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He watches the first recording of the livestream that's come out once he wakes up in the hospital. He doesn't tell anyone, because he assuredly would've had his phone confiscated. He 'needs time to process it first', or whatever. Katsuki gets about halfway through the shitty recording before the grainy quality and his own tears make it too difficult to watch at all.
He sees Izuku's arms and sets his phone on the bedside table for the rest of the day. Nobody bothers him when he pulls up a chair next to Izuku's bed and presses his ear to his chest, Izuku's right hand held tightly in Katsuki's left. He ignores how his right hand sits uselessly at his side, not at all compelled to break down over how he can feel himself becoming more and more useless the longer he rots in this hospital.
It could've been an hour, maybe a bit longer, when Katsuki's chest starts to constrict, a heaviness to each of his breaths as tears cloud his eyes again.
He's done enough whining to Izuku. He puts the chair back and returns to his bed, pulling the curtain shut around him and stifling his crying in the shitty hospital pillows. He bites into his lip hard enough to make it bleed, choking on the taste of copper (so familiar, now) on his tongue. His tears don't stop until they've worn his body out entirely, and he falls into fitful sleep with wet tracks down his face.
The next time he watches the stream, he's still in the hospital. Izuku is awake this time, in the same room as Katsuki to prevent any aggressive trips down the hallway (which has happened all of twice, both times which are completely justifiable, for the record). Katsuki, well aware of how hypocritical he is, doesn't want Izuku to see the livestream. He doesn't want Izuku to know there's recordings at all.
So he watches with his earbuds in, the volume low for fear of sound leaking out and busting him. He sees himself, dead on the ground, same as last time. But this time, it doesn't send him into a borderline dissociative spiral that makes him blank on the following minutes of the recording; he sees Aizawa's face, terror and grief so clear, hears Monoma's voice break as he yells. His eyes blur again as Jeanist hunches over his cooling corpse and tries desperately to figure out some way to fix it, wrap it up and make it feel better.
Izuku is distracted from the class groupchat he's been entertaining to check on Katsuki, his eyes soft (and dull, dull and sad, how did he get so sad?) as he asks what he's doing that's got him choked up. His tone tries for lighthearted, but it falls flat with the hoarseness of Izuku's throat.
Katsuki tells him he's reading a book he downloaded, and the dumb music he's listening to at the same time is making the scene sadder than it needs to be.
Somehow, as he hears Edgeshot's ragged declaration, it doesn't feel too far from the truth.
Izuku questions him three more times until Katsuki gives up on getting through it again. He closes out the tab and opens the class chat, coiling up his earbuds and setting them aside as he scrolls to the last message he'd seen.
It doesn't make blinking away sheen of his eyes any easier. In fact, reading Denki's messages and Kyouka's deadpan responses and seeing the gifs that Shoto and Mezou communicate in or the emoticons that Kouji likes to use only makes it harder to choke back a sob. He likes his classmates a lot. He thinks he'd miss them if he stayed dead. He wonders, less than absently, if they'd miss him too.
He draws the curtain shut, and softly tells Izuku he's tired. Izuku promises he'll keep his phone on silent. Katsuki cries.
Eventually, they're released from the hospital. At the same time, because apparently Izuku fucked himself up enough to compete with the formerly-dead boy. Katsuki has to finish watching that stream.
Their classmates welcome them back to the dorms warmly, a small party waiting when they walk through the door with their backpacks slung over their shoulders and duffels in their hands. Toru bounces over and snatches Izuku's bag, and Tenya takes Katsuki's with a chop of his arms as he ushers the two of them to the kitchen. Rikido is waiting with a small cake and a cupcake. He tells Katsuki that he tried a tiramisu recipe that should taste like the spicy coffee blend he prefers. The cake is sickly sweet and the rest of the class indulges happily.
Katsuki is so sick of crying, but he can't deny the way his eyes water as he bites into the cupcake and it tastes exactly how he imagined.
They play Disney movies and cheesy dramas well into the night, and Katsuki pretends he doesn't soak in the heat of the warm bodies around him like he's trying to imitate Tsuyu. Mina, in her typical fashion, clings onto the nearest space-heater (either Katsuki or Shoto, typically) with a damn impressive display of waterworks when the guy in the drama finally runs after the girl who he 'definitely doesn’t have feelings for'.
