Chapter Text
“Everyone knows what they must do, right?” inquired Ashido, her eyes twinkling in expectation as she glanced at every single one of her classmates, all forming a circle in the middle of the communal area in the dorm. All of them nodded their heads in acknowledgement. “Very well then, let’s begin Operation Moment of Truth!!!”
“Yeaaaahh!!” came a chorus of voices in response.
“We’re off to go call Bakugou and Todoroki,” announced Kirishima, tasked with the extremely important role of convincing Bakugou to leave his bedroom and come downstairs to the communal area. Iida, who was likewise tasked to go call Todoroki, also nodded his head at Kirishima’s words and off went the two of them, leisurely yet resolutely walking towards the elevator.
“We’ll begin making the food arrangements, then,” said Satou with an acknowledging nod to his two departing classmates. Their plan this time was to bait both Todoroki and Bakugou downstairs and give them the truth serum mixed in some orange juice - the excuse was they wanted to cheer them on about the supplementary classes so they bought some special oranges that would revitalise their bodies and give them a boost of energy. Bakugou obviously wouldn’t believe in that load of baloney so Kirishima was their biggest and only bet in managing to convince him to drink that juice. Or so they all hoped. Satou, Sero and Uraraka would also get some snacks ready for all of them - they couldn’t just give the spiked juice to their OTP and not have snacks around while they enjoyed the show, right?
And as those five students were busying themselves with their respective tasks, the rest of the class was…
“Hm… How much truth serum should we mix in the juice?” mumbled Midoriya to himself as he fixedly stared at the clear liquid inside of the glass flask. “Hatsume-san said it’s pretty much odourless and tasteless when correctly mixed with juice but she didn’t give us any dosage or preparation methods.”
“We have plenty of freshly squeezed orange juice so I doubt we’d mess up the dosage,” pointed out Asui while gesturing towards a tall juice jar filled to the top with orange juice. “Hatsume-chan didn’t give us that large of an amount so maybe one-third of truth serum to this amount of orange juice will do?”
“Yeah, that should work out,” said Kaminari with a couple of nods of his head. He grabbed the glass flask, popped out the lid and carefully poured a chunk of the truth serum into the orange juice. Ashido eagerly mixed the two with a wooden spoon, excited giggles escaping from her vocal cords - with that kind of imagery and her giggles, she looked like an evil witch preparing a potion but no one dared to mention it.
The orange juice still looked like your regular orange juice.
“...............”
Yes, the orange juice still looked like your regular orange juice and that made the small group question its effectiveness once again.
“We’re dealing with Bakugou’s stubbornness here… Maybe adding a bit more would be better, no?” suggested Sero, an eyebrow slightly arching as he suspiciously stared at the spiked orange juice.
“Yeah, I kinda agree with Sero,” said Ojiro, his arms crossed over his chest as he observed his classmates making their schemy concoction. “Both Bakugou and Todoroki are very strong and their bodies are big too. With so little truth serum mixed in so much orange juice, it might not have the needed kick to get them talking.”
“Let’s add a bit more then~” acknowledged Kaminari with a singsong voice. Like the previous time, he poured a bit more of the truth serum into the orange juice and Ashido eagerly mixed it with the wooden spoon, now some small excited hops joining the likewise excited giggles.
Only half of the truth serum remained inside of the glass flask.
The orange juice still looked like your regular orange juice.
“................................................”
“Screw it, let’s add all of it,” said Kaminari out of the blue, already tilting the flask downwards to pour the rest of the truth serum in the orange juice. Two hands grabbed his arm and wrist to stop Kaminari.
“W-Wait! Let’s think about this a bit more carefully first,” warned Midoriya, his green eyes panickingly glancing up and down from the orange juice, the remaining truth serum and his classmates. He was well acquainted with Hatsume and her more-often-than-not catastrophic ‘babies’ so he had to hesitate before making any rash decision.
“Midoriya-chan is right, mixing too much truth serum might be dangerous to Bakugou-chan and Todoroki-chan,” added Asui with a couple of nods of her head. “We don’t want to poison them.”
“Midoriya, Tsuyu-chan, this is all or nothing,” pressed forward Kaminari, still attempting to pour the glass flask’s contents into the orange juice despite his arm being restrained by two strong hands. “We’re already crossing the line of legal by spiking their drinks without them knowing. If we don’t go all out and nothing happens, we would be betraying Bakugou’s and Todoroki’s trust for no reason! If we’re going to become small scale criminals and eventually be exploded to an early grave by Bakugou, then I at least want it to be after my TodoBaku dreams come true!!!!”
“Y-You’re making some compelling arguments there… but still…” babbled Midoriya, the back-and-forth glancing between his classmates, most of which were supporting Kaminari’s words and actions by nodding their heads and saying ‘pour it all in there’, and the spiked fruit juice became quicker and more erratic. His body still held some reservations about it, perhaps out of traumatised muscle memory, but his brain was telling him that mixing all of the truth serum was the only way to destroy Bakugou’s denial and tsundere antics.
“I still don’t think that’s a good idea,” said Asui, ever the voice of reason within that dorm.
“C’mon, we don’t have enough time to be fighting among ourselves right no- Waaah!” groaned Kaminari with a roll of his eyes, but the sound of the elevator’s chime announcing the arrival of someone downstairs made his body flinch from head to toes. The glass flask slipped out of his hand’s grasp and fell on the juice jar. Luckily for them, the glass flask was too big to fit in the jar’s opening so it simply remained on top of it… as it spilt the rest of the truth serum into the orange juice.
