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andypantsx3 · 4 years

Text

war paint | 6 | blade

pairing: Bakugou Katsuki / Reader

length: 27,765 words / 10 chapters

summary: Desperate times force you to disguise yourself and join the kingsguard. When a suspicious string of crimes strike the palace, however, Captain Katsuki Bakugou starts paying extra close attention. (spin off of in cinders)

tags: mulan AU, secret identity, romance, reader-insert

warnings: aged up characters, some violence, eventual smut

The bath house might have been the strangest moment of your life, but it proved only the beginning of Bakugou’s unusual behavior.

The captain seemed to be everywhere you turned in the days after. In the mess hall, you’d catch him staring at you from his table of officers, an unreadable look on his face. On the training pitch, he seemed to almost ignore your mistakes -- or at least, he didn’t appear as eager to rap you across the knuckles with the flat of his sword any time you were full seconds off a strike. He never reprimanded you, or revealed in any way that he’d caught you out after hours.

He was so confusing.

You’d thought more on his comments in the bath, about the prince and his valet. He had at least answered one of your long standing questions about why he - a marquis - would have joined the kingsguard instead of lounging around in Musutafu, slowly filling his manor full of heirs like the rest of the nobility. It was clear he was so viciously protective of the prince, and of Midoriya, though he seemed loath to admit it. You guessed that he couldn’t well knife anyone who “fucked with them” as he’d put it, from the comfort of a country estate.

This humanizing connection had you more confused than ever, and in combination with his weird behavior over the past few days, you were beginning to think he was waging some kind of psychological campaign on you. His lingering, thoughtful gazes were reaching off-putting levels of obviousness, and the way he corrected you in drills -- while still colorful with swears and insults -- was almost downright friendly for him.

You wondered what was wrong with him.

“He’s gonna murder you,” Kaminari offered unhelpfully, when you asked his opinion. “It’s like a final act of kindness. The prisoner’s last meal.”

Sero poked him with the stem of the herbs you’d been trying to grind into a staunching salve. “It’s not that. When have you ever known Bakugou to be kind?”

“That’s what I’m saying!” Kaminari defended himself. “Why else would he be less mean to L/N than if he was gonna kill him?”

Sero rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “I guess you have a point.”

You looked at him in alarm. “I don’t want to die,” you hissed. “I was just taking a bath.”

Kaminari smirked, piling up his own herbs in a towering heap, spilling out of the bowl of his mortar. “Not so great now, are they?”

You rolled your eyes, picking up your pestle and stabbing it into the mortar with feeling. “You can’t hate being clean that much.”

He didn’t respond.

You looked back up at him only to find him frozen, eyes fixated on something behind your back. He looked white as a sheet, and sat stiff and unblinking, as though locked in rigor mortis. A tall shadow fell over your workstation.

“Lotta yapping over here,” a rough voice said, and you looked up, up into a pair of red eyes. Your body locked up.

“Uh,” you said stupidly, feeling as blank as Kaminari, “The pestle leaves my mouth free.”

Sero let out an inhuman noise next to you, and the corner of Bakugou’s mouth twitched.

“Thought you did all your talking outta your ass,” he said, eyeing you closely.

Your face reddened. “Captain! I--That’s not--!”

“Calm down, shrimp,” he smirked. “You’re excused from medical training today. You’re coming with me.”

You stared up at him in shock. Was he taking you somewhere to kill you? Why not do it in front of the entire garrison? That seemed more his style, leaving your body to send a message to anyone else who dared commit the unforgivable sin of bathing after hours. What was he trying to do?

“Captain?” you asked nervously, fingers tightening on your pestle. Kaminari and Sero just stared, slack-jawed and open-mouthed like neanderthals.

“Now, soldier,” Bakugou said, insensitive to your plight. “Ten pushups for every second you make me wait.”

You shot to your feet. “Yes, sir.”

He turned on his heel, stomping back across the training field. The sun winked across his broad shoulders, falling in streaks over the blood red of his captain’s uniform.

“We’ll honor your memory,” Kaminari said sadly as you made to follow. Sero elbowed him, but it didn’t change your nervousness.

You thought quickly as you followed Bakugou across the field. If you weren’t being murdered, were you being discharged for your actions? Why now, why not days ago when it had happened?

Bakugou led you across the castle grounds, to a small building set in the shadow of the palace.

