DRAGON'S BROOD (Kirishima x Bakugou)

Chapter 25: Preparation

Bakugou's PoV

Distraught I stared at the small metal mirror that Denki held in front of my nose. I agreed to modify my appearance a little, but had refused to change anything serious.

"What the hell?" I murmured as I looked at my gelled hair and touched the stiff strands of hair lying flat on my head. It looked terrible.

I heard Red giggle quietly behind me and turned around unnerved. The half dragon had an amused sparkle in his eyes and quickly held a hand in front of his mouth to hide his grin.

"Just let it out, Red," I growled.

"Sorry, but you look so... different," he chuckled. When I still looked at him angrily, he came up to me and gave me a soothing kiss on the lips. Admittedly this small gesture had a calming effect despite my discomfort. I sighed and drove through the stiff strands of hair once more.

"Come on Baku, I didn't know you were so vain," teased Red.

"I'm not vain," I grumbled, but decided to drop the subject. After all, it was just a matter of changing my appearance slightly. It wasn't directly a disguise, we rather wanted to sink into the masses. Red had his red hair tied up to a small bun, and unlike my makeover, it looked damn good.

It was early in the evening, and Sero had to come any minute. I got up and ignored Denki, who was still holding out the metal mirror and looking at the clock. Restlessly I began to walk up and down. We had retired to one of the back rooms again, as the taproom had filled up with the first guests. I resisted the urge to go out the door and wait for Sero at the front door. Attracting attention was our biggest enemy in this operation.

When someone knocked at the door to the small room I flinched, but opened it immediately. Sero stood in front of us, holding a small bundle of clothes in his arm. His gaze wandered up to my hair and I saw him suppress a grin.

"Yeah, go ahead and laugh," I growled. "Just come in."

"You have to leave your temper here," he replied mischievously and walked past me into the room. Of course, he first gave his boyfriend a kiss before giving Red a friendly handshake.

"Well. Here I have the uniforms," he said, opening the bundle and putting the clothes on the table. It was the same simple uniform he wore himself. For each of them a pair of grey trousers, a white shirt and a red cape. Apart from the cloak that was represented in every uniform that belonged to the royal military, it had nothing to do with the one I wore as a dragonslayer. Although I had taken off my new cape the last few days because it was simply too conspicuous, I had to admit that I missed it. This cape here had no fur on its collar and was clearly less elaborately embroidered, but it was better than nothing.

Red curiously felt the fabric. "Okay, we'll put this on right now, right? Are we going right away?" he asked excitedly.

"Yes, change now," Sero replied. "While you do, I'll tell you what's going to happen."

Red and I both took our respective uniforms and started changing.

"So, we're about to go into the tower together. We just talk normally and go to the notice board to see our rosters. By the way, for the external patrol the names Kuwa and Taito will be registered. Remember them and decide who is who."

"I am Kuwa!" I heard Red's dull voice say as he pulled his shirt over his head.

"I don't care. Then I am Taito," I said with little interest.

Sero nodded and went on. "I will have to go to my position relatively quickly. According to the duty roster I have to work with one out of my grade shift. I honestly thought he was still sick because he has been missing the last few weeks, but that's good. He is a chatterbox and not very attentive. He won't cause us any problems, except", he looked deep into my eyes, "you're acting like a temperamental dragonslayer. Then even he will understand who you are."

I gritted my teeth. "All right," I spat out.

Sero looked at me skeptically and sighed. "Just let Kiri talk when it comes up." I nodded, still contrite. Too often I had already heard that I was too rude and too temperamental. I hated it if I could not be who I am. But Sero seemed to be satisfied with my half-hearted confirmation and continued. "As I told you yesterday, there is a little ritual when you pass through the gate and start your shift. First of all, no matter who is standing with us right at the moment, who wants to go through or whether a queue has formed, you go past all of them directly to us. After all, you have priority. The ritual is only the abbreviated version of the oath on the city and on the king. So you just stand up tightly, take your hand to your heart and speak the oath. We'll do it after you, and then you'll be free men."

"Okay, that should be easy," grinned Red. "What's the oath?"

I just rolled up my sleeve, but looked up and carefully watched Sero.

"The oath is this: I swear to dedicate my loyalty, my strength, my life to the king and the city of Ariko. As I said, it is only the short form. The whole oath is very long and everyone here had to learn it by heart during his training. That's exactly why there won't be anyone here who mixes up the order or has to think longer. You should be able to memorize the phrase and best of all, play it down a little bored. Once you've worked a few shifts, most people's enthusiasm is over."

Red and I memorized the sentence until we played it down in the same bored tone of voice that Sero had spoken of. Then we start to hide our belongings in some way on our bodies. The most difficult of these were the swords, which were not part of the regular equipment of the guards in the format in which we had them. After some trying, we finally strapped them to our thighs. Thank God both shirt and trousers were cut quite wide and the cape also covered a lot.

Finally, we decided it was time to go. I tried to keep my nervousness under control. This was our only chance to get out of town without attracting attention. Maybe we could even shake off our pursuers completely. I looked at Red, who seemed to be almost exuberant and had to resist the urge to grab his calming hand. He noticed my gaze and smiled gently at me, loosening the knot in my stomach a little.

Finally we reached the wall near the western gate and walked the last bit to the tower. "Relax," Sero whispered quietly once more, then he opened the door and went in ahead of us.