"No, no, no no no no no no-" Dropping the knife, Bakugo frantically grabbed at the limp string, wishing it was all a trick of the mind. He swore he could still feel Uraraka pulling at it! But he could also feel the bumps in the thread and clearly see the frayed end where the knife made contact.

He really did it. He cut the string.

"Fuck! Fuck!"

The tugging continued at his thumb, perhaps a phantom sensation created by the twisted effects of his scrambled brain. It seemed to pull more frantically, actually. He must be losing his mind.

"Why are you fighting so hard against it, Katuski Bakugo? Cut off your hand and free yourself!" The mad woman wiggled her fingers and taunted, not realizing that he had already broken what was most precious to him.

Even if he himself didn't know it.

Why didn't he ask that old lady what would happen if the string were to break? Would Uraraka hate him now? Would it hurt her? He was prepared to meet his death, but what if he caused hers too?

He was desperately gulping for air now, sucking it into his lungs greedily to try and retain some semblance of calm. He needed to break free of this lady's fingers somehow to go and see for himself. See if Uraraka was ok.

"Damn it, let go of me!" His voice cracked with desperation, the hysteria further preventing him from creating a solid escape plan.

In the midst of his panic, Uraraka crashed through the ceiling like a meteor in all its glory. The rickety roof gave way easily to her gravity-assisted weight. She didn't have her pink and white hero costume on, but she didn't need it. Her large, brown eyes had turned into slits, blazing with fury. Her chest was heaving up and down with the trapped roar she unleashed when she pinpointed her target and yelled, "Get your hands off him!"

"Oh, don't worry my sweet Ochako Uraraka. Once I'm done with him you'll get your turn." The crazy lady crooned, making no move to release her victim, but visibly stiffening in defense.

If he were in his right self, Bakugo would've known, without a doubt, that Uraraka could take the brain lady in her sleep. But while he was still under the influence of the mind-numbing fear, all Bakugo could think of was the image of her mind being controlled and cutting her own fingertips off like the low-level henchmen were detailing earlier.

"No!" He managed to yell out. "No! I'll do it, I'll cut off my hand. But you don't lay a finger on her!"

"Oh? You would do that for her? You would sacrifice your quirk, your body?" Hijack eased her prodding as she pulled away at the fear center and tested his words.

For a moment, he thought that maybe he had proven something to the villain. Something worth sparing him for. She could clearly tell if and when he was lying. But he was no fool. He quickly squashed his hope down and prepared for the worst.

With her free hand, Hijack slammed the knife down on the table point side down, sticking it into the grainy wood. "Alright, then. Be a true hero, sacrifice yourself, and I let her go. I swear it on my honor."

"Bakugo, don't you dare!" As Uraraka came charging at them, Bakugo could feel the pressure on his head release. Hijack was stepping back so that the choice would truly be his. It seemed like she was taking the deal seriously. Which meant he would have to cut off his hand out of his own volition if he wanted her to stay away from Uraraka.

Really, if he could spare her of this pain, he would do it in a heartbeat.

But before he could pick up the knife to seal his fate, Uraraka grabbed him by the wrist and forearm, and tossed him over her shoulder, clearing the table in a perfect arc. "Arghhh!" Bakugo wasn't sure who yelled louder, him or her. She didn't even need to cancel out his gravity, she just chucked him out of the way and proceeded to slam the table into Hijack's gut with a solid kick to the edge.

With the wind knocked out of him, and the added daze of getting his brain back, he could only vaguely make out the fight above him.

Although, it wasn't really a fight. Hijack was no match for Uraraka in terms of physical prowess, even if she hadn't just been hit with a table. If it weren't for the colossal distraction Bakugo faced at his apartment, he would never have been in this position. In addition to the disparity between their physiques, the villain relied too heavily on her quirk to overpower her opponents by brute force and Uraraka was no stranger to the challenge of staying clear of one's fingers.

Crouched against the wall, Hijack grit her teeth and poised her fingers to strike at any window of opportunity. But Uraraka wouldn't give her an inch. She front flipped off of the table, activating her quirk on it as she launched towards the deranged woman.

Hijack scrambled to get out of her landing zone, but only barely made it out, getting caught by Uraraka's sweeping leg and banging her chin on the ground on the way down. Seizing her chance for a quick and bloodless victory, Uraraka dug her knee into her opponent's back and pinned her hands down with her other boot.

"Take one wrong breath, and I will crush you." She all but growled the threat. A shadow loomed over them and Hijack immediately realized the table was floating above them, just waiting for the command to drop on her body.

