Katsuki grumbled as he aggressively tapped his foot.
Resisting the urge to check his phone for the fourth time in the last five minutes.
It was pretty late for him to be up, and he had asked Izuku to come and meet up with him to talk about some important crap.
Things seemed to have calmed down since Izuku texted him about castrating someone, and he didn't want to put this shit off any longer than was necessary.
He was currently waiting outside so Izuku was going to be along soon.
Which Izuku did, a little out of breath and looking for all the world like the worried puppy as he rushed over to him.
"What's wrong?" Izuku asked immediately.
Katsuki tsked and began to sign 'Why the fuck do you act like the world's ending when you get a 'we need to talk about something important' text?'
Izuku flushed and rubbed the back of his neck.
"Sorry, just you don't really text me like that out of the blue." Izuku apologized bashfully.
Well, he'd have to give the fucker that point, he normally waited to see him on Thursdays when they needed to talk about something.
'That's because we need to talk about something important and I wanted to give you time to get your shit together for it dumbass.' Katsuki signed back.
"Talk about what?" Izuku asked somewhat confused.
'Do your friends know what I did to you?' Katsuki questioned, unsurprised when Izuku's shoulders hunched in, and he avoided Katsuki's eyes.
"No." Izuku quietly muttered back.
Katsuki tsked, shaking his head.
Izuku had become much better at holding him accountable for his shit, and respecting himself as a person but he was still pussy footing around their crappy past.
Unintentionally or not Izuku was trying to bury the past, which would have been fine if their past hadn't been more toxic than a barrel of nuclear waste.
'You can't keep that crap from them.' Katsuki signed back.
"I know." Izuku admitted, rubbing one of his arms, then leaned on the same wall he was and let his head hit the wall as he stared up at the sky above.
"I know they should know; they need to know to make a fully informed decision of whether they want to hang out with you." Izuku said a minute later.
Katsuki could practically hear the reasons why Izuku hadn't told them even if Izuku knew better than to say them.
'I just didn't want them to think you were still a bad person, Katsuki.'
'I wanted them to get to know you first so they could see you're different now Katsuki.'
Katsuki grabbed Izuku's shoulder and shook it to make him look at him.
'I'm going to tell them next Sunday. Do you want to be there or not dumbass?' Katsuki asked and watched as Izuku's face fell.
"Yeah... I'll be there Katsuki." Izuku told him and began to hug himself "Thank you for telling me first." Izuku muttered, his mind clearly already working to do damage control for the future shitshow that was going to go down.
'I told Potty and Patchy too, they wanted to come but I told them to fuck off and stay home.' Katsuki informed him.
"Are you sure?" Izuku asked concerned.
Katsuki tsked and signed 'If one of your friend's tries to fuck me up, then it's just that bitch karma catching up with me and you'd pull them off before they screwed me up that bad.'
Izuku sighed "Of course I would." he agreed "I just hope Uki doesn't try to knife you." Izuku commented.
Katsuki frowned but ultimately did think that Newton fucker would absolutely knife his ass if she had one on her.
He'd deserve it but Newton did not need that crap on her record.
Katsuki already had his plans for the conversation made.
He'd texted Izuku and his friends to meet at his house and go out into the woods nearby, it would be in a public place they knew somewhat and could leave easily.
It would also not be too public so they wouldn't have to worry about anyone seeing them attack him, which Katsuki was expecting at least one of them to punch him out for it.
Most likely Newton fucker since she would be the one with the balls to do it.
Katsuki also had told his parents what he was going to do and his old man had a first aid kit at the ready just in case, and as annoying as his hag was being when she hugged him, Katsuki did appreciate her offering to re-set his nose if Newton fucker broke it.
He'd also thought about how he was going to explain it all to them, including if he was going to be interrupted a lot by their questions.
And to keep himself from blowing up at them he blew up a few of the dolls Potty made for him, to burn off some of his nerves.
Katsuki knew what reaction he'd get, including the idea that it might go nuclear, and they would try to cut him off from Izuku.
Which would be shitty, but fully understandable considering how bad it all got.
He was Izuku's main tormentor for almost a decade and had hurt Izuku in some pretty horrifying ways, all while being a total bastard to him for most of the time.
