Chapter Text
Thousands of times before Bakugo had heard the phrase “a good haircut can change your life.” If he was honest, it was something he believed in and saw every day. The way one carries them self can get them anywhere they want to go. Walking with confidence is an effective weapon. A weapon Bakugo constructed for people every day, seeing it bloom before him in his chair time after time.
So even if it sounded stupid as fuck, Bakugo believed that a good haircut really can change someone’s life. Just like it had for him when he finally put one on the head of Number One Pro Hero Deku.
The media had been kind of annoying about it, saying how it rang in a new era for the hero, the soft halo of green gone taking his baby face along with it. Instead there were angles shaved into the underside, with green curls tall and defined on top. People loved it and other heroes asked about it. When Deku told them it was his childhood friend, Bakugo Katsuki, and that he’d never dream of getting his hair done by anyone else requests steadily started to come into the salon at which he worked. Bakugo told Deku he “could literally not care less” if he came to him for his hair or not, but Deku kept loyal to his word and never saw another stylist after the first appointment. When he brought in his boyfriend, Half Hot Half Cold Hero Shouto Todoroki, Bakugo gave him what seemed to be the first good haircut of his life and finally taught that half and half disaster how to style the mop of shit on his head. After that was a blur.
His books were soon slammed with requests from heroes off all rankings and soon he moves to a referral only system. Quickly, he’s given the luxury of being very particular with his clientele. He opens up a salon of his very own. Five stations, each in their own simply and stylishly decorated suites to give each client privacy. After a very demanding hiring process, he chose four assistants and two receptionists. He preferred to keep his staff small, the less people he had to manage the better.
One day he’s in his office in the back of the salon, receptionist sitting across the desk from him and scrolling through their tablet reading off the new referral requests when a particular name came up.
It seemed that Pro Hero Red Riot needed a new stylist.
“What’s his current ranking?”
“He’s currently at number 15.” They answered, looking it up quickly.
“No.”
They looked up from the tablet at him questioningly. “You do Headphone Jack’s hair and she’s ranked at 43.”
“Her hair isn’t a fucking abomination to God and all of humanity, who’s next?”
Number 15 Pro Hero Red Riot was told that Bakugo wasn’t accepting new clients right now and to try again later.
That night as Bakugo was cooking, he had hero news on for background noise, and he heard a name for the second time that day. Red Riot was on screen, smiling as he always did. Showing off his bright, dangerously sharp teeth. He had impressively taken some big villain out with only one hit, and the media was all over him as usual. They were showing recaps of Red Riot in his Unbreakable form leaving Bakugo so distracted his vegetables started to burn.
When he changed into his pajamas that night he threw on the first larger shirt he put his hands on. It wasn’t until he was looking in the mirror while brushing his teeth that he realized it was one of his many Red Riot t-shirts.
At Deku’s next appointment Bakugo felt particularly pissed off at the strange smile on his face.
“What the fuck are you so happy about?” He asked, making eye contact in the mirror only briefly looking up from where he was precisely lining up the back of Deku's shaved section.
Deku’s smile seemed to overtake itself with the excitements of his next question, “How was your appointment with Kirishima?”
Bakugo rolled his eyes, even more annoyed than his usual baseline level when he was with Deku. “I didn’t accept the referral.”
Deku’s face physically fell, “Kacchan, why?”
“I don’t have the availability.”
It was Deku’s turn to roll his eyes,”We both know that’s not true you were just saying that you had a few spots open up.”
Bakugo straightened up, turning off his clippers and setting them down to grab a towel to clean off Deku’s neck. “Shut up or I’ll shave a line in the back of your head. Slots opened up for normal hair. Do you know how much of my time that monstrosity on top of his head would take up?”
Deku sighed,”I guess that’s fair.”
He was clearly disappointed, not that Bakugo cared.
A few days later found Bakugo at the grocery store. He was choosing between two different kinds of Havarti cheeses when his phone pinged. Throwing both items in his basket he took his phone out of his pocket to see the notification. It was from Hero News, the new rankings had just come out. Two other notifications quickly followed, bringing up the rankings of the only two heroes Bakugo had starred as important, sending notifications to his phone any time their names were in the news.
Deku held on to his number one spot, as expected.
Red Riot had moved up to number eleven.
At work a few days later Bakugo was talking one of his assistants through Yamada's new formulation. His grays were increasingly stubborn and the loud asshole still wanted to look 25 by any means necessary.
He was wrapping up when he heard his receptionist greet someone cheerily, “Welcome, Todoroki! Congrats on your number three spot!”
