In Your Shadow [Chapter 1]

“Bakugou, come see me before you go to lunch.”

Katsuki sighed. It was never a good thing when Aizawa called him over personally; it was usually to lecture him about swearing in class (again) or insulting his classmates (again) or blowing up the training room (again). Considering their most recent class, he suspected this one was going to be about internships. As much as he’d never admit it, he’d actually learned a lot from Best Jeanist in his first year, but he knew he’d garnered somewhat of a reputation from it, too. If he hadn’t known it from the start, he’d sure as hell have learned it when he got shit-all at offer time in second year.

All the same, he walked up to the desk at the front, waiting for the class to empty out before he gave Aizawa a pointed look, silently asking him to begin. With a quiet sigh, Aizawa picked up an envelope from his desk: plain and unassuming, just like the thousand that had been handed out during class. He offered it out, but before Katsuki could take it, he spoke again.

“I want you to know that Jeanist and Yagi have both pulled some strings to get you this offer,” he explained, straight to the point as always. Katsuki had always liked that about him. “I will still give you time to review the rest of your offers, of course, but I recommend you consider this one very seriously.”

Well. That… Wasn’t what he'd been expecting.

He took the envelope with a nod, tucking it into his bag to open later, and waited a moment to see if Aizawa would say anything more. He felt like there was one more sentence hanging in the air between them, waiting to come out, but Aizawa didn’t offer it up.

“And you?” he asked finally.

“Me?”

“Do you think I should take it?”

Aizawa paused, contemplating, and finally conceded a nod.

“I think it would be good for you,” he said slowly. “But it’s your decision, ultimately, and I’m sure you’d learn a lot from any of your other offers, too.”

“Thank you.”

As he walked toward the cafeteria to join his classmates, he couldn’t stop thinking about what might be inside. Strings pulled by Best Jeanist was probably a bad sign, but by All Might too? All Might seemed to have at least a grudging amount of respect for him, after everything they’d been through. He was the only one who had stuck up for him when he'd destroyed a section of the dorms, the only one who saw his… Moment of weakness.

He should really start calling it what it was. A nervous breakdown, he’d had a damn nervous breakdown – because of course he did, he was tortured by a sludge villain before he even started high school, and then he was kidnapped for god’s sake. What teenager wouldn’t have a nervous breakdown after all that shit? But maybe he hadn’t handled it in the best way, and All Might had been on his side afterward, when it seemed like no one else was.

He fell into the empty seat left for him beside Kirishima, nodding faintly when a tray was immediately set in front of him. As much as he hated to admit it, his friends were always looking out for him, even if it was just getting him decent food before the queues stacked up and the options ran low. He granted them a faint nod in thanks, but apparently the assholes took that as code for talk endlessly, because there were immediately four different voices demanding information.

“It was just an internship thing,” he huffed, when they finally gave him a minute to answer. “Aizawa wanted to recommend one of my offers.”

“He gave you personal advice on who to pick?! I’m so jealous!” Kirishima whined. “I’ve asked and he still says I have to make the decision myself! I only ever get like a dozen offers and I still can’t choose, I don’t know how you guys do it with hundreds.”

“Pick whoever has the highest ranking in the charts.”

“Easy for you to say, Mister Top-Ten-Offers. But that’s how you got Best Jeanist, I would have thought you’d be more careful this time.”

“He got Endeavour through Todoroki, though,” Mina pointed out. “That wasn’t really an offer from the top ten, he just got the hook ups from his Remedial Course Buddy.”

“Maybe I should ask Todoroki to get me in with him,” Kaminari mused. “He’d do it, right? If I asked nicely? And bought him soba or something?”

“You’d hate it there,” Katsuki grumbled, through a mouthful of rice. “Want me to look at them for you instead of our study shit tonight?”

“Would you?!” Kaminari gushed, clasping his hands together as if he were begging for the help. “You won’t be too busy with your own?”

Katsuki shrugged, plucking the envelope from his bag and holding it up to the light. Other than his name carefully inked on the front, there was absolutely nothing on the paper. Nothing to give him any kind of a clue where it came from or who wrote it, just a boring, anonymous envelope.

“I should probably just accept this one,” he shrugged. “If All Might and Aizawa want me to, it’s probably a good choice.”

“Yagi recommended it too?! Dude!” Kirishima’s jaw dropped as he stared at it. “You didn’t say that! Who’s it from?!”

“I haven’t looked yet.”

“Open it! Let us see!”

Katsuki shook his head, putting it away again and returning to his food without an apparent care in the world, despite his friends’ indignant squawking about it.

“I want to decide without looking,” he mumbled, silencing them immediately. “It’s probably better that way, rather than looking first.”

“Let us know when you look, okay?” Kirishima smiled understandingly, clapping him on the shoulder. “I’m keen to find out who they want you to work with so badly!”