Yeeeeeees! , cheered the students on Kaminari’s side while Midoriya and Asui inwardly screeched and sighed, respectively.
“Iida said you have something for me?” inquired Todoroki - the first one to arrive downstairs, as expected - as he walked closer to the rest of his friends together with Iida.
“Ah, y-yeah,” nervously yelped Midoriya, quickly removing the empty glass flask from on top of the juice jar and hiding it behind his back. “Um, I don’t know if Iida-kun already told you but we… ah, got some special oranges earlier today and well, we thought it would be a good idea to share some of their juice with you and Kacchan since… um, you’re working so hard with the supplementary classes and our regular classes and… the like…”
“Thanks,” said Todoroki with a small expressionless nod, none the wiser of what he was getting himself into.
“Why don’t we take this to one of the dining tables then~” suggested Ashido, grabbing Todoroki from behind by shoulders and happily guiding him into the closest table. “Oh, wait, we need a gla-”
“I have them here,” noted Sero, raising two glasses over his head as he walked to the same table as them. Kaminari held the juice jar in his hands, a satisfied grin on his lips as he hummed a song. They put both of them on the table in front of Todoroki and then took a seat there too, together with some of their other classmates without anything else to help with.
“What makes these oranges different from regular ones, though?” asked Todoroki, his head slightly tilted to the left as he observed Kaminari pouring some juice into a glass.
“Well, um… I believe it’s the environment in which they were grown,” explained Iida after softly clearing his throat. “Different climate, sun exposure, soil, water, minerals, the kind of agricultural practices none of us is familiar with, as folks born and raised in the city.”
“I see,” acknowledged Todoroki as he took a hold of the glass. He drank a little bit of the orange juice and then put the glass back down. “Tastes like regular orange juice, though.”
“Perfect!” accidentally exclaimed Ashido with a victorious fist pump. When she noticed that Todoroki was looking at her with a quizzical expressionless demeanour, she straightened her sitting position once again and tried to come up with an explanation for her behaviour. “Y-You see, I’m not very fond of orange juice but I was curious about those special oranges so ya know… If they taste the same as regular ones, maybe I’ll be able to drink their juice too, even if I don’t like the flavour that much.”
T-That was a close call…, inwardly sighed class 1-A in relief when Todoroki dropped his attention towards Ashido and continued leisurely drinking the juice. They cautiously glanced at the elevator. Now the only one missing is…
Todoroki was halfway done drinking his glass of orange juice when the elevator’s doors opened once again. From its insides came a very reluctant Bakugou and an excited Kirishima, who was pulling him by the arm to the communal area.
“C’mon, Bakugou! We’ll be done with this fast and then you can go back to your room to sleep,” whined Kirishima, putting on his best puppy eyed-expression to try to convince, even if just a tiny bit, Bakugou into following after him. “We went out of our way to prepare this for you and Todoroki, the minimum you could do is drink a sip or two, yeah?”
“You did this shit because you wanted to! It has nothing to do with me!” growled Bakugou in annoyance, his brows creased with a terrifying, moody frown. Despite his angry demeanour, there wasn’t much resistance as he was dragged around by Kirishima. Typical Bakugou and his unwillingness to participate in group activities and festivities, even though he easily was lullabied into staying after some begging and convincing.
“The orange juice is good, Bakugou,” said Todoroki, turning his upper body around to glance over in Bakugou’s direction.
“Like I care about that!!” snapped back Bakugou, yanking his arm out of Kirishima’s grasp. Moody as he was, unwillingly as it might have been done, Bakugou eventually took a seat at the same table as the rest of his classmates, an empty seat between him and Todoroki. He grumbled under his breath, “It’s just fuckin’ orange juice… You morons fell for those stupid TV programs and needlessly spent money on a hoax… If that bullshit was true, scientists and the like would be researching those stupid oranges by now… Seriously, I’m surrounded by nothing but dumbasses…”
“You never know, Bakugou,” said Kirishima with a small shrug as he sat down on the seat next to his pal. “This juice might really help you out in the long run.”
“Yeah, I call that bullshit,” scoffed Bakugou with a dismissive roll of his eyes.
“Hehehe, are you scared to be proved wrong, Kacchan~?” snickered Kaminari as he filled another glass with the orange juice and slowly slid it across the table in Bakugou’s direction. A knowing, provocative smirk could be found on his face in an attempt to irk his friend into cooperation. Bakugou cooperated with their misadventures better when challenged into it, after all.
“Huh? Scared? I know I’m right, there’s nothing to be scared of, damn it!!” roared Bakugou. He slammed his fist on the table and then used the same hand to grab the glass and lead it closer to him. He drank the whole glass in a single sitting and slammed the glass back down on the table, as if proving a point.
His head came slamming face-first on the table right afterwards, his body completely motionless.
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH! WE POISONED HIM TO DEATH!!!!!!!!!!, inwardly screeched Class 1-A, their eyes nearly popping out of their sockets as they gawked in shock at Bakugou’s slumped sitting position.
“B-Bakugou…!!” yelped Kirishima once the initial shock faded and he could move his body again. He grabbed him by the shoulders and went to check if he was still alive. He sighed and slumped back down to his seat. “He’s just sleeping…”
“I didn’t know orange juice could be used as sleeping medicine,” casually pointed out Todoroki, still leisurely sipping on his drink.
