Hello all!

Here's another chapter!

(And there's another one being posted here in a hot sec)

Enjoy!

One Day Before...

"Alright, everyone listen up so we can get situated for the night without taking the entire night."

The class in front of him quiets almost instantly, a habit they've gotten the hang of more or less since their first day of classes not so long ago. Twenty pairs of eyes lock onto him, and he feels two more pairs from behind him— the two additional chaperones only feet away.

"You'll be split into three different groups and positioned next to one of three of the buildings within this facility. Present Mic, All Might, or I will be in each of these buildings monitoring your progress. We'll start the exercises tomorrow morning at dawn."

He hears a few groans, easy enough to be heard within the quiet of the facility's command post. He sees a few of the security personnel wandering along their routes down the hall behind his class. Closer is the staircase which apparently goes up to the sleeping quarters. They haven't gotten that far yet, but he already can't wait to sleep off his weariness from traveling as far as they have today.

"Any questions?"

Nothing. He watches as a few curious eyes wander the halls of the facility like they're in a hotel or something. It's relatively plain, fluorescent lighting in long strips down the hallway, Windows along the length of the hallway. The entire "building" they're in is basically a hallway, wrapping around the entire facility while exposing the training grounds to the natural weather patterns of the mountain. Luckily, it looks like there won't be any terrible weather while they're there. Some snow. Possibility of a blizzard the following day. Nothing they can't handle, no doubt.

The last time they did any sort of overnight field trip, they ended up getting attacked and having their trip cut short. He feels a tingle run up his body at the prospect of history repeating itself, but pushes it down— ignoring it.

"Fine, then go on and head up to the rooms."

There's a few excited cheers, plenty of roughhousing as the more boisterous members of the class rush to the stairs first. Iida yells something about 'representing UA' and 'needing to be respectful and civil'. Bakugou, Kirishima, Sero, Ashido and Kaminari ignore him easily enough. The rest don't seem to care either way, with only Ururaka and Midoriya seeming to listen.

Shouta sighs through his nose, slouching further than he was previously, "Why do I feel like living with these kids still hasn't prepared me for appearing in public with them."

There's a clap on his back, "Shouta, you gotta relax, man. I'm sure they're not that bad."

"You didn't see them at the training camp," he says, "I thought they'd never go to sleep. Even after I threatened them with more work."

"Hopefully it won't come to that," All Might says with a light chuckle, "Let's have faith that this trip goes as smoothly as possible, yeah?"

"Heck yeah, but not boring. A little excitement. Just a little."

Shouta rolls his eyes, "Give an inch and they'll take a mile."

i/i/i/i

Warmth.

It's the first thought that shoots through his mind when he pushes towards some semblance of consciousness. The first feeling he takes note of.

For some reason...one that he can't quite put his finger on...this is something special . Something he didn't have before. This is something that he had pleaded for , he just knows it. And yet, he can't remember the exact circumstances. He can't remember why he had been in a situation like that to begin with...or figure out the reason he was so desperate...for what?

For who?

His eyes beckon him to open them but he would flat out tell them to shut the Hell up if it would do any good. The small pocket of warmth he's found himself in is too good to be ruined by some desire to figure out where he is. That will come later. Sleep is now …

.

.

.

.

.

There's some low incomprehensible drone somewhere nearby. It is easily ignorable, or so he thought, but it pokes and prods at his brain as though screaming, " Hey, this is important. Wake up. Now. This instance. Get up, you lazy half-human thing and figure this out."

And he would. He truly would, if he knew what exactly his attention was needed directed towards.

His mind clears ever so slightly at that, as though beckoning closer to consciousness whether he likes or not. If there's one thing he hates more than interrupted sleep, it's being left out on important information.

"— b here through all that—"

What?

"—even understand how he managed to get them both anywhere in that storm…"

Storm... right! There was a snow storm. A flat out blizzard. That's why the warmth was strange and he wanted to cling to it for a bit longer.

"—even understand him he was so out of it, and Young Midoriya wasn't doing any talking at all—"

Midoriya .

Shouta's eyes snap open with a gasp. The ceiling above him shimmers red for only a moment before he realizes he'd accidentally activated his quirk. The hair floating around his head lowers slowly, falling back to the pillow beneath his head.

Pillow..?

The voice has stopped.

