It took six weeks for his arms to heal, despite the help of a witch's healing magic. When the bindings came off he looked down at despair at the amount of muscle he'd lost, not that he could build up much to begin with as a child without stunting his growth. But now even Izuku looked thicker than him!

The only consolation he got from that was his mother declaring him ready for the trip to the dragons.

Apparently, and this was news to him, his tribe had once been full of dragon tamers. (And dragons apparently existed, wowza, wish he had know that earlier.) It made all the dragon decorations make sense. If they had a national flag or symbol, it would have to be a dragon. But, the rest of the world grew insanely jealous of their tribe's kinship with dragons, so they did all they could to either kill their tamers or steal them into their nations to use their power for their own.

Thus, hundreds of years later, dragon tamers were almost legend. One or two dragon tamers were born in a lifetime to their tribe.

And the mark of a dragon tamer was the magic of their hands, which could vary depending on the dragon their destined for.

"And since you made fire, we're going to the Burnt Lands," his mother had said.

"It's not fire, it's nitroglycerin," he'd said, just to be belligerent. He'd been cooped up in a bed and bored to death for days, he hadn't be exactly cheerful. Especially since he could remember a life where there had been TV and video games. And books. Fuck, if being illiterate didn't suck balls and make sense at the same time. His tribe didn't even have a written language, everything was oral.

His mother gave him a look.

"A dragon will help you control your power so this," she gestured to his stinted arms that were bandaged into thick poles of white. "Doesn't happen again."

"I just need to increase my strength. I'll grow into it," he said.

"Are you seriously turning down a dragon companion?"

"I'm turning down shoveling dragon shit for the rest of my life, if that's what this is."

Her eyes narrowed. "Dragons are as intelligent as you and me, brat. I'm sure it can take care of its own shit-unless your pig head bonds with an dysfunctional moron."

That line in her head repeated over and over several weeks later when the first, and only, dragon he'd ever seen slid to a stop at his feet in the black basalt gravel. It picked up its head and dropped its long pink tongue out like a happy dog.

" Baku-bro! It's you! I can't believe it! "

The voice ringing in his head, like some sort of telepathy, was none other than shitty Kirishima's.

The donkey-sized dragon didn't even give him time to think as it continued to jabber in his head as it hopped to it's clawed feet and waved its little wings around like spazed out parasols.

" It's you! It's you! Oh my gaaaaawd, I've missed you so much, and you're so smaaaaaal and so cuuuuute-that was so manly how you jumped in to save Midoriya, but shit, man, that was fucked up! It fucked me up so bad, do you have any idea what it did to your mom? It was- "

"Shut up!" he roared. He didn't want to know!

His mother, who had been gawking at the dragon, but not really acting like she heard anything, jumped a foot in the air.

"Katsuki!" she screeched. "What the hell!"

"Not you, hag, the dragon!"

"The dragon isn't saying anything!"

"In my head, Ma, in my HEAD!"

"It's talking to you in-"

" Oh, hey, there's your mom too, what's she doing here? Isn't this, like, a different world? "

"Shut up, shark face!"

"How can you talk to your dragon like that?" his mother shrieked.

"He ain't my damn dragon! I ain't done nothing!"

"He came to you, so he's your dragon!"

"You mean I don't even have a choice ? DAMN IT, WHO MAKES THESE SHITTY RULES?!"

Kirishima, bright red, scaley, with hard black horns that looked suspiciously like his old up-gelled hairdoo, dropped his jaw in a very doggy-like smile.

" I mean, there's more dragons behind me, but I- "

"Then take me to them! I wanna pick!"

" Whoa, hold on, I was the only one who sensed you coming! That's a bond if anything. They'll just kick us right back out."

"Like hell they will!"

Katsuki spent the better part of a day climbing the black ridge of volcanic rock just so he could look down into the valley, only to be looked at by several giant dragons, the size of freaking houses, and get his head filled up with telepathic laughter.

"WHAT'S SO FUNNY?!"

Him, apparently.

" Come on, man, I already said I'd be the best dragon ever ," said Kirishima. " I even gave up moving on so I could check in on you, doesn't that mean something? "

"That's exactly why I want a different dragon," he growled beneath his shoulder. "I already have one self-sacrificing idiot giving up his death for me, I ain't having two." And he clamped his mouth closed on the disgusting vomit which was his guilt over having dragged his mom and dad over from the other world on top of Izuku. What was wrong with these masochistic people wasting their time on assholes like him? His parents at least made some sense, but Kirishima? Hadn't he lived long enough to have a wife or kids or…

Katsuki didn't want to finish that thought. For all he knew, Kirishima died young like he had. The only sure thing was that, in order to get this chance, you had to die giving up your life to save someone else. Or was that just to get memories of your past life? Shit, it's been too long.

Inevitably, though, he ended up heading home. At least he still had a horse to ride. Like hell he was riding Kirishima.