Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Why did people pair him up with Bakugou so much for missions, Todoroki would probably never know. It could be his ability to handle the others outburst or the way he could completely stop the angry individual from doing something irrational.

But, the question of why would show up on almost every mission, especially when it was a stealth mission as Katsuki could be very very loud. So loud that it could give them away to the enemy.

“Why are we even on this?! This is belo-”

“Would you stay quiet? It’s supposed to be a stealth and rescue mission, not a let’s be as loud as possible.”

Katsuki shot him a dirty look, but sunk down again, looking around the corner of the wall.

“Who is it even we’re rescuing?”

Todoroki raised an eyebrow, “Did you not listen to a word Aizawa-sensei said?”

Again, Shouto had a feeling it would continue this way, Katsuki gave him a dirty look. “I did, but I forgot. Are you going to give me an answer or am I going in blind?”

Shouto contemplated it. He’d done that on other missions as well, whenever the blond questioned him about intel he’d either missed or ignored during a briefing.

“Midoriya Izuku. He disappeared two and a half years ago on a mission. Teammate Uraraka Ochako came back with two broken ribs and a black eye, and a fear of small spaces and crevices. Refused to go on this mission.”

“You mean Deku?”

Shouto rolled his eyes, “Yes, it’s Deku.”

“So, what’s the plan. Go in and bust him out, or what? Why are we even here, couldn’t he just break out himself?”

Shouto, for the second time that night, asked himself why Bakugou Katsuki had been chosen to be his teammate. What had Aizawa and Hizashi been thinking when they made that choice?

“He’s been spotted working together with other villains.”

“That doesn’t sound like De-”

“Peek-a-boo!”

The voice rung out from above Shouto, loud and clear. Both him and Bakugou froze.

“Good going, Icy-Hot.” Rung out as Bakugou rose up and started sprinting towards the stairs, most likely looking to hide before getting busted by the owner of the voice. Shouto, however, stayed still, almost frozen in time because of hearing the voice of his old teammate and friend.

But, of course, he shouldn’t have stayed still. It left Izuku an opening to attack him, exposed his body to damage with the way he was crouched down. And from what Shouto knew about Izuku’s quirk, he would do just that if and when he found Shouto.

And that was exactly what happened approximately five seconds later when Shouto got slammed into the wall he was hiding behind. His head managed to slam against it too, causing him to be disoriented as his world went black for a second or two.

And then he understood why Bakugou had run off. Because Izuku wasn’t even trying to conceal what he was doing when they started fighting, he was going for Shouto’s left side, the one he knew Shouto would refuse to hurt him with. If Bakugou had been there, Midoriya would have gone straight for his hearing aids, one of Bakugou’s weaknesses. If you were to remove his hearing, Bakugou could have trouble locating and fighting you.

And then Shouto heard someone sprinting on metal floors, coming in their direction. And then a loud boom and someone had tackled Midoriya in front of him.

“Get to it, Half-and-Half!”

And then it was like Shouto’s body started responding to his brain again, he finally started moving. Started to fight back with his right side, freezing Midoriya’s feet to the floor while his quirk was occupied with Bakugou’s explosion. Now all they needed to do was get him to go with them, either willingly or with force. Knowing Izuku, they’d have to go with the latter.

“Deku! You piece of-”

Bakugou stopped talking. Midoriya had gotten close enough to go for his hearing aids, and decided to go through with it. In the green-haired boy’s hands were now two dull-red hearing aids. And Shouto could see the sheer panic on Bakugou’s face, his posture getting stiff from losing his ability to hear. And Shouto could see the smug and victorious grin on Midoriya’s face and wanted nothing more than to clock him one in the face for taking advantage of something like that.

And then it clicked why he was always chosen to work together with Bakugou. He was protective of the slightly older boy, and that’s what did it.

He simply decked Izuku in the face, something that was so out of character for him that Izuku didn’t expect it. Midoriya hadn’t been prepared at all, so when Shouto’s fist reached its destination, the world went dark for the boy.