“Yeah, I will.”

In the end, it didn’t take him long to make the decision. It weighed on the back of his mind throughout their lunch break, still hung there as they went to training with All Might afterward, and by the time All Might called him over at the end of class, he realised he’d pretty much made his mind up the moment it was handed to him.

“Did Aizawa give you the letter?” All Might asked, straight to the point – for once, Katsuki couldn’t help but think.

“He did,” Katsuki nodded, pulling the sealed envelope from his backpack. “I haven’t looked at it yet, but I’m going to accept.”

“Without knowing who it came from?”

“If I look, I’ll be biased,” he shrugged, trying to pretend his hands weren’t trembling as he choked the words out. “If it’s someone low-ranked, even though you all recommended it, I’ll struggle to say yes. Or if it’s someone I don’t like, or don’t know, or… Anything, really. If… If you think I should do it, I will. No matter who it is.”

All Might smiled at him warmly, and even with his gaunt face and sunken features, it made Katsuki remember the man who'd inspired him to be a hero in the first place.

“I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised, Young Bakugou.”

─────

Six feet and two inches tall, a hundred and eight kilograms at last mention, twenty-three years old in a couple of months’ time, and owner of one of the best quirks in the country, despite its dumb name: Super Power. Augmenting his body with a strength that couldn’t be matched even by the likes of Endeavour, or All Might in his prime. He was a local celebrity in Katsuki’s town, the first from their school to ever be accepted to U.A. – the only one to beat Katsuki there – and the first to become a top-ten hero, let alone…

Katsuki grumbled under his breath as he read the letter again. It was so short and to the point, gave nothing away, just an official invitation to intern at the agency, printed on green letterhead and signed by the man himself.

He couldn’t decide if he wanted to keep the autograph or not.

Katsuki knew everything about the guy, and he kind of hated himself for that. He wished he could go in blind, wished it was some hero he’d never heard of, or barely knew, but instead it was the young man he’d spent his entire childhood hearing about, the local news always singing his praises for the work their hometown hero was doing. The man with the shadow so long that Katsuki couldn’t even see where it ended; he had tried his entire life to force his way through, but it just seemed to go on forever.

“Holy shit, dude!” Kaminari marvelled, staring at the fancy signature. “This is so unfair!! You’ve had top-ten heroes every time, even when you only got like three offers!”

“Not cool!” Sero pouted, clapping him on the back all the same. “I’m jealous as hell.”

“It’s super cool,” Kirishima corrected him, elbowing Kaminari in the ribs and shoving Sero in the shoulder lightly. “We’re so happy for you, Bakubro!”

“Whatever,” Katsuki grumbled, snatching the invitation back and shoving it deep in his bag. “I told them I’d do it, Aizawa already accepted on my behalf. So get your shitty lists out so we can get this over with.”

“Wait, he already accepted for you?”

“Yeah? So what?”

“So you seriously accepted before you looked at it? I mean, I know you said you would, but I didn’t think you’d actually do it!”

“Haah? The fuck is that supposed to mean, hair-for-brains? I don’t say shit I don’t mean!”

“Okay, okay! I’m just surprised, that’s all! Relax!”

“Do you want my help or not, shitbag?”

“Yes! Please!”

Katsuki huffed, but thankfully the idiots shut their mouths, pulling out their stacks of offers and beginning the long process of sorting through them. Katsuki started out with Sero, helping him sort through a much more modest pile of letters than the rest, quietly debating the merits of each agency with him as the others tackled their own. When he came across the offer from Kamui Woods, he shoved it in Sero’s face stubbornly, glaring when Sero dared to even open his mouth.

“He’s number eight you piece of shit, stop giving me hell about getting offers from the top ten and take it.”

“Wait, number- Holy shit is this for me?”

Sero stared at it with wide eyes, the rest of the group crowding in to take a look, and Katsuki just raised an eyebrow when Sero looked his way again.

“I’m gonna go see Aizawa,” he said sheepishly, climbing to his feet. “I’ll be back to help you guys soon!”

Katsuki took the liberty of tossing his rejected offers in the trash the moment he was out the door, shuffling over to take half of Mina’s pile from her silently. She shot him a big smile for his efforts, but Katsuki ignored it, flipping through letters as if he hadn’t even noticed.

“I got an offer from Fat Gum again,” Kirishima mused. “I liked my work study there, but I feel like I should try something different, you know? Learn from someone new.”

“It’s a good fall-back plan, though,” Kaminari shrugged. “If you don’t like the look of anything else, you’ve got a safety net.”

“Yeah, that’s true. Death Arms could be cool too, Jirou said he worked her really hard when she went.”

“Oh dude, look at this!” Kaminari leapt up, spilling papers everywhere as he shoved one in Kirishima’s face. “Holy shit!”

