Part 5 of the We Still Have Hope Series

The sun was high in the sky, it was early afternoon on a Wednesday and the entirety of 1.A were back at U.A. The were all in their uniform, despite technically having a few more days off for summer. Aizawa-Sensei had led them to rows of brand-new buildings, their new dorm rooms, so called Heights Alliance. Their building had "Class 1.A" above the door, thankfully, Katsuki thought, considering the fact that all of the dorm buildings looked the same.

Aizawa stood in front of the class. He was in his hero costume and had finally given up on whatever shaving kick he'd been on. Now Katsuki wouldn't deny, his teacher definitely looked better in a suit, most people did. But he preferred everything being normal.

The class gathered around him, excitedly staring up at the huge building. Katsuki couldn't see what all the fuss was about really. He wasn't that keen on the idea of leaving his family behind. He'd never been away from his parents for longer than a week before. Now he was going to be gone a whole semester.

Sure, he could visit, but with him working on Sunday's he'd hardly get the chance. Unless he went home after school one day. Aizawa hadn't told them whether or not that was allowed yet. Katsuki hoped so.

"Given everything that has happened, I'm glad we were able to bring Class A back together." Aizawa started.

"So we all got the go ahead to move on campus?" Sero asked, looking around.

"It took a lot of convincing from my parents," Hagakure sighed, drooping down towards the floor. Jirou smiled at her.

"I was pretty concerned about mine."

"It makes sense," Ojiro turned to face the girls. "You got the worse of the gas attack."

"We're glad to see that the teachers got to come back too," Asui said, looking up at Aizawa. "I was afraid you wouldn't be allowed, the people at the press conference seemed pretty upset with you guys."

"Yeah," Uraraka added.

"I was surprised as well," Aizawa said, "but circumstances have changed. Now then, I'll explain how the dorm assignments will work shortly." He said, clapping his hands together. "First, however, we haven't forgot about the provisional licenses you were supposed to get whilst at the training camp."

"Oh yeah, that's why we were there." Sato said

"So much has happened it totally slipped my mind." Mina agreed.

"Listen well, this is important," Aizawa redirected the class's attention back onto himself. "Kirishima, Yaoyorozu, Todoroki, Midoriya, Iida; you five are the ones who broke the rules and went to go rescue Bakugou that night."

Aizawa glared at the aforementioned student. Bakugou rolled his eyes at the word rescue. He'd admit to himself that they rescued him. That he had needed their help. But did Aizawa have to tell the whole class?

The entire class began to murmur, worried gasps and a rather concerned kero echoed through the students. Aizawa sighed.

"Based on your reactions, I assume the rest of you were at least aware of their plan."

Wait, hold on a second. Bakugou thought to himself. They all knew already? They all knew that the others were going to try and rescue him? Why didn't any of the others help? Didn't they want him back? What did it mean when even the prospective heroes of his own class didn't want to save him?

"I'm going to set aside a number of issues and just say this," Aizawa continued, "If it weren't for All Might's retirement from the hero scene, I would expel everyone here, except Bakugou, Jirou and Hagakure."

Why those two? Katsuki thought with a scowl. He loosely remembered something about Jirou still being in the hospital when he was rescued, was this Hagakure in the same predicament? In all honesty he had no idea who Hagakure was.

"The five of you who went, of course," Aizawa went on, "But also the remaining twelve who didn't stop them. You betrayed our trust, even if it was to keep your friends from getting into trouble."

So that's who they cared about. The other class members, not him.

"To regain our confidence, you will have to obey every rule to the letter and live as model students. That's all." Aizawa said turning around to walk towards the new dorms. "Now look alive, welcome to your new home."

"We're supposed to be excited after that?" The class chorused. Everyone murmured amongst themselves, grumbling about Aizawa's harsh words. Katsuki looked towards his boyfriend. Kirishima was staring at the ground, his eyes glazed over, a frown on his face.

Katsuki's heart sank, he hated how guilty he felt. It wasn't necessarily his fault, he didn't make Kirishima come and rescue him, although he was grateful. He didn't like the fact that his boyfriend was sad. He wanted him to smile.

"You, come here." Katsuki said at Kaminari, grabbing the back of his shirt and dragging him towards the bushes at the bottom of the path leading to the dorms. The dunce struggled against his grip but Katsuki wouldn't let him go.

"What the hell man? Let me go." Katsuki pulled him behind the bushes and released him. "What the hell is wrong with you?" Kaminari asked, straightening out his shirt.

"Use your Quirk, make them laugh." Katsuki said, scowling.

"What? Why?"

"Kirishima's sad." Katsuki shrugged, "They're all sad. And it's fucking hilarious when you lose your shit. So use your Quirk, dumbass. Or I'll make you." Kaminari snorted at his response, palms already buzzing with static electricity.