If for whatever reason they weren't pissed off at him he'd be the one to snap because any decent person should be rightfully concerned and have some pointed questions about why they were still hanging out with each other.
Izuku had come over early as well and hung out for a bit that morning, his own nerves being the obvious reason for him coming over, though he tried to pretend that he was much calmer about the whole thing.
Thankfully before Izuku lost his crap in worrying, his friends arrived and they happily greeted each other, all clearly excited to go out and have a walk around the woods.
Though Katsuki was certain that Eldritch fucker had clocked this wasn't going to be a nice romp through the woods like some Disney movie.
"So, why'd you invite us out Cat? You're not the friendliest alley cat and not usually the one to get us to hang out?" Hatrack asked saddling up to him.
Katsuki tsked shoving his hands into his pockets, because of course Izuku would befriend people that would notice a change in him.
"Just got some shit we need to clear out." Katsuki answered making sure not to look anywhere in Izuku's direction when he spoke.
He'd made progress to speak around Izuku, but he still couldn't look at him while talking or directly talk to him, that crap still felt too much like a loose cannon for him to try.
Signing worked just fine since he had been practicing it with others now.
Hatrack nodded "Cool, cool." Hatrack said then just continued walking around until Katsuki made all of them stop in one of the clearings.
Motioning for Izuku to know it was 'time' and Izuku was quick to move so he was out of Katsuki's line of sight.
"Okay you dumbasses, there's some crap that we need to talk about and to clear the fucking air." Katsuki told them leaning back against a tree.
"Eh, what do you want to talk about?" Newton asked sitting on a rock and paused from drinking her water bottle, likely thinking they were just taking a break.
"How much did that idiot actually tell you about me?" Katsuki replied jabbing a thumb over at Izuku, and saw the confusion cross the three faces.
"Mido-Kun told us that you two have been friends with each other for years and that you've know each other forever." Eldritch answered for them.
Katsuki groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose.
"We were, but there more to our personal shit than that." Katsuki said before crossing his arms.
"I'm pretty fucked up in the head, I got E.D. from my hag." Katsuki informed them and Hatrack held his hand up "Yes Hatrack?" Katsuki asked.
"I'm probably the odd one out here but the fuck is E.D?" Hatrack questioned "Like there are a lot of illness and mental crap so I just want to be sure which of them you're talking about." Hatrack explained after a moment.
"Technically it's officially known as 'Intermittent explosive disorder', but me and the old hag drop the 'I' because it doesn't matter to us that much, and it boils down to our brains not being wired the same way and that making us more likely to rage and have fits where we get violent." Katsuki explained for him.
"My old man and my hag have some bite and burn marks from when I've had fits and attacked them for trying to stop me from raging." Katsuki threw out to give them an example.
"Ah, got it, I think." Hatrack replied giving him a thumbs up to continue.
"The big problem with having a fucked-up brain like mine is that when I'm stressed or someone winds me up, I will almost always lose my crap or get thrown into a fit." Katsuki told them.
"And I'm sure you can fucking imagine just how that would screw me up when I grew up in the same toxic place with this dumbass over there," Katsuki pointed out.
He saw sympathy cross their faces, but Katsuki was quick to continue speaking.
"Which made things worse, but I was already acting like a shithead to Izuku before then." Katsuki said.
"When I heard Izuku was a two-toes, I was a little shit to him about it at first because I thought he broke his promise to me to become heroes together, and I was still a little bastard until my old man pulled me aside to correct me on some of the shit the adults were saying." Katsuki explained to them.
Newton rubbed the back of her neck.
"Well, you were pretty young then, and I kind of understand how you might have felt betrayed as a kid back then." Newton commented a bit uncomfortably.
"I ain't finished Newton fucker, hold your tongue until I finish." Katsuki corrected.
"If it was just me being a dumbass kid, I wouldn't have brought this crap up, but it wasn't just toddler shit I did to Izuku." Katsuki further informed them.
"Because once I was over that I got pissed with Izuku for not training with me and just messing around with his notebooks." Katsuki elaborated for them.
Watching them look a bit irritated over that comment but Katsuki held his hand up.
