Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Still Water.

Izuku opens the door to his apartment. He still felt numb from what All Might said. From what Bakugou said. Bakugou who was a bully but nothing more. Bakugou who didn’t hate him for his quirk. At least that’s what he thought. But Bakugou had told him to take a swan dive off a roof and pray for a quirk in his next life.

You’re an idiot. Izuku thinks as he walks up the stairs to his room. Bakugou never liked you, he bullied you for heaven’s sake. But the other part of his mind, the one that wanted to stay hopeful would always say; but he had never said anything regarding your quirkless status until today, besides he looked like he had eaten a lemon when he said it. Yeah because he hated even thinking about me.

Izuku shook his head as if trying to forcefully get rid of the thoughts circling around his head. He stares up at the harsh light reflecting off the bathroom's ceiling. Izuku dimly notices the feeling of water hitting his head and back, matting his hair down in the process. He was in the shower – and when did that happen, he didn’t think he had moved from the door. Izuku feels like he’s a ghost watching and feeling as his body moves on its own toward the drawn bath, but not feeling attached to it at all. A part of his brain screams at him telling him something’s wrong, but Izuku doesn’t register it, he’s far too lost in his thoughts.

Bakugou never cared about you, he just never specifically targeted your quirk to make it hurt more when he eventually did. This part of his brain would just repeat on loop – there was no stopping it. Maybe everyone’s right, Izuku thinks. You’re just a useless, quirkless, stupid Deku.
A swan dive off the roof, Izuku thinks. It repeats like a broken record in his mind. He feels something rush over him, it's physical and makes Izuku’s vision go blurry.

Bakugou will forgive me for diving into water instead, right?

Then Izuku is sinking.

There’s a heavy weight in his lungs and he thinks he hears his name being called. Thinks he hears the bathroom door open. The voice calling for sounds like his name, but that would be absurd.

It’d be nice, Izuku thinks, that someone actually would care when he died.

Then his vision is being filled with black dots – maybe they're white, he can’t tell, and that doesn’t bother him because, finally.

He’s free.

Bakugou’s tongue tasted sour. Not because of the fucker trying to shove itself down his throat – No. Because of what he had said to Midoriya. He just couldn’t fucking believe it. With the shitty extras jeering him on and his racing thoughts it wasn’t surprising what he had said, it just wasn’t what he wanted to say. He wanted to go back and tell Midoriya what he actually wanted to say, what he actually thought. He wanted to tell Midoriya that he was better than all the shitty extras, that he was better than them for not listening to their pointless jeers. He wanted to tell Midoriya that he never wanted to bully him, it was just that when the moment happened he could never do or say what he always wanted to. He always got caught up in the second and his body always did the opposite of what he wanted.

What Bakugou wanted to tell him was that he was so, so proud of him.

Instead, he told him to jump off the fucking roof. ‘Take a swan dive off the roof and pray for a quirk in your next life.’ Who the fuck says that kind of thing?! Him apparently, because he told Midoriya to jump. He saw the light dim from Midoriya’s eyes when he said that, and he knew why. Bakugou was the only person to not bully him for his quirk. He still bullied him of course, there was no denying what he did, but it wasn’t about his quirk. Until now.

‘Why, why did I say that?’

Bakugou knew the answer, it was part of the reason why he was sitting in the back of an ambulance, tired, wet, and suffering from quirk exhaustion. He couldn’t help but think that if Midoriya were there, that he would’ve been able to find a way to beat the slime villain. He knew Midoriya would’ve been able to cause those books, those damned books.

Books he would never see again. Books whose owners smile he would never see again. He would never hear the voice of that person again. And he had only himself to blame.

Because Bakugou had killed him.

And that hurt more than anything else.

Chapter Text

Bakugou didn’t know what to think anymore. He was being praised for his quirk and how he stood up to the villain. It was a normal thing to be praised, it happened all the time at school. It was different though, when it was several pro heroes doing the praising. He didn’t want it. He didn’t deserve the praise being given to him. He had killed someone, an innocent person, his ‘friend’ of three odd years, and they were practically praising him for it! 

It reached a point of insanity, all the voices jumbling together and he couldn’t stand it anymore, it was all too overwhelming the voices, the noise, the lights and cameras. He was growling, eyes twitching furiously and expression contorted into one of anger, the noise slowly turning into words, “Shut the fuck up!”.

Everyone recoiled from the loud exclamation. The heroes, the vultures, the civilians, all of them moved in shock, some of them even gasping slightly. No dared speak to multiple pro heroes like that! “You guys didn’t even do one damned single fucking thing!” Bakugou continued oblivious to the reactions his words were gaining him. “I was the one who got my ass out of that shitty predicament! You all just stood there, watching, filming, as I almost died.” He was practically snarling at this point, “Someone could have done something, even if it was just getting my ass out of their or causing a fucking distraction! But no, instead you all sat and did jackshit because, and I quote, ‘our quirks aren’t suited for the job.’ Isn’t that right, Death arms? You did nothing, Backdraft did nothing, Mt. Lady did nothing because your shitty quirks weren’t suited for the job. Death arms, it’s not like the slime fucker doesn’t have parts of him that you can your grubby hand on or are you to blind and have stick shoved to far up your ass to see the fucker’s eyes and it ugly mouth as it spat shitty insults at you all. Backdraft, you could have diluted the bitch. Mt. Lady, you could have pulled me out, all of you could have pulled me the fuck out!” 

There was silence in the air, no one dared to breathe a word and the tension between everyone was thick enough to be cut with a knife. “And don’t you ever praise me on my quirk again, especially after what I did today.” With that he grabbed his stuff and walked away, having long since hopped off the ambulance to get in the faces of the ‘heroes’ while gesturing wildly.

The second he left the public eye he was crying, tears streaming down his face as the day caught up to him. He regretted every second of it. The words had been too much, the thoughts had been enough, and the feelings were consuming. They were making it so he couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, bearing down on him like the weight of the world. But he was no Atlas, and he couldn’t shoulder everything, so instead it came crumbling down around him. All the pieces were lying on the floor around him – on top of him – and the dust was floating up – he couldn’t breathe – it was hazy and smoky, he couldn’t see anything around him, just black. It felt like his head was being ripped apart, like all the crumbling pieces were still trying to fit on his shoulders – there was more weight being added to the pile of rubble, he could tell – and then there was a voice seeping through the rubble. It sounded like Midoriya’s. Bakugou was clawing desperately at the rocks and boulders on top of him, trying to get to Midoriya before it was too late, to tell him all the things he had wanted to say earlier but couldn’t, he wanted to apologize. “Why did you tell me to jump?” There it was, the voice, soft and whispered right into his ears. He slowly turned his head to the now more cramped space next to him, and there Midoriya was. He looked small underneath the stone enclosure. His green hair didn’t have its normal saturation to it, it seemed darker than normal and Bakugou couldn’t see properly. Suddenly he’s spinning and when he opens his eyes. He feels like throwing up, he’s sure he did throw up because in front of him Midoriya is lying broken and bloodied. His hair doesn’t have its normal vibrance because of the blood matting it. His school uniform is stained with blood. His shoes are off his feet, and he can feel wind brushing up against him, his hair in his face. One gust he’s staring at a familiar skyline from a rooftop, the next Midoriya is standing across from him. He’s still bloody, except now he looks taller, and his hair seems far more spikey and like his own for Bakugou’s liking. He doesn’t realize until he’s pushed off the edge of the roof and hits sludgy water, the disgusting muck filling his lungs that Bakugou realizes what’s happening, and well, it might as well be irony, the gods above delivering karmic justice. And as Bakugou’s concision starts to fade and the pain starts to numb, he finds that he doesn’t mind it.

Bakugou shoots awake, sweaty, panting, and with his heart trying to break out of his chest. There was something he had to do, something he had to know. He had a shirt on before he knew it. He was hurrying to get everything he needed, phone – he practically ripped it from where it was charging, shoving it into the pocket of his sweats – jacket – it was still chilly at night, and he didn’t want to catch a cold – his keys – he didn’t want to be locked out of the house – and what he was going to say when he arrives at his destination.

He was opening the door to his bedroom and running down the stairs to the front door, barely managing to put the slippers by the door on before he was unlocking then re-locking the door. He flew down the sidewalk, the slippers almost falling off his feet, not having been designed for running. It was a long way to go before he reached the Midoriya’s but if he ran the whole way – which he could and was going to – then it would only take about ten minutes.

Inko wasn’t expecting someone to be knocking at her apartment door so early in the morning, granted she was still up but she couldn’t sleep after what had happened. When she closed her eyes she could still see his face in the water, as the last bit of air was expelled from his chest, the water swallowing his final breaths and taking their place eagerly.

She grabbed the shotgun next to the door as she looked through the peephole. It was a habit she had tried to install into Izuku many times, he never seemed to learn though, always answering the door without looking through it.

Seeing the person outside she set the gun down and unlocked the door, opening it and coming face to face with her best friend’s son. She blinked at him, confused. There was no way Katsuki could know that Izuku was in the hospital, he couldn’t know that Izuku drowned. Inko hadn’t told Mitsuki yet. In front of her stood a very winded and red in the face Katsuki, who looked like he had done a fair share of crying that night. “Katsuki, why are you here? Does your mom know you're over here?”

“No, but before you call her, and please don't, I'll head home right after I’m done, I have a question.” He was rambling like Izuku does. Inko nodded her head, showing she was listening to his words, knowing and dreading what he would say next. “Is Izuku okay?” Those three words broke a dam that had been building and Inko put her hand on her mouth, let tears stream down her face, and shook her head.

Katsuki’s expression matched her own, and he had his own set of tears streaming down his face. “No, he’s not okay,” Inko choked out. “He’s gone Katsuki.” And with that she sank down to her knees, Katsuki following her down and reaching out to hug her. She accepted the embrace easily, her tears and snot staining his jacket as she sobbed. Katsuki was doing the same on her shoulder, and it was telling of just how upset he was, he never cried.

“I’m sorry.” He choked into her cardigan.

“It's not your fault Katsuki.” Inko was trying to be reassuring to both him and herself. She knew how Katsuki used to bully Izuku. 

“It is though.” Katsuki pulled away from her, his eyes meeting hers. “I told him to jump.” The words were like a punch to the gut.

“You… what?” Inko sobbed, her voice full of sadness. She wasn’t angry, she just wanted to know why. Why would Katsuki say such a thing to her baby?

“I know it doesn’t change anything but I’m so sorry. It’s just in the heat of the moment with all the extras cheering me on it just spilled out. And now Midoriya’s dead and it’s all my fault. His face when I told him to jump was just… Why did I say that?!” They’re both sobbing now, neither of them were pretty criers.

“I told him to take a swan dive off the roof and pray for a quirk in his next life auntie. Why did I say that?” Katsuki was looking at his violently shaking hands. “I’m so sorry auntie, I killed something that was dear to the both of us, I’ve gone and fucked up harder than ever before and it’s gotten Midoriya killed.” When had Katsuki and her baby gone back to last name basis? When had everything start to go wrong?

Katsuki left after that, both of them were still sobbing messes, both of them were still beating themselves up over what happened, both of them still couldn’t do anything.

When Bakugou went to school the next day, he couldn’t focus. He kept staring at his notebook, the words on it turning into Midoriya’s face. He kept asking the same question from last night, ‘Why did you say that?’ It was playing on repeat in his head, and he couldn’t shut it off.

During lunch he found himself drawing in his notebook, Midoriya’s bloody face from the night before slowly being spun into existence by his pencil. All things considered it was a beautiful drawing, the spider lily’s surrounding Midoriya’s face. He just couldn’t help but notice the blood and the words on the page. ‘Why’d you say that Bakugou?’ They were haunting him at this point.

He was jarred out of his wallowing by fingers wrapping his arm around his shoulder. “Come on Bakugou, look at this cool trick!” Fingers waved his fingers in front of his face, while using his quirk to grow them and twist them into a lewd gesture. 

“Get off me!” Bakugou shouts at fingers and rips his arm off his shoulders. “All of you, just… fuck off, leave me alone.” He grabbed his notebook and bag, stalking out of the room to find somewhere quieter. He could hear people whispering as he left. “What has he got shoved up his ass?” and “Is he okay?” tend to be the most common phrases that can be heard. 

Tch. He didn’t care what those extras thought, he was done with that. He was done with their toxic words and poisonous feelings. He was done. Maybe that’s why he was sitting in between two lockers crying. Maybe that’s why he was having thoughts about dying himself. It was because of those words that he was even in this situation. It was because of their words, but mostly his words, unspoken or not. Maybe it would just be better if he left. He couldn’t do that to Inko though. She had already lost her son, no need to have her lose another one. He couldn’t do that to his dad, he would break apart more than he already was. He couldn’t do that to the old hag, as much as he hated her, he loved her. He couldn’t do that to himself, he still wanted to be a hero, he still wanted to save people, he still had dreams he wanted to achieve.

Izuku could let go of all of it.

He couldn’t.

“Bakugou.” His name is being called out by the vice principal, who’s snapping their fingers in his face. 

“What?” he growls out. He’s at his limit with this place and right now the only thoughts on his mind were about what he would do to this shit hole of a school when he was gone. 

“It’s time to leave.” The bitch said. He grabbed his bag and notebook, grumbling to himself as he stood up. He started to walk away when he heard the lady call out behind him, “Oh, and try not to cry at school, it doesn’t look good for us.”

He was going to burn this place to the ground.

As he left he could only think one thing, ‘Do I deserve my quirk?’

He didn’t think so.

He knew that if he could get rid of it he would.

So when All Might himself offers Bakugou his quirk, He can't accept. He doesn’t want to.

There’s a booming laugh in front of him and it’s coming from All Might, the number one hero, in the flesh. Bakugou doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry, All Might wants to talk to him. The person who just killed his best friend, he’s practically a villain! “Sorry, Sorry, back up, What the fuck did you just say?” Bakugou hasn’t been processing the words All Might’s saying and he really needs to hear whatever it is that All Might wants to say to him.

All Might looks startled for one moment before he’s jumping right back into what he was saying, “I was talking about how well you took care of the slime villain! I only saw it after the incident, I’m sorry I was not there to help you.” All Might’s booming voice is going to make all the people on the street think that someone is dying out here. “And I was thinking about how wonderful of a quirk you had,” At those words Bakugou’s heart sinks and he gets the distinct impression that something is about to go very, very wrong. He feels like there’s going to be a disturbance in the force if you will.

All Might’s saying things, talking about some past fight and how he was injured in it, and then suddenly In front of Bakugou is a skinny, lanky, very tall man. He’s still All Might, Bakugou knows that, but he’s trying to process what’s going on and it’s not working very well. Also, what the fuck is All Might doing, spilling a secret like that in a residential area where anyone could hear what he was saying, did he want to get shanked?

“I want to pass my quirk onto you.” All Might says when he’s done with his story. It’s not even a question of what Bakugou’s going to say to All Might.

“I don’t want it.” Bakugou says it with an air of finality, willing for the conversation to be done. He doesn’t deserve it after what he did. If anyone should get it, it should be Midoriya, not him.

“But my boy- “All might starts saying before Bakugou cuts him off.

“I don’t want your quirk, I never want you quirk, I don’t even want mine so why would I want yours?” Bakugou spits out hurt and anger staining his voice.

“I just think you should reconsider, it a great opportunity-” 

“No, you listen here old man. I get that you don’t understand why, that’s fine whatever. But let me make it clear for you, I don’t want your quirk. It’s as simple as that. I don’t want your quirk and you’re just going to have to suck it up. I don’t want your quirk, I don’t want my quirk, I just want my friend back, but that’s not going to happen, because he died and I killed him. My dead friend should be who you’re offering this to, he deserves it more than me. But you can’t give it to him or me because he’s dead.” With that Bakugou stomps away, he couldn’t care less what All Might thought of him.

“At least think about it…” All Might trails off.

He should be glad that Bakugou has enough self-restraint to not murder the number one hero.

Chapter Text

Bakugou woke up to a call. The ringing pierced through his head, shaking him out of his sleep. He grumbles to himself before flipping over and grabbing his phone to look at the caller ID.

Inko.

The caller is Inko and Bakugou almost wants to blow up his phone and then go back to sleep and never wake up again. “Why the hell are you calling me when it’s still before ten?” Bakugou yawns into the phone. Then he hears the sniffle. It’s a half laugh, half cry and it makes Bakugou’s heart clench, trying to eat its way out of his chest.

“Never change Katsuki, never change.” The words are said in the same weak laugh, it still makes Bakugou’s heart clench.

“Auntie… are you okay?” Bakugou tentatively asks.

“No, but you're not either.” Bakugou gives a slight snort at that, the understatement of the century. It's quiet for a moment, neither him nor Inko saying anything, then, there's a slight sigh into the phone. “Hey, Katsuki?.”

“Yes, Auntie?”

“Can you…, will you still become a hero?”

“I- I don't know Auntie, with everything that's happened, everything I've done, I don't think I could be a hero.”

“Well, before you make your decision, I still think you should be one.” More silence, “It's what Izuku would have wanted, and it's what I want.”

Bakugou feels tears in the corners of his eyes, his body’s shaking and he can't breathe. “How can you say that, after what I did?” he chokes out. “I killed Midoriya! I- I killed Izuku, and you still want me to become a hero?”

“I know you don't understand Katsuki, but please can you be one for me?” Inko asks, her voice so quiet it barely picks up on the phone's mic.

“I can - I can try, auntie.” He whispers. His heart is slowly breaking, and he’s not sure why. He doesn’t think he minds it though.

It feels like a fitting punishment.

When Inko called Katsuki to tell him to be a hero, she didn't tell him why. She didn't tell him it was her throwing him into something to keep him from dying. She didn't know what she would do if both her boys were gone. She knew it was manipulative and she felt bad doing it. Katsuki could still die! It just wouldn’t be from suicide, it would be a villain attack or a collapsing building, but at least he would have the chance to save someone before he went.

At least he could make a difference and try to stop blaming himself along the way.

Bakugou stares out over the beach, the salty wind blowing in from the coastline. The only thing ruining the view was the trash all over the beach. Bakugou remembers how the beach used to look about seven or so years ago. There was significantly less trash and there was no rot smell mixed in with the oceans salt. He wonders what Izuku would have thought of the beach if he had lived here several years ago. The nerd would have loved it, just like Bakugou had. He would have been far more devastated than Bakugou had been. By the time the beach became inhospitable and hobo city’s downtown, Bakugou had considered himself to be above playing in the water and sand.

He wanted those simpler days back. Back before quirks mattered to him. Back before Izuku and Auntie had moved to Mustafu to be closer to the old hag. Back before he had anything to worry about other than being good at school. He wished he could turn the clock back three years to when he and the nerd actually met face-to-face for the first time.

It was a disaster.

The both of them had gotten into an all-out brawl. Izuku had several bruised ribs and Bakugou a black eye and a cut lip. They had gotten the scolding of a lifetime from their respective mothers. They had laughed it off and Bakugou admitted to himself that even though Izuku was quirkless he had an impressive arm on him. 

He just didn't consider why this scrawny green bean would have that good of a hit, especially for only being eleven. 

He didn't then, but he would find out in a few weeks when school started up. He didn't know that there was more than one reason for them moving closer to the hag.

Bakugou remembers the first day of junior high like the back of his hand. The old hag had called to him before he left, she had told him to look out for the twig, that the overgrown beanstalk had had issues in the past with bullying because he was quirkless. Bakugou had scoffed, what victory and satisfaction was it to win against a quirkless person? Then they had gotten to class and had to introduce themselves to their classmates for the next three years - That was when things truly went to shit.

The class had gone around showing off their quirks while saying their names and hobbies or something Bakugou didn't really care, he was only taking note of their quirks to see if there was anything interesting. There wasn't.

It had gotten around to the nerd and Bakugou watched, dissecting him as he slowly stood up.  He had a nervous look on his face, as if he were dreading what was to come. He watched curiously as the green bean started talking, “H-hi! I'm Mi-Midoriya Izuku, I'm glad to make your acquaintance, and I’m - I’m quirkless.” Midoriya spit out the last couple of words like a curse, throwing them out and getting them done with. Murmuring started up in the class, everyone whispering to one another. 

Halfway through first period they started throwing paper at the nerd.

Lunch they threw his food on the floor. Bakugou pointed out that winning against a quirkless person wasn't a victory of any kind. There was a pained yet relieved expression on Midoriya’s face.

Going home Bakugou had asked Midoriya a question that had been bugging him for a while, “Why didn’t you just beat them up?”

Midoriya had given a sad smile up at him then looked back down at his shoes, “What use is it? It never stops anything, just makes it worse. Besides I never want to have to beat anyone up.

It didn't take a genius to realize why he was so good at throwing punches.

They had walked by it that day and Izuku had gotten a sad look on his face, he had never done anything about it though.

So that's how Bakugou ended up moving the trash on the beach into organized piles, his arms burning by the end and the beach looking marginally cleaner than five hours earlier.

“Where have you been all day?” It’s the first question coming out of the hag’s mouth as they sit down to eat dinner. His old man looks between the two of them warily, silently praying for no fights to break out.

“I was at the beach.” Bakugou answers back, his tone defiant but sad.

“The trashed one?” his dad asks, surprised. “I thought you considered yourself above going there?”

“I was cleaning it up.” Bakugou grumbles into his spicy curry.

He can’t see the look his parents shoot each other from this position but he’s sure it’s something with a worrying undertone. 

“Well, next time you’re going to be out late let us know, you had us worried there for a bit.” And that’s it. That’s all they say. He gets that they’re trying to be supportive in his decisions and that they don’t want to lose their son as well, but he wants them to make a bigger deal out of him being home late. He knows he would hate it and it would just make things worse, and he knows that they care, yet somehow it doesn’t feel like enough.

He got into this mess because of his need for attention, and hell knows he’ll stay here forever because of it as well.

The rest of dinner is surprisingly quiet and Bakugou thinks and mulls over an idea in his head. While his mom is finishing clearing the table he goes to the kitchen to help his dad wash the dishes. It’s quiet here too for a while, no walking on eggshells to make sure no one will start yelling, he’s a part of the problem, which is why he has to ask his dad.

“Could…” He trails off, not sure how to phrase what he wants without sounding weak. He knows he should suck it up at just ask, but the way he thinks has been trained into him so hard it’s the only way he can function.

His dad has stopped washing the dishes looking at him expectantly. “Could… can I be signed up for therapy?” he asks quietly. He feels weak and inadequate for having to ask, for having to get someone else’s help with his own issues, with the problems he’s caused for himself. He should be the one fixing them and not some shrink, but then he wouldn’t be in this situation in the first place would he?

His old man smiles down at him, it’s not happy, and it’s not comforting either, it looks distant and sad, tired, and exhausted. Bakugou’s never been able to relate with him more in his life than in this moment.

“We can work on that as soon as were done here.” Bakugou nods and they finish up the last couple of plates.

“At least this time you get to pick the shrink you want.” Bakugou barks out a laugh as they sit down in front of his dad’s laptop.

He’s still an awful person, he still inadvertently killed someone, and he’s still the same jackass he’s always been. But he’ll try to be better for Inko and for Izuku’s memory, He doesn’t want to be a hero that much anymore, and it’s amazing how much your perspective can change in a little less than a week. He doesn’t want to be a hero anymore but he’s going to be, Izuku wanted to be a hero and doesn’t get to be.

Maybe along the way he’ll be able to forgive himself though he doubts it.

Hopefully along the way he’ll get to help some people before he dies, it doesn’t change what he’s done, but maybe he can start changing.

Maybe he’ll get to see Izuku one day, when he finally dies in duty.

Although if his luck keeps up, he won’t change, and nothing will happen, and he’ll still be the same bastard as always.

There was a reason he was going to start therapy.

Chapter Text

Bakugou’s tapping his foot impatiently against the floor of the shrinks wait room. There's a TV on one wall playing some ten-hour-relaxing-nature-sounds-and-music thing from YouTube. There's a little hanging water feature as well, the sound of running water is slightly calming. The small couch he was sitting on was surprisingly comfortable for being in a doctor’s office waiting room. He could hear the clock on the far wall ticking quietly and the slight clicking of keyboards tapping as the two secretaries did whatever the hell it was they did. His dads next to him, absentmindedly scrolling through the news on his phone. The one other person in the waiting room is doing the same, and Bakugou would be too if he wasn’t uncharacteristically nervous.

He had one of his hearing aids on their Bluetooth mode, and there was quiet metal music playing so that he could still hear when the shrink called his name.

“Bakugou Katsuki.” The shrink was standing in the doorway that led to the offices and Bakugou grumbled as he got up off the couch. Speak of the devil and he shall appear.

He followed him through the door and the shrink looked over at him as they walked toward his office. “It’s nice to meet you Bakugou, how have you been lately?” He knew the shrink – who he should really call Dr. Yasu in his head so that he didn’t constantly call him ‘Shrink’ in their sessions – knew exactly what had happened recently, it was all filled out in his paperwork, and he couldn’t help but snort at the man’s pleasantries.

“All things considered I think I’m doing pretty fucking good, but that’s not saying much.” Bakugou grumbles back at him. There's a slight uptick in the corner of the mans mouth at his words, figures.

The man’s office is small but nice. There's a little desk for him and his chair is next to that, laptop on said desk along with many, many, many notepads. He also has a clock on his wall that Bakugou can’t hear even when he’s quiet – must be a silent one. Along with that, there's few hanging plants on his walls along with nature photos and the smell of lavender and other herbs coming from his diffuser.

He takes a seat on the small couch and in turn Dr. Yasu takes a seat in his chair.

“So today we’ll just be going over information you’ve already given me and anything else you’d like to tell me, along with seeing if you’re a good match for my style of therapy, it’s not for everyone and don’t hesitate to tell me if you don’t like me, I’ll recommend you to someone who I think would fit you better.” He says this as he boots up his laptop and Bakugou nods along.

He had been to therapy many years ago when he was younger, his parents wanted him to be able to express his emotions in a healthy way instead of beating people up and cursing them out, because for some reason having a five-year-old cuss at you was upsetting for most people.

It was also required because his teacher had been tired of his behavior.

He wonders what happened to the teachers that actually cared, maybe he just didn’t notice that they didn’t care because he didn’t have a quirkless classmate, but the point still stands. None of his Junior High teachers would have recommended that he go to therapy because of his anger issues. They would actively encourage it and turn a blind eye to everything happening in the school. He wants someone other than himself to blame for the shit that he did, there really isn’t anyone to blame but himself, but he wishes he could say it was the extras and the teachers. He knew it wasn’t just him, but he was the one who let their words get to him.

“So Bakugou, tell my why you’re here, not what your paper says, but why you chose to come here today.”

He nods at Dr. Yasu before taking a deep breath to gather his thoughts, and he finally starts talking.

Bakugou nods at Dr. Yasu as he leaves the office with his old man. They walk out the door to the building and head to their car. The car door shutting behind him as he gets into the passenger seat feels final in a way. He knows with certainty that he’s going to keep seeing the damn shrink, they had scheduled appointments for every other week after school. He’s still not sure what he’s going to get out of this, whether it’ll just be him ranting and Dr. Yasu giving input every now and again or what, but he thinks it’ll help, and that’s what matters.

It’s around mid-day when they get out of his office, he knows the session ran longer than it was scheduled for, but the shrink had insisted they get everything out of the way first, then decide what to work on from there. A brain dump of a sort.

There was a lot he had to say, about his own decisions, about what he’d done, about his school and his classmates, even about his home environment, anything and everything he could think to blame he talked about. It all kind of just tumbled out of his mouth in heaps of unorganized information.

His shrink had told him to get a notebook to start writing his thoughts into, and that made Bakugou smile slightly. He and Izuku were both going to be nerds who wrote obsessively in notebooks now.

At home he reheats some curry from last night and grabs a small salad on the side. It’d been about a week since Izuku had died, and he hadn’t eaten anything that was straight vegetables since then. If he was going to be a hero he needed the proper nutrients, and he was also craving something that wasn’t just snack food – it was all he could stomach for the past few days.

Normally on Saturdays he would go hang out with the extras, he’d go and do something adventurous. Today he felt like staying inside and curling up to hide. So instead, he grabbed his keys to the house and his phone along with his wallet. He slipped his shoes on as he walked out the door, sending a quick text to his old man.

_{Sent: 12:42pm} Going out for some me time, maybe heading

_Read                 to the store, not sure yet.                             

Okay, let us know when you’ll be back, stay _{Sent: 12:46}

safe out their kiddo, and be home before            _Read

dinner time.

Turning his phone off and letting his music play he started walking. He’s not sure to where yet but being able to feel the breeze on his face, hot and sweet, made him feel slightly better. He knew he’d be out all afternoon, so he starts with heading to a nearby bookstore. He knows he can get just a plain ass notebook at any store, but he’s feeling like getting a different looking one from normal for writing his thoughts into.

