"Hey, Midoriya."

"Yes?" said green haired boy responded. He carefully closed his notebook and tucked it into his lap, and then he turned in his seat. "What is it, Kaminaaaa Oh My God!"

Izuku stumbled out of his chair, his hands shaking and his eyes locked on Kaminari's vivid black eye and split lip. He reached forward, as if to graze the injuries with his hands, but his movements stuttered and he awkwardly clasped them in front of him. "Are- are you alright?"

Kaminari waved his hand, though Izuku was worried to see that he was leaning more on his left leg, and his free hand was tentatively holding the table Izuku had been sitting in front of for support. "I'm fine, it's just a flesh wound."

Izuku eyed the massive bruise on Kaminari's face with distrust.

"I swear!" Kaminari exclaimed. He shifted slightly, glancing over at the other people in the study lounge that had looked up with Izuku's exclamation. He carefully leaned closer to Izuku. "I was kinda asking for it anyways, and honestly, Kirishima told me I'd probably get decked for saying what I did. But it made me wonder, and I really need to ask you something now." Izuku blinked. He opened his mouth, but was interrupted before he could speak.

Ochako leaned in from beside Izuku, her face pulled in concern. "I think it can wait- who beat you up? You look like roadkill!"

"I wouldn't say 'road kill'-"

"Yes, like you got hit by a truck!" A new voice chirped. Ashido, who had been studying two tables down, had slid into the conversation in a movement as slick as those she used acid to perform. Kaminari cringed.

Izuku's lips pinched. "Was it- was it someone from class B?"

Ochako and Ashido gasped- as did the fellow 2-A students that had all been listening in since Kaminari walked into the small study space looking like a train wreck.

"Don't let them silence you!" Iida exclaimed from the other side of the room. "I can liaison with the teachers, and justice will be found!"

"Yeah- they're B for a reason, them Bitches, and they won't get away with beating up even you!" Ashido added.

"Wait, what do you mean 'even' me-"

"What did you do to piss them off?" Jirou interrupted. Yaoyorozu bumped her shoulder, her cheeks colouring as her friend asked a question that wasn't particularly polite.

Todoroki, who had been sitting across from Izuku, diligently studying, sighed. He put down his pencil, and blankly tuned into the conversation. "So much for nailing the math midterm," he muttered.

Kaminari shook his head, waving away the concerns of the 2-A class members present in the small study lounge that they had claimed as their own. "No, no-"

"It was Monoma, wasn't it?"

"Or that creepy manga kid!"

"NO!" Kaminari interrupted. He took a deep breath in, and turned back to Izuku. "Man, you guys keep sidetracking me. It's not really a secret- Sero dared me to call Bakugou 'Kacchan' for twenty bucks, and I did." Kaminari gestured at his face. "This is the result."

Iida gasped. "He assaulted you?!"

Kaminari shifted. "Well, we were outside sparring, practicing for the physical- and, ah, I may have worded it something like, um." Kaminari blushed. "'Come on, 'Kacchan'- can't you give it to me rougher?"

Silence.

Slowly, Izuku's face bloomed red, devouring his freckles away in a furious blush that sent him slipping back into his chair. Jirou sighed, muttering 'typical', while Todoroki rolled his eyes and pulled out massive headphones that he slipped over his ears.

Ochako leaned over Izuku and narrowed her eyes at Kaminari. "Okay, yeah, you deserved that."

Kaminari furiously pointed back at her, and cut through the other mutters of agreement throughout the room. "But why?" he asked. "Me and Bakubro-"

"Only Kirishima can call him that."

"Bakugou, whatever, are friends!"

Ochako cocked her head and gave Kaminari a look.

"Okay, friendly acquaintances," Kaminari muttered. "But it was just a bit of playful teasing!" He whipped towards Izuku, who carefully didn't meet his eyes. "So that's why I'm curious, and came here to ask Midoriya about it. Bakugou kinda hates you? Or something, you guys are weird- so why does he never seem to care about you calling him some cutesy nickname when he decks me in the face over it?"

Ochako blinked. She turned to Izuku, as did Jirou, Iida, Yaoyorozu, Ashido, and Todoroki, though he only discretely lifted his eyes from his page. Izuku blinked, the blush fading from his face as he pursed his lips.

"I- I don't know?" he said. "I've always called Kacchan 'Kacchan'. Maybe he's just used to it, the same way he always calls me Deku."

