Chapter Text
The line between criminal and hero, thought Jirou Kyouka as she rolled an almost naked Denki Kaminari onto his side, is a thin one. Wrestling his pants off (skintight leather, barf) had taken the better part of 10 minutes, and now she stood back to survey her work. Clothes scattered across the room, empty vodka bottle placed incriminatingly next to the bed - with any luck, Kaminari would wake up in the morning with no memory of tonight and assume that he’d blacked out and made it home from the bar alone. Her victim let out a guileless snore and Jirou felt a brief pang of conscience. Whatever. Kaminari probably would have let her crash here anyway if she sucked it up and explained her circumstances. But she was too paranoid and humiliated to explain herself. Thus, Kyouka had resorted to a life of crime.
She watched him across the bar, chatting with someone who might be his best friend or a total stranger. With Kaminari, it was impossible to tell. He made everyone feel special just by looking at them. Kyouka stirred her drink and drummed her fingers on the bar. The last time she was this nervous was on her first patrol. He hadn’t noticed her yet (good - that was the exact reason she chose this seat), but she was certain everyone in a half-mile radius had noticed him. He glowed. Made the most boring of topics seem fascinating. Almost imperceptibly, he was gathering a group of people around him. Kyouka honestly wasn’t sure if he came to the bar with any of these people, or if he met them here. It didn’t matter. By the end of the night, Kaminari would be on a first-name basis with all of them. She glanced at the clock - about an hour until closing. Kyouka took a deep breath, downed her drink, and stood up. It was now or never.
After checking Kaminari’s vitals and rolling him into a recovery position, Kyouka headed to the kitchen. She was starving - she’d spent most of her money on drinks for Kaminari at the bar, and she was too nervous to eat anything ahead of time. She couldn’t hear anyone else in the apartment, which meant she could take her time exploring. She opened the fridge, expecting to find some beer and perhaps a slice of moldy pizza, but instead found it surprisingly well-stocked. She opened several containers, took a few bites of each, and decided they were all equally delicious before putting the fullest one in the microwave. She didn’t peg Kaminari for much of a cook. Maybe he finally grew up. Her brain helpfully presented her with an image of the skintight leather pants. Maybe his roommate was the cook.
Kaminari was already pretty drunk. Getting him more drunk, it turned out, was not as hard as she expected. She had way over-budgeted for this part of the enterprise. When they left the bar together (again, not as hard to do as she expected), she had several hundred yen left. He was thrilled to see her, absolutely thrilled. “Jirou!” He’d practically yelled, engulfing her in an enthusiastic hug that was more rattling than endearing. “How long has it been? I didn’t know you were in town! Sit down, let’s do shots to celebrate our reunion!” Same old Kaminari. She wanted, for a moment, to open her mouth and tell him the entire sob story. Kaminari had that effect on people. He made life seem easy. Instead, she gave him what she hoped was a confident smile and sat down next to him.
In the taxi, Kaminari snoozed on her shoulder. She fished his ID out of his pocket to get his address (in a surprisingly nice part of town) and gave it to the driver. When they pulled up, Kyouka wondered how on earth he could afford an apartment in this building. Chargebolt must be making better money than she thought. After paying the driver (with bills from Kaminari’s wallet), she half-supported, half-dragged him through the lobby to the elevator, and then down the hall to his front door, where she was momentarily stumped. No keyhole? She leaned Kaminari against the door to give herself a minute to think, at which point the door beeped and swung open, dumping Kaminari onto his living room floor. She realized the lock was one of those newfangled magnetic ones, and Kaminari’s keycard must be in his pocket, which unlocked the door when he leaned on it. Being dumped on the floor momentarily roused the unconscious hero, who muttered at her to take her boots off “er my roomme ‘tsgonna kill mee,” before immediately passing out again.
Kyouka finished her meal and looked around the apartment curiously. It was astonishingly well-furnished for a bachelor pad. Was that coffee table designer? She definitely didn’t think Ikea sold anything that…sculptural. Either Kaminari was living well outside of his means, or his roommate was well off. She examined the rug. It looked expensive, but Kyouka didn’t know enough about rich-people furniture to guess how much it cost. She had honestly never paid attention to the furniture in her parents’ house, and Kyouka herself bought most of her stuff secondhand - with the exception of anything music-related. Remembering her instruments locked away in storage somewhere, gathering dust and probably mildewing as she stood, Kyouka felt briefly desperate and sad. She counted to ten before giving herself a little shake and continuing with her exploration of the apartment. There was no use dwelling on it. It couldn’t be helped.