There's many different notebooks to choose from there, some with moon cycles and calendars, planners, and the sorts. He eventually settles on one bound in soft brown leather with a compass and map engraved into the front of it. It weighs heavy in his hands as he pays for it along with a set of pens, and he’s slightly grateful for the weight of it. It feels grounding for some reason.

He didn’t bring a bag, but the notebook isn’t huge and while it’s a slight squeeze, he manages to fit it in his hoodie pocket just fine. It does make it bulge a little wonky, but he doesn’t care all that much.

He finds himself at the beach again, the piles he had started on last time still there. He had worked until there was a small clear area in the trash piles and had started organizing things so that they could be taken to the proper disposal places. Now as he goes through the trash, he notices that some of the things he finds while he works are things he can’t understand why they’d got thrown away. There's a picture of what looks to be a father and his son running a laughing happily, A ring that looks too expensive to have not been worth something, a small box full of now ruined photos and papers. He’s not sure what to do with these items so he takes pictures of them and puts them online, seeing if anyone recognizes them. He doesn’t really care what happens to them or who gets them, as long as the someone who gets them are going to actually treasure them.

Around three in the afternoon he stumbles over a guy sleeping in the trash. He curses as he gains his balance. The dude doesn’t move and Bakugou would think he was dead if not for the slight rise and fall of his chest. His hair is dyed black, with red roots and patches in the read that look like they’ve been through one-to-many rounds of bleach, clearly he needs a re-dye. The man grumbles slightly before sitting up, rubbing the back of his head from where it had been resting in the sand.

“What the fuck are you doing sleeping in the trash?” Bakugou asks the man. Before he can answer he keeps going, “I mean, I knew this was hobo city, but I thought they just burnt shit and got drunk here, not fall asleep.”

The man snorts at his words. “I was doing just that; guess I got a little too drunk.” He sits up and starts grumbling about his other hobo friends who apparently had ditched him in the trash.

After that Bakugou doesn’t stay at the beach much longer, he’s made a good clear spot in the trash, starting from the bottom of the stairs leading down to the beach and a good ten feet in. The bigger things are farther in, but he knows that if he climbed over all the trash it would all drop off suddenly into the clear beach.

Well as clear as a beach that was partially covered in trash could be.

He finds himself walking to the park he used to go to a lot when he was a kid. The forests that stretch behind it hold memories of simpler times. He finds himself walking into the woods, crossing the log bridge into the nearby clearing. He lays down in the grass, letting the smell engulf him and the distant sounds of birds and running water lull him into a quiet peacefulness.

He can hear some people approaching and he can’t find it in himself to care if it’s someone he knows or not. He knows that the extras still come here, there’s several logs set up around the dead patch of grass from people use for bonfires. He recognizes the voice of Fingers as the people get closer, so he can only assume everyone else must be the other extras. He sighs and sits up. He really doesn’t want to talk to them, but he feels weak running from them, so he stays. He was here first, and they can be the ones to fuck off.

He knows when they’ve spotted him, there conversation stopping before one of the extras – he thinks it’s the one who can extend his eyes – call out, “Hey Bakugou, we didn’t think you were coming, you weren’t answering your phone.” Bakugou remembers the plethora of notifications he had when he finally looked at his phone on the way over here. None were his mom or dad telling him to come home so he ignored the rest.

“I wasn’t coming to join you extra’s, I didn’t look at your texts.” He responds harshly. The extra who had spoken frowned slightly before speaking again. “Well, you’re here now, wanna’ come hang out? We were going to go get some food and then hit the arcade maybe.”

“No, now fuck off, I don’t want to hang out with you.” He looks back down at his notebook. The only thing he’s written in it being his name and what he’s using it for on the inside of the cover.

“Aww, now don’t be like that Bakugou, just because you finally did what we all wanted to and killed Deku doesn’t mean you get to not hang out with us anymore.” Fingers is smirking at him like he thought what he said was going to get Bakugou to go with them.

Bakugou feels something in him snap.

Bakugou lightly set the notebook on the grass around him before standing up, dusting the dirt off of him. Walking over to Fingers he dimly hears the other two extra’s cheer that he’s going to hang out with them before he stops in front of Fingers.

“What did you say about Midoriya?” he asks coldly. He can feel white hot rage race up his spine, his fists clenched at his sides, because if Fingers said what he knew he said, his face was about to get a makeover.

“I said just because you got the honor of finally offing Deku doesn’t mean you get to lord it over us.” Fingers is smirking now, clearly thinking he’s won something.

Bakugou nods agreeably, “That’s what I thought you said.”

His fist connects with Fingers face with literal explosive power behind it.

When he gets home, the old hag is not happy with him.

“Katsuki! Get over here this instant!” Bakugou does as his mom says, walking into the living room with his head low. She hits him solidly against his head, only serving pushing it down farther. “Why the fuck did you punch that kid in the face?” He doesn’t shout back at her like he normally would in situations like this.

He replies quietly to her harsh words, “He said that just because I killed Izuku doesn’t mean that I get to lord it over them.” Behind him he hears his father gasp, and his mom is staring at him slack jawed. They were aware that Izuku was gone, he’s pretty sure they know how because he can tell that there’s something they’re not telling him, but he can’t bring himself to care.

He does know that Inko didn’t tell them what he said, he wanted to do it himself when he was ready. With downcast eyes he tells them what he said to Izuku. His father is staring at him in disbelief and his old hag is still slack jawed. He heads upstairs before the hag can hit him again and sits heavily on his bed with his door locked.

He stays there, looking up at the ceiling before rolling over and sitting down at his desk, notebook open. He hesitates before putting his pen on the page, not sure what he wants to say, what he wants to write. Tentatively he puts his pen to the page and starts writing. An hour or so later his dad is calling him down for dinner and when he doesn’t respond – dried tear tracts on his face being the only thing to betray his emotions – he tells him he’ll leave food at his door if he wants some. It’s quiet for a moment before he speaks again.

“Me and your mom don’t think anything less of you Katsuki. And I’m even prouder of you for going to therapy today.” He can hear his receding footsteps then and sighs to himself. Leaning back in his chair, head hanging over the edge and the top of the chair digging into his neck. The pain is a welcome sensation, and he’s not quiet thinking as he lifts one hand to his arm above his head.

He’s always wondered what his explosions felt like.

He can feel the tingle and spark of his quirk before his arm erupts in pain. His eyes go wide, and he starts cursing to himself. What the fuck was he thinking? That was a stupid fucking idea, how the hell is he going to hide that from his parents?

The burn mark, which can’t be just first degree given that his hand was on his arm when he lit the explosion, was a weird mix of hand shaped and star-burst shaped. It stung slightly but was mostly just numb, his nerves fried. He slams his head onto the desk and turns it, so his cheek is resting against the cold wood. His hand is clutching his arms, it’s the perfect size to cover the mark he made. There's a drop or two of blood that had gotten on one of the notebooks pages and he curses to himself again.

A quick google search tells him to run water over it if he doesn’t have burn cream, but not cold water. He doesn’t have burn cream but they do have lotion in the bathroom so that’ll have to work. The point is to put moisture back into the skin right? He knows he’s panicking slightly, and as he opens his door he find food waiting for him just like his dad promised.

He knows it’s fucking disgusting, but he grabs it off the floor and takes it into the bathroom with him. He locks the door and sits on the floor to start rifling through the cabinets for anything that might help him.

Dear Izuku, it stupid to be writing to a dead person, but I want you to know I’m sorry. I didn’t really mean what I said, and I know that doesn’t fix anything, it just makes it worse. Because I’m not just an asshole, I’m an asshole with a guilty conscious. I shouldn’t have said what I did and for what it’s worth, I think you would have made an amazing hero.

I’ve started to therapy for you, beat up an extra for you, I’ve started cleaning that trashed beach for you, and I can’t help but feel like my entire future I’ll spend trying to make up for what I did to you. It’s not healthy, and I know that, but I thinks it’s what’s been keeping me sane this past week.

Auntie told me that you would want me to be a hero even after what I did, and while she’s probably right, I wish she wasn’t. I want to say that maybe if you actually stood up for yourself this wouldn’t have happened. I know you can’t, you would get detention, things would get worse, so many awful things would happen if you stood up for yourself, so you didn’t.

I was supposed to be the one to stand up for you, I did the first couple of days, and then I didn’t, I couldn’t stand up for myself either.

You and all the extras have called me strong, and while you may be right physically, emotionally and mentally I’m so weak it’s genuinely depressing. I’ve let the extras get to me and use me. They might not realize it, but that’s what’s been happening.

I never want to be used again.

I hope one day I’ll get to see you again.

Maybe when I die saving someone or when I jump as well, I guess we’ll see.

But until then, don’t wait for me. I’ll catch up this time.

Chapter Text

“So Bakugou,” Dr. Yasu stars. “How have you been these past few weeks?”

“I’ve been okay I guess.” He nods to himself then fully turns to face him.

“Today I was thinking we could talk about and work on your relationships with others.” Bakugou nods in agreement. He had brought his notebook with him to write any ideas he had down, the feel of the leather cover soft and comforting. It still weighed heavy in his bag.

He didn’t know how to get the blood stains off, so he didn’t. Instead, he drew around the blood splatters, flowers and distant faces being spun to life beneath his hands.

It was interesting, creating beauty where there is none.

Hey Izuku, I’m working with my therapist on how to express myself properly. I am not good at it, though I don’t know what I expected considering everything. After talking for a while, he brought up how my family is dysfunctional. He said it wasn’t necessarily abuse, but how the constant question of if someone is going to set someone else off isn’t healthy either.

So, we’re starting family sessions in about a month.

He also said I should start some form of martial arts, something about a healthy way to release my anger. I was thinking about boxing but I’m not sure yet, just me and my fists and a bag or someone’s face.

I hope you’re having fun.

God knows I’m not.

He’s back at the beach today. It’s started to become his go to destroy/move shit while upset place, and in the past month or so he’s made great progress if he says so himself. You can actually see the ocean now; he had finished carving a path from the stairs to the clear parts of the beach.

There was still an insane amount of trash left and sometimes when he came to clean, someone else would be there doing the same thing. Some tried to talk to him, and others didn’t. He was finally getting into the stuff too big for one or two people to move, so he did what he could, then called a tow truck company to get the car he could currently see a way into the trash.

Then he got back to work, digging his way through the piles of shit. He hadn’t run into anyone sleeping in the sand since that one hobo from several weeks ago. He wasn’t sure of what he was going to find here, but he found anything and everything except for who he was looking for.

Hey Izuku, it’s been a few months now. Boxing has been going well, it has been fun punching people in the face with no repercussions.

Family therapy has been going well, I had dinner with Auntie last night. She seems happier, which is great for her. I’m not sure how she does it, although sometimes she talks about you as if you were still here.

After he had punched Fingers in defense of Izuku the school had turned on him. He expected them too, but that didn’t mean he appreciates being sent death threats in relation to Izuku. If they were feeling particularly mean, instead of just calling him a quirkless suck up and a pussy who can’t decide what he wants, they would call him a faggot. More accurately they would call him and Izuku faggots.

It took everything he had to not burn the school to the ground.

If the teachers didn’t care about the bullying when it was directed at their star student, then they sure as hell weren’t doing anything for the other people getting bullied. It was honestly disgusting that they let this slide, he knew he used to be a part of this feedback loop of death, but that just made it far more startling when the school turned on him.

He didn’t really want to get involved with all the bullshit as it would just make things worse for him, but he’s going too. For his peace of mind if nothing else.

The next day he punches the kid with the eyeball quirk who was going after a first-year student.

A week after that he steps in front of one of the kids with a weak quirk.

It’s all he can do, the school doesn’t want their prized student to have bad records, so he never winds up with detention, but that doesn’t change the fact that withing the next three weeks whatever reputation he did have was gone.

He had become the new target of their ire.

Hey Izuku, I guess I was right when I would say I’d end up still doing shit for your memory for the rest of my life, because it’s been six months now, and I still don’t know how to handle what happened. I’m still doing things that I feel would make you think I’m a better person.

I’m not sure what that makes me.

Bakugou’s sweating as he pummels the bag at his gym. It falls down his neck and is making his back itch, but he can’t bring himself to care or take his gloves off to scratch at it. Sometimes instead of just punching the bag till it breaks he’ll kick at it, spinning and trying new things and watching in satisfaction as it swung from the force of each blow. Sparing with a real person would be better but that will have to wait for when he gets into Yuuei. Other than going to the beach, he goes to the gym when he’s got a lot to think about. It’s cliche but not having to think about anything while you beat the shit out of something is nice. It’s also nice to not think about what you’re doing and think about what you’ve done.

He should really head home and shower, he had come here straight after school, and he had a therapy appointment in an hour. But he doesn’t want to think about anything else than his imaginary opponent.

Left hook, underhand, overhand, side to side, left to right, up and down. His feet are dancing across the floor, the steps a long since memorized one.

Jump back, fly forward, go for their eyes or nose, nothings off limits when in a fight for life and death.

He can feel the sweet building up in his gloves and before he knows what he’s doing, he can feel the sparks going off.

He curses as he tugs them off his hands and throws them to the ground. That’s another pair ruined. He sits heavily on the mats, grateful that the time of day means no one other than him is in the gym. His hands are shaking and torn, the pressure inside the gloves from the accidental explosion bruising them more than they already were from his relentless pursuit against the bag.

His knuckles hurt and when he reaches over to grab his water bottle he realizes it’s empty. Cursing himself again he puts his ruined gloves inside of his bag and grabs it as he heads toward the vending machine. He grabs the first sports drink that looks good to him and heads into the bathroom, taking a quick shower before rushing out the gym doors.

If he runs he can make it home in time to change and grab a snack for the car ride to the office.

He has only got forty or so minutes, and by the time he gets home he’ll have maybe twenty.

Right as he’s thinking that he hears a whimpering sound and again – curses himself and his bleeding heart. He thinks the noise came from between two different store fronts, and as he turns down the narrow alleyway he can see the small dog hiding behind the big dumpster. It looks half-starved and tired, Bakugou figures that it had probably slumped over and wined for someone to hear it, to give it some food or care or anything so that it could go on another day.

Muttering to himself he leans down to grab the dog. It makes a pained noise but is too tired to try and fight him off.

His heart breaks a bit for the dog.

He continues his trek back home with the filthy dog in his hands, running as fast as he can without disturbing it. He can hear his phone going off and he shifts the weight of the dog to his other arm before digging through his bag and retrieving his phone.

“Katsuki, why aren’t you home yet, you’re going to be late for your appointment.” His dad’s voice is urgent and Bakugou momentarily pulls it away from his ear to look at the time.

Twenty minutes left till he needs to be there.

“I think we’re going to have to cancel.” he says, adjusting the dogs’ weight again. It might not weigh much but holding it in one arm in a stable position was tiring.

“What do you mean we’re going to have to cancel?” His fathers’ frantic tone came clear over the line.

“I’m about five minutes from the house, just give me a minute to get there and then you’ll see.” He hangs up and shoves his phone back into the bag.

“Now,” he says quietly to himself, the noise barley picking up on his hearing aids, “What am I going to name you?”

“You got a dog.” His mom is unimpressed, and it comes through clear in her voice. He knows it’s not the fact that he brought a dog home that’s the problem, it’s that he didn’t tell them.

“Yeah, so what? He doesn’t have a collar and from what I can feel he doesn’t have a chip either, I just found him behind a trash can.” He and his mother are staring off at each other his dad watching them wearily. It had gotten better, but occasionally he would still feel like he had eggshells cracking under his feet.

She sighs and throws her hands up into the air before turning around and walking away. “Fine!” she says loudly. “We can keep the damned dog, he’s your responsibility though.” His dad smiles slightly at him before rushing after his wife.

Bakugou takes the mutt upstairs and into his bathroom, closing the door behind him. He gets a bath running and pulls out the hot dog he had grabbed from the fridge, holding it out for the dog – who he is now going to call Lord Explosion – to eat. Once Lord Explosion is done chomping greedily on the hotdog, he picks him up and gently lowers him into the tub. He grabs some soap from the side of the tub and starts working at Lords fur, washing the dirt and muck off of it.

Lord Explosion waggles his butt and short tail as he massages the soap into his coat. He’s making small yipping noises and sounds far more alive than he did an hour ago. Bakugou smiles slightly at him as he towel his fur. He wonders what his reaction would be if he took a hair dryer to him, or the hose outside. He had seen the videos of dogs going crazy and trying to bite at the air or water, and he had to admit it would be amusing to see in real time.

Once he’s done washing Lord Explosion he picks him up and walks to his room, setting him down on the floor. While Lords running around sniffing things he goes to work on his homework, keeping an eye on him to make sure he didn’t pee on anything.

Hey Izuku, I got a dog today. I know, surprising. Didn’t think I would be able to successfully take care of a living thing did you? Well, I found him behind a dumpster and Lord Explosion also is not a house plant. Those fuckers die no matter what you do. Too much water, too little water. Not enough sun, too much sun. Their Satan’s spawn I swear. I have no Idea how Auntie takes care of so many of them successfully.

I still have a few months till the Yuuei entrance exams, and I’m working hard to get to where I need to be.

I hope to see you there.

He wakes up to Lord scratching at his door, asking to be let out to go pee. He rubs his eyes as he yawns and gets out of bed, throwing a shirt and jacket on and opening the door to his room. Lord waddled down the stairs and waited patiently for Bakugou to fallow him lazily and open the door to the yard. Grabbing his leash and putting his shoes on he did just that. It is too early to think clearly so he just stares off into space while Lord Explosion does his business.

Coming back inside he gets coffee started and looks in the fridge for anything to munch on. Eventually settling on some granola bars in the cupboard. Sitting heavily on the couch while nursing his coffee, Bakugou thinks.

It’s been ten months since the incident. He is still going to therapy, and he is still writing in the journal he got. He goes for morning runs with Lord at least twice a week and he still cleans the beach up. He absentmindedly looks down at the coffee table. His paperwork for applying to Yuuei is on the table. The entrance exams are tomorrow, and he’s not sure what to think. He’s still got school today, so he should be worrying about what he’s going to do when he gets there.

The student body had completely turned on him, including the people he’s helped, though he can’t blame them, he wouldn’t want to put himself in the line of fire again either. It’s hard being the center of their rage even though he put himself there. He has no idea how Izuku did this for three years, it was just another sign reminding him that He was far stronger than him.

Getting ready for school is practically a ritual for him at this point. Go on a run with Lord Explosion, come back and make breakfast, shower, and change, then leave. The walk to school was always a surreal experience. He was always in his head far too much, not feeling quite present in his body. He tended to turn his hearing aids off, so the background noise of the city wasn’t overwhelming. He breaths in deep, the polluted air stuck in his throat, but he didn’t mind. It was grounding in a way, especially when Aldera High was constantly pissing him off. The people their sucked ass and so did the school’s shoddy construction, one of the stairs was practically falling apart and if you weren’t careful, you could easily trip over the cracked concrete. He didn’t know if the school itself wanted him to go to Yuuei because it might bring them some attention and therefore more funding, but they clearly hadn’t used their brains when making that decision.

He had no Idea how this place was still running.

He wouldn’t even have to set it on fire, and it would fall apart on its own.

He grinned slightly at himself at the thought. He was doodling in his journal; he still had the drawing of Izuku that he had made months again pinned on his wall and every time one of his parents saw it they got a sad distant look in their eyes. Currently he was drawing his hero costume. He was hoping he would get in and if he did he needed a costume design that fit him well. He still really liked his old costume design, but it didn’t feel right. He didn’t really want to be a spotlight hero anymore, so a flashy costume wouldn’t do him well, and neither would the big ass grenade tank things. Seriously, why had he thought that was a good idea? His wrists had enough issues already.

He was honestly okay with the feel of the old costume, he liked the elements in it, but there were a couple of things he wanted to tweak, so that was what he was doing.

He wasn’t sure what was going to happen tomorrow, but either way, he’d try his best to make Inko and hopefully Izuku proud.

He had to.

Chapter Text

Bakugou stares up at the building Infront of him. Yuuei was an impressive sight, and he was unsure if he should go into the building. He still didn’t feel like he should be here despite everything. He’s almost done cleaning the beach, all that was left was a small pile of trash along with the scraps and small things buried in the sand. He’d made progress, and his parents and Inko were proud of him.

“You nervous?” The question comes from a girl standing next to him. She’s got short brown hair and rosy cheeks and is looking at the school with awe in her eyes.

He shakes his head in response. “Fuck no. I just don’t deserve to be here.” She looks at him oddly before continuing her train of thought.

“Well, I am, nervus I mean. I can’t believe I’m actually here.” There was wonder and hope in her voice. He’s not entirely sure what her brand of shit is, because everyone’s got some brand of shit going on. He wonders how she gets her optimism; sure, he was a cynic, but he couldn’t help but wonder. It was probably just because she hadn’t sort of accidently killed one of the only people who really tried to know her. He looks back at the school for a moment longer before heading inside.

“Assuming you’re here for the hero course, I hope you can keep your optimism sweet cheeks. Heaven knows the field needs more of it.” He doesn’t turn around to see her reaction, just heads inside the doors with everyone else, getting mixed in with the crowd and disappearing from her view, following the swarm of people to the exam hall.

It was going to be a long day.

The written exam was pretty standard. He figured the other courses had different special questions. The questions other than the norm on the test were mostly about what you should do in different scenarios that could happen while working. There was also a section specific for recovery, spotlight, and underground heroes. You’d check the box for which one you wanted to be then answer the corresponding questions below, though you could answer all the questions if you wanted to.

Bakugou knew he sure as hell didn’t want to be a spotlight hero, even though he would probably be best suited for it. And while he could do recovery, his quirk definitely didn’t have the finesse for it. Besides, underground heroes had always intrigued him.

A lot of the spotlight questions were about how to handle the media, fans, and balance that with your necessary duties. The recovery hero questions were how to distribute weight on someone, how to safely extract people from dangerous situations, and how to recognize different conditions so you could call for the correct personnel.

The underground hero questions though, those were interesting. Moral dilemmas were always intriguing to him, and when applied to hero work, they were even more interesting. Do you save, capture, or kill this villain in this scenario? How to deal with big ass villain organizations, and even a brief one about rouge heroes, and what to do with vigilantes.

Underground hero’s delt with the messy underside of hero work, they scraped the bottom of the barrel and get fed by the maggots they find there. They were the people who did the groundwork for everything, and they got no recognition for it. They got paid worse than the other heroes because of the popularity charts, and people tended to think they were a joke.

Bakugou could go for a job where he didn’t get recognition, no one praising his quirk or his actions.

“If you’re exited to be here, give me a ‘hey’!” Present mic shouted over the intercoms. No one shouted back at him, and Bakugou had to stifle a laugh at that. “Aw come on, no one ever shouts back.” And, just because he can, and he doesn’t care anymore, and he feels Izuku would have done the same, he shouts back.

“HEY!” The people next to him flinch away and stare at him like he’s insane. He sits back down with a smug look on his face, just because they didn’t feel like standing out doesn’t mean he couldn’t, and it also was just really fucking funny.

“That’s what we like to hear listener!” He can hear present mic’s smile over the intercom, and he wonders if he helped the man win a bet today. He goes on to explain the robot point system, and the zero pointer, which would probably end up being a massive troll. He wondered how the people with non-physical quirks who hadn’t trained before would handle the robots. Now, they really should know better than to join the hero course with no training at all, not even weights or martial arts, but the point still stands that it’s rigged and unfair to them.

There had to be another point scoring system, he was sure of it.

They get their assigned testing grounds when they leave the stadium, and then each of the groups are ushered onto buses to be taken to their physical exams.

They’re waiting outside a gate for a que of some kind, so Bakugou passes the time stretching and even shadow boxing a bit, going through what he knows in his head.

“Go!” Present Mic shouts and he’s taking off toward the gate, along with some other kids who actually had a reaction time. “What are you doing? There are no countdowns in real life, GO!” That spurs everyone else into action and as Bakugou enters the faux city, he grins maniacally.

This was going to be a fucking breeze.

He throws an explosion powered punch at the first robot he sees, and when the facial panel blows off it, he jumps on top of it and rips its wires out of its face quiet viciously. He was sure he looked maniacal, but when you’ve been controlling your anger and mild blood lust for months, a chance to just go fucking ham and beat shit up is an amazing opportunity.

He jumps off that robot and goes running around the corner, dragging some extra out of the way of one of the robots while he dashes by. He leaps for one of the fire escape bars and hauls himself up and over, continuing until he’s at the top of the building’s roof. The mock city isn’t huge, and the height of the building lets him see everything he needs to. The robots are concentrated at the back of the testing grounds, and no one else is close to there yet. Bakugou jumps off the roof in the direction of the robots and lets an evil grin slide across his face as he uses his quirk to slow his descent and rolls as he hits the ground to take some of the energy.

He makes a break for the back of the testing grounds, they were all sitting in a small park, and Bakugou figures that no one was supposed to go back that far, and that eventually they would all leave the area.

He rounds another corner and almost runs face first into another examie. He’s standing Infront of the robot with what looks to be a part of a light pole and Bakugou yells at him. “What the fuck are you doing?” The other kid looks at him, there’s determination and fear in his lavender eyes.

“What’s your quirk?” the kid asks urgently.

“Explosions.” He says. “But I’m not going to help you beat it up, I’ll save your sorry ass, but you shouldn’t need my hel-“He cuts off mid-sentence and the kid smirks at him.

“You’re going to help me whether you like it or not. Go beat up the robot.” Bakugou feels his body respond to the dudes’ commands, and if he could move any part of him, he would turn around and glare at the kid to the point of setting his ridiculous purple hair on fire. His conscience hovers over his body as he explodes the robot into oblivion. He barely notices the pain in his wrists over the cacophony in his head. If the mind fuck wasn’t controlling his body, he wouldn’t be able to breath. Instead, he’s just having the panic attack in his head while majorly disassociating and it’s not a pleasant experience. The robots destroyed and he can feel the kids quirk slip out of his mind like water.

He's standing over the robot, even and steady breaths for a moment before he sits hard on the ground, breathing speeding up. He feels his body wretch and he throws up to the side off him. Theres someone standing Infront of him, lavender eyes, telling him to breathe, and he does the first thing he can think of.

He punches the guy in the face.

It calms him a bit, realizing he can move of his own accord. Slowly he starts flexing his fingers and moving his arms. Slowing his breathing and swallowing back the remaining bile in his throat.

“The fuck is wrong with you?” he asks the kid. He’s stood up now and the kid is cradling his jaw which will probably bruise violently. “Like, I get why you would struggle with fighting robots with a mental quirk, but a little heads-up next time before you decide to mind fuck me!”

The kid is staring at him in shock, and he can’t seem to register the words being spoken to him. He’s in such shock that he doesn’t see the robot behind him, which how? Those fuckers aren’t quiet.

Bakugou runs up and grabs the kid, yanking him out of the way before the robot can clobber him over the head. He sends an explosion towards it and then another more controlled one at its wiring, frying them immediately.

“Sorry.” The kid says eyes down cast. “I’ve never seen anyone react to my quirk like that before.” Bakugou snorts at him, he’s still pissed off, but he has better things to do than get angry at this kid. “Well, unless you’re purposefully trying to be a dick,” Bakugou knows there’s too much venom in his voice, but he can’t find it in him to care. “Then ask the person, because a heads up would have been really fucking nice.”

He stalks off from the kid before shouting back at him. “Go for the joints with your pole than rip out their wires, it’s not that complicated.” He takes off into a run again, starting for his original destination. He’s not sure how much time they’ve already used, but he’s going to get as many points as he can before the time runs out. When he finally reaches the park a few minutes later, a wake of destruction and broken robots behind him, there are less than when he first saw them, but still a good amount.

He sparks his hands in a warning and a way to get their attention before blasting himself forwards.

Bakugou almost goes stumbling to the ground when everything starts shaking. Theres a massive crashing noise and he turns his head to look at where it came from, not caring about the few robots still around him. The building he was standing on earlier is crumbling as a robot that Gundam would envy explodes through the walls and roof. Bakugou curses and quickly takes out the last few robots around him before running as fast as he can towards the entrance. It’s a difficult task with all the fallen robots, but after months of picking through and walking over trash, it’s not that hard, at least they don’t slip beneath his feet.

It takes him another few minutes to get to the main road where the big ass robot is causing mass mayhem. He feels someone yank at his arm, and he stumbles backwards, sharply turning his head to see who grabbed him. It’s the kid from earlier and second later a chunk of rock hit where he had been moments ago.

“Thought I would return the favor.” The kid says. “I don’t like being in people’s debt.” Bakugou nods before turning around and scanning the ruble for anyone that might be stuck. He and the kid pick their way through the ruble to help a couple of kids who had gotten stuck out.

“The fuck was Yuuei thinking? The robots don’t kill sure, but the goddamn falling rocks do!” He’s cursing angrily as they help one of the kids up and put their arms around him. The blondie between them keeps insisting that he doesn’t need help, he can walk on his own and something about superiority and Bakugou and the other kid shout “Shut up!” at the same time.

