A/N: Thanks to my amazing beta, Extra_no3112. Any typos, grammatical errors or clunky writing is entirely my fault. Without her and her enthusiasm for one Bakugou Katsuki I doubt this story would exist. In fact, I probably wouldn't even be in this fandom if not for her. Thank you, bestie.
The first two chapters of this fic are... I don't know what to say. I wrote them a while ago and they're not great. I'll probably come back and edit them later. Constructive criticism is appreciated.
His teachers had told him that the ringing in his ears was normal, something to be expected given the nature of his quirk.
Over time though it got worse. Eventually the ringing became constant. And then one day it stopped.
At that point his mother realised something was wrong.
The doctor's office was a bleak, sterile little room. The walls were covered with medical diagrams and a skeleton stared disconcertingly at him from the corner.
The doctor himself was a bald man in his fifties with an exubirantly fuzzy moustache. His calm demeanor was probably meant to be reassuring, but it come across as emotionless, as though he didn't give a fig for his patients.
He folded his hands in front of him.
"Katsuki's hearing might recover. He's still young so there's a chance of that," the man said, looking at the charts in front of him, "but he will have to stop using his quirk. Else he'll go completely deaf."
He hadn't been able to imagine anything worse than the silence, the feeling of being cut off from the rest of the world. But to stop using his quirk, to give up on his dream... that was so much worse.
"No way!" He jumped up. " I can't stop. How can I become a hero if I can't use my quirk?"
"Katsuki," for once his mother didn't shout it. He had to strain to hear her. "Sit down, please."
He sat down without argument.
"You heard what the doctor said," she looked at him as she spoke so that he could read her lips, "if you continue to use your quirk you'll lose your hearing completely. Is that what you want?"
No. He didn't want that.
But he didn't want to give up either.
Bakugou had wanted to be a hero for as long as he could remember. Ever since he had been little, watching All Might on television. He wanted to be like that, to be able to win no matter what went wrong. To use every challenge to make himself stronger.
Well, what was this, but a challenge?
"I'm not going to give up. If I lose my hearing then I'll learn to adapt. I'll do whatever I have to. But I will become a hero."
His mother said nothing. Then - to his shock - she hugged him fiercely. Usually he would have fought off the affection, but he was too surprised - and his mother's embrace was so reassuring that he did not move. He started to cry. He did his best not to. It was just so overwhelming. Despite his words, he was scared. Scared of going deaf, scared that no matter what he did, it wouldn't be enough. That he wouldn't be enough.