#mha apocalypse au

[woahjo]

The People We Became (Bakugou x Reader)

masterlist | ao3

Pairing: Bakugou x Reader

Summary: Zombie Apocalypse Au.

The world fell apart almost a year ago and you refused to go with it. Left alone and to your own devices in a world full of monsters, where the dead come back to life, you believe that maybe surviving isn't living.

When Katsuki finds you alone in the woods and on the precipice of collapsing from exhaustion, he decides to bring you back to the house his group calls home. Against your better judgement and hesitancy to become attached, you decide to stay. In this world, everyone has lost someone. No soul is spared the violence, and you start sleeping with Bakugou Katsuki to dull the ache. Somehow, peace finds you anyway, but not without sacrifice.

Chapter Content Warnings:  fem!reader, gender neutral pronouns, strangers to lovers, violence typical of zombies, blood, gore, romance, slow-ish burn (for the emotional stuff), angst, kissin', questions of identity, loss, grief, graphic depictions of death and/or violence, mentions and descriptions of starvation/exhaustion typical of an apocalypse setting, very slight implications of possible sexual violence typical of an apocalypse setting, derealization, depersonalization, weapons (guns, blades, and traps), loss of identity

All content warnings can be found on ao3 with the rest of the series.

Word Count: 14.4k — 53k total on ao3

A/N: it's finally done... i'm sweating. i screamed. i cried. i bled. you know the drill. i am posting this a little differently than my other fics and series. only the first chapter will be posted here on tumblr (this post), with the rest of it broken up into chapters and posted on ao3.. purely because it was originally meant as a one shot and i don't like posting chapters on tumblr. it's not built for that and im tired. anyway, im nervous this is my new baby and im pretty sure my soul is somewhere in here. if u read this, pls come tell me what you think.. it fuels me. enjoy, cry, sweat, or whatever else you do when you read. as always, thank you and i love you.

Two hundred and seventy six. It’s been two hundred and seventy six days since the world completely went to shit. You don’t really count the initial outbreak. The initial outbreak was relatively contained once people found out about it. You quarantined. You stayed inside. All it really took were a handful of idiots. Someone selfish. Someone who panicked and ran instead of facing the world honorably, and that was it. It only took days to lose almost every semblance of a normal life and a week to lose everything else. 

The light of your fire is dim, embers burning low as you sit in a foldable chair beside it. The chair is from a friend, someone you’re not with anymore and who went somewhere you couldn’t follow, and you've got a metal spatula in your hand. You're not sure why you grabbed it when you fled, but panic does weird things to the mind. You absentmindedly wonder why you’ve brought it along with you all this time. There’s no logical reason for you to tote the thing around. A friend had told you how strange it was that you thought to toss it into your bag and continue carrying it. This, along with a few other oddities, are all you managed to take from your house when the world fell to ruin. Everything else are things scavenged along the way or from people you'd met, joined, and lost. 

Maybe it’s because the spatula is somewhat normal, like somehow when you cook the game on your makeshift tin over your shitty fire, you can pretend you’re in your kitchen. A smash burger sounds good right now, with grilled onions on a brioche bun like the ones from the place by your apartment. 

The night is near silent and trees creak and crack like the hulls of great ships under heavy pressure, but the birds don't sing and nothing in the crowded wood you're taking shelter in makes a sound. Well, except for you and the gentle crackle of your fire. 

It’s easy to miss the noise that used to irritate you when the world goes quiet. You used to hate the sounds and lights of passing trucks when they’d cross on the street below your apartment window. Now, you’d do anything for the familiar comfort. The world is so dark and quiet, like it’s holding its breath and waiting for this to be over. The silence is almost too much, so loud that it hurts your ears. You huddle closer to the fire, craving its quiet sound. Focusing on it lessens the anxiety of the other noises. The ones you don’t want to hear. 

Your head is on a swivel. It has been for months. Ever since the outbreak, ever since the dead rose and began consuming and infecting the living, you've kept watch. A paranoid, never ending cycle that you suppose—if left on your own—will burn itself out. You swallow thick and return your attention to the fire, watching the tree line just in front of you for any hint of movement or monsters. 

A branch cracks just behind you. A swift sound, followed by rapid footsteps. You stand, quickly turning your head, only to see a figure a few feet away from you. They move quickly and the dancing light of the fire obscures their features from view. Their eyes, most importantly. You can always tell if someone is dead or alive based on their eyes and the sounds that their joints make. In this light, should this stranger have that milky white film over them, you wouldn't be able to tell. 

You make a small noise, something between a whimper and a shout, as the person comes to a stop in front of you and holds a flashlight directly into your face. You squint, panic in your veins as your eyes adjust as best they can to the sudden assault. It takes you a moment to realize that there is a gun pointed directly at your forehead. The living. This person is alive. You're not sure yet if encountering one of the dead would have been worse. 

"Shut up and drop your weapon," he says in a hurried voice. It's aggressive and threatening. It comes from deep in his chest, like somehow fear has gripped and mutilated it into something violent. 

You raise your shaky hands to your head quickly at the order, screwing your eyes shut in the beam of the flashlight. 

"It's not a weapon!" you shout, voice cracking. "It's a spatula. It's a spatula." 

The words are rushed and heavy, fear seizing your chest as you look down the barrel of the gun. The flashlight turns off, sending you back into the dark. Your eyes fight to adjust, catching the firelight that glints off of the barrel, and you begin to makeout the man’s features. He's big, blonde under the grime, you think. A man, not the best thing to encounter alone at night in times like these. 

You see him hesitate for a moment, eyes darting between you and the silver kitchen item in your hand. You drop it quickly, hoping to appeal to his humanity. 

"Do you have a weapon on you?" he questions, voice a little less urgent. 

You shake your head in response and then shakily look beside the chair, choking out the word “ground”. There's a knife there and a pistol with no bullets. You're a poor shot and you had run out of ammo the previous week. He glances at it, the gun still raised at you, and sidesteps to grab the two items. When he does, he cautiously lowers the weapon and you start to lower your trembling hands. 

Then, as if struck by some realization, the man stomps towards the fire and you jump as he does.

"The fuck are you doing lighting a fire this late?" he says angrily, opening the clip of your pistol. "And with no fucking bullets. Those things may be dead, but they can still fuckin' see. That's a good way to get yourself killed." 

He stomps out the fire as he talks, urgently stamping out what's left of the low-burning logs. 

"I didn't think there were many in the area," you justify, furrowing your eyebrows as you step away from him. 

"And that's a risk you want to take?" he says indignantly. You wonder briefly what business he has worrying about you. 

"What do you want?" you snap, "My food? Weapons? Life? What is it?" 

The man scoffs, "Jesus, none of that. I don’t want your shit." 

You narrow your eyes and take a step back. One thing this world has done is remove trust from every chance encounter, and that was already hard enough when the place was sane. 

"Not all people who camp out in the woods are good," he says. "But I sure as shit didn't expect to find someone like you alone lighting a damn fire. Stupid." 

"There were others," you say indignantly, like somehow that makes it better. "Force of habit, I guess." 

The man pauses for a moment as understanding passes between the two of you. It's a relatable feeling. Everyone has lost someone now. 

"Got a name?" he asks. 

You hesitate in giving it to him and the pause causes him to roll his eyes. “You want me to call you Idiot-with-no-bullets instead?” 

You give him your name and the man nods as if he likes the sound of it, turning it over in his head before inhaling. 

"I'm Katsuki," he furrows his eyebrows. "You're alone?" 

You nod, swallowing down the grief that pushes at your throat. 

"Wasn't always," you respond, "but yeah. Now, I am." 

He nods his understanding. 

"Come with me." 

"Where?" you say instinctively, a defensive edge to your voice. Katsuki looks at you as if you’re stupid, or maybe it's pity, like you're a wounded animal. Probably both. 

"Where the fuck do you think?" he retorts. "We've got a camp a little ways from here. I saw your fire from the watch post we have stationed." 

You look at him like he's a little crazy for even thinking to bring you. Kindness, especially the selfless type, is so rare now and you find it difficult to believe that he’s willing to take you there at no cost. 

He scoffs and rolls his head over his shoulder. "Look, we've got men and women," then he pauses. "Used to have children. We're not gonna hurt you. World's gone to shit, do you really wanna keep at it alone?" 

He's probably right. You've been alone for weeks now, exhausted for longer, and though your common sense tells you not to go off with a strange man in this kind of world, the promise of rest is far too tempting. You nod and glance back to your camp. A measly collection of supplies haphazardly put together. You suppose that it doesn’t look so promising. 

"We'll come back for it when it's light," he says. "I don't know about you, but I'd rather not spend longer in these dark ass woods than I have to." 

"Okay," you say. The presence of another person both sets you on edge and makes you feel the press of fatigue even more. A gun's barrel on your nose followed by the promise of safety and you're going with him? You must be stupider than a horror movie protagonist. "Do you take in a lot of strays?" 

Katsuki looks over his shoulder and you think you see him smile a little at the phrase. 

"If that's what you want to call it," he says begrudgingly. Then, with a softer tone of voice, barely noticeable with the quiet whisper you both have been speaking at. "I'm sure the others won't mind one more."

You nod a little and follow him through the wood, stepping over obstacles. Your eyes have adjusted to the dark, but you feel unsteady on your feet. Everything you’ve ever learned about this world tells you that maybe you shouldn’t go with him. What if they’re dangerous? It’s easy to lie about women and children, about a community that doesn’t exist. Or worse, it’s easy to fool yourself that where you are is good, but you don’t know yet if he’s the type to delude himself. He doesn’t seem it. 

The two of you walk for what feels like forever, even if it is only a little over half a mile. Your feet have been aching for days and every step you take feels like a blade into the heel. Katsuki seems steady, his gun secured at his hip and a large knife in his dominant hand. He doesn’t have the flashlight out, but he seems sure-footed and takes every step in stride, as if he’s too heavy to be swayed by any missed step. 

As you move, you can barely make out his back in the white tank top he wears. You use it as a landmark, following the glowing white as it catches the light from the moon. Like chasing a ghost through the trees. 

Then, the wood eases up. The trees grow sparse and the suffocating humidity of the forest eases into a more breathable, open-air breeze. Katsuki steps out into a clearing. It’s relatively small, for how large the world is, but it’s some of the most open space you’ve seen in a while. The feeling of stepping out into the tall grass, where you’re both visible to any wandering thing, sends a rush of fear through you. 

By the edge of the clearing, there’s a small house with a short steeple. It almost looks like a Christian church, but you get the sense that it’s likely a barn. That must be the watchtower and you wonder just how good the view of the forest is from up there if Katsuki managed to see the light of your fire. How many other people had seen your fires over the weeks and not made it out to confront you? How close had you come before to safety or annihilation? 

"Hey!" a girl's voice calls. "He's back!" 

In the near distance, you can see a large and dimly lit house. It looks a little worn down, but soft and hardly noticeable light emanates from it in a way that makes it seem inviting.You can’t make out its exact silhouette and night blurs just how broken-down it is, but you can tell that people live there in the same way you can tell when someone has just left a room. 

Someone runs across the field to you both. It looks like a man and a woman, maybe around Katsuki's age. They move quickly through the tall grass and for a moment, the urgency that they move with frightens you. You worry that your presence will ignite some protective sort of panic. You linger back, letting Katsuki grow a little farther from you as they call out to him. 

“Yeah, yeah," he half-shouts, no longer seeming to care about keeping quiet. Guess that's what happens when there's a group. "I found the fire I mentioned." 

The two come to a stop in front of him, resting their hands on their hips as they catch the breath they lost. 

"We started to get a little worried," says the girl. She's pretty, with big eyes and curly hair that looks like it probably used to be dyed. "You've been gone for a while." 

"Well, I'm back," he says. 

"And you brought a friend," the other man says, sounding shocked. His tone is noticeably kind. The boisterous type of kind and when he smiles, you can see that he has sharp canines. His hair is straight, sticking out in different directions, and tinged with red in this light.

"More like an acquaintance," Katsuki says. “I found them in the woods with a fire and an empty clip. Felt like their blood would be on my hands if I didn’t bring them back.” The red-haired man gives him a telling look and Katsuki scoffs in response and turns to the girl. "Get them settled, Mina, will you?" The girl called Mina nods and Katsuki takes off toward the house without another word. 

"You're lucky," she says, pausing when you flinch as she steps closer. "You're gettin' the last solo room in the place. Kirishima, is it set up?" 

Kirishima shrugs his shoulders. "You'd have to ask Izuku. He'd know all about that, but I can go check." 

Mina shakes her head and turns her attention to you, giving you a quick once over with her eyebrows pulled together.

"You must be tired.” 

When you nod, she gives you an empathetic smile and motions for you to come with her. "We'll fix that. You hungry?" 

"What do you think?" you manage, saliva pooling in your mouth. "Do you have food?" 

"Plenty," she smiles. "not quite enough for leftovers just yet though, don’t tell anyone." 

You smile awkwardly. Who on earth would you tell? 

"Sounds like a good deal," you say. 

You follow Mina up to the house. Around it, there are a few parked cars. They look like they could pull out at any moment, and through the dust covered windows, you can just make out supplies in the back seats as you pass. In the distance, you can see the fuzzy silhouette of the barn you’d assumed was a watchtower in the dark of the field and you figure that maybe it used to be a place to keep livestock. 

Mina doesn't say much to you as you pass through the field, and when you walk into the door, the first thing you notice is a large group of people seated at a dining table. They all look up at you when you enter and it's with a bit of shock that you register their faces as healthy. Well, healthier. These people live well. Something stirs in your chest, both anxiety and excitement at the thought of possibly having found somewhere safe. They blink at you for a moment, exchanging looks that all end up landing on Katsuki. 

"This is the group. Well, most of us," Mina says pleasantly and with a light huff. "That's Izuku, Denki, Ochako, Sero, and you already know the handsome guy on the end there. Kiri's probably checking to see if the room is half decent.." They all greet you with a glad murmur. "Group, this is..." 

She looks at you expectantly. When you tell them your name, you can't help but look at Katsuki who already knows it. He raises his eyebrows unconsciously and turns his attention to the glass in front of him. 

There’s an awkward pause as you stand in the doorway, suddenly conscious of just how dirty you must look. Remnants of an older world, you suppose. No one really worries about things like that anymore.

“Uhm…” you search for something to say, but your people skills seem to have left you. 

“You’re okay,” Mina says lightly. “Plenty of time to get to know you when you’ve rested and had something to eat.” 

Mina sits you down at a chair that she pulls in from the other room. It doesn't match the other ones in the dining room, but you suppose no one is really thinking of the decor in their house anymore. It's only now that you realize the house has electricity.

"You have power?" you say incredulously, looking at the center light in the dining room on its low setting. 

"Mhm," Mina hums as she sits down next to you and spoons a helping of vegetables onto your plate. "It's got a generator. We got lucky finding this place. I don't think many of us would be alive if we hadn't." 

Those listening in the group nod their affirmation. 

"It draws from well water too," she adds. "With the right care, the place practically runs on its own. Hard work but what isn't nowadays?" 

“Like you do any of the heavy lifting," Sero scoffs across from her.

"That's not fair," Katsuki adds with a slick smirk, "you know damn well none of our vegetables would be so well socialized if she didn't use them like a damn diary all day." 

The group laughs a little and Mina rolls her eyes and sits back in the chair. You avoid looking at anyone, shoveling the food into your mouth. You’re salivating an almost embarrassing amount, struggling to eat at a normal pace. There’s something about food cooked inside, about the way food tastes when you can smell it wafting in from the kitchen. 

"Don't worry," she turns to you, as if you’re at all concerned with the implication that she doesn’t do much work, "they know we’d hardly have vegetables at all if it weren't my job to tend them. I used to garden quite a bit before all of this." 

Sero tosses her a sideways glance and you get the sense that maybe it isn’t just her doing it. 

"Mina does a lot of the garden stuff," Ochako pitches in, her voice hesitant. "We all sort of just do what we can." 

You can’t really keep up with the conversation and instead just blink at her for a moment before turning back to your food. Maybe that’s rude, but you don’t have the energy to consider it. There’s food in front of you. Food that doesn’t taste like it’s been poorly slaughtered or rotting in a cabinet for months. 

The group at the table with you shifts back into what you feel is their normal conversation and you watch them through your peripheral. You can’t relax yet, maybe you never will. Always on watch with your guard up. 

They pass the dishes around the table, plates going from hand to hand over mismatched sets of silverware. The action feels strange to you. Your chest squeezes at the thought. Just a few weeks ago, you’d done this around a fire with the people you loved. You’d passed a too-hot-to-touch pot around a circle of friends, laughing quietly at the little moments of joy you could find. It feels far away now and jealousy rouses beside hope as you sit. 

“So, where did you come from?” Izuku at the end of the table asks. 

It takes you a moment to realize that he’s talking to you and there’s an edge to his voice that has everyone at the table sitting up with curiosity. You stare at him for a moment, exhausted and defeated and unable to muster the words. 

“Leave them be,” Katsuki says, looking up from his plate. “They just got here. They’re probably freaked out.” 

The table goes a little quiet, a hush falling over it. You look around as glances are exchanged before Mina stands up quickly and quietly claps her hands together. 

“I think,” she says with an awkward laugh, “it may be time for bed.” 

Mina turns to you. “I’ll show you where you can sleep.” 

