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For as long as Katsuki could remember, he could only see one color: green.
He hated it.
He hated that fucking Deku of all people had given Katsuki the color green. Deku couldn’t be important! He was a useless nerd! Not only was Deku quirkless, he never trained or even did shit to try to become a hero even though he said it was his dream. And on top of that, Deku was too damn nice. The dumbass would sacrifice himself for anyone, and it scared Katsuki.
What if Katsuki let himself get close to that green, and then it just vanished?
So instead Katsuki pushed the green away.
If Deku didn’t care about himself, then Katsuki wouldn’t either.
But then Katsuki earned his spot at UA and the green was still there, floating in the corner of his vision, just like always.
Katsuki growled at the asshole trying to lecture him, about to yell back, but some guy with shitty spiked up hair stepped between them .
“Woah!” Shitty Hair grinned at the asshole, “We should probably avoid fighting on the first day!” And then his grin shifted to Katsuki. “Would you mind putting your feet down?”
Katsuki glared at him. “Yes.”
Deku groaned, the nerd’s head making a soft thump against his desk.
Shitty Hair blinked in confusion. “Yes, you mind? Or yes you’ll do it? I’m not really sure which one you mean, man.”
“Does it look like I’m moving my fucking feet?”
Shitty Hair glanced at them, frowning.
“That is most unbecoming for a hero! How can you claim you want to help people when you treat those around you so poorly? Your behavior is more like—”
Oh Katsuki was not going to just take this shit. He lunged forward, his palm bursting with explosions, but suddenly Deku was grabbing the back of his shirt and his palm was ramming into a hard arm instead of the asshole’s shoulder.
Katsuki stared at Shitty Hair.
He could see another color.
Shitty Hair stared back at him. “Dude! You have the coolest eyes I’ve ever seen. They’re so manly!”
"What the fuck?" Who just said shit like that?
“Wait. You can see what color his eyes are?!” Deku was beyond excited, the nerd.
“Yeah. Just now!”
And now Katsuki had another person his life would supposedly impact, and who would impact his life in turn. At least it was fucking mutual. One way colors were for the weak.
“Kacchan’s eyes are red! The same color as yours, actually!” Deku was practically beaming now; Katsuki didn’t even have to turn around, he could hear it in the nerd’s voice.
Red.
So that’s what red looked like.
Katsuki glanced over at Shitty Hair, studying him.
“You saw a new color too, right?” Shitty Hair gave him a shark-toothed grin, and Katsuki found he didn’t mind this guy’s smile as much as Deku's. “You looked startled, at least.”
Katsuki nodded. “I can see red, too.”
“Awesome!” Shitty Hair’s voice cracked, making Katsuki snort. The guy just kept going, though, apparently not even fucking embarrassed. “That’s so cool that we gave each other the same color! That’s supposed to mean that we’ll be really close, right?” He held out his hand. “I’m Kirishima Eijirou! Nice to meet you!”
Katsuki stared at him. Should he take it? He hated attachments and shit like that. But this was also UA, and the guy seemed strong, unlike Deku and the dumbasses back in middle school… Slowly, Katsuki reached out, gripping the hand in return. “Bakugou Katsuki.”
Deku squeaked.
Before the nerd could do shit, though, the door banged open. There was a man on the ground in a fucking sleeping bag of all the random shit, and then he stepped out of it, strolling to the front of the classroom as if he hadn’t just done the weirdest shit Katsuki had ever seen.
And then he started lecturing them about UA not being about socializing and shit, making everyone scramble for their seats.
The man looked way too disheveled to be a fucking pro hero, but Katsuki at least appreciated the no-nonsense shit.
“UA is different from most high schools in that all of our students inevitably develop deep bonds with several of their classmates as they go through their training. It’s dangerous for you to suddenly experience new colors in the middle of sparring or other training, so let’s get this out of the way. One at a time stand up, state your name, and then go shake all of your classmates hands.”
Katsuki rolled his eyes. Fucking lovely. Well, he already knew which two classmates had his colors.
But then the second person made their way around the class, and suddenly Katsuki could see pink as her hand touched his.
“Dude! I know that look! You totally see another color, don’t you?!” Stunned, Katsuki nodded. She’d given pink to Shitty Hair, too, so maybe he shouldn’t be surprised but…. Three of his colors in one class?
The girl spun toward the front desk where the teacher had put out different colored items. “That one!” She ran over to the fruit, picking it up in awe. “Orange. I can see orange now!”
At least she didn’t give Deku a color. Did that mean that Katsuki wouldn’t be around the nerd as much here, even if they were sitting next to each other?
The last guy in the first row was that asshole from before class, but to Katsuki’s surprise Katsuki ended up giving him the color orange. At least whatever the impact was, it wasn’t fucking mutual.
And then the last girl in the first row gave him brown, the same color as her hair. Apparently he’d given her orange, as well? And she gave pink to Deku.
Katsuki was confused.
The teacher didn’t seem surprised that so many of them were giving five or six other classmates colors, but even for an intense program like UA’s, surely this shit wasn’t normal?
Most were lucky if one classmate in highschool gave you a color. This was unheard of.
But then a dumbass with a lightning bolt in his hair shook his hand, and suddenly Katsuki could see yellow.
Katsuki’s head hurt like hell from processing the three new colors, but there was still half the class left.
And apparently he wasn’t done.
Punk rock girl gave him purple.
The guy behind her with a dumbass grin gave Katsuki orange.
Katsuki gave the bird head red, but he didn’t receive a color from him.
And then Half and Half gave Katsuki blue.
