Kapitel 2298: 40
Chapter Text
It was night by the time class 1-A returned to the Heights Alliance. Mostly everybody was in the common room mulling over the course of the day, regaling in either the attainment of their provisional hero license or factors that prevented such from happening.
The lone exception was Izuku;this was entirely in part to his exclusion in the provisional license exam. The others were still shrouded in mystery over the details of the mystery program Izuku had found a part in, and were eagerly attempting to extract whatever information they could to ease their curious minds.
"Come onnn, Midoriya!" Ashido groaned. "I want all the juicy details! What's with your special exam thingy? What's with all the cloak and dagger?"
"Actually, Ashido," Yaoyorozu began, "I'm fairly certain that using that phrase greatly overexaggerates the situation." She paused, eyes shifting. "Unless you're implying some sort of outward questionable actions centered around Midoriya's newfangled training?"
"Oh, you know what I mean!" Ashido fired back, swiping her hand in Yaoyorozu's direction.
"I personally wonder how much harder it actually is going to be from the regular provisional exam, kero." Tsu croaked.
Iida suddenly butted in, his hands chopping down as per usual and making his presence known to the rest of his peers. "If Midoriya doesn't wish to divulge the details of his newfound training, he shouldn't have to. He's entitled to that right since he gained higher training in the first place."
Izuku was simply letting this all happen around him. Rather than interfering, he'd let the errant rumor mill run rampant. It was Izuku's belief that the more he kept the details sparse; the less likely his classmates would piece together all the factors regarding his training.
Besides, the less of a connection he had to the up and coming 'Hive Lord,' the less his class would be inclined to notice any discrepancies and/or similarities to himself and his vigilante (and now police-enforced) persona.
"Eh, I don't know man," interjected Kirishima. "This summer's been pretty eventful to all of us, sure. But that fact doesn't attribute more to anyone than Midoriya here. I mean, he was kidnapped by the League! And he fought off that Muscular dude at the camp! And now he gets this special apprenticeship thing or whatever. A bit much for one summer, don't you think?"
"I still think that he's just a trouble magnet," Jirou mumbled. "Might even be some sort of second secret quirk he has."
"Please," Kaminari teased. "What is this, a shonen?"
It was at that moment that Izuku took note of Bakugo. He was slowly making his way down the stairs, not stopping until he entered the common area. Predictably, he didn't arrive to socialize; he instead went around floating on the edges of the crowd, eyeing Izuku with a careful glare.
All it took was a minor opening, a brief second where Izuku was free of the surrounding crowd, for Bakugo to make his move. A small clashing of shoulders later, and one small whisper was pushed to the forefront of Izuku's mind.
"Meet me outside later. We're going to talk about some stuff."
Peeking past the blinds of his window, Izuku spotted the lone figure of Bakugou waiting in place and concealed in shadow down below.
It was an unnecessary effort of course; Izuku himself could have used his bugs to check and it would have provided the same result. And yet, Izuku refrained from checking with his bugs. He didn't know why, but using his own eyes reassured him that what was happening actually was happening.
"You know that he's going to goad you into a fight, right? I've seen the animosity he holds for you. And he hasn't had a proper outlet for all that pent up aggression on you for months."
Izuku closed the blinds, stalking away from the window. "I know that. I'm just deciding whether or not I should play into his hands or spite him by not showing up and letting him wait there all night."
"Heh. Not a bad id —"
"I'm going." Came Izuku's terse decision.
"You are?" QA questoned. "Well then, lead the way."
A hardlined focus on his bugs revealed that the rest of his class was sleeping, notifying Izuku that none of his classmates would be interrupting his late night brawl with Bakugou.
He turned to leave by the door, but not before letting out a small reassurance to the occupants of his room.
"Be back soon, guys. I've got to take care of a little something." He paused. "And behave, Spurt. I'll actually be back early within an hour or two this time."
A chorus of chirps, buzzes, chitters and admonished clacking echoed throughout the room all at once. Izuku closed the door and began his trek down the stairs.
The walk would take longer than using the rope, but there wasn't a point to using it to leave his room unless he just wanted to make Bakugo even more suspicious and frustrated. Which, honestly, was a fairly tempting action. But Izuku would hold off for now.
