Chapter Text
Bakugou had no idea what the fuck was going on.
Last week, after walking home from patrols, Uraraka had said ‘you can forget about those apartment listings’ so nonchalantly that he’d almost tripped over the uneven sidewalk. He’d just stared at her. Because honestly, what the fuck. Bakugou had been looking into apartments even before she’d thrown those listings across his bedroom—wait no, not his bedroom, it was still hers—because it wasn’t like he could just move in. Already. Or at all. That was a lot… right? Fuck, he didn’t really know. He’d never actually dated anyone before.
Uraraka was a walking whirlwind of weird and unpredictable and it was annoying because she had always been able to do that kind of stuff. Just throw him a curveball when he least expected it. It had been one of the things he’d always, albeit begrudgingly, loved.
Although he really had to admit that it sort of pissed him off this time. Everything had turned around to benefit him, which he normally liked, but there was still some weird shit floating around that the two of them hadn’t really talked about. Her apparent indifference was grating on him. Indifference might not have been the right word… not when she wore every emotion plainly on her face at every turn. The issue was that he wasn’t great at reading them. And Uraraka had a tendency to hold everything in until she exploded.
They started dating and Uraraka seemed happy enough with letting bygones be bygones, which he might have also been happy with if it didn’t make him feel like the scummiest hero to ever walk the streets. And a shitty boyfriend. He was fucking everything up already.
He knew he was lucky.
He knew for a fact that he should have been out on his ass the moment he’d fucked with her about her virginity, but she’d just let him wander back to bed. Then again after he’d practically attacked her after pumping her full of alcohol. He’d meant what he told her about getting carried away even if it was a shitty ass excuse, because Uraraka, the girl he’d found himself inexplicitly pining over for years, like some sappy asshole, had practically spouted a confession on him and no part of him had been prepared for that shit.
Even if none of that had pushed her far enough to the edge, the shit with Reika should have been his nail in the coffin.
He knew that.
Even with his temper, he’d accepted her notice to vacate, because he’d crossed a line he hadn’t even realized was there until he was so far over the border that there was no way to backtrack.
Maybe he’d even wanted her to kick him out.
He was self-aware enough to know he deserved it but Uraraka was too selfless. She could probably stand to be a little more selfish.
Being around her all the time at work and at home had been near unbearable. Seeing her so comfortable around him, emerging from her room on their days off at noon looking like a goblin and giving him a sleepy smile, pouring way too much cream and sugar into her coffee, always trying to cook him dinner even though she was an undeniably bad cook, acting like being around him was just so natural and normal and comfortable…
It yanked at all that shit he’d tried really, really hard to forget. For years. For fucking years he’d pushed that shit away because it was a brutal fight he never thought he could win. It was a loss he didn’t want under his belt.
Being partnered up with her by their agency had felt like a cruel joke.
Like the universe was laughing at him.
But he’d kept it in check, he had to, because there was no fucking way some crush from when he was fifteen was still following him around. Absolutely no way. But apparently, he was actually a pathetic, sniveling, love-drunk fool because she just had to keep being so disgustingly perfect all the damn time. With that stupid smile that gave the sunrise a run for its money and kept his stomach in a vice grip. With the way her chestnut hair floated around her face in zero gravity. Those round, pink tinted cheeks, always scrunching up under her eyes or puffing out when she was angry or focused or embarrassed. That way her eyes just fucking burned in the middle of a fight, overflowing with determination, seeking victory and fucking finding it because she knew she could; she was capable, and she was just so much more than she realized, so much stronger than she gave herself credit for, braver than she’d ever believe. How distractingly sexy she was without even fucking realizing it, in her stupid skin-tight hero garb or in those ratty gym shorts she always wore that he recognized from their days in the dorms.
Ugh.
Bakugou wasn’t stupid. He’d known, years ago, after she’d tried to drop an entire arena on his head when they were kids, that he was in deep shit. People didn’t often get the drop on him. He wasn’t an easy guy to trick. But she’d done it, even though he was the one who had emerged victorious. A second later and he would have been done for. And that was all it took to get his attention.
Obviously though, the universe was still a dick, and of all the people that had to catch his attention, it was her. Uraraka. Deku’s little fangirl. The girl that only looked his way to give him disapproving scowls when he yelled at the green-haired mop. The girl who followed Deku around like he was some blinding beacon of light. The girl who wouldn’t give him the time of day.
Things went sour after that, what with the League of Villains trying to convert him, All Might’s retirement, finding out that Deku, the one person who always managed to make him feel inferior, had inherited the greatest responsibility of all.
After all that, Uraraka had just… fallen into the list of unattainable things. Things he wasn’t good enough for. Battles he’d never win.
So, he’d pushed her aside and tried to ignore how her laugh always brightened up the room. He tried to tell himself that he was watching her during class or at the gym because she always looked so fucking ridiculous. He told himself that he watched her matches in the Sports Festival during their second and third years because he was trying to be more proactive about figuring out his classmates’ quirks and tactics. He pretended like he wasn’t proud as fuck—because, really, he had no right to be—whenever she won a sparring match or came out on top after a fight.