With a yell on her lips, Hijack struggled and bucked against the weight when Uraraka pushed deeper, crushing the air out of her lungs and extinguishing her cry. "Try me." And that was the last thing she heard before she was met with a double slam to her ears and blacking out.

Uraraka hastily made sure the villain was still breathing and not seriously injured before propping her against the wall and pinning her there with the table. It was easy to check for internal injuries, seeing as her skull was completely see-through. Once that was secured, she rushed over to the still-shocked blonde man on the ground nearby.

"Bakugo!" She slid and knelt in front of him, grabbing his sweat-slicked hands in hers. "What were you thinking? You are not going to give up your quirk for me!" Noticing his wincing, she realized his shoulder had been dislocated by her earlier flip. In her haste to get him away from the crazed villain, she pulled his arm out of the socket.

"I'm gonna need to pop your arm back in." Although Bakugo was no stranger to bodily injuries, this was not the first time he dislocated something, Uraraka didn't want to unnecessarily surprise him with the pain and send him into shock.

"Do it." Gritting his teeth, he braced for the excruciating pull that comes before the readjustment. At his confirmation, she yanked sharply and set the bone back in its place.

Breathing hard through the pain, he could feel her small hands patting all over his body, checking for other injuries. As she neared his head, about to comb through his hair, he jerked away and covered his skull with his hands.

"No." There was no way he was letting anyone near his head for the rest of his life. Even thinking about showering and having to lather in shampoo was giving him the creeps. As ridiculous as it might look, maybe he needed to invest in a helmet or something.

"She messed around with your brain. If there's anywhere I need to make sure you don't have lasting damage, it's your head."

"I'm fine now. You don't have to touch it."

"Bakugo," She said with exasperation laced through each syllable. "You were talking about cutting your hand off. You're not in your right mind."

"That wasn't her. That was all me."

"What? Why?" She wanted to shake him, knock some sense into him.

"Because!" Bakugo growled in frustration, feeling the embarrassment prickling at his skin already. "I don't care about the string. I still choose you."

"Th-the string? I don't understand." She searched his face for some sign of brain damage. Who knew what kind of long-term effects the psycho lady would have on him?

"I cut the string! The stupid red soulmate string!"

"But the string is-"

"No! I don't care! I want you and it doesn't matter whether this string exists or not. I would give up my quirk if it meant keeping you safe because I choose you!"

"Bakugo." Uraraka calmly interjected with a gentle touch to his knee. "The string is fine. See?"

She held up her left hand and used her right to grab at the swinging cord between them. It held taut as she pulled at it, strong and unscathed by blade. The knot at the base of his thumb dug into his skin, a welcome pressure. His fingers trembled almost uncontrollably as he took the glistening thread by his fingers and traced the entire length between them. From thumb to pinky.

"Did she make you think you cut it somehow?" Bakugo nodded mutely at Uraraka's question, prompting her to continue. "After Officer Takahashi caught me up on my attackers, I looked into Hijack's patterns. It seems like she gets her victims to reveal how to disable their quirks by activating their fear center and then acts it out herself. I was hoping I'd get to you before that happened."

But his biggest fear wasn't losing his quirk, or even cutting off his own hand. It was losing the string connection to Uraraka.

"Whatever you think you did, whatever you think happened... I promise you, it wasn't real. You're safe now."

He wasn't sure if it was the soft tone in her voice, or the fact that she somehow knew the exact words to put him at ease, but the blush worked its way through Bakugo's whole body.

Seeing he had calmed down, she patted the top of his thigh and checked one more time. "Ok, ok… Are you alright?"

"Fucking splendid."

"Really?"

He grunted in response.

"You promise? Because I'm gonna feel like a huge jerk if it turns out you're actually injured." She continued to recheck his physical state, although she settled on grabbing his chin to inspect his head instead of the back.

"I said I'm fine!" He swatted her hand away and crossed his arms, trying to somehow shield himself from the damage he surely brought upon himself with his involuntary confession. And just as he predicted, the corners of Uraraka's mouth twitched as she fought against the gigantic grin growing on her face.

"Alright then. So what were you saying about me being your soulmate?" He fought the urge to to jerk back as she leaned forward and giggled.

Damn. She was never gonna let him live this down. He was kidnapped, forced to undergo literal brainwash, and she had the nerve to poke fun at him?

"Forget it!"

"You were saying you liiiiiiiiiiike me!"

And in that moment, looking at the ridiculously dancing woman in front of him, Bakugo couldn't deny it. He really, really did. With her sweat soaked hair plastered to her face and the swollen ankle from dropping in through the ceiling, he couldn't think of a single other person he'd rather be with.

