16 - Kenji

The phone rang and I knew it was the police calling to confirm their location. Since I was the hostage I believed that they wouldn´t try to take Kenji into custody or try to arrest him, not as long as he had the upper hand. I have no idea what they had agreed on before hand, but right before Kenji and I went through the portal he told me to shut up and not say anything. The smokeman who I had learned was called Kurogiri was the only other person with us through the portal, giving them an upper hand if something happened. Kenji had his quirk ready and told me to walk through the portal in front of him. As soon as I went through his arm wrapped around my neck the other pressed to my back. He was using his hardening quirk to protect the arm holding around my neck. It was dark outside and I saw at least fifteen police officers in front of the portal, all with loaded guns, in the front there were four heroes, all from my parents agency, one of them were Razor. My dad and Kirishima was also with them, Bakugou was chained with huge handcuffs making it impossible for him to use his quirk; he was dressed in his civilian clothes while Kirishima was in his hero costume. Another portal opened just in front of Bakugou, telling him to walk inside of it.
"Malina first, Kenji!" Bakugou yelled to Kenji, clearly upset.
"It does seem like if I let her go I will be killed, we didn't bring fifteen people with guns to the trade" he wasn't stupid, letting me go now would be unwise of him. Kirishima whispered something to Bakugou, making him start to walk. He went into the portal and the portal closed, as soon as it closed Kenji pulled me a little back to get closer to the portal before he let me go.
"Kenji, please don´t hurt him, promise me" The tears started to roll down my face as I felt it was my fault that this happened at all.
"I promise, you´ll get him back"
"Pinky promise?" I asked him putting my right behind my back for him to grab the pinky I was offering. It´s the only real promise in our family. He lowered his hand and grabbed the pinky in his.
"I pinky promise" he pushed me forward and disappeared into the portal and it closed behind me.

Kirishima was the first to reach me, checking me for any type of weapon or bomb before bringing me back to Razor who healed both my ribs, my broken arm, pierced lung, concoction and some frost damage on my leg. I was fine in no time, it was so easy to heal those injuries it was like it never happened, but it didn't take away the guilt, the feeling of being a failure and too weak. I lent into my dads embrace hoping that one day he would forgive me for being like this. The police quickly left one after the other, it was only the most necessary people left, a few heroes, the chief of police and some of his men and one ambulance that insisted on checking out my condition even after Razor healed me. As soon they had done their check they left too. I don't really know why we were there for so long. I don't remember half of the things that were being said to me and I do not remember changing any of my clothes before I was in the car on my way to the police station. They thought it was the only safe space for our family right now and they wanted me to tell them everything. We were given a room to talk; it was small but big enough for just the two of us. Kirishima sat down on the couch taking of some parts of his hero costume. I fell to my knees crying bowing with my forehead against the floor to ask for his forgiveness.
"Please forgive me!" he was in front of me dragging me into his embrace as fast as I had dropped to my knees.
"It´s not your fault, Malina. You don't have to do that" he pushed me hard into his chest not letting go before I calmed down.
"I was too weak to do something. If I had been just a little stronger I might have…"
"STOP SAYING THAT" he grabbed both my wrists and pulled me out of the embrace for me to look at him. The tears were rushing down his face too.
"YOU´RE NOT WEAK! It´s NOT your fault! Don't blame yourself for this!" He loosened his grip letting me into his embrace again. He sobbed into my shoulder too, taking this just as hard as me.
"H-he p-p-promised m-me" I sobbed into his shoulder.
"Kenji? Promised you what?"
"He p-promised to b-bring him b-back and to not h-hurt him"
He was silent for a moment, not knowing what to say.
"His promise means nothing, Malina, its just an empty promise" I pulled away from him looking into his red eyes.
"He told me his plan, he pinky promised, dad! He meant it!" his eyes narrowed.
"He is a murderer and a villain, Malina! How can you trust his promise so naively?"
"Because he is my brother!" he sighed and I could see the anger build up in his body. The door to the room went up and uncle Deku and Kaminari came into the room, they were both wearing their hero costume.
"Are we interrupting?" Kaminari asked us with a smile on his lips. I got up to give them both a hug, I couldn't ask for a better timing. Dad fell into their embrace too, neither of us were strong enough mentally to support the other, we needed them here. They both held conversations about everything else then the situation, making it easier to contain my emotions. They stayed the entire night and I slept in Kaminari´s embrace.