They reach the hoard of gathered students and Bakugou realizes something. The zero pointers released within the last five minutes, but he hasn’t seen a single robot since then, so why is that? What game are they playing?

Theres a nurse going around and cataloging everyone’s injuries, and its nothing short of a miracle that no one died, let alone no serios or critical injuries.

He wonders why there’s already a nurse here, because technically the exam isn’t over yet, and then it hits him, rescue. There were rescue points, he was sure of it. He turns to the mind fuck and looks him over. “How many robots did you take out?” He glances back at him and sighs.

“Only eight or so, not even the high scoring ones either.” Bakugou nods and then grabs hold of the kid and drags him along. “What’re you doing?!” The guy sounds incredibly distracted and Bakugou laughs.

“Were going to get you more points.”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but the huge robot isn’t worth any points and there are no more robots milling around.” Mind fucks dry tone makes Bakugou want to shake his head and smile.

“Were not getting you points from the robot’s you idiot, were getting you rescue points.” Mind fuck blinks and then understanding crosses his face. It doesn’t take any more encouragement to get him moving, and there back to looking for people. Bakugou’s just making sure he doesn’t die from a stray piece of ruble, and in the next four or so minutes they manage to spirit about five people back to where everyone else is. Bakugou’s not sure how much rescue points are worth, or what the system on them are, but it’s better than nothing he figures.

He takes the water bottle that the nurse hands him and drinks from it greedily. Mind fuck is doing the same next him and when he finally lowers the bottle the first words out of his mouth are “Thanks you, I wasn’t sure what we were doing and when I realized it was robots, something my quirk doesn’t work on, I was panicking.”

Bakugou nods in response.

Mind fuck seems to steel himself on something, “Could I get your number?”

Bakugou blinks at him in shock and Mind fuck takes the silence as a decline. “It’s just that,” He starts, nervously putting his hand on the back of his neck, “I don’t really have anyone who talks to me at school, and you seem like a pretty cool dude so…” He trails off awkwardly.

In leeway of a response Bakugou fishes his phone out of his pocket before unlocking it and passing it over to Mind Fuck. He puts his number in his phone and passes it back over to him. “I’m Shinsou Hitoshi.”

“Bakugou Katsuki.”

“I can’t believe you’d want to be friends with me, given my quirk.” Shinsou says bitterly. Bakugou snorts again.

“Have you ever killed anyone with your quirk, or because of it?” Shinsou looks alarmed and shakes his head. “Then you’re doing a hell of a lot better than me.”

Shinsou looks incredibly confused, so Bakugou decides to take sympathy on him. “It took me suicide baiting and then that person dying for me to understand that quirks don’t mean shit. And now I’m doing everything I can to make it up to him, but that’s difficult when he’s dead and I’m not.” Shinsou is staring at him in mixed horror and understanding, and Bakugou has to wonder what his brand of shit he’s been through is. “You’re not the only one who’s school hates you, except that they hate me for changing and not being an asshole who enjoys the fact he basically killed someone.” Shinsou’s face has turned to disgust and Bakugou just stays quiet. It’s still loud around them, people talking about how awesome the test was and nurses taking care of people’s wounds.

“My mom an Auntie are probably going to want to meet them when I tell them I made a sort of friend, so be prepared to be spirited away from your house for dinner.” Now it’s Shinsou’s turn to snort at him.

“I can’t wait.”

“Katsuki!” His hag shouts from downstairs.

“What!?”

“You’ve got mail!” Bakugou groans and gets off his bed. His back hurts like a bitch. He had spent the past week finishing up the beach, and now whenever he walks by, he sees people actually there. He’s going to have to get a sign for the beach that says something along the lines of don’t leave your trash here, you asshole.

He walks downstairs to get his letter from Yuuei, Lord Explosion is hot on his heels, wondering what all the fuss was about. When he opened the letter, he was expecting, well, a letter, not the heavy disk that fell out. He has to shoot his hand out to catch it and when it hits his hand a hologram appears in the air. He hears his dad whistle behind him and say something about the money Yuuei must have thrown around to be able to afford these for the students.

“Hello Bakugou Katsuki! It is me, All Might! In a hologram!” The little All Might on the screen says. “You may be surprised to see me, but the reason I’ve been in town is because I will be teaching at Yuuei this year!” Bakugou groans in response. He wasn’t even sure if the hero remembers him, but he really doesn’t want to know.

“You got eighty-two villain points, and thirty-eight rescue points! That gives you a total of a hundred-twenty points! Which is the highest score we’ve had in over five years!” He hears his parents gasp behind him, and he’s filled with a sense of pride and accomplishment.

“This is enough points to pass the exam, its well over infact! Welcome Bakugou Katsuki, to your hero academia!” The hologram cuts off and Bakugou walks over to the table and sets it down.

His mother scoops him up in a hug and squeezes him tight to her chest. “I’m so proud of you Katsuki.” When she lets go, she seems a little frantic. “We have to tell Inko!” She runs to where her phone is sitting on the island and hastily dials Aunties number. He and his dad share a look and he ruffles his hair, Bakugou batting at his hands in return. “I’m proud of you as well.” He gets up and goes over to calm his wife down, and Bakugou can hear Aunties excitement over the phone.

“Were going to have dinner with your Auntie! So, you had better go wash up, and invite your friend, you haven’t had friends over in forever.” Theres an edge of sadness in her voice, but with everything happening, it’s barely noticeable.

He heads upstairs and grabs his phone while absentmindedly scratching Lord Explosion behind the ears. He still does his little but wiggle and Bakugou still finds it extremely adorable.

He dials Shinsou’s number and frowns when it immediately goes to voice mail.

Sorry, can’t talk on the phone right now, what do you need?

Have you gotten your letter from UA yet?

Yeah, I have, part of the reason I can’t talk right now.

Well did you get in?

Yeah, just barley though, those rescue points saved me :)

I got in to, and my hag wants to celebrate and said

I should invite you over. >:/

I’ll see if I can come over, what time?

Around five.

I can come and pick you up from your place.

That’ll work.

“He says that he can come over!” He shouts down the stairs before hopping in the shower and changing. When he gets out there’s a text from Shinsou with his address and he puts it into google maps. It’s on the other side of town, not a very nice part of town either, he’s going to have to take the subway to get there. He’ll have to leave in about an hour and in the meantime, he scrolls through the news on his phone while Lord is curled up next to him, enjoying his warmth.

There was an article about a new vigilante who had been dubbed, ‘Grimm Reaper’ which was a pretty fucking cool name if you asked him. According to the media, while the guy was known for tipping heroes off, his track record for the people he’d saved contained a surprising number of villains. The article was going on about how he should be fighting villains, not helping them, but Bakugou thought that saving the people in shitty situations who no one else cared about was pretty admirable.

Along with the article were the food blogs and international news announcing some new up and coming hero in America. There were your generic advertisements and local news and he briefly saw something talking about All Might teaching at Yuuei. He wondered what business the man had to teach there, but he figured it had something to do with the conversation he had had with the man almost a year ago now.

When it’s time to leave he lets his feet fall loudly as they connect with the stairs, the sound always gave him an elated feeling. He lets Lord Explosion out before he leaves to go cause havoc for the backyard wildlife, Bakugou living vicariously through his mass destruction.

The stations are busy right now with everyone getting off work, and the train ride is filled with the low chatter of hushed phone calls and conversation. Bakugou leaves his seat partway through the ride to give it to an older lady who had just gotten on who thanks him with a bright smile. By the time the trains at his stop his arm had gone numb from being held above his head for so long. He vigorously shakes it out as he steps outside, completely aware that he looks insane with his arm flailing everywhere.

He stretches out his sore back and shoulders on the way to Shinsou’s place. Normally train rides weren’t this bad, but with it being rush hour there really wasn’t much excess room. He stops outside the door of the small two-story town home. Tentatively raising his hand, he knocks gentle but firm. He can hear some muffled shouts from inside and then footsteps coming toward the door.

A woman who doesn’t look much like Shinsou at all opens the door partially, just enough for her to stand a bit outside but not enough to see inside. She looks haggard and tired, and Bakugou can sympathize with the feeling.

“Hi, who are you? I didn’t think Takahashi had anyone coming over today.” He can hear the voices inside more clearly but still can’t make out their words.

“I’m here for Shinsou ma’am, he was invited over to our house for dinner to celebrate him getting into Yuuei, unless this is the wrong place?” The frown that stretches across her face the more he speaks gives Bakugou an uneasy feeling in his stomach. He’s not sure why, but he doesn’t like the vibe of this place.

“No, this is the right place.” She sighs before turning around and walking back into the house with a “Wait here.”

A couple minutes later the door opens again and Shinsou walks out, hastily shutting the door behind him. “Damn.” Shinsou’s rubbing at his throat and jaw, likely trying to scrub at the lines in his face there. “I could really go for some water.” His voice is scratchy like he hadn’t used it in a while and Bakugou grimaces at the roughness of it.

“The fuck was that all about?” He asks as they head for the station. Shinsou sighs as they finally get on the train. “Nothing I can do anything about.” Bakugou frowns at him, but if Shinsou’s not going to tell him, he’s not going to ask. Shinsou’s gaze is a little unnerving, dead but knowing at the same time, and if Bakugou didn’t already know what his quirk was he would have suspected a mental quirk.

“How long is your hair when it’s not up?” He’s not quite sure why he asked but he figures it’s a fairly normal question considering the length of his hair. “Not quite as long as yours.” he replies. Bakugou hadn’t bothered to cut his hair in the weeks following Izuku’s death and then he just didn’t feel like cutting it, he liked being able to run his hands through the length of it, and it was fun to absently braid it. He had his hair up in a short ponytail most of the time, his bangs still weren’t long enough to fit inside the hair band, but Bakugou was never a fan of the harshness of his hairline.

When they stepped off the train and started their walk to his house Shinsou blinked and looked at the slowly growing houses around them. “You didn’t tell me you were rich.” Theres a blankness in his voice, along with curiosity.

“My parents are big time fashion designers; A lot of my clothes are custom as well.” Shinsou blinks down at him again and whistles when they reach his house.

“You don’t say.”

Bakugou nods before remembering something, “The old hag is probably going to interrogate you, don’t worry that much, I’d be more worried about Auntie, she’ll probably cry so much she’ll flood the place, I swear tears are actually her quirk.” He unlocks the door and enters his house, shouting a quick ‘I’m home!’ before inviting Shinsou in.

“This is the living room, that’s the kitchen and dining room, my room is upstairs.” With that he sits down heavily on the couch, Shinsou left standing and gawking at the size of their house before his dad walks into the room, Auntie behind him.

“You must be Shinsou!” His dad says at the same time Auntie says, “It’s nice to see Katsuki making friends.”

Auntie and his dad look at each other for a moment before laughing lightly.

“Katsuki, go help your mother with the food.” Bakugou grumbles as he gets up and heads towards the kitchen. Behind him he can hear his old man and Auntie talking to Shinsou and he smirks slightly.

Welcome to the family, good luck leaving it.

Chapter Text

Aizawa looks down at his class roster from where he’s sitting in Yuuei’s vents. School starts in about thirty minutes, and if he looks down through the grate, he can see students slowly trickling in through the door into his classroom. A few people are already in the room when the student with the highest exam scores comes in, a kid with purple hair in tow. This kid, Bakugou Katsuki, was interesting from what he’s seen from the entrance exam footage. 

His quirk lends him an explosive advantage, literally, and he did get the most villain points out of everyone. 82 villain points was nothing to scoff at, but the 38 rescue points along with it were extraordinary, making his total score 120. The purple haired kid, Shinsou Hitoshi, hadn’t gotten many villain points, but he did gain a fair number of rescue points at the end. The two had run into each other at some point during the exam, and at the end, Bakugou and Shinsou had searched for people among the rubble, Bakugou making sure nothing happened to Shinsou while he dragged other exam-ies out of the rubble.

There were some other students who had piqued his interest as well. Todoroki Shoto and Yaoyorozu Momo of course, along with Iida Tenya and Aoyama Yuga. They all came from well-known families, and they were students to watch, as they probably had more quirk training than the others given their families connections.

When the time came for class to start, he got into his yellow sleeping bag, and waited just outside the door. Despite what everyone else seemed to think, he hadn’t gotten the sleeping bag – it was a gift. He genuinely hated the color, but it was comfortable, and everyone else hated it with vigor as well, and it was worth the obnoxious color for good naps under his teaching podium. 

A few of the kids stiffened, feeling that they were being watched. And out of those who stiffened two turning to look down at him. He met Yaoyorozu and Bakugou’s gazes head on, and Bakugou turned and smacked Shinsou lightly on the shoulder and gestured towards him. When the purple haired kid looked down at him and recognition sparked in his eyes. He leaned over and whispered something to the blond who looked back at him with an unimpressed stare. Over the sound of the other students, he couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he could make out their lips moving, and they appeared to be talking about him, more specifically, about him being Eraserhead. 

When he revealed himself to the class, Bakugou, Shinsou, and Yaoyorozu were the only students unsurprised by his sudden appearance. After they all took their seats, he explained what they were going to be doing today.

“Get your gym uniforms on, where doing something else today.”

When all the students were outside, he told them about the quirk assessment test they were going to be taking.

“But what about orientation?” Said a girl with short brown hair and round eyes. Uraraka Ochako then.

“I’m allowed to run my class how I see fit, and I think orientation is a waste of time, if you’re going to be real heroes and make the spotlight, than you had best start working now.” A few of the students nodded like this made sense, and he spotted Bakugou raise his hand at the back of the group after Shinsou whispered something to him.

“Yes Bakugou.”

“What about people who want to go underground, like you, do we go to orientation?” He spoke with a different and slightly teasing tone, like he already knew what the answer would be.

“No, if you’re going into underground heroics, you should be here even more, its far harsher than spotlight heroics.”

Bakugou and Shinsou nodded, matching shit eating grins on their faces.

“Now, Bakugou, you got the top score, didn’t you?” Bakugou nods and whispers start up around him at the news. “You all have done physical tests before, but you haven’t been allowed to use your quirks. So, Bakugou, what was your score for the softball throw in junior high?” Bakugou flinches slightly at the mention of junior high, which while he’ll agree that junior high sucks, was odd.

“67 meters, I think.”

“Do it with your quirk.” He watches as Bakugou’s eyes dart to the side in fascination, almost as though he’s scared of his own quirk.

Bakugou steps up to him and grabs the ball from his hands, harder than he probably should have, and stalks off toward the circle. Once inside he clarifies that he’s supposed to throw the ball and use his quirk, and when Aizawa confirms his clarification, Bakugou takes a deep breath before reeling his hand back. Aizawa has a split second to examine the burn scar on the inside of his arm before he swings his arm up and around, a wind hitting them as he uses his quirk to put an explosive power behind his throw.

“You all need to learn your maximum capabilities, it’s the most rational way of figuring out your limits, and how good of a pro hero you’ll be.” He flips the tracker around to show the students the score Bakugou had gotten.

“Woa, 705 meters, are you kidding me?”

“I wanna go! That looks like fun!”

“This is what I’m talking about, using our quirks as much as we want!”

Chatter erupts from the students, and while they might think it’s going to be fun, in the words of Mina, it won’t be.

“Who said this was going to be fun?” He watches with mild satisfaction as most of the students recoil at his words.

“You have three years to become a hero, you think it’s all going to be games?” He shakes his head at the students. They’re young, and it pains him to look at their bright faces, sure from the looks of some of them, they know it’s not going to be just fun and games, but they’re called hero hopefuls for a reason. “Today you will compete in eight tasks to gauge your physical potential, whoever comes in last will be expelled.” The students balk at his words, but some seemed to notice the specifications on physical potential, and he thinks that the ones smart enough to pick it up, are also the ones smart enough to not come in last. The ones smart enough to realize that it’s little more than a threat for motivation, but smart enough not to tell anyone.

Those are the ones to look out for.

“You can’t send one of us home!” Uraraka shouts out, several students nodding along with her. “I mean, we just got here! Even if it wasn’t the first day, that isn’t fair!” Her optimism is annoying, but refreshing at the same time, some hero’s he knows, mainly himself, could stand to have a little more optimism.

Before he can open his mouth to respond to her Bakugou snorts and Shinsou is trying not to laugh after his friend let out the sound. Several other students, again, the smart ones, the ones with hero ancestry, also seem to find what she said sad or amusing.

“You think heroism is going to be fair, sweet cheeks?” Shinsou almost starts laughing at the nickname, but Uraraka doesn’t seem to notice the nickname, in fact, given with how she turns to look at him quickly, she had probably been called that before by him.

“Of course not, but that doesn’t mean that the first day of school doesn’t have to be!”

“At the same time, it has to be that way. You wouldn’t know what bullshit you were getting yourself into otherwise would you? The point is to teach you that it’s not going to be fucking fair, and how to overcome that unfairness. Hell, I yelled at pro heroes on live television because they couldn’t get over themselves and see that their shitty goddamn quirks weren’t everything. I wish it was fair, I’m sure everyone in and going into the profession thinks the same, but it’s not, so we have to learn to deal with it, and find ways around it, to make it fairer.”

Aizawa stares at the kid in wonder along with the rest of the students, what the hell had this kid been doing to allow him the opportunity to yell at heroes on live television about their incompetence? He also needed to mentally jot down what the kid says for a future speech.

“He’s right.” The students look back at him, standing to attention. “So, show me that you belong here.”

He doesn’t notice Bakugou scoff again.

Bakugou massages his wrist as he watches the first group do their 50-meter dash. Iida, the kid with engines, was clearly the fastest one, but he had to wonder how well he turned when at full speed. Tsu, the girl with the frog quirk was fast as well, but not to the level that Iida was, it was clear that she had exquisite dexterity though.

The next group, the guy with the tail quirk beets sweet cheeks. The kid with the naval laser quirk and the girl with the acid quirk were next, raccoon eyes beets laser boy just barley, the laser had cut off moments too soon, allowing her to edge just in front.

It was him and Shinsou up next, and the two laughed at each other silently, Shinsou shakes his head and signs him good luck.

“You do know you can talk here, right? There not going to punish you.” Shinsou nods beside him and they both get into their ready positions. Bakugou beets him by a lot but given that Shinsou’s quirk wasn’t one that would make him move faster, it made sense. And he also wasn’t in the best physical shape. It was something Bakugou was working on, but it was slow going. He walks over to his friend and claps him on his back while Shinsou heaves. It might have been a short run, but they were running as fast as they could.

“You did a good fucking job, better than you have before, its improvement.”

“Yeah, but is it enough?” he spits it out bitterly.

They watch the rest of the students do their runs quietly.

The octopus guy gets the highest score on the grip strength test, frog girl gets the highest on the standing long jump, and the kid with balls on his head wins the side-to-side. Shinsou had been averaging middle of the pack the entire time, not really excelling at anything, but not lacking either. Uraraka got the highest on the ball throw, maxing the device out at infinity, and several people let out low whistles.

When Shinsou’s turn comes around he stops in the circle and stares at the ball, thinking. Bakugou meets his gaze as it slides away from Uraraka, and Shinsou opens his mouth to say something before closing it wearily. Bakugou nods at him in encouragement, and Shinsou opens his mouth again to speak. He’s aware of Aizawa watching the two of them with narrowed eyes, trying to make sense of their silent conversation, but Shinsou answers the question for him.

“Hey Bakugou, mind telling me about when you yelled at those heroes?”

The other students stare at Shinsou in confusion, and Bakugou does the same as he answers.

“I mean, I guess I can tell you, but now’s not really the goddamn ti-“ His voice cuts off and his eyes glaze over, and he dimly registers and follows the instructions Shinsou gives him. No wonder he put a weird emphasis on the word mind, it was a bit of a warning so he wouldn’t have another panic attack.

When Bakugou comes to, his hand hurts and he flexes his grip while shooting a look at Shinsou, who just shrugs at him. He hears someone shout out about how having someone else just do it for you is cheating, and Shinsou stiffens at their words.

Bakugou whirls around on the person, the tall kid with engines in his legs and glares at him. “He wasn’t fucking cheating; he was using his quirk.” The kid takes a step back at the sheer venom in his voice. “Just because every one of you jackasses has a quirk that has physical abilities, doesn’t mean everyone does.”

“He, he controlled you.” Whispers the kid with a tail.

“That’s a villains quirk.” Says the kid with the balls for hair.

Bakugou rounds on the short kid, and spits at him. The kid visibly recoils as a bit hits him on the face, and everyone else is staring at the two of them in shock, surprised that he spat into the kid’s face. “It’s only because society fuckin’ makes people with cool ass quirks like his villains. Because of people like you, this fucking awful society continues to be quirkest beyond reason, and its killing people and ruining families, so please, think twice before you fucking speak, because someone might take your words to literally.” Everyone is staring at him. Shinsou is the first to move, gently reaching for his shoulders. Bakugou doesn’t even realize how heavy he was breathing, until Shinsou moves to stand in front of him, and exaggerates his breathing.

The two of them stare at each other for a moment before he tears away from him, stalking off to God knows were. He thinks he hears sweet cheeks calling out to him quietly, but he’s not sure. He can hear Aizawa sensei talking to everyone else, hardness in his tone of voice, but Bakugou had taken out his hearing aids for the time being.

He couldn’t listen to them anymore.

Around ten minutes later, Shinsou comes to fetch him, signing that he needs to do his next test, but he already asked Aizawa sensei, and he said its fine if he wants to keep his hearing aids in his pocket. Bakugou nods and stands up, joining everyone else for the sit up test, along with the flexibility and endurance tests. No one tries to come up to him or Shinsou, staring at the two of them wearily, and Bakugou scoffs to himself.

At the end they all stand anxiously, waiting for Aizawa to share the results. Ponytail in first place, scar-face in second, and himself in third, Shinsou coming up about dead even, middle of the pack.

The kid with balls on his head came in last.

Aizawa sensei opens his mouth to speak, about to say who was going to be expelled, or if anyone was actually smart, tell them that it was all a logical ruse, when Grape head starts wailing. “It’s not fair!” He cries out, not noticing everyone else grimace at the call back to earlier that morning. “Why does he get to stay when I have to go!?” The idiot is sobbing like a baby, practically throwing a tantrum in hopes of staying in. Bakugou had put his hearing aids back in for the reveal when Aizawa sensei would tell them it was all a ruse, just a way to motivate them, but now with the kid wailing he ripped them back out of his ears, flinching at the pain of the sudden dislodging.

The kid was being so loud he could still hear him, even without his aids, and it was grating on his nerves. Gently he held his hand up to his ear, feeling for pain, and coming back with a few drops of blood on his hand. Swiping the blood away on his pants, he walks away from the group, unnoticed in comparison to Grape heads freak out.

He turns to a nearby bush and retches into it.

Swiping his hand across his mouth, the acidic stench burning at the back of his throat, he walked back over to the group.

The kid was still wailing, talking and babbling through the many platitudes being sent his way, and not listening as Aizawa sensei tried to call for attention. Growling and slapping his hands over his ears Bakugou shouts out, “Shut the hell up Extra!” It’s far louder than he meant it to be and is accented by twin pops of fire, but without his hearing aids it was hard to tell how loud he was being, when the point of him yelling was to drown out Grape heads pathetic wails.

Everyone turned to look at him, and when he took his hands off his ears, they both had splatters of blood on them. He stares down at his hands, frozen in horror, would his hearing aids still work? Quickly he dug them out of his pockets, not noticing everyone’s eyes on him as he hastily put them back in his ears. Sound flooded in, the wind rustling and the quiet song of birds, and he breathed a sigh of relief.

That was when he noticed grape head yelling at him.

“Who you are calling an extra! I’m not an extra! You can’t just throw me out of Yuuei!” He turns his cries back to their teacher, who looks ready to slap him. Bakugou stares back down at his shaking hands, words ringing in his ears.

I called him and Extra.

He’s not even paying attention to what his body is doing, but he feels someone grab his wrist. Momentarily shocked out of his daze, he looks down at the hand, far too big to be Shinsou’s. He looks up and meets his teacher’s gaze, and he can feel bile rising back up in his throat. Aizawa sensei’s gaze flicks down, and his frown grows deeper, and when Bakugou looks down as well, he can see why. His teacher had caught his hand inches away from the burn mark on his arm, and it was clear who the hand the burns emanated from belonged to.

“Bakugou, do you-?” Aizawa sensei cuts off before he can finish his sentence, but he doesn’t need to.

Bakugou shakes his head violently before turning around and throwing up again.

Aizawa new this class was going to give him headaches from the very beginning, they all gave him headaches, but he could tell as soon as Mineta called Shinsou a villain, that some line had been drawn in the sand, but only by two students. Shinaou he could understand being repulsed by Mineta, he could understand all of them being repulsed by him, he was for heaven’s sake, but the outright hostility Bakugou had spoken with was shocking.

And the way he spoke like he knew exactly what he was talking about raised some questions.

And so did his reactions to other words, and his own. Once Mineta had started wailing about how unfair it was for him to be expelled and not Shinsou – Not letting Aizawa inform him that no one was getting expelled, least of all Shinsou, who had scored far higher than him – Bakugou had stumbled away after violently pulling his hearing aids from his ears, throwing up unnoticed by everyone else in a bush.

In the group of students, he could see Shinsou covering his ears as well, or at least, that’s what he thought he was doing until the kid had started clawing at his face. Next to him, the Todoroki kid was staring at him in alarm, seemingly unsure of what to do. It was utter pandemonium, and Aizawa took back what he was going to say, Mineta was getting expelled, just so he never had to deal with this shit again.

As Bakugou came back, he clapped his hands over his ears, clearly still being able to hear the wailing kid even without his hearing aids. Before Aizawa could do anything, Bakugou shouted out an incredibly loud, “Shut the hell up Extra!” He seemed to not realize that he had let off two little explosions while his hands were still covering his ears, and Aizawa started over to him while Mineta kept blabbering.

Bakugou’s hands came off his ears and he stared at the blood on them in horror, before shoving one into his pocket and retrieving his hearing aids, shoving them back in to make sure they still worked, and he sighed in relief until Mineta’s words reached his ear.

“I called him Extra.” His voice trembles as he says the words, and his left-hand falls to his right arm, and Aizawa sees the slight flex in his hands that he is starting to become familiar with. Before Bakugou can hurt himself, he grabs the boy’s wrist, unsure of what exactly to do. He was having a sensory overload as well, several of the students were in fact, and as soon as he was done here, he was going to check on the other students as well, no matter how overwhelmed he was. He would probably talk to Yaoyorozu first, Todoroki had finally done something with Shinsou, and while it might not have been what he wanted it to be, it worked. The Todoroki kid was doing something with his quirk, Aizawa could tell, his brain giving him the information of a quirk being in use, and he couldn’t tell given his position, but from Todoroki’s body language, he looked to be having a panic attack as well.

Just great, I have several different students prone to panic attacks, and I don’t know any of their triggers, other than something about this entire situation had managed to set them all off.

He curses himself.

Bringing himself back to the present, he looks down at Bakugou’s arm, where his hand is resting over the burn mark there. The burn mark in the shape of his own hand.

He can tell when Bakugou notices where he’s looking by the way he stiffens under his grip.

“Bakugou, do you-?” He cuts himself off with a gulp, speaking quietly. Bakugou shakes his head violently, before turning around and throwing up again.

Aizawa grimaced, just great.

Bakugou sat down heavily, and one of the other students approached – Kirishima if he remembers correctly – and it’s not that hard, given the red hair.

“Is there anything I can do to help Sensei?” The boy asks nervously, like he’s not sure if he’s allowed to.

“Can you watch Bakugou and make sure he doesn’t accidently hurt himself?” Kirishima nods and Aizawa turns away to look at the grape that caused this whole mess in the first place.

He turns his quirk on, and all the students look at him, feeling their powers leave them. Mineta slowly stops his hysterical tyranny on his class and looks up at him with fear in his eyes.

“I wasn’t going to expel anyone.” He starts what he’s going to say with this, carefully weighing his other options. A few of the students nod with this, clearly having realized that. “But I’ve changed my mind on that decision.” The students blink at him, and Mineta whimpers into his hands. “Mineta, take a look around you, half the class is having a panic attack, be the overstimulating situation or something else, I don’t care, but you have effectively tarnished anything you were going to achieve here.” He whimpers again, too terrified to look around at the classmates covering their ears with tears streaming down their faces. And that’s just fine, no one wants to be gawked at when they’re freaking out, and Aizawa feels bad for calling them out, but it had to be said.

“So Mineta, if you had just kept your mouth shut and not made it your duty to tell everyone your prejudice, very loudly I might add, then we wouldn’t be here, but that is not the case.” Several of the students, namely Shinsou, seem shocked that he’s taking their side in this situation, and God he has so much research to do into these problem children’s lives, it’s not even remotely funny, except in the case of hysterical laughter that tends to signal a breakdown.

“I’m expelling you Mineta. Go to the office and we can do the official crap.”

