Chapter Text
Shouta wakes up without remembering when he passed out.
The last thing he can recall is the devastated gleam of Hizashi's eyes, the image distorted and the sound warbled but the color so intense that he can't focus on it for long without feeling overwhelmed.
Green, green, green….then nothing.
Now, everything seems slower than it should be. The sunlight from outside is dripping through the shades and across his bed like a thick marmalade, and there's a lazy, rhythmic beep coming from his left, slightly above him.
Again, nausea coils deep in his gut, and he huffs in displeasure. It's not enough to even qualify as a huff, in all honesty–he feels too winded, breathless, to make much of a sound. His hands feel stiff and unfamiliar, as if they aren't his own, and so he can't even lift them to claw at the tubes across his face. The most he manages is to twitch his index finger a few times, then, despite the pins and needles, his entire fist.
He recognizes the feeling of waking up in a hospital. It hadn't been all that different after USJ, except this time he's wrapped up in wires and tubes in lieu of bandages and casts.
He takes another labored breath and swallows thickly, closing his eyes to stop them from burning in the combination of bright light and dry air. He remembers over-using his quirk before he was taken out, still unused to his new limits after the injuries to his orbital socket from his last traumatic fight. He's paying for it now.
He focuses on the other noises around him: soft, ragged breaths coming from the other side of the room, the chittering and droning of the machines keeping him stable, the clack of hard-heeled shoes on the sterile tile flooring of the hallway outside the ICU.
He finally pushes himself enough that he's able to grab the call button remote attached to his bedside, presses helplessly at it until his bed shifts him into a sitting position. He immediately regrets it when white hot pain sears through his abdomen, tight bandages digging into his skin.
He winces, the tiniest grunt clawing its way up his throat and disturbing the peaceful quiet of the room. There's a new noise, then–the scraping of a chair across the flooring, the hurried tap of boots across the tile, the sharp intake of breath from next to him as he meets Hizashi's gaze.
Hizashi takes the remote and reclines his bed, and the pain eases. Shouta turns his head as best he can to read the labels on his IV fluids, to see what they're giving him, but his vision is still too blurred, his surroundings dreamlike.
"Don't move your bed," Hizashi scolds gently, placing the remote out of his reach. "You can't put any unnecessary strain on your wounds right now."
Shouta blinks at him, hopes he understands the meaning–'then when?'
"Or for the foreseeable future," Hizashi adds, a strained smile on his face. "They really fucked you up, Shou. You should have called for backup."
Shouta manages a small nod at that. He remembers flashes of the fight–he'd been outnumbered, and their quirks had been strong. There was only so much he could do, and when a ceiling beam broke under the strain of his capture weapon, the fight was as good as over.
"The police have captured two of them so far," he continues, pulling Shouta's blanket up to cover his arms. He's grateful for the information. "They have leads on the others. Your civilians are safe, too."
All's well that ends well, Shouta thinks.
"But you paid for it in blood. Do you have any idea how much you lost?" Hizashi asks. There's a sharp edge to his voice, and ah, here's the lecture Shouta had been waiting for.
"A lot," he croaks, wincing. He thinks back to the room he'd been prepared to die in, to the obscene amount of red puddled beneath him.
"A lot," Hizashi echoes, nodding. "At least forty percent of it. You went into hypovolemic shock, Shouta, they weren't even sure that blood transfusions could help you with the state you were in. You almost died."
"Almost," Shouta reminds him, exhaling sharply through his nose.
"Yes, almost," Hizashi spits. He takes a moment to rub at his temples. His voice is more controlled when he speaks again. "As in, like, almost almost."
"Still alive, though," Shouta mumbles.
"Right. Until I kill you myself for having to spend an entire thirty minutes believing you died in my arms."
"Should've," Shouta muses, eyelids drooping. "You're warm. Would've been a nice way to go."
His vision is still blurred, but it's sharp enough now that he can see the way Hizashi clenches his jaw, the way he wrings his hands together in his lap and picks at his nail polish, a nervous habit he'd never quite been able to shake.
There are alarm bells going off in the back of Shouta's mind, he knows he's being too candid, knows that Hizashi's going to catch on to the implications of his words sooner or later, probably already has if the conflicted expression on his face is anything to go by.
Still, Shouta feels calm. He thinks it might be the medication they're giving him–he hasn't been able to let his mind wander to this topic in a very long time without feeling infinitely guilty, uncharacteristically anxious, overwhelmingly panicked.
"Shouta," Hizashi growls, shaking his head. "C'mon, don't…it'd be a nice way to live too, you know? I didn't want to do this now, I wanted to…but you started it, I can't get your goddamn voice out of my head."
Shouta arches an eyebrow. He'd said something, then? It was hard to recall–everything before he passed out was like liquid, like smoke; he couldn't quite grasp the memories, could only conjure up glimpses. He remembered Hizashi finding him, remembered the blood coating his hands as he tried to hold back the flow, remembered Hizashi's eyes, bright and panicked and pleading.
He'd told him he loved him, hadn't he? It had been selfish, but he finds that if he focuses hard, he can remember seeing devastation flash across Hizashi's expression, remembers the way he had wanted to make it better, had wanted to make it go away, had wanted, had needed Hizashi to know.
"Ah," Shouta sighs, finally sliding his eyes closed. "That's right. Sorry for doing that to you."
"Shou, please dont be," Hizashi sputters. He leans forward to take his hand, lacing their fingers, and then laughs. The sound of it forces a smile that Shouta can't quite hold back, but he finds that he isn't entirely upset about it. "I love you too, you know?"
Shouta cracks an eye open in time to see Hizashi lean closer, feels the feather-light press of lips against his temple, his cheek, his nose, and hums to himself.
"I don't," he replies honestly. "But I'd like to."
"Don't worry," Hizashi huffs, pressing their foreheads together, "I'm never, ever going to let you forget it."
" 'm glad." Shouta leans in the rest of the way, finally catching Hizashi's mouth with his own. The kiss is brief, but it's urgent; and the drugs coursing through Shouta's veins make it that much more unbelievable that he gets to do this every day for as long as Hizashi will let him.
"Me too," the blonde agrees, squeezing his hand. "I'm sick of wasting time."