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In the fall of their third year, Shouto gets hurt.
Really hurt.
He comes to in a room that isn’t on U.A.’s campus, which is his first clue that something is really wrong. His second and third clues are are the oxygen mask and heart monitor-beeps respectively. Shouto’s fourth clue is the monumental effort required to move his fingers, and not just because Katsuki is holding his hand. It’s a very gentle grip, all things considered — more of Katsuki’s hand just resting on top of Shouto’s. At least until Shouto manages to open his eyes and wiggle his thumb, at which point Katsuki startles awake and instinctively clenches his fist.
Katsuki straightens in his chair, takes one look at Shouto’s open eyes, blurts out a raspy ‘fuck’, then leaves the room.
He doesn’t come back when three nurses and a doctor stomp back into the room. Shouto is momentarily distracted from his disappointment by the nurses taking samples of his blood and fiddling with his oxygen mask. Shouto inhales shakily when the doctor asks him what his name is.
“Todoroki Shou—” he chokes, then coughs as he heaves for air. Someone shoves the mask in front of his face again and then someone else mentions a cannula and it’s taken away again. He breathes a little easier when the thing is in his nose. The doctor gives him a moment to catch his breath.
“Okay, good. Todoroki-san , you were in an accident. I’m Doctor Sakana, I’ve been in charge of your care for the past few days.” The past few days? “Is it okay if I ask you a couple of questions?”
Shouto nods, dazed, and a barrage of questions follows.
How old is he? 18. Where does he study? U.A.. Was there anyone in the room when he woke up? Yes, Katsuki. What’s the last thing he remembers? The fight.
“Good, good. Todoroki-san , both your long- and short-term memory seem intact. You were severely injured in an accident during the fight, and you’ve been in a coma for the past six days.
“I understand that this is a lot to process, but with time to heal you’ll be back to just the way you were. Now that you’re awake there are a lot more treatment options, and we’ll send for someone with a suitable healing quirk once you’ve recovered a bit more.”
Shouto nods along. “He… um. The person who was with me, Katsuki Bakugou.”
“We’ll see if we can find him and tell him you asked for him,” Doctor Sakana says.
One of the nurses hands him a cup of water, and he nods before turning to Doctor Sakana. “Thank you.” She smiles diplomatically at him before slipping out of the room.
One by one, the nurses also leave, until Shouto is alone with only his water, his swirling thoughts, and a prompt to call if he needs anything.
He needs Katsuki, but he hasn’t come back yet and is probably pissy and flightly as hell right now. No way the nurses are going to get a hold of him. So instead, Shouto lies on the hospital bed and listens to the beeping of the EKG as he reviews how much pain each of his individual body parts is in.
He goes from bottom to top and has just concluded that his hips feel pretty okay when there’s a tap on the door. He knows by only the knocking that it isn’t Katsuki, and tries not to be disappointed by seeing Momo after he calls ‘come in’.
That’s just the Katsuki withdrawals.
“Shouto-kun ?” Momo peeks through a crack through the door. “Oh good! Bakugou said you were awake.”
Yeah, and also I spoke to you, Shouto refrains from saying. Again, Katsuki withdrawals. “Hi, Momo.”
“Hi!” She brightens, holding up a floral-patterned thermos. “I brought sencha. I asked a nurse, she said it should be fine for you to drink.”
She makes her way into the room and sets up a little impromptu tea party on his tiny rolling table. She opens the thermos and brings out two dinky hospital mugs. Shouto clears his throat.
“Um… where is he?”
Momo looks up, her eyes wide. “Who—? Oh. Bakugou? He, um… he…” she trails off, handing him one of the filled cups. Shouto frowns at his reflection in the tea. Momo doesn’t say anything for a while, so he speaks up.
“You know what—”
“I’m sorry, Shouto-kun . I don’t know where he went.”
Shouto nods, takes a sip of his tea. Thankfully, the awkward atmosphere melts away soon enough. Momo catches him up on the things he missed during his coma. It still feels weird to think about the fact that he was in a coma, so he focuses on the things Momo tells him about her notes and their classes. (Along with the notes he’s likely to receive from Katsuki, Shouto won’t have any problems catching up.)
Where is Katsuki?
Momo stays until he has finished his tea, and some time after that. It’s nice, just having her there for company even if he can’t talk too much.