“Wha- but!”

“You brought this on yourself Mineta, heroes don’t throw tantrums when they don’t get their way. We don’t take our frustrations out on our peers because something didn’t turn out how we wanted it to, and if I find out that someone does, they will be expelled.” Most of the students pale at his words, making mental notes to always be on their best behavior. It won’t even be that hard, just don’t act like Mineta did, he thinks dryly.

But Todoroki – who up until a few minutes ago had had that spaced out look that Bakugou had had when under Shinsou’s quirk – looked up at him sharply at his words, slight confusion on his face.

Aizawa sighed again.

He was going to have a metric shit tone of research to do on these crotch gremlins’ home lives.

After the disaster that was the end of the quirk assessment test, the group of first years was told to go get their syllabuses from their classroom. Bakugou was handed a slip to go to recovery girl if he wanted, in fact, several different students were, and if he paid attention, those same students were shaking slightly or breathing heavy, clearly the situation had gotten to other people as well.

On the walk back to the classroom the kid who had been standing next to him when Aizawa sensei told the midget that he was expelled started talking to him in earnest.

“You’re so manly!” Shitty hair had awe in his eyes as he spoke.

Bakugou scoffed at him, “I’m really not.”

Shitty hair gasped, “Yes you are! Your quirk is so manly! And so is the way you stepped up for Shinsou!”

Bakugou flinched at the mention of his quirk before grumbling and grabbing a syllabus off the lectern and stalking out of the classroom. Shinsou was waiting for him and Bakugou sighed.

“I would invite you over, but I’ve got therapy right after I get home, and I don’t think you want to be in my house with just my mom home. Unless your cool with that.” He quirked his eyebrow, looking at his friend.

“No no, its fine, ill head home, maybe another day.” He smiled weakly to himself.

“Yeah, maybe another day.” The words held far too much weight than they should have.

“Thanks for that, by the way.” Bakugou grunted his reply, and they waved as they parted ways at the station.

Bakugou sat down heavily in one of the seats.

This was going to be a long next three years.

Chapter Text

Bakugou’s foot bounces with unchecked nervous energy as he sits in the waiting room. No one else is here, everyone else in their last sessions of the day. Dr. Yasu had agreed to meet them later in the evening to accommodate him going to Yuuei, and Bakugou want sure if he was grateful for that or not.

“Bakugou.”

Dr. Yasu’s calm voice carries gently in the silence, and Bakugou stands up, the two of them beginning the short trip to his office. “So how was your first day of school?” His shrink had probably not expected the results he would get, but Bakugou drew in a breath anyway.

“It was fine till this quirkest bigot called Shinsou’s quirk a villain’s quirk. Then it went pretty shitty.” Dr. Yasu paused his typing and looked up at Bakugou’s dry tone.

Bakugou had gained his full attention.

“Well, tell me what happened after that.”

“Hey Auntie, could I come over for dinner tonight.”

“Of course, honey, come over in about an hour will you.”

“Yeah, I’ll be there.”

Bakugou put his shoes on while he waited another several minutes to leave, despite the fact that his parents were in the next room over, he pulled out his phone texted his dad.

Hey dad, I’m going to eat dinner at

Aunties tonight.

His dad pokes his head into the room, a tight expression on his face.

‘You, okay?’ He mouthed.

Bakugou shrugs in response.

His dad shakes his head as if this makes sense, and then leaves the room, allowing Bakugou to chill on the couch in peace. The last several minutes crawl by, and as it finally hits time to leave, Bakugou gets off the couch with a grunt. He’s incredibly tired from the physical exertion he endured today, along with his panic attack and recovery girl healing him. Grabbing Lord Explosion leash and clipping it onto his collar, Bakugou sets out. Lord might not be the biggest dog out there – not by a long shot – but he sure was the scariest, and Bakugou liked that about him, small but fierce, like his own personal Stitch.

Once he and Lord reached Aunties apartment, Bakugou rapped his knuckles firmly against the door. There was a bit of scuffling inside, and the Inko opens the door to let him inside.

“Hi Auntie.” He greets her as he takes off his shoes before stepping inside.

“It’s so good to see you, Katsuki!” Inko pulls him into a hug that he hesitantly accepts.

“So how was your first day?” she asks, mock seriousness in her voice. “Need me to beat anyone up?’ She whispers in response to his scrunched-up face.

“Ha! No, no one needs beaten up, besides Auntie, I’ve got to beat them up, I can have my awesome Auntie do all the heavy lifting for me, how do you think that’ll make me look to the other pro’s?”

“It won’t look like anything other than your awesome aunt going ham on villains.”

They both chuckle as they sit down and start eating their katsudan, his significantly more spicy than Inko’s.

“Thanks for this auntie, I just, don’t think I ca be at home right now.”

Inko nods. “So, how was the first day, really?”

Bakugou sighs into his bowl. “It was actually going really well, I mostly just talked to Shinsou, but then some quirkest grape called Shinsou’s quirk a villains quirk, and that kinda set me off and I yelled at him.” He grimaces, trying to think of how to phrase what to say next. Inko had set her utensils down and was listening intently, and Bakugou shivered. “So, I had to step away for a bit, and when I came back to the group, I had taken my hearing aids out. Well, I put them back in at the end of the quirk assessment test, because I wanted to hear Aizawa sensei tell everyone that him saying that the person coming I last place being expelled was a logic ruse.”

Inko reals back I shock for a moment before getting her expression under control.

“He said he would expel whoever came in last place?”

“Yeah, but it was so that we would give it our all, something about potential or whatever.” He waves his hand I the air to accent his words. “But then the kid who got last place, the same kid from earlier, started going on about how it wasn’t fair that he was being expelled and not Shinsou, because of his quirk.”

Inko stares at him in shock, and now it’s his turn to shake his head in confirmation.

“Yeah, so I ended up getting really pissed, and Shinsou was having a panic attack for obvious reasons, and the kid was just being really disruptive and loud, and it seemed like about half the class was just really overwhelmed. It took a while for Aizawa sensei to get everything under control. But when he did, he told the class that it was a rouse, but that the grape head was going to be expelled for his awful conduct.” He takes another bite of his katsudan, relishing the burn of the spices in his mouth. When he finishes chewing and looks up at Inko, her face is drawn tight with repulsion.

“Yeah, I know, I almost punted the kid, and I haven’t punted anyone in months, I would hate for my streak to be broken by some grape head.” He stills when he hears what he said horror washing over his face in return.

“I didn’t, I didn’t mean that- I” He swallows his words.

He’s not sure what to say anymore.

He had been doing so well with not calling people worthless or useless or extras, and the one quirkest kid with grapes on his head comes by, and it’s all he can do.

He scrubs his hands over his face and stands up – startling a sleeping Lord at his feet – and collects his plate and heads to the kitchen.

“I uh, I think I’m going to head out Auntie.”

Inko nods back at him and hugs him on his way out, wishing him a safe trip. He picks up Lord; Lord Explosion is perfectly capable of walking, but it’s late, and he’s tired.

And Bakugou wants something to hold.

It’s only when he’s been walking for over twenty minutes that he realizes he’s heading in the wrong direction. He looks out over the beach, smelling the salty air without the stench of the trash. A ways down the beach he can see a group of people having a bonfire, and he makes his way over, readying his scolding speech about not leaving trash on the beach.

The group looks like a bunch of loons the closer he gets.

There of varying ages, the youngest being a girl about his age, and the oldest appearing to be a muscular woman. He recognizes the guy he ran into all those months ago sleeping in the trash, and as he makes his way over, he speaks up.

“These the friends who ditched you after burning shit in the trash?” The group startles and looks at him, and he can get a good look at the others. There's one guy who seems to have some lizard mutation quirk, and man in a trench coat and formal attire.

The guy with the burn scars smirks. “Yeah, they are.”

The girl who looks to be his age gasps at the older man. “Hey! It’s not our fault you got shit faced after burning a bunch of Endeavor merchandise! Besides, your heavier than you look.” The man gives her an unimpressed look.

“Ad you know how heavy I am means jack shit; you guys were just lazy.” The girl sticks her tongue out at him before turning back to look at Bakugou.

Whatever she was about to say dies in her throat when she catches sight of Lord Explosion in his arms.

“Doggie!” She shouts, and the lizard guy next to her slaps his hands over his ears at the loud noise. “Can I hold him?” she asks, excitement in her voice.

He looks at her for a moment before nodding, handing Lord off to her.

“Sure, but it’s not my fault if he bites you.” She doesn’t seem to mind his warning though.

He turns back to look at the rest of the group while the girl smothers Lord In love. “I just came over to tell you guys that you better not leave trash on the beach. I did not spend ten months cleaning it up just for you guys to trash it again.” The man I the nice clothing nods in understanding.

“We will make sure to clean up after ourselves.” Bakugou looks at him for a moment before grunting in response. The girl, seeming to understand that the conversation was over, hands Lord back to him. He hears the burn scar man suck in a sharp breath as he reaches out to grab Lord Explosion.

“Who did that to you?” He asks, there’s a strange hardness in his tone and it takes Bakugou a moment to realize what he was talking about.

“Oh, you mean the burn?” He asks, clarifying the situation.

The man nods.

“I did.” He says simply. “Shit was going to shit, and I wasn’t thinking or paying attention, and I accidentally used my quirk on myself.” He shrugs I response to their looks. “It happens, I might be older, but everyone still messes up with their quirks every once in a while.” He turns around and leaves them to their bonfire, not caring about their gazes on his back.

School is like school always is, at least class wise. There were your usual core classes, but everyone around him was going on about the heroics class that was going to happen later in the day. Bakugou is aware of Shinsou sleeping behind him, and he sits up straighter to hide him from Preset Mics view. He’s not sure exactly what goes on in Shinsou’s home, but it seemed like he deserved all the hours of sleep he could get.

Lunch was a normal affair, or at least it would have been if he wasn’t swarmed by kids from his class, although he guesses that that used to be a normal occurrence. He had sat down with Shinsou, again them being the only familiar face, and a couple minutes later the Todoroki kid sat down with them. They ate in silence for the first several minutes of lunch, but the silence was broken when the kid with the red hair sat down next to him, smiling wide.

“Yo! How are you bro?” Todoroki flinched at Kirishimas loud tone. Bakugou eye twitched at his disturbed peace, but before he could say anything, a voice rang out through the lunch room.

“Hey! Hey Kirishima! Can we sit next to you?” The pink girl, Mina, and the electric kid, Kaminari, were walking over to them, the loudness following them. While there was a time the loudness followed him just as well, he really wanted the quiet to be the one to join him now. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Todoroki mutter something to Shinsou who nods, and then he stands up with his lunch to go somewhere else.

Kaminari frowns as he sits down I the spot Todoroki had just vacated. “Why’d he leave?” Mina shrugs at him before turning around to them.

“Hi! I’m Mina Ashido, I feel like you should be louder Bakugou.” He has to still his twitching eye and unclench his fist, the effort being incredible.

“I try not to be as loud as I want to be.” He growls out.

Kirishima frowns next to him. “But then how are people going to know what you stand for? That’s not very manly.”

“I’ll be loud about what I believe, but I try my best to not yell at people who don’t deserve it.” Clearly the warning goes right over Kaminari’s head, because he starts talking. And talking. Talking about anything and everything, and if Bakugou’s being honest, he doesn’t mind all that much, sure he’s an idiot, but the topic of constant conversation isn’t about him, and their words go right over his head.

It feels kinda normal, almost.

“I Am Here!” Shouts a voice out in the hallway that can only belong to one person. “Entering The Door Like A Normal Person!” the door slides open and All Might immediately contradicts what he just said. Bakugou stiffens, thinking back to their encounter all those months ago.

All Might looks over the class and blanches when he sees Bakugou, and Bakugou glares at him in return.

“Today were going to be doing battle trials!”

The class erupts in exited whispers.

“So!” He clicks a button on his remote and part of the wall slides out, revealing a bunch of numbered suitcases. “Go get changed and meet me at Ground Beta!”

The class is still talking loudly as All Might walks out of the room.

“All Might! Teaching here! At U.A.!”

“I wonder what the battle trials are?!’

“He’s so cool!”

Bakugou just grumbles as he grabs his assigned suitcase and makes his way towards the changing rooms.

Bakugou examines his costume in one of the mirrors. It came out looking like how he wanted it to, so no need to go to support for that, although if his slimmed down gauntlets don’t work, he’ll need to.

“Yo! That’s so cool looking!” Several of his classmates are complimenting each other’s costumes and he scoffs quietly.

“Not a fan of all the sparkle?”

“Fuck no, it’s too bright.” Shinsou sniggers as he finishes putting his costume on. It’s dark with slight accents of gray and purple, and it suits him well. Not to mention that the hood looks like it’s got cat ears.

When they finally make their way to Ground Beta, the girls are already there, and several of them are looking down at their costumes in disdain.

“I’m not sure about the amount of skin showing.” He hears Yaoyorozu mutter.

“I not sure about how tight this is, I was thinking more astronaut looking, fluffy, you know? Like 13.” Sweet cheeks say in response.

“Then go to the support course after this, if its not the image you want, then don’t project that.”

The two of them startled and look at him, surprise in their eyes. “If you want a puffier hero costume, go to support and ask for the modifications.” The two girls nod at him and then turn to each other to bounce ideas on how their new costumes should look.

“Now!” All Might booms, regaining the classes attention. “Its time for combat training!”

“Sir.” The engines kid starts, hand raised politely. “This is a battle center from the entrance exams, so will we be conducting urban battles again?”

“No.” All Might holds out two fingers. “Were going two steps ahead. While most villain fights happen outside, atrocious villains appear indoors far more frequently. Imprisonment, house arrest, back room deals, in this society filled with heroes – truly intelligent villains hide in the shadows!” The class listens intently to his speech. “For this class you'll be split into hero and villain and fight 2-on-2 indoor battles.”

“Without understanding basics?” the frog girl questions.

“This is a battle to understand those basics!” All Might laughs.

“How will wins and loses be determinate?” The class erupts in questions, and next to them they hear Aoyama asking if his cape was crazy or not.

“It sparkles like the one who wears it!” He hears Shinsou shout next to him, Aoyama beams back at them.

“The situation is that the villains have hidden a bomb somewhere in their hideout. The heroes are trying to dispose of it. The heroes need to capture both villains or touch the bomb in the allotted amount of time. The villains need to protect the bomb the whole time or catch the heroes.”

The class starts murmuring, excitement tainting the air.

“You will be drawing lots to decide your team!”

Everyone walks up to the box to grab there paper ad go looking for their partner.

Team A ends up being Shinsou and Sweet Cheeks while Team D is him and Iida.

“The first team to fight will be… Team A and Team D! Team A will be the heroes, Team D will be the villains.” Bakugou meets Shinsou’s eyes and grins.

“Everyone else head towards the monitor room!”

Those hoes are going down.

Bakugou and Iida head into the five-story building. It’s made almost entirely from concrete, nothing special that they can use to their advantage. The bomb is ridiculously massive and incredibly noticeable, there’s not much they can do about that though.

“I’m going to go after Uraraka, I want you to stay here and keep the bomb safe and to take care of Shinsou if he shows up.” He stalks off to the nearby stare case when Iida calls out.

“Shouldn’t we actually be planning this Bakugou?” Bakugou stops and then smacks his head.

“Sorry, I didn’t explain. Uraraka’s quirk is Anti-gravity, right?” Iida nods. “Well, if I get hit with her quirk, or she uses her quirk to float, I can actually give chase, and I have experience in flying around with my quirk.” Iida nods again.

“I see, you want me here to protect the ground while you protect the air, right?” Bakugou nods and over their earpieces they hear All Might call out start. He quickly dashes up the stares and onto the roof calling out behind him, “And whatever you do, don’t respond to anything! No matter who says it!”

“Come on Sweet Cheeks, don’t dodge!” He had spotted her trying to float her way to the roof as soon as he got up there, and he had let her, trusting Iida to do his job. As soon as she touched down onto firm ground, he jumped, explosions propelling him, and went to deck her in the face. Most people would consider it harsh, but he was confident in her abilities no matter his own and didn’t want this to be a long, drawn-out battle. She had managed to roll away from him just in time, and as he goes in for another punch, she grabs his arm, activating her quirk and throwing him over her head. He hears her release her quirk right as he goes over the apex of his arc, and the force she managed to get in that time along with gravity knocks the air out of his lungs as he slams into the ground.

Sweet Cheeks makes a dash for the door into the building but before she can pull it open Bakugou jumps up and propels himself forward, tackling her low and causing her to fall over, her chunky heels scrabbling for purchase on the smooth concrete roof. Before anything else can happen, she hits him in the face with the things around her wrist, and he hears a muttered apology along with her activating her quirk again, he feels his body go weightless and his stomach leaps to his throat again, not a moment later she kicks up at him, sending him careening into the air and then he’s heavy again and nausea rises up in his throat as he spins as he falls, only just managing to right himself in time.

This time he dives for her ankles and grabs one of them and makes for the other, but she stomps on his fingers. He grins as the adrenaline flows and rushes into his veins, a much missed feeling that boxing doesn’t give compared to a real fight.

It’s because the stakes are high.

Quickly retreating his crushed hand, he reaches into his pocket for the capture tape and lets her go, she uses her quirk on him one more time before finally running inside, forgetting to capture him in her haste.

Bakugou smirks, Bingo.

Silently thanks to the quirk, he makes a break for the room Iida’s in, entering through the window. Iida doesn’t notice him, which is fine, he doesn’t need him too, but it is amusing to watch him pretend to be a villain, although it is soured by Iida calling him a villain.

Bakugou knows he’s a villain, it’s why he’s trying to become a hero, to right his wrongs. He silently tapes up the window he just cam through, working on the other one’s afterwords. He’ll get the door last, it’s the only entrance into the room from the hallway, and Iida will notice if anyone comes through.

“Iida, I’ve captured Uraraka, Shinsou’s the only one left.” Iida shoots to attention looking for him, and when he spots him, he opens his mouth to reply. Before Bakugou can shake his head no – he didn’t say that and that it was Shinsou – Iida calls out.

“Do you have any idea where he is?” Iida’s eyes glaze over.

Bakugou smacks his head with his palm again.

He doesn’t know where Shinsou is, although if there are vents, he would bet those from the echoey aspect of his imitated voice.

Which means Shinsou can see him, but he can’t see Shinsou.

Bakugou swears and runs up to Iida, keeping aware of his surroundings the whole way over. He doesn’t make it halfway there before he feels Shinsou’s capture scarf wrap around him. He snarls and grabs it, yanking it towards him, struggling as much as he can while weightless. Out of the corner of his eye he sees Iida run up to him, bringing his leg up in a kick that would probably knock him out. Bakugou allows Shinsou to fling him around, planting his feet on a nearby collum after being dragged well out of Iida’s immediate reach.

He explodes the capture weapon immediately attached to him, and follows its retreating form to the top right corner of the room, meeting eyes with Shinsou whose clinging to the wall with the other end of his capture scarf around one of the buildings pipes.

Bakugou ducks at the sound of whistling air and Iida’s leg sails by his head. Growling as he turns sharply – keeping Shinsou in his peripheral vision – he grabs Iida’s leg, and the other boy falls to the floor harshly, he sees Shinsou flinch out of the corner of his eye and smirks before unceremoniously dropping Iida’s leg, he’ll join them when he’s ready.

Instead of going for Shinsou he turns and throws himself towards Uraraka, who had entered during the chaos.

“Nice try you fuckers.” He snarls a slightly bloody grin down at Uraraka before tying her wrists together. At this point its basically 1 on 1, Iida being most likely concussed from his fall and out of it from his brain being fucked with.

Him and Shinsou grin evilly at each other before an explosion fills the entire room.

He knows Shinsou has no where he can run outside of the room, all the windows have been blocked off, but it doesn’t matter; he’s not attacking Shinsou.

The entire building rattles as he aims his gauntlet at the floor, dust exploding out from the hole and filling the room. He has to do this quickly; he doesn’t want the building falling on all of them. He and Shinsou are pretty evenly matched in skill in a room with low visibility, but Bakugou does have the advantage. Shinsou now has truly no where to run, the big ass hole in the floor is in front of him, and he’ll hear him swinging across the room.

Bakugou stalks away from his position, rounding the room. The sun cuts beams into the smoke and dust, and Bakugou can see the dark figure of Shinsou. He can only assume he swung across the gap while the explosion happened, a major risk, but one that’s paid off.

Quietly he steps around the rubble, and stalks Shinsou. He can tell Shinsou doesn’t know where he is, he would have gone for the bomb already if he had. He slows his breathing and closes his eyes, listening to his more reliable senses.

Rubble shifts to his left, too heavy for it to be a stray piece hitting the floor.

Bakugou pounces.

He wraps his arms around Shinsou’s neck, and the other boy curses, struggling against his hands and stomping on his foot. It does nothing with the reinforced shoes on his feet, and Bakugou scrambles to grab his capture tape, securing Shinsou’s hands to each other were there prying at his arm.

Not a moment later the alarm goes off, signaling the end of the trial.

Shinsou groaned beneath him. “When the fuck did you learn to see through fucking smoke?”

Bakugou smirks. “Wouldn’t you like to know weather boi.”

Shinsou groans again, lightly punching him in the shin.

“That was uncalled for.”

“It really wasn’t.”

Bakugou walks back into the monitoring room and is immediately hounded by his classmates.

“That was so Manly Bakubro! You have to teach me some of your cool moves!”

“Was going after Uraraka like that really necessary?”

“The way you just choked out Shinsou was mad scary dude.”

“What a revelry in the dark.”

“Get the fuck outa my face!” The people shoving up against him jump back, platitudes and apologies rolling off their tongues.

They walk to the next building, not wanting the next two teams to have prior knowledge of the building layout. Scar Face and Tentacle Dude are up next as the heroes, the Tail Guy and Invisible Girl this rounds villains.

Scar face demolishes them.

The rounds carry on, Iida comes back and wins with Yaoyorozu against the lightning kid and earphone jack ears girl. By the end of the block, everyone’s exhausted and most likely weren’t going to be paying attention to their afternoon classes.

“Young Bakugou!” All Might shouts over the students. “Would you please stay after?” Shinsou looks at him, silently asking if he wants him to stay.

Bakugou shrugs.

Shinsou nods and leaves.

He tenses as the door shuts behind him and he faces All Might.

“Yes sir?” He doesn’t think he’s in trouble, but he was pretty brutal in his take down of Shinsou and Sweet Cheeks. He honestly would rather it be about that than what he thinks it’s about, his mind going back to their conversation months ago.

“Do you remember our conversation several months ago?”

Fuck.

Bakugou nods. “I would like you to reconsider the decision you made then. Your skill in battle and with your quirk are incredible, and I would be honored to have you as my successor.”

Bakugou sighs. “I’m going to turn you down again, and I’m going to ask that you don’t keep asking about it, I don’t want your quirk. I would be honored to be your successor All Might, but I don’t want to be, ask someone else.”

He walks out of the room and slams the door behind him.

Shinsou, who had undoubtedly been listening in, was laughing, but sends a questioning look his way when they leave. “What was that about?”

“Trust me, you don’t want to know.”

Bakugou yawns as he slumps down in his seat, he can hear Shinsou sniggering behind him, and if class wasn’t about to start, he would have turned around and smacked him on the head. “Shut up fuck head, not everyone can be an insomniac like you.” This only has the effect of making Shinsou snigger into his palm harder.

Aizawa opens the door, and everyone immediately scrambles to their seats and shuts up, the man has a commanding presence, which is probably the only reason he got a teaching job. “Good job on the training exercises yesterday, I have some pointers to give back to you, but overall, everyone did fairly well.” He sets the papers on his lectern and addresses the class again.

“Now, for some housekeeping business, you need to decide on a class representative.” There's a feeling of relief among the class and a resounding, ‘it’s a normal school activity’ throughout.

The class burst into shouts, everyone scrambling to be the one to get the role, but one voice is clear through the chaos.

“Silence, please!” Iida shouts over the chaos. Everyone stops, turning to look at him. “It is a job with the serious responsibility of leading others. It is not a job for just anyone who wants to do it. It’s a calling that requires the trust of those around you.” The class nods at his speech. “If we want to use democracy to decide on a true leader, then we should hold an election to choose one.”

“He’s the one with his hand raised the highest.” Bakugou snorts and looks back at Shinsou. “Really? Thanks for pointing that out, I hadn’t noticed.” Shinsou holds up his hands in a don’t look at me gesture.

“But we haven’t even known each other for that long.”

“Wont everyone just vote for themselves?”

“Don’t you think that is precisely why whoever receives multiple votes here can truly be considered the most suitable person?” Iida says in response to Shitty Hair and Frog Girl. He turns around to face their teacher who is zipping himself up in his hideous sleeping bag. “Don’t you agree with me, sensei?”

The man grunts. “I don’t care as long as you decide before homeroom is over.”

“Thank you very much!” Iida says as the man falls over onto the floor.

They decide to wright down their votes on slips of paper, and then walk up to the lectern and turn them in. Bakugou had put Yaoyorozu down as president and Shinsou as vice president, mostly as a joke to see if he was paying attention. There's the sounds of paper shuffling and pencils scratching against the desks, and the almost deafening sound of footsteps as everyone goes to turn in their papers.

Once everyone has, Iida tally’s up everyone’s votes, and wrights them onto the board. It’s true, almost everyone did vote for themselves, but the winning names give Bakugou pause. He hears Shinsou burst out laughing behind him, and Bakugou has to release some sparks before the buildup becomes too much.

“Who the fuck voted for me?” Yaoyorozu got first, putting her as president, but who the fuck had thought Bakugou would be a good idea?

He can see Shinsou doubled over behind him, and on the other side of the classroom, Iida is shaking, disappointment evident. “Well then,” Aizawa says, getting out of his sleeping bag. “Our class president will be Yaoyorozu and Bakugou will be our vice president.” Bakugou snaps his head up and glares at his teacher.

“I don’t want it.” The class all turns to stare at him in shock, and he shakes his head. “I don’t fucking want it, I’ve been a class rep before, and I don’t want it, I’m not a good one.” Everyone is looking at him like he grew a second head, and Aizawa puts his head in his hands, dreading the revote about to come.

The bell rings not a moment too soon.

Bakugou picks at his food at lunch, he wasn’t terribly hungry anyway, but the whole class rep thing had ruined his appetite completely. “I’m going to guess you voted for me, but who the fuck else did?”

“That would be me.” Bakugou about jumps out of his seat and turns around to glare at Iida.

“Well, you should have picked someone else, cause’ I don’t want it.” Iida frowns down at him.

“Its not about who wants it, its about who’s most qualified.” Bakugou stands up and whirls around on him.

“And I’m not!” He growls into the taller kids’ face.

Iida opens his mouth to say something when an alarm blares out across the lunchroom.

“There has been a level 3 security breach.” Says a robotic voice over the intercom. “All students please evacuate outdoors promptly.”

“The fuck is a level 3 security breach?” Shinsou says to the world and the kid next to him answers his question.

“It means someone is trespassing on school grounds!” Shinsou swears and stands up, Bakugou close behind him, but they don’t move from where they are. They can see all the students stuck in a bottle neck, pushing and struggling against each other to get outside. The two of them are now standing in a mostly empty lunchroom, and wince at the crowded hallway out.

“Someone’s going to get hurt.” He hears Shinsou murmur next to him as they head towards the hallway. Before diving into the throng of students, they take a look outside the window next to them.

“Well fuck.” Shinsou says, and Bakugou can only nod along, mouth gaping as he looks down at the situation. The media is pouring in from the gates, how they got in, who knows, but they’re causing a panic over nothing. They can see Aizawa and Present mic talking to the press, trying to calm them down and get them off campus, and if it was anything like this morning, they’re hounding the two for an interview with All Might.

Right as they tun their heads away from the window, looking back over the sea of students, a very familiar figure floats up into the air, and very, very slowly, navigates his way to the exit sign, slamming himself into the wall. Well, slowly isn’t exactly the right word, more accurately, he did about fifteen somersaults before slamming into the exit sign.

“Everyone!” Iida shouts, having gotten most of the students’ attention. “Everything’s fine!” He’s shaking as he shouts over the crowd. “It’s just the media! Theres nothing to panic about! Everything’s fine!”

When they get back to class, Bakugou shoves Iida up to the front and then makes his way to his seat.

Everyone seems to get the message.

Chapter Text

Bakugou stretched his arm over his head as they got off the bus while Shinsou and most of the class gaped at the building in front of them. It wasn’t a long bus drive, the place they went to – that ends up being called USJ, exactly like Universal Studios Japan, someone needs to get the building renamed before someone gets sued – rises up over the trees, massive and imposing in front of them. The inside only adds to the student’s awe, different rescue zones scattered around the building interior.

Neither Yaoyorozu nor Uraraka had been able to get their costumes changed yet, but they had thanked him for his suggestion after they went down to the support course, although they seemed completely traumatized for reasons he couldn’t fathom. After the awe of their surroundings had died down, their attention was on Thirteen. Shinsou sent him a look when they heard Aizawa whisper to Thirteen about the reason All Might wasn’t there.

