Yes bakugou for this chapter because i miss him

Here's some fluff to recover from hurt

Chapter 4: little moments i'll treasure

Katsuki didn't even know why he was packing.

He'd come to the goddamn hospital with only the clothes on his back– burned and tattered clothes, mind you– yet here he was, packing.

Apparently, those shitty extras and the old hag decided then and there he would fucking die– ha, fat chance– and turn his hospital room into a funeral home.

Son of a– there was even unlit incense by the corner.

"Ah, Kacchan! You shouldn't be moving around so much! Here, let me!" The big-ass knitted quilt in his hands was snatched up in a flash, leaving Katsuki looking like an idiot with his empty hands out.

Right. There was this other thing. And by 'thing,' he meant the annoying as fuck green-haired idiot who'd somehow managed to turn himself into an annoying leech that wouldn't leave Katsuki's side.

Literally. He could fucking feel and see Black Whip just at the corner of his eye, making the hairs at the back of his neck and ankle constantly be on the rise.

His palms itched to grab ahold of them and explode them, but he controlled himself.

He didn't want to make Izuku cry again, after all.

Katsuki growl was interrupted when scarred hands pushed him back on the chair behind him, the bed filled with all sorts of knick-knacks that he'd just been figuring out how to fit into one gym bag.

"Fucking nerd. I can fold a goddamn blanket, you ass!" His attempts to snatch it back failed, reflexes still a bit slower than he'd like. "I'm not a deadweight, Deku!"

When the words came out, Katsuki wanted to pull them right back.

Fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck. He hated this.

Katsuki hated how the simple slip of a word could plunge his world into freezing depths that pulled the air from his lungs, suffocating him. He fucking hated how Izuku's cheery demeanor would freeze and crack, the slips in the mask showing trembling lips and tear tracks.

He hated how he'd had to walk around goddamn eggshells with every extra that dropped by, lest he'd have crybabies flooding his bed with their shitty tears.

"Fuck, I– That's not what I meant, nerd."

But what he hated most of all?

Izuku turned to him, emerald shining with tears he'd never let loose since Katsuki had woken up with lights in his eyes and tubes in his throat.

"I know, Kacchan."

Katsuki hated how everything should be a dream come true, but his partner was caught up in nightmares he didn't know how to quell. How could he?

When it was him who was causing it?

Those weeks he'd spent motionless and on death's door– according to the doctors and nurses who wouldn't shut up about it– seemed to have made him lose his touch. Because something must've shown up on Katsuki's face that made Izuku's torn ones soften, the quilt being set aside for his hands instead.

Katsuki looked away and clicked his tongue but squeezed back all the same despite the flare of heat in his chest. It didn't fucking help that emerald threatened to pull him into its abyss.

He wondered when was it that his love for Izuku that grew day-by-day, unfurling petal by petal, erupted and overflowed to the point that it took everything in him to wrangle those three words back behind the gates?

Death must do that to a person, Katsuki thinks.

He wasn't an idiot. Even when the extras would downplay his injuries, he heard the whispers when he'd sneak out of his room.

Katsuki knew he wasn't supposed to be sitting upright in Izuku's chair right now, skin flush with a healthy glow and lines of white almost gone. He wasn't even supposed to be able to speak, move, think or even breathe without a tube in his throat, needles, and wires stuck in his skin.

When he closed his eyes, he could still feel the feeling of nothingness permeating through every inch of his existence, a breath away from welcoming him into its eternal fold.

The stupid hospital therapist was fucking wrong. Katsuki didn't 'brush' with death. He fucking died.

"At least let me fold the goddamn socks, nerd."

He died, but he'd process what exactly that meant later. Whether later meant minutes, hours, days, weeks, or years, he didn't give a shit right now.

Izuku laughed, and the corner of Katsuki's lips turned up when the hand in his didn't let go. It was going to be a bitch to fold socks with one hand, but he wasn't going to complain.

Right now, he was alive, and the love of his life was holding his hand. That was fucking enough.

When Izuku collapsed on top of him, a mix of tears and saliva pooling at the crook of his neck, Katsuki thinks there wouldn't have been a better way to wake up.

