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unintentionaloracle · 7 years ago

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Dirty Little Secrets: Chapter Six [A MHA Fic]

All Previous Chapters Here

Ao3 Here

Chapter Six: Pink

“You know, you can be kind of a dick to him,” Shinso said to Bakugo after school as he was trying to dodge his explosive swipes. He felt a of heat off one swipe that just barely missed his face.

“Gonna need to be more specific, General Studies.” Bakugo said.

Ugh. Shinso did not want to be throwing himself into Bakugo’s stupid feelings crap. Especially after Midoriya had him doing so many push ups that he somehow felt like his hair was going to fall out. Not to mention the true terror that was sparring with post-internship Uraraka.

But he was still riding that ‘made-a-girl-stop-crying’ high from earlier, and managed to do okay in today’s class exercise, so he figured he could manage.

“Kirishima. You know, the one you claim that you-”

Shinso got a swift kick in the head and fell hard to the ground. Bakugo grabbed Shinso by the hair and yanked him back up to his feet as the other boy started spitting the blend of grass and dirt out of his mouth. His ear was tingling.

“Don’t you say a damn word about that,” he hissed in his ear. “If I start treating Kirishima differently, these idiots will catch on.”

“You sure it's not just that you're a huge d-”

Bakugo kneed Shinso in the gut, knocking the air out of him, and turned away as Shinso fell to his knees.

“I'm not feeling this ship today. I'm going home...”

The group watched him leave. Kirishima chased after Bakugo, shouting, “Yo, Blasty! You gotta stop being such a-!”

Shinso couldn't hear the last bit as they ran out of earshot.

“You okay?” Sato asked as Yaoyorozu started inspecting him.

“‘m fine.” Shinso said, holding his gut.

Well, guess I can say I tried...

After school, Shinso was texting in two group chats: one with some of his former classmates, and one with Ashido, Sero, friends, and Bakugo.

With the General Studies kids, he was trying to get a better timeline of the events of the party. He didn't get far, but he at least had a guesstimate of when the Mass Placebo-Drunkness/Blackout happened: around 10:20. At least thirty minutes before people said the witness claimed to have seen Mineta at the station. And given it was a fifteen minute walk to that station, Shinso had probably brainwashed him at 10:35. He also now knew where some of the General Studies kids were, which was nowhere important. None of them seemed to really recall having interacted with Mineta that much, unfortunately.

Meanwhile, in the other chat:

E-LIT-tricity: Lord Blows-Up.

AlolaXenomorph: Michael Bay.

FlexTapeHero: The Human Molotov.

TheBoulder: Sparky Sparky Boom Man.

Don’tCallMeKilgrave: The Explosive Expletive.

DIEDIEDIE: **** ALL OF YOU! DID YOU ONLY ADD ME BACK TO THIS CHAT TO MOCK ME!?

Shinso smiled to himself.

Don'tCallMeKilgrave: It's why I voted you back in...

*DIEDIEDIE posted a GIF: middlefinger.gif*

*Don’tCallMeKilgrave posted a photo: lookigotyouonetoomeatshield.jpg*

FlexTapeHero: The unstoppable force meets an unmovable object.

E-LIT-tricity: lol how long til Bakugo kills Shinso?

AlolaXenomorph: BAKUGO DO NOT KILL SHINSO! =͟͟͞͞( •̀д•́)))

DIEDIEDIE: I MAKE NO PROMISES!

TheBoulder: Though, I do have a legit hero name idea, Bakugo...

Why not Detonator?

It's like that Deathinator name you came up with, but… Marketable?

Don'tCallMeKilgrave: Please don't say ‘marketable’…

TheBoulder: Right. Sorry. I meant less threatening

DIEDIEDIE: BUT THE THREATENING PART IS THE BEST PART!

E-LIT-tricity: sighs

AlolaXenomorph: I thought “Detonator” was cool, Kirishima…

*AlolaXenomorph posted a gif: tacticalhugengaged.gif*

TheBoulder: Thanks

FlexTapeHero: I liked it, too.

E-LIT-tricity: ^^

DIEDIEDIE: WHY DON’T YOU THREE IDIOTS COME UP WITH DUMB NAMES FOR GENERAL STUDIES INSTEAD!?

*FOUR

E-LIT-tricity: How do u misspell 3 as 4?

DIEDIEDIE: **** YOU!

Shinso knew how, but valued his life too much to say it.

AlolaXenomorph: I have a dumb one!

The Brain.

‘Cause then whenever we teamed up, we’d be Pinky And The Brain! (｡•̀ᴗ-)✧

Don'tCallMeKilgrave: ...

DIEDIEDIE: QUIT MAKING WESTERN POP CULTURE REFERENCES!

BESIDES, I’VE ALREADY GOT A NICKNAME REFERENCING THAT FOR YOU! IT WOULD BE REDUNDANT!

