Chapter Text
The sky is too blue for cruelty.
Bright and endless and stupid with summer. No clouds, no shadows. Just that blinding expanse overhead like the whole world’s too clean for what’s about to happen.
But that’s never stopped Katsuki before.
Recess at Aldera drags longer than any class period. The heat sticks to your ribs. Sweat clings beneath uniforms no one washes often enough, and the dirt turns gritty under your shoes—baked sharp, like broken glass pressed flat.
Kids circle near the fence, loose and lazy, pretending not to look. That’s the rule. If you look too hard, you get dragged in. If you pretend it isn’t happening, maybe Katsuki won’t notice you next time.
This happens every day.
Katsuki Bakugou stands at the center of it all, spine loose, shoulders cocked with easy threat. He cracks his knuckles slow. Lets the sound travel. Then flicks a pop of fire from his palm—nothing dangerous. Not yet. Just enough to make the air hiss and warp, the smell of burnt skin in miniature. The scent of warning.
“Hey, Deku,” he calls.
Izuku looks up too fast.
Too nervous. Too predictable. Always.
Katsuki jerks his chin at the notebook wedged under Izuku’s arm. It’s stuffed full of dog-eared pages, ink-stained at the corners, like it’s been clutched too hard too many times. “You still writing your little hero diaries?”
He doesn’t wait for an answer. He never does. Just takes one easy step closer, toe hooking the frayed strap of Izuku’s backpack and dragging it behind him like a trophy.
The bag thumps the ground. A few pages flutter free, one catching on the wind and spiraling like a leaf. It lands between them.
All Might. Mid-pose. Sketch lines sharp with admiration. The note beside it a mess of half-legible urgency:
Analyze escape paths in open-air urban zones. Too easy to bottleneck support-type heroes—
Katsuki squints. “Jesus,” he mutters. Not cruelly. Not yet. Just—
Confused.
“Are you seriously still doing this?”
Izuku lunges. His fingers flash out, reaching like he can still fix this if he’s fast enough. Katsuki gets there first.
He doesn’t move away. Doesn’t dodge. Just lifts the page higher, smooth and slow, sparks crackling lazy at his wrist. The heat licks at Izuku’s skin.
“Bakugou,” Izuku says. His voice is already thick. Embarrassed. Bracing for impact. “Give it back.”
“You gonna make me?” Katsuki grins, teeth white and too sharp in the sun. “Use your big quirkless rage powers? Gonna cry at me ‘til I short-circuit?”
A ripple runs through the watching kids—uneasy laughter, low and mean and practiced. They know their parts in this scene.
Izuku grabs again.
Katsuki doesn’t even flinch. Just stares at him.
And in that moment—
There’s something else.
Something twisted up under his smirk. Like a wire pulled too tight behind his eyes. Like he’s pissed off at something that isn’t Izuku, but Izuku’s here, so—
He looks at him like he’s breaking some rule by being small and scared and still looking at him like that.
“I said give it back.”
Izuku’s voice shakes now. Barely above a whisper. But he doesn’t run. Doesn’t cry.
Katsuki lets go.
The page flutters to the dirt, catching on a breeze before landing face-down in the dust.
Izuku kneels fast. Too fast. Hands trembling. He scoops the page like it’s something sacred, shoving it back into the notebook without looking. His fingers smear charcoal by accident. He doesn’t fix it.
He doesn’t say thank you.
He doesn’t say anything.
Just clutches the journal to his chest like a shield and turns, head ducked, shoulders hunched. Fast, darting steps. Shoes scraping rough against the ground. He disappears into the crowd without ever really being in it.
Katsuki watches him go.
He could’ve pushed harder. Could’ve lit the whole bag on fire. Could’ve shouted, made it loud, made it cruel.
He doesn’t.
“Whatever,” he mutters, voice low. Mostly to himself.
The sparks fade.
He turns away, hands stuffed in his pockets, jaw tight. His shadow stretches long and crooked behind him. No one says a word.
And in the shade beneath the school doors,
someone watches.
