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"...Kacchan?"
There a small knock, followed by that timid voice, a voice the previously half-asleep Katsuki would know anywhere, coming from the door to his dorm room. His sleep-riddled mind took a moment to activate until he was able to lift himself up from the beguiling confines of his bed - though begrudgingly - and actually answer it.
During the short walk to the door, Katsuki debated whether or not it was actually him - Deku, that is. What would that nerd be doing here? The hero had actualy been there when that self-sacrificing goddamn idiot was told to take it easy by not one, but about a dozen different doctors and nurses and all that type of shit. But, of course, the stubborn ass was ignoring his needs again - Christ, sometimes that damn shit was too stubborn for his own good. Actually, scratch that. He was always too fucking stubborn for his own good.
Blinking drowsiness from his hazed-over crimson eyes, Bakugou swung the door open, coming face-to-face with a trembling, wide-eyed Deku.
Confusion flashed over his face for a moment as tears collected in those familiar, emerald green eyes, Izuku's panicked gaze asking hundreds of questions and speaking volumes upon volumes without a word leaving his lips.
Oh.
The confusion soon faded from Katsuki's expression as he looked down at the shorter boy, nodding the tiniest of nods and taking a step back to grant access to his teary-eyed, quivering friend.
The next few motions were so fluid, so calm, so un-Bakugou-like that even Bakugou himself could tell; the way he led Deku to his bed, the way he gently lowered him down, the way his arms wrapped around his slim frame, holding him close, but also with a delicateness that could only be identified in a way that made Katsuki feel uneasy - he knew what it was, but refused to acknowledge it. As per typical.
Katsuki lowered his head down into the lightly tangled nest of evergreen curls below him, feeling the soft touch of those same curls, along with a head, lean against his chest. Deku's jittering body began to ease as he placed his ear directly above Bakugou's heart, listening to the rapid thudding and occasionally brushing his crooked hand over it. It was almost as if he was confirming for himself that it hadn't stopped beating. The panic in his movements became substantially less, but Deku's own heart was still going so fast it was almost hard to tell if it was even beating at all.
"You're okay, nerd," soothed the blonde, feeling the sting of those uncomfortable emotions again. Anger, because the stupid idiot snug in Bakugou's arms had been bottling all of this up again, trying to save face in public; "it's so nobody gets discouraged during these hard times," was the selfless fucker's reasoning. Sadness, because seeing his closest friend - or was he even sure "friend" suited how he felt anymore? - break down in front of him was really hard to watch. Especially when it was a friend that was always so strong, so much so that it had scared - and still scared - Bakugou down to his core. Some days, it seemed like he would never be able to match the level of steel and courage Izuku had, others he looked... fragile, haunted by unseen terrors that Katsuki had yet to soothe. Or rather, did his best to soothe. He had always sucked at helping people with that type of thing.
Shit most definitely happens to you when you watch people die. Especially a person you'd known since forever.
And not to mention... those feelings. The ones that made him question things, that still made him fill with doubt, fear.
Namely that inexplicable, overwhelming pride he felt whenever he saw Izuku taking another step forward away from the hellish mental aftermath AFO left behind. It made Bakugou's heart feel like it might burst, but not like the time that Deku was currently reliving. It made a warm, yet almost bittersweet kind of effusiveness fill his whole self. He didn't understand it, nor did he understand the way it was constantly changing; the first time he discovered he was truly proud of Izuku, he had ended up ugly crying in front of him, using threats and his fists to express the things he couldn't get himself to comprehend. Like how he was disappointed and disgusted by himself, not Izuku.
Funny as it was, he had barely made any progress since then; the only thing he got from that fight was the lingering nickname "house arrest". He really wasn't going to catch up to him, was he?
Suddenly, Bakugou was thrown out of his slowly spiraling thoughts as the soft, quiet voice of the boy still wrapped up in his embrace rang out into the air.
