Chapter Text
Well shit.
Just when he thought his week had been going well.
Monday was fine, he got to blow some shit up during his remedial course.
Tuesday was chill, he got his math test back, and obviously he had aced it.
Deku hadn’t been around on Wednesday after he had broken one too many bones (the scolding he got from Recovery Girl had been one of her finest).
He destroyed the idiot squad in a spicy noodle eating contest on Thursday. Their faces had been a priceless mix of horror, pain and panic as they watched him slurp down the spiciest noodles on the menu, all while he looked them dead in the eyes without even wincing. It got even better when he got to watch them chug milk that (because they are incapable of doing anything normally) dripped down their chins and soaked their shirts. It was hilarious. They even got some of it on camera.
But, he should’ve known the good week was never gonna last.
In all fairness, Friday had been just fine till the evening. Classes were surprisingly calm and the remedial course was neutrally chaotic. Aizawa had been the one to bring Icy-hot and himself to the classes that day, and since it was already pretty late - around 6:45pm - sensei had decided to take them out to dinner at a Thai place not too far away.
“It's my treat,” he had said in his usual deadpan voice. “You guys have been training hard and I think you deserve a break. Plus, I’ve been craving Thai all week so you two are getting lucky”
Katsuki hadn’t put up much of a fuss. He was honestly pretty hungry and already kinda worn out from training. Thai sounded pretty good right about now.
But then, of course, he had to forget his phone in the car.
Stupid.
So here he is, walking back through some alley with his phone stuffed in the pocket of his oversized, white hoodie, on his way to the restaurant where the candy cane and his sensei are waiting for him.
But something’s off. He’s sure of it, the hairs on the back of his neck stand up and it feels like someone’s watching him. Like something’s following him.
(Keep walking).
Katsuki glances around, but he doesn’t see anyone. He can feel it though, this shit’s happend often enough and he knows when something is wrong.
Something is definitely wrong.
He doesn’t know what, but he isn’t alone right now.
Yeah okay, fuck, something just moved on the roof.
Alright, he should probably call Aizawa. Just to be safe.
He grabs his phone and calls his first emergency contact. It rings exactly two times.
“I’m guessing you found your phone. Do you need directions or something?” comes from the other side of the line.
“No, but we might have a different problem.” It’s not quite a whisper, but Katsuki keeps his voice low.
“... What kinda problem?” He can practically see his teacher straighten up as he speaks, there’s a subtle kind of concern(?) in his voice.
“I think I’m being followed.”
-----
Shota just sat down at the table with his Disaster Child when he felt his phone buzzing in his pocket. He goes to grab it and immediately has a wary feeling in his gut when he sees the caller ID.
The fact that Bakugou is calling him, is definitely raising red flags in Shota’s mind. The explosive teen never calls anyone . And if he has to, then he will always text.
And that is NOT an exaggeration.
When the class was doing practice disaster scenarios where the students had to try and keep the ‘civilians’ safe, Bakugou had gone off on his own to safely destroy a small building to prevent it from spreading fire to a bigger building. The other students had agreed with the plan and went off to guide the ‘civilians’ to safe locations. Bakugou was told he’d have exactly eight minutes to set up and get out but -as they found out later- the supposedly controlled fire wasn’t as controlled as they thought, and Bakugou ended up having about two minutes instead of eight.
The building collapsed on itself with Bakugou in it.
And about three minutes of ‘oh fuck’ later, Shota received a text -a fucking text - that read:
Bakugou: The hell? The fucking building collapsed. Thought i had ten min??
With a follow-up text that read:
Bakugou: Anyway im stuck in the fuckin basement and cant get out so if u could maybe send someone thatd be appreciated
They eventually got him out and he was mostly fine, just two fractured bones and some bruises, nothing Recovery Girl couldn’t fix.
But the point is that Bakugou never calls, and the fact that he’s calling right now, well, Shota doubts the kid just doing it to check in.
