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Keisuke was exhausted, in every cell of his body.
The people that had been running out of the burning building had mostly escaped — there were a few still staggering and struggling to the door that Keisuke had just entered in, and Keisuke left it up to the other heroes to take care of them while he went deeper into the building, finding the sources of the live blood that he could sense on the various floors.
Going up the stairs was a task in itself — the whole building, an apartment complex, groaned worryingly under his footsteps, but he kept running — until he got toward the top, where the other heroes were least likely to sense the others.
The air was cleaner up here. He ducked over to the group of people clustered around the open window, and he walked purposefully until he stood a few feet away from them, typing into his text-to-speech, Please hold on to me so that I can lower us to the ground.
They startled when they saw Keisuke — and his shorter height certainly did him no favors as he got them to hang tightly onto his body — and Keisuke broke open the window with the little jar of his blood that he had kept stored since the piece of concrete as it had fallen had sliced open his arm, shoulder to wrist.
He lowered them as quickly as he possibly could to the ground. And when the little girl — mostly holding onto her mother instead of Keisuke — started to fall, Keisuke wrapped his blood around her waist to lower her to the ground with the rest of them.
Several of his passengers fell heavily to the ground, with medics rushing forward. Keisuke took a moment to breathe — his lungs were starting to ache around the smoke, and his throat burned and throbbed, the old injury aggravated by the smoke — before he got to his feet, swaying just a little before rushing back inside.
It was hot, and Keisuke felt a little dizzy. He did a quick tour of the building, wanting to be absolutely sure that there was no one left before he gave the building the all clear, only to detect something faint in the basement levels on his way out the door.
He swore soundlessly, and then rushed down the spare set of stairs, jumping over the ruined parts of it to find it, and when he saw the old man — bleeding from where a piece of the ceiling had crushed his leg, leaving him trapped — Keisuke wanted to cry for him.
His bald head was dark with soot, his eyes got big and round when he saw Keisuke, as if he hadn’t expected for anyone to find him. He vehemently hoped that he never would know that he almost had been left here alone to die.
Keisuke dropped to his knees beside the old man, ducking when the building shook more aggressively above him. The man was trying to plead with Keisuke, but was struggling to breathe properly with all the smoke.
Keisuke removed the front part of his mask — a simple, blank, black face mask that vaguely resembled a human face — and then removed the part that wrapped around his throat, passing it to the man, who drank in the air greedily.
The burn in his throat was immediately noticeable, and enough to make Keisuke’s lungs spasm around the hurt, and he coughed quietly, trying not to disturb the man. He needed backup, he thought, and he spared a grimace for the man before setting off his little siren, the one he used to get around his own mutism.
He couldn’t ever call for help, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t let technology do that for him.
It didn’t take long for Red Riot to find him, face pinched in worry, even as it immediately cleared upon seeing Keisuke mostly upright, even if his brows pinched in worry at Keisuke’s bare face.
Lift the rubble so I can carry the man out, Keisuke signed.
Red Riot only hesitated a moment, thank all the gods, before getting into position. Keisuke wrapped his arms around the man’s chest, and let Red do the work of soothing the panicked, injured man.
Red counted down, and released on two, and Keisuke ignored the man’s scream of pain long enough to wrench him free. Red took him from Keisuke bodily, rushing up the stairs with full faith that Keisuke would follow.
And, fuck, he tried. He jumped up past the flames, using his Quirk to propel him the rest of the way, and he sensed the last group of people that he’d missed. Red ran out the doors, and Keisuke hesitated just a moment before taking the stairs up a floor to find two kids huddled up together.
Keisuke had just reached them when the building shook, sending him to his knees and making both kids scream. Keisuke wrapped both arms around the kids, drawing them against his body and holding them tightly as the building collapsed.
Unconsciousness was brief, which Keisuke immediately regretted when he opened his eyes.
Pain struck through his head like a strike from God, and he choked down a little noise, squeezing his eyes closed as he waited for the pain to settle into something that was just a little less intense. He heard a whimper, and he opened his eyes, remembering the kids he’d wrapped himself around with a start.
They were huddled up together, one waking up and one already awake. Keisuke blinked, trying to sit up, and smacked his head against the rubble above him.
