Kirishima's POV

The rescue mission was a success, but with severe consequences. It wasn't just some villain who had captured Bakugo, it was the most terrifying villain I've ever seen. We were able to rescue my friend so that All Might wouldn't have to pull his punches when fighting the guy.

We watched with the rest of the world as the number one hero spent the last of his energy and then demanded more. He pushed his body past its limits. We all watched in horror as his body seemed to deflate, his iconic muscled form became scrawny and gangly.

I could feel Bakugo tense bedside me as his favorite hero was beat to a pulp. And yet, like always, All Might found a way to push forward and win. It was as if he could hear the shouts of encouragement from every street in the world as we all cheered him on.

And now, I'm walking with the newly rescued Bakugo down to the police department for him to recount what had happened. He's been silent ever since the TVs turned back to their regular programming and I don't know what to do. He just witnessed All Might nearly lose. I can't imagine what's going on in his head right now.

I keep trying to ask him how he's doing and what happened with the villains, but he doesn't answer me.

"Go home, Shitty Hair," he growls.

"No way, man!" I insist. He just escaped from the League of Villains and he wants me to leave before he's at least safe? "Besides, I have a promise to uphold. You can't get rid of me that easily!"

He merely grumbles in response, but allows me to walk with him anyway.

"Speaking of," I continue. "What happened to Koto?"

He raises an eyebrow at me. "Hah? Didn't Icyhot tell you?"

"He said she was attacked, but he didn't see whoever did it. You were the only one that did. Other than her I guess, but she's not..." I think back to my friend, shaking and screaming on the hospital bed from just the sight of us.

"She's not what?" He snaps at me, kicking a pebble down the sidewalk in front of him.

I try to find the best words. "She's...not cooperating...right now..."

"That fucker," he growls, kicking the small rock hard enough to put a crack in a flower shop's glass door. I lead him away before the owner can come out and yell at us. "He was at that fuckin' movie night. Somebody's boyfriend or whatever. When I found him, he was sitting next to her with his hand on her head."

"What did he do?" I ask quickly, both fear and hope blossoming in my chest.

"How the fuck am I supposed to know?" He snaps, but continues anyway. "There was...this white cloud around her head. When he ran away, it sorta followed his hand. I don't know what the fuck that means or what it did, but that's what I saw."

I wonder what he could've done to make Koto react like that. But I guess it makes sense why she isn't injured. Whatever the guy did, it was obviously something mental. Well at least we know who did it and somebody in that family knows where to find him. Hopefully with that information, they'll be able to capture him and figure out how to fix it.

"It's scary," I say after a moment, "what he did to her."

Bakugo doesn't respond, instead stomping ahead and into the police department.

•°•°•°•

Mr. and Mrs. Bakugo offered to drive me home while picking up their son. Their personalities...shocked me to say the least, but it's clear where their son gets his personality from.

I sit in the back of their minivan with my friend as they fire question after question at him. Realizing I still haven't upheld my promise, I find Uraraka's number in the class group chat and pull up a private message to her.

Me: Bakugo's safe and he knows who did it. It's the guy that somebody brought to movie night

She texts back almost immediately. I feel bad, imagining her sitting up in bed, waiting for any update from me and worrying.

Uraraka: Eito? I can't believe it he's so shy tho

Me: Bakugo says he knows 100% that it was him

Me: Ur probably gonna get a call in the morning just give them any info you can on him. Bakugo didn't know who else to refer them to since he didn't have a name

Uraraka: Thnx for the heads up. U coming to the hospital tomorrow?

Me: I was planning on it why?

Uraraka: I have an idea, but idk if it'll work. I'll tell you tomorrow

Me: Ok get some sleep. She'll be fine. I promise

Uraraka: Don't promise when there's no way of knowing

Me: No I know. She's going to be fine

Me: Goodnight

Uraraka: Good night

I had mainly ignored the Bakugo family's shouts as I was texting, but when I return my attention to the people in the car, I'm shocked to find a peaceful silence settled over them. My blonde friend is slumped over in his seat, fast asleep. It occurs to me that he probably refused to sleep when he was kidnapped. He must've wanted to stay alert. Well, it's good he can get some rest now.

When we pull up to my house and I get out of the car, Bakugo's mom, Mitsuki, leans out her window and shouts, "he's been over here too much! Next time, you're coming to our place. And bring that cute girl he's hanging around all the time too, would ya?"

