Sorry..”

“It's not a bad thing!” She assures, waving her hand dismissively. “Oh! You think Rock Lock could have rivaled Hawks as the Number Three Hero?” Another thought crosses her mind and she squeals. “Ooo! What if they were to team up! No, wait! What if they were to fight!”

It’s like a switch flipping. Midoriya is shrouded by an aura so thick they could all almost touch it. He begins mumbling under his breath, miming writing on his cards as if they were his journals, and his eyes are wide with thought after thought of how a battle with them would go. It makes everyone scoot over to put space between him and them, frightened at the amount of energy he could radiate so suddenly.

Mineta looks at him partly disgusted and partly horrified. “Scary..”

Midoriya is so deep in Imagination Land that he can't even hear himself being insulted. “....Hawks’ feathers have long range attack power, but they're not that strong. Rock Lock’s power is good for defense, and makes it easy for him to get close to an opponent….however if Rock Lock uses his quirk to stop Hawks’ feathers….” 

“He’s completely out of it..” Todoroki mumbles. 

“Oops, my bad..!” Mina closes her eyes as she smiles awkwardly, brows furrowed ups under her puff of hair as she moves her hand dismissively in Todoroki’s direction. After playing her card, she gets up and walks around Aoyama and the table to stand behind Midoriya, putting a hand on top of his head to grab his attention. 

He stops immediately. His shoulders rise in alarm. He goes completely still. Mina’s smile widens almost mischievously. He really does wear his heart on his sleeve. And, better yet, his hair is really frickin soft!

So she says it out loud. “Whoa, Midoriya, your hair is really soft!” And she reaches both hands up and starts running them through his fluffy curls. “You know, I’ve always thought this, but you and I have really similar hair!”

“Seriously?” His arms slowly reach up and Mina bows her head to let him have a touch. 

“No fair Midoriya!” Mineta stands up, points at him accusingly with Kaminari backing him up with a disapproving look. 

Mina once again sticks her tongue out, screwing up her face and laying her head on top of the hands she had resting atop each other on Midoriya's head, her elbows on his shoulders. They were subsequently running their fingers through each other’s hair without a care as the round finally got to Kirishima. Suddenly, as if just realizing what he was doing, Midoriya stops and his face becomes so red that Mina can almost feel it. Screaming a “Sorry!”, he sets his hands back in his lap, tightened into balls as his mouth twists into a tight smile and his cards go forgotten. Mina bursts out laughing, still resting her weight on his head as she bares her neck and lets loose. 

“Midoriya, you don’t have to be so shy, ya know?” She grins, though knowing he can’t see it. “We’ve already known each other for more than half a year!” Looking to her right, she notices the second-hand blush that Uraraka has on her own face. She sighs dreamily, continuing to use Midoriya as an elbow rest as she holds her head up in the palms of her hands. “But Rock Lock is kind of a hottie, huh.. I wouldn’t mind cheering for him..!”

Kaminari laughs, shrugging off his jacket and tying it around his hips, getting a yelp from Mineta as he accidentally elbows him in the head. The boy’s so small he could barely see him sitting there. “Wow, didn’t know you were the type for celebrity crushes, Ashido!”

“Not really,” She stands at full height, closing her eyes and hearing a sigh fall from Midoriya’s lips as she lifts her hands palm-face-up in a shrug. “I may be aromantic, but I can still appreciate beauty when I see it.” 

When she doesn’t get a reply, she opens her eyes and drops her cool, nonchalant stance, making a sound of confusion. Everyone’s silent and looking at her. Aoyama has his cheek in his palm, smiling that smile of his. Uraraka and Mineta look confused. Todoroki, Tsu, and Tokoyami look surprised. Kirishima’s expression is a little harder to discern. Kaminari and Midoriya seem to not understand why everyone’s gone quiet. “Oh! Did I forget to come out to you guys?” She herself sounds genuinely surprised. She could have sworn she’d told them before now?

Mineta is loud, so as not to be ignored this time. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m aromantic. Cupioromantic, specifically.”

Before Mineta can ask another question, Todoroki explains, “It’s when you don’t feel romantic attraction.”