For once, Katsuki doesn't shove her away. He appreciates that she ignores the way he shudders, burying his face in her puffy hair.
Class 2-A falls asleep in the common room of their new dorms, curled around each other in lumps of bodies with blankets, pillows, and plushies strewn haphazardly all around. Aizawa stops by in the early hours of the next day, right before the sun rises and the first of his students to wake up start their morning. He'd intended to check each of their rooms and make sure the last two of his students to arrive had settled in fine, but instead he sits on the end of the couch and does a headcount of the snoring students spread around.
He leaves before anyone starts blinking the sleep from their eyes.
Katsuki, to no one's surprise but his own, is one of the last to wake up. By the time he sits up, his back cracking loudly, only Mashirao and Hitoshi are still out. Still bleary with sleep, he tries to push himself up to a stand with his right arm. It collapses beneath him, and he falls with it with a thump.
The noise startles the other two awake, and Katsuki debates pretending he was just sitting there for a moment. He gives the idea up immediately, just curling around his useless arm, cradling it close to his chest with his left.
"Katsuki?" Mashirao asks, crouched by his side. "Are you alright?"
Katsuki's not volatile like he was Before. He's learned to channel the constant adrenaline that keeps his heart running against the nitroglycerin to paranoia instead of aggression, and he's an expert at keeping his paranoia to himself. So he doesn't snap at Mashirao, doesn't curse him out or tell him to fuck off or blow him up for ever thinking Katsuki could be so weak.
He just nods. He opens his mouth, too, hidden behind his knees, but nothing comes out.
"I'll... I'll get Izuku," Mashirao settles for, briefly settling a hand on Katsuki's shoulder before his steps creak the floor farther and farther away.
They're sick of you already, the nasty part of Katsuki's mind whispers. Don't be so high-maintenance. They're struggling with their own problems, this isn't their fight.
He pretends he doesn't care and the notion is entirely nonsensical, as though he's going to fool himself. We take care of each other, he tries to reason. I want to help them, so why would I be exempt from that care?
He pretends the answer isn't tucked against his chest.
Izuku sits on his left, bumping their shoulders together. Katsuki's chest feels hollow and too full, tight like his ribs are being crushed under the pressure of Hanta's tape. He needs to finish watching that fucking stream, needs to figure out exactly how much he'd failed Izuku.
(The embers. It echoes his mind like a nasty curse. Katsuki wants to scream, to destroy something, to spit and strike and fight. Katsuki wants to do anything but cry.)
His arm hurts. Or maybe he's mistaking numbness for pain. It prickles and it feels void, like a phantom limb despite still being attached to him. The doctors had mentioned the possibility of an amputation. Katsuki had needed to go to the bathroom after that, puking up the little bit of Inko's homemade food he'd been able to stomach. The rush of nitroglycerin still thrummed underneath his skin everywhere it hadn't before, but the implications of losing essentially half the power he'd trained nearly his entire life didn't feel any better with that knowledge.
The quiet in the hospital had given him the time to question if his quirk would overwhelm his body again, circulating through him fully. Edgeshot will not be around to save him a second time, and he's near certain he's already outlived his use, his expiration the same moment as All for One's.
What a thought.
Izuku's talking, his voice filtering in smoothly through Katsuki's new hearing aids. Another thing he'll have to live with now, a repercussion of the wars. His stomach churns. The starburst scars through his gut, his mangled, useless arm, his busted ears, the tear through his right cheek. An exemplary child soldier and the reasons they shouldn't exist. Hah.
Katsuki wonders what he would do if he had turned out like Hawks; losing his quirk to All for One. He wonders if he would feel relieved. The risk of dying again from his quirk reduced to zero. Then he realizes he's a fucking coward, and pretends he'd never had the thought to begin with.
He sighs, and lets his head drop to Izuku's shoulder. His shoulders, which he didn't realize were wound up to his ears, droop as well when Izuku's head lays on top of his. It's almost awkward, only cushioned by Katsuki's hair because of the section of fluffy green that had to be shaved off. Neither of them mind.
