Chapter Text
I used to love when the ocean would sing it’s morning song to me; Listening as the foaming waves would crash up against the rocks, and extend it’s misty dew upon my face as a fresh ‘hello’. I used to love when the sand- that had been capturing heat throughout the day- would warm my feet as it slid between the tight creases between my toes. I remember how much I used to love climbing palm trees and grabbing as many coconuts as I could, before my mother would caution that I was ‘too high’, and to ‘get down from there’.
I used to love the ocean. How unfortunate that my love for something so beautiful, would capture me like a child catching fireflies.
Now that I think about it, ‘trapped’ seems like a better word to describe it.
In the beginning, I marked the palm trees so I wouldn’t lose track of how many days it’d been since I washed up on an unfamiliar shoreline. The rough trunk of the tall trees- they couldn’t be any taller than 10 feet- had been scratched into as high as my arms could reach while standing as high as I could on the balls of my feet. I don’t remember the last time I had a decent foot massage. I could really use one; they were so calloused and dry.
When I first got here, I counted 15 palm trees. Maybe 12, considering my vision wasn’t the clearest on day one. Or, maybe it was 10? 11? I’ve lost track again.
I would sit and wait, for an entire day by the shoreline- just to see if someone- anyone, would come by and help. I looked out into the vast, blue hole that was the ocean. My ocean. The same waters that had taken me prisoner and drifted me onto land.
The island itself wasn’t very big. I’ve walked around it in less than an hour. It couldn’t be any more than 2- maybe 2 and a half miles in perimeter. At that point, I wasn’t sure what I was more scared of: Not finding any supplies from the wreck, or confirming that I am truly- without a doubt- alone in my survival.
20 palm trees, now.
“I wasn’t sure what to do first when I arrived,” I told the reporter. A tall, rugged man who smelled like a fresh shower. Men’s body wash was such a forgeign smell to me now. My nose crinkled in slight disgust from how heavy the smell lingered off the man’s body.
“We just need to know about the events that took place after the wreck, Mr. Midoriya,” the man interjected, adjusting himself in his seat as he held the microphone closer to my face.
“Bakugou,” I corrected, “My last name is Bakugou. I’ve been married for over 4 years. I would also like to see my husband, please.”
“We aren’t sure that’s a good idea just yet, Deku,” Ochako stated, her eyes glancing over to her reporter partner.
How long had I been gone? Really? Ochako was with some no-name fool who didn’t have a single regard for others’ feelings. How uncharacteristic of her to find someone with little-to-no emotion behind his words. She was always such a sweet, bubbly face in high school. Then again, I haven’t spoken to her in years. She’d been so distant since that day, and I never found out why.
“I don’t care what you think is best for me; I want to see Katsuki,” I demanded, my brows furrowing in annoyance. “I’ve been away for months, and the only thing you can think of is your precious story. What happened to you, Ochako? This is so...unlike you.”
The jab to her personality seemed to strike a nerve. An expression of hurt, but also confusion, stemmed up her face.
“Please, Deku,” she continued, trying her best to stay professional, “People were worried about you for nearly six months.”
‘Six months’ were the only words to echo in my head. I could’ve sworn I’d only been there 30 days. Maybe even 32. Six months is so much time. How did Katsuki function without me?
“We’ll write down everything you say. Please, just...talk to us. Talk to me.” That last phrase seemed to stir something up in her partner. His face contorted in a fashion of jealousy, and he averted his eyes to another part of the room that didn’t have his girlfriend in the picture.
But I saw the gleam of hope in her chocolate-colored irises. They seemed to sparkle after asking so nicely; like freshly watered plants after a damp, cold rain. I haven’t seen her make that face in years. It was so refreshing to get a feeling for the old Ochako again. I had such a crush on her back in high school, too. Always so nice to people, and that determined attitude she had seemed to be the only thing to stick with her throughout the years.
I let out a sigh, thinking over how I should start.
“Alright, then. I suppose I should start at the very beginning, right? I’ll skip some details so I don’t bore you two to death.”
