This was requested as a birthday fic from a friend of mine. We talked about it for a little, discussing the details, and this is what resulted.
I do not own My Hero Academia.
This one goes out to you Tsuki.
The Buffet
Katsuki Bakugo was many things. Smart, strong, fast, and, most important of all, powerful. His ability, Explosion, would catapult him to new heights.
He knew this because everyone said so. His mom, his friends, his teachers. Even that useless nobody, Izuku, said that Katsuki would go far.
His insurmountable strength was one of his many good features, not that he had many bad features.
That was why it confused and angered him that day that Izuku tried to help him. He was Katsuki Bakugo! He was gonna be the next top hero in the world! He didn't need help from anybody, let alone some quirkless, useless nerd!
He smacked Midoriya's hand aside that day with a sneer, and a black wolf howled in the woods. Katsuki thought it almost sounded… mournful.
From that point on, things only got worse and worse. It started with small things, teasing comments, snide remarks, hiding Izuku's pencils.
When he didn't get in trouble for it, the blonde escalated. Light punches. Those quickly turned not so light, then hard, then as hard as he could. Then he started using his Quirk against Izuku, and anyone else that got in his way.
It was illegal, but the teachers and other kids just ignored it. If that was the case, it must be okay. It must be okay, because he was strong and everyone else was weak.
They had that saying. Might makes right. The most powerful people were the best people. Just like All Might! He was the strongest guy ever, and he was always right!
Katsuki barely heard the soft whining of something in his mind. Instead he focused on the vicious growl.
It was a constant companion, sounding like a rampaging wild dog. Or maybe a wolf. Yeah, a wolf. It was at its worst around Izuku, though. For whatever reason, that useless nerd caused the growling to become wilder, louder. It only quieted when Katsuki showed him his place.
The day that he beat Izuku black and blue, the wolf was fully silent for two days.
Then Izuku came back to school. Katsuki feared, briefly, some form of retaliation.
Nothing. No anger, no hate, no snitching to the teachers.
Nothing.
Nothing except snapping jaws, gnashing teeth and furious howls.
That fucking prick! Who the fuck did he think he was?! Katsuki Bakugo didn't need anyone's pity, or charity, or anything! He'd show that fucking nerd!
A part of him, a part he simply refused to acknowledge, knew that what he really wanted was for Izuku to strike back, to tell someone, to get him punished. He deserved it.
The rest of him went on the offensive.
One day was worse than the rest.
They were thirteen. A pop quiz had just been held. Mathematics. Of course, Katsuki aced it. He always did.
"Congratulations, Midoriya," their teacher said to the useless prick, "Full marks, plus the extra credit question. Keep up like this, and maybe you can make something of yourself."
Katsuki looked at the sheet being handed to Izuku. One hundred over one hundred, plus ten. All in bright red ink.
"And you Bakugo, as usual, this exam was almost a waste of your time. The only one you didn't overtake was Midoriya. Keep up the good work."
Katsuki's own test was marked in red, too. Ninety eight over one hundred. No bonus credit.
Izuku's cheeks were pink with a small amount of earned pride, though he kept his head down, trying not to appear arrogant for it. Katsuki ground his teeth. The little son of a-
Katsuki's fist pushed into Izuku's stomach. The air whooshed out of the smaller boy's lungs. It was later that day, just after school.
"You useless piece of shit!" the blonde roared, punching Izuku in the face. The jaws snapped, the teeth gnashed.
"K-Kacchan, what-?" Another blow landed on Izuku's face, shutting him up.
"Did you think it was fucking cute? Showing me up?" he grabbed the boy by his hair and punched him again, harder than before. The blow was so hard it ended up tearing hair off of the greenette's head.
"Hey, Bakugo-"
"What?!" his blazing red eyes met the gazes of his cronies. The look on his face was horrifying to them. It was twisted in rage and the heaving breaths he was taking made him look like a monster.
"N-nothing. Just, ya know, hurry up. We don't wanna get caught."
