Birds of Prey | Tododeku

Chapter 14

A thick, pale yellow gas seeped out of the can. After a few seconds, the two began to cough mildly. The mild coughs quickly turned violent as Bakugou palmed at his eyes and swore between choked breaths.

With every breath Todoroki attempted to draw in, he felt his throat close a little more. He felt the chemicals rip apart and swell the inside of his throat. He coughed and hacked as he decided enough was enough.

He swatted the smoke, looking for the canister through the goggles. Once found, he picked in up with his gloves hand and slammed it in the water, shaking it around for a bit. Soon, the bubbling in the water stopped. Todoroki took off the glove and hesitantly took off the goggles. The second the goggles were off, Todoroki's eyes began to sting and water.

Mucus slowly dropped from Todoroki's nose, as he wiped at his nose, the sting and burn of the gas became ever more prevalent. The two continued to swear and cough. At one point, the two of them had completely collapsed, both hacking their lungs out on the ground.

After 20 minutes of suffering and agony, the two got up and opened the door, closing it as quickly as possible. They made their way outside quickly where Toga was messing with the hose. Her mask was on and her hair unconventionally pulled back into a single ponytail. Bakugou ran to the garbage and threw up violently. Just looking at him made Todoroki nauseous.

Todoroki and Bakugou coughed and groaned as Toga stared at them. After a minute Toga turned on the hose and pressed her thumb against the side, making the water spray harder on the two. As the two were doused in water, they continued to cough, inhaling some water in the process.

Twice and Compress walked out. Compress held a couple water bottles in his hand, while Twice held two jugs of milk.

Toga turned off the hose for a minute and grabbed a water bottle from compress. While she began to help Todoroki, Compress began to instruct Bakugou to do the same.

The two sat on their knees. Toga tilted Todoroki's head back. "Blink rapidly," she instructed. She poured the water into Todoroki's eye one at a time. Just as Toga and compress switched to the other eye, they heard a throat clear. A police officer stared at the five a couple meters down the alleyway. Todoroki and Bakugou awkwardly coughed to relive their throats.

"I was passing by and I couldn't help but notice this...peculiar situation. Is everything alright? Would you mind explaining why the five of you are back here?" The officer asked.

Bakugou chuckled. "Well, you see officer, my friend here thought he could handle hot peppers better than me."

"And I was right," Todoroki smirked back, impressed by Bakugou's quick thinking. "But we stared to get a little overzealous and ended it got a little...messy. We got the pepper juice everywhere. Including our eyes."

"We work at the bar up there and it's been a slow day. We were nice enough to help them out, even though I warned them before this even started," Toga said to the police officer. "You know how boys are."

"And I have the milk!" Twice yelled triumphantly. The five looked at Twice as he held up the two gallons, grinning ear to ear.

The officer chuckled and leaned into her walkie-talkie. "No backup necessary," she said softly. "Be more careful next time boys, and word of advice, whenever you're doing something stupid, try not to look so suspicious. For a second, I was going to bring you all in for suspicious behavior."

They all laughed and waved to the officer as she walked away. As she disappeared, they all gave a sigh of relief. Bakugou turned to Twice.

"Why the hell do you have milk?" Bakugou asked. Twice cradled the milk defensively as Bakugou interrogated him.