The Pastry Thief [Kirishima x Bakugou]

TPT Chapter 3: Did You Just Say "Fuck"?

Commander Aizawa stood up, brushing the dust off of himself while avoiding eye contact with Bakugou. "I know it's short notice, but the kingdom of Shiketsu has waged war with the Yuuei Kingdom." Bakugou had a look of pure annoyance on his face.

"Those bastards just can't accept defeat, huh?" The blonde rolled his eyes. "So, how long until we get to hand their ass to them, again?"

"About two weeks. But we must remain cautious, we don't know if any of them have found their soulmates by now."

"So pathetic, needing soulmates just to win a fucking war..." He leaned forward, stepping away from the side of his house that he was just propped up against. "Anything else I should know about?" Commander Aizawa looked at Kirishima, and then back at Bakugou.

"Yes. You are excused from all patrols until further notice. I want you to continue to train Eijiro Kirishima, have him battle-ready in two weeks. No more stand-ins, I want him to learn from the best. You can use your strange bandage method if you really don't want to touch, I don't care."

Bakugou's eyes went wide, and he stomped up to Aizawa. "But-"

"THAT IS AN ORDER, KATSUKI BAKUGOU!" For once, the feisty blonde didn't object. He just stood there, looking at the ground as he balled his fists. "You will wake up, eat breakfast, then you will train. Then you will stop only to eat lunch, and then train more until dinner. Have I made myself perfectly clear?" Bakugou stood silently, still clenching his fists. "Don't make me repeat myself."

"Fine," Bakugou grunted. "But after the war, I want you to relocate Kirishima to his own house. I don't want to have to see him again after this whole fucking ordeal is over." He sighed, reluctantly looking over to Kirishima and seeing the obvious hurt in his eyes.

"If that's what you want, it shall be done. I understand you may have things to do today, but starting tomorrow, I want you to begin the actual training. Again, I won't allow for any stand-ins." Commander Aizawa turned around and walked away, which left Bakugou and Kirishima to stare at each other in silence for a while.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know you really hated me that much..." Kirishima said, breaking the silence. The hurt and sadness in his voice caused a strange pain to arise in Bakugou's chest. He opened his mouth to try and say that he didn't actually feel that way, but the words wouldn't come out. "It's fine, I completely understand. You took me in on a whim, not expecting it to take up much of your time. But now, I'm your biggest problem. I'll try to learn fast, I promise. I don't want to be too much of a burden..."

"Shut up," Bakugou finally mumbled. "Look... that's not... I mean, you..." He quickly gave up and walked back inside his house. "Nevermind, let's finish lunch." Kirishima nodded and slowly followed him inside, closing the door behind him. They finished their potatoes in silence, and while Bakugou went to collect the dishes, Kirishima once again broke the silence.

"Why do you hate soulmates?" Bakugou stopped what he was doing and glared at Kirishima. "Ah, sorry! I mean, you don't have to answer, of course! I was just-"

"First of all, if you hope to be a soldier, stop saying sorry every two seconds. You're strong as hell, yet you act like such a fucking wimp. It's annoying." He sighed, rubbing his temple in frustration. "And second of all, about the soulmate thing, there are... a few reasons. It started out as me wanting to be strong. In fact, I wanted to be the strongest in the land, all without depending on a soulmate for anything."

"And now that you are the strongest in the land, what's your reason now...?"

"Well, for a while, I didn't have a reason. It was just out of habit, really. But now, I think I have a new reason." Bakugou looked at Kirishima. "I want to love who I want. I mean, if I were to ever fall in love, that is. I'm not in love now. But if, or when, I do fall in love, I don't want it to matter if the universe deems us soulmates or not. And if we don't turn out to be soulmates, which would frankly be pretty unfortunate for them if we were, I don't want them to fall out of love over it. I want us to love each other freely, without the ties of the universe..." Kirishima stared back at Bakugou for a minute, before smiling shyly.