And, as it turns out, Shota’s right (as usual), because there is no way Bakugou would say something like that if he isn’t 100% sure it’s true.
His student is being followed.
Fuck.
Shota knows, he knows, that this isn’t going to end well. The Hell Child is all alone, probably about a 7 minute run away from where Shota and Todoroki are, and he’s being followed by an unknown amount of people who have unknown quirks and unknown plans.
Given Bakugou's track record, those plans can’t be any good.
Goddammit.
Why does it always have to be Bakugou? The kid’s already been targeted and kidnapped before. He’s only sixteen, a child. The universe really can’t leave him alone for two-freaking-seconds?
Jeeze, Shota really doesn’t get paid enough for this bullshit.
He just wanted to eat some Thai food with his ki- his students.
-----
“Okay, don’t hang up the phone. Keep walking and send me your location, I’m on my way.”
Yeah, Katsuki knows this is where his good week’s gonna end.
Damn, this really had to happen right before dinner as well? Can’t whoever is following him at least have the courtesy to not attack until after dinner.
He sends out his live location and keeps walking through the alleyways, and just when he’s putting his phone back to his ear, he realises that he can't breathe. Well, he can still breathe, but it’s like the air has changed. Like there isn’t enough of it or something.
Yeah fuck. This isn’t good. His steps start to falter and he comes to a stop next to the alley’s wall. His breathing is picking up fast and it’s becoming erratic. His hand grips up to his chest to pull at the collar of his hoodie, he’s trying to take in more air. Fuck. Why isn’t he getting enough air??
“Bakugou? Are you alright? You still there?” He can hear the suppressed panic in his teacher’s voice and he notices the vague background noises of cars and crowds (Is he running?).
“Yeah. Just can’t fuck’n-” he tries to take in a sharp breath. “Fucking breathe.” Little sparks are popping in his palms now. He’s starting to panic and he feels a little lightheaded.
Okay yeah, this isn’t good, he’s pretty sure he just dropped his phone. Crap. Aizawa’s probably going to worry now. The old man would never admit it, but he’s definitely a big softie and Katsuki knows the class has already basically taken years off of the man’s life at this point. Aizawa really deserves better.
Okay, focus.
Looking around, Katsuki isn’t seeing anyone he can fight.
The edge of his vision is getting darker.
Goddamn. This shit’s so much fucking easier when he can fucking breathe.
Just try to stay calm. Don’t pass out.
He’s taking in quick, heavy breaths and leaning against the wall, maybe he should pick his phone up ‘cause he’s pretty sure Aizawa is calling his name.
And in that exact moment, he isn’t paying enough attention to his surroundings. It’s really his own fault. He should’ve been paying better attention, shouldn’t have been so focussed on the panic he felt. Next thing he knows, some weird, sticky, slimey arm (is it an arm? Why does it feel so wet?) is covering his mouth and nose, wrapping around his face, and yanking him back. Dragging him away.
Okay so now he really can’t breathe.
Fuck. This shit’s reminding him too much of sludge forcing its way down his throat. It’s reminding him of muzzles and chains that were put on too tightly, leaving his skin red and raw after he’d finally gotten them off. And it’s reminding him too much of a hand on his neck and being pulled into darkness.
Yeah alright, he’s in panic mode now.
He claws at the arm, tries to blast it off, but the second he touches the sticky stuff, he knows he fucked up again. His hands are coated in the slimy substance and it’s covering his nitroglycerin. It’s blocking his sweat and holding his explosions back. And he can’t get it off. He can’t fucking explode. It’s like the quirk restraint gloves his mo- wait no, nope, not going down that path right now.
Okay, FUCK THIS. He’s being dragged away, he can’t breathe, he can’t explode, he can’t fucking scream and he can’t even bite this slimey bastard, but he is not letting this shit happen again. He needs to get away.
