Adonis Coming Down

Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at http://archiveofourown.org/works/38028277.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences

Archive Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Category: M/M
Fandom: 僕のヒーローアカデミア | Boku no Hero Academia | My Hero
Academia
Relationship: Bakugou Katsuki/Midoriya Izuku
Characters: Bakugou Katsuki, Midoriya Izuku, Todoroki Shouto, Todoroki Enji |
Endeavor
Additional Tags: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Major Character Injury,
Character Death, Suicide, (not bkdk related), Stabbing, Murder, Original
Character(s), Original Character Death(s), Hurt Midoriya Izuku, Hurt
Bakugou Katsuki, radiation, radiation poisoning, Midoriya Izuku Needs
A Hug, Soft Bakugou Katsuki, Bakugou Katsuki is Bad at Feelings,
Pining Bakugou Katsuki, Bakugou Katsuki is a Dork, Bakugou Katsuki
Needs a Hug, Blood, Blood and Injury, Mythology References, Endeavor
Internship Arc (My Hero Academia)
Language: English
Collections: Favorite Bakugou Angst with a Dash of Fluff, Bakudeku, Top bakudeku
fics everyone should read, For the tears that leave you empty at night
Stats: Published: 2022-03-29 Words: 19,951 Chapters: 1/1
 Adonis Coming Down
by edema_ruh

Summary

More than Adonis and Aphrodite, he felt like Orpheus, ready to go to hell and back for his
love, but bound to lose him either way in the end.
After all, it was well known: where there were heroes, there were tragedies.

Notes
See the end of the work for notes
Katsuki and Izuku’s relationship was like a nuclear powerplant accident waiting to happen.

When they were growing up, they had had their differences; everyone knew that. Katsuki
used to hate Izuku, but life – and the very own former quirkless boy – seemed to always find
a way to pull them back together, like magnets, until hatred turned into something else –
something more appeasing. They orbited around each other and the tension between them
was like an invisible force that tied their lives together, and that became stronger and stronger
the harder Katsuki tried to pull away.

Until he gave up on pulling away and allowed Izuku’s immense gravitational force take its
toll.

You see, he didn’t give up per se. He wasn’t the kind of person that gave up on things. But
like it was said, their relationship was a nuclear accident waiting to happen, and when it did
happen, Katsuki found no way out from it. No escape. All he could do was stand very still
when Izuku pressed their lips together for the first time, mid-argument, while they were
resting from patrol on the sunny rooftop of a construction site. Then, the next “only thing he
could do” was to pull Izuku’s hair so that he could expose his mouth and crash their lips
together with force while he returned the kiss, devouring him, consuming him, with the
brightness of a match that burned a bit too bright right before its flame went out.

It happened a few months into the beginning of their internship with Endeavor. Todoroki and
his father had been going away from the busy agency a few times a week during training
hours so that they could train Todoroki’s left side on a secure and appropriate space, which
meant Katsuki and Izuku were (forced) to spend more time together.

The truth was: they were alone together. Everyone else at the agency were too busy to pay
them any mind, and people expected them to work well together and get along with each
other because they were from the same school, same class. No one expected them to have
such a complicated history, right? And since they wanted to keep their jobs plus future
carreers, they decided to put (most) differences aside and cooperate, for once in their lives.
Maybe it was because Katsuki was more mature at this point, maybe it was because Izuku
was getting better at reading his curse-words and general grumpy mood for the meaningless
pettiness they actually were – but it worked. Their patrols were done in pairs, and they ended
up getting along better, especially because of the special secret that they shared – One For
All.

Their whole lives had been lived with a stark difference between them – Izuku’s lack of a
quirk, and Katsuki’s possession of an incredible one. Now, they finally had more in common
to pull them together than points of difference to push them apart – and when Izuku kissed
Katsuki for the first time, and when Katsuki kissed back with an alien hunger on his lower
belly, he found that he’d been secretly longing for this for longer than he had known.

He had always craved for Izuku’s presence, even if he hadn’t been aware of that desire for
most of his life. After all, the boy had always been there, trailing after him as certainly as the
sunrise and the sunset – Katsuki had never been faced with his absence to know if he’d be
able to endure it. After the kiss, when he got back to UA and his dorm room, as he laid down
to sleep, he found himself trying to imagine a life without Izuku, and found – much to his
consternation and confusion – that he couldn’t, even if he didn’t necessarily think in a
romantic way. He couldn’t really see himself without his green shadow behind him,
advancing closer and closer to him until they were no longer chasing after each other but
rather walking side by side as equals.

And being close to Izuku – or, at least, closer than they used to be before – became easier and
easier with time. It felt natural, as if it was meant to be. Katsuki still wanted to surpass him
and become the number one hero in the ranks, but he found himself cherishing Izuku’s
company, and enjoying his presence, in a way he had never done before in all those years
they had known each other. It felt alien, and weird, and it scared him at first, until he decided
that there wasn’t a thing in the world that scared Bakugou Katsuki and that he wouldn’t let
himself be taken down by thoughts and uncertainties that turned him into a coward. He
wouldn’t be a coward. All Might himself had told him – whenever he was faced with a wall,
he laughed. So that was what he was going to do.

That was why he asked Izuku to be his boyfriend. He never once doubted that the little nerd
loved him; he never once questioned Izuku’s feelings for him. All he did question were his
own feelings, and once he made his peace with them, deciding to face them head-first rather
than cowering away from them, he was sure: this was the right thing to do. There was no way
Izuku would say no, right?

Right?

Wrong.

Because Izuku did say no.

Katsuki’s ears started to ring as soon as he received the response.

“No…?”, he asked with a blank expression, comprehension beyond his current abilities.

“Kacchan –“, Izuku tried pleadingly, but it was for nothing – upon his refusal, Katsuki
misinterpreted his pleading tone as despise and contempt, as he always did, as he had always
done. In the short span of a single second, he had regressed all the way back to his former,
obnoxious, teenage self upon the refusal he hadn’t been waiting for.

“No, that’s fine. Suit yourself”, Katsuki scoffed angrily, venomously. He turned on his back
to leave, but stopped himself half way. “In fact, forget I ever asked anything”.

“You’re getting everything all wrong!”, Izuku whined behind him, trailing after him. Right
where the motherfucker belongs, the petty side of Katsuki’s brain provided bitterly.

But Katsuki was angry. And when he was angry, he didn’t think of anyone but himself. He
had been that way all his life, all his life. He didn’t know how to change. He didn’t know how
to be better.

And at that moment, he didn’t want to be better. He wanted to be right; he wanted to be on

the top.
He turned on his heels and pushed Izuku back against the wall, their lips dangerously close to
one another.

“If you say a word about this to anyone – and I mean anyone”, he growled dangerously low,
like a feral animal caught on a trap. He didn’t know what he was feeling – anger, sorrow, fear,
shame: they were all mixed up inside of him. “All Might better say goodbye to his little heir
and his little legacy”.

Izuku stared at him with wide eyes, resembling that former quirkless teenager he had been
just a couple years before.

“Let me speak –“, he attempted again, pleading, voice high-pitched and squeal-y.

But Katsuki let go of him abruptly, making him topple to the side at the lack of pressure, and
left the room without another word.

“Kacchan! Wait!”, Izuku shouted after him, pleading, but it was for nothing. Katsuki was
gone.

The next day, they had to chase a perp during their internship’s patrol.

The man was a wannabe mad scientist in his mid-twenties with an unknown quirk who had
happened to steal dangerous radioactive material from the laboratory he used to work at. The
guy was dangerous because of the unknown quirk, so they should have probably left the
pursuit to the pros – however, Izuku (and Katsuki, after all) had faced worse villains than a
common thief; they could handle some simple chase-and-arrest quest that wouldn’t take them
half an hour.

The sidekicks were occupied with other important stuff, also. Endeavor and Todoroki were
nowhere near the agency at that time, too busy doing their father-son training somewhere.
Izuku and Katsuki, on the other hand, were completely not-busy at that moment, killing time
and waiting for the chance to jump on whichever opportunity appeared in front of them as
soon as possible. Anything to kill that weird, tense silence between them.

Katsuki wanted to be anywhere but beside Izuku at that moment, but they both wanted to be
heroes and they couldn’t exactly just skip work over their personal grudges. They were still a
pair of pathetic interns, after all, which meant they had to show some stamina and some will
to get their asses to work.

When Burnin received the call with the anonymous tip on the mad scientist’s location, they
were quick to shout a well-synchronized-but-not-planned “ON IT!”, right before leaving the
building without giving Burnin the chance to deny them that opportunity. They were just a
pair of newbie interns, so technically she shouldn’t have allowed them to just leave after a
dangerous perp like that, but she knew them well enough already to be able to tell there was
no changing Bakugou Katsuki’s or Midoriya Izuku’s minds once they set their wills on
something. Also, they were short on people to go after the bandit at that moment, and the kids
had already proved their competence enough for her to trust them with this.

When they reached the tipped location, after getting there without exchanging a word with
one another mid-flight, there was no radioactive material in sight, just a guy around his
sixties kneeling on the floor and cradling something to his chest while he cried and sobbed.
Katsuki wasn’t one to comfort people, but he told Izuku through one quick, dry glance that he
would approach the suspect and question him on his own. He didn’t need the nerd’s help,
especially not after his shitty refusal from the day before. He didn’t need one damned thing
from Deku.

That was when it all went wrong, really.

Izuku saw it way before Katsuki did, not because his reflexes were quicker but because of the
damn lighting in the spot where he was standing at, that made the metal shine in his
peripheral vision. He noticed it, the glimmer of a blade, the spark of a knife, and he knew, in
that instant, that Kacchan was about to be stabbed in the guts. Information about knife-related
injuries flashed before his eyes in the spark of a second, and in that instant Izuku knew: the
odds of Kacchan surviving this, no matter how amazing he was, were slim to none. After all,
he was still human, no matter how great of a hero-in-training he was. Plus, the pain he would
feel while he was still alive, fighting for his survival, would be horrendous – gut-stabbing
was known to be one of the most painful ways to kill someone.

“Watch out!”, was all he had the time to scream before using One For All’s speed and
throwing himself against Katsuki to push him to the side, away from the blade.

Good. He succeeded – he had used his own body not only to throw Katsuki away from the
man’s knife, but also as a shield against any possible further attacks.

And Katsuki was only able stare with wide eyes as the man jammed the knife on Deku’s side,
earning a pained yelp from the smiling boy.

“You did this!”, the man shouted, hands trembling, as he stood up and took several trembly
steps away from the pair of training heroes. He pointed a shaking finger at them. “This is
your doing! This is your fault!”

“Deku”, Katsuki side-eyed Izuku and said with a low voice that only his partner could hear.
Izuku had remained standing after the blow, but he was hunched over in pain and discomfort.
With one quick glance he was able to recognize the question in Katsuki’s stern, almost
worried eyes – are you ok?

“I-I’m f-fine”, Izuku said through gritted teeth, already pale and sweating from the pain and
the shock, hands pressing down on his bleeding injury. “G-Go do your thing”.

“Tch”, was Katsuki’s response, and he started to advance towards the man, who had dropped
the bloodied knife and turned on his heels, running away from the sight of Katsuki’s
untampered rage.
But before he could start the chase and take the idiot down, Deku fell on his knees with a
yelp and a hiss, and Katsuki found that he had to sort out his priorities. Chase the man and
leave Deku to potentially die, all alone and bleeding out on the cement floor of a dusty,
abandoned factory, or get Deku some help and find the man later.

At the end of the day, it wasn’t a difficult choice. As much as Katsuki might have hated Deku
in the past, as much as he hated Deku now for refusing him like he was nothing, he still
had… feelings for the guy. He didn’t know what those feelings were, exactly, and in that
moment they were all mixed up and confusing, but he was training to be a pro, and what kind
of hero would he become if he left weaklings like Deku behind to die when he had the power
to save them?

“For fuck’s sake”, Katsuki said with anger, frustration and annoyance, abandoning the chase
and approaching Deku on the floor.

“No!”, Deku protested, sounding desperate and ashamed. “You can go after him! I’m ok, I’m
o– agh”, he gasped and squeezed his eyes shut in pain.

Broken bones? Easy peasy. Stab wounds? Not the kind of pain he was all that much used to.

“Like hell you’re ok”, Katsuki growled at his face, crouching down so that he could grab one
of Izuku’s arms and pass it around his shoulder. He hoisted the boy up like he was a bag of
potatoes and Izuku let out a half-scream of pain that made him completely embarrassed.
“See?”, Katsuki had raised a triumphant eyebrow at the sound, even though it had made his
chest tighten with worry.

