Chapter Text
Jirou Kyouka figured she was an acquaintance of Bakugou Katsuki.
Over the past two years he had done his own form of ‘mellowing out’, which resulted in a malformed less intense reincarnation of the mass of pure rage and bloodlust he originally was. Though he could still be caught stealing lollipops from babies on the weekends and yelling in the middle of libraries, he had at least become somewhat more subtle and less frequent about it. He was less abrasive and more encouraging to his classmates, his old insulting shouts a mere echo of the helpful critiques he offered now. He was even kinder to Midoriya, his blatant taunts turning into brotherly teasing and harsh shoves into gentle nudges.
If she were more bold, she would consider herself one of his friends. Ever since the culture festival of their freshman year where she discovered their mutual interest in rock music (which really shouldn’t have come as much of a surprise considering their matching dark aesthetic), she found herself cherishing the conversations they had between classes and after school. And although he seemed irritated with her at first, she quickly learned to ignore his cheap facade of indifference and find the interested spark in his deep red eyes.
However, although she had grown to like him and assumed he at least tolerated her, she never in a million years could’ve imagined him plopping down next to her at one of the Cryptic Club meetings she continuously, and unsuccessfully, invited him to.
And yet there he was, sitting cross legged in all his nonchalant glory, as he glared at Tokoyami Fumikage, who had yet to start their meeting on time due to the shock of it all.
The Cryptic Club was a fairly new thing. Initially starting at the end of their freshman year with only two club members (Tamaki Amajiki as the original president, and Tokoyami tagging along for what he thought would be a short ride), it had become popular amongst sophomores during the start of their second year after a rumor spread around about how they had succeeded in exorcising the ghost that haunted the second story girl’s bathroom. In reality, the ghost was just a leaky drain that had gotten fixed, but that didn’t hinder many overenthusiastic students from attending the next club meet, much to the host of Dark Shadow’s ultimate demise.
Currently it sat at a fair number of twenty-four members, including Jirou and Shinsou Hitoshi along with several Class-B members and mostly general education and support students. The amount of people who attended the gatherings varied each date depending on certain tests and school events; however, clubs rarely got any new members so late in the year and Bakugou Katsuki, who didn’t do any extracurriculars that anyone knew of, was far more unexpected than any other first attendee who could’ve walked through their doors.
It took a total of three minutes for Tokoyami to collect himself and clamp his beak shut, but once he did the whole room seemed to suck in a deep breath, anticipating the events to come next that not even a self proclaimed clairvoyant like their only fourth year member seemed to be able to guess.
“Bakugou… to what do we owe the pleasure?” the club president managed to ask, his voice as solemn and elegant as ever, however there was a slight clip to the end of his words that only revealed itself whenever he was anxious. After watching a few of the most gory horror movies in existence with him, Kyouka was well aware that it took a lot to get him to talk like that.
The boy in questioned slid his ruby gaze over to Tokoyami, a sharp eyebrow raised dangerously. If Jirou weren’t so in love with Kaminari Denki, she was sure her heart would flutter at that demanding look, so wanting and determined. If passion’s personification was walking the planet, it would rest in Bakugou Katsuki, who’s expressive, piercing eyes and arrogant smirk could make even the most loyal couples crack momentarily.
Another thing that had changed about him with his sudden shift in attitude, was his change in appearance. Now that he wasn’t trying to sneer at every person in a room at once the second he walked in, he looked pleasant. Hot , even, with a waist Mina Ashido had announced snatched during their freshmen graduation dinner party, and a face models strived for. He was up in the ranks with Todoroki Shouto as far as stunning went, and if he didn’t have such a pissy attitude most of the time, she was certain he’d be higher.
“I need some fucking advice,” the blonde admitted as graceful with his language as always, effectively snapping the strings of his allure off with ease.
Jirou heard Shinsou sigh on her other side, smiling to herself when she noticed the fading blush on her classmate’s pale face. At least she wasn’t the only one who had been so easily entranced just a few moments prior. “ The Bakugou Katsuki asking for advice? What is this? The Twilight Zone?” he asked, dully, schooling his expression to it’s usual neutral form as the attention fell on him.
The few brave souls that dared to chuckle were silenced immediately by the irritated twitch of Katsuki’s lips. Instinctively bracing herself, Jirou stuffed her extended earlobes into her sweatshirt pocket for the enraged bellows that never came. She was almost less pleased to hear the chilling voice that followed.