"You know," Izuku began, musing more to himself than QA, "I'm having a strange sense of deja vu. I mean, it's not all the same, but the basis is at least similar. I'm sneaking out in the middle of the night again. Probably going to get caught too, if I've learned anything about Nezu. He might even be watching me right now, and he's just letting this all play out."
He reached the bottom of the stairs.
"And what are you going to do about it?" QA asked.
Izuku mulled over the question for a few seconds, bobbing his head side to side as he did so. "Eh. Nothing."
He reached the front door and didn't waste any time swinging it open. Once his face touched the cold nighttime air, so did his eyes meet those of his current adversary.
The two of them didn't speak, a sort of mutual understanding growing between the two as they glared at each other in the eye. This continued for a few moments, the atmosphere breaking as Bakugo did a quick one-eighty and stomped off. Izuku followed not too long after.
They traveled, wordless and slow, through the campus of UA. Minutes passed with nothing but the empty footfall of the two boys and the ambivalent sounds of a calm night. They eventually came upon Ground Beta, the hyper-realistic and small-scaled cityscape the hero course used during their training exercises with All Might.
"You know," Izuku said, breaking the silence, "I haven't actually thanked you for helping rescue me from the League back in Kamino. I really appreciate your going out and distracting those villains, even if it was just for that little bit. So thanks for that, I guess."
Bakugo continued walking, letting Izuku's words fall to seemingly deaf ears.
A minute more and Bakugo stopped, turning around to face Izuku with a vicious glare.Izuku paid it no mind, waiting for whatever Bakugou was aiming to say.
It was exactly like before, both looking and waiting for the other to crack. And as it turned out, Bakugou was the one who grew tired of waiting .
"How is it," Bakugo hissed, "that a worthless weakling like you got into UA?" His voice was soft, contemplative, and quiet — and yet somehow still tinged with anger and rage.
"You've been hiding your quirk from me all this time!" His voice grew into a shout. His hands curled into fists and his eyes emitted a dangerous glow. "How long, huh! Since back in middle school, when all those bugs covered the window?! How long before that? Since we were four?"
"You didn't exactly give me a reason to tell you anything," Izuku replied curtly, keeping his voice steady. "You would've just tried beating me up harder. Your words would've just gotten harsher. We both know that."
Bakugo growled, his anger showing clear as day. He looked ready to pounce as a predator did to prey.
It was only then that Izuku realized just how long it had been since he had actually had an honest confrontation with Bakugo. All his pent up aggression would do wonders to make the upcoming fight a hard one.
He called in millions of bugs in preparation.
"To answer your question," Izuku simply continued, "I truly was a late bloomer. I was eight when it happened. I got my quirk in the middle of the night." Izuku laid out his words before Bakugo as if they were mere facts, with no hint of emotion attached to them.
"But by that point, there was now way I was going to tell you. It wouldn't have changed your view of me, anyways." The cold assessment did little to quell Bakugo's already worsening temper.
"You've been making waves things ever since we got here," Bakugo spat. "That first battle trial, that freak show display you flaunted all around at USJ, and now you have the freaking privilege to get into some special program? You don't even need to take the license exam! And I failed mine!"
"This whole time, it's been pissing me off! And after seeing you at Kamino…" He shook his head. "All of a sudden, you're getting all this attention. From the principal, from Aizawa, from everyone else. Even All Might."
Bakugo huffed. "We haven't fought once, you know. Not during any of our battle trails. Not at the sports festival. Nothing. And that's why we're going to fight. Right here, right now. Show me what it is that everybody's seeing in you."
Izuku narrowed his eyes. He went into motion.
A few of Izuku's smaller, less noticeable flyers flew in from behind Bakugo and carefully landed onto him. A single bug landed on each limb and concealed themselves from sight, with Bakugo none the wiser.
Bakugo shifted, his body adopting a ready stance, eager for a fight. Izuku did the same. Both were silent.
And then Bakugo launched forward, his explosions setting off a bright blast of yellows and oranges that highlighted his smiling face. The mere sight of the occurrence reached deep into Izuku's psyche, bringing long forgotten scars right back to the surface. Images of fire, explosions, and pain, all rolled into one singular and constant origin. It was enough to cause Izuku to still, leaving him open to attack.
But Bakugo's initial movement was sloppy. Izuku didn't know if the boy was simply too caught up in the moment to notice, or if he was merely underestimating him, but the attack could be easily countered, even without the use of bugs.
