Todoroki knew.
He knew Bakugo would be enraged. Beyond pissed. And he was.
As Almight hung their sports festival medals around their necks (and bakugo's on his face) he recapped their fight. Short clips of it still played in the overhead screen showcasing highlights of the festival.
Midoria's final punch, tesutesu and Kirishima's double KO, and then his fight. There it was- that moment. Bakugo charging at him, flames rising from both their skin...and then nothing. He'd stopped. The explosion of their impact should've been enough of a power display to rock the stadium, but Shoto had pulled back. He'd quelled his flames and left himself open. Bakugo stumbled in surprise and hit him with a subpar punch to the face.
Todoroki could still see the look on his face. Shock, and then almost desperation as he tried to get him to fight at his full potential...until finally rage.
He'd given Bakugo the match. Not to say he was completely sure he'd have won...but his spirit to fight had been depleted after his fight with Midoriya. The entire festival had been a whirlwind of emotions he'd had no idea he'd be facing. Other classes had bought a lot of unexpected challenges to the ring but Shoto had found the biggest challenges in his own psyche.
He looked over to Bakugo who stood a podium above him glaring back down. He hadn't taken his eyes off of him. Hadn't stopped yelling either. His muffled swears could still be heard behind his muzzle as the announcers congratulated the top three placers.
He felt guilty. And it exhausted him. It was another emotion stacked on top of the heavy ones already swirling in his chest. There was resentment towards his father, disappointment at using his flames, confusion as to why he had in one fight and couldn't in the next, stress from losing the match over internal distractions and the fatigue from the entire day was suddenly weighing on him.
And then Bakugo. He clenched his fists. He didn't even want to think about the boy. The look on his face when he figured out Shoto was backing out had looked almost...sad.
He didn't want to think about the weight that put in his stomach. He wanted to forget that face and his voice.
"Don't do this to me! Fight damnit!"
Dont do this to me.
He knew bakugo's goals- his pride and ambitions. Everyone did. And he shit on it by handing over 1st place so easily.
The explosive boy had effectively been able to hold Todoroki's attention for most of the year for multiple reasons. Actually, he had a way of holding everyone's attention, but Shoto had begun feeling something different toward him as they constantly indirectly fought for the top spot in class. He'd ignored that feeling however as there were more pressing things he needed to focus on. Not the fleeting emotions that came with being a teenager.
But hearing him say those words brought them back to the surface. He hadn't only let himself down.
Dont do this to me.
Todoroki exited the stadium after the award ceremony concluded and Bakugo was wheeled away in a different direction. It hadn't mattered apparently because as soon as the restraints were off, he could hear the blonde storming throughout the halls looking for him.
"Where is that half-assing half-n-half bastard!"
He respected bakugo's drive and goals. They almost mirrored his own but with the added fire of an agressive pride. The guilt Shoto felt at ignoring him in the ring wasn't intense, but it was there and enough to make the 2nd place boy feel as if he owed an apology. Or at least an explanation.
As if on que, the door to Shoto's waiting room was kicked in with a "CRACK".
The rage in bakugo's eyes seemed to intensify as they met with his target's. "YOU!" He stomped over to the boy and grabbed the collar of his shirt, snatching him forward in his seat. "What the hell is your problem Todoroki!? You threw that match!"
"I did" was the short reply.
"I KNOW THAT!" Bakugo spat, pressing his forehead against the other boy's. "Rematch right now! Get your ass back in the ring so I can kill you!"
Shoto actually flinched, much to bakugo's surprise. He couldnt know that the dual-haired boy flinched at the closeness and not out of intimidation however.
Bakugo smelled like sweat and heat and his breath was surprisingly cool on shotos face. That shouldn't have been something worth noticing.
Adrenaline still pumped through the blond's veins and Shoto was close enough to feel the battle still radiating off of him. It made him want to push him away. He needed time to gather his thoughts and Katsuki was distracting in more ways than one.
"I can't..." He responded blandly. He didn't know what else to actually offer the boy as an answer. Bakugo wasn't one to sit through a life story or an excuse even if Shoto felt he owed it to him. He didn't want to provoke him more, and honestly he didn't want to talk about it. He couldn't respond the way the other boy wanted him to.
It wasn't often that Bakugo directed his attention in Todoroki's direction.
Before the match, Shoto had challenged Midoriya directly. The green eyed boy was the center of a lot of things, including Almight and Bakugo's attention. He'd be a necessary stepping stone on his way to the no.1 hero spot.
Bakugo took personal offense and gave todoroki an earful.
"You talked to the wrong person. I'm who you'll have to beat!"
Shoto had been surprised and even felt a tinge of excitement at the boy's acknowledgement. They weren't matched together at that point but Bakugo promised they would be. Shoto nodded, accepting the challenge.
Then he didn't deliver.
He didn't think the aggressive nature of his classmate would get to him, but it did. Bakugo shook him and pressed their bodies together in a fit of rage. Shoto was too vulnerable in that moment and the closeness was making blood rush to his head.
More than anything however, he was tired. He'd exerted his ice side and used a side of his quirk that he never did. He broke his pact with himself and was confused with weather he should be disappointed or not. He wanted to know how his mother would have reacted if she'd seen? Would it remind her of his father?
He wanted to see her. He shut his eyes tight.
"Like hell you can't!" Katsuki asserted, yanking his rival from his chair. "You're coming back out there if I have to drag your ass myself!"
Shoto heard his father's voice over the intercom as the speaker continued to recap the day.
It was too much.
He planted his feet and broke free of bakugos grip.
"You-!"