Too tall for this place. Too still. Like they’re already bored with the kingdom and ready to take the crown.
Katsuki Bakugou ruled Aldera Middle with explosions and ease.
The hallway cracked open around him like a fault line.
He didn’t walk — he claimed territory , each step daring the world to try and stop him.
People moved. Girls waved like they were waiting to be chosen. Boys laughed too loud, orbiting him in wide arcs, each hoping to catch some ember of attention. Teachers turned their backs when he blew up desks or slammed kids into lockers. Why wouldn’t they? His grades were high. His Quirk was flashier than anything anyone else had. He was already halfway to U.A. High, and everyone knew it.
He wasn’t a student. He was a stormfront.
A star in the making.
A future hero.
And today?
Today was going to be easy. Just like all the others.
Katsuki swaggered into class like it owed him something and dropped into his chair with a crack of wood and impact. He didn’t even glance at the kid in front of him — didn’t have to.
Midoriya sat there, same as always. Rigid spine, twitchy shoulders, eyes like breakable glass.
Katsuki kicked his feet up against the support bar under the desk — the one that ran right under Deku’s seat — and pressed , just enough to make him feel it in his ribs.
Not because he cared. Not even out of habit.
Just because it was fun to watch him flinch.
Speak of the devil.
Midoriya shuffled in three seconds before the bell — backpack clutched to his chest like armor, curls tangled from wind or panic or both. His whole face was red around the eyes. His lips looked chewed raw.
Had he been crying again?
Katsuki grinned.
He balled up a scrap of notebook paper, flicked it with practiced precision — plink — right into the green mess of hair.
It stuck.
A few kids snorted behind their hands.
Katsuki let out a low, smug chuckle.
“Yo, Deku,” he drawled, loud enough to cut across the room. “That wasn’t even bad. You crying over that? Tch—grow a pair. I could’ve burned your whole nerdbook again.”
Midoriya’s shoulders snapped up to his ears.
But he didn’t turn.
Didn’t move.
Didn’t speak.
He just sat in it — the humiliation, the heat, the eyes on his back.
Tension crackled under his skin like stormlight. His stupid notebook was already open — scribbled margins, worn spine, pages bent from gripping too hard. His hands trembled where they rested against the desk. He bit down on his lip until it turned white.
The silence stretched.
Then — so quiet Katsuki almost missed it —
“Shut up.”
It wasn’t brave.
It was torn out of him.
But it was the first thing he’d said back in weeks.
Katsuki blinked.
His smirk faltered.
'The fuck?'
His chest itched — not with anger. Something else. Something tight and crawling, like shame but meaner. Like Midoriya had stolen something by standing his ground, even that little bit.
“The hell you just say to me?” Katsuki growled.
He was already shifting forward, arms sliding off the back of his head, legs bracing like he might stand—
SLAM.
The classroom door burst open hard enough to rattle the windows.
“Everyone sit down!” the teacher barked, already pissed off and late. “We’ve got a transfer.”
The class rippled with noise — gasps, whispers, the low thrum of excitement. Transfer students were rare. Transfer students mid-year were unheard of.
Katsuki’s scowl deepened. He hated surprises.
Izuku, though—
He looked.
He shouldn’t have.
The boy who stepped in wasn’t like them.
He was too tall. Too still. His uniform collar was wrinkled, but he wore it like military-grade Kevlar — like he’d been through worse things than this. He didn’t fidget. Didn’t glance around like a kid in a new school. He just stood in the doorway like he owned it , chin tilted slightly, eyes heavy and bored.
A shadow with a heartbeat.
“This is Arata Tsugami,” the teacher said, gesturing with a thumb. “He’ll be joining us for the rest of the year.”
Arata didn’t bow.
Didn’t even blink.
He gave a half-smile — sharp, wrong — like a wolf pretending to be tame.
“Arata’s fine,” he said. His voice was low. Clipped. Edges like a knife that had already drawn blood. “Just don’t waste my time.”
The room exhaled all at once.
Someone whispered cool .
A girl giggled.
Another kid rolled their eyes and muttered tryhard.
