Category: Friendship Fluff

Characters: Katsuki Bakugo, Izuku Midoriya

Warning! Spoilers ahead for My Hero Academia: Heroes Rising!

Everything hurt, but his arms especially. An agonized moan spilled from his lips before he even registered the action. As he lapsed into consciousness, the first thing he became aware of was the excruciating pulsing pain in his arms. It felt like they were submerged in lava, just melting away all the layers of skin until his bones relented too and crumbled into ashes. Katsuki never cried, but despite his pride, a few tormented tears slipped out of the corners of his eyes to roll down his cheeks. It hurts… It hurts so fucking much, he whined silently. For a few minutes, all he knew was that awful pain; no reality, no thought, nothing but the sharp pulsing of his destroyed tissue and nerves. Slowly, slowly, he realized that he lay on his back in refreshing grass.

Though the action pained him, Katsuki forced his eyes open just a sliver. His red eyes peeked out from beneath ash-blond lashes to behold the sky. The roiling gray clouds drifted on the trade winds, coasting away from the island. That's right. Nabu island. Nine. Deku…! The memories clapped into his mind like lightning, sending a searing pain striking through his brain tissue. Katsuki keened and kicked his legs at the unbearable sensation. The heels of his boots dug into the earth, pushing it up into mounds as he scored trenches into the damp dirt. He remembered everything- his classmates and their valiant effort to subdue the supervillain, the children's heroic last stand, he and Izuku fighting side-by-side, and…

Katsuki's vermilion eyes snapped open. One for All.

There was no room for disbelief in his mind. Izuku had really passed on the Quirk to him. He could feel the electric energy of all who had come before simmering in his cells, humming just beneath the surface, waiting to be called forth. Their voices whispered in his eardrums, speaking of glory and valor and sacrifice. No, he begged them. I don't want it. Not like this. Not like this!

A whimper from beside him caught his attention. Katsuki bit down hard on his bottom lip, knowing that turning his neck would send ribbons of pain shooting down his likely fractured spine. There was another whimper followed by a high-pitched groan. Just do it, pussy, he growled to himself. With a stubborn grunt, he wrenched his head to the left in one swift motion. His jaw then clenched tight as the shooting pain bloomed down his spinal column. A piercing scream was torn from his throat despite his efforts to swallow it. His vision blurred for a few moments, but he could still discern a smudge of pine-green hair and a ripped green-and-black hero costume.

"Deku," Katsuki croaked. Izuku's form gradually came into focus. The boy's chest rose and fell with ragged, laborious breaths, and his eyes scrunched up in pain. Dirt and bruises and smudges of blood littered his face. Blood dripped from the holes of his costume. Katsuki assumed he fared similarly, based on the dull aching pulsing in every part of his body. Katsuki called Izuku's nickname again, but the boy did not stir. If Katsuki couldn't see his chest moving, he genuinely would've wondered if he was dead.

Katsuki's crimson eyes swept the length of Izuku's ragged form. The way his rival rested so stilly caused a visceral reaction in Katsuki; his throat constricted as sobs threatened to spill forth, and his lips wobbled as tears stung his eyes again. Despite his arms being mangled and broken, he still forced the shredded muscles to move so that he could raise a hand and touch Deku's face. As his purple, broken finger brushed over the linear scrape on the other boy's cheek, lightning-fire pain blasted through his over-sensitive nerves. That wasn't what finally made the tears spill down his cheeks, though.

No, it was the fact that now, Izuku could never be a hero.

"You fucking idiot," he cursed, voice cracking with raw emotion. "You're an idiot, Deku!" he then shouted. "Why'd you do that, huh? You should've used that big stupid brain of yours to think of something better!" Yelling wouldn't awaken the unconscious boy; Katsuki knew that. It didn't make him feel any better, either. One for All pulsed in his cells, as if to admonish his scolding. "It's not fair," Katsuki whimpered. He no longer had the strength to hold up his arm, and it flopped down next to Izuku's cheek, his fingers tangling into the sweaty, dusty fibers of his green hair. "He was gonna be a hero."

The gray clouds parted further, spilling sunshine down upon the pair of young hero hopefuls. The light bathed Izuku's face with a soft white glow, making him seem so innocent and angelic; meanwhile, Katsuki lay in mottled darkness, like a thief observing the victim of his crimes. That's what he felt like- a thief. Izuku had offered him the Quirk in a rash, stupid, desperate decision, and Katsuki knew deep down that if he had refused, they would've died, and Nine would've succeeded to possibly become an even more dangerous villain than All for One. He knew that, yet his heart still ached to share a body with the Quirk. I stole it, he grieved. I stole Deku's future.

A sudden anger flared in his body. "No," he snarled aloud. His spine cracked as he shifted, straining his battered limb to grope around for Izuku's hand. Every flop of his palm against the soft grass felt like a hundred knives stabbing him at once; yet, he just clenched his teeth until they threatened to shatter and continued searching. Finally, he found Izuku's left hand. He grasped it tight, making the tendons and ligaments of his arm and shoulder wail in anguish, and pressed the small nick of his finger against the one on Izuku's.

"You don't get to fucking do this, asshole," he hissed at the slumbering boy. Katsuki could feel his consciousness fading; fog drifted into the corners of his mind, and the outer edges of his vision fuzzed black. "You and I still have a lot of fighting to do. I'm gonna beat you to number-one hero, fair and square, and I can only do that if you take this goddamn Quirk back!" Their blood mixed in the small cuts. In another time, in another life, perhaps they could be friends taking the oath of eternal brotherhood. Maybe, in the back of his mind, that's what Katsuki was doing in this life. Everything floated in dark water as his consciousness phased in and out. Please, he begged his tortured body. Just a little more time…

"Give it back," he whispered. "Give it back to him. I can't lose him- my rival… my friend." Katsuki didn't know if his effort would succeed, and if it did, if he would lose his own Quirk in the passing. At the moment, he could care less. Katsuki could become a hero without a Quirk just fine; he would do it out of spite. One for All was everything to Izuku. It was his life, his faith, his dream. After how far they had both come, Katsuki couldn't steal Izuku's dream. He just couldn't.

"Please, I beg of you…" he pleaded with the invisible force inside of him. His lips curled upwards into a smirk as he felt the familiar hum in his cells of the Quirk activating. A woman laughed amiably within his mind.

You care a lot about him, don't you?

"Don't you ever tell him, lady, or you and I will have words," he warned. The woman's jovial laughter echoed in his skull again. When Izuku had gifted him the power, Katsuki had felt the oddest sensation of warm energy flooding his body, starting at his finger and spreading outwards. This time, he felt the opposite. It felt like all the warmth was being siphoned from him, leaving him cold and exposed. Izuku's right arm ignited with red streaks like lightning as the Quirk returned to him.

Don't worry. We'll take care of him, several voices chimed in Katsuki's head. He flopped against the ground with relief, and a shaky laugh rumbled in his lungs.

"You'd better," he rasped as his eye began to drift shut. The clouds had parted completely now, bearing the full brunt of the sun. Katsuki's skin basked in the warm glow of the sunshine washing over him; it felt like someone draping a cozy fleece blanket over his body. Just as his vision flooded with darkness and numbness began to creep up from his toes, he murmured, "Because I'm gonna give him hell until he's the best hero he can be."

Distantly, he felt Izuku stir beside him and whisper, "Kacchan?" The boy's hand squirmed against Katsuki's own, and so with the remaining dregs of his strength, Katsuki gave it a firm squeeze.

"Don't worry. I'm here… Izuku."