"Fine!" he turned back to Izuku, a gash splitting his face that was a cruel mockery of a grin, "Just one last thing to do, anyway."
The quirkless boy was crying, but there was nothing new about that, anyway.
"Give me your arm," Katsuki demanded, almost calmly.
Izuku shook his head, sobbing quietly.
Katsuki kicked him in the stomach with a roar of, "Give me your fucking arm!"
The poor boy yelped, and with a gasping sob, held out his left arm. He was shaking head to toe.
"Your other one," the blonde growled.
Slowly, Izuku held out his right arm, clenching and unclenching his fingers.
The sickening crack of breaking bones was drowned out by the smaller boy's wail of agony. Katsuki and his cronies booked it. He knew that would be the end of it. Izuku was too much of a fucking coward to tell on him for it. His 'friends' were looking a little nervous, so he'd have to talk to them about it, but the only thing that would come of this is that Deku would learn his fucking place.
The quirkless nerd was out of school for a week. He heard there was a minor investigation, but that was just to prove that Inko hadn't been abusing her son. Fucking idiots. Inko would never do that.
When Izuku finally came back his arm was in a thick cast. He wouldn't be able to write with his right hand for the next month. Katsuki approached him at lunch that first day, marker in hand. The boy flinched away from him, of course, but the blonde took a firm grasp of the cast and wrote a simple message on it, then tucked the marker in his front pocket.
'Don't forget your place, Deku.'
The teacher never once mentioned the oddity of a high tier student like Midoriya suddenly dropping to the middle of the pack. Katsuki also noticed that the smaller boy would take twice as long on tests, doing a lot of erasing.
The monster inside him would rumble lowly that Deku still needed to be shown his place, but the demand wasn't as aggravating now. Once or twice a week he'd still have to put the nerd nose to dirt, but he hadn't needed to do anything as drastic as breaking his arm again. Yet.
The beginning of their final year of Junior High was marked by the career path exams.
"I'm supposed to help you all pick out a High School for your prospective futures. Bankers, doctors, lawyers," the teacher looked around the room, taking in the bored and disinterested faces, "Aw, who am I kidding, you all want to be heroes!" He tossed the useless packets into the air and suddenly the class cheered, showing off their many and varied abilities with enthusiasm.
"Alright, alright, settle down! Don't use your quirks in public!" The man ordered, "Now there are a bunch of hero schools all over Japan. We even have three, here, in Musutafu Ward. Now has anyone got an idea which school they'll be applying for?"
"Yeah," Katsuki said with a smirk, "Unlike these extras, I'm going to the only school that matters; UA!" His arms were crossed and his feet were up on his desk.
"Are you kidding? Those exams are super hard!" One of his classmates said, "Only one out of every hundred applicants even passes the entrance exams!"
"You're damn straight! I already aced all the mock exams, and when I'm the only one from this pissant little school to make it in-!"
"Ah, Midoriya," the teacher said, interrupting the blonde, "You're applying for UA, too. Pretty bold, given your disability."
"What?!" The entire class yelled out, then almost unanimously began to laugh at the quirkless boy, "Bakugo we get, but how the hell is a quirkless loser gonna even live through the entrance exams?"
"W-well, it's not impossible, and they've even started letting people without quirks try out, so-"
"Deku!" Katsuki roared, slamming an exploding palm on the smaller boy's desk. The wood splintered, the boy yelped in fear and cringed away from the blonde.
Despite his earlier warning about using quirks in public, the instructor didn't even make a token complaint about the destruction of school property.
"What the fuck are you thinking, Deku?" He growled. The wolf that had been varying shades of quiet had started up again with a new fervor. It had never sounded so vicious before.
"T-there's no harm in trying," Izuku gulped, "the worst that happens is they say no, y-ya know?"
"You're wrong," Bakugo said, almost calmly, "The worst that happens is you die," he had laid a hand on Izuku's shoulder, and it started to smoke as he only used the ignition part of his quirk, "Because, if you actually take the test, I will fucking kill you." The last part was said low enough so that only Izuku could hear.