“You know about it, Todoroki?” Mina asks, attention now back to him. At some point he sat himself beside where Mina was, so that now he was directly beside Aoyama. He was probably tired of being in the only chair in the room. Tokoyami was sitting on his nightstand/bed frame and beside him sat Tsu, Uraraka, Kaminari, and Mineta, with Kirishima on the very edge. Midoriya was sitting on a tall stool beside him, and across from him was Aoyama, Todoroki, and where Mina was sitting on some pillows. And there were her cards, flipped over and abandoned for all who tried to get a peek to see. The table was in the middle of them all. 

Todoroki nods blankly. “I’m aroace. I think. Probably.”

Now, Kirishima has known Mina for a long time. They went to middle school together, and they’ve hung out a couple times now at UA, being in the same class and everything. She’s also gotten pretty close with Kaminari, and the girls. None of them, not a one, has ever seen her eyes light up like this before, and just from hearing Todoroki say one word that the two out of four didn’t really understand. 

Leaving Midoriya’s side, she jumps over to Todoroki and grabs him by the shoulders, shaking him back and forth excitedly. “OMG!” Todoroki does nothing to stop her, completely caught off guard. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Tokoyami with a surprised look on his face. Upon meeting eyes with him, Tokoyami gives him a small thumbs up. He looks back up at the excited Mina as she exclaims, “I’m not aroace but your flag is so coooool!”

“Like this?”

Mina turns around to look at Tokoyami, along with Todoroki, who was glad to have stopped being shaken by the young acid queen. Tokoyami has his sleeve rolled up, revealing a bracelet with a mix of colors. Stripes of orange, yellow, white, blue, and dark blue alternate over and over across the bracelet. 

Todoroki’s eyebrows shoot up and Mina screams, to the surprise of her peers. It’s a scream of happiness, her hands in fists and shaking close to her face, wide in an open grin. She, again, jumps across the room and grabs Tokoyami by the wrist, shaking his hand roughly and exclaiming delights. Tokoyami is blushing underneath his feathers, his mouth parted in surprise and his eyes wide with furrowed eyebrows. 

Kaminari grins awkwardly with closed eyes. “I knew about Mina but you guys are a surprise. Though,” when he really thinks about it, “It’s not all that surprising.”

“You know what they’re talking about, Kaminari?” Mineta looks over at his friend with genuine confusion. 

“Yeah, sort of,” Kaminari scratches his head, his awkward feelings towards the situation now aimed at Mineta through his confused expression. “I’m confused, though. Mina, I thought you said you were aroace?”

She lets go of Tokoyami’s hand, to his relief, and turns to Kaminari with her hands on her hips. “No, I said I was aroallo. Or alloaro. Whichever.”

Kirishima looks at her surprised while Kaminari looks at her with even more confusion. “Allo? What? How can you be aro and not ace?”

“And what do those even mean!” Mineta is getting agitated. “And are we even playing UNO anymore?” 

The game had stopped a while ago, but only Aoyama had managed to remember who last went because he, personally, really wanted to continue the game. Out of everyone here, he was the only one that Mina had no idea why he wanted to come. Maybe he really wanted to play UNO?

Mina sighs. “Ok, first I have to explain the difference between attraction and desire..”

“Oh man..” Kaminari feels a sweat go down his temple. 

Aoyama follows his example. “We’re never going to finish this game of UNO, are we..?” He begins to sulk, cards drooping in his hands. 

Kirishima notices Aoyama’s shoulders drop and tries to console him. “We’ll play as she explains. Who went last?”

“It’s Mina’s turn.”

She waves them off. “Skip my turn. Professor Ashido is about to teach.” 

With that, Todoroki puts down a blue nine. 

Mina points a finger at the sky matter-of-factly. “Like Todoroki said, aromantic means having no romantic attraction. Aual means having no ual attraction. Aromantic for short is aro, aual for short is ace. Don’t confuse attraction and libido, they’re two different things. Attraction is basically the urge to do that thing with someone. If you feel romantic attraction, you have the urge to be in a romantic relationship with someone. You have the desire to take them on a date, do couple-ey stuff. Same for ual attraction. Libido is the urge itself to do ual stuff. Libido is the urge to do the action while ual attraction is the urge to do the action with someone. So an aual person can have a high libido and still be aual. This is also why you will sometimes hear about auals fapp—“

Kaminari interrupts her. “Oi, you don’t have to finish that sentence.” He watches a yellow three hit the table and hits back with a yellow skip.