At some point, he’d decided to label his stupid, teenage obsession with her as: ‘fascination’, rather than the pathetic crush it was. Kirishima hadn’t bought it though and Mina had straight up laughed in his fucking face before he’d chased her out of his dorm room with a few explosions. And, apparently, they’d never forgotten because one of those fucking assholes had outed him. His money was on Kirishima. That dickhead had no filter. At least Mina knew how to keep secrets.
Sometime during their third year at UA, he’d decided it was bullshit.
He’d resigned himself to just asking her out. Not because he thought she’d say yes. Not because it would make him better than Deku. Not because it pushed him any closer to being number one. Just because he couldn’t fucking take it anymore. He’d thought if he just put it out there and took the loss, he’d be able to move along and stop caring.
But Bakugou either had the worst timing in the history of the god damn world, or the universe really, truly had it out for him, because he’d hunted her down after school just to almost barge in on her stupid fucking Deku confession behind the gym.
And that was that. He’d walked away, he hadn’t bothered eavesdropping on the response.
There had been no point in saying anything.
It was an easier rejection, anyway. Just another way Deku had managed to outshine him over the years. It hadn’t really occurred to him for a while after that the two of them never started dating post confession, because they were basically glued at the hip regardless with that Four-Eyed weirdo.
So, Bakugou just buried himself in everything else, convinced himself that she’d basically rejected him because she obviously loved the nerd, she didn’t see him. Not in the way he saw her. So, their third year at UA came to a close, they all graduated, their class signed on with different agencies, and Bakugou and moved on.
Or… well, he tried to.
And he’d managed to completely wipe that round-faced girl from his mind for a while.
Being a pro, especially with all the coverage he’d received in high school, made shit easy despite still being new on the scene. His first few months as a professional hero were filled with one-night stands, casual hookups, drinking with his friends after a particularly grueling day of patrols. Uraraka never even crossed his mind. Because why the fuck would she, he was completely over it. At some point Bakugou even convinced himself that there hadn’t even been anything to get over, because he wasn’t into that weird, mushy boyfriend shit anyway. He hadn’t even been that into her anyway. Telling himself lies was way fucking easier than the alternative.
Then one day, the patrol schedule came out and revealed his partner for the week. It was always such a chore; he preferred his solo patrols. But whatever. It was just a week with someone he wouldn’t bother learning the name of. Just a week of showing someone up. They were always good at making him look even better by comparison. But it was god damn Uravity.
He’d been floored. Not because just seeing her name printed next to his made his memories resurface and his heart jump into his fucking throat, definitely not, but because he hadn’t even known she was there. Working at the same agency. He’d never seen her name on the schedules before that day—not that he ever really looked at anyone’s name but his own. How had he not seen her? Were they working opposite shifts? Had she known? If she did, why hadn’t she said anything?
But it was whatever. He was over his high school fascination. Bakugou would show her ass up, just like he’d done with everyone else. Easy. Fucking perfect actually. Because then he could show her what a dunce she was for never looking at him the way she’d always looked at Deku.
Then, on the third day of awkward, silent patrols with that dumb girl, they’d completely fucking demolished some asshole that called himself Bulldozer. Even thinking back on it now, Bakugou was still surprised how well they’d handled it. They hadn’t even spoken to one another, largely at his insistence, but when the villain kept ripping out chunks of concrete and throwing it all around the city block like confetti, it was like they’d both had the same idea at the same time. Uraraka had just looked at him, eyes frantic but determined, and he’d just thrown her zero-gravity ass in the air in response. Because he just knew what she was thinking, and she trusted him so completely, so fucking blindly. It was like they’d been reading each other’s minds.
She’d maneuvered around in the sky, tapping all the bits of concrete that Bakugou shattered with explosions when the villain chucked it at him. Then he blew the bastard right into her line of fire and watched as she pressed her fingers together and sent a meteor shower raining down on him.
Really, she’d completely won the fight, and it should have pissed him off to share the glory, but it didn’t. It couldn’t.
The agency had made them permanent partners soon after that.
Bakugou hadn’t even argued. That connection they’d shared in the moment had been… something. They had some unfortunate chemistry in battle, but he wasn’t even pissed about it. He’d even wondered if that chemistry went beyond beating the shit out of villains before he caught himself.
But it hadn’t changed anything. Even after months of working together, even though Bakugou found himself constantly beaming with pride whenever she kicked ass, even though she was way too amazing, nothing had changed. He was still totally, completely fucking over it. And she still didn’t see him.
So, months passed and Bakugou kept up with everything else. Even after she offered him her spare room. Because why the fuck wouldn’t he? He wasn’t still hung up on high school. He didn’t like Uraraka like that. She was just his coworker turned partner and temporary roommate. Although he knew he definitely couldn’t tell Kirishima about it. Or Mina. They’d read way too far into it. He’d figured it’d be easier to just ignore them until he found a new place. It wasn’t out of the ordinary for him to go a few weeks without checking in, anyway. And he didn’t feel like dealing with their shit. He didn’t need another voice in his head reminding him of everything he’d been trying to forget.
Initially, Bakugou hadn’t thought too far into the fact that the only thing separating him and Uraraka were paper-thin walls. She’d said to make himself at home while he was staying with her. She hadn’t set any rules about… well, anything, really. But definitely not about sex. Plus, Uraraka slept like a fucking log. He didn’t think she’d hear him and whoever he brought over always left before morning, so it didn’t seem like a big deal. Even when some of them were a little too loud, he just assumed she’d fucking say something.