To Katsuki's complete and utter surprise, Izuku didn't back down. His eyes started to water, his entire body began to tremble, and he clenched his fists at his side.
Then his green eyes met Bakigo's red and the blonde's eyes widened. The glare there was fierce, unyielding, in the face of such adversity.
"The god damn do it!" He hissed at his former friend, "Break me again, Bakugo! Prove you were never a hero to begin with!"
Even with his voice quavering in fear, what Izuku said struck a chord deep inside the blonde. Prove you were never a hero to begin with!
The snarling wolf, with its snapping jaws, whined in fear. Deep in his mind, there was another howl.
Katsuki, surprising everyone, just went back to his desk. He kicked his feet up, put his hands behind his head, and focused on the lesson. There had been other things. Things he was going to say and do. But now?
Somehow, it just didn't feel as right as before. So, he didn't tell Deku the best way to get a quirk was to commit suicide from the school roof. He didn't burn his notebook. He didn't threaten to do worse.
Because now, after what Izuku said, he could feel a tingle of fear. Fear that all the things he'd done would finally come back to haunt him.
Part of him knew this wasn't the end of this. He'd come back, full of vitriol and violence, to put the nerd back down where he belonged, but for the day, he'd let the useless fucker have his small victory.
That all changed later that day, when Katsuki found himself captive to a villain made out of ass scented sludge. It was pouring itself into every orifice, trying to take over his body. He could hear it laughing insanely as his oxygen depleted. He had tried to blow it up, but all that had done is start several fires around the street.
He looked out over the crowd watching. No one was doing anything. Not even the pro heroes. Not a one was doing any damned thing to save him.
Then his eyes met the gaze of the last person he expected to see.
Deku. The fucking nerd met his eyes, his own green orbs starting to tear up. He covered his mouth like he was trying not to scream, or puke, or both.
He turned away and Katsuki knew all hope was lost.
There was a high pitched scream, people telling someone to stop, and the sludge monster recoiled in pain. The next thing the blonde knew, Midoriya was right in front of him, tearing at layers of sludge until Bakugo finally had room to breathe.
"The fuck-blegh!- are you doing, Deku?" He growled and cursed at the smaller boy.
"You," he struggled for a moment at a particularly thick tendril of slime, "You just looked like you wanted someone to save you, and my body just moved!"
"You stupid brat!" The sludge villain roared, lifting up one arm to smash the dark green haired teen, "Die!"
There was a woosh of air, and Bakugo could feel it as he and Izuku were sat down a safe distance from the monster. He looked behind him and he saw the muscular back of All Might. The Symbol of Hope. The number one hero in the world.
"I'm pathetic," he said, even as he clenched a fist at his side, "After everything I said to you earlier, Midoriya, I'm a damn hypocrite!" He punched forward so hard that it blew away the sludge villain. More than that it actually caused clouds to form, and rain started to fall.
Almost immediately afterwards, Midoriya and Bakugo were taken to separate ambulances and looked over for injuries. The blonde ignored the blathering of some nameless pro about having a strong quirk.
Instead, his red eyes were solely on Midoriya as he was being chewed out by Death Arms. The look on the greenette's face, in particular, was interesting. It was sadness, doubt, and mounting rage.
Bakugo couldn't hear what the hero was saying, but everyone heard it when Izuku snapped.
"As opposed to what?! Letting you pathetic excuses for heroes just watch him die! 'Oh, woe is me, my quirk isn't the exact perfect type for this situation!'" He mimicked snidely, something the blonde didn't even know he could do, "Grow up! It's your job to risk your life to save people! If you can't, or won't, do that, then hand in your damn license and quit trying to throw people who actually help under the bus!" Izuku grabbed his book bag, threw down the blanket and started stomping away.
Bakugo watched him go with a blank look on his normally pinched face. Deku kept surprising him today. The refusal to back down in class, his rescue operation, and now this. The Izuku of last year, hell, the Izuku of last week, wouldn't have done any of those things.