That was enough to get Izuku to act.
Izuku easily saw it; a rightward swing — Bakugo's usual opening attack. A quick dodge backwards and to the right, and Izuku was off the course of the attack. The end result was an unscathed Izuku and a fuming Bakugo.
"I'm going to give you the chance to stop while you're ahead, Bakugo," Izuku cautioned.
"Oh?" Bakugo said, half laughing. "Why is that? Is it because you know that you can't beat me, is that it?"
Izuku set his bugs off to work. He had the perfect counter… Probably.
"No," Izuku said. "I'm warning you that you'll lose. If you stop now, you won't be wasting your own time and efforts. Though, that's just my suggestion."
Bakugo let out a howl of rage, barreling right for Izuku with his own two feet. Izuku immediately ducked into the nearest building that he could, finding himself in a rather sparse two-story office. The action served two purposes, really. The first was to rid Bakugou of the advantage of an open space to fight in. The second was evasion.
Swarms of bugs instantly moved to cover Izuku's escape, shrouding him in an amorphous cloud that blocked Bakugo's vision. Bakugo was thus forced to blast away one mass of bugs after another, repeating the same attack over and over until the swarms suddenly stopped. By then, Bakugo had somehow ended up in the middle of the building's first floor.
"Stop hiding!" Bakugou yelled, his eyes scanning the dark recesses of the building for movement. "Come out here and fight me!" Bakugo calmed his breathing, listening for any potential movement.
He grinned when he heard a small scuffle being made against the floor. He turned towards its direction and shot off a large blast in its direction, blowing away debris and blasting a hole in the wall.
When the dust cleared, Bakugo's smile faltered. As it turned out, what he had attacked was merely a swarm clone. And with the abundance of bugs in the area, the floating figure easily reformed.
"You're making quite a racket, you know," the swarm buzzed. "I wonder how long it'll be until someone checks up on us?"
"Stop playing around!" Bakugo growled. "Come out and face me yourself!"
The swarm scoffed. "You must think I'm an idiot. We'd be having a different kind of fight right now if I had a quirk that'd let me face you head on. But the fact of the matter is that I don't."
"So you admit that you can't beat me?" Bakugo retorted. "That you're just a weakling?"
"You just can't see it, can you? You can't face the fact that I'm plenty strong enough to hold my own. You can't face the fact that I'm actually capable of beating you if I don't run at you like a reckless idiot."
"I can definitely take you!"
The swarm laughed. "We'll see."
A metal pipe came crashing down from the ceiling, bashing Bakugou right over the head. Bakugo wasted no time in retaliation, aiming his palm upwards and letting out another concussive explosion. All it did was bring about even more rubble over his head.
When the resulting dust cleared, a quick tumble of rocks captured Bakugo's attention. A quick look revealed the outlines of a foot retreating around the corner of the hole in the wall.
Bakugo's face scrunched up. "You can't run forever!"
"You sure?"
Bakugo swerved and let out another explosion. The action proved useless. Another swarm fell to the ground and was readily replaced by another.
After realizing his mistake, Bakugo paid it no mind and went to follow the glimpse of Izuku he had seen just a moment ago.
"You've been bottling up all this aggression!" the following swarm spat. "It's a wonder you're still able to function."
A quick blast disabled that swarm into nothing. Bakugo kept trudging forward. The quick slamming of a door caught his attention. He immediately went for it.
"Your motivations aren't wrong, you know." Another clone spoke, moving its hands in a placating manner. "There's nothing wrong with wanting to be the number one hero. That's what I'm trying to do too. The only thing that I find despicable about it are the methods you undergo to reach that goal. Well, that and your attitude."
The door was blown off its hinges. Baakugo was met with an enormous swarm that flew right at his face.
"The fuck!" Bakugo spat out the words as the swarm dissipated from his immediate vicinity.
"I'm having way too much fun with this, you know."
Bakugo turned around, slowly this time. He was met with a dozen or so clones, each spread out far enough that a single blast would only take out one or two at a time.
Bakugo didn't care. He began blowing each and every one as they closed in on him. Each clone dispersed upon contact, leaving little but a few bites and scratches. By the time the twelve clones were gone, he was met with silence.