“Babies..” She mumbles to herself as Mineta growls at him. “Anyways. It's like when you’re craving food, right? Let's say you’re craving something salty. That's libido. Now let's say that salty thing is ramen. The ramen would be the subject, which would be what you’re attracted to. You get me?”

“Yeah, that actually makes a whole lot of sense..!” Midoriya says, eyes wide with enlightenment. Mina smiles, her ego successfully . 

Midoriya draws two cards after Kirishima sets a draw 2 on the table. Aoyama has a yellow four that saves him from grabbing any more cards. He whistles as he lets out a breath.

A thought comes to Mina. “Ooh! It’s like music. You know when you want to listen to music, but you aren't sure what song and every song you look at on your playlist just doesn’t feel right? That’s what being aual and aromantic is like.”

“Ooooh..!” The analogy seems to resonate with everyone more this time around, and they nod agreeably. Kirishima had looked into aromanticism when Mina told him about her being aro earlier in the year, but he only did surface-level research into it and hadn’t really understood it until now. 

“Now, onto other types of attraction!”

They groan. “It's not over yet?” Drawls Kaminari, leaning his head back and squeezing his eyes shut like his brain was turning to mush. He gets out his phone from his pocket and looks at the time, then starts typing.

“You shush!” She purses her lips at him, furrowing her brow. He doesn't see her, too busy scrolling down contacts in his phone. “You’re the one that asked!”

“That was Mineta!”

A red six hits the table.

“No, but, I’m curious too.” Todoroki says, looking genuinely interested for someone with a natural poker face. 

Kaminari let out a puff of air, stuffing his phone back in his pocket. He’d never get all this. “Continue.”

“Outside of romantic and ual attraction, there’s tertiary attraction, which consists of platonic attraction, sensual attraction, and aesthetic attraction. You obviously know platonic attraction, so I won’t explain that. But..” she puts a finger to her cheek and thinks for a moment. “..You know how Todoroki is hot?”

Todoroki’s brows raise but other than that he shows no reaction. Uraraka startles and Aoyama nods, his hand under his chin. 

“Ribbit.” Tsu croaks.

“Well, that’s aesthetic attraction. When you look at someone or something and think wow, it’s cute! You're experiencing aesthetic attraction. So aspec people— aspec meaning aual and aromantic people and those on the spectrum— right, there’s a spectrum! I need to tell you about that! I’ll get to it later. Anyway, aspec people can experience aesthetic attraction and still not feel romantic or ual attraction. Because they’re completely different feelings! Sensual attraction would be if I were to want to hold Todoroki’s hand, or something. It’s basically feeling the desire to be touchy-feely with someone. This includes hand-holding, cuddling, putting your arm around someone’s shoulder, hugging, kissing their forehead, their cheek, even their lips for that matter!”

“Wait!” Both Midoriya and Kaminari speak up at the same time. They look at each other and Midoriya motions to Kaminari to go ahead. He does, “Then what's the difference between sensual and romantic attraction?”

“Good question! Sensual attraction isn’t inherently romantic. Kissing other people on the lips is a greeting in some cultures. And I know that’s what you’re most curious about, so I’ll explain it like this." Mineta puts down a reverse card that makes Kaminari curse under his breath and take a card out of the stack, all the while listening to Mina’s exposition. "Mom's kiss their babies on their faces, and kids hold hands when crossing the street, but those aren’t seen as romantic because we don’t consider them romantic. Arospec people don’t consider, or rather some arospec people— arospec meaning people on the aromantic spectrum specifically— don’t consider hand holding or kissing on the lips romantic at all! It’s all platonic and sensual to us!” She corrects herself. “Personally. We understand that kissing is still largely romantic to people. There’s also romance repulsed aros, but I'll get into that later." 

Tokoyami nods, places down a green nine. 

"Aspecs can feel platonic and sensual attraction the same way allos, which means non-aspec people, can feel ual or romantic attraction with sensual attraction. This is where we get our affectionate aros, like me! Romantic attraction is really just a huge cesspool of all the different forms of attraction put into one. Aesthetic attraction can lead to romantic attraction which can lead to ual attraction, or it can lead straight to ual attraction without romantic attraction in between. Sensual attraction can lead to romantic attraction, in, how, like, someone could touch your shoulder and you’re so touch-starved that you fall in love with them? I've heard of that happening before? It... sounds fake..? But...okay..?"

