A Work In (No) Progress…

For all that they are annoying and cocky, they are also hard-working and diligent and such a close-knit group that it honestly warms the heart, not that Shouta would ever tell them.

Instead he keeps barking at them, keeps pushing them until they are all nothing more than shivering, wet lumps of misery and then he tells them to get warmed up and take the rest of the day off, despite the fact that it's the middle of the day and they have several hours of classes left.

The cheering he gets for that almost makes him deaf and he waves them all off when some come over to thank him, and he really, truly does not appreciate Hitoshi's cheeky look that very loudly calls him a softie straight to his face.

At least his son knows how to keep his mouth shut, because otherwise Shouta would have to keep him here and let him run laps.

Hitoshi clearly knows that, too, because he ducks his head and scurries off with the rest of his class and Shouta watches after them, takes note of Kaminari swaying on his feet, of Asui hopping happily to the side, of Iida dragging his feet and of Bakugou walking stiffly behind everyone else.

This training clearly took more out of some than of others and Shouta already rearranges his lesson plan to analyse today.

It'll be good for some of them to realise that the weather can be their greatest foe out there, too.

~*~*~

Shouta has just settled in, blanket over his lap, cup of steaming hot coffee in his hand, when his phone chimes.

He lets out a sigh, because while training out in the rain couldn't have been fun for the kids, watching them train out in the rain wasn't fun for him either, and he'd really rather relax on the couch after his shower than deal with whatever he'll have to deal with once he opens the text.

Still, he can't very well go around ignoring it, because what if it's important and so he unlatches one hand from his cup and gets his phone.

It's a message from Hitoshi, which already means that Shouta is glad he decided to read it, because the boy hardly ever reaches out like this, even after all this time.

Something’s wrong with Bakugou, the first message reads and immediately, Shouta frowns. Midoriya told me to let it go, but he's in the common room.

There's no follow-up text, no can you please check on him, because gods forbid someone can accuse Hitoshi of caring for his classmates, but Shouta can read the plea between the lines.

He heaves out a sigh before he heaves himself off the couch, because there's no way in hell he's going to ignore this.

If Bakugou is behaving strangely then it's something Shouta should check out; not only because he's the most volatile of the bunch, but also because the class is strangely attuned to each other and if Bakugou is in an especially foul mood, then soon enough the whole class will follow and that will spell trouble.

And possibly thousands in property damage.

So he makes his way downstairs and he's not at all surprised to find Hitoshi hovering in the stairwell, just waiting for him to show up.

"He's—distant. Spacey. I don't know, it's wrong," he rushes out, voice pitched low as if he's afraid someone else will hear him and know he's actually a human with feelings, who cares about his peers and Shouta reaches out to ruffle his hair.

"I'll talk to him. Thank you," he offers and Hitoshi flushes red and ducks his head and scurries off as if Shouta threatened him with detention and Shouta is left to stare after him, helplessly fond of his kid before he pushes it all away and concentrates on the task at hand.

His most problematic problem child is apparently in need of something and Shouta better gets to figuring that one out.

Just like Hitoshi said, Bakugou is in the common room, sitting on one of the couches and staring off into nothing.

It's—wrong, that much is for certain, because Bakugou is always moving, always animated and to see him this still and distant is jarring in a way Shouta wasn't prepared for.

"Bakugou," Shouta says as soon as he's next to the couch, but Bakugou doesn't react at all, he simply continues to stare off into nothing and okay, this is officially worrying now.

"Hey, Bakugou, are you alright?" Shouta asks and gingerly sits down next to him, but again, he doesn't get a reaction at all.

"Can you hear me?" he asks next because he can't see the tell-tale bright orange of Bakugou's hearing aids but even so, he should have reacted to Shouta sitting down next to him and he still didn't do that.

"I'm guessing that's a no, then," Shouta mutters and reaches out to put a hand to Bakugou's neck to get his attention.

Shouta has one second to realise his mistake, has one second to feel Bakugou tense under his touch, one second to think a very resounding Fuck before a hand is shoved into his face and sparks go off.

Shouta yanks his head to the side the same moment he activates his quirk, even though it's no good anymore but still, instinct takes over. It's not good enough, it's not enough to prevent the explosion from going off at all, but it's enough to prevent Bakugou from blowing him up completely.

The explosion stays small and contained thanks to Shouta's quirk, but it still went off and part of Shouta's face and shoulder still got caught up in it.

He threw himself over the back of the couch the moment he realised what was about to happen, but his eardrum is still busted and the searing pain of burned flesh is racing through him, almost worse than the pain of getting his elbow disintegrated.