"I really need some air" I told them as I left the room, Deku followed me, not letting me have one moment alone since they came to the station. We went to the roof as the front of the station was filled with the press. It was so cold outside that I couldn't stay for long.
"How´s the training going?" he asked as he sat down beside me on the edge of the roof.
"I haven't gotten any stronger" I told him.
"I don't believe that, Todoroki told me how hard you were working"
"Really? I am training so much, but it doesn't mean I am doing any progress. I hate this quirk, it weakens my explosions"
"I bet when you get stronger you will be unstoppable" he clenched his finger into a fist.
"I don't think I´m worthy to be a hero" I looked down on my hands, looking how one hand represent my strong side and one hand the weak side, combined they were both weak, and I was too weak to become anything more than a burden.
"Not worthy? You´ve been working to become a hero as soon as you got your quirk, I don't know anyone who works as hard as you have to become a hero. Of course you´re worthy" I looked at him, he didn't understand.
"I´m too weak, I can´t even protect myself, how am I suppose to protect anyone else, how can I help others when I cant even ask for help myself?" He put his arm around my shoulder.
"You´re only 16 years old, you´ll get strong enough, just give yourself the time to grow stronger"

We stayed at the station for three days before we were allowed to go home. The media had gotten tired of waiting for us outside of the station and was gone when we went outside to the car. Deku drove us home; I think he felt a need to take care of us since neither of us was stable enough to even have a conversation together. Dad was too worried about Bakugou to even care about his own needs and every try to keep a conversation made him angry. I bet he felt just as useless as I did. The police had told me about the agreement between them and Kenji, they had promised to keep away from the operation, leaving the mission to Bakugou, which meant that Kiri couldn't do anything to try to locate him or try to reach out to him. I thought that was the hardest part for him, to know he could do something but being denied the opportunity, we had to assume that Kenji had the upper hand in this situation and act like we usually would in a hostage situation where life's where on the line.

The house was cold and dark and it didn't feel like a home anymore. Even if nothing was different from when I moved out it didn't feel like the same house. I sat down in the couch watching as Deku was trying to make it more like a home, he was lighting candles, making tea and dinner for us, but it was like making a hawk comfortable inside a tiny cage. The air was heavy to breath, like every breath was a struggle and after I had eaten my dinner the walls felt like they were closing in. I went up to my room, the empty room; I had nothing only empty shelves, my bed, a closet and my computer. It felt just as empty as myself right now. Not knowing what to feel, how to act, whom to blame. Was it my fault, Kenjis, dads, the police? Was I mad at them, angry, confused? I had no idea.

Days went by, I used most of my time to watch old training videos of Kenji and me, looking for a change in his behavior or in his technique that would indicate his change, but I couldn't detect anything. Every time Bakugou was screaming at us my heart skipped a beat. He was putting so much of himself into our growth and for us to be better, to be the best. He rarely mentioned us becoming heroes, he told us to follow our dreams, but to train children from our age to fight and to train as much as we did, and especially our quirk wouldn't make any sense if it weren't to become heroes. I snuck into Kenjis room to look at his pictures form his time at UA and to look at his accomplishments. He had his medal for first place form the sports festival from his second year hanging on the wall together with other medals from different events he attended as a kid. I stole my dads family sweater, the yellow and red to just smell him again and to get the feeling of him.

I still clanged to the hope that Kenji would keep his promise and let him go, but as another day went by and I didn't hear anything new about him, I started to lose hope that he was coming back. Maybe Kenji just had lied to me, why did I expect him to keep a stupid pinky promise? As unstable as I had witnessed him to be, he might have just killed him once he stepped through the portal. Maybe the story of the abusive heroes was only something he made up, just to brainwash me to think he actually had a reason to be angry with our dad. Maybe it was all a lie? He had seemed so calm and passionate when he told me, it couldn't be something he had made up on the spot. The way he was so gentle when he had cleaned the blood off my face, why would he do that if he didn't care about me or my feelings. He had to have the same feelings for our dad, he didn't hate him, he couldn't, and if he did he wouldn't be so cruel to Kiri or me that he would kill him off would he?