A few days in though, Bakugou had an inkling that things were a little awkward between them and he’d wondered if maybe, she had been listening... But there was no way. Uraraka could be timid but she didn’t have an issue speaking her mind with him. At least not when he managed to really piss her off.
There was a part of him that kinda hoped she was though. Listening. It became this horrible, exciting fantasy in his brain. So, whatever, he wasn’t quite as over it as he thought. Didn’t change anything.
However, when it turned out that it wasn’t just a fantasy, that not only had Uraraka heard everything, but he’d actually woken her up at night, he immediately felt guilty. Not that he would ever admit it. It was all well and good in his head, but in reality, it just made him a dick. And he decided that Reika and the others could fuck off until he got his own place again. He liked doing what he wanted but he wasn’t gonna mess with her sleep schedule or whatever. He wasn’t that much of an asshole. Most of the time.
He wasn’t sure why he’d invited her to drink with him that night they took in all those villains with the insignia. He knew he should have just gone out or gone back to the apartment before her but… when the idea had popped into his head, he couldn’t shake it out. So, he just did it because he wanted to. As it turned out though, he was way too impulsive for his own good, and shit had spiraled out of control before he could even get a handle on himself.
Somewhere in the middle of their grind fest, reality hit him like a god damn freight train. He was absolutely fucking positive that he was the shittiest hero that ever lived—heroes didn’t pressure people into drinking. Heroes didn’t just start making out with someone just because they said some shit that suggested they might have feelings for someone. For fuck’s sake, it wasn’t even just heroes! He’d felt like the shittiest man of all time. Shittiest human? Whatever. He’d felt like shit.
And she was special, even though she wasn’t supposed to be. Being an asshole was one thing but being an asshole that took advantage of the stupid, amazing, round-faced girl he loved was something else entirely.
He’d wanted her to be angry. He wanted her to kick him out on his ass right then and there. He wanted her to say she’d never forgive him. He wanted her to call the agency and refuse to work with him anymore. But instead she was just… fucking sad. He’d seen the tears welling up in her eyes and he’d heard her voice break—
“Right. It was a mistake.”
Bakugou had no idea what the fuck he was supposed to do after that. He hated being uncertain, he hated feeling like he was lost, because god damn it, he was supposed to be the best. At fucking everything. He was supposed to be number one.
Calling Reika had been a whim.
Admittedly, with hindsight, a shitty one.
But if he called her, she’d show up. He was confident in that. He knew she’d come, and she’d put her mouth around his dick if he asked—or if he didn’t—and then she’d just be on her fucking way. He was so certain about that and so unsure about everything else. So, he called. Not because he wanted Reika, but because he didn’t, and it was pathetically obvious that he had no control over how he felt for Uraraka and he hated it. He just fucking needed to take back some control. That was the comfortable bubble he lived in. Control meant safety and certainty.
After all, there was no way he could even face Uraraka after everything; who knew what she’d say? What she would do? Bakugou had spent so much time attaching the word unattainable to Uraraka that telling her how he felt hadn’t even crossed his mind. Loving her was stupid. She’d just spouted some drunk nonsense. She’d only kissed him back because she wasn’t in the right state of mind. The Uraraka he knew didn’t fucking like him like that. She never had. She’d never seen him.
“I know that you’re more important to me than I ever thought you’d be…”
But… he’d been wrong.
That was a weird twist from the universe. A welcome twist, for sure, but still almost unbelievable after everything. Apparently, some instances of being wrong weren’t all bad.
But just because she’d kissed him back last week, just because she’d let him put his hands down her panties and had somehow given him the best handjob of his fucking life and he came faster than a horny fucking teenager, just because she’d agreed to his half-assed attempt at asking her out… it didn’t mean she was head over heels in love with him or anything. She liked him, at least enough for all that. Or, at the very least, she was curious.
That was fine for now. Sort of.
If he was being honest, he had absolutely no fucking idea how everything had ended up the way it had. It had already been a week and he was still reeling. Seriously. It was completely, unbelievably, batshit insane. Sure, the fact that he was dating anyone was wild enough, but the fact that it was Uraraka was… crazy. It was just fucking crazy. He couldn’t think of another word for it.
Still, there was still the matter of… everything else. Like Uraraka telling him to forget about the two weeks notice to get the fuck out of her apartment. What the hell did that mean? She hadn’t even brought up the Reika thing once in eight days. Eight. Actually, she hadn’t brought up anything that related to his fuck buddies even though that shit was kind of what spurred all this on in the first place. Even though they were dating now.
Bakugou obviously had no intention of contacting any of them. He’d already deleted their numbers. He was all in. There was no point in doing anything if he was gonna half-ass it. Besides, it was her. He’d spent so long fantasizing about her that he’d rather let himself get exploded into a million tiny pieces than call them.
The issue was that he thought that she’d say something. To like. Confirm that. Or some shit. Or maybe she just assumed that was a given.
He didn’t know, but it pissed him off anyway. Because it felt like either she wasn’t taking this seriously or she just assumed that he wasn’t.