In one day, Katsuki had gone from seeing only green, to seeing every fucking color there was, and he was overwhelmed. It was just so damn much! How the hell did people process all this shit?
And then it was his turn.
Even though Katsuki could already see everything, that didn’t mean he wouldn’t give the last two behind him one of their colors, so Katsuki stood up, passing by Deku without a word.
“Wait, man! You forgot to shake Midoriya’s hand!”
“It’s ok!” Deku rushed to assure them, “I’ve known Kacchan for a while now. Our first touch was years ago.”
Katsuki ignored them, taking grape balls hand instead. The dumbass gasped. “They said your eyes are red, right?”
Katsuki grunted. So another one way impact.
The girl behind him was the same way.
Katsuki didn’t miss the fact that Half and Half, Deku, and him had given more people colors than anyone else. Out of the three of them, Deku had given them to the most people, though. Katsuki hated it.
His eyes surveyed the group that had given him colors.
Green: Deku.
Red: Kirishima Eijirou.
Pink: Ashido Mina.
Brown: Uraraka Ochaco.
Yellow: Kaminari Denki.
Purple: Jirou Kyouka.
Orange: Sero Hanta.
Blue. Todoroki Shouto.
Supposedly these eight would have more impact on his life than anyone else.
Katsuki’s head pounded, throbbing at his temples.
The door slid open with a bang and an old woman shuffled in, lecturing them about how it wasn’t normal to develop this many colors at once and they needed to make sure to eat her gummies.
Fuck, Katsuki would eat anything to get rid of the drill driving its way trough his skull. At least the shitty gummy did actually help with the pain.
The teacher wanted them to go outside for benchmark tests or some shit like that, and everyone was whispering, awed by the new colors as they changed into gym uniforms and made their way outside.
Brown and Blue seemed like they would fit more with Deku’s misfit crew since they’d given more people in that grouping colors, but Red, Pink, Yellow, Purple, and Orange had all given each other colors in addition to giving them to Katsuki.
So those were the people he was meant to become close with? Katsuki scowled. Most of them seemed like dumbasses.
When lunch time came around, though, Red, Pink, and Yellow grabbed orange and purple, then crowded around his desk demanding they all sit together. Katsuki glared at them all. “I’m here to become the best hero. Get in my way and I’ll fucking kill you.”
Red stared at him in awe. “Setting such a high goal is super manly, Bakugou!”
Yellow was laughing. “He might want to cut out the ‘I’ll fucking kill you’ part, though.” Katsuki’s eyes narrowed. No one had ever dared be snarky with him before.
“Come on, man!” Orange gave him a thumbs up. “We’re supposed to impact you in some way. Doesn’t that make you at least a little bit curious about us?”
“Exactly!” Pinky waved her arms around in excitement, then hugged Purple. “I want to know everything about you guys!”
Katsuki stared at their hopeful expressions, then gave in with a groan. “Whatever.” He supposed Orange did have a good point.
Though Katsuki honestly didn’t know what to make of any of this shit.
He came here to become the number one hero, not find all of his colors.
They spent most of the way to the cafeteria talking about food and then teasing each other about their selections once they were in line (seriously, Red, who the fuck ate that much meat?) or pointing out the weird color combinations that none of them had expected (who knew plums were such a bright red?), but the second they sat down the topic shifted into more annoying territory.
“Midoriya called you Kacchan, right, Bakugou? What’s that about?” Yellow was grinning at him, and it was fucking bright as hell and annoying.
Katsuki rolled his eyes. “The nerd’s just always called me that.”
“It’s so cute!” Pinky cooed, clapping her hands together in excitement, “I know! Can we call you that, too?!”
“Huh?”
“Totally!” Yellow was nodding along. “We’re all supposed to impact each other’s lives, right?! So we have to be best friends!”
What the hell. Katsuki didn’t want best friends. “Colors can also mean negative impacts or you just share important moments or some shit like that, you dumbasses.”
“But when it’s a large group like this who all impact each other’s lives, that usually means friendship!” Red had his arm up, his hand tightening into a fist. “We should at least give it a try!”
All the others seemed to agree, though Purple shared an exasperated look with Katsuki from across the table. “If our impact isn’t friendship, I certainly won’t be crying about it.” Purple picked up a piece of ramen as she gave them all an unimpressed stare. “I can already tell that you’re all exhausting.”
“Thank fuck one of you has sense.” Katsuki was not looking forward to years spent with these dumbasses.
Purple turned to give him an unimpressed stare, “Honestly, you seem the worst of all of them.”
“What the hell?” What had Katsuki done to deserve that shit?!
“Aw, don’t be like that!” Yellow slung an arm over her shoulders, his grin still blinding. “You seem really awesome! You like music, right? What are your favorite artists?”
Katsuki blinked as the girl blushed, pulling away from Yellow before nervously rattling off a few names. Well at least her tastes in music didn’t suck. “Those aren’t half bad. Their drummers kick ass.”
Immediately Purple leaned forward, nodding, and suddenly Katsuki found himself drawn into a conversation about which drummer was best. He’d never been able to talk about this shit with anyone before.
It was… odd.
And the others acted interested, too, even if they didn’t know shit about any of it. They weren’t even faking it like all those sycophant assholes had done to Katsuki in middle school.
Katsuki didn’t know what to think.
Though Purple was fucking wrong about Kawaguchi Senri being the best drummer. The chick was badass, but she wasn’t the absolute best.
By the time the lunch bell rang, Katsuki found he didn’t half-mind their company, which was fucking weird.
He’d always been annoyed by having others tag along after him.
Why was this shit different?