Letting his instincts take over, Katsuki throws his full weight back, slamming whoever’s behind him into the wall. He hears a grunt and some curses but the slimey arm hasn’t let go. His explosions aren’t working right now, he doesn’t have enough time to clean his hands from the icky goo so he goes to grab the knife he keeps strapped against his ankle.
He doesn’t even think about it. He just stabs whoever’s behind him in the leg, hears a high pitched scream, and feels the arm let go. Katsuki stumbles forward, wiping the sticky substance off his face so he can take a fucking breath. But then there's a tall, bulky looking man there who introduces himself by punching Katsuki in the face. Ouch, that was pretty fucking rude. He stumbles to his left (at least the air’s still working over here) and regains his balance quite easily.
“Stop fighting, kiddo.” Someone says from a distance (Okay so, at least three people. Don’t know where the third one’s at though). “There’s no point, and you’ll only get yourself hurt.”
Alright, Katsuki is not happy, in fact, he’s getting kinda pissed . First some assholes attack him when he just wants to go eat some Thai food, then they tell him to not fight back?? What the fuck were they expecting?
He’s wiped the nasty sticky stuff off his hands while regaining his breath. And jumps towards the tall guy to give him an explosion in his face, but it’s like there’s a force working against him, slowing him down, and the guy grabs his arm and throws him in front of his slimey, tentacle armed friend.
Okay, well at least that explains the whole ‘not-being-able-to-breathe’ situation. The tall guy probably fucks with the density of the air, he decreased the density so he couldn’t breathe and he increased it so the drag countered the force of his explosion. Great.
Mr. tentacle goes to grab him again, with one arm wrapped around his bleeding leg, but there’s no way Katsuki is falling for that bullshit again. He dodges to the left, sidesteps, and jabs his knife in the guy's side. Blood splatters on his sweater when he pulls it out, another high pitched scream and Mr. tentacle slides down the wall to the ground, cursing at Katsuki and trying to grab his leg. He isn’t letting that happen though, so he sets off an explosion right in the guys face. It leaves quite a nice scorch mark on the man’s bald head and the wall, it’s like what you would see in a cartoon.
Unfortunately, Katsuki doesn’t get a lot of time to think about that, as he gets slammed in the side by ... something.
The impact is so hard that it throws him about a meter or two to the right. Using his explosions to maneuver himself through the air, he manages to land on his feet.
He’s barely there for a second before he launches himself at the tall guy. He tries his best to use as much force as he can in the small area to try and slam himself into the fucker. It works to some degree, he feels the air density shift about two seconds before impact (it’s kinda like trying to fly off with Aizawa sensei’s capture weapon holding and pulling him back). There’s still enough force to get himself close enough to the asshole to set off a big blast though. The guy gets stunned enough to stumble backwards a bit. And just when Katsuki wants to get above him whilst he’s got his guard down, there’s a transparent blue square flying right at his face. He manages to dodge it, but this has gotta be the third person's quirk and what had previously hit him in his side.
Looking at where the square came from, he sees a woman standing on the roof. She’s glaring at him, clearly pissed off, but the glare is weak compared to his mother’s and -more importantly- he doesn’t give a fuck. This does mean that he’ll have to deal with her long distance attacks while fighting the asshole in front of him though. Great.
He can feel the air around him becoming thinner and it’s hard to breathe again. However, if he’s right about the tall guy’s quirk, then that means he’ll be faster. There’ll be less air resistance.
Taking his chance, he uses his explosions to dodge two squares that fly past his side and under his feet, and gets himself about three meters above the tall guy. He knows he can’t just use the force of his explosions to take this guy down when he feels the air becoming dense again. The guy is obviously expecting Katsuki to try and knock him out with an explosion or something. He's trying to use the air density as a shield against Katsuki’s force. It won’t work though, ‘cause the density of the air won’t hold back his momentum. It might slow him down a little, but it won’t stop him. He flips the knife in his hand, and when he comes down, he sticks it right in the guy’s shoulder and twists it to the right. The man lets out a pained cry and Katsuki can feel blood splat on his face as he pulls the knife out.