I don't even get a chance to respond before she steps on the gas and drives away.

Tonight, when I climb into bed, I'm at least a little more hopeful than last night. One down, one to go.

•°•°•°•

In the morning, I wake up to two texts from Bakugo which is insane considering he never reaches out to me first.

Bakubro: They found the fucker and had me confirm it was him

The next one is from five minutes ago.

Bakubro: He admitted to it and they're taking him to the hospital to fix Curly

I immediately shoot out of bed, throw on some clothes, and run a brush over my teeth. I don't even bother to do my hair before I run out the door, saying a quick goodbye to my parents and grabbing the flowers from the vase we put them in yesterday so they wouldn't dry out. I text Uraraka on the train.

Me: Hey Bakugo says the guy's going to the hospital to fix whatever he did with his quirk

I don't get a response until I'm racing down the road, the hospital slowly growing in the distance.

Uraraka: Yeah I'm here now

Me: I'll be there in 5

I bypass the receptionist and run up the stairs, stumbling out onto the third floor to see a small group already assembled. So far, it's only Aizawa, Present Mic, Midnight, Uraraka, and a woman who I slightly recognize from the movie night.

She must be the one who had brought him.

They all turn to me as I stumble to right myself. The woman studies me intently for a moment before extending her hand. "Sayuri Fujino," she introduces herself.

I take it and give it a shake. "Eijiro Kirishima. Who's with Koto?"

"One of the nurses," Midnight says. "We're meeting with the detectives and Mr. Watanabe out here and not everyone will be able to go in with him. You two," she points to me and Uraraka with her sharp red nails, "along with Bakugo will stay out here while he is returning her brain to normal."

"'Normal'?!?" Uraraka and I shout at the same time.

"Everything will be explained when he gets here," Aizawa sighs. "Now try to compose yourselves. You're making Hizashi cry."

Sure enough, the voice hero is clutching his leather jacket close around him and tears are dripping from behind his green glasses.

"I'm sorry, man," I say, going over to put a hand on his shoulder. "Koto's gonna be fine. The detective has a lie detector quirk, right? If the guy says he can fix what he did and he wasn't lying, then everything's gonna be alright."

He sniffles a few times and goes to hug my homeroom teacher, but the man moves as fast as I've ever seen him, sidestepping away and pushing Midnight in his place. She grabs Mic and pulls him down to lean against her chest, tracing lines down his face. I feel my face heating up at the sensual gesture and look away.

The door to the elevator opens before I can find a seat and all our attention snaps to the group walking in. The blue haired man in quirk suppressing handcuffs is ushered forward first, followed by two police officers, then Detective Tsukauchi, his partner with the cat head, and Bakugo. The cat man keeps hissing at my friend who, hilariously, is hissing back. I run over to separate the two before the officer gets his whiskers singed.

"Okay, so who's going to explain what's been happening?" I demand, barely managing to harden my face in time to catch an explosion from Bakugo.

"No quirk usage in the hospital," Aizawa growls, erasing both our quirks.

"That fucker's about to," Bakugo snaps, glaring at the man.

"Under our supervision," our teacher says.

"And I'll ask again, what's happening?" I say a little more desperately.

The detective turns to the man, Eito Watanabe, in handcuffs. "Well," he says quietly, so much so that I have to strain to hear him which takes me off guard. "Let me just start off by saying that I'm really sorry. The League took my little brother and they were gonna kill him unless I participated in the attack. In all honesty, it could've been a lot worse."

"Could've been worse?!?" I shout, getting angry. This villain thinks he can just come in here, tell us this sob story and we're gonna forgive him? Just like that? "My friend is in there, chained down, and you have the nerve to say it's not that bad?!? Tell me, how could it be worse?!"

The man shies away from me, tucking his chin into his shoulder. I feel guilty for a moment, but I staunch the feeling, remembering what he did to Koto.

"I could've made it so it can't be fixed," he whimpers. "My quirk registration says I can rearrange the axons in someone's brain. That controls the direction of impulses between neurons. Basically, I can disconnect and reconnect people's thoughts. It's helpful to have it in psychology because I can also just monitor them, so I can see where people's trains of thought lead. I mainly work with people who have phobias, seeing where their fears stem from."

"Get to the point," Bakugo snaps and the man flinches.