“In,” he grunted, opening the door. You eyed him apprehensively but ducked under his arm, stepping into a dim room. Racks of weapons lined the walls - heavy looking crossbows were pinned to the rafters, quivers of arrows lay in piles on the floor, and all manner of swords and maces lay racked in every corner. A tall man with a hawkish nose and dark eyes sat at a worktable in a cramped corner of the room, fletching a pile of arrows.

“Tokoyami,” Bakugou greeted him, following you into the room. You halted, but he prodded you forward with an impatient hand. “This is the little runt I was talking about. Think I got the size right?”

Tokoyami considered you, rising from his worktable. He took your wrist gently, placing his other hand under your elbow to pull your arm out, holding it perpendicular to your body. “He looks as described. I think it will work.”

Your heart picked up in your chest. What would work? What was he doing with your arm? Why was he holding it out? Was he going to cut it off?

You took a step back, running up against a hard chest. Bakugou let out a breath behind you, putting a steadying hand on your shoulder. It was almost unnaturally warm, burning through the layers of your uniform like the sun on a summer afternoon.

“Relax, princess,” he rumbled quietly in your ear as Tokoyami dropped your wrist, turning back to his worktable. He rummaged around in a pile of weapons behind it, the metal of swords clanking lightly as he shifted them.

You fidgeted uncomfortably under Bakugou’s hand, trying not to focus on the heat of him just behind you, the scent of smoke and something sugary that clung to him like dew on morning grass.

Tokoyami eventually emerged with a thin scabbard, holding it out to you. “Here.”

You looked at him curiously, but Bakugou gave you another impatient push. “Take the damn sword, shrimp. We don’t have all day.”

You took it from Tokoyami carefully, holding it out gingerly. “Captain, what is this?”

Bakugou scoffed from behind you, and you turned around to look at him.

“The standard issue blade’s too big for you. It’s why you’re so shitty at drills,” Bakugou said, crossing his arms over his chest. His uniform groaned in protest over his biceps, and you forced your eyes back up to his face.

“What?” you asked stupidly.

Bakugou smirked. “You’re not putting on the same muscle as those other fucks. I saw it in the baths. You needed a different blade - a little smaller and much lighter.”

You stared at him in shock. Is that why he had come into the water to harass you? He’d been looking you over? What else had he noticed about your appearance? Surely not much more or you wouldn’t be here…

“Please open it,” Tokoyami said quietly from your side. “Make sure it is to your liking.”

You followed his direction, pulling the hard leather from the blade. The crisp metal caught the glint of the afternoon sun, falling through the room’s single window. You noted immediately that it was perhaps an inch shorter than your own current blade, and about a fingertip less wide, with a smaller grip much closer to the size of your own hand.

The most dramatic difference, however, was its weight. It felt barely half as heavy, lightweight and almost airy in your hand after the weight of your own blade.

Tokoyami reached out and tapped the sword where a large groove ran through its center. “I had it fullered, much deeper than the standard issue blade to relieve some of the weight. I took enough length and width off to lighten the load but not give you a disadvantage in a fight, and reduced the grip size to keep the balance,” he paused, lip curling, “and because the captain said you had hands like a child.”

You whirled around to glare at Bakugou. He leaned against a sword rack, smirking, a thin blonde eyebrow raised as if daring you to disagree.

“You’ll need to practice with it,” Tokoyami continued, unaffected, “it will take some getting used to after the standard blade.”

You turned back to him. “Thank you. This is - wonderful.”

He seemed to smile, pleased. “It was the captain’s order. I only made it.”

You looked back at Bakugou. “Captain, I--”

“Save it,” he waved a hand, leaning back out of his slouch. “Tokoyami, thanks. We’ve got training to get to.”

He pushed the door open and stepped back out into the afternoon sun. “Move it, shrimp.”

You bowed to Tokoyami and scrambled after him. Bakugou led you back through the palace grounds to a small, out of the way training field you had never seen before. In the late afternoon sun, his hair shone like pale golden wheat, ruffling lightly in the breeze.

He stopped in the center of the field, unsheathing his own sword. “C’mon, princess. Let’s break in that new blade of yours.”

Your gut churned with nerves, but you nodded. You unclipped the sword belt containing the standard issue blade and kicked it to the side, drawing your new sword. Again, its lightweight build shocked you and your arm overshot the draw slightly, whipping the sword out a little farther than you intended.

