Listen up, a**hole - Chapter 11

As Bakugou stepped out on stage, he felt like his stomach was doing backflips. The room was much smaller than the conference which began all the drama, but it seemed as though the same number of people were crammed into it, humming with an odd excitement. His little microphone was strapped to the pole that held the normal one, out in plain sight as per his very specific request to the organisers, and on the side of the stage a familiar face waited for him.

A hush immediately fell when he stepped onto the stage, checking the height on his microphone stand even though he knew his boss would never have let it go unchecked. He glanced off to the side at a smile of confirmation, then opened his mouth to speak.

“Thank you for coming today,” he began. “My name is Bakugou Katsuki, or Number Three Hero, Ground Zero. I've been getting a lot of calls recently in regard to my comments on Saturday, so rather than address them all individually, I'd like to make my statements publicly and openly, right here.”

He paused for a moment, glancing off to the side again as the hands stopped moving, and gestured toward her sheepishly.

“You've probably noticed my companion here. This is Kotoe, my interpreter for tonight. I was lucky enough to visit a school for the Deaf yesterday, where she helped me to converse with a group of students who... Frankly, were maybe the best kids I've ever met. And I say that as someone who, as you probably know, isn't the best with kids.”

When he'd stood backstage, he'd had such vehement words ready on his lips, stern and delivered with a glare that would warn them not to question him.

“I'm not fuckin' disabled,” he wanted to tell the world. “I'll punch anyone who says I am, dickwads.”

Instead, he found himself curling his fingers around the microphone to keep them from trembling, taking a long, deep breath and finding his lungs were also shaky.

“Yeah, I'm hard of hearing,” he said instead, to a dead-silent crowd. “I wear hearing aids, and one day, I will likely end up entirely deaf. You've heard how loud my quirk is from streets away, imagine that being right beside your ears every day of the week. And so damn what? I'll still kick the ass of any villain who stands in my way. I'll stick kick the ass of anyone who questions my validity as a hero any day of the week, and then you can go out and tell everyone you got beat up by a disabled guy.”

He couldn't, frankly, believe that the words were coming out of his lips, but it lifted a heavy weight from his chest that he didn't even know had been sitting there.

“Someone told me, once – probably as a joke, sure – that when I came out to the public, I became a Gay Icon in the hero world. And at the time, yeah, I punched him and told him to shut the hell up, but you know what? I'll take it. If people want a kick-ass hero to look up to who happens to like hot dudes, then hell yeah, I'll do it. And if people want a disabled hero to look up to? Then yeah, I'll do that too.”

He reached for a remote, pulling an image up on the screen behind him that the students, teachers, and parents alike had all been more than happy to grant him permission to use.

“These are some of the kids I met yesterday,” he explained, smiling to himself at the image of him comparing hearing aids with the children. “These kids told me stories about their parents crying for their hearing loss, and about being told they needed a new dream, because their career wasn't practical for a Deaf person. These kids aren't even in high school yet, some of them have barely started primary school, and already the world is telling them they're not good enough.”

He refused to let his gaze drift to Midoriya, waiting off the side of the stage, blocked off from the crowd by a dark curtain but ready and waiting if Bakugou needed him.

“One of my best friends as a kid was a late bloomer. He got his quirk really late in life, so for most of our childhood he was considered quirkless. When he told people he wanted to be a hero, they laughed at him, or cried for him – not one of us ever thought to say 'hey, work hard, you can do it' and I hate myself for never doing that for him. Now he's the most amazing hero I know, he proved us all wrong.”

He clicked through more images, sharing his small collection of stories with a rapt audience, until finally, as he neared the end, he caught himself smiling again.

“You can call me whatever words you want; insult me, laugh at me, pity me, call me names – I will still keep doing my job, I will still save you when you need it, because that's me. I'm a hero – I'm a damn good hero. And I'll do it all with hearing aids, and whatever else might come my way.”

The screen behind him went black and he set his remote aside, gesturing again toward Kotoe as she diligently kept up with his words.

“Thank you again, Kotoe, for being here today. I hope I can continue to make my interviews more accessible or those who need it. I'll certainly be more proactive about doing so, and I hope other people will be too. It's about time we started embracing this shit instead of hiding it away and pretending it doesn't exist.”

He caught a glare from his boss, frowning as he puzzled over it, replaying his words in his head.

“Oh, right, I'm not meant to say shit. Sorry. Oi kids, if you repeat that before you're eighteen, I'll find you. Be better than I was at your age. Now, there's a microphone over there, please keep your hands off the stand so it doesn't interfere with my own one, alright? And don't be like my dumba- Um, my dumb friends – just talk like normal, I don't need the pretentious slow-talking shi- stuff.”

As a line formed behind the microphone, he finally sneaked a glance at Midoriya, smiling when he saw the eyes shining both with tears and admiration.

“And feel free to ask about my boyfriend,” he smirked. “I could talk about him for days.”

For the 12th and final chapter, click here!