You nod, standing up and turning to the group with furrowed eyebrows. You want to thank them, to tell them that you’re grateful for the meal and their kindness, but the words don’t come. Instead, you meet Katsuki’s gaze, grateful for the intervention, but suspicious at such forthcoming kindness. He scoffs a little and turns away. 

—

“It’s just up here,” Mina says as she guides you through the house.

You pass rooms with their doors ajar. They are lived in, with unmade beds and glasses of clean water on nightstands. It’s like something out of a life gone by, with a few less amenities. You can imagine a family moving through this house. Girls in school uniforms calling through the halls about a stolen hair clip. Now, you picture these people doing that. Living and not just surviving.

“The bathroom is across the hall,” she says. “You can take a shower if you want. I’ll leave a towel and some clothes in there just in case.”  

You nod. 

“No worries if you don’t,” Mina adds in a whisper. “When I first met everyone, I didn’t undress to bathe for days so… take your time. We won’t be offended.” 

She shuts the door behind her when she leaves and you stumble back onto the bed, shocked by just how soft it feels after spending weeks on the floor. It’s not much, but it’s nicer than anything you’ve experienced in the last nine months, and there's a working shower. You haven’t had a shower since everything fell apart and the layer of grime on your skin is so thick that you can feel it. You haven’t felt safe enough to properly wash since you’d lost the rest of your group, only stopping to rinse your body in streams you pass if the thought occurred to you. The idea of running water and a shower is near euphoric. 

You probably shouldn’t. It may not be wise to shower tonight. You still don’t know these people or what they’re capable of, but the temptation of being clean is too great and as soon as you hear Mina close the bathroom door and walk away, you hurry across the hall on the balls of your feet. 

The bathroom looks old and the sink is white porcelain, eggshell now with a lack of care. The shower has a bathtub in it and though it’s cloudy, there’s a mirror over the sink where you catch the first clear glimpse you’ve had of yourself in weeks. 

You don’t know who you’re looking at. The person in the mirror is nearly unrecognizable. Their eyes are wide and frightened, wild like an animal’s, and their face is covered in a layer of grime that looks like it can never be washed out. Their hair is unruly, sticking out in some areas and matted down with blood in others. This is a person you’ve never seen or met before. Someone you would have avoided only a year ago if you’d ever encountered them. 

You reach up to touch your face, running your hand over the dried blood that has made a home on the underside of your jaw. How long has it been there? Have you always looked so unwell? So sick in mind and body? The promise of a shower grows unbearably pleasant. 

The knob squeaks when you turn it, screeching as the pipes hum and clang to life. Water spits out in a few bursts before raining down from the faucet and hitting the back of the tub in a steady thrum. It sounds a little bit like music to you, constant and heavy, and it gives the impression of normalcy as you begin undressing. 

The fabric of your clothes sticks to your skin, peeling from your body in an unbearable and disgusting way. You don’t look at your body in the mirror. In fact, you avoid it entirely. Not recognizing your face was enough, but your body—a part of yourself you never really recognized—would drive you over the edge. 

Then, you pull the shower curtain back and stick your hand under the water, stepping into it fully with a deep sigh. The water is lukewarm. They probably turned off the heater to conserve power and allow the main generator to function for longer. That’s fine. Beggars can’t be choosers and everyone is a beggar nowadays. Besides, it’s warm enough outside that the water isn’t too cold as it is. In the winter, you probably wouldn’t be able to shower and the pipes might freeze entirely until the following spring. 

There’s a normalcy that you settle into as you wash your body. You return to muscle memory, running your hands over your skin and scrubbing the grime out. It’s simultaneously like the first shower of your life and as if you’ve been doing it every day. You return to a state of pleasant, familiar humanity as you wash away dirt that has built up for weeks. You feel as it pours off of you, see it run down your body onto the porcelain of the tub and swirl down the drain. It’s dirt and dried blood that has been caked onto your skin. You worry that even after washing, it will leave a permanent mark. 

The person in the mirror when you get out of the shower is in stark contrast to the person who went into it. They’re someone that you recognize. You could almost convince yourself that nothing ever changed. Your water-soaked skin is so familiar to you, that you could be getting out of the shower and dressing to go to work. If it weren’t for the look in your eyes, you could have fooled yourself. Something undefinable has changed in you, something that you will carry with you forever. You glance at yourself in the foggy mirror and think that there is no going back. 

The house is quiet when you dry yourself and open the bathroom door. You step across the hall on the balls of your feet, careful not to make any noise, and when you push the bedroom door open, you do a visual sweep to make sure that it’s safe out of habit. 

Your body is exhausted. You are so thoroughly tired that you think you could collapse at any moment, but when you sit down on the bed in your fresh clothes, you find yourself restless. This place is new to you and you’re unsure if the safe feeling is your mind playing desperate tricks on you or the real thing. The lamp by your bed is on, casting a yellow glow across the bedsheets and the dark wood furniture. Come to think of it, you didn’t get a good look at the house when you came in and the thought starts to bother you as you stare at the closed door to the hallway. 

Someone could be behind it. They could be waiting for you to lay down, to sleep, before doing something awful. You almost feel guilty for thinking this way about them. They’ve fed you, given you a shower, given you fresh clothes. Luxuries you weren’t sure even existed anymore, yet you’re sitting here doubting them, wishing you had your pistol or knife.

The bedroom door creaks as you open it. You wince, nervous that you’ve disturbed the quiet peace of the house and that everything will come crashing down as quickly as it seemed to come together. The hallway is dark, save for some light coming from under two doors at the end of the hall. One of them turns out as you creep past it to the stairs, and you hear the distinct sound of box springs squeaking as someone crawls into bed. You let go of the breath you’d been holding, straightening up as you relax into the late-night environment. 

The house looks old even from the inside. It gives the impression of having once been dirty and in near disrepair. There are dust stains and dull spots that no amount of scrubbing could get out. You can almost picture how this place may have looked when they found it and it’s entirely possible that it had been abandoned before the actual outbreak. Someone run out of their home for lack of money. What a trivial thing now. 

The stairs are sturdy, probably held together so well by the foundation of the house, and they’re made of dark wood. They’re steep too, the kind that a baby or old person might trip over, and you hold the railing to calm the shaking of your legs as you slowly feel your way down. You can see the light on in the kitchen from around the corner, spreading out onto the floor of the old fashioned drawing room. Dishes clink in the kitchen, like someone is washing them, and you jump a little at the noise as you creep around the corner. 

Kirishima is standing at the sink with his back to you, whispering something to someone beside him. The expanse of his back is broad, moving every time he goes to run his hand over the dish in front of him. Then, he turns to look at you and you see Mina pop her head around the corner. 

“Oh,” Kiri says, “did you need something?” 

You shake your head. “Not really, I just couldn’t sleep.” 

Kiri nods sympathetically as if he knows the feeling. “Well, you look like you feel a little better at least.” 

You pad over to where he’s doing the dishes and Mina offers you a soft smile and a knowing look. It all seems so normal. Doing the dishes, whispering quietly as they do. Something about it screams a kind of humanity you haven’t experienced in a long while, even with your last group. 

“Are you sure we can’t get you something?” Mina says, furrowing her brows. 

“Why are you all being so nice to me?” You ask. “You don’t know the first thing about me.” 

“Is there some reason why we shouldn’t be nice to you?” Kiri says over his shoulder. 

“No,” you shake your head. “I just think it’s reckless, that’s all. I could have been anyone.” 

Kirishima and Mina exchange a look. They glance at each other, like they’re debating on saying something, and then Kiri turns and rests his palms on the back of the sink. He looks at Mina. 

“We don’t usually decide to do this so quickly,” she admits. “We’re friendly, but nobody’s that friendly anymore.” 

Kiri nods his agreement and you listen quietly, trying to determine if they plan to toss you back out into the woods in the morning. 

“But, Katsuki doesn’t usually bring people in,” she continues. 

“He’s a little more closed off than the rest of us,” Kirishima adds. “He’s a good guy, just takes a while to warm up, is all.” 

“Mhm,” Mina says. 

“What does that have to do with me?” you ask. “This is nice and all, but I’m sure you get why I’m wary.” 

“He’s a good judge of character,” Kiri adds earnestly. “He doesn’t bring people in often, but when he does, he’s usually right.” 

You nod, not quite understanding. Sure, you don’t plan to do anything terrible. In fact, you’re content to accept their kindness and stay, if they’d let you. Anything is better than being alone, but their blind trust in one man’s judgment of character makes you uneasy. 

“He was alone for a really long time,” Mina adds. “A lot of us were. I got lucky meeting Kirishima early on, but Katsuki’s luck was a little less fortuitous.” 

“So you all just… happened upon each other by chance?” You ask. 

“Yeah, pretty much,” Mina says. “It was me and Kiri for a long time. Just the two of us. We’d found Izuku and Katsuki together a while later, but they didn’t seem to like each other all that much. We still haven’t really figured that out, especially because they’re so close now. Ochako and Sero ended up cornered together by accident. We found them just before we found this place, and Denki just sort of showed up here one day and promised to fix the generator in exchange for safety. That was months ago. We’ve been like this since.”

“So you’re all strays,” you say and Mina laughs a little and looks at Kiri. 

“Sure,” she says. “We’re all strays. There were others too. Shoji. Jirou. She was Denki’s girlfriend.” 

“I’m sorry,” you say with a frown. It feels pointless to apologize for the dead, if you get caught up in it, you’d be apologizing forever. 

“Don’t be,” Kiri adds. “But best not to bring her up. It was pretty recent and Denki’s only just started to get over it.” 

You swallow thick and nod a little. 

“Anyway,” Mina says, “we can’t really explain it. We just trust him. We trust Katsuki. That’s all.” 

“Hm,” you hum, understanding that to a degree. 

You trusted the people in your group. If they believed in someone, you were willing to as well, so you suppose you can understand a little where they’re coming from. 

“What are you talking about,” Katsuki rounds the corner, walking into the kitchen and putting his water bottle under the sink. 

“Nothing really,” Mina says. 

Katsuki furrows his eyebrows and then looks at you. He gives you a once over, taking in your new clothing before scoffing lightly. 

“Don’t you look cozy,” he says. “You get settled?” 

“When can I go get my stuff?” You ask. 

“Someone’s eager,” he says through lightly gritted teeth. “Didn’t I tell ya we could go in the morning? Besides, what’s there really to miss in that lot of junk?” 

“Katsuki!” Mina quietly chides. 

“I have things I care about there,” you say. “Things I’m not ready to lose.” 

Katsuki blinks at you for a second before swearing under his breath. “We’ll leave when you get up in the morning.” 

“You don’t have to come with me,” you say, frowning a bit at his sour attitude. 

“Like hell,” he scoffs. “What if the dead are waiting back there for you?” 

“I made it this far on my own,” you respond. 

Katsuki nods for a second. “I’m going. Come find me in the morning.” 

He walks off and around the corner. You hear him go up the stairs, followed by the distinct click of a bedroom door shutting. 

“Don’t pay too much attention to that,” Mina says. “It’s past his bedtime.” 

“You’ll get used to him,” Kiri adds. 

“Right,” you say, swallowing down your frustration in favor of trying to be appreciative of the help. You sway on your feet a little and then steady yourself. “I’m going to go to sleep. Thank you for the meal and the bed.” 

Mina and Kiri nod, but you don’t stick around to hear a response. Fatigue creeps up on you. It ambushes your senses and you go from feeling dream-like to delusional in a matter of moments. You make your way up the stairs, your body feeling heavy as lead, and wobble your way into the bedroom they’re letting you stay in. 

When your head hits the pillow, you’re out. The world around you fades to dark and just before you sleep, you swear that you can hear the sounds of cars passing on the highway. A busy night, Saturday maybe, and people go about their daily lives outside of the window the way that they always have. They live, never the wiser to just how quickly things fall apart and how little it takes for our humanity to leave us. 

— 

Mornings in this place are boisterous. The sun coming through the lone window in your room wakes you up and you can hear the calls of busy people getting to work outside. There are voices from the porch out front that your window looks over and though you can’t see them, you get the sense that they’re having a pleasant conversation. 

As you rouse, you come to the realization of just how exhausted you’d really been. They probably saved your life by bringing you to this place, feeding you, and offering you a bed. In hindsight, it’s easy to see just how little you had left in you. You get the sense now that you’d been running on an empty tank for days, slowly coming to an inglorious, gruesome, sputtering stop. 

Things seem a little clearer, like the sunlight is somehow less bleak than it had been the days previous and you feel a little bit like you have a new lease on life. There are no big emotions, no swells of hope or humanity just yet, and you dread the moment you are rested enough to let grief consume you. Right now, you can’t feel it, but there is a fear in you that as you get to know these people who live relatively beautifully in an ugly world, it will weigh you down so much that you’ll never be able to outrun it. 

You wonder if they’ll let you stay. They very well may not, even with the way they were talking last night. Strangers are more dangerous than they’ve ever been and if they ask you whether or not you’ve killed someone, you refuse to lie to them. Sitting up on the bed, you mull over the very real possibility that you could be back out there on your own again in a matter of days and you don’t even have that many good acts under your belt to plead your case. You’re just a person and you’ve done what you needed to in order to survive. Now, you’re not sure if that’s enough. 

You swallow thick, wandering over to the mirror on the dresser. It’s fogged, though less than the bathroom mirror, and you can make out your features a little better than you could last night. You feel a bit more sane, though you still don’t recognize the frightful and distrustful look in your eyes. Like a wounded animal. Inside your head, you acknowledge that you are completely different from the person you were two hundred and seventy seven days ago. 

The voices grow louder as you climb down the stairs, more secure on your feet than you felt last night. You can hear them talking about the generator, as well as a name you don’t recognize. 

“He should be back by now,” a woman says. “Shoto’s never gone longer than a day or two, max.” 

“We shouldn’t jump to conclusions,” another woman says with a worried bite in her voice. Mina, maybe? “We’re only a few hours into the day. He probably got holed up somewhere.” 

“Someone needs to go look for him,” a man says.

“And what? Risk getting yourself killed?” the first woman says. “No, it doesn’t make sense. We need you here.” 

“You’d rather we leave him to die on his own?” 

“No one’s fuckin’ dying.” 

You recognize Katsuki’s voice. 

“He’s perfectly capable of going on a gasoline run,” he continues. “He’s done it before.” 

“I should have gone with him,” says the same woman. 

“On that leg? You wouldn’t have made it halfway to town, let alone there and back,” his voice raises a little. “Don’t be stupid. He’ll be back.” 

You clear your throat and step around the corner. The group turns to face you quickly at the sound, their eyes wide for a moment before relaxing. You can’t sneak up on anyone nowadays. 

“Sorry,” you say, “I didn’t mean to eavesdrop. Is everything okay?” 

It’s not your business, but you ask anyway, wondering for yourself about the safety of Shoto. 

“Fine,” Izuku says, shaking his head. You recognize him to be the one who'd vouched for going after their friend. Katsuki takes a step away from the broad man as he says this. “Nothing for you to worry about. Did you rest?” 

Izuku smiles gently at you, his chest inflating a little at the question. The movement broadens his shoulders and you realize that he stands almost a head taller than Katsuki. You look briefly between the two of them before nodding. 

“I did,” you say. “Thank you.” 

“Nothing wrong with a little hospitality now and then,” he smiles and you can’t help but furrow your eyebrows at the distinct hesitance in his voice. 

“I don’t think we’ve met,” the woman standing across from Izuku says. “I’m Momo. Sorry I wasn’t there to meet you last night. I’ve been a little under the weather.” 

You introduce yourself to her and glance down at her leg. Her ankle is swollen and wrapped in a bandage. Her sneaker laces are untied at the top to make room for the swelling and you can see that she’s guarding that side of her leg. 

“Is it…?” you grimace, taking an instinctive step away from her. You almost feel bad for it, but sometimes good people make bad decisions when loved ones get bit. 

“No,” she says quickly, “no, it isn’t. Caught an edge in an old chain link fence on the property a couple days back.” 

Momo smiles slightly at you as if to reassure you. She’s really beautiful, with thick dark hair pulled back into a somewhat messy ponytail. Her eyes are bright, like she’s engaged in lively conversation, and you find yourself feeling a little sad for her. She’ll need medicine soon, if they can get it. Infections set in easily these days and you get the sense that even she knows that she may not have long without it. Maybe that’s something else their friend Shoto set out to find. 

“I assume you’ll be wanting to go get your supplies?” Katsuki says, cutting the conversation short. Maybe he could sense the sour turn of thoughts. 

“Ready when you are,” you respond with a nod. 

Katsuki glances at Izuku, who gives him a slightly disapproving look. 

“Someone get them something to eat,” Katsuki says. “...I’ll get my shit ready.” 

“Fig jam…” Mina mumbles as she motions for you to follow her to the kitchen. 

You oblige her, not exactly jumping to turn down a meal. She walks you into the kitchen and opens up a cabinet, where she pulls out a jar filled with a dark and seed filled paste. It’s a jam, sealed in a jar that looks older than what’s inside of it. The seal breaks open with a pleasant pop. 

“This stuff is so good,” she says to you over her shoulder, pulling out a package of crackers that have likely gone stale. “You won’t believe it.” 

She spreads the jam on a few crackers and sets it in front of you on a plate, pushing it across the counter towards you. 

“It’s fig jam,” she says with a smile. “Homemade.” 

You look down at the plate, your mouth watering at the prospect of something sweet like this. It’s been so long since you've had fresh jam. It could be as long as 10 years. You don’t think you’ve had it since you were a kid, when jam came easily and you preferred the processed brands at the supermarket to the ones your mom used to make sometimes. 