But Izuku—
Izuku’s heart dropped .
He couldn’t explain it. Couldn’t name what was wrong.
It wasn’t just that Arata looked strong.
It was the way his presence bent the room around him.
The way his stillness felt like a coiled spring. The way his eyes scanned the desks like he was hunting , not looking.
And then those eyes stopped.
On him.
Not Katsuki. Not the teacher.
Izuku.
His blood ran cold.
The moment lasted less than a breath — but it cracked something open. Arata’s gaze didn’t assess. It selected. Like he’d found the weakest animal in the herd.
Izuku froze.
His fingers went numb. His pen slipped from his grip and rolled off the desk with a small, damning clink .
He didn’t reach for it.
He couldn’t.
The courtyard shimmered with sun and heat.
Cracked pavement. Withering grass. That one bent old tree in the far corner, gnarled like a spine, its bark peeling in long strips — a lone, skeletal witness.
And under its shade: Izuku Midoriya.
Alone, like always.
No lunch. No drink. Just that notebook, clutched in pale, twitching hands like it might bite him. He didn’t even write today. Just stared. Phone dark beside him, earbuds wound so tight around it they looked like they might choke.
His face was pale. Tight around the mouth. A little hollow, like something had been scooped out.
Katsuki didn’t care.
Except—
He noticed.
He always noticed.
And then he looked away. Like always.
At his table — the biggest in the courtyard, two long lunch benches shoved together — Katsuki dropped into the center of his kingdom. Baseball teammates flanked one side, loud girls with heat-perfect hair on the other. Friends who knew when to talk and when to shut up.
He bit into crispy pork, smirked around the steam, and leaned back to laugh at something stupid one of the guys said about a quirk backfiring during math.
Everything was normal.
And then he arrived.
Arata Tsugami.
The courtyard tilted .
At first it was subtle — just a few heads turning. Then laughter quieted. A voice called his name. Another kid slid over, made room like it was owed.
By the time Arata reached Katsuki’s table, it felt like he’d always been there.
“Yo,” he said. Just that.
He dropped his tray. Sat down. Grinned like a king.
And no one stopped him.
“Did I tell you guys about the time I got into a fight on a train?” he began, easy and loud. “Some psycho tried to mug an old lady. I had a broken arm, still held him off. Threw him out between stops.”
“No way—”
“Holy shit, that’s badass.”
Katsuki blinked. Half a pork cutlet hanging off his chopsticks. His jaw clicked shut.
Arata kept talking. Story after story — explosions, brawls, run-ins with heroes. His voice wrapped the table like smoke. He said his quirk was called Reverberate — that his body stored kinetic force like a battery.
“Had to get training braces just to stop from snapping my own spine,” he said, flashing his wrists like scars.
People fucking ate it up .
Katsuki’s molars ground together.
He barked a louder laugh. Slapped a friend’s back hard enough to sting. Cut in with his own story — the explosion drill, the ten-foot crater. It was cool. They’d all seen it.
Arata didn’t even look at him.
“Explosion, huh?” he said eventually, finally glancing over. His brow lifted. “That’s cute .”
Katsuki stiffened. His vision narrowed.
“…Cute?”
“Yeah,” Arata said, sipping from his juice box without breaking eye contact. “Like a firecracker.”
The paper straw crinkled between his teeth.
Something inside Katsuki snapped .
He stood too fast. Hands clenched. Breath shallow.
“You wanna go, transfer bitch?”
“Oh,” Arata said, rising in one fluid motion. “Do I.”
The first punch was Katsuki’s.
He missed.
Arata didn’t.
One twist. One kick. The world flipped.
Katsuki hit the ground hard enough to knock the air from his lungs. His shoulder cracked the dirt. Light burst behind his eyes. His palms scraped against gravel as he clawed for balance.
Crack.
The courtyard gasped as one.
Students scrambled back, forming a ring without thinking. The air went still.
Blood dripped from Katsuki’s mouth. Copper-hot. His lip was split.
Arata leaned over him. Fingers curled in Katsuki’s shirt like a claw.
