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There’s an ache in his bones as he watches him, the boy he’s trapped with him. Hisashi watches in silence as the boy--freshly quirkless once more presses further back, as if he can somehow disappear from the man.
He’s smaller than he thought he would be, tense and quaking as if the hero he’d been for so many had disappeared with his quirk.
Worst of all, perhaps, is the bruising along his face--the swelling in his eyes, and down his jaw. His nose is bloody--perhaps broken--and his clothes are torn in a way that suggests that he might have broken a bone or two as well.
Something inside of him begs to hold him. Begs to take him off the concrete he tries to sink into, and hold him as he had the day he was born, and all too few times after. He wants to. Hisashi wants to do nothing more than to make up for the long years that have been lost between them. In his mind however, he’s terrified of how fragile he is, of how small he was--how small he had been.
How easily he could break him into pieces.
He couldn’t. He’s able. If he wanted to, he could shred him by his cells. Leave him to rot over and over again. But he can’t. He couldn’t. He can’t imagine wanting to hurt a hair on his head. Wanting to hurt him feels like a cardinal sin, and it’s the only one that’s ever mattered to him. A part of him is begging to hold him, but the rest of him feels the strength in his hands, and feels as if the mere thought of touching him--of trying to bring something gentle to his hands is impossible.
Hisashi is not kind, is not gentle--and the only ones who had known him as such hadn’t spoken to him in almost a decade.
It feels like some kind of horrible act, as if reaching out for his own flesh and blood with such tainted hands was something evil. Something so damned, and cruel that even he shouldn’t be able to do it.
But he needs it. He needs to feel the weight of his son in his arms more than he’s ever needed air, or water, and he’s sure that if he doesn’t have it soon he may very well turn into ash.
Izuku’s violent flinch when he does reach for him does not deter him. Izuku, his beautiful, wonderful son jerks backwards, as if he could press himself further into the concrete behind him, trying to hide from Hisashi’s reach.
His skin is cold to the touch, and in the moment Hisashi’s not sure if his shivering is from fear, or the cold. In the back of his mind he thinks of giving the boy his coat--not that he could look away from him now. Not after so long. Not now.
He lifts the boy's head manually, ignoring the glint of tears in his eyes. He will pretend it’s not there. Hisashi runs a thumb up his jaw, traveling to run it over his freckles over and over again, until Hisashi can feel nothing but the cold path of his skin under his thumb.
Izuku’s chest heaves as he breathes, as if it’s either a great effort, or the boy is terrified. Hisashi knows which one he prefers, even if it is the least likely. His nostrils flare, and once more, there’s more tears for Hisahsi to wipe away.
“ Please .” Izuku’s breathing hitches despite the effort, cutting his plea off with a whine. He whines again, sobs shaking in his chest, as he struggles to breathe through his panic. He shushes him, as though somehow it will change a decade worth of absence, and everything else he’s left him alone with.
He needs to say something. Say or do something that will somehow fix everything. He finds however, that nothing he has to say will fix anything. There is nothing that can, or will erase anything--much less everything he’s done to his boy, but the more insistent half of his brain insists that he can. That if he says the right words he can take him home with him willingly--that he will let him hold him for longer if he says just the right thing.
That he could be his son again.
His other hand finds its way to stroking his bruises.
“I-I don’t have…I don’t have anything else.” He slides a hand to brush his fingers along the back of his neck, brushing the baby-fine curls of unruly hair down his neck with his fingertips. He tries to repeat his sentiment, pulling back even as Hisashi urges him forward.
He’s not as strong as Hisashi--without the quirk he’s not even close. The muscles he should have gained from hero work, and training give out all too easily under Hisashi’s force, and as Izuku crumples into him, tenser than ever, Hisashi worries he used too much. That he was right in the assumption that he could never be as gentle as he should.
Izuku’s hands move to push him away, rather than hold onto him like he had not so long ago. He could never hurt him, could never want to, but his arms wrap around him with the means to trap him.
He’s strong enough to hold him still, and cradle him at the same time. Hisashi buries both a hand, and his face into his hair. He’s still cold, colder than he has any right to be, and somehow Hisashi sill knows that the shiver running down his boy's spine isn’t from just the cold.
But he’s there. His son is there, in his arms for the first time in a decade, and he’s not sure he has the will in him to let go.
He’ll just have to take him with him.