You raise the cracker to your mouth and stuff it in with little grace. The sweetness spreads across your tongue as soon as you bite into the stale cracker. It fizzes and pops almost, the sugar melting across your tongue as the seeds crack softly between your teeth. The smile that hits your face is completely involuntary and though you know that nine months ago, this jam wouldn’t have been much, today it is something extraordinary. 

Mina nods a kind of girlish agreement, like the way people used to when they had their friend try something at their favorite restaurant. 

“We got here in the fall. I want to say late October or early November?” she offers. “We were starving and there wasn’t enough food to feed all of us. By that time there were like… nine of us.” 

You listen as you eat your crackers. 

“This place was in such an awful state,” she laughs. “I mean, really terrible. But, it was big and there was a fig tree in the back. A little thing, probably only a few years old and it had fruit on it. We ate so many of them that if the world were normal, we’d have sworn off of them forever. When we realized that the house actually had some old food in it,” she interrupts herself “-nothing good, canned stuff mostly- we decided to jar up the rest of the figs so that they didn’t rot.” 

She smiles at you like it’s a pleasant memory, but you can only think about how hungry they must have been. Your stomach growls as you eat. 

“I know it doesn’t sound like much,” she says, “but for some reason it’s a really nice memory. Honestly, we’re lucky we didn’t die.” 

Mina laughs a little. 

“I mean,” she continues, “we didn’t even clear the area before we started pulling at the figs and throwing them into our mouths.” 

You tilt your head at her and furrow your eyebrows with a small smile. 

“You’re really forthcoming with information.” 

“You just seem a little hesitant, is all,” she answers. 

“Can you blame me?” 

Mina shrugs her shoulders but doesn’t really offer an answer. You assume it’s because she can’t, because Mina has the same doubts everyone carries with them in this world. All of the what ifs people would think about before they slept have become more prevalent than anyone would have ever liked. 

“The jam is good,” you say, trying to be friendly in the same way she is. “Even if it is months old.” 

“Things keep well in jars,” Mina defends softly, smiling a little as she gets another out of you. 

This place feels like a little slice of paradise. A blessing from whoever lived here before and kept a garden stocked with vegetables. From someone who lived in an old house with stables and well-water, who kept canned food past its expiration date. It feels almost too good to be true, like these people live in a bubble bound to pop. 

“You ready?” Katsuki thuds into the kitchen with an empty backpack slung over his shoulder. 

You turn, startled by his sudden appearance and nod as you quickly finish chewing the last cracker. Katsuki furrows his eyebrows as he watches the way you scarf it down. 

When you stand from the table, Katsuki turns on his heel to make for the front door and you follow with a light step. Mina says something about staying safe, but you don’t respond, glancing once over your shoulder at the girl. 

It’s strange, the world has made you wishy-washy and uncommitted. You never used to be like that, never so distrusting as to second guess someone’s kindness the moment your back is turned to them, and you’re certainly not the type to be friendly one moment and closed off the next. Now though, you find that doubt creeps in easily through cracks and any foundation that didn’t exist before, seems to be swallowed before you can finish building it. 

Katsuki leads you back across the small clearing you’d come through the night before. It looks different in the day, almost romantic, and it lacks any of the ominous feeling it had the previous evening. He steps over mounds in the dirt from moles and gophers that have made lawns their new home and you try to mimic his steps, sinking occasionally into a particularly soft patch of dirt. Every now and then, Katsuki glances behind him to check that you’re still there and you offer him a forced smile that he never returns.

You catch up to him when you hit the trees, sticking close at his side like something will come and take you away if you’re not. It’s unintentional, but you don’t have a weapon on you. Your knife is back at your makeshift camp, along with the unloaded pistol and your trusty spatula. 

“How do you know where we’re going?” You ask in a whisper. 

Katsuki tosses a look at you over his shoulder. “I’m good with directions.” 

His tone is clipped, like he’s pissed about something, and your expression sours at it. Sure, you get it but it irritates you to some small degree. You hadn’t asked him to come along. In fact, you’d have been fine getting back here to collect your stuff on your own. You’d have asked for a knife and set out without a second thought, if only because being alone in the woods with some guy was less preferable than doing it by yourself. Of course, some guy also probably saved your life, but you’re not quite ready to relinquish your trust completely. 

“Thanks for coming,” you decide. A peace offering. 

Katsuki doesn’t answer and you furrow your brows a little bit. You wonder if he’s always been like this or if the end of the world brought on the loss of his manners. 

Then, he stops, taking you by the arm and pulling you down beside a bush. You gasp and he puts his hand over your mouth to silence you. There’s the urge to bite him, to catch the fleshy bit connecting his thumb and pointer finger between your teeth and bite down till he bleeds, but you stop when you catch what he’s looking at. 

Two of the living dead crouch by a tree, clicking their tongues as they eat something just out of sight. You furrow your eyebrows, eyes widening at the horror of it. For some reason, seeing them always brings about a round of momentary shock. You’ve yet to let go of the hounding thought that they used to be people and sometimes have to reorient yourself to the world you’re in now. 

You catch Katsuki’s eye behind you, his calloused hand still clasped over your mouth, and nod your head. It’s a silent communication that you’ve seen what he has and he removes his palm from your face to grab a knife tucked into his belt, passing it to you quickly. 

The two infected haven’t noticed the two of you yet, but they will soon, if only by the smell of your flesh which has yet to rot. You hear Katsuki let out a breath, as if to calm his heart, and do the same. There’s time to look at them like this and you’re struck by how human you can pretend they are in your head. Well, you suppose they were human once, now they’re a disease using someone’s skin as a mask. 

Infected people aren’t quick, that’s one thing to be grateful for. Back when the outbreak first started, the CDC had released information on what to look out for in those who might have contracted the virus. The first was obviously a bite wound from another infected person, but you can tell from other symptoms. Early symptoms are average. Body aches, fever, lethargy, and delirium. All things you might see with a nasty flu. Then, infection of the wound site, twitching, foggy eyes—like low-grade cataracts—that develop within a matter of hours or days, severe disorientation, aversion to food, insomnia, with the final symptom being a coma that no one ever wakes up as themselves from. 

These are the symptoms that people are conscious for. The ones they feel. The sickness that people tried to nurse others back from. There is no coming back though, not alive at the very least. The virus attacks the nerves throughout the brain and body, that’s what causes the twitching and convulsions. It’s what ultimately kills us, and it's what they think causes the bodies to come back. 

Most infected will crack when they move. It’s the cartilage breaking down as the bones grind together and crack as they’re weakened from the marrow out. They twitch like rabid animals, unable to keep masterful control of their bodies because they are run like puppets from the brain stem. You don’t know if they think. If somehow the people they used to be are still in there, unable to stop themselves from consuming and spreading the virus to others. All you really know is that they twitch and click, functions of the brain that still remain. Tiny impulses sent through the synapses. You imagine it to be like the way you twitch when you sleep, an arm here or a leg there, the way someone might call out with their voice to a room with no one in it. 

Maybe the infected think they’re dreaming. A nightmare that they never wake up from, like those of us who have to put them down. You could see it as a mercy from that perspective. You have an easier time rationalizing putting a knife in someone’s skull if you convince yourself that they’re silently begging for it. 

Katsuki shifts his weight and looks at you. He mouths the words no guns and you nod, briefly wondering where the fuck he thinks you could have gotten a gun from. 

Then, you kick off and run with Katsuki towards the infected. They don’t really have time to begin moving towards you both. You’re faster than them, but you hear the crack of their legs as they stand from their crouched positions, pulled in at the idea of their next meal.

Katsuki takes the farther one, sinking the knife into the soft spot of its temple with relative ease. You switch yourself off and take the one closest only a few moments later, sending your blade through the top of its skull. That happens to you when you have to do this. You turn yourself off for a bit, just so that you don’t have to remember the way it feels to hit the soft part of someone’s brain. You didn’t used to do that, only starting when you realized that there’s no going through this world anymore without it. 

Katsuki wipes the blood on his pants. It’s brown, no longer oxygenated, and the area around you begins to reek. You notice, but for some reason the smell of decomposition doesn’t register in your brain and you continue on behind him. 

There are a few beats of silence, save for twigs breaking under your feet, before Katsuki speaks up. 

“You okay?” It’s barely above a whisper and you wouldn’t have caught it were you not listening for the distinctive crack of human bones. 

“Yeah,” you say, continuing forward. 

The campsite rounds into view and in this light, with your full night’s sleep under your belt, you can see just how pitiful it looks. A tent that you’d hastily put up before nightfall, the remains of your stamped out fire, the folding chair which has since been knocked over, and your weapons on the floor covered by a few leaves disturbed by the wind. 

You snatch them up and move to grab your backpack out of the tent. The inside is shitty too and your torn sleeping bag hadn’t even been rolled out yet. You pick up the bag, returning to the folding chair as Katsuki begins to take down the tent. The polyester and nylon blend zips together as he makes quick work of folding it. Then, he kicks some dry brush over the remains of the fire, like he’s covering your tracks. 

“The next person that comes through here might not be alone,” he says plainly. “And they may have more bullets than you did.” 

“Right,” you respond. Your voice sounds a little far off and you settle your backpack on your shoulder in one quick motion. 

“Got everything?” 

You nod, following him as he heads out in the direction you both came from. The two of you pass the bodies of the infected you’d killed. The smell has permeated the air, lingering like how it does in cities, only less pungent. Their fogged eyes stare blankly at nothing, expressions plain and unreadable. You pass and try not to think much about it. 

Katsuki is a few feet ahead of you and he doesn’t glance back to make sure you’re following. You could leave now and never get attached to these people. You could head off in another direction and never have to think twice about it. No more worrying about who you could lose, about who’s next to become one of the sick masses. Just you by yourself. Then, when you finally kick the can, someone else can put you down the way you did to those strangers. 

Is there really a point to it anymore? To community or living in general. No one is as they once were. Does that make it fantasy to live in their beautiful bubble? Could you even find it in yourself to pretend again, to make nice and play house in that place? They saved your life, sure. They fed you, clothed you, bathed you, but for what point? Tomorrow, you could end up back in the woods, lighting fires with twigs you found in the brush, paranoid that someone would find you or the fire would spread. 

You watch Katsuki’s back as he moves, shoulders shifting with each step. His shirt is stained, white turned eggshell from the wear and tear of time. It seems so off to you that he looks relatively clean, like he lives well. 

Fear strikes you as you realize that your rambling thoughts have merit. Anything you fear now has become real and loss is so tangible to you that you can squeeze it in your hand. They could turn you out. Tomorrow night you could begin the starve and step all over again, moving from place to place, talking to yourself, filling your hours with paranoid thoughts like these that plague you when you’re alone. Is that worse than loss? If you’re alone long enough, you’d probably forget what you’re missing. Losing anyone else could make the wound fresh. For now, the hunger wins out. 

Katsuki jogs ahead of you to get to the house. Momo is on the porch waving him in and he hurries up the steps and bursts through the front door. As you approach, you can hear voices, some of which are relieved, others hurried. When you enter the room, you find a man standing there whom you’ve never seen before, Shoto maybe. 

“A plus one,” the man looks up, tilting his head at you in an odd way. 

“Katsuki’s,” Kiri says with a low smirk. 

Shoto’s eyes widen as he peers at his friend, clutching what looks like an injured shoulder. Katsuki just huffs his irritation. 

“Well, that’s rare,” Shoto says. 

“What’s rare?” Katsuki spits. “They were in the woods with a fire. What was I supposed to do? Let ‘em die?” 

“Maybe,” Shoto says, a light smile creeping onto his features. Then, he turns to you. “What’s your name?” 

You give it to him and he nods his head, tilting it at you again. 

“How long are you staying?”

You’re not sure how to answer that question. In fact, no one is, and it feels like more of a test than it does a genuine inquiry. Kiri and Mina exchange a glance and Katsuki tosses a somewhat dirty look towards Shoto. Ochako gives Shoto a knowing glance and Sero and Denki shift uncomfortably on their feet. Then, Momo clears her throat, spurring Izuku to say something. 

“Shoto,” he says. “You’re probably hungry, you should eat something and lay down. Ochako? Could you take a look at his shoulder?” 

“Sure,” the girl says softly, giving a closed mouth smile to Shoto as she takes him by the arm. 

She glances at you as she passes, almost like she’s too embarrassed to look at you fully in the face. You suppose this is what happens when people are forced to think about whether or not they will potentially leave someone else to die. It’s like the trolley cart question and though in this case there is always the possibility of a better outcome, it’s not likely in this world. 

“Just until I’m rested,” you add with a small tilt of your head. “A few days.” 

Shoto looks at you over his shoulder and gives you a small smile. It’s funny, you can see kindness there. His actions aren’t kind, but you can feel that he has kindness in him, though his rudeness stems from something different than Katsuki’s, you think. Like he’s strange in some way. 

“I’ll start on dinner,” Sero says. “Kiri, give me a hand.” 

The group disperses and you head upstairs without speaking to anyone else. A few days to rest and then cut the first people you’ve spoken to in weeks loose. What sort of idiot gives up something like this to avoid a little awkwardness? Not that you necessarily had your mind made up. You wonder briefly if you’ve just sealed your own tomb. 

—

After dinner, you go upstairs to sleep after eating as much as they would offer you. Your stomach has ceased its constant growling and the shakiness that comes with hunger has receded almost entirely into the background. The bed is soft, with a slight dent in it from whoever slept in here before. The thought unsettles you that they’re probably dead now, but you try to push it from your mind as you steel yourself for what comes within the next few days. 

You had volunteered yourself to leave. To what? Save yourself the embarrassment of pleading? Did you even want to plead? Why are you regretting not asking to stay? These people don’t know you, what trust can you have built with them in only a few days? Your skin crawls at the expanse of possibilities in front of you after so many weeks without any. 

You think that if you let yourself walk away, you’ll probably die. You’re out of bullets and don’t know where to find any food except by luck. You can try to catch prey, but prey hides whenever infected are around, and they’re everywhere nowadays. It’s spring, water wouldn’t be a problem, but running water has its clear comforts. Then, there’s the possibility of loss. You’d come to care for these people if you stayed, you know it. 

You furrow your eyebrows and look at the ceiling. There’s really no choice to be made. You’ll let them make it for you, even if you don’t know them. It’s their house and you won’t walk in uninvited or try to take it. You’re not about to become a monster just because the world is full of them now.

The darkness grows and your eyes drift to the dim light wandering in under the crack of the door. Hushed voices whisper in the living room, you can hear them. It’s a heated discussion, lively, but deliberately quiet. It’s been hours since everyone went to bed, yet you get the impression that many people are chiming in. You’re too nosey to leave it be. 

You open the bedroom door silently, turning the cool knob with a wince as it clicks out of place. When you peer into the hallway, every upstairs bedroom door is open with the room empty. The light is coming from down stairs and around the corner, and you can see shadows move as you inch closer to the source. 

You pause at the top of the stairs, knowing that they creak, and crouch by the bannister to listen. You’re out of sight. The only way they’d know you’re listening is if you made a sound, but you won’t. You’re good at being quiet. 

“We don’t even know them,” someone says in a rushed whisper. “We don’t know what they’ve done before.” 

“Everyone’s done things they’re not proud of now, Shoto,” a woman adds. It’s Mina. She’s spoken enough to you that you recognize her voice. 

“I agree with Shoto,” says another woman, her voice higher pitched. She sounds guilty and her voice is tight as she speaks “We have no clue who they are. They could be dangerous.” 

“You mean like me, Ochako?” A man adds. “I could have been dangerous.” 

The group grows quiet for a moment. 

“No,” Momo says. You recognize the cadence of her voice. “Shoto might be right, Denki. It’s been nearly six months since you got here and the world has changed a lot. We don’t- we can’t know for sure.”

“Can we really know anything for sure?” Another man adds, Kiri.

“What about you guys?” Shoto says, presumably to the rest of the group. 

“I don’t know.”

“I’m hesitant, but I don’t know either.”  

“Jesus,” another man with a baritone voice, harsher than the rest. That’s Katsuki, the first voice you’d heard of the group. “You guys make me a little sick.” 

“That’s not fair,” Ochako says. 

“No,” he interrupts. “It is fair. You guys want to… what? Send them back out there to die?” 

“It’s not like that,” Shoto says.  

“It is like that,” he says, raising his voice and then lowering it back to a whisper. “You didn’t see them when they got here, Shoto. They- they didn’t look… shit. The rest of you, you saw them. You really want to send them back out there to fuckin’ waste away? I don’t know about you all, but I won’t do that to a person.” 

There’s a pregnant pause.

“Katsuki’s right,” Izuku says with a bit of conviction, like he’s finally made up his mind. “Sending someone out there alone is a death sentence. How does doing that make us any better than the people we’re trying to protect ourselves from?” 

“What if there are more of them?” Ochako says quietly. “What if they’re not alone?” 

“Trust me,” Katsuki says, “They were alone.” 

“But what if they’re not?” She insists at a whisper, a bit of shame creeping into her voice. “What if people come for us?” 

“See?” Shoto says gently. “There are so many what-ifs.” 

“That works the other way too,” Mina adds. 

You don’t listen to hear the rest of their conversation. They’re going to run themselves in circles debating about you. They’ll go around and around and land on whichever argument ends with the most votes. They’ll convince each other of one thing and it will happen totally out of your control. 