Shouta shoots into a sitting position, seeing the colors and lights and walls around him get splotched with dark spots. He twists where he's sitting frantically scanning the space around him.

Everything rushes back. The sirens he heard back at his outpost, the call about a villain having broke through the facility's barrier, Mic, his students, the fight, the lake, the blizzard, All Might—

"Aizawa!"

He twists around shapes blurring together. He stops, gaze immediately settling on him . All Might, golden hair and blue eyes watching him pensively from the other side of the room. His hands are raised in a consoling manner, eyes soft and he gestures to Shouta—

"Be careful."

...or, not Shouta. He gestures to—

Shouta slowly gazes down to beside him. Green tufts of hair are the first things Shouta sees. Slightly damp still, but beginning to defy gravity on the pillow shoved under his head just the same. As is natural. Blankets, the same ones Shouta had tousled in his panicked awakening, are pulled up to his nose, the kid's turned sideways— Shouta would even say he looks to be in recovery position, but he can't see the rest of his body.

God.

Shouta presses a shaky hand to his forehead. He kind of...lost his cool for a second there.

"I wasn't really expecting you to wake up this soon," All Might says out of his line of sight, "You really conked out there. Scared me half to death."

Shouta glances at him from between his fingers, "How long has it been?"

All Might quickly glances behind him at the computer monitors, "Ahhh...about two hours, give or take."

Two hours.

It wasn't just sleep either. He passed out. Fainted. In front of All Might of all people, too. Great .

All Might can apparently sense his distaste for the situation which, yeah — of course. This situation is all kinds of wrong smashed together into an ordeal that in reality has only taken up a few hours, but still . The man stands over at the threshold between the monitoring area and the living area uncomfortably— passing his weight from foot to foot, fumbling with his hands. His shirt is tousled, damp in some places, sleeves rolled up, hair a little more untamed than usual, if that's possible, "It, er, wasn't a big deal, Aizawa. I wasn't really able to do a whole lot, anyways."

Aizawa nods, pinching the bridge of his nose— bad idea. He hisses, immediately wrenching his hand away when, instead of touching his bare skin, they touch tape and cotton. Tape...and cotton. Bandaged, basically. Not necessarily properly , he'd have to go to the hospital when this was all over for a variety of reasons, that being one of them, but still. Tape and cotton.

"What did you do?" Aizawa asks, only now noticing the strange sound his voice makes, unable to really use his nose. Congested. He sounds congested, "What did—"

And it's really only then that Shouta actually takes care to take note of his body's current condition. Sore. Of course it's sore. Unbearably sore. An ache deep in his torso— probably from being hit by the villain's quirk... Midoriya's quirk. His feet are burning, a deep seated chill running through his body even though he feels like fire is licking at his toes and hands and face.

And he's naked.

Great .

"Well, I couldn't get you two onto the couch. I, uh, couldn't lift you— I could barely lift Young Midoriya, so I settled for just leaving you two there", All Might says, stepping deeper into the living area and gesturing to the fireplace, "You two were soaked to the bone. I put all of your clothes over there…"

Only when Shouta turns to look does he actually see the chaos that ensued after he'd lost consciousness. The med kit lays open about a foot away from the nest All Might had apparently tried to form as a replacement to the couch, wrappers strewn around it. They're pushed into a messy pile, as though he had tried to bring some order to the mayhem. Fire light shimmers in a few puddles leading from the door, more growing from the sodden clothes laid out in front of the fireplace, draped over a small rack apparently meant for that sort of thing. His boots and Midoriya's sneakers barely catch his attention, tossed haphazardly in a pile beside the fire.

The lights to the living area are off, illuminated only by the fire crackling a few feet from them and the computer monitors on the other side of the room.

When he looks, there seems to be about five blankets strewn over top them, including a shock blanket at the very bottom. A few more are laid underneath them, keeping the chill of the concrete from truly affecting them.

All Might was apparently pretty busy.

Shouta glances back down to his student, seeing the way the fire dances off the metal of the respirator. Dances off of his palor. He feels the bite of cold from the skin still making contact with his thigh underneath the blankets.

"Body heat, huh?"

"Huh?"