*AlolaXenomorph posted a gif: angrypuffyface.gif*

E-LIT-tricity: Clockwork Purple.

Don'tCallMeKillgrave: Hard pass.

DIEDIEDIE: WHAT DID I JUST SAY ABOUT REFERENCES!?

FlexTapeHero: That's kinda an ****ed up movie to base a hero name on anyway…

E-LIT-tricity: Its a book 2

*DIEDIEDIE posted a gif: ididntknowyoucouldread.gif*

E-LIT-tricity: I'm re-banning him

FlexTapeHero: Control Freak!

Shinso’s hero name, I mean. ^_^’

Don'tCallMeKillgrave: No.

TheBoulder: General… Brain… Something…

I got nothin’…

DIEDIEDIE: DID SOME GOOGLING AND WHY NOT JUST RIP OFF ERASERHEAD’S NAME AND BE ELEPHANT MAN, AIZAWA FANBOY!?

Don'tCallMeKillgrave: That makes no ****ing sense.

The chat then erupted into a heated debate about how “oh sure, Bakugo can make pop culture references but we can't!”

Shinso elected to ignore the chat for a while, remembered to scribble down his Mineta info from the other chat, and got ready to go to sleep.

By the time he climbed into bed, he noticed he got a private message from Ashido:

AlolaXenomorph: Yo. After School. We're going to the mall.

Don'tCallMeKillgrave: All of us?

AlolaXenomorph: Nah. Just you and me. Two friends hanging out.

Don'tCallMeKillgrave: One minute…

Shinso stuck his head out the door and shouted, “DAD, IS IT COOL IF I HANG OUT WITH ASHIDO AT THE MALL TOMORROW!?”

“SURE! GLAD YOU’RE MAKING FRIENDS IN YOUR NEW CLASS, HITOSHI!”

Don'tCallMeKillgrave: Dad says it’s cool.

AlolaXenomorph: Nice. (*▼▽▼*)

Shinso set his phone to Do Not Disturb and went right to bed.

Surprisingly, Saturday’s class went by with little to report. And Shinso had managed to avoid injury enough during the exercise (“Three-On-One Battling”) to still be able to go to the mall. After a quick change out of their uniforms, he and Ashido were on their way.

Upon their arrival, Ashido pulled him down to her level and positioned her phone in front of them.

“Selfie?” She asked.

When in Rome... Shinso thought with a shrug. “Why not...”

With a grin, Ashido threw up a peace sign and winked. Shinso opted for the ‘yeah, whatever’ look. She took the picture, stuck a bunch of stickers and a fun filter on it, and immediately posted the finished product to some social media site with the caption: “hangin w/ my boi shinso! #coolkids”

“C’mon, there's a really good ice cream place, here! We need all the sugar we can get to maximize our time here!”

Giving Ashido sugar seems like a terrible idea, but okay...

The two got their ice cream. Ashido got some brightly colored monstrosity that gave Shinso diabetes just by looking at it. He, however, settled for a simple soft serve vanilla cone.

Once they were properly ‘fueled up,’ they started goofing around the mall. First, Ashido took him to the arcade.

“Hey, Battle Kings is working again! Shinso, you gotta try this one!” She said, “I’m better at rhythm games, so I kinda suck at it, but it's really fun and that’s what matters!”

“I dunno. I’m not good at beat ‘em ups. I’m kinda more into RPGs and...”

“Also, Bakugo has the high score.” Ashido said simply.

“...Hand me some coins, Ashido.”

Neither of them even got on the leaderboard, but they had a good time fighting the endless hordes of enemies until their characters’ untimely demises. They tried a couple other games at the arcade before they moved on to the shops.

At first, Ashido was the one picking where they'd go and pulling him along. But after a while, Shinso was insisting on what stores to go to with Ashido enthusiastically agreeing.

Shinso had to admit, after everything that had happened this week, it was nice to just relax, do regular kid stuff, and forget the whole ‘potential manslaughterer’ thing.

Toward the end of their raid on almost every store, the two of them sat on a bench with their bags, drinking some juice.

“Hey, Ashido?” Shinso said, looking at his cup contemplatively.

“Hmm? What's up?” She asked.

“I was just wondering…why did you decide to invite me into your group my first day? And why you want to hang out with me?”

Ashido laughed. “Really? I thought it was pretty obvious…”

Shinso looked over at her. She was smiling. I-Is this going to be a confession? Isn’t that a little soon? He thought, panicking a little and trying to think of how to handle this.

“You look like you’re going to explode, Shinso! Relax!” Ashido said with another laugh. “I did it because I figured you'd be lonely. I mean, you just transferred to a new class. You hardly knew anyone in the class and a couple of them held a tiny grudge against you. I figured you could use some friends, ya know? Help you feel welcome. I mean, after all, you're one of us now, right?”

Shinso turned a little pink. He couldn't help but break into a small smile. (And internally sigh with relief.) “Yeah, I guess I am… Thanks, Ashido.”