“You gonna cry?” he sneered, low and sharp. “Huh? Poor baby. Where’s all that boom-boom now?”
Katsuki growled, chest spasming — ready to lunge again—
“Leave him alone!!”
The voice cracked across the courtyard like thunder.
Every head turned.
Under the tree, notebook forgotten in the grass, stood Izuku.
Pale. Shaking. Fists clenched so tight they trembled.
Arata blinked.
“What are you gonna do?” he asked, slowly straightening. “Wave your spaghetti arms at me? Cry about it?”
“I’ll…” Izuku’s voice hitched. “I’ll fight you.”
Katsuki coughed a laugh. Blood stained his teeth.
“Deku,” he snarled, “get the hell out of here, you quirkless freak. I don’t need your help—”
Arata paused.
“…Wait. You’re quirkless ?”
Izuku flinched.
Arata howled . A full-body laugh, tilting his head back like it was the best thing he’d ever heard.
“Oh my god. This is too good. You seriously came over here to fight me with your fists ? What a fucking loser.”
And then he moved.
Fast.
Katsuki opened his mouth to shout, but it was too late.
Izuku barely got a hand up before Arata slammed him into the tree trunk.
The sound it made —
A sick, wet thud.
Leaves shook loose in a scatter. A bird fled the branches.
Izuku’s head snapped back. His knees gave out.
He collapsed like a ragdoll, boneless and breathless, dust kicking up beneath him. One hand twitched. Then went still.
“DEKU!” Katsuki roared, scrambling forward.
Arata shoved him back without effort. Katsuki’s spine hit the dirt again, the bruise blooming across his ribs like a firework.
Two kids. One new transfer.
And no one moved.
No one helped.
Teachers were late. Students watched.
And in the silence that followed —
as Arata dusted his sleeves, smiled like it was nothing, and walked away without a scratch —
Katsuki didn’t rise.
He stared at the sky.
Dirt in his teeth. Rage in his throat.
Humiliated.
Outmatched.
Shaking.
Something cold knotted in his gut like barbed wire.
For the first time in his life—
Katsuki Bakugou had lost.
And Deku?
Deku was still there.
Bleeding in the grass.
The courtyard had never felt this empty.
The bell rang.
The sound cut sharp through the heat, and the crowd vanished —
like smoke, like they’d never been there at all.
Just whispers in the air, wide eyes retreating, a few muffled laughs trying to swallow themselves.
No one stayed.
No one checked.
Even Arata was gone—already halfway back to class, shoulders loose, head high, untouched.
Katsuki Bakugou lay in the dirt.
His jaw ached.
His ribs throbbed —deep, blooming pulses that made it hard to breathe. His vision pulsed red behind his eyes from where his skull cracked concrete. Dust clung to the sweat on his arms. Gravel bit into the backs of his hands.
Humiliation buzzed beneath his skin like electricity.
Alive. Crawling. Impossible to shake.
He didn’t move.
Didn’t speak.
Didn’t even breathe right.
Until—
Movement.
A groan. A shift in air. Shoes crunching gravel.
Beside him, someone stirred.
Izuku Midoriya sat up first.
His breath came in stutters. One hand slipped on the dirt as he pushed himself upright, the other clutching his ribs like they might fall apart if he let go.
Blood streaked down the side of his face — thick and too dark, trailing from the gash above his brow and soaking into the wild tangle of curls. It glistened in the sunlight. His lip was split. His nose crooked, maybe broken. There was a smear of dirt across his cheekbone, and his whole left sleeve hung in tatters.
He wobbled.
Sat still for a long second.
Then looked down at his hands, like he didn’t recognize them.
Like he wasn’t sure they still belonged to him.
And then—
“Are you okay, Kacch—”
He choked on it. Swallowed it back.
“…Bakugou?”
Katsuki’s breath caught in his throat.
That name—half-formed, half-alive—landed like a punch straight to the chest.
Not "Bakugou."
Not "explodo-kills."
Not even "Dumbass."
But that—
That childhood echo. That first-syllable softness he hadn’t heard in years.
And it hurt.