"But Deku is an insult coming from him," Iida said. "It has, indeed, been a question on my mind for some time as to why Bakugou does not react adversely in the slightest to such a, ah, childish nickname from you. Beyond his usual awful treatment of you, that is."

"Yeah, Midoriya," Ashido tagged on, and leaned on Kaminari's back with an arm around his shoulders to peek over at Izuku, heedless of Kaminari's hiss of pain. "If Bakugou let someone get away with calling him some cheerful sounding nickname, it doesn't make sense that it would be you. After all, he takes every possible chance to insult or blame you. I literally saw him call you a bitch ass yesterday for sneezing in his direction, and when he tripped over a rock the other day on the way to a ramen place with us he said 'fucking Deku'. You were literally nowhere in sight."

Kaminari snickered. "I forgot about that."

Iida waved his hands empathetically, ignoring Jirou's mutters of 'Iida Tenya, the "king of no chill".' "I understand now, Kaminari, why you so rudely interrupted all of our precious study time-"

"Burn," Ochako mumbled.

"-because this is a rather interesting observation, and though antagonizing Bakugou while you were already sparring was immensely idiotic-"

"Double burn-"

"-it does bear due consideration!" Iida turned towards Izuku, and mashed his face overly close to the tense boy. "Have you ever called Bakugou by his real name, or surname?"

Izuku froze. He blinked once. Then twice. His eyes widened. "No," he whispered. "I, I wasn't able to pronounce Kacchan's name when I was younger, and, well, by the time I could it had already 'stuck'- I can't imagine calling him anything else."

Ashido hummed. "Have you ever thought, Midoriya, that maybe part of the reason Bakugou hates your guts is because you keep calling him a cutesy nickname he clearly despises?"

Izuku gasped. He whipped around to face Ochako. "Do- do you think that could be part of why Kacchan stopped being friends with me? Because I call him 'Kacchan'?"

"Uh," Ochako said, and desperately made eye contact with the snickering other members of the class. "I think Bakugou just doesn't … ah. Like you, Deku. At all. Which makes him an idiot, obviously!" Ochako hurriedly assured. She slowly lowered her arms and pursed her lips, her brows pulling together. "But," she trailed off, then glanced at Izuku, who stared at her with rapt attention. She swallowed. "Well. I know if someone I didn't like called me something I found annoying, it wouldn't help."

Izuku stared blankly down at his hands that still cradled his notebook, but it didn't seem like he was really seeing anything. His jaw slackened, his lips quivering with words too faint and mumbled to be distinguished.

"Great," Jirou drawled. "You broke Midoriya."

Kaminari groaned. He waved his hand in front of the green haired boys face, tried snapping his fingers, and even nudged at the boy's tense shoulders to no avail. "I just wanted to know the secret to getting away with calling Bakugou a kiddy nickname, not give Midoriya an existential crisis." Kaminari's shoulders dropped. "This black eye was for nothing…"

Todoroki, silent till now, smacked his notebook on the table. Ochako jumped as it nearly made her tea spill on her notes, and she shot Todoroki a mild glare that he ignored. "If you're all done, Kaminari," Todoroki said, "we do have midterms to study for. I think you should be more worried about studying yourself instead of barging into this sacred study space."

"Sacred?" Kaminari asked, bemused. "I literally saw Ashido balancing her pencil on her nose when I came in. C'mon, this is way more important stuff!"

But Todoroki clearly didn't care. He made a show of pulling out his Ipod, cranking the music to nearly max volume, and snapping his headphones back over his ears. Kaminari huffed, and turned away. He looked back at Izuku, but before he could open his mouth Jirou cut him off.

"Yeah, Todoroki wasn't kidding- it's not that big of a deal." She put down her pencil, shared a quiet word with Yaoyorozu, and got out of her seat. "Let's go get some ice on that eye, kay?" She rolled her eyes. "Moron- you need all the help you can get."

Kaminari beamed, the split in his lip reddening as it struggled to crack fully open. "Well, if you insist on coming, I guess we should go get some ice."

Side by side, Jirou and Kaminari left the study lounge. Over her shoulder, Jirou shot Yaoyorozu a thumbs up, and the girl gratefully smiled before turning back around to fully immerse herself in her studying once more now that the boy who brought distraction in his wake was gone. Mina droned out 'boring!', but returned to her seat as well.

Iida decisively nodded as Jirou trailed out of sight. "A worthy sacrifice for the sake of many- what a women." He nodded again, then hurriedly sped back to his seat, jumping right back into his school work.