Laughing, Kirishima took the page from him to read, eyes widening when he reached the name. His laughter stopped abruptly, looking up instead at Kaminari’s shock and excitement, and after a moment he nodded.

“Yeah, I’d say that’s a good choice.”

Katsuki leaned over to grab it, ignoring the whines Kaminari gave him about being careful, and his eyebrows shot up when he found Edgeshot in the first line, pausing a moment before he handed it back much more carefully than his initial handling.

“And you guys gave me all that shit about top ten,” Katsuki huffed. “You can shut your damn mouths, now.”

“Understood!”

Katsuki returned to his portion of Mina’s offers, scanning through for someone who was at least a familiar name, only finding one on the second to last offer in his entire pile. He hummed to himself faintly when he read it, thinking back to work studies that felt like a lifetime ago, and finally turned to look at Mina.

“You talk to Round-Face a bunch, right?”

“Ochako? Yeah! How come?”

“You should ask her about this one.”

He handed it over, and Mina’s face lit up when she read it, holding the paper up with all the glory of a lost idol that she’d just liberated from an ancient temple.

“Number eleven is close enough!” she grinned, waving it wildly. “I’m going to see Aizawa! Are you coming, Denki? Or do you want to check out the rest first?”

“Nah I’m pretty set on him, I’m coming too. I’ll help you when we get back, Eijirou!”

“It’s all good,” Kirishima assured him. “Take your time!”

Katsuki waited for them to be gone before he set aside the shitty offers from Mina’s pile, rounding the table to sit next to Kirishima as he gnawed at his lower lip.

“You’ll find one," Katsuki assured him quietly, holding a hand out for some papers to sort through. “You’ve got a ton here, there’s gotta be at least one good one.”

“I know,” Kirishima grinned, completely unconvincing. “I’m happy for them!”

“I know you are.”

Within fifteen minutes the rest of the group was back, each taking a section of Kirishima’s offers to wade through. He had a lot of them – more than any of them, Katsuki excluded. More chance to find something amazing, but also more duds to drag himself through, his smile fading slowly as he let the self-doubt take over.

“I would pick one of these,” Katsuki sighed, handing them over and climbing to his feet. “I’m going to bed. Don’t let it freak you out.”

“You’ve got so many offers, man,” Sero grinned knowingly, leaning in to press his shoulder to Kirishima’s. “I’m jealous! There must be so many good ones in here, I don’t know how you’re gonna choose.”

“Yeah,” Kirishima agreed, his smile a little wobbly. “Just gotta keep sorting.”

“I’ll stay up with you,” Kaminari offered. “I don’t need as much beauty sleep as Bakugou does.”

“Fuck off,” Katsuki growled, kicking him in the shin. “Don’t stay up all night, assholes, I’m not helping you tomorrow when you fall asleep in class.”

“We’ve got it, Blasty,” Mina laughed. “Sweet dreams!”

“Whatever.”

He stalked off toward the elevators, rolling his eyes when he heard the stage-whisper behind his back.

“You wanna gossip about him now that he’s gone?”

“Hell yeah.”

With a little huff he punched the elevator button, groaning when he turned around to see Todoroki at his heels, a towel wrapped around his shoulders to handle his damp hair.

“You get any good offers?” he asked, as they stepped inside and pushed their floor buttons. “Looked like you had a lot to go through.”

“Already picked,” Katsuki shrugged. “Wasn’t hard.”

“Oh? You got a really good one?”

“Course I did, asshole.”

“Hmm. I seem to remember a few months ago you had none.”

“Fuck off with your Daddy Issues bullshit. We both know you’re just gonna go back there and force yourself to use that shitty half-assed fire again, like your own damn quirk is such a burden or whatever the fuck your issue is. I’m still waiting for that fuckin’ rematch, so hurry up about it.”

Todoroki cracked a smile at that – he’d grown far too comfortable for Katsuki’s liking.

“You’re right,” he acknowledged. “But I’m working on it, and isn’t that what internships are about? Learning to use your own powers in better ways?”

“Just stop letting that old fucker ruin your quirk,” Katsuki glared, folding his arms over his chest. “You’d rather piss him off than be number one?”

“Pissing him off is pretty great,” Todoroki answered, deadpan. “He’s been trying to make it up to me or something. You know, for being a shitty father. That’s why he let me bring you along, last time. He asked if I wanted to take anyone with me this time, too.”

“So that’s why you’re talking to me?” Katsuki snorted. “I have a thousand better offers.”

“Good, I’m glad you found somewhere that suits you. I’m surprised you’d turn down the number two hero, though. You must be growing up. Who did you pick?”

The doors slid open on Katsuki’s floor, and he took a step into the hall, turning back to shoot Todoroki a smirk as they began to close again.

“Number one, motherfucker.”


[Chapter 2]