“No, Todoroki-kun, I don’t think it can,” corrected Iida while he adjusted his glasses on the bridge of his nose. While he was at it, he also grabbed Todoroki’s lower arm and forced him to put his glass down on the table. Drinking more of the spiked juice was out of the question now that they had witnessed the effect it had on Bakugou.
“G-Group meeting!!” yelped Midoriya in an attempt to summon all of his classmates. “Oh, n-not you, Todoroki-kun, you can stay there and keep an eye out on Kacchan… Please…”
“Okay.” Todoroki obediently sat back down on his seat and turned his body slightly sideways so he could more easily look at the sleeping Bakugou. Todoroki hadn’t been knocked out like Bakugou had but, for some reason, he was acting somewhat… abnormally. Though they couldn’t quite put their finger on what exactly about him was currently amiss since he looked the same way as always.
They all grouped up in a circle-like formation near the kitchen to do the requested group meeting.
“Okay, guys, what exactly went wrong here?” whispered Ashido so that Todoroki wouldn’t be able to hear their conversation. They all took a long, hard glance at the orange juice on top of the table and then looked back to one another. Ashido’s head slumped in defeat. “It was Hatsume’s truth serum, wasn’t it…?”
“It can only be Hatsume-san’s truth serum…” sighed Iida with a regretful small voice. He knew something would go wrong because of Hatsume’s ‘babies’. He might have somewhat relaxed his suspicions because that truth serum didn’t look anything like Hatsume’s usual insane mechanical creations, but it seemed it was just, if not even more, dangerous as all previously used creations.
“Did you guys perhaps use the wrong dosage or something?” inquired Uraraka, restlessly peeking at the table. Sure enough, Bakugou was still very much down.
“Hatsume-san didn’t give us any accurate dosage or a method of preparation, just to mix it in some juice and since this is Kacchan and Todoroki-kun, we kinda ended up using all of it…” whispered Midorima in a fluster, closely observing the empty glass flask on his hands, seeking some sort of answer from it. “Wait… Hm?”
Upon a very close inspection, Midoriya noticed that the label that Hatsume had stuck to the glass flask had been placed on top of another label. Carefully, slowly, he used his nail to lift one of the corners of the top label and slowly, carefully, peeled it out of the flask. He nearly dropped the glass flask on the floor when he read what was written on the hidden label.
“VODKA!?” loudly yelped Midoriya, his heart nearly jumping out of his chest through his mouth.
“VODKA!?” also loudly yelped the rest of class 1-A in reaction to what Midoriya had just said. So the contents of that glass flask wasn’t actually a truth serum but…
“Vodka?” repeated Aizawa and All Might at the same time as they opened the front door of the dorm building and made their way inside the communal area. The large group all compressed inside of the kitchenette area immediately turned their heads in their direction upon hearing their voices, their faces pale and in a panicky shock. That reaction plus a motionless Bakugou slumped over the table was all Aizawa needed to see to know something was going on. “What exactly have you guys done this time?”
-.-
“So let me see if I got this straight…” sighed Aizawa, tiredly rubbing his temple with the pads of his fingers. He was a teacher and he was aware that teenagers sometimes did dumb, reckless stuff but what he had just heard was a tale he had never imagined to hear coming from one of his students. “You guys think Bakugou and Todoroki are in love with each other and want to see them become a couple so you’ve been trying to find a way for them to confess to one another. One of those ways was to deceive them into coming downstairs and spike their drinks with an unknown liquid that Hatsume said to be a truth serum but that you later discovered to be vodka?”
“.........Yes…” hesitantly confessed class 1-A in unison, their lowered heads and small voices conveying how much they were already regretting their actions.
“You do understand that, even if it was done with the best of intentions, what you just did was a crime and that I’ll have to punish you, worst-case scenario, expel you for it, right?” inquired Aizawa, an eyebrow slightly arched as he closely observed his students.
“.........Yes…” nearly croaked class 1-A, some even sniffling with a sorrowful voice.
“W-Well, I think the most important thing to do right now is to assure ourselves that both Young Bakugou and Young Todoroki are okay and will remain okay until their bodies flush out the unknown liquid, whether it is truly vodka or something else,” intervened All Might, feeling empathetic to how his students were feeling right now. Aizawa was certainly doing the right thing by scolding them and foreshadowing the future repercussions of their actions but he couldn’t help but pity them. They had truly acted out of concern and support for their friends, after all. “First things first, was the liquid truly alcohol or was it something else?”
“Hatsume-san said that it was a truth serum that would get them talking and telling the truth but after we mixed it with the orange juice and Kacchan… well, passed out, we discovered another label underneath the label saying ‘truth serum’,” explained Midoriya once again, this time a little bit more calmly and logically. He lifted the glass flask and showed that second label to both All Might and Aizawa. “The label says it’s vodka but… I have no idea how and why Hatsume-san would have vodka in the development studio.”
“Maybe it was a by-product of one of her experiments or creations?” offered Yaoyorozu as a possible answer to that big, important unknown.”Alcohol is the result of fermenting grains and fruits. It’s even possible to make vodka from potatoes.”
“There’s only one way for us to find out…” sighed Aizawa, very much tired of that whole situation already. As their headteacher, however, he had the responsibility to see it through to the very end. He walked up to the table where Todoroki and the unconscious Bakugou were sitting and positioned himself directly behind Todoroki, a couple of metres separating them. “Todoroki, could you walk up to me in a straight line?”