He sandwiched her cheeks between his palms, effectively stopping her sing-songy teasing. "You're moving in. Tomorrow."

"Eh?" She made no gesture to remove his hands, making her next words sound garbled. "Aren't you gonna ask me out first?"

Why couldn't she just say yes and make this easy for him?

"I like you, and you like me." He couldn't help it, his eyes darted to the side, unable to look her directly in the eyes. "What's the point in beating around the bush when we both know what we want? I want you to move in with me. And when I want something, I get it."

"Well, I want you to ask me." She nudged him back a bit, not completely rejecting his proposal, but pushing just enough to let him know she was serious. He dropped his hands from her face and drooped in rare defeat.

That's what he liked so much about her. She refused to be squashed down. She knew how to hit back.

"Fine. Be my girlfriend."

She cocked an eyebrow, crossing her arms and demanding more,

"... Please."

"Hmmmm." Dragging out the act, she watched him squirm in amusement. "On one condition."

Oh god. She knew she had all the power, didn't she? "What do you want?" He knew better than to negotiate with a terrorist. But he also knew, no matter what she said, he wouldn't have a choice. He would always give in to her.

With a little laughter of glee, she squirmed as if she was about to unleash something nefarious and said, "You owe me oden for life!"

That's it? He rolled his eyes. "Fine. So you're moving in?"

"Sure! There was no way I was gonna fall asleep alone anyway." She said it so nonchalantly, like it was inevitable. And maybe it was. Maybe it meant she wanted this just as much as he did.

That she wanted him.

It didn't take long for the police to arrive at the scene. Mrs. Kobayashi contacted Uraraka right after she saw Hijack ambush Bakugo and force him to sleepwalk out of the apartment building. She had planned to invite the young man over for dinner, having heard from his mother that it would be his first night without Uraraka in almost a week, but was met with the frightening scene instead. Uraraka immediately instructed Officer Takahashi to ping her location by phone, thanking the heavens for her failproof tracker, the string.

They found the two heroes standing by the entrance, waving the officers over to where the villain was still unconscious against the wall. After securing her in one car headed towards a holding facility, they seated the two in another set for the hospital, against protests from the explosive, blonde man.

He refused to be treated apart from his partner. After threats of knocking out nurses that dared to pull them apart and examine him, they finally pushed together two beds and allowed both patients to be treated simultaneously within sight of each other.

"If I knew you were gonna be this clingy, I would've suggested ending my lease that first night I stayed over."

"Shut up!"

While Uraraka was getting stitches in her hip from her fall through the roof and adjusting the ice pack so it lay flat on her ankle, It turned out that the only concern with him physically was the previously dislocated shoulder. It was carefully set in a sling with instructions to let it rest undisturbed.

"Did you hear that, cheeks? No more rough-housing from you."

"Oh, shut up!"

They had to employ Uraraka to place the discs around Bakugo's skull in order to do the EEG and test his brain activity. Even with her, it took some coaxing before he finally relented and let her attach the electrodes on his scalp with the doctor's guidance. He gripped tightly onto the bed rail as she warned him every time she placed another one.

Once the torturous test was done, which indicated his brain was functioning typically, aside from his stress levels going through the roof, he ripped off the cords that connected him to the machine and stormed out of the testing room, not bothering to wait for the nurse to wheel him out of there or even Uraraka.

Blazing through the hallways with the only goal of leaving that room behind, he soon found himself lost.

"Ah. I've been looking for you." Bakugo whirled around to see the old fate lady beaming up at him wearing nurse scrubs. Her face had even deeper wrinkles than before and her hands were so veiny, he could swear her skin was see-through.

"Why? Your work is done. You showed me the string, you warned me of the evil bitch, what more do you need?" He really didn't need anything more today.

"Can't you indulge an old lady and her curiosity in how it all turned out?" She asked through a gummy smile.

"You're not that old."

"That's sweet." She hobbled over and patted his right hand affectionately, as if he were her own flesh and blood grandson. "How's your Uraraka?"

"She's…" He gulped nervously. He could deflect, tell her to piss off and leave him alone. But he couldn't, really. Even knowing her quirk, he knew there was something more to this woman. Something that demanded his honesty. "She's perfect."

As he said that, he saw her come around the corner. She was visibly overcome with relief when her eyes landed on him. Bakugo hoped to a god, any god out there, that she didn't hear what he just said.

"There you are! They said we can go home!"