The two looked forward once more, leaning in slightly to get a clear statement. I was certain that this story may take awhile to tell. I don’t remember most of what happened, and I’m even more certain they won’t believe a single word I tell them as my tale progresses.
“I won a 1-week cruise from a radio station,” I started, “And I went alone because Kaachan had to work. I knew I should’ve checked the cruise-line before even so much as stepping onto the ship, but I was so excited that I hardly had a chance to research it. It was my own fault for getting into the mess I did. I think about that every night before bed, too. I think about how cold, lonely, and afraid I was for all that time I was stranded on that Godless, unforgiving slab of land. Y’know,” I started to deviate, “I always saw in movies that drinking the ocean water would make you hallucinate, but I never thought it was true until about four days into my survival.”
The details after were starting to become fuzzy to me. I wasn’t sure what was fact, and what was fiction. But, they were just doing their jobs, and I’m sure they wanted the entirety of the story.
“A few people from our class were there, I think.”
“Wait,” the rude reporter stalled, “I thought you said you were alone?”
“Do you want to hear the story or not?” I questioned with an irritated tone.
He sat back in his seat, taking in a deep breath and letting out an exhale as his back hit the padded part of the chair. Then I continued.
“I washed up on shore alone, yes. But it never felt like I was by myself for the entire time I was there. It felt as if...I was talking to someone everyday, just to keep my sanity.”
The unforgiving waves of the midnight ocean crashed over me like a weight of anxiety and fear. They dragged and drowned me deep into its cold belly of water before spitting me out on unfamiliar territory. I was sure I was dead. I was sure I had died from drowning in those waters. But Heaven forbid I died at the age of 24 from a b-rate shipwreck. These sands weren’t warm between my toes like back home. It was damp and clumpy. I woke up coughing my lungs out, hoping to get all of the salt water out of my system. When I looked around, the only thing I could see were trees. At least 10 of them. There wasn’t much else I could make out in the dead of night, and my body was so exhausted from being thrown around in water, that I passed out about as soon- and as quickly- as I had woken up.
That morning, I woke up again with a splitting headache. I finally realized that my dream had been all but real.
Sand. Water. Palm trees. A few rocks.
The first thing I did was panic.
“Hello!? Hello!? Is anyone there!?”
I walked all the way around the shoreline, holding my head in pain as I screamed and cried out for help; hoping someone would answer me.
“I’m here!” I heard a voice yell back. It sounded so familiar to me, and I was eager to confirm if my suspicions of the voice were true.
“Hello!?” I yelled out again, coming around the bend to find Kaminari propped up against a large boulder, his legs outstretched in front of him. His clothes had been tattered and worn to the point of ripping in various places. The sky blue t-shirt he was wearing was already starting to lose it’s curved form around the neck, drooping lower than he’d originally bought it. His dark brown shorts had already been torn at the bottom hem on both legs and wrapped around his shins to hopefully piece his broken bones back in place.
“Hold on,” the reporter interrupted again. But before he could point anything out, Ochako stopped him. She shook her head, indicating that he just sit there and listen.
“Kaminari! Oh, thank God I found you here! How did you get here anyways? What happened? Everyone thought you were dead! Is this where you’ve been? Can you stand?” I interrogated, worried for the blond who seemed to have washed up on shore with me.
“All I remember is that the ship went down, and I woke up here a few hours ago. But both of my legs are broken. I can’t feel them, let alone anything from the waist down.” His breathing started to get heavy, and he sounded as though he was having an asthma attack. He was beginning to panic. “Dude, how the hell am I gonna survive out here if I can’t walk, man!? I-I’ll fucking die within a day because of this!”
“Denki, calm down,” I tried to sooth, “The good thing is that we’re together, okay? As long as one of us can walk around, we’ll be fine. I promise. People must know we’re missing by now. It can’t be much longer before help comes along.”
