~~~
They must have spent half the day in the living room, with Kira explaining as much as she can. Midoriya always had a question to a particular circumstance and no matter how extensively she answered, he never appeared to be satiated, as if he was determined to out her as a traitor.
"What else will it take for you to believe me?" She asks, leaning forward in her seat. "I mean, I've explained everything to you: Toga's trick about pretending to be my mother; my father's reappearance; my second Quirk. With Toga disguised as my mother, I betrayed the school and my friends. But, it was an accident." Kira pauses, searching Midoriya's eyes for some sense of understanding. "Tell me: what more do you need?"
"Where's the proof?" Midoriya says simply, looking up from his lap.
"Proof?" Kira repeats. "About which part?"
"All of it."
"I'm not sure how I can prove to you about Toga, but I know what I can do for now..."
Kira jumps up from the sofa, leaps over Bakugou's knees and speedwalks into the kitchen. She searches the drawers quickly, until she finds the object she's searching for. Kira turns on her heel, revealing the sharp kitchen knife to her classmates. They both tense at the sight of the potential weapon, but Kira assures them there's nothing to worry about.
"I don't know how long this is going to take," Kira admits, sitting beside Bakugou, closer to the blonde so he too can see the effects of her secondary Quirk. "My father theorized that my healing ability works at a slower rate than his. What appears to be the same is a nasty aftertaste."
With her free hand, Kira gestures to the scar on her neck, the work of the villain Dabi. With the knife, Kira rolls back the sleeve of her baggy jumper and with a deep breath, slices the blade across the skin on her forearm. She winces as it splits her skin with ease and her blood trickles down to her fingers. Neither one of her classmates seemed concerned about her actions and neither one of them tried to stop her.
This was understandable, though it did hurt to reveal that they would rather have her come clean about her faults by any means necessary, even if that meant self-harm. It was also interesting to view Midoriya this way - the one she assumed would die for her classmates and prevent them from any harm, no matter what it may be.
When her father showed her his Quirk that night, when he took her to the park and sliced his skin, his wound healed pretty much straight away, leaving behind nothing but a thin scar. With her, the wound bled for a minute or so, dripping onto the carpet at their feet.
"This would explain that day at the villain's base," Kira says, wincing slightly, as she reveals her slow-healing cut.
As Kira glares down at her arm, she feels Bakugou look up slightly, staring right at her, searching for more, for an explanation.
"After all, I was unconscious for two days," she continues, slowly removing her hand to let the others see the wound gradually healing. "That villain, Dabi, must have been assured that I was dead. Perhaps, the damage that he caused" - she points to her neck - "it would have been enough to kill an ordinary person if they didn't have this second Quirk of mine."
Midoriya's eyes seem locked onto her arm. Slowly, he reaches forward, his hand riddled with his own scars from past battles. Kira lets his fingers graze over the newly formed scar, as if fascinated.
"Does Mr Aizawa know about this?" Is all he asks.
Kira hesitates, a small frown forming on her brows. "No."
"Then what were you talking about with him yesterday?"
Kira keeps quiet for a moment. She's split up her secrets and now everything's caving down around her.
"Well, I mean, I told him about Toga," she scoffs lightly. "That's definitely something a teacher should know about."
Midoriya finally tears his eyes away from Akira's new scar and she brushes her sleeve down, wiping some of the blood on the inside of her shirt. It would be a pain to have to explain the blood to her classmates when they return from class.
"He should know the rest," he says bluntly. "Your dad? He could be a villain for all we know. Just like Light Bringer was."
"Light Bringer wasn't the villain," Kira retorts. "Remember: Toga was somehow imitating her. I don't know how, but my mother? She's gone."
"How the hell do you know for sure?" Bakugou finally speaks up. "Not that I wanna side with this damn nerd, but you were tricked before."
"He's not a villain!" Kira raises her voice, slicing through the argument. She hesitates, calming her irritated nerves. Kira's surprised Bakugou didn't scream in her ear for shouting at him. "He told me some things."
"What?" Midoriya and Bakugou say simultaneously and the blonde nearly punches him across the jaw.
"He's gotten close to the League," Kira interrupts, preventing the two from starting round two.
"The League of Villains?"
"No, the Sports League," Bakugou answers sarcastically. Before Midoriya can argue back, Bakugou continues. "Is your dad an idiot or something? If he gets close to those bastards, he's as good as dead."
"Don't you think I know that?" Kira snaps back. "I told him to leave it alone, but he's not stepping down from this."
The three of them are quiet, pondering on this new information. An early morning breeze brushes through an open window, scooping the curtain up and Kira shivers involuntarily, despite not being cold.
"Isn't that proof that he's not a bad guy?" Kira asks, her voice a mere whisper, as she hugs her arms. "I'm gonna end up losing him all over again."
Another pause. It's a lot to process so quickly. But, now that the three of them share this information, besides Aizawa, Kira feels like she can breathe a little easier. Like the sun feels a little brighter, her shoulders feel a little lighter.
However, there were still some matters she feels she can never share with her classmates, not like she did with Mr Aizawa.
Kira shakes her head to herself slightly.
No, they can never know.