“Okay,” said Todoroki, promptly getting up from his seat. He took a step forward, everything was normal. But by the second, third, fourth step onwards, his path towards Aizawa was getting more and more crooked - he was walking just like a drunk person who couldn’t walk properly without wobbling around and wind up straying from the direction they were attempting to reach. Todoroki came to a stop, an even longer distance now separating him and his teacher, and frowned. “Sensei, I can’t walk to you in a straight line if you keep moving away from me.”
Yup, he’s dead drunk right now, inwardly confirmed class 1-A and their two teachers. His expressionless demeanour hid his drunkenness very well and he wasn’t slurring his words either but the sluggish, wobbly movements of his body were a clear indication that the alcohol content in the orange juice was taking its toll on him.
“Let’s take them upstairs and put them to bed,” said Aizawa after another tired sigh. “It’s safer for them and everyone else if they sleep it off than to let them walk around the dorm creating an even bigger mess or hurting themselves.”
“Yeah, agreed,” nodded Kirishima in acknowledgement. His bedroom was right next to Bakugou’s so maybe it would be an even better idea to take him there and keep him under constant surveillance. He was knocked out cold right now but this was Bakugou they were talking about here. Who knew what kind of mayhem he’d cause if he was to wake up in the middle of the night as drunk as a skunk. He started walking up to the table to pick him up and take him upstairs but he suddenly came to a halt. “Um… Where’s Bakugou?”
“What?” They all interjected at the same time, all of them also glancing at the table… and the empty seat where Bakugou was previously sitting, motionlessly slumped over the table. They quickly surveyed their surroundings with their eyes, their hearts thumping loudly against their ribcage, but still no signs of Bakugou anywhere. Oh no…
There were no signs of Bakugou until…
“Waaah!!!” screamed Ojiro in surprise out of the blue, startling everyone else in the communal area into immediately looking at him. He slightly rotated his body while also looking over his shoulder to peer behind him. There, holding his thick tail with a suffocating hug was Bakugou. Bakugou had just silently sneaked up on Ojiro to snuggle up on his tail. “Um… Bakugou…?”
“What?” growled Bakugou, lifting his head from the fluffy tail end to scowl menacingly at Ojiro. Before he could open his mouth a second time, he held the tail more closely against his chest and tried to yank it out of Ojiro’s grasp. “Nuh-uh, it’sh mine now, fuck off.”
“......” Ojiro was at a lack of what to say and how to react. Especially since almost everyone inside of the communal area was laughing their asses off right now.
“AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! OH MY- AHAHAHAHAHAHA!” laughed Kaminari out loud, his upper body folding over the arms wrapped around his stomach. “AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
“AHAHAHAHAHAHA! I CAN’T- AHAHAHAHAHA! I CAN’T BREATHE LIKE THIS, AHAHAHAHAHAHA!” likewise laughed Ashido, her upper body slumped over the kitchen counter as she banged her fist on it again and again. She even tried to not look at Ojiro and Bakugou or she would really pass out from laughing so hard nonstop. “AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!”
“Pfft… Looks like you’ll have to fight over your tail now, Ojiro,” snickered Sero, doing his best to also not break down laughing like Kaminari and Ashido. It was an extremely hard feat to accomplish since Bakugou was, as we speak, still trying to pull Ojiro’s tail out of his body as if it were a removable piece.
“Cute…” softly mumbled Todoroki as he started walking once again. However, his drunk legs instead of taking him closer to Bakugou and Ojiro ended up leading him against the window panels circling the garden space in the middle of the dorm building. His forehead made a loud clunk when it came crashing against the window. Once again scowling, he suspiciously groped the clear glass with his hands. “Who put a window panel here? Wait, where did everyone go?”
It went without saying that the laughing and cackling doubled in volume and intensity after that one.
They couldn’t afford to just laugh their asses off, though. This was a very serious matter, regardless of how hilarious and silly it was. They needed to keep it together to counter Bakugou and Todoroki’s current inability to operate normally.
“Um… Todoroki-kun…” meekly called Midoriya as he approached his friend and tried to turn his body in the right direction with his hands. “How about going to bed now? T-That orange juice works best if you sleep right after drinking it…”
“Does it?” inquired Todoroki, head tilted to the left as he stared right back at Midoriya.
“Yes, that’s how it is,” added Iida too, likewise walking up to them to offer extra hands in leading Todoroki and his unsteady feet in the right direction. As an avid orange juice drinker, he hoped that him confirming Midoriya’s lie would quickly deceive Todoroki and make the trip to his bedroom faster and easier.
“You’ve heard the man,” said Kirishima, walking up to Bakugou to try to tear him away from Ojiro’s tail. Unlike Todoroki, Bakugou had all of his motor functions working as normal, though his mood and speech was slightly impaired at the moment. He placed his arm around his shoulders and gave Bakugou a soft yank to pull him away from poor Ojiro, still at a complete loss of what to do. “It’s time for you to go to bed, like promised, yeah?”
“.........” Hearing those words, Bakugou halted his body completely. He wasn’t necessarily hugging Ojiro’s tail that strongly anymore but he wasn’t letting himself be pulled away from it by Kirishima either. Out of the blue, beady droplets of salty water started falling from his eyes, alongside a small whine. “But I don’t wanna shleep.”
Silence suddenly reigned over the entire dorm.