"Sorry, sorry. I lied on my quirk registration because I didn't want anyone to know the full extent of what I can do. If I had only used that part of my quirk, her brain would be like a rubix cube that's impossible to solve, which is what the League wanted me to do. Admittedly, what I did makes it look like that from anybody else's point of view, but I can actually fix it. I can remove people's neurons as well. When I do that, there's just a disconnect in people's brains, but most of the mass is still there. It's easy enough to just put back in the same spot."

He pulls out a small glass vial. Inside, there's an odd greyish white mass. "The longer they sit unused, the more they deteriorate. They have to be put back before they dissolve."

"Wh-what did you take away?" Uraraka stammers.

"I took every neuron associated with positive emotions. Say she sees one of her friends, an impulse travels down the line from your appearance to register your name, your personality, things that she associates with you, and then her emotions towards you. From positive emotions, there are impulses sent out to calm her, make her smile, and such. I took those specific neurons away. She still has the associations between your appearance, name, and personalities, but right now, they're only associated with her negative emotions. All of those with nothing to offset them is what's making her act the way she is."

He finishes his explanation and we all look to the detective. He nods, signifying that the man is telling the truth.

"And you can put them back?" I ask.

"Exactly the way they were," he confirms.

"And I'll be in the room the entire time to stop him if anything seems out of sorts," Aizawa says, sending a menacing glare towards Eito.

"So what happened to your brother?" Uraraka asks after a moment.

His shoulders seem to relax just barely. "The League gave him back, something about a civilized trade. I guess they wanted me to be on their side of my own free will. Well...I guess the smokey guy did. The guy with all the hands on him didn't seem to care too much."

The cat officer steps forward and says, "the boy and his family are currently in witness protection. After he returns Miss Yamada to her former mental state, Mr. Watanabe will be joining them."

I guess he's trying to do the manly thing by trying to help, I think. But he belongs in jail for what he's done.

Before I can voice my opinion, the officers lead Eito towards Koto's room, the rest of the adults following. Uraraka and I sit, but Bakugo tries to follow after them.

"Sit down," Aizawa demands, eyes flashing at the boy.

I see Bakugo's hands tense, but no explosions are coming out like they normally would. "I'm the only one who's seen that fucker use his quirk, so how do you know he's gonna fix it?"

"He's told us exactly what it will look like and Detective Tsukauchi has confirmed it," our teacher states.

"Bakugo, you don't want to be in there," I say, standing up. I keep imagining Koto's face as she saw me and screamed. I made her feel that way. If all her positive emotions of me are gone, does that mean she's scared of me? Was that how she felt anyway? "If all her positive emotions are taken away, she only feels all the negative things she gets when she sees you," I say, feeling a bit dejected.

I thought we were friends. What would've prompted her to feel that way? Was she lying about everything all along?

The blonde boy looks between me and Uraraka who, I've noticed, is crying quietly in her chair. She seems to be at that point where she can't take in any more air to even make noise, her sobs breathless and silent. I can't say I'm that far off from that.

But that's different in her case, isn't it? Koto tried to attack her...

I feel my knees give way and I sit down hard on the seat next to her. "You don't want to see what she thinks of you," I choke out and tears fall into my mouth. I swallow, tasting the salt on my tongue. "It's not something anyone should see."

"I can handle it," he snaps.

"Maybe," interjects our teacher. "But it's still unnecessary and could cause her more trauma than she's probably already facing."

"The nervous fuckwad is already gonna set her back to normal, so what's the harm?"

"She'll have to live with what she does and so will you."

Just as Bakugo's about to bite out another argument, someone must've opened the door to Koto's room because her screams echo through the hallways. The sound carries, broken and terrified, to where we all are frozen in place.

"Stay here," Aizawa demands, running off.

Bakugo waits for our teacher to turn a corner before running after him. "Bakugo, no!" Uraraka cries, trying to run after him, but Koto lets out another bone rattling scream that has her falling to the ground, covering her ears.

"I can't do it," she whimpers and I lower myself onto the ground next to her. "I can't listen to it anymore."

"I know," I choke out, pulling her closer to me.

We sit there for a while, crying before I hear footsteps from down the hall. Bakugo turns the corner, white as a sheet. He doesn't say anything as he walks over and sits down on the ground next to me.

------Author's Note------

Hey guys!!

We have more fan art!!

Thanks so much to Freedom5556 for this awesome gif of Koto at Hosu! The animation is fantastic and totally captures the emotion in her face! I'm so thrilled with this, it looks so good!!

Thank you all for your support of this story, I hope you're enjoying!