It’s weird cause he isn’t even thinking about it, he doesn’t even notice the blood dripping down his neck and he doesn’t register the painful screams and yelling coming from the man.
All Katsuki knows is that he can’t let these people win. He won’t get taken again . He can’t be weak. He doesn’t want these people to have any power over him. This is the only way he can get them away. This is the only way he can say no. He still has the right to say no, right? Not that not having that right matters that much, it’s not like he’ll stop saying it, it’s not like anyone ever listens when he says it in the first place.
No, Katsuki isn’t thinking about the unconscious man against the wall and he isn’t thinking about the blood spilling from the shoulder of the guy in front of him. He just needs him to back the fuck off. Why can’t people ever just leave him alone?
The guy goes to kick Katsuki in the side, but Katsuki grabs his leg and yanks him off balance. One strong and firey explosion to the chest and he’s down.
One left to go.
The woman has the audacity to hurl another couple of her weird squares at him whilst she casually climbs down from her spot on the roof. Katsuki quickly dodges and sends an AP shot her way. She doesn’t jump to the side or try to dodge, instead she just conjures one of her fucking squares in front of her, it’s bigger that the previous ones, and it works as a surprisingly good shield. It doesn’t even rattle or move from the spot it materialised.
Huh, weird quirk.
She hurls maybe ten or fifteen squares at him as he charges right at her. He just manages to dodge them all, minus one that grazes his cheek. And then, when he gets close enough, he sends a giant blast to her shield, but it doesn’t even crack.
She’s laughing now. Looking pretty smug and not at all bothered. Probably has some boring monologue going on about how he’ll never get through her stupid square or whatever. She’s clearly worried about that happening though, why else would she surround herself with more stupid squares? She basically boxed herself in with the ugly things, she even has one floating right above her head. Which means she can’t go anywhere and she has to create openings to hurl more squares at him.
It’s pretty stupid to have such an obvious weakness.
Katsuki knows exactly how he can win this. The stupid bitch is giving him very clear openings whenever she creates space to throw some more squares. They’re not big enough for his explosions, or for the knife he is currently holding in his hand to get through. But it expands just a little whenever she sends a square his way. If he times this just right, he’ll be able to shut her the fuck up.
He’s carefully dodging the squares while timing the openings so he can do this in one go (he’ll probably only have one shot at this). He blasts his way over her cube of isolation and just as he sees a square hurtling towards his face, he whips out three of his smaller throwing knives -he keeps these in his right side pocket- and throws them through two different openings in her cube.
The first knife embeds itself in her arm, the second one lands in her upper leg and the third one embeds itself just above her leg in her torso. She lets out a painful groan and falls to her knee. The walls around her fade, but she clearly isn’t done yet. Pulling the knives out and disregarding them on the floor, she’s slowly standing up. She seems pretty pissed, but that sucks for her ‘cause Katsuki is pretty damn pissed himself.
Just as he flips himself around to land about a meter away from her, she conjures one of her annoying ass squares over her hand and decks him in the nose. His eyes water as he blocks a high kick with his arm as he stumbles backward. Dodging two more failed punching attempts and one more kick, he goes in and punches her right on the bleeding wound on her torso and gives her a nice right hook to the jaw. Hollering in pain, she collapses to the floor. Her head hits the ground and then she promptly passes out.
-----
Honestly, Shoto wasn’t really feeling Thai food today. Camie had mentioned something about tacos during remedial courses that afternoon and he had been craving them ever since. However, Aizawa was the one taking Bakugou and himself out to dinner tonight, and he knew for a fact that his sensei/newly adopted father had been complaining about wanting Thai food all week. Therefore, the half-hot half-cold boy didn’t really mind not getting his tacos tonight.
That was really meant to be the only downer of the night.
