Chapter Text
“Shouta—“
“No! Don’t touch me. Stay away from me!”
“Shouta! It’s just me, Hizashi, I’m...I’m here. You’re safe—Shouta, what’s wrong, what’s—“
“Stay back, Mic! Don’t, just...” Words seem to fail him, and Shouta screams, a raw mixture of frustration, anger and helplessness.
Silence falls, punctuated only by their harsh breaths.
Slowly, Hizashi approaches him.
“Shouta...listen to me...it’s...it’s alright. It’s just me.” Hizashi reaches him, kneeling, fingers tentatively brushing against his shoulder.
Shouta flinches, turning further away from him.
Hizashi recoils.
“Mic......Hizashi...I...” There’s another frustrated sigh, and in the midst of it all he can’t help but hear the terror in Shouta’s voice. It sends a wave of panic through him.
Shouta hardly gets scared, he rarely shows it anyway, and to hear it in his voice now...
Shouta’s fingers uncurl. Slowly, hands trembling, he pulls it away from his head, moving to cover his face instead.
He gasps sharply.
“Hizashi, please...I don’t want to hurt you...”
Shouta’s hair floats upwards, unruly and filthy. It writhes in the air, in a way it’s never done before, twisting as if they had a mind of their own, resembling Medusa’s vicious snakes. He can almost imagine them hissing.
His gaze shifts downwards, down, down, to his face, his eyes. They’re hidden from view, Shouta’s hands clamped tightly over, but he sees it anyway.
The dampness trickling from underneath his fingers down his chin, the faint red glow peeking out between the gaps.
“Shouta...” He stiffens further, cowering away.
“I can’t...I can’t control it, I don’t know what they did, but now I can’t turn it off, and I don’t know what it’ll do to people, whether it’ll just erase quirks or...or...” Shouta’s voice quivers, raspy and whispered, more afraid than Hizashi’s ever heard him be. He doesn’t finish his sentence, but Hizashi doesn’t need him to, to know the implication.
Fear grips his heart. For a moment, he can’t move. He’s just frozen in place, speechless, feeling more helpless than he’s ever felt. Seeing Shouta in such pain shatters his heart.
Then, just like they’ve done countless times before, he moves without thinking; moves to do something he’s done nearly every morning since they’d confessed to each other.
He unclasps his directional speaker, sets it carefully on the ground next to them. Then his hands wrap around Shouta’s waist from behind, gently pulling him close, such that his chest is flush against Shouta’s back.
Shouta twitches, breath hitching, but he doesn’t scramble to get away.
Slowly, Hizashi rests his chin on Shouta’s shoulder, burying his face into the crook of his neck, inhaling his scent. He doesn’t care that it smells of blood and sweat and other strange scents he can’t place. He smells Shouta, and a pulse thrums, strong and rapid, against his cheek.
It’s the most reassuring thing in the world.
“It’s alright, love. I know. You would never hurt me.” He murmurs against Shouta’s neck.
Shouta doesn’t react.
For a moment.
Two.
Then he leans a fraction backwards, into Hizashi’s arms, trembling. He’s too cold, too small in his embrace, it tears at his heart.
Hizashi hugs him tighter.
And he doesn’t let go. He holds him through it. Rides out the effects of whatever horrible drugs they pumped into him with him.
Every time he shivers, Hizashi pulls him closer, wills his own body warmth to seep into Shouta.
Every time he tenses, a quiet whine falling from his lips, Hizashi shushes him gently, strokes his hair, presses butterfly kisses to his neck.
And he holds him through it.
Until his shuddering breaths even out, shallow and soft, but present and calm, almost serene; until the glow fades from his eyes, and his hair settles back around his shoulders, onto Hizashi, who carefully brushes the locks out of their faces, tucking them behind Shouta’s ears; until Shouta’s eyes flutter close, stilling in his arms, tension melting off, the entirety of his weight falling against Hizashi.
Then, gingerly, his arms slip under Shouta’s knees, and he rises to his feet, lifting Shouta, bridal style.
Shouta’s head lolls against his chest, nuzzles into him, and for one moment Hizashi allows the reality of the present to wash over him; let’s himself stare at Shouta’s face, somehow blissfully peaceful in unconsciousness; lets himself remember the hurt and pain and suffering they’ve both endured, the memory of the desperation and fear of losing Shouta that coursed through him while he’d dashed around trying to find him, each second of failure extending Shouta’s torture.
He lets himself look at Shouta, new scars marring his body, evidence of the cruelty done to him, and be wholly, truly, saddened.
Then he pulls Shouta closer, shields him protectively from the world, cradleds his head against his heart. He wipes away the tears, plants a kiss to Shouta’s forehead, easing the arm that had hung limply off his side onto his chest comfortably.
He lets the pain fall away, in light of treasuring the preciousness he’s still fortunate enough to have held on to, and carrying his beloved starlight, leaves behind the struggles of the past, walking into the light.