Shouta oh so carefully leans back over and shoves one of his hands underneath Midoriya's shoulders, lifting him and pressing him chest-to-chest with himself. He hisses softly at the ice cold skin when it makes contact with his chest. He hugs the kid tighter to himself, anyways. Bearing with it. And Midoriya just lets him do whatever, not even a twitch of his face. Tremors run up and down the kid's entire body. He thinks he can hear the soft clack of teeth tapping together every few seconds. His frown deepens.

"Oh," All Might says, lowering himself slowly onto the couch behind Shouta, "Yes, I, uh, figured it was only, what you would say, 'rational'."

"It was," Shouta agrees, tugging the blankets up and over his shoulders and wrapping them tightly around Midoriya as well, "Thank you."

And he means it. Truly. All Might was probably expecting him to get angry at the invasion of privacy, and yeah , this'll probably be an awkward fact once this situation is all said and done. Especially since he's fairly certain Midoriya is just as bare as he is right now, but at the moment it's necessary.

Him and the older, retired hero don't get along all too famously. They just don't click all that well— able to work fine together, deal with hero work, have conversations every now and again, but that's about it. Their similarities are probably less that him and Hizashi, and that was saying something.

But at the moment, Shouta can tell All Might's still feeling the effects of adrenaline, the way he hears the soft shake to his voice every few words, or can sense his eyes on the back of his head. Like he isn't quite sure if he did enough, or did the right thing at all. He gets it, especially for heroes often in the limelight. Heroes who were only meant to show up, dish out a strong attack, and go on their merry way.

They weren't part of the clean up. They didn't see the aftermath all that much— not to say they never did, but it was fairly rare. Shouta remembers plenty of instances that he had been in charge of leading clean up. Having to watch as paramedics loaded people in and out of ambulances— sometimes discarding bodies for the coroners to take care of so that they could make room for patients who still had a chance. Those very same coroners having to scrape bodies out from underneath concrete slabs and from under buildings.

It was those visions that kept him awake at night. Those visions that sometimes left a bad taste in his mouth when he spoke with any member of the top ten heroes.

The point being, All Might wasn't used to this sort of thing. He was trained for it, sure. Every hero was to a certain degree— some more than others. But that doesn't mean he knew what to do in the heat of things. Something as sensitive as first aid. As dangerous as severe hypothermia . Of people fainting on him and having problems breathing. He didn't have as much experience as Shouta, and in this instance, with the individual in need being his own student, even Shouta had his issues trying to stay focused.

He did good.

All Might smiles kindly when Shouta manages to turn enough to see him— dragging Midoriya further on top of him. He has this look in his eyes still, almost haunted. A dark ring that makes his hollowed face even more pronounced, "You're welcome. It truly wasn't a big deal. It was my job , actually."

And he laughs, the sound somehow manages to lift something heavy in Shouta's chest. Something that had been building there since he first left his base to go run through the snow to make sure none of his students died there on that mountain. He can see just another reason why this man in front of him was able to stay as the number one hero for almost his entire hero career.

"You did scare me though, like I said earlier," All Might continues, leaning forward and clasping his hands on his knees, "I was surprised enough to see that it was you out there knocking at the door. Much more so to see you two's conditions."

Shouta grimaces, hands clasping tighter around Midoriya's limp and shivering body and a small, unrepressed shiver runs up his own spine at the memories, "I wish I was able to warn you, at least."

All Might hums, "When I spoke with Mic a few minutes ago, he said he couldn't get ahold of you. I'm assuming you lost your phone in the snow somewhere during your ordeal?"

"Probably," Shouta says dismissively, "What did Mic say? Did he mention the rest of the class? Or about the authorities getting here? Of medical personnel making their way here?"

All Might waits patiently for all of the questions to leave Shouta, "Well, he said that Young Bakugou seems to have a concussion, and that everyone else is warming up without complication. They seem to be pretty concerned about the two of you, though, from what he was saying."

As expected , Shouta thinks. He ran off after their classmate and they heard nothing for up to two hours. For all they knew, the two of them died out there while they were getting warm. Just another thing to add onto their trauma cards, apparently.

"He also said his knee was wounded, but that it isn't too bad. Probably pulled something if I were to guess," All Might continued.

Shouta nods, biting his lip when a particularly violent shiver runs through Midoriya's body with enough gusto to cause a soft breath of air to puff out of the kid's respirator-covered mouth, "And what about the medics?"

