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The world is in ruin. Survival is the only thing that matters and for those whose quirks are strong that means either going out alone, living selfishly and using what you have to survive, or trying to protect others whilst letting them share some of the load.
***
Baugo Katsuki wanted to be alone. There were few who were strong enough to keep up with him as he moved through the broken landscape. He accepted the tiny group of followers who ran with him, but he knew that he would drop them in a heartbeat if it meant that he could stay alive another day. They knew it too, but they chose to follow him anyway. Idiots. They were helpful in their way, but the moment someone became dead weight Bakugo blasted them out of existence. His world was brutal, but that’s the way he liked it.
When his SoulInk began to appear, sprawling across his arm and shoulder, he covered it before anyone could see, determined that he would not fall foul to the same fate as those around him. Tied to another person, through nothing more than the whim of some deity who clearly didn’t give a fuck about them. A person that he might have to protect. A person whose quirk might well be worthless. Kirishima was lucky, his ink matched him with someone strong, someone he worked well with.
Others hadn’t been so lucky.
Bakugo vowed that when the day came that he saw the person who wore his mark he would end them before they had a chance to fail him.
***
Uraraka promised her parents that she would live, as their last breaths passed their lips she swore to avenge them, and she didn’t plan on letting them down. Her quirk wasn’t ideally used for fighting, and many believed her weak, but her abilities were endlessly useful and she had survived to her 30th year on her wit and that quirk alone. None would connect with her for long, seeing her only for her non offensive quirk, but it didn’t matter. She was fast, and she was strong, and she could make her own way.
The sprawling ink that bloomed on her arm in the weeks running up to her 18th birthday was a constant reminder that there was someone out there destined for her. The ink would fade away if that someone died, so she had to stay alive. She had to at least see what the universe intended for her. What her life could have been in a less broken world.
But it had been twelve years and she had never seen even a glimpse of her mirrored ink. She never settled, moving from place to place with what she could carry on her back and her eyes always ahead. Hunting.
She would find them, whoever they were, and she wouldn’t have to be alone anymore.
***
Across the wastes Bakugo saw a woman, striding out in the open as though there wasn’t death around every wreck. What the fuck was she doing? He hunkered down, bracing himself for the moment when his team would leap, would dive forwards and either take her out or shake her down. She looked too strong to have been tainted, but they could never be too careful. The strange quirk that had taken the minds of so many was always learning, always growing. It wouldn’t be long before it outsmarted all but the best.
His good eye widened when she came into view, the wide set of her shoulders making his stomach leap. Her brown hair pulled back out of her eyes, muscles from her neck to her ankles to rival his own. Thick strong thighs that his eyes lingered on just a little too long. Then his gaze fell to her arms. Strong, thick, scarred biceps. And there on the left, was her ink.
Was his ink.
He looked down at his right arm, wrapped in cloth, hidden. The moment had come.
The eyes of his followers were on him, waiting for him to make the call.
She looked strong, so strong, and she walked alone. Scarred and battle worn but fierce in a world where that’s what you had to be. His mind was screaming at him to move, to strike as he had always vowed to do. But his heart stopped him. His eyes ran up and down that beautiful, dark ink and he couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe .
He stood, slowly, drawing confused whispers from his team. He held his hand up to silence them. For the first time in his life, he’d changed his mind. With his left hand shaking he tore the cloth from his right arm and stepped forward onto the road.
***
The world is in ruin. Survival is the only thing that matters and for those whose quirks are strong that means either going out alone, living selfishly and using what you have to survive, or trying to protect others whilst and letting them share some of the load.
Bakugo and Uraraka walk through the turmoil side by side. Stronger together than either could ever be alone.