He jerked his head up. Every thought in his skull sparking like live wires.
What the fuck is he doing?
Why’s he looking at me like that?
Why’s he asking if I’m okay?
He’s the one who got wrecked—again.
Like always.
Just like always.
He’s the one who bled for nothing.
The one who got up for nothing.
And I didn’t ask. I didn’t want him. I don’t need him.
I don’t need him.
But then—
Katsuki looked.
Really looked.
And something buckled.
Izuku was still staring at him.
Wide-eyed. Glazed with pain. Pupils huge, breath thin, lashes spiked from sweat and blood.
His face was torn up. His body wrecked. His hands shook like leaves in wind.
But still—
One reached out. Slow.
Tentative.
Like touching Katsuki might set him off. Like it still mattered anyway.
It landed on Katsuki’s shoulder. Light as anything.
He flinched.
Not from the touch.
From what it meant.
Fucking idiot.
Fucking self-sacrificing, no-boundaries, limp-spined nerd—
He clenched his jaw. Hard enough to crack something.
He stared at that hand like it was a live grenade.
Then up—
At that stupid, bleeding face.
Those eyes.
And the words—
The good ones, the bad ones—
Any words—
Wouldn’t come.
Not even the ones he used like knives. Not even the ones that usually rolled off his tongue like they were made to hurt.
So he did the next best thing.
He shoved the hand away.
Not hard. Just enough.
Like brushing off dust.
“…Tch,” he muttered, voice raw, ruined. “Fuck you, Deku. I didn’t need your help. All you did was get yourself hurt.”
His throat burned.
Izuku blinked.
Didn’t argue.
Didn’t look away.
Katsuki couldn’t take it.
He stood. Slow.
Everything hurt . His balance wobbled for a breath, but he didn’t let it show.
He didn’t look back.
Didn’t meet Izuku’s eyes again.
Just turned.
And walked toward the building.
Each step ringing louder than it should.
Like something was missing behind him.
Like something had broken , and neither of them knew how to name it.
He walked away like nothing had happened.
Like he hadn’t just lost everything.
Like Deku wasn’t still bleeding in the grass.
Izuku walked home with gravel in his elbows and dried blood flaking from his cheekbone.
His schoolbag hung too low on one shoulder, the strap digging into his collarbone with every uneven step. The jostling made his back throb — a deep, bruised ache from where Arata had slammed him into the tree. His face pulsed hot along the cheek, the temple, the corner of his mouth. Sweat stung the cuts.
And somehow,
somehow,
none of it hurt as much as the look on Kacchan’s face when he hit the ground and coughed red into the dust.
He hadn’t cried when it happened.
Not when the first punch landed.
Not when the kick connected to his ribs.
Not even when Arata’s boot had knocked the wind from his lungs.
But now—
now, walking the long route home in shoes that scuffed too loud against the pavement—
his eyes burned in a way that had nothing to do with wind.
There were still echoes behind his ears.
Laughter.
Gasps.
That awful silence right before Arata moved.
The sun was starting to lower, warm and sharp as a knife against the side of his face. The shadows were getting long. His feet dragged. The strap kept slipping.
He always took the long way home now.
Because Kacchan didn't.
Ever since that day—Katsuki’s tenth birthday—when Izuku had handed him something real. Not a toy, not a drawing. Support gear. Rudimentary, sure—stitched with uneven thread and soldered in a school science lab—but functional. Months of testing. Wiring. Burn resistance. Izuku had made explosion-dampening bracers from scratch, for him. And Katsuki had smiled. For one perfect second, he’d beamed. And then his eyes lit—too bright, too wild—and he blasted them point-blank. The braces cracked, splintered, burst apart with a sharp bang. One flew into Izuku’s face, broke his nose clean. Katsuki didn’t flinch. Just laughed. Called him Deku for the first time. And Izuku had learned that day what it meant to offer something precious and be punished for it. Like kindness made him pathetic. Like he was stupid for hoping.
No warning. No teasing. Just fury.
White-hot, formless.
Fists.
Explosions.
The first real beating.