All Might sighs, something sad and almost wet sounding, "He hasn't been able to contact anyone, nor have I. I told him I'd call him back in about an hour, and he's going to keep trying to contact the police or the facility security personnel, though I'm not really thinking our odds are looking too great."

Shouta quirks an eyebrow at him, silently questioning his meaning.

"I mean," All Might continues, "And this isn't my strong suit, so forgive me, but I have a feeling that our phones not connecting is something more than simply nobody answering on the other end, or some bad weather."

"You think the connection has somehow been vandalized?" Shouta asks, "By the villain?"

"Well, the mountains don't get very good signals at all, so there's a cell tower built specifically for this facility, right?" All Might explains, a deep frown seated on his face, "I wouldn't put it past someone who is willing to attack children to this degree. And I think Mic is only able to contact us, and vice versa, because of the relatively short distance we are from him."

He gestures to Midoriya, his grimace deepening ever more. Shouta follows his gaze to the face pressed up against his chest, unconscious face facing up towards him.

"But, I'm sure that we'll figure something out."

Something warm slides down Shouta's torso. Had been for the past few minutes, but he only really realizes once he has all the answers he's going to get at the moment. It startles him. Such a high contrast to the cold body he has in his arms that he thinks he's imagining it at first, but it becomes very obvious he isn't at that point.

"What's—" He pushes Midoriya away slightly, holding onto him just the same. The kid's head lolls with the movement, a small grunt escaping him but nothing else. That's good, considering Shouta's heart about leaps from his chest when he looks down to the space he felt the sensation without anything else happening.

A streak of red runs down his own chest, and when he look's to Midoriya's own, he sees a similar red streak on his chest, as well. He hadn't thought to look before. Had been too lost in thought— too desperate for answers to their current situation. Perhaps too desperate to ignore the elephant in the room that just so happened to be the kid lying next to him to actually approach the most important problem they had on their plate at that moment.

Damnit.

"What happened?"

The shoulder. Midoriya's shoulder. That'd been stabbed. A wound transferred to him from Shouta's very own knife. If he still had the thing on him— if it wasn't lost at the bottom of the lake or somewhere in the snow, Shouta knows for certain that the wound would line up perfectly with the blade. What was something akin to a pinprick to the hulk of a villain they'd encountered is much larger to Midoriya's smaller frame.

There's gauze taped to the spot, red seeping through from the other side and so Shouta carefully peels the swath away, flinging it to the pile of wrappers by the fireplace. He feels cold all over again upon seeing the wound exposed to air.

It's about two and a half inches wide, three steri-strips trying their damndest at keeping the edges together. One of them is already failing, peeling up from the skin, soaked in blood. The flesh pulling upon without the strip's support. It's a mess. A terrible mess, and something dark squirms in Shouta's gut just looking at it and thinking of the implications such a wound has. Where the wound came from.

"Oh, no," All Might grunts, quickly stepping away from Shouta and Midoriya towards where he has the med kit set up still, "Not again."

Shouta blinks at that, gently tugging the useless steri-strip away from the wound. He flinches when he hears a small, miserable groan in retaliation, "What do you mean by, 'again'?"

All Might kneels beside the two of them immediately, a fresh gauze in hand, "It started bleeding pretty badly after the first hour since you had gotten here. I think it's cause he was warming up...anyways. I got it under control but it must have gotten jostled or something."

After taking a deep, calming breath, All Might forces his shaking hand to press the gauze to the wound. The pressure is enough to elicit another groan from Midoriya. Shouta grimaces again at the sound, but the frown slips off his face as soon as he sees the kid's eyelids flickering open.

All Might must see it too, because the older man inhales sharply, seeming hesitant to keep the pressure up. He doesn't though. A focused and sure clench of his jaw takes over his almost fearful expression.

"Midoriya?" Shouta tries, clasping his shoulder.

His eyes open, green color vibrant against the palor of his skin. Shouta's conflicted between feeling ecstatic or fearful— noting the differing pupil sizes. "Anisocoria" . He's had enough concussions in his life to have heard the term a few times from doctors. Not necessarily serious, but... still . Not good , either.

Shouta sighs, "He hit his head."

There's a long pause before All Might responds, "I know...I saw."

"Midoriya?" Shouta asks again, louder, "you there, kid?"

