I'm on a spree, aren't I? XD Hope y'all enjoy!
Bakugou stared at the man with wide eyes. He wished he could say he felt incredulous at that question—how presumptuous of this asshole to claim that it was his fault?—but really all he felt was the lingering anxiety that he couldn't seem to ditch and the sudden fear pooling in his gut.
The man growled before grabbing the teenager by the collar of his gakuran.
"What the fuck did I do?" Bakugou yelled with painfully obvious false bravado, trying desperately to stop his vision from blurring, "I didn't do shit! Th-the real question is what did you do?!"
"Don't give me that bullshit, you fucker! You did something and now something is fucked up! I don't know what it is, so that means that you must know what it is. So tell me what you DID!" he yelled, physically lifting Bakugou off of the ground.
The blonde's feet dangled in the air as his gakuran began to choke him. It was like his world narrowed to just him and this asshole, and nothing else mattered. He could feel the hot breath on his face and the sweat rolling down his neck. The blurriness finally overtook his vision as he lost his focus and all the sounds around him blended together into one incomprehensible wave of sound.
Once the teen felt like he was on the verge of passing out, something slammed into his waist. Suddenly, the world around him widened and the scope of his vision and hearing expanded exponentially. His head pounded as he was wrenched out of the suffocating grip and discarded onto the front steps.
Ignoring his throbbing head, Bakugou snapped his attention to the man in front of him, his heart racing at the sight of Deku standing between them protectively. If he had been any less tired from the emotional whiplash of the day he had just had, Bakugou might have been mad at the figure guarding him. For some reason, that piece of introspection was all he could think of as he sat on the ground, his hand resting on his throat delicately.
Dread pooled in his gut at the realization that nothing had changed one bit during these damned loops. Part of him was still insisting that he shouldn't have to change to make Deku feel better—it wasn't his job. But, he was responsible for this. He was responsible for Deku's low self-esteem, his suicidal thoughts, and his general unwillingness to fight back.
He had trained him to be that way, through years of conditioning: unloading burns, bruises, and vitriol onto him in a horrible attempt to control his actions. As though giving him shit would somehow make Bakugou feel better about the spontaneous bruises his mother gave him, or the insults that cut deeper than he'd ever like to admit.
But then, the sudden crack of the man's knuckles smacking against Deku's face snapped his floaty brain back into attention.
He shot to his feet and gripped the green-haired nerd by the wrist to keep him from tumbling down the steps from the force of the hit. Without hesitation, he could feel his eyes narrow as he leaned forward and ducked under a wide, clumsy punch sent his way. He snapped his head up with the sole purpose of being able to glare at the man as he delivered a powerful kick to the man's groin.
He grinned dangerously as he watched the man fall to his knees in seconds, gripping his wounded area as though he were dying.
Ha, served him right.
But at that same moment, the grip Deku's shoes had on the ground wavered and his feet slipped, leaving Bakugou to support his weight with only one hand. The blonde's grasp on Deku's wrist slipped a bit, but he refused to let go so they both tumbled down the steps together.
Bakugou landed directly on top of Deku, his stomach pressed against the nerd's stomach uncomfortably. He was laying diagonal across the dumbass who had just slipped, so he could feel the way Deku's hip bones, ribs, and shoulder dug into his own muscles painfully. His head was over his shoulder, the nerd's dark green hair tickling his nose as his head smacked the concrete dead-on. Of course, it was only two or three steps that they had fallen down, but it was just enough distance that his forehead began pounding when it made direct contact with the concrete.
As fast as humanly possible, Bakugou shot up off of Deku, trying and failing to ignore the way the skinny teen wheezed under his weight.
"What the fuck is wrong with you!" the blonde could help but shout at the fucker who had apparently thought assaulting minors was acceptable, "Like I fucking said! I didn't do anything!"
"Then why the fuck are you here, you bratty-bitch?!"
Bakugou stomped back up the stairs, his rational mind suddenly blinded by rage. All he could think about was the way that bastard decided that hitting Deku was okay. Only he could do that. And he wasn't sure if he even wanted to anymore, either.
"K-kacchan… d-don't antagonize him!" Deku squeaked as he slowly sat up.
He internally growled at being told what to do, instead electing to ignore Deku altogether, "Listen up, motherfucker! We're here because you fucked something up and I need you to fucking fix it! What the fuck is your quirk?!"
The man took a step back in surprise, failing to mask the sudden anxiety that was written all over his face, "Wha-why the fuck would th-that matter to you?"
Bingo. It was this fucker the whole time. Son of a bitch!
"I've had the longest fucking day of my life for well over a fucking week now. Fucking make it stop, you bastard!" he couldn't help but shout as he gripped the man by the collar and pulled him down to his shorter stature.
The man, now with wide eyes and furrowed brows, didn't resist the pull and was forced into an awkward leaning position that couldn't have been good for his back. But that didn't matter to Bakugou, he just tightened his grip on the man's collar even more and forced the man to remain face-to-face with him. Their eyes met and they stared at each other, Bakugou not letting the man look away despite the obvious signs of nervousness.
