"Come at me, you damned cowards!" Bakugo roared perniciously as he ran toward Kirishima and Kaminari, his blasts boosting his speed tremendously. A wicked smile was plastered on his face and his eyes glowered.
"Ah, shit." Kirishima rolled his shoulder painfully, "I'll take this one." He let the electric blonde rest for a moment behind him before bursting off to meet Bakugo's intimidations, shouting heckles all the way there.
Their two-on-one spar was definitely wearing on Kirishima and Kaminari. There was no doubt that they were strong enough to face Bakugo each on their own merits, but they lacked the same tenacity of the fair-haired animal that they often regretfully called their friend. The spar had continued uninterrupted all morning long and Bakugo mercilessly wailed down blows on his friends. Kirishima was getting sick of taking the brunt of Bakugo's rage to the face, so he had started counting down the minutes to their lunch break an hour ago.
"That's more like it!" Bakugo sneered as he cancelled his blasts and skidded to a halt in order to allow Kirishima to come at him instead.
The rock-hard redhead grit his teeth as he hustled toward his only opponent, "Like I'd be afraid of a kitten like you, Bakugo!" He raised a toughened fist threateningly as his running feet pounded the dirt beneath him.
He didn't just say that. The blonde bristled at Kirishima's ridicule, his eyes shining evilly with an entirely new determination to win. Yes, he was going to put that shit-brain in his place once and for all right now. He raised his hands purposefully and snarled as Kirishima came within firing range, "Now DIE!"
The consequential blast shook the entire training ground, rattling the windows of the mess hall nearby and the wind chimes hanging by the door started clanging loudly. A wave of intense heat rushed over all the nearby students caught in their own spars, enticing them to turn their attention that way. As the angry flames dissipated and the residual smoke cleared, they were all surprised to see Kirishima kneeling only a few yards from Bakugo, his forearm raised in front of his face protectively.
"Damn, Bakugo!" Kirishima laughed boyishly as his hardening began to disappear. "That was nuts!" He stood up to put out the embers caught on his pants and grinned proudly at the blonde. "You sure are gettin' tough!"
Bakugo was stunned at Kirishima's ability to withstand his full-power stun grenade. Obviously the redhead would not have made it out without a few bumps and scrapes, but he definitely should have been KO'd by that, right? Had Kirishima really improved that much?
Kirishima walked leisurely up to his angry blonde pal, a grin slapped on his face. "Just when I didn't think you could get any stronger, you do it anyway." He slapped Bakugo's shoulder roughly. "I'd say this quirk extension training is working pretty good for you."
Bakugo breathed deeply but angrily, "How the fuck did you not die?!"
Kirishima only chuckled teasingly again, "Hey man, you're not the only one here getting better, you know?" His infectious grin tried to coax Bakugo's lips to smile, but unfortunately his goofy-boy charms never worked on the hot-head.
Bakugo gruffly shoved the other boy to the side, "Fuck off, Kirishima." He stalked away aggressively. He needed to go blow something up right the fuck now.
Kaminari was still sitting down in the dirt when Bakugo stormed by, unsurprised when he was completely ignored. He looked expectantly over at Kirishima but only received an accepting shrug in response. The electric quirked boy rose to his feet and wandered over to his buddy, "Is he still pissed off about that stuff from yesterday? He's in an especially bad mood today."
Kaminari wasn't wrong in his assumptions. Normally when they sparred with Bakugo, he never really went all-out on them but today he'd been especially presumptuous in releasing a ridiculous amount of pent-up rage. Both of Bakugo's friends scrunched their faces thoughtfully and wondered silently if Uraraka's remarks had gotten under his skin more than he let on.
"Well that was intense," Ashido squealed as she skipped up behind them. Her eyes were lit up with uninvited curiosity. "He seems like a bigger jerk than usual, am I right?"
"Don't ask," Both Kirishim and Kaminari replied flatly.
Ashido's face went downtrodden, "Aw, I want to know! Please tell me!"
Kirishima closed his eyes, trying to figure a way out of this situation. "You know how Bakugo is, he's just trying to stay at the top of his game."
Ashido didn't buy it, but decided not to press the matter. "So are you guys done? If you want, Jiro and I could use a change up in sparring partners!"
Kaminari planted his butt in the dirt tiredly, "I need a break first. Fighting Bakugo always makes my head hurt a lot." As much as he'd love to spar a little with the ear-jack girl, he didn't want to visit stupid-ville today, no thanks to his most signature move.
Ashido pouted again but waved at the boys, "Let us know if you guys change your minds, mm'kay?"
Kirishima nodded at her, his cheeks brightening up at her cheerfulness. Ashido was like one of the boys to him; fun to be around and always willing to go along with their hair-brained ideas. Despite all that, she was still always able to harness and dangle her shard of girliness in front of them. Damn, she's weird, but also pretty awesome.
After another forty-five minutes of quirk-enhancing spars, Aizawa dismissed them for lunch. Hungry stomachs could be heard growling as the students entered the air-conditioned mess hall. Bento boxes were handed to each student as they arrived and their excitable chatter drowned out the scuffling of chairs and clacking of chopsticks.