Kirishima snorts, waits for Midoriya to put a card down. He's getting dangerously low, but Kirishima can't seem to get anything less than eight cards without someone hitting him with a draw 4. If Mineta hadn't used that reverse, he could have gotten a hit on him. 

All the while, Mina continues her teachings. "Romantic attraction can lead to sensual attraction, aesthetic attraction can lead to you wanting to be that person's friend which is platonic attraction, so on and so forth.”

Todoroki speaks up. “So… what if you can’t tell whether it's romantic or platonic attraction?”

Mina drops her fist into her palm. “You’re right, hottie!”

“Please..don’t call me that.”

“I forgot about alterous attraction! It's exactly how you said, Todoroki. Alterous attraction is a mix of platonic and romantic attraction. It’s basically like this: you can’t tell if you want to date someone or be friends with them, but either way you want to be connected with them somehow. I’ve heard it explained like you wouldn’t ask someone out yourself and wouldn’t mind staying friends, but if the person were to ask you out, you’d go along with it.”

“Isn’t that how most people feel?” Kaminari asks. 

“Yeah, doesn’t almost everyone feel platonic and aesthetic attraction, Denki?”

He shuts his mouth just as a buzz goes off in his pocket. He checks his phone, sends a real quick text, and gives her a thumbs up. 

“That’s why it has a word. It's not like it's a special thing. Just not well known.There’s also queer platonic attraction but I don’t understand the difference enough between it and alterous to explain it. All I know is that it’s a desire to have a queer platonic relationship with someone.” Before anyone can even try to ask, she quickly explains, “Queer platonic relationships are a type of relationship between people that is not romantic but has just as much commitment between the people in it as a romantic one. People in a QPR can kiss, live with each other their whole lives, and do romance-coded things, but, like, platonically. That’s why it's called a queer platonic relationship.”

Todoroki still doesn't look quite convinced. “I’m still..confused. I mean, all that you’re saying makes sense.. but I’m still not sure if I completely get it..” Todoroki’s eyes narrow as he looks down at the table. His turn is next. Somehow the color went back to yellow, which he no longer has in his deck. He picks up a card. 

“Well, what are you confused about?”

“I still don’t understand romantic attraction. You said it was the desire to date someone, but what does that really mean? What’s the difference between dating and just hanging out?”

“Ahh..” Mina taps her chin. 

“Well, dating is romantic and hanging out is platonic.” Uraraka cut in. 

Mina turns to her. “No, that’s what he’s confused about. What is romantic attraction if it means desiring to do something you can do platonically?” She turns back to Todoroki. “I get why that’s hard to get. Let me put it a different way, then.” She walks over to the chair Todoroki abandoned and sits in it, tapping her chin with her index finger, her arm settled over her ribs. She thinks long and hard, hearing the sound of a door opening and closing but too focused to linger on it, and ponders aloud. “Romantic attraction is...craving to do romantic-coded things, such as sensual stuff,  kissing, hand-holding, being close, etc., in...what'd you'd judge as a romantic way...with someone.” She pauses. “You'd have to desire the intention of the interaction to be romance. And wanting them to reciprocate it. If you don’t want them to reciprocate, that’d be lithromantic.”

“Huh?” Sounds throughout the room. Cards shuffle in hands and the bed creaks as someone moves around. 

“Man, I’m so confused..” Mineta scratches his temple. 

Kaminari, now preoccupied with touching Ojiro's tail, looks down at him, tiredly. “You weren’t even paying attention half the time..”

“Why are you having me explain it, you guys are the ones that actually have these types of feelings!” Mina stands abruptly and looks around at the group, excluding Todoroki and Tokoyami. 

“I couldn’t explain it to you if I tried,” Kaminari shrugs with a lazy grin, practically cuddling with Ojiro's tail now as the boy plays with his cards in hand.

Mina looks at Uraraka who immediately looks away, panicked. She then looks at Kirishima who then blushes and also looks away. “You guys are hopeless...” She looks back at the red-and-white-head. “Well, did my explanation make sense, Todoroki?” 

His face is blank as he continues to stare into the pile of cards, once again in a mess on the table. “Yeah...romantic attraction is desiring to do whatever things the person considers romantic with someone else. And a date would just be hanging out with the intention of it being romantic.”

“Yeah..yeah!” She turns to the allos in the room. “Does that sound right?”