"Izuku's biggest strength is his brain, but if we were going to be heroes, especially if we were fighting a bigoted system that wouldn't let him fucking try, then he would need to be able to punch a bastard out too." Katsuki explained to them, getting some begrudging nods.
"But all the dumbass did was write in those books, he didn't do shit to physically train himself which annoyed me, so I tried to bait him into fighting with me just so he'd do some kind of training... I said a lot of crap to him to try and get him mad enough to punch me or something, and when that didn't work, I tried to force him to fight me." Katsuki detailed, clenching his arms.
"You bullied him." Eldritch said his eyes narrowed, Hatrack looked like he was about to tell Eldritch not to jump to conclusions, but Katsuki spoken up first.
"Sure, as shit I did, and it all came to a head three years ago when I put his ass in the hospital with bone fractures and a TBI." Katsuki coldly informed them.
Newton was immediately to her feet and shouted, "You did what?!" looking furious.
"Uki-" Izuku tried to defend him, but Katsuki held up his hand, something that wasn't helping how angry the three of them looked when Izuku immediately shut himself up.
"Izuku, due to some twisted fucked up sense of loyalty to me, lied to everyone about the crap going down between us, and with no one knowing what I did aside from the negligence bigots at the school and our bastard classmates, the shit I was doing escalated until I was doing crap that could have killed him if I wasn't as careful." Katsuki flatly informed them.
"I- How could- " Hatrack began to sputter.
"Because I was getting close to my breaking point, after years and years of watching Izuku do nothing to make something of himself and just spiraling deeper and deeper into his notebooks, I was starting to lose hope that he'd ever get out of the depressive slump that quack that told him he was a two-toes put him in." Katsuki told them, gritting his teeth.
"You fuckers only knew the Izuku that left that shit behind him and started building up the red lights out of pure fucking spite and kindness, you didn't have to watch day by goddamn day as he wasted away just letting everyone and their mother tear him apart." Katsuki spat venomously.
"I did, and if I'm being honest, it scared me the hell out of me as each day the boy I grew up with was losing everything that made him who he was and becoming someone, I couldn't fucking recognize as he clung to those damn books. Becoming someone... " Katsuki said before letting his head hang.
The word hollow coming to his tongue and sitting on it painfully, he would never say that crap, not out loud but that's what Izuku felt like back then.
Like some hollow mindless doll sometimes you could do anything to, and he'd still have the stupid fucking grin on his face.
"I fucked up, and lashed out, letting my frustration and fear hurt Izuku when I should have been his fucking rock and done more to protect his ass from all of the shitheads around us." Katsuki confessed with his head hung lower.
"I used my quirk on him, kicked him while he was down and probably caused more than one of his mental issues with all of the crap I did. I am a sick son of a bitch that got off easy for it because I went to therapy and had a victim the law wouldn't give two shits about." Katsuki told them.
"Why he still wants anything to do with my toxic ass, I don't know. Even though I ain't that same person anymore and won't ever let me be that bastard again, he shouldn't want anything to do with me." Katsuki said before lifting his head.
"But I ain't about to let you idiots try and befriend me without knowing all of the shit that went down between us, or how much of a trainwreck I am." Katsuki told the three, watching as they all looked at him.
Hatrack seemed to be utterly lost and betrayed looking as he looked between him and Izuku.
Eldritch was silent and angry.
Newton on the other hand, was shaking in her anger and the next second she was rushing over to him, and Katsuki made no attempt to protect himself from the swing of Newton's fist.
The crack of bone echoing in the thicket while Katsuki fell to the ground, his hand went to hold his now broken nose that was pissing blood, and hurt like a motherfucker.
"You- You-" Newton tried to say standing above him but unable to finish.
Katsuki looked back up to see Newton's hand held up in a fist and shaking as if she was held back from giving him a second punch, before it was forcefully lowered and Newton turned away from him and stomped off into the woods.
Eldritch and Hatrack quickly following her, Izuku hesitating and looking back to where he was sat on the ground holding his nose, before Izuku too was quick to follow after his friends.
Katsuki sighed then pushed himself back to his feet and started heading back to his apartment.
At least he told them.