Chapter Text
Bakugou always knew the press didn’t like him. But who cared if they didn’t like him! He was going to be the number one hero, and then they could shove it. Except it doesn’t work like that.
When training to be a hero, everyone always told him his attitude was villainous and he needed to change it or he won’t be a good hero. Bakugou threatened to blow them up in response and ignored them. I mean, Endeavor was the number one hero and people love him. As long as he blasted villains and saved people, who cares about his attitude.
That was one of his biggest mistakes. Bakugou overlooked the fact that the hero rankings aren’t just based on how many people they save or villains they catch, but also on popularity. Popularity you get by doing interviews and interacting with fans. Most of which Bakugou hated and avoided with his usual violent behavior.
Bakugou never had any good experience with the press or ‘fans’ in the first place. With the embarrassment that was the sludge villain and everyone watching how weak he was for having to be saved by an even weaker Deku (physical weak at the time, Bakugou can admit that Deku has come a long way since then), the press had painted him as the poor boy who was held hostage till he had to be saved. Then after the sports festival, no one liked him. The press talked about his horrible behavior and it seemed like anyone and everyone recognized him on the street. After some drunk guys tried to fight him, Bakugou stopped going out unless he was in a disguise.
At some point, one of his old middle school lackeys must have leaked his phone number. He could not even use his phone for two weeks because of how many death threats, suicidal baiting, and lewd messages he was receiving. After he finally destroyed his phone from anger, he had to get a burner phone with his own saved up money because his parents refused to get him a new one.
It didn’t stop after Kamino but it slowed down. People had more things to worry about than the kid that ended All Might. Well not really, they didn’t stop harassing him but since the start of the dorms, he had no reason to leave therefore outsiders stopped interacting with him. The only people that gave him any trouble were the kids in the other classes. His class liked him though, he thinks they did at least.
After the disaster that was his first year, he tried hard to keep out of the spotlight. But once they started internships, it was hard to lay low. Always fighting too hard, causing too much damage, not listening to instructions(it wasn’t that he wasn’t listening, he just couldn’t hear it).
Once he graduated, no hero agency’s wanted to take him on and the negativity he brought with him. Since he didn’t have enough money/sponsor willing to invest in him to start his own agency like Deku, he had to become a freelance hero. While it’s nice to not have to follow under anyone, freelance hero’s have a lot more paperwork and have to pay higher in taxes and insurance while also making less in pay. So it’s no wonder why people never do it.
Within the first few years of graduation, everyone from class 3-A had a higher rank than 50. Except Bakugou. Bakugou had the lowest rank in the class. He didn’t even really have a rank. The ranking starts at 100, and everyone else underneath doesn’t have a real rank. In order to stop competing in lower ranks, the hero commission decided to get rid of ranking under 100.
When they first graduated, the class was all still super close and got together almost every weekend to hang out. As time passed and their rankings went up, the hang outs became more sparse and scattered. After a while, many of Bakugou's friends' PR agents got with him and told him to stop hanging out with them. They told him that because of all of his bad press, it was negatively affecting his friends' popularity status and their ability to rank higher.
The next time they asked to hang out, Bakugou said he was busy. Which was true, being a freelance hero means you have to work more hours to make pay. After a while, they just stopped talking. There was no fight, just losing touch. Sometimes Bakugou wonders if anyone ever noticed or even missed him. He knows he misses them.
Bakugou has been living on his own since he was 18 when his parents kicked him out. Seems like he was giving them a bad image too. Or maybe it was just a long time coming with them being tired of his bullshit. Now he lives alone in a dingy apartment that he can barely afford and that’s only because he had to get jobs on the side of being a hero just to pay the bills.
And sure, waiting tables and being a cashier at a gas station weren’t how he planned spending his early twenties but whatever it takes to be the best. Even though he is not the best right now, if he could just learn to keep his mouth shut then maybe he wouldn’t be in this position. He is trying though.
Being alone is something Bakugou is very familiar with. Besides Deku, he never had any real friends till UA. And now he doesn’t even have them anymore. The only friend he has is the cat that sometimes hangs out outside his apartment building. Sometimes one of his coworkers will talk to him, but most of the time he can see them talking about him behind his back. ‘Perks’ of being a hero no one likes.
Bakugou isn’t really sure what to do next. He thought he would be in higher places by the time he was 26. Now, he is sewing patches onto the hero suit that is multiple sizes too big these days. The villain he fought the day before had a knife quirk that sliced into him. If he was faster, that wouldn’t have happened. But he was tired from his three shifts in a row and hadn’t had enough money for lunch the past few days so he had been eating even less than usual.