“Funny, Hitoshit, but I’m dead fucking serious,” the boy announced, leaning forward, and leering at the circle as if he was about to begin telling a horror story. The ever expressionless Kodai shot Jirou a concerned glance as she was never one for scary tales and always skipped their bonfire meets solely for that purpose—but thankfully, Bakugou assuaged her concerns quickly with his next brash statement.
“Todoroki Shouto is a vampire.”
Blatant laughter was a rarity for the Cryptic Club.
As the residential emos of UA, they kept in character at all hours, not even unleashing their real feelings when they were grouped together such as this. None of them could ever be caught gushing with each other or joking around unsarcastically —it was practically against the law . Feelings were gross —they were emo s for a reason.
But as soon as everyone seemed to register what exactly the Bad Boy ™ had claimed; it seemed as though no one could hold in their reactions.
Shinsou snickered, doubling over on himself as if his stomach hurt and he was in pain (and in hindsight he may have been, laughing harder than he ever had before); Kuroiro was gasping for breath and next to him Yanagi was wheezing between disbelieving mutters of “oh my god” and a repeated, disappointed and knowing: “blondes” ; Kodai had giddily stated: “Mm!” and Tokoyami had even let out a blunt chuckle. Jirou found herself shaking with laughter until she noticed how cold the temperature seemed to dip next to her as Bakugou’s scowl grew.
“Shut the fuck up,” he demanded, affronted, and seemingly uncomfortable with how tense he had gotten, his shoulders inching up to his ears. Jirou didn’t hold that against him though, it was probably the first time he had heard any of them so giddy after all, it would be undeniably unnerving for anyone. “I’m being fucking serious. I think he’s a damn threat to all of UA- if not all of mankind,” he continued, only further feeding the hysteria around him.
As much as Jirou wanted to reassure her acquaintance that his problems were valid, even she couldn’t keep her composure as he continued to insist that Todoroki Shouto —who she had once caught dragging twelve bags full of strawberry milk up to his room—who she had seen watching Mulan at 3AM once—who she had to explain how to properly make instant ramen to the other day—was a vicious, cruel, demonic creature.
Sure, he was devilishly handsome, any person on campus would dreamily admit that; and looked as though he was sculpted by the gods on his good days and Michelangelo on his worst; but there wasn’t anything incriminating about being attractive. This wasn’t Twilight, and although Todoroki’s sweat may glisten in the sunlight, he didn’t sparkle. He didn’t have fangs the last time she checked as he slurped down cold soba. And the closest he had gotten to drinking blood was the themed punch Satou had graciously made for their annual Halloween party.
“Do-do you…” Tokoyami trailed off, wrestling dark shadow’s beak closed to halt his relentless cackles. He took in a shaky breath once he had finally shut his parasite of a quirk up, before attempting again. “Do you have any proof?” he managed to ask seriously, effectively silencing and refocusing the room. Kyouka was impressed that he managed to remain so stoic as he addressed the issue, grateful they had such a strong, emotionless president, because if not, she was sure they would have continued laughing for hours.
Bakugou bit the inside of his cheek, likely debating whether or not he’d get ridiculed for his “evidence” as well, but after a moment of deep consideration, he let out a suffering sigh and seemed to decide that he could take another round of the awkward torture that was emos expressing emotions. Shinsou rolled his eyes so hard Kyouka thought she’d have to catch them when they fell from his sockets, silently revealing just how much he thought of the hothead’s bravery.
“He never sleeps,” Bakugou began bluntly, cutting off a few individuals who dared to snicker and mutter same with a glare that promised an afterschool KO. “I’ve never seen him eat garlic, ever , and he’s always like dead cold when I brush against him. And last week, he told me I smell nice and then tried to smell my neck? And I’ve bled during practice a few times, and he’s always so quick to cover it. He doesn’t seem affected by the weather at all ever either—and yeah, it could be his quirk, but he told me he doesn’t use it all the time—and he certainly wasn’t using it on the way back to the dorms yesterday after the training we had—but he still gave me his jacket even when it was like zero degrees out—” he seemed like he would have continued to break off into tangents for the rest of the time they had reserved for their club in the classroom, but before he could continue to rant about relatively normal human interactions (for Todoroki at least) that would’ve made anyone at the school jealous, he was interrupted.
“Bakugou-san,” one of the underclassmen cut in. A general studies student, who apparently didn’t know fear yet. Bakugou seemed prepared to to break the poor, ignorant fool’s neck for the crime of interrupting him, but before he could spit out whatever venom was brewing on his tongue, the girl continued, fast and beady eyed and ignorant. “Are you sure it’s not that he like… you know…”
Bakugou Katsuki did not know. Neither did Jirou Kyouka for the matter, until she saw the telltale smirks on a few of the faces around her and the way the girl had begun to turn a dark shade of red as she averted her gaze and cleared her throat. This wasn’t going to end well, Kyouka decided after a beat, having a sinking suspicion of where this was going. The underclassmen lowered her voice and said again, slower and more officious this time. “ You know… ”
Bakugou’s eye twitched. “I fucking know what,” he blurted, as patient as always.
