Summary: Bakugo fulfilled his dream of being a police officer, unknowingly sacrificing every connection he had with his friends and family in the process. Only after meeting an old classmate and impulsively trying to help her does he realise that he was the one who needed to be saved all along.

Katsuki Bakugo x Ochaco Uraraka

Chapter 1: Black Maria (Prologue)

…

"Bakugo, are you ready to roll?"

Katsuki wiped the sweat and rain from his brow with a towel, watching as the perps lined up and piled into the wagon. They busted a group of bikers cooking and dealing meth inside some hole in the wall bar. Not even the rain could wash away the tell-tale stench that wafted through the joint from the large-scale cooking within the 'lab'.

"Nah, I'll just wait around until we finish up." Katsuki regarded the dark circles and pale face of his partner. "You look like shit man. Take some time off and go home to your wife and kids."

He didn't wait for him to respond and took shelter from the rain elsewhere. From all his years working, he knew there were two types of people in the force. Cops that worked for years and hardened for the job or normal people that burnt out too quickly and moved to a safe desk job. This guy wouldn't last the year.

"Sir, please… I'm not that kind of girl."

Katsuki's sharp focus narrowed in on a scuffle in a nearby alleyway. The woman's voice was soft and oddly familiar. He stepped carefully, peering behind the filthy cool brick to get a closer view of what was going down. The street lights barely reached the dark abyss and he had to adjust to see what was happening.

Some drunk was harassing a young woman and from the way she was dressed, it didn't take a genius to realise she was a prostitute. She wore a satin red Chinese cheongsam that showcased her stunning legs, surprisingly scar and bruise free for a working girl. She tried to calm the man down and back away, but he wasn't taking the hint.

"C'mon baby, I got money!" The drunk tried to clumsily grab her but she backed away firmly.

"Mister if you try to touch me I'm going to have to use self-defence!" She said, her voice quivering as she tried to keep up her strong façade. "I don't want to hurt you, but-"

"Listen you whore!" He growled, grabbing her arm with his fist. "I want to fuck and whether you want it or not doesn't matter as long as I throw you a buck when I finish!"

Katsuki threw down his towel and was already running to intervene, but before he even got close enough to throw a punch in, the girl turned and yanked the drunk's arm over her shoulder and threw him to the ground. The man was so dazed he pissed himself before passing out.

Katsuki suddenly got a weird feeling of déjà vu.

It seemed like a century ago but it was more accurately a decade. He still had an ego even today, but at fifteen he especially thought he was hot shit. The memory of what led up to the moment was still kind of hazy, but he distinctly recalled pissing a girl off enough that she threw him to the ground.

The feeling of weightlessness, like your body was floating in space, all ending in a second when inertia and gravity kicked in and you fell straight on your ass. He could remember that feeling like it was yesterday.

The woman turned to face him and it all came rushing back. He would never forget those smooth round cheeks and big doe eyes brimming with infuriating optimism.

"Kacchan?"

He hadn't been called that since high school.

….

Katsuki grinded his forehead against the ceramic wall as the hot water beat down on his head. He didn't know why he invited her back to his place. It was a weirdly impulsive decision and he half expected her to say no, but she didn't.

Groaning, Katsuki reached for the towel but noticed he'd forgotten something. He kind of just rushed to the shower straight away to have an excuse to think about things for a second, and forgot to get a spare change of clothes.

He was so used to walking around as naked as the day he was born ever since he left home and got his own place that he forgot about ever getting dressed in the bathroom. There was no way he was getting back into that uniform again so he bit the bullet and opened the door.

The minute the door swung open, he was immediately assaulted by Ochaco's lithe body as she pounced on him, wrapping her legs around his waist and holding his head to her breasts as she hugged him close. "You've grown so much, Kacchan!"

Katsuki's face reddened. With the softness of her breasts in his face, he hoped she didn't notice how much he thought the feeling was mutual.

Ochaco had grown, too. She was always small and kind of chubby as a teenager and now all of that baby fat had moulded into soft curves and supple skin. That dorky girl that hung out with dorky Deku was now everything that drove him crazy wrapped up in a neat little package.

If she were anyone else, he would take that as an invitation to throw her down on the bed and show her just how much he had really grown, but knowing what little he did from the girl she was in high school, he knew that she was socially inept and as much as it pissed him off, she probably didn't realise that he was a hot-blooded man instead of the kid he used to be.