Kirishima, Mineta, Aoyama, and Kaminari all nod in agreement. 

"But if you can't tell if your feelings for the other person are romantic or platonic, then it's probably.."

"Alterous attraction, yes. If that's the case, then you'd probably use date and hang out interchangeably. Because it wouldn't matter either way."

Tsu speaks up for what seems like the first time tonight. “Um, you said something about lithromantic? And a spectrum?”

“Right!” Mina realizes. 

Tsu sits up straight on the bed and confesses, “I know just a little bit about it, but it's all surface-level knowledge. I looked into it once. Wasn’t it that aspecs feel a little attraction but rarely or under specific conditions? Isn’t that gray-uality? And one’s... Demi? Demiuality?”

Mina put on a face like she was about to cry. “Tsu, I could kiss you! You give off such aro vibes..!”

Tsu smiles awkwardly at that. 

“It’s probably the green. And yes, you’re right! Gray aces and grayros experience little to no attraction. Grayro meaning gray aromantics,” She gives a look to Midoriya and Mineta, who looked like they were about to ask. “Gray aces and aros sometimes experience romantic or ual attraction but not enough to consider themselves fully allo. Aros, aces, grayros, and gray aces are all under the aspec umbrella. All gray people are aro and or ace but not all ace and or aro people are gray. These identities are called micro labels. Lithros, or akois, are a part of this.”

“Wait, lithro or akoi? Why are there two different words?” Uraraka asks. 

“I’m not sure..” Mina admits when Tokoyami steps in. 

“It’s because lith was a predominantly lesbian term, and because conversation about it started getting rough, it was renamed to akoiromantic or akoiual. But lithromantic and lithual are still mostly used.” Tokoyami explains, arms crossed and eyes closed. Mina has the thought that he seems like a grandmaster out of an anime or something, despite them all being the same age. 

“Whoa, I had no idea!” She was impressed. If he knew so much about it, he should join in on the lesson too! Be a teacher's assistant! Oh, that'd be amazing! Mina thought. 

He nods. 

“And what does it mean?” Midoriya asks, taking imaginary notes. He picks up four cards as Kirishima puts down a draw four. He hadn't even noticed the line had been reversed. 

“Oh, an akoi person feels attraction until it's reciprocated. Then it starts to fade as soon as the feelings are returned.”

“Oh, that !” Kirishima furrows his brow. 

“They can’t help it.” She shrugs. 

“They can attest, it for them too.” Tokoyami comments. He wouldn't say it to anyone, but he frequented aroace group chats online. It wasn't something he was inclined to talk about, but he hasn't had any other way to connect with aspec people at this school. He hadn't learned of Mina's aromanticism until today! And even though he didn't show it, he was actually really happy not to be the only aro here. Now if only she were a little less extroverted..

“Other gray identities would be aro or acespike, which is feeling romantic or ual attraction very rarely or sporadically like maybe one percent of the time or twice a year, fray meaning feeling attraction until you get to know someone better, demi being the exact opposite of that, not feeling attraction until you’ve built a close emotional bond with someone first, recipro, the opposite of akoi, not feeling romantic attraction until you know the person has a thing for you, and, aro or ace flux, which is fluctuating between aspec identities like the ones I just described or between micro labels. It also means going from being romance or favorable to repulsed to neutral or back to favorable, and so on, from day to day or week to week or month to month.. You get it.”

“Dude, demi is everyone.”

“Oh I knowyou, of all people, aren't saying that,” Ojiro comments out of the side of his mouth as he sets down a red one.

“Micro labels?” Midoriya questions. 

“Oh, okay, micro labels are for aros and aces that aren't gray! Like me! Take me for example!” She gets excited, claps her hands. “I’m cupioromantic! I’m an aromantic person that’s romance-favorable and would like to still have a romantic relationship despite not feeling romantic attraction! I don’t feel romantic attraction at all, unfortunately, but I am highly affectionate and I am well-versed in aesthetics!” She makes a heart shape with her fingers. 

Kirishima seems to sigh, then picks up a card.

“There’s also bellus! Another favorable identity that enjoys doing romance or ual-coded things, but with them, they don’t want to pursue a relationship. They can flirt and make jokes and be completely comfortable doing things like that but actually being in a committed relationship activates their fight or flight response!” She winks and sticks her tongue out. 

