Chapter 2 — Alone Together

Three weeks after the press conference, Izuku Midoriya had become very familiar with the taste of solitude.

The agency halls felt different now. Not quieter exactly, but emptier in a way that had nothing to do with headcount. People still nodded at him in passing, still offered the requisite professional courtesies. But there was a distance in their eyes. A careful space they maintained, as if proximity to him might contaminate them with something unnameable.

Izuku noticed it in the way conversations would pause when he rounded a corner. In the subtle shift of bodies angling away from him in the elevator. In the Alpha heroes who had once clapped him on the shoulder after successful missions now keeping their hands firmly at their sides, as though touching him might trigger something neither of them could control.

It was absurd. He was the same person he had always been. The same hero. The same colleague. But the word “Omega” had rewritten him in their minds, transformed him from partner to liability in the span of a single news cycle.

He stood outside the mission briefing room, watching through the glass panel as his team assembled inside. His former team. Director Hanamura had been apologetic when she explained the restructuring. Very apologetic. She had used words like “temporary adjustment” and “optimal operational dynamics” and “nothing personal, of course.”

The Alpha heroes on his squad had requested the reassignment. All four of them. Separately, but within the same week.

Nothing personal.

Through the glass, Izuku watched Takeda laugh at something Reyes said. Watched Kimura pull up mission specs on the holographic display. Watched them move together with the easy camaraderie of a team that trusted each other, that didn’t have to think twice about who was standing at their back.

His chest ached. A dull, persistent thing he had gotten used to carrying.

He turned away from the glass and walked toward his office. The fluorescent lights hummed overhead, casting everything in a flat, sterile glow. His footsteps echoed in the empty corridor. He had his own assignments now. Solo patrols. Low-priority response calls. The kind of work usually reserved for sidekicks and interns, not a hero ranked in the top ten nationally.

His phone buzzed. A dispatch alert.

Tech transport robbery in progress. Route 47, heading east toward the industrial district. Multiple suspects, quirk status unknown. Nearest available hero requested.

Izuku was already moving before he finished reading. The ache in his chest dissolved, replaced by something sharper, more immediate. Purpose. This, at least, was something he could do. Something that didn’t require anyone else’s permission or comfort level.

He hit the street at forty percent power, the wind whipping past his face as he launched himself between buildings. The city blurred beneath him, a patchwork of glass and concrete and late afternoon sunlight. His costume’s sensors registered the temperature drop as he gained altitude, the way the air thinned slightly at the peak of each arc. His earpiece crackled with updates from dispatch. Three suspects. Armed. The truck they had stolen contained prototype support gear, enough to outfit a small army of villains if it reached the black market.

The familiar rush of adrenaline flooded his system. His muscles remembered this, the stretch and pull of movement at speed, the calculations his mind ran automatically about trajectory and timing. Up here, soaring between skyscrapers with the sun warm on his back, none of the rest of it mattered. Up here, he was just a hero doing what heroes did.

He spotted the truck two minutes later, weaving through traffic with reckless speed. A white box truck with no markings, its driver laying on the horn to force civilian vehicles out of the way. A black sedan with blacked-out windows flanked it, the getaway vehicle. Izuku adjusted his trajectory and dropped toward the road.

The landing cracked asphalt, sending spiderweb fractures through the pavement. He straightened just as the convoy rounded the corner, and for a moment the lead driver’s eyes met his through the windshield.

Fear. Recognition. The universal expression of someone who had just realized their day was about to get much worse.

The truck swerved hard.

Izuku moved.

One For All sang through his muscles as he closed the distance, power flowing through him like an electric current. The sedan peeled off, trying to escape down a side street, but he was faster. Always faster. A controlled burst of Blackwhip snagged the rear axle and yanked. The car spun, tires screaming against asphalt, and slammed sideways into a parked delivery van with a crunch of metal and shattering glass.

The truck was still running. Its engine roared as the driver floored it, desperate to put distance between himself and the hero behind him.