“I-I’ve been through worse”, Izuku spat through gritted teeth, sweating profusely at this
point. Katsuki noticed the way his eyes were becoming blurry from unshed tears and from
pain, so he hurried up to the agency, which was equipped to provide emergency medical care
to its heroes, without saying another word. He couldn’t tell if the stab wound had been
serious enough to call for a hospital, but even if it had, the walk to the agency was shorter
than the one to the closest medical facility, and he would need to inform Burnin anyway.

They carried on without talking – Izuku was in too much pain and Katsuki was too angry to
manage any sort of conversation. He kept replaying the moment of the stabbing in his head as
he carried the stumbling, shivering Deku across the streets, ignoring the looks they received
from civilian passerby and trying to figure out what he could have done differently. Izuku
was hugging his injury side and gritting his teeth as they went, looking whiter by the second.
It was only when they turned on the agency’s corner that the harmed boy finally spoke up, his
voice tight and trembly from pain.

“Y-You know, you d-don’t have to carry me inside”, he mumbled out. “I c-can walk”.

And for some reason, that affirmation pissed the hell out of Katsuki.

He had quit on a chase that could have led them to dangerous, stolen radioactive material,
just so that he could get the nerd to safety and to the urgent medical care he clearly needed.
And now he was what? Ashamed of being seen with Katsuki? Ashamed of being carried by
him? Ashamed of having been stabbed? Damn well he should be ashamed of that! It had been
an idiot move made by an idiot who clearly couldn’t think before he acted! Like an idiot!

“Whatever, suit yourself”, Katsuki said angrily, letting go of his arm and throwing Izuku back
on his feet dismissively, as if he was a sack of potatoes. Izuku stumbled and managed to keep
his balance without falling on his butt, but he sent Katsuki a confused, almost hurt look that
was easy to spot even past all the pain that was embedded in his expression.

“So you’re really going to be like that?”, he asked, but it kind of came out sounding like an
accusation. Defensively, he had added: “I told you to carry on with the chase, but instead you
didn’t!”

Katsuki scoffed, continuing to walk without looking back at the hunched over Izuku.

“So you don’t listen to me and now you’re not talking to me, either?”, Izuku chased after him
with difficulty, hugging his bloodied side. “Way to show some gratitude!”

That made Katsuki fume. He stopped walking.

“I didn’t ask you for shit!”, he turned on his heels and yelled at Izuku, right there, in the
middle of the busy street. “Next time, I’d rather get stabbed myself than have you throw this
sort of crap on my face!”

Izuku stared at him with wide eyes at this. It was evident: they were miscommunicating
again. Without waiting for a response, Katsuki stormed into the agency’s reception, the
furious look that was constantly on his face made even more evident by the snarl he was
wearing.

“Kacchan!”, Izuku trailed after him, one hand hugging his injured ribs. “If you would just
listen to me –“

“I don’t want to hear another word from you!”, Katsuki shouted, not caring about the scene
he was making.

Izuku took a deep, calming breath, but it was useless to ease his anxiety – or his pain. His
heart was pounding in his chest, and his ribs throbbed in a perfect mimicry of it.

“You’re overreacting”, he accused calmly, reasonably, even though he knew well where those
words would lead them. But he was unable to stop himself from saying them anyway.
“Again”.

Katsuki turned to him slowly, eyes narrowed and crimson eyes glistening in the white lights
of the main entrance of Endeavor’s agency. With one quick swipe of his shoulders, he threw
his hero gauntlets on the floor, taking a slow step in Izuku’s direction.

“The fuck did you just say to me?”

“I said you’re overreacting!”, Izuku said, unbothered by the intimidating display. He had seen
worse from Kacchan before in his life. “I was just trying to save your life –“
“I don’t need you to save me!”

“And I didn’t even get hurt that badly! All I need is a few stiches –“

“Because you’ve got fucked up luck! I don’t know how you do it, Deku, maybe having
fortune on your side was your damn quirk all along!”

There was silence, for a moment. Izuku didn’t say anything, too taken aback by those words
to react. Katsuki had hit a sore spot and he knew it. He didn’t feel sorry, though; that much
was evident – he was still too furious to feel remorse. And Izuku – Izuku became angry, too,
contaminated and infected by Katsuki’s wrath.

Seriously? Sure, it had been wrong – or at least regrettable – to throw his self-sacrifice at
Kacchan’s face like that, especially because of how aware he was of the guy’s pride issues.
But it was undeniable – he had put his life on the line to save Kacchan. And he didn’t do it
for recognition, for praise, or for thanks – but he certainly didn’t do it to get yelled at, either.

“Luck?”, Izuku snorted, shaking his head slightly. “You think having my quirk is luck?”

Katsuki rolled his eyes to the heavens and threw his head back with a fed-up sigh.

“Deku –“

“You know me better than anyone. You’ve been there since the beginning. You – You know
how my childhood and my teens were. You saw me grow up the way I did for 15 years, you
made me grow up like that, and you call that luck?”, he breathed out heavily. “You call
breaking my bones all the time luck? You call failing over and over and needing help all the
time luck? You call getting stabbed for you luck?”

Katsuki glared at him, well aware that Deku had misinterpreted his words again, the little
shit. They kept doing this to each other, didn’t they?

“It’s not about luck, Kacchan”, Izuku continued. The tears were rolling down his face freely,
now, and Katsuki honestly couldn’t tell if they were from pain or – or something else. His
lower lip was trembling, and he looked as pale as Katsuki had ever seen him – the sight
disturbed him in a way that few things in life could. “It’s about hard work, and dedication.
You, more than anyone, know those two words very well. But do you know what word you
don’t seem to fit in your vocabulary?”

Katsuki just stared at him, angry and scowling.

“Self-sacrifice”, Izuku said. He seemed angrier than Katsuki was used to seeing him, even
though his brow was sweaty to the point of having his green curls stick to it. “Altruism. I put
my life on the line for you, and I don’t want any thanks, I didn’t do it for thanks, but I won’t
get scolded or dismissed for it, either. I’m not an idiot, I knew what I was doing. And I told
you to go after the guy –“

“And leave you to bleed out to death, huh?”

“I wouldn’t have bled out! But, yeah, even if I had bled out, I’d lay down my life for the
greater good any day!”, Izuku protested. “But you don’t even have to bother – I know you
wouldn’t do the same. You wouldn’t risk your life for anyone, let alone stupid me”, he
snorted.

Izuku tried to take a step past Katsuki so that he could end the argument with a cool
storming-out shenanigan and walk into the main hall of the agency, but then – he stumbled on
his own feet and nearly collapsed. Blood was streaming steadily from his wound and
dripping to the floor, at this point, staining the white tiles. Katsuki caught one of his elbows
out of reflex just in time without looking at him, supporting him. He rolled his eyes at the
stupidity of that situation.

“Deku –“, he growled, but Izuku wasn’t done talking. When was he ever?

“You’re not the hero that saves to win. You’re the hero who wins to save. And that’s what
matters the most to you, isn’t it? Winning”, he wheezed, trying to shrug away from Katsuki’s
touch but failing to do so. He sagged further; Katsuki held his other elbow along with the first
one for safe measure. “Well, sorry I d-didn’t stand around idly to watch you get hurt,
Kacchan. Sorry I stole your v-victory today. Guess I’ll just – I-I’ll j-just –“ he stopped
talking, making a retching noise and having his chest spasm as if he was about to throw up.

“Guess you’ll just – get your ass to the med bay already”, Katsuki filled in the blank with a
scoff, grabbing Deku and going back to dragging him along, not caring about how it would
look or about Deku’s shame to be seen with him. “I’ll just ignore all the nasty shit you just
said to me and put it under blood-loss-induced delirium before I’m forced to stab you too.
And you’d better stop talking before you make your wound worse –“

But before he could continue, and just as they arrived at the agency’s bullpen, Izuku coughed
and coughed and coughed, spitting clots of blood all over the floor, which was stark white in
comparison. Katsuki’s eyes widened at this, and just like that, Izuku collapsed to his knees,
head low and arms hugging his ribs. He let out a low, breathy groan, as he spasmed and
choked on more blood.

“Help!”, Katsuki came back to his senses after a couple seconds and screamed, finally
drawing the attention of the busy staff working at the place. “Get a medic here, he’s been
stabbed!”

Burnin’s head popped up from behind a computer at the distance and she took one quick
glance at the two boys before standing up.

“Shit! Get him here! Quickly!”, she instructed, rushing to the med bay and opening the door
to fill the resident doctor in.

Once again not caring about how it would look, Katsuki picked Izuku up in a bridal-style and
ran as fast as he could to the sidekick, ignoring the painful twist his heart gave when he heard
Izuku’s pained moan at the sudden motion. There was blood running down his cheek now,
adding up to the blood flowing from his stab wound. Katsuki didn’t notice it at the time, but
the front of his own black-and-orange uniform and his gloves were also tinged red.
“Fuck”, Katsuki grunted as he laid Izuku down on the med bay mattress. Izuku’s hands lolled
lifelessly from the edges of the bed, but Katsuki carefully took hold of them and tucked them
neatly at Izuku’s side. “You fucking idiot!”, he shouted, suddenly angrier and sickened with
worry. “If you die because of a shitty stab wound you took in my place, I’ll kill you myself!”

“Bakugou –“, Burning tried to pull him away from Izuku’s side.

“You hear me, asshole?”, he continued to scream while the agency’s doctor examined Izuku’s
still choking form, pointing a finger at him. “You’re dead meat if you think you can die on
me!”

“He’s not dying”, the doctor announced sternly, seeming focused. He was listening to Izuku’s
lungs and heart with his stethoscope, eyes distant. “But he does need surgery immediately if
we want to keep things that way. I’m calling the General Hospital for an ambulance”, he
rolled on his chair, grabbing the phone.

“Surgery?”, Burnin frowned, then turned to Bakugou. “Shit, kid, what did you two get into?
This was supposed to be a simple arrest –“

“Not – N-Not Kacchan’s… fault…”, Izuku wheezed breathlessly from the mattress, voice
small, as he tried to turn on his side so that he could get up. With an eyeroll, Katsuki stepped
in and pushed him back into a lying position, keeping his hand in place against Izuku’s
shoulder as a safety measure.

“Shut up before you kill yourself, dumbo”, Katsuki spat, then he turned to Burnin. “The guy
we were after wasn’t there”, he filled her in. “There was only an old man crying about
something. He tried to stab me, Deku got in the way. I would have dodged, but the idiot’s
body doesn’t listen to his brain before he makes a move”, he pointed Izuku with a glare.

“And the man?”, Burnin raised an eyebrow.

Katsuki closed his eyes and sighed before turning to look at her through narrowed eyes.

“Escaped”, he announced with defeat, which wasn’t a usual emotion for him. The words
tasted bitter on his tongue. “I was going to chase after him, but Deku looked like shit. I
presumed it would be better to bring him here before he died on his own at that stupid factory
than to follow a guy I can easily catch later”.

Burning sighed, shaking her head.

“Endeavor isn’t going to like this”, she announced grievously. Then, she placed a hand on
Katsuki’s shoulder. “But you did right by bringing him back. If the man had to recur to a
knife, he probably doesn’t have a powerful quirk. That means it will be easier for the pros to
capture him”.

Katsuki frowned.

“The pros?”, he asked. “What about me?”

“What about you?”, Burnin frowned back, not following.

Katsuki snorted as if the answer was obvious.

“This is my mission”, he said. “My duty. I gotta finish what I started”.

Burnin gave him a look.

“Well, sorry, kiddo, but it doesn’t seem like you have started anything”, she said as sincerely
and bluntly as ever. “All you did was get your friend stabbed and lose our best shot so far at
grabbing that radioactive material back. I thought I could trust you on this, Bakugou”.

Katsuki fumed.

“I didn’t ask Deku to be fucking stabbed for nothing”, he claimed.

“It wasn’t for n’thin’”, Izuku wheezed. “I was tryin’ – was tryin’… to save…”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, except I didn’t need to be saved, especially not by you!”, Katsuki snapped
again. “I had it under control! I’d seen the goddamn knife, I would have dodged!”

“Woul’ not!”

“Would too!”

“Woul’ not!”

“Shut up before you make yourself worse!”

“He’s right, kid”, the doctor nodded from where he was pressing gauze down against Izuku’s
bleeding injury. “Stay quiet and don’t move so much. Also, stop talking, you have a
punctured lung. The ambulance is on its way; ETA 5 minutes”.

“Everyone shut up, especially you, Bakugou”, Burnin commanded, hands on her hips.
“You’re out of this case, plain and simple. You shouldn’t have rushed in without a plan in the
first place, so guess I’ll be getting my ass scolded for letting you go as well. The best you can
do right now is go to the hospital with Midoriya and keep an eye on him until we’ve got this
all sorted”.

Katsuki squinted.

“You’re benching me?”

“Damn right I am”.

“And putting me on babysitter duty?!”