And it sucked because he’d honestly really been looking forward to dinner. He’d been kinda excited to spend time with his recently acquired, tired dad and Bakugou. Their group dynamic was… interesting, in all the good ways.
Though it’s contrary to what many people probably think, Shoto really likes the Bakugou, and -even though the blond will probably never admit it- they are friends. It isn’t a friendship either of them ever really talk about, but it’s there and it’s real.
They can relate to each other in ways they can’t relate to other people. They share silent glances and have their own ways to be there for eachother that no one else really has to know about. They have their own quietly mumbled inside jokes that the others wouldn’t get, and they have their own sort of banter filled with harsh insults that only the other is allowed to say.
And Bakugou knows all about him and his childhood, he knows about his father.
He was actually the first person Shoto told about Aizawa and Yamada adopting him (other than Eri, Shinso and his siblings for obvious reasons). It was partially because Bakugou had actually already figured it out himself, but also partially because Shoto felt that he deserved to know first. Because Bakugou was the one he’d vent to about his family issues and Bakugou was the one who’d give him valid excuses to not have to see his father. He’d even yank the phone out of Shoto’s hand and tell his dad, the number one hero , to F-off ‘cause he already had plans with Shoto. He’d tell him they were sparring or training and sometimes they would do just that, but sometimes they’d just chill. They’d even gone to the movies once or twice (some of the ‘bakusquad’ members tagging along). And even if he complains about it, Bakugou would always be there.
He knows that Bakugou doesn’t actually mind it, Bakugou would never willingly do something that he doesn’t want to do.
Shoto also knows that Bakugou’s parents aren’t great (there’s a reason he can relate to the other so well).
However, he doesn’t actually know too much about them or the blond’s childhood. Bakugou doesn’t tend to talk about himself as much as Shoto talks about himself.
Whenever Shoto asks, the explosive boy always just sorta shrugs and says that he didn’t always have the best childhood but that it was okay. His mom’s just a bitch (or asshole, hag, wench, you name it) and his dad’s a pussy and a liar. He deals with it. He says it’s not a big deal and besides, he only has two years -that he can mostly spend inside the dorms- left and then he can finally pack his bags and get the heck away from there.
Shoto never pushes for information, Bakugou will tell him when he is ready. But he knows there’s more to that story, no one’s that angry for no reason and no one has reflexes that are just naturally that good. He knows people tend to think that anger is just part of Bakugou's personality, but he thinks the opposite is true really, the anger is more of a cover-up of his personality. He uses it to keep people away and he uses it to hide his true feelings. He hides a part of himself with his anger, and Shoto guesses it works like armor for him. It’s intimidating and it looks scary, it keeps people out (from something he doesn’t want others to see). It weighs him down but it protects him, at least, he thinks it protects him.
Shoto tries to help with the weight where he can, he calmly tells people they’ve had a long day at remedial courses and that Bakugou’s probably not in the mood to hang at the moment. And he goes to train or spar with the blond when he can tell he’s got too much energy or needs to let some anger out.
The point is, Shoto and Bakugou are friends, and Shoto has already had the displeasure of watching Bakugou get taken right in front of his eyes - when he was so close to catching him - once. And he does NOT want that to happen again.
So here he is, running after Aizawa and shoving people to the side like a madman, trying to get to Bakugou before it’s too late (again). Trying to keep a level head as he hears Aizawa shouting Bakugou's name through the phone, that can't be a good sign.
They’re almost at the alleyway Bakugou is (hopefully) still at. Running at full speed, they round a corner -maybe two alley’s from where Bakugou supposedly is- and both faceplant into some kind of bluish, transparent wall.
Yep. This definitely won’t be considered their most graceful or elegant moment, the loud SMACK that resulted from their faces colliding with the wall would have probably been heard within a mile radius from where they’re standing.
They both stumble back a couple steps from the impact and examine the wall, it seems to go up pretty high and there’s no way around it. This definitely isn’t good.