He guessed that the boy was finally ready to push back. Push back against the world, against the pros. Against him. He was, again, conflicted. The snarling beast inside him demanded retribution, but he was actually proud of the fucking nerd.
The beast, the feral wolf creature snarled and barked and howled until, on the way home, Katsuki punched a wall hard enough to hurt his hand. The knuckles split open and blood slipped freely to the ground as he continued walking home.
"Shut the fuck up!" He snarled back at the beast, and it whimpered, retreating into his subconscious, where it belonged.
That night, Katsuki had a strange dream. In it, there was a strange, feral wolf sitting in a clearing. It was sickly looking. Patches of fur were missing here and there, and the skin beneath was yellowed. It's jaws, crunching on what he somehow knew to be human bones, were frothing. This wolf, this creature, was a representation of everything he knew to be wrong with himself.
His arrogance, his anger, his hate, his envy, his fear. Everything negative that a person could feel, this white wolf was it.
He watched it for a good long while, wondering what the point of this was. Then, hours later, a new wolf made its way into the clearing. The new one was black as night, with eyes the color of purest amber. The white wolf looked up and Katsuki could see that the white wolf had an eye that was infected and milky. It got to its feet, it's disgustingly distended belly wobbling, and snarled at the black wolf.
By contrast, the black wolf was healthy, if emaciated. It's fur was thick and had a healthy glow to it, its eyes were sharp and it stood lightly on its feet. It lowered it's head and growled while making eye contact with its opposite in the white wolf.
The fight began, and ended, in a flash of movement. They had just stared at each other for a long while, then the black wolf darted forward.
The white wolf tried to snap at him, but it pulled up short and snapped at the opening on its right side. It ended up tearing the white wolf's throat out, then darting away.
Katsuki observed with a morbid fascination as the white wolf died. With its throat ripped open, it would die in minutes. Still, it snarled wetly, trying to struggle back to its feet. The froth in its mouth took on a pink, then red tint. There was a disturbing wheeze every time it breathed.
The black wolf paced around it slowly. It was taking no chances, simply watching its rival die. Any time the white wolf tried to approach, the black wolf would run in the opposite direction, then resume to slowly circle the dying monster.
Finally, the sickly white wolf collapsed to the floor of the clearing and wheezed out one last, pitiful howl.
The black wolf stopped its pacing sniffed at the corpse, then lifted its head to the sky and howled its victory. The crooning echoed for miles and a grand wind came along to pull the sound even further.
The last thing Katsuki saw before the dream ended was the black wolf, staring directly at him.
The blonde teen woke up slowly. He knew, without a doubt, that dream had been a psychological statement from his subconscious.
Katsuki was smart. He studied. He knew things useful to being the best hero on the planet. Unbelievably, this meant some amateur dream analysis.
That dream was telling him to cut his bullshit and start being the hero he always said he was going to be.
He growled for a moment. This was gonna be such a pain in the ass. And he'd do it. He'd buckle down. He'd do better. He'd be better.
Because Katsuki Bakugo was going to be the greatest hero ever!
The next class he had with Midoriya, there was a different air about his former friend. He was determined, confident. Happy. Something had changed.
And then he saw what he was doing underneath the desk. He was working on his hand and wrist muscles with a pair of grip strengtheners. He did that for all of period one, then switched to the other hand during the second period.
"The fucking nerd is finally putting in some effort," he grumbled to himself. If that was the case, Bakugo knew that Deku would, at the least, be fit enough for the entrance exam. And it would certainly not do, to fall behind.
That night, he plotted a workout schedule that would improve his reaction speed and arm strength.
The test at UA was a joke. Kill a bunch of robots? Easy as fuck. Easiest seventy points of his life.
More interesting had been the sight of Deku in the changing rooms. The fucking nerd had gone from a skinny little fuck with no muscles to practically buldging with power.
It really snuck up on him, he had to say. He knew that the boy had been training for the last ten months, but it wasn't until just before the practical exam that he realized the nerd wasn't half assing it.
