Bakugo hadn't seen Seiko for approximately three days, and quite frankly, he couldn't make heads or tails over whether that concerned him or not.

On one hand it wasn't like the kid had to come see him every day after school― he had never asked her to do so to begin with and he sure as hell wasn't ever going to. He had his own things to focus on in his life and she had… whatever a six year old considered important to focus on. It was as simple as that. But on the other hand Seiko's presence in general, while an incredibly odd one, was ridiculously easy to get used to and just as easy to notice its absence. And her no-show streak had been pointed out to him several times by complete strangers, much to his annoyance.

"Your little sister hasn't stopped by in a while. She's not sick, is she?" they would ask.

"How the fuck would I know? She's not my sister dammit!" he would respond.

"You're that little girl's brother, right? How is she? I've been getting a bit worried since I haven't seen her for a couple days."

"How many times do I have to say this before you get it through your thick skulls― we're not fucking related!"

"Aw man, I miss your sister! She's so cute when she waves hello and tells us to keep up the good work. You'll tell her that we miss her, won't you?"

"Does the part where I keep repeating 'We're not siblings' mean nothing to you airheaded fuckwits?"

And it just went on, and on, and on. They just kept on coming with their stupid repetitive questions and unnerving concern for, in their case, some random kid. Of course it didn't really help that all Seiko ever called him in front of others was 'big bro', but he didn't think it was that difficult to tell that they weren't actually related. If anything, more than just convincing him that everyone around him were absolute morons, it led him to the conclusion that Seiko didn't possess even a shred of common sense when it came to stranger danger― even if all the strangers around here were attending the same school as him with the intent to become a hero. Honestly, that kid was probably the biggest danger to herself all on her own.

'Still…,' bright red eyes scanned the edge of the path for signs of either a little pink umbrella or a bright yellow hoodie. 'The fact that she hasn't shown up by now is kind of weird. By now I would have had my ear talked off about some random thing she learned in school today or whatever.'

Needless to say though, the little girl's disappearance threw him off.

But when he said he didn't know what happened to Seiko, or where she was― which was the truth ―he did have a pretty strong idea as to why she hadn't shown up. It didn't make him feel any better thinking about it though. As to what gave him his idea, well, it all came from a particular discussion that had been held the week before when he and his parents had gone over to the little girl's house for dinner.

Laughter, loud and raucous, erupted from the three adults that had chosen to remain seated at the table instead of moving for the more comfortable seats in the living room. They sounded more like old friends catching up after some time apart, casually sipping their coffee while trading wild stories that each of their families had endured. This particular round was one Katsuki did his damndest to ignore, not particularly thrilled with the fact that his mother felt the need to embarrass him by sharing something cringeworthy from his childhood with a stranger. Altogether it proved to be easier said than done; his mother had a particularly annoying and ugly laugh. It reminded him too much of a hyena.

'Can't that hag find something to talk about that doesn't involve me?' he wondered sullenly as he watched Seiko go through a reenactment of one of her dramatic battles against her imaginary villain. The little girl dropped to the ground and began rolling, throwing her hand out to release invisible orbs at the enemy. Earlier, when he had asked, she had somewhat explained the concept of a machine that ejected paintballs with different purposes, saying it was modeled after some retro hero called 'Moiya'. Since the little girl had no idea what kind of quirk she would get, or what she would even like to have (there were too many cool quirks after all), then the made up gadget was her default for the time being.

Seiko jumped up and raced around the couch. He craned his head around and watched as she held up her hand again, bracing it with the other as she yelled, "Freeze, villain!"

There came the high pitched 'pew, pew, pews' as she fired her weapon before charging out of the room with indignant cries, seemingly having already forgotten that this was just a 'replay' of a 'previous episode' as she had referred to it. And apparently she had forgotten about him too.

'She's such a space cadet,' he scoffed to himself, folding his arms over his chest, and leaned back to rest on the couch to wait until either his parents decided to leave or Seiko came back. The second option struck him as having a better chance of winning.