The bedroom door shuts with a low click that makes you wince again. You think about the people who went to bat for you and the people who didn’t. You don’t blame those who opposed. You’d have probably reacted similarly if your old group were still alive and you understand very clearly why they do it. One person’s stupid reaction can be catastrophic and they don’t know enough about you to be certain that you’re not one of those stupid people. It’s how the world went to shit in the first place and though nine months ago you’d have surely condemned someone for making the same decision, you know that fear has warped humanity beyond comprehension. You didn’t get it until you lived it. 

Still, Katsuki’s humanity feels intact somehow, more so than yours at least. His response is something you probably never would have said under the same conditions and you can’t help but feel some sort of fondness bloom in you for him. Call it connection, gratefulness for his willingness to stick his neck out for you, a trauma response. You still feel it. Mina and Kiri had said that Katsuki was a good judge of character and that’s why they were willing to back him. You wonder briefly if maybe Katsuki sees something in you that you don’t recognize in yourself anymore, or maybe something you don’t expect other people to recognize. What is it that he wants so badly to protect? 

Someone stomps down the hallway, heavy boots against the old creaky floors. You hear the steps recede down the hallway, maybe a door or two down, before it shuts quickly. The sound makes you wince and you listen as the house grows quiet and then hums quietly with the sound of others coming upstairs a few moments later. Someone pads to the end of the hall, pushing the door open. 

You hear a woman’s voice, so muffled that you can’t make out what she’s saying. Then, you hear the sound of a man’s affirmation before the bedroom door shuts and the visitor moves back down the hall to a separate bedroom. Information passing through the house. 

Someone is moving around in a room below you and you figure that there are probably bedrooms downstairs as well. From the outside, you’d never guess that the place could house ten people. Inside though, the bedrooms are small. That’s probably why so many can fit. You’d guess that the place used to have multiple generations living in it, or maybe even rented out rooms to people for a few months. It sort of has a boarding house feel to it, like many people have come and gone even before people stopped staying in one place. 

That’s a good thing to call it, the boarding house. It certainly has that sort of feel to it, many of its spaces undeniably communal. 

You turn over in the bed, facing the bedroom door. The lights have gone out completely now and the house is quiet save for the occasional creak or thud from someone preparing to sleep. It’s been a long while since the sounds of living have been so prevalent near you. You’re eased by the sounds of the house settling, a familiar reminder of what living used to be. Your group had been on the road long before you lost them and the comforts of an interior are almost overwhelmingly nostalgic. You’re better rested to notice it now and shutting your eyes, you savor the feeling. 

—

“Need some help?” You say. 

Denki turns around, grease smeared across his nose where he likely wiped it with his dirty hands. He’s holding a wrench in a glove so tattered that it hardly counts as a glove anymore. He looks startled, amber eyes widening before he uses his forearm to brush stray hairs out of his face. The rest of it is pulled up into a messy ponytail, revealing the moist back of his neck. 

“Oh, sure,” he says, a bit surprised. “Do you know how generators work?” 

He crouches back over the machine and you step up behind him. 

The machine is rusted near the bottom and between the exposed winding pipes. Its paint has chipped away, leaving the weather-damaged metal open for you to see. On the side, a fan-like piece spins slowly in circles and the machine whirs and sputters softly as it… generates power, probably. 

“Not quite, but an extra pair of hands is always helpful,” you say softly, passing him a tool he’d been reaching for. “Did it break?” 

“No,” Denki says, “but it’s probably on its last legs. The thing’s almost as old as we are, probably older, so it’s good to tune it up a bunch.” 

You hum your agreement, tilting your head as you stand and watch him work. 

You’re not necessarily comfortable with Denki, but he feels like a safe person for some reason. Maybe it’s because he’s got a sort of ditzy, non-threatening vibe to him. You can almost distinctly picture him tripping over his own feet and something about that makes you feel considerably safer than someone who wouldn’t. That and he was the first person you’ve come across this morning who you don’t think distrusts you too badly. 

“Are you dodging something?” Denki smirks up at you from his crouch. 

“Who on earth would I be dodging?” you snort a bit defensively. 

“Shoto,” he says with a light smile. “He put you in a tight spot the other day.” 

“Yeah, well,” you say, glancing over your shoulder. “It wasn’t anything he didn’t have a right to ask.” 

“Right, but it sure was rude, huh?” 

Denki laughs to himself a little and you’re surprised by how easygoing he is. You subconsciously begin to categorize him with Mina and Kiri. The dichotomy of this group baffles you a bit, but you can certainly see all nine of them as a collective. Tightly knit and well acquainted with the habits of others. 

“Oh!” He exclaims, “I have something you can do for me.” 

You tilt your head. 

“There’s a bucket over there,” he says, pointing absentmindedly to a shitty plastic bucket against the side of the house. “We use the water from the creek as coolant. It’s not factory grade, but it does the trick. You wanna go fill it up and bring it back for when I’m done tuning this thing up?” 

You furrow your eyebrows, not sure where the creek he’s talking about is. 

“The creek is just over there,” he points behind the house to the edge of the treeline. “I know you can’t see it from here, but if you walk in a straight line, you’ll hit it. Katsuki should be down there too, so you can use him as a landmark.” 

When you don’t immediately answer, Denki whines a little. 

“I mean,” he says, “I’d go myself, but-” 

“I’ll do it,” you laugh a little and Denki seems surprised that you do. 

“Really?” 

“Yeah,” you shrug. “I’d like to pull some weight at least while I’m here. Plus, I offered.” 

Denki mumbles his pleasure and you walk to the bucket without another word and set off in the direction Denki pointed. You’re much more willing to go out to the treeline now that you have a knife back at your side. 

The walk to the trees is longer than it looks, like how sometimes the horizon looks like something you could reach out and climb up onto. The walk stretches with each step you take and you become a little more understanding of why Denki didn’t want to do it himself. But the walk is actually pleasant, the warmth of mid May collecting evenly on your skin as the humidity grows more intense with the sun. 

You wonder what Katsuki would be doing by the creek. Maybe he’s fishing, or crouched over himself sharpening an arsenal of knives that you think he might keep in a roll attached to his belt sometimes. You’re not sure why, but Katsuki sort of has that expression to him. He’s handsome, but the scowl projects something hostile that makes him seem unapproachable. 

As you cross through the middle of the clearing, you could almost imagine that this is a normal day. Humidity collects on your skin, making you sweat a little as you dodge gopher holes and soft spots of dirt. It almost feels like summer camp, if it weren’t for the looming idea that you’re contributing to something you may not be a part of. Denki’s attitude though, has you hoping for a more favorable outcome, if you want to call it that. 

You’re only a few steps into the line of trees when the earth dips into a sand-lined ravine. The trees leave room for the sun to beat down on warmed rocks, making the area seem brighter with their subtle reflection of the light. The noise of the creek drowns out the sound of your footsteps and you shuffle toward where the earth flattens just before the water starts. A little ways to your right, you can see Katsuki sitting on a rock in the sun, his hands dipped into a large bucket. You narrow your eyes as he pulls what looks like a cloth out of the water, rubbing the fabric together before dipping it in the cool water of the creek.

As you approach, you realize what it is that he’s doing. It’s laundry. On the other side of him, you can see a bin of what look like dirty clothes and water-soaked clean ones. Talk about misjudged character. 

“Katsuki,” you say as you approach him, the bucket still empty in your hand.

He squints up at you, shifting his face so that it's in your shadow. 

“You’re still here,” he says plainly, returning to his task. 

“Clearly,” you respond, watching as he runs his fingers over the next piece of clothing in the bucket. 

“Why are you down here? Did Denki pawn the generator water onto you?” He says, like he’s somewhat frustrated. “He does that shit to anyone he can.” 

You shrug your shoulders and continue to stare at him. 

“Are you just gonna stand there?” He huffs out. 

“You’re doing laundry.” 

“Yeah?” he furrows his eyebrows and looks at you. “So?” 

“Nothing,” you say. “I just didn’t expect that.” 

“Yeah well,” he stops for a moment like he’s struggling to find the words. “It needed to be done. Figured I might as well.” 

“How progressive of you,” you joke with a straight face. 

He looks at you out of the corner of his eyes and sighs, not justifying your comment with a response. You find yourself smiling a little bit. 

“If you’re going to linger, sit down and do it,” he says. “You’re creeping me out.” 

You oblige him and sit down on a rock next to him, far enough that you’re not touching, but near enough to hear him if you speak in a low voice. For some reason, you feel a sort of kinship with Katsuki. You’d thought longer than you’d like to admit about his willingness to vouch for you and find that you want to live up to his expectation of your goodness, even if it’s not what you believe yourself to be anymore. Maybe it’s because you’ve slept well the past few nights and feel more like yourself, but there’s a certain casualness to conversing with him that you enjoy. He’s not looking at what you could be, but rather what you’re showing him that you are. His lack of doubt in that is something you find relatively attractive. 

You watch his arms out of the corner of your eye in between gazing at the treeline and the sky. Your field of vision catches on them, his sleeves cut short to expose his biceps, a bit muddied near the elbows where the mud has begun to stick. 

Katsuki doesn’t seem all that bothered by your presence, but now and then you’ll catch the sideways glance he gives you, almost like he’s trying to figure out exactly why you’re lingering. 

“How long have you been with them?” You ask, more as a way to fill the silence. 

Katsuki’s hands pause as he thinks about answering, then, they continue their steady pace. 

“A decent amount of time,” he says. “I met Izuku first, probably in November just before Mina and Kiri. The rest came later.” 

You furrow your eyebrows. 

“No offense,” you start, “but you don’t really seem like the group type.” 

“And you don’t seem like the type who’d be alone,” he retorts, like your statement was stupid. 

You press your lips into a tight line, not really knowing how to respond. 

“Sorry,” he says, shaking his head a little. 

“Were you?” 

“What? Was I sorry?” He furrows his eyebrows at you. 

“No,” you shake your head. “Were you alone? Before Izuku.” 

He goes silent. You’ll take that as a yes, but you regret asking a little. It had just slipped out. If someone were to ask you something like that, you’d probably react the same way. That’s just as well, you don’t really need to know him like that anyway. 

You wonder briefly if anyone does. He seems closed off, but Mina and Kiri spoke about him a few days prior like they knew him well. Well enough at least to allude to a history you’ll likely never be privy to. Then there’s Momo, who whispers little things to him that he answers in kind. Curiosity gets the better of you, if only to tease. 

“Do you have a girlfriend?” you ask and Katsuki’s response is to rest his elbows on his knees and let out a dry laugh. 

He turns his head and looks at you from the side. “And what the fuck are you asking me that for?” 

“Just curious,” you say. “Is it Momo?” 

“Momo?” He makes a sour face at you. “Yeah, right.” 

“She’s pretty,” you say. 

“Sure is,” he responds dryly. “If you’re into the mom type.” 

“What? You’re not into moms?” You grin a little and Katsuki furrows his eyebrows at you. 

“So you do have a personality,” he scoffs a little. 

There’s a pause. You haven’t felt this in a while. The feeling of bonding with someone new, compatibility on the human level that feels nearly instant. 

“I’m kinda serious though,” you say, tilting your head down to catch his eye. “Do you?” 

You’re leaning a little closer to him now.

“You seen any nice restaurants to take a person out to these days?” he questions, clearly a little frustrated with you in the way someone gets when they’re a bit amused. 

“You don’t have to take someone out to a restaurant to fuck them, you know?” You laugh a little. 

Katsuki’s lips part and he swallows like his mouth has gone dry. 

“Yeah, well,” he starts, looking away from you. “I’m a romantic. Sue me.” 

He’s just full of surprises, isn’t he? You find that you’re captivated by this feeling, this humanity, that exists in him. It’s something alive between you both, something left behind from the old world, and you crave it the same way you crave food. 

Katsuki continues scrubbing the clothes, rubbing the fabric together and then dunking it in the bucket before plunging it into the freshwater creek. You’re not sure why you do it, but the next time he looks at you, you kiss him. 

It’s not as if you like him, but it’s something to feel. Some remnant of the butterflies you used to feel on dates and the kiss makes you feel like you could be close to human again. You pull away almost as soon as you put his lips to yours and you can tell that the expression on your face is one of surprise.

Katsuki blinks for a second, looking at you with his brows knitted together. The expression doesn’t leave him as he places a wet hand on the side of your face to kiss you again. It’s an anxious kiss, confused and slow but—like someone riding a bike for the first time in years—it quickly becomes something familiar. Muscle memory that you both let yourselves sink into. 

You can feel his expression as he kisses you, something between confusion and desire, like his own actions are perplexing. You feel the same way, hesitant, but reaching in the dark for the promise of some sort of normalcy. You want to feel like a person again. You haven’t felt it in so long and you push yourself against him as the ache swells in you. 

The two of you continue like this for a moment, Katsuki’s fingers pressing lightly into the skin of your neck. You moan softly as his tongue slips into your mouth, taking a sharp inhale at the sensation of skin on skin. The sound of the creek drowns out the clicking of your mouths, but you can feel the way he hums into your mouth. They’re little sounds, involuntary ones driven by the nervous, desirous feelings inside of you both. 

Then, Katsuki pulls away, swallowing thick as he takes his bottom lip between his teeth for a moment. You appreciate the way they look. They’re swollen, anxious to continue and keep forgetting where you really are. He drops his hand from your face with a sigh and almost seems like he comes back to himself. You do the same, moving back into an upright position. 

“Denki will want that water soon,” he clears his throat and motions to the empty bucket by your feet. 

“Oh,” you say, laughing a little. “Right.” 

You stand, dusting off the back of your pants and dunking the bucket into the water. It sloshes, the liquid hitting the back of the plastic with a satisfying elastic sound. You begin to walk away without another word, heading down the way you came to climb up the gentler part of the slope. 

“Hey,” Katsuki calls softly. “You should stay. We talked it over last night. You can if you want to.” 

The last part, he says facing the wash, his hands moving as if he hadn’t said anything at all. You don’t respond, knowing that the obvious answer is already yes. 

Dread settles in your stomach. It’s an icky, swirling feeling that threatens to make you double over. You climb up the bank, the water in the bucket sloshing as you move through the trees and enter the clearing. The feeling doesn’t dissipate, growing as you leave the cover of the trees. You probably wouldn’t have kissed him if he’d asked you that earlier. 

The boarding house comes into view and you can see Denki sitting beside the generator, conversing with who appears to be Shoto. They turn and Denki waves you down, Shoto turning away and starting around for the front of the house. 

Denki jogs to meet you, taking the bucket from your hand. You flex your fingers as the weight is removed, wincing a little at how stiff they feel. 

“Jeez, what took you so long?” Denki laughs and with your new information, you understand his willingness to be friendly with you a little better. 

“I asked Katsuki for his life story,” you respond dryly, following him back to the generator. 

Denki looks over his shoulder and laughs at you. “Did he tell you?” 

You pause for a moment, watching as Denki unscrews something and pours the water in. 

“Nope,” you say. “Not a thing.”

Click Here to go to the second chapter and find the rest of the series on ao3. The remainder will not be posted on tumlbr, but please feel free to reblog!

[wolvwa]

Streamer au Izuku playing dress to impress.

It's cannon.

fem reader (.❛ ᴗ ❛.)

Sometimes, he begs you to play with him.

"Girl you are not eating.."

"You don't even have skin yet be real."

"Thank you for the five gifted, Deku's....!"

You don't let him finish reading that, and he's very grateful. Overall, his chat is normal, and you two are clipped everywhere on tiktok. Especially when he screams out rigged (and it very much is.)

"Chat we are getting podium today!"

"Dont jinx it baby, please."

He did jinx it.

"Get off of our stage right now girl you did not even touch the plate."

CLIPPPPEEDDDD!!!!

He doesn't spam pose, he has all his posed favorited in order and syncs with you.

When you two finally do get podium, he's cheering and very quickly running off screen to hug you. That's clipped, too. It's either a ship edit or an edit starting with him going "TOLD YALL WE SLAYEDDD!!"

You two make Ochako or Katsuki join you sometimes.

Katsuki is surprisingly good and gets podium almost every time. He thinks it's rigged when he doesn't which makes for a loud ass fucking stream. If it's the same theme he's done, he is not doing the same fit.

Ochako is more calm on the other hand.

"Aw.. you all did great, ggs!" The ggs is a little forced with the people who didn't even try..

I think she's more prone to getting 4th and 3rd place😭

Katsuki is so aggressive reading chat everybody loves him. Show him and edit and he's staring at the screen like.

'...what'

And

'DAMN RIGHT I SERVED CUNT!'

Don't get me started on horror games with these bitches. Most insane sleepover trio.

Everyone's screaming for different reasons. Izuku is floating cause Ochako accidently touched him when she accidentally floated her phone. Bakugou isn't scared, he's just mad you're all being babies. And that you went to try getting Izuku down after sitting to him the whole time.

After stream, Izuku is happily enjoying sleep over time with you all. Katsuki takes over his bed, and you decide to take over his takeover. To which you two have a screaming match. Ochako is fine with her little floor bed while Izuku is panicking on where to sleep.

Would Kaachan really let him sleep in the same bed?

Yes

Katsuki makes Izuku sleep at the bottom

"It's my bed...but okay😒"

You made Ochako join so you two are cuddled against the wall while you hold hands with Izuku from your new long distance relationship 💔

Katsuki grumbles to himself about letting you idiot keep him up so lage and presses his back against yours. He's very warm so you have absolutely no complaints.

Izuku very much does, though.