Aoyama appreciates the flare she’s going for, but still has to wonder why she’s striking all these poses. He picks up a card. 

“Romance-repulsed aros and -repulsed aces are called apothiromantic or apothiual. But you don’t have to be aro or ace to be apothiromantic or apothiual.” She further explains and Tokoyami nods. 

“It’s being completely uninterested and usually disgusted by romance and . That’s what I am.” 

The two aros look at Todoroki, who looks down at his hand, suddenly put on the spot. “I’m still figuring out if I’m really aroace, so I don’t really care.”

“So.. neutral?” Mina guesses, pink finger pressed into her, also pink, cheek. 

“I guess.” He sets down a blue draw 2 card.

“Mm,” She puts a hand to her chest and smiles. “You’ve got all the time in the world, don’t you worry about it. I, on the other hand, am alloual, so I’m alloaro. I still experience ual attraction, but romantic attraction is beyond me.” She shakes her head, hands up in a shrug and eyes closed while she smiles at the room full of her peers. “Oh, and, alloromantic is the romantic version of alloual. So if I felt romantic attraction and not ual attraction I’d be a alloromantic aual, or alloace." She stretched her arms out, hears a pop. "You understand? I think that might be all! Whew! I just explained the entire aspec community!”

“Well, not the entire community.” Tokoyami interrupts. “There’s, like, fifteen other micro labels.”

She pouts. “I couldn’t think of them all at once…”

“Do you guys..need..all those labels?” Kirishima hesitates to ask. Rightfully so, because Tokoyami and Mina stare daggers at him, hard. Their eyes practically glow red. “I didn’t mean anything bad! But..fifteen? Were you just being hyperbolic?”

“I get what you mean. But the labels are meant for those who need them and no one else.” Mina crosses her arms. “They’re all really cool in their own right..! And if those specific labels help young, questioning or non-questioning, aspecs find their place here, then they are all important.”

Todoroki nods, and Tokoyami says quietly, “Yeah..”

Ojiro has absolutely no idea what he's walked into, but what he does know is that this sure is a hell of a long game of UNO. He sets down a yellow skip to purposefully tease Mineta. 

“Either way, they're all aro or ace. If they were all gray identities then maybe it would be different, but micro labels are used really just to get aros and aces of a kind a way to meet up and talk. For the most part. Not always. Don’t take my word as the end all be all.” Mina says, looking back at the stack. Someone had stacked the cards back up into the pull stack. The three newest discarded cards were red, yellow, and blue. She sits back down, hands drooping down by her knees. “I think I might be panual, but I don’t know if I want to use labels yet. I might just call myself a non-sam aro, but I don’t know if that works if I’m cupioromantic and not aroace—”

“I am!” Kirishima’s voice rings across the room. His hand is raised and he looks like he was in the midst of standing but he slowly sits back down and lowers his hand. “I mean, I’m panual...if we’re all coming out…”

“Oh!” Uraraka gasps. 

“That makes sense,” Tsu says. 

“I.. I was mistaken..” Aoyama’s smile gets wobbly and he looks away as Kirishima looks his way, a sweat going down Aoyama’s temple as he does so.

“Whoa, let's not change the subject!” Mineta crosses his arms and points a suspicious look at Mina. “It’s real suss that you say you feel ual attraction even though you’re aro.”

Kaminari gave his own awkward look as he pet Ojiro’s tail. “Yeah...I get being allo and ace, but wanting without romance?”

“Well, I do want romance. I can’t help that I don’t like anyone,” she says and raises up a finger, pursing her lips. “And there’s plenty of ual relationships that don’t involve romance. Like those QPRs I talked about. Also, I don’t need romance at all to have a partner. That’s amatonormativity, boys.”

“You keep using big words; they’re not gonna know what you’re saying, Mina.” Kirishima teases. 

“Hey!” Kaminari grips Ojiro’s tail tighter and glares at Kirishima alongside Mineta. 

“Kirishima!”

“Amatonormativity is the outdated notion that no one's life is complete without a significant other, oftentimes referring to a romantic partner.” Mina explains matter-of-factly, ignoring the boys’ whining. 

“You talk like a textbook.”

“You talk like a erted idiot.”

“...I’ll take that.”