"What about you two?" Kira wonders, breaking the uneasy silence. "You're way too smart to fight Bakugou like that." Kira gestures to her level-headed classmate. "Especially at that time of night. What exactly were you fighting over?"
The two boys look at each other before Bakugou leans back in the sofa, his lips sealed.
"Uh," Midoriya stammers over his words, his serious demeanour vanishing rather quickly. "There's just some things between me and Kacchan that you probably wouldn't understand. After all, I've known him since I was a kid."
"Come on, Midoriya," Kira sits up in her seat, her turn to become serious. "I've just spilled my guts out to you here. You gonna keep the reason for your little fight a secret?"
"It was nothing, really," the boy ensures. "Kacchan wanted to talk about some things, but it kind of... got out of hand."
"Talk about what?"
"Nothing!" Midoriya blurts instantly.
Kira snaps her head back to Bakugou, knowing full well he probably just sent Midoriya a deathly look to keep their involvement a secret.
Kira sighs heavily, facing back to her friendlier classmate. "I already know a few things about the both of you, Midoriya."
"Oh yeah?" The boy sounds curious. "Like what?"
Kira turns back to Bakugou once more, but he looks unbothered about everything, as if he either doesn't care or has no idea what exactly Kira's insinuating.
"Back in the other reality," Kira adds, giving Bakugou another chance to realise the situation.
Again, not even a batted eyelid, his head turned away with his chin in his hands, just like he was before during her unwavering confession.
"Oh yeah!" Midoriya repeats, this time with overenthusiastic interest. "I never got to know exactly what happened over there!"
With another heavy sigh, Kira peels her eyes away from the blonde and back to her classmate. "Well, to put it bluntly, it wasn't a better world."
"Better?" Midoriya tilts his head to the side slightly, his green hair following his movements.
"Yeah," she whispers. "It was a dark place. A place without you, Midoriya."
"Well, what does that mean?" Midoriya pushes, a firm frown set on his brows.
"It means that... that you died."
"Oh..." He says slowly, his head dropping, the excited sparkle in his eyes withering away. "Ho- how did it happen?"
Kira opens her mouth to give him an honest answer, but a part of her doesn't want to tell him. For some unknown reason, she bites down on her tongue, her thoughts racing.
Beside her, a hand grips the sofa next to her thigh and Kira suddenly realises. Everyone has their own way to express their discomfort - this was his. Stone, cold silence. Uneasiness. The inability to share his feelings directly. The dismissive behaviour.
Kira's eyes flicker back to Bakugou, his fingers trembling ever so slightly under his chin, his eyes merely a squint as if he's trying his best to hide any shed of tears that manage to squeeze past that steel exterior.
But, the death grip on the sofa next to her tells her all she needs to know.
Akira doesn't know nearly enough about these two and what they may have endured while they were kids. The general idea was that Bakugou bullied Midoriya throughout childhood and the boy did nothing in return but follow him around. To Midoriya, Bakugou was his idol. His hero.
But, that's still not enough for her to pry herself into their relationship. Simply put, she knows nothing.
"I don't know," she says instead, her voice cracking, as she offers an unknowing shrug. "The point is, you were never at UA. You never met your classmates. Mr Aizawa. Never entered the Sports Festival. Never went to the Training Camp. Didn't enter the Provisional License Exam. I don't know what happened to you in that world, Midoriya."
"That would make everything so different in so many different ways," Midoriya starts, his finger on his chin in deep thought as he starts to mutter his theories.
While Midoriya continues on his tangent, his eyes cast down to the floor in thought, Kira allows her eyes to linger back to Bakugou. His hand has finally released the sofa beside her and his eyes are open normally. But, he's still staring off to the side, completely separated from the conversation. His hand on his chin is no longer trembling, but instead gripping his skin, seemingly in frustration.
It's obvious to Kira now, that despite how closed off Bakugou appears to be, there are still a few traits that have managed to slip through the cracks of his shielded personality.
To be honest with herself, she should have noticed this trope sooner. But she was being naive. There have been a few times where Bakugou has left himself open to judgement and Kira has been too oblivious to remark upon it until now.
The avoidance, for one thing. Whenever a conflicting matter involving physical confrontation arises, Bakugou's usually the first one to involve himself. But, when it refers to his emotional self, the wall comes crumbling down. He'd much rather avoid the situation than charge headlong into trouble because he doesn't know how to control his emotions.
Kira's eyes widen suddenly, remembering her mother's insistent tone throughout her training. Control your emotions. She's always said that. Why does she remember something like that now? And why is it always in the circumstance of Katsuki Bakugou?
Kira turns back to Midoriya, her eyes slightly widened. The boy looks back at her expectantly. "Hm?" She simply hums.
"I was wondering: did you meet everyone else? How much of my theory was correct? What about Kacchan?"
Kira blinks herself back to reality. "Oh, Bakugou was there alright."
"I knew Kacchan would make it to UA with or without me being there."
Kira nods slowly, just as Bakugou stands up, the sofa reacting to his brisk movement. He merely takes three steps away from the others when he stops, his fists clenched by his sides.
"Come on, you morons. Place isn't gonna clean itself."
~~~