The girl winced, bowing her head sullenly as if she could suddenly sense that she was about to be blasted through the brick wall several feet behind her. The friend at her side set a palm on her shoulder—or in zir’s case a paw, as ze had a wolf centric quirk. Jirou recognized zir from the interest meeting as Tanaka, as ze made quite an impression on people due to zir confidence.
“What Fujiwara here means to say is,” Tanaka cleared zir throat as ze became the subject of Bakugou’s burning glare, and Kyouka couldn’t help but feel slightly impressed. Normally people had a reaction that involved much more trembling to the sight of that dark look. She didn’t have much time to appreciate the freshman’s courage though, because a split second later she was sputtering at zir bluntness.
“Doesn’t Todoroki just want to get in your pan-”
In a brilliant act of self preservation and survival instincts, the only sensible underclassman in the room jumped forward at the last second and slapped a hand over zir mouth before the damage could be done. Collectively, it seemed as though the whole room let out a shaky breath under Bakugou’s intense scrutiny.
“ What ,” the blonde demanded again, disgruntled, and Kyouka thanked the lord that he was just as dumb as Kaminari when it came to gossip and feelings; else they’d all be twenty feet in the air at the moment with the force of an unrestrained exoplosion.
“Ze means that, uh,” this boy had the normal reaction to Bakugou’s presence, the wobbly tongue and fear ridden visage. Green skin flushed a magenta shade as the boy exasperatedly tried to decide on the safest course of action, but he seemed to notice quick that he was on a time limit and only became more flustered as the blonde began squinting at him and Tanaka had opened zir mouth again purposefully.
It was then, in a moment of desperation, that the girl who had started the chain of reactions that only seemed to progressively get worse, ended the stuttering and sweating with a harried shout. “You—...you are completely right!” Fujiwara exclaimed, faux cheerily, saving a few lives in the process. “About Todoroki Shouto being a vampire—I mean, those are pretty clear symptoms. Todoroki just wants to get in your—ur, circulatory system,” she hurried out a second after, her breath uneven when she had finished.
Jirou Kyouka’s fingers twitched with the sudden desire to strangle the girl as Bakugou let out a sated sigh. She could already tell that this was not going to end well for any of them.
“So what do I do?” the blonde asked, expectantly, leaning forward so he was closer to the freshmen. Fujiwara let out a squeak, her fingers trembling as he pushed into her space and Jirou shot a glance at Tokoyami, who nodded dutifully and came to the rescue of the freshmen. Not that she deserved any rescuing in the first place, she had brought this upon herself—and everyone else in the room for that matter.
“I imagine you need physical proof of Todoroki being a vampire,” he informed. Shinsou choked on a snort behind him as Katsuki considered his words seriously. “Only that way will anyone but us believe you. There aren’t many people inclined to believe in supernatural occurrences without proof,” he continued to explain, and only after he finished did Jirou realize that his eyes had been shut throughout the duration of his advice—as if he couldn’t bear to see the mess unfolding before him that was Bakugou Katsuki’s enthusiasm.
The blonde nodded eagerly, jumping to his feet in the same movement, practically beaming with excitement. “Fucking great,” he exclaimed, and it took Kyouka a second too long to recognize that he hadn’t said it sarcastically the way he normally did. He was genuinely relieved. She didn’t know whether to feel good for him, or pityingly. “I’ll check in with you all next week or some shit with proof,” he proclaimed, with an overconfident smile he was accustomed to assuming.
“Yeah…” Fujiwara agreed slowly as he took to the door without even a proper goodbye. No one spoke for a minute after.
And then.
“Isn’t he the third ranking student in Class 1-A?” Tanaka asked, dismally, shooting Jirou an accusatory look.
She grimaced, too ashamed to answer.
()
Mina Ashido smirked when Todoroki Shouto gracefully took a seat next to her at the first Love Club meeting of the month. “I’ve been expecting you,” she admitted, omnipotently.
Todoroki slanted his eyes over to her for a split second before he averted his gaze to the wall beyond her once again. “I’m struggling.”
He jolted forward at the force of her hand slapping against his back.
“Yes, you are,” Mina agreed, smiling widely.