The first day of classes, such as it was, undid a lot of the progress Bakugo had made.
It had started with the ball throwing test. Hell, it started when their weird caterpillar of a sensei announced who had the highest score in the entrance exam.
"Midoriya," Aizawa said tiredly, "you had the highest score on the practical exam."
Bakugo's jaw suddenly clenched hard enough that he almost cracked his teeth. What?! How the fuck-? Sure, the fucking nerd got buff, but how in the hell did he beat me for points?!
"What's the furthest you threw in middle school?"
Deku rubbed the back of his neck nervously, clearly blushing, "Eh, about forty meters." The whole class looked at the clearly fit boy, wondering what the hell that was about? Did he use a weighted ball? "I, uh, I didn't start working out till the last year, or so."
"Whatever. Use your quirk to throw the ball," Aizawa waited a moment then added, "Safely. Other than that, do whatever you want while staying in that circle."
"Pah, that nerd is Quir-"
"SMASH!" The ball created a sonic boom as it left the school grounds.
Almost as one, the whole class felt their jaws drop. More so when Aizawa showed the results on a holographic display. Nine hundred twenty seven meters.
"Deku!" Bakugo roared dashing forward, his hands already sparking with his quirk. Izuku saw him coming, and rather than flinching away, or cowering away, Katsuki would be damned if he didn't square up.
Before anything could happen, however, Katsuki's quirk shut down and bandages wrapped around his body, slapping his arms down to his sides.
"The fuck?!"
The bands pulled him back to be held just in front of Mister Aizawa.
"One, watch your mouth. Two," he leaned in close, his eyes glowing red, his hair lifting upwards, "I don't care what your problem with Midoriya is, if you attack a fellow student again, I'll expel you on the spot. Are we clear?"
"But he-!" Katsuki growled, trying to turn his head and glare at Deku.
"Are. We. Clear?" Aizawa growled at him in a tone that brooked no further argument. After a long moment, the blonde nodded. The look in his eyes said it wasn't over.
Ten months. For ten god damn months, the monster in his head had been silent. Not a single growl, or bark, or anything. Now, after that display by Deku, it came back.
At the end of the day, Bakugo would place fourth overall. Just under Deku. He grit his teeth when he thought about that.
That night he had another dream. It was much shorter than the last one about the wolves in the clearing. It was the white wolf again, but it had rotted in the months since its throat had been ripped out. Its face lacked any fur, or flesh, showing hollow sockets and sun bleached bones.
After a few seconds, the dead wolf began to move. Its spine arched and twisted around. It's ribs cracked and broke, spreading outwards. Its paws lengthened, a thumb growing out to make them more humanoid. Each finger ended in inch long talons. Finally its hip bones snapped into a position to allow for bipedal movement.
Suddenly it took a deep, wheezing breath in, and let out a gurgling hiss. With its back to Katsuki it looked like the monster was enjoying the taste of fresh air again, after ten months dead.
Slowly, it turned around to face him again. Its sockets were bottomless pools of black and only one had the light of a small blue orb that focused on the blonde bomber.
"He," it rasped and gurgled as it spoke, "LIED!" The last word was a sickening howl, wet in the way only rotting flesh can be.
Katsuki jolted awake, but not in fear. A glare settled on his face and he gnashed his own teeth together.
"That fucking bastard!" He growled, practically jumping out of bed and getting ready for his second day at UA as quickly as possible.
He barely remembered, or paid attention to, anything that was said. Not until All Might announced that Bakugo would be teamed up with a speedster called Iida, against Deku and some round faced girl.
Fucking perfect.
When he and Iida were in the room with bomb they were supposed to secure against the other team, he outlined his plan.
"I'm gonna go beat the fuck out of Deku!" He almost yelled, "Keep the other one busy until I'm done making him beg for mercy!"
As soon as the two were allowed into the building, Bakugo headed for the first floor. It didn't take him long to find the fucking nerd. Round face split off after something Deku said to her.