Bakugou’s mood was slightly impaired? Scratch that, it was absolutely unstable or no one would have been able to get him crying like that, especially not Kirishima.
“You made him cry,” accusingly mumbled the entire class (plus Aizawa and All Might), pointedly looking at Kirishima, who was flapping his mouth open and closed in a flabbergasted manner. Ojiro even went the extra mile and took a half step backwards, placing his tail more snuggling against his crying classmate to comfort him.
“M-Maybe we should let them stay here for a little while longer,” suggested All Might with a certain hesitation. He gestured towards the sofa next to him. “But get them to sit down at least.”
After a little bit of persuasion and calming down, Kirishima, Sero and Asui managed to guide Bakugou to the sofa by making very good use of Ojiro, who didn’t have any choice but to stay glued to Bakugou through his tail. Todoroki was a bit harder to deal with since he had to walk slowly to keep himself on the right track to the sofa and because he easily got distracted whenever someone said something.
All in all, it took class 1-A a good 20 minutes to get Bakugou and Todoroki to sit down on the sofa.
“Haa… Our plan went from shipping spectacle to taking care of two drunkards…” sighed Kaminari, his body tiredly slumping down on top of another sofa. He thrust his hand inside of a bowl of popcorn that had been placed there and sluggishly ate them one by one with a sulky expression.
“You only have yourselves to blame for that,” chided Aizawa, arms crossed over his chest as he kept a stern, cautious gaze on his students. He instructed, “Get them water too. Alcohol will make them dehydrated very fast.”
“I’m on it!” acknowledged Satou with a quick salute. He dashed towards the kitchenette area and filled two glasses of water nearly to the brim. Then he quickly, albeit carefully, returned to the sofas and offered the glasses to Todoroki and Bakugou. Todoroki almost immediately accepted the glass and started sipping on the water but Bakugou…
“I only d’ink wate’ from the Alpsh,” refused Bakugou, turning his head the other way and hiding it against Ojiro’s fluffy tail end.
“But we don’t have water from the Alps,” said Satou, glancing up and down to the glass filled with tap water and Bakugou. The small shrug Bakugou gave at hearing that made Satou’s shoulders slump down in defeat.
“Bakugou-san,” gently called Yaoyorozu, her voice similar to that of a mother trying to reason out with a misbehaving child. She gave a small nod at Satou while she took the glass from his hand, silently reassuring him that she knew how to deal with that situation. “This water is from the Alps. Thanks to the water cycle, this water right here has been in the Alps at some point in history. It went down the Alps once the snow melted and gathered in the streams and rivers, then it was collected by someone, used by us humans, and later returned to the ocean, where it evaporated into the clouds and rained down on us, who once again collected it and gathered inside of this glass. So rest assured, this water is from the Alps.”
Ohhh! Nice one, Yaomomo!!, inwardly cheered Class 1-A when they saw Bakugou suspiciously peeking at the glass on her hands, almost as if slowly processing her explanation and trying to decide what he should do next.
“The wate’ shycle…” mumbled Bakugou as he released Ojiro’s tail and grabbed the glass, almost yanking it out of Yaoyorozu’s hands in fear of it being stolen away from him. He stared at it hard, his face creasing into a frown. He kept staring at it even when his body started sliding sideways and laid down on top of the sofa, fortunately not spilling even a single drop of water as he fell. Without any warning, his frown turned demonically angry and he yelled, “DEKUUUUUUUUUU!!”
“Woah…!!” yelped Midoriya, quickly jumping to his left when he saw the glass of water being catapulted in his direction. The glass shattered on the floor upon impact, splashing water all over the place and onto Midoriya’s legs. He hesitantly turned his head in Bakugou’s direction, a cold sweat seeping out of his pores. “K-Kacchan…?”
“How dare you poijon my wate’ with your nerd!!” roared Bakugou, accusingly pointing his finger at Midoriya. “Your shtupid body contaminated my wate’, you fuckin’ ashhole! Who shaid you could drink wate’, huh? You can’t! You… uh… ngh… sniff… you can’t drink wate’... sniff… ngh…”
Silence once again filled the entire dorm as Bakugou turned his head and buried his face on the sofa’s cushion, hiding his crying features and muffling slightly his sobs and sniffles.
“Midoriya, dude…” admonished Kaminari, softly shaking his head in disapproval while glancing sideways at Midoriya as if he was a first-class traitor. Several more of their classmates did the same, including Uraraka. Even All Might sighed in disappointment.
“B-But I need to drink water to survive…!” cried out Midoriya, trying to justify the ‘crime’ he was being accused of committing. Bakugou was already a mean, unreasonable bully on the daily but it seemed drunk Bakugou took that to a whole new, unexplored level.
“Bakugou, don’t cry,” said Todoroki, his body copying Bakugou’s previous motions and also sliding sideways until he was laid down on the sofa. He stretched his arm and gently patted the top of Bakugou’s head a couple of times.
“I ain’t cryin’!” screeched Bakugou, his voice still very muffled by his current position. “Deku’s cryin’!”
“I sure feel like it…” mumbled Midoriya under his breath, his shoulders and head slumping down.
“Oh, okay,” simply said Todoroki, wholeheartedly believing Bakugou’s lies. He briefly glanced at Midoriya but didn’t show any signs of wanting to comfort him like he was still doing to Bakugou, his fingers entwined with his blonde locks.
T-There it is…! Our TodoBaku show is finally starting!!, inwardly squealed Class 1-A, trying their best to not let their thoughts and the fantasies running wild in their brains show too much on their faces.