"What a lively kid!" Mitsuki chortled. "She must have an equally energetic quirk to match that hyper personality of hers. Heaven knows that Katsuki's personality ended up matching his quirk."

Said boy pretended not to notice the pointed stare drilling holes through the back of his head, though he did grit his teeth at the dryness of her remark.

"Ah, no― it's all one hundred percent energy of a six year old. Seiko doesn't have a quirk…," Chiyuki hesitated, almost as if she were going add a 'yet' at the end of that sentence, but something held her back. Bakugo cocked his head to the side, interested yet apprehensive as to where this conversation might lead.

"Well there's still time, I'm sure, unless you've already taken her to the quirk doctor?" Masaru said, more in thought than anything else, though when he realized his mistake he quickly jumped to correct it. "Sorry, I don't mean to pry."

No doubt Chiyuki was waving it off― she seemed to do that a lot, he'd noticed ―and she gave a mildly embarrassed huff. "I've been holdin' off on taking her to see the quirk doctor for a couple of reasons, but I can give a fairly good educated guess for myself on what the results would be. No one in our family has a quirk unless they're, like, some distant cousin or something. So…"

The woman sighed.

"I just want to let her enjoy imagining the possibilities― to be a kid that still sees it as an attainable dream to be like the super heroes she admires so much before the reality of it sets in."

There was shifting, and then his mother was trying to lift the heavy atmosphere with a little bit of good natured hope. "Genetics are a weird thing so I wouldn't just automatically assume, yeah? Katsuki has a friend from childhood― always a late bloomer to everything it seems ―but he got his quirk before entering high school, even after being deemed quirkless. You never know, your little sister might be the same."

Bakugo clenched his teeth, a slight twitch developing in his eye. There was still a sharp sting in both his pride and knowledge where it concerned that little detail. Even if Deku had given some half-assed explanation about the sudden appearance of his quirk it still didn't stop every fiber of his being from accusing the wimpy green haired boy of being a fucking dirty little liar. He wanted to whip around in his seat and start cussing both of them out― Midoriya and his mother ―but he held his tongue, slowly but finally edging into a disgruntled point of acknowledgment in the usefulness of the act.

"To be honest," Chiyuki spoke up again, much more quietly, after allowing for a moment of thoughtful silence, "I was actually thinking of taking her to see the quirk doctor on Monday, after we get her arm checked out. And― this is gonna sound awful of me, and hypocritical ―but I'm really hoping she'll turn out to be quirkless.

"As much as I would like to support Seiko's dream of becoming a hero, I also find myself wanting to keep her away from such a career. Being a hero's not all that it's cracked up to be. It's a dangerous way of living no matter which field you go into― quirk or no. And I just can't guarantee or even trust that she'll be able to handle anything when the time comes for her to start making major decisions."

He couldn't believe he was hearing such utter bullshit. Being a hero isn't all that it's cracked up to be? Yeah, that much was obvious to anyone that even bothered to pay so much as half a cent of attention to the aftermath of any kind of battle, and it was an understandable concern, but seriously? As a general rule, most people knew what they were getting into the moment they decided they were going to try and go pro. They accepted the fact that there would be danger and chose to endure so that everyone else could be safe. What exactly did she expect the job of a hero to consist of― sunshine lollipops and fucking daisies? Give him a goddamn break.

And was this woman really chucking her sister's dreams under the bus by going so far as to say she couldn't even trust Seiko in the future? What in the actual fuck? He may not of had much room to be judging, as he ended up being far worse in regards to Izuku, but he couldn't stop himself from violently rejecting Chiyuki's argument in this moment simply because of how wrong it was. Especially after all that drivel she had said about wanting to let Seiko enjoy imagining a future as a hero.

