Chapter Text
Denki could count on one hand the amount of times he’d overused his quirk since he’d started at UA. His ‘short circuiting’ on the other hand was something completely different, and he was perfectly content with his classmates not knowing that.
-1
Speaking of short circuiting, he was starting to come after having done so in training. He was sitting, and there were people chatting around him. Ah, his classmates. With slow blinks he was able to take in that they were in the common room doing homework, Denki’s own papers lay untouched on the coffee table in front of him.
“Oi Dunce Face!” Denki turned to Bakugou, who was hovering over Mina a couple feet away, “If you're back with it get cracking, I know for a fact that you haven’t started the History essay yet.” Before Denki’s brain could fully comprehend what the explosive boy wanted, Midoriya piped up from behind him.
“Kaachan, give him a minute! He just woke up!” He scolded. Bakugou scoffed, but obliged, returning to drilling Mina on her Math worksheet. Denki tried to toss a smile and finger guns toward Midoriya as thanks, but his hands didn’t quite get the memo and his joints locked up uncomfortably.
Whoops. He looked back down, surprised to see his stiff hands twitching slightly. He must’ve actually overdone it this time.
Midoriya raised an eyebrow at the half-gesture, “Kaminari, are you okay?”
“Huh? Oh yeah, just a little sore, sorry!” He quickly responded. Technically it was more than being sore but he didn’t feel like explaining why your muscles lock when you get shocked and how that related to his quirk. Especially since he was talking to Midoriya and, as much as he loved the guy, he would probably ask a boat load of related questions. Thankfully, Midoriya seemed to accept his answer and went back to whatever he was doing with Ururaka.
Denki instead turned his focus in front of him, towards the neat stack of papers one of his friends must’ve pulled out of his backpack. He scooted closer, even though his legs protested, and glanced over the page on top. He was pretty sure he understood the concept, but when he tried to pick up his pencil, it immediately dropped from his loose fingers.
He tried again, willing his hand to close around the thin thing. It took a couple tries, but it was finally in his hand. He had to reread the question to remember what the answer was, which was annoying, but heroes don’t give up. At least that's what he tried to tell himself when the pencil lead broke as soon as it met the paper. He groaned inwardly, the idea of trying to move his thumb up and press on the eraser to push more lead out sounded painfully difficult. He would rather just complain about being bored until Sero joined in and they convinced Bakugou to let them play Mario Kart.
But Bakugou was right, he had an essay to start, along with today's Math and Hero studies worksheets. Since he overused his quirk, he'd probably be too tired to do it later, which meant if he wanted his grades to keep climbing up he needed to do it now. He sighed and gripped his pencil as tight as his fingers would allow. Heroes don’t give up.
-2
Denki flopped down on Mina’s bed. The fluffy comforter was so soft he was pretty sure he could fall asleep then and there. Kirishima didn’t let him by jumping right on top of him, forcing him to cough and sputter.
Once he got air back into his lungs he whined, “Kiri! What the hell, man!” Kirishima laughed and he tried to heave the stronger boy off. Sadly, Kirishima was stronger than Denki, and heavier, and hard to reach while Denki was on his stomach, so his attempts were futile. “Dude-” He tried again, “I can’t breathe bitch!”
Kirishima, still laughing, finally gave in and rolled off. Denki made sure to kick him as hard as could once his legs were free. He wasn’t actually mad though, and a smile was quick to appear back on his face while they tussled.
Denki had a great day. He got a reasonable amount of sleep the night before, got his English test back with a B+, and had been able to reach his quirk limit without short circuiting during training! It was his best day, week really, in a while, and now he got to hang out with his friends, which made it even better.
“Now now boys, no fighting on my bed, this is supposed to be a stress-relieving day.” Mina called over her shoulder. She was almost fully in her closet, trying to find her favorite sweater. He and Kirishima paused before the latter rammed into Denki, who yelped in surprise, and sent them both tumbling to the floor. Sero egged them on from the doorway, until Denki’s hand accidentally smacked into Bakugou.
“STOP FIGHTING OR I’LL BLAST YOU BOTH TO HELL!!” The boy exploded, literally. Denki quickly scuttled back, not having the immunity to Bakugou’s blasts that Kirishima did, but he was still laughing, propped up on an elbow so he could hold his aching stomach.
Kirishima was trying to calm Bakugou down when Sero interrupted, “Wait, what the hell? Denki what is that?” Sero was pointing toward him, more specifically, toward his stomach. Kirishima and Bakugou had stopped fighting and were now looking over with interest. Jirou tilted her head from the doorway and Mina peeked her head out from the closet.
His shirt had risen up somewhere during his scuffle with Kirishima, and now visible were jagged red marks that branched over his skin. They were sore, but they hurt less than when he had gotten them during 1v1 battles earlier. Denki smiled at the reminder of his personal success, but before he could respond 4 voices talked at once.