Sero walks into the room, and knocks only after all of him except his left leg is inside.
“Hey, Todoroki! Man, you look like hell.”
Shouto can’t help but crack a smile at that. “Thanks.”
“No problem.” Sero grins. He holds up a bag with the Kinokuniya logo on it. “Brought you some stuff. Three volumes and a strawberry Pocky — Mido’s on his way with a pillow and a hoodie.”
“Is he at the dorms?” Shouto asks. Sero nods. “Can he…” he takes a deep breath through his nose, “one of Katsuki’s?”
Sero grins even wider. “Sure, I’ll ask him. But damn bro, you’re whipped.”
“I wouldn’t need it if Katsuki were here .” Shouto frowns.
“I’m sorry, man.” Sero falters, but doesn’t say anything about why Katsuki isn’t here, or where he is instead of in Shouto’s hospital room. He just sits down on the edge of Shouto’s hospital bed and hands him the bag. Shouto takes it gratefully and reaches for the volumes inside. It’s number four, five, and six of the latest shoujo manga he and Sero have been co-reading. His chest warms and he looks up at Sero, who’s rifling through his own bag.
“I finished volume three while you were out, so if you just wanna chill we can read together in here.”
“Thank you, Sero. I’d like that.”
A nurse walks into the room, and Momo excuses herself to look for Katsuki. Shouto smiles wanly at her, suddenly very tired. He hears the nurse speaking to Sero, and then his sheets rustle. Sero taps Shouto’s shoulder, and he blinks up at him.
“I’ma head out for a bit, let you sleep. Midoriya’s gonna come by with your stuff later, yeah?”
“Yeah,” Shouto mumbles and lets his eyes slip shut. The lingering pain fades along with his conciousness.
⚘
He comes to with his nose buried in something soft and familiar-smelling.
“Katsuki?” he mumbles.
“Just me.” Shouto’s eyes crack open to see Izuku’s familiar green hair. “Hi, Shouto-kun . I’m glad you’re okay.”
“Hello,” Shouto says, hiking himself up on the bed. Izuku immediately gets up to help him raise the bed with the little buttons on the side. “Thanks.”
As he gets upright, something falls into Shouto’s lap. It’s a big red hoodie, and Shouto immediately recognizes it as Katsuki’s. It must’ve been what he smelled and felt when he woke up. He sits and stares at it for a while, the cheap proxy for his favourite person’s presence. It makes him a little irritated, that Katsuki would run away somewhere and let Shouto wake up from a literal coma alone and scared.
Well, he’s not alone. But he’s without Katsuki, and that’s bad enough.
He lets his head fall to the side so he can stare at Izuku with minimal effort. He has that look in his eyes, the one that makes Shouto want to disappear to a place where nobody can see him. The one that kind of makes him want to start crying, for no apparent reason other than he has a friend that cares about him.
Izuku puts a hand on his shoulder and Shouto has to stare up at the ceiling as he feels his eyes welling up with tears. “You know where Katsuki is,” he says to a stain on the acoustic paneling next to the fluorescent lights.
“Yeah,” Izuku whispers, a little like he’s afraid.
“Why isn’t he here?” Shouto allows the slightest whine to make its way into his voice. He thinks he deserves to be petty. He was in a coma, he’s entitled to it. Plus, Katsuki isn’t here to complain about it, so.
“Has anyone talked to you about it?” Izuku asks, with a gentle squeeze to Shouto’s upper arm.
“No!” Shouto sobs. “Nobody will talk to me about anything, and I—”
Izuku envelops him in an embrace. It’s warm and nice and Shouto likes it but what he really wants right now isn’t this. It’s Katsuki’s burnt-sugar smell and his wide shoulders and his spiky hair getting in Shouto’s mouth. He chokes on another sob.
“I’m scared, Izuku,” he admits.
“Shouto-kun , I’m sorry.” Izuku backs up. “Kacchan… he was here the whole time you were out.”
“What?”
Izuku nods. “He wasn’t always in school, Shouto- kun . He sat here, waiting for you to wake up. It really wasn’t looking good in the beginning, for either of you. Kacchan wouldn’t talk to anyone, he barely ate or slept. And you…”
Shouto doesn’t understand why nobody would tell him this, and is infinitely grateful for Izuku actually talking to him. No matter if it hurts to hear.