The first time Izuku truly understood that something was gone.
They hadn't walked home together since.
But today—today, the world didn’t seem to care.
Because as Izuku reached the edge of the block,
Katsuki turned onto it.
Same timing. Same distance. Same gravity , pulling them into each other’s orbits whether they wanted it or not.
A limp in Katsuki’s gait betrayed him. Subtle, but there.
His bag slung too low.
His hands buried in his pockets like he could hide the damage that way.
For a heartbeat,
everything paused.
The world held its breath.
Muscle memory surged in Izuku’s legs—
walk faster, walk next to him, say something, please —
But he didn’t.
He swallowed it.
Let it rot behind his ribs like all the other things he couldn’t say.
Kacchan—
No. Bakugou .
Was already heading toward his front door.
Same house. Same paint-chipped gate. Same little crack in the stone path where Izuku used to hop over like it was lava.
Their homes still faced each other like they had since they were five.
Like they’d been placed across a quiet cul-de-sac by gods who thought these two boys would grow up together. Become something good. Something great.
Maybe they would have.
Before it all went wrong.
Bakugou didn’t look over.
Izuku didn’t call out.
The air was warm. Still.
He turned.
Opened his own gate.
Went inside.
And behind him,
the whole street
stayed quiet.
“Oh my god, Izuku—what happened to your face?!”
His mom’s gasp hit like a dropped dish, loud and shattering, followed by the slap of socked feet on tile. Her hands were on him before he could even shrug out of his jacket — gentle and frantic, tilting his chin toward the kitchen light, fingers trembling at the edges of his jaw.
She winced at the swelling.
Her voice stayed sharp, even as her thumbs softened.
“Was it Bakugou again? Did that boy do this to you? Izuku, I swear—”
“No!” he blurted, too fast, too loud. It cracked out of him like a dropped plate.
Inko blinked. Startled silent.
He swallowed. Tried again, quieter.
“No… Kacchan didn’t do this. He was…”
A pause. A breath. His hand rubbed at the back of his neck like he could scrub the memory off.
“He was kind of… in the fight. With me. Like… beside me.”
She stared at him like he’d grown two heads.
“ Beside you?”
He nodded. Lips pressed thin.
“The new kid’s big,” he added, like it meant anything.
It didn’t. But she let it go.
Instead, she helped him over to the couch, wordlessly pulling blankets from the backrest and piling pillows into a nest. She guided him down like glass. Pressed an ice pack to his ribs — a cold shock, jagged and grounding. He hissed. Didn’t protest. She’d always known where the pain was, even when he lied about it.
She didn’t scold him. Didn’t ask more.
Just kissed his forehead like she did when he was little and scared, then disappeared into the kitchen. The smell of katsudon drifted back minutes later — warm rice, sweet soy, extra pork.
They watched an old All Might documentary together.
Izuku barely followed the narration. His eyes kept drifting toward the front window.
Across the street.
The house with the porch light on.
The upstairs window still glowing blue.
He imagined Katsuki there. Icing his ribs in the dark. Maybe watching the same episode. Maybe staring at his ceiling, jaw tight and fists clenched, breathing like it hurt.
Because it probably did.
Katsuki Bakugou had never come home like this.
Not bloodied.
Not bruised.
Not humiliated.
Not with his pride broken and stomped into pavement under someone else’s heel.
Izuku shifted, winced, and pressed the melting ice closer to his ribs.
He didn’t know how to feel.
About Arata.
About himself.
About the moment he stood up — when it wasn’t his turn — and watched Katsuki fall for the first time.
He hadn’t cried then.
He might now.
The front door creaked open.
Katsuki stepped inside quiet, shoulders tight, trying not to limp.
“Katsuki,” came his mother’s voice — sharp, unimpressed — from the kitchen. “You’re late.”
He didn’t answer.
“Your food’s on the table. Try not to be disgusting for once.”
Still no answer.
He dropped his bag by the stairs. The strap hit the floor with a thud too loud in the silence. His socks caught on the carpet as he moved. Step. Step. Step.
He walked into the kitchen like a ghost.