Bakugou ended up sending a bigger blast than intended and missed. He ended up setting a few cars on fire and his insurance company is giving him hell for it. He is already over phone calls minutes from the last villain fight and the talk they had, but this one will end up costing him a full paycheck from how long it was. The insurance company is dropping him. They will cover this one but since Bakugou causes so much damage with his quirk, they will no longer have him as their client.
That means that Bakugou is temporarily out of hero work till he can find another company that will take him. Not only is his hero work without hero insurance illegal but also so expensive that he would never be able to afford it. Unless he became a vigilante, there was no way for him to legally be a hero.
Two weeks after that, he was walking back to his apartment early after his boss at the dinner fired him. Because of all the stress he had been dealing with, he had been even more short tempered than usual and ended up snapping at customers and his coworkers. Sometimes when he got recognized at work he would just try to brush it off but this time he yelled at the customers and that was the last straw.
Now with just the cashier job at the gas station, Bakugou was at a loss. He doesn’t make enough money there to pay rent, utilities, and food. It was barely enough to pay just rent. He doesn’t really need the lights anyway since he works the night shift and there is a river a few blocks away that he can bathe in and get water from. It’s in the woods too so he doesn’t have to deal with any embarrassment. It’s still warm out, but he can deal with a few hot days here and there.
And that’s how Bakugou spent that summer. Sure the hunger is horrible at times but if he’s careful, no one notices one less package on the shelf. Bakugou feels guilty at the action but his ever thinning stomach thanks him. He has been applying to many jobs but no one seems to want him and his history. The only reason his gas station job hasn’t gotten rid of him yet is because he is doing everything in his power to keep his ‘attitude’ in check. If that means no talking anymore then so be it. No one really talks to him anyways so it’s not hard, and even if they did it’s not like he could hear them much anymore.
At the start of September when the annual hero license renewal comes around, Bakugou has to make the hardest decision he has ever had to make. Not renew it. Hero licenses are not free and they certainly are not cheap to renew, especially if he can’t even afford food. So Bakugou will either have to retake the test when he is more financially stable or give up on his hope of ever being a hero. At the rate he is going, it will most likely be the latter.
Once the leaves start falling, that’s when he realizes that he might have to find new ways to survive the winter without heating. So far, Bakugou has been refusing to go to food pantries or donation centers because he didn’t want to take from people who actually need it. So it was time to suck up his pride and go.
Walking to the donation center, Bakugou had on a ratty baseball cap that he found in a puddle a few months previously, one of the few thin and baggy long sleeves he had left, and some ripped pants that kept sliding down every time he walked. Keeping his head down, he walked into the building and to the registration desk. The worker at the desk was an older woman who looked like she was even angrier than he was in middle school.
“Name?” She said without looking up
“U-umm, Bakugou Katsuki” Bakugou said in a voice rough from disuse
The woman pauses from typing on her computer and looks up and looks at him judgingly.
“This is a center for people in need, not for rich heroes to get some free stuff.” She says in a loud voice. Many people look over at him.
“I-I know” he said timidly
“Then leave, this is not a place for you” she said rudely before turning back to her computer.
Embarrassed, Bakugou turned around and left without receiving anything. No matter how long it’s been since he was in the news, people still recognize him.
After a few more cold days, he gave in and tried a few other centers with similar reactions and was kicked out. He stopped trying altogether when the last one he tried said that all of the centers ‘knew’ what he was doing and had black listed him from all of them.
Returning to his apartment, he resigns himself to a very cold winter. Once there, he immediately noticed an envelope taped to his door. It was his landlord. He was evicting him. While he still paid rent, Bakugou never thought that not paying utilities was a reason to evict him. It probably wasn’t but his landlord never liked him anyways. Just a greasy looking man who only ever cared about money.
When Bakugou first moved in, the landlord made it clear that any missed payment and he would be out. After all, you can’t make money from people who don’t pay. Seeing as utility’s weren't the rent itself, Bakugou thought there would not be a problem, especially since he hasn’t paid that in months. The landlord probably upped the utilities bill so he could still get a cut. Either way, Bakugou had three days to get out.
Bakugou already didn’t have many possessions, mostly because he sold what he did for food money, so it didn’t take him long to pack everything in a backpack. Over the next three days, Bakugou looked all over for a shelter for him to reside in. After the disaster of the clothing centers, he didn’t even try for homeless shelters. He did find, though, an abandoned church on the sketchy side of town. Though the ceiling was caving in some spots and everything smelled of piss and alcohol, it will have to do.
Making himself comfortable in his new home, Bakugou thought of all that has led him to this point. If he was smarter, stronger, faster, nicer he would not be here. Looking out of the broken window and at the night sky, he exhaled. Seeing his breath in the air, he tried to make some sparks to warm himself up but after months of not using it and malnourishment, his attempts were unsuccessful. He curled into himself and closed his eyes, letting himself fall asleep.