He couldn't hear what it was. The beast in his mind was far too loud to hear anything but the war drum that was his heartbeat. The fucking liar held his fists up in something approaching a boxing stance, and Bakugo was ready to tear his fucking head off.
He lead with his right hand, an explosion blasting out at about half his max capacity.
"Did you think it was funny?!" Bakugo roared.
Deku dodged the blow. To the blonde, it appeared that he was in direct line of the blast one moment, the next he was off to his right, punching him in the face.
"Did I think what was funny?" the smaller boy asked.
The explosive teen growled as he got to his feet, his eyes wild with hate, "All these years! All these fucking years you pretended to be quirkless! Why? Just to have a laugh at me?!" he pointed his hands behind him and exploded forwards. At the last second, just as Izuku was putting up a defense in the obvious direction of attack, he altered his trajectory with another explosion, "STOP LOOKING DOWN ON ME, YOU USELESS FUCKING DEKU!"
The blow that landed on Midoriya's face would have been enough to put him out for a couple of days a year ago. But this was not the Midoriya of a year ago. This was the Midoriya who had enough being the victim. This was the Midoriya who had put in ten months of effort like never before in his entire life. This was the Midoriya who had told All Might to go screw himself when he tried to tell him to give up on being a hero.
This was the Midoriya who had completed training on the beach two months before the entrance exam, and had used that time to receive specialized, one on one training from All Might on how to use his quirk, One for All.
The punch landed and Katsuki felt like he'd punched a steel block.
"Katsuki," Izuku said in the coldest voice that Katsuki had ever heard from the excitable hero nerd, "Get over yourself." One of greenette's hands clamped on his left gauntlet.
Katsuki Bakugo wasn't sure what happened. One moment he was getting ready to pull the pin on his specially made gauntlet to make Deku get the fuck out of his face. The next, he was waking up in a room with a white ceiling with a blue curtain. Oh, and his jaw felt like he'd been punched hard enough to take his head off.
"Ah, good," said the elderly nurse of UA, Recovery Girl, "Follow my finger," she commanded. She waved it back and forth slowly in front of him and he thought about the obvious outcome of the fight. Deku had knocked him the fuck out. And it looked like he'd barely been trying.
Katsuki had lost, unequivocally. Maybe Iida had pulled a team victory out of his uptight ass, but he severely doubted it. After a small battery of tests, and assurances that he hadn't been hit hard enough to deal any lasting damage, Katsuki was released. He had only been out for about twenty minutes, so he made his way back to class.
Just in time to see the match with that Icy Hot bastard.
Another one. There was another guy here that he was certain could have beaten him, now. He wasn't sure that there would have been anything he could do to block or stop that ice. He'd have tried, he knew, but he wasn't certain that it would work.
He looked over at Midoriya who was now surrounded by a small group of other students, including Iida, the pink girl, Round Face, some red headed dude with sharp teeth, and the frog girl. The look on his face was just as he remembered it. He was blushing, trying not to preen too much under the attention of others too much. He had a genuine smile on his face as he thanked them for their compliments, then added his own to each of them, presumably about their own trials.
Those green eyes briefly considered Bakugo, then slid away, without even changing his expression.
And suddenly the blonde knew, without a doubt, that things had forever changed between him and Midoriya. He actually didn't care anymore. Not about Katsuki Bakugo. The blonde was certain that Izuku would save him again, if something like the sludge villain was to happen, but that would be it. He'd do what was necessary, then forget about Bakugo until needed for the next time.
Izuku Midoriya no longer cared about Katsuki Bakugo.
+- End of Part One.
This story has another part incoming, and fairly soon at that. Now, let me just say that I didn't choose to describe Bakugo's inner spirit animal as wolves on a whim. When My friend requested this story, she asked me to base it off the Cherokee proverb of the Two Wolves.
An old Cherokee was teaching his grandson about life and the world when one day he said, "A fight is going on inside me."
"It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil–he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego."
He continued, "The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you–and inside every other person, too."
The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: "Which wolf will win?"
The old Cherokee simply replied, "The one you feed."