Still, he catches himself in a roll, and comes up again, his quirk activating again in case Bakugou comes after him once more, but when Shouta finally manages to see something through the pain and his watering eyes it's Bakugou's horrified face.

"Aizawa," he mouths, the sound just barely audible with Shouta's busted hearing, and Shouta drops his quirk with a pained exhale.

Bakugou is at his side a second later, not to attack him but with fluttering hands, panic etched into his every move and Shouta heavily sits down.

There's blood running down the side of his face and his arm, where his flesh wasn't just burned to a crisp and the pain is really setting in right now.

"Help me get to Recovery Girl," Shouta pants out between tightly clenched teeth and Bakugou nods, frantically even as he carefully bullies his way under Shouta's good arm to get him off the ground.

The walk to Recovery Girl is excruciating and more than once Shouta contemplates asking Bakugou to simply knock him out and carry him there but he pushes through, because Bakugou is pale and shaky and it's more than obvious that he's in a worse state than even Shouta is, at least mentally, and Shouta is not about to add to the burden he's already clearly carrying.

When they finally make it to Recovery Girl, she meets them with a disappointed look, a reprimand clearly already at the tip of her tongue, but Shouta silences her with a look.

He doesn't need her lashing into Bakugou before he figures out just what set the boy off, and despite everything he's more than capable of reprimanding Bakugou himself, should he feel the need to.

Right now, he's not sure it's warranted, though, so he would appreciate it if Recover Girl could focus on healing him, instead of making everything worse.

She seems to understand, because she clicks her tongue and guides Bakugou to deposit him on a bed before she checks out the injuries.

"If I heal you, you'll be out for several hours at least," she finally says and Shouta trusts her assessment.

Bakugou shrinks further into himself.

"Great," Shouta mutters, because he could really do without this, but the pain is bad and he's in no condition to have this conversation with Bakugou right about now, so he fixes his gaze on the boy. "Go get your homework, I expect you to be here when I wake up," he says, makes sure to enunciate his words clearly because Bakugou still doesn't have his hearing aids in and he gets a shaky nod in reply, which is good enough for him.

"Do your worst," Shouta sighs out with a look to Recovery Girl and just like that, he's out like a light.

~*~*~

Shouta wakes up to the sound of pen moving over paper and when he blinks his eye open, he spots Bakugou next to his bed. Going by the light outside he was asleep for way longer than Recovery Girl told him and so Bakugou should be long done with his homework by now.

"Still doing your homework?" he asks as he pushes himself up and Bakugou freezes, before he goes on writing.

"No," he mutters, all without meeting Shouta's gaze and Shouta takes a moment to move his arm, his jaw, to figure out if his ear healed up as well.

Everything seems to be working just fine and the pain is nothing but a distant memory, just another thing to add to all the other aches and pains in his body and so he swings his legs out of the bed.

It's time to figure out what's going on with Bakugou, then.

"What are you writing?"

"An apology," Bakugou shortly says and holds the paper out to Shouta. "I already packed, so you can kick me out whenever."

He's clearly trying for indifferent, but his voice is shaking just as much as his hand is and Shouta pushes the letter back to him.

"I don't need your apology," he says, trying for kind and gentle. "And I'm not kicking you out. I just want you to explain."

"What’s there to explain?" Bakugou snaps out. "I lost my shit and attacked a teacher. That’s all there is to it."

Shouta doubts that's true, because he remembers the vacant look on Bakugou’s face right before everything went to shit and he suspects that they are dealing with trauma and not an insolent student.

"You had an adverse reaction to something. You didn't blow me up for the fun of it so explain it to me."

Bakugou works his jaw, clearly unwilling to speak, but Shouta is a patient man; he has the time to wear Bakugou down, and it takes even less time than he suspected.

"I'm not unfit to be a hero," is the first thing Bakugou says and Shouta huffs out a laugh.

"Never said you were. You think pro heroes don't have PTSD? Hell, if you cover my eye or touch my elbow when I'm distracted I'm going to punch you in the ground. We all have our triggers, that just comes with the territory, sadly. I'm just trying to understand what set you off, so we can make sure it never happens again. That's all."

"I blew you up," Bakugou repeats as if he's uncertain Shouta understood that part and Shouta sighs.

"Yeah, you did. But you didn't want to, so I'm not mad. Kid, I can tell when something is a panic response and when not. You were panicking. I need to know why."

Bakugou chews on that for a while and Shouta lets him, content to just sit and wait him out and categorise each new pain in his body.

"I'm not weak," Bakugou finally says and Shouta frowns at him because that thought truly never crossed his mind.