Slowly, Ochaco slid down and stood on her feet, resting her hand against his chest for support. Her touch rested longer than necessary, as she stared up at him in awe.

He wasn't the kind of guy that liked to follow someone else's pace, so he tried to take control before the situation got out of hand.

"What were you doing in an alleyway on that side of town dressed like that anyways, round face?" Katsuki cleared his throat as he tried to create some distance.

"I can't believe you can't remember my name…" She pouted. "It's Uraraka Ochaco – not 'round face'."

Of course, he knew her name.

Grunting, Katsuki slipped a shirt over his head and stepped into a pair of sweatpants, shimmying underneath the towel. It was the first time he got changed like that and he made a note to never do it again.

He always remembered her, but she was Deku's girl and it was best he kept his distance. The reasons were different then, but his intentions were the same. Right now, she was happy to see a familiar face after something traumatic and she would probably be more guarded in the morning.

"I was uhmm - working." Ochaco frowned, dropping her eyes to the floor. "Please don't tell anyone about this. I don't want anyone from the past thinking, 'Oh, what happened to Uraraka?'… and then you saying something and them getting the wrong idea or something like that."

"Pfft."

Katsuki opened the fridge to get a beer, wondering if he should chuck her one too. Mulling it over, he decided to open the can and hand it to her, while he leaned against the counter and took a long sip of the cool brew.

Ochaco nursed her drink silently while he tried to figure out what to say to her. It had been so long since he'd talked to someone out of uniform that it was harder than he originally thought.

"You really think that's going to come up in conversation?" Katsuki didn't know why he was so irked by what she said. "You really think I'm going to say to someone – Hey dude, that dorky round-faced girl from high school is a whore now."

As he raised his eyes, the look on her face was enough feedback for him to understand he fucked up. Katsuki knew that she wasn't the kind of girl to cry over something stupid he said, but that wasn't the point. He didn't want to hurt her. He just didn't know what to say.

"I don't really talk to anyone from high school anyways." He said, cautious with his choice of words. "I don't really give a shit what you decide to do with your life- urgh!"

Pinching the bridge of his nose, he groaned.

"Fuck. That's not what I meant."

He could plan an intricate operation or a bust, take down multiple guys coming at him at once and chase down even the fastest criminals on foot without breaking a sweat but he couldn't reassure a girl.

"It's okay, Bakugo." Ochaco laughed quietly to herself, although the smile didn't reach her eyes. "I always knew you weren't the type to talk about other people's lives or gossip or anything like that. It was wrong for me to even suggest you would. I trust you."

Katsuki relaxed, "If you really feel that way, can you tell me what is going on? Are you in any trouble?"

"I don't want to say anything incriminating to a cop!" Ochaco laughed, taking a shy sip of her beer. When his expression did not change she added, "That was a joke by the way."

It wasn't that Katsuki didn't think it wasn't funny, his focus was more on the fact that for once in his life he forgot about work. "I'm off duty so don't worry about it."

"It's a long story."

Ochaco sat down on the couch while Katsuki ordered pizza. His workout regime made him pretty ravenous and usually he ordered enough to feed a carnivorous elephant. The only other thing he had in his fridge was beer and he didn't know how much women usually ate, so he decided to splurge a bit.

Sitting down next to her, he left another can of beer on the coffee table for her while he rested his arm on the back of the couch over her shoulder. Even though he was used to sitting like that with a girl around, it didn't feel right and he made himself uncomfortable doing so. She seemed cold in her skimpy dress, so he sighed and got up as quickly as he sat down, digging out one of his old university jumpers from a box in the corner.

"Huh?" She squeaked, as he pulled her arms up and dressed her like she was a doll. The jumper fell down to her knees and he wished that it hid her sex appeal, but seeing her in one of his old jumpers was somehow even more erotic. "Thanks, but I'm okay, really."

Katsuki didn't know if her cheery façade or his sexual frustration pissed him off more, but it was hard to look at her. More to the point, he didn't want some pimple faced pizza boy rocking up and looking at her either.

The buzzer rang and she said on reflex, "I'll get it!"

Without restraint, Katsuki grabbed her wrist and pulled her away from the door. He answered, trying to block as much of the kid's view as possible, which wasn't hard from how big he was. Balancing the boxes in one arm, he paid the kid and slammed the door in record time.