The tall, lean man smiled softly saying a quiet “Thank you” before an assistant was leading him back into a suite. Bakugo was right behind him.
“Still can’t beat Creati, huh?” He said from behind the man who was already sat and getting draped.
He took a beverage from another assistant before responding. “Maybe next time.” There was a playful smirk on his face as they were left alone in the suite. “I’m surprised even Deku was able to best her this time.”
“He’s probably got the system rigged, that nerd.”
“Well if anyone could figure it out it would be him.”
The two discussed Bakugo’s plan for the service, then Todoroki was sent to the washroom to get shampooed.
They made light, comfortable banter through the haircut like normal. Todoroki had become a normal face in his world since Deku started dating him his last year of high school. They were always pretty indifferent towards each other.
Just as Bakugo was finishing up Todoroki’s face became a little more deviant just before asking a question, “So, you still won’t take Kirishima, huh?”
Bakugo clicked his tongue, feeling immediately annoyed. “Call me when he’s top ten.”
“Careful what you say. He just might be by next quarter, he’s doing really well.”
“We’ll see what happens.”
Todoroki smiled slightly at him. “Too afraid to talk to your hero crush?”
“You’re awful brave talking like that to someone with sheers in their hand.”
“I fought someone with blades for fingernails yesterday, I’m hardly trembling.”
Some weeks later Bakugo was getting his own hair cut at his friends salon. He sat in a chair in the washroom, hair in a cap and him scrolling through his phone while his deep conditioner processed. He clicked the notifications that had come through from his hero news app. Nearly all Red Riot, there must have been a showdown today between him and some villain. He tapped a video of an interview Red had given the press earlier about saving a bus full of school children from an attack. Watching it he couldn’t help but notice something about him looked different.
Red Riot had gotten a haircut.
Bakugo immediately brought his phone closer to his face, pausing and rewinding to get a better look. God it was a fucking disaster. He had seen Red Riot’s long spiky ponytail and he had seen -thanks to Deku’s social media- Kirishima’s long hair falling in the same spikes well past his shoulders.
He’d come up with a thousand cuts for him, thought of a thousand different techniques he would use. He thought about the baby fine low-lights he would put throughout his hair so it could still remain vibrant, but wouldn’t be the aggressive blinding red it was now and never, not once in all of his fantasizing and theorizing had he ever cut in the sloppy, undignified way that whatever criminal who got their hands on his hair had done. Bakugo was furious. He crossed his legs and arms at the same time. Not being able to stand looking at his phone any longer. Leaning back in his chair, he let out a short huff of air. Red Riot better break top 10 next ranking.
“I’m not fucking saying that you have to watch it in order, dumb ass, pay attention.” Bakugo’s current client said to him.
“That’s what the fuck you were implying.”
“No,” he lazily gestured his hand in annoyance. Tone and face not consistent with the actual words he was speaking. “I was just saying if you were gonna watch every movie in the series it would made the most sense to start with the beginning of the story”
Bakugo twisted some hair and clipped it out of his way as he spoke, “Well write the writers for Star Wars and crybaby about it to them.”
“How the fuck do you know I haven’t.”
Bakugo looked up at his lavender haired friend in the mirror, smiling “What the fuck, have you really?”
“No, what the fuck is wrong with you, of course I haven’t.” The mind control hero replied, laughing.
Bakugo had been doing Shinsou’s hair for a while now. They had met at a party of Deku’s neither of them wanted to be at. Shinsou having been brought there by his boyfriend, Kaminari, and Bakugo there because stupid Deku annoyed him until he caved. The two boys instantly tolerated each other which was saying a lot for both of them. Normally Bakugo didn’t see a lot of vigilante type heroes, but Shinsou was an exception. And Shinsou had amazing hair once Bakugo darkened it at the roots and cut it into its now signature overgrown mohawk.
Which is what he was doing when his receptionist walked in with something written on a post-it note.
“Bakugo, sir you’ve got a new referral from Mr. Todoroki” they approached seeming a little nervous “I know you don’t like being interrupted in a service, but he said to get this to you immediately.”
“Who is it?” He asked, ignoring the paper in their hand to focus on sectioning Shinsou’s hair.
“Red Riot!”
“No.”
“He said that if you refused to reiterate that as of ten minutes ago he is number eight pro hero Red Riot.”
He paused to look at them- then to Shinsou who was already hiding a smug smirk behind his hand. It seemed like damn Deku and Todoroki had been loud mouthed about the situation.
So Red Riot has broken the top ten.
Fuck.