After taking up a card, Uraraka clasps her hands in her lap and peeks up at Aoyama, who looked strangely out of place in this discussion. Everyone else around her was talking or busying themselves writing notes telepathically into their hand. Tokoyami was explaining to Tsu some other micro labels: 

“...Then there’s idem. At its core, it's experiencing platonic and romantic or ual attraction the same but using outside information to tell when which is supposed to be which. It's kind of like platoni but platoni doesn’t try to tell the two apart and just feels it. Then quoi, or wtf, i—“

“Wtf?”

“Yeah, I know.” A sigh. “It's not being able to understand romantic or ual attraction at all and finding it unuseful—“

And Kirishima was staring at Mina and Mineta and Kaminari as they argued, as well as Midoriya to his left, who was once again going into a tizzy thinking about something. Ojiro looked completely out of place as he played for Kaminari.

Either way, she was thinking that maybe if she talked now, no one would pay her any mind but the one she wanted to talk to. She opens , her heart beating hard in her chest, and says, “Actually…” She pauses, looks at Aoyama head-on. “Aoyama.”

He meets her gaze, surprised to see it filled with both nervousness and determination to get whatever she needs to say out. “Hm..?”

“When you said that I liked that person that day—“

And the room mysteriously goes quiet. Uraraka breaks eye contact with Aoyama and glances around to see all eyes on her. Her heart rate skyrockets. It was not supposed to go like this. But she’d already started, and she was going to get this out. She just needed to watch what she said. And not look at Midoriya. 

She lets out a deep breath. “When you said I liked that person during the training with Thirteen, I felt kind of like you were...forcing feelings on me…? That I didn’t have..?” She waits for a reaction and he nods for her to continue, obviously just as nervous if the disconcerted look on his face was anything to go by. “Obviously it’s not your fault. It’s a common thing to joke about. But I just really admired him.. and that thought hadn’t even crossed my mind before you said that. And now it feels kind of weird talking to him when it seems like others will also get the wrong idea..” Though she was still trying to figure out if it was the wrong idea. “Mina mentioning amatonormativity..it just reminded me of that…”

There’s a long silence. 

“I’m done.” She says so fast the group could barely catch it. She looks back down at her cards, lips tightened into a line, waiting for a reaction. 

There’s a few more seconds of silence, then: “Damn, this is a long game of UNO.”

Everyone looks at Ojiro. 

“Oh..Was that..was that out of place?” He scratches the back of his head, deadpan. “My bad.”

“Whoa, so you really DID have love trouble!” Mina exclaims, bringing the attention back to Uraraka and Aoyama. Midoriya gulps but says nothing. They all look at Aoyama for a response. 

With all the eyes on him, Aoyama clears all the nerves from his face and keeps his smiling poker face. “Well for me, every guy I admired turned out to be me crushing on him—“ He sits up, motions with his hand. “So I thought maybe it was true for you! I’m sorry!” He apologizes. 

Everyone seems stunned but not into silence. No, the room gets as loud as it’s been all night, because of course everyone knew it, but they’d never thought he’d say it out loud. And then he goes on to flat out say, “I’m gay.”

Mineta is ripping balls out of his hair. “What is going on tonight, man!” 

“This game is never gonna eennndd!” Ojiro puts another card down. 

“Aegoromantic, or aegoual, also known as autochorriual and autochorisromantic, but not anymore after we found it originates from a alloallo guy, is feeling a disconnection between oneself and the object of attraction, like reading romance novels or enjoying romantic comedies—“

“Mhm mhm.”

“I just want to go to bed.” Kaminari lays down long ways on Tokoyami’s bed. 

"Wait, Aoyama, so you thought I was gay?"

“Kirishima, thought you were gay.”

“Wha—? Mina!”

"You give off so much gay energy, my man.”

“You were always going on about manliness and everyone being so manly,” Aoyama explains with sadness in his voice.

“Aro and acevague are neurodivergent people who feel their uality is connected to their neurodivergence. Nebularomantic and nebulaual are for neurodivergent people who are platoni but because it connects to their neurodivergence.”

“Mhm mhm, ribbit!”

“Wait, Ojiro, when did you get here?”

“Midoriya, I’ve been sitting right here for a good while now.”

“Wait, Ojiro, when di—“

“TODOROKI! ET TU?”

“Well, after all you just said, and after thinking about it a little, I think I might be aual or acespec.” Midoriya says suddenly in Mina's direction, hand under his chin and eyes concentrated in thought again. 