“You’re going to have to put more force into your swings to accommodate for the missing weight,” he said. “It’s easier to move but you won’t be striking as hard when you do.”

You nodded, fingers tightening on the sword’s grip.

Bakugou smirked, eyes darting down to your hand. And then, before you could blink, he was on you.

You got your sword up just in time, barely saved by the fact that it was lighter than you were used to. The force of his strike rang up your whole arm and you gritted your teeth as he followed through, pushing you off balance.

You took a step back, ducking under his wide swing and darting your sword at his side. With almost inhuman grace, he twisted, leaning to the side and bringing his blade down to knock yours aside.

You followed the movement of your sword, letting it carry you outside his immediate reach.

“Good, princess,” he bit out, the corner of his mouth curling. “You’re faster.”

You stared at him. You felt faster, but you still couldn’t touch him.

“Again,” he commanded imperiously.

You thrust another strike at his chest. Again he caught it, knocking your blade aside. As he did, you noted that the force of it was easier to control than usual, and you were much faster in regaining command and bringing it back up to cut at him again.

“So you have been learning something,” he said, letting a savage grin touch his mouth. “You’re less useless than I’d have guessed, shrimp.”

It was hardly a compliment at all, but from him it felt like high praise. Something warm like satisfaction curled in your chest.

“Focus on bringing it down harder,” he said, stepping back into your space. The dirt of the field crunched under his boot. “You’re still not accommodating for less weight behind your blows. It’s easy for anyone to throw you off.”

You threw another blow at him, putting all your own weight behind it. He caught it, but was a fraction of a second slower in pushing you back off.

“Good,” he murmured again, red eyes tracking you as you stepped back out of his reach.

He threw another strike at you and met it with a heavy swing. He stepped through the recoil, and thrust again. Again you caught him in time and used his own momentum to swipe his strike aside. He grinned savagely.

After that, your focus narrowed entirely to strikes and thrusts, parries and blows. Your whole world became the swing of your arm, the glint of sun on bright metal, the soft dirt under your feet as you wove and ducked and swiped. Only gradually did you become aware of your heavy breathing and a slight fatigue in your arms. When you next noted your surroundings, the sun was no longer in its place in the sky, leaning close to the earth to kiss the horizon.

Bakugou used your distraction to kick your legs out from under you.

“That’s enough for today, shrimp,” he finally said, and you noted with some pride that he was breathing a little heavily as well. “I went easy on you, but you’re good. Better than I would have expected.”

You got to your feet, sheathing your sword. “This whole time,” you panted out between breaths, “I didn’t think - I, I’ve just been terrible.”

Bakugou tucked away his own blade. “You were. Now you’re not.”

You realized with a start that not only had he commissioned you a blade, but he’d set aside an entire afternoon to train you with it. Something like embarrassment, and gratefulness, washed over you in a hot wave.

“Thank you,” you blurted, grabbing the hem of your uniform for something to do with your hands. The tips of your ears felt hot.

Bakugou raised an eyebrow, then scoffed. “Shoulda caught it sooner,” he said, dismissively. “Knew you weren’t stupid with the way you picked up the medical shit.”

You looked at him in question.

“I thought you’d build up enough muscle,” he said, looking you over. “I didn’t take into account...other factors.”

Your eyebrows knitted together. “My...age?”

His crimson gaze caught yours, holding for a moment before he looked away. “Something like that.”

You stared at him but he didn’t elaborate, padding over to pick up your sword belt and previous blade from the ground. He held them out in a large, calloused hand. “Bring this back to Tokoyami. Then you’re dismissed.”

You took them from him, nodding. “Thank you again, Captain. I....appreciate it.”

A smirk overtook his handsome face. “Don’t embarrass me again at drills.”

A flush overtook your face so quickly it felt like you were scalded by your own skin. “I won’t, sir.”

He considered you a moment, then turned on his heel and set off across the field, waving a hand dismissively. “Get to the armory, princess,” he called over a broad shoulder, “I want you back in your bunk by sundown. No more late night escapades.”

You watched him go, something like a smile touching your mouth. A foreign feeling washed over you and you stopped to think on it for a moment.

For the first time in months, you felt like you were in the right place.

#bakugou x reader #fanfic #bakugou katsuki x reader #bnha #bnha x reader #boku no hero academia #bakugou katsuki

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