“WHAT THE FUCK ARE THOSE SPARKY?!?”
“Denks, are you hurt!? Why didn’t you go to Recovery Girl?”
“Bro, are you okay?”
“When the hell did you get those?”
Denki’s eyes widened and he quickly threw his hands up to quiet his friends down. He smiled easily, hoping to ease their worry, “Chill guys, it’s just lichtenberg figures, I get them every now and then because of my quirk.”
Apparently this did not calm them like he hoped, instead they exploded into concerned yelling once again, forcing him to stay put on Mina’s bed while they took care of him for the rest of the night. Even Bakugou didn’t complain about making the group dinner that evening. That night, surrounded by his closest friends while some animated movie played on Jirou’s laptop, Denki couldn’t help but lightly wipe at his eyes before dozing off.
-3
A phone. It was a phone.
Denki couldn’t believe this. Sure, he’d been having a bad day, but really? Short circuiting because Kirishima’s phone was low battery? Denki had been charging phones for years!
At least he hadn’t been out for too long, regaining himself to Kirishima explaining what had happened to Mr Aizawa. When Kirishima apologized, confirming that it was in fact charging a phone that had caused Denki to ‘go dumb’ (as Bakugou had dubbed it), Aizawa had tried to make him sit out during rescue drills that afternoon. Denki was practically down on his hands and knees by the time he convinced his teacher to let him participate.
Unfortunately, Denki was put in group 4… the shipwreck group. God damnit.
Wishing he had just accepted Aizawa’s offer, he made his way to the water with Iida, Ojiro, and Uraraka. The activity was simple, in each group, two students would be villains and two heroes. After the first drill was done, they would switch. The goal was to get the civilians (dummies) to safety in under ten minutes and engage in as little fighting as possible. Denki’s partner was Uraraka.
The first round they were the Heroes, which was pretty easy. Once they had made their way onto the ship, Denki kept lookout while Uraraka used her quirk on the dummies, making them weigh nothing. Their escape went less smoothly, Denki having to hold off Ojiro. He took a good kick to the stomach, since he wasn’t as well trained in hand to hand as the Karate boy, and probably would’ve been much worse off if they were sparring. Thankfully, Uraraka had enough time to get the dummies on an emergency raft and Denki quickly launched himself over the boat’s railing just as Iida appeared.
Round two, they were the villains. While waiting for the others to make it onto the boat, Denki drew silly faces on dummies, which elicited a laugh from his partner. A warm feeling bloomed in his chest. Denki knew he was seen as a bit of a perv, but he liked to think that was just a misunderstanding. He just loved making everyone happy and it wasn’t his fault everyone (both the girls and the boys, he’s a bi disaster thank you very much) was so freaking hot!? Plus, he never did something he knew would make anyone uncomfortable, instead sticking mostly to compliments.
When their opponents finally did make it on the boat, Ilda picked up both the dummies in one motion, already on the other side of the boat by the time Denki could react. He jumped in surprise, he hadn’t heard the emergency raft’s engine approaching. They had expected something like this though, so Uraraka was already waiting for him around the corner. She lunged, hand outstretched, but at the last moment Ojiro swung down and smacked her arm away. Denki tried to get in Iida’s way, but the boy was too fast. The raft was waiting for them overboard, and once Ojiro was on it to stabilize the dummies, Iida used his engines to propel them towards safety. Ah, so that’s why Denki didn’t hear them approaching.
Uraraka was up and next to him immediately, “Here, I’ll float you down to the water, then you can shock them.”
Denki knew that was a bad idea, electricity was extremely hard to control in water. He didn’t doubt he’d be able to control his output, he had done extensive practice to make sure he didn’t accidentally kill someone, he was much more likely to hurt himself. So obviously he said, “Huh? Oh- uh okay.”
Look, Uraraka is such a sweet and bubbly girl, and when they won the first round she had jumped up and down in excitement, but when she was focused she got such a determined look on her face. Denki didn’t want to let her down, sue him. Plus, in an actual battle, he would need to do it anyway.
He was at the water's surface in seconds, and with a glance up he saw the raft halfway to shore. He sent a silent prayer and thrust his hand into the water, activating his quirk at a low voltage. He saw Iida’s legs spaz and lock up, and tried to hide the fact that his arm was doing the same. He quickly cut off the current, but the damage was done. The timer went off.
Once Uraraka hefted him back up over the railing, she thrust her fist in the air and gave him a hug. Denki tried to convince himself it was worth it, even though it was hard when the pressure on his arm set every nerve on fire.