There wasn’t much room, he realized after a moment, just barely enough for Keisuke to shift onto his knees and hunch over the kids — ten, maybe, and a boy and a girl from the looks of it, the latter of whom was sprawled out and bleeding just a little, arm at an awkward angle.
“Are we going to die?” the boy whispered, tears sliding down his face. Keisuke jumped, automatically reaching for the boy when his radio crackled to life.
“Ruin? Ruin, where the fuck are you?”
Keisuke breathed out slowly. His voice was shot — he could still smell the smoke, and he struggled not to choke on it. He tapped the broken screen of his voice app, and when that failed to do anything, he just pressed the little radio clipped to the buckle around his chest, bringing it to his head to listen to the static. Another voice — the first was Dynamight, he was pretty sure, and it was Red Riot that spoke next, voice shaking.
“Can you hear us? Ruin? It says your radio is still active, but we can’t — ”
Keisuke pressed down, letting them hear him instead. He couldn’t speak, but he tapped the radio, gently, twice against the concrete around him. The boy watched with wide eyes.
“Oh my God,” he heard Red say before Dyanmight quickly cut in.
“Where are you, idiot? Is there anything you can use to identify — ”
Keisuke clicked down, unable to answer and not wanting the kids to hear. He breathed, very slowly, before coughing against the smoke in his lungs, nearly gagging on it. He put the radio back against the buckle in his chest, lowering the sound when Red’s questions got a little more panicked.
“Is… is that — ?”
Keisuke nodded. The boy sniffled once, and then looked down at, presumably, his sister, and then back at Keisuke.
“Are we going to die here?” he repeated, a little more firmly. His voice was shaking, but his eyes were lined with resolution.
Keisuke shook his head. He reached out to check the girl’s pulse, and when he found it beating steadily, he leaned back, thinking.
He wasn’t all that sure how far they had fallen when the floor had caved in. He also wasn’t all that sure how much the building had crumbled — was it just the first couple floors, or had the whole building come down?
“You’re the mute hero, right? Ruin?”
He nodded once, still thinking.
“Was that Red Riot? And — and Dynamight?”
Another nod. The boy leaned back against his heels, breathing shallowly with his wide, scared eyes before his breathing hitched all over again.
Keisuke put his speculations aside, reaching over to lay one hand over the boy’s chest. No panic attacks here and now, when he wasn’t sure what oxygen was left, when he didn’t know how long it would be until rescue came. He breathed in, exaggerated, and then out. He did it twice before the boy caught on, and they did nothing but breathe for several long moments.
The girl stirred. The boy gasped, leaned over her, crowding into her space and gasping desperately, “Ami? Ami, please — ”
The girl’s mouth moved as her eyes blinked open, wandering around for a moment before landing on her brother. It was a moment before there was any voice to the words she was murmuring. “ — Shin. Shin, where. Shin.”
“We’re stuck,” Shin said, and he looked over at Keisuke before returning to his sister. “The — mute hero, Ruin? He’s here with us, and Dynamight and Red Riot are looking for us, and — ”
The girl surged upward, and Keisuke shifted forward, pushing the boy back best he could in the limited space while pressing down the girl, who gasped against the agony that was her broken arm. He gently felt around her head, searching for the source of blood he could sense on her, and deciding that the head wound was already clotting, and she would be fine without any intervention from him.
Without much more to do, he leaned back out of her space, using his Quirk to sense bodies above him. None of them were familiar, so he assumed that it was the firefighters working above him to put out the rest of the fires. He couldn’t sense very far — the agony in his head tripled when he so much as breathed, shattering his concentration over and over again — but it was enough, for now.
At least that answered his question — they were below ground, meaning they probably fell at least two floors, and were underground. He pressed his lips together; if they weren’t far from the top, he might have been able to shift the rubble they were buried in with his Quirk, using the blood from the girl — Ami, he remembered — and himself.
He still could, theoretically. Though Keisuke wasn’t all that certain that trying wouldn’t bring the whole rest of the building — whatever was left of it — down on their heads, or if he could push aside enough rubble to get the kids out.
His head hurt. He breathed out slowly, trying to decide what to do.
“Don’t worry, Ami,” Shin whispered, gently patting her shoulder as he drew his knees up to his chest to take up less space. “Ruin says we’re not going to die.”