A flicker of movement caught his eye, breaking his intense inner dissection of the many flaws in Chiyuki's argument. He looked up at the doorway that led to the main hall just as Seiko ducked back around it. She had only been there for a second, so it was difficult to tell, but he could have sworn he saw something akin to hurt on her tubby little face.

Katsuki ground his teeth and stood up, unfolding his arms to forcefully shove his hands into his pockets. He didn't bother to turn around as he addressed the group behind him, sharpening his words specifically for the young woman, while walking towards the hallway.

"You're thinking too deeply about an unknown future. Don't say shit based on how things are now and expect them to never change, especially without giving her a chance to prove her own potential and capability."

As soon as the words left his mouth his entire childhood, even up through middle school, with Izuku flashed through his mind and the heavy cloud struck him hard in the chest again. It almost felt like the memories were calling him out, yelling at him that he was the biggest fucking hypocrite in the history of hypocrites. Bakugo didn't let the guilt show, though, merely proceeding to block out his own accusing thoughts and the apologies his parents were serving to Chiyuki as he rounded the corner.

Seiko jumped the second he entered the hall, her amber eyes widening as she craned her neck back to stare up at him. Instead of seeing pain or dejection from hearing her sister's words he found that there was a weight of understanding blanketed over the child. She knew being quirkless was a permanent possibility, and a part of her showed her fears like darkness between splintering cracks, but the most important thing he saw was the echo of the declaration she had proclaimed to him: "Then I'll just become the number one sidekick for the number one hero!"

And that, to him, was admirably brave.

Bakugo studied her for a little longer before slipping a hand out of his pocket and, very hesitantly, reached out to pat her curly little head.

She dipped her head in compliance, so very used to the action itself, but peeked up again as soon as he stopped. For a second they stared at each other, and then Seiko grinned.

"Wanna see my posters?"

A little of the pressure dissipated within him and Bakugo shrugged.

"Sure."

He finally spotted the familiar yellow hoodie at the base of a tree, the little girl huddled up beneath it with an intense focus on something in her lap. Without particularly meaning to his pace quickened a fraction, eyes roaming over the child for some sort of sign to indicate distress or any other negative connotation of the word. The first noticeable thing was the fact that she blatantly ignored anyone that called out to her. She reacted to each person that said hello, of course, a miniscule jerk of her hand raising up and a slight shift of her head, a robotic reflex, but ultimately her attention remained focused on whatever was in her lap. The other thing that drew his attention as he got closer, was the number of visible bandaids that patterned any and all visible skin.

Eyes narrowing, Bakugo came to a halt a couple paces away from the child with a heavy frown pulling at his features.

"Where the fuck have you been, runt?"

A hint of gold flashed from beneath dark bangs, but she never actually raised her head to look up at him as she mumbled, "Hey big bro. Sorry I didn't come over, I was… busy."

He scrutinized her for what felt like a long time before letting out a deep sigh. Carelessly he allowed his backpack to slip from his shoulder and hit the ground with a heavy whump! just before following closely after, settling himself against the tree not all that far from Seiko. The little girl quickly hurried to hide the item in her lap. Before it completely disappeared he caught sight of something red, and then a brand name for a company that sold art supplies― a sketchbook. Curious though he was, he held off on asking her about it in favor of demanding different answers.

"Don't lie," he growled as he reached over and pinched her cheek, careful to avoid any bandaids, giving it a little tug for extra measure. "Especially to me. Now try again."

Little hands batted his fingers away and she vigorously rubbed her cheek, still refusing to look at him, and now it almost seemed like she'd be unwilling to talk. Bakugo rolled his eyes before turning to glare at the sky.

"Well? We don't have all damn day."

Seiko inhaled sharply, and from his peripheral view he watched her fiddle around with a crayon in her hand. "I didn't want sis to be right," she whispered. "I didn't."

