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"If you're all here to form cute little packs, the doors that way."
Aizawa Shouta can feel it, how the soft, tempting tendrils of the student's souls freeze. At least, where they were creeping in his direction. He doesnt stop the curl of his lip, the whisper of threat as he turns, zipping up his sleeping bag in swift, controlled movements to start scribbling on the board.
"It took you all eight seconds to stop talking. That's not going to work. Time is precious, rational students would understand that." Work done, a brief outline of their first week drawn in crisp white chalk, and he turns, pointing at his name. "My name is Shouta Aizawa, and I'm your teacher."
There's the brief, shocked silence, familiar after four years teaching, before his entire class erupts in expected, though not welcomed, chaos.
It took far too long, and far too many muttered threats, but Shouta's adorable little pack of children eventually settle down. They're loud, brash, and some are still attempting to pack-bond with him, pseudo telepathic links pushing at the boundaries of his mind, despite how he swats them away with prejudice. He was not here to be the little leader, the gentle guiding force most of them were surely used to.
Teachers were, after all, one of the first pack bonds most children knew. It would be easy, to look out at the nervous, hopeful faces and just think 'Mine.' To allow the possessive instinct to rise up, overflow his mind.
Cloud his mind.
No one was complete without some pack bonds, at least. But Shouta Aizawa was viciously selective with who he would allow that utterly close. Two, so far. Just the two, held and protected and violently dear. Yamada and Nemuri, Mic and Midnight. His pack, small as it was. Despite everyone else enthusing on the various strengths or multitudes of their own pack bonds, the presence of others nestled against their souls. It sounds exhausting, and Shouta can't contemplate it. Much less as a teenager, where every minor panic or dispute tugs attention away from what they should be doing, a call to go racing to whatever packmate was upset. In the safety of his sleeping bag, yellow and utterly safe, currently pressed tight a familiar back, he curls his lip in a silent snarl, curling a little closer to the back in front of his face. Leather covered, and near vibrating with constant, fluttering movement, Hizashi Yamada wasn't the most restful companion, but he blocked a majority of the harsh fluorescent lighting, and the joy he was exuding was… it was nice.
Addicting, like caffeine and his juice packs, once a simple pleasure and now things he couldn’t go without now. Both Hizashi and Nerumi had other bonds, but were always… over excited when one, or more rarely both, of them managed to convince their "dour, grumpy, lame-o!" friend to take enough time to drape himself over them, to… to allow a moment of easy rest. A moment of warm bodies breathing in time, of simple knowledge that the others are near, are safe. Hizashi can never manage to stay still when they're like this, but. But it's not… it's not bad.
"Long day?" At least he's quiet, a gentle rumble against Aizawa's front, one daring hand glancing over Shouta's dark hair, pressing it down and back. "What happened, bro?"
"Kids." He finally grunts, pressing his face a little more firmly into leather-covered muscles. "Trying to pack bond."
Hizashi laughs, still quietly, because Aizawa can and has left in the middle of a good cuddle session, and pushes back a little further, hiding Shouta's face from any other staff looking a little too close. It's good enough, and while his own contented thrum could never outshine Hizahshi's bright, vibrant joy, it doesn't need to, mixing to a pleasant, cottony fog that saps any remaining annoyance from his veins.
In the staff room, shielded and safe with his packmate watching over them, Shouta Aizawa closes his eyes and sleeps.
It's later, though. That the dreams come. Memories, though he hates to admit that's exactly what they are. Illogical terrors of things that can no longer hurt him. Of being pinned down, trapped. Of the initiation, when he first was working undercover, and later. Later as torture.
The two were equally painful, though the instances were a year apart and different enough to be nearly incomparable.
One of the gang had a particularly nasty quirk, to manipulate pack bonds in anyone she touched, with just enough control to try and be gentle as she snapped them away, pressing the gang's souls in the open, weeping wounds she was causing. She'd been young, too young, and even as Shouta writhed on the dirty ground, screaming his throat raw, she whimpered alongside him, cried and apologized and told him it was going to be okay. That it was just for now, and he'd have a better pack, a stronger one. Where they all looked out for each other and were going to be the strongest and the richest and no one would dare hurt any of them, because the rest would utterly destroy anyone that tried. Because they were pack now. Strong, and sure.
And she made it so.
For a year. Shouta knew every emotion, every ounce of discomfort or ease. The entire gang, the entire group of low life criminal scum, attached to his soul. To his mind like a parasite.
He changed. In that hellscape of a year. Hardened, became more vicious than he knew how to handle, bristled and snarled and defended the gang like they were the only thing he cared about. But. They weren't. Not wholly. Not completely. Deep, deeper than any bond should rightly go, woven into his core when they should have just touched his outer edges, Nerumi and Hizashi. They shone, worry and restraint and something purer than the filth he was tied to. With them, and his logic… he could survive.
