Occupational Hazard
Chapter 1 - Exposure
"Deku! There's someone alive trapped under all this!" Earphone Jack yells to the other Pro-Hero.
An earthquake caused a building to collapse, and Deku and Earphone Jack are two of the most effective heroes at rescuing. Deku can lift and break anything, and Earphone Jack can hear through yards of solid concrete to sense more survivors.
Deku runs over and punch-smashes a large bit of the concrete and then lifts the rest with one arm. He's not fazed by all the blood he sees pooling from the woman, but she closes her eyes and coughs, some blood coming out too.
Using his other arm, Deku picks the woman up and takes her out before letting the wall fall back down.
"Hey, you're okay. I'm Deku." Trying to console the woman, he sees the EMTs already headed over to them.
She tries to turn her head away from him before she coughs, but it isn't fast enough. She coughs blood all over Deku's face – in his mouth, in his eyes. He is relatively unfazed, if only a bit grossed out.
The EMTs make it over to them and Deku gently places her on the gurney. He is handed a wet wipe to try to clean his face and some water to rinse his mouth before getting back to work.
A day later – at 5pm – Deku is about to go to sleep for the first time in two days. He had many rescues with that earthquake, and he is utterly exhausted.
And he receives a phone call.
"Hello?"
"Yes, is this Izuku Midoriya?" The voice on the other line asks.
"Who's calling?"
"I'm Dr. Shoyo Yoshino from the Hero Corps medical center. You rescued a woman from the earthquake yesterday, yes? When treating her she told us what happened when she coughed on you." The doctor says, and Izuku is more awake now than he has been the last six hours.
"Is she alright?" Of course Izuku asks this – he has such a bleeding heart and he cares for everyone who needs help.
"She will be, but the reason I'm calling is that she informed us that she was recently diagnosed as HIV-positive." The doctor says, and Izuku tries to process what he was just told.
HIV…?
Just hearing those three letters rekindles a fear within Izuku that hasn't reared its ugly head in several years.
Izuku knew he was gay since before going to UA. But he knew that gay people were at higher risk of getting STI's and HIV, and he didn't want to end up like that.
So he avoided dates, avoided making boyfriends, and avoided having one-night stands. He came out to his friends at UA and his mother (mostly to stop their questions about girls he's interested in and whatnot), but he's never done anything with another guy in any way that matters.
He claimed he was too busy to ask guys out. Now he claims he has to focus on his career in the prime of his life.
But what he was just told…twenty-four years old now and he might have just caught HIV for trying to help someone?
"What does…this mean for me?" Izuku asks, trying to keep his voice calm.
"It means you need to get over here right now and take PEP – emergency medications that could help prevent HIV infection after exposure. The sooner the better. We will remain open for you for the next hour."
He has his prescription, and he has to take it for a month. He is prepared for the nasty side-effects he was told PEP could come with. He has to take one pill a day for the next month at the same time consistently.
He can do that. He set several alarms on his phone, set alarms in his home, and has a bottle of water next to where his pill bottle is.
He can do that.
But what he can't do is handle the stress of the situation. Since he got home he's just been laying in his bed. He's scared and tired and wants to sleep and cry and scream. He wants to be alone and he wants someone there at the same time. He wants to distract himself but he also wants to just know too.
Izuku's mind is a concoction of contradictions. It's running but also at a standstill. He has so many thoughts but they are of nothing.
Izuku eventually falls asleep without eating anything. He was too numb to even know he was hungry and his brain shut off for the night.
Izuku takes a personal day the next day. He doesn't have the energy to go to work. He makes himself a breakfast that is barely edible and lays back down and tries to watch something on TV.
He knows he's acting pathetic. But it just isn't fair.
He avoided exactly the things that put him at risk. He focused on his dream of helping people. And what does he get in return? HIV-positive blood in him. What is that about karma? Hasn't he built up a life of good karma?
And he might be fine too. He might not have the disease – the PEP treatment might work. And this is how he's acting after an exposure with timely PEP…?
But he feels as if he can sense the virus already multiplying in him. He feels so gross. He feels dirty. He tried taking a shower shortly after turning on the TV but it didn't help him feel any cleaner. He feels stained. Every time he thinks about his heart beating he thinks about the virus coursing through his entire body.
It's barely 9am and Izuku just wants it to be medicine time so he can have one day less (out of twenty-eight more) until he can have an initial test.
Then he has to wait three more months for a definitive test – assuming the initial one is negative.
But if it's positive…
…Izuku doesn't even want to think about that. He has no idea what he would do if he was positive. He knows that the majority of people with HIV in developed countries (supposedly…?) live normal lives except for taking a pill or two a day, with blood work done every few months.