His shoulders slumped and suddenly it was as if he were adrift at sea; stuck in the middle of nowhere with a deep, vast expanse of the dangerous unknown surrounding him from all sides, leaving him completely and utterly alone. That was half of the worst part― not knowing how to deal with the situation and having no one to look to for some sort of help. The other half came from only knowing all the wrong things to say. It put a lump in his throat that was nearly impossible to swallow down.

So instead of saying something helpful, or inspiring, or even remotely comforting, he asked another question. "What's with all the bandaids?"

There came a sniffle and he glanced over to see Seiko wiping her nose with the back of her hand, an incredibly spiteful glare directed at her sketchbook marring her usually cheerful features.

"Got angry," she muttered. "An' bein' angry just makes me a clumsy, no good idiot."

He shifted until he was facing her, glaring harshly― though the action was not meant specifically for the child ―and ground his teeth together. His immediate reaction would have been to demand who had told her that, as the line was clearly not something she would have come up with about herself, but he already had a very good idea of just who might have called her such a thing. There were better questions to ask anyways.

"And what was making you angry?"

Something about the question felt ironic to him. Here he was, asking this kid what made her angry, when he himself had his own anger issues that needed to be addressed just as badly. If he wasn't busy trying to get to the bottom of this mystery then perhaps he would have laughed at himself.

Seiko opened her sketchbook, but kept it mostly obscured from his vision as she began to furiously scribble on the page. "Everyone's sayin' that 'cause I ain't got no quirk then I can't be a hero. They told me I'd just get in the way of the real ones and that I'd be so useless that I'd have to be saved all the time. Even my teacher said I had no business bein' a hero without a quirk."

A tick developed near his eye, the erratic twitching driving him insane just as much as the words running through his mind did the same. With a different perspective to a familiar hell sitting right next to him Bakugo came to understand an ugly truth: He had said the exact same damaging words and ultimately fucked over someone else's childhood. And now, while he had come to find himself on the opposite side of the coin, history was repeating itself yet again.

Suddenly Seiko stabbed her crayon into the sketchbook with a startling amount of viciousness, pushing down hard as she dragged it along the paper, creating a deep red scar. Her face was flushed and large tears had gathered at the corners of her eyes, yet she showed no sign of yielding to them despite the quivering of her lower lip.

"What's it matter if I have a quirk or not?! Before quirks there were all kinds of people that were heroes. And no one ever said they couldn't be a hero because they didn't have a superpower. They all thought those people were cool because they did brave and dangerous things to do what was right. So why can't I―"

She hiccuped, her voice pitching higher as she hurried to wipe away a few escaping tears. "So why can't I be a hero too?"

Bakugo inhaled sharply, the air catching in his throat. Part of him knew that the reason why was because, as a given, the twenty percent of the population that was born without a quirk was weaker than the rest who were born with quirks, a minority. And as a minority they were not given nearly the same amount of equal opportunity to thrive along with the rest of society. Certainly there were jobs that were still technically considered hero jobs that quirkless people could apply for, but there wasn't entirely much merit to it when everything was overshadowed by the Pro Heroes anyways. That was just the way the world turned.

Or at least that was how he used to view it. To his surprise Bakugo found the other part of himself silently demanding the answers to that very question along with Seiko. Why couldn't she be a hero? Just because she didn't have a quirk didn't mean it ruled out her potential. Potential, if given the time to be worked with and molded properly, could give way to skill. Skill could wind up being what wound up being the most important deciding factor in any given situation. In the end it all gave way to credible capability, the trust of many, and the right to claim, "I did it. To all who said I couldn't, I. Did." And if he were to be completely honest with himself every time he looked into her eyes he saw a kind of potential that not even he had, though he wasn't sure he could properly explain it even if he wanted to.

"You can."

Those words― words that he had uttered to no one but himself ―slipped away from him without a second thought to stop them. They startled him nearly as much as they'd startled Seiko.

"You can be a hero," Bakugo said again, turning his head to clear his throat. "And you already are... sort of. Even if you're quirkless you've got something weird that makes people smile and want to be happy; a positive vibe that makes people feel… Sunny. Not everyone can do that, y'know. As for the ones that say otherwise then they can just fuck off."