Todoroki looks surprised, and so does Uraraka. Mina, though, looks like her head is about to explode. 

She makes a sound like giggling and screaming at the same time. “My hair brother! Fluffy siblings! The ace and aro team! I’ve got to learn how to use a bow and arrow, now!”*

Midoriya looks at her with confusion but she excuses herself and lets him continue. “Sometimes I find that stuff horrifying,” He puts his hands in his lap and looks down and to his side. “But other times I just feel embarrassed.”

The excitement seems to leave Mina a little bit. “Well...mm.. I dunno.. That just sounds like a normal reaction to me.” She looks at Tokoyami for input. 

“It could be going from repulsion to neutral. If that’s the case, it sounds like aceflux.”

“Yeah, maybe,” She doesn’t seem quite convinced as she looks back to Midoriya. “Look into it. Take your time.”

“Yeah..” He said, cheeks tinted a light pink. 

Ojiro laughs awkwardly, rubbing his head. “I feel awkward...being here..”

Mina squints at him for a long moment. “Seriously, when did you get here?”

“Seriously?” He exclaims. "Kaminari texted me saying he wanted me to take over for him.."

“Well, Ashido, you always chastised us but your statements tonight prove you’re just as sleazy as us!” Mineta says with his chest held high and a cocky smile on his face so wide his eyes close. Kaminari is standing beside him, mimicking him. 

“Don’t compare me to you!” She says in their direction, not picking up that they're obviously joking. 

As they argue, Midoriya moves to sit next to Todoroki as he begins to explain in more detail about auality and its many identities:

"She didn't say anything about it but I read about oriented and angled aroace. I'm not sure of the difference but oriented is when an aroace person feels tertiary attraction so strongly that they find a need to include it in their aroace identity."

 Tokoyami explains another identity to Tsu, with Uraraka listening in this time around:

“Abro is when someone’s identity is fluid and changes every so often. So one week they could only feel attraction to someone of the same or one day they would only feel attraction towards people they have an emotional bond with and maybe for a few months they’re completely aromantic aual. It's not always one identity for a long or short period of time—“

And Mineta and Kaminari and Mina are still teasing each other incessantly, getting more and more into it while Ojiro is getting more and more uncomfortable. He tries to leave but Kaminari is still holding tight to his tail and won’t let go. He clicks his tongue, then notices Kirishima sitting in front of him, not talking to anyone and looking quite lonesome. Upon asking what’s wrong, Kirishima looks up at him in surprise and says nothing! before he turns to the also awkwardly and quietly sitting Aoyama and grabs his attention. They begin talking about being the only known mlm in the room, and again, Ojiro is alone. 

"Sam is the split attraction model, so a non-sam is someone who doesn't use that. A non-sam ace would just say they're aual, not aual hetetoromantic or insert orientation here. Auality is the only identity that matters to them and explains their whole deal." Explains Todoroki. He puts a card down and says, “UNO.”

Everyone abruptly stops talking. They stare at him, long and hard, seemingly not comprehending what exactly he said. 

“The game..the game is over?” Mina’s voice is so light and low in volume that if it weren’t otherwise dead silent in Tokoyami’s room they would not have heard her. 

It’s like a pin dropping:

“IT IS! IT’S FINALLY OVER!” Ojiro screams and the room is filled with sudden cheer. 

“Yay!”

“We got to do this again.”

“No, never again.”

“ no, I’d rather die.”

“See you again next Friday?”

“Please don’t do this in my room again.”

 

 


*she's referring to a well-known Tumblr post regarding a superhero duo named arrow and ace

I was told that Horikoshi was setting up a romance between Kirishima and Mina in the manga, but since I haven't read it myself and don't plan to, it could possibly be them just becoming closer friends and people being amatonormative and assuming. Either way, I tried to make Kirishima's feelings ambiguous when it came to Mina being aro. The character's thoughts on micro labels aren't my thoughts, but how I thought they'd react in the moment. Please don't get in a tizzy about Mineta and comment negative stuff because he's in this!! Also, NO SHIP TALK PLEASE!!!

Midoriya later figures out he's not ace but has an appreciation for the community(unless you want him to be ace. Then feel free to ignore) and Todoroki is definitely aroace for sure no question about it.

PLEASE LEAVE A COMMENT ❤☺

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