Trembling hands marred with white lines continued running through green locks, the monitor that rang a cacophony of beats coming back to its monotone pace as Katsuki matched Izuku's.

He didn't even notice his heart was beating wildly until it calmed down, listening to its one match in the world.

"Dynamight-san," The doctor barreled through the bubble of silence, stopping when Katsuki growled in warning, hands in green locks tightening. "We need to check on your condition. Please. All of this must be a shock to you."

Crimson flitted to graying eyes, looking over the other white-clad figures fidgeting by the foot of the bed. While worry and concern took up most of their features, Katsuki could see other things he couldn't understand.

Why the fuck were they looking at him with those shell-shocked faces, mouths slightly gaped and eyes raking over him– taking him in as an artist would their muse? Or as a scientist would their subject before bringing a scalpel to split them apart?

He couldn't understand anything. Not with the ringing in his ears, the throbbing spread from the top of his head to his feet, and the rattle in his chest that came with every breath that tried to match with Izuku's.

"Kacchan." He looked down at his world, hands aching to smooth out the furrow in those brows and wipe the tears at the corners. But every motion creaked, hurt, and trembled, making the reality of the unknown situation sink in.

With gritted teeth, Katsuki nodded.

His nails dug and broke into skin when they took Izuku away.

.

The following hours and days after that was a blur of extras opening the door to his room with a bang, seemingly forgetting their sense of self-preservation with the way they dwarfed him with wet hugs and wails.

Katsuki didn't blast anyone's face off, though. For good reasons, of course. Like the fact that the doctor told him to stay off using his quirk awhile.

It wasn't because the extras self-dubbed as his friends clung tight, fingers digging almost painfully into healing flesh– as if they thought that if they held on tighter, Katsuki wouldn't leave.

"I'm not fucking dropping dead before any of you assholes." He sighed, bringing his free hand up to purple curls. "So stop with the mourning, you shitheads."

Eijirou just wailed louder, Sero's tears streaming endlessly and Denki blubbering about being Katsuki's eternal phone charger.

What a bunch of crybabies. At least the others crammed in the room managed to crack a small smile, their eyes still shining with a tear or two slipping.

Katsuki didn't shed a tear when other extras came and went. They were doing it for him, soaking the hospital garb and sheets in fluids that he was glad wouldn't be on his clothes. No tears fell even when former teachers came, All Might enveloping him in a hug he was still processing.

When visiting hours were almost over, the door slid open, and only then did Katsuki allow the gates to open.

Mitsuki glared at him, but the scowl and purse of her lips were shaky, hands trembling at the side. "You shitty brat. You–! "

He watched as the strong facade– one he'd inherited and made his own– fell apart and two pairs of arms wrapped around him. Rain fell upon him again, but this time no protest came to mind as salty streams slipped from his.

Katsuki shakily took in a breath, a sob coming out. It was the irrefutable scent of warm family dinners, loud cooking sessions, and quiet hikes up trails that did it for him.

It was familiar and grounding, but it wasn't home.

Home was with emerald eyes speckled with freckled constellations when they closed from the stretch of a smile that outshone stars and galaxies. It was in their apartment of half a decade, with holes made by Katsuki's fist covered by hero posters and their couch stained with spicy sauce and pork cutlet covered by various quilts.

Home wasn't here in a white-walled prison with wires as his shackles and the prod of needles accompanied by muttering not Izuku's. It wasn't here in walls reeking of antiseptic and gossip of miracles appended to his name.

The curtain fluttered with the wind, and moonlight slipped through to caress fallen chrysanthemum. If Katsuki hadn't been waiting, he might've missed the sound amidst the whirring of machines and monotonous beeping.

He turned. Crimson met emerald. A scowl met a shaky smile.

"What took you so long, shitty nerd?"

Katsuki watched as that shaky smile morphed into the smile he'd known all his life. It was the smile that greeted him in lazy mornings, in the middle of breakfast, in every moment spent with the love of his life.

Izuku smiled, and Katsuki's love went past the gates. "Hi, Kacchan."

He moved to close the door, but a hand shot out and slammed it back. He suppressed the exasperated sigh, opting instead to widen his straining smile. "Yes, Auntie?"

