Inquisitor

- Chapter: 53 -

Katsuo knocked gently on the door before he opened it. He stepped inside the room and saw Recovery Girl sitting at her desk, reading over some papers. The Youthful Heroine turned to him when she heard the door open, the knocks too quiet for her to hear.

"Oh, hello dear."

Katsuo slightly nodded when she spoke and asked her, "Where's Izumi?"

Recovery Girl turned around and pointed at one of the beds near the back. "She's over there. She's still resting so please be quiet and quick."

Katsuo nodded again and replied, "I'll think about it."

As Katsuo walked over to the bed he heard Recovery Girl mutter something, what she said he couldn't make out.

He reached the bed and pulled back the curtains, saying "Knock knock." as he did so. Izumi was lying in the bed with her head propped up by pillows. She jumped when Katsuo suddenly appeared and dropped her phone, with a small noise leaving her mouth.

When she realized it was Katsuo her face reddened slightly and her hands flew down to cover her phone with her left hand covering her right. "K-K-Katsuo! Wha-wha-what are you d-doing here?!"

Katsuo looked Izumi over, then said, "Suspicious."

Izumi's hands seemed to press into her phone more when she heard Katsuo's response. A cold sweat started to spread across her face. "What? Suspicious? Wh-who, me? Heheh... Noooo..." Her eyes drifted off to the side as she cursed herself for being so bad at lying.

Katsuo's eyes narrowed. "Yeah, now you're really looking suspicious."

"I-I'm not..."

"Really? Because you trying to hide your phone from me is pretty suspicious."

Izumi blinked at Katsuo's remark. "But... I'm no-"

Katsuo perked up one of his fingers at Izumi and wagged it back and forth. "Tsk tsk tsk. You can't lie to me Izumi." Katsuo reached over to pick up Izumi's phone, and Izumi swiped her hands away from his when they got near, sliding them over to another spot. Her left hand still over her right, and now pressing into the mattress even harder than before.

As Katsuo turned her phone on Izumi said, "I'm not hiding anything on my phone! Even if I was you couldn't open it anyways!"

As the words left Izumi's mouth, Katsuo's fingers swiped across the screen and unlocked her phone. He turned it around so she could see that it was, indeed, unlocked.

Izumi jumped up as much as she could while wrapped under blankets on a bed, her hands flying up in shock when she saw him unlock her phone. "HOW?!!"

Katsuo shrugged his shoulders and answered, saying, "Well, we spend a ton of time together and you've unlocked your phone hundreds of times around me. I just learned the motion to unlock it and copied it. Surprised I got it first try though."

Izumi was about to speak, but realized her hands had flown up in surprise and quickly pushed them back onto the mattress. Her left hand again on top.

"Now then, time to figure out what you were looking at that you wanted to hide from me." Katsuo started looking at Izumi's open background apps to try and figure out what she was doing.

"Katsuo, I wasn't doing anything!"

"Hero registry, hero registry, hero registry... hero... registry... why do you have 57 open tabs of nothing but different hero registries?"

Izumi's face grew slightly redder. "I was researching them to write in my notebook."

"Huh?" Katsuo looked at Izumi's phone, then to her side where a table was, and, lo and behold, was her current hero notebook turned on a page with a half done hero entry. Katsuo looked from the book to the phone, then to Izumi. "Guess I was... wrong? You weren't trying to hide something from me..." Katsuo said, his voice and face showing he was slightly fuddled. He handed her phone back to her.

When she didn't go to grab it, he tilted her head. "Izumi? I'm... uh, handing your phone back now." he said, wiggling the phone as he spoke.

Izumi shakily nodded her head. "Yeah, I know."

"Then are you going to... take it?"

Izumi prodded her head at the table and said, "You can just set it down."

Katsuo looked at her for a moment before his gaze turned down to her hands. Her left hand was open and pushing down on her closed right hand. In his mind, he felt the gears click and start spinning.

He bent over to put the phone on the table, when he was straightening himself his face was suddenly covered in a confused look. He pointed slightly at the table and Izumi turned to look. When she did, he grabbed her left arm and pulled it off her right hand, grabbing her right wrist with his other hand, pulling her hand up for him to see.

"Hey! Wait, Katsuo stop!" Izumi tried to pull her arm back but couldn't. Katsuo looked at her hand and felt his breath hitch. Her fingers were crooked, scars covered her hand going up slightly past her wrist. He stood and stared at Izumi's hand, frozen. After a few seconds of him staring, Izumi stopped trying to pull her hand free, her arm going slack in his grasp.

Katsuo looked at Izumi when he felt the trembling in her arm. She was trying to hide her face by looking downward but it wasn't working. Katsuo saw her face. The tears in her eyes, the painful red in her cheeks, the twitching of her eyebrows. The trembling in her lips.

He knew that expression all too well.

He didn't even realize his hand was moving until it was already on her head. Ruffling her hair up even more than it normally is. He let go of her wrist, her hands going up to her head to try and stop him from messing with her hair.

When she got his hand restrained, his other hand took up the duty and ruffled Izumi's hair. Izumi, in an attempt to stop Katuso's other hand, let the first escape. Katsuo used both hands to ruffle her hair, with Izumi trying to fight back.

Somewhere in there, they started laughing. A few chuckles at first, but soon it was full body shaking laughter. They laughed so hard that Katsuo couldn't mess with Izumi's hair and she couldn't fight him back.

They stayed like that, just laughing with one another for a while. Just laughing with each other.

"Katsuki Bakugou wins the match! May the first round semi-finalists please make their way to the field!"

When the speaker in the room announced the end of Katsuki's match they slowly stopped laughing. Katsuo stepped back and let Izumi walk past him to go to her next match. He soon left after receiving a warning from Recovery Girl, and began walking to the preparation room.

His mind was racing trying to think of ways to counteract Katuski. The blond had grown quite a bit in the roughly two years since Katsuo had first met him. He had to figure out quite a few different things to be able to beat Katsuki. He couldn't just run up and attack freely like he had the last time they went all-out against each other.

'Well, not that I ever have gone all out.'

As he was making his way to the room, a voice drew his mind back to the world around him.

"No way, she's some weirdo!"

"C'mon dude, weirdo isn't enough for her!"

"Yeah!"

Katsuo looked in front of him and saw a group of three guys talking about something. He shook his head and continued forward, intent of just ignoring them.

"I mean, seriously! I thought she was a guy at first! What with her hair and body! I doubt she'll ever get a boyfriend!"

"I know what you mean!! That green mangly mess on her head is sooo unsightly. I feel bad for her!"

"I feel bad for any of the idiots that think she's attractive!!!"

Katsuo heard them and his feet froze. He turned to them and asked, "Excuse me, but who are you three talking about?"

"Huh?"

"Who're you?"

"This ugly chick named Midoriya!! She's in the tournament!"

Katsuo nodded slightly. "I..."

A twisted smile formed on his face.

"...See."