Good, he could be fucking uncomfortable for all Bakugou cared.
Bakugou let himself huff in the man's face in an attempt to ignore the hot breath that made his face itch. He made sure to keep up a dangerous glare for however long the moment lasted, reveling in the power he felt from turning the tables on an adult. He took care to cement this memory in his brain, mentally making a note to come back to it later whenever he needed to feel powerful.
The glorious moment was broken, however, when Deku anxiously pulled Bakugou's hand away from the man's shirt and carefully dragged him back a step or two.
"W-w-what the hell i-is g-going on? K-Ka-Kacchan? T-Takaki-san?" he questioned as he squeezed his eyes shut, bracing for some kind of punishment for questioning Bakugou.
Whether he was expecting a physical attack or a verbal assault, the explosive blonde wasn't sure.
"Hold on a minute," Takaki growled, "You two are from Aldera, aren't you? Little shits. Whatever. If he doesn't know what's going on, then why the fuck is this bush even here?"
"B-bush?" Deku squeaked from behind him, too surprised to decide whether he was offended or amused by the comparison.
Bakugou ignored the nerd—who had yet to let go of him—as he silently simmered in his anger. He couldn't help but begrudgingly consider the man's point. Deku didn't know what was going on and the blonde wasn't about to fucking let him in the loop either. But it wasn't like he could just leave the nerd unsupervised, especially considering the chance he would go and fucking kill himself again.
But he seemed fine now… didn't he? There was no way the nerd would go and off himself after this weird adventure. Surely he would be too busy trying to figure out what Bakugou was talking about with this man to consider doing something stupid…
Right?
"Fucker," he hissed at the fact that he agreed with this bastard, "Deku, go the fuck home and stay there."
Deku flinched and finally let go of Bakugou's waist, "W-what?"
"I only fuckin' needed you to show me where her fuckin' house was. Now that you've done the one thing you were useful for, you can leave. So fuck off, shitnerd," he whirled around to stare Deku directly in the eyes, holding up his right hand, palm-up, purposefully imitating the position he usually used to produce small explosions for intimidation.
The shitnerd let out a little, "Eep!" and pathetically scrambled away from the house as quickly as possible.
Once he was out of sight, Bakugou turned back around to glare at the Takaki-fucker, "Let's talk."
Aizawa tried and failed to calm his pounding heart as he browsed the isles of the library for the section he was looking for. There were a few sections that looked promising, but there were people loitering suspiciously in those sections, so he forced himself to make note of which aisle it was and continued walking.
Luckily for his sanity, the library wasn't anywhere near full. Given that it was what he considered ass-o'clock in the morning and that most villains were generally nocturnal, it wasn't exactly unexpected. Despite this fact, the groups of people standing around were far too large for him to be able to relax. He could feel one or two pairs of suspicious eyes from each group he walked past.
After a few loops around the library, with a few brief stops to scan other areas he thought might have been relevant (they weren't), he made his way back to the first aisle that had caught his attention.
The group of suspicious characters had cleared the area almost immediately after he had made eye contact with their look-out. Aizawa couldn't decide whether that was a good thing or a bad thing. On one hand, he was now able to access what he had come for without getting into a conflict or seeming too suspicious, but on the other hand there was the risk that it was a trap specifically set up for him.
He scanned the book titles, searching for anything related to time quirks or the history of them. There didn't seem to be any, so he let his mind wander as his eyes went over the same four shelves of textbooks about quirk history that were probably at least 75% edited or fabricated information purposefully inserted into the education system and professional consensus by either the government or the Hero Commission.
It didn't seem likely that this was a set-up, as the only people that should know about his interest in time quirks would be an angry blonde teenager and a helpful detective that wouldn't remember anything because of the loop.
Of course, this entire thing could have been a set-up to target him in the first place, but it all seemed way too convoluted and any sort of plan would rely on a series of coincidences.
Unless this mystery person was also looping, and somehow purposefully guiding their actions.
But that was-
A hand suddenly grabbed his shoulder from behind and Aizawa's heart leapt into his throat. He whipped around, ready to defend himself. Instead of the man that had been following him, he was met with the sight of one of the librarians.
"Do you need help finding anything today?" she asked in a smooth tone, not bothering to hide her sincere smile.
Letting his fists uncurl and his shoulder relax, he let himself melt into the familiar presence of a fellow underground hero.
"Actually, I do… That is, if you aren't stingy." he looked her dead in the eye, distantly wondering if they had changed the code-phrase that would allow them into the back room of the library.
She smiled widely, her eyes crinkling with amusement, "I'm a librarian and this is an education building. Who would ever be stingy with knowledge?"
Well, that answered his question. It was definitely the same as it had always been.
Without any words exchanged, Aizawa trailed after her to the breakroom for the librarians. She led him to the backroom and only once the door was shut and the lights were turned on did he dare to elaborate on what he was looking for. After all, one can never be too careful when it comes to eavesdroppers.
"Do you have anything on the history of specific quirk types? Specifically, time-based quirks."
Her smile dropped and her eyes darkened, "You're playing a dangerous game, Eraserhead..."