“You heard me. I’ll go call Endeavor and tell him what happened. You two should prepare
yourselves for one hell of a scolding when he gets back”, she gave them pointed looks.
“Especially you, Midoriya”.
“M-Me?”, Izuku asked with a wheeze and a gasp, sounding as outraged as he possibly could
in a situation where he was still spitting up blood.

“Yes, you”, Burnin nodded, looking concerned but not allowing herself to display any
sympathy for the boy. “I’m pretty sure Bakugou would have dodged the knife, kid’s got cat-
like reflexes. I’m the first one to praise heroic actions, but wasting your life over nothing –
that’s not a hero move, that’s just dumb. And Endeavor doesn’t like dumb interns. Plus, you
seem to pull the self-sacrificial act all the time, so it’s about time you get an earful for it. Pray
you’ll still have this job by the end of the day”.

And with that, she turned on her heels and left the med bay.

Izuku continued to look at the door with an indignant face that was dimmed by the fact that
his cheeks and chin were covered in red. He still looked pale – too pale – and as if he was
about to pass out any moment now. Still, he turned on his side again in an attempt to sit up,
which had Katsuki pushing him back against the bed once again.

“God, how can you be so thick in the head?”, he snorted, keeping his hand on Izuku’s
shoulder. “Stay still and don’t do anything stupid. We can both argue with Endeavor later”.

Izuku let out a wet chuckle at this, more blood bubbling out of his lips, which made him
groan in pain.

“You’ve nothin’ to argue ‘bout”, he wheezed wetly. “You agree with’im”.

Katsuki rolled his eyes.

“On what, you being a stupid motherfucker? If so, hell yeah, I do. But even though you’re as
good as a braindead person when it comes to thinking strategically, and even though I would
have totally dodged a 50-year-old’s pathetic attempt at murder, you still took a blow for me –
a blow you didn’t have to take. It would be fucked up if I didn’t stand by your side on this
one, even if I totally agree with Endeavor”.

There was more behind Katsuki’s words and they both knew it. I love you, I won’t ever be
against you. But he was too hurt and too bitter about being refused to be able to vocalize
those feelings. His pride, as usual, spoke louder.

Izuku sighed, resigned.

“I was just tryin’ – I just wanted…”, he tried, apologetic.

“Save your breath”, Katsuki scolded. “I’m done listening to your belittling of me”.

Izuku froze and frowned, confused and offended.

“Belittlin’…?”, he shook his head, breathing with difficulty. “Why’d you – Why’d you
always think tha’?”

“Because it’s true”, Katsuki snapped, not meeting Izuku’s eyes. He was glaring at the wall
instead, arms crossed above his chest defensively. “You’ve always looked down on me, as if
someone like you could ever beat me in any way. Offering to help me, asking me if I’m fine –
even your annoying-as-fuck child ass wouldn’t get out of my case. Refusing me. Guess what,
Deku, I can look after myself just fine, and I don’t – I don’t need you”, he lied just to make
himself feel better. “So why don’t you just give it a rest and mind your own business for
once?”

Izuku was breathing shakingly, the sound of it still wet and dragged.

“I’ll never let you die on m-me”, he wheezed. “Not if I have the chance to save you”.

Katsuki rolled his eyes and sighed, angry and frustrated.

“Because, again, you’re an idiot”, he accused. “You must see me as a pathetic little helpless
thing, if you think I need your help to be safe. I can handle myself, thank you very much”.

Izuku shook his head, closing his eyes.

“No… It’s not that. It’s not that”.

“Then what is it?”, Katsuki snorted. “What is it, idiot? You said I don’t know altruism; I
don’t know self-sacrifice. Yeah. I don’t. I never said I did, and I definitely don’t. Because I
don’t go around throwing my life away for every cat stuck in a tree that I come across, like
you do. You think it’s cute, don’t you? Wasting your life with that heroic act of yours, ready
to lay down your life for the greater good. You know what’s more useful than that?
Surviving. You can do a shitload of good deeds when you’re alive and kicking. Dead? Not so
much. So yeah, go ahead and guilt-trip me into thinking you’re a better hero just because
you’re willing to die for other people – for everyone and anyone else. It won’t work. You’re
never going to surpass me and you’re never going to become number one if you keep this
stupid shit up. Ok? I’ll be the better hero and I’ll be the indisputable number one while you’re
laying dead under the ground. And I’ll do that without ever having to die for other people,
and yeah, I’ll do that without ever having to die for you”.

But Izuku didn’t respond.

Katsuki finally turned to look at him and found the boy limp, mouth slightly open, purplish
eyes closed and face blank. Blood was oozing slowly from the corner of his mouth. He had
passed out.

He panicked.

God. Those couldn’t be his last words to shitty Deku. Shitty Deku couldn’t die like that!

“Oi!”, Katsuki called the doctor, who was back on the phone with someone. The man turned
to look at him. “He fainted!”, Katsuki said, heart beating hard and fast inside his chest. This
couldn’t be happening. This couldn’t be true.

Ok, maybe he shouldn’t have said that shit about Deku being dead under the ground. Or
believed the nerd when he said it was just a scratch. Those things were hitting too close to
home, now.
“The ambulance is arriving”, the doctor announced, approaching them and taking Izuku’s
pulse. “I was just talking to them. They’re coming in. Are you accompanying him to the
hospital?”

Katsuki stared at Izuku’s pale face and then at the bullpen outside, where Burnin’ was
gathering some of the few available sidekicks in order to go after the perp who had done this.

Katsuki had already wasted his chance at chasing after him – could he do it again? Should he
do it again? He didn’t want to see Deku dead – he didn’t want his last image of the boy to be
this, pale and bloodied on a medical bed –, but he also wanted to make the man who had
attacked him pay. And he wouldn’t be able to do that if he was stuck as a babysitter in a
hospital, waiting for Endeavor to arrive and scold them.

“Will he be ok?”, he asked the doctor instead of responding.

The man gave him a look.

“His oxygenation levels are a little too low, but his chances are good. The ambulance got here
in time, and I did what was in my power to keep him stable until they did. I wouldn’t want to
say anything too definitive in case there are complications, but I –“, the man stopped with
one fulminating glare from Katsuki. “Y-Yes. He will be ok”.

Katsuki nodded. He looked at Burnin again. They were leaving the agency. If he was going to
follow them from a distance and step into this arrest at the last minute, then he needed to do it
now.

He looked back at Izuku. He looked small in that mattress, all bloodied and pale and weak.
Katsuki wanted to hold him in his arms and take care of him until he was better. He wanted to
protect him and make sure he would never get hurt again, not for his sake or anyone else’s.

But Izuku didn’t want that. He didn’t want to be Katsuki’s.

He remembered Izuku’s refusal, and the way that the “no” had slipped from his lips so easily,
so naturally. The way he had looked and sounded. The way he had found despise hidden in
green eyes. Deku was ashamed to be with him. Deku was ashamed to be seen with him, to be
his. He would probably feel mortified if he woke up in a hospital and found Katsuki there
waiting for him to wake up. And yeah, usually, Katsuki wouldn’t give a shit about what Deku
felt mortified about or not, but he was different, now. He was doing better, even if he didn’t
want to. And he wasn’t going to impose his presence on someone who clearly didn’t want
him around – on someone who he had hurt so much in the past.

Deku was right not to want him. Deep down, he could understand his reasons.

“Text me his status when you hear from him, will ya?”, he asked the doctor.

He turned on his heels before he received an answer and left to go after Burnin.

⚜
Izuku chuckled softly, the tips of his green curls sending tickles to Katsuki’s cheeks. Katsuki
smirked and snorted while he, too, laughed – something he was ashamed of, but didn’t really
mind doing in front of Izuku. Izuku, his constant, his kizuna, had been there since the
beginning. He was sure the boy wouldn’t leave him or refuse him over something as mundane
as Katsuki’s ugly laugh.

“Kacchan, stop! I’m going – I’m going to die from laughter!”

“As if I’d ever let you die on me, ugly nerd”, Katsuki mocked, continuing to tickle Izuku’s
stomach. The boy was squirming and twisting beneath his grasp, desperate to get away but
not all that desperate. Deep down, he liked it – their proximity, their closeness. Their
intimacy. This little thing they had, just the two of them, something that had taken so, so long
to bloom, but that was thriving more and more now that it did.

“Don’t call me ugly!”, Izuku protested, light-hearted.

“You asking me to lie?”, Katsuki mocked. Izuku squinted at him, and Katsuki found it secretly
adorable – the way little wrinkles appeared on the bridge of his freckled nose, the way his
big, green eyes became small, the way his mouth made a little pout that he wanted to kiss and
drown in forever.

“Kacchan!”, Izuku protested.

“You know, you can call me ugly back”, Katsuki provided. “I can take it”.

“But I don’t think you’re ugly!”, Izuku frowned, still laughing. “I think you’re the most – stop
tickling me! – the most beautiful man – Kacchan! Stop!”

“Getting distracted, oi, nerd?”

“I didn’t take you for a tickler!”

“I’m not a tickler, I’m a jester. This is me provoking you. And like the loser you are, you’re
falling for it, just as usual”.

“Kacchan! Stop calling me names!”

Katsuki rolled his eyes and stopped tickling Izuku, using his free hand to rub his hand on his
hair and push his head away a bit too abruptly instead.

“You know that’s just my way of showing affection, right?”, he sighed, raising one eyebrow
at Izuku.

Izuku sighed as well, tired from laughing so much, and gave Katsuki a smile.

“I do now”, he said. “I think it’s cute”.

Katsuki’s unusually easy-going expression turned into a more familiar scowl in the speed of
light.

“The fuck?”, he protested. “I’m not cute!”

“Yes, you are!”, Izuku went back to chuckling. “See, you’re even cuter right now!”

“Shut up! I’m deadly, not cute!”

“You can be both!”, Izuku said, humorous. “And to be fair, I’m glad I’m one of the very few
people who gets to see the cute side”.

“Well, you’ll be the first and the last”, Katsuki spat, angry and offended. “Because I ain’t
being cute ever again”.

“So you admit you were being cute before!”

“Shut up!”

“Kacchan, you were tickling me!”

“That makes you the cute one, not me!”

“No, it doesn’t!”, Izuku laughed. “And I don’t mind being cute when I’m with you!”

“You’re cute all the time, idiot”, Katsuki rolled his eyes. “Not just when you’re with me”.

“Aww, Kacchan!”, Izuku cooed. “You’re being cute again right now!”

“Shut up! I’ll kill you! They’ll never find your body!”

“And if you do that, you’ll have to live without me”, Izuku pointed out. “Are you ready for
that?”

“I’ve been waiting for that chance my whole life”.

“Ouch”, Izuku said, half-pretending he was hurt, half-hurt for real. Noticing there was
veracity in Izuku’s reaction, Katsuki rolled his eyes again and pulled him closer.

“Yeah, Deku. I’d totally be willing to make out with you and tickle you and spend time with
you if I wanted you to be gone from my life. Can’t you take a joke, stupid nerd? Why do you
always take everything to heart?”

Izuku was still smiling, but he became a bit more serious along with the conversation.

“I…”, he started, but then trailed off, hesitant.

Katsuki sighed, nudging him with his nose.

“Go on”, he urged. “Speak your damn mind”.

Izuku bit his lower lip.

“Do you… Remember our arts classes from middle school?”

Katsuki scowled and frowned at the unexpected change in subject.

“The fuck?”

“Bear with me”, Izuku urged. “Do you?”

“Yeah, they were useless”, Katsuki scoffed. “What about them?”

“Do you remember that trimester where we learned about old Greek mythology and stuff?”

“Do you have a point?”

“I said bear with me”, Izuku sighed. “Do you remember them?”

“Kind of, yeah”, Katsuki shrugged, not following. “What about them?”

Izuku looked away, flushing. The red of his skin was making his freckles disappear, and while
Katsuki found the sight endearing, he preferred those freckles over any constellation.

“I… There was this one myth I never really got”, he said, shrugging. “I don’t know, it felt
totally dramatic and out of place and… and…”, he hesitated again.

“Deku”, Katsuki said. “You’re not making any sense”.

Izuku closed his eyes, gathering his thoughts.

“So, do you remember the myth of Adonis and Aphrodite?”

Katsuki narrowed his eyes.

“Do I look like I’m someone who bothers remembering the myth of Adonis and Aphrodite?”

Izuku gave him a look.

“I think you do remember and you’re just playing difficult to tease me. Either that, or you
think you’re too cool for Greek mythology”.

“I won’t say which answer is the right one, but it’s definitely one of them”, Katsuki snorted.

Izuku sighed.