-4
Denki was short circuiting less and less, and he was really proud of himself. His therapist said it’s because he’s been healing and his mind is finally starting to recognize that he’s safe. The only problem is that he was overusing his quirk more often. Usually he would short circuit before he had the chance to overdo it, which meant he didn’t have a good idea of his limits.
This meant he was getting ‘foggy brain’ some days after school, which led to some admittedly funny situations.
Like when he put the milk in the microwave instead of the fridge by accident, or when he kept trying to open the pantry with his ID because he didn’t hear the click of it unlocking (the pantry doesn't lock and doesn’t even have a card scanner), or even when he pet Bakugou’s hair because he thought it looked soft and didn’t think about the fact that it was Bakugou. That last one was a little less funny when he was chased around the common area afterwards.
Anyway, it was anything but funny when he met up with Shinsou after school like he had promised. Denki was entirely not with it, thoughts drifting between Shinsou’s hair looking pretty and wondering if he got enough sleep with how deep the boy's eye bags were. He failed to notice Shinsou nervously fiddling his fingers together, and the blush forming on his cheeks.
“I was wondering if you wanted to go on a date this weekend?” He blurted out suddenly.
Denki stared back with a blank expression, “Huh?”
Shinsou paused for a moment before elaborating, “We could, like, go and get dinner, or actually- it’d probably have to be lunch because of curfew, but you know…a date.” Denki was still confused, his mind slow to comprehend what Shinsou meant.
“Or we could do something else, we could even stay in the dorms and play games if you want, it's totally up to you.” He was getting more fidgety.
“Uhh, why?”
Shinsou paused, “Wh- I- Why?” his cheeks turned a deeper red, but his brows furrowed in confusion, “Because… I like you?”
Denki’s mind finally seemed to figure out what was going on, but instead of responding how one normally would to a confession, he smiled brightly and said, “Oh! Yeah me too, man!”
Single Handedly the most embarrassing and worst and best moment in his life. Shinsou liked him back, which was amazing, but his dumb brain was too stupid to respond normally. Shinsou thought he was messing with him and ended up muttering a ‘nevermind’ before he turned and ran.
Once Denki realized what he did he started crying (fried brains means no emotional control). That’s how Jirou found him, and after he was barely able to blubber out what had happened, she marched him right up to Shinsou’s door to explain.
…They did go on the date, and it was wonderful. Another plus, the bakusquad decided to never mention it or tease him about it again after Denki burst into tears the first time they tried because he was still so mad at himself.
-5
Denki pounded on Mina’s door. To say he was frustrated was an understatement, he just wanted to do his makeup. There was music coming from her room, there almost always was, but he recognized the song as Sweater Weather and that made him feel the tiniest bit better.
The door opened and Mina peeked out warily, “Uh hello-oh! Denki? What’s up babe?” She let the door open further and Denki caught sight of Tsu laying in Uraraka’s lap. A quick lean to the side confirmed that the rest of the girls were also there. Jirou had her guitar, and Momo and what he could only assume was Hagakure were sitting on the bed. Snacks and drinks were strewn across the floor, each girl having their own pile.
“Uhhh, shit, sorry. I didn’t realize you were having girls’ night, I- uh, I don’t want to interrupt” He managed to stutter out, sounding very awkward even to his own ears. Heat seemed to rise on his neck up to his ears.
Mina deadpanned him, “Kami, sweetheart, if it’s important enough to have you banging on my door like Bakugou when I slept through a tutoring session, it’s important enough to interrupt girls' night.”
Denki fidgeted for a moment before looking down, blush rising on his cheeks, and saying quiet enough for only Mina to hear, “I need help with my eyeliner.”
“Help with-” Mina quirked an eyebrow, “I mean, of course, you know I’m always down to do makeup together, what’s got you so nervous?”
“I- well- My hands aren’t really cooperating because I overdid it in training and, you know, it’s a little embarrassing…” He mumbled. At this point he kinda just wanted to go back to his own dorm.
“Whattt? Denks I can’t even count the amount of times you’ve helped me take off my makeup because my hands were irritated from my acid, and the rest of the girls get it too, don’t worry,” she rested a hand on his shoulder and smiled, “We got your back.”
Denki’s smile seemed a little lighter at that, but he still wanted to confirm. “Are you sure?” Mina nodded sincerely. With that, he forced his shoulders to relax, took a deep breath, and sauntered through the doorway, yelling, “Hey ladies, we’re doing makeup now!” There was only a moment of silence before a chorus of cheers greeted him.
The girls got to see a different side of their resident sunshine boy that night, besides Mina and Jirou who hung out with him regularly. Denki laughed, cheered them on during an impromptu fashion show, and sang surprisingly good karaoke. They bestowed upon him the title of ‘honorary girl’- which elicited wheezing laughter from Denki himself- and promised to invite him to girls’ night every now and then.
It wasn’t much, but it made Denki feel appreciated more than they could know.