Ochako didn't immediately return to her notes. She glanced uneasily at Izuku, who continued to stare blankly at his lap. She leaned over the table towards Todoroki, and jerked her thumb over at the twitching green haired boy beside her. "Do- do you think he'll be alright?"

Todokori glanced at Izuku, and the white knuckled grip he had on his notebook, the way he deliriously mumbled, and the absolute rigidness of his shoulders. He shrugged. "He looks fine to me."

"…You really suck at reading social cues," Ochako mumbled. But Todoroki had decisively ramped up the volume of his heavy metal music, which allowed Ochako to hear it even through his headphones. She huffed through her nose as she slid back into her seat. She glanced at Izuku again. Would her best friend be okay? Anything that had to do with Bakugou usually sent him over the deep end in drama, which, if Ochako wasn't partial to his midnight crying sessions, would have been amusing considering all the flailing, repressed man pain, and childhood destiny bullshit that came from both sides.

Then again- she was partial to too many tears at late hours of the night, and exams were coming up. Should she interfere? Would this really get out of hand?

…Nah, Todoroki was right- Izuku might be freaking out right now, but he spazzed all the time (not that Ochako would ever tell him that to his face). Just the other day when they went shopping, he had a meltdown for five minutes over a limited edition figurine of All Might posing with Sir Nighteye that they found in a second hand store. Freak outs were the norm with Deku.

He'd be fine!

…And to be on the safe side, she might lock her door and sneak Todoroki's noise cancelling headphones, just until exams were over in case Mr. Green Misery came knocking late at night looking for a crying session. She would post pone best friend 'privileges' until she knew she had passed her math and heroics 201 finals, thank you very much.

Mildly reassured, Ochako popped her own headphones in, mentally making note to get Izuku some chocolate later to ensure he really was okay. She zoned back into her notes, and let all other troubles but her imminent math midterm fade away.

After all- some dumb comment from Kaminari wasn't likely to tip the balance that much. If class 2-A could handle dramatically timed and frequent villain attacks, they could handle anything!

Next to Ochako, Izuku continued to mutter. His eyes darted back and forth, analyzing some invisible data known only to him. Abruptly he went silent. He stared for a moment more at his lap, then slowly, slowly, nodded to himself. Restored to reality, he carefully lifted his notebook from his lap, and returned to his studying. His slightly jerky movements eventually became more fluid, and to the casual observer, all would seem well- like nothing had changed from the regular status quo.

The casual observer, of course, would then be blindsided by the clusterfuck to come.

XXX

The results of Kaminari's, and in a way all of the 2-A members in the study lounge that (to be later realized as terrible) day, observations of Izuku and Katsuki's soap opera complication worthy relationship came back to bite them in the ass the very next day.

It started normal. The sleep deprived students of 2-A filed into the classroom occupied by their equally sleep deprived teacher, internally jealous of the social laws that allowed Aizawa to be passed out on the floor in a sleeping bag while they had make do with copious amounts of coffee. The only one with any degree of energy was Bakugou, who as usual kept up his grumpy mutters and exclamations for anyone who dared to cross him. That boy harnessed pure anger to defeat exhaustion, to the envy of many.

First and second period passed suspiciously peacefully, if rampant and frazzled math test writing could be counted as peaceful. The bell inevitably chimed the freedom of the oppressed, and Aizawa breathed a sigh of relief. He lazily waved his hand above his head from where his other arm cocooned his head on his desk.

"Tests in. And pencil down, Kaminari, or so help me I will rip your exam to shreds and set it on fire."

Kaminari squeaked, but slammed down his pencil.

In a grim swarm, the heroes in training trudged towards Aizawa's desk with tests in hand, eyes blank with repressed misery as each paper was stacked.

Izuku stumbled slightly as he turned from Aizawa's desk, and with typical luck for him (meaning, non-existent) he happened to bump slightly into Katsuki.

"Fucking Deku!" said boy hissed out. "So much of a God damn zombie you can't even watch where you're going? Tch." Katuski harshly hit his shoulder into Izuku's as he pushed by, which was actually progress since their first year, considering he sometimes used to knock Izuku over before they had their too many to count heart to hearts during their overly exciting first year.

"Ah," Izuku mumbled. "Sorry, Bakugou."

Katsuki abruptly froze.

Izuku, heedless, carried on to his desk. His sleep deprived mind noted the lack of usual response from Katsuki- not a swear in sight!- and a distant part of him that wasn't a groggy mess figured that it was a good sign. Maybe Ashido was right. If he stopped calling Katuski 'Kacchan' when he hated it so much, then maybe, someday, reeaaalllly far into the future, they could become civil with each other.