"You have our numbers, right? And the doctor's? And the emergency hotline? You know we're available 24/7, whatever and whenever the brat needs us?"

The door trembled, torn between being pushed in one direction or the other.

Izuku smiled, green lightning subtly arching along his arm as he pushed harder. "Yes, I've had it since UA. Yes, they punched it in my phone themselves. Yes, all heroes have speed dial to it. Yes, I know– you told me so over the car ride."

Before the only door to their apartment could get wrecked, Katsuki intervened. Well, by 'intervened,' he really just delivered a swift kick to the door, shutting it on Mitsuki's face.

"Get the fuck out and go back to the old man, hag!"

Izuku sputtered, looking back and forth between the muffled screeches that they'd definitely get a complaint about later and Katsuki kicking off his shoes and leaving them strewed across the genkan.

He thought back to the hour-long car ride consisting of a never-ending stream of unnecessary advice and questions that rivaled even Izuku's own muttering.

"Have a safe ride back, Auntie!"

He doesn't even try to hide the chirpy lilt in his voice, grin mirroring Katsuki's boisterous laughter ringing out as they finally entered their apartment.

Home.

Izuku stood just beyond the entryway, watching and reveling in golden and crimson no longer trapped in white. Katsuki was a whirlwind, uncontrollable and wild as he swept through dirty socks and underwear, mugs left on the table, dirty dishes that piled up the night they were called in.

If he hadn't experienced piecing his world back together for hours on end, Izuku would've thought the month in the hospital was a fever dream.

A wet rag hits him in the face.

"Fuckin' hell, Deku, did none of those shitty extras or the old hag drop by and clean? What the fuck do they think those keys are for, ha? A shitty accessory to open beer bottles with? Assholes, watch me leave their stupid cats to die when they end up in a goddamn hospital for a month."

Katsuki continued to grumble with promises of death to felines and plants under his breath, the threats losing their heat with the blonde lugging a laundry basket around.

He missed this. Izuku didn't even know this everyday sight was something precious until he opened his eyes day-by-day to the view of a pristine ceiling fan and white walls. This domesticity that almost a decade's worth of living and working together had produced, emerald and crimson working as well-oiled cogs in the machine that was life.

Izuku coughed, scarred hands trembling as he caught it before it could reach Katsuki.

"Oi, nerd! Make yourself useful and wash the dishes with me. The shitty hospital food smells fuckin' better than this."

He looked down at the wet rag clenched in his hand, water dripping along the scars and contortions no amount of therapy would heal. It took everything to stop the trembling, his pale knuckles catching in the light.

Izuku was sure they couldn't hold a plate without letting it go, porcelain falling and becoming another box to be ticked off for cleaning.

Katsuki popped his head out from the doorless kitchen, scowling at the greennette. "The hell you standing around for? Get your ass here already, 'Zuku."

He's reminded of the doctor's words to not overexert himself; that the only reason he hasn't collapsed was the adrenaline still sustaining him.

But this was Kacchan, and how could he say no?

It turned out, being someone's nurse wasn't easy.

Izuku sighed when he spotted another of the dumbbells missing, feet already walking towards the room where he knew he would find them.

The door swung open, and this time, Katsuki didn't even bother to hide the fact that he was working out, still pumping out reps even as Izuku entered and stood before him.

Being someone's nurse wasn't easy. Especially if the patient was a crimson-eyed pro-Hero, who had never called in sick leaves or cashed in his vacation days.

"Kacchan."

The hero in mention ignored him, breath coming out in puffs and sweat dripping into his tank top. Muscles strained and flexed under the weight, every curl adding to the sheen of sweat covering Katsuki.

If it took Izuku a few minutes of due appreciation before snatching the dumbbell and throwing a towel in Katsuki's face, no medical professional was present to judge him. They'd probably be proud of how Izuku didn't fold under his partner's pout.

Well, for him, it looked like an adorable pout with Katsuki's cheeks puffed out, and his arms crossed over his chest. But, for people who weren't in love with the blonde, it probably looked like Katsuki was plotting the decapitation of Izuku's hand.