Izuku pivoted, calculating the angle, ready to pursue, and then a familiar explosion split the air above him.

The sound hit him before the visual did. A sharp crack like thunder, followed by the acrid scent of nitroglycerin and smoke. Izuku’s heart stuttered in his chest, recognition flooding through him faster than conscious thought.

Katsuki Bakugo dropped from the sky like a meteor, palms blazing with controlled detonations that slowed his descent just enough to avoid shattering his own legs on impact. He landed on the truck’s roof with enough force to dent the metal inward, and the vehicle lurched violently before the driver slammed the brakes. Bakugo didn’t wait for it to stop. He ripped the driver’s side door off its hinges with one hand, hauled the man out by the collar, and threw him onto the pavement with more force than strictly necessary.

“Stay down,” Bakugo snarled, one palm aimed at the groaning criminal, sparks dancing between his fingers.

The driver stayed down.

By the time Izuku reached the truck, Bakugo had already secured the second suspect from the passenger seat, zip-tying his wrists with the brutal efficiency of someone who had done this a thousand times. The third suspect was trying to crawl out the back, fumbling with some kind of device, but Izuku caught him with Blackwhip and pinned him to the asphalt before he could take two steps.

It was over in under a minute.

They stood in the wreckage of the failed robbery, surrounded by dented vehicles and groaning criminals and the settling dust of violence concluded. Police sirens wailed in the distance, growing closer. The late afternoon sun cast long shadows across the scene, painting everything in shades of orange and gold.

For a moment, neither of them spoke.

Izuku’s heart was pounding. Not from exertion. His body had barely registered this as a workout. No, this was something else entirely. Something that had nothing to do with the fight and everything to do with the man standing ten feet away, backlit by the setting sun, ash-blond hair still smoking faintly from his explosive entrance.

Fighting alongside Bakugo felt like breathing. Like coming home. Like his body remembered a rhythm it had been missing for weeks, a frequency it was specifically tuned to receive. They hadn’t planned this, hadn’t coordinated, hadn’t exchanged a single word. And yet every move had flowed together seamlessly, two halves of a whole that didn’t need instructions to function.

Izuku had fought beside other heroes. Good heroes. Capable, professional, skilled. But it was never like this. Never this effortless synchronization, this bone-deep knowing of exactly where the other person would be and what they would do. With anyone else, he had to think, had to communicate, had to translate instinct into language.

With Bakugo, he just moved. And Bakugo moved with him.

He had missed this. More than he wanted to admit. More than he had let himself acknowledge during three weeks of solo patrols and empty corridors and conversations that stopped when he entered a room.

“Oi.”

Bakugo’s voice cut through his thoughts, sharp and impatient. The blonde had released his hold on the suspects and was stalking toward him, expression thunderous. His boots crunched against scattered debris, each step deliberate, predatory. The scent of burnt sugar preceded him, strong enough that Izuku caught it even from several feet away.

“Where the hell is your team?”

Izuku felt his shoulders tense. His body recognized the danger in that tone even before his mind caught up, an instinctive response to an Alpha on the edge of anger. He forced himself to hold his ground, to meet those blazing red eyes without flinching.

“I don’t have one right now.”

“What do you mean you don’t have one?”

“I mean…” Izuku hesitated, the words catching in his throat. Saying it out loud made it real in a way that his own internal acknowledgment hadn’t. “The agency restructured my assignments. I’ve been handling solo patrols for the past few weeks.”

Bakugo stopped walking. He stood there, absolutely still, and the silence that stretched between them felt heavier than gravity. Izuku watched the muscles in his jaw tighten, watched his hands curl into fists at his sides, watched the careful control he maintained over his expression start to crack at the edges.

“Solo patrols,” he repeated flatly. “You. Solo.”

“It’s not a big deal, Kacchan. I can handle—”

“Bullshit.”