[goosegooserevolution]

Part 1 of my zombie comic

No quirks AU! This was crossposted to tiktok which is why the formating is Like That lol

[nekoo3001]

Zombie apocalypse au pt.2/The first meeting. Happy Halloween!

Pt.1:

https://www.tumblr.com/neko3001/731984584052523008/neko3001?source=share

[thicctails]

MLP x MHA infection au concepts!!!

[pityslash]

— “IN THE WATER.”

SHIP: bakugo x fem reader

DESCRIPTION: one year unexpectedly turned into two, you start to think all hope is lost in the apocalypse. spoiler warning: the real danger in the zombie apocalypse isn't the dead, it's the living.

TW: short series, apocalypse au, rawr rawr zombies & mild gore, descriptions of a panic attack, friends to lovers, main character injury.

　　I. WHO ARE YOU?

“please let there be something other than canned beans.”

you stood watch in front while he was looking around the back aisles. you two were in search of food, but everything else has been wiped out already. you weren’t excited about moving onto the next town.

it was cold out, you bury your face in the scarf around your neck when a shiver runs down your spine. occasionally you would see a few undead stumble towards you, empty eyes and its jaw hanging loose. you always took care of them quickly, you just have to aim for the head. “katsuki.”

it’s been years since everything turned to shit. when the bitten were who you feared and everyone you knew was gone. sacrifice or idiocy, it didn’t matter. but sometimes, you’ll catch a glimpse of the survivors —they always traveled in groups and you wanted to avoid them at all costs.

you had to remind yourself what kind of people would be left over, what morals they have.

the screams met deaf ears when katsuki saved you from this other man, grabbing his neck and throwing his body on the ground, the eyes of horror before getting a shot to the head. you shift slowly, shards of glass dig into your hands as he comes closer.

“you killed them.” you hated the way your voice trembles. blood leaks out of the holes in their heads, your throat tightens and aches like you’re about to cry.

it was like static noise on television, the buzz of city life only a memory in the back of your mind. now all you hear was the groaning of the undead, and the screams of those who weren’t resourceful enough.

your small moment of peace doesn't last long, broken by the slide of the glass door behind you and a pair of footsteps. you don't need to look over your shoulder to know who it is. “there’s nothing but dog food. some fucks must have found our stash.”

you can’t hide the disappointment on your face and it makes katsuki roll his eyes, pushing up the safety lever on the beretta 92 before sliding it back into the band around his waist. “i see more revenants coming this way, let’s go.”

katsuki holds out a hand and you take it.

the man took a glance at your arms and legs and you knew what you’d see from the excruciating agony. “yeah, should i have left you for dead?” he kicks your leg with his shoe, “maybe i’ll shoot you anyway, just in case.”

in case you were bitten? you were bleeding too much for it to be a bite.

“no— of course not!”

you hold your breath, bruised cheeks burning and you felt dizzy when he raised the pistol again, unblinking and focused. “stop yelling, jackass.” you can’t even look at him directly.

you’re shaking and everything hurts, and the blood everywhere makes you so scared, the gun pointed at you makes you so scared. it was the ease with which he saved your life, the complete lack of hesitation.

“keep zoning out and you’ll get lost again.”

“that was one time.” you take a deep breath, the smell of wet grass doing little to calm your nerves about being in the open like this. “how much further?”

“just a few miles.” katsuki says quietly, not a hint of hostility in his voice for the first time, and you nod, fighting to get your breathing under control. you wished, more than anything, that you had your anxiety medication.

“hey, relax. before you make yourself pass out,”

it took a long time to gain his trust, having to pack up the bedding while he took care of the rest before you two made it to the city, in case you made a run for it with days worth of food. the hours and hours on your feet and the whining while this man told you to shut up, struggling through a harsh winter.

but he was true to his word.

“it looks abandoned.” you look up at the house with boarded up windows and a wooden fence, it was too quiet. “wanna do it?” the sky was pretty and clear, finally warming up but that meant the undead would venture out again, too. katsuki sighs, “we can’t be too sure, be careful.”

you duck behind the car halfway up the driveway and creep up the stairs of the front porch.

the slits between the boards give you a limited view inside, seeing only the first room but there was a gate leading to the backyard, though it was chained up. katsuki kept watch while you tried the knob. it was locked, of course.

you share a glance and he held his gun at the ready with a nod. pulling out the crowbar from your backpack, you pry at the door as quietly as possible, the sound of wood splintering. it took a few tries but you finally eased the door open.

you two searched the house, both floors came up empty besides a few dead animals. there were four bedrooms, one belonging to a young girl and you wondered about the kind of family who once lived here.

smudged pencil marks on the door frame, glittery princess stickers peeling off the yellow walls. you find out the girl’s name and it didn’t make you feel any better.

the sun was setting so you two settled in for the night, putting your sleeping bags down in the living room and lighting a small candle. the house was empty and wasn’t completely falling apart. “here, take it.”

he was giving up his share. you offer half of the jerky and he reluctantly takes it, the grumble of his stomach enough to shut his mouth.

“thanks.”

for miles all that could be heard was the sound of running water and kicking a stone on the road, that random tune that got stuck in your head last night.

the sun was high in the sky and it reminded you that you’d have to meet with katsuki at noon. you were the one who suggested the split up to cover more ground even if he was reluctant.

“is it too early for lunch?” you asked no one, digging through your bag for the last of the jam and bread you packed before leaving home. things were getting harder every day, and you two were getting more and more frustrated when you came back empty handed.

you take a bite out of the bread and savor the blueberry jam, rich and sweet. katsuki would always tell you to make it last, maybe you’ll save him half.

you finally made it back to the market. those things always wandered about, and the place was too big to just walk inside hoping for the best.

so you knock your crowbar against the tile floor to call out any more undead but there was only silence. you start to go through the mess. sunflower seeds, some dented cans of tuna and fried apples, it must have been luck.

you were looking at the arrangement of dead flowers and think about taking a magazine with a cover that caught your eye, but then you heard a scream.

there’s gunshots and names thrown around as you rush over to see the commotion. you quickly see more undead thanks to all the noise, hoping katsuki wouldn’t come this way, because you could be stuck here for a while.

two kids were cornered just across the street, it used to be a barber shop, those disgusting things getting closer and closer. leave them or give into the last bit of humanity you had. “hey, this way!”

you call out to them from the other side, it was a little girl standing in front of the boy, who you assume was her brother. she cried in frustration when the gun clicked each time she pulled the trigger. revenants are fast, but they’re clumsy, so you could be faster.

you stab two in the head without breaking a sweat, they fall to the ground with a hollow thump. you make a run for it since more were drawn by the noise. “come on!”

they caught up quickly, the scraping of that girl’s shoes against the cement makes you want to cover your ears. “katsuma!” you hear from behind, turning to see her pick him up from the ground. he tripped.

“hurry!��� you might have pushed their backs too hard if the squeak that left the boy’s mouth was any tell, struggling to keep up with their small legs. then you notice the alley, taking a sharp turn and yanking their arms to pick them up.

suddenly you were inside a heavy metal door, it was dark and they whisper as you slide down the handle and there’s a click.

“quiet,” you shush them, using your own body to shield them if worst turns to worst. you feel the boy bury his face in your shirt, grossed out by tears and snot, and the little girl squeezed your hand, so tight it felt like it’d bruise.

you were horribly out of breath, maybe even scared. but the undead finally passed —waiting a few minutes wouldn’t hurt. you listen as the groans and growls get far enough, taking a deep inhale and slowly moving away from the cool surface.

it was alright.

“we’re safe now.“ but you can't even turn back before there is something cold on the back of your head. this time she holds the gun with confidence, fingers on the trigger.

“put your hands up and close your eyes.” you feel your blood boil, the tone of this girl’s voice not sitting right but maybe that was the point. “don’t do anything dumb.. take the bag.”

you noticed the boy, katsuma, had dried the tears from his face and started to walk over while you slowly took off your backpack, which he took with shaky hands. “so i just saved you and now you’re robbing me?”

he must have been surprised it felt so heavy.

the girl snatches it from him. “we were fine, didn’t ask for your help.” sure seemed like it. you turn your head and watch her digging around in your backpack and you know katsuki will kill you.

“we’ll just take this, thanks. keep your eyes closed and count to fifty before you go.” she said, and for some reason you did.

the silence after their small footsteps fade out, even with your keen ear. you finally found katsuki waiting for you anxiously outside of the market.

“i heard the gunshots. what happened?” he was quick to ask and you were never one to hold back from him. too bad he was as upset as you expected. “—but you’re alright?”

the question made your smile get bigger, and you feign a small limp. “mm, i twisted my ankle so bad.” katsuki didn’t look impressed. “anyway.. katsuki, they could have been with a group, don’t you think? maybe they got separated.”

you made it home before dark. when you finally are able to shake off the feeling of being watched, you collapse on a chair in the dining room, the legs scraping against the floor loudly. katsuki drops his bag on the table and you make grabby hands, “so, what’s for dinner?”

“beans. and more beans.”

the look you give him makes katsuki glare back, opening the lid of one can. “don’t complain! next time, don’t let some kid take our shit.”

you snatch a can of beans and katsuki rolls his eyes, spoon flinging a bean at you from across the table. “didn’t your mom ever tell you not to play with your food?” but katsuki only gives a half smile, and it makes dimples dig into his cheeks. you swear you haven’t seen him smile before, or maybe you never noticed.

you two eat in silence and start to get ready for bed, doing one last house check and finally putting out the light. you stayed up a little longer though, wrapped in a small matted blanket as those kids have yet to leave your mind.

glancing out the window, stars bright in the unpolluted sky, you hoped they had a safe place to sleep tonight. you sigh and finally close your eyes, not that it makes a difference in the dark.

[s0larts]

Apocalypse au? 🤔🤔

[sugolara]

Away with you

ft. Katsuki Bakugo x Shoto Todoroki x Izuku Midoriya x fem! reader

Synopsis: After a deadly virus leaks all over the world, every country is forced to close down it's borders and airports to prevent anyone from coming in and out. Though, it's to late for some people. The dead has rose and is looking for revenge. Cw: gore, quirkless! au, apocalypse! au, zombie! au, weapons, death, angst, lots and lots of blood, cannibalism, suicidal thoughts, slow burn

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Moon high up, specks of dirt fluttered around pairs of running shoes. Rustling bushes caused nearby rotters to move in the direction, their growls growing louder as they caught a glimpse of their next meal. Lungs were aching, but they couldn't afford to take a quick break, not when they were left in the open with hundreds of trees surrounding them.

With his pistol kept low, Izuku led the group to safety. He took every option that was given to avoid the rotters that tried grabbing on them. Granted they had to take things into their own measure, but with a quick slice, hit, and shoot they managed to break free.

Behind him was F/n and Katsuki, both their weapons ready incase they were caught off guard. When they felt like they were at a safe distance, they came to a halt, crouching by a bush that contained red berries. They looked at what's in front of them, but to their disappointment only a road that stretched out for miles could be seen.

"Do you guys see any signs?" Izuku whispered as he tried looking in the dark. From the corners of his eyes he could see F/n and Katsuki shake their heads. He closed his eyes as he let out an inaudible sigh, "We'll follow the road and see if we find anything. Okay?"

Receiving a nod, they quickly took off just as a rotter spotted them. They stayed by the road, using the bushes and overgrown trees to keep them hidden. Apart from the dead they'd sometimes come into contact with a few critters that ran by when they disturbed their homes.

It wasn't until sunrise when Izuku could faintly hear the sound of running water. With the sun now guiding them, they emerged from the trees, wiping away their sweat as they found a bridge with a pile of cars. From where they stood, they could see a few dead trampled over by cars or resting near them.

"Be careful." Izuku softly said as he moved to a vehicle. The two behind him separated as they searched through the other cars. Wiping the dust that sat on the window of the driver seat, he peeked inside and apart from luggage there seemed to be no rotter. He placed his hand on the handle and tried opening it, but it refused to do so.

He didn't want to break the window and alert anybody so he moved onto the next vehicle. The untinted windows allowed him to see inside. A set of car keys still dangled from the ignition and a backpack sat in the passenger's seat. Luckily, the doors were unlocked, allowing him to check the bag.

Nothing but accessories, clothes and photo albums. A disdain sigh left him as he checked underneath the side of the steering wheel to prop open the trunk. A click was heard as the trunk opened and he headed out to search. However, when he fully opened it and peered inside his mind shut down. A quiet moan traveled through the trunk as a dead woman with hands bound behind her back tried reaching out for him. He closed the trunk quietly and moved onto another vehicle.

Inside a black truck, F/n threw luggage's of cases onto the floor when it contained nothing useful. She'd sigh and roll her eyes when her hands grabbed photos and clothes. She turned to face the front as she took in a breath. She was able to see herself in the rear mirror and frowned when she saw smudges of dirt mixed with blood on her face. She wiped it off with her sleeve as she headed back outside.

She checked the trunk, pulling off the tarp only to be met with a tire. Hearing a soft moan, she turned to the direction with her machete in hand. Seeing a rotter coming towards her, she approached it and with a quick movement she decapitated the middle of its head. Hearing the body thud, she wiped the remaining blood on her jeans as he made her way towards Katsuki, "Found anything?"

The blonde scoffed as he threw items out of the truck, "Just damn junk. Anything from Deku?"

She shrugged as she leaned on the vehicle, her eyes going to Izuku who searched through one, "Don't think he's having any much more luck than we are."

"What a damn pity." He mumbled as he moved to a vehicle next to the truck. Opening the driver's door, he spotted a set of camping tools. Grabbing it, he placed it on the hood of the car before unlatching the leather that held it together and a grin formed on his lips; two sets of hunting knives, a combat knife, hatchet, pocket knife, and headlamp with spare batteries.

He slid it towards F/n as he went back inside the car, "Don't hog it all."

He heard her call for Izuku as he looked at the backseat. His grin fell when he saw a car seat. Blood coated the pink seats as a sippy cup laid in the middle of the backseat. He decided not to check the vehicle as he closed it.

"Here." F/n threw the blonde a water bottle. She then pointed to Izuku who wasted no time in chugging his, "I retract my statement. He is having better luck than us. He found a map to."

"So far," Izuku fiddled with the map as he looked over it. Though he felt embarrassed when he realized he had no idea where they stood since they've been running through the woods, "...I have no idea..."

"Give me that!" The blonde yanked it out of his hand.

"How are you supposed to know where we are even when we don't know?" She confusingly glanced at him, "And should we really trust you with the map? Remember last time? You got us lost."

He scoffed as he gave the map a death stare, "Only happened once, stop making it a big deal."

"A big deal that almost landed us on top of a horde." She muttered though pulled back when he lifted the map, about to smack her head.

Ignoring their antics, Izuku pulled himself on the trunk of a car. He placed his foot to where he wouldn't slip as he looked beyond the rows of abandoned vehicles. Another set of woods, but just in the distance he could faintly spot skyscrapers, "It looks like where next to a city."

Removing her hand from the blonde's wrist, she turned to the freckle male, shielding her eyes as the sun set above them, "You see a sign or something?"

Izuku hummed, "No, but it looks really far."

"So much for being useful." Katsuki mumbled. He then folded the map before placing it in his back pocket, "Let's get to it. I'm starving."

"We all are." She said, hearing Izuku jump off the vehicle.

"Let's get going." The male let out a huff and adjusted his bag once more, "If the city is Rhote, we want to head they're before sunset."

That's right, their next destination was the city Rhote. It's where they heard the radio broadcasted of a sanctuary a few months back. Chances of it being rundown was a high possibility, but they wanted to place that thought at the back of their heads, instead hoping that the sanctuary was still running. It would be a first since they've seen other people, to which F/n was weary of, but if it meant scoring a warm meal and a nice bed she'd put that thought away for now.

Continuing to use the vehicles to hide their figures, Katsuki, with his newly found weapon, used it to eliminate the dead that almost grabbed onto them. Being in the back he came across quite a few, not that he cared, he was just irritated at the fact blood would splatter on him.

With them continuing to walk, they managed to exit the small bridge to walk another few miles of trees surrounding them. Their quiet steps kept them safe, however, when they reached the end of the woods, another bridge laid ahead of them except it seemed the road they walked on was the main part of entering the city Rhote as it had fences and concrete barriers to barricade it. There were even a few rotters with gear on, making it difficult to kill them.

"You've got to be fucking kidding me." The blonde said before letting out a frustrated groan, "Are you serious right now!?"

"Kacchan, keep it down." Izuku said, noticing that the rotters turned to them, the fence rattling as they tried to grab them.

Looking around, F/n pointed behind the fences where a sign big enough for one to see was posted, "How lucky are we to find Rhote?"

"Awesome!" Izuku pulled out his map, before glancing at the area around him, "We can't enter through there so we'll have to go around."

"Back in the woods?" Katsuki annoyingly said, "I've got dead fucking bugs on my hair. Do you see this!? You think I want more!?"

The freckle male chuckled, only feuding to the blonde's anger, "We'll just go back and go around. It won't take long if we run."

Her hands were on her hip as she glanced at the sky, listening to them talk. She could hear the blonde scoff and Izuku's map crinkle as he placed it back on his pocket. She could also hear a rotter and a squelch with the blonde grunting as she looked to the clouds, muttering to herself, "Rain."

"Ready?" Izuku asked them both and with a nod they ventured back into the forest. After three months, with feet aching, rodents being killed for meals and eyebags heavy, they desperately hoped that the sanctuary they heard before was their ticket out of this mess. The chances of it still standing was nothing, but they were sure something was waiting for them.

