From the Shadows || Katsuki Bakugou x OC

Chapter Fifty-two

6:53, not bad for time. I got up and out of bed and decided to throw on a cropped hoodie with high-waisted jeans. I still have plenty of time until I leave with Hanta and Denki, might as well play a game for a bit. I sat down on my bean bag chair and chose The Untitled Goose Game, it's a simple game that doesn't require much thought, which is nice since I just woke up.

With not much thought being needed for this game, my mind wandered to other thoughts. Last night I did think I might not mind using she/they. I mean I know I'm fine with she,  but what about other pronouns? Am I a girl? Now that I think about it... maybe not? But I like she... but pronouns don't equal gender... it's too early in the morning to think about this. Who cares I'm just a sack of meat anyway, just a person living life.

Wait a minute. I paused my game and pulled my knee up to my chin. I'm... just a person... maybe that's it, maybe I don't need to be a boy, a girl, or an enby. Now that I think about it, I might not exactly like being called a girl. Hang on I need to do some research.

I shut down my game, even though I barely played for five minutes and opened up my laptop that I brought from home. I typed in the search bar "what's the word for not having a gender", who knows, maybe I'll identify with something. The first thing that came up was agender.

"Agender people ('a-' meaning "without"), also called genderless, gender-free, non-gendered, or ungendered, are those who identify as having no gender or being without a gender identity."

Huh... that does... sound kinda like what I might be feeling. I'm not a hundred percent sure yet, but maybe. I mean, I don't think I would care if people referred to me as she or they... would I care if I was referred to as he? There is some sort of appeal there... maybe I'll talk to Hanta and Denki today. I think they would understand if I wanted to experiment with pronouns.

It's funny that a friend coming out got me questioning my gender and pronouns. If I was never really exposed to anything within the LGBTQ+ community I probably would've never questioned it.

I know I don't want to be called a boy, and now that I actually put thought into it, girl just doesn't... quite feel right.

Hmm, I'm kinda hungry, I should probably go eat breakfast. I closed my laptop and headed out the door.

"Good Morning, Keiko!" Momo waved, she happen to be leaving her room at the same time I was.

"Morning Momo, how are you?"

"A little tired, but some tea should fix that! How about you?"

We walked into the elevator together and I pressed button for the ground floor. "Pretty good, I'm going out with Hanta and Denki in a few hours. They want to get matching piercings."

"Really? That's sweet, they must be very good friends." The elevator door opened and we made our way to the kitchen.

"Yeah, honestly it's like Kiri, Hanta, Mina, and Denki share the same brain sometimes." She laughed and got to making tea for herself, I decided to have a bowl of cereal and a banana. After a few minutes she left to sit on a couch in the common area.

"Hey Kei-"

"Why are you resting your head on my shoulder?"

Denki stared at the wall for a second, "Because it's comfy." I rolled my eyes at him but he continued. "After you finish eating can Hanta and I come to your room to play smash?"

"So you're being affectionate to get something?" I kept eating my cereal and used my quirk to lift his head off my shoulder. "But I guess so. Before that I want to brush my teeth."

"Awesome!"

Katsuki walked in the room and grabbed breakfast for himself, "You have four controllers right?"

"Yeah, do you want to play too?"

"Duh, I have to kick your asses in smash." He leaned against a counter and ate. "Besides, I don't have anything else to do today until close to lunchtime."

"Ooo~ what are you doing?" Denki asked while adjusting himself to sit cross-legged.

"Getting part of my hero costume changed."

"Oh, you're finally doing that? Let me know how it turns out." He vaguely mentioned discussing getting modifications to help with his hearing, hopefully everything goes okay.

"What are you getting changed?"

"I'll tell you if it actually works, maybe I'll have some story about that crazy pink-haired girl trying to kill me."

Once I was ready we grabbed Sero from their room and all four of us went to my room.

"Alright, I'll get the game set up, decide what controllers you want."

"I need the Pikachu one!" Denki exclaimed, "Hanta here!" He shoved the Samus controller into their hands, "Now Kacchan has to use the Kirby one!"

"I'll still kick your ass no matter which controller I have."

Hanta hopped up onto my bed, "Yo Denki, get up here." He hopped up with them and they both turned their controllers on.

"There's enough room for Katsuki and I on the bean bag chair anyway." I flopped down on it and Katsuki joined me, "Alright, games ready."

I picked Zero Suit Samus, Hanta picked Luigi, Denki picked Pikachu "for the memes", and Katsuki picked Ryu to start. We would occasionally change up characters and even have challenges where we all randomized a fighter and had to use them. After playing for about an hour and a half, we had played 28 rounds. I won six, Denki won five, Katsuki won six, and Hanta won eleven.

"Ha! Who's kicking who's ass now Katsuki!" Hanta threw their arms in the air in celebration.

"Ugh, whatever." He put his controller down and grabbed climbed on top of my bed, then picked Hanta up by the ankles and dangled them in the air. "But you can't beat me in a real fight!"

"Please don't break my bed!" I stood up, quickly putting away all the controllers so they wouldn't get broken either. Denki was on his back laughing his ass off, and Hanta was smirking.

"You think you could beat me in a fight? But you don't realize you've backed yourself into a corner." What the hell are they talking about now? "You wouldn't dare use your quirk in here! You'd break Keiko's stuff!" Hanta shot tape out from their elbow, taping Katsuki's legs together.

"Hey! You asshole!" Katsuki tried to get the tape off without dropping Hanta, but they just taped his hand to his legs while cackling. This caused Katsuki to lose his balance, drop Hanta, and fall onto them.

My door slammed open, "I heard a loud noise! Are you... I'm not even gonna ask." Kyouka had entered my room, just staring at the scene in front of her. Hanta is face down on my floor with Katsuki's face buried in their back and three of his limbs taped together. "I was gonna go to Momo's room, but I doubt anything can top what led to this."

"Well you see-"

Katsuki shot up from the floor, using his one free hand to prop himself up, glaring at Denki who was still laughing. "Don't you fucking dare."