“Uh… Bakugou?” Uraraka’s voice cut through the rattling of his brain and he jumped, only slightly irked at the little grin that lifted her cheeks like all this turmoil wasn’t her fault for being way too fucking distracting.
She was leaning over his desk, clad in her hero suit minus the hefty gauntlets and headpiece, with her hands tucked behind her back.
Oh right. They were still working.
Bakugou glanced down at the paperwork, still scarcely filled in, and frowned. Now he was zoning the fuck out at work because of all this shit. He should probably talk to her at some point. He just didn’t know how the hell to do that, and that only served to fill his brain with foggy frustration.
Bakugou leaned back with a groan and stretched his hands behind his head, “What is it, Round-face?”
“Detective Tsukauchi is coming by soon,” She responded with too much enthusiasm for the late hour, “They’re finally finished with the interrogations!”
He shot to his feet, blinking away the lightheadedness. He’d been sitting stagnant for way too long. Paperwork was a nightmare. “Fucking finally! They’ve been dragging their asses with that shit.”
Uraraka shrugged and leaned against his desk, crossing her arms and furrowing her brow as she spoke, “I think it has more to do with the weird… circumstances.”
Both the villains they’d apprehended at the warehouse had been in custody for a week now along with the one that had been responsible for the attack on the office building and convenience store, but the agency had been largely in the dark since their arrest.
Bakugou had all three of their files on his desk, but most of the information was outdated and from what he and Uraraka had been able to find in the days since, absolutely nothing linked them together. They were from all over Japan, they all had different motives, and they didn’t share any affiliations with any known villain groups. The fact that they were all apprehended at the same time, in their jurisdiction, obviously involved in the same coordinated attack made absolutely no fucking sense.
It had been eating away at Uraraka, even though she rarely talked about it at home or at work. Her run in with Haunter had apparently been more talkative, whereas that knife bitch just leaped onto him like a wild fucking animal. She’d been too focused on trying to slice the tendons in his legs to bother with small talk, which was fine by him, but it left them far less informed in the long run.
“I wonder if they got anything substantial…” Uraraka grumbled, glaring off into nothing.
“Well, we know it’s connected to that huge group from a few weeks ago,” He offered, suddenly impatient all over again. It had been bothering him too. Everything hinted at the rise of some new organization. But there hadn’t been any reports of that stupid insignia outside of their patrol zone so, it was likely based somewhere nearby.
Bakugou couldn’t help but frown at the thought. Whoever had to balls to start shit in his jurisdiction was either insanely strong or monstrously stupid. Or both. It didn’t really matter though. Didn’t change the fact that they’d figure it out and beat the life out of them. Make them regret it.
“Mm,” She hummed, tapping her bottom lip with her index finger, deep in thought.
It was hard not to stare. It was like she was asking to be ravaged on this fucking desk looking like that. Working with her after seeing her eyes roll back in her head when she came on his hand, after knowing what she felt like, after hearing her normal, chipper voice raw with need, knowing she could beg… It was going to require way too much fucking self-control.
Her eyes flared to life as she whipped her head around to look at him and a giant grin tugged on her pink cheeks, “It’ll be fine, you know, with Zero-Gravity on the case!” The laugh she let out was unfair. They were in public. He very well couldn’t just kiss her right here—even though it was late, the office was still relatively full, and they hadn’t gone public with anything yet. The only thing that kept his feet where they were was that dumbass name. Honestly, those vulturous media outlets couldn’t come up with something better than that? Ridiculous.
Bakugou just rolled his eyes and slumped back into his chair, trying—rather unsuccessfully—to shove away the memories that threatened to get him hard in his hero garb, “So when’s that asshole supposed to get here, anyway?” He glanced at the clock on the far wall then back at his paperwork.
“Within the hour, I think. He offered to come by in the morning but…” She shrugged, “I wanted some answers tonight. I figured you would too after all this waiting.”
Bakugou nodded, “I’ve gotta finish this shit and you look like you’re about to fall over, go make yourself some coffee or something.” He pulled himself back to the desk and resisted the urge to groan. Paperwork really was the worst part of this hero shit. At least once he was sitting at the top, he’d have a fuck ton of sidekicks to do this shit for him.
She sighed and pushed herself back to her feet, shooting him a soft smile before making a beeline for the break room.
He stared after her until she disappeared around the corner. It was almost annoying that she could act so calm around him at work, like nothing between them had changed. Obviously, their hero work came first and foremost, for both of them, but it was still a little grating. Bakugou always found himself watching her during their downtime, which definitely meant she was too god damn distracting, but she didn’t seem to have any issue at all.
Whatever. He had to finish this report from their patrols today or they’d be stuck here even longer after their debrief with detective wide-eyes. He’d have her to himself soon enough.
An hour later, Tsukauchi arrived and Uraraka escorted him into one of the empty conference rooms. Bakugou followed behind a few minutes later after grabbing his own cup of coffee, the files on the villains, and an extra notepad.
Normally, he wouldn’t have bothered with notes or the coffee, but he was too damn tired to trust himself to commit everything to memory right now. Even his reluctance to have a dependency on caffeine seemed stupid right now. It was well after midnight at this point and they were gonna have to be back at the agency in less than 8 hours.