They are so predictable and easy to read…, inwardly sighed Aizawa, softly rolling his eyes around as he kept paying close attention to everything that happened inside of the dorm. He might chastise and punish them for what they had done tonight but he just knew they’d continue to formulate silly, crazy plans until they got what they wanted. Which didn’t make any sense to Aizawa at all. If they were so sure that Bakugou and Todoroki were in love with each other, why didn’t they simply talk with them about it? Why did they have to use such uncertain, roundabout ways to try to hook them up? It didn’t make sense. It was beyond illogical. It was childish, unreasonable and unfair towards both Bakugou and Todoroki, who were unknowingly being used as some sort of live spectacle and toyed with to meet their classmates’ fantasies and delusions. He sighed. I don’t like to get involved in this sort of affair but as a teacher, I should put an end to this right now or their plans will keep on escalating.
“Todoroki,” called Aizawa after releasing one more sigh. His student promptly lifted his head from the sofa to look his way. “Do you like Bakugou?”
AIZAWA-SENSEIIIIIIIIIIIII!, inwardly screeched Class 1-A in total panic, their eyes threatening to jump out of their sockets due to the shock caused by that question. Some were even grabbing their hair and shaking their heads with foreshadowing fear.
“Bakugou?” repeated Todoroki, his head falling back on the sofa with a soft fwump. He patted Bakugou’s head a couple more times and then nodded. “Yeah, I like him.”
“.........Eh?” gasped Class 1-A in near-perfect unison, their panicking and fumbling coming to a halt right away. Did… they hear that correctly or did their brains completely short-circuit and were creating auditory hallucinations?
It took them 3 seconds to realise that yes, they had heard that correctly. Todoroki had just admitted to liking Bakugou. Which meant, they had been right all along. They weren’t delusional. Their fantasies were no longer daytime dreaming. Their TodoBaku ship was safely sai-
“And Midoriya,” suddenly added Todoroki, his eyes staring to nowhere in particular as he kept enumerating more and more names while rhythmically patting Bakugou’s head. “And Iida. And Uraraka. And Asui. And my mom. And my sister. And my brother. But not my stupid father. I don’t like him yet.”
We thought we were there! We were this close to being there!!!!, inwardly wept Class 1-A, all of their expectations thrown out of the window by the same person who had seemingly acknowledged their wishes for a brief moment. They all turned their saddened, yet sour, expressions at the instigator of that verbal slaughter. This is all your fault, Aizawa-sensei…!
“We’ll go nowhere like this…” sighed Aizawa with a soft mumble, speaking to himself more than his sulking students. Nevertheless, and unlike his immature students, he’d see it through to the very end, whether it shattered his students’ dreams or not. “What about you, Bakugou? Do you like Todoroki?”
Bakugou suddenly raised his upper body from the sofa with his hands and arms upon hearing that question, unfortunately (for his classmates, that is) knocking Todoroki’s hand out of his head.
“I hate Tororoki,” said Bakugou without a drop of hesitation. He inched closer to Todoroki and almost mockingly stared straight at him from above as he kept mercilessly going, “I reeeeeeeeeally hate Tororoki. Ya hear that, Half-and-Half Bashtard? I reeeeeeeeeeeally hate you. Hah! Sherves you right!”
“...” Todoroki simply expressionlessly stared back at Bakugou while laid down on the sofa. After a small tired sigh, he rolled on the sofa and turned his body so he’d be facing the backrest of the sofa.
“Hey, don’t ignore me, you ashhole!” complained Bakugou, slapping his hand on top of Todoroki’s head. No reaction whatsoever from Todoroki. That only annoyed Bakugou even further. He bonked his closed fist a couple more times on top of Todoroki’s head, though the strength used was only akin to light taps. “I shaid don’t ignore me! Hey, Tororoki! To.Ro.Ro.Ki! TOROROKI!”
“Bakugou, you just told him you hate him straight to his face, of course he doesn’t want to talk to you right now,” pointed out Kirishima, trying to reason out with Bakugou before his soft attacks escalated to punches or, worse yet, point-blank explosions. Not that he was fully in the mood for it. He was still recovering from Todoroki’s fantasy-shattering answer and now he had to deal with Bakugou’s mean antics and outright denial of even the slightest of affection towards Todoroki.
“Hmph!” Bakugou turned his head the other way and sat back straight on the sofa, his arms crossed over his chest as he sulked on his own. After a couple of minutes, he loudly stomped his feet on the floor and got up from the sofa.
“Wai- Where are you going, Bakugou!?” asked Ashido in a fluster, positioning her body right in front of Bakugou to try to block him. He skillfully skirted around her and kept stomping towards Midoriya with an annoyed expression on his face. Unconsciously, Ashido sent a couple of prayers to her soon-to-be-dead classmate. Rest in pieces, poor Midoriya…
“Gimme that!” growled Bakugou as he yanked Midoriya’s notebook out of his hand. He started stomping to the closest table to him but then seemingly remembered something and walked back to Midoriya. He also yanked a pen from his pocket (how he knew Midoriya had a pen there nobody tried to find out, they’d probably needlessly anger Bakugou with silly questions like that one and Midoriya would definitely suffer the worst of it) and then finally walked to the table, where he took a seat, opened the notebook at a random empty page and started writing something in it.