“Ok, so. Aphrodite is the goddess of love, right? And one day, she was bragging to everyone
who would listen at the Olympus that she could make anyone fall in love with anyone. Zeus,
who was pretty much of an ass, decided to prank her over this and made her fall in love with
a mortal man named Adonis. Adonis was a hunter, right? And Aphrodite’s lover, Ares, the god
of war, became so jealous of her love for Adonis that he decided to send a boar to kill him
during one of his hunts. In despair, Aphrodite came down from the heavens to see her lover
one last time before he died. Then, she accidentally cut herself with the thorns of a field of
white roses. Her blood tinged the roses red, and she mourned Adonis’s death in that red field.
That’s why red roses are used to symbolize love”.

Katsuki was staring at Izuku with an unreadable look.

“And you’re telling me this shit because…?”

Izuku sighed.

“I never really understood why Aphrodite had to fall in love with Adonis, out of all people. I
mean, I get why Adonis fell in love with her. She was perfect in every way, a literal deity,
and… and basically sugoi. Adonis had all the reasons in the world to fall for her. But why…
Why would she fall in love with him? It had to be something out of a prank, right? A, a
misconception, of some kind. Something like that. A trick, a… a lie”.

Katsuki narrowed his eyes.

“Are you saying you’re Adonis and I’m Aphrodite?”

Izuku’s blush deepened.

“Kacchan… Don’t mock me over this”.

“So you think I’m a deity?”, he said with a shit-eating grin.

Izuku rolled his eyes.

“You’re insufferable, sometimes”.

“Oh, do go ahead, Adonis. Tell me more about how I’m as pretty as the goddess of beauty
herself. Tell me more about how I’m so high above all others –“

“Stop mocking me!”

Katsuki stopped, but continued directing Izuku with that teasing smirk.

“Deku. Look at me, will you?”

Izuku did, but there was shame etched in his eyes. He was still blushing.

Katsuki cupped his face with one of his calloused hands.

“I’m not a god. And you’re not Adonis. I’m not some unreachable deity who lives in the
Olympus, or, well… At least, not to you. I’m just a guy who wants to be a hero and who
happens to share a life with you. And yeah, I totally get it where you’re coming from when
you say I’m perfect in every way –

“Kacchan”.
“ – but believe me, I have as much reason to enjoy – this thing between us – as you do. I
mean, aren’t you enjoying it?”

Izuku lowered his head.

“Yeah”.

“Then stop comparing yourself to a dead loser who got killed by a boar and just live a little.
Enjoy the moment. Carpe Diem or whatever”.

Izuku raised his head, smiling.

“So you did pay attention in class!”

“Ugh, shut up, you’re ruining the moment”.

“I knew it! You’re a nerd!”

“You’re the nerd here, idiot”.

“We’re both nerds”.

“Nah”.

“You go to bed at 8”.

“So what?”

“So that’s a nerd move!”

“Having a regular sleeping schedule is a healthy move, not a nerdy move! You don’t know
what the fuck you’re talking about!”

“I’m not arguing with you over this”.

“Then shut up and kiss me”.

Izuku was still laughing when they kissed, quickly drowning themselves in each other. Their
hands were wandering each other’s bodies and clinging to each other, desperate to keep
themselves close. When they finally separated, blushing and breathless, Katsuki came to the
realization that there was nothing more he ever wanted than to spend the rest of his life with
this stupid nerd.

Then a thought occurred him.

“Wait a minute”.

“What?”

“You think me making out with you regularly is a trick?”

“Kacchan…”

“That’s what you said. A trick, a misconception. A prank”.

“I didn’t really mean it, you know”.

“You better not have!”

“I was just… um”.

Katsuki gave him a stern look.

“Go on”, he urged.

Izuku averted his eyes.

“I was a bit insecure. Because you’re so amazing, but you always saw me as… as…”

Katsuki’s face became serious and full of regret.

Izuku met his eyes, and there was a silent apology hidden in them.

“You know”, he shrugged.

Katsuki sniffed, looking away.

“Yeah. I know”, he admitted grumpily.

Because he didn’t need Izuku to finish. He knew what the boy meant. He had been horrible to
him in the past, he had bullied him and abused him and belittled him and mistreated him. He
had ignored Izuku, and in the rare moments he had paid him any attention, he had put him
down. Katsuki knew he shouldn’t be offended that Izuku felt insecure over their developing
relationship, but at the same time, he couldn’t help but to be. He had changed; he had grown.
Couldn’t Izuku see? Couldn’t he sense it?

No, probably not. Because on the outside, Katsuki was still that little bratty son of a bitch
who always returned a shout and who never went home without defending his honor. On the
outside, he hadn’t changed a bit – the only difference Izuku could probably see was that now
they made out every now and then, when there was no one else looking.

But Katsuki would change that. He had to, right? He had to make Izuku see it – how much he
cared about him, and how much he liked him now, and how deeply his feelings for him ran. It
was his duty.

He would find a way to show Izuku he wanted to spend the rest of his life with him. He would
find a way to show Izuku that he was no Adonis, and Katsuki himself was no unreachable
deity who inhabited the skies, away from him, away from his love.

He would show him. He would find a way.

For now, he just pulled Izuku into another kiss that was full of apology and unsaid words.

That would have to do for the time being.

Izuku woke up feeling groggy and disoriented.

There was a distinct smell of disinfectant in the air, and there was something pressed against
his face, hurting his cheeks… He blinked his eyes open, and they rolled in their sockets for a
few moments before he managed to focus on a white ceiling. Slowly, bits and pieces of
memory started to come back together, and he realized that he was in a hospital.

Hospital. Stab wound. Kacchan.

The man had gone for Kacchan!

“Kacch– agh!”, Izuku jolted into a sitting position, and immediately regretted it. Pain flared
in his torso, blinding his already blurry eyes and making him wince loudly. A hand found his
shoulder and pushed him back into a laying position. He opened his eyes with hope that this
was Kacchan, but all he saw was two Todorokis staring down at him with multicolored hair
and eyes.

“T-Todoroki-kun”, he grimaced, feeling a lot of pain. He blinked several times until his
vision stopped doubling and he could see straight again. “W-What…?”

“You’re in the hospital”, Todoroki provided in a monotone. “You were stabbed by a villain in
Bakugou’s place. You needed surgery for a punctured lung, and it was successful. You’ll have
to lay low for a while, but Recovery Girl will arrive soon to finish healing you. The doctors
predict you should be back on your feet in one day and a half, at most”.

Izuku frowned, blinking at Todoroki. He looked down and found his own torso wrapped in
bandages and gauze, while the memories still flooded his brain.

“Where is Kacchan?”, he raised his head and asked, remembering their argument and the bad
terms in which things had ended between them. He couldn’t remember exactly at which point
of Kacchan’s scolding he had lost consciousness, but he was pretty sure the argument
between them had been left unresolved and unconcluded, as usual.

Todoroki’s lips formed a thin line and he looked away, showing emotion for the first time –
discomfort.

“No one knows”, he said lowly, in a barely hearable voice.

“What…?”, Izuku’s frown deepened.

Todoroki sighed, meeting Izuku’s eyes again.

“No one knows where he is”, he said. “The agency’s doctor said he left after Burnin and her
team of sidekicks, who went after the villain that did this to you and who might be tied to the
radioactive material case. But he’s gone AWOL and hasn’t turned up in…”, he checked his
phone’s clock. “Twelve hours”.

Izuku’s eyes widened.

“Twelve hou– how long have I been here?!”

“Twelve hours as well”, Todoroki provided. “He left as soon as the ambulance arrived to
bring you in. I’ve been trying to get in touch with him, but… He hasn’t answered me. Or
anyone, for that matter. The old man’s furious at the both of you, but Bakugou’s certainly
receiving the worst end of it”.

Izuku blinked and lowered his head. He shook it slowly in disapproval, lips forming a thin,
displeased line.

“He’s going after him alone”, he concluded.

“The man who stole the radioactive material?”, Todoroki frowned.

Izuku nodded, eyeing Todoroki.

“He wants to avenge me”.

Todoroki’s frown deepened.

“That doesn’t sound in character”.

Izuku sighed, throwing his head back and feeling thankful that he was wearing an oxygen
mask. His brain was getting less foggy with each second. Things were becoming clearer.
What he wasn’t particularly thankful for in that moment was Todoroki’s oblivion to the
obvious love affair that was taking place right under his nose.

“I messed up”, he admitted simply.

Todoroki stared at him, stoic.

“You two were following protocol. You were more than apt enough to carry on with the
mission, but accidents are always bound to happen, especially in our field. I already talked to
the old man and he is not going to go through with firing you –“

“No, no, not that”, Izuku shook his head, pressing the balls of his hands on his squeezed-shut
eyes. “It’s – I’m talking about something else”.

Todoroki watched his falling-apart form for a moment. Then, he took a step forward and sat
on the edge of the bed.
“You seem troubled, Midoriya”, he said. “Is there something you’re not telling me?”

Izuku sighed. He swallowed dry, uncovering his eyes but staring at the ceiling instead of
Todoroki.

“It’s... It’s just… Kacchan”, he shrugged. “He… opened up to me”, he said vaguely, not
wanting to share too many details about their relationship without Kacchan’s permission. He
didn’t know if the boy would be comfortable with going public like that, after Izuku… turned
him away. “And I was an idiot about it. You know him; you know how difficult he can be
about openness and feelings. And when he finally came clear, I… I dismissed him. It wasn’t
fair of me”.

The thing was: Izuku didn’t want to lose Kacchan. He was the only constant in his life, the
person who had been there ever since he could remember what life was like. Losing him was
unthinkable. And Izuku knew how Kacchan was, better than anyone. He had been belittled
and bullied by the boy through most of their lives. And Izuku didn’t hold it against him, no –
but it wasn’t like he completely forgot about it either.

When Kacchan started to be more affectionate to him in secret, and to kiss him in secret, and
to hug him in secret, and to rub their bodies in secret, locked away at the deposit room of
Endeavor’s agency, Izuku had been happy. He had been in cloud nine. This was what he had
always wanted without being aware of his own desires – Kacchan’s attention, devotion, and
love. And now that he had it, he had become addicted to it – he didn’t want to ever, ever lose
it.

That was why, when Kacchan wanted to show their relationship to everyone else, to all those
judge-y people, to their parents and their friends and their co-workers and their boss, Izuku
became scared. Because, again, he knew Kacchan. He wasn’t an affectionate person. He
wasn’t one to display love and affection and care, especially not in public. And Izuku would
do anything to be caressed by him, to be held by him, to be loved by him, even if it had to be
in secret, in locker rooms and in their dorm bedrooms in the dead of the night. He didn’t want
that to end.

He didn’t want to turn their relationship public, because he didn’t want to lose that side of
Kacchan that he and only he had access to – the side that was caring, and gentle, and tender
to him, no matter how rough and calloused his hands were, or how strong and brute his pulls
on green locks were.

But of course, as it always happened to them, Kacchan had misunderstood his refusal. He had
thought Izuku was looking down on him, again. It was like they were taking two steps
forward and three steps back, every time, all the time. And Izuku had tried – god, he had tried
– to talk to Kacchan and explain: I don’t want you to stop being nice to me, I don’t want you
to go back to shouting at me and pushing me around just to maintain your public image and
your reputation, I don’t want you to be ashamed of being seen with me, I don’t want to lose
you. But it was all for nothing. Kacchan had left, and on the following day Izuku didn’t have
the chance to approach him for an honest talk because there had been the damn perp and the
damn stabbing situation and it wasn’t like Izuku wanted to make things worse by saving
Kacchan and therefore hurting his pride, but he couldn’t afford to take the chance of letting
him die, either.
And now, here he was. Holding back tears in a hospital room while he waited for Recovery
Girl to arrive and finally clear him out of there. He desperately wanted to leave and go after
Kacchan, because even though he was amazing and incredible and all those things Izuku
never tired of saying, he still could use some help in his pursuit of the perp. Izuku’s help,
specifically.

Ok, he had to be honest. He was just terrified that something bad would happen to Kacchan if
he wasn’t there to throw himself in front of him. He would never tell Kacchan that, of course
– he didn’t want the boy to think that Izuku considered him weak or in need of saving –, but
he did feel better when he and Kacchan went on patrols and missions together. Their
connection was too deep for Izuku to ignore the way Kacchan made him feel, the way he
always felt ready to throw everything away for the boy’s sake.

“Midoriya?”, Todoroki called, and Izuku found himself muttering his thoughts in a low voice
as he always tended to do when he overthought. He realized he’d been doing that for a while
now.

“Sorry”, he said sincerely, feeling ashamed. He shook his head again, previous thoughts
getting back to focus. “I just need to make things right. Before he gets himself killed and I
miss my chance of apologizing”, he jested, giving Todoroki a small smile. Todoroki raised an
amused eyebrow in response.