Izuku's voice tapers off. Or maybe Katsuki's hearing aids died after he had them in all night. The brief consideration that he should probably be making breakfast for fear of someone far less capable attempting is quickly pushed aside by the fatigue that weighs on Katsuki's eyelids. He doesn't want to fall asleep, but he needs to take his aids out regardless. His upper left arm is jammed between him and Izuku, so he begrudgingly starts to pull himself away, eyes sealed shut.
Izuku makes a motion to pull him back, arm wrapping around to his right shoulder. Katsuki makes a halfhearted motion to his hearing aids, but he's too tired to fight about it. He's vaguely aware of careful hands tugging away the wire before he's fully asleep again.
When he wakes, he's on a spare futon, a few pillows under his head and in a half circle around him, a blanket pulled up to his shoulders. To his mild embarrassment, he realizes his fingers are curled tightly around a cat plush he remembers Momo gushing about receiving as a gift.
A steaming cup of coffee is sitting to the side of the futon, the culprit of its assumedly consistent warmth on the couch behind him.
"Katsuki," Shoto greets with a nod, standing up with his own mug in hand. "Fumikage, Kyouka, and Ochaco told me to ask you to stay here until they get back. There's the coffee blend you like next to you—" (and, noticeably, to his left. How did Katsuki ever get so lucky to have these people?) "—and they're going to be back with food. You weren't up at breakfast, so they wanted to make sure you ate. I believe Momo is going to come with a few of our other classmates so we can have a 'game night', or something?"
Katsuki nods, leaning up against the pillow-nest as he sips his coffee. His eyes drift from Shoto's lips, and his slightly-louder-than-normal murmurs fade into garbled nonsense without his aids in. Huh, Izuku must have taken them out.
With the resistance to heat his hands developed thanks to his explosions, the mug doesn't get unbearable to hold in one hand. The commons are cold, Katsuki notes as he tries to coax the blanket farther over his shoulder with his chin. Before he can shuck it off in agitation, a set of hot-cold hands wraps it more firmly around him. Shoto settles next to him, his warm side pressed against Katsuki.
He bites back an emotion that tastes something like gratitude and a lot like grief. What an idiot he is, being coddled by his classmates and wasting his time grieving himself when he isn't even dead, not really.
Ochaco arrives with a tray, Kyouka and Fumikage trailing behind her and carrying a few cups of what Katsuki guesses is juice.
"Oh, you're awake!" Ochaco greets softly. She turns away as she continues talking, so Katsuki can't quite make out what she's saying. He feels slightly guilty, blinking blankly at her back. Shoto taps him on the shoulder, getting his attention.
"She asked if you would prefer something spicy or just soup for now," he signs. Katsuki has to take a moment to process that Shoto knows sign at all, then another to realize he knows Katsuki didn't understand Ochaco. He opens his mouth to respond, feeling nothing but a strangled croak come out.
He holds his coffee between his thighs, moving to sign a response. His shoulders slump when his right arm does nothing but twitch. He doesn't know how to string together a coherent sentence with one hand, and resigns himself to forcing words from his throat.
Shoto hold up his pointer finger. "For spicy." Then he lifts his pointer and middle fingers. "For soup." One for spicy, two for soup.
Katsuki's bottom lip wobbles minutely, clenched under his teeth, as he raises one finger. Shoto turns to Ochaco, and Katsuki hears the rumble of his voice as he communicates Katsuki's answer. Ochaco spins around at Shoto's voice, startling.
"I'm so sorry!" she signs. Signs? Do they all know sign? "I thought you had your aids in! I can't believe I was just rambling this whole time." Her expression is sheepish, and Katsuki can only nod dumbly, holding up a one with his pointer finger again as his brain fails to compute.
Kyouka's hand waves his attention to her. "Do you want me to grab them? I can ask I-Z-U-K-U where they are. If you want to let your ears rest, that's..." She keeps signing, but Katsuki can't see anymore. His eyes are gross and watery again, and he ducks his head in a pathetic attempt to hide the glossy sheen. He sucks in shaky breaths. He doesn't know if the words come out sounding right, but he whispers a "Thank you." anyway.
