Chapter Text
“Woah!! Look at All Might fight!!”
“That guy’s impossible to beat, this’ll be a piece of ca-”
“Who’s that villain? I’ve never seen-”
“He’s so stron-”
“Go All Might!!!”
As the cheers and shouts all began to blur together, Bakugou couldn’t seem to distinguish any of them anymore, like trying to follow a single thread in a sea of tangled yarn. The noise of the crowd rose into a dull roaring, and he felt like the world was compressing in on him. There were bodies all around him, people bumping and brushing him on all sides. He was starting to feel numb. Like he might float away at any second.
All Might.
All Might was on screen, fighting the villain behind his own kidnapping. For the first time in 3 days, he should have had the ability to just stop and breathe, so why did he suddenly feel like that was the last thing he could do? It should have been simple- inhale, exhale, repeat. He’d escaped relatively unscathed, he was out of harm’s way, and he was even surrounded by a few familiar faces.
So why did he feel like he had just taken a Texas Smash-sized blow to the chest?
His skin was too tight, his eyes refused to focus (were those tears?), his hands were trembling, and he thought he might vomit at any moment. It was too much.
Everything was too much and-
And then there was a hand on his, fingers gently brushing against his own.
“Bakugou?”
Kirishima was pulling the thread for him, lifting it out and untangling it from the mass of yarn he had been drowning in a few seconds before. Bakugou’s fingers twitched, but he didn’t pull away, so Kirishima took that as encouragement and fully entwined their fingers.
Slowly, Bakugou came back down to Earth, felt his feet return to the ground, his skin untighten around his bones, his chest reinflate. He blinked, clarity returning to his vision, and cleared his throat.
Kirishima gently squeezed his hand. Bakugou squeezed back. No one else noticed.
How could they, when the Symbol of Peace was being brutally dismantled on every screen in the country by the strongest villain the world had never seen?
~
“Alright, kid, we’re gonna need you to come back to the station with us so we can take your full report.”
Bakugou just nodded curtly at the police officer, said nothing in response.
The man put a gentle hand on his shoulder and made to lead him away but hesitated at the sight of one of the other UA kids bounding up to them.
“Wait! Bakugou, hold on!” Kirishima shouted as he pushed through the small sea of people that had formed between them in the time Bakugou had been talking to the police.
Bakugou glanced up, still not saying a thing and not allowing his face to betray a hint of emotion, either. Kirishima faltered in front of him, suddenly looking unsure of himself, but he quickly pushed his doubts aside and threw himself at Bakugou, wrapping his arms around his shoulders and burying his face in his neck.
“I’m so glad you’re okay, man!”
Bakugou felt his cheeks redden, but let his eyes fall shut and his arms come up to wrap around Kirishima’s waist anyways. His heart was pounding again, but this time didn’t feel quite like he was dying, at least.
“Thanks,” he whispered, his voice barely audible over the rumble of conversation from those still lingering about the city streets.
But Kirishima heard, his mouth splitting into a mile-wide grin. “’Course,” he said, pulling back enough to look Bakugou in the eye but still leaving a hand on his shoulder. His smile fell a bit at seeing the emotionless mask still covering Bakugou’s face.
“Text us when you get home, please? We’ve been going out of our minds,” Kirishima muttered, a serious look clouding his eyes. At that, Bakugou noticeably perked up, if only for a split second, knowing without even having to ask which ‘we’ he was referring to. He stared into Kirishima’s blazing red eyes for a few more seconds before finally responding.
“I will.”
At that, the cop once again put his hand on Bakugou’s shoulder and led him away, leaving Kirishima standing there alone, eyes glued to the back of his best friend’s head as he climbed into a cop car and was taken away.
He exhaled, pulling out his phone and taking it off of airplane mode. Slowly, the messages came rolling in, and after 2 minutes of what seemed like a never-ending sea of notifications, his phone finally stopped buzzing. He opened up the one group chat that really mattered, and without even bothering to read most of the messages, he typed up a response to the 3 people he knew would be otherwise sitting at home sick with worry.
Kirishima slipped his phone back into his pocket and rejoined the other 4 where he had left them. Within a few minutes, they were on their way to the train station, finally ready to start heading home. Kirishima sighed heavily, relief flooding his body and calm clouding his mind, if only for the moment.
~
Kiri: We’re okay
Kiri: Hes with the police now. Promised he’d text when he got back home
Kiri: …we got him.