“Um… What exactly is he doing?” whispered Kaminari to Kirishima and Sero, his gaze closely observing Bakugou as he silently worked on his writing. Both Kirishima and Sero shook their heads, silently telling Kaminari and everyone else that they too had absolutely no idea what was going on right now.
Any of them, Aizawa and All Might included, could simply go up to Bakugou and take a peek at what he was writing in Midoriya’s notebook. But no one did so. They all unanimously decided that it would be best to leave Bakugou to his own devices for as long as he wasn’t putting himself or others in danger.
Not even ten minutes had gone by when they started hearing a ripping sound coming from Bakugou’s table. He was ripping the page he had been writing on out of the notebook. He then folded it in halves two times and wrote something else on the upper side of the neatly folded paper. It was honestly impressive that someone as drunk as Bakugou was capable of such precise, delicate movements with his hands. If it had been Todoroki doing that, he’d probably write illegible characters half on the notebook, half on the table.
“Al’ight,” acknowledged Bakugou with a small nod of his head. He got up from the table, leaving Midoriya’s notebook behind. He walked up to the middle of the room, briefly looked around his surroundings and let the folded paper fall on the floor. Bakugou then took a few steps backwards and once again looked around the room. Once he was satisfied with the big nothing that happened, he approached the dropped folded page, picked it up from the floor and sulkily stomped to the sofa.
Not a single soul could understand what the heck Bakugou was doing.
“Hey, Half-and-Half Bashtard!” called Bakugou, stopping right next to where Todoroki was lying down. Slowly, Todoroki turned his body around just the slightest, just the bare minimum to be able to peek at Bakugou. Bakugou pushed his hand forward, motioning the folded page closer to Todoroki, but he turned his head the other way, not wanting to look at Todoroki. “I found thish on the floor. It hash your name on it.”
BAKUGOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOU…!!, squealed Class 1-A in the back of their minds, their hearts being sweetly squeezed by that adorable act. A letter… Bakugou had gone out of his way to ‘secretly’ write a letter to Todoroki! That pure display of concern and affection alone erased all of their doubts and reignited their desire for a TodoBaku endgame. It had to happen at some point, they were now more sure than ever about it.
“My name?” inquired Todoroki, head slightly tilted as he looked at the folded paper close to his face. He changed his position and sat up straight on the sofa before accepting the paper. He squinted his slightly hazy eyes to read what was written on the outside of the folded paper and then slowly, clumsily unfolded it so he could silently read what was written on the inside.
“Ohh~ What’s that you got there, Todoroki~?” inquired Kaminari with a sing-song voice, his extreme curiosity taking the best of me. He cheerfully skipped to behind the sofa and leaned over the backrest so he could take a good look at the letter’s contents. Come hell or high water, he needed to know what the letter said.
“Nothing,” said Todoroki, tightly holding the letter against his chest to hide it from Kaminari. He then looked up at Bakugou, still standing in front of him. “Bakugou, who wrote this?”
The sound of several hands being slapped on their faces echoed across the dorm. Todoroki’s denseness was striking again, it seemed. And this time it was one hell of an attack, seeing as even All Might was softly massaging his temples while shaking his head in disappointment.
“......” Bakugou opened his mouth to speak but quickly closed it once again. His pouting expression turned into a sour frown as he silently turned around and sat back down on the sofa next to Todoroki. Even now, he still refused to look at Todoroki. “How wou’d I know!? Figure it out on yer own, Half-and-Half Bashtard!”
“Okay,” acknowledged Todoroki with a small nod. He parted the letter from his chest and took a quick peek at it, later hiding it from everyone else’s sight once again as he stared away into the distance. He really seemed to be thinking about it to try to figure out the letter’s sender, just like Bakugou told him to do.
This really isn’t going anywhere like this, inwardly sighed Aizawa, unknowingly clicking his tongue in annoyance. Their classmates weren’t the only ones being illogical here - it seemed both Bakugou and Todoroki were even worse as far as behaving logically was concerned. That ridiculous scene alone was starting to give him an inkling as to why his students were being forced to formulate silly roundabout plans and schemes.
“C-C’mon, Todoroki-kun, I think… I think it’s pretty obvious who wrote that letter,” said Midoriya as a last resort. Right now, he didn’t care about the possible retaliation he’d get from Bakugou for sticking his nose where it didn’t belong, he was desperate enough to act at the detriment of his own safety. Really, they needed to do something or Todoroki and Bakugou would forever remain stuck in this impasse brought out of a mixture of denseness and denial. He was probably going to drag others to hell together with him but it was that or nothing. The nothing frustrated him above everything else. “Um… Don’t you think so too?”
“Y-Yeah, Midoriya’s right!” stepped in Kirishima, very much in agreement with Midoriya’s suicidal stunt. He sat down next to the sulking Bakugou and gently nudged his elbow on his torso. “Right, Bakugou!?”
“I’m shleepy,” mumbled Bakugou, his face dead serious rather than… you know, sleepy. The moment he leaned the back of his head on the sofa’s backrest, he fell asleep instantaneously.
“NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!” screamed Class 1-A in unison, accompanied by All Might’s frustrated “Dang it…”. Bakugou really went through with his backhanded threat and went to sleep right there and then.
“Bakugou! No, you can’t sleep now!” screamed Kirishima, grabbing Bakugou by the shoulders to shake him awake. It didn’t work. “Bakugou! C’mon, you were so, so close! Don’t fall asleep in the middle of it, please…!!!”