I looked down at my hands, running my fingers over each other in a subtle fit of mourning. I knew Denki wasn’t truly there. Well, at the time I didn’t, but back in reality, I knew. He hadn’t been around in about a year beforehand. Nobody knew what happened. He just up-and-left one day and never came back. Denki and I were pretty close after high school. He’d hang out with Katsuki much more, but he never ceased to brighten my day. As we got older, he’d be off doing something daring. Sometimes we wouldn’t see him for a few days, then he’d come back into our lives as if nothing happened.
When word got out that Denki was officially missing, and then declared ‘deceased’ a few weeks later, that’s when our friend group became strained. Everyone from high school had gone their separate ways. Maybe that’s why Ochako acts the way she does now, because she doesn’t want to feel the same way she did back then. But to me, that’s not a valid enough reason to abandon your friends. Denki going ‘missing’ wasn’t a good enough excuse for me. We all knew he did that sometimes; disappear. Denki never would’ve--
“How long did you and Denki stay together, Deku? You came home alone, and the Coast Guards said there was nobody else there that could’ve made it. What happened?” Ochako questioned in a soft voice.
“Denki wasn’t there, Ochako. He never was. You and I both know what happened to him.”
The room fell silent, and shuffling from the other reporter filled the room.
“What happened?” he asked.
Neither of us wanted to answer. The wound was still fresh. But I just had to go and open my big mouth.
“Ironically, they found him at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean with plankton living in his nose. Would you like me to describe it to you the same way to coroner did? Or should I reserve that right for someone who isn’t an asshole?”
“Deku-,” Ochako snapped under her breath.
My gaze was locked on to the man sitting across from me. Everytime he moved, that damn smell of body wash wafted through the air. So strong and potent. It made me sick to my stomach. He never let his eyes off me, either, though. A staring battle ensued before Oachako interrupted one again.
“We’ll move past the Denki situation, alright? Just-...how about you tell us how you called for help.” Her legs adjusted in a crossing fashion, attempting to keep herself comfortable in the fold-out chair she’d been given.
“...Fine,” I retorted, my glare still held. “I looked for as many rocks as I could to try and spell out ‘SOS’. You know, like they do in the movies. The one thing that I did notice, though, was that there weren’t very many palm trees. I wasn’t exactly sure if it was my mind playing tricks on me, o if the island was so small that I could literally see the other end of it through the little amount of palm trees. That’s when I got the idea to write on them to keep track of the days.”
Ochako scribbled something down before asking another question. “Only 10 palm trees on an island that has a 2-mile perimeter? That seems...unrealistic, don’t you think?”
“That’s what I thought, too. But it seemed like, with every passing day, there was one more tree than the day before. I didn’t think much of it, since I wasn’t actually counting the number of trees, but when day four came around, I was starting to question it.
“Say, Deku, I never got a chance to ask you how your wedding went,” Denki started, looking over at his friend with a sweet smile, “I’m sorry again for not being able to make it. Being a traveling hobo has its downfalls,” he laughed.
I chuckled with him as we sat at the shoreline, reminiscing about the old days before all of this craziness happened. I had taken a seat to the left of Denki, who seemed to have calmed down and accepted that they were stranded for a few days.
“It was great, actually. Katsuki looked so handsome in his white tux. He tried really hard not to cry when I walked down the aisle. It’ll be our official 4-year anniversary in a few weeks. Once we get back home, you’re invited.”
We shared another laugh before looking back at the ocean. Somehow, I felt calm. Just like I did when I was back home, looking out into the vast blue. I took a deep breath, taking in the salty air as much as I could and letting my eyes shut for a moment. My head tilted up towards the sky, allowing the sun to kiss my face with it’s warmth.
In this moment, I didn’t realize I wasn’t talking to Denki. I wasn’t talking to anyone but myself. I couldn’t make out that the reality of my situation didn’t allow for down time like this. The dry bones of a different victim had been sprawled out and propped against the boulder that my back had rested on. The decaying remains of someone else seemed to be the only other ‘person’ around, and my mind could only keep itself together if it thought it was someone close to me.
And I was truly alone once again.