A year later and they were still working the newbie hours. He might have spent a few minutes stewing over it if he weren’t so fucking exhausted.
Detective Tsukauchi was smiling when he pushed the door to the conference room open, “Good evening, Ground Zero. Or good morning,” He chuckled, far too cheery for Bakugou’s liking, “We’ve got a bit to unpack here.”
Bakugou just grunted in response and ignored Uraraka’s scowl, but wide-eyes didn’t seem to notice or care as he pulled a hefty file from his damp trench coat and dove right in before Bakugou even sat down.
“First things first: the insignia. It definitely matches the lackies you two apprehended on the first of the month. But none of them had the mutilation like Yoshizawa Taketo. After examining the woman from the warehouse, Suzuki Hinata—Knives—we discovered that she had an identical marking, though it was a hypertrophic scar by this point. The doctor determined it was at least a year old, but it was in the same spot. On her forearm.” He slid two photos over to them, first Haunter, then Knives, and Bakugou scrunched his nose. It hadn’t been healed by any quirk or modern medicine by the look of it.
Tsukauchi slid a third photo over to them and Uraraka squirmed in her seat, “This was the third villain that was taken into custody at the office building, Ueda Fumihiro,” He said, “The same insignia carved into their flesh in the same spot. The examination suggested it was inflicted that day, maybe a few hours before the bomb went off."
Bakugou stared at it, half fascinated, half disgusted. You could see the muscle underneath and the stretching tendons that went to the wrist, but the cuts were clean, no signs of struggle at the edges. And obviously, none of these assholes had bled out. So… some sort of anesthesia and, probably, some kind of medical training…
“This is the examiner’s report,” the detective said, handing a folder to Uraraka, “All the gory details are in there, although I’m not sure how beneficial they’ll be. Aside from the mutilation, they all seem to be in good health. Physically, at least.”
“Alright, they’re connected by some gross scarification shit,” Bakugou barked, tearing his eyes away from the photograph to glower at the detective. Sure, the mark was gross and weird, but it just cemented what they already knew. These assholes were connected beyond the explosions. That wasn’t answers. “But what the fuck did they say?”
Tsukauchi frowned, although Bakugou wasn’t sure if it was directed at him or the case itself, “None of them were particularly talkative. We recorded their interviews but…” His eyes shot between him and Uraraka uneasily and Bakugou felt himself tense before the man sighed, “Yoshizawa had quite a bit to say about Uravity. He seems to be a… fan.”
She tilted her head to the side far too innocently, “What do you mean?”
The man cleared his throat uncomfortably and just pulled a small USB from his breast pocket, “I’d rather not repeat anything, to be honest. There’s a transcript in the file and we have the video footage on this.” He pushed the small device toward them with far too much hesitation.
She straightened up in her chair and placed her arms on the table defensively, “Should I be worried?” Bakugou just clicked his tongue in response. Of fucking course, she should be worried. Some disgusting asshole was saying shit about her that made the god damn veteran police detective wary.
However, the detective just shook his head and gave her a gentle smile, “I wouldn’t focus on that aspect. He’s under armed guard and he’s restrained 24 hours a day. Nothing he said was particularly threatening, just… unpleasant.” Uraraka relaxed a little at his words and Bakugou resisted the urge to roll his eyes. She could be so weird about the strangest things. It made her more comfortable to know some slimy bastard was saying nasty shit about her rather than threatening her life?
Bakugou was boiling. This little session wasn’t helpful at all. “Did we learn anything about whoever fucking planned it?” He hissed, “Ochako said that shit in her report—”
“I was talking to someone else,” Uraraka interjected in agreement, letting her chestnut eyes flicker between the two of them before nodding, “I think he was speaking through Yoshizawa, with a quirk.”
“We already checked the files that we have on hand in the office. The only fucker with a quirk even close to that is Haunter himself,” Bakugou finished, rubbing his temples. They’d spent hours scouring known villain files over the past week, searching for anything even remotely close but had come up totally empty, “And you guys have the whole database down at the station,” He hadn’t meant for his voice to sound so accusatory, but the clock was fucking ticking.
Uraraka shot him a sharp look that he purposely ignored.
“We have a team searching through it,” Tsukauchi responded flatly, “Quirks of that nature are extremely rare, Ground Zero. The doctors think it’s more likely that he has a mental disorder. We’re waiting for the doctor to arrive from Tokyo for the psych eval—”
“No,” Uraraka said quickly, “I’m positive. There was a quirk in play.”
Detective Tsukauchi sighed and glanced at his watch as he stifled a yawn, “I can grant you both access to the database by Monday, if you’d like to assist the police team in their search, but you’ll have to come to the station,” He opened the thick file before him, “There’s one last piece of information that we received from Ueda. If you believe there was a fourth quirk in play during the attack, it makes his ramblings a bit more credible, but he was the most difficult to interrogate because of the… nature of his quirk. He was pretty heavily sedated the entire time.”
“That’s the kid,” Bakugou grumbled, clicking his pen against the notepad, “Killer Comedian.”
Uraraka gave him a strange look and twisted her mouth into a tight frown that tugged at the knot in his stomach that had formed when he’d read through the kids file a few days ago.