They stood in awkward silence as Katsuki laid out each box on the coffee table while he pretended to be confident by keeping his hands busy. He could count the number of times he had ever felt self-conscious on one hand, but for some reason her awkwardness rubbed off on him.

Opening each box, Katsuki waited for her to eat a slice before he got her to talk. Clearing his throat, he got her attention. "We've got pizza, beer and no more interruptions. Tell me what you were doing in that street corner."

"I know you probably hear this a lot, but it isn't what you think." She said slowly, sipping from her beer while her eyes met his. "They said that strippers get paid a lot, but my first day on the job kind of got interrupted by something."

"A drug bust." Katsuki filled in the blanks. "I guess everyone made themselves scarce."

"I never actually got to perform so I guess I'm not even a stripper let alone a prostitute." Ochaco smiled with a private chuckle. "Although I was asked once to do something or other with a video camera but I'm a little clumsy with technology…"

Even though she was dressed as she was, she was the same old Uraraka Ochaco she was in high school. Usually that would be a bad thing, but personally he was glad that was the case.

"What do you need the money for?" Katsuki said, as sharp as ever.

"I've been trying to send as much money home as possible." Ochaco wrung her hands on his jumper, her downcast eyes scanning the past. "After I dropped out of school, I've been working flat out to try to send money to help my parents. I told them that I found a successful entry-level job, but I just couldn't keep up with sending more money for every 'promotion' I lied about. You know how you just try to impress someone and it all just comes out so wrong and you don't know what to do to fix it?"

Yes, he knew the feeling - but he wasn't ever going to admit that.

"Why do you need to send money to your parents?" He felt comfortable moving a little closer after the slight buzz from the booze. "I always thought they owned their own business and did alright."

"I knew you remembered stuff about me!" Ochaco said, nudging him on the shoulder playfully. "I just had to keep you drinking to get your guard down for you to admit it."

"Heh." Katsuki scoffed. That was the exact tactic he tried to use on her, so he couldn't exactly be annoyed about her playing him. "Don't change the subject – it's not every day you'll get me interested in other people's lives."

"Well, I don't really know how to answer that. Why else do you try to help your parents other than just because you love them?" Ochaco said, waving her hand like it was the most obvious thing in the world. "You'd do the same, wouldn't you Bakugo?"

Katsuki really couldn't remember the last time he talked to his parents, let alone did anything dutiful like help them out financially. At first, his mother held on and tried to badger him about his cleaning and eating habits, but his father held her back and let him have his independence. The problem was that since then, he hadn't made an effort to reconnect with home.

"So, let me get this straight. You tried to make easy money stripping so that you could send the cash to your parents to help them out?" Katsuki asked, sceptically. If it were any other person the story would be ludicrous, but this seemed pretty standard Ochaco. "Am I missing anything here?"

"When I hear it from you it sounds so dumb, but there really aren't that many ways for a high school drop-out to make good money." Ochaco's head rested against the back of the couch, her hair tickling his arm. "I was told that stripper money is like getting drafted to your favourite sports team. You make good money when you're young, but the older you get…"

Katsuki turned his head to suppress a laugh. She caught him off guard and he realised how long it had been since he let his guard down. Not that she would have noticed, because she was already pretty tipsy off two beers, which was oddly endearing. It was more a reflex then anything, but he had this weird urge to just – he hated to admit it, but to protect her.

"I'm not really into giving advice, but since you're such a train wreck I'm going to make an exception." Katsuki said, trying and failing to drop the smirk.

"I will warn you that I don't have a cent on me right now and the only way I can pay for that advice is with my body." She giggled taking another clumsy swig of her drink.

"Payment first then."

Cautiously, Ochaco crawled closer and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. He didn't reciprocate and sat as still as possible, while she rested her cheek on his shoulder. "You thought I meant something dirty but what I really meant was hugs."

He sighed, waiting for her to sit back and let go, but she held on lazily regardless. "If it's so important to you, just crash here and look for work that doesn't involve taking your clothes off for money. As long as you don't get in my way or piss me off, I'm not going to hound you for rent or kick you out on your ass."

"Thanks, Kacchan." Ochaco smiled lazily as her eyes fell shut and her breathing slowly came in long, deep breaths.

When he knew for sure she was asleep, he lifted her up and held her in his arms for a moment as he regarded her face. Ochaco was still as small as he remembered and felt even lighter than she looked.

Just for tonight, he would sleep on the couch and let her have the bed.

…

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