"...Ka-cchan is... safe," Izuku hiccuped, his murmur faintly laced with a sob. At the sound, Katsuki realized that he had been so absorbed in his own thoughts that he didn't notice the small, damp tear stains on his black tank top. Katsuki's heart hurt even more at the sound of Deku's little self reassurance - his voice was small, almost meek. It reminded him almost too much of the fearful, timid Izuku the green-hair had once been. The shy, fourteen-year-old kid who did everything possible to stay as small and quiet as possible, especially when he was hurting. That side of him always seemed to show whenever he had these goddamned panic attacks.
"You bet your ass Kacchan is safe, Deku. I'm not goin' anywhere anytime soon. I'm safe."
Those green curls bounced up and down slightly as Izuku gently pried himself out of Katsuki's grip, revealing his still apprehensive, freckled face. The All-For-One successor's emerald eyes were glittering with both fallen and unfallen tears as he sniffled, his pretty green eyes meeting Katsuki's unusally soft red ones.
"...you can't promise tha-t. You said... you said y-you'd be fine, then. You said you'd b-e okay." Deku's wavering, hiccuping voice cut invisible daggers directly into Katsuki's heart. For once, Katsuki wished he had a bone in his body that was any good at helping with these things in any other way than joking or just giving awkward hugs; especially since it was Izuku. He wanted to help Izuku more than anything, to help him get over this trauma. Together. That was what they'd both always wanted, wasn't it?
A soft sigh elicited from the blonde as he tried to think of something at least substantial to say to the boy in front of him. Why, oh why, was everything so hard with stupid-ass Deku?
"...well, first off, I'm not on the battlefield. Second, I got you and all the other annoying-ass extras in the building here, so even in the impossible case that there is or was any villain dumb and fucking brainless enough to attack such a secure place like U.A. out of the blue, they would get fucking trounced. By yours truly, of course." Katsuki tried to keep some semblance of his typical cockiness in his demeanor and voice, but he knew deep down that he wasn't feeling it. Not that he doubted his words - they were entirely correct, not just meant to soothe Deku - but he just couldn't bring himself to act the same right now. Not after what had just been going through his mind.
A few more fat tears rolled down the side of Izuku's freckled nose, and a quiet hum of acceptance reverberated from his throat. Bakugou hoped his lower lip didn't tremble as much as he felt it did as he thought of how much he wanted to just kiss away those tears and bring back Izuku's sweet smile. It almost hurt to think about how much he wanted to express how much he cared, how much he wanted to truly reassure his Deku that he wasn't going anywhere, that he would and wanted to be by his side as long as he could physically be, but not in the ways somebody labeled simply as a "friend" would want to.
But he was too scared.
Because Bakugou Katsuki was a coward. A coward who ran from his feelings because he didn't - and likely never would - understand them. A goddamned, motherfucking coward who would undoubtedly never be able to catch up to Izuku, in many more ways than one. He was never as strong as Izuku, nor as smart. He never showed the signs Izuku did when it came to natural heroism. And he sure as hell couldn't patch a broken heart like that stupid nerd could.
"...and Shigaraki is gone. Kacchan can't get... hurt by Shigaraki."
Bakugou paused to wipe away the few tears that lingered on Deku's pretty face, trying not to let his calloused thumb linger on his soft, freckled skin for any longer than necessary. That knot of raging, swirling emotions in his stomach only seemed to grow.
"No, I can't. That's right, calm down, okay? I'm safe, you're safe, we're all safe. I've got you."
A sigh, seemingly one of relief fell from Izuku's lips, and he began to move a bit closer to Katsuki again, looking almost unsure. He paused for a short moment before his jade-colored irises flicked their precious attention back up towards Katsuki's uncharacteristically - and untruthfully - calm face.
"...can I, uhm, still stay here for a little longer, Kacchan?"
"'Course you can, stupid Deku."
With that simple sentence of approval, Izuku gave Bakugou a grateful glance and tentatively curled up against his chest, his ear still pressed directly to the taller boy's sternum, taking in the soft beating of his heart with a newfound calmness that made Bakugou want to smile and cry at the same time. Noticing how Deku's eyes had shut closed, he slowly lowered himself down so that he was laying against the headboard of the twin-sized bed, lying comfortably with the weight of his closest friend atop him. After barely a few seconds of this new development in their positions, Izuku's eyes opened and his voice, now less timid and more like the strong-willed, bright student Katsuki knew and loved, rang out into the otherwise dead silent room.