And Bakugou would be the last to admit it, but he almost cried at Thirteen’s words. They made him feel, well, a little better about himself. His quirk wasn’t the reason Midoriya had died, but in someways it was. After Thirteen had finished talking, Bakugou had glared at Shinsou’s face – he looked like the cat who caught the canary – and about jumped out of his skin when Kirishima threw his arm around his shoulders, the rest of his idiot squad gathering around him.

And then, then everything had gone to shit.

“Get back!” Aizawa had shouted. “Those are villains!” And then, it wasn’t fun and games anymore.

“They’ve probably got someone blocking the signals to set off the alarms.” Todoroki said solemnly, speaking what they had all been thinking. Aizawa had told Kaminari to try and reach the school, and then had jumped down the stairs – like a fucking idiot – and started taking on the villains.

Thirteen had only just started trying to get them to move towards the door when the smoky villain who had opened the portal that let everyone in appeared in front of them.

“All Might was supposed to be here, but no matter, we are the league of villains, and we are here to kill All Might.” Bakugou had to grab onto Kirishima to stop him from lunging at the villain, had pulled him back just in time to avoid the blast Thirteen sent the villain’s way.

“Just what the hell do you think you’re doing!”

“I can’t just sit around! I have to do something!”

“You can not get yourself killed!”

And on that lovely note, Thirteen cried out in pain, and fell to the floor, their quirk having eaten a hole into their back from the villain’s quirk – some kind of warp – re-directing it.

“Thirteen!” came the choir of concerned voices, now at a loss for what to do. All they could do was stare. Thirteen’s back was completely destroyed; their blood was pooling around them.

Bakugou had to resist the urge to vomit. At least Dr. Yasu was going to stay employed by him for the rest of his life.

Iida, Yaoyorozu and a couple other classmates ran up to them, but, before they could do anything, a giant purple cloud surrounded them, wind howling in their ears. Bakugou wasn’t sure what happened after that exactly, because the next he knew, he was falling. Far. Cursing as he tried to right himself in the air before he became an angry pancake on the rocky floor, Bakugou took the time – it wasn’t a lot – to quickly scan the air around him.

He couldn’t see anyone.

He wasn’t sure if that was good or bad.

He was pretty sure he was alone though.

Slamming into the ground, he started retching. They hadn’t even been to Yuuei for a month, and they were already getting ambushed by villains. Villains that wanted to, and seemingly could, kill All Might. It was all he could do to heave for air, gagging, Thirteen’s torn and shredded back burned into his mind. All he could think about was the missing muscle and bone, and that there was no way, no fucking way, that if Thirteen survived they’d be able to work again.

He didn’t even get time to gather himself, to stop panicking, before someone kicked him hard, sending his prone form flying, back slamming into the ground, rocks slapping and scratching any bare skin they could reach, he could feel blood dripping down the back of his head, the watercolor of bruises he was sure to get already starting to form.

“This little bitch doesn’t seem too hard, he was already kneeling and bent over when he showed up.” A mans blurry face came into view. He was certain he had a concussion, but the fuzziness, the lack of oxygen, it made his head oddly clear.

Maybe it was because he was already panicking.

The guy in front of him crouched down, leaning over him, and all the fuzziness left as adrenaline pumped through his veins.

Just a little closer.

And like the guy could hear his thoughts, he leaned I just a bit further, and Bakugou held his breath.

“You know, he’s got quite a pretty fa- FUCK!” Bakugou jerked his head up, colliding with the guys, and the villain stumbled away from him, clutching his nose, eyes watering.

“You bitch! You broke my fucking nose!”

Bakugou scrambled out from under the guy, heaving himself up to his feet just in time to dodge another hit that came his way.

This was not how he was going to die; he had promised to live to to many people for this to be it.

Although he could very well die here.

He backed up and put his back to the nearest building. He wasn’t sure if all the villains were in front of him, but what he assumed was a good chunk of them were standing in front of him, slowly getting closer. Bakugou took a deep breath before raising his arm and pulling the pin.

The resulting blast almost deafened him, but even he could tell that it was too loud, that something was wrong.

And then the ground below his feet started to move, and he realized where he was.

The fucking landslide zone.

And he had just detonated a bomb in a volatile landscape.

He wasn’t sure if the villains were alive or not, he had aimed right at their faces, but he couldn’t find it in him to care. The ground started to shift eve more beneath his feet, and he gasped as a giant ass fucking boulder slammed into him, taking away any air he might have regained. Stumbling away, he took off, leaving the collapsing landscape behind him.

He landed in the square just in time to see Aizawa’s face get smashed into the ground, and this time, he really did puke.

He was going to be seeing his teacher’s blood for years after this.

Mina yelled as she fell into the water of the shipwreck zone, momentarily losing where she was before she started to float up toward the surface. She righted herself and started to swim up.

Thirteen…

There was so much blood.

Mina wasn’t sure when she’d be able to forget that sight, but it wasn’t going to be anytime soon.

She was near the surface when the villain attacked her, and quite stupidly she shrieked and then clamped her hands over her mouth, as if that would get the air she had just let go back into her lungs. Her chest was burning as she started swimming up faster, and for one dizzying moment she thought she was going to pass out here, that she was going to drown, that the very real possibility of dying was what was going to happen.

Her head burst out of the water right as it turned freezing, and she looked down to see the now frozen villain sinking and Todoroki bursting out of the water.

The two of them heaved for breath for a moment before he froze the surface of the water and climbed onto the iceberg he made; Mina hot on his tail. They both quickly slid down the trail of ice Todoroki was making, and Mina about kissed the ground when they stepped back on land.

“Hahhhhhhhhh!” She cried out. “I can’t believe we made it ba- hey!” she called to his retreating form. “Where do you think you’re going!”

Todoroki paused and looked back at her. “I’m going to go help Aizawa sensei.”

“But we need to evacuate!”

He turned to stare at her with cold eyes.

“I didn’t think you were coming with me.”

Mina blinked up at him from where she had collapsed against the ground.

“Of course not! I going to go help Thirteen!” Todoroki nodded.

“Then you’ll need one of these.” He said and tossed her a small cylinder. “Its first aid supplies.”

She tightened her grip on it and nodded, shooting back up to her feet and running towards the stairs.

She hoped Thirteen would be okay.

Momo panted as she hit another villain with her staff. Behind her Shinsou was working on ensnaring as many villains in his quirk as he could, and Kaminari was panicking instead of helping. It was understandable but ultimately unhelpful, and it just made it harder for her to think. She was never good with plans, her best subject had always been, and always would be, chemistry, not tactics or strategy. Analysis just wasn’t her thing; she couldn’t do anything other than hit the villains and hope for a miracle.

A miracle that came in the form of a ticked off Shinsou.

“Kaminari! Shut! Up!” Kaminari paused where he was and turn to look at Shinsou.

Momo wanted to face palm.

“What do you expect me to do?” Kaminari said. “It’s not like I’m a taser or something!”

All three of them paused.

Shinsou shrugged. “Worth a shot.”

The villains were quick work after that, and the three of them rushed back to the entrance.

Perhaps Kaminari wasn’t as dumb as she had thought.

Hagakure grimaces as the cool air and rain assaulted her skin. You could actually see her, the rain not passing through her body, revealing her location to anyone who paid attention.

“What are we supposed to do now!” She yelled over the rain.

Jiro sent another shock wave out and blasted the villains back.

“Stay alive!”

“Well, I know that!”

“We’ll evacuate, Kero.”

She nods and turns to face the villains one more.

They could do this.

It was easy to get out of the mountain zone for Tokoyami and Uraraka, it helped that because of the combination of their quirks they could just fly away.

The downside was that they could see everything that was happening.

The students panicked over Thirteen’s broken body. Mina ran up the stairs and started applying first aid to her, seeming to calm their class down some.

Various classmates escaping their respective areas.

Iida escaped with a bit of a struggle at the doors before he slipped out.

Aizawa getting his head smashed in by the dark hulking creature. His skin flaking away at the elbow before hand.

They saw it all.

Uraraka hoped no one they liked was below them when she puked.

Bakugou had come out of nowhere and tried to blast the thing, and it had no effect.

He did have a matching scar on his chest to Aizawa now though.

And then the doors flew open, All Might was there, the pros had arrived.

He wasn’t smiling.

Sato and Kirishima burst through the walls from the fire zone as All Might burst through the doors, but the sight that greeted them wasn’t a good one. All Might had managed to grab Bakugou before any lasting damage could happen, and he gently set Aizawa’s cradled body onto the floor next to Bakugou’s slumped over form and addressed Todoroki who had just come running up, his directions obvious.

Run.

They needed to run.

And then the thing shrieked into the air and hit All Might.

And All Might had skidded across the floor.

Bakugou gaped as the giant thing sent Aizawa’s head into the floor hard enough to break the concrete and was broke out of his stupor by his arm being broken. With a cry he had launched himself at the monster, slamming its head with an explosion, grinning when it shrieked as its eye and right side of its face was blown away, blood splattering his face in unwanted freckles. He jumped back away and slid across the floor, but as the dust settled, he watched the things face stitch back together.

That was what they were going to kill All Might with.

It was a weapon.

It was made.

Bakugou choked out a cry, a broken what, when the gut-wrenching pain shot through his body. He stared down at his chest in shock, at the hand that was disintegrating his costume and his flesh, and he looked up into a pair of red eyes.

It was like looking into a fun house mirror. He thought and laughed bitterly.

It seemed like this was how he was going to die.

But then the villain laughed and pulled his hand away and said, “Your so cool Eraserhead.”

Bakugou slumped down to the ground, clutching his hands over his mutilated chest, and greeted the familiar black around his vision with a hiss and a cry, tears filling what vision remained.

The spots started filling up all he could see, and distantly he heard a loud bang and his body being moved. He stared up at All Might with glassy eyes.

“You need to smile more.”

Todoroki looked down at the two bodies he’d been entrusted with.

He had no clue how he was going to carry both of them towards the entrance.

Luckily Shinsou came running up to him and bent down to grab Bakugou.

“You take Aizawa sensei, and be careful, these aren’t ideal circumstances, and we could make them worse.”

Todoroki nodded and carefully put Aizawa over his shoulders.

He felt he should be doing more, like he could be doing more. But this was it.

Tokoyami and Uraraka dropped down to the ground as Shinsou and Todoroki started walking away with Aizawa and Bakugou. Uraraka ran towards the two of them, intending to lighten their load, while Tokoyami ran towards All Might and the villains.

They weren’t ready for Dark Shadow to slam into the warp villain and pin him down, causing him to release his hold on his quirk. They weren’t ready for Sato to drag All Might out of the gates before they closed. They weren’t ready for an opponent they couldn’t touch or hit.

Sato turned on the monster with All Might while Tokoyami turned his attention to Dark Shadow and the disintegration villain – Shigaraki from what he’s heard – trading blows. Kirishima was keeping the warp villain – Kurogiri – down.

“You fucking cheat code!” He shouted. He started aggressively scratching his neck, drawing blood, and Tokoyami couldn’t help but cringe away.

“Nomu, free Kurogiri.”

None of them had time to act beyond their eyes widening when a giant explosion came from where Kirishima was, blasting them all back several feet. Tokoyami blinked the white spots from his vision and looked around. Sato and – even more surprisingly – Kirishima were next to him. Kirishima blinked rapidly, confusion on his face.

As the smoke cleared, they watched as All Might pulled himself from the wall the Nomu had slammed him into.

“Go.”

Footsteps from behind them skidded to a stop.

“All Might! What the hell are you thinking? You don’t have ti-“ Shinsou cut himself off. All Might, all be it a little confused looking, gave Shinsou a thumbs up.

“I’ll take the kids.” Shigaraki said.

Everything started moving at once. All might and the Nomu took off, blocking Shigaraki from reaching the four of them. Tokoyami had Dark Shadow curl around the four of them, so they didn’t get blown away from the fistfight happening far too close to them, no matter how far the two giants flew away from them.

Then the Nomu got punched through the wall of the building. Tokoyami gapped, that was how strong All Might was? No wonder he was number 1. Shinsou gasped as smoke started rising from All Might.

“Fuck.” He hissed.

“We need to leave now!” Kirishima shouted. “Were not needed anymore!”

“No.” Shinsou stepped towards All Might.

“Hey! What are you doing?!” Sato calls to him. “We need to go before one of us ends up as a hostage!”

Shigaraki charged All Might, who stood still, waiting for the coming hit. They watch in almost slow Mo as his hand inches closer to All Might. Shinsou pushed past them, ignoring their calls for him to come back.

“Hey Hand kink!” Shinsou shouted. “Your Nomu couldn’t beat All Might, so why can you?” All their eyes widen. Shinsou was trying to get Shigaraki under his control. Shinsou flung his capture weapon towards Kurogiri and got it around his neck before Shigaraki could do anything. Whipping the smoke villain around, Shinsou slammed him into Shigaraki.

“Hey! Just what do you think your doing!” It wasn’t a response to Shinsou’s question, and Shinsou cursed, if he could just get him to respond, this would be over. Shigaraki got up and ran for Shinsou. Shinsou, in his attempt to get away, overdoes his matrix dodge and falls to the ground. Getting his arms over his head, he pushes himself up, kicking Shigaraki in the stomach. The villain coughs aggressively, bile rising to his throat.

“Your gonna pay for that, brat.” He spits out.

Gun shots ring out, one hits Shigaraki in the hand he was reaching for Shinsou. Tokoyami looked up and let go of a breath that was burning in his chest. The pros were here.

Shigaraki cradled his hand close to his chest. “Its game over Kurogiri.” Right before he could step into the portal, more gunshots went off, hitting him in his shoulders and legs, blood splattering across the floor. He stumbled into the warp gate, and the two of them disappeared.

Tokoyami lets out a relived breath.

Suddenly, a wall comes up between the three of them, separating them from Shinsou and All Might.

“We need to make sure all the students are safe, so please make your way back to the front.” Cementoss tells them.

They nodded and made their way back; this was going to be even longer of a day than it already was.

Iida had panicked when the warp started to surround his classmates, and he lunged for the nearest ones, pushing them out of the circle.

“Holy shit!” Sero cries out from under him. “What the hell is this guy?”

Iida stands up, fist clenched at his side. “I don’t know.” Dashing back over to Thirteen, he knelt beside her. “Aoyama!”

“Moi?” Aoyama looks to him, and then back to Thirteen and then back at him. “No!”

Iida sighs. “Give me your cape Aoyama.”

“But, but how will I sparkle otherwise?”

Ojiro ripped Aoyama’s cape off his back as he walked past. Aoyama gapped at him.

“Thanks Ojiro.” They nodded at each other, and Iida worked on tying Aoyama’s cape over Thirteen’s back, hoping it would help at least a bit.

“I-Iida.” Iida glances down at Thirteen in shock.

“Yes?”

“You need to run for the doors, go and tell the other teachers about what’s happening here.” Iida stepped back, alarmed.

“But I’d be leaving you all! I can’t do that!” Iida resisted the urge to scrub his eyes, he wasn’t sure when he had started crying.

“You can, and you will.” “Yeah!” “You can do this Iida!” A chorus of his classmates call out to him.

He nods. “I will do my best.”

“You focus on getting to the doors! We’ll cover you!” A resounding ‘YEAH!’ from his classmates sounds out after Sero’s words.

“Thank you, guys.”

He runs like he’s never run before.

Bakugou blinks up at the ceiling of the nurse’s office absentmindedly. Next to him All Might is getting scolded by Recovery Girl, with Shinsou trying to control his inappropriate laughter on the other side of him.

“What were you thinking, All Might!” Recovery Girl says. “You have two students who know about your quirk and condition, and neither of them are even your successor!”

Bakugou snorts. “To be fair, he offered his quirk to me about ten months ago, I turned him down, that’s how I know, and Shinsou likes eavesdropping, and even more than that, All Might can’t figure out how to talk about national secrets in places that aren’t easily spied on.”

Shinsou full-on doubles over, unable to contain his laughter anymore.

Recovery Girl shoots them a look before turning on All Might with a harder one.

She hit him over the head with her cane.

Turning back to them, she hands Bakugou a gummy.

“Well dearie, the only significant damage was when Shigaraki tried to disintegrate you, it’ll scar, but you’ll be fine.” Bakugou nodded and finally sat up, wincing a little at the sudden movement.

“School will be cancelled tomorrow, so don’t eve bother, and take a rest day, lord knows how much therapy you kids will need, Inui is already scrambling.”

“I’ve already got a therapist ma’am, but I have no intentions of not showing up to sessions anytime soon.”

Recovery girl nods and sends the two of them on their way to continue yelling at All Might.

Bakugou and Shinsou are quiet on their way to the station, and the two of them pause at the bottom of the stairs. “You want to come over to my place tonight? I can lend you some clothes.” All the tension leaves Shinsou’s shoulders.

“Oh, God yes. You’re a life saver.”

Chapter Text

“Hey mom I’m ho- ugh!” Bakugou stumbles as his mom slams into him, trying to hug the life out of him.

“I’m so glad you’re okay Katsuki, I don’t know what I would’ve done if I’d lost you.” He’s never seen his mom cry, let alone really hug him. None of them were huge on physical affection. “Masaru! Inko! Katsuki’s back!” She finally detaches herself from him and locks eyes with Shinsou. They all stare at each other for a second before his mom turns around and heads into the house. “Shinsou’s here to!”

Shinsou warily looks at him, “There not going to ask why I’m here and not at my foster parents’ house?”

Bakugou shrugged. “They’re not the invasive type, besides, I think they’re glad that someone else will be here to keep me out of my head.” Bakugou picks up Lord as he comes running up to sniff his and Shinsou’s legs. They make their way up the stairs, and Bakugou puts his bag down by the door while Shinsou stands around awkwardly.

“You can put your stuff wherever, I don’t care.” Shinsou snorts as Bakugou face-plants onto his bed.

“Okay, whatever you say.” Theres a playful note in his voice but before Bakugou can look up to whatever mischief Shinsou is causing, his backpack hits him in the stomach. Bakugou grunts and sits up, glaring at Shinsou.

“If that was any heavier, I would be blasting you all the way to Sunday.” Shinsou coughed out a laugh and flopped down next to him. They sit in silence for a while, the only noise made when Shinsou bent down to pick up Lord Explosion and set him on the bed, his asshole of a dog immediately sitting on his face and making it impossible to breath anything but dog. “Be glad I like you.” Bakugou grumbles into Lords fur.

“Well now what the hell are we gonna do? I don’t think I could handle going online or watching something right now.” Bakugou nods at Shinsou’s comment.

“Well, were going to eat dinner.” Shinsou smacks him. “And then, I don’t know, we could go to Dagobah beach?”

“That’s the one you cleaned up, right? Finally going to introduce me to your friend who burns shit in the trash?”

Bakugou shrugs. “I don’t know them, but sure, if they’re there.”

The trash goblins weren’t there, but honestly that was okay. Bakugou leans over and sets Lord down on the beach, his awesome dog taking off and jumping straight into the water, then running across the beach. Bakugou walks around picking up the couple of bottles that had gathered since he was here last and Shinsou grabs a nearby stick, throwing it and laughing as Lord runs after it. Bakugou puts the last piece of trash – a generic cigarette butt – in his bag when he notices a person in the corner of his eye. Looking up at them, his breath catches in his throat. Green eyes and dark curls look down at him from the top of the stairs, but there’s no way that’s who Bakugou thinks it is.

“Hey Bakugou! Is something wrong?” Shinsou calls out. Bakugou blinks and the haunting figure disappears. Shakily turning his head Bakugou looks to Shinsou, “Nah, just thought I saw something.” Shinsou nods and then trips over himself as Lord Explosion barrels into his legs. Bakugou laughs and turns back to look back at the top of the stairs. Theres no way, he’s hallucinating again, figures given what happened earlier in the day.

Bakugou calms his heart rate down as he throws the trash bag in the trash – something he never understood how people could miss – and curses himself. It shouldn’t be so hard to let it go. It shouldn’t be, and yet.

Bakugou grins as water is flicked at him, turning around and tackling Shinsou to the ground, Lord acting as their referee as their laughter echo’s out over the ocean.

Neither of them gets great sleep that night and at about two in the morning they decide to call it quits and beat each other’s asses at Smash instead. His old man finds them down in the living room that morning, passed out with the TV still on and their characters in the middle of a fight, surrounded by a blanket nest. Bakugou huffs awake to Lord scratching at the door to the backyard, asking to be let out before he takes his shit on Bakugou. He stumbles to the door and nearly falls out onto the porch before regaining balance and flipping his dad off.

Shuffling up the stairs he grabs some clothes for himself and some he thinks would fit Shinsou, and changes before heading out his door. Shinsou’s still asleep when he stomps back down the stairs and he throws them at his face, for payback of course, and goes to help his dad with breakfast.

His mom emerges later, after Shinsou has his coffee and is staring at it absently while slumped over in his seat and food is almost ready. She reaches over for the pot and pours herself a cup, taking a sip. “So, what are you to going to do on your day off?”

“Die.” Shinsou says as his head thumps against the table.

“Preferably not that.” His dad says.

Bakugou shrugs, “Haven’t thought that far yet.”

“To early for thinking.” Comes Shinsou’s muffled voice.

His mom nods and they all sit down for breakfast.

“Oh,” His dad says. “You have an appointment with Dr. Yasu today.”

Bakugou hums back absent mindedly. His appointment would be far later in the day, probably around the time Shinsou would head home if he wanted to.

“Is there anything you want to do Shinsou? Something you’ve always wanted to but couldn’t?” Shinsou freezes.

“Actually, there is, it a bit of an… odd request though.”

“Hi, I’m Shinsou Hitoshi, I’m here to see Shinsou Aiko please.” Bakugou had been a little confused when they arrived at the hospital, but it made sense when Shinsou had explained it to him. His mom was in rehab so she could regain custody of him, and his father was out of the picture for one reason or another. Shinsou hadn’t been able to visit her since he arrived at his foster home cause his foster parents wouldn’t let him.

“That’s fucking shitty.” Was all Bakugou said.

“It’s not all that bad, at least me and my younger sister and I are in the same foster home, and I can actually talk to her.” Bakugou had raised an eyebrow at that one.

“Of course! I didn’t realize any of her kids wanted to visit her! Right this way.” Shinsou cringed at the nurse’s words and followed behind her sheepishly, Bakugou hot on his heels. “She’s in here.” The nurse said, gesturing to the door before leaving. Shinsou took a deep breath and knocked on the door.

“Come in.” A steady yet quiet voice said.

Shinsou reaches for the door handle and pulls it open, and cringes at his mom’s quiet gasp. The two of them stare at each other and Bakugou can’t help but notice that they really do look alike.

“Hitoshi! How are you?” His mom pats the spot beside her on the bed and Bakugou steps in, shutting the door behind him and pulling up a chair, sitting on it backwards. Her eyebrows raise as she takes him in. “And who’s this?” A slight teasing tone in her voice.

“I’m Bakugou Katsuki ma’am.” He says and gives as much of a bow as he can in the chair.

“I’m, actually doing really well Mom, and Bakugou is a friend, we actually met at the Yuuei entrance exams.” His mom gasps and looks up at him. “He uh, he’s probably the only reason I get into the hero course.” His mom laughs and hugs him, and Shinsou sighs, some of the tension leaving his shoulders.

They spend most of their day like that, talking with Shinsou’s mom about anything and everything, catching her up on what’s been happening.

Bakugou smiled to himself, Shinsou seemed actually happy, and that was good.

“You could barely see me!” Hagakure cried out. Shoji nodded.

“It is kind of hard to stand out looking like that.”

Ojiro gaped at his bluntness.

Bakugou wanted to scoff at all of them but didn’t. He knew it was just them trying to rationalize and cope with what happened. It was kind of ridiculous, the entirety of class 1-A, youngest heroes to be diagnosed with PTSD. Maybe not all of them, but a surprise attack like that, and so soon into their not-yet carrier was sure to have some lasting effects. All things considered, no one had big of bags under their eyes, Kirishima was definitely the worst nest to him, and Shinsou had perpetual eye bags.

But that didn’t change the fact that this was the quietist it had been since they got into Yuuei.

Iida walked up to the front of the class, addressing them all. “Everyone! Class is about to begin, please get into your seats!” Yaoyorozu put her head in her hands. It would normally be her job to get the class under control, but since everyone was in their seats, she felt no need to.

“Iida, everyone is already in their seats.” Iida looked sheepish.

“Sorry Yaoyorozu, I’m just—”

“Pent up, we all get it.” Iida nodded and apologized again, stepping down and going to his seat.

“Who do you think will be teaching homeroom? Theres no way Aizawa’s well enough to teach yet.”

“I don’t know.”

The door slid open, to reveal a mummified Aizawa, and the entire class gasped. “Sensei! What are you doing here?” “Aren’t you supposed to be in the hospital?” “Does this mean your all right?”

“My wellbeing isn’t that important.” Bakugou blanched. “The fight isn’t over yet.”

“Don’t tell me…” “More villains?”

Aizawa shook his head. “The Yuuei sports festival is almost here.”

They all let out a breath. “That’s such a normal school event!” “Oh, thank god!” “You gave me a heart-attack sensei!”

Kaminari smacks his hand over Kirishima’s mouth. “Wait! Wait!”

“Is that eve a good idea?” Jiro says, lowering her hand. “I mean, villains just attacked the school, what if they did it again?”

“Apparently,” Aizawa started, his disapproval evident in his voice, “Its Yuuei’s way of showing that the villain attack didn’t affect us.” All of them look at each other.

“But... It did…” The class nods, solum looking.

“I know.” Aizawa sighs, “I don’t like it either, but security will be five times greater than previous years. And to those wondering, it looks like thirteen will recover, they’ll not be able to fight ever again though.” The class gasps, relived and devastated at the same time. “And remember, this is one of three chances you have to show the pro’s what your made of, don’t squander it. Class dismissed”

The bell ringing sounds the end of literature and the beginning of lunch. “Even though all that stuff happened, I’m getting really exited!” Kirishima shouts. Bakugou feels pumped to, its his first real chance to prove to himself, and others, that he’s really changed. Everyone’s exited, and Bakugou thinks that’s the real reason that Yuuei is still doing the sports festival, to give their students something to look forward to.

“Everyone.” A dark aura filled the room, and the whole class turned toward Uraraka. “I’m going to do my best!” she declares, and everyone smiles.

“Yeah!”

They all head out the door, moods much brighter.

They had something to put their minds to, anything to not think about their mistakes.

“Hey Bakugou.” Kirishima comes up to him. “Can I eat with you?” Bakugou glances at him and nods.

“Don’t blame yourself for thirteen, its not worth the pain in the long run, try and forgive yourself.” Kirishima’s eyes fill with tears.

“I’ll do my best man!”

Chapter Text

“Why- why are there so many people?” Uraraka shouts as she opens the door to leave.

“What business do you have with class 1-A?” “We can’t get out!”

“Their scouting out the enemy, obviously.” Bakugou growled out as he and Shinsou made their way to the front of the class. “We survived a villain attack.” Bakugou stopped in front of the group outside the door. “And, if they had any cognitive ability, they’d realize how fucking stupid of an idea that is, now move, we want to go to lunch.”

A kid with blond hair pushed to the front of the crowd. “Oh, you think that because you survived a villain attack, you’re so great. That you can overshadow us?”

Shinsou walked up to meet the guy, literally looking down at him. “No, I think we deserve some peace after what happened, if you think we wanted to be attacked by villain, watch one of our teachers get ripped apart, the other beaten to a pulp, and one of our classmates almost die, just for a spot of fame, then you’re an idiot.” The crowd is silent. “But, if you want to be traumatized for life, be my guest, I’m sure any of us would have rather to be in your shoes and not scrambling to keep ourselves together.” He leaned down to stare the kid dead in the eyes. “Now, some of us would really like to eat lunch and think about other things than the villain attack that almost killed us, so please, scram.”

Shinsou walked through the opening he made, Bakugou following him and stopping in front of the kid. “Some of us have goals other than fame. I’ve been a hostage in a villain attack before, no one wants fame from that, you don’t want it, and neither do any of us.” He walked after Shinsou, Todoroki hot on his heels. “It just makes you feel weak, which is why we’re going to come out on top.”

“So manly!” He hears Kirishima cry out from behind him.

Bakugou knocked on the support course doors after class, and winced as an explosion rang out. “One second!” A voice called out, and the door slid open, a manic grin and pink dreadlocks greeting him. She blinked at him.

“You’re not Power Loader.”

“No, I’m not.”

“And you weren’t sent by him to kick me out.”

Bakugou raised an eyebrow. “No. Should I be?”

Her eyes light up. “Does that mean you’re here for gear!?” Bakugou nods.