Ueda Fumihiro. Age sixteen. Code name: Killer Comedian.
He was the one they were the most unsure of. He was the youngest out of anyone that had been apprehended since all of this began and, unfortunately, the one with the most dangerous quirk. The logistics of his quirk, Killer Joke, were fucking murky at best but they’d discovered it when he was five years old, told a joke to his father, and accidentally ended his life. From that moment onward, he was separated from his family and taken out of his pre-school. He’d lived a life of isolation until he escaped from the facility he was being housed at two years ago, leaving a trail of bodies in his wake.
When Bakugou had gone through the file, he’d found himself thinking that there was no other path this kid could have gone on—with a quirk that could kill someone with a few words, you had to be a villain. It’s not like he could have been a hero, anyway. Killing was something that happened. Sometimes. Usually on accident, but always as a last resort if it couldn’t be avoided. It wasn’t exactly in the job description.
His stomach twisted again and wiped the excess sweat from his palms onto his pants. He’d hated himself for thinking it—he hated himself for thinking it again right now. That villainy was inevitable.
Tsukauchi continued but Bakugou felt Uraraka’s eyes on him again.
“We’ve commissioned a device to alter his voice so we can try the questioning again when he’s lucid,” He sighed and glanced down at his watch again, as if to signal that the debriefing was nearly over, “It should be ready tomorrow morning.”
Bakugou clicked his tongue and then the pen impatiently against his notepad, “Fuck, what did he say, then?”
The detective sighed, obviously annoyed, but apparently not enough to speak up about it. He’d dealt with Bakugou’s mouth plenty of times at this point, along with Uraraka’s incessant apologies on his behalf, and he’d never really seemed the type to be easily riled, much to Bakugou’s annoyance. Maybe if the cop reacted at some point, Bakugou would consider being less mouthy. Maybe.
“The exact wording is in the transcript, but he kept talking about ‘The Reaper’. We assumed it was a metaphor for death, but if you’re positive that you were speaking to someone through Yoshizawa,” He turned his eyes towards Uraraka, who shifted in her seat, eyes gleaming in anxious impatience, “Then it’s best we consider that to be the code name of an unknown accomplice.”
“Or mastermind…” Uraraka breathed, all traces of exhaustion gone from her expression.
After a few more exchanges and an overly polite bow, the detective left them with their mountains of new evidence and a million more questions that only served to tangle the web even further.
They left the office and silently made their way back to her apartment less than an hour later.
Uraraka walked a few steps ahead of him, brows pulled together in an admittedly adorable scowl, but Bakugou pushed the thought aside and found himself wondering how the hell he was supposed to talk to her about their dating bullshit with this threat looming overhead.
It seemed trivial after that meeting with Tsukauchi.
Realistically, it was trivial in the grand scheme of all this.
Even Uraraka, who was typically a nonstop source of noise and conversation, was quiet in the aftermath. The problem was that they’d have to spend hours scouring the information wide-eyes had given them before next week and their patrols didn’t give them much extra time at the agency to get it done. Which meant the precious few hours they had at her apartment were about to be plagued with more work.
At least that would probably give Bakugou more time to figure out how to bring up some of the shit he knew they had to talk about.
It wasn’t like Bakugou didn’t understand communication—he knew it was important. He wasn’t an idiot. It mattered in hero work and in everyday life with his friends, and his parents, and Uraraka. He understood that staying silent usually just fucked shit up. He knew it. But he really, really hated talking. And just because he knew it mattered didn’t make him any god damn better at it. Half the time, the thought made him feel physically ill, and the other half it made him feel like a total moron. Talking wasn’t supposed to be difficult, and when he struggled to find the right words or the right explanations, and failed, he always found himself thinking that it didn’t feel like a loss if he just kept his mouth shut instead.
When Uraraka pushed the door to her apartment open and stepped through the threshold she deflated. Her shoulders slumped and rolled forward, her chin fell to her chest, she dropped her duffel bag onto the old, warped wood and kicked it towards the couch, and then just sighed as she ran her fingers through her puffy, tangled hair.
This case was hitting her harder than Bakugou had been expecting. Sure, he was wound up too. There were some freaky scarification assholes wreaking havoc on their domain, after all. But hero work was the one thing she never seemed to overthink—if anything, Bakugou had learned that it was her outlet to stop overthinking everything else.
“Don’t worry about it right now,” Bakugou heard himself saying as he moved past her, almost surprised that he felt the urge to comfort her, “Whoever this fucker is doesn’t matter. We’ll figure this shit out and shut it down.” He shrugged and tried his hardest to stop the automatic grin that tugged at his mouth when he turned to face her and she gave him that soft, genuine, goofy smile that scrunched her pink cheeks. He almost felt like he didn’t deserve it—he was just stating the obvious, anyway.
His chest clenched without his permission and holy fuck this girl was turning him dumb. Like the people he used to make fun of, all the love-drunk idiots and horny teenagers. But it wasn’t bad. Not really. If he was being perfectly honest, he liked it probably just as much as it terrified him. He couldn’t even remember when he’d started thinking that smile was that pretty. It felt like special treatment, even though he knew she smiled all the time. They were alone—that smile was for him.