[allmightsherocostume]

#5, strange looks

Chap.1

FALLEN JUSTICE

[hh0kum]

"just take my hand... Idiot"

BakuSero apocalypse AU

[helixol]

(click for better quality!)

got to do a piece for the MHA horror bang over on twt :)

the accompanying fic by samsaur is on AO3. it is so good! it has some audiobook-style journals from the bakusquad, ft. krbk, srrk, and lots of zombie trauma 😈

[drlessy]

redrawing my fave MHA AUs/fanfics pt. 8 ^-^

Apocalypse AU! :)

fanfic link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29138859

[nekoo3001]

Some 相澤 in zombie apocalypse au,probably will do a pt2

Pt.2:

[undermine-the-instinct]

When We Begin Again

Bakugou x Sniper!Reader Chapter One

《 No Quirks Zombie AU》

Chapter one of my riseofthedeadcollab, by @medusashima is here!! Took me long enough

Warnings: Foul language, world typical injuries. Wc: 7.4 K

About: Japan has fallen under the weight of the apocalypse, but three prestigious colleges remain as sanctuaries, trying to take back the world they once knew. But something strange is happening in the depths of the city, and Bakugou doesn't know what this could spell. He has enough to deal with Shiketsu and Ketsubutsu's powerplays. But he at least knows (hopes) you're strong enough to protect yourself.

It's a fucking shitshow out there.

It's a fucking shitshow everywhere else too really, but fuck this really takes the cake.

Across from him, hiding behind a wall, Kirishima meets his eyes. A horde of those nasty motherfuckers were in the corridor ahead of them, standing in between them and the plexiglass holding all the medicines that they needed. Either they run, and they could outrun these shits, the exit isn't too far off and Sero still has the car still running, or they take a chance and start blasting.

And they really need this fucking medicine, so there's really only one answer.

In sync, they raise their guns, take aim and start shooting.

______

"We just grabbed as much as we could carry, we made sure we got you that asthma pump and your damn allergy medicine too, so here." Kirishima finished pulling out all the bags they brought and filled, and Sero got out of the car to lean against its side, lit cigarette in hand. Bakugou wrinkled his nose.

"Put that shit away man. Your teeth are already too fucking long, you trying dye them shits yellow now too?"

"Fuck off man," Sero chuckled, tapping the cigarette off so the ashes fell to the ground.

"You know these aren't allowed in the compound, so let me de-stress for a minute."

"Like you were the one fighting off hordes of zombies?" Kirishima grinned, canine sharp. The early morning sun was just cresting, bright and gold and warm. The light slipped over buildings and between the cracks of buildings, and Bakugou noticed how they made all his scars shine softly.

"There's a reason I'm the driver between us three. You keep bumping into shit and fucking up the car, and anger issues over here keeps trying to run over zombies."

"If I see one of those fucks I'm gonna kill it."

"You don't swerve and speed down a highway just to kill one or two. We need to conserve gas, it's a limited resource."

"It's always been stupid."

"Well, I'm still fucking awesome. I was driving and shooting down the ones that were chasing ya, like a movie. If that ain't badass I don't know what is."

Bakugou grinned, and held up his fist for Sero to pound it.

"Yeah, you came in clutch there."

One of the residents got in the car and honked, and Sero pushed himself off so they could start driving the car back to the garage, to check for any damages.

"You think Jiro and her team got back yet?"

"They left before us, and we've been gone for a couple of days, let's go check."

As soon as they step inside they strip down to their briefs in the corridor, and the cleaning unit takes their clothes to be washed and disinfected. Paramedics check their bodies for any wounds, namely scratches or bites, and when they've been cleared, they're disinfected and given new clothing, they head straight to the shower stalls.

Bakugou is done in ten minutes, and he waits outside for the other two to hurry the hell up, toweling his wet hair.

After that, they make their way over to their captain's quarters, knock, and they are let inside.

Aizawa Shouta is an imposing man, dark hair and one blood red eye. With his eye patch and prosthetic leg and slight stubble he looks like a man that takes no shit. And he is.

Which is exactly why Bakugou respects him, even before he got those injuries and before he was his captain, and just his professor.

"How did it go?" He doesn't look up from all the forms and papers on his desk but they respond all the same.

"We visited all the pharmacies on the West coast of the city, I believe we have more than enough to hold us down sir."

"All the pharmacies?"

"Most were already ransacked, probably by the other camps or sanctuaries," Kirishima explained.

"The only ones that were still mainly full and intact were closer downtown, towards the inner city. These had plexiglass we had to break to get in."

"Downtown is more infested, though we've managed to quell it some. How many zombies were there?" They shared a look at one another, and returned to their salute.

"Mainly four or five in each, sir. We left before more could arrive due to the sound of the gunshots.The last one however had at least fifteen, and a couple crawlers." Only now did he pause, and put down his pen, stare them down with all the exhaustion in his remaining eye.

"A couple crawlers? How many did you kill?"

Bakugou spoke up. "Around six, at least. Only one managed to escape and that was because we were focused on escape sir. Sero ran over it over though so it shouldn't be able to move much to do anymore shit."

"They only arrived after we killed all the regulars and had the bags mostly full. Bakugou held them off while I finished packing, then we hauled ass and ran to the van. That's when we used the shotguns to kill off the ones chasing, while Sero drove."

Aizawa stared them down over his stapled hands, and they stood still in their little line, backs and shoulders straight.

"....You ransacked the place?"

"No. Bakugou left some supplies scattered around." Three pairs of eyes turned to him, and he had to fight the urge to scoff.

"Not everyone lives in a compound or wants to join one. Doesn't mean we need to hog all the shit to ourselves." Aizawa's face didn't change but there was an approval there.

He sighed and unclasped his hands, back to his papers.

"What else do you have to report?"

"Nothing, sir. The number of zombies seems to be the same, with numbers increasing the more you go downtown. We noticed more Shiketsu markers though, they've expanded their territory." Aizawa sighed, and nodded.

"Yes, Jiro's team noticed that as well. They're growing, and fast too. Commander Nedzu had scheduled a meeting with them in your absence, and it's today at five. It would be good to attend."

"A meeting? What for?"

"Hopefully, an alliance." Three pairs of eyebrows rose in astonishment.

"Those Shiketsu bastards are stingy as fuck. Do you really think that they'd agree to an alliance?"

"They're small, but only in territory. And Ketsubutsu is in the same position, so they might ally with one another instead. They are just as, if not more desperate for shelter and food and medicine as we are. It's a good chance they'll be open to it, with Yuuei, with all the people and resources we have. There are strong fighters there too, and they'll do well within our ranks."

"Strong fighters yeah, until they decide not to cooperate or pick a fight or somethin'. What do we get out of that then?" His eye flashed, and the guys flinched back into position.

"They are humans, just like us. They're trying to survive any way they can, and with the way the world has fallen to ruins, it would do good for you to remember that we are not very different. We need to band together to survive. Now if that's all you have to report, I'll see you at five." They nodded their heads, and left the room without a word.

The compound was huge, and always near bustling, at least away from the captains quarters. People were on schedule, and followed it religiously; maybe having something to do constantly took their minds off the horror the world had turned into.

The cafeteria was decently full, and they immediately spotted Jiro's team in the far corner. Denki and Mina waved excitedly when they caught sight, and Jiro raised her half a bagel with a nod. Bakugou immediately zeroed in on the black bruise around Mina's eye, and the way that Jiro tilted her head, so her bangs could hide her cheek, and probably a bruise. They took a tray, got in line, and flashed their cards for authentication.

"Man, doesn't this remind you of highschool?" Bakugou gave Mina a look as she cut him off before he could say anything, and she swirled her spoon in her little yogurt, a fond smile on her face when the boys sat down at their table.

"No, not really. It's the asscrack of Dawn and you were always late, so we never had breakfast together."

"We did sometimes." Mina pouted at Sero.

"Once in a blue moon you mean."

"What time did you guys get back?" Kirishima asked, a mouthful of food.

"Like, an hour or two ago. We would've gotten back quicker but the van ran out of gas."

"Oh shit, what did you do?"

"Had to go to a gas station and fill up the gallon. Only a couple stragglers there so we were able to kill 'em' and get back. Not many zombies on the highway, you know?" Denki shrugged. His hands were bandaged, and there was a scrape on his cheek. They all looked a little fucked up.

"You look like you got socked in the face pinky." Mina huffed at him but it was true. Her normal complexion, dark but kinda pinkish and warm, was pale, like she was an undead, and she had the nastiest ringer around her right eye. She immediately scowled.

"That's because I was."

"What, do the zombies know how to box now?" Sero chuckled.

"No, but that Shiketsu bitch I found going through our supplies does." The smile fell from his face, and that immediately had their attention.

"What?"

Mina sighed, and moved to tell the story.

"We were all fucking exhausted so we stopped to get sleep. Denki and I went to kill any zombies around and Jiro was setting up the traps and making sure we still had connection to contact the compound. I get back first and find this blondish bitch going through our shit so I immediately call her out, you know?" They nodded along and she continued.

"Anyways, she tried to run but I tackled her and we ended up fighting. I guess her teammates thought she was being attacked by zombies because they came running, and Jiro and Denki came running too and we all got in a fight. They ran but they still took like, two bags of supplies."

"And you're sure they were Shiketsu?"

Denki nodded.

"Yeah. After I punched a guy I saw those button things they wear. They all had one. It was dark so we couldn't really see their faces, but we saw those things."

Sero clicked his tongue, and stabbed his fork through his scrambled eggs.

"And we're supposed to meet these guys for an alliance?"

"What meeting? Alliance?"

"Shiketsu has been slowly expanding its territory. Commander Nedzu thinks it'll be good to join and combine what we got."

"It's not that bad an idea." Jiro shrugged, her gangly earrings swishing with her hair.

"More territory means we have more space for compounds or gardens or livestock. Make routes and expand human territory. Shiketsu got some hard hitters too, obviously, so we could go on more missions."

"And raids." The table looked at Kirishima, who didn't look up from his plate.

"Kirishima…"

"Even I'm not that suicidal sharkteeth."

"But it's viable. Slowly, we can get more ground, maybe even join other compounds. Take the city back."

"That shits not gonna happen. Not in our lifetime at least."

"Listen man," Kirishima put down his fork, a little forcefully.

"All I'm saying is that there is a chance, and I'm gonna believe in it. Gotta have some kinda hope in this fuckfest. Otherwise, what's the point of going on?"

No one really had a reply to that. They all looked at each other, haggard and tired, and continued eating.

Denki gathered the trays and bowls and utensils from everyone, and Bakugou was too tired to even protest, like he would usually do. He just nodded his thanks and Denki smiled wanly.

"Oh, did you hear if Izuku's team is back yet?"

"Hatsume received a message from them, they should be back by noon."

"They left before us, what took them so long?" Kirishima asked.

"We'll see when they get here."

With that, they separated. Men and women were split, even those with private dorms, and they each went to their respective sides, ready to catch some sleep before chores. Bakugou however made a detour, and walked the steps to the highest floor. From there he flashed his card, authority granted, and stepped outside to the roof.

It was like those rooms that castles would have for their archers, to shoot mainly unseen in case of attack. It was like that now, but with snipers instead of archers, no ceilings.

From this high up he could see plenty of the compound, the farmers starting to work in the gardens and fields and take care of the livestock, or people running to and fro carrying cargo. He was willing to bet a good chunk was what he and his team brought, and Jiro's. The sky was clear and the sun was bright, the wind crisp and choppy. But that wasn't what he was here for.

The compound had three snipers per wall. Each sniper was trained, best of the best, and took shifts watching the wall and shooting stray zombies, alerting the compound if there was a horde approaching. It was also their job to hold them off as long as they can in this case.

Bakugou walked over, quiet, careful to not disturb the other two snipers at the ends of the wall. This early in the morning all sound was echoing and loud, his breath the hiss of smoke after explosion.

He kneeled down, and gazed through the tall, vertical window.

She didn't move from her position, hands still and eyes steady. Her breathing was rhythmic and she made no sign to acknowledge his presence.

"...Theres one of those fucks right there." A blink from her wide eyed stare was the only acknowledgment. She probably already knew. One second, two, three, while the zombie approached the wall, and a bang! The thing fell dead.

She rolled her shoulder from the recoil, and went back to her gun.

"What's the score?"

"...Timothy has eight, Matthew's got twelve."

"And you?"

"Fourteen."

"That's my girl." Bakugou held out a granola bar, one of the soft ones, and she moved her head to take a bite. Bakugou brushed her hair out the way.

"How long have you been here?"

"I've been taking the deadman shift along with my normal ones." He felt a tick in his jaw.

"Fuck, you're gonna wear yourself ragged."

"I was worried about you."

She probably was. She probably watched their van leave too, from her post all the way here, and probably waited to watch them come back.

"Couldn't sleep?"

"No." Bakigou sighed and adjusted himself on his haunches, muscles aching.

"How did it go?"

"We had to travel farther into town, since most of the pharmacies were already ransacked. We got what we needed and then some, and came back."

"Got into any trouble with anybody?"

"You heard what happened with Jiro's team?"

"Nah," and now a smile spread across her face.

"Mina and Denki came out yelling and hollering as soon as they came out of the van, cause Momo was the one to come and greet them. Jiro was the only one not looking to get babied."

"Momo must've shit herself out of worry." Her lips pursed.

"Crude. Wouldn't you be worried if your lovers came back bruised and limping?"

"Jiro and Denki looked fine to me, and Mina only had a ringer. Who was limping?"

"Jiro was limping some but not too bad, I think it was just some swelling."

"Okay." They stood in the silence, feeling the morning sun's rays and the wind through their hair. She clicked her tongue and adjusted her rifle.

"What is it?"

"The wind's choppy. Its fucking up my aim, I gotta adjust constantly."

"You got that one bitch good." Already the body was being taken away by people in hazmat suits, leaving only a trail of blood that would soon to be washed away. She smirked.

"'Cause I'm just that good."

"Course you are." Bakugou held out the bar and she ate from it, eyes in front but head turned to him. When she finished he brushed his hand over her mouth, wiping away the crumbs. She kissed his thumb as he drew it back.

"What time does your shift end?"

She smiled bitterly.

"I still got an hour and some change. I'll meet you at your dorm so get outta here." Bakugou sighed, but he was tired. He stood up, and dusted himself off.

"Fine. I checked your schedule, you also got kitchen duty today, at three, so don't forget that, pistol. Hurry up so you can sleep." She smiled at the familiar nickname. This entire time, her eyes never left the distance.

"I won't baby. Get some sleep, I'll be there."

Bakugou trudged his way back to his private dorm, his body suddenly weighing twice it normally did. Which didn't say much since he could easily lift twice his body weight but he just wanted to get to bed, okay?

Sleeping in car seats or the back of a van these last couple of days, wary of zombies or stray packs of humans that could try to attack, it left him tired. He could've groaned at the softness of his bed, the clean, warm sheets and all the extra pillows that Pistol always hogged. In minutes, he was out.

He only woke up seemingly a few minutes later, by hands reaching around him, familiar and calloused. Blindly he reached, and pulled her to his side, and she latched on to him. He groaned at the warmth, but held tighter when she tried to move back.

"Oh sorry, are you in pain?"

"No, just get back here woman." She let him pull her back, but her hands skittered where his shirt had ridden up.

"You got a couple bruises. You can go to the nurses later."

"Hm."

"Get an ice pack or compress or something."

"Mmhm."

"...I was worried, y'know?" He rubs her shoulder, and she lets out this little sigh, one of those little sounds he won't stop thinking about for days afterwards. The kind of sounds he replays in his mind in every raid, every mission, every night you're not in his arms. It keeps him calm.

"I know. I'm always gonna come back though. Just gotta do what needs to be done, y'know?"

"I know."

Silence creeped back in, slow like molasses, but you've never been one for sweet.

"I'm kinda tired of just doing that though, you know. Just what needs to be done."

"The fuck you mean?" Katsuki cracked an eye open, and lifted his head a little to look down.

"No, no, it's just….is this all there's gonna be?"

"It's an apocalypse baby. Compared to the rest of the world, we're living in paradise right now. We got food, medicine, shelter, animals, clean water, weapons–"

"I know, I know!" You shoot up, till you're sitting up and staring down at him.

"I've just been….it just that, I'm …." You fumble with the words, stumbling over your tongue like two left feet on a dancefloor.

"....I'm just so tired Katsuki." Yeah, he's not having that. He pulls you up and over and sits up himself, leaning over till his forehead rests against yours.

"You've been taking too many shifts. You're burnt out."

"No, I'm–"

"Yes, you are. Or you're going to be. You've been taking the deadman shift, youre regular shift, and then breakfast duty every day since I left. On top of all the other jobs you got assigned too."

"It's easier to sleep that way. Too tired to worry."

"You do that anyway baby." He shakes his head against yours, and that makes you giggle. "I'm gonna walk you over to Granny Chiyo when we get up, get you checked up. Get you to stop asking for so many shifts."

"You're such a hypocrite Katsuki." But you bury your face in his shoulder, so he knows you're gonna give in.

"I'll get some patches too, alright? And some pain relief. Ugh. Nagging woman, is that good enough for you?"

"Yes, this will appease me for now," You chuckle. He feels the rumble through his skin.

