Upstream [Kacchako] [ENG]

I. Downstream - Windy with 50% Gravity

"Please train with me!"
Ochaco Uraraka sketched a bow under Katsuki's deadpan gaze.
A gust of spring wind rushed to stir the young woman's hair, speechless in a sort of palpable stasis and tension. Time seemed frozen as if all life on the planet had shrunk to the two of them, standing in a deserted corridor of the academy.
The Sports Festival had recently ended with the blond's win, reluctant to receive the gold medal because he could not fight with Izuku during the competition.
On the other hand, the moment most imprinted in his memory was precisely the match against Ochaco in the first round. Not Kirishima, Tokoyami or Todoroki.
"Get up, Round Face, you're embarrassing."
He scolded her almost with contempt; although bowing was an intrinsically Japanese custom and Bakugō was aware of his position within the class, it annoyed him more than it should have had. He would never tell her openly, but their skirmish had earned her his respect. There was no need for such formalities. The girl raised her face showing a sad, almost hurt expression. She didn't expect his intemperance to vanish at any moment, but in her heart she had more encouraging expectations about how Katsuki could have replied to her request.
A request he would have accepted without hesitation, if Uraraka had not faced him with the persuasive skill of a wounded gazelle.
Their irises crossed, but the brunette immediately looked away. It seemed almost a paradox, how she had faced him at the festival and how, barely four days later, she trembled at the very idea of asking him to train together.
She would never have said it either, but behind that unusual fearful attitude of her hid the need to learn from her mistakes and frailties, a need dictated by her parents' smiles printed in her memory.
She clenched her fists hard, returning to face his small eyes.
"I want to train with you, Bakugō. What happened at the festival opened my eyes, so I won't take no for an answer. Maybe I'll never be like you, but I really want to get stronger."
There it was, the same determination from the first round. The same funny raised eyebrows, the same fire in the hazelnut-colored irises. The same desire to show what she was capable of.
The blond snorted and grinned, showing an indecipherable feeling, and turned his back to walk away.
"Tomorrow after class, at the clearing in the woods. Don't say anything to anyone, I don't want any pain in the ass."

-

"So, Round Face? Don't you want to give up yet?"
Katsuki was spinning handcuffs on his finger, the same ones she had brought to help make the training a little fairer.
Apart from this detail, the situation was a déjà vu of five days before: Bakugō was not smiling slyly as he would have done with any other opponent. Instead, seeing Uraraka with a ripped and scratched tank top troubled him, but after all she had asked to train together and she knew what that would have meant.
The girl was out of breath, one hand resting on the ground to seek an instead weaker and weaker stability.
Yet the boy had allowed her to bring external objects and had chosen the clearing as a field to facilitate it, but in less than ten minutes the battle had taken the expected turn.
Ochaco was smart and had been able to exploit her quirk well in tune with the surrounding environment, but the disparity in their strength was too much and no matter how many trees, stumps, branches and dust she could raise, the blond man would always know how to push them away with explosions.
"Not... yet..."
The girl's sight clouded more and more, until her opponent became a speck of blue before her eyes closed completely, causing her to collapse to the ground in a state of semi-sleep. Simultaneously with her impact on the ground, a tree with a partially severed trunk drew a rapidly descending arc towards her body, moved by a violent gust of wind.
"Uraraka!"
For the second time in three months he called her by surname.
The shrub was at forty-five degrees and was gaining speed, Ochaco would not have made it if he had not done something to save her.
"Fuck, you're a real nuisance!"
It was not she herself who triggered the impetuous curse, but having to actively save her.
Katsuki, the living antithesis of teamwork and the personification of violence.
He clenched his teeth so hard he could have broken them and sprinted forward, helping himself with the push given by his quirk. He slipped on the ground, roughly pushing the young woman and managing to get out of it unharmed; the dense branches of the tree seemed to hold back the impact, before crumbling like grains of sand in the wind.
Katsuki realized that he was still clutching his classmate's body to protect her from branches and dust, but he, thanks to her unconscious state, did not fear that it could be perceived as strange.
He lifted her with his arms, scrutinizing her face and hands one last time, marked by countless scratches and cuts; she had a troubled and tired expression, but it would take a couple of hours at Recovery Girl's to get her back.
Ochaco knew from the beginning how it would go and she still wanted to try to overcome her limits, embodying the "Plus Ultra" motto with a determination even higher than the boy's, already motivated by his innate power; power that Ochaco, on the other hand, did not have.
He gave her a look halfway between annoyance and understanding, before turning a look at U.A. that stood majestically from the treetops.
"Stupid Round Face."