“I can go check if there are news. But my duty here is to keep an eye on you and ensure you
don’t leave this bed until you receive the green light from your doctor. So stay still and don’t
do anything dangerous until I get back”, he instructed sternly, but also trustingly, as if he
knew better than to doubt Izuku’s commitment to their friendship.

Izuku nodded.

“O-Ok”.

With another nod, Todoroki left the room, leaving Izuku alone with his thoughts about
Kacchan and their relationship.

God, Izuku had a bad feeling about this. Radiation was dangerous stuff. It had been one thing
to chase after a potential perp in pairs, it was a completely different thing to go alone after
someone who was willing to stab a kid in training. And there was something else – after
stabbing Izuku, the man had accused them of being guilty of something. He clearly held
some sort of grudge against them, which made him even more dangerous and unpredictable.
Kacchan should have left this one for the sidekicks; they had more experience and better
training, for god’s sake. Damn Kacchan’s pride and his stupid big ego.

The throbbing ache on his torso caused by his waking’s sudden movement was starting to die
down slowly, which meant he was relaxing more with each second. Except the worry about
Kacchan was keeping him tense. It was a paradox – as if his mind and body were
disconnected. His mind was rushing with a hundred of anxious thoughts about what would
become of Kacchan whereas his body was sinking further and further into the mattress and
the pillows, taken over by the effect of the painkillers and the drugs in his system…
He ended up dozing off before Todoroki came back.

Katsuki was fucking awesome.

He had managed to find the perp’s house before Burnin and the other useless sidekicks could,
and he had entered it through the half-open window. He was currently sneaking around as
quietly as he could in search for the old man who had stabbed Deku.

Sure, he wasn’t only trying to avenge Deku’s whole stabbing situation, but also learn
information on the radioactive material and where it had been stocked. No way Endeavor
would kick their asses out of his agency if Katsuki solved the main case the heroes were
working on, on his own, while he was still a shitty little intern. This was the best possible
way to prove himself after the whole shitshow from before.

The house was large, but the architecture was rectangular and long rather than square-y and
wide, which meant he was forced to walk past several rooms and check them one by one
instead of having a panoptical vision of the place. No problem, though – he would turn the
shitty place upside down if he had to.

When he got to what seemed to be the living room, he noticed something off right away. The
coffee table was pushed far from the center of the room and the tapestry on the floor had been
lifted and folded on itself, as if to clear the way for a hidden door. Upon closer inspection,
that was exactly what Katsuki found – a square-shaped hole on the middle of the solid wood,
leading down to a path that was too dark to see. It was evident – whoever was down there,
whether the old man who had stabbed Deku or the mad scientist who had stolen the
radioactive material – had gotten down there in a hurry, too rushed to bother fixing the
tapestry or the table to hide the path.

Katsuki clicked his tongue and climbed down into the hole using an old metal ladder that was
attached to the entrance. The climb didn’t go too far down, and soon enough he found
himself jumping into a moist, cold floor, which made the contact of his feet with the concrete
echo across the darkness.

He looked around but couldn’t see much, given the lack of light sources in the place. The
only light in the underground was coming from the hole on the floor above them, and from
somewhere to Katsuki’s left – a dim glow that was faint and shivering, as if unstable. Katsuki
narrowed his eyes and slowly approached the second source of light, taking care to walk as
softly as he could so that the echoes of his footsteps wouldn’t reveal his presence there.

“ – understand! I don’t want this either, but it’s too late!”, someone was saying from the
distance. Katsuki found the underground went on for so long that it stretched into a corner,
and from the other side there were voices.
“Let me the hell out of here!”, someone growled, voice distorted and booming, as if
technologically enhanced.

“I can’t! I’m sorry! I’m so sorry! But I can’t!”

“If you don’t let me out, I’ll tear this place apart!”

“You’re out of your mind! You need to think straight, son –“

“Don’t you dare call me son when you’re locking me up inside my own creation!”

“You’re corrupted! I can’t let you do this!”

“Don’t worry. You won’t be in my way for too long, old man”.

Yeah, that was enough for Katsuki to step in.

He turned into the corner and found the old man who had stabbed Deku standing behind a
large glass door that was the only way into a huge metal box, which looked like a
containment chamber of some sort. It looked like he was trying to hold the door closed, but
he was struggling against an immense force coming from inside. Upon further inspection,
Katsuki found the source of the flickering light that he had seen – there was a glowing man
inside the chamber.

“Oi, what the fuck is going on here?”, Katsuki called from the corner, hands held out by his
sides and ready to engage in combat if necessary. The old man startled and nearly lost
balance, which allowed the door to be opened a sliver before he pushed his back against it
again.

“Good! A hero!”, the glowing man celebrated with an evil smirk, whereas the old man
shouted: “Get out of here, kid!”

Katsuki snorted and approached the scene, still ready to fight as soon as he needed to. He
studied the glowing man inside the chamber before eyeing the old man, who was sweating
and seemed terrified.

“I’m not going anywhere until you’re arrested. You fucking stabbed my partner. Who’s the
freak?”, he nodded at the glowing man.

“The stabbing was your own doing!”, the old man accused, breathing heavily. “If you heroes
hadn’t – hadn’t –“

“What, protected the country? Saved countless lives? Arrested criminals? What is it exactly
the damn heroes did that got you so pissed?”, Katsuki snapped.

“You made him into this!”, the man shouted, still holding the door. “My son – he was a good
kid! He was a nice man until you corrupted him!”

Katsuki eyed the glowing man, who had stopped trying to push the door open. Instead, he
had his multicolored eyes fixed on Katsuki, as if he was trying to reach a conclusion about
what should be done with him. As if he had that sort of power.

“Care to elaborate on your old man’s rant?”, Katsuki raised an eyebrow at the man.

He scoffed, taking a step back from the glass door.

“He’s not wrong”, he started. “You heroes turned me into this. And now – now I’ll turn you
all into dust”.

The old man covered his eyes with one hand and started to sob.

“My son – oh god, my son! My son!”

“Ok, I don’t know what the hell is going on with you two”, Katsuki said, fishing his phone
out of his pocket. “But I’m calling the damn pros to arrest both of you”, he sent an
emergency text that reached all the phones of the agency, giving off his location. “While they
don’t get here, you can go ahead and tell me where the fuck is the radioactive material you
stole”.

The glowing man laughed and the old man whimpered. Katsuki narrowed his eyes.

“Son, get out of here”, the old man pleaded to Katsuki, sounding sincere. “Get out while you
still can –“

“I ain’t your son”, Katsuki scowled.

“Idiot!”, the glowing man called. “If you want your precious radiation so much, I can give it
to you!”

Katsuki snarled, slamming one hand on the glass door with anger and indignation.

“Who’re you calling an idiot? Do you want to fucking go, glowing fairy?”

The glowing man took a few steps back and threw himself against the door again. The old
man was barely able to contain the weight, and his shoes screamed as they dragged across the
floor.

“Get out of the way, father!”, he shouted. “This is my chance! I’ll prove it to you – I’ll prove
it to everyone – that I’m a self-made hero who will be greater than All Might!”

All right, that settled it. Inadvertently, this guy had hit Katsuki’s sore spot.

“You fucking wish, Tinker Bell!”, Katsuki shouted, grabbing the old man by the shoulders
and shoving him away from the door.

“No!”, he screamed, collapsing on his side. “Don’t –“

“Come at me!”, Katsuki yelled.

The glowing man threw himself against the glass door to open it, but it didn’t give in –
Katsuki realized it was locked. Probably not all the way through, since the old man had
stayed there to keep it from bulging, but still pretty much locked.

Now, Katsuki wasn’t an idiot. If the guy’s own father had locked him up in this seemingly
containment chamber, it probably meant he was dangerous and shouldn’t be let out. Katsuki
was well aware of that. However, as always, his ego spoke louder – and he wanted to prove
himself. He knew that he was more than capable of taking down this D-lister and redeeming
himself in Endeavor’s eyes, all he needed to do was give his best and do what he had been
training to do ever since he was a brat. This way, he would show Endeavor he was efficient
enough to remain in his agency, and he would show Deku that he didn’t need anyone to
fucking save his life, he could take care of it well enough on his own, thank you very much.

He yanked the glass door open and gave the glowing man his freedom. Slowly, the man, who
was smirking wickedly, stepped out, looking around the dark, moist attic. His glow
illuminated the room, and Katsuki could now see that the place seemed like a bomb shelter,
probably from the second World War – the walls seemed to be made of a mixture of steel and
concrete.

But his assessment time was little – as soon as he was out of the chamber, the glowing man
lifted a hand and pointed it towards his father. It started to glow even further, as if he was
charging it to release some form of energy. Before he could do that, Katsuki charged up his
own hands and aimed an explosion at the glowing man’s face.

He fell on his back, surprised, but wasted no time before he started to look furious. The old
man was now on his feet, trembling and staring at the exchange with wide eyes.

“God save you”, he muttered, half to himself and half to Katsuki. “God save us all!”

He started to run back the way Katsuki had come from, towards the stairs that led to the
house, but Glowing Man aimed his hand at him again. Katsuki lowered himself to one knee
beside the man and glued his still hot hand to his face, using his other to grab the aiming arm
and lower it down.

“Why waste your time on that old man when you can fight me?”, he snarled, smiling
wickedly. Behind them, the old man made his escape and disappeared behind the square-
shaped hole on the floor.

“Idiot”, Glowing Man spat. “You’re gonna regret that”.

“Oh, will I?”, Katsuki snorted with humorous disdain, tightening his grip on the guy. “I think
you are gonna regret it if you don’t tell me where the stolen radioactive shit is, right now”.

“It’s gone, you fucking loser”, Glowing Man laughed, but his expression soon turned somber
again. He couldn’t quite face Katsuki, not with the training hero pressing down on his face.
Instead, he stared at him from the corner of his eyes. “God, you’re slow, aren’t you?”

“The fuck did you just say –“

“It’s in me!”, Glowing Man interrupted, and, somehow, he glowed even harder with those
words. “That’s my quirk, my curse, and my gift. I can absorb radioactivity and transform it
into energy. Good ol’ dad, who you just allowed to escape, used that my whole life for his
own profit. I used to be a good boy for him, thinking that way he would let me live my life.
But when I finally decided to do something out of my own volition, when I decided to
become a hero greater even than All Might, he got all angry and locked me up. Like he’s
being doing ever since I was a kid!”

“Well, where’s your gratitude? I just set you free”, Katsuki grinned. “Now I’m going to kick
your ass and lock you back up until you return the radioactive material to where it belongs. I
don’t give a damn about your sob story; you still stole a lot of dangerous, expensive shit”.

Glowing Man sighed and rolled his eyes as if Katsuki was the most irritating person he knew.

“I can’t give it back, kid. I absorbed it. It’s gone, now. I can only transform it into energy or
into untampered radioactivity”.

“So fighting you isn’t even going to be fun, if all you can do is blast energy at me and miss”,
Katsuki scowled, pushing Glowing Man’s head to the side abruptly before standing back up.
“Turns out defeating you was pretty fucking easy. Come on, back to your shitty cell. The pros
are gonna have more questions for you when they arrive”, he grabbed the man’s arm.

Glowing Man scoffed.

“As if I’m ever getting back to that cage!”, he shouted, yanking his arm off Katsuki’s grip.
He took a step back, and Katsuki went back to combat-mode, arms ready beside his body.
“Here’s what’s going to happen”, he pointed at the ladder that led upstairs. “I’m going after
the old man and you’re not going to follow me unless you want to shrivel and die from
radiation poisoning as soon as you touch me. I don’t want to kill you, kid, but I’ll do it if you
try to lock me up again”.

Katsuki snorted.

“Here’s what’s gonna happen, dipshit”, he retorted. “You’re walking back into your shitty cell
one way or another, unless you want my hand exploding your face. How does that sound?”

Glowing Man scowled.

“Whatever”, he muttered, charging up his hands again. “Have it your way”.

Katsuki propelled himself forwards with two explosions that echoed loudly in that confined
space, but he was only fast enough to dodge Glowing Man’s blast of energy. The energy
wave hit the door of the confinement chamber instead, whereas Katsuki landed on the floor
with grace and ability. He raised one hand and allowed it to pop with tiny, threatening
explosions.

“You think you can defeat me that easily?”, Katsuki teased, smirking. “You think I’m just
gonna let you murder your own dad like that?”
“Who says I want to murder the old man?”, Glowing Man frowned. “I just want to lock him
up in the same cell where he’s kept me prisoner for years. I want him to suffer like I suffered.
I want him to taste his own poison”.

Katsuki rolled his eyes.