And so he did. Bloody lips and bloody knuckles, copying the gang's style and weapons, fighting alongside them. Making them stronger. All while feeding a constant stream of information to the police, building the case to ensure every one of the scumbags were brought to swift and utter justice.
But he got sloppy.
He got caught.
This time, there were no new bonds to replace the old. No sense of attempted gentleness. Nothing but snap snap snap and cold, and alone and forgotten and forsaken.
The girl, still young, too young. Is still crying, is still openly sobbing, but her hand doesn't waver, presses hard against his chest, digs into the meat of his pectoral as she rips at his psyche. Pulls the gang out by its roots, and then dives deep. Shoves her way into his mind, to the precious bonds of Nemuri and Hizashi. Takes them, and breaks them.
Shouta is suddenly, starkly, alone. Empty. Adrift and cold. Packless.
Away, far away, he can feel his throat. Raw and agonized, but still drowned out. Drowned out, by a frantic, horrified scream. By Hizashi's scream. Not. Not right outside, the building still stands. But. Where? Where? It echoes, shakes the building's foundations, because this wasn't calculated. This wasn't an attack. It was all Hizashi, opened and raw and aching and so scared it hurt. Hurt as much as the fist in his gut, the hand in his hair yanking his entire body after it, pulled by that singular grip as the criminals see flashing red and try to scatter.
It's useless.
The police are here. Half feral as Shouta was, he knew that much, knew it in his bones.
He helped, as much as he could. Formless, graceless swings. Hands that clawed themselves across vulnerability, blinded and bloodied and kept himself away from the flashing lights. They give him a headache, and even when the noise dies down, he still tucks himself away, high in the rafters of whatever building they threatened their way into using. Maybe he had helped with that one.
It's sheer luck that Hizashi is the one they send after him, the shadow where there should be no shadows.
There's not much left in Shouta, but he can recognize the man that was his best friend. The yellow, spiked hair was enough, even if Hizashi is oddly quiet, shoulders bowed in a way that wasn't like him. One hand is pressed against his throat, wincing every time his Adam's apple moved, and the look on his face, triangular glasses half off his face. It's pain, yes. But it's loss more than anything. And Shouta can feel it. Can practically see the open, empty place in the man. The place that should be his.
That is his.
Shouta doesn't intend on letting go. This man was his. His friend, his packmate. His.
His body moves on its own. Furious, protective, possessive. There's just enough in him to remember to let his back slam into the concrete, to be underneath Hizashi as he connects, wrapping arms and legs around the other man. Its instinct, disable modes of escape, wrap himself up in his friend, and slam open his mind. His soul. It's not so much a tendril, reaching out, as a typhoon. An open, unending rush of his essence, of everything that made him Shouta Aizawa, crashing down and into Hizashi. Hizashi, who gives a broken little noise, hands clawing into Shouta's back and opening his own mind.
There's time, after that. Where Shouta can't remember which body was his, who he was, if these memories were his or Hizashi's or if there was truly any difference between the two. He knows there was a third part, for a while. Remembers Nerumi, slipping in and connecting with them both, the desperate clinging from her as well, but. She got herself under control faster, separated quicker. But everything is overwhelming, is foggy, and his next clear memory is a hospital bed.
Warm, at least, with both his packmates sprawled on top of him, Nemuri in her casual clothes while both he and Hizashi wore the paper thin hospital gowns, backs open to allow more skin to skin contact. But. He's. Back inside himself. Water retreating back behind its dams, the surge extinguished and calmed. Just the aftermath to deal with.
They called it "trauma based bonding". Explained in the clearest way they could, when no one had been so viciously undone before. But…
He couldn't bond normally. Not after something like that. Any pack, any bond would be… intense. More intense than should be possible, he shouldn't be able to pull another person so deep within himself. Much less not be able to do anything else.
Normal bonds can be worn away. With time and distance and simple thought. Their endings are painful, yes, but expected. Made into sitcoms and self help books and jokes. Shouta couldn't do that. He knows it, in a grim understanding kind of way. When someone was his. They were His.
Possessive, protective, jealous. Wrong.
He kept it hidden well, how he knows he could just… pull, and both Hizashi and Nemuri would be nearly forced to his side. But. But… He can't control the nightmares. He can't control the nightmares, or the instant relief when two more bodies slip into his bed, familiar as his own. They're warm. Warm, and safe and maybe even happy, when two sets of lips press themselves into his hair, limbs tangled and brains opening, melting from three separate entities to one, ecstatic mass. Limbs are no long "mine, his, hers" but… "ours." Our arms, our legs, our voice.
"Shouta, you're thinking too loudly. Shut up." All their bodies speak. So fond, so warm. Lips lift, a smile. And… and he obeys, stops thinking, just. Allows himself to fall back to sleep, secure in the middle of his pack.