Ashido beamed. “No problem, dude! It's what I do!”

She inspected the stores around them, stretching her arms in front of her. “I think we have enough time for one more store. Your turn to pick, Shinso.”

Shinso looked around. His eyes honed in on a pet store with kittens in the window. He pointed at it.

“Really? The pet store? Okay! Let's get going!”

Shinso made a beeline towards the kittens, all in a big tub. He immediately scooped one up to pet it.

“Oh my gosh. You're a cat lover!” Ashido squeed.

Shinso nodded before returning the kitten to the bin and reaching down to pet two more. The first kitten climbed into his hair, mewing as Shinso rose up with the other kittens in his arms.

Ashido laughed. “And it looks like they're Shinso lovers, too!” She whipped out her cell phone again. “Pleeeeease, can I make this my contact photo for you?”

Shinso laughed as the kittens tried to climb all over him. This was his heaven. “Sure, go ahead…”

Ashido snapped the picture, put her phone away, and helped get the kitten out of his hair.

“Hello, Shinso. Ashido…”

Shinso's eyes darted to the entrance.

“Todoroki…”

A shocked Kaminari was also there.

“Ashido, are you two on a date!?”

“Nope!” Ashido said, laughing. “Just two bros hanging out.”

Todoroki went over to Shinso, who scrambled to put the cats away.

“Hey.”

“We came down here when we saw Ashido’s post to ask you two something. Also Kaminari wanted to see what was happening with you two.”

“NO I DIDN’T!” Kaminari said, defensively.

“Oh, relax, Kaminari. Even if it was a date, I’d still have time for you, buddy...” Ashido assured.

Kaminari seemed to relax and smiled at her.

“So, anyway, what did you want to ask us about?” Shinso asked.

“We just wanted to ask you guys some questions, tomorrow. About that party.” Todoroki stated.

“Yeah, for our Mineta investigation.” Kaminari added.

“Wait, don't you spend time with your mom on your days off?” Shinso asked.

Todoroki smiled briefly. He seemed to be touched that Shinso remembered that. “She's been sick the last few days. There's a chance my visit with her might get cut short tomorrow. And if not, we're meeting up late afternoon.” Todoroki said, inspecting one of the kittens.

“Is she gonna be alright?” Shinso asked.

Todoroki smiled again as he reached down to the kittens, petting one. The other kittens mewed and tried to push each other out of the way to get a turn. Shinso couldn't help but smile, too, as he watched. “She's going to be fine,” Todoroki said. “The worst of it’s over. Thanks for your concern.”

Shinso rubbed the back of his neck and looked down. “No problem.”

You need to accept his invitation. It’d be suspicious if you didn't. Shinso thought.

Ashido shrugged. “Well, I know I'm not gonna be any help. I don't remember much of anything,” She said with a pout, folding her arms. “Just dancing and waking up at home the next morning in my party clothes. Oh! And apparently I got a bunch of numbers from some cute boys and girls!” She added.

Kaminari looked distressed. “How is it you have better game than all of us combined!? All I got from that party was a number from someone named ‘Nakamura’, whoever that is.”

Shinso nearly choked.

“You okay?” Todoroki asked.

“Fine. And I can try and swing by,” Shinso said.

Todoroki smiled a third time. Truly, it was a blessed day. “Thanks. Every little bit of information helps. Here,” he said, handing him a scrap of paper and going back to being ‘professional’. “My dad’s hero agency’s address. Unfortunately, we're stuck meeting up there most of the time.”

Shinso nodded.

“I also put my number on there, too.”

Shinso nodded again, for some reason, he couldn’t completely trust his words around Todoroki right now. (Because he's part of the Mineta investigation?) “Great, I'll text you so you can have mine...”

Todoroki nodded back. Shinso couldn't place the other boy’s emotions. Was he suspicious? Confused? Embarrassed? “Thanks. See you tomorrow.”

“You too,” Shinso said, leaning against the bin.

Kaminari and Todoroki left. Shinso looked down at the paper. Then back at Ashido, who was smirking.

“You like him, don't you?” Ashido teased.

“What!? No!” Shinso said, holding his hands up. “I mean, yeah, he's not as cold as I thought he was, and I like talking to him, but I don't-”

He noticed Koda enter the store.

“OH HEY, IT’S KODA!” Shinso said a little too loudly, spooking the timid boy.

Ashido noticed and waved at Koda, who waved back shyly. “Yeah, I think he comes down here to talk to the animals…”

“Right, that’s what his Quirk does?”

“I think so. I know he can at least get them to do what he wants.”

Shinso got a determined look in his eyes.

“Hey, Koda.”

Koda jumped a little. He nodded.

Shinso looked at him, completely straight-faced. He held up a kitten.

“Can you tell these guys they're perfect and I appreciate their existence?”

Koda’s eyes sparkled; he nodded enthusiastically.

[To Be Continued]

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