Bakugo closed the distance between them in two strides, getting in his face the way he always did when he was angry. Which was often. But this close, Izuku could see the details that the distance had hidden. The dark circles under Bakugo’s eyes, faint but present. The tension in his shoulders that spoke of sleepless nights and grinding frustration. The way his scent had sharpened from burnt sugar to something more acrid, almost bitter.

“You’re telling me your garbage agency pulled your team because of that Omega crap?” Bakugo’s voice dropped to a dangerous register. “And you just let them?”

“I didn’t let them do anything.” Izuku heard the defensiveness in his own voice and hated it. “It wasn’t my choice.”

“Then make it your choice.” Bakugo’s eyes blazed, red and fierce and absolutely certain. “You don’t have to stay with those cowards. Transfer out. Come work with me.”

Izuku blinked. For a moment, he wasn’t sure he had heard correctly. “What?”

“You heard me.” Bakugo didn’t back down, didn’t soften the demand. “My agency has been trying to get me to take on a partner for months. I keep telling them no because everyone they suggest is useless.” He jerked his chin toward the incapacitated villains behind them. “You’re not useless. You’re the only person I’ve ever worked with who doesn’t slow me down.”

The words landed somewhere in Izuku’s chest, warm and heavy. He opened his mouth, closed it, tried to find the right response and came up empty.

“Kacchan, I can’t just—”

“Why not?”

“Because…” Izuku struggled to articulate the knot of resistance that tightened in his chest. The fear that lived there, curled up and waiting. “I don’t want to be a burden. You’re competing for the number one spot. You don’t need me dragging you down with my… my situation.”

Something flickered across Bakugo’s face. There and gone so quickly Izuku almost missed it. Something that looked almost hurt, almost wounded, before it hardened into familiar irritation.

“Your situation,” he repeated, the words dripping with contempt. “You mean the situation where you’re one of the strongest heroes in the country and a bunch of weak-willed Alphas are too insecure to work with you? That situation?”

“That’s not—”

“It is, though.” Bakugo stepped closer still. Close enough that Izuku could feel the heat radiating off him, could see the individual sparks that danced across his palms when his quirk activated unconsciously. His scent sharpened, burnt sugar and smoke and ozone, the edge of his agitation bleeding through despite his legendary control. “You think I give a damn what other people think? You think their hangups mean anything to me?”

Izuku’s throat tightened. His heart was doing something complicated in his chest, a rhythm he couldn’t quite identify. “I just don’t want to cause problems for you.”

“The only problem you’re causing is by being stubborn about this.” Bakugo’s voice dropped, losing some of its edge. The anger was still there, but something else had crept in underneath it. Something that sounded almost like concern. “We’ve been down this road before, Deku. You trying to handle everything alone. Thinking you have to carry the weight by yourself. And every time, you push yourself too far and end up half-dead somewhere.”

The words landed like a physical blow. Because they were true. Because Bakugo knew him well enough to see exactly what he was doing, even when Izuku couldn’t see it himself.

Memories surfaced unbidden. All the times he had thrown himself into danger without thinking, without waiting for backup, without considering what it might cost. All the hospital beds and recovery rooms and worried faces. All the moments when Bakugo had found him broken and bleeding and dragged him back to safety with curses on his lips and fear in his eyes.

“I remember,” Izuku said quietly. “I remember what you told me. That you’d be there to fight by my side.”

“Then stop acting like you forgot.” Bakugo held his gaze, unflinching. The setting sun painted him in shades of gold and amber, softening the hard lines of his face. “I meant it then. I mean it now. So quit being an idiot and let me help you.”

For a long moment, Izuku didn’t respond. He stood there, looking at Bakugo, at the fierce certainty in those red eyes, at the set of his jaw that said he would stand here arguing until the sun went down and rose again if that’s what it took. At this impossible, infuriating, irreplaceable person who had somehow become the fixed point around which Izuku’s world kept orienting itself.

Something warm bloomed in his chest. The same warmth he had felt in the waiting room three weeks ago. The same warmth that always seemed to surface when Bakugo was near, no matter how much Izuku tried to ignore it or explain it away.