“Newsflash, asshole. The old man’s going to jail for stabbing my partner. He’ll spend the rest
of his life locked up for attempted murder against a hero in training who also happens to be a
minor. While you – You didn’t commit any crimes that I’m aware of. For what I care, you can
roam free and fuck off to wherever you want; I don’t give a shit. All you gotta do is
peacefully wait for the pros to arrive and question you; then, if you’re innocent, you’ll be
able to go”.

Glowing Man hesitated, lowering his hands a bit. Katsuki nodded at the action, taking a step
closer and feeling glad that he was displaying a typical pro-hero level-headedness.

“See? Not that hard, is it?”, Katsuki gestured to him as if attempting to calm down a feral
animal.

Hah, if only Deku could see this. He was always complaining about Katsuki being an
impulsive hothead who always jumped into things. Now, he was resolving this situation
calmly and diplomatically, like that damn Icy Hot Deku loved so much always tried to do
before freezing everyone’s asses off.

Huh. Maybe that was why Deku had rejected him in the first place; maybe he preferred Icy
Hot over him. Maybe… Maybe they had their own little hidden affair, kept in secret from all,
even Katsuki, just like Deku kept his affair with Katsuki hidden from everyone. Maybe if
Katsuki acted more like Todoroki – less like fire, more like ice – Deku would love him like
he loved him.

God. Katsuki wished he was ok. He wished the stabbing wound and the punctured lung
wouldn’t –

“He’s lying!”, a familiar voice yelled from the distance. Katsuki was embarrassed to come to
the realization that he had become distracted by his thoughts regarding Deku, and that the
Glowing Man was reaching out a hand towards him – not to attack him, since it wasn’t
charged up, but to hold him, a smoke-like glow emanating from it.

Katsuki turned around to see the old man – Glowing Man’s father – holding a gun and
pointing it at his own son.

What a shitshow of a family.

Glowing Man flared his nostrils, lowering his hand and not touching Katsuki. Katsuki, on the
other hand, took a step back and out of the gun’s way, eyes darting between the father and the
son.

“He’s lying”, the old man said again, approaching the two of them with rushed, heavy steps.
Upon closer inspection, Katsuki could realize that the hand holding the gun was shaking, but
his aim was firm – his son’s head. “He’s always been a liar, and a manipulator, and a
sociopath! And I loved him like a father, and my love turned me blind. Now it’s time – it’s
time I correct my mistake”.

Katsuki frowned at the man, whereas Glowing Man scowled.

“Dear old dad”, he mocked, scoffing. “Finally decided to grow balls at the late age of 65?
You were never strong enough to stop me; don’t go thinking you’ll be able to do it now”.

“Quiet!”, the man shouted. “Be quiet, Akio! You never respected me, but you will listen to
me now. Let this kid go, and let’s solve this at last. You must do as I say!”

Katsuki became offended.

“Oi, I’m not going anywhere!”, he protested. “You’re going to jail for stabbing Deku and for
trying to kill your own son; as for him…”, he looked at Glowing Man. “I don’t know what
the fuck he did to make his own old man want to shoot him, but I’ll be glad to hear it”, he
glared at the old man, encouraging him to continue.

“If you let him go”, the old man said almost pleadingly. “He’ll destroy the entire country.
He’ll kill the entirety of Japan with the radiation he absorbed! That’s why he stole so much
radioactive material, so that he could absorb it all and catalyze it into even more potent
radiation!”

“Shut up! I won’t kill Japan! I will save Japan!”, the guy yelled, distressed. Katsuki raised a
cautionary hand at him, but looked back at the old man with the gun.

“Go on”, Katsuki told him, stern and serious. The man gulped.

“He thinks he can control it, but he can’t”, the man said.

“I can –“

“He can’t!”, the man shouted. “Back when he was a child, he used to absorb all sorts of
harmless radiation. The radiation from the sun, from cell towers, from radios, even from
microwave ovens… And he was never able to control it. If he didn’t expel it in the form of
energy, which his mother and I encouraged him to do, the radiation would become even more
potent and seep out of him like smoke – like, like foam. His mother – my poor wife – she
died of radiation-induced cancer after he refused to release and diffuse the radiation he had
absorbed! He became radioactive himself! She had held him for too long, she had gotten too
close. If I locked him up in this chamber – if I used the energy he expelled – it was because
he was killing people with it! And I wanted to redeem my son, I wanted his quirk to be used
for good! Maybe that way – maybe that way he could be cleansed from his sinful ways!”

“You treated me like a living battery!”, Glowing Man accused, angry. “You studied me like
an animal in a zoo, you acted like was inhuman! You never saw me as a person, only as a
way to profit –“

“You killed people! You killed your mother!”

“Ok, enough!”, Katsuki shouted, gesturing at the two of them. “You’re both criminals, so get
your shit together and calm down –“

“She knew what she was getting into!”

“Don’t talk about her like that! She loved you, she only wanted what was best for you –“

“By studying me like you did! You two and your scientist ways, you never loved me! You
never saw my potential as a hero, you saw my potential as a weapon!”

“Heroes aren’t supposed to kill! Heroes are supposed to save!”

“This is an outdated belief! Look right in front of you!”, Glowing Man pointed at Katsuki.
“This kid is training to be a hero and he threatened to blow my face up several times, and that
was before he even knew I’d killed someone. Heroes are supposed to make the world better,
by any means necessary! No matter the cost, no matter what it takes!”

The old man looked at Katsuki helplessly.

“I need to make him stop”, he said, an apology in his tone. And then, eyes downward: “I’m
the only one who can make him stop. He’ll kill everyone if I don’t. He’ll kill everyone. His
plan is to kill just the villains using his radiation, but he was never able to control his quirk
like he thinks he is. I need to stop this. I need to put an end to this”.

Katsuki’s eyes widened.

“No, don’t!”, he shouted, propelling himself forwards with an explosion. No matter how
much of a criminal Glowing Man was, Katsuki still couldn’t just stand idly and watch a
murder take place right in front of him when he had the means to stop it. That was his duty as
a training hero.

But it was too late. The man pulled the trigger, and the bullet buzzed right past Katsuki’s arm,
hitting Glowing Man right in the forehead. He swayed on his feet for a second before falling
back and hitting the floor heavily, eyes wide open and lips parted in half-shock. Katsuki fell
to the floor uselessly, failing to avoid the inevitable.

“You fucking asshole!”, Katsuki yelled, rushing forwards and checking for Glowing Man’s
vitals. He was gone. There was no way he’d be alive after such a certain shot. He snapped his
head back to the old man, who was on his knees now, crying. “You shot your own kid! What
kind of psycho does that?”

“M-My son”, the man hiccupped, sobbing. “My son!”

“If you hadn’t showed up with that shitty gun, I would have managed to lock him in!”,
Katsuki continued, alien to the man’s grief. He wasn’t the best when it came to empathy, that
much was true, but his shock was so grand that he couldn’t quite compute what was
happening without resorting to anger as a first response. “I would have made sure he’d be
locked for the rest of his shitty life without ever killing anyone else!”
“He would have escaped”, the man shook his head, tears painting his face. “He would have
found a way! This needed to be –“

Katsuki squinted and frowned when the man suddenly stopped talking. His eyes were wide
with horror and fear, and he was staring at something beside Katsuki. Katsuki turned his head
to look at the corpse at his side, which was… fuming? There was a white, sparkly smoke
emanating from the bullet hole in the middle of Glowing Man’s forehead, and whereas
Glowing Man was no longer glowing, the smoke was.

The radiation would become even more potent and seep out of him like smoke – like, like
foam.

Katsuki stared at the old man.

“Is he –“

“He is”, the man said, paralyzed by horror. He shook his head, eyes fixed on his dead son. “I
thought that by killing him I would save Japan… but I have doomed it. I have doomed us
all”.

The man lifted his hand and put the gun to his temple.

Katsuki froze. If he moved, the man could pull the trigger and off himself. Maybe if he stood
very still –

“I – I did the one thing no parent should ever do. I killed my own son”, the man lamented,
weeping, and closing his eyes softly. “And for that, God will wipe this entire land out”.

He pulled the trigger.

A few warm droplets of crimson found their way to Katsuki’s face, and his eyes were still
wide as the old man’s body toppled to the floor face down. The clicking of the gun falling
from a limp hand echoed in the attic-bunker, and Katsuki remained very still for a few
moments, unsure of what to do.

Two deaths. Two easily preventable deaths he could have put a stop to, but didn’t. What
Endeavor would think about his failure didn’t even cross his mind in that moment; all he
could think about was how much of a useless wimp he had been. What kind of hero was he
going to become, when he faced Death eye-to-eye and did nothing to stop her greedy hand?

He turned to look at the Glowing Man – Akio – again. The smoke his body was producing –
the radiation he was emanating – was slowly gathering on the floor around them like fog,
spreading to the sides like poison ivy. Katsuki vaguely wondered if the sudden cold he was
feeling was coming from the radioactive fog or from his own fear.

He had to do something. Think. Think, goddamn it.

Waiting for the pros to arrive – which they should do at any given moment, hopefully – was a
good plan, but also a risk, since the fog was spreading fast and had already covered the entire
square meter of the attic-bunker, starting to float up the stairs towards the house above. Plus,
there was a chance his emergency message had never reached the pros, since he was inside a
godforsaken World War Two bunker, for god’s sake. Was there even phone reception down
there? The thought only occurred to him in that moment, and he regretted not having
considered that possibility earlier or checked to see if the messages had hit their destination.

The foam was spreading fast and starting to make his eyes tingle. He needed to do something.
He needed to do something fast. His mind was rushing with so many thoughts and
possibilities that he didn’t even realize he had started hyperventilating, hands gripping his
hair and pulling at it.

He looked behind him and found the containment chamber still open behind him. Maybe…
Maybe there was a chance it could keep the radiation in? It had apparently done its job before
Katsuki foolishly allowed his ego to take over and opened it; Akio’s energy blasts and
radioactive foam had apparently been useless against it. And according to the man’s own mad
scientist father, the chamber was created to lock him up. So Katsuki didn’t feel too foolish to
hope that the chamber would be able to keep the radiation from spreading even further.

With his mind made up, Katsuki bent down and grabbed Akio’s body by the arms, pulling it
towards the chamber. Once he was inside, the radioactive fog quickly started to flood the
place. Katsuki left as hurriedly as possible, coughing, and pushed the glass door closed
behind him.

Except as soon as he let go of the handle, the door opened again.

Katsuki noticed with dread that the blast Akio had aimed at him and missed – the blast that
hit the chamber… It had broken the handle.

“Shit”, Katsuki breathed heavily. “Shit”.

Things were starting to spiral out of control way too quickly for his liking. He had already
breathed in enough radioactive foam to give him at least two different types of cancer, and he
was about to get sick from radiation poisoning soon. The body’s fog was spreading fast, and
he needed to do something about it before things got worse.

The old man had said so himself – Akio had absorbed enough radiation to poison the entirety
of Japan, once released. That meant that the fate of the entire country – babies, children,
grandparents, couples, men, women, Deku – rested in his ability to fix his mistake. God, he
had fucked up. He had fucked up badly. And Deku would be only one of the millions of
people – innocent people – who would pay the price for his error.

He thought about Deku’s smile, making small dimples appear on each side of his cheeks and
wrinkles show up on freckled skin. He thought about the sound of Deku’s laughter, which
cheered up any and all rooms he could be in. He thought about Deku’s warmth, seeping into
the coldness of his own body as they hugged and Deku rested his chin on Katsuki’s clavicle,
his curls making his skin tickle. He thought about Deku’s scent, his smell, his shampoo,
which was the same one he’d always used throughout their whole lives. He thought about
growing up together, of matte yo’s and sugoi’s and take a swan dive off the roof of the
building.
He thought of Deku’s perfect, freckled skin; his well-defined muscles; his perfectly shaped
abdomen; his ever-loving green eyes, all destroyed by radiation and bloody scabs and death.

“Fuck”, Katsuki gasped, choking on the foam and on his own breath. “Fuck!”, he screamed,
raw and hoarse.

Heroes aren’t supposed to kill! Heroes are supposed to save!

You’re not the hero that saves to win. You’re the hero who wins to save. And that’s what
matters the most to you, isn’t it? Winning.

Fuck. There was no way to win this time.

But there was a way to save.

Katsuki closed his eyes and swallowed dry. He stared at the chamber, at the corpse inside, at
the radioactive fog surrounding his boots up to his ankles.

He made his choice, and he would have to make his peace with it.

“Midoriya”.

“Hm…”

“You need to wake up”.

“Hm hmm…”

“Midoriya. Are you listening to me?”

Izuku opened his eyes sluggishly, tired and sleepy. His mind was slow, but one look at
Todoroki’s face was enough to sober him up, even if just a bit.