"Aww Bakugou cares about everyone."

"Shut up." Katsuki snapped. Kaminari stuck is tongue out.

"You might want to step back."

"Yeah whatever," Katsuki said, walking around the other side of the bush, going on the grass to join the group. The crackle of Kaminari's electricity made him glance back towards the bushes, just in time for him to see the yellow arches of energy.

Kaminari stepped out of the bushes, making high pitched noise and tripping over his own shoelaces. Jirou burst out laughing and the rest of the class followed.

"Kirishima," Katsuki called, approaching the red head. Kirishima turned, half a smile on his face. Katsuki pulled out the wad of cash in his pocket. The night vision goggles had been weighing on his mind, especially since the two of them had begun dating. He didn't like the idea of Kirishima spending so much money on him. Katsuki knew how much those goggles had cost.

"Woah, did you shake him down for cash?" Kirishima asked, eyes wide.

"No you idiot, this is my money." Katsuki rolled his eyes, "For those stupid goggles."

"How did you find out about that?" Kirishima asked. Katsuki ignored him, pushing the money into his chest.

"Don't say I never get you anything."

He walked towards the dorms, past everyone who was crowded around Kaminari, laughing at him. Katsuki walked up the steps, towards Aizawa. There was a soft smile hiding beneath his capture scarf.

"You're going soft." He teased as Katsuki approached.

"Yeah, you're one to talk." Katsuki rolled his eyes.

"Alright, everyone inside." Aizawa shouted to the group. The class all began to make their way towards their teacher with Kirishima shouting something about getting everyone "Barbeque". Aizawa rolled his eyes before adding. "And someone plug Kaminari into the mains to charge him up."

As soon as they got into the dorm Uraraka and Ashido exclaimed their excitement. They ran around, throwing themselves on the sofas, Kirishima and Sero pushed each other into the coffee tables and Kouda and Sato went to explore the kitchen.

Jirou took a phone charger out of Kaminari's pocket and plugged him into the mains as Aizawa explained how the dorms worked. Boys were on the left, girls on the right. Bakugou was on the fourth floor with Kirishima and Shouji. Katsuki guessed the one with all the arms was Shouji, seeing as Kirishima high-fived one of his many hands at the news.

Katsuki smiled at Kirishima across the room. Some part of him was excited at having his boyfriend so close. An even smaller, more secret part of him couldn't wait to see how the pair of them would exploit that fact further along in their relationship.

Aizawa claimed that their belongings were in their assigned rooms and said they could customise it however they wanted as long as they paid for the changes. He said that the school knew that some of them needed special requirements for their Quirks and understood that trying to get everyone conform to the same room type was unfair.

Aizawa dismissed them, and they all went to their own rooms. They had all seen pictures of their rooms, Aizawa having shown them an image of the basic layout when he had come to their homes. So Katsuki had been planning what to do with his room for the past two days.

He'd bought several cans of black paint and a set of orange curtains. He'd brought his favourite bedspread from home, a reversible black and orange one with a dark green throw and scatter cushions. He had also bought smaller cans of green, blue, purple and white paint, as well several lengths of wood that his father had prepared for him to build a cat climbing frame for Hoshi. All Katsuki had to do was assemble it, which he was sure would be as difficult as he imagined.

Katsuki walked into his room to find Hoshi pacing the carry case, yowling and hissing at her owner. Her fur was fluffed up and her ears were flat. Katsuki opened the cage and the cat jumped out. He pet her on the head and went about unpacking his clothes. He put them away in the drawers and wardrobe, before pulling off his uniform and getting changed into a pair of sweats and a tank top.

"Come on you, you've got to go in the bathroom. I don't want to get paint on you or anything." Katsuki said, picking up Hoshi and carrying her to the adjoining room. It held only a toilet, sink and medicine cabinet. Katsuki put the cat down and moved the rest of his packed belongings into the room, to avoid getting paint on them. He set up the litter box in the bathroom and put a bowl of water on the floor for her.

He then went back to his room and opened up the doors to his balcony and got started. He clambered up onto his desk and began to paint the ceiling black. After about two minutes he regretted his decision entirely. Looking up for that long started to hurt his neck and his shoulders, he lost his balance several times and almost fell of the desk.

As he moved around the room he had to drag different articles of furniture with him so he could reach the roof. Despite his father giving him all of the "appropriate" tools, it took him longer than expected to put the first coat of paint on the ceiling.

When he was done he pulled his bed away from the wall and painted a feature wall in black too. Once done with that he returned to the roof. He applied a coat more to each the ceiling and the wall, wanting nothing more than to collapse into his bed once he was done. But he wasn't finished.

He left his room, going downstairs to get a drink of water and have a break before continuing with his mission. Kirishima was the only person in the kitchen when he got there, he was sat on the counter, hair up in his bandana with a cup of tea in his hands.