“Well, let’s just say there was a reason Kacchan sat with you all the time. It wasn’t until— what? — day three until they found a suitable healing quirk for the state you were in? They had to fly them in from Taiwan.”
That leaves Shouto reeling. He was that hurt?
Izuku’s thumb makes random patterns over his shoulder, presumably to be soothing. “It was— a lot. I’m sure it’s a lot for you right now, too.
“I think… I think Kacchan just needed a moment to let it all sink in. You know how he is.”
Shouto does know. It makes him extra angry, because he also knows that Katsuki shouldn’t be alone when he’s like this because he gets destructive and ends up making things worse for himself. He at least hopes he’s with his parents, and expresses as much to Izuku.
His face twists in a grimace. “Um.”
“Spit it out,” Shouto says, becoming more agitated by the second. He catches himself. “Sorry.”
Izuku waves his hands around wildly. “No, no! It’s okay, really. Believe me, I know what this—” he gestures to Shouto and the bed, Shouto in the bed, “is like.”
Shouto tangles his fingers together.
“Kacchan was upset. Like, really upset — but in a very Kacchan way. He’s probably pacing around the floor right now. Don’t get up.”
Shouto stops moving, partially because Izuku tells him to and partially because it makes his entire torso ache. He slumps down on the bed, fighting the urge to cry like a four-year-old.
“Izuku,” Shouto starts, but the words get stuck in his throat. He feels needy and pathetic and weak. “Can you give me…”
Katsuki would know by now. He would know just by how Shouto looked at him and said his name.
Come here, you fucking numbnut. You’re okay, Shou.
And Shouto doesn’t blame Izuku for not knowing his most intimate tells. Not at all. But…
“…a hug?”
He feels so pathetic asking.
“Oh, Shouto, of course!”
And it’s not the same.
The first tears start leaking out of his eyes and it’s downhill from there. Shouto squeezes his eyes shut but it’s like something in him has snapped. The tears don’t stop and when the last and final breath he’s been holding has been sucked dry of oxygen, a sob claws its way up his throat. It hurts and he’s out of breath and the nasal cannula feels weird and the hug is all wrong—
“Get Katsuki,” he breathes, desperate. ”Please, please, get Kat—”
He doesn’t make it any further, too out of breath to even finish his sentence. Izuku leans out of the hug and grabs his face by the cheeks. Shouto almost manages to dislodge his hands with how vigorously he’s shaking his head.
“I will,” Izuku says, “but please take a deep breath first.”
Shouto does as he’s told, drawing in a breath as deep as he can manage. Izuku lets go of his face and disappears out of the door like a green flash of lightning. Shouto pats around him blindly until his hand meets soft fabric. He picks up the hoodie and hyperventilates into it, watching with detached fascination as the fabric darkens with tears. It smells like Katsuki but it’s not Katsuki but maybe it’s all he will get today because Katsuki left even though he was supposed to stay—
The door opens, and Shouto looks up so fast that something in his neck strains the wrong way.
It’s not Katsuki. It’s a very startled-looking nurse holding a bag of clear fluid, with his dad in tow.
“Todoroki-san ?” the nurse almost whispers. “I have to change your IV, but I could wait…”
“No, no,” Shouto says, waving her in. “It’s fine.”
It’s not fine, but he’s not going to keep her from doing her job just because he’s a little sad. His dad stands in the doorway, looking as if he’s about to flee at any moment. It’s, unfortunately, a very familiar look.
“Did you want anything?” Shouto asks, perhaps a little icier than he really intended.
“Uh…” Enji says with the sort of hesitation that only started showing up after Touya came back at the end of his first year. After he decided to try to be a decent person to make up for shit that really should never be forgiven. “Just wanted to see that you were alright, son.”
“Mm.”
Enji nods, starts leaving. “I’ll come back later?”
Shouto winces as the nurse nudges his IV port a little. “Yeah, alright.”
Enji smiles, and the door barely has time to shut behind him before the nurse slips out as well. Shouto picks the hoodie back up, holding it to his chest and taking deep, shuddering breaths. When the door opens again, he doesn’t dare to look up for fear that it will be someone other than Katsuki again. He buries his face in the hoodie instead.
He doesn’t want to get his hopes up, but those steps sound awfully familiar. Like the person taking them never quite learned what proper posture is supposed to look like.
