Need You (ShinDeku)

Ch. 72 - Cool

A/N: I'm sorry I'm a bit late, so before this chapter starts here's some [lore?] for the story that may please you or cause infinite anxiety over past scenes. That's up to you.
Mido mumbles a lot. That's his thing. If you think you haven't seen a lot of his mumbles in this fic... I'm here to tell you you're wrong. He just doesn't realize he's doing it, and the POV doesn't allow you as readers to realize either. About 50% of the italicized words portrayed as Mido's thoughts in this fic are actually mumbles, but he'll never know because he just doesn't realize. Usually his words don't have much of an effect on the surrounding characters because he mumbles quietly/quickly enough that they don't understand it. I'll leave it up to you to decide which thoughts you think are actually mumbles, and which of those are heard by others...
Have fun reading!

Midoriya POV

Kacchan was waiting outside the door with his arms folded across his chest when we arrived. He gave me a pointed look and I shifted my gaze to Hitoshi.

"You can put me down now." Wow, that was really embarrassing to say. I felt the heat crawl up my cheeks as I avoided all of my friend's gazes. You had no problem just sitting there in his arms talking to people like nothing was off, but asking to be set down is embarrassing? What is wrong with you Deku?

Hitoshi set me down gently, an arm lingering around my waist for a few extra seconds. My walking stick tapped on the ground and for a moment I debated whether I looked cool and sophisticated or just dumb. Kacchan raised a judgmental eyebrow at me as if he knew what I was thinking. Yeah, definitely just dumb.

But now I have a cool weapon on me, I thought, remembering the way Momo used her Bo staff against Aoyama in the mock battle. It's not quite the same, but I bet I could use it somewhat similarly. It's still a stick, just much shorter and the wrong material, I reasoned.

That brought a genuine smile to my face, realizing that just having this with me made me feel a lot safer, like I could protect myself even without a quirk.

"Hey extras, is your memory as bad as a goldfish or are you just that stupid? I said I was talking to- to the nerd alone." My gaze sharpened at his slip-up, smile fading quickly. No one else seemed to have noticed it. Why would Kacchan pause like that? Kacchan was confident in everything he said—even if it was wrong—which it almost never was. He did it earlier too when he yelled to get my attention and I brushed it off, but this is strange. This was definitely the real Kacchan, no one could fake him that well, but what was wrong with him?

"Yeah yeah, we get it Bakugo. We're all just helpless idiots and you can't stand to be around us." Uraraka said sarcastically. "Don't worry, us poor goldfish will get out of your way." Iida looked like he wanted to be proud but his morals wouldn't let him.

The five of them left us, walking into the classroom. The door shut behind them, and the hallway was silent for a moment.

"Ner-"

"Why did you pause earlier?" I cut him off. It's bothering me. There was a reason, what was the reason? It shouldn't matter but it's Kacchan. He sounded unsure. He cut himself off like he was about to say something he shouldn't have.

He looked at me surprised. I guess he didn't expect me to cut him off. I didn't expect it either, but it was bugging me. I needed to know.

"The fuck?" He almost sounded offended. "You're making shit up."

I found myself narrowing my eyes as I leaned into my stick. I didn't say a word, because I knew he was flustered and would fill up the silence himself.