So, Shouta doesn't pack bond. To no one besides Nemuri and Hizashi.
He doesn't explain it. Doesn't excuse it. It works.
Until USJ.
Until the tiny, fragile bodies of his students are in danger. The bone breaking, blood letting kind of danger that could end with them dead or worse. Despite his warning on that first day, they had already formed packs, he could see it when one flinches and three more jerk in that direction. Can see it as some grow stronger before his eyes, drawing on the need to protect what's theirs. Adrenaline flooding their systems.
It won't be enough. Not here. Not now.
And they know it too. They can feel it, and for the first time in a month, Aizawa can feel it. The twisting, pleading tendrils. The cautious crawl of packbonds, begging him to save them. To protect them.
He can't resist. Not now. Not again.
Carefully constructed walls are ripped down, torn open. Destroyed. Left open, waiting.
His class. His class. His students. His tiny, fragile bodies to protect. They flood into his mind, attach with desperate neediness to his mind, his soul, dig themselves a home and settle in.
He can feel them. Can feel each and every one of their heartbeats. He's still himself, still Shouta Aizawa, but just. More.
Drawing deep on that, on that more just out of reach, and Aizawa snarls, slams a foot back and up. Breaks the hold Nomu has on him. He fights, like he did back then, full now, instead of empty. But just as furious, just as certain.
Villains fall beneath his hands and his capture weapon. His pack helps, taking care of each other and themselves, taking villain after villain down, using what he's taught them to survive. Pride wells, with the vicious, violently pleased sensation of breaking bone and defeating threats to his pack.
They're still going to lose, unless Iida runs a miracle, but they're going to make this loss hurt. Make it as agonizing for the league as concrete to the face is for Shouta.
He's still far too open, far too vulnerable, giving and receiving from his students. When All Might crashes in. Its… and it's too late. Another body. Another soul. But it's okay. It's okay because All Might is baring his teeth, mirroring Shouta's own bloody slash of white and red, and. Everything is alright. He was there.
Recovery Girl was… not happy. That was an understatement, as she used her cane to flick at a determined pink tongue away from the lock on his private room. Again. As in, Tsu had not yet stopped trying to break in. Despite the current time being four in the morning, on a school night.
"You finally let someone packbond with you, and it had to be twenty students?" She grumbles, though her touch is gentle as she adjusts his bandages, ensuring his comfort until she could kiss him a little better.
"And All Might." He rasps, wondering a little at the blatant lack of Mic and Midnight beside him. Normally, when his foolishness landed him in the infirmary, they'd be next to him, explicitly allowed.
"And All Might." She allows, tilting her grey tipped head, curious and too astute for her age. "He had to be sedated, to prevent him from wandering in here and stealing you away."
It's… not quite a scolding. But not quite anything else, low in deference to the cold early morning. He grunts, already aware that she would require a verbal response, but without anything to actually say. Silence, until she sighs, using her cane to deflect another attempt from Tsu, her tongue coming from the air vent this time. Which would explain the delay. She had gotten tired, apparently of the same angle of attack.
"They're taking shifts. She'll try for the next fifteen minutes, and then." She pauses, considers, "it'll be that young man, Tokoyami, next. I apologize for the light in advance, dearie."
Except. It's not Tokoyami that disturbs the quiet little hospital room. Not by a long shot.
"Oh dear. Excuse me!" Mile long limbs, and a smile brightly polished. All Might strides in, larger than life and with his own bandages crossing over his form. "I'm terribly sorry, Miss Chiyo, but I'll be borrowing my friend here!"
And… he does so.
Just scoops Shouta up with an exquisite care that doesn't quite make sense with his bulk, and strides back out the door, ducked low over Shouta's body as he's carried away.
"I'm terribly sorry, Aizawa-sensei, but the students are so worried about you." He explains, walking into 1-A to reveal…
"Did you all really make a nest? In our classroom?" That's all there is to call it. A positive mountain of sheets and pillows, bolstered with uniforms and backpacks, soft and inviting. It also explains where Mic and Midnight were, curled around a few of the more injured children, though their eyes are greedily hooked on where AllMight is carefully stepping into the erected nest, a cheerful Tsu smiling over his shoulder. Aizawa doesn't protest, doesn’t think he can with the addicting rush of 'sleepy-soft-warm-worry-concern-safety' that's like a physical drug, and he can't worry about it. Not when his kids, his pack make room for his battered body, cradling it with their own. He doesn't allow himself to fall completely, keeps his knowledge of what's his body in relation to the others… but it would be foolish, at this point, to demand a return to the infirmary. Recovery girl will know where he is and that's just going to have to be enough.
Waking up? With her small, aged form tucked under his chin?
It looks like it was.