"For now? Greedy little bugger." He mushes your face away while you laugh and try to press closer, straining your arms to reach him while he keeps you at bay. The smile on his face is delighted and sharp, and the corners twitch with every rise and snort of your laughter.

Finally, exhausted, you just grab his hand and fall back into the sheets, pressing the back of it against your cheek. You sigh again. Like a cat stretching, content and languid, like it came from somewhere deep in your chest. He feels something unwind in him.

"...I'm so glad you came back to me. Don't leave me, okay Katsuki?"

"I won't." He answers too fast, but you smile, press your mouth to his palm and mutter the words again.

"I don't know what I'd do if you left. Probably throw myself into a horde of undead or something."

"Don't fucking joke about shit like that." He grabs your face, gently of course, and turns your face to his. But you keep your eyes closed and keep smiling.

"You know Achilles and Patroclus? From the iliad? And the rewritten take? When Patroclus died Achilles gathered his ashes in an urn, which was usually the wife's job, and said to mix their ashes when he dies, so that they'll never be apart. Isn't that so romantic?"

Bakugou doesn't speak, he just watches you. You're slipping into sleep, and your breaths are slowing. You hold his wrist and rub small circles into his pulse point.

"....I'll wake you up in an hour." He'll actually wake you up in two; the mumbo jumbo coming out your mouth is proof you need it.

You don't reply, already gone. Bakugou picks you up so your head is on the right side of the bed, and follows you to sleep.

He doesn't think any urn would be enough to hold the both of you.

▪︎▪︎▪︎▪︎▪︎▪︎▪︎▪︎▪︎

He's not surprised to see how many people are here.

The captains are here automatically. Captain Aizawa, Captain Sekijiro Kan, and Captain Nemuri Kayama. They're spread around the room but he doesn't fail to notice how close they are to the windows, to Commander Nedzu. Who, in question, is preparing tea with a blasé smile on his face. His dark hair doesn't even gleam under the lights, and his eyes are purposefully kind but blank. Creepy.

Todoroki is here, and so is Ochako. Jiro. Deku is here too. Including him, it's the main team leaders.

Todoroki nods at him when he walks in, and Ochako barely does the same, steel focused and rubbing her wrists raw. Jiro smacks her hands away. It's Deku who comes up to him and pats his shoulder.

"Hey, I heard you went further downtown on your raid. Met a couple of crawlers."

"Yeah, we killed most of them before we had to abandon the place."

"Got what you needed?"

"Do you even need to ask, stupid Deku?" And he smiles, wan.

"We could've bumped into each other sometime. My team and I were downtown too."

"Why would you need to go downtown?" Deku looked tired. He couldn't have been back that long because the standard soap and disinfectant scent still clung fresh unto him. His hair was as wild as ever and bandages disappeared beneath the sleeve of his shirt. His face was pale, freckles standing stark against the pallor.

"Oi? You got hurt?"

Deku smiles, tired but reassuring.

"Just a tumble down a hill. Gravel, and stuff." Bakugou smells bullshit, but he sees the way Izuku closes himself off. He backs off.

Coincidentally, that's when Captain Hizashi walks in, with their guests in tow. It's only one adult, a lady with a bandana and mint green hair, and three others, a girl and two guys around his age. Less people than what he was suspecting.

"Shouta, how ya been! Long time no see, huh?" Captain Aizawa narrows his one remaining eye at the woman.

"Fukukado. I didn't expect you to be here."

"I came to propose my hand in marriage! Aizawa Shouta, will you-"

"No."

"Aw, not even a chance?"

"No." She deflates, but brightens up not two seconds earlier. Bakugou stands where he is, and takes in the other 'guests'.

A blonde chick, with a too deep neckline. Another blonde guy, but like, sandy blonde, with shaggy hair and somber eyes. The other…..looks like he could be Deku's older brother, or him himself, if he was taller with no freckles, and black hair. Deku 2.0 catches his eye and grins at him.

He doesn't like him.

"We expected to be entertaining Shiketsu, but it seems Ketsubutsu decided to join us." The room turns to the Commander, whose fingers tap, one by one on the tea pot, tap tap tap tap.

"Well, the more the merrier I say. Please sit! Let's start this meeting." The table is soon filled, and Bakugou is sat next to Jiro and Todoroki.

"First off, thank you for trekking all the way here for this meeting. You've shown your cooperation."

"So it was a test?" Nedzu looks at Deku 2.0, eyes gleaming.

"Yes. Your name?"

"Yo Shindo from Ketsubutsu. Head ranger."

"Pleased to meet you. And you two?"

"Camie Utsushimi! Team leader and part of communications. Shiketsu." He doesn't know where she got it or how she smuggled it in, but she blows a bubble and pops it, bright pink like her mouth.

"Nagamasa Mora. Team leader and assistant director. Shiketsu."

"And me! Captain Emi Fukukado, and Shouta's future wifey~From Ketsubutsu of course." She winks at Aizawa, who doesn't even roll his eyes, like when he catches any one of them acting stupid. It's clear they share history.

"The trek here wasn't anything arduous."

"Well, of course it wasn't." Utsushimi cuts Nagamasa off, elbows on the table.

"You didn't catch them trekking us from when we passed central?" The room quiets, and Nagamasa clears his throat.

"Yes, but I was being polite, Camie."

"But there's no need to be so stiff now, yeah?"

"It's called having tact, Camie…"

"I'd prefer if we simply got to the point of this meeting." Fukukado cuts in, spreading her hands on top of the table. Her body language was open, but less playful.

"Of course, but we were supposed to discuss an alliance with Shiketsu, and not Ketsubutsu," Captain Sekijiro grumbles. "Frankly, this meeting doesn't concern you as you shouldn't be here."

"But it does, which I'd like to bring up. But first, a proposal." This kid must've tried going for a business major, because Deku 2.0 reeks of cockiness and self importance. He even adjusts his collar for fucks sake.

"Which is?"

"Ketsubutsu and Shiketsu have decided to join together. We've decided to extend the offer to Yuuei, proposing an alliance, as well as a sort of joint mission between us three." He smiles, swarmy.

"Just to see how well we work together. A trial run, if you will."

Yuuei is stunned into silence and exchanges looks amongst one another.

Yuuei, Shiketsu, and Ketsubutsu were the top three schools in the country. Heavily endorsed, large grounds and campuses and funding for extracurriculars. Always rivaling one another, but Yuuei was always at the top. It's why so many people fled here when the virus spread.

First, the students and staff and their families. People in the immediate vicinity. Pets. Then Yuuei needed to strategize. They were just accepting everyone even if they have a limited food source. So they needed a plan. Yuuei was backed by water, and they built filters so they had a reliable water source.

They turned the sports fields into farms and accepted priority people; people with useful skills like plumbing or gardening or mechanics. Deku had protested. Bakugou had protested louder. "The idea of priority puts people on the scale of worth and value. All people deserved to be saved," Deku had said. "All people are worth the same. All people bring value."

What Bakugou never told him was that he saw the logic. It was an apocalypse. They needed to be smart. "All people are valued at the same worth." No, they weren't. But all people are worthy and are owed the chance to be saved. That's what he believed. Some people just saved more people than others, that's all.

Eventually, after a couple months, they were able to import a couple cows and pigs and goats, from a family who lived in the open countryside. A team had gotten lost, stranded on a scouting mission out of the city, checking radio towers, and found the family. There were only two families left there, the others were infected and they had killed them and they couldn't take care of the rest of the animals by themselves. It was a lucky break and now, nearly three years later, they have a good sized amount of cattle.

People needed a balanced diet, and vitamins could only go so far. Milk, cheese, eggs, meat–compared to other shelters having these items made them a sanctuary.

Literally. Japan's government, when they got over their collective pants shitting, started sending out the military. They declared the three schools sanctuaries. They provided weapons, and some training, and tasked them all with expanding their territory, and taking back the city and open land. A task far easier said than done, especially when the crawlers started appearing. Regular zombies could die with enough blood loss or a severed brainstem.

Crawlers needed a couple bullets to the brain, at second best. They could still come back. Only a completely severed head could make a crawler stay dead. Hard as fuck for one or two, but more than that? Essentially impossible without insane luck, skill and aim.

'I bet Pistol could do it.' Bakugou thought.

"Ketsubutsu and Shiketsu are allied? When did this happen?"

"Around a month ago." Fukukado smiled at Captain Nemuri.

"Guess your intelligence isn't up to speed." Hizashi's mouth twitched in a grimace but he smothered it. Jiro's grimace however was not as well hidden.

"...Midoriya." The man startled when Commander Nedzu spoke in that warm, calm voice. His hands were steepled over his cup, tea which he hadn't offered the guests.

"Yes, Commander?"

"You've only just returned from your mission. I'd like to hear your report now."

"Yes sir." Deku stood, and placed his hands behind his back, shoulders straight.

"Five days ago, my team, Mineta, Hagakure, Shoji, Aoyama, Tsuyu, and I were sent on a mission to update the markers and communication wires further downtown. It was a delicate mission, checking the wires and shelters along the way, avoiding undead hotspots." The captains nodded along as he spoke. They probably already heard all this.

"We reached the wires and spent the next few days checking and repairing the ones that were damaged. Which ones exactly are in the written report. Two days ago we upset a previously unknown undead Hotspot. Most of them were crawlers." The room tensed, and the guests who were lax and listening, tensed and straightened.

"Mineta and Aoyama are some of the best marksmen we have. They held them back while Shoji cut the ones that got past. Tsuyu and I rushed to replace the wire we were on, and then we joined the others and brought down the pack. Hagakure held down the van."

"Hah? Really? You guys took down a pack of crawlers?" Yo Shindo laughed, staring down Deku like a kid telling a tall tale. Bakugou sneered.

"It takes our captains a hard time with a couple of crawlers, and I bet yours too. But a group of dropout college students somehow took down a pack? Stop the bullshit," He laughed.

Deku stared at him, and yeah, the resemblance was fucking creepy. Without a word or preamble, he took off his shirt, and the muscle tee underneath.

He had plenty of scars, they all did, but what caught Bakugou's attention was the bruise patches all along his back and ribs, the bandages wrapped around his waist, blood peeking through. He unwrapped the one on his left bicep, and a gasp hissed through his teeth.

"A crawler bit me. Tsuyu cut the flesh away and disinfected it as fast as she could. I got proper treatment when we got back."

The wound was closed, the stitches were precise and uniform, but red and deep and angry, it would leave a deep dark scar. The kind with ridges and bumps and dips and edges that looked shiny in the light. It looked vicious.

Tsuyu didn't have to just cut the flesh away. She had to dig, and carve below the infected flesh just to make sure she got it all. He could've died from crawler, or regular infection, shock, bloodloss. Or even hitting his head wring tumbling down a hill.

Deku's green eyes, bright and uncanny, met Shindo's.

"Of course, we all wore our body cams too so we have footage, though that's confidential. You'll need to be a part of support and communications, or fill out a form to see them." Shindo kept eye contact, but his jaw ticked when he swallowed. Ochako stood and helped rebandage the wound with a soft glare, and Deku met his eyes when he redressed.

"I did fall down a hill. I just forgot to tell you it was with a crawler biting into me."

"If an undead doesn't kill you Izuku I fucking will." He seethed, soft under his breath. Deku's face folds into that wan smile again. He looks like Auntie Inko.

"Yeah, I know."

"Bakugou's team also ran into some crawlers at a downtown pharmacy, so Aizawa told me," Commander Nedzu says.

"The front was already raided, so they moved further to the back, where they were. Crawlers prefer places long abandoned. Old apartment buildings, department stores and the like. The rise of crawlers in these recently raided, inhabited, or otherwise open spaces is odd. I'm sure you both have your concerns as well.

"Does this joint mission address these concerns?" Before Fukukado went on he asked,

"Does anyone in your alliance have the skills to take down a crawler? A pack of crawlers, if the situation should ever arise, again? Can any one of you deal with a crawler bite immediately? Intelligence tells me that neither of you have been going out on raids often." The Commander cut a look towards Fukukado.

"We've been finalizing the terms and conditions of our alliance," Nagamasa supplied.

"Yeah. And we thought we could set up a communicative wire in between Shiketsu and Yuuei actually. We're building one between Shiketsu and Ketsubutsu now." Utsushimi lolls her head.

"Even if we don't align, communication would still be ideal."

"Eradicating a couple known undead hotspots would also do some good, we could see how well we'd all work together." Fukukado waved her hands. What a clown.

"Nagamasa, yes? That folder you brought, what is it?" Captain Nemuri smiles encouragingly.

"Potential teams we could make, highlighting certain strengths and attributes."

"Hand it over, please?" He did, and Captain Hizashi moved to read over her shoulder.

"...How did you know Yaoyorozu and Jiro were in Communications?" Heads snapped up, and they shrugged.

"I was a traveling Substitute teacher, remember Shouta? I can guess how you utilized your kids." For the first time Shouta's face fell into irritation, and his eyes burned into Fukukado, who just smiled. Her eyes were sharp like knives, which Bakugou was sure she had hidden on her. Knives don't always have to be metal. They just had to be sharp.

"It's not like the kids are all complete strangers. Before the bullshit people would go places and meet people, like the central mall, or the parks, internships, regular ol' jobs, that sort of stuff. It's easy enough to guess."

It was a plausible enough excuse. Even he knew a couple people from the two schools. Bakugou turned his head, and caught Jiro, sitting stock still.

She was staring holes into the Utsushimi girl's skull, hands fisted under the table. The girl met her eyes, mildly confused, and they were in a sort of stare off.

Suddenly her eyes widened, and she smiled, slow. She blew a bubble, big and slow, and popped it, swiping her tongue out to collect it back into her mouth. It set off his anger meter, petty bubblegum cheerleader chicks like this one always did, and he scowled as she just smiled at Jiro. He had a guess to who she was.

"Yeah, you, we met before. You remember me. You were the one caught stealing from our van."

"Well, I am a team leader. I had to take an initiative and go for it. Make an example of myself, you know?" She didn't even try to deny it.

"Couldn't get your own shit? Had to be a thief and steal?"

"Aren't you technically stealing from everyone by taking from all these stores and pharmacies?" The girl huffed, her pout fading and something more genuine crossing her face. Irritation.

"I know you allow shelters in your territory for the people who don't want to align, but how much do you really give them? You raid and hog everything so people are forced to depend on you. I was just tipping the scales a little." That bubblegum fake smile was put back in place, and she waved her painted fingers at jiro.

"Be grateful your friend only got a black eye. And you, you only got a little bruise on your cheek! My team could have shot you, thinking you were undead."

"But that's not true, right?" Todoroki spoke for the first time, dual eyes zeroed in on the chick.

"You probably scouted them for a while and waited for them to run surveillance. Otherwise you all would have approached cautiously with weapons on hand.

"If you weren't sure if the van had undead, then that's what you would have done. If you did suspect and still went alone, that's just plain idiocy. Your team could have lost their leader." Todoroki looked her over, evaluating.

"And I don't think you're that dumb. You don't look stupid."

"Like you can tell." Bakugou muttered under his breath.

"I can. And she's not it." He still was staring her down with his two colored eyes.

"She saw the emblem on the van. She tracked them and waited to attack. She chose her steps carefully. It was all premeditated."

Utsushimi whistled and clasped her hands together, eyes lighting up.

"Wow, you're so smart! And you're like, super duper gorgeous, like, super model gorgeous. Wanna go on a date?"

"No."

"You're sure? I can make it worth your while…"

"Anyways," Captain Aizawa cut her off, the resemblance to another woman in the room probably made him antsy.

"Ketsubutsu and Shiketsu have made an alliance, and wish to extend the offer to Yuuei. Is that right?"

"Exactly." The four spoke at once, like it was rehearsed. Bakugou couldn't keep the sneer off his face, he was sure he looked like an asshole, but fuck that.

"You worry about our skill, but of course we have members that are skilled enough to deal with crawlers. Shiketsu and Ketsubutsu were not that far apart in terms of prestige." Nagamasa supplied.

"All three schools after all had elite students and faculty, so it's to be expected."

"Expected, but not assured. But that was before the apocalypse." Commander Nedzu spoke as he leaned forward, smile and clasped hands and all.

"Of course, we all had our fair share of exceptional students and teachers in our facilities. Our little rivalry was going strong, and for good reason. But this is the apocalypse and we are not students and teachers anymore." His eyes flashed, dangerous, soft.

"We are Captains. Lieutenants. Leaders. Rangers, scouts, foragers, doctors and cooks and nurses and stable hands and Commanders." Finally he unclasped his hands and raised his cup to his mouth. He frowned a hint, before dropping two sugar cubes in the tea.

"And I'm sure you both have your fair share of those, especially after merging together, so I'll leave you two to figure those sorts of things out on your own. To get yourselves situated." He shrugged. He was a small man, but there was nothing small about the way his smile stayed, but the warm (and fake) geniality faded with each word from his lips.

"After all, this meeting was for a discussion between my captains and team leaders and Shiketsu, and not a jokester and a couple of college dropouts and a thief. So if you may, I'd prefer someone more competent in the next meeting, which I will send a date for. I'll let Ketsubutsu attend next time if I'm feeling gracious. This meeting is adjourned."

Yuuei, Captains and leaders, immediately sprung up into salute, and Captain Hizashi immediately walked around the table to escort the four guests out.

Only the Utsushimi girl looked unaffected, poping her bubble with her arms above her head. Fukukado just pouted, while the guys grumbled and glared, with their hurt pride. Utsushimi shot a wink at Todoroki before she left, and there was an obvious release of tension once they left the room.