Those stupid assholes have done their research. They've learned sign and not given any sign names because none of them are deaf and they're asking if he wants to keep his hearing aids out because they know they start to hurt after being left in too long. He hates all of them and he hates that the first thing he'd done when he learned he was going deaf was brainstorm sign names he wanted to give all of them.
His hand shakes as he brings it up to his face to press the tears back into his eyes. He's grateful he can't hear the way his breath hitches and shudders. The pressure in his throat makes him wonder if his crying is audible as his shoulders tremble with each hot trail down his cheeks.
The mug of cooling coffee is removed from where he held it his his lap, and warm pressure leans against his right side. Soft hands tug his arm down, gentle swipes clearing the tears as they drip and soothing, feather-light circles chasing away the redness where he'd dug his fingers into his skin. The cat plush is placed into his hands, and he squeezes his eyes shut and cries harder as he pulls it close to him, careful not to squish it. He doesn't want to ruin the gift Momo likes so much.
More warmth settles around him, a new hand finding its way to his hair. It's a larger hand, calloused and aged, and it pulls Katsuki's head forward to rest against soft fabric. It smells like coffee and faintly wet cats, and Katsuki knows it's his teacher. God, he wants to stop crying. Why does this only make it worse?
He doesn't want to hear himself as he wails, feeling his voice crack in his throat and pretending the muddled sounds he cringes at aren't coming from him.
There are more people around him, familiar and warm, and Katsuki feels like he needs to confess his deepest secret; his greatest shame. He needs them to know he's a coward so he doesn't have to wonder if they'll look at him the same.
"I didn't wanna die," he warbles between blubbering tears. "I was so scared."
He remembers thinking about Izuku. He wanted to chase Izuku's back forever, reach out to his shining light, stay in his shadow, as long as Izuku would let him. He wanted to race and not care about winning, he wanted to compete in everything, and he thought he'd never get to again.
"Everything hurt, so bad." It's so stupid to complain about. He's been run through the gut more than once, he's been kidnapped, he's been attacked by villain after villain, he's fought with blood obscuring his vision. Izuku has had to deal with all that pain amplified in almost all of his fights, and he's always fought to save, so earnest in his battles despite how much he suffers for it. What right does Katsuki have to complain?
But his lungs ache with his heaving breaths and he's still sobbing regardless. "I didn't wanna die," says again, because Aizawa's still holding him and no one has left his side and they don't get it. "I'm a coward," he confesses, because he needs them to know, he needs the other shoe to drop now before he gets too comfortable. "I didn't want to go back out and save All Might or fight All for One. I wanted to lay down and stay dead, 'cause it hurt so bad just to breathe."
It feels similar then, the ache of breathing. He feels like he's just run a thousand miles, feels like he's narrating as his legs still pump beneath him. "I want my arm back," he cries. "I want my hearing back. I don't want the scars on my face or my stomach, I just wanna go back to how it was before."
He wants to be playing the drums again (he'll never be able to perform the way he did then) and encouraging his classmates as aggressively as possible. He wants to watch them spar and he wants to begrudgingly organize a study session for exams with Momo and Tenya. He wants to sneak out with Izuku after curfew and get caught sparring and talking at Ground Beta, he wants to see All Might as an infallible symbol of everything Katsuki knows he'll be one day and he wants to stop feeling guilty for everything. He wants so much that he can never have.
"I'm sorry," he tells Aizawa and the amalgamation of comfort around him because he feels like he's wasted everything. He's wasted Edgeshot's sacrifice and All Might's sacrifice and every sacrifice Izuku has made to stay by his side this long. He can't breathe. "I'm so sorry."
Someone grabs his right arm, and he can barely feel it, but they're holding him so gently. Somehow, the touch sounds like 'It's okay.' Maybe 'We forgive you.'
The part of Katsuki's brain that's left him sobbing in the first place tells him that it means 'You have nothing to apologize for.'
One day, maybe, Katsuki will be convinced that that's the truth.
For now, his family is content to let him cry and hold him closely, carefully, as he grieves.