"You're not," he agrees, because Bakugou is one of the strongest people he ever came across, at least quirk-wise.

He's not quite resilient enough to survive hero life, Shouta thinks, not yet, despite everything he's already been through, but he's getting there, faster than he even seems to realise himself.

He'll make a goddamn great hero, and there's nothing weak about him.

"Before UA, there was an incident," Bakugou mutters, staring down at his hands. "With a sludge villain."

Shouta wrecks his brain and he thinks he remembers hearing about that. Some villain with a sludge quirk attacked a kid and a bunch of heroes did nothing until a bystander stepped in and then All Might had to clear up the entire thing.

"You were attacked?" he guesses and Bakugou nods.

"He was trying to—I don't know, pour himself into me or some shit and my explosions were doing shit to him and he was choking me with all of his sludge."

And with how everyone normally concentrates on the heroes instead of the victims, Shouta guesses that no one bothered to ask Bakugou how he was doing afterwards. No one talked this shit through with him and now he has a trigger.

Wonderful.

"The training exercise," Shouta mutters, because he remembers seeing Bakugou fall out of the sky, face first into a puddle of, well, sludge, and of course that must have triggered something.

It would certainly explain the vacant look on his face.

"Water hit me wrong and busted my hearing-aids, too," Bakugou goes on, still not looking at Shouta. "And when I was kidnapped the fire-fucker scruffed me," he mumbles and Shouta just barely manages not to facepalm.

Of course he had to go and touch Bakugou’s neck when he was already having a flashback and didn't even hear him approach. Well done, Shouta, truly, he bitterly thinks and shakes his head.

"I'm sorry," he says and that, finally, gets Bakugou to look at him.

"I blew you up and you're apologising?" he asks, completely incredulous, and Shouta shrugs.

"I shouldn't have touched you at all, I normally know better."

He just forgot that his kids have been through hell and back and they all have reason to be traumatised. He treated Bakugou like a kid instead of a war veteran and this really is Shouta's own damn fault.

If he had seen that vacant look on any other hero, he would have never opted for touch in the first place, because he knows fucking better but he forgot. He forgot that his sixteen-year-old students are just as fucked up as every adult hero and that's on Shouta.

Bakugou looks as if he's going to argue some more, as if he's just about to beg Shouta to punish him for his actions and Shouta leans forward.

"Listen to me," he says and he waits until Bakugou truly meets his eye before he goes on. "You were triggered. It happens. I'm not going to punish you for it, you're not expelled and you're not weak. But you will be going to therapy and if you need me to punish you for what happened, then take that."

"Therapy," Bakugou repeats as if he's never even heard of the concept and Shouta mentally curses himself.

He should probably sent his entire class to therapy, at least to check if there is something that needs to be addressed but for right now, Bakugou's case takes precedence.

Mostly because he has a way too volatile quirk to be having trauma responses.

"Therapy," Shouta repeats and Bakugou sneers but then his expression turns to something more akin to grief.

"You think I need it."

"I think your entire class probably needs it," Shouta says with a shrug. "I am certainly going twice a week."

It's not something he normally advertises, but maybe he should start with that. Looking after ones mental health is not a weakness after all.

"You are?"

"You think i can be pounded into the ground, cut off my own leg, lose my eye and have to watch my student die and come out unscathed? I'm blunt and harsh but I'm not heartless."

Bakugou stares at him as if he's seeing Shouta for the very first time and Shouta is not prepared to spot the tears in his eyes right before he ducks his head.

"My parents said therapy is for weaklings."

"Your parents are dead fucking wrong," Shouta immediately says and vows to have a good long talk to them, too, because if they made sure that Bakugou never got help after that very first incident, then they are in for the tongue lashing of their lives.

"I—can still be a hero if I go?"

"You’re arguably going to be a better hero if you go," Shouta gives back, because if he doesn't go at all, it's very likely that the first year out in the field is going to kill him or crush him.

And Shouta would rather see him succeed in taking the top spot than have to read about his early demise or retirement.

"I'm still sorry about today," Bakugou says and there’s an urgency to his voice that lets Shouta know that he needs to apologise.

"Okay. Make it up to me by going to therapy," he gives back with a nod and Bakugou relaxes slightly.

"Fine," he agrees and Shouta reaches out to pat his head.

"Good. Now burn that fucking letter and lets go back. I'll set up an appointment for you."

Shouta expected a lot of replies to that, but Bakugou slumping forward and pressing his forehead to Shouta's shoulder was certainly not one of them.

"Thank you," he mutters and Shouta bites back a sigh and instead pats Bakugou some more.

"You're welcome, kid."

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