It wasn't his most eloquent delivery considering he was not one for comforting others, but she could get the message, right? The two looked at each other, a deep crimson that somehow appeared lighter and calmer than it ever had, and an amber that was splashed with hazel patterns, teary but bright and hopeful. Seiko gave a wide, toothy smile while using the back of her hand again to wipe her face.

Bakugo rolled his eyes, his nose wrinkling. Blindly he reached for his bag, pulling it into his lap to look for a disposable napkin. (He never kept them on himself, considering it too much of a hassle as well as unnecessary since he hardly ever needed them anyways.)

"Gross, use a napkin," he said as he handed her the said toiletry. The child giggled while taking it and blew her nose. By the time she was done Bakugo had made another surprising decision.

Standing up, he gestured for the kid to follow him. "Alright, let's go."

"Go where?"

"A once in a lifetime surprise. Don't ever expect me to do this again, got it runt?"

She gave him a confused look but nodded anyways. Bakugo grunted in approval and together they walked down the road. They went until they reached the end, where it led into a main vein that connected the school to the rest of the city. Instead of continuing his on his way like usual the young man detoured to the right to where a very cheap convenience store sat in wait for exhausted students who were in need of a fast refreshment. He made Seiko wait near the front before disappearing behind a rack of snacks.

Humming to her herself, the little girl bounced from foot to foot, clutching her sketchbook closely to her chest. She felt loads better after talking with big bro. After she had found out she was quirkless the disappointment hit her hard, and she couldn't help but get sad about it. Then she had begun to wonder if Bakugo would even let someone without a quirk become his sidekick and it just made her feel even worse; avoiding him that first day had seemed like the best option at the time, though she couldn't stop thinking about how shameful that was. The day after that she'd confided in Zeke and Lau― a big mistake ―and they told the whole class and scribbled mean things all over her drawings. She got mad, especially when she saw what they did to the picture of her costume, and started a fight that she lost.

The icky feelings kept piling up within her, and the nastier she felt the more she started to get mad at anyone with a quirk― she had even hurt Taz's feelings. It didn't help at home either when her sister tried to persuade her to find something else to grow up into. The larger the emotions grew the more she resented being denied a fair chance to even try and reach for her dream. She hated those that kept telling her she couldn't, when there were so many other people like her from before that could. She hated it because it didn't make any sense. Why was she any different from them?

And so, when Bakugo had said those simple little words, the anger had no room to stay in her heart.

'You can.'

"I can," she mumbled to herself with a giddy little smile. "I can."

"Oi space-brain, let's go." Bakugo held the door open and impatiently gestured at her to move it. A small plastic bag dangled from his wrist, swaying in time with his movements. The second they were both outside the blonde dug into the bag and pulled out one red, frozen treat.

"A popsicle!" Seiko blurted.

"Yeah yeah, here you go." He broke the dessert in half and handed her a stick with a reminder. "It's just this once though, okay?"

The little girl smiled as she reached out to take the popsicle from him, chirruping, "Okay! Thank you!"

They stood off to the side of the building, enjoying the treat, the warming spring air, and the peace that came with it all. Bakugo watched in amusement as the child struggled keep the quickly melting food from dripping everywhere, the red smears that were left behind giving a nightmarish result across the child's face. Still, she was happy, and that was a success for him as a hero, wasn't it?

"You really are a sunny person no matter what you do, aren't you?" he mused aloud. Seiko stopped mid-bite, a weird look flashing across her face before brightening.

"That's it!" she shouted gleefully. "My hero name! It's Sunny!"

'Fuck that's―,' he quickly ran a hand over his face to suppress the twitching (a.k.a the attempt to smile) that overcame him. '―cute.'