"Hey man, are you done too?" Kirishima asked.

"No, I've got loads to do." Katsuki sighed, "How are you finished?"

"I just set my punching bag up and stuck a couple posters on the wall. I don't have that much stuff." Kirishima laughed, scratching the back of his neck self-consciously. "Why are you covered in paint?"

"I was painting." Katsuki shrugged.

"No shit," Kirishima laughed again.

"I was going to ask your help actually."

"What with?"

"Painting." Katsuki stuck his tongue out. "You know that picture you painted, that you showed me. The one of the stars."

"Yeah," Kirishima said, "I was just flicking paint at a canvas and seeing what it would do."

"Can you do it do my ceiling?"

"Yeah, man, that'd be awesome. I'd have to get some paint and brushes and stuff, but I could totally do that." Kirishima smiled, jumping off the counter, sloshing tea over the side of his hand.

"I already have stuff like that. If you wanna come up now. If you're not busy or anything." Katsuki said, fetching himself a glass of water.

"Sure, I can come up now." Kirishima smiled, gulping down the last of his tea.

Katsuki returned the smile. He led Kirishima up to his room, the other boy grumbling when they didn't use the lift. Katsuki laughed at his struggles and continued up the stairs.

"Ahh I see what you mean when you said painting." Kirishima said when he entered the room. He stared at the black ceiling and wall.

"Yeah," Katsuki said, before pointing toward his desk. "The painting stuff is on there, I don't know if it's ok."

"All of this is great man," Kirishima smiled, leaning across to kiss Katsuki's cheek. "I can work with this."

"Great, I'm going to be working on this." Katsuki said gesturing to black pile of wood.

"Yeah what is that?"

"My Dad's over expectation in my carpentry skills."

"Wait, what?"

"I said I wanted something for my cat to climb on and I was looking at stuff online. He was all like, I can make you something better then that. Cuz he and my Uncle used to build furniture or something. So he made all this and gave me instructions on how to put it together. But I don't get any of it, so I'm just gonna be drilling wood into the wall."

"Sounds legit." Kirishima laughed. Katsuki shrugged.

He was complaining, but in reality his father had already built most of it. The pile of wood consisted of four hollow boxes, big enough for an adult cat to comfortably sleep inside. They allowed for the cat to walk straight through them and each had a shape carved into them. Two had cats, one standing, one washing a paw, one had a fish and the other had a mouse.

All Katsuki had to do was attach them to the wall, along with the smaller ledges, in the pattern his father had drawn. He had long since given up wondering how his father managed to do the things he could do. Masaru's art and carpentry skills were amazing, Katsuki couldn't help but think his Father and boyfriend would get on in that regard.

"I don't know where to start," Kirishima sighed, looking up at the ceiling, "I don't want to mess up."

"You wont mess up." Katsuki said, getting a pencil and a ruler, drawing lines on the wall next to the door.

"But what if I do and you hate it?"

"I won't hate it, but if I do, I'll just paint over it in black." Katsuki said, "Don't worry about it."

"Ahh, okay." Kirishima said, "I've got art fear."

"You don't have to do it if you don't want to." Katsuki said, "I won't be mad."

"I know, I want to." Kirishima said, offering him a small smile. "I'm excited to work on a surface this big."

Katsuki nodded, drawing more lines on to the wall, indicating where he was going to place the cat climbing frames. There was a little ladder included with the wood; a way for Hoshi to get from the floor to the first box.

"Hey Bakugou,"

"What?"

"Are we gonna tell the class? About us?" He asked in a quiet voice, playing with the paintbrush in his hand. "I mean, I told Mina, when you asked me out. I was having a moment and didn't know how to cope. But I… I don't want this to be a big thing."

"Deku knows. He's too perceptive for his own good. But I agree, I don't see why we need to broadcast anything. It's none of their business. I don't want to suddenly be the gay icon of 1.A."

"That would be a turn of events." Kirishima snorted.

"I know right." Katsuki responded. "Like, I'm not saying we sneak around or hide, not anything like that. I just don't think we have to walk into the common room dressed in rainbows, holding hands."

"Eww, imagine you in rainbows."

"I know right, gross." Katsuki laughed, drawing the final line. "Do these look straight to you?" Katsuki asked, pointing at his work.

"They're the only things in this room that are."

"That was so lame." Katsuki laughed.

"I couldn't miss the opportunity." Kirishima said, finally dipping the brush in the purple paint.

"I'm gonna start drilling these in then." Katsuki said, pulling a box towards him. Masaru had lent him the power tool, telling Katsuki to be careful with it, like Katsuki had ever been careful in his life.

"Okay." Kirishima said, clambering up onto the desk and flicking paint at the ceiling.