“T-Todoroki-kun?”, he frowned, trying to sit up and blinking the sleep away from his eyes.
Todoroki had a look on Izuku had never seen before in his life, and it kind of made his chest
tighten. It was a mixture of grief and terror, as if something horrible had happened. “What is
it? What’s wrong?”, he asked, more alert.

Todoroki took a deep breath and let it out through his nose, slowly. He averted his eyes from
Izuku and bit his lower lip.

“You’re needed”, he said, voice stern but somehow still shaking a bit. As if he, the stoic,
level-headed man was nervous, which was something Izuku rarely ever saw.
“Needed…?”, Izuku frowned deeper, heart starting to beat faster in his chest. He didn’t like
the sound of this conversation; he didn’t like where it was headed.

“On the mission”, Todoroki said, still not meeting his eyes. His leg was bouncing a bit, up
and down, very fast – a detail Izuku would have probably missed if he hadn’t been looking
for signs that something was wrong.

“O… k”, Izuku swallowed, nodding his head hesitantly. He blinked and stared at his own
bandaged midsection for a bit, before kicking off his hospital sheets and throwing his legs off
the bed. He wouldn’t let something as silly as an injury keep him from helping others who
needed him. He didn’t really understand what could have possibly happened to make the
agency recur to him, a recovering intern, as a last resource. But if Todoroki said he was
needed… He would never be able to turn his back.

He was in the middle of walking to the hospital room’s couch, where a little bag with his
clothes and belongings were sitting, when he heard Todoroki’s chair creak. He turned around
and saw his friend standing up, hands forming fists beside his body and lips forming a thin
line. His head was bowed down.

“Midoriya”, he said, solemn, voice heavy. Izuku’s stomach sunk.

“Y-Yeah?”

Todoroki sighed and looked at him, meeting his eyes.

“I’m sorry”, he said, serious, severe. “I’m so sorry”, he squeezed his eyes shut, looking away
again.

Izuku stared at him, blankly. His brain was trying to go over every single possible thing that
could have earned such a rare reaction from Todoroki, but he couldn’t figure it out for the life
of him. He wasn’t sure if it was the pain meds, the injury, the shock or something else, but he
couldn’t quite comprehend what was going on. The only conclusion he could come up with
was – he was needed, so he would go. He was wanted, so he would be there. Easy as that.
Simple.

“Midoriya…”, Todoroki said, voice full of grief, taking a step forward. “We really need to
leave”.

Izuku stared at him.

“I was just going to change”, he said, pointing at his clothes. Surely there was time for a suit-
up? He couldn’t just show up to the heroes’ aid wearing a hospital gown, right?

“It’s a time-sensitive matter”, Todoroki tried, and Izuku wondered, for a moment, if he was
beating around the bush. It wasn’t like Todoroki to do so, but everything about him seemed
so weird and off-putting…

Wait. Was this even Todoroki at all?

“Ok, what’s going on?”, Izuku took a step back, closer to the couch. He stared at Todoroki
with suspicion.

“Midoriya…”, Todoroki closed his eyes for a moment, trying to keep his cool.

“I don’t know why you’re acting like this”, Izuku said, feeling vulnerable and confused. He
was sure, now – the drugs were addling his brain. But that didn’t make Todoroki’s behavior
towards him any less weird. With people who had copycat quirks like Toga Himiko out there,
it was hard to fully trust the certainty that Todoroki hadn’t been cloned or controlled in some
way.

“I just need you to come with me”, Todoroki tried to reason, outstretching a hand towards
him as if attempting to calm a feral animal.

“Come where?”, Izuku asked with a trembling voice, verging on paranoid. His breathing was
hard and his heart was mad inside his ribcage.

Todoroki’s shoulders slumped and he rubbed a tired hand on his face.

“We found the radioactive material, and the man who stabbed you, along with his son who
stole it all in the first place”, he said. “But something else happened”.

Izuku continued to stare at him like a deer caught in the headlights. He nodded fast to sign his
comprehension but didn’t move, still trying to figure out what was going on.

“It’s…”, Todoroki sighed, looking away for a moment of courage-gathering before raising his
eyes to meet Izuku’s again. “It’s Bakugou”.

The world froze.

“Huh?”, Izuku spat before his brain could even catch up with the words he was being told.
Because yes, at some deep part of his mind, he must have realized, at some point, that these
weird mannerisms Todoroki was displaying – that unusually hesitant manner, that careful
tone, that rare beating around the bush – had to do with Kacchan somehow. Who else could
cause others to be so careful and mindful around Izuku?

“Midoriya? Are you listening to me?”, Todoroki snapped his fingers in front of Izuku’s eyes,
closer to him now. Only then did Izuku realize he had been staring at nothing, about to get
lost in his own thoughts as it usually happened to him. The drugs certainly weren’t making
that characteristic better, and he blinked blankly at Todoroki, trying his best to focus.

“Kacchan? What about Kacchan?”, he swallowed, frowning and panting. His heart was
beating so fast it hurt.

Todoroki held his shoulder with one hand, squeezing it.

“Time’s sensitive”, he repeated the information from before, slowly and clearly as if Izuku
was a small child. “We need to go, now”.
Izuku felt lightheaded and disoriented. He didn’t know what was happening. Was this a
dream? Was this a nightmare? What was so wrong with Kacchan to the point of taking Izuku
out of his hospital bed before he was fully healed? Why the urgency? What was happening?

“Ok”, he ended up saying, and took a step forward. Todoroki grabbed his jacket from where
it was sitting at the back of the visitor’s chair, and placed it behind Izuku’s shoulders. This
provided some discretion from the hospital gown.

“Ok?”, Todoroki asked, supporting one of Izuku’s elbows.

“Ok”, Izuku swallowed dry, eyes slightly unfocused. He wanted to ask what was wrong with
Kacchan – he desperately wanted to know. But he was so afraid of the answer, he couldn’t
bring himself to. He dreaded that knowledge. All he knew was that time was so little that he
couldn’t afford to change clothes, which was enough of an indicator of how bad the situation
was.

Todoroki didn’t say anything else; he just guided Izuku to the hospital’s elevator and down
the main hallway. When a nurse approached them with a worried look, Endeavor appeared
out of nowhere with arms crossed above his chest and a stoic look on his face.

“The boy is with me”, he said simply, in a tone that left no place for an argument. The nurse
blinked and nodded rapidly before retreating and going away.

Izuku stared up at Endeavor. Endeavor stared down at him. He, just as much as Todoroki, he
looked different, but Izuku couldn’t quite put his finger on what was wrong.

Well, what was he supposed to think? Kacchan was Kacchan. He was amazing, and all those
praises Izuku constantly showered him on. Whatever this was – whatever incident had
happened –, Izuku was sure they would figure it out. All he needed to do was follow the
Todorokis to wherever place they were about to take him and trust them to guide him
correctly. Then he would get to Kacchan, and they would solve everything. They would solve
everything.

The medication he was on was pretty strong. He had a healing hole in his lung, after all – he
wasn’t supposed to be up and about so soon, and even he knew that, as much as he was eager
to help. Because of that, he ended up dozing off on their way to wherever, but his sleep was a
restless one, because he kept thinking about what could have possibly happened to Kacchan
to make everyone so fussy and hesitant around him. Izuku knew that he’d fix it, but he was
still worried.

“Midoriya”, Todoroki called after five seconds – or fifty minutes? – passed. “We’re here”.

Izuku simply nodded and opened his eyes. He didn’t know where they were. Endeavor was
driving, he could see that now. He opened the car’s door and shivered at the cold temperature
outside; he stepped out of the car with bare feet against the wet floor. Something about this
was so, so wrong – letting him out of the hospital like that, taking him to an alien location
with nothing but a hospital gown and a borrowed jacket. Time’s sensitive, was what kept
echoing in Izuku’s brain, so he made no complaints. He just walked, feet black and dirty
against the cold, harsh floor of the street, and allowed Todoroki to guide him inside a house.
There was a whole team of police officers, pros and sidekicks inside the place. They all
stared at him when he entered, Todoroki and Endeavor right behind him. Izuku blinked.

“Endeavor…”, someone said – it was a police officer Izuku didn’t know. “Decontamination
is still in progress –“

“Is it safe to go down?”, Endeavor interrupted.

The officer sighed, probably knowing this was a lost argument.

“Yes, but –“

“Then we’re going down. This is the boy’s last chance to see him”, Endeavor said simply,
walking past the man and dragging his son and Izuku along with him.

Izuku looked at Todoroki, searching his face for answers. The accidental nap he had taken at
the car had sobered him up a little bit. He was more aware, now. And because of that, he was
also more nervous.

He followed father and son across the house, walking past police and heroes alike. They were
all staring at him with pitying looks, which Izuku didn’t really understand. Everything would
be all right, this was Kacchan. Couldn’t they see? Didn’t they know him? His amazing deeds,
his incredible resilience? For a petty moment, Izuku deemed them all fools and got angry.
How dare they think so low of Kacchan? Why couldn’t they just mind their own business?

“Midoriya”, Todoroki said, seeming concerned. “Are you crying?”

Izuku took a hand to his cheek and found it to be wet. He frowned and stared at Todoroki.

“T-Todoroki-kun”, he said, suddenly very aware of his surroundings. “What is really going
on?”

Todoroki sighed. He spared Endeavor a look, and the man caught the hint. He climbed the
stairs down to the underground and disappeared, leaving the pair of friends on their own.

Todoroki turned back to Izuku and placed a comforting hand on his shoulder.

“You know Bakugou better than any of our friends”, he started.

Izuku nodded. There was no doubt about that.

“You know of his talent. And of his pride”.

He nodded again. Todoroki bit his lower lip.

“I’m sorry”, he said, lowering his head, making Izuku’s chest feel even tighter. “I didn’t want
to be the one to tell you this”.

Izuku swallowed dry. There was no way out. He needed to know. He needed to know.
“Please”, he said, voice small and broken with fear. “Just tell me”.

Todoroki breathed in and out.

“Bakugou found the man who stabbed you”, he said. “He found his son, who stole the
radioactive material”.

Izuku nodded.

“Ok. I know that”.

Todoroki nodded back.

“The thief’s quirk… it had to do with absorbing radiation. He absorbed everything he stole.
His plan was to use the radiation and the energy he absorbed to kill villains, but he couldn’t
really control his quirk and he would end up murdering civilians and heroes as well in his
enterprise. His father knew that, so he killed him before he could do anything. But by killing
him, the thief’s body started to release the radiation he had absorbed. It was enough to wipe
out the entire country, Midoriya. It was a lot”.

“O-Ok”, Izuku nodded, trying to keep strong – trying to make himself strong.

“There is a chamber down there. A chamber that contains radiation, keeps it from poisoning
everyone. But in the fight, the lock was damaged, and it could only be closed from inside”.

Izuku’s knees immediately gave out.

“Midoriya?! Midoriya!”, Todoroki shouted, grabbing Izuku before he could fully collapse.

“No”, he shook his head, clinging heavily to Todoroki. “Don’t tell me – Don’t say that –“

“Midoriya”, Todoroki called, frantic. “You have to breathe”.

Izuku took a deep breath, but it didn’t quite reach his lungs – whether or not it was because of
his stabbing injury, he couldn’t tell.

“I need to – I gotta – I need to talk to him, I need to see him, where is he –”, Izuku said,
spiraling. He got back up on his feet, but Todoroki kept supporting him, as if he was sure
Izuku would fall on his face as soon as he was left alone.

“Calm down first”, Todoroki instructed, to which Izuku snapped, in a high-pitched voice,
with: “You said time was sensitive!”

Todoroki backed down at this, raising his hands in front of his chest.

Izuku didn’t know what happened next – he couldn’t remember. All he knew was that, one
moment, he was staring at Todoroki’s apologetic face, and on the next, he was in the
underground, staring at a chamber with two people inside. There was police and pro-heroes
down there as well, but Izuku, the usually excited one to see new heroes, paid them no mind
as he walked towards the chamber in the center of the place.
I’d lay down my life for the greater good any day! But you don’t even have to bother – I know
you wouldn’t do the same. You wouldn’t risk your life for anyone, let alone stupid me.

Izuku swallowed dry, taking slow steps towards the chamber. Upon a closer distance, he
caught sight of familiar blond hair leaning heavily against the glass, as if that was the only
thing supporting his weight and keeping him from falling on his side. Izuku kneeled in front
of the closed chamber and placed his hand on the glass, longing to touch Katsuki on the other
side but unable to.

“K-Kacchan?”, he said, voice small and hesitant. Katsuki’s face was turned away from him
and his breathing was shallow, Izuku could tell at least that much.

Katsuki stirred upon the call of his name, as if he had been dozing off. He squirmed for a
moment, as if trying to move but unable to. Then, he lifted his head and turned it to Izuku,
who sucked in a sharp breath upon the sight that met him.