Before the boy could get another word out, todoroki grabbed his shoulders and froze his legs and arms together. The cold spread throughout the room, freezing the entire floor and frosting the windows. It hit the lights and they fizzed out with an electric pop. He'd overdone it but wasn't in the right state of mind to care.
"The hell, you wanna go right n—!" Bakugo shouted in the dark at what he thought was a sudden attack until his mouth was sealed. Shoto pulled the sides of bakugos collar and pressed his cold lips hard against his. Both boys inhaled sharply, one with eyes closed and the other with eyes wide in shock.
Bakugo swore he'd seen tiny licks of flame flutter from Todoroki's skin but was too thwarted to really process it.
Shoto held him there for a moment, his emotions spiking and over flowing as he pulled the other boy as close as he could, until finally, his heart rate started to settle.
He pulled back abruptly and exhaled, a dense cloud of heated breath rising up from the space between their lips. He dropped his head on the boy's shoulder, breathing heavily, feeling his head spin as he calmed down.
Bakugo stood stone silent in the cold dark room, mouth agape, unmoving, unbreathing, unthinking.
That was rare for him.
"I'll fight you. Just Wait." Todoroki said barely above a whisper. His tone wasn't demanding, but more like setting a condition.
He let his arms dangle as he leaned his head on the silent bakugo's shoulder for a moment longer before standing and walking out of the room without a word.
Bakugo stood, listening to Shoto's footsteps leave the room and walk down the hall. He listened until he couldn't hear him anymore and then listened to the silence around him as his soul seemed to slowly return to his body. The empty state of his mind would remind one of Denki after short-circuiting.
He exhaled shakily after what seemed like an eternity of not breathing. He watched the faint cloud from his breath evaporate in the cold dark as the gears of his mind attempted to restart.
What...the fuck.
He looked around and stopped abruptly upon remembering he was restrained. He looked down at his frozen limbs incredulously before red anger flooded back into his face.
"COME BACK HERE AND UNFREEZE ME YOU CRAZY BASTARD!!!"
A month later...
It had been a few weeks since the sports festival and surprisingly a lot of things had remained the same. Everyone had left for their separate internships for a while and then returned to classes as usual. There was still a lot of talk about the festival, but it was beginning to die down. There was also no specific talk of anything that had happened after concerning first and second place winners.
Todoroki sat at lunch listening to Iida give fake details about his internship. The two of them and Midoriya had come face to face with The hero killer in Hosu during their internship, but he pushed the secret to the back of his mind. Time had gone by and classes had resumed.
The only thing that was really different was Bakugo.
His usually intense demeanor seemed to shift whenever Shoto was in the same room. He stared at him, blatantly watching whatever he did. His expression would occasionally change from a blank stare to a confused skepticism and back, but the two never spoke to eachother.
Bakugo had apparently kept the frozen kiss to himself. His friends of course noticed his weird behavior but chalked it up to him being discontent with the results of the festival whenever Todoroki came around.
Even now, as Shoto ate his lunch, he could feel eyes on his back. Knowing why Bakugo watched him made the hairs on the back of his neck stand but it was much less discomfort that being confronted.
He wasn't sure what he'd say if he was confronted. He didn't have an explanation for doing what he did other than relieving the turmoil that'd been stirred inside of him. He'd felt tired and exposed and Bakugo was unknowingly stimulating his senses until he'd overflown.
Something in him had stopped caring about a lot of things that day.
He was standing on more solid ground now however, after mustering up the desperate strength to visit his mother.
He went to see her. They talked and then he went to see her again and again.
Something felt like it could begin to heal.
He still had a lot of things to think about, but his emotions at least seemed to be wound back from their unraveled state.
The ones he'd felt toward Bakugo would be hard to ignore now however. Most likely because said classmate had been abruptly made aware of them.
He sighed as he finished his lunch. Standing to clean his trash and head to his classes. He spared a glance over his shoulder only to directly meet Bakugo's narrowed gaze as he also stood to empty his tray. Shoto turned back to his table and sighed before leaving the cafe and heading toward his locker.
He'd left earlier than most of the students to avoid the crowd so hadn't expected anyone to be around as he slipped his shoes into his locker.
"Yo." A nearby presence made itself known.
He turned to see face Bakugo, who stood leaning against the adjacent locker, hands in pockets and frown in place. A nervous excitement pushed through his body but he ignored it. Horomones were a brand new type aberration.
"Katsuki" he greeted, feeling a static in the air at his name. It was the first time they'd acknowledged each other since the festival.
His classmate narrowed his eyes and frowned further. "You owe me a fight."
Shoto nodded in affirmation, not really knowing what he'd expected the boy to say. "I do."
"When?" Kaachan asked, as if it were a demand.
Good question. "Summer camp is here now but I suppose after that we'd need to get permission to use school grounds first for-"
"Cut the bull." He interjected, standing from his lean on the locker. "It's already been over a month. We're doing this at camp. Be ready."
Todoroki seemed to consider the consequences of an undocumented fight between classmates but nodded in agreement. He was right; it'd been long enough. He owed him a proper fight. "Alright."
Bakugo seemed skeptical of how easily he'd accepted but didn't speak further. He turned his head to the side seeming to think of something that knitted his brow together. He looked back to Todoroki and started to say something but stopped. He frowned and for a moment he looked tired and frustrated.
He looked away sucking his teeth sharply and walked away.
Shoto blinked, finally shutting the locker he'd stood there holding. Bakugo had wanted to say something, and he was sure he knew what it was about. But in the end he'd chosen not to mention it. Maybe it was easier for him that way. Shoto sighed. Maybe it was easier for both of them that way.
Either way, he'd see him at summer camp and their fight would put an end to the tension one way or another.
Or at least that's what he'd thought in that moment. Neither boy knew things were going to be drastically different over the summer.