Masaru looked up from the TV. Blinked. Didn’t pause the screen.
“What the hell happened to your face?”
Katsuki didn’t stop. Didn’t flinch. Just walked to the table like this was normal. Like this was fine. Like nothing had shattered in the courtyard hours ago. Like there wasn’t gravel in his skin and blood in his teeth.
“You lose?” Masaru said, tone flat. Like he was asking if it rained.
Katsuki didn’t meet his eyes.
“...It was a lot of punks.”
A lie. Automatic.
Because the truth—one kid, one name, one fucking loss—
Would’ve meant something worse.
Would’ve meant hearing he was weak.
That he was a failure.
That he was embarrassing .
Mitsuki didn’t even wait for him to sit.
She barked a laugh, sharp and ugly. The kind that hit harder than a punch.
“A lot of punks? You think that makes it better?”
She crossed the room in three strides. Her hand snapped out and caught his chin — fingers like a vice, nails digging in. She yanked his face up to the kitchen light, inspecting the swelling, the bruise beneath his eye.
“Look at you,” she sneered. “Fucking pathetic. One black eye and you already look like you’ve been through a war.”
Her breath smelled like cigarettes and anger.
“Did you even fight back, or did you cry and piss your pants like a little bitch?”
His whole body locked.
Jaw clenched. Shoulders pulled tight. Fists curling at his sides until the knuckles blanched.
She felt it.
“Don’t you flinch from me.”
Her voice was ice over glass.
“You’re not too old to get your ass whooped here too.”
“I did fight,” he growled. Low. Fractured.
She snorted. “Not well enough.”
Silence.
Masaru didn’t say anything. Didn’t look away from the screen. Didn’t stand up.
Just sipped his beer and watched TV like his son wasn’t bleeding in the kitchen two feet away.
Katsuki didn’t sit down.
Didn’t touch the food.
He stared at the pork cutlet on the plate, steam curling in the air, rice clumping at the corners. It should’ve smelled like home. It made his stomach turn.
His insides were rope and stone and shame.
His head still echoed with Arata’s voice. With Deku’s .
Screaming. For him.
He turned.
Mitsuki’s voice followed like a slap.
“Don’t think you’re skipping dinner to sulk like some weak little girl!”
Her heels struck tile as she moved to follow.
“You wanna be a hero , don’t you?! You think they give a shit if you’re tired? If your tummy hurts?”
He didn’t answer.
Didn’t turn.
Didn’t breathe.
Just climbed the stairs.
One step.
Then another.
The pain in his ribs sparked with every motion.
He reached the top.
And slammed the door.
Hard.
Loud.
Final.
The walls shook.
And downstairs, the house kept breathing without him.
His room was quiet.
Not peaceful. Just… quiet .
Like something had been gutted out of it.
The walls didn’t echo.
They pressed in.
He stood in the center, fists limp at his sides,
shoes still on.
Backpack abandoned in the hall.
For a long time, he didn’t move.
Just stood there.
Looking at nothing.
Feeling everything .
Humiliated.
Replaced.
Forgotten.
It was supposed to be him .
He was the one people watched.
He was the one they whispered about, laughed with, feared, followed.
Every hallway, every classroom, every look—
It had all been his.
Until that stupid fucking new kid walked in.
Walked in like he owned the whole goddamn school.
Like he could rip Katsuki’s name out of their mouths and wear it like a crown.
And Deku.
Fucking Deku .
Showing up. Stepping in.
Getting hurt.
For him.
His jaw clenched so tight his teeth ached.
He was supposed to hate him.
He did hate him.
Deku was supposed to stay in his place.
Stay small. Stay behind.
Stay losing.
That was the order of things.
That was the deal .
So why—
Why did his chest ache like it cracked open when he remembered the blood on Deku’s face?
Why did his stomach turn thinking of him on the ground like that, blinking through the dirt, hand outstretched?
Why did it feel wrong ?
So fucking wrong
seeing him like that?
He changed clothes like he was sleepwalking.