Bakugo arrived later than most everyone else, snatching a bento box and snarling a curse. He parked himself unceremoniously at the table Kirishima, Kaminari, and Sero occupied before ravaging his meal. He didn't utter a word as he scarfed down some rice and chugged down his water bottle. Sweat was still dripping from his brow, but he didn't bother to wipe it away.
Their lunch break carried on normally. Their table was always rowdy and busy with teases and borderline dirty jokes. But it wasn't too long until the entire table was sent into shock as a bubbly brunette set her tray with a bento box down at their table. "Hello, Bakugo!"
Everyone excluding Bakugo had wide eyes and dropped jaws. Their eyes fell fearfully on their blonde ringleader, anticipating his response and ready to spring into action if he were to try to attack her.
She gracefully overlooked the jarring expressions of her peers and kept her smiling eyes on Bakugo, "That big blast earlier really was something! I didn't realize that you had gotten so strong!"
Her compliments didn't even register with the group as they looked back and forth at the pair, their expressions never shifting to anything but more bafflement.
Bakugo kept his demeanor of self-righteous attitude, "What the fuck do you want, you irrelevant shit?"
Uraraka only smiled sweetly at him, effectively covering up the sheer terror behind her eyes. Oh man, she knew she was going to regret this! "I just wanted to tell you how cool it was." She nervously nibbled on some of her rice.
"You just did, now beat it." Bakugo shot back snidely, completely unimpressed with her shielded bravery.
Uraraka forced out a very light chuckle, "I'm already here, so I might as well stay." She gestured to the three other boys to agree with her, but found their faces glued into looks of shock.
The three onlookers waited in anticipation for Bakugo's response but were floored by his new and cold ignorance of her. He simply went back to scarfing down his food, albeit at a faster rate than previously. If she was going to stay, then he was going to get out of there as quickly as he could. She had already deflected his cues for her to leave, so he saw no other option than to finish eating and take off.
Kirishima took it upon himself to break the thickening tension at the table and cautiously started up a new conversation with the brunette. "So uh… Uraraka… How did sparring go for you?" He chanced another glance at Bakugo, only to see him still ignoring his surroundings.
Uraraka beamed back, "So good! Tokoyami is super hard for me to try and beat! I can never get close to him, it's kind of like trying to spar with Bakugo. He's good at keeping his distance."
Bakugo nearly choked on his food at hearing this. Was she seriously comparing him to that shadow-fucker?
"Well that's good, I guess." Kirishima continued hesitantly and decided to turn the conversation toward himself, "If it makes you feel any better, I got the snot kicked out of me too."
"I saw," Uraraka replied pleasantly, "But you've grown super strong too, Kirishima! You handled Bakugo's blast like it was nothing!"
Kirishima rubbed the back of his head awkwardly, trying to keep Bakugo's delicate bubble from popping. "I definitely wouldn't say it was nothing... It took a lot out of me! Hopefully in the next round, I can get some more moves in."
Bakugo restricted a snicker of criticism for Kirishima's hopelessness from leaving his lips.
Uraraka knew she had to keep the conversation moving, "I'm teaming up with Iida for the next round, so hopefully I can get Tokoyami this time! He wants us to fight him in a cave, so there is no way I'd be able to beat him alone."
Bakugo finally interjected, rolling his eyes before slamming his bowl of rice down on the table. "Would you just shut the fuck up, already?! Why are you even here?!" He sharply stood up with irritated fists.
Uraraka's eyes widened at his sudden outburst and she looked up at the blonde menace. For a moment, she met his cold gaze with one of pure shock before she composed herself and started gathering her things. "I think I made a mistake," She rose from her seat gently. "Thanks guys, but I think I'm going to eat somewhere else. Sorry for intruding!" She smiled at them before briskly walking away and toward Midoriya and Iida on the other side of the room.
She scolded herself as she basically ran away. 'I am so stupid! Why do I do this sort of thing to myself and why am I trying to be that jerk's friend?! I knew this was a bad idea, shame on you Ochaco!'
The alarm in Midoriya's eyes was severe as she approached his table. "Are you okay? What were you doing?!"
Uraraka plopped down defeatedly across from Midoriya, resting her head in her hands. "That guy is impossible. I just thought that if I was nice to him, maybe he wouldn't freak out! But no, that dude is some kind of sadist or something. He clearly only responds to anger…" She puffed out her cheeks at her failure.
Uraraka's reasoning for approaching the boys' table only confused them more. She wearily picked at the remainder of her lunch, regretting her stupid decision to go over there in the first place. Jeez, that guy makes her feel like such an idiot!
"That's Kacchan for you," Midoriya shyly declared. He couldn't even to begin to comprehend why Uraraka would try something like this. She'd never shown interest in Bakugo before, but now she wanted to be nice to him? It made no sense.