He was definitely right about her. There was just something weird about everything she did that made it so damn hard not to smile at. It was contagious, and almost every fiber of his being screamed at him to avoid the contagious thing, but what the hell was he supposed to do when it was constantly hanging out around him? The answer: Not a damn thing. Because more than likely, Seiko would find a way to get around whatever he did.

And oddly, that didn't sound like such a bad thing to him.

"Sunny and King, crime fighters supreme! Watch out Melon Lord! We're coming at you stronger than ever!" Seiko punched and kicked at the air, flinging cherry colored droplets as she went. The little girl turned to him with a gleam in her eye. "Come on, let's hurry. There's a park close by, we'll be able to catch the villain if we go through there."

Bakugo hesitated for a second. He should have been on his way home by now and he had homework to do…

"Ah fuck it. Let's go." It wouldn't put a dent in anything if he stuck around for another ten minutes.

"Yeah! Eat flaming paint Melon Lord!"

Bonus:

Clean up duty had never really been Tsuyu's favorite after school activity, but she never made a fuss about it. It was necessary work much like taking care of her siblings was. Thankfully because she was so used to cleaning up then organizing the classroom had been a breeze and she was able to go home with the last of the students leaving school premises. The silence that joined her on her walk was comfortable, though she would have also liked to have gone home with everyone else. Having friends to fill the spaces between was a very nice thing indeed.

At the end of the road the young frog turned down the path just after a small convenience store. She wanted to get home fairly quick so she could change out of her uniform and get started on her homework, so that meant using the trail that went by the park would cut down her walk time by half. It was a very efficient short cut in her opinion.

Up ahead there came the sounds of children playing.

"Ack! Melon Lord got me, King!"

Tsuyu smiled to herself. 'Sounds like someone's having fun.'

"You're not allowed to die on me Sunny." Another, more familiar snarl ripped through the air, causing the girl to freeze in her tracks. She stared in surprise at a tree just ahead of her, trying to calculate the odds that if she had really heard Bakugo's voice, then she would also find him on that other side of the tree… playing?

Hesitantly Tsuyu edged forward. The sight that greeted her was no more expected than the likelihood of Mineta turning around and straightening his morals by abandoning his lascivious ways. When she had suspected Bakugo of playing there hadn't even been an image to accompany the improbable notion― at best it was the 404 error code that appeared when a computer malfunctions. To actually see it was certainly something that made her wonder if she needed to get her eyes checked.

Bakugo was crouched on the ground awkwardly cradling a little girl with one arm, a fierce glare on his face as per usual. The child dramatically clutched at her yellow hoodie and stared up at him with a surprisingly convincing pained look on her face.

"Avenge me and defeat Melon Lord in my place," she croaked just before going limp with a comical 'bleh' to signify her death.

Bakugo raised his fist and shouted at thin air. "You bastard! I'll kill you!"

A large hand flew to her mouth to stifle the giggle, but it was too late. The sound caught the angry blonde's attention and his head whipped around. Mortification danced across Bakugo's features as he recognized her, the blood in his face draining before quickly returning and glowing brightly, his entire body turning to stone. Furious red eyes pinned her down and Tsuyu blanched.

'Not one word,' the look seemed to say. 'Not one fucking word or you're dead. You saw nothing, so just walk away.'

More than happy to oblige to the silent demands the frog girl hurried on her way, not even daring to cast another look back. But as Tsuyu walked out of the park she couldn't help but think about the strange thing she had witnessed. Placing a finger close to her lips, her gaze drifted upwards and she smiled to herself once again.

'That was cute, -ribbit.'

Sorry, the old Bakugo can't come to the phone. Why? Because he's dead. /slapped

Hey shouting out some honorable mentions to MerhppDerhpp and TheHolyBlade for their suggestions (which I kinda tweaked), definitely enjoyed working with those, and I'll enjoy working on some of the others that were suggested. (I saw that angst one and I just― I'm such a sucker for angst haha :') )

Next chapter: Bakusquad

See you then!