She grinned at him, grabbing his arm and pulling him into the abandoned classroom, and Bakugou took in the metal strewn about with trepidation. “You’re here for a commission?”

“Yeah, I’m from the hero course, I was wondering about upgrades I could give my costume in the form of better gear.” She cackled and jumped into a chair, spinning around before settling facing her computer.

“What’s your name?”

“Bakugou Katsuki.” She paused before squinting at him. He thinks he hears her mutter something along the lines of ‘not what I thought he’d look like.’ before her eyes shine even brighter.

“You scored first in the entrance exams!?”

He took a step back from her enthusiasm. “Uh, yeah, I want to go underground though.” She grinned at him, to many teeth showing.

“Perfect.” She paused again and shot up out of her seat, holding her hand out to him. “I’m Hatsume Mei! Future CEO of Hatsume Industries! I’m happy for you to be one of my first clients!”

He smirked back as he shook her hand. “Likewise.”

“Shinsou!” He called out the next day, the taller kid turning around to look at him. “I’m going to come grab you at like, five tomorrow, you’re going to join me at the gym, alright?” Shinsou nodded hesitantly.

“Ohhh!” Kirishima rushed over. “Can I join in?”

Bakugou shrugged. “Why not, I’ll text you the address, be there at about five thirty.” Kirishima nodded and ran off towards Kaminari, Sero, and Mina; enthusiastically talking to them.

Bakugou grumbled as he got up that morning, but grabbed his gym bag, an extra water for Shinsou, and shoved his feet into his running shoes before stomping out the door. He honestly wasn’t a morning person, but he never wanted to get off his sleep schedule again like after Midoriya had died, it was practically hell on earth, the constant disorientation. He was glad that the trains ran late and early, glad that there was significant enough nighttime activity for the trains to run. He was surrounded by groggy, drunk, and hungover people. Some downing enough coffee to put themselves into cardiac arrest as they headed into work and others passed out and drooling in their seats.

Stepping off the train, he started the jog to Shinsou’s, shooting off a text that he was on his way. Shinsou wasn’t waiting for him when he got there, and he hadn’t responded either. Bakugou huffed and called him, shifting his bag to his other shoulder as his phone rang, and rang, and rang, until he was sent to the voicemail box. Frowning at his phone he called again.

No answer.

Bakugou looked at the door to Shinsou’s place and prayed that it was someone other than Shinsou’s foster parents who opened the door. He knocked on the door, not wanting to ring the doorbell, hopefully there was another insomniac in there than Shinsou. The door clicked and opened slightly, a young girl’s face staring up at him.

“Oh.” She whispered. “You’re not Toshi.” He knelt down to be closer to her height. This must be the younger sister Shinsou had mentioned, and Bakugou breathed a sigh of relief.

“No, but I’m a friend of his. Has he told you about me?” She studied him for a moment before nodding.

“Your blasty, right?” She signed as she said the word blasty, and Bakugou nodded at her.

“Yeah, I’m blasty.” She smiled at him, and then frowned.

“But, Toshi isn’t here, our other mom kicked him out for a night, and he doesn’t have his phone either.” Her eyes started watering. “And, and she left his face cover on, he can’t talk, he can’t get help.” She was crying, far quieter than someone her age should know how to do, and Bakugou’s heart froze.

“I’m here to find him, do you know where he might have gone?” She shook her head, tears falling faster down her face.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know.” He nodded down at her. It was the answer he had been expecting, but it did make looking for Shinsou harder.

“Can you grab his phone for me? I’m going to give it to him once I find him, is there a number he can call you on?”

“I can do that, but I don’t have a phone, and no one else here likes him, even though he’s the best big brother.” She ran back into the house, steps quiet and Bakugou wonders how many times she’s stayed up to let her brother back in after he’s been kicked out.

He set his bag down and dug through it letting out a quiet ‘Hah!’ when he found a chocolate covered granola bar in his bag. He smiled at her when the door opened again, Shinsou’s phone practically dwarfing her hands.

He gently grabs the phone from her hand and ruffles her hair. “And for being such a good helper, you get a treat!” He held out the granola bar for her to take, and she let out a quiet gasp as she took it.

“Thank you!” He nodded down at her.

“Be safe.”

As soon as she closed the door Bakugou shot up, panic evident on his face. Those fucking excuses of foster parents had put a muzzle on Shinsou and kicked him out for the night without his phone.

That meant no means of protection other than fists, and Bakugou knew damn well that wasn’t happening either.

He paced down the steps and pulled up the maps app. He wasn’t sure when Shinsou had been kicked out, he wasn’t sure how often this happened, he had no idea where to start looking, so he figured he’d methodically make his way through the neighborhoods.

He sent off a quick apology to Kirishima, letting him know that he’d be late and might not make it. Kirishima told him everything was fine, but if he was okay cause he seemed panicked, there being about a thousand typos in his message.

Bakugou hesitated before hitting the call button, Kirishima picked up on the first ring.

“I don’t know where Shinsou is, I went to grab him, and he didn’t answer his phone cause he’s not at home and left it.”

“I’ll come help you look man!” Kirishima said in his normally cheery voice. “We’ll be getting our steps in today it seems!” Bakugou snorted and hung up after saying bye, quickly sending where he was to Kirishima before taking off in a random direction.

An hour later, Kirishima having started looking in the other direction for Shinsou, Bakugou found him.

He was curled up around himself in an alleyway, clawing at the piece of metal on his face. Bakugou knelt down beside him and called his name. Shinsou’s eyes snapped open, shock on his face.

“You weren’t at your house, so I came looking for you, and good for you, Kirishima went the other way to find you.” Shinsou’s eyes widend even more. “Now, I’m going to take this off you, and give you your phone back that your nice little sister gave to me back to you and were going to go meet up with Kirishima.” Bakugou reached around Shinsou, unbuckling the muzzle and throwing it away once it came off. He held out the water bottle he had grabbed for Shinsou.

“It’s almost time to head to school, lucky for me, I brought my school clothes to change into, I’m not sure about Kirishima though, and we need to go back to your place to grab your stuff. Shinsou nodded and Bakugou gave him his phone, pulling out his own to tell Kirishima that he found Shinsou and that they were on their way back to his apartment and to meet him there. They walked most of the way back in silence before Shinsou breaks it.

“Thank you.” His voice is slightly raspy, and his face has read marks on it from the muzzle, but other than that, you’d have no idea what had happened.

Bakugou sighed. “I only wish you’d tell the teachers; you’ve already seen how Aizawa sensei doesn’t tolerate quirk discrimination.”

“… I’ll tell them after the sports festival.” Bakugou nods.

“Yo!” Kirishima shouted as they approach. “You good?”

Shinsou nods.

“Come on.” Bakugou said, walking up to Shinsou’s door. “Were grabbing your stuff the heading to the school, we can change in the locker rooms.” Shinsou sullenly agrees and Bakugou knocked on the door again.

It’s not Shinsou’s sister who answers the door.

His foster mom stared down at him in shock. “Shinsou’s not here.” she said in a clipped voice.

Bakugou grinned up at her, too many teeth showing. “Actually ma’am, we went and got him, and me and my friend are here to grab his stuff and head to school.” He could feel Kirishima’s confused stare on his back. “So, if you would please let the three of us through, that would be amazing, cause I know where I threw that thing away.” She looked up and blanched when she noticed Shinsou without his muzzle on and Kirishima behind him. Slowly, with a glare, she opened the door and let them in. Bakugou shouldered past her, Kirishima and Shinsou right behind him. Shinsou’s sister poked her head out from around the corner and lit up.

“Toshi!” She yelled as she ran up to him, giving him a hug. She stepped back and frowned at him. “Where’d your mask go? Other Mom’s going to be mad that you don’t have it.” Kirishima frowned down at her before looking back up at Shinsou, and Bakugou sees the exact moment he realizes what’s going on, because he opened his mouth but thinks better of it, which thank God. She turned to face him, smiling sheepishly. “Thanks for bringing Toshi back, and for the granola bar, it was delicious!” She hugged his legs with as much force as a small kid could and beamed at him.

Bakugou stares down at her and his heart breaks a bit.

They head up the stairs to Shinsou’s thread-bare room and grab his school stuff.

“Change of plans.” Bakugou said and Shinsou and Kirishima looked at him. “You think your sister would like a playdate with Lord Explosion?” Shinsou’s eyes widened, and Kirishima burst out laughing.

“Your dog’s name is Lord Explosion?”

They come down the stairs and Shinsou goes to ask his sister if she’d like to have a playdate with his dog while him and Kirishima stare down his foster mom.

The three of them end up late to class, and Aizawa gives them an unimpressed expression.

“I hope you all had a good reason for being late.”

None of them say anything and sit down. Shinsou passed out at his desk, and Bakugou’s pretty sure Kirishima is trying to process what all’s happened this morning. Bakugou’s head hits his desk hard enough to leave a mark, and he wonders what all of them think at the sight of the three of them. All in rumpled clothes and tired, looking like they’d been through hell and back.

After that day Kirishima – and by extension Kaminari, Sero, and Mina – join him and Shinsou. None of them ask why Shinsou’s younger sister seems to be over so much or why Kirishima gives them sad looks every time they have to go back home.

Bakugou decided he likes the four of them.

The day of the sports festival arrived faster than Bakugou realized, and worse than that, he realized he didn’t have a speech prepared for the biggening of the festival and cursed himself for forgetting about that. He figured he’d just have to wing it, which sucked, but oh well.

They all sat in the waiting room, pent up energy from the last couple of weeks making legs bounce and people talk excessively. Him and what Mina had taken to calling the ‘Bakusquad’ sat around a table, nervus chatter going round and round gain. The table fell quiet as Todoroki approached them. He had sat with Bakugou and Shinsou a couple of times at lunch before the rest of the squad joined them, as they were the quietist table, but he had started eating alone afterwords, and Bakugou felt mildly guilty about that.

“Bakugou.” He looked up at Todoroki, one eyebrow raised.

“I swear to god if you’re making a declaration of war, I’m going to laugh at you and then not feel really bad about it later.” Todoroki looked down at him, shock evident on his face.

Bakugou grinned up at him. “Let me make myself clear. If you think you can beat me, or any of us for that matter, without using part of your quirk, you’re out of your mind.” Todoroki opened his mouth and Bakugou held up a hand.

“I’m not going to tell you to use your other side, I don’t know what the deal with that is, it’s your issue, but don’t try and say your better than any of us when you’re not using a side of yourself that could save someone.”

Todoroki narrowed his eyes at him. “All Might has his eye on you.”

Bakugou barked out a laugh and Shinsou smirked next to him.

“Despite what most people think, All Might’s not above us, I don’t care what All Might thinks of me.” Some of the other students gasp at his words.

“So Endeavors the best hero than?” Bakugou barked out another laugh at that.

“Hell no, the best hero I’ve ever met never got the chance to be a hero, that’s why I’m here, to try and make it up to them.” Bakugou slammed his hand down on the table and stood up. “So, I’m not sure what gives you the right to assume things about people, but some people become heroes not cause they really want to be them, but for themselves. Some need the money, some need the recognition, some need to feel better about themselves, some even do it out of spite, but in the end, it doesn’t matter. We’re all here to do the same thing, save as many people as we can, and if you don’t give it your all, someone’s going to die.”

The announcement is made for them to come out into the ring, and Bakugou huffs and walks out the door, the rest of the class right behind him.

All the first year students gather around the stand Midnight is at, and Bakugou mentally prepared himself for what’s about to come.

“Quiet down everyone!” Midnight shouted out. “Representing the students is Bakugou Katsuki from class 1-A!” His friends next to him turn to stare at him in shock.

“WHAT?” He heard Kaminari shout out as he walked towards and up onto the stage.

Bakugou paused in front of the microphone and breaths in deep.

“First, I would like to apologize to the other courses, it’s natural that the hero course would get more attention, that’s just how society is geared, but the fact that in light of recent events you have all been skipped over entirely is awful.” Bakugou takes in another deep breath as the crowd starts murmuring.

“Next, I’d like to tell my parents and my Auntie, and whoever else is watching that all of us, from every course are here to give it our all. We might all become heroes for different reasons, but at the end of the day our job is to help people, not beat up villains. And lastly,” Bakugou starts before he can stop himself. “I’d like to selfishly apologize to the person who is the reason I’m here. I know you’re not watching, but I’d like to say I’m sorry and that I’m doing everything to make it up to you.”

He raised his head high, ignoring the chatter behind and in front of him.

“We’re Yuuei’s first years, we have a lot to show you and a lot to achieve and we’re all going to do our best to win. Isn’t that right?” He turned around and addresses the crowd of students who look a little less pissed off.

The entirety of the first years all roar out over the noise of the crowd.

“PLUS ULTRA!” The crowd joins in and Bakugou smiles as he hands the microphone back to Midnight who smiles at him.

“I don’t know how you did it kid,” She said outside of the range of her mic, “But somehow you’ve got everyone ready to win this thing, good job.” She turned around and addressed the crowd. “Now, let’s get started right away!”

A giant screen appears and started spinning through different options, and Bakugou looked up at the screen wearily as his friends pat him on the back.

He’s not sure why, but he feels like someone important is watching him.

He’s perched on top of a roof looking down at the video playing on his phone. He normally wouldn’t be out during the day for danger of getting caught, but with all the heroes at the sports festival some extra support outside of Yuuei was needed. The words of the first-year representative echo in his head, rattling around like a broken record.

“You are, and have been, forgiven.” He says to the screen.

His phone starts ringing, and he picks up.

“Yo.” He says, voice changer automatically activating.

“Hello Reaper, I’ve got a tip off about the Hero Killer being in the Hosu area, if you want to go check it out.” Grimm Reaper snorts.

“Sure, why the hell not, I haven’t had some good action for a while now.”

The person on the other side of the line chuckled, “You know, I always forget about your death wish kid.”

The Reaper hit the end call button on the phone and tucked it into his pocket, coughed once and smacked his chest and started to make his way to Hosu, muttering about the best way to take down the Hero Killer under his breath.

“The first round will be… obstacle course!” Midnight shouts out to the crowd. “The course will host all eleven classes and be around the outer rim of the arena! Of course, our schools biggest selling point is freedom, so as long as you stay in the ring, your free to do what you want to!” The crowd cheered. “Now take your places everyone!”

A count down starts, and as it hits one Midnight shouts out ‘start!’ and everyone takes off down the tunnel. Bakugou had placed himself in the back so he could watch what happened before decimating everyone.

“All right!” Shouts Present Mic. “Here’s the play-by-play! Are you ready to comment Mummy Man?”

“You’re the one who dragged me here.” Bakugou snorts as he observes the classes getting stuck in the bottle neck of the tunnel. A gust of cold wind blasts out from the tunnel and Bakugou takes that as his cue. Grinning maniacally, he squats down before leaping into the air and taking off, flying above the other students with his explosions. Theres a whole bunch of people using different tactics, but he laughs as he sees Shinsou being carried by people. They were all from their class though, so hopefully they wouldn’t be to mad.

Theres a loud explosion in front of them, and everyone comes to a skittering halt.

“The first obstacle, Rebo Inferno!”

Theres a bunch of robots, just like the ones from the entrance exams. The Zero pointers of course. Bakugou grumbled and shot himself into the air. Below him Todoroki freezes the robot in its place and runs through to the other side.

Bakugou breaths and let’s go of the air he’s holding in, tuning out Present Mic entirely.

When he lands back on the ground, he looks behind him briefly. It wouldn’t be fair to say that everyone moving forward was from class 1-A but a lot were. None of them were standing around, and Bakugou wished that they were, because that would mean that the USJ never happened.

He looked at the giant pit fall in front of him and turned to the familiar voice of Hatsume as she takes off and flies over on a jetpack. He laughed and took off after her, giving her a thumbs up as he passed. She cackles at him, and he leaves her alone, let the crazy lady do what the crazy lady wanted to do.

Absently he hears that Todoroki’s made it to the last obstacle, a mine field, and Bakugou continues what he’s been doing the entire time and shoots himself across the minefield, calling out an undeniably obnoxious “Do better!” As he flew by Todoroki.

Bakugou blast out of the exit to the announcement of him coming in first and tumbles, rolling across the ground as he comes to a stop and staring up at the sky, weekly throwing his arms up I a hooray gesture and winces at the movement.

“Fuck.” He hisses out and sits up.

Once everyone has gathered back in the arena, Midnight announces the results: He and all his classmates had made it through.

“Now! What could the second game be?” The wheel stops spinning. “A cavalry battle!”

Chapter Text

“And first place will have Ten Million points!” Midnight shouted out. Everyone next to Bakugou turned to stare at him and all he could do was grin a lethal smile as Midnight explains the rules, he thinks he already knows how this is going to go. Shinsou walks up next to him as everyone scatters to find teams and they share a smirk.

“I can’t believe how many people flock to you; you honestly have the personality of overcooked jerky.” Bakugou laughs.

“They heard I have a dog; Lord Explosion is the only reason people want to be around me.” Shinsou shakes his head disappointed.

“Ten Million!” Hatsume yells out behind him, getting in his face. “Will you show off my Baby’s, Blasty?” Shinsou coughs next to him, choking on his own spit. Bakugou considers her, Hatsume wasn’t who he was expecting, but she’d work well depending on what support items she had.

“What Baby’s do you have?” Her eyes glint as she launches into an explanation.

Bakugou grunts as he lifts Kirishima onto his shoulders. For how lanky his friend was, you’d think he’d weigh a bit less, fuck the compact bitch that he was. He had decided to not be the horse, he had gotten enough attention by winning the first round, and he would prefer to go underground, but a little bit of exposure was always good. For the same reason Shinsou was in front of him. They had each been given something from Hatsume, Bakugou the bracers that she had been working on for him so that when they took off it would be a bit easier to steer and so he didn’t fuck his wrist up even more (seriously, you would think he would have learned that drawing wasn’t a good idea with is already shitty wrists, but look at him now, carpal tunnel syndrome at 15). Shinsou had the jetpack on – with Hatsume and her boots and Bakugou and his explosions being able to assist in flight – he not being able to would have thrown them off-balance. And Kirishima had her grappling hooks, they weren’t sure if they’d end up needing them, but Bakugou was sure they’d end up using them in the fifteen-minute hell they were about to endure.

Their plan was simple, stay up off the ground as long as they could. A mild – or rather a really fucking huge – wrench was thrown in their plan when the start sound shot off and they took to the air, and not even a couple seconds later Team Uraraka rose to meet them. “What is this!?” Present Mic’s voice shouts out over the speakers. “Two teams flying? Is that eve aloud?” The eight of them look down at Midnight who shouts out an ‘I’ll allow it!’ and sigh a breath of relief.

Bakugou hadn’t anticipated another team flying, but he really should have. Case in point: Team Uraraka, which consisted of Sero, Uraraka, Jiro, and Tokoyami. They both had gone for practically the same strategy, which sucked for everyone below trying to get their points but was great for them.

It was just a battle between the two teams, no one else could easily interfere.

Uraraka grinned at them and the four of them smiled back, none of them were nice smiles, but none of the ones on Team Uraraka were either.

His team was at a bit of a disadvantage here. They didn’t have any long-range fighters, but Uraraka’s team was entirely long-to-mid-range fighters except for her. They all knew how Shinsou’s quirk worked, so it really was a matter of evading until the end.

They all ignored the sounds of battle coming from below, continuing in their floating stare off, waiting for the other to make the first move.

Dark Shadow shot out, reaching for Kirishima’s headband, and everyone burst into motion. They adjusted and flew towards Team Uraraka while Sero tried to snag their headband from the other side. Bakugou shouted for Kirishima to harden and sent a blast towards Dark Shadow, the quirk cowering in the face of his explosions. Kirishima ducked under Sero’s tape and grabbed hold of it, using it to drag the two teams closer together. Hastily, Sero cut off the tape, but by that point they were already flying towards each other. Instead of colliding with the other team however, Bakugou blasted them backwards towards the other side of the arena.

“Hey Shinsou, think you can use Sero’s tape?” Shinsou nodded and Kirishima untangled it from his arm and passed the length to Shinsou, who flicked it a couple of times and smirked.

“Yeah, this’ll work.”

“Alright guys, evasion is what we’re trying to do here, but if we can get their headband we should-“

“LEFT!” Hatsume shouted and automatically Bakugou blasted them that way. They spun around in the air until Shinsou and Hatsume got them stable and Bakugou finally saw what she had warned them about. A not small but not huge wave of Ice was where they had been before, if they hadn’t dodged, they would have gotten stuck in it. Bakugou looked down, intending to flip Todoroki off, but Todoroki wasn’t who had sent the ice their way.

“That kids got a copy quirk!” Bakugou shouted. “He could do anything, so remember to watch out!” The rest of the team nodded in agreement.

In the end, the copy kid didn’t matter much at all. It was exhaustion that go them.

“We can’t stay up much longer!” Hatsume shouts. “We have to land!”

“Five minutes left!” Bakugou and everyone else nods and they touch down. “What’s this? Team Kirishima is coming down from their perch on high!” The four of them pant slightly and almost immediately Kirishima has to duck under someone’s hand. They haven’t fully touched down, hovering an inch or so above the ground, enough of a buffer between themselves and the floor that they can still fly around. Bakugou blasted Dark Shadow away again, Team Uraraka coming down now that they were out of the sky so that they could collect more points.

One of the teams, Bakugou doesn’t know which one but its full of people he doesn’t know, corners and stops them. The rider is some girl from Gen Ed, and she pulls uncaps her marker and starts drawing on herself. Bakugou frowns before his eye’s widen.

“Her quirks like Yorozu’s!” Kirishima and Shinsou curse and not a moment later the girl has a net launcher in her hands. Hatsume shrieks.

“Theres to people who can make things from nowhere?!” If they weren’t in a competition Bakugou wouldn’t doubt for a second that Hatsume would have gone and recruited the Gen Ed girl into her slowly forming cult.

“Less fangirling more running!” Shinsou hollers at her. Shinsou flings out Sero’s tape and grabs the gun from her hands, flinging it out of the ring. They shoot off over the team’s heads and land on the other side safely.

“Two minutes left!”

The temperature drops around them.

“FUCK!” Bakugou shouts. They had forgotten to watch out for Team Todoroki and now they were entirely blocked off, a wave of ice blocking them from leaving and other teams from getting in. There was no way they’d be able to continue their game of keep-away in this small area. Not with only two minutes left. Bakugou wishes he could hear what Iida had just said, because he was certain it was important.

“Guys! Their gearing up fo-!” Bakugou doesn’t even get the chance to blink before the headband is ripped from Kirishima’s head. They have a couple other headbands, but not enough to get them through to the final round. Iida’s out of commission now, which is probably why he hadn’t used the move before. His engines were steaming, clouds of smoke rising from them.

“WOAH, it looks like Tea Kirishima just lost their One-million-point advantage to Team Todoroki!”

The two teams stare each other down, panting and sweating as Present Mic calls out, “One minute left!”

“I have an idea, but you guys are going to have to trust me.” Kirishima pipes up suddenly. They all nod in agreement. “Shinsou, get ready.” Shinsou tightens his grip on Sero’s tape. Kirishima hits the release button on the grappling hook, planting it into the ice wall on Todoroki’s right, and Shinsou sends out the tape to block off retreat to the left.

“Catch me guys!” Shinsou’s eyes widen, and he calls out a loud “What the fuck Kirishima!?, as Kirishima goes flying off their shoulders towards Todoroki.

“Three!” The crowd joins in count the count down.

He reaches out his hand, Todoroki going to meet him, fire sparking along his arm, but it’s no use. Kirishima hardens his skin and gabs blindly for a headband, coming out with one in his grip.

“Two!”

Shinsou throws out the tape as Kirishima releases the grapple and drags him backwards.

Todoroki lunges for them, trying to get his missing points back and –

“Times up!”

“YEAH!” Kirishima shouts. “I got it!” He holds out the headband he got, and sure enough, it has their points on it. The crowd goes wild as he held up the headband triumphantly.

“Now let’s take a look at our winning teams!” Kirishima runs up and hugs Shinsou. “In first place, Team Kirishima!”

“I can’t believe you got what I was trying to do!” Shinsou grimaces and pats him on the back. “Uh, no problem, man.” Kirishima stepped back and wiped his eyes.

“Man, you we’re all so manly.”

“In second place, Team Todoroki!” Bakugou turns towards the other team in their circle to congratulate them and frowns at Todoroki who’s staring down at his left hand like he wanted to fry it off. Which he couldn’t decide would be easy or hard given that that was the hand that lit on fire.

“In third place, Team Uraraka! And in fourth, Team Setsuna!”

A cheer goes through the stadium.

“And now we’ll have a break for lunch and recreational games before the third round starts!”

“Bakugou, may I talk to you?” Todoroki’s cold voice asked behind him. Bakugou turned to face the other boy. “Yeah, sure, why not.” Shinsou and Kirishima looked back at them, tilting their heads in question. “You guys go on ahead, I’ll catch up.” Shinsou shrugged and left, Kirishima trailing after him.

The two of them slipped into the student and staff entrance, a false privacy, but no one was back here right now anyway. “So… what did you want to talk about?” Bakugou leaned back against the wall, arms in his pockets in a very similar fashion to Todoroki. They stared into each other’s eyes blankly, and Bakugou would laugh but he’s got a feeling that what’s coming isn’t going to be funny.

Todoroki sighs. “You overpowered me, so much so that I broke my oath.” Bakugou raised an eyebrow. Honestly this whole thing seemed ridiculous. “Kirishima might have been the rider, but I know you were the one who came up with the strategy.” Bakugou hummed. Not all of it had been his idea, really, only that end bit wasn’t his, but Bakugou wasn’t in such a hurry to tell him off, and this was obviously going somewhere.

“You caused me to use my left side.” Bakugou can’t help but snort.

“I don’t really see the problem here, and Kirishima came up with that last move on his own, so if you want to talk to someone about making you use your ‘left side’ go talk to him.” Todoroki glared at him and continued.

“No one else felt that pressure, not to the same extent.” Todoroki goes back to glaring at his hand. “And All Might’s got his eye on you, I can’t imagine why though.” Bakugou didn’t hold back his laughter this time.

“Man, I don’t fucking know either, the bitch just keeps following me, I think I’ve finally told him off though.” Bakugou laughed harder and threw his hand up in a gesture of dismissal as he stalked out of the hallway. “Look man, I don’t have time fo-“

“Have you heard of quirk marriages, Bakugou?”

Bakugou stopped dead in his tracks and turned around – he wasn’t laughing anymore – and walked back into the tunnel.

“Yes.”

Todoroki nodded and then continued, “My Old Man has a strong desire to rise in this world, he won the number two spot with crushing force, but he’s been stuck as the number two hero for as long as he’s been one.” Bakugou isn’t amused anymore, more like downright homicidal.

“So, he moved onto his second plan. He won my mother’s parents over with money and gifts, all so he could get ahold of her quirk.” Todoroki takes a steadying breath.

“Stop talking.” Todoroki snapped his eyes up to him.

“What?” he spits out, offended and angry.

“You don’t need to tell me anything, I have no right to anything, I mean, I’ll listen if you really want to tell me something, but I can get the picture.” Bakugou huffed out a breath and popped his knuckles, a nervous tick, but one easily explained away. “Endeavors and awful piece of shit who I didn’t like beforehand and has no means for redemption now. I’m going to guess your good at fighting cause of all the beatings disguised as trainings that happened.”

Todoroki’s quiet for a moment. “I’ve already started, I might as well finish.” Bakugou only offers a bob of his head for encouragement. “My mom’s always crying, in my memories of her. She told me my left side was unsightly before she poured boiling water over my face.” Bakugou sucked in a sharp breath. Well shit, and he thought he was messed up. “When she realized what she had done, she tried to use her quirk to help but… that just made it worse.” Todoroki clenched his fists. “I’m going to win the sports festival without using my fire, I can’t- I can’t let him win.”

Before Bakugou could say anything, footsteps raced down the hall, Shinsou panting as he came to a stop in front of them. Bakugou and Todoroki turn to look at him. “First off,” He said, “I’m sorry.” Bakugou’s eyes widened, and he slapped his forehead.

“What the hell Shinsou, it was funny with All Might’s national secrets,” Todoroki quirks an eyebrow, confusion evident on his face and the most expression Bakugou’s ever seen him make, “but not with this!” Shinsou hastily shakes his head.

“I know, I know, but you always seem to get the best tea!” Bakugou face palms.

Shinsou turns back to Todoroki. “I’m sorry, I have a habit of spying on people, It’s kinda second nature at this point, but, um…”

“You heard all of that.” Todoroki finished. Shinsou nods guiltily.

“I’m supper sorry, but what the fuck do you mean you’re not going to use your fire?” Todoroki blanches and Bakugou speaks up again.

“He’s right, we both get why, but it’s a loser’s way to go.”

“Yeah! I mean, were all going to be giving it our all and you’re going to be using only half of what you’ve got?” Shinsou cries out. Todoroki shakes his head wildly.