Kacchan’s face was red, covered in scrabs and wounds that made his skin look burnt. Izuku
noticed that the rest of his body sustained similar wounds – probably an effect to the
immediate exposure to that amount of radiation. Beneath the redness, Kacchan looked pale
and weak, in a way Izuku had never seen before in all those years they had known each other.

“D… k…”, Katsuki tried, throat raw and dry. He swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing up and
down sharply, but his mouth remained desert-like. Izuku felt his eyes fill with tears, but tried
his best to remain strong, for Kacchan’s sake.

“H-Hey…!”, he said softly, forcing a smile into his lips that didn’t feel honest at all. “Hey,
I’m here. Ok? I’m here with you”.

Katsuki frowned, and his eyes suddenly widened.

“G’ away”, he rasped, shifting inside the chamber. He seemed out of it; incoherent thanks to
the radiation poisoning. “Y’ need… t’ stay back, Deku…”

“Kacchan”, Izuku interrupted as gently as he could, voice trembling. “It’s ok. They’ve
decontaminated the place. It’s safe for me to be here. I won’t be going anywhere, ok?”, he
pleaded.

Katsuki frowned again, but relaxed against the glass. Spotting Izuku’s hand against the glass,
he lifted his own, pressing it against the door right above Izuku’s palm.

“D… k…?”

“Shh”, Izuku said softly, tears running down his face silently, but never putting off the fake,
reassuring smile he was wearing. “I’m here. Ok? Everything will be fine, because I am here”,
he lied.

Katsuki sighed shallowly.

“De… ku…”
“Yes, Kacchan?”

“Di’ I save ever’one?”, he slurred, voice hoarse and dry. “Di’ I do it?”

Izuku lowered his head, allowing the tears to flow. But he nodded. He nodded emphatically.

“Y-Yes”, he basically whimpered, unable to keep emotion from cracking his voice. He
pressed his hand harder against the glass, yearning for contact with Kacchan’s hand. “You
saved everyone. You did it, Kacchan. You won”.

Katsuki swallowed dry again and closed his eyes, slumping harder against the door. He shook
his head slightly; the movement was so subtle that no one but Izuku could have caught it.

“No”, he protested, voice low. “No, didn’ win. I saved”.

Izuku’s face scrunched up into an ugly sobbing face, but he remained silent and still.

“Hah… how ‘bout tha’, shitty Deku”, Katsuki laughed without humor, too tired to feel
anything. “Saved to win”.

Izuku hiccuped, but used his free hand to press against his mouth. He bit down on the skin –
he didn’t want Kacchan to see him crying, not like that. He knew how much Kacchan hated
the sight of him crying.

“Y-Yeah, Kacchan”, Izuku forced himself to smile again, face flushed and wet. His freckles
were barely seeable. “You saved. And you won. You can rest, ok? I’m here, I’m with you”.

Katsuki frowned. Izuku couldn’t tell if the reaction was a result of his discomfort and pain –
god, he must be in such pain – or of doubt.

“’m I…”, Katsuki licked his dry, chapped lips. “’m I dyin’…?”

Izuku bit his lower lip with such strength that it almost drew out blood. He pressed harder
against the glass, against Kacchan’s hand on the other side.

“You’re all right”, he lied, still with that fake smile, still with that fake optimism. God, he had
never, ever been able to lie to Kacchan, but this was different. He couldn’t just tell the
confused boy he was dying. That this was it. That all was over – his hero career, his dream,
his life. Izuku knew it was messed up and unfair of him to lie, to promise everything would
be ok, but he couldn’t really bring himself to say the truth. “You’ll be all right. Just… rest,
ok? You can rest, now”.

Katsuki sighed, as if in relief. He nodded briefly and closed his eyes, but it only lasted for a
moment. Soon enough, big crimson eyes were staring into Izuku’s moist green ones, pain and
confusion etched in them.

“Can I…”, he coughed, dry and hoarse. “Can I… ask ya som’thing?”

Izuku smiled again, even though his brow was scrunched up. He nodded.
“Of course”, he said. “Anything you want”.

Katsuki swallowed dry again.

“Why’d you… say no?”, he asked. And if Izuku hadn’t known Kacchan was out of it before,
he certainly did now, because sober-Kacchan would have never dared to ask such a question.
He would have never brought himself so low as to second-guess Izuku’s reasons for
rejection. He would have sucked it up – like he had been doing for the past days – and he
would have buried the matter without ever bringing it up again. To hear him ask such a
question just served to show Izuku how bad the situation was.

How fast he was losing Kacchan.

“Kacchan”, Izuku started, not sure of how to continue. “I never meant to hurt you”.

“I get it”, Katsuki rasped, weak and incoherent. “I’m an ass. I’m an ass to you. But I… I…”

“You’re not an ass”, Izuku tried, gently.

“I am”, Katsuki retorted. “I know I am. I don’t… I know I don’t… deserve you…”

“Kacchan!”, Izuku exclaimed. “Don’t say that. Please don’t say that. That’s not why I said
no”.

Katsuki stared at him with glassy, confused, disoriented eyes. Searching Izuku’s face for an
answer, an explanation. Izuku cleared away his tears with his spare hand, keeping the other
pressed to Kacchan’s even thought there was glass in the middle, separating them.

“I said no because I’m an idiot”, Izuku started. “Because I was afraid that if we made our
relationship public, you’d change. You were a bit of an ass in the past, yeah, which was why I
cherished the moments in which you weren’t. Whenever you were affectionate to me, and
caring, and loving… those were my favorite moments in all of the whole wide world. They
made me feel all warm and happy inside. And the thought of losing that… it was maddening.
I was so terrified you’d change if we made our relationship public. I was afraid you’d be
embarrassed of being seen with me, I was afraid you’d stop being so warm and tender to me
like you always were when we were alone. That’s why I said no. Because beggars can’t be
choosers, and I’d rather have just a piece of the real you than have none at all. I’m selfish just
like that”, he laughed manically, sounding like a mad person, especially because of the fact
he was still crying.

Katsuki stared at him with confusion and lost eyes. His mouth opened and closed like a
fish’s, as he tried to figure out what he could possibly say in response.

“Deku”, he rasped. “I’m sorry”.

“Please”, Izuku begged, tears in his scrunched-up eyes, “don’t apologize. You’ve got nothing
to be sorry for”.

“I should have done better”, Katsuki said, coughing. “I should… I should…”

“You did everything right”, Izuku said, pressing both hands against the glass now. “You were
perfect. You were amazing. You did everything right, please, believe me, you did everything
right”.

“I didn’”, Katsuki sighed, eyes half-lidded. “Back… When we were brats…”

“Kacchan…”

“No, I gotta say it. I was a dick. I hurt you… You’re not s’lfish for wantin’ me to be
aff’ctionate. I’m the selfish one for not giving you wha’ you deserve all the time. And I’m
sorry”.

“Please, don’t be”, Izuku pleaded. “I can’t bear the thought of it”.

I can’t bear the thought of you dying while sad.

“I’m sorry, Izuku”, he said, barely awake now. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry”.

“What are you saying?”, Izuku sobbed, unable to keep his emotions in for any longer. “Why
are you saying this?”

“I know you… love me”, Katsuki slurred. “’n I love ya too. Don’t blame yourself over this”.

So his lie had been for nothing. Kacchan knew he was dying.

“Kacchan”, Izuku sobbed, pressing harder against the glass. “Kacchan!”

“I know ya love to play martyr”, Katsuki continued, breathless. “I know you’ll take the
blame. Don’t do it. ‘s not your weight to carry”.

“Stop”, Izuku squeezed his eyes shut, more tears rolling out. “Please, stop”.

“I couldn’t let ya die”, Katsuki slurred. “Couldn’t let Japan die. Had to do something. My
choice, my deeds, Deku”.

Izuku pressed his forehead against the glass.

“I shouldn’t have said what I said to you”, Izuku lamented. “You’re so stubborn, I bet you
were just trying to prove me wrong, weren’t you?”

Katsuki let out a weak laugh that became a cough.

“I know you’ll miss me”, Katsuki said after a moment.

“I will”, Izuku nodded, face scrunching up again.

“I’ll miss ya too”.

Izuku ugly-cried, lowering his head.

“Love you, Izuku”, Katsuki breathed out, as if all strength had been drained out of him.
“Love you. Love you”.

Izuku sobbed.

“I love you too, Kacchan”, he said. Then, he raised his head to look at Katsuki. “I –“

He stopped on his tracks. The hand that Katsuki had been pressing against the glass had slid
down, and the boy was staring at nothing with a vacant look on his burnt face.

“Kacchan?”, Izuku asked, face blank. He tapped the glass door. “Kacchan, did you hear me? I
said I love you too”.

Katsuki remained very still, eyes open and unseeing. Izuku noticed with terror that his chest
was no longer moving.

No. This couldn’t be.

“Kacchan!”, he smacked the glass door. “Did you hear me? I said I love you too, Kacchan!
Kacchan! I said I love you!”

“Midoriya…”, Todoroki appeared behind him, placing a hand on his shoulder. Izuku turned
to him with tears and snot running down his face, looking – and sounding – desperate.

“You have to open the door”, he pleaded. “Maybe Recovery Girl… She can still do
something. I know she can. Just open the door and let him out! Can’t you see the radiation’s
killing him?”

“We can’t open the door, Midoriya”, Todoroki said, sounding almost compassionate. “I’m
sorry. He’s gone”.

“No”, Izuku sniffed, smiling – which made him appear sort of mad. “You’re wrong”, he
swallowed, turning back to the glass. “I’ll show you”.

“Midoriya…”

“You’re never going to be number one like this!”, he shouted at Katsuki, eager to make him
wake up. “Is that what you want? For me to surpass you?! For someone else to claim your
rightful place? Wake up! Wake up and claim your place!”

Todoroki tried to pull his trembling frame away from the chamber, but Izuku shrugged the
touch off, slamming his hands against the glass.

“Kacchan! Wake up! Claim your place!”, he shouted. He was well aware he was making a
scene, but he didn’t mind. “Wake up! Wake the hell up!”

“Midoriya, no!”, Todoroki exclaimed when he noticed Izuku had activated One For All. He
threw himself against the boy and tackled him to the floor before he could break the glass,
which was the only thing containing the radiation.
“No! He just needs Recovery Girl, let me take him to her!”

“You need to calm down!”

“No! Let go of me! Let me – let me – khh –“, he was stopped as something metallic clogged
his throat, and before he knew better he was vomiting blood, eyes squeezed shut in pain and
tears still running down.

“Midoriya!”, Todoroki exclaimed in horror. “Medic! We need to take him back! His lung got
worse!”

Voices became mixed together and everything turned fuzzy. Izuku was aware someone was
carrying him because gravity had shifted beneath his feet, but he couldn’t tell whether it was
Todoroki or someone else. All he could see, through his vision that was blurred by tears and
pain was the increasingly far-away chamber containing Kacchan, his love, his heart, his soul,
and the rose-shaped clot of blood he had just spat on the floor.

Then everything turned black and he passed out.

When Izuku woke up, days after his second surgery and now fully recovered thanks to
Recovery Girl’s quirk, he found Katsuki’s funeral had taken place without him.

Well, it wasn’t like they could have waited for him to wake up. And it hadn’t been exactly a
funeral, either. It was too dangerous to leave a chamber filled with enough radiation to wipe
out a country accessible to the public, so they had to isolate it. They had buried it on a
radiation-disposal appropriate location, covering it with concrete and lead to isolate it from
nature. Katsuki couldn’t be removed from inside the chamber, so he was buried along with
the villain he gave his life to defeat, his life and death intertwined with the man for eternity,
now.

Izuku visited the place, once he was well enough to be discharged from the hospital. They
had placed a memorial on the location, so that Katsuki and his sacrifice would never be
forgotten. But that wasn’t enough for Izuku. It would never be enough.

He understood the myth of Adonis a little bit better, now. He understood blood covered rose
petals and grief and mourning for a lost loved one. He understood loving someone so much
you could come down from the heavens for their sake. But he couldn’t quite make sense of it
all.

No, he couldn’t quite wrap his head around the fact that Kacchan was gone, never to be seen
again, never to be kissed, and touched, and hugged, and cherished. He had been buried with a
villain. He had been buried before he could achieve his dream, before he could reach his
well-deserved greatness. Before he could become number one.
And Izuku would never forgive himself for that.

If only he had said yes to Kacchan’s proposal. Maybe they would have handled the stabbing
situation differently, then. At least, Kacchan would have enjoyed a couple days of happiness
before his demise. But now, Izuku would never know.

He could never know.

More than Adonis and Aphrodite, he felt like Orpheus, ready to go to hell and back for his
love, but bound to lose him either way in the end.

After all, it was well known: where there were heroes, there were tragedies.

⚜
End Notes

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