“Working with you again,” he said slowly, feeling a small smile tug at his lips despite everything. “I can’t pretend I haven’t missed it.”

Bakugo’s expression flickered. For just a second, the hard edges softened. Something vulnerable passed through his eyes, quickly suppressed, before he looked away with a rough exhale.

“Yeah, well.” His voice came out gruffer than usual. “Don’t get used to the sentiment. I’m still going to kick your ass for pulling this solo hero crap.”

Izuku laughed. It felt like the first real laugh he’d had in weeks, bubbling up from somewhere he had forgotten existed. “I’d expect nothing less.”

Bakugo opened his mouth to respond, probably some cutting remark about Izuku’s various deficiencies, and then stopped.

His shoulders went rigid. His head tilted slightly to the side, nostrils flaring, and a strange expression crossed his face. The irritation drained away, replaced by something Izuku couldn’t immediately identify. Confusion, maybe. Or something closer to alarm.

“Kacchan?” Izuku stepped forward, concern overriding caution. “What’s wrong?”

Bakugo didn’t answer immediately. He was staring at Izuku with an intensity that made his skin prickle, red eyes narrowed as if trying to solve a puzzle that didn’t make sense. His nostrils flared again, subtle but unmistakable. He was scenting the air.

“Your scent,” he said finally. His voice came out rougher than before, scraped raw around the edges.

Izuku frowned. “Scent? I don’t have a scent.”

“Is that so.” Bakugo’s jaw tightened. His hands flexed at his sides, the motion restless, uncontrolled. For a moment he looked like he wanted to say something else, something important, but the words seemed to stick in his throat.

Before Izuku could ask what he meant, Bakugo shook his head sharply. Whatever he had noticed, whatever had caught his attention, he seemed determined to dismiss it. He shoved his hands into his pockets and stepped back, putting deliberate distance between them.

The sudden loss of proximity left Izuku oddly cold, as if a source of warmth had been abruptly removed.

“Think about what I said.” Bakugo’s voice was clipped now, controlled in a way that felt like armor. “About transferring. Don’t be stupid about it.”

“I will. I’ll think about it seriously.”

“Good.” Bakugo turned away, already walking toward the perimeter where police vehicles were beginning to arrive, their lights painting the scene in alternating blue and red. “And next time, don’t go chasing villains without backup. I’m not always going to be around to save your ass.”

“You didn’t save me.” Izuku called after him, something defiant rising in his chest. “We took them down together.”

Bakugo paused. Glanced back over his shoulder, and for just a moment the hard expression cracked. Something that might have been the ghost of a smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth.

“Whatever helps you sleep at night, nerd.”

Then he was gone, launching himself into the air with an explosion that left scorch marks on the pavement and the lingering scent of smoke in the air. Izuku watched him disappear over the rooftops, a trail of fading embers marking his path against the deepening evening sky.

The warmth in his chest lingered. Stubborn. Persistent. Impossible to ignore.

He turned back to the scene, to the police officers approaching with questions and paperwork, to the wreckage of the robbery they had stopped together. His body still hummed with the aftermath of the fight, with the memory of moving in perfect sync alongside someone who had never once doubted what he could do.

As he answered the officers’ questions and filled out the requisite reports, part of his mind kept drifting back to that strange moment. The way Bakugo had frozen. The intensity in his eyes. The roughness in his voice when he mentioned Izuku’s scent.

But that didn’t make sense. Izuku didn’t have a scent. He had never produced pheromones, never experienced any of the biological markers that defined most Omegas. That was the whole point of being asymptomatic.

So what had Bakugo noticed?

The question nagged at him as he finished the paperwork, as he made his way back to the agency, as he sat alone in his empty office and watched the last light fade from the sky outside his window.

Maybe Bakugo was right. Maybe he was being stubborn. Maybe accepting help wasn’t the same as being a burden.

And maybe, just maybe, he was tired of fighting alone.