I watched a training video, one of the last workouts with Kenji before I attended UA, he pinned me down to the ground like he always did. I rubbed my eyes as the clock had gone passed 4am. The door behind me opened but I didn't take my eyes of the screen. It had to be Kirishima since there were no other people in the house at the moment.
"What have I told you about sleep, Night owl?" my heart skipped a beat. It wasn't Kirishima. I turned around to find Bakugou leaning against the doorframe his arms crossed over his chest. I blinked a couple of times before I believed what I saw. I ran into his arms and he lifted me up and squeezed me hard against his warm body, actually he was sweating even if it was freezing outside.
"Did he take your quirk?" I asked him not getting my priorities straight of the questions. He put me down again, not letting go of me as he showed his tiny explosions off. He hadn't even taken his quirk? What had happened?
"I need to tell Kiri that I´m home too, Honey. You look like you could use some sleep" he rubbed my hair and started to walk against his bedroom where Kiri was sleeping.
"But what happened, did he just let you go?" he didn't turn around as he quietly told me to go to bed and that we were to talk about it in the morning. I felt relived that he was home again, but something seemed off. Bakugou opened the door to the bedroom and shot me a look that told me once again to go to bed. I bet they had a lot to talk about too; maybe it was for the best to leave them alone until tomorrow and go to bed. They will tell me everything once they are ready too. Even if it felt like the burden of him being away was lifted there was still this strange feeling that I could not shake, something about the entire thing that didn't make any sense. How could he just have walked away from there, unharmed and with his quirk? Had he made a deal with Kenji, maybe something about the story he was going to publish? Maybe he talked some sense into him?

I couldn't wrap my head around his behavior, why was he so calm? Was it really a façade just to keep me calm or was there something else? The scenarios spun around in my head, how did the conversations go, what did Kenji tell him? I couldn't sleep, there was so much to ask and so much to know. What if Kenji had switched sides again and chosen to be good again, it would put him in jail probably. Was that where he was now? Was he being questioned by the police and put in a cell for the night? He was a high functional criminal, and the police have been looking for him for a while, making him their priority in this town at least. It was light outside when I fell asleep, finally my mind drifted away and thought about something else.

"Honey" someone was stroking my back until I awoke. My face was buried so far into my pillow it was painful to look up from it. It was Kirishima; he was dressed in jeans and a red sweater looking like he was ready to head to the city.
"Good morning, dad" I pushed the hair away from my face as it probably was all over the place like it used to be when I wake up.
"Good morning? Its 1pm!" he laughed as I looked at the clock. He had fixed his black hair so that it was pointing straight up, I had told him once it made him look younger and ever since he has been wearing it like that when he was going out. "You need to get dressed, we´re going into town" I notice he was wearing one of his most expensive watches too, it had to be something special happening, because he was putting a lot of thought into this outfit.
"Where are we going?" he noticed I was looking at his clothes.
"Dress respectfully, ok?" he went out of the room without answering the question; it wasn't really like him to avoid it just like that. I was too tired to care, I looked around in my closet, these were the clothes I had chosen not to bring to UA so it wasn't the clothes I would usually wear, but I did find one dress that used to be one of my favorites. It's a knee long black dress, long sleeves and a flowy skirt, it still fit me, and maybe even better then I remembered. Since it was November I had to wear black stockings underneath to not freeze to death. I put my hair up in a long ponytail, and put light make up on. To keep it some kind of casual I chose my black converse to go with. I think Bakugou and Kiri had coordinated their outfit since they were almost wearing the same thing, the watch, the pants, the only exception was the sweater, Bakugou had gone for a white shirt, of course he left the two top buttons unbuttoned. It looked like we we´re going to a movie premier, it would have been nice to know where we were going. They told me that they had to take some phone calls before we left, leaving me to eat breakfast alone, trying not to spill any food on my dress.