Bakugou suppressed a groan at his own inner monologue and luckily Uraraka took his lull as her cue to talk, effectively distracting him.
“Yeah… you’re right,” She murmured, nodding quickly, doing that cute fucking thing where she tucked her long strands of hair behind her ears, “I, uh… I’m gonna get in the shower before bed, so...”
Bakugou grunted in affirmation and began making his way back to the bedroom, vaguely aware that she hadn’t moved from the entryway despite her declaration. Even after he retreated further into the room and dug for some clean clothes in his suitcase that he’d opted to keep using instead of the dresser in the corner and made his way back to the door to close it to change, she was still standing there.
He stared and swallowed hard as he studied her.
She wasn’t looking at him. Instead, it looked like she was trying to will away the floor under her feet with how hard she was staring, wide-eyed, lips pressed together in a taught line. For a second, he wondered if he’d pissed her off. But she didn’t look angry—although a furious, flaring Ochako had a tendency to send an embarrassing amount of his blood downward and saying it wasn’t hot as fuck was basically equivalent to saying he didn’t need air to breathe.
No, she wasn’t angry. She was flushed from the tips of her ears down to her exposed collarbones peeking from too-large sweatshirt that hung off her shoulder. Being exhausted apparently made him totally oblivious too. Shower. She was getting in the shower. And she was waiting.
It was an invitation.
Honestly, this woman was trying to pull him away from every ounce of self-control he’d managed to hold onto this past week.
Fuck.
Bakugou wanted to accept. He really, really fucking did. He’d imagined it plenty of times since he’d started staying with her—what she’d look like under the cascading water, how her chestnut hair would look slicked back from her face, how it might stick to her neck, how he’d touch her in the blinding florescent lights, taking in every bit, imagining where he could pin her against the wall, listening to the noises she made, how they’d echo—but that was actually exactly the fucking problem.
They’d starting dating a week ago but aside from that first day, there hadn’t been much else to report. A few more fully clothed grope-fests, more kissing than Bakugou had probably ever done with any one person. Uraraka had gotten exceptionally better at handling his dick with little to no instruction. She loved to look at him while she did it, he’d learned, and there was something fucking thrilling about the way she watched. Bakugou hadn’t progressed to anything beyond fucking her with his fingers—partly because he couldn’t believe she could get so blissed out from just that, but mostly because he really didn’t want to fuck this up.
Not sleeping with Uraraka was his current goal—not because he didn’t want to, because fuck he wanted to—but because he knew every bit of this was new for her. She’d never even kissed anyone before he’d taught her how. Sleeping with her after a week didn’t really feel right. Besides, Uraraka struck him as a woman who valued her virginity with some sentimentality; the idea of her regretting losing it to him was fucking disgusting and, if possible, he was gonna avoid that outcome at all costs.
Bakugou tried, much harder than he’d ever admit, to ignore just how sappy and lame all of that sounded in his head. He wasn’t very successful.
He exhaled through his teeth and opted for obliviousness, “Bathroom’s back there, Round-face.”
Uraraka peeked up at him, through thick lashes and hesitant lids. He couldn’t help but stare at the way her neck—florid and exposed—tensed as she swallowed. This was Bakugou’s nightmare.
“Don’t you… well, you have to shower too, right?”
Fuck. Uraraka might as well have been a fucking temptress.
How did she manage to look so disgustingly amazing even now, in an old, tattered pair of sweatpants that were at least two sizes too big with that loose men’s tank-top she had stuffed under that hoodie? She didn’t even wear real bras, for crying out loud. Her chest was always stuffed into a sports bra and she owned literally nothing that could be considered even remotely sexy by societal standards. But the way she tilted her head to the side and looked at him through those big fucking eyes and those stupidly long lashes… the way she tucked her hair behind her ears when she was nervous or embarrassed and chewed on her bottom lip or curled herself against his chest and gripped at his shirt when she slept… the way she just looked at him. All the time. In the morning, through sleepy eyes. At work, shimmering with that fierce fucking fire. In bed, all unwound and hungry and desperate…
Fuck.
“We’ve been up for like 20 fucking hours,” He muttered, walking back into the bedroom, ignoring the weight of her gaze on his back, “What I have to do is go the hell to sleep.”
This was evil. A cruel, vindictive move by the universe, like he had to suffer to make up for everything he’d ever done wrong in his entire life. Rejecting advances from anyone wasn’t exactly in his repertoire and rejecting Uraraka felt like drowning. He was drowning in the god damn ocean and someone was throwing him one of those fucking rescue buoys and he was ignoring it and choosing to sink deeper under the surf instead. It went against the most basic of instincts. And it was complete bullshit—
Why was he doing this again?
“Right,” Her voice was quieter this time. He could hear that he’d hurt her. Why the fuck was he so good at that? Why did he keep doing that? “Okay.”
That night, they slept in their respective beds for the first time in a week.
When he woke up late for work that morning, she wasn’t home. And then she wasn’t at the office when he arrived. They’d just said something about Uravity getting called to the police station, but he ignored them because all he could think about was that she hadn’t woken him up and told him or invited him to join her. And then he patrolled the streets alone, texting her enough to be annoying, and then getting progressively more pissed off as the hours passed and he received no reply.