"Kacchan," Izuku sighed, setting down the weight to grab the discarded towel. He crouched, beginning to wipe away the sweat. "You know what the doctors said. No working out, no extraneous activity, and–"

"–no fucking doing literally anything that makes a single sweat drop, I know, Deku. I was there, you ass."

Izuku raised a brow. "Yeah, I was also there when you threatened to blow off the doctor's face, Kacchan."

He turned over Katsuki's hand, prying the clenched hands open to wipe away the sweat there. "I was also there when you told him where he could stick his pen, Kacchan."

"The way he was clicking on it was fuckin' annoying."

Izuku sighed. "It wasn't even a ballpoint pen, Kacchan."

Katsuki scoffed but didn't bother retorting– Izuku thinks he couldn't have anyway. So instead, he swung his legs back onto the bed and scooted until his back hit the wall filled with sparse posters and photos.

The greennette immediately followed, decades worth of studying Katsuki's subtle cues already making him flop on the spot left for him. The blonde grunted and moved, a familiar warmth spreading along Izuku's right side.

It wasn't that Katsuki's bed was small. On the contrary, it was king-sized and more than enough to accommodate a drunk self-proclaimed Bakusquad.

But it's always been like this. Katsuki scooting further into the bed and Izuku following, a whisper of an inch between their shoulders and hands. Sometimes they'd talk about everything under the sun that day, especially when the circumstances that led Izuku to step past the threshold were shadows with their claws that drew screams not his own.

Sometimes they'd talk about nothing at all, both tired with green and blonde locks dripping and soaking the walls at their backs. Izuku would close his eyes for a moment and find himself waking up with his face buried into the crook of Katsuki's neck with his arms around his partner, tangled legs messing up the comforter.

Neither would close the distance willingly, fingers just brushing against the other but never touching.

So it was to Izuku's surprise that blistered ones moved, fingers marred with white lines interlocking with disfigured ones. "Kacchan? What's wrong?"

Katsuki was still scowling– pouting, in Izuku's eyes– but his grip betrayed him. "Fuckin' everything. Everything's fucking wrong because I should– we should be out there kicking ass. But, instead, we're fucking here, and I can't even brush my goddamn teeth without you offering to do it for me."

"I'm sor–"

"Stop fuckin' apologizing, Deku! Just stop!"

Was Katsuki holding his hand, or was the iron-grip around the heart Izuku had already reserved for one man? He didn't know, but he couldn't breathe; the lungs in his chest ceasing function at the order.

"Fuck…" Katsuki's voice broke, face hidden behind the hand not gripping scarred hands. Izuku's own ached to gather his world in his arms, hoping to soothe the turmoil unseen to all but crimson eyes. He ached to move but couldn't because Katsuki told him to stop, and he listened.

Izuku knew that his existence was more than his own now, after all.

Katsuki took a couple breaths before looking up, dragging his hand across his face and wiping the tears he thought he could hide. He picked at imaginary lint on the blankets, the other hand tracing the scars Katsuki had always been fascinated by.

Scars weren't ugly or demeaning– they were symbols of victory tinged with the bitter reality of sacrifice. Or at least, that's what Katsuki told Izuku in the throes of nights when he'd spend way too long in the bathroom, staring and scratching.

"You keep saying sorry, 'Zuku. You don't say it out loud, no. Not after I fuckin' threatened to pull your tongue out if you do," He wasn't looking at Izuku, crimson focused on a spot the greennette couldn't reach. "It's in your goddamn eyes. You keep apologizing with the tears you fuckin' think I don't see or with the way you– the way you fuckin' drink me in like I'm gonna disappear if you don't."

Crimson went back to the plane and faced emerald. "That's why you volunteered, huh? To take care of my pathetic ass."

When Katsuki laughed, Izuku didn't rise to the bait of the hollow hook. They were past this, but sometimes the blonde would take a few steps back and cower behind scathing remarks and riling words.

He closed the inches worth of a distance, resting his head on Katsuki's shoulder. It was an awkward position, making Izuku strain his neck with their heights almost par with each other. He squeezes the hand back, now his turn to trace the new scars that match his.

"Do you know how you got the scars, Kacchan?"

Silence. Izuku continued.