An involuntary smile crept onto his face at the idea, them going home. Together.

"Let me discharge you and you'll be free to go." The old lady pat his hand one more time with a knowing look before letting go and grabbing a clipboard to fill out paperwork.

Before he could explain who that was, Uraraka slipped her hand in his, intertwining their fingers and letting her round pads brush against his knuckles. He instantly forgot what he had planned on saying and gaped at her forwardness.

"What? You're my boyfriend now, remember?

"Ugh. Do you have to say that outloud?"

"Hey, everybody! This guy here is my-mphhhm!"

"What the hell are you doing?" With his hand covering her mouth from finishing her sentence, Bakugo looked around frantically to make sure no one actually heard what she was trying to say. Thankfully, there weren't many people in the emergency room in the middle of the night. Just a couple of night nurses checking charts and a woman sleeping on a nearby bed.

Prying his hand off, Uraraka shrugged and answered his somewhat rhetorical question. "Proving to you that nobody here cares about your love life. Anybody who matters is gonna figure it out eventually and the media already thinks we're dating anyway."

"Still, you don't have to spell it out for them." How was she able to say that "L" word so easily?

"Well, if you care that much about keeping it a secret, then let go of my hand."

"No." He grasped at her tiny hand in case she'd try to pull away.

"You're impossible." She said affectionately with a laugh, squeezing back. Although, it felt like she was wringing out his heart with that crinkle in her eyes.

"Alright. You are good to go now, young man." The fate wielding nurse returned with a signed note for Bakugo's agency. "The doctor's prescribing 48 hours of rest before returning to work. We've already contacted them so don't you go and try and prove us wrong."

Uraraka laughed at Bakugo's face scrunching with annoyance, on the verge of arguing that damnit, he's fine, why was everyone insisting otherwise? "I'll make sure he doesn't go out and do something reckless."

"I'm sure you will." The old lady's eyes twinkled knowingly. "Take care of each other."

"Of course!" Uraraka chirped immediately, oblivious to the weight of the words.

Bakugo knew better. He stared the old woman down as long as he could, feeling her stare strike into him with unparalleled intensity. Letting this mission fully sink in, he swallowed nervously before clearing his throat and adding a casual, "Yeah. Will do."

"Why are you giving in so easily?" Uraraka looked up at him with dubious, narrowed eyes.

"Come on. Let's go home." Ignoring the nagging feeling that Uraraka was just waiting for the next opportunity to grill him for answers, he dragged her out of the hospital and into the taxi they called for him. Still looking at him questioningly, she lowered herself onto the peeling, smoke-saturated leather seat and moved over to make room for him.

"Stop looking at me like I just grew an extra head" He slid in next to her and closed the door, signaling the driver to get onto the mostly empty road.

"But it was so unexpected!"

"Just figured it would be the easiest way for her to leave me alone and let us out of there."

Although it wasn't the most convincing excuse she'd heard, it also wasn't completely out of the question. Momentarily satisfied, she stopped squinting at him suspiciously, even though his shifting eyes seemed to never land on her. Slouching in her seat with a sigh, her eyes fluttered closed as the exhaustion caught up to her.

Staring at their clasped hands in the space between them, Bakugo felt stuck on how to fill the silence. Just thanking her wouldn't really encompass what he wanted her to know. And asking if she was ok would be redundant and fall into the category of meaningless small talk.

He wanted to shove away the feeling that he needed to say and do more- Uraraka seemed to know how he felt faster than he did at times anyway. But he also knew that she deserved more than his emotionally stunted ass.

So if he couldn't say it, he would just have to show it.

He could feel her shoulder tense the moment his head made contact. Not wanting to have to explain himself, Bakugo squeezed his eyes shut as he waited for her breathing to even out and her brain to absorb the fact that he was voluntarily leaning on her.

It was his turn to tense up when he felt her fingers softly stroke his cheek. Then they cautiously moved down to drag along his jaw, outlining the shape over and over again. Relaxing into her, he almost hummed out loud when she began to slide a finger down the bridge of his nose.

She stopped at his lips, avoiding them to finally settle on his cheek, content with resting it there for the remainder of their trip.

But that wasn't enough for him. He didn't want her feeling like she had to tiptoe around him or observe some invisible line because he was incapable of communicating like a normal person. Before he could lose his courage, Bakugo lifted her hand off his cheek and placed a kiss on her palm before hastily returning it to its original place.

As Uraraka adjusted her body to lean her head against his, two bodies merging under the fleeting city lights, he couldn't help but think she got the message.

I'm safe with you.