Bakugo was seething. "Stop being such a coward and fight!"
"Ok."
Bakugo didn't have time to react to his hearing of Izuku's own voice. After all, it had come from everywhere all at once. Another dozen clones sprung up in front of Bakugo, moving in tandem with each other towards their mutual target.
It was enough of a danger to Bakugou that he didn't notice another clone coming up from some rubble from behind. That one grabbed Bakugou by the shoulder and wrapped a hand around the back of head head, twirling him backwards and smashing his face into the ground.
Bakugo instantly sprang up with an explosion, aiming to decimate Izuku where he stood. However, his efforts were hampered by the various bugs that found the time to cloud his vision yet again.
By the time the bugs surrounding his face left, his vision took in the sight of another twelve clones surrounding him from all sides.
Bakugo roared. "Enough!"
His hands slammed onto the ground, engulfing the road in a huge explosion. Debris and rubble flew everywhere, dispersing all the clones except for one. A single clone among the twelve let out a gasp of surprise upon hitting the ground.
"There you are." Bakugo didn't waste any time with words that time around. He instantly let off dual explosions that launched him towards the noise. And in one swift movement, Bakugo had Izuku by the scruff of his neck.
"Not so tough now, are ya?" Bakugo raised his free hand, sparking small explosions in preparation. "You're nothing without your bugs. So just relax and let me—"
Bakugo didn't have a chance to finish. He was caught off guard by the harsh kick that connected to the stomach and forced him to stumble back, letting go of Izuku.
Izuku smirked. "As you were saying?"
Bakugo slowly got up, eyeing Izuku with a heated glare. "And actual kick from yourself this time, eh?" He smiled. "Good. 'Cause I'm not letting you play any more of your tricks."
Bakugo launched himself upwards with a tightly wound explosion. When he was high enough, he copied the movement with his other hand, aiming upwards instead to propel himself downwards at a high speed.
Bakugo was sure that he had Izuku straight down his sights.
However, the high speed and unpredictable moves were for naught, given that Izuku still had bugs hidden within the clothing of Bakugo's limbs. Izuku made himself tight and aptly moved, using layers of bugs in an attempt to throw off Bakugo's aim.
In the end, it helped. By the time Bakugo collided with the ground, Izuku was only scraped by the attack, receiving a few minor burns on his left arm.
Izuku promptly found it within himself to take off in the other direction.
"Running again?!?" Bakugo grunted in dismay.
He blasted off again. However, to his surprise, he didn't have to go far. Bakugo steered himself into an alleyway, where Izuku came into his sights. He descended to the ground.
"Tired of running?" he asked.
Izuku shifted his stance. "Perhaps."
Bakugo smirked, his head nodding once. "Good."
He ran forward, his palms shooting off miniature explosions to aid in his movement.
Izuku met him halfway, again dodging Bakugo's opening strike and taking a swipe at his opponent's leg.
Bakugo stumbled, but quickly recovered his footing with an assisted explosion. Reorienting himself, he sent a punch back; a punch that was unassisted by explosions but was still packed with quite an amount of force.
The punch landed a hit on Izuku's torso, leaving what Bakiugo saw as an opening to initiate a grapple.
Bakugo, however, found himself assailed by another kick and a quick jab. Only the jab managed to hit, but Bakugo easily powered through it.
Bakugo countered Izuku's next upcoming punch, stepping back and then assisting himself forward with a blast, catching Izuku in the face with an enclosed fist.
Izuku stumbled back, caught off guard from the sudden explosion-reinforced punch. He was hit right in the face, the fist impacting his nose and causing it to begin bleeding.
The two furthered away from the other, each having the precedence to believe the other had a counterattack in waiting.
Both were proven wrong, however. This left them a few feet apart, breathing heavily and each eyeing each other for their next move.
Bakugo moved his fingers about, clenching and then unclenching them in anticipation. Izuku, meanwhile, slowly bent down and reached for his ankle, taking out his knife into the open nighttime air.
Bakugo narrowed his eyes. "What the hell are you doing?!"
Izuku tightened his grip. "You have brute strength and endless explosions. I have this knife. A fair match up, don't you think? I won't even use my bugs for the initial part."
Izuku wiped at his bleeding nose, making an effort to wipe the blood away from his mouth. He ultimately failed and only succeeded in spreading blood further across his face. "And don't you dare say that this isn't a legitimate strategy. I'm just using everything that I have available to me. Same as you."