“T-Todoroki-kun, do something! Please!” also begged Uraraka, not able to take any more of that. They were so close yet so far away, it was driving her crazy.
“Sorry, Uraraka. I’m busy right now,” said Todoroki in all seriousness. He took another peek at the hidden letter and then tilted his head to the left, a small humming sound coming out of his vocal cords as he kept mussing about that big mystery.
“It’s no use…” sobbed Kaminari, slumping on his knees on the floor, hands tightly gripping his head. “It’s no use once again… They’re too strong of an opponent… Their denseness is too strooooooooong…!”
“Maybe it’s for the better,” pointed out Asui out of the blue, which earned her quite a few dirty looks and whining. Even so, she continued to be the voice of reason, as usual. “I mean, isn’t it very common for people to forget about things because of their extreme alcohol consumption? Even if Todoroki-chan and Bakugou-chan were to make any progress in their relationship while completely drunk, they might not remember about it tomorrow morning.”
The whole class gasped in realisation at hearing that.
“T-That’s true…” stammered Hagakure, her invisible body fidgeting just the slightest. “They could either not remember any of it or just blame it all on the alcohol…”
That’s something Bakugou would definitely do…, inwardly groaned Class 1-A in vexed disappointment.
Asui’s words added to that realisation made them come to the conclusion that this had truly been an epic blunder on their behalf. They did their best, resorted once again to Hatsume’s creations, yet the result was… a disappointing failure of biblical proportions.
“We were so close… So close…” sobbed Ashido, her body likewise slumping on the floor as she observed the sleeping Bakugou and the thinking Todoroki from afar.
What a wasted opportunity, inwardly sighed Aizawa, still doing his job as a teacher. However, without him even realising, his outright disagreement with his students’ actions had somewhat turned into the same type of disappointment they were all currently experiencing.
TodoBaku had yet again made no progress… but Class 1-A gained two very strong allies to their cause.
-.-
Bakugou couldn’t quite put a finger on what exactly had woken him up that morning. Was it the strong clarity of his surroundings? The awkward sleeping position he had taken throughout the whole night? The hammering headache annoyingly pounding the insides of his cranium into pulp? Perhaps it had been all of the above.
What he also couldn’t quite put a finger on was why exactly was he sleeping in one of the sofas in the communal area of his dorm, surrounded by several other of his classmates sleeping in whatever spots they had found comfortable, be it other sofas, be it the chairs and tables, be it even the floor. Aizawa was also fast asleep inside of his sleeping bag further down the room.
But the most appalling thing of that whole mess was his shoulder. Or better yet, the person using his shoulder as a pillow. Or even better yet, Todoroki using his shoulder as a pillow.
What the fuck is going on…?, inwardly asked Bakugou, blinking his eyes a couple of times as he tried to start up his hazy, confused brain. The last thing he remembered was Kirishima coming to his room to annoyingly force him downstairs to drink some stupid orange juice. From that point to him waking up was a big blank. He had absolutely no memory of what had happened the previous night.
The only thing he knew was that he had a killer headache, that almost the entire class, himself included, had slept on the communal area rather than their respective bedrooms, and that that stupid, annoying, moronic Half-and-Half Bastard was for some reason using his shoulder as a pillow while he peacefully slept.
Bakugou would have probably screeched his throat raw if his headache wasn’t threatening to implode with his brain at even the sound of his breathing. So the only thing he did was slap his hand on Todoroki’s head and strongly push him in the opposite direction.
“Ugh…” groaned Todoroki, the resulting impact startling him awake. A terrible pounding started hammering the inside of his head as he tried to sit up on the sofa, fully waking him up. However, even being fully awake couldn’t explain why he was sleeping in the living room with the rest of his classmates. He looked around, confusion clear in his expressionless face. “What…? Why are we all sleeping here?”
“Fuck if I- Ugh…” snapped back Bakugou but he had to hold himself in check, as speaking only made his headache even worse. All of the moving he was doing, be it pushing Todoroki away, be it massaging his aching head, was being too strenuous on his body, though. Especially on his stomach. He sluggishly got up from the sofa and started wobbling to the bathroom. He groaned while clutching his mouth shut, “I don’t know who I will have to kill… but someone will definitely fuckin’ die today…”
“...” Todoroki didn’t add anything to that foreshadowing nuclear blast that would surely befall on his classmates very, very soon. His head was hurting too much for him to speak but it was also hurting too much for him to go back to sleep so he simply slumped back down against the sofa’s backrest. As he did so, he heard a crunching sound coming from his pants’ pocket. Not knowing what it was, he slowly, sluggishly patted his pants until he found something inside one of the pockets.
It was a folded piece of paper, seemingly ripped out of a notebook or something, with ‘To Half-and-Half Bastard’ written in it. Todoroki had absolutely no clue how that folded paper had ended up inside of his pocket, much less what it even was.
The only thing he knew was that it was definitely from Bakugou, seeing as he was the only person who called him that.
Since he was at it, Todoroki decided to check out what was written on the inside. There were several things scratched over, completely illegible underneath so many scribbles and lines. Further down the page, there was a single sentence. Just four little words. No, there was a smaller one right underneath that sentence, bringing the total count to two sentences, seven words.
I don’t hate you
I like you
Todoroki simply stared at those words for a long while, until his lips gently curled up into a small smile.
He folded the paper and put it inside of his pocket once again.
His head hurt too much to do anything more than that right now.
[TO BE CONTINUED???]