Pulled the bloodstained shirt over his head with stiff arms and tossed it to the floor. It hit the wood with a wet sound, heavy with sweat. His whole torso ached — ribs tight, shoulder burning — but he didn’t slow down.
He grabbed the roll of athletic tape off his desk.
Unspooled it with his teeth.
Wrapped his knuckles first. Then his wrists. Tight. Messy.
No gloves tonight.
He wanted to feel it.
Then he started swinging.
The first punch cracked through the room like a gunshot.
The heavy bag rocked on its chain. The ceiling light trembled.
He hit it again. And again. And again.
Harder.
He imagined Arata’s smug fucking face.
That lazy grin. That juice box. The way he didn’t even try and still won .
He imagined Deku’s lip trembling.
The gravel in his curls.
The blood on his cheek.
The way he almost said Kacchan again—
The sound of it, cracked and soft, like something half-dead crawling back to life.
And it hurt .
The bag slammed against the wall with a heavy thud .
He didn’t care.
Sweat dripped down his back. His forearms screamed.
The wraps turned dark, red blooming through the tape like ink in water.
Still he hit.
And hit.
And hit .
His breath turned jagged. His fists blurred. The sound of impact became rhythm — violence as penance, pain as distraction. He didn’t stop.
Not until his lungs burned.
Not until his arms gave out.
Not until one final punch cracked something deep in his wrist and the pain was white and blinding and he stumbled back with a ragged gasp.
He collapsed onto the floor.
Hard.
Sat there, spine against the wall, legs sprawled out, whole body humming like a struck bell.
His breath came in short, wet bursts.
His hands trembled in his lap, blood dripping in slow dots onto the floorboards.
His eyes stung.
But he didn’t cry.
Not when his face pulsed with heat and swelling.
Not when every inch of him throbbed like he’d been hollowed out and filled with fire.
Not when his own mother called him pathetic.
Not when his father didn’t even look at him.
Boys don’t cry.
Katsuki Bakugou doesn’t fucking cry.
He clenched his fists.
Even that hurt.
But he didn’t cry.
He showered.
Scalding hot, water beating down over bruises he couldn’t bring himself to look at.
He didn’t scrub hard enough.
He didn’t feel clean.
His hands throbbed when he dried them. The tape stuck to his skin and peeled in patches, bloody and frayed. He threw it all in the trash.
Brushed his teeth. Too hard. Gums bled. He spat pink into the sink and didn’t flinch.
Got into bed.
Didn’t bother with pajamas. Didn’t bother with lights.
Just sank into the mattress like it could swallow him whole.
He didn’t sleep.
His ribs ached. His eye was swollen. Every time he breathed too deep, pain flickered under the bone like static. He shifted. Turned. Flopped onto his side, then back again.
Still awake.
Still thinking .
His thoughts ran wild and useless—
Arata’s face.
Arata’s voice.
Arata’s fucking smile .
Then Deku.
Deku, flinching.
Deku, shaking.
Deku, bleeding .
Deku stepping forward like an idiot, like he was brave, like Katsuki was worth saving.
His throat tightened.
‘Why the fuck would he do that?’
He wanted to scream it. He wanted to rip the thought out and crush it.
Katsuki Bakugou— the Katsuki Bakugou—had gotten his ass handed to him. In front of everyone. Knocked flat. Humiliated. Protected .
His fists curled into the sheets.
Tomorrow.
Tomorrow he’d fix it.
Tomorrow he’d remind them.
Remind himself.
Make them shut up. Make them watch .
Make it make sense.
But tonight—
Tonight, he didn’t know what he was anymore.
He curled in on himself, slow.
Careful not to press on the bruise under his ribs.
His hands throbbed under the skin like they were still punching. Like they wanted another round.
His face burned.
He blinked up at the ceiling like it had answers.
The dark gave him nothing.
And still—
still—
he didn’t cry.
Didn’t sob.
Didn’t shake.
Didn’t let a single tear fall, even as his chest knotted so tight he could barely breathe.
Boys don’t cry.
Katsuki Bakugou doesn’t fucking cry.
But god,
he didn’t know what else to do.