A lookover of the Izuku in front of him had Bakugo flaring his nostrils, heavy huffs of air spewing forth. "You know what it was that I hated about you?" Bakugo asked, an eyebrow raising in agitation as he initiated the sudden topic change.
"It's that impassive face of yours. I never knew what you were thinking. You, looking at me with those damn eyes as if you knew something I didn't. Despite how much I'd beat you over and over. Like you were looking down on me."
"Is that what you thought!?" Izuku snapped. "You can't be serious?! You were already somebody wonderful! Strong and resilient! Somebody I could've looked up to!"
Izuku shook his head. "But you squandered that. You have a horrible attitude, and an even worse personality. It's shameful that you let it shape you."
"Argh!" Bakugo shot forward, aiming to pulverize Izuku's face with his fists. Unfortunately for him, this left his lower torso open to attack. Izuku took the opportunity to swipe towards Bakugo's stomach with his knife.
Bakugo stepped back, narrowly dodging the incoming knife.
"The fuck, Deku!"
Izuku didn't relent, forcing Bakugou to keep on dodging backwards, looking for an opening.
After ten or so swipes, Bakugo believed that he saw an opening in Izuku's defenses. However, he was unable to do anything about it, instead falling backwards as he tripped over something behind him.
His legs remained suspended on some sort of string at the height of his ankles as he fell on his back. Izuku didn't waste a moment of the opening and immediately mounted Bakugou.
Izuku in turn took out a thin, grey string, using it to hold Bakugou down by pressing it against his neck.
"You tripped over a tripwire. It's made of spider silk."
Izuku pressed down with the wire in his hands. "The same stuff this string is made of. You like it, Bakugo?" Izuku asked, tilting his head. "I had some spiders fashion it after a garrote. Of course, it's not as brutal as old time garrotes. You won't die; though part of that has to do with the position and how much force I use. This one'll only knock you out, I promise."
Bakugo didn't care all too much. Two explosions erupted from both his hands, launching him forward and knocking Izuku off of him.
But just as Bakugo was getting up, various pockets of swarms came at him again, each almost as long and tall as the alley itself.
"Fucking stop with this shit, Deku!"
Bakugo barely advanced, instead focusing all his effort on blasting away each wall of bugs as they came. This stopped as he caught a glint of something through the haze of the swarm.
A portion of the swarm moved, revealing a knife flying straight at him.
Bakugo's eyes widened, and he stepped over to the side and pressed his back against the wall, narrowly missing the flying knife.
The action allowed Izuku ample time to close in on him.
Bakugo didn't have the time to react, and found himself pinned against the wall of the alley and Izuku. His eyes widened again as Izuku raised his other hand, which had a knife in its grip.
He froze, the knife moving through the air seemingly aimed right for his head. He flinched, his eyes closing for just a second. But the impact never came.
Opening his eyes, Bakugo found the knife laying to the right, pointing straight at the wall on the space beside his head. After a breath, Bakugo slowly turned his gaze towards Izuku's, whose piercing eyes were only a few inches in front of his.
"You let your anger control you," Izuku muttered, his words almost a whisper. "You let it devolve you into a skilless grunt. You allowed me a large margin of opportunity. Fix that. I hate seeing you waste your potential due to something like an explosive attitude."
Bakugo opened his mouth to spit back a retort, but Izuku preemptively responded by slamming Bakugo's body back against the wall. "I'm not gonna be your punching bag anymore. Okay, Kacchan?"
Bakugo growled at the name calling, but otherwise stopped himself from doing any more.
Izuku backed off, releasing Bakugo from his hold. Bakugo promptly landed on his feet and dusted himself off. His eyes didn't leave Izuku's form for even a second.
"Sorry, Aizawa-sensei," Izuku said. He was still facing Bakugou, whose eyes morphed into confusion upon hearing the words.
However, that changed when Izuku turned to face his teacher. "I wasn't too rough on him, was I?" Izuku asked, his voice much too innocent sounding for the events that had just transpired.
Aizawa merely sighed, rolling his eyes. "Really, Midoriya?"
Notes:
A/N: Not much to say. Just reminding you all of the poll!
Anyways, stayed tuned for chapter 41!
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