“Oi, Shou.”
He sobs into the hoodie. Finally. He doesn’t look up because he might as well get rid of the tears as soon as they fall.
Katsuki pulls on his hair until he looks up. Shouto thinks he looks awfully passive for someone who just left their boyfriend alone when he was waking up from a coma. “Why did you leave?” Shouto asks.
Katsuki doesn’t answer, just scowls at the ground to his left before letting go of Shouto’s hair and sitting down in the chair next to his bedside. “Been sittin’ here for fuckin’ ages, needed to stretch my legs.”
“Why now?” Shouto prods, getting angrier by the second. Maybe Katsuki’s rubbed off on him a little too much.
“Fuckin’ everyone was in here, and you’re telling me I had to be here too?” Katsuki grabs his hand and starts playing with his finger. The gesture really shouldn’t be as comforting as it is, especially not when they’re arguing.
Shouto’s brow knits, and he looks down into his lap. “Yes. I was scared.”
Katsuki lets his fingers fall between Shouto’s, and Shouto tightens his grip. No way is he leaving now that he finally came back.
“So was I,” Katsuki mutters, so quietly it almost can’t be heard. “Was fuckin’ weird, seein’ you like that, alright? I had to… just.”
“Just what, Katsuki?”
Katsuki stares into his eyes, clearly uncomfortable with this line of questioning. Shouto holds his hand a little tighter, as hard as he can with the needles and the bandages and tape. They hold the stare-off for a pretty good while, both of them too used to tense silences to give in early.
Katsuki folds first, naturally. “I had to go fuckin’ cry, alright!? I went to the waiting room right outside and just sat there and had a fucking cry about it like I was a five-year-old who dropped their stupid ice cream. Damn it.”
Katsuki swipes roughly at his watery eyes with his free hand. Shouto untangles their hands so he can wipe away the tears that are running down Katsuki’s cheeks.
“Don’t ever fuckin’ do that again, y’hear me Icyhot?”
“Wasn’t planning on it,” Shouto says with a wan smile. Katsuki scoffs.
“Damn right you aren’t— scoot over— I swear to god, I’ll kill you myself next time.” He sits down on the bed once Shouto has shuffled over to the side. “D’you know how bad my ass hurts after sitting in that dumb-ass chair all week?”
“You said ass twice— wait, all week?”
“Tch. Nevermind.”
“No, Katsuki—”
“I said forget it!”
Shouto is not going to forget it. “Katsuki, you were here all week?”
Katsuki sighs, and the sound could just as well have been made by a ninety-seven year old grandpa. It sounds like he summoned up all the exasperation he has in his entire body and exhaled it all at once. “Yeah, I was, okay? Surprised the nerd didn’t tell you about it.”
“He just told me you were upset and sat with me sometimes. Not all the time. ”
Katsuki laughs, short and clipped. “Sounds about right. Did he also tell you that we thought you were going to die at one point?”
“I think someone hinted at it.” Shouto shuffles a little more as Katsuki lays down on his side in the bed. They’ve done this song and dance a few times too many, so Shouto knows the drill by now. He can’t get his arm situated comfortably to let Katsuki lay his head down, so he moves back so they can share the pillow instead.
Their breaths mix in the tiny space between them. “I’m okay now, though.”
“Big words from the dumbass who couldn’t move his arm up.”
“There were tubes—” Shouto stops short when Katsuki’s warm hand places itself on his cheek. His thumb moves back and forth like a little windshield wiper, drying the last residues of tears.
“Knew you were gonna make it, though. You’re strong.”
Shouto moves his head forward and presses his lips to Katsuki’s. It’s only now that he realizes how dry his skin is, and he wouldn’t be surprised if the first thing Katsuki insists on when he gets discharged is a hot bath and a seven step skincare routine. For now, they’re both happy with the kissing, though.
⚘
“SHOUTO!” Enji tears the door open, and four heads immediately turn to shush him. He recognizes the people as Shouto’s classmates, and can name the green-haired one as Deku, Midoriya-kun . The rest he knows vaguely, but no names are associated with the faces.
In the bed, Shouto is asleep on his side, locked in a tight embrace with Dynamight, Bakugou-kun .
Enji lets the door shut quietly behind him on his way out.