…
Sparring continued after lunch and Aizawa let it carry into the late evening, citing that they needed to stretch their quirks to the maximum potential before they deserved to eat again. He ordered them to continue as he and Present Mic exited the training ground and made headway for the mess hall. At least they'd be able to eat in the silence of absent students. As the sun crept away from them, the students maintained their momentum despite their exhaustion.
Uraraka and Iida were still busy handling Tokoyami's shadow, their newest round of sparring still occupied the darkening cave. The three of them were growing weary of their quirks after 5 sparring rounds since their lunch hours ago.
Uraraka had floated herself up to a ridge inside the cave, seeking an opening to touch Tokoyami as Iida ran circles around the shadow-user in an attempt to distract. She panted exhaustively, her stomach beginning to decry her forceful use of her quirk. As the sun was falling more, it was becoming harder to see the action below her. The sun was no longer lending it's light through the cracks of the cave meaning Tokoyami was only becoming more powerful by the minute.
She took the moments she was up there to close her eyes and try to calm her reeling tummy before even thinking about leaping back into the fight, but as she opened her eyes a new scene was unfolding. Tokoyami was beginning to be consumed by his shadow.
"I-I've…" Tokoyama fought to get the words out, "I'm losing c-control!"
"Tokoyami!" Iida shouted and changed his course to head straight for the shadow-quirk classmate. "Hold on!"
Before Iida could get anywhere near him, the shadow swept a large and menacing claw at Iida, effectively throwing him into the nearest wall.
As Iida moved to stand, he squinted through his now broken glasses. "Tokoyami!"
The beast that was beginning to consume the bird-headed classmate released a sickening roar and turned it's full attention onto the class representative.
"Get away!" Tokoyami cried weakly, "It'll kill you!"
Iida hurried to get to his feet now, hoping to sprint away in time to dodge the incoming attack and Uraraka watched in absolute horror. Where is Mr. Aizawa?! He was nowhere to be seen! No, there's no time to think about that now. She knew that the onus was now on her to help her friend recapture control. She leapt from the ledge, catching herself before she fell too far. All she has to do is touch Tokoyami and she can force him outside the cave and into the sunlight.
"I'm coming!" Uraraka hollered and tried to fall in on the monster, but was surprised at it's supreme reflexes. Before she had time to think her next thought, she was being thrown against the wall of the cave, rocks threatening to tumble down on her. She shrieked and maneuvered away without a second to spare as the boulders tumbled in on themselves.
This was starting to look very bad.
From outside of the cave, the other students could hear the spar inside reaching a new level of intense. The majority of the students were too far from earshot to really decipher that things were going downhill fast for Uraraka, Iida, and Tokoyami. It sounded menacing, but not deadly. The fact that Tokoyami could lose control never even crossed their exhausted minds.
However, Bakugo and Kirishima were not so easily convinced. They'd been sparring along the cliffs of the mountains due to Bakugo's insistence and both could almost immediately tell that something did not sound right about the match taking place inside the nearby cave.
When they heard a girly scream, they knew it wasn't a surprised one. It was a scream of panic. The residual sounds of the rocks collapsing inside led both boys to believe that there was real trouble brewing there. Without a second thought, both bolted to intervene.
When they entered the darkening cave, they could barely make out what was going on. As their eyes adjusted to it, they could see that Tokoyami's shadow had taken on a new form entirely. It towered over Uraraka and Iida, throwing them around like ragdolls as they tried to get to the source of the power; a now unconscious Tokoyami.
When the monster pinned Iida down with a claw and lunged for Uraraka, Bakugo leapt into action. His hands sparking with demanding fury, "What the fuck is going on here?!"
The shadow monster didn't blink before abandoning it's pursuit of Uraraka and engaging the angry blonde. In a split second it had muffled the explosion building in Bakugo's palms and thrown him down to the floor of the cave with a cracking thud.
"Bakugo!" Uraraka shouted, her face was puffy and bruised even though they'd only been fighting the monster for a few minutes. She ran toward him to check on him before she was swept up by the monster once more. It really was a shame that her quirk was useless on a shadow.
She was swung around in the air as the monster arched it's arm, preparing to fastball her into the nearest wall. There was nothing she could do now but accept that this was about to happen. She had never felt the urge to give up in her life, but now she felt like had no choice. She shamefully shut her eyes as she was thrown full force, unable to stop her departure.
A few words of apology escaped her lips and she didn't bother preparing for the impact, but the impact never came. When hot hands wrapped around her, she blinked her eyes open to see that a red-eyed blonde had come to her rescue.
He glared at her disapprovingly, "Who the fuck said you could just give up?!"
Author's Note:
Slight cliffhanger. Well at least for a day or two. I should have another chapter out very soon. Honestly, I was going to write all the way up to the end of this scene but alas, I have to leave for class. College gets in the way of my writing and it's kind of annoying, but I guess I have to have "priorities".
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter :) I will try not to keep you hanging for too long! I have a test on Monday, so I'll try to make sure I have time to update over the weekend. Pretty please review! Thank you to Kirana Retsu and Fire Tribe's Lad for being so kind :) You guys are super cool!
See you guys soon!
~NumberSixteen