“Shoto, I know you don’t have your license yet, but I need you to-” There’s a loud explosion in the distance. Aizawa’s eyes go wide and he’s grabbing his phone. “-try to break through the wall. I’m calling for backup.”
Aizawa takes some steps back whilst dialing a number on his phone.
Alright, he can do this. Bakugou needs their help right now and he can’t let him slip through his grasp again.
Shoto takes a step back and sends a sharp and strong slab of ice at the wall. The ice crashes against it but the wall doesn’t even rattle. Fuck. This clearly won’t be easy. He tries again and again and again , but the freaking wall won’t even budge. He tries using his fire and he tries using both his fire and ice at once, but the goddamn thing won’t let them through.
And then, just when he’s taking a breath and trying to regain his focus so he can try for a different approach, the explosions in the distance stop.
He makes immediate eye contact with Aizawa and he notices the worry in his eyes.
The distant explosions meant that Bakugou was still there, he was still fighting, but now they stopped.
Bakugou always fights till the end.
Shit. They were too late. He let him slip through his grasp again .
-----
Shota was just about to attempt scaling the five or six meter high wall when the explosions abruptly stopped. He could see the worry, fear and exhaustion in the eyes of his Disaster Child as they locked with his own. Oh fuck. There was no way the backup he called was going to get here in time if the villains were escaping with his Hell Child right now.
Fucking shIT.
GODDA M N I T.
Why? Why did it always have to be his freaking class? Couldn’t Vlad’s class be bothered once? Did villains always have to attack UA? Couldn’t they go after Shiketsu or something? Can the universe not give him a single break?!
Okay, take a breath.
There’s only one option left: he’s gonna have to scale the wall now. He has no clue how the fuck he’s going to pull it off, it’s at least five meters high in the air and there’s no grip, but he is going to get to the other side even if he has to do it by using the pure force of his deadly rage alone.
This is fine, it’ll be easy. No sweat. He’s glared down plenty of villains and he will not hesitate to glare down the laws of physics.
He takes a step back, readies himself and then, the wall fades away. Wait what? Did it just fucking disapear? His rage must’ve been more powerful than he thought.
No wait, if they’re not holding them back anymore, then this definitely can’t be any good. This means that the villains probably already left and who knows what’s happened to Bakugou.
Alright, time to run like a madman part 2, let’s hope they don’t faceplant into another wall this time.
They round two more corners and arrive at Bakugou's last known location.
Of all the things Shota was expecting to find, this was not it.
To be fair, he probably should have given his most powerful student some more credit, but he was definitely expecting another kidnapping situation or maybe even worse.
Thankfully though, that isn’t the case and Shota was relieved, he lets out a breath he didn’t even realise he was holding. His student is still there. He’s okay, just slightly panting as he stands over an unconscious body on the floor, a dripping knife in his bruised hand, white sweater stained red and blood splatter on the side of his face, and- oh.
Oh.
OH.
There’s three unconscious bodies laying around, and he notes the little pools of blood under them. A man with tentacle arms slumped against the wall, another man lying on his back a little further down the alley and a woman lying face down in front of Bakugou.
He locks eyes with his student after taking in the situation and he can tell that Bakugou’s in full fight or flight mode. He’s fully prepared to either fight Todoroki and himself, or to bolt away from them and disappear within a second. Then, realising who they are, his student’s face changes and he releases a small puff of air. The anger and panic in his kid’s eyes is replaced with releaf.
Walking over to him, Shota asks the most important question first: “Bakugou, are you alright?”
There’s a flash of legitimate confusion in the kid’s eyes, like he doesn’t understand why someone would ask him that question, but it’s quickly replaced by a look of horror and slight panic. The kid looks around, takes the scene in and his gaze drops to his hands, stained in blood and holding a knife.
There’s police sirens approaching in the distance.
“I fucked up.” His voice is hoarse, “Fuck, I- I’m sorry.” and Shota swears he’s never heard Bakugou sound so small.