It becomes pretty obvious pretty quickly that the kid is, in fact, not there. His eyes flicker back and forth between their faces, but the eye are glazed. Clouded by an unconsciousness that is pulling him back. A small quirk to his eyebrows every time All Might adjusts his hold on the gauze. His head lolls back and forth in a sort of rhythm, like he's unsteady despite laying down. Shouta's lips thin at the discomforting sight.

And then Midoriya sighs shakily, eyes closing once again.

All Might lifts the gauze away from the wound. The cloth is blotched with red, but not soaked. Meaning that the bleeding seems to have lessened, if not completely stopped completely.

"There's a suture kit in here," All Might mumbles, stretching to pull the med kit closer to the group of three, "I haven't trained on how to use them, though, and I didn't want to try. I didn't want to mess anything up more than it already is, so…"

Shouta nods, looking down at the wound. As the blotchy mess it has left down Midoriya's chest and his own. He almost forgot about the blood on himself. He'll need to clean that up as soon as he's able.

"I know how…" Shouta says uncertainly after a moment of All Might fumbling with the other supplies in the kit, "It's been a while since I've had to actually use the training I have for it, though. I'm a bit out of practice."

All Might stares at him, finger tapping at the med kit in their silence before the older man breaks it, "Do you...want to try?"

Shouta hesitates before wordlessly reaching over and grabbing the suture kit from out of the box. It's a small thing, A box with a spool of suturing thread, small metal forceps, a needle holder, and alcohol wipes. Great. Okay.

"I'll try."

He remembers from the training he got that wounds are fine with steri-strips if they're small, as in an inch or less, and relatively shallow. That's two red X's for this situation, so he knows stitches should be put in. And if they aren't sure when medical help is going to get to the mountain, it is best to get it done if they have the skillset available to them.

"Do they have any spare clothes here?"

All Might seems confused by the equation for only a short moment, "Oh, yeah. Yes, do you want me to go get something?"

"Just some pants," Shouta responds, eyeing the kit in his hands as he sets it on the ground, "I need to go wash my hands before trying this, and I would really rather be semi-clothes to do that."

All Might snaps his mouth shut, "R-right. Of course. Obviously— I'll be right back."

/i/i/i/i/

"We don't have any anesthetic, do we?"

All Might halfheartedly looks through the box but Shouta can tell that he already knows that they don't. It's just another thing adding to the weight he feels when he finally measures up the sterilized needle to the task at hand. He knows this won't be pretty. Knows that once Recovery Girl gets sight of his stitch-job, he's going to get Hell for it. But if it makes the rest of this ordeal easier in the long run for Midoriya, then he'll just have to deal with the old lady's wrath.

"Alright then," Shouta says, clearing his throat and glancing All Might's way, "Get ready. He's probably going to react to this."

And he does. Really . Shouta pushes the needle through the brutalized flesh and Midoriya's eyes immediately snap open, his broken arm jerking up and somehow managing to snatch a hold of Shouta's wrist. He grunts, feeling nauseated when he's almost positive when he's almost certain he can feel the broken bones grinding together in the tight hold.

All Might shoots forward, pressing one arm down against the kid's collarbone to keep him flat and the other manages to loosen the broken hand's hold without getting too aggressive with it. Although, they were broken fingers...it probably didn't take any effort whatsoever.

Shouta's going to desperately need a vacation after this.

"It's alright Midoriya," Shouta tries, knowing how confusing this probably is. Already wiped out from everything else going on with him, Midoriya wouldn't understand why he's suddenly getting hurt seemingly by the individual who's supposed to help him, and God , he doesn't want to see that hurt look directed his way. Betrayal shimmering in the glazed eyes, "Take a deep breath. I'll go as fast as I can."

"Wh-wha—?"

He has to keep going. Get this over with and then they can figure something out about the pain. They still need to do something about the broken arm. All Might had unwrapped it from the soaked capture weapon he had used initially, leaving it exposed and without support for the time being. That's going to be a pain, too.

"I'm sorry Midoriya…"

He pushes the needle further, trying to ignore the tremble of both his hand and All Might's beside him. Trying to ignore the low screams and groans. Ones he knows would be kept quiet if the kid was in his right mind, though he doesn't know how to feel about that fact.

They should have never come here. To this facility.

All this suffering...this is all his fault.