Izuku smiled. If this non-reaction was any indication, he was on the right track!

With a skip returned to his step (that looked more like a sleep deprived limp), Izuku scooped up his bag, and made his way out of the classroom. He had more cheer then could have ever been expected of someone who just finished an 'Aizawa Test', which frequently contained material units ahead, and proved that logical ruses didn't end at scaring the shit out of first years with possible expulsion on the first day.

Izuku just had a good feeling. Kacchan was a pretty kiddy nickname- it really was time that he called Katsuki by something more age appropriate.

"Uh, Bakubro? You, uh, doing okay?"

Katsuki continued to stare blankly at Izuku's distant back. After Izuku left the classroom, he stared blankly at the doorway as students continued to file out, most of them too tired to note Katsuki's odd behaviour.

The math test in Katsuki's hands slowly crumpled as the explosive boy's hands clenched. Kirishima tentatively reached a hand towards Katsuki's shoulder, only to wrench out of the way as the boy pinwheeled, slammed his test on top of the pile, swooped to his desk to quickly grab his bag, and stomped out of the classroom without a word.

Kirishima blinked. He cocked his head to the side, and being the precious cinnamon bun that he was, actually felt concern for Katsuki.

"Wait," he suddenly said, eyes lighting up, "Bakubro's always angry- it's probably nothing."

Impeccable logic, Kirishima.

With a hoot, Kirishima fled the classroom, leaving Aizawa to depressingly stare at the tests he would have to mark.

"Sleep is for the weak," Aizawa mumbled, his head lolling. "The… weak," he said, and let his head smack onto the desk.

Poor sleep deprived teacher- not too pure for this world, considering the caffeine content in his bloodstream would likely inhibit him from passing a drug test, but still not deserving of what was to come.

After the coming lunch of 'death and destruction and teenage angst', he wouldn't get another meaningful nap for the next three weeks.

XXX

The next class on 2-A's plate that day was Hero History. Contrary to popular thoughts on historical content being able to lull an individual to sleep, the course was actually quite interesting. Even the Bakusquad were willing, usually, to pay attention to the whole lesson.

The excitement that kept the class from being a slog was, of course, the guest speakers.

"So, 'Atilla the Nun', nutcase that she is, is trying to convert my sidekick to her cult- sorry, 'holy order', while her enslaved minions are attempting to make mincemeat of me. Blasting them away with sound waves wasn't doing much, especially against the behemoth of a hero she had mind controlled, one named 'Rockhard'- yes, that hero who spent six years trying to defend his choice of name to the Hero Association…"

It was all quite interesting, really, and the hero, a slim woman with wild red eyes known as 'Soundshot' was making a valiant effort to prevent her audience from falling asleep. She was competing against midterm sleep deprivation though. She partially succeeded- most of the students were at least conscious, if unable to process anything she said, and even if they were passed out like Todoroki currently was, they weren't disturbing her story.

It left a split- the go getters that somehow managed to cobble together some semblance of sanity to pay attention to the lesson (though Iida was spastically twitching while taking notes, so that semblance of sanity would probably deteriorate by lunch), the zombies blanking staring forward, and those who had embraced Aizawa's mentality and had passed out on their desks.

The only outlier was Katsuki.

He wasn't half asleep, attempting to pay attention. He wasn't a zombie. He wasn't flopped on his desk.

He was staring.

If Izuku had been more cognizant of his surroundings, he would have sensed the steely gaze fixed to his back. Thanks to his sleep deprived mind still swirling with math calculations from earlier however, all he felt was a mild buzz of discomfort. He didn't look back once.

The only one who noticed Katsuki's strange behaviour was, oddly enough, Yaoyorozu. She was the least tired of the lot though, and that lent more to her awareness. But she did not heed the warning for what it was. She may have found it odd that Bakugou, dedicated student that he was, was not paying attention to the lesson, but she attributed his odd behaviour to it being a 'Bakugou Midoriya thing', as class 2-A had to come to identify such angsty situations.

She didn't voice her concerns, and Katsuki continued to slowly boil in his seat, a ticking time bomb unnoticed.

An hour later, after the cafeteria had been set on fire, three students had gained broken bones from getting in the way of a hurled table, and Class 2-A learned more about the 'Bakugou Midoriya thing' then they ever wanted to, Momo cursed herself for ignoring the signs.