They didn't talk much even if I was asking a hundred times where we were going. Why didn't they want to tell me? Was it a surprise or what kind of game were they playing?
"Here, put these on" Kirishima was handing me a pair of huge sunglasses as we drove into the town.
"Sunglasses? But there is no sun outside?" I looked at the sunglasses thinking that it wasn't really my style.
"You should put your scarf on too, make sure to cover your face as much as possible" Bakugou gave me the order and I started to fumble with my scarf, I understood what this meant.
"The media?" I haven't checked my phone today; maybe there was something on the kidnapping? Should I check my phone or just wait until they told me? The media often didn't even get half of the story right so it would be smart to wait. The car was following the signs toward the hospital, and I understood that we were going there. The hospital why were we going there? Was Kenji there? Had there been a fight where he had gotten hurt or was it someone else? As we pulled into the hospital I saw multiple people with cameras, microphones and TV-cameras, this had to be a big case. I wrapped the scarf around my face and put the sunglasses on, like Bakugou and Kirishima did, we parked as close to the door as we could.
"Put these in too, Honey" Kirishima gave me a pair of earplugs.
"Isn´t that a little too much?" he put them in my hands and I did as they said, knowing making an argument over it was stupid, and every second we stayed in the car increased the chances of the media seeing us before we got out. It would make it harder to get into the hospital. I stepped outside of the car with the earplugs in my ears. Kirishima quickly grabbed me around the shoulders and pushed me against him walking determent towards the hospital, Bakugou right behind him. The people was taking a lot of pictures, and they made it hard to go passed them, but they did respect our space and let us through, I heard they asked a lot of questions, but I couldn't hear what they were saying. They stayed outside when we got in, but we didn't stop until they didn't see us anymore. I took out the earplugs and took off the scarf and sunglasses.
"Can you tell me why there is paparazzi outside of the hospital?" Bakugou pushed me in the direction of the elevator, Kiri was right behind us. Their faces was like stone, they showed no emotion at all, maybe they were afraid that some of the paparazzi was inside the hospital too. Bakugou pressed the button that took the elevator down to the basement. I looked at the floor plan in the elevator to see where we were going. I felt myself be physically sick when I saw the only thing in the basement was the autopsy lab. It meant someone was dead? Kenji? The elevator opened and we stepped out and into a white corridor, the smell of sterile was stronger here than on the first floor. The white lights in the roof lighted up the corridor; there was not a single thing in the corridor, only doors into other rooms. It was so silent here, only the sound of our shoes on the white floor as we walked further into the corridor. Bakugou didn't let go of my back, as I started to hesitate he pushed me to walk further in.
I turned around to face the both of them and in a moment of panic I raised my voice, tired of not getting any answers.
"What is going on?" they both stopped and looked at me. The lump in my stomach grew stronger for each second I had to stand there in the white corridor without any idea to why I was there in the first place. They looked at each other with their emotionless faces.
"Malina this is a hospital, do not raise your voice" I looked around; there was no one there to hear me talking anyway.
"There is no one here!" they sighed and started to walk further down the corridor grabbing my arm almost pulling me along with them. They stopped in front of an office door, Bakugou knocked politely before they went inside, pulling me along. There was a man there wearing a typical doctor uniform, and he was reading in a folder when we entered. Both my dads bowed to him and I followed their example, not knowing who he was.
"Thank you for meeting with us Dr. Nori" The man bowed back and pointed to the chairs on the other side of his table. Bakugou pulled my arm to signal me to sit down in one of the two chairs as he stood behind it.
"We apologize for talking so loudly in the corridor, Sir" Bakugou started. The man told us it was nothing to worry about; he was the only one working there today. Dr. Nori was an old man; he had to be past seventy years old. He wore huge black glasses covering his bushy white eyebrows. He didn't have any hair on his head, but to compensate for that he had the biggest mustache covering his lips, and moved when he talked.
"Thank you for coming so soon and for bringing the rest of the family with you. You do have to understand that these circumstances are really special, with the media almost running down the doors to the hospital. As soon as this is taken care of I hope that they´ll go away, but the media are unpredictable."
"We are truly sorry for the inconvenience they bring to the hospital, Sir. We have tried to keep the media out of it as much as possible" Kirishima once again bowed his head. The doctor held my gaze for a long time before he continued to talk. I got a bad feeling, as his face was filled with pity and compaction.
"It must be hard for you all, but I need someone to confirm the persons identity, I thought that only Mr. Bakugous witness would be enough, but sadly that's not the case" I looked at Kirishima, I knew what was going on, but I couldn't really understand it, or I wouldn't understand it. It was like I was watching the room from another perspective, as his talking quickly only became mumbling. I faded entirely out as I understood that the person who we were identifying were indeed Kenji. They had not told me because they knew I would react like this, they knew I would refuse to go, but they had to because the family is usually the once to identify the body. On television they ask for a mark of something we knew would identify him, like a scar or a birthmark, did Kenji have anything like that? I was so unsure about everything, I couldn't even remember his face properly anymore, or was it my body that rejected the picture, to push my emotions away? To keep my chin up I had to think about something else, I just couldn't bring myself to picture him lying on a bench, being carved up by this old man probably already so badly hurt that he was unrecognizable. The nausea was stronger than ever and I could feel myself starting to sweat. I couldn't do it, they cant make me do it can they? What crazy parents are making their child look at their brother's dead body? My heart was beating so fast that my breathing started to go faster. I could feel the look from the doctor on me as he mumbled something in my direction. I rose up and ran towards the door, Bakugou grabbed my arm and stopped me.
