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The Other Side Of The Radio

Summary:


The static-crackle-screech of the radio is hurting Izuku's ears. A lot of him hurts a lot worse, but the walkie-talkie is vibrating against his hand, the noise a sharp thing against his brain, and he wants it to stop.

Sometimes there is something almost discernible in the crackle, words or syllables that might just be familiar, voices much the same, but none of it is there enough to register with him and his wandering mind. His arms aren't really there, and his legs might not be either, he thinks, but his ribs are, because they're tight and strained and rubble-crushed aching, maybe, he dreads, because he can barely feel it but for the fact that one thing he knows, the only thing he's sure about right now, is that he just can't breathe-

Notes:

For my server's fifth Spring Equinox prompt: radio. I had far too much fun with this one.

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

 

 

The static-crackle-screech of the radio is hurting Izuku's ears. A lot of him hurts a lot worse, but the walkie-talkie is vibrating against his hand, the noise a sharp thing against his brain, and he wants it to stop.

 

(He wanted everything to stop, minutes-moments-millennia ago-)

 

Sometimes there is something almost discernible in the crackle, words or syllables that might just be familiar, voices much the same, but none of it is there enough to register with him and his wandering mind. His arms aren't really there, and his legs might not be either, he thinks, but his ribs are, because they're tight and strained and rubble-crushed aching, maybe, he dreads, because he can barely feel it but for the fact that one thing he knows, the only thing he's sure about right now, is that he just can't breathe-

 

The radio is still being noisy and he still kind of wants it to be quiet, but he also thinks he needs it. It's important, right? Izuku-Deku-rawbloodbonesnerves is sure it is.

 

He nudges it. He- he can barely even feel his arm, the faintest tingles along what he isn't even sure is his scars but feels like it should be, valleys of lightning-static that feels like the crackles of the noise in his ears, shuddering through him, along his fingers and palm and wrist, but he tries to move it all the same, hearing a little scrape of something against something, barely coherent enough to really process that fact or what it is.

 

Perhaps because of him trying (did he fail or succeed? what has he done, did he do anything at all, what was he meant to do...?), the jagged chattering noise swelling somehow, louder, more frantic, more pressure. It sounds a little like shouting. Like somebody is yelling at him, like he's in trouble, and he shudders with the fear abruptly sparking down his spine, arcing between the disconnected pieces of his vertebrae, floating islands bridged by agony and terror and- and-

 

He inhales wrong, hitching, catching, a drag of dust in his throat, thick with an iron tinge, rusted. It's shards-sharp. Izuku nearly convulses with it, whatever he can feel of his body shuddering, spasming, struggling, everything seeming to fall apart within him, around him, aching in hammer-falling arcs. He hurts. He hurts so, so much, and he's woozy, closing his eyes until it puts him close to throwing up, he thinks, something sour-slick twisting through him.

 

Izuku feels bad. Wrong. He- Everything is heavy and sharp around him, yet he feels like he's floating, body distant, barely tethered by the agony of it all, too-close and too-far all at once. 

 

The radio is getting louder again, Izuku thinks, but all he feels-hears-knows is the echo of his own keening, of the noise he can't help but seep through every fraction of him, and he wants to pay attention to the thing that should be important, to what he is still mostly sure matter, but he just- He just can't. (He was talking to someone, wasn't he? And the person- they were worried. Except maybe it was more than one person, and maybe they weren't worried yet, or maybe they were, Izuku isn't sure. Either way, they're worried now. They're full of rising volumes and syllables that he barely recognises or knows or understands, but they feel like what he wants to react to. Like he wants to make sure they aren't worrying about him-)

 

There are noises other than the static-sharp chatter, all of a sudden, between one blink and the next (between catching, barely-there breaths that have his ribs protesting, straining, fighting-). Different noises. Scraping, rumbling, echoing noises that are a relief and pain all of their own.

 

Then there's light-breath-freedom, ribs shifting, shuddering. Izuku's world promptly goes black.