Keisuke looked over at the same time Ami did, and he saw her doubt in eyes that were quickly losing their focus, but he nodded once, firmly. Shin relaxed further, and Ami closed her eyes, taking in a shuddering breath and then clearly trying to relax, without much more to do in the little space.
Shin had started telling stories at some point, when Keisuke nudged Ami awake each time her breathing started to even out. It seemed to help her focus, and he smiled warmly at Shin — who preened under the praise, making him wonder if his devotion to their hero names indicated that he was a fanboy like Midoriya.
The radio went off a few more times, more checks to make sure he was still alive, he was pretty sure, and conscious. When he heard Deku — as if summoned by his thoughts — he straightened, listening carefully.
“Ruin?”
Keisuke pressed down and tapped twice.
“Are you injured?” he asked, voice firm. He’d already run through these questions earlier, with some medic and Dynamight, the most senior member there as the number two hero, and Keisuke struggled to swallow back his impatience.
Two taps. Another pause. “Do you have anyone with you?”
Tap, tap. It was a long time before Deku responded, first prompting him for how many — another set of two taps — before he asked, “Tap for what floor you were on when the building came down.”
Another set of two taps. Keisuke waited, shifting slightly, and Shin and Ami tracked his movements with wide, quiet eyes.
“Do you know what floor you’re on now?”
Two taps. Deku waited for which floor, but he didn’t know how to indicate that he was pretty sure they were on the below-ground floors.
Luckily, Red guessed, his voice crackling through the static. “Did you fall below the first floor?”
Keisuke tapped the affirmative. He waited, but it was a long time before Deku’s voice filtered through.
“We’re looking, Ruin, but there’s a lot of damage all around. The bomb took out most of the floors above you, and there’s a lot of rubble between us and you. We’ve got as many heroes as we can, but — ”
Keisuke tapped twice, and then put his radio back. Shin and Ami watched with wide eyes.
“We — we’re not going to — ?”
Keisuke shook his head. It seemed to pacify Shin, who relaxed and resumed his storytelling, but he saw the skepticism and fear behind Ami’s eyes, and he wondered.
It had to be hours. It was darker than it was even before — making him wonder if there was a path upward, to the sunlight, and therefore to freedom — and the smoke was gone, but the exhaustion was back tenfold. Shin’s voice had given out, but he still nudged Ami awake.
Keisuke looked up, measuring to himself. The firefighters had left, and there were at least a few heroes circling around, but he was pretty sure that they weren’t really sure what to do — he wondered if they even knew where they were, and, given Deku’s questions about where they were.
His own strength was waning, and his headache showed no signs of letting up. Now, he decided, it had to be now, before the exhaustion got worse, before he lost the ability to do anything at all.
Carefully, he sat up as far as he could, and tapped twice to get their attention, and then resumed slowly pulling them against him, trying not to jostle Ami’s arm, and hearing Shin’s breathing hitch around his question. “Are we going to try to leave?”
Keisuke nodded. He pressed against his radio, and gestured to Shin.
“You… want me to tell them that?”
Keisuke nodded. Shin hesitated, and when Keisuke pressed down against the button, he said, voice in a rush, “We’re going to get out.”
It was another moment before Red’s voice sounded. “Hello? Is this Ruin?”
Shin hesitated, but spoke at a gesture from Keisuke. “This is… Shin Shibuya. Ruin, he’s right here. And my sister, Ami.”
A long pause. Keisuke shifted, waiting for the lecture, the warning.
It was Dynamight who spoke. “You said you’re gonna try to get out?” His voice was rough. Keisuke’s chest ached at the sound, knowing that it was a cover for some great emotion he didn’t want to let out, and he hoped that Eijirou and Katsuki were taking care of each other.
“Yes,” Shin whispered.
Another long pause. Keisuke took his radio back, clipping it against his buckle, and smiled when Red’s voice said, very softly, “I believe in you, Keisuke.”
Shin’s eyes widened. Not really wanting to address the questions, Keisuke closed his eyes, breathing out slowly, sensing the blood in his body, and the blood smeared around the ruins around him, and he gathered it up as a shield around him. Just holding it was exhausting, let alone pushing against anything else.