Chapter Text

Ochaco didn’t know what to think. Todoroki and Bakugou had returned earlier that day, one carrying a passed out Midoriya Izuku. She’d just come back from working out, and there her old teammate was, being carried down the hallway.

And of course, her first reaction was fear. She’d tried to stop it, but stepping back into the doorway she came from seemed almost like instinct at that moment. It didn’t even matter that Bakugou actually looked sorry for her, he knew, she just retreated like a dog with its tail between its legs.

And somebody had to have noticed of course. And that person just happened to be her mentor, Aizawa, also known as Eraserhead. The hero agency all of them worked for, was his, so of course, he cared for them immensely. He was still mostly underground, and so was most of the employed heroes. Some of his former Yuuei students had chosen to join him, some of them Ground Zero, Uravity and Shouto. During the earlier years, the hero Deku had also been a part of their team. Red Riot teamed with them occasionally, same for Froppy, Creati and Earphone Jack. Ingenium was busy, but would still try to stop by and help sometimes.

So when he pulled her aside later, she knew what he was going to say. During their school years, he may have seemed more cold than caring, but later they’d managed to draw out the softie in him. He cared for each one of them, some of them had even been mistaken for his children in public because of it. It had made Present Mic have a good laugh, and according to Aizawa he still teased him with it.

“You’re still scared of him.”

Be honest with yourself. Be honest, Ochaco, you can do it.

“It’s hard not to.”

Good job, you did it. Her voice echoed through the room.

Aizawa smiled, “Following the advice of your girlfriend-not-girlfriend for once, huh?”

“She’s wise when she wants too. Remind you of someone?”

“Sure it does. When’s she coming around next time?”

Logical ruse. Making her switch conversation topic. She did that too, switching when Ochaco became uncomfortable. Switched to something Ochaco could talk about for hours on end, just to switch and surprise Ochaco later, to make sure she got the truth.

“She was talking about stopping by next week. Something about one of the interns at hers causing enough trouble to put the whole assist team on full alert for a couple of days.”

Aizawa is tricking her, she knows. But she allows him too. “You going to talk about this with her?”

And there it was. “She’s going to force me too if she finds out, might as well.”

“Hope she does. Until then, follow what she told you to do, okay? As much as I hate to admit it, the girl knows what she’s talking about.”

Bakugou had seen Uraraka back away from them when they came in with Deku. He’d also seen Aizawa following her, so he figured that problem would be dealt with with the help of Aizawa and Uraraka’s girlfriend-not-girlfriend. Those two had been together for two years but still had the joke going to amuse everybody around them.

Why did you punch him that hard, Icy-Hot? We have to wait now. Bakugou signed to that peppermint-haired fucker. He still hadn’t found replacement hearing aids, so their conversation had been reduced from talking to signing back and forth.

Todoroki, Shouto, responded with Reflexes kicked in. Shouto ‘straight to the point and forward’ Todoroki strikes again. Did you figure out if Hatsume could make you some new ones?

No, not yet. Bakugou responded, She talked about having to pull up old blueprints to make them, and when she has done that she’ll take about 30 minutes or something.

They’d moved out of the room after they’d tied Midoriya to a chair, and stood like guards at the door. Todoroki never liked having conversations on the job that he thought was unnecessary. After his shift, he would still be quiet but would hold a conversation if prompted. It was one of the things Bakugou was pleased Midoriya, getting Todoroki out of his shell. It was the one thing that Bakugou could look at most of the times and think, it’s okay that he did this better than me.

So when Uraraka approached them, he was surprised.

He can see Todoroki talking, but can only hear blurred out sounds. He makes eye contact with Uraraka, and she looks almost sympathetic with him. She points to her own ears, and Bakugou connects the dots and nods.

She looks to Todoroki again and sees him signing for Bakugou, so he could be a part of their conversation. How is he doing?

Bakugou shrugs, why should she care? He’d hurt all of them a couple years ago, especially her. And with their luck, that probably prompted the trashing sounds that came from the room at that moment. Perfectly timed of Deku, huh?