Captain Kan scoffed.

"What kind of power play was that? If they were going to try something so stupid they should have sent their Captains instead of children." He huffed.

"You seem to know that woman, Fukukado, right Aizawa?" Captain Aizawa sighed and rubbed his temples.

"We went to the same community college before we transferred to separate universities."

"She seems to have a crush on you huh-"

"Don't start Nemuri." Todoroki came up to his elbow. He didn't speak but he had that blank, expectant look on his face like he expected Bakugou to just read his mind.

"The fuck is it icyhot?" He tilts his head for him to follow, and he does, but not without grumbling.

Icyhot turns to him when they reach a private corner of the room.

"If this is about the blonde chick I don't want to hear it."

"What? No, I'm not talking about her. It's about the raids you and Midoriya went on. The crawlers."

"What about them?"

"My team and Ochako's noticed a few weeks back that people have been going missing from the unaffiliated camps around the borders. We couldn't check Shiketsu much less Ketsubutsu, but they looked dwindled too. I think…I think the disappearance of these people, and the hotspots has something to do with the crawlers."

"...Well fuck Icyhot, that's a crazy conclusion to come up to. You told the captains?"

"Told them, but they said that it's just a far-fetched theory. Hatsume in research and development said that it makes sense though." He sighs. "But she's been crazy since before the break."

"Why the hell are you telling me this?"

"Because most likely you're the one who'll be sent when Yuuei reaches out to Shiketsu and Ketsubutsu again," Todoroki grit his teeth.

"Deku is injured and Ochako and Jiro are on mandatory leave. And you know my Father doesn't want to send me out with all this...activity." he grit out.

Enji Todoroki, a long lasting politician. A ruthless man who was pushing his children to join the military and rise the ranks. His wife was institutionalized before the break, and her hospital was overrun by zombies. The eldest son, Touya, rushed in to try and save her, but his body was never recovered. Neither of them were.

"He thinks he's protecting me. Now," he scoffed,"now after all these years…"

"At least he's trying. Making shitty amends for how he raised you lot growing up, yeah? Better now then never. Late paternal instincts I guess."

"How is what he's doing to us any different than what he did to my mother?" His voice was so stone cold Bakugou almost expected mist to come from his breath. Bakugou shrugged. He didn't know. He was just sick of this meeting already. He still had work to do.

"Hell if I know icyhot. But if you go along with his shit, at least for now, he might ease up or somethin'. He's one of our main benefactors so we can't lose his support." He pats his shoulder, kind of awkward, but Todoroki showed no sign of acknowledgement. He started to walk away.

"I'll fight to be put on the roster, but there's no guarantee. Enji has been trying to transfer me permanently to support and management."

"Stay on point, Bakugou." He smirked.

"When do I never?"

[thelastidiot29]

A Couple a' Blockheads

Katsuki Bakugou

Zombie Apocalypse AU

TW!! Slight singular use of the word "cripple." Might be offensive to some.

☠◉☠◉☠◉☠◉☠◉☠◉☠◉☠◉☠◉☠

Fire ran through his biceps, climbed down to his wrists as he pulled, further, until he was high enough to grab the wood of the chipping fence. He climbed, grimacing at the moans and grumbles of the beasts below him. They roared and jeered. Their reaping stentch enough to make a stable cow gag. Even so, he hauled himself over the fence and his spine hit the balcony. He was left a gasping mess.

"Fuck!" Katsuki blew.

A breath later, or maybe two, and he was sprawling on his side, grabbing the nearest wall and climbing to his feet. He limped closer to it on his bleeding leg, grunting and seething.

Katsuki couldn't help but snort. How the hell did he get here? Pressed against a wall, bleeding, with a hoard of no-brained, undead lurking below, waiting to claw his guts out and feast. Like hell that was happening.

Gripping the wall and feeling the roughness of the rocks that bricked the building run across his palm, he limped over to the nearest window. Then, without a second of thinking, he slammed his elbow against the pane and watched it shatter. He swung an arm around to his back and returned with a handgun and aimed the small sized pistol around the room before declaring it safe to climb through.

Avoiding glass shards, he grabbed the end of the window and pulled himself inside. He gave a second to scan the small little bedroom then bolted to loot the place. Well, as fast as he could on an injured leg. He rummaged through dressers, desks, and wardrobes. All empty. He ducked under the bed and saw nothing.

Not nothing.

The small outline of something, hidden in the darkness. He kneeled and hissed at the ass kicking his injury provided. Katsuki fell on his chest, pressing his face against the floor and stretching his arm far beneath the mattress. It was a box, he could tell when he knocked it further back with the tip of his finger.

Katsuki groaned, "Come on.."

He flexed his shoulder, his hand, his forearm, stretched as far as he could and gasped when he felt the curvature of a small plastic handle.

"Oh, hell yeah." He grinned, pulling the box towards him, moving to pull it into his lap. Holding the grin, he pulled off the lid. Then, his grin fell. The cold barrel of a gun pressed against his skull, and a few short uneven breaths came from the person behind him.

The person cocked the gun, it clicked. A soft, yet stern voice of a woman said, "Put it back."

Katsuki didn't. "Go to hell."

"I will shoot."

"Oh yeah?"

His head was pushed forward with the gun and he grunted. With a sigh, Katsuki dropped the box, used his good foot to kick it back under the bed, and raise his hands above his head.

"Can you stop waving that thing around now?" He snarked, but was mentally running through his options. He decided the only one that would end with him alive was doing what they said. So he held his hands there, and didn't press back against the pistol's barrel.

"Who are you? Why- why are you here?"

"Put the damn gun down!"

"I want a name."

Katsuki blew a breath. "Bakugou. Happy?"

"A full name."

He blew another, through gritted teeth. "Katsuki Bakugou, want a middle name too?"

The girl pulled the gun back, only a little, "Why are you here?"

"Why the hell else?!" Katsuki snapped, his patience running thin, "I got chased by a bunch a' Blockheads. I saw a house. I went inside the house. Are you stupid?"

"Blockheads?"

"So that's a yes? Great. A trigger happy fool. The dead people! The hell do you call them?! The-"

"The dead."

Katsuki pressed his lips closed. And after a second that dragged on for ten, the gun left his head, and the girl stepped away from him. He grabbed the bed, used it to climb up and stand, cursing and seething every chance he got. Slowly, cautiously, he wheeled around to face his perpetrator, and found the pastel green eyes of a girl who looked nothing like what he expected to find.

Her face was soft, clear of scars or cuts, clean. Her eyes were green and bright, full of something. Something he thought was lost a while ago;

Humanity.

He knitted his brows together, finding a second to scan over her. Her small frame, the pink strands of hair that bled through the mass of brown.

She looked down, her eyes going wide. She gasped and jumped away from him, tugging the bag at her flank backwards when it swung. Before Katsuki could blink, the gun was pointed at him again.

"The hell?!–"

"You're bitten?!"

Katsuki looked down at himself. He expected to find just that. The bite of one of those heinous blockheads, the thought managing to spark the smallest amount of fear through his chest. But, all he found was the injury on his legs, the bloody mess now poking out from his pants leg. Damn, he really needed to cover that.

He looked back up, hiding the relief that spread over his face. "No. I was caught in a bear trap."

"A bear trap?! You can't expect me to believe that, you're standing right now!

He snarled, "Trust me, hurts like hell."

"Prove it!" She stepped backwards, stumbling over the leg of the nightstand. Her eyes were wide, and she trained the gun on him, steadily.

He raised his hands back over his head. He was frankly tired of her, and debated taking his gun out and shooting her in the shoulder. He didn't. Instead, he sighed, snarled, and calmly said, "If I was bitten then I'd have a fever. I'd have a fever and dizzy spells."

Her face softened only a bit, and only for a moment.

"I'm standing perfectly fine, ain't I? But, unfortunately you aren't coming near me to check my temperature."

"So, you expect me to trust you?"

He ignored her, "You're holding the gun wrong."

"What?! I know how to hold a gun!"

"Then unlock your elbows." Katsuki snarled.

Her eyes shifted down to her own arms, and with a deep breath, she loosened her elbows.

"Great. Now put it down." Katsuki nodded to the bed.

She looked at it, then back at him. "You don't get to bark orders. If you couldn't tell, I'm holding the gun at you."

"You're shaking, and tense." He snarked back, his eyes almost daring her to prove him wrong. Daring, with utmost confidence. "You aren't gonna shoot me."

"I could."

"You won't."

"I could. That should be enough for you to stop talking."

"Save us both some time, dumbass." Katsuki dropped his hands, and growled at the sudden pain shooting through his leg. He waved her off and sat on the bed, ignoring the gun aimed at his head. "Drop it."

He paid her no mind, grabbing a fist full of the end of his pants and pulling it on the bed. The loose blue jeans were repainted to brown and red, mixture of dirt and the blood spilling from his leg. He sucked his teeth, pressed a hand around the injury and stopped himself from biting his tongue.

"You have to clean that before–"

A crash, loud and obnoxious, a roaring crash came from the door and was followed by groans.

Katsuki whipped his head around to the threshold. The door was forced open with the mangled face of a monster and it made him stiffen and reach for the gun stuffed in his pants against his back. The moment his hand wrapped around the pistol, the firing sound of lead sliced through the air and it didn't come from his gun. The Blockhead fell against the wall, and slid to the floor without a sound.

The girl held the gun out, aimed in front of her when Katsuki turned back to her. Her chest was heaving, and it took a moment before she was pushing the gun into her belt.

She scoffed, "See? I know how to use a gun."

"How the hell did that get in here?!" Katsuki demanded, now glaring, glaring daggers full of accusations.

She must've done something wrong, left a door unlocked, didn't barricade the windows on the bottom floor. Wasn't this where she was staying? How could she be that careless?

"I don't know." She said, and she was a little too calm and Katsuki was inclined to start throwing things. She kneeled down, reached under the bed. "This isn't my place."

"The hell it isn't!"

She re-emerged, the unlidded box in hand, "I came here for loot."

"I came here for loot, and you pulled a goddamn gun on me!"

"You were gonna steal my loot."

"Well that's a load of–"

She looked up, those green eyes were soft. She looked sorry, apologetic. It almost pissed him off more, "Catch."

She tossed a small bottle, and Katsuki caught it in his hand. In printed text it read an unfamiliar name and; Oxycodone. Yeah. Now he was pissed.

"There's medicine in there?!" Katsuki tried to jump up, and the moment he tried he yelled out in overwhelming pain. "Oh you son of a-!"

"Sorry." She said, and it sounded sincere. "You've survived this long at the end of the world, so you have to be smart enough to take care of yourself. There is ammunition downstairs if you're low, I didn't get to grab it. Maybe we'll meet again."

"Yeah, in hell. I will put a bullet in your head, come back here!" He pulled himself off the bed with his gun, red with hot, hot rage. He limped closer to her as she moved further to the window.

She put a leg through, "Goodbye, Katsuki Bakugou."

She cradled the box closer to her chest and ducked through the shattered window.

Katsuki kept moving on his burning leg, kept moving until he could grab the wall for support. "You can't leave without splitting those supplies. Your bullet is going to bring every Blockhead for three miles to this house."

"I need this stuff more than you."

"You are perfectly fine!"

"Well, someone I love isn't."

Katsuki turned his head back. More groans echoed outside the door. More, lots. He could hardly stand, and he only had nine bullets left. Katsuki straightened his back against the wall, aimed his gun at the door and waited for the first face to appear.

It did, he shot is, straight through the eye. It collapsed on the ground and he waited for the next, "Give me the medicine, or I swear to God–"

"Come on."

He faltered, "What?"

"You aren't gonna live if you stay here. You shouldn't be worrying about the medicine."

"How touching. Three seconds ago you were prepared to leave my ass!"

"Come on."

"I don't need your help!" Katsuki shouted, firing his gun at the next sonofabitch, then the next. "I need what I came here for."

"Are you stupid?"

"The hell did you just say to me?!"

"Fine. Stay here and die then."

Katsuki glanced over his shoulder for a moment, and the girl shuffled away from the window. The box was now on the floor empty, and she pulled the strap of her bag over her head and started walking.

He looked back, firing one more bullet at one of the moaning Blockheads then shot for the window. He cursed himself, cursed and scolded himself for even thinking about accepting help.

He ducked through the shattered gap, "Wait! Fine, I'm coming."

Maybe she was gone, already fled the place. That's what he thought until he felt an arm grab his and haul him through the window. Katsuki grunted, pulled his injured leg through, seething when his wound hit the outline of the gap. Then, when both of his feet were on the ground, the girl hoisted his arm over her shoulder.

"I don't need your help." He said, but made no effort to pull away. Instead, he let himself put his weight on her. The pressure released from his leg and immediately the pain shrunk down to almost nothing. He drew in a deep breath, "I don't need your help, or pity."

"You know, most people say thank you." She replied and started pulling them both forwards.

Katsuki staggered on his feet, resisting the need to gasp every time he took a step. The monstrous groans and grumbles of the Blockheads below him managed to pump his heart a little faster than he would like.

"Okay, so what's your plan? We are on a balcony, seven feet above a sea of idiots." Katsuki said. Then, he glanced over the fence at the horde.

The girl was silent for a moment. He almost repeated the question, opened his mouth to snark out some sarcastic witless comment. But, then she drew a breath and he snapped his mouth shut.

"That's the complicated part. The plan is complicated now that I'm carrying a cripple."

He whipped a glare at her, surprised to find a playful grin staring back. Still he scoffed, loud, to make sure to catch her attention so she could linger on his next words. "You are hardly carrying me."

"If I moved right now, you'd collapse over that fence." She nodded towards the red wood lining of the fence. Then, she shrugged her shoulders, pulled Katsuki's arm a bit. "My plan was to just maneuver over rooftops. But, like I said, you complicate things."

"Let's do it."

"What?" She stopped at the end of the balcony.

Katsuki pulled away from her. He forced himself on both his feet, and immediately regretted it. A sharp sting shot up his leg and he had to chomp down on his tongue to prevent himself from yelling.

He stood, and ignored the fact that his legs were trembling, "I can make it."

"Hah… haha." The girl laughed sarcastically. "...No."

"I can. I've done more with worse." He deadpanned.

"You're insane."

"Maybe it's why I'm still alive."

"No, it's why you won't be alive in about ten minutes."

"Bite me." Katsuki snarled.

"I won't be the reason you're dead. You are bleeding! You- you can't be serious." Her mouth fell open a little.

Katsuki gritted his teeth. With determination, he took a step forward, then another. He grabbed the rail of the fence, pulled himself on top of it.

The girl's footsteps shuffled slowly behind him, "Oh my God, he's serious…"

Katsuki looked up at the roof shingles nearly in reach. He ignored the burning in his leg, ignored it like it didn't exist. He didn't attempt to put more weight on his other leg, he completely ignored it.

He gritted his teeth, "Give me a boost."

"Me? You are two times bigger than me, and my weight will be divided on the skinny surface of a fence."

"It will be easier for you to lift me up from down here than you pulling me from up top."

"How do I know you won't leave me?"

Katsuki looked down at the girl, "Because I need that medicine. More than just some painkillers."

"I never told you I'd give you any." She shuffled. Katsuki narrowed his eyes at the discomfort in her face, at the way a frown dug into her features. Her green eyes avoided his, "I told you, I need it more."

Katsuki scanned over her, spotting the strands of hair dyed in her bangs. "I won't leave you, Pinkstreak."

Her face twisted, but she climbed onto the balcony fence next to him. Katsuki moved over, and she evened her feet on the wooden plank. Their conversation turned to silence, the Brunette folding her fingers around each other, and Katsuki waited until she was ready and he lifted his good leg and stepped into her hand. All of his weight was left pushing into the torn skin of his wound and he resisted a reaction.

"Are you ready?" She asked.

He almost scoffed at the concern painted on her. With a roll of his shoulders, and a deep breath, he nodded. He felt her hand start to lift upwards, and that's when he stepped up against her tied palms. The shingles of the roof were inches from reach, and the moment he grabbed the roof the girl's hands pushed him up higher and made his climb easier. Katsuki grabbed at it. He positioned his elbows on the surface and pulled himself with his shoulders. Soon, he was able to swing one arm up, and then the other. Breathing heavily, with intense gasps, he fell back flat on the roof's surface and seethed at his pestering leg.

"Are you alright?"

Katsuki combed his hand through the tangled blonde on his head. His chest heaving, his heart racing, and he realized the chills spreading down his arms and the exhaustion blowing on his neck. He probably was running a fever by now Shit.

He rolled himself over, gathered himself back on two knees. "I'm fine."

When Katsuki peered over the roof's ledge he saw the girl, her feet planted on the fence, and her eyes staring up. Then, her eyes met his, and he could swear he saw a look of relief pass over her face.

She pulled the satchel bag closer to her hip, "Alright, then help me up."

With an eye roll and a snort, he leaned down and stretched out his hand, "Come on up, Pinkstreak."

"My name is Amai." She spoke softly, he almost didn't hear her. "Amai Tsuyuki."

"I think I'll stick with Pinkstreak."

I know you kids prefer the x readers. You load of simps. But, Amai has been an OC close to my heart for years now and I'd like the opportunity to share her. So yes, I am telling you that thus is an x Oc story at the end, with the hope that you gave it a chance first.

I plan on making a part two if people like this, and definitely some CU content with her. She's a darling, you'll love her. I swear.

[s0larts]

Notebook nr. 01

Shifters