He's done his research!
But in that research, he's also learned of the few people that weren't that lucky. Getting drug-resistant strains, or the treatment just not working. He can imagine it right now – him dying a slow, painful death where he just gets worse and worse and dies of AIDS as his mother and friends (he hates the thought of how he imagines his Mom's and Shouto's and Kacchan's faces as he lies dying in a hospital bed…) accepting that he is going to die.
He doesn't want to die…
…he thinks.
It's been a week since he started taking PEP, and he feels awful. The nausea and diarrhea caused by the treatment are some of the worst he has felt so far. He called the doctor and he said these two symptoms aren't symptoms of seroconversion if he were to experience them, but Izuku is unsure.
He is scared.
He had to tell his supervisor at the hero agency that he had to take a certain medication and he needs desk duty unless it's a real emergency. He didn't go into specifics – and his boss didn't pry – and he was assigned paperwork and filing duty until his regimen was complete.
His coworkers looked concerned and told him to get well – nobody takes desk duty unless they were ill – but Shouto looked more concerned than the others but didn't pry. The two young pro heroes have been best friends since they were in U.A., but they both know they talk to each other when the other is ready.
And Izuku is definitely not ready to tell anyone about this.
(He wants to never tell anyone about this…)
Another week later and Izuku wakes up feeling like death.
It's like the worst flu he has ever had. Vomiting, fever, sweats, chills, constant diarrhea, fatigue.
He wants to believe it is just the flu…but he knows what this is. As much hope he has always had in his life, he wants to hope that this isn't it. But in his heart he knows what is happening to him.
He calls the doctor at the Hero Corps. and they send someone to pick him up. They want to do bloodwork as early as they can and he is in no condition to walk, let alone drive.
(He has the doctor call his agency and tell him he is sick.)
"Mr. Midoriya, this isn't what we had hoped for, but for what we know now this is good." The doctor says, and Izuku scoffs at that.
What any part of this could be described as good?
"We caught it early, Mr. Midoriya. Very early. We could get you to undetectable levels in just a few months." Izuku's eyes close as he hears the word undetectable.
He can be undetectable…but he will still always have HIV.
"We need to have some blood drawn so we can start developing your treatment. And after that I want you to speak to an HIV counselor. I know this must be difficult for you, but this isn't the end of the world." The doctor says in a sympathetic voice.
Couldn't it be, though? Might it be the end of Izuku's world?
He knows he could have possible prevented this too. Not by not being a hero or anything, but if he went on PrEP years ago.
Izuku is blaming himself – for not taking PrEP; but he is also blaming that woman – the woman who coughed blood on him – and he somewhat wishes Jirou never actually found her.
And that thought makes Izuku almost vomit right there in front of the doctor – he knows it is extremely wrong to feel like that, as heroes put their lives on the line every day they work – but this is different. He helped someone who was in need – and she tried to turn her head away too. And she told the doctor who let him know.
It's not her fault, as she was a victim on the earthquake. But it still is her fault, because it was her. And it's Izuku's fault because he's a hero. But it is his fault because he didn't take PrEP. But it isn't his fault because he was just helping someone.
The nurse who draws his blood doesn't say anything at all. When the doctor returns, he just tells Izuku to 'stay strong' - .
The nurse who draws his blood doesn't say anything at all. When the doctor returns, he just tells Izuku to 'stay strong' – he doesn't feel strong at all – before telling him where the counselor's department is.
He can't even see a counsellor that day…he needs an appointment despite just being diagnosed. So he makes one for the following week and heads home.
He's barely able to concentrate on the road. He parks his car badly and just heads inside to take off his clothes and fall into bed face-first.
(His face is covered by a pillow, and he breathes in cloth as he doesn't want to move his head.)
And he cries.
He sobs.
He yells into his wet and snotty pillow about how this just isn't fair. He never put himself at risk. He blames that bitch for infecting him. Then he calls himself an asshole for blaming her. Then he curses a fucking damn earthquake.
Then his cries devolve into sounds of suffering, but no more discernable thoughts. The young pro hero cries out all of the grief of the past week, and when he finally removes his face from the pillow he is disgusted.
Disgusted with himself, the doctors, the woman, and the pillowcase. He absentmindedly takes it off the pillow before throwing it to the ground with the rest of his clothes.
He takes a deep breath, then he turns on the TV so he can try to fall asleep.
He eventually does, and he has dreams that make him feel bad too.
(But he feels lucky he can't remember them.)
A/N: Well that's chapter one. I hope guys enjoyed reading this. This story has a lot of angst, but by the end most should be resolved. Hope you review and stick around for chapter two.