Kaminari - or perhaps his mysterious roommate - was definitely loaded. To afford a three-bedroom apartment in this part of the city was completely mind-boggling. What’s more, one of the bedrooms was apparently empty. With the exception of a yoga mat in the closet and a few dumbbells in one corner, there was nothing in the way of furnishings or personal touches. Kyouka’s best guess was that they used it as a workout or meditation room. Why anyone would waste perfectly good downtown real estate on a poorly-furnished home gym was mystifying, if not least because hero agencies were usually outfitted with state-of-the-art gym equipment in every corner. Maybe Kaminari’s roommate was in finance, or an artist, or something. That would explain the fancy coffee table. The third bedroom - where the mysterious roommate presumably slept - was locked, preventing Kyouka from learning anything about them.
She examined the bathroom (surprisingly clean, especially given the state of Kaminari’s bedroom), checked the medicine cabinet (empty), listened for Kaminari’s breathing again (still alive), and went back to the living room. She washed her dishes and put them in what she guessed was the correct cupboard, effectively erasing all trace of her being here. The only give away was her boots by the door. Kyouka chewed her lip - what was her best option here? The reasonable thing to do, of course, was leave and get a hotel. She knew perfectly well that she wasn’t going to do that, but she included it anyway to bulk up her list of options. She could sleep in Kaminari’s room - most likely she’d wake up before him and take off. But what if he woke up before her? Also, if she was honest with herself, Kyouka was at the limit of what she could reasonably expect Kaminari to do for her (consciously or otherwise). Sleeping in his room felt more intrusive than sneaking into his apartment. She could sleep on the couch, of course. But what if the roommate came home? Kyouka was a notoriously light sleeper, but with her luck she’d get walked in on. Plus, even if she woke up, moving from the couch elsewhere in the time it takes someone to open a door seemed unlikely, even for a stealth hero such as herself. That left the meditation room. Sleeping on the floor wasn’t her favorite thing in the world, especially hardwood. She rolled out the yoga mat. It would have to do for bedding. She stole a throw blanket off the couch, laid down, and promptly passed out.
It could only be attributed to how little she’d slept recently. There was no other explanation. Only sheer exhaustion could explain how Jirou Kyouka, aka Earphone Jack, the listening hero, didn’t hear someone sneak up on her. And yet, there he stood: in the doorway of her borrowed room, glaring at her with the force of a hundred suns.
“SHIT.” She was on her feet immediately, but he was about two feet taller than her, and he filled the entire freaking doorway. She mentally took stock of her situation. There was a window behind her - maybe she could escape that way. What floor was she on, again? “Shit!” Oh, how eloquently she expressed herself under pressure! Kyouka silently cursed every god and man that saw fit to burden her with sentience. His glare deepened slightly, but otherwise he didn’t move a muscle. Her panicky brain wondered if she would have to fight him - he probably had more experience with hand-to-hand combat than her, but maybe she could surprise him. Her eyes darted frantically from his enormous biceps to his steel-toed boots to his chiselled jaw. He would definitely win in a fight. Maybe she could at least leave some of her blood or hair behind so when the cops investigated her murder, there would be some evidence pointing to her killer. Because she was definitely about to be murdered. His glare - somehow - deepened further.
“Are you homeless or something?” Kyouka didn’t know how to respond to that. Her mouth hung open slightly.
“Um,” she began, before realizing she had no idea how to continue. “Um,” she tried again, equally unsuccessfully. She wanted to punch herself in the face. Maybe if she continued being this stupid, he would do it for her. He continued glaring at her for about a minute while she frantically tried to bully her brain into working. No work, too sleepy, insisted her brain. “I’m…I’m really, really sorry. Really sorry! I’ll, uh, leave immediately. I mean, as soon as you stop standing in the way. Because it’s weird. I mean, it’s weird that I’m here! I didn’t even know you lived here. I mean, obviously someone lives here. You might as well live here! It’s a nice apartment! I just meant…uh, I mean that, um…” she trailed off, uncertain what to do now that her audience had disappeared. Jirou considered jumping out the window one more time. She took a timid step toward the doorway (and freedom) - only to be immediately blocked by his reappearance.
“Here,” he grunted, thrusting some bedding at her. “Sleep on this instead of the floor, ya weirdo.” And then he was gone again. Kyouka stared after him, mouth hanging fully open now. Of all the turns she had expected tonight to take, this was not one of them. She stared after him for a moment, half-expecting him to change his mind, but he didn’t reappear. She heard him unlock the door to his room. The adrenaline of her midnight encounter wearing off, a wide range of emotions settled over her: surprise, mainly, but also relief and gratitude. She wished she had articulated herself better.
“Thank you, Bakugou,” she said quietly. The only response was the sound of his bedroom door shutting.