"Let me go!" I yanked my arm out of his grip and opened the door. He wasn't far behind, and grabbed my arm again. He spun me around, looking very mad, as I just had shown a huge amount of disrespect for the doctor. "You can´t make me, dad! I don't want to see him!" I tried to yank the arm out of his grip again, unsuccessfully this time. I tried again and again until I gave up, he wouldn't let me go, and where would I go. As my eyes filled with tears he embraced me. I could feel where his fingers had held around my arm when he let it go.
"It will only take a second, Honey" he stroked me over my hair.
"I don't want to remember my brother as a corps" I said into his shoulder and he didn't respond, maybe he didn't know what to say. He crouched in front of me wiping the tears away from my cheeks.
"We know that, but you´re the only one together with dad who can do it. I know you can do it, I´ll be right beside you all the time. Come lets go back." He grabbed my hand started to walk towards the office again, letting me stand beside him while the doctor was talking. The tears never stopped streaming down my face.
"I´ll think we´re ready, I just need you to sign this form" we all signed it and followed him into another room. The room was much colder and much darker than the corridor and the office. Every surface was a metallic gray, and it was as sterile as the corridor, making it extra creepy. Bakugou had his hands on both of my shoulders to calm me down. In the middle of the room was a table, you could clearly see there was a body on top of the table, but it was covered in a sheet. Beside the table was another smaller table filled with different tools, like scalpels and needles. As soon as I saw the body I froze, I didn't want to go any closer, it was too real.
"Its fine, we´re right here" he squeezed my shoulders and I kept on moving closer, Kirishima was waiting by the table. As we were lining up the doctor watched me closely like he wanted me to say anything or do anything. I clenched my fists and took a deep look right before the doctor lifted the sheet from his face. I felt my entire body tense up as I saw Kenjis dead body laying on the table.
"Can you confirm that is him?" the doctor asked and I nodded, the tears falling from my eyes. Kirishima had a dead serious face as he also confirmed that it was Kenji on the table. His face had no traces of any combat, it looked like it used to do, his blond spikey hair was just as spikey when he was dead, his lips looked like they were in a half smile, like it always was, because of his fangs. The doctor dragged the sheet further down reviling the cause of death; I quickly turned around covered my face in Bakugou´s chest. His entire chest had a huge hole in it; it was a little bit bigger than my fist.
"I think we´re done here, thank you, Sir" Bakugou dragged me out of the room letting me sit in the corridor while we waited for Kirishima. It was silent; I could only hear my heart beating and Bakugous breathing. A faint clicking sound, maybe his watch was the only thing keeping me sane at the moment.
"You killed him?" I whispered. I knew the hole was from an explosion, I have blown holes in so many trees to know how big the holes usually are, it was just the size of a hand. There is no way he didn't kill him, his own fucking son. He slid down by my side pulling his feet up to his chest.
"We´ll talk about it when we get home, ok?" I really didn't like the way he pushed everything away from him right now, how he didn't show any emotion, how he didn't wanted to talk about it here and he didn't even want to tell me the fucking truth.
"It´s an fucking easy question to answer, dad! Did you kill him?" his red eyes met mine as I was starting to get really angry. Couldn't he respect me enough to tell me to my face right now? Was he so afraid to let go of the control for one minute that he couldn't answer a simple question from his daughter? He didn't answer and I rolled my eyes, this is pathetic. He is pathetic!
"I can´t believe you told me to dress up to look at my brothers dead body, like he was some kind of trophy"
"You watch your fucking mouth, Malina!" He grabbed my face to make me look at him, it really hurt, but I wouldn't show that to him. "Don't you for one second even think about talking that disrespectfully to me" he let go and I rubbed the pain away. "You need to get your emotions in check right now before we walk out of this building, you understand?" I nodded, not wanting to interrupt his anger. "We dressed up to show the hospital respect, Malina. Something you haven't shown since we got here!" he raised his voice. "You may be in pain right now, but you should know better than to talk to me like that, especially when I risked my fucking life to save yours" he took a deep breath to calm himself before he ended the discussion "Look at me" I turned my face to him. He licked his finger to rub away some of my makeup from under my eye and wiped away the last tears. At last he pushed my chin up. "You´re a Bakugou, act like one" He handed me the sunglasses, the scarf and the earplugs. I put the glasses on and the scarf and one earplug. Kirishima came out as I was wrapping the scarf around my face. As we took the elevator up Kirishima held around my shoulder and started to move faster. I buttoned up my jacket just before we went outside. There were even more reporters there now, taking pictures of us and asking questions. Since I only had one earplug in I could hear their questions, everyone about Kenji, how he died, how he was going to be buried, if he was considered a part of the family anymore. I quickly put in the other earplug too. It was hard to get to the car fast, but fortunately they were really polite and probably understood our pain and let us trough. The way home was long, too long for my liking, and all I could think about was Kenjis dead body lying on the metallic gray bench with a huge hole in his chest.