"...thank you," he mumbled drowsily, subconsciously nuzzling his head into Katsuki's chest.
"Fuckin' thank me again, asshat, and I'll blow you up so many times they won't even be able to identify your corpse."
This earned a small, beautifully familiar chuckle from the smaller boy.
"Kacchan is so nice..." drawled Izuku, his eyes slipping shut again as he snuggled up to his friend, still actively listening to his heart. The green-haired hero barely seemed to have taken notice of Katsuki's empty threat. Who would, anyway? Maybe somebody who didn't know Katsuki like Izuku did. But Izuku knew that that was just the blonde's way of expressing affection, and friendship.
Bakugou knew it was his way of expressing how much he loved Deku.
That gentle silence descended upon the pair of teenagers again until Katsuki, surprisingly, was the one to break it.
"...you fallin' asleep, nerd...?" he murmured, his soft tone showing a bit more care and affection than Katsuki would have thought fit. That, however, didn't stop him from reaching up with one of his hands and slipping his fingers through soft, lush, green curls. He'd practically memorized the feel of Deku's hair on his hand, as weird as it was; after knowing somebody since you were in diapers, though, he guessed things like that just automatically happen.
"...m'not," came the muffled reply, somehow even sleepier than the quiet "thank you" from before.
Katsuki almost choked up at the little mumble, a sweet memory coming back to him.
Little bright-eyed Izuku, curled up next to him after the nth All Might movie of the night, falling asleep where he sat. Bakugou had asked basically that same question, and earned the same response. Then he remembered how Izuku had fallen asleep, right next to him, and how he went to sleep soon after - action movies are no fun without somebody else to watch them with. He was sure Auntie Inko had a picture of them from that night, asleep, wearing their matching Silver-Age All Might kids' onesies. Yeah... he could remember it now, how his nose had looked, crinkled at the flash of the camera, how Izuku's little hand grasped his -
It took a lot, then, to keep Katsuki from letting the tears he felt build up in his crimson eyes from falling down his face.
He looked down briefly at Deku, then, feeling that strange pride all over again. He wondered, silently, how Izuku had changed so much, yet stayed just the same. He still had freckles in all the same places, still had that dimple on one side of his face, still had that same excited-little-kid energy whenever he mentioned anything about heroism. But a lot of that childishness was gone now. Izuku didn't cling to Katsuki as much as he used to - in fact, he'd made so many friends and built an amazing career... by himself. Did he even need Katsuki anymore? Was he the only one still clinging to those last bits of the past, only to have them slip through his fingers?
Katsuki gently brushed aside a lock of Izuku's hair, watching his sleeping face with awe that could only be described as one thing. Love.
That word made Katsuki feel uncomfortable in his skin, but also so warm. So, so warm, so fuzzy, so happy. But also sad. Definitely sad.
Because he knew somewhere deep within that him and Izuku would never be anything more than friends, friends with shared trauma and years of friendship under their belts.
Where one of the friends had, somewhere along the line, malfunctioned and fallen in love like some stupid, stupid idiot who didn't understand how badly it would hurt later on.
Bakugou stared down at Izuku's face, feeling that intoxicating myriad of emotion rise up to his throat, blocking his breathing. He felt like he was drowning in an invisible ocean, one that existed for nobody but him.
In a fleeting sense of something, he leaned in and kissed the top of Izuku's head.
It felt so right, even if he knew it was wrong.
He then, silently and gingerly, moved over so that him and Izuku were laying beside each other, shoulders brushing, breaths mingling.
Katsuki took one last, long look at his friend's - his best friend's - face, before letting his eyes fall shut at last, putting a halt to the ever-living, deep aching in his heart that had only grown more from these thoughts.
The funny thing?
He thought he could recall doing the same thing, all those years ago.