Trust Falls

Much too young to fell this damn old

Shouta watched the youngest Bakugo storm from the room and resisted the urge to roll his eyes at the teenager's dramatics. From across the coffee table, Masaru caught his eye and flashed a small smile at him in support. The hero figured the man must be used to it by now since his son and wife had such similar personalities.

The teen also fooled none of them with his attitude. Every adult in the room was very aware that the only reason he'd picked the fight and attitude with his mother was so he could storm from the room and go upstairs to see Izuku.

Teenagers.

Mitsuki huffed and dropped down onto the sofa next to her husband, arms crossed over her chest and a familiar scowl tugging at her lips as she stared Shouta down.

"Exactly how worried should we be that there's apparently a villain that's already kidnapped my son in our house?" She practically growled the words, posture tense.

"With Izuku present? Not at all." Shouta drawled, eyes drifting towards the stairs as he contemplated when exactly his life got this complicated. "They both have a soft spot for him so they'll behave."

Both of the Bakugo's stared at him like he'd grown a second head and Shouta sighed heavily, dragging a hand through his hair. This was his life now. Balancing and managing teenagers and their love triangles.

Hizashi was at home laughing at him, probably.

"Dabi is the one who's been taking care of Izuku since he disappeared." He said finally, shoulders slumping as he watched the emotions flash across both of their faces.

Grief, at the years of thinking Izuku was gone.

Confusion about how exactly that situation would work.

Masaru's face smoothed over first, seeming to accept the situation for what it was. The man didn't relax fully but some of the tension drained out of his shoulders as his eyes briefly flickered towards the stairs.

Mitsuki, though? Confusion made way for growing horror and anger, Shouta could see it in the way that her posture grew stiff and her gaze slipped away from him and into the middle distance. Whatever was going on in her mind, whatever worse case scenarios that were playing out in her mind's eye, were enough to have her hands trembling in anger as she uncrossed her arms and made a motion to stand up.

"If that bastard hurt Izuku I'm going to kill him." She growled, tugging her arm out of her husband's reach as he reached to try and get her to sit back down. Her gaze swiveled back to Shouta, red eyes alight with anger so similar to her son's. "Tell me you're not condoning this?! Shouldn't you do your damn job and put his ass in jail?"

The hero let his head drop a little and dragged a palm over his face, reining in the urge to snap at the woman. The urge to tell her that he knew how to raise his own damn kid, thank you very much.

That thought alone sent uncomfortable prickles down his spine at how similar they sounded to something Inko probably would have said in this situation.

"Dabi defected from the League for Izuku and has shown a quite frankly surprising amount of effort at playing nice with us so far." Shouta settled on focusing on one problem rather than the other for the moment. "For the moment he is not a threat."

"Not a threat?! He's a villain!" Mitsuki shrieked, throwing her hands up in the air and turning away from Aizawa and towards her husband, hands gesturing wildly at the hero as she lost her words in her anger for a moment. "You're just letting a villain do as he pleases around teenagers on blind trust!"

"I trust Izuku." He answered calmly, far too used to the Bakugo anger to give the woman a rise. His tone was bland and his face was blank. "I trust that he knows what is and isn't acceptable. I also trust that your son knows what to do if he were to do something threatening."

The woman stared at the hero, eyes wide and her mouth agape. It took her several seconds to form words but once they did they were still unhappy, her lips curving down in a scowl again.

"Izuku is a child, Aizawa. You can't possibly trust him to make decisions like this." She said finally.

Shouta could feel the blank mask of indifference on his face slip at her words and he had to take a deep breath to stop himself from being harsh. From the way she twitched he could tell that his gaze wasn't exactly the friendliest but a part of him didn't care. This woman was important to Izuku, was someone he was going to be interacting with a lot in the future and he needed to knock this notion out of her head now. Before she ruined every bit of progress he'd made with Izuku.

"Do not ever repeat that thought in front of me again or let him think you're even thinking it." He said firmly, tone and face stone. "That child has been through more than most adults go through in an entire lifetime. You will respect that and his ability to decide what is best for himself."

He plowed on forward, even as the woman opened her mouth to argue. This was important and there was absolutely no way he was letting it go without her understanding exactly why she was wrong. This was a delicate balance they'd reached and he'd be damned if he let anyone break the trust he'd put so much work into building with Izuku.

"I understand you want to protect him but at this point, it's too little too late.There's very little at this point that he hasn't already seen, trust me on that." He kept Mitsuki pinned in place with his glare, trying to will her to understand the situation. "If we try and impose what we think he should be doing with no regard to what he's gone through then we'll be just as bad as Inko and he'll most likely disappear for good this time."

The blonde woman sank back down onto the sofa like her strings had been cut at his words and Shouta heaved a small sigh of relief. He almost felt bad as Mitsuki dropped her head down into her hands, shoulders shaking under the weight of her emotions.

Almost.

She had to understand and he wouldn't regret doing what he had to.

"What did she do to him?" Mitsuki broke the silence finally, lifting her head to meet Shouta's gaze once more.

The look in her eye was a little concerning but if he was being honest, he wasn't going to think too hard about it.

He wanted plausible deniability for whatever she was planning.

"She blamed him for being quirkless." He said slowly, not even trying to keep the disdain from coloring his tone. "I didn't see any sign of physical abuse. She seemed to prefer to ignore what Izuku was going through as a form of punishing him. I think she believed he deserved the abuse brought down on him from his peers and teachers."

He let that absolutely disgusting thought hang in the air for a moment before leaning forward, planting his elbows on his knees as he let his gaze bounce between both of the Bakugo's.

"When we get back to U.A, I'm finishing the paperwork to adopt Izuku under a new identity." He informed them. "She has no proof that he's still alive and no way of finding him. Nezu and I are making sure she can never ever hurt him again."

Mitsuki's mouth hung open again for a moment before she collected herself and glanced towards her husband, who smiled very genuinely at the underground hero.

"Welcome to the family." Masaru said with a small laugh as his wife swatted at his arm lightly. "Would you like to get in on the bet on if Katsuki proposes before or after graduation?"

"Masaru!"

"It'll be before, I'm sure."

Before anything else could be said, three pairs of eyes turned towards the stairs at the sound of Katsuki's rapid-fire mini explosions.

"YOU HAVE GOT TO BE FUCKING KIDDING ME"

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