Keisuke held his arm out gingerly, winced against his Quirk ripping open the skin to push the blood out, into something he could use to gather strength all around him.
Then, he shoved, as hard as he could, lifting and lifting and lifting — and there was agony, rippling from his head down to his back and shoulders like a physical weight that he was holding, and he looked up, breathing shuddering and gasping, and pushed with all his strength until he was sure that he could see above him.
He kept a tight hold on his power when the structure groaned and rustled all around him. Holding tightly to the children, who clung right back, he slid the blood underneath them like a platform, and lifted all over again.
His whole body was shaking when they got to the top — and it was mostly a crawl space, barely enough room to get through, and he deposited them on the edge, gripping Shin’s shoulder tightly, eyes sharp and focused.
Go, he mouthed. He turned to the side, where the pretty glass doors of the apartment had been, and he shoved all over again, pushing toward the entrance. When the structure threatened to cave in, he borrowed more blood from his body, bracing the rubble and creating a little tunnel for the kids to get out of.
“But — ”
Whatever else Shin said was drowned out by the blood rushing through his ears and the gasping breaths that couldn’t seem to get enough oxygen into his lungs, and he tried not to scream around the agony coursing through his body.
Before it all gave out, Keisuke saw a figure crawling through his tunnel, felt a hand wrap firmly around his wrist, and then there was nothing.
Keisuke drifted toward the surface without any real desire to break through to the other side. He remembered — not much, really. No thoughts, no dreams. Still, he was aware of comfort waiting for when he was ready. A soft spoken voice. A little laughter. Gentle pressure against his body, something wrapped around his shoulders and a sense of safety.
When he was curious enough to break through to the other side, the first thing he was aware of was bright, bright light. The same soothing voice, a hand running through his hair. He couldn’t grasp onto any of the words before he was slipping back, tired beyond belief.
The next time he broached the surface — and it was a little more like waking up this time, even if all of his limbs were too heavy to move and the exhaustion still dragged at his limbs — he saw Eijirou, his hand wrapped tightly around Keisuke’s with Katsuki just beside him, looking over at him.
“Water, Eijirou,” Katsuki said, reaching above the hero to press a button against the wall.
Something struck him as terribly, horrifically wrong. He struggled a little, trying to find something solid to connect the feeling to, and he startled a little at the feeling of Eijirou’s warm, strong hands cupping his face, eyes bright and fierce.
“It’s okay, baby, I promise,” he said, and it eased some of the clawing panic he couldn’t quite place. “Shh, it’s okay. You’re okay, you’re safe.”
Keisuke’s body relaxed without much input from him, and then Eijirou lifted the cup to Keisuke, who drank and winced at the pain in his throat before slumping back against the pillows, exhausted.
“Go back to sleep, stupid,” Katsuki muttered as nurses began to filter into the room. Keisuke stiffened, wary, but exhaustion was yanking him down, and he looked at Eijirou, who just smiled and gently rubbed the hand he held between both his own. Keisuke blinked, once, twice, and then was out.
Waking up felt a little like hitting the pause button from where he had been before. It was dark outside. Eijirou was curled up at the foot of his bed, slumped against it and deeply asleep. Katsuki was awake, at Keisuke’s side, and glaring out the windows.
Keisuke shifted a little, trying to refocus, reaching out to him. He didn’t make a sound, at least not vocally, but Katsuki’s head whipped around, tensing before quickly relaxing when he saw Keisuke, taking his outstretched hand.
He hesitated, and then said gruffly, “You alright, shithead? Any pain?”
Keisuke blinked, long and slow, before breathing out slowly. He tapped against hand Katsuki held, and he smiled a little.
He raised a shaking hand to sign, You came for me.
Katsuki scoffed. “Of course we did, idiot,” he snapped, voice raising a little at the end. Eijirou twitched, but Katsuki ignored it. He hesitated, obviously battling with himself, before he sighed and admitted quietly, “He was… really worried about you. You were in there for… a long time. And when Eijirou dragged you out… you looked…you looked dead, alright? And. I don’t know. Just. Don’t do that again, okay?”
Keisuke smiled before closing his eyes, rolling onto his side gingerly. He held out one hand before relaxing back into sleep.
I love you too.