Goodbye Solitude

Chapter 11

Damn, old shit was made to last.

Bakugo started walking toward them threateningly, a gleeful grin on his face. "Surrender the guns before someone gets hurt. And by someone, I mean you." His gauntlet sparked as he prepared another blast.

Just as he took another step toward them his unzipped pants slid down on one side of his hip and he stepped on the hem that suddenly dragged on the ground. He teetered, his hands swinging wildly, and landed on his belly. The impact made him lose control and the fireball he held back blasted out of his hands with much more force than he ever meant for it to, incinerating one of the crates of guns, lighting the wood on fire, and turning half of the weapons into smoldering lumps of metal.

Cheaply-made new shit. The filing cabinet took heat better than most of the guns.

"Fucking hell," Bakugo grunted.

"Bakugo! You okay?" Kirishima started running for him.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw movement. "Wait, shitty hair!" he called out, fear tightening his throat. The villains crouched, about to leap out with guns blazing.

Kirishima reacted instantly, pivoting on his feet like some kind of goddamn dancer, and charged at the villains. His quirk rippled down his entire body as he collided into the filing cabinet and tackled it to the ground. Metal squealed and Bakugo leapt back to his feet, one hand frantically buttoning the top button of his pants as he rushed to help Kirishima.

The gun smugglers groaned from underneath the filing cabinet. Kirishima's hands were jagged machetes, shredding the metal into strips that he buried into the cement floor. His face was monstrous with fury as he finished destroying the metal, effectively trapping the villains. He panted like a beast as he ripped the guns out of their hands before falling back.

Bakugo walked over to touch Kirishima's arm, his eyes roaming over his partner, assessing and trying to guess if he was hurt anywhere. "You ok?" he asked after a moment.

Kirishima rolled his shoulders, releasing pent-up tension. "Yeah, you?"

Bakugo nodded. His ego might not ever recover from tripping over the bottom of his pants, though. Hopefully he could just bury that memory and hope Kirishima never brought it up.

A couple moments later the police burst into the warehouse along with a couple heroes that were vaguely familiar but Bakugo couldn't remember their names. Kirishima helped free the two villains from the torn filing cabinet so the police could formally arrest them. For the next few minutes the police wandered the warehouse, taking notes, while more took turns talking to Bakugo and Kirishima about what happened. By the time the police were done and all the weapons and other evidence seized it was the end of their shift.

As soon as they entered the Hero Home Office both of their phones jangled with an alert from the president. They were being summoned to his office. The men looked at each other with worried frowns on their faces. This could not be good. They hadn't even had a chance to fill out any paperwork yet.

The president was sitting at his desk with a scowl on his face as they entered his office. "So, I heard about the villains you helped capture today. Congratulations about that."

Kirishima shifted and glanced at Bakugo uneasily. "Thank you," he replied slowly.

"There are a couple serious problems, though. First off, a significant amount of the evidence was rendered completely useless because of your carelessness. I can't stress enough how important it is that we recover as much evidence against villains as possible." His voice was heavy with disapproval. "But, more importantly, the villains themselves have alerted us to a major issue." The president glared at them now. "They're making threats."

Bakugo tensed. "What kind of threats?" he demanded. "Is another villain about attack us? A partner?"

"Undoubtably, they're not working alone. But no, that's not what I was talking about. They're threatening to go to the press about you two."

"The press?" Kirishima asked bewildered.

"Yes, about your highly unprofessional behavior while working." The president rubbed his temples wearily now, like he was fighting off a headache. "Look, I don't care about your personal lives. Well, as long as two consenting adults are involved its nobody else's business. But your personal lives should never interfere with your jobs! And if this gets leaked to the press they're going to have a field day. As it is, we're probably going to have to make a deal with the villains to get them to keep their mouths shut. If I knew you guys were.... involved with each other I would never have paired you together. I paired Bakugo with you, Kirishima, to be a positive influence on him."

Kirishima looked down at the floor, his shoulders hunched and his face pallid with obvious shame. "I'm sorry, president. This won't happen again."

Bakugo stared at Kirishima, something in his chest squeezing painfully. Was this the first time Kirishima had ever gotten into trouble for anything? It might be and suddenly Bakugo was ashamed too. Not because of what they'd done but because of how it effected Kirishima. It felt like the president was saying that instead of Kirishima making Bakugo into a better hero, Bakugo made Kirishima into a worse one. Bakugo tainted Kirishima's perfection.

He never cared about being a perfect hero before. He never cared about being liked. All he cared about was saving people and making the world a better place. But after seeing how he affected Kirishima he wondered for the first time if everything he'd done up to now was really enough. And if he was good enough for Kirishima.

The president nodded. "You're right, it won't happen again. I'm assigning Bakugo a new partner. You're on your own again, Kirishima."

Bakugo's jaw dropped and Kirishima sputtered a protest. "Who's my new partner?" Bakugo demanded.

"He should be here any second now...." A knock sounded at the door. "Come in!" the president called.

In walked Tetsutetsu, looking the same as he did from their UA days, baring his sharp jagged teeth in a friendly grin at them all.