“I won’t, I can’t-“

“Shinsou! There you- Hey Bakugou! Todoroki!” Kirishima calls as he turns into the student entrance. Bakugou wants to laugh hysterically, because seriously, what the fuck was his life if not an increasingly more insane string of coincidences. “Sorry to interrupt, but if you guys want to eat, we need to go soon.” Kirishima paused for a second. “Uh, you can join us if you’d like Todoroki.” Todoroki shakes his head and stalks off back into the building, leaving Kirishima bewildered and Bakugou and Shinsou plotting murder.

Although Bakugou wasn’t sure whether Shinsou was going after Endevwhore, purely for this. Because seriously, what the fuck?

Chapter Text

“Welcome back everyone!” Present Mic shouted into the mic. “I hope everyone’s ready for this final rocking’ event to kick off, cause it going to be…?” The crowed joined in the call “Plus Ultra!” Bakugou drummed his fingers against his leg, waiting for the first match to be called. “Up first we have Ashido Mina from the infamous class 1-A up against the lovely Shiozaki Ibara, the deadly assassin from 1-B!” The crowd’s cheering was cut off by Shiozaki raising her hand, her other hand on her chest.

“Um, I am not an assassin, nor am I deadly, I would never betray a past teammate like that.” Present Mic stopped his announcing and Bakugou laughed quietly to himself. “Er- Sorry?”

He continued immediately after the interruption, “The rules are simple! You win by knocking your opponent out of the ring, by incapacitating them, or by them surrendering!”

Midnight took over from there. “On my count girls.” Bakugou gave the ring his full attention and watched in interest as Ashido dropped into a crouch, he couldn’t see the gathering acid on her hand from here, but he had no doubt she was gearing up for attack. Ashido had worked with Shiozaki in the last round, so he could only guess that an offensive strategy was better, despite what she always said, she wasn’t stupid, as not the best at school didn’t always translate over to battle smarts.

“Three…” Shiozaki’s vine-hair started twitching.

“Two…” Ashido’s foot shifted.

“One…” Both girls stiffened.

“Go!”

Shiozaki’s vines shot out towards Ashido who immediately covered them with a high-strength acid judging by how fast the vines melted away. Ashido skated forwards on her acid, playing an intense game of keep-away with the vines coming at her from every direction, trying to get her to trip up to ensnare her. The closer Ashido got to Shiozaki, the more she backed up. She had vines at the edge of the ring to keep her from accidently leaving, but once she bumped into them, there wasn’t anywhere she could go.

Bakugou smirked and leaned over to Kirishima. “She’s cornering Shiozaki, once there’s nowhere for her to go, she’ll probably destroy the vines at her back, and whatever momentum Shiozaki has will send her stumbling out of the ring.” Kirishima frowned. “That’s not very manly though, backing your opponent into a corner.” Bakugou shook his head. “Its not about if its fair or not, here its about showing off and on the streets its about survival, she seems like she knows that you have to do what it takes to survive.” Kirishima frowned and nodded.

“Yeah… she does, doesn’t she.” There was something off about his voice. Bakugou frowned but let it go.

That was exactly how the match went, Ashido had cornered Shiozaki against her vines and then destroyed the ones behind her that she was leaning on the brace herself, causing her to stumble backwards without extra weight or support there.

“Shiozaki Ibara is out of bounds, Ashido Mina wins!” Midnight exclaimed to the cheers of the crowd. Present Mic waited for the two girls to leave the ring before announcing the next match.

“Next up is Iida Tenya, 1-A’s very own driving force, versus Hatsume Mei, who I hear from Power Loader is the most explosive person in the support course!” The two walked out on stage and Bakugou and the rest of 1-A along with a fair amount of the stadium burst out laughing. “Hey!” Present Mic shouted at Iida who was covered from head-to-toe in Hatsume’s support gear. “Is he allowed to do that?” Midnight contemplated it for a moment. “There’s no rules about it, so I’ll allow it!”

None of 1-A could contain their laughter at the match that ensued. It would probably go down in history a little bit. Hatsume had hacked into the speaker system and was advertising her work to support course businesses. And then once she was done, she stepped out of bounds.

Bakugou heard Iida yell at Hatsume and grinned, good for him, he needed someone to hate, no more mister up and tidy Iida when Hatsume was around.

Midnight’s laughing as she announces the winner. “H-Hatsume Mei stepped out of bounds, Iida Tenya wins!”

“Wow! That was a brutal smack down, after that I can’t wait to see whet the next match brings to the table!” Present Mic hisses in sympathy and poorly contained mirth. “Next up is Shinsou Hitoshi from 1-A, who knows how to hit you where your week, versus Komori Kinoko from 1-B, who has a penchant for mushrooms.”

Bakugou doesn’t hear what Shinsou said when Midnight called start, but before much could happen, Komori’s eye’s glazed over and she walked out of bounds. There was a plethora of mushrooms the had grown from nowhere, which he assumed was her quirk. Shinsou broke his quirk as he doubled over coughing, spores coming out of his lungs. Midnight announced his win as the med bots came to get him. Komori was apologizing profusely about her quirk getting into his lungs and that there were no more mushrooms blocking his air ways, but he should still get medical attention.

“Wow! Despite the short match, both of them were ruthless!” Present Mic exclaimed. Bakugou stood up from his seat and made his way to his preparation room, Kirishima splitting off behind him and doing the same thing. They missed seeing Todoroki and Sero’s match in person, but Bakugou shivered as the stadium chilled. On one of the nearby TV’s Todoroki was unfreezing Sero out of the absolutely gargantuan iceberg he had made. Bakugou knew he and Shinsou had pushed some buttons when they were talking with Todoroki, but he hadn’t thought it was that bad.

Bakugou absently watched Yaoyorozu fight Tokoyami while he was thinking up his strategy for Kirishima. They were a great match up, perfect foils for the others quirk. He could always have a beat down against Kirishima, and he knew he would win that. He figured out what he was going to do as Present Mic yelled about Yaoyorozu’s brilliance in conjuring a practical army of stage lights, getting rid of Dark Shadow before knocking Tokoyami out of the ring.

Bakugou waited just inside the tunnel, waiting for his name to be called.

“Next up, class 1-A’s very own Kirishima Ejiro with his rock-hard determination versus Bakugou Katsuki, class 1-A’s resident bomb!” Bakugou stepped out into the light, new opportunities awaited him on that field, and he wasn’t going to waist them. Maybe they would call him selfish for beating Kirishima, tell him he was showing off, but what they would never understand was the desperation to prove themselves, the desperation to be your own self that you would always put yourself first. He didn’t think it was selfish, wanting to beat everyone. He was a nice-ish person, but being a nice person didn’t mean letting everyone walk over you, he wasn’t going to be anyone’s door mat again.

He had something to prove.

He rushed Kirishima when Midnight called ‘Go.’ He was counting on Kirishima to harden and hold his ground against his quirk. Instead of exploding him, Bakugou barreled into Kirishima and picked him up, running for the line like a demented cross between wrestling and a knock-off American football.

“Wait, Bakugou!” Kirishima turned over Bakugou’s hold on him and head-butted him. Bakugou wasn’t here to show off his quirk.

He was here to learn how to live.

He was here to say sorry, to let people live without burden.

He was here because his Auntie had asked him to, and he wasn’t one to let people down.

Bakugou dodged a punch sent his way and rammed into Kirishima, cutting his own skin on Kirishima’s as he shoved him backwards with the force of an explosion behind him. He wouldn’t have called any of the fights pretty, but his and Kirishima’s was definitely the worst. They were both cut and bruised once Bakugou had finally sent Kirishima flying out of the ring with an explosive kick. The crowd exploded into cheers, Midnight calling out his victory over his new friend, and even as Bakugou held out his hand for Kirishima to grab, he wasn’t entirely happy about his victory.

“Sorry.” He said as they walked away. Kirishima looked at him confused.

“Why are you saying sorry man? You beat me fair and square in a totally manly battle!” Kirishima gave his winning smile and pumped his arm. “Although I wasn’t expecting to be picked up and carried around like a sack of potatoes!”

“I hurt you, I’m sorry.” Bakugou said to the floor.

Kirishima turned to look at him, concern on his face. “Hey man, man, what’s wrong?” Eyes flickered frantically over his face, not sure what to do about the tears welling up in his eyes. He put a hand on Bakugou’s shoulder and looked into his eyes. “Man, it’s okay. You didn’t hurt me Bakugou, it was a competition.”

Bakugou nodded. “God! I don’t even know what I’m doing.” he said, wiping at the tears that had escaped his eyes.

Kirishima smiled. “You’re being a hero!” Bakugou looked up at him and smiled.

“Yeah, yeah I’m going to be a hero.”

Shinsou knocked his head against the table in the preparation room, he was going to fight Todo-fucking-roki who had absolutely decimated Sero in their match. Uraraka had beaten Jiro in their match and Setsuna had made a laughingstock of Kaminari. Ashido was doing much the same with Iida, who had already been embarrassed by Hatsume. Ashido had coated a good percentage of the ring in her acid and Iida couldn’t stop once he had started moving, there was hardly any friction. He ended up sliding right off the ring, much to his continued embarrassment. There was going to be a short break between his and Todoroki’s match to get rid of the acid on the ring.

The door to his room slid open and he turned around. “Look Bakugou, I appreciate the support bu-“ He cut himself off when he finally noticed who was at the door.

Endeavor.

Shinsou’s face hardened. “I think you’ve got the wrong room Endeavor.” If his tone could change the weather, it would be cold enough to freeze the man right where he stood regardless of his quirk.

“My son will beat you.” Shinsou shrugged.

“Probably, but again, you have the wrong room, Todoroki’s in a different prep room, and I don’t know where it is.” Endeavor glared at him. In all actuality he did know where Todoroki’s prep room was, it was right across the hall, but like hell he was going to tell Endewhore that. He also knew that Endeavor was probably here to talk to him.

“My son was created,” Shinsou almost gagged at the phrasing, “to become the number one hero, I will not have some delinquent with a villains quirk beating him.”

Shinsou stood up. He was nowhere near Endeavor’s height, but in a stadium full of heroes and cameras there was no way the man would be dumb enough to attack him.

He hopped, at least.

“Listen here you old man.” Endeavor balked at his brazen words. “I’m not going to lose just so that your ‘masterpiece’ can win. If he’s going to win, he’s going to do it on his own, not cause his rich abusive daddy threw money at the Hero Commission. Now, I suggest that you leave.”

“You insolent-“ He cut off, eyes glazing over. Shinsou knew it was a bad idea, but it was too late now.

“Leave, don’t bother me again, and forget about this.” Shinsou brushed past him as he left, and Endeavor went in the opposite direction.

He really hoped Endeavor forgot about this, otherwise he’d be toast, literally.

Todoroki looked on at Shinsou with cold eyes. He would get this over with quickly, he just had to not respond to Shinsou. He didn’t doubt for a second that even after he froze him Shinsou would try to bait him.

“Up next is the ferocious Todoroki Shoto versus the elusive Shinsou Hitoshi!”

“Start!”

Todoroki sent a wave of ice Shinsou’s way, intending to end this quickly.

“I think you forgot Todoroki, but Bakugou was the one who taught me to fight.” Todoroki’s eyes widened as he turned to his left where Shinsou had dodged his ice. It made sense, if he could dodge someone propelled by explosions, he could certainly dodge his ice, it wasn’t exactly the fastest thing in the world. Shinsou lunges for him, and Todoroki realized a second too late that it wasn’t going to be a quirked match on Shinsou’s part. Shinsou seemed to know that the only things that would get him to respond were questions and jabs about his quirk and old man, and he seemed to have the decency to not air his dirty laundry on live television.

But that meant he had no idea what Shinsou’s strategy was.

Todoroki cursed under his breath and sent another wave of ice Shinsou’s way, and much to his chagrin dodged to his left again. He was clearly taking advantage of Todoroki not using his left side.

“I’m not here to tell you what to do Todoroki, but I’m not a villain because of my quirk, and you’re not your mom or father because of yours.” Shinsou’s calming voice echoed to him. The words rattled in his head.

“It’s none of your business!” Todoroki shouted as he shot another glacier at Shinsou. The ring they were in was slowly getting smaller and smaller, leaving not much room to work with.

“Your right, it’s not, which is why I’m dropping it now.” Shinsou jumped on top of his next ice pillar and rode it until it stopped high in the air. He slid down the ice spike and towards Todoroki. Todoroki, who had forgotten about the piece of Sero’s tape Shinsou had grabbed during the sports festival.

And of course, he threw it towards Todoroki’s left.

The moment he instinctively lit up his right arm and sent a wave of fire towards Shinsou the arena exploded, the temperature changing drastically.

When the dust cleared Midnight called out Todoroki’s victory and he was hit by something important.

Shinsou could have used his quirk on him earlier, he had the opportunity to, to push just the slightest bit more, ask why he shouldn’t get involved, but he didn’t.

He didn’t.

Did he… not want to win?

Todoroki couldn’t figure out for the life of him what the reasoning behind Shinsou’s actions were, but Shinsou gave him a bright smile as they were ushered to Recovery Girl via med bots, and Todoroki could only assume it had worked.

He looked back down at his left hand, perhaps it was that, perhaps it wasn’t, he probably wouldn’t ever know, but it also didn’t take a genius to figure out.

Shinsou had lost for the sake of Todoroki winning. Not Todoroki winning the sports festival, but him beating one of his own battles.

Todoroki smiled down at the past out form of Shinsou on the cot next to him.

He honestly didn’t mind his classmate, he wasn’t quiet per-say, but he was really only talkative with Bakugou, which was a story Todoroki had wondered about often. After the first day of classes Shinsou had looked at him more, curiosity in his gaze. He had used his quirk to calm him down from a panic attack, and every time he remembered that first day, he wondered how Mineta had ever made it past the entrance exams. He probably would have sat next to Shinsou and Bakugou if Bakugou didn’t seem to attract the loudest people. He didn’t mind Kirishima, Kaminari, and Ashido, but they were a lot for him, he hadn’t had much interaction with kids his age aside from Yaomomo.

Perhaps once this was all over with, he’d finally pay a visit to his mother.

Bakugou knew he couldn’t rely on his quirk for this fight. Yaoyorozu’s quirk worked entirely off of knowing and memorizing chemical structures, she would know how to counteract his nitroglycerin. Ultimately it would come down to who could fight better, which he wasn’t sure about. Yaoyorozu was a recommendation student, and while she might not have the best confidence, she had to have been able to fight at least slightly to have gotten in. Winning a battle before this, against Tokoyami who was a strong opponent, would probably boost her confidence, so would her role as class president.

“We’ll see how these two compare to that last fiery fight! Our next match is Yaoyorozu Momo versus Bakugou Katsuki, whose creativity and power will best the other?”

“Start!”

Yaoyorozu had a grenade in her hand as soon as the signal was given and Bakugou flew towards the girl across from him. Bakugou got off one blast at Yaoyorozu before her grenade of water blew up, dousing him and diluting his sweat. A second grenade of what he assumed was sodium hydroxide hit him. The nitroglycerin he sweated for his explosions was a bit different from what people normally thought of as nitroglycerin, but it could still stop working under the same circumstances.

He tried firing up a small explosion.

Nothing happened.

He crouched and smirked while Yaoyorozu readied something.

He was not prepared for a net-gun, and he had to admit that Yaoyorozu had taken him by surprise. She fired at him, and he couldn’t manage to move in time and got tangled in the net she sent at him.

“Bakugou, can you move?” Midnight asked and he slumped in defeat.

“No.”

“Yaoyorozu Momo wins!”

In the end, Yaoyorozu won – having beaten Ashido the previous round – and Setsuna came in second place after – having taken down Todoroki and Uraraka before him. Todoroki and Ashido ended up in third place. Iida wasn’t there when the four of them received their metals, he had been called out on a family emergency or something. He’s pretty sure Ashido’s crying a little bit, Yaoyorozu and Setsuna are both standing straight, Yaoyorozu serine and Setsuna wit a little gremlin smile on her face, and Todoroki doesn’t even see to be paying attention, seemingly off in his own space. He snorts when Midnight and All Might accidentally cut each other off and everyone looks supremely awkward as All Might hugs them.

All in all, Bakugou was satisfied with how things turned out.

Chapter Text

He was lucky to be close to Hosu when his contact had called him, as there was no way he would have gotten there in time to stop Stain. He wasn’t entirely sure who Stain was going for this time, but he didn’t have a wide variety of heroes to go for with most of them being in Mustafu at and around Yuuei. He yelped with joy as he jumped from one roof to the next and over an alley full of trash. He wasn’t in the best physical shape, and never would be, but that was a byproduct of what he had done. Every time he jumped over a new alleyway he looked down, making sure his target wasn’t in one of them. He had a pretty good idea of where Stain would be going, he had been wandering all day, he knew who was out on patrol, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

His scythes holder thumped down against his lower back with every landing and roll, and he was glad that he had a mask along with his hoodie, because it had long since fallen off his head, leaving his hair to whip around in the air.

The glint of metal and red out of the corner of his eyes had him shifting his weight and momentum moments before a knife flew by his face.

He skidded to a halt, leg sliding out behind him. In front of him stood Stain, covered in someone’s blood – he was too late, he could maybe save them though – and supremely pissed off.

“Reaper.” He growled.

He got his feet under him and shot up from the ground and towards Stain. He was planning on finishing the guy off right now, but someone was hurt, and he needed to take care of that, so evasion it was.

He just needed to get past the older man and down the building, then he’d be fine.

Stain lashed out with one of his katana’s and he rolled under it. Clearly Stain wasn’t expecting him to go around, as by the time he had turned himself he was already down in the alley, ignoring the dead hero and tending to the one who had been left alive, mitigating what damage he could.

He scampered off when he heard the sirens. He had no idea why Stain had left Ingenium alive, but he would count his lucky stars that he had called the ambulance, he didn’t have that luxury. He was certain that Ingenium would live, would even be able to walk again after intense physical therapy, but there wasn’t much he could do.

He watched as the hero, the hero he had interacted with many times, who was well known in the vigilante community for helping Crawler, was carted away and delivered to the hospital’s ICU unit.

He grabbed out his notebook and wrote down what Ingenium had told him, he had an amazing memory, but writing it down wouldn’t hurt.

Stain watched as the kid – and he was a kid, he never spoke, but that was all he could be – slid down the fire escape and dropped down into the alleyway. Ingenium wasn’t his intended kill, but he would let fate decide what to do with that one. The Grimm Reaper, however, was something else. He wasn’t sure what, but he seemed, half alive almost, like he had died before. Stain shuddered as he sheathed his katana and retrieved his knife. He knew he had a disturbing aura, but he didn’t think the kid had even an inkling of an idea.

Hey Izuku, I just competed in the sports festival! And you know, apologized to you on live television. I’m pretty sure my therapist is going to over-analyze that one. I think… I think I’m doing better. Shinsou was a creeper as always and ended up overhearing something he really shouldn’t have – I wonder what you think about the Number 2 hero? – and Kirishima seems to keep having ‘bro moments’ with people.

It’s sort of impressive.

Oh, also one of my classmates, Iida Tenya, his brother was attacked by Stain during the festival by Stain. You would probably love Iida, and Stain, or at least figuring out his quirk, it’s not like anyone knows what it is.

I wish you were here, at least to help cheer me on if nothing else.

Chapter Text

“I had several elementary schoolers tell me ‘Don’t worry about it’” Sero complains.

“Don’t worry about it” Tsu replies.

“Aahaaaa!” Sero cries out. “Why would you say that!?” He sits down hard.

Shinsou snickers at him, “You shouldn’t worry about it.” Sero turns around and gasps loudly.

“I hate all of you.” He slumps over with false hurt.

Jiro snorts before her and Shoji sit up. “Aizawa Sensei’s coming!” Jiro hisses out.

Everyone scrambles to their seats and Bakugou laughs as Kaminari trips on air, catching himself on two desks before hastily sitting down moments before the door opens revealing their teachers perpetually tired face.

“Morning.” Aizawa calls out as he walks up to the podium.

“Good morning!” They all chorus back, everyone in their seats like they should be.

“Kero, your bandages are gone, I’m glad.”

Aizawa acknowledges Tsu briefly before steam rolling right over her. “We’re having a special class today.” The entire classes’ hearts stop. “Code Names. Or rather, you’ll be picking your hero names.” Several excited whispers pop up around the class. “Do you all remember the hero drafts I mentioned a couple days ago?” They all nod. “Well, some of you guys got picked by pro heroes.” A list shows up on the board.

Yaoyorozu is in first place, closely followed by Todoroki, then Ashido, then himself, Uraraka, Tokoyami, Iida, Kaminari, and lastly Shinsou. He can see his friend balk behind him, and he smiles. Damn right he would get an offer, he had trained him. The offers are reasonably spaced out but steadily declining the further down the list it goes.

Several of their classmates are grumbling, but just as many are excited. Bakugou turns around and raises his eyebrow at Shinsou’s shellshocked face. “I told you.” Shinso glares at him.

“Yeah, yeah.” He can tell Shinsou doesn’t know what to do with this information. He didn’t get a lot of offers, only around ten or so, but he got some, which was better than he had expected.

As the talking and cheering dies down Aizawa speaks back up. “Whether or not you got votes, all of you will be interning with pro-heroes. You might have already faced villains, but it’s still important to see pro-heroes at work. The hero names your picking aren’t permanent, but if you’re not careful right now-“

“You’ll regret it later!” the door slides open reveling Midnight, who struts in like Aizawa’s class time was hers. “I’m here to help you pick your hero names.” Midnight winks at them.

Whiteboards and markers are passed back for them to wright their names on before presenting to the class. Bakugou frown down at his whiteboard. He hadn’t really thought about what his hero name would be, but then… maybe that would work. He uncaps his marker, its squeaks joining the others as he writes down ‘Dynamight’. He hadn’t come up with it, Izuku had around the time they had first met, and he hadn’t meant it as a hero name, but a nickname of a sort. He sets his whiteboard down and absently taps his foot against the ground as he doodles on the corner of the board, lost in thought.

“Alright!” Midnight’s voice startles him out of his trance, and he drops his marker. “Who wants to go first?” He looks down at his whiteboard, not paying much attention as his classmates go up and present their names to the class. Hastily he wipes the doodle of Izuku away, not bothered by the smudge of marker on his hand and cuff. He turns his attention back to the front of the classroom and listens idly as people go up and down from the podium.

He doesn’t get why some of the names are turned down, in his opinion ‘Alien Queen’ was a great name, but whatever.

Theres only four of them left, and Bakugou breathed a sigh of relief when Iida went first – He should have gone up earlier, sometime around the middle, but it was to late now. He frowned as Iida walked off. He knew his brother had gotten hurt, everyone did, but none of them really knew the extent of the damage beyond the fact that he was lucky to be alive. Todoroki went with his first name as a placeholder, which wasn’t all that surprising.

Bakugou sighed and stood up, heading to the podium and giving Shinsou more time to work himself up. Gently, he set the board down and turned it around, showing it to the class.

“Dynamight, huh?” Midnight wondered aloud. “I like the wordplay.” It was almost anti-climactic, but then again, to everyone else, it was just one more name that had been thrown into the lot, nothing major – not yet – in the grand scheme of things. He let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding as he walked back to his seat, whiteboard in hand. His shoulders sagged and he slouched a bit, his body slowly coming undone.

He wondered if that was how everyone else felt.

He sagged into his seat, and Shinsou got up from behind him, stiffly walking to the front.

“Um, I haven’t really given this much thought, but here goes nothing?” Shinsou says, voice trailing off at the end, as he turns his board around. ‘Jackrabbit’ Is written on the board, and most of the class makes noises of confusion.

“Jackrabbit?” Midnight asks, curiosity on the tip of her tongue.

Shinsou nods, “In American folklore they can mimic and imitate the voices of people, and then pull you into their thrall – I think. I don’t know the whole specifics, but they’re pretty cool.”

Midnight nods along and then clap’s her hands together, bracelets jangling. “Well! I’m off! I hope I’ll see you sweeties again soon,” She adds with a wink, “Don’t give Aizawa to much trouble now!” She sashays out of the classroom and into the hallway, and as soon as the door closes behind her Aizawa sensei gets up from his sleeping bag.

“Alright, we don’t have much time left,” He pulls out a bunch of thick packets from god knows were, “These are packets with agencies offering internships.” He walks around the classroom, handing out the packets, “I’ve highlighted ones that I think would be good for you, but feel free to pick anyone that you want, but keep in mind what you wish to gain from your internship, and what the hero you’re interning under predominantly does.” Bakugou takes his packet from Aizawa as he walks by. It has his name on it, so he assumes it has his offers on it, and, sure enough, the first several pages are of the people who have offered to have him. As he scans the list, his gaze catches on one of the names, and he lets out a vicious grin. Oh yeah, he knew who he was interning with, he didn’t need to look at any of the others.

He turns around to look at Shinsou who is frowning at his much smaller packet. “Do you have any idea of who you’re going to intern with?”

“Aizawa already offered.”

Bakugou balks at his words. “What do you mean he already offered?” That was more surprising than who he had picked.

“Oh,” Shinsou looks up from his packet, “Well, after yesterday, when I, you know, told him about stuff-“ Bakugou grimaced, “He offered for me to intern under him, I think its so he can see if I live okay with him.”

Bakugou’s brain slammed to a halt. “…What?”

Shinsou snickered, “Yeah, turns out, Aizawa sensei’s a real dad at heart, I think its some weird sort of trial run for fostering.”

Bakugou huffs out a laugh as he stands up, Aizawa calling out to them to get out of his classroom so he can take a nap in the peace and quiet, and raises an eyebrow at Shinsou. “You sure were talking about the same guy here?”

“Yeeeeeeep.” Shinsou drawls out.

Bakugou grabs his umbrella and shoes out of his locker, hastily putting them on before rushing after Shinsou – curse his long legs – and past Iida.

“No running in the halls!” Iida calls out after them and Bakugou halfway turns back around, still walking.

“Sorry Vice Rep!” He turns back around to find Shinsou had started running and was further from him than before. “Hey! Dickwad! Wait up!” He takes off after Shinsou, laughing as his bags slaps against his leg and throws him half-off balance – his half-tied laces not helping with that, not taking note of his classmate behind them, looking after the two of them fondly, as they break every rule in the book, but having fun.

Iida turns away, walking in the opposite direction from them, and taking the elevator instead, he doesn’t have the heart to reprimand them.

Chapter Text

  ^{Sent: 8:57} Good luck with Aizawa

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Thnx <3 ^{Sent: 9:00}                                              

                                                                                                                                    ^{Sent: 9:02} wtf

^Read The hells with the <3??? 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ^{Sent: 9:03}

Bakugou laughs at his phone, shoving it back into his pocket and jumping over the small gap onto the train he was taking. The address he was heading to was an apartment, not an agency, but then again, so were Shinsou and several of their other classmates, so it wasn’t too weird. He wasn’t totally sure the hero he’d pick would intern him – despite the fact that she offered – but he was ecstatic when she had agreed. He wasn’t one hundred percent sure how well they’d get along, but he’s sure he can learn to deal with another bullheaded brash person. Heck, you could even call it practice for the future.

He speed-walked down the streets after he stumbled out of the train – why was everything so fucking crowded? – and had enough decency to say ‘excuse me’ before shoving past people breathing a sigh of relief once he finally reached the apartment he was heading for. He hesitated before he knocked on the door, was- was this really happening? Before deciding that, yes, yes it was, and firmly rapping three times on the door. The moon hanging on the door jingled as it opened with a woosh and he was met with the face of the pro hero he was interning with.

“You Bakugou Katsuki?” Miruko asked in a gruff voice.

“Yes Ma’am.” He nodded.

She barked out a laugh, stepping back and opening the door for him to step inside. “Don’t call me ‘Ma’am you hooligan,” The door slammed shut behind him and he grinned, “Now, are you ready to get to work?”

“Yes,” he huffed, “Then what do you want me to call you, Ma’am?”

She grinned down at him, matching evil smiles on their faces, “Call me Rumi, squirt.” She led him further into the apartment and turned around with a flourish after she stepped into her living room. “Welcome to hell you hooligan.

Bakugou had to have the same crescent moon symbol on Rumi’s costume on himself somewhere when on patrol – according to Rumi, it was so other pros would know who he’s with, although he was fairly certain it was for her own entertainment – They were on their way to Hosu, and he had laughed at her idea for where the moon should be. So now here he was, sitting on a train with all his gear in tow – they were getting a hotel – with a big ass heavy-duty sticker thing stuck to the back of his costume. He wasn’t sure how it stayed on so seamlessly, but it did. Rumi was next to him, both of them scrolling through different feeds and accounts on their phones, completely ignoring the people staring and pointing at them.

Bakugou seriously had thought that one of the guys who they had passed by on the way to the train was going to pass out, people really needed to learn how to rein it in.