Katsuki took the drill out of its box and attached the proper drill end, that matched the screws he was using. Katsuki was not sure exactly how to do the task at hand, but in the end just said fuck it. He thought he would start with the smallest of the shelves, therefore he would get better with each one he did.

Katsuki held the drill and the wood against the wall and turned it on. The sound was sharp; loud and echoing through the room. Despite expecting it, Kirishima jumped. The whirring sound reverberated around the room, making his hearing aids vibrate like static.

As soon as the screw was embedded in the wood and the wall he pulled the drill away and turned it off. He rubbed his ear with his hand.

"You okay?" Kirishima asked, flicking purple paint at the ceiling. The splatters were packed densely, looking like a weird splotch in its unfinished state.

"The noise hurts." He said, his ears still ringing. "I'm gonna take the aids out. So if you need me, shout."

"Like usual." Kirishima teased.

"Exactly." Katsuki said.

It took Katsuki around two hours to assemble his cat climbing levels. He placed Hoshi's blanket inside the box that was second from the bottom and put some of her toys in the others. He had several other panels of wood to make a bookshelf above his desk, which was easy compared to the cat shelves.

In that time Kirishima had finished splattering the roof with the blue, green, purple and white paint to create a swirling galaxy. He'd moved onto the wall Katsuki had painted black and was doing a similar thing.

"It looks amazing." Katsuki said looking up at the ceiling.

"Thanks, it's not that hard." Kirishima shrugged.

"Yeah it is. I bet if I did it, it would look like shit." Katsuki said.

"Do you want to try?" Kirishima said, holding the paintbrush out, it was covered in blue paint. His hands were covered in multicoloured smudges of the substance.

"No, I don't want to ruin it."

"Come on, are you scared?"

"Fuck you, asshole." Katsuki scowled, holding his hand out for the brush.

"You just do this," Kirishima said, flicking more paint against the wall. He picked up the purple covered brush and offered it Bakugou. Katsuki took it and mirrored the action.

"I feel like and idiot." Katsuki said with a sigh.

"That's cuz you're doing it wrong." Kirishima teased, putting his own brush down. He moved to stand behind Katsuki, placing a hand on his wrist and correcting his movement.

"You're getting paint on my arm." Katsuki said, looking at the blue and purple fingerprints staining his skin. Kirishima put an arm around Katsuki's waist, pulling him closer.

"You're already covered in paint, what's a little more?" Kirishima said, resting his head on Katsuki's shoulder.

"I look stupid with purple spots."

"I think you look hot." Kirishima said, pressing a feather light kiss to Katsuki's neck. The action made Katsuki's stomach flutter with excitement.

"Yeah right." He breathed.

"Mhm," Kirishima hummed, kissing Katsuki's jaw. "Do you not know how beautiful you are?"

"You're so cliché." Katsuki said, turning in Kirishima's grasp. He dropped the paint brush and wrapped his arms around Kirishima's neck.

"It got you in my arms, didn't it?"

"Shut up." Katsuki said, leaning forward to meet Kirishima's lips. Kirishima quickly took control of the kiss, running his tongue along Katsuki's lip, instinctively Bakugou allowed Kirishima to deepen the kiss. Nerves bubbled in Katsuki's stomach; he had no idea what he was doing. Katsuki pulled back with a squeak.

"Too much?" Kirishima asked, pressing his forehead against Katsuki's.

"No. Just new." Katsuki murmured. "We should finish this. It's almost time for dinner. And you promised everyone barbeque."

"Why did I do that?"

"Because you're an idiot." He said, kissing Kirishima lightly, before pulling himself out of his grip. He picked up the paint brush and put it back on the side.

"The jury's still out on that one, I'm afraid." Kirishima smirked, taking up a brush he continued to paint. Katsuki snorted.

"I need to unpack everything else." He sighed.

"You do that then; I'll carry on with this." Kirishima said. "Where is all your stuff anyway?"

"In the bathroom, I didn't want to get paint on everything."

"Smart." Kirishima said.

Katsuki walked over to the bathroom. He opened the doors and Hoshi burst out. She scampered around the room, slipping under the bed before coming out and running under the desk. Katsuki grabbed her and placed her on her new climbing frame.

"Woah, there was a cat in your bathroom."

"Where the fuck did you think she was?"

"I don't know, I thought that you'd bring her later." Kirishima shrugged.

"Nah, she's here."

"Evidently." Kirishima snorted, "How come you were allowed to bring her?"

"I think Aizawa-sensei just likes cats." Katsuki shrugged. "Don't go round telling people though, I don't want my room full of weirdos wanting to pet my cat."

"Oh I've always wanted to be part of an exclusive club." Kirishima laughed, "It's just you, me and the little guy."

"She's a girl."