Bakugou didn’t mean to get so angry. He knew he’d probably upset her the night before—no. That wasn’t right. He knew he’d hurt her. He’d been trying to. Because he’d made a promise to himself to take shit slow and not fuck this up, but she’d invited him into the god damn shower, obviously intent of destroying any semblance of his already withering self-control and he’d fucked up anyway. He knew he fucked up as soon as he heard her shuffling around the living room after her shower, when he heard her footsteps outside his door before she walked away, and again when he heard her bedroom door close.
God, he felt like such a fuck up.
They needed to talk. He knew they needed to talk. And they would… eventually…
No—tonight. He’d make dinner or some shit and they’d talk. About the living arrangements, about Reika and the rest, about what why he’d rejected her invitation, about what she wanted.
Now, if she’d just fucking text him back.
Bakugou readjusted the mask on his face as he pushed himself forward on the sidewalk.
Some people waved at him when he passed by but most everyone knew by now that he wasn’t gonna wave back. They knew he’d reject their requests for photos and say something about how he was on the job, that is if he didn’t ignore them altogether. It was awkward and he hated it. But it was even more uncomfortable when Uraraka wasn’t walking next to him to smile or greet them on his behalf—she was a lot better than him for that kind of shit. He really didn’t know how to deal with it; he didn’t like being treated like some kind of celebrity. He wanted to be number one to prove he was the best, not to have people showering him with weird amounts of attention and then chastising him on the internet for being ‘unapproachable’.
So, he usually ignored people when they called his name on the street.
Which was why he wasn’t sure why he’d turned around when some girl yelled “Ground Zero!” from across the street. She was waving her phone frantically in her hand, but she was grinning something fierce, so there probably wasn’t trouble. After it was clear she’d gotten his attention, she darted through traffic and stopped in front of him, waving her hand dismissively before he could even open his mouth for a good scolding.
“I wanted to congratulate Uravity on the arrest!” The girl beamed, smoothing out her uniform skirt, “Could you tell her thank you for me? My father is an officer at the station and… well, if she and Deku hadn’t been there, it would have been really scary!”
Bakugou felt himself frowning. The police station. An arrest. Something scary. Deku.
If she was perturbed by his lack of response or the look on his face, the girl didn’t show it, “My name is Nakatomi Megumi, please tell Uravity that I-I’m her biggest fan!” She bowed so quickly that Bakugou had to take a step back before her head could whack his gauntlet, “And! I-I’ll be watching her climb to the top!”
The girl darted back across the street again, this time once the light turned red, and returned to her friends before Bakugou could respond one way or another.
The police station. An arrest. Something scary. Deku.
A hero pulling out their phone on patrol, in public, wasn’t technically forbidden, but it was frowned upon. There were countless articles online with pictures of different pros, phones in hand, accompanied by captions about their lack of professionalism and tons of other bullshit that didn’t matter because those journalist weren’t out there beating assholes to a pulp to protect the public. But Bakugou didn’t even bother thinking about who might be watching him with a camera as he pulled his phone from his pocket and searched for the arrest the girl gushed over.
It didn’t take long—namely because several news stations had already picked up the story and it was plastered all over the internet already—and Bakugou skimmed the words, trying way too fucking hard to swallow his anger.
There had been an incident at the station late that morning, during an additional interrogation of Haunter. Uravity had been there at the request of the lead detective, Tsukauchi Naomasa. Pro hero Deku had been there on unrelated business. Shit apparently went straight to hell because the station went into lockdown to apprehend escaped villain, Killer Comedian. Uravity engaged, her and Deku apprehended him. In the press photos, her bright, wide-eyed face was bruised and bleeding and radiant and—
Bakugou frowned as his eyes landed on the last photo in the slideshow.
It was fairly grainy, obviously taken from somewhere across the street, but clear enough to tug on the burning jealousy that had pooled in the pit of his stomach. Uraraka and Deku were crouched on the roof of the station, her back mostly facing the camera and Deku’s stupid, freckled face way too fucking close to hers. With that giant smile that always found its way to his face when he was nervous. Their hands were woven together, fingers tangled, blood had darkened the hair on the side of her head.
Pro Heroes Deku (right) and Uravity (left) embrace in the midst of battle.
One voice, sounding faintly like Kirishima, sounded off somewhere in his brain. Calm down, it said, don’t freak out. And it was right—it was right, and he knew it. Uraraka and Deku were friends, she was obviously in rough shape by the look of it, it had been Killer Comedian, he was lucky she wasn’t fucking dead, there wasn’t anything to freak out about. It was a good thing Deku was there. It was good.
But the hot tendrils took hold anyway, burning and twisting his stomach every which way, tightening his gloved grip on his phone, sending shaky breath through his nostrils. Because—fuck, what the fuck was that? What the fuck was that photograph? Why were they sitting like that, in the middle of a fight? Why was it Deku?
For fuck’s sake, she was fighting a kid with a quirk that could kill just as easy as he could breathe! She was beaten to shit. And Deku was there. Deku. Not him. Why hadn’t she called, even now, after it all?
Because you fucked up, a different voice shot back, this one sounding unmistakably like himself. You would have been there for her if you hadn’t fucked up.