The ride was smooth, the gentle rocking and motion lulling nearby passengers into a light doze. It was quiet, like it was normally when it wasn’t crowded. They were going to Hosu because Rumi wanted to go after the Hero Killer, but also to offer assistance in general. Several heroes had gotten tipped off that something might be going down in Hosu soon – Rumi being one of them – and while it might be nothing, it could also be something, and with everything else happening recently, it was better if they didn’t take their chances. He wasn’t one hundred percent sure about going after the Hero Killer, but he also wouldn’t be the one going after him, more like probably unneeded backup, someone to call the cops when they found the guy – if the found the guy. Hosu was big, not massive, but big, so the likelihood of finding him was slim, especially when the alleyways around here numbered one through one million. They follow the crowd out of the train and up and out onto the streets of Hosu, leisurely walking to their hotel, which was apparently a nice one near the center of town. He tossed his bag onto the bed, put his phone on the charger, and turned to look at Rumi, raising an eyebrow at her grin.

“What now?”

“Now, we see what your made of, and make you into a proper hero, hooligan.”

They end up at some hero agencies gym, which has semi-public access, as you had to be with someone with a hero license to get in. It was deserted when they walked in, anyone else who would be in here on patrol.

“Go get your suit on, then meet me back out here.”

He did just that, flexing and rolling his arms and shoulders as he walked out of the locker rooms, popping his back and wrists and knuckles. He stepped up onto the mat and stretched a little while he waited for Rumi. He was in the middle of stretching his legs, sticking one out and leaning onto the other one when he heard the swish of air moving quickly behind him. He lunges forward and rolls before popping up and turning to face the person behind him.

“Your quick, sport.” Rumi smirks at him as he drops down into a crouch. “Time to see what your made of.” She mirrors him, dropping her weight slightly to be more balanced. He doesn’t want to make the first move, so they circle each other, watching for the tensing of muscles and the shifting of each other’s feet, waiting.

Rumi gives first, and he leaps to the side just as she jumps, foot and leg flexing, and bringing a fast and hard kick down on the mat where he was a second ago. He doesn’t waste any time – that would mean certain defeat – sending a blast at her before pushing off the ground and up and backwards, both sliding and sinking into the mat. Instead of devolving into another staring match he reached down to one of the grenades on his belt and popped the pin, tossing it toward Rumi. She jumped back moments before it exploded, a deep dark green spreading over the mat and further.

Rumi laughed at him. “Smoke screens are great and all, but not very effective with me.” She kicked into the air, arching wide and blowing the smoke away. It wasn’t completely gone, but it seemed that Rumi had experience in fighting hard and dirty. He could work with that.

He thanked Hatsume before pulling another grenade off of his belt. This time, like he hoped, Rumi caught it, growling at the thing, the thing that looked exactly the same as the used one.

“I told you it won’t wo-“ part way through turning toward him – she had pinned his location down the moment the smoke went up, it wasn’t like he could stop breathing – the grenade exploded into foam, quickly expanding and hardening. It wouldn’t hold her, he knew, but for the moment it did he dashed up to her and wrestled her into a choke hold.

Bakugou heard the foam crack and break and shatter, and Rumi grabbed him throwing him over her and onto the far side of the mat. He rolled before coming to a stop breathing hard while Rumi laughed, bits of foam clinging to her and the mat and the dust from it breaking all over the walls and them.

“That was good kid, I’m just a whole lot stronger than you, but you almost had me there for a moment.” He huffed, heaving for breath from the sudden adrenaline rush, sweat trickling down his face.

“Not good enough.” He grumbled. She smiled down at him, holding her hand out for I’m to grab onto, hauling him up stumbling.

“You’re never going to be good enough compared to me, I’m in the top 10 on my own for a reason, squirt.” She looked confident, hands on her hips, hair falling over her shoulders, hero suit on. He envied it for a moment, but he would grow into it, and like she had said, this had been her job for years, and he was pretty sure she fought before it too – however legal that fighting was, he wasn’t sure.

“Alright, kid, lets go again.”

They’re on their way back to the hotel late that night when it happens.

There's a loud explosion in the distance, and fire and smoke erupted towards the center of the city. They curse in unison, both muttering ‘fuck’ under their breath before taking off in the direction the sirens and smoke and fire was coming from. It wasn’t next to their hotel, thank God, he had shit in there he didn’t want to lose, but it was close enough that if it turned out to be nothing it wouldn’t be a huge detour. Given the reason they were here I the first place though, it was better to be safe than sorry.

A loud screeching noise pulled his attention up to the sky, where a, a something was flying, illuminated by the fires in the night, red and burning and hot. The thing looked somewhat familiar, but he couldn’t place why until they were running into the square and he caught sight of what the heroes were fighting.

“Nomu.” He breathed out, and Rumi glanced down at him before looking back at the ugly misshapen thing in front of them.

Bakugou was frozen, he couldn’t move, and one of the Nomu turned to look at them. He wasn’t sure if it really looked at him, but it felt like the dead eyes were staring into his soul. It rushed toward them, and still, he couldn’t move. His brain and heart and muscles were protesting everything, he wanted to move, but he couldn’t. His hands shook and he tensed up as the Nomu got closer to them.

Rumi jumped up and brought her heel down on the things brain, blood splattered across them, and Bakugou flinched when it hit him. He raised his hand up, wiping away the blood, and staring at them shaking.

“Dynamight.” His eyes snapped to her, looking up in fear. Rumi had a hard look on her face, he wasn’t sure if this was the first time she had tried to get his attention but given that her hands were on his shoulders and her voice was raised, it probably wasn’t.

“Ye-s?” He choked out.

“Go help evacuate civilians, I don’t want you around these guys, and you clearly can’t handle being around them.” He nodded and took a testing step backwards. When his knees didn’t buckle, and the step was steady, he turned around and ran towards the evacuations happening.

“Hey kid!’ Rumi shouted after him, “If absolutely necessary, I give you permission to use your quirk.” He gave her a thumbs up as he ran. He heard the roaring and grating noises of Nomu behind him but didn’t turn around, he new if he saw one that he would freeze again, memories of the USJ would flood his brain again, and he was just fine not re-experiencing the feeling of getting pounded into the dirt.

Ushering the civilians away from the fires and Nomu was chaotic but not particularly difficult, just enough that he could focus on that and not the fighting. He flinched at the loud crash behind him and the heat that rose from unbearable to sweltering. At least he wouldn’t have any problems with his quirk in these conditions. A booming laugh and a chorus of exited ‘All Might’s’ followed. He might not be a fan of All Might, but the man was very, very well equipped to deal with the Nomu.

He didn’t look behind him to see the fight going on, just kept moving and directing and helping people, handing a kid off to his mother and calming down an old lady. In his pocket his phone buzzed, a little chime ringing out of it.

Except… his phone was off, and he shouldn’t be getting any notifications unless it was an emergency.

He cursed and grabbed his phone out of one of his pockets, grumbling as he hastily typed in the password. The message he had gotten was a series of coordinates, and he stared at his phone dumbfounded. The place was nearby, maybe ten minutes away tops, but the unknown number was what had him pausing.

It was also what had him moving.

It wasn’t like he had all of his classmates numbers, and he knew a couple of them would be interning here. And give that the location was in a bunch of alleyways, he could probably guess who it might be.

He turned and ran from the sight, running into the closest alleyway system. He was careful not to run into any walls or stray trashcans while making his way to the location while looking at his phone. He didn’t, however, notice Todoroki looking at his own phone in the middle of the alleyway and barreled into him, almost knocking the both of them over.

“Todoroki? What are you doing here?”

“I could ask the same thing about you.”

Bakugou holds up his phone to him, showing his screen. “I got a text from an unknown number with a location, I don’t know who it is though, but it went through despite my phone being turned off.” Todoroki blanched before holding up his own phone.

“Same here.”

Bakugou squinted at the phone before huffing and jogging forward, “Well, hopefully we won’t get killed wherever it is this person wants us.” Whoever it was had probably just sent out a mass text to everyone.

Todoroki snorted and took off after him.

Iida couldn’t tell you why he was so set on having the Hero Killers head on a pike, well, okay, he could, but he wasn’t a normally violent person was the point. But the Hero Killer had gone after his brother, had made it so he couldn’t work anymore, made it so that he’d be wheelchair bound for life. And what was worse? He wasn’t even the target, he was a side note, a non-entity that had gotten in the way and was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

He both was and wasn’t interning in Hosu for the explicit reason of finding the Hero Killer. If it happened, he wouldn’t be opposed, he wouldn’t fight him either, he wasn’t that naive. And if it didn’t happen, he wouldn’t complain either. But the possibility for vengeance was a drug that had him in a vice.

He had run off from Manual in the chaos following the Nomu showing up. Well, run off was an exaggeration, he had been told to look for any lost or hurt civilians not in the main lineup. He was running past an alleyway, glancing in to look for anyone hurt, when he saw it, or rather him.

He didn’t see him at first; he saw the hero – Native – first. He changed directions and skidded to a halt at the mouth of the alleyway where Native was propped up against a wall, bleeding heavily and breathing shallowly.

“Are you okay?” He asked while pressing two fingers to his pulse, looking him over to see what wounds he had. “If you can’t respond to me, can you nod or shake your head? If you can respond, where are you hurt?” He knew what he was saying didn’t make one hundred percent sense, but he was panicking. There was no way Native was okay I any semblance of the word, not with that much blood and his glassy look. He pulled out his phone and dialed the ambulances.

Native choked on his words as he spat out blood. “Look- look… out” Iida saw his eyes slide to something behind him and leapt to the side right a sword – a katana – came down where he had been moments ago, stabbing his dropped phone, cracking the screen and going straight through it. He looked up at his attacker and his blood froze.

The Hero Killer grinned down at him, red and bloody and glistening, scary and inhuman, an idea that had been so detached from reality that it being real was scary. The confidence that he had been building up bled out of him as he went pale.

He was now well and truly – pardon his cursing – fucked.

Chapter Text

When there are so many other options for how to improve society, why do we always go for violence? Why did I go for violence? Why did he go for violence? Maybe… maybe it really is just what we all are in the end.

I don’t know anymore.

Maybe you would.

See you soon Izuku.

Iida stares up into the eyes of the Hero Killer, red, unflinching, and asks, “Why my brother? What did he do?”

“Nothing.” Iida cried out, squeezing his eyes closed as Stain stabs through his shoulder. He’s almost certain Native is dead now, he was almost when he got here, but now? It was almost guaranteed. He blearily opened his eyes, vision hazy with pain as he looked up at the sky, shrouded in smoke and pollution. All he can think in what he is sure is his last moments – because he got in the way, just like- is that its beautiful. That the nasty air and the high-rise buildings and the dingy alleyway are all beautiful. Yes, they’re bi-products of man, of years of the destruction of the world, but in a way, wasn’t that beautiful? His eyes snag on a figure on a nearby roof, small and witnessing his death. Iida smiles, its sad but then again, it was also relieving in a gruesome way that someone who was alive would be witnessing his death.

He braces for the final blow that’s about to come, the memory of Bakugou and Shinsou flashing across his mind, it was an interesting one to think of, that’s for sure.

When they get to the alley that the text on their phones say Iida is in, they find him, alone except for a figure motionless against one wall who has clearly bled out, and Iida on his way there. Todoroki heads for the person on the wall, checking for a pulse while Bakugou slides to his knees next to Iida.

“What happened?!”

“It, it was Stain- I- I wasn’t looking for him a swear! He was, attacking the hero over there, Native, I’m… pretty sure he’s dead, and he, he got my shoulder bad, and I can’t move.” Todoroki nods his head and confirms that there’s no pulse or breathing, nothing at all to indicate any remaining scraps of life in the hero.

“What happened to Stain?”

“I don’t know, he just disappeared after he stabbed me.”

“That's o-“

“Look out!” “Shit-Fucking hell!”

A sword – a katana – embeds itself into the ground next to them.

“What the fuck was that?”

“It’s refreshing to see heroes who know what they should be prioritizing, even if you are only in training. But you’ve gotten in my way. I take no pleasure in this, I assure you, but you’ve gotten in my way, that’s unacceptable.”

It’s Stain.

Stain is in this alley with them and they are so fucked. Well and truly fucked. “What the hell are you talking about? We got alerts that our friend was in danger, so we showed up, if anything you’re getting in our way of doing our jobs!” Stupid, stupid stupid stupid. That was a very stupid thing to say. He’s panicking though, anything seems like a good option right now.

“You’re interfering with my kill, bad hero or not, you need to be eliminated, make no mistake, I don’t delight in killing children.”

“Heroes are supposed to save people you bastard!” Stain frowns at them. “You want to stop playing around, we’re not living up to your standards, no one is, you hypocritical numb nut, so you might as well just get this over with!” He’s stalling, praying that more experienced heroes get here in time, but it doesn’t seem like they will, so they’ll just have to fight to survive.

Stain moves in a flash that Bakugou can barely track but dodges anyway. He’ll be spilling blood tonight, he knows, there really isn’t a point trying to deny it.

They are so fucked.

Todoroki sends pillars of ice towards Stain, to maim or kill or incapacitate he doesn’t think even Todoroki knows, but it doesn’t matter, the only way to win this fight is if they live.

Stain dodges the ice and Bakugou shoots off an explosion in his direction to heard him the other way, back towards it.

He could end this fight; he knows he could. Pull the pin and there was hardly a chance of Stain getting up, pull both and there was no way. Except that as much as survival counts, he can’t hurt Todoroki or Iida or himself, and he can’t destroy any buildings. Releasing such a powerful blast in the small confines of the alleyway would do all of those, so he has to think of something else, and fast.

Stain comes at them again, hit after hit after hit, one brutal blow after another. Bakugou is sweating a lot now, so much that it feels like even a normal explosion might be too much for these old buildings. He doesn’t know, he doesn’t have time to think-

A knife flies by his face, lightly grazing his cheek, and his world narrows down onto it, and the man who threw it, who follows it behind him. In what feels like slow motion he turns to face Stain, he sees him go for a killing blow, trying to bring his second katana down onto his back and spine hard. Todoroki won’t be able to help him in time, and Iida is still immobilized, he has no one to count on, no one who can step in and take a blow for him or block it. There's no one to save him, no teammates, no naive young friends. Nothing

He's dead. He’s so dead, but he still has to try.

Something moves and suddenly in front of him, there is a person. Dressed in black with accents of neon green and lettering on their jacket that says ‘Grimm Reaper’ on it – like the vigilante, this is a vigilante – and wielding a dual sided scythe that he uses to block the blow from hitting him.

“Destroy that knife!”

Using his preexisting momentum from when he turned, he points his already outstretched hand at the knife that had grazed his cheek earlier and explodes it. From the outside he’s sure it looks almost coordinated, except, he’s never met this person in his life.

“I see you guys got my message.”

WHAT. Was the person who sent that text to him and Todoroki this guy?

“You just couldn’t stay away.” Stain says in a cold voice.

“Nope!”

“Cheery brat.”

“I know!”

Todoroki sends another wave of ice at Stain, who dodges right into the fire he also sent. Stain throws back several knives, not all of them hit their target, but a couple slide home into Todoroki’s arm. He grimaces and plucks them out, they’re not in vital enough places that he needs to keep them in and keeping them in while fighting would make the wound worse. He incinerates them as soon as they hit the asphalt

Bakugou grunts as a sharp pain shoots up his own arm, and he does the same thing, ripping the knife out, choking back a loud cry and exploding it in his hand, ruining the metal and anything else that could be used.

“Don’t let him get anything with your blood on it, he paralyzes people that way.”

“Is that what happened with Iida?”

“Your friend?”

“Yes.”

“Then yes, it was, he should be up and ready to go soon, but I don’t intend to let this fight go for that long.”

The vigilante rushes stain, swinging his scythe in a wide arc towards him which the man easily blocks. They swing around their own weapon and bring a kick down onto Stains head, which when he moves to dodge, they spin with, wrenching their scythe out of Stains hold, throwing him off balance.

Bakugou shoots a blast off at Stains face, and he snarls, once again seemingly disappearing and showing up behind him. Bakugou reaches behind him to grab onto any part of Stain that he can and ends up with a handful of what he thinks is his shirt, which he uses to heave Stain around and onto the ground. He’s immediately on top of him, smashing his fists into his face as hard as he can, bloodying and bruising Stain. Not for long though, as Stain quickly gets out of his hold and reverses their positions, bringing up another knife to strike before a wave of fire crashes over his head. Following close behind the fire is the vigilante who hits Stain in the head and whose scythe has split in half, now two smaller handheld scythes held together by a chain. Both the vigilante and Stain have what amount to knives now, and the vigilante is crouched, holding their scythes in one hand the other flat on the ground. Stain faces them – he’s either scowling or smirking, its deranged either way – with his own knife, poised to strike. The action stalls for a moment before bursting again, Stain leaping for the vigilante and the vigilante ducking and sliding under, spinning his body around in one clean motion that has them low to the ground with one leg outstretched and their arms close a scythe in both hands. They pull on their weapon, which has wrapped itself around one of Stains legs, and throw him of balance, jumping up toward him and mercilessly slamming on of their scythes into one of Stains arms before he can recover, rapping the chain around his neck and pulling, tighter and tighter, Stains hands scrabbling at the chain to get it off his neck, the scythe ripping deeper into him, still stuck  in his arm.

Bakugou ignores them for a moment, trusting the stranger’s ability to handle the Hero Killer, rushing over to Iida’s side where Todoroki has been standing guard. “Can you move?”

“I can feel my fingers, but not much else, and-“

“SHIT!”

Bakugou curls over himself, clutching his shoulder where a long knife has embedded itself deep inside his body. He coughs, throat heavy and thick and full, metallic and tasting of blood, he’s sure there’s some on his lips and tongue now.

“Bakugou, are you alright?!”

“No, you fucker, I just got stabbed in the FUCKING SHOULDER!!” He roars out. He’s not mad at Iida for asking, but everything hurts, it all hurts so, so, so much, he really can’t think now, his head is foggy. He’s dripping blood like a leaky faucet and that isn’t good, not at all.

Well, no pros have shown up yet, and as well as this vigilante seemed to be holding it with Stain, he can’t take much more of this.

“Todoroki, get Iida out of the alley.” Todoroki nods and picks Iida up without question, which Bakugou is very glad for. “You’re certain Native is dead?”

“Yes, he didn’t have a pulse when I checked when we first got here several minutes ago.” Bakugou nods.

“Alright then.” He turns around slow and excruciatingly agonizing, his shoulder flaring up in pain with every motion and movement. He hears Todoroki get the hell out of the alley with Iida, and if he could, he would be running like hell with them, but he has to do something really, really stupid first.

“Hey Reaper!” He holds up his hand, aiming it at Stain who is still focused on the vigilante. It’s a bad idea, and he’s going to get in so much trouble, but no one’s dying today, “FUCKING MOVE” He makes eye contact with the vigilante for the first time and swallows hard, closing his own as soon as he sees them move.

And then he pulls the pin.

He couldn’t tell you what happened next, he can’t hear anything, deafened by the loud blast as he is. His arm burns, everything hurts, and he can’t move. He knows he made it out of the burning and collapsing alley somehow, he thinks someone pulled him out, but he doesn’t know, he feels almost delirious.

He’s sure he is delirious.

He’s only slightly aware of being caried to where Iida and Todoroki are with the rest of the heroes who finally showed up. They’re all yelling, and it hurts, he can’t hear them, but it hurts. The person carrying him – the vigilante? With eyes that are far too familiar but impossible? Is he just hallucinating? – gently sets him down on an ambulance for the EMT’s to look over. They all hover over him for minutes that feel like hours spaced out as he is. There's to much information, he knew that that was a bad fucking idea, but he did it anyway, way to go him.

And then the media shows up, and they’re asking questions to. It’s all very familiar to him, sitting in an ambulance, strangers and heroes who did nothing all up in his face asking question after question-

And the praise, oh god the praise.

He wants to bash someone’s head in.

He hunches over coughing the blood up from his lungs and clawing at his throat, it feels far too much like sludge, and he wants it out- and nothing is right and it all feels wrong and-

Finally, another voice cuts through the fog in his mind, and he painstakingly lifts his head and gaze to lock eyes with Miruko. She looks devastated, and he’s confused, no one died-why is she so upset looking? The EMT’s must say something to her because she stops trying to talk to him, just envelopes him in a hug.

He’s pretty sure that Todoroki and Iida are getting looked over in the other room, but for now, in this moment, he’ll stay, he thinks he deserves a moment to weep.

Bakugou groans as he wakes up, shifting on the uncomfortable hospital bed. His head is clear again – thankfully – but it hurts like hell. He’s had a constant headache pounding against his temples despite the pain medication he’s on. Neither he nor Iida will have any permanent damage beyond some light nerve damage and matching scars. He’s just glad that he got hit in his left shoulder, because they’re not supposed to do anything strenuous in general but especially with it for weeks, he’s going to go insane.

He, Iida, and Todoroki have been sharing a hospital room these past few days before they need to be discharged and head back to school, whether the hospital likes it or not. Today, the police are finally coin to ask them about what happened, and none of them are really excited to expand upon it, but oh well, such is the law, right?

They’re coming in an hour, and Bakugou wants to be able to gather his thoughts before they’re asked what happened. Of course, there’s only so much preparation you can do, but Bakugou hopes he’s not in too much trouble with the law. Technically what they did was vigilantism, but he doesn’t really know, giving that Miruko gave him permission to do what needed to be done, and he’s sure Endeavor did the same for Todoroki, probably wanted him to even.

He's not sure about Iida though, in fact, he has no idea what happened or is going on with Iida then or now. He keeps frowning into the distance, and Bakugou wants to tell him to stop because he’s sharing his negative energy, but he doesn’t know what he’s thinking about, so he’ll just leave him alone.

Bakugou has to keep himself from making an extremely inappropriate joke about the chief of police when he comes in, because that would be an absolutely abysmal first impression on the guy who so much of their future relies on in this moment.

“Hello, I am Chief of Police Kinji Tsuragamae, woof.” Bakugou blinked. Was that kind of thing something all people with mutant quirks did? Because Tsu does it to. It’s something interesting to think about. “I want to talk to all of you about what happened a few days ago while Hosu was under attack by the things that you all identified as ‘Nomu’.” Bakugou looks to Todoroki and Iida, and they all nod or half shrug, giving an indication that they’re listening.

“Can you all tell me what happened in that alley?”

They were all quite for a moment before Iida spoke up, “I believe I would be the first person to go? You two only showed up later.”

Todoroki nods, “That sounds appropriate.”

“Alright, I had been told by Manual, the pro I was interning under, to go look for any lost and hurt civilians. I was only taking the alleys to get back to the main streets, as I had been told they were already cleared out. But as I was running by one of them, I found a hero, Native, slumped up against a wall. I immediately stopped to go help him, I guess, I guess I thought that he had gotten injured somewhere else and made his way there for some reason? I’m not sure, there was a lot of adrenaline going through me that night. Well, when I went to go help him, that’s when Stain showed up, although he was probably always there.” He took a deep breath, rubbing at his eyes with a hand. “I won’t lie, I probably instigated a little bit of that fight, but he had just put my brother out of doing hero work, I just wanted to know why, why Tensei, he was good, he was a good hero, and I just didn’t get it.” Iida is close to crying now, and Todoroki and Bakugou shuffle closer to him, offering support. Bakugou couldn’t imagine what it would be like to have a family member who was permanently injured like how Ingenium was, getting rid of whatever meaning they had.

“He attacked me, because I was getting in the way of his kill, I ended up paralyzed and he took his sword to my shoulder, although immediately after he disappeared, although I assume it was because he heard Bakugou and Todoroki coming.”

The chief of police nods, looking up from where his clipboard is. “It’s a good thing you weren’t outright looking for Stain, as that would complicate things much more.”

“I suppose I can go next.” Bakugou offers, and Chief Tsuragamae nods in assent. “When the attack started me and Miruko had a Nomu on us quickly, after it was dealt with, she sent me to go help with the evacuations because after USJ, she didn’t think I was mentally equipped to deal with fighting Nomu. She did give me permission if absolutely necessary to use my quirk, although I assume it was meant to be more of a ‘if another Nomu attacks you’ sort of situation. At some point while doing that, I got a message on my phone. It wasn’t anything specific, just a location, but it got through the hero block, so I assumed it was sent by someone we know or another hero who needed help stat. I wasn’t doing anything super important, other heroes had what I was doing covered, so I went to go check out where the location that had been sent was. I bumped into Todoroki on the way, who had gotten the same message, and I guess I thought it was weird, but like Iida said, a lot of things were happening that night.”

“When we got there, we found Native and Iida in the alley, but they were alone. We were on guard, but we went to check on them both, because they were both hurt badly. Todoroki checked Natives pulse and didn’t get anything, and there we’re no other signs of life either, so we presumed him dead, and if he wasn’t before, well he was by the end.” He chuckles humorlessly. “Stain, like Iida said, wasn’t in the alleyway when we got there, although soon after we got there, he showed up, scared the shit outa me to.”

“There was a fight, I was using my quirk and Todoroki was to, but partway through it Stain got behind me. He was about to kill me, would have succeeded probably, but the vigilante, I think their names the Grimm Reaper? Showed up, just got right there and blocked the blow, probably saved my life to. There was more fighting after that, but I quickly broke off to check on Iida. Todoroki was still next to Iida, keeping him safe, but I wanted to make sure that he was fine, and the vigilante had Stain handled. Well, something got through, because I ended up with a knife several inches deep in in my shoulder.” He gestures towards the bandages around his shoulder as evidence. “After that, I was pretty done with the fight. I told Todoroki to get Iida and himself out of the alley, and I did the same with the vigilante, told them to move so that they would get hurt less when I pulled the pin on my gauntlet. I’m not totally sure what happened after that, but I think it was the vigilante that pulled me out of there. I could have just ended the fight from the beginning, but I knew that it would be too much for the buildings if I did, and I wanted to try and wait for heroes to arrive, but well, none of them did.”

He thinks for a moment. “I think that about overs it.”

Tsuragamae nods and gestures for Todoroki to start.

“I was helping Endeavor down where the attack was, he also gave me permission to use my quirk to help out. I got a message on my phone that was the location Iida was at, same as Bakugou, and ran into him on the way there. Everything went down like Bakugou said it did, I carried Iida out of the alley, and I heard the noise from the explosion, although at that point I had already met up with the heroes who were on the street. That’s all of it, except…” He hesitates ad looks at Bakugou, “I’m certain that the vigilante was the one who sent the message to me and Bakugou. No one else received it, and when the vigilante showed up, he mentioned something about us getting his message, so I assume that’s what he meant.”

The Chief of Police nods. “Thank you, that about covers everything I had questions about. Giving that Iida never used his quirk against Stain and everything you guys did was in self-defense, you can take credit for the take down of Stain if you wish, woof.” He looks at all of them seriously, “That being said, you need to think carefully about this, we can say It was the pro heroes who took him down, and we can say it was The Reaper as well if you don’t want to be seen so early.”

“Sir, I think we’ve already been noticed, with the USJ incident and the sports festival. We go to UA, I don’t think there’s any way to remain conspicuous in this scenario.” Bakugou says.

Iida nods in agreement. “Although, I didn’t do much of anything, as I was paralyzed the entire fight, so if you would leave my name out of it?”

“I don’t really care one way or another, but the heroes didn’t do anything, they took minutes to get there, even though me and Bakugou told someone where we were going, I’m alright with taking credit for his defeat.”

“Let the Reaper take some of the credit to, whether they deserve it or not, they helped, kept me from dying that’s for sure.” Bakugou adds.

“Alright, woof. That will be all, rest up and get back to your homes and school safely tomorrow.”

“Thank you, sir!” They all chorus as he leaves the room. Immediately after, the door slams open again, Miruko rushing in and heading for Bakugou’s bed, Manual and Endeavor coming into the room at a much more reasonable pace.

“You brat! Don’t ever do that again!” She tackles him in a hug, and he hisses in pain.

“Fuck, Rumi that hurt!”

“Well, who’s fault is it running off and getting injured like you did, huh?!” She lets go of him, sitting down on the bed. “Speaking of, what’s the damage look like?”

“Mild nerve damage in my shoulder, I’m going to need to do a lot of physical therapy to keep it in working condition, but Iida’s in the same boat with me there at least. My entire right arm will have a bit of scaring from the burns I got when I pulled the pin on my gauntlet, the upper arm the most because my gauntlet helped protect the rest. I’ll also have some scaring from the other knives that got my arms, and my right side has some burns as well. I’ve got a couple of broken ribs from the blast. All in all, ill live but come out looking worse for wear.”

“Oh kid, don’t worry about that, your scars will make you look bad ass! There nothing to be ashamed of.”

“I know.”

That night, after everyone left the room and Iida and Todoroki are asleep, he tries to keep himself from crying, so he doesn’t wake them up, but fails at it. So, he sits in the dark with the beeping and the sound of something whirring in the background with his fist in his mouth choking back tears.

How awful is it, that almost all his scars he gave to himself?