"Do you know why I apologize with every fiber of my being rather than with words you prohibited?"

Silence. Still, he continued. He nuzzled further into strong shoulders that have carried the brunt of a judgmental world and scathing tongues. The scent of cinnamon and smoke fills his senses, triggering the gates to open and crack down on the delicate atmosphere of the room.

"Do you know when I stopped piecing every piece of you back together until there was finally a pulse under my fingers?"

They did this for the rest of the day that stretched into the night and the following day.

With Katsuki trembling and silent, Izuku relaying questions that brought more and no answers that the love of his life could want.

Izuku still had difficulties managing Katsuki's erratic mood swings. He still found some dishes already cleaned, clothes folded, and weights missing sometimes.

But that was fine because Katsuki learned to listen with time.

Scowls and snarls turned into exasperated puffs and pouts. When Izuku would hesitate by the threshold, body tense and prepared for rejection, a hand would grab him by the wrist until he tumbled past.

Katsuki's body would be tense then, every press of scarred fingers on points doing the opposite of what they should. Izuku knew his partner hated it– the feel of cream on his skin and fingers on spots of built-up worries and pain.

He hated it, but he never moved to stop Izuku from continuing.

Being a nurse was challenging with a patient like Bakugou Katsuki. But Izuku knew that that was the only person he'd ever be a nurse for.

The explosion on the screen boomed throughout the apartment, a sound reminiscent of times when it came from blistered hands and crimson eyes.

For now, however, Katsuki thinks this is okay.

The laughter of a hero now lost to the throes of time, and the cackle of villains replicated in streets and alleys resounded in their small space, flashes of colors and light reflected in crimson and emerald.

"Fuckin' stupid."

The bundle beside him sighed, almost slapping Katsuki with unruly green locks, wild after two months of no haircuts. "Kacchan. It's a movie."

"Still stupid. Fuckin' obvious that the director of this shit doesn't know crap about quirks," He tore his eyes away from the screen. "You could do a better job, nerd."

Izuku giggled and drew the blanket closer to him, pouting when the blonde pulled his end back. Trust the goddamn weather to plummet Shizuoka in snowfall just when they were both stuck indoors with a shitty heater.

Both of them kept promising that they'll fix it, but in the seven years they've lived in the apartment, the simple call to a technician a few blocks over never comes through.

"Nah, I don't think I'm suited for the director role. Maybe a costume or stage designer?"

"Ha? What the fuck for? You an artist or somethin'?"

The question was another one of the landmines he'd unknowingly stepped on. They were haphazardly spread, hidden among strewn clothes and crumbs on the floor.

They were small, almost unnoticeable with how they detonated, but bedrest didn't make Katsuki's instincts any less than they were in their prime. He saw how setting one off would stave away and get a crack in on Izuku's light and cheery facade, emerald eyes glazing over and out to somewhere Katsuki couldn't go to.

It's how Izuku looked like now, the dialogue from the screen no longer important as emerald stared at crimson. But they looked at Katsuki in the way he knew they weren't really looking.

They were remembering.

"Ah," Izuku smiled. "Nevermind, Kacchan."

The greennette turned to go back to the movie, and unlike the other times when Katsuki felt these parts of Izuku slip through his fingers, he held on tight.

Literally, this time.

Izuku's cheeks felt warm, a mercy for the cold that assaulted them in the morning. Katsuki would never admit it, but another reason he hated winter was that it was the one season in the whole fucking year that made freckled constellations disappear.

"Kacchan?" The nickname came out soft, emerald shining bright but confused all the same. Katsuki's thumb stroked over the place where the faintest hint of freckles still lay, crimson drinking in the light flush.

Midoriya Izuku was beautiful.

"You're so goddamn beautiful, 'Zuku." He leaned closer, breaths almost mixing in an intricate dance of warmth and trepidation. "Makes me want to fuckin' punch you because you're so unfair, dammit."

"Wha– Kacchan! You can't just say things like that!" Katsuki growled when the greennette tried to move away from him and hide his face somewhere the blonde wouldn't see.

But that was stupid because Bakugou Katsuki had always been looking.

The first kiss was slow and brief. His hands still cradled Izuku's face, but they weren't there to keep or pull him. They were just there– a reassurance of Katsuki's warmth and presence that the nerd couldn't find himself to stop looking for.

So Katsuki gave Izuku time to pull away– to tell him no, and that would be it. They'd go back to watching the movie, and he'll just know that the lingering warmth and spark on his lips would never leave his mind.

Then the second kiss happened, Izuku surging up with trembling hands pulling at blonde locks. Words were exchanged in between, random and incoherent, as they were lost in gasps, moans, and the press of lips and dance of tongues.

They were incoherent to all but the two of them. Two heroes who've given so much for everyone else that they've finally allowed themselves to hold the world in their arms.

And if the message still wasn't clear, that's fine with Katsuki. He'll gladly hold his world in his arms and pepper him with kisses until it gets across.

The tape ran its course, and the screen went black.

It must've been the fifth time Izuku asked for it to be played back, but he still couldn't wrap his head around what he witnessed.

"Deku-san, are you alright?"

He almost laughed at the question but opted to hide his face in his trembling hands, his body still shaking. They've been in that state since he woke up, mind frenzied from being wrenched away from Katsuki.

Katsuki who was awake, alive, breathing, and no longer at death's door.

It took a couple breaths, maybe more, he wasn't sure, but the question resting at the tip of his tongue finally rolled out. "How?"

How is this possible? This shouldn't be possible. It's unthinkable.

"Deku-san, I have to ask agai–"

"It wasn't One for All, sensei." It was one of the possibilities they tackled after the first run-through of the tapes showing Katsuki's room.

"Then I have to ask, Deku-san," The doctor leaned forward with pursed lips. "Are you sure you were quirkless before you received One for All?"

Shaking emerald eyes flitted back to the black screen, remembering the scene that played over and over again. They darted back to the doctor, a bald man overlapping with the one before him, lips moving to declare his fate.

Izuku swallowed around a dry throat, ripping his gaze away to settle on the hands of a clock by the wall. Emerald watched the tiny one tick and pass, not dictating but following time and its laws. "You said you've seen something like this before, sensei?"

It wasn't an answer, and they both knew there wouldn't be one.

The doctor sighed, their graying brows furrowing. "I'm not entirely sure myself, Deku-san. But I have seen something like it before in another country. A mix of an emitter, transformation, and accumulation quirk."

A pause. Izuku looked up, clenching his still trembling hands. "And?"

They tried for a smile, but Izuku was a hero who knew when it didn't reach a person's eyes– when it was meant to reassure someone in an uncontrollable, maybe hopeless situation.

"They... It was a bit different for them. They couldn't control how much they gave and who they gave it to, and by the time I saw them again…" The smile slipped. "It was a grave that greeted me."

This time the laugh couldn't be contained, and the doctor winced at the sound. At one point in time, someone told Izuku that his laugh was the next reassuring thing to his smile. It was light, filling people with sunshine and hope.

Now, it showed its cracks, the sound depreciating and grating to the ears and heart.

Izuku didn't cry. No salty oceans made their way down freckled constellations, and no whimpers and wails came from his chapped lips.

Shitty nerd.

The broken laugh tapered off, and the inklings of a small smile swept over his face. He wasn't sure if it was normal to feel this way when one's meeting with the cloaked figure of souls was already a set date.

Izuku wasn't sure about the words that spilled from the doctor's lips or about the tape that kept playing over and over in his head. He wasn't sure if the sense of calm and warmth in his chest was ordinary for someone in this situation.

But he thought back to Katsuki– alive, breathing, and screaming at nurses as he curled around Izuku to protect him from the noises of the world.

If there was one thing Midoriya Izuku was sure of, it was that he would do it– give his life– again and again if that's what it took to keep his world from losing its flame.

Take everything from me. Take my heart, my soul, my lungs, my fingers.

Take everything and give it to him.

出 from Izuku's name can mean exit, leave, go out.

Doctors in Japan are usually addressed as 'sensei'

Personally, considering Baku's character and personality, it's a challenge as a writer to write from his perspective and not make it not funny. Since you know… he swears like a goddamn sailor.

Good thing I like challenges, though.