The Hands At My Throat - kiribakukami soulmate AU

Fixing up *some* of the mess

"Wait - what!" Kaminari stops chopping his onions abruptly.

"Yeah, and there's this whole thing where Kiri thinks that Bakubabe doesn't want him, and they're both super upset."

Kaminari looks around before lowering his voice.

"Do we need to get Midoriya involved?" He whispers.

Mina sighs, before shaking her head.

"I hope not. Not yet at least. But Kiri will hopefully talk to him."

"Aw man, and Kiri was so excited to meet his soulmate as well. He was always going on about how he'd accept them no matter what, because whoever they were, they would be perfect for him. Remember?"

Mina laughed dryly.

"He's a sap, that's for sure. But at least he didn't downright shut down whenever anyone asked him about it. You're probably the most Bakugo's talked to anyone after Kiri. I feel kinda sorry for him, you know?"

Kaminari hummed in agreement, and Mina changed the subject.

"So, how're you feeling? I heard you kept panicking around Kiri, something to do with that guy's quirk. What even happened?"

Kaminari had to think for a second. He'd been avoiding the memories in his head, so much in fact that he wasn't worried about them.

"Well, it kinda just hurt a lot. Like, a lot a lot. I couldn't even activate my quirk."

He didn't say the rest of it. He didn't want to talk about the emotional pain, the things he remembered in a moment, but can't remember any more. Things that sent daggers through his chest.

He does remember the two pairs of crimson eyes, though. He assumed they were Kirishima and Bakugo. They were filled with such hate, pain, and sorrow, that Kaminari didn't know what to think of them. So he tried not to think of them at all.

"But other than that, I'm fine now. Some stuff makes me panic for god knows what reason, but I'm fine," he grinned.

"Ok, good. Heard you got invited to Mr Aizawa's cabin? That's gotta be exciting."

"I'm absolutely ecstatic," he replied, rolling his eyes.

"You know, I would invite you to sleep in the girls cabin..." Mina began, "but you're an absolute pervert and none of us trust you," She finished, giving him a look.

He rolled his eyes.

"I'm not that bad, am I? I'm not as bad as Mineta." Mina narrowed her eyes at him.

"Yeah but you work with him. Almost the same thing."

Kaminari sighed, but he was smiling a little bit. He was probably going to sleep in the boys dorms anyway, he was just teasing.

But maybe he did need to back away from the girls a bit.

Suddenly all the hairs on the back of his neck raised, and he felt a shiver down his spine. It took all he had not to jump up and run away. From the corner of his eye, he could see that Bakugo had just walked past. He watched carefully until Bakugo was a full 10 metres away, talking to the cooks with his usual scowl, before he could relax his muscles.

"You weren't kidding about the panic, huh."

Kaminari huffed and rolled his eyes, before hacking back into his onion.

"It's only for a week..." he muttered, more to himself than anyone else.

~~~~

Bakugo is definitely upset, Kirishima concluded after dinner. He'd been trying to deny it, but the more he thought about it, and went over his conversation with Mina, the more he realised she was right. Bakugo doesn't do anything out of pity, and he doesn't half ass things. He's not a 'let's just give it a go' kind of guy.

But while the guilt continued to gnaw away at him, Kiri did know that if anything between them was going to work, Bakugo was going to have to agree to let down his emotional barrier. Because as much as he knew Bakugo wasn't great at expressing himself, Kiri didn't want to end up being the only one participating in the relationship.

So he had to think about this.

He waited until after dinner, as everyone started to prepare for bed and go back to the cabins.

"Hey Bakugo... can we talk please?" He asked hesitantly. But he had no need to worry, because Bakugo just turned around obediently.

"What do you want?" There was no vice in his voice. No drive, no anger, not even sorrow. It rang completely empty.

"I just want-" Kirishima gulped and took a breath.

"I want to take you up on your offer. As much as a made a scene this morning, I would, really like, to go out with you."

Bakugo looked up, suprise written on his face, but there was also a glimmer of hope in his eyes. Hesitant hope.

"What do you mean," be growled, eyebrows furrowing into a confused scowl.

"I... I was upset. About you leaving when we found out. And I thought you didn't want me. So instead of talking to you rationally, I just assumed the way you felt and took my anger out on you. I'm sorry."

Bakugo looked up at Kirishima, then down at the ground.

"You shouldn't be sorry. It was all my dumb fault. If I hadn't run away with my tail between my legs, like a wounded puppy, none of this would have even happened."

"So you aren't mad at me?" Kirishima asked.

"Of course I'm not mad at you, dumbass. Your pretty much all I could ask for."

And, because Kirishima's a sap, just that phrase made tears well in his eyes.

"No- shit- Kiri please don't cry," Bakugo scrambled closer to him.

To which Kirishima did actually start crying.

"I'm sorry," he sobbed, reaching out to hug Bakugo. "I was just so scared I was gonna lose you and you were gonna hate me forever."

Bakugo wrapped his arms around Kiri, even though he was technically the shorter one. He rubbed his back comfortingly and sighed.

"I could never hate you Kiri. You only get one soulmate. I'm not letting mine get away that easily."

They stood in comfortable silence for a few moments, before Kirishima spoke up, voice muffled by Bakugo's shirt.

"If we're gonna do this, you gotta tell me about your feelings more, ok? No more misunderstandings because of dumb shit like this."

There were a few more moments of silence, and for a second Kirishima was scared that Bakugo was gonna shut him out. But then he felt a nodding against his shoulder.

"I will," he heard Bakugo whisper. "I promise I will."

Only one soulmate lol.
Anyway, it's been like 5 days since I last updated :P. What a ride.
I'm officially in school holidays, as of today (apparently some people don't count the weekend). And this is the summer school holidays, so I